Kindred: Love & War

Prologue

We Shall Overcome

It had been forty-six days since Zuko had left for his self imposed exile. Azula had believed nothing could be worse than learning her Uncle's plans for that Water Tribe slut, but that day had been so hard to bear. When she had been sent away to the Academy, no chance had been allowed for farewells and she had hated her parents' for that. This time though as they caught their last sights of one another, she had been forced to a show him the mask she wore for the rest of the world as his ship receded into the ocean.

Compared to the years apart during her training at the Academy this paltry span was nothing. Yet at the academy she had known patience would be rewarded, that eventually her life would lead her back to the only real family she had. It had been that certainty which had allowed her to keep going.

There had been other distractions of course, the Academy was not for the faint of heart. The girls were often left to their own devices and a pecking order was encouraged, the teachers believed intense competition helped build character. At her father's request special pressure had been placed on her, ruling the school was just another one of his tests for her. Taking a pair of non benders under her wing she had done just that and outshined many of her teachers by the time she was released to return to the Court.

She thought of her brother, standing atop the bridge of his ship, relentlessly scouring the horizon for signs of his quarry. Unbidden dozens of possible disasters sprang to mind. His ship striking an enemy mine, or set upon by Water Tribe raiders. Suppose his search of the continent lead him into the path of the Mad King or the Blind Bandit, could he stand against the two most infamous Earth benders? Suppose a storm-

Azula shook her head, her brother would not die so easily. He would stay alive and follow the wild goose-tortoise chase Uncle Iroh had set him on. Meanwhile it fell to her to get him back. Father viewed Zuko as weak and ineffectual, in truth he was as brilliant and fierce as a summer wildfire. For all that though she had little hope he would be able to find a man that had eluded the combined efforts of the Fire Nation for a century.

The word of the Fire Lord was law in the Fire Nation, only another Fire Lord could undo the will of another. Her father had always taught her to seize what she desired, had it ever occurred to him that his throne would fall into that category? Azula would take his throne and either crown herself and recall Zuko, or have him summoned to take the throne himself, it would make no difference either way. All that mattered was that they be together.

Today was the day her destiny would begin to unfold. Her father had placed himself among her enemies, and she was going to destroy him like any other obstacle.

Three Months Later

The city of Azulon spread out under the moonlight. Majestic crimson spires, decorated with golden patterns loomed over the cityscape. The city spread out below in a series of grided streets, gracefully curved avenues, and squares of varying sizes. The beauty unique to a planned city.

Azulon was named for the late Fire Lord, he had not conquered it, but it had grown prosperous under his reign. A hundred years ago a modest Earth Kingdom port named Devo had occupied this land, that town had been annihilated during the initial campaigns of the war. What had risen from the ashes was a military base and shantytown to accommodate the forces operating in the region. Then Crown Prince Azulon had used this dilapidated metropolis as a staging ground and was frustrated by its poor infrastructure. Thus under his reign as Fire Lord, the area had been radically redeveloped.

For all intents and purposes what had risen from the mud was the manifestation of Fire Lord Sozin's ambitions, a Fire Nation City erected on Earth Kingdom territory. The city and its province was the poster child for the colonial program, Fire Nationals made up more than ninety percent of the populace, the remainder being slaves from the Earth Kingdom. The culture, food, and even the climate made it seem like one of the home isles had collided with the continent.

This was the last place in the colonies that trouble could start. Which made it either a humiliating posting or a wonderful one depending on your perspective. These last years the garrisoning of Azulon and its colonial province had fallen to the Third Army, and they chafed under it.

The Third Army had first made a name for itself in the early days of the war, suffering a string of defeats against the forces of the Earth King. It had taken the personal intervention of Fire Lord Sozin to salvage the situation with the Battle of Han Tui. Under their monarch's command the Third Army had redeemed itself, reversing its earlier set backs.. Crown Prince Azulon had later commanded them as General of the Third Army and they had spearheaded the conquest of the Hu Xin Provinces, and stunnigly triumphed over an Earth Kingdom army three times larger than their own at the Battle of Garsai. In light of this the Third Army became famous as the Royal Army, feared by the enemy, revered by the Fire Nation.

It had come as no surprise when Crown Prince Iroh received his generalship, it was over the Third Army. Under the Dragon of the West the Third Army once again covered itself in laurels. In recognition of their great general they even changed their styling from the Royal Army to the Dragon Army.

Sadly their star had fallen along with their last great commander. Though by all accounts they fought valiantly against the defenses of Ba Sing Se and achieved an unprecedented breach of the Outer Wall, they were decried by Fire Lord Ozai as failures. Stripped of their honors for having failed to capture the enemy capital and ending the war, they had been withdrawn from the front and turned into what amounted to a constabulary for the Azulon Province.

Azula shifted her gaze from the cityscape to focus on the garrisons. This was where she would begin. This city and this army would be the seeds that would grow into her father's ruin.

Her spies had already combed the ranks, and her father was far from popular. It was not surprising, her research had shown Ozai had a number of enemies in the Fire Nation, the army and to a lesser extent navy where hot beds of discontent. The officer class was nothing if not conservative and her Father's ascension had flouted tradition.

The recent tradition of a Fire lord serving in the army had been ignored by her father. Though Ozai had never been defeated in Agni Kai the only military action he had ever undertaken was the Second Battle of the Comet. Not only had he granted favor to the upstart Sky Fleet, but he had failed to display valor. The Sky Fleet was despised as a pack of cowards by the Army and Navy, reigning down death on enemies that could not reach you, it was insulting to those who faced their enemies on land and sea in mortal combat.

Not to mention that he was seen to have squandered the advantages they had held that day. Infuriated over the retaking of Omashu(1) by King Bumi he had ordered a large force of Firebenders to take the city, only for the mad man to collapse the entire city around the attackers. Her father's use of excessive force had resulted in excessive casualties, and recaptured a pile of rubble for the Fire Nation. Elsewhere his orders had been for a general advance, calling for his troops to carry all before them. While territory had been captured the Earthbenders had retreated and formed new lines once the comet passed. A few concentrated strikes would have delivered much greater gains of strategic value, but the Fire Lord had insisted that with the Comet victory was assured.

Finally there was Ba Sing Se(2). Ozai had flown over the walls that had defeated his brother and burned the greatest city in the world to ash, along with all those inside. Even Fire Nationals were terrified at this, after all these had not been soldiers, just enemy civilians. Atrocities happened in war, that was accepted and taken in stride, but the scae of the massacre was unprecedented(3)? Worse the city had held great wealth and economic potential. The population of Ba Sing Se alone could have meet much of the Fire Nations slave quota. All of that wealth reduced to worthless ash. Since then Earth Kingdom forces would sooner die than surrender, the entire city was now a martyr for them and rebels to rally behind.

And despite her father declaring the war over, it most certainly was not. The Earth Kingdom still endured in the South, ruled by the Earth King and his government. It had not taken genius to know what the Comet would bring, so the government, treasury, and most of the military had been long gone when the Sky Fleet arrived. The Kingdom also had high morale with heroes like Mad King Bumi and the Blind Bandit in their ranks. That was not even mentioning the support they received from the Water Tribe.

On top of her father's military incompetence, many viewed him as a usurper. When a Fire Lord died the eldest of their children to possess firebending would inherit the throne, that was the law of Agni. It was legal for a younger sibling or a cousin to challenge the claimant for the throne with an Agni Kai. In fact many a weak elder brother or sister had lost their lives to more able relatives in the name of the throne. Ozai had ascended to the throne despite being the younger brother, and he had not bested Iroh in Agni Kai, this was unheard of. Some would even call it heresy, claiming that the poor progress of the war since then has been a sign of Agni's displeasure.

These sentiments abounded in the Third Army as no where else. To them Ozai had humiliated them and cheated their great leader out of his birthright, a usurper and a coward was how they viewed him. When she requested to command in the war her father had been eager to grant her request. She was tainted, no longer his ideal heir. He would be thrilled to have her die in battle paving the way for his next child. Perhaps he would even arrange an accident in the confusio of the battlefield.

When you got past how very low he was willing to sink in obtaining his goals, Fire Lord Ozai turned out to be quite predictable. She had brought Mai as her adjutant and Ty Lee as a companion, the three of them would best any assassin her father could send, including the elite fire benders her father had sent as bodyguards. Her father only saw the Third Army as spent force, but Azula was confident that she would turn the Dragon Army into the finest force in the military. They would think of her as the Dragon of West's niece rather than the Fire Lord's daughter as she lead them to a final victory over the Earth Kingdom. They would love her as they had loved uncle Iroh, and respected Grandfather. They would follow her across the sea to topple the Fire Lord in the name of General Azula, and to avenge their own tarnished honor.

"The near before the far," she reminded herself. It would take years of work to reach her goal, but she could wait. After all what she did was for the sake of love, and the bards said that love conquered all.

Footnotes:

1.Since Azula never visits Omashu it is never christened New Ozai.

2.Since Azula never performs a coup Ozai goes with his original plan of destroying Ba Sing Se. At this point he still believed that military victories would break the will of the Earthbenders, ergo he does not try and burn down the continent.

3. The Air Nomad Genocide was numerically smaller(though proprtionally greater), but mainly this had less of an impact because Sozin was smart enough to distort the reality of the situation to his subjects. The average Fire National was lead to view it as a battle with the Airbenders refusing to surrender. Ozai was too proud of his achievement to sugarcoat the bloody details, making the mistake of taking himself as the measure of his people.