#I cannot emphasize enough how hilarious that is for the multiverse

[muffinlance]

Analyze me like one of your French girls <3

Hi ! prompt idea : What if Zuko was armed during the first episode and was stranded with the water tribe while the avatar left with Katara and Sokka, Iroh on his trail for white lotus reasons.

Oh we are going to have us some FUN with "stranded with the water tribe", say no more.

---

Zuko was dripping, and steaming, and staring down two dozen women and their gaggle of small children, plus that old not-the-Avatar crone from earlier. They were all cowering away from him. Which was--

Good. It was good. If they were cowering, then they hadn’t noticed how steam was not flames. He wasn’t sure he could make flames, not after the arctic water he’d landed in, with that last sight of the Avatar glowing; not after surfacing under the ice pack, after swimming, after kicking slamming breaking through and his ship was gone and there was only ocean all around and

and he’d made it back to this pathetic little camp of the Southern Water Tribe, because that was the only place he knew for sure would have shelter, and he wasn’t going to die just because they were all staring at him, even if felt like he would.

Even if the old not-the-Avatar woman could probably take him, right now. But she didn’t know that.

Zuko pulled himself up, taller than her by at least a few inches, and blew steam from his nose.

“I am commandeering one of your huts,” he said. And added, because Uncle said even a prince should be gracious: “You may choose which one.”

---

She choose her own.

...The only one without children that flames might scar, or younger women to catch a soldier’s interests.

Zuko sat by her fire and determinedly started struggling out of his wet clothes and she was still in here with him--

Zuko pulled one of her animal pelts over himself, and finished fighting off his clothes. When he stuck his head back out, cheeks still reddened from what was obviously the cold, she dropped a parka on his head.

“Dry clothes, Your Highness,” she said.

The parka was much bigger than he was. He fell asleep hoping that the camp’s men were on a long, long hunting trip.

---

He woke up again. Kanna tucked her favorite ulu knife away, newly sharpened, and stopped contemplating the alternative.

---

“I am commandeering a ship,” he said.

The crone led him across the village, all twenty paces of it, to a row of canoes.

“Take whichever one you want,” she said. “Will you need help getting it to the water?”

Zuko looked at the canoes. Looked at the ocean. Watched a leopard seal, easily the size of the largest canoe, dozing just past the ice his own ship had broken through the day before. It was frozen again, a great icy arrow pointing from the waves to the village, snow already starting to cover it over.

Beyond was blue sky and gray ocean and white ice, floating in blocks like stepping stones, like boulders, like cliffsides.

There wasn’t even a hint of gray steel, or smoke. Or any land, besides what they were standing on.

He looked down at the canoes again. Somehow, they seemed even smaller.

“I, uh,” Zuko cleared his throat. “I’ll require supplies. Before I go.”

---

They... did not have supplies. Not extra ones. This didn’t stop them from trying to give him supplies, food and blankets and anything else he could think to ask for. But each blanket was a pelt hunted by someone’s grandfather, had been inked with images and stories by someone’s mother, was the favorite of someone’s husband or brother or uncle or cousin--

They couldn’t go to the nearest market to replace things, here.

And when they talked about food, about what they could spare, they kept sneaking glances to their children, who were sneaking glances at Zuko from the huts, sticking their heads just over the snowy ledges like their fur-trimmed hoods would hide them. Their mothers and aunts shooed them away, and they crept back, like barnacle-crabs. Zuko glared, and they disappeared.

“When are your men coming back?” he asked. “They’re hunting, aren’t they?”

Oh. So that was what they looked like, when they weren’t trying to hide their hate.

---

Zuko wrapped himself up in the same blanket that night. It was printed inside with fine lines and images, telling a story he didn’t know. He wondered whose favorite it was.

---

Kanna wondered how quickly he’d wake—if he’d wake—if she built the fire up with wet driftwood and tundra grass, if she had one of the younger girls boost up a child to plug the air hole, if she let the smoke draw its own blanket down over this fire child.

---

It was hard to know when to wake up, because the sun never set. So everyone was up before him, and they all had spears and clubs and—and nets, and trap lines, and snow googles with their single slat to protect the eyes from snow blindness. Zuko had seen those once, at the Ember Island Museum of Ethnography, where they’d gone when it was too rainy for anything more exciting.

Oh. They were going hunting.

“Give me that,” Zuko said, and took a spear.

The women looked at him. One of them adjusted her googles.

“I can hunt,” he scowled.

He did not, in fact, know how to hunt.

---

“Give me that,” the Fire Prince said, and Kanna almost, almost gave him her ulu. Humans, like most animals, had an artery in their legs that would bleed them quick enough.

She kept skinning the rabbit-mink one of the women had snared.

“I can help,” he said, with less grace than most of their toddlers. Likely with the skinning skills of a toddler, too. She wasn’t going to let their unwanted visitor ruin a perfectly good pelt.

“Chop the meat,” she said, and gave him a different knife. “It’s dinner.”

“...This is really sharp,” he said a moment later, looking at the knife with some surprise.

“Is it,” said Kanna.

---

Things the Fire Prince was convinced he could do: hunt (until he realized he couldn’t tell the tracks of a rabbit-mink from a leopard-rabbit apart); spear fish (at least he could dry himself); pack snow for an igloo (frustrated princes ran hot); ice fish (the prince was a problem that kept coming close to solving itself).

Things the Fire Prince could actually do: mince meat, increasingly finely; gather berries and herbs, once he stopped trying to crush them; dig roots, under toddler supervision; mend nets, after the intermediary step of learning to braid hair loopies.

“Can’t I take him ice fishing again?” asked one of the women, as she watched Prince Zuko put as much apparent concentration into braiding her daughter’s hair as his people had into exterminating hers.

“Wait,” said another woman, sitting up straight. “Wait wait wait. I just had an idea.”

---

Three words: Infinite. Hot. Water.

---

Summer was coming to an end. The sun actually set, now, and the night was getting longer, and colder. The salmon-otter nets were mended and ready. The smoking racks were still full of cod-lemmings. The children were all a little older, the women all a little more used to doing both halves of their tribes’ chores; a little more used to not watching the horizon, waiting for help to come.

The Fire Prince was staring at the canoes again.

“Are you actually going to try leaving in one of those?” Kanna asked.

“...No.”

“Come on, then; someone needs to watch the kids while the women are hunting.”

She didn’t leave him alone with them, of course. But she could have.

---

Elsewhere, the war continued.

The moon turned red, for a moment none could sleep through; they did not learn why.

The comet came and went, leaving their castaway prince laying on the beach, his breath fogging up into the night sky above him, as the energy crashed from his system as quickly as it had come. Above, lights began to dance in the sky; Zuko pulled his hood up, so none of those spirits—children, dead too soon—got any ideas about kicking his head off to be their ball.

The war had ended. The world didn’t feel any different; no one in the south would know until spring came again.

---

Suffice it to say, Sokka and Katara were not prepared for this particular homecoming.

[lotrewrite]

LOT Chat Recap

So the chat went very well! I have grouped the subjects into thematic categories for everyone's ease.

A few up-front things for everyone:

Scheduling

Everyone will have two more weeks to revise their drafts or send in comments. Writers, please send me the edits you want me to make to your episode outline, which will be posted to the outline doc; you can also start drafting your final episode. If writers have any further questions about your episode, send in submissions or asks and they can be discussed by the group on this page; I am also always available to talk by messenger. Readers, please send in your comments and questions on episodes. I will be posting "let's talk about these three episodes" posts every day for the next week so that people can submit specific comments about those episodes if they have any additional comments to make.

We will have another chat on Saturday June 24 at 1PM EST (unless people prefer a different time)

Fully written episodes will then be due on Friday, July 28.  We will then have two weeks of editing and proof-reading, with the goal of posting the complete season to Ao3 by August 15.

Format

As people are welcome to start drafting their episodes ASAP, we need to decide on format. I will post a separate post in regards to this question with a poll.

Recap

Queen B

We're using the "Queen of Bialya with mind control powers" version, with an amulet instead of "pheromones" because it corresponds with Amaya's symbolism-wise; Queen B is from 2016

Motive: she's sensitive about the fact that she's illegitimately in power, which is why she isn't in Bialya

Legends could use in the Roman Republic episode where she's pretending to be a Queen; that’s why she has a feud with Mari, who has been helping undermine her power base by helping prove that she's not legit; she wants the spear so she's legitimately the queen of Bialya, which is why she joins the Legion (also because messing with Amaya will interfere with Mari)

Femme fatale style villain, which would make the scene in episode 16 where instead of seducing/convincing/mind controlling the guard, she just punches him, SO MUCH FUNNIER (like she saunters up, you think she's gonna use her powers, she smiles all seductive - and WHAM)

We need to pump up her role in the various episodes - she can take Merlyn's place as the "person who snarks with Darkh"

Amaya

Needs more development of her plot where she’s thinking about her future and trying to think of whether she should change it or not

Episode 10: Amaya and Queen B fight  - Queen B hints at things, building up Amaya’s curiosity

Episode 13: Queen B has more revelations for Amaya, telling actual facts

Amaya is thinking about changing: the destruction of her village and the fact that Mari grows up in the foster care system

That means we can have her start to angst about changing things in the Tudor episode (14) and New York (15); maybe a scene in 14 where she does research about her future secretly and then in 15 more debate about changing it, with the events of 15 inspiring her not to change it

that way we have a 5-part arc for Amaya about it

and her later confrontations with Queen B in 18 and in Doomworld work stronger because of it because Queen B’s taunts don’t  work as well any more

Compass

They pick it up in Episode 8 from Constantine in return for helping with the Crusade; Lily gets brought in to use her micro-tech knowledge to amp it up but really because Stein wants her around, but otherwise I think we can limit the references to it to "so Gideon says the compass goes to Y time period" – but it should be referenced consistently after Episode 8

Lily first appears in Episode 7 just like in canon, possible reference to present day Clarissa

Lily first gets picked up in episode 15, and ends up having her fight with Stein about him hiding her aberration status in episode 15 so that 16 starts with them still fighting; she can just be brought in as an "expert" in technology to help calibrate the compass, not because she’s an aberration – Rip can reveal it to her because he’s a Time Master and objects

Relationship with Stein: he’s still a workaholic, tries to over-interfere with her academics, distant but proud of her accomplishments and they bonded over their intelligence, he’s a good mentor figure; she’s pissed off that he didn't tell her about the aberration thing - it makes her feel like he didn't trust her, and she presumably had to fight HARD to get to a position of academic achievement where she felt he respected her instead of humoring her because she's his beloved daughter; a case of "daddy knows best" when it comes to the aberration issues. And she can be like "this is just like when you came to my dissertation defense!" It also explains why she forgives him in episode 16: she's kind of used to him being a bit of an oblivious tactless dumbass

Oculus – Spear

The Oculus' destruction and the scattering of the spear pieces are somehow connected – they were using the spear to power the Oculus; when it exploded, they scattered

as a Time Master, Rip knows where to find them – the piece he finds in the time loop with the 81 people is one of the pieces from the Oculus; the pieces want to get back together and are powered up by one of them being used

they don’t whisper and cannot be used to guide to each other – they don’t work by “wishes” per se, they just allow people to make changes to the timeline (good luck in succeeding in changing history to your will); only the spear together can you “wish” a new world into existence

The spear pieces weren’t “always there” – they were scattered there

Re-work the pilot so that the piece Rip gets is from the Oculus and maybe we can scatter the information that they had been powering the Oculus with the spear into episode 4 (Eo's explanation) and episode 8 (Constantine can do a bit of an info dump, he's a magical character)

Len

Len ends up just hovering in the background in a lot of the episodes and he never seems to get any lines that talk about his bitterness/resentment, so we need to use him more.

He is connected to the Oculus and that's why putting the spear back together = we see him more

Len’s appearance guide:

First few episodes, we have ONLY "visuals" of Len, just momentary glimpses, through episode 5, but nothing more - no comments, just blink-and-he's-gone.

Episode 3 is our first appearance of blink-and-miss-him - thematically appropriate since we're also bringing in Amaya

More blink-and-miss appearance in the next two episodes

We have the "funeral" episode as the turning point between “blink and gone” and “talking” next episode

Then in episode 6 we have our first appear-and-talk Len, the big moment where Mick is taken aback and is surprise (like in canon, where Mick has to give a gruff "You're not real"). But at that point, he's still only showing up briefly.

Len starts showing up more as the episodes go by; episode 6 through 10 we have him saying things TO Mick and Mick trying (and failing) to ignore him

Episode 10 being the episode where he's talking enough with Mick that the others notice

Episode 11 they test Mick for hallucinations, but Len's still there

Episode 12 Len doesn't do much, but the audience finds out he's real

Then from episode 13 to 16, Len should really be written as a full member of the cast just one that no one else can hear but Mick.

In Episode 14 L!Len steals the piece while O!Len is around, which is when O!Len realizes for the first time that Legion!Len is around; we could have a scene with O!Len asking Gideon "WTF was that"

NOTE: once Len is a full cast member, he can have scenes by himself, he doesn't always have to be tied to Mick or to another cast member, but before that, when he's just a hallucination, he shouldn't appear solo

Episode 16, he argues with Mick and leaves to go with the Legion!Len, who he discovers can also see him

Episode 17 is the episode where he helps Legion!Len fight the Legion

Episode 18 O!Len comes back and re-joins Mick's side, but isn't able to convince him not to go with Legion!Len in episode 19

Episode 20, Mick discovers Len is real

Episode 22, everyone else does and Len gets resurrected

Bambi

Decision made that Bambi survives; Pan will fix the details

Because Bambi survive in episode 2, there will be a line in the very end of the finale, when they crash land in LA and there are dinos there, just as the scene is fading to black we get a Ray voice-over going "wait...Bambi?!"

because that would be A, hilarious and B, a good tie-in to show that time is broken and they didn't land in a different part of the multiverse

Pencil

It's a convenient device that Nate would have around that the audience won't immediately go "ah-ha! mysterious item gets mentioned! will be important!"; him waving around the pencil in the pilot is a nice, easy way to bring it into the audience's view - but not emphasize it

It's his "lucky" pencil that he only uses for important exams; think of the kid who has a pencil box where he lovingly keeps that ONE PENCIL that he passed a test with and he uses it ONLY for tests

Nate inadvertently creates his own closed time loop: the spear is scattered through time and appears in Nate’s possession, which he thinks is a gift from his grandfather – it immunizes him from the changes in time (Nate tells his grandfather "you gave me your lucky pencil"; his grandfather who does not' have a lucky pencil gets weird about it then grabs a random pencil from the mission ( the spear piece) and gives that to young!Nate thereby completing the circle)

The JSA is there on a legitimate mission that is being messed up by the spear piece being there but since they're IN the time period, they don't realizes it's being messed with; the Legends, however, realize something is wrong and figure out that those weird glowing sticks might be involved and go looking but also try to help fix the original mission, which they mess up and show how unprofessional they are; however, in the end, they manage to help the JSA complete their mission and in the process, Henry grabs the spear piece he doesn't know it's a spear piece because the legends never shared that info

He takes the pencil because Nate told him he gave him his lucky pencil and Henry didn't have one but he doesn't want to disappoint his grandson so he picks one up going "this is a good memento of a really weird mission" and the Legends realize that that's how Nate got the spear piece in the first place it plays on the nature of time travel

the pencil is a closed time loop - it's a really nice way to play with time travel without being too cliche - it's the "being your own grandfather" trope but funny

the fact that we have two "time loops" in the early episodes - but not really in the later ones - could be a symptom of the timeline freeing itself from the "set" history of the Time Masters

which would be really cool thematically, with the Legends being set up by their various experiences in season 2 to actually start /deliberately changing history/ in season 3

Nate

Nate's hemophilia resolved with Gideon just saving his life, but doesn't fix his hemophilia

would be really funny to have Nate cameo in Doomworld by literally doing the same thing he does in the pilot - breaking into the mayor's office and babbling about history something. except this time it's Darkh;  but then darhk would kill him, but it'd be undone by the end of Doomworld

Ray breaking his suit

The full sequence is episode 6 (damage) episode 7 (overshadowed by Invasion) episode 8 (breaks) episode 9 (unsuccessful repair; acknowledge that he won’t be able to use it) episode 10 (can't use it all; trying new personas).

Because it's his screwing up in episode 6 that causes it, but it doesn't fully break it. and he's not a big player using his suit in Invasion, which we're mostly leaving alone

In Episode 9, he’s trying to put the suit back together but has only gotten parts of it to work; he shrinks due to an error and is worried he won’t be able to get big again – should have a moment at the end of the episode where Ray acknowledges he won’t fix it any time soon and realizing he needs to try to be a hero in a different way to set up the episode 10 montage

Ray montage

in terms of visuals, the scene should probably focus on Ray in the center, with whoever commenting doing so from off-screen

Ray tries to give himself powers; "I'm going to Captain America myself" "Remember how that went for Bruce Banner?" - a good way to point out that the Marvel universe are comics in DC

dress him in the GL outfit and he's explaining to someone that "so it'll be based around this ring -" "won't work"

dress him as the Blue Beetle for a second before he goes "naaaaah" 

booster gold and Gideon advises against

We should have him in a superman costume at one point but with no "s" and he's saying "I dunno, maybe if something went in the middle?" (that is also a Powergirl reference - the superman outfit but the "s" was a chest-window or the "atom" LOT symbol, and then you have someone (Jax?) off-screen going "no, man, no")

possibly one piece outfit, Naruto outfit - Mick offscreen just goes "NO, haircut"

Vikings

Jax says Stein is his dad, possibly a mentor instead? Or a specific reference to multi-cultural Vikings

the changing vs. preserving history argument

They are split up as sara, ray, amaya for preserve and mick, jax, stein for change, but by the end of episode 13, it ends up as mick, jax, stein, amaya vs. sara, ray, rip once rip's brainwashing is removed and amaya hears about her future from queen b

Cameos

Jason Blood in the background for a few episodes

I think the references to Poison Ivy not returning their calls and then having a discussion of Poison Ivy in Doomworld worked really well using Kendra three times was also really great

the Lanterns should also be foreshadowed more, if they're going to appear (one reference to the Lanterns in our rewritten Invasion, so if we have maybe one more somewhere, it'd be enough)

References to the other rogues: both in the future and mick, len, and lisa talking about them

Need to fill in reference in filler episode (Selina Kyle? Someone else?)

Trauma

Should have some scenes dealing with the trauma Ray went through while surviving in the cretaceous period and dealing with the effects Rip's brainwashing had - both characters would try to deny it, powering through until they break (Ray when his suit breaks for good in episode 10 - he mentions that he feels empty without his suit and all alone like he did in the Cretaceous period)

Rip and Mick should definitely have a moment to discuss brainwashing, if possible

Ray's suit is some symbolism for his psychological journey

Episode 3

Possible move to D Day or using the 1942 occupation of the south of France because of the Allied invasion of Morocco

Episode 10

Stein goes undercover as a Brit as well, and that's how they find out that the Legion are influencing the Brits; That way he gets stuck on the British ship and can't form Firestorm until the climatic battle moment

episode 8

Zatanna and Madame Xanadu should appear briefly in the beginning (wild goose chase montage when they’re trying to hire someone other than Constantine)

The organization should be 1, Rip being chased; 2, intro sequence; 3, Constantine sequence with Zed getting the vision; 4, they go after Rip and I think 4, the feudal Japan sequence, should be longer, with more chasing and action sequences, as well as a scene where the Legends lose Rip to the Legion because Ray’s suit breaks and where Rip thinks Eobard is friendly before realizing he’s not;

needs a scene where the Legends return to Constantine and he offers them the compass in exchange for help with the Crusade, THEN intersperse the Rip interrogation with the Legends defeating the Crusade

[musings-by-certified-bi]

Tags From Muffin on my addition:

#Absolutely agree on the crazy fallout this AU would cause all around #But specifically it is very very important to me at 3am #That you are all picturing the village toddlers ordering Zuko around like tiny drill sergeants a la Sokka in episode one #Because that is the example he set and Zuko is THEIR war prisoner #Zuko's extremely heated debates on his wartime status are actually very reassuring for their mothers to watch #Sir you are engaging in a screaming debate with a literal toddler and you are losing #(and the only thing you're lighting on fire is the air) #Anyway Zuko is very Bullied By Babies in this AU and you all need to know that #Also important: Kanna DOES NOT adopt Zuko #I cannot emphasize enough how hilarious that is for the multiverse #If only Kanna maintains her professional distance #Thereby giving Salvage!Hakoda and LittleZuko!Sokka zero legs to stand on #Do you understand my vision

I do. I see the relationship as less of adopted child, and more of a babysitter they're all protective, but wary of. He may be a child but he's the same age as their sons were when they left. Their sons who they don't know if they're still alive.

As for the point about food, even if fire benders need more, they were still prepared to feed two teens instead of one. While he's still somehow less efficient than Katara and Sokka were on their most distracted days, he goes at everything with 100% in a way that aches because he's so eager for praise and not to be ostracized, but they can't let him in the same way they might let in a Earth Kingdom refugee.

Muffin's tags on 0samue0's addition:

#we love the women keeping him extra close and extra busy when the menfolk come home #Zuko: why are you picking on me #The Women: because it's good for you #The Children: *nodding for this has been their philosophy all along* #Sokka wiping a tear from his eye: I trained you so well

And on wileycap's:

#I find it important to note that Zuko is ABSOLUTELY mad about this in the background #It's just not helping him at all #Sokka you're their superior officer call them off #SOKKA #Aang for one LOVES a captive audience #Hey do you think we could have been friends? #Zuko: We could be friends RIGHT NOW if you UNTIED ME #Aang: DEAL #and that's how the Fire Prince became contractually bound to be the Avatar's (very grumpy) friend #(also Aang: pays the kids off with sweets behind Zuko's back)

I love the idea of Aang winning his friendship quest with Zuko simply by leveling up in other areas and leaving Zuko with children for long enough. When Zuko sets the air on fire around him, the children know to bring out the snacks and use him as a portable fire and Aang is honored to learn their ways.

Katara is suspicious but her time in the Fire Nation changed her perspective on a lot of things, and her begrudging acceptance of Zuko totally happens when she's doing something and her hair comes loose. She snaps for Sokka to fix it because her hands are busy, and even after accepting that women are badass he's still her older brother and sputtering out excuses and then in between this, Zuko totally not thinking about what he's doing re-does her hair on instinct, because she had the exact same tone as the young girls that have taken to the fact he is very good at hair loopies now and make him fix their hair when it becomes clear he gives in easier than their mothers. My boy doesn't even notice both siblings staring at him as he returns to his task and walks away. Aang has sparkles in his eyes. Sokka is annoyed on principle because how is Zuko better at him at this when he's not even Water Tribe(practice Sokka, practice)?

And this begs the question of does Zuko want to return? Does he have a choice? Because at the end of the day the tribeswomen took care of him when they didn't have to. And it's his duty to return and become Iroh's heir, but what is that worth? Has he changed too much? Will the Fire Nation want him back after the shock of his survival wears off, and there's the same banished unworthy prince with his knowledge of his home dulled by being at sea and then in a foreign land? Because even if we think Zuko has reconnected with a part of his history that he buried, I don't think his inner monologue will see it that way. And even Aang and the water tribes women and children keeping him distracted and away from the important debates about what to do now, doesn't stop the thoughts that keep him up at night.

Hi ! prompt idea : What if Zuko was armed during the first episode and was stranded with the water tribe while the avatar left with Katara and Sokka, Iroh on his trail for white lotus reasons.

Oh we are going to have us some FUN with "stranded with the water tribe", say no more.

---

Zuko was dripping, and steaming, and staring down two dozen women and their gaggle of small children, plus that old not-the-Avatar crone from earlier. They were all cowering away from him. Which was--

Good. It was good. If they were cowering, then they hadn’t noticed how steam was not flames. He wasn’t sure he could make flames, not after the arctic water he’d landed in, with that last sight of the Avatar glowing; not after surfacing under the ice pack, after swimming, after kicking slamming breaking through and his ship was gone and there was only ocean all around and

and he’d made it back to this pathetic little camp of the Southern Water Tribe, because that was the only place he knew for sure would have shelter, and he wasn’t going to die just because they were all staring at him, even if felt like he would.

Even if the old not-the-Avatar woman could probably take him, right now. But she didn’t know that.

Zuko pulled himself up, taller than her by at least a few inches, and blew steam from his nose.

“I am commandeering one of your huts,” he said. And added, because Uncle said even a prince should be gracious: “You may choose which one.”

---

She choose her own.

...The only one without children that flames might scar, or younger women to catch a soldier’s interests.

Zuko sat by her fire and determinedly started struggling out of his wet clothes and she was still in here with him--

Zuko pulled one of her animal pelts over himself, and finished fighting off his clothes. When he stuck his head back out, cheeks still reddened from what was obviously the cold, she dropped a parka on his head.

“Dry clothes, Your Highness,” she said.

The parka was much bigger than he was. He fell asleep hoping that the camp’s men were on a long, long hunting trip.

---

He woke up again. Kanna tucked her favorite ulu knife away, newly sharpened, and stopped contemplating the alternative.

---

“I am commandeering a ship,” he said.

The crone led him across the village, all twenty paces of it, to a row of canoes.

“Take whichever one you want,” she said. “Will you need help getting it to the water?”

Zuko looked at the canoes. Looked at the ocean. Watched a leopard seal, easily the size of the largest canoe, dozing just past the ice his own ship had broken through the day before. It was frozen again, a great icy arrow pointing from the waves to the village, snow already starting to cover it over.

Beyond was blue sky and gray ocean and white ice, floating in blocks like stepping stones, like boulders, like cliffsides.

There wasn’t even a hint of gray steel, or smoke. Or any land, besides what they were standing on.

He looked down at the canoes again. Somehow, they seemed even smaller.

“I, uh,” Zuko cleared his throat. “I’ll require supplies. Before I go.”

---

They... did not have supplies. Not extra ones. This didn’t stop them from trying to give him supplies, food and blankets and anything else he could think to ask for. But each blanket was a pelt hunted by someone’s grandfather, had been inked with images and stories by someone’s mother, was the favorite of someone’s husband or brother or uncle or cousin--

They couldn’t go to the nearest market to replace things, here.

And when they talked about food, about what they could spare, they kept sneaking glances to their children, who were sneaking glances at Zuko from the huts, sticking their heads just over the snowy ledges like their fur-trimmed hoods would hide them. Their mothers and aunts shooed them away, and they crept back, like barnacle-crabs. Zuko glared, and they disappeared.

“When are your men coming back?” he asked. “They’re hunting, aren’t they?”

Oh. So that was what they looked like, when they weren’t trying to hide their hate.

---

Zuko wrapped himself up in the same blanket that night. It was printed inside with fine lines and images, telling a story he didn’t know. He wondered whose favorite it was.

---

Kanna wondered how quickly he’d wake—if he’d wake—if she built the fire up with wet driftwood and tundra grass, if she had one of the younger girls boost up a child to plug the air hole, if she let the smoke draw its own blanket down over this fire child.

---

It was hard to know when to wake up, because the sun never set. So everyone was up before him, and they all had spears and clubs and—and nets, and trap lines, and snow googles with their single slat to protect the eyes from snow blindness. Zuko had seen those once, at the Ember Island Museum of Ethnography, where they’d gone when it was too rainy for anything more exciting.

Oh. They were going hunting.

“Give me that,” Zuko said, and took a spear.

The women looked at him. One of them adjusted her googles.

“I can hunt,” he scowled.

He did not, in fact, know how to hunt.

---

“Give me that,” the Fire Prince said, and Kanna almost, almost gave him her ulu. Humans, like most animals, had an artery in their legs that would bleed them quick enough.

She kept skinning the rabbit-mink one of the women had snared.

“I can help,” he said, with less grace than most of their toddlers. Likely with the skinning skills of a toddler, too. She wasn’t going to let their unwanted visitor ruin a perfectly good pelt.

“Chop the meat,” she said, and gave him a different knife. “It’s dinner.”

“...This is really sharp,” he said a moment later, looking at the knife with some surprise.

“Is it,” said Kanna.

---

Things the Fire Prince was convinced he could do: hunt (until he realized he couldn’t tell the tracks of a rabbit-mink from a leopard-rabbit apart); spear fish (at least he could dry himself); pack snow for an igloo (frustrated princes ran hot); ice fish (the prince was a problem that kept coming close to solving itself).

Things the Fire Prince could actually do: mince meat, increasingly finely; gather berries and herbs, once he stopped trying to crush them; dig roots, under toddler supervision; mend nets, after the intermediary step of learning to braid hair loopies.

“Can’t I take him ice fishing again?” asked one of the women, as she watched Prince Zuko put as much apparent concentration into braiding her daughter’s hair as his people had into exterminating hers.

“Wait,” said another woman, sitting up straight. “Wait wait wait. I just had an idea.”

---

Three words: Infinite. Hot. Water.

---

Summer was coming to an end. The sun actually set, now, and the night was getting longer, and colder. The salmon-otter nets were mended and ready. The smoking racks were still full of cod-lemmings. The children were all a little older, the women all a little more used to doing both halves of their tribes’ chores; a little more used to not watching the horizon, waiting for help to come.

The Fire Prince was staring at the canoes again.

“Are you actually going to try leaving in one of those?” Kanna asked.

“...No.”

“Come on, then; someone needs to watch the kids while the women are hunting.”

She didn’t leave him alone with them, of course. But she could have.

---

Elsewhere, the war continued.

The moon turned red, for a moment none could sleep through; they did not learn why.

The comet came and went, leaving their castaway prince laying on the beach, his breath fogging up into the night sky above him, as the energy crashed from his system as quickly as it had come. Above, lights began to dance in the sky; Zuko pulled his hood up, so none of those spirits—children, dead too soon—got any ideas about kicking his head off to be their ball.

The war had ended. The world didn’t feel any different; no one in the south would know until spring came again.

---

Suffice it to say, Sokka and Katara were not prepared for this particular homecoming.

[bayofalgecirascranes]

Prev tags with my own additional commentary below: #Absolutely agree on the crazy fallout this AU would cause all around#But specifically it is very very important to me at 3am#That you are all picturing the village toddlers ordering Zuko around like tiny drill sergeants a la Sokka in episode one#Because that is the example he set and Zuko is THEIR war prisoner#Zuko's extremely heated debates on his wartime status are actually very reassuring for their mothers to watch#Sir you are engaging in a screaming debate with a literal toddler and you are losing#(and the only thing you're lighting on fire is the air)#Anyway Zuko is very Bullied By Babies in this AU and you all need to know that#avatar the last airbender#atla#zuko#Also important: Kanna DOES NOT adopt Zuko#I cannot emphasize enough how hilarious that is for the multiverse#If only Kanna maintains her professional distance#Thereby giving Salvage!Hakoda and LittleZuko!Sokka zero legs to stand on#Do you understand my vision

I love that. Kanna doesn't adopt zuko, The Village's children adopt Zuko. Zuko is not aware of this fact. The children are not aware of this fact. Their mothers are very aware of this fact and they go from amused-horror to regular amused when it becomes clear that an army of toddlers easily subdues the Fire Prince every single time.

Hi ! prompt idea : What if Zuko was armed during the first episode and was stranded with the water tribe while the avatar left with Katara and Sokka, Iroh on his trail for white lotus reasons.

Oh we are going to have us some FUN with "stranded with the water tribe", say no more.

---

Zuko was dripping, and steaming, and staring down two dozen women and their gaggle of small children, plus that old not-the-Avatar crone from earlier. They were all cowering away from him. Which was--

Good. It was good. If they were cowering, then they hadn’t noticed how steam was not flames. He wasn’t sure he could make flames, not after the arctic water he’d landed in, with that last sight of the Avatar glowing; not after surfacing under the ice pack, after swimming, after kicking slamming breaking through and his ship was gone and there was only ocean all around and

and he’d made it back to this pathetic little camp of the Southern Water Tribe, because that was the only place he knew for sure would have shelter, and he wasn’t going to die just because they were all staring at him, even if felt like he would.

Even if the old not-the-Avatar woman could probably take him, right now. But she didn’t know that.

Zuko pulled himself up, taller than her by at least a few inches, and blew steam from his nose.

“I am commandeering one of your huts,” he said. And added, because Uncle said even a prince should be gracious: “You may choose which one.”

---

She choose her own.

...The only one without children that flames might scar, or younger women to catch a soldier’s interests.

Zuko sat by her fire and determinedly started struggling out of his wet clothes and she was still in here with him--

Zuko pulled one of her animal pelts over himself, and finished fighting off his clothes. When he stuck his head back out, cheeks still reddened from what was obviously the cold, she dropped a parka on his head.

“Dry clothes, Your Highness,” she said.

The parka was much bigger than he was. He fell asleep hoping that the camp’s men were on a long, long hunting trip.

---

He woke up again. Kanna tucked her favorite ulu knife away, newly sharpened, and stopped contemplating the alternative.

---

“I am commandeering a ship,” he said.

The crone led him across the village, all twenty paces of it, to a row of canoes.

“Take whichever one you want,” she said. “Will you need help getting it to the water?”

Zuko looked at the canoes. Looked at the ocean. Watched a leopard seal, easily the size of the largest canoe, dozing just past the ice his own ship had broken through the day before. It was frozen again, a great icy arrow pointing from the waves to the village, snow already starting to cover it over.

Beyond was blue sky and gray ocean and white ice, floating in blocks like stepping stones, like boulders, like cliffsides.

There wasn’t even a hint of gray steel, or smoke. Or any land, besides what they were standing on.

He looked down at the canoes again. Somehow, they seemed even smaller.

“I, uh,” Zuko cleared his throat. “I’ll require supplies. Before I go.”

---

They... did not have supplies. Not extra ones. This didn’t stop them from trying to give him supplies, food and blankets and anything else he could think to ask for. But each blanket was a pelt hunted by someone’s grandfather, had been inked with images and stories by someone’s mother, was the favorite of someone’s husband or brother or uncle or cousin--

They couldn’t go to the nearest market to replace things, here.

And when they talked about food, about what they could spare, they kept sneaking glances to their children, who were sneaking glances at Zuko from the huts, sticking their heads just over the snowy ledges like their fur-trimmed hoods would hide them. Their mothers and aunts shooed them away, and they crept back, like barnacle-crabs. Zuko glared, and they disappeared.

“When are your men coming back?” he asked. “They’re hunting, aren’t they?”

Oh. So that was what they looked like, when they weren’t trying to hide their hate.

---

Zuko wrapped himself up in the same blanket that night. It was printed inside with fine lines and images, telling a story he didn’t know. He wondered whose favorite it was.

---

Kanna wondered how quickly he’d wake—if he’d wake—if she built the fire up with wet driftwood and tundra grass, if she had one of the younger girls boost up a child to plug the air hole, if she let the smoke draw its own blanket down over this fire child.

---

It was hard to know when to wake up, because the sun never set. So everyone was up before him, and they all had spears and clubs and—and nets, and trap lines, and snow googles with their single slat to protect the eyes from snow blindness. Zuko had seen those once, at the Ember Island Museum of Ethnography, where they’d gone when it was too rainy for anything more exciting.

Oh. They were going hunting.

“Give me that,” Zuko said, and took a spear.

The women looked at him. One of them adjusted her googles.

“I can hunt,” he scowled.

He did not, in fact, know how to hunt.

---

“Give me that,” the Fire Prince said, and Kanna almost, almost gave him her ulu. Humans, like most animals, had an artery in their legs that would bleed them quick enough.

She kept skinning the rabbit-mink one of the women had snared.

“I can help,” he said, with less grace than most of their toddlers. Likely with the skinning skills of a toddler, too. She wasn’t going to let their unwanted visitor ruin a perfectly good pelt.

“Chop the meat,” she said, and gave him a different knife. “It’s dinner.”

“...This is really sharp,” he said a moment later, looking at the knife with some surprise.

“Is it,” said Kanna.

---

Things the Fire Prince was convinced he could do: hunt (until he realized he couldn’t tell the tracks of a rabbit-mink from a leopard-rabbit apart); spear fish (at least he could dry himself); pack snow for an igloo (frustrated princes ran hot); ice fish (the prince was a problem that kept coming close to solving itself).

Things the Fire Prince could actually do: mince meat, increasingly finely; gather berries and herbs, once he stopped trying to crush them; dig roots, under toddler supervision; mend nets, after the intermediary step of learning to braid hair loopies.

“Can’t I take him ice fishing again?” asked one of the women, as she watched Prince Zuko put as much apparent concentration into braiding her daughter’s hair as his people had into exterminating hers.

“Wait,” said another woman, sitting up straight. “Wait wait wait. I just had an idea.”

---

Three words: Infinite. Hot. Water.

---

Summer was coming to an end. The sun actually set, now, and the night was getting longer, and colder. The salmon-otter nets were mended and ready. The smoking racks were still full of cod-lemmings. The children were all a little older, the women all a little more used to doing both halves of their tribes’ chores; a little more used to not watching the horizon, waiting for help to come.

The Fire Prince was staring at the canoes again.

“Are you actually going to try leaving in one of those?” Kanna asked.

“...No.”

“Come on, then; someone needs to watch the kids while the women are hunting.”

She didn’t leave him alone with them, of course. But she could have.

---

Elsewhere, the war continued.

The moon turned red, for a moment none could sleep through; they did not learn why.

The comet came and went, leaving their castaway prince laying on the beach, his breath fogging up into the night sky above him, as the energy crashed from his system as quickly as it had come. Above, lights began to dance in the sky; Zuko pulled his hood up, so none of those spirits—children, dead too soon—got any ideas about kicking his head off to be their ball.

The war had ended. The world didn’t feel any different; no one in the south would know until spring came again.

---

Suffice it to say, Sokka and Katara were not prepared for this particular homecoming.