Avatar Fics

[fulselden]

A selection of ficlets, ranging from sad to silly.

 

Life under Wartime
Series: Avatar
Characters: Zuko, Iroh
Rating: G


In the lower ring of Ba Sing Se, a boy called Li serves tea in thick pale cups to off-duty guards and tired
housewives.

The cups are earthbent, says his uncle, that’s why they all have the same shape, the same dent on one side.

“Such a useful technique,” he beams, looking at Li over the rim. “And such an improvement in the tea.”

 

Li learns the quickest way to sweep the shop, that a slice of sun comes through the door between the sixth and the seventh hour.

“Your uncle’s brewing is bringing in a better class of customer,” the owner tells him. “When summer comes, perhaps we’ll put some tables in the courtyard out back.”

 

His uncle sits under the trees in the dry little park near their tenement and plays pai sho with old men on boards soft with yellow pollen. One of the players, his arm shiny with burns, elbows Li in the ribs.

“Want to lend me a hand against your uncle? Us veterans have to stick together, right?”

 

Li wakes to the sound of children in the courtyard. For a moment he realises he must have nodded off in front of his tutors, that his sister and her friends are playing in the gardens outside.

“Hurry up, Zuzu,” says his sister. “Come out with us now or we won’t wait for you.”

 

His uncle closes the shutters and sets out a row of tiny lamps full of heavy yellow oil.

“You must practise your breathing, Prince Zuko,” he says. “Practise keeping the flame steady.”

 

At night, the low clouds are green with the light of the city. Li opens his eyes. A girl in red kneels by the door, her hands still in her lap.
“My parents are pleased to announce my betrothal, Prince Zuko,” she tells him. “I’m told it is a most suitable match.”
She looks up, but he can't see her face.
“After all, it has been some years.”
Li wakes; his uncle snores in the next room.

 

Between the third and the fourth hour, the courtyard well holds the sun down in its water, like a dropped coin.





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They're Living Things To Me

Written for the 31_days prompt 'the sleep of reason produces monsters'.
Series: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Characters: Azulon, Ozai, Ursa, Zuko, Azula
Rating: G

Blindfold, in the dark, with the brush of a finger, I could tell one from the other. They’re living things to me; they know me, they return the touch of my hand.

Henry James, The Spoils of Poynton.

 

Brick red shadows slammed out across the palace courtyard as guards raised up the banners, long stiff slabs of silk. The sky was grey with heat, the high roofs wavering against it as if held in still water. Ladies fussed and fluttered in the dark hallway behind the royal family, their robes crisping across the floor, fans jerking the air back and forth.

 

Prince Ozai stood beside his father, his wife a step behind him, their daughter in her arms. Their son, almost three years old now, stood at one side, between the dowagers Li and Lo, clutching unsteadily at their robes.  His mouth was wet and sticky; the ladies had been giving him sweets. Ahead, the courtyard was massed with nobles, palace functionaries, military staff, their heads bowed. Fire Lord Azulon raised a hand.

“I am here,” he said, “to witness the naming of my grand-daughter.”

Ozai’s wife stepped forward, her hair sheeting briefly white as she passed into the sun. She held the child out to the waiting Fire Sages, who gathered to streak her hands and feet and mouth with wet red oil. The baby squirmed in her mother’s arms, mouth quirking ominously. Azulon raised a whisper of fire in his hand, almost invisible in the sunlight. The Fire Sages stepped back.

 

The Fire Lord tipped his hand out over the princess, flames licking the oil up. The baby blinked, stilled. A good omen. Her mother raised her before the crowd.

“Azula,” announced the Fire Lord, “Fifth of the blood.”

He turned, nodded at his son, swept back into the glinting dark of the palace. The crowd rippled as he left.

 

Ursa was smiling down at their daughter, wiping at the last traces of oil with a finger. The world around Ozai suddenly turned small and hot, a tight red snarl of palace towers and courtyards and powdered old ladies. His wife would be one of them someday, mouthing at sugared squares of plum jelly in the second best apartments, their daughter behind her laughing into her sleeve. The sun twisted above him, the sky stretched and filmy. His son looked up at him, eyes squinting against the light. His daughter mouthed at her mother’s finger, tiny and pale with heat. The crowd waited.

 

“It’s a fine name,” his wife said, absently enough. She touched his sleeve.

Ozai bowed his head, lifted a hand to his daughter’s face. Then he turned and led his family back through the rustling women into the palace, following his father. The banners dipped down into their shadows. The crowd broke apart behind him.





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Grin Like A Dog

Written for the 31_days  prompt 'Grin Like A Dog'.
Series: Avatar
Character: Azula
Rating: G

Azula smiled. Picked up the hairbrush, lining it precisely in place on her vanity. She was, after all, perfectly capable of putting up her own hair; a commander had to be prepared for such exigencies in the field. She smiled a little wider, carefully, neatly. Briefly her uncle, at siege for two years outside Ba Sing Se, came to mind, his failure, the even, level fields stretching between the city and the outer wall, the loop and dive of the great stone monorails. Her city. She wondered what it would look like from the air.

 

She smiled, twisted her hair up, stepping carefully across the floor, holding up her robes. A Fire Lord must expect certain standards, of course. But a commander might even have to sand and oil her own armour, if the war demanded it. There was no excuse for any lapse in order. She settled the silk around her shoulders.

 

The corridors of her palace swelled and looped around her. She stretched out a sheet of paper, ground her brush into the ink, poised herself over the page. She should record the occasion for posterity, for her father. She allowed the ink to lap at the paper; she licked her lips in the silence.

She wondered what the palace looked like from the air.

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Slide Your Smile Out

Written for the 31_days   prompt 'the esthetic of lostness'.
Series: Avatar
Character: Jet
Rating: G

Jet crunches his grass stalk between the teeth at the side of his mouth; spits expertly. He hooks an arm around the boy’s shoulders and gestures expansively upwards, into the streaks and skirls of red leaves.

“Well, kiddo? What’s the verdict?”

The kid looks up at him, white snot ringing each nostril, long dusty hair in his eyes.

“It’s a very nice place,” the kid says politely.

Jet puffs out a breath, hoicks a rope down from the branches above. All the little ties on the kid’s robe are still done up, all the way up to his neck; he isn’t even very thin, even though Jet won him over with a bowl of noodles.

“Well,” he says conversationally, “you ain’t seen nothing yet.”

He grabs the kid in one arm, the rope in the other, and they shoot up through the branches.

 

Smellerbee crouches on the walkway waiting for him. She pats the kid down, not unkindly, puts him to one side.

“Come on,” she says, “you gotta see this.”

Beside her, Longshot inclines his head.

“It’s very nice up here,” the kid says.

“Fine, fine,” says Jet. He slaps the kid between the shoulder blades. “You’ll get the grand tour later on, kiddo.”

They whip through the treetops, red light around them. He hears it before he sees them, the neat sound of men marching in step down the dry dirt road. Rows of grey smoke rise from the town into the sky; a short trench is being dug outside the walls. Jet curves himself over on his branch, grinning around his grass.

“Well, well,” he says. “Now they’re in our back yard.”

 

They come back to the camp in the trees; the kid is where they left him, sitting with his hands together in his lap.

“Come on, kiddo.” Jet swings himself up beside him, takes out his knife.

“Gotta look sharp to be a freedom fighter.”

He saws away at the boy’s hair, the strands falling out into the air, drifting like sugar in warm red water.




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Important Considerations

Written for the 31_days   prompt 'The whole unvisited world'
Series: Avatar
Characters: Suki, Ty Lee
Rating: G



Suki kicks up her feet and considers kissing. This is because Sokka has drawn little hearts all over the White Lotus documents, as well as his list of criteria. There is even a picture at the bottom of the list. She’ll ask him just what it’s meant to be when she sees him again, but he’s at the South Pole now and that’s quite a way from the eastern coast of the Earth Kingdom.

 

She tips her chair back; something gives way at the back of the bar behind her and clatters across the floor. Outside, Rin and Saika are tying up the last of the dissident colonials. None of them are in any state to talk yet, so Suki drops the White Lotus papers and picks up Sokka’s list.

 

“Ambiance” she reads out. Ty Lee pops up from behind the bar.

 

“Eight and three quarters!” she declares. “Three quarters because the energy lines were totally messed up by that big plant pot before it got smashed.”

 

“No half marks,” Suki reminds her.

 

“Awww.” Ty Lee dips down behind the bar again. The barman groans. Suki doesn’t feel that sorry for him: he should have ducked when she shouted, and anyway he’s waking up to a face full of Ty Lee. Men have got knocked out for worse.

 

“Eight,” Suki decides. This bar certainly has a good view, out over a steep green valley to the sea. She moves down the list.

 

“Cuisine.”

 

Ty Lee pokes her head up again.

 

“I think that’s just a no, Suki.” She bobs back down. “Do you serve food?” she asks. The barman groans again.

 

“Local colour.”

 

“Pink!” says Ty Lee, as usual. Suki considers.

 

“Seven,” she decides. She makes a note, “Nice view. Folk art on walls.”

 

The other warriors file in, dusting themselves off.

 

“All secure,” Rin reports. “They’ll be out for a while longer, though.” She finds herself an unbroken chair and flops down. “Six for ambiance.”

 

“We already did that one,” Suki tells her. She looks around at her warriors, still sharp after months of chasing rebels and war criminals across the Earth Kingdom, and runs a finger down the list.

 

“You know,” she says, “I think this time we can just skip to the end.” There is a chorus of agreement, though Misaki, on guard duty by the door, pouts.

 

“No fair.”

 

“You'll get your turn,” says Suki. She taps her fan against the last item on the list; Sokka has surrounded it with a little ring of hearts.

 

 “Right,” she says, as Ty Lee bounces up, bottles in both hands and on one foot.

 

“Beverages!”