#men's team kata

[sheltiechicago]

Hangzhou, China

Members of the Kuwait team perform during the men’s team kata at the 2023 Asian Games

Photograph: Kim Kyung-Hoon/Reuters

[atlanticcanada]

Team New Brunswick wins first medal during 2023 Canada Winter Games

Team New Brunswick gained its first-ever Canada Games medal in trampoline during the 2023 Canada Winter Games in Charlottetown.

Fredericton's Dexter Richard and Eric Davis struck gold in the men's synchro trampoline on Monday – claiming the first medal of the games for Team New Brunswick.

“I am so happy to be receiving this medal, we worked hard for it,” said Davis.

The pair finished in first place ahead of Saskatchewan and Alberta respectively to claim the gold medal.

Monday's competition also featured the first-ever karate event in Canada Games history.

Emilee Goodine from Oromocto, N.B., came close to winning a medal in the women’s karate kata, losing in a bronze medal match in Summerside, P.E.I.

Karate resumes Tuesday with the kumite.

Tuesday’s action will also feature biathlon, women’s curling, gymnastics, men’s hockey, long track and short track speed skating, ringette, table tennis and wheelchair basketball.

Results and the games' full schedule can be found online.

from CTV News - Atlantic https://ift.tt/UqOPld0

[megamangx]

scp allince slayer-the girly things plot

read the allien slayer sweries of scp storys

mike jenklin was doing paperwork witch he hatted becuse he liked fieldwork becuse he liked guns and swords and fighting with his buddy darkblade.

but one day all the female sciantists started quitting jobs and dressing like fucked up barbie "what is happened doctor rights you used to love sciance you where part of the science team for god sake" mike shaked her

"like i love make up and ballat and dolls now witch is normel things for girls to like now go away" she said and walked out in high heels and blodn hair.

"something is wrong and the peace is not more i must go to ask doctor kain pathos crow he is smart and willing know ansmwers" i said then mike opened the door to crow lab

the doctor was there "crow all the females are wearing pink and quitting"

crow laughed "oh its just girls they havbe womenblely needs and it is normal for them to do girl things like cottege cores and housewife" he said and the other staff laughed and slapped each others bums

"now mike lets get you a wife woof woof" barked kain pathos crow but mike was not imprassed becuse he was womans rights "something is wrong why are you liked this"??

then the door opened and evil woman keelee was there "i control the scp now and soon this site 19 will be demolished and turned into a cottagecore village for good girls to live and service the men" she said as the men bowed down

"you see i have a blog called just girly things and it will make girls into nromal girls who like pink and being wife" she laughed

mike jenkins tryed to go for gun but a strong women grab him and he could not fight "but why men help you" mike begged

suddanly a purple computer grapheic farmer man was there "well thatd be me pardner i used my goat mind control to make all the boys here do what they are told.

mike was scared "GOAT VR YOU ARE HELPING THEM?!"

The farmer laugh "thats right keelee promased me i could have 10 percent of the worlds men to turn into my goat slaves forever and send them into my game"

keelee kicked mike whern he was down and wispered in his ear "remember years ago when evil pagan cult take over scp that was me we where doing a testing run for the just girly things program memes" and mike was shook.

darkblade came in holding the mastermune sword as he stuck the heavy weapons girls down "mike you where trained in the kata how could you be so easily defeeted after you punched the evil sun to death remember" said darkblade

MOTIVATION came over mike as he powered up becoming powercul with the kata and unlashing his silver power form "Keelee you have stolen these womens freedoms and slaved them and for that you will pay" and mike puncher her 20000 times "ora ora ora ora ora ora ora ora" he said and punched her out a window.

"you gotta deal with me boy" said the farmer as mike used norton anti virus to kill him "oh fuck you too" said the farmer who was deleted.

then mike and darkblade used the antimeme to cure doctor crow and the others as the dog thanked them "sorry about that i was weak to let that computer man mind control me." said crow

"Don';t worry friends look out for each other" laughed mike and they all wented out for pepsis.

at a secret base hitler crushed his list as his glass of warm milk shattered he was angry "so our gender roles group we funded has failed i am das angry and hate zat mike i will get him" hitler said no longer in the mood for his warm glass of milk.

[zante-selachi]

unveiling my Shadow Company OC

pushes him to the front this is how he looks for now, dont remember if i made any additional changes after drawing this hshsh (Leopard was his old callsign) also im not the best w/ writing on tumblr cus i dont really post here so...

anyway if anyone wanna use him for any SC prompts/drabbles/writings, feel free to do so or ask me/dm me about him :3

will insert some sketches of him i did which also have his old design at the bottom

CW: mention of torture, unhealthy coping mechanisms

Callsign: Belantik / Orion (based on the constellation) he doesnt mind whichever bc both mean the same thing, just in Malay and English

He/him, pansexual, 5'10 and Malaysian. He has tanned skin with hazel eyes (i suck at colouring so if he looks off, im sorry 💀)

He likes to paint his nails black or any other dark colours and wear rings when not on mission

He has a scar on his neck from when he was tortured really badly bc his captors wanted to silence his screams

Sucks to be them, he can still talk but not for too long/too much bc it hurts so most of the time he doesnt talk unless he needs to and this made him looks like that one scary higher-up that will stare you down--and he will--but the point is that he. Will. Get. His. Point. Across. No. Matter. What.

Orion who was only working with SC temporarily for quick cash but they somehow wormed their way into his heart and he eventually signed his life away to the devil (Graves, that smug man) and found himself being in a whole ass PMC after years of working alone/being vigilant

He took some time to adjust being in a team again and trusting them with his back because ✨trauma✨ but once he got the hang of it, he is fiercely protective of the men and will stop at nothing for them

Orion who wakes up every morning very dazed and just smiles at whatever the men are doing, no matter how chaotic they are while he sips at his tea (he rarely drinks coffee bc it makes him sleepier) has a sketch of this below‼️

Orion (a Captain) who would make sure his men come back from their mission alive. Banged up to the hell and back but alive and able to get back on their feet while he hovers over them whenever possible to make sure they rest properly

Las Almas absolutely devastated him and he isolated himself for some time bc it reminded him of bad times, felt like he didnt do good enough for his men and Graves

Orion who grumbles with a scowl on his face at how stupid the men are while he just stands and watches them, not even trying to stop their antics (because he likes seeing how happy they are, missions are hard enough and hes not stopping them from having fun)

Anytime he grumbles or shit talks someone, he would revert back to his native language which is Malay. Examples of what he would say below :>

"Ni lah dia budak2 zaman sekarang..." (Kids nowadays I swear...) [exasperated & fond]

"Orang dah kata jangan buat, dia buat jugak. Kan dah kena." (I said to not do it and they still did it. Serve you right.) [amused]

"Susah lah aku kerja ngan orang2 bodoh cam si botak ni, beruban aku sial." (It's so damn hard working with dumbasses like this bald fucker, im gonna grow white hair atp) [angry]

"Pale hotak kau." (Are you fucking dumb.) [deadpan]

"Commander tersayang aku ni... bongok gak." (My beloved Commander... just as idiotic) [fond]

"Aku benci mat saleh, babi pahal sedap sangat suara ngan accent??" (I hate white ppl [slang, but in this he actually just meant non-Malaysians] why the hell are their voices and accents so damn nice??) [frustrated & flustered]

Silly facts when i was first making him

- I wasnt sure if i wanted him in tf141, kortac, or sc but chose sc bc ehem graves... hello...

- i forgot about giving him his number in sc oops but maybe 2-15?

Sketches!

1&2 are based on a tt video (old design)

3 is self-explanatory (old design)

4 is eepy and smiley Orion (current design)

5 is his first ever design‼️‼️

Thats all for now, thank u goodnight runs away

[worldofver]

[MotoGP] Ngomongin Valencia Test

Valencia GP udah selesai, ini artinya musim 2023 MotoGP udah beres meskipun belum resmi-resmi banget. Lalu setelah ini ada kegiatan apa? ada Valencia Test!

Tapi sebelum bener-bener bahas valencia test, kayaknya kurang afdol kalau belum bahas silly season MotoGP alias perpindahan beberapa rider ke tim baru mereka di 2024 dan bikin timeline 'gempar'—siapa lagi kalau bukan Luca, Diggia, dan Marc.

Sebagai orang yang rooting for him even tho he's not my number one *fav* rider, denger rumor Luca yang udah hampir mencapai kata sepakat sama HRC tentu bikin kaget. gimana gak kaget? dia ada di tim punya Valentino Rossi yang mana adalah kakak tirinya dan nunggangin motor terbaik di grid saat ini meskipun ketinggalan setahun, eh tiba-tiba ada rumor dia pindah. Inget banget waktu itu week race di Sepang, timeline isinya akun-akun yang bahas perihal ini meski belum dikonfirmasi secara resmi kala itu—yah gimana gak rame kalau rider yang udah dua musim naik Ducati MEMILIH PINDAH KE HONDA MUSIM DEPAN.

Memang gak ada salahnya, sih, tapi melihat Repsol Honda yang terseok-seok musim ini bikin kita bertanya-tanya soal apa alasan Luca kok mau nerima tawaran tim pabrikan asal Jepang ini? Apakah karena bayarannya langsung meroket? Ada barter juga biar motor yang bawa kakak tirinya menang waktu masih di Honda jadi milik mereka? Atau ada kesepakatan yang bener-bener nguntungin Luca sebagai seorang rider?

Well, mari kita kesampingkan bola-bola liar tersebut dan melihat ke sisi baiknya; Luca Marini, buatku, adalah pembalap yang tau apa kelebihan dia. Dari podcast 'Late on the Brakes' edisi Qatar, dia bilang sendiri kalau dia adalah pembalap yang sensitif kalau udah menyangkut motor dan bisa ngasih feedback ke engineers buat pengembangan berkelanjutan. Gak lupa juga kalau balapan buat tim pabrikan dan ngembangin motor buat menang adalah mimpi Luca—bikin aku, atau semua orang yang pingin lihat Honda keluar dari kekacauan musim ini yakin kalau mereka memilih rider yang tepat buat 2 musim ke depan.

Lanjut ke Marc Marquez, si 8 kali juara dunia yang ngumumin pindah ke Gresini Racing waktu race week Indonesia GP (eh iya gak sih?). Buat umur yang bisa dibilang gak lagi muda di dunia motorsport, ditambah dia yang ambis buat nambah gelar juara dunia bikin kepindahan Marc ke Gresini sebuah kepindahan yang bisa dibilang wajar, tapi efek dominonya jadi kemana-mana.

Ngomongin kepindahan Marc ke Gresini, Diggia yang jadi korban dari efek domino ini kelihatan nothing to lose setelah tau seat-nya bakal 'diambil'. Dari Mandalika dimana dia dapet P4 (posisi tertinggi dia selama di MotoGP), lalu dapet podium pertama dia di Philip Island, sampai akhirnya menang di Qatar tentu bikin terharu; apalagi dengan masa depan dia yang masih belum jelas di MotoGP karena sampai menjelang akhir musim belum ada info tim mana yang tanda tangan kontrak sama dia. Namun dengan Mooney VR46 Racing Team yang akhirnya ngumumin bahwa Diggia balapan buat mereka musim depan, gak lama setelah pengumuman Luca ke HRC, bikin kita sedikit tenang.

Buat Pedro Acosta, Alex Rins, atau Johann Zarco sih jujur gak banyak yang aku inget waktu diumumin bahwa mereka naik kelas/pindah tim. Tapi, men, Franco Morbidelli pindah ke Prima Pramac… sedikit sedih karena pair Franky-Fabio ini adalah pair yang chemistry-nya ciamik buatku biarpun motor Yamaha mereka di musim ini kayak badut. Namun kalau Ducati bisa bawa dia ke top 10, tawaran buat pindah ke Prima Pramac tampaknya memang lebih baik untuk diterima.

Okay, selesai bahas silly season MotoGP musim ini, mari kita bahas Valencia Test (tentunya bahas sebagai penggemar yang gak paham teknis motornya). Tapi dari mana dulu? tentu saja dari Marc Marquez yang ditunggu sama semua orang semenjak pengumuman kepindahan dia ke Gresini. Saking ditunggunya sampai depan garasi dia dipenuhin sama jurnalis dan photographer. BAHKAN PECCO YANG HABIS NYABET JUARA DUNIA GAK SERAMAI ITU GARASINYA!

Dan bener aja, setelah Marc dengan calon motornya buat musim depan keluar dari pit lane, kelihatan selama ini masalah bukan ada di diri dia, tapi dari motor sebelumnya yang bikin dia gak maksimal selama balapan (yah walaupun honda musim 2023 begitu karena ada campur tangan dia dikit). Kalau gak salah, perlu waktu 7 menit buat Marc adaptasi sama Desmo ini sebelum akhirnya masuk 10 besar selama test berlangsung—bahkan ada waktu-waktu di mana dia di posisi 3 besar, loh!

Yap, dengan Desmosedici GP23 yang bawa Pecco juara dunia buat kedua kalinya, gak kaget rasanya kalau Marc bakal masuk di jajaran riders yang fight buat gelar juara dunia musim depan.

Buat riders Ducati yang lain terlihat lebih banyak yang nyoba adaptasi atau cari lebih banyak data selama test. Franky contohnya yang kayaknya masih keliatan kagok sama Desmo24; wajar sih, apalagi setelah pake motor badut macem Yamaha. Lalu gimana sama temen satu tim barunya Franky? Jorge Martin terlihat mau cari sampai mana limit dari ini motor sampai-sampai dia jatoh 2 KALI!

Lalu di garasi VR46 Racing Team yang taun depan disponsori sama Pertamina Enduro kelihatan ok. Ngomongin sponsor baru mereka, JUJUR kepo sama livery mereka nantinya karena aku inget host MotoGP Trans7 bilang kalau Pertamina yang selama ini jualan BBM sama Pertamina Enduro beda dari segi barang yang mereka jual sehingga nantinya warna livery gak biru kayak tim di Moto2 yaitu Pertamina Mandalika SAG Team.

Bau-baunya sih warnanya bakal perpaduan merah-hitam.

Cukup bahas per-Ducati-an ini, kita beralih ke tim pabrikan Jepang dimulai dari Repsol Honda. Ngeliat Luca yang bongsor naik motor yang peruntukannya buat Marc ini tampak lucu karena doi harus ekstra buat bungkukin badan selama test—moga aja sama Honda motornya di-adjust demi kemaslahatan punggung Maro selama 2 musim. Terus gimana performa motornya? gak terlalu kelihatan wah lah ya karena mungkinnnnn dari Luca sendiri masih beradaptasi dan ngumpulin data dulu sebanyak-banyaknya. Tapi dari semua itu, yang lucu adalah wing belakang Honda YANG NUTUPIN KAMERA SEHINGGA BIKIN KITA GAK BISA LIAT APA-APA SELAMA TEST BERLANGSUNG. Sementara itu di tim satelitnya Honda, LRC, kelihatan steady walaupun Zarco sempet jatoh di test sesi sore.

Sekarang lanjut ke Yamaha. Dari Alex Rins terlihat nyantai selama test berlangsung meski ada masalah sedikit—dan lagi-lagi gak banyak yang bisa kuinget dari test dia. Sementara Fabio? Wallahi… bayangin aja kamu lagi test terus gak bisa berentiin motor kamu di turn 1, jelas sih kalau Fabio frustrasi. Huft… banyak PR yang harus Yamaha selesaiin, sih, sebelum musim 2024 dimulai.

(tapi sumpah, deh, kalau Yamaha masih gini terus kayaknya Fabio perlu pindah tim deh T___T)

Buat tim lain kayak KTM, gak tau deh livery-nya yang mereka pake di test ini bakal dipake juga di musim depan. lucu sih kayak zebra gitu, tapi kalau ditempelin sama logo/nama sponsor apakah gak terlihat sumpek dan keramean? Lihat taun depan kali, ya, bakal gimana jadinya.

Selanjutnya Aprilia, Maverick Viñales ada di urutan pertama selama test berlangsung dan bisa dibilang kuat lah ya mengingat selama Grand Prix Valencia kemaren dia dapet pole position dan nyatet record baru (meskipun penyakit mundur perlahannya belum sembuh).

Lalu gimana Tech3 dengan Pedro Acosta-nya? satu kata sih buat dia; gila! Baru juga naik kelas ke MotoGP dan ngerasain motor yang cepetnya mungkin bisa 2 kali lipat dari motor dia di Moto2 aja gaya balapan dia kayak udah balapan buat MotoGP setaun. Kalau gini rasanya gak kaget juga kalau dia bakal jadi ancaman buat riders lain di masa depan.

Akhir kata, sebagai penggemar yang baru ngikutin MotoGP musim ini, bohong kalau aku bilang musim ini bosenin karena selain balapannya (meski banyakan rider Ducati yang menang), gak dipungkiri kalau banyak balapan yang seru dan ngasih banyak plot twist (Philip Island dan Qatar contohnya) plus drama-drama silly season-nya yang gak kalah seru dan kacaunya. Gak sabar jadinya buat musim depan dan liat gimana perebutan juara dunia berlangsung.

Apakah Pecco bisa mengunci gelarnya untuk ketiga kalinya? atau Jorge Martin dengan redemption arc-nya, atau Marc Marquez yang raih gelar juara dunia bareng Gresini? Atau malah rider lain?

[hardynwa]

CSU: Stop chasing shadows, defend allegations of forgeries against you – Atiku to Tinubu

The presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), in the 2023 general elections, Atiku Abubakar, has challenged President Bola Tinubu and his team to stop chasing shadows, spare Nigeria’s image further damage by coming clean on the myriad of controversies surrounding him. A team of Atiku’s aides, led by Paul Ibe, gave this challenge at a press conference, in Abuja, on Sunday. The media advisers noted that Tinubu’s team appears fixated on an inconsequential alleged discrepancy in the day/date an avidavit deposed to by Atiku to officially change his name over 50 years ago. They said, “Since the discovery of documents with Chicago State University brought to the fore the litany of certificate forgeries and impersonation by President Bola A. Tinubu, there have been attempts by many of his media aides to create a parallel narrative about the public life of former Vice President Atiku Abubakar. “It was obvious from the start of their journey into futility that what the media aides and supporters of Bola A. Tinubu were doing was a random bite of the public profile of Atiku Abubakar until they found an item they could chomp with their filthy teeth. “It was amusing watching them running kiti-kata like a person wey drink water no wan drop cup – as we say in Naija parlance of a restless soul on a fruitless journey. “So, eventually, they found that the affidavit that Atiku Abubakar deposed to in August 18, 1973, wherein he expressed his wishes to be publicly known as Atiku Abubakar was signed on a Saturday. And voila! “The APC e-rats found what they have been looking for. “For them, it isn’t important that the person called Bola A. Tinubu was discovered to be the name of a female, nor was it important that Bola A. Tinubu forged a certificate he submitted to the Independent National Electoral Commission or that Bola A. Tinubu is the Guinea pig student of the Government College Lagos, who was used to test run the school four years before it was founded. “All that mattered to them is to pick a hole in Atiku Abubakar’s public profile. “Like the late Fela Anikulapo said: I be thief, you be robber! You are also a thief is not a defence to an accusation of theft. “They thought they found someone else to share the inglorious stage of certificate forgery with.” He further said, “So, it was found out that Atiku’s affidavit was signed on a Saturday, and they went into a frenzy; oiled as a diesel train. “They remind us of the 1974 album by the legendary Elton John titled: Saturday Night’s Alright for Fighting. “They blare and burn all decency. They have found a mate in their naked state. “Oh Lord! Atiku’s affidavit was signed on a Saturday! They screamed. The sound of it mesmerises and intoxicates them. They get around oiled as a diesel train! “But because we know the character of the man that we work for, we knew that their frenzy was all vain hallucinations. “We conducted research into the registry of the Lagos State high courts in the same year, 1973, to see if it was really an absurdity to have court papers signed on a Saturday. “The outcome of our findings showed clearly that there are court papers that were signed on Saturdays in the year 1973! Atiku Abubakar’s affidavit was not the only one signed on Saturday as the corn-men would want you to believe. “Here and now, we shall show you slides of our findings. A practitioner of democracy, especially someone who sits on the chair of a president, must live above board. “A president must mirror the moral rectitude of trust and transparency. “To be called the president of a country is to be an approximation of the values that such a country stands for. Nigeria does not stand for forgeries and impersonation. “It is, therefore, on this note that we, yet again, call on President Bola A. Tinubu to follow the example of Atiku Abubakar to clear the air about all doubts and kuru kere about his past. “Since Lagos is his domain, we ask Bola A. Tinubu to boldly walk into Government College Lagos and make available to the world, just as we have done today, a copy of his 1970 certificate with which he sought admission into the Chicago State University. “He may as well tell us, the business centre inside Oluwole Market in Lagos, where he printed the forged Chicago State University certificate that he presented to the Independent National Electoral Commission. “And if, assuming the president is afraid to come out clean, because we can only assume at this point, that Bola A. Tinubu has some skeletons in his closet. He should feel free to confide in us what those skeletons are. “It is embarrassing enough that the FBI and other anti-crime agencies in the United States are poised to start releasing information on our president any moment from now. “It is more embarrassing that President Bola A. Tinubu will fight tooth and nail to block those discoveries about his past, saying such will cause him irreparable damage. Bola A. Tinubu needs to be reminded that what the FBI and other US security agencies are set to do by releasing the #FBITinubuFiles will undoubtedly cause Nigeria irreparable damage! “Nigeria is a country of laws, and no one single man or woman, no matter how highly placed, is bigger than our laws. “We hope that this discovery into Atiku’s Saturday affidavit by his own media team will rest this issue and provide the opportunity for Bola A. Tinubu’s team to come clean with its decades of forgeries and lies. Nigerians are waiting for them to put an end to this kindergarten Tom and Jerry that has done nothing but brought embarrassment and humiliation to our country and its people.” Read the full article

[turisiancom]

TURISIAN.com - JBL Ride 2023 kembali meramaikan Pantai Indah Kapuk 2, Banten, dengan balap sepeda yang memukau. Edisi ketiga ini menghadirkan empat kategori perlombaan yang siap mengguncang hati para penggemar sepeda, berlangsung mulai 6 hingga 10 September. Ketua Panitia Penyelenggara, Harlie Ayung, mengemukakan bahwa event ini mampu menghadirkan berbagai tantangan di kategori yang dipertandingkan. "Di edisi ketiga ini kami menghadirkan empat kategori lomba. Pertama ada Team Time Trial (TTT), Individual Time Trial (ITT), Criterium, dan Sprint," kata Harlie Ayung, Rabu 6 September 2023. BACA JUGA: Ngabolang Gratis di Sungai Tahang Green Belt Pantai Indah Kapuk, Perhatikan Tips Ini Untuk kategori Team Time Trial (TTT), para pria dari tim komunitas akan menaklukkan jarak sejauh 75 km dengan delapan orang dalam satu tim. Sementara itu, untuk kategori wanita, mereka akan menempuh jarak 37,5 km dengan tim beranggotakan empat peserta. Persaingan Tim Elite Tidak hanya para komunitas, JBL Ride 2023 juga memberikan kesempatan bagi tim elite untuk bersaing dalam berbagai nomor perlombaan, termasuk TTT. Untuk kategori elite pria, satu tim akan terdiri dari lima orang. Sedangkan untuk kategori elite wanita, satu tim akan beranggotakan empat orang. BACA JUGA: Holiday Inn Resorts PIK2 Segera Hadir, Menawarkan Keindahan Pasir Putih Bagi peserta non-elite, seperti masyarakat umum, pegiat sepeda, dan mantan atlet berusia 35 tahun ke atas juga memiliki kesempatan untuk bersinar. Meski sebelumnya, mereka tidak pernah berpartisipasi dalam lomba sepeda internasional, kejuaraan nasional. Atau juga kejuaraan daerah dalam dua tahun terakhir, juga memiliki Dalam kategori Individual Time Trial (ITT), ada enam nomor yang diperlombakan. Termasuk ITT Women-Elite, ITT Women-Open, ITT Men-Elite. BACA JUGA: Ratusan Goweser Ikuti BJB HepiRide 2023, Melintasi Rute Ini Kemudian, ITT Men-Master A (30-39), ITT Men-Master B (40-49), dan ITT Men-Master C (50-59). Sementara dalam kategori Criterium, ada tujuh nomor berbeda. Seperti Criterium Men–Open, Criterium Men– Master A (30-39), Criterium Men–Master B (40-49). Lalu ada, Criterium Men–Master C (50-59), Criterium Men–Master D (60+), Criterium Women–Open, dan Criterium Women–Elite. Jadwal Kompetisi Sedangkan untuk pecinta kecepatan dalam kategori Sprint, ada enam nomor perlombaan. Termasuk TTT Sprint Women–Open, TTT Sprint Women–Elite, TTT Sprint Men–Elite, TTT. BACA JUGA: Tiga Event di Yogyakarta yang Ditunggu-tunggu, Dari Gowes Hingga Lari Selanjutnya ada, Sprint Men–Master A (30-39), TTT Sprint Men–Master B (40-49), dan TTT Sprint Men–Master C (50-59). Jadwal kompetisi pun sudah ditentukan dengan cermat: kategori TTT akan berlangsung pada tanggal 6 hingga 8 September. Untuk Individual Time Trial pada 9 September, sementara Criterium dan Sprint akan memuncak pada 10 September. BACA JUGA: Balap Sepeda Tour de Siak Datangkan Berkah Bagi Pelaku Usaha Wisata Para peserta yang berani menghadapi tantangan ini di JBL Ride 2023 akan bersaing untuk merebut total hadiah senilai Rp200 juta. Ajang balap sepeda ini tidak hanya tentang kompetisi, tetapi juga tentang semangat dan persaudaraan yang dihasilkan oleh olahraga sepeda. Siapakah yang akan menjadi pemenang di tahun ini? Kita tunggu hasilnya! ***

[usaphilomaths]

Maria Dimitrova and Larry Aracena qualify for the next Central American and Pan American Games - USAPhilomaths

SANTO DOMINGO.-Dominican Maria Dimitrova and Larry Aracenain the modalities of the national karate teams Kata Both men and women won gold medals in the first round Central America and Caribbean Tournamentsin addition to qualifying for the Central American Games in San Salvador and the Pan American Games in Chile, 2023. Various competitions and weight battles started yesterday where there are…

[tetsuyasogo]

< Recent LinkedIn Posts >

January 1, 2023: Visited Gunma to watch the “New Year Ekiden”, an annual men's ekiden over 100 kilometers which takes place on 1st January. The race is a national championship contested between Japan's corporate running teams, and NTN team finished in 29th place this year. Although NTN team did not achieve its target of 15th place, I was very much encouraged by the powerful running of those top runners. “Happy New Year 2023 !!” 🥳

December 28, 2022: Had a discussion on my leadership (assimilation meeting) with senior managers in NTN Finance Headquarters to be ready for the completion of “NTN Revitalization Scenario” next year. Close teamwork based on mutual understanding and trust is essential to achieve our tough goals.

Midosuji Illumination 2022: A large-scale illumination that envelops Midosuji, the symbol street of Osaka, in gentle light. The section from Umeda to Namba glitters with colorful illuminations.

November 4, 2022: NTN First Half Financial Results Briefing was held on the web. What we should do during this fiscal year is extremely clear and shared globally. We will do that and achieve our upward revised profit outlook.

Kellogg Magazine Fall/Winter 2022 has arrived at my home, that renewed my determination to revitalize NTN, and I am confident that we are on the right track.

<NTN Report 2022> The “NTN Report 2022” was published. It is an integrated report that summarizes not only NTN’s business but also ESG measures and future growth strategy.

Kellogg Magazine Fall/Winter 2022: Class Notes, EMBA Cohort 32

I feel that "Management" is similar to "Karate" in the importance of the basic “Kata” and the “Growth Mind” to always aim at the improvement. This old video was taken in Tokyo when I was 21 years old.

Essence of “CFO Message 2022”, NTN Corporation (Japanese/English)

<July-August: Global Web Meeting on CFO Message> Since I have drafted “NTN Revitalization Scenario” at the beginning of 2019, I hold Global Web Meetings with our management executives in each region regarding my CFO Message for each fiscal year to make sure that the basic direction is clearly shared in all NTN Group. Even in a very tough management environment, as exemplified by the COVID-19 pandemic, a shortage of semiconductors, the situation in Ukraine and a surge in prices of raw materials, we have been steadily moving forward to revitalize NTN in the fiscal year ending March 31, 2024, while maintaining a course set forth in the NTN Revitalization Scenario. As a total NTN Group, we are on the right track !!

[dull-c]

rewatch continues! i slept til 2pm today (yeeeeew) and then made fried rice for combined breakfast-lunch-dinner, so i didn’t get around as many eps as i thought i was gonna, but i did get from 1x08 to 2x07 which i think is decent – especially considering how much kreese there was in these episodes. also, i said i was gonna be more coherent this weekend but that has not worked out, sorry

1x08

LUCILLE!! god randee is so beautiful and also somehow very comforting to me. the mom vibes are real!

-“you’re dating a larusso?” jlawz wants to be dating a larusso so bad :(((

-even if i didn’t know the specific men that wrote the amanda and lucille interactions in this episode, i would definitely know a Man wrote it, ya know what i’m saying?

-continuing this episode’s theme of train crash family dinners jlawz dumping “just because you live in a nice house doesn’t mean there’s nice things going on inside” on the diazes yiiiikes. like i get it buddy but you met these people three weeks ago and have had two conversations with them. jlawz is the worst reflection of drunk oversharing me and i don’t like it

-daniel and robby kata montage is making me so sad. i’m really gonna need them to be on good terms again soon, it has been 84 years and my heart hurts

-look, what louie did to jlawz’s car was objectively very bad but he felt he was defending daniel’s honour so i am going to give him the tiniest, tiniest little point for that. sorry but i love daniel and i empathise with people doing terrible stuff because they love him (NOT you terry)

 1x09

-okay HANG ON. did jlawz just walk angrily into the backyard of every house on escalon drive, encino until he found daniel’s place?? and how long was he standing there staring at him?? like the whole time he was making his coffee he just stood there staring ominously?? was he there the whole night??? i need answers!!

-the speed with which the old men go from screaming and trying to fight each other to flirting over cars and nicknames, to bonding and opening up about childhood daddy issues and mutual ex-girlfriends together gives me whiplash. cobra kai is not a comedy it is a tragedy and the tragedy is these two hotheaded idiots who desperately want to be friends and keep fucking it up!!

(billy is essentially just mouthing the words to take it on the run while ralph sings and i think we can guess here which of them came from a theatre background)

-also the way jlawz looks at daniel when he says ‘it’s alright’. i wish to /consume/ it

-“yeah except yours didn’t break your trophy and try to kill you” insane how quickly the showrunners are gonna forget this later!!

-when are we gonna get johnny and daniel drunkenly sparring for real??? it’s been three seasons!! we have been denied it too long. GIVE THE PEOPLE WHAT THEY WANT, SHOW

-daniel’s rage at robby ‘was this all a con?’ is not at all reasonable (he’s a child daniel jfc) but also feels a little different with the tkk3 viewing still fresh in my head i gotta say

-and johnny screeching off out the driveway with a car that's not his. both these men are really the Overreaction Bosses. they apparently never grew out of it and now everyone in the valley must pay

 1x10

-okay but like, jlawz getting his dick out in public and pissing on the larusso plate while muttering about how he can be robby’s father if he wants strikes me as even more repressed home of sexual than the billboard thing. i can’t explain it, it’s just how i feel

-“just when you think life’s going good…” god johnny really wanted to spar with daniel real bad, didn’t he? it’s okay i wanted that too, you dumb little baby man

-yaya is truly aspirational

-the eyefucking going on through the tournie. the crane kick smirks. GOD just fuck already people are getting maimed here

-there’s no way anyone in the topanga team is in high school

-oh robby. i genuinely feel like he is the will byers of cobra kai. as in, he really really needs to catch a fucking break

-daniel being like “i’m not saying you have to like the guy, i know i never will.” babe you literally took him to your childhood home to reminisce yesterday but ok!!

-johnny when he realizes he’s created a little no mercy! miguel monster:

-i have resigned myself to the fact that whenever i hear the miyagi theme i am going to cry now. nothing to be done about it

 2x01

-the way jlawz wanted to punch kreese in the face as soon as he saw him? i felt that

-season 2 has a lot to answer for bringing us kreese and stingray, but daniel looking beautiful and radiant restoring the miyagi do dojo almost makes up for it tbh

-”balance is my thing.” oh yeah for sure jan!!

-miguel really grew whole inches and got his braces off in one weekend. amazing

-jlawz peeping daniel and robby at the hardware store and getting upset and going off at robby about is actually desperately sad. it gives big divorced family energy

-robby: he cares more about his rivalry with you than he does about me daniel [frowning]: hmm bummer but nothing i can do about it as an adult grown man who is one half of this rivalry i guess!! 

-probably more stuff happened in this episode but i was eating my rice at this point so just enjoy this photo i took of the tv screen for some reason (the reason was i love daniel):

so nice that the lesbians on the left there got a car AND a photo with daniel larusso. truly the dream of all lesbians

 2x02 (ish) to 2x07(ish) {my thoughts got a bit slow and same-y after i had all those carbs, so i have condensed the thoughts from these episodes all together bc why not}

-daniel’s calves (that was all i wrote down, that was the whole thought. and i agree with me)

-when kreese said “the gang’s all back together. well, almost all of us” i literally dropped my fork in fury. full offense, i hate that raggedy racist old bitch with all of my heart. i'm so mad i will probably have to sit through his ‘redemption’ in s5. i hope chozen kicks him into a ravine

-anyway, again, there’s something very ~recent exes~~ about the way daniel walks up on kreese and jlawz and stares angrily at jlawz like he’s betrayed him and then kreese puts his hands on jlawz in a weirdly claim-y way and jlawz shrugs him off and tries to talk to daniel and daniel’s like i’m Not Angry I’m Disappointed Goodbye (he IS angry tho). why is every lawrusso interaction like this??? why are they like this

-i’m not gonna get into any deep meta/wank about whether daniel should have told johnny anyway about robby. of course he should have, but like sigh, adults are beating up children here in karate wars town. within the logic of the show it makes sense that daniel would see kreese (a man who jumped out from behind a cardboard cutout of himself to yell grraaaaar at him) and go yeah nah peace out i’m not putting robby in that mess

-it’s 2018 there’s no way that cement truck business wouldn’t have been recorded and uploaded to twitter and johnny would have been the new bean dad

-oh so daniel was gonna do an ice demo at valleyfest and jlawz does a fire one huh? and the fire was melting the ice? it’s almost like…. there’s some sort of …. symbolism… there…. 

-an angy little tory appears! and she loves to do violence

-hey guys so we need for miyagi to give daniel some indirect advice but he’s dead what should we do? just put another guy in a hat that looks like miyagis and have him give the advice? okay perfect!!

-when daniel high kicks the shit outta those guys on the beach and is like “your grandpa know how to move like that, huh?” he is the actual hottest man alive. that is a science fact

-also his face when demetri shows up. please!!!! he’s so happy and so soft!!! YOU get a shoulder pat and YOU get a shoulder pat and YOU get a shoulder pat

-amanda’s comment about daniel hyperfocusing is so bang on and also timely. this is clearly going to come back soon

-season 2-3 hawk is genuinely a bit terrifying and I always forget this and then here I am scared of him again

-re: the trashed dojo. very upsetting on multiple levels, but when daniel barges into the ck dojo all wild and spitty to yell “what are you gonna do about it” and try to goad jlawz into a fight? i’m sorry but my simple little lizard brain is into that

-jimmy and bobby’s reaction to kreese being back is so valid. they are me. we are vibing

-“everyone deserves a second chance” jlawz babe your projection is showing :(( i love you PLEASE go talk to your son. stop adopting evil old men and random sweet adorable neighbours and go talk to your son who is just crying out for any effort from you at all.

-literally putting tommy in a body bag is the absolute worst crime this show has committed, and it has committed so many

-also all the cobra boys yelling wake up at him. guys……………… he’s dead i- 

-that kreese army photo is so unintentionally funny. why does he look like he’s pretending to be an army guy in a porno

-interesting how when daniel recounts what happened in tkk3 leading up to briefly joining cobra kai to the kids, he completely omits the part where he was terrorized into joining the tournament in the first place.  i suppose that could just be down to keeping it simple for the tv audience, or the writers doing that thing they do where they minimize what happened to daniel. but from a character perspective it’s interesting, like he still blames himself for wanting to win it.

aaaand that’s it for now. 2x08 next and then! pulpo. which i suspect will take longer that all the rest of the episodes for me to get through bc i will need a couple of intermissions to scream into a cushion

sidenote: when i get to s4, @lionlikenick​ is joining me to tandem watch, so that could mean one of two things. the thoughts on here could get a lot fewer because i’ll be sending them all direct to knickers, or you (all two of you) will be copping double the thoughts – mine and the ones i appropriate from her. no way of knowing which way it’ll go, but just warning you in advance.

[prettywarriors]

Ok ill bite whats the worst mg series

alright, whats the worst magical girl series in your opinion?

Thanks you two for letting me do some yelling. The obvious guess would likely be one of the recent edgelord shows right? Magical Girl Site or something similar? But nay I say, for while MGS and Day Break Illusion and such and what not generally tell you what to expect right away. Don't like super violence and suffering? Watch something else is the clear message from the get go. One of the bait and switch series then like Madoka or maybe Yuki Yuna? For what faults they may or may not have, at least these series do something and are interesting, even if you're not huge on what goes down in the series. A parody then? They range from affectionate to banned in New Zealand but regardless of quality and their feelings for MGs, it's a parody. It's a joke and shouldn't be taken seriously (plus they're usually short so you can just forget about them forever).

So what makes a series terrible then, I am sure you are asking. IMO? Setting expectations for an interesting and enjoyable series, and then dashing them to hell.

Come with me below the cut, as I talk about Key Princess Story: Kagihime Eternal Alice Rondo!

Spoilers abound so if you care about those for a 15 year old series, click away.

Background: Kagihime was a 4 volume manga that ran from 2004-2006 that was picked up for a 13 episode anime adaptation near the end of its run. The manga is created by a pair (Kaishaku) who you may know for making Magical Nyan Nyan Taruto. Kannazuki no Miko, and Steel Angel Kurumi, and the anime had a script written by the same writer (Mamiko Ikeda) for Tenshi Ni Narumon who also did some script writing for Princess Tutu and Seven of Seven. The anime also had 6 character music videos which are fairly simple but a nice addition to the series for the main girls. Discotek has been publishing the anime in the states in recent years, and the manga was brought over by *squints at book spine* Dr Master Publications.

The Premise: Girls transform and enter weird outside of reality spaces to fight each other with giant keys to take each other’s stories to create a third Alice In Wonderland story.

Well, an off-brand Alice story written by Alternate L. Takion, rather than Lewis Carroll/Charles Dodgson, that while the series uses all the aesthetic hallmarks of the tradition Alice, the little we see of the in universe Alice story is clearly different. Which is fine, at the end of the day, it’s still about someone who loves the Alice stories and wishes there was more, and even makes his own fanfiction version. His? Oh yeah, while the girls do all the fighting, the main character is Aruto, a teen boy who loves Alice, and for reasons we don’t know till late game, can enter the liminal spaces that the ‘Alice Users’ fight in. He chases a girl who looks like the Alice he sees in his story, who is named Arisu, and gets roped into this fanfic battle royale. He is also the older brother of the very needy Kirihara, who also ends up being and Alice User. As does Kirihara’s bff Kisa. To round out the group of enemies-turned-friends-who-will-work-together-to-collect-the-Eternal-Alice-without-having-to-fight-eachother group is a young genius researcher Kirika who wants to know more about Aruto’s connection that allows him to enter the spaces where the girls fight.

Then there’s all the other girls, some of whom still have real importance to the story and some who have a few panels or 2 scenes total. But with a whole bunch of girls to design, the creators reached out to a whole lot of other people to have them create designs! Eventually the battle gets down to the last few girls, there’s a confrontation with the guy running the whole thing, and while the anime and manga vary quite a bit the whole time, in both version Aruto ends up with Kirihara. Oh and Arisu was created by Aruto’s super imagination powers.  

The Promise: Here on is subjective, particularly with what I personally saw as potential from this series. because I need you to understand how much I want to like this series. 

~Alice in Wonderland themed: I know some people aren’t alice fans and that’s fine you do you but as a big alice fan this is great. We have a few alice episodes and themed characters amongst series like CCS and MGRP, and even Alice themes in other series like Tweeny Witches and Alice 19th. But damn it I am down for Alice series.

~Giant Keyyyyyyyys: Yeah yeah Kingdom Hearts but these keys are much more staff like for a lot of the characters which ads and air of elegance rather than the KH ones that for me at least feel well designed for big ol props rather than actual weapons. We also get...

~Weapon variety: It counts as a key if it’s a thorn whip that can be shaped like a key right? How about a giant pocket knife? Crossbows can also be keys. Hush. And we have this variety because

~Guest Artists: For magical girl series where we have a variety of outfits designed by different people, we have Kagihime, Uta~Kata, and uhh I guess Magia Record? But that’s a mobile game with a hella number of characters and with how mobile game works I wouldn’t count it just because it’s less the intent of the series to have variety and more the nature of having lots of girls. (Precure doesn’t count because unless I missed a memo each season’s set is still by one designer). If a series isn’t about a team and therefore doesn’t need cohesion, bringing in other artists is a great way for variety and new looks. 

~The long term goal: Fighting with other people who love the same piece of media you do in hopes of creating new material that will be viewed as official? That’s just fandom nowadays. But it’s a legitimate interesting concept, and opens up so many doors for a message for the series, be it ‘what you create is no less valuable than the canon work’ or ‘it’s hard to let go when something you love doesn’t have more to it but you can still love it for what it is’ or ‘bond with the people who like the thing you like ya idiot instead of fighting about it’. The concept is interesting and there are so many narrative ways you can take this.

~Gays: Between the anime and manga, we have at least 5 wlw. Is it a magical girl series without some gays? (side note- the manga had a short thing where the MC wears a girl’s uniform and is pretty comfortable in it and while there is no way this was the intent, between that and the emphasis on the stories that live in girls and how the fight zones have no men, I’m just saying, Trans girl Aruto.)

~Greater Fairy Tale Premise: We meet a Little Match Girl based MG who is obsessed with Andersen rather than the Alice books, and touch on a Sleeping Beauty character in the manga. The manga at least implies that classic stories and fairy tale authors uh. Live on in a liminal space as immortals with world warping powers within that world and there could be opportunities for other girls in the real world to fight for Little Mermaid 2: Electric Boogaloo.

The Good: Everything has positive points, no matter how bad it is.

~Character Designs: Some of those looks slap. As do most of their weapons. 

~Backgrounds: I have a strong opinion on backgrounds in anime that can be easily boiled down to old watercolor backgrounds good, modern filtered photos as background bad, and as a 2006 series, this might not be Memole nice but they’re quite attractive. 

~Splash Pages: Easily my favorite thing after the designs, each chapter’s title page for the manga just has a character standing in a setting. Which is not everyone’s thing I’m sure but it’s a nice simplistic way to let the characters breathe imo. Even if at least some of the settings were deffo traced. But that’s how backgrounds work to some extent? If I ever get to the Met again, I am tracking down this exact photo, but here is a likely candidate for an example.

~Different Versions: I do not understand the need to make an adaptation that tries to be a 1:1. Kagihime had the same ideas and characters and did some of the same beats but very much had a different finale story and a lot of changes in the middle (like the Alice cops in the manga). Again, not something everyone probably wants I’m sure, but I very appreciate this, especially since the Anime kept good pace with the number of Manga chapters (reading the manga again while watching the anime at 3.8x speed just now was very interesting to see the different interpretations of events in a different medium.)

The ‘Fine’: Yeah.

~Anime Visuals: Look 2006 was still early enough into digipaint that I will give it a total pass on these. The colors are too bright but in a very bland way, the lineart is nothing interesting, and the faces are. Iffy. But it’s not total garbage to look at (probably helped by backgrounds and character designs...) it just came out in an era where not enough people knew how to stylize things to account for the weakness of the tools of the time. (It was 4 years earlier but I feel Kagihime is the polar opposite of Chobits with its painfully bland color palette while still being just. Flat. Sorry for the drive by Chii.) 

~Music?: There sure were songs. Obviously, they are nothing to me.

The Bad: CW for.... somehow all the big things to an extent. 

~Fanservice: Look, I am fine with fanservice, especially for a series that’s, ya know, not targeted at kids, big Mai Hime fan here even if I would recommend skipping the panty thief episode. And honestly the series generally isn’t fanservicey, at least by the modern standards of having the camera choosing under the skirt rather than an over the shoulder shot like I’ve seen plenty in other shows. Even the sexier outfits like the rose whip dominatrix aren’t bad BUT. When the girls fight. One takes her phallic key and drives it into another girls chest between the boobs while the loser cries in pain and then her book comes out and when the victor rips out pages, the loser’s clothes also rip. It is very SuperS Amazon Trio assault metaphor-y. There’s also a bit of fanservice with the sister becauseeeee....

~Incest: If you read the premise up there, first wow good job because I’m sure not re-reading that, you might have noticed I said MC ends up with his sister. As someone who is a big mythology fan and watches plenty of anime, I have a decent tolerance for your obligatory ‘oh we’re siblings but actually cousins so our feelings are okay’ or whatever the fuck Citrus has going on I don’t know that series and I don’t vibe BUT. I have limits and boy did this series go beyond that because multiple episodes are dedicated to the sister being in love with the brother? And the brother returns her feelings but knows that they are wrong so he put everything he likes in his sister into his version of Alice who, of course, physically manifests as Arisu who he creates accidentally with his uh. Magic imagination powers. But again in both versions MC still ends up with his sister. Hey, at least the manga eventually said the boy was adopted when the sister was like, 3, so if nothing else no blood relations? The anime did not ad this. -_-

~Under Utilized Characters: Arisu’s gradual revelation that she has no childhood memories because she isn’t a real person is so interesting and they don’t do nothing with it but also? That’s the kind of thing I personally would love to dig into and Kagihime, while touching on this world shattering revelation, easily loops back to So Anyway She Should Fight For The Man and to hell with developing a life or personality outside of what has been written for her. The rest of the main 5 were 2 note characters which. Could be worse? The most interesting character ends up being the child genius who accidentally murdered her childhood bestie (and/or lover? depending on version) and her coming to terms with that (the friend is alive but the version changes how and why she thinks she’s dead). Then the villain has the motivation of ‘i lost my creativity and now have become an immortal living outside of normal space and am getting girls to fight each other because that’s like a story so I’m still relevant right?’. But shoutout to the anime for then taking death of the author literally. The numerous other girls are canon fodder outside of like. The manga version of the dead gf and the little match girl.

~Battle Royale: This is not a thing I have an issue with generally. Again, but Mai Hime fan, I need to read MGRP 11, BUT by not developing the non-main girls there is no emotional connection which makes them just canon fodder and that’s boring as sin for a royale system. The initial main character fights revolve so much around the MC guy being there that they fall flat, and the 2 or 3 final battles in both versions still feel without any stakes. Also for a royale thing most of the characters don’t actually die, which cool! Neat! Except when they do? Some nobodies and a somebody are murdered (at least in the manga) and the tone never feels like it’s supposed to be upping the stakes, it’s just. Some people are dead now. And do you want to guess which of the main characters died?

~Gays: Oh boy the best friend of the brother-complex sister is in love with her and (in the manga) dies. She does apparently get better for the last chapter but the death itself is only felt by the rest of the cast for a page or two before we go back to feeling sad big brother wants to kiss his mentally generated sister clone rather than his actual sister u_u. Bury your gays is nothing new, but I wonder if it was also intended to be justified because Guess Who Is Creepy and a bit Perverted? Oh look the lesbian keeps the used swimsuit of her beloved and manipulates events to get an indirect kiss and when she sees the sister trying to strange Arisu for a moment she decides to do it for the sister? It’s not good. You want bad gay rep in a magical girl series, well here ya go. We also had a nobody in the first(second?) episode whose story pages reveal her having a kiss with a girl, and then we also have the prodigy again and- in the manga- her. Uh. childhood lover who she thought she killed but the girl has been wiping her mind over and over so prodigy remembers ‘killing’ the friend and not the she’s alive so she can keep? fucking with her? Toxic!

~Sexual Content: But wait you say, you already covered fanservice! Ah but that is sexual content for titilation. This is sexual content for dramatic backstory! The red riding hood character was sexually assaulted, another character was manipulated into sex first as a teen and then more often to ‘get into the publishing industry’, and the same writer forces some aggressive kisses on the MC. None of it is gratuitous which is nice, but also, was it necessary? Not making a new point for this but read riding hood’s dog was also murdered so unnecessary animal death gets tossed on in there. 

~Male Lead: You can have a male, non magical character as the main character surrounded by magical girls. This is not how to do it. If I can make a vicious and hopefully not understood reference, Aruto is basically Tate from the Mai Hime Manga. If you understood that, I am so sorry. If you didn’t, congrats! Don’t read the manga. Or do and send me asks about the iconic final page of the first volume (18+). Anyway, this dude is boring, everything revolves around him, BUT I’ll be generous and say at least this isn’t a harem series? It looks like it out of context but it’s just a triangle with a fun attached scientist and token lesbian.

~Premise: They didn’t make good use of it. The initial goals of ‘take other girls pages from their soul books because if we get enough we unlock a third alice book’ is good! And then we add the twist that that was never going to happen and either if we get all the pages we can grant a wish, or these fights are just happening for the amusement of and asshole. Either way, yeah okay I guess. But at no point do we ever achieve this forbidden wish granting book and the asshole just. Lives. Nothing happens to him. His peers don’t even dunk on him. The only real changes from the beginning and the end of the series are: the siblings are now chill with dating, and the scientist lady won’t turn into a child in magical spaces. Oh. Yeah.

~Why did we make this adult a child sometimes?: I think we know why. Stop trying to get those types of folks to watch your already meh series. I also could have sworn at points in the past looking up images for this series I’ve seen extra art for Yuuri the Thumbelina-y Alice User that seemed like it would fit alongside anything by POP. You know, the Moetan guy. If you don’t know, god I wish that were me. 

Wrap Up: I have definitely forgotten some points and am well within my rights to ad to this whenever I remember more points but uh. Yeah.  

Listen you want an alice themed battle royale with nice outfits? Rozen maiden is right there. Battle Royale magical girl series that’s good with fanservice? Mai Hime. Series with different outfits while being based on a classic story? Pretear.

Hope anyone who read all of this at least got what I was saying, even if they don’t agree with it. And thanks for reading because whoops. 

[popwasabi]

“The Mandalorian” S2 is a power fantasy with mini Star Wars trailers

The term “Plot armor” is often used by readers and viewers to describe the myriad of ways writers keep their heroes away from any real danger no matter what choices or actions they make in the narrative. It’s typically a derisive phrase for the way a writer’s hero seems to escape death no matter what is thrown at him for the sole purpose of moving the plot forward.

In Disney+’s “The Mandalorian” this term takes a far more literal description in the form of our main anti-hero, played by Pedro Pascal, in his beskar armor which seems to be, by all accounts the most indestructible material in the galaxy far, far away.

(I mean, it still looks really cool too, of course.)

The result of this narrative decision in this series is that action scenes often don’t have real tension to them. In another series you might be able to reasonably believe the hero might be in danger with blaster fire shooting all around them but with beskar it’s almost comically not the case at all. Stormtroopers fire laser blast after laser blast at The Mando and each time they bounce harmlessly off him as if he were fucking Superman. It makes scenes feel devoid of stakes and danger no matter what situation they are in.

The show thus becomes a power fantasy, as action scenes serve as extended highlight reels for the Mando. Where season 1 of the show mitigated the power of the Mando’s plot armor by putting him more often in situations where his beskar alone wasn’t enough to save the day, season 2 goes mostly full power fantasy as The Mando rarely runs into a situation he can’t just quite literally walk through.

(“Aim for his armor, men! That’s his weak point!”)

This isn’t to say the season wasn’t without its high moments or even that it wasn’t enjoyable plenty of times but the series’ devotion to fan servicey action and callbacks to “Hey remember ____” makes it a fairly shallow story. At least for myself.

Season 2 of “The Mandalorian” continues the story of Din and his small Yoda-like companion, The Child (later known officially as Grogu), as he looks to complete a quest to return the burgeoning Force wielder to the Jedi. As he seeks to reunite The Child with the ancient Order, he encounters other Mandalorians who are on a quest to retake Mandalore and right on their tail is the nefarious Grand Moff Gideon who is still bent on capturing Grogu for whatever it is he has planned for the Empire.

Let me start this review by saying power fantasies aren’t inherently bad to watch or read. They can be good, cathartic junk food for the soul and can also be compelling, artistic, or even deeply metaphorical in their own way. A movie series like “John Wick” for instance is a power fantasy that aims to reinvent the wheel in action film-making with Keanu Reeves performing perhaps the best gun kata of all-time onscreen. Another film like Paul Verhoueven’s “Total Recall” can satirize the power fantasy to show how ridiculous it is in concept.

So, making your hero an unstoppable killing machine isn’t necessarily always a bad thing if used properly.

(Seriously, this is one of the smartest action films ever made. Don’t @ me.)

Now that that’s established, however, “The Mandalorian” season 2, despite some strong moments here and there, is a power fantasy that lacks these elements for a more interesting narrative. If you believe killing dozens of stormtroopers onscreen while never suffering so much as a scratch for eight episodes equals compelling storytelling then boy does Disney have a series for you.

Through the first four-ish episodes, the new season is mostly just fine and even quite enjoyable. We have the Mando getting a fun side quest with Timothy Olyphant on Tatooine where they get to wrangle a sand worm in a callback to the Westerns that inspired much of the franchise’s aesthetic. The Mando gets to escort a frog lady to her home planet to give birth to some tadpoles and they run into some actual danger in this episode in the form of kyrnknas/space spiders. And we get the return of Bo Katan from Dave Filoni’s “Clone Wars” and “Rebels” cartoon series, with Katee Sackhoff herself reprising the role in a fun Mandalorian team-up episode.

(I’m just so happy to see my girl, Starbuck, again more than anything honestly ;_;)

But the wheels started officially falling off for me in the next episode.

Episode 5 marked the live-action debut of fan favorite Ahsoka Tano, played by Rosario Dawson, and she meets the Mando by getting the jump on him with her lightsabers. In virtually any other situation we have been told lightsabers can cut through virtually anything. Now, beskar has been shown to be plenty durable throughout the series so far but lightsabers? Surely not.

Well…

It is an overall good episode despite this but it marked the point for me where I badly wanted The Mando to just go the rest of the series without it. Obviously, the writers aren’t going to actually kill our hero, afterall The Mouse needs more money and he can’t have it unless we get 50 more Mandalorian episodes and spin-offs, but at some point I gotta feel like there’s a possibility at least that our hero might actually die or at least is in danger. It is actually super funny to me each time The Mando ducks or seeks cover in a shootout when I know, and the viewer damn well knows, he can literally walk right into the middle of it and shoot all these motherfuckers at his own leisure cause his actual plot armor is the stuff of adamantium and vibranium combined.

Episode 5 is mostly good though, it’s a nice callback to old school samurai flicks and for an old fan like myself it was enough to ignore beskar again saving the Mando’s ass.

(This was cool...This...was...cool.)

If episode 5 marked the point in which the wheels began to come off though, episode 6 is where the show really spun out into the ditch for me. Perhaps, this series worst episode, personally, episode 6 reintroduces fan favorite and series inspiration Boba Fett back officially into the fold and the result was perhaps the most self-indulgent entry of the series.

(I mean, it was directed by Robert Rodriguez so...)

Boba arrives to demand his beskar from The Mando who promptly tells him “no” before they are ambushed by a platoon of stormtroopers. Alongside Ming-Na Wen’s Fennec Shand, the three do battle with the stormtroopers with ridiculous ease. I’m aware that stormtroopers exist to be on the highlight reel of our heroes in this franchise and have a long history of not being able to hit the broad side of a bantha but again, I can only watch these guys die by the dozens onscreen over and over again while our heroes get away without suffering even a bruise before it starts feeling boring and repetitive.

It only gets worse once Boba actually puts on his armor. In a sequence that I would describe as “gratuitously” fan servicey, Boba wastes just about every last stormtrooper in this scene culminating with him destroying their two get-away vehicles in a single shot with a rocket. Considering he was killing them with ease just moments before with nothing more than a battle club and a bathrobe, it seemed almost hilariously needless that he donned his iconic armor.

(It would be tempting to say the stormtroopers fought as ineptly as the Putty Patrol here but even the Power Rangers have struggled a few times against these guys...)

I get that Boba is really important to a lot of fans, based on their perceptions of him in the original trilogy and subsequent books and graphic novels that came out in the following years, but here’s a hot take; this series didn’t need him in it. Maybe they didn’t need to keep him rotting in the Sarlacc Pit but this episode, alongside Ahsoka Tano’s feels more like marketing choices for the story rather than narrative ones. I’ll concede that there is a bit more substance to having Ahsoka there to commune with Grogu but their additions to the plot don’t actually show much of anything about the Mando outside physically helping him in a fight.

The way they tease, in both cases, stories that exist outside the internal narrative between Ahsoka’s search for Admiral Thrawn and Boba taking over Jabba’s palace at the end of the final episode, it feels like Disney threw in mini trailers for fans to nibble on at the expense of telling the Mando’s own story and letting it stand on its own like the first season.

The choice to have these characters shoved into this season again appears to be market driven not narrative. Once more, I get that these characters are important personally to many fans, but the appearance of these characters alone DO NOT equal good storytelling.

(Me when a fan tells me “But Boba was such a badass in *obscurely titled EU book that a handful of general audiences have read*! He deserves this moment!”)

The final episode of the season is truly encapsulating of all these issues “The Mandalorian” has, however. Moff Gideon, played by the always sharp Giancarlo Esposito, has Grogu imprisoned aboard his ship. The Mando and his friends plan a rescue mission to save him and, just like nearly every episode before, it is stupidly easy for our protagonists.

The crew of five, again, walk through every Imperial on the ship. I don’t mean this metaphorically by the way, I mean this literally as Cara, Fennec, Bo Katan and Koshka Reeves (played by WWE’s Sasha Banks) without a single moment of real adversity just blast through every stormtrooper on the ship and never get hit once in the process.

A good action scene needs an element of danger, a sense that our hero might actually not come out of this alive even though we all know they will. An action scene without this has no tension and without tension it becomes booooooooring.

(Even John fucking Wick is capable of bleeding, guys...)

The finale had a chance, however, to add real stakes and danger to the scene in the form of this season’s new enemy; The Dark Troopers. These Imperial battle droids were foreshadowed as these super soldiers at the end of episode 4 and seemed to be billed as a real dangerous match for our heroes to faceup against. When the Mando finally gets himself face to face with one he finds they are not as easy to kill as the nameless stormtroopers from before. To see The Mando briefly face real adversity for a change snapped me out of my cynical mood so sharply for a moment I thought I had turned on another series by accident.

But of course, danger never lasts long in this series as The Mando’s armor again saves him first from getting pummeled to death by the droid’s super fists then he uses his plot spear, cause of course he has one of those too, to finish the job.

Danger over.

Moff Gideon doesn’t fair much better in this episode. This villain who had been built up for two seasons as this calculative monster gets stopped rather easily with Mando and his friends barely breaking a sweat. This character feels wasted because of this, even though I’m sure Giancarlo Esposito will return in the next season. He just feels about as much like a pushover as the nameless stormtroopers in this series.

The episode had one more chance though to show these Dark Troopers meant business toward the end as we found the heroes cornered on the command deck with nowhere to run and a dozen of these droids ready to blast and pound them into the floorboards. But help arrives in the form of a Deus X-Wing Machina.

Without having to face even one Dark Trooper, Luke fucking Skywalker arrives on the ship and kills every droid without breaking a sweat. It plays as inspiring in the moment but again I just found myself bored and irritated. A chance to see the series heroes actually use their wits and show their creativity in a moment of true danger thwarted to please fan boys.

I get that Grogu called out to him in episode 6 but creatively this felt like an extremley lazy way to solve the heroes’ dilemna.

(“Hello my name is Jedi. I enjoy doing...*computes script* Jedi things.”)

This season wasn’t all bad. It certainly had nice production value that made each alien world pop and beautiful to look at. Every actor and actress played their parts expertly well, with what they were given, and made for interesting characters at times. There are also nice homages to both Western and Samurai cinema throughout the season that fans of both will appreciate. And Pedro Pascal is just so good on his own, especially in tender moments with Grogu, that you forget that his character is kind of a Gary Stu.

But the main crux of the issue here that I’m trying to get across is the reason you need to remove the plot armor of your heroes is not just because action scenes need tension and stakes, it’s that when faced with danger these scenes reveal who these characters are. I used to believe that the reason Mandalorians and Jedi had such a fierce rivalry in the lore despite the obvious advantages of wielding the Force was because these famed bounty hunters were just that fucking good at killing. That despite being, on paper, normal people they had great martial prowess, athletic skill, and the tactical wit to outsmart people who can literally sense their feelings. But now with beskar and the way this series is written, it appears the Mandalorians were challenging warriors just because they happened to harness the most OP armor building material in the galaxy.

It makes you wonder how the fuck they were conquered to begin with…

(Maybe they just needed more knee rockets...)

This takes away from the mysticism of the Mandalorians for me. It makes The Mando less interesting to me in the way he fights. Yea he can shoot really good too but really it’s the armor that makes him the fighter that he is and I find that kind of boring. We occasionally get this character to remove the armor during the series, including a whole episode that was easily one of the best of the season, and in every case he’s more interesting once the helmet comes off. I get that fans hold a lot of reverence for that armor, yea it still looks really cool, but making it this impenetrable super material doesn’t add anything to the story.

If anything, it takes away from it.

(Plus how could you not love Pedro Pascal when he’s out of armor? uWu)

I wouldn’t go as far as to say I hate season 2, even though I spent 2000 plus words just now lambasting it but I guess I just want to say I am unimpressed more than anything. I feel like I’ve seen better Star Wars be it in the movies, cartoons, books, video games, etc and I’ve certainly seen better action in the franchise as well.

Considering fan reaction so far appears to be overwhelmingly positive, I am definitely in the minority here and you are welcome to enjoy this series as much as you want in spite of how unimpressed I am with the season. But considering all I have seen of this fandom the last few years, regarding complaints about fan service (“Rogue One”), easily defeated/underdeveloped bad guys (“The Last Jedi”), and Mary Sues (The sequel trilogy in general), I have to ask again what is it actually that fans like or don’t like about new entries in the franchise? It’s not that there isn’t valid criticisms there and “The Mandalorian” is enjoyable in sincere ways too but it has many of the issues I hear commonly said of more divisive entries in the Disneyverse. So why does it get a pass?

I’ve been told it’s not worth my energy to talk too derisively about the fans in one of my earlier write-ups, so I’ll leave it at that but it does make me wonder.

(“Rogue One” admittedly has a simarily self-indulgent action sequence though haha...)

Season 2 of “The Mandalorian” isn’t the worst piece of Star Wars media ever created, far from it, and for most part its solid enjoyable Saturday morning cartoon theater but if the series wants to really take steps to become more compelling in the future it might be good to stop bubble wrapping their heroes in plot armor. Literally.

Until then this is the way…I guess…

Me getting ready for the backlash...

[purplesurveys]

1299

1. Do you have any big plans for November? Just at the start of the month. I’ll be in Zambales with my work team from tomorrow to November 2nd to reward ourselves for the merciless month that was October. Other than that I’ll be celebrating my 1st anniversary of being employed at my workplace, but it’s not the kind of thing I’d throw a party for lol.

2. What upcoming event are you most looking forward to? Just the vacation I mentioned. It’ll be my first out-of-town, longer-than-a-day trip without my family so I hope all goes well.

3. What was the last song you heard? Telepathy by BTS.

4. Quote something from last night: Like, any quote? “Don’t drink and then go swimming” my grandma told me when I told her about my plans for the next three days hahaha.

5. What time did you wake up today? 7 AM. I would’ve slept in but my teammates wanted to have our antigen tests by 9, and considering I lived the farthest from the hospital we were assigned to I had to wake up extra early. 

6. What does your last incoming text say? Continued from last Saturday. My mom was just asking for updates about my trip and what I’ve been up to.

7. Is there a vase in the room you’re in? I think there may be, I just haven’t paid enough attention to be sure. There’s a lot of artsy stuff decorating the room, though.

8. Any plans for today/this evening? I’m honestly not sure. It’s the last night of our short vacation and I really just want to stay in hahahaha since I missed taking surveys and watching videos. I know for sure I’ll be having dinner with Bea and Kata, but I think we might have a more chill time tonight considering we literally stayed up all night earlier. 

9. Have you recently been insulted? No words were said but I definitely felt insulted – I’ve felt harassed by three men on this trip.

10. What is the radio in your car tuned to at this exact moment? A station that my mom chose since she’s the only one who uses the radio in my car anymore. Whenever it’s me driving I always automatically set it to Bluetooth.

11. Compared to someone else of your age and gender; do you feel that you have a lot to offer someone? Yes. I put in a lot of effort for people I care about.

12. How many days a week do you work? 5 days a week.

13. Are there people you feel more connected to than others? Sure.

14. Is there ONE person you feel more connected to than others? There used to be, but not anymore.

15. Are you more like your mother or your father? My mom, I think. I’m a lot like my dad too, but with all factors considered I’d have to say I’m a carbon copy of my mom.

16. Where did your eye color come from? Both my parents.

17. Describe the pants you are wearing: I have gray sweatpants. Their most noticeable feature is the black outline on the front pockets, but other than that it’s just your regular pair of sweatpants.

18. Have you ever been in a recording studio? Once, when I was job shadowing in high school - which is like an internship but you never really get asked to do anything and just people-watch all day. Anyway, the company I was job shadowing for had a new radio ad coming up and I was invited to come to the studio where the voiceovers were being done. Pretty cool because the talent was actually really good.

19. The myspace picture you’ve had up the longest? No Myspace.

20. Are any of your myspace pictures alcohol related? I don’t think I even ever posted photos on there...

21. What is your worst relationship quality? I’m very competitive, so I tend to get insecure if my partner gets to do or achieve something that I can’t have access to. Losing that constant urge to compare myself to someone is probably one of my favorite things about being single lmao. 22. What was your most recent serious injury? A really bad graze on my finger from the time Cooper violently yanked on his leash around two weeks ago. I only realized there was something wrong when my finger started to sting and I looked down and saw it in really bad, bleeding shape hahaha.

23. What were you most recently happy about? This trip I’m on :) I’m so happy I finally got the chance to relax and be away from the house for a while. I think it also made me closer to my work team which is also great. 24. Are you happy with the way the Yankees are playing? I don’t watch, uh...baseball, I believe?

25. Are you a fan of cake? It’s fine. I never look for it, but I’ll have a slice if it’s a flavor I like.

26. What shirt have you not worn in a while that you would like to? I can’t think of any, actually. I never go out these days so I’m never in a hurry to wear anything in particular.

28. When was the last time you were hit on? Uhm so there was this really fucking creepy man on the beach earlier who approached me? I had the whole beach to myself at the time and was relaxing and enjoying my alone time and being at peace, when he suddenly walked my way and said he wanted to introduce himself (in Filipino) and said his name was Francis. Part of me thought I was seconds from getting kidnapped, another part of me started to think that maybe this is how they flirt in the province?????? anyway I found it so fucking gross and it ruined my mood and essentially told him to fuck off. I’ve never gone back to the beach since.

29. What is the next concert you are going to and where are you seeing it? Not sure for physical but I know I’m getting tickets to stream BTS’ concert in LA this December.

30. Name someone you know who is most likely to be found at a bar on Wednesday night? At this point in my life? No clue hahaha everyone’s busy building their own lives now, me included.

[seyaryminamoto]

Matching Heartbeats: Sokkla Saturdays 2020

Day 5: “I melt in your hands”

On FF.net//On AO3

So. It really had come to this. Of all things, her first mission ever truly had to turn out like this.

She hadn't underestimated him when he had nearly shattered her bones with his club, had she been careless enough to stand closer to him or failed to evade his attack. No properly-trained firebender would ever be quite so stupid as to believe themselves superior to heavy weapons, especially one that looked as heavy as that damn club. Yet she had expected he would only be a warrior, at the time: she never expected him to be the brains of his group, for this was merely their second encounter, and while she was still assessing the enemy as they crossed blows in the abandoned town the Avatar had lured her to, she had never quite expected… well, that there would be a truly smart foe in the other team, to put it in some way.

"I know when I'm beaten," she had said, eyeing the group that surrounded her, her hands raised in the air. "A Princess surrenders with honor."

She had noticed they were whispering, though: just as she saw Iroh had been focusing on the earthbender, that tall warrior boy had spoken to the short, new member of their team too: the waterbender and the Avatar were listening as well, her brother, of course, was only focused on her… so many potential targets, what to do?

She chose to attack Iroh in the end, but it happened just as the earthbender attacked, too: a sudden surge of earth, and all her limbs had been restrained, held down: she tried to evoke fire, but the strain of this completely awkward position, prostrated on the ground, didn't allow for it.

"Quick! Look for something to tie her up, I don't know…!" the warrior boy had ordered… just as her brother screamed:

"AAAAAAH!"

Ugh. He was always so melodramatic.

She struggled against the restraints… only for the earthbender to take things further: she found herself buried to the neck in the ground, gasping for breath, panicking as she realized she couldn't move at all. What to do, what to do…? There had to be a way out, she just had to think…

"I found shackles!" exclaimed the waterbender, from inside one of the buildings: she and the Avatar had taken to rummaging through the nearby ghostly town to follow fit with the warrior's demand.

"Great! That'll be way better than rope, she'd just burn through that…"

"Oh… wait, Zuko!"

The waterbender returned with the shackles, but she handed them to the Avatar as she approached the firebenders: Azula's brother was crouched by their Uncle's inert form… and upon realizing the Avatar and his friends were approaching him, he shouted:

"Ugh! Get away from us!"

"Zuko, I can help!"

"LEAVE!" he exclaimed, and now he outright attacked them: wow, that was rude. And here Azula thought they were friends… it would explain why he had been so incompetent as to fail to capture them throughout the past months.

Yet just as she thought Zuko would get what he wanted, and she'd be left buried in this damn place for eternity, the tall warrior boy turned towards her. Azula scowled at him too, and he huffed, hands on his hips.

"No way we're leaving. Not without our prisoner, anyway," he said, stepping towards her.

"I'm not your…! You'd best stay where you are, or I'll make you pay for this!" she exclaimed, knowing her bravado was empty. What could she do, spit fire at his boots? Maybe he'd be outraged about it… and then he might outright kick her face. Which would be utterly deplorable and humiliating. What on earth had just happened? Why was she in this completely unacceptable situation?

"You know, I can move those shackles with my bending, lock them around her wrists underground," the earthbender revealed, with a mischievous grin. "That way she's not going to be a problem!"

"Wait, wait, wait!" the Avatar said, eyeing them all warily. "Are we… going to make her our prisoner? Really? But… why?"

"I'm with Aang on that. Why do we want her with us?" the waterbender asked, eyeing her fellow Water Tribesman – who Azula suspected would be her brother – and the earthbender with utter confusion.

"Well… to change up the game somewhat? It's always the Fire Nation trying to capture us, right? And this way, we know this one's not going to catch us again," the warrior suggested. "Not if we keep an eye on her ourselves."

"Ridiculous… my friends will find me. And then they'll defeat the whole lot of you without breaking a sweat," Azula said, with a proud smirk. "And if, somehow, you managed to avoid them, every Fire Nation soldier will attempt to find me once my captivity is known. You won't get away with this, and you'll pay for it with your lives, whether by my hand or anyone else's."

"You sure?" he had asked, raising his eyebrows. "Because, hey! We're already being chased by a lot of Fire Nation people and so far, we're doing pretty good! Honestly, you and your friends were the scariest ones to chase us so far, so it kind of feels like you were the best the Fire Lord could send already? Which means… now that we took you down, we're feeling pretty good about our odds against everything else they could send at us."

He smiled sardonically. She scowled, angrily. And while the Avatar and the waterbender appeared unconvinced still, they soon surrendered, and the damned warrior boy got his way: she was shackled and unearthed afterwards, and while she could presumably wield basic fire against them, she couldn't possibly perform a full kata within these restraints. She'd have to use more than firebending to escape… she'd have to use her wits. And that she intended to.

She would leave a trail of breadcrumbs for Mai and Ty Lee to follow. It was hard to decide on which breadcrumbs, but eventually she took to lightly burning the ends of her hair, by raising her shackled hands to wipe her face. The hairs would be in danger of floating off their own accord in the breeze, but hopefully they wouldn't be blown away too fast for her friends to follow her trail, much as they had followed the damn bison's…

And soon enough they wound up on said damn bison who, to Azula's chagrin, was fully clean now, and apparently not shedding anymore. It growled at her, and she scowled at it too. Shaggy beast…

And then she got dragged up to the saddle, where the three benders fell asleep, and the non-bender, despite having huge bags under his eyes, decided to stay awake and keep watch, for she couldn't be trusted. And of course she couldn't be: who wouldn't be mistrusting of their captive foe? It was natural. She had to figure out a way to turn that caution of his against him… or turn it into something else, instead.

"You look terrible. I bet you're far more handsome when you've had a few hours of rest," she said: men were fools in many ways. Perhaps a girl's compliments, however shallow as they might be, would sit well with him.

The reaction was just as she had expected it: that her plan would work at all, however, was rather startling: he was visibly flustered, eyeing her with uncertainty, but he appeared perfectly shyly pleased by the compliment nonetheless.

"Well, yeah… you'll likely see that later tomorrow, I guess, once I do get enough rest," he said, with a shrug. She did succeed at goading his ego, of course she did… perfect.

"Will I, now?" Azula replied, raising her eyebrows.

"Yeah… as long as you don't try to escape beforehand, anyway," he said, shrugging. Azula scoffed.

"What makes you think my friends won't find us before that?" she asked.

"That they haven't found us yet, I think," the warrior boy admitted, with an awkward grin. "You three dangerous ladies seemed pretty intense, but something – or rather, my instincts! – tell me that you're the brains of the group. Were you the one who decided to chase after us on that creepy machine? Where did you get something like that, in the first place? And those mounts… you've got to be some real top-of-the-line bounty-hunter or something, huh?"

"You think I'm a bounty-hunter?" she asked, amused. "So you don't see the family resemblance either?"

"Family resemblance…?" he said, blinking blankly. Azula raised her eyebrows. "Woah. Wait a minute, are you…? You're Zuko's sister? Hell, no, I don't see it!"

"Oh, really?" Azula smirked. He scoffed.

"You're way prettier, like, by a landslide. And you're smart. Huh. I think you got the family jackpot, come to think of it… which, huh, who knows why the Fire Lord's family has anything good in their lineage, but if there's anything at all, looks like you hogged it all up for yourself."

Despite everything, Azula laughed. Why did she laugh, she didn't know. The warrior chuckled too, scratching the back of his neck. Were they flirting, without meaning to? Or was this just honesty? She was having a hard time telling… for it was the first time any boy had called her pretty.

"Is that why you decided to keep me as a prisoner? Because you were smitten with me right away?" she smirked. The warrior scoffed. "It's alright, you can admit it…"

"And why would I admit something that's not true? I mean, come on, if it were a matter of being smitten, I'd much rather keep you chasing after me," he smirked. "Boys love the idea of being chased violently by beautiful girls."

"And girls love the idea of being hogged up possessively by handsome boys," Azula retaliated.

They both snorted. And then they laughed.

Was she seriously laughing with the enemy?

"Could you two idiots quit with the weird flirting and let me SLEEP?!"

Toph's shout certainly landed on its mark. Both a Princess and her new enemy-captor-possibly-new-friend merely nestled on a saddle quietly for a while, blushing and hoping the other one couldn't tell under de cover of darkness.

"Though…" she finally broke the silence about ten minutes later: she could tell he was still awake, and his head jolted towards her quickly. "Would be nice to know your names, at least. If nothing else."

"Oh… heh. I'm Sokka," he said, smiling awkwardly.

"Sokka, huh…?" she said, enjoying the sensation of uttering the foreign name's syllables. Curious feeling…

"And you're…?" he said, raising his eyebrows.

"Azula," she replied. Sokka eyed her appreciatively.

"Azula it is, then," he said, with a small smile. "Uh, the rest of us… the bison is Appa, the lemur is Momo, my sister there's Katara, and that's Aang, the Avatar, and…"

"Shut. UP!"

"… And the grumpy one's Toph."

"Right."

They did fall silent then… and the gears in the Princess's mind continued turning. No, this situation was far from ideal… but if she forged a bond, however basic it might be, with one of her captors, there was a far higher likelihood of escape than by only waiting for Mai and Ty Lee to find her. Those two usually were reliable enough… but who knew how far the breeze would blow the miserable trail she'd left behind herself. Not to mention, if that damn bison took off with them, she'd be as good as beyond their reach before long. No, this wouldn't do. She would find a way out of this situation by herself, and she'd obtain a ton of intel on the enemy in the process, too. It would be difficult to endure for a while… but it didn't hurt that the boy she'd chosen for her scheme wasn't that far from her type anyway. A little lankier than her preference, sure, but he could fill out more muscles with the years and…

And why was that even important? It wasn't. She had to focus.

That he was somewhat handsome – and she used both words quite loosely, no, she didn't like him, she wasn't a schoolgirl with a crush or anything like that – only helped matters anyway: she wouldn't have to feign her interest in him, at least, where it concerned his physical appeal to her. Everything else was a matter of delicately weaving a net of perfect deceit until he was so wrapped within her web that he'd be caught completely off-guard once she betrayed their fun little group…

It was just a matter of patience until the right moment to strike arrived. She wouldn't be a problem prisoner, she'd accept her fate… for now.

Flying on the bison was a strange, yet not entirely unwelcome experience, despite it practically sentenced her to not be found by her friends anytime soon. The group she was stuck with was… slightly strange, without a doubt. The waterbender often eyed her warily – she likely still disagreed with the notion of keeping her captive, and wanted nothing but to see Azula vanish from sight as soon as possible. The Avatar seemed careful too, but before long he started to talk more cheerfully, and Azula wondered if he had decided she was trustworthy already. The damn lemur had often climbed over her lap, and she had to shoo it only for the Avatar to laugh it off and say 'Momo was just happy to make a new friend'. As if she'd ever be friends with a large-eared rat…

The earthbender, to her surprise, seemed to be almost as new to the group as she was. She asked occasional questions about how things worked in the team, and it became apparent she had only joined them recently, just as Azula had suspected – her absence back in Omashu could have had many explanations, but that they'd only recruited her recently made perfect sense. And of course, the one she had decided would be her target was the non-bender… who was sleeping at the far end of the saddle, drooling awkwardly, with his limbs splayed in any direction, as though he were a carelessly discarded toy. She wondered how someone could rest in quite such relaxation when he had an enemy so close by… did he truly take their last conversation to signify she could be trusted? Or was it he trusted the rest of his companions to keep her in check? Or… perhaps he knew she wasn't stupid enough to try anything while hovering so many miles above ground, in foreign lands, when she had no idea where they were going.

"What exactly is our destination, if I can ask?" she sighed.

"We'll know when we get there," Katara said, simply. Azula's eyebrows twitched: this one was absolutely ruled out of her plan to earn goodwill from her captors. Anyone else would be fair game, save her. And that lemur. She really didn't like that flying rat.

They only reached that destination – a canyon – after about ten hours of flying, after which the bison apparently couldn't keep going any longer. Yet the Avatar seemed thrilled about where they'd wound up, and the warrior was also in a blissful mood after napping for most the day on the creature's saddle. Of course, the waterbender didn't stop giving Azula the stink-eye as they unpacked, though as the others seemed to be warming up to her, to a fault, Azula decided to poke the hornet wasps' nest instead of enduring the judgment and scowls.

"You really seem to dislike me quite strongly," she said, casually. "Which I find odd, seeing as it seems you've been chased by my brother for far longer than me, and yet you offered him a helping hand back when I attacked our uncle. Is it you feel threatened by my presence somehow, or…?"

"Threatened? Yes. Because I'm pretty sure you're exactly where you want to be," Katara rebuffed, shooting her another harsh glare. "And yeah, Zuko's been worse than you, so far. But that you're his sister doesn't help in the least. And I wasn't really offering my help to Zuko but to Iroh. He gave us a hand back in the North Pole, so…"

"Is that so…?" Azula asked, unable to mask her genuine outrage at those words. Katara scoffed.

"You do remember, still, that we're not your friends? You yourself said it, didn't you? Enemies and traitors, working together?"

"Right, but I just thought that perhaps you had a soft spot for Zuzu since he'd chased you for so many months… I figured maybe I had to up my game so I'd earn some goodwill around here, but I guess it's not that simple," Azula sighed. "Working against my nation seems to be the only way you'll trust me, huh?"

"And even then I don't think Katara will let go that easily," Aang said, smiling awkwardly, though he blinked a few times when his words were almost interrupted by a loud cackle: "Uh… Sokka?"

"Zuzu?! Y-you call him Zuzu?!"

Azula glanced at the warrior with unabashed amusement: he DEFINITELY was her target. And yet, to her surprise, the earthbender snickered too… and the waterbender snorted before covering her mouth with a hand. Oh, maybe this wouldn't be quite as bad as she had anticipated… if they could bond over trashing Zuko, she had plenty of material to work with.

"I wasn't laughing!" Katara exclaimed, and yet everyone laughed at her denial just as well.

"Of course I call him Zuzu," Azula smiled proudly, as Sokka gazed at her with brimming amazement. "I don't presume to know how it works in your culture, but in the Fire Nation, the younger sister's official job is to embarrass and torment her older brother as best she can."

"Oh, it's the same in the South Pole, surprisingly," Sokka declared, smirking at Katara, who stuck out her tongue in his direction. "Though it's true too that the older brother's job is to protect their little sister… a thankless job, but we are just that selfless."

"Pfft! You don't have to protect me! I can protect myself just fine, thank you very much!"

"Sure thing! You know, it's not just about combat, it's about everything else! Who's the one who goes hunting and foraging and finding food for us…?"

"The one who's ALWAYS hungry?"

"And who did you tell to get a job when YOU were hungry? That's right, it was me! And I went and got one, and nearly died in a STORM while you didn't get a job of your own, but did I complain? Not even once…!"

"You're complaining now…" Toph pointed out, smirking, but the argument seemed poised to continue regardless.

Azula watched them bicker, however, and a rather strange sensation nestled in her chest upon hearing their words… upon processing them. Was that really what a brother was expected to do? In other cultures, maybe… it was ridiculous, though, and she scoffed at so much as the idea of picturing her brother getting a job for her sake, or going hunting or foraging for her. That wasn't likely to ever happen… not that she needed it to, of course. She did fend for herself, unlike Katara. She had been apart from her brother for three years, and she saw no need to rely on him. She didn't truly need anyone…

Hours after a rather simplistic dinner – Sokka caught a small animal that didn't taste very good to Azula – the group was set to rest again. The earthbender crafted an earthen tent for herself, the waterbender set up a traditional tent for herself, the Avatar was resting on his bison's saddle… and again, the warrior seemed determined to keep watch.

"You're on guard duty again tonight?" Azula asked, raising her eyebrows. Sokka nodded.

"It works, doesn't it? I got plenty of sleep through the day anyhow, I can take it," he shrugged. "You should get some rest too, Princess…"

"You'll still watch me as I sleep, won't you?" she teased, smirking. "Quite interesting to be the object of someone's observation to such extent…"

"Uh… yeah. Because you're a prisoner. And I don't want you pulling any funny business on us," Sokka said… and yet he was smiling. Ha. He found amusement in her teasing just as well.

"Oh, surely that's not all there is to it," she said, beaming mischievously. He chuckled and shook his head.

"There's not supposed to be more to it…" he said. "But anyway, you didn't sleep all day like I did, so you should rest now. You can even borrow my sleeping bag, if you want."

"Borrow your…?"

It hit her then that it wasn't a matter of older brother protectiveness: that was just what he was like. He protected people… even if they didn't deserve his protection.

"Only if you promise you won't set it on fire just to mess with me or anything mean like that, okay?" he said, smiling at her before reaching for his bags and unfolding the sleeping bag for her.

What a rare act of kindness… of generosity. What would he gain from this? What did he think he'd gain from it? Nothing, surely: he had to be stupid to think she had truly lowered her guard with no ulterior motive… and she could tell he wasn't stupid. At least, not when it came to things that mattered. So why show her any form of kindness…?

Once she was halfway inside the sleeping bag, she realized there was more to this apparently selfless act than met the eye: her stomach lurched at the scent of the sleeping bag, and she shot the owner an accusatory glare.

"W-why would you…?! Are you trying to kill me?!"

"What?" he said, raising his eyebrows. "Oh! Oh, yeah, Toph says it smells weird, huh…? Woops. Heh, I forgot. Okay, okay, I'll wash it as soon as I can! Sorry… but it beats sleeping on the hard ground, doesn't it?"

"That depends on how sick I am in the morning…" Azula huffed, covering her nose, hoping that breathing through her mouth would be enough for her to ignore the stench.

"Well, I do hope you don't die! I promise, that wasn't an attempt to kill you. You haven't given us any useful information yet, so what's the point in trying to kill you at all, huh?"

"Ah, that's why you keep me alive, and not so you can watch me sleep," Azula asked, raising her eyebrows. Sokka smirked and nodded.

"True. Not that I'm complaining about the other thing, but I've got my priorities sorted out," he declared. She bit her lower lip but smiled.

Was this really what it was like to flirt with a boy? She'd never truly made any progress with anyone on that front before. This one seemed rather responsive to her advances, though… well, it would be useful practice for the future, at least. She could count on him for that.

"Good night, then," she said, keeping her head safely out of the sleeping bag, in hopes to inhale fresh air rather than the stale scent of the sleeping bag.

"Good night, Azula," he responded. It was weird that her gut felt tingly upon hearing him say her name…

The next day, however, took Azula by surprise: the Avatar had actually chosen this location to train, it seemed. And when Sokka was finally taking his time to sleep, the earthbender took to teaching earthbending lessons to the Avatar, and all his attempts to rest were thwarted completely. Once Sokka finally gave up resting, he took off to hunt, and Azula tagged along: while it was rather useful to learn more about the mechanics of earthbending, to unravel how to fight against it more effectively, she couldn't be careless and disregard her main pursuit. And as tempers seemed to flare often in the Avatar's training session, she ended up tagging along for Sokka's hunting trip instead. It would be useful to learn how hunting was done, if nothing else…

… Or so she thought, until Sokka fell into a hole, after chasing after a moose-lion cub, and despite he begged her for help, there wasn't much she could do for him: she pulled at him, jerked his hands upwards, and he only seemed to sink further. Funny how ironic life was, considering she was the one stuck in the ground similarly just two days ago…

"I'm going to die stuck in here, aren't I?" he groaned, after Azula's final attempt to heave him out failed.

"It's a possibility," she acknowledged. "I could be more helpful, you know? If I weren't shackled…?"

"Not much luck with that, I'm afraid…" Sokka groaned. "I… don't have the key myself."

"Ah. Then I'm befriending the wrong Water Tribe sibling, aren't I?" Azula said. That, at least, got a smile out of the warrior.

"Damn. And here I thought I was your type," Sokka said, nonchalantly.

"I didn't say you weren't. Just that, if you don't have the power to get rid of these, you're not much use to me," she said. Sokka chuckled and shook his head.

The rest of the day was surreal: the small moose-lion cub Sokka had been trying to hunt decided to play with him, carelessly so, even bringing him an apple that Azula found a most ironic gift for the avid meat-eater. Sokka groaned, swore he'd go vegetarian, made countless baseless claims… and yet not once did he beg her to go ask the others for help. Odd, considering two of his friends were earthbenders, albeit one more trained than the other…

And then the actual, chaotic mess began to unfold: Aang, apparently sick and tired of Toph's harsh training methods, stumbled into Sokka and his awkward situation. He failed to airbend him out of the hole, and then proceeded to pity his poor efforts at earthbending with a rather unexpected string of unfortunate wording, such as claiming to be stuck between a rock and a hard place… Azula couldn't stop chuckling, earning herself Sokka's harsh glares in retaliation… and that was when the mother of Sokka's new friend, the saber-tooth moose-lion cub, had appeared on the scene.

"Aang, just earthbend me out of here!" was Sokka's most common request, but the Avatar appeared to want to do anything but earthbend… leaving both his restrained companions to somehow fend for themselves as the furious creature sought to attack them.

It was fair and good that the Avatar's airbending seemed to distract the moose lion on occasion… but at one point it became apparent that it would trample Sokka most deliberately unless it was distracted. And while Azula could barely bend, with her hands shackled as she was, she leapt between Sokka and the creature and shot a small plum of blue fire in its direction.

That, of course, only seemed to make the creature angrier: Aang had to intervene then, casting a powerful gust of wind that finally alarmed the creature enough about these humans and their potential abilities, and it left through the forest at last.

And then Toph took advantage of that momentum to force Aang to earthbend for good. The Avatar was astonished to finally unlock the secrets of the art… while Azula and Sokka were merely relieved they had survived a nearly lethal encounter with a beast that could've killed them both.

Katara was delighted to see Sokka safe and sound once they were all free to return to camp, though she scowled at Azula, ready to blame her for her brother's disappearance…

"Azula stuck by me the whole time I was in that stupid hole," Sokka sighed, smiling and clapping the Fire Nation Princess on the shoulder. "I kind of thought she'd make a run for it? But… she stayed! And then even tried to save me from the moose-lion, but she just made it angry instead…"

"Really?" Katara said, blinking blankly, utterly blown away by the explanations.

"Animals… don't like fire. Clearly," Azula said, sighing.

"But she still tried to help me! And that really took me by surprise," Sokka grinned. "You know, you might fit better with our team than I thought all along. Aang! How about getting a new firebending teacher? Jeong Jeong was a pain anyway, so we could just recruit Azula for it and…!"

"W-wha…?!" Azula gasped. "Did you forget I'm supposed to be your enemy?"

"I think you're the one who did, eh? You tried to save my life today!" Sokka grinned, spreading his arms as though to hug her, and Azula squirmed out of his reach, hoping fruitlessly for her cheeks not to be as red as she suspected they were, going by the heat that surged underneath her skin.

Had she forgotten she was their enemy? No, not really. But was she growing to enjoy their company…? His company, in particular?

Perhaps a little.

Many strange things seemed to happen to the Avatar and his friends… and being caught in the middle of so many happenings was a rather novel experience for Azula. While she wasn't quite the most sheltered noblewoman in the Fire Nation, the idea of traveling abroad with a group of teenagers and children close to her age, with no one to enforce real discipline, no rules beyond those they agreed upon, no stability beyond the ground underneath their feet – or the saddle on which they flew – wouldn't have crossed her mind at all until it became her reality.

After the wild encounter with the moose lions, they went on a strange vacation spree that she found utterly laughable – they took vacations carelessly, willfully ignoring that her father was surely gearing up to strike against the Earth Kingdom's bastions? Truly? – and that resulted in a highly questionable trip to the Si Wong Desert. It didn't help that a group comprised by one too many weirdos decided to recruit a grown-up who appeared to be even more airheaded than Ty Lee – some professor at Ba Sing Se's university –, and that Sokka had decided his vacation would take them to a Library. Oh, it was a real pain that his decision would be the first one that was slightly appealing to her, in all this mess… despite the obvious fact, of course, that visiting a Spirit Library sounded completely, utterly absurd to the Princess of the Fire Nation.

"Does this place even exist?" Toph asked, eventually, as they soared across the desert on the sky bison's saddle.

"Some say it doesn't," the professor replied. Azula scoffed.

"Unsurprisingly so. Why would a Spirit Library be located in a desert, of all places?" she asked. "Utterly inconvenient."

"Well, a desert probably has plenty of room to host a big Library, right?" Sokka said, casually.

It was absurd logic, as far as Azula could tell – might as well claim there was plenty of room at the bottom of the sea, too, and if the idea was to keep everyone away from the damn place, it was far safer underwater than in a desert –, but so much as looking at Sokka right now, while he was shamelessly shirtless, was a bad idea. Why he had decided to strip off his upper body's garments, Azula didn't know, but while she didn't believe she was a prude, she couldn't dare look at him if there was a chance he'd catch her. So far, she had merely glanced at him on occasion… and admired his lean body. Yes, that was harmless, it wasn't like she'd tried to make a move on him – not like she truly knew how, anyway. But if he so much as suspected what effects his shirtless figure was having on her mind, he would never let her live this embarrassment down. And curses, she didn't need further problems while traveling with this group…

"How about the fact that this is something… spiritual?" Azula said, with a sardonic grin.

"You know, that part's been bugging me too," Toph said, flopped upon the saddle as she was. "The heck does it even mean, a Spirit Library? Are spirits even real?"

"Of course they are!" Aang exclaimed, beaming.

Azula huffed, glancing – despite her better judgment – at Sokka as though to ask if he truly believed such nonsense… only to find a rather surprising, disheartened expression on his face. She frowned: what was that? Melancholy? Misery? Longing? Why would the mention of spirits make him react that way?

He was the one to spot something eventually: a tower in the middle of the desert, apparently. And yet, before long, the group realized the Library was actually underground, somehow. Curious, despite herself, Azula requested that they allowed her inside the Library too: while Katara hesitated at first, Azula agreed to the conditions of being shackled again once they were done climbing inside the building, and to everyone's surprise, she did nothing to hinder their mission – fools that they were, truly, for expecting otherwise. What was she going to achieve by attacking them in the middle of a desert, of all things? So Toph and Appa lingered behind, and the rest of the group entered the tower by climbing through with a rope.

Her initial disbelief was rewarded with the most incredible location she had ever set foot upon, and she had been raised in a Palace, of all things. But nothing was quite so astonishing as the giant owl: Sokka had to clap a hand over her mouth as they hid behind a pillar, hoping not to alert the terrifying otherworldly being of their presence. Alright, fine, spirits were real, and she sure wanted nothing to do with them. Yet the fool professor had ran out and revealed himself… and soon enough Azula caught herself watching as each of them offered knowledge of some sort to the creature. The Avatar's wanted poster had been accepted, though… that rang a bell.

"I'm sorry it's so crumpled," she smiled awkwardly, as she offered the giant owl another wanted poster, this time bearing the faces of her brother and uncle.

"Both of Fire Nation make?" the owl spoke. "Quite an astonishing find. I appreciate these additions to my collection."

Oh, she was saved. She had folded one of those posters carelessly into a pocket a long time ago, and that it was still there was a damn miracle… for, otherwise, she might be doing something even more ridiculous than Sokka's splendid knot. In Azula's opinion, it wasn't all that bad… but the owl was far from impressed.

"You're not very bright, are you?"

Wow. Those were harsh words to speak to someone who was, in her opinion, the second smartest person in this very group. The comment, of course, didn't sit well with the warrior, who scowled as the owl welcomed them into the Library and left them to their own devices.

"Bright enough to fool you," he said, bitterly, before setting out to rummage through the Library's contents.

The owl's comment had unsettled Azula too… though she wasn't entirely sure why it bothered her so much. She felt an impulse to reassure him, even if she wasn't sure it would be welcome: she did think he was smart. If anything, that owl appeared rather foolish to her for not being able to see it. And yet every time she wanted to speak out, she failed to find the strength to utter the words: why? Was it because they were too honest, this time around? What was wrong with her? Was she…?

… She wasn't. There was no way she was developing actual, serious feelings for this boy, was she?

Yet she kept following him through the Library, watching as he stuffed his bag with scrolls, and she watched with curiosity until he shot her a sharp glare.

"What? You think I shouldn't do this?" he asked.

"I wasn't judging you in the least, no," Azula said, blinking blankly. "Did you think I was?"

"… Maybe?" Sokka pouted, skulking towards another area of the Library.

"If anything, I'd think it's fair. After that owl's comment about you, I'd gladly ransack this place, too."

Sokka slowed on his footsteps and glanced at her with uncertainty from over his shoulder. Azula blinked blankly: had she said anything wrong? She had hoped to have conveyed her feelings nonchalantly enough that he might not suspect she had any deep motivations to speak them…

"You… you're really something, huh?" Sokka said, lowering his gaze. "You do remember, right? That… we're supposed to be enemies?"

"You think I'd forget?" she asked, though her heart sank at that question. That had to mean she was developing a stupid, one-sided attachment, right?

"W-well, it's just… when you say stuff like that, I end up thinking, well… stupid things, I guess," Sokka sighed. "Things I shouldn't. Especially not after… everything."

"Everything?" Azula asked, blinking blankly as she stared at his back. "Well… granted we didn't start off with the right foot, but… I thought we were getting along better lately. That you were happy I'd stood between you and an angry moose-lion? I wouldn't be surprised if you decided my being Fire Nation makes all that worthless, but…"

"It doesn't make it worthless, it makes it… complicated," Sokka said, gritting his teeth. "But that's not it. Not really."

"Then…?" Azula asked, raising her eyebrows.

"I… look, I don't want to talk about this, usually," he said, breathing deeply. "And I don't know if you'd understand, anyway. But I… lost someone. Someone I liked, a lot. It happened in the Siege of the North, and… it still hurts. And sometimes when I look at you, I remember how that felt, and it's great for a second until I suddenly just think…"

"That you shouldn't be feeling this way about anyone else?" Azula ventured, warily. Yet, to her surprise, Sokka shook his head.

"That I shouldn't be feeling this way about someone I'll probably lose too, anyway," he said. "You know why we're here. You know what we're doing. You know I'll fight the Fire Nation, no matter which side you choose to stand on. And… no matter how friendly we've been, you'll choose your own people, won't you? Just… as I'd choose my own, if our situation were reversed somehow. There's… there's no happy ending for this, is there?"

Azula gritted her teeth, frowning… no, no, there wasn't. But… did this mean he liked her too, to a fault? He'd be the first boy to ever… no, the very first person she'd know for a fact had ever liked her, in whatever sense of the word. Was it wrong to fixate upon that now, when he was stating something as important as this? They were enemies, no matter what came next…

For she couldn't turn against her father, could she? She couldn't just become a traitor… she couldn't turn against her people.

Not even for the first boy she had ever grown to like this way.

"I'm not saying we can't be… well… okay, I don't know what we can't be, to be honest," Sokka sighed, turning towards her once she stayed silent for too long. "Or what we can be, either. But you'll want to stop us from attacking your nation, and we just want to set the world free of the Fire Nation's control. We want balance back. And unless you're having second thoughts about your life's mission… I don't know how things will work, from this point onwards."

Azula sighed but shrugged. Sokka gulped as she raised her shackled hands in a gesture of surrender.

"You're not wrong. Not in the least. If you want the truth? I… was trying to get to you. I thought maybe befriending a member of your group would be the best way to break out of this imprisonment, somehow. So… you don't have to worry about a thing. I was completely dishonest the whole time."

"Huh… the whole time?" Sokka asked, though his voice carried a tinge of disappointment that took Azula aback. It wasn't a surprised disappointment… but rather, an expected one.

"You… knew, didn't you? That this was why I…?" Azula said. He shrugged.

"I guessed. I hoped otherwise, but… what's the point?" he smiled sadly, shrugging again. "That… makes it easier, doesn't it? Because the whole time, I knew that was probably what you were after, so…"

"So, we were on the same page" Azula determined. Sokka nodded, too.

"Good thing we cleared the air," he said. She nodded.

"Then, I… will leave you to your research, whatever it may be," she said, simply. "I… will go do something else, in the meantime."

She walked away quickly, wondering if he'd call for her or stop her, anything dramatic and apparently romantic as that… and of course, it didn't happen. Ugh, she was an idiot. She was an idiot. Her heart was beating so sadly… why would a heart beat sadly? That made no sense! And yet each miserable beat seemed to propel nothing but misery through her system. Idiot… she really had grown fond of him. Too fond. What was wrong with her? What kind of fool grew to like the person who had taken them captive?

But she knew why… she did. He was the first person to laugh loudly at her jokes, and his smiles were the warmest that had ever been directed towards her. He was sharp, just as she was… he was strategic, cold-blooded, analytical. All of that sat well with her. Too well, if anything. But perhaps that was wrong, wasn't it? It had to be. Surely their similarities, the ones she had been surprised to discover existed between them, weren't all that strong in the end… or, if they were, weren't conducive to a good relationship. Yes, that was it. That was certainly the likeliest of truths. But… it wouldn't hurt to confirm it.

The disaster began when she was halfway through scouring across the romance section, seeking any books or scrolls on compatibility: the building trembled suddenly, and sand leaked through the walls. The whole group seemed ready to scram, and she caught up with them… just in time for Sokka and Aang to race back inside, and for Katara and the damn professor to stay behind.

"What is going on?!" Azula asked. Katara gasped, eyeing her warily.

"And to think… I took for granted you'd be the one to cause more trouble around here!" she admitted, with an apologetic grimace. "Run! We have to keep him distracted!"

"The giant OWL?!" Azula asked, astonished. Katara huffed.

"Who else?!" she asked.

Azula huffed, wondering what to do. There had to be a strong enough distraction, something that the creature would be too incensed by to remember it was chasing any of them…

Oh. Well, that was a risky gambit, but it was worth trying anyway.

"Katara! Remove these shackles, now!"

"Are you sure about what you were saying before you found that paper, Sokka?" Aang asked, as they moved the dials of the calendar in the planetarium room. "I know what you mean that it's probably better to let her go, but… are you really sure? You seem to really get along with Azula!"

"And that's going to be a problem in the future, don't you think?!" Sokka squeaked, eyeing the dials anxiously – not close enough, another attempt, maybe the next date would do…

"Well… I don't know how it's not going to be one, if anything," Aang said. Sokka scowled.

"What'd you mean by…? Oh, we're close!" he exclaimed. "Next one!"

"I mean… you're already so worried about her that you're pulling away in fear of getting hurt, or hurting her!" Aang said. "You really think seeing her off will change that? You're still going to care, if we bump into her in a battlefield! That's not going to change now!"

Sokka gritted his teeth and eyed Aang with uncertainty as he pulled the lever one last time. Why was that little guy so wise when he shouldn't be? Yes, at this point, he'd definitely hesitate if he found Azula in a battlefield. He'd never have the guts to go through with fighting her at his best… and then she'd kill him, surely, because she was raised to uphold her nation above all else. There was no reason for her to hold back… especially when her apparent interest in him had been feigned just to obtain a fleeting friendship that would buy her way out of the group.

Which… he had been about to give her.

Was he really about to give the girl the chance to fulfill her plan perfectly?

"It's this one, Sokka! Look, it matches!"

He hadn't even noticed the planetarium's lights were dimmer this time. He made sure to jot down the right date for the eclipse and then he dragged Aang out of the room at haste… only to find something was very, very wrong in the Library now.

"YOU MONSTERS! CRIMINALS! YOU DEFILE MY VAST COLLECTION FOR THE LAST TIME!"

"What…?" Aang gasped: the owl's voice seemed to come from the lowest depths of the Library. Was he truly down there, rather than chasing Katara up here?

They reached the landing where they'd left the rope… to find only Katara and Zei nearby. Sokka's heart nearly stopped.

"Where's Azula?!"

"She's…!" Katara grimaced, glancing downwards…

An inferno of orange flames burned brightly down below. Aang and Sokka gasped: they had found out about the burning of the Library's collection of the Fire Nation… and they knew exactly how angry Wan Shi Tong would be upon losing more of his collection now.

"What…?! What's she doing, hell…?!" Sokka exclaimed, clasping the railings of the Library's topmost floor glancing down at the inferno below before shouting: "AZULA!"

He wouldn't have believed it if he hadn't seen it: a sudden speck of blue in the sea of orange took him by surprise, more so when it continued to increase in size, constantly: was she jetting herself out of the Library's basement?

"She's coming back! Oh, she's actually…!" Katara gasped.

"We need to get out of here!" Aang said, unfolding his glider. "Grab onto the rope, Katara, Sokka, Professor Zei! I'll fly us all out as fast as I can!"

"Oh, but…" the professor hesitated… when there was no time to hesitate at all: Sokka and Katara clasped the rope they'd used earlier, glancing at the man in chagrin. "I won't find another collection like this. I'd much rather stay…"

"Are you kidding me…?!" Sokka exclaimed, but Katara gritted her teeth and urged him to grab onto the rope tight… for Aang was pulling at it already. "Professor Zei! You're going to die if you stay there!"

"Sokka, there's no point…" Katara said, gritting her teeth as they flew off… as the rope dangled before Zei, and he refused to take it.

And it turned out to be a good thing, for by the time Aang, Katara and Sokka had only just reached the exit, Azula was about to catch up to them: half the rope caught fire, and she nearly tore the whole window to shambles when her explosive firebending brought her out of the Library in a hurry.

She tried to ease her fall into the sand, but it wasn't easy. She could hear Sokka calling for her – was he for real? Was he really worried about her…? Oh dear, why was her heart beating that much faster upon that thought…? – but the adrenaline and the excitement over what she'd done was still bursting through her as she landed rather wildly on the sand. It hurt, she was definitely going to bear a few nasty bruises… but she'd be okay. She'd distracted the damn owl, and now…

"Azula!"

Two hands caught her shoulders, and suddenly she was being hugged. Hugged. When the blazes had someone hugged her this tightly, this intimately before?

Surely Katara could tell this was a rather awkward situation for her, as she returned Azula's near-frightened gaze with her own… though Aang wasn't quite so interested in whatever was happening with them. No, he had much bigger concerns in mind, for now that the Library was gone, there was no one but them and Toph in the wide expanse of the desert:

"Where's Appa?"

If she'd decided to bet on it, she would've sooner thought the first member of this strange team to lose its mind and decide to lash out at everyone aggressively would be the damn lemur.

That Aang would be distraught by the loss of his bison wasn't quite that impossible to understand. That he would unleash that frustration upon his friends, though, took Azula by surprise: even goody-two-shoes like him had dark sides, then? And yet he hadn't even asked about whether or not she was okay after her rough landing, disregarding how Sokka had demanded she was kept unshackled before helping her walk through the desert, an arm around her waist, and also disregarding Azula's rejection of Katara's offer for waterbending healing, for the Princess suspected that, without the damn massive hairy creature, they'd be stuck in a desert for eons, and wasting what little water they had on healing a few bruises seemed a bad idea.

And where she had expected Sokka to push her away, now he seemed to be doing the exact opposite. Why? It made no sense. Not that she needed it to, she rather liked being held by him… somewhat. She guessed. It was comfortable. That was all there was to it. Yet their last conversation hadn't been that friendly, and now he seemed to be protecting her with all his might…?

"Are you… alright?" she asked him. Sokka blinked blankly and gazed at her with unexpected shyness. "You're being, well…"

"I'm trying to help. I mean… it's my fault you set the Library on fire," Sokka grimaced. "And then you got hurt. I… I'm sorry."

"Ah? Then going back inside instead of running away when the damn building started to sink was your idea?" Azula said, huffing sarcastically. "Had I known it was you and not Aang I wouldn't have burned anything at all…"

He laughed and shook his head, and she smiled. It was weird… but it felt like they were back on track, suddenly. Maybe they wouldn't become anything else… but this was fine. This worked, for now.

Of course, what was happening with the rest of the team was a whole different story: Toph was riddled with guilt over not being able to stop the sandbenders from stealing Appa, Katara was confused over whatever was brewing between her brother and Azula, but more than that, she was aghast by Aang's terrible mood, too. He had taken to gliding frantically, searching for the bison to no avail. The sandbenders were gone… as was his best friend.

"Katara, can I have some more water?" Toph asked, suddenly. Katara warned her against consuming too much of it, and Azula agreed, silently, despite she accepted the small amount of water Katara offered each of them through her bending.

"Can't be that healthy to drink someone's bending water, huh…?" Sokka reasoned, before making a face of disgust. "Ugh! You used this on the swamp guy!"

"No wonder it tastes swampy," Toph said.

"Well, there's not much I can do about that. We can't find much water around here, can we?" Katara said, gazing around at the endless expanse of desert before them…

"Maybe we can!" Sokka exclaimed suddenly, beaming. "Look!"

He grinned before releasing Azula from his hold just to rush towards a cactus he'd spotted not too far from where they stood. Well, there was water inside plants, why deny that? And yet…

"You shouldn't eat strange plants, Sokka!" Katara told him: Sokka had already taken to slicing the cactus with his weapons, though, offering her a glimpse of the watery interior.

"I know it's not every day this happens… but I agree with Katara for once," Azula said, watching Sokka with uncertainty: Momo had taken to drinking with him, of course… that damn creature was a menace, Azula was certain of it.

"It's very thirst quenching, Azula!" Sokka grinned, motioning at her to approach him. "Come on, it'll do wonders for you, especially after all you bent in the…"

He stopped talking suddenly, only for his body to start reacting rather weirdly to the juice he'd just ingested: his pupils dilated, he shook his head violently, he smiled awkwardly, some of the juice trickled down to his chin…

"Drink cactus juice! It'll quench ya'! It's the quenchiest!"

Both Azula and Katara stared at him in chagrin… while Toph merely raised her eyebrows, entirely confused by what her feet were sensing: was Sokka waggling like a worm on the sand, for some reason…?

"Okay, that's definitely too much for you," said Katara, grimacing. "We have to keep moving on."

"Hey, who lit Toph on fire?" Sokka asked suddenly, before turning towards Azula. "It was YOU?!"

"U-uh, no? I didn't light anything on fire…! In the last, uh, two hours?" Azula said, blinking blankly…

And yet Sokka didn't seem to be all that appalled by the notion of her setting anything on fire. Instead, he was smiling brightly at her, and that only felt more ominous than anything else.

"You know what?!" he exclaimed. "Your fire's WATER TRIBE! Can you believe that, huh, huh?! You're Water Tribe, deep down! I knew that was why I got you so well, eh, eh, Azula?! You're like… wham! And I'm just… whosh! I melt in your hands, girl!"

"You… what? I have absolutely no idea what you're trying to say… and I'm not sure I want to," Azula swallowed hard, as Sokka waved his arms around recklessly.

"Oh, you know what I'm saying! You should marry me!"

The words stunned the three girls, outright. Sokka only smiled carelessly… while the lemur twitched awkwardly behind him. Azula's face was rather red now… and not precisely because of the sunburns a whole day in the desert would result in.

"Y-y-you… that's not a proposal, is it? Or is…?" Azula said, blinking blankly.

"You know what? I want some of that cactus thing," Toph decided, beaming. Katara flinched.

"Not a chance, Toph. I think one love-crazed, cactus-addled weirdo is enough for today…"

"Hey! I'm not in love with any of you, I won't start proposing willy-nilly…"

Azula stared at Sokka again, utterly blown away by their words: in love…? Was Sokka…? No. That wasn't right. That made no sense. That was just a weird joke between friends, wasn't it…? Just as the jokes she'd usually pull on Zuko and Mai back when they were kids…? For they couldn't be serious. Sokka couldn't be serious. The cactus juice was messing with his head… or was it making him more honest than he was before?

Suddenly, a gust of wind, and a rush of sand dust, startled the whole group: they turned towards its source to find it appeared something had exploded deeper in the desert, perhaps, by the pattern of the shifting sand…

"What's that?" Katara asked.

"N-no idea," Azula mumbled, quickly. It was a good idea to change the subject, yes. Weird sand clouds were much more intriguing and important than whether Sokka loved her or not…

"It's a giant mushroom! Maybe it's friendly!"

… Upon hearing those words, Azula's mild suspicions that maybe he was serious about his proposal went up in smoke, vanishing without trace, much as the giant mushroom had.

"Shouldn't have given you that much credit," Azula sighed, looking at Sokka. "Hey. We should get moving. No point in admiring the mushroom anymore."

"Oh! Okay! Let's do something else now!" Sokka decided, beaming.

She didn't foolishly believe she could anticipate to any of Sokka's weird decisions or words while he was in this strange, intoxicated state…

… And yet she never would have expected his new idea would be to kiss her.

Her face flushed red violently, more so when she heard Katara gasping behind her.

"Is he waving at the giant mushroom again…?" Toph asked, but Katara didn't appear to want to respond… not even when Sokka pulled away at last, beaming.

"You taste better than cactus juice!" he declared.

"Y-you…! T-that was my first…!" she exclaimed, blushing madly as she covered her mouth with her hands. "You're…! At the very least you should've had the decency to do that while you were on your right mind!"

"Oh, you didn't like it?" Sokka asked, blinking blankly as he tilted his head sideways. "Must be you need to drink cactus juice too! It's the quenchi-…!"

Azula smacked the small plant bowl he'd held in his hand so far, doing away with the remaining cactus juice, and Sokka gasped, digging at the sand desperately as though searching for the now lost liquid that had leaked through the ground.

"Nooooo! We're dooooomed!" he exclaimed. Despite the situation had been rather strange, Katara laughed softly now, and Azula only rolled her eyes and scowled at the foolish boy she certainly liked far better than she ever should have.

Yet as difficult as it was to navigate the desert for hours with an awkwardly rambling companion such as Sokka, it seemed to Azula his nonsense made the matter livelier, kisses or no… especially when Aang returned. He had been rather unpleasant about collecting water from a cloud that crossed the sky, right under the moon… namely because he had hopelessly thought it was his bison. Yet Azula's attention was caught by something else: Sokka's comment.

"Why would Princess Yue need Appa? She's the moon! She flies by herself!"

She had read reports of what had happened up north. Her father had briefed her of it directly, too. At one point, the moon had been blocked, its influence faded, all because of Admiral Zhao's decisions, apparently… she had thought it was a nonsensical claim, for waterbenders losing their power completely? It sounded like a rather helpful phenomenon, but a confusing one too. How had it come to pass at all…? Especially when it hadn't lasted very long, too: the waterbenders were back on track not long after, and the battle was lost.

According to her father, Admiral Zhao meant to destroy the Moon Spirit that day. Whatever that meant. She had given the matter little credit at the time, but was the Moon Spirit this Princess Yue…?

She resolved to ask Katara once they had a chance to take a light break, upon bumping into a sand glider that Aang helped steer most unwillingly. The waterbender was busy watching the compass, ensuring their course was true, and Azula offered to support her with that, for it was better to talk to someone rational than to talk to Sokka right now…

"What, exactly, happened with this Princess Yue?" she asked. Katara froze, glancing at her warily.

"You're wondering… why, exactly?" she asked.

"He brought up that he lost someone before. He didn't elaborate," Azula explained. "I didn't know what he meant, but… it surprised me a little to hear him talk about the Northern Water Tribe's Princess."

"Well… Sokka had a thing for her," Katara said. Azula damn near cursed herself for feeling disappointed upon hearing those words, even if she already knew them to be true. "But she was supposed to marry someone else? And yeah, I do think she liked him too, but… then she became the moon and there was no way they'd be together anymore."

"She became… the moon?" Azula said, with an awkward grin.

"She explained that she was stillborn," Katara said. "And then the Moon Spirit touched her when she was a baby: it brought her to life or so. When Zhao killed the Moon Spirit, she gave her own life to remediate things… she took the Moon Spirit's place and sacrificed herself to save everyone."

"And… she left Sokka? Just like that?" Azula asked, puzzled. Katara shrugged.

"She had a duty. He understood," Katara said, simply.

A duty. A duty to her people… to fulfill what was expected from her. And in the process, she had surely broken the heart of the boy she liked, even if she had never meant to.

No wonder Sokka had claimed to be ready to let her go even before anything serious started between them, too.

He was still his most carelessly goofy self as they traveled across the desert, but Azula found herself looking at him with different eyes now. How odd that a young man with such heavy burdens could be so reckless and silly when he wanted to… her lips still tingled where he'd kissed them. Ugh, it wasn't something she should be thinking about fondly, of course not… but that he might truly like her was still a most dazzling concept, one she wasn't sure how to cope with yet, let alone now that she understood the true source of his apprehensions.

She ended up finding a way to cope with it by watching over him once they stopped at a massive rock their compass led them to: Sokka claimed he felt better, but upon attempting to taste a gross substance on the wall, Azula decided he simply wasn't recovered yet. She slapped his hand violently and he gasped as she pulled him towards her.

"No eating weird sticky nonsense that's stuck to a cavern's walls!" she growled. He blinked blankly, staring into her eyes with innocent confusion.

"Why not…?" he said.

"Because if that tastes like crap and you kiss me again, I'll set you on fire," Azula declared.

"And I don't think anyone will stop her this time, Sokka," Katara smirked. Toph snickered too as Sokka winced… and yet he found Azula had taken his hand in hers, pulling him through the cavern with her.

"You're just… going to hold my hand now?"

"I can't trust you to behave yourself if I don't," Azula said, curtly, hoping not to betray just how nervous she was about acting this way…

Yet she could see, from the corner of her eyes, when Sokka bit his lip and smiled. Was he happy to hold her hand…? Or was he simply happy that someone was looking after him so closely, protecting him, when he was always the protector…?

She couldn't help but continue defending him once the buzzard wasps attacked: she shielded him with her body, even using her fire to chase away the beasts. Busy as she was ensuring the groggy Sokka wasn't hurt, she couldn't do anything to protect the damn lemur – she KNEW he'd be trouble eventually, damn little thing – when one of the buzzard wasps took him away. Katara was busy serving as Toph's eyes, just as Azula had taken to shielding Sokka herself, so it was Aang who saved him… rather violently too. But when the Avatar and the lemur returned to the team, and the buzzard wasps appeared to gear up to continue their attacks, towers of sand chased away the creatures… and that was when the sandbenders had appeared.

Tired as she was, puzzled by too many things at once, Azula barely paid attention to the exchange, checking on Sokka to ensure he was okay… and then the most terrifying of all moments began when the Avatar lost his temper completely.

This time, however, Sokka took to protecting her: he had seen this before, Azula realized. He collected Toph too, one arm around each of them, and helped them get away from the whirlwind of wild sand, stirred by the savagely furious Avatar. It was a display of power unlike anything Azula had seen, and she could barely take her eyes away from him: he had been so small, so innocent in her eyes, merely twenty-four hours ago… and suddenly he was the most punishing force of nature she had ever witnessed. Suddenly he wasn't just a symbol of everything her father had raised her to defeat, a potentially dangerous bender… no, he was already as dangerous as he pleased. And, as powerful as Fire Lord Ozai was… could he ever go against someone with such unnatural, otherworldly bending and win? Even if he was but a twelve-year-old boy?

Somehow, Katara managed to calm him down, if it could be called that. All the while, Sokka held Azula closely, her face pressed against his chest, his heartbeats reassuring her, despite she was anything but soothed… despite she suddenly found her world had taken yet another tumble on that chaotic, catastrophic day, and she wasn't sure how she'd compose it, or herself, ever again.

Finding water again was so refreshing, and drinking it cleared his mind completely, it seemed to Sokka. Katara was far more cheerful now, though that she decided to jump into the water by doing what she had called a "waterbending bomb" was probably not the best use of her improved mood – she soaked the maps Sokka had stolen from the Library, and she had to dry them under her brother's fierce glare.

All the while, though, one member of their group was unexpectedly aloof… and perhaps self-conscious. She had washed, rinsing off the dirt and dust from days on the road, but she hadn't joined the others at playing in the water. Sokka had expected her to join him in deciding which route to take to Ba Sing Se, where they hoped to find Appa… but so far, nothing. She had never been this distant, and she sat at a distance as a group of refugees, passing through the area, offered them useful information regarding a secret way into Ba Sing Se that the Fire Nation was fully unaware of. Even once they started on their way to Full Moon Bay, she was quiet and distant still, walking at some distance from the rest of the group.

"Say, uh… you two talked a bunch, while I was cactus-juice addled?" Sokka asked his sister casually, once he pulled her away from chatting with the refugees they'd just met. "I think, at least? I don't really remember most of what happened anymore, but…"

"Ah, you're not sure why she's being all that distant and weird now? Probably because you kissed her without permission," Katara declared, beaming. Sokka's jaw dropped. "Not that I know for sure if she's mad about that, but you know… surely doesn't help much, does it?"

"I…! Oh, no. She'll hate me now, won't she?" he groaned. "But… wait, when did I do that, again?"

"At the start? You'd just drank the damn thing and then you said you melted in her hands? You were being really weird about her," Katara said, smirking. Sokka raised an eyebrow in Katara's direction.

"And that… somehow doesn't bother you that much?" he asked. "I thought you didn't like her."

"Well, it's hard not to like the only other person who wasn't completely helpless while we traveled through the desert," Katara sighed. "Besides… I mean, yeah, she wasn't nice at first, and she did chase us, but she's definitely never done anything as bad as Zuko did. She's been with us for a while, she's not chained down anymore, and she's still done nothing to hurt any of us. I don't know, Sokka… maybe she's not that bad."

"I agree," he said, smiling at her. "I… I really think she isn't, either. Though, well, I guess we could be wrong. But the way she helped distract that owl, and she's tried to help keep me safe so many times… it's weird, you know? She jumps in front of me all the time…"

"She probably likes you too, see?" said Katara, smirking. "Which… I guess, from a rational point of view, it might not be a great thing? I mean, I know why you'd be apprehensive, Sokka, and if you think this isn't worth trying it's okay, but… I'd expected worse from the Fire Lord's daughter."

"Yeah… me too," Sokka smiled, glancing at the Princess, who walked far ahead of him and Katara.

"Just… talk to her? I guess?" said Katara, shrugging. "Maybe you still have a shot, somehow."

"Even if I kissed her when I shouldn't have, huh…?" he mused.

There were several reasons why he wasn't all that sure about this… and yet whenever he thought back to the past weeks of being allied with Azula, he couldn't help but feel warmth nestling in his chest. She was something else, wasn't she? And he… he was very much attached to her now, whether it was wise or not. Whether he had tried to push her away or not. And if he ever kissed her again… well, he'd make sure it was the right way, this time around.

He decided to talk to her once they reached the ferry station: Azula had been unusually quiet so far, and he guessed it was time he apologized for the cactus juice mess, anyway.

"Uh… hey, Azula?" he called her, unusually shyly, as they lagged behind at the end of their group: the station was very crowded, but they managed to find the line to request for passports anyway. "I, uh, wanted to say I was sorry for troubling you back in the desert. I didn't mean to, but… I guess I did a lot of things I shouldn't have."

"Oh?" Azula raised her eyebrows, intrigued by his words. "Such as…?"

"W-well… I shouldn't have had cactus juice, for starters," he smiled awkwardly. "And I shouldn't have, well, kissed you without asking…?"

"Without… asking?" Azula repeated. Sokka's face flushed. "So… you think it's fine if you ask?"

"W-well! Only if you say I can, even if I ask. T-that is. Well. I think so?" he said, swallowing hard.

Azula blinked blankly at the taller boy. He was so nervous… so endearing, too. She certainly didn't expect to grow genuinely fond of him, and she had resisted the notion for a while… but she was inevitably interested in him now. And his babbling wasn't helping matters at all.

"Hmm… well. I guess… I'll have to think on that permission, then. Just as that woman seems to be thinking about ours," Azula said, grimacing. "If only this were the Fire Nation, we'd be on a ferry by now just because I'm here…"

"Heh, yeah. No doubt," Sokka smiled awkwardly. "Though… we should try to not let anyone know you're Fire Nation, you know? A lot of people here probably were fleeing the consequences of the war, and if they knew…"

"Ah, true enough. Can you lend me your clothes?"

Sokka froze in place, staring at Azula in disbelief as she smirked teasingly at him. Yet she didn't take her words back.

"I mean… you lent me your sleeping bag before. I suppose your clothes will be smelly too… but no one would assume I'm Fire Nation Royalty if I'm smelly, right?" she said. Sokka's face was redder and redder by the minute.

She couldn't help but laugh as he failed to find words to respond with. Flustered as he was, he stared at her with disbelieving amazement, ignoring that Toph was securing passports for them to cross Full Moon Bay… and also ignoring that someone had walked up to him suddenly.

Azula frowned when the female guard suddenly forced Sokka to turn towards her: she was immediately tempted to jump between them, again finding protective instincts triggered when Sokka was concerned… did that guard think he was a criminal? Did they realize that whatever story Toph had fed the woman at the passport counter was bullshit…?

"Tickets and passports," said the girl. Sokka blinked blankly, inching away from her.

"Uh… I don't have mine right now. Go ask our, uh, team leader? Toph, over there," he said, before turning to Azula again. "Y-you don't really… I mean, if you'd told me you wanted to wear my clothes I would've washed them more thoroughly! We were at that waterfall, it would've been a good idea…"

"I was… messing with you," Azula said, smiling awkwardly: the girl behind Sokka appeared utterly perplexed by how he'd disregarded her words… and by the contents of the ones he was saying to his companion, too. "Is something wrong?"

"U-uh, no, I mean… no," said the girl, smiling dryly. Sokka glanced at her once more and she bit her lip. "You really… don't remember me?"

"… Am I supposed to?" he said, with an awkward smile. "Sorry?"

Azula covered her mouth with a hand, attempting not to laugh too boldly as the guard grimaced and sighed, walking away, defeated by Sokka's apparent forgetfulness. He turned towards Azula again, utterly perplexed.

"I… don't know what that was about," he said. "B-but anyway…!"

"I only hope she's not someone you kissed once too and then proceeded to forget about for no reason," Azula smiled. Sokka scoffed.

"Hell, no! I'm sure I don't know her!" he declared, pouting. "I've never seen that face before!"

And it wasn't a lie, not truly: never seeing Suki without Kyoshi Warrior makeup certainly hadn't prepared him for recognizing her without it – or without stronger clues aside from that confusing teasing.

The mood between Sokka and Azula appeared to make more sense now, although the underlying tension remained: Azula wasn't happy, however, when Aang determined they would give up their comfortable trips on the ferry for the sake of traveling across the dangerous Serpent's Pass with the same refugees from before. Sokka appeared just as miserable about the loss of their tickets and passports… and just as paranoid about the Serpent's Pass once they started to traverse it: at one point rocks nearly crushed them, and he shielded Azula with his body while Toph spared them from the falling rocks.

"Thanks, Toph…" Azula said, trying not to be flustered as Sokka pulled away slightly.

"U-uh… didn't mean to… yeah. Well. You're okay, though… right?" he said, biting his lip. Azula nodded weakly.

"You two need to climb a tree," Toph sighed shaking her head. The two of them shot her a confused glance. "You know? That song, people climb trees and make out there or whatever…?"

"Toph!"

She whistled carelessly as she walked past them, leaving Sokka and Azula flustered before each other. It wasn't enough, of course, that things were slightly awkward between them… their friends, naturally, had to make it worse.

But not a lot could make matters worse for Azula, as things stood. Once they made camp at last, in the middle of the night, she sat gazing into the line of the horizon, where the dark sky and the Mo Ce Sea seemed to merge together. The moon, Yue, as she'd finally come to know, hovered there… perhaps watching. Perhaps wondering if she could be half as good for that boy as she might have been. Perhaps knowing that Azula was plagued by the exact same conflict that had stolen her away from him…

And just thinking about him seemed to summon him: Sokka bit his lip as he took his seat beside her. He cleared his throat awkwardly before finally blurting out the actual words he'd wanted to say all day.

"What's bothering you?"

Azula raised her eyebrows and glanced at him. Awkward as he was, his eyes were full of concern.

"I… just can tell you're not okay. You're really quiet, and… well, I guess maybe it's because of how things turned out at the Library? Maybe it's because you don't want to enter an Earth Kingdom city…"

"There's a lot of reasons why I'm not okay," Azula said, simply, rubbing the bridge of her nose with her fingertips. "But… I guess the moon up there is the bigger one."

"The… moon?" Sokka said, gulping. "Huh… you talked to Katara about Yue, didn't you?"

"I'm not going to be an unreasonable asshole… I won't say that because I fancy you, you should've never had any history with anyone else before you met me," Azula said, with a sad grin. "If that's what you thought, anyway. But… I think once she told me about this, I understood. She's the reason why you tried to push me away in the Library, isn't she?"

"N-not for the reasons you might think," Sokka said, gritting his teeth. "It's not that I… that I don't like you as much as I did her, or anything like that. I just…"

"You don't want to lose anyone else the same way you did her. And you'd lose me, for sure."

Sokka gritted his teeth, his fists tightening. Azula breathed out slowly, gazing at the sky.

"I've gotten too caught up in this weird adventure," she said. "It's… nothing like I'd anticipated my first big mission would turn out. I thought I'd be successful, that I'd catch my brother and uncle, defeat the Avatar, overtake the whole Earth Kingdom singlehandedly… and so far, none of that has happened. Instead… I became a prisoner. And I… ended up befriending my captors, to the point where… where I don't even try to run away despite I'm no longer in chains."

"It wasn't that bad, though, was it?" Sokka asked.

"No. But it will be bad, in the future," she said, gazing at him earnestly. "I don't know what I mean to you… but I do know that I'm not much better than your Princess Yue. My loyalty is for my nation. I… I intend to fight by my father's side. Even if we're friends… even if we're more than that, as soon as I can find anyone trustworthy, I'd double-cross you. And then we'd be back to being enemies. And…"

"And?" Sokka said, his voice sad… though he was immediately alarmed by the chagrin on Azula's face.

"And… your Avatar? He… he's going to kill my father, isn't he?"

The question took Sokka by surprise. His eyes widened… for he had never thought of the Fire Lord as someone's father. As someone anyone genuinely cared about. And yet Azula's anguished face spoke lengths about how much he meant to her.

"It doesn't matter how hard we fight, how we push to win the war… I saw what he did when he lost his temper with those sandbenders," Azula said, gritting her teeth. "Not even with Sozin's Comet's return will we be able to stop him if he's trained enough by then. There's… there's no point, There's no happy ending, you said it yourself. And with him… I'll go down, too."

"N-no! No, Aang would never…!" Sokka started, but he froze: yes, Aang would have to kill Fire Lord Ozai, he had always assumed as much. Defeating him would likely require more than just demanding for his surrender. There was no chance in hell Ozai would step down for less than death… and yet: "He'd never hurt you. He'd never be able to hurt someone who was his friend."

"Not even if that friend is fighting alongside a man who'd do a lot worse to him than steal his sky bison?" Azula asked, eyeing Sokka in disbelief. "On top of that, I… I don't even know how I'll ever… how I'll ever fight you guys, if it comes to that. Any of you. I've learned so much about your skills, your abilities, your strengths and weaknesses… and I don't want to even picture going against you anymore. I…"

"Then don't picture it. Don't oppose us!" Sokka said, reaching for her hands with his. Azula blinked at the contact and gazed at him in confused disbelief. "Look… you don't want your dad to die? I get that. I don't want mine to die either. Granted, the war's not my dad's fault but… never mind, that's not the point! The thing is… Aang is a pacifist. He's a good kid. If it comes to it, maybe he won't want to kill your dad at all, and he'll find another way. We can all find other ways! You… you know him. You know your father better than anyone! If you want things to change, if you don't want us to defeat your nation, then… help us!"

"How does that make any sense…?" Azula asked, Sokka shook his head.

"Work with us," Sokka said. "See the world with us. Understand how many mistakes the Fire Nation made. And then, when we go see the Fire Lord… you can help him see reason. And if he won't? Then… we can try to defeat him without killing him. And you can take his place."

"I… what?!" Azula exclaimed. Her sadness was now replaced by utter disbelief. Sokka smiled awkwardly.

"Look… this is crazy, you and me. Maybe it's… too fast? Though, it was really fast with me and Yue too, so I don't know how to go slow, if anything" he chuckled "But I don't know how I'd fight against you either… not for real. I want you on my team. I want to be in yours. And heck… as big and burly and strong as the Fire Nation has tried to be, if you can tell already that the Avatar is going to overcome everything and bring back balance, what's the point of fighting? Your people will pay the price if the war continues to escalate and if Aang's involved, it will be turned against the Fire Nation eventually, just as it was in the North Pole. There can be a happy ending, Azula, if the war just… ends. If we don't have to go that far to make it stop. Look, I hate your dad… but if you can make him pull back his army and make amends as best he can for all the harm he and his forefathers did, I'd never ask for his death. I wouldn't need it. I don't need him to die, I just… I just need the world to make sense again. I just need a world where people don't have to die like Yue did. A world where… where I wouldn't lose you the way I lost her."

Azula didn't say anything for a moment, despite Sokka was gazing at her intensely, holding her hand as he was. He bit his lip at her silence, unsure of what to do… until she leaned closer, her lips hovering inches from his…

And then she lowered her head, pressing her face to his shoulder instead. Sokka bit his lip as her hand tightened around his, as her eyes closed tightly.

"You don't have to make a choice right away, right now," Sokka whispered, his thumb stroking the back of her hand. "But… you can choose anyway. Whatever Aang says or thinks… as far as I'm concerned, destiny can change if you want it to. If you fight to make it so."

Destiny…? Was that truly what guided them? Was there a force that kept them locked into set decisions and choices… or were they altering the world with each new step they took to oppose what was expected of them?

Azula raised her gaze, finding Sokka still watched her. She gritted her teeth before leaning in far more decisively: her lips brushed his lightly, and this time he kissed her wholeheartedly, no longer in as clumsy and silly a manner as he had while drinking cactus juice. That had still thrilled her when it happened, despite she hadn't wanted to feel giddy about it… but this? His arms held her closer, and her heart was beating so fast she thought it would burst from her chest. She liked this… she liked him. She really liked him.

Maybe she felt something stronger than that, even. For it seemed so did he.

She probably should have been losing her mind about how absurd it was to fall in love with the enemy. About how ridiculous it was to find herself so appealed by a Water Tribesman she had barely known for a few weeks. About how outrageous it would be that the exemplary, ideal Princess Azula had cast everything into the wind, forsaking all notions of being saved, of being found, of being her father's perfect child and heir… but somehow, the heart she had kept in check for so long was beating powerfully anew, filling her very soul with emotions and feelings that floored her. Emotions that she had thought she'd never feel… let alone for someone who embodied everything she should have never loved at all.

And yet that didn't stop her from falling asleep holding his hand that night. It didn't stop her from walking with him the next day, sharing awkward smiles, as she pondered her future some more. As she reasoned that there were so many choices left ahead of her: she could still push him away, if anything compelled her to… she could run away in Ba Sing Se, if she wanted to. Just so… she could stay, if she wanted to.

Granted, things weren't quite so cheerful anymore when the giant serpent attacked. That was quite the disaster: Toph fell into the water, leading both Sokka and Azula to jump in for her and swim her back to safety while Aang and Katara deflected the giant creature's attacks and ensured the refugees got through safely. And then? Then the pregnant one decided it was the ideal time to have her baby. Yes, of course Azula knew that wasn't something anyone just decides on, but she couldn't have picked a worse timing… yet huddling together with Sokka as they dried up after their incursion in the water wasn't the worst thing ever. And while the Avatar had still been somewhat miserable, it seemed he was far happier once Katara finished helping deliver the baby, and things should have moved along better from that point onwards, as they escorted the refugees to the city itself…

Until Aang saw the drill.

She knew what it was as soon as he described it. She knew exactly what was happening: it was a stratagem her father had plotted and concocted from a long time ago, commissioned to the inventor who had taken up refuge in the Northern Air Temple. It was on its way to tear down Ba Sing Se's walls, and it would breach all the way to the Earth Kingdom's Palace if it was uncontested… and it would be. It would be.

It was a won battle already. There was no way the five of them could stop them… and did she even want to stop them?

They climbed the Outer Wall and watched how Earth Kingdom troops were fighting back; the very sight of them told Azula she would have to make her choice far sooner than Sokka had intended her to. He eyed her with uncertainty often, though he didn't reveal his doubts… despite Azula could see in Aang, Katara and Toph's expressions that they were doubting, just as much as he was. It was the first time she had confronted her own nation by their side… and for all they knew, she would turn the fight around and help her nation, instead.

The so-called Terra Team attacked the drill relentlessly, but to no avail: their earthbending would never withstand the drill's might. The tanks that accompanied the drill had been cast away quickly, or so the earthbenders had believed, but they retaliated before long. And while the earthbenders fought fiercely, and defeated some of the firebenders, in the end their resistance amounted to nothing.

"So, the question is…" Aang said. "How are we going to stop that thing?"

All eyes turned towards Sokka, who had been studying the drill intently. He blinked blankly upon sensing he was being watched.

"Why are you all looking at me?" he said, grimacing.

"Because you're the idea guy," Aang answered, quickly.

"Oh, so I'm the only one can come up with a plan?" he retorted.

Well, no, no he wasn't the only one. But no one had asked her yet. And she wondered briefly if no one would.

"Azula?"

It was, of course, Sokka who called her name. He eyed her hopelessly, despite his tone seemed to suggest he clung to some sort of hope, regardless. The others watched him intently, and the Fire Nation Princess waited quietly for him to finish what he was saying.

"Do you know anything about this thing? Anything about how we can defeat it?" Sokka asked. Azula breathed deeply and raised her eyebrows, holding off from answering for almost ten whole, endless seconds:

"I might," she finally said. Sokka's eyes widened as the rest of the group gasped.

"Please, tell us!" Aang said, stepping towards her. "So many people will be in danger if we do nothing… Azula, I know you were our prisoner, but now? You're our friend. Please… help us save Ba Sing Se."

Her fist tightened. She frowned heavily. Cornered, forced to make up her mind, just as she was trying to enjoy the freedom of having a choice… brilliant.

"There's only one way to take down that thing," Azula said, dismissively. "And it's from within. We need to get inside the drill."

"Wait… we?" Sokka said, blinking blankly. Azula huffed, raising her eyebrows.

"Did you think you'd do this without me? That I'd sit out on my own plan?" she asked.

"Well… no. But, you know, you don't really have to join in if you don't want to," said Sokka, swallowing hard. "I know this isn't, well, anything you wanted to do, so…"

"Not like I have much of a choice anymore, do I?" Azula said, bluntly.

She proceeded to explain what she had in mind… and to her surprise, Sokka added his own ideas to her plan just as well. At first, her suggestions seemed to startle the others, for it sounded like a rather risky venture, one that could backfire so easily… and yet there was no other way. They had to trust her… to trust she knew that drill. To trust she wouldn't turn against them, even if her strange stiffness, her sudden distance, suggested she might.

They made their way down the wall again, gathered under a crevice: Toph whipped up a dust cloud and then a tunnel for them to travel through, unseen. Once they reached the drill, Sokka spotted a possible entrance, and Aang helped hoist each of them into the drill until Toph seemed to get cold feet at the last moment, choosing to stay on the ground and fight back from outside the drill instead.

"Okay, so we need the layout of this machine if we're going to figure out the best spots to break," Sokka said, looking around himself. Pipelines ran through the system, powering it, and before long, he settled on breaking one that appeared to be a source of gas rather than any other substance.

"What are you doing?!" Katara exclaimed.

"Someone's going to have to come fix it!" Sokka grinned. "And it'll probably be an engineer. We can just steal the drill's plans from him and be done with it!"

Azula bit her lip as she retreated into a dark corner with the group. Soon enough, an engineer did show up. Katara stepped out into the open…

Only for a sharp kick to her lower back to knock her to the floor.

"Wha…?!" Aang gasped. "KATARA!"

He had no time to respond: a sharp blow to the back of his neck knocked him unconscious just as well.

The last one left, of course, was Sokka. His eyes were wide with hurt, and Azula eyed him apologetically before striking him down too, digging her knee into his stomach.

"What is…?! What?! Princess?!" the engineer exclaimed.

"Ugh. It was about time," she said, rolling her eyes- "Please, help me bring those three to War Minister Qin. Clearly, one can't be captured around here and expect assistance, can they?"

"We heard you were missing in action, but we trusted you'd prevail!" exclaimed the engineer.

"Enough with the pointless excuses!" Azula shouted, freezing the man in place with her harsh words. "We have work to do. That city will be ours."

She glared at Sokka, who squirmed, the only one still conscious, on the floor. He gazed at her pleadingly, but her eyes' sharp, golden steel offered no respite. She had made her choice. She would simply have to figure out if she could live with it.

"You're ALIVE! It's a miracle! You've returned to us, Princess!" War Minister Qin was exclaiming happily, and Sokka would shoot glares at him from the top-most observation deck's floor. His sister and the Avatar, tied beside him against a railing, were doing the same thing, now they were back to their senses. "Oh, the Fire Lord will be thrilled that you are, and that you brought the Avatar with you, too! Today marks a grand victory for our great nation!"

"That it does, War Minister, for sure," Azula declared, languishing carelessly on a throne-like chair that still stank of the War Minister's stale perfume. Of course, the man had been happy to sit here until she had arrived. No doubt, despite all his apparent bliss over her return, he was definitely distraught about having to share his triumph with her. "Are we progressing well so far?"

"Perfectly on schedule, Princess! We should make contact with the outer wall within the next ten minutes!"

"Ten minutes, is it?" she said, raising her eyebrows. "How utterly sluggish and slow is this damn machine that it would take that long? This… this is truly a pathetic strategy. Did that Mechanist design this machine deliberately to stall us?"

"Well…! We have, yes, suspected as much, but… surely that's not the case! And even if it were, we'll keep going, Princess, of course!" said the War Minister.

Azula huffed, raising her chin haughtily.

"Full speed ahead, War Minister."

"F-full…? Well, we are going at the safest speed we can…"

"Full speed, I said!"

"R-right! Yes, Princess!"

It wasn't a good idea, he knew: the system was delicate, despite how sturdy it was from the outside. Any overloading of materials could cause a clog within the machine's drill, and if that happened… oh, her recklessness could doom their whole enterprise. She shouldn't demand for this, but how to say no?

The drill began moving faster, digging up earth from down below to move forward. A sharp glance at the three that sat, gagged and restrained, on the floor… Azula rose to her feet, and the War Minister nearly winced as Azula gestured at the periscope.

"Please, keep watch. Ensure we're headed in the right direction at all times, War Minister."

A rather ridiculous order, and yet again, the War Minister rushed to the periscope and abided by it. All other eyes on the command module were set on their respective tasks, too, for they were busy setting up everything so the Princess's full-speed order would be heeded…

And so, none of them saw the Princess step towards the three captives and burn off their restraints.

It was a rather strange but amusing pandemonium: Aang's airbending took everyone by surprise as he crafted a whirlwind inside the command module. Sokka rushed towards his weapons and Katara's water pouches, which the War Minister had requisitioned: together they took to taking down the rest of the engineers within the room… while Azula had a rather violent firebending showdown with the two Imperial Firebenders within the module, tasked with the protection of their mission. The War Minister screamed desperately, no doubt searching for a place to go… only for Sokka to deliver an uppercut at him, knocking him unconscious right away.

"HA!"

There wasn't too much time to celebrate yet, though: he rushed to help Azula, tossing his boomerang to distract one of the firebenders. The Princess smirked at him, taking the opportunity to deliver a most lethal charged fire blast at the firebender's stomach from the soles of her shoes, after she performed a somersault that left Sokka gaping in wonder at her skill. The next firebender attempted to attack only for Azula to dodge him, trip him with a firebending kick, and leave him for Sokka to finish off with a powerful blow of his club to his helmet, a sure way to knock someone out.

By the time the two main firebenders were done, everyone else was either surrendering or had given up already. And so, Azula made her way to the machines, switching each value to its opposite one as violently as possible, both to ensure the drill would either collapse fully or at least move in the wholly opposite direction.

"We did it! We stopped the drill!" Aang exclaimed, hugging Katara excitedly.

"And it didn't even reach the Outer Wall!" Sokka said, beaming brightly as he helped Azula with busting the machine. "Princess, your plan was GENIUS!"

It wasn't long before some loud explosion resounded through the mechanism: of course, so many careless commands would eventually be too many for the machine. It would break down – without exploding, hopefully – and it would be out of commission for good, as long as the Earth Kingdom's authorities took the machine and dissembled it safely…

Azula released a deep breath before turning to smile at Sokka. He stood beside her, grinning just as brightly as he had when he had been intoxicated… though far more earnestly, this time.

"I was sent to hunt down a traitor and a failure…" she said. "And I guess I'm the traitor now, huh?"

"Definitely not the other thing, though," Sokka said, beaming. "I always knew you were the best your dad could send after us! Look at this! You tore them down in one go! This was…! You're just…! Hell, I…"

"You have something to say, yes?" Azula asked, amused. "Are you going to sing praises about me? Declare me the greatest being that ever lived? Or perhaps will you say embarrassing things such as 'I melt in your hands' once again?"

"Y-yeah, well…" he chuckled, his hands on her shoulders. "You know what? Yes, I can say I definitely melt in your firebending hands, Azula. Especially after today. I know what this means to you. I know how much you're sacrificing for, well… us. But I think… or rather, I hope? That it'll turn out okay in the end?"

"I sure hope so too. Because if not, you'll have to refund me for all this faith I'm putting in you," Azula said, pointing at him and pressing her index finger to his chest. Sokka chuckled, lowering his gaze. "Make sure I won't regret this, alright? Tall, warrior boy?"

"I can think of an idea or two to achieve that, dangerous, beautiful Princess," he grinned.

His brow pressed against hers just before he kissed her, fully. Aang blinked blankly as he watched them – as did the conscious crew members of the drill, gaping in utter disbelief at their Princess's shameless behavior: wasn't she supposed to be the good kid, as opposed to her brother?

"Woah," Aang managed, but Katara laughed beside him, tugging him away, towards the people they'd have to keep watch over.

"Come on, it's not polite to stare," she said.

"You're taking this way too well, huh?" Aang grinned. Katara shrugged.

"What can I say? I guess she grew on me, just a little," she smiled. "Besides… this way you'll have a firebending teacher, right?"

"And she'll be the best teacher ever!" Sokka declared, revealing he and Azula had stopped kissing by then, though his arm remained wrapped around her shoulders. She gasped.

"Hey! I never did say I'd do that, did I?" she asked. Sokka laughed and shrugged.

"And why wouldn't you?" he said. "It'll be fun!"

Azula groaned and shook her head, though she smiled as her friends laughed together. Her friends… new friends, who hadn't wanted her for her title, her position, her privilege. Friends who had shared their meals, even their bedding with her, who had worried about her, who had protected her… and whom she had protected, just as well. It was a strange sensation, one she wasn't sure she had ever felt before… but as she stood there, an arm wrapped around Sokka's waist, watching his most goofy, cheerful grin, Azula guessed she melted in his hands just as well, for this was exactly where she wanted to be.

"So… do you really think Zuko is going to be somewhere around here?" Ty Lee asked, nonchalantly, at Mai. "Maybe we really should've gone back to find Azula… she would've tracked him easier than us."

"We had the beasts, she had nothing. If she didn't come back to us, it's because she couldn't. There's no reason to think she would've done any better than we have," Mai sighed.

The damn ferry station was a pain: she and Ty Lee had secured outfits to blend in as Earth Kingdom, dreary colorful stuff she would never wear if she could help it. Then, they'd tracked down two people and with her knives, threatened them out of their passports and tickets. They had raced away, crying… and Ty Lee had certainly seemed sorry for it, but Mai wasn't too bothered about the matter. Surely Azula would've done worse to people if she'd wanted what she didn't have, right?

But the damnable ferry just wouldn't arrive, would it? The sooner they reached that damn huge city, the sooner she'd be close to tracking down Zuko…

"Uh… huh? Mai! Mai!"

Mai's eyes drifted towards the direction Ty Lee was pointing at: the passports lady was speaking to two newcomers: a short, balding man with a silver beard… and a young man with dark hair, and a rather violent scar across his face.

"You… you figured it out! You found him!" Ty Lee exclaimed, beaming. "Aww! This is soooo romantic!"

Despite the discomfort of the situation hadn't decreased in the least, Mai smiled: maybe this ferry station wasn't so bad, after all.

[reydjarinkenobi]

So I love time travel, and Finn/Poe, so maybe Finn/Poe in the clone wars?

Thank you for this prompt! I found it very interesting. I would like to preface this by apologising. I have sought of run away with this. This is mostly set up but it is just the first chapter. Tell me if you want me to do more. 

----

Poe knew that touching the stone was a stupid decision.

Really, even as he was reaching out to touch the weirdly carved symbol on the large stone jutting out into the room, he was telling himself not to do it.

In his defence, Luke had told all of them that Finn and Rey weren't allowed to touch anything weirdly carved  in the Temple. He hadn't said anything about Poe.

It was a simple mission; the simplest one he'd ever had. Go into the weird old Jedi Temple. Take a few holos. Go home.

Really, it was just to get them off base and doing something; a distraction.

Chewie hadn't been adjusting well to Solo's death. Even eight months later, he growled at everyone except Rey, General Leia and Finn, at the drop of a hat.

Rey was on edge from Luke's not-really training (and, really, Poe could sympathise with her. It must have been hard being assigned to sit alone in a forest for hours instead of learning how to fight when every time they stepped onto a battlefield, their comrades were dying in droves.) Though, Luke's refusal to train her hadn't stopped Rey from learning a bunch of battle changing tricks herself.

Plus, she and Jessika had been spending much of their spare time looking for information on Rey's parents. From what Poe had heard the last news hadn't been good. The two had been planning on going on a trip back to Jakku when they got a chance. That was until…

Well that was just another reason they were stuck with this assignment wasn't it?

Finn was still reeling from the debacle at the last Temple they had been sent to investigate. Him and Rey had activated something that had caused both of them to glow as they were thrown into a Force Vision which had apparently helped reveal him as Force Sensitive.

As soon as he'd gotten back to base, he'd been set off on similar exercises to Rey, but they'd all seen how Luke seemed to pay extra attention to him. Poe had been part of more than one late night invasion of the training rooms where both of them had passed the Skywalker lightsaber back and forth, attempting to follow the katas written out in one of the books that Rey had pilfered from the Temple they'd been in.

And Poe? Well Poe was just tired. They all were really.

The last world the First Order had invaded was Yavin 4. His father hadn't survived.

He didn't know how much longer he could take it. How much longer they could all take it.

They were losing. They all knew it. More and more Republic planets were siding with the First Order, their leaders choosing to bow and save themselves the expenses rather than fight. Their funds were waning, and they were losing too many people. Every battle, every retrieval, hell, every relief mission, was turning into a disaster. More than half their fighters were refugees.

Every day, they got news of the First Order progressing, or Rey and Finn would feel the pulse of another Force User dying, the last remnants of the Jedi Order being eradicated as the First Order and the Knights of Ren spread their influence throughout the galaxy.

Soon, there would be nothing left but darkness.

So, yeah, Poe kind of needed the break.

"You should take it!"

"Luke would want you to have it."

"You're better with it! You've had more practice."

"You already have better control than me."

"That is not true."

Poe shared an eye roll with Chewie as BB-8 trilled in annoyance.

This was a familiar back and forth that Rey and Finn had been having over the last few missions. Neither of them wanted to take the Skywalker lightsaber with them.

It would be funny watching two supposed Jedi fighting over who should not have a lightsaber, if it wasn't so irritating.

"I'm better with a blaster!"

"Well, I'm better with my staff and that's a melee weapon, so I'm already covered in close combat."

Finn faltered at that argument, taking a second to search for something to combat that leap in logic whilst Rey waited with a raised eyebrow. Poe huffed and strode forward, closing Finn's hand around the saber.

"Come on, Finn. Rey's more stubborn than you. And she won the argument. Let's just get this over with."

Finn huffed. "She's far more powerful than me - you saw what she did on Dandoran. She should have the lightsaber."

Rey scowled. "You're the better Jedi. You have better control. Luke's going to formally claim you as his padawan any day now. He's been showing you katas four times a week for almost a month."

"You've learnt more than me on your own. You're the better Jedi."

"Luke thinks I'm a ticking time bomb and he's right. They're just hoping I blow up in the Order's faces not their own."

With that, she strode into the temple, Chewie lumbering on behind her with BB-8 trailing behind with a few sad beeps.

Finn sighed and Poe bumped their shoulders, threading the fingers of their free hands together.

"Give her time. She's still recovering from..."

Finn swallowed. "I know. But she didn't lose control. I felt it. She didn't go dark. She reined herself in and got the job done."

Poe squeezed his partner's hand. "Dandoran was… a mess. And what she did was amazing. But I get why it scared her."

Finn frowned and shrugged, making to walk off after Chewie, BB-8 and Rey, but Poe tugged him back.

"Do you know who else was amazing on Dandoran? You were. Cutting the wing off a TIE fighter mid-air and not dying from the fall was incredibly hot."

With how close they were, Poe could see the way the praise made his partner's cheeks heat up and Finn smiled into the quick kiss they shared before they followed the rest of their team inside.

Their argument ended up being moot, because in the third room they entered, Rey summoned an object to her hand, obviously sensing something weird with it.

Finn hummed in interest when he saw the saber. It's hilt was much longer than the Skywalker saber's and when Rey held it in both her hands, a blade emitted from each end, one a pale blue and one gold.

She gasped swinging the blade through the air before her eyes widened, as she twisted her hands and the saber came apart into two.

"I didn't even know you could make sabers like this," she whispered, powering down the sabers so that she could test the mechanism locking them together without risk of burning herself.

She closed her eyes and grew very still for a few moments before she came back to herself with a light shiver.

"The Master left it here knowing someone would need it."

Finn grinned at her, patting her on the shoulder. "See? You've got control of that ability now. I don't even know how you do it."

Rey wrinkled her nose.

"Yes… Luke's instructions on how to strengthen my shields really helped with that… and the meditation on controlling both my powers and my emotions didn't hurt either," she admitted grudgingly.

Poe sent his boyfriend a proud smile when didn't gloat as they all moved into the next room, still looking for the runes that Luke and General Leia had asked them to take holos of.

Eventually, they got to the room they were looking for and Chewie and Poe were left to twiddle their thumbs whilst BB-8, Rey and Finn started pouring over the walls.

That was until Poe had touched the stupid rune.

He really knew he messed up when Finn and Rey had snapped their heads around half a moment before his fingers had brushed it, both of them calling out for him to stop, but by that point it had been too late.

The world around him had filled with a blinding light, and, when his vision cleared, they weren't alone in the room anymore.

He jumped away from the man that had materialised beside him. He was in armour that would have made him reach for his blaster if it wasn't painted blue. Nevertheless, he stumbled back a few steps before an unseen Force shoved him behind Finn and Rey, who had both assumed defensive stances.

He didn't know which one of them had moved him, but he wasn't fazed by it; he'd had to get used to getting manoeuvred by invisible hands when he'd started fighting regularly alongside Finn and Rey, neither of whom were afraid to use their powers to move their allies out of the way of danger if they could.

It didn't bother him. Honestly? It was kind of a thrill.

There were five other men dressed in similar armour, though three of them had gold paint, whilst the last two were wearing significantly less protection with their weird robes that kind of reminded him of Luke. In the back, near the doorway, was a young Togrutan female as well as an older human female around Poe's age clutching a blaster.

The Togrutan and the man in black robes ignited lightsabers whilst the other men raised their blasters.

The last man in the beige robes and the light upper body armour glanced at the man beside him with a disapproving frown.

"Now, now. We don't need to resort to violence right away."

"Who are you?" the dark robed one with a scar over one of his eyes growled, ignoring his companion.

They all stood there gaping. The last thing they'd expected to see was people with lightsabers. At least not ones that weren't red.

Poe glanced between Finn and Rey. Neither of them had gone for their lightsabers, instead Finn had raised his blaster whilst Rey was brandishing her spear. To be fair, he'd never seen Finn miss a shot and had once watched as Rey knocked out ten storm troopers with her staff within fifteen seconds.

Both of his Jedi were frozen, staring at the image in front of them with blank expressions.

Intellectually, they all knew that there had to be a few other Jedi in the galaxy, but any ones that hadn't already been killed should be impossible to find unless they had the protection of the Resistance at their backs, and the only ones who did were Finn, Rey and Luke.

For once, Poe was the first to recover in a social situation. He was good at back alley deals and criminal underworld politics - he'd had to be with the sheer number of undercover missions he was send on - but Rey and Finn had this quality about them that could sway any opponent. Years in the First Order under countless temperamental commanding officers had taught Finn just how to react to deescalate any interaction and the genuine kindness that Rey met every situation with, hiding her sharp, calculating mind completely disarmed almost anyone they met. That was, unless they were on the battlefield. Then, they were terrifying.

He drew himself up, tilting his chin back confidently in a way that he'd learnt to do whenever he was met with a more powerful opponent. "I think we should be the ones asking the questions since we were here first. You just appeared out of thin air."

Chewie let out a garbled roar and Rey nodded in acknowledgement.

Poe really needed to learn Shyriiwook. They had all worked together on nearly every mission since Finn and Rey had joined the Resistance - he was fairly sure they were officially considered a team in the official records. Finn and Rey had been promoted to the rank of Commander, and Chewie had been given it as soon as he formalised his commitment to the Resistance.

"The Force is… different now," Rey murmured, her face an impassive frown.

She'd gotten better at controlling her expression over the past few months. Maybe all the meditation was helping with that. Though, Poe would never suggest that to her.

Finn glanced at her, before taking half a step back and closing his eyes. A moment later, he jerked, letting out a gasp. Poe stepped forward, putting a hand on his shoulder.

Finn gave him a small smile as he leaned slightly into the touch.

"It's… so much lighter," he murmured, is voice thick with awe.

Rey hummed in agreement. "More full at least. There are just… so many lights."

Less than a moment later, she shook her head, snapping her gaze towards the people in front of them.

"Something… very strange has happened," she announced and Poe sighed internally.

He really shouldn't be surprised by weird Force shit when he spent most of his time around Jedi. He definitely couldn't complain when he was actually dating one.

The man in the dark robes frowned as he powered down his lightsaber, the young Togrutan in the back doing the same for her green one and her smaller, yellow one.

The red-haired Jedi and the dark robed one shared a glance.

"I'm Obi-Wan Kenobi, High General of the GAR, and this is General Anakin Skywalker. We may be able to assist you."

Poe felt himself freeze.

"Oh shit."

Finn and Rey glanced back at him, their eyes wide with similar realisation.

Finn turned back to them. "If you're Obi-Wan Kenobi… and you're Anakin Skywalker, that would mean…"

"We travelled back in time," Rey finished for him, her voice barely above a whisper.

Poe instinctively wanted to deny it. Time travel was crazy. There was no way.

But the group in front of them looked pretty darn solid.

And the man in front of him wasn't wearing a black helmet.

So it was the only logical conclusion.

Calling time travel logical seemed like a juxtaposition.

This should be impossible.

Chewie let out a roar, and Poe didn't have to know Shyriiwook to understand the gist of what he was saying. This was fucked.

"Excuse me?" Kenobi asked, arching an eyebrow.

Skywalker snarled, "You expect us to believe that?"

Chewie grumbled and leant back against the wall, striking up a quiet conversation with BB-8, which consisted entirely of them complaining at each other, from what he could hear from BB-8's replies.

Finn, Poe and Rey glanced at each other, all of them trying to think of the right thing to say. It needed to be something that would prove that they were from the future, something they couldn't have known if they lived in the time they were currently in, but it couldn't be something that would side track this conversation too much.

So no bombshells. Like the Emperor. Or Darth Vader. Or the Genocide of the Jedi.

Right.

Rey inclined her head downwards and Finn grasped at his belt. He raised his eyebrows and tilted his chin. Poe nodded, signing a quick agreement with Rey's plan.

Finn sighed, and unclipped the metal cylinder from his belt.

"This is your lightsaber," he said, looking at Skywalker. "The one you're holding right now."

He held it flat in his palm, allowing Skywalker to easily summon it to his hand, comparing it to the identical weapon he'd already been holding. The man closed his eyes for a few seconds, grimacing.

"It's the same saber," he announced when he opened his eyes, his tone more subdued than before. "But the crystal doesn't recognise me anymore."

He nodded at Finn, holding the weapon out.

"It likes you though."

Finn blinked as he summoned the weapon back to his hand. "Uh… thank you?"

Rey shot him a smug grin and Finn rolled his eyes.

General Kenobi frowned, putting a hand on his chin.

"So we do have… visitors from the future."

BB-8 trilled angrily and Poe cringed.

Rey blew out a sharp breath. "She's right. It seems our way back has been destroyed as well."

She gestured to the now cracked stone, that Poe had just touched.

Yep, they were royally screwed.

Kriffing Jedi bullshit.

----

Are you guys curious? Do you want more? Not gonna lie, I have big plans for this fic. Send me an ask or a message if you want more. Or comment on ao3.

[dhwty-writes]

Zutara Week Day 6: Affirm

I am really sorry for how I ended the chapter yesterday. Take this as compensation?

Be sure to check out the previous parts!

Read on AO3

Katara felt awful. She had felt awful before. Awful and heartbroken. When her mum had died or when her dad had left for the war. When she and Sokka had left the South Pole. And when she had broken up with Aang, of course.

But this? This was torture. Because Zuko and her hadn't broken up. He hadn't died or left, unsure when or if he would return. She had left him instead and all because she had caught some feelings and he had no clue. And didn't feel the same anyway.

He was always so worried about the Fire Nation and the laws and the economy, it was the only thing he was ever talking about. She hadn't even been sure if he'd noticed her.

And then he'd invited her to the garden and she'd thought, hoped, that maybe, maybe, he felt something, too. And when she had finally worked up the courage if all of that meant something- he'd said no.

So naturally, she had to leave.

She had made up a flimsy excuse about a pregnant Suki - which she was, and Katara was very glad for her and Sokka - and boarded the first ship to the South Pole to get the hell out of there. She was almost glad that Zuko hadn't noticed how feeble her pretext had been. Almost.

When she had arrived in the South Pole, she had been greeted by a very concerned Sokka and a very happy Hakoda. Yet, it had been Gran-Gran she'd ran to.

Gran-Gran with her open arms and her knowing glare who had just opened her door and told everyone to leave them alone. She had broken down on the polarbear-dog rug and cried. She had cried for hours, clinging to her grandmother for dear life.

"It hurts," she had sobbed, "it hurts so much. Gran-Gran, how do I make it stop?"

And the wise woman had just gently stroked her hair, rocking back and forth. "I know," she had whispered, "it is allowed to hurt. That way you can heal."

After two days of tears and self-pity Katara had pulled herself up. "I'm done with weeping," she had said.

And so, she was.

She went outside, relishing in the welcome feeling of being home. Oh, how she had missed it. The last time she had felt that way was when she had walked into a stuffy council room on some backwater island and found Zuko sitting there. She didn't allow herself to venture on that thought.

Instead she ventured out into the snow and ice with nothing but the clothes on her back. On day she stayed in the frozen wasteland, bending up a storm under the crushing pull of the full moon. After all that time in the Fire Nation where her powers were weak and withered, she had never felt this powerful in her life.

She returned with a fierce and wild look in her eyes and not even dared to talk back to her.

Then she calmed down.

Katara started teaching again, filling her days with the laughter of children and adults alike. She enjoyed the combat lessons as well as the healing sessions but what she loved most was that for the first time in her life she got to explore her element for fun. She raised statues and adorned houses with carvings, went penguin sledding and ice dodging and laughed until her sides ached.

And when they gathered around a fire in the night and Katara pulled children into her lap to teach them the stories of their ancestors that were written in the stars, maybe her heart ached, too. Because maybe she would have liked telling black-haired, blue-eyed children of the spirits dancing in the sky. Maybe she had even dreamed of it. But that would never come true, so Katara didn't think of it.

Instead she filled her days with laughter so she wouldn't drown in her tears.

 ~*~

 The war had ended over ten years ago and still the sight of black snow was enough to strike fear into her hear.

The small children stared in wonder but she saw the same panic that boiled in her stomach in the eyes of the men and women who still remembered. Instinct made them grab their children and run and Katara wanted to flee, too.

But instead she grabbed Sokka by the arm and ran towards the sea. "What is happening?" he asked breathlessly. "You don't think-"

"No," she answered and stood. There was no fleet of warships heading towards their shore. There was no fleet at all. Instead it was one single ship, painted in red and gold. "It's Zuko."

"Ah." Her brother straightened. "He sure took his time."

Katara whipped around and narrowed her eyes. "What did you do?" she hissed.

He raised his arms in defence. "Nothing!" he insisted and Katara didn't need Toph's abilities to know that he was lying.

She prodded her finger into his chest and growled: "We'll have words about this." before walking away to greet the Fire Lord.

The ship docked less than an hour later and lowered the bridge. Katara straightened herself, prepared for the host of nobles that usually surrounded the Fire Lord.

Instead only one figure stepped out, dressed in silk that was in no way appropriate for a South Pole autumn. "Hello, Zuko here," Zuko said. It was easy to imagine the sixteen-year-old boy who had showed up in the Western Air Temple, he looked almost the same. Even his hair fell into his face just like back then.

And it was also distressingly easy to conjure up the rage that had burned her from inside out back then. "What are you doing here?" she asked. She sounded furious and she knew that he didn't deserve that but she didn't know what else to say.

She could see how he glanced at Sokka, Hakoda and Suki beside her who stared at him with crossed arms - though Suki's threatening vibes were probably negated by the growing bump under her parka. "I, um- I missed you. So, I came to see you."

"We weren't made aware of a state visit," she countered coldly.

A hurt expression flitted over his face and Katara's stomach twisted painfully. "That's because it isn't," he said quietly. "I came here as myself. As Zuko, just Zuko, not the Fire Lord. I- I came because I missed you." He hunched his shoulders. "But if you don't want me here, I'll be on my way as soon as I can."

"Don't be silly," an old voice croaked. "Of course, she wants you here, boy."

"Gran-Gran!" Katara exclaimed concerned, "What are you doing out here? You should be resting!"

The old woman waved her aside. "I'll be fine, my child. I might not be a spring komodo-chicken anymore, but I can still decide when I can leave my house." She walked over to Zuko slowly and patted his hand. "You're always welcome here, boy. There's a room in Katara's house I'm sure she's happy to share. Right, Katara?"

"Right..." She couldn't very well say no to that, could she? She jerked her chin. "Come on then, bring your stuff."

They walked in silence over to her house. It was one of the first ones she'd ever built and therefore smaller than most. Still, there were two bedrooms, a kitchen and a bathroom and that was more than she'd ever had while growing up. And it was her own, so that was all it needed to be.

As soon as the door closed behind them, the silence broke. "Why are you mad at me, Katara?"

That phrase was all it took to make the tension leave her body. "I don't know," she admitted. "I guess I am not."

"Then why do you act like you're mad at me?"

She winced pondering on how to answer that without giving away that she was hurting. She was hurting and maybe if she pushed him away it wouldn't hurt as much. But even as she contemplated her options, she knew that it all was bullshit. "Why are you here?" she asked instead.

"Because I missed you." She winced. "Why did you leave?"

'Because I love you,' the realisation hit her like a gut punch.

"Katara," he pleaded, his fingers wrapping around her shoulders. "Look at me, please." Slowly she let him turn her around and raise her head. He studied her face for a long time, agony spreading on his features. "Why did you leave?" he asked again, his voice barely more than a whisper.

Tears burned in her eyes. How should she answer that? How could she answer that without ruining all that they had? Members of Team Avatar shouldn't date each other, she had tried it with Aang and it hadn't worked.

"Is it because of the dinner?" he asked and she had to close her eyes because that was just a bit too close to the truth. She heard him inhale sharply. "Then I'm sorry for that, Katara. I overstepped and clearly make you uncomfortable with trying something more-"

"No, Zuko, you don't understand," she whispered, "I wanted more. I wanted it to be more. And then you said-"

"Fuck."

"No, that wasn't it," she couldn't resist the joke and cracked one eye open. If the situation weren't so tragic, she would have laughed at the face Zuko pulled as if he was processing approximately twenty-five distinct emotions at the same time.

He held up one day. "Wait, wait, wait. Say that again?"

"Say what again?"

"You wanted it to be more?"

It took all her self-restraint not to wince. "Yes, Zuko. I would have liked it to be a date."

"Fuck," he said again and stumbled backwards. "Oh, shit, I fucked up."

She frowned. "What do you mean?"

"I panicked!" he blurted. "I had meant it as a date! And then you asked and I- shit!"

Realisation dawned on her face. "Oh," she said. "Shit." He had meant it as a date? "Why didn't you say so?"

"I panicked!" he repeated and buried his face in his hands. "I'm sorry, Katara, I'm-" He looked up helplessly.

She held up one hand to shut him up. "I'm making this right," she declared.

Then, Katara bolted out of the door.

It took almost all day to do the preparations. Spirits, if only she'd known! She wasn't able to cook, though she doubted that Zuko had cooked himself that day either.

She did have time to do the decorations, however. She had spent so many hours in that garden that she had memorised every single flower in it. So that would have to do.

The sun had already set when she went back to her house, a joyful spring in her step. Zuko was still sitting pretty much where she'd left him with the only addition of Sokka and Suki to keep him company. 'And to calm his nerves,' Katara guessed.

When his eyes fell on her he smiled brightly. "You're back!"

"I am," she answered and smiled wider than she would have thought it possible. She held out one hand. "Come with me, Zuko?"

He scrambled to his feet. "Always."

Sokka gagged. "Spirits, that's disgusting."

"Nah, it's better than Katara pining," Suki added.

Katara exchanged an incredulous look with Zuko. "I ran into both Suki and you before you had sex for the first time," he reminded them.

"And I held your hand the whole voyage home when you got separated from Suki after the war. Even at night when you cried." She gave him her 'don't-mess-with-me'-glance and they thankfully shut up.

Katara took Zuko's hand and laced his fingers with hers before tugging him outside.

"Were you really pining?" he whispered against her ear.

She granted him a sweet smile. "Shut up or I'll change my mind."

He chuckled. "As you command- oh." He stopped dead in his tracks, taking in the sight of the garden she had bent up, complete with turtleducks swimming on a frozen pond and icy lampions. "Really, Katara?" he asked quietly.

She chewed on her lip and nodded. "Watch this." She closed her eyes concentrating on the lampions and a little trick she had learned some time ago. When she opened them again, they were glowing softly.

"You are amazing," he breathed and meant to lean down but she stopped him.

"Wait! You have to ask first."

He took a deep breath. Not annoyed at all. More smitten. "Katara...," hesitantly Zuko stepped closer and looked down at her with a smirk. "Is this a date?"

This time she didn't ignore the fluttering feeling in her heart. This time, she embraced it. Slowly, she reached out, gently cupping his cheek and running her thumb over the jarred edges of his scar. "It is," she said quietly, "if you want it to be."

He hummed, a warm smile spreading on his face as he leaned into her touch. "I would love it to be."

A bubbling feeling spread through her chest and belly, warm and giggly and suddenly she felt like fourteen again. "Can I?" she asked and he just nodded. Katara raised her second hand and put it on his other cheek. She rose up on her tiptoes and pulled him into a tender kiss.

Zuko didn't kiss how she'd expected him to. She thought it would be scorching and burning, consuming as a firestorm in a dry forest. Electrifying, lightning crackling in a hot humid summer night, ripping through the quiet and racing towards her, unbridled, untamed, inescapable. Inevitable. But it wasn't.

Inevitable, yes, because the moon and the sea were drawn towards each other, always pushing, always pulling. She laid herself bare before him, naked and unguarded. He could take her heart if he wanted to. And he did. But not with force, instead with gentle caresses and tentative touches and hidden smiles. She gave and gave and gave and took as well. She took hurt and desperation, loneliness and fear and it all evaporated between them. They were perfect opposites in perfect harmony.

And it ended way too soon.

"Katara-" Zuko croaked and she barely let him catch his breath before kissing him again. They had waited far too long for this. Zuko was stumbling and Katara was drowning, tumbling down an ice tunnel, lunging into the abyss. It was intoxicating, addicting and Katara didn't care. She wanted it all. She had it all.

They broke apart breathlessly and Katara rested her forehead against his. "You were wrong," she whispered.

"What?" he slurred.

"The moon is in love with the sun and round and round and round they went, always chasing each other. But not anymore. I caught you."

He tightened his embrace. "I found you," he answered.

They stood in the pale moonlight kissing and holding each other, making up for lost time, until Katara was shivering and he carried her back to her house. She led him into the bedroom and he layed her down gently, caressing her cheek and whispering sweet words into her ears.

"Wait," he said suddenly and sat up.

"What is it?" she asked, fearing for a moment that he'd changed his mind.

"I just- If we're doing this, I want to do it right," she said solemnly. "Right for you. I said that I wanted a date but- that's not all. Really, that is overly simplified."

"Then make it as complicated as it needs to be."

He took a deep breath. "When you were in the palace, I was the happiest I have been in a long time. The best part of my day was the precious hours I spent with you. I love the way you smile and the way you fight and the way you heal. I love the way you let the world be a part of your life, how you forgive and help and show mercy and kindness to everyone. I love- I just love you, Katara."

She closed her eyes and sighed in contentment. "Say it again," she whispered.

"I love you."

She smiled and pulled him close to kiss him again. "I love you, too, Zuko. With all my heart."

"Will you come home with me?" he blurted.

'Home...' It was a strange word. Home had meant so many different things over the years. A backwater village at the South Pole, an air bison's saddle, a never-ending search of belonging. And then she had seen him again and suddenly her search had ended. "You are my home."

"So... is that a yes?"

Tears were streaming down her face but this time they were happy tears. "Yes," she sobbed, kissing him again. "Or course it is."