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Blue Mask	By : PatPat Category: Avatar - The Last Airbender > AU/AR - Alternate Universe/Alternate Reality > Het- Male/Female Views: 11083 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Avatar: The Last Airbender, nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

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Blue Mask, Two Swords, and Sozin’s Comet
Acceptance
By Pat Squared

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Azula now knew the awful truth.

Zuko...Jian Li...The Blue Spirit...they were all the same person.

He had tried to tell her the truth without hurting her.

However, she was driven by her childish impulses to get the things the things that were denied her. He refused and she reacted as the spoil little girl she really was. He tried to get her to leave him be and she had forced him to break one of the fundamental commands of the gods. Even animals instinctively practiced incest-avoidance, and she hunted him down. He tried to prevent this from happening. Yet she had forced him to love her...no, she force him to breed her an heir to twist as she was twisted by her sire.

When Jian Li recovered from the drugs, she expected him to hurt her as she hurt him. She actually looked forward to the assassin relieving her of a burdensome life. Even if he let her live, she expected him to at least say, “I hate you.”

Yet he did not.

He hurt her in the worse possible way – he forgave her.

Azula knew that she should have been killed for her crimes against her brother. She had planted the seeds of fear that cause their mother to kill their paternal grandfather, Fire Lord Azulon, to save her son, and in doing so would face certain execution so that the onus of the crime would die with her. She watched as her father personally strangled their mother as the law required. She laughed when Zuko had to light their mother’s pyre and tend to the flames himself, because no one else would release the soul of one would committed regicide.

Instead of remorse, Azula was actually happy that Zuko would no longer have anyone who loved him.

It was that day, that she had lost her claim to being a member of the human race and instead became a monster to please her father. She had learned to love the screams of agony as she tortured prisoners in her father’s dungeons. She had drunk down great gulps of madness as she questioned prisoners. In eight years, she became more twisted than any serpent depicted in the traditional scrolls.

The girl that once clung to her older brother during the summer lightning storms instead sought to psychologically destroy her brother.

Azula had schemed to take Zuko’s birthright because she believed that he had stolen her mother’s love. She had poisoned their father’s mind to banish him instead of merely outright killing him so that Zuko’s suffering would last longer. When she believed that Zuko was dead, she even actually was aroused by the aura of blood and mystery around Zuko’s apparent assassin. She enjoyed hunting him down and hurting him. She even felt elation when she struck down their Uncle Iroh for it was obvious that Zuko and the old man shared a bond that she would never have.

Yet he forgave her for all these crimes and many more.

Azula knew that she would never be worthy of his forgiveness. After four years, she was reunited with her brother to only hear him slowly die.

The familiar coughing woke her out of her churning mind. She felt her way over to her brother and started thumping him on the center of his back with the flat of her hand just like their mother use to do to him to help him cough up the fluid in his lungs. She could hear the gurgling sound as he tried to breathe.

“I’m okay,” he muttered after coughing up a mass of fluid.

It was a lie.

She could hear the loud splat the fluid made when it impacted the hard earth. She could hear the tortured lungs futilely try to bring in life giving air into his failing body.

He tried to stand up, but she pushed down on his shoulders.

“Don’t lie to me. I can hear the quivering in you voice, Zuko. I know you are ill. You can’t go any further tonight. Have you been to a healer?”

There was a long silence only interrupted by the sound of the dripping water running down the damp walls of this hidden passage.

She knew that he did and the answer would not be good.

“I have maybe only a few more weeks left.”

If she still had eyes, Azula knew that she would not see tears in his eyes.

She could hear the acceptance of death in her brother’s voice.

That was the worst part about breaking her brother’s spirit. The old Zuko she knew would have rallied and fought off death to the bitter end. He used to be so stubborn that his body would have to rot to the bones, before he conceded to defeat. When he was banished, she knew that he would never quit until he found the avatar. Instantly she wondered how much of his new found acceptance of his death was her fault.

I broke him. I broke his spirit. I destroyed his honor. I killed him while he is still breathing.

If she still had eyes, she would have been blind to his suffering. In losing her vision, she had learned to see that he was the only one left who loved her.

“Zula, I have to face our father one last time. Promise me that you will not avenge me. I know that it will cost me my life, but I don’t have much longer to make things right.”

Azula could not make that promise.

It was her fault that they both were trapped in this hostile land. She had stabbed him in the chest. She had destroyed his health. She had killed him in the slowest method possible. She not only destroyed body, but broke his soul. She had ensured that nothing will ever be right again.

She made a vow that she knew that she would soon break. She had silently sworn on her honor. It did not matter for she had lost her honor eight years ago. It did not matter for she never had any honor to begin with. It would take a while to raise his child, but in the end, Azula would go on a final hunt to avenge him.

Today, it was time to rest. It was time to gather up her energy for tonight’s run to freedom. Azula curled up next to her brother. She wrapped her arms around him as he fell asleep and started fighting the demons in his dreams. The former Fire Nation princess could not fall asleep. She was already trapped in her own nightmare and had to sort out these demons haunting her before she could face the demons of her unconscious mind.

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“I know about my nephew.”

Mai looked up from the dispatches at Iroh, formerly the Dragon of the West. His hazel eyes were full of tears.

“Elder Uncle, I...I could not tell you. I knew that he was your...son. Not the son of your flesh, but the son of your soul. Have some tea, elder uncle. I just got some rare ling zhi mushrooms from Aoki and plenty of purple willow. It’s good for relieving the pain from the crystals in your back.”

Mai started up and walked towards the kitchen she shared with Ty. Iroh followed her.

Mai pulled out a dried mushroom, inspected it and then finely chopped up three thumb lengths of the fungus into very tiny pieces. Only when she was satisfied with the mincing of the mushroom, then did she start seeping it in hot water.

The room was silent.

Mai knew that the next words out of her mouth would hurt the old man and might upset his heart. As a precaution, she tossed in a small portion of crushed purple willow bark and a little dab of honey to counter the taste.

Instinctively, Mai switched from the common patois used by both the Fire Nation and the western Earth Kingdom to guwen, the ancient temple language used only by Fire Nation sages and those who were highly educated in classical Fire Nation literature and traditional arts. It was virtually intelligible to even most Fire Nation citizens and would guarantee that no one else would be able to listen into their conversation.

“Elder uncle, a militia patrol found Jian Li washed up almost dead on a beach just south of the capital. He was apparently caught in a storm out at sea and sweep overboard. He was taken to Azula’s personal torture chamber. With your brother’s reemergence to the dais and your niece vanishing...”

She looked at the old man’s beard. She was afraid to look up and see his eyes.

“I am dependent on what I get from my agents and the gossip they overhear. Everyone is talking about Azula and her disappearance when Ozai retook power. Some say that the Blue Spirit killed her and then the Fire Lord killed him. Others say that the Blue Spirit and Azula slipped away to be lovers. Some say that Azula is in hiding waiting for the Blue Spirit to kill her father. Some say they are both in the same torture chamber personally being tortured by their teacher.

“All I have are thousands of rumors. Most are ridiculous, but some have some elements of the truth. Which ones, I honestly don’t know. All I know was that Zuko was captured, severely ill. I am afraid to tell you what I believe. If Azula found out that Jian was Zuko... She had a terrible infatuation for Zuko’s alter-ego. If...she knew her ego would flare up and I have seen her question prisoners before. Her pride would ensure that she would break him. If so, I wish that his heart quickly burst, otherwise...”

The only sound was the whistle of the tea kettle. Mai took the kettle off the flame and pour the former general a cup. Iroh sat down and started sipping his tea. After a minute, he suddenly fell forward. Mai screamed for Ty Lee to get help as she rolled the former general face up.

Damn, not now.

Mai looked up at Ty Lee.

“Get Madam Chi and the healer up here now.”

Because of Kozun and his experiences in the campaign against the Air Nomad, basic field medicine was a required subject for all who attended the imperial war academy. While Mai was not a surgeon, she had learned to handle shock cases. It was her job to keep Azula’s guests breathing long enough to keep Azula happy. Grabbing a nearby spice storage box, she raised the general’s feet and listened for a heart beat.

Nothing.

Mai immediately pinched the old man’s nose and breathed into his lungs. Placing her weight over his chest, she started compressing it as she prayed to Agni for the strength to pull Iroh away from death’s grip.

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Tonight, they would have to move fast. Zuko knew that the ports were sealed and that the Fire Lord would have the shuirshu and their handlers out looking for Azula’s scent trail. However the hunt for the Avatar taught Zuko that even the legendary nosed of the blind beast can be defeated. He had to make it to Zhejiang.

Zhejiang was the center of perfume production for the Fire Nation and the air was dominated by the scent of the chu-lin trees and sandal wood that fuel the fragrance industry. There the shuirshu legendary ability to scent out their trail would be overwhelmed by acres of fragrant trees and flowers. The problem is that the province is a three day journey by foot. Once the pair left the safety of the passage, they can not stop until they were deep in the chu-lin farms.

With his lungs failing so fast and Azula blindness, he knew that they did not have a chance. Yet he had to keep her hopes up. Zuko started rhythmically flexing his fists, preparing for a grim task. He was unarmed save for his fire bending skills. If it looked like they were going to be captured by his father’s troops, he vowed to snap his sister’s neck so that she would not have to undergo the torture the guard would inflict on him.

He took in a breath.

Fate had given some bad hands to play during this life, now he had to bluff with nothing in his hands to take the ultimate pot. He knew to quit was to fail and that for his sister’s sake, he could not quit.

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Madam Chi looked at the gray-faced man lying in her bed. If it was not for Mai, he would have died before the healer could save him. Thankfully, Mai put purple willow bark in the old man’s tea and knew how to keep his blood circulating.

Storyteller Li... Iroh was her soul mate. They found each other two generation too late to have their own brood, but they were meant for one another. Madam Chi loved her husband, but it was a love that came from years of living in an arranged marriage and raising children together. Li was the first man who stole her heart and her imagination, even though she was fifty two year old when she met him for the first time.

Today was fate telling her that they were not both young anymore with four or five decades of life to look forward to. Li was old and living as a fugitive from his homeland drained his health. Today, he almost died and he would die without knowing that she missed him.

Even the tallest mountain is craved by the winds and water.

Her pride had blinded her to the fact that there were elements more powerful than the two of them of their relationship. Time was slipping away and he almost slipped away from her because of her pride.

It was time to let go of her pride.

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Zuko collapsed face first into the earth.

Will power could only compensate so much for any physical failings.

He had tasted failure once more. No matter how many times one tasted failure, the taste did not get any better. Now he had to fact the brutal unforgiving truth that there was no realistic way he could guide Azula to safety. He knew that now in his weakness he couldn’t even spare his sister the fate that would fall upon them. He looked up at her. The spirits let him out so he could taste this failure before he returned to hell.

Even resting, laying on the earth hurt, but he did not even have the energy to speak. He wanted to tell her to go on without him. However, there was no way she could navigate the volcanic mountains and the network of valleys that made up the home islands of the Fire Nation. The mountain roads are so twisted that there was no way that a blind traveler could avoid being disoriented. However to stay here is to die.

Once Zuko would have welcomed death. Now he could not indulge in the luxury of selfishly letting go of his obligations. He did not ask for the obligations, but he had them and would not shirk them. He will get Azula out of their mad father's reach.

Zuko felt her wrap her slender arms around him. He was awed by her strength as she got him back on his feet. She was supporting the bulk of his weight.

“Zuko, let me help you. Let me be your strength. You be my eyes. Each one of us is only at half strength. You cannot face father alone. I must go with you.”

Zuko couldn’t let her go with him to face their father. To do so was a certain death sentence.

“I can’t let you go.”

“Don’t you see, once he kills you, he will hunt for me. You are the only person in the world that can help me. Without you, I am truly blind. Without you, my strength, my powers are useless. We are now both only halves. Only together can we make a whole, even if it is an imperfect whole. Zuko, please let me help you. Otherwise, there is no hope. Our child will be his to mold as he once molded me.”

Zuko did not want to hear the truth, but he knew his sister was right. He was dying. Without her, his final sacrifice would not change anything. Without him, she would have no chance of survival. Without the pair working together, the Fire Nation will be doomed.

There was only one place left for him to turn to. He would have to look up an old friend and ask him for a favor.

It was time to call upon Clan Kozun. It was time for the one who traveled alone to accept other’s aid.

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“Please don’t make me do this,” the Avatar begged.

However, the looks on their faces told him that he would sooner turn hell into a paradise than get them to let him set off alone.

Aang looked on at his three traveling companions what he knew it would be the last time in his life. He looked at his wife, Toph. He knew that he would never see their child.

Sokka had finished painting his body in the blue and white body paint of the legendary Water Tribe berserkers. He was only clad in Water Tribe blue breeches. The berserkers would recklessly attack their foes without regard to their own safety. However to be a berserker was to swear a compact with the gods of the underworld to keep attacking until all his enemies were dead at his feet.

Katara looked at Aang through her sad, blue eyes. He knew that she would not rest until she fulfilled her oath to ensure that Zuko’s body was properly cremated.

Aang knew that he was leaving for his death. Worse, they would be coming to join him in the next world no matter what he tried.

Reluctantly, the avatar and his companions mounted Appa for one last trip. Tomorrow night, they will face the might of the Fire Lord.

For the first time since he awoke in the iceberg, the words yip, yip did not signify the start of another adventure, but the end of days. The prophecies that Toph shared with her about the Broken One were coming through and the world they all knew will be no more.
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Blue Mask