Azula's first memory went as follows:

Her newborn brother, staring up at her from her mother's arms, with eyes that dared to be even more gold than hers. His insolence was inborn.

"Yours were even brighter," mother tried to reassure her, but mother was smile-laughing. "They'll darken as he gets older."

(They wouldn't.)

"Do you want to hold him?"

"No." Azula crossed her arms.

(Father was not in this memory. She had a sense of him having come and gone. He hadn't wanted to hold the baby, either, and father was always right.)

"Don't be afraid," mother said. "You won't drop him, if you're careful."

"Not afraid!"

The memory ended before she held her little brother. She wasn't sure if she ever did. It wasn't as if mother was around to ask.

%%%

In a deserted Earth Kingdom town fourteen years later, an exhausted Avatar closed his glider, and sat down to wait.

%%%

Azula threw her first sparks when she was two and a half. Her dumb baby brother was in his dumb basinet next to her, while mother and father were having a discussion in the next room. It was loud but not scary at all because they did this all the time and what kind of baby would be scared of loud noises.

Zuko, that was who. He was crying and he wouldn't stop and mother wasn't coming to shut him up and the servants always played the be-a-ghost game until mother and father were done and why wouldn't he stop—

"Bad baby," she yelled down at him. "Stupid bad dum-dum baby—"

And then there were sparks around her fists, her very first.

Zuko stopped crying. His still-too-gold eyes followed the sparks, chubby baby hands with no idea of depth perception and an even worse sense of self-preservation trying to reach up to grab them.

By the time mother and father were ready to play the we-were-only-talking game, Azula had figured out how to make it happen again. And again. The same little firefly sparks that kept Zuko giggling and kicking his legs made father praise her, and lead her into the courtyard so he could demonstrate a fire punch for her. Then he made her try again, and again, and again, and it was the most time he'd ever spent with her, so she tried and tried and tried harder.

Zuzu started crying when she left. Grubby-chubby little hands reached after her, and wouldn't be soothed by mother.

Even at a young age, her brother displayed occasional glimpses of superior taste.

%%%

Prince Zuko knew a trap when he saw one. ...Didn't see one. Was probably walking into one.

This was definitely a trap, was the point.

But father had trusted him to capture the Avatar, and the Avatar was sitting there in the middle of a deserted street, and if he waited for his squad to catch up then he knew father would think Captain Izumi had done all the work, when he'd been the one up for the past few days tracking. And if he waited for Mai or Ty Lee to finish checking the other trail, then even though they would let him take all the credit they wouldn't let him get anywhere near the target. If he actually wanted to prove himself, he had to act now.

...It was still definitely a trap, though.

He nudged his mongoose lizard into a slow walk, trying to keep an eye on all the desolate buildings and the single small figure ahead and Licorice Whip's head movements, because the lizard might hear or taste something amiss before he did.

The young boy—the ancient spirit that had destroyed an entire fleet mere weeks ago—kept sitting there, some kind of staff across his knees. Zuko's own swords were a reassuring weight at his hip. He knew how to handle staff wielders. (...On the palace training grounds.) It was more the whole master-of-all-four-elements thing that might prove difficult. Not that he was nervous. A Prince of the Fire Nation, descendant of Agni himself, didn't get nervous.

"Avatar," he said, stopping his lizard a safe distance back. He raised his chin, and stared down at the deceptively young looking spirit, and channeled his best Azula. "I am here to accept your surrender, on behalf of my father."

"That's… nice," the boy said. "Who are you, again?"

"Um. Prince Zuko? Son of Ozai. ...The Fire Lord."

On one hand, it was reassuring to find that the Fire Nation's greatest enemy knew so little about the royal family. On the other, he could have done without the complete bafflement on the boy's—the incredibly dangerous spirit's—face.

"Oh," the Avatar said. And grinned. "I'm Aang!"

%%%

Mother killed grandfather and then disappeared. Father had probably killed her, though Azula didn't see why. It wasn't like the entire court couldn't figure out at a glance what had happened. If anything, mother's sudden absence made Fire Lord Azulon's oh-so-convenient death even more glaringly obvious.

"Where's mom?" Zuko asked.

"I don't know, Zuzu. Have you checked the turtleduck pond?" This was meant as sarcasm. Just like the last time she'd said it.

"Yeah. And her rooms, and every garden, and the whole palace and everywhere, she's not here."

"Then I guess she's gone, Dum-Dum."

"When's she coming back?" He sat down next to her, and did that annoying thing where he leaned against her side and just assumed she wouldn't stand up so fast that she'd drop him.

Why don't you ask father, she almost snapped, but then the idiot would, and he'd probably disappear, too. It wasn't like the court cared about the two other glaring absences, or father's rushed coronation plans. Who knew when Uncle Iroh would be home to dispute them. Maybe when he got back, it would be father's turn to disappear. And hers. And Zuko's.

"Your bending is terrible," Azula said. A much more pertinent topic than their mother.

Her brother straightened up and glared at her. He had a very good glare, for an eight year old. "I know. I'm trying."

"Trying isn't good enough, Zuzu. Do you still have those swords?"

"...Father said I had to get rid of them," Zuko said, in a very not-an-answer way.

"Father says a lot of things."

Like As you will it, on the topic of killing one's firstborn child.

Mother said things, too, like Everything I've done I've done for you, and Protect your brother.

And then grandfather was dead and mother was gone and father was still here.

She shouldn't have to protect Zuko. He was one of her minions. A proper minion should be able to defend himself.

"Come on. We're going to Mai's." Mai used blades, too; surely one of her tutors knew a good swordsman. A discrete one, who would take payment in the form of mother's jewelry.

"What about mother?"

"She's not here, Dum-Dum. Go get your swords. Do not make me wait."

Her brother gave her that near-rebellious look, the one father hated so much, the one he had yet to find an instructive enough punishment for.

Punishments didn't stick, with Zuzu. Rewards were far more effective.

She praised how fast he got back, and took him to find a suitable instructor in sharp stabby things.

...Perhaps she would speak with Ty Lee's tutors, as well.

%%%

"So you're the Fire Lord's son," the Avatar said.

"Yes."

"And you're here to capture me."

"Yes."

"Because I'm a threat."

"You sank the northern fleet!"

"I told you I feel really bad about—"

"I don't care if you feel really bad about it! Are you going to fight, or—or am I just going to come down there and capture you?"

"I like the coming down part, it's kind of hard to keep looking up at you. But you could just… sit. And we could talk some more. You said you wanted me to surrender, and surrendering always takes a lot of talking, to negotiate terms and all—"

"You're an overpowered ancient spirit monster! We shouldn't be talking, we should be fighting!"

"I'm twelve. How old are you?"

"Fourteen."

"Wow, that's really young."

"You're twelve."

"So I'm not an overpowered ancient spirit monster?"

The boy was grinning. They weren't even fighting yet, but somehow Zuko was losing.

%%%

Zuzu came into the war room on their uncle's coat tails, which rather conclusively proved Azula's suspicion that the jovial old man was passive-aggressively trying to get his brother's children killed.

"What are you doing here," she whispered, through the grit teeth of a pleasant smile.

"I need to learn more if I'm going to be your general."

He was eleven and still an idiot. And father was frowning at him, but not ordering him from the room. ...Perhaps some instruction would not be amiss.

"Sit next to me and don't talk."

He talked.

She shut him up before he could say more. And put a calming hand on his shoulder that forced him to sit back down. Azula bowed first to father, and then to the general.

"Please forgive Prince Zuko. He has far to go in his studies of war strategies, and has an even worse grasp of war humor. Clearly he has failed to understand the key part of your ingenious plan, general; that bait is required for a trap."

"It's still not right." Zuzu grumbled. Loudly.

"Would you rather we lose untold experienced troops in a head-to-head fight? Who would protect and train our new recruits if we expended our veterans so carelessly? They trust us too, Prince Zuko. This plan minimizes casualties. After all, I'm sure the general wouldn't be fool enough to use them as a mere diversionary tactic."

"But—"

"Dear Uncle Iroh. If your guest is upset, perhaps you should escort him out."

Her father watched the pair leave. The flames in front of the throne still roared, despite a sudden chill to the room. She bowed again, and took her seat, and did not talk.

"Zuzu," she told him later, as he sulked in front of the turtleduck pond. "You can't keep caring about every individual soldier. That would make you an excellent squad commander, but a terrible general. And since I'm going to be the best Fire Lord, you have to be the best too."

"I know."

"So get smarter, Dum-Dum."

%%%

Zuko was somehow sitting on the ground, getting his new armor dusty. Licorice Whip was tied up at a house to the side, basking in the sun. The Avatar hadn't stood up a single time or made a single aggressive move, besides being extremely aggravating.

"Because we're enemies!" Zuko shouted.

"But we only just met. I don't think we're enemies. I refuse your enemy-ship."

"That is not how being enemies works! You can't just unilaterally decide—" He'd jumped to his feet to yell more properly, which he'd maybe been doing a lot this conversation.

"Well you can't just unilaterally decide either," the tiny bald awful child said, in his best angry Zuko voice.

Zuko temporarily lost words. And all associated coherence. He took deep calming breaths like Uncle always said to do, and squeezed his fists around fire daggers like Azula always said was an acceptably intimidating word-substitute, and—

And got hit with water. Really agressive water. He rolled out of his fall, and rooted himself to face this new enemy.

"Aang!" a girl called, more water flowing around her hands as she readied her next attack. Besides her, an older boy was raising some kind of weirdly shaped weapon.

Zuko knew this had been a trap. Traps were a lot easier to deal with than whatever weird head games the Avatar had been playing.

...Oh. It had been a stalling tactic.

He was never telling his sister how long it took him to figure that out. Finally, finally they could just—

"Hot hot sharp!" the Avatar shouted, finally springing to his feet. "Wait, no, I don't want to—"

—fight. His dao sang in his hands, his fire dancing around him.

%%%

"Oww," Zuzu said.

"It wouldn't hurt if you were better," Azula said, examining her nails. The paint was sorching under the continued heat in a way her paint should not. She would need to have a talk with her new maid. "If that swordmaster of yours can take on a hundred soldiers, then a prince of Sozin's line should be able to handle three half-trained girls. Get up, try again."

"...I can't move, Lala."

Ty Lee giggled at the nickname. Or at the temporary paralysis. It was hard to tell sometimes, with Ty Lee.

%%%

It was three on one, and all three of them knew combat styles he'd never trained in or against, and—and this was his first real fight outside of the palace training grounds, which wasn't an excuse, but generally the only people who looked at him like they really would maim him were Azula and father but now both of the Water Tribesmen had that same intent and then the earth shook—

"You guys didn't tell me you were going to have a rumble. I'd have stuck around."

—and then it was four on one. And he was trained for that, he was, but he was still really glad when suddenly the vicious waterbender was pinned to the side of a building by knives and the tiny feral earthbender was dropping to the ground with a startled shout and the boy with the really annoying returning weapon was squawking 'Not Again' as Ty Lee bounded over the little girl and towards her next target.

"Katara!" the Avatar said. "Toph, Sokka—!"

He wasn't even looking at Zuko. A lot of people made that mistake, when Azula's friends were around. Zuko let out a single breath of relief, switched his dao to one hand, and jabbed at a few key pressure points. The Avatar dropped. And kind of… flopped.

"You missed on the left arm," Ty Lee helpfully noted, sitting on the back of the groaning Water Tribe boy. She pointed at a place on her own arm. "You need to hit here."

"That's where I did hit."

The Avatar continued to flop. And stir up a small, localized dust cloud. (The obvious airbending explained the master airbender tattoos, at least. It didn't explain where he'd learned airbending. Everything Zuko knew said the formal Air Army was purged under Sozin's righteous flames, and the last of the lingering Air Assassins had been rooted out of their hiding places while father was still young.)

(But he'd also been taught that the Northern Water Tribe didn't teach their women combat bending. So.)

Ty Lee smiled up at the sky in a completely benign Royals Are Always Right manner. Mai's gaze kept flickering around the scene, another knife ready in her hand. Zuko sighed, and knelt down.

"Stop flopping," he ordered the Avatar.

"Stop trying to paralyze-poke me!"

"Stop being a baby about it, Ty Lee does it to me all the time, it doesn't even hurt—"

"Zuko," Mai drawled. "You said you were going to continue pursuit along this trail with your escort."

Zuko paused, with a still-flopping arm in his hand. "...They were slow. And I didn't want him to get away. And we were just, ah… talking?"

"We actually were," the Avatar confirmed, from the ground. "...Can we go back to that?"

Which was when the rest of his escort caught up, tanks and all. Captain Izumi was not pleased.

Ty Lee flitted between members of the enemy party, re-poking them as necessary during the very respectful dressing down that followed. Mai waved her off from the waterbender. The girl's growling attempts to un-pin herself had more entertainment value, and Mai was nowhere near out of knives.

Licorice Whip looked up, tongue flicking towards the sky, tail twitching behind her. No one paid any particular attention to this until the bison came crashing down.

It was an actual flying bison.

%%%

"Did the Avatar really return?" Zuko asked, finding Azula in the halls after a particularly surreal council meeting. A closed council meeting.

"You're getting better at sneaking," she complimented. "But if you want to hear things clearly, you obviously need to find a better hiding spot."

"Azula."

"He did. Commander Zhao is tracking him."

"Commander…? Wait, the creepy sideburn guy? The one who tried to invite you to private tea? I thought he was a captain."

"Father promoted him."

"Why?"

It was questions like that which made her Dum-Dum unfit to attend meetings through the door. At least he knew to hold his tongue while sneaking.

%%%

"You can't fireball it! They're really endangered!"

"Prince Zuko," the captain ordered, "please step away from the angry bison."

"Not until you—"

"Prince Zuko, behind you!"

The waterbender had gotten free. And had one of Mai's knives. Zuko couldn't see it himself. Just… feel it. Whenever he swallowed.

This armor should really have a higher throat guard.

"We're leaving," the girl growled, "or your Fire Lord is losing his heir."

Mai slid her blades back up her sleeves. Ty Lee held up her hands. Captain Izumi signaled her unit to hold position.

It wasn't long until the enemy party was able to move again. Enough to climb into a saddle with some bison-assisted airbending, at least.

Zuko got to ride the animal, too. They took away his swords and tied him up, hand and foot. With rope. ...Very flammable rope.

"Burn through and we're punting you out of the saddle," the nonbender threatened.

Zuko swallowed. Nodded. Both of which were a lot more comfortable to do, without a knife at his throat. If his nod was taken as agreement rather than understanding, that wasn't his fault.

They left him largely alone once the bison was in the air. He leaned over the side of the saddle, his bound hands behind him, and watched the animal's giant legs moving like it could run on air. Which… apparently it could, because the ground was getting farther and farther away, and he was feeling less and less comfortable with that saddle-punting threat.

Below, Captain Izumi was shouting orders. Mai was yawning. Licorice Whip was on her feet, tugging at her own rope. And there was so much land under them, strange and flat and dry, with mountains in the distance, but even when he'd been down there himself he could see for miles without the next ridge blocking his view. No wonder it was so easy for their troops to advance in this terrain (no wonder it was so hard for them to keep supply lines secure in this terrain—)

"Are you trying to fall out?" the waterbender said, yanking him back by his armor collar.

"...I was just looking."

"Wait. Are you having fun?"

"I, uh. I like flying. But Admiral Keahi banned me from the war balloons."

"The what?" the nonbender squawked.

%%%

"Zuzu," Azula said, like a knife over silk. "How did you even know we had war balloons?"

"Um."

"This wouldn't be related to how you got banned from them, would it, dear brother?"

"...They can't prove it was me. And I brought it back. Mostly."

How one mostly brought back an experimental aircraft, Azula decided she did not wish to know.

"I didn't even mean to take it the first time," her brother continued, rather strengthening her desire for him to stop talking.

%%%

"They're still following us," the Avatar said. He sounded really, really tired.

Zuko leaned over the saddle as far as he could. They'd left the captain and her troops behind, but three mongoose lizards with two riders were steadily following. Down below, a tiny pink figure gave an overly enthusiastic wave. He would have waved back, but. Still tied. Still under the suspicious gaze of the Avatar's allies, and presumably still under punting threat. He was saving the burning-through-his-ropes thing for when they were closer to the ground. Which shouldn't be long; the bison kept slumping lower and lower in the sky. That couldn't be healthy for it, he really hoped they weren't going to ride it to death or something, but he didn't have a way to signal Mai and Ty Lee to stop chasing, and he needed to stop being their prisoner before they recovered enough to interrogate him. Or worse.

He was in enemy hands now. Two uncultured Water tribals, the inexplicably tiny earthbender, and an Avatar known for mass murder. He wasn't safe here, this was probably the least safe he'd been in his entire life—

The waterbender yanked him back. "Would you please stop trying to fall to your death?"

"I'm okay with Fire Lord Junior falling to his death," the nonbender volunteered. "Unless he wants to tell us more about those war balloons."

"Ssh," the earthbender said, curled up in a nest of their softer supplies. "Less war, more sleep."

"You could surrender," Zuko said. "You'll be treated well; you have my word." The tiny earthbender felt around the saddle with her bare foot (why did she not have shoes? Was she just a refugee they were transporting?) until she found his ankle. Then she kicked him. Hard.

"Hey!"

"Sleep."

He was kind of tired, too—he'd been chasing them for as long as they'd been running. Longer.

But it wasn't safe to let his guard down. Especially while they were in the air. On an actual flying bison. And they were going over a town, an unassimilated Earth Kingdom one, the captain had made their party steer clear of any potential rebellion strongholds so he'd never gotten to see—

The waterbender jerked him back into the saddle. Again.

%%%

It was like the morning after mother disappeared, except that she was the idiot, searching every garden and turtleduck pond and training ground, even though she already knew her answer.

"Father," Azula asked at dinner, her chopsticks perfectly poised between one bite and the next. "Were you planning on telling me that your spare heir was gone, or was I supposed to hear it from the courtiers?"

'Gone' was a safe word to use. It just meant he wasn't here right now. It didn't need to be a permanent state, there might still be time to fix this, what had the Dum-Dum even done—

%%%

The Earth Kingdom was boring. Flat and brown and dull, and everything looked the same everywhere, and they'd been flying forever. Mai and Ty Lee were persistent dots on the horizon. Zuko was still tied up even though it was getting really tempting to call their killing-a-valuable-hostage bluff.

It didn't take too much shuffling to join the earthbender in flopping down on the enemy's supplies. She grumbled next to him. The flying lemur curled against her back chittered an admonishment at them both. Zuko didn't know quite what to make of the creature. It seemed harmless, possibly even useless, but there was no way a war party like theirs would just be carrying around a pet. He lived in the safety of a palace, and even he wasn't allowed that luxury.

(Licorice Whip wasn't a pet. She was a highly trained and ferocious battle mount, hand-reared so that her loyalty to him would be paramount.)

"Hey," the nonbender said, craning his neck. He was taking a turn at the reins. "Hey. Is he getting comfortable back there? Someone make him stop that! If I don't get to sleep, neither does he!"

"You could sleep," Zuko said, wiggling against the pile until he made a bound-arms-shaped gap to lean back against. "If you surrendered."

The older teen made some kind of strangled goose-ferret noise. Zuko smirked.

The Avatar was curled up on his side, trying and failing to sleep. He kept sneaking glances at Zuko. Zuko kept sneaking glances back, though he had to be more careful with his, because the waterbender had both her waterskin and Mai's knife and a look in her eyes like sleep-deprived murder, and had already demonstrated a consistent disrespect with regards to laying hands upon his person. Also, he wasn't sure when she'd blinked last. (He wasn't sure waterbenders needed to blink. Could they bend their eye-water? Would it be weird to ask?)

He was their prisoner. It would be smart to not say anything substantial, especially when he'd already screwed up about the war balloons. He should be quiet, and stoic, and—

The Avatar was peeking over at him again.

"My compliments on your strategy," Zuko said. "Your refusal to fight was… unusual, but an extremely effective stalling tactic."

It wouldn't have worked on Azula. Or anyone else he knew. The Avatar's millenia of experiences clearly made him an expert at reading people, and tailoring his strategies accordingly.

(Azula said Zuko should leave reading people to her.)

The spirit boy sat up, frowning. "I wasn't stalling. I meant it: I didn't want to fight you. I still don't. I'm sorry we kidnapped you, we'll let you go as soon as—"

"No we won't," the nonbender put in, "we have the Fire Lord's son prisoner, Aang, we aren't just going to catch-and-release him—"

"I am trying to sleep," the earthbender growled, facefirst in a rolled sleeping bag. The lemur pressed tiny little fists over its big gigantic ears.

"Aang is a pacifist," the waterbender snapped.

These were all really different reactions. Which meant their party was divided. Zuko wished Azula was here; she would know how to exploit that.

Zuko didn't. At all. So he just kept… being himself.

"...What's a 'pacifist'?"

%%%

Father's lips curled into a smile.

Her brother had heard the news from the north. (Why had she encouraged his eavesdropping?)

Her brother had come to father and argued that their family traditionally proved themselves on the battlefield early. (Lu Ten had been seventeen at his first posting, which was far from enemy lines, with a unit uncle had hand-picked. He'd been experienced by the time he joined uncle at Ba Sing Se in another safe, hand-picked position and look at what had happened to Lu Ten.)

If he was going to be a general by the time Azula was Fire Lord then he needed to start even earlier— (Reminding father of his mortality was never safe—)

Her brother had begged for the honor of bringing the Avatar back to the Fire Nation.

Father had obliged him, and sent him on his way with a unit of the Royal Guard composed of those members he didn't particularly like.

It was unclear whether father had put him on the first ship out, or if Zuko had refrained from telling her he was leaving. If it proved to be the latter, she would grant him a much swifter death than those fools in the Earth Kingdom.

%%%

Pacifists were people who didn't like to fight.

Pacifict's friends were people who yelled at him for not knowing what pacifists were. He was a horrible person, son of a horrible man, and as she yelled she kept clutching at an empty place on her neck like there should be something there. And now the earthbender was yelling too and the waterbender was yelling back and Zuko was just going to sit very still and try to avoid attracting either of their attention.

"I really don't want to fight," the Avatar said, quietly. He'd scooted closer, probably to be heard over the shouting.

"Neither do I," Zuko said. "But there can't be peace unless we fight."

"That, uh. That doesn't make sense."

"Do you think I want my people to keep dying? This war is stupid, and it's gone on too long, but no one would listen if we asked to stop. They'd just turn around and attack us. Or cut us off from trade, which we'll need once this ends, or—um." Everyone had stopped yelling. Which meant that suddenly he was the only one talking, and they were all listening. "I just. I want the war to end."

"Well that's messed up," the nonbender said. "You realize it's your dad who's stopping it from ending, right? And killing the Avatar isn't going to help?"

Zuko squared his shoulders (as much as he could, with his arms tied behind him still, and they were starting to ache). "I'm not trying to kill him. I don't even want to hurt him, I'm just going to bring him back to the Fire Nation so the rest of the world will stop using him as a weapon. Uncle's told me the stories. The Avatar's supposed to help keep the balance, not fight the Water Tribe's battles for them and slaughter hundreds of people."

The Avatar looked a little sick at the reminder. Which was weird for an ancient spirit, but maybe not for a twelve-year-old pacifist.

Zuko couldn't be fooled by appearances. Father trusted him to do this.

%%%

Father was trying to get Zuzu killed. Death by Avatar, or possibly by the Earth Kingdom; she sincerely doubted he had a preference. Either would be an excellent rallying point for their nation. The troops did so like their idealistic prince.

As the Fire Lord's filicidal tendencies were no particular surprise, Azula had her correspondence composed and sent within the hour.

%%%

The bison couldn't fly any farther. Zuko knew it, which meant all the rest of them had to know it, too.

They landed in a craggy ravine. High earthen sides that an earthbender could pull down on an opponent, a narrow but steady stream through the center for a waterbender to draw attacks from. The bison flopped on the ground, its sides heaving. The enemy team jumped from the saddle, and started preparing for the coming confrontation.

Except for the earthbender. She waved a vague hand in their direction, not even bothering to look their way.

"Wake me up when it's time to crack skulls," she said. The lemur continued to be useless, except perhaps as a backwarmer.

The nonbender grabbed Zuko's arm, and dragged him down with them. His sore shoulders protested the sudden jerk, loudly, but he was a soldier now so he grit his teeth and did-not-wince. He ended up sitting against the bison's side, with the older teen looming over him, fidgeting with his curved weapon.

It looked a lot sharper, closer up.

Zuko tried to stretch his hands behind him. Tried to get some blood flow back. He'd probably have to burn through the ropes soon, and that would go a lot more smoothly if his fingers weren't tingling with pins and needles.

"Are you petting Appa?"

"...No."

Winding his fingers through the bison's fur was merely a dexterity exercise.

The bison turned its head, and whuffed a voluminous breath of hot air in his face. Zuko blinked. And continued his dexterity exercises.

Where had they even found a flying bison?

%%%

Dearest Mai,

Though I am certain the neverending thrills of your life in New Ozai have gripped your fullest attention, I have a small request to ask regarding my brother. By the time this letter reaches you, he should not be far out of your way...

%%%

The lizards crested a ridge. Their riders looked down at the small party below. The Avatar's group stared back up, their stances ready.

"So this is how this is going to work," the nonbender said, taking over where his fellow tribal had left off back in the deserted town, eg, holding something sharp to Zuko's throat. "You're going to surrender. My hand isn't going to slip. That's the order of events, here."

"Sokka…" the Avatar said, looking oddly uneasy.

"Zuko," Mai drawled, "if you get your throat slit, Azula is going to kill you."

He didn't cringe. Soldiers didn't cringe. "Can we just… not tell her about this?"

"I'm not hearing any surrendering," the older teen said, like being geographically closer made him the bigger threat.

%%%

Ty Lee,

If you want to join a real circus, help Mai keep my idiot brother alive.

%%%

The actual order of events went as follows:

Licorice Whip, who didn't have a rider on her but saw her rider right there, came happily trotting down the slope. This was a clear surprise to all parties, and resulted in no attacks.

Affectionate mongoose lizards—highly trained battle mounts—were extremely effective at shouldering Water Tribe peasants away from the target they were currently threatening. ...Also at messing up Zuko's topknot and possibly denting his crown hairpiece with lizard-kisses.

"Hey!" the nonbender protested.

At which point all three Fire Nation teenagers were free to act.

Zuko burned through his ropes, which hurt, but it wasn't like he'd never been burned before. Father didn't let him stop when he got burned in training, because father had wanted him prepared for exactly this kind of situation out in the field—

Ty Lee used the waterbender's shoulders as a springboard for somersaulting towards the nonbender, who was—

—Looking just as confused as Zuko when she ignored him entirely—

And chi-blocked Zuko.

She dragged him up into Licorice's saddle, hopped up behind him, and started running away. She grabbed her own lizard's reins in passing, and tugged him along.

Mai guarded the backtrail from their (very confused) enemies, then followed.

"But we need to capture—!" Zuko protested.

"You need to capture him," Mai said. "I need Azula to keep financing this road trip. I am not going back to New Ozai."

"Bye, cutie!" Ty Lee waved behind them.

Zuko grumbled into the side of Licorice's saddle. Which was really all he could see right now. And for the entire bumpy ride back to the tank caravan.

While the doctor wrapped the burns on his wrists and ankles, Captain Izumi gave him the you are a valuable hostage so don't put yourself in a position to get captured safety lecture again. It hadn't changed since he was five, so he didn't really need to listen.

(If asked, Captain Izumi would disagree very strongly. But no one had asked her opinion on shipping her people and her lord's youngest heir to an active war zone.)

%%%

"...Who's Azula?" Sokka asked, when their hostage and/or newest antagonist was gone. At least the Fire Prince wasn't as skeazy as Zhao. And he was shorter than Sokka, which was a very satisfying plus that should not be ignored, and was more fun to think about then how terrifying he was. What was with the whirling blades of fiery death thing? That wasn't normal. That wasn't normal, right?

The guy's swords were still on Appa's saddle. They were Sokka's swords, now.

"Sleep," Toph countered, which was a valid argument.

"Wait, did you even join the fight?"

He got hit with a small rock for his trouble.

Newest teammate rating: 2/5. Sokka still thought they should have gone with The Boulder.

%%%

Zuko stared up at the ceiling of his tent. The ground was hard underneath him, which wasn't too unfamiliar, but it was a lot more irregularly lumpy than the roof of the palace.

He thought about an ancient spirit (a twelve year old) who was a pacifist. And who hadn't gone on the offensive once, even when his friends had attacked.

They were probably still at their camp. Their bison wasn't up to moving. He could…

(He was better at sneaking than his sister's friends were at catching him.)

%%%

Aang stared up at the stars. Appa's head was warm and fluffy under him, rising and falling with each bison-sized breath.

He thought about the son of the man everyone wanted him to kill, who couldn't be much older than Aang was, and who said he wanted peace. Even if he was really wrong about how to make peace happen.

...He was wrong, wasn't he?

(He was the first person who'd said Aang shouldn't be used as a weapon.)

There was no way the Fire Prince's camp was far. His troops had to be tired too, and he wanted to stay close. Aang could…

Appa didn't stir as he slid his glider off the saddle. Neither did anyone else.

%%%

Zuko didn't want to startle anyone. So. He left Licorice Whip tied up a little ways back, and tried to step on every twig between here and their camp. The screeching lemur that flew over his head helped.

(It wasn't a pet, it was a guard lemur. That made so much more sense.)

He cleared his throat. "Hello, Prince Zuko here."

The entire camp was already awake, even though it was still dark.

"What did you do to Aang?" the waterbender snarled.

And then he was fighting even though he was clearly shouting that he'd just come to talk, and hadn't she just been yelling at him for not being a pacifist. They still had his swords and he wasn't a very good bender without them and they'd gotten at least a few more hours of sleep than he had—

They didn't use rope this time. The earthbender made stone cuffs over his bandages, instead. Really heavy ones.

Earth Kingdom ground was even less comfortable like this.

"...Can I sleep next to the bison?" he asked.

"No."

%%%

There was a whole unit of soldiers set up in a small encampment, with tanks circled up and sentries and two mongoose lizards that turned their heads and flicked their tongues at him even though it was still dark out.

There was also a pretty obvious Fancy Tent in the middle of everything. Aang went for the people-don't-look-up approach: he gained altitude, swooped down directly from above, then ducked inside all super-stealthy-like.

There was an empty bed, stuffed with an extra blanket and some pillows to make it look like a person.

The door flap opened, and the two terrifying girls looked in.

"I can explain," Aang said, holding up a pillow that wasn't at all Zuko-shaped now that it was uncovered.

"He was already gone when you got here, wasn't he?" the one with all the knives asked. "...I am not dealing with this before sunrise. Ty Lee?"

"Sure thing," the bending stealer smiled, and moved a lot faster than Aang had been counting on.

So on the down side, he was paralyze-poked again. But on the up side, she let him stay on the prince's bed, and even fluffed up the pillows for him. It was actually super comfy, until one of the soldiers came in with shackles.

Less comfy, then.

%%%

The exchange of their respective captives happened the next morning.

"We have your idiot," the knife girl said, stopping at the edge of their camp on top of her giant evil fire nation lizard-thing. Sokka did not like those animals and their seeming inability to tire, persistence hunting should be a human trait. "We'll meet you halfway between camps in an hour. There's an open field. Bring our idiot."

"I'm not an idiot," their prisoner sulked.

"Sorry," the girl drawled, "I can't hear idiots until after breakfast."

Then she left. Her idiot indignantly shouted after her. The only part of it she acknowledged was the Could you at least take my lizard back to camp with you, which prompted an over-the-shoulder-wave that might be counted for agreement.

So that's how Team Avatar (Minus The Avatar) ended up flying towards the world's most obvious trap. The fact that it didn't look like a trap was what made it even more trappy.

The Danger Ladies were on the ground with Aang. No lizards. No extra troops. Sokka could see the enemy camp off in the distance, and couldn't see any soldiers nearby, which meant he wasn't looking hard enough.

Aang raised shackled hands, and waved up at them.

The Fire Prince raised his stone-cuffed wrists, and waved back.

"Stop that," Sokka snapped.

"He started it," Ozai's son grumbled.

They landed at the far end of the field. Across from them, the Pink Paralyzer took off Aang's shackles, and gave him a little push towards them. Toph wiggled her magic-earth-hands and made their own prisoner's cuffs crumble, and tried to give him a bending-assisted shove forward. Which he gracefully sidestepped, the jerk.

Both sides watched, with various degrees of tense anticipation, as the prisoners walked. Crossed paths. Kept walking.

Stopped in the middle of the field.

Looked back at each other.

Started talking.

%%%

Zuko was just past the Avatar when the other boy spoke.

"Did you mean it? About wanting to end the war?"

"Did you mean it about not wanting to fight?"

%%%

Stop that, Sokka wanted to shout. But Aang had started it. Again.

%%%

Crown Princess Azula,

Please prepare funeral arrangements for Prince Zuko. His idiocy is terminal.

Co-signed Mai and Ty Lee

%%%

The Fire Nation unit, complete with Dangerous Ladies and Fire Prince, were trailing them below. Appa was flying slowly enough for them to easily keep up.

Sokka didn't know what was going on with his life anymore.

"Aang, he is still trying to capture you. Aang, he literally said he is still trying to capture you."

"No, he said he's going to make me surrender. Those are totally different things!" Aang's smile (and decision making abilities) had to be an after-effect of all the sleep deprivation, right? Right?

"I'm not sure they are, Aang," Katara said.

"He's going to meet us at camp tonight," the world's soon-to-be shortest lived Avatar gushed. "And we're going to talk more. I knew we could try speaking with the Fire Lord! If he's like his son—"

%%%

Father,

I have successfully opened negotiations with Avatar Aang—

Fire Lord Ozai stared down at the urgent hawk letter in his hand. It was already on fire at the edges, the flame pulsing slowly inward with each of his breaths.

Zuko's ability to fail at any task—including a suicide mission—was truly impressive.