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"Are you sure about this?" Aang tried to give a skeptical look, but the exhaustion visible around his eyes mostly made him look tired.
"Relax, Avatar. We all could use a vacation after all the--" Azula waved her hands dismissively-- "hope and change blah blah you've been up to with the end of the war."
The waterbender looked like she wanted to murder Azula, which meant that they had been in each other's company for at least five minutes. Right on schedule. "Not like you've been involved in bringing peace to the world!"
Azula rolled her eyes. "Yes, I'm sure you've been a great help with the politics of the Fire Nation; it's so helpful that you were the one to unmask the New Ozai Society."
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It had been trivially easy to reveal the clumsy conspiracy of has-been elites, though embarrassing that Mai's father had been stupid enough to a) participate and b) get caught doing so. Thankfully, after her little traitorous episode saving Zuzu and his peasant friends from falling into a boiling lake, Mai wasn't in disfavor. Not that Zuzu would use disfavor as a weapon anyhow. Really, the princess of the Fire Nation had to do everything herself.
Azula had come back to herself in the palace infirmary, surrounded by nervous guards, with Zuzu on the throne. And while she fully expected to take the throne at some point... she was tired from all the conquering and winning. And it was amusing to watch her brother flail around trying to end a century of war and wrangle the nobility into supporting his efforts.
The nobility that had arranged their efforts specifically to profit off of the war effort was, unsurprisingly, unsupportive of Zuzu's naive ideals of "human rights" and "not sending peasants to kill and die as part of the war machine" and "not burning down the entire world, including the food we ourselves are hoping to purchase and eat."
After Ty Lee ran off to join the avatar's fangirls, it had been dreadfully boring around the palace. And Zuzu had come and humbly asked for her help in dealing with the rebellious nobles. Honestly, it was the smartest thing he had ever done. His staff was hopeless at tracking down the conspiracy and its plans, while the New Ozai fanboys gladly gave absolutely everything to Azula and Mai. However, they weren't smart enough to veil how they intended for Fire Lord Azula to be a figurehead for their own plans.
Azula would be Fire Lord. Later. But she would be no one's puppet or pawn. And Zuzu would have the... pleasure of cleaning up their ancestors' mess first.
And so there was an amusing moment when Zuzu returned to his office to find Azula, seated in his chair, his crown perched perfectly in her own hair, with complete dossiers on all of the New Ozai fanboys and their collated plans arranged neatly in front of her on the desk.
"Sit," she'd said. "Let's discuss how we're securing your throne."
"Can I have my crown back?"
She'd tapped her chin. "We'll see. First you need to respond to these pretenders."
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The waterbender smoldered impressively, almost as good as a firebender, which Azula absolutely intended to tell her at the first opportune moment.
"Yes, yes, you've been very clear that you intend to see me as a villain until one of us meets our unfortunate demise." The princess waved her hand dismissively in Katara's direction. "Nevertheless, I've chosen in my magnanimity to invite you to my destressing weekend alongside the more pleasant, quote, war heroes."
"Ty Lee and Suki have the weekend off from guard duty," Mai droned in her happy monotone (not that anyone but Azula, Zuzu, and Ty Lee could ever tell the difference). She knew what was coming.
"So where we going? And tell me it doesn't involve ships or air travel," the earthbender injected with her refreshing directness.
"A short jaunt away on the royal flagship. It's luxurious, steel, and trust me, it'll be worth it." Azula smirked, not that Toph would ever see it, but somehow she could always sense it just the same.
"...So do you have some kind of island of traps to dump us in or something?" the smarter water peasant asked, partly joking.
"I thought Zuzu already took the avatar there," she quipped. "But you're right that we're visiting an island with at least a few pleasant memories for all of us. And I have pleasant nostalgia-adjacent plans to make new memories together."
The avatar and water peasants looked disturbed at this plan, possibly because of its brilliant-yet-devastating source. Zuzu smiled his "fuzzy fraternal feelings" smile at her, probably because she was making an effort to get along with his bleeding-heart peasant friends, and Toph gave a spike-sharp grin that she usually reserved for theft and property damage.
Clearly, the earthbender had the right idea.
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Zuzu took the opportunity to display trust in his more competent sibling and did not check up on the specific plans while in transit, instead playing sword battle with the smarter water peasant and later in teams with Mai and the head fan girl. Toph got involved by creating amusingly unexpected obstacles with the steel deck. She was devastatingly good at tripping Sokka and making him squeal in demonstrative distress. Azula respected her devotion to the craft.
Meanwhile, Katara and Ty Lee seemed to be painting each other's nails while discussing spa visits and the cuisine of the various places they'd visited. Very... fluffy. But it should keep Ty Lee's aura very... pink. Which was apparently the correct color, for Ty Lee.
Azula made sure that all was in order for their... special activities, and then found a sunny spot to rest on deck. She was, surprisingly, joined by her second most famous lightning target.
The avatar floated in on his glider and came to a stop next to her, flying rodent on his shoulder. "Hey, Azula. What's up?"
"Not you, at present." She smirked. "Perhaps that cloud?"
He chuckled lightly and sat in the adjacent deck chair. "It's nice of you to plan all of this for us. It has been a while since we took a few days to rest."
"I assure you that it was my pleasure. The scheduled... activity at our destination will be even more satisfying." She grinned, looking forward to pleasant recreation-through-destruction.
The avatar chuckled again, looking less sure of himself. "Right, right. Hey, uh, any chance you are going to let us know what this great plan is?"
Azula tapped her chin with a perfectly manicured nail. "It is a surprise... but I can assure you that it won't involve me shooting lightning at anyone." She specifically did not promise not to shoot lightning at objects. She was leaving her options open. It was quite refreshing to cause explosions with a single perfect bolt of understated, tasteful destruction.
The overly cheerful bald kid perked up at that. "Oh, that's good. I figured you weren't luring us here to murder us all, but it's always nice to be reassured."
Azula smirked. "Relax, Avatar. I have no intent to hurt any people during our stay. Though if we run into some of those New Ozai dimwits, I might change my mind. They are so dreadfully tedious with their poorly thought-out inklings of treason."
She shot a bolt of lightning at a rock protruding from the ocean almost a mile away, barely visible in the distance. It exploded in a cloud of rock bits and dust. One of these days, she would have to see if she could destroy rocks in the distance as quickly as Toph. It would be... amusing to race her.
The avatar squealed in surprise, jumping onto the side of the conning tower. When he saw the cloud of destruction, however, he cheered for her.
"That was so cool when it wasn't pointed at me!"
Azula gave him a smug grin.
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It was one of the first good weekends for visiting Ember Island, as the cherry blossoms were coming into bloom and the weather was more likely to be warm and clear.
She had the ship dock near the old beach house, waiting to see which peasant would figure out where they'd gone first.
Sokka stumbled down the gangway first, blinking at the sun like he hadn't been standing in it for the past few hours and looking all around him. "Is this Ember Island?" he squawked in his high-pitched shock voice.
Toph followed him, stepped onto the beach, and smiled. "This definitely feels like Ember Island. Sparky's family's beach house is over there and everything." The blind girl pointed directly at the house Sokka had somehow missed.
He did a double-take and began pointing and shouting back towards the ship: "Hey, guys, it's Beach Adventure, Part Two!"
Zuzu turned to her, smiling gently. "Shall we?" He made a (mockery of a) polite bow and offered her his arm, which she deigned to accept gracefully, as a proper royal. The more murderous water peasant followed them off the ship, looking all around, doubtless for traps.
Ty Lee cartwheeled after them, followed by Mai and the head fan girl. Despite her job guarding Zuzu, Suki seemed unexpectedly calm about the surprise trip. It was... surprisingly pleasant that at least this cleverer peasant had caught on that the princess of the Fire Nation was an indispensable part of its royal administration, not a threat to it.
The avatar decided to relieve the crew by flying their baggage over to the beach house's courtyard. The crew stared in confusion for a moment, then bowed politely and returned to their duties.
"Hey, Princess Platypus-Bear, do we have any plans other than sandbending and relaxing?" Toph was already creating a model of the flagship out of sand, complete with a giant sand unagi heading toward it to crush it and devour its remains.
Azula shot a barrage of blue flame at the sand ship, which turned it into molten glass. The earthbender stepped back, grinning. "Whoa, that feels cool," she commented.
"Did you just firebend at Toph?!" the waterbender screeched self-righteously.
"Chill, Sugar Queen. I'm fine. We're just having fun with our bending on the beach, like two well-adjusted members of the nobility." She grinned, creating a sand sculpture of Katara's hilariously outraged self.
The waterbender sent a wave at her friend's work, cooling the glass ship with a burst of steam and washing away Sandtara.
"Now, now, waterbender. Are you really that insecure that you can't handle a little caricaturing from your dear Earth Kingdom friend?" Azula smiled her "surely I am devoted to peace" smile, which probably looked smug to the smoldering waterbender, but that was fine. They had been in each other's presence for five minutes, after all.
When the wave came at Azula, she was prepared with a wave of blue flame that turned it into steam, doing nothing more than making her perfectly pointy bangs a bit frizzy. She raised a well-groomed eyebrow at the steaming water peasant.
"C'mon, Katara, let's go surfing!" The vibrating form of the avatar dragged the waterbending miscreant away to enjoy herself elsewhere.
She turned back to Toph. "To answer your question, I have a... special activity for us this weekend. But there is no hurry. It will wait for us."
They smiled the same smile of shared anticipation.
"You know Sugar Queen thinks you're going to murder us creatively, right?" the earthbender asked, smirking.
"I would expect no less from her," Azula quipped. At least a few of these peasants were tolerable company.
She nodded toward the water. "Can you feel the rocks over there by the cliff?"
Toph scoffed. "Did I invent metalbending single-handedly in one day? Of course I can."
"First one to explode the tallest one wins. Go!" Azula cried, shooting lightning as she said it.
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They lounged around the courtyard, enjoying the food the servants had brought up from the ship for them. Aang seemed to especially appreciate the vegetarian curry and fruit platter that his... pet filched from almost more than he did.
Katara grumbled a bit, but also muttered, "At least she didn't make me cook."
Azula rolled her eyes. "There's no point in us cobbling together meals when we have royal cooks literally floating over there on the ship. I try to show my dislike for you in ways other than pointless work." She shrugged.
Before Katara had finished sputtering and parried a comment back, Sokka wandered over excitedly.
"Oh man, is that komodo jerky? That's even better than the sausages!" he enthused.
"You might enjoy the fire-flake-crusted fried bangus fish," Azula suggested.
The water peasant literally drooled, wandering over to one of the tables they'd set up for... seconds? thirds? Quite appreciated multiple helpings, in any event.
Katara rolled her eyes, but was distracted from her obligatory frenemy banter as Sokka brought her some of the sea kumquats that were similar to her favorite Water Tribe dish.
Azula smirked. She didn't have to like people to know useful information about them. This should be an enjoyable moment, even for her least favorite water peasant.
Mai nudged her shoulder. "Have you picked a time for the... activity?"
Azula smirked. "I was thinking a few hours before sunset. That should allow enough time. The sunset will look beautiful over the... remnants."
Mai smirked for a split second and nodded imperceptibly.
The earthbender perked up. "Remnants? Please tell me we're destroying something."
"Would I do that?" Azula asked in a faux haughty voice, grinning sharply.
"I'm just saying, rocks over fire for destruction."
"We shall have to test your bold claim, earthbender." Azula lit her hands and Toph stomped up a rock, just for a moment, before they both nodded and put them away. For now.
At that moment, Zuzu decided to use his stealth skills and appear at her side. "What are we destroying, exactly?"
She grinned harder. "Nothing we haven't destroyed before."
He looked back at the beach house for a moment, clearly confused, since they'd moved their bags in and planned to stay the night there.
She sighed. The princess of the Fire Nation really did have to do everything around here. "I'll show you once your friends are done filling their faces."
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"NO! Azula, no. We are not destroying Admiral Chan's house again!" Zuzu yelled.
The smarter water peasant mouthed the word "again" to his sister, looking curious.
"Whyever not, Zuzu? Do you not recall stripping him of all his titles and property for his mutinous treachery? This--" she gestured widely at the house-- "is as much yours as your crown is," she cajoled smoothly.
"You steal my crown all the time!" He threw his hands up in the air.
"Irrelevant, Zuzu." She flipped her hair dramatically. "The point is, this property exists for the service of the state now, and the state is well served by all of us having a stress-relieving activity."
"But it's illegal to destroy state property!" he protested.
"Silly Zuzu. Did you not listen to Grandfather? 'It's not illegal if you're the Fire Lord,'" she quoted.
"But--"
"Perhaps you're just guilty about last time," she snarked lightly.
He let out an inarticulate scream of frustration. "No, Azula, as your Fire Lord, we are not destroying Admiral Chan's house, and that's final!"
Azula had been waiting for this moment. She quickly reached out, gently grabbing his crown and yanking it out of his topknot, causing his hair ribbon to fall onto the sand and his hair to fall gently down into his face. In one fluid motion, she inserted it into her own topknot. "As your new, and better, Fire Lord, we are absolutely destroying Admiral Chan's house."
Toph cackled and smacked her fist into her palm.
The avatar shrieked in surprise and jumped back.
Katara looked murderous, but what was new, really?
Her brother was giggling at the show, as was his fan girlfriend.
Mai and Ty Lee could have predicted this exact situation, having seen it play out at least ten times before, and thus were not particularly reactive, beyond Ty Lee's smile anticipating the inevitable capitulation of Fire Lord Zuzu.
Zuzu gave her his traditional deadpan look, but his eyes betrayed no surprise.
"Well, think about it this way, Zuzu. Had things worked out last time we were here, I might have married that idiot Chan the Younger. And then he'd be your brother-in-law, kicking around in your palace all the time, flirting with all the noble ladies with his idiot friend."
He paused for a moment and sighed. "You've always been skilled at knowing what to say that would make me feel like breaking things."
"What can I say? I have a gift," Azula smirked.
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Zuzu was the only member of the group who had any hesitation about destroying Chan's house.
Katara was hesitant to trust Azula in general but didn't have any problem with destroying the property of an evil Fire Nation noble who'd tried to dethrone Zuzu. Her water whipping of the kitchen and its implements could be heard all the way upstairs, her grunting with destructive zeal echoing over the sounds of falling and crushing and splashing. At some point, Azula thought she heard the destruction move on to the dining room.
Azula and Toph were having a bit of a race upstairs to see whose element could destroy Chan's house and effects the fastest.
Toph's bending of the metal sculptures decorating Admiral Chan's upstairs was inspired, first forming them into the rear ends of animals and making impressive braying "I'm Admiral Chan!" noises, and then gathering the metal into blades with which to cut through the walls.
These competed with Azula's penetrating lightning, which she was shooting through doors and wall paneling and practicing using on a small scale to explode plant pots and fancy side tables. Toph wisely kept the metal she was bending off her body. She knew who she was working alongside.
Eventually, after they'd both won a few races, Toph started using her bent blades to call shots for Azula, since the metal would attract her lightning anyway.
In this way they pierced the roof like a needle pulling thread made of pure electricity. Except the fabric crumbled and fell to the ground. Clay tiles. Toph grinned and gathered a ceramic boulder to her hand.
From what she could see, the avatar and Ty Lee were having a great deal of fun swinging on the rafters, destroying the contents of high shelves, smashing any objects thrown up to them, and -- their pièce de résistance -- a high-flying, clattering show of destroying the chandelier. Apparently, the avatar would have fit right in alongside Ty Lee's circus buddies.
The fan girl and sword peasant seemed to be focusing on the main sitting room downstairs: paintings, potted plants, tables, statues, shelves, and... pretty much anything in the room, really, said goodbye, except for the walls and floors. And there were quite a few slashes on the wall.
The sword peasant made sure to destroy the windows with his boomerang, a gleeful expression on his face as he managed to get two with one toss (one going, one coming back).
The fan girl was slicing the chairs to bits with her fan, looking happy, especially as they both jumped on the sofas and other seats.
Mai was in the solarium, cutting all the paintings, smashing the windows, cutting, denting, and kicking the furniture, ripping the rug, and doing what she could to thoroughly destroy it. Mai's face seemed ecstatic to those who knew her well. At some point, Mai had brought the rugs over to the fireplace and tossed them in, before moving to do the same to the music room. The loud crashes, clangs, and off-tune instrument noises were not pleasant, let her tell you.
Zuzu had made his way to the wine cellar and was gleefully (seriously, he was never happy, but he was grinning) slashing and smashing the bottles to bits and kicking down shelves and racks. He knocked over several barrels of fire whiskey, and halfway back up the stairs, having destroyed everything else, he shot them up with arrows of flame, cutting holes in the barrels that then, as the alcohol was exposed to the air, caught fire. The cellar floor eventually followed.
Everyone converged on the main level, or what was left of it, anyhow.
"We need to finish up," Zuzu warned. "I kind of set the wine cellar on fire."
"Nice!" Toph praised, giving him a high-five. "We took out the roof already."
Everyone looked up at the intact ceiling, which was slightly on fire.
Zuzu grinned manically at Aang and Azula. "Shall we?"
They grinned back.
"You guys should probably move toward the exit," he warned the non-firebenders.
With that, they walked to the far end of the room and began throwing streams of flame at the walls and ceiling. They backed up carefully as they went to make sure the ceiling did not fall in on them. Ty Lee stood in the doorway to be a spotter for them.
"Azula was right," Mai commented mildly. "The sunset is lovely over the wreckage."
Azula made it outside in time to see the water peasants nod in affirmation. Suki laid a kiss on the sword peasant's cheek; apparently destruction made for a good date activity. Noted.
"I'll take your word for it," Toph commented. "Sunsets never did much for me anyway. But watching this house be demolished is pretty cool."
Zuzu decided to take his life in his hands by hugging his sister. "Thanks, Lala. You were right. That was... surprisingly restful."
Azula smirked. "This is why I'm the better Fire Lord. Without me, you would be a sad, stressed lump at your desk."
"Without you, I think I'd be dead," he admitted.
The house surrendered to the flames with some pleasing crushing and shattering noises, the remaining wreckage falling into the wine cellar and flaring up once again.
"Shall we head back? I instructed the staff to leave us some dessert to enjoy under the stars," Azula guided.
"Yes! You are the best formerly-evil princess ever!" Sokka enthused. ...She supposed he could be her favorite water peasant. He was certainly the cleverer one.