三
A day or so after Aang's death, Iroh had left for the Wastelands to find his nephew. Zuko needed to know.
He had known that it would be difficult to find his nephew - the Wastelands were large - but he had confidence in his tracking ability.
That confidence wavered over the course of days. There was no sign of his nephew, not a single trace despite Iroh's tireless searching. He couldn't give up, refused to give up. When his meager supplies were gone, he simply foraged for food and continued searching. What if Zuko was hurt? What if the same person who had killed Aang attacked his nephew as well?
When he slept, his dreams were troubled with visions of a young man's body, ripped open like Aang's had been. Sometimes it was Zuko, other times Lu Ten, sometimes both at once.
One day he tripped over a rock and landed face first in a little stream. After the first rush of pain subsided, he found himself laughing. It would be just like Toph to knock some sense into him - literally.
There were still children who needed him, who were no doubt worried by his absence. And they needed to be told.
Slowly and carefully, Iroh made his way out of the Wastelands and back to their house, to break the news that their little family had lost another member and he another son.
[text]
[It took Iroh a lot of effort to post this, as the emotion in his voice garbled what the dictation program wrote. Strikes are what he originally said and then rewrote.]
It seems that Zuko has left gone missing gone home.
My nephew was blessed with many friends here. Thank you for your friendship. I know he was grateful to have you, and that he would have liked to have said goodbye.
[ooc: Iroh has already informed the housemates in person. Housemates, you can either tag in as action to play out finding out, or you can just assume Iroh told you. As always, threadjacking encouraged!]
He had known that it would be difficult to find his nephew - the Wastelands were large - but he had confidence in his tracking ability.
That confidence wavered over the course of days. There was no sign of his nephew, not a single trace despite Iroh's tireless searching. He couldn't give up, refused to give up. When his meager supplies were gone, he simply foraged for food and continued searching. What if Zuko was hurt? What if the same person who had killed Aang attacked his nephew as well?
When he slept, his dreams were troubled with visions of a young man's body, ripped open like Aang's had been. Sometimes it was Zuko, other times Lu Ten, sometimes both at once.
One day he tripped over a rock and landed face first in a little stream. After the first rush of pain subsided, he found himself laughing. It would be just like Toph to knock some sense into him - literally.
There were still children who needed him, who were no doubt worried by his absence. And they needed to be told.
Slowly and carefully, Iroh made his way out of the Wastelands and back to their house, to break the news that their little family had lost another member and he another son.
[text]
[It took Iroh a lot of effort to post this, as the emotion in his voice garbled what the dictation program wrote. Strikes are what he originally said and then rewrote.]
It seems that Zuko has left gone missing gone home.
My nephew was blessed with many friends here. Thank you for your friendship. I know he was grateful to have you, and that he would have liked to have said goodbye.
[ooc: Iroh has already informed the housemates in person. Housemates, you can either tag in as action to play out finding out, or you can just assume Iroh told you. As always, threadjacking encouraged!]