Set after Episode 3.2 (The Headband)

It was past midnight and still Zuko lay awake staring at the burgundy canopy above his bed. The same as he'd done every night for weeks. Since coming home.

Azula's reassurance in the throne room of Ba Sing Se rang more hollow every time his mind struck against it.

"He betrayed you."

"He betrayed you."

What was so insidious was that the words were true—it was indisputable fact that General Iroh had conspired with the enemies of the Fire Lord, committing high treason against his own blood kin. Zuko had acted for the good of his people, and out of his loyalty to the man who should command it. He had chosen the right course.

But still he couldn't sleep, and his meals turned to sawdust in his mouth, because he knew Iroh never acted selfishly, and if he chose to side with the Avatar, it was for good reason. He had nothing to gain and everything to lose, and chose anyway. If Iroh was right, that meant that Azula, and by extension their father, were wrong.

It was also true that someday, probably as soon as the Avatar revealed himself again, that Azula would betray him. When she took up the strings there was no question her puppets would dance for her; Mei would plant as many kunai in his belly as Azula wished, a few kisses and a sunset picnic nonwithstanding. She might feel conflicted about it, but she would do it.

There was also a small part of him that whispered greater fears—whether Azula held their father's strings too, in hands blessed with wit and charm and flawless skill that matched the Fire Lord's own, no matter that she was a girl and second-born. His father had never defended him against anything—not against Azulon, and not against his own pride when Zuko had spoken out, justly, against his most trusted generals. His mother and uncle were the only ones that ever tried, the first dead and the second imprisoned behind thick walls of stone and his own stubbornness and spite.

Zuko was alone. Completely. And afraid.