Avatar Zuko

Chapter 8

Zuko awoke with a slight twinge of pain down his right side and a pounding in his head, yet he still felt more well-rested than he had in weeks. In his sleep induced haze he could still blearily make out that he was on the back of Appa, not laying on his usual spot on the saddle, and was surrounded by Aang, Katara and Sokka- all of whom were unaware he'd regained consciousness. The last things the Prince could recall were pirates, then Katara and then… Airbending that he'd purposely done to save these people. Hopefully they hadn't realised that was him.

“Shhh, Katara! He's waking up.” whispered Sokka as loudly as if he were half-shouting. The three all went completely silent and Zuko figured it was time start talking.

“Hey..?” He greeted, trying to push himself up to a sitting position with his arms but Sokka and Katara pushed him back down into a laying position.

“You probably shouldn't have do that, pirates cracked your ribs and I tried to heal them- I can heal with water now by the way- but I'm not sure how well it worked…” Explained Katara quickly, not really surprising Zuko since his uncle had told him many stories of different bending techniques. Some waterbenders could heal, some firebenders had lightning etcetera.

“Well, I'm fine, barely even hurts.” He grunted simply, swatting their hands away and pushing himself up so he was properly looking in the three’s surprisingly worried eyes.

“Okay… But maybe you should still take it easy for a little while-” started Aang before Zuko interrupted.

“I said I'm fine. What's wrong with you people?!” He asked aggressively, before being struck with the realisation that these guys had been away from the war, especially Aang, and had probably not dealt with someone getting injured and not dying. Even in the South Tribe raids, the people had only ever been captured or killed- no wonder the group didn't know how to properly deal with people getting hurt.

“Well I'm so sorry that we didn't want you to break even more ribs, hotshot, next time we'll just leave you for the pirates to deal with. You know, it would have been a lot easier, if I wasn't so muscled and strong then we would have had to leave you anyway- since, for your information, we had to carry you back here.” Replied Sokka angrily, crossing his arms and pouting.

“... Fine… But I swear I'm okay.” Zuko said, much more quietly than before since he did kind of regret being so hostile when these people were trying to help him. “And why didn't you just leave me to the pirates? Saving me just put you all at risk, and you already had all the money and stuff with you.”.

The firebender’s words elicited silence from his companions who were now staring at him intently. Being a little overwhelmed by the attention, Zuko turned his head and looked over at the skyline they were flying over. They were still in the Earth Kingdom and it seemed to be midday, if he had to guess he'd say he'd been unconscious for about a day and a half, so by now they were probably plenty far enough from the pirates.

“Lee, we saved you because we weren't just gonna let you die. We didn't even think of leaving you behind.”Said Aang kindly, and it seemed that the others agreed. Zuko had no idea how they'd managed to sort of trust him enough to save his life in a week and a half where he'd barely done anything to help them except giving them money.

“... Oh…” Was all the Prince could reply before Katara coughed slightly.

“Yes, well, ummm, guys, I think Appa needs a rest and there's a village there so…” She said, gesturing to the sloppy movements Appa was making as he flew over a small Earth Kingdom town.

Aang quickly leapt over to Appa’s head (using airbending, of course) and started steering him down to what seemed to be an empty river. They landed with a bump that would've probably been pretty painful for Zuko had he not been mostly healed by Katara and had he not had such a high pain tolerance at this point. Once the four had landed, they rested for a few moments in the paradise that was being on land and not being attacked, before they heard a large crash like a landslide.