Empty

OOC: XD Sorry for the ambiguity; I just kind of wanted to do an 'aftermath' thing to the post below, but that's kind of hard to do in the first person because Azula lies/denies/is a general head case so much. Heh. So, yeah, what the subject line says... if anyone responds and wants to do an RL that's fine, but first-person posts are good to go as well. :) (Possibly a bit unorthodox, I know- new RPer is new and full of fail.)

Sometimes, especially at night when everything was quiet and she didn't really have anything to think about, her mind involuntarily wandered back to that night. How- though there were many negative words she could use to describe the whole experience (idiotic, foolish, childish, weak, weak, weak)- it hadn't been altogether unpleasant. Not really.

Still, when her mind got to mulling this sort of thing over, she would invariably end up- quite without warning- feeling as though her hand was too empty, or that her luxurious bed was far too big for one person (perhaps something a bit smaller would suffice?). These sorts of thoughts made her angry, and when Princess Azula was angry, people around her tended to get hurt (one of the servants who had been unlucky enough to knock on her door at exactly the wrong time was currently in the infirmary, having a fairly sizeable burn on her hand treated and bandaged). Even Ty Lee herself had thought the situation embarrassing, and had no desire for it to be repeated. Therefore, more often than not, Azula found herself wishing for some sort of memory eraser- something that would rid her of confusing thoughts and turmoiled emotions. She was lucky that this sort of thing didn't plague her during the daylight hours- she couldn't afford to lose the peace of mind essential for bending lightning.

She had been telling the truth, though, when she said that she had never tried to harm Ty Lee. Even that time at the circus, when she had come to fetch the girl- she knew that she would be able to keep from falling onto the flaming net, or into the jaws of some wild animal below. She wouldn't have bothered going for her if she hadn't been talented.

That still didn't change the fact that she had made a big mistake. Weakness was unacceptable- not just in her actions, but in her thoughts, her emotions, her life. And- even though she would never admit this to anybody- it worried her that she wasn't at all sure that it wouldn't be far too easy to make the exact same mistake over again.

Mother

It always seemed to work the same way- Azula would leave every interaction with her mother absolutely furious, ready and willing to fry anyone who made the mistake of crossing her path.
After a time, however, the anger would fade and be replaced with mere frustration- and sometimes, sadness, loneliness, and confusion (those- in her mind, at least- weaker emotions that she rather liked to pretend didn't exist). Invariably, she would end up escaping to her room after the first stage (often leaving in her wake at least one or two servants in varying stages of injury) to climb into her bed, curl up under her luxurious down comforter, and ignore the fact that ever since that night when she had made that stupid, stupid mistake, being completely alone just made her feel worse.

It simply didn't make sense. She truly hated her mother- she didn't desire to have a better relationship with her, and if she were to somehow turn up dead, it wouldn't matter to her in the least- the only emotion she would feel would be annoyance at whatever circumstances stole her job, her right, from her. There were no repressed feelings, no desire for her love- it did hurt, a little bit, to know that she was a monster in her mother's eyes, but that had nothing to do with her personal feelings towards the woman (and besides, she had never denied it).

During these times, she was able to gain just a little bit of comfort by reminding herself that when the war was won and the Fire Nation had proven itself to be the most powerful nation in the world, she would have the time to hunt down her mother and end her. Until then, however, she had to focus on the task at hand, which was much more difficult when she kept popping up.

It really was a good thing that she didn't see her mother all that often.