Crackfic Idea:

Crackfic Idea:

30-year-old Zuko gets randomly flung back in time to his 16-year-old self. For a couple of hours at a time. At the most random times imaginable. Imagine the potential.

Zuko assumes that it's a dream or a vision, but definitely not real. He tries not to freak everybody out too badly, but he's also fully enjoying himself and seeing all of his friends as their young selves.

ZUKO, as he and Aang circle each other at the South Pole: I've spent years preparing for this encounter. Training, meditating. You're just a [Spirit Shwoop Sound] ... baby Aang!

AANG, confused: Well, more like preteen Aang. How do you know my name?

ZUKO, looking around: Wait, where are we?

AANG: Um... this is the-

SOKKA: Don't answer him! He's trying to get information out of you. You can't give away our location!

KATARA: Sokka, he's standing in the middle of our village. I think he knows.

ZUKO: We're here? This is so weird. I was just here for the Annual Penguin Race.

AANG: THERE'S AN ANNUAL PENGUIN RACE?!

ZUKO: Well, yeah, it was your idea... you gave a whole speech about cross-cultural cooperation and friendship, but I know you just wanted to go penguin sledding with a bunch of people...

AANG: Well, I-

SOKKA: Stop giving him more information! He already knows about the penguins!

Everybody else is confused, bewildered and even befuddled except for Iroh, who assumes that it's Spirit Shenanigans™️ and just fully accepts that his nephew likes tea and hugs and Pai Sho sometimes while being his usual shouty surly traumaball self at others.

ZUKO, stepping into the cabin: Hi, Uncle. I brought you some ginseng. How about a game of Pai Sho?

IROH, tearing up a little: I would love that, my nephew.

ZUKO: I wish we could do this more often, but you live so far away...

IROH, mentally calculating that he lives exactly three doors away from Zuko, and nodding sagely: The rat-viper may never climb the mountain that a hog-monkey can, but the monkey does not know what lies underneath it.

ZUKO, sighing sadly: I know, Uncle. I do appreciate my position in life, even if it has disadvantages.

IROH: Hmm. Your move, nephew.

The crew of Zuko's ship is terrified by the fact that whenever it happens, Zuko is somehow even more hyper-competent, seems to be weirdly calm about everything, and most unnervingly of all, he's polite.

SOLDIER: Here is a report on the best teahouses within three days travel of our current location, Sir. And, uh, Commander Zhao sent a messenger hawk.

ZUKO: Excellent. Thank you very much, Sergeant. I think we can ignore whatever Zhao has to say. In reply, I want you to send him a list of the most famous officers in Fire Nation history, and point out that none of them had sideburns. I want to see if he shaves them.

SOLDIER, sweating nervously: O-of course, Sir.

As a matter of fact, the whole fic could just be Zuko trolling Zhao. It would be glorious.

happy birthday muichiro!! 💙🎉

tea time with the bestie

i have enough ideas to write 100 books and enough indecision to write none.

ah christ it's bongo oh no bongo they got you

Yes, Zuko’s hair development is great, but let’s take a second to appreciate Iroh’s hair/beard development as well.

All of season one, same style. Clean and pointy in the front, half up in the top-knot, the rest loose. traditional Fire nation military style.

Immediately post-exile, obviously he’s homeless, so no equipment to shave.

Just let’s it go wild, cause, ya know, what choice does he have?

Once they get into Ba Sing Se, he does seem to at least be styling and brushing, making it much more presentable, but still no trimming it seems like.

Once they get into the upper ring and are doing pretty well for themselves, Iroh starts styling his beard as well as wearing his hair in an earth kingdom-typical braid.

He does seem to start trimming and reshaping in the tail end of season two, though this could simply be due to animation inconsistency.

Prison era, back to unkempt, but this time is on purpose. Gotta put on peak crazy old man performance of course.

Now this is what I find interesting. He’s with his gang, Iroh and the old guys. He is going full traitor mode, actively fighting against the Fire Nation instead of being complacent or sidedly resigned, and what does he decide to do? Shave it back to the proper military cut. His lineage proudly on display, despite actively defying that lineage. Here, I believe Iroh is wearing this cut, not for the current, corrupted Fire nation, but for its future, and the nation he hopes it will become under Zuko’s rule. ‘I am Fire nation, and I will fight to return my country to is former glory.’

It could also be for the people of Ba Sing Se, saying ‘I am the man who laid siege to your city, and I am not hiding that fact. I am here again, now, to liberate it, and make up for my past misdeeds.’

It may also be for the occupying military members already there, as a sort of final ‘fuck you’ to the military he once served. ‘Look at me, the great dragon of the west, I’m a trendsetter when it comes to attacking this city, and I am also the trend-killer. I’m going to kill you now.’

After the events of the show, he seems to maintain it in such a way that keeps the pointy-ness of the traditional cut, while also blending it with the softer ‘T’ shape that he styled it to when he first entered the upper ring. We can only assume that he kept it more or less this way for the rest of life, and finally let it exist in its full ‘wise old man w/sagely long white beard’ Gandalf style when he departed to the spirit world. Zuko in his old age also wears his beard in a similar, albeit much shorter, soft ‘T’ shape that Iroh always favored.

Thank you for coming to my TED Talk.