[fic] Something to Hold Onto, Chapter 9: Strain This Chaos, Turn It Into Light

[wildgoosery]

Title: Something to Hold Onto [9/13]
Word count: 11,000
Pairing: Jet/Zuko
Rating: A very hard R for language, violence and sexual content
Summary: Since the day the walls of Ba Sing Se fell, the Freedom Fighters have struggled to protect what remains of the city and its people. Jet and his second command, a mysterious boy named Li, have spent the

Comments

Assholes Together: A Love Story

[sistermagpie]

What I love about this chapter is how it's all about what they fight for. A lot of times people will get focused on quests or battles or whatever, but they think scenes like this are boring, scenes where people are just being happy and peaceful and having fun and arguing over folkdances and shyly admitting that they play the flute, kind of. So I loved just getting to spend time with everybody.

It was like everybody touching base and making sure everyone important knew how they felt about them before the end, which was hanging over everything. Jet has his wonderful scene with Smellerbee and Longshot where they explain to him what was really going on back in the forest, sort of refocusing him to a mature view, if that makes sense. He gets to see all those years what he was in their eyes, and what he wasn't, so he can let go of things that aren't really necessary. And they're also able to talk about what Zuko was--ha, I loved Smellerbee's admitting Jet was actually right about something she fought him about.

Which is totally similar to Iroh and Zuko, where he gets his Glinda "She had to learn it for herself" moment. With Jet to talk him down from the threat of a fit of self-pity over when an IDIOT he was. I love how you work in all the beats that are important for the show because they're necessary for everyone's development, like Zuko finding out about Roku and seeing just what Iroh did for him all those years. Bonus points for explaining the Iroh/Zuko connection, how the Lotus had every reason not to trust him and reminding us that his wisdom was won the same way Zuko's was, through loss of the things important to him and major fuck ups.

All of which gives Jet and Zuko the ability to have a mature conversation about their future and what they don't know.

Finally, one moment I wanted to remember to cheer about because I loved it was when Jet was watching Zuko firebend with his hand in the grass and thinking about the forest. So often it's only the benders who get associated with their elements, but I love how you show how Jet is earth kingdom all the way, just in his non-bending way, living and loving the forest, chewing on stalks of things generally smelling like grass, I imagine, next to Zuko whose bending is part of who he is. Love how Jet recognizes that as something he knows about benders while not recognizing it in himself.

And all the pictures this time make me do a dance of joy.