*。☆。
★。＼｜／。★
˚ ₊ ♡ ❰  MIRACULUM ❱
*✧ ─── ❝ ❪ BELOW THE SURFACE ❫ ❞

⋆ 🌪. CHAPTER TWENTY NINE✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*
˚ ₊ ♡ 112 a.a ─── book two: earth

"ZUKO." HER VOICE WAS STEADY, FIRM AND CARRIED ACROSS THE ALLEYWAY. Zuko froze, his grip on the Dai Li agent tightening before he tilted his head sideways, shadows dancing across the scarred skin of his face.

"How long have you been following me?" he gritted his teeth.

"Long enough to know what you're planning." Uki replied honestly, "even though I had hoped you wouldn't."

His jaw tightened, and slowly, he turned, moving the earthbender in his grasp with him.

"I'm going to find him," he said. "He's close."

"Zuko," Uki said again, stepping forward. "You need to let it go."

He finally lifted his head to truly look at her. His face was pale in the early moonlight, a sheen of sweat along his brow, eyes bruised with exhaustion and something else. Obsession.

"You don't understand," he said, low and controlled. "This is my only chance. If I capture the Avatar's bison, I'll draw him out. I can still—"

"Still what?" she snapped, stepping closer, all their earlier conversations running through her head "Regain your throne? Crawl back to a country that banished you?"

He stepped toward her, slow but deliberate. "This is what I was born to do."

"No," Uki said, voice sharper now. "It's what your father told you to do. There's a difference." She paused and took a steadying breath, "you have a chance at a real life here. Please don't waste it."

Zuko flinched like she'd struck him. His hand twitched toward the twin broadswords at his back.

"I thought you understood," he murmured. "You've been helping us—helping me—this whole time."

"I have," Uki nodded. "But not so you could go back to being him. I know, just like you uncle, that there is someone better inside you, someone honourable."

Zuko's lips pulled into a bitter line. "You don't get to decide who I am."

"And you don't get to use the Avatar to fix your broken crown."

She shifted her stance, just slightly, the waterskin at her side rippling.

Zuko saw it and Uki knew whatever fragile friendship they had found would shatter.

"I'm going," he said flatly.

"Then I'll stop you."

There was a moment of stillness—like the breath before a storm. Then—

Zuko moved first.

His swords were out in a flash of steel and moonlight. Uki reacted just as fast, pulling water from the pouch at her hip and sending a slicing arc toward his feet. He leapt it easily, twisting midair and slashing downward, but she had already melted the water using it to shield her in a swirling wall.

The clash echoed in the alleyway. Zuko was fast, but Uki was fluid. Every strike he made was redirected, slowed, or blocked by sharp curls of water that surged and whipped with practiced precision.

"You don't have to do this," she panted between blows, ducking a heavy arc of both his blades.

"I do!" he shouted, his temper finally breaking through—and Uki knew that if he could, if he dared inside the city, he would firebend.

He struck again, this time with a flat, glancing blow that caught her arm and sent her staggering back.

She caught herself, breath hitching, and launched a wave of water that smashed into him full force, knocking him hard against the alley wall.

For a heartbeat, he didn't move.

Then Zuko rose, smoke curling from his sleeves, the edge of one blade nicked from her water whip.

"I'm sorry," he said. "But you're not stopping me."

He lunged.

This time, Uki was too slow. She raised a shield of water, but his strike came from the other side—he feinted, pivoted, and slammed the hilt of his sword into her side.

She cried out, stumbling.

Then the second strike came, clean, quick, and blunt to the temple.

Darkness folded over her before she even hit the ground.

UKI'S BODY FELT HEAVY, HER THOUGHTS TANGLED LIKE KELP IN A TIDE. A DULL THROBBING PAIN BLOOMED at her temple, and slowly, so slowly, consciousness dragged her back into the world.

A hand was on her shoulder, firm but gentle, shaking her.

"Uki..."

The voice was warm, but tinged with worry and it sounded familiar,

"Yue?" She mumbled her head swirling.

"Uki, child, wake up." The voice morphed again, this time more clear instead of a whisper underwater. The lilt was low and comforting.

Her eyes fluttered open. Shapes blurred together above her; green tunic, kind face, silver beard. The faint glow of lantern light flickered across stone walls.

"Iroh..." she mumbled, struggling to sit up.

He caught her shoulders gently. "Take it slow. You've taken a nasty hit."

She winced, bringing a hand to her aching head. Her hair was damp where it had pressed against the stone, and her ribs ached with every breath. The alley around them was dim, only lit by the soft golden spill of light from a far-off window.

Then everything rushed back.

Zuko. The swords. The fight. The way he looked at her—like she was the enemy.

Uki shot upright.

"He's going after Appa," she gasped.

Iroh's eyes, so often full of mirth, had turned grave. "I feared as much. When I found you here, I knew something had gone wrong."

"I tried to stop him," she said through clenched teeth, pushing herself shakily to her feet. "He wouldn't listen. He still thinks capturing the Avatar is the only way."

Iroh stood with her, steadying her as she swayed.

Uki looked down the alleyway, the last faint traces of Zuko's footprints vanishing into the shadows. Her hand curled into a fist. "We have have to stop him before he goes too far."

She goes to take a step, but she wobbled unsteadily on her feet, and Iroh reaches out to steady her one more.

"Careful child." Iroh warned her with a gentle voice. "it can be dangerous, and you are not fully recovered."

Uki's jaw tightened, "I'm not afraid of him."

Iroh gave her a look, part sorrow, part pride. "No. I don't suppose you are."

Without another word, they turned and moved together into the darkness, slipping through the quiet backstreets of the Lower Ring. The moon hung high above them now, casting silver across rooftops and shadowed alleys. Somewhere ahead, beyond walls and gates and guarded paths, Zuko was moving.

And they had to catch him, before he did something neither of them could take back.

Iroh to her surprise, was easily able to track his nephew, as if he knew the way before Zuko even did. They moved through narrow alleys and twisting backstreets, weaving between laundry lines and stacks of discarded crates.

"He's heading to Lake Laogai," Iroh murmured.

Uki furrowed her brow. "How do you know?"

Iroh casted a glance sideways, mirth in his eyes. "There is knowledge in these streets only few know about." He replied vaguely, before chuckling warmly about a joke she didn't understand—or realized had been made.

Uki scowled but didn't say anything.

Eventually, the winding streets gave way to the outskirts of the city—a quieter place where lanterns thinned and fog curled in from the distance. The moon reflected faintly across the black surface of a lake, glassy and silent as the grave.

Lake Laogai.

Uki stepped to the edge of the water, scanning the still surface. "You're sure he's here?"

"I am." Iroh's voice had taken on a weight she hadn't heard before. He stepped beside her, hands folded behind his back. "This lake is a lie, much like the city that hides it. Below its calm surface... are things better left buried."

She didn't like the sound of that.

"Do you know how to get down there?" she asked.

"I do," he replied softly. "There is a tunnel. Hidden among the rocks along the lake's edge."

Uki turned her gaze back to the water, her jaw tightening. "If Zuko finds the Avatar's bison, if he captures him—"

"He will not," Iroh interrupted gently. "Not if we reach him in time."

Uki gave a small nod. Her heart beat harder in her chest, but her mind stayed clear. She could not let him do this, she had given him plenty of chances to change his mind, to do what was right.

She defended him against Jet, she lied to the Dai Li, but she could not stand for this.

The two of them stepped into the shallows, the water cold around their ankles. Mist clung low across the lake's surface, and silence wrapped around them like a shroud.

Then, Iroh reached forward, pushing aside a wall of moss-covered stone to reveal a narrow tunnel. Darkness yawning within.

"Stay close," he murmured.

Uki swallowed the lump in her throat and stepped inside after him.

The lake swallowed them whole.

The hallways were dark, cold and eerily empty. Their footsteps echoed against the smooth stone floors, swallowed quickly by the silence. Iroh moved like he had walked these halls before, unfazed by the cold or the haunting quiet. Uki stayed close, her hand resting on the cork of her waterskin, ready to draw at the first sign of movement.

The deeper they went, the colder it grew. Not the crisp kind of cold Uki had grown up with in the North, but a sterile, lifeless kind. The kind that clung to your skin like damp silk and reminded you that no sunlight had ever touched these halls.

Then she heard it, faint at first. The sound echoed and her heart started to race—she darted away before Iroh could realize.

She skidded to a halt at the end of a corridor, a large looming door greeted her and the sound of Appa's growls and stamping feet sounded pleasantly in her ears.

Iroh appeared beside her just as she pushed the door open.

Light cascaded through the gap and illuminated a familiar figure clad in black.

"Uncle?"

"So... the blue spirit. I wonder who could be behind that mask?" He spoke calmly, stroking his beard in a knowing manner.

Zuko sighed, paused for a second before he pulled the blue mask away from his face. "What are you doing here?"

Uki remained in the back, ice-coloured eyes focused on Appa.

"I was just about to ask you the same thing." Iroh countered, "what do you plan to do now, that you have found the Avatar's bison?" He approached his nephew, "keep it locked in our new apartment? Should I go put on a pot of tea for him?"

"First I have to get it out of here—"

Uki stepped forward, jaw set, "I would never let you pass this door firebender." She spat out, feet shifting into a offensive position.

"And then what!" Iroh interrupted their stare down and glanced at Uki. "You fight, alert the whole base of your whereabouts and everyone will get captured." He took a deep breath before turning to look at Zuko. "You never think these things through."

Uki flinched at his tone, harsh cold—something she had always expected from a firebender, and yet it sounded wrong coming from Iroh's mouth.

"This is exactly what happened when you captured the avatar at the North Pole. You had him, and then, you had nowhere to go."

"I would have figured something out."

"No!" Iroh shook his head, hands waving in front of him, "if his friends—if Uki, hadn't decided to take you with them, you would have frozen to death."

The firebender clenched his jaw, a low growl escaping his throat. "I know my own destiny uncle."

"Is it your own destiny?" Iroh continued, "or is it a destiny someone else has tried to force on you?"

"Stop it uncle, I have to do this." He turned to Appa once more.

"Zuko please," Uki stepped forward, tears lining her eyes, "you can't do this. Please you have to do what is right—you know what is right!"

"I'm begging you prince Zuko," Iroh added fiercely, "It is time for you to look inward and begin asking yourself the big questions. Who are you and what do you want?"

A scream erupted from his throat and with a forceful swing he threw his swords to the ground. They clattered loudly, the sound echoing from the walls.

Hope lit inside her chest.

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