playinginsand | [Rabbithole: Loo and Sokka, post Mikideath]

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[Rabbithole: Loo and Sokka, post Mikideath]

The Fire Palace is techincally a series of much smaller buildings grouped together and locked by walled footpaths and ornate gardens. The Imperial audience chambers are in the centre, near where the Royal family live in a smaller, heavily walled domicile. Guests are quartered in expansive rooms in one of the outer rings, a short walk away from the temple, used by all who live in the Palace.

One of the low buildings in the temple itself is dedicated to memorials to the departed. Smoke rises in thin worms from a thousand incense sticks, set before rolls representing the dead, individually or collectively. At the front, facing the worshipper as he enters, are twin rolls representing the parents of the current Fire Lord - one handsome king with his face marked by a hug burn scar, and one exotic looking blue eyed woman, sporting a scar of her own. As only four people in the world have ever met Melaka Fray, no one's arguing the likeness.

The victims of the recent border attack are in a temporary position next to Zuko. Each name is written out in perfect and careful calligraphy grouped by nation, and not one is left out, no matter who they might have been or which element they subscribed to. The sand in front of that scroll burns with more sticks than anywhere else, today.

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Ursa might be gazing wide eyed at him, but all Louise - who is as interested as her daughter - can say is, "can you really see Mom living like this?"

"Yes," Sokka replies, looking over at Lu to give her a firm, serious nod, "I can. A lot of things would have driven her nuts about it, but she would have loved the space and the people outside of the palace. You can bet she would have gone sneaking out as often as possible just to find a game of cards in an alley somewhere."

Louise sighs, dramatically butn out of Ursa's detection. She misses cards.

"Mom couldn't live here," she says. "Anymore than Hana could."

"She wasn't the same as Hana," he says quietly, swinging Ursa's hand and smiling at her. "She fought the same, but she did it because of her family, not out of any sense of duty. Hana was-- very, very different."

"I didn't mean personality-wise," Louise remarks. Ursa is just listening now. "I meant the Slayer. Bi-Ying, whatever you call it. Mom had it too."

"Mom had half of it," Sokka corrects, giving Lu all of his attention now, insistant without trying to be insulting. "Harth had all of those dreams and stuff, your mom had the strength. I thinkk she would have spent a lot more time sneaking out of the palace than in it, but she would've followed her family."

Louise looks at him for a second, then shrugs.

"It's not important," she says quietly.

Ursa, on the other hand, is bored, and tugs on Sokka's hand. "Finish the story!"

Worry flits over Sokka's features and he does frown, but Ursa distracts him from continuing on that topic. "Hmm?" he asks, startled and looking down at Ursa with a blink. "Oh, right. Where was I with the story, Ursa?"

"Grandma and Grandad coming back to the Fire Nation," she tells him firmly.

"Ohhhh, yes, yes, yes, okay." He starts swinging Ursa's hand again, thoughtful as he tries to remember. "Well, eventually, Grandma decided that she didn't want to leave Apocalyptica, not before anyone else did. That's just who she was, though, even though she wasn't family or even friends with everyone in the apartments, she had to make sure everyone else was safely home before she'd leave. Didn't change after your mom or aunt were born either, since by that point, Apocalyptica really wasn't all that bad. We had fresh food and plenty of supplies..."

"And a store," Ursa says. "With food in metal boxes and things."

"Right, the cans," Sokka agrees, nodding. "And your grandpa, once he finally sat down and talked to his wife-- well, they weren't really married then. Or ever, really. They never had a formal ceremony but they did decide to start calling themselves married after a while."

He pauses, free hand against his jaw and rubbing while he thinks. "...wait, where was I?"

Ursa laughs. "What happened when they talked?" She asks.

Louise is smiling just to watch them, her hand touching a point on her armour below her throat, underneath which a silver opal ring hangs on a leather thong.

"Right, right, right. Well, they finally started talking to each other and your grandad decided that he didn't really need to come back here to the Fire Nation. Even after Azula, that's your great-aunt of Evil, hurt your grandma, Zuko decided the best good he could really end up doing would be staying in Apocalyptica and keeping the people safe there. He was good at it, too, even after he got really hurt and couldn't walk for a while.

"We all got dragged to Eden not too long after that, me first, then Grandma and her girls, then Grandad at the end of the week."

"I know how he got hurt," Ursa says. "That was my evil great-uncle."

Nodding slowly, Sokka doesn't stop swinging Ursa's hand - it's been a long time and they all stopped being particularly sensitive to that part of Zuko's scars fairly early on. "Right. Great-Uncle Harth would somehow enjoy being talked about, though, even dimensions away, so I try not to do it too much.

"No one was real happy about being in Eden. We'd lost all the good food we'd had at the apartments and a lot of the people we cared about. In Apocalyptica, your great-aunt Katara and I were only a year apart, but since she didn't follow us to Eden, and my sister here never even came to Apocalyptica in the first place, I'm much older than she is now."

"And that's why Dad is only one year older than Mum even though he was born the year before Grandad."

See, she knows things! Even if they make no sense.

It's a requirement of anyone in their family.

"Exactly!" Sokka praises her, swinging her arm and smiling down at her. "And why your Aunt Steph and I were the same age when we met, and I'm five years older now."

"Eden's confusing," is Ursa's opinion. "All it says in the history scrolls is that Grandad went to the Spirit World and was replaced by Mom and Uncle Iroh. And Aunt Hana." That last one added as an afterthought.

"I know much more than I need to."

"Old people like to talk about their lives," Sokka informs her sadly, pitiable as he pouts at her. "Unfortunately, honey, your family of old people is particularly talkative.

"Don't worry, though. There won't be a test."

Ursa grins at the joke. "I like to hear stories about Eden anyway," she says. "It's much more interesting than the Palace."

"Well, I guess that's one way to put it," Sokka replies with a grin. "The history scrolls don't say much because not everyone in the world is as smart as you and your brother and cousins - they couldn't handle all that information, you know."

"That's because I'm a Princess..." Ursa starts, but Louise shakes her head.

"No it's not," she says. "It's because you're a Fray."

"It's because your family came from Eden," Sokka adds, squeezing the hand he's swinging. "My children know the same stories, and my granddaughter, too."

Suitably chastised for her classist remark, Ursa looks down for a second, before asking, "did you bring your wife and children here?"

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