Story [Avatar:TLA] Zuko: The Last Firebender - Same Players, Different Story - Updated 8/17

Title: Zuko: The Last Firebender
Author: The_1237
Fandom: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Drama, action, suspense
History: Aang, the Avatar, is now the AirKeeper, leader of the Air Nomads. The Air Nomads' council influenced the young Avatar into letting them branch out into the world, to spread their culture and hopefully bring the world closer together instead of staying within the confined walls of the Air Temples. The Fire Nation took this as a threat to their existence without investigation and proceeded to fight to Air Nomads, and the Air Nomads could only respond in kind.
Other: To avoid confusion about ages, Aang is 22 and most of the show's characters are 10 years older though some may vary with changings with my story. I will inform you as needed. Also, thanks to R_Zion for the opening.
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Water, Earth, Fire, Air.
Not so long ago, the four nations lived together in harmony.
Then, everything changed when the Air Nomads attacked.
Only the Avatar, master of all four elements, could slow them, but when the world needed him most, he was silent.
A decade has passed and my Sister and I are all that remains of the our great people and, though my firebending is good, I'm not yet ready to defeat the Air Nomads.
I am Zuko of the Fire Nation and...I will save the world.

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Nomadic Air Prison

This had been a good plan after all, he would have to thank Azula later. If he could find her that is. Azula stayed on the move nowadays, even when she was sleeping and so he made himself a promise that if whenever they crossed paths again he would definitely thank her.

The prison was made for airbenders. There was little oxygen flowing in, hence there wouldn't be enough for airbenders to breathe in required for bending and it limited a certain firebender's air to burn also. But he hadn't come aboard this prison to fight the airbenders. He had come aboard to find out information about his mother. She was a waterbender who, as far as he could remember, had disappeared long before the war for reasons that only pointed to his father, though the man had been among the first killed in the war, so asking him wouldn't bring up any results now.

Zuko was, rightfully, the Fire Lord. A Fire Lord with no nation, no people, and no home, but Fire Lord nonetheless. Sometimes he found himself wondering where everything had gone wrong in the war, but quickly remembered that it had went wrong with the reign of the Airkeeper Aang and he would correct that mistake soon enough. It wasn't about vengeance, though he had quite a helping of that, it was about taking back what was rightfully his and killing the Airkeeper.

The man was the Avatar, shouldn't he have been saving the world? Not unleashing his army of Warrior Monks out on the people of the world and it was all that the Fire Nation could do to hold them off, which drained their economy and eventually destroyed their people.

Zuko stood up in his cell. It was time to stop recalling and get out of here. His investigation had only confirmed his belief that his mother was still alive and in one of the water tribes, and that was all he needed to know for now. His mother, with Azula, could gather up enough sympathizers for some kind of resistance. Zuko also had his own reasons for going to find her. He needed to know what had happened, why she had left.

Using this longing and anger at the Airkeeper as fuel, Zuko started a small fire. Ironically, the Warrior Monks were very eco-friendly and so they didn't use metal to build their ships, but grain, hollow pipes, and hardened mud. It was like a big flying piece of their temple, which he supposed was what they were aiming for. Now, however, he was aiming for the wall. Showing no caution, the Firebender exploded the flame as he spun towards the wall, blowing a hole in the caked wall and wasted no time jumping out of the ship.

He noticed quickly that Azula's plan had worked to perfection, because he was now falling

 

Great start!!

 

I like it. It's something. Interesting. I'll be watching this one. PM me when you update, or tell me somehow. kthxbai.

 

Brilliant work! I look forward to updates.

 

Awesome! It sounds great! Is there hope for Zutara in this?

Either way, please put me on the PM list!

 

Chapter 1: The Rogue

"You alright, pal?"

Zuko awoke with a start and looked around him to take in his surroundings. It was a learned habit, and a very necessary one. With firebenders being hunted, he had learned to survive on less sleep and to be aware of his surroundings even when he was asleep.

Recalling the events before darkness had taken him, he was pretty sure the water impact had knocked him out. He was on solid ground now, so undoubtedly, someone had found him and hauled him to land. It was a snowy land and looking behind him, he realized that he was inside the Northern Tribe's walls.

The brown man above him shook him hard, "Hey! Can you hear me?"

Zuko winced as the man shouted at him. "Yes, yes, I can hear you." He spoke with a dismissive wave of his hand. He started to feel his head and felt multiple lumps on his head, as if they had hit him with tones while he was knocked out.

"Who's in charge here?" Zuko demanded rather than asked as he stood up, dusting the snow off of him as he did so.

"Lady Katara, but why do you want to know? Its not like you're going to see her. She doesn't waste time with outsiders. Since we're trying to be nice, take some food and get going, stranger." The brown man walked away and Zuko turned his back to him and began to a very large, dome-like temple.

If the leader was indeed in the village, there was no doubt in his mind that she would be here. Leaders were drawn to large structures, naturally.

Entering the temple quietly, Zuko eyed around until he sighted a tall, beautiful, young woman. She was just as he remembered her. His family had once came here when he was 5 for a festival to celebrate peace between the nations. Zuko remembered having a crush on the dark skinned girl with loops in her hair and big blue eyes.

He felt like it was all coming back to him, smashing the wall to his heart as it had when he was a boy. When she turned around, he felt like he was in the presence of a goddess. She glided to him faster than he would have expected and embraced him in a close hug.

"Katara..." He buried himself in her scent. It was good to feel a woman's touch other than Azula's painful punches she called "love taps". "You've...grown. You look fantastic."

She pulled back from him, looking him up and down. It was then that Zuko realized what he must look like. He had shoulder length unkept hair, a dark beard, and he was wearing yellow Airbender prison clothes, which were still wet from his fall.

"You look...great." Zuko should've known Katara would never insult him, even though the insult would be true. "I thought you were dead, Zuko. When I heard that Fire Lord Ozai had been killed, I just...I'm sorry."

"No worries, Katara. If you really want to know the truth, Azula and I are all that's left. We do well. I hate to cut this meeting short, but I just escaped from an airbender prison ship-"

"They know who you are?" Katara gasped in shock.

Zuko waved his hand and smiled, "No, I got in on purpose. Its just that they will come back around here when they find out I escaped and I don't want you or your people to get in trouble."

The shock disappeared from her face and a strong sense of pride replaced it. Her body straightened back up. She now embodied the look and persona of a leader. "Zuko, don't worry about my people. If the Airbenders come back around, they are going to get a rude awakening. Aan...The Airkeeper hasn't stepped foot across our border in a long time and I intend to keep it that way."

Zuko was silently shocked. Aang and Katara had been lovers at one time, but now he could sense that somethings, if not all things, had changed. Her tone now indicated that was further away from him than Zuko was.

He smiled and decided that he better not indulge into her personal business, instead waved his wet sleeves. "You have a change of clothes for an old friend?"

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More to come today.

 

So this is Zutara...

 

Nice update, blu!

 

Great post, B!

I love Zutara

 

Get some, Zuko. Superb writing.

 

Good work, Beastie Boy. Keep at it and you'll have a fine fic in no time!

 

Thanks everyone for reading and I hope you enjoy the rest.

2-The Rogue-2

Looking forward at the Northern Water Tribe, the Airkeeper felt the memories rushing, once again, back to him, except this time they were good memories. He remembered the first time when he and Katara had kissed, when they were together. Katara was the type of woman that made you feel about what you had, even if you had nothing material wise. She was his comfort, the one thing he could fall back on when things got rough.

But he didn't have that anymore.

Maybe that was why he was now tougher than a Lion Turtle's shell. Aang had learned that he had to be independent of others because he had a people to lead and trying to rely on another leader's advice would only bring him to ruin. He would have thought that Katara would have understood that with her becoming leader to the water tribes, but she didn't and had turned her back on him.

If he was younger, it would have brought him to tears what he was feeling now. Despite what she had done to him and vice versa, he still loved her. That was the reason he was going there now, to see her again. There was another reason and he despised having to talk to her about it. It was part of the expansion plan.

The fire nation was gone, as much as the words left a bad taste in his mouth, and his people were ready to advance and construct their own temples on the land. To soothe tensions with the other nations, Aang had decided to share the land with the other nations, to show it as he wasn't completely cold-hearted and wanted to stitch the wounds he had caused in national relations.

The Airkeeper was still going over how he would bring it up as he landed less than a mile outside the walls. As expected, no less than 100 soldiers came marching up to him. This was overkill for an average person, but he was the Avatar, so he guess it was appropriate. He slid off of Appa and stood straight up as the soldiers stopped and surrounded him.

A lean, brown man with his hair in a "Warrior's Wolf Tail" came towards him with the symbolic blue Anorak with its hood up. Aang noticed that the man had no fear or hesitation as he walked right up to the Avatar.

"Airkeeper Aang, what a...pleasure to greet you. May I ask what brings you to our walls? Not another expansion, I hope."

Aang kept his emotions under control and only returned with a firm look. "I am here to meet with Princess Katara." The Northern Water Tribe was a patriarchal society, so Sokka was the Chief, but he had all but handed all the real responsibilities to Katara.

"I don't think she's going to want to see you, oh your majesty Airkeeper." The man returned with a wide grin.

Aang tried to keep a straight face before bursting out in laughter and grabbing his older friend is a strong embrace. "How are you, Sokka? I see you finally got that facial hair you've always wanted."

The man's figure betrayed his strength as Aang felt his body being crushed in response to his joke. Sokka pushed Aang back, "I see you finally got...your head to shine like you always wanted. Its so clean I could eat off of it. Hey Appa!"

As they walked back to the gates after the reunion, Sokka nudged Aang. "She's seriously not going to want to see you, buddy. Its been five years. If it had been Katara instead of me, she would probably have blasted you into the spirit world. Speaking of the spirit world, how's ole Roku these days?"

Aang picked up on his friend's real question. "Roku's fine...and so is Yue."

Sokka smiled at that as they entered the gates.

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Katara ran her hand through her hair, just as she had done when she was alittle girl and would blush when a boy would look at her. But Zuko wasn't looking at her, she was looking at him and she liked what she saw. Zuko had always been handsome, but now he was grown and she, as a woman, knew what she liked in a man.

He was fit, his body tall and lean but toned. He had shaved his beard, and cut his hair, though it still

 

Toph!!!!!


Nice update. I wonder what Zuko's going to do next.

 

but he was a goofy genius and she was amazed at how he was a dedicated male warrior.

If only he could relay that to his love life, she thought.


Poor Suki! Wonder what's wrong.

I love Sokka Great post!

 

I liked the Aang and Zuko parts. I don't know about Toph. I'm still interested. I like it.