Gladiator

by Seyary-Minamoto

In a world where the Avatar wasn't found, the Fire Nation took over two nations and they strive to overcome the last one. Water Tribe warrior Sokka seeks to fight for his people's rights, but he's captured by his enemies. His life is no longer in his hands as he fights as a Gladiator, and his fate will eventually depend on the Fire Nation Princess, who needs him for her own ends...

383. Chapter 383: Negotiations Compromise 5

Negotiations and Compromise

5

"Things were… tense, if seemingly peaceful, for some time after the war meeting," Azula continued, eyes downcast as she fixed them upon her cup. "Song and Rei worked to oversee repairs in my room and… at one point, when they were gone, my father paid me a visit. Whether you can believe it or not… he apologized for his actions, from the previous day, when he forced me into the war meeting and humiliated me as he did."

"That… does sound hard to believe," Sokka frowned. Azula shrugged.

"I couldn't give it much credit yet. At one point, it slipped out of me to call him father by sheer instinct and I backtracked… he told me I didn't need to mind that order of his anymore. Even so… I tried not to do it often. It… it didn't feel like I should let myself think of him as my parent, if just because I wanted there to still be distance between us. I… I didn't want to deal with the pain of being disappointed by him all over again. Even so, he… he changed, after that day. Even if he didn't truly amend the error of his ways? He… he still did better. In retrospect… I do think his change was genuine, even if I wasn't sure at first. He never… never regressed into the punishing monster he had been thus far. And after what happened last night, well…"

Her breath hitched, but she shook her head. The tears that threatened to slip from her eyes were quickly brushed away with her fingertips.

"Never mind that. I… well, when he paid me that visit, he… he offered to approve a divorce for me and Zhao."

"What?" Sokka gasped: he stared at her questioningly, and she shrugged.

"Never really did happen… he died before coming back, after all," Azula said. Sokka grimaced. "But… that he brought it up at all caught me by surprise. It… it didn't seem possible, it was too good to be true, but… it was. My father was genuinely sorry for what he had done… to the point of saying that nothing I'd done truly warranted the pain he had inflicted upon me. Nothing."

"Not even loving a bastard like me?" Sokka asked. Azula shrugged.

"He… he was twisted, there's no denying that," Azula said. "You… terrified him. Just so, a part of him definitely admired you, more so after you stood up to him as you did. It was easy enough, before you raised an army that could defy him, to dismiss my attachment to you as a mere fickle weakness… as the need of a foolish girl to feel loved when that mattered little, if at all, to someone like my father. When you proved to be that much of a daunting leader… I think it broke something in him that he probably never truly understood. The Avatar, his son… both were coming for him, for all he knew, and yet the only one he acknowledged as a genuine hazard, the one he saw as… as better than himself, in the end, was you."

Sokka swallowed hard. Azula sighed, eyeing him earnestly.

"I know it's hard to believe, but…"

"Would be harder if it weren't for… those final moments. How you convinced him," Sokka said. Azula gritted her teeth. "He was stubborn, sure, but… that wasn't the same rage from the last fight in the Dome. The way he screamed for my death then, the way he yelled at you, it… it had nothing in common with how he talked to you last night. I wasn't about to trust him, no matter what, but… the difference was there. I just… don't really know how or why it came about. Was it really just because I challenged him, and he couldn't truly beat me?"

"I don't know," Azula sighed. "I think some part of him had to admire you for what you were capable of. You know, obviously you do, that nobody in history has ever achieved what you did. You've set the world free, Sokka… you could've become a conqueror, a tyrant, controlling every nation if you cared to. I said as much earlier, in the meeting… because it's true. And yet… that's not what you chose to do. Maybe… in having that much power at your fingertips, but using it without letting it control you, you showed my father something he never anticipated he'd find. Maybe I'm just being wishful… but maybe a part of him wished he could've done for my mother what you were doing for me."

Sokka grimaced. Azula sighed, sinking in her seat and shaking her head.

"Either way… I returned to my room after a few days, once things were patched up, to a fault. Mai and Ty Lee dropped by to visit… a few days later, my father returned, when I was a few weeks away from delivering Hotaru, and he didn't ask a single question about the war, or… or anything like that. Instead… he talked about parenthood. About his own failings as a father when Zuko and I were young… about the challenges I'd face, too. He… well, this might not sit well with you, but…"

Azula sniffed, shaking her head and closing her eyes. Her throat burned as she spoke anew.

"He told me… that as soon as he held me, I did… e-exactly what Hotaru keeps doing to you."

"What?" Sokka frowned. A moment later, his eyes widened with realization. "You… you grabbed his beard?"

"Seems like it," Azula said, wiping the tears again. "W-when I saw her doing it to you the first time, it… it brought that back. Of course, you'll be a million times the father he was, but…"

Despite himself, Sokka reached over and wrapped his arms around Azula. She sniffed, sobbing in his chest as the grief poured out of her, no matter if she wished to restrain it. He rubbed her back kindly, reassuring her, as Azula's chest heaved against him.

"I'm… I'm sorry, Azula," Sokka whispered. "I'm sorry it turned out as it did. I… I don't really know what our future would've looked like, if he were still alive, but…"

"I-I don't either… m-maybe it's better this way, for the world at large, but…" she sobbed. "I wish I… I could care less. I wish I could stop grieving over him, h-he… he didn't deserve this much. Not even at his best was he… was he that good a father, and yet…"

Sokka sighed, shaking his head as he held her snugly. The undeserved comfort urged Azula to push out of his arms… but she didn't dare. For now, she let him hold her… for the next stages of their story might just convince him to let her go for good.

"After… after all that, Rei and Song… started preparations for Hotaru's birth," Azula said, forcing herself to continue, or else she'd weep in his arms forever. Sokka nodded. "Song started feeding me… disgusting things."

"Disgusting?" Sokka grimaced. Azula laughed a little, if tearfully still.

"I don't even know… it tasted like hell, the components were awful, but she said it'd help make the birth smoother," she said. "It revolted me, but I put up with it anyway. They… built this birthing station, a wooden contraption with a cloth that hung over it. I… had to grab onto that when I was delivering, it's how it's done, so…"

"Damn," Sokka blinked blankly. "That sounds… surreal to so much as think of. Must have been really painful, too… well, I know it was."

"You saw me," Azula smiled a little. Sokka nodded. "Well… I suppose I should share disturbing news about the beginnings of Hotaru's existence, before we get to that. If I've suffered with this knowledge, you deserve to endure it too."

"Heh? Say what?" Sokka blinked blankly as Azula pulled back, eyes red, but with a slight smile upon her face.

"I… went to the bathroom, at one point. Something weird leaked out of me, I panicked, called Song… she said it was probably not something urgent, even though I felt… weird. She had predicted that the baby should be a week or two away still… but what she thought might have happened, the drop of something called the… mucus plug? Well, it's supposed to herald the start of the delivery process."

"Oh… but, then, Hotaru was early?" Sokka frowned. To his surprise, Azula shook her head.

"That's the story we gave, but it's not true. She's… a timely little princess," Azula smiled, fondly. "Born just when she was supposed to… which, uh, implied something that I didn't want to accept, at first. You see… I asked Song when, exactly, she was calculating the conception date. She was taking for granted that it had been at some point on the Barge, we slept together enough times back then, it would've made sense… right?"

"Right…" Sokka blinked blankly: Azula's cheeks flushed. "What… what is it?"

"Well… once I revealed something a little embarrassing, it became apparent that Hotaru might just arrive sooner than what she was calculating. As in, on the very day when I lost the plug," she smiled awkwardly. Sokka frowned. "The embarrassing thing being, uh… that we had sex in prison."

Sokka's eyes widened as plates. Azula offered him the most awkward grin possible.

"S-so… there's no certainty about it, I won't say there is, but that… that appears to be when we conceived our baby."

"Prison…" he repeated, jaw dropping. "We…! B-but…! Hell, maybe she was a little early! It doesn't have to have been…! Shit, what the…? Crap, and you told Song about this?"

"And Rei," Azula confessed: Sokka squealed, cheeks flushing, and she dropped her head against his chest, shoulders shaking with laughter. "I'm sorry, it might be cruel to inflict that knowledge on you after all, but…"

"N-no, I mean… all things considered, it's… better than other things you've got to talk about, I bet?" Sokka grimaced, covering his mouth with a hand. "Fuck. Of all times… Azula, we…! We slept together a million times and the one time we make a baby, it's…!"

"I know," Azula said, with a dry grin. Sokka yelped, dropping heavily on the couch.

"We… will never tell her that, will we?" he said.

"I'm not exactly keen on ruining her life by making her aware of her chaotic beginnings, much less her parents' reckless sex life, so… I'd rather not," Azula said. Sokka breathed out slowly.

"And the less people know, the better, too…"

"Well. I'm not going to be too shocked if a certain sneaky someone ever lets it slip to Rui Shi…"

"I'll talk to her," Sokka pouted, flustered still. Azula smiled at him.

"You sure? You don't sound nearly as intimidating as usual, General Sokka…"

He jolted upon hearing her use his title that way. He raised an eyebrow, and she stared at him right back.

"Sorry. It just… hits different when you're the one who says it," he smiled a little. "I kind of assumed you'd ridicule that title, to be honest… it felt so out of place and pretentious to me, heh."

"Ridicule?" Azula repeated, smiling. "I mean… if things work out, I might just use it to tease you here and there, but it's not ridiculous at all. If anything, it might fall short considering what kind of leader you turned out to be. You deserve a bolder title still."

"U-uh, yeah, that's not what I expected you to say…" Sokka admitted, eyeing her in surprise. Azula shrugged.

"We're full of surprises, you and I. Including conceiving babies in prison," she said. Sokka snorted.

"Next one will be conceived in more reasonable circumstances, I'm sure," he said. Azula smiled.

"That's giving us too much credit. For all we know, we might just be…"

She froze when she reasoned with what he'd said. It wasn't only that he had casually mentioned another potential child… but that he would want more, still, when he hadn't heard her whole story yet, even if he no doubt could guess at much of it by now. Azula glanced at him with uncertainty, but found no remorse, no restraint, in his clear blue eyes.

"Next one?" she repeated. He shrugged.

"If we had another one…" he said, almost shyly. "Maybe we won't, but… I figured it's not impossible, right? If… if we wanted to try again, maybe intentionally, rather than accidentally…"

Azula's heart pounded in her chest. She reached for his hand again, pulling closer to press her lips to his cheek. Sokka's hand rose, cupping her jaw as he turned his head, trapping her lips between his own. Azula closed her eyes, accepting his boldness fully, embracing it without pulling back anew. The story wasn't over still, but…

"I… will need more time," she said against his lips. He hummed. "Still feels like… I'm not entirely back to my right body after the first one, I mean."

"Right," Sokka smiled. "Whenever you're ready."

Azula nodded before hugging him tightly. He buried his face in her hair, and Azula sighed.

"You wish… you could've been here for it all, don't you?" she asked. He hummed.

"You know it," he whispered. "I… I keep wondering what you might have looked like, you know…"

"Awful," Azula said. Sokka snorted and rolled his eyes.

"That's not within your possibilities, Azula, sorry to say…"

"Sokka…"

"You can be just about anything you want, woman, but you can't be awful-looking, incompetent or stupid…!"

"I've been pretty stupid often, I'll have you know," Azula laughed, and he chuckled along with her before kissing her brow.

"Whatever… I'm sure you just couldn't tell you were beautiful, as usual," he said. She sighed, holding onto him tightly. "I wish I could've just been… the pain in the ass of a husband who never leaves his wife alone when she's pregnant."

"Hmm. It sounds idyllic now, but I bet I'd have been throwing pillows at you before long," she smiled. Sokka chuckled.

"Pillow fights can be fun…"

"No kidding, silly," she said, reaching up and kissing his cheek. "If… if all goes well, between us, in the days ahead, you… you won't have to wonder about any of that, okay?"

"Then… you'd do it again?" Sokka asked, cupping her face. Azula swallowed hard and nodded, smiling a little.

"There were many inconveniences, but I… I love being your child's mother," she whispered. His heartfelt smile spread wider still. "Knowing she was growing within me, that I would get to know her, once she was born, it… it was such an exciting idea. It outright kept me alive when it seemed like nothing else would, so… I want to know, too, what it would be like to live that by your side. Even if you do annoy me…"

"I always do," Sokka scoffed. Azula laughed, tears blinking in her eyes. "You're used to it."

"I want to be used to it again," she said, turning her face into his hand. "In a sense… I took for granted that I'd never lose you. Made it easier to be annoyed by anything you did…"

"Well, say what you will, but on that particular spiritual connection… you sounded quite cross with me," Sokka smiled. Azula snorted, laughing and shaking her head.

"The pain was blinding. I… I was scared, I didn't know if I'd mess it up, if Hotaru would be fine, if I would survive…" she explained. "All of it came to a head and I just… exploded a little, when we connected. I was already pushing, Mai and Ty Lee had come by for support, but Song only worked with Mai while Ty Lee and Rei waited outside. My father… he was informed that I was about to give birth. Song did it herself. And he just… went to the temple and prayed, apparently."

"Heh," Sokka said. "At least that should have been reassuring… a little bit, anyway. He didn't want to be there right away…"

Azula nodded.

"I'd often tried to… to think up plans and ideas on how to get Hotaru to safety after she was born. The girls, they tried to help me, but nothing solid and feasible came up. There were always loose ends, I'd never be able to protect everyone and everything I wanted to," Azula explained. "The main thing I used to have in mind, back in the day, was… was sending Hotaru, Rei and Song to you, in the South Pole. Once I confirmed that you weren't there anymore… well, that particular train of thought went down the drain. I had no real plans, no way of protecting Hotaru anymore… nothing but the hopes that my father's apparent mercy would last longer than it had thus far. So, well... I simply focused on delivering Hotaru, and it was overwhelming. You know just how much…"

"I felt it along with you," Sokka nodded, cheeks flushed. Azula smiled.

"Must have been awful… experiencing ghostly labor pains when you're a man."

"You girls really have one hell of an endurance, is all I'll say…"

"Thanks for noticing," Azula smirked. He chuckled. "Either way… it didn't last as long as I feared it might. Song and Mai's help, your encouragement… And the knowledge that I'd finally get to meet Hotaru, all of it drew together and compelled me to push to the end. I'd even scolded her before she was born, telling her to stay put, safe and sound, in my womb… but by then, it was clear that I had to do it. So… I did. And when she cried for the first time, I… I think my world changed forever."

Sokka smiled warmly as Azula sighed, a tenderness in her voice and gaze as she recalled those first moments.

"I managed to tell you… that I'd call her Hotaru, indeed," she said. "It was for that brief window that we could speak, but I told you so anyway and… and I hoped you'd have heard it. Then, I just… just had to hold her, recover, care for her. Song kept telling me what to do, how to go about each thing, Mai helped too… Rei came in after a while, and she met her baby sister. She was so excited about it, too…"

"I can imagine…" Sokka smiled. "It… it didn't bother her, then, that the baby wasn't Zhao's?"

"Oh. She nearly laughed in my face when I brought that up," Azula chuckled. Sokka raised his eyebrows. "Seems like, as soon as she learned about our relationship… she came to that conclusion on her own. It never bothered her one bit."

"Heh. Good, then," Sokka grinned. "She really is a good kid."

"Both of them are," Azula smiled, though she raised her gaze towards him. "Just… just so you know, you don't need to rush into building a bond with Rei, even if I think it won't be hard for you to do it. Don't… don't feel the need to fill some void, or to be a step-father or… anything like that. Just be yourself. You two will probably have a great time talking each other's ears off about science and such… but if you never truly feel comfortable thinking of her as your daughter, it's alright. I know that kind of bond isn't something you can or should force… and the last thing I want is for either of you to feel out of place in our family."

"Our family," Sokka closed his eyes, a blissful grin on his face. "I like the sound of that."

Azula smiled too, tenderly, and Sokka raised her chin to kiss her softly.

"Thank you," he whispered, startling her. "I know how hard everything was for you… I'm glad you didn't face it alone in the end, even if I wish I'd been there every step of the way. But… thank you for not giving up. For doing your very best for our daughter, even when it could've been so much easier to surrender… more so when things around you seemed to fall apart. I know you might not feel too strong as of late, but… most people would have crumbled under that kind of pressure. Maybe you think you could've done better, knowing you, surely you do, but… that you carried that pregnancy to term when you had everything against you sounds like an even more epic feat than leading armies into battle."

"I don't know about that…" Azula sighed, pressing her brow to his. "You don't have to be so grateful, I… I don't feel that strong. I don't…"

"You can't see your own virtues… it's been that way for a long time," Sokka smiled. "But you're incredible, Azula. I wish you'd never been in pain at all, but… that you endured it all and you're still here, in my arms now, is… is a miracle, if you ask me."

"Sometimes it does feel like one… yes," Azula admitted, placing her head on his chest. Sokka kissed the top of her head.

"How… did you avoid him doing anything to Hotaru, though?" Sokka asked. Azula bit her lip. "He had to be told she had been born safely…"

"We fed him the story that… she needed to be quarantined, because she had been born early," Azula said. "Of course, as far as he could tell, she had been… about a month and a half early, even though that wasn't the case. But… truthfully, I think he tried to see her. It was about… I don't know, an hour, maybe two, after she was born. I felt… like someone was watching us, and when I glanced at the door, it was ajar. He was standing there… I froze up, and then he just bowed his head at me and left."

"He…" Sokka frowned. Azula swallowed hard. "Huh. He… chose to do nothing, this time. He must have suspected…"

"He knew, all along, just as Zhao did…" Azula sighed. "He had no way of confirming it until Hotaru was born, of course, but… once she was born, he didn't bother confirming it anyway. It's like he… he chose to step aside, knowing that, if he didn't, he'd just hurt me again. If… if everything else didn't convince me that he no longer meant me harm, that certainly pushed me towards thinking so."

"Well… good on him, not giving you more grief than he already had," Sokka said, fingers slipping through her hair. Azula nodded.

"I… I told the others Hotaru's name. They liked it," she said. "I fed her for the first time once most of them fell asleep… I thanked Song, too, for everything she'd done. She was exhausted… she surely still is. She deserves about three years of taking a break from all kinds of work, if you ask me…"

"Gotta ask her, I think," Sokka smiled. "I have the feeling she'll refuse to do that."

"Right. She has no sense, much like you," Azula sighed. Sokka chuckled. "The first month, then… it went by quickly, faster than I realized. She was a baby, so… typical baby things happened. She cried at random, woke me when I was asleep… she found amusement in things that are so mundane and meaningless to us as grown-ups. Her eyes… she always looked like she was thinking about something, and I kept wondering what it might be, heh. It was a really… really smooth month, all around. But… all such things had to come to an end."

"I suppose," Sokka sighed. Azula gritted her teeth.

"He summoned me again. Even though I could've declined… I didn't dare risk it. Besides… I'd already condemned myself, as far as I could tell, by aiding him in the war meeting. Whatever he had in mind now… it was but a continuation of what I'd already started. So… I went to talk to him, and he told me the situation was only getting worse, of course. You… you'd taken War Minister Qin as your prisoner by then. I didn't fully direct them to the Northern Air Temple, in the war meeting… it was my father who thought about the bombs you never did finish. He asked me, and I confirmed… the ones you'd used in the Dome were the Mechanist's doing. I should've shut my mouth, I knew, but…"

"He would have figured it out even if you had. Wasn't like I was subtle when I set that place on fire," Sokka said. Azula shrugged.

"Either way… I burden myself with responsibility for that one, too. My father… he didn't reveal any of this right away. He wanted me to make a decision… he said he'd respect it. As much as I wanted to believe he had changed, I… I would've been a fool to assume he would stay true to his word, but…"

"What kind of decision?" Sokka asked. Azula sighed, closing her eyes.

"The decision of joining him in fighting against you… or not."

Sokka frowned, lowering his gaze. Azula's face was once again darkened by the shadows of her burdens, the guilt she wouldn't shake off regardless of the ultimate outcome of this conversation.

"If I had said no, I figured… the minute things grew complicated, he'd come after me, after Hotaru, threaten me into compliance and subservience. Maybe he'd grow even more menacing towards Xin Long, threaten not to feed him anymore, I had no idea…" Azula said, shaking her head. "And if I agreed… it meant betraying you. Even if I'd know what you were doing, I wouldn't be able to help you get it done. I knew that taking a single false step, showing any signs that I was ideologically aligned with you, would read to him as the ultimate betrayal and he'd punish me for it. So… either choice was far more complex than he wanted to let on. He pretended otherwise, of course he did, but…"

"Did he say there would be no consequences, if you didn't join him?" Sokka asked. Azula nodded.

"I'd just… remain in the dark about whatever was going on, forevermore, I guess," she whispered. "He wasn't going to trust me with information unless he believed I was on his side. So…"

"So… you were," Sokka finished. Azula sighed, covering her face with her hands.

"I told him… I'd always chosen the Fire Nation over you," she said: the words didn't hurt any less when she spoke them, no matter if Sokka knew as much already. "That I'd do it again. On some measure… I believed I deserved it. After everything I'd done, condemning the Northern Water Tribe as I had, I… I didn't think I should have been forgiven at all. From the moment I did that… I thought my life was forfeit. I believed in you, I was certain that you'd win… but I couldn't fathom ever standing by your side as you did it. Because… I'd failed you. In a million ways, I'd failed you. I didn't save your tribe, I couldn't stop my father from sending ships there, I gave up the Northern Water Tribe, the Northern Air Temple… I'd betrayed you on a personal level too, by marrying Zhao. I know, yes, you might just say none of that matters to you, but it mattered to me. In my eyes… it meant I was as despicable as someone like my uncle, like my father, like Jeong Jeong…"

Sokka sighed. He watched her with uncertainty: her remorse was clear, and he knew exactly where it had led her.

"You… believed the only atonement you'd find would be in death," Sokka finished. Azula shuddered. "And you weren't likelier to come across it than… than by fighting against my forces."

"The world you wanted to build… someone who had sentenced so many people to their deaths, be it by inaction or by unforgivable mistakes, didn't deserve to live in it," Azula said, gritting her teeth. "The one choice I could see… was to stick with my father's side, stand with him, save and protect as many Fire Nation citizens as I possibly could… and then die, whenever you and your forces arrived. Once we were out of the way, him and I… the Fire Nation might as well have wound up in Zuko's hands, and things could change then. Hotaru… she was innocent of all my sins. I bloodied and dirtied my hands… all be it to ensure that the world you'd build was one she could survive in. So… I had to make the right choices to keep her safe, keep her alive, and see to it that she'd find her way to you one day. By that point, that was the only thing I could tell myself in order to make a choice, one way or another."

"Was he thrilled that he'd have you on his side?" Sokka asked. "He better have been. He had to know he didn't stand a chance without you."

Azula raised a confused gaze at him. Sokka raised an eyebrow.

"You don't think so?" he asked.

"Well, it's not that I think he could have… more like, I never thought I made that much of a difference," she said. Sokka scoffed.

"If I hadn't found you in that battlefield yesterday, Azula… I don't know what would have happened, in the end," he said. She shivered. "You made all the difference. You think… that I'm inherently good, that I always made the right choices? Not a chance. If you hadn't been there, if I hadn't clashed against you… I might just have been blinded by rage more often than you think. I mean, I was, when… when I came across Zhao."

Azula glanced at him with uncertainty. He sighed heavily.

"I suppose… you made your choice," he said. Azula nodded.

"He asked me to help him find a new weapons' supplier… and a new War Minister," Azula said. Sokka hummed. "The Mad Alchemist was the obvious option that sprang to mind…"

"Those bomb launchers were his doing, then?" Sokka asked. Azula nodded. "And I guess you found gas supplies elsewhere…"

"He had a source near his estate, apparently," Azula said. "As for Aonu… I figured I'd be better off with an ally I could trust who could think for himself. I didn't really want to burden him with being part of this without understanding what it entailed, but… he had always wanted to be acknowledged by the Fire Nation. Hence… why I thought of him. He accepted, and… and that was that. In my father's eyes, I… I was Crown Princess anew. He no longer shunned me, he brought me back to the war meetings on a permanent capacity, again by his right side… he listened to me, though of course it's not like everything was perfect, but…"

"I guess he minded his words more?" Sokka asked. Azula shrugged.

"Mostly. He didn't take too well to my choice in Aonu, at first. He… seemed concerned about the nature of my association with him," Azula said, with a dry grin. Sokka scowled. "I told him quite boldly that, regardless of what he thought, I didn't sleep around with just about any guy who looked my way. It… probably shouldn't have been as satisfying to see him shrink when I said that, but it was."

"Piece of shit," Sokka scoffed. Azula smiled.

"I guess he never really did get over the fact that I'd chosen you myself," she whispered. "That I wanted you, and that I'd defied his every expectation to be with you. That, even then, my choice was being proven correct considering the potential and power you proved to hold…"

"Still… I'd punch him for that one if I could," Sokka said, shaking his head. "And saying that, after the deal with Zhao, too… he really didn't have much sense in his head, did he? Did he think you were a child still, a reckless teenager who was rushing into relationships thoughtlessly?"

"Beats me what he thought… but maybe he did see me as a child all along," Azula said, with a shrug. "Either way… that was the start of my downwards spiral, I suppose. And now… I guess I ought to learn what my heinous choices resulted in. Both in the Air Temple, and in the Water Tribe."

Sokka nodded, running a hand over his hair.

"The Air Temple could've been much worse… though it wasn't exactly a fun time either," Sokka admitted. "I decided to find the Mechanist for support with more hot-air balloons, right after I realized that we had to go to the Northern Water Tribe. Piandao went south, to meet a group that was establishing a trade route between Omashu and Ba Sing Se… he returned with your mother. She had been with the trade group, hoping to go to Ba Sing Se as soon as it was safe. But anyway, I took Aang, Katara and your guards on that mission to the Northern Air Temple. Didn't make much sense to take more people, I thought… until we got there and we found airships hovering right by the building. I figured we'd have to be stealthy… we entered through the garage, and we found the refugees had been locked there, actually, so that they wouldn't cause trouble while they were fueling the new weapons.

"Once we got some idea of what the situation was… well, I started planning how to fight back with your guards and the refugees who were willing to help. In the end, Tai Wei and a few others drove some remaining tanks in the garage up the side of the mountain, they caught War Minister Qin's forces by surprise by doing that… meanwhile, those of us in the garage caused a ruckus, made it so some of Qin's soldiers would rush in the garage to think we were gone… they wound up going over the side of the mountain once we ambushed them. With that, the way was clear… and we went upstairs to find Qin and his goons in a courtyard. It was a violent battle at first, but very fast. They weren't expecting enemy firebenders, it confused them… and once we'd reduced everyone in land, I had the tanks shoot their harpoons into the baskets of the airships. We kept them locked into the temple that way… and that's how we seized those resources. Another airship showed up shortly afterwards, and I made it so that we'd test the weapon by attacking it and taking it down."

"That… you could do it that fast?" Azula asked, eyes wide. Sokka nodded.

"The Mechanist's people knew exactly how the weapon worked, they'd built it, after all. So… yeah. We filled the weapons of our stolen airships again before leaving, and I had Aang set the gas reserve on fire. All Fire Nation soldiers were left tied up and helpless, awaiting rescue… except, of course, War Minister Qin."

"Who you took with you to Ba Sing Se," Azula finished. Sokka nodded.

"Rui Shi and I took him to one of the temple's rooms beforehand, for a talk," Sokka said. "He… told me a lot of what you've explained so far, but obviously, not in detail. He didn't know as much about you as I wish he had… he mentioned Renkai, that's when Rui Shi told me he was an ally rather than a foe. He also talked about Rei, and about this 'Wen' midwife… Rui Shi realized it was Song right away, as soon as Qin said she was Lo and Li's niece. It made sense, so… I hoped he was right. But the things Qin told me… they angered me beyond belief. That Zhao had attacked you… I saw red for it. If that hadn't happened… I might have been more level-headed when I met him. I couldn't be."

"I understand," Azula sighed. Sokka gritted his teeth.

"It was a lot to take back then. I won't say it's easy now, but… that I'm hearing this from you definitely helps," he said. "Not knowing if I'd ever get to see you again, to be near you… fearing that your father might get you killed, that he might kill you himself if he had that much of a leave of his senses? It was driving me mad with rage and grief. So… I was in a foul mood for a while. Didn't help to come back to Ba Sing Se… to find that Jeong Jeong somehow had conscripted your brother into the White Lotus."

"What?" Azula frowned. Sokka nodded.

"And he did it behind my back, too," Sokka said. "Funny how he made that move the minute I wasn't around to tell Zuko not to do anything stupid. Anorak theorized… he did it because he and I were growing friendly enough that Jeong Jeong might have thought his influence on important members of the army was weakening. Either way, Zuko explained himself later, he wanted to be a voice in my favor inside the White Lotus, alongside Piandao's… he promised he wouldn't just be a subservient idiot under Jeong Jeong's control. Apparently, Iroh didn't encourage him to join…"

"That so?" Azula said, skeptically. "Guess he had enough sense to not want Zuko to follow on his rotten footsteps…"

"Seems like it," Sokka said. "Piandao wasn't pleased for it either… and neither was your mother. She's the one who told me, I wasn't expecting to come across her when I came back to the city… and you're making a funny face."

"Sorry. Sorry," Azula said, grimacing and covering her face with her hands. "You can talk about anything and anyone and it's fine but the minute you say she… did anything, or talked to you or… I don't know! It just makes my mind… fuzzy. Like… like I can't really fathom that particular thing happening, out of everything that you've said."

"Easier to believe that I fought a war all across the world and that I won it than it is to think I found your mother?" Sokka smiled. Azula eyed him guiltily before nodding, and he laughed. "Come on…"

"It's… it's surreal, okay? It will keep feeling surreal even if all your friends and Zuko tell me all about what she was like these days, too, and… my mind won't accept it until I see it. Hell, it might not accept it even if I do," Azula said, shaking her head. "Anyway! Do go on, do go on, don't mind me…"

Sokka smiled, shaking his head and reaching over to pat hers, gently.

"Next part's probably going to feel even more surreal, then… because I asked to speak with her one morning," Sokka said. Azula pouted slightly.

"I mean… that's not something that should be surreal, I know you were around her…"

"It was the day when you gave birth to Hotaru."

Azula tensed up. All her insecure demeanor faded as she glanced at him in confusion… and Sokka smiled.

"I was talking to her because… well, War Minister Qin saw her, when we brought him in. He lost his mind, freaked out about her, but the guards took him away fast enough. Later? He kept saying that, if we turned her in to the Fire Lord, the war would surely end. That Ozai absolutely would surrender as long as we did that… and of course, nobody really believed him. I didn't. But even so… I knew Ursa wanted to go back to him, no matter how much she resented him. I asked her opinion… and she refused to go home."

"Well. That adds up," Azula smiled awkwardly. "I mean, if they let her go to the swamp whenever she cared to, it sounds like she could've returned…"

"I suppose she could have tried, but back then her mind was too clouded," Sokka said. "By that point… it was clearer, and she was all too wrathful over what Ozai had done to you and Zuko to want to go to him just yet. She… I think she believed she'd see him again, after all was said and done, provided he… survived."

Azula frowned. Sokka eyed her remorsefully, and she sighed.

"Well… that's a shame," she whispered. "Guess this way she won't want to go home at all."

"Maybe," Sokka said. "At any rate, though, our conversation went incomplete because I started experiencing second-hand labor pains…"

"Oh. Right in front of her?" Azula asked, smiling awkwardly at him. Sokka grimaced.

"It was… confusing. She kept noticing I was not alright. But then I realized… well, it was a weird sort of pain. It didn't feel like it was mine, it felt like it was yours instead. And… it had been around nine months since we'd parted ways, so… I put two and two together quickly enough and realized Hotaru was about to be born. So… believe it or not? Your mother helped me meditate through that pain… all be it so I could harness the pain's power and reach you."

"What? She… she helped you reach me with the spiritual connection?" Azula's eyes widened. "Really?"

"She did," Sokka smiled. "Once I came back to myself… she asked if you were okay. We ended up crying like idiots when I told her you were fine… that she had a granddaughter named Hotaru, too."

"She was… glad for it," Azula said, a small smile spreading over her face. "She… she didn't think I'd fuck it up?"

"If she did, she never said as much to me. Considering how guilty she feels about her own mistakes? Safe to say she assumes you could never be a worse mother than she was to you," Sokka said. Azula bit her lip. "Again… stuff for you to think about and dwell upon and then figure out once you're ready. But… she was really happy that you made it through. And to be a grandmother again, even if it was for the third time, technically, but…"

"I guess it was," Azula smiled. "She didn't find out about Mari and Zi as it was happening, though…"

"Nope," Sokka said. "So… Zuko found us then, he had no idea what had happened at first, but then I told him. The people closest to me… well, they joined me in a small, impromptu celebration over Hotaru's birth. Even if we were so far away, I… I was so happy, Azula. I was so relieved you were fine that even though I wanted to be there… I just found joy in knowing you'd made it through, and that our little one was alive and safe with you. Otherwise… well, I know I would've felt it. But I just felt your happiness, your relief, and… and that was enough."

Azula clasped his hand again. He offered her a tender smile… but it faded from his face quickly before he poured himself some more water.

Azula watched him do it: the next stage of his story would not be easy. The Northern Water Tribe might have been one of his most challenging, painful moments… and she should brace herself for it. She meant to… but a soft cough burst from her lips then. She snarled, shaking her head before Sokka jumped out of his seat: he came back with a towel, musty as it might be after being locked up in storage for over a year, and Azula smiled in gratitude for it. Sokka sat again beside her, pouring water too, that Azula drank once she coughed out whatever she needed to, this time around.

"I thought it might be gone…" Sokka sighed. Azula shrugged.

"It's lessened, at least. I take relief in that," she said. Sokka released a deep breath.

"Want to take a break?" he asked. Azula frowned, looking at him in confusion.

"Can we afford to?" she asked. He gritted his teeth. "I mean… I'd go check on Hotaru, maybe even take a nap, if we hadn't just cut short the meeting to determine the fate of the world for the sake of clearing things up to each other. It feels like… we need to get this done."

"Right," Sokka sighed. "Then… The Northern Water Tribe. It was probably about as bad as you imagine, if not worse."

Azula gritted her teeth, but she nodded to encourage him to go on. Sokka sank in his seat and ran a hand over his hair.

"We thought the Fire Nation wouldn't attack until the sun rose. It was going to… it did, by the end of the battle, even," he said. "But Zhao, well… he thought he could win beforehand. He was better prepared, I guess, than usual… the Northern Water Tribe had no defenses against the airships, they'd never contended against anything like that. Most of their defenses were torn apart, mowed down… I don't know how many warriors and waterbenders perished, but it was no small number. For what it's worth, most civilians survived, but…"

"It's no meaningless thing, that their military was cut down to that extent," Azula said, lowering her gaze. "I… I'm sorry."

"I know you are," Sokka said, taking her hand as she closed her eyes tightly. "When we arrived, we could see some of the mess from where we landed, the ice cliffs of the city's valley. The way the airships were laying things to waste was terrifying. We dove down, on Appa, when we realized something was happening at the heart of the valley… it was the oasis. Anorak had told us about it, and it seemed to be Zhao's target. It… it was him, there, threatening the Northern Water Tribe's Princess."

Azula's brow drew together slowly. Sokka scoffed.

"I think he really didn't like princesses those days, huh?" he said, dismissively. "Either way… he was ready to kill her when I jumped in to stop him. He freaked out when he realized it was me, and… I was ready to fight him to the death, truth be told."

"Rather, you were ready to kill him," Azula said, raising her eyebrows. "That piece of shit wouldn't have lasted ten seconds against you in a fair fight…"

"He wouldn't have. But it wasn't a fair fight."

Azula frowned, glancing at him in confusion. Sokka breathed deeply.

"I don't fully know what happened, before we got to them, but… it seems he forced Princess Yue to fill a waterskin with the oasis's mystical water for him. Apparently, from what she explained… Hahn's delusions about the oasis's water went quite far. He thought the oasis could provide someone with eternal life, but that's not really it: it requires a waterbender to properly use the water to heal, or the Moon Spirit's prowess itself, I guess? Yue had been born without breathing, from what she said… they placed her in that pond at the oasis when she was a newborn, and the Moon Spirit touched her. Her hair turned white – still is white, if you were wondering – and she came to life because of that blessing. So… she was convinced that one day, someone would kill the Moon Spirit and she'd have to give her life up to save the world."

"Did… Zhao do that?" Azula asked, trembling. Sokka shook his head.

"Not for a lack of trying, but no," he said. "We stopped him before he could pull it off. Yue survived."

Azula nodded, letting out a relieved sigh.

"But… that's not to say things worked out just fine after that," Sokka said. "Zhao… he seemed to panic, but he was out of his mind. He wanted to spur me on, to attack him… because he drank the water. It was healing his wounds, or at least, that's what he thought it was doing? Either way, I… I did attack him. I stabbed him. It… it was a deadly wound."

"You… you killed him yourself?" Azula frowned: the letter he had sent didn't quite say that, though…

"Nope. The water patched him back up. I didn't expect it… he threw fire at my face, almost blinded me, and I lost my footing. Fell into a pool of water, and the bastard ran away," Sokka snarled. "Yue told Katara to use the spirit pool's water to heal my wound… good thing that she did, because I'd probably have a nasty burn scar over my face now, if she hadn't."

"Then… it did heal you, because Katara was using it with waterbending healing?" Azula said. "But you say it wasn't working for Zhao… and yet he survived a lethal blow?"

"What we were told later was… that the water, without bending's intervention, would only take his chi and redirect it very effectively, too effectively, towards remedying whatever was wrong," Sokka explained. "So it wasn't the water that healed him then: it was his own energy, redirected, spent to save him. It was saving him, at the cost of his own life, so to speak. He grew weaker by the minute and he didn't seem to realize why…"

"Damn," Azula's eyes widened. "But then… you gave him chase."

"I did. Aang and I went after him… the others went to fight at the frontlines," Sokka said. "From what I know, they weren't doing half bad, supporting Pakku's forces there. Uh, Pakku's the waterbending asshole who kept joining forces with Jeong Jeong in today's meeting…"

"Right," Azula nodded.

"But, well… things took a bad turn at one point. Don't entirely know how, I wasn't there, but… Zuko seems to have taken an arrow when he was trying to protect Kino," Sokka said. Azula frowned. "Kino was helping too, I think? He noticed a Fire Nation group was breaking in through another area of the main wall or so, he went there to help stop them, disguised in Fire Nation uniform… but it didn't work out so well when Zuko got badly injured. Your guards helped out after that, they'd been sabotaging the airship fleet on their own hot-air balloons thus far, but they made for the city when they realized that was happening… Katara did her best to save Zuko, I don't think it looked promising at all, so they had to take him to the oasis for healing with the mystical water there.

"As for me… I hunted down Zhao. He kept saying all the worst things he could to antagonize me… I lashed out, right back, and we kept clashing as he tried to run to his airship. I… stabbed him more. I should've killed him then, and then again, and again, and again… he wouldn't die, though."

Sokka scoffed, shaking his head as Azula tensed up beside him.

"It was brutal. It was… one of the most gruesome things I've done. Eventually, it looked like the water's power wasn't working as well as before… he gave me the slip briefly, managed to run to his airship. I tried to give him chase, grabbed onto the catwalks when it was rising… they, of course, didn't want me there. As hard as I fought to stay aloft with them, I fell from a pretty awful height… and I must have cracked my back badly, because I couldn't move after I fell."

Azula gasped. Sokka gritted his teeth, reaching over to grab her hand reassuringly.

"Aang… he stepped in, right on time. For a crazy moment, I… I thought I saw you, instead of him. I figured I was going to die," Sokka smiled, shaking his head. "You probably see anything that isn't there when that's what you're expecting. Because, you see… Zhao had leveled his airship's weapon towards me, and he was going to unload all that fire on me."

"The fucking…" Azula said, eyes shot with rage. Sokka breathed out slowly.

"Aang… caught the explosion. He managed to make the Avatars lend him their strength… and he turned the burning air against them."

Azula froze up. Sokka bit his lip.

"He turned it… a little more intensely than he realized he had."

"That's… how it all burned down?" Azula asked. Sokka nodded.

"The sky was on fire. That's… that's what I thought," Sokka whispered. "He never meant to go that far… he had a pretty awful personal crisis afterwards, too. He never wanted to kill anyone… it had been a constant with him, from the moment I met him. But he saved the Water Tribe… by as good as destroying the Fire Nation army. The airship fleet was annihilated… I figure a few warships survived the wreckage, but probably not many."

Azula breathed deeply, and she released the air slowly afterwards. She dropped against the backrest of the couch, bringing her hands back to her face. Sokka eyed her guiltily, unsure of how to comfort her now.

"I… won't sugarcoat it," he said. "It was a massacre. On both sides. It felt like nobody had won a damn thing on that day… and maybe Zhao would've charged ahead that way regardless? Maybe your father would've decided to worsen the violence in the north anyway. But…"

"But he only did it on time, when he did, because I told him to," Azula said, shaking her head. Sokka sighed.

"I'm afraid so."

"Fuck, I… fuck," she said, shaking her head as tears spilled down her face. "I'm so sorry. I… spirits, I'm so sorry. I shouldn't have… I… I should've just…"

"You should've been the one to die instead. Or to die later, and pay for all the lives you've stolen," Sokka finished for her. Azula sniffed, eyeing him begrudgingly. "Thoughts I'm all too familiar with, love. I didn't really want to say it much, but… you keep sounding disturbingly like I did, when I was stuck in the Amateur Arena."

"I… I did much worse things than you ever could, back then," Azula said. Sokka scoffed.

"Why did you?" he asked. "Because he made you. Because he cornered you. Because he pushed you around, as he did to everyone. Even when you were supposed to be free to make your own choices, you knew that wasn't the case. He had already proven he was a craven, cowardly bastard who wouldn't abide by his word… by any pretenses of honor."

"And yet how is what I did any better than what Iroh did?" Azula scoffed. Sokka frowned. "I… pointed him in the right direction. Just as the old bastard did when he told him about us. How… how do you overlook that, or just set it aside, when…?"

"Because… you're comparing the wrong thing," Sokka frowned. "Azula… Iroh was free to shut his damn mouth and he didn't. If he hadn't said a word to Ozai that night, nothing would've happened. The world would have continued as it was. If you had refused to cooperate with him, if you rebelled in any way… well, you're aware of the consequences that would have followed. You had no guarantee, either, that he wouldn't do awful things anyway, even if you didn't point him in the right direction. Maybe he would've had the airship fleet for longer, if you hadn't told him where to go… and he could've used it effectively to destroy my forces later on. Probably in last night's battle, considering Aang wasn't going to be there to save us if that kind of firepower struck us. Point is… you weren't free. If you had been… it'd be a lot easier to see your mistakes as you do. But I wasn't free, either, when I was forced to kill other gladiators. They use you, Azula, they'll grab your hand if they need to… they'll guide your weapon down to kill a man you wanted to spare, and they'll thrive in knowing that they're breaking you. That's… that's not your fault. No matter how many times you think to yourself that you should have been stronger… they should have never used you that way. It's sadistic, it's dehumanizing, it's… it's meant to break you. It's meant to convince you that you're worthless."

"And you think I can't let them get away with that?" Azula asked, eyeing him with uncertainty. Sokka shook his head.

"I think you shouldn't. But I know how hard it is to get over that kind of thing. To see it differently," Sokka whispered. "I just… just need you to understand that I can't hold you as responsible for all this as you hold yourself. I… I killed plenty of people across this last year's battles. I did that far more freely than you ever did."

"You weren't free anymore than…"

"I was fighting for freedom, everyone's freedom, sure. Doesn't change that I could've stayed home and done nothing," Sokka said. "Nothing would be better, the war would not have ended, if I had done that. But… it was an option. A choice I could have made. And yet I didn't. In that sense… I'm the artificer of my own fate in ways you weren't."

"Even when my choices landed me in my father's control?" Azula asked. Sokka nodded. "When I got Xin Long captured? You won't even hold that against me?"

"You were weak, frail, sick… and he, again, had every chance to make a better choice and didn't," Sokka said. "It feels like you're asking me to hold a slave responsible for the master that beats him. Sometimes… sometimes you can't fight back. Even if you want to, you can't. That's why I set out to fight for those who couldn't… those like you."

"And that we fought against you… that doesn't matter one bit?" Azula asked, eyes full of tears. Sokka breathed deeply and shook his head.

"It matters… because it's proof of how important it was that I succeeded. Because only if I won would you, and those in positions like yours, ever be set free."

Azula shook her head, an elbow on her knee, her hand holding her forehead.

"I… am not a slave. I never was one," she said. Sokka hummed.

"Really?"

"Sokka…"

"You were under your father's command, under his control, doing whatever he wanted you to do, whether willingly or not. That the leash he had upon you was figurative rather than literal doesn't make much of a difference: a lot of slaves weren't chained constantly either, and they weren't any less slaves for it," Sokka said, bluntly. "He kept demoting Fire Nation people into slavery when they pissed him off… in his own way, he did the same to you. If you'd rather not see that way… well, doesn't change that I do."

Azula shuddered: she certainly had thought of it frequently, the similarities between her latest experiences and Sokka's, in the Amateur League. It still felt wrong to draw a direct comparison – she hadn't lacked food, hadn't been treated as trash, hadn't fought for her life as viscerally as he had –, but that Sokka himself would be the one to say it… that he, too, found her circumstances alarmingly similar to those he had endured, disturbed her greatly.

"Freedom… isn't something you write on a paper and attest that someone possesses," Sokka reasoned. "While we talked today about slavery's abolition… I think it's obvious that it won't be as straightforward as that. There were enough situations where there was no explicit and direct claim of slavery, but in essence, it was the same thing… such as what happened with Koshing and his gladiators. Not because there was no statement made to prove it does it mean that someone isn't a slave… and I'd even say that, when that's the case, it can even be harder to break these invisible chains."

"Because… we're certain we're not slaves at all?" Azula asked, frowning.

"Yep. How do you break free when you don't know you're in a cage? It's… like what happened to Xin Long, in his cave," Sokka said. Azula shivered. "He didn't know what the world was like until you showed it to him. He thought himself free… but he never truly was."

Azula sighed, shaking her head. As much as she didn't want to be persuaded, it seemed that Sokka had a point.

"You still don't really know the worst of it," she said. Sokka shrugged.

"Were you at any point in time making choices with no fear of the consequences?" he asked. Azula frowned.

"I wouldn't say that I ever was, no," she said. "But I… I always thought I could've done something differently."

"By doing what? Doing some grand deed that would get you killed, I bet?" Sokka asked. Azula frowned. "See? You just keep proving me right. I know all those mental paths, been there, done that…"

"It just felt like… things would have been better for those who depended on me, somehow," she said, shaking her head. "I mean, I never really convinced myself of that entirely, otherwise I would've let it happen eventually, but… it was easy to think that, without me to torment, they'd lose their value as hostages to my father. But… I couldn't convince myself fully that that would be the case."

"Same as I couldn't convince myself that nobody would ever need me again… that I was better off dead for good, to the point where I'd stop fighting in the Amateur League," Sokka said. "I couldn't really know if… if everyone in my tribe had died, if they had survived, if they hated me… I wanted to live long enough to know that, at least. And, well…"

"To take your revenge," Azula said, with a weak smile. Sokka shrugged.

"And heck, I think I've succeeded," he said. Azula raised her eyebrows. "Somehow made you fall for me, ended the Hundred Year War, you had my child… revenge plan well and truly successful."

"Right. Including all those death scares and dangerous moments where we survived by sheer luck?" Azula asked. Sokka scoffed.

"No, no, no. I planned all of that, you know?" he teased her. Azula laughed, shaking her head. "Remember the forest? I'd hired Xin Long beforehand, we met in the South Pole when I was like… ten, yeah, that sounds believable, and I told him to bond with you when we inevitably landed in his lair…"

"Totally believable, yes. Your mastermind plan paid off perfectly," Azula smirked. Sokka snickered. "You… you really don't have to soften this up, though. To lighten my load this much, Sokka. I appreciate it, but… doesn't feel like I deserve it right now. Not when I'm learning of the disasters I'm guilty of. Do you really not feel… any frustration or resentment over what I've done? I mean… even if you no longer feel that way, I…"

"You want to know about it, if I ever did?" Sokka asked. Azula shivered, but she nodded.

"I think I need to."

"Just to punish yourself further?" Sokka sighed. Azula shrugged.

"I can't fathom that even you would think no ill of me after everything I've done."

Sokka sighed. She did want his honesty… as much as he was loathe to offer it in these regards. He brought a hand to his brow, pondering her request briefly… recalling one regard in which he certainly had felt devastated, even if it had taken time for him to reason with it.

"I don't even think it's fair…" Sokka said. "But if you insist, I… I suppose I'll have to say that the main thing I begrudged you for was the feeling that… that you'd chosen the Fire Nation over me."

Azula winced, glancing at him with uncertainty. He sighed, leaning against the backrest.

"I feel it's probably unfair because… you didn't really do that," Sokka said, frowning. "Not entirely, anyway. If… if you'd only ever chosen the Fire Nation over me? You would've never been mine. Our relationship wouldn't have started… by the time your father caught us, you threw everything away for my sake. You said it yourself… we'd lost balance, as proven by how willing we were to do anything to save each other, betraying our nations, turning our backs on them… if I had refused to do as you told me to, if I hadn't gone back to the Water Tribe? They'd be dead now. At least… most likely. If I had just stayed with you, then… I would have well and truly betrayed my family, my roots, my people. And the only reason why I didn't do that… was because you made me stay in the south. So… should I really get upset about this? We were that keen on choosing each other over everything else, for as long as we were, and I can tell the consequences would've been dreadful if you hadn't made the painful choice you did…"

"You can be upset, though," Azula said, softly. "I… I'd rather you allowed yourself to feel whatever it is you do. Denying it… it would only hurt you."

"Then the same is true for you," Sokka said, eyeing her begrudgingly. "My story's not over… neither is yours, but I'm sure something or another in mine must be infuriating, frustrating…"

"I…" Azula sighed, dropping against the backrest too and raising her eyebrows. "I guess I already said it. The main thing that upset me… was that you'd been your rebellious self, all over again, as usual. I'd asked you to do nothing… and you went and did everything. It angered me that you'd put yourself in danger… that you would risk so many lives with what you were doing. I knew why, it's not like I could blame you for it altogether, but… I didn't want you to do it anyway. I wanted you safe… I fought as hard as I did on those bleak days to make sure you'd survive. And after you made it through the attack on the south… I just hoped that was what you'd do. But of course…"

"Nothing would've changed if I'd done as you asked," Sokka said, softly. Azula nodded.

"I know. Somedays… it felt like that would've been better," she whispered. "But that's most likely not the case. Either way… we have been out of balance when it comes to our nations and each other. In multiple ways. I felt torn apart every time I had to work for my father to antagonize you… but I did it anyhow. It was a betrayal of something deep inside of myself, and every time I did it I just… just wanted to die again. But I couldn't stop, and… and I kept doing it until our last fight. It's just… not fair. It never was, on either of us. I don't… don't want to choose between two sides of myself. I'm Fire Nation, as awful as that can be… and I love you, as difficult as that can be due to our circumstances. Things… things worked while we were together. It felt right in ways nothing else ever has. Why… why would I need to be forced to choose sides at all?"

She sighed, shaking her head before glancing at him mournfully.

"For what it's worth… I am sorry for it, too," she whispered. "Be it… my dark thoughts about you, my selfish frustrations when I knew you were doing the right thing, and my choices that hurt you as much as they did. It won't change your pain, I know that, but…"

"If we'd been free to choose… neither of us would have spent all that time walking alone," Sokka said, meeting her gaze. Azula gritted her teeth, but she nodded in agreement. "I'm sorry too, love. As much as… as much as I did think those things on occasion, it wasn't hard at all for me to imagine what you were facing. In the end, it only spurred me on even more… because, if my insecurities and fears were right? I still wanted to set you free so that you'd tell me, point-blank, that you didn't want me. That you were done with me… that you'd live your own life, if that was what you wanted. Of course, I hoped you wouldn't do that, but… if that was it, then I would've endured it, is what I thought."

"You really thought that…?" Azula said, eyeing him with uncertainty. Sokka sighed.

"You might think you were the only one as self-aware about how much you were hurting me, but… I wasn't so stupid as to expect you to welcome me triumphantly. Obviously, I hoped for something more along the lines of, uh, you running into my arms. Then you'd kiss me, and then you'd smack my chest and tell me I was an asshole for everything I'd done. And then I'd kiss you again and tell you I missed you, and you'd say I was still an asshole, and…"

"You really pictured that…?" Azula smiled a little. Sokka shrugged.

"It was what made the most sense," he said, smiling too. "I… I knew it wasn't going to be so easy and straight-forward, even if at first I hoped it would be. But hell, I joined forces with Iroh, with Jeong Jeong… I'd have been a complete moron if I had thought you, somehow, would be fine with that."

"Even knowing you were on the right side of the conflict didn't convince you otherwise?" Azula asked. Sokka scoffed.

"It's hard to see it that way when… when you feel like there's that much blood on your hands," he said. "Say all you will about yourself, but… it isn't wrong, anyway, that if I'd just stayed put and done nothing, the thousands of deaths that took place throughout the Earth Kingdom across my campaign wouldn't have happened. Surely, yes, eventually all those people would've died in various ways, but… not the way they did. So, when you hold yourself responsible for what happened in places like the Water Tribes, or the Northern Air Temple? I… I'm responsible too, for joining the war and pushing it into its heights as I did. I'm no more innocent than you in that respect… if anything, I could be held more responsible than you, considering what I said earlier. You know, that you were basically in the position of a slave…"

"I still don't really support that interpretation, but… sure," Azula sighed. "I also don't support the interpretation that you're to blame for all those deaths entirely, I mean… the Fire Nation started the war. If we keep tracking back to the very source of the problems…"

"Someone else will always be there to be blamed," Sokka finished for her. Azula bit her lip. "We're responsible for the choices we make freely… for their consequences. And sometimes we fail to foresee them. Sometimes we don't realize we've made terrible mistakes. I know I foresaw many things and I still barreled ahead, hoping the future would make all those sacrifices worth our while. And… a lot of people won't think it was worth a damn. Those who lost their loved ones, those who were injured, maybe crippled for life, whose homes were torn down, who will be at a loss over what to do with their lives now? They… they'll think I'm the villain, Azula. And nothing I say or do will change their minds… much like nothing will change our minds about Iroh, to say one thing."

"I guess so," Azula said. "But… that really puts us in a fucked up place, doesn't it?"

"What does?"

"You're kind of… saying the things I said, back when we had our first big fight."

Sokka frowned, eyeing her with disbelief. She smiled a little before shrugging.

"Key difference is… I didn't particularly care if I was the bad guy," she said. "I suppose you're just too jaded by it to worry about it much. You have bigger things to worry about. But I'm pretty sure you said the Fire Nation was evil… I said that either that meant nothing to me, or that it was a matter of perspective. Maybe I even said both?"

"Seems a little strange that we ended up changing each other's minds to this extent, huh?" Sokka smiled.

"I don't know… guess it means I realized the true cruelty and corruption within my nation," Azula reasoned.

"And I realized good and evil aren't as cut and dry as all that, too," Sokka said. "I never did imagine I'd care for the Fire Nation people, whether as a whole or specific individuals, when we had that conversation. Even if I'd bonded with Piandao, and I was terribly aware that you were as hot as you cared to be, I…"

"Hot?" Azula smirked. He smiled back.

"Need me to remind you of the blue fire?"

"Fine, fine. Curious wording, but I'll take the compliment," she smiled. He chuckled softly.

"Point is, it was a lot easier, still would be, to pretend there's nothing worthwhile in your nation. It allows so many people I've met across the last year to despise your nation without issue. It's very easy, you see, convincing yourself that the other side's story doesn't matter one bit. And it doesn't negate, no, that the Fire Nation's crimes are as terrible as can be… but there's more complexity to the situation rather than simply lumping all of you together as criminals and sinners. The Fire Nation's worst deeds were related to attempting to stifle every nation, so that balance ended and the only one left was the Fire Nation indeed… if our choice was to avenge the fallen by removing the Fire Nation right back? Well, who would be left? The Water Tribes? With how much damage they've faced, I wouldn't even bet on us…"

"I would. Sounds like you're all far more resilient than the rest of us," Azula mused. "Surviving my father's fleets, whether in air or water, the way both the north and south did, is a considerable achievement…"

"Might be, but it's not like everything was smooth sailing for either tribe afterwards," Sokka sighed. "Guess, if left to thrive, we really could take over the world if the rest of you destroy each other and we're the only ones left, huh? But, anyway, bad jokes aside… I might have been stubborn and shortsighted before about the Fire Nation, mainly because I'd never seen anything but its worst side. Now that I know its potential for good things, now that I've seen you fulfill it…"

"Not really sure I've done much of that, as of late," Azula frowned.

"Yeah, well, you had enough compassion in your heart to try to save the life of your father when any lesser person would've rejoiced in his death," Sokka said. Azula winced. "And moreover, you saved the city with your fire, even when it could've come at great cost to you. That's without going into all the things we did before, too, so…"

"We've always been better together," Azula whispered. "Or, at least… I know I'm better if I'm beside you. But…"

"I'm not too different either," Sokka said. "It's so much easier to lose sight of what matters when I'm not around you. But by now… I can see clearly again. I can be myself in ways I couldn't before, because you're here… even if you're hellbent on tormenting yourself for everything."

"You'd be no better off, if you'd been in my shoes. You already said I remind you of your old self," Azula said, eyeing him begrudgingly. Sokka smiled.

"Maybe… maybe that means I'm finally learning to walk in your shoes, putting up with a stubborn idiot who couldn't seem to understand his life mattered. And you in mine, where nothing anyone says about your worth means a damn, because you think you know best… well, if I'd never listened, if I hadn't let you help me, I'd have gone and died at one point or another ages ago and I wouldn't have achieved everything I have. The war would not be over, the world would not have changed… so, in the end, I owe my achievements to those who believed in me and kept me on my path. People like you."

Azula gritted her teeth before sighing heavily. Sokka's hand reached out to hers, squeezing her fingers gently.

"I'm not asking you to think of yourself that way right now, from here on out," he said. "I know it's hard. But… I do believe it's a good idea for you to be more lenient on yourself, if just because you're tired of punishments by now. If there's anything you should be held accountable for? You will be. But for now…"

"Is it really fine for you to be the judge of that?" Azula asked. Sokka smirked.

"Turns out I'm the Gladiator. Even the White Lotus have been daunted into shutting up because of me," he said. Azula raised her eyebrows. "If I'm the man who won this war? Then maybe my one demand as the victor is for no one to interfere in our decisions regarding your retribution."

"That's going to feel like corruption to many," Azula said. Sokka smiled and shrugged. "Like… you're just taking advantage of power to protect whoever you want to."

"They're lucky I've got great taste in people to protect, then. Because I know that, going forward, you'll never make the same mistakes you did during the past year. I know you'll do right by the world. And I also know that some people won't care if you do, much like some won't care if I do… they'll resent us forevermore, and I guess that's something to live with. But we can do better, Azula… we just need to try. Giving up now, it means never making amends for everything that went wrong."

"That's… what I said to my father, too," Azula said, rubbing her brow with her fingertips. "It's… it's a lot easier to say those words than to live them, I admit. But… but if this is what you want me to do, I'll try, Sokka. Just… know that I don't really think I deserve it."

"Guess it'll be up to me and those who love you to ensure that you change your mind," Sokka said, raising his hand and brushing her hair gently with his fingers. Azula eyed him with uncertainty.

"What… what happened after?" she asked. "Once the battle ended… were you tended to? Your wound…"

"Ah. I was picked up by the waterbending warriors," Sokka said. "Kino and the guards were with them, and then they took me to the Palace. Your brother was healed by the actual best healers in the North Pole, Katara took to learning from them. I didn't need the magical water the way Zuko did, though…"

"He really was that close to…?" Azula grimaced. Sokka nodded.

"It was a very dangerous wound. He's not fully better even now," he said. "He's still recovering, even if he can take some exertion at this point. Truthfully, I wasn't sure about entrusting any big missions to him, but… he insisted that he could do it. I decided to leave it up to him."

"Well… he seems no worse for wear right now, at least. Guess it's not so easy to tell anymore… he recovered quite well if that happened only a few months ago," Azula said. Sokka nodded.

"Kino kept watching over him as he slept, Zuko didn't come back to consciousness for a while," Sokka said. "After I could walk again, which fortunately was merely a few hours later, thanks to their healing, I was asked to attend a meeting with Pakku, the Tribe's Chief, Arnook, and Princess Yue. I explained myself then, Kino had given them a letter Jeong Jeong wrote to vouch for me already… they were surprised by our story, I of course couldn't share it in full, but it was enough for them to understand where I was coming from."

"Wait, our story as in you and me, or…?"

"Yep," Sokka nodded. Azula swallowed hard.

"Did they give you any grief for… well, being involved with me?" Azula asked, uneasy. Sokka shook his head.

"Wouldn't say grief, but they definitely were surprised by it. Yue was moved by our story, actually," Sokka said. Azula raised her eyebrows. "Eventually… she told me she wished she had known a love like ours. But, heh, maybe she does by now…"

"Does she?" Azula asked. Sokka smiled.

"Believe it or not… she and her kids took a liking to Kino. Ah, yeah, she has three kids, think I forgot to mention that, but…"

"Kino?" Azula repeated, blinking blankly. "You mean… the Kino who was feeding Xin Long? The one from Whaletail Island…?"

"The one who was steering Appa when I caught you in midair last night, and he saved us both," Sokka said, with a proud grin. Azula's eyes widened. "I know he doesn't look very reliable and acts like a goof often, but… hey, people could say the same about me, right?"

"I… don't think anyone with sense would say that about you anymore," Azula said, with a dry grin. "But… I'm not saying he doesn't deserve it, it's just surprising. I didn't think he'd be the type to catch a Princess's eye that way…"

"Well, heh, you're one to talk…"

"Sokka, my standards in men have been proven to be perfectly agreeable, over and over again, by none other than you," Azula said, skeptically. Sokka laughed. "So do excuse me if I think Princess Yue wasn't shooting for the stars like I was when I fell for you, but I did imagine a Princess might be more… ambitious."

"Just a minute, now, at what point did I become the great catch in this relationship? How the hell are you acting like I'm the one who's out of your league…?"

"Do we really need to discuss that?" Azula smiled. "Not like you spent ages proving you were on my level or better while we worked together, no…"

"I didn't do that…!"

"You also went and saved the world…"

"You did too!"

"I wouldn't have done shit if you hadn't started it. So clearly, you're a much better savior of the world than I could ever hope to be. Deal with it," Azula said, stubbornly. "You're handsome, fearless, strong, a peerless leader, compassionate, fun, amazing in bed…"

"Azula, I'm – ah. Well, uh, that last one caught me off-guard, but…"

"Point being, I got lucky. Too lucky," Azula said, shaking her head. "Hence why I somewhat imagined Princess Yue might just have similar ambitions to mine, you know? If I'd been in her shoes, I would've despised this Princess of the Fire Nation that bewitched you so…"

"Good thing that you weren't in her place, then… you bewitching Fire Nation Princess," Sokka hissed. Azula smiled at him.

"I suppose, if Kino somehow caught her eye, I ought to thank him for it. Otherwise, I guess I'd have had competition," she said, firmly. Sokka snorted.

"You wouldn't have, because I didn't want her," Sokka said, simply. Azula smiled to herself. "To her father's chagrin, but still…"

"Wait, what?"

"He's the one who wanted me to marry Yue, not Yue herself," Sokka said. Azula's smile waned quickly. "Didn't happen right away, but after a while, he tried to coax me into marriage with Yue… mainly under Pakku's machinations, as far as I understood."

"How come?" Azula frowned.

"I think he realized Yue and Kino were growing too close together. He was spending too much time with the kids, too," Sokka said. "Kino absolutely had it bad for her, but he was… kind of like we were, you know, around each other? He never really let himself think he'd stand a chance with her… then he was blown away when she actually fancied him after all. But he was pining a lot, that's for sure… and Pakku definitely thought that was a threat. So… he proposed the idea that our tribes would be better suited, stronger, if I married Yue. I pretty much laughed in their faces and refused."

"As sensible and reasonable as ever," Azula said, though she smiled. "How did they ever cooperate with you after that?"

"I'm that much of a scary bastard, seems like," Sokka said, smugly. Azula laughed. "Either way… guess I got ahead of myself, but the point is, Yue and Kino did get started before we left the Northern Water Tribe. And, uh, Katara and Aang totally got it on when we were there, too…"

"Wait, they weren't always?" Azula asked, puzzled. Sokka shrugged.

"Katara seems to have gotten cold feet because of my sudden return, all the way back in the South Pole," he said. "I was surprised when I found out that they were something of an item, sure… hell, it was Mari who made me aware of it, come to think of it. I was telling her the story of how Prince Piqi and Lady Uchiwa went on a date, she asked me what that meant, and…"

"Wait, wait, wait… Prince who, now?" Azula smiled awkwardly. Sokka snickered. "Sokka… y-you didn't call my brother Prince Piqi in your crazy story. You didn't!"

"I did. And of course, that meant that Jing's nickname for him was…"

"N-no. Oh, curses, no…!" Azula snorted, bursting out with laughter against the couch's backrest. Sokka chuckled too, indulging in the blissful, rare sight of his beloved Princess surrendering to her amusement so openly.

"It was an honest, wild, ridiculous coincidence, okay? I was just poking fun at your brother, never meant for things to go that far," he said, though none of his explanations slowed down Azula's laughter. "At any rate… where was I? Oh, right, Mari just blurted out that Katara and Aang went on dates too when I explained what a date was and… yeah, that's how I found out my sister was, uh, involved with the Avatar. But I don't really know how far they went… at least, it didn't look like they'd been too intimate until the North Pole. By then, well, there was one night when I very much walked into them trying to sneak around, so…"

"Heh. Don't we know what that's like…" Azula smiled. Sokka nodded.

"Truthfully, well, that was a weird night… weirder than just because I was confronted by the reality that my sister was banging the Avatar," he said, eyes wide, before glancing at her. "I… don't really know how to put this, though. But, uh… did you ever have, you know, inappropriate dreams about me?"

"Inappropriate?" Azula asked, raising an eyebrow. "I don't really think they'd qualify as all that inappropriate once we actually started being together…"

"Okay, well, sex dreams. That's what I mean," Sokka blushed. Azula smiled.

"On occasion, yeah, but… tended to be rather miserable since I'd wake up knowing you weren't there," Azula said. "Though… admittedly, there was one night where…"

She frowned before glancing at him. He eyed her furtively right back, and her lips parted.

"Sokka…?"

"Azula?"

"Did we… have sex across our spiritual connection?" she asked, lowering her voice as though she expected someone to overhear them. Sokka chuckled and shrugged.

"At times, it felt like we did. Like the night of our anniversary? Kind of felt like, once we fell asleep, we…"

"Yeah, but that was vague. It was the feeling of fulfillment that I'd expect, sure, but… I don't really remember details that time," Azula said, blinking blankly. "But when I was on the Barge that night, I…"

"The Barge?" Sokka repeated. Azula winced.

"Well… I suppose, on my side, things got a little hectic after your battle in the north," Azula said. "Though you didn't mention one thing… the bodies. The ones you sent back to the Fire Nation…"

"Oh… yeah. Did that pretty early on, after the battle," Sokka scowled, shaking his head. "I… I couldn't believe Zhen was one of the dead. I know that I was responsible for so many awful things, but… it hit differently when I saw him there. We never clashed, I taught his son, for crying out loud…"

Azula sighed, closing her eyes and grabbing Sokka's hand. He shook his head.

"Zhao, too, of course… confirming he was dead didn't really make me feel a lot better, I have to say," Sokka muttered. "But yeah… the Water Tribe had no means to deal with so many dead, so I figured… wouldn't be a bad idea to send them back to the Fire Nation. Maybe it was fucked up on some level too, but…"

"It wasn't as bad as… as leaving countless people to wonder," Azula said, shaking her head. "It caught us by surprise that you'd do that, of course… Aonu handled it. If it had been anyone else… the letter you sent through Zhao would've never reached me. Frankly, you…"

"What?" Sokka eyed her furtively when she scoffed, smiling a little at the memory.

"It was absurd, what you did. That Water Tribe scroll…"

"Hey, I didn't have any other paper to write on. I knew it was going to look fishy, but see, that's why I wrote…!"

"'To my wife'. I know," Azula said, with a dry grin. Sokka smiled guiltily. "I knew it had to be your doing, damn it… clever Gladiator. Blew me away, but… but I treasured that letter more than I can say. It… it proved our connection, the spiritual one, was more than just my delusions too. You used Hotaru's name… you wouldn't have known it if you hadn't heard me. I really cherished it, Sokka, even if I wept like an idiot over it, but… thank you for doing that."

"Well… sounds like you have a lot of those for me, too," Sokka said, with a sad smile. Azula winced. "Don't want me to read them now?"

"Well… I never really did," Azula admitted. Sokka pouted. "Look, they're…! Depressing. Probably demoralizing. Only a handful aren't that bad, but mostly, they're just… the flow of thought of a woman who had lost most things in life and that's not fun to read, is it?"

"Don't think I'm looking for fun there, but sure," Sokka smiled. "I'll read them if you allow it, but I'd be open to doing it. Might be another way to truly understand what you were facing."

"Maybe," Azula sighed, eyeing him with uncertainty. "Beyond that… well, we already knew Zhao was likely dead, we'd been told as much. Rei… she took it quite hard. When you were so compassionate over her, and apologized for what you'd done to her father in your letter… it really meant a lot to me. Must have meant a lot to her, too. Once his body arrived for the funeral… she's the only person who wept for his fate. In a sense… I think my father and I knew that we were bound to wind up in a similar place as the one Zhao and Rei were at. It felt that way, anyhow. I suppose… I should be grateful that, even though it was awful, it wasn't quite as bad as what Rei faced. My father was a bastard, but… at the very end, he… he did right by me, if just then. Zhao never did the same for Rei."

"I wish he'd done better," Sokka sighed. "I'm sorry, though… for what I had to do. I feared Rei might not be able to forgive me for it… as bad as he might have become, Zhao was her father."

"I'm afraid that's for the two of you to determine, but… I don't think Rei hates you," Azula said. Sokka smiled a little. "She wasn't blind to who her father was. She still cared more for him than was probably healthy, but… she wasn't blinded by her affection or her emotions. So… while I can't choose what you'll mean to her in the future, it doesn't mean that you can't be family."

"Well… you made it so we were one already," Sokka smiled. Azula smiled back, if painfully. "We'll see how that works out in the coming days."

"Alright," Azula said, breathing deeply and caressing the back of his hand gently. "Now, then… after the funeral, of course, things got complicated again. I… I grew aware of the fact that Seethus was indeed snooping around and trying to see Hotaru. Along with that, Rei's mother showed up…"

"What?" Sokka scowled. Azula shrugged.

"Looked like she wanted hush money or else she would disparage Zhao's reputation and reveal Rei's origins, as well as that I'd adopted her. I didn't really face her myself… but Rei did, very bravely," Azula smiled. "Seems like she shut down her pretensions successfully. But Seethus was a latent threat… and I had to deal with that, and also with the fact that the the one person my father's council was determined to send to Yu Dao was me."

"Right," Sokka frowned.

"So… obviously the situation wasn't promising. I didn't want to do it, as ever, and I had to go, but… I mainly decided to focus on protecting the city rather than anything else," she said. "As for the girls… I brought them with me in secret. They hid inside the Barge's secret compartment, the one in my room? Nobody knew they were there, or at least, not for sure… not besides whoever might have heard Hotaru cry occasionally, but fortunately, she's not as much of a crying baby as others. I feared my father might react poorly, of course, once Seethus snooped around and revealed that I'd taken a baby to the frontlines, but… he never wrote anything to reprieve me for it, at least. Moreover… when I reached my cabin, on the very first day of the journey, I found he'd left a gift for me there. It was my armor. The new one… same design as the old."

"And… now I fucked up that one too," Sokka grimaced. Azula smiled and shook her head.

"Can't say I mind much. I… was torn about this one," Azula whispered. "It felt like he wanted for things to go back to what they were… that wasn't going to happen, no matter how nice he tried to be. Anyway, though, on that first night, I was writing a letter for you while the others slept, and I started… picturing you, as if you were sitting there, talking to me."

"Ah. You did that too, then?" Sokka smiled. Azula chuckled.

"We're terribly similar in several regards, as we know," she said. "At any rate, I did that indeed, and… I guess that's the night where we had that strange shared horny experience, huh?"

"Well… I hope it was as good for you as it was for me," Sokka said, raising his head proudly. Azula laughed, shaking her head and leaning against him again.

"It felt far too vivid for a typical dream, but… it wasn't fully real, evidently," she said, hands interlinking again. "Admittedly, though… I'd dozed off on the table, halfway through writing the letter, without my awareness, and that's when it happened. I just went to bed in hopes that it'd carry on then. Surprisingly… I think it did."

"Might have," Sokka smiled, blushing slightly. "It really was a strange relief, considering we were still apart, but…"

"It's more of a relief knowing now that we were actually sharing in on it," Azula laughed. "Hard to believe it wasn't just some wild delusion, but either way… that was a good enough start for my journey to Yu Dao. Probably your favorite part of that story, I wager…"

"Well, that you somehow captured Anorak and had him guard Hotaru doesn't sound that bad… but I guess I'll have to hear how it happened," Sokka said. Azula sighed and nodded.

"I suppose the first thing to note is… well, the Morishita family welcomed me with open arms," Azula said. Sokka smiled. "They were worried about me… Mr. Morishita and Kori had been among the very unfortunate folks who were invited to my miserable wedding to Zhao. I tried to not be too depressing when she sat across me, but… I doubt I succeeded. Couldn't even bring myself to talk, just… just gave her a thumb's up, as usual. You really gave me a great way to communicate without words with other people, you know?"

"I'm glad I did," Sokka smiled sadly.

"But besides from them, I… came across Chan again," Azula said, with a dry grin. Sokka crooked an eyebrow.

"The guy from earlier," Sokka said. Azula nodded. "Spawn of the Volcano's sponsor… and the first guy you were supposed to marry. Say, is it me, or did he and I look… a little similar?"

"Just a little," Azula pouted, cheeks flushing. Sokka snickered.

"Someone's got a type…"

"Shut up. You're my type, not him," Azula said. Sokka laughed, wrapping his arms around her and kissing the top of her head. "Especially considering how oh so clever he proved to be… I really improved my standards, you know, going from him to you?"

"I'm glad that's the case," Sokka smiled. Azula sighed.

"He… wanted revenge. Which, I guess, will just convince you further that I have a type?" Azula grinned dryly. Sokka laughed. "I didn't expect to ever see him again. He wound up joining the army, once his family's fortune went downhill over his father's greed, and our failed engagement… and his great idea of avenging himself was to prove what a great upstanding soldier and man he was, so that I'd always sulk over not marrying him, apparently."

"That… isn't much of a revenge, is it?" Sokka frowned. Azula rolled her eyes.

"The idiot was certain that he knew me on some profound level, which meant that he, and only he, truly knew what a terrible, awful person I was," Azula smiled dryly. "Kori hugged me in front of him and he nearly shat himself right then and there. Probably thought I'd set her on fire for it."

"Pfft. Yeah, well, that doesn't sound very respectable," Sokka laughed.

"It wasn't," Azula confirmed, eyes wide. "And to make matters worse, I had no valid reasons to dismiss him right away. That we had a bad history didn't really serve as an excuse, he was a captain in the army, went through his training properly… and he was already stationed in Yu Dao, serving there, before I arrived. He even had earned the respect of the Morishita family, to my shock… though I think he risked losing it when he acted like a moron over me, all things considered."

"So… you had to put up with him," Sokka concluded. Azula sighed heavily.

"More so after… he got in too deep, I guess," Azula said. Sokka raised an eyebrow. "I asked Kori for help with Hotaru, Rei and Song. I needed to get them out of the Barge and to someplace safe, her family had a boat but they hardly ever used it at all, so we decided that they'd relocate there and Sneers would watch over them. On the night when they made the switch, I kept the Third Squad busy with explanations on what to expect once Jeong Jeong's forces arrived, strategies to deal with you, should you turn up, and so on…"

"Really?" Sokka blinked blankly. "What was your plan, if I did?"

"The real one? Probably to let you kill me," Azula said, with a dry grin. Sokka winced. "I'm nothing if not consistent…"

"Well, clearly," Sokka said, rolling his eyes. Azula smiled.

"If the Avatar turned up… I was supposed to shoot lightning at him when he wasn't expecting any," Azula admitted. Sokka's eyes widened. "Don't know if he's ever dealt with an attack that fast and devastating. It was the only idea anyone had in mind for how to defeat him… and that's the primary reason why I was sent to Yu Dao, too: I could bend lightning myself and finish him off, if he turned up at all…"

"Heh. Good thing we didn't decide to go bolster Jeong Jeong's forces, then," Sokka said, eyes wide.

"I'm glad you didn't, too," Azula sighed, eyeing him remorsefully. "At any rate, though, while I was busy talking about all those things… Renkai snuck out, faking that he was sick, and he escorted the girls all the way to the Morishita family's boat. But once he was there… well, he felt he had been followed."

"Chan?" Sokka scowled. Azula shrugged.

"Yes… and no. Turns out another guy was following him, and then Chan followed that guy, knocked him out, and Renkai bumped right into him when Chan did that," Azula sighed. "The other guy was a spy Shaofeng must have slipped into my Barge's new crew. He wanted to figure out what I was doing, what kinds of things I was hiding, and so on. Couldn't let him get away with that… so I had him locked up, under the claims that he was a White Lotus spy instead. No one was going to trust him anymore after that, I hoped… don't think much came from it. But Chan… the bastard now knew that I had stuff to hide, and he was anything but trustworthy."

"Then… you had to deal with him?" Sokka said. Azula shrugged.

"More like I had to put up with him," she sighed. "He was bound to run to anyone with the tale that I had something secret hidden in that boat, I figured… so I appointed him as my personal guide in Yu Dao and basically saddled myself and Renkai with always keeping an eye on the bastard, in case he did anything he shouldn't have, contacted anyone to reveal what he found out about me. Fortunately, a few weeks passed and, besides being a monumental pain in everyone's ass, he didn't do anything noteworthy… across that time, Kori had been hard at work building an underground tunnel for the girls to cross, so that they could come to the house secretly, without anyone in town or Kori's parents realizing it, and so that I could feed Hotaru safely. Until then, I'd just visit them at night as quietly as possible, and of course, Renkai and Chan had to go with me every time…"

"You really had to spend a lot of time with the guy, then," Sokka said, eyes wide.

"I did. And eventually, Kori was exhausted after working so hard day and night," Azula sighed. "Aonu turned up eventually, and he gave us a hand one night, after… after delivering the new weapons the Mad Alchemist had developed."

"Eh. The bomb launchers, or whatever they're called," Sokka grimaced. Azula nodded.

"Chan and I had to sit together in the cabin the tunnel led to, that night, as Aonu went in there to finish digging it out himself, with Renkai's help. Renkai asked to go too because he would be proof for the girls that Aonu was trustworthy," Azula said. "Anyway… I had a pretty thorough conversation with Chan that night. Turns out… well, among many things, he knew nothing about gossip connected to my life because he didn't pay attention to any of it. He didn't even know I'd been married off to Zhao, thought that Hotaru was a baby I'd kidnapped and was keeping hostage…"

"Kidnapped? Curses…" Sokka said, eyes wide. "That guy's got one hell of an imagination."

"Oh, it's a wild one. Not a good one, but a wild one," Azula smiled dryly. "I thought I'd mess with him, but surprisingly, he could tell when I was lying and when I wasn't. Guess that was one of those rare moments where he wasn't too stupid. After that night, when he finally heard the truth about you and me, well… he pretty much became part of the group more thoroughly. More willingly, I'd dare say, too. But… I guess that's where things get complicated. I… I did set up defenses, helped Yu Dao prepare with landmines and decoy mines all around the city. We had the weapons, we tested them… we had to set up for the most dangerous possibilities in the hopes of ensuring that the city could not be seized."

"And it sounds like you succeeded," Sokka pointed out. Azula sighed and nodded.

"We did. Though… I almost failed where it mattered most," she said, her left fist tightening. "When Jeong Jeong showed up, well, it wasn't long before some of his troops rushed into the minefield and blew up. We had underground defenses too, we knew by then that your troops had a penchant for attacking below ground, so… at one point the earthbenders manning our defenses basically blew up yours. It was not pretty business."

"Fuck," Sokka grimaced.

"Then… they started using their catapults to fuck up our minefield," Azula sighed. "I… involved myself directly then, by striking down their payloads before they could hit the ground. Eventually, those with the volatile bomb weapons did it too, Chan was one of them… and if they snuck up close enough to the enemy lines, they might be able to destroy the catapults, we realized. I didn't really want to risk losing that squad, but they committed to it, with the earthbenders' help… and it worked. They basically set the forest on fire and forced Jeong Jeong's troops to flee after losing their catapults. It seemed like that was as far as that battle would go, but… an emergency horn in the bay gave away that there was something else stirring back there."

"Of course," Sokka sighed. "Jeong Jeong did tell me… he sent them there because Unnuaq proposed that plan. Anorak was against it…"

"Well, it almost worked for them," Azula said, with a sigh. "They killed several soldiers, some of the Third Squad's new members… I got there by flying with my fire, all the way to the bay. By trying to keep Hotaru, Rei and Song out of danger, I'd left them at the boat… and now they were in greater danger still. The city hadn't been breached at all… but we didn't prepare enough for an attack by the harbor, much less by a full waterbending squad."

"You had some defenses, though… if the Third Squad was there," Sokka frowned. Azula nodded.

"I thought it was possible, I wasn't going to risk it outright, but I didn't really anticipate that it would be that severe. I rushed there, seeing red, and I fell into the water after launching a first attack. Renkai dove in after me, trying to save me, and he found me at first, but…"

"But?" Sokka frowned.

"Well, that guy, Unnuaq, I suppose, got me," Azula frowned. "The water suddenly caught me, yanked me out of Renkai's grip, and I was seized by a waterbending opponent. I'm assuming it was him because he sounded terribly sure of himself when he… when he gloated about how he'd captured the Blue Wolf's whore."

It was probably utterly stupid of Azula to still feel so much resentment over that statement… and most likely stupider still for her to find so much satisfaction in Sokka's outrage upon hearing it. She offered him a dry grin.

"Anorak did say, later, that you would've never allowed anyone to refer to me as your whore, but at that point, I… didn't really know what to think," she said. Sokka scoffed.

"That bloody… goddamn it, is he one of your prisoners?" Sokka asked. "Because I could just…"

"He's dead."

Sokka froze. Azula sighed, shaking her head and resting against the couch anew.

"By my hand."

"You…?" Sokka froze up. Azula shrugged.

"Wasn't merely that he called me that, though I admit I remain irrationally irritated by it," Azula said, shaking her head. "He was endangering my daughters and Song. If someone with that mentality reached them... well, he was basically the exact kind of people I feared the White Lotus was comprised by. The kind of people I couldn't fathom you'd join forces with. He was squeezing me with his water, crushing me there… I couldn't really breathe. He snuck the water underneath my armor, froze it, and he just squeezed so I would suffocate."

"Fucking…" Sokka's eyes widened.

"I was saved… by Sneers," Azula said, eyes drifting to the ceiling. "He had no reason to help me… he was only going to draw a target upon himself if he did. We'd talked… I knew he sided far more with the White Lotus than he ever would with the Fire Nation. I never asked him to fight alongside us… I told him I understood that he'd rather be on your side. I did. So… the only thing I asked of him was to protect the girls. He agreed to doing that, it was an innocent enough mission, one that didn't require for him to betray anything he stood for. But… well, he apparently decided I was worth saving. So, he threw his axes, broke the ice that held me, and I fell into the water."

"Did someone else help you…?" Sokka asked: maybe Anorak had enough sense to…

"No… by then, well, I was incensed enough that I didn't need help," Azula said, with a sigh. "It's not too often that I allow my rage to take the wheel as it did that day, but I saw red indeed. My daughters were in danger… and I'd just been insulted, nearly killed by this wretch? You were allied with him, too… I couldn't stand those thoughts. I grew so angry I just unleashed firebending out of sheer impulse, melted down what was left of the ice, and shot out of the water on my own. I landed on my Barge's deck… and from there, I attacked Unnuaq. I think he was fighting with Renkai when I returned… and I shot him and his team full of lightning."

Sokka's eyes widened. Azula sighed.

"I regretted it later. I… I didn't really think it through. Didn't realize I was… killing someone with my own hands, for the very first time. All I could feel was… rage," she said. "I did it one more time, with the next trio of waterbenders that came after me. It was gruesome. By then… well, the rest tried to flee, but we stopped them from doing that. Anorak was among them… we restrained them, yanked them out of the water just like that, took them as our prisoners. More lived than died, sure, but… considering what you explained about the north, it still feels like… like I should've tried to figure out another way."

"Well… for that matter, I should have done the same with everyone who tried to kill me on a battlefield, and I never did," Sokka said, lowering his gaze. "Very diplomatic of you to think so, but… war is war. You kill or you die. That's how it works."

"I know… I think I always knew. I just… never really thought I'd have to do it that way," Azula sighed. "Still… the main thing that mattered to me was that Hotaru, Rei and Song were safe. I moved them permanently to the Morishita house after that… there was no point in hiding them elsewhere anymore. I needed them close by, it was clear that even if Jeong Jeong came back, our defenses were stronger than whatever he had brought with him. After being tended to, I went to question the prisoner waterbenders… and I may or may not have been in a foul mood as I did it, courtesy of that Unnuaq bastard. But, well… after a while, Anorak kind of ousted himself as someone who knew you, without even trying. At one point in the fight, Unnuaq had called him by name… I guessed he had to be important if the leader would call him that way. So… I singled him out as significant, brought him with me to the Morishita home. I questioned him alone there… mainly to find out what your situation had been, the last time he'd seen you. He clarified that Unnuaq wouldn't have had the guts to call me your whore in your presence… I was quite pleased for that, I won't deny it. Eventually, though… I realized he was reliable enough to enact the one true plan I needed him for. Sending Renkai with the girls to you? It didn't sound… didn't sound feasible, or doable. How would I know that they'd get there safely? But him… he was an ally of yours. As long as he agreed to it, and he did… he could take Hotaru to you, if anything were to happen to me. So… while he obviously wasn't going to help the Fire Nation in any given way, and I wasn't about to ask that of him, he did agree to bring them to you, to keep them safe until you were ready to look after them directly."

"Heh," Sokka said, frowning. "Well, you did choose right. Anorak's a reliable guy… as proven by how he made it this far and succeeded at his task, too. I'm glad you didn't, uh…"

"Kill him too?" Azula said, with a dry grin. "Yeah, well… I can say I didn't want to. I regretted that fight a lot after it was over, no matter if I knew that, to protect my daughters, I… I would've done that as many times as needed."

"Understandably. I would have, too," Sokka frowned. Azula glanced at him with uncertainty.

"Even against people like them?" she asked. "Your tribespeople…"

"Rhone was a Southern Water Tribe man," Sokka said, bluntly. Azula tensed up. "He tried to kill you… so I killed him."

"Isn't it a little more complicated than that, in the middle of this war?" Azula asked.

"Rhone thought he was fighting against the Fire Nation too," Sokka pointed out. "Made no difference to me when I stabbed him."

Azula sighed, eyeing him begrudgingly. Sokka met her gaze, letting out a deep sigh.

"It's… different, yes, when you do it yourself for the first time," Sokka said. "The first man I killed was one of the soldiers in the settlement. It was right before we met. My boomerang returned to me… it was soaked in blood. I shook it off, kept moving, told myself I'd think about that one later. Didn't have much time to focus on it, admittedly… but I never forgot about it, as you can see. Sometimes it doesn't matter how much you rationalize it, the guilt won't go away. And maybe that's what happened to you, but… a bunch of your father's chief soldiers are dead now. I don't know how many members of his council survived, but going by what I saw in the temple today, it wasn't many."

Azula lowered her gaze. Sokka sighed.

"I feel bad, I do, about Zhen," he said. "I already told you so. It almost feels like I killed an innocent… but he wasn't one. He was fighting for the Fire Nation every bit as much as anyone else in that battle was. Does that mean his death was deserved? Any of their deaths? I… I don't think so. And yet, the deaths they dealt to the Water Tribe weren't deserved either. Little by little, you ponder all these things… and it becomes obvious that we're all killing and dying."

"And that's how you just… shake it off and keep going?" Azula asked. Sokka shrugged.

"If you don't do that… every awful deed you're responsible for is still your doing," Sokka said. "I've collected scars and memories across all these years … all of which, I hope, were vindicated last night. If I could end this war, to honor those who could not do it themselves, and yet hoped to see it undone… perhaps I proved worthy of survival."

"And you think I can do something of the sort too?" Azula asked. "Well… maybe you're right. But maybe… maybe the truth is we've done awful things nobody should forgive. Maybe we've done things that ultimately, neither of us can forgive."

"What…?" Sokka frowned: her eyes, remorseful and accusatory at once, spoke of what came next already.

"Or… are you going to pretend that's not how you felt? That what I was doing, in Yu Dao and afterwards, didn't push you to the very edges of your compassion?" she asked. Sokka clenched up. "Because… that's what it sounded like, on our very last spiritual connection."

Sokka breathed deeply. Azula averted her gaze from him: their hands, linked often so far, slid out of each other's grip now.

"There are many things we're guilty of… but I guess, ultimately, it comes down to that, above else, between the two of us," Azula said, meeting his gaze.

"To whether we can forgive each other for those moments… or not?" Sokka asked.

"No: whether you can forgive me."

Sokka's eyes widened: her stance was clear.

Nothing in his story, it seemed, would shake off her certainty that she had nothing to forgive him for.

But the memory of that anguished final encounter in the spiritual plane they often reached together, of that blinding flash of fire in that barrier, at sea… of that burst of blue, among the orange.

Sokka gritted his teeth: the question ought to have had an obvious answer… but for once, the truth was more complicated than he would have liked.

He took a moment to think. A moment to breathe. A moment to ponder her question… and then, he gave her an answer.