A Different Nation a New Code (Zutara)

Chapter One

•••Zuko's perspective•••
Zuko didn't believe that his mother had simply just "died", his father was evil he knew something must've happened. Since Zuko could remember his father was deeply in love with his mother so he never knew why things suddenly changed between the two. But he remembered one day when he was around ten years old that it all changed, his parents got into a huge fight. And they continued having fights after that until he turned eleven when his mother suddenly died.

This fight often haunted his nightmares and every so often he'd wake up from it. Tonight was one of those nights, he remembered the fight like it was yesterday. In the dream him and his younger sister Azula rushed to Zuko's room and hid under his bed, the fighting went on for a while until it finally stopped. The two parents came upstairs and knocked on Zuko's door, his mother was crying and his father didn't seem to care. Zuko rushed out from under the bed and ran into his mother's arms, soothing her and making sure she was okay.

Azula rushed over to her father's arms giving him a hug with a small smirk plastered on her lips, if it wasn't already obvious the parents had favorites. His mother liked Zuko much better but his father hated Zuko, he thought Zuko was a disgrace and a horrible bender. When Zuko was born it was almost impossible to tell he was a bender and his father wanted to get rid of him, when Azula was born it was obvious.

Zuko woke up from the dream and sat up in the king sized bed, he was sweating profusely and he looked to his left seeing Mai next to him. She was a heavy sleeper and never woke up when he had nightmares, he was thankful for that though; he didn't want to seem like a coward. To many people in his life already thought he was a coward.

Zuko slipped from the bed and grabbed his underwear off the ground pulling them on, he also grabbed his bathrobe and tied it walking out of their bedroom. He didn't know what time it was but it seemed to be early in the morning, he walked through the castle hallways thinking of everything that happened to him when he lived here with just his father and Azula, it gave him chills.

He came across his old childhood bedroom and stood outside, he just stared at it. Many emotions rippled through him when he saw this room, he still hadn't gone in it since he was banished, spending his days looking for Aang. If he opened the door it would bring back to many memories he didn't want to think about, so he kept it shut.

He had Mai go through Azula's room for him because he couldn't stand going into her room. He also had Mai drop off some of Azula's belongings to her in the mental asylum. He walked past Azula's room and flipped it off.

He got to the end of corridor where there was a family photo album. He walked over to his mother's photo which he always had nicely kept, with candles and flowers surrounding it. He took his father's picture off the wall and burnt it the minute he moved into the castle, he kept Azula's up though, she couldn't of helped being jealous of Zuko their mother really did love Zuko more.

Zuko sighed and ran a hand through his dark hair, he stood there for a moment thinking about his stressful and fucked up life. He knew his mother didn't just die, he wanted to find her. He tightened his fists and walked outside into the courtyard. He practiced trying to use lighting but just ended up hurting himself, he let out a big sigh ,and laid down on the cement staring up at the night sky, his fist were balled.

Mai did hear this though and she sighed getting out of bed, she was sick of this. It was almost every night that he went out and tried practicing bending lightning and he never told her why. She put on her night dress because she was naked and walked out to the courtyard, she stood over Zuko and crossed her arms over her chest. "Zuko get up", she hissed. Unlike Katara she'd never be sympathetic with Zuko pulling this.

Zuko sighed and stared up at her, she gave him that bitchy look of hers and he knew she wasn't joking. He sat up slowly his breaths heavy. He put himself in a lot of pain.