uncle_iroh | Inbox for Sn: Pai Sho

(Please note that Iroh still does not quite understand his phone so... this will be.... interesting.)

"My nephew tells me that I should ask you to leave a message. He says he will show me where to find that message once I have one. So please, leave a message."

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From:

uncle_iroh

[He's still not used to this thing. Also fat fingers + unfamiliar touch screen.....]

"Rich onr?| Whee arw yuu?"

From:

rediscovering

[ Oh boy... Zuko facepalms before he even responds, and he switches to voice, attaching a selfie taken with him and Aang close together in the carriage where Zuko found the young airbender (though not so young as he remembers him, Aang being about sixteen here, which Iroh may notice too); both boys are smiling brightly. It's a cute photo. ]

I'm in the caravan with Aang, Uncle.

From:

uncle_iroh

[It took him a few moments to recall how to switch over to voice as well. There might be some beeping in Zuko's ear.]

"That is some painting, prince Zuko. It almost makes him look as young as you." [Allow him his humour, he's finally not the oldest one here.] "Does this thing allow me to speak with him as well?"

From:

rediscovering

It's a photograph, Uncle. Like the videos I showed you, but still. And Aang is...— well, you can talk to him about it yourself sometime. I helped him set up his phone, too. ...Aang, what was your username again—?

[ And indeed, Aang's voice can be heard now too, replying with "avataraang," simple and direct choice in name. ]

It's "avataraang." I told him you are here. I'll give him your username, too.

From:

uncle_iroh

"Perhaps we should all have tea together."

[All being an elastic word, at need.]

From:

rediscovering

We definitely should.

[ Zuko's smile can be heard in his voice.

It's short-lived. He and Aang have a lot to catch up on. Much more than Zuko even knows... And once he finds out how little he knows, he's not gonna be so smiley. ]

From:

uncle_iroh

"Good. Let us see how to set that up."

From:

rediscovering

[ Regardless of whatever Iroh says in response, Zuko doesn't respond again for many hours more. But Iroh will get a text later that night — maybe around 22:00, which is late for these early-rising firebenders. That's basically bedtime! And indeed, Zuko's coming over for a, uh... impromptu slumber party... ]

uncle im coming over

From:

uncle_iroh

"Alright. I shall put on tea."

From:

rediscovering

[ Of course he'll put on tea... Zuko doesn't want any tea, but he knows better than to tell Iroh so. He'll make it anyway. It doesn't matter.

The boy shows up within what feels like moments — had he already been on his way? Surely. He knocks at the door with loud, dense pounds of his fist. He's scowling when Iroh answers the door, deeper than usual, doesn't even try to smile or say hi. And... he has a black duffle bag full of stuff with him on one shoulder, and Zunyan perched on the other shoulder, wrapped around Zuko's neck in part. Zuko has the hood of his black sweatshirt up, and looks thoroughly disgruntled, far more so than Iroh had seen him in a long time, and disheveled, too. In fact, his hair is messy beneath the hood, his jeans are covered in dirt for some reason, and his good eye looks mildly puffy; and upon a closer look, for someone who knows the boy's face as well as Iroh does, the faint freckles of burst capillaries beneath the thin skin of his right undereye, his brow still knotted so deeply in frustration it almost hurt — the face of someone who's been crying and screaming furiously. And the look of someone who's clearly expecting an impromptu sleepover. ]

From:

uncle_iroh

He pulled the boy into a hug. Answers and explanations could wait. Zuko needed him, and had come to him. So he would be here for the boy.

From:

rediscovering

He hugs Iroh back, but loosely, and it's quick before he pulls away and makes his way inside without a word. He's not in the mood to be touched. He sets his bag on the floor next to the couch, but doesn't sit. He sets the dragon on the couch to sit, but it just hops off with a little flap of its wings and scurries over to Iroh, standing on its hind legs with its claws snagging the old man's clothing — pick me up, pick me up, as if to say. Zuko may not want to be touched, but Zunyan does. This was a distressing night for the little dragon, too, clearly. Meantime, Zuko just sets to pacing across the center of the room, dragging both his hands alongside his temples and all the way back across his scalp and down his neck, self-soothingly. He doesn't say a word right away. Just paces.

From:

uncle_iroh

He scooped up the little dragon and closed the door before getting their tea. He set it on the table and stood with the table and tea between them to give Zuko the space he seemed to want. "Do you want to talk about it?"

From:

rediscovering

The dragon nuzzles itself rather frenetically against Iroh where it's held, frantic little claws twisting to find the most comfortable spot in the old man's grasp, squirmy but desperate for love, hello. It's in crisis too?! And Zuko's not comforting it! It needs to be held! Look at them, in distress together...

Zuko's content to pace anxiously, though he does stop for a step to glance at the tea when Iroh comes and sets it down. As if considering his options: to calm down or to talk about it. He shoots his look away from the teaset sharply, waving his arms in the air dismissively as he turns to pick up the pace again. But still he says nothing. Until finally...

"...Mother is alive!"

His voice breaks, volume erratic, not at all using his inside voice. His tone shatters any calm Iroh's trying to establish here. He's just gonna drop that bomb, just like that, yup.

Edited Date: 2021-06-04 07:04 am (UTC)

From:

uncle_iroh

Iroh pet the little dragon as he watched his nephew pace. He wasn't sure what was wrong, but he was certain that whatever it was, they could weather it. Together. So he thought he was ready for anything.

Anything but that.

It was only down to his years that he managed not to drop the Familiar - or his jaw - to the floor. He needed to understand what exactly Zuko meant to have any idea what to do from there. Because for the first time in years he was utterly blank. "She is here?" he asked, voice faking calm, as though he could pass some of that to the boy.

From:

rediscovering

"No, but she's alive! Aang told me! So I confronted Azula about it..."

...And now he's here. Pacing and looking an emotional wreck. So clearly that went well...

From:

uncle_iroh

"And Azula knew," he finished, gravely. Had it just been Azula, he would have doubted. Despite how it might have seemed, however, he trusted the Avatar. Which meant that rather than suspicion, anger was roiling within him. He did his best to keep it contained, but was not as successful as he usually was. He had chosen to tell everyone other than Zuko that he was from an earlier time to give his niece a chance. They had not even spoken yet and he was already finding cause to think he had wasted his efforts.

From:

rediscovering

"We agreed from the start it was best for her not to reveal anything about the future, but — I didn't think she was hiding something like that! And! And! Now I know there was no point to even hiding anything at all, because Gokudera confirmed that we don't remember anything about these places when we go home!" How can Gokudera confirm that? A long story Zuko's too hysterical to tell. "So in the end there was no reason for withholding this knowledge in the first place! I'd been afraid it would affect my future if I knew too much, too early — I was afraid it'd fuck up something about all this time and space travel... But deciding not to know only affected my present! It only fucked up my judgment! I thought that if Azula wasn't trying to fight me, that whatever happened in the future, we must have built a truce — that that was enough to build a truce now... It was in her best interests not to tell me anything, though — of course she agreed not to divulge any details! How could I be so stupid?! Ugh!"

He'd not usually be so crass around Iroh, but hanging out with Gokudera the past half a year has worsened the prince's language, and he's entirely too overwhelmed to hear himself right now. He slaps himself in the face with a groan, keeping his hand pressed over his eye in frustration, both eyes pinched shut because seeing is overstimulating the more worked up he gets. He feels so blind, anyway.

From:

uncle_iroh

"Language, Zuko," he admonished. mostly to buy time to get his own emotions under control.

"Aside from if we do or do not remember, there are somethings that should not have been kept secrets. There are reasons, sometimes to keep a large secret. But Azula does not have the experience necessary to make such a decision." Which was the far far politer version of what he actually wanted to say. "It was not hers to make. The question is, now, Zuko, what do we do with what we now know?"

From:

rediscovering

"I don't know! I was the one who told her not to tell me anything, she just listened to me — am I supposed to be mad at her?! She technically didn't do anything... This was all years ago for her! But I'm furious! Of course I'd wanna know that, she should have known I'd want to know that, I just didn't know it was— ugh! I don't know what to do, Uncle!"

His latent tenderness is conflicted by this budding friendship with Azula he'd tenuously built over the past half year... In order to preserve the peace they've designed together, the trust they've redefined, Zuko's come to have blurry eyes trying to differentiate between empathy and forgiveness, and justification and rationalization. Is he seeing things from a new, kinder perspective; or is he being manipulated into not 'abandoning' his sister, as she put it, when he probably should? This question has bothered him before, but now with Aang's big reveal, it's even more seering. His face feels hot and he feels the lump returning to his throat, so he just shakes his head and drags his hands down his face with some pressure, and returns to his pacing.

From:

uncle_iroh

He walked around the table to rest a hand n the boy's shoulder. "What we will do now, we will figure out together. We should speak to the Avatar and see what he knows. We will try to see if any others have returned home and then here again to see if the experience is universal. We will learn, and from there, decide."

And he is adding this to his mental list for if and when he encounters Azula himself.

From:

rediscovering

Zuko nods, closing his eyes to hide the fact that they're growing wet with tears he's barely willing not to fall. His voice is hoarse with emotion when he speaks, taking a second to swallow the lump in his throat and pretend to compose himself before he tries to say anything.

"...Tomorrow, Uncle. I'm tired. I want to stay here tonight." Like that wasn't already obvious with his duffle bag and general disposition. "...Maybe for a few nights, actually."

He's overwhelmingly thankful his uncle is here for this. That hand on his shoulder carries the weight of the world to him right now in exactly the way he needs. Gokudera had helped him prior to meeting Azula earlier that night, but after having actually confronted Azula now, the only person in the world who could comfort him, he felt, was standing here in front of him, making plans of his own.

From:

uncle_iroh

He nodded, then kissed his nephew lightly on the cheek. He would have gone for the top of the head, but hight differences are a thing.

"Tomorrow then. But Zuko, know this. No matter what happens, whatever you learn or chose to do... you are not in this alone."

From:

rediscovering

"...Yeah. But Azula is," he mumbles, throwing his gaze aside. The show of affection is finally enough to calm him, though, and at long last he takes a seat on the couch, collapsing more than sitting, looking forlorn. He's not too tired to talk... just to tired to talk to the Avatar.

From:

uncle_iroh

"She has made her own choices. There is only so much that we can shield her from that, and less that we should. It is fine line to walk, Prince Zuko. Protect someone too little and they could be badly hurt or die, they could break, they could change as a response to that pain in ways that they can never recover from. Protect someone too much and they never learn or grow, they never change at all. Everyone who tries to protect anyone ever will make mistakes sometimes, Zuko." He certainly had. "But that too is something we learn from."