To an infamous English teacher who never let them bully me on his watch...
oooooooooo
Since I could never get enough of flashbacks from the Fire Nation royal family's history, here is something that picks up after Ursa left and goes on in a bit of a different direction from there.
I just always hated how Iroh kind of gave up on Azula and bringing her to the good side, so in here I gave her someone who could lead her down a good path...
oooooooooo
As a nine-year-old, Princess Azula absolutely despised her school. She didn't hate learning new things however, she often excelled at those immediately, or at least quicker than others, which meant she was showered with the praise she undoubtedly deserved. She just didn't understand why she had to come here for it. Her father already gave her private lessons on ruling, fighting and battle strategy. What else could she possibly have use for later in life...
She often voiced her thoughts on this, and every adult in her life gave her pretty much the same answer. Her mother's was the freshest in her memory. It's to teach you about community. To connect you to other people.
And if it indeed was about the people here, Azula was sorely underwhelmed. She hated everyone here to some degree, she realized as she finished her school lunch. Even the two girls sitting at her sides, Mai and Ty Lee. She hated them the least, but some days... She just wished she could shut them up for good.
"You're done, Azula?" Ty Lee asked from her right.
Oh, Spirits, Ty Lee, where do you get these ideas? What tipped you off? Was it my empty plate, the utensils I set down, me wiping my chin or maybe even me standing up?
"We're leaving," Azula ordered, turning her head to Mai who was still chewing.
The three girls were slowly leaving their table, the one Azula didn't let anyone else use, when she remembered something.
Azula had realized long ago that if she was to spend time here at the Royal Fire Academy for Girls, then it was in her best interest to make it useful. Efficiency was important and the school did provide her with a unique opportunity. Her mother was right about one thing, it was about the people here... They provided a perfect sample to test out her knowledge of ruling strategies her father was teaching her. The first lesson that came to mind was about having to occasionally remind your subjects of who you are and what you can do. At least that was easy...
"Hey, you! Yama!" She yelled at a girl carefully walking past her friends.
"Hi, Azula... My name is... Um... Amaya." The girl managed, freezing in place with her food plate. She was not a bender and a lot shorter than the rest of her peers, so she feared Azula even more than the other girls did.
"No one cares..." Azula snapped. She never remembered their names... Why would she trouble herself with triviality? She remembered them by their impressions, their signifying features. Tremors, Blinker, Crooked... This girl, she was Mouse, as much for size as for temperament.
"Yeah, no one cares, Yama!" Ty Lee echoed the insult in almost the same tone.
"Do you want something?" Mouse asked, trying to maintain eye contact. Someone had probably advised the girl to do so. It wasn't a dumb idea, but Azula was not just an ordinary bully. She just kept staring and eventually, Mouse looked down, hating herself. Like she did every time.
Azula took way too much pleasure in it.
"I'll give you a hint, it's your hair," Mai spoke. "It's the same as Azula's."
"That's not a hint, you just told her, stupid!" Azula snapped. "Learn words!"
Mai looked away in shame and Ty Lee made a sniveling face in what... Sympathy? No one made her say that stupid thing.
"I'm sorry, Azula... I wasn't thinking. I'll take it-" Mouse was interrupted when Azula shoved her to the floor. Everyone at lunch heard it and turned to look. The students, sure, but the teachers and cooks too. Mouse looked back at the adults in the room, hoping one of them would stop the Princess, but she knew they wouldn't. No one of any age wanted to upset Azula, even more so since her father became Fire Lord recently. One word to him from her and any one of them could just disappear.
Then the bell sounded from far away, ending lunch time. Everyone started moving towards the exit.
"It ends when I say it ends!" Azula screamed and they all stopped. Then she leaned forward and grabbed Mouse's hair to undo the top-knot. The hair-band came off, but not without taking some of Mouse's hair with it. To Azula's great surprise, the girl didn't even let out a sound at the pain.
"Next time I burn it off!" The Princess threw the hair-band to the floor then straightened her back and walked out of the lunch room gracefully, followed by Ty Lee and Mai, or as she used to call them in her mind, Parrot and Sheet-face.
oooooooooo
It was exactly noon. The Mathematics teacher, Shig, ran outside. They were expecting their new teacher that day. They were really understaffed after Princess Azula complained about a few employees to her father and Shig needed this man to show up right that second.
He was looking back to his papers to check if he had the right date and time when he heard hurried footsteps. Finally...
Shig looked up and there she was. The most beautiful woman he'd ever seen, looking at him and smiling slightly. He smiled back involuntarily, as his mind filled with all kinds of thoughts his wife would kill him for.
"You work here, Sir?" she asked.
"Yes... Yes, I do." He coughed to fix his voice. "Are you lost, Miss?"
Shig had a tendency to call every beautiful woman Miss, but this one looked old enough to have been a Mrs. for years now.
"Not at all... What I am is late. My apologies." She tried to walk past him, but he blocked her way.
"Late for what?"
"The teaching job, of course. It's my first day, but the train passed the war front, so you know... Delays."
Shig blinked a few times while processing the information.
"That can't be..." He looked down at his papers. "The letter... We were expecting a man by the name of Zen Omori."
Omori was a very, very respected last name. Shig was sure he wouldn't mix it up with another, but he checked all the same.
"Oh, I see the problem. I'm Zyra Omori. Zen's my little brother. You just asked for the last name and assumed it was him."
"But it clearly says here, the applicant graduated from the Royal Fire Academy for Boys. I'm afraid we cannot have someone who studied here teaching the young ladies. This school's curriculum was very lacking in the past."
"No, it's true. I transferred to the Boys' Academy on the account of being gifted. I graduated with honors, you can see it right there." She pointed to a line in his papers.
"I understand, however... You're... You are..."
Zyra was almost amused seeing this man trying, struggling, to think of single sound reason why a woman couldn't work there as a teacher. Almost amused.
"Sir, it's not difficult. You are in need of a teacher, I am one. It's just that simple." And with that she hurried past him, carrying her suitcase.
"Mrs. Omori?" He seemed to come back to his senses after a few seconds, since she heard his voice and footsteps as she walked through the corridors.
"I'm not married."
"Miss Omori, then. I need to talk to the other teachers about this."
"I don't think I see why... All the paperwork I sent is legitimate."
"I know Miss Omori, but... University?" His eyes went wide at the diploma in the file.
Zyra knew it wasn't that unusual on a nation scale. The nobility in the capital were really the only ones who still fought to hold women back. She also knew it was a lost fight.
"Zyra's just fine, since we're co-workers. Now where can I put my things?" She soon realized she wouldn't get an answer that easy, since other teachers in their red coats gathered around them. Shig was telling them about the mix-up. The faces those grown people were making... Honestly, it was like none of them had seen a woman prior to that day.
"Miss..." started the oldest one of them. "As the Headmaster, I think I speak for everyone here when I say, we would like to have you working here. It's just that we don't have the accommodations for someone like you."
"Accommodations?" she asked, faking interest.
This ought to be good.
"For example, this coat... It's catered to a man's proporti-" He had no time to finish, since Zyra took the coat from him and put it on. Yes, it was a little wide at the shoulders and the sleeves were too long, but it was hardly a disaster...
"Any other problems?" she asked, rolling the sleeves back.
"We don't have an appropriate office for you."
"And if I were a man, then..." Zyra was getting pissed at this nonsense already.
"We intended for you to share an office with Mr. Akagi. But since he is... A man and you... Well, it would be bad form."
"I understand." And she did... Nothing had changed here in the capital since she'd left.
"You do?"
"We have no way of knowing what would happen if we were to find ourselves behind closed doors..." she mocked, but wasn't sure they were picking up on the sarcasm. "Better not risk it... Where is this office?"
Shig pointed to a door a few steps away.
"Thank you." Zyra nodded and marched to it. She briefly considered burning down the door, but this was her workplace, and this was her first day. She'd see how it went from that day on, but today she wasn't destroying any property if she could help it.
She opened the door, startling a thin, mustached man scribbling something while enjoying a cup of tea. There was a second desk in the room, that was completely empty, waiting for the new teacher. Zyra pushed it out of the office with surprising ease and unbelievable noise, while the men just watched in disbelief.
"Here," she said, once her desk and the matching chair were both in the middle of the hallway. "Now that we're sure nothing inappropriate will be going on, are there any more objections?"
The teachers were silent.
"Well, in that case, gentleman, I'll be off to teach my class. Can any of you point me in the right direction?" She considered their stares. "Actually, I'll find it on my own."
oooooooooo
Azula sat in her desk looking around at the other girls in the classroom. They all diverted their gazes. Yes, it was definitely working. They all remembered who she was. What she was...
"The new teacher's late..." Mai said, disinterestedly.
"I'm aware." Azula didn't feel like snapping, but she just hated people stating the obvious.
"How long do you think this one will last?" She heard a voice from behind her. It was a whisper really, but not quiet enough.
"The way today's going, I give him till the end of the week. Maybe less."
Azula recognized them now. It was Blinker and Crooked. They thought they were far enough from Azula's ears, but clearly not.
"Yeah..." Blinker chuckled.
"I heard my mom say she knows a teacher who moved out of the city to not have to work here because of her," Crooked said.
"Azula, so can I come over after school?" Ty Lee clearly heard the girls too and tried to distract her friend before something bad happened again.
Not everyone's as dumb as you, Ty Lee.
"I mean she's completely out of control," Blinker added.
"What did you just say?!" Azula stood up and turned. The two girls fell quiet. "No... Come on, say it now."
Still nothing.
Azula grabbed Blinker by her collar and pulled her up. The girl proved her nickname correct, by blinking about four times as often as humanly necessary.
"Azula, you're scaring away teachers and it's all of us who suffer for it." Crooked said.
Oh?
Guess, it was time for the next one of Ozai's lessons. Quelling rebellion.
Azula let go of Blinker and took a step back. "Come on, then. You and me, Agni Kai."
"No." Crooked recoiled.
Azula walked to the open part of the classroom, next to the board and turned back. "Not to the death, coward. Now, come on."
"I'm not going to fight you. Even if I win, your father would hurt me and my family." But the girl stepped into the open space to face Azula. She wanted to show everyone she was done being afraid. Azula knew she had to do something about that, and fast. She saw how everyone was looking at Crooked... The girl would have more than her crooked teeth to worry about after today.
Azula shoved her, but the girl stepped back and regained her balance.
"I order you to fight back!" Azula made a flame in one of her hands.
Crooked shook her head and closed her eyes to stop the tears that were already escaping. Azula extinguished her flame in anger and lunged forward, wrapping her hands around Crooked's throat.
"When I order something, you-"
"Stop that! Unhand her!" A firm voice came from the now open door to the classroom. Azula let go out of pure shock and then turned to find a woman she didn't know standing at the door, wearing a teacher's coat. The woman made her way to the two girls with a disapproving look, then put a hand on Crooked's shoulder. "What's your name?"
"Sora." Crooked managed through those ugly teeth.
"Go to your desk now." The woman turned to the Princess now. "And what is your name, young lady?"
"Azula."
Everyone in the room tensed as they realized this new woman didn't know. She had no idea she was speaking to the Princess, she just saw a misbehaving child. The girls were anxious about what Azula was about to do and she loved it.
"Well, Azula, what I just witnessed is unacceptable. Not just from you, but from everyone," the woman paused, looking around. "If you see a student being attacked by another student you don't intervene, but you don't stand and watch either. You go and find an adult to stop it. Am I being clear?"
Most of the girls nodded.
"Now this time, only Azula will get punished, but in the future-"
"Actually," Azula cut in. "It's Princess Azula of the Fire Nation, daughter of Fire Lord Ozai."
She watched as the woman's eyes widened in shock for just a fraction of a second before she summoned her composure back.
"That does not change what you did."
"Well, I'm not apologizing." Azula crossed her arms in defiance. Who even was this lady...?
"I won't make you. Forced apologies only teach children to lie more effectively." She dropped the suitcase she was carrying next to the teacher's desk. "You just earned yourself detention today."
The whole class stared at her unblinkingly.
Azula smirked.
"I don't get detention."
"I'm afraid that today you do. Now sit down." The woman gestured and Azula found herself obeying before she knew what was happening. There was no way this woman would get away with this.
"I'm sorry we had to start with something so unpleasant, but we can only work if everyone feels safe here... My name is Zyra Omori and I'm your new History teacher. Any questions?"
Azula chuckled.
She knew that family name. Omori. They were an old family and a rich one. In her mind, Azula associated it with a fat, clumsy man she saw on a few royal gatherings. But she'd never seen this woman. Azula studied her teacher as she walked to her slowly.
Zyra was definitely a noble. The way she carried herself, Azula knew only noble daughters were taught that. It was something every girl there had. Then Zyra stopped in front of her desk and she realized this woman might also have a military background. There was just something about her standing still, not to mention the fact that her long black hair was up in a braided bun. Trophy wives had their hair down...
"Azula, you may request I use your full title of Your Royal Highness if you so wish, but all the rules here apply to you too." Zyra waited for an answer, but Azula wasn't planning on giving her anything more than an enraged stare.
oooooooooo
Azula went the rest of class without speaking, completely ignoring everything the teacher was saying. At first the rest of the girls were just as unresponsive, but they soon started having fun answering Zyra's questions, meant to determine how far they got with their previous teacher. Azula refused to speak up, even if she knew the answers.
"Does anyone know when the name Earth Kingdom was first used?" Zyra asked the class next.
"1000 BG!" yelled Mouse, a grin on her face.
Idiot...
"Good guess, Amaya, but I was more looking for a relation to other events. We don't really know the actual year..."
After the Muddy Rebellion.
"Anyone?" Zyra asked again, after getting no answer. "You didn't go over it then?"
"After Kyoshi's death?" Blinker said after being called upon.
"They called her Shield of the Earth Kingdom in her time... It's a dumb guess." Azula cut in, before realizing she's supposed to be ignoring them.
"I trust that a smart young girl like yourself can express her opinion without resorting to insults. You have an answer for me?" Zyra was smiling so much, it was getting Azula angry again.
"Immediately after the Muddy Rebellion," she answered with a little grin because she knew she was right. No one else knew. She was the best one there. But to her surprise, the teacher's face looked delighted, not angry, because of this.
"Now just tell me what caused the rebellion and you might get your first grade from me."
"Easy. The King ordered a lot of roads to be built to make the kingdom connected."
Crooked raised her hand and Zyra gave her a nod.
"They didn't rebel because they got roads. They rebelled because they had no rights and needed to pay enormous taxes," she finished, then looked smugly back at Azula.
"Interesting..." begun Zyra. "You see, class, Sora here gave the classic answer from the people's perspective, while Azula answered more from the ruler's perspective. What he could have done to stop what happened..."
"The King's father had the same taxes and rights system," Azula explained herself. "This King was soft and built roads to connect the peasants and provide them access to education."
"A noble effort, making your country better, wouldn't you say?" Zyra asked.
"Wasted effort. He got killed for his troubles. Uneducated, starving peasants don't rebel. But this King gave them just enough so that they'd want more."
"And if he gave them everything he could? What do you think would happen?"
"It would never happen. Someone in his court would kill him before, replace him with a ruler who knows how the system works." Azula was happy with the way she'd phrased that, and she wasn't at all surprised at the blank stares of the other girls there. No, what surprised her was that her teacher's face wasn't shocked or scared at what she'd said, but instead sad.
The bell rang in the distance, marking the end of the day. Everyone started getting up while Zyra yelled out a few details about tomorrow's lesson. Azula was almost at the door when the woman blocked her way.
"Detention, remember?" Zyra said.
"Not happening." Azula smiled. "I have a driver and a carriage waiting to take me to the palace."
"I'll tell them to wait."
oooooooooo
"Professor Omori, I just don't think you realize-" the Math teacher tried.
"No, you don't realize what you are doing...." Zyra stood her ground as a group of other teachers circled her.
"Azula. Is. The. Princess."
"I'm not disputing that. But she is also a nine-year-old child who's never been told no and whose behavior is out of control. A child who effectively runs this school, because none of you will enforce the rules!" When she said that, they all diverted their gaze. "I will do it alone, if I have to..."
"Listen..." The headmaster stepped forward. "You are not wrong, but before you do this, I want you to know you can get killed for crossing that child. It is not a rumor, people have disappeared from your position. I wish I was lying."
"I appreciate the concern, but I came to do a job. And I'll do it."
After saying that Zyra marched out of the building and found the only carriage still waiting outside. She explained the situation to the men, and they were surprised, but none of their orders directly contradicted this, so they agreed to wait.
"I am not doing it!" screamed Azula, as Zyra explained her punishment would entail helping her put up posters around the school. "That's what servants do! I'm not that!"
"Well, I'm sure if you really put your mind to it, you can manage it too." Zyra said, while calmly putting up a poster. "Like this."
"When my father hears of this... Did you know I can have you killed?" Azula asked, in a way a regular person would discuss going out for ice cream.
"Did you know I can have you in detention tomorrow? No threats, no insults. Posters." Zyra put up another one. "Now you're two behind. Come on."
"I'm not doing this! I said I'm not! You don't- I hate you! You'll pay for this! He'll kill you!" Azula went on screaming like this, eventually pushing Zyra back since she wasn't reacting to the tantrum in any way. She just waited. Waited until Azula stopped moving, until her screams turned into no more than roars and huffs.
"I understand you're upset, but this is supposed to be punishment," Zyra started, calmly. "Now whatever you do we are going to be here until we finish this. It's in your interest to start soon."
Azula raised her clenched fist over the pile of posters.
"If you burn those, I'll find something longer for us to do." Zyra threatened and Azula sighed, picked up a poster and put it up in silence.
"It is punishment, but it doesn't have to be torture." Zyra continued with her pile of posters. "We can sing something while we work. Or maybe talk history some more. I think your views are very interesting. Especially, for a girl so young."
"Zyra?"
"Miss Omori, please."
"About what I said..."
"Yes, Azula?"
"I meant it all."
oooooooooo
Now about the dedication, I'll put one in for every chapter, each for one of the few good teachers I had throughout my life.
Anyway, Zyra will probably be my only OC in this story. Only important one, that is.
I'm sorry about the title though, it'll make more sense later in the story, but not a lot more. I do a lot of things well in my life, but naming things is not one of those.
So, I'll try to post every few days, and right now my plan is to have six chapters total. If you like how this started and are interested take the time to leave a comment :)