#jee what is the name of the dragon...do I even wrote it right....

[rennelelorren]

Dead Mai AU part 2 [part 1]

Today I even come with a little fluff before angst!

[evienyx]

Wait Wait Wait does Uncle know that Zuko is with the Ember Island Players??? Like, how does that even go down? How many threats does he send them when he finds out?? Does he low-key raze the Earth Kingdom coast first trying to look for his nephew?? Does he give them advice on how to deal with an angsty and traumatized (but won't admit it) teen?? Does he secretly travel to Ember Island with the crew to watch his nephew in a play? I NEED ANSWERS.

Oh part 2, part 2, more sudden questions. Does Uncle secretly travel to Ember Island to take Zuko on a Dragon-Discovery Trip so that he can use rainbow flames while working with the Players? When Uncle is with the Gaang, does he regale them with tales of Zuko as a player? Is he the one who takes them to the production (and later helps them get backstage)??? I NEED ANSWERS AS TO WHAT UNCLE IS UP TO AND WHAT THE GAANG KNOW (imagine they don't find out about Zuko till they defeat the Fire Lord).

- - -

Iroh had just left the fifth colonial town when the letter flew in.

Well, technically, it was two letters. One seemed to be an announcement, the other a note.

The announcement could best be described as gossip. People saying that ‘The Dragon of the West is back,’ and that he was ‘making the rounds terrorizing the Earth Kingdom and colony coast.’

Okay, that was an overstatement.

He unfolded the letter, ready to read the thinly-veiled threat from his brother that it surely was, and felt a shock to his system when, instead, his eyes landed on the familiar scrawl of his nephew.

“Zuko,” he murmured, unfurling the letter much faster now and reading it as fast as he could.

‘Uncle,

‘This is your nephew. I know I probably worried you a lot, because it’s been about two-and-half months. I’m sorry about that. I ended up on Ember Island, and I am staying with the Ember Island Players. If you want to come see me, you can figure out how to  they would love to have you.

‘Your nephew.’

It was, by far, one of the worst letters Iroh had ever read. He reread it another fifteen times once he’d finished, and then had Jee set a course for the Fire Nation.

After all, it’s not like anyone banished was on board.

- - -

In all thirteen years of his nephew’s life, Iroh had never seen Zuko so... happy.

Sure, he was happy when Ursa had still been around, but this... this was different. He was laughing, and he bantered with the Ember Island Players, he insulted their acting skills, and though he was obviously trying to hide it, he clearly adored them.

And they adored him, too.

Which is why, when he finally sprung the question, the answer wasn’t much of a surprise.

“Zuko,” Iroh said, looking to his nephew who stood beside him on the balcony. Iroh had asked for some alone time with the boy, and no one had argued. “I have a question to ask you.”

“Yes, Uncle?” Zuko’s eyes were on the ship, docked out in the water, the rowboat that Iroh had taken to the shore sitting on the beach. He was frowning. He looked... sad.

“Zuko...” Iroh wet his lips, looked out at the sea, back at the door to enter the theater apartments, and then at his nephew again. “Would you like to come with me, or would you rather stay here?”

Zuko opened his mouth to answer and then blinked, as if just now realizing what Iroh had said. His eyebrows furrowed. “Stay... Stay here?”

Iroh nodded. “If they’ll have you.”

Zuko let out a laugh, and it was one of the happiest sounds Iroh had ever heard. “I was gonna say you’re gonna have to take me and jump off this roof if you wanna get back to the ship without Ami tackling you to the ground.”

“Ami?” Iroh had memorized the names he had learned, but he had only really talked to the people inside for fifteen minutes before coming out here, so he wasn’t quite sure why Ami was the one who would apparently try to fight him to the death to keep Zuko here.

“She’s the one who found me on the beach apparently. She was the first person I met when I woke up. And she tried to stop him, but Eiko also told me that she stayed by my side more than anyone while I was asleep.”

“Zuko...” Iroh didn’t quite want to ask, but it had been two-and-a-half months, and Iroh needed to know. “How long were you asleep?”

“Five-and-a-half weeks,” Zuko replied, as if it was nothing at all. As if he hadn’t lost more than a month of his life to a burn and a fever.

Iroh felt a tugging in his heart, and he thought back one more time to the light in his nephew’s eyes that he hadn’t seen in that week that he’d been awake after the Agni Kai. “Zuko... do you want to stay here?”

Zuko was silent for a long time, and then he didn’t meet Iroh’s eyes and nodded. “I think I do. Just to make sure they don’t mess up Love Amongst Dragons again.”

“What about the Avatar?”

Zuko’s face screwed up a bit. He said, “Wait here,” and then disappeared back inside. Iroh sat there for a few moments, wondering if he’d done something wrong, when his nephew reemerged, holding a rolled-up piece of parchment.

Iroh felt his stomach drop when he saw it.

It was a royal decree, with a portrait of Zuko on it, a description adding that he should have a giant burn on the side of his face, and a few quick words saying that if he was found in the Fire Nation he was to be captured, dead or alive.

“Takeo and Nori found this downtown about three-and-a-half weeks after Ami found me on the beach.”

Iroh read a bit more, and saw that anyone in the Fire Nation found helping the banished prince would be arrested immediately.

“They... didn’t turn me in.”

Zuko shook his head and waved to the side of his face where the burn was. It looked... a lot better than Iroh had expected it to. The skin was smoothed out, though a bit bumpier than the rest of his face, and a pinkish color rather than a hard red. Honestly, one might just think it was a weirdly-placed sunburn if they didn’t know any better. “Nori said she didn’t need it on her conscious, but...” Zuko smirked. “Ami says she got attached.” He shook his head, and the smile faded a bit. “They taught me to apply makeup to make it look better than it would. It’s... a bit of a process, though, so I tend to not go out too much, just to be safe. The Players do sweeps of the town every few days to make sure there are no new posters with my face for some reason.”

Iroh felt his heart sink as he realized that this was not how bad the burn scar looked normally. This was with makeup. And some of the best the world had to offer, too, if it was from the Ember Island Players.

He didn’t think he wanted to see right now. Plus, Zuko had said it took a long time to apply. No need to wash it off when it wasn’t even mid-day.

“You really mean it?” Zuko asked, breaking Iroh from his thoughts. “I can... I can stay here?”

Iroh nodded. “I’ll keep up the ruse that you’re looking for the Avatar.”

The hug was so sudden that Iroh almost fell over. When his nephew pulled away, his eyes were red.

“I didn’t... I didn’t want to write the letter. They... They made me. I was... After I saw the poster...” They both glanced at the parchment with Zuko’s un-scarred face that was now discarded on the ground. “I was... I was so scared. I’m... I’m sorry...”

Iroh said nothing, and just pulled the boy in for another embrace.

- - -

The first letter he got from Ember Island that wasn’t from Zuko (because of course he kept in touch with his nephew, still) came as a bit of a surprise.

There were two more permanent Players that Iroh hadn’t met while he was there, and one of them, a woman named Maru, was the one who wrote him the letter. It was much more professional than any of Zuko’s letters, but it basically told him that they had just started working on a new play that they would put on in a month, and that it had seven roles, and so instead of bringing in only one extra actor, Zuko was going to be filling in instead. His first role. Well, sure, it was a small role, more of a background than even a supporting one, but that wasn’t important.

Iroh was glad he got the message so far in advance because, with a quick check of the date, they would have just enough time to get from the northern part of the Earth Kingdom waters back to Ember Island in time to see the play.

Iroh turned to Jee, and told him to set a course for the Fire Nation, and then went to his quarters to see if he had anything he could use to frame the letter.

- - -

Zuko hadn’t known that Iroh was coming to visit the first time.

Iroh being who he was, was greeted with such honor when he arrived and treated with such prestige that he almost wished that he hadn’t come at all. He reminded himself multiple times that this was for Zuko, and he smiled and nodded and spoke as formally as one would expect from the Fire Lord’s brother (from the man who had been born to be Fire Lord until his world fell apart). 

He was given a best seat in the house, a private balcony, with a perfect view of the stage. It had apparently been reserved by a noble couple, but they tripped over themselves as they insisted that he take it instead. Normally, he would rather sit somewhere less... royal, but this was Zuko’s first performance and he was going to have the best possible view to see it.

Zuko ended up being the right-hand man of the main antagonist, a dark spirit, and his scar was painted over black, with a replica over his other eye. He had a total of maybe ten lines, and at the end Iroh’s hands hurt from clapping.

He remembered the way backstage from the first time he had come here, when Zuko had told him where he was, and so he made his way there.

People murmured around Iroh, but they generally cleared the way. Many of them were nobles, and they all knew who the esteemed General Iroh, brother of the Fire Lord, was.

It seemed, though, that while some of the audience members were talking about him, many were also whispering about the play itself.

“A masterpiece, as usual,” one noble said to his wife. “The Ember Island Players never fail to disappoint.”

“I wonder who that new actor was,” another mused. “The young one? Who played the dark spirit’s companion? He was incredible.”

Iroh felt himself perk up a bit at that.

“The playbill says his name is ‘Li.’ What an average name.”

“He looked so young. I would bet he’s not even fourteen. No wonder they grabbed him up so quick.”

“I hope he’s still here next year. I’d love to see him act again. He was so... expressive...”

Iroh had a skip in his step the rest of the way to the backstage area.

When he entered, no eyes went to him. Everyone seemed to busy congratulating Zuko.

“Nice job, kid,” one man, Takeo, said, patting Zuko on the back. He was dressed in a dark costume and makeup as well, playing the role of the dark spirit that Zuko’s character had been working under.

“Ah, you did great!” Ami exclaimed, pushing forward and wrapping her arms around Iroh’s nephew.

“It was a very impressive first performance,” Nori agreed.

“That it was.”

Now all the attention was on him. Zuko’s makeup had already been rubbed off a bit on the side of his face without the scar. Zuko’s eyes landed on Iroh and widened before he breathed out, “Uncle?”

Iroh nodded, a gentle smile on his lips. “You didn’t think I’d miss my nephew’s first performance, did you?”

Zuko just stared, mouth gaping, before he mouthed the word ‘Uncle’ again and leaped forward, embracing Iroh in a single, quick motion. Zuko was sweating, probably from the two or three stunts he had done on stage, as well as the bright lights, and the makeup on his face was already moist and was getting all over onto Iroh’s clothes, and he couldn’t find it in himself to care. He just returned his nephew’s hug and allowed himself to revel in the fact that he had at least done right by one son.

- - -

Iroh went back to visit every few months after that. The second time he saw Zuko perform, his nephew was wearing a mask, so when he went backstage after the show he got a good look at Zuko’s scar for the first time, and he didn’t let the fourteen-year-old go for a good twenty minutes afterward.

He missed a few of the times Zuko was in a play, and sometimes when he was there there wasn’t a performance at all, but that was fine. He wasn’t there for the shows. He was there for Zuko.

He normally stayed for a few days, three to five on average. He stayed for a week each time Zuko had a birthday, because those days were important. 

One time, when Zuko was fourteen, Iroh visited and was met on the beach by the sixth and final member of the permanent Ember Island Players, a man named Satoshi.

“The kid’s sick,” Satoshi said. “We would have told you, but it just happened late last night. He just woke up sick. No one knows why.”

Iroh thought of the date that he had seen on the calendar in his room that morning and felt his heart sink as he said, “I do.”

Zuko wasn’t incredibly sick, not like he must have been when Ami first found him, but he was throwing up, and he had a slight fever, and he was crying. 

“Zuko.”

The boy turned to him and desperately wiped at the tears.

“Uncle,” he choked out. “I-”

“I know.”

Iroh joined his nephew on the bed, and simply held him as he cried. Zuko had been doing remarkably well for so long. It would make sense that the first time he would truly break down would be on the one-year anniversary of his banishment.

Iroh stayed silent as Zuko cried, as his nephew sobbed into his shirt until there weren’t any tears left, and the old general focused in on the scarless side of his face and wished he could make this child forget.

- - -

It was in the late fall, over three years since the Zuko had been banished (and had promptly jumped overboard to remain in the Fire Nation) when Iroh got the letter.

‘Uncle,

‘I’m not sure if you’re aware of this, but it was recently announced that the Avatar has returned. I would like to ask you if you would please go and train him. They are saying he’s around twelve years old and seems to be in the process of learning waterbending. 

‘You’re the best firebender in the world, Uncle. You only visit me once every few months, and I’ve still made worlds more progress in the last three years alone than I ever did training back at home. Please, you’re the only one who can do this.

‘Your nephew.

‘Also, I practiced that lightning redirection thing that you showed me last time you were here during the storm last night. I’m grounded for another week, but I would like to let you know that I redirected it successfully. So, thank you for that valuable lesson.’

Iroh reread the letter a few times, wrote back a simple reply of ‘Of course,’ and had the ship set out to the nearest harbor to see if they could find anything about the Avatar’s whereabouts.

- - -

“If anything should happen... I need you to do something for me.”

“What is it, Iroh?”

“Send this letter to my nephew, along with the whereabouts of Aang and his friends at the time that you send it off.”

“Your nephew? The... Fire Lord’s son?”

“Yes. Aang must learn firebending, and I think everyone would rather it not be Jeong Jeong who teaches him...”

“Of course. Why would you think this would even be necessary, though?”

“I worry, sometimes. But I promise, on my honor as a Grand Master of the Order of the White Lotus, you can trust my nephew.”

“All right. If need be, I’ll see it delivered. I presume I would use your messenger hawk?”

“That would be wisest.”

“Of course.”

“...Thank you, Pakku.”

- - -

Iroh wasn’t quite sure how it happened.

Okay, well, he knew how it happened, it was just... hard to process.

It had been pure bad luck (or good luck, for the soldiers) when, on the first day of the Siege of the Northern Water Tribe, he had run into one of the largest groups of firebenders who, of course, immediately recognized him. He was sure there were wanted posters across the Fire Nation’s homeland and colonies with his face on it.

He could fend the troops off just fine, of course, and everything probably would have been all right if another Fire Nation soldier hadn’t managed to sneak up behind him and bonk him on the head.

The next thing he knew, he was waking up on a ship. In a prison cell.

And then there was Admiral Zhao. Agni, Iroh hated him.

“Ah, the great General Iroh, a traitor. I’m sure the Fire Lord will have a special place for you when you get back.”

Zhao had gone on to explain that Iroh was being shipped back to the Fire Nation immediately, on their fastest ship, to avoid any waterbenders or Avatars slipping in and breaking him out. The whole time, up until he left, Zhao had a sickly grin on his face, staring at Iroh as if he was the best prize he could have hoped for.

“Oh, well, maybe the Fire Lord will even give you a merciful death. You may see your nephew again sooner than you thought.”

Zhao let out a cruel laugh, and Iroh was thankful once again that he had sent in that report about six months ago claiming that Zuko had been lost to a hurricane that swept across the Earth Kingdom coast near where they were.

(The truth was, the storm was in the east, and their ship had been in the west, but the Fire Nation didn’t need to know that).

Regardless, Iroh was glad was Zhao was gone.

It gave him time to think.

Agni, he hoped Pakku remembered to send that letter.

- - -

It was the second-to-last day of winter when Zuko got the letter. The Players got two week-long breaks a year, and this was the evening before the first day of one of them. That was probably a good thing, he soon realized.

‘Nephew,

‘If you receive this letter, it means something has happened to me. Either I have been captured or killed during the Siege of the Northern Water Tribe, and a dear friend of mine has sent this letter to you in my stead.

‘You know I would not ask this of you if I did not think it was the only option. Unfortunately, here we are.

‘Nephew, you must join the Avatar and train him in my stead.

‘There are no other firebenders capable. I have traveled with the Avatar and his friends for months, and they know all about you. I am sure you will be good friends. Please, nephew. This is the only way to end the war. You know about the comet. You know that this is what must be done. This is your destiny.

‘You are one of the best firebenders I’ve ever seen. You’re incredibly talented, especially for your age, and you’ve even been blessed by the Masters. You are the only one who can do this. I believe in you.

‘Attached should be the whereabouts of the Avatar and his friends. You must meet up with them. None of this has been explained to them, but I’m sure if you just say I sent you, it will be fine.

‘Say hello to the Players for me.

‘Uncle.’

Zuko felt his heart sink as he read the note again and again.

Finally, he emerged from his room and walked to the living area, where the six Ember Island Players sat. Zuko took a deep breath and then spoke.

“I need to leave.”

Ami was the first one to speak. “What? Why?”

Zuko mouth felt dry and his heart pounded but he replied nonetheless. “My Uncle has been captured and taken into Fire Nation custody. I must now join the Avatar and train him in my Uncle’s stead. I need to leave for the Earth Kingdom by tomorrow.”

There was a glance that traveled among all the Players, and then Nori spoke.

“Well, you can count on us, kiddo. Family sticks together, before anything.”

Zuko grinned, though his eyes burned. “I probably won’t be back until the fall, at least. Please don’t mess up Love Amongst Dragons this year without me there to help.”

“No promises,” Satoshi replied.

Zuko must have been obviously holding back tears, because he soon found himself wrapped in a hug.

He never wanted to let go.

Still, the next day, he found himself on a boat (a fast one, he noted, though small) heading toward a Fire Nation outpost in the Earth Kingdom, the six Ember Island Players by his side. They might not be coming with him on the journey, but they were going to see him through to where it would begin, skipping out on their time to go home, and, to him, that meant more than anything else in the world right now.

So, Zuko, banished prince of the Fire Nation, nephew of Iroh, looked out at the endless horizon that they were speeding toward, and smiled.