Disclaimer: I don't own Avatar: The Last Airbender.

"She wasn't always evil but she was wild and unprepared for the world. With no one to guide her justly and a crave for her father's approval and mother's affection, she easily became the fiercest among flames and that, was the start of her downfall."

But what is sanity, really? Other than a mere word opposite of craziness. Who gets to decide when you cross the line? Who had the right to lebell her as a lunatic?

Azula knew the answer to that question and she wasn't pleased but her troath had long ago gone sore from yelling and she had long ago lost the will, the strength to fight for something that would never be achieved.

For once, she lost and her foolish older brother won. He had everything now and she remained with nothing but a wounded pride and her fire bending, which amazingly enough, wasn't taken by the Avatar.

That didn't mean that she was free to use it as she wanted, though. The chains around her wrists made sure of that. When they allowed her to bathe and change clothes, which was every day because enemy or not, somewhere deep down she knew Zuko, stupid, soft hearted Zuko still cared; or he at least felt enough pity for her that the luxury she grew-up with was as much a right now as it was before she got imprisoned, her chains would be slightly less painful but not enough.

Tying the laces of her blood red dress, the colour of her nation, she stood in front of the mirror, a habit now, more than anything else. Her vanity and aristocratic upbringing made sure she will never look anything less than perfect, under any circumstances, prisoner in the dungeons of her own palace or not.

Azula didn't bother to look away from her reflextion, proud as she was when the sound of knocking echoed in these four walls that she had grudgingly accepted as her room. Not a prison, not a cell because if she called it like that, then she had truly and completely lost the war.

At Zuko's compassionate demand, the room she had been living in since three years ago was comfortingly similar with her own chambers. Far smaller than the original but from the bed sheets made of silk to what she knew was her old wardrobe everything was the same so Azula could pretend, could live in this illusion where she was not just a mere pathetic shadow of her glorious past self.

She figured, that her stubborness and resolve of steel added to her pleasant surroundings were what kept her sane at the end of the day.

They were far more idiotic than she thought them to be if they believed that she was a basket case.

They would have been done for if that was the situation. You can't hope to have a civil talk with a crazy person, least you want to earn an early grave from that encounter.

"You may enter." she allowed after she managed to braid her hair in it's usual style.

When there was no servant or guard standing in the doorway, Azula didn't allow the shock to show on her face. She rearly had visitors but to have him come from all people... She didn't know if she should laugh at the irony or glare at the one person who destroyed her life.

"To what do I owe the honour, Avatar? Oh, pardon my memory, you'd never come to me for chit chat, would you?" she questioned, attempting a light tone with her eyebrows raised in a mocking manner.

"You made sure of that long ago Azula." came his reply and she couldn't help but take notice of his voice. It sounded...tired, a far cry from the cheerful annoyingly high pitched voice that she remembered.

"Yes, yes, I think both of us can agree that I'm the devil's spawn, if not the devil himself reincarnated..." she paused, amber eyes piercing him with a glare. "Say why you came here Avatar and stop waisting my time. You have finally decided to take the only thing that I have left, no?"

She was not going to beg him not to do it, she was not going to go as low and act as pitful as that even if the thought of the one thing that made her special being taken away was painful.

"I'm not going to take away your firebending."

Her mask of indifference must have cracked and the shock she felt must have showed, because the Avatar continued, unperturbed, as if he was talking about the weather. "I mean it, Azula. In these three years, you could have tried to escape or you could have choked a servant just for fun. You could have spent hours, days, months, forming a master plan to bring me down the second I walked into your chambers."

She decided that she didn't like the way his face was beginning to lighten up or the way he was looking at her, as if she wasn't a lost cause, as if, she wasnt's as evil as everybody thought.

He wasn't looking at her with pity, nor anger and not even hate but with caution and an emotion that she didn't want to identify.

"What makes you think that I'm not waiting for the perfect opportunity to strike?" she taunted, displeased with the fact that he was not afraid of her and no, she didn't think that he was good at acting. The Avatar was a childish fool and his eyes reflected his every emotion. Or at least, they used to because now she wasn't so sure. Maybe he had learned how to lie and play the game.

Yeah, and Zuzu is going to give up the throne in my favour. Azula chuckled, not being able to imagine the Avatar as anything but a child who recieved more power than he could master. Never mind the fact that he had grown in the meantime. His head was as much in the clouds as it had always been.

Must be an airbending trait.

"Hm, now that I think about it, I suppose you might be right. Just because I'm a pretty impatient person that doesn't mean everybody is going to attack head on." he mused out loud, eyes curiously looking around the room.

The fire princess rolled her eyes, getting more annoyed with his presence by the minute. "If you didn't come to take my bending away, then why are you here Avatar?"

To torture me with your stupid idle chatter?

Her slightly irritated voice surprised him because up until the news spread out that she had fallen deep into madness, Aang wasn't able to imagine her as anything but calm and composed and even then, it was still hard for him to picture Azula as soomeone volatile and ruled by emotions, negative ones or not.

Truthfully, he had expected some insults and more yelling, some violent reactions but this could be almost classified as a civil conversation. Not for the first time, he couldn't help but wonder if the royal medics had lied about her condition out of sheer spite.

She didn't look crazy to him, angry and annoyed, sure but that was to be expected.

"I was thinking that it must have gotten boring for you around here, having nobody to talk to."

Azula couldn't help but huff in bewilderment. She knew the Avatar was stupid, she just didn't know his idiocy was that vast.

"I think spending so much time with that peasant girl is finally showing. You are an idiot on your own Avatar, you didn't need the extra help."

Not only was his suggestion stupid but it was beyond her understanding how could someone, him, no less, wilingly keep her company.

Could he be...drunk?

Azula was far from being an idealistic shunned and protected from the world girl. She had spent enough time with soldiers and men from her father's council to know of alcohol and other vices and while she couldn't imagine him doing that sort of "scandalous" thing, she wasn't going to cross out the possibility just yet. Men were men, after all; even if the man in question was more of a child in spirit than anyone she had ever met.

And there come the insults. thought Aang, a bit disappointed before he went back to being his usual self. Azula will have to do better than that if she wanted to upset him.

"She has a name, you know. Katara, and for a peasant, as you said, she had defeated you in combat."

He knew he was playing with fire but taking risks was what got things done at the end of the day.

However, when he spotted the hate and shame in her amber eyes, Aang swore that never before had he felt more like a fool than he did in that moment. Guilt was a horrible feeling, one he had never expected to feel for an enemy.

Azula couldn't detect any sign of malice when he said the cursed words but that didn't slow down their impact. The last thing she wanted was to think about her lowest point in life.

Losing was not something that she took lightly and it was certainly not something that she could forget about. She vowed, one too many times that if she ever escaped...well, let's just say that water tribe peasant better have her prayers done with when she came for her revenge.

"Get out of my sight." she said through gritted teeth, turning to face the window and let him look at her back. He didn't deserve her attention anymore. Actually, he never did to begin with so why had she stood and listened to his nonsense and foolish babbling?

Aang let his hands fall limp at his sides and sighed. "I didn't meant it in that way..."

She wasn't going to let him finish though. Someone who came into her chambers to further twist in a knife in old wounds, who made her remember what a disgrace she was, didn't deserve the courtesy of explaining themselves.

"Do not test me Avatar. Leave, before I consider the million of ways that I could take you down without using my bending."

Her threats aside, Azula knew that he didn't leave because of fear that she could keep true to her word. It was something different, akin to respect. Something foreign that she hadn't recieved in a long time.

Neverthless, it didn't matter because now, more than ever, her old sense of ambition had returned and if the Fire Nation will be turned upside down, people will have the Avatar to thank for doing the opposite of restoring balance to the world.

Azula opened her wardrobe and touched the material of her most prized armour. She had always known, somewhere deep down that her reign will start with chaos. She just didn't know that the Avatar would be the catalyst of it.

A/N: Well, this is my first time writting Azula. Actually, this is my first Avatar: The Last Airbender fanfic. I hope I did some justice to her and Aang. I'm still debating if I should end this as a one shot.