#by his face you know he's had nothing BUT coffee for the past 48 hours#he's going to wake up tomorrow with a pounding headache a fever and a bison parked outside his apartment chewing the courtyard weeds#and the Avatar sitting on his couch defending tea#while Uncle nods#and the Water Tribe boy ruthlessly STEALS ZUKO'S BEST BEANS HE'S NOT EVEN BOILING THEM RIGHT#...oh agni is this what Uncle feels about his leaves#Zuko has not had enough coffee to deal with this#Uncle: actually nephew I think starting your day with coffee and only coffee may have been your prob--#Zuko: ignores him to snatch beans back from Water Tribe boy. wakes up three months later on the throne.#Druk in the background: head back horking beans from the bag stuck over his nose while palace servants try to catch a CAFFEINATED NOODLE
scaled salvage: there are some... innocent misunderstandings between the earth kingdom and the southern water tribes about what an "information gathering" session with the prince entails - kutsaa is left to patch up the aftermath with a disturbingly calm zuko, bc if he interacts with a single earth kingdom representative he'll cause a diplomatic incident.
zuko isn't sure why everyone is so surpised or upset.
hakoda is quietly filing away the notion that zuko thought they *knew* what the earth kingdom was going to do and didn't try to fight back or refuse, to deal with at a later date.
“But…” the prince started. Again.
Hakoda stared him down, until he shut his mouth. “Just answer their questions, the same way you answered mine. Listen to them, behave for two hours, then you can come back to our ship.”
The prince didn’t agree, per se. But he let himself be marched across the gangplank, which was agreement enough.
“He’s convinced you’re going to break his hands,” Hakoda said, to Fong’s representative. A joke that was a warning.
“He’s your prisoner, not ours,” the man said. “We can respect that.”
Hakoda nodded, once. “Try to get something out of him that we can use as proof of life. I’m pretty sure my crew could forge a more personal letter than the ones he’s been writing.”
“Of course,” Fong’s representative said, with a smile.
* * *
The prince was returned before dinner. He walked stiffly back aboard, and took up position behind Hakoda, like he wasn’t sure he was dismissed.
“Your proof of life,” Fong’s representative said, handing Hakoda a strip of something black. “Thank you again. That tip about his hands came in very useful.”
It took until a long moment of staring to recognize the strip for what it was: dragon hide. He’d… never touched it fresh.
* * *
The kid didn’t say anything as Hakoda led him down to Healer Kustaa’s.
He needed leading.
“Out,” Kustaa said, and closed the door.
* * *
There was the barest hint of a burn on Prince Zuko’s hand. The flame they’d used, to make him shift. The threat behind it, if he refused.
The skin had been sliced neatly from between his shoulder blades. It was… not a disabling wound, for a human.
Kustaa rigged up a kind of wrap, to keep the prince’s wings immobilized. And mandated that he spend at least half the day as a dragon, to aid with healing across both forms.
“Will it heal?” Hakoda asked.
“The scales on his face didn’t,” Kustaa said.
The black dragon spent a lot of time stretched out, unmoving, on a yard of the mainmast. The easiest he could climb to. Hakoda did not climb after him.
* * *
“You knew they’d do this,” Hakoda said.
“You told them to.”
He hadn’t known what he was asking for.
“Why would you let them?” Hakoda knew it wasn’t the right thing to say, that it wasn’t the prince’s fault that he’d been skinned, but he also knew that nothing on the Earth Kingdom ship had been lit on fire in the process and he couldn’t understand how those facts fit.
“You said I had to listen to them,” Zuko said, “before I could come back.”
The prince had wanted to come back, even thinking that Hakoda had—
Of course he had. It was better than being sold to the Earth Kingdom. This ship was… it was safe, for him. The safest option he had right now.
Being sent off to be deliberately hurt, then coming back to where they only hurt him accidentally: that was the prince’s idea of safety.
…Hakoda hadn’t known what he was asking for. But he had a child aboard now, and it was time he figured out what that meant.
#Zuko: you banished me into a terrible situation and then you let me return the same day#+1000000 dad points#Hakoda: I don’t want them#Zuko: you don’t want the only thing I have to give#dad point combo#Bato arrives on board: Why is there a dragon sleeping on the mainmast#Hakoda: that’s my guilt-son next question#Avatar The Last Airbender#atla#Zuko#Hakoda#Salvage#Scaled Salvage#dragon Zuko
out of frame someone probably just called him zuzu or hotman. or honestly just adressed him.
(my last avviable time lapse under the cut. thanks for your patience. unlikely to do this again in the near future!)
In retrospect, one thing I kinda like in ATLA is how Zuko never tells the gaang how he got his scar.
It would have been cool to see their reactions to Zuko's story and see how their perspective on Zuko changed. And I have no doubt that he tells them about it at some point. But this way, it doesn't come off as emotional blackmail, with him trying to paint his actions as 'Yes, I hunted you across the world, but I actually had a really good reason."
If he did, he might have had a better chance of joining the Gaang, but he doesn't. In traditional Zuko fashion, he takes the most challenging route possible.
Zuko takes full accountability for his actions, even though they came from a place where he felt he had no choice. Because at the end of the day, he realized that even though his father put him on his avatar's path, he was the one who zealously attacked them at every opportunity. He isn't letting himself off the hook for anything.
#zuko is so funny to me because at multiple points throughout the show if he had any manipulative bone in his damn body #he wouldve gotten somewhere #blue spirit? why are you throwing fire. the avatar is talking with you. LIE. #its so fucking funny bc the gaang is like 'zukos EVIL he is PLAYING you' guys zuko doesnt know how to do that. #full honest truth confessing insane shit in front of them. he didnt even gaf about being friends or being FORGIVEN it was abt the goal #'i need the avatar to take me into their group so i may aid in however possible to stop my father' that was the goal. truly was like #'take me as a prisoner if this is the way i can help' HES CRAZY (@ponytailzuko)
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