After the war

The figure in the crowd

Zuko and Sokka looked around at the stunned faces of the crowd around them and were completely stunned when the crowd burst into applause. For the next hour they were being congratulated and lots of people wanted to shake their hand.

In the middle of someone asking how the boys met Zuko saw an out of place figure in the midst of the crowd. The tip off that the figure was out of place was Ra running up to his head, arching his back, snarling and hissing. He excused himself from the man bombarding him with questions and wormed his way through the crowd. He guessed he must have looked a little suspicious because he ran into Katara and she immediately asked what was going on.

"I thought I saw some shifty looking guy moving through the crowd" Zuko said madly looking around.

"Shifty how?"

"I don't know how to describe it, but he looked suspicious"

"The only suspicious looking one here is you, loosen up and enjoy the party Zuko" Katara gently patted her friend on the shoulder.

"Yeah, okay Katara"

Katara was pulled away by Toph leaving Zuko with an uneasy feeling. He took a deep breath in and slowly breathed out in an attempt to calm himself. He was approached by a man from the Earth Kingdom congratulating him and Sokka, but even though he was distracted by talking to people he couldn't shake the feeling plaguing him.

Toph was walking around with Suki and they saw Zuko looking around the crowd looking very shifty.

"What's up with Zuko?" Suki asked Toph

"How should I know" Toph shrugged at her friend, thinking Sparky wandering around looking like a gremlin was pretty much normal. Unfortunately, what was also normal was Toph being hounded by upper class Earth Kingdom twats asking about her family and grovelling.

Sokka had been separated from Zuko by people shaking his hand and congratulating him and prying into the boys' relationship. He was stuck talking to a northern water tribe lady about how he and Zuko met but he was convinced he saw Zuko sneaking around the crowd out the corner of his eye. He excused himself from the woman and followed his boyfriend through the crowd.

Zuko was still occupied by the prying Earth Kingdom man and he saw the figure again. He kept talking to the man and answering his questions, admittedly somewhat distracted, and looking for the figure out the corner of his eyes.

"So how long have you two been together?" the Earth Kingdom man asked Zuko.

"Uuhh, a few months"

Zuko's eyes met with the figure's eyes and his heart started racing as he saw the last person he wanted to see. His breathing started to get heavier and he started to feel very hot as he looked into Jet's eyes. He started to feel increasingly unsafe and felt like Jet could sneak up on him at any given moment.

"Um, could you please excuse me, it's getting a little crowded, I'm gonna go get some air..." Zuko trailed off moving swiftly away from the crowds of people. Once he was away from the view of everyone else, he broke into a sprint towards the edge of the south pole and collapsed at the entryway, far away from the other people.

Toph was minding her own business walking around with Suki trying to evade the upper-class Earth Kingdom idiots when she suddenly felt... off.

"Suki I think something's wrong with Sparky"

"What makes you say that?"

"His heart rate is elevated, he's breathing quicker and he's shaking, I think we need to investigate, he's having a poorly contained panic attack"

"Okay, let's get the others and go find him"

"Good call"

The girls ran off to fetch their friends and go find Sparky, something was definitely wrong.

Zuko fell to his knees under the arch of the southern tribe. He curled over his legs, so his nose was almost touching the floor and covered the back of his head with this arms. He could barely hear Ra standing in front of him crying out trying to elicit a reaction from the firebender. Zuko felt a presence near him and looked up, looking directly into the face of a certain freedom fighter that he never wanted to see again. Zuko's eyes widened as he looked up at Jet. He wondered why he wasn't approaching him, trying to finish what he started a week ago or attack the Firelord.

"How are you here?" Zuko tried to ask him in a threatening voice but in reality, it came out as a scared whimper.

"That's not of your concern, my dear" Jet's voice sounded off but that didn't register when Zuko was paralysed with fear.

"Why aren't you coming closer?"

"Do you want me to?" Zuko wanted to punch the smirk of the asshole's face.

"Not really" Zuko glared at Jet as he stood up. There were waves of rage and hatred that seemed to be pulling him towards Jet. The firebender wondered if he were feeling the same thing, begging the question again of why wasn't Jet approaching him? Something about this whole situation seemed wrong and off.

Zuko didn't know why he took a step forward, but he did. He stepped out from under the arch and immediately regretted it. The minute Zuko had stepped to Jet's side of the arch he felt a change and Jet's smile got eviller and more twisted as he sprang towards the Firelord, weapons out. Zuko tried to shoot the freedom fighter with a fire ball but he couldn't. He looked at his hand completely horrified.

"No bending Hotshot?"

"Do not CALL ME THAT!" Zuko yelled at Jet as he whipped his own swords out and charged at the freedom fighter.

"Do not CALL ME THAT!" Sokka drew in a sharp breath as he heard Zuko's distressed cry at the edge of the south pole, he and the others were at the other side of the, now rather large, village and all thoughts of intelligence, or coherence went out the window as they ran to Zuko.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Wrote this chapter directly after the last one, still dissociating so apologies if the writing isn't of a normal standard.

Jet's back oh nooooo!

Y'all know what to do with comments and likes and things pls don't let my story flop I worked hard!