Written for avatar_500 prompt #15, Defeat.

Summary: Ba Sing Se keeps falling.

The Dust and the Silence

The water sloshed over the edge of the bucket as Jin drew it carefully out of the public well.  High apartment walls rose up around her, hemming her in.  The well stood in a patch of sunlight between the shadows, and the summer heat beat down, bringing sweat up to bead on her forehead and under her robe.  The cloth stuck to her body and her hair sank low and wet into her eyes.

An arm dropped itself around over her shoulders.  The fingers attached to it swept down across her breasts.  She dropped the bucket.  “Hey, baby, come with...”

Jin couldn’t even hear the words.  The water splashed over her arms and stomach.  The cold only made the arm around her burn more.  She flinched away from both.

She lowered her bucket on its rope back into the well, ducking the Fire Nation Soldier’s arm.

She had to say yes.

There were still Dai Li hiding just behind the roof beams.

She never would have thought that defeat would taste the same as peace.

Written for avatar_500 , prompt #13, Memory.

Summary: There are so many ways for someone to get hurt.

So Many Ways

After the birth, while her thighs were still bloody, the royal physician lay the baby in Mai’s shaking arms.  She slumped against the pillows and tried not to clench her hands and press her new daughter to her, to keep her safe from everything else.

Because she knew that would leave bruises all over her new, red skin.

She clenched her jaw instead, and felt something clench deep inside.

Zuko, face yellow-gray with worry, lowered himself down to perch tentatively beside her on the bed.  Mai’s hand clutched his so hard her nails sank into his flesh and raised up little drops of blood.  She stared at him in desperation.  Her voice was neutral.  Her voice was always neutral.  “Do you want to hold her?”

When he shook his head, he trembled so hard, the movements looked like spasms.  “No.”  She had seen him scared.  She had seen him scared so many times, but not like he was when he looked at the tiny human in her arms, not the wrenching, freezing terror and guilt radiating off him as he tried to tear his eyes away from their daughter.

He wanted to shove her away, send her away.  Far away so that he couldn’t hurt her.  His scar ached, and he felt the air around him crushing in on him.

All they could do was look at each other.  Neither one of them could speak.  They looked at each other instead of their child and tried not to remember anything.

Written for the atlaland and avatar_500 joint challenge, prompt #11, Teach.

Summary: After the war, Iroh talks to Ozai about their father.

Merit

The guards left as soon as Iroh waved them away.  When Iroh had been on the other side of the bars, the guards had stayed.

Iroh sank to the floor and folded his legs.  “I thought you should know Azula’s doing better.”

“Not screaming for her mother anymore?” Ozai sneered.

“She never screamed for Ursa.  She screamed at Ursa.  She screamed for you.”

Ozai turned to face the wall.

“Her doctors could bring her to visit if you promised to be nice.  She would like that.”

Ozai flinched.

Iroh pushed the teacup he brought through the bars.  “You know, I would have thought you would have learned something from our father, but you treated your children the same way he treated us.”

Throwing himself at the bars, Ozai kicked the teacup into his brother’s face, hands clenching on the iron.  “I did everything different!” he howled.  “I swore I’d never treat any my children differently just because one was born first!  They’d have to earn-”

Iroh thought about his nephew waiting for him by the turtle-duck pond and the niece he’d just visited, and wondered how the man could choose.

Before his brother could say anything else, Iroh was gone.

Written for avatar_500 prompt #9, Honor.

Summary: Living in hiding takes its toll.

The Scariest Day

The scariest day of his life was the day he told his wife what he was. She was six months pregnant, and he should have told her on their wedding night, but he was a coward. He knew he was a coward. He came from a family of cowards.

That day, she screamed and raged and he waited for the soldiers to come to their door to kill him. But she didn’t tell.

Sometimes, after she let her hair down in the evenings, and before she braided it back up for bed, he bent a breeze to play with it as he ran his fingers through, and she would laugh at him.

They had children together. Ty Hei was only the first. There was honor in keeping his family safe.

The scariest day of his life was the day he told his wife what he was until the scariest day became the day he sent Ty Lee off to school.

The rest of his children he could tutor, but Ty Lee was only a year older than Princess Azula, and people would be suspicious if he didn’t send her hoping they’d become friends and win their family favor. No one could ever be suspicious of them.

It should have been Ty Un, who liked to liked to collect dolls and crack jokes, and could keep her feet on the ground. She would have bored the Princess. Boring was good. Boring was safe, and kept the family safe.

Ty Lee bent like she breathed, and her feet never touched the ground.

But Ty Lee turned out to be the best of anyone at hiding it. She bent and fought at the Princess’ side and no one ever noticed, because she was Ty Lee.

They taught all of their children to fight. Ty Yan even joined the navy. The day she did, he and his wife heaved a sigh of relief. No one would expect to find an airbender in the Fire Navy, any more than they expected to find them among the Fire Nation nobility.

He taught all of his children to hide as he had been taught to hide. He taught them to smile, and laugh, and play stupid, and keep the conversation on everybody else. It kept them safe. It kept them all alive. And he knew how much they must hate it.

His mother’s father’s mother had passed down what she could to her children, who passed it down to theirs. Surrounded by people who wanted them dead, the only way to keep a little bit of their history alive was to keep it secret and teach their children. There was honor in keeping their people alive.

When the war ended, it was hard to remember there was honor in speaking.

The scariest day of his life was the day he sent Ty Lee off to school until the scariest day became the day he told the world what he was and watched his children learn to fly.

Written for avatar_500 prompt #7, Neglect.

Summary: When wars end, there's always someone lost in the shuffle.

Asunder

Wangji’s mother is Earth. Her mama is strong and steady, and steadfast as stone.

Wangji’s brothers and sisters are Earth. They have green eyes, and slow tempers, and they grew up with dirt on their hands.

Wangji’s stepfather is Earth. He has big hands and wide shoulders that Wangji and all of her siblings rode around on in turn.

Wangji threw sparks around her crib as a baby. When he was feeling cruel, her big brother Keqin would tell her all about how that made her mother cry, and rage, about how Wangji wasn’t her stepfather’s but that Fire soldier who had-

Everybody was so happy when the war ended and the Fire Nation soldiers left and the Earth Kingdom ones came back. Wangji too. She’s not happy anymore.

When they came back, they put Wangji in a wagon. They wouldn’t let her family come, so her mama, and papa, and all her brothers and sisters followed along side and held her hands until the soldiers drove them away. There were other mothers fathers, stepfathers, stepmothers, brothers, and sisters following too, for the other kids, until the soldiers drove them away.

When they put her on the wagon, she was wearing green, a jeogori and chima her mama sewed her. They made her change into something red, but she didn’t own anything red. She still doesn’t. The scratchy thing they gave her is the brown color of dry blood.

She’s the oldest kid in the cart from her town; they keep handing her the babies, but she’s the baby of her family, and she’s never been near any other kind of baby before. But the Fire Nation colonists in the cart with them won’t have anything to do with them; they say the kids are Earth Kingdom, and they won’t admit they lost the war, and Haizi’s crying and she can’t do anything.

She’s thirteen. Everybody says that’s the same age as the Avatar. She hates him.

Tomorrow she’s going to get on a big metal ship, and everything left of what she knows will be gone.

She doesn’t think anyone in the Fire Nation will want anything to do with them any more than the Fire Nation colonists do.

There won’t be anyone waiting for her.

She doesn’t bend anymore. It aches and aches, and calls to her, but she won’t bend like they bend.

Wangji knows she’s Earth.

Written for avatar_500 prompt #5, Tyrant.

Summary: The strain takes its toll on the new Firelord.

Leaving and Gone

“What! Which one of you just said that?”  Through the flames around her throne, she could barely see the twins pointing their gnarled fingers at each other.  The flames first turned blue, she remembered, when Zu-zu left.  Everybody was always leaving.

“What a shame.”  Her eyes were bright.  “There’s only one way to resolve this. You two must duel each other. I order you to fight an Agni Kai.”

It didn’t matter which twin started the answer.  “But…”

“We’re not firebenders.”  Because they finished it together.

“Alright, fine.  Lo, you’re banished.”  it didn’t matter which of the twins she was pointing to.  “Li, you can stay.”  They were both going to be leaving.

~*~

“But what choice do I have?” Azula howled.  No!  She wasn’t going to think about Mai and Ty Lee.  She refused to think about the ones who’d already left.  “Trust is for fools. Fear is the only reliable way. Even you fear me!”

“No. I love you, Azula.”  Her mother’s reflection gave her the saddest look.  Why did she have to look at her like that?  “I do.”

Her hand latched onto the brush.  She wasn’t crying.  She wasn’t crying!  The tears splashed on the top of her table.  Her mother was talking to her, and she was already gone.

Azula roared.  Her hand opened.  The brush slammed into the glass.  The air broke apart, and from the ruined pieces on the floor, her mother blinked back at her.  Why wasn’t she leaving?  Wasn’t she already gone?

Written for avatar_500 prompt #3, Undying.

Summary: The first new moon.

Uncharted

Yue rose early, pale and lusterless in the morning sky.  “Hello Agni,” she greeted, bowing her head.

Beaming, he waved to her as she climbed higher.  Her hands trailed though the air, pulling the ocean waters after them, and La reached his hand up to her, but she didn’t take it.

He wanted Tui.  She couldn’t be Tui.

When she came close enough, Agni took her hands and pulled her into an embrace.  “You feel so thin,” he whispered.

She leaned against him, letting his short, round body bear her weight for a while, her head against his pudgy arm.  “Is something wrong with me?”

He shook his head and tucked her braids behind her ears.  His eyes took on a faraway look.  “Tui always had a hard time just before the new moon too.”

Yue let go abruptly.  “I’m sorry,” she wanted to say.

She hadn’t realized she had spoken it aloud until Agni laid his hand over hers.  “What for?”

“You must miss your sister terribly,” she murmured.

Agni rubbed the back of her hand with his thumb.  “Your sister too.”  Smiling sadly, Yue shook her head, and let him keep holding her hand.  After a moment, he let go and stood back, dangling in the air in front of her.  “Do you want me to help you through the sky?”

She felt horribly weak nodding, but her head bobbed without her permission.  He lifted her and her sliver of moon into his arms and carried her through the sky, letting the sun disk drift along behind them.  “Was-”  she stopped talking, and looked away.  “Was Tui your real sister, or was she your sister like I’m your sister?”

His brow furrowed, puzzled.  “You’re my real sister.”

“No, I mean, did you have the same parents?”

“We don’t have parents.”  He closed his eyes as she looked back to him.  “But I’m the Sun, and she was the Moon, so she was my sister.”

Yue wished he would smile. His round face was made for it.  She wished she could make him smile.

“I’ve never missed anyone before.  She’s the first of us to die.  I...”  He closed his eyes again and fought back tears.  “I didn’t even know we could.”

A piece of Yue was circling La in the pool at the spirit oasis, frail, and living, and vulnerable.  She brushed her hand against her brother’s cheek.

Written for avatar_500 for prompt #1: element.

Summary: People cross into and out of their elements all the time.


Ten Thousand Things

Playing another note on his reed flute, Aang grinned around the mouthpiece as another prairie dog popped out of its hole and echoed the note.  “I’m putting an orchestra together!”  He looked up at his friends.

“Orchestra, huh?” Sokka muttered.  “Well la dee da.”  But it didn’t matter, because Aang was in his element.

Toph crossed her arms.  “I say you guys go ahead without me.”

Katara rounded on her.  “You got something against libraries?”

“I’ve held books before, and I gotta tell you, they don’t exactly do it for me,” she sneered.  She didn’t like being out of her element.

~*~

“So, you like flyin’?” Toph drawled.  Appa scratched his ear.  Toph was out of her element anyway.

~*~

“I have an authentic waterbending scroll.” Katara smiled eagerly.

“Oh…” Wan Shi Tong murmured covetously.  “These illustrations are quite stylish.”  As he swept his wing over the scroll and it vanished into his collection, Katara bowed to him, still smiling.  She was in her element.

~*~

The water tribe boy dangled from the rope.  “Professor, let’s go!”

Zei picked his head up from the scroll in his hands, disregarding the sand pouring down around him.  He was in his element.

~*~

“Your waterbending won’t do you much good here,” the knowledge spirit sneered.  “I’ve studied Northern Water Style, Southern Water Style, even Foggy Swamp Style.”  He raised his head and opened his beak.

Sokka waited to let go of Aang and the glider until he was right above Wan Shi Tong.  The book in his fist crashed hard into the knowledge spirit’s head.  “That’s called Sokka style,” he crowed, beating the air with his fist.  “Learn it!”  As he ran, he was in his element.

~*~

Wan Shi Tong drifted out of consciousness, his knowledge flitting away from him.  He was out of his element.

The Will of a God

“I thought I told you if you ever slept with a man who could not beat you in fair combat you would suffer my wrath!” the war god thundered his bloody gaze falling on the scrawny form of the man beside her. The flames from the god’s sword miraculously didn’t set the pillows on fire, but she could feel them burn where the blade touched her neck.

Her new boyfriend stared wide eyed at the shining terror standing at the foot of the bed.

She didn’t even bother pulling up the sheet and winked. “Our Scrabble matches are very combative.”



Author's Note:  So it's a stupid, misogynistic, melodramatic trope, so I feel compelled to spoof.

Stop.  Don’t.

Ty Lee’s father’s feet were as light as hers, and when she was little, she watched him hesitate, and draw them down, and keep his steps even, but didn’t know why.

Stop.  Don’t.

Around her, her sisters followed his lead, and gazed at the sky with wistful smiles, and never left the ground, at least not where anyone could see.

Stop. Don’t.

Her mother always gave her father a puzzled look when he said that.

Stop.  Don’t.

But Ty Lee dreamed she could fly and woke up sure she could.  The air would never have let her fall.