"...I love you Azula..."--Speech
'...I do...'--Thoughts
XXXX--Scene change
... --Mini time skip
Enjoy
Kneeling before a pedestal adorned with incense sticks and candles stood an elderly gentleman with a long white beard in ornate red robes, signifying a high position. Praying to the spirits for guidance during these troubling times, he was suddenly interrupted as the door to his chamber creaked open.
"If this is not important, I'll have you stripped of your position for interrupting me." The gentleman said calmly with his eyes closed.
The one who interrupted bowed and apologized. "I'm sorry High Sage, but this must be reported to you; it is urgent!" The one who spoke wore the usual fire sage clothing, but had a different headpiece indicating a higher position.
Well, out with it, Great Sage. I'm getting impatient." The High Sage had an annoyed look on his face.
"The princess has been kidnapped, sir!"
The High Sage's eyes burst open in shock and swirled around to face the messenger. "What?"
"The gaurds that patrol the tunnels came reported themselves"
Standing up from his kneeling position, he swiftly walked towards the great sage and passed him with an urgent step. "Lead me to them at once," he said.
...
Landing on Ember Island Beach, the two finally arrived, exhausted. Especially Aang, who had barely slept while steering Appa.
Stepping into the saddle to wake Toph up, he was greeted by the sight of her undignified snoring. Her body was all sprawled out. To think this was a girl from a noble house, times sure have changed, ugh just thinking like that made him sound old. Reaching down to wake Toph up, he touched her shoulder and almost received a fist to his face. "AAAHH!" He dodged in time, but not without a terrified scream. "Sorry, about that Tinkle-toes, not being able to see kinda makes my jumping." Finally calming down, he released a breath of relief.
"That's okay, Toph. I understand. Anyway, we're back home now."
"Finally, I don't think I'll ever get use to being blind." sighs
"The sun's already in the sky but not that high so I think we're still in time for breakfast" Aang looked at sky and shielded his eyes from the light.
"That's great and all, but what do you think we should tell the others?" she sounded nonchalant, but her body language suggested otherwise.
"I think we should tell them the truth; pretty soon, they'll start asking questions, and I know I'm not good at lying". Aang shrugged in a hopeless manner.
"Yeah especially to miss goody two shoes" she took a crack at him smirking.
"True" He nodded. Even Aang knew he would fold in a matter of seconds should they ask him about Zuko's whereabouts, especially Katara.
"Well let's get this over with so I can sleep some more"
...
After hearing the report directly from the guards, the High Sage ordered them to maintain silence regarding the entire ordeal and issued a warning. He called for an emergency meeting of all the Fire Sages to discuss their next course of action.
As the last sage rushed to his seat, the High Sage began. "Good, now that we are all here, I have important matters to discuss with you. Princess Azula has been kidnapped." All five Sages broke into murmuring, worrying about the news, especially if it reached the new Phoenix King. Raising his hand to silence them, he said, "I already ordered the guards to remain silent over the whole matter; however, I suggest we decide to act quickly on this matter before anyone else finds out."
One of the Fire Sages spoke up and said, "Should we report this to the Phoenix King?"
"Not necessarily, if we can get the princess back without anyone else noticing, not only will our positions be secure, but if the world finds out Azula is missing, who do you think is next? "An older fire sage spoke up.
The other Sages broke into worried murmurs again, for the fire Sage's fall below the royal family in power, meaning if the world heard about this they would be targeted next.
"Silence!"
The High Sage slammed his fist on the table,"I suggest we do what Fire Sage Shyu suggested, we get the Yuyan archers to retrieve both the Princess and those who kidnapped her." Seeing all of them nod in agreement, he continued, "Good. We'll summon them in the dead of night. Fire Sage Miko, you will be in charge of transport; I don't need to remind you that this is of the utmost importance - our very own lives are endangered should it be leaked." The High Sage glared across the table at them to emphasize how serious it was.
XXXXX XXXXX XXXXX
Slowly opening her eyes, she stared at the sealing of the tent. Her mind began to wander, wondering where it all went wrong. Her hair a mess, her expensive silk robe dirty with a few holes and tears, no friends, no family, and all alone. She was pulled from her thoughts when someone entered the tent. She sat up straight, or at least tried to, as she flinched in pain from her injured left shoulder.
"Azula!" Zuko exclaimed in concern as he rushed to her side to check if the wound hadn't started bleeding again; only to swiftly move back to dodge a swipe from her nails located on her right hand. Zuko looked into her eyes and saw the hate and anger being directed at him, which made him sigh in sadness. Breathing heavily as she threw venomous words at him.
"Get out," she said through snarling teeth.
"Azula-
"Get out!" she threw a small fireball at his head, which he ducked under and quickly ran out of the tent.
Standing outside with clenched fists, his temper starting to show, Zuko thought, 'What the hell am I even doing? Seriously, Zuko, out of all the insane ideas you could come up with, this is the most inane one you could think of'. He started pacing back and forth in the clearing, trying to calm himself down. 'Why am I even doing this?..' A flash of Azula's tear-stricken face went through his head, which instantly calmed him down. 'No, I have to go into this level-headed; I can't have her anger me or else it will never work.' He ran a hand through his hair, looking at the entrance of the tent only made him take a deep breath before cautiously approaching the entrance.
Standing in the threshold, he saw her carefully examining the bandage over the wound, picking at it. The lack of red stains on her fingers reassured him that she hadn't started bleeding again.
She thought she told him to leave; the venom never left her voice as she turned her head to him, clenching her fists and responding, "You did." He glared back at her.
"Then why can I still see you ugly scarred face, or do you want a matching set!"
Glaring harder at her, his scar has always been a touchy subject to him but recently he started to look at it as badge of honour, a sign off him standing up for what was right. He walked into the tent.
"Before you decide to attack me again, let me give you your ultimatum," he crouched before her. "You and I are alone on this island, which means if anything happens to me and the Avatar group finds out, you will face a fate worse than death." Her sharp glare could have cut diamonds with how angry she was. "Meaning you will either be left on this island to starve to death or be shoved in a freezer after they win the war. So use that smart head of yours and let your brother look at your bandages." A deadly stare-down occurred between the two for a few moments, neither backing down until Azula looked away and glared at the floor in defeat.
Seeing her look away, he moved to her side and began looking at the bandages, tying them up properly this time. Her sitting up made his job so much easier than when she had been passed out.
"I caterised your wound" Swirling her head to glare at him again.
"We're in the middle of nowhere and I don't want your wound to get infected" He explained
"Oh, and whose fault is that with your oh-so-genius plan of kidnapping me?" she sarcastically asked in anger, narrowing her eyes at him.
"I'm not sorry that I kidnapped you, Azula, nor do I regret it, but I won't let you die in the middle of nowhere because of an infected wound."
"Tsk, as if you care whether I die or not" she looked out the tent.
The response made him sit down with his legs crossed, as he pondered it in thought; a moment of silence passed between them before he finally spoke.
"You may find this unbelievable... but I do care if something had happened to you."
She scoffs. "Yes, that is unbelievable."
"I know you must think that I hate you, Azula...and sometimes, I think I do too."
"Isn't that surprising?" she remarked sardonically.
"Would you let me finish?" His eyebrow twitched in annoyance.
"Please, proceed."
Squinting his eyes at her in annoyance, he sighed, "And yes, I was jealous of your talent."
"obviously"
He didn't let her comments stop him this time. "I felt like a failure everytime I had to perform before father..."
"understatement of the year, but whatever"
"...but even under those circumstances, I was still impressed with how quickly you mastered the Fire-bending arts," looking at him with surprise, not expecting the compliment, but saw him looking down, still deep in thought.
"I had the utmost respect for you...my little sister, so young yet so talented...but every time you would rub it in my face about how much better you were, it would hurt...but that gave me the motivation to work harder...you were my measuring stick, even after all these years." He looked up at her and softly smiled.
Her face remained stricken with shock, this was impossible, this had to be a trick, yes Zuko would never admit to all these things, he's too proud, this must be all part of a plan. Narrowing her eyes, yes it must be.
"If you think I would believe your insane ramblings for one second, you're sorely mistaken; you think this plan of yours will actually work and you can turn me against the Fire Nation - then you must be a bigger fool than I thought!"
His eyes widened a bit, but quickly went back to normal; lowering his head, he bit the inside of his cheek, slowly standing up and walking to the entrance of the tent. He stopped short of actually exiting it.
"I know our relationship has always been complicated, Azula...There was never an ounce of trust between us; we always looked at each other with suspicion. So, yes, there was a plan. Sozin's Comet will arrive in thirteen days. I know I will face you in our final battle, and when I do…I don't want our battle to be fought by anger and hate. I want to fight you at your best—with honor. A set of changed clothes are in the sack next to you." With that, he walked out, and gone into the woods.
XXXXX XXXXX XXXXX
Late afternoon...
Returning from his tor- I mean training, Aang and Toph walked into the front yard to see Katara waiting on them with the rest of the gang sitting behind her on the stairs.
"Good we're all here...now have anyone seen Zuko" she asked
Toph walked past Katara but stopped when she heard the question and turned to Aang with a raised eyebrow. "You haven't told them?"
"Tell us what?" Katara asked them with a raised eyebrow.
"...erh...well, you see..." Aang started sweating.
...After explaining their little adventure and Zuko's whereabouts, but leaving Azula's breakdown out of it.
"HE DID WHAT?!" Katara exclaimed. "And he's where?!" Sokka
"What is he thinking! The comet is in 13 days, is he crazy!" Katara exasperated over the new information.
"More importantly! whose gonna teach Aang while he's gone!" Sokka exclaimed in distress.
"Don't worry, Sokka," Toph said as she sat down next to him, "Zuko asked me to keep an eye on his training."
"Well that's great Toph, but you're a earth bending" Sokka deadpanned
"Wow who would've thought, I must be blind and have memory loss" she scoffed" I'll just be looking at his forms Sokka, Aang showed me what they were working on and I'll just have him master it, until he can do them in his sleep"
Aang had flashbacks to the very first time he started training under Toph, and let out a short terrified scream of "AAHH!" gaining everyone's attention, especially Toph's evil smirk.
"What's wrong with you?" Katara asked, confused.
"Nothing" Aang answered quickly and tried to composed himself.
"This is still very irresponsible of Zuko to abandon Aang in the middle of his training to look after his sister on a remote island, and I have the brains to go find him to give him a piece of my mind." - Katara finished very annoyed.
"Aang can you give anymore information on why he's doing this"
"No can do, Sokka," Aang said, shaking his head. "Zuko asked me to keep quiet about it."
"Ugh"
A hand laid on his shoulder, Suki finally joined the conversation.
"Maybe, it's something that's important to him."
"What's more important than teaching the Avatar?" he turned to her, to which she shrugged and responded.
"Family?.."
"Right...well, if Zuko wants to run off on some remote island with his sister, who am I to stand in his way?" Sokka threw his hands up in exasperation.
"Well, I still don't like it; his sister is the reason he betrayed my trust the first time, so who knows what she could be planting in his head? "Katara exclaimed, still annoyed.
Toph rolled her eyes and decided it wasn't worth responding to her accusation; she really didn't need Katara being a worrywart right now, and honestly, she kind of felt sorry for Azula during her episode - she had never felt such intense bitter emotions coming from a person before, that poor girl needed all the help in the world at the moment.