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Perhaps I should kill him, Azula thought, cold and meticulous and ultimately merciful. There was something cruel about keeping a human alive, when their eyes were so empty.
Across the battlefield, Zuko stood, his eyes blank and any spirit he had ever had burned away with the skin around the left side of his face. He stood like he used to when they were children, his stance relaxed and just confident enough to make people hesitate. Despite Azula’s prodigal skills, Zuko had always been better.
Easier, as well, to mold. Azula remembered now, as she saw the scar, why she had left that night. The night Father held down her brother and taught him resilience, and Zuko had sat there and taken it. He hadn’t even screamed.
Azula used to think she was a monster, until she saw Zuko that night.
“Azula?” Katara asked, “What now?”
She glanced at the other girl and then suddenly remembered the firmness of her friend’s voices reminding her you’re not a monster.
She wouldn’t kill Zuko today.
To be fair, seeing the flickers of white curling against the blue in his flames, Azula wondered if she even could. She herself had only managed to turn her flames purple.
“Where’s Toph and Sokka?” Azula asked as she returned her mind to the fight before her, blasting away a Dai Li agent with ease.
She glanced at her brother. She just stood there, unflinching.
“No idea,” Mai said, managing to drawl even now, “But Ty Lee was with Aang. They’re headed this way.”
As much as Azula loved her current friends, she’d certainly missed the flat disinterest of her old friend that made this situation a little bit more amusing.
“Why is he just standing there?” Katara hissed as she ducked below a flying boulder.
Azula moved sideways to dodge the same boulder before sending a flame after the agent that has sent it. She huffed, glancing over to her brother, who still hadn’t moved, even as his flames started spreading enough to become an obstacle for them.
“He’s waiting,” Azula said quietly.
(She remembered, now, suddenly, how he had waited patiently, as she complained about the palenquines that were arriving late, and then, still impassive, told her she could ride his shoulders all the way back home.
How he had been stoic, even then, blank and unmoving, but his eyes had been so bright.)
“Azula!” Katara yelled, her water smashing against earth that would have broken her skull. Azula gave her a grateful smile, ignoring the look Mai sent her way.
There was a loud crashing somewhere to Azula’s right, behind the wall of white flames now blocking her view.
“Help has arrived!” they heard, and Azula had never been quite so happy hear Sokka.
A blast of wind blew past them, taking the Dai Li down. Aang was here too. Shit.
Ty Lee cartwheeled over to them, avoiding flying stones with ease. Toph grinned her little gremlin grin and sent bigger rocks flying back. Aang flew over to them.
“Hey!” he said, “Let’s go - Appa’s just out - “
A burst of flame, singing Aang’s clothes. Wildly, Azula looked to where Zuko was standing - only to see he had moved.
He was fast - of course he was, what wasn’t he good at - and Azula found herself flying off to the side before she could even react. She would never roll her eyes at Sokka when he complained about how much being blasted bu fire sucked.
“Aang,” she tried to yell, “Get - “
A stone wall slammed into her, pinning her down to the ground. Disoriented, she looked up, to see the Dai Li moving aside as Zuko glided across the room, eyes set on Aang as he and the Dai Li batted past Katara’s water with ease.
“Oi!” Toph said, punching her rock-encased fists together, “I don’t care if you’re Azula’s bro, I’m beating the shit out of you.”
Zuko stared at her flatly. Azula struggled against her bounds.
Toph fought through the Dai Li with ease, but Zuko only stood by and watched. Calculating.
“Need help?” Sokka grinned.
Azula glared, “Just do it.”
“Ah, the great Fire Bender is at my mercy,” he smiled, even as he broke her restraints with his boomerang.
Any witty comeback Azula would have come up with was lost when she hurt Toph scream.
Her feet were burning.
Her feet were burning.
Katara moved out of her shock and put out the fire, kneeling beside Toph to try and heal it, but the damage was done. Azula looked at Zuko - remembering the boy who used to feed turtleducks, even as Azula tried to burn them - and saw no remorse.
He was gone. Her brother was gone.
Even now, as she watched Zuko take down her friends one by one, she could see Ozai’s hands gripping him. Whispering into his ears and cradling his hand, so gentle and soft in a way that he knew would never fool Azula but would always make Zuko weak.
Death is a mercy, Zuko once said, and Azula had been so young then, too young to understand.
The thought came back to her, the nagging thought of ending it here, but Azula knew that this wasn’t the time.
The situation seemed all too desolate. Even with them all, they didn’t stand a chance against the Dai Li in their home ground. Katara was trying to protect and heal Toph at the same time. Ty Lee and Mai were back to back, cornered. And Sokka was nowhere to be found. Across the battlefield, her eyes made contact with Aang, and she knew he was thinking the same.
“I’m sorry, Katara,” he said.
The Avatar State. So his training had been fruitful, at least, But then she saw Zuko, saw his fingers pressed together and his stance became firmer.
Azula didn’t know why she moved. Why she reacted the way she did. Why she even cared about this stupid monk kid and his (Azula’s) little friends. She didn’t know what she was doing, really, until she was in front of Aang, ready to take lightning for him.
Somewhere, she thought she heard Ty Lee scream. But when she opened her eyes, there was nothing.
For a moment, the world was quiet. For a moment, Azula looked into her Zuko's dead eyes and saw … fire.
“Azula,” he whispered.
The single word sent a shiver down her spine, and for a moment, she thought she saw -
But the moment broke as the ground shook. She craned her neck up to see Sokka had arrived.
Zuko took up his stance again but the momentary distraction had been enough. Toph was back - not on her feet, but that wasn’t going to stop her - and sent a wave of earth crashing straight into Zuko’s side.
“You bitch!” she spat, and Azula could very well understand that sentiment.
“Get on!” Sokka yelled, as Appa rumbled loudly, his experience with the Dai Li making the sky bison angrier than Azula had ever seen him.
She got on, shoving Aang along who was still dazed from his near death.
“I didn’t know you could stop lightning,” he said.
“I can’t.”
Azula looked back, to where Zuko was already getting back on his feet. Their eyes connected again.
For a moment, she thought she saw her brother. Still in there. Still alive.
But his eyes had gone cold again, and he signaled for the Dai Li to surround them. They got out in the nick of time, just as the ground rose to meet them, trying to bind them to place.
“You’re brother is creepy as hell, Azula,” Sokka managed to say as they all struggled to catch their breaths and slow their hearts.
Azula remembered a boy who held her hand as she realised that neither of her parents loved her. She remembered a child who held her and said, I’ll love you for the both of them.
She remembered Zuko burning, and she knew that her brother had died that day.
“Next time,” she said, careful to let her voice be steady, “We should kill him before he kills us.”
There are no complaints there. Not vocally, anyway. But the part of her mind - the part of her that had given in to her friend’s persistent kindness, and the part of her that remembered Zuko’s warm hands on cold nights - was screaming.