my "divorced" zukka au, slammed back into my memory by @transboyzuko latest addition (a true hero right there yall)
story idea is below the cut because whoo boy it became a lot longer than i thought it would
sozin's comet, sokka and toph are dangling off the ship, there's smoke and fire everywhere, it's getting hard to breathe, hard for sokka to see, and without his weapons, sokka is unable to see a way out
a figure of a guard appears through the smoke, and sokka jerks back and away from the man (in vain) but in doing so, jostles his leg. the pain and the shock combined, toph's hand slips out of sokka's grip and he watches helplessly as she falls
sokka makes to jump after her, but the guard grabs him before he can and yanks him back onto the safety of the wider platform. sokka tries to fight, but he's quickly subdued and he falls unconscious
(fear not, toph does live: she falls from sokka's grasp, but what sokka doesn't realise, due to the intensity of the smoke and fire, is that suki is right beneath them, and she catches toph. do not worry i am not killing toph, i am too scared to do that)
the airship pulls away from the battle, with the most senior commander taking over and urging a retreat to one of the southern fire nation islands, where he, and a number of powerful fire nation lords, hail from - that part of the fire nation does not recognise the authority of fire lord zuko, however it is unclear if they would recognise ozai, now that his bending is gone (and besides, quite a number weren't wholly impressed with him usurping iroh), so the war has become more of a civil war, with the separatists (they're not separatists but idk what else to call them) planning to take over the fire nation and then continue the war
the gaang are now faced with a fire nation civil war AND convincing the many ek provinces and water tribes to support zuko so that the 100 year war can truly end, however many ek ministers and some northern water tribe ambassadors believe this is a trick
during this time, sokka is a prisoner of the separatist group, and has resigned himself to this fate, believing toph to be dead and ngl perhaps suki as well, but he's definite that toph is dead and he's definite that his actions led to her death, so MAJOR survivor guilt
this is, of course, exacerbating his guilt about not protecting yue, his mum, katara (even though she's not dead he still doesn't know what happened to her)
so yeah, sokka's feeling very guilty and feels as if he deserves being imprisoned/tortured/etc, so he's not making any escape plans or anything, he's just done
BUT THEN
a new political prisoner is placed in the cell next to his: a young boy called hinata (imagine like 7 or 8) who the separatists are using to try and goad one of the fire nation nobles who is supporting zuko - he reminds sokka a bit of the boys back home in the swt that he cared for
sokka begins to feel very protective of this kid, especially when the guards come round to do their usual tormenting, or when they give out too small rations, or when hinata has a nightmare, and after a while he realises that he needs to get out, but not for himself, just for hinata
so they do, they escape (you'll notice how much thought i've put into this lmao) but they can't get back to hinata's family because it's all a massive war zone so sokka grabs the kid and they head for the ek, and not just the ek, like south east of ba sing se ek, near the eastern air temple ek, like as far from the fire nation as possible, sokka isn't letting anyone near hinata
yeah, he essentially becomes an older brother to hinata
now sokka has every intention of reuniting hinata with his family once the war is over but unfortunately they are very remote and so the village they are staying in doesn't exactly get the news asap. or like, at all
aang is visiting the eastern air temple a few months after that war has ended (i'm thinking at least a couple of years after aang defeated ozai but hey whatever floats your boat) and he stops by at a village to get supplies and lo and behold sokka and hinata are there
the reunion is very accidental, one of appa's buckles on his saddle snapped and aang landed near the village because he didn't want to continue his flight to the eastern air temple with a broken saddle and he needed supplies anyway, and so he enters the village, asks a nearby kid who looks strangely fire nation "hey, do you guys have a blacksmith" and hinata is like, "oh yeah, come with me" and he takes him to sokka
yes sokka would become a blacksmith fight me if you dare
(also i'm imagining that during sokka's time as a prisoner, he definitely lost his leg that got broken because like the separatists would have gone for the easiest route with sokka's broken leg and if it's broken too badly then why bother trying to heal it just go chop chop- so yeah, sokka makes himself a prosthetic and specialises in mobility aids, which are sorely needed in this area of the ek with the amount of refugees that fled to that province when they couldn't get access to ba sing se, but he does other engineering things as well and his ideas are, ngl, creating a bit of a hub near the eastern air temple, so slay for sokka)
regardless, aang and sokka reunion :)))
long chat about hinata having to return home, because like yes that was always the intention but aang reveals to sokka that hinata's family were killed when hinata escaped and the separatists had no more leverage over hinata's family (he doesn't reveal that to hinata for obvious reasons, he lets sokka do that) and hinata and sokka have become a little dependent on each other
it's not co-dependency per se, but like it was definitely going that way before they reached the village and their community helped them begin to heal from their trauma and stuff, but regardless they don't want to be separated, and so after much deliberation sokka and hinata decide that they want to stay where they are and if the gaang want to visit that is fine but if there's nothing tying them to the fire nation then why leave their new home
sokka's part of the decision is most definitely fueled by shame over losing toph and not being able to protect the people he loves, but aang doesn't realise that sokka doesn't know that toph is alive so aang doesn't mention anything, he just agrees to tell the gaang and family and all and leaves
aang returns not even three weeks later with katara zuko toph suki, a couple of hinata's uncles who want to at least see that hinata is alive, and a letter from hakoda and bato saying that they're aboard a ship sailing over
angsty reunion for sokka as he realises that toph is alive lemme assure you that was not on his reunion bingo card no siree
angsty reunion for suki and zuko with sokka because zuko and suki were very sure that sokka was dead and sokka was very sure that zuko and suki would hate him for getting toph killed
angsty water tribe fam reunion obvi with a heavy dosing of katara hakoda and bato assuring sokka that he did not fail
...so yeah it's angsty it's dramatic it's miscommunication it's long distance it's kind of technically not really divorced au but it's got a bit of flair and that's all that really matters
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