#Meanwhile the firebenders basically have their powers all the time and just create their own fire

[lieutenant-amuel]

Since I know you’re finishing soon, just like with the end CXGF, you finished! Now what was your fav? Like fav episode or moment or character, or just not even your favorite. Just what are your thoughts on this epic epic show?

Thank you for the ask! And for encouraging me to finally watch this masterpiece <3

To be honest, it’s always difficult for me to explain why I like certain things, because in most cases I simply don’t have any reasons, I just like it subconsciously x) Anyway, I’ll try to share my general thoughts, plus a few of my favourite things, divided into categories (like a character, episode, season, etc) so as to keep it structured.

Here we go!

General thoughts: this is a fantastic show. I can clearly see why people praise it so much and note that many other TV shows should look up at it, especially in terms of storytelling, character development, and world building (I even saw how fandom creators take this show as an example when it comes to creating something themselves, so I, as a creative soul~, can say that I also took something from it).

I read a few reviews on this show and I noticed that many people pointed out that this show didn’t hook them then since the very beginning because it was a bit childish but assured that it did get better eventually. As for me, it really hooked me since the first episode, because it already seemed super dynamic and as I kept watching it, I was truly amazed by the variety of the adventures the main characters had and how many subjects this show brought up. One of the reasons I love animation is that it can balance out serious mature topics with childish lightness so as to keep it enjoyable for everyone and I think ATLA does it perfectly.

I think it really all I can say. This is a very well-written show, and I love how consistent it is in terms of storytelling. It rarely has pointless episodes and makes a fantastic job on its characters, all of whom have clear personalities and dynamic stories (arcs) on their own. It talks about mature important subjects, and I’m just weak for the pieces of media that create their own universes because I love digging into the lore (and it’s really possible to talk ATLA lore for hours).

Favourite character: as I already mentioned, Sokka! He’s amazing.

I don’t want to talk too much about him because I might get repetitive but to put it simply, I love how multilayered Sokka actually is. He’s a fun guy with a boomerang on the surface but if you look inside, you can see how smart, brave, protective, and caring he is. He’s a leader, a strategist, a warrior, and I suppose I simply have a thing for the characters like him x) (and you can’t imagine how much I feel him in those scenes when he rushes his friends to be focused on the mission, especially when Katara gets distracted by helping some random villagers and he says something like, “Katara! We have more important things to do!” and I just shout at the screen, “YES”).

My second fave is Iroh! He caught my eye since the episode one, because, I don’t know, he just seemed genuinely funny and enjoyable to me x) But as I kept watching the show, I started noticing how wise, caring, loving, and kind he is, and my love to him reached the top somewhere in season 2 when he and Zuko got much more sweet uncle/nephew moments. And can I just say that his reunion with Zuko legit made me shed a tear 😭

And my third fave, to make it Top-3, is Zuko! I think I was quite indifferent to him in season 1 but started seeing much more in him in season 2 when he was trying to find his true path and was rushing between searching for Aang and having a peaceful life. And I absolutely love him in season 3. The way he rehearsed his meeting with Aang (“Hi. My name is Zuko”) was adorable :’D

Favourite season: I don’t think I can explain why but for some reason season 2 was the most memorable to me. It has so many cool things, from the introduction of the new characters to absolutely fantastic Zuko’s arc. And for absolutely no reason I really can recall many episodes and their titles from this one without looking up, even though it’s been quite a while since I finished season 2 (and by saying it, I don’t mean season 1 and 3 weren’t memorable and I don’t like them; just season 2 brought me more emotions, I suppose).

Favourite episodes: I’ll list a few ones from each season because for now I’m not sure which episode is my ultimate fave.

Season 1 - The Storm, The Blue Spirit, The Great Divide.

Season 2 - Zuko Alone, The Swamp (I LOVE this one a lot!!), The Chase, The Crossroads of Destiny.

Season 3 - Sokka’s Master, The Puppetmaster, The Day of Black Sun (two parts), The Firebending Masters, The Boiling Rock.

Favourite ship: I… don’t have one? Even if we take canon ones into account, I don’t really feel anything towards them. Sokka/Yue certainly have a beautiful and tragic story, but I don’t think about them that often. Sokka/Suki are nice, too, but that’s all I can say. Zuko/Mai… I’m not sure how they even became a couple. Aang/Katara don’t really bring anything to me either.

I’m pretty sure that Zuko/Sokka is quite popular in the fandom but I just don’t see it, I’m sorry.

So yeah, I don’t have a fave ship, but if anyone has opinions to share with me, I’d love to hear them. I’m quite open-minded at this point.

Favourite moments: akjajdkf I don’t think I can recall many. I really need to watch this show at least one more time for that. Anyway, the ones that come to my mind are (random order):

Iroh and Zuko’s reunion, as I already mentioned. This scene made me cry. CRY. ME. I rarely cry while watching/reading anything, so it really speaks a lot (it reminds me that Esteban’s sacrifice in Coronation Day made me cry, too. I literally had to pause before continuing to watch because I couldn’t stop sobbing ajhsjdkf).

Sokka’s battle with Piandao in “Sokka’s Master”.

Literally all flashbacks scenes in “Zuko Alone.”

Ice dodging in “Bato of the Water Tribe.”

Hama's story and bloodbending in “The Puppetmaster” (that’s so creepy and fantastic).

Zuko and Aang perform the firebending technique to the dragons in “The Firebending Masters.”

Aaaand this is really all I can recall for now x) Those are not necessarily my most favourite moments, just the ones that were off the top of my head at the moment.

Well, I think that’s it! To conclude, I just want to say I really loved this show (and now I don’t feel awkward for never watching it anymore XD), these characters, this world, and basically everything. It was a super enjoyable watch and I’d love to rewatch it someday! (maybe even showing to my sister to watch it together)

Thank you for the ask again and sorry that it took me quite long to get to it!

[aikoiya]

DPxAtLA AU

This is just another DP crossover idea. AtLA & ALoK, starting with AtLA first. If nothing else, I feel like bending would either be effective against ghosts, at least to a degree, because it's fueled by chi which, I believe, is a spiritual energy despite being channeled through bodily movement. However, if I’m wrong & chi is actually a physical energy, then just like ki, it wouldn’t be effective at all due to the nature of ghosts.

At the same time, if it is spiritual, then it'd also depend on which element is being bend & the core elements & weaknesses of the Ghost themselves. So, in Danny's case, water, air, & possibly fire would be least effective against him, but lightningbending would hurt like hell!

The majority of Danny Phantom team would be 17-18 upon appearing in this world, with Jazz being 20 & Ellie being, like, 3-10 with the brain of a 12 year old. (I don’t care what the show or phandom says, Elle looks 8 in the cartoon. Also, this is after the Disasteroid & Elle being rebuilt with Sam’s DNA to stabilize her. Doing so regressed her to her actual age, which would’ve been, like, 2 at the time.)

Danny would definitely be able to learn waterbending, but he'd be limited to the manipulation of ice & unable to manipulate water beyond turning it to ice. I also think he'd be an airbender, which would come as a surprise to everyone there, especially the Gaang, & get him mistaken for the Avatar quite often. In reality, he's just aligned with ice as his main & wind as his secondary. I can see him creating his own style that has influence from both the waterbending & airbending styles. I suppose some might begin to call him a 'frostbender' or 'blizzardbender.'

If it were a twin au, Dina would just be straight waterbender, but like Katara, would be a healer too.

I feel like Danny, at least, would have the airbender ability of being able to travel to the Spirit World (via meditating like Aang), if not all the Halfas (by overshadowing Aang when he goes there & therefore piggybacking off him), though in the case of it just being Danny, Aang would have to teach him how through meditation. In my mind, the Spirit World is basically the Spiritual Plane of the Avatar universe & it has a connection to the Infinite Realms. The problem would be if the whole team is there because, obviously, no one but Danny, & possibly the other Halfas, can go to the Spirit World until ALoK. So, that'd at least delay them all returning home for a while.

One passes through the Spirit World first before going to the GZ.

The Halfas would definitely be able to see spirits in the Elemental Nations even when they are invisible. Not to mention, their ghost powers would be very effective against them.

Anyway, while in the Elemental Nations, Danny would learn how to fight formally (he'd have the most to learn) & Dina would get more effective training on how to merge water & ice with fighting. Meanwhile, spirits would recognize them as the "Spirit Prince & Princess."

If the rest of the team is involved, I don't see Jazz as being very bender-esque. Sam, I see as a 50/50 chance. Either she can't or she can & she's swamp sage-type & bends the water in plants. I dunno. If not, I do think that Sam would absolutely be into the idea of being a Kiyoshi Warrior. I can see Vlad & Valerie as firebenders, either both are able to lightningbend or just Vlad, who quickly gets to the point where his fire burns blue like Azula’s (if Valerie isn't a firebender, then she'd also be very into the Kiyoshi Warrior thing) & Tucker as an earthbender with a specialty in sandbending, before eventually becoming a metalbender after Toph teaches him how. Ellie would be either a waterbender that bends the water in plants like Sam or an earthbender. As for Vlad, either he learns a Fire Nation style of swordsmanship that utilizes firebending or he creates his own based on his own personal style of swordsmanship.

What also makes the Halfas odd is that their cores provide them with a certain amount of resistance. For instance, Danny is immune to cold & ice, while Dina & Ellie are merely resistant to it. However, Danny & Dina are both weak to lightning. Vlad is immune to fire & heat, as well as resistant to lightning.

If we go with Sam & Tucker eventually becoming Halfas themselves, Sam would be weak to both extreme heat & extreme cold as well as fire & ice. Meanwhile, Tucker would be resistant to fire, but immune to heat & lightning.

Sam would probably get onto Sokka for being as carnivorous as Tucker & praise Aang for being vegetarian until she realizes that the Water Tribes sorta have to eat meat not only because of their locations, but also because of the time they live in. It's just not feasible for the Water Tribe to turn vegetarian because they live at the poles where it's near impossible to farm produce. Such a major change in diet would either require abandoning their ancestral homes or intensive trading deals that just wouldn't be possible, especially for the Southern Water Tribe until after the war was over.

I also feel like Tucker & Sokka would get along great.

Maybe I’ll make it so the Halfas can only be ghosts in the Spirit World so that they aren’t so op all-the-time. However, in doing so, it’d make them all able to go there, but only via meditation. At the same time, I might make it so in order to reclaim the use of their ghost powers in the Elemental Nations, they have to die again & be revived.

Also, Danny is still able to create Ghost Ice outside of ghost form, which is nearly indestructible & at some point, he’d begin to make weapons from it. However, it takes a lot of training to be able to form it in human form. As humans, they have access to a couple ghost powers, but it's only to the level of ecto-liminal. Meaning that when they walk, they're silent, they are able to slow their falls & turn invisible for a short period of time in areas of high spiritual energy, can see in absolute darkness, can heal very quickly, are naturally stronger, faster, & more flexible than most humans (though, not superhumanly so), Danny, Dina, & Ellie being even more so due to being of a dhampiric bloodline, & able to affect spirits the way that Korra could. Also due to their dhampiric bloodline, they are still able to sense supernatural beings such as spirits. Dina, specifically, manages to keep her sirenic singing & ability to understand water-dwelling mammals & control other water-dwelling creatures to a degree.

I think that I’ll also make Danny, Dina, & Ellie ‘lightbenders.’ (It’s actually photomancy, but you know.)

I can also see Vlad teaming up with the Fire Nation, specifically Zuko, Iroh, Azula, & Ozai, giving them a limited amount of information on the new pieces in the war. However, he’d do so on the condition that Dina & Danny be turned over to him, Dina unharmed & treated with respect due to their friendship. He’d also refuse to do anything to Ellie due to his promise to Dina. He’d first show up with Azula right after the invasion of the North Pole.

He actually sees a lot of his own family’s dynamic in the Fire Lord’s family. Vlad sees a lot of his own father in Ozai, a lot of his Uncle Demetri in Iroh, & a lot of himself in both Zuko & Azula. He recognizes Zuko as being a lot like how he’d been when under his father’s thumb & Azula as being how he could’ve been if he’d never met Dina. He even bets that he’d also see a lot of his mother in Ursa had he met her & he’d be right. It actually strikes him seeing how they interact with each other & how similar their relationships are to his own family’s dynamics. His stomach sinking as he sees more, wondering which of the 2 Fire Heirs he’d have ended up like more had his own father, Manfred, continued to live & sent his mother off.

As such, he sympathizes with the prince & princess quite a bit. He actually tries to help them both to reconcile because he would’ve wanted someone to do so for he & his sibling had his mother not miscarried. He often wonders if said sibling lived, if their relationship would’ve been like Zuko & Azula’s.

Vlad actually becomes very important to both Zuko & Azula, almost taking the place of Iroh without really taking his place during the 3rd season. He gives them both advice during this time. He often wishes that his uncle hadn’t died so early in his life so that he could’ve been as much of a guide to him as Iroh has been to Zuko. Or, at least that his uncle had returned to Earth quicker as Vlad had been an adult & long into his career by the time the Dairy King had shown up at his mansion in Wisconsin. He’s honestly somewhat jealous of Zuko in that respects. I think that he’d get along rather well with Iroh once it was all said & done.

FYI, I’m debating making Azula have a bit of a crush on Danny. However, he can just smell the crazy on her & is like, “nope.” Also, even if she wasn’t completely off her rocker, he’s with Sam, so no anyway.

At the same time, it could make for an interesting dynamic as she tries over & over to lure him to her side with promises of making him her husband when she becomes Fire Lady & how they’ll rule the world with an iron fist. (I’m thinking how she behaved on Ember Island.) It kinda freaks Danny out because it’s reminding him of when Vlad was still after his mom which makes him sick to his stomach.

Anyway, while at the North Pole, Dina would feel a strange connection to both Tui & La, as well as Yue. She’d feel a sort of kinship with them & they with her. The same could be said of Danny & Ellie, but to a far lesser extent than Dina. She’d also be able to sense it when the moon spirit was in danger much like how Aang & Yue could. During the actual invasion, Dina is able to continue waterbending even while the moon was dead because she technically counts as her own moon. When the moon goes dark, Dina begins to shine brightly despite not being in ghost form & this is the first instance of ‘lightbending’ that takes place. Her light acts as a substitute for moonlight, so all waterbenders near her are still able to bend. In fact, even after this, her proximity regularly gives waterbenders a boost as if it were a full moon. Oddly, Danny can still bend, but that’s because his bending is fueled by starlight rather than moonlight.

Either Yue realizes that Dina has a connection to the moon as well & together, they are able to restore the moon spirit without Yue having to die. Or, Dina is with the waterbenders, helping them with her light & Yue has to die. If she’s there when Iroh mentions Yue having been touched by the moon, after saving both the moon & Yue, Yue becomes sickly. She still has a bit of the moon in her, but not enough to keep her healthy like before. Dina is fine because of her Halfa status. She only used enough of her energy to save the moon spirit. As for Sokka & Yue, she has to stand her ground about her duty & they don’t get together. It’s bittersweet.

At the same time, I feel like Vlad never really learned how to utilize his core element, rather he just continued to suppress it the way Danny tried to suppress his in Urban Jungle: at least, until it all burst out, at which point it would start over again. So, being in the Elemental Nations would give him a means to learn how to control his elements: fire as his main & lightning as his secondary.

I figure that when the Halfas bend, their cores light up, shining from within their body through their skin. Their cores also make their bending more powerful than most other benders. However, that can also make their bending more difficult to control at the beginning. As such, they have to work harder to get it under control.

I definitely think that Sam, & maybe even Ellie, would feel a certain connection to the Swamp & would absolutely be with Katara & Aang about not harming the Swamp. She’d be able to feel the life circulating through it. If she’s able to bend, it’d be here that she’d learn to control plants.

There's this idea I've seen where there is a tribe of waterbenders living out in the ocean & they've lost contact with the rest of the world. They're called the Ocean Water Tribe, they live on islands in the middle of the ocean, & they have a culture similar to the Polynesians, being wayfarers. They'd have an entirely different sort of bending style compared to either the North, South, or even the Swamp styles. I wanna put that in & have Dina learn both the Northern & Ocean styles.

I think that Sam would also see a lot of herself in Toph & her relationship with her parents.

It wouldn’t be until the Desert that Tucker would show signs of bending. The sand would react to him & later, he’d be able to turn earth to sand & bend that.

I believe that with Danny there, he could convince the Gaang to not betray Wan Shi Tong's trust because, with his expertise in astronomy, strong connection to the stars, an innate & well-trained understanding of how the stars & planets move, & the ability to tell time & never get lost based on the position of the stars, he could figure out everything that the Planetary Calendar Room would show on his own with enough time & research. Especially considering that, by then, he’d have a good enough handle on this new world’s star calendar. It’d be one of the first things he’d get under his belt while in the Elemental Nations because I don’t think that he’d handle not knowing those things very well. I can see him creating a star map of his own & specifically making a copy of Earth’s star map for Wan Shi Tong as his bit of knowledge.

This would prevent the loss of the library, at least, for the foreseeable future.

At the same time, even though the library doesn’t sink & so Toph has her full attention on Appa & the sandbenders, I still don’t think she’d be able to save him. Simply because of just how outside her element she is in the Desert. Not only is her seismic sense not working as it should, she’s also not used to bending sand yet, & she’s also outnumbered.

At the end of the Ba Sing Se invasion, Vlad kidnaps Dina & brings her to the Fire Nation with him as an honored guest/prisoner. That way, part of the Gaang & Team Phantom’s goal is to rescue Dina. By that point, Vlad would find his feelings for her changing. Their relationship as warden & prisoner would evolve & develop, Vlad realizing that he cares about her far more than he does power or fame or money.

Azula often taunts them by calling Dina Vlad’s “little pet,” which angers Vlad more than Dina because he respects the female Halfa too much to ever consider her a pet. When rumors begin to circulate about Dina being his whore/sex slave, he gets frustrated & angry because he’d never make her do such things even if he is attracted to her. She is his best friend first & foremost.

During the Day of Dark Sun, Dina is killed by Azula & Vlad damn near loses his mind. In an effort to save her, he uses CPR to restart her heart with tears in his eyes, at which point she’s revived & goes ghost humanside for the first time since they all got to the Elemental Nations. Vlad lets Dina go with Zuko to save her while he stays behind to misdirect the Fire Nation from locating Team Phantom & the Gaang.

Sometime between now & the final episode, the other Halfas also die & are revived.

Vlad eventually betrays Ozai by requesting that Iroh kill him then restart his heart with lightningbending during the war. The only reason it works is because he’s resistant to lightning anyway. Afterwards, he confronts either Ozai or Azula as Plasmius & helps in the fight.

Phantom Twins AU Masterlist

[vortexbeyondthestars]

decided to post some of my ideas for a ninjago/atla au besties. tell me whatcha think

under read more cus its kinda long lmao

some background first…

here, the first spinjitzu master is smth that doesn’t actually exist in avatar bc i couldn’t for the life of me figure out what to make him so now he’s like… he’s basically the child of all the original benders: the badgermoles, the sky bison, the dragons, and the moon spirit combined. he was born of their powers, and he was the first avatar, kinda like this au’s version of raava i guess?? so this au’s version of vaatu is the overlord, and like in ninjago, they have this never-ending rivalry. and the overlord is an avatar, too, but more of a dark one. it only cares about corruption and evil.

the first bending master, as he’s called in this au, manages to banish the overlord into the spirit realm, but he knew that one day, it would return. so he creates a land called ninjago and fills it with people of all kinds, each corner of the world having one type of bending. he gave the humans bending, but only one type for each person.

he didn’t want a repeat of the overlord.

so then he has two sons: wu and garmadon. he hemmed and hawed over what elements to give to them, but eventually he chose. wu gets airbending, the element of life and serene and calm. garmadon gets firebending, rough and harsh and the element of destruction. his fire is violet and incredibly hot.

everything goes fine, and the first bending master manages to keep balance of the world as its avatar. except the overlord does indeed return.

garmadon gets corrupted by its spirit and is bitten by the great devourer. he becomes obsessed with power and wanted to be the avatar more than anything in life. he believes that his father was holding his powers back because he didn’t trust him. and he believes that his father was going to hand over his power to wu after he died. and he couldn’t have that.

wu notices his downward spiral and suggests that he take a trip to visit the mortals. maybe that would help him realize that there is reason for their father being the only avatar in the world.

so garmadon goes down into the mortal plane. and meets fire lord chen and his second in command clouse.

fire lord chen is quite interested in an old legend of what is called the serpentine: ancient tribes of snake people said to have been born from the hatred and despair of the overlord, led by the toughest and the greatest, the great devourer. chen wants to bring these serpentine back, and at first garmadon agrees to help him, if only to get revenge on his father.

but he snaps out of it, because he realizes that its the great devourer’s fault in the first place that he’s like this. he betrays chen and clouse and warns wu of their plan, but without telling him whose plan it is. together, the brothers manage to gather together an alliance of the greatest bending masters in the world. garmadon wants their father to help, but wu gives some unfortunate news.

the first bending master is near his deathbed. he is very, very ill, and he is thousands of years old at this point. he wants rest.

so, naturally, garmadon is conflicted about this. he’s ecstatic bc he thinks that he can gain the powers of the avatar once his father passes, but also he’s sad, because, well, thats still his dad after all.

but anyway, the bending alliance manages to defeat the serpentine and seal them away in the spirit realm, like the first bending master had done to the overlord. this… turns out to be a bad idea.

fire lord chen and clouse both manage to shift the blame away from them, and since garmy was the only one who knew they caused the plan, he lets it happen. because he still is a bit evil.

something happens that gives him hope, though: he meets misako, who might be the love of his life. (also in this au that weird love triangle shit don’t happen) they get married, and for a while, garmadon seems perfectly sane. but.

the first bending master dies.

lloyd is born almost right after.

no one makes the connection, though, thankfully, but it is enough for garmadon to lose whatever sanity he had left. he completely goes insane.

he races back to their family monastery believing that he can and will gain the powers of the avatar, somehow, but he doesn’t. and that is too much for him to take. all of this… all of this… waiting… for nothing?

garmadon stares at himself in the mirror. he looks down at his hand, at the bite mark blemishing his skin, and grabs a ceremonial knife. he laughs to himself and places his hand on the mirror, slowly raising his knife towards it… he thinks he can stop all this pain in one easy swoop.

garmadon, sneering at himself: maybe… maybe this will fix it… if i just cut off the damn thing…

first bending master, in the mirror: i would not recommend it, son.

garmadon, face falling: why are you here?

first bending master: i came to speak with you. and to try and help you.

garmadon, snarling: don’t pretend like you care about me! i know what you really think. you think i’m a monster.

first bending master: i think you’re conflicted. the part of you that wants to be the avatar so badly you are willing to kill for it… that part of you clashes with the real you. the one that wants everyone you care about to be safe. your brother, your friends, your wife… your son.

garmadon: *laughs and turns around* why should i care about them, father? they don’t care about me! not my brother, not my wife, not my so-called friends, and certainly not you! the only one who does care about me is my son, and thats only because he doesn’t know any better. he’ll leave one day too.

first bending master, solemnly: you are wrong. i do care about you. i always did. i love you, garmadon. i do.

garmadon shakes, his hand gripping the knife tighter. his mouths trembles, and eventually turns into a scowl. he whirls around to face the mirror and slams his knife into it, shattering it into pieces.

he gets worse from there on. he begins to attack people left and right, villages and cities, even going so far as to consider breaking the serpentine free. he doesn’t get that far, though, because his brother interrupts him.

wu is very concerned, bc, well, garmy was a bit weird but never straight up insane like he is now. so he heads over to his family’s old monastery. there, he finds garmadon, seething and stewing. garmadon doesn’t take his arrival well.

garmadon: ugh! for once, can’t you just leave me alone?!

wu: no, i cannot. this isn’t you, brother! you must snap out of it!

garmadon: this is me! this has been me for my entire life, wu! i can’t change it now, and i can’t even be the avatar. what’s the point?

wu: the point is that father trusted us to take care of ninjago once he passed on. we have a duty.

garmadon: father was a fool, and father was selfish! i am remaking the world in my own image, an image that won’t let anyone have the kind of power that he did, except for those who are worthy!

wu: that’s crazy! you can’t just pick and choose who gets to be the most powerful bender in the world!

garmadon: isn’t that what father did, though, when he died? who is the new avatar, wu?! tell me!!

wu: i don’t know. and neither will you, if you keep this up.

garmadon: *laughs* are you threatening me?

wu: i am.

garmadon: fine. you want to take control of ninjago over me? fine. fine. fine. i challenge you to an agni kai! the battle that was always meant to be.

wu: very well.

garmadon: for the record… i’m sorry it had to end this way, brother.

wu, sadly: no. you aren’t.

cue final agni kai type fight, light vs darkness. fire vs air. obviously, wu wins, and manages to chain garmadon up so he can’t attack anymore. garmadon then has a complete psychotic breakdown like azula, complete with the spitting fire and sobbing hysterically while wu watches sadly.

wu banishes garmadon to the spirit realm, because he doesn’t think there’s anything else he can do.

ninjago is saved.

or so he thinks.

see, chen and clouse are still around. as are the serpentine, biding their time in the spirit realm. they meet garmy and decide that they should work together. garmadon, so torn up by hatred and despair, agrees to help them, if he gets to destroy his brother.

meanwhile, everything is going good.

lloyd is the avatar, obviously, but he’s only like. thirteen when he finds out. he’s an airbender avatar and lived with koko (bc its my au and i get to pick the mom i use) in one of the air temples (idk which one tho). he’s raised believing that he’s just a random kid who happens to serve the avatar, kinda like kyoshi.

that avatar he believes he serves is none other than morro, the adopted son of airbender sage wu. morro is four years older than lloyd, and he was just revealed to be the airbending avatar. morro, of course, is thrilled. but he also gets an incredibly big ego over it, believing that he is better than other people bc he is the avatar. the reason he was thought to be the avatar was because he appeared to waterbend at one point, but it is later revealed to have been simple airbending that pushed the water.

but morro doesn’t realize or know this until its too late. and when he does… its a shitshow.

basically, lloyd and morro are sent to meet with fire lord chen and his daughter skylor, along with wu, koko, and some of the other air sages. skylor is a chi blocker, an incredibly talented one who has mastered all of the different bending fighting styles even tho she herself is a nonbender.

ok so clouse is obviously there. he recognizes lloyd via koko and is fucking pissed. he’s like my ex-boyfriend rival’s son is here?? what the hell?? so he keeps a close on eye on lloyd bc he doesn’t like him. morro, meanwhile, is treated like a king at the palace bc chen wants to get into the avatar’s good graces.

and uh. well, as it turns out, morro isn’t the avatar…

they’re attacked by the serpentine, bitter at the bending masters for having locked them underground. morro is excellent at fighting, but lloyd has more adrenaline.

and lloyd firebends.

cue shock and horror and anger from all sides.

wu is the most horrified of all. the son of his brother… the man he banished… is the avatar?

so yeah thats the background AT LEAST. i dont really know what happens after that but lloyd runs away or something. i will write more i promise!!!

[sucubism-archive]

i’ve talked about this before but the comparison is still made so i felt i wanted to talk about it again, so here it goes. when comparing and contrasting the Todoroki’s to the Royal Fire Family, Dabi is Zuko and Shouto is Azula. When the Touya reveals happened, i think i saw a post that said word for word “we all knew shouto was zuko, so it should be no surprise that dabi is azula!” this is wrong. this will probably get long though so i’m adding a read more....

the comparisons between shouto/zuko and dabi/azula are very very surface level. what we basically have is Shouto and Zuko = fire power + abusive father + scar on the left side of their face and Dabi and Azula = blue fire + evil. this is all very basic surface shit that sure, are definitely valid comparisons, but really don’t get into the actual meat of any of those characters storylines. we need to talk about the abuse aspect and how it affects each characters arc. to do this we must first analyze the Narcisstic Parent and the Scapegoat vs. Golden Child dynamic.

SO. in a household with a narcisstic parent, often times the type of abuse that stems from this is what’s known as the Scapegoat vs. the Golden Child. We can see this easily in the plot of Zuko and Azula. Azula is the child who can do no wrong, the one who Ozai is proud of to the point where he is willing to make her fire lord (albeit, if Ozai is Phoenix King that title would really not have much meaning, but to her it did.) and Zuko cannot do anything right. see: “my father says [Azula] was born lucky. He says i was lucky to be born.” In this dynamic, it’s common for the children to be pitted against one another, and that kind of thing forms serious resentment, often times lasting for the rest of the respective children’s life, especially if never treated. again we see this much more with azula and zuko, mostly because shouto was simply too young and we don’t have much information on how shouto and touya interacted as children, if really at all.

when analyzing it this way we can easily see that Dabi was the Scape Goat. While Endeavor was “happy” to see that Touya’s fire surpassed his own, Touya was not what was he looking for (i.e. a child with both his and Rei’s quirk) the comparison here with zuko is that when zuko is born, it is said he did not have the “sparkle in his eye that firebenders are born with.” So both Ozai and Endeavor train their first born, but continue on to make an heir that they actually want. Nothing Touya ever does is good enough for Endeavor, in my opinion, and we can argue the semantics around Chapter 291 and whether we take things Endeavor says at face value or not but that’s not really the point of this post. Once shouto and Azula are born, the Narcissistic parent finally gets what they want.

i want to be explicitly clear- i am absolutely NOT saying that Shouto and Azula were not abused. I would never ever say that. Both the Scapegoat and the Golden Child are abused, just in very very different ways. I will also not be comparing abuse. This isn’t “which kid had it better or worse,” because abuse should never be compared that way. It is simply different manifestations of abuse and how that defines each respective child. Given that, the Scapegoat has an easier time rejecting the Narcisstic parent and forging their own path (see: Zuko joining team Avatar, Dabi joining up with the League of Villains, both of them attempting to overthrow their abusive parent’s reign of power.) Meanwhile, the Golden Child has a harder time finding their own identity without the parent. this case is more explicit and extreme with Azula, i feel like i really don’t need to explain it that much, but we also see it with Shouto in the Sports Festival Arc when he confronts Deku claiming that if Deku is related to All Might somehow, it is Shouto’s duty to surpass him.

We can see the affect that this has had on both Azula and Shouto in the way that their story lines go. Azula’s storyline is quicker and shorter and more extreme (probably as the show was created for a younger audience than BNHA was) and she never really ends up rejecting her father the way that Shouto has, and we see this in her as her mental health starts to deteriorate more and more. However, Shouto has never rejected his father the way that Zuko and Dabi have. While Shouto doesn’t succumb to Endeavor’s abuse the same way Azula did with Ozai, there is still a very large part of Shouto’s identity that is wrapped around Endeavor, Endeavor’s ideals, and Endeavor’s conceptions on what it means to be a hero.

Zuko and Dabi, on the other hand, end up completely rejecting everything about their fathers once they escape their need for the Narcisstic Parent’s approval. Both of them eventually realize that nothing they do will ever quite be enough to earn that approval, and so they decide to not only reject said parent, but do whatever they can to provide a better future in their eyes by overthrowing their parent. (whether or not you agree with dabi is really irrelevant to this argument.) And this is all without even getting into the comparisons between Endeavor/Ozai and Rei/Ursa which could be whole other posts on their own but.

TLDR: the way abuse has affected each character and shaped their storyline is the way that the comparison should be made, not on surface level character designs or the good vs. evil idea.

[ilonga]

Got some Avatar Au Questions! So I'm assuming mustafar deviates significantly from canon, but how do obi-wan and anakin sort things out? How do obi-wan and Ahsoka escape palpatine's purge? When Anakin joins up with the rebellion, what is the reunion like for obi-wan, anakin, & Ahsoka? (The last one might be spoilery, so I completely understand if you do not want to elaborate on it)

oooh these are questions I’m super excited to answer!!

ok, to start with answering these questions, let’s first explain how Order 66 goes down in this au. 

As I already mentioned, Palpatine has some sort of team up/deal with Vaatu that allows him quite a bit of control over the spirits, and he’s been using this power to orchestrate the spirit attacks starting with Maul so long ago. As the years passed, Palpatine increased the spirit attacks and the destruction and death they caused, and used this to gain more power himself and, eventually, create an army to fight them. At the end of the AOTC-adjacent era, he, despite Padme’s fighting against it (”We have had peace with the spirits, respected them, for centuries--we must find out why they are attacking, not escalate the conflict!”), creates the Grand Army of the Four Nations to fight back against the spirits in the first Spirit War in centuries. He then conscripts nonbenders into the army and places members of Raava’s Order, benders, at the head of various battalions. 

When it comes time for Order 66, Palpatine orders the spirits to posses various nonbenders and has them attack their Generals/Commanders with intent to kill, taking most of them by surprise. Similar to canon, most of the benders are slaughtered while some manage to escape. A lot of the nonbenders are then killed/disposed of, so Palpatine doesn’t have many people who know the truth in the way (and also, he can claim that the benders killed them in their quest for power and turn the public against them even more). In addition, for benders not in battles/in the temple, Palpatine sends the Inquisitors, firebenders that he’s kidnapped and trained in secret over the years. 

Ahsoka in this au (an airbender) is a bit like Jinora from Legend of Korra; she has a strong spiritual connection and connection to the spirit world. Because of this, she’s able to save herself and Obi-wan, and save some of the nonbenders from the spirits’ possession, such as Rex and some others. In the chaos, they get separated and don’t really have time to figure out what just happened, but they both know, to an extent, that Palpatine is behind this, and that most of Raava’s Order has just been slaughtered.

Then, Obi-wan learns that Anakin killed the avatar (Shaak Ti).  

He’s betrayed, and confused, and furious, and in complete shock. He’s also mentally not in a great place; he’s just seen his friends and comrades slaughtered in cold blood. He thinks that Anakin was in on the plan to wipe them out completely (Anakin, meanwhile, doesn’t know about Order 66 and doesn’t learn about it until he wakes up after the Mustafar-adjacent battle), and had been working with Palpatine (because why else would Anakin kill Shaak Ti? How could Anakin kill Shaak Ti?). 

So he goes to confront Anakin, and in a bit of a reverse of canon, Obi-wan’s the one who’s angry and on the offensive here, and initiates the fight. It’s worth noting that Anakin’s also not in a great place mentally; aside from having just killed the Avatar, he thinks his wife and unborn children were murdered because of the Order and that the Order he’s spent years fighting for has just been trying to gain power and suppress nonbenders all along (Pong Krell, anyone?). When Obi-wan attacks him, the conclusion he draws is “Oh no, he was in on the conspiracy too. He was in on the thing with Padme too.” because why else would Obi-wan be attacking him so viciously out of nowhere? So now they’re both sure they’ve been betrayed by the other, and they’re fighting. Usually, in a fight between benders, there’s some tradition, some honor. The swords, a big part of duels according to the traditions of the Order, are used. In this fight, none of that is used. Obi-wan forgoes them entirely; it’s a very much “how could you”, emotional, blunt force, unrefined kind of fight. Obi-wan blasts water, shards of ice, waves at Anakin, Anakin dodges, responds in turn with spurts and jets of fire. Both know each other’s techniques inside and out, obviously; it’s a very even fight. At one point Obi-wan yells something adjacent to his “you were my brother” line in canon, a “how could you betray me, us, like this?”, or a “how could you?”, smthing like that, and Anakin has a split second of distraction because what is Obi-wan talking about? What happened to the Order? 

Obi-wan takes advantage of this distraction and his next hit knocks Anakin unconscious; he then freezes Anakin in a massive block of ice. He flees, then, it all being too overwhelming. He can’t bring himself to strike any kind of killing blow. He doesn’t know, then or later, if he left Anakin there hoping he would die or hoping he would survive. Years pass and Obi-wan seriously regrets the fight, especially regrets that he never found out why Anakin sided with Palpatine, or killed Shaak Ti. He realizes that there must have been something he didn’t know, and wishes he hadn’t attacked him so rashly and had at least gotten answers.

As for Anakin, Palpatine’s lackeys find him hours or maybe even days after the fight, and get him out of the ice. The time spent in the ice leaves him with frostbite and he ends up having to get three limbs amputated (his right arm and both legs). It also leaves him with permanent tremors. He gets prosthetics, which he can power with a low level-lightning type technique, and armor and a helmet, which Palpatine forces him to wear. He’s forced to wear the armor for a couple reasons; to hide his identity as a former member of Raava’s Order and a beloved hero, to hide the tremors, which Palpatine views as a sign of visible weakness, and because Palpatine enjoys the feeling of owning Anakin and the armor is a way to mark that.

Anakin physically joining the Rebellion happens right after he tries to sacrifice himself in Palpatine’s throne room so that Luke can escape, and though he manages to take out all of the guards/inquisitors and hold off Palpatine for some time, he gets blasted with a hell of a lot of lightning and fully expects to die right there. Luke goes into the Avatar state and gets them both out, and is able to do enough healing so that Anakin survives the encounter. He gets them to the Rebellion and basically? Begs Obi-wan to heal Anakin. 

“I know he’s Vader, I know what he’s done to you, to the Order, but he sacrificed himself to rescue me and he’s dying, you have to help him--”

Obi-wan, of course, does, and has been living with his regrets and missing his little brother for so long that he probably would have done it without the begging anyways, at the very least so he can finally get answers from Anakin.

So Anakin is being slowly but surely healed by Obi-wan (it probably takes him months to recover tbh), and there’s plenty of angst because Obi-wan sees the extent of the injuries he caused and guilt, and because the first time Anakin wakes up--

Well, Anakin fully expected to die, right? And now he’s not dead which makes no sense, he was ready to die (and he wakes up and he thinks, even if I’m not dead now, I’ll be dead soon enough--either the lightning will do me in or Obi-wan will, if he had any sense he’d kill me--obviously he’s not mentally in a great place but being tortured and manipulated and slowly fighting back against the Firelord for years will do that to you), but it’s also good because he’s been Blue Spirit, a double agent, for years ever since Luke revealed himself to Anakin, and this means he has a chance to give the vital information he has on the Empire’s attack plans, ship schematics, etc. 

So the first time he wakes up, when he can finally get his eyes to focus, he gets Obi-wan’s attention and basically starts babbling about attack plans, schematics, weaknesses, etc etc. And Obi-wan’s like “no, wait, you’re still weak, you need to recover, go back to sleep--” and Anakin’s like “no time, you need this information before I die--” and a stressful time is had by all. The next time he wakes up, he’s a bit less all over the place and it slowly starts to sink in that he is going to survive after all, so the urgency dies down a bit. Obi-wan gets the full story of how Palpatine manipulated him, what happened that night, etc, and Anakin gets the full story of what exactly happened during Order 66, what actually happened to Padme, what happened to his kid (kids, he has two--major shock is had). Ahsoka is the one to tell him that Palpatine was controlling the spirits all along. 

He’s surprised, of course, but also somewhat resigned. The grandfatherly veneer of Palpatine has fallen further and further away as the years have passed and his true nature has been clearer and clearer; Anakin has known for a long time that Palpatine is not the good guy (hence his personal rebellion).

Ahsoka, like in canon, manages most of the intelligence networks of the Rebellion in this au. So she’s been getting and processing Blue Spirit’s messages for years, and when she realizes it’s Anakin--well, lots of emotions all around.

Obi-wan and Anakin do mend their relationship, as do Anakin and Ahsoka. Some of the kids Anakin saved over the years are at the Rebellion and recognize him--this also helps things along. And his information as Blue Spirit has saved many lives. 

Obi-wan has been Luke’s waterbending teacher for a while, and Ahsoka has been his airbending/spirit world teacher, so eventually Anakin does take his place as Luke’s (and Leia’s!) firebending teacher.

Thanks for these asks and sorry for making the response so long!! Honestly I think I’ve been hoping for these questions, I’ve been wanting to talk about how this goes down forever :) 

shorter summary: Obi-wan encounters Anakin just after Order 66 occurred and Anakin’s killed Shaak Ti. Believing Anakin to have been in on Palpatine’s plan all along and having betrayed them all, he attacks and initiates the fight in something of a reverse of canon. Anakin, seeing Obi-wan attacking him, comes to the conclusion that Obi-wan must have been part of the Order’s conspiracy (that Palpatine has convinced him of), which he would have never believed of him but why else would Obi-wan be attacking him like this? Neither of them are in a particularly good state of mind or particularly mentally sound during the fight. Obi-wan knocks him out and freezes him in ice, then flees. Palpatine finds Anakin a sizable amount of time later, and Anakin is left with three amputated limbs (which he gets prosthetics for) and permanent tremors (which the Vader armor hides). 

Obi-wan and Ahsoa escape the purge because Ahsoka has a spiritual connection akin to Jinora’s in LOK, and is able to purge the spirits from some of the army such as Rex. In the chaos, the two are separated.

Obi-wan and Anakin reunite first, when Luke brings Anakin back to the Rebellion severely injured from the confrontation with Palpatine. He begs Obi-wan to heal him and Obi-wan agrees. It takes some time for Anakin to move past the fact that he’s not dead, but eventually, he and Obi-wan communicate, they both get the full story of what happened twenty years ago, and their relationship starts to mend. It’s faster once Obi-wan and the Rebellion realize that Darth Vader and Blue Spirit (the Imperial double agent whose information had saved so many) are one and the same. Same with Ahsoka, although it’s a quicker fix for her and Anakin’s relationship since she only found out about his actions secondhand, from Obi-wan, and it makes so much more sense once he gets his side of the story, and because she’s the one who’s been processing his info as Blue Spirit. 

hope you liked!!

[katara-s-blog]

Breathing Exercises, a Zutara oneshot

Written for day two of @zutaraweek 2017! I hope you enjoy it.  Read on AO3

Summary: After two years, Zuko and Katara meet again in the South Pole, and a confrontation quickly turns into a swim in the Antarctic sea. Or, Zuko learns the difference between drowning and being underwater. Rated T.

He looks in the mirror, and finds Ozai staring back.

The faucet runs, and he cups his hands under the water. He throws the water at his face, desperate to wash off his father’s eyes, his father’s grin. In the mirror, nothing has changed, so he claws at his flawless skin. The faucet continues to run, and soon the water is up to his waist. Then his chest. His neck. He continues to claw at his face until the water in front of him starts to pink with blood, until it rises up to his eyes.

Gasping awake, Zuko reaches for his cheek. Relief washes over him as his fingers brush the plastic smoothness of his scar. His room, too large for one man, is lit with early morning light, and he focuses his attention on the soft edges of the bed, and then the doorframe, and then the tapestry. He turns his head to the right and traces the window with his eyes. I’m here, he reminds himself, I’m here. He presses his palm on his chest, feeling a scar there too, as if to still his rapid heartbeat. Too many mornings he wakes up this way, gasping, jolted awake by his ghosts. Each time he wonders how much time has to pass before he no longer feels like drowning.

It has been two years since the war ended, two years since he assumed the position as Fire Lord. It has been two years of atoning for a century of terror and atrocities. It has only been two years, Zuko thinks as he begins his day as he usually does: getting dressed, having breakfast, reviewing newly arrived letters of requests and complaints. The work is tedious, but necessary, and Zuko is determined to bring honor back to his nation. There is nothing else he’d rather do. Some days, however, or perhaps too many days, he wishes he could just breathe without thinking about what his people will eat, about what to do with the remaining colonies. He can only imagine what it must be like to not worry about things often too big for himself on a daily basis. Even before becoming Fire Lord, Zuko lived with a pressure around his neck. As a boy, he had his prodigy of a sister to constantly catch up to. He needed to prove himself as a skilled firebender, and soon enough, a worthy heir to the throne. With the latter backfiring, he lived out three years of his life in banishment, forced to capture the Avatar no one believed was even still alive. Three years at sea, surrounded on all fronts with water that never seemed to end, has trained him to resist more than just pressure. Now, as the Fire Lord during the first era of peace in a hundred years, Zuko is expected to make reparations with other nations while keeping his own stable and satisfied. He has to quell rebellions, to be vigilant of assassination attempts. He worries, too, about his sister, who, in her recovery, refuses to civilly interact with Zuko. Underneath all that, the fear that he will turn out to be just like his predecessors runs deep: every day he struggles to cope with Ozai’s legacy, with being Ozai’s legacy.

It’s too early for this, he thinks, rubbing his temples. He closes his eyes for a moment and focuses on his breathing until he feels calmer. One day at a time. Picking up the next scroll, Zuko finds its contents pleasantly surprising. It’s an invitation to the inauguration of the Southern Water Tribe’s new town hall. As Fire Lord and friend of Sokka and Katara, who have become political leaders of their tribe themselves, Zuko had been regularly receiving updates regarding the state of the SWT. He knows that its sister tribe heavily assisted in rebuilding it, and that establishing a school for benders and non-benders alike, in order to preserve their culture, had been a priority. So too was reestablishing a political organization, a better one, since their population has been steadily increasing in the past few years. This inauguration, the letter says, is basically an opportunity for the Southern Water Tribe to present itself to the rest of the world as a political power. Having been one of the more heavily damaged nations during the Hundred Year War, the inauguration is their way of announcing that they are back on their feet, and they have invited the leaders of each nation—several from the Earth Kingdom due to its size—to witness it.

Politically, attending the inauguration would be advantageous: it would be an opportunity to meet and discuss with world leaders again, the last summit having been almost four months ago. It would also be a show of goodwill on his part as the Fire Lord: firebenders have not set foot on the South Pole in a hundred years without bringing fear and terror with them—and that includes him. The last time he was there was the same time he first saw the Avatar and terrorized the small village. He had been too busy as Fire Lord to pay a visit since then, and international conferences have so far only been held either in the Fire Nation or in the Northern Water Tribe. He had provided financial assistance, of course, but that was as far as his relationship went with the South Pole.

Personally, attending the inauguration would be a chance to see his friends again. He does not need more motivation than that.

-

A week later, Zuko sights the South Pole.

It hadn’t been too long since his last voyage. Last time, almost four months ago, the North Pole had been his destination for the biannual summit. He came with his uncle then who served as his adviser shortly before deciding he wanted to settle down and return to managing the Jasmine Dragon in Ba Sing Se. Taking this voyage reminds him of that fact, of his uncle, and the reminder is a knot in his chest. He had been happy for his uncle, he is happy for him, but he is still adjusting to not having the wise man to regularly turn to.

Attendance during the last summit was complete, with each nation-state represented, but Zuko noted that, despite his expectations, Katara was not there. She was present at the first one in Caldera, representing the SWT along with her brother, so he was surprised she wasn’t at the second summit. Sokka explained that she had projects she needed to focus on back in the South Pole, but he had the inkling that there was more to her absence than that. He didn’t pry, though. He didn’t really have a reason to.

It is for this reason, perhaps, that Zuko is incredibly excited and nervous that he is going to be seeing her this time around. They have not spoken much since the war ended, exchanging only small conversations at the first summit, and mailing each other mostly business letters sprinkled with a couple of pleasantries. He has been secretly disappointed at how their friendship turned out since then. Zuko tries not to think about it too much, but Katara was one of the few people he could confide in that he knew would empathize, not just sympathize. Their short time together in the days leading to Sozin’s Comet had been comfortable, no, more than that. Like I were at ease. Not completely, of course, as those were days of war, but in the midst of the worry and anticipation, Katara’s company put him at ease. She understood him, respected him. She saw him at his worst, and forgave him twice. He felt like a person in her presence, not the prince of the Fire Nation, not a firebending teacher. Just Zuko, the firebender.

“Hey Fire Lord,” Zuko hears from a distance, snapping him out of his thoughts. “Are you going to get down here or what?”

He notices just now that the ship has docked at the South Pole. The soldiers he traveled with are lined up by the railing, already ready to disembark. For a moment he feels embarrassed, thinking that someone probably informed him of their arrival and that he must not have heard it. He thanks his crew anyway, and makes his way down to the pier. A small group of people in Southern Water Tribe garb are waiting to greet them, and he squints through the cold air to see their faces. He immediately sees Sokka waving, and realizes it is him who must’ve called out. Beside him stands Katara, and he tries not stare. He tries not to reveal his anxiety as the cold begins to register in his body.

“I forget how cold the Poles can be,” is how he starts his greeting. Sokka laughs, drawing him into a hug.

“Says the guy who swam in Antarctic waters.” He sees Katara’s bright, smiling face before she tackles him in a tight embrace. She smells like warmth, and the sea, and her arms around his torso feel like safety. “It’s been a while.”

Pulling away, he regards how Katara has changed since he last saw her. Her face is sharper, and her blue eyes still carry the same fire he remembers. She is taller, too, and fuller.

“I, uh, we missed you at the last summit,” he says, hoping they did not notice his error.

“Yeah, well, I was busy,” Katara says with a small smile. Then, gesturing to the other people around them, she introduces them to Zuko one by one. They are officials, he learns, and he tries to remember their names. He loses them in a minute, but he maintains his composure throughout the introduction.

“You’re two days early, so we’ll have plenty of time to catch up,” Sokka says as he pats Zuko’s back, pushing him further inland. Drawing his eyes away from the small group, he looks up and is awed—the South Pole is unrecognizable to him. Gone were the tents of animal hide and small fences of snow, replaced by large, intricate ice structures creating an incredible skyline. On their walk towards the old town hall, where he will be housed for the meanwhile, he learns the following: He is the first foreign dignitary to arrive, Sokka and Suki are finally engaged, and the recently renovated school is successfully operating. He and Katara do not speak the whole time, but he is hyperaware of her presence beside him.

-

After dinner, Katara invites him to take a walk.

“I’d love to.” He is telling the truth, but he doesn’t tell her how nervous she is making him.

It’s still bright out, to his confusion, and then he remembers that, half the year, the South Pole does not experience nights at all. Not being able to approximate the time based on the sunlight disconcerts him. Among other things.

“So,” he begins as they pass by the small school behind the town hall. “What were you up to at the last summit?”

Beside him, Katara remains quiet, but he doesn’t push her. They just continue walking, and Zuko pays attention to his surroundings first instead. Patterned textiles hang outside many of the ice structures. He reminds himself to ask Katara about them, but perhaps not today.

It takes a while before she speaks again. In a soft voice, she says, “I owe you an apology, Zuko.”

He stops in his tracks and faces her. She keeps her eyes down, avoiding his gaze. “Why would you owe me an apology?” Zuko asks, confused.

“Let’s keep walking,” Katara says, and he follows.

He respects her silence, but the longer she kept it, the more anxious Zuko became. He could not think of a single transgression that he could fault her for. If anything, there are many things to thank her for. So what did she mean?

They reach a quiet part in the outskirts of town, away from curious eyes. The nearest structure is a small house that does not seem to be housing anyone at the moment. Nearby, he could hear the sea, and they seem to be walking towards it. Of course she would take us to the sea, he thinks.

Then, “I shouldn’t have left you.”

Again, Zuko stops. To this, he does not have anything to say. He’d be lying if he said that it was okay that she did. He understands why, he understands both their circumstances. Katara had obligations elsewhere, and he had his. Personal and political ones. He has gone through this in his head many times. But he’d be lying if he said he was okay when she did.

“You had no obligation to stay, Katara.”

Katara exhaled heavily and sat down on the snow. “I know. I just—you needed people, too. I didn’t know Iroh would move back to Ba Sing Se. Or that,” she pauses, “Mai would join her family back in Omashu. I’m sorry.”

That everyone left, you mean.

He sat down beside her, focusing his gaze on the horizon. “Katara, none of that’s your fault.”

“No, Zuko, I just mean”—she takes a deep breath—“that you’re my friend too. And that I didn’t treat you like one these past few years. And, I’m sorry for that.”

This time, Zuko was the one who kept quiet. Neither of them looked at each other.

“You might have noticed,” she continued, “that Aang and I aren’t, uh, together.”

“I’ve been meaning to ask, but I wasn’t sure if it was in my place to do so,” he replies, trying not to sound embarrassed. “Are you okay?”

Hugging her knees, she answers, “I am, I suppose. I broke up with him. This was right before the summit, so it was a big reason why I decided to stay behind, to be honest. I hated that I did, I hurt him, you know?” She sighs, turning away. “But I had to. I felt like I was losing myself along the way. I just knew that the life he needed to live as the Avatar couldn’t involve me. I was miserable, to say the least.” At that last sentence, her voice drops almost to a whisper.

Zuko was shocked. To him, and perhaps to many people, Aang and Katara were the perfect, happy couple, leading the world’s transition into an era of peace and equality. It surprised him, and made him sad, to discover she wasn’t happy at all. “I’m sorry, Katara. I didn’t know.”

She went on, “I just followed him around. I didn’t get to pursue what I wanted. I barely corresponded with my friends, even with Sokka. I barely talked to you, after everything you’ve done for me,” she trails off. “You didn’t deserve that.”

His chest keeps tightening, as though he’s about to burst. He feels consoled by the apology he didn’t know he needed, but he still doesn’t see it as her fault, or anyone’s fault. “Katara—“

“And then when Sokka got home from the summit, he told me about how you’ve been doing, all the work you’ve been doing. And then he told me Iroh was officially retiring, and in Ba Sing Se, and I couldn’t help but think of difficult it must be to be the Fire Lord and be alone.”

A pause. “I could have been there,” she says, turning her head to face him this time.

Zuko presses his lips into a line. He couldn’t articulate what he’s feeling at that moment. Everything Katara is saying is true, but he has tried not to think of it that way, that he’s alone. It shouldn’t matter, he thinks. I have my duty as Fire Lord. It was always going to be difficult. And it is.

Instead he says, “I wish I could have been there, too. Given you support when you needed it. It must’ve have taken a lot of courage to stand up for yourself when it comes to someone you care about. I get that, and I’m proud of you.”

“Now you’re just being too nice,” Katara laughs, and Zuko is relieved when the air around them becomes lighter. “But thanks, Zuko. That means a lot to me.”

He shrugs, smiling at her. “Friends should be there for each other, right?” He sighs. “I try not to think I’m alone. It makes the job much more difficult, but you’re right. It’s there. Sometimes…” He bites his lip, trying to find the words. “Sometimes I can’t breathe, and I don’t know what to do about it.”

“Hey,” Katara gently places her hand on his scarred cheek and tilts his face toward hers. He tries not to quiver under her touch. Her eyes are bright, glistening with concern. “I want you to know that you can talk to me, Zuko. That’s what I wanted to get at, basically. You can tell me.”

“Trust me, you wouldn’t want to hear about the failing trading policies between the Fire Nation and Omashu,” he half-joked.

“I would actually,” she corrects, her eyebrows raised. “I could even give you advice. You may be Fire Lord, but you’re not the only leader around here.” She grins playfully, and Zuko feels a weight leave his chest, replaced with something electric.

“Maybe tomorrow,” Zuko says, taking her up on her offer. “Today, I am not going to think about that.”

He feels Katara’s eyes on his face but he doesn’t return the gaze. Katara seems to understand and sighs, looking towards the horizon again. She gently places her hand on his shoulder instead, and squeezes.

“Do you want to hear a terrible idea?” Katara asks, breaking the silence.

Zuko perks an eyebrow. “What?”

Standing up, she says, “Let’s take a swim, like you once did.”

Zuko stares at her incredulously. “I barely survived the last time, and last time I was just desperate.” He laughs. “And why would I willingly subject myself to that if I could stay warm up here?”

“I don’t know, for the fun of it, come on,” Katara urges, all traces of their previous conversation washed away from her face. “I’ve only ever accidentally fallen into the water, so this’ll be a first for me. Sort of,” she smiles.

Amused, Zuko shakes his head, but agrees anyway. “Fine,” he looks up at her, locking their eyes. “Remember that this was your idea,” he says, standing up, secretly excited by the rush of adrenaline he knows he’ll get upon falling into the frigid waters. He removes his shoes and outer robes, leaving on his tunic and pants. The wind pierces into his thin clothing like needles.

Katara, looking fierce and almost victorious, also takes off her parka, leaving on as much as Zuko did. “I will regret this in a minute.”

“I know. Let’s jump for it. Are you ready?” Zuko prompts, bracing himself. He’s not too worried about himself, knowing that he can breathe warmth through his body like last time. He’s more worried about Katara, who, despite having lived in the South Pole all her life, would probably not be resistant to the biting cold of the water.

She grabs hold of his hand, and for a second the heat between their hands is sharper than the Antarctic wind on his face, and in another, they are jumping into the ice-cold sea.

The cold registers like a shock, and his body automatically regulates its heat. Focusing on his breathing, he exerts a bit more effort to make himself warmer, until he is almost comfortably so.

“Terrible idea,” he hears Katara stutter through chattering teeth. “Terrible, terrible idea.” She’s laughing, though, as she embraces herself for warmth. Without a thought, Zuko pulls her shivering body to him, and shares his warmth with her. He laughs, too, to hide his embarrassment and awkwardness. Katara, still shaking from both the cold and her laughter, breathes a warm sigh on his shoulder and puts her arms around his body.

They stay like this for a moment, pressed up against each other as they tread in the water. Zuko feels light, as though nothing waited beyond the ice and sea. Extending all around him are just the whites and blues of water, and in his arms, Katara breathing against his skin. He runs a hand slowly down the back of her head.

“Zuko,” she looks up at him, her lips pale.

“Do you trust me?” He asks boldly, resting his hand on her cheek. She nods, then tilts her face towards Zuko’s palm, sending a rush of heat through his body. What cold, he thinks to himself.

“Hold your breath, then.” He has already been holding his, he realizes.

Her eyes, inquisitive at first, light up when she realizes what he has in mind. Slowly, then, he pulls them both underwater, holding Katara close to him, keeping her warm. In his ears, he hears the static of water. He keeps his eyes closed and focuses on their connected bodies, regulating both their heat. Katara clings to him, to his warmth, moving her hands around the plane of his back. Underwater, she is weightless and tender, and warm, despite it all. He keeps one arm around her waist, and another at the back of her neck, pressing her head gently against his chest. He feels her long hair floating behind her, and he imagines what they must look like, their bodies tangled like that. She nuzzles her face in his neck without warning, as if digging for more warmth, and did it feel like warmth. Like being at ease. Holding his breath like that, in the arms of someone he begins to realize he has always loved, he feels like he’s breathing for the first time in a long time.

[skaylanphear]

Voltron/Avatar AU

Okay, okay, okay, so I know this has been done a million times by now, but I wanted to tackle the idea from my own personal narrative perspective. So, here we go –

 Characters:

 Shiro – Gifted earthbender that was raised inside Ba Sing Se and was being trained as a member of the Dai Li before he was abducted by firebenders and taken prisoner. His abduction was a result of a plan by the Fire Nation to secretly infiltrate the Earth Kingdom and take down its most gifted benders. Before he was realized as being talented and brought in to train for the Dai Li, he lived in the lower ring of the city with Keith, who’d he’d long since adopted as a younger brother. They found out during their youth, however, that Keith was a firebender, which Shiro told Keith had to be kept secret. He encouraged Keith to learn his talents nonetheless, if only for self-defense. After he’s kidnapped, he loses his arm and his tortured, etc, and eventually develops metalbending out of sheer desperation to escape. Metalbending is what allowed him to create and use a metal arm as replacement for the one he lost. He eventually gets away—after learning that the Dai Li has been corrupted and secretly overtaken by firebenders—and goes back to the city to find Keith. But when he returns to Ba Sing Se, he comes home to find that Keith is gone and clearly has been for some time.

 Keith – Firebender. A very good firebender, in fact, but too ashamed of his talents to really do much with them. He grew up with Shiro in the lower ring of Ba Sing Se—basically poor—and grows so distressed when Shiro disappears that he lashes out at the Ba Sing Se law enforcers. His status as a firebender is revealed and he has no choice but to flee the city. He’d planned on leaving anyway to go looking for Shiro, and so it becomes his mission to find his older brother—even if he has to search the entire world. Unbeknownst to Keith, however, he was tossed out of the Fire Nation palace as a baby because he was an unwanted bastard son to the Fire Lord. Also, spoilers, he’s the Avatar as well, but is unaware of the fact due to how subdued he’s been forced to keep his talents his whole life. Lots of drama for Keith, haha. Poor child just wants his brother back. Oh well.  

 Lance – Waterbender from the Northern Water Tribe. Prince, though he’s nowhere near being in line to become chief. Still, there are plenty of responsibilities he has, but he decides to run away in search of adventure instead, wanting—more than anything—to be a hero and stand out, basically. He’s had this plan since he was a child—was his dream to see the world—and so he spent a lot of time not only mastering waterbending, but the spiritual connection and teachings of the Northern Water Tribe, as well as healing despite the fact that, as a male, he wouldn’t normally know how to heal. Though he wasn’t the most gifted waterbender, he spent most of his youth studying and practicing in preparation for his big leap out into the world. As a result of being a healer and having studied the spirits extensively, he’s very knowledgeable, but generally keeps these things to himself (wants to be a lady’s man, not a nerd, basically). He is a bit spoiled nonetheless, and doesn’t have a real realistic idea of what’s going on in the world. He and Keith are both opposites and foils as a result of their upbringing and positions.

 Pidge – Waterbender from the Foggy Swamp Tribe. Her father was an inventor from the Earth Kingdom, however, who found himself studying the energy levels of the swamp area before meeting her mother and promptly falling in love. Her brother and father are earthbenders, while she and her mother are waterbenders. And while she is trained in the techniques of swamp people waterbending, Pidge is far more interested in technology and the things her father studies. Her father and brother make regular trips into the earth kingdom—for research supplies, etc—and eventually end up abducted by the Fire Nation for being meddlers or something. Which inspires Pidge to leave her home in search of them, determined to rescue them much like Keith is aiming to rescue Shiro. She isn’t one to be trifled with, however. While she doesn’t have much interest in bending, she is trained and is more than capable of defending herself, as well as using the plants around her to her advantage. She and Lance practice very different types of waterbending as a result, but this doesn’t come between them or anything. They probably bond over it, actually.  

 Hunk – Earthbender. He’s from a small village to the north that is occupied by the Fire Nation and generally has no interest in getting involved with business outside of it. However, when Lance shows up and causes a ruckus (no doubt by accident), he gets caught up in it and ends up wanted by the fire nation and unable to return home because, if he did, he’d be putting his family in danger (they’re already in danger from the Fire Nation, but Hunk is kind of sheltered and naïve). So he ends up tagging along with Lance, deciding that he’d simply go to the Fire Nation higher ups and explain the misunderstanding, thus clearing his name and allowing him to go home. Obviously, he learns that this isn’t really going to work and that the conflict is much larger than he and Lance really realized. Upon seeing how people are suffering because of the Fire Nation, Hunk vows to do all he can to stop it.

 Allura and Coran – The last two airbenders in the world. They were originally part of a secret society that—after the airbenders were basically destroyed—vowed to find the new avatar (who was murdered during the airbender raids) and return balance to the world. However, the society has basically died out and so Allura and Coran are all that’s left. They’re still going around the world, searching, but to say the mission has kind of become hopeless is a bit of an understatement. Still, they’re determined, convinced that if they can find the Avatar, they can stop the Fire Nation.

 Story:

 And so we have our misfit team of heroes whose paths eventually cross. Lance and Hunk come together first, and then probably end up with Pidge as a result of trying to help her (likely when she doesn’t need help), before those three maybe meet Keith in a prison where he’s searching for Shiro (they’re there because Pidge is looking for her family in the same place). Meanwhile, Shiro is hunting for Keith, knowing more about him than he realizes (Shiro knows Keith is the avatar, which is half the reason he was so protective over him. He probably saw him accidentally bend earth or something, but then lied and said he’d done it instead). He meets up with Allura and Coran, and as they have a shared interest in finding the avatar, they team up. Likely the two teams meet up as the finale of season 1 or something, where it’s revealed during a dramatic battle or something that Keith is the avatar before they all make a break for it.

 Hunk and Shiro end up as Keith’s earthbending teachers, Allura is his airbending teacher, and Lance is his waterbending teacher (though neither are happy about it. Pidge doesn’t really have the knowledge to teach waterbending, or so she claims, though she does end up teaching Keith a thing or two as well). Water ends up being the element Keith has the most trouble with, which of course spurs antagonism between him and Lance. And when it’s revealed that Keith is actually a bastard prince from the fire nation, this makes things between him and Allura rather tense as well. While all this is happening, Lotor is around causing trouble like Azula did and we’re getting a more in-depth look at what Fire Lord Zarkon is really aiming to do. Basically he not only wants to take over the world, but the spirit world as well (which Haggar, his right hand lady and spiritual expert, thinks is silly—he should be content with the normal world, obv). Zarkon is looking for the avatar not to kill them, but to somehow remove the spirit of Raava and merge with it himself. This is becoming increasingly more difficult for him to do, however—especially with Keith getting stronger—and so he learns instead (maybe from the owl library that he forced his way into) about Vaatu being imprisoned and decides to instead merge with that spirit. Which is kind of what brings us to the season 2 finale. Probably the main group has split up because they’re fighting and they all get reunited in the end, where Keith tries to fight Zarkon and fails. And it’s Lance, who maybe shows up last, that uses his knowledge of spirits (which has basically been lost to Allura and Coran, despite them being airbenders) to separate Vaatu from Zarkon before a dark avatar can really be created. But as a result, he, Lance, ends up attached to Vaatu. Why? Because he and Keith were painted as foils for a reason, that’s why.

 So basically Lance is all sorts of fucked up now, and is dealing with some pretty dark shit that Keith has to help him with, which kind of allows a friendship to form between them where there previously hadn’t been one. Through a lot of interaction and development between all the characters, they eventually come to understand that Vaatu being attached to a human is similar to having him imprisoned and that, so long as Lance remains uncorrupted, he should be able to function as a second avatar. After all, it’s about balance in the end, dark and light, yin and yang, and so while Keith and Lance seemingly oppose each other, they also complement each other. Thus Lance is the first Dark Avatar, a new avatar that will be reborn along with the original and will need to be trained in how to master the evil inside them or something like that. He gets to learn all the elements too, but probably isn’t a master by the time we reach the end of season 3, unlike Keith. Meanwhile, Zarkon is pissed and is like, fine, I don’t get an avatar spirit, I’ll create my own and he basically uses secrets taught to him by Haggar to harness raw spirit power for his own gain. Now he’s really dangerous and threatens all the worlds with potential destruction. And yeah, all of team avatar(s) have to work together to stop him!

I can’t decide if I should do a more in-depth outline for this or not. Like, one that reflects the importance of all the other characters, not just Lance and Keith, haha! Because, obv, they’re all crucial. I mean, clearly Shiro needs to have a personal connection to Zarkon, maybe even some kind of connection to the spirit world. And, like, I was thinking of trying to incorporate the lions as spirits of some kind too. I dunno--we’ll see XD

[kannagimikazukioracles]

Divine Realm's Message Today - #16

Date and Time: March 27, 2018 at 1:00PM (+8GMT)

Sky/Wind: overcast, like the sky has mist, sunny, little to no wind

Mood: Ok, I guess

Today's 3-card pull:

5♥ 5♣ 2♦ (I had been pulling the 5♥a lot lately, like 3 days in a row. Weird. I may need to do a reading for this one)

Spirit's message today is:

"By combining intentions (heart, emotions) with the Creative Source Energy (the Divine Fire) through the power of imagination (the mind), miracles and dream-like realities can be made."

This is a pretty straightforward message about setting intent, using the imagination to come up with alternate realities, putting full trust in the Source (and one's own sufficient energy to meet half-way) that this reality will indeed happen.

Extended readings:

Two 5's - two hands, within one's reach, the power of one's grasp

♥+♣= creativity, service to others, good luck

♣+♦= increased power/money, rewards from work

5♣+5♥= important opportunity at hand, dream within reach, creative hands

5♥- feminine energy, intimacy, desired opportunity, satisfy one's desires, attraction

5♣- action and change, 5 fingers of the hand, extra effort to get the job done, surprising realizations, new ideas, good luck, competition

2♦- self-sufficiency, desire for independence, the imagination, it's all in your head, small money card, the stomach, rivalry for affection, motivation to strive to do the best, writer or journalist

If you feel like this message touched your heart, gave you hope, or felt it resonate with your thoughts, feelings, or both, then please find comfort knowing that it is what you need at this moment. It doesn't need for you to receive this as soon as I post it. Rather, let it cross your path as you need it, so you'll notice it more than the usual.

Thank you for stopping by, and I'll see you soon.

Be well always, and may the Source be with you.

神凪🌟織姫

Kan-nagi Orihime M.

P.S. If this message helped you in any way, I would love to hear from you.😁Please drop a comment below!

P.S.S. - For all ATLA -Avatar the Last Airbender fans, Character analysis after the cut. 😈 

ATLA Character Analysis Based on the above Cards

(Sidenote: I was gonna do this part yesterday because it was funny and lol but then something killed my good vibes so I had to set that straight out before I made this, so I won't be spreading the mood-killer of the past. Here it is, with all the sunny shiny feels and vibes. Hope you all like it =D  )

OK, so here we have two fives: a five of hearts and a five of clubs, and a two of diamonds. Corresponding to the elements, the Hearts represent water, hence they represent waterbenders, the Clubs represent air or the airbenders, and the Diamonds represent the element of fire, thus we have the firebenders. Spades (which isn't shown here because I did a three-card pull so don't worry I have no bias against them, I love all them benders and non-benders ok? peace) correspond to the earth element and the earthbenders, and while they're not in the photo they're definitely in the deck and are important members of the ATLA-TLOK universe. (Also Badgermoles, c'mon!)

Now for the analysis (Trigger warning for Zutara fans you might wanna look away, unless you feel like you wanna keep reading yay).

The two fives here are from the heart and club suits, and based on ATLA canon, well Katara is represented by the 5 of Hearts while Aang is the 5 of Clubs. They're both fives, they have something in common at the least, and while they could choose other people or numbers, here they came together and the two fluids which seem very different but are actually quite similar (they can conform to the shape of their containers) create a wonderful emotional and healing connection when they are together. Also if you're into fluid mechanics please help me explain why both air and water are fluids, just in case someone tries to tell me off that water is the only fluid element yay thx xoxo

Meanwhile, we have a two of diamonds over here, a firebender, and let's assume that it's Zuko because I want to assume that he is, since he's the first firebender that appeared in my head when this card popped up. Also he’s pretty much a notch different from Aang and Katara in more ways than one (status, age, lineage, bending abilities lol the list can go on). Indeed, fire and air are actually friends, mates, because air can affect how large or small the flame can be, and the fire in turn can affect the air's temperature through increase or decrease. This can be seen in Aang and Zuko's friendship, first it's just one huge clash but as the two started to learn not just to be friends with the other but more importantly to learn how to make peace with their own painful pasts: Aang for leaving the Air Nomads, being unable to protect or help them and in turn he ends up being bereaved and alone; and Zuko suffering emotional damage due to various factors which caused him to end up being confused as to what he should be striving for, while causing pain and suffering for others along the way. In this way, the two were able to grow and learn how to become better through their interactions with other people who they otherwise wouldn't even have a chance to meet (like in Zuko and Katara's life-changing trip, OK also Sokka and Zuko's life-changing trip, and Aang's blossoming relationship with Katara, his friendship with the other members of the extended GAang too many to mention lol) as well as him taking their own responsibilites quite seriously, as shown in the graphic novels. It's basically pushing their comfort levels as much as possible and with the results showing up.

OK, now here's the part where some people might cringe and turn but please hear me out first, OK? If you'll also look at the spread, the heart card is separated from the diamond card by the club card, meaning that Clubs is an intermediary between water and fire, which would end up either one fizzling out or both. It's pretty much the same way with how Zuko and Katara normally interacted around Books 1 and 2. Once Aang created a rapport with both of them, they both were able to be a bit more understanding of the other, and made their lives a bit more bearable. This is alluded by the fact that Zuko and Katara had an important life-changing adventure, which is quite literal because if it wasn't, they'd still be quarrelling till TLOK lol but hey you'll never know.

Wow I guess that was some word vomit there, and to be honest this was even a lot longer than my original card reading post, oh well, this was pretty much inspired by the layout, like I spent more about making up this post than actually getting the message from the Divine Realm, like I just got the first message right away and ruminated on this one while laughing for a good 3 minutes before the lid fell on me. Anyway, I hope you guys liked this extra post, and stay cool and good my dear ATLA-TLOK fans/trash/stans well you know what I mean. Peace out, Orihime the fan-girl signing out.