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melzula · 4 years

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The Gift

pairing: Zuko x Princess!reader

notes: this was requested by an anon!

summary: Zuko and Princess celebrate the opening of her new water bending school

~ part of the fire lilies series ~

You rise before the sun to prepare for the busy day ahead of you. You’d only been crowned Chief two months ago but already you found yourself busy with countless tasks and duties assigned to you by your people. However, you gracefully took each challenge head on, and despite being home for such a short time you’d already accomplished so much.

With the help of your friends you’d managed to dethrone Koa and begin a new era of peace and rebuilding in the South; there was much to do and no time to waste when it came to helping your people, and with assistance from Pakku and members from your sister Tribe you were able to begin the period of growth in no time. Aid had been sent out to the smaller tribes who were being looked after and rebuilt by the men who wished to rectify their wrongs after turning against their Princess in support of the former advisor. Leading them was Hakoda, Sokka and Katara’s father as well as your new advisor. Already the outer tribes were beginning to grow, and with that growth came the discovery of the next generation of water benders.

Before his departure back to the Earth Kingdom Sokka had helped you construct the plans for your new water bending school, and with two months having come and gone the structure was almost complete. Another day or so and you’d be ready to begin your teaching— both younger children of your tribe and a few migrants from the South would be your students, and with Master Pakku’s help you had no doubt your school would be a success.

Many sleepless nights and countless hours of work came with being the Chief of a tribe that was attempting to rebuild itself, yet you still made sure to send letters to Zuko whenever you could. You swore to him before his leave back to the Fire Kingdom that you’d reply to his letters and inform him of any more trouble you faced, and so you found yourself writing back and forth with your boyfriend at least three times a week thanks to your shared messenger hawk. You would have preferred to meet in the secret tunnel, but both of you were much too busy now to escape to your hideaway, so you settled for communication through scrolls.

The sun is just beginning to rise as you adorn the Chieftain necklace and allow the Water Tribe emblem to fall proudly against your chest. Your father would have been proud, and you wish he could see all the things you’ve accomplished for your people.

You slip on your parka and give a wistful glance at the portrait of Zuko that sits on your dresser (a portrait that is accompanied by the doll he’d given to you long ago) before making your way towards your office to get started on the plans for the day. The early mornings were always reserved for scripts and scrolls, it made things more organized and helped the plans ease along nicely, and it also allowed you some quiet time to yourself before you were pulled every which way throughout your day.

You’re not sure how long you sat with your nose buried in paperwork, but by the time your mother steps into your office the morning sun is high in the sky and your people have begun their tasks for the day. She smiles fondly and approaches with a cup of tea in her hands, the cup being a part of the china set Iroh had sent Zuko with months before.

“Well you’re up awfully early,” she notes while carefully setting your tea before you.

“I have a lot to catch up on before the opening of the new school. Pakku brought me a list of possible students and I’m going through each and every one to make sure their needs will be met if they choose to participate in lessons.”

“About that...”

“What?” You prod, immediately looking away from your paperwork and towards your mom. She has a giddy smile on her face and a glint in her eye that she fails to hide from you.

“Would you like to go for a walk? I think we should go for a walk,” she replies, quickly changing the subject and hoisting you out of your seat before you can even comprehend what’s happening.

“Mom!” You try to interject, but she simply brushes off your comments and concerns.

“It really is so nice out today,” she hums gleefully. Guards gift you friendly smiles or respectful bows as you pass, and outside the palace you are greeted with excited commotion.

“What the flameo is going??” You say exasperated. Your gaze settles upon your school in the distance and a confused frown etches itself across your features at the sight of a crowd around the building. You weren’t exactly expecting any students just yet, and the school wasn’t meant to open for another day or two. You also weren’t sure why exactly there was a blanketed structure in the courtyard of the school; you hadn’t authorized any additional features, so what was it?

“Took you long enough,” Pakku greets you both with a smile. Little children stand around him and look upon you with pure glee and excitement. You recognize a few of them from your list, but you hadn’t even reached out to their families yet to ask for permission for their participation in your water bending lessons.

“Can someone please tell me what’s going on here?” You plead desperately. Pakku and your mother grin.

“Why, we’re celebrating the opening of your new school, of course,” he says as if it’s the most obvious thing in the world.

“The opening? But nothing’s ready!”

“Actually, everything is ready,” your mother corrects with a smile. “You’ve been so busy running around trying to get everything in order, so Pakku and I took it upon ourselves to finish up the school for you. All you have to do is say the word and your water bending school will officially be open!”

“Well, we did have some help from the Fire Lord...”

“Zuko?” You retort with furrowed brows. “How did Zuko help?”

“You’ll see,” your mother replies giddily. “Are you ready to open your school?”

It takes you a moment to process the whirlwind of information that’s been given to you in a matter of minutes, but you can’t deny the relief you feel at knowing that the work has been taken care of for you. The first promise you’d made as Chief was to restore water bending in your tribe, and to know you were mere moments away from completing the task was a weight lifted off of your shoulders. All the little children look upon you eagerly, and it’s with a confident smile that you look to your people that have gathered around the school and proudly hold your head up high.

“As Chief of the Southern Water Tribe, it is my great honor and pride to announce the official opening of our school for water benders,” you announce. Your mother beams with pride at the sight of your first big accomplishment as Chief as she gives an agreeing nod to Pakku.

“And to celebrate this great achievement, we have a gift for Chief y/n,” he adds. Your brows furrow in confusion.

“A gift?” You repeat, watching as he pulls a scroll from his coat and begins to read off of the paper.

“I, Fire Lord Zuko, would like to show my excitement and support for the rebuilding of the Southern Water Tribe by offering this gift for Chief y/n. I know it’s impossible to capture her real life beauty, grace, and compassion, but I believe this gift does a pretty good job of displaying her greatness for all to see.”

The blanket is removed from the structure, and all including you gasp in awe at the sight before you; a statue in your likeness stands in the center of the courtyard. Your face holds a warm and benevolent smile, your head held high with a fire lily neatly tucked into your hair, and your hands are held out before you right on top of left as a circle of water swirls in between them. You look regal, elegant, like a perfect Princess and water bender.

“I... I can’t believe it,” you murmur in awe. Your mother smiles.

“Zuko sent me a letter a few weeks back to tell me he planned on commissioning a statue for you— a gift for your accomplishments. I told him it was a wonderful idea and agreed to have it sent here the moment it was finished to celebrate the opening of your school.”

“It’s beautiful,” you say with a teary eyed smile.

“You know, that Zuko is quite the catch. Does he know you’re of marrying age?” Your mother asks with a sly smile.

“Mom!” You exclaim embarrassed. She laughs.

“What? It doesn’t hurt to ask.”

“It’s a little too early for that,” you reply with a sheepish laugh. “Besides, I’ve still got a lot of work to do.”

“You’re right about that,” Pakku says, pulling you aside. “Are you ready to meet your new students, Chief y/n?”

“Actually,” you reply with a coy smile, casting a glance towards your statue, “it’s Sifu y/n when class is in session.”

“Sifu y/n it is,” he agrees with a smile before guiding you into the school to begin training your new students.

| tags: @rainteslerrrr @simpinforsukka @sirkekselord @protect-remus @oddment-niwit-blubber-tweak @thebluelcdy @royahllty @the-firebender-girl @coldlilheart @ilovespideyyy @yiyibetch @eridanuswave @lammello @a-monsters-love @knaite-solo @zukh03s @taeeemin @user12345321 @just--artemis--with--ghost @titaniafire @dekahg @emberislandplayers @kikaninchen-2 @lozzybowe @izzieserra @melacholy @music-geek19 @thia-aep @thyunnamed @haylaansmi @nataliahaslosthershit @idkdude776 @aangsupremacy @thirstyforsometea @ihaveaproblem98 @brown-eyed-thang @djskfkdkkf @xapham @yeetletzgetitjae @misnmatchedsox @chewymoustachio @that-bucket-hat-gal @chilifrylizard2 @kyomihann @kaylove12 @kiwihoee @freggietale @neighborhoodpansexualdisaster @noodlesfluffy @moon-spirit-yue @bubblegum-bee-otch |

#zuko #zuko x reader #zuko imagine #prince zuko #prince zuko x reader #prince zuko imagine #zuko and the princess #fire lilies #avatar: the last airbender #avatar the last airbender #atla #atla x reader #atla imagine

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kumeko · 3 years

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A/N: For the Hold On @tokkazine! I love how these two banter and play off each other.

…

Every time Sokka came to Republic City, it felt like a brand-new place. Fields turned into houses turned into buildings until he could hardly recognize the place. The way people travelled, the businesses opened, even the fashion styles changed with the blink of an eye. It was almost impossible to keep up with and there was little wonder that the rest of the world could hardly keep up with the city’s innovations.

Even the people living in the city had a hard time keeping track of it all.

Still, despite how the roads changed, Sokka never once got lost when he headed to Toph’s office at the police headquarters. His body had long memorized the route, even as the sights around him changed. Including, it seemed, the actual headquarters: the building in front of him was twice the size of the old one and fancier too. Sokka stared up at the imposing brick building, bemused.

“When did they even find the time to make this?” he muttered, feeling awkward as he stepped inside. Sometimes, he missed when the department was a small, two-room affair. Toph had only one or two assistants at the time, and her title hadn’t so much been Chief of Police as it had just been The Only Police.

Now there were a dozen people looking at him as he stood in the lobby. They were all dressed in a grey uniform that looked a little like an overcoat with armoured shoulder pads. Recognizing a few faces, he waved as he quickly trotted along the long carpet to back. Toph’s office was always the biggest room in the place, and he scanned the ids next to the offices as he passed. There were two plaques labelling each room, the second in braille, and he smiles as he finally found an open door with her name on it.

Sokka poked his head in to find Toph standing next to a table, her brow furrowed in concentration as she manipulated a metal ball. As usual, when she focused, it was like the rest of the world stopped existing.

Which meant it was the perfect time to surprise her.

Slowly, he tip-toed in, the plush carpet muffling his steps. The best thing about her office was how plain it was—the blank walls were a bright white, the furniture limited to her desk, chair, and one super comfy couch. There was nothing around for him to bump into, nothing to navigate around.

One, two—

“Hey, Snoozles!” Toph chirped, smirking as she set down the metal ball. “You got to do better than that.”

Sokka pouted, crossing his arms as he gave up the jig. “How do you always know when I’m here?”

“My radar, duh?” How Toph ever learned to roll her eyes despite being blind, he had no idea. He was half certain she’d learn it specifically to make fun of him and Aang, but he could never be certain. “Come on, you’ve known that for years.”

“Not that.” Sokka snorted, slightly insulted. “I meant, how do you know it’s me? I didn’t even say anything.”

“It’s…it’s obvious it’s you.” He wasn’t sure if it was the lights or if he was imagining it, but her cheeks looked rosy pink as she dug her fingers in her thighs. “When’d you get back?”

She was the changing the subject. He would have glowered at her, but there was no point. “Fine, keep your secrets.” Maybe it was another Earth-bending skill she was developing. Grinning, he padded over to her, wrapping arm around her back for a tight side hug. “Just now! I dropped my stuff at the temple and bam! Came to see you!”

Toph wrinkled her nose, though she didn’t step away. “You smell like it too.”

“Hey, that’s the sky bison, not me.” Discretely, he sniffed himself. It wasn’t that bad.

Then again, he’d been smelling sky bison for the past few days; maybe he wasn’t the best judge. Pulling away, he sheepishly rubbed his neck. “Maybe I should have taken that bath first.”

‘You think?” Toph chuckled. Heading over to the sofa, she picked up her grey coat. He could just make out a small badge at the front as she draped it over her arm. “Let’s get dinner.”

“Didn’t you just say I smelled bad?” Sokka frowned, confused.

“Didn’t say I couldn’t handle it, did I?” Toph raised a brow, looking more amused than annoyed. “’sides, I’ve handled criminals all day. You’re the least fishy thing I’ve handled.”

Sokka guffawed, loving the duel meaning. God, he’d missed this—there were so few people who got his sense of humour. Even fewer who could make jokes. Sometimes, he dealt with Katara for so long he forgot that not everyone else was a humourless worrywart.

Hands in his pockets, he waited outside as she closed the door. “You good to go now?”

“Yep.” Toph grinned slyly, her voice lowering to a whisper as she leaned closer. “You know what’s the best part of being blind?”

He felt a little like a giant as he bent over, lowering his head so they were at the same level. Despite getting a growth spurt over the years, Toph was still the smallest person he knew. “What?” he whispered back playfully.

“I never have to handle the paperwork.” She winked at him devilishly before humming as she headed toward the doors.

Sokka laughed again as he walked apace with her. Her poor subordinates.

As they slipped out the police station, he asked, “So why the new uniforms?”

“Blame Twinkle toes.” Toph shrugged. Fortunately, despite it being mid-September already, the weather was warm tonight. It was comfortable walking around in his usual sleeveless vest, and Toph even unbuttoned the top two buttons of her dress shirt. She scrunched her nose. “He wanted us to look the same or something. I think it’s stupid.”

“Why? Uniforms are cool.” Sokka pulled the collar of his vest and stood up a little straighter. “I happen to look very good at them.”

Toph shot him a disgusted look. “I’m sure if I could see, I’d gouge my eyes out.”

“Hey!”

“Besides, if Katara or Zuko picked them, sure, but Aang?” She stopped walking and unfolded her coat. Tugging it on, Toph rested her hands on her hips as she turned to him. “Does this look good to you? I can tell just by feeling them they’re ugly.”

“They’re…” Sokka stared at it as the slightly big coat hung loosely off her shoulders. Aang hadn’t even gotten the size right. He’d seen it on the rest of her coworkers but seeing it like this—it wasn’t great. The shoulder pads were too big. The coat was really plain and out of place. “It has…a nice badge?”

“See?” Toph shrugged out of the coat before he could say anything else. Hanging it off her arm, she continued walking. “Everyone hates them except for Aang.”

“I can talk to him,” Sokka suggested, rubbing his chin thoughtfully as they walked. “It’s not like they’re completely terrible, maybe if we…”

“If you find a solution, I’m all ears.” She kicked a pebble and it skittered across the road. “How was the trip?”

Sokka brightened immediately. It was hard not to, considering the past few weeks he’d had. If there was one thing he liked about his job as an ambassador of sorts, it was the travelling. Maybe it was their journey to save the world, but he’d gained a sense of wanderlust from it all, an inability to stay still. Grinning, he started to tick off his mini adventures. “Awesome, I got to go to the Earth Kindgom again, ate the bestdumplings, save the Lettuce-man’s stall for once—”

“He’s still in business?” Toph’s jaw dropped in surprise, an utterly rare sight that he immediately committed to memory. She moved her hands rapidly as she tried to articulate as a proper sentence. “But his cart—didn’t we burn it down once?—I thought he wanted to—he’s still in business?”

“Yes, yes, I don’t remember if we did that, yes, yes,” Sokka replied easily, not bothering to hide his amused laugh. “I guess if we’re not near him, he actually does good business.”

“You just said you saved his stall,” Toph pointed out, raising a brow. She still had a look of utter disbelief, as though he had just destroyed her worldview like they had destroyed cabbage all those years ago.

“Kinda?” Sokka admitted sheepishly, rubbing his neck. “I was kinda the reason it got in trouble in the first place.”

Toph snorted, shoulders shaking with silent laughter. “That sounds about right.”

“Hey!” he protested, shooting her an ineffective glare. Now that he was older and his voice deeper, he could actually growl properly, but she still never took him seriously. Despite her jokes and how childish she acted at times, Toph was very much an old soul, as steady as the earth itself.

“Anything else happen?” she asked, ignoring his objections as usual.

There was no point in arguing. With a sigh, he shrugged. “Lots of ambassador paperwork—”

“Which is why I never want to go.”

“—and Uncle Iroh looked fine.” Sokka frowned, processing her last sentence. “I thought you couldn’t do paperwork?”

“Nah, I won’t want to.” Toph smirked mischievously, and he felt sorrier for her assistants. “Also, Uncle Iroh?”

“Look, it’s really weird calling him just Iroh, okay?” At the memory, a shiver ran through his spine. “I don’t even call our village elders by their name, and they’re like half his age.”

Toph scoffed. “I don’t think he’s that old.”

“Well, okay, maybe, but he feels like it. I tried calling something else and then he got weird about it so we just…settled for Uncle.” Sokka sighed. “And that’s not even going into how weird it is to workwith all of these firebenders. We fought them for so long, and now I have to ride with them on Appa. Like, we all had a little adventure with Zuko, right? How am I supposed to do that with a thousand people?”

“Sounds rough, buddy,” Toph agreed, roughly mimicking Zuko’s voice as she reassuringly patted his arm.

Sokka exploded in laughter; Toph’s imitations had only gotten better with time. “You should have heard Zuko whenever I call him Emperor.” He made a strangled cry; his imitations weren’t too shabby if he said so himself. “I thought I accidentally killed him.”

Toph howled with laughter. “I’m doing that next council meeting.”

He blinked. Now that she mentioned it, she did meet with Aang and Zuko on a regular basis. She was the chief of police for a city they both had founded. Curious, he asked, “Wait, then what do you call him?”

“Sparky and Twinkletoes,” she replied bluntly, without an ounce of hesitation. “What, you think I’d actually call Aang ‘respected avatar’?”

“Even in front of the council?” Now it was his turn to gape, and he almost tripped over a pothole.

“Especially in front of the council.” Utterly unrepentant about it all, she grinned devilishly. “Man, if you could have heard their gasps…”

“I’d try it, but I think Zuko would kick me out.” Sokka laughed. It was ridiculously easy talking to Toph, even for something inane as this. A cool evening breeze wafted by as they walked down a narrow street infested with potholes, but he didn’t mind it. Hell, he didn’t even mind the smell that came from the nearby developments. They could have been walking through Zuko’s palace, the way he felt.

Humming, he squeezed her hand.

Her hand.

Sokka glanced down. They were holding hands. When had that happened? Somehow, he hadn’t noticed, and even now all he could say was how comfortable it felt. Her sly insults, her warm hand, the way she walked as though she ruled the place; every part of it felt like an integral part of him coming home.

“Sokka?” Toph asked as she stopped in front of a brightly lit restaurant.

She’d laugh. No, she’d tease him about this for the rest of his life. That he was the densest person on the planet, to realize like thisthe reason he always looked for her the second he came to the city, how he kept finding her in the corner of his eyes whenever he travelled away. But he’d always been some flavour of an idiot. Suki had told him as much when they’d started dating, and Katara never failed to mention it when he’d missed the signs of her pregnancy.

He liked Toph.

Everything felt so simple the second he’d thought the words, all the pieces falling into place. Elated, he blurted out, “Wanna go out with me?”

“Wha—?” Toph blushed, her cheeks tinged an adorable pink as she gaped at him.

Sokka stared at her for a minute before realizing that he hadn’t actually explained anything out loud. “Er, I mean, you’re—”

Toph snorted. She actually snorted at his confession, letting go of his hand as she headed into the restaurant. “We’ve been dating for months now, Snoozles. What are you talking about?”

“Yeah—” He let out a strangled cry. Sokka shouted at her retreating back, “WHAT?”

Sticking a finger in her ear, she turned to him. “We’re at a restaurant, have some manners.”

It was utterly rich, coming from her, but he couldn’t deny she had a point. Already, strangers around them were gawking at them curiously, twittering softly about the Chief of the Police and one of the Avatar’s Ambassadors. Hunching slightly, he quickly stalked after Toph. “Right.”

“Good.” Her hands were in her pockets now as she entered the small restaurant. It smelled lightly of sizzling meat and spice, a strange aroma that reminded him of that firebender town in the Earth Nation. A small shop, it only had about a dozen or so tables, most of them packed with couples or small families.

Raising her voice, she called out, “Two.”

“Two?” A middle-aged woman turned away from the table she was waiting on. Recognizing Toph, she smiled brightly. “Chief Toph! Your usual spot’s open.”

“Nice!” Toph grinned as she headed further into the restaurant, to a table just outside the kitchen doors. “We’ll have the usual.”

“You have a usual spot?” he asked, momentarily forgetting about their discussion. “And a usual?”

“I’m their number one customer,” Toph added cheekily, slipping into a seat. “I swear this place changes hands like every five months, but the food’s always good so whatever.”

“Isn’t that a bad thing?” Sokka muttered, wondering just how good a place could be if they kept getting shut down. Still, it smelled good at least, and his belly rumbled in anticipation. “The food here…”

Toph’s smile grew wider. “Recognize it? It’s some sort of Fire Nation/Earth Nation fusion thing.”

“Fusion?” Considering Republic City’s purpose, he should have expected that earlier, but still. He looked around curiously. Now that she’d mentioned it, he recognized the decorations—the stone badgermoles, the copper dragons, even the fans had different styles of decorations. “No wonder it smells familiar—it’s like that town we visited.”

She hummed her agreement. Leaning back in her chair, she clasped her hands behind her head. “If you’d come like three weeks ago, you could have had the Water/Fire one.”

“Whaaat?” Sokka slumped over, put out. “Why didn’t you tell me this? We could have eaten there the last time I came!”

“You didn’t ask.” She shrugged nonchalantly.

Grounding his teeth, he crossed his arms. “Is that also how we’re dating? Cause I didn’t ask?”

“No, that’s…” she trailed off, her cheeks tinged an adorable shade of pink. “You did ask.”

“Huh?” Sokka struggled not to shout again, using all of his willpower and self-restraint to keep his tone at a neutral level. “When?”

“Months ago.” Despite her obvious embarrassment at it all, she didn’t shy away from conversation. “You asked me to go out with you.”

“I did?” He clasped his face, his fingers digging into his cheeks as he struggled to remember. What had they been doing months ago? God, he couldn’t remember, it felt like years ago. Hazarding a guess, he replied, “I think I just meant go out? Like going out to eat or going out to do something?”

“Who tells someone let’s go out when you just want to eat?” Toph hissed, daggers in her voice. He flinched.

“If we were inside, then we had to go out to eat. Besides, we both know I’m bad with words,” Sokka hotly defended himself, willing to even throw himself under a bridge to get out of this mess.

“But that bad?” Toph growled, irate. She knitted her brow as she asked, “Then why do we keep going out for dinner?”

“Because we’re friends?” Sokka held his hands up, not sure how to explain this better. “I eat with the others too sometimes.”

“Not like you eat with me,” she argued, her fingers digging into the table. “I’ve asked and Zuko and Aang said you don’t eat with them as much as you eat with me.” When he opened his mouth, she added, “And you travel with Katara, so that doesn’t count.”

He snapped his jaw shut. “It’s not that much,” he muttered under his breath, averting his gaze.

“Twice as much,” she pointed out, raising a brow.

“Oh.” Now that she mentioned it, he had been seeing her a lot recently. “I like your company?”

“You’ve given me hairpins and random gifts,” she said flatly. “You just held my hand.”

“That’s…” Sokka couldn’t deny it. His hand clenched involuntarily, remembering how firm her grip had been, the callouses on her fingertips.

“That?” she repeated.

There really wasn’t another word for it. “You’re right. That does sound like dating.”

God, no one was going to let him live this down. Anyone could do anything, and it wouldn’t match the stupidity levels of this.

“Like I’m ever wrong,” Toph derided. She leaned back slightly away from the table as the middle-aged woman from before walked by, her arms laden with dishes.

“Here you go, your usual,” the woman chirped as she set down two plates in front of them. A curried chicken sat on a bed of rice. Despite how dark brown the curry looked, it smelled faintly of pepper. “Have fun!”

Before he could say anything, the woman gave them a wink and disappeared into the kitchen. Now that he thought about it, that happened a lot whenever they went out to eat. Sokka couldn’t even explain that away, there was no good reason for him to miss that. He really was an idiot.

Gleefully, Toph dug in. “They cook so quickly.”

“What’s this?” Sokka poked the chicken gingerly, a little suspicious. Toph had unusual tastes sometimes, though he hadn’t yet determined if she genuinely liked strange food or was just messing with him. Either way, it did smell nice, so maybe she wasn’t pulling his leg this time.

“The usual,” Toph replied, mouth full. “Trust me, you’ll like it.”

If there was one thing his journeys had taught him, it was to never question food too hard. It was meat, something he couldn’t have at Aang’s, and that was good enough for him now. Hesitantly, he swallowed a spoonful. Despite the spice, he only felt a mild heat as he chewed. More than that, he felt the Earth Kingdom’s more earthy flavours blending in with the Fire Nation’s sharp ones. It was a strange sensation. His tongue felt a little numb from it.

All in all, though, surprisingly good. He took another bite, praising, “I’d eat this all the time too.”

“Right?” Toph grinned at him cheerfully, as she shoveled yet another spoonful. She looked like a chipmunk, with her puffed up cheeks. “Told you.”

It was silly, really, how bubbly he felt just watching her smile. She looked utterly ridiculous, a police chief acting like a little kid over a meal, but there was something utterly endearing about it all. His courage swelling up, Sokka boldly grabbed her hand. “Let’s go out.”

Toph almost choked on her food. Grabbing a glass of water, she forced it down before kicking him. “We’re already going out.”

“Kinda?” He didn’t bother to refute it this time. Even he had to admit the signs didn’t look good. “But I wanted to ask you properly this time.”

She flushed lightly. “Do you now?”

“Yes.” He reached over, covered her hand in his. It felt right. It had always felt right. “Hey, Toph, I really, really like you. Want to see what happens?”

“Really, really like?” she repeated, scoffing. “What are you, five?”

Despite her words, though, her cheeks were as red as flames. He wanted to kiss her. Leaning closer, he asked, “So?”

“Do I need to answer?” she mumbled. For all her cool before, she was a mess now, unravelling with every honest word. “You think I would have pretend-dated you for months otherwise?”

Sokka laughed, almost at her lips now. “No, I guess not.”

Realizing what he was after, the blush spread to her ears and neck as she angled herself for the kiss. They ended up bumping noses and he laughed again. That was just like them. “Oops.”

“You’re so bad at this,” Toph grumbled, grabbing his collar and pulling him down for a proper kiss.

#tokka #atla #toph #sokka #toph x sokka #fanfic

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is-that-another-soulmate-au · 4 years

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Zukka Soulmate AU part 9

@mypureessence

@chaoticidiott

@ari-shipping-stuff

@knightedbot

@idkhowbutimgayer

@swampy-beans

@angrylittleintrovert

Kurt was only out for about 15 minutes but that was long enough for Tarren and Fin to get him to the back on one of the spare cots. The gaang besides Iroh and Jee stayed to see how things went down, all gathered in the room reading maps and planning their trip while Lily paced back and forth muttering to herself before she threw her hands in the air

"Why wouldnt he tell us!?" She shouted

"I dont know Lily" Tarren said while he dabbed a cold towel on Kurt's forhead

"I mean, he could see the scars the three of us share! Why... why wouldnt he say anything!?"

"I'm sure he had a good reason Lily, I mean, how did you guys even know you had a third soulmate?" Katara asked with a small tilt to her head.

The duo both placed their hands to their chests instinctively. "Well, we didn't always know, but one day we both collapsed in the middle of a shift,"

[Flashback when? Flashback now!]

"Of course Miss Jin, Grey with honey and two sugars at 3 pm sharp just like every other Friday" Lily smiled while handing the girl her cup of tea she made for her at the exact same time every single friday evening. Jin was a favorite.

"How are you and Tarren?" Jin asked with a smile which made Lily blush

"Hah. We're doing alr-" suddenly Lily lost her breath from a blunt pain in her chest. "Tarren" she wheeled out just before letting out a yelp and clutching her chest "Tarren!"

"Lily!" Tarren's voice called out from the other sid of the Library followed by the sound of scrolls falling to the ground

The two scrambled to eachother with Jin following Lily and Fin rushing out from the back with paperwork to see what was happening. The pair crashed into eachother and held onto the others arms "what happened?" Lily cried out "whats going on. It burns, oh Gods it burns Tarren"

"I- I dont know" Tarren when to unclip his uniform, shucking off the top shirt before ripping the underdress to reveal painful bubbling skin in the shape of a hand and spreading across his chest and up to his neck down past where he managed to rip down to.

"There's a third" Jin said with a gasp

"Whoever they are theyre in trouble" Fin said bluntly while turning to Jin "Jin do you mind running to get the medic? I have to stay with them and they can't move" he gestured to their shivering crying forms.

"Are they dying?" Lily managed to wheeze out between sobs of pain

"No, this isnt direct, its just an- oh right" he nearly forgot that Lily watched her parents killed in a similar way "Lily, trust me, the third in the trio is not dying, they're being hurt, but they aren't dying"

Lily nodded, the pain lasted for a good 20 minutes before slowly dying down and feeling like it was being treated on all ends.

[Flashback over]

Katara gave a small frown "I wonder what happened to him"

"Ill tell you if you help me sit up" Kurt said with a small cough. Sokka who had been sitting near him but was lost in a map with Zuko looked up

"Oh, the munchkin awakens!"

"The... what?" Kurt laughed out

"Ignore him, he's stupid sometimes" Katara said as she helped Kurt sit up and put a pillow behind his back. "How did you get burned if you dont mind me asking?

Kurt gave a sigh and looked to Sokka and Zuko "well, honestly its probably a similar story to mr princey over there"

Zuko tensed "how do you know who I am... and you don't know how I got this"

"I do" Aang said with his hand raised "well, kinda, I think it was your da- mphf!" Zuko shut Aang up with his hands on his mouth

"Shut up, now is not about me or how I got my scar, its about short stack over there"

"Shortstack!? Okay, now that was just rude. But I got this burn from my dad, he wasn't great and had no position to even justify his abuse against me and my mom." He brought his hand to his necklace with a small frown

"He caught me hanging out by a small pond with an earth boy named Haru and was convinced I was a traitor for doing so. He lectured be when he got me home by slamming me against the door and burning me"

he looked up to Tarren and Lily "I didn't tell you, and I always hid my scar because I'm scared hes going to find me again, after he left for the war my mom fell ill and died, so I ran away to my Pappy and he's sick right now so I don't know how long I have with his protection." He gave a sigh "I dont want him to find me and know that you two are my soulmates because he'll hurt you to get to me. And I cant let you get hurt..."

Lily put her hand on her chest with a frown "I'm sorry Kurt, I had no idea. But now that we know I hope you understand we won't let anyone hurt you or us."

"And that includes me" Fin said from the doorway "you've got two master earthbenders and a vigilante assassin on your side now"

"Woah, woah, vigilante assassin?" Toph piped up "Lily is an assassin!? That's so cool!" She marched right up to her and jabbed her finger in her direction "I dont know you too much but I do know that I like you!"

Lily flushed a bright red and rubbed the back of her neck awkwardly "hah, thanks? Wait are you a beifong?"

"Sure am!"

"I didnt know the beifongs had a daughter, let alone a daughter teaching the avatar earthbending" Lily said with a smile

"Yeah, well they didn't think I was strong enough because I cant read" Toph gave a shrug

"I could teach you sometime" Lily offered

"Im blind missy" Toph said with a cackle

"I know" Lily giggled "We have Braille books, I can teach you to read braille if you want to"

"Braille?"

"Instead of ink on the pages there are raised dots in patterns to make the letters, numbers and words, Fin and his wife managed to invent it ten years ago because Fin's best friend is blind and he wanted to send him letters, but it isn't too popular yet sadly"

Toph stood there for a moment before saying anything "wait... are you telling me there's a way I can read?"

"Yeah! Its more commonly on paper but Tarren and Fin use earthbending to write it out much faster on stone tablets, its much less wasteful. But for nonbenders like myself thats not really an option, so I write with the paper and the pressing tools."

Sokka piped into the conversation with a quick jump to his feet "can you teach me too? I want to know how to write in a way that she can read" he had a determined look on his face and sound in his voice that caught everyone off guard

"I... didnt realize you cared?" Katara said with a confused look

"Of course I care Katara! I probably care too much sometimes, I care about every single one of you," he looked around "did... did you really think I didnt care?"

Aang looked at Katara and then at Sokka "she probably only thought that because you show care differently than her, I know you care, I mean you've managed to keep us all together and solve our problems, youre a uh... solve it kinda care... if thats a type"

Everyone looked at Aang befote Lily gave a small laugh "you sound like Fin, he's really caring for sure but you have to understand him to notice his love language." Lily paused "but teaching you both will take a while, even just teaching Toph here, who I assume has never been taught anything about letters and words on pages. I'm guessing you lot are traveling to stop the war?"

"You bet!" Aang said with a cheeky grin

"Well you could easily travel with them and teach them all, you and Tarren both" Kurt suggested

"Im not going anywhere without you" Lily said whil jabbing a finger towards him and leaning down close to him "I promised to protect you, and I will"

"Then how about you all come with us! We can all learn braille! I mean I'm already teaching Aang waterbending, Toph is teaching Aang earthbending. And hopefully Zuko and Iroh will teach him firebending so a new writing language should be good for all of us!" Katara said with excitement clear in her voice

It only took a bit of convincing to have Kurt join but it took a good 20 minutes worth of convincing Fin to let Tarren and Lily travel around while Fin ran the library with the help of Jin who stepped up to take over the pairs roles in the library.

But before leaving Lily showed Sokka the braille pressing tools so he could get a quick idea of the way they worked before packing up a good amount of paper and tools so she could teach them. On the road. Tarren would help Toph with hers for stone given they're both earthbenders.

Once they started packing up their own belongings Toph walked into Lily's room with a small knock "hey, you almost ready petty steps?"

"Pretty steps? Uh, yeah I just have to find a good place to put this" she moved her hand a bit with a wooden mask facing up

"What is that?"

"Its my assassin mask, its got a white base, think warm wind. Two black marks, think of cold night ponds stretching from the side tips of her nose, above the brow bone and getting much thicker before going up and becoming two horns. The eye holes and the lips are both dark red, think of the warmth of a summer evening sunset."

Toph stood in the doorway "I didnt need the description but that kind of makes colors interesting"

"Really?"

"No"

The two laughed at the bluntness but then Lily shrugged "I guess your right, I didnt need to describe it, but I wanted to anyways" she held the mask for a second before packing it away "it's from my sisters favorite spirit fable. 'Lady of the sunset pond' she had my mama read it to us every night" Lily reached to her necklace and held the roght ash stone.

"Sounds like they hold a special place to you"

"Yeah, they do"

"What happened to them?" Toph asked while leaning against the wall

"We don't have the time to unwrap another story today" Lily gave a small laugh while she set her bag down "besides I need to change before we go, can't leave in a work uniform you know, not really meant for traveling" she moved towards Toph and gave a small bow "thank you for accepting to learn braille from me"

Toph smiled shortly but then punched Lily's arm earning a confused 'ow' to which she responded "thats how I show affection"

"Ah, thats an interesting way to show it" Lily laughed "now I best be getting changed, mind stepping out? I know you see with earthbending, I've seen Tarren train without sight before so I can recognize it"

Toph laughed and stepped out "whatever Pretty steps"

Once everyone was changed and packed they all let on loading up Appa and preparing to fly to the next place. The ragtag group of 4 traumatized kids was suddenly a ragtag group of 8 traumatized kids and 2 wise old men traveling on a flying bison with a small mischievous lemur. What a busy two days huh?

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bellatrixobsessed1 · 4 years

Text

Kissing Dead Pearls (Part 22)

They have trouble getting him to eat, anything they feed him seems to come back up again until they settle for giving him liquid food in small amounts; apple sauces and oatmeals with a fair amount of tube feeding. She doesn’t like the sight of it.

They tell her that she doesn’t need to be here, that she is well enough to go back to the hotel so long as she takes it easy. But she remains at the hospital, at least during visiting hours.

“No one has claimed him yet?” She hears one nurse ask.

“No, not yet.” Says the other.

“And no ID?”

“All of his IDs and paperwork are probably on the ocean floor with his boat.”

The pair enter, a stout man with a clean shaven beard and a fleshy face and a woman, just as stout but rather petite. The man checks over the feeding tubes while the nurse checks over the patient himself.

“Has he woken up at all?” The woman asks.

“Not while I’ve been here.” Azula replies.

Deciding that everything is in order, the doctors step out once more. She looks at the time, she ought to be heading out herself. She waits another few moments before pulling out her phone, it rings several times before Zuzu answers. “Why are you answering father’s phone?”

“He and Jet went for a swim.” Zuko replies. “Do you need me to tell him something?”

She hears the boy stir in his bed. She lowers the phone for a moment before replying. “Just tell him that the sailor is waking up, so I might be here for a little while longer.” She doesn’t wait for a reply before she stuffs her phone back into her purse.

She wanders over to the bed. The boy squeezes his eyes tighter before opening them. They are tired and gentle and a very vivid blue. Azula swallows, they are a very familiar vivid blue. She takes his hand, wondering how it had taken her this long to recognize him.

“Gee…” he speaks, his voice hoarse and weak. “Guess the town motto is true, ‘all waves lead to Port Tui-La.’” He tries to laugh but his mouth is too dry.

She hands him a cup of water and waits for him to swallow before saying, “we’re not at Port Tui-La.” She wants to hug him with a tightness that will assure her that he won’t leave again. Even if she had both of her arms free to use, she worries about pressing on his sores the wrong way.

“Then where are we?”

“A small resort island called, Su Oku.”

“You think that I could get a pina colada with this hospital banquet.” He gestures to the oatmeal.

“I think that you couldn’t keep a pina colada down if they gave one to you.” She replies. It is unfathomably amazing to hear his voice again. To hear those stupid and poorly timed jokes.

“What happened to your arm?” He asks.

“It happened while I was saving you. You ass.”

“Now that’s no way to treat a guy in a hospital bed. That’s not how you…” he pauses for another drink. “Greet someone that you haven’t seen in months either.”

“It’s a perfect way to treat an imbecile who promised to take you out for a birthday dinner and stood you up for months.”

He makes a gesture as if to slap his forehead but thinks better of it at the last moment, “Ah shit, I forgot your birthday.”

Azula could slap him. “We thought that you were dead, Sokka.” She whispers after the humor fades. And suddenly it is overwhelming. The notion that she is going to have to speak with Jet crosses her mind and mixes strangely with joy and relief.

She feels his hand brush against her cheek, a rough and calloused hand. “Why are you crying?”

“I’m not.” She wipes at her eyes.

“Of course not.” He chuckles.

How is she going to tell him about Jet? How is she going to tell Jet about him? But he’s alive, goodness he’s alive. She carefully cups her hand over his. “What happened to your ship and how did you survive?”

“It’s a long story.” He replies, she can tell that he is going to fade out again. “Visit tomorrow and you might get to hear it.”

“Might?!”

He is already out again. She finds herself laughing. Of course he will leave her unanswered. It dawns upon her, as the nurse enters that she probably should have let them know that he was awake.

.oOo.

She finds herself terribly anxious the closer they draw to the hotel. The walk from the hospital isn’t terribly long, she almost wishes that it could be longer. It is a nice day, in the storm’s wake there is a cooler edge to the day. For once her skin isn’t slick with sweat from the walk and jasmine dances within the breeze. “You’re quiet.” Zuko remarks.

“Enjoy your break.” Azula mutters.

“Did something happen to the sailor?”

She shakes her head. “Nothing bad.”

“But something happened.”

“He woke up.”

“And.”

She bunches her hands in her pockets. She isn’t sure why she is so hesitant to tell him. Perhaps it is because she doesn’t want him to slip and tell Jet before she can. “It’s Sokka.”

Zuko comes to a full halt. “What? How?”

She shrugs. She had imagined it time and time again, a reunion, telling Katara that her brother is alive. And perhaps it is because she had truly expected it to be anything but a reality, that it is so hard for her to process that her daydreams have become truth. Truth be told, she isn’t quite ready. “I don’t know, Zuzu. I didn’t that we would actually find him.”

“Well aren’t you, I don’t know, elated?”

She knows that she should be. She should be happy, excited, grateful. And she is, but she is also nervous. It has been so long. He doesn’t know about father, he doesn’t know about Jet, about...she traces the length of the scar on her arm, rather she traces the parts of it that aren’t tucked into the sling. “I am.” She says. “I’m just trying to figure out what to tell Jet.”

“Fuck off, is a good option.”

She elbows him. “I know that you don’t like him but he treats me well.” They pass a merchant selling bundles of hibiscus and bamboos sticks. With the storm well and past, the island is lively again. She spies several bikers and a couple with a picnic basket. There is a child with an armful of shells and a missing sandal, an exasperated woman holds that sandal. Colorful umbrellas are propped open all along the beach that runs parallel with the road. A road that is scattered with palm fronds, branches, clusters of flowers, and other things that the storm had thrown about. She can hear the hum of cicadas and the chatter of birds, mostly seagulls. “I suppose that I should just tell him outright.” That is how she would have wanted it if Jet had fallen for someone else.

“That’s what I meant when I said tell him to fuck off.”

Azula rolls her eyes. “I’m sure it is.” But that doesn’t make it any less daunting, knowing that she has so much to fill Sokka in on. Though she supposes it is, at the end of the day, fair. He has a long story for her and she has a rather long one for him. If he will hear the rest of it after finding out about her fling with Jet. She decides that she will get to that part after talking about how increasingly difficult and lonely things had gotten. She will answer the why’s before sharing what they had led to.

She enters the hotel and holds the door open just long enough for Zuko to get his hopes up before letting it slam in his face. He cusses and she chuckles. It has been a while since she’d got him like that.

“See if I hold it open for you next time!”

She fixes him with a faux pout. “You mean you’d slam the door on your handicapped little sister?”

“I sure would.” He replies.

They reach the hotel room at the same time as her father and Jet. She watches Jet rub his hair with his towel.

“They left you by yourself?” Azula asks.

Katara shrugs. “I could use the quiet time. How was your visit?”

“It was…” she can’t keep the smile from her face. “Surreal.”

“Surreal?”

“He’s alive, Katara. That sailor is…”

“Sokka?” She asks softly.

Azula nods. She has made Katara cry several times throughout childhood, and once as a pre-teen when she’d decided that she was too cool to hang out with the girl anymore. But she had never made her cry with joy and relief.

“You sure that it’s him?”

“He asked me for a pina colada.”

“That’s him alright.” Ozai grumbles. He slings his towel onto one of the racks and makes his way into the bathroom.

“Hey!” Jet calls. “We agreed that I get the first shower!”

“You have things to discuss with my daughter.” Ozai shrugs. “I’ll take an extra long one to make sure that she can cover all of the details.” With that, the door closes and she hears the lock pop into place.

“He’s alive, Zuko!” Katara springs up and throws her arms around him. “My brother is alive!” She lets go of Zuko and turns to Azula. “You saved him…”

Azula nods. “He better treat me extra special or I’ll throw him right back out there.” She folds her good arm against the other.

“Do you need us to…?” Zuko gestures towards the door.

Azula nods. She waits for the door to shut once more before taking a seat on the bed.

Jet sighs and rubs the back of his head. “I take it, there’s nothing I can do to make you choose me.”

She hesitates before shaking her head. “There’s nothing.”

He blows out through his lips, “the ride home is going to be mighty awkward.”

“It doesn’t have to be.” She answers despite being well aware that she has a solid track record for being awkward as hell.

“Does he know yet?”

“No.” She says. “He will tomorrow.” She just hopes that that will go well.

“Were you using me as a rebound?” Jet asks.

“No.” She says again. “I was trying to move on…”

“Which is why you went out on a sailing trip to find your boyfriend?”

“I didn’t anticipate anything coming from it.”

He nods, clasps his hands together and presses them to his lips. “Then why do I feel like I got used.”

“I didn’t use you.” She insists. “If I had I would have asked for a lot more cash.”

This elicits a humored snort. “I’m going to go back to the pool.” He stands. She doesn’t stop him. The soft slam of a door, shut slightly too hard, rebounds around the room. She supposes that he needs to process things. She needs to process things. Good news or not, her head still spins and she finds herself feeling notably drained. She falls back onto the mattress and stares at the ceiling.

#Avatar The Last Airbender #Azula #Sokka #Sokkla #Zuko #Katara #Zutara #Ozai #Jet #Jetzula #Fanfiction

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zukofenty · 4 years

Text

just my luck

➜ Summary: The one where Katara whisks away her picture-perfect life the night she kisses a stranger with the worst luck in the world.

“I lost all my good luck!” Katara screams. “Everything I touch turns to shit!”

“I mean, have you considered fucking a leprechaun?”

➜ Genre: Modern!AU, Journalist!Katara, Girl group manager!Zuko, Music Producer!Zuko

AO3, @zutaraweek

“I am too pretty to be punched!” Katara yelps, ducking and clenching the holding cell’s bars until her knuckles turn white.

“And I thought I was too pretty to commit tax fraud, but here we are.” Ty Lee rolls her eyes. “That’s just how the pussy crumbles.”

“First, you need a gynecologist. Second, I think the saying goes ‘that’s how the cookie—’” Nothing in life could have prepared Katara for the tiny girl to deliver a resounding punch that has her head rattling against the jail cell.

“I lost all my good luck!” Katara screams. “Everything I touch turns to shit!”

“I mean, have you considered fucking a leprechaun?”

Katara sighs, still recovering from the intense nosebleed Ty Lee bestowed on her. “Where the fuck would I even find a leprechaun?” She promptly shoves wads of tissues up her nostrils. Of course, the next one she reaches for actually had a spider in it, and she thinks killing herself just might be easier on her soul at this point.

“Just say you like Megan Thee Stallion and all of a sudden all the men under 5’7” start giving you a 5’11” attitude. Easy peasy.”

She’d managed to limp her way back to Suki and Toph’s apartment from prison, after getting a call that her apartment had flooded, destroying everything in it. Only her apartment. She was barely holding on to her broken YSL pump in one hand and her pride in the other. Emphasis on limp , because while calling taxis to instantly stop for her was always her thing , now she was nothing but an ant (in head-to-toe Prada) on their radar. If they do stop, the taxi either gets snatched up by someone else, or the drivers tell her, not so kindly, to eat a dick.

Nevertheless, she’s still determined to have a positive day, walking and humming a Rihanna song to try and calm her nerves. But, because this day was sent by Satan himself (Jeff Bezos), she was drenched, face to booty to toes, in drain water by the seemingly hundreds of Uber Eats whizzing by, trying to get someone’s Buffalo Wild Wings order to them quickly.

“I can’t believe you guys actually think all that stuff’s real!” Suki scoffs, diligently painting her toenails a pretty pastel purple and not giving any mind to the conversation.

“Tell me, how would you explain this bitch’s life?” Toph points an accusatory finger in Katara’s way. “Katara has been living life as the main character. For fuck’s sake, you won prom queen five years in a row at Ba Sing Se High!”

“A lot of people win prom queen—”

“We went to Omashu High!” Toph adds with frustration. “You even won the year after you graduated!”

Toph and Suki could never quite wrap their heads around Katara’s life.

For as long as they knew her, she was always the luckiest girl in the world.

At seemingly every turn, the girl had all the luck in the world on her side. I mean, just the other day she was accidentally delivered Rihanna’s dry cleaning, because of course she lives in the same fucking building as Rihanna, the goddess herself. See, Katara was the type of person with the luck to manage to find an upscale apartment on their shitty salary in the city for nearly half of what Suki and Toph were paying to sleep next to inbred cockroaches.

“Bitch, you do not have the range for that.” Toph snatches the dress away before Suki or Katara could make a face and whimper a soft ‘gimmie gimmie’ that surprisingly always worked.

“I might not, but at least we could clone Rihanna now.”

Toph pauses. “Say what?”

“I’m getting the girls and gays that album, no matter what.”

Katara went to return the dress after getting in a helicopter with her date of the night, People Magazine’s Sexiest Man Alive, Haru (before the mustache). On top of all that madness, she said Rihanna, in the shimmery, Fenty Beauty Body Lava coated flesh, even complimented her makeup. Suki almost shit herself when Katara was added to the Fenty Savage PR list.

Katara would walk outside and the clouds seemed to part as if on her command. She could wear all-white in the city without a bird unloading one on her shoulder, or one of those guys on the street flicking feces in a pudding cup her way. Jammed streets or congested traffic never ceased her from being ten minutes early to every meeting, event, or even accidental movie set she walked on and got cast as an extra instantly. The lead actor, Academy Award winning Bolin, is still sending her detailed DMs about the various ways he would harvest her toenails because it reminded him of her.

And you know those Airpods or laptop scams that go around on social media you have to train your grandparents not to click on? Or those princes that email you promising to marry you after you send them your banking information? Guess which bitch manages to actually win over a prince’s heart and his inheritance?

Katara had the universe wrapped around her finger, and it didn’t seem to mind bending to her will.

Fresh out of college, after much clawing and fighting and miraculously switching coats with an editor at a restaurant, Katara managed to snag a job at Nyla magazine and secured spots for her best friends, too. They’d been reading the entertainment magazine before they could even process solid food. While they were all saddled with a mailroom job, Katara’s quote unquote irresistible charm had landed her as a scribe to record meetings when their original conveniently broke a nail.

Of fucking course, the day their entire team is stuck in a broken elevator is the day the CEO of White Lotus Records was coming into the office to discuss Nyla ’s next cover star.

Their next big thing, teen singer, Song was still hesitant to work with a magazine aimed at young adults with unhealthy coping mechanisms, compared to the J14s and Tiger Beats with the foldable poster at the back you could steal if you were quick enough at Walgreens.

“ Young lady.” Ugh, why do old men always sound so fucking condescending? You know how easy it is to push an old person? “You know how much dough I make so I can regularly spend it on drugs? Every minute of my time is worth $964.” While Piandao gets up for his assistants to put on his fur coat, Katara slams her hand on the table.

“I promise you this cover story will be worth every minute of your time. I’ll even pay you $965 at the end of my presentation if you hate it.”

And who could say no to that sweet (and scary) face?

When editor-in-chief June waddles back, glazed with sweat after someone farted their entire Del Taco Thursday three chicken soft tacos for $2.49 deal in her face , their cover story was booked. The carnival themed, masquerade party to celebrate Song’s new cover was already scheduled in Google Calendar. Soon enough, Katara was handed her own office, Tesla, and platinum corporate card to start planning the entire event.

Everything was going fine . There were acrobats doing flying yoga in the sky, a fortune teller she hired at the last minute that everyone loved. Music was playing, people were dancing without a care in the world, and everyone was having a good fucking time. She even snagged her bitchy boss a date with her hot neighbor, and her Painted Lady costume was designed by Vera Wang herself. By the end of the night, her brain was scrambled from the paperwork and yelling and pen marks all on her hand. Yet, with her luck, she still managed to kiss the cute guy who asked her to dance.

Well, at least she knew he felt and smelled like a cute guy, considering half his face was covered by a mask.

He was a bumbling thing, managing to stomp on her feet a few times even when she reassures him at the end of the day. Despite being all broad shoulders and muscles, he seemed to shrink in on himself at that moment. “I’m really, really bad at dancing.” She gave him a weird look and Zuko had to remember that he had stolen a backup dancer named Lee’s gig for the night to sneak into the event.

Katara rolls her eyes. Dancing, much like nearly everything else, always came easy to her. “So what if you gave a girl a black eye and another guy a concussion?” Her laugh is so pretty and her waist between his warm fingers just felt right.

He lets himself laugh, too. Wrapped up in the girl’s spell. Forgetting any thought of trying to win over the White Lotus CEO.

She leaned in first, and he was more than happy to reciprocate. Zuko didn’t have time for impulsive decisions, not when the universe was actively always trying to kill him. For some reason, he couldn’t help but be drawn in. Her soft lips against his felt like a plush dream, and all he didn’t want to wake up to reality. Not when in that moment, there were sparks and blood rushing to his head and soft skin peeking out of her expensive dress he wanted to discover more of.

One minute, Katara was throwing back a margarita in case she had dumb bitch breath that caused her mystery man ran off. The next, she was choking to death, only spitting out the olive on Suki’s face after Toph delivers a quick punch to her sternum, right between the titties.

“Eenie meenie miney mo, catch a stupid whore by her throat!”

“Stop choking me, June!”

“No!” June screeches. How was Katara supposed to know she accidentally set her boss up with the ‘ King Kuei ’? The FBI’s most wanted illegal animal trader by day, male prostitute by night? And who knew that would land her a night in jail?

“The universe is a stupid fucking whore!” Katara sniffs, still trying to detangle the chunk of hair embedded deep into Suki’s blow dryer. Katara managed to not only break a mirror with the blow dryer in her mere ten minutes in Suki and Toph’s place, but also rip out a section of her hair after throwing said blow dryer in their bathtub which promptly caught on fire. The icing on the dog shit cake of the day was when she managed to cause the building’s power to short circuit, shutting off everyone’s lights.

The universe, for the first time in his life, was finally on Zuko’s side.

For as long as Zuko could remember, rain clouds suddenly appeared when he walked outside, even despite what Alexa told him earlier that morning.

“Alexa, what’s the weather like today?”

“Completely sunny with a chance of naive bitch,” the smart speaker might as well have said.

Zuko was sure of four things in life.

Adderall and 7 up were never a good combination

Alexa was always watching for an opportunity to strike fear in his heart

He could never catch a fucking break

Having a waterpark poncho always on hand never hurt

He heard from his Uncle Iroh his family was perpetually cursed. Something about a fame-hungry witch with the last name Kardashian in the past life, and one of his relatives eating said witch’s ass that inflicted the present day curse on his family.

Everyone he knew was impossibly clumsy. Random flooding accidents, cars always running into you, bugs trying to get their fuck on in your ear. It was like the universe said yeet! On their good fortune.

What does he wish for every year on his birthday? For it to be easy just to be him . To be easily liked, like Adele, or Dippin Dots. He wished life could be easy enough for him to take a shit without the toilet bowl accidentally caving in, or a lightbulb somehow always falling on his good eye.

Zuko had always been relatively clumsy, worse than what Iroh’s seen before. After so many years of being shit-out-of-luck, and having literal shit on you at all times, he was used to being alone.

It stopped stinging a few years ago. Besides, he had his half-sister Kiyi to keep him company these days.

Nobody wanted to be around the guy who constantly smells like dog shit because he always manages to find a shit covered dollar bill flowing down the street. No one wanted to be associated with the guy who, without fail, splits his pants open every time he bends down. Saddling him with yet another public indecency charge.

Like clockwork, at least two times a week, he was getting his face shoved into the concrete and handcuffs slapped on him. He started investing in a mouth guard about five years ago.

It was like a safety hazard, just being him. There were so many times you could get struck by lightning before you were banned by the nation from buying umbrellas.

Predictably, he has been rejected from every job he applied to. His laptop has been hacked by so many Hentai porn bots he doesn’t even bother upgrading his Dell from 2013. He even started a conversation with the guy monitoring his keystrokes. Landlords chucked his application out the window before he could even give them his soul and a deposit, and while the doctors didn’t think he’d do it, he found out that yes you can survive being hit after someone throws a piano out their window while you leave the leasing office.

Sure, he came to the city with dreams of making it big, loving music since his mom taught him the difference between a treble and bass clef. But when he’s always accidentally setting his tsungi horn on fire? Breaking his nose open trying to put resin on his violin’s bow? Somehow getting a reed stuck in his throat and his sphincter (on the same day)? No chance in hell was anyone willing to risk their lives to let him play anything on stage.

So he stuck to writing and producing, watching YouTube tutorial after tutorial to learn mixing, because he thinks it’s safer for everyone involved.

“Zuko, someone tried shoving Nutella up their ass and shat it back over the bathroom.” He looks up from his laptop to see a plunger too close for comfort near his face.

“Why?”

“Some weird sex thing! I don’t fucking know.” Jet points to the elderly couple nearby. “You ask them why!”

Zuko takes a deep breath in. “No, I’m asking ‘why?’ because my shift doesn’t start for another two hours.”

He was a janitor at the bowling alley across the street (it was the only place that would hire him, but he thinks they felt bad for him after he ugly cried and ate out their supply of shitty, frozen curly fries).

“You know I love you, Zuko! But these!” Jet cups Zuko’s chest with two, oddly gentle, hands. “Make our alley’s world go round.” He even gives them a squeeze for emphasis.

“Let go of my man titties,” Zuko glares at Jet. “ Now .”

“You’re the breast.”

Zuko’s eye twitches.

It wasn’t all bad. After all, the alley does let him make music in his free time, and the girl group he was “managing” can perform their sets on Fridays.

“We’re firing you!” Mai pokes at his chest and has him readjusting his glasses from the force.

It was a Monday and his week was starting off better than most. He was scraping green colored poop from the walls and was already being threatened at 9 a.m. without any weapons in sight.

“You don’t pay me!” He points out, which only seems to get everyone in the room angrier. His sister and her friends formed Shooters 4 Rihanna when they were pre-teens. They wanted to be a group trying to make it big in the pop scene, and quickly signed to a record label together. The girls were promised all their years of childhood training would pay off when they would debut as young adults. That was, until their CEO was broadcast on TLC’s My Strange Addiction for his habit of collecting Mark Ruffalo’s nose hairs, and confessed to killing someone for it.

Investors weren’t too happy.

While all the girls could see was repressed childhood trauma, Zuko saw that and potential star power.

Every single member already had years of dancing and singing lessons under their belt. They could play their own instruments, write their own songs, and had the stage presence. A few Twitter DMs later (from his multiple accounts, because they thought his profile picture made him look like a fucking creep and blocked him years ago) they were dumb enough to trust him with their future. He’d been trying to get them signed for months to no avail. Somehow fucking up, or electrocuting himself in the process of showing an executive their new single.

“This was a mistake!” Jin shoveled the curly fries in her face.

While Yue was always one to stay positive, her sad ‘ I miss pickled fish ,’ had the rest of the girls wanting to leave, too. Going back home, just give up seemed sensible. Why waste your prime years on a pipe dream?

He stopped them, plunger in hand. Against all logic, and partially because they could smell the desperation, the girls gave him one week .

One masquerade party later, he managed to throw Piandao out of harm’s way, taking the brunt of the taxi running into him.

“ Are you fucking stupid !” The CEO screams. The boy had blood flowing from his scalp, but looked as alive as ever handing over Shooters 4 Rihanna’s demo CD.

“A little.” Zuko admits. He could feel his bones still intact, and judging by the blood it wasn’t anything serious. Piandao gives him a call the next day after listening to the tape.

By some miracle, or Kardashian curse lifting, the girl group and him were shuffled into the city’s upscale penthouses, and their debut single was slated to be released on the radio the next day.

While he headed for lunch at a nearby cafe (one he couldn’t afford to eat at just last week) he can’t help but notice her .

“Ma’am, I have already told you our restaurant’s motto! No eat, no shit!” The waiter glares down at her. “Either pay up or get out, broke bitch.”

Katara was caked head to toe in mud, tissues shoved yet again up her nose. Haru had invited her out to his dad’s art show the night before. After insulting the literal piece of shit art, she tripped over the clump of clay on display and landed face-first in his million dollar creation.

Of course, it would land her in prison, and of course Ty Lee would be there, too. “Move bitch, I’m gay! ” When Katara was too exhausted to budge, the girl, yet again, socked the shit out of her.

Katara just wanted a plate of steaming breakfast foods, but of course all her cards declined. And of course, she has a meltdown because she was fucking tired, hungry, and was about to throw hands.

She grabbed the salt shaker. “Look, I’m just going to try one thing before I go!”

“It’s the bath salts,” she hears one woman whisper. “Those fashion bitches are always on bath salts.”

“Just smile politely. We’re witnessing mental illness.”

She didn’t expect that throwing salt over her shoulder would land in the waiter’s eye, or cause him to collapse on the table of Mormons nearby. Or something to catch on fire, or someone to get stabbed with a fork with a pancake on it.

She certainly didn’t expect a (cute) stranger to be so gentle with her, helping her escape the madness and handing over his turkey on rye. Or him following her as she tried to save face and sit on a random bench away from any nearby birds’ tiny assholes.

“You look sad.” He’s not mocking in the slightest.

“What does that even mean?” She went from sad to affronted in just a second.

“What’s wrong?” Fuck this guy and those eyes that were so damn enchanting .

“I don’t look sad.” She says with the roll of her eyes. “I am fucking sad.” She was blackballed from every newspaper in the Four Nations, the prince she was talking to did indeed end up stealing her savings, and on top of all of that, her undereye concealer was creasing.

“You!” Katara points her finger in the fortuneteller’s face.

“Me?” Aunt Wu looks beyond irritated. “Look, I can’t predict when you’ll get a fat ass, just buy a resistance band and leave me—”

“You’re the one who told me whatever Wheel of Fortune would spin back on me! And Alex Tribek would take away my good luck or something!” Katara was crazed and running on two hours of sleep, but she had a bone to pick. “My perfect life is gone.”

“Wow, that was a lot to unpack.” Aunt Wu locks her shop’s door. “Look, can you think of anything strange that happened that night?”

“Besides someone telling me to make them toilet wine in prison, no I don’t think so!” Katara grunts out petulantly.

Aunt Wu smacks her with a stack of tarot cards. “No! Jesus! What else happened?”

“Can’t you just tell me? Childhood trauma has really fucked with my memory.”

“You kissed someone, didn’t you?” The fortuneteller scurries to her Kia Soul before Katara could retaliate. “Maybe he needed that luck more than you do!”

She tried kissing every single dancer that was working that stupid party, and came up with nothing but mono and the feeling of defeat.

“Did you know, I even fucking sharted myself today!” She smacks her forehead repeatedly. “At twenty-fucking-three! How fucking embarrassing . All I could do is run to the H&M with my cheeks out to buy a pair of sweatpants.”

“I know a job looking for someone,” he says and even when he’s staring at her with nothing but understanding, she’s still apprehensive.

“Don’t care, didn’t ask, plus you’re a colonizer.” If she had any energy she would’ve put more force into the shove. “Why are you even helping me?”

She looked like shit on a dick and he was just smiling at her. “Let’s say, I just know what it’s like to be SOL.”

��What’s the catch?” She stares at him down and pouts. He’s wearing an Armani shirt with an Off-White belt, which was already offending her senses, but on top of that he dared pair the atrocity with a pair of knock-off Converse. He couldn’t have sprung for a real pair, he just had to get the off-brand from Costco that made everyone’s ankles look like cankles.

New money . “I am not letting anyone suck my toes for money, again. Try a different girl.”

Zuko grows positively red, but at least it brings the ghost of a smile to her face. “No toe sucking. Only on Wednesdays.”

She delivers a well-aimed kick to his crotch. While she’d expect him heaving and puffing, he’s unphased. He’d put on his MMA fighter grade, groin protector out of habit, even though he’s getting kicked a lot less in the ball bags lately.

“So, you’re trying to convert me to Scientology?” Katara scoffs. “I’ll pass, Asian Tom Cruise.”

“Not that either.” He sees the defeated look in her eyes, the same one he’s seen in himself. There’s a spark there, though. A willingness to just keep going. Something he lost years ago. “Trust me.”

“No.”

“All good.” He shrugs. “Can I at least help you up?” Before she could bite back, she turned to the spot on the bench where he was pointing.

Wet paint.

He’s taking her mustard covered hands (the sandwich exploded in the foil) in his soft ones without question, and peeling her off the bench.

“Of fucking course,” she huffs.

She thinks he knows. He knows the fact that she wants him sticking around. Even with her adamant protests against it, he’s persistent.

Stopping by after long days at the studio to her shit job, handful of first aid supplies at the ready.

He’s just always there .

He’s there when she’s scraping gum from under the alley’s tables and almost swallows one that had “Live, Laugh, Love” carved into it. He quickly stops her from choking, practically an expert at the heimlich with how many times he’s almost died from drinking boba.

There when she electrocutes herself changing the alley’s light bulbs to catch her as she falls straight off the ladder. He’s not even phased, pushing a fried piece of hair sticking up the heavens and staring at her as though she squirted cupcake frosting from her nipples.

He’s there with his first-aid messenger bag, all duct taped and falling apart and it makes her want to say sorry to Alexander Wang for daring to wear it with his Spring 2019 boots after Zuko forces her to carry it around. But then he’s pulling out a tube of toothpaste from the bag while she’s cooling her burnt fingertips on a 10 year old Yerba Mate can, and she’s reminded why he’s so firm about it.

“Earth Nation trick to heal burnt skin.” He’s too concentrated on rubbing the paste into her flaming skin to notice her staring. She remembers that he included her favorite Fenty gloss in the bag after handing it off to her, and blushes.

“I don’t need your help, you know.” Katara was always the one fighting for her own dreams. She didn’t want to stick back living the life other people imagined for her. Even all the luck in the world couldn’t help her escape a sleepy town or an unsupportive family.

When they came to the city, she knew her friends let her take care of them on purpose. It was second nature, what she grew up on. She’d always been the one looking out for everyone, even if they didn’t ask, and they let her do it because they all needed a coping mechanism. Toph’s is cake cutting videos, Suki’s is practicing her crying face because she always wanted to be a pretty crier, and Katara’s is being overbearing.

She was confused. As many times as she tried drilling through his thick head that her grandma was a nurse, that she could easily wrap up every cut, bruise, and swollen toe, he never budged. For the first time in a while, someone was there, stubbornly making sure she was okay.

“I know?” He says it as though it was obvious. “I’ll make you a deal, though. Just let me help you out, just this one time?” He gently taps her fingers wrapped in Minion bandaids he got her just because he knew she hated them in public, loved them in private. “I won’t do it again.”

He’s teasing and it’s obvious he knows she’s putty in his hands. Though, his newfound look (she helped with) balancing boy-next-door with heartthrob is not working on her heart. Her pussy, sure. Not her heart, though. She swears.

“That’s what you said last time,” Katara protests, without any energy behind it.

He sends her a lopsided smile. “I know.”

Zuko wasn’t about to let any hair on her pretty head get hurt.

While Kiyi already had enough of a bad case of bad luck, considering all the Power Ranger figurines she had super glued to her face by fourth grade boys, Katara’s was just something else.

It reminded him of him . Whatever stroke of good luck he had, he knew the universe takes in ten-fold what it might give. So he’s taking advantage of every bit of luck he has for a girl without any.

While he’s been stabbed many a time walking back home at night, somehow he’s in the clear when he escorts Katara back to her apartment. Or the times he buys her Water Tribe take out because she’s still figuring out how that prince managed to spend $10,000 on Swampbender diet pills. Or when he sneaks in before her shift to do some of her tasks for the day (he still has the keys), so he doesn’t have to worry about her bruising her pubic bone with the vacuum, or breaking the ceiling with a slippery bowling ball.

He wasn’t all used to his new life. The designer shoes, the fancy parties, the attention . Girls in the past would look at him as though he wasn’t more than shit at the bottom of their Jimmy Choo, but his good luck brought this newfound female attention that was exhilarating and terrifying all at the same time. Especially when, all he wanted was to catch her eye.

She was his good luck charm and didn’t even know it.

Since he’s met her, everything just was going right . She brought Toph over with her guitar to string together a few verses the day they were in desperate need of new lyrics to go with the beat he’s spent the last few nights cranking out. The day after they released it on Apple Music, the song went #1 on Billboard. Piandao had even booked them to play the Hard Boulder Cafe for their first performance, and tickets were sold out.

Even when things just seemed to get better and better for him, the universe doubled down in its punishment for her.

He’s there when she’s walking back from work, drenched to the bone because she missed all trains for the day, a taxi said her face looked stupid, and she was just tired of it all and wanted to go home and eat processed frozen food and die.

Zuko’s there, though. Without fail.

He’s there with his fucking Tesla and personal driver and Chanel top and she couldn’t be any more embarassed.

“Get in!” He hesitates before approaching. “Also, maybe let’s put down the umbrella?” It was inverted anyways, and looked three seconds from whisking her away into the storm.

“No, I’m good!” Katara insists. She was afraid that falling for Zuko, going to bed and waking up thinking of him was messing with her brain and she didn’t know if she wanted it to stop.

“You could get hit by lightning.”

“That can’t—” She ponders it for a second. “You know what, fuck you.”

He throws his expensive jacket over her to quell the shivers, and when she protests, seeing as it was a Valentino Lacquered Nylon Jacket, he bundles her even deeper in the thing, buttoning it up until she’s complaining from the warmth.

“You’re laughing at me.” She pouts.

He’s covered completely in bubbles. Not her fault he decided to strip off his shirt to throw in the cycle with her wet clothes, and she got distracted by the abs and dumped the whole bottle of laundry detergent in the washing machine.

Zuko shoves her face into a pile of the suds. “I am, yeah.” She looks upset and he stops the mirth growing on his face. Reaching out to her, instead. “Katara, I’m sorry did I—”

She might’ve leaned out to accept his embrace, but then she’s flipping them over, pinning him down to the floor. Her warm, still soaking wet body, pressed against him and her arms coming out to pin his hands to the ground.

He gulps.

“This would be more fun if you let me peg you afterwards.”

Her laugh vibrates her whole body and he couldn’t help joining in, too.

He let her have her pick of his dress shirts, and she looked so much at home. Little strands of her bangs framing her face and growing curly with the addition of water. Her brow furrows when she mentions her leave-in conditioner washing away with the suds, and he takes advantage of the momentary distraction. Flipping her and placing two hands at the sides of her head.

She knows he’s covered in the bubbles, just so she wouldn’t feel anymore of a stupid bitch than she already does. He never seems to mind it, even when Katara was frustrated and just couldn’t figure out why all this was happening to her and dragging him into every single accident.

“What would you say to the universe, right now?” She’s curled up on his couch and he’s massaging the balls of her feet she presses in his lap.

“Welcome to your tape.”

“Katara, no.”

“That bridge off of Fourth Street? Looking really easy to jump off of right about now, universe.”

He lets her take his bed that night after he cooked up his famous komodo chicken and both Kiyi and her complain about having a food-baby.

“Hey, Katara.” He whispers while her eyes could barely open. He tucked her in those blankets all ethnic people have, the super fluffy ones with a tiger on them that are always wrapped in a plastic bag. “You’re cute.”

“Yeah?” She breathes out, crinkling her nose and blinking those long lashes and making his heart skip beats. “Hey, Zuko.”

“Yeah?”

“I think I like you.”

He pinches her cheek. “I think I like you, too.”

He was right. As soon as life blessed him with everything he’s wanted and more, it whisked it away just as fast.

He’d mustered up the courage to invite her to a studio session after everyone in Shooters 4 Rihanna insisted on meeting her. Their songs were getting a little too emotional and they wanted to meet his muse. It was going well, too well. He even catches all the lamps she knocks down. When she rights herself, she manages to knock down the table with their food. Double bagging existed for a reason, just like he warned her! But, of course, the bags holding the takeout she was supposed to surprise him with broke from the bottom. He’d go hungry, that day. But, anything for her, though.

She looked so into the session, asking him if she could play with the buttons, leaning into his chest when he hesitantly surrounds her space. His two lean arms coming out to steady her waist when she trips on herself and sends him a sheepish smile that has him hypnotized.

Katara normally felt lightheaded around him, but she felt absolutely faint as soon as Piandao walked in to finalize the details of the performance, and Zuko started talking about some lucky masquerade ball.

She couldn’t hear much else, body getting up before she even registered it.

Before he could fully get into his chair at the mixing console because just one little note in their new song “Rihanna Impregnate Me” just sounded off, she’s tugging him up.

“Can I kiss you?”

“W—what?” She’s holding him up by the collar of his shirt.

Katara smirks. “I really want to kiss you.”

“I mean, uh, yes! Definitely a ye—”

It’s everything he’s imagined, hoped, prayed for the last few months and more. She’s sweet and soft and tasted like lip gloss and the toothpaste he had stowed away in her bag. When he’s leaning in for more, ready to do things like give her his heart or do her taxes for her because he couldn’t think straight and his heart was guiding him through the motions, she’s gone.

Katara’s gone when Ty Lee somehow gets into, yet another, tax fraud case and can’t make their performance.

She’s gone when he needs her by his side because even though he’s not performing he still manages to feel fucking sick. He wants her holding his unnaturally sweaty palms and telling him it’s going to be okay, just like what she does during his late night writing sessions where she stays up and refuses to sleep until he does.

She’s gone when the band has to answer to an angry crowd, an angry CEO who already sees the articles lambasting the girl group’s unprofessionalism and was ten seconds away from pulling the plug on his dreams.

“Zuko!”

He hates his heart rushes, even when it was about to break because of her, too.

She's gotten her perfect life. She’d gotten the job back, her apartment back, Rihanna even sent her a secret song for fuck’s sake.

She must really love this fucker, because she was giving up a chance to stalk Rihanna so he could be happy.

“Maybe he needed that luck more than you do!” Was running through her head the entire week she avoided him.

“I don’t know what to do, Suki!”

“Why don’t you both fuck leprechauns?” She says between bites of string cheese.

Katara sighs. “Why are yours and Toph’s minds built like that?”

“I heard my mom tried punching her stomach every day, hoping that I wasn’t going to be a result of St. Patrick’s Day sex. That’s why my head’s lopsided.”

He felt nauseous. Not only did 3 of the girls just spew their lunch into whatever container they could get their hands on, of course Azula has gone missing. “Katara not now I—”

She comes to him flushed, extensions stuck to her hand after running too fast and accidentally grabbing someone’s hair. Her feet hurt, her heart hurt, but in this moment she knew. She knew he needed this more than her. He was soft and kind and took people in and cherished the moments with his half-sister because he missed all the ones with Azula. He worked so hard now because he was afraid she hated him, and even when he was on the verge of giving up, he still pushed through. He gave people chances, even when the universe was never as kind to him.

After she presses her lips to his, suddenly Azula presses a button from the underground room she was trapped in, appearing on stage in front of their very eyes. They have the best show the Hard Boulder Cafe’s seen in decades . Their contract is extended, and he opens a bottle of champagne to celebrate without taking his eye out.

He was the luckiest man in the world.

Though, when he turns, he realizes.

His girl’s missing.

“Katara!” She tried shuffling away, but accidentally slips on a few drug needles someone threw carelessly on the ground.

She’s still nursing the sore spot on her forehead, where the champagne cork hit. “Zuko, please just...go.” She waves him off with a bandaged hand.

“I know you’re going to be stuck here for the next three hours. Because trains never come on time for you no matter what.”

Even in the middle of the nearly dead station, he was right. Every stop flashed to delayed .

“Then you’ll be robbed by someone on the train, and then you might even get spit on by the guy with the imaginary dog who’s afraid of whoever gets too close to it, and then you’ll get an eye infection.”

Katara wipes the snot at her nose. “So?”

“So?” He laughs, tucking his hands in his pockets. “I’ve lived a whole lifetime of bad luck, and I can’t let you do that for me.”

She lets him turn her to face him, lets him gather her up in his arms and hold her like she’s delicate and irreplaceable, and not just a girl with mascara running down her face and her heart stolen by someone she couldn’t love.

“Even in a lifetime of being shit out of luck, I still got the chance to meet you.”

“Zuko, stop.” Katara wipes at her tears. “Our luck will just get switched, and I always figure things out, I always do. But, I just want you to keep this. You put it to better use than I would’ve.”

Zuko shakes his head. “I don’t want it anymore.”

“I said that to my bladder infection, and that didn’t work. What makes you think that will work now?”

“I can live without it.” He smiles. “A few bumps and bruises are the price I’m willing to pay for you in my life.”

She’s blushing, hands coming up to bring his head closer to hers, to see every little detail of him.

“You’re so fucking stupid.” She whispers, millimeters away from his lips.

The grin splits on his face without his permission. “I am, yeah.”

#Zutara #Zuko #Katara #Zutara Week 2020 #Celestial #Day 4 #atla #avatar the last airbender #Zutara Week #Zutara fanfiction

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replicarters · 7 years

Text

hellraiser 3 funtime carnival, pt 2

PREVIOUSLY

so my dude @yvenly, unbeknownst to me, loves a hellraiser and has a fuckin shirt of the scary man that he was wearing while reading the first part. jake assures me that the scary man is not going to come and get me and nothing i own is haunted. i trust jake, so fortunately i am able to continue what i started to do the other night, which is watch a scary gory movie starring a space angel. i can confirm it is both gory and scaring me. let me remind you, me, and god that i am only 20 minutes into it, and it took exactly 6 minutes to get to the point where i was gently pissing myself. i shudder to think what the remaining hour and ten minutes hold.

i would very much enjoy if it held more of this:

and less deep crimson rivers, but i know i'm wishing for too much.

hot topic is making breakfast, terribly. this charred, molten husk, for instance, lying atop a burner, is either toast or a severed steak. i think it's toast. everything is burning and she should stop. now, just last night, hot topic was bumming smokes, recklessly flipping curtains open, sitting on the couch weird, and emptying the contents of her backpack all over the floor. but now all of a sudden it's "hey what's up let me make breakfast", so, great, now i'm invested in this blossoming love story. god, what if hot topic dies??? i don't think i could handle that. she and joey are friends now! hot topic's trying to make her food to repay her kindness! it's all fine with me as you might guess.

hot topic's name actually is... terry... or teri... or something. hmmmm. i like to imagine the mental force of will required to not constantly go "yeah?" at your own name not being used to address you. acting!

here's where it starts to cross over into the gay danger zone, when hot topic says it's her first time cooking. and the turn of phrase she uses is that she's a... kitchen... virgin...?

is that... so...?

joey offers to boil some water and says it's a specialty of hers and they laugh awkwardly like two heteros having a hetero time. joey also starts to make a suggestion to hot topic, and i thought to myself, "is she going to tell her to go watch cartoons?" and that's Exactly what she fucking did. i bet hot topic is a big fan of the snorks.

that cookbook appears to be campbell's microwave cookbook, which is wonderful on about 15 different levels. microwave cookbook being levels one through ten.

hot topic dances on the edge of the gay event horizon by sneaking a peek in joey's closet Come On Now is this for real

and joey is apparently not that great with toast either so i don't know how these girls are going to feed each other after they defeat the hellraiser and get married.

one LITTLE detail left out until the change in camera angle is that hot topic isn't wearing any pants. that seems like it was pretty important information for me to have, for the f/f hellraiser 3 fanfic i am now writing.

everything is all fine and dandy until the music starts going again and hot topic gets upset. she really loves it here. she wants the movie to flip into a lesbian romcom instead of being the mind-crushing hack-and-slash that it is. you guys what if she gets hacked and slashed?! oh god i don't want it

"uhhh a guy's head exploded in the first six minutes; we can't go back." yes, joey has to solve this mystery, which, i mean, she's braver than me; if i watched a guy get blasted all over the hospital walls after chains pulled his head apart i'd have a repressed memory that wouldn't resurface until years and years later, at which point i'd pass out in the grocery store as a grown adult with kids or something, and when i came to i'd remember the hell out of it and wouldn't stop screaming until my vocal chords snapped.

oh my good god

there's something important happening here but all i heard was "we're going shopping." forrrrrr strap-ons?

oh, they came to the hobo man's art gallery that's only open at night, and that i keep calling the pyramidhead gallery in my head. also check out those pants. yikesaroo! i can hear 1992's sears catalog calling from a landfill!

gracious me this whole ensemble! noooo.

"maybe they're closed." they're not closed, they just cannot let you in dressed like you belong in a parade on stilts. it will offend the art and we'll have more bad guys roaming around in the spooky shadows.

some man with a dog across the street says the pyramidhead gallery is closed every day, except for he apparently doesn't know it's open exclusively at 12:01 am. he says it's been there for months, closed. hot topic says that's bs; her boyfriend just bought something there last week. ew so the boyfriend that threw her out is imitation danny zuko. girl, run far away because that guy's busy communing with unholy messenger rats.

then for no reason at all, this poor pup gets dragged away by its neck, growling because dogs know stuff. does the dog also know its owner is an irresponsible sack of shit who needs to learn what a proper harness is? sheesh.

"chill," hot topic says. "there's a back door, right?" and then she pulls a lock pick out of her tits. like, not on a chain or anything, so i guess it was just resting freely in her cleavage. another important detail for my fanfiction.

there are more ugly paintings inside but joey gets right down to business and finds a file drawer that's pretty much exactly like every file drawer we have at work. just full of accordion folders with papers shoved in them.

"ughhh," joey says, "this is gonna take Forever." i literally... had that moment with my boss at work yesterday trying to find some paperwork. but it's not gonna take forever, not with the music going, it's not...!

the most illuminating revelation is that the gallery is a total scam; everything they have comes from bankruptcy sales, high school art classes, insane asylums... wait, what? uh oh.

uhhhhh ohhhhhhh.

thankfully we leave immediately and head straight back to the loser room. yeahhhh fistbump brah! fistbumps existed in 1992! imagine that. we can truly trace all tradition back to our ancestors.

danny zuko spies a hot blonde and motions to his mark sheppard-looking bartender that he wants to hit that, so the bartender pulls a rose out from the... ice bin...? "here babe take a cold-ass rose" "oh baby the frozen petals are burning me up" - is that what's supposed to happen?

so danny zuko comes over, the girl's like, "oh, it's you~" and he tells her she's beautiful she says "oh no there's lots of girls here more beautiful than me" and he pretends like he cares about how she feels blah blah blah

and then we come to sex noises so the arctic rose worked pretty well. i think i'll spare you a screenshot of the actual sex; i'd rather take a picture of a head split in half. my favorite part though is that he constantly has his hands on her tits so you don't see any nip. so we can watch the other graphic shit we've seen and yet we're not allowed to look at a boob? the fuck?

oh ps the statue is in the background, watching them.

and at the exact moment danny zuko comes (ugh) the statue's eyes open. ohhhhhhhhhhhohohoho fcukinggfkhgkldhgl

then the eyes close again.

hot topic and joey are back at her apartment. joey's broken out of a pair of scully specs so i guess things have gotten serious in here.

hot topic prepares to walk out the door and joey is like HOLD ON???? WHY LEAVE??

she's trying to get some tape and succeeds and this is extremely untoward and i am offended!!!

hot topic guesses joey got what she needed, and prepares to show herself out. joey's face immediately falls and she's like no????? and she invites hot topic to stay in her spare room.

hot topic gets very emotional and says that's great, and offers to do breakfast! oh boy!!

even at the thought of inedible trash breakfast, joey is thrilled. this is Fucking Gay

"so cool... Radical!"

the girl danny just boned stands in front of this painting which, to be honest with you? kind of looks like dukat? maybe dukat if he roided up before the reckoning.

danny's already done with this and has important things to do like getting a scuff off his ugly red cowboy boots. it all goes south pretty fast.

"but you gave me a rose."

"and tomorrow, i'll give one to somebody else." ooooooh

"you shit," the girl says, speaking the truth.

there's yelling, the girl backs up toward the statue, i'm biting my nails because something's clearly gonna happen

LAUGHS NERVOUSLY OHHHHHH NOOOOOOO

chains, chains, it's always chains, hooked chains come out of the statue and sink into her. danny zuko, for as vile as he is, didn't plan this at all as even he's like "what the ffffuuuuuuccckkkk"

hello!! furby's awake!

the statue gets one more hook right into her forehead and then? and THEN, the all-time grossest fucking thing happens, and i swear to god i'm not making this up but also you're kidding if you think i'll actually screenshot it: the hook pulls THE ENTIRETY OF THE GIRL'S SKIN OFF HER BODY IN ONE SHOT, and THEN, STILL ALIVE and screaming bloody fucking murder, the girl, looking like a page out of any muscular system biology book, is DIGESTED BY THE STATUE.

and then once properly absorbed, her face appears SO ALL THE FACES ON THIS STATUE ARE PEOPLE WHO'VE BEEN SKINNED AND EATEN HKFLGRHLGKLSKB I'M SCREECHING

i guess a nutritious meal was just the thing to get ol stoneface back to normal. HE'S HERE, THIS IS HIM, THIS IS THE GUY!! jake says his name is pinhead? just going to call him pincushion, hope that's okay. honestly it's more like nailcushion, those look like a bunch of nails sticking out of him. why does he love metal so much!!!

and all danny zuko has to say is "jesus christ!" like he couldn't even pretend to barf.

and pinhead FUCKING RESPONDS: "not quite." buddy, i'll say.

he starts getting poetic and i never expected him to have an accent. who do you think you are, shakespeare? i've never heard of shakespeare writing a scene where taming of the shrew ends with a flesh barbecue.

pinhead does one fun thing which is compare himself to danny zuko, which in my mind is exactly right but danny zuko cries and whines and says "no that's fuckin evil man!!!" yeah, just. like. you!

according to pinhead, there's no good, there's no evil, only flesh. is this what he does, just eats people? i didn't expect this either.

"you will help me," he says.

no Fuckin way danny zuko says, bringing out a gun like this is going to do anything other than increase pinhead's desire for flesh cakes.

oh my god and then pinhead laughs and says "how touching, that is the gun you used to kill your parents?" LMAO WHAT????

zuko unloads the gun and pinhead spits every bullet out of his mouth. just lets em drop right out onto the floor. danny zuko then drops his gun.

looks like you're in this for the long haul, pal!

he drops to the floor and starts sobbing. puny man sobbing in his boxers dot jpg.

there is a place, pinhead says, at his right hand for this manchild. yucky.

aaaand true to form, danny zuko takes a minute to think it over and then signs right up. this is so insulting to danny zuko; maybe i ought to start calling him his real name which is JP, which also is not really a name.

meanwhile, joey is full on channeling murphy brown and lookin cute. her friendly grandpa cameraman runs up to give her a package. something for her story? mmm something for something. grandpa cameraman, ever a decent person (oh god what if HE dies?) says if there's any way he can help, just give him a call. i think the first thing he can do to help is contact a priest specializing in exorcisms, get to that statue, and end this before it starts hopping railroad tracks.

scully specs are back on, tape is in the vcr, quest to quit smoking is shot, and we are go.

the tape is of a girl in a room at what looks like that asylum that was referenced before, and she's talking about The Box.

"demons," she says. "demons live in the box." well girl, we are way past that, the demons are out of the box, in statues, in hospitals, that box barely has anything to do with anything anymore.

"it's a gateway to hell." yeaarrrrgghhhhh somebody close it, then!

this is a really nice shot, i just wanted to stop everything and have you look at it. hands!

uhhh thennn the tv switches to an image of a dude

and that dude

starts talking

to joey

NOOOOOOOOPE

"she's telling the truth, joey," this guy that sounds Suspiciously like pinhead says.

joey tries to rewind the tape to see what the hell that was, but there's nothing out of the ordinary there... nnnnggghhhhgdhflk

anyway, demons live in the box. it "opens itself", they come out, that's the sitch. fuck all this.

s-s-s-speaking of the b-b-b-box, here it is at joey's apartment, where hot topic is currently all alone. god if anything happens to her i will be devastated beyond belief. pleeeease don't eat her please don't eat her.

hot topic stares at the box the same way i stare at the box: with off-the-charts trepidation. but she notices what i also noticed, that it looks a little different, like now it has color.

"man, joey must've polished you up some, huh?" oh no please don't

i'm pretty much. gonna shit. please put it down please please please joey will be so sad if you are dead and i can't take it!

oh god and then the phone rings and she puts it down thank jesus

absoLutely not the phone call i wanted her to get.

jp wants hot topic to come over. no no, no, no no no, no, and no!

pleeeeeease just wait for joey to get home she'll protect you and you can both be safe! if you go over to jp you're literally going to be devoured by a hell beast aaaaahhhhhhhh

well thank the lord she says she just can't and slams down the phone. score one for pure love! can you win against the delicate softness of girls being nice to each other, pinhead, can you?!

uh wait, then hot topic triggers joey's messages and it sounds like cameraman telling her she got a job that she wanted across the country. ??? what happened to pure love?!

joey comes home and the place is just a sty. it's dark and hot topic's not there.

and she finds this note that says, "enjoy monterey, you liar".

welp, love is dead and the demons are coming! might as well start breaking ourselves down into bite-sized chunks!

that's all for this evening. we’ll have another fun jaunt tomorrow! now, what do you think is the best technique for cutting off your own arm? just grab a hacksaw and go to town?

#picspam #terry farrell #ds9

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