#2. iroh didnt have nonbender soldiers. lu ten was set up by zhao and ozai and subdued by long feng and his men.

[mugentakeda]

the gossiping men at the bar asked him if he has siblings or kids back home. apparently hed been that visibily disturbed by the rumor. he just stands there like an idiot for a second, mulling over the question, because hed done a double take in his head. like, yeah, i do. wait- no, i dont.

he does that a lot. sometimes his boss says his name and he forgets that he has to respond, because he forgot that was his name. because he forgot he even had a name that he had to respond to.

how do you forget your name? how do you forget if you had siblings or kids?

he doesnt have siblings or kids. unsure on the had, though. boss told him he didnt know if he had a family before general irohs siege because he hadnt been working for him at the time, but he did know that hed been stationed there on the outer wall. and most of the men stationed at the outer wall lived in the outer wall. so, if he did, theyre probably dead. its been a long time since he thought about that.

boss had only seen the aftermath of however general irohs men jumped him. a bunch of cowardly, stuck up, hypocritical cunts with this idea that the earth kingdom soldiers were the unhinged barbarians that needed to be hounded and attacked without remorse. the general mustve had nonbender soldiers specifically for attacking other nonbenders so he could reserve his firebenders for the earthbenders- because not one of his scars from the attack were burns. just crude and jagged cuts. he doesnt remember any of it, so he only saw- and felt- the aftermath as well (he has plenty of burn scars, but they were all old. a lifetime of soldiering, then. he probably never had siblings or kids.)

hed been curled up in mild pain by the fireplace in the boss’ office while he read off reports. injured children, sick children, dead children. looking back, hes not sure why he never considered checking out the orphanages or the ba sing se census, just to make sure, but. a good portion of the dai li dont even know he exists. he never even thought about it very hard until after he heard about the royal fire nation spawn thats been let free into the wild. he really doubts he had siblings or kids.

boss said he came from the outer wall, which is where the death count had been the highest. if he tried to dig for answers and found what he was looking for hes not sure what hed do. maybe kill himself.

but thats only given the hypothetical that he did siblings or kids, of course. lots of dai li officers dont have families, after all, which is why theyre dai li in the first place. so he thinks hes gonna continue with being a phantom with a job. anyone with a shred of empathy would feel for a kid that got his face melted by his own dad. goes to show just how ghoulish the firelord is.

the rumor doesnt make continuing to be a phatom with a job easier.

it gets harder, if anything, because telling his boss about it slipped his mind. hes not sure how, because he was told that general iroh is accompanying the kid, which makes an already bad nugget of news a hundred times worse. the general doesnt need an army to be dangerous, after all. itll be kept from the king, naturally, but as long as long feng knows about it, he will definitely feel the burn.

its a threat to their city. its a threat to his job. his life, as the reminder keeps terrifying him, because the worse he fucks up the worse he gets punished. he highly doubts the hook is the worst thing his boss has in store in terms of disciplinary action, especially over something this dire. how the fuck could he forget to tell his boss? after all the flipping his gut did at just hearing the fire princes name?

whatever. he’ll handle it when its at his doorstep. he has bigger problems any fucking way. maybe la will spare his ass and knock the general overboard during a storm or something, because a 13 year old disabled fire prince on the loose will probably warrant a slightly less harsh punishment than general fucking iroh. his luck never seizes to amaze him.

adding onto my dai list lu ten au thing where hes the only agent allowed in and out of ba sing se cus hes more of a lone wolf agent that does more assassin and spy type stuff for long feng personally rather than a secret police officer like the rest of the dai li. imagine he hears rumors about zukos burning and banishment in passing and just. Pauses. and feels a really sickening tug and harrowing deja vu for a while. not really sure why. like walking in a room and forgetting what you were doing and being deeply bothered about it all day. or getting acid reflux over something you don’t remember eating. or waking up from a bad dream you don’t remember anything about