Chapter Text
It was pitch black this deep in the prison. Swallowed completely by blackness, the only light being the sparsely placed torches. The cells were only large enough for a bucket and a thin, lumpy mat.
The higher segments, those aboveground, were the oldest. Built under the reign of Firelord Sozin. The segments below that, just underground, were built while Firelord Azulon ruled. And these deepest cells, as far away from the sun and moon as you could get, were ordered by Firelord Ozai.
He had demanded that they be built to sap the power of any captured waterbenders, forcing earthbending prisoners to carve the ground beneath their feet until it was complete.
Here, deep underground, the former Phoenix King Ozai stayed. Arms and legs chained to the ground, body weak and frail, a curtain of greasy, filthy black hair dragging along the floor and blocking his vision.
How long had he been here? Years? Decades? He didn’t know. He had been transferred here, a terrified guard dragging his weakened body from the higher parts of the prison and throwing him into this cell.
At the time, Ozai had laughed, thought that the guard should be terrified.
Now, he wasn't quite sure. He was pathetic. Weak. He had no bending, no influence, and no power. Not anymore.
The guards down here made sure he knew that. They beat him, tortured him, mocked him, and all Ozai could do was take it. Maybe, just maybe, if he did exactly what they wanted, they would stop.
But had Father ever stopped?
He felt like a child. Dependent on others mercy. And he deserved it, because he was too weak to do what was needed. He wasn't good enough to kill the Avatar, and this was the price to pay.
He had been enraged before, when his son came to mock him in his cell. Now, he would give anything for him to appear again. He would give anything for the chance to beg and plead for mercy.
He didn't know why Zuko - Firelord Zuko - stopped visiting. Was he really that pathetic? To be forgotten and left to rot by a weakling like him? If he had just killed the Avatar, if he had won , none of this would have happened. He would be Phoenix King! The Fire Nation would rule over the entire planet, its prosperity spread across the land and those other, inferior nations crushed beneath his shoe.
But he never stood a chance against the Avatar. He knew that now.
Ozais mind was a blur. Each day was the same as the next; 2 bland meals of an unidentified gruel, after which he would be tormented. Whipped, beat, cut, burned. Worse. Far, far worse. The guards took great pleasure in asserting their power over the former Firelord. And he deserved it, he did, because he was weak, weak, weak.
He did not hold back screams of agony, when they came. He was too pathetic to bother trying to seem dignified.
Sometimes, he thought; Did Zuko feel this pathetic? When I banished him?
He always tore the thought to shreds. Zuko was weak, and the weak and cowardly, those without honor, had no place with the strong.
But sometimes, he could not dispel the thought fast enough, and a flood of thoughts followed.
What would Father think?
Even if he got out, what would he do?
Beg?
Beg to who? Zuko? The Avatar?
A chance to redeem himself, to prove that he wasn't weak, that he could do what was needed, and then…
And then what?
Ozai wondered sometimes. No, often. If he had killed the Avatar… what would he have done? A war of 100 years was useless . He had wanted to win, but why? It was Sozin's goal, wasn't it? Sozin would have known what to do afterwards.
But had he told Father? Father certainly hadn't told him.
He just wanted power, in the end. He just wanted to prove that he could .
No. No, no, no, no, no. He would do something. Father would have wanted him to kill the Avatar and win the war. That's how he would carry on his legacy!
But he had no bending. He couldn't. Never in a million years.
How long had he been underground? Years? Decades?
At some point, he couldn't stand it anymore. The silence, the pain, the loneliness and humiliation. And, for the first time in his life, he sobbed. Loudly, messily. Shame racked his body but his tears remained unhidden; he had already lost all dignity.
He cried and screamed until he couldn't anymore. And then he would start again. He would slam his skull against the floor, claw at his own face with his cracked, yellow fingernails. The guards only laughed. He wanted his status back, his honor back, but it would never come back. Never .
Maybe, if he suffered enough, he would be let free. At least he would have that.
And then it happened. At some point, he could not cry anymore. He would start again in a few hours, inevitably. He didn't want to, but at some point, he would break again. He knew he would.
But that was when he heard the voice.
“You've been going on for a while, boy.”
A guard was here to mock him, was his first thought. But no; the voice was steeped in the roughness of the elderly. It was coming from beside him…
From the cell beside him.
“Who…?”
His throat was raw now. It was little more than a whisper.
“Tell me who you are, and I'll return the favor. Maybe.”
Silence.
He had no honor left. If this woman hated him too, wanted to prove herself more powerful, then he would let her.
“Ozai.”
This was met with a wild cackle, and he braced himself for her next words.
“Ozai! Firelord Ozai, in the flesh! Oh, this is just beautiful! The son of the man who dragged me to this rotten place. You're in pain, aren't you, boy? Tell me, what have they done to you?”
She waited expectantly, laughing, and Ozai suddenly wished he could still cry.
“My…fingers. They pulled off some of my fingers.”
The woman howled with laughter, and he heard the stomping of feet.
“Brilliant! That was a month ago, wasn't it? That was what I heard! What else?”
Ozai felt sick at the woman's tone. She was taking immense joy in his suffering… and he deserved it. He was weak. This was his punishment. He wasn't good enough. He would never be good enough, now. Everything he had done, he did for no reason.
“The bald one… burned my face. My jaw.”
He deserved it. He had banished Zuko, calling him weak, when he was even weaker.
The old woman cackled horribly.
“More, more! One more, and I'll tell you my name, boy. Make it worth my time.”
He swallowed. Guilt and shame tore through him horribly, but this was his punishment. He would never regain his honor, but he could at least pay for his weakness.
“They… they did things… horrible things, t-they-”
He couldn't bring himself to say it. He couldn’t. He was shameful. Disgusting . Weak. a disappointment. Shameful. Horrible. An honorless joke, a failure.
The woman's laughter cut off within seconds.
“Hama,” She said, voice flat and cold. “My name is Hama. I am a waterbender.”
A waterbender, down here? To cut her off from the moon, no doubt, but what could she have done?
“Earlier, you… you said I lost my fingers… a month ago,” he gasped out. How was he so frail and weak? “You can… feel the moon?”
How long had he been here? Years? Decades?
“Unlike the sun, the moon's power can’t be blocked by mere earth. But my hands are still chained… a shame.”
“How long…?”
He could practically hear her smile.
“We've been here for a long, long time, Ozai .”
She mocked his name, pronouncing it like some horrible slur. It might as well have been. He was disgusting and shameful. Saying his name at all was a horrible sentence. Hama might as well have killed herself right then and there, and spared herself the shame.
He did not say anything in response to this. He didn't need to.
“Ten long years, boy.”
Tears rolled down his face once more.
He was shameful. So, so shameful. He should be grateful, really.
At least now, he knew that nobody was coming for him. There would be no begging. Only punishment.
Maybe, if he had never done any of this, he could have avoided the shame.