Sarapen's Journal

This post is about the Avatar fanfic I am writing, tentatively titled The Quest. It’s shaping up to be my magnum opus, to be honest. I’ve been kicking it around for months and the amount of research I’ve done for it is far beyond what I’ve done for any other fic. I’ve been reading up about Chinese kinship systems, obscure martial arts, and attitudes on the Mandate of Heaven. To be fair, though, I wasn’t reading those things specifically for the fic but I did note interesting stuff down.

Anyway, The Quest is set three years after the war in a world where Aang’s iceberg was found by Suki at Kyoshi Island (it drifted north). Yeah, it’s majorly alternate universe. I was kind of worried that all of my stories would be retreads of the canon series with one or two points of departure, but this one is way different.

I’m currently having a marathon of Legend of the Legendary Heroes while roasting a pork shoulder in the oven (and yes, the title of the anime sounds dumb). In the course of my viewing I spied a certain Miran Froaude:

Who bears an uncanny resemblance to Mai from Avatar: The Last Airbender:

Two differences:

1. Miran doesn’t have the odango pigtail buns hairstyle and,
2. Has a penis.

I’m just guessing on the last part, it’s not like ze whips out the block and tackle for the audience to have a gander. But damn, “Miran Froaude”? The name sounds stupid, just like a lot of made-up Japanese names from sci-fi and fantasy. Then again, I’ve come up against some pretty dumb names in English fiction as well.

Mirrored from Sarapen.

What follows are scenes I’m thinking of including in The Dog Who Was a Prince. It’s annoying how much I’ve got already written when you consider the fact that all of it is stuff from later chapters. I guess I just need to get over the hump of the next chapter. Again, there are obviously lots of spoilers, and again, I welcome any and all feedback.

This is as much as I have for now, I’ll put up some more of my writing notes tomorrow.

What a great place! The Freedom Fighters had an awesome hideout and everyone here was the best! Aang laughed as he watched his new friends talking and having fun around the dinner table. It was great being around so many people his age, and for a brief second he recalled being at the Southern Air Temple again with all of the Airbender novices. Of course, the Southern Air Temple had only been this much fun before he'd found out he was the Avatar, before his friends had started to avoid him, before the Fire Nation – Aang quickly changed his thoughts to another subject.

His new friends and his less-new friends looked to be getting along well. Katara especially was hitting it off with Jet, the leader of the Freedom Fighters. Then again, she got on well with everyone. She was just great that way.

Suddenly he heard happy shouts of surprise and turned to see an older boy in a rice farmer's conical straw hat being led to the dinner table by a group of younger Freedom Fighters. His guides were all shouting questions at him. "Lee's back! What adventures have you had, Lee?" "How many Fire Nation soldiers did you take out, Lee?" "Did you bring us anything, Lee?"

What if Zuko deserved to be banished? What if Ozai had a legitimate reason for despising him? And what if poor Iroh still had to stick with him?

Note: This is an expansion of the one-shot fic It Never Happened.

-------------

"But why do I have to go to the council meeting?" whined Zuko to his Uncle Iroh. "It's boring and there aren't any hot chicks there."

"It's your duty as heir to concern yourself with matters of state," answered Iroh as he pushed his charge down the halls of the palace. "Someday you'll rule our country so you should begin preparing for your eventual reign."

Iroh realized that Zuko wasn't listening to him, but was instead eyeing the admittedly shapely behind of the maid scurrying down the hall in front of them. "Zuko, pay attention!"

"Huh? Uh, yeah, sounds good. Sounds really good." Iroh noticed drool starting to leak out of Zuko's mouth. "Really, really good. Who's a good girl? Yeah honey, work that cute little – ow!"

Iroh drew his fingers back from Zuko's eyeballs. "Uncle, you blinded me! This is treason! How am I supposed to masturbate without visuals?"