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Post by ®Hawkpath® on Nov 9, 2021 3:07:57 GMT -5
It didn’t take more than a moment for someone to join Sal. He stopped as the kid appeared, eyes wide as he took him in…he was clearly terrified, but it was also clearly because of something in his world, not here. He didn’t recognize him for a moment, just hesitated, unsure how to react. And then he got a better look at his face, and he realized. “Zuko?” He asked, his voice soft enough that it was possible he wouldn’t even be heard.
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Transgender
strider
No mourners, no funerals
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Post by strider on Nov 9, 2021 3:15:54 GMT -5
Zuko tensed at the sound of his name, his eyes widening as he looked up at the boy who had spoken it. He didn’t recognize him, but he had been in the House before. He had been fairly convinced then that it was the Spirit World, and after what had been happening in his world… he shuddered against the thought, one hand moving up to quickly wipe away his tears before Sal could see them. Well… it was probably too late for that, but before he could comment on them. “Who are you?” Zuko asked, crossing his arms and trying to cover himself as best as possible. He tried to sound strong and defensive, but his voice came out high, shaky, and scared. “How do you know me?”
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Post by ®Hawkpath® on Nov 9, 2021 3:34:08 GMT -5
Sal hesitated, looking into the younger version of his friend. The younger version that hadn’t even gotten his scar, yet. The way he curled on the carpet made it clear he was terrified, but Sal had no way of even beginning to guess what was happening to him. He just knew it was bad. “Take it easy. You’re safe for now. Do you, uh…have you ever been here before?” He asked, trying to stay far enough back that Zuko wouldn’t see him as a threat. For both their sakes. He didn’t want to scare Zuko, and he didn’t want to get burned.
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Post by ®Hawkpath® on Nov 9, 2021 3:50:26 GMT -5
Sal blinked, hesitating at the unfamiliar name. Something from Zuko’s world, maybe? Hit would make sense for him to think that, as a kid. Especially if he hadn’t met many people. “It’s actually the Paradox House,” he answered, trying to keep his voice light. Whatever was happening, there was nothing he could do about it here. There was nothing he could do about it at all, actually. “What? No, no you’re not dead,” he added, eyes widening a little. “Are people in the Spirit World dead?”
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Post by ®Hawkpath® on Nov 9, 2021 15:53:14 GMT -5
Sal could tell how uncomfortable Zuko was. He wished he had a coat or something…he didn’t really wear layers, but blinking in had made him think it might be a good idea to start, if only so he had something to offer if someone needed it. But that would mean having to wear a coat at all times, because blinking was so unpredictable… He shook his head focusing. That wasn’t his biggest worry at the moment. He felt a stab go through him at the words, and looked away. It was something he couldn’t offer. Actually, he couldn’t think of anything he could really offer. “I wish you could, but…I don’t really control anything here. I just got pulled in like you did,” he told him, and then hesitated again. “Hey, uh…here.” Taking off his shirt wasn’t easy. It wasn’t as though Sal had a lot of practice with it, either, since he usually took the two off at the same time. But he managed it, and handed it to Zuko.
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Transgender
strider
No mourners, no funerals
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Post by strider on Nov 9, 2021 16:41:09 GMT -5
Zuko looked down, brows furrowing into a half-formed mimic of the angry expression he would regularly wear in the coming years. He was angry. He hated seeming this vulnerable in front of a stranger, especially when there wasn’t anything a stranger could really do. The stranger couldn’t keep him here. He couldn’t turn back time so Zuko would never have upset his father. He should have just listened to Iroh… Zuko’s gaze snapped up and he wiped away more stubborn tears, eyes wide as he looked at the sweater. He… hadn’t been expecting that. He wasn’t sure what he was expecting, to tell the truth. Maybe he’d feared the stranger would mock him. “T…thanks,” Zuko murmured, pulling the sweater over his ponytail. The bracer on his arm caught on the weave of the sweater for a moment, but he managed to pull it through. It was big on him, but he didn’t seem to mind. “It’s… colder here than it was at the duel.” That wasn’t the full reason he’d been uncomfortable, but it was explanation enough.
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Post by ®Hawkpath® on Nov 9, 2021 19:47:34 GMT -5
Sal could see the anger settling in this younger version of his friend. It hadn’t grown to the heat he knew it would, yet, but he could see where it had come from, where it had settled. He couldn’t protect him, not from his own world. Whatever he was going through there, he would have to survive it on his own. Sal knew he would. He had to, because he was still alive in the future. But that didn’t mean it was going to be easy. “Duel?” He asked carefully as he leaned back, trying to look as much at ease as he could, mostly so Zuko would feel like he could do the same. “What’s happening?”
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Transgender
strider
No mourners, no funerals
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Post by strider on Nov 9, 2021 20:40:00 GMT -5
Zuko looked up at Sal, half in shock that the older boy didn’t know, half glad he didn’t. It seemed like everyone in every world was aware of what had happened. Was aware that Zuko had disrespected a general who should have known better than to sacrifice innocent lives. That Zuko had disrespected his father by speaking out of turn in his father’s war room. His shoulders hunched as the realization hit him for the first time. It wasn’t just the general he had disrespected. It was his father. What was happening wasn’t unfair, no matter how terrifying it seemed in the moment. Zuko was caught in an impossible position. If he fought his father, he would lose. He might die. If he fought his father, he would be showing him disrespect. If he refused to fight, he would be a coward. He had made his choice, and all he could see was the flames arching towards him. He had felt the heat of them in the moment before he had blinked in. “I… I spoke out of turn,” Zuko replied quietly, pulling the sweater sleeves over his hands to create sweater paws. It almost seemed big enough to engulf him, though whether that was because of how small he felt or how much smaller he actually was was anybody’s guess. “I disrespected my nation. And my father.”
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Post by ®Hawkpath® on Nov 9, 2021 20:55:13 GMT -5
Sal didn’t know a lot about Zuko’s past. He knew he had been banished, obviously. He knew he was after the Avatar, and he could go home when he caught him. But he didn’t really know too many of the details. He hadn’t pried, and Zuko hadn’t volunteered. But here…he was suddenly struck by the fact that Zuko looked around the age he said he’d been when he was banished. It couldn’t be happening now, could it? But why else would the House do this? “So…you’re in a duel, now?” He asked carefully, keeping his voice soft. He didn’t know if he should ask. It seemed like maybe he shouldn’t, if knowing wouldn’t make him able to help. But it was Zuko. “It’s your dad. Isn’t it?” He added, voice softer. He had no way of knowing that, but…he had a feeling he wasn’t wrong.
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Transgender
strider
No mourners, no funerals
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Post by strider on Nov 9, 2021 21:00:19 GMT -5
Zuko looked away, the truth of the words shining in his golden eyes. He didn’t want to say it. He didn’t want to pretend he was afraid. “I didn’t want to fight him,” he managed, his voice smaller than he ever allowed it after. “I thought… I thought I was going to fight the general I insulted. He… I wasn’t afraid of him. I could’ve fought him, it would have been fine, I didn’t… I didn’t know…” he curled in on himself, not entirely certain why he was sharing so much with this stranger. It was just… he seemed nice. And he seemed to care. And Zuko had done his best to seem like he wasn’t scared when he had spoken to Iroh, but Iroh hadn’t known the truth of the situation either. “I didn’t mean to… I tried to beg for forgiveness…” the tears came again, though Zuko thought better of brushing them aside with a sweater that wasn’t even his. “Sorry,” he managed, shoulders hunching.
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Post by ®Hawkpath® on Nov 9, 2021 21:10:00 GMT -5
Sal rarely got angry. It wasn’t that he didn’t feel things as strongly as Zuko did, it was just that it didn’t tend to show itself through the same fury Zuko had. But here, he could understand it. Here, with the kid version of Zuko in front of him, huddled and scared and trying to sound brave, he couldn’t help being angry, because someone was causing this. Someone was making it happen, and not even because he needed to. Sal had the terrible feeling he knew where the scar had come from. “Listen, Zuko, I…” he hesitated. He wasn’t sure why Zuko would care what a stranger in a world he didn’t even understand said. But he knew the older Zuko. And now, knowing this… “This isn’t your fault. Okay? It’s…it’s gonna be really scary. And it’s probably going to hurt, and you’re going to have to be brave, but it’s not your fault that it’s happening.”
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Transgender
strider
No mourners, no funerals
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Post by strider on Nov 9, 2021 22:11:10 GMT -5
Zuko looked over at Sal, eyes wide as he took in what the older boy was saying. It was nice, but it wasn’t true. He breathed out, then shook his head vigorously. “I shouldn’t have disrespected them. If I had just… kept my mouth shut, it wouldn’t be an issue.” He bit his lip, wishing he could stop his tears from sprouting at his eyes. He didn’t want to deal with this. He didn’t want to go back, he didn’t want his father’s flames to touch his eye. He shuddered, half wanting to press close to Sal. He was the prince. He couldn’t afford to show any weakness at all. “I’m not scared,” Zuko said after a long moment, though it was a lie. He was trying to pretend like everything was going to be okay. “I…” he couldn’t force another lie through his lips. “I’m brave,” he added, which wasn’t exactly a lie.
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Post by ®Hawkpath® on Nov 9, 2021 22:57:00 GMT -5
Sal couldn’t undo what Zuko had been through. What he was going through now. He knew Zuko wouldn’t believe it…he knew he might not even remember it. There was no way he could, was there? He clearly hadn’t remembered when he and Sal had met. But was it so wrong to try? To hope that maybe it would stick in Zuko’s subconscious, even if he never knew? “Hell yeah, you’re brave,” he told him after a moment. He didn’t contradict him about not being scared. “I know you are. But you have to try not to forget. It…might be easy to forget.”
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Post by ®Hawkpath® on Nov 9, 2021 23:09:40 GMT -5
Sal waited, though anything Zuko wanted wasn’t going to be something he could give. He could try to comfort him, but… But anything he said was just going to be forgotten in the pain as soon as Zuko blinked out. It was much harder to comfort someone when it hadn’t happened yet. He stood up as Zuko did, but it took him a second to realize what he was doing. “Zuko, wait!” he said, his voice strained. “I don’t think…I don’t think that’s a good idea right now.”
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Post by ®Hawkpath® on Nov 9, 2021 23:23:57 GMT -5
Sal shook his head, but he didn’t contradict him. He was right. Sal couldn’t tell him what to do. Not because he was the prince - Sal had done the opposite of what Zuko said more than once, in this kid’s future - but because the only way he could was to block the door, and even if he’d been fine with that, Zuko was much closer to it now. “You’re dad won’t know anything you do here,” he said instead, voice steady. He couldn’t imagine any other reason Zuko would want a room. Except maybe as a distraction… “Has anyone warned you about the rooms yet? They can be bad. Really, really bad.”
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Post by ®Hawkpath® on Nov 9, 2021 23:45:07 GMT -5
It felt like Sal had known pieces of the puzzle, but never the ones that connected. He’d known he had gotten his scar at some point. He’d known he was banished. He’d known he wanted to prove himself to his father. But not this. He hadn’t known this. He hesitated, looking away. Telling Zuko he couldn’t do a room felt as wrong as letting him do one, but the thought of the House pulling something cruel, of making this day even worse for the kid… “Some of them can kill you,” he said quietly. “Some of them make you see people being hurt and you can’t help them. Some of them make you tell your secrets…they’re not all like that. But a room might not be a distraction. It might be something you have to try and distract yourself from.” He breathed out. Missing a shirt but having his prosthetic was a strange sensation. He shouldn’t have preferred that to the other way around, but he thought he did. “If you still want to go, then…I’m coming with you.”
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Transgender
strider
No mourners, no funerals
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Post by strider on Nov 10, 2021 0:22:31 GMT -5
“I don’t care,” Zuko said after a moment, making his voice as determined as he could manage. He wasn’t sure about the rooms at all. He didn’t want to die, and he didn’t want to watch other people get hurt, but it wasn’t like he had any secrets to hide. He hadn’t done anything wrong, and the only things he knew about his mother were the things that everyone knew. He wasn’t the kind of person who had secrets. He wasn’t supposed to. As the crown prince, he needed to be more or less an open book if he wanted his people’s trust. He just wanted to be a good Fire Lord one day. He wanted to be worthy to fill his father’s and grandfather’s shoes. He didn’t want to put Sal in danger either, but… he was older than him. Which meant he had a few more years of training how to fight. It didn’t even cross Zuko’s mind that there were people who hadn’t trained in martial arts. People who hadn’t spent a significant portion of their childhood learning how to defend themselves and, if it came to it, be a good soldier.
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Post by ®Hawkpath® on Nov 10, 2021 16:15:52 GMT -5
He did care. Sal could see that much. He wished there was a way to make the rooms safer, just this once, but… He breathed a quiet sigh. Zuko cared, but for him, it didn’t matter if he did a room. His father was waiting for him back home. It couldn’t be worse than that. “Okay. But I’m picking the door,” he said finally, forcing himself to sound more confident than he felt. It wasn’t that he was bad with kids, it was that, all things considered, he wasn’t dramatically older than Zuko was. Three years at the most, he guessed. Which was enough to make him feel like the grown up here, but not enough to make him know what to do. At least if he was the one to open the door…maybe whatever the room was wouldn’t be added to the list of things Zuko thought was his fault. He headed for the hall. If this was the wrong choice…but he didn’t see what else he could do.
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Transgender
strider
No mourners, no funerals
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Post by strider on Nov 10, 2021 21:08:13 GMT -5
“Okay,” Zuko replied, but he had a propensity for blaming himself for things anyway. No matter what Sal did, it was Zuko’s decision to go into a room. If any harm befell them while they were there… well, then it was on Zuko’s head. It wasn’t a conscious decision, it was just… how things were. He had grown up believing that the things that went wrong were his fault, so he was just carrying that legacy into the House. If it was his decision to go into a room, it didn’t matter what door they went into. “Does… the door matter?” he asked after a moment, looking over at Sal. He hadn’t really been in many rooms, and the rooms he had been in weren’t ones he had walked through the doors to. Well… one of them might have been, but most of the time he just blinked into rooms. “They all look the same,” he added in explanation, gaze scanning over the doors laid out in front of them.
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Post by ®Hawkpath® on Nov 10, 2021 21:40:07 GMT -5
Sal glanced at Zuko, hesitating at the question. He wished he knew that for sure, but…did it really matter if the doors made a difference if there was no way to tell them apart? It was going to be chance either way, “Nah,” he replied, looking away again. It was the truth, as far as he knew. “I mean, probably not.” Which meant there was probably no point stalling either. He stopped in front of a door, his hand resting on the knob. He’d go with Zuko, obviously, but…that didn’t mean he wasn’t worried. He hadn’t really noticed many patterns, exactly, but sometimes he felt like the House’s sadistic streak tended to come out all at once, and blinking Zuko in like this… He breathed out. He should probably be the first one inside, anyway. “See you in a sec,” he told Zuko, braced himself, and stepped through.
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Transgender
strider
No mourners, no funerals
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Post by strider on Nov 10, 2021 23:03:32 GMT -5
Zuko watched as Sal disappeared behind the door, moments away from losing his confidence. They were going to be okay. And if they weren’t… then maybe Zuko could do something to make sure that Sal got out okay. That was all that mattered. Zuko had nothing to go home to. He was half certain the flames headed towards his face were going to kill him. Would Ozai do that? Zuko shuddered at the thought, then forced himself through the doorway after Sal. The sweater he’d been borrowing disappeared from him, leaving him in the same garb he was wearing when he blinked in. For a long, terrifying second, he thought he had blinked home. But no… Sal was still there, standing across from him. There was no doubt in Zuko’s mind what this was, though. He immediately got into position to attack, eyes narrowing a little bit as he looked over at Sal. Would Sal know what an Agni Kai was? Zuko was about to explain when he noticed something in the stands. A person. His blood froze in his veins as he realized his father was sitting there, gold eyes narrowed as he watched. Swallowing, Zuko strengthened his resolve and turned towards Sal. He bowed, as was tradition, then readied himself to fight. He didn’t care if Sal wanted to fight or not. He was going to prove himself to his father. Maybe this would save him when he blinked back.
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Post by ®Hawkpath® on Nov 10, 2021 23:37:33 GMT -5
It was much warmer on the other side of the door. That was the first thing Sal noticed, followed by the lighting, which was unfamiliar to him. He thought he was on a stage, maybe…or a long table, but the crowd made it a stage either way. He looked around at them all, searching for anyone he recognized, but he had a feeling these weren’t blinkers. Blinkers were never in that much agreement about what they wanted. It took him a moment to find Zuko again, now missing the sweater, though the House hadn’t returned it to Sal. He wasn’t surprised, but…it didn’t feel fair for them to both be uncomfortable. He started towards Zuko, trying to cross the table before this room started. He didn’t think he liked how intense it felt already…it wasn’t any one thing. It was everything. This didn’t feel like a peaceful room. He didn’t quite put it together. The familiar clothes, the heat, the golden eyes of the man watching them both, but mostly Zuko. And he had no idea what it would have felt like to firebend.
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Post by ®Hawkpath® on Nov 11, 2021 0:40:28 GMT -5
Sal hesitated, the look on Zuko’s face and the way he said it both stopping him. He looked…tense, but in a different way than he had before, somehow. It was probably because of how this room felt. Tension spiked the air, thick enough to feel almost suffocating. Sal crossed his arms over his chest, trying to seem either intimidating or smaller. He wasn’t sure which effect he wanted to work more. “Bend?” He whispered back, glancing around again. He didn’t know how well they could be heard, but if Zuko thought whispering was a good idea, he wouldn’t argue. It took him a moment to understand. “Me? No, I’m not a bender. I’m not from your world,” he told him, shaking his head a little. He was going to say more, but his eyes caught on a nearby flag, and he froze. “Zuko, do you…know where we are?”
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