Azula sat alone staring at web of scars. They lined her arms and her legs. Some splayed themselves across her belly, and they only seemed to be duplicating. She was twitchy and agitated for a plethora of reasons that were stacking up at a rate that matched her scar count. She retrieved the bottle from her dresser and finished the last of its contents. She found herself absently tracing her thumb along the marks. Each one bore a different tale; each story as troubled as the next and never coming to a happy ending. Never ending at all in fact.

Never ending at all. She grimaced.

She just wanted it to stop. For the hurt and the anguish to fall away.

It didn't matter how so long as the torment ceased.

But no matter how hard she tried, she couldn't get it to end. It seemed to her, that the more effort she put into clawing herself back to some semblance of normalcy, back to who she used to be, the further away from her old self she got. She dropped herself onto the mattress and shifted her gaze from her ravaged arms to the ceiling. They—the doctors, Iroh, Zuko—said…no, promised that the further she strayed from her old self, the better off she would be. That she was in critical need of serious introspection. They were so firm in their insistence that she needed to change. But how fast they had turned away when they saw how she changed.

When they spoke of this change—this wonderful metamorphosis, they only accounted for the progressive sort. It hadn't crossed their minds that she could transform in a different, more horrible way. She supposed that they already saw her as someone of the worst sort and didn't see how it was possible for her to grow more so.

Oh, but they didn't know. There was an assortment of ways for her to change for the worst and she'd found nearly all of them.

Azula was still the same unpleasant person she always had been. The unlikeable woman, they pushed to change. Yes, she was very much the same, and yet she had changed, very much so. She was simply a different brand of awful. She had become absolutely deplorable. Perhaps that's why people had stop coming up to check on her. Not for the first time, Azula considered that they made a mistake in caving to her demands. If they would have ignored her fits and rages she would still be locked away and safe in the institution that she loathed so much. No, they freed her and they left her to her own devices where she could destroy herself even more than she had already. She had become a lost cause and stealing glances into the palace garden only reminded her of such.

The day was warm and sunny and Zuko had an expression to match it. How could he not? He was the Fire Lord, his bending was improving tenfold, he had his mother, and he was surrounded by his friends—two of which he'd stolen from her.

And she wasn't there to impede and ruin.

The sound of their laughter didn't carry into her room, but she could hear in anyways. The avatar was always especially chipper. He and TyLee both—between the two of them one would think that nothing was wrong in the world. Azula knew that she would never have that, she wouldn't even be able to attain the slight and soft smile that Katara wore so often.

One of these days she'd be able to bring herself to close the curtains.

.oOo.

Sokka held the paintbrush firmly between his fingers. This time, he would get it right. If he couldn't be a bender then he would master painting. Pushing his tongue out slightly in concentration he completed the final brush stroke.

He took a step back to assess his work and groaned. The landscape looked well enough but Zuko's position was all off and Mai was taller than one of the few trees. It didn't help that they had all been moving. The only person he managed to draw well was his sister, who was—and continued to be—sitting relatively still.

"What's wrong Sokka?" She inquired.

"I can't bend and I suck at painting." He grumbled.

"Let me see it." Katara grinned.

"Oh no." Sokka snatched up his newly finished artwork. "No way."

"Oh, come on, it can't be that awful." Katara rolled her eyes.

"Trust me it is." But he revealed his art regardless, making a point of covering the portion that Mai took up. He wasn't quite ready for Katara to tease him about how awful his perspective was, especially since she was the one who warned him to put care into that aspect in the first place.

"It isn't so bad. You painted an extra finger on Toph though." She chuckled.

Sokka's face went red. "That's not true!" He sputtered. "Let me see." He hastily took his painting back and scanned it for Toph. Katara's swelling giggles alerted him that he'd fallen for it. He was no master artist, but he certainly didn't give Toph a sixth finger. He set the portrait aside, having enough of art for one day. The painting had served its point; it took his mind off of things for a little while. But no distraction ever seemed long enough. With the painting finished he had time to look at it. The longer he looked at it the more apparent it became that there was something missing.

Someone.

All at once he hated the damn thing and how painfully it ended up reminding him that Suki wasn't there. He unfolded the very first group portrait he'd tried to draw. They were all there in the Jasmine Dragon, each doing their own things, the comet freshly behind them. It was an atrocious drawing, but he liked it much more than any of his newer ones. He crumpled up the new painting and hurled it into the pond with a frustrated groan. He flopped onto his back, balled his fists, and held them over his eyes, earning himself a choir of concerned stares.

He couldn't do this again.

He couldn't let himself lose control.

Katara didn't need to see him fall again.

.oOo.

Azula wasn't sure how long she had been staring at the ceiling for, but she knew she ought to stop. She knew she ought to leave her room, to leave her bed, to do anything really. But there were only two…maybe three things she wanted to do. None of which were beneficial in any way. And she wouldn't even have to leave her bed to do any of them.

She forced herself to sit up, her hair coming to fall over her face, with three days' worth of knots and tangles. She rubbed her puffy, tired eyes, supposing it would do her well to get dressed. It's been a while since she'd done that, and yet—despite all intentions of doing so—she still couldn't seem to pull herself out of bed to do it. But she could always find the energy to pour another glass or light another cigarette. Agni forbid she do anything else. Even as she chastised herself for it, she reached over for another cigarette and lit it. The only thing she ever seemed to use her bending for these days.

Indeed, she was damaged and know one knew just how much nor in what way.