fanwright:

Word: Dream

---

She awoke to the sun in her
eyes speckled by shadows, the smell of charred bamboo heavy in the air.

Her head throbbed, her body
ached with pain, and her mouth was sticky with blood. The world was a chaotic daze,
shapes losing their form, colors blurred from one to the next, sounds of
ringing in her ears.

Fear jolted through Azula.
She couldn’t comprehend what she was seeing and she struggled to regain a
measure of herself.

As she tried to sit up with
her elbows, rasping for air, she coughed up blood instead, the pain irritating
her throat.

“Whoa, hey,” came a voice, a
shadow blotting out the stifling sun. “Easy now, lets not get excited.”

A firm yet gentle hand urged
her back down. She blinked away the haze and, slowly, she saw the boy with healing
scar across his face.

“…You… Sokka,” Azula grunted, a
sudden jolt of pain spreading through her as his hands pressed a salve to her
burns. “Not s’pposed… t’have a scar…”

“What?”

Her head rolled slowly to
her side, the charred body of her former sister baking in the sun beside her,
vision blurred by her tears.

“S’not… not a dream then…”

---

And so we come to the 7th and final Saturday for this set. Thanks everyone for taking up this challenge with us! I’ve been honored to take part in this with you and I hope you all had fun. Its been a great time.

Bonus drabbles are up in FF if you want to see them – a “7th Saturday” gift.

Again thank you @seyaryminamoto @focusas @thingsareswinging @clarielparke @purpleplatypusbear21 @otpruinedmylife and @poof-tylee, as well as to all our writers who are exclusively on FF. You make this small community proud.

fanwright:

Word: Question

Word Count: 205

---

The dawn was red and the fog
weaved through the bamboo stalks like a rushing stream.

Her breath was ragged and
sweat clung to her face behind her splintered mask. She caught her breath,
daggers of blue fire reignited in her fists.

“Have you forgotten your
oath, Mèimei?” Zirin asked, hunched across from her. “The one you forced us to take, when you needed us for your little plot?”

Azula was silent, her gaze
fixed on her opponent.

“’A sister shall not harm or
abandon another sister. Heaven and Earth bear witness and strike dead anyone
who breaks this oath.’”

Zirin clutched her charred
mask and threw it to the ground. Her face was bruised, blood staining her
teeth, fury flickering in her eyes.

“You let Ming die at the hands of those New Ozai holdouts!
And for what!? Because saving that boy
from them was more important!?”

Grass crunched beneath
Azula’s feet as she took a stance, the morning heat rising.

Her voice was grim. “You turned on me for that. You tried to kill him and
me. You dared to defy my orders.”

Zirin’s hands ignited with
fire, trembling with rage as she broke into a sprint.

“You monster! I’ll kill you!”

---

A/N:

The oath Zirin mentions is attributed to an oath sworn by the three main characters in a martial arts movie called “The Warlords”, starring Jet Li, which takes place during the time of the Taiping Rebellion. Personal favorite of mine.

fanwright:

Two versions made. First one posted on FF. Will post second one as bonus content.

Word: Muse

---

That night, when the dew
caught the moonlight dappling the jungle canopy, he played a song with a bamboo
flute.  

Foolish risk. The tune
carried through the leaves and rode on the breeze. Anyone could’ve heard it,
but through that night, as Azula listened from among the shadows, no one dared
to come.

She wished someone had. It
would’ve been a welcomed distraction.

His song was practiced,
passed down, each note like a mournful howl echoing through the night, rising
to the moon.

It stirred something in her
as her eyes slid shut, lost in its melody.

She sighed against her mask,
the past rushing back into her. She remembered the war, the madness that
consumed her, images of her mother plaguing her mind.

That woman and her lies were
as cold and distant as the moon. Azula wanted it that way. She would embrace
the darkness that she knew had long been apart of her life. She would relish
being the monster in the night.

And, yet, his song strummed
at the pain that still lingered within her.

For a fleeting moment,
removing her mask, Azula cupped her face in her trembling, bloody hands and
imagined his embrace.

---

Azula had never been fond of
blades.

Through her toil, tears, and
fury, she had forged herself into a living weapon. There was no use for a piece
of sharpened steel when all she needed was fire.

Zuko had a fondness for
them. He was given one when she was given garbage.
He pestered and whined, begging to be
taught by the best, befitting one given the best.

He was never the best.

Mai had a fondness for them
too. It grew over time into a skill born from boredom. She made herself into an
accomplished nuisance through knives. A treacherous
and selfish nobleman’s daughter
rebelling against the world through cuts in the wall.

She was utterly pathetic.

The peasant with the black
sword… Sokka.

He was cut and bruised, mud and
sweat staining his tunic as he fought his last opponent among the burning
bamboo stalks. He was possessed with a furious desire to live, charging through
the smoke and ambers.

A single cut. Blood dappled
his face. The fire-bender fell.

Azula tilted her head, a
smile slowly touching her lips behind her mask. She never knew killing a man
with a blade could be so captivating.

---

A/N:

The song for the first drabble I had in mind was “Home Wind” by John August.

fanwright:

Here’s another extra drabble that didn’t make the cut for today. Hope you enjoy.

Entry: Scar

---

At least he could thank the
Universe for bestowing him with the
grizzly battle souvenir he always wanted. It was, however, in a bad place and
it was a lot more agonizing than he
thought it would be to stitch it up.

“Can you, maybe, uh, not poke my nose with that?” Sokka
winced, eyes half lidded as he held back tears of pain.

The needle passed through
his skin and he felt a sharp pang as the string tightened, making him grit his
teeth.

“The cut runs through the
middle of your face,” Azula stated, sitting across from him, her steely gaze
focused on her task. “Be thankful you still have a nose to breathe out of.”

She had the air of a girl
possessed with thoughts of murder. Sokka tried not to let that get to him.

“You’re mad at me,” he managed
to utter as he felt the needle prick the skin near the cut.

“Livid, actually,” Azula said sharply. “Any closer and you would not
have a head.”

For a time Sokka didn’t
speak, sitting quietly as Azula continued to stitch his wound, trying to find
the right words.

“…Thank you. I… appreciate what you’re doing,” he finally
said.

“Hmph. You better be.”

---

@seyaryminamoto @purpleplatypusbear21 @clarielparke @otpruinedmylife @poof-tylee – for your viewing pleasure.

fanwright:

Word: Scar

---

The cut was fresh and deep,
running like a red chasm down his face.

Before the rains came she
had watched him in pain, the creek stained a murky red, his face the very
picture of agony as he came up for air, washing the cut.

He bit down on a scrap of
wood as he rubbed a green, viscous salve over it, choking down tears.

He slept in the shade now,
under a thick canopy of rain sodden leaves, sword at his side.

She watched the faint rise
and fall of his chest. Thunder boomed through the trees, but he didn’t stir.
Her finger tapped against her thumb incessantly.

“Gonna leave a nasty scar. That’s
what he gets for ambushing holdouts,” Zirin muttered.

“He beat ‘em all though,”
Ming added.

“Those New Ozai grunts were never good fighters,” Zirin spat.

She turned her masked face
toward Azula, her hand gripping her arm, pleading.

“This has nothing to do with us anymore. Let’s just
leave. If they kill him, so what? He’s not trying to find us any-“

“Shut up,” Azula hissed, tearing her arm away from Zirin. “Not another word. The remnants of the New
Ozai Society have outlived their usefulness. Time to fix our mistake.”

They slipped away into the
jungle, the air cold as the rain pattered hard against the leaves.

---

Thanks for reading and hope to see you all next Saturday!