She was thirteen, and smiling. Her hands were closing around her very first racing helmet, and her father was standing in front of her, beaming. "Be sure to take good care of it, Asami," he had said, eyes dancing with light and happiness. "It'll keep you safe when I can't."

"If you grip that pen any harder, it will break."

Asami inhaled sharply, the words breaking into her memory and shattering the scene, like a splintered window pane hit with too many rocks. She dropped the offending object back onto the table in front of her.

Beside her, the decorated general had sat down without her noticing. She hadn't seen much of him since the day they fought Amon and all his Equalists-she had been busy rebuilding her father's company and he had been sitting in on meetings between Korra and the new council. He looked much different now, hair precisely combed instead of ragged and loose, buttons on his jacket crisp and straight.

"What are you doing here?" Hiroshi Sato's trial was not public, to her knowledge. The council sat primly at the front of the room to listen to her father's defense, along with a handful of witnesses. Tenzin had excused himself from the council due to a conflict of interest (though, really, everyone in Republic city had a conflict of interest with her father), and he and Korra had abstained from attending the sentencing, for which Asami was grateful.

He stared straight forward as he answered. "Commander Bumi sent me as his proxy, since he is tied up in other negotiations at the moment." He spared her a sideways glance. "I saw you here and thought you could use a friend."

The last thing Asami wanted was company, but it wouldn't do to tell the General of the United Forces to get lost. So instead, she smiled her best proper lady smile and said, "Thank you, General Iroh."

"Please, call me Iroh."

"Iroh, then."

She found the pen again and squeezed it into her palm, comforted to have something solid between her fingers. She saw Iroh's line of sight follow the motion of her hands, so she primly folded them both in her lap, pen getting lost in the folds of her skirt.

She didn't look at him. And she was very careful to not look at the older man in the front of the room either, even when he searched for her with mournal dark eyes.

Iroh's gaze shifted to the defendant's stand, then back to Asami. He cleared his throat. "You know, a wise man once told me that forgiveness sets free the bird who is tangled in the web of vengeance."

Asami drew a sharp intake of breath. "I know of forgiveness." Much more than anyone would give her credit for, at least. Against her will, she felt the burning sting of angry bile rising in the back of her throat. "I know of forgiveness, almost as well as I know of empty words. I know about hiding alone in my room at night, because my father was angry and yelling on wine and spirits. I know about the capacity to change." She sighed and lowered her eyes. "And I know when all the love in the world isn't enough to change someone."

She thought of her father, lying in the crippled mechatank, enraged enough to send a killing blow aimed straight at her heart. She remembered the icy cold resolve in his eyes, so foreign on a man had shown her nothing but warmth and affection her whole life. Well, almost her whole life.

"Your father was an...alcoholic?" The word seemed foreign on his tongue, like he wasn't used to such crude language.

Asami closed her eyes. She didn't want to talk about this, not to Korra or Mako or Bolin. But somehow the words kept spilling out anyway. "I was six, when my mother died. My father didn't know how to handle it. He had so much to take care of-first his company and now me, all alone. He replaced my mother with a bottle of wine, and for a while it was okay."

Beside her, the general was silent. She continued. "But then it got worse. He started getting angry when he drank, and some nights he wouldn't come home at all. One night he started ranting about bringing justice to all benders and throwing things, and I just started screaming. I told him that he was scaring me and that if he didn't stop, I'd hate him forever." His obsession with revenge against benders should have been a clue, if she had listened to it. Why oh why hadn't she listened?

"After that awful night, he did change. He stopped drowning his sorrows in his glass and started being the father I remembered. He taught me how to race, took me to school and to parties. I never saw him angry again." Asami swallowed and had to hold back tears when she remembered their last encounter. "At least, not until he said there was no hope for me, and tried to kill me."

Iroh made a motion to speak, but she held up a hand. "I have forgiven him. I've forgiven him already for all he's done wrong after my mother died. Then I forgave him again when he joined the Equalists, because he's my father and he's my only family. I wouldn't support him, but I would forgive him." She closed her eyes, angry hot tears still finding their way to spill down her cheeks, clinging to long lashes. "But I cannot, I will not, forgive him this. I won't forgive him for putting his ideals over the lives of so many, over the life of his own daughter."

Iroh's expression remained frustratingly stoic throughout her entire explanation. Despite herself, Asami started to feel angry. He was the one who sat next to her, he was the one who had the gall to suggest she forgive her father when he knew what the man had done to her, and then just-

"I am sorry for all your suffering." His words were formal, but there was real warmth behind them. "But I was talking about forgiving yourself, not about forgiving him."

That response had Asami stunned. "What?"

He cleared his throat, looking slightly more uncomfortable. "It isn't easy to cut ties with family, to go through the process you did. My grandfather had to come to terms with the fundamental differences between his ideals and those of his family, and he never quite forgot it. It took him a long time to forgive himself enough to start living again, to start his own family."

Asami dipped her head and let her hair fall in a curtain to obscure her face. Had she forgiven herself? She hadn't quite thought about it. Every time she thought of her father she was filled this boiling rage, this empty sadness. The questions were endless. Did he not love her enough? Did he ever regret it? What else could she have done to save him?

Perhaps there was nothing more she could have done.

"I...thank you, Iroh. I will have to think about that."

The council stood, announcing the beginning of the trial. Iroh silently pushed back his chair and slid out from behind the table, sparing Asami one last glance. "Good luck, Miss Sato, though I don't think you will need it." His lips curved into a small smile. "If you would like to talk after the council adjourns, I will be waiting in the entrance hall."

Asami's eyes widened and she inclined her head, once. His smile broadened just slightly, but somehow it had the effect of lighting up his whole face. He returned her bow and left to sit with the rest of the military representatives.

Turning back to the front of the room, Asami felt herself relax just a little. She knew she had a long road ahead of her, and she would be a fool to think that everything would be alright after today. But she also three irreplaceable friends, a job she loved to keep her occupied, and a rather handsome general waiting for her outside of the council room. For the first time, the future was looking brighter.

And maybe in time she would forgive her father. Maybe she wouldn't. But it was far past time to forgive herself.

A/N: I'm so excited for Irosami week! All of my submissions will be under the same story, with different chapters for each day. Permission is fully written, and Tea is halfway done, so hopefully I'll be able to stay on time with all my submissions. I'm trying to keep these in 'one-shot' territory instead of 'drabbles', but some will probably straddle those definitions anyway.

Sorry it's on the short side, tomorrow's is longer!

Hugs and kisses,

OrganizedxChaos