Oneshot

[shadowsong26]

Title: The End
Rating: M
Genre: General
Summary: After the war is over, how can you put yourself back together?
Warning: Post-finale

 

The treaty was finished. Signed and sealed. And he was home again.

Home.

The word tasted so sweet, now that he was welcome here in his head and heart as well as in his body.

Home.

Only one thing remained unresolved; Ozai still wouldn't tell him what had happened to Ursa. Every day, he went down to the prison and asked, and every day he got no answer. And it wasn't like he could leave again to find out.

He slipped into his study--his now, and that felt so strange--and sat behind the desk. It was even more intimidating from this side. He'd noticed that. He wondered if it woud ever be less...frightening.

Somehow, he doubted it.

~~~

The nightmares wouldn't stop coming. He thought they would, with his sister in an asylum, and his father in prison. When they got too bad, he would slip out of his room to his study and hide in his papers, half of which he still wasn't sure he really understood, and try and get some work done.

He hadn't been ready for this. Not by a long shot. He was too young, too unsettled, too...frightened.

He didn't like that word.

Home was sweet, frightened was bitter.

I can't do this, I'm not strong enough, smart enough, old enough, no one takes me seriously, and why should they I've been a failure/traitor for so long

He took a deep breath and shoved those thoughts into the back of his mind again. I'll deal with that later. When I have time.

~~~

A year had passed. He was almost eighteen--he'd turned seventeen back at the Western Air Temple; the others hadn't been happy when they found out he'd kept that a secret.

They were coming. He wasn't sure he wanted them to. He'd thought the previous year, the last year of the war, had been terrible.

War was nothing.

Politics was a nightmare.

And he had no idea what he was doing, and all the people who could help him were far away or had gone silent.

Ozai had gone silent, months ago. He would still eat, but he wouldn't talk. He just...existed. A permanent reminder never to do wrong.

And the other Firelord spent more and more time shut up in his study, preparing...for what, he wasn't exactly sure.

Maybe for madness. His sister was mad, his father had arguably gone mad as well, it was only a matter of time until he did.

So he hid in his work, trying to get things settled enough so that, if and when madness took him, it wouldn't throw the realm into complete chaos.

Iroh would have to come out of retirement.

He wouldn't like that much.

~~~

Bitter, bitter, that reunion. He loved Aang, like a younger brother, but every time he saw him he couldn't help bug fear--the next time I screw up, are you going to rip my identity out of me, too?

He prayed it would never go that far. On either side.

Katara was only a little easier to face. Maybe she was right about me, before I won her over with the Southern Raiders.

Sokka was simple. The easiest to face, by far.

Toph looked at him with her empty eyes, and she knew he was disintigrating. Apparently, she'd learned tact or something, because she didn't say anything during the party.

Thunder rumbled, rain started pouring, everyone fled inside.

The party continued.

He hated the party, he just wanted to leave...

"Sir?"

He turned. "What is it?"

"There's something you should see."

~~~

There's blood everywhere, gold eyes emptier than Toph's staring out from over a ripped out throat.

He stumbles away and throws up.

Someone presses a broken, bloody rock into his hand. It cuts it, he throws up again.

Thunder booms.

He screams.

"My Lord?"

"Make it stop!"

More thunder. More lightning, reflected in the cooling blood.

Voices behind him, someone runs to get help.

"Makeitstopmakeitstopmakeitstop..."

Something hits him and he falls. Distant, "That wasn't what they meant, Toph!" The glittering red lightning fades into black.

~~~

TAKE MY HAND

He's swallowed by the ocean.

When he wakes up, nothing, everything's gone, ripped away, and he's nothing anymore, not even that little shred he clung to all those years in exile.

He screams inside his head.

"...he was upset. I didn't realize it was this bad." Mai...

"It's not your fault." Aang, wearily. "None of us noticed."

"I did." Toph.

"Why didn't you say something?" He flinches. Katara's angry again...

"Because I didn't think Ozai was going to cut his throat and make him break down tonight, okay! I thought I could just leave it for now!"

"It's okay, Toph." Why is Aang so tired...? He sits up, groggily. His head manages to spin and pound at the same time--quite a feat, he knows, he's concussed himself before, but it usually took it in turns to waltz and stepdance. A new trick, doing both at once. Whaddaya know. I can learn new tricks.

Slowly, he stands. His stomach waltzes with his head and he throws up again. He waits a few minutes when he's done, staring at the pool of empty bile.

The storm is over.How long was I asleep

"Zuko?"

He looks up. Aang hugs him.

"I'm sorry..."

"Not your fault." Yes it is. Should've killed him then, quickly, no disintigration. "How long was I out?"

"A couple hours." He hasn't let go. "I don't think Toph meant to hit you that hard, she just panicked."

He nods. Stepdancing watz again. He swalows the urge to vomit a fourth time. "It's okay. I'm calm now." You don't need to break me like you broke him.

"Zuko..."

He doesn't flinch. It takes an effort. "Really. I'm not going to shatter again." Disintigrate, oh, fuck, they're going to lock me up too, what do I do now?

Aang just hugs him again.

~~~

Another year passed. He refused to let anyone celebrate his birthday this time. He locked himself in his study for most of the day, working. There was no storm, no death, no party, no fear.

There was nothing.

The war was over, completely over now, with Ozai's death.

The end was empty.