#zuko is a dweeby little turtleduck

[attackfish]

So everybody here knows that I'm notorious for being a massive defender of Ursa, and that I have no patience for the "Ursa was a bad mother, she favored Zuko, and was abusive to Azula and abandoned her kids, and made Ozai abuse Zuko," narrative. That narrative is vile, victim blaming, and deeply stupid on a number of levels.

With that out of the way, I want to talk about some really really bad parenting we see Ursa do during the series. And it is to be clear really really bad.

In the Book Two episode, "Bitter Work", Zuko and Iroh have a conversation:

ZUKO: So Uncle, I've been thinking. It's only a matter of time before I run into Azula again. I'm going to need to know more advanced firebending if I want to stand a chance against her. I know what you're going to say, she's my sister and I should be trying to get along with her-

IROH: No, she's crazy, and she needs to go down.

This scene is a favorite of a certain type of Azula fan who wants to paint Iroh as a big meanie who didn't wave his magic redemption wand over Azula the way he clearly did over Zuko. See? See? He's writing her off here and calling her crazy.

This of course misses the context of that scene, which is that Zuko is taking care of a severely injured Iroh, who was injured by Azula, in what looked a heck of a lot like a murder attempt. Earlier in Book Two, in the episode, "The Avatar State", Azula unambiguously attempts to murder her brother after failing to capture him, and he is only saved by Iroh's quick reflexes.

But let's leave that argument aside for today because what interests me about this scene in the context of Ursa's parenting, is the line Zuko says right before Iroh's infamous declaration: "I know what you're going to say, she's my sister and I should be trying to get along with her."

Because in the context of Zuko and Iroh's situation, where Azula has recently attempted to kill Zuko, and just put Iroh into a coma that Zuko had to take care of him during, in which he has only just woken up from, this line from Zuko actually demonstrates some really warped thinking. It is not a healthy response to the situation at all. And his assumption is that a good caring parent figure like Iroh is going to respond to this situation by telling him that Zuko needs to get along with his sister, who is actively trying to hunt him down and capture or kill him.

So why does Zuko think that? What adult reacted that way to Azula's violence toward her brother in the past? It wasn't Ozai. Ozai is not going to use the language of getting along with one's siblings, when he is so bent on setting them against each other. So who was it?

The show answers this a few episodes before this scene, in the Book Two episode, "Zuko Alone." The answer is clear and heartbreaking: It was Ursa.

The scene in which this becomes plain, starts with Zuko and Ursa walking together. Mai spots them and smiles and blushes. Azula notices, and then turns to Ty Lee, and whispers, "Watch this!"

AZULA: Mom, can you make Zuko play with us? We need equal teams to play a game!

ZUKO: I am not cart-wheeling.

AZULA: You won't have to. Cart-wheeling's not a game, dum-dum.

ZUKO: I don't care. I don't want to play with you!

AZULA: We are brother and sister. It's important for us to spend time together. Don't you think so, Mom?

URSA: Yes, darling, I think it's a good idea to play with your sister. Go on now, just for a little while.

And then Ursa leaves Zuko alone with Azula and her friends.

There is a lot here that I want to talk about. I have in fact talked about this scene before, and what it tells us about Ursa's eagerness to reinforce Azula's seemingly kind and loving behavior: [Link], and even touched on why this is in fact an example of bad parenting from Ursa: [Link], but I think this deserves its own post, where we examine exactly what went on here, what this tells us about Ursa's parenting, and how this affected Zuko, and to a lesser extent, Azula.

In those previously linked posts, I talk about how this is clearly a pattern, that Azula has learned to predict and manipulate, and because we know it's a pattern, we know that this behavior on Ursa's part is repeated, and something her children have come to expect from her. Zuko and Azula know their mother wants her children to get along with each other, and love each other and have a good sibling relationship with each other so much that if Azula she plays into that, Ursa will force Zuko to spend time with his sister, and worse, that time will be unsupervised.

So, to be clear here, what Ursa is doing is giving Azula unsupervised access to her brother, against his will, as a reward for Azula momentarily acting nice. Or in other words, Ursa forces Zuko to spend time with his abuser against his will because she wants them to get along.

I think we can all see how that is some grade A terrible parenting.

And it does have negative effects on Azula. I think that we can see her learning how to manipulate people, learning how to lie and get what she wants from people, and that Ursa by giving her what she wants here, is showing her that this is a thing she can do to get what she wants. That is not a great lesson to teach your kid. I think it also feeds into Azula's possessiveness of her brother, and sense of entitlement towards him. She has learned that even the people who love and care about her brother, won't protect him from her. And she has learned that no matter what she does to him, he is supposed to try to get along with her.

These are some really terrible lessons, and we see some of the effects of them throughout the course of the show, so why is it that the "Ursa is a terrible mother" crowd never bring this up? I mean of course we know why, it doesn't fit their narrative. Their premise is not simply that Ursa is a bad mother, or even that her bad parenting explains Azula's behavior.

In fact frequently it isn't even about finding someone to blame for Azula's behavior, so that the responsibility isn't Azula's. (Which, to be clear is not how it would work anyway, because even if Ursa were exactly the type of horrible mother they said she was, Azula was still making the choices to do Very Bad Things, in the same way that just because Ozai is an abusive father, this doesn't mean Azula stopped being responsible for her own actions). It's more about proving that she has suffered enough that she deserves all the sympathy, and is allowed to be awful to other people, including Zuko, you know, as a treat.

The narrative that the "Ursa is a terrible mother" crowd are pushing is that Ursa didn't love her daughter, and thought she was a monster, Azula suffered so much, and it's so sad, and this is why she deserves to do very nasty things to everybody else, and no one should ever hold her accountable. Frequently there is some flavor of, "Zuko had a mother who loved him, you guys, unlike Azula, so he doesn't deserve sympathy, not like poor baby Azula!" Which is a deeply warped thought process on many many levels, but we're not going to go into that here.

The point is, that this type of bad parenting that I am pointing out here, doesn't fit this narrative, because this is not the kind of parenting mistake that a mother who doesn't love one of her children, and thinks that child is a monster, is going to make. This is the kind of mistake that a mother who loves her children very much, and wants them to have a good relationship, and doesn't recognize the threat that one of her children poses to the other, is going to make. In fact, the fact that she does it, proves that Ursa does in fact love her daughter and does not think she's a monster. So it does not fit the narrative these people are spinning, so they will never bring it up as an example of how Ursa was a bad mom.

Of course the other reason the "Ursa is a terrible mother" crowd aren't going to bring this part up is because it would mean acknowledging that Zuko deserved to be protected from Azula, and needed to be protected from Azula, when they were both children, which would go against the whole "she's a poor innocent child" thing they like to spin, and also because Azula is getting what she wants here, and Zuko is the one suffering, which is not going to get Azula any sympathy points.

And for the most part, Ursa was an excellent mother, who did the best job she could in horrible circumstances that she had very little control over, but she wasn't perfect, and she did make mistakes, which makes all of this a wonderful example of how even very good parents can make very bad choices that hurt their children and cause serious long-term damage.

I've talked some about the long term damage that Azula faces from this, learning about manipulation, and developing some really nasty entitlement issues with regards to her brother, but Zuko's long-term damage is if anything worse.

When we put this together with Zuko's line from "Bitter Work" quoted earlier, we can see that Zuko learns what Azula learns from the other angle, which is to say that he will not be protected from Azula by anyone, and not only will he not be protected, but he does not deserve to protect himself. Not only can he not defend himself, but he can't even protect himself by avoiding her. That's not allowed either. And in the face of her cruelty and violence towards him, it is still on him to make their relationship work, and to be clear, he should absolutely be making their relationship work. And the adults who love him are going to tell him this, no matter what Azula does to him.

I for one am really glad that Iroh is there to say no, that's a terrible idea, and you do not need to keep trying to get along with your sister who is trying to kill you. And it's significant that throughout Book Two, Iroh consistently protects Zuko from Azula, and teaches him what he needs to fight back.

[misspines]

It's kind of funny that this is totally applicable to any moment in the series

[glitter-gummy-bears]

Made this forever ago and found it!

It's based on that pidgin girl meme!

[lostheather9]

ATLA : The Beach in nutshell

[asaaesthetic]

after a cliffhanger :

[jely-bely]

Zutara and Kids

[fanaticloser]

Teenage Dirtbag of the Week

Zuko - Avatar: The Last Airbender (2005-2008)- The Legend of Korra (2012-2014)

[nihilistmasqueradingasanoptimist]

ashfbkadjj i just dinished reading one of the BEST fire hazard siblings centric atla fanfics IVER EBER READ and now im sharing it w u jkabfvjkanfkjjvea

ITNDSNGIJZSKGNKAJ

[attackfish]

5 headcanon for Azula is significantly older than Zuko. What happens when Aang is forced? Obviously Zuko would be too young to be banished. But does something happen to Azula? Does she turn to the Avatar to help protect her brother from their father?

Continued from: [Link], [Link], [Link], and [Link].

I presume you mean when Aang is found?

1. When Ursa leaves, her son is a babe in arms. When Aang is found, that same boy is a six year old, learning his first lessons in firebending, and learning to write his first characters. But something is already apparent. He isn't leaping ahead with the lightning speed of his sister at that same age. And that might not have been remarked upon, if not for something else. Little Zuko is... soft. He gets angry and upset when birds of prey kill turtle-crabs on the beach. He tries to sneek abandoned owl cat chicks under his bed, and is distraught when they don't make it, because they were too young. He puts himself on the side of the weak and vulnerable, and tries to protect them from the powerful and from the uncaring universe. And in doing so, he earns his father's scorn.

2. Azula couldn't tell you if it happened gradually or suddenly. She remembers both a sense of sudden dislocation, and change to a new reality, with new rules, and also a gradual creeping dread, as the world, their father's world, shifted around them. All she knows for sure is that one of her very woest fears has come to pass. Zuko is no longer a little ball of potential that she is being measured against at all times. Now he is weak, and pathetic, and she promised. She promised she would protect him, and teach him what he needed to know, and how can she, when their father is so big, and so powerful, and Zuko doesn't even understand what she's trying to teach him, and it makea her so angry, when he just doesn't get it... And she feels like he must have, the day on the beach, with the turtle-crab and the hawk, and she can't help worry that someday her dad will realize she's pathetic and weak too.

3. When the Avatar is first found, he is Zhao's problem. Azula never thought much of Zhao, but by all reports, the Avatar is a twelve year old child with training in only one element. It doesn't occur to her that Zhao will fail to capture him. But he does. Again and again. And after the debacle at the North Pole, Azula finds herself kneeling at her father's feet, telling her it is her turn. She must find and capture the Avatar.

4. And she must capture, or preferably, in her father's eyes, kill, her uncle. Because her uncle disappeared a less than a month ago, and showed right back up, at the North Pole, helping the Avatar and opposing Zhao. Her father is of course outraged at his brother's treason. Azula's thoughts are more tangled. And more wounded. He would leave to help the Avatar, a stranger and an enemy to her people, when he barely deigned to notice his own niece and nephew. And that's the thing, isn't it? Azula's whole life has been marked by the presence of so many people, so many adults, who either didn't notice what her father did to his children, or just let it happen. Her uncle is just one more. Only her mother ever tried to protect her.

5. Azula has to leave her brother behind, in her father's care. Which is why, for her, the goal isn't just to capture the Avatar and deal with her uncle, it's to do it as fast as possible. Which is why she goes to Mai and Ty Lee. And if she has qualms about threatening Mai's baby brother to remind her of what she has to lose? Well, it's her own baby brother on the line.

[attackfish]

5 hcs for any Avatar AU, idc which, all of the ones I've read from you are great!

I have chosen my airbender Mai universe. Continued from: [Link], [Link], [Link], [Link], [Link], [Link], and [Link].

1. Azula does not keep Mai and Ty Lee at the Boiling Rock. The Warden is Mai's uncle, after all, and her treason saved his life no less than Zuko's. The two are instead taken to the tower prison at the capital. Azula does not visit them on the journey back to the capital, spent, perversely, locked in their shared well appointed cabin. For all they have committed treason, Mai and Ty Lee are left with the trappings of their noble, privileged childhoods, locked in their room like naughty schoolgirls. It gives them time to think on what will happen to them, on the enormity of the choice they both made. It gives them time to wonder when, if, their trial will take place, whether they will be sentenced to death, what will Azula do? So they wait and they worry, and Azula doesn't come.

2. They are marched up to the prison tower, stripped, searched, Mai's less obvious knives are finally taken from her, and they are handed the prison rags which will serve as their uniforms. Mai's brain is buzzing and spinning with a thousand thoughts, a thousand ways she could break out, shove themselves to the forefront of her mind, nearly all of which would involve airbending. The prison feels like it's made out of paper. But she can't airbend. She doesn't know what is happening to her family. She can't risk them. But she doesn't know what Azula is doing to them. This whole time she has traveled with Azula, the threat that she would hurt them, kill them, if Mai stepped out of line, has hung over her, and now, well, she sure stepped out of line. But she can't escape, because what if they're fine? The prison is made of paper, and Mai has to be careful not to tear it.

3. They are locked in their cell, together, which feels like an oversight. Wouldn't it be better to keep them alone and isolated? But no, they are together. And one room over, that Ty Lee can hear through the window at the back of their cell, are the Kyoshi Warriors. Predictably, Ty Lee starts trying to make friends. With the people who they helped Azula capture and imprison. Of course she does. And because she's Ty Lee, she succeeds. She weathers their anger, and self-righteous well-what-did-you-think-would-happens, and smiles and laughs until they soften to her. She's a wonder, honestly. Mai has no idea how she does it, only that she never would be able to pull it off, not in a million years.

4. Through it all, Azula doesn't come. She stays away, and Mai is glad for it. But she also isn't. It scares her. She didn't expect it. It leaves her on edge. She paces their little cell long into the night. Then, one evening, Azula turns up like a bad coin, disheveled, hair ragged, looking like neither of them have ever seen her, her air of untouchable perfection nowhere to be seen. She yells at them and blames them for everything that happened since she put them in there, her voice more and more... out of control. Her tone, her volume, the pitch, are as wild as her hair and her eyes, and as she rants, she lets more and more slip about the world outside the prison, and Ty Lee tries to soothe her, practically on instinct, and Mai doesn't. She tries to stay quiet and in the back. It's also on instinct. But Azula never mentions their families, and Mai starts to hope that Azula forgot their families exist. Either way, after Azula leaves, Mai feels even more on edge than before. That night, she whispers her secret to Ty Lee. When Ty Lee gasps in the darkness, that soft little sound is as loud as a thunderclap. And then Ty Lee squeezes her, and Mai tries to push her away and tell her she doesn't like hugs, but just this once, Ty Lee holds her, and tells her she will never tell.

5. And then the world turns on its axis once again, and Mai, Ty Lee, and the Kyoshi Warriors are set free, and Ozai takes their place. The prison guards scramble around like termite-ants whose mound have been kicked over, and Mai, Ty Lee, and the rest beat a hasty exit before anyone can change their mind. Mai runs to her family townhouse while Ty Lee goes off with the Kyoshi Warriors to meet Suki, their leader. She stands in her room in an empty house, and washes and dresses as quickly as she can, her hands putting her hair into order with quick, practiced motions she doesn't have to think about. Zuko knows. Zuko is Firelord now, and he knows about her airbending. Zuko's friends know. The Avatar knows. And in a few minutes, she's going to have to walk out the door and deal with that. The metal knob is cold and hard under her fingers as she turns it open.

[attackfish]

Can you do more of the Lu Ten back from the dead AU?

That describes more than one AU of mine, so I have chosen the one where Zuko is brainwashed by the Dai Li, and while under Lake Laogai, finds his cousin. Continued from: [Link], [Link], [Link], [Link], [Link], [Link], [Link], [Link], [Link], [Link], [Link], [Link], and [Link].

Aang wakes up, with, what must be said, is perfect, and perfectly awful, timing. Lu Ten is just about to make his escape, when the Avatar opens his eyes and starts having a freak out about being on a Fire Nation ship, and about how he failed to save Ba Sing Se from being conquered by Azula (Azula? His little cousin, Azula? That Azula? Conquered Ba Sing Se?) So of course Lu Ten does what all good little Fire Princes do, and tries to follow him, because that's the Avatar! He should capture him and take him home to the Fire Nation, and come out of his captivity covered in glory! His father and grandfather will be so proud.

So of course when Aang ends up stuck on some driftwood and washed ashore by the kindly Moon Spirit, Lu Ten ends up washed up, half drowned, on the beach with him. And he's still half drowned and wondering if he really saw the Moon Spirit, or just hallucinated that bit, when the Avatar's friends show up. After the hugs and reassurances, the question quickly becomes what to do with Lu Ten. The problem of course is several fold. 1) he is a danger, because he just tried to pull a Zuko and kidnap Aang. 2) He was pretty useless about it. Zuko could have done better in his sleep. This shows that Lu Ten is still kind if not fully with it, and kind of needs to be taken care of. 3) And Lu Ten's dad is in prison for helping them-

Wait what? His dad is in prison for helping the Avatar and a bunch of teenage enemies of the Fire Nation? His cousin Azula, who last he checked was eight, conquered Ba Sing Se? His cousin Zuko, who is ten, which is, he supposes, not much younger than the twelve year old Avatar, but still ("I'm pretty sure I'm thirteen now, actually, I mean dates are weird with the whole being frozen for a hundred years thing, but...") is not only trying to kidnap the Avatar on the regular, but is apparently doing pretty well at it ("uh, we wouldn't go that far... Also Zuko's sixteen, and Azula's like, fourteen, we think? It's not like she told us.") Oh okay, Zuko is sixteen. He was captive for six years? Six years? Oh. Oh okay. Okay. Wait, who had his dad imprisoned? What do you mean Firelord Ozai? How did Uncle Ozai become firelord if his dad is still alive?

What the Avatar and his companions tell him is confused and disjointed, but what what explaination he does get paints a bleak picture, especially when they tell him that both his father and his cousin said that Ozai, and/or Azula would probably kill him if they found out he was alive. Lu Ten has no idea what to do, and finds himself trailing along after a bunch of teenagers ("Toph's twelve") by default. And when one of those teenagers ends up being dragged off to school, and then getting in trouble at said school, and having to have a parent teacher conference, Lu Ten is the only adult in reach. He works out in his head how much older he would be than his supposed son. If the Avatar is thirteen, and Zuko is sixteen, and Zuko was born when LunTen was ten, he would have been a father at thirteen himself.

Fortunately for everyone involved, six (it's six, right? Wow.) years of captivity have aged Lu Ten beyond what is expected, and he looks far beyond his twenty-six years, old enough to pass as Aang's father. He does his best with stolen clothes and his reflection in a pool of water in the cave they've been hiding in. The Dai Li kept his head shaved, and it's only had a little time to grow out into a spiky fuzz all over his head. He looks like a disgrace, his topknot shorn, the delinquent father of a delinquent son. But it's the best he can do. He isn't exactly surprised when the principal threatens his "son" with being sent to the coal mines. He also doesn't believe a word of it.

After Aang holds his little dance party, amd they all have to run out of town, he finds himself on the road with a pack of children, and is baffled by how many "adventures they find themselves in, impersonating spirits (a Fire Nation town shouldn't be in this kind of squallor!), getting taught by Piandao (who Lu Ten stays well away from, since Piandao could recognize him), dodging assassins, and running into secret waterbending blood witches. That last one was horrifying in so many different ways. She wanted... She tried to kill him. She tried to force the others to kill him. She... Was, at least on some level, a captive like him.

And at the end of it all, when they meet up with the ragtag "army" heading to storm the Fire Nation capital, he hears about the eclipse. And he decides that while the rest of them are trying to take on Ozai, he's going to spring his father. So, he slips away during the fighting and heads for the capital prison tower. Hopefully that's where his father is being kept. And Lu Ten might not have Zuko's ability to break into and out of almost anything, but it hardly matters, because he has barely made it inside when his father, having broken himself out, runs into him, and they leave together.

All this means is that when Zuko (who never did tell anybody about his cousin being alive, which is going to make his tearful reunion with his uncle and cousin a little less awful) shows up to the Western Air Temple, the Gaang is short one Fire Prince. And now they have a new one. Yay! And once he starts to become friends with them, they've got a whole bunch of questions about just what exactly is going on with his family. And yeah, the answers he gives are, well, they are... Wow, Zuko, no wonder you're so messed up!

[attackfish]

Could we get a continuation of the time travel/back in time au? I love the maiko setup!! (Ik i just sent in a different 5hc ask as well, but I sent some very scary emails today, so I’m rewarding myself :D)

Universe tag: #The whole Gaang wakes up a hundred years in the past verse

1. Mai's "siblings" don't tell her they even sent an offer of her hand off until the prospective groom has asked to meet her. So when her supposed sister bursts into her room one morning and tells her to start packing her meager possessions, because they found her a husband, Mai is horrified, she has no idea who they might have sold her to, and she is doing everything she can to come up with contingency plans to get out of this. Until of course her "sister" tells her that she's going to court. Mai can work with that.

2. Of course her plan is to go to court, and use the opportunity to assassinate Ozia, in a suicidal blaze of glory, which is both suitably dramatic, and would solve the problem of her having to actually deal with her intended husband. She wouldn't be around to have to worry about such things. So she and Ty Lee pack up and head to the capital, sharing a cramped one room cabin on a merchant ship, and Mai grits her teeth and doesn't scream as Ty Lee speculates about this new, and newly enobled, court soothsayer Mai is meeting to see if he will marry her. Ty Lee doesn't remember him from the history books. Mai doesn't care, okay? He is irrelevant to her plans.

3. And then they reach the capitol, and who is there at the dock, and trying not to look like an anxious little monkey-poodle puppy hoping his person is coming home soon? It's Zuko. Of course it's Zuko. He looks ridiculous, in court fashions that are a hundred years out of date, or in fact perfectly suited to the time period in which they find themselves, and when he sees Mai he lights up with relief and joy, and Mai feels a little bit like a character in a play as Ty Lee introduces her for appearences sake.

4. He escorts them to his new townhome, and breakfast is served, and then just like they always used to, Zuko contrives to send the servants away, and as soon as they're gone, with only Ty Lee around to witness, Mai sinks into Zuko's arms. It isn't about passion, or excitement, or even romance, but simply about exhaustion, and relief, and the complete trust that she can let down her guard, and rest here, with Zuko and Ty Lee. And Zuko just holds her for a few minutes, until she remembers that he would probably like to be held too, and she wraps her arms around him.

5. Before, Mai and Zuko were nowhere near talking about marriage. Sure, it was always somewhere in the background that Zuko was going to have to marry someone, because he was Firelord and he was going to have to make heirs, but they had only really just gotten back together. And now, they're stuck in this archaic dynastic betrothal, and sure, Zuko could refuse to marry her and send her home in disgrace, but really, they're going to get married to at least avoid having to get married to anybody else, and they both know it. They might as well get used to it.

6. Ty Lee would like out of the room so that she could stop being the third wheel. Anytime now.

[attackfish]

5 prompts for an AU where Azula is a non-bender? (still a fire nation princess tho)

This is from may benders and nonbenders swap. Continued from: [Link], [Link], [Link], [Link], [Link], and [Link].

It all starts to fall apart for Azula when Mai and Ty Lee turn against her at the Boiling Rock. What can she do? They are the secret to her ability to be able to pretend to be a firebender. They know too much, and they are too necessary to her, so she has them dragged back to the palace and locked up, until they've reconsidered their folly. As she starts slipping, her father makes plans to burn the Earth Kingdom to ash on her suggestion. She almost holds it together, until he leaves without her.

Then Zuko shows up, and tells her he wants to fight an Agni Kai. She laughs at him. He's a nonbender. Well so is she, he retorts. Mai and Ty Lee are there behind her in the shadows. Will she pretend to bend while they bend for her? he asks. Will they bend for her? Before she knows it, Mai and Ty Lee have turned on her again.

There is a terrible twisted irony to Azula's life. She spent so long learning how to pretend to fight that she never learned how to really fight, and without Mai and Ty Lee, she is helpless when confronted by her brother's swords. It's the work of a moment for the waterbender who came with Zuko to chain her up. There is nothing she can do but scream her rage.

It doesn't surprise her at all that the only thing her brother can think to do with her is lock her away, where no one can see what an embarrassment she really is.

So when Zuko lets Azula out of prison to help him find their mother, she finds her secret out, Mai and Ty Lee completely outside of her control, and Zuko an actual firebender. It feels like a sick joke the universe is playing just on her.

[attackfish]

Can you do a continuation of the Au where Zuko is Zhao's son and Azula's boyfriend/fiancé?

Continued from: [Link].

The thing about Zuko and Azula's relationship is that they're only engaged for convenience, and specifically Azula's convenience at that. So, as far as Azula's concerned, nothing as messy and irrational as feelings should enter into it. Which means that of course there are some very messy feelings involved. Including the fact that Zuko and Mai are kind of in love with each other and completely unable to admit this to themselves or each other. Including the fact that Zuko is terrified of Azula. Including the fact that Zuko's father is now dead, and he died a failure, and Zuko now doesn't have anything to fall back on if Azula throws him over.

Including the fact that Azula doesn't know where expediency ends and reliance begins, or where reliance on Zuko ends and affection begins.

And all of this comes to a head when Zuko hears Ozai's plans for the Earth Kingdom, and finds that there is a limit to what he can stomach in the name of keeping himself safe. He writes Mai a letter, confessing, as much as he can, his feelings for her, and flees, off into the night, to find the Avatar, to teach him firebending, and maybe, just maybe, find out what actually happened to his father.

[attackfish]

@sightofthesun53 asked:

More stuff for the au where Zuko accidentally kills Ozai on the day of the black sun?🥹 I'm especially curious about his shaky relationship with the gaang.

Continued from [Link], [Link], [Link], [Link], and [Link].

Okay, so I talked this a little bit in previous posts, but what's going on is that Zuko killed his father and then took the throne without ever joining up with the Gaang. So he never had the chance to form individual positive relationships with them, they never became friends, they never built trust, and the gaang never came to see Zuko as one of their own.

Cast your mind back to the Book Two finale. This is where Zuko's relationship with the gaang ended. Katara still smarts from what she views as a profound betrayel, when Zuko sided with his sister, after sharing a moment of understanding and commiseration over the losses of theit mothers. She views him as untrustworthy, and a danger to the people she cares about, and consequentally, to the fragile peace Zuko himself helped bring about. And Zuko does not exactly have a ready way to build trust with her. Or, as Zuko would think of it, get her not to hate him.

Sokka and Zuko likewise have a lot of baggage, not least of which is the fact that Sokka killed Zuko's sister, something both Zuko and Sokka feel differently about moment by moment. And of course, Zuko also killed his father, and if you think he doesn't have large and complicated emotions about this that he struggles to process or understand, well he does.

Aang wants to think the best of Zuko, and to trust him, and he's working on it, but that trust is still fragile, built as it is on a foundation of Aang's deliberate and self-chosen optimism. And Toph never really had to deal with Zuko at his worst, and she likes his uncle, so she's more or less willing to play nice. And Suki only knows him as the guy who burned down her village and released her from prison, so she's willing to see where this goes.

Basically, they are not friends. They aren't enemies, but they don't really like or trust Zuko, and there is nothing he can do about that, other than keep doing the right thing as Firelord. And half the time he has no idea what the right thing is. And with his uncle gone, because he has to be, and with only Mai and Ty Lee there that he can rely on, well, it's lonely at the top.

[attackfish]

Could you please do another Mama Lin AU post? I absolutely freaking love it!

Continued from: [Link], [Link], [Link], [Link], [Link], [Link], [Link], [Link], [Link], [Link], [Link], [Link], [Link], and [Link].

1. The deciding factor, and there were other things too, but the one that brought them to the breaking point, was that Tenzin needed to have children if there were ever going to be more airbenders, and Lin wanted to be a mother about as much as she wanted to be buried alive. And now she's got two kids? It's a bit of a shock for Tenzin, let's be fair. He's married to someone else, and has children, and he's not unhappy about not being with Lin, but it's a weird feeling, a road not taken feeling, something like, but not really, regret.

2. But whatever mixed and complicated emotions Tenzin feels in regards to Lin's forays into motherhood, he recognizes a potential political ally when he sees one. And he has too few of those to throw one away needlessly. He, of all the Council members, treats Republic City as his home. Air Temple island is right offshore, and the United Republic is part of his father's legacy. Most of the rest of the Council expect to serve out their terms and return home to their respective countries. Tarrlock is the only one who intends to stay, but Tarrlock is slippery as an eel-shark, and anyway, he is two parts smarm, one part corruption, and he has no interest in changing the status quo to improve lives for the poor. Not a man Tenzin can work with. Lin however, Lin he can work with.

3. Technically, Lin isn't officially a mom yet. The official adoption is still about a week away when she has her audience with the Council. They still have to meet in front of a judge and declare that they are a family. Bolin is over the moon excited about it, and Mako is, well Mako has mixed feelings. He can't shake the worry that this is all some kind of trap and everything will change once he and his brother are legally Lin's sons. He knows it doesn't make any sense, but... Lin asked Mako's teacher about that, and she said it's normal, so Lin is mostly ignoring the worry, cautiously trusting that it will fade when nothing actually changes. And nothing does change. They go in front of the judge, the paperwork is filed, they go out to dinner at Mako and Bolin's favorite noodle shop to celebrate, and the next day, Lin signs a paper with their school to officially add Beifong to the boys' names. That's it. They're officially a family.

4. Okay, that's not strictly true. Zuko also shows up a few days later on the boys' day off school with Fire Nation style ginger honey plum cakes, and presents for the three of them, and a mock-stern warning that the boys are his nephews now. Lin pulls him aside later to talk to him about the problems in Republic City, and he promises to talk to Izumi, but it's all he can do not to pinch Lin's cheeks.

5. I just want to give a shout out to Kuvira. It takes a lot of bravery to do what she does next, calling Katara up in the middle of the night (for her, not for Katara) to talk.