#ikem and kiyi

[nayadoesstuff]

i hate the atla comics (apart from azula in the spirit temple) but if we're pretending they're canon lets be real for a second.

kiyi is not ikem's child 😭😭

wdym the child of two non benders melted literal steel?? this is unreal she's definitely ozai's kid

[waterfire1848]

Avatar AU - Ikem is Azula's father, not Ozai.

[dangeroflove]

reject the comics and chill

[gotticalavera]

Zukaang Modern!AU

Where Ozai is still a terrible father... but he acts like any father when he sees his son dating a guy with a criminal record and tattoos.

[stardust948]

Kiyi: Daddy!

Ozai, hugging her: Oh my little dragon! Happy birthday!

Ozai: I'm so sorry I'm late. I didn't know what time your party started.

Kiyi: It was on the invitation.

Ikem: He didn't get an invitation! But he came anyway!

Kiyi: I'm gonna go tell Mommy!

Ozai: You don't have to-

Kiyi: *Runs off*

Ikem: What are you really doing here, huh? Come to make things about yourself again?

Ozai, sarcastic: Good to see you too Ikem.

Kiyi: Mommy's so glad you're here she choked on her drink!

Ozai and Ikem:

Ozai: Look what I have for you. *gives her a gift*

Kiyi: *pulls out mangled rabbit plushie*

Ikem, horrified: What is that thing?!

Kiyi: It's so ugly! I love it!!! 😄

[hello-nichya-here]

So AtLA comics suck, but is Kiri one of the few parts you're willing to consider as a potential canon asset of the continuation of the story? Or would you have her completely ruled out?

Kiyi, much like her dad, are what I take as "suggestions." I might sometimes include them in stories because I like the idea of Zuko, Azula and Ursa getting a new beginning as a family, with Ursa having a decent husband and her children getting a new sibling.

But because the way these two characters were handled in the comics was ATTROCIOUS, I ignore nearly everything about it. The most I accept is "Ursa loved Ikem before she married Ozai and they were reunited after her banishment and then they had a child."

None of the forced marriage to Ozai, or Kiyi being a replacement for Azula, or Ursa CHOOSING to forget her children and Ikem then not wanting her to recover said memories because he wants her to care about THEIR child, not the kids she had with Ozai.

[julietwiskey1]

🔥 I know your passion is Azula & Ursa dynamics so what’s your opinion on Ikem & Kiyi & Ursa starting a new family? Of course we agree the comics are trash but the concept itself - potential to make things more complicated & interesting or it’s better to scrap it?

Ask me for a controversial opinion ask game.

Well I don’t know if these will be controversial opinions.

Ursa starting a new family during her banishment is interesting. And I think it is a realistic depiction of what could have happened. Because really what was Ursa facing in banishment? A new life and identity. Fire Nation princess is behind her. And while in heart she is the mother of Zuko and Azula she can no longer be so in action. For Ursa there is not much practical difference between what she faces and being a mother who’s family dies.

So Ursa remarrying is interesting and can play a lot into developing who she is a person. How she treats her new kid and how she remembers her old affect each other. These are things that can go a variety of ways and be treated differently by different authors.

What I do think is important is when given the chance she chooses Zuko and Azula along with her current family. Particularly while Zuko and Azula are still children. If Ursa chose to just pretend her new family is all she has it would feel unsatisfying. This is the person who killed a king, why would she not give a chance on having the kids taken from her?

Azula and Zuko should have a chance to be annoyed or angry with Ursa and her new family. Feeling replaced or ignored should not be looked down upon. After all it would be an entirely new experience for them. They aren’t used to having a half sibling or step dad. They never imagined meeting Ursa again and feeling like she has more important stuff then them.

As for Kiyi and Ikem specifically I am more split. I have explored several stories where Kiyi is involved. A young daughter who is similar to Azula is interesting, so I do like playing with that. As for Ikem? I don’t care for him. A new husband as a concept is great. But I feel Ikem is about the worst way they could have gone about it. So I would go with a completely new character for it.

[cartoonfan21]

Zuko's🔥family collage

[laugh-of-the-medusa]

lorde maybe I’ll commission someone for this

u kno what I need in life? an AU where Azula runs away or gets banished (or anything involving her leaving the Fire Nation for “good” before the events of ATLA) and ends up in Hira’a before Ursa does (idk she got lost somewhere lmao).

Anyways, she’s a prickly menace but somehow finds a father figure in Ikem/Noren. For a while, she finds peace there. Like, she doesn’t lose her edge, but she learns what it’s like to be genuinely loved by someone, to have a parent whose approval you don’t have to win because it’s always freely given. And Ikem is patient and kind, even when he’s being firm about Azula not pushing him around.

Also, like, imagine a scene displaying Azula’s vulnerability? And her age. Like, her, acting like a child (which she was) and being terrified that Ikem would hurt her for disappointing him because Ozai had no qualms about doing it.

At some point she starts call him “father.” As a joke, mostly. One of those sarcastic things where Azula’s rolling her eyes, “okay, dad” moments even when she goes and does whatever it is Ikem asks her to do. Maybe insert a melodramatic scene with Azula having a fever (Zuko-style when he decided to turn over to the light side lmao), and she deliriously calls Ikem “father.” And afterwards, it’s just a thing that she does. Sarcastic or not. And even if she doesn’t do it often, and she still calls him by his name, sometimes she just call him dad in earnest.

Enter, at some point, Ursa. Maybe Azula wasn’t there when she returned.

Just like… imagine that scene:

Azula knows rage, knows how it burns; knows its fire intimately because she cradled in her chest for years, welcomed the way it coursed through her veins with dizzying intensity. She knows rage by the smell of burnt flesh, knows it by the scars Ozai left behind on her back whenever she disappointed him. (I was six, Azula remembers telling Ikem. He said it was his duty, as my father and as fire lord, to ensure I will not be a disappointment to my nation.)

It is only her respect for Ikem (and the genuine fondness hidden beneath the casual indifference she likes to wear) that stops her from unleashing that fury. It burns like acid beneath her skin, but she keeps herself still. Azula wonders what she would have have done if she had met this woman years ago, when the hurt was still a raw and aching thing. She would have burned her where she stood, with a dagger made of flame so the pain she inflicts is precise, because how else could she make this woman understand her own suffering if not by carving it onto her own flesh?

But Azula doesn’t wish her harm. It isn’t the besotted look Ikem wears for this woman that stays her hand (it isn’t even her knowledge of the past they shared). Even from this angle, Azula can see that the woman is not Ursa. At least, this woman is not wearing her mother’s face. Her chi is startlingly familiar though, and Azula knows it like her own even after all these years. She reaches for it, brushing against it with a softness foreign to her. The woman startles, and finally turns to look at her.

“Oh, hello,” she says with a smile. Her expression is kind, and her eyes hold no fear or contempt. She speaks with a rasp Azula has never heard in her childhood, but the voice remains unmistakeable.

Azula clenches her jaw, swallows harshly. She tears her eyes away from the woman’s face to look at Ikem. “Did you catch another stray while I was gone?”

“Azula,” Ikem says, his tone is light despite the warning in it. The woman doesn’t flinch at her name, Azula doesn’t expect her too, there is no dawning recognition in her eyes either. “This is Noriko.”

—

And just, like, imagine Azula always being so torn about “Noriko.” Because there’s a part of her that wants so desperately to lash out, but her newfound conscience tells her this woman doesn’t deserve it. Oh, Ursa would have understood every quip and barb Azula would deliver with scathing carelessness; but Noriko wouldn’t. Noriko who is kind to her, who laughs at her jokes even when they are callous, who is affectionate in a way she doesn’t remember Ursa ever being (to Zuko, maybe, but never her; she was always her father’s daughter. Maybe, this time around she’s simply lucky enough to have someone better to call father.)

—

Also, a scene where like:

“Did you tell her about me?”

“I did.”

“And she still chose this.” (Azula looking obviously hurt, and so, so, so young.)

“Azula.”

“Does she hate me that much she would rather forget me?” (Tightness in her chest, the back of her throat burning.)

(Ikem drawing her into a hug she tries to resist at first.) “She didn’t think you would have wanted to see her.”

No, Azula thinks. She didn’t but… “That doesn’t mean she can take that choice away from me.” (Then, clearly hurting.) “But she was a coward and she ran away instead of facing me.” She left me, she thinks. Again.

(Azula leaving. Noriko overhearing everything. Talking with Ikem about her memories. More angst and resolution happens along the way. Kiyi is born knowing Ursa as her mother.)

—

But also something more wholesome like Azula holding Kiyi when she’s born, Kiyi having her wrapped around her lil finger even when she pretends this isn’t the case. Azula being a better older sibling to Kiyi than Zuko ever was to her because she has the benefit of being in a healthier environment. (Also something about her newfound relationship with Kiyi making her think about her relationship with Zuko, how to patch things up with him.)

I mean. Idk where the fuck this is going or whatever else is happening.

Maybe, something to the effect of Azula spending some years in Hira’a with Ikem until after the threat of whatever she was running away from more or less disappears. Timeline is pushed forward a bit so everyone’s just a tad bit older when the events of canon starts.

Azula eventually venturing out of Hira’a to offer her services as some sort of mercenary or spy (being in an acting troupe earned her a few skills, including being decent with a sword; plus brushing up on old skills taught to her by Mai and Ty Lee, trying to “perfect” what she remembers and searching out texts and teachers to bridge that. At first she tells herself it’s because she needs to know how to fight without her bending, blue flame is recognizable after all, but the truth of it is, really, is that she misses them and this is the only way she knows how to keep their memory alive.)

I guess she’d return to Hira’a sporadically, and what have you. But for the most part, traveling as a mercenary for hire is how she meets Gaang.

—

ALSO. Imagine: Azula being all “pro-fire nation” as a product of her seeing the Fire Nation through the eyes of its people (and it’s colonies) rather than something ingrained in her as Princess. Like. I want her time in Hira’a unlearning Ozai’s imparted shittiness to be a way of her also, at first, losing faith in the throne and being disenchanted by their supposed greatness. And then just, learning how to love her people because she sees them from a whole new perspective. Yeah. That. I want that growth too.

OOOH lastly: Azula seeing Zuko again for the first time and seeing his scar and then immediately feeling angry because what the fuck did he do to you?! and she doesn’t have to ask who did it, she knows because she has her own scars to match beneath her clothes. But she’s still angry, and she wants Ozai to pay for hurting her brother. Her mother’s son. (Azula, at some point, telling him about Ursa and Kiyi and Ikem… Zuko’s redemption arc in part being brought by Azula as much as it is Iroh. Azula still butting heads with Iroh because Iroh, wise as he is, still sees her as Ozai’s golden child even after all these years. Because he doesn’t understand Azula’s sharp sense of humor the way Ikem did, the way Ursa-as-Noriko learned it. Iroh and Azula developing a better relationship through Zuko, or because of Zuko, because they both care about him.)

—

(I mean. Azula’s still gonna be gay as fuck here too. Maybe not the focus, but she’s gonna be gay af. It’s a toss up between long lost childhood friends to lovers with Ty Lee (or Mai or both of them lmao) or something with more rivals to lovers vibes with Katara OR even something unexpectedly dangerous with Toph, damn that’s bound to be chaotic OR actual rivals to lovers with Suki because Azula the mercenary has had run ins with the Kyoshi warrior OR heck Yue lives in this one because gdi I say so. cue “When the Sun Loves the Moon”)

[withgirl-sq]

For the strange character fact: can I ask for Kiyi ?

Thank you for the ask!

As a disclaimer, all of my thoughts about Kiyi, Ursa and Ikem do not consider the face swapping plot point to be canon, I firmly believe that Ursa was banished and sequestered to Hira'a after poisoning Azulon so she remembers that Zuko and Azula exist!

Because of this, I think that Ursa would have been reluctant to allow her to learn firebending after seeing what it did to her other children so she has to teach herself rather than being allowed to learn formally like the rest of the benders in the village

By the time she meets Zuko and Azula, they are both shocked by how good she is despite not having any real technique from a lack of formal training. Azula takes it upon herself to teach her, but she ends up learning that not every form has to be perfect and between the two of them they learn to be better benders!

[turnedinto-themoon]

thinking about Ursa tonight :/

[nayadoesstuff]

HC: Kiyi exists, but she's not Ikem's. There's no way she's Ikem's. Two non-benders have a kid that can burn through steel with no training? Not Ozai's. This is the woman that said Zuko (a carbon copy of Ozai) was Ikem's. I mean, let's be honest. Ursa was probably pregnant when she got banished but didn't realise. Then the whole comics mess happened and she assumed it was Ikem's/Noren's.

[witchzoe]

New Interlude for my FoundFamily!Fire Warrior A.U., in which accompany the Royal Family on a vacation, including (forced) relaxation on the beach, discussions about theatre and school, forest exploration and midnight snacks.

[original-sheepsandwich90]

[hello-nichya-here]

Ursa/Ikem. What are your thoughts on that ship? (Sorry if you have already talked about this before, you can just link to it in that case)

I like Ikem more as a concept than as the useless human-shaped cardboard that he was in the comics, who somehow was shown as the good guy despite wanting Ursa to never remember her two other children just because they were not his. Same goes for my feelings on the idea of Kiyi VS how she was used as a replacement for Azula.

Ursa deserves to find love and rebuild her life, and there's a lot of chaotic fun that can be had with Zuko and Azula suddenly having to deal with having a step-dad and a half sibling.

[mesapies]

A better look at the cover for the upcoming avatar comic coming out 2025.

I'm here for more atla content, but I kinda don't like this. Kiyi going to a ROYAL fire nation school? Why is ursa moving back into the palace or nearby? Is ikem with them? It just pushes the "kiyi is zuko replacement sister for azula" narrative. At least mai looks good