Chapter 7: Over the Horizon (Part 1)
Yeah, sorry, we had a surprise live session tonight. I might go live again tomorrow too since I still have that bonus session I owe. Thanks for reading, everyone! I hope I can make this arc work.
Here's the start of Chapter 7: Over the Horizon.
-----
97 AC (15 years old)
Fire Nation Royal Palace: Crown Princess's Chambers
You are Akane, princess of the Fire Nation.
Your father has stripped you of everything but that.
He destroyed your firebending. He forced you to break ties with your brother and uncle. He keeps Azula under such a grueling training regime that you never have a chance to speak with her.
You can hardly even bear to face Mitsuko, now. Even she can't ignore your flaws anymore.
All you have now is your title, but even that is hollow - in retrospect, Father's actions pitting you against your family make the most sense if he's leaning towards Azula as his heir, not you.
He's taken everything from you. Even your face...
...is flawed.
You're flawed.
Even with makeup, you can tell. People can tell. Everyone can tell. They could always tell. You can't hide it. You can't pretend that you're flawless, that you're not ugly or weak or foolish or gullible or -
Half of you wants to reach into the mirror and strangle the person you see there. That's what Grandfather would have done. The other half of you can't seem to manage to summon up any feeling at all. The scar is there. It's been there. It's just a fact. You can't hide from it. You can't hide from any of them. Not the burn scar on your cheek, not the electric scar on your wrist, not even the ghost of a line across your palm where you gouged your hand on the crown trying to put Grandfather in a chokehold. The flaws are there. They've always been there. You can polish a crown clean, but not skin.
You haven't worn clothes that exposed your arms in two years. What are going to do now, wear a veil? Idiot. Idiot. Your acting doesn't fool anyone, least of all Father.
What is Mitsuko going to think? She always said you had such flawless skin. You don't know how she can look at this without feeling sick, let alone...
But what right do you have to complain? Zuko's scar is worse. Even if you gave him the luxury of being able to hide it.
Father would say that you have only yourself to blame, for both Zuko's scar and your own.
And maybe he's right.
If you had been stronger, none of this would have happened. Father forced you into this because he could. You should have been - needed to be - strong enough that he couldn't force you to do anything. Your will, your firebending, even your political position - if you were stronger in any or all of them, Father couldn't have done anything to you. If you had more power, you could have protected everyone from him. You weren't even strong enough to make allies to aid you.
This is all your fault. Your weakness's fault. If you try to blame anyone else, you're missing the point.
You were weak, so you were scarred. There's nothing more to be said.
Father will always try to manipulate you. It's just what he does. Expecting anything else from him is just another weakness - it's just sentimentality towards family, the same kind he's always warned you about. You suppose you should have paid more attention to that lesson after all.
It's your fault for not recognizing Father as your enemy sooner.
A part of you feels like the realization should cause you more pain. You feel like you should be panicking, or crying, or something like that. You're being more honest with yourself now, aren't you? You're not acting. Knowing how weak you've been lately, you expect yourself to break down blubbering at the idea that maybe your family isn't full of harmless friends. But you don't. The realization comes to you with a numb sort of clarity, just like the realization that you have a scar.
Father is your enemy. Or, at the very least, your rival. He will never allow sentimentality or familial ties to affect how he acts towards you. You're just a tool to him. Nothing more, nothing less. It's your own fault for not acknowledging that sooner.
It's that simple.
Wherever you go from here, you can't afford to forget that again.
* * * * *
97 AC (15 years old)
Zuko and Uncle depart on their assignment to hunt the Avatar soon after the Agni Kai. There's not even much time for him to heal. You're present to see them off, not that either of them acknowledge you. Even Uncle's bearing seems colder. Father got what he wanted.
It's almost funny. To you, the excuse for the Agni Kai barely mattered.. To him, it's probably something he'll never forget.
It was just some discussion of the campaign in the northern Earth Kingdom. General Bujing was advocating for an aggressive approach towards an Earth Kingdom holdout in an excellent defensive position that had successfully bogged down the invasion for months. He believed that the cautious approach and hesitation to directly besiege them was ultimately costing more lives and time than an overwhelming direct assault would.
Father, unusually, asked you and Zuko for your opinions. It was only a day after he had confronted you in your room. It was clear what he intended.
You advocated a cautious approach - it's foolish to waste lives with the comet so near; every soldier spared now will be far more valuable in a few years - and Zuko, predictably, tried to point out every flaw in your reasoning. He wasn't even necessarily wrong about everything he said; he was just too weak to back it up.
Maybe he'll be able to learn his lesson more quickly than you did.
* * * * *
97 AC (15 years old)
Royal Woods
In the privacy of the woods, you do what passes for your training now. The panic and denial have passed in the days since the Agni Kai; indulging in them is a luxury you can't afford. You must face the facts of the situation.
Your fire is gone.
Oh, you can still summon up those low, red flames. It's almost more insulting than if you could manage nothing at all. There's so little heat and force behind them that you would never want to rely on them in a fire duel, and you certainly couldn't punch through stone with them. Your bending is pathetic enough that it wouldn't even be acceptable to Zuko, let alone you or Father or Azula.
But, again, panic is something you can't afford.
You try to approach the issue methodically. First, you look for workarounds, practical combat solutions. Your attempt to generate lightning causes an explosion that nearly injures you; you brush it off and just chalk it up as another failure, force yourself not to dwell on it. It's the worst accident you've ever had while attempting lightning. But, again, you force yourself not to dwell on it. You go through every firebending form you've learned or made up to try to see if any seem to work better. There are no major differences. Even Uncle's precious Dancing Dragon fails to cause any magical improvement in the quality of your flame.
You aren't completely helpless, though; you discover you can at least still control fire in your environment. If you use your firebending to set things around you on fire, you can manipulate those flames for somewhat more effective attacks. When you hold your hand to burning wood, you find that you're still at least capable of protecting yourself from being burned by normal flames. Who knows whether that defense would hold up during a duel, though.
You can still perform the motion for Uncle's little lightning redirection trick, too, for all the good it will do on the front lines. And, actually, practicing the technique does help you discover something that may be significant. As you concentrate on the flow of chi through your body, you find that it feels drastically different than it did when you first learned the technique. Your energy feels heavier, harder to move. When you take time to meditate and study the feeling in detail, you find that your chi feels blocked somehow; the flow is all wrong, like there's something knotted in your pressure points. It's such a solid, clear feeling that you're not even sure whether the blockage is mental or actually something that's physically wrong with you.
Maybe research into chi and pressure points could help you fix your fire. Maybe meditation could help you reignite your flame. Or maybe you should just try to improve your skills with a sword. You can't be sure what's most promising, and you aren't sure how long you have before Father sends you to the front.
* * * * *
97 AC (15 years old)
Royal Library
According to what you can find in the library, the human body has seven significant chakras that chi flows through. The chakras and associated pressure points and pathways allow chi to flow to give strength to the muscles and to bending. It's a concept you're already familiar with, but now you need to find the fine details on how these chakras work - and what can make them malfunction. You skim through the promising-looking texts on the subject in the library. Rapid research is becoming something of a skill of yours.
Unfortunately, there are precious few details to be found.
Ancient spiritual traditions have historically claimed that the functioning of the chakras was governed by whether an individual was living in a spiritually and emotionally 'balanced' way. Modern science disagrees. The current research suggests that inheritance and physical health are the biggest determinants of how well the chakras function. Emotional state does play a role, particularly for benders - the book you're reading makes note that firebenders require focus and anger to galvanize their chi properly. But modern scholars believe that most ailments related to chi can be explained by biological defects, either inherited or acquired. According to the research you're reading, the overemphasis on a very particular idea of 'balanced' spirituality was likely just an ancient superstition that kept the masses mired in stagnancy-inducing cultural norms. The idea was especially prominent in the Air Nation, which is taken as further evidence of its bankruptcy.
You aren't sure what to believe about the Air Nation's ideas. It feels like you can never be sure how trustworthy the Fire Nation's researchers are in their evaluation of other nations. But you doubt it would be practical to try to rediscover a lost Air Nation religion and convert to it in the hopes it would clear your chakras, so you focus on the physical side of things. Acupuncture, certain exercises, and certain forms of massage therapy are believed to enhance the flow of chi through the body. You rapidly incorporate them all into your routine, and keep it up for the next week. Lo and Li help you make the arrangements. If Father notices or cares about what you're doing, he doesn't care enough to interfere.
And... well. You think your physical fitness is improving, at least.
Your firebending is not.
You don't know where to turn. There is something wrong with your chakras, you're sure of that much. It's not an inherited problem. You don't lack the emotional foundation for bending; you have anger and will in spades. If the problem is physical, you should be seeing progress -
Unless, of course, Father is having your physicians and masseuses all quietly sabotage you. It's not impossible. How can you really be sure? It could be another test; he could be probing your defenses to see if you're still hopelessly naive. You don't know why he would do it but you know he certainly doesn't have any compunctions about hurting you if he needs to.
How can you be sure?
You're weighing the merits of trying to arrange clandestine visits with a new physician versus finding an obscure Air Nation religion to convert to when someone knocks gently on the bookcase behind you. You jump and twist in your seat to defend yourself -
"Hey, Akane," Mitsuko mumbles. "Sorry. Long time no see."
-----
Sorry it was a short session. I think I was kind of burning myself out doing 10-12 hours of live writing every week; my live sessions might be a bit shorter for now. Sorry! I hope you all enjoy.
Here's the start of Chapter 7: Over the Horizon.
-----
97 AC (15 years old)
Fire Nation Royal Palace: Crown Princess's Chambers
You are Akane, princess of the Fire Nation.
Your father has stripped you of everything but that.
He destroyed your firebending. He forced you to break ties with your brother and uncle. He keeps Azula under such a grueling training regime that you never have a chance to speak with her.
You can hardly even bear to face Mitsuko, now. Even she can't ignore your flaws anymore.
All you have now is your title, but even that is hollow - in retrospect, Father's actions pitting you against your family make the most sense if he's leaning towards Azula as his heir, not you.
He's taken everything from you. Even your face...
...has a pale, small, but visible, burn scar on the cheek. (14)
...is fine. It's fine. It's fine. (8)
...is fine. It's fine. It's fine. (8)
...is flawed.
You're flawed.
Even with makeup, you can tell. People can tell. Everyone can tell. They could always tell. You can't hide it. You can't pretend that you're flawless, that you're not ugly or weak or foolish or gullible or -
Half of you wants to reach into the mirror and strangle the person you see there. That's what Grandfather would have done. The other half of you can't seem to manage to summon up any feeling at all. The scar is there. It's been there. It's just a fact. You can't hide from it. You can't hide from any of them. Not the burn scar on your cheek, not the electric scar on your wrist, not even the ghost of a line across your palm where you gouged your hand on the crown trying to put Grandfather in a chokehold. The flaws are there. They've always been there. You can polish a crown clean, but not skin.
You haven't worn clothes that exposed your arms in two years. What are going to do now, wear a veil? Idiot. Idiot. Your acting doesn't fool anyone, least of all Father.
What is Mitsuko going to think? She always said you had such flawless skin. You don't know how she can look at this without feeling sick, let alone...
But what right do you have to complain? Zuko's scar is worse. Even if you gave him the luxury of being able to hide it.
Father would say that you have only yourself to blame, for both Zuko's scar and your own.
Father's right, but not in the way he thinks. It's your fault for the scars, because you were too weak - too weak to protect your loved ones and too weak to enforce your will. (20)
+Father manipulated you, that is what he does, but you are also to blame for failing to decide, father could be an enemy or an ally, but he would never be our father. Ozai is the fire lord, he could have been an ally, but that is in the past, he is clearly your enemy and you need to deal with him as such. (15)
+You were not only too weak to fight him, but too weak to seek help to cover your weaknesses. (14)
Your weakness is at fault. Father was able to force you into this position only because he was strong enough to do so, and you were to weak to simply kill him. (8)
Father is to blame for the scars. He forced Azula to hurt you and forced you to hurt Zuko. This is his fault. Whatever mistakes you may have made, it's his fault for starting all of this. (5)
This is your fault. Your mistakes caused all of this. You could have stopped it at any point just by giving Father the simple things he asked for. You defied and then provoked him. (2)
+Father manipulated you, that is what he does, but you are also to blame for failing to decide, father could be an enemy or an ally, but he would never be our father. Ozai is the fire lord, he could have been an ally, but that is in the past, he is clearly your enemy and you need to deal with him as such. (15)
+You were not only too weak to fight him, but too weak to seek help to cover your weaknesses. (14)
Your weakness is at fault. Father was able to force you into this position only because he was strong enough to do so, and you were to weak to simply kill him. (8)
Father is to blame for the scars. He forced Azula to hurt you and forced you to hurt Zuko. This is his fault. Whatever mistakes you may have made, it's his fault for starting all of this. (5)
This is your fault. Your mistakes caused all of this. You could have stopped it at any point just by giving Father the simple things he asked for. You defied and then provoked him. (2)
And maybe he's right.
If you had been stronger, none of this would have happened. Father forced you into this because he could. You should have been - needed to be - strong enough that he couldn't force you to do anything. Your will, your firebending, even your political position - if you were stronger in any or all of them, Father couldn't have done anything to you. If you had more power, you could have protected everyone from him. You weren't even strong enough to make allies to aid you.
This is all your fault. Your weakness's fault. If you try to blame anyone else, you're missing the point.
You were weak, so you were scarred. There's nothing more to be said.
Father will always try to manipulate you. It's just what he does. Expecting anything else from him is just another weakness - it's just sentimentality towards family, the same kind he's always warned you about. You suppose you should have paid more attention to that lesson after all.
It's your fault for not recognizing Father as your enemy sooner.
A part of you feels like the realization should cause you more pain. You feel like you should be panicking, or crying, or something like that. You're being more honest with yourself now, aren't you? You're not acting. Knowing how weak you've been lately, you expect yourself to break down blubbering at the idea that maybe your family isn't full of harmless friends. But you don't. The realization comes to you with a numb sort of clarity, just like the realization that you have a scar.
Father is your enemy. Or, at the very least, your rival. He will never allow sentimentality or familial ties to affect how he acts towards you. You're just a tool to him. Nothing more, nothing less. It's your own fault for not acknowledging that sooner.
It's that simple.
Wherever you go from here, you can't afford to forget that again.
* * * * *
97 AC (15 years old)
Zuko and Uncle depart on their assignment to hunt the Avatar soon after the Agni Kai. There's not even much time for him to heal. You're present to see them off, not that either of them acknowledge you. Even Uncle's bearing seems colder. Father got what he wanted.
It's almost funny. To you, the excuse for the Agni Kai barely mattered.. To him, it's probably something he'll never forget.
Father asked both of you your opinions during a war meeting. Zuko criticized the cautious strategy you suggested. You challenged him for his presumption and his carelessness with the war effort. (28)
You explained to Zuko what a horrid wretch of a human being your mother was at times. He did not take it very well. (15)
Literally can't remember what you said. It pissed Zuko off though. (13)
You told Zuko he wasn't training hard enough one day, to provoke him. He retaliated by saying you were obviously falling behind Azula, since your flame wasn't blue. You challenged him to an Agni Kai on the spot. (3)
You explained to Zuko what a horrid wretch of a human being your mother was at times. He did not take it very well. (15)
Literally can't remember what you said. It pissed Zuko off though. (13)
You told Zuko he wasn't training hard enough one day, to provoke him. He retaliated by saying you were obviously falling behind Azula, since your flame wasn't blue. You challenged him to an Agni Kai on the spot. (3)
It was just some discussion of the campaign in the northern Earth Kingdom. General Bujing was advocating for an aggressive approach towards an Earth Kingdom holdout in an excellent defensive position that had successfully bogged down the invasion for months. He believed that the cautious approach and hesitation to directly besiege them was ultimately costing more lives and time than an overwhelming direct assault would.
Father, unusually, asked you and Zuko for your opinions. It was only a day after he had confronted you in your room. It was clear what he intended.
You advocated a cautious approach - it's foolish to waste lives with the comet so near; every soldier spared now will be far more valuable in a few years - and Zuko, predictably, tried to point out every flaw in your reasoning. He wasn't even necessarily wrong about everything he said; he was just too weak to back it up.
Maybe he'll be able to learn his lesson more quickly than you did.
* * * * *
97 AC (15 years old)
Royal Woods
In the privacy of the woods, you do what passes for your training now. The panic and denial have passed in the days since the Agni Kai; indulging in them is a luxury you can't afford. You must face the facts of the situation.
Your fire is gone.
Oh, you can still summon up those low, red flames. It's almost more insulting than if you could manage nothing at all. There's so little heat and force behind them that you would never want to rely on them in a fire duel, and you certainly couldn't punch through stone with them. Your bending is pathetic enough that it wouldn't even be acceptable to Zuko, let alone you or Father or Azula.
But, again, panic is something you can't afford.
You try to approach the issue methodically. First, you look for workarounds, practical combat solutions. Your attempt to generate lightning causes an explosion that nearly injures you; you brush it off and just chalk it up as another failure, force yourself not to dwell on it. It's the worst accident you've ever had while attempting lightning. But, again, you force yourself not to dwell on it. You go through every firebending form you've learned or made up to try to see if any seem to work better. There are no major differences. Even Uncle's precious Dancing Dragon fails to cause any magical improvement in the quality of your flame.
You aren't completely helpless, though; you discover you can at least still control fire in your environment. If you use your firebending to set things around you on fire, you can manipulate those flames for somewhat more effective attacks. When you hold your hand to burning wood, you find that you're still at least capable of protecting yourself from being burned by normal flames. Who knows whether that defense would hold up during a duel, though.
You can still perform the motion for Uncle's little lightning redirection trick, too, for all the good it will do on the front lines. And, actually, practicing the technique does help you discover something that may be significant. As you concentrate on the flow of chi through your body, you find that it feels drastically different than it did when you first learned the technique. Your energy feels heavier, harder to move. When you take time to meditate and study the feeling in detail, you find that your chi feels blocked somehow; the flow is all wrong, like there's something knotted in your pressure points. It's such a solid, clear feeling that you're not even sure whether the blockage is mental or actually something that's physically wrong with you.
Maybe research into chi and pressure points could help you fix your fire. Maybe meditation could help you reignite your flame. Or maybe you should just try to improve your skills with a sword. You can't be sure what's most promising, and you aren't sure how long you have before Father sends you to the front.
Focus on researching chi and pressure points in the Royal Library; you can train anywhere, but you won't have access to books elsewhere. (31)
+Stay in physical shape while studying. (28)
+Ask Lo and Li if they have any ideas on how to fix your chi (18)
Focus on meditation and trying to salvage useful techniques from your bending. (1)
Focus on physical combat. You're extremely fit and coordinated; you should be able to pick up swordfighting without difficulty. (1)
+Stay in physical shape while studying. (28)
+Ask Lo and Li if they have any ideas on how to fix your chi (18)
Focus on meditation and trying to salvage useful techniques from your bending. (1)
Focus on physical combat. You're extremely fit and coordinated; you should be able to pick up swordfighting without difficulty. (1)
* * * * *
97 AC (15 years old)
Royal Library
According to what you can find in the library, the human body has seven significant chakras that chi flows through. The chakras and associated pressure points and pathways allow chi to flow to give strength to the muscles and to bending. It's a concept you're already familiar with, but now you need to find the fine details on how these chakras work - and what can make them malfunction. You skim through the promising-looking texts on the subject in the library. Rapid research is becoming something of a skill of yours.
Unfortunately, there are precious few details to be found.
Ancient spiritual traditions have historically claimed that the functioning of the chakras was governed by whether an individual was living in a spiritually and emotionally 'balanced' way. Modern science disagrees. The current research suggests that inheritance and physical health are the biggest determinants of how well the chakras function. Emotional state does play a role, particularly for benders - the book you're reading makes note that firebenders require focus and anger to galvanize their chi properly. But modern scholars believe that most ailments related to chi can be explained by biological defects, either inherited or acquired. According to the research you're reading, the overemphasis on a very particular idea of 'balanced' spirituality was likely just an ancient superstition that kept the masses mired in stagnancy-inducing cultural norms. The idea was especially prominent in the Air Nation, which is taken as further evidence of its bankruptcy.
You aren't sure what to believe about the Air Nation's ideas. It feels like you can never be sure how trustworthy the Fire Nation's researchers are in their evaluation of other nations. But you doubt it would be practical to try to rediscover a lost Air Nation religion and convert to it in the hopes it would clear your chakras, so you focus on the physical side of things. Acupuncture, certain exercises, and certain forms of massage therapy are believed to enhance the flow of chi through the body. You rapidly incorporate them all into your routine, and keep it up for the next week. Lo and Li help you make the arrangements. If Father notices or cares about what you're doing, he doesn't care enough to interfere.
And... well. You think your physical fitness is improving, at least.
Your firebending is not.
You don't know where to turn. There is something wrong with your chakras, you're sure of that much. It's not an inherited problem. You don't lack the emotional foundation for bending; you have anger and will in spades. If the problem is physical, you should be seeing progress -
Unless, of course, Father is having your physicians and masseuses all quietly sabotage you. It's not impossible. How can you really be sure? It could be another test; he could be probing your defenses to see if you're still hopelessly naive. You don't know why he would do it but you know he certainly doesn't have any compunctions about hurting you if he needs to.
How can you be sure?
You're weighing the merits of trying to arrange clandestine visits with a new physician versus finding an obscure Air Nation religion to convert to when someone knocks gently on the bookcase behind you. You jump and twist in your seat to defend yourself -
"Hey, Akane," Mitsuko mumbles. "Sorry. Long time no see."
-----
Sorry it was a short session. I think I was kind of burning myself out doing 10-12 hours of live writing every week; my live sessions might be a bit shorter for now. Sorry! I hope you all enjoy.
