A/N: The Following is rated F; for Finale.
It corresponds, chronologically, with S2E20 "The Crossroads of Destiny."
Reader discretion is advised.
Chapter 17 "Destiny"
High Summer, Year 11 in the reign of Fire-Lord Ozai
There was a ruined city underground.
Green crystals, brighter than Zuko had seen before, grew, almost organically, in places around the ancient stone buildings. Whatever the place, whatever city, this had once been, currently it was not an ideal battleground for firebenders. A massive waterfall dominated one side of the cavern filling two wide channels with rapidly moving water. There was also the fact that, being a cavern, it was underground; an exceptionally dangerous place to be fighting anyone who could earthbend.
All of this flitted through Zuko's mind in a single heartbeat as he entered the large chamber and saw his sister, his girlfriend, and the Avatar standing in a rough triangle, all three in fighting posture. Azula on his left, Katara on his right, the Avatar further away and between them.
He announced his presence with a blast of fire that exploded with huge force between the two women.
They were watching him, their fighting stances unrelaxed, waiting for his decision. His eye flicked back and forth between the two girls, his mind conjuring memories in his head.
Azula; weeping the frightened tears of the very young as Zuko told her that their uncle was a fool who didn't know how strong she really was.
Katara; a force of nature, slamming him into the walls of the spirit grove, a beautiful fearsome smile on her face.
Azula; eyes wet, but now refusing to cry, after her Itami no Kyokun. Her still tiny hands cupped in Zuko's as he banished pain from them as their cousin had taught him to do.
Katara; beautiful and deadly, yet soft and warm beyond belief, curled against him in the badlands, her face snuggled into his chest.
Azula; squawking in mock outrage as Mai, quiet and unseen as always, tapped her on the head and ran off with a smirk, the closest thing the girl ever did to a laugh.
Katara; naked and on top of him, her blue-grey eyes on his as she found a rhythm that suited them both.
Zuko could have stood there forever, basking in the memories of the two people he loved best in this life...
...but something kept getting in the way.
As his eye flicked from his sister to his girlfriend and back again, there was… something that was between them, something interrupting his thoughts.
Something yellow, and orange.
The Avatar.
Zuko's eye fell to rest on the boy…
…and just like that, the decision was made.
"Akodo," he whispered, his eye now burning on the young man. Katara's eyes grew wide in horror, Azula's in triumph as her mouth twisted into a malign smile.
"AKODO!" Zuko roared, bending a wave of thunder out at the Avatar, knocking him back as he charged.
The fight began.
Conscious thought evaporated from Zuko as he drove forward, red flame colliding with shields of air and stone. Their collisions rocked the cavern, the echoes making them much louder and forceful than he remembered as he slammed through the bulwarks of crystal the Avatar threw up in defense.
Where the Avatar stood his ground Zuko smashed through. Where he attacked, Zuko found it weak, feeble. Deep in zanshin Zuko could almost see the patterns of air forming and crashing towards him; he met them all with FIRE, doubling the size of the ensuing explosion and tossing the smaller combatant back, again and again. The Avatar dodged and twirled, leaping from one high column of stone to another, evading Zuko and fleeing like the coward Zuko knew him to be.
Suddenly the boy leapt again, even higher than before, and after reaching the ceiling he bent earth; separating a massive stalagmite from the ceiling and driving it into the ground bodily, dwarfing the shockwaves Zuko had wrought and knocking him off feet for the first time as he made a massive crater.
As Zuko lept back to his feet he saw Katara, streams of water from her hands joined with his sister's opposing leg and arm, looking as though she might rip her in half. With a shout, a kick, and a wave of fire he severed the connection and charged forward. Azula smiled broadly and ran the other direction, towards the massive crater that the Avatar was groggily emerging from, trading Zuko dueling partners.
Katara bent water and ice and shouted at him. He countered with fire and ignored it. In zanshin it was just sound, extraneous noise. It wasn't important, he'd made his decision.
Or had he?
As they fought, Zuko's flames seemed to grow weaker, his zanshin less steady, his mindless sure. Images of him and Katara together exploded in his mind, distracting him, damning him.
"…please, Zuko! Please!"
Whips of water collided with jets of fire.
"I…"
The cavern shook again as Azula sent the Avatar flying across its entirety, knocking him through the ruins of an ancient building. Then she turned and with incredible speed engaged Katara as well, knocking her back suddenly with the force of an unforeseen attack. Katara cried out in pain as she collided with one of the crystal formations and fell to the ground.
That noise shattered Zuko's zanshin like badly made glass. Almost instinctively he moved to put himself between the two of them, but the motion was brought up short by the thundering roar of the Avatar rising from his second crater. His ragged battle-damaged robe flapped in the air as he bent earth in a large wave, riding towards the Akodos, charging them like an angry avalanche.
KILL. HIM.
Zuko refocused, his conscious mind shelving the image of the woman he still loved crying out in pain for later. There would be time for guilt and recriminations later. Now was the time for battle.
Zuko loved battle too.
The massive tidal wave of earth roared across the cavern like a storm front, the young man on top of it glaring and snarling in a fury such as Zuko had never seen from him before.
He's in love with her too, Zuko suddenly realized.
His eye narrowed
Fine, that's just one more reason to KILL him.
But in the moment before either the Akodos or the Avatar could strike, the Dai Li was there. They disrupted the earthen wave, tossing the Avatar aside, transforming him from a titan of power to just a small young man flying gracelessly through the air.
Suddenly the chamber was full of Dai Li, appearing from the walls and even the ceiling. They surrounded Katara and the Avatar en mass.
Katara, her hair unbound, her face contorted with pain and fury rose from where she had fallen, bending a massive torrent of water around her in the Octopus kata, its many limbs blocking and striking at her attackers.
The Avatar rose from where he had fallen, a wave of exhaustion and sorrow covering his face as he became aware of his situation. Then, shockingly, he turned his back on all of them, even Katara, and bent himself into the ground.
"Coward," Zuko snarled and spun around to stalk towards Katara.
I told her, Zuko thought furiously as he met her stunned blue-grey eyes. I TOLD her he would run.
But… this is GOOD, he thought suddenly as his brain spun, trying to figure out how to salvage the situation. She has to see what an honorless ashpile he is now. Maybe I can get her to surrender? She must see that we've won. It's better, safer, if she surrenders to me rather than Azula. I… I can take her back to the Fire-Nation with me! She'll see. She'll see that we're not all monsters. Maybe… maybe…
He had barely made it three-quarters of the way to Katara when the cavern, the entire earth, began to hum. Every eye in the cavern was drawn to the bright blue beam of light that emanated from where the boy had submerged himself in the earth.
And then the AVATAR burst forth from the ground, floating on a column of air and shining blue-white light, his eyes and arrow tattoos aflame with divine power.
And here it comes, Zuko thought calmly, resignedly. The part where he pulls victory out of his ass and rides off into the sunset with your girlfriend. Ancestors, I hate hi-
CRACK-a-BOOOOM!
Lightning.
Of all the people in the room, only Azula had kept her wits about her.
Lightning.
Only Azula would be unimpressed by the appearance of a Kami in their midst.
Lightning.
Nothing impressed Azula.
Lightning.
…The Avatar's lifeless body tumbled through the air.
As the boy tumbled towards the earth and Zuko's shocked mind tried to process this impossible development he was knocked off his feet by a giant wave called into existence in a bare second. Katara rode it over him, his sister, and the assembled Dai Li, tears streaming down her face as she caught the boy before he impacted on the stone.
As Zuko regained his feet he saw her kneeling, the Avatar's lifeless body in her arms, a look of heartbreaking sorrow etched on her face.
She looked up at Zuko, helplessly, as though asking if could take it back, undo it somehow.
And in that moment, if only just for a moment, he wished that he could.
Azula was triumphant, a massive smile plastered over her face as she began to move forward towards the Avatar's corpse, blue flames gathering at her fists. Zuko moved forward as well, to cut her off before she could do any more damage, but suddenly both of them were forced to spin reflexively out of the way as a massive wave of fire appeared in front of them.
Iroh had arrived.
"You've got to get out of here!" he shouted at Katara as he bent flame. "I'll hold them off as long as I can!"
And Katara fled, dragging the corpse with her to the waterfall and bending a spiraling stream of it up and out of the cavern.
As soon as they were out of sight Iroh stood down and was immediately encased in stone bent by the Dai Li. Azula screamed in frustration and sent a blast of blue flame at Iroh's defenseless head.
NO!
Zuko tore himself out of shock and lept forward, blocking the blast with fire of his own.
"What? …He's a TRAITOR, Zuko," Azula said turning to him angrily.
"Whatever he might be, Akodo Iroh is our uncle and worthy of respect," Zuko said voice flat. "His Majesty will decide his fate."
"Damnit Zuko," Azula said moving closer to him and lowering her voice, "we needed the body. Do you think father will believe me without it?"
"I think that if the word of the Crown-Princess in not good enough for him nothing will be."
She considered him for a moment. "A valid point," she said and her face broke out into a ferocious smile. "We've done it Zuko. It's taken a hundred years, but the Fire-Nation has conquered Ba Sing Se."
"Not yet we haven't. We need to make sure that that fool didn't upset anything before you brought him down." Despite the force in Zuko's voice, the words felt hollow. After he had intervened to save his uncle his eye had fallen back on the waterfall Katara had disappeared up as though hoping somehow that Katara might reappear there.
Azula nodded and moved away, beginning to bark orders at her Dai Li. From the way they jumped to obey Zuko could tell that they were her Dai Li. He tore his eye away from the waterfall and found his uncle.
He saved her, Zuko thought. The least I can do is…
"I am sorry, uncle," he said aloud. "If you ask it of me… I will grant you seppuku."
Iroh didn't answer. He wouldn't even look at Zuko. He simply turned his head away in… disappointment.
Somehow that was worse than anger.
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Zuko admitted, in the privacy of his own head, that he was really getting tired of being right about some things. In this case, he had been right to assume that the Avatar had managed to fuck things up before Azula had killed him.
Well, perhaps not specifically the Avatar, but Toph, on the other hand, had done so quite thoroughly. Despite having been captured a few hours earlier, she had apparently learned to metalbend and had liberated herself, Sokka, General How AND the Earth-King from the iron prison cell they had been secured in. Zuko and Azula had found Ty Lee with her arms and legs earthbent into the throne room floor as Mai slowly attempted to free her with a hammer and chisel. The Earth-King had only returned for his pet bear, Bosco.
Had he been capable, Zuko would have laughed.
As it was, however, he found himself filled with an odd mixture of rage and grief; fury and sorrow in equal measure. They seemed to cancel each other out somehow, leaving him with only a dark hollow feeling. He stood absolutely still in rooms that Azula had appropriated, his arms folded behind his back as he looked out the window at the dark Ba Sing Se skyline and attempted to come to grips with his new situation.
Azula, on the other hand, couldn't seem to stop moving. She paced back and forth, ranting and railing at her Dai Li, at Mai and Ty Lee, at him. Zuko could practically feel her fury building behind him, could feel the heat as she started spitting blue flames.
"Azula," he said, croaking, the word now sounding as cold and hollow as he felt inside.
Remarkably she cut off immediately. Zuko could feel her eyes boring into the back of his head.
"Why are you wasting time?" he continued, not turning from the window.
"Wasting… It's OVER, Zuko! How are we supposed to control the Earth-Kingdom without that fool of a King here to be our puppet?"
"The way we always control things; strength of arms. You have the palace, you have the Dai Li, you have an army outside the walls. I fail to see the problem."
"Oh yes, it so simple, Zuzu. Let's just march our army into the largest city in the world! All the army would have been good for is suppressing whatever fools might have refused to accept the Earth-King's surrender! Even a million peasants united are a force to be reckoned with."
"United?"
"Do you think they will just stand idly by while we ravage their city? The will fight tooth and nail! I thought you understood the earthers!"
"I do, I understand that their 'unity' is an illusion," Zuko said, turning from the window and gesturing out it. "Have you seen conditions in the lower ring?"
"…yes? They are miserable. Yet another example of Fire-Nation superiority. What does that have to do with anything?"
"Why do you think that transit between the rings is limited? If the mass of humanity saw how they live in the inner ring, what do you think would happen? How quickly would they turn on their masters?" Zuko's eye flicked to the Dai Li who had been to shift uncomfortably.
Azula's mouth curved upwards in a smile. "Yes," she hissed. "We don't need to convince them all, we just need to plant the seeds of doubt." She gestured broadly as she began to pontificate. "The Dai Li, having grown tired of serving a corrupt master, and seeing their people suffer so greatly, have decided to open the city walls-"
"A corrupt master who has fled Azula. Coward that he is. Fled before the righteous liberating armies of the Fire-Nation."
"Liberating? Hmmm, I don't know. That's a tough sell, so many refugees…"
"We don't have to convince them all you said. We lead the army in, distribute food in the lower ring, play peacemaker-"
"You want to coddle the earthers?"
"Not earthers, Azula. Fire-Nation Colonials. Property of His Majesty the Fire-Lord and Her Highness the Crown-Princess."
"Seems… workable," Azula said with a thoughtful nod. "Mai, go fetch your cousin, we will have need of her." Azula began to give orders to the Dai Li, directives to bring the new plan to fruition, her brilliant mind charging ahead, already a league ahead of Zuko. Zuko turned back to contemplate the dark city, feet wide, arms behind his back, face set in a dark glower.
Images of Katara kept trying to force themselves into the forefront of his mind and he had to continually shove them to the back. It was getting rather full in the dark recesses of his brain, however, and he would need to find another distraction soon.
One was provided for him a few minutes later when Mai's "cousin" swanned into the room.
"Your Highness…es," Lady Xian crooned, bowing to Azula and then, after the briefest of hesitations, Zuko.
"Xian," Zuko said, intending to growl in anger, but finding only the same dark flat tone he had used before.
"Oh, don't be cross with me, darling. Your sister is just too delightful, how could I turn her down?"
"I am simply surprised you would betray your people like this."
"My people? Darling. Kitsune is my married name. It is in MY nature to sting."
"You're… a Shosuro? A Scorpion." This time Zuko did manage to find that growl.
"Indeed. And as for my people, well, my husband has been dead for years and my daughter works in the colonies last I heard. My people are in this room."
Zuko considered her a moment longer, then nodded in acceptance and turned back to the window. As Xian and Azula began discussing the best ways of turning the city upon itself, he tuned them out. Let the Scorpions do their plotting, it's what they're best at, he thought darkly. HE was a Lion, and he needed to consider the battle ahead.
It was what he for after all.
It was his destiny.
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"Absolutely not," Zuko said flatly.
"Darling, we have been over this. You have to look the part," Xian said with something much akin to testiness.
Xian had already had a flock of servants go over him, trimming his beard into a short version of the Fire-Nation three-point style, putting his hair up in the topknot again. NOW she wanted him to…
"Come on Zuko, I bet it will look great!" Ty Lee said brightly.
"Why is there a cape?" Zuko said, the flatness in his voice now laced with the barest hints of scorn.
"Because it's dramatic!" Xian and Ty Lee said together.
"NO," Zuko said, actually managing to growl appropriately.
"Just put the damn armor on, Zuko," Azula said, tapping her foot in impatience. "It's the best I could do with limited time. I won't have you getting an arrow through the side after I've invested so much time in this."
"I fail to see how making me look ridiculous will help our-"
"It's a birthday gift," Mai said quietly from near the doorway.
Zuko's eye fell on her as she leaned against the door frame, idly twirling one of her kunai. She looked back at him, totally and completely unimpressed by his glower.
"Birthday. Gift."
"Yes, it is a bit early, but High Summer was yesterday, dum-dum," Azula said massaging the bridge of her nose. "How is it that you never remember these things?" Despite the venom in her voice Zuko could detect a faint hint of nervousness in her posture.
She just wants her brother to like the gift she picked out for him.
"Fine," he said, managing a snort. "But if it looks stupid then I'll make do without."
It didn't look stupid.
The armor was black. Xian said it would have been suspicious, and near to impossible, to find a set of Lion gold and black armor. So, she'd settled on plain black. Glossy lacquered black, with silver highlights along the chest mantle. The solid gauntlets and boots were the same unrelieved black, plain and without ostentation and were only barely offset by the slightly less black pants and shirt he wore underneath. They were quilted and double layered for extra protection, but still allowed for enough freedom of movement for him to bend without resistance. The armor made Zuko, who was already tall, seem to absolutely tower over the women.
The cape was pure melodrama. Dark as night and heavy, yet it still managed to billow dramatically at the slightest provocation. It would slow him down if he needed to run anywhere and he was about to insist that it be removed, when he noticed the looks that Ty Lee and Xian were giving him.
"Woof," Xian said, fanning herself ostentatiously.
The cape would stay.
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They made it to the Kaiu Wall with little trouble. The Dai Li had closed off the public rail system for the duration of the "crisis" and Zuko and Azula, along with a handful of them rode along it in silence.
"There is… one more thing, Zuko," Azula said as the train ground to a halt.
Zuko turned to her and found her holding… his wakizashi.
"A samurai shouldn't go about without one of these," she said, holding the short sword out in both hands. "Take it. And take your rightful place at my side. Together we will bring this world to its knees."
Zuko's hand paused over the scabbard of the blade, his heartbeat slow, but pounding in his ears. He exhaled deeply and grasped it, lifting it reverently out of her hands and placed it in his belt.
It felt right there. Probably the first thing to really feel right since the caverns.
"I… I'm sorry I had to-" Azula cut herself off with a shake, her eyes growing hard again. "You had better NOT screw this up, Dum-dum." She walked away, pulling the handful of Dai Li with her as she made her way towards the wall.
Going through the wall itself was nerve-wracking. The Dai Li bent them a small tunnel and Zuko couldn't help but think about how easy it would be for them to collapse it on him and Azula, essentially ending the line of Akodo.
If they considered it, the didn't act on it.
Under cover of darkest night, the two children of the Fire-Lord made their way the several miles to the camp of the Fire-Nation army. General Matsu Qin, who it appeared had been sleeping, was less than pleased to see Azula and flatly ignored Zuko.
"I welcome you return Highness. Is your business in the impenetrable city complete?"
"Not quite," Azula said with a sneer. "Assemble the staff officers. We have work to do."
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Azula tapped her foot in impatience as the commanding officers and their staff slowly assembled inside a large meeting tent.
"It has begun," she declaimed, rising out of her seat after they had all gained theirs. "The day of victory is at hand. Soon my agents will bring a segment of the Kaiu Wall down, and we will pour through like a raging wildfire, burning all resistance away. You all know, at least by reputation, my brother, Prince Zuko," she gestured at Zuko who loomed silently over her right shoulder. "He will be taking charge of this army while I attend to other business. You will show him proper respect and obedience as he leads you to this glorious victory. They will speak of this day, this glorious day, for a thousand-"
"You cannot be serious Highness?" one of the officers, a colonel by the look of him, interjected.
Azula cut off in mid-speech, the rapturous look of upcoming triumph fell off her face like a mask and was replaced by a placid calm that Zuko knew concealed a terrible black fury.
"Are you questioning me?" she asked quietly, dangerously.
Uh oh.
"Highness… if victory is at hand, as you say, then surely we shouldn't-"
He was suddenly, and terminally, cut off as a bolt of lightning slammed into him. Throwing him out of his chair and into the walls of the tent.
"Any OTHER objections?" Azula snarled, still in the final pose of the lightning kata.
"Perhaps... you could leave a few of them alive?" Zuko said leaning over and whispering for her ears alone. "We do have need of them."
Azula glared at him for a moment, releasing her stance, then turned her eyes on the now nervously sweating officers. She nodded and turned to leave.
"On-yer-feet!" Zuko barked, a sergeant addressing unruly troops. The officers shot to their feet, to the position of attention, with all the alacrity born of years of reflex. "Bow!" and when they had all done so he suited his own words, executing a crisp left turn and, right fist in left, bowed to his sister. "Your Highness," he finished in a normal tone.
Azula looked mollified, even going so far as to return to her usual smirk as she nodded in thanks and left.
After she had gone Zuko turned back to the still bowing officers. "Take… SEATS," he barked. As they did so he surveyed them, which ones were calm, which were angry or unsettled at Azula's actions, which ones were already scheming to undermine his authority. Those last were easy to find, he just needed to look for the traditional face-covering mempo that Scorpions wore with their dress uniforms.
There was a thick and palpable tension in the air of the tent now. Zuko, knowing that he would need, if not the love and admiration of the officers before him, then at the very least their trust, made an effort to clear the air with a speech of his own. More of a mission brief, his tone dry and flat, businesslike.
"Ladies, Gentlemen; let us discuss the elephant-koi in the room, shall we? I am sure that many of you have misgivings. You do not believe that I am worthy, or that I have the experience to lead an army. Perhaps you are right, but I don't happen to think so, and neither does her Highness. I trust that all of you are loyal to His Majesty and my honored sister, the Crown-Princess. That is all I require of you; loyalty to our lords. But you are all samurai, how could it be otherwise?"
Zuko, his arms still behind his back, began to slowly walk around the table as he continued.
"We have been presented with a unique opportunity, one which will most likely never again happen in our lifetimes. Her Highness has control of the palace, and four members of the Council of Five. The Earth-King, coward that he is, has fled the city and my honored sister, through dint of threats, fury, and pure charisma, has acquired the loyalty of the Dai Li, the 'cultural' guardians of Ba Sing Se; earthbenders, every one of them. Imagine it, an entire battalion of earthbenders, already inside the walled city and on our side. At dawn they will bring down the segment of the wall ahead of us and we will advance into the city. Be at ease. What questions do you have?"
The officers muttered amongst themselves for a few minutes before one worked up the courage to ask a question.
"The Dai Li… you're certain we can trust these traitorous scum?"
"Her Highness does, and that is good enough for me," Zuko said. "If they don't come through tomorrow this is going to be the shortest attempt to take the walls in Fire-Nation history."
The officers chuckled, the tension dropped a notch.
"Why you… sir?" another officer asked.
"You'd have to ask the princess that. Which, in all honesty-" Zuko gestured to the now empty seat at the table- "I do NOT recommend."
"Rules of engagement?" a third asked, faster now, the tension growing less by the minute.
"Her Highness called us a wildfire, and that's as may be, but we are the wildfire that clears away the deadwood, not the one that sweeps through the rice lands." Zuko paused in consideration of the strategic necessities of the scenario. "Soldiers are fair game, but I want civilian casualties kept to a minimum. You're to treat Ba Sing Se as a colony with rebellious elements. Swift and deliberate reprisals in self-defense, no 'example' making."
"You can't be serious?" one of the older officers, another colonel by the look of him, barked.
The room grew still, waiting to see how this Akodo would take to being questioned in this manner.
"Dead serious," Zuko said, his voice dropping into the sub-arctic range as he leaned on the table to stare down the questioner. "The last flaming thing we want is a million, pissed-off, united rebels with superior area knowledge. Our men are on the inside working at destabilization as we speak, and there's no reason to make their lives, or our own, any more difficult that they have to be." He leaned back and addressed the room at large. "I don't know about all of you, but I never found any honor in killing peasants."
Many heads around the table nodded in unconscious agreement.
"I want discipline tight," Zuko continued, resuming his stalk around the table. "One good flame up and everything will go straight to the ashpits." he raised his voice, pitching louder to ensure that everyone most definitely could hear. "I am holding each and every one of you personally accountable for the behavior of the soldiers under your command. I do not want to have to bring the hammer down on anyone in this room, but do not think for a second that I won't."
"Sir?" one of the younger soldiers, a captain, had her hand raised. Zuko nodded for her to continue. "What… what about… the Avatar, sir?"
Everyone around the table grew tense again.
The image of Katara, weeping, cradling the Avatar's lifeless body shot through him and it took everything Zuko had not to let the turmoil show on his face.
"The Avatar… is no longer a factor," he said quietly, wooden façade of indifference unbroken.
"This is IT then!" one of the Colonels shouted, rising to her feet in excitement. "I thought this was going to turn into another 'Zhao debacle' but now… we can DO this."
A loud chorus of affirmations rose from the table.
The tension was gone, replaced by excitement and the beginnings of an energetic strategy session. Maps were unrolled, orders were sent, somebody even told a joke.
Zuko just wished he could share in their enjoyment.
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After the frenzy of a strategy session Zuko commandeered a tent, complete with camp desk and chair, and begin pouring through piles of troop reports and equipment lists. He needed to come to grips with the "feel" of the army, with its composition and its capabilities. Occasionally his left hand would trail up to his neck and rub at the golden sunburst pin that had been found for him and now adorned the collar of his uniform.
He supposed it made sense, the leader of an army was a general. When he'd been a boy, he dreamed of the day he'd have an army under his command, of the pride and glory that would accompany such a duty.
Now it felt somewhat hollow.
We have too many engineers, he thought idly. We'll need to get them outfitted in better gear as quickly as possible. The time for giant drills and clever machinery is over. We need every single samurai under arms and ready for a long and drawn out fight. Perhaps the daikyu companies-
"General?" A voice called from outside the tent.
"Come," Zuko said without looking up.
A moment passed in silence before Zuko glanced up from his reports and found Rin and Haki standing before him in iron fetters.
"Her Highness said…" the sergeant who had brought them in stammered slightly, "said you might want to deal with these ones yourself."
There was another long and pregnant pause as Zuko eyed the two men who had been charged with hunting him down.
"Leave us," Zuko said quietly, not taking his eyes from the prisoners.
He rose from behind his back desk and slowly stalked around it to stand in front of the two men.
These two know you were ronin. They could make things… difficult if they wanted to.
"…Do you have anything to say for yourselves?" Zuko rasped.
"I did my duty, burn you," Haki said bluntly, eyes still be looking straight ahead.
"Please don't take it out on Bo, that's all I ask sir," Rin said calmly.
Zuko glanced at one man, then the other, waiting to see if either had anything more to add. Finally, he nodded.
"That will have to be enough I guess," he said softly as his blade of fire burst into being in his fist.
The blade rose and fell in two swift chops…
… And the ruined iron fetters fell away.
"Sit," Zuko said pointing at a pair of camp stools in the corner of the tent. He suited his own words and crossed back to his own chair behind his desk.
Rin at least still looked completely calm as he moved to obey. Haki looked at Zuko as though he actually HAD been beheaded.
"You're not going to kill us?" he finally managed, eyes still wide and shocked.
"I am not in the habit of killing people for following the orders of their superiors," Zuko growled as he gained his seat. "Sit. Down."
Haki started, then quickly moved to obey.
Zuko considered the two men for a moment and decided to give them the whole truth. It had worked with the command staff, it would work here as well.
"I think my sister would rather I kill you," Zuko said tonelessly. "You both know a few… uncomfortable things. Things she believes should warrant your deaths. I, on the other hand, don't believe in punishing someone for being loyal. It's why I didn't kill you both back in the desert."
Haki looked to be on the brink of shooting something back but, wisely, held his tongue.
"Had either of you revealed yourselves to be cowards I'd have taken your head without regrets. But thankfully, as you are not cowards, we have reached an impasse. You have two choices before you, either seppuku, in which case I swear here before you now that I will personally see to the well-being of your families."
Both men nodded appreciatively.
"Or… I will admit that I have not had the best of luck with retainers, but the royal family always has a need for good loyal samurai. Swear fealty to me and I can protect you. I cannot guarantee that your lives will be much longer, His Majesty may decide that I am still a failure and order my execution, but at least then you will have a fighting chance. Make your choice."
Rin moved immediately, dropping out of the stool to his knee, one fist on the floor. "If you treat us half as well as you treated Ping it will be twice what we deserve, sir."
"...Ash," Haki swore after a moment. "My wife is going to be pissed. She was hoping I could retire after this tour." Despite this fact, he seemed pleased to join Rin on one knee.
"I, Uesugi Rin, samurai of the Wolf…"
"I, Matsu Haki, samurai of the Lion…"
/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\
Colonel Notarin was dead.
While Zuko had wished the man no ill-will, hadn't even known his name until the early hours of the morning, he was grateful. Azula had done Zuko an unwitting favor by executing the man for impudence as it meant that his infantry battalion needed a new commanding officer, a position that Zuko was more than happy to take on in addition to the overall command of the army. It gave him even more to do, and over the last twenty-four hours he had found that the more things he had to do the less time he spent brooding over the things that he had already done.
Rin and Haki had the entire battalion turned out in the early morning fog just before dawn, and they'd marched to the Kaiu Wall in the dark. The troops were tired, and a bit sullen, having been roused from their tents with no warning.
"I'm not much for speeches, so I will keep this as quick as I can!" Zuko barked, pitching his voice as loud as he could as they all waited before the massive wall. "We are NOT here to conquer this city! Let me say that again for you deaf bastards in the back, WE ARE NOT HERE TO CONQUER THIS ASHSTAIN OF A CITY! We are here to LIBERATE this city. This city has got a million starving peasants trapped in between two walls and a thousand fancy bastards living the high life in the center, with more gold and trimmings in their latrines than His Majesty would allow in the throne room. So, when you go in there and see those wretcheds, you'll be peaceable and courteous. Just remember these two things: One, fighting with them is a waste of time, and neither I NOR His Majesty, have any patience for time wasters. And Two, those earthers in there BELONG to His Majesty, though they don't know it yet. Anybody here who thinks they can ride roughshod over Fire-Nation citizenry, no matter how new they are to the fold, is going to answer to me. Am I flaming clear!?"
"YES SIR!" the battalion boomed.
If nothing else the Dai Li had excellent timing. As the battalion's affirmation echoed back from the wall, a wide segment simply collapsed revealing the Earth-Kingdom's rice lands and rising sun. The entire army paused for a moment, totally stunned by the sudden breach in the impenetrable wall.
The roar that followed could probably be heard all the way back in Otosan Uchi.
/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\
The march to the inner wall went swiftly.
After Zuko and his personal battalion had marched through the breach, mostly as a symbolic gesture, the actual strategy began to unfold. The cavalry battalions raced ahead through the rice lands and established dominance of the western side of the inner wall. Any Earth-Kingdom force that attempted a sortie from the walls would be met and suppressed where possible. If not then at the very least Zuko and the rest of the command staff would know about it as the cavalry commanders had guidance to keep them apprised of any troop movements.
Zuko didn't really anticipate any resistance at this point in the siege, however. General How was a conservative officer, and it had been over thirty years since the armies of the Earth-Kingdom had attempted any major sortie from the walls of the city.
Zuko needn't have worried at all, General How had his hands full.
When the army reached the inner wall Zuko could practically hear the riot. Small streams of smoke trailed up from above the wall, a fact made more significant by the knowledge that the city was primarily made up of stone and not wood. Zuko took a moment to remind his officers, his soldiers, anyone he could get his hands on really, that they were a liberating force, not a conquering one. Any mistake at this point could very easily see his whole army swallowed up by the simple power of mathematics.
One million was greater than fifty thousand.
Another segment of the inner wall came down, and Zuko, flanked on either side by Dai Li agents, strode through the breach. For the first time in recorded history an enemy army had breached the inner wall of Ba Sing Se.
The scene inside the wall was almost comical. Hundreds of people, who had only moments before had been fighting one another were frozen, locked in a tableau of violence, staring at the impossible breach in the wall and the equally impossible army marching through it.
One old man charged directly at Zuko, waving a shovel. Zuko waved off the Dai Li and strode forward to meet him. The shovel came down in a wide wobbling arc and Zuko grabbed the haft below the shovel blade. He didn't break it, or strike at the man, he just held it in place, effortlessly immobile, as the elderly man fumed and cursed. The old man finally gave up and released the improvised weapon, falling to his knees in sorrow. Zuko tossed the shovel aside and looked around at the crowd still frozen in place.
"WE are not your enemy!" Zuko shouted, pointing east towards the upper ring. "Your enemy is there! Your King has abandoned you, your lords take advantage of you, and your own people bring the wall down! We are NOT your enemy."
With that Zuko marched on, cape billowing behind him, as the army of the Fire-Nation followed.
/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\
While Zuko's theatrics bought him some time, it only took him as far as the Chokan Wall which, despite the Dai Li's best efforts, had fallen back into loyalist control. Zuko set up his command center half a block away and began to slow painstaking work of tearing General How's fingers off of the inner city.
After seizing the lower ring's granaries, food distribution centers were set up and the law, Fire-Nation law, was reinforced over the population. The local town watchmen didn't resist for the most part and in many cases welcomed Fire-Nation military magistrates with open arms. Zuko suspected that Lady Xian had something to do with that.
Meanwhile, Zuko endeavored to expand his own strategic thinking.
No Fire-Nation general had ever had access to earthbenders before, and the few Dai Li that were under his command immediately proved invaluable. The third of the great walls was still a massive barrier, but a significantly less formidable one when you could just move the stone out of the way.
The challenge was in doing so where and when General How was not expecting.
While the legion's forces outnumbered the loyalists by a considerable amount their earthbending resources did not. Almost the entirety of General How's small fighting force was made up of earthbenders, plus whatever ashigaru he could scrape up from the middle-class citizens if the inner two rings.
Normal strategic wisdom would suggest that a standard siege was the best course of action. Zuko controlled the enemy's rice lands and soon enough, helped along by the occasional raid, the enemy's foodstuffs would dwindle, and starvation would set it.
This hardly classified as a normal situation however; it was a siege within a siege. Azula was still in the Earth-King's palace with a small force of soldiers and Dai Li that she had brought back with her in the chaos before General How had gotten organized. That scant force, barely managing to man the battlements of the palace, was now under siege by loyalist forces, who were, in turn, besieged by Zuko's forces.
It was a complicated situation, and Zuko needed to hurry.
His first attacks were probing, almost gentle. Soft projections of force easily retracted back into the main body of troops which now surrounded the entirety of the Chokan Wall. Zuko had to practically invent new methods of communication and troop coordination on the fly to coordinate simultaneous attacks from unexpected angles on all sides of the middle ring. Stillness unexpectedly becoming a frenzy of activity at a word from Zuko.
Where it had taken his uncle over six-hundred days, it took Zuko just over six.
Nine days past the Summer Solstice Akodo's 25th Legion, as well as a small, albeit angry, percentage of the lower ring's population, burst through a rent on the east side of the Chokan Wall that Zuko had made.
Thus, on Akodo Zuko's nineteenth birthday, the battle of Ba Sing Se began.
The middle ring became a furious battleground, the fighting fierce, almost a brawl in some places. Good order and discipline could only do so much as Fire met Earth in places, while steel met steel in others.
Arrows darkened the sky and were interdicted by walls of stone or blasts of fire as samurai battled samurai on the stone roads of the middle ring. Angry rioting peasants with hammers and farming implements smashed into ranks of poorly trained university students with hastily made bamboo spears.
The slate grey stone of the roads gradual turned a darker shade, tinged the dark crimson of a battlefield.
"When the general draws his sword, he must set down his gunbai," Akodo had written. He had meant that a general should refrain from entering the fray in person, because when he did so he was no longer a general in command of his army but became, in himself, nothing more than another soldier.
Zuko knew this, and found that he didn't care.
As he sat in his command center and received reports, of street corners taken and lost, lists of casualties, he could feel that cold hollowness fall over him again. Over the last week, the echo of Katara's cry of pain had a tendency to rouse him from a dead sleep. So, he abandoned both the headquarters, and sleep, and sought out battle. He strode, black cloak billowing behind him, from street corner to street corner, throwing himself at the enemy where they were strongest, rallying troops, extracting the wounded, and avenging the dead. Rin and Haki were his constant companions, primarily saving their strength for those times that they needed to extract Zuko from those situations they deemed unacceptably dangerous. More than half a dozen times Zuko found himself being half led, half dragged, away from some conflagration, spitting and cursing, still flinging fire at the enemy.
Zuko never shouted at them for it, it was one of the primary functions of a retainer to be a bodyguard, and where personal safety was concerned a bodyguard's judgment was to be trusted.
Zuko simply paused for a moment to catch his breath and then stalked off to find another fight.
And sixteen hours after true battle had been joined he found General How, presumably doing the same thing he was.
"Akodo!" Zuko roared as he plunged through the intervening soldiers, leaving a cursing Rin and Haki behind.
Hida How was, like most of the Earth-Kingdom aristocracy, a giant; easily seven feet tall and holding a pair of large tetsubo in either hand. A small space in the chaotic conflict opened around them, and the two samurai began to circle one another, eyes locked on their opponent's. How threw his tetsubo away, sending them crashing to either side of him, ringing like gongs. Zuko snorted, fire coming from his nose as he sheathed his katana. It would be a purely bending duel.
They continued circling, watching one another intently, and the battle around then died away. Samurai in both red and green put their weapons away, unmixing themselves to stand on their respective sides.
The two generals made one final slow circuit of the opening in the crowd. Zuko could see the towering form of the Earth-King's palace behind General How, its golden roofs glinting in the now dying sunlight. Behind him was the wreckage of a war-torn Ba Sing Se, columns of smoke rising into the dying light of the sky, the Sun visibly setting in the jagged rent in the formerly impenetrable wall.
This was how it was supposed to be. Zuko had dreamed of this moment as a child, striven every day for this. Bringing the fury of Akodo's legions and the honor Fire-Nation to the very heart of the enemy. Coming to grips with an honorless adulterer in a showdown to determine the fate of the city. He should have been happy, he should have been proud, he should have been able to hear the song.
But there was nothing.
Nothing but a black and gaping maw where his heart should have been.
It no longer felt like the climax of his life, a long-awaited and singularly important moment, now it felt like… sharpening his swords.
Or boiling rice.
Or reading a troop report.
It was just a chore.
Just another task, another job, another duty.
The fight began.
General How was a master earthbender. No one, least of all Zuko, would deny that fact.
But he was in his fifties, and most likely had not seen personal combat in over a decade. He was a master… but he was not Zuko. Zuko was nineteen, had been honed to a razor's edge by his blood, by the merciless training of the many instructors assigned to him by his father and grandfather, and by the grindstone that was a life of warfare and exile. He was the katana his sister had spoken of, a living weapon, a tool.
A blade in the hand of the Fire-Lord.
Hida How was a man, Akodo Zuko was a weapon.
The man fell.
How fell to his knees, gasping in pain and exhaustion, the life pouring out of him from the many wounds he had taken. Zuko's sword of flame burst into his hand and he pointed it at How's neck as he made his slow solemn walk around the kneeling earthbender.
Zuko did not speak, there was no need for speech, no need for request or confirmation. They had both known what had to happen from the moment they had locked eyes.
The only sound in all of Ba Sing Se was the rasp of How's wakizashi exciting its sheath.
He placed the tip at his stomach and mouthed the words "Lin Mi."
In that moment Zuko wondered exactly who How had truly broken faith with; the wife who was the mother of his children, or the peasant girl whose name would be the last words he spoke in this life.
He wondered if his treachery was any better.
How made the cut, the only sounds he made were the grunts of effort on each motion.
He inhaled deeply, about to scream in mindless instinctive pain, when Zuko's blade descended rapidly allowing him to keep his honor intact.
Zuko had been wrong, How had had honor.
The Earth-Kingdom surrendered. Its soldiers, many weeping in anger and sorrow, knelt there in the streets, their weapons clattering to the cobblestones.
It was done.
The Earth-Kingdom had fallen.
/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\
It was done, finished, Ba Sing Se had fallen, and already messenger hawks were arriving from Gaoling to talk terms of surrender.
The hundred-year war was over.
Which unfortunately now left nothing for Zuko to do but think, to argue silently with himself, arms behind his back looking out at the city he had helped conquer, the eye of his mind seeing only the luminescent crystal cavern that lay some ways below his feet.
The look on her face.
Not relevant any longer. I should-
She was heartbroken, she was HURT, I did that to her.
It had to be done. My people need-
She will NEVER forgive me.
…Good.
Zuko started in surprise at his own thoughts, his eye narrowed.
It's GOOD. The pain if this will love with you forever, another reminder, another SCAR. A reminder of what you had to sacrifice for your people. You will never forget this, and every moment you spend in the Fire-Nation will be that much more important because of it. Because of the cost, because you know what it means to sacrifice, that you understand what it means to try to hold on to something… and to fail. "Without an understanding of human failings, of human frailty, you cannot have mercy." SHE taught you that. Well, now you understand. And because of that understanding, you WILL make every day for the rest of your life worth the cost, or you will die trying. Anything less is unworthy of you and disrespectful to HER.
Zuko sighed and turned away from the cityscape.
I need to make this worth it. SOMEHOW, I will make this worth it.
...it HAS to be worth it.
/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^End of Book 3^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\^/\
A/N: Ladies and gentlemen! Boys and girls! You have done it. WE have done it. Welcome to the finale of book 3. Remember to comment/review and tell me what you think!
First off let me just say, "I'm sorry." I'm sure many of you had hoped things would go differently this chapter. A good many of you knew that things were going to play out in this way. Have been calling it for months. Well done you!
I'm afraid that narratively things had to go this way. Zuko needs to go home. Not just to be pampered and all that BS he needs to see the Fire-Nation, REALLY see it. Anyway, let's get right into…
FINALE-BITS!
Choices: How does somebody make this choice? Between the two types of love Storge (familial love) and Eros (romantic love). If you paid attention, you may have noticed that Zuko… really didn't. He didn't choose Azula over Katara, he chose to go after the Avatar. A bit of semantics I know, but still relevant. Not that it changes the outcome, or how Katara feels about it. In the words of the inestimable Geddy Lee "If you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice."
There were so many ways this could go in the crystal caverns, so many "what if" Zutara stories start there. What if Zuko had chosen the other way is the most obvious one, but there are so many others I tossed around in my much-battered grey matter. What if Zuko had changed his mind halfway through? What if Aang HAD fled, or just couldn't get into the Avatar state? What if Azula had missed and/or had her lightning thrown back at her? What if Iroh had been the one to drag Aang out of there and Katara was captured? SO many options, and honestly most of them, in one form or another, have been done before. I am a bit late to the fandom after all.
If anyone is looking for something in these veins drop me a line, and I can throw you some decent recs.
Spirit water? What spirit water?: Again, My astute readers will have noticed a major difference here in my rendition. There has been no mention of the spirit water. This is one of those things that was originally an oversight on my part, but as I played with the draft I realized I liked. Katara sort of backed herself into a corner vis a vis spirt water and Zuko's face. How does one go from "I think you're handsome just the way you are," to "But… I could heal that nasty scar for you!" The answer, you don't. This is not a "Katara is mean" thing, this is a "Katara has common sense and tact thing." I'm sure that, had she found a way to offer it without contradicting her previous statements she would have. She was just waiting for the perfect moment. Kinda like she was waiting for the right moment to drop the L-bomb. Poor thing.
Darth Vader: I told you Zuko was going to have a zesty Darth Vader flavor. It's right there on the author/series page! Now I've got a tall scarred guy with black armor and a red fire-saber. Wonder who I was thinking of there? (wink, wink) This is almost Zuko's "I'ma be an idiot, choke my girlfriend with the force, and fight Ob-Wan on a friggin volcano" moment. So, should you go back and re-read this chapter, feel free to look up and play the following: "Anakin Vs Obi-wan" during the fight scene, "The Imperial March" when the army breaks through the inner wall and most importantly "The Emperor's Theme" whenever our boy is being super broody and looking out over the city. I was THIS close (/holds finger and thumb 1.24 mm apart) to giving Zuko an asthma attack or something just to get the breathing thing.
Kinda felt it would have undermined the gravitas of the moment though.
Mempo and gunbai: Yay! New words! In reverse order, due to complexity, the gunbai is a sort of little fan that can be used by a general to signal maneuvers to his troops. More symbolic than anything really. A mempo is the face guard of a samurai helmet, ALSO it is a part of the Scorpion clan's (dojo) tradition. Scorpions hold that "everyone is always wearing some sort of mask, we're just the ones who will admit it." I generally have removed that trend in the work because I like to be able to describe facial expressions. But it's a thing for Scorpions, and a big one. There's a whole system of what type of mask you get to wear and when and blah blah blah. In L5R I've never played a scorpion (as you may be able to tell) but I know enough to get by.
That's it! No more. This book is officially done! (barring massive typos and other embarrassing things that would force me to fix them). Hope you enjoyed it and will stick around for book 4, coming to an internet near you in just a few short hours!
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IN A FEW HOURS on a very special "Avatar: The Last Dragon"...
Zuko reads some well-written fan-fic and gets a job.
TUNE IN. Same Zuko time, Same Zuko channel!
Original post date: 2 December 2018
