𝘩𝘪𝘳𝘢𝘦𝘵𝘩

Passive Pain and Sky Screamer

~

In mere moments, I saw Lu-Ten, the older boy, crushed between two boulders.

I screwed up.

~

It was painful, but as the heat radiated and I passed out, it stopped feeling like anything at all. However, where the burn still feels it stings and pulsates and I've never known a pain worse.

For a while I've been awake, but too afraid—and frankly too annoyed, to open my eyes. My focus was mainly on the pain in my shoulder, and holding making a passive aggressive joke to Zuko as my first words.

I lift one eye and feel like my skin is exposed. Which it is. The bandages spand the width of my torso, just over my undergarments, and wrap over my shoulder putting uncomfortable pressure on the destroyed epidermis. My top is unfastened and sitting open plus another, larger one supposedly as a blanket over my chest. I think it's safe to say my privacy has not been invaded too much. I'm wearing pants. It's all good. Right now, I wish I had a friend who was a girl, but that hasn't been the case since ever.

Apparently I make some grunting noise when I shift, because everyone in the room is immediately alerted. "Are you awake? Don't try and sit—"

I turn with a grouchy glare, stopping whoever was speaking short. "I'm not stupid," I say. ""You have injuries!"" I mock.

"Actually, I was going to say don't sit up because you'll bang into Zuko." Where— What Zuko? It's apparently Iroh who speaks. I blink several times, trying to line up that thought with what I see— the emo kid with the scar staring down at me. Ah, that Zuko. I shriek, zapping upright and collide with his jaw.

"Ow! Why the– he literally just said–!! Uh, I mean, why did you just freak out like that? " Zuko's tone went from aggressive to trying-to-be-calm. Extremely strained sounding.

"I have a reason to freak out when someone is staring at me in a creepy way. Especially since it's the first face I'm waking up to," I say, taking a deep breath of air and calming down.

"Uh, sorry. Here, I made tea." He quickly pours a cup of tea and hands it to me.

I take one sip and almost spit it out. There is an extremely bitter, tart taste to it. I don't even know if that description does it service, because it's really awful. "Prince Zuko, um, you're really bad at making tea."

He doesn't seem bothered by the comment, so I slowly dribble back into the cup. Or at least tries not to be. He had it coming. "Where did you learn to fire bend like that?"

I turn to him in confusion, while dumping my tea out the window. "Like what?" I ask. After the hit in the head, most of yesterday is foggy. Or... whatever time has passed since we fought Azula.

"You... all of it's wrong. Your form, technique, everything a firebender is taught, you don't follow any of it, yet how... can you keep up like that?!"

"I can keep fire under control. He taught me that."

"No, I mean your techniques aren't fire bender. Well, they are, but then there's different style. You were able to take hits from Azula. You were able to get her off her feet at least once," Zuko says.

While I'd been running from Fire Nation soldiers for weeks, it came to a point where I had to train harder incase I really had to fight–which I was avoiding. Handling one versus twenty was a big difference. Other than of course, learning from the villagers over my short stay. Of course my firebending became controlled in a forest, where I hadn't wanted to set fire to trees. Without Zuko to spar, without Iroh to criticize, it became something of my own. I intended to learn properly, but the firebending forms slowly slipped from my mind as I watched other benders in other towns. A mesh into a close form of punches, elbow hooks, knees, and using every force of nature with just heat. Everything about my soldier training became loose. All that isn't worth explaining to Zuko though, so it comes off in a shrug.