White Hot Flames (ZukoxOC)

49

        The first scene of the second act opens in the earth kingdom, where Toph is finally intorduced as a six and half foot tall body builder that used echolocation to see by screaming exremely loudly. Against the expectations of the others, Toph was thrilled. Absolutely over the moon.

The play goes through their greatest hits and, although it was overdramatic and awful to listen to, the play was oddly accurate to the events that unfolded in real life. Rezalia watched the events of the cave again, jaw tight and grip on Zuko's had even tighter. She had decided that she hated this play.

Though she did get a good laugh out of "Katara" and "Zuko" flirting. Mostly because of how uncomfortable the two of them were. Aang left after that part and didn't come back.

The play took another break where the majority of the world thought the story ended not more than a month ago. With Azula shooting Aang down in the crystle cave and Rezalia changing sides. Zuko was the first out of the theater. "Should someone go talk to him?" Suki wonders.

"And Aang. He left to get me fire gummies, like, ten minutes ago and I'm still waiting!" Sokka exclaims, crossing his arms.

Katara stands. "I can talk to Aang. Rezalia?"

"No," she replies. "Zuko knows how I see him but that's not going to help him right now. He needs to hear it from someone else."

Toph gets up and stretches her arms above her head. "I can take a crack at it."

Which leaves Rezalia to go get food while Suki sneaks Sokka backstage. Eventually, she figures it's safe to join Toph and Zuko, who appeared to be pouting. "Aw, whatsa matter, Z? Fire flakes?"

He takes some, still pouting. Toph laughs, "Some kid told him that his scar is on the wrong side."

Rezalia bites back a laugh and pats Zuko on the knee. "Alright, well, c'mon. We were supposed to be back a while ago."

Sokka catches them up to speed just in time for them to watch "Katara" and "Aang" profess their sibling love for one another. Suki frowns and leans over to Sokka, who was now sat next to Rezalia. "I thought you said that you saw them kiss?"

"They what?" Rezalia hisses as Zuko leans across her to listen in. Sokka gestures for them to shut up.

"Shut up, I'll tell you later," he promises. Rezalia and Zuko exchange looks and refocus.

Not long after, the play catches up to the present and then continues into the predicted future. "Azula" kills "Zuko" and "Ozai" kills "Aang". The rest of them are implied to have died offstage, which was fun.

When the lights come back up, everyone sits there in silence for a while. Zuko is the one to break the silence. "Well...that play sucked." The others agree and begin to leave. As they exit the theater, Rezalia slips her hand into Zuko's.

"How are you feeling?" she asks.

He lifts their joined hands to kiss the back of her hand. "I'm good. Thank you."

~*~

The next day, Zuko decides to ramp up the training. In the meantime, everyone else drinks wateremelon juice and tans. Zuko lasts about a week before he gets tired of it and, if you asked Rezalia, it was Sokka's beach party that pushed him over the edge. Zuko had walked off to do who knows what, leaving the rest of them to build sculptures out of sand, or surfing, or laying on the sand so that the waves just barely washed over them.

Rezalia turns onto her stomach to watch the other unveil their sand sculptures. Sokka is the next to go, reveailing a clump of sand with various shells and strips of seaweed pressed into it. "Is that a blubbering blob monster?" Aang asks genuinely.