Embers: Chapter Five
Sep. 12th, 2025 06:32 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
masterghandalfThis is a repost from Das_Sporking2; previous installments of this sporking may be found here.
Warning: This chapter contains discussion of genocide and racism.
MG: Well, everyone, it’s time to continue our journey through Vathara’s Embers! Last time, we reenacted the climax of The Chase with more healing, Katara got a surprisingly fair treatment considering what Vathara is going to do to her later, and Zuko and Iroh tried to explain what’s really going on to those naïve kids in the Gaang. Today, we deal with the aftermath of that battle, and get more of a sense of where some future developments in the fic will be going. Joining us today will be Aang and Zuko!
Chapter 5
"Okay," Sokka said, with what Toph thought was probably supposed to be strained patience, but just felt sarcastic. "We're fed, Appa's all shedded out, no crazy ladies or metal monsters in footsie range, and, most important of all, we've all had sleep. Now. Are you going to explain what you meant about knowing nobles, and what that's got to do with Aang asking one of the less crazy fire-guys to teach him?"
Aang: *shrugs* What’s weird about Toph knowing nobles? She is one! We saw her big fancy house and everything when we met her, and later on, her family name was enough to get us past a lot of Earth Kingdom officials.
MG: Yeah, but right now is time for Vathara to stress that you all don’t really know anything important and need to have information on The Way of the World spoon-fed to you by more knowledgeable sorts, and for the moment it’s going to be Toph doing the feeding, so strap in.
Toes feeling everyone's place in the loose circle around her, the earthbender frowned, and cracked a nut between two rocks to buy a second to think. Most of the time, she'd just bull through with the blunt truth, and let people's illusions shatter around her. But even though she'd been locked out of sight by her own parents, she'd still managed to slip out for months of earth-rumbles. You met people that way. Good people, weird people, people you never, ever wanted in touching range. And you learned stuff. Some of it stuff that might have turned really nasty, if she wasn't the best.
MG: *sighs and rubs their forehead* And of course, Toph sneaking out of the house periodically to fight in Earth Rumbles means she knows more about the world than people who have been traveling around the world for months now, and who hadn’t been living their lives in a gilded cage before that. Honestly, something Vathara’s Toph always just puts me in mind of Carmine Falcone’s “reason you suck” speech to a young Bruce Wayne in Batman Begins. “You think you know about the ugly side of life, but you don’t. You’ve never tasted desperate.” Of course, the point of that scene in Begins is that Falcone is right about Bruce and his privileged upbringing, and even though Bruce hates him, he also takes it to heart, and it’s a big part of what sets him on his path of wandering the earth incognito, learning and training and eventually becoming Batman (and returning to Gotham and taking down Falcone; funny how these things work out). But Vathara goes with the idea that Toph is (almost) always right, and the rest of the Gaang need to shut up and listen to her about any wisdom she chooses to dish out, even in contexts when logically she wouldn’t be the most knowledgeable. And, IMO, there’s a troubling subtext to the fact that out of the show’s main cast, it’s the nobles – Zuko and Toph – who are presented as wise and worldly, while Aang, Katara and Sokka (a monk and two commoners – and here I agree with Vathara that their dad being the village chief doesn’t make Katara and Sokka nobles) are generally expected to shut up and listen to their betters. Subtext which will get worse as the fic goes on and becomes ever more effusive in its praise of the Fire nobility as a class in particular. Maybe I’ve just got too much Mists of Avalon still haunting the back of my mind… but having seen it, I can’t really unsee it.
The Blind Bandit Wins Again: 3
Divine Right To Rule: 4
These kids? Just look how they'd tried to deal with her parents. They were - well, they weren't dumb, but they could stand to learn a few things.
Zuko: As opposed to what I’ve heard Toph did, which was run away without telling anyone, leaving her parents to think you all kidnapped her and then pay bounty hunters to go after her and bring her home? Bounty hunters Uncle and I ended up running into?
The Blind Bandit Wins Again: 4
He Has Much To Learn: 6
"First off," Toph asked, getting her thoughts in order, "why didn't you say Prince Zuko, instead of just some angry guy with a ponytail?" Which he didn't even have, anymore; she would have heard his hair swishing around, like she heard Sokka's. And she hadn't.
Zuko: …why is the story acting like the fact that I cut off my topknot is the most important thing here? I mean, in the Fire Nation we only do that in extreme disgrace* - that’s why it was such a big deal when Uncle and I cut ours off to blend in – but I don’t think any of you all knew that?
*Per the novels.
MG: Honestly, I can’t shake the feeling Vathara is annoyed that the Gaang weren’t treating you with the proper respect, like how dare Sokka call a prince an angry jerk with a ponytail! Can you even imagine? *fans self in mock horror*
"So he calls himself a prince," Sokka shrugged. "Big deal. Our dad's a chief. Who cares?"
"It is a big deal." Toph stabbed a toe into the dirt, flinging up a pebble to smack him from behind. "There's plenty of kings in cities across the Earth Kingdom, but there's only one Fire Lord. Ozai's got two kids. And we just met both of them."
"Zuko's the Fire Lord's son?" Katara said warily.
"Azula's his sister?" Sokka squeaked, almost at the same time.
Aang: …yeah? We knew that! I’ve been in the Fire Nation a hundred years ago, remember? One of my best friends lived there! I know what being a prince means in the Fire Nation and Zuko, sorry to say this, but you were going on about your dad and it was kind of creepy. I mean, I’d been frozen for a hundred years and just got out of the iceberg, so I wasn’t really up to date on the Fire Nation Royal Family tree, but I knew you were a prince and your dad had to be the Fire Lord pretty early on.
Zuko: And people had heard of me! Even the old man in that village where I met Lee knew my name when he heard it, and at least a bit of my story. I wasn’t exactly trying to hide who I was, at least not yet when I met you.
MG: Yes, but there are two things at play here. First off, Vathara seems to think that if the Gaang doesn’t have a scene in the show that spells out explicitly that they know something, she seems to decide that means they clearly don’t know it (rather than “they knew Zuko was a prince and Ozai’s son from very early on, and never attached much importance to it”). And the second is that Vathara has to portray Aang, Katara and sometimes Sokka as ignorant children any time she sees an excuse for Zuko, Toph or some of her OCs to lecture them for it.
Aang and Zuko: *both facepalm*
The Blind Bandit Wins Again: 5
Simple Rubes from the Water Tribes: 3
Toph swung her head toward Aang. "You're not surprised."
"She asked if I could see the family resemblance," the airbender admitted reluctantly. Vibrations told her he was clinging to his airstaff. "She thought Zuko's scar was… funny."
MG: Not to defend Azula’s character overmuch here, but I’m pretty sure it was her impression of Zuko she thought was funny, not the scar specifically… not that it’s much better in-context.
"That's what most of the Fire Nation thinks," Toph said sourly. "My parents didn't like me around when they entertained, but when you can walk through walls, you overhear lots of stuff. Earth Kingdom merchants like to talk." That some of what she'd overheard had really been from Fire Nation merchants - maybe she'd better not lay that little bit of truth on them just yet. The Bei Fongs weren't rich from being stupid. They traded with anybody honest enough to strike a good deal with.
MG: Okay, so here I think it’s time to lay a few things out. First, an admission. As far as Avatar: The Last Airbender fandom goes… I’m a heretic. Toph isn’t my favorite character. I don’t dislike Toph, mind you, and I absolutely understand why she’s so beloved overall, I just find her the least developed and least interesting of the main cast (by which I mean Aang, Katara, Sokka, Toph, Zuko, Iroh and probably Azula). Weirdly, my reaction to Toph when I first watched the show was almost the reverse of my reaction to Zuko – having gone into the show just knowing the premise and brief descriptions of the characters, I fully expected to hate Zuko and love Toph. I ended up loving Zuko and not being especially invested in Toph. Just wanted to lay that out because it might color some of what I’m about to say.
First off, I don’t think Vathara means to imply Toph’s parents are war profiteers, but that’s kind of where my mind jumped reading this for the first time (then again, that’s how we can tell the Beifongs – iirc, writing Toph’s surname as two words was common in fandom at the time this fic was coming out, and I also did it that way, but all official material from Korra onward has spelled it as one word – are all right in Vathara’s estimation, they’re cool doing business with the Fire Nation). For another… yes, we’re going to be treating Toph as knowing more about the war from spying on her dad’s business meetings than the Gaang do from actually living the war as right and correct, and playing it completely straight. I just have to think that in most stories, it would be Toph who would be having the rude awakening – being forced to learn that the polite unreality of her family’s business empire has real consequences for the lives of real people, and those Fire Nation merchants her dad seems to think so highly of are part of a machine that’s spent the last century slowly grinding her country under its heel. But no, Vathara’s writing and Vathara likes Toph, likes nobles, and likes the Fire Nation, and doesn’t like Aang or Katara, so of course Toph is right and they are wrong. However little sense it makes.
The Blind Bandit Wins Again: 6
Divine Right to Rule: 5
"So you know some stuff about the guy who's chased us all over the planet?" Sokka sounded reluctantly interested.
"I know he doesn't have a choice," Toph said flatly. "Nobody I heard really knew how he got scarred, but they think it had something to do with why the Fire Lord banished him right after. And everybody who's anybody knows he got told he couldn't come back without the Avatar. For three years, it was one big joke. And not the good kind." She pointed toward Aang. "And then you woke up, Twinkletoes, and all of a sudden? People aren't laughing anymore. Prince Zuko just might have a shot to do it. You have any idea how many people that got mad? Really, really mad?"
Aang: Uuuh… Zhao? I met Zhao, remember? And Azula, too. I could tell there was a lot of anger going on there, believe me.
"Like Azula," Katara whispered.
Huh. Sugar Queen's heartbeat felt way confused. Good. She needed to fall off that high ostrich-horse once in a while.
MG: *growls*
Beware the Sugar Queen: 2 (giving a point on general principle)
"You got it," Toph nodded sharply. "Zuko's her older brother. He gets out of exile, he could be the heir. He fails - or dies, you don't want to know how many people were sure he'd croak chasing rumors all over the world - she gets the throne. And from what people say? She's the one Ozai wants. Daddy's little girl, all ready to go out and burn soldiers alive." Toph snorted. "Makes me glad I'm an only child."
Zuko: …somehow I don’t think Dad would’ve been any more reasonable if I’d been an only child. Maybe he wouldn’t have banished me if I was his only heir, but… he wasn’t exactly in the running for the Fire Nation’s most wonderful father at the best of times. However he’d have treated me, he’d have made my life miserable.
"But she's his sister," Aang protested. "Isn't that important?"
MG: …ironic that Vathara has Aang saying this, because she’s going to be depicting Aang as having essentially no concept of family being important because of how he was raised later in the fic…
He Has Much to Learn: 7
"Hey," Sokka patted the airbender on the shoulder. "We all know Zuko's the bad guy. No way would he tell the truth about-"
"He. Wasn't. Lying," Toph ground out. "He was mad, and scared, and just about dead on his feet, but he was not lying. I know when people are lying."
"You do?"
"You scarfed the last berry-tart out of Katara's bag and blamed it on Momo," Toph said bluntly. "Earth lets me know about people. Zuko's got really good stance; he's probably been training it for years. That's why you guys didn't realize you could have knocked him over with a lizard-bird feather."
Aang: Wouldn’t that imply his stance was bad and only looked good?
MG: But of course, Toph is the author’s favorite, so Toph has to be the only one who took Zuko’s warning seriously…
"And we left him back there with her?" Katara swallowed uneasily.
"Relax," Toph waved. "Now that Uncle knows she's trying to kill them, if she does catch them, she won't get off that easy. You don't tick off the Dragon of the West."
Zuko: Uncle was there when Azula tried to shoot me with lightning at her ship; he redirected that lightning! I think he knew already that Azula at least considered the two of us dying to be acceptable.
"The who?" Sokka said skeptically. "He doesn't look like a dragon to me. Just kind of short, stumpy, follows after Zuko like an old… um." Sokka's heart sped up, as that rock-like (but strangely, unbendable) brain finally let a few conclusions through. "Uncle? Ah. You mean, on Zuko's mother's side. Right?"
Aang: *confused* Does Vathara think Sokka doesn’t know what a metaphor is? Why is he acting like she was trying to say Iroh was a literal dragon? *to Zuko* And I think we’d all figured out who your uncle was, too. He was pretty famous.
Toph grinned at him.
"…Oh, this is not cool…."
"Um, raised by monks," Aang put in warily. "Am I missing something?"
Aang: I think I’m missing why my being raised by monks is important here, actually? Katara and Sokka weren’t raised by monks and they were confused too, at first.
"Are you ever." Toph raised a handy rock to lounge against. "The guy you asked to teach you? General Iroh. The Dragon of the West. The only firebender who ever breached the outer wall of Ba Sing Se." She paused, just to drive the point home. "Fire Lord Ozai's older brother."
The airstaff fell from nerveless fingers.
Aang: Oh. I guess this version of me didn’t know who Iroh was. Why is Vathara trying to make it sound like none of us had any idea what we were doing?
MG: Because she thinks you didn’t have any idea what you were doing, and it’s going to get worse.
Aang: *sighs* Great.
He Has Much To Learn: 8
I'm not going to scream at Uncle. I am not going to scream at Uncle.
Singed, blackened, and ears still ringing from the third failed explosion, Zuko punched fire into the ground instead.
Zuko: Wait, are we already partway through me trying to learn how to make lightning? Really? Huh; you’d think my learning healing might have some impact on how I’m going to be trying to learn some other form of advanced firebending – apparently not!
Stations of the Canon: 11
"Zuko!"
"Leave me alone!" He clenched the more hateful words behind his teeth; they weren't true, Uncle was trying to help, it wasn't Iroh's fault that Azula was perfect at this while he was just-
A failure.
Zuko: *buries his face in his hands* And do I ever know that feeling…
He breathed out pain and flame and the simmering fury of Uncle was hurt, I couldn't stop her-
It should have been me.
Aang: Hey, you did manage to use healing to patch him up this time? That counts for something, right?
Another long, shuddering breath of fire, and Zuko sat back, drained. Going to have to cover the ashes if we want to keep our trail cold. Spirits, that was so stupid…. "I don't think this is going to work."
"You must clear your mind, Prince Zuko. Let go of your shame-"
"I'm not ashamed!" I know what I am. I try, and I try, and I can't fix it! I'm not ashamed-
Just angry.
Zuko: Am I the only one who wants to grab my other self by the shoulders and shake him really, really hard? Not because this part is poorly written; just because I remember trying to bury all my other emotions under anger, and it really, really didn’t help.
Angry, and tired. And tired of being angry. There had to be something he could do.
"If the enemy is too strong to face directly, change your tactics."
Zuko blinked, absently weaving flame between his fingers. "Lightning… the energies are inside."
Zuko: Yeah, that’s how firebending works when you’re making your own fire – or, uh, lightning in this case. You breathe in, your breath enters your body and becomes energy, then you force it back out through your limbs, where it becomes fire. Uncle explained this when we were at the South Pole, remember?
Iroh sighed, resigned. "Yes, they are. You separate your chi, and-"
Zuko let the flames flicker over his hand. "This is outside. So is healing. I can move my energy, Uncle - but I move it outside."
Zuko: Yeah, but it still starts inside (though that is a way lightning is supposed to be different – Uncle told me how once you create and release it, it goes where it’s going to go and you can’t control it anymore, not like normal firebending).
"…Hmm." Iroh stooped to feel through the ashes, rising with a few blackened, glassy lumps. "Perhaps I have forgotten what it is like to be your age, nephew. Lightning requires calm. And if your temper is anything like mine was then, calm will not come easily for some years."
Zuko blinked at the odd shift of tone. Not the impatience he'd expected from a master faced with a substandard student, but… understanding? "You had a temper?"
Zuko: …yeah, I knew that. Most firebenders can be pretty aggressive when they have to – firebending is all about positive jing, always staying in motion and on the attack. And sure, Uncle’s pretty laid back, but I’ve seen what happens when you push him too far.
"The stories I could tell, could curl an airbender's hair," Iroh said with great satisfaction.
"…They're bald."
"Not without shaving." Uncle looked him over with a considering frown.
Aang: Also, only Air Nomad men shaved their whole heads. Air Nomad women shaved the fronts of their heads, but usually grew their hair long in the back. And even the men tended to grow some pretty amazing beards and mustaches – just look at the Southern Temple elders!
"But I had thought you were calm, when you healed."
"You did?" Zuko said incredulously.
"It would seem I was mistaken," Iroh said thoughtfully. "You have always seemed quiet, with the healing fire. Focused."
Zuko eyed him a long moment, then shook his head. "It's not calm, Uncle. It's-" He hesitated, reaching into memory for the feel of it. "It's like a fight."
Zuko: *shrugs* I guess that’s a kind of focus? Not sure if it would help me make lightning, though.
And now Uncle was looking at him very strangely.
"It's like fighting with someone else." Zuko glanced away, remembering that first touch of flame on Asahi, and how the wounds had seemed to scream a challenge at him. "They're fighting too, but they're just outnumbered. So you step in, and guard their weak side. And you keep fighting until it's over." He took a breath. "The energies - what you use is from you, and the fire, but what you're fixing is inside. Knots. Sort of. That you're trying to get straight again. Katara… she soaked them, until they loosened up and did what she wanted. I - kind of have to melt them. A little."
Iroh smacked himself in the forehead.
"Uncle?"
"At my age, I should know better than to assume," Iroh said ruefully. "I have another idea."
Aang: Aaand, I guess we’re going to have to wait to find out what that is, because it’s back to us again! *glances down* And, uh, I’m not sure I much like where this is going…
"So what's got your hair-loops in a knot?"
Hand on the canyon wall, Katara groaned. Aang was snoring the sleep of the earthbending-exhausted,
Aang: You know, from what I’ve heard about where this story is going, I’m kind of amazed Vathara skipped over everything Toph put me through to try and get me to earthbend the first time…
Stations of the Canon: 12
and Sokka was busily cleaning out any scraps left in the cooking pot, but apparently it was too much to hope that Toph's feet would let her brood in peace. "My hair's fine, thanks."
"Sparky, huh?"
"Sparky?" Katara sputtered.
Zuko: *confused* Sparky?
MG: Yep, Embers!Toph has a nickname for you – and you’d better get used to it, because we’re going to be seeing a lot of it for the rest of the fic.
"I've heard a lot about firebenders," Toph shrugged, leaning back against comforting stone. "Never heard of any of 'em who could fix people."
"No," Katara said quietly. "That's just weird. I mean, Master Jeong Jeong said-"
"You met Jeong Jeong the Deserter?" Toph cocked her head, obviously interested.
"He tried to teach Aang firebending," Katara nodded. "That… didn't go so well." She looked down at her unmarked hands. "That was the first time I ever healed myself. He saw me do it; he was the first person to tell me waterbenders could heal. I think he would have given anything to be a waterbender instead of fire." She frowned. "It just doesn't make sense! Master Jeong Jeong - well, he wasn't nice. He was hard, like Master Pakku at the North Pole. But he was a good man. Why should Zuko-" She cut herself off.
MG: IIRC, Jeong Jeong doesn’t show up in person in the fic at all until the very end, when he’s just one member of a group of White Lotus masters. He’s not mentioned all that much either, iirc, and I’ve never gotten the impression Vathara cares much for him; probably because he’s full of self-loathing about his element and its destructive power instead of talking about how awesome it is like she’d probably prefer. *shrugs* Just the vibe I’ve gotten.
"Masters don't know everything," Toph said seriously. "Mine thought I was still working on kiddie moves." She stirred dirt with her toes, a sandy whirlpool. "Don't tell Aang this, but some of my serious stuff? I kind of got started on by accident. Just to see what I could do. So I can pull moves other benders think are impossible. 'Cause nobody told me I couldn't."
Aang: Which is kind of funny, because whenever we asked Toph about how she learned earthbending, she always talked a lot about learning from badgermoles; I don’t think I ever remember her mentioning Master Yu at all? Not that I blame her; I wouldn’t want to talk about him, either. But she did have good teachers – just not human ones.
Katara stared at her. "You think Zuko figured out how to heal by accident?"
"Why not? You did."
MG: Eeeh, not exactly, as we’ve already seen (about Zuko, at least, not Katara…). Kinda-sorta?
That… actually made sense. Kind of. "It just seems crazy," Katara shook her head. "I know what fire does, it-" Her throat tightened. Mom.
MG: Hoo boy, and here we’re starting to get a glimpse of “Katara hates the Fire Nation irrationally and refuses to consider fire as an element to be capable of good” that we’re going to be seeing a lot more of down the line…
"It's like Azula?" Toph said wryly. "Hey, if you think you're confused, what do you think he feels like?"
MG: …because in Embers, Zuko’s feelings always take precedence…
"I don't care what that jerk feels like!" Katara snapped. "He came to our home, he threatened Gran-Gran, he's always trying to hurt us, and Aang-"
MG: Honestly… I think this makes sense coming from Katara. At this point, she’s seen very little to suggest Zuko is anything but an enemy, with even their teamup against Azula last chapter being a temporary expedience more than anything. But an idea that Vathara is going to constantly keep hitting is that the Gaang should have known that Zuko was an honorable antagonist who never meant them serious harm (more on that later…) and should have known enough to both take him seriously and feel sorry for him, all in ways that make it extremely plain who’s the main character and who has the author’s backing.
"I could go home," Toph said matter-of-factly.
Katara rolled her eyes. "If this is about the camp chores…."
"No. I could go home. You and Sokka - you could go home. If you really wanted. And now you're thinking about how Sparky can't, and it's got you twisty as a nest of dragon-flies."
"Well, Aang can't go home either!" Katara bit out. "And who can we blame for that?"
Aang: *uncharacteristically morose* Yeah, that’s a good point. Not only can I not go home, at least Zuko’s home was still there – even if the Fire Nation hadn’t attacked the airbenders, I was still in that iceberg for a hundred years. My old life was gone. I… I try not to dwell on that too much, but it’s true. But why am I getting a weird feeling that’s somehow not good enough for Vathara?
"Is Zuko really a hundred years old?" Toph said wryly. "'Cause I gotta tell you, Sugar Queen, he sure doesn't move like it."
Zuko: …just wanting to let everybody know that nobody has ever accused me, personally, of taking part of the slaughter of the Air Nomads. Just wanted to get that straight. It was still my ancestors who were responsible for it, though, which means that, for better or worse, I carry some of that guilt – especially once I inherited their throne.
"But it was the Fire Nation!"
"This time." Toph snorted. "Never had to sit through history lessons, huh? Check out Chin the Conqueror. If he could've gotten up to the Air Temples, you bet he would have."
MG: *groans, rubs their forehead* Okay, everybody. The very worst of the Air Nomad bashing takes place in the later part of the fic, but Vathara gives us a bit of a taste of it here. First off is her idea that all the Air Nomads’ neighbors secretly resented them and always either outright wanted them gone or at least shed no tears when it actually happened. Needless to say, substitute virtually any real-life group who’s suffered genocide or ethnic cleansing for “Air Nomads” (who are, of course, specifically based on Tibetan Buddhists) and you can see how monstrously callous and inhumane that sounds. But there’s the other side of things that’s here too, in the completely out of nowhere mention of Chin the Conqueror. Now, in canon, we have no indication that Chin ever had anything against the Air Nomads, or if he even came into conflict with them – as far as we see, his specific goal was making himself emperor of the Earth Kingdom, and any further plans he had never got off the ground because, you know, Kyoshi. And the Kyoshi duology we have doesn’t reach Chin’s war (though it seems likely we’ll get that story in some form sooner or later) but does establish the power vacuum in the Earth Kingdom that would eventually lead to Chin’s rise. No Air Nomads involved (Vathara, of course, is eventually going to tie the Air Nomads in a certain way to Chin’s rise to power). So, at the risk of Godwinning this discussion, it feels as random as someone responding to discussion of the Holocaust by bringing up Napoleon and saying he could have done something like that too. And, like, sure, maybe if Napoleon had stayed in power long enough he might have tried to do something like the Holocaust (though IIRC he didn’t really bear any particular personal ill-will towards the Jewish people, at least any more than any other ruler at the time did – not that there’s any indication Chin bore the Air Nomads any particular enmity either – and even overturned some longstanding anti-Jewish laws after he came to power, though he also imposed restrictions on Jewish life and activities later in his reign) but the fact is that he didn’t, and the Nazis did. Just like maybe Chin could have exterminated the Air Nomads under the right circumstances, but the way things actually played out he didn’t, and Sozin did.
But there’s a consistent theme in this fic that takes the form of a certain… whataboutism, let’s say, that seems to exist primarily to keep the other nations from having a leg to stand on when it comes to criticizing the Fire Nation by establishing that hey, they all have atrocities in their history too, so how can they really judge? We’ve already seen Chin brought up for the Earth Kingdom, but apparently a thousand years ago the Air Nomads were brutal conquerors whose leaders were just as bad as Sozin and whose invasions left the Fire Nation with lasting cultural trauma (yes, really, Vathara is going there), and two thousand years ago it was an OC Water Tribe Avatar who went crazy and had to be put down and started the chain of events that sent the world into this mess in the first place, as will be revealed in the later parts of the fic. And this sort of stuff seems to be brought up so often in response to Fire Nation atrocities, as if to say – you’re no better. And urgh, I hate it, and it rubs me the wrong way so badly, and does nothing to discount the fact that the Fire Nation are the ones trying to conquer the world now.
Aang: Yeah, like, who cares if Chin might have turned on the Air Nomads someday – he didn’t actually do it! That never happened! Sozin did wipe out the Air Nomads! That did happen! It’s a pretty big difference! And if Chin really did want to attack the Temples, I can think of worse ways to climb mountains than with an army of earthbenders.
"And they didn't do anything to him, either!"
"Yeah. They didn't. Nice, peaceful guys, right? Didn't do anything to him. Didn't do anything to stop him. People kind of don't like other people sitting back and watching them get creamed."
MG: We have no idea what the Air Nomads may have done, or not done, about Chin. We also have no idea if the Fire Nation or Water Tribes tried to stop Chin either – and if they did, they clearly failed – but it’s not like Vathara brings them up. But of course, everyone hates the airbenders, and everyone resents their pacifism, and so we have to dogpile on them at every opportunity, *groans loudly* Urgh. I really hate how Vathara handles the Air Nomads, and even if everything else about the fic was perfect, that element alone would be such a black mark against it I wouldn’t be able to rec it unreservedly… but we’re going to be talking a lot more about this as we go on.
Detached from Reality: 4
Toph looked straight at her, blind eyes serious. "I don't exactly do maps. But last I heard, the Air Temples aren't in the Fire Nation. They're on big mountains, right? Surrounded by the Earth Kingdom. Or up near the poles. Which means Water Tribe territory."
MG: Technically, if you look at the canonical maps of the Avatarverse, the land around the Air Temples is usually colored in white, distinct from Earth Kingdom tan or green, Fire Nation red or Water Tribe blue. So, the Air Nomads always seemed to have their own territory, even if it is mountainous and inhospitable. They weren’t just squatting on other countries’ land. Even in the Kyoshi novels, iirc Kyoshi’s mentor/father figure Kelsang, an Air Nomad, is explicitly described as being a “monk from a foreign land” in contrast to the Earth Kingdom Kyoshi.
"So?" Katara said, puzzled.
"So. Who let the Fire Nation get to those mountains?"
Zuko: …from what I’ve heard of my great-grandfather, he wasn’t someone to let people get in his way, or tell him what he could or couldn’t do. Also, some master firebenders can fly, and with Sozin’s Comet in the sky that day… they may not have needed much help getting up into the mountains.
MG: IIRC, some lore tied to the short-lived A:TLA Trading Card Game indicated that the Fire Nation had help from an Air Nomad traitor when it came to breaching the Temples, though the canonicity of that is debatable.
Katara swallowed, chilled. "You're wrong. You don't know my father. You don't know anything!"
Aang: Wait, is Toph blaming the Water Tribes for helping Sozin?
MG: Water Tribes, Earth Kingdom… yes, yes she is. And it’s not the last we’ve heard of this, either.
Aang: …oh, no…
"I know your father's not a hundred years old, either," Toph shrugged. "You going to tell me I'm wrong, Snoozles?"
Katara smiled as her brother wandered their way, scratching the back of his head with a thoughtful scowl. Her big brother, would-be warrior, pretty much a good guy when he wasn't thinking with his stomach-
Aang: Wow, am I the only one who thinks that feels amazingly condescending? And not much like Katara?
Zuko: No. You’re not.
And then he had to open his mouth.
"Well, Dad wouldn't have," Sokka frowned. "But Gran-Gran's a lot older than any of us, and she left the North Pole for some kind of good reason."
MG: Yeah, she left the North because she was engaged to Pakku, they had some sort of fight about his rigid adherence to the Northern Tribe’s laws and traditions (Katara guesses she never loved him, though considering we know they ended up actually getting married at the end of the series, I’m assuming there was at least some positive feelings there… though I always figured Pakku did a lot of groveling before Kanna was willing to take him back) and eventually she left. We don’t know the details, but it never seemed like it was that complicated. But I really don’t think Vathara likes Gran-Gran, so be on the lookout for that…
"Sokka!" Katara exclaimed.
"Hey, you know what you had to go through to get Master Pakku to teach you waterbending," her brother pointed out. "And they were going to use eighty-five-year-old Fire Nation armor to try and sneak into the fleet. They didn't even know it changed!"
Aang: Because the Northern Tribe was basically living in a fortress and the Fire Nation didn’t want to attack them until they were sure they’d win? And what does this have to do with the Air Nomads, exactly?
"So?" Katara griped, folding her arms.
"So, what do we really know about the Fire Nation? Besides the fact that they did start the war, they are after Aang, and Zuko's so stubborn even a city full of waterbenders couldn't keep him down. Well, him and his uncle," Sokka amended. "And that's… weird. Interesting, but weird."
Zuko: But you all aren’t like the Northern Tribe! You have been traveling the world and seen some stuff at this point! It’s not the same situation at all!
MG: But of course, we had to bring the conversation back around to Zuko in a somewhat complimentary fashion somehow.
Katara snorted. "Believe me, Sokka, nothing about that jerk is interesting."
"Still mad he tied you to that tree, huh?"
"I'll save you from the pirates." That high-handed, arrogant, over-confident-
MG: Once again, this seems like a legitimate thing to be angry about, yes. At least Vathara isn’t trying to present the “I’ll save you from the pirates” bit as being somehow romantic (in case it needs to be said, this fic does not ship Zutara!) but on the other hand… we’ll be coming back to that scene, and that line.
"Ooo!" Toph bounced. "You've got to tell me about that!"
MG: Ergh, this is another thing that gets me about how this fic handles the Gaang’s past interactions with Zuko. These kids are at war, and Zuko has been, to this point, their enemy – not their worst enemy, certainly, either in terms of being evil or being dangerous, but still an enemy, actively working to take Aang captive to present him to the leader of the enemy, And Toph seems to be taking it about as seriously as if it was a bunch of schoolyard mischief… and we’re seemingly supposed to agree with her, and treat Katara as if she’s just overreacting by holding a grudge over these shenanigans. I just… do not like how this is handled, at all.
"Never mind about the tree!" Katara snapped. "I can't believe you're still thinking about him. Or his uncle!"
Aang: Well, they were involved in a pretty big deal we just went through…
"I kind of can't believe you're not," Sokka said seriously. "Iroh told us something important." He held up a finger for emphasis. "Remember how he said Azula thinks they're traitors? And that wasn't fair to his nephew?"
"I really could care less what's fair to Zuko, Sokka," Katara grumbled.
Zuko: *looks like he’s about to object, then slumps* Yeah, at this point I can’t really fault her for that.
"He didn't say it wasn't fair to him."
"Whoa. Good point," Toph said. "He helped you guys at the North Pole, right? Which kind of squashed Admiral Zhao's whole invasion flat. He really is a traitor."
MG: Well, on the one hand, Iroh explicitly denied being a traitor at the North Pole, since Zhao destroying the moon would hurt the Fire Nation too… on the other hand, he did attack Zhao and his men, and Ozai clearly considered his acts to constitute treason, so… yeah.
Katara let her arms fall, unable to argue. "But Zuko trusts him." She frowned. "And he said he wouldn't help Aang."
"He's not going to teach Aang," Sokka said, with what was meant to be a wise and knowing air. "Doesn't mean he won't help, next time we run into them."
MG: Considering that, canonically, the next time the Gaang ran into Zuko was the Book Two finale, when Katara was the one who tried to befriend him and he ended up throwing it in her face and teaming back up with Azula… that’s kind of hilarious in hindsight.
"Next time?" Toph asked.
"Oh, yeah," Katara sighed. "With Zuko? There's always a next time."
Aang: Yeah, I think we’d all figured that out by then. Zuko never gives up, and all!
MG: And so we come to the end of this scene, which gives us our first real taste of some of how the Gaang is going to be characterized and how some of the other nations are going to be handled in this fic. And, as I think I’ve made clear, my reactions to all this run from mere distaste to outright hating it. And now, I think it’s time to assign some points, which I’ve been waiting to do for the whole conversation!
Beware the Sugar Queen: 5
The Blind Bandit Wins Again: 8
Detached from Reality: 5
Divine Right to Rule: 6 (for Toph the aristocrat being right about everything)
Prince Stuko: 8
Simple Rubes from the Water Tribes: 5
"All this four elements talk is sounding like Avatar stuff," Zuko said warily.
Zuko: Wait, did we just skim over Uncle telling me all about the philosophies of the different elements and how the different nations reflect them? That was the most important part!
Meaning he was treading on the very thinnest ice of his nephew's willingness to listen, Iroh knew. Lifting a hand from his dirt drawing, he tossed another twig to the small fire he'd built in Zuko's seared pit; deliberate distraction, to ease the singing tension. The Avatar was the bridge to the spirit world - and the spirits had ever been less than kind to his nephew.
Aang: …I didn’t have anything to do with that. Just so we’re clear.
Zuko: And we’d fought a lot by this point, anyway – you’d think Uncle would consider that that’s why bringing up the Avatar around me back then might not go over well!
Well. Except, perhaps, in one instance. Asahi browsed in and out of view, clearly unworried by any fire so long as it was theirs.
"It is the combination of the four elements in one person that makes the Avatar so powerful," Iroh agreed. "But a true Avatar's power is rooted in more than just bending. The Avatar was meant to travel the world, and teach each nation of the others, so none of us forgot why we need each other. He saw the ways of each people, and so we saw them in him. For sometimes it is only by looking at another that we can see the truth of ourselves."
MG: Kind of ironic, considering that Vathara will later establish that the Avatars, at least the more recent ones (Kyoshi and Roku in particular) had basically dedicated themselves to enforcing a sort of apartheid between the different nations (yes, yes, I know – we’re going to have so much to say about that and how Vathara twists a single line Roku said to Sozin in a moment of anger into something it was clearly never meant to be or mean) and that the Avatars needed the yaoren to advise them in order to really understand the four nations and the world in general (more on that later, too).
"I don't understand."
Nor do I. Not as I had thought I did, Iroh thought. "I have been considering what you said, nephew. And I believe I may have an answer. But to be certain - and I must be certain - I will need you to do something very difficult."
Zuko sat up straight, determined. "I'm ready."
"Good," Iroh nodded. Waved at the fire. "Imagine a small child, who has just started to firebend. Like yourself, perhaps, when Lu Ten was your age. Teach him to heal."
"Uncle?" The unscarred eye was wide.
"Imagine, nephew," Iroh said gently. "Imagine that I ask for him, why does this work? How do I begin?"
Zuko: …I actually see what Uncle’s doing here. He’s forcing me to work through what I’ve been teaching myself on its most basic level, both so I can understand it better myself and learn how to teach it to someone else… you know, for all the things about this story I’m already starting to get the feeling I don’t like, sometimes Vathara really does show she can write really good moments between me and Uncle, when she wants to.
Zuko stared into the fire, silent.
Perhaps it is too soon. I hoped not, but what Azula did to both of us… betrayal cuts deep.
"Fire wants to fight."
Zuko: …sure, but fire does other things, too. That’s what the dragons showed me – that fire is about light, and life, and passion, not just destruction the way the Fire Nation had been focusing on for the last hundred years. I thought Vathara was into that kind of thing?
MG: But keep in mind that “fire wants to fight” is the very first thing she has you say when breaking your technique down to its most basic level… because that is going to be so important for her understanding of the Fire Nation as a whole.
Iroh sat back, listening.
"It wants to fight, and it wants to burn." Zuko frowned, feeling his way through words. "If you want it to be more, you have to give it part of you. You have to flow with it. It's like… if firebending is being the captain of the ship, healing is turning it so you don't get swamped by the rogue wave. You get what you need, but you're not - all the way in control." He paused, shaking his head. "Fire is a rhythm, a heartbeat. It knows how to dance, it just doesn't know what dance you need it to do. You have to show it the steps. It's you, and the fire - and you're not trying to match it, not like breathing. You're trying to find a rhythm you can both fit. And then it's you and the fire and the person you're healing, and that gets complicated, and sometimes you trip a little. But you care, you have to care - and if you just keep going, it'll work." Zuko blew out a breath, obviously not happy with his own words.
MG: …on the other hand, as Zuko trying to explain something that defies simple explanation, this I like quite a lot.
Look outside yourself, indeed, Iroh thought, smiling. Dancing, especially with a partner, was a habit of other peoples, not the Fire Nation.
Aang: Only because the only music your schools were teaching was those boring military marches! You had lots of dances before the war started! We had a whole adventure about this, remember? And Zuko, remember that the firebending form we learned from the Sun Warriors was the Dancing Dragons, and it was designed for two people to do together!
Zuko: Considering that immediately after we did that technique for the first time, we got soaked in goo and stuck to the ceiling all afternoon, I don’t think I’ll ever forget.
And why should it be otherwise? Other benders must find their element outside themselves. We carry ours within. Which is why those like Zhao proclaim us superior. And perhaps we are - in combat, in killing.
But in our dances, we dance alone.
Aang: …I think that’d be a lot more meaningful if I didn’t know Fire Nation people used to love to dance before Sozin decided to make your whole country all about fighting, all the time.
The Superior Element: 5 (while taking a swipe at Zhao’s speech I named my count for, it’s still got a pretty undeniable undercurrent of “fire is special” going on)
"It seems a place to start," Iroh nodded. "Now. Show me."
Eyeing him doubtfully, Zuko beckoned to the fire-
Stopped. Took a breath, and reached out again with both hands. Slowly.
Shaping a fireball, Iroh thought, watching intently. But he called it from the fire, not himself, and he has not separated it wholly from the flames. And he is adding his own energy to it. Much like a waterbender, riding a wave.
Ball of flames between his palms, sparks trailing to the fire, Zuko began moving his hands in slow, opposing circles. Glints of green caught and spread, ribbons reaching out to wreathe his hands.
Zuko: Okay, there’s the dragon fire.
It is like the dao, Iroh realized. They do not move exactly as one. As two halves of a whole, yes. But one is sometimes faster, or slower. And sometimes they are near to block a single enemy, while at others, they separate to fight a host of opponents.
MG: Huh; another bit I rather like, reflecting on how Zuko’s swordsmanship influences his firebending technique, and vice-versa.
A fight. A heartbeat. A dance. If there were something less akin to the calm separation of lightning-bending, he had never seen it.
Zuko took the opportunity to reach back and run flames over the bruises from his meeting with the street, and let the fire in his hands die. "I guess that's it."
Nodding, Iroh reached out to the fire himself.
This is not as easy as it looks.
Zuko: Not to insult Uncle… but I’d imagine that if it really was as easy as it looked, the technique wouldn’t have been lost to begin with. Someone else would’ve figured it out.
Training said to keep his movements precise, sharp, controlled. To establish boundaries between himself and the flame. Fire, taught the masters, was anger, destruction, deadly passion. It could not be left to rage unchecked.
But Iroh had seen dragon's fire. And yes, rage was in it - but also warmth, compassion, friendship. Even the rage was no cold thrill in destruction, but desperate love of what they fought to protect.
Zuko: …you know, I still need to get the full story of that out of Uncle. One of these days…
MG: Unfortunately, and somewhat confusing, I don’t think Embers ever really goes into much detail about Iroh’s encounter with the dragons as a young man; iirc, the two dragons from “The Firebending Masters” never actually appear in the fic at all, though other dragons do.
Flow with the flame. Let it be part of you. Care.
It seared inside, like the times he'd snuck into hidden caverns to try to bend lava. Not so much physical pain, as of the spirit; he'd ached for his family and his people so very long….
It was the searing that kicked in training again; fortunately his own, and not any gained from Sozin's teachings. Live! Let the energy flow. In, down, up, out-
Green blazed between his hands, before it shattered apart.
"Uncle!" Soothing warmth kneaded his shoulder, sinking in to his heart. "You - you weren't breathing right…."
Iroh drew a deliberate breath, and felt the flow of his own chi. A bit uneven, but Zuko's efforts were mending that. "The technique," he said wryly, "is not so harmless to the student as it appears."
Aang: I’m glad your uncle’s okay, but Zuko, didn’t you tell me that when you tried to bend lightning for the first time, it blew up in your face too? Are advanced firebending techniques just… like that sometimes?
MG: And again, I do appreciate that neither Iroh nor Zuko are instant experts on this stuff, and that Vathara resisted the temptation to make Iroh the Keeper of All Secret Knowledge, which I think would’ve been an easy trap for a fic like this to fall into.
"Not harmless? What did you do?"
Green flickered away again from Zuko's hands, and Iroh leaned gratefully on his nephew. "On the bright side, it appears that I am right. And for that, I am sorry. I am truly sorry, nephew. It has been in plain view for years, and I did not see."
Zuko's fingers felt for his pulse. "Uncle, are you sure you're all right? Because you're not making sense."
Iroh chuckled ruefully. "I am, no thanks to my own training. Zuko. When you change the fire to heal, you leave its energies linked to the flames. And to yourself. This is not what firebending teaches."
Zuko stiffened, pulling back. "So I'm doing it wrong."
"No!" Iroh gripped his shoulders, holding the young man before he could escape back into doubt and pain. "No, nephew. You are doing it right! I did it as firebenders are taught; I controlled the flow, precisely. And like the rogue wave on the sea, it is not meant to be so tamed."
Zuko: Except I was trained in the same style, and I’m not having that problem apparently? Is that just because of Mom’s influence? And Uncle was the one who told me not to try and control lightning, but to be “its humble guide,” I think he’d have an easier time with this?
"Your heart." Zuko was desperately pale. "You have to feel it with your heart, and…."
"Yes," Iroh nodded, relieved to have finally - finally! - gained a clear view of his enemy's position. And if his intuition was correct, it might yet become an ally instead, if he were clever enough. "The heart has a rhythm as well. Control the fire too tightly, it turns on those rhythms of your own it can reach." And I thought only lightning could so stop a heart.
Which led to grim thoughts of exactly what Ursa might have done… no. His father's death was the past. Zuko's life was here, and now. "You did it right, Zuko," Iroh said simply. And laughed at himself, ruefully. "Which means, of course, I have been teaching you firebending as I might calligraphy, left-handed."
Zuko gave him a look askance. "Did you get hit with a boomerang when I wasn't looking?"
Zuko: I think I’d have figured out that Uncle was being metaphorical here? He was just saying that his own training was holding him back!
"Listen to me, nephew," Iroh said patiently. He couldn't blame the boy for his doubts. Any other master would swear he'd been sunstruck. But if he closed his eyes to the lessons of Sozin and Azulon, and looked at what his nephew had actually done…. "To throw fire together with another bender is a fundamental technique, yet it remains one of the most difficult. Many do not even bother to master it. Why should they, when we can order the mass fire of hundreds? But at the South Pole we threw, and you did not hesitate."
"I know my basics, yes, thank you, Uncle-"
Aang: And Iroh was your teacher and you’d trained together, right? I bet you were a lot more in sync than just about any other two firebenders would be.
"Hush, and listen," Iroh directed. "When you faced Zhao, I worried he had you; yet with one spin you shattered his fire and his stance. I have known masters who could not have struck that blow. When you raised fire about Azula, why did she not wrest it away the instant it burned? Unless she could not, until she forced herself free with all her strength. And now, when you heal…." He let go, and smiled. "What do these fires have in common?"
Zuko swallowed. "They're outside." He grimaced. "But that's not how it's supposed to be."
Prince Stuko: 10 (giving a couple of points here for hyping up some of Zuko’s past achievements in a way the show never did)
"At the moment, I believe we should be less concerned with proper style, and more with what will work if Azula does bring reinforcements." Iroh nodded toward the dao resting by their packs. "Is that not why you learned swords as well?"
Zuko's fists clenched. "I just - wanted to be good at something."
MG: Heh; you know, I’ve always quietly headcanoned that the reason why we never see Azula use any sort of sword on-screen in the original show is that she’s very much aware swordsmanship is one of the few things Zuko is just straight-up better than her at, and she hates that.
"And so you are," Iroh said firmly. You are good, nephew. Not a master, perhaps; but you are only sixteen. Give yourself time.
MG: This, on the other hand, is kind of hilarious in hindsight considering all the things Vathara is going to end up having Zuko actually accomplish while he’s still sixteen…
Azula was chasing them. Sozin's Comet was coming. Time, they did not have.
"Do not discount your gifts, Prince Zuko," Iroh said instead. "They may yet save your life. There is a firebending technique neither Azula nor my brother know, and it depends on something very much like what I have seen you do."
"There's a move the Fire Lord doesn't know?" Zuko said warily.
Iroh smiled. "He doesn't know, because I made it up myself." He dropped his nephew a wink. "I was studying waterbenders years before Katara drew your attention, nephew."
"Drew my attention?" Zuko sputtered. "She buried me in ice in the middle of a blizzard, Uncle!"
Aang: Part of me feels like I should apologize for that, because she was protecting me at the time… but I also can’t really feel too bad about it, because she was protecting me at the time; does that make sense?
MG: And just to be clear again, if it needs to be said, this fic does not in any way ship Zutara… though Iroh himself kind of seems to be hinting he might?
"You should have seen what my Natsu did when I was your age," Iroh said fondly. "Ah, what a fiery chase she led me, before she caught me!"
"Uncle." Zuko was gripping the bridge of his nose in the exasperated way that meant he'd decided this was another bout of temporary insanity, which just might pass if he waited it out. "She's Water Tribe. She is not waiting to ambush me with a red cord and three cups of wine. Trust me."
MG: The ritual described here sounds like it’s based on the Japanese San San Kudo (thank you for the link, LanWan!); we’ll be hearing references to this a fair bit more as the fic goes on, and similar rituals in different contexts. “Natsu” as Iroh’s wife’s name seems to be Vathara’s invention (at least, I don’t think I’ve heard it anywhere else in fandom and the character isn’t named in canon); we know nothing about her from canon, save that Iroh had a (presumably legitimate) son, and therefore was presumably married at one point. I think the most common fanon is that she’s dead, and likely has been for a long time as of the series.
"Ah, a shame," Iroh sighed gustily. Mentally chalking another point on his side of the tally: one distraction, complete. "Well. The cold fire is powerful, and certainly impressive, but it has a weakness. More than any flame, it is energy, and it seeks the path of least resistance. If you let the energy in your own body flow, the lightning will follow." He stood. "Let us begin."
Zuko: Okay, so now we’re getting into redirecting lightning… but still missing the part where Uncle told me about how waterbending emphasizes adapting to your opponent and turning their energy against them, and that’s specifically where he got the idea for this technique…
In, down, up, out, Zuko chanted to himself as they practiced through the afternoon, shifting the flow of energy as he moved. Trying not to think of that flash of pure fear, as he'd stared Azula's sparkling death in the face-
Before Uncle had stepped between them, and redirected her bolt into the cliff.
He saved me. I didn't even realize what he did, not then - too scared, too angry - but he did.
Zuko: Actually, I already knew Uncle could do that – I even saw him redirect a natural lightning bolt during that storm, which was a lot bigger than any of Azula’s! Remember, I guessed what technique he was going to show me pretty much as soon as he admitted it was something he made up himself.
Next time, I want to save myself.
Zuko: That, on the other hand… that’s about right. I think I’d have been willing to take any advantage over Azula I could get, at that point. After all I’d been through lately, I needed it.
In, down, up, out.
It was and wasn't like healing. Healing was a dance, a partnership, both sides trading off the lead. This was more like Jun the bounty hunter's whip, snapping out against danger. But it was still a flow. A pattern.
It makes sense.
He could feel the technique, solid as any of the basics Uncle had taught him. This was how it would flow. How it would work. "I'm ready."
"Ready?" Uncle Iroh said incredulously, dropping out of stance. "What, are you crazy?"
"I have to know it works, Uncle!"
"And if it does not?" Iroh blazed. "I have lost my son; I will not lose you as well! If you are lucky, you will never need this move in your life!"
Aang: You actually tried to get your uncle to shoot lightning at you!?
Zuko: …I’m not sure how much of this is really me anymore, but that part… yeah, I did try that. I was desperate to prove myself at something, but looking back? I can’t blame him for not wanting to do that!
He's angry. He never gets angry. Zuko clenched his fists, unwilling to back down. "When have I ever been lucky, Uncle?"
Aang: So, you think you’re doomed to be unlucky… which is why you want to be shot at with lightning so you can try a technique that could kill you if you’re not lucky? Does that make sense?
Silence, stretching taut between them as gold warred with gold. "No," Iroh said flatly, every inch the Dragon of the West. "You are not ready."
Zuko: …am I the only one getting the feeling Vathara is making Uncle less sympathetic about this than he actually was? I mean, it was pretty clear looking back that he wasn’t angry, he was scared and didn’t want to risk me dying, which I very well could have!
I need this! It was all the banished prince could do not to scream. I need this, Uncle. I need to win. I need to beat her!
…I need to be good enough. Just once.
Zuko: *groans audibly* And boy, do I remember that feeling. And I get it. But looking back, I also get that Uncle wanted a living nephew. Lightningbending isn’t something you play around with! It’s actually dangerous!
Breathe. Bite back the anger, even if smoke rose from between his clenched fingers. "Azula's after us, Uncle. If she brings troops - if she gets us separated…." Zuko swallowed hard, pride burning like acid. "If she does that, I'm dead anyway."
I'm not good enough to take her. I never have been. All I can try to do is stay alive.
All we can do is run.
It wasn't fair. It just wasn't fair. The rage burned in him like lava, demanding to blaze free….
It's never been fair, Zuko reminded himself, forcing the anger back. And I don't care. I'll make my own destiny. Whatever it takes.
MG: Which, again, is a bit ironic, because Zuko has about three or four distinct destinies planned for him by various parties before the fic is done… some of which are actually tied to the fact that he doesn’t have a set destiny, or much luck, apparently, with his lack of luck actually becoming a plot point. But we’ll get to that later.
Uncle sighed, anger draining away like water, leaving him worn and tired. "You make a good argument, Prince Zuko. I will consider it."
Zuko let out a breath of relief. "Thank you, Uncle-"
"No!" Iroh slashed a hand across, trailing smoke. "If you wish me to risk your life, you will earn it! You will practice. You will listen to me. And for once in your life, you will wait, until I say you are ready!"
Zuko swallowed, shaken. Uncle Iroh was always calm, always controlled. To see him half-raise fire without even thinking about it…. He shivered.
Zuko: …yeah, even with this, it really does seem like Vathara rewrote this bit to make me come out on top… even though looking back, I still can’t believe I was literally begging Uncle to shoot lightning at me, and then went up on a mountaintop in a storm to try and find real lightning… what was I even thinking… Though if Vathara is right about one thing here, it’s how desperately I felt I needed to win at something.
Iroh sighed once more. "We are tired," he went on, more quietly. "And healed or not, a fight like that we faced yesterday would drain trained soldiers, much less-"
"You don't have to explain, Uncle." Biting his lip, Zuko bowed, student to master.
And tried not to flinch, as Iroh's arms closed around him.
"I love you, nephew," Iroh said softly. "I do not tell you that enough. If I could, I would stand between you and harm forever. But you are right. I cannot." One hand lifted, brushing back unfamiliar short hair. "I can only give you the skills to protect yourself, and pray."
MG: These few lines, on the other hand? In summing up Iroh’s role as both a surrogate father and a teacher… these I really do like.
Uncle's hand in his hair. It should have been comforting. It was.
And somehow, that made it even worse.
No familiar weight of a phoenix-tail. No breeze across shaved skin. Clothes that weren't meant to be worn with armor; that weren't even red. No taste of salt, no coal smoke, no sway of the ship under him….
Nothing was right in the world. Nothing.
Aang: Wait, are you implying things were right when you were at sea, chasing me down all the time?
Zuko: *flatly* No, they weren’t. I guess it was better than being stuck in Middle of Nowhere, Earth Kingdom… but what I really wanted, always, was to go home.
"I'm sorry, Uncle," Zuko choked out, hating the tear that trickled from his good eye. "If I hadn't chased him to the pole, you wouldn't have been with Zhao. Our crew wouldn't have- they couldn't call you a traitor-" He swallowed hard, words a bare whisper. "I just wanted to go home."
Zuko: Okay, there we have it. I… I don’t think I ever let that out all the way. But I definitely felt some of it.
"I know, nephew. I know." A chuckle against his shoulder. "And you may underestimate Lieutenant Jee. Our crew has seen the Avatar unleashed before. If anyone had a chance to survive that fury, they did." Iroh let go, and nodded. "Come. We can make some more distance, before dark."
MG: And yes, Lieutenant Jee – or rather, Captain Jee – is going to be turning up alive again partway through the fic.
So it begins.
Lying awake beside Asahi's warmth, Iroh looked over at his nephew. Even in sleep, Zuko frowned, huddled on himself, hands clenching and unclenching on the bedroll.
Aang: *puts a comforting hand on Zuko’s shoulder*
"I just wanted to go home."
Zuko knew. He had not admitted it to himself, not yet. But he knew.
We can never go home again. Iroh smiled wryly. Perhaps I should almost get killed by Azula more often.
Zuko: *flatly* Yeah, Uncle, I’d recommend you not do that.
Though he doubted matters would have gone this well, had Zuko not been able to heal him. Azula had won the physical fight, but Zuko had denied her the victory. It gave him strength. A place to stand, to be certain of himself, when all the world seemed to fall apart around him.
And it will.
All his life, Zuko had tried to please his father. To win, by painful effort, the approval Azula seemed to gain simply by breathing. To admit that they could not go home, would be to admit he had failed. That he had not - could not - wring love from Fire Lord Ozai's heart of stone.
I love you, Zuko. I wish that were enough.
MG: Ooof; a lot of this chapter has been… not great, but we’re hitting some genuinely good stuff here, I can’t lie.
Futile wish. A child's first love and loyalty was to his parents, always - and while soldiers might put that as second to their commander's orders, the Fire Lord was the crown prince's commander. Exiled or not.
To admit the truth, will break my nephew's heart.
But would it break his loyalty? That, above all, was the question.
MG: …and of course Vathara has to bring it back around to creepy magic loyalty. Sigh.
Well, no, Iroh admitted to himself. Whether or not Azula will catch us - all else will hinge on that.
So. First, avoid the she-devil on their trail.
Aang: What’s a devil?
MG: …something that doesn’t really exist in your world; you have evil or dangerous beings and spirits, sure, but not by that name. Even dark spirits are just regular spirits that have been enraged into a state of madness and violence, not a separate type of being (though some spirits are nasty enough of their own free will – Aang and Zuko, count yourselves very lucky neither of you ever met Father Glowworm from the Kyoshi books). I don’t know why this term jumps out at me so much, but it does.
Though if they were lucky, Azula would leave them for later, pursuing glory from her father by seeking the Avatar's head.
…Not that he wished the young airbender harm. Quite the opposite, despite that horror at the North Pole. The boy was twelve. He could not, truly, have known what he was unleashing, allowing the Ocean Spirit his way with all an Avatar's power.
Hope that is so, Iroh told himself grimly, recalling torn ships and bodies, awash in the sea. Remembering weeks trapped on the raft with Zuko's nightmares and his own. Hope he did not know, and that he will never do so again. The consequences, otherwise….
MG: And here we have an early taste of another of Vathara’s pet issues – the idea of Koizilla as the absolute worst thing that could have happened or that Aang could have done. Not going much into it here, because the fic is just teasing us with it at this point, but we are going to be hitting this drum so much before the fic is done. Vathara hates the idea of Koizilla, and is going to be stacking the deck in various ways so we can all be sure of what a terrible and unforgivable thing it was. The big thing that stands out here is that Iroh actually cuts Aang some slack for it, while later discussion of that scene are… less likely to do that, to put it mildly. We are, however, going to start a count here:
The Deadly Depths: 1
Well. There were reasons beyond family he had trained Zuko, and followed his nephew on what seemed a fool's quest. Reasons Aang had best hope he never learned.
Zuko: …what. *groans audibly* Let me guess, this is about those destinies you mentioned earlier?
MG: Some of them, yes. And also to how I’m of the opinion the fic’s characterization of Iroh takes a nosedive in the second half… but we’re a long way away from that being elaborated on.
Still. Young Aang had friends, and allies, and a flying bison. He and Zuko had only each other and one stubborn ostrich-horse. And with Sozin's Comet on the way, they were running out of time-
Iroh sat up suddenly.
"Mmph? Uncle?"
"Only thinking, nephew. Go to sleep."
"Mmph…."
Leaning back as his nephew settled, Iroh probed at that sudden thought. Sozin's Comet would arrive by the end of summer. After that-
After that, it would be the Avatar against the Fire Lord. One would win. If that one were the Avatar, his nephew would be safe. If it were not….
MG: Spoilers – this fic has several climactic confrontations occurring around the same time. Aang against Ozai… is not one of them (Aang does encounter Ozai, briefly – and I have issues with the way that’s handled, too – but it’s not one of the big climactic confrontations).
Aang: *stunned* What!? So what was I spending all year training my arrow off for, then?
MG: …you’ll see.
Aang: …I don’t think I like the way that sounds
We would have to run again. But the comet does not last forever.
Zuko: About a day, actually… which was more than enough time for my father and his forces to do plenty of damage…
We do not know where the Avatar has gone. And even my nephew will not strike out blindly. If I can only keep us moving….
No. No, that would not do; Azula was moving, and the Avatar was definitely traveling, and the more they themselves crossed the land, the more chances the spirits had to arrange another meeting between all of them.
Aang: Am I the only one imagining Koh and Yue and Wan Shih Tong and maybe that one grumpy old monkey who was mad I kept distracting him from meditating pushing us all around like tiles on a big Pai Sho board? And maybe betting on us?
MG: Well, aside from the monkey… you’re kind of on the right track with some of that?
Aang: I guess I had to say it, huh?
Iroh was not feeling charitable toward spirits, at the moment.
MG: Which is kind of weird, considering Vathara is going to make “Iroh is excessively pious and respectful of spirits” a significant point of his characterization later in the fic, iirc…
We are in the Earth Kingdom, and we should take a lesson from the badger-mole. Go to ground, and hide.
Easy to say. Far more difficult to do. The Earth Kingdom and the Fire Nation were locked in war, territory changing hands with each shift of the tide. Nowhere was safe-
Iroh drew in a sharp breath. It hurt; even all these years later, it hurt. But he steeled himself. Considered the option. And nodded.
Ba Sing Se.
Those walls had not fallen to his assault. They would hold. At least until the comet came.
Zuko: Or until a certain someone we all know got inside the walls…
Still. To venture there, where he would never escape memories of a young man who had never had the chance to give him grandchildren… he shook his head.
"Father," Zuko murmured in his sleep. "Please…."
Almost against his will, Iroh's fists clenched. Deliberately, the old general called to mind those high walls, those proud earthbenders, the whole massive edifice that had denied him victory.
You took my son. Iroh let out a quiet, angry breath of flame. Let us see if you can save my nephew.
MG: Mmmmrph. I have very mixed feelings on these last few lines. On the one hand, Iroh thinking about Lu Ten’s death, then seeing Zuko having a nightmare and that inspiring him to action – oof, right in the gut, in a good way. On the other hand, something about the framing around Lu Ten’s death feels… off. I never really felt like Iroh held much of a grudge against Ba Sing Se itself for his son’s death in canon… mostly because I thought it was pretty clear the person Iroh blamed the most for Lu Ten’s death was himself. After all he was the invader, he was the one who brought his army – and his son – to the city in the first place, and he was the one who, ultimately, bore responsibility for ordering him into the battle that killed him, and that guilt and that knowledge is the biggest reason why the Iroh of the present day is a changed man compared to who he once was. Focusing the blame on the city… I don’t know, it feels like it blunts the edge of Iroh’s own guilt, and the Fire Nation’s guilt for being there in the first place. Maybe that’s just how it reads to me, knowing the fic and its biases.
Anyway, we’re now done with the chapter save for one, very short, AN!
A/N: If bloodbending is internal waterbending, why shouldn't firebending - as it is currently practiced - have had similar origins? All the other elements involve external control of an existing substance. It'd make a lot of sense if firebending started the same way… and then evolved, into the internally-controlled fire which can be much more handy for combat.
MG: …hmmm. Bloodbending=internal waterbending I get, but bloodbending is a very advanced and difficult waterbending technique, one that most waterbenders can’t do at all without having their power boosted by the full moon, not the original basis of waterbending. And I’d think a firebending counterpart to bloodbending would be more like using firebending to somehow forcibly seize control of and manipulate someone else’s internal energies, in the same way bloodbending forcibly controls another person’s body through the water in their blood. Maybe I’m just not quite understanding what Vathara is arguing for here.
Anyway, I think this chapter is a mixed bag. A lot of the Zuko and Iroh stuff continues to be really good, both in terms of exploring their bond and the underlying philosophy of their firebending. I do have a few qualms with how some elements of it are presented here… but like a lot in this first arc, it’s mostly because I know it’s a sign of what will become much bigger issues later in the fic rather than because I think they’re inherently bad on their own. On the other hand, we’re pretty firmly in “Toph is the one reasonable member of the Gaang” territory, as well as “the other nations have atrocities and tyrants in their pasts and so have no leg to stand on in criticizing the Fire Nation” and “everyone actually secretly hated the Air Nomads” territories. So that’s not so great, to put it mildly, and it’s also going to get much, much worse as the fic goes on… though iirc the Gaang are going to fall out of the story for a while, as their side of things will mostly be following canon, and therefore kept off-page, for the remainder of Book II, until their paths cross with Zuko’s again late in the Ba Sing Se arc. Next time, Zuko and Iroh run into some trouble on the road, and more of the fic’s future elements get foreshadowed in greater depth. We’ll see you then! Our counts stand at:
Beware the Sugar Queen: 5
The Blind Bandit Wins Again: 8
The Deadly Depths: 1
Detached from Reality: 5
Divine Right to Rule: 6
Elemental Determinism: 3
He Has Much to Learn: 8
Prince Stuko: 11 (giving a final point for Vathara having Zuko come out of his argument with Iroh somewhat better than he did in canon
Simple Rubes from the Water Tribes: 5
Stations of the Canon: 12
The Superior Element: 5
The Ultimate Firebenders: 4
Warning: This chapter contains discussion of genocide and racism.
MG: Well, everyone, it’s time to continue our journey through Vathara’s Embers! Last time, we reenacted the climax of The Chase with more healing, Katara got a surprisingly fair treatment considering what Vathara is going to do to her later, and Zuko and Iroh tried to explain what’s really going on to those naïve kids in the Gaang. Today, we deal with the aftermath of that battle, and get more of a sense of where some future developments in the fic will be going. Joining us today will be Aang and Zuko!
Chapter 5
"Okay," Sokka said, with what Toph thought was probably supposed to be strained patience, but just felt sarcastic. "We're fed, Appa's all shedded out, no crazy ladies or metal monsters in footsie range, and, most important of all, we've all had sleep. Now. Are you going to explain what you meant about knowing nobles, and what that's got to do with Aang asking one of the less crazy fire-guys to teach him?"
Aang: *shrugs* What’s weird about Toph knowing nobles? She is one! We saw her big fancy house and everything when we met her, and later on, her family name was enough to get us past a lot of Earth Kingdom officials.
MG: Yeah, but right now is time for Vathara to stress that you all don’t really know anything important and need to have information on The Way of the World spoon-fed to you by more knowledgeable sorts, and for the moment it’s going to be Toph doing the feeding, so strap in.
Toes feeling everyone's place in the loose circle around her, the earthbender frowned, and cracked a nut between two rocks to buy a second to think. Most of the time, she'd just bull through with the blunt truth, and let people's illusions shatter around her. But even though she'd been locked out of sight by her own parents, she'd still managed to slip out for months of earth-rumbles. You met people that way. Good people, weird people, people you never, ever wanted in touching range. And you learned stuff. Some of it stuff that might have turned really nasty, if she wasn't the best.
MG: *sighs and rubs their forehead* And of course, Toph sneaking out of the house periodically to fight in Earth Rumbles means she knows more about the world than people who have been traveling around the world for months now, and who hadn’t been living their lives in a gilded cage before that. Honestly, something Vathara’s Toph always just puts me in mind of Carmine Falcone’s “reason you suck” speech to a young Bruce Wayne in Batman Begins. “You think you know about the ugly side of life, but you don’t. You’ve never tasted desperate.” Of course, the point of that scene in Begins is that Falcone is right about Bruce and his privileged upbringing, and even though Bruce hates him, he also takes it to heart, and it’s a big part of what sets him on his path of wandering the earth incognito, learning and training and eventually becoming Batman (and returning to Gotham and taking down Falcone; funny how these things work out). But Vathara goes with the idea that Toph is (almost) always right, and the rest of the Gaang need to shut up and listen to her about any wisdom she chooses to dish out, even in contexts when logically she wouldn’t be the most knowledgeable. And, IMO, there’s a troubling subtext to the fact that out of the show’s main cast, it’s the nobles – Zuko and Toph – who are presented as wise and worldly, while Aang, Katara and Sokka (a monk and two commoners – and here I agree with Vathara that their dad being the village chief doesn’t make Katara and Sokka nobles) are generally expected to shut up and listen to their betters. Subtext which will get worse as the fic goes on and becomes ever more effusive in its praise of the Fire nobility as a class in particular. Maybe I’ve just got too much Mists of Avalon still haunting the back of my mind… but having seen it, I can’t really unsee it.
The Blind Bandit Wins Again: 3
Divine Right To Rule: 4
These kids? Just look how they'd tried to deal with her parents. They were - well, they weren't dumb, but they could stand to learn a few things.
Zuko: As opposed to what I’ve heard Toph did, which was run away without telling anyone, leaving her parents to think you all kidnapped her and then pay bounty hunters to go after her and bring her home? Bounty hunters Uncle and I ended up running into?
The Blind Bandit Wins Again: 4
He Has Much To Learn: 6
"First off," Toph asked, getting her thoughts in order, "why didn't you say Prince Zuko, instead of just some angry guy with a ponytail?" Which he didn't even have, anymore; she would have heard his hair swishing around, like she heard Sokka's. And she hadn't.
Zuko: …why is the story acting like the fact that I cut off my topknot is the most important thing here? I mean, in the Fire Nation we only do that in extreme disgrace* - that’s why it was such a big deal when Uncle and I cut ours off to blend in – but I don’t think any of you all knew that?
*Per the novels.
MG: Honestly, I can’t shake the feeling Vathara is annoyed that the Gaang weren’t treating you with the proper respect, like how dare Sokka call a prince an angry jerk with a ponytail! Can you even imagine? *fans self in mock horror*
"So he calls himself a prince," Sokka shrugged. "Big deal. Our dad's a chief. Who cares?"
"It is a big deal." Toph stabbed a toe into the dirt, flinging up a pebble to smack him from behind. "There's plenty of kings in cities across the Earth Kingdom, but there's only one Fire Lord. Ozai's got two kids. And we just met both of them."
"Zuko's the Fire Lord's son?" Katara said warily.
"Azula's his sister?" Sokka squeaked, almost at the same time.
Aang: …yeah? We knew that! I’ve been in the Fire Nation a hundred years ago, remember? One of my best friends lived there! I know what being a prince means in the Fire Nation and Zuko, sorry to say this, but you were going on about your dad and it was kind of creepy. I mean, I’d been frozen for a hundred years and just got out of the iceberg, so I wasn’t really up to date on the Fire Nation Royal Family tree, but I knew you were a prince and your dad had to be the Fire Lord pretty early on.
Zuko: And people had heard of me! Even the old man in that village where I met Lee knew my name when he heard it, and at least a bit of my story. I wasn’t exactly trying to hide who I was, at least not yet when I met you.
MG: Yes, but there are two things at play here. First off, Vathara seems to think that if the Gaang doesn’t have a scene in the show that spells out explicitly that they know something, she seems to decide that means they clearly don’t know it (rather than “they knew Zuko was a prince and Ozai’s son from very early on, and never attached much importance to it”). And the second is that Vathara has to portray Aang, Katara and sometimes Sokka as ignorant children any time she sees an excuse for Zuko, Toph or some of her OCs to lecture them for it.
Aang and Zuko: *both facepalm*
The Blind Bandit Wins Again: 5
Simple Rubes from the Water Tribes: 3
Toph swung her head toward Aang. "You're not surprised."
"She asked if I could see the family resemblance," the airbender admitted reluctantly. Vibrations told her he was clinging to his airstaff. "She thought Zuko's scar was… funny."
MG: Not to defend Azula’s character overmuch here, but I’m pretty sure it was her impression of Zuko she thought was funny, not the scar specifically… not that it’s much better in-context.
"That's what most of the Fire Nation thinks," Toph said sourly. "My parents didn't like me around when they entertained, but when you can walk through walls, you overhear lots of stuff. Earth Kingdom merchants like to talk." That some of what she'd overheard had really been from Fire Nation merchants - maybe she'd better not lay that little bit of truth on them just yet. The Bei Fongs weren't rich from being stupid. They traded with anybody honest enough to strike a good deal with.
MG: Okay, so here I think it’s time to lay a few things out. First, an admission. As far as Avatar: The Last Airbender fandom goes… I’m a heretic. Toph isn’t my favorite character. I don’t dislike Toph, mind you, and I absolutely understand why she’s so beloved overall, I just find her the least developed and least interesting of the main cast (by which I mean Aang, Katara, Sokka, Toph, Zuko, Iroh and probably Azula). Weirdly, my reaction to Toph when I first watched the show was almost the reverse of my reaction to Zuko – having gone into the show just knowing the premise and brief descriptions of the characters, I fully expected to hate Zuko and love Toph. I ended up loving Zuko and not being especially invested in Toph. Just wanted to lay that out because it might color some of what I’m about to say.
First off, I don’t think Vathara means to imply Toph’s parents are war profiteers, but that’s kind of where my mind jumped reading this for the first time (then again, that’s how we can tell the Beifongs – iirc, writing Toph’s surname as two words was common in fandom at the time this fic was coming out, and I also did it that way, but all official material from Korra onward has spelled it as one word – are all right in Vathara’s estimation, they’re cool doing business with the Fire Nation). For another… yes, we’re going to be treating Toph as knowing more about the war from spying on her dad’s business meetings than the Gaang do from actually living the war as right and correct, and playing it completely straight. I just have to think that in most stories, it would be Toph who would be having the rude awakening – being forced to learn that the polite unreality of her family’s business empire has real consequences for the lives of real people, and those Fire Nation merchants her dad seems to think so highly of are part of a machine that’s spent the last century slowly grinding her country under its heel. But no, Vathara’s writing and Vathara likes Toph, likes nobles, and likes the Fire Nation, and doesn’t like Aang or Katara, so of course Toph is right and they are wrong. However little sense it makes.
The Blind Bandit Wins Again: 6
Divine Right to Rule: 5
"So you know some stuff about the guy who's chased us all over the planet?" Sokka sounded reluctantly interested.
"I know he doesn't have a choice," Toph said flatly. "Nobody I heard really knew how he got scarred, but they think it had something to do with why the Fire Lord banished him right after. And everybody who's anybody knows he got told he couldn't come back without the Avatar. For three years, it was one big joke. And not the good kind." She pointed toward Aang. "And then you woke up, Twinkletoes, and all of a sudden? People aren't laughing anymore. Prince Zuko just might have a shot to do it. You have any idea how many people that got mad? Really, really mad?"
Aang: Uuuh… Zhao? I met Zhao, remember? And Azula, too. I could tell there was a lot of anger going on there, believe me.
"Like Azula," Katara whispered.
Huh. Sugar Queen's heartbeat felt way confused. Good. She needed to fall off that high ostrich-horse once in a while.
MG: *growls*
Beware the Sugar Queen: 2 (giving a point on general principle)
"You got it," Toph nodded sharply. "Zuko's her older brother. He gets out of exile, he could be the heir. He fails - or dies, you don't want to know how many people were sure he'd croak chasing rumors all over the world - she gets the throne. And from what people say? She's the one Ozai wants. Daddy's little girl, all ready to go out and burn soldiers alive." Toph snorted. "Makes me glad I'm an only child."
Zuko: …somehow I don’t think Dad would’ve been any more reasonable if I’d been an only child. Maybe he wouldn’t have banished me if I was his only heir, but… he wasn’t exactly in the running for the Fire Nation’s most wonderful father at the best of times. However he’d have treated me, he’d have made my life miserable.
"But she's his sister," Aang protested. "Isn't that important?"
MG: …ironic that Vathara has Aang saying this, because she’s going to be depicting Aang as having essentially no concept of family being important because of how he was raised later in the fic…
He Has Much to Learn: 7
"Hey," Sokka patted the airbender on the shoulder. "We all know Zuko's the bad guy. No way would he tell the truth about-"
"He. Wasn't. Lying," Toph ground out. "He was mad, and scared, and just about dead on his feet, but he was not lying. I know when people are lying."
"You do?"
"You scarfed the last berry-tart out of Katara's bag and blamed it on Momo," Toph said bluntly. "Earth lets me know about people. Zuko's got really good stance; he's probably been training it for years. That's why you guys didn't realize you could have knocked him over with a lizard-bird feather."
Aang: Wouldn’t that imply his stance was bad and only looked good?
MG: But of course, Toph is the author’s favorite, so Toph has to be the only one who took Zuko’s warning seriously…
"And we left him back there with her?" Katara swallowed uneasily.
"Relax," Toph waved. "Now that Uncle knows she's trying to kill them, if she does catch them, she won't get off that easy. You don't tick off the Dragon of the West."
Zuko: Uncle was there when Azula tried to shoot me with lightning at her ship; he redirected that lightning! I think he knew already that Azula at least considered the two of us dying to be acceptable.
"The who?" Sokka said skeptically. "He doesn't look like a dragon to me. Just kind of short, stumpy, follows after Zuko like an old… um." Sokka's heart sped up, as that rock-like (but strangely, unbendable) brain finally let a few conclusions through. "Uncle? Ah. You mean, on Zuko's mother's side. Right?"
Aang: *confused* Does Vathara think Sokka doesn’t know what a metaphor is? Why is he acting like she was trying to say Iroh was a literal dragon? *to Zuko* And I think we’d all figured out who your uncle was, too. He was pretty famous.
Toph grinned at him.
"…Oh, this is not cool…."
"Um, raised by monks," Aang put in warily. "Am I missing something?"
Aang: I think I’m missing why my being raised by monks is important here, actually? Katara and Sokka weren’t raised by monks and they were confused too, at first.
"Are you ever." Toph raised a handy rock to lounge against. "The guy you asked to teach you? General Iroh. The Dragon of the West. The only firebender who ever breached the outer wall of Ba Sing Se." She paused, just to drive the point home. "Fire Lord Ozai's older brother."
The airstaff fell from nerveless fingers.
Aang: Oh. I guess this version of me didn’t know who Iroh was. Why is Vathara trying to make it sound like none of us had any idea what we were doing?
MG: Because she thinks you didn’t have any idea what you were doing, and it’s going to get worse.
Aang: *sighs* Great.
He Has Much To Learn: 8
I'm not going to scream at Uncle. I am not going to scream at Uncle.
Singed, blackened, and ears still ringing from the third failed explosion, Zuko punched fire into the ground instead.
Zuko: Wait, are we already partway through me trying to learn how to make lightning? Really? Huh; you’d think my learning healing might have some impact on how I’m going to be trying to learn some other form of advanced firebending – apparently not!
Stations of the Canon: 11
"Zuko!"
"Leave me alone!" He clenched the more hateful words behind his teeth; they weren't true, Uncle was trying to help, it wasn't Iroh's fault that Azula was perfect at this while he was just-
A failure.
Zuko: *buries his face in his hands* And do I ever know that feeling…
He breathed out pain and flame and the simmering fury of Uncle was hurt, I couldn't stop her-
It should have been me.
Aang: Hey, you did manage to use healing to patch him up this time? That counts for something, right?
Another long, shuddering breath of fire, and Zuko sat back, drained. Going to have to cover the ashes if we want to keep our trail cold. Spirits, that was so stupid…. "I don't think this is going to work."
"You must clear your mind, Prince Zuko. Let go of your shame-"
"I'm not ashamed!" I know what I am. I try, and I try, and I can't fix it! I'm not ashamed-
Just angry.
Zuko: Am I the only one who wants to grab my other self by the shoulders and shake him really, really hard? Not because this part is poorly written; just because I remember trying to bury all my other emotions under anger, and it really, really didn’t help.
Angry, and tired. And tired of being angry. There had to be something he could do.
"If the enemy is too strong to face directly, change your tactics."
Zuko blinked, absently weaving flame between his fingers. "Lightning… the energies are inside."
Zuko: Yeah, that’s how firebending works when you’re making your own fire – or, uh, lightning in this case. You breathe in, your breath enters your body and becomes energy, then you force it back out through your limbs, where it becomes fire. Uncle explained this when we were at the South Pole, remember?
Iroh sighed, resigned. "Yes, they are. You separate your chi, and-"
Zuko let the flames flicker over his hand. "This is outside. So is healing. I can move my energy, Uncle - but I move it outside."
Zuko: Yeah, but it still starts inside (though that is a way lightning is supposed to be different – Uncle told me how once you create and release it, it goes where it’s going to go and you can’t control it anymore, not like normal firebending).
"…Hmm." Iroh stooped to feel through the ashes, rising with a few blackened, glassy lumps. "Perhaps I have forgotten what it is like to be your age, nephew. Lightning requires calm. And if your temper is anything like mine was then, calm will not come easily for some years."
Zuko blinked at the odd shift of tone. Not the impatience he'd expected from a master faced with a substandard student, but… understanding? "You had a temper?"
Zuko: …yeah, I knew that. Most firebenders can be pretty aggressive when they have to – firebending is all about positive jing, always staying in motion and on the attack. And sure, Uncle’s pretty laid back, but I’ve seen what happens when you push him too far.
"The stories I could tell, could curl an airbender's hair," Iroh said with great satisfaction.
"…They're bald."
"Not without shaving." Uncle looked him over with a considering frown.
Aang: Also, only Air Nomad men shaved their whole heads. Air Nomad women shaved the fronts of their heads, but usually grew their hair long in the back. And even the men tended to grow some pretty amazing beards and mustaches – just look at the Southern Temple elders!
"But I had thought you were calm, when you healed."
"You did?" Zuko said incredulously.
"It would seem I was mistaken," Iroh said thoughtfully. "You have always seemed quiet, with the healing fire. Focused."
Zuko eyed him a long moment, then shook his head. "It's not calm, Uncle. It's-" He hesitated, reaching into memory for the feel of it. "It's like a fight."
Zuko: *shrugs* I guess that’s a kind of focus? Not sure if it would help me make lightning, though.
And now Uncle was looking at him very strangely.
"It's like fighting with someone else." Zuko glanced away, remembering that first touch of flame on Asahi, and how the wounds had seemed to scream a challenge at him. "They're fighting too, but they're just outnumbered. So you step in, and guard their weak side. And you keep fighting until it's over." He took a breath. "The energies - what you use is from you, and the fire, but what you're fixing is inside. Knots. Sort of. That you're trying to get straight again. Katara… she soaked them, until they loosened up and did what she wanted. I - kind of have to melt them. A little."
Iroh smacked himself in the forehead.
"Uncle?"
"At my age, I should know better than to assume," Iroh said ruefully. "I have another idea."
Aang: Aaand, I guess we’re going to have to wait to find out what that is, because it’s back to us again! *glances down* And, uh, I’m not sure I much like where this is going…
"So what's got your hair-loops in a knot?"
Hand on the canyon wall, Katara groaned. Aang was snoring the sleep of the earthbending-exhausted,
Aang: You know, from what I’ve heard about where this story is going, I’m kind of amazed Vathara skipped over everything Toph put me through to try and get me to earthbend the first time…
Stations of the Canon: 12
and Sokka was busily cleaning out any scraps left in the cooking pot, but apparently it was too much to hope that Toph's feet would let her brood in peace. "My hair's fine, thanks."
"Sparky, huh?"
"Sparky?" Katara sputtered.
Zuko: *confused* Sparky?
MG: Yep, Embers!Toph has a nickname for you – and you’d better get used to it, because we’re going to be seeing a lot of it for the rest of the fic.
"I've heard a lot about firebenders," Toph shrugged, leaning back against comforting stone. "Never heard of any of 'em who could fix people."
"No," Katara said quietly. "That's just weird. I mean, Master Jeong Jeong said-"
"You met Jeong Jeong the Deserter?" Toph cocked her head, obviously interested.
"He tried to teach Aang firebending," Katara nodded. "That… didn't go so well." She looked down at her unmarked hands. "That was the first time I ever healed myself. He saw me do it; he was the first person to tell me waterbenders could heal. I think he would have given anything to be a waterbender instead of fire." She frowned. "It just doesn't make sense! Master Jeong Jeong - well, he wasn't nice. He was hard, like Master Pakku at the North Pole. But he was a good man. Why should Zuko-" She cut herself off.
MG: IIRC, Jeong Jeong doesn’t show up in person in the fic at all until the very end, when he’s just one member of a group of White Lotus masters. He’s not mentioned all that much either, iirc, and I’ve never gotten the impression Vathara cares much for him; probably because he’s full of self-loathing about his element and its destructive power instead of talking about how awesome it is like she’d probably prefer. *shrugs* Just the vibe I’ve gotten.
"Masters don't know everything," Toph said seriously. "Mine thought I was still working on kiddie moves." She stirred dirt with her toes, a sandy whirlpool. "Don't tell Aang this, but some of my serious stuff? I kind of got started on by accident. Just to see what I could do. So I can pull moves other benders think are impossible. 'Cause nobody told me I couldn't."
Aang: Which is kind of funny, because whenever we asked Toph about how she learned earthbending, she always talked a lot about learning from badgermoles; I don’t think I ever remember her mentioning Master Yu at all? Not that I blame her; I wouldn’t want to talk about him, either. But she did have good teachers – just not human ones.
Katara stared at her. "You think Zuko figured out how to heal by accident?"
"Why not? You did."
MG: Eeeh, not exactly, as we’ve already seen (about Zuko, at least, not Katara…). Kinda-sorta?
That… actually made sense. Kind of. "It just seems crazy," Katara shook her head. "I know what fire does, it-" Her throat tightened. Mom.
MG: Hoo boy, and here we’re starting to get a glimpse of “Katara hates the Fire Nation irrationally and refuses to consider fire as an element to be capable of good” that we’re going to be seeing a lot more of down the line…
"It's like Azula?" Toph said wryly. "Hey, if you think you're confused, what do you think he feels like?"
MG: …because in Embers, Zuko’s feelings always take precedence…
"I don't care what that jerk feels like!" Katara snapped. "He came to our home, he threatened Gran-Gran, he's always trying to hurt us, and Aang-"
MG: Honestly… I think this makes sense coming from Katara. At this point, she’s seen very little to suggest Zuko is anything but an enemy, with even their teamup against Azula last chapter being a temporary expedience more than anything. But an idea that Vathara is going to constantly keep hitting is that the Gaang should have known that Zuko was an honorable antagonist who never meant them serious harm (more on that later…) and should have known enough to both take him seriously and feel sorry for him, all in ways that make it extremely plain who’s the main character and who has the author’s backing.
"I could go home," Toph said matter-of-factly.
Katara rolled her eyes. "If this is about the camp chores…."
"No. I could go home. You and Sokka - you could go home. If you really wanted. And now you're thinking about how Sparky can't, and it's got you twisty as a nest of dragon-flies."
"Well, Aang can't go home either!" Katara bit out. "And who can we blame for that?"
Aang: *uncharacteristically morose* Yeah, that’s a good point. Not only can I not go home, at least Zuko’s home was still there – even if the Fire Nation hadn’t attacked the airbenders, I was still in that iceberg for a hundred years. My old life was gone. I… I try not to dwell on that too much, but it’s true. But why am I getting a weird feeling that’s somehow not good enough for Vathara?
"Is Zuko really a hundred years old?" Toph said wryly. "'Cause I gotta tell you, Sugar Queen, he sure doesn't move like it."
Zuko: …just wanting to let everybody know that nobody has ever accused me, personally, of taking part of the slaughter of the Air Nomads. Just wanted to get that straight. It was still my ancestors who were responsible for it, though, which means that, for better or worse, I carry some of that guilt – especially once I inherited their throne.
"But it was the Fire Nation!"
"This time." Toph snorted. "Never had to sit through history lessons, huh? Check out Chin the Conqueror. If he could've gotten up to the Air Temples, you bet he would have."
MG: *groans, rubs their forehead* Okay, everybody. The very worst of the Air Nomad bashing takes place in the later part of the fic, but Vathara gives us a bit of a taste of it here. First off is her idea that all the Air Nomads’ neighbors secretly resented them and always either outright wanted them gone or at least shed no tears when it actually happened. Needless to say, substitute virtually any real-life group who’s suffered genocide or ethnic cleansing for “Air Nomads” (who are, of course, specifically based on Tibetan Buddhists) and you can see how monstrously callous and inhumane that sounds. But there’s the other side of things that’s here too, in the completely out of nowhere mention of Chin the Conqueror. Now, in canon, we have no indication that Chin ever had anything against the Air Nomads, or if he even came into conflict with them – as far as we see, his specific goal was making himself emperor of the Earth Kingdom, and any further plans he had never got off the ground because, you know, Kyoshi. And the Kyoshi duology we have doesn’t reach Chin’s war (though it seems likely we’ll get that story in some form sooner or later) but does establish the power vacuum in the Earth Kingdom that would eventually lead to Chin’s rise. No Air Nomads involved (Vathara, of course, is eventually going to tie the Air Nomads in a certain way to Chin’s rise to power). So, at the risk of Godwinning this discussion, it feels as random as someone responding to discussion of the Holocaust by bringing up Napoleon and saying he could have done something like that too. And, like, sure, maybe if Napoleon had stayed in power long enough he might have tried to do something like the Holocaust (though IIRC he didn’t really bear any particular personal ill-will towards the Jewish people, at least any more than any other ruler at the time did – not that there’s any indication Chin bore the Air Nomads any particular enmity either – and even overturned some longstanding anti-Jewish laws after he came to power, though he also imposed restrictions on Jewish life and activities later in his reign) but the fact is that he didn’t, and the Nazis did. Just like maybe Chin could have exterminated the Air Nomads under the right circumstances, but the way things actually played out he didn’t, and Sozin did.
But there’s a consistent theme in this fic that takes the form of a certain… whataboutism, let’s say, that seems to exist primarily to keep the other nations from having a leg to stand on when it comes to criticizing the Fire Nation by establishing that hey, they all have atrocities in their history too, so how can they really judge? We’ve already seen Chin brought up for the Earth Kingdom, but apparently a thousand years ago the Air Nomads were brutal conquerors whose leaders were just as bad as Sozin and whose invasions left the Fire Nation with lasting cultural trauma (yes, really, Vathara is going there), and two thousand years ago it was an OC Water Tribe Avatar who went crazy and had to be put down and started the chain of events that sent the world into this mess in the first place, as will be revealed in the later parts of the fic. And this sort of stuff seems to be brought up so often in response to Fire Nation atrocities, as if to say – you’re no better. And urgh, I hate it, and it rubs me the wrong way so badly, and does nothing to discount the fact that the Fire Nation are the ones trying to conquer the world now.
Aang: Yeah, like, who cares if Chin might have turned on the Air Nomads someday – he didn’t actually do it! That never happened! Sozin did wipe out the Air Nomads! That did happen! It’s a pretty big difference! And if Chin really did want to attack the Temples, I can think of worse ways to climb mountains than with an army of earthbenders.
"And they didn't do anything to him, either!"
"Yeah. They didn't. Nice, peaceful guys, right? Didn't do anything to him. Didn't do anything to stop him. People kind of don't like other people sitting back and watching them get creamed."
MG: We have no idea what the Air Nomads may have done, or not done, about Chin. We also have no idea if the Fire Nation or Water Tribes tried to stop Chin either – and if they did, they clearly failed – but it’s not like Vathara brings them up. But of course, everyone hates the airbenders, and everyone resents their pacifism, and so we have to dogpile on them at every opportunity, *groans loudly* Urgh. I really hate how Vathara handles the Air Nomads, and even if everything else about the fic was perfect, that element alone would be such a black mark against it I wouldn’t be able to rec it unreservedly… but we’re going to be talking a lot more about this as we go on.
Detached from Reality: 4
Toph looked straight at her, blind eyes serious. "I don't exactly do maps. But last I heard, the Air Temples aren't in the Fire Nation. They're on big mountains, right? Surrounded by the Earth Kingdom. Or up near the poles. Which means Water Tribe territory."
MG: Technically, if you look at the canonical maps of the Avatarverse, the land around the Air Temples is usually colored in white, distinct from Earth Kingdom tan or green, Fire Nation red or Water Tribe blue. So, the Air Nomads always seemed to have their own territory, even if it is mountainous and inhospitable. They weren’t just squatting on other countries’ land. Even in the Kyoshi novels, iirc Kyoshi’s mentor/father figure Kelsang, an Air Nomad, is explicitly described as being a “monk from a foreign land” in contrast to the Earth Kingdom Kyoshi.
"So?" Katara said, puzzled.
"So. Who let the Fire Nation get to those mountains?"
Zuko: …from what I’ve heard of my great-grandfather, he wasn’t someone to let people get in his way, or tell him what he could or couldn’t do. Also, some master firebenders can fly, and with Sozin’s Comet in the sky that day… they may not have needed much help getting up into the mountains.
MG: IIRC, some lore tied to the short-lived A:TLA Trading Card Game indicated that the Fire Nation had help from an Air Nomad traitor when it came to breaching the Temples, though the canonicity of that is debatable.
Katara swallowed, chilled. "You're wrong. You don't know my father. You don't know anything!"
Aang: Wait, is Toph blaming the Water Tribes for helping Sozin?
MG: Water Tribes, Earth Kingdom… yes, yes she is. And it’s not the last we’ve heard of this, either.
Aang: …oh, no…
"I know your father's not a hundred years old, either," Toph shrugged. "You going to tell me I'm wrong, Snoozles?"
Katara smiled as her brother wandered their way, scratching the back of his head with a thoughtful scowl. Her big brother, would-be warrior, pretty much a good guy when he wasn't thinking with his stomach-
Aang: Wow, am I the only one who thinks that feels amazingly condescending? And not much like Katara?
Zuko: No. You’re not.
And then he had to open his mouth.
"Well, Dad wouldn't have," Sokka frowned. "But Gran-Gran's a lot older than any of us, and she left the North Pole for some kind of good reason."
MG: Yeah, she left the North because she was engaged to Pakku, they had some sort of fight about his rigid adherence to the Northern Tribe’s laws and traditions (Katara guesses she never loved him, though considering we know they ended up actually getting married at the end of the series, I’m assuming there was at least some positive feelings there… though I always figured Pakku did a lot of groveling before Kanna was willing to take him back) and eventually she left. We don’t know the details, but it never seemed like it was that complicated. But I really don’t think Vathara likes Gran-Gran, so be on the lookout for that…
"Sokka!" Katara exclaimed.
"Hey, you know what you had to go through to get Master Pakku to teach you waterbending," her brother pointed out. "And they were going to use eighty-five-year-old Fire Nation armor to try and sneak into the fleet. They didn't even know it changed!"
Aang: Because the Northern Tribe was basically living in a fortress and the Fire Nation didn’t want to attack them until they were sure they’d win? And what does this have to do with the Air Nomads, exactly?
"So?" Katara griped, folding her arms.
"So, what do we really know about the Fire Nation? Besides the fact that they did start the war, they are after Aang, and Zuko's so stubborn even a city full of waterbenders couldn't keep him down. Well, him and his uncle," Sokka amended. "And that's… weird. Interesting, but weird."
Zuko: But you all aren’t like the Northern Tribe! You have been traveling the world and seen some stuff at this point! It’s not the same situation at all!
MG: But of course, we had to bring the conversation back around to Zuko in a somewhat complimentary fashion somehow.
Katara snorted. "Believe me, Sokka, nothing about that jerk is interesting."
"Still mad he tied you to that tree, huh?"
"I'll save you from the pirates." That high-handed, arrogant, over-confident-
MG: Once again, this seems like a legitimate thing to be angry about, yes. At least Vathara isn’t trying to present the “I’ll save you from the pirates” bit as being somehow romantic (in case it needs to be said, this fic does not ship Zutara!) but on the other hand… we’ll be coming back to that scene, and that line.
"Ooo!" Toph bounced. "You've got to tell me about that!"
MG: Ergh, this is another thing that gets me about how this fic handles the Gaang’s past interactions with Zuko. These kids are at war, and Zuko has been, to this point, their enemy – not their worst enemy, certainly, either in terms of being evil or being dangerous, but still an enemy, actively working to take Aang captive to present him to the leader of the enemy, And Toph seems to be taking it about as seriously as if it was a bunch of schoolyard mischief… and we’re seemingly supposed to agree with her, and treat Katara as if she’s just overreacting by holding a grudge over these shenanigans. I just… do not like how this is handled, at all.
"Never mind about the tree!" Katara snapped. "I can't believe you're still thinking about him. Or his uncle!"
Aang: Well, they were involved in a pretty big deal we just went through…
"I kind of can't believe you're not," Sokka said seriously. "Iroh told us something important." He held up a finger for emphasis. "Remember how he said Azula thinks they're traitors? And that wasn't fair to his nephew?"
"I really could care less what's fair to Zuko, Sokka," Katara grumbled.
Zuko: *looks like he’s about to object, then slumps* Yeah, at this point I can’t really fault her for that.
"He didn't say it wasn't fair to him."
"Whoa. Good point," Toph said. "He helped you guys at the North Pole, right? Which kind of squashed Admiral Zhao's whole invasion flat. He really is a traitor."
MG: Well, on the one hand, Iroh explicitly denied being a traitor at the North Pole, since Zhao destroying the moon would hurt the Fire Nation too… on the other hand, he did attack Zhao and his men, and Ozai clearly considered his acts to constitute treason, so… yeah.
Katara let her arms fall, unable to argue. "But Zuko trusts him." She frowned. "And he said he wouldn't help Aang."
"He's not going to teach Aang," Sokka said, with what was meant to be a wise and knowing air. "Doesn't mean he won't help, next time we run into them."
MG: Considering that, canonically, the next time the Gaang ran into Zuko was the Book Two finale, when Katara was the one who tried to befriend him and he ended up throwing it in her face and teaming back up with Azula… that’s kind of hilarious in hindsight.
"Next time?" Toph asked.
"Oh, yeah," Katara sighed. "With Zuko? There's always a next time."
Aang: Yeah, I think we’d all figured that out by then. Zuko never gives up, and all!
MG: And so we come to the end of this scene, which gives us our first real taste of some of how the Gaang is going to be characterized and how some of the other nations are going to be handled in this fic. And, as I think I’ve made clear, my reactions to all this run from mere distaste to outright hating it. And now, I think it’s time to assign some points, which I’ve been waiting to do for the whole conversation!
Beware the Sugar Queen: 5
The Blind Bandit Wins Again: 8
Detached from Reality: 5
Divine Right to Rule: 6 (for Toph the aristocrat being right about everything)
Prince Stuko: 8
Simple Rubes from the Water Tribes: 5
"All this four elements talk is sounding like Avatar stuff," Zuko said warily.
Zuko: Wait, did we just skim over Uncle telling me all about the philosophies of the different elements and how the different nations reflect them? That was the most important part!
Meaning he was treading on the very thinnest ice of his nephew's willingness to listen, Iroh knew. Lifting a hand from his dirt drawing, he tossed another twig to the small fire he'd built in Zuko's seared pit; deliberate distraction, to ease the singing tension. The Avatar was the bridge to the spirit world - and the spirits had ever been less than kind to his nephew.
Aang: …I didn’t have anything to do with that. Just so we’re clear.
Zuko: And we’d fought a lot by this point, anyway – you’d think Uncle would consider that that’s why bringing up the Avatar around me back then might not go over well!
Well. Except, perhaps, in one instance. Asahi browsed in and out of view, clearly unworried by any fire so long as it was theirs.
"It is the combination of the four elements in one person that makes the Avatar so powerful," Iroh agreed. "But a true Avatar's power is rooted in more than just bending. The Avatar was meant to travel the world, and teach each nation of the others, so none of us forgot why we need each other. He saw the ways of each people, and so we saw them in him. For sometimes it is only by looking at another that we can see the truth of ourselves."
MG: Kind of ironic, considering that Vathara will later establish that the Avatars, at least the more recent ones (Kyoshi and Roku in particular) had basically dedicated themselves to enforcing a sort of apartheid between the different nations (yes, yes, I know – we’re going to have so much to say about that and how Vathara twists a single line Roku said to Sozin in a moment of anger into something it was clearly never meant to be or mean) and that the Avatars needed the yaoren to advise them in order to really understand the four nations and the world in general (more on that later, too).
"I don't understand."
Nor do I. Not as I had thought I did, Iroh thought. "I have been considering what you said, nephew. And I believe I may have an answer. But to be certain - and I must be certain - I will need you to do something very difficult."
Zuko sat up straight, determined. "I'm ready."
"Good," Iroh nodded. Waved at the fire. "Imagine a small child, who has just started to firebend. Like yourself, perhaps, when Lu Ten was your age. Teach him to heal."
"Uncle?" The unscarred eye was wide.
"Imagine, nephew," Iroh said gently. "Imagine that I ask for him, why does this work? How do I begin?"
Zuko: …I actually see what Uncle’s doing here. He’s forcing me to work through what I’ve been teaching myself on its most basic level, both so I can understand it better myself and learn how to teach it to someone else… you know, for all the things about this story I’m already starting to get the feeling I don’t like, sometimes Vathara really does show she can write really good moments between me and Uncle, when she wants to.
Zuko stared into the fire, silent.
Perhaps it is too soon. I hoped not, but what Azula did to both of us… betrayal cuts deep.
"Fire wants to fight."
Zuko: …sure, but fire does other things, too. That’s what the dragons showed me – that fire is about light, and life, and passion, not just destruction the way the Fire Nation had been focusing on for the last hundred years. I thought Vathara was into that kind of thing?
MG: But keep in mind that “fire wants to fight” is the very first thing she has you say when breaking your technique down to its most basic level… because that is going to be so important for her understanding of the Fire Nation as a whole.
Iroh sat back, listening.
"It wants to fight, and it wants to burn." Zuko frowned, feeling his way through words. "If you want it to be more, you have to give it part of you. You have to flow with it. It's like… if firebending is being the captain of the ship, healing is turning it so you don't get swamped by the rogue wave. You get what you need, but you're not - all the way in control." He paused, shaking his head. "Fire is a rhythm, a heartbeat. It knows how to dance, it just doesn't know what dance you need it to do. You have to show it the steps. It's you, and the fire - and you're not trying to match it, not like breathing. You're trying to find a rhythm you can both fit. And then it's you and the fire and the person you're healing, and that gets complicated, and sometimes you trip a little. But you care, you have to care - and if you just keep going, it'll work." Zuko blew out a breath, obviously not happy with his own words.
MG: …on the other hand, as Zuko trying to explain something that defies simple explanation, this I like quite a lot.
Look outside yourself, indeed, Iroh thought, smiling. Dancing, especially with a partner, was a habit of other peoples, not the Fire Nation.
Aang: Only because the only music your schools were teaching was those boring military marches! You had lots of dances before the war started! We had a whole adventure about this, remember? And Zuko, remember that the firebending form we learned from the Sun Warriors was the Dancing Dragons, and it was designed for two people to do together!
Zuko: Considering that immediately after we did that technique for the first time, we got soaked in goo and stuck to the ceiling all afternoon, I don’t think I’ll ever forget.
And why should it be otherwise? Other benders must find their element outside themselves. We carry ours within. Which is why those like Zhao proclaim us superior. And perhaps we are - in combat, in killing.
But in our dances, we dance alone.
Aang: …I think that’d be a lot more meaningful if I didn’t know Fire Nation people used to love to dance before Sozin decided to make your whole country all about fighting, all the time.
The Superior Element: 5 (while taking a swipe at Zhao’s speech I named my count for, it’s still got a pretty undeniable undercurrent of “fire is special” going on)
"It seems a place to start," Iroh nodded. "Now. Show me."
Eyeing him doubtfully, Zuko beckoned to the fire-
Stopped. Took a breath, and reached out again with both hands. Slowly.
Shaping a fireball, Iroh thought, watching intently. But he called it from the fire, not himself, and he has not separated it wholly from the flames. And he is adding his own energy to it. Much like a waterbender, riding a wave.
Ball of flames between his palms, sparks trailing to the fire, Zuko began moving his hands in slow, opposing circles. Glints of green caught and spread, ribbons reaching out to wreathe his hands.
Zuko: Okay, there’s the dragon fire.
It is like the dao, Iroh realized. They do not move exactly as one. As two halves of a whole, yes. But one is sometimes faster, or slower. And sometimes they are near to block a single enemy, while at others, they separate to fight a host of opponents.
MG: Huh; another bit I rather like, reflecting on how Zuko’s swordsmanship influences his firebending technique, and vice-versa.
A fight. A heartbeat. A dance. If there were something less akin to the calm separation of lightning-bending, he had never seen it.
Zuko took the opportunity to reach back and run flames over the bruises from his meeting with the street, and let the fire in his hands die. "I guess that's it."
Nodding, Iroh reached out to the fire himself.
This is not as easy as it looks.
Zuko: Not to insult Uncle… but I’d imagine that if it really was as easy as it looked, the technique wouldn’t have been lost to begin with. Someone else would’ve figured it out.
Training said to keep his movements precise, sharp, controlled. To establish boundaries between himself and the flame. Fire, taught the masters, was anger, destruction, deadly passion. It could not be left to rage unchecked.
But Iroh had seen dragon's fire. And yes, rage was in it - but also warmth, compassion, friendship. Even the rage was no cold thrill in destruction, but desperate love of what they fought to protect.
Zuko: …you know, I still need to get the full story of that out of Uncle. One of these days…
MG: Unfortunately, and somewhat confusing, I don’t think Embers ever really goes into much detail about Iroh’s encounter with the dragons as a young man; iirc, the two dragons from “The Firebending Masters” never actually appear in the fic at all, though other dragons do.
Flow with the flame. Let it be part of you. Care.
It seared inside, like the times he'd snuck into hidden caverns to try to bend lava. Not so much physical pain, as of the spirit; he'd ached for his family and his people so very long….
It was the searing that kicked in training again; fortunately his own, and not any gained from Sozin's teachings. Live! Let the energy flow. In, down, up, out-
Green blazed between his hands, before it shattered apart.
"Uncle!" Soothing warmth kneaded his shoulder, sinking in to his heart. "You - you weren't breathing right…."
Iroh drew a deliberate breath, and felt the flow of his own chi. A bit uneven, but Zuko's efforts were mending that. "The technique," he said wryly, "is not so harmless to the student as it appears."
Aang: I’m glad your uncle’s okay, but Zuko, didn’t you tell me that when you tried to bend lightning for the first time, it blew up in your face too? Are advanced firebending techniques just… like that sometimes?
MG: And again, I do appreciate that neither Iroh nor Zuko are instant experts on this stuff, and that Vathara resisted the temptation to make Iroh the Keeper of All Secret Knowledge, which I think would’ve been an easy trap for a fic like this to fall into.
"Not harmless? What did you do?"
Green flickered away again from Zuko's hands, and Iroh leaned gratefully on his nephew. "On the bright side, it appears that I am right. And for that, I am sorry. I am truly sorry, nephew. It has been in plain view for years, and I did not see."
Zuko's fingers felt for his pulse. "Uncle, are you sure you're all right? Because you're not making sense."
Iroh chuckled ruefully. "I am, no thanks to my own training. Zuko. When you change the fire to heal, you leave its energies linked to the flames. And to yourself. This is not what firebending teaches."
Zuko stiffened, pulling back. "So I'm doing it wrong."
"No!" Iroh gripped his shoulders, holding the young man before he could escape back into doubt and pain. "No, nephew. You are doing it right! I did it as firebenders are taught; I controlled the flow, precisely. And like the rogue wave on the sea, it is not meant to be so tamed."
Zuko: Except I was trained in the same style, and I’m not having that problem apparently? Is that just because of Mom’s influence? And Uncle was the one who told me not to try and control lightning, but to be “its humble guide,” I think he’d have an easier time with this?
"Your heart." Zuko was desperately pale. "You have to feel it with your heart, and…."
"Yes," Iroh nodded, relieved to have finally - finally! - gained a clear view of his enemy's position. And if his intuition was correct, it might yet become an ally instead, if he were clever enough. "The heart has a rhythm as well. Control the fire too tightly, it turns on those rhythms of your own it can reach." And I thought only lightning could so stop a heart.
Which led to grim thoughts of exactly what Ursa might have done… no. His father's death was the past. Zuko's life was here, and now. "You did it right, Zuko," Iroh said simply. And laughed at himself, ruefully. "Which means, of course, I have been teaching you firebending as I might calligraphy, left-handed."
Zuko gave him a look askance. "Did you get hit with a boomerang when I wasn't looking?"
Zuko: I think I’d have figured out that Uncle was being metaphorical here? He was just saying that his own training was holding him back!
"Listen to me, nephew," Iroh said patiently. He couldn't blame the boy for his doubts. Any other master would swear he'd been sunstruck. But if he closed his eyes to the lessons of Sozin and Azulon, and looked at what his nephew had actually done…. "To throw fire together with another bender is a fundamental technique, yet it remains one of the most difficult. Many do not even bother to master it. Why should they, when we can order the mass fire of hundreds? But at the South Pole we threw, and you did not hesitate."
"I know my basics, yes, thank you, Uncle-"
Aang: And Iroh was your teacher and you’d trained together, right? I bet you were a lot more in sync than just about any other two firebenders would be.
"Hush, and listen," Iroh directed. "When you faced Zhao, I worried he had you; yet with one spin you shattered his fire and his stance. I have known masters who could not have struck that blow. When you raised fire about Azula, why did she not wrest it away the instant it burned? Unless she could not, until she forced herself free with all her strength. And now, when you heal…." He let go, and smiled. "What do these fires have in common?"
Zuko swallowed. "They're outside." He grimaced. "But that's not how it's supposed to be."
Prince Stuko: 10 (giving a couple of points here for hyping up some of Zuko’s past achievements in a way the show never did)
"At the moment, I believe we should be less concerned with proper style, and more with what will work if Azula does bring reinforcements." Iroh nodded toward the dao resting by their packs. "Is that not why you learned swords as well?"
Zuko's fists clenched. "I just - wanted to be good at something."
MG: Heh; you know, I’ve always quietly headcanoned that the reason why we never see Azula use any sort of sword on-screen in the original show is that she’s very much aware swordsmanship is one of the few things Zuko is just straight-up better than her at, and she hates that.
"And so you are," Iroh said firmly. You are good, nephew. Not a master, perhaps; but you are only sixteen. Give yourself time.
MG: This, on the other hand, is kind of hilarious in hindsight considering all the things Vathara is going to end up having Zuko actually accomplish while he’s still sixteen…
Azula was chasing them. Sozin's Comet was coming. Time, they did not have.
"Do not discount your gifts, Prince Zuko," Iroh said instead. "They may yet save your life. There is a firebending technique neither Azula nor my brother know, and it depends on something very much like what I have seen you do."
"There's a move the Fire Lord doesn't know?" Zuko said warily.
Iroh smiled. "He doesn't know, because I made it up myself." He dropped his nephew a wink. "I was studying waterbenders years before Katara drew your attention, nephew."
"Drew my attention?" Zuko sputtered. "She buried me in ice in the middle of a blizzard, Uncle!"
Aang: Part of me feels like I should apologize for that, because she was protecting me at the time… but I also can’t really feel too bad about it, because she was protecting me at the time; does that make sense?
MG: And just to be clear again, if it needs to be said, this fic does not in any way ship Zutara… though Iroh himself kind of seems to be hinting he might?
"You should have seen what my Natsu did when I was your age," Iroh said fondly. "Ah, what a fiery chase she led me, before she caught me!"
"Uncle." Zuko was gripping the bridge of his nose in the exasperated way that meant he'd decided this was another bout of temporary insanity, which just might pass if he waited it out. "She's Water Tribe. She is not waiting to ambush me with a red cord and three cups of wine. Trust me."
MG: The ritual described here sounds like it’s based on the Japanese San San Kudo (thank you for the link, LanWan!); we’ll be hearing references to this a fair bit more as the fic goes on, and similar rituals in different contexts. “Natsu” as Iroh’s wife’s name seems to be Vathara’s invention (at least, I don’t think I’ve heard it anywhere else in fandom and the character isn’t named in canon); we know nothing about her from canon, save that Iroh had a (presumably legitimate) son, and therefore was presumably married at one point. I think the most common fanon is that she’s dead, and likely has been for a long time as of the series.
"Ah, a shame," Iroh sighed gustily. Mentally chalking another point on his side of the tally: one distraction, complete. "Well. The cold fire is powerful, and certainly impressive, but it has a weakness. More than any flame, it is energy, and it seeks the path of least resistance. If you let the energy in your own body flow, the lightning will follow." He stood. "Let us begin."
Zuko: Okay, so now we’re getting into redirecting lightning… but still missing the part where Uncle told me about how waterbending emphasizes adapting to your opponent and turning their energy against them, and that’s specifically where he got the idea for this technique…
In, down, up, out, Zuko chanted to himself as they practiced through the afternoon, shifting the flow of energy as he moved. Trying not to think of that flash of pure fear, as he'd stared Azula's sparkling death in the face-
Before Uncle had stepped between them, and redirected her bolt into the cliff.
He saved me. I didn't even realize what he did, not then - too scared, too angry - but he did.
Zuko: Actually, I already knew Uncle could do that – I even saw him redirect a natural lightning bolt during that storm, which was a lot bigger than any of Azula’s! Remember, I guessed what technique he was going to show me pretty much as soon as he admitted it was something he made up himself.
Next time, I want to save myself.
Zuko: That, on the other hand… that’s about right. I think I’d have been willing to take any advantage over Azula I could get, at that point. After all I’d been through lately, I needed it.
In, down, up, out.
It was and wasn't like healing. Healing was a dance, a partnership, both sides trading off the lead. This was more like Jun the bounty hunter's whip, snapping out against danger. But it was still a flow. A pattern.
It makes sense.
He could feel the technique, solid as any of the basics Uncle had taught him. This was how it would flow. How it would work. "I'm ready."
"Ready?" Uncle Iroh said incredulously, dropping out of stance. "What, are you crazy?"
"I have to know it works, Uncle!"
"And if it does not?" Iroh blazed. "I have lost my son; I will not lose you as well! If you are lucky, you will never need this move in your life!"
Aang: You actually tried to get your uncle to shoot lightning at you!?
Zuko: …I’m not sure how much of this is really me anymore, but that part… yeah, I did try that. I was desperate to prove myself at something, but looking back? I can’t blame him for not wanting to do that!
He's angry. He never gets angry. Zuko clenched his fists, unwilling to back down. "When have I ever been lucky, Uncle?"
Aang: So, you think you’re doomed to be unlucky… which is why you want to be shot at with lightning so you can try a technique that could kill you if you’re not lucky? Does that make sense?
Silence, stretching taut between them as gold warred with gold. "No," Iroh said flatly, every inch the Dragon of the West. "You are not ready."
Zuko: …am I the only one getting the feeling Vathara is making Uncle less sympathetic about this than he actually was? I mean, it was pretty clear looking back that he wasn’t angry, he was scared and didn’t want to risk me dying, which I very well could have!
I need this! It was all the banished prince could do not to scream. I need this, Uncle. I need to win. I need to beat her!
…I need to be good enough. Just once.
Zuko: *groans audibly* And boy, do I remember that feeling. And I get it. But looking back, I also get that Uncle wanted a living nephew. Lightningbending isn’t something you play around with! It’s actually dangerous!
Breathe. Bite back the anger, even if smoke rose from between his clenched fingers. "Azula's after us, Uncle. If she brings troops - if she gets us separated…." Zuko swallowed hard, pride burning like acid. "If she does that, I'm dead anyway."
I'm not good enough to take her. I never have been. All I can try to do is stay alive.
All we can do is run.
It wasn't fair. It just wasn't fair. The rage burned in him like lava, demanding to blaze free….
It's never been fair, Zuko reminded himself, forcing the anger back. And I don't care. I'll make my own destiny. Whatever it takes.
MG: Which, again, is a bit ironic, because Zuko has about three or four distinct destinies planned for him by various parties before the fic is done… some of which are actually tied to the fact that he doesn’t have a set destiny, or much luck, apparently, with his lack of luck actually becoming a plot point. But we’ll get to that later.
Uncle sighed, anger draining away like water, leaving him worn and tired. "You make a good argument, Prince Zuko. I will consider it."
Zuko let out a breath of relief. "Thank you, Uncle-"
"No!" Iroh slashed a hand across, trailing smoke. "If you wish me to risk your life, you will earn it! You will practice. You will listen to me. And for once in your life, you will wait, until I say you are ready!"
Zuko swallowed, shaken. Uncle Iroh was always calm, always controlled. To see him half-raise fire without even thinking about it…. He shivered.
Zuko: …yeah, even with this, it really does seem like Vathara rewrote this bit to make me come out on top… even though looking back, I still can’t believe I was literally begging Uncle to shoot lightning at me, and then went up on a mountaintop in a storm to try and find real lightning… what was I even thinking… Though if Vathara is right about one thing here, it’s how desperately I felt I needed to win at something.
Iroh sighed once more. "We are tired," he went on, more quietly. "And healed or not, a fight like that we faced yesterday would drain trained soldiers, much less-"
"You don't have to explain, Uncle." Biting his lip, Zuko bowed, student to master.
And tried not to flinch, as Iroh's arms closed around him.
"I love you, nephew," Iroh said softly. "I do not tell you that enough. If I could, I would stand between you and harm forever. But you are right. I cannot." One hand lifted, brushing back unfamiliar short hair. "I can only give you the skills to protect yourself, and pray."
MG: These few lines, on the other hand? In summing up Iroh’s role as both a surrogate father and a teacher… these I really do like.
Uncle's hand in his hair. It should have been comforting. It was.
And somehow, that made it even worse.
No familiar weight of a phoenix-tail. No breeze across shaved skin. Clothes that weren't meant to be worn with armor; that weren't even red. No taste of salt, no coal smoke, no sway of the ship under him….
Nothing was right in the world. Nothing.
Aang: Wait, are you implying things were right when you were at sea, chasing me down all the time?
Zuko: *flatly* No, they weren’t. I guess it was better than being stuck in Middle of Nowhere, Earth Kingdom… but what I really wanted, always, was to go home.
"I'm sorry, Uncle," Zuko choked out, hating the tear that trickled from his good eye. "If I hadn't chased him to the pole, you wouldn't have been with Zhao. Our crew wouldn't have- they couldn't call you a traitor-" He swallowed hard, words a bare whisper. "I just wanted to go home."
Zuko: Okay, there we have it. I… I don’t think I ever let that out all the way. But I definitely felt some of it.
"I know, nephew. I know." A chuckle against his shoulder. "And you may underestimate Lieutenant Jee. Our crew has seen the Avatar unleashed before. If anyone had a chance to survive that fury, they did." Iroh let go, and nodded. "Come. We can make some more distance, before dark."
MG: And yes, Lieutenant Jee – or rather, Captain Jee – is going to be turning up alive again partway through the fic.
So it begins.
Lying awake beside Asahi's warmth, Iroh looked over at his nephew. Even in sleep, Zuko frowned, huddled on himself, hands clenching and unclenching on the bedroll.
Aang: *puts a comforting hand on Zuko’s shoulder*
"I just wanted to go home."
Zuko knew. He had not admitted it to himself, not yet. But he knew.
We can never go home again. Iroh smiled wryly. Perhaps I should almost get killed by Azula more often.
Zuko: *flatly* Yeah, Uncle, I’d recommend you not do that.
Though he doubted matters would have gone this well, had Zuko not been able to heal him. Azula had won the physical fight, but Zuko had denied her the victory. It gave him strength. A place to stand, to be certain of himself, when all the world seemed to fall apart around him.
And it will.
All his life, Zuko had tried to please his father. To win, by painful effort, the approval Azula seemed to gain simply by breathing. To admit that they could not go home, would be to admit he had failed. That he had not - could not - wring love from Fire Lord Ozai's heart of stone.
I love you, Zuko. I wish that were enough.
MG: Ooof; a lot of this chapter has been… not great, but we’re hitting some genuinely good stuff here, I can’t lie.
Futile wish. A child's first love and loyalty was to his parents, always - and while soldiers might put that as second to their commander's orders, the Fire Lord was the crown prince's commander. Exiled or not.
To admit the truth, will break my nephew's heart.
But would it break his loyalty? That, above all, was the question.
MG: …and of course Vathara has to bring it back around to creepy magic loyalty. Sigh.
Well, no, Iroh admitted to himself. Whether or not Azula will catch us - all else will hinge on that.
So. First, avoid the she-devil on their trail.
Aang: What’s a devil?
MG: …something that doesn’t really exist in your world; you have evil or dangerous beings and spirits, sure, but not by that name. Even dark spirits are just regular spirits that have been enraged into a state of madness and violence, not a separate type of being (though some spirits are nasty enough of their own free will – Aang and Zuko, count yourselves very lucky neither of you ever met Father Glowworm from the Kyoshi books). I don’t know why this term jumps out at me so much, but it does.
Though if they were lucky, Azula would leave them for later, pursuing glory from her father by seeking the Avatar's head.
…Not that he wished the young airbender harm. Quite the opposite, despite that horror at the North Pole. The boy was twelve. He could not, truly, have known what he was unleashing, allowing the Ocean Spirit his way with all an Avatar's power.
Hope that is so, Iroh told himself grimly, recalling torn ships and bodies, awash in the sea. Remembering weeks trapped on the raft with Zuko's nightmares and his own. Hope he did not know, and that he will never do so again. The consequences, otherwise….
MG: And here we have an early taste of another of Vathara’s pet issues – the idea of Koizilla as the absolute worst thing that could have happened or that Aang could have done. Not going much into it here, because the fic is just teasing us with it at this point, but we are going to be hitting this drum so much before the fic is done. Vathara hates the idea of Koizilla, and is going to be stacking the deck in various ways so we can all be sure of what a terrible and unforgivable thing it was. The big thing that stands out here is that Iroh actually cuts Aang some slack for it, while later discussion of that scene are… less likely to do that, to put it mildly. We are, however, going to start a count here:
The Deadly Depths: 1
Well. There were reasons beyond family he had trained Zuko, and followed his nephew on what seemed a fool's quest. Reasons Aang had best hope he never learned.
Zuko: …what. *groans audibly* Let me guess, this is about those destinies you mentioned earlier?
MG: Some of them, yes. And also to how I’m of the opinion the fic’s characterization of Iroh takes a nosedive in the second half… but we’re a long way away from that being elaborated on.
Still. Young Aang had friends, and allies, and a flying bison. He and Zuko had only each other and one stubborn ostrich-horse. And with Sozin's Comet on the way, they were running out of time-
Iroh sat up suddenly.
"Mmph? Uncle?"
"Only thinking, nephew. Go to sleep."
"Mmph…."
Leaning back as his nephew settled, Iroh probed at that sudden thought. Sozin's Comet would arrive by the end of summer. After that-
After that, it would be the Avatar against the Fire Lord. One would win. If that one were the Avatar, his nephew would be safe. If it were not….
MG: Spoilers – this fic has several climactic confrontations occurring around the same time. Aang against Ozai… is not one of them (Aang does encounter Ozai, briefly – and I have issues with the way that’s handled, too – but it’s not one of the big climactic confrontations).
Aang: *stunned* What!? So what was I spending all year training my arrow off for, then?
MG: …you’ll see.
Aang: …I don’t think I like the way that sounds
We would have to run again. But the comet does not last forever.
Zuko: About a day, actually… which was more than enough time for my father and his forces to do plenty of damage…
We do not know where the Avatar has gone. And even my nephew will not strike out blindly. If I can only keep us moving….
No. No, that would not do; Azula was moving, and the Avatar was definitely traveling, and the more they themselves crossed the land, the more chances the spirits had to arrange another meeting between all of them.
Aang: Am I the only one imagining Koh and Yue and Wan Shih Tong and maybe that one grumpy old monkey who was mad I kept distracting him from meditating pushing us all around like tiles on a big Pai Sho board? And maybe betting on us?
MG: Well, aside from the monkey… you’re kind of on the right track with some of that?
Aang: I guess I had to say it, huh?
Iroh was not feeling charitable toward spirits, at the moment.
MG: Which is kind of weird, considering Vathara is going to make “Iroh is excessively pious and respectful of spirits” a significant point of his characterization later in the fic, iirc…
We are in the Earth Kingdom, and we should take a lesson from the badger-mole. Go to ground, and hide.
Easy to say. Far more difficult to do. The Earth Kingdom and the Fire Nation were locked in war, territory changing hands with each shift of the tide. Nowhere was safe-
Iroh drew in a sharp breath. It hurt; even all these years later, it hurt. But he steeled himself. Considered the option. And nodded.
Ba Sing Se.
Those walls had not fallen to his assault. They would hold. At least until the comet came.
Zuko: Or until a certain someone we all know got inside the walls…
Still. To venture there, where he would never escape memories of a young man who had never had the chance to give him grandchildren… he shook his head.
"Father," Zuko murmured in his sleep. "Please…."
Almost against his will, Iroh's fists clenched. Deliberately, the old general called to mind those high walls, those proud earthbenders, the whole massive edifice that had denied him victory.
You took my son. Iroh let out a quiet, angry breath of flame. Let us see if you can save my nephew.
MG: Mmmmrph. I have very mixed feelings on these last few lines. On the one hand, Iroh thinking about Lu Ten’s death, then seeing Zuko having a nightmare and that inspiring him to action – oof, right in the gut, in a good way. On the other hand, something about the framing around Lu Ten’s death feels… off. I never really felt like Iroh held much of a grudge against Ba Sing Se itself for his son’s death in canon… mostly because I thought it was pretty clear the person Iroh blamed the most for Lu Ten’s death was himself. After all he was the invader, he was the one who brought his army – and his son – to the city in the first place, and he was the one who, ultimately, bore responsibility for ordering him into the battle that killed him, and that guilt and that knowledge is the biggest reason why the Iroh of the present day is a changed man compared to who he once was. Focusing the blame on the city… I don’t know, it feels like it blunts the edge of Iroh’s own guilt, and the Fire Nation’s guilt for being there in the first place. Maybe that’s just how it reads to me, knowing the fic and its biases.
Anyway, we’re now done with the chapter save for one, very short, AN!
A/N: If bloodbending is internal waterbending, why shouldn't firebending - as it is currently practiced - have had similar origins? All the other elements involve external control of an existing substance. It'd make a lot of sense if firebending started the same way… and then evolved, into the internally-controlled fire which can be much more handy for combat.
MG: …hmmm. Bloodbending=internal waterbending I get, but bloodbending is a very advanced and difficult waterbending technique, one that most waterbenders can’t do at all without having their power boosted by the full moon, not the original basis of waterbending. And I’d think a firebending counterpart to bloodbending would be more like using firebending to somehow forcibly seize control of and manipulate someone else’s internal energies, in the same way bloodbending forcibly controls another person’s body through the water in their blood. Maybe I’m just not quite understanding what Vathara is arguing for here.
Anyway, I think this chapter is a mixed bag. A lot of the Zuko and Iroh stuff continues to be really good, both in terms of exploring their bond and the underlying philosophy of their firebending. I do have a few qualms with how some elements of it are presented here… but like a lot in this first arc, it’s mostly because I know it’s a sign of what will become much bigger issues later in the fic rather than because I think they’re inherently bad on their own. On the other hand, we’re pretty firmly in “Toph is the one reasonable member of the Gaang” territory, as well as “the other nations have atrocities and tyrants in their pasts and so have no leg to stand on in criticizing the Fire Nation” and “everyone actually secretly hated the Air Nomads” territories. So that’s not so great, to put it mildly, and it’s also going to get much, much worse as the fic goes on… though iirc the Gaang are going to fall out of the story for a while, as their side of things will mostly be following canon, and therefore kept off-page, for the remainder of Book II, until their paths cross with Zuko’s again late in the Ba Sing Se arc. Next time, Zuko and Iroh run into some trouble on the road, and more of the fic’s future elements get foreshadowed in greater depth. We’ll see you then! Our counts stand at:
Beware the Sugar Queen: 5
The Blind Bandit Wins Again: 8
The Deadly Depths: 1
Detached from Reality: 5
Divine Right to Rule: 6
Elemental Determinism: 3
He Has Much to Learn: 8
Prince Stuko: 11 (giving a final point for Vathara having Zuko come out of his argument with Iroh somewhat better than he did in canon
Simple Rubes from the Water Tribes: 5
Stations of the Canon: 12
The Superior Element: 5
The Ultimate Firebenders: 4
no subject
Date: 2025-12-17 06:46 pm (UTC)I think this speaks to a lot of the lack of planning and retconning that happens later as the fic develops.
Which again, isn't something I can throw stones about. Writing a fic and posting it live as its written is going to cause issues like that. There's a reason books go through drafts and editing phases.
But yeah. There's definitely an irony here.
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MG: And again, I do appreciate that neither Iroh nor Zuko are instant experts on this stuff,
For sure.
One thing I like about this fic is how much characters are actively learning things. Playing with stuff, experimenting, practicing. A later scene with Zuko and Toph on the beach... but I'll leave that for its time.
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I think I’d have figured out that Uncle was being metaphorical here?
Vathara's Zuko can be so literal and resistant to metaphor. I mean, not the worst offender in fics I've read? But it's clearly a struggle for him.
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though Iroh himself kind of seems to be hinting he might?
This Iroh seems to ship Zuko with any unattached girl he gets even the slightest bit friendly with. Or in Katara's case, not actively murderous.
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the idea of Koizilla as the absolute worst thing that could have happened
Vathara is going to hammer home over and over the idea of koizilla as a weapon of mass destruction. And the consequences of unleashing a powerful "weapon", especially the spiritual consequences.
Which I could take more seriously if both Vathara's spiritual framework made a bit more sense to me, and also if her Bleach/MCU crossover fic hadn't made the argument both in text AND author's notes that she believed dropping atomic weapons on Japan was necessary.
...Vathara has a pretty warped view on necessary evils and again, thinking of my attempts to write in her universe... untangling the world's moral and spiritual systems to make sense to me is going to be work.
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Which is kind of weird, considering Vathara is going to make “Iroh is excessively pious and respectful of spirits”
Yeah I'm going to attribute this to more retconning and writing on the fly.
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using firebending to somehow forcibly seize control of and manipulate someone else’s internal energies
While I do enjoy Ember's split between internal and external fire, personally... This does put me into mind of a different fic I read where Zuko figured out HEAT bending. ...and learned how quickly he could snuff out a life using it, to his dismay.