>
>"You're welcome, sir," the robot replied. "Is there
>anything else you require?" After a pause precisely timed for
>maximum effect, he added cordially, "Fisto is programmed to
>provide complete satisfaction."

*snort*

>
>Sitting opposite Zuko on the lounge's right-angled modular sofa, their
>mother smiled and chided her gently, "Azula, don't torment your
>brother."
>

I liked what little I saw of their mother in the original series. I'm glad you're bringing her out of the fridge.

>"Do you know," she said suddenly, during a natural lull in the
>conversation, "I don't think the three of us have ever, ever done this
>before."
>
>Zuko blinked in surprise and glanced at Ursa, who nodded a little
>sadly. "I think you're right, Azula," she said. "By the time you and
>Zuko were both old enough to have a day like this, you were no longer
>really on speaking terms... and there was always the shadow of your
>father," she added with a troubled frown.

Shadow. Yes, well, I suppose that's one term for it.

>Zuko could only stare, his jaw dropping, as Katara - still dressed in
>her now-very-rumpled clothes from last night, her hair in
>pillow-induced disarray - blinked like an owl in the gentle lights of
>the sitting room, then glared blearily at the back of Azula's head.
>

*spittake*

>"i hate you," she muttered, her voice a dry
>croak, as she lurched past the chair and sank into the loveseat
>opposite the L-sofa.
>

This, for the record, is where the grin really started. It only got wider from this point forward.

>"Your satisfaction is Fisto's purpose," the robot replied
>with a cordial bow before exiting.

This isn't the first time Fisto has appeared, and Google is of course My Friend so I should know where he's from, but frankly I'm scared to type "fisto" into a search box.

I don't *need* to know -- the character's enjoyable as-is without prior knowledge -- but if there's an in-joke here I'm missing besides the obvious one then I'm still missing it. :)

>Katara stared at her for a second or two, her expression hard to read,
>and then demanded, "Why are you being nice to me?"
>
>Azula shrugged slightly. "Why not? The other way clearly
>never got me anywhere."
>

This entire exchange is really good. I like it a lot more than I liked their previous banter during the party. During the party Azula seemed... smug, I suppose. Katara wasn't any better. I certainly get that these grudges have been building for a long time, but neither of them seemed ready at the party to really lay down the axes.

Here it seems that Katara's the one holding more of a grudge. I don't know that I agree with that -- Katara's always struck me as the forgiving type -- but I can't argue against the presentation. It *makes sense*, regardless of what I think of her character.

I *really* like how you've broken, then fixed, Azula. I always felt like she got the short end of the stick in the original series, and seeing her in UF is refreshing.

>"Only vaguely," said Katara. "I seem to recall it started with a
>revisitation of that half-baked non-apology you came up with at
>dinner."
>

That... is an amazingly apt description. That's what I remember thinking while reading that scene: "This isn't an apology, Azula..."

Of course, I'm not sure how justified one would be in demanding an apology from someone who was *clearly* out of their gourd when the did the bad things, but that's not exactly the point.

>Azula chuckled dryly. "It did, yes. From there... well, the short
>version is that it developed into an examination of the
>fruit-of-the-poison-tree doctrine vis-à-vis my actions during
>the War and any good I might've managed to do for anyone since." Her
>wry smile flickered on again as she added, "You took rather a hard
>line."
>
>"Hnh," said Katara noncommittally into her coffee.
>

"Hnh," I said, and turned to the dictionary.

>"In the end, though, I think we might've met somewhere near the
>middle. And, for the record, it wasn't a non-apology. You might be
>dissatisfied with what I apologized for, but the apology itself
>was sincere. I was wrong, I was cruel, I hurt you and the people you
>love, and I'm sorry for it."
>

Ah, but, it's all in the presentation, Azula my dear.

>her spirit battled against each other within her. On the one hand,
>she was a caring, compassionate woman, a doctor and healer, a person
>in whom hope for the future had never quite died even in the darkest
>moments of the war. On the other, she was a warrior of the Southern
>Water Tribe - tough, tenacious, a survivor; but that same tenacity
>made her stubborn and slow to forgive.
>

This actually makes your interpretation of Katara make a helluva lot of sense. I can see it. Again, not sure if I agree, but I can see it.

The bitch of it is I lack the skill to explain *why* I feel like Katara is slightly off somehow. I look at her here and something just doesn't seem quite right, but I don't know what it is.

Like I said above though, the UF!Katara makes sense as a character, and this part here shows why you went the way you did with her. Which makes me happy; I don't have to agree with how you portray a character to still enjoy the portrayal of that character, if that makes sense.

>"Ah," said Azula. "That explains why he claimed he had intended to
>last night; to save your blushes. Did you think I'd turned willingly?
> Changed my mind about rejoining Father's 'team'?"
>

If this had been her debut in the UF setting, I would *totally* have thought that... though I would have also suspected that you were setting up a reversal of some sort, because UF is where characters go to become awesome again after their original writers forget how to treat them right.

>"I'd say 'look after yourselves'," she remarked, "but given that
>you're all dead anyway, that seems a bit silly."
>
>"We're not dead, we're battling evil in another dimension!" Sokka
>insisted.

*slow clap*

>"Armistice Day" - a Twilight / Desolation Angel Mini-Story
>by Benjamin D. Hutchins
>special to the Eyrie Productions Discussion Forum
>© 2014 Eyrie Productions, Unlimited

And a damn fine read, sir. Thank you.

--sofaspud
--