Fire hazard siblings Zuko and Azula getting along and Zuko has One Brain Cell and Azula has Two but they have to work together to overthrow their father because neither of them wants the other one to die.
KEY POINT: Neither of them have talked about it and neither is willing to admit either of them wants to overthrow their father so they just keep strategically "messing up" and being weirdly cool with the other one also fucking up constantly. Outsider POVs don't know what to think lmfao
A ficlet featuring beta!Azula being a little insecure about omega!Katara actually wanting her. All my A/B/O are fully @the-genius-az's fault (hope you enjoy it, I promise this not a tragedy.
Growing up, Azula has learned that being an omega doesn't make you inherently weak, look at Ozai. Being an alpha doesn't make you inherently strong, look at Ursa. Being a beta doesn't make you anyone's favorite, look at Zhao.
Zuko and Azula are just the exceptions.
Zuko isn't weak, she never believed. She always thought he should put more effort in his bending, in his studies. He had the potential. Not being a prodigy never meant he couldn't become one of the most powerful, skilled Firebenders of his generation. But he would whine about anything that Azula was ever slightly better than him, and go cry on Mother's arms, and Mother kept giving him space to become actually weak.
The firstborn alpha son constantly upstaged by the secondborn beta daughter.
Azula grew up doing everything she could to be valuable, a need that carved its way into her very bones. Carved with claws made of fire handled by Ozai, by Ursa and by everything in the Royal Family culture.
Now, twelve years after the end of the war, Azula can feel that insecurity burning under her skin. Because she's a beta among alphas and omegas, a better bender and a better fighter, there's the underlying convention that betas don't belong so high up in society.
It doesn't quite matter for them, they tell her. They make sure she knows she belongs – as a person, not a weapon the way Ozai did.
She's not sure what is going on between her and Katara. The omega waterbender had broken up with Aang, with the Avatar, with the most wanted alpha in the world, and has been getting closer and closer to her. They kissed a few times, but Azula is used to that, to being an experiment. She's not even bitter about it, betas don't mate.
"You're being very clingy," Azula comments, because Katara is, sitting on her lap with face on Azula's neck.
"You smell so good."
"I smell-" the extra sweetness finally hits. "Are you in heat?"
"Not yet."
"I'm sure you know I do not possess the needed equipment."
"Needed equipment," she repeats with a giggle. "I just want you to be here, just cuddle and hold me."
"I'm just a be-"
"No," Katara moves back, pupils blown wide but still sober. "You're the strongest bender I know, you're loyal and fierce and brave. And you're beautiful too. You're just great. Why wouldn't I want to be with you?"
"You want to be with me?"
"'Zula, I've been trying to court you for a year."
"What?"
"For a genius, you're so oblivious."
"I'm just a beta, you're surrounded by suitable alphas."
"You're Azula, that means a lot more than you think it does. Now just hold me, we'll figure the rest later, if you want to."
Personally, I do think there’s a lot of intrigue in Azula redemption AUs! I stumble across some from time to time and have seen some very well done ones! She definitely was molded into being who she was by Ozai, so seeing her learn to break away from that would be very interesting and cool!
I don’t seek these AUs out too too often though, but that’s just because I happen to focus a bit more on other characters. But yes, I do usually enjoy them when I come across them!
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Azula & Zuko (Avatar)
Characters: Zuko (Avatar), Azula (Avatar)
Additional Tags: Sibling Bonding, redeemed!Azula, NOT zucest, i'm in my feels about these two and if i have to be you do too, fire siblings, fire siblings get to be happy and healthy for once
Series: Part 1 of Can't We Be Seventeen?
Summary:
Three years after the end of the war, Zuko's council wants Azula moved to the Tower now that her mind has healed, but when he goes to break the news to her, she asks him to make a different choice.
Or, someone chooses Azula for the first time, and lets her be seventeen.
So I’ve been thinking about Azula getting a redemption arc a lot recently and why or why not it should happen
I’ve decided a redemption arc for Azula just doesn’t make sense. Azula has lived her life always being the best and the brightest, and always praised by her father for being just that. Whether or not she really strived for her mother’s love, that problem was taken care of when her mother disappeared, at least on surface level.
The fact that Azula has essentially gone mad by the end of ATLA also was put into thought here because she doesn’t <i>want</i> to be redeemed. She doesn’t strive for anything at this point but to continue gaining power.
Now, people argue that Zuko didn’t want redemption either, but we have to take into account how much of his life was spent with Iroh. Whether or not he rejected Iroh’s teachings for a long time, they were still there. Zuko has always had more of a side for good than Azula simply because, to Azula, good meant weakness.
Anyways, this is just a quack spilling of thoughts. It’s by no means a comprehensive post, and it’s not meant to start an argument. I just wanted to put this out there.
