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jasmine-iroh · 4 years

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Sparring Partners

Pairing: Zuko x f!reader

WC: 2.5K

A/N: howdyyyy I’ll be honest idk what this is besides self satisfactory fluff oops. send in some requests pls, I’m bored as heck!

Never let (Y/N) and Zuko spar.

That was an unspoken rule on Team Avatar after Zuko joined the group. The group had witnessed the aftermath of their practicing one too many times; angry gatherings of flames licking at the bark of uprooted trees scattered around piles of rubble and burnt grass.

Simply put, the pair were a force of nature. That wasn’t the reason they weren’t allowed to fight, though. No, nobody really paid much mind to their destructive tendencies, as long as they weren’t too close to camp.

It was their moods after the fight was done that brought about the rule.

Zuko would slink away to his tent and brood, grumbling at anyone who ventured too close to him. (Y/N) would stay with the group, a grin stuck to her face the whole time. It wasn’t a smile that put anyone at ease, though. It was feral, the snapping teeth and predatory curl of her lips more suited to a big cat than a young girl. Even Katara, who was usually found near (Y/N)’s side, avoided sitting too close.

(Y/N) was never mean to the others, but she had a razor sharp edge to her for hours after the duel that made Aang shift nervously in his seat and Sokka focus more on being the meat guy than the sarcasm guy. Suki would stay on edge until it was finally time to split up into their individual tents. Her fighting instincts would be on alert at the scent of scorched earth coming from (Y/N), a completely different smell from the smoke from the campfire.

Zuko, of course, would be the one to start said campfire. There was a tense, almost shy set to his shoulders as the weight of wild eyes bore down on him from near Toph. Toph, incidentally, never seemed to mind the rumbling of thunder in (Y/N)’s voice after a fight with Zuko, or the way Zuko’s heart beat staggered whenever (Y/N) so much as walked past him.

Toph didn’t care if the pair sparred, as long as it would get them over their timid dance around camp. She thought it was an entertaining break in the monotony of training and hiding, and the feeling of (Y/N) earthbending with such raw emotion was as sappy as any romance story there was. It was truly hilarious to her that nobody else could connect the dots between the unbridled chaos of their fighting and their quiet moments together around a campfire.

It had been a few days since the last incident when Toph finally decided to ask (Y/N) what their deal was during a training session.

“So, what’s up with you and Sifu Hotman?” She asked, a slightly maniacal laugh falling past her lips when she managed to catch (Y/N) off guard and nail her in the side with a boulder. Toph had taken to using Aang’s ridiculous nickname after she realized how quickly she could get under Zuko’s skin with it. Payback for Zuko burning her feet, she had justified.

Coughing and sputtering from the blow, (Y/N) tried to deflect the question with a volley of rocks she’d been keeping suspended in the air long enough for Toph to half lose track of.

“Hey, that’s cheating!” Toph huffed indignantly, dodging the attack before shifting her feet and sending the slab of earth below (Y/N) tilting sideways.

“No, I just saw a weakness and used it,” (Y/N) laughed and leapt from her crumbling perch to position herself in the middle of the sparring area, knowing that Aang, Zuko, Suki, and Sokka were somewhere behind her. Toph wasn’t stupid, she knew (Y/N) was trying to get into a position that would make Toph go easier on her with their friends in the line of fire.

Oh (Y/N), you really think you’re clever, don’t you? Toph thought with a smirk as a plan formed in her mind, pressing her knuckles into the dirt and twisting them sharply. She felt (Y/N)’s growl before she heard it, knowing that the other girl hated when Toph locked her feet into the earth. This time, though, she kept her hold on the rock, sitting down and waiting for (Y/N) to answer her original question.

“Toph, c’mon!” (Y/N) whined, trying to free herself as Toph sat a few meters away laughing.

“Just tell me and I’ll let you go!” Toph called back, bending herself a chair from the earth with one hand while the other kept it’s grip on the rocks around (Y/N)’s ankles.

“You’re such a little jerk,” (Y/N) answered instead, looking around for something to help her. She was weak without being able to use her feet as her center, something Toph had been hounding her about forever.

“I thought best friends told each other everything,” Toph mocked as she felt the others stop fighting to watch the scene in front of them.

“Yeah, but you also told me you’d throw me off Appa because I took Momo’s seat last week,” (Y/N) replied, crossing her arms stubbornly. Toph was a stronger bender, but (Y/N) had more patience, knowing Toph could get bored or frustrated pretty quickly. That’s how they’d always been, ever since (Y/N) had been sent to live with her helpless, blind little cousin all those years ago.

“What’s going on?” Aang asked the pair, scootering over on a ball of air with a peeved looking Zuko trailing behind him.

“(Y/N)’s keeping secrets from me and acting like I won’t find out,” Toph accused, watching as Suki and Sokka joined the group. Katara, who had been assigned camp duties for the day, drew closer at the lack of fighting sounds.

“Toph,” (Y/N) warned, a sharp threat in her voice as the sound of a tree being pulled up at the roots echoed around the clearing as (Y/N) clenched her fists.

“Yes?” A challenge in her voice, her fist twisting further into the earth and sinking (Y/N) up to her waist in tightly compressed rocks.

“Enough.” Zuko stepped in between the pair, and Toph couldn’t help but notice the spike in his heart rate when (Y/N) dropped up to her shoulders in rock.

“Zuko, stay out of this. Toph’s just being a pain,” (Y/N) huffed, having a hard time breathing with the merciless press of dirt and rock around her chest.

He didn’t stay out of it of course, his heart beating faster than a bird's wings as he watched (Y/N) struggle in the ground. Toph thought the duo were nauseatingly oblivious.

She let out a frustrated growl and slammed her foot on the ground, sending Zuko sprawling flat out next to (Y/N) and encasing his hands and feet in earth.

“Fine. You can both stay here until one of you tells me, then.” Toph declared before standing and walking away from the pair. The rest of the group looked from Toph back down to their friends buried in the ground, and decided that maybe they didn’t want to end up stuck next to the pair. They walked off, promising to talk to Toph and have her fix this.

“Spirits, she’s such a little bastard,” (Y/N) mumbled, turning her head to look at Zuko. She blinked in shock, not expecting his face to be quite so close to hers. A tricky little bastard, the girl amended in her head.

“What were you two fighting about?” Zuko asked quietly, not having to speak much above a whisper with their proximity. Had his eyes always been so golden?

“She asked about what was going on between us,” (Y/N) answered, closing her eyes and turning her head away from him towards the sky. The sun pressed red kisses against her closed eyelids while the breeze played with her hair, making her feel for a moment that she was laid out next to Zuko in a spring meadow by choice instead of locked into the dirt by Toph.

“What did you tell her?” He kept his voice low, tone conspiratorial. He stared at (Y/N), the sun loving her throat and pressing kisses to her cheekbones. He thought, just for a moment, that Toph had done him a favor by locking him into this view.

A laugh, and then, “I didn’t tell her anything.”

“Why not?” He prodded, wishing (Y/N) would turn her head so he could… could what? He thought to himself, images of him wiggling closer and closing the distance between them flickering in his mind without warning. A warm blush crept up his neck at the thoughts, wishing he wasn’t so affected by their proximity.

“Because sometimes you need to let Toph think she holds all the cards so she’s a little less of a pain in the ass. And so she wouldn’t question what we really do when we spar,” (Y/N) whispered, opening her eyes and turning to face Zuko. She met his amber gaze immediately, a grin pulling at her mouth as she leaned closer to him, feeling the heat radiating off his body.

“Oh, you mean that thing where you torment me with your comments all day around camp and then try to play innocent when we’re alone?” Zuko huffed with a smile as he wormed his way closer.

“Hey, don’t get mad. I just saw a weakness and used it,” (Y/N) giggled as she leaned in towards him. Her gaze flickered briefly from Zuko’s eyes, to his lips, and then back to his eyes in a way that made him feel like the ground was falling out from under him. He leaned up to meet her halfway, falling just short of being able to seal their lips together. A soft groan from (Y/N) pulled a chuckle from Zuko’s throat, before his head flopped back down onto the packed earth.

“Such a little bastard,” he heard (Y/N) mutter a moment before her face contorted and rumbling from around them was heard.

Zuko’s hands and legs were freed from their earthen prison, letting him roll away only a second before (Y/N) rose up from her hole on a pillar of earth. She hopped down gracefully and brushed her clothes off before helping Zuko to his feet, that wild look back in her eyes.

“You couldn’t have done that earlier?” Zuko asked, brushing the dirt out of his hair.

“I can put you back, if you’d like,” (Y/N) hummed, stepping closer to him and giving him that sharp grin that sent his stomach fluttering.

“I’m fine right here, thank you,” he replied, a deep blush staining his cheeks as (Y/N) pulled him close and finally, finally, pressed her lips to his own in a slow kiss. He returned the kiss eagerly, loving the warmth of her hand cupping his jaw with gritty fingers as the other tangled in Zuko’s mop of hair.

The pillar she’d used to free herself moments before was now scraping against his back as (Y/N) traced a lazy trail of kisses along Zuko’s jaw. He let out a sound that was suspiciously close to a whimper and felt a thrill go up his spine at the glint of absolute trouble reflected in (Y/N)’s eyes when she pulled away.

“How long do you think we have until they realize we’re not stuck anymore?” She pondered, pressing delicate kisses up the side of Zuko’s throat and along the edges of his scar.

“Enough time to get a head start and cover our tracks.” His eyes moved deliberately to the forest away from camp, before flicking back to hers with a bashful quirk of his eyebrow. His breaths trembling, he tried to ignore how his nerve endings were alight with the feeling of (Y/N)’s lips on his skin.

“Very tempting, but I don’t feel like listening to Mother Katara yell at us for ‘running off and worrying the group,’” (Y/N) whispered back, pressing a kiss to Zuko’s chin before moving to pull away. His arms snaked around her waist quickly, locking her against him.

(Y/N)’s brows shot up in pleasant surprise at his actions. She had been the one to make moves from the start, more accustomed to touch that wasn’t soured by pain or anger. Zuko figured she’d like to have more physical affection from him, but the long nights spent untangling his emotions in return for a kiss were enough to keep her happy and moving at his pace. Zuko had been without a loving hand to hold for so long that he forgot how simple and sweet an embrace could be, how the pad of a thumb rubbing across bruised knuckles could soothe his aches better than any balm.

Feeling bold between the column of earth and (Y/N), Zuko leaned down to her height and pressed a gentle kiss against her lips, retreating before she could respond. The girl only grinned widely, wrapping her arms around his muscular torso. A puff of air left Zuko’s lungs as he was pulled into her strong arms, before tightening his own arms around her waist and pressing his face into the crook of her neck.

“We have to at least make Toph think nothing’s changed, or we’ll never hear the end of how she’s so right and it's everyone else who is really blind,” (Y/N) told him, pitching her voice in Toph’s bratty little sister voice she used when she won arguments.

“Let her. I’m tired of not being able to be like this whenever we want,” Zuko replied, his warm breath against the side of her neck sending a wave of goosebumps over (Y/N)’s skin. It shocked her in the most pleasant way possible to hear him say that to her, since they’d agreed to keep things quiet until he could figure out his emotions.

“Alright, but don’t say I didn’t warn you when she makes you wish you were hard of hearing,” (Y/N) laughed, nudging his head back up to face her. Her senses were filled with Zuko, the smell of smoke filling her nose as the heat from his body scorched a pattern into her heart. Their noses brushed once, twice; their lips a breath apart.

Before either could close the distance, Toph marched around their column of rock, almost slamming straight into them. In a breath, she was gone again, back the way she’d come.

“I knew it, I was so right! You losers are so blind!” She shouted to the others.

Her sudden appearance had shocked the pair apart, making (Y/N) quirk an eyebrow and pulling a rare grin from Zuko at the astounding accuracy of (Y/N)’s impression of Toph.

“Just remember, you brought this upon yourself,” (Y/N) laughed, turning to walk back to camp. Zuko’s hand shot out and grabbed her wrist, reeling her back in towards him so he could seal a lingering kiss against her mouth.

“I know, but that was worth it,” he hummed, walking alongside her back to camp, their fingers tangling together without a second thought.

#zuko x reader #zuko x you #prince zuko #zuko #aang #toph #toph beifong #sokka #katara #suki #beifong!reader #earthbender!reader #atla imagine #atla fanfic #avatar #avatar the last airbender #atla #avatar imagine #avatar fic

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momsopposed2theoccult · 3 years

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A Very Special Night

Hey everybody! Here’s a quick oneshot I wrote where Toph and Su help Lin get ready for her school dance, because we deserve more happy Beifongs and Lin getting the love and support from her family that she was denied in canon. Enjoy!

“So, are you nervous? You must be nervous, you’re not eating.”

Lin looked up from her plate at her sister’s words. It was true, she was nervous. Her dinner lay untouched on her plate, as her stomach was in knots.

“Eat up, baby girl. You can’t dance on an empty stomach. Well, I suppose you can, but you shouldn’t,” her mother chimed in.

“No, no, I’m not nervous. I’m just… excited, that’s all!,” she lied, something her mother picked up on immediately.

Toph’s expression shifted into one of concern.

“What’s wrong, Linny? This is a big night, you should be over the moon right now,” she wondered.

It was true, tonight was a big night. When her school at first announced that they were going to be hosting a formal, Lin decided right away that she would not be attending. She was a horrible dancer, not to mention socially awkward, and she didn’t know the first thing about getting dressed up. It wasn’t until one of her oldest and quite frankly only friends, Tenzin, had decided that he wanted to go and as his best friend she was obligated to go with him was she convinced to buy a ticket.

Lin wasn’t sure why she felt like her heart was gonna beat out of her chest when he asked her to go with him. It wasn’t like it was a date or anything. She had known Tenzin forever. This was just a friend thing, she repeated over and over again in her head, although the mantra didn’t do much to rest her fast beating heart.

“Promise you won’t laugh at me?”

“Promise,” Toph and Su assured her.

“Well, I have a dress and shoes and everything, but I’m still not really sure how I’m going to do my hair and makeup. You know I’m not good at that stuff,” she confessed, blushing.

Su perked up. “Oh, that’s easy! I can do it for you, I’m great at that stuff!”

It was true. Su had always had a keen and stylish eye that her visually challenged mother and dorky sister lacked. Maybe Lin should have felt embarrassed that her ten year old kid sister knew more about these things than herself, a girl of fifteen, but she was honestly just grateful for her help.

“Here, I can do it right now no problem,” Su offered. The sisters got up from the table and began to make their way upstairs.

“Hey, girls! Aren’t you gonna finish your dinner?,” Toph called out.

“Yeah, yeah, we will in a bit. But this is more important!,” Su shouted back from the top of the staircase.

The girls made their way to the bathroom, where Su sat Lin down on the closed toilet seat. She pulled out a hairbrush and assorted hair elastics and then plopped herself down on the edge of the bathtub behind her sister.

“So, you and Tenzin?,” she asked suggestively as she brushed out Lin’s hair.

Lin began to blush. “What about me and Tenzin?”

“Is this a date?”

Lin’s face lit up bright red. “Wh- what? No- no we’re just friends. We’re going to the dance as friends. Not a date. Why would I be going on a date with Tenzin?”

“Because you have a huge crush on him?,” Su said knowingly, as if this should have been obvious.

“No! No I don’t! Who told you that anyways?”

Su rolled her eyes. “Nobody told me, silly! I figured it out myself. You make it pretty obvious, you know.”

“No I do not! I do not make it obvious because I do not have a crush on Tenzin!”

Su sighed. It appeared she was going to have to bring in the big guns.

“Hey Mom! Does Lin have a crush on Tenzin?,” she shouted down to Toph in the kitchen.

“Su! What are you doing?,” Lin asked her sister angrily, a warning tone in her voice.

Toph laughed. “Well duh! She’s had a crush on him since she was like, what? Five? Six?”

Lin’s face was growing redder by the minute. “Mom! Why would you say that? I. Do. Not. Have. A. Crush. On. Tenzin.”

“Sorry baby girl. Deny it all you want, but your heartbeat always goes crazy for that airhead. Don’t worry, he likes you back,” Toph called up to them from the kitchen.

“What?,” Lin shrieked, although she couldn’t deny that she didn’t entirely hate the idea. She more than just not hated it. She actually… well she could actually get used to the idea. Tenzin having a crush on her.

Su giggled. “Keep still, I’m trying to do your makeup. Unless you want me to poke you in the eye with this thing,” she joked, waving the mascara wand in front of her face.

Lin rolled her eyes. “I don’t think I would mind having my eyes poked out right about now. And maybe gag me with a spoon while you’re at it.”

Five minutes and lots of eye goop later, Lin had been transformed into a thing of beauty. That’s not to say that she wasn’t already beautiful as she was, but it wasn’t as if Lin put a ton of effort into her appearance on a daily basis. She told herself that it was because she had more important things to worry about, but in reality it was mostly because she always felt as if she couldn’t really pull it off.

“Here! All done! You look absolutely gorgeous, Tenzin is going to love it,” Su told her with pride.

Lin took a look at herself in the mirror. Her sister hadn’t been lying. Her dark hair was done up in a low bun at the base of her neck with a braided crown circling her head. A blue lotus blossom poked out from behind her ear to match the shade of the shadow on her eyes. Her lips were glossy, and her cheeks blushed a faint pink.

She looked fantastic.

“Wow, Su. I don’t even know what to say. Thank you.”

“My pleasure!,” she replied with a smile.

“I’m gonna go put on my dress. How about you go downstairs and help Mom figure out the camera?”

Su gasped audibly as Lin emerged from the top of the stairs several minutes later. Her beautiful blue qipao dress perfectly matched the flower tucked behind her ear, and it made her look and feel like a star.

“How do I look?,” she asked nervously.

“Wow, Lin. You look amazing!,” Su exclaimed.

Toph walked up to where her daughter was standing and cupped her face with her hands, tracing her features softly with the tips of her fingers. She had to reach up and pull her face down to her level, as Lin had undergone quite the growth spurt within the past few years and had shot up well above her chronically short mother.

“Gorgeous. You’re gorgeous.”

Toph began to tear up a little. “I can’t believe my baby girl is all grown up. Where does the time go? It feels like just yesterday I was holding you in my arms for the very first time.”

“Yeah baby girl, where does the time go?,” Su repeated in a light mocking tone, although there was no real malice behind it.

“You’re growing up too, little miss beauty parlour,” Lin reminded her sister with a laugh, but she was interrupted by the doorbell ringing. All of a sudden, the nerves she had been keeping at bay all came flooding back to her.

“He’s here! Okay, you guys cannot embarrass me.”

Toph threw up her hands defensively. “We wouldn’t dream of it.”

“Mom, that means you can’t try and interrogate him like he’s some criminal. And Su, if you mention anything about this being a date or how I have a crush on him, I’m going to have to kill you later,” she warned her family.

“Got it. Scout’s honour,” Toph swore.

“Yeah, yeah, I got it,” Su agreed reluctantly.

Lin took a deep breath and opened up the door.

“Wow, you look fantastic!,” Tenzin exclaimed, blushing.

Lin began to blush herself. Tenzin had gotten pretty dressed up. She was surprised to see him in a suit, normally he wouldn’t be caught dead in one unless his parents forced him to.

“You look pretty good yourself,” she complimented him.

Su waggled her eyebrows suggestively behind Tenzin’s back, and Lin shot her a warning look.

“So, Tenz. Bring my daughter home in one piece, will ya? We kind of like her around here.”

“Oh yeah, of course Aunt Toph!”

Toph raised one eyebrow at him.

“Oh- uhhh- I mean- uhhhh- yes. Yes ma’am. I will do that,” he stammered.

“Good man,” Toph validated him with a nod of her head, apparently unable to resist an opportunity to take a power trip.

“Let’s take pictures, and then you guys can go have your fun,” Su giggled.

Lin rolled her eyes at her sister, but obliged to take a few cheesy photos of her and Tenzin posing together.

“Alright, we better get going or we’re going to be late,” Tenzin warned.

“Right. Okay, I’ll see you in a few hours, bye!,” she said, waving goodbye to her mother and sister.

“Have fun, kiddo! Don’t spike any punch, at least not without me there to make fun of the aftermath!”

“Bye Lin! Bye Tenzin! Have fun on your date!,” Su called out as the door slammed shut.

Lin shot a look at her sister, but it was too late. Tenzin had heard.

“D- date? Is this a date?”

Lin’s face burned bright red. “I mean- n- no. Unless you want it to be?”

Tenzin went quiet for a moment, as if he were thinking it over.

“Yes, yes I do. I do want this to be a date. But I mean, only if you want it to be.”

“I think I do.”

Tenzin’s entire face lit up, and Lin felt herself begin to grin as well. Perhaps school dances weren’t so terrible after all.

#atla #lok #avatar the last airbender #the legend of korra #lin beifong #toph beifong #suyin beifong #tenzin #linzin #nora writes #writing

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passable-talent · 4 years

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part 4 was so so good!!!!! can you make a part 5? i’m in love with your writing and that series!!! you’re feeding my need for zuko content and i love u for that.

it literally took exactly 19 minutes to get a request for part 5

THANK U THO SHDBCNDGS IM HAPPY YOURE ENJOYING WHAT I DO

been excited to get back to this one, y’all aren’t ready 😏

OKAY I SAID YALL WERENT READY BEFORE I EVEN WROTE IT BUT NOW IVE WRITTEN IT AND LET ME FUCKING REITERATE: YALL ARE NOT F U C K I N G R E A D Y

For chapter five, and my five hundred follower special, we will go back to spring of the year 100 AG, right before Azula’s coup succeeded in their destruction of Ba Sing Se . . .

“So what’s happening?” You asked Mushi as the two of you hurried through the streets of the upper ring.

“Come close,” Mushi answered, and your footsteps brought you beside him.

“My nephew and I are more than refugees,” he began, “my name is Iroh, and I am the brother of the Fire Lord. My nephew, Zuko, is the banished prince of the Fire Nation. I’m sorry we lied to you, but we needed to, in order to stay in Ba Sing Se where we were safe from our family.” Your head reeled, but you kept beside him, because still you trusted this man. You were trained to react and to think, thanks to the Dai Li, so you analyzed his words.

“Were?” you questioned, wondering why he seemed to suggest that he was no longer safe.

“My niece, Princess Azula, has infiltrated the city. She tried to capture me- she did capture Zuko.” Your eyes widened, and your speed increased beside Iroh. “I need your help to retrieve him, and the Avatar’s. That’s where we’re headed.” You looked up at the house you were approaching, half caved in from some sort of destruction. What had happened here?

“The Avatar?” you asked, and Iroh nodded, pausing in front of the door to knock politely. You waited beside him, but held your forehead- you were so shocked about everything you were finding out.

Zuko- not Lee. The banished prince of the Fire Nation. You hadn’t even known that the prince of the Fire Nation had been banished! What else didn’t you know about the other nations of the world beyond the walls of Ba Sing Se?

Why had this information been kept from you? You were training to be in the Dai Li, one of the best and most important police forces of the Earth Kingdom, shouldn’t this information be privy to you? Why wasn’t it?

You were pulled from your thoughts as a girl opened the door, and regarded Iroh with friendliness.

“I need your help,” he began, and you watched the reactions of the other two at the door. They seemed frightened by Iroh- what kind of history had they that you weren’t aware of?

Why were you kept in the dark about everything?

“You guys know each other?” demanded the boy you had to assume was the avatar, who didn’t seem much concerned with your presence. Maybe it was the earth kingdom robes?

“I met him in the woods once, and knocked him down,” answered the girl, and with her gaze that didn’t seem focused on the avatar you wondered if maybe she was blind. She, however, seemed like a strong earthbender. It was one of the things you were trained to pick up on in the Dai Li, and relied entirely on how a person carried herself. “Then he gave me tea and some very good advice.”

“May we come in?” Iroh asked sheepishly, and you wondered why there wasn’t more urgency to his tone.

“Who’s your friend?” the clearly water tribe boy demanded, and you lifted your chin, being acknowledged.

“I’m Y/N, a soon-to-be member of the Dai Li,” you answered, “You can trust me.”

“The Dai Li?” Avatar Aang responded, more shock in his face than before.

“That makes us even less likely to trust you!!” the water tribe boy shouted, and your eyebrows knitted together.

“The Dai Li are the protectors of the city!” you said, though you felt doubt gnaw at your spine- they had kept so much from you, their own cadet.

Iroh turned his eyes to you, and something in his gaze told you to hush up.

“Princess Azula is here, in Ba Sing Se,” Iroh told them, his tone stern and serious.

“She must have Katara!” Aang said, and you looked to Iroh. You didn’t know these people- but that Azula would capture both Zuko and a friend of the avatar meant that she was one of two things: insanely brave or insanely stupid.

“She has captured my nephew, as well,” Iroh said.

“Then we’ll work together to fight Azula, and save Katara and Zuko,” the avatar said, and you felt a little lightness crawl into your heart. You’d be able to help save Zuko, and a friend of the avatar? You were about to go on a crazy adventure.

“Whoa there,” said the water tribe boy, walking back into the conversation, “you lost me at ‘Zuko.’ “

“I know how you must feel about my nephew,” Iroh began, and your expression softened. There was definitely history here, and you’d be interested to learn it. “But believe me when I tell you, there is good inside him.” You brought your eyes to the avatar’s, and nodded, trying to fathom something to say that they’d believe. They didn’t know you, didn’t know what you stood for, and it seemed that you didn’t know much of that yourself.

“I’ve known Zuko for a while,” you said, “and he’s never been anything other than a scared and polite refugee.”

“Good inside him isn’t enough!” The water tribe boy insisted, “Why don’t you come back when it’s outside him too, okay?” Your chest deflated further, and you had to wonder: what had Zuko done, what had Zuko been, that they had this strong of a hatred for him?

Did you want to know?

“Katara’s in trouble,” Aang said to his friend, “All of Ba Sing Se’s in trouble. Working together is our best chance.”

On the way toward the catacombs of the city underneath the palace, you learned Sokka and Toph’s names, as well as the true treachery of the Dai Lee. You learned about the war with the Fire Nation, and had a smile on your face as you took in how lucky you were that the two firebenders whom you had come to love were the only two on the right side of this war.

“Well, whaddaya know, there is an ancient city down there,” Toph said, her hand pressed to the stone courtyard, “but it’s deep.” She opened up a large hole in the stone, heading downward.

“How can you tell?” You asked, and she cracked her knuckles in your direction.

“Right, you’re classically trained,” she mocked with a rude laugh, which made you smile. “I can sense seismic activity through stone. Maybe I’ll teach you, when this is over.” You nodded, intrigued, before Sokka grabbed your attention.

“We should split up. Aang, you go with Iroh and Y/N to look for Katara and the angry jerk,” he said. “No offense,” he added in Iroh’s direction, and once again you found yourself confused on the nature of their shared past when Iroh said “none taken.”

“And I’ll go with Toph to warn the Earth King about Azula’s Coup.”

Aang, Iroh, and you began heading down into the tunnel, Iroh holding up fire for light while you and Aang took turns lengthening the tunnel downwards.

“So, Toph thinks you give pretty good advice,” Aang said, seeming to try to make conversation. “And great tea.” A smile came to your face- Iroh’s tea was the reason that you were, apparently, romantically involved with the prince of the Fire Nation.

Imagine that.

“The key to both is proper aging,” Iroh said, and you laughed under your breath. “What’s on your mind?” Aang paused, and took his turn lengthening the tunnel.

“Well, I met with this guru who was supposed to help me master the avatar state and control this great power.” You turned to look at the avatar as you walked, amazed at both his story and his mere stature. You never thought that you’d get to meet the avatar.

“But to do it, I had to let go of someone I love, and I just couldn’t.” You reached the end of the tunnel, and took stance beside Iroh to take your turn lengthening it. However, Iroh began speaking, and you figured it rude to interrupt him.

“Perfection and power are overrated. I think you are very wise to choose happiness, and love.” With a smile on your face you earthbent and opened up the tunnel further, deciding then and there that you would stick with Iroh. Surely you weren’t to stay and train with the Dai Li, and as it seemed he was teaming up with the avatar, maybe you’d get to help fight in the war!

“But what happens if we can’t save everyone and beat Azula?” You didn’t answer, and let Iroh, both because you didn’t know the answer, and because you felt that the scope of your knowledge and importance wasn’t what it needed to be to even participate in this conversation.

“Without the avatar state, what if I’m not powerful enough?”

“I don’t know the answer,” Iroh said, making you gaze to the side at him. “Sometimes life is like this dark tunnel. You can’t always see the light at the end of the tunnel, but if you just keep moving...” Iroh paused as Aang took his turn to break through the stone in front of you, revealing light and a wide open new space, “...you will come to a better place.” You paused, standing on the edge of a cliff, to look out over the ancient city. There was a fountain in front of you, making the air smell fresh even though you were so far below ground. It was amazing, and part of you wished you could have stayed. However, you knew that there was much more pressing matters, and so you quickly moved along with Iroh and Aang into another chamber to hopefully find the prisoners you were looking for.

Aang burst through another wall of stone, and quickly disappeared through the hole as you and Iroh followed.

“Aang!” A girl shouted before embracing him, and you barely put it together that this must be ‘Katara’ before your feet had carried you to Zuko, and hugged him tightly. You yielded this, however, to Iroh, who hugged him with just as much relief as you felt in your heart.

“Uncle, I don’t understand,” Zuko said, a malice you didn’t recognize glinting in his eyes. “What are you doing with the avatar?”

“Saving you, that’s what,” Aang said, and Zuko began to lunge before Iroh caught his chest. You flinched- this wasn’t the boy you knew at all.

“Zuko, it’s time we talked,” Iroh told him, then looking at Aang and Katara. “Go help your other friends. We’ll catch up with you.” Aang and Katara turned away while you stood still, but Iroh turned to you. “You as well. It’ll be alright.” You nodded, and raced down the tunnel after Katara.

“We’ve gotta find Sokka and Toph!” Katara shouted, but you couldn’t answer her before you heard roaring behind you. You didn’t recognize the sound, but when you turned and saw blue fire, nothing could’ve prepared you.

This wasn’t in your training. It wasn’t in your index of attacks to react to. You had no idea what to do- if it wasn’t for Aang and the wall that he raised, you would’ve surely been charred on the spot.

You didn’t recognize the girl that had shot it, but you felt that it was safe to assume it must’ve been Azula.

Katara raced around the wall and picked up water, revealing herself as a powerful water bender before your eyes. The fight between her and Azula created a cloud of steam, and you staggered back even further from Aang’s wall, your chest rising and falling quickly.

You were panicking.

All of that training, everything that your instructors had ever done to harden your will and sharpen your reaction time, it stood nothing against this. This, with the sister of the guy you were crushing on shooting blue fire at the avatar, and you weren’t even sure who’s side you should be on.

That was stupid, of course you knew you should be on the avatar’s side. But something in your head whispered doubts- she was Zuko’s sister. She was the leader of the Dai Li, who you belonged to.

Azula appeared from the steam and shot two fireballs at Aang and Katara, who were forty or so feet in front of you. You just watched, dumbfounded, and realized quickly that she wasn’t aiming at you. She wasn’t targeting you at all.

She landed on a column, which Aang rocked beneath her, and she fell down to stand between Aang and Katara, her back to you. She kept her hands pointed at both of them, but suddenly, her attention turned toward you.

“You’re Y/N, right?” She asked, and your eyes widened. “I remember you. You’re a very impressive cadet, you could be an asset to me. I control the Dai Li, now, and so your allegiance is to me.”

Just for a moment, Katara’s gaze turned to you, wondering if there was any truth to that statement.

Was there?

A fireball impacted the ground between Aang and Azula and you staggered backward, looking up for the source of the flame.

Zuko. Relief filled your chest- at least you knew for sure you were on his side.

As though time was frozen, you watched as he turned his ready stance from aiming at Aang, to aiming at Azula, and your tension melted away. You could fight beside Zuko and the avatar and Katara, and surely between the four of you the princess would be defeated.

Then, from your position fifty feet behind Aang, you saw Zuko’s eyes land on the avatar.

The calmness drifted away, and all you saw was rage.

Fire blasted toward Aang, and he couldn’t avoid the plume, his air bending keeping him from harm but also sending him back beside you. Zuko’s fire kept coming, and you threw up a wall in front of you, turning to the side with your body made into a smaller target out of pure fear.

Zuko had turned on Aang. He’d shot fire at Aang- he’d shot fire at you.

Aang leapt away to continue his battle, which left you behind your wall of stone, paralyzed with fear and indecision and betrayal and anger and sadness.

Didn’t you know Zuko at all? That look in his eye... you had never seen that before. There was pure rage inside him, and you couldn’t understand it, you couldn’t comprehend how this was the boy you’d cared for.

You heard fire roaring throughout the cave, and the whooshing of the wind that Aang sent back. Rocks clattered to the floor and water shot around the cavern, and it was all too much, the sounds of martial arts and groaning and impacts, you couldn’t get a clear thought through your mind.

“I thought you had changed!” Katara’s yell echoed off the rocks, and just for a moment your hands lifted from your temple. Was she talking to Zuko?

“I have changed,” he answered, and it was in the silence that followed that you made up your mind, finally.

Zuko was on the wrong side of this war. Not as you’d thought.

You heard a yelp from Katara and brought up a hunk of earth underneath you, launching you across the cave and into a defensive position in front of her with a battle cry. Both Azula and Zuko seemed surprised by this decision, but before any of you could react, the rumbling of Aang’s reemergence interrupted the fight. They turned their attention to him, which gave you the moment to send a hunk of stone into both of their abdomens, knocking them backward. However, your eyes turned up with the sound of Dai Li stone chains, and you couldn’t pull your limbs in tight enough to avoid their sudden grip on you.

“No,” you snarled as Katara woke, and brought a ring of water around the both of you. You stood back to back with her, small finger movements slowly dissembling the stone chains around your wrists so you could help her in the fight.

But there were too many agents- you knew you couldn’t take them all on. Not even with a master waterbender at your back.

A gust of wind surprised you, and you broke free in time to see Aang rise from shattered crystal inside a beam of light. It was amazing- and you were stunned into awe.

Lightning struck the avatar.

Katara nearly drowned you in the wave she created, but you pulled up a slab of stone just in time to surf on it behind her, just like you had on summer days in Lake Laogai. Mowing down Dai Li agents, and the royal siblings, the two of you raced toward the falling avatar, before he was caught by Katara. Soaked, exhausted, and tears blurring your vision, you stood between her and the siblings, who walked toward her, as though they were predators, and she an easy meal.

Though you knew you should be watching them both, your eyes were on Zuko. Maybe, there was some of Lee left in him, and seeing you would bring it back. But his eyes were firmly on the dead-or-dying avatar, hungry, predatory, and your heart shattered.

Fire cut off their path and you looked up to see Iroh, who leapt down in front of even you.

“You’ve got to get out of here!” He shouted, looking back at you. “I’ll hold them off for as long as I can!” Katara stood and you joined her on Aang’s other side, carrying the avatar toward a waterfall, the sound of fire roaring behind you.

It was terrifying.

“Hold onto him!” Katara shouted, her grip tight on the avatar as she used her other hand to bend an upward spiral around the three of you.

You watched Iroh face Zuko until the rock covered your vision, and you closed your eyes.

Back on Appa, you kneeled behind Sokka, one eye keeping a watch on Katara as she attempted to heal Aang. But mostly, you gripped Appa’s fur, and cried.

The Dai Li had lied to you. Zuko and Iroh had lied to you. The Dia Li turned on you. Zuko turned on you. Zuko turned on Iroh, Azula killed the avatar. Everything was so messed up, beyond proportion, skewed beyond belief. The boy you thought you might’ve loved...

He’d never existed in the first place.

And though the avatar lived, you laid your forehead to the bison’s back, and sobbed.

tag list for this series- @furblrwurblr @eridanuswave

oh yeah request for pt 6 /// already been requested y’all are fine

edit: | part 6 | part 7 | part 8 |

-🦌 Roe

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stitch1830 · 3 years

Text

@twinkle-toph I heard you wanted a bit of angst so here's what I found in my stockpile lol.

I wrote this with the idea in mind to eventually make romantic Tokka, but for now it's just platonic (also hopefully I have more ideas to get to romantic Tokka. Time will tell lmao).

......

She hadn’t left the bed since the services concluded, and they were only informed of the state of their friend through nannies that Poppy sent over. Apparently, Lin hadn’t stopped crying and Toph blocked out the world, unwilling to engage with anyone, including her daughter.

It hurt to hear this, but it wasn’t entirely surprising, either. After all, none of them knew how they themselves would have reacted to such a jarring change in their life.

Sokka paced her living room floor while the group decided to talk with Toph alone, one by one. He waited with everyone else while Katara attempted to coax Toph out of the bedroom. Aang sat in a lone chair, bouncing his leg incessantly and twiddling his thumbs. It was a rather odd sight to see Aang so jittery, but Sokka assumed it was because he wasn’t sure what to say.

Zuko sat on the couch upright and still, his eyes closed. Sokka could feel the Fire Lord trying to summon a reality—any reality—that was an ounce better than this one.

Suki sulked on the couch as well, resting an elbow on the arm and her head in her hand. Tears slowly made their way down his friend’s cheeks.

The turning of a doorknob had everyone jumping in their seats and staring at the doorway. Only Katara emerged, and she looked worse than when she entered the room.

It seemed that his sister’s attempts at comforting and helping Toph were futile.

And it went on like this with every member of the group. One of them would enter, prepared and determined to help Toph with their specific strategy, and they would always leave the room defeated. Even stranger, no one talked about what was said in the room.

One by one the group came and went into Toph’s room, until Sokka was the only one left. He took a deep breath, mentally preparing his intervention speech and determined to help his best friend through the hardest time of her life.

But the second he opened the door, his resolve cracked, and he wasn’t so sure he could help.

……

She lay down on the bed, clutching the side of the covers Kanto used. She felt and heard nothing in the bed they shared—used to share. All she did was replay the scene of the last time they woke up together. Over and over and over, hoping her will to change the scene would eventually become a reality…

His mocking gasp and his playful baby voice woke her. “What’s this? Mama’s almost up! Should we say hi? Huh? Say hi to Mama?”

Toph heard Lin giggle in agreement, and spirits, was it hard to keep still and not smile. But she did, and pretty soon Kanto had Lin hovering over Toph’s face close enough for her little arms to touch.

Unfortunately, Lin hadn’t quite yet grasped the concept of the gentle touch, for she slapped her mother square on the cheek. Toph groaned at the sharp disturbance while Lin and Kanto continued to laugh.

“Linny says good morning,” Kanto said.

“You need to teach her how to say it without slapping,” she complained lightly, turning in the bed so she was on her back.

“Why me?”

“Because she likes you more.”

“You have a point.”

Toph scoffed at Kanto and lightly slapped his forearm. “Jerk! You’re not supposed to agree with me.”

“Hey! You know I was lying, what’s the big deal?” he asked playfully. Lin began to wiggle in his arms, and he gently placed her on Toph’s chest and in her arms. “Lin is very excited for her ladies day.”

“Why do you keep calling it that? The nanny is off today, that’s it.”

“Yes, and you get to spend the entire day with this little badgermole. I’m a little jealous.”

“Don’t be,” she reassured him. “All we’ll be doing is sitting together in silence. If anything, I’m jealous of you.” Toph turned to point a smirk in Kanto’s direction, and he grew quiet. An unusual deviance from the typical morning banter, and she wondered why.

She didn’t have to wait long to figure out what, however.

“Hey, Toph,” he began.

“Hey, Hotshot.”

“Have you ever thought about our future?” he asked.

“Like?”

“Like, what do you think our future holds, what it will be like…” his voice sounded as if he had more to say, but Kanto left the sentence lingering in the air, waiting to be answered.

Toph assumed it was an opening for more banter, so she responded with, “Our future holds coffee and baby spit up.” She kicked her feet over onto the floor and made her way to the kitchen with Lin in her arms, while Kanto quietly chuckled and followed slowly behind.

He asked about their future. Their future. Together. And it all hit her when she stood over his body at the morgue, clutching to the thin, metal ring she found in his pocket what he was asking earlier in the day.

Marriage. He was going to ask her to marry him.

And so she replayed that morning in her head over and over and over, fixing the memory to make it what it was supposed to be…

“What are you asking, Kanto?” she asked, sitting upright in the bed with Lin still in her arms.

“I’m wondering if you’d… um…”

Toph smirked at his erratic heart rate. It wasn’t easy to detect in the soft bed, but his heart was beating out of his chest that Toph could practically hear it.

“Croco-cat got your tongue?” she teased, Lin giggled at her antics as well.

“Spirits,” Kanto groaned, rubbing his hands through his hair. “Why is this so difficult??”

“Just ask me, Hotshot,” she replied quietly.

“Huh?”

The earthbender sighed. Sometimes Hotshot was a little dense.

“I can ‘see’ the ring,” she confessed, then chuckled when Kanto sat up stiffly in the bed. “Just ask me already,” she repeated.

Her calm and steady voice must’ve tipped the man off that he had nothing to fear. Kanto chuckled and inched his way closer to Toph and Lin. He gently placed his forehead on Toph’s and held her free hand. “Toph Beifong, will you marry me?”

A smile grew across Toph’s face. She never thought she’d be the type to settle down and get married, but with Kanto… it felt perfect. Right.

So there was no hesitation in her answer. “I’ve got no plans today.”

“Wait, you wanna get married right now?”

“Why not?” she asked. “Work will be there tomorrow, and Lin and I have the day to ourselves. I think we can make room for Baba.”

He grinned into her cheek like he always did, then kissed her. “Sounds like we’ve got ourselves a date.”

Toph laughed. “That, we do.”

But no matter how many times Toph replayed the memory, it wouldn’t change. She didn’t stop him from going into work, she didn’t give him the opportunity to ask her, and she couldn’t even remember if she told him she loved him.

Now all she had were his lingering scent, the memory of his voice and his laugh, his clothes now rendered useless in her house, and the little bits of his personality she found in Lin.

It wasn’t enough.

She wanted her happy ending or whatever the fuck people called it. She wanted him. She wanted to hear of the future he thought for them, for the question that he meant to ask her for weeks, she wanted life with him.

And now that was impossible.

……

His entire speech seemed to fall on deaf ears, because Toph didn’t move. Sokka watched as her grip on the covers tightened and loosened every so often, as if a thought of Kanto appeared before her and the thought alone was too much to bear.

“Toph?” he called out after 5 minutes of talking to himself. “Can you hear me?”

No response.

He crouched down and reached across the bed to grab her hand. When his hand made contact, Toph immediately sprung to life and snapped at him as she sat up on the bed.

“Get off his side!” she hissed.

Sokka quickly took his hands off the covers. “Toph, I just—”

“No,” she interrupted.

“Toph,” he repeated, standing up. “You can’t lay here forever. You need to take care of yourself. Take care of Lin.”

“Didn’t know I was competing against you for ‘Mother of the year,’” Toph snapped. “Leave me the fuck alone, Sokka.” Toph stood up and turned away from the warrior, her hands crossed over her chest. He didn’t recall anyone else getting such a reaction from Toph, so he took this as a sign of progress.

“You’re lashing out because you’re upset.”

“Upset doesn’t even begin to describe what I’m feeling.”

“I’m sure it’s not,” he agreed. “But staying in here won’t bring him back. And he wouldn’t want—”

“Fuck that, Sokka!” she yelled, spinning around to face him once again. “Fuck what Kanto would’ve wanted! He’s dead! What he wants is impossible.”

“But he wouldn’t want you to waste your life away for him, Toph!” he argued.

Toph scoffed. “What would you know? None of you know what this feels like.”

“We’ve all experienced loss—”

“Oh? Have any of you lost the love of your life to some crazy murderer on the day they were planning to propose?!”

“Toph—”

The earthbender waved a hand at him. “I don’t want to hear it, Sokka.” Toph fell back onto the bed, all of her fight suddenly spent on those bitter and hurtful words. “Just leave me alone. All of you.”

Sokka didn’t move. He just wracked his brain for something, anything that would bring Toph some semblance of peace. She was so heartbroken, and he wanted to fix it for her. Because that was what they did for each other. He protected her, and she protected him.

But how could he protect Toph from a broken heart?

She was snow on a mountain. Stuck in place until just the right tremor sent her down the elevated earth and back in motion, back to some semblance of life.

And he knew what had to be done.

His entire friendship hung in the balance of his next move, but he had to risk it. Toph was worth it, even if she remained furious with him for the rest of her life.

Sokka walked over to Toph’s side where she lay, and he wrapped his arms around her, picking her up and leading her to the door. His small but mighty friend lashed out, throwing her arms and legs in every which way and screamed for him to let go, but Sokka didn’t.

Thankfully, Toph didn’t earthbend at him, but she slammed her fists into his arms in an attempt to break free. The warrior wouldn’t budge; his friend needed to leave the prison she made for herself.

They made their way out of the bedroom, eventually, and Toph Beifong was still furious at him. She pushed, shoved, and punched Sokka, hoping to escape his iron grip. But she couldn’t break free, and the fight she had within her was slowly withering away.

She didn’t want to stay in that room forever. But it was the thought of losing Kanto completely that kept her holed up. What if Toph forgot what he smelled like? What about his voice? His heartbeat was strong and soothing and helped her fall asleep each night, now it ceased to exist. Would she forget all that made Kanto Kanto?

The fear of the unknown ate away at Toph, and now that she was out of their bedroom, she couldn’t go back. Being in the room, especially now, caused her to succumb to thoughts of Kanto again, allowing them to consume her completely with no fight to stop it from happening. She crossed the doorway, taking the first painful steps of moving on... and she had to be dragged to the starting line.

In the back of her mind, she hated herself for pointing all her pain and anger and sadness on Sokka, her best friend. But he absorbed and shouldered every hurtful comment and shove she aimed at him, and years down the line, she would be grateful for his boldness. Still, in the moment all Toph could do was cry and beat at his chest until all the anger left her, and all that was left was the grief. Her fight slowly but surely withered away.

Kanto was gone, and now she had to spend the rest of her life filled with regret and pain and Toph Beifong wasn’t sure how she was going to get through it all.

But the arms of Sokka were strong and warm and soothing all at the same time, and Toph cried in the comfort of them. She sobbed and let the tears fall as she thought of what her life could have been, what it was supposed to be, and how sad her reality would soon become.

#kantoph #toph #toph beifong #kanto #atla #lok #writing #platonic tokka #was this good enough angst? ;)

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infinitebread · 3 years

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Freefall

Pairing: Toph/Aang

Rating: T+

Description: For a brief moment they were free falling together, completely at gravity’s mercy. And Aang was the only thing Toph could see in this world.

*******

Toph really didn’t care what Aang was thinking.

She didn’t.

In fact, she wasn’t the least bit bothered when they flew back to their make shift camp in complete, absolute, mind numbing silence. A gentle woosh, the tell-tale sign of a typical earth kingdom summer night, filling up the space where laughter and chatter should have been.

She wasn’t the tiniest bit perturbed when the first thing the young airbender did when they landed was wordlessly slide off his seat atop Appa's head and immediately busy himself with setting up the camp without so much as a peep sent in her general direction.

And she definitely didn’t have any feelings of indignation when he finally approached her, extending a friendly arm into her space, only to realize, as their excitable lemur companion hopped off her shoulder and onto Aang's waiting forearm with a series of enthusiastic chirps and gurgles, that it was meant to be a perch for Momo.

It took everything within her to stay calm and not hault his movements by earthbending him halfway into the ground with a furious, “What is your problem?”, right then and there…

But she didn’t care. Really.

Though Toph would never admit it out loud she was aware of the fact that, as a child, she wasn’t always the best at controlling her temper or dealing with conflict. But she wasn’t a little kid anymore. At nineteen, Toph had sat through a lifetime of diplomatic meetings (much to her chagrin), negotiated with countless criminals during hostage situations (even though she would have greatly preferred pounding them into the ground), and even survived her most challenging discussion to date: reconciling with her parents.

Which is precisely why when Twinkletoes decided to give her the silent treatment without reason or preamble she reacted as any mature, adult person would: she bended the biggest freaking earth tent she could muster and sat in it, seething, for over half an hour.

You know, as one does.

Digging her heels into the soft, loamy familiarity of the ground beneath her, she reached out using her seismic sense, pinpointing her cantankerous other half’s barely-there-feather-light vibrations. He was preparing something on a fire, his tall lanky form moving with uncharacteristically heavier steps, as if he was being weighed down by thoughts too grave to utter out loud. The earth bending master felt her stomach sink. Worry began to colour her irritation. She thought back on the day’s events in an effort to make sense of her companion’s sudden change in demeanor.

*******

He had been in high spirits earlier that morning when they had received a report of suspicious activity occurring around a small earth kingdom town. It was suspected that a nearby factory was being used as a hideout by a ragtag team of dangerously violent robbers and miscreants who had been terrorizing the townsfolk for months. Lucky for them, the Avatar and Sifu Toph Beifong were on the case. And unluckily for the robbers, the factory in question just so happened to be etched onto the side of a cliff.

The mountain was colossal, forebodingly so, the terrain peppered with jagged rocks and heights that promised any soul cursed with a slippery grip a nightmarish demise. This would have no doubt intimidated even the most experienced climber. But Toph and Aang merely smirked at the challenge. The robbers couldn’t have picked an area more suited to the duo’s talents if they tried.

“It’s almost like they’re begging us to take them down.” Aang grinned. With one simple movement he drew out his staff and then released the wings of the glider in another, ready to execute a plan they had concocted seemingly through shared thoughts alone.

“It would be rude of us not to, to be honest.” Toph agreed. Cracking her knuckles in anticipation. Confidence exuding from every pore.

They were almost always in sync. Their hearts and minds operating on a wavelength made just for the two of them.

“We should split up. I’Il take the skies. They probably won’t be expecting an aerial attack. That’s when you--"

“I'll take advantage of the distraction you’ll have created and metal bend as many of those goons into the walls as I can. Got it.”

He smiled fondly. Enamored by her cockiness. The affection he directed at her was almost audible.

“Anything to add?”

“Yeah, actually. How about this time I fly in through the roof? Just to shake things up a little.”

The sound of his laughter reverberated through her like a gentle shockwave and the subsequent quick kiss he placed on her forehead filled her stomach with butterfly-moths.

“You’re ridiculous.”

“But you’re considering it.” She teased.

“Not gonna respond to that.” He had already started running, gaining the momentum needed to take off before shouting, “Be safe.”

“Do damage.” She called back.

She stretched out her senses, reaching downwards, deep into the ground beneath her, calling upon the stubborn element that was hers to enjoin. A large pile of rocks catapolted her into the air briefly, before another rose to catch her, and then another and another until she reached her destination.

The factory was quiet. And yet it wasn’t. The whirring, ticking, pounding and clanging of metallic machinery was unmistakable. If there was one sound Toph knew very well, it was the sound of metal: obnoxiously high-pitched and unapologetically sonorous, as if to mock the very nature of the soundless earth from which it was born, with its incessant clickity-clacking.

The factory had once been used to manufacture weapons for fire nation soldiers in the former Earth Kingdom colonies, but almost 8 years after the war had ended, it was practically abandoned. Save of course for the criminals said to be using it as a hide out. But that was just the thing. There was plenty of sound coming from the machines but Toph couldn’t detect a single human heart beat from within the building.

Did they receive the wrong intel?

Then it hit her.

She heard the explosion before she felt it.

A trap.

The words had barely registered in her mind before she realized she was airborne. She was airborne and her ears were ringing. She was airborne and there were little chunks of debris falling all around her. She was airborne and the wind had been knocked right out of her. No she wasn’t airborne.

She was falling.

Her entire world was a conglomeration of shapes, vibrations and sounds but without her beloved earth beneath her her world was empty and quiet and dark. And terrifying.

She had no idea how far off the ground she was, too disoriented to even make sense of which way was up or down. A distant blast of heat radiated towards her. She felt it on her face. And suddenly this all felt familiar. She had been in this situation before. Years ago, dangling precariously over the edge of a war blimp. A comet raging through the sky as she held onto Sokka’s fingertips for dear life. The feelings of suffocating hopelessness and indescribable fear forcing her to shed silent tears.

Toph was certain she was gonna die.

Both then and now.

Warm arms suddenly enveloped her. The quiet nothingness around Toph was replaced by the frantic yet comforting thump-thump of a familiar heart beat. He held her to him and probably said something she didn’t hear with the roaring of the wind and violent crunch of debris crashing down around them. For a brief moment they were free falling together, completely at gravity’s mercy. And Aang was the only thing Toph could see in this world.

*******

She wasn’t quite sure what exactly happened next after that. Next thing she knew they were back on solid ground, the inky black void dissipated the moment her feet touched the earth and she was almost overwhelmed by the return of all her senses. She felt like she could breathe again. The shock of what had just transpired soon left her system, and she had been back to herself again, ready to regroup and kick ass. Those robbers had just ticked off the World’s Greatest Earth Bender and, as soon as new intel surfaced, there would be a reckoning.

Aang on the other hand, after doing a quick inspection of her for any serious injuries had fallen into an almost meditative silence. Which concerned her at first but it went on for so long, it began to irritate her.

Correction. Irritated. She no longer cared.

Nope. Not at all.

She cared so little in fact that when Aang rapped lightly on the front of her earth tent she absolutely did not jump to her feet entirely too quickly, and she definitely did not bend the makeshift stone door down before he had even begun to knock a second time.

Okay. Maybe she cared a little.

He held something out in the hand that hadn’t been knocking. She recognized the aroma immediately. He had made congee. With mushrooms. Her favorite.

A peace offering?

“A bribe.” He stated sheepishly. As if he could read her mind. “Come over by the fire, I wanna try to heal your wounds.”

She’d be lying if she said she wasn’t touched by the thoughtful gesture. However, she wasn’t about to let him off the hook that easily though.

“So you decided to finally break your random vow of silence? S'that it?” she asked once they were settled by the fire.

She crossed her arms in an effort to look unimpressed only to immediately uncross them and wince in pain when her fingers brushed against a bruise on her forearm. Her arms were littered with them, cuts too. But those were the extents of her injuries. She had been very fortunate.

“What do you mean?” He responded distractedly, the sound of water splashing as he bended it onto his palms to heal her. He had learned from Katara so she knew he was competent at healing but only with minor surface level injuries.

“You’re kidding right? You’ve been ignoring me all day.”

“I have?”

She contorted her face in a way that she hoped conveyed both utter annoyance and the non-verbal equivalent of ‘duh'.

“Guess I just had a lot on my mind. I’m really sorry.”

“Uh huh.” An unwelcome thought suddenly occurred to her. She exhaled loudly and braced herself for her next words. “Look Twinkles, I understand if you wanna blame me for messing up back at the factory.”

“Wait, what?” his voice was genuinely incredulous, but she needed to say these words, even just for her own sake.

“I should have realized it was a set up sooner.” She clenched a fist in her lap.

“Toph.”

“They set off all those machines to drown the bomb out but still I should’ve--"

“Toph.”

Aang silenced her with a gentle tug on her wrist and pulled her closer.

“I don’t blame you. At all. Not even a little bit.” He cups one of her newly healed hands in both of his. The gesture annihilates any ensuing words she had planned to say. “I almost lost you today, Toph. I kept thinking about what would have happened if I hadn’t caught you in time…and you looked really scared…I don’t even wanna think about what could’ve--,” he breathed in deeply, gathering his emotions, summoning courage, “I love you, Toph.”

Her whole body stiffened in shock. But he continued on, his heart beating with all the nervous energy of a trapped sparrow-keet, yet his voice remained calm and betrayed nothing.

“I know this is kinda sudden and unexpected,” he carried on while beginning to heal the abrasions along her arm with feather light touches, leaving a trail of goosebumps in his wake. “but I’m sure of how I feel now. I guess I have been for a while actually.”

She blinked at him, mouth slightly agape. He swallowed anxiously.

“You don’t have to say it back. I completely understand if this is too random. I just wanted you to know that I care about you, Toph.” He chuckled in spite of himself, “A lot.”

He had moved his hands to heal the cut that ran along her face, just below her eye, swiping it away with the stroke of his thumb across her cheek bone. Before he could move his hand away, Toph held it in place with her own. A move that surprised both of them.

“I love you too, Aang.” She said honestly. She had never ever been one for mushy declarations but…he made it so easy. She had long suspected it and the sincerity in both their heartbeats merely confirmed it.

“Really?” Their faces were close together now, foreheads almost touching. The proximity thrilled her.

She answered him by closing the gap between them, crashing their lips together. He immediately responded grabbing the back of her neck and deepening the kiss, causing her to lose all coherent thought. Her arms wrapped around his neck instictively and for the second time that day, it felt as if the whole world had fallen away and there was only him. Neither of them noticed the abandoned bowl of congee tip over and spill into the soil. All Toph was aware of in those moments were needy hands and a series of heady kisses on her cheeks, her nose, along her jaw, on her neck and her eyelids, until he claimed her lips once more.

She felt like she was falling again.

They finally broke apart, panting, eyes closed, hearts racing, foreheads touching.

Before her senses returned to her in full, Toph found herself wanting to tell him more. She wanted to tell him he meant so much to her too. She wouldn’t know what to do without him either.

And that she thinks she’s not afraid of falling anymore because she knows he’ll catch her…

But mushy declarations still weren’t her forte. She would say all of this to him. One day.

Today, she gave him one more quick, lingering kiss, smirked and told him,

“The congee’s getting cold.”

#taang #i was supposed to work on my pieces for taangst week but i wanted to write a practice fic first and i got a little carried away #so this happened oops #not sure if this is fluffy or angsty or both or neither lol #my writing #taang fanfic #also sorry this is so long i'm on mobile and it wont let me insert a cut szdvvklvm

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angularbean · 4 years

Text

Snuggles Not Struggles - Zuko x Reader

This is my first Zuko x Reader, I’m sorry if its bad! This gif isn’t mine but please enjoy! I got a bit carried away! Please request!

Word Count: 2489

---

You stared out at the sky where fluffy clouds were scattered within it, your (h/c) hair whipping around your face. Here you sat, with your knees tucked underneath your chin, on your third day of nonstop travel with the rest of the Gaang. The cool wind felt nice against your hot skin, but sitting on Appa for three days straight was starting to get to you. Everything started to get irritable. Katara and Sokka bickered for what it seemed like the millionth time that day for whatever reason, something about food or something which would make sense because Sokka always seemed to be hungry.

“Will you two just shut up!” Toph screamed, looking, or at least trying to, towards the sound of the bickering siblings.

“Don’t tell us what to do!” Sokka retaliated as Katara ‘hmphed’ and nodded in agreement.

You let out a sigh and looked over to your friends. Sokka and Katara sat in one of the corners of Appa’s saddle, shoving each other as they still continued to bicker despite Toph’s protest. Top sat in the corner next to them, outwardly groaning as she threw herself on her back and covering her face with her hands. Your eyes traveled to the corner next to you, where a certain banished prince sat. He rolled his eyes at the scene in front of him and rested his chin on his hand, looking out towards the trees below them as Appa finally descended closer to the ground. His hair flowed in the wind as his pale skin glistened in the sunlight. He looked so, in short, beautiful.

It wasn’t a secret about how you felt about him. Everything about Zuko just made your heart flutter. From the first time you met him at Kyoshi island, to the time he tried to join the Gaang. You don’t know why he made your heart skip a beat. Maybe it was the way his black hair fluttered in the wind, or how his eyes shone like flecks of gold in the sunlight, or even how his voice always seemed to soothe you no matter how anxious you were. Okay, maybe you did know why you crushed on him but you would never admit it. You would never hear the end of it from Katara. She had caught you staring at him as he trained with Aang once, and she never let go. She would always give you knowing smirks or winks whenever you’re around Zuko.

As you admired how Zuko looked in the golden sunlight the sunset produced, he turned and his golden eyes met your (h/c) ones. You felt your whole face flush and quickly turned away. He caught you staring, how embarrassing. Desperately, you covered your face with your hands to cover faint blush dusting your (s/c) cheeks. Next to you, Zuko’s face was dusted with the same blush. Unbeknownst to you, he had been admiring you just a few minutes before.

“Look a village!” Aang pointed, gaining the attention of everyone. “We can stop there for the night!” He continued which elicited cheers from everyone as he landed Appa near the entrance of the tiny village.

Sokka was the first one off of Appa, planting kisses on the grass. Everyone took the time to stretch their limbs. After three consecutive days of being on Appa, it really took a toll on your limbs. You stretched until you heard a satisfying pop, causing you to sigh in content.

“Oh, ground! I never knew I’d miss you so much!” Sokka practically moaned, still kissing the grass.

“That’s how you get sick. Disgusting,” Katara stated as her face contorted in disgust which caused Sokka to glare at her. Sokka opened his mouth to deliver a snarky response but you quickly stopped it.

“Come on guys, no more fighting. Let’s find somewhere to stay,” You stated, trying to keep the peace. Zuko walked over to you and placed a hand on your shoulder closest to him.

“(Y/N)’s right. We should head in before the sunsets.” Zuko agreed, a trace of nervousness his voice. He quickly removed his hand and walked towards the village.

Sokka grinned at you and placed his hand on the same shoulder Zuko had.

“(Y/N)’s right. We should head in before the sunsets. Also, (Y/N), I’m in love with you but I’m too much of a baby to admit it. Let’s make out.” He mocked, deepening his voice as best he could, as he made kissing noises at you.

You quickly shoved Sokka off of you as your blush deepened from the small contact you had with Zuko, which caused Katara to giggle.

“Shut up.” You muttered as you headed towards the village with the rest of the Gaang in tow, who continued to tease you.

---

Everyone decided to do some quick supply shopping before you all turned in for the night. Since the food had run out everyone decided to get some nonperishable food first, considering no one wanted Sokka to whine about there not being food. Sokka lead the group through the market, with Toph next to him, Katara and Aang chatting behind those two, which left you with Zuko. As you walked, there would be the occasional brushing hands together but neither of you stopped nor acted upon it.

Sokka stopped to browse one of the stands, in turn, you decided to look around as well. Your eyes landed on a small stand run by a young woman, it was a little jewelry stand. You approached it as the lady made eye contact with you.

“Hello! Is there anything I can help you with? Is there something specific you’re looking for?” She asked.

“No thank you, I’m just browsing,” you answered as you offered her a smile.

“Let me know if you need anything!”

With that, she left you. Your eyes scanned through the jewelry; necklaces, bracelets, rings came in all sorts of assortments, sizes, and color. As you browsed, your eyes landed on a small necklace. The necklace itself was simple, the centerpiece was a small crystal held horizontally by small chains. Regardless of its simplicity, you loved it. You made a mental note to come back tomorrow morning as the sun began to finally set. You hoped it would be there tomorrow as you headed back to where your friends were.

Before the Gaang began their shopping trip, this wonderful elderly couple offered their shed to them. One thing they forgot to mention was the bed arrangement. As they entered the shed, they realized how spacious it was but the problem was that there was one four beds, each on a different wall of the shed. There was six of you. None of you thought to bring your sleeping bags with you and Appa was all the way back at the entrance so everyone fought for those four beds.

Toph already called one of the beds and no one really wanted to fight her for it. For someone that small, she could really pack a punch. Everyone else had to decided who got what. Of course the only way to do it was playing elemental rock, paper, scissors. In the end, Sokka came out as the victor and earned a bed to himself. That left you, Katara, Aang, and Zuko. It seemed the obvious arrangement would be you and Katara then Aang and Zuko. However, it seemed Katara had different plans. Her lips spread into a condescending grin as she pulled Aang to one of the other beds.

“Goodnight (Y/N)!” She sang as she dragged the poor air bender behind her, who had an obvious blush coating his face.

It was obvious what she was doing, and it frustrated you. How could she, you’d never forgive her!

You and Zuko looked at each other in disbelief.

“Uh. We don’t have to share a bed if you don’t want to. I-I can sleep on the floor.” Zuko offered as he refused to make eye contact with you, rubbing the back of his neck sheepishly. This time, you didn’t miss the pink tinge of his cheeks.

“No!” you responded a little to quickly causing a feeling of embarrassment to rush through your veins. “I mean, n-no I-I don’t mind. The floor wouldn’t be too comfortable anyway.” Zuko gave you a small smile in response.

You couldn’t believe how attractive this man was, especially in the light of the fire that you guys had started. He practically glowed. Maybe, you could forgive Katara, just this once. Zuko had already climbed into bed, facing the wall. Not wanting to seem weird for staring, you climbed in after, facing the fire that was a good couple of feet away from you. The bed was small to the point that your backs were touching which caused your heart to flutter. You tried to sleep for a good ten minutes but you couldn’t seem to. To be fair, you were sleeping next to your crush. Kind of a hard situation to just ignore. You tried shifting around a little bit by placing your leg over the side of the bed, but that proved to be very uncomfortable. There were’t very many positions you could sleep in since most of the space was compromised.

No matter how hard you tried, you couldn’t get comfortable. You tried shutting your eyes and forcing yourself to sleep but it never worked. Zuko didn’t seem to be able to sleep either, as he continuously shifted on his side of the bed. Eventually he just flipped over. His back was pressed against the wall as he faced you. That seemed to prove more comfortable for him as he stopped shifting. You could feel his warm breath on the back of your neck, causing you to tense up; creating goosebumps on the back of your neck. Your heart beat rang loudly in your ears and you silently hoped that he couldn’t hear it, but you doubt he couldn’t. Hell, you’re pretty sure Toph could hear it from the other side of the room.

You let out the breath you didn’t know you were holding and shifted for the millionth time. Your body was close enough to the edge of the bed to the point you thought you were going to fall off, maybe you should just sleep on the floor. Maybe then you’d stop your heart from racing.

Suddenly, she felt arms wrap around her waist that pulled her back slightly.

“Is this okay?” A sleepy Zuko whispered in her ear. In that moment you were sure your ovaries exploded. And you thought his voice was attractive as it was, his sleep voice was even better.

“Y-Yeah,” you chocked out after trying to get a coherent sentence out. You silently cursed at yourself for stuttering and tried to even out your breathing.

You could still feel his even breath on your skin, so he had to be asleep. Everything felt unreal. Here you were, being spooned by the most attractive person you’ve ever met. There was no was you were going to be able to sleep.

About half an hour passed and you still had no success in sleeping. You decided to shift your position one last time. You sat up a little, pushing up the thin blanket covering you, and pushed your self back into Zuko’s chest. While trying not to wake him up, you tried to mold yourself against him as you push your backside against him still trying to get comfortable. A soft grunt escaped Zuko’s lips as his hands gripped your waist, holding you in place.

“Are you trying to turn me on?” Zuko grunted in your ear. “Stay still.”

Blood immediately rushed to your face as you struggled to formulate words.

“I-I’m so-so s-sorry.” In which Zuko on hummed in response. Where did this come from, last time you checked this boy was awkward as hell. Yet here he was, spooning you while he rested his head on the crook of your neck. His surprisingly soft hair tickling you. Your heart was beating out of your chest and your mind was racing. You couldn’t believe this was happening and how nonchalant he was about it!

Your body seemed to give you mercy as you finally were able to fall asleep.

---

Sunlight immediately impeded your vision, causing you to squint your eyes. Your eyes were met with Zuko, sleeping peacefully his hair covering his face. Man, you could get used to this. His eyes fluttered open, gold ones meeting (e/c) ones. You couldn’t quite name the look in his eyes, maybe the best way to describe it was adoration. Zuko smiled softly as he raised one of his hands from the small of your back to brush a strand of hair out of your face. He opened his mouth to say something but he was instead interrupted by squealing.

Startled, you pushed yourself away from Zuko, causing you to fall of the bed. You groaned in pain as you rubbed your back. Zuko immediately sat up and looked down at you.

“Are you okay?!”

---

As you headed back to Appa, you never heard the end of it. Katara talked off your ear, asking you a bunch of questions which you didn’t answer. Toph just teased you about the whole thing. You were sure the boys were doing the same exact thing to Zuko a few feet behind you. Ignoring everyone else, Zuko caught up to you gaining your attention.

“Hey so uh, I saw you looking at this yesterday and I thought it would look really pretty on you. Not that I was staring at you or anything I just happened to notice...” Zuko rambled. He gave you a cute little box that was topped off with a bow. You raised an eyebrow and opened it. You then realized that it was the necklace you were looking at. Grinning you threw yourself onto Zuko, pecking him on the lips; successfully shutting him up.

“Zuko, I love it! You didn’t have to!” You smiled at him. “Can you put it on me?” You asked, handing him the necklace. He nodded and motioned you to turn around, which you did. His fingertips brushed your shoulders and the back of your neck as he clipped on the necklace, causing your skin to tingle. Once he was done you turned and faced him, the necklace resting in between your collarbones.

“Beautiful.” Zuko stated as he wrapped his arms around you, pushing you flush against his chest. Both of you leaned in until there was little to no space left in between you.

“Finally! I thought we were going to have to force them to kiss!”

“Sokka! Shut up! You’re ruining the moment!” Katara scolded, causing the two to start bickering.

Rolling your eyes, you closed the space, pressing your lips against Zuko’s as the siblings bickered in the background.

#zuko x reader #prince zuko x reader #reader insert #zuko imagine

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justanotherghostwriter · 3 years

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Hi, Ghosty. I'm having a really good week and looking for some fandom feels to distract me a little. Would you consider writing a bit more about your Zutara Modern AU. Maybe when Zuko is in the hospital or just out? I love soft feels. Don't know if you're a blog who takes these kinds of requests so feel free to ignore.

Dear Anon. I’m going to take a wild guess that you meant to say you’re having a bad week? If this is the case: I’m so sorry your week is going terribly, and I hope that it picks up over the weekend. If you are, indeed, having a great week then: whoo! May it continue. Either way, it’s an honour and a privilege to be “one of those blogs” as often as I can be. This turned into four short snippets, because I had minimal time today, but I didn’t want to leave you waiting. I hope this is a bit of the distraction you were hoping for.

Context/other bits of this AU found here.

Warnings: Medical things and recovery. Mentions of child abuse.

---------

“This doesn’t – are you sure about this?”

Aang was fretting, shifting his weight from one foot to the other, eyes wide and brimming with compassion and worry. For a moment, he glanced up at Katara in a silent plea before he went back to watching Zuko very slowly and very painfully inch his way to the side of the hospital bed.

“What’s he doing?” Toph asked, voice higher than usual, hand gripping her cane as a weapon rather than an assistive device. Katara idly wondered if she knew she was doing it.

“He’s hurting himself,” Aang insisted sharply, reminding Katara how young he was despite having been forced by the world to grow up too quickly.

“It’s okay,” she soothed, even though her heart was in her throat, twisting with worry and sympathy, hands folded across her middle because, if they weren’t, she didn’t know if she could stop herself from rushing forward to push Zuko back onto the bed. It was agonising watching somebody usually so graceful and sure and strong move in slow, jerky, uncertain movements, shaking and pale just from the effort of sitting up and starting to move his legs over the side of the bed. “It’s good for people to get up and moving a little as soon as possible after heart surgery.” Her brain knew this knowledge. Her heart railed against it.

“But… but it was three days ago.”

She understood why Aang was fighting against this so hard: it felt as though a part of her hadn’t left two days ago behind. Like she was still sitting in a waiting room hoping that the odds would turn out in their favour, somehow. She could still recall how still Zuko had been lying in her arms. And the image of him through the glass when they’d still had him in an induced coma for the first day, grey as a corpse and hooked up to machines she wish she didn’t know about, was still just behind the black of her eyelids.

“’S’kay,” Zuko gasped, and it was meant to be encouraging, but it just made Katara’s stomach shrivel even more, and Aang’s hands clench into fists due to how weak it was. Stronger than the first dying-old-man weak he’d had when he’d first woken up – the sound that had rattled Toph so much Suki had had to find an excuse to take her out the room to reassure the woman to whom sound was so much that he was better than his voice told her he was – but still not Zuko.

“Are you sure you didn’t bribe the nurses into clearing this?” Sokka said, all calm cheerfulness to cut through the tension and worry in the room. “They have been staring at your naked chest a lot. I’ll bet you used it to your advantage.” Zuko paused in his shufflings to give Sokka one of the flattest stares known to mankind, tempered only by his bedhead and very pale face. Sokka held up both hands in mock surrender, pulling a face. “I’m just saying, dude. It’s a nice chest.” There was silence for a beat and then he repeated, more firmly, “It’s a nice chest.” When silence continued, Sokka looked over his shoulder and stage-whispered, “Suki!”

“Not as good a chest as yours, Sokka,” Suki chimed in, tone as plastic-fake as possible.

Sokka fake-preened. “Aww, babe, thank you.”

Despite herself, Katara snorted in half-amusement. Toph had also relaxed, some, but Aang was as rigid as a tree branch, eyes still locked on Zuko as he got both feet on the ground and then paused, visibly gathering himself. Wordlessly, Sokka held out an arm to Zuko. Although it was the crook of an elbow like one might have offered a Regency lady, Sokka was suddenly all seriousness. Zuko glanced at the arm, then at Sokka’s face, and stayed there for a long moment before he reached up, took Sokka’s arm, and used it to haul himself to his feet.

He tried – Katara knew him, and she knew he tried really hard – to hold in the noise of pain, but some of it still escaped. Sokka moved forward instantly, hands bracing, and Suki’s hands came up at the ready, too. Nobody in the room seemed to breathe for the few moments it took for Zuko’s face to unscrew and his knees to properly lock.

“Do we have a destination today, Sir?” And there was the posh-Regency teasing that had been absent a moment ago, Sokka pursing his lips and trying to look down his nose at Zuko despite Zuko being a smidgen taller even when slightly hunched over in pain and weakness.

“Giving you… a swirlie,” Zuko muttered at him, with no heat and a pause for breath in the middle that made the threat laughable.

“Awww, man. I’ll bet they use all sorts of things to disinfect the hospital toilets that will suck for my hair,” Sokka complained, even as he gently pivoted Zuko toward the bathroom and started supporting him toward it.

“Okay, we can set up the game so long, then,” Katara said, more cheerfully than she felt, wanting to save Zuko the mortification of everybody save Toph watching his shuffling, swaying walk across the otherwise empty ward to the nearest bathroom. “Aang, Toph, help, please,” she said, tone booking no argument, shattering the moment of suspended awkwardness by forcing people to move.

Sokka definitely half-carried Zuko the last two or three feet to his bed, and Katara knew Suki was also watching out of the corner of her eye, ready to step in at any moment. Getting Zuko back to lying down was another painful thing, despite him keeping stubbornly silent and making his face as blank as possible, and by the time the whole ordeal was over he was sweating and even paler than before.

But he still insisted on playing with them, getting Katara to move his token and read out the cards for him as she did for Toph. They finished about half an hour before visiting time ended and, while the others opted to leave – they’d all been thrown out the day before for overstaying their welcome, and they didn’t want to chance it two days in a row and lose all their chance to see Zuko at all – Katara said she’d stay right until the end and take a walk home, as she wanted to pick up some of the end-of-day-half-price-sale bread from the bakery on the way home.

“Be safe,” Sokka told her.

“It’s not far, and I can take care of myself,” she promised, thinking not only of her martial arts but also the mace in her bag and the crowds of people who would be walking around at that time of day just before the sun started setting.

“Katara…” There was a frown on Zuko’s face when she looked at him, but she just smiled and shook her head.

“The house is kinda crowded at the moment,” she told him, lowly. “It’s hard to find space to really concentrate. I wanna finish this chapter for English here where it’s quiet.”

None of that was a lie at all. But it also wasn’t the whole truth. Because the whole truth included her wanting to hear him breathing and see the little blips of the pulse ox to quiet the nervous jittering inside of her. The whole truth included knowing that he hated the smell of hospitals after his history with them, and found being alone in them something utterly disquieting. She hated having to leave him at all to fend off ghosts and pain in an empty ward, so she’d push the rules as much as she could.

Zuko squinted at her for a moment more and then rolled his head to look at Sokka. “Speaking of. Did you bring our English book?”

“Oh, dear Spirits,” Suki sighed at him, exasperated. “You have extensions. How many times must we say this?”

“Doesn’t mean I can…get super behind,” Zuko argued back, stubbornly. “’Sides. It gets boring here. Might as well.”

Suki sighed again and rolled her eyes to the heavens, but Sokka, looking sceptical about the whole affair, nonetheless dug out their setwork and placed it on Zuko’s bedside table. The round of goodbyes started again, and everybody clasped Zuko’s arm instead of the hug they wanted to give him and, despite having looked utterly exhausted forty-five minutes ago already and now looking more asleep than awake, Zuko obstinately reached for the book and opened it to read as Katara did the same in the chair next to his bed.

The silence that descended was familiar, and Katara felt herself relax as reality pushed to the background and the story in the pages before her took up her attention. She paused to make notes on a pad every now and then, but didn’t look up from the book until she reached a time skip. A rush of exasperated-fond-endearment rose up in her at the sight of him with his head lolling to the side in sleep, one hand still loosely clutching his English setwork.

“Idiot,” she sighed at him, and slowly, slowly, gently pried the book out of his hands and put it on his bedside again.

“Are we going to have problems tonight?” Katara glanced to the doorway where a severe nurse was watching her with narrowed eyes.

“No, Ma’am,” Katara said, politely, standing at once and gathering her things.

The nurse snorted, but moved away, giving Katara a chance to reach over and brush away some of Zuko’s hair from his forehead. She wished she could lower his bed from its very upright position, but she knew that would wake him. And, Spirits, the boy needed rest.

“’Night, Zuko,” she whispered to him, one touch to his forearm in the shadow of a Water Tribe greeting before she reluctantly left. She looked back four times.

***

“Hey! I snuck you in some real food,” Katara said, slipping her way into the little world the curtains around Zuko’s bed made. There was finally another patient in the ward, and it was laughable how it felt like somebody had invaded their space. “Nice, baked, chocolate…”

She trailed off, caught off guard by the sight of him sitting in scrub pants and shirtless on his bed.

“Hi,” he answered, and blushed a little at her staring. “Uh… they… want to…”

“Air out the wound,” she answered, automatically, almost in time with him. “Yeah. I…”

She should stop staring. She knew it was rude, and was making him very uncomfortable, but the scar was longer than she expected. Ripping her eyes away, Katara tried to go back to being excited about her smuggled cupcake while her heart was in her throat.

For you, her brain kept reminding her. That was to save you.

Zuko, being Zuko, split the cupcake in half with her, but their usually easy silence felt off.

“What is it?” he finally asked her, stuck somewhere between self-conscious and bold.

She shook her head. But then, from inside of her, a truth she could voice sprung: “I’m sorry. For staring.”

He gave her a crooked grin. “I’m used to being stared at, Katara.”

She scowled at him and shook her head, fiercely. “No. You shouldn’t be. Not by us. I mean… we’re…”

He touched her shoulder, feather light but lingering. “It, uh… It doesn’t… matter… when it’s you guys. Or Uncle. Because I know it’s not…” He blushed again, shrugging carefully, losing his words.

But she understood, and reached to touch his knee. She chewed on her lip for a few moments, and saw Zuko watching her out of the corner of her eye, silent and holding space until she was ready.

“Do the staples hurt?” she blurted out. And then the blush rose in her cheeks at his utter surprised look. “I mean… None of the books or articles…”

“No,” he said. “No, I hardly remember they’re there.”

“You can’t feel them?”

He shook his head. “Not in my chest. But when you touch there, you can feel them through the skin.”

She couldn’t keep the interest off her face, and he smirked at her. And then reached out for her hand.

“Woah, woah, I don’t wanna hurt – ”

“You won’t. Just don’t slap me or something,” he reassured her, utterly at ease as he placed her hand across his new scar.

Tentatively, fearfully, she placed her thumb on the length of it. The stitches were still in, and she didn’t want to disrupt them. Zuko didn’t even flinch beneath her hand, so she dared press a little bit more and then dragged her hand down.

“Oh!”

She could feel them – every now and then, there was a little bump under his skin that was entirely different to the stitches. A knob like bone, but harder, smaller. Tiny bits of metal holding his sternum together for the rest of his life.

For you. For you.

“You’re sure it doesn’t hurt?” Her voice came out surprisingly small.

“No, Katara.” He was surprisingly gentle. She took her hand away, the memory of the bumps under his skin still on her fingertips. He smiled gently at her. “It’s okay.”

“That’s pretty cool,” she offered. “Better than Sokka’s splinter callous.”

He pulled a face. “A narrow victory, I’m sure.”

And the tension in the air shattered as she grinned and reached into her bag for another book as she began to tell Zuko all the things that had happened in the house the previous night that he’d missed.

***

For ease of storage, Sokka kept all his things in his room, even though Zuko was currently occupying his bed. Every time some shadow of a sigh at that fact rose – usually when he was on the lumpy mattress listening to his Dad and Bato attempt to out-snore one another where they lay on the sofa beds – he remembered how much Zuko still winced. How absolutely calculated every movement was that his friend made. The feeling that had suckerpunched when Zuko had been brought home from the hospital and had automatically turned to the living room to where his mattress was, as though people were going to let him sleep on the ground when his chest was… broken.

Those thoughts stopped any complaints even before they could be born.

But he did still have to go into his room to get things, and that was why he stumbled upon Zuko curling into himself, swearing under his breath. His breath that was coming far too fast and sharp for Sokka’s liking. Instantly on high alert, he debated whether going to Zuko first or shouting the house down for somebody. He chose the latter, and crouched in front of Zuko.

“Hey, Buddy. I heard air is still in, this season.”

“’S’kay,” Zuko said, face twisted in a grimace. “Not…ah… not SVT.”

Some of the crushing weight left Sokka’s chest. Arrhythmias on Zuko were always kind of scary, but since the heart op they were downright terrifying. Sokka would have stuck through one, of course, but… he was glad he didn’t have to.

“What’s up, then?” He saw Zuko begin to deflect, and just shook his head. “Nope. No jerks are allowed to sleep in this bed. This is a jerk-free zone. And lying to your best friend is a jerk move.”

Zuko glared at him a little, and then looked away. The faintest bit of colour returned to his ashen face, and he murmured something that Sokka only understood as, “hoodie” and “arms”. So he tried to do what he did best: figure out the puzzle. It didn’t take long: Zuko was wearing a very loved and much patched red number that was one of the few things he’d brought with him. And it was an over-the-head thing instead of a zip-up.

“Can’t get it off?” he guessed. Zuko shook his head, lips pressed together, still not looking at him. “No problem-o. Let’s do this. Man, you really want to show off that sexy chest of yours. Best hope Suki doesn’t catch us.”

Sokka caught Zuko’s hem in both hands and gently began lifting. He couldn’t keep the silence; the full-body flinches and smothered moans of pain were too much to bear. “What do you call a DJ who stops breathing?” he blurted, as he tried – and failed, damnit – to get the hoodie off without causing Zuko too much pain. “Off the air! Why are air cons so loud?” A pause as he got Zuko’s head through the hoodie. The worst was over; he could breathe again as he gently pulled the arms free. “They’re venting,” he answered himself. Zuko gave him a tired, side-eye that didn’t hide how he was still struggling to breathe. A catch-22, because every deep breath probably hurt like something Sokka couldn’t imagine. He’d bruised a rib before, but never broken his sternum open. “I highly recommend zip- and button-up things for the future.”

“Yeah,” Zuko agreed with the shadow of a laugh as he wrapped one arm loosely around himself. He glanced up at Sokka again, struggling to meet Sokka’s eyes for a moment before his jaw turned hard and resolute and their gazes locked. “Thank you.”

Sokka patted him on the shoulder. “You can return the favour when I get drunk for the first time,” he said, seriously, and was relieved when Zuko gave him a half-smile that chased away the shame that had been shadowing in the dull corners of his eyes.

***

“Oh, Zuko… Let me…” Kanna said, suddenly, moving to rise from her chair.

Katara, and many others, swivelled to look where Gran-Gran was looking, and found Zuko in the kitchen reaching for things to warm himself some tea.

“It’s okay; you’re busy. I got this,” Zuko dismissed, and then wrapped an arm around his chest as bracing while the other reached for a cup in the cupboard above him.

Exclamations of Zuko’s name rang out and he paused to scowl at all of them, looking beyond frustrated. “It’s warming a cup of tea,” he said.

“Just let somebody help you, dumbass,” Toph said, and got poked by Bato’s toe for swearing.

“You’re all busy with case things,” he argued back.

“And we don’t mind helping,” Kanna said, already on her way to him.

“Nephew,” Iroh said, with a hint of worry in his voice, and Zuko sighed. “You need to rest, Zuko. I know it’s frustrating, but you’ve only been – ”

“You’re all acting like I’m about to keel over at any moment,” Zuko snapped at him, scowling. “It’s just broken ribs! Like those aren’t easy to work around.”

The silence hit like a physical thing, heavy and painful in its implications of Zuko’s past. Iroh closed his eyes, briefly allowing himself to grieve. Zuko lost the scowl, picking up in the change in atmosphere, eyes flickering from one person to another sharply, searching for context on how he’d messed up and how to fix it, and that… just made it worse. That he didn’t know why him thinking he had to just ignore and compensate for broken ribs hurt them; that he still expected, instinctively, to step wrong so badly there would be consequences. Even Jeong Jeong was utterly silent.

Kanna moved, and was very, very deliberate to approach Zuko from his right, even though it meant going around the kitchen island the long way. She gently steered him out the way. “In my house,” she said, quietly, gently, “that is not how healing works.”

She got a cup down, and pressed a palm to Zuko’s head as she moved to the tea, and his shoulders relaxed under her touch.

***

#ghostfic #Ledges and Parachutes AU #Man whoda thunk other people would actually be interested in this AU whooowee #I honestly am v surprised #but in a good way!#thanks for loving my sandpit and coming to play in it anon

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deiliamedlini · 3 years

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ALTA Oneshot- Strength From Within

When your niece watches ALTA and Korra for the first time and she’s OBSESSED with bloodbending and you get inspired by her many comments. So behold, Katara bloodbends.

Mild Zutara, retelling of the final Agni Kai

“Can you feel the power the full moon brings? For generations it has blessed waterbenders with its glow, allowing us to do incredible things!”

Katara can hear Hama’s words racing through her mind, playing again and again on repeat. It’s incessant; a sound that never stops, never leaves. That woman’s voice is a nightmare that she’s reminded of day and night.

Katara can only bloodbend during the full moon. She knows this. She’s done this.

“Once you perfect this technique, you can control anything, or... anyone.”

Turning in her sleep, Katara can feel where Aang is, just feet away. She can sense the way his blood moves throughout his body. The pulsing of his heart is steady, but no less loud than everything else.

Katara hates nights like this.

No matter how hard she tries, she can’t push it away. She can’t stop feeling her brother’s pulse, or Toph’s, or even Zuko’s.

“My work is done. Congratulations, Katara. You're a Bloodbender.”

Soon, Katara is up, moving as far away from the group as she can, letting her head rest on her arms, trying to listen to the sound of the night birds and the sway of the trees. They are too far from the water for that to comfort her, so she makes do with the pieces of nature she can cling to.

But she can feel someone approach from behind. She can feel them.

She wonders if this is how Toph sees, though she still can’t tell who is who just from the rush of their blood. With time, she thinks she might be able to.

While she can’t tell their blood apart, there’s no mistaking the raspy voice that sounds from beside her, still tired, still hesitant.

“You okay?”

“I’m fine!” she snaps. But immediately, she sighs, regretting it. “I’m fine,” she says again, much calmer this time.

Zuko takes the space beside her. Zuko, she realizes, has a soothing presence, despite his normally chaotic energy. She doesn’t feel obligated to talk to him just because he’s there. And she loves Aang as much as she loves Sokka, she does, but he needs her to confide everything to him so he can tell her how to let it go. Sometimes, that’s not what she wants. That’s not what she needs. There are some things that she can’t let go of. Some things that have just become her.Zuko understands this. Aang, Sokka, and Toph don’t.

“You’re stronger than Hama,” Aang had said to her one night when she’d confessed her fears. But that is what Katara is afraid of.

Katara turns to Zuko with a shaky breath, tears spilling from her eyes as she realizes she can feel his calm heartbeat, his blood leisurely doing its job. The red water in his veins isn’t straining to work, it’s just there. And it’s that calm that calls to Katara.

She takes her head in her hands, her fingers tight in her hair by her ears, as if she can stop hearing it; as if she can stop feeling it. Her tears come harder, and she can feel those. Every part of her is screaming, demanding she bend it all.

Zuko can see her white knuckled grip, and he gently touches her hand. When she doesn’t pull away, he helps her uncurl her fingers and instead laces his own through hers.

It’s good: his warm hand in hers. She wants this, but she can feel too much. He’s too close now. She feels it all.

Standing, she pulls away, finally giving in and bending her tears away from her eyes so she looks almost like she wasn’t crying, save for her puffy, red eyes. “I’m sorry,” she mutters.

Zuko watches her leave. He knows why. He’s seen her bloodbend and he knows that she’s still struggling with her powers. Unlike the others, he understands what it’s like to hate a something inside yourself so deeply that it threatens to break you. He knows this because it’s been his most defining feeling since the day of his banishment. And every day, he has had to push past it to see the greater picture, one that Uncle Iroh has been painting long before Zuko could see the brush strokes.

When Katara returns from her walk, she sees a rolled-up scroll on her bedroll and moves closer to the embers of the dying fire to read it. It’s undeniably Zuko’s script, but it’s not his words. They’re words from an old legend, from a story that’s been told in tales and plays for years. One that Iroh had told him time and time again. One that Katara had seen performed during a festival.

“The true mind can weather all lies and illusions without being lost. The true heart can touch the poison of hatred without being harmed. From beginningless time, darkness thrives in the void, but always yields to purifying light.” – Lion Turtle

With a soft laugh to herself, Katara turns to Zuko. His eyes are closed, but she’s almost certain they’re cracked open just enough to see her. She smiles at him and tucks the words into her hand to read again.

And once she reads them three more times, the call of bloodbending feels less and less like a threat and more like a promise that she can overcome.

_____________________________

Katara watches as Zuko and Azula circle each other. Azula is a ball of uncontrolled energy and rage. Blue sparks of lightening and embers of flame encircle her, fanning out and wild. It’s like a fresh log had been placed over a campfire, and the flames were discovering a whole new world of opportunities and places to go.

Zuko’s flames, red like his scar, were precise and controlled, everything Azula’s weren’t. His strikes weren’t wild. Where he aimed, they went.

Katara remembered when she’d seen Zuko for the first time, when he was unbalanced, and his flames were as uncontrollable as Azula’s. Now, she can see something of his uncle’s style, something so tamed and yet so dangerous in each move he makes. His firebending, while not hot and bright, is just as dangerous as Azula’s, and far more of a threat than she’d ever seen.

Zuko fights with passion, and Azula fights with rage. Two emotions that come from the same place but are redirected in entirely different ways.

Katara can feel the call of water beneath the grates. She wanted to help, but she knew Zuko needed to do this on his own. She even knows he can win, but in the event that Azula pulls something, in the event Zuko falls, Katara isn’t going to just watch because the honor of the Crown Prince is at stake. She values his life too much now. And she thinks he knows that.

It’s difficult for Katara to see. The courtyard is a mix of reds and oranges, blues and whites. She almost calls up the water to shield her from a wide attack of Azula’s, one that dies before Katara has the need.

She walks the perimeter behind Zuko, always making sure that there is an angle from which she can see.

Zuko says something to Azula, and she spits fiery words back at him. She sees Zuko center himself, move into a space inside where he is at peace. Lightening, she thinks immediately, though it’s Azula who bends it. She’s wild, and the lightening appears all around her rather than directed through her movements. Her form is off. Even without being a firebender, Katara can see that.

Azula throws her head back with a laugh and moves her hands. Suddenly, the lightening is coming towards her, and not Zuko.

She hears him cry out, she sees him move. And then she sees his body engulfed by lightening.

His hand manages to redirect the lightening, but he doesn’t make it in time to move it out harmlessly into the sky. Instead, he’s redirecting it into himself, away from Katara.

He falls to the ground, twitching. She’s not sure if he’s in pain, or if it’s his body’s nerves acting on their own accord.

For a second, Azula is surprised. Her eyes are wide. She’s not upset, just surprised. She had wanted to rattle her brother with the death of the waterbender. She’d wanted to make her victory sweet by breaking Zuzu. She didn’t want to just beat him, she wanted to defeat him.

But Azula smiles. This turn of events is okay. Zuko’s death was inevitable, and Azula had always been flexible with plans.

Katara is stopped from rushing to Zuko by a blast of blue flame. A sickening laugh is loud over the explosion a collision makes. Katara just manages to get out of the way of another blast, rolling to her feet as debris pelts her face.

Azula bends lightening again, taunting Katara as she does. But Katara bends a wall of water as her shield.

It’s not enough against the lightening. Katara still feels painful ripples of shockwaves course through her, as if she’s been hit by a weak blast. It hurts, and it stings, and her arms are red already. Water conducts electricity, but water is all Katara has at her disposal.

There’s a pillar that Katara makes it to, just in time to feel the heat of blue flames on the other side.

“Zuzu, you don’t look so good!” Azula mocks from atop a roof.

Katara peeks her head out just in time to see Azula bend lightening once again. She looks at Katara and smiles, full toothed, hair wild. Unhinged.

And aims the lightening at Zuko instead of her.

This time, it’s Katara who screams. She’s too far from Zuko to take the hit, or even to lessen it with her water in the way. There’s no time to do anything.

Anything but react.

“What?” Azula screeches as her hand jerks to the side. The bolt of lightening misses Zuko by mere inches, but Azula’s aim has always been true.

She looks at the waterbender and notices that she’s in an unfamiliar stance. Her eyes are determined as she takes a breath and focuses on Azula.

Azula knows she’s faster. She bends the lightening again and aims it at both Katara and Zuko.

But suddenly, mirroring the waterbender, Azula’s hands move up to the sky, and the lightening misses again.

Katara can hear Hama’s voice again. “The choice is not yours. The power exists. And it's your duty to use the gifts you've been given to win this war.”

Then, she hears Aang’s from the first day they met. “If you want to be a bender, you have to let go of fear.”

She’s no longer afraid of Azula. She’s no longer afraid for Zuko. And she’s no longer afraid for herself.

Surprised, almost, by her actions and resolve, she glances at the sky. It’s not a full moon. It’s not possible.

“You’re stronger than Hama,” Aang had said to comfort her. He’d meant it that Katara didn’t need to worry, that mentally, she was stronger than Hama. But the words ring true for a different reason. Katara is a waterbending master. She’s stronger than Hama. Hama needed the moon to bloodbend.

Katara doesn’t.

“What are you doing to me, you filthy peasant?” Azula screeches, jumping off the roof when Katara lets go.

Katara has never done this without the full moon, so all she can manage is the twitch of an arm, not the full control of every action as she’d done in the past. It’s enough to surprise Azula though, and Katara feels a brief twinge of disgust before looking at Zuko once again.

He’s lying there, the front of his shirt burned off from the heat of the lightening. There’s a hole in his skin that reminds her of Aang’s wound that nearly cost him his life. She wonders if Zuko is close to death, if she can still get to him in time to save him. If the only chance of that is bloodbending.

Azula looks like she’s given up on lightening for the moment, but she charges at Katara with all four of her limbs lit up like the flames that propel the airships.

Katara runs, bending the water into a wave and then freezing it before skidding her feet along it to escape Azula. The heat from her flames melts the ice behind Katara, and she uses that to her advantage, bending the melted water into a whip that strikes Azula and knocks her back.

The move gives Katara enough time to get in front of Zuko, to protect him from anything that Azula can throw their way.

But Azula isn’t in front of them anymore.

She’s behind them.

Katara only knows this because the firebender cannot stop laughing whenever she feels giddy or that she’s done something right. It gives Katara the time she needs to turn around and see the flames coming at them, and she bends a wall of water to stop it.

Azula is relentless to the point that Katara can no longer remain on the defensive. She shoots ice picks at her, and uses the octopus form just to try to knock her off balance.

Zuko knew he’d need Katara’s help to beat Azula, and now, Katara realizes that she too needs Zuko’s help. But he’s barely breathing behind her, shallow breaths that are getting fewer and farther between. And Azula has broken through every defense, leaving Katara with no time to heal Zuko.

She hears a particularly strained breath from Zuko and realizes that there’s little other choice. She reaches out and feels Azula’s blood, really feels it.

The first time, she’d been acting on instinct, stopping Azula from killing Zuko. This time, her motive is the same, but it is no knee-jerk reaction. Fully understanding the repercussions, fully aware of what her body was about to do, Katara widens her stance and bends the water near her, drawing strength from its constant flow. It is as soothing as it is strong, and that’s the same energy she channels into her bending as she reaches for Azula.

It’s easy now. She’d been sensing her friends’ blood all the time. It called out to her in a way that was entirely foreign, yet altogether too familiar. So here, she can find it easily. The water is distinct, and she starts in the easiest place to reach: Azula’s fingertips. Following the line, she is at her wrist, and Katara stops there, contorting Azula’s wrist away so that she can’t properly bend. But that enrages Azula, and fire is shooting out of her feet as she kicks.

Katara moves further down, one hand of hers focusing on holding Azula’s wrist while the other searches for her leg.

She’s sweating with the effort, disgusted by every action she takes and every second she’s holding another down with waterbending. But how is this any different from when she’d frozen Jet against that tree? How is it any different from restraining anyone? It’s the same, she tells herself so she can get through this.

Azula is screeching as she slowly starts to lose control of muscles.

Katara struggles to breathe, feeling like how Zuko must, as she maintains her form. Her hands and feet are precise as she lowers Azula to her knees and holds her there.

It’s hard enough to maintain the control without the fill moon, but she takes strength from inside herself instead, her unbendable resolve. Katara lets the water on the ground flow slowly from her to Azula, wrapping around her legs and turning to ice, slithering up to hold her wrists in the same place. Katara sees chains, and hastily rushes to replace the ice that Azula can melt with the unbreakable metal that only Toph could have torn through.

Azula is wild as she tries to break free, finally resuming control of herself as Katara lets go.

She’s dizzy, but she stumbles to Zuko and bends water around her palms before placing them on his chest, closing her eyes, and calling strength from the exact same place she’d just been to bloodbend. It’s jarring, how two contrasting actions—controlling someone’s will and healing their wounds—can be summoned from the same strength. Her desire to save Zuko is above all thoughts of herself or her morals.

She can feel heat on her back, but when she checks, she just sees Azula breathing fire as she sobs and writhes on the ground. It doesn’t distract Katara for long, and she returns her attention to Zuko.

His wounds close beneath her hands. It’s something she never got to do for Aang, but she’s glad she can do it for Zuko. His body stops shaking, and for a moment, Katara thinks she’s killed him with her tainted hands, that this was her punishment for using bloodbending. But there is no such punishment. Zuko tentatively opens his eyes and smiles.

“Thank you, Katara,” he manages. And she knows that there is more to this thank you than the healing. He’s thanking her for so much more.

“I think I’m the one who should be thanking you,” she says tearfully. And he smiles, because like her, he knows that this is more than a shallow thank you for their actions that day.

Katara helps him sit up and lets Zuko rest his head on her shoulder while he gathers his strength. She wouldn’t have minded if he stayed that way. She is tired, and so is he. They could both use a rest.

But he pushes himself to his knees, and then to his feet, keeping a steady arm wrapped around his waist.

They both watch Azula as she no longer speaks in full sentences, only incoherent screams. Tears run down her face, and she is rolling on the floor. She’s not even trying to escape anymore, but the hysterics have taken hold, and it’s like she’s being bloodbent again: no longer in control of herself.

Zuko, as much as he wants Katara near him, moves away from her touch to kneel in front of his sister. She tries to breathe fire on him, but he waves it away as though it were nothing. “I feel sorry for you,” he says earnestly. “I’m sorry this happened to you.”

Azula screams some more, but Zuko has said what he needs to. He returns to Katara’s arms, and leans against her while he cradles the painful reminder of his wound. Though Katara healed it, there is still some way to go.

“We should try to find Aang,” Katara breathes, looking up at the red sky.

“No, he has to face my father alone. We should try to stop the fighting down here.” He turns to those observers, the ones who were ready to crown Azula Firelord.

“They’ll listen to you, Firelord Zuko,” Katara says with a smile. But it’s melancholy as the words register in her ears. Still, there’s nothing to do about it now. “They’re now your troops. You can stop this.”

Zuko nods, but before he can take a step, he grabs Katara’s hand. “I wouldn’t have been able to do this if it weren’t for you. I can’t thank you enough.”

Katara blushes, but she’s still reeling from everything. She knows her high from the win will crash soon, and she’ll remember the feeling of Azula’s blood in under her control for days. She knows it’ll give her nightmares, and make her feel powerful. She’ll remember how it came from the same source that her waterbending came from, and that will have her conflicted.

“Zuko,” she says, moving her hand up to his arm. “Please, don’t tell anyone what I did. Don’t tell them I was bloodbending. They wouldn’t understand.”

Zuko’s eyes search hers for a moment before he nods. “I won’t tell, Katara. But you shouldn’t be ashamed of it. You just saved the fire nation and the entire world. I know it’ll feel like you paid a heavy price, but you just saved everyone. We can end this now that Azula isn’t the Firelord.”

“What about your father?”

“Aang will take care of him. The Avatar isn’t the only one who can save the world, Katara. You did, too.” He doesn’t say anymore as he hurries over to the fire priests. They both know that the time for talking is later.

For now, Katara gives herself five seconds.

One, she takes to mourn Azula. For everything she is, she’s still just a young girl who’s lust for power has corrupted her.

Two, she hopes that bloodbending doesn’t lead her down that same path; that she’ll be okay.

Three, she thinks of Aang fighting Ozai. She knows how scared he was, but he’s the Avatar. He was born for this. He’s ready.

Four, she thinks of Sokka, Toph, Suki, and her father. Mostly, she thinks of Sokka, and hopes that he’s staying safe, despite knowing him.

And five, she thinks of Zuko. That alone is enough to make her smile, but he’s here, and he’s alive, and he’s waving her over.

She knows now what she’d be willing to do for those she loved, and that alone was enough to displace any regret she had about bloodbending.

She’d do it again, if she had to.

For them. For him.

#avatar #avatar anniversary #avatar the last airbender #zutara #mild zutara #zuko #katara #azula #bloodbending #fanfic #writing #I didn’t know what to do with this but hey it’s the anniversary so have at this experiment into a different fandom #not loz #alta #oneshot

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muertawrites · 4 years

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Two Halves - Chapter Six (Zuko x Reader)

Part Five

Word Count: 2,100

Author’s Note: Wow it’s been a clusterfuck this week. I’ve been exhausted and unable to concentrate for the past few days, and then today when I tried to release this chapter for patrons it turned out that all of Cloudflare was down, so something like 12 million sites worldwide were just completely unreachable. I plan to force myself into going to bed early tonight so I can actually get myself back on track and be productive over the weekend (I have two requests I want to publish so they don’t get pushed back into all my ideas for next month, and I also want to look into other ad providers outside of Adsense so I can start saving up money for my eventual move out of the country). I promise that next week will be less of a bummer chapter. Here’s hoping sometime we’ll actually catch a fookin break, m8.

~ Muerta

You stand in the portrait hall, awaiting its newest addition with Rina; she grips your arm, clapping giddily as the towering scroll unfurls to reveal the painted image of you and Zuko beside one another.

In it, you're seated to his left side, mirroring the generations of other wedding portraits that line the massive hall; what's different is not only the color and style of your robes, but the fact that Zuko’s hand rests on your shoulder, yours clasped firmly within it. When he did so, the royal historian who was present instructed that the Firelord and lady were never depicted touching one another - you'd placed your hand over his in a unified stance of defiance. You'd also been asked to remove your betrothal necklace for the portrait, and had told the historian in a few choice words exactly why it would be staying on; you still feel the rush in your veins of hearing Zuko mumble “that's my girl” under his breath.

“Oh, it's gorgeous!” Rina exclaims, bouncing excitedly on her toes. “The Firelord looks so handsome in a Water Tribe silhouette; I'm so glad you did this!”

You laugh, hugging her by the arm that's hooked with your own and unable to deny the fact that the Southern style tunic you had the seamstress make for him does provide a nice view of his body, highlighting more of his broad shoulders and sturdy midriff than the billow of traditional Fire Nation robes. It also pairs well with his chest plate, making him look every part the skilled warrior he is instead of some aristocratic monarch ruling only by privilege. Beside him, his fingers locked between yours, your gaze steely and knowing behind layers of ink, you look like a weapon instead of just a wife; you start to think there might be much more reason Hakoda arranged your alliance with Zuko than just forming a concrete tie between your nations.

“My lady,” one of the palace messengers addresses you, bowing respectfully as he approaches. “I’m sorry to interrupt, but Advisors Sung and Qiang request an audience with you in their offices.”

You and Rina look between each other, Rina’s eyebrows raised in confusion.

“Just me?” you ask. “Should I also send for the Firelord?”

“No, your majesty,” the messenger says. “The councilmen asked that only you be sent for.”

You nod, bowing to the messenger in thanks before taking Rina’s arm once more, walking in pace with her to the administrative wing of the palace.

“They’re sure to send me out of the room,” Rina tells you, speaking in a hushed, conspiratorial tone. “I’m unsure about Advisor Sung, but Qiang has never trusted servants with any kind of information; he used to work information security under Firelord Ozai until he defected after Prince Zuko’s banishment.”

“If he won’t allow you in the room, you’ll wait at the door,” you state. “Whether he likes it or not, I still have more power than he does.”

When you arrive at the international affairs office, Qiang and Sung are seated around a small table, primed in wait for you. You make a point of not bowing in return when they do so upon your announcement, instead choosing to simply nod in greeting. Sung smiles at you in his polite, pleasant way as you sit, while Qiang eyes you with a cold, almost uncertain stare.

“My lady,” Sung welcomes you, “I apologize for bringing you here on such short notice, but there are urgent matters that must be discussed. As you know, Advisor Qiang has taken the liberty of guiding me as I adjust to my new position as the head of international affairs, and we’ve been mulling over the matter of your wedding portrait for the past few days.”

“More specifically,” Qiang interjects, “we’ve been discussing the stunt you pulled in deciding your wardrobe. Many people across the Fire Nation are not pleased to see their Firelord in Water Tribe garments.”

“It was simply a tunic,” you calmly defend yourself. “The only other change was to the color. Has anyone taken issue with the fact that I wore a Water Tribe dress under a Fire Nation robe?”

You glance between the two men, expecting the question to be entirely rhetorical - you know the answer already, but as you guessed, they’re either too cowardly or too correct to say it aloud.

“We understand your intentions,” Sung replies after a beat, “but we’re uncertain the execution of your ideas is as tactful as it should be; I know I needn’t remind you that we’re still living in very unstable times as of the end of the war.”

“I understand your concern, but I don’t think the nature of our mixed heritage is the most pressing issue at hand,” you say. “The world experienced a century of cruelty under Fire Nation imperialism - it’s important that we reform our militant image in every way we can. Dressing me like a traditional Firelady when I very clearly am not one would have upset far more people than just our citizens.”

“The Fire Nation is still very powerful,” Advisor Qiang argues, “even with the abolition of many of the Earth Kingdom colonies. Upsetting our people could have consequences that reach beyond the mainland’s borders.”

His words are spat at you almost like a threat. You tilt your chin a little higher, meeting his gaze without faltering.

“What do you suggest, then?” you ask.

“We want to keep watch on you,” Qiang tells you. “Our aids will accompany you as you gain more freedom from the Firelord and guide you to ensure that your actions reflect the image the nation wants to see from their leader.”

“This sounds like something Advisor Yong should oversee,” you evenly contest. “I'm certain my husband would like to have his say, as well.”

“We simply wanted to present the idea to you,” Advisor Sung cuts in. “We thought it might give you more peace of mind to have someone beside you; teach you how to properly present yourself to the people of the Fire Nation.”

“You can send your aids to keep tabs on me,” you reply, “but I am still your superior. Firelord Zuko has been more than an adequate mentor. I don't need another one.”

“Do you suggest we have you answer to the Firelord on our behalf, then?” Advisor Qiang asks, sounding skeptical.

“I'm stating that I don't answer to anyone,” you respond. “Zuko is my equal. You're the one born and raised in the Fire Nation - you should understand that better than anyone.”

Qiang fixes you with the chilled, empty glare you noticed your first day in the council’s meeting chambers. You keep your own expression blank, refusing to avert your eyes from their lock on his.

“My lady,” Advisor Sung addresses you, “I promise you, we mean no offense. We truly have your best intentions at heart; we understand that the culture of the Fire Nation is very different from that of the Southern Water Tribe, and only want to keep you safe in the wake of Advisor Fen’s passing. We believe taking extra care in how you interact with our people is the only way to move forward.”

“Alright,” you say, standing abruptly. “I'd like some hands-on training, then. I need fabric to build my wardrobe with, and want to explore my new home. Gather your aids - I’m taking them to the market.”

To say that people are shocked to see the Firelady out amongst common folk is an understatement.

You travel in a rather large group, flanked not only by Rina, Iroh, and Toph, but three of Qiang and Sung’s aids and a small army of royal guards. People flee when you approach, some of them going as far as to fall to their knees before you, bowing out of fear; each time, you offer your hand and help them back to their feet, explaining that you're only out to do some shopping. Once more onlookers notice your kind, gentle handling of those who cross your path, panic turns to interest, many people staring at you as you pass or calling out to you, saying hello; a little girl manages to get past the guards, scurrying out of her father’s flower shop and through their legs, stopping in front of you with an adorably clumsy bow to present you with a dandelion she picked from between the cracks in the cobblestone street.

“Why, thank you!” you exclaim, daintily taking the flower from her chubby little hand and bowing in return. “It's very beautiful, just like you.”

You twist the dandelion into your hair before walking the girl back to her father, who apologizes and thanks you profusely; you assure him it's no trouble.

“How very touching,” Iroh says to you once you continue on your way. “I wonder what the aids will tell their superiors.”

You huff, smirking at him out of the corner of your eye.

“Probably that I don't inspire enough fear,” you mock. “I thought the dictatorship ended when my dear father-in-law was thrown in prison.”

“The memories of his reign are still very fresh,” Iroh explains. “A brute hand is all much of the Fire Nation knows in a leader; it is hard to bring change.”

“I still don't like our little entourage,” Toph remarks, loud enough that the men trailing you can certainly hear. “Aang never travels with guards, and he's got a way bigger target on his head than you do.”

“Yeah, but he can also bend everything,” you remind her. “I've never even held a spear.”

“I'm blind and I still kick hella ass,” Toph replies. “You don't have an excuse.”

You roll your eyes, grinning as you shove her sideways so she stumbles; she laughs, coming back at you with a hard punch to the boob and blowing a raspberry into your face. You can't help but cackle, taking her into a headlock and scruffing up her hair.

“My lady,” one of the aids pipes up, her nose wrinkled in disdain, “this isn't proper etiquette for a Fire Nation queen.”

“Oh, spirits forbid anybody be human,” Toph groans. “The war is over and this is a leisure trip. People have to get used to the Firelady acting like a person instead of a government puppet.”

Rina takes hold of your arm, leaning in close to your ear.

“I like her,” she whispers. “Can we ask her to stay?”

You laugh, shaking your head.

“I wish,” you mumble back, “but Toph sort of just does what she wants.”

You choose a small, cozy-looking shop to buy fabrics from, everyone in the group (save for the aids and guards, who have no choice but to wait outside) making easy, pleasant conversation with the owners; they're a relatively young couple from Omashu, who came to the Fire Nation after the war to trade fabrics that weren't widely available in either country, wanting to bring more options to each place. Their shop is filled with soft cottons and delicately embroidered patterns, many laced with shimmering metals and gems only found in the Earth Kingdom; you purchase a few yards of almost everything, leaving them a contact to the palace so that they can come and discuss expanding their trade routes. Everyone is pleased except for the aids, who look on with disapproving glares.

When you return to the palace, you find not only Zuko awaiting you, but Qiang and Sung as well; you hardly acknowledge the two councilmen, instead going straight to Zuko’s side.

“Rina sent me a message about your meeting this morning,” he murmurs. “I told Advisor Yong, too. They should have come to both of us.”

You nod, taking him by the arm and leading him away from the larger group, out into an open corridor surrounding a courtyard that sits off the entrance hall of the palace’s administrative wing.

“There has to be something we can do, right?” you wonder. “We’re above them. We have the final say in everything.”

Zuko sighs, taking your hands within his and holding you close to him, chests pressed together.

“We’re supposed to,” he says. “But my grandfather taught my father and sister how to manipulate their way into power. Lots of other government officials learned it, too, and it hasn’t completely gone away.”

Advisor Qiang passes through on the other side of the courtyard, eyeing you with his signature frigid gaze as Advisor Sung and the aids trail behind him. You look away from him, focusing only on Zuko.

“We have to keep the people on our side,” you murmur. “The government may be able to manipulate itself into submission, but they're no match for everyone else. The world beat them once - we can beat them again.”

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airiustide · 4 years

Text

forever young. forever you.

chapter 2/day 2: counterpart

A/N: sorry for posting on tumblr late, work kept me. but here it is, chapter 2. Thank you all for the lovely comments and @zutara-was-robbed for her amazing idea vomiting that helped make this fic possible and her ability to make me laugh.

Summary: After reunion comes joy- at least Katara had hoped. When she finally has the opportunity to confront the stranger, she learns a devastating secret that weights heavy on her heart and soul.

also posted on: AO3

“Speak what we feel, and not what we ought to say. Well, I’m forever young, and you're forever you.” -We are Life by Emarosa

She wasn’t crazy. She hoped.

Katara wants to confront the man in black out in the open, only that would prove to be futile if it really happened to be who she thought it was. No doubt, he would run upon seeing her again like her first day here. She had no evidence it was Zuko but he looked at her, and when he did it was clear that he recognized her.

It took about a week before he crossed her, unnoticed to him. He was taller, much taller. His clothes did not hide his muscle definition and she can tell he was intensively active. Much different from the seventeen-year-old buy she knew but there was no mistaking those eyes.

Once she picked up on his routine, Katara was quick to follow, utilizing every chance between meeting Lotus members and rest to make it just an inch closer to Zuko. She stopped every so feet each time, afraid he might pick up on her stalking- other than the off chance of her being wrong weighing in her mind. No point in turning back now , Katara thought, I am officially labeled a creeper .

It was the same every night. He came out just as the sky turned night, stealthy moving in the dark, through alleyways and barely traveled streets. She remains anonymous as well, choosing clothes colored in dark blue and tying her hair in a low ponytail. He appears from behind an abandoned building again, silently prowling through the streets. This time, he’s not making his usual destination. Katara curses when he stops abruptly a quarter mile from his usual path and turns his head slowly over his shoulder.

Katara stills, biting her lip to hold back anticipated breathing and willing her pounding heart to cease beating in her ears. He’s hesitant for only a moment, facing forward again and slipping into the alley. Katara, darts after him, stopping at the corner. Shock flushed her face. He’s gone!

Cement trickles from above and she barely misses the figure swinging onto the rooftop. Blue eyes widen, shocked to find the stranger peering down at her. In the dark his golden gaze seemed to mock her. Come get me, if you dare, they read. Katara always enjoyed a good challenge.

*** He’s running ahead of her, hoping from rooftop to rooftop. It felt like they were in sync, the way they ran through the night, his movements as flawless as a languid waterbender. The moon was on her side tonight, providing her the much needed energy to keep up with him. The excitement of it all sang in her blood, heightening her adrenaline.

Katara wanted to laugh with childish delight. Lift a hand out to the sky and feel the wind wisp between her fingers. Never mind that she was chasing after a unknown man but something told her he wasn’t intent on harming her.

She halts gracefully in her tracks when he jumps from one of the rooftops, sliding across a tarp and swinging on the structure holding it up just before he lands on his feet. Katara makes a disappointed groan, knowing this was the end of their game. Instead, she stays on his tracks via rooftop, afraid that if she took the time to crawl down, she might lose him.

She crouches low, cursing herself more than ever. How had she not realized she had wondered into enemy territory. Ozai Society members occupied this area, having scouted here the week before with the White Lotus under guise.

The man made two raps on the door across the street from where Katara hid, a sharp one thrice, then another two. The door cracks open and Katara can’t make out their voices. The man in black removes his glove and lifts the sleeve of his right arm to reveal a symbol tattooed right below his palm.

She wanted to kick herself. This wasn’t Zuko after all, and she had exposed herself to the enemy. Regardless, she was already here and decided to scope out what was taking place, at least, settling on leaving before the stranger or anyone else decided to come out of the house.

An hour went by, and no one’s left or entered. She’ll have to return home and let the White Lotus know her findings, on top of admitting that she followed an enemy without their knowledge. La, she was in for a scolding. Katara kicks the dust under her feet, preparing for a running start.

“Leaving so soon.” A raspy voice brought her to an abrupt stop.

Katara narrows her eyes, examining the figure carefully approaching her in the dark, contemplating whether to take off or use the opportunity to question the man; though it might turn into a physical confrontation, she was ready for both. “Are you going to make it worth my while if I decided to stay?” She inquires, crossing her arms over her chest.

Amusement flickered in those gold eyes, but he doesn’t reply to her question. “Not very smart coming here.” He tells her.

Katara smiles behind the cloth covering her nose and mouth. That voice, so distinct and so much like him. “ Yet, here you are.” She retorts.

“This isn’t a joke.” He dismisses her playful attitude. “You need to return home.”

“I’m not going back to the inn.” Katara argued, hurt that he was pushing her away without an explanation off the bat. “At least...at least tell me you’re doing okay.”

He shakes his head. “Not the inn. Go home, Katara.”

“No!” She yells, closing the fists at her side. Zuko was stubborn but Katara was even more so. She had him here, she couldn’t stand the idea of him disappearing again.,Her voice carried in the dark, and both of them heard chatter below. A group flooded the street, muttering suspicions. Humiliation and worry colored Katara’s face.

“Damn.” Zuko groaned, snatching Katara by the elbow. “We gotta leave.”

***

So this is where he’s been hiding? The apartment wasn’t exactly rundown but it certainly wasn’t spacious either. It was decent as decent could get. A single bed, a small table and a washroom fit for one. A bed was posted at the far side of the wall, opposite the door, right next to a large window. You could see the town far out in the woods beyond it.

Katara wasn’t ready to remove her disguise, watching Zuko intently as he quietly closed the door behind them and had yet to reveal himself. The air between them thickeded, from the tiny room or their awkwardness, Katara couldn’t tell which. Four years had gone by since the last time they’d seen each other.

Zuko only stares. From behind his shaggy hair, he looks mysterious, ominous, dangerous. For all she knew, he could have very well become those things, four years can change a person.

“You working for the White Lotus?”

He blinks, taking what feels like forever to reply. He shakes his head.

“You’re doing this alone.” Katara guessed, more of a statement than a question, rather.

“Yes.” He tells her.

Katara licks her lips, nervous now that she truly knew it was her missing friend. “Are you the one who’s been anonymously sending tips to the White Lotus.”

“Yes.”

“And you’ve spent all four years infiltrating the Ozai Society? Because you knew your Uncle and Koji were their new target?”

“Yes.”

“...Your Uncle misses you.”

“Don’t.” He says sternly, eyes darting sharply at Katara. “I should’ve taken you to the inn.”

Katara doesn’t know why but that hurt more than she thought. Zuko was known to push people away but he was flat out trying to get rid of her. If she hadn’t lured those members out, he might have left her without a second thought.

Changing the subject, Zuko announces he’ll make them tea, finally removing the mask from his face and revealing paler than normal skin. Being away from the Fire Nation must have made it so.

Feeling more relaxed in his presence, Katara takes a seat on the bed, studying the place, though there wasn’t much. Zuko kept it simple, probably in case there was risk of his true identity being revealed. Or he cared little for anything other than necessities.

She was anxious to know the reason behind him leaving, a million questions hanging on the tip of her tongue. Katara knows if she blurted out a single inquiry, he’ll shut her out immediately. Zuko comes back with their tea in two wooden cups, sitting beside her and taking a quiet sip of his cup.

Katara does the same before proclaiming. “I’ve missed you too.” Hoping it wouldn’t make him retreat.

A furious blush colors Zuko cheeks, his hard features softening. He looks away, clearing his throat and Katara notices his Adam's apple bob. She blushes too, aware just how much he had grown.

“I-I missed you. All of you; Aang, Sokka, Toph. It’s been hard…” He admits.

Progress? She only hoped. “Really?” Katara soothes, hesitantly reaching out to enclose his hand with hers. Zuko doesn’t shake her away.

“Come back.” Katara whispers softly. “After this, come back with me. If not to the Fire Nation, there’s always a place for you in Republic City. Aang can-”

He slips from her grasp, standing on his feet and trudging across the room. Zuko slumps against the wall, crossing his arms and shaking his head. “There’s no place for me. Go, Katara. Back to Republic City, back to Aang.”

“And what will happen if I leave, after you and the White Lotus take down the Ozai Society?” She wasn’t going to leave, of course.

Zuki shrugs. “Why do you care?”

“Because you have family who are worried about you. Iroh is going out of his mind, concerned about what happened to you, he’s not the same.” And because I want you back , she wanted to say, burrowing down her confession.

“I’m doing this for my Uncle.” Zuko clarified.

“No, you're being selfish and doing things on your own again. Keeping everyone who loves you at arm's length, telling yourself you’re protecting them, when in fact you’re only hurting them-

“Stop!”

“You stop!” She promised herself she’d keep her cool, she promised herself she would give Zuko the much needed time to come around. That flew out the window real fast. “When will you grow the hell up! I swear, I thought you matured after joining Aang but silly me for thinking that you’ve evolved from the childish, egocentric, spoiled prince-” She was on her feet, flying at him. Katara couldn’t contain the outrage, the audacity at how he lacked any consideration.

“I said, stop .” Zuko seethed, cuffing her wrists and pressing them to her chest.

“Not until you fix this! Not until you make things right by everyone who has been worried sick about you!”

“It’s none of your damn business!” He shouted, releasing her wrists and reeling back.

Katara’s left speechless. It doesn’t hit her that a single tear escapes down her cheek until her vision is blurred and a ball forms in her throat. She swallows, the ache failing to subside, and she turns away from Zuko in a daze.

Inhaling sharply, Katara regains her composure, wiping the stray tear with the palm of her hand. “I’m worried about you.”

There’s a moment of dead silence, beating darkly in the room. The weight came down heavy on Katara’s limbs like chains. She can hear Zuko’s feet shuffle on the wooden floor, a slow creak like that of a desperate cry. Then he sighs, footsteps retreating to the front door.

“Don’t be.”

***

She didn’t know when he returned. Dreary, swollen eyes fluttered open to the aura of his presence right next to the bed she borrowed. The inn was across town and the thought of leaving didn’t sit right with her, aside from the exhaustion of their discourse last night.

She sits up quietly, looking over his slumped figure; a mere shadow in a darkened room. Zuko’s hands were clasped together, elbows to knees and his forehead pressed to his fists. He seems to be asleep, until...

“I thought I had a purpose.” Zuko broke the silence. “I had so much to offer at the time, now that I had found my way. You, uncle, aang, everyone...you all gave me a reason to push forward. And though it took me so long to change, to finally realize the man I needed- no, wanted to be, in the end the universe decided I still wasn’t worthy enough.” He paused, Zuko’s breath shook with every attempt to gather himself. “I was so happy. I didn’t deserve it but I was so happy to have met you all. My only regret was that I didn’t make you part of my life sooner, that I didn’t make things right with my Uncle sooner, that I didn’t take the opportunity to truly examine my bad behavior early on in life and make better decisions- because then I’d have more of those precious moments to hold onto.”

Katara doesn’t like this. He’s pouring his heart out but she doesn’t like where this is going. A black hole formed in the pit of her stomach, noting the way Zuko clung roughly to the front of his tunic, at the very center where the evidence of his sacrifice lied. She doesn’t want to meet his eyes when he finally turns his gaze to her. She doesn’t want the memory of those amber eyes glossed with fear and sadness staring back at her with utter defeat.

Please, Yue . Katara prays.

“Katara,” He says softly. Any other time she would have loved to hear him call her name so softly- like a flutter kissing her cheek- but not like this, never like this. “I’m dying.”

#zutara #day 2 #counterpart #zutara week #zutara week 2020 #fanfiction #zutara fanfiction

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is-that-another-soulmate-au · 4 years

Text

Zukka Soulmate AU part 7

@mypureessence

@chaoticidiott

@ari-shipping-stuff

@knightedbot

@idkhowbutimgayer

@swampy-beans

@angrylittleintrovert

"Get away from. Him Azula" Zuko said while standing between his sistet and Aang

"Aw, do you really think you can capture him first Zuzu" she mocked

"No" he narrowed his eyes at her but turned his head to the right just a bit to see that Aang looked exhausted, of course he was. He was tracking his sister while her Mai and Ty Lee terrorized the group. He sent Jee and Iroh after the others to make sure they were safe while he want after Azula

She gave a huffed laugh "come on Zuko, why turn against fathers orders now? You could still get his love back yo-"

"Has it ever occurred to you that I've realized he never loved me in the first place?" He growled out "do you honestly think that two and a half years at sea wouldn't open my mind to the reality that a family isn't supposed to burn half your face off?"

"Come on Zuko, you know you deserved it, he had to teach you a lesson-"

"Shut up!" He fired a blast that she easily lept over and the chase was on once again, Azula chasing Aang and Zuko trying to stop her.

When she almost had a grip on Aang, Zuko picked up a large rock and chucked it at her managing to hit her in the wrist and send her spinning to an alley. She turned to glare at him while clutching her wrist while Aang managed to hide behind Zuko like he was Aang'solder brother or something "so your aim has gotten better I see, mommy's little assassin"

He held tight to a wooden plank he managed to grab as well and glared daggers back at her "no, youre just an actual target now"

"Is that so" she took a stance and went to fire a blast but was launched away by a block of earth under her feet revealing Toph, Katara, Sokka, Iroh and Jee.

"Toph!" Aang shouted and Zuko managed to relax just a bit

"Hey twinkle toes, we figured you guys could use some help with crazy over here" Toph jabbed her thumb in the general direction of Azula

"She's not crazy, she's just stuck and stubborn" Zuko pointed out

"Two very bad traits that lead to crazy Zuko" Aang said while elbowing the older teen in the side.

[Not a scene shift but a pov shift from Zuko to Sokka]

The group circled around Azula with their weapons at the ready and Sokka glared at this girl they had cornered, the way she looked mockingly at Zuko and the look Aang was giving him told him everything he needed to know. This girl had hurt Zuko in some way or maybe many ways.

Perhaps she's part of the reason they share so many scars. Regardless he knew she was a threat. "Alright, you got me" Sokka narrowed bis eyes, she was lying. "I know when I'm beat" she turned her back to them and started to kneel but shot a blast, at Zuko's Uncle. The expression that twisted Zuko's face was heartbreaking, it was as if Iroh was the only thing he had to hold onto and it was just ripped from him in an instant.

Filled with an almost unimaginable amount of rage Sokka threw his boomerang at Azula mere seconds before the rest laid on the bending and Azula disappeared

[And now we shift back to Zuko because I said so]

As soon as Azula was out of sight Zuko was at Iroh's side, he leaned his head down and pressed his ear to Iroh's chest listening for a heartbeat. After hearing one but noticing it was weak he let out a breath he didnt notice he was holding. Though the moment of slight relief didn't last long. He should have protected his Uncle, he's younger and faster, besides its him and Aang that Azula has quarrel with not Iroh.

Iroh was the only family he had left and now he might lose him too. All because he couldnt protect him. He felt his palms growing hot, like they were about to burst into flames so he clenched them in an attempt to suppress the fire. Jee sat beside him with a look of both fear and sympathy on his face.

"Zuko" he heard Katara softly call out behind him

"Leave us!" Zuko cried out over his shoulder

"Zuko I can help!"

"I said Leave!" He went to swing his arm back and release the flames begging to escape but Jee caught his hand halfway there and gave him a hard glare. Zuko stared at him with confusion but then his gaze shifted over to see Sokka staring at him with tear filled eyes and his heart sank.

He gave a sigh and Jee let go of his hand. "Oh... okay" he said in a soft voice before moving to let Katara take a spot beside Iroh so she could heal him. "Just... dont hurt him please" he whispered

"I would never" Katara reassured as Zuko watched her closely. He watched mesmerized by the glow in the water around her hands, he didnt even realize Sokka had moved beside him until he heard the dirt beside him scatter from the slump Sokka did.

Turning to Sokka he found himself pulled into a half hug and stiffened, he wanted to cry but didn't want to let himself until Sokka reached up and played with his hair as a comfort touch. It was like the floodgates opened, he held onto Sokka holding back sound but letting his tears flow with a few small whimpers.

It wasnt until three hours later when they were all huddled up in a small earth town inn that Zuko managed to bring himself to check on Iroh. He walked into the room and found Iroh sipping a cup of tea with Katara and Jee who all turned to him with smiles. "Zuko, how are you feeling?" Iroh asked with a grin

Zuko gave a snort and a stifled laugh that quickly devolved into a full belly laugh "me? How am I feeling?" He leaned against the wall with his hand and tried to catch his breath "you ask that like I was the one shot with a blast of blue fire!" He gave his uncle a grin "stop doting Uncle, its my turn for a while, okay?"

Iroh gave a hearty laugh and sigh "alright Prince Zuko, but I have one more question" he raised his brows with an unspoken question

"Oh no" Zuko slapped his face in a face palm motion, hearing a loud 'ouch!' From the other room

"Oh yes, that is the exact question" Iroh, Katara and Jee all snickered

"Not right now, they haven't even accepted us into the group, she's healing you and they might just up and leave us after that so Im not giving my hopes up"

"First of all mister gloomy!" Katara said while standing up and jabbing her finder into his chest "we have accepted you guys, and Second! You already have" she flicked his now very much out in the open blue ribbon tied around his forearm given his change of clothes into short sleeve earth kingdom clothes

Zuko flushed and turned away "thats.. uh... I have an explanation about that"

"I'd love to hear it" she put her hands on her hips and gave an expecting look.

"Uuuuhhhh... well you see... uhm..." he paused for a while and then just sighed while sagging his shoulders "okay fine I got it because Sokka's eyes are blue.... and really pretty...."

Katara clasped her hands together and inhaled with a big grin plastered across her face "Oh my gods thats so cute!"

"Shhh! Just... dont tell him okay? I know he doesn't like me so I'm just gonna wait for him to ask me to attempt to tell him okay?"

"Ugh! Fine!"

"Thank you" and with thst he snuck out of the room and back into the shared bedroom where Sokka and Aang were pressed against the wall. Shooting them a glare he made a 'tch' sound and walked out and sat outside the Inn on the small steps in front of the building.

Agni this day was a rollercoaster.

#avatar the last airbender #avatar: the last airbender #prince zuko #zuko #atla zuko #atla sokka #sokka #zukka #i will die on my endless soulmate au hill #soulmate alternate universe #soulmates #soulmate #RayMakesSoulmates #ray of sunshine #zuko x sokka #sokka x zuko

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just-another-author-i-guess · 5 years

Text

Bets:

Requested: yup

Warnings: she/her pronounced reader, mentions of hickey’s because I’m gross

Pairing: Zuko x reader

A/N: so this was a request, and I’ve been really excited to make it! I hope it turned out okay! In this, you’re Zuko’s secret girlfriend, you’re also Katara’s twin. Even though you and Zuko have been acting like two fools in love lately, the gaang still seems completely oblivious to the fact that the two of you are dating. You get tired of the gaangs obliviousness, and decides to make a bet. Who will win?

“When the war ends, I swear, the first thing I’m gonna do is buy us a sofa,” Zuko complained, back tired and bruised from having laid on the hard dirt all day. You giggled at his statement, and shifted your legs, trying to make him lay a little more comfortably in your lap. He hugged your leg tight, pouting into it at the discomfort.

“You’ll buy us a sofa? Wouldn’t that mean we’d have to live together?” You cheekily replied, heart beating as you looked down to meet his soft eyes.

This was the first time, he had ever really brought anything with the war up. You both knew it was coming to an end, of course, you both believed in Aang to end it. But never had any of you discussed what to do after, you couldn’t keep your relationship a secret forever.

Zuko would have to go back and claim his right to the throne of the fire nation, and you had to go back to your village. Of course you missed gran gran, and all your old friends, but the thought of having to leave Zuko was almost unbearable.

“Of course we’d have to live together, don’t think you can escape that easily,” Zuko replied, tone soft as he looked up to meet your sparkling eyes.

He wanted nothing more than to marry you, he wanted you to be his fire queen, but he didn’t know how his people would react. After all, you were a water bender and you were from the southern water tribes, and not only did he have to worry about his people, he had to worry about your family too.

He knew your relationship with your siblings, especially your twin sister, was very strong, and he wasn’t ready to get his ass kicked by the water tribe siblings just yet, even though you had been acting awfully much like a couple lately.

You saw the furrowing of his eyebrows, and gently reached a hand down to cup his cheek, making him look up at you.

“What’re you thinking about? You look so worried..” you trailed off, brushing your thumb gently over the burned skin of his cheek.

“Do you think they’ll accept me?” Zuko asked lowly, eyes nervously searching yours.

“I have done so much damage to your village and your people, if it was me I wouldn’t be ready to forgive me just yet-“

“Zuko,” you interrupted, making him stop his little rant.

“It’s fine, I could forgive you, so can they,” you said, determined to keep the worry away from your handsome prince’s face.

Zuko let out a grumpy sigh, indicating he didn’t believe your statement to be completely true. You merely chuckled at his antics, and gently brushed some hair out and away from his forehead, to plant a light kiss there.

“We can’t keep it a secret forever,” he mumbled, as you gently kissed his cheek.

“I know,” you sighed, when suddenly an idea lit in your head.

“Tell you what, we could make a bet out of it? Who do you think will notice first?” Zuko sat up, hair a mess from when you had buried your fingers in it earlier, and another pout stretching his pretty lips out.

“y/n, that’s a stupid idea,” he complained, and you rolled your eyes at the grumpy prince.

“Don’t be such a party pooper, it’ll be fun! Now, who do you choose?” He narrowed his eyes, knowing he had already lost the battle to your stubborn self.

“Choose?” He asked, a slight whine to his voice as he talked, and you rolled your eyes yet again.

“Who do you think will notice first, dummy,” you said, tone slightly annoyed as it was now Zuko’s turn to roll his eyes.

Zuko sighed, but finally gave an answer, “I choose..Toph and, uh, Sokka-“ you had to keep yourself from laughing too loud, at the mention of your older brothers name. He couldn’t possibly be serious, could he?

“What?” Zuko asked, shooting you a glare, but quickly changing his frown into a little smile, when he saw your laughing face.

“You can’t be serious, Sokka wouldn’t even know love if it slapped him in the face,” You wheezed, waiting for the moment Zuko would say he was joking, but it never came.

“I’m just saying, the guy has a girlfriend and all, I’m sure he’ll catch on to it soon enough,” Zuko tiredly explained, and you held up your hands in mock surrender, while still giggling like mad.

“Alright then, that leaves me with Aang and Katara, be prepared to loose,” you teased, thinking Zuko had already given up, you could never have been more wrong.

“I’m sorry, but I didn’t hear you over my victory,” he teased, a cheesy grin breaking out, making him look oh so adorable.

“Fine then,” you giggled, leaned forward to plant a sweet kiss to the corner of his mouth.

“Let the game begin.”

Next morning, had started with Zuko going out of his way to make you sit next to him at breakfast, even going as far as draping his arm lazily over your shoulders.

Not even a single stare had been thrown your way, as everything just went on as normal. Both you and Zuko decided, that it was time to try something more risky, and so you did.

After dinner, you practically glued to Zuko’s side, you cleared your throat.

“Goodnight guys, we’ll head to bed now, sleep well..” you awkwardly said, stretching your limbs as you talked, Zuko quickly standing up to wrap his arms around your waist.

“Goodnight guys! See you tomorrow!” Aang happily waved goodnight, innocent as ever, and you groaned in frustration as you turned to walk away, still with Zuko’s hands and arms all over you.

Nobody even questioned why you were going together, nor did they seem to notice the hungry stare Zuko had been sending you the entire evening. This was going to be way more difficult than you originally thought.

As the two of you entered his tent, Zuko let out a frustrated groan, falling onto his sleeping mat.

“How can they be so dense? We’ve literally done every single thing, and there they are, just waving goodnight to us like nothings happening,” he buried his face in his pillow, as you let your body drop down next to his, and bury your face in his warm back.

“Mhm,” you answered, eyelids already feeling heavy, as you relaxed into him.

Zuko tiredly sighed again, and turned around, to cuddle you, wrapping his arms around your waist and letting you bury your face in his hard chest.

Suddenly your lips were moving, smirking into his chest.

“Sokka and Aang sleeps in here too, right?” You asked, looking up at him from under your eyelashes, hoping he was catching on. The smirk that stretched across his lips, told you he already knew what you were saying.

“Yeah, it would be a shame if they were to walk in on something,” he said mischievously, just as he bend his head down, so his lips could catch yours.

The next morning, you had woken up snuggled tightly and comfortably in Zuko’s arms. The sunlight had hit your face, and you had realized that both Aang and Sokka were in the tent.

Quickly, you removed yourself from Zuko’s sleeping form, hearing his small sleepy protests, as you red faced went out to help Katara with breakfast.

“You and Zuko seem to be getting awfully close,” Katara mumbled, as you were standing besides her, washing the dishes in a river nearby.

“W-What do you mean?” You asked cheekily, thinking you were about to win the bet, you and Zuko had made earlier.

“You know, you didn’t use to be alone together this much, I’m happy that you’re becoming friends and all-“

“What?” You interrupted your twin, making her shoot you an annoyed glare, you knew how much she hated getting interrupted.

“You think we’re becoming friends?” You asked, eyes wide, as the realization sank in. They all just thought you were good friends. How ignorant can they be?

“You guys aren’t friends?” She asked, head tilting as she talked, confusion lazing in her words, and you realized how your sentence must have sounded to her.

“No-I mean, yeah, but no,” you began to explain, almost choking down your own words, as she looked at you funny again.

“What?” She asked, and stopped cleaning the dishes for a while, when she was too busy trying to figure out what you were saying.

“Just-I’ll- nevermind,” you said, cheeks aflame, as you started to wash the dishes in a furious pace, almost breaking a few plates.

Sitting by the campfire, everything went on as it normally did. Nothing more.

That was until Aang accidentally touched your hand, when shifting in his seat. Instantly Zuko’s not so discreet jealousy shined through, and he almost growled at the poor avatar, before pulling you into his lap, your back flush against his chest.

Your cheeks flushed with red, but quickly died down again, when the others didn’t even lift their gaze to look at you, except for Aang, who gave you a funny look but soon brushed it off.

At the ignorance, Zuko let out a low, frustrated growl into the junction where your neck meets your shoulder. The little action, cause shivers down your spine, as you looked nervously around at the others.

Your reaction didn’t go unnoticed by Zuko, and soon he was gently kissing at the spot, causing more shivers to run through you.

“Z-Zuko,” You rasped, trying to get his attention, and trying to stop him before he got carried too far.

It was already too late, and after hearing your little protest, you could feel him smirk as he bit down a little harder on the spot, causing a slight whimper to escape you.

That whimper would be the doom of you, as Sokka’s ears instantly perked, and he looked over to you and Zuko. It was already too late, and when he pulled away, there were already a big, dark hickey forming, very visible to everyone who would even dare to look your way.

“Flameo is dating my little sister!” Sokka wheezed out, face instantly going red and expression changing from everything between happiness and devastating horror.

“Seems like I won, then,” Zuko said, tone cocky as you glared at him and quickly pulled your hair in front of you, to try to cover the hickey as best as you could.

“y/n, is this true?” Katara asked, tone slightly panicked and a judging look resting on her features.

“Uh-I-I-“ You stuttered, suddenly loosing the ability to talk, as you could feel Zuko let out a huff off air behind you.

“Yes, that is true, I’ve known for a couple weeks now, they’re really getting at it guys-“ you slapped a hand over Toph’s mouth, looking at her with shocked eyes, face turning redder by the second, as you felt Zuko stiffen behind you.

“You’ve known?” He asked, horrified, and Toph licked your palm, making you quickly retreat it as she answered.

“Yep, it’s impossible not to know, considering how much you guys-“

“Okay, I think we heard enough!” Katara cut her off, looking at the two of you with a horrific expression, you and Zuko looking back at her with equally terrified expressions.

The rest of the night was spend teasing the two of you, until your faces were so red, they could very likely explode. Actually, the next few weeks were spend that way, but hey, at least you didn’t have to keep it a secret anymore.

#i hope this is okay #zuko x reader #prince zuko #avatar the last airbender x reader #avatar the last airbender #avatar toph #avatar katara #avatar zuko #avatar sokka #avatar aang #prince zuko fanclub

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saang · 4 years

Note

maybe some mutual pining???

mutual pining coming right up,,,

and apparently i can’t write anything under 1500 words when it comes to taang

word count: 1800

read it on ao3

They walked through the town, silently laughing to not to disturb the citizens. Aang could hardly breathe. Times with Toph were always his favourite. Even though the earthbender could be frustrating, more often than not they got along like a house fire.

Toph suppressed chuckles under her breath. She wasn’t focused on the world around her, so she let Aang guide her. Putting her absolute trust in him. Aang had long forgotten how their laughing fit had started, but whenever either of them said anything, a chorus of laughs would make it start again.

They set out to explore the town near their campsite. Sokka and Suki went out to find food. Katara and Zuko didn’t need help setting up for dinner which left Toph and Aang to their own devices. Just like old times. Aang covered his arrows so he wouldn’t be mauled by fans. Now, he was almost regretting it. He could feel the sweat starting to form, accumulating around the brim of his hat.

The summer heat, combined with the blood boiling within his veins caused by Toph’s hands curled around his forearm. It was almost becoming too much. Almost. He’d go through anything if it meant he could be close to Toph. Even when she was infuriating, she was the light of his life. The love of his life.

Unbeknownst to him, Toph felt the exact same. It had been a learning curve. She had never felt something so strong in her entire life. When she’d been twelve, and she hadn’t been in love with her best friend of seven years, everything had been so much easier.

When her heart started beating faster around him, her breathing faltering, she had refused to accept it. She was too stubborn to admit to herself that she had fallen for Aang. He had long gotten over what he dubbed his ‘babysitter crush’ on Katara, but she still doubted he’d ever think of her like that. She was reluctant to get her heartbroken if that was the case. Neither Suki nor Katara faulted her for that when they eventually found out.

They found out at a Fire Nation celebration. Aang had whisked Toph away, dancing wildly, no fear of being judged. When Toph returned to her seat and Aang returned to the dance floor. The head she had once held up high with the shining grin fell. It was a mix of relief and yearning.

“Toph? Are you okay?” Katara had asked, her hand resting lightly around her glass. Her clothes were very reminiscent of what she wore when they were fugitives, hiding in plain sight all around the Fire Nation.

“Yeah, just a little tired, that’s all,” Toph had replied, putting on her cheery façade once again. Suki snickered and Katara scoffed, shaking her head slightly to brush the hair out of her face.

“I’ve seen you tired Toph. This isn’t it,” at Katara’s words, Toph let out a defeated whine. Toph shifted in her seat so she was fully facing both Suki and Katara.

“You have to promise not to tell anyone,” the two girls had hummed in agreement. “I think I might be kind of really in love with Aang.”

Sokka and Zuko, however, had found out almost immediately after Aang did. He and Zuko were firebending, talking with Sokka about how Zuko was reforming the Fire Nation. Halfway through a move Aang stopped, his eyes went wide. His mouth agape.

“Hey, Aang? Buddy? What’s wrong?” Sokka had asked while walking up to the two now that they weren’t shooting fire from their fingertips.

“I’m in love with Toph,” Aang had said simply. After he’d said it, a grin started to emerge. “Oh my God, I’m in love with Toph!”

“Okay, I’ll handle the obituary if you handle the food,” Zuko had bargained turning to Sokka.

“Deal. Katara can handle the guests, and Suki can get Toph out of jail for killing Aang,” Sokka had agreed, affirming their arrangements with a handshake.

“Well, it’s not like I can do anything about it anyways. I don’t think she’d ever think about me that way. I’ll just live in secret for the rest of my life.”

Aang and Toph had made their way back to the campsite. They had calmed down, but Toph’s hands still wrapped themselves around Aang’s arm. When Katara saw it, she immediately looked at Zuko, who looked at Sokka, who looked at Suki. Suki glanced at the couple, then to Katara.

“Katara? Can you come here for a second?” Suki’s eyes were boring into her soul. Katara quickly nodded and walked over to her.

“What’s up?” Suki yanked the water bender down to the log she was sitting on. Making Katara let out a small yelp.

“We need to get those two together. I’m tired of the constant pining,” Suki whispered, careful not to let anybody hear.

“Yeah, but how? It’s not like we can just force them to date,” Katara whispered back.

“Maybe Sokka will know?”

“It seems suspicious if all of us were crowded around without Aang or Toph.”

“Yeah, that’s true,” Sokka said beside them, scaring Katara enough she almost fell off the log.

“Oh my God,” it was barely a whisper, her hand was on her chest, her eyes closed tightly. She smacked Sokka's arm after she had somewhat recovered. “You scared me half to death!”

“What are you guys talking about?” Zuko strolled up. The cloth he was holding, now draped over his shoulder.

“Oh nothing,” Katara assured. She leaned in closer to Zuko, whispering in his ear. “I’ll tell you later.”

“Okay. Anyways, I came over here to tell you dinner is ready,” as the words came out of Zuko’s mouth, Sokka dashed towards the food. Suki rolled her eyes but followed her husband to the table, where Aang and Toph sat. Zuko held a hand out for Katara, helping her off the log.

“Always the gentleman,” Katara teased. Zuko laughed a little, smiling as they joined everybody else. Whenever Aang looked at Toph a small blush would dust his cheeks. He was glad Toph couldn’t see it and he was glad no one else spoke up about it.

The night progressed without much of a hitch. Aang went to sleep the earliest followed by Toph. It was the perfect opportunity to discuss Katara and Suki’s wonderful plans.

“We need to get Toph and Aang together,” Suki said once it was just the four of them.

“Well, yeah,” Sokka replied. “But it’s not like either of them are going to admit that to each other.”

“Maybe we need to just tell them outright,” Zuko offered up the solution.

“What do you mean? When they wake up just say ‘oh yeah, you guys are in love with each other, here’s breakfast!’” Suki mocked.

“The looks on their faces would be so good if we did that though,” Katara laughed. “Honestly, I vote we do that just for the shock value.”

“It would be good,” Sokka agreed. “Toph would probably hate us, but it would be good.”

“It’s a price I’m willing to pay,” Suki kept her composure for a few seconds before laughing.

“Alright, who’s going to say it?” Sokka asked. “I vote Katara.”

“What? Why me?”

“I don’t know, I feel like you would have the best chances of coming out of it alive.”

“That’s a valid point,” Zuko said. “You can go toe to toe with Toph, I’ve seen you do it.”

“Okay so,” Suki started. “Katara will tell them, we will hide in a tree so Toph can’t see us. Aang and Toph will get together or just stop being that tension around wherever they go, at least. There we go, problem solved!”

The four stayed up for a little while longer, the conversation drifting off the topic of the two young, but oblivious, lovebirds. Eventually, they went to bed, Katara was woken up by the smell of the fire pit.

She got up out of her tent to see Zuko stoking the flames. “You’re up early,” she noticed.

“I rise with the sun. It’s a firebender thing,” he explained. “You ready to end a few years of mutual pining?”

“Yes, I am. I don't deserve to be subjected to their hopelessness any longer. I am much too good for that.”

Zuko rolled his eyes goodheartedly at Katara. He glanced over at Aang’s tent. He saw movement inside of it. “Looks like Aang is up, now we just wait for Toph.”

Aang came out of his tent, taking a seat by the fire. Suki and Sokka got up next. They all, sans Aang, shared an anxious look, knowing what would go down today.

Toph, eventually, woke up. Katara looked between the two youngest members of their group. Then to Sokka, Suki and Zuko. They silently urged her to follow through with the haphazard plan they had brewed up the previous night.

“So, the weather is nice today isn’t it?” Katara asked. She received a nod from Aang and a murmur from a Toph. “Almost as nice as it would be if you two admitted your love for each other.”

She tried to sound nonchalant about it, and the high pitched sounds coming from her brother's direction did not help. The choking sounds coming from Aang also didn’t help.

“Our what?” Toph asked, incredulously. Aang was still coughing, trying to recover from almost drowning himself.

“You two are in love. It’s quite obvious when you look at it objectively,” Katara said, maintaining her ambivalent exterior. She was screaming on the inside, but only she knew that.

“We’re what?” Aang asked, finally able to breathe.

“In love,” Katara was trying so hard to keep calm. Aang turned towards Toph, both of their cheeks so red.

“We are?” Aang asked in response, although it was more aimed at Toph than Katara. Toph could feel how fast Aang’s heart was beating, it could only be rivalled by her own.

“If you are, then there could be a possibility that I am as well,” Toph answered. Her cheeks, if it were even possible, turned a more pigmented shade of red.

“And if I said I was?”

“I would say I am too.”

“Finally!” Sokka yelled in triumph. “It has been literal years! We are finally free!”

“Here, here!” Suki screamed. “Here is to Katara, for getting them to admit it!”

“You’ve been in love with me for years?” Toph asked.

“Yes,” Aang answered. “I am in love with you, Toph Beifong. I have been for three years.”

“Well in that case, how about we ditch these folks and go on a little adventure?” Toph suggested, her cheeks were still red, but she had a confident smirk on her face.

“Lead the way,” Aang said, taking Toph’s hand in his own and smiling.

#thank you for the prompt #taang #aang #avatar: the last airbender #toph #toph beifong #tophaang #toph bei fong x aang #toph beifong x aang #taang oneshot #these two are so cute #i love them #fic #taang fanfiction

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zukofenty · 4 years

Text

FWU

➜ Summary: The one where Katara (is sure) she's in love with the campus drug dealer.

“Sokka, I swear! He’s not a drug dealer...he’s just an unlicensed pharmacist!”

➜ Genre: Modern!AU, humor, DrugDealer!Zuko

➜ Words: 2.5k

➜ Warnings: I will fight Katara for DrugDealer!Zuko 😩

AO3

“We got the goods!” Katara squeals, throwing down flour, sugar, chocolate chips, and a sack of marijuana.

Suki picks it up, sniffing the plastic bag. “This shit is loud and clear.” Her smile is dangerously devious. “Thanks, Zuko! This is going to be the best 4/20 ever!” Suki immediately begins to grab the proffered ingredients, shuffling them to the kitchen. She’s already taking some of the buds and putting them on a tray to prep in the oven. “Who knew fingering a drug dealer’s asshole would come in handy?”

Zuko immediately turns beet red. “Why do you keep telling people that happened?” Katara slaps Suki upside the head.

“Because I like seeing the two of you squirm, sue me!” Suki admits, shrugging her shoulders and dodging Toph’s slap to her ass.

Katara collapses on her futon, positively spent after spending the day helping Zuko drop off sacks for his clients, while buying all the ingredients they needed for baking edibles to celebrate the holiday.

“Zuko, what the fuck are you doing!” Katara screams, almost losing grip of the wheel.

“How about you make sure your fucking Prius doesn’t eat shit?” Zuko screeches, coming back to his seat after sticking his entire body out the hybrid car.

Katara smacks her forehead. The pain where she hit is almost as bad as the frustration she feels. “This is the exact fucking reason I never get Chipotle with you!” She sees the car that was formerly beside her pulled over at the side of the freeway, the driver clearly angry with how hard he was pounding the pavement with his fist. His entire body is covered in Zuko’s half chicken half barbacoa burrito bowl.

“I’m not going to lie, that was impressive. The NFL’s vag must be positively pulsating,” Katara deadpans, rubbing at her temples to relieve the pressure from forming. Sokka always said her road rage was the worst he’s ever seen, but alas her shouting and occasionally flipping people off could never compare to Zuko’s hotheadedness. Her gut feeling about grabbing an extra bowl paid off, much to her dismay. This was not a rare occurrence. “How did you manage to throw your entire bowl through the crack of his window?”

“Well, the NFL can go eat a dick!” Zuko says, wiping his hands on a Chipotle napkin before taking a sip from his water cup filled to the brim with their lemonade. “And the shit dick had it coming.” He did, Zuko swears. It’s completely his fault for not only playing Michael Buble as loud as his Honda Accord was capable of, but also refusing to use his turn signal, and then screaming “fuck you, pussy hoe!” when Katara honked at him. That bitch.

“Right. Anyways, I’m recalling a conversation we had I think...yes! Two days ago. You’re still thinking about going to therapy, right? You’re moving on from your designated therapy toad?”

Zuko fully turns to face Katara. He accidentally bumps his head on the roof, and proceeds to smack it. “First of all, what makes you say that? Second of all, you know Frank has a name!”

“Not your anger issues, of course.” She doesn’t miss his eye roll. “Also, when you gave me your phone so I could text your uncle that you were going to pick him up, I went through your Youtube search history. Because I care. You deserve better than boxed hair dye tutorials, Zuko. I know you can do better.” At the red light, she grabs Zuko’s shoulder in an almost caring manner. He slaps her tiny hand away.

Zuko was certain he was spending this 4/20 positively baked , so while he waited for everyone to wash their hands so they could whip up his favorite Vegan Chocolate Chip Cookies edibles (with a gooey marshmallow middle), he took out his grinder from his hoodie’s pocket.

He grabs at the Sailor Moon bong he bought Katara for the one month anniversary of the time she saved him from being beaten to death by a group of frat brothers. She didn’t nearly like using marijuana as much her friends did, insisting on her maintaining her brain and lung health. She’d never admit to enjoying the cannabliss that came with huffing and puffing out some Mary Jane, but Zuko knows her sleepy smile after taking a hit lets her sleep just the slightest bit better.

Especially now that she’s working nonstop to pay off her tuition this semester. While Sokka was efficiently loaded, his record label was going through a rough patch after a scandal with one of their artists. Apparently, having viral toe sucking videos reflected badly on you as a person, and a number of investors pulled out after the news broke. Sokka was dipping into emergency savings, about to sell the Bugatti, but Katara insisted on taking on a few part time jobs. It breaks Zuko’s heart when he’s the first one to come home to her apartment, even after doing his runs for the night. She’s always blearly, insisting on taking a “quick nap” before she takes off her makeup. He likes feeling useful, when she instantly falls asleep and he’s the one using Micellar Water and a cotton pad to rub off her stubborn mascara of the day.

“I will literally curb stomp the Dean for you,” Zuko tells her, the fire behind his words that makes Katara doubt it was a passing joke.

“Zuko. No.”

He remembers being woken up in the middle of the night, Katara whispering into her phone. He invested in the Sailor Moon pipe after he found out she could only sleep a few hours, before being woken up abruptly from the stress weighing on her mind (her dark circles betrayed her). “I started seeing someone,” Katara mutters, checking over her shoulder to see if Zuko was still sound asleep. She started wincing at the palpable silence that followed.

“As in dating or hallucinations?” Sokka questions, much too loud for her taste.

She sighs. “Don’t get like this! He’s a good guy, I promise. His name’s Zuko.” She hears shuffling on the other side of the line, after the prominent thunk of the phone dropping. “Why does that name sound so familiar? And so colonizer-like…” His voice is filled with suspicion, and she could almost see the cogs in his brain whirring to life. Before she could utter another word, her brother abruptly yelps. “Isn’t he the drug dealer who got beat up on campus?”

Katara sucks in a breath. “How do you know about that?”

“I read the Campus Crime Alert emails the school sends out, idiot! For such an expensive school, you would think they would have better security and less laptop snatchings. By the way, we need to buy you a laptop lock. You still have that self defense knife I sent you?” Sokka angrily whispers in the phone, mocking Katara’s quiet tone.

“Yes, dad !” She hears his irate protests as she flips her body to face Zuko. He looks a few years younger when he sleeps, breathing even and face forgetting the patented scowl. His bare chest and sweatpants hanging low on his hips were enticing. His hair was almost perfectly positioned, the strands messy and unruly but just screamed Zuko . The dangly cross earring doing too much to her heart. Down girl, down! Katara tells her pussy. “Sokka, I swear! He’s not a drug dealer...he’s just an unlicensed pharmacist!”

“I have the email right here! Right here! And tell me what about ‘student being violently attacked due to drug related incidents ’ doesn’t scream drug dealer getting beat up for drug dealing !” Katara bites down on her tongue, whether to hold back a laugh or scream she wasn’t completely sure.

Suki takes a hit from her Hello Kitty dab pen, a white, bedazzled one that Zuko had gotten her. Toph and Katara also had matching Hello Kitty dab pens, in green and blue respectively. She thinks Zuko has one in red, too. She added a second layer of soy lecithin to the weed infused mixture, before popping it in the oven again for another 30 mins.

In the meantime, Katara was preparing the ingredients for the cookies. Zuko’s laying on the ground, narrowly missing the futon, eyes glazed over. He hasn’t moved in the past twenty minutes. “Katara, that isn’t the hand mixer, that’s your vibrator .” Suko gently chastises, moving the device from her lax hands. Katara always complained her hands were numb when she was high, and once dropped a mug from their balcony after they packed a bowl together for the first time. Suki is still bitter. It was her favorite Gudetama mug.

After freezing the mixture for two hours, Suki, Toph, and Zuko were hard at work, mixing ingredients, and preparing to get fucked up. A few people have stopped by the apartment to exchange plastic bags for cash.

“Are you turning Katara’s apartment into a dispensary? ” Toph is absolutely incredulous.

“That’s a loaded question with an answer very much open to interpretation…” Zuko ducks the house slipper Toph propels to his face.

Katara has a dumb smile on her face, wide and threatening to split her head open. She’s an avid texter when she’s baked.

Katara: What are you doing right now? Come over! Zuko’s got apology weed for you <3

Jet: I’m at McDonald’s!! Kinda of high lol

Katara: Ooo you got the munchies?

Jet: Nah

Katara: how come?

Jet: I smoke meth lmaoooo

“Who are you texting?” Zuko asks, plopping next to her spot on the floor. She’s sprawled out, hair every which way and tangling into already unruly knots he’s going to have to detangle in the morning for her. Because Katara’s a lightweight, and suffers from weed hangovers regularly. Zuko’s already recovered from his many hits at the Moon Stick pipe.

“Did you know Jet smokes meth?”

Zuko rolls his eyes, curling up and trapping Katara with his outstretched embrace. “I really thought he would like my I’m sorry weed.”

“Me too.” He kisses the pout off of her.

Katara steadily crawls up (Zuko doesn’t miss her sleep shorts riding up) and tries her best to help Toph mix the marshmallow and Cinnamon Toast crunch mixture being heated up in their big pot they stole from Katara’s neighbor.

When Katara grabs the hand mixer to try assisting the cookie batter, Zuko knew he had to intervene lest something explodes. She smiles when he surrounds her with his body, the warm weight of his chest against her back and his hand wrapping around hers on the mixing device.

He loves her, he’s sure. Even while they roll the cookies together she tries to be funny (when she clearly knows she isn’t) and throws the dough at him, and it lands in his hair. He’s sure she peed herself with how hard she was laughing and scrambling to find the bathroom when her eyes could barely open.

Zuko shuts down his phone when the sweet scent of the pastries flood his nostrils. Even if 4/20 is like his version of Christmas, he’s determined to spend it with his girl. “I think my pussy just gave out. That shit looks dank ,” Katara squeals, shaking Toph by the shoulders to emphasize her point.

“Thanks for the visual,” Toph says, looking devious and wholly prepared to get stoned.

“I could beat his ass if I needed to,” Katara loudly whispers in Suki’s ear. At this point, they were all laying down on the floor, the familiar tingle of an impending high at the forefront of their minds.

“Katara, you’re staring at a poster of 11 year old Frankie Muniz.” Suki shakes the girl off her. “Why do you always say that about any guy you see, sober or not?”

Zuko’s the most sober of them all, but based on the fact he killed a few joints on his own, he thinks he’s about to die. Toph’s on the balcony, weary of the smoke detector. She comes back in after repeatedly coughing, pounding at her chest to lessen the pain. She promptly lays on the floor with the rest of them, stupidly smiling.

Zuko sits, leaning on the futon for support. He pulls Katara into his lap, and she’s pliant, immediately melting in his hold. Hands coming out to wrap around his neck. “Check your school portal,” he says into her ear. She laughs at the sensation.

“Why?” She’s breathless, when he rubs comforting circles into her back. Zuko finds her phone, thrown carelessly on the futon, before gingerly handing it to her. After she types in the login information, she gasps, the sound reverberating through the room. Zuko blushes, and rubs the back of his neck gingerly.

“Happy 4/20, baby,” he presses a sweet kiss to her hair, wiping away the pricks of tears appearing at her eyes.

“ You’re lying !” She couldn’t believe her eyes, and thinks she’s a little dizzy from how many times she zooms in and out of the tuition financial statement. “You’re fucking lying!” The bill, formerly with a nauseating number of zeros was now only $0.00. “How?” she splutters, even spitting in her haste.

“Toph knew your portal login, so I just kind of...paid it off?” He’s doing the thing where he’s rubbing at his neck and looking shy, and so so positively adorable . The sheepish look he gives her makes it known that she was screwed . So absolutely in love. “I want you to not worry about it. Save the money from your job for something else.” The kiss she slams against his lips nearly knocks his breath away.

“So what’s your plan, after paying all this off?” Zuko remembered Toph asking, after she entered Katara's password.

“After this, she’s catching all this ball juice. Going to suck her eggs out her ovaries like it’s boba. I’ll even use the straw and everything,” Zuko says, entering the pin of his debit card.

“You know what. She should have let you die that night.”

“Who knew there would be perks to dating a drug dealer?” Toph teases. “Girls be so single and then boom ! Baby shower pictures with some drug dealer in a Burberry shirt and Nike Air Maxes.”

Suki groans. “Toph, I swear. You are a hindrance to society.”

“Well, you’re a cunt!”

She shoves the smaller girl. She gets up to face Katara, still staring at her phone in shock. Her hair is a bird’s nest after growing two sizes two large and painfully matted. “You know, we thought we were bad friends for letting you date a drug dealer with mommy and daddy issues. We just sat there and prayed that our ‘we’re so happy for you guys!’ was convincing. But, I kind of like him.”

“Thanks for the support,” Zuko grumbles.

“Anytime!” The two say, perfectly synchronized.

“Like MJ doctor, they killing me,” Zuko sighs, dropping his head in the crook of her neck, defeated. Katara’s heart nearly bursts because he’s so cute . A big bad drug dealer, but she still was squeezing at his cheeks like they were mochi, and he was dumbly smiling back.

“Why do you always quote Nicki Minaj lyrics when you’re high?” She thinks she can’t feel her face, the excessive smiling numbing her features.

He’s bombed, stomach growling from getting the munchies and devouring an entire box of Suki’s Wheat Thins cereal and he thinks he feels his heart about to explode. Whether it’s Katara’s sweet, sweet smile, or her body pressing to his, he’s not sure. She’s soft and perfect and everything he could have asked for. He’s sure he’s in love, the type of love that was dangerous and stupid and promised to consume him whole. Yet, he’s all but offered his heart on a silver platter to Katara. Her presence in his life was a constant he was willing to fight to keep.

“I love you,” he mumbles against her lips.

“I know.” She stares into his eyes, before grabbing his hand. “I love you more.”

“Impossible.”

She pokes his chest in protest.

“Say it again, please?” Zuko begs, voice whiny. Her kiss was an adequate confirmation of the sentiment.

#zutara fanfiction #zuko x katara #zuko #katara #zutara fanfic #zutara #atla

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saang · 4 years

Note

stars for the taang prompt thing maybe??

i did not think it was going to end up being this long,,,,,, i also did not think i was going to be done so soon,,,,, but uhhh here is a taang oneshot about stars, i guess

word count: 1700

read it on ao3

“What do stars even look like? Like, what’s so special about them?” Toph asked. She shrugged her shoulders, the dim light of night casting shadows on her skin.

“They’re gorgeous. One of the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen, besides Suki of course!” Sokka exclaimed, putting an arm around his girlfriend. She leaned into his embrace, her head resting in the space between his shoulder and his neck.

“They breathe light, they peer into your soul. Mimicking your movements, but never mocking them. They are a source of light, causing a shadow on all of us. Within all of us,” Zuko monologued, a near sleeping Katara in his arms.

“Okay, Mister Proverb,” Toph rolled her eyes, her arms crossed against her chest. “I'm just going to go to bed, it’s not like I’d actually be missing something.”

“Maybe you should bring Aang along with you,” Suki commented, noticing the sleeping Avatar.

“Twinkle toes, wake up,” Toph batted his arm lightly. It was enough to wake him up, but only enough to put him in a sleepy haze. Toph pulled him up and walked him back through the forest back to their camp.

With each step Aang felt more awake, the small vibrations he’d been trained to feel, reverberating throughout his body. As he became more coherent, he noticed Toph’s hand wrapped around his wrist. It made his pulse quicken slightly, which he was sure Toph took note of. The air was brisk against his skin. It aided in waking him up and cooling the blush that overtook his cheeks.

Toph felt Aang’s pulse falter, if only just for a second. She took that as a sign he was actually waking up.

“Oh, you’re finally awake,” Toph said, her hand letting go of Aang’s wrist; much to his disappointment. They both lost a warmth that they’d been yearning for. The loss of warmth and physical contact sent shivers down her spine, it caused goosebumps to decorate her arms. Finally feeling the cool breeze of the night.

She was finally feeling everything. Not being overcome by a love-struck haze. Having Aang so close, with nothing else keeping her focused, the only thing she could focus on was him. How warm his hands were, how soft his skin was, everything about him consumed her. Much to her dismay, it was now gone. It forced her to push down her feelings and focus on the world around her. The grass, the trees, the broken branches and fallen leaves. The ever so light steps of the ants crawling across the forest floor.

Aang’s wrist felt so cold without the warmth Toph provided. It almost made him angry how much comfort she could give him. In spite of how incredibly fast his heartbeat around her, he was always at peace with her around. He wished he could tell her everything. How much he adored her. How much he wished they could be together, but when push comes to shove, he always gets scared. Toph would’ve said that’s very air bender of him; if she knew that is.

They were almost at the campsite when Toph stopped. Aang immediately stopped with her, looking both confused and worried.

“Toph? What’s wrong?” his voice soft, like always when he was talking to Toph.

“It’s nothing, never mind. Let’s just keep moving,” she brushed it off and started walking again. Only to be stopped by Aang’s hand on her shoulder.

“If something is bothering you, you can tell me. I won’t judge you, I promise,” Aang assured. His voice calm, welcoming, loving.

“I said it’s nothing, you don’t need to worry about it.”

“Are you sure? I’ve been told I’m a good listener.”

“Yeah, I'm sure,” Aang’s hand slowly slid off of her shoulder. She was so lovestruck she almost whined when she lost the physical contact. “Actually, I’m not sure, and this has been bugging me for a while. I’ve never really been one to beat around the bush. I’ve never really been one to ramble, but look at me now. Anyways, I just wanted to say, I’m in love with you. I have been for a while.”

“At first I was scared, I’d never felt anything like this, and it was you. We always fight, I get on your nerves. You get on mine, how was this ever going to work? I tried to get over my feelings, get rid of them somehow. All that did was reinforce them stronger than before, and I’ve been dancing around it for months now. It’s been nagging at me nonstop since this isn’t something I do, like ever. I get it if you never want to speak to me again, but you deserve to know,” Toph rambled, her hands fidgeting from the nerves. Aang stood there speechless. The love of his life had just confessed to him. The love of his life just confessed to him. A sly smirk appeared in his face

“Does Toph Bei Fong, Heiress of the Bei Fong company, like little old me?” Aang teased, his smile wider than ever.

“Not anymore,” Toph said plainly walking away.

“Wait, wait. I was joking, I really like you too, please come back,” Aang yelled after her, he smiled after he heard her laugh. Her laugh, the first thing he fell in love with about her. The reason he fell in love with her.

“Does the mighty Avatar Aang have a crush on little old me?” Toph teased back. The smirk once adorning his features now adorning hers.

“Absolutely,” Aang smiled. She looked breathtaking in the scarce moonlight. She always looked breathtaking, but this was certainly a sight to see. Toph blushed at his bold confession. Aang stepped towards her, taking her hands in his own.

“May I,” he asked, his lips inches away from hers. She could feel the warmth of his breath on her face. She nodded, her breath catching in her throat at the closeness. Aang leaned down, his lips capturing hers in a soft embrace. It was innocent, sweet, like sugar. It was something written in a fairytale. The prince and princess sharing a kiss, perfect and quaint.

They broke apart after a few seconds, grinning like fools. Aang rested his forehead against hers, a breathy chuckle escaping his lips. Their fingers were still intertwined, their hearts were beating fast, their cheeks were flushed. Neither one of them had the strength, the will to break the silence between them. They were simply content where they stood.

The air musky, the soil at their feet slightly damp from the rain the past few nights. Toph hoped mother nature would take pity on her and grant her one night without rain. One night, where she and Aang could stay like this, where they stood, happily in love. She heard thunder in the distance and knew nature hadn’t been merciful.

“We should head back to camp before we catch a cold,” She whispered, Aang hummed in agreement, but didn’t move an inch. They stayed there for a few minutes, until they felt the first drops fall. Toph and Aang, hand in hand, ran back to the campsite. Laughter filled the air as they finally reached Toph’s rock tent. Aang using his water bending to get the water out of their clothes.

“I love you too,” Aang told her as he got the last bit of water out of his clothes. Toph hummed in confusion. “ You told me you loved me. I didn’t say it back, so I’m saying it now. I love you Toph Bei Fong, with everything that I have.”

“That’s so cheesy!” Toph exclaimed, lightly punching his arm. Aang laughed at her response. They fell into another comfortable silence as Aang got rid of all the water. Aang slowly moved his hands towards hers. She noticed and intertwined her fingers with his. Toph couldn’t hold back her smile as he caressed her hand with the pad of his thumb.

They sat there for as long as time could tell, Toph sitting between Aang’s legs. Her back on his chest, his chin on her head. Their hands held together, and their hearts beating in sync.

Aang was already asleep and Toph’s eyelids were getting heavier by the minute; listening to the rain, Aang's heartbeat, the softness of his hands holding hers. It was a noteless lullaby pulling her into a deep slumber.

The voices of her friends pulled her out. She quickly fell back into a sleepy haze when Aang’s arms tightened around her; causing her to immediately relax into his sleeping form.

She was lulled to sleep by muffled voices and steady heartbeats. The corners of her lips perked up into a faint grin, her mind filled with elation. She was in Aang’s arms without a care in the world.

“It kind of made me sad when Toph asked what was so special about stars. She’s so adamant about not being treated differently, I sort of forgot she was blind for a second,” Suki eyes reflected the flames she was sitting in front of. The light of the fire casting amber toned shadows against her skin. Katara used her water bending to create a shield around them, keeping them dry from the pouring rain.

“Yeah, I can't imagine having never seen stars, the night sky. Colours at dusk, at dawn. The light seeping through clouds on a summer day. It’s tragic,” Zuko said, his hand playing with Katara’s hair, her head on his lap.

“Why do you sound like a novel? The words that come out of your mouth belong on a page. Nobody else talks like you, it’s weird,” Sokka replied. His eyes narrowed in confusion as he spoke.

“I take that as a compliment, thank you.”

“Of course you would,” Sokka rolled his eyes. A smirk on his face; showing everybody he didn’t truly mean it.

“We should all take after Aang and Toph and get to bed,” Katara said after a while. She sat up yawning, her eyes half closed already. They all silently agreed. Zuko put the fire out, quickly retreating to his tent.

They all fell asleep to the sounds of heartbeats and rainfall. Soft hums, slow breathing. The definition of perfection.

#thank you for the prompt #taang #avatar: the last airbender #toph #aang #missed these cuties #toph beifong #tophaang #toph bei fong x aang #toph beifong x aang #fic #taang fanfiction

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