#but Zuko is angry and self destructive so yeah

[the-badger-mole]

So your post having reminded me of that awful comic again I decided out of curiosity to delve into the Kataang side of the fandom to see if any of them ever talked about this comic and Aang’s behavior. Apparently the consensus over is that it’s OOC of Aang. To quote:

“I find his behavior to be very odd, too rude, self-centered and outright aggressive, especially the part when he exploded the volcano on Katara's face nearly hurting her, he was angry about Katara refusing to talk about the kiss then directed that anger into firebending which it isn't right for Aang as an Air Nomad to use the aggressive emotions to bend fire, then despite his apology which feels hollow he dismissed he was even worried about her getting burned again.

While Aang has flaws and outbursts sometimes this behavior strikes me to be unreasonable and OOC.”

Which is pretty funny to me because he literally said he’d be in the avatar state if he could over the play shipping Zuko and Katara. If he didn’t have his chakra blocked he absolutely would have gone into the avatar state and had a destructive tantrum. I wonder do they think those moments in the canon show are OOC of Aang too?

Your Ozai and Aang parallels are sadly spot on. The fandom is just too blind to see it because the narrative tells us rather than shows us he’s the hero. I really want to see into Bryke’s mind because they continue to baffle me 20 years later.

Yeah, Aang in the comics tracks with who he was in the main series. He was always self righteous, disrespectful and emotionally unregulated, but he was cute and cheerful, so a lot of people tend to overlook that. Remember how disrespectful of SWT culture he was in Bato of the Water Tribe? Yeah...that's never walked back. Of course he would make sure his only airbending child had no connection to his SWT roots. Aang is prone to tantrums, and his emotional outbursts include bending. Like you pointed out, as has been pointed out so many other times, Aang saying that he would have gone into the Avatar State over that play suggesting Katara was interested in someone other than him is a massive red flag. That whole scene on the balcony comes after the Lava Fissure incident. With that context, Katara saying she was confused instead of outright refusing Aang takes on a really dark meaning.

But people are entitled to their takes. A lot of Aang fans want to ignore the comics as canon. That's fine. I can totally relate. I ignore the comics and LoK as canon, too 😏

Zutara fans 🤝 Aang fans

ignoring canon

[franceblr]

some of my modern au zukka headcanons!

- zuko is definitely the guard-dog-type overprotective boyfriend. like yeah, college zuko is on his zen shit and the rich kid gremlin that used to terrorize his entire highschool is a distant memory, but god help you if you so much as look at sokka wrong. zuko cannot stand seeing people be dismissive to sokka: sometimes people will take sokka’s kindness for granted, or discredit his intelligence just because he’s the funny guy, and zuko just hears kill bill sirens in his head and it’s over. it’s hilarious cause when it’s him that’s being insulted, zuko will barely dignify the offender with an unimpressed stare. but you make a jab at sokka and you’re done. next thing you know sokka has zuko in a deathgrip and is dragging him away before he jumps you.

- bonus points for zuko’s resting bitch face and his extensive training in like every martial art under the sun.

- he just cannot see sokka’s feelings hurt. he can’t. sokka is so brilliant and beautiful and funny and confident, it’s easy to miss how sensitive underneath it all sokka really can be. but zuko knows; zuko guards his heart with fierce jealousy, wrapped around it like a dragon protecting his gold. truthfully sokka is capable of defending himself just fine with his endless wit and snarky remarks, and he’s just as well built, but zuko’s fury always gets the best of him.

- zuko adores sokka and dotes and fusses over him all the time. not that he’d ever admit it. sometimes it’s subtle and sometimes it’s neurotic screeching, and sokka will never miss out on the chance to bring it up and make fun of zuko’s arrogant nose scrunch and his fierce blushing. zuko always keeps track of how much food, sleep, exercise and downtime sokka gets; he often has to chase sokka with his glasses or adhd meds, always picks up sokka’s jewelry when it’s misplaced; he’ll quietly surprise sokka with the most thoughtful acts of service, like cleaning his car when sokka’s been putting it off for weeks, or take sokka on a run when the lows hit. he’s a total mom. but also dad, cause sokka still struggles with discipline despite being so hardworking and motivated. and zuko sucks at talking about emotions -he’s still working that out in therapy but he’s getting there!-, but he always makes sure to check in with sokka when sokka gets a little too funny, when he gets restless and absent and clearly something’s up. and zuko’s not much of a speaker, but he always knows just the right words to say when sokka feels like his brain is just wired against him and he can’t get it to shut up. always knows how to take a day off with sokka and press the restart button for him when he can’t seem to break out of his executive dysfunction. somehow zuko always knows how to help sokka get his life back on track after a rut, without ever being patronizing or overbearing. zuko always knows exactly the way to reassure and hold sokka when the rsd gets bad, with his infinite dragon patience and understanding he only reserves for sokka’s heart.

- sometimes zuko’s caring can become smothering, but sokka deeply appreciates not having to always be the self relying grown up with a plan, and he’s learnt to release the responsability and give in to zuko’s pampering. besides, it’s not like sokka’s any better

- sokka treats zuko with such overwhelming tenderness. he doesn’t care that zuko is 6’4 and all lean muscle and solemn regalness and cheekbones, zuko is his baby. sokka manages zuko like he’s fragile, handling his sharpest pieces with such care, it soothes zuko’s hurt and inspires him to be kind. even when zuko sometimes slips back in his old self destructive ways, sokka knows how to calm and tuck in bed the angry teenager in zuko that screams and kicks and sets himself on fire. knows that with enough kindness and firmness he’ll coax out again the mature zuko that goes to therapy and does his yoga and does his best everyday to be kind and brave. and sokka is so patient with zuko, how could he not always strive to be better and make him proud?

- sokka is aware he’ll never truly know what it means to grow up in a family like zuko’s, and he doesn’t always understand all the dynamics and triggers and layers of trauma that kind of abuse inflicts on a person. and zuko does a wonderful job at keeping things manageable and in control. but when zuko breaks, sokka is always there. sokka is always there to pick zuko up after he visits ozai in jail, and knows better not to question why zuko returns even when he cries in the passenger seat on the drive home. sokka always picks up when zuko’s having a panic attack at work and he’s begging sokka to talk him through it on the phone. sokka always sits with zuko on the bathroom floor and rubs his back when he’s throwing up from stress, and he’s always there to redirect zuko’s attention and force him to take a break when his work outs get too extenuating.

- totally agree on the common hc that zuko’s in either political science or law, and sokka is a mechanical engineering student.

- as far as hobbies go, they’re both physically active and into sports, though i think sokka would be more of a surfer/gym/basketball/track athlete type of guy, and zuko’s more of a martial arts/tennis/pilates type of dude. zuko’s also an avid reader and opera and theatre enthusiast, likely can play an instrument. while sokka engages in a variety of creative hobbies that span from painting to writing poetry to knitting to pottery. sokka picks up new hobbies routinely, and though most of them don’t end up sticking, he masters them crazy fast. he enjoys anything that stimulates his logical thinking, and him and zuko often play chess and videogames together. sokka also has the nasty habit to go through zuko’s crossword puzzles and fill out the words he knows before zuko has the chance to get to it himself.

- sokka broadened zuko’s personal aesthetic and fashion horizons. zuko still favours neutral colours (with the exception of red) and a laid back but purposeful style: he’s very anal about his pants being pressed properly and his sneakers being clean. he also wears only natural fabrics, and is well known for his perfectly ironed cotton t-shirts. he always makes sure to throw something in his outfits that nod to his heritage, whether that be in the tailoring or model of the clothes, or his accessories. he’s a serial hoodie stealer, and sokka introduced him to crop tops, which to sokka’s delight, zuko pulls off incredibly. he also may or may not have nipple piercings and a tattoo somewhere.

- sokka on the other hand is either giving athlete off duty or pride, no in betweens. he’s very expressive in the way he dresses and accessorizes, and likes to experiment with bold colours and less gender conforming stuff. most of his wardrobe comes in shades of blue though, that’s just how it was meant to be. sokka is huge on proudly wearing traditional clothes, and likes to showcase his culture through fashion. he also makes a lot of his and zuko’s jewelry. definitely has at least 3 piercings per ear, a nose ring, and is tattooed. most of the time sokka has kinesiology tape peeking out from his clothes. and dirty sneakers lol

- on days where zuko doesn’t want his hair in the way, sokka will braid it for him beautifully. but zuko always has at least two small braids at the nape of his neck, and beads woven in his hair.

[whyarealltheusernamestaken9]

Let me present you a list: My Cats From Most Petable to Least as Decided by Me

Starting off strong with

1. Loki; he likes pets, and he loves to meet people, ngl he's my favorite cat so yeah

10/10 good boy

2. Bennie; he is so soft, bonus points if you have a brush because instant purrs, he is a scaredy cat tho

10/10 very soft

3. Lily; just wants to cuddle, sharp claws to the boob because she wants to make biscuits, very soft

9/10 she's a grandma

4. Minnie; loves pets, will purr, don't know how he is with strangers tho

8/10 big boy

5. Zuko; baby, often hiding in the sibling's room tho, likes pets

7/10 hard to find

6. Kuro; baby, cone can get in way, but he love pets, sleepy

7/10 self-destructive (see cone)

And finally

7. Millum; so angry, sweet but so mad, please no touch unless asked, will not ask

5/10 loved despite her flaws

[ssreeder]

Hi ssreeder!!!

As always I’ll begin with telling you how much I’m in love with LIAB and RIA!!! Those two are so perfect I wouldn’t change ANYTHING. Because I think if they got even better than they are now I’d really die or the pleasure of reading them. I’m sorry I don’t gather the willpower and courage to comment often enough. I’m not super literate or eloquent while or after reading a chapter and I never know what to say about it when I think about it. I’m just always impatient to see the next chapter and whichever length it is, it always will take top priority on my mind’s reading queue. Whatever I plan to read next or I am currently reading, the new chapter will always get in first place! (Should it even be a +50k words chapter!!!) You inspire me to draw so much! And your comments about them are always so enormously generous and sweet. Thank you so much!!! I can’t stress it enough.

Anyway, I’d be delighted to have a little sneak peek of #5 Blue Spirit Alone, if you will.

Thank you once again and have a wonderful day!!!!

AWWWWW I LOVE YOU

Listen here! you could leave a comment that is just you rubbing your face across the keyboard and I’d love it!! No pressure though I love chatting with you in the discord & seeing your AMAZING art.

I would eat it with a spoon and fork it’s so amazing, if I had half your talent I’d be drawing angsty art all over the place lol.

Ughhhhh you ask me about WIP??? Haha (when I say WIP I mean random ass notes that have no real structure behind them yet…)

So Blue spirit alone is an angsty idea I had that I will probably never actually write but…

Iroh dies after getting struck by azulas lightning which pretty much sends Zuko into a self destructive spiral and he uses his BS persona to wreck havoc on the FN because he is so angry.

He meets Jet as the BS, and of course Jet is like let’s be besties and come with me to BSS & somehow Zuko ends up going with him and that’s where they run into Sokka and it’s just a mess and lots of Dai Ali creepy vibes and miscommunication and angst and three boys that can’t figure it out and maybe someone dies but maybe someone doesn’t and yeah.

Like I said it’s an idea I haven’t given MUCH thought but it’s in my notes and I like writing Jet & I like angst so there you go.

Thanks for asking!! Which I was better at explaining things hahaha

[jasmine-iroh]

Sparring Partners

Pairing: Zuko x f!reader

WC: 2.5K

A/N: howdyyyy I’ll be honest idk what this is besides self satisfactory fluff oops. send in some requests pls, I’m bored as heck!

Never let (Y/N) and Zuko spar.

That was an unspoken rule on Team Avatar after Zuko joined the group. The group had witnessed the aftermath of their practicing one too many times; angry gatherings of flames licking at the bark of uprooted trees scattered around piles of rubble and burnt grass.

Simply put, the pair were a force of nature. That wasn’t the reason they weren’t allowed to fight, though. No, nobody really paid much mind to their destructive tendencies, as long as they weren’t too close to camp.

It was their moods after the fight was done that brought about the rule.

Zuko would slink away to his tent and brood, grumbling at anyone who ventured too close to him. (Y/N) would stay with the group, a grin stuck to her face the whole time. It wasn’t a smile that put anyone at ease, though. It was feral, the snapping teeth and predatory curl of her lips more suited to a big cat than a young girl. Even Katara, who was usually found near (Y/N)’s side, avoided sitting too close.

(Y/N) was never mean to the others, but she had a razor sharp edge to her for hours after the duel that made Aang shift nervously in his seat and Sokka focus more on being the meat guy than the sarcasm guy. Suki would stay on edge until it was finally time to split up into their individual tents. Her fighting instincts would be on alert at the scent of scorched earth coming from (Y/N), a completely different smell from the smoke from the campfire.

Zuko, of course, would be the one to start said campfire. There was a tense, almost shy set to his shoulders as the weight of wild eyes bore down on him from near Toph. Toph, incidentally, never seemed to mind the rumbling of thunder in (Y/N)’s voice after a fight with Zuko, or the way Zuko’s heart beat staggered whenever (Y/N) so much as walked past him.

Toph didn’t care if the pair sparred, as long as it would get them over their timid dance around camp. She thought it was an entertaining break in the monotony of training and hiding, and the feeling of (Y/N) earthbending with such raw emotion was as sappy as any romance story there was. It was truly hilarious to her that nobody else could connect the dots between the unbridled chaos of their fighting and their quiet moments together around a campfire.

**

It had been a few days since the last incident when Toph finally decided to ask (Y/N) what their deal was during a training session.

“So, what’s up with you and Sifu Hotman?” She asked, a slightly maniacal laugh falling past her lips when she managed to catch (Y/N) off guard and nail her in the side with a boulder. Toph had taken to using Aang’s ridiculous nickname after she realized how quickly she could get under Zuko’s skin with it. Payback for Zuko burning her feet, she had justified.

Coughing and sputtering from the blow, (Y/N) tried to deflect the question with a volley of rocks she’d been keeping suspended in the air long enough for Toph to half lose track of.

“Hey, that’s cheating!” Toph huffed indignantly, dodging the attack before shifting her feet and sending the slab of earth below (Y/N) tilting sideways.

“No, I just saw a weakness and used it,” (Y/N) laughed and leapt from her crumbling perch to position herself in the middle of the sparring area, knowing that Aang, Zuko, Suki, and Sokka were somewhere behind her. Toph wasn’t stupid, she knew (Y/N) was trying to get into a position that would make Toph go easier on her with their friends in the line of fire.

Oh (Y/N), you really think you’re clever, don’t you? Toph thought with a smirk as a plan formed in her mind, pressing her knuckles into the dirt and twisting them sharply. She felt (Y/N)’s growl before she heard it, knowing that the other girl hated when Toph locked her feet into the earth. This time, though, she kept her hold on the rock, sitting down and waiting for (Y/N) to answer her original question.

“Toph, c’mon!” (Y/N) whined, trying to free herself as Toph sat a few meters away laughing.

“Just tell me and I’ll let you go!” Toph called back, bending herself a chair from the earth with one hand while the other kept it’s grip on the rocks around (Y/N)’s ankles.

“You’re such a little jerk,” (Y/N) answered instead, looking around for something to help her. She was weak without being able to use her feet as her center, something Toph had been hounding her about forever.

“I thought best friends told each other everything,” Toph mocked as she felt the others stop fighting to watch the scene in front of them.

“Yeah, but you also told me you’d throw me off Appa because I took Momo’s seat last week,” (Y/N) replied, crossing her arms stubbornly. Toph was a stronger bender, but (Y/N) had more patience, knowing Toph could get bored or frustrated pretty quickly. That’s how they’d always been, ever since (Y/N) had been sent to live with her helpless, blind little cousin all those years ago.

“What’s going on?” Aang asked the pair, scootering over on a ball of air with a peeved looking Zuko trailing behind him.

“(Y/N)’s keeping secrets from me and acting like I won’t find out,” Toph accused, watching as Suki and Sokka joined the group. Katara, who had been assigned camp duties for the day, drew closer at the lack of fighting sounds.

“Toph,” (Y/N) warned, a sharp threat in her voice as the sound of a tree being pulled up at the roots echoed around the clearing as (Y/N) clenched her fists.

“Yes?” A challenge in her voice, her fist twisting further into the earth and sinking (Y/N) up to her waist in tightly compressed rocks.

“Enough.” Zuko stepped in between the pair, and Toph couldn’t help but notice the spike in his heart rate when (Y/N) dropped up to her shoulders in rock.

“Zuko, stay out of this. Toph’s just being a pain,” (Y/N) huffed, having a hard time breathing with the merciless press of dirt and rock around her chest.

He didn’t stay out of it of course, his heart beating faster than a bird's wings as he watched (Y/N) struggle in the ground. Toph thought the duo were nauseatingly oblivious.

She let out a frustrated growl and slammed her foot on the ground, sending Zuko sprawling flat out next to (Y/N) and encasing his hands and feet in earth.

“Fine. You can both stay here until one of you tells me, then.” Toph declared before standing and walking away from the pair. The rest of the group looked from Toph back down to their friends buried in the ground, and decided that maybe they didn’t want to end up stuck next to the pair. They walked off, promising to talk to Toph and have her fix this.

“Spirits, she’s such a little bastard,” (Y/N) mumbled, turning her head to look at Zuko. She blinked in shock, not expecting his face to be quite so close to hers. A tricky little bastard, the girl amended in her head.

“What were you two fighting about?” Zuko asked quietly, not having to speak much above a whisper with their proximity. Had his eyes always been so golden?

“She asked about what was going on between us,” (Y/N) answered, closing her eyes and turning her head away from him towards the sky. The sun pressed red kisses against her closed eyelids while the breeze played with her hair, making her feel for a moment that she was laid out next to Zuko in a spring meadow by choice instead of locked into the dirt by Toph.

“What did you tell her?” He kept his voice low, tone conspiratorial. He stared at (Y/N), the sun loving her throat and pressing kisses to her cheekbones. He thought, just for a moment, that Toph had done him a favor by locking him into this view.

A laugh, and then, “I didn’t tell her anything.”

“Why not?” He prodded, wishing (Y/N) would turn her head so he could… could what? He thought to himself, images of him wiggling closer and closing the distance between them flickering in his mind without warning. A warm blush crept up his neck at the thoughts, wishing he wasn’t so affected by their proximity.

“Because sometimes you need to let Toph think she holds all the cards so she’s a little less of a pain in the ass. And so she wouldn’t question what we really do when we spar,” (Y/N) whispered, opening her eyes and turning to face Zuko. She met his amber gaze immediately, a grin pulling at her mouth as she leaned closer to him, feeling the heat radiating off his body.

“Oh, you mean that thing where you torment me with your comments all day around camp and then try to play innocent when we’re alone?” Zuko huffed with a smile as he wormed his way closer.

“Hey, don’t get mad. I just saw a weakness and used it,” (Y/N) giggled as she leaned in towards him. Her gaze flickered briefly from Zuko’s eyes, to his lips, and then back to his eyes in a way that made him feel like the ground was falling out from under him. He leaned up to meet her halfway, falling just short of being able to seal their lips together. A soft groan from (Y/N) pulled a chuckle from Zuko’s throat, before his head flopped back down onto the packed earth.

“Such a little bastard,” he heard (Y/N) mutter a moment before her face contorted and rumbling from around them was heard.

Zuko’s hands and legs were freed from their earthen prison, letting him roll away only a second before (Y/N) rose up from her hole on a pillar of earth. She hopped down gracefully and brushed her clothes off before helping Zuko to his feet, that wild look back in her eyes.

“You couldn’t have done that earlier?” Zuko asked, brushing the dirt out of his hair.

“I can put you back, if you’d like,” (Y/N) hummed, stepping closer to him and giving him that sharp grin that sent his stomach fluttering.

“I’m fine right here, thank you,” he replied, a deep blush staining his cheeks as (Y/N) pulled him close and finally, finally, pressed her lips to his own in a slow kiss. He returned the kiss eagerly, loving the warmth of her hand cupping his jaw with gritty fingers as the other tangled in Zuko’s mop of hair.

The pillar she’d used to free herself moments before was now scraping against his back as (Y/N) traced a lazy trail of kisses along Zuko’s jaw. He let out a sound that was suspiciously close to a whimper and felt a thrill go up his spine at the glint of absolute trouble reflected in (Y/N)’s eyes when she pulled away.

“How long do you think we have until they realize we’re not stuck anymore?” She pondered, pressing delicate kisses up the side of Zuko’s throat and along the edges of his scar.

“Enough time to get a head start and cover our tracks.” His eyes moved deliberately to the forest away from camp, before flicking back to hers with a bashful quirk of his eyebrow. His breaths trembling, he tried to ignore how his nerve endings were alight with the feeling of (Y/N)’s lips on his skin.

“Very tempting, but I don’t feel like listening to Mother Katara yell at us for ‘running off and worrying the group,’” (Y/N) whispered back, pressing a kiss to Zuko’s chin before moving to pull away. His arms snaked around her waist quickly, locking her against him.

(Y/N)’s brows shot up in pleasant surprise at his actions. She had been the one to make moves from the start, more accustomed to touch that wasn’t soured by pain or anger. Zuko figured she’d like to have more physical affection from him, but the long nights spent untangling his emotions in return for a kiss were enough to keep her happy and moving at his pace. Zuko had been without a loving hand to hold for so long that he forgot how simple and sweet an embrace could be, how the pad of a thumb rubbing across bruised knuckles could soothe his aches better than any balm.

Feeling bold between the column of earth and (Y/N), Zuko leaned down to her height and pressed a gentle kiss against her lips, retreating before she could respond. The girl only grinned widely, wrapping her arms around his muscular torso. A puff of air left Zuko’s lungs as he was pulled into her strong arms, before tightening his own arms around her waist and pressing his face into the crook of her neck.

“We have to at least make Toph think nothing’s changed, or we’ll never hear the end of how she’s so right and it's everyone else who is really blind,” (Y/N) told him, pitching her voice in Toph’s bratty little sister voice she used when she won arguments.

“Let her. I’m tired of not being able to be like this whenever we want,” Zuko replied, his warm breath against the side of her neck sending a wave of goosebumps over (Y/N)’s skin. It shocked her in the most pleasant way possible to hear him say that to her, since they’d agreed to keep things quiet until he could figure out his emotions.

“Alright, but don’t say I didn’t warn you when she makes you wish you were hard of hearing,” (Y/N) laughed, nudging his head back up to face her. Her senses were filled with Zuko, the smell of smoke filling her nose as the heat from his body scorched a pattern into her heart. Their noses brushed once, twice; their lips a breath apart.

Before either could close the distance, Toph marched around their column of rock, almost slamming straight into them. In a breath, she was gone again, back the way she’d come.

“I knew it, I was so right! You losers are so blind!” She shouted to the others.

Her sudden appearance had shocked the pair apart, making (Y/N) quirk an eyebrow and pulling a rare grin from Zuko at the astounding accuracy of (Y/N)’s impression of Toph.

“Just remember, you brought this upon yourself,” (Y/N) laughed, turning to walk back to camp. Zuko’s hand shot out and grabbed her wrist, reeling her back in towards him so he could seal a lingering kiss against her mouth.

“I know, but that was worth it,” he hummed, walking alongside her back to camp, their fingers tangling together without a second thought.

[sokkastyles]

I said that Mai treats Zuko the way her mother treats her (no I'm not saying Mai is abusive, but this is bad behavior that has the potential to become abusive if left unchecked, and it is behavior that the finale plays as romantic and hilarious and that will always be a problem), and there's a lot of argument about Mai. Many people who dislike her will deny that she was abused by her parents and say her mother was just "encouraging her to express emotion," not repressing her emotions. That shows a misunderstanding of what controlling and emotionally abusive parents are like. In "Return to Omashu" Mai's mother tells her that she should be happy for her father's position and not complain, and the reason this is emotional abuse is because although she is encouraging her daughter to express emotion, she is only encouraging her to express the right kind of emotion. That's what Mai meant when she said her parents gave her whatever she wanted as long as she behaved, and why she struggles to express emotion of any kind.

But she also treats Zuko in a similar way and she does this many times, but I want to talk specifically about "The Beach" because I've seen people make the exact same claim here that they make about Mai and her mother, that Mai was encouraging Zuko to express his feelings. But what she was actually doing, just like her mother did to her, was encouraging him to only express the kinds of feelings she wanted him to express.

No, I'm not saying it was acceptable for him to fly into a jealous rage at the party and attack another guy for talking to her. Of course it wasn't, and she is right to shut him down and not put up with that kind of behavior. But she also shows an inability to engage with him emotionally that he calls her out on during their argument, and that does not get enough focus because people focus on his jealousy and anger. And I think the reason for this is because we tend to assume that's what toxic behavior looks like. But the kinds of behavior we associate with abusive men, anger and aggression, are also often symptoms of being abused, especially in men and boys who are victims of abuse. That's where the myth of mutual abuse comes in, and this is quite common in situations where women are the perpetrators. We see this kind of behavior a lot with Azula and Zuko, in fact. Zuko often is upset and hurt by Azula but can't express himself so he'll react with ineffectual anger which she immediately shuts down. Zuko acted out because he felt like Mai didn't really care about him, and that does not excuse his behavior at all, but it is very clear what is behind it. She's also easily able to shut him down.

Mai: [Angrily.] Zuko, what is wrong with you?

Zuko: What's wrong with me?

Mai: [Scolding.] Your temper is out of control. You blow up over every little thing. You're so impatient and hotheaded and angry!

Zuko: [Snapping back.] Well, at least I feel something, as opposed to you. You have no passion for anything! You're just a big blah!

Mai: It's over, Zuko. We're done.

Of course Mai should not have to put up with Zuko's behavior here, but their conversation also reveals that jealousy wasn't really the issue. When she angrily asks what is wrong with him, he immediately shoots back "what's wrong with me?" And he doesn't say that what he thinks is wrong with her is her talking to other guys, he says she has no passion. He says at least I feel something. Now, why would he say that?

Mai: [yawn] I just asked if you were cold, I didn't ask for your whole life story. Don't worry.

And this is exactly the dynamic between Mai and her mother. We see Mai express negativity, acting out because she's unhappy, and her mother tells her she is wrong to express negative emotion. In "The Awakening," Zuko tries to talk about his feelings but since those feelings are negative, Mai does not want to hear it.

And then at the party, then she wants to know what's wrong with him. She acts like she has no idea why he's upset, because she doesn't, and when he tried to tell her what was bothering him before, she shut him down.

And the scene around the campfire? Is this Mai encouraging Zuko to express emotion?

Azula: There's a simple question you need to answer, then. Who are you angry at?

Zuko: No one. I'm just angry.

Mai: Yeah, who are you angry at, Zuko?

All three of the girls keep pushing him in this scene until he says that he's angry at himself. And I've talked about this scene before but, oh, boy, this scene. Yes, Zuko should be angry at himself, but he also has justified anger at his father, Azula, and Mai that he does not get to express because he can't be angry at his abusive father when he's under his control. He can't be angry at Azula when she's right there pushing him and manipulating him and insisting that her actions are for his own good, he can't be angry at Mai when she's yelling at him and expressing justified anger at him for his blow up at the party, nor can he tell her what's really wrong. This isn't a scene where Zuko can safely express himself. So he directs that anger inward, and his real problem with Mai, that he wants her to care - specifically, to care about him, does not get addressed. It only gets addressed when he stops being angry at her and blames himself. Then she immediately says she cares about him and it's make out time, despite her having broken up with him a few scenes before that. She never addresses the reason she broke up with him in the first place, but she's happy now that he's not angry at her, but at himself. Yikes. So the message, whether this was intended by the show or not, is that Mai cares about Zuko when he is expressing approved emotions. Even if he's expressing self-destructive anger, at least he's not angry at her! What she is doing, whether intentional or not, is encouraging him to internalize negative feelings and turn them into self-blame. This is NOT a healthy dynamic. For either of them, considering how Zuko lashed out at her after repeatedly being forced to bottle up his emotions.

I know why Mai acts this way, I do believe she does care about Zuko, but her behavior is extremely hurtful and damaging especially since Zuko already has a tendency towards self-blame. I'm not saying Zuko never hurts her, either, but the difference is in how the show portrays their actions. And the final note the show leaves us with in the finale is one in which Mai again invalidates her boyfriend's emotions and agency, says she "kind of likes him," and warns him never to break up with her, and this is portrayed as cute and funny.

[jaxsteamblog]

Scars

Triggering content: discussion of violence, including gun violence, implications of self-harm Content warning: heavy smooching, nothing explicit

Click here to read the full fic on AO3

Laying in bed, Katara started to drift as Zuko casually passed his hand up and down her side. With the shade pulled down, the late afternoon sun cast an orange light in the room, turning most of the things she could see into silhouettes. 

“Katara?” Zuko asked. 

“Mmm?” Katara took in a deep breath and shifted in the space next to him. 

“I want to ask you something, but I’m worried about your reaction.” 

“I’m not dropping out of school.”

“It’s not that.”

Katara pushed herself up on one arm and squeezed her eyes shut briefly, trying to wake up.

“What’s wrong?” She asked.

“I wanted to know about,” His hand paused and Katara glanced down. “This.”

The line of the scar ran almost a hand length down her side. All of the scars she still had were ones she couldn’t heal herself, usually because she had been unconscious for the surgery and too weak to finish it after. 

“That’s when I was shot.” She said nonchalantly. Craning over, she used her free hand to pull on the skin a bit as she looked at it. 

“I think this one is from the last battle actually.” She added and laid back down. Looking up at Zuko, she shrugged at his horrified face.

“You were shot?” He questioned.

“Weren’t you?” Katara asked. 

“Well.” He started, but didn’t continue. She knew regardless, she had seen enough battle wounds to name all of the marks on his body.

Rolling onto her back, Katara tossed the blanket off her body. 

“Obviously, you know this is a burn. That was during a partial eclipse; a Fire Nation soldier surprised us and Sokka was barely awake enough to fight him off.” She explained, tracing the outer edge of a patch on her abdomen. 

“The one on my thigh is from getting tangled in barbed wire after we burned our first prison. It got infected pretty quick, but I was able to use my bending for that one.” She moved on quickly, lifting her left leg and turning it to show the curling scar. 

“Blazes Katara, what happened to you?” Zuko asked. 

Katara lowered her leg but looked up at the ceiling, resting her hands on her stomach. After a moment of silence, Zuko pulled the blanket back up, draping it over her. 

“Sokka and I were alone for a lot of the two years we were out there.” Katara started. “We’d run with Suki and the Kyoshi Warriors for a bit and then break off when they had to do something for the Earth Kingdom. For a few months, we stayed with this liberation group, but they ended up being borderline terrorists.”

Katara’s thoughts drifted to Jet and his group, and Zuko stayed quiet as she reminisced. 

“We weren’t trained soldiers. Jet, he ran this teen army or something, he taught us a lot. That’s probably why we stayed as long as we did.” Katara shook her head. “No, I made Sokka stay because I wanted to fight back. I was so angry. He didn’t trust Jet at all.” 

“What happened with that?” Zuko asked. His voice was soft and sympathetic. 

“We left. For a bit.” Katara said tersely. “After Sokka met Piandao and wanted to train, I was livid. He couldn’t trust Jet, called him a bad guy, but then he goes begging to work with a Fire Nation veteran?

“Of course, by then I had seen the worst of Jet but…”

“Fire Nation was always the worst.” Zuko finished for her.

Katara sighed, rolling back onto her side and putting her hand on Zuko’s hip. 

“Back then, yeah.” She said. “So I left and found Jet. I got the feeling he was hitting places close to me on purpose, so I knew where to find him. I didn’t tell Sokka. He doesn’t know everything I did.” 

“Was it bad?” Again, there was no judgement, but Katara still hesitated.

“Jet stopped being so,” She took in a breath. “Violent. He said I made him want to be a better person, a noble hero kind of thing.”

“Did you two…?” Zuko left off the end of his question. 

“Yeah. He was my first.” Katara said simply.

Zuko was quiet and Katara rubbed his side. 

“Hey.” She murmured.

“No, I know. I mean, obviously Mai and I. It’s just,” Zuko shifted uncomfortably. “If he wasn’t a great guy…”

“He and I were young. We thought the passion we felt was love, not the insane rage we held toward the Fire Nation.” Katara said and then laughed, low in her throat. “He would constantly gush about my scars as if I were a martyr.” 

“The wounds are horrific, but I am grateful for the scars. They mean you’re alive.” Zuko said.

“And that’s the difference between him and you. He would talk about being a martyr in war, but you wanted to live. I had to realize that there was nothing noble in my desire for self-destruction.” Katara explained.

“So these?” Zuko asked, holding her wrist and stilling her hand.

“Just because I knew it wasn’t noble didn’t mean I stopped seeking it.” Katara replied. 

“Did Jet survive?” Zuko asked, moving his hand to interlock their fingers. 

“He did. I don’t know where he ended up, but we reconnected once after the war. He came to my college.” She said.

“I’m assuming you didn’t pick back up where you left off.” Zuko said.

“Oh my gosh, are you jealous?” Katara asked, laughing. Zuko scowled.

“No.” He said.

“I did not hook up with Jet if that’s what you’re wondering.” Katara said and then grinned. “Because I was dating someone else I had met during the war.”

“Who?” Zuko questioned.

“You aren’t going to know him!” Katara retorted.

“I’m just curious!” 

“His name is Haru. He’s an Earthbender I met in a little mining village Sokka and I were hiding out in.” 

“So no Waterbenders?”

“Nope. But I did have a crush on Yue.”

“Oh really?” 

Katara laughed again and wriggled closer to Zuko.

“Yeah, but it was pretty obvious she liked Sokka. So I didn’t say anything.” She said. 

“You don’t say a lot of things.” Zuko pointed out.

“Plenty of people have scars from the war.” Katara said. “It’s not unusual.”

“You weren’t a soldier. You weren’t trained for that.” 

“How could they have ever trained you for yours?” She questioned, putting her hand to his scarred eye. 

“I’m Fire Nation.” He said.

“And you would cut off your own hand before you’d hurt me.” 

He held her, pulling her close, kissing her with a fever. Katara pressed herself into him, clinging to him and yielding to his attention. 

His fear drove him and Katara could feel his heart pounding in his chest even without her bending. 

“Never.” He said, breaking away to kiss her throat. “I would never.”

“I know, Zuko. I know.” She said, her voice breathy. 

“No more scars.” He said.

Katara put her hand to his chest, pushing herself back to look at him. 

“I’d heal them anyway.” 

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30

[bellatrixobsessed1]

Speak No Evil (Part 23)

Warning on this chapter for animal death: Azula & Mai go hunting and there is some description of the hunt. Nothing hardcore though. But I still thought that I should mention it.

Seicho is still holding her when she wakes. She is surprised to find that it doesn’t startle her to find herself waking in the arms of someone who isn’t TyLee. She is surprised to find that it feels both liberating and refreshing. She gives Seicho a gentle squeeze, something of a test to make sure that she is clinging to something real. When Seicho doesn’t stir at her touch, she makes herself comfortable in the woman’s arms once more, she supposes that it can’t hurt to let her sleep in, they have to wait on Zuzu and the others anyhow.

She finds that it is lovely to sleep in the arms of another once again. She snuggles herself closer, finding it significantly easier to be affectionate when the woman is sleeping. So much easier when she doesn’t have to worry about the woman witnessing her more awkward gestures.

She must have fallen asleep again because when she opens her eyes next, it is to Seicho toying with her hair. She brushes it out of Azula face and strokes her cheek with her thumb. “Did you sleep well.”

Azula feels around for her parchment, not finding it soon enough, she settles for a nod.

“Good.” She squeezes the princess’ hand.

Azula sits up and rubs her eyes. She feels under her pillow and finds her parchment. ‘Have the others caught up yet?’

“We would have heard them if they did.” She waits for Azula to get to her feet before snatching the sleeping bag and rolling it up. “I don’t know what we’re going to do while we wait, we don’t exactly have a camp to tear down.”

‘Breakfast.’ Azula digs around her pack for her pouch of beech and hazelnuts. She is running short on them. They will have to go for a good hunt once they regroup.

“That isn’t much of a breakfast.” Seicho sits down next to her.

Seicho’s hand creeps over hers. Azula spares a glance at it, now cupped over her own. The woman is certainly growing a lot bolder. Though Azula can’t truly blame her; she had been the one to cuddle so close to her in the night.

She looks up to see the woman’s bright smile. Her grip tightens on Azula’s hand and it comes back to her, that light and kind feeling upon awakening in her arms. She thinks that she should be doing something, reciprocating in some way but she isn’t sure how. But what if she has it wrong again? What if she is overthinking and misreading? She stares off into the treeline, glancing over at Seicho every now and again. She should try to make conversation, she isn’t sure why words are so lost on her in the moment.

Seicho rolls her eyes. “For a brilliant strategist, you’re pretty clueless.”

Azula’s face flushes and she scrawls a hasty, ‘excuse me!?’

Seicho laughs one of her powerful laughs, a full body thing with her head thrown back. Azula stares at her until the laughing fit passes. Sehicho’s hand leaves her own, she slides herself closer, and tilts Azula’s head towards hers. She halts there, with Azula’s face inches from her own, “now I’m not going to do all of the work.”

Azula’s lips part. It has been so long--it feels as though it has anyhow--she isn’t sure that she remembers what she is doing. In all likeliness, Seicho probably won’t mind if her affections a rusty and lacking in grace. She closes the space between their lips.

It comes back to her quite naturally; she leans closer and slides her hands along and up Seicho’s spine.  Sehicho’s hand is still cupping her chin. Her lips tingle pleasantly when she pulls back, semi-breathlessly. “You’re a good kisser.” Seicho comments. Azula leans in for another. Her second kiss is a greedy thing, really--a self-indulgent attempt to make up what she has been deprived of for some time now.

This time Seicho pulls back, ‘’geeze, you really do put hard work into everything.”  She gives a breathy laugh.

Azula nods, ‘no point in doing something if you aren’t giving it everything.’ She folds the full parchment, puts it in her pocket, and takes a new one.

“Have you been saving all of those?”

‘Just our conversations.’ Reading them  helps her to sleep at night. Reading them reminds her that someone cares enough to fight her on her death wishes and patterns of self destruction.  Reading them reminds her that she can’t actively try to sabotage herself. She clutches her pocket. ‘They are important.’

She doesn’t think that Seicho quite grasps just what they mean to her, it doesn’t matter. She only needs to know that they are important, that she is important. That is enough.

“I am glad that I didn’t lose you.”

‘Because I’m a good kisser?’

“Because you’re you, Azula. I’ve never met anyone like you before.”  

For once she thinks that this is a good thing. And, finally, she is certain that she is also glad that she hadn’t given herself to the volcano.

.oOo.

As the days wear on they settle into a comfortable routine; as comfortable as the spirits will let Azula grow. At this point they seem more or less indifferent to her presence, it would seem that pulling at her hair and nipping at her arms and ankles is no longer an amusement to them. And she is thankful for it. Thankful but covered in small knicks and welts from their previously relentless onslaughts. By the time they are through with her, she is spent and worn and Seicho fights to keep her from going under again. She has to fight for herself. Mostly, she manages.

Zuko fares much better than she; he seems to have taken a shine to Zhang-Zin and the pair have taken to helping set up the shelter while she and Mai hunt and Seicho gathers firewood. This is part of their daily routine and Azula supposes that it is what is keeping her sane. To have some semblance of order.

She peeks her head around a tree, the tigermonkey that they have been stalking is just in front of them. Azula lets the lightning dance on her fingertips and gives Mai a nod. Mai confirms it with one of her own. She will send her lightning at the creature, it will fall--dead before it knows that it had been struck--and Mai will get to work harvesting the meat.

Should they have a successful kill, they won’t have to hunt for a good while after this. Azula lets the lightning sail. She hears a heavy thud and Mai steps forward.  It is tedious work to carve an animal, especially one so large but Mai does it with an impressive efficacy.

Still, Azula anticipates being there for at least an hour or two with the size of their kill. And she anticipates finding herself bloodied by the end of it.  For the time she casts her shirt to the side, she doesn’t have many changes of clothes and shouldn’t like to soil even one. Mai has the same idea. She tries not to make a big deal of it; it is only practical after all, easier to wash blood from skin than fabric. All the same, her face colors when Mai tosses a glance over her shoulder and requests her bigger hunting knife.

Azula carries it up to her and observes in forced silence as Mai puts the knife to use. There is something that she should like to discuss with the woman, but she is up to her elbows in blood so Azula decides to put it off a little longer. Every now and then, she asks Azula for a hand in prying the meat from the bone. Her hands come away sticky with blood and she shudders at it and its uncleanliness. Mai rolls her eyes or chuckles each time she makes a disgusted face or crinkles her nose.

At last, Mai steps back from the tigermonkey carcass and begins packaging the meat. Azula dips her hands into the nearby stream and picks up her brushes. When Mai turns back around she is greeted by parchment. ‘Why did you do it, Mai?’

“Why did I do what?”

‘Kiss TyLee.’  She clenches her teeth, she has roused a nervous loling in her belly. She isn’t sure that she wants to hear the answer. Isn’t sure that she should even be bringing it up, not when they are, at the very least, finally cordial with each other again. Though it would simply rest there, festering beneath the surface, if she hadn’t. She doesn’t think that there can be any real reconciling with such a mess beneath the floorboards.

Mai sighs. “Because I was angry. At you, at Zuko, and I do love TyLee.” Her already quiet voice becomes moreso. “And I ended up hurting her too.”

There is one thing that they have in common. They’re both fools. Hopeless, inconsiderate, and quite possibly socially inept fools.  ‘No wonder she left. We’ve all been using her.’

Mai gives a stiff sniff, “yeah.”

‘Are you still angry? At Zuzu and I.’

Mai comes to a stand still. “Yeah.”

Azula swallows, her stomach sinking lower than it already plummeted. “I’m guessing that the two of you are still mad at me too.”

She is right. Azula supposes that it is only fair for her to harbor some resentment of her own. ‘I don’t want to be angry.’ She admits finally. Truly, she doesn’t. It is taking so much out of her and she doesn’t have much energy to exert these days.

Mai’s face seems to soften. “I don’t want to be angry either.”

Perhaps it is time to let by gones be by gones. She wouldn’t have met Seicho if she hadn’t fled. She wants to say that she would never be able to fully heal with TyLee, but she is almost certain that she could have had she been given time--had she given herself time. But that has nothing to do with Mai anyhow.

‘Stop being angry then?’

“That’s not how it works.”

‘I know.’ She replies. Though she doesn’t think that she is angry anymore. She thinks that she is sad. Sad and tired and tired of being sad. She thinks to ask Mai when she thinks that she will stop being angry. Instead she holds up the parchment and asks if she needs help carrying the meat.

Mai’s expression softens though Azula doesn’t know why. “Here take this one.”

Azula makes sure that the blood isn’t seeping through the sack before putting her shirt back on and her portion of their haul over her shoulder.

“Thanks for helping me with the hunt, Azula.” It is still cool and stiff. But it is a start.

[linkspooky]

Ten Favorite Female Characters

I was tagged by @midnight-in-town​, so now I have to show them how much I love my favorite women. 

Name your favorite female characters from 10 different Fandoms and tag 10/or the amount you wish people

Tagging: @hamliet​ @amonmahboi​ @inumaqi​ @thyandrawrites​ @kaibutsushidousha​  @harostar​.. yeah, I don’t know ten people. 

Enoshima Junko 

“Hope is harmony. A just heart, moving toward the light. That is all. Despair is hope's polar opposite. It is messy and confusing. It swallows up love, hatred, and everything else.”

Junko wishes she was a psychopath. She’s spent her entire life pretending to be a crazy psychopath, because living that life is just so much more interesting than the one she’s stuck in. Enoshima Junko is just too smart for the world, and everything is too easy for her, and rather than try to dumb herself down a little bit she’s decided to knock everything else down. She’s a girl kicking down sandcastles because building them out of sand all alone is no longer doing it for her. 

Junko’s interesting because of the weird logic and loops she runs her brain into. There’s a complex character behind the whole “I exist only to spread despair” thing. She’s perfectly capable of forming emotional attachments to people, and genuinely caring. But the people she likes are generally far worse off than the ones she doesn’t care about. 

Junko wants so badly to, just not be human. She does the most inhuman things possible to prove that she’s not human. What really made me love her is the lengths she’s willing to go, to the point in Dangan Ronpa Zero where she basically took a screw to her own brain and started acting like a normal girl only when all of her memories were removed. 

Junkos relationship with Matsuda shows two conflicting sides of her character. How much she's humanized by her love of him,  and also how much she wants to completely destroy that part of herself. It's like she physically can't be a normal girl. Or rather she doesn’t want to be to such extremes she’ll break everything and then herself. 

And if she can’t be normal than Junko decided that self destruction is her next best bet. There’s just nothing that will satisfy Junko, and it’s interesting to watch someone that empty decide the world is going to end, or she’s going to end herself and she doesn’t really care which. 

Ajimu Najimi

“Call to me with affection, Anshin’in-san. Well, I don’t really care what manga characters call me.” 

Hey, I put Junko on this list twice. Both Ajimu and Junko live in a world that is too easy for them, and therefore they have no reason to get emotionally invested in others or try to attach themselves to anything. Which is why it’s fun to see Ajimu attempt the same thing as Junko to kill herself in style and eventually get saved from herself.

Medaka Box is such a meaningful manga to me because they take the weirdest characters and no matter how deranged they are they find the parts of them that are relatable and go, well guess what you’re human too. Ajimu literally calls herself a non-human and she’s just as human as all the rest in the end. 

The best part is it’s not her good points that make her human, it’s all her flaws. It’s easy to feel like the world isn’t real, that nothing in the world is worth living for, to feel no emotional attachment. Those are all human emotions. Not because they’re good and shining, but because they’re petty and terrible. Ajimu is this brilliant character, but she’s also kind of just a petty little girl using a ‘fiction is reality’ lens to cope. She’s not that special actually, she’s just suicidal, and kind of awful in general. It’s nice to see that human side behind the mastermind character. 

Azula

“My own mother thought I was a monster. She was right of course but it still hurts.” 

Azula is someone thoroughly dehumanized by everyone even the “good” members of her family (Uncle Iroh, Zuko, her Mother). I like how Azula in some part seems to be aware that both her brother, and mother seem to kind of consider her the “bad sibling” and she just decides to embrace it. Like it’s... not emotionally healthy in any way and it’s terribly tragic but there’s something about characters who actively make the decision to be a monster that gets me. 

There’s something about Azula’s writing that makes me uncomfortable, and it makes me sad that Zuko like... continually associates her with his father’s abuse, and demonizes her like she wasn’t also a kid going through the exact same situation, but Azula getting increasingly unstable is at least an appropriate response to that. 

Even if her brother, her mother, or her father won’t see her as her own person and they all see her as an extension of her father’s abuse on her, Azula is just so determined to be her own person even if it means burning the world, or herself A common theme I guess, but a lot of these characters have narratives about not being allowed to be their own person or shown any kind of humanity or normalcy. 

Morrigan

“Well, well, well what do we have here?”

Morrigan is mean, and nasty, and grumpy and bitchy and witchy. She’s allowed to be unlikable, because Morrigan never bends to anyone. Her survival, and freedom will become first before anything else. 

It feels like Morrigan is the main character in her own story, and you just happen to be a part of it for a short while. You may even be an important character to her, she may be attached, but ultimately you’ll never be more than support to her. 

Morrigan is such an ambitious an singular entity that her character development is letting you be a part of her life and not the other way around. She'll always survive on her own.  Morrigan is irrevocably shaped by her environemnt, and yet she craves freedom in that too because she doesn’t want to be bound by her past or shaped by her mother. So much of herself is dedicated to being better than the environment that she was raised in that she defeats her mother not by killing her, or freeing herself, but rather by being a better mother than her. 

Raven / Rachel Roth

“Azarath, Metrion, Zinthos...” 

Raven is fun, because a bunch of monks thought the best way to teach her to handle her emotions was to never allow her to feel any emotion ever. So, Raven is eternally running on a zero. She’s terrified even a small amount of happiness will end the world. She’s not allowed to be her own person, neither her bastard father, nor the monks treat her like one.

Raven is so gentle, and selfless, and emotionally perceptive and sensitive to others needs but she can’t ever display almost any of these good traits because she’s internalized the idea that she’s such a bad person. She always believes all the time that she exists to hurt others and that makes it so difficult for her to connect to others. 

Which is why her true friends bond with the Teen Titans is so meaningful, because Rachel found a family in spite of all of that. She has friends who think she’s a good person unconditionally despite the fact that Raven continually tells herself she isn’t. There are people in the world willing to navigate the maze of walls that Raven has built around herself, and that her environment forced her to build and closed up, and she’s so happy to have them. 

Midna

“Some call our realm a world of shadows, but that makes it sound so unpleasant... The twilight there holds a serene beauty... You have seen it yourself as the sun sets on this world. Bathed in that light, all the people were pure and gentle...” 

Midna just steals the show. Her story now. The game’s not called Legend of Zelda anymore now it’s Legend of Midna. Not only is she the most important character in the game she appears in, but she’s also in character someone so selfish she’ll always prioritize herself over everyone else. However, only because she feels that she can’t exist as anything other than the princess of the twilight and has to prioritize her survival for the sake of her people. Midna even says so at the start of the game, she can’t be kind because she wasn’t spoiled like princess Zelda in the bountiful kingdom of the light. 

Midna is so selfish and yet doesn’t really have her own wants and needs as a person outside of the role she has to play for her people, which is why she’s so terribly lost without it and just because this terrible selfish little gremlin. Link and Zelda affect Midna so much because they humanize her. They both sacrifice themselves to save Midna the person and she doesn’t get why. She doesn’t get why two people would help someone who has been so unkind to them and who has failed them this much so far. 

That act of selflessness moves her, and also freaks her out. She even says she didn’t want to be saved by either of them. Which is what makes her redemption in the second half of the game so interesting, because Midna really improves herself so she can become someone worth their kindness. She doesn’t want the selflessness of people like Zelda and Link to go to waste, and because of that begins to care about things outside of her kingdom and her role as princess 

Vriska Serket

“After all of this is over. Do you want to go on a d8?”

Unfortunately one of my top 3 favorite characters of all time comes from a really terrible source material. Vriska is everything I like in a character.  She's a mess. She's really hard to swallow. She's a character that's not meant to be liked.

Nobody really likes Vriska and it's all her fault for being such a horrible person, nobody wants her damage. Which is so interesting because usually main characters get forgiven over and over again. Everyone leaves and if they don't Vriska will burn those bridges herself. No character better embodies what it's like to be stuck in a self harming cycle

Authors are always so obsessed with making characters look good or showing what a good person they are few characters are allowed to be just plain unlikely in ugly ways. It’s what lets Vriskas genuine desire to be better actually seem like a struggle. 

Kocho Shinobu

“Are you angry? Yes, I’m angry Tanjiro. I’ve always been angry.” 

Shinobu is just all pleasantries on the surface, but so full of negative emotions in ways women aren't allowed to be. I love the medicine / poison dynamic to her character and how it rots her to the core. Too much medicine is a poison, while poison can be a medicine when applied to the right situation.

Shinobu is, two faced. She’s beautiful and kind, and full of ugly emotions and empty. She nurses people back from the dead, she sees no point in living herself and purposefully throws herself into a suicide in her plan against Doma. There’s just such a destructive dance between extremes for her because Shinobu is such a unique individual, trying to deal with all of these emotions she just can’t deal with. She can’t be noble, or better than her trauma, she just pretends to be a good person while she slowly rots away inside.  

Shinobu can put on smiles all day -

But she can't be like her sister.  She can't love people like her sister can. Maybe she could once but all that's left now is anger. Bitter, unpleasant, and completely in denial of it and still masquerading as a good person. The most beautiful kind of poison of all.

She’s not her sister, but she’s also not really her own person. She doesn’t know who Shinobu is, doesn’t know who Kocho Shinobu lives for. She just doesn’t imagine herself living past her revenge, and even though she’s surrounded by love she’s just so cracked it all pours out of her and absolutely nothing could be worth prolonging her life after everything she’s lost. 

Toga Himiko

“What exactly is a normal life? I also live a normal life, you know.” 

Himiko Toga is a girl who lives entirely on her own terms. Which is just so rare for a female character, you know? It’s so genuinely subversive to know that Himiko was once a nice girl, who always smiled, always put other people’s feelings first, and that sort of ‘good girl’ behavior drove her completely insane.

Toga deciding to be true to herself is an act of rebellion against the world. 

For Himiko everything is flipped. What others regard as psycho behavior is her normal. She doesn’t let other people define her story as a tragedy, and even murders the one person who tries to control her story. In a story where female characters constantly downplay their own importance to support the male characters Himiko is the only character important enough to be the center of her own story. Himiko’s story is so subversive as well, both of how society treats her, and how the story treats characters like her. 

Himiko is such an excellent yandere, all yanderes wish they were himiko. She comes off as this batshit stabby girl,  but then you find out that shes actually emotionally perceptive. She first comes off selfish, bratty, and self-centered but she turns into one of the most sensitive characters in the manga. She eschews the ideals of being a good girl that was forced down her throat, but that doesn’t mean she’s not empathic, or that she’s not capable of goodness. She’s good to twice. She’s good to the people who accept her. 

Himiko no matter what will always be a deviant. Always be an outsider. Instead of trying to make room for her her parents forced her to lie and wear a mask until her identity became completely shattered. I like Toga because under the knife wielding psycho she's a normal girl. Then under that normal girl there’s also a knife wielding psycho ready to fight back, and both of them are the real her. 

Ihei Hairu

“I saw the reaper, he was very beautiful.” 

Every character from the garden is just fundamentally broken.  Hairu and Rize are interesting foils, because if you think of about it a loveless childhood turned them both into ruthless killers. It’s just they decided to live for different things, Rize lived rejecting love and Hairu lived chasing after love. However, fundamentally they are the same. They are children starved for any kind of love or nurturing.  Hairu is so desperate she devotes her entire life to the first person who acknowledged her. However, the same sort of desperation to live, that tragic need to make the most out of the few short years they have exists in all garden children.

Hairu wants so badly to be a person, but she’s not a person. She’s half ghoul. 

There's just something about a girl who was never meant to be born and never meant to live, still trying.  There's a dark side to her character, she's violent and inhuman exactly like the environment she was raised in but she was also still a child at heart seeking love.

Which is why though her narrative is a thoroughly unhappy one, it does make me happy that there was someone who loved her in the form of Koori Ui. There is someone who wanted her to live longer. Her life was short, but she did live, and it’s that struggle to connect to others that made her truly alive. 

[firelxdykatara]

Why do you think Zuko was out of character when he hired Sparky Sparky Boom Man ? And by the way am I the only who doesn't' have a problem with Zuko's characterization in the first half of book 3 ? I see a lot of people saying that they turned him into a bad boy or he was ooc but wasn't that the point ? Zuko was trying to be someone he wasn't. I don't know maybe i am not seeing something.

Mmmmm ok there are two different things here, and I’ll start by addressing the second: Zuko’s behavior in the first half of book 3.

To that, I will say that I actually don’t have a problem--overall--with his characterization there, because it made sense. As you said, Zuko was trying to force himself to fit into a space he no longer belonged. He was trying to be the Crown Prince his father wanted, he was the prodigal son returneth home triumphant after his defeat of the dastardly Avatar. He had everything he wanted--his honor, his father’s approval (but not, as he would come to realize, his father’s love), even a nice noble girlfriend of whom his father and the nobility at large would approve.

And it was only after he had everything he’d been searching for since his banishment, that he realized he actually had none of it. His honor wasn’t something he could get back from someone else, his father’s approval was conditional on the lie Azula had told him, his girlfriend didn’t understand him (largely because of the changes he’d undergone while banished and later exiled) and probably never would and their relationship was based on nothing but superficial attraction and his sister’s machinations. Nevermind his father’s love, which he never should have had to earn in the first place.

So of course Zuko was angry and emotionally volatile, prone to explosions of anger and frustration because he had no outlet for his pain, no means of conceptualizing why he was so desperately unhappy despite the fact that he finally had everything he’d ever wanted (or so he thought). It wasn’t until he finally had his own self-realization--and came to accept that his father, and his nation, was wrong, to maim a thirteen-year-old boy and to wage a war that brought nothing but pain and destruction to the people of the world--that he was able to look his father in the face and say ‘you were cruel, you harmed me and I did not deserve it, I’m leaving to help the Avatar and you can’t stop me, you have no power over me’, and leave.

(Notably, while he’s still somewhat emotionally volatile with the gaang, he’s considerably happier and healthier with them, because he’s no longer trying to force himself to fit back into a society he had outgrown. Once he becomes the Fire Lord it is within his power to change that society, but while he’s with the gaang he settles for learning the true meaning of fire and helping his new friends save the world.)

However, let me circle back around to one particular point: Combustion Man, and why I think hiring him was very OOC for Zuko, even as he was in the first half of book 3.

Because here’s the thing: the core of Zuko’s character has always been compassion and empathy. That is what got him scarred for life by his own father--it was compassion for his people and empathy for their lives that lead him to speak out during that fateful war meeting, staring down men more than twice his age and demanding they treat their own people better.

Ozai tried to burn away Zuko’s compassion, but, and here’s the critical bit, it didn’t. fucking. work. Because you see Zuko making the compassionate choice, again and again, even in book 1. He cares more about his uncle’s safety than the mission he’s been on for three years, and that is shown in episode seven of book one--so, almost from the beginning, we see that there is something more important to him than capturing the Avatar, and that’s his Uncle. But we also see that Zuko is never fighting to kill, or even maim. Suki’s village burning is an unfortunate side effect of a firebending, well, bending fire around a bunch of flammable buildings, but Zuko is not given to wanton cruelty or destruction for destruction’s sake--he doesn’t stick around to hurt the people who were harboring the avatar any of the times he catches up to the gaang and finds them surrounded by people willing to protect them.

Which, yes, you can absolutely quote katara and talk about the not as big of a jerk as you could have been award, but it’s still important to Zuko’s overall arc and the fact that Zuko is not the primary villain, even in book 1. Because Zhao is right there, being a primo bastard, to the point where Zuko even saves Aang from his clutches--and, sure, you could say that was just because he didn’t what Zhao to be the one who takes the Avatar back, but at the end of it all he didn’t give chase when Aang ran, letting him go and instead returning to his ship.

Then, of course, at the end of book 1, what do we see? Zuko, attempting to save Zhao’s life. This was a man he hated, a man who’d tried to kill him multiple times, a man who was competing with him to try and take the Avatar (and was far more cruel and excessive about his methods), but Zuko still reached out a hand to save him when La snatched him up. He tried to save the life of a man he hated and had no reason to want alive, because he’s a compassionate person and he didn’t want to see even a man he hated die like that. Zhao rejected his hand and ultimately sealed his own fate, but Zuko still tried. And then, of course, he spent book 2 on something of a roller coaster, emotionally and mentally, but he was still compassionate at his core, despite attempts to obfuscate it. He stole Song’s ostrich horse, but he helped Lee and his family, and didn’t lash out when his identity was discovered and he was ultimately rejected. He had such a crisis of conscience when he saved appa that he got sick, something that has been memed to death (especially lately), but it wasn’t because he did one (1) nice thing--because we’ve seen him make compassionate choices already--it was because he did a good thing that also jeopardized his one last chance and getting what he wanted (ie capturing the Avatar and returning home).

Now, obviously, he made the wrong choice at the end of Book 2, despite that experience--because when he freed Appa, getting what he wanted was still a somewhat distant prospect, but Azula was right there holding it out to him on a silver platter. Of course he couldn’t reject it! Even when that meant turning on his Uncle, even when that meant ultimately throwing Katara’s compassion in her face, he had the chance right then and there to just go home, and he needed to take it. (Not only because of his need for closure, but because narratively, he story would’ve felt rushed and incomplete if he didn’t get that chance to go home, have everything he wanted... and realize he didn’t actually want it at all anymore, let alone need it. Having said that, I love a good ‘Zuko joined the gaang at the end of book 2′ fic as much as the next Zuko fan. I just don’t think it would have worked as well in canon [although I still think he should’ve joined the gaang sooner, but that’s a whole other rant].)

What does all of this have to do with Zuko hiring Sparky Sparky Boom Man? It’s simple: I do not believe for one second that Zuko did not feel an immense surge of relief at the thought that Aang might have survived.

Now, obviously, this would have been followed by a surge of terror--because if Aang was alive, and his father found out, then what the fuck would happen to him???--which is why I think it would’ve made much more sense for Zuko to hire a tracker. Or, at least, someone he thought was a tracker. Azula slipping him a name of someone she knows to actually be an assassin, perhaps? Just to pile that guilt on Zuko’s shoulders should he be successful, or simply hedging her bets??? Who knows. But something other than Zuko knowingly hiring an assassin to track down and murder a child. (And all of his friends lmfao since Zuko would know they wouldn’t just let the dude kill him.) Especially when Zuko had never tried to kill anyone, even when he had the chance, in the entire show to that point.

Anyway, yeah, that’s why I think that Zuko’s behavior in the first half of book 3 made sense, and that him hiring an assassin was super ooc and I don’t vibe with it.

[loopy777]

Hm. Lately I’ve been feeling conflicted. I would usually say that even if Azula did become good, she would still need to be punished for the horrible things she had done (being in prison is a punishment for sure). But then I would think about how that should be applied to Zuko, Mai, and Ty Lee. Like yeah, they did decided to be good (arguable “good” with Mai & Ty Lee) in the end, but it didn’t really erase the terrible actions that they had done. (1/2)

But I’m attached to these characters. I understood why they did they things they did, why they acted like they did, and how they become who they are. And I don’t want them to be in harms way after knowing about their past, trauma, and issues that they had to worked through. But then I’m being a hypocrite since I wasn’t the same with Azula. And if Azula got punished for her past wrongs, I suppose the others should too? I don’t know... Should they have been punished? (2/2)

This gets into the purpose of punishment in general, which turns out to be a very personal thing.

I, coming from a Catholic Christian background, don’t see any purpose to punishment beyond an attempt (and we’ll touch on this word again later) to correct bad behavior. I used to be a fairly angry little kid (Raphael was my favorite Ninja Turtle for a reason) and I liked to wish misfortune (usually destruction of property, like a car dying) on the people I was mad at. So my mom used to quote me the famous bit from St Paul’s letter to the Romans: “’Vengeance is mine, I will repay,’ says the Lord.” So I was always taught that trying to pay people back for their evil deeds, purely as an act of justice, is cosmically wrong. On the other hand, I was given time-outs when my behavior was bad and also told I did not have to subject myself to the company of bullies, so clearly the lesson isn’t just to let people be bad and not worry about it.

There are people and cultures, though, that demand retaliation. This is just their worldview, and leaving bad things unaddressed would be an active injustice.

Pragmatically speaking, a punishment’s value to society at large is to discourage bad behavior. You do a bad thing, you get an appropriate punishment, and so you decide you don’t want to do the bad thing again in order to avoid future punishments. Ideally, the very threat of punishment is a preventative. Punishments are scaled to the crime to prevent inflation; if every bad act merited the death penalty, then you might as well commit premeditated murder against someone you dislike instead of just calling them a rude name.

However, as I alluded to above, punishments are an attempt to prevent or correct bad behavior, but are not necessarily effective. Rewards are the opposite side of the coin, a system of encouraging good behavior. There’s all kinds of studies on these things, how effective they are, whether and how they can be mixed, the effectiveness of certain types of punishments and rewards, etc. So I’m not going to get into the nitty-gritty of all that here. This is just foundation for answering your question.

So, with my background in mind, I don’t see any reason why Zuko, Mai, and Ty Lee should be punishment because they have already done the following things:

Admitted they were wrong.

Suffered for their bad behavior.

Attempted to redress or mitigate the consequences of their actions.

Changed themselves so that they are now, based on the recognition of the badness of their previous selves, forces for good.

Again, to bring up my Catholicism, this is exactly the process by which forgiveness of Sin is achieved (maybe minus the suffering depending on how old-school or hardcore the Catholicism is, but narratively the suffering usually makes for a better story), so as far as I’m concerned, there’s no need for punishment or hell for Zuko, Mai, and Ty Lee. Some people, though, might not see their experiences and changes as enough; they might want the victims to judge Zuko, Mai, and Ty Lee and pronounce some form of punishment or restitution. Arguably, though, this kind of already happened, with the Kyoshi Warriors accepting Ty Lee and Aang accepting Zuko as his Firebending teacher and Suki accepting Mai as a Pai Sho opponent (hey, they can’t all be dramatized on-screen). But some people might want a formal process.

Azula, on the other hand, is keeping up her bad behavior. Now, “redemption” is another one of those words that can mean different things to different people and cultures. Going by my own definition above, Azula has not admitted that her behavior was wrong- last we saw her, she was still trying to teach Zuko that fear is more powerful than love, and she’s still delighting in petty cruelties. She has suffered, but as I noted, this part is optional and not terribly important, anyway. She has not tried to fix the harm she’s caused other people. And she has certainly not even attempted to change herself to become better- just more effective at living up to her old standards.

So, arguably, Azula thus deserves a punishment as part of her path to Redemption.

However, let’s get back to discussing the effectiveness of punishment. As I noted, Azula has suffered. What punishment is going to be worse than her experiences in the finale, being left behind by her father to stew in her paranoia until she is defeated by her enemies and loses all self-control? Is throwing her in jail going to make her better? Is scarring her going to have more of an impact than what she’s already been through?

(Of course, if she doesn’t change, then jail is certainly appropriate to keep her from harming others, which she keeps actively attempting.)

This now gets into the modern debates about crime and punishment, and that our modern criminal justice system is not particularly effective at rehabilitation. Again, there’s stuff out there to learn from, but I’m going to focus on Azula’s narrative. She can certainly experience a story where she is not actively punished but nevertheless transforms into a better person through experiences that truly teach the rewards of being a good person. Azula might more effectively and believably embrace the power of love through rehabilitative experiences instead of punishments.

But would her story be as rewarding if there’s no transformational suffering? Would we feel her Redemption has been earned?

Like I said, this gets personal. I don’t think there are solid answers, hence why my own focus for telling stories about Azula isn’t “redemption.” I think there’s interesting stories to tell about her coming into mental and emotional balance, and that’s what I focus my narratives and themes on supporting. The end result might be a Redemption Fic, but I reached it through character work rather than judgement and justice. As Gandalf once said, “Many that live deserve death. And some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them? Then do not be too eager to deal out death in judgement. For even the very wise cannot see all ends.” This seems to most directly address the idea of capital punishment, but I think it speaks to the inherent lack of ‘justice’ in life. There’s no undoing bad things or crimes, so no true justice can be done. What remains is simply how we ourselves react to it all.

So I don’t know if made my philosophical case, but I at least hope I explained why Azula is currently in a different class than Zuko, Mai, and Ty Lee.

I am, of course, completely ignoring that the AtLA comics consistently portray Zuko as someone who tries to murder his friends whenever he disagrees with him. Because that Zuko totally needs a time-out.

[bluearrowed]

Your Inner Peace | Self Para

“Do not let the behaviour of others destroy your inner peace.”

— The Dalai Lama

Aang had been afraid something would happen. He didn’t wanna wait outside the Palace, in case he looked like some sort of guard, so he’d sat on the roof and watched the courtyard, his glider lying beside him. Zuko was inside, having his first council meeting. He’d wanted to be there too, but the thought of sitting there with so many of the Fire Nation nobles who’d served under Ozai made his stomach churn. How was Zuko going to work out who had been loyal out of fear, and who was really on Ozai’s side? Maybe they could get Toph into one of the meetings, to see who was lying? Why didn’t he think of that?

Momo was sitting beside him, and Aang patted his head, absentmindedly. “No one’s here yet, buddy,” he said, watching the courtyard. Maybe he’d been wrong. Maybe nobody had a problem with the old council. He thought about how happy everyone had been at the coronation party, but that was mostly higher ups, and people who’d fought in the invasion. There weren’t a lot of common people there. How did they feel? Aang drew his knees closer to his chest, and hunched his shoulders, trying to make himself smaller.

He’d been happy, too, at the coronation party. He’d been proud to wear his dark orange robes, and his wooden necklace, standing out as an Air Nomad in a sea of Earth, Fire, and Water Nation people. He’d been so pleased to see everyone looking so happy, enjoying firebending, seeing it for what it could be -- a beautiful and intricate martial art, not just a force of destruction and fear, and drinking tea made by a man who was almost the Fire Lord himself. At Zuko’s coronation, Aang could have almost forgotten his duties as the Avatar, and just be a kid again, for a little while.

It’s important to live in the present, Aang, Monk Gyatso had said, a hundred years ago. He knew it was a hundred years ago, but, to Aang, it still only felt like just over a year ago.

But how can I? Aang had asked. If I’m gonna be the Avatar, don’t I have to worry about the future?

Now, he sat on the roof of the Fire Nation Royal Palace, watching for any sign of trouble, and trying to just live in the moment. But that was when they showed up.

A huge mob of people, chanting something he couldn’t hear, stormed into the courtyard. A lot of them were wearing Fire Nation civilian clothing, but he could see people from the Earth Kingdom too, and even some people from the Water Tribe. You won’t silence us! someone cried. It was hard to make out what they were saying -- they were all shouting at once.

Aang jumped to his feet, and flicked his glider open. In a second, he was airborne, sailing down to the courtyard. A few people saw him, and looked up.

“Hey! It’s the Avatar!” someone yelled. And then everyone was looking up. Some of them started pointing, and yelling. 

Aang landed on the ground, and spun his glider closed. “Everyone! Quiet!” he shouted. And, to his surprise, everyone fell silent. They all stared at him, like they were waiting for him to continue. He straightened his back, and clung to his glider a little tighter. “I know you all want this meeting to go well! So do I! But you’ve gotta give Fire Lord Zuko a chance to make things right before you go forming an angry mob!” He looked at the pitchforks warily.

“That’s easy for you to say!” An Earth Kingdom man shouted. “Aren’t you the Fire Lord’s adviser?”

“Yeah!” someone else called. “You don’t know what it’s like for us! You’re the Avatar! You can’t know how we suffered --”

The shouting started again. Everyone was talking over each other, trying to be heard.

“You don’t think I want things to be better too?” Aang shouted. He knew he had to stay calm. If he got angry, for Zuko’s sake, it would look really bad. He took a deep breath, and exhaled slowly, and tried to imagine his anger flowing out of his mouth, the way the monks had taught him. “Look, I know you all suffered under Ozai. I know you want justice. But Zuko’s not like his father.” He looked at the crowd, trying to meet everyone’s gaze one by one. “I believe in him. And you should too.”

“That’s all you’ve got!” someone shouted, from far back in the crowd. “Belief and hope! What good’s it gonna do?”

“Just let me talk to the Fire Lord!” Aang said, loud enough so that everyone could hear, but he didn’t yell. He tried to imagine Gyatso and the other airbenders standing behind him, nodding sagely. “I know you’re angry, but please! Violence isn’t the answer!” He looked at them all, and tried to really see them. Not just as a mob, but as people, who’d suffered under Ozai’s tyranny. People who wanted a new start. These were the people he’d fought Ozai to protect. These were Zuko’s subjects, and people from the Earth and Water Nations. They deserved to have their voices heard, even if they were going about this all wrong.

“Let me talk to the Fire Lord,” he repeated. Some of the crowd nodded, but some looked angry.

And nobody in the crowd moved.

[timetot]

i don’t need any calming tea - a zuko fanmix

1. no sunlight - death cab for cutie

with every year that came to pass / more clouds appeared until the sky went black / and there was no sunlight / no sunlight anymore

2. dog people - guante & big cats

the definition of loyal and eager / who love unconditionally / even when love should maybe have a couple conditions at least

we're dog people / so much talk about honor / you could almost forget about the collar

3. arsonist’s lullaby - hozier

all you have is your fire / and the place you need to reach / don't you ever tame your demons / but always keep 'em on a leash

4. heaven knows - first aid kit

you've lost yourself in others' expectations of you / now you prefer this caricature before being true / but you're better than that / you're so much better than that / i know you better than that

5. set yourself on fire - anti-flag

those days reckless, earnest, angry and naive / so much has changed but so much stays the same / yeah self destruction is still flowin' in my veins / could rise to greatness or could all go down in flames

6. history repeats - brittany howard

i just don't want to be back in this place again / i mean, i done cried a little / tried a little, failed a little / i don't wanna do it again

history repeats and we defeat ourselves / come on everybody / one more time

7. close to home - vienna teng

accept the shame on some shaky basis / admit that you were mistaken about it about it after all / but oh the ache the fantasy forsaken / the alien and adjacent you would give anything to take off

raise your life a new dawn / tyrant of your cells now overthrown / never have you felt so close to home

8. you are a tourist - death cab for cutie

‘cause when you find yourself a villain / in the story you have written / it's plain to see / that sometimes the best intentions / are in need of redemption / would you agree? / if so, please show me

9. dancing in the light of a burning city (phoenixes) - flobots

when unhinged the country’s on fire / when unquenched the thirst brings empires / to their knees and unspins the spires / pillars fall when umpteen town criers / become choirs to unseat the sires

born of the ashes / heir to the flame / lit by the fire / we look the same / i’m on fire (i’m okay, i’m okay)

10. lightning w/ chastity brown - guante & big cats

that energy enters you like a lightning bolt / and no matter how dark its origin / once it’s inside you / it’s yours to control

build something lasting / as this empire's collapsing / and when they ask me to come along quietly / i’ll say “how can i quit? / i’ve got lightning inside of me”

[kdinthecity]

Confessions of a Teenage Sugar Queen: Soulmates

Zuko retrieves his laptop bag from his room and heads for the kitchen table. I linger in the hallway, trying to focus long enough to make sense of his mom’s article, but the words are blurring together.

Damn you, tears.

I take a minute to collect myself before joining Zuko in the kitchen. He fishes something out of his pocket and places it on the table while he types in his login password. It’s a tube of chapstick, and I would be lying if I said I haven’t noticed that slight bulge in his pants before. He must carry it with him all the time.

I’m so wrecked. If I don’t kiss Zuko soon, I might die of thirst. I don’t like the taste of his particular brand of chapstick, though.

I figure this moment is yet another lost opportunity when he snaps the cap off, but it isn’t chapstick at all.

It’s a USB drive. Oh, yeah. He was going to show me something. Right.

When it loads, I can’t help but say the name out loud, “Ursa.”

“These are my mother’s files I found on my father’s—“ Zuko presses his lips together like he always does when he’s said too much. His hand is shaking when he double clicks on the disk icon.

I read through the folders, silently this time. “Anthology… Articles… ENG101... ENG110… Grades… Lectures… Notes… Painted Lady…”

“What’s in the Painted Lady folder?” I ask, ignoring the lump that has formed in my throat.

“I can’t open it. I’ve read through everything else on this disk, but that folder is password protected.”

There is only one other folder, “Pictures,” and it piques my curiosity. “What’s in there?” I point at the screen.

A deep sadness passes over his face, making the scar seem more pronounced than ever. He obliges and opens the folder to reveal one single image entitled “Beach.” It’s an artfully composed silhouette of a woman and a child walking along the beach at sunset. I can only assume it is Ursa and Zuko, but the figures are too shadowy to tell.

“That’s it?” Surely he has more photos of his mother somewhere.

“There were at least a hundred photos in that file. But that’s when the data transfer was interrupted. That’s when… I got caught.”

This is the story of the scar. I just know it. But I have no idea what to say next.

I don’t get a chance before he redirects. “Katara, I’ve tried every password I can think of to open this file—my name, Azula’s name, our birthdays, Mom’s nicknames for us, and all of that in every combination. I was wondering… what if the file came from your mom? What if… do you know of a password she might use?”

It is too much. I am suddenly my nine-year-old self sorting through a box of Mom’s stuff that Dad has refused to touch since she died. All I ever wanted was something like this—a collection of her writing, notes, and pictures. Instead, all that came back from the coroner was assorted jewelry, cosmetics, and other typical items from a woman’s handbag.

“Katara? Are you OK?” Zuko breaks through my reverie.

No, I’m not. I can’t do this right now. “It’s getting late. I should go.”

His shoulders drop in disappointment, but when our eyes meet, we come to a silent understanding. It’s the tide pool scene all over again but with our roles reversed. The impact of the triggered memory hits me hard, and it is easier to choose distance and distraction over the pain of pushing through it. I no longer blame Zuko for his reaction that day.

I also acknowledge that he did try to talk about it. And neither of us has to bear our burden alone. We have each other.

I tell myself that only this moment is lost, not everything—not yet. And then I leave.

I refuse dinner and hull up in my room. I can’t exactly describe what I’m feeling—confused, yes, and maybe a little angry. Or perhaps I’m just jealous that Zuko somehow ended up with access to my mother’s work when all I’ve ever gotten is my father’s gruff response, “Katara, just let it go.”

I’ve read all of her articles in back issues of The Modern Times, of course. Gran Gran secretly gifted me with an online subscription last year. Dad makes comments like, “It’s old news anyway, so we need to focus on moving forward.” Sokka says that Mom’s writing will probably always represent suffering and loss for our family.

Sometimes when I feel… like I don’t know what to feel, that is when I write. But that hardly seems like a therapeutic option right now given the circumstances, so I decide to watch Netflix instead. I really should catch up on Crossroads of Destiny because the new season starts later this month. I don’t want to miss out on Uncle Iroh’s premiere party.

When did I start referring to him as Uncle?

This episode is about Phaethon, son of Helios, the sun god. As his tragic story unfolds, I wonder if this is the plotline Zuko had confused with Icarus. The boy certainly tries to prove himself to his father and to the world, but only brings fire and destruction, eventually falling from his chariot in the sky to his untimely death. I can’t handle the images of scorched landscapes and dried-up riverbeds in my fragile state, but before I turn off the show, the earth goddess says something that strikes me.

“Help us, great Zeus! Is this the end of earth? Even the heavens are burning. The past turns to ashes, and the future is fire!”

The future is fire—the slogan for Ozai’s company. I don’t even know what Future Fire Technology does, despite Azula’s constant bragging. She asserts it’s the “way of the future,” whatever it is. So, I look it up on my phone. They make virtual reality components such as headsets, gloves, and even a full exoskeleton for an “immersive experience.” The website is vague on what their products are actually used for, though.

I regret leaving Zuko. I should have tried to help him with the password instead of freaking out. Our mothers are obviously connected somehow, and he put himself at risk just to get those files. Mom took all kinds of risks to get information in her line of work. I never wanted to be a journalist, but I do want to be like her.

Before I even realize what I’m doing, I’m pulling the box of her things out of my closet. I used to look through it nearly every day, but I haven’t now for a few years. I wipe the dust from the lid and carefully lift it to reveal an odd collection of treasures. I hold up a pair of pearl earrings, and a shaky sound escapes my lips, almost like laughter, but not. I remember begging Dad to let me pierce my ears so I could wear them. He said I had to wait until I turn 16. Here I am, almost 16, and I don’t really care about that anymore.

Next, I run the pad of my thumb over a necklace I had also hoped to wear someday. The pendant has a wave carved out of whalebone, attached to a blue velvet ribbon. Dad gave it to Mom when they got married, and I’ve always figured it would be too painful for him to see it again. Maybe I could ask him.

Maybe I could ask him if he knows Mom’s password, too. I will have to explain that I’ve found a file of hers, and he might not like that. I understand if he doesn’t want to dwell on the past, but surely he doesn’t want to forget everything?

Finally, I pull out a tube of bright red lipstick, and this is when I lose it. It was her “power paint,” she called it. When I pretended to be a warrior princess as a young girl, she would paint the Aleut symbols on my face and tell me stories of our people.

“Katara, are you OK, dear?” Gran Gran calls from the doorway.

I sniff and wipe my face with Zuko’s sweatshirt. Yes, I still have it. “I-I-I’m fine, Gran Gran.”

“Can I make you some chamomile tea? Or run you a relaxing lavender jasmine bubble bath? You’ve been working so hard lately.”

“No thanks. I’ll just… go to bed early, I think.”

“OK, dear. Just let me know if you need anything.”

“Thank you, Gran Gran.”

“Oh… and Katara? Your mother would be very proud you.”

I wait until she leaves before fully releasing the tears I’ve been holding back. I suppose a good cry is long overdue. I throw myself on the bed with Zuko’s sweatshirt balled up like a pillow. I don’t realize that I’m still clutching the lipstick. The cap pops off which means I’m probably making a huge mess on my sheets, but I don’t care. Besides, I’m a laundry expert. Mom even used to call me Moonpeach.

I wake up the next morning drowsy and disoriented. Strands of my hair are stuck to my face and my throat is raw��this is why I hate crying. I stand up and brush the wrinkles out of yesterday’s clothes. Mom’s lipstick falls to the floor with a clank, and I say out load to no one in particular, “OK, I’m awake, I’m awake!”

I groan when I look at my phone. Zuko will be here in thirty minutes to pick me up. I scoop up his sweatshirt and laugh. At this rate, he’s never getting it back. I give it a squeeze, a pathetic part of my morning ritual these days. As I scan the room for my shoes, a glint of silver catches my eye.

No. Fucking. Way.

Mom’s lipstick is a USB drive, too. All this time I never knew.

I am cursing our old school computer for how long it takes to boot up. My stomach churns so violently with nerves that I consider calling in sick today. I even taste bile in the back of my throat when the icon “Kya” shows up on the screen.

I don’t know where to start. The “Pictures” folder? There is one called “Fiction,” too. Did my mom write stories like I do? There is also “Case Files,” and that one scares me a little. My hand hovers over the mouse, paralyzed by indecision.

Then, I see it. “Blue Spirit.”

And after years of wishing I had all the rest of these files and only weeks of knowing Zuko, that is the folder I decide to click on first.

Of course. Its contents are encrypted and require a password.

“Zuko is here, dear!” Gran Gran calls from the entryway.

Shit. I can’t process any of this, so I quickly eject the disk and secure it in the zippered part of my bag. I haven’t even changed clothes, but at least I’m in uniform, so it’ll have to do. Both Gran Gran and Zuko eye my disheveled appearance with some concern, but I simply brush past them and head toward Zuko’s car.

I don’t talk to Zuko right away, and he respectfully heeds the silence. He probably thinks I still need my space after yesterday which is partially true. I’m actually dying to tell him what I found, but I’m also reeling from it. His mom has one of my mom’s files, and my mom has one of his mom’s files. What does this mean?

After I fix my hair into my usual braid for the day, I text Dad to ask him if he knows Mom’s password. He confirms what I already suspect—that it should be derived from my name, nickname, or birthday just like Zuko suggested.

I cast a sideways glance at Zuko who unsurprisingly has a death grip on the steering wheel and laser focus on the road. He always does that when there is something left unspoken between us. Is he this easy to read to everyone… or just me?

“Hey Zuko?”

Predictably, he lets out a huge sigh of relief since I finally broke the tension. “Yeah?”

“Can you come over after work today?” I ask.

“Sure.” He stares straight ahead, but a smile tugs at the corner of his lips.

I look down at his lap to confirm he still has the chapstick in his pocket. No, I am not ashamed of this in the least. “Great. And can you bring your laptop?”

He tilts his head in my direction and nods, but I don’t acknowledge this because I am still groping him with my eyes. OK, I may have a problem.

My problem is that I’m a fucking waterworks these days. I cannot stop crying! The bus driver keeps looking at me like I’m a dam about to bust.

Depending on the outcome of Zuko’s little meeting, I’m gonna bust someone’s ass for sure.

I can’t believe he’d agree to go meet with his sister! Ever since I connected the mysterious Ursa files with Zuko’s scar, I don’t trust the Kasai family at all. Except for Iroh, of course. Wow, how did the apple fall so far from the tree? In my Google search last night, I read an article about corruption within the company when it was an arms dealer under Zuko’s grandfather, Azulon.

Zuko says he will call me later. I text back that he should just come over. To pass the time, I read through a few of my mom’s short stories. Hers are not fantasy like mine, though. More like melodrama… and more than I can take right now. I pace between the kitchen and living room. Gran Gran gives me worried looks. I imagine Azula stabbing Zuko with skewers, and Ozai using him as a punching bag. I cry some more. I double check the freezer to make sure we have icepacks. Of course we do. Sokka lives here after all.

Dammit. I even miss Sokka, the big oaf. When we were younger, I had a stuffed penguin, and he had a stuffed otter. If I were crying at night because I missed Mom, he would put on a show to cheer me up—The Adventures of Otter Penguin!

I’m in the middle of composing a text to Sokka, complete with otter and penguin emojis, when Zuko calls.

“Hey, sorry it’s so late.” He sounds very tired.

“Are you OK?” I sound very motherly.

“Um, yeah. Mostly.”

Hmm, not the answer I wanted to hear. “What did Azula want?” I growl.

“She offered me a job at Future Fire. She said things were… how did she put it? Heating up. She could use the help… or something like that.”

Oh no. “Did you—“

“No, Katara.”

“OK, good.”

“It’s not good. I told her I’m happy at the Marine Center, but Azula doesn’t want me to be happy. I told her I’m already doing what Dad wants, but if she thinks I have his favor for any reason, she’ll fix that. She’ll report some bullshit story back to him. He’ll come by the Marine Center to check up on me. I’m so fucked.”

I can’t stand how defeated he sounds, so I deftly change the subject. “Hey, about that password…”

“Yeah? Did you think of something?” His tone changes completely—thankfully.

“Well, you could try Katara082800 or maybe KataraAugust2000 or something with my name and birthday which is August 28, 2000.”

“OK. Just a minute.”

Soon I hear his furious typing in the background. “No luck.”

“You could try Sokka’s, too. His birthday is September 6, 1998.”

I wait for what seems like forever. His frustration mounts with the continuous beating of the delete key.

“What about a nickname, Katara?”

I was afraid he’d ask this. “Don’t laugh, OK?”

“I won’t.”

“It’s… Moonpeach.”

A pause.

“Shit. Holy shit. Katara! That’s it!”

The silence that follows is deafening.

“Zuko?”

“Sorry.”

“Is it… stuff from my mom? In the file.” Because, dude, I’m dying over here.

“It’s uhhh—“

I have an epiphany. “Zuko, what’s your nickname?”

“What?”

“What. Is. Your. Nickname?”

“Oh, umm. Turtleduck.”

“Turtleduck?” I laugh but only because it sounds like a creature that would fit perfectly in my fictional world.

“Hey, I didn’t laugh at yours!” he whines. “It’s because I loved that Christmas song when I was a kid but called it a turtleduck instead of a turtledove, OK?”

I’m half-listening because I just typed “turtleduck” for the password, and the “Blue Spirit” file on my mom’s disk is now accessible.

Seriously, what does this mean?

“Zuko, if I can access my mom’s files with your mom’s password, and you can access your mom’s files with my mom’s password, do you think… were we supposed to find this together?”

Were we supposed to find each other?

Zuko doesn’t answer.

We should be doing this together.

“Zuko, can you come over?”

“I… I’m not sure if that’s a good idea.”

“What? I think… it was meant to be! How else would you explain it?”

“It could just be a coincidence. Maybe they used each others’ passwords to ensure no one would find out ever. Maybe we’re not supposed to know any of this.”

I don’t know what this is because I haven’t read anything, yet. I realize I want him here with me because I’m scared.

“Zuko, please…”

“Even if our moms wanted us to know, my father absolutely doesn’t. It’s too… dangerous. I shouldn’t… you should stay away from me.”

Another epiphany.

“Zuko, did your dad hit you because of me?”

“No! It was… I broke curfew.”

“You’re lying.”

Zuko lets out a noise of frustration, something I’ve never heard him do before. “ARRRRRRGGGGHHH. He just said it was a reminder. To not dishonor the family. He’s a fucking psychopath, Katara. Just let it go.”

I hate that everyone keeps saying that!

“No! I think… Ozai knew that our mothers were working on something together. Something big. A scandal perhaps… maybe it involved your father. So when he found out you were seeing me, he forbade it. And then beat you as a reminder.”

“Katara, have you read any of your mom’s files, yet?”

“No.”

“OK, so read them. And we’ll talk in the morning.”

Chpt. 1 | Chpt. 2 | Chpt. 3 | Chpt. 4 | Chpt. 5