Chapter Text
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Things didn’t go back to normal. Well, whatever normal was to the Avatar’s gang.
They had no real plan in mind, other than Aang needed an earthbending teacher. They didn’t have a particular person in mind, besides Bumi, but he was a king. Zuko had pointed out he could be busy and they should keep their options open. It felt weird, from having such a straightforward goal of getting to the North Pole to searching the large Earth Kingdom until someone caved into Aang’s incessant begging.
Katara had been ecstatic when Pakku revealed he was turning over a new leaf, that he was going to help rebuild the Southern Water Tribe. And while Aang hadn’t mastered waterbending, Katara had, so she’d teach him whatever was left to know.
Before they left, Zuko watched Sokka speak with Chief Arnook. He couldn’t hear their conversation, but Zuko could tell recent events were continuously bothering Sokka and that conversation didn’t help much.
Which brought them to now.
It was their first night back camping, and Sokka kept poking the dying embers of their campfire. Katara and Aang were already asleep. Zuko sat, back against a tree, trying to scratch off some soot on his spirit mask. It needed a repaint, but part of Zuko didn’t want to get rid of the chipped and smudged parts.
“Are you going to go to sleep?” Sokka’s voice uncomfortably broke the silence of the forest.
“I wasn’t planning on it… you?”
Sokka didn’t turn to speak to him. “You should sleep.”
To Zuko, that didn’t sound like much of a suggestion. Sokka wanted him to sleep, but the firebender doubted it was out of concern for his health.
“Are… you sure? If you think someone needs to take watch then I can do it while you sleep-”
“Just go to bed, Lee.”
Zuko sighed. “You should sleep too.”
Sokka didn’t reply, and Zuko shuffled away from the campfire. Since he didn’t really own a sleeping bag, he took to sleeping in trees. When he was a little kid, he used to climb the tree in the gardens and nap up there, back when Azula was too fawned over to climb trees. Sometimes, his mother would find him and scold him for getting twigs and leaves in his hair, and then she’d brush them away, frowning.
“A prince should keep his hair tidy, no?”
Zuko ruffled his hair around. It was really long now, the ends brushing his shoulders ever so slightly. He looked up at a particularly sturdy-looking tree for any bird or pecker-squirrel nests and scaled the trunk when he found none.
Settling on a thick branch, Zuko stared into the darkness, as if it might gain consciousness and yell at him to sleep. Because as tired as he was, he knew he wasn’t going to be able to rest tonight.
Some shuffling and footsteps interrupted Zuko’s absent-minded knife twirling. He stood on the branch and looked over the campsite only to see Sokka walking in the opposite direction of where everyone slept.
On the other side of the forest was a meadow-like clearing that Appa hung around earlier, mowing as much grass as he could. Zuko could’ve just brushed it off as Sokka going to sleep on Appa because sometimes Aang and Katara would do that, but something in the back of his mind told him to follow the other teen.
Agni, I’m just getting nosier and nosier by the day, aren’t I?
Zuko followed Sokka using the trees for cover, scowling at himself when he rustled one too many leaves.
Just as Zuko predicted, Sokka trudged past Appa, the beast just barely opening its eye to watch him.
Zuko watched Sokka walk (more like drag) himself to a plush area of short grass and fall into himself, one hand clutching the clothing on his chest and the other running down his face as he slid to the ground.
A few seconds went by and Sokka began to tremble enough that Zuko could see it from his spot in the trees. Even from so far away, the firebender caught the hitched sobs that floated through the soft night breeze. Something in his chest twinged. He would normally just walk away from this, but something about the person breaking in front of him being Sokka forced a pull from his mind and body.
With a soft thump , Zuko landed in the grass. He noiselessly made his way over to Sokka, wincing as the hurt sounds his friend made got a little louder with every step. Not wanting to think too hard, Zuko quietly sat beside Sokka, crossing his legs gracefully. When Sokka noticed him, he choked a bit before trying his best to wipe his tears, but they just kept coming. Zuko didn’t move, didn’t try to talk or touch him. He just sat with his palm against the grass, staring up at the stars as Sokka tried to put himself together.
His tears only just prickling at his eyes now, and the dried ones beginning to make red trails on his cheeks, Sokka spoke.
“Why aren’t you in bed, man?” He rasped as if it hurt physically to talk.
“Couldn’t sleep. Heard you. I… I want to help?”
Sokka chuckled wetly. “There’s nothing to help.”
“There’s always something to help,” Zuko replied ominously, “And I don’t think you’re the kind of person to cry over nothing.”
It was silent for a moment.
“I was holding her, you know,” Sokka mumbled, and Zuko tried his best to hear the next part, “I wish I hadn’t been.”
Zuko turned his gaze to the moon, which only showed half of itself tonight. Or, herself, he guessed.
“I heard from Katara what happened, I… I’m sorry.”
“‘S not your fault.”
“It’s not yours either.”
Sokka glared at him. “I was supposed to protect her. That was my job.”
“Seems to me she didn’t need to be protected much,” Zuko said.
Another glare was shot at him.
“The princess made the choice herself, right?”
“Barely,” Sokka scoffed, before resting his chin on his knee. “Cheif Arnook… her father , he said… he said he’d known it would happen. And I just… how could he do nothing? She wasn’t- She couldn’t have been born only to die. That’s…”
“It shouldn’t have happened,” Zuko agreed, “But it did.”
“But it fucking did. I don’t- I should’ve done something, anything-”
“You did the most,” Zuko declared. Sokka gave him an incredulous look. “Did you not see the way she looked at you? I mean- I really think she saw you as the best thing in her life, Sokka. I know that look.”
Zuko knew it from when Uncle looked at Lu-Ten’s portraits, from when Kovah and Suki sat across from each other and sappily stole glances of each other when they thought the other one wasn’t looking. He’d seen it in the way Aang stared at Katara when she laughed. Zuko knew he never experienced much love, not in his sixteen years of life, but that made it all that much easier to notice on the faces of others.
A few more tears escaped the corners of Sokka’s eyes, dripping down and cupping his jaw.
“She was only sixteen,” He whispered, “I’m almost sixteen. You’re sixteen. That’s… it’s so young to…”
“Everyone deserves a bit more time,” Zuko exhaled, “But… she’s not really gone, is she?”
Sokka stilled. “What… what is that supposed to mean?”
“Your sister told me her soul saved the moon spirit, making Princess Yue the new moon spirit,” Zuko turned and gestured with his head towards the moon, “She’ll always be there now, in the sky…”
“Do you think she can see us? Hear us?” Sokka asked, and the firebender could detect a little desperation at the edges of his tone.
“I don’t see why not.”
Sokka slowly turned to face the moon. The pained furrow in his brow smoothed out, ever so slightly.
“Hey, Yue,” He breathed. Zuko allowed himself a small smirk.
Sokka continued. “I’m sorry I couldn’t protect you,” tears began to stream steadily down his face, but they were silent, “But… I mean… I know you were focused on your duties… you knew it had to happen, right?”
“... You were very brave,” Zuko said to the moon. He didn’t want Sokka to feel weird about talking to something that wouldn’t respond.
When Zuko had lost his mother, he’d visit the gardens. He’d eventually gotten the mother turtleduck to trust him slowly, and bit by bit he’d spill his secrets to her as if maybe, just maybe, this turtleduck still remembered his mother. That somehow, if he spoke to this animal, his mother would hear.
“Very,” Sokka nodded, “I miss you, and I wish you could’ve stuck around… so I could show you the world. But I guess you already see the whole thing, huh?”
The Water-Tribe boy sighed, and it sounded much more content. Then he looked down, staring at a spot between his feet.
“I hope I don’t forget you.”
“You won’t forget her,” Zuko tried to assure.
Sokka shook his head. “I… I’m going to forget what she looks like. It’s just what happens.”
“What she… oh. I get it.”
Sokka made a face. “How could you possibly get it?”
“I… you know, when someone’s gone for so long you just… forget their face. It’s… upsetting.”
Zuko only really remembered what Lu-Ten looked like because Uncle kept his picture up. Zuko never carried a picture of his mother around. And everyone at the palace acted like she never existed. One day he woke up, and every trace of her was gone. He’d bet there were portraits of her back on Ember Island, but he wasn’t allowed there and every portrait in the palace had been disposed of.
So, usually, if Zuko wanted to picture his mom, he’d think of Azula. He could remember her face a lot more, and maybe that was because she was still alive. He’d just imagine Azula had kinder eyes and a soft smile, and he could build up the woman everyone told him had never been around in the first place.
Everyone wanted Zuko to forget his mother, but Sokka sounded as if he didn’t have a choice in forgetting the one he lost.
“Yeah,” Sokka stared at Zuko, “Yeah I… after a while I just… I can’t remember people’s faces. I hate it. My… I feel like such a piece of shit sometimes, because I can’t… I can’t even remember what my own mother looks like. I just always put Katara’s face on an older woman and hope it’s right, but it never is. And… I won’t be able to forgive myself if I forget what Yue looks like. I just won’t.”
Zuko stared at the moon and thought about one of the few reasons he had promised himself he’d capture the Avatar and go back to the Fire Nation. He wanted to be closer to the memory of his mother. Maybe he’d be able to go back to Ember Island and retrieve her portraits.
“Tell you what,” Zuko suggested after a few beats of silence, “When I get enough money, we’ll visit a portraitist. There are a lot of them who specialize in unreferenced portraits, for… well, past loved ones… and basically you just give them a list of features… and they paint the person for you. I’ll commission one for you, and then you won’t forget the princess. You can have her right in your pocket if you’d like.”
Sokka stared at him long and hard. After a while Zuko thought he had said something wrong but-
The teenager pounced on Zuko latched him in a hug that sent them both tumbling on their backs. The firebender let out a small ‘oof’ as Sokka’s weight settled on top of him.
“Thank you, Lee,” Sokka whispered into the crook of Zuko’s neck.
And if he was blushing? Well, that was nobody’s business.
Sokka pushed himself up so that his hands were on the grass beside Zuko’s chest and his face was level with the other teen’s.
“You… have no idea how much that means to me. So thank you.”
“It’s nothing,” Zuko replied breathlessly.
Sokka stared down at Zuko for a few seconds, before his nose scrunched up and his eyes flickered away, that miserable expression back on his face.
“I can’t believe my first girlfriend turned into the moon.”
A beat passed.
“That’s rough buddy.”
Sokka looked back at him, gaping a bit, before absolutely losing it. His head dipped into Zuko’s chest and he howled with laughter.
It was a hundred times a better sound than the sobbing from earlier, even if Zuko didn’t know what was so funny.
Sokka rolled off of him, clutching his sides and snorting like a hyena-hawk. It took him a couple of minutes to calm down while Zuko fretted at his side, unable to see how what he said was this hilarious.
“-Oho, oh man…!” Sokka wheezed, “How are you so funny without trying?”
“Uh? Not sure,” Zuko said, a bit concerned.
They lied in the grass, stewing in that familiar comfortable silence between them.
An owl-squirrel hooted in the distance.
“Are you alright?” Zuko asked. He rarely broke the silence, but he needed to know if he actually helped his friend.
“I am. I’m… I’m okay. You?”
“If you’re okay, then so am I.”
“... Good.”