aang (avatar)

Zuko realizes his destiny much earlier. As in, as soon as he wakes up in the palace after his Agni Kai and is told he is banished. Unfortunately, he's never been a patient one. So he storms right up to Ozai and tells him what he's going to do. And gets locked up for over three years. Then, one day, he's being pulled out and told he's the new Fire Lord. A "Zuko never meets the Gaang and suddenly becomes Fire Lord after three years of literal torture" AU. In which the Gaang doesn't know what to think of the new Fire Lord who happens to be the missing nephew of Aang's firebending teacher, Iroh constantly has a headache, and, sure, maybe the world hates the Fire Nation, but the Fire Nation LOVES Zuko, and he can work with that.

Dragon's fire is not so easily extinguished; when Zuko rediscovers a lost firebending technique, shifting flames can shift the world...

When Azula is nine, she becomes an only child. She hears the Fire Lord call for Zuko's life, and in the morning, her mother and brother are gone. Azula may be young, but she isn't naive. She knows what happened to them. Which makes it all the more surprising when Azula tracks the Avatar down and fights his group of peasant friends, only to find herself staring into an eerily familiar face.

After the newly crowned Firelord Iroh finds out what happened to his father, Ozai and Ursa have no choice but to take the children and flee his wrath. In the chaos, Ozai and Zuko end up separated from Ursa and Azula across the nations. Years later, density brings them together as they aid Team Avatar in defeating Firelord Iroh.