Zuko, the spirit worlds local stray

Tui and La he's crazy

- Zukos' Perspective -

"Ok ok wait, how exactly did this happen? I think some explaining is needed here." Katara askes. She was giving me a kinda weird look as if what I had just said was crazy. Actually, now that I'm looking all of them are. You'd think that since they traveled with the avatar they would be used to spirits by now, if anything it's stranger that they aren't.

"I second that motion!"Sokka exclaims, breaking me out of my musing. "Are you seriously saying that you just used to run into RANDOM SPIRIT HOLES!" He starts waving his arms around, gesturing wildly. "How did you come up with that! It doesn't even make any sense! Just cause he's the avatar doesn't mean he's always involved with spirits!"

"Well it worked didn't it?" I asked, staring back at his incredulous face. "I don't get why you guys are freaking out, it's not that big of a deal."  For some reason this makes him start sputtering.

"Not that big of a- how can you- " 

My cheeks heat as they continue to stare at me, well at least the spirits aren't acting any weirder than normal, and the hair petting does feel pretty nice. Looking away from the gang I lean into the touch.

- Sokkas perspective -

He was leaning into that spirits' ...hand? I think it's a hand, whatever, at this point, there's just too much to process. Shaking my head I open my mouth to ask more but Toph beat me to the punch. 

"So spill, when and how did this happen?"

"Yeah, you gotta tell us the story. " Aang jumped in enthusiastically, " Ooh let's do circle time!" he suggests.

"Circle time?" Katara spoke up, latching on to the first relatively normal part of this conversation. At least I'm not the only one weirded out by Zuko and his....friends?

"The monks used to tell stories late at night and we would all form a circle to listen to them."

"Yada yada," Toph cut in, "back to the point, go ahead sparky. How did this happen?"

"Oh well, it was near the beginning of my banishment when my scar was still healing."

- Storymode (no ones' perspective) -

"I was following a lead on the avatar in the earth kingdom and got lost in the vast forests there. I didn't realize that I had stumbled into the spirit world until I started seeing unexplainable things. I found a cave-like structure and inside there were sections of glowing water and the trees seemed to go up forever. " He looked around at the Gang before continuing.

" To be honest, it was really beautiful, but at the time I was too freaked out to notice. I ran into an old toad spirit named Sapo who explained to me where I was, they were the ones who helped me to get out. " Zuko explained.

"You've got to be kidding me! Why do they let you in so easily!" Sokka says, throwing his hands up in frustration.

"Sokka!!!" Katara admonishes. 

"What! I'm right!" he exclaims grumpily, "We, the ones with the supposed 'bridge between the worlds' can hardly get in the spirit world and when we do everything tries to attack us! But the moment princess," he points his finger accusingly at Zuko, " wants to the world just lets him waltz in?! Unscathed and in a beautiful cave no less!! I should be the one walking in glowing water!!! ME!" he continues, waving his arms quite sillily to emphasize his point.

"He's kinda right katara," Aang adds. "They didn't help me at all when I went in, they just ignored me!"

Everyone had forgotten for a moment that the spirits in question were, in fact, there despite one of them literally cradling Zuko in its arms as if he was a cat and not a human. They glance at each other before one speaks up,  "Not to be rude, but from what we've seen all you avatars cause is trouble." Others nod a bit in agreement. 

"What! but I helped that panda spirit a while ago!"

"Yes, Hei Bai, I know of him, but that was just one instance in one life out of a thousand, so forgive us for being skeptical." dispite their politeness the spirits saw that he was still a bit upset. They didn't really care if they had upset the avatar, but this was also one of Zukos new freinds so it was best to not start off on the wrong foot.  "I mean think about it, if a dog kept causing trouble all around town and then one day appeared on your front lawn you probably wouldn't just invite them in." At this Aang looked like he was considering their words before nodding, appeased.

"I guess that makes sense, even I can be a bit suspicious at times."

"Now that that's settled, how about you all shut up, I wanna hear the story!" Toph says, pulling the focus back to zuko. Everyone settles down as Zuko looks a little embarassed before speaking.

"If it's any consolation, I'm pretty sure they only helped me because they felt bad. I mean, to them, I was little more than a baby with how our different life spans are." Zuko shrugs as there is laughter from the spirits.

"You still are." one says,

"Look how small you are, " the one holding him coos, teasing the tiny stray prince by lifting him as if to prove the point. Zuko's face heats up as he blushes.

"Stop that! I've already explained to you the life span difference!"

"We know we know we're just teasing," a different spirit says, trying to calm him with a gentle hand on his back. The hand is almost wider than the span of it which doesn't help to disprove the point of the prince being smaller than them, but when he sees the others are watching he awkwardly clears his throat and continues talking.

"Anyways, after that, I realized that since the avatar was like you said, 'the bridge between the two worlds' it would make sense for him to be near any spirit-related activities. So from then on when I saw something strange or spiritual I would just head that way and check it out. Because of this, I did end up getting sucked in a couple of times though." he admits sheepishly.

"To be honest a lot of us didn't like him at first," a nearby spirit pipes up while laughing, "some even went as far as to call him a feral stray because he didn't like spirits coming near him even though he insisted one being in the spirit world!" 

"Yes," another agrees, "but then his uncle came in and explained to us through Sapo that he was his nephew. He asked that we be patient with him and explained that he didn't even like his own kind all that much, nevertheless spirits! Though," he says, eyeing Zuko and smiling, "given that he's with all of you I'm guessing that changed somewhere along the line while he was away." All eyes turn toward their local stray whose trying his best to act as if he didn't hear the comment and isn't still being manhandled by multiple spirits.

"Sorry about kinda just leaving you guys with no notice, I thought that I'd see you even more often while traveling with the avatar so I didn't think I'd need to. But for some reason, it's like he's avoiding the spirit world. He always passes right by openings and steers away from most spiritual hubs, so I haven't had time to visit, sorry." he says apologetically, rubbing the back of his neck.

"Wait, I WHAT!" Aang bursts out. There's a moment of silence as Zuko looks at him confused. Then he looks at the others and finds them staring too. Finally, realization dawns on him and he says, "You.....didn't know about that? I thought you were doing it on purpose, so I didn't say anything."