Categories > Cartoons > Avatar: The Last Airbender
Zuko doesn't understand.
He doesn't understand why the morning of the day his life scarred the sun was up in the air, beaming, and he had woken up with the songs of birds in his ears.
He doesn't understand how it could have been any day, really, any day, in those forsaken icy seas when he saw the column of light that altered his life.
Again.
Now, before he sleeps every day on the cold hard marble of the Western Air Temple, he wonders whether a pattern exists in his life or not. His mind insists, incessantly, that there must be. There must be a reason, a meaning, something.
Then he retches uncontrollably because he has eaten something wrong and its cold and he can't even call his fire to heat himself up while Katara smiles apologetically, and it's the first time she's smiled at him since Ba Sing Se and oh Agni and he throws up again onto her lap.
He stops thinking after that, and sleep comes easily, but not that much.
When his thoughts are not addled by sleep and it's not dark and he's not alone, however, he remains perplexed. It's nighttime and everybody in the Temple is huddled together and sleeping far, far away from the rain and the thunder, but he's outside and he's letting the water fall on his face and closed eyelids. And this time it is different. It shouldn't be raining this time of the year, but it does and he doesn't understand.
A flash of light and thunder and Zuko opens his eyes to see power in its purest form and without a thought he raises two fingers to accompany nature in its journey, and only after he's spent and his hand is smoking he realizes what he has accomplished.
He has no idea how he did it.
That night he doesn't sleep much and the next morning he says something wrong (he supposes) and the next thing he feels is cold ice burning his cheeks and pinning him into a wall, and big angry blue eyes. Something (Sokka?) tells him asking her what's wrong will probably not end well, and so he falls asleep until the ice melts a few hours later and he falls without warning and everyone, even she, laughs while he holds his head and wonders whether their laughs mean something.
They should, shouldn't they?
The next day the blind girl Toph wants to train with him and they do and afterwards as he argues with Katara (again). Zuko wonders about the symptoms of insanity.
Then his back hurts and he's pinned to a wall again and it takes him a while to understand that he has verbalized his thoughts aloud in front of—
Well.
The sun breaks out from a bunch of dark clouds and shines on his bruised face and crucified body on the wall, and Zuko doesn't understand.
He can't care less, really.
Really.
It's just uncomfortable.
He doesn't understand why the morning of the day his life scarred the sun was up in the air, beaming, and he had woken up with the songs of birds in his ears.
He doesn't understand how it could have been any day, really, any day, in those forsaken icy seas when he saw the column of light that altered his life.
Again.
Now, before he sleeps every day on the cold hard marble of the Western Air Temple, he wonders whether a pattern exists in his life or not. His mind insists, incessantly, that there must be. There must be a reason, a meaning, something.
Then he retches uncontrollably because he has eaten something wrong and its cold and he can't even call his fire to heat himself up while Katara smiles apologetically, and it's the first time she's smiled at him since Ba Sing Se and oh Agni and he throws up again onto her lap.
He stops thinking after that, and sleep comes easily, but not that much.
When his thoughts are not addled by sleep and it's not dark and he's not alone, however, he remains perplexed. It's nighttime and everybody in the Temple is huddled together and sleeping far, far away from the rain and the thunder, but he's outside and he's letting the water fall on his face and closed eyelids. And this time it is different. It shouldn't be raining this time of the year, but it does and he doesn't understand.
A flash of light and thunder and Zuko opens his eyes to see power in its purest form and without a thought he raises two fingers to accompany nature in its journey, and only after he's spent and his hand is smoking he realizes what he has accomplished.
He has no idea how he did it.
That night he doesn't sleep much and the next morning he says something wrong (he supposes) and the next thing he feels is cold ice burning his cheeks and pinning him into a wall, and big angry blue eyes. Something (Sokka?) tells him asking her what's wrong will probably not end well, and so he falls asleep until the ice melts a few hours later and he falls without warning and everyone, even she, laughs while he holds his head and wonders whether their laughs mean something.
They should, shouldn't they?
The next day the blind girl Toph wants to train with him and they do and afterwards as he argues with Katara (again). Zuko wonders about the symptoms of insanity.
Then his back hurts and he's pinned to a wall again and it takes him a while to understand that he has verbalized his thoughts aloud in front of—
Well.
The sun breaks out from a bunch of dark clouds and shines on his bruised face and crucified body on the wall, and Zuko doesn't understand.
He can't care less, really.
Really.
It's just uncomfortable.
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