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No sooner had the conversation with Toph finished and subsequent bruise she likely gave him faded when a little boy, dressed as Aang—or at least, play-Aang—came zooming around the corner. He stopped briefly, leaning in and seeing Zuko.
“Your Zuko costume is pretty good, but the scar's on the wrong side!
As soon as his name came out of the little boy's mouth, Zuko's jaw dropped, and as soon as the boy had finishing speaking, he zoomed away, leaving Zuko to call out the blatant lie and ignorance through gritted teeth after him, and pointing.
“The scar is not on the wrong side!”
Zuko slouched back against the wall and put his hood over his head with a mild huff. It didn't hide the scar—nothing but a mask could do that—But it certainly made it less noticeable to random fanatic onlookers like that crazy kid.
That being said, the hood's obstruction on his peripheral vision, and combined with the fact that Toph was sitting on his left meant Zuko didn't notice the small visual cues that Toph was scheming (in this case her hands behind her head one leg over the other, and a wicked smirk) until she said her comment aloud.
“I mean, As far as I can tell it's on the wrong side.”
Toph felt a quick flash of warmth next to her, roughly where she knew Zuko's fists to be, and while it was too quick and too light to have done any damage, it still made the earthbender quickly wipe the smirk off her face, returning her palms to the ground.
“Zuko…”
Zuko turned to face Toph, pushing his Scar further away from her, despite the fact she couldn't see it regardless.
“It's just…”
“Just what?” Toph asked. But there was a long awkward silence between the two before any answers were given, only disturbed by Toph rocking her feet from side to side and Zuko's thoughts and considerations into what he would say next.
Eventually, out came an unexpected question.
“How much do you know?”
Toph tilted her head, confused, so Zuko continued.
“Of, uh… about the scar.”
Now it was Toph's turn to briefly hide in thought, as she crossed her arms to think.
“Honestly, not much. I mean, from how much it's mentioned I gather it's sort of obvious, but I also imagined it being this little—”
Zuko cut her off.
“It's not small.”
He pulled his knees closer to his chest.
Toph furrowed her brow.
“Then how big is it?”
“Do you mind if I show you?”
Toph shook her head, and while she didn't take if from the floor herself, let Zuko pick up her right hand, as he began to pull it towards his face, but midway suddenly stopped.
Toph could kind of tell why. Not fully, but she knew it was creating some kind of reaction in Zuko. The firebender’s pulse was that annoying fast state. The kind that came with weariness and fear.
Zuko dropped Toph's hand and let his own fall to the floor, feeling the mix of shame and hurt that had come with the trigger of a hand coming that close to his face from that particular angle in that particular position, and hung his head.
“I'm… I'm sorry.”
Toph put her left hand atop of his right. It was enough for the two of them to touch, but it didn't mean she came any further into his space then he might have wanted.
There were no words exchanged between the two for a moment. The silence was good. At least, before it dragged on for a really long time and then became awkward again, neither knowing how to break it, but Zuko giving it his best shot.
“Uhh-”
That didn't mean his best shot was a particularly good one.
Zuko reached into his hood and scratched the back of his neck, pondering how he was going to continue with this when Toph asked one final question.
“Is it badass?”
Zuko blinked a couple of times, pushing himself further towards the wall he was leaning on and sitting up as a result.
Was it badass?
He thought about it, remembering back to the circumstances surrounding receiving the scar itself. While the Agni Kai—The Agni Kai—was something his mind had forced him to mostly forget, save the occasional phantom feeling of flame on skin, the events leading up to it still ran though his mind clear as day. He had spoken out of term because of the injustice placed upon division forty-one, respectable fire nation troops. He had taken the scar because he had refused to fight his father. For a while it defined him, and to many it still did, but he was more than that.
The scar was a symbol that he had managed to move beyond what his father had wanted. He had managed to find his own path. Like uncle had always pushed him to do, even when he was a little boy. Even before he was ever concerned about the Avatar. Because Uncle loved him.
Zuko came to a conclusion with a smile, allowing his eyes, or rather, eye, to relax and open up wider, with the small but bright smile that took over the rest of his face.
The scar wasn't a mark on Zuko's honour, it was a mark of his honour.
“Yeah, it's pretty badass.”