atla one shots

1- skin n bones

Zuko pov

I'm not sure how hard it'll be to live with this gaang. I know it'll be harder than most places I lived and I especially know it's for much better reasons than the other places, but the food and treatment I'm given makes it harder to stay on the path I chose. I love having the possibility of friends, but so far Toph, Aang, Momo and Appa are the only ones who will hang  with me for an extended period of time. Sokka feels weird, The Duke, Teo and Haru fear me and Katara? She hates my guts and is part of the reason why I'm currently hurling in the closest thing the air nomads had to a toilet. I understand, but if she doesn't give me something edible soon, I'm going to be too weak to teach Aang to firebend, which entirely defeats the point of me being here. I groan and swallow, trying not to hurl again. I get off the floor and stumble to my room, where I drink some water, after rinsing my mouth to get rid of both the taste and the hunger pains. I know I've lost lots of weight since getting here, but the fact I was underweight to begin with doesn't help. I collapse on my bed, and drift into a tired, hunger induced sleep.

Knock! Knock!
"Zuko, it's time for training. Are you ok? You're usually up by now."
I groan, but sit up and head for the doorway, knowing Aang is waiting to the side to give me a semblance of privacy. I grab the doorway and lean on it subtly, before looking to him.
"Give me a few minutes. I fell asleep late and didn't feel the sun coming up because my body decided sleep was more important. I was planning the training for today."
He nods and waits as I change and clean up a little. Then we head to our designated clearing to the side of the "main room" so Katara can watch "us" train. I settle against the wall as he starts his warm ups, before glancing at Katara. She's glaring at me even as she stirs the pot, probably planning to feed me more left over brunt scraps. I turn back to Aang and begin my teaching, ignoring the eyes boring through my head.
"Today, I want you to aim your fire at me. And then I'm going to teach you something that's a little more fatal if not practiced right."
He looks hesitant, but I lock eyes with him to prove he can't hurt me, so he gets into stance. I nod and settle into one of the defence stances. The fire from his hand is a gentle red, enough to hurt but not burn too badly. I made this next move by copying an earthbender and fixing it for firebending. I send fire along the ground in small waves towards him, even as I use small flames to create a wall that will absorb the other flames. I lower the flames immediately before they even touch him, but I can tell from the sparkle in his eyes he knew exactly where I was going with that.

He gets into the defence stance and I fix it, before starting to explain, catching sight of Toph, Sokka and Teo watching us.
"What you're gonna want to do is imagine a small circle of flames surrounding you with lines leading up to you randomly. When the enemy sends a flame at you, send several of the lines towards them, while also focusing on building a wall that will absorb their fire. We'll start with the circle and go from there."
A few hours later, after we took a break for a breakfast where I sat in the middle of our training area and pretended to eat, he's got down sending the flames and the circle, while the wall needs some work.

"Ok. Time to teach you something more important, that could be fatal. In order for you to do this, you must empty your mind of all your troubles and doubts, not pushing them aside, but working through them. Then, once you've cleared all doubt, all troubles, all thinking, you must focus on your surroundings  and pull yin and yang apart. Yin will feel kinda like a blanket of darkness, soothing and cold, while Yang will feel like the sun, warm and bright. Once you've pulled them apart, direct them down your arm and out your fingertips. Aim for something not important and far away, the wall on the other side of the canyon should do."

Aang seems to really being paying attention, so I carefully show him all the moves for doing lightning, ignoring the lightheadedness and fatigue washing over me. I slide down the wall and rest my back against it, watching through half lidded eyes as Aang tries to clear his mind. I watch him work through several problems by the look on his face alone, before Katara calls dinner ready. I nod and send Aang in, but he doesn't move, watching me.