Beta read by Levi Ackermanlet
Zuko wasn't used to strange noises when he woke up. The creaks and groans of his ship had been almost comforting over the three years he'd lived aboard it. More recently, it had been a blend of serene quiet, and the calls of Earth Kingdom wildlife. Whatever he was hearing now was most certainly not natural, yet it was so alien from any Fire Nation technology he couldn't place it as that either.
Strangely, he didn't feel the usual dull ache that he felt after a fight. It wasn't even numbed like when he'd had a healing herb mix lathered over his wounds. Slowly waking up, the first thing he saw was some strange fire inside the ceiling. It was white, so it must have been incredibly hot, or it was a strange fuel. Given that he wasn't feeling too hot, it was probably the latter.
It could have been a type of glow-rock, or even some new breed of the glow worms that lived in the cave near Omashu. It made him question as to just why someone would go through all that effort when a torch would do just as well?
'Probably some Earth Kingdom noble, they have more wealth than brains most of them…'
So, he was in some kind of Earth Noble's home. But…why? He lifted his hands up to his head to rub his eyes. Not chained up, so their cover was still intact. He began to sit up when something tugged on his chest. It was a series of strange ropes and metal darts, all pricked into several points on his body.
"What the-"
"Hm…? Prince Zuko!"
Iroh hurriedly stood up from the chair he had so obviously been sleeping in. His eyes held a strange mix of gratitude and…apprehension?
"Uncle? What's going on? Why are you calling me that?"
He sighed and looked away, choosing his words carefully.
"Our cover is not needed here. We…" He stopped, taking an even deeper sigh as he frowned in frustration. "We are no longer in the Earth Kingdom."
"We're not?"
"No, you're not."
From the shadows a man stepped forth wearing a black coat and green scarf. He was clutching the end of a cane in his hand, even though he clearly had no need for it.
"Who are you? Where have you taken us!?"
"My name is Ozpin, headmaster of Beacon academy. You're in one of our medical bays on the academy's grounds. You, however prince Zuko, are a most interesting young man if your uncle is telling the truth."
"You told him who we are? Why!?"
"We… we have no need to hide anymore, it would seem."
His uncle looked downright despondent, as if all hope had been drained away from him.
"Uncle, what is going on?"
Zuko's question was steady, but adamant. Something had happened, and his uncle was clearly not looking forward to telling him. But damn it all, he needed to know.
"Zuko, it seems… It seems that a spirit has...taken us away."
"…taken us?"
Ozpin watched on in silence, looking over every inch of the boy to see his reaction. His uncle's story was ludicrous, but the man seemed genuine. His nephew's reactions would help him decide if he were to believe him.
"A spirit has taken us…to a world not of our own."
"Not of our own? Uncle, now isn't the time for riddles. What has happened?"
"The world we knew is gone. The Fire Nation, the Earth Kingdom, the Northern and Southern Water Tribes do not exist here."
"Wha…What? That's…that's not possible!" He pointed an accusatory finger over at Ozpin. "What lies have you been feeding my Uncle!?"
Ozpin didn't react in anger, or even react much at all really. He simply continued to watch the young man curiously. It was strange, he seemed completely confused and angry, the perfect response…if his uncle was telling the truth.
"I have told your uncle nothing but the truth, and you'll be pleased to know he didn't believe me until it was proved to him."
Lazily, Ozpin raised his hand clutching some rectangle in it. He did something with it and there was a flash of light on the wall. Zuko stared at the wall which now held what seemed like a painting of a red-headed man wearing a hat.
"The robbery was led by nefarious criminal Roman Torchwick, who continues to evade authorities. If you have any information on his whereabouts, please contact the Vale Police Department. Back to you, Lisa."
Zuko looked all over to find the voice, his mouth dropping as the painting shifted to that of a blue haired woman, a smaller painting just over her shoulder of strange animal-eared people holding signs.
"Thank you, Cyril. In other news, this Saturday's Faunus Civil Rights protest turned dark when members of the White Fang disrupted the ceremony. The once peaceful organization has now disrupted-"
A fireball tore into the wall, morphing the painting into a series of waving black and blue lines. Lightning seemed to spark around the edges of where Zuko had blasted a hole in it.
"What are you!? Some kind of sorcerer!?"
"Prince Zuko please, it is-"
"It's quite alright, Mr. Iroh. Prince Zuko, it would seem that your…'world', does not exist here. That was a television, simply a piece of technology."
"The fire-nation is the most advanced nation there is! And there's nothing we have that can make…moving walls, or whatever you say it was!"
"So you say, and yet you just saw it, didn't you?"
"I don't know what I saw, but…the fire-nation is not gone! You're lying to me! You have to be! One piece of technology doesn't mean the world is gone!"
"My nephew, please…" Iroh looked pleadingly at him to listen. "I have seen many things while you were unconscious. Amazing things, impossible things. I have seen the maps of this world too, they look nothing like our own."
"Forgeries! Fakes! Uncle I can't believe you're naïve enough to-"
"I have seen the world outside of this room too!" Iroh wasn't angry, even if he had shouted. His nephew may not have seen it, but Ozpin could see how desperate the man was becoming. From what he'd seen so far, the teenager was very…volatile. Ready and willing to protect his uncle to be sure, but not quite wise enough to recognize when he was only making more trouble.
"Uncle, that doesn't mean anything-"
"I have seen the work outside of this room, and I have never seen anywhere like it before. I was born in the fire nation, I know my homeland just as you do. I took an army, and I conquered my way across the Earth Kingdom. After… Afterwards, I came with you, and we travelled across the world. Never in my life, have I seen such a place as this."
"Even you said the Earth Kingdom still has its secrets."
"And do you, Prince Zuko, think that anyone could keep a secret such as this?"
As if to prove the point, a metal door at the far end of the room opened and closed itself as a blonde woman stepped inside.
"Ozpin, the new students are arriving."
"Thank you, Glynda. I'll be along in a moment."
'Glynda' nodded in silence, sparing a glance towards the increasingly horrified looking boy in the hospital bed before she turned and left.
Zuko's mind was racing. He trusted his uncle more than anyone, and even if he didn't…what he said was right. What he'd seen, what his uncle had apparently been shown, there was no way anyone could keep something like that a secret, even if they were lying.
Either people would leave and spread the word, or they'd be forced to stay and the disappearances would attract attention. They couldn't be the first to find this place. They'd found it by total accident, by waking up in the middle of nowhere. Not to mention that the technology would take a long time to create. Far too long to go unnoticed. The mechanist's abilities most certainly hadn't. He'd been contracted by the Fire Nation before Zuko had been banished when word had spread from neighboring Earth Kingdom villages.
But if it couldn't be kept hidden, and it wasn't fake…
"No…no no no."
He made to get off the bed and felt himself roughly tugged back by the wires in his chest. He roughly yanked them out, blood drops spattering across the bed. A loud and alien noise began to blare in protest, and Ozpin quickly shut off the alarms.
Zuko turned away from the headmaster and darted towards the window. He was about to thrust it open when he froze, his eyes coming to rest in the sky.
"The moon…"
It was broken. Shards of debris trailed behind her, as if the moon spirit had been killed and her body strewn across the sky. It wasn't possible. Zhao had killed the moon and it disappeared, this was…it wasn't real. It couldn't be real. Yet here he was, staring right up at the mutilated corpse of the Water Tribe spirit.
Zuko tightly clutched his short hair in panic. If it was real, if this wasn't…'his' world then…
"I can't go home." It was barely even a whisper, but it was enough to shock his uncle with fear. "I can never go home again."
Zuko's eyes looked empty, his desperate hands weakened and fell limply by his side.
"No, Zuko! You must never give into despair! Allow yourself to slip down that road and you surrender to your lowest instincts. In the darkest times, hope is something you give yourself."
"What hope!? What is there to hope for!? It's gone! Everything's gone! My nation! My family! My honor! I will never get it back! Everything I've worked my life for, is…is…"
His head fell into his hands, and for the first time in a long time. Zuko began to cry.
Iroh wrapped his nephew up in a hug, whispering soothing words into his ear as he rocked him. Zuko didn't hear them. He didn't care about what his uncle had to say, or about anything anymore. His entire life…was over.
'Not an act.' Ozpin thought to himself as he quietly exited the room. Glynda motioned to him and he followed, if only to allow himself to continue with his thoughts.
The teenager, who had seemed so proud and angry when he'd woken up, was now openly sobbing in his uncle's arms.
'No, definitely not an act.'
The boy truly believed he had lost everything. Whether he had or not was still in doubt. There had never been a recorded instance of someone transporting to a different reality before of course. Even an aura power had never been known to do anything even remotely like that.
'Could the boy and his uncle have been manipulated?'
Possible. There were some very dangerous aura abilities which were known to affect one's mind. Though why someone would do that still needed to be answered. It took a lot of work to implant someone with fake memories, and unless they were done extremely well, the slightest inconsistency would shatter the façade. Add that together with the fact that they were dumped in the middle of Emerald Forest somehow. Qrow hadn't stayed long enough for Ozpin to see him, no doubt because he wanted it that way, but he'd passed along a message through a nurse.
They appeared from a ball of fire. Unconscious, and completely clueless when they woke up.
Somebody wanted them here, at this school. If they had good intentions, there were many better ways to send them to Beacon. If whoever sent them did it for nefarious reasons…
'Perhaps I should send them away. Into Vale perhaps, away from the students.'
Let him in.
Ozpin whirled around on his feet, stopping suddenly in the middle of the hallway. His eyes searched every crack in sight, and every hide away there was.
"Ozpin?"
"…It's nothing, Glynda. Thought I…never mind."
What had he been searching for again? It didn't matter. He had to decide what to do with his new guests. 'Zuko' was the right age to enroll, however his uncle obviously couldn't attend, even if they did have the money to afford it. Which they didn't. Unless…
Like somebody had pushed the idea into his mind, he felt the beginnings of a plan forming.
There was a position open in the kitchen which the uncle could fill. House him in one of the spare staff dorms, with rent of course. But Zuko…he would need a scholarship for entry. Not an academic one, if his story was true then any teaching he'd have would be near useless. The combat scholarship then.
It had been originally given to Miss Pyrrha Nikos, but some clerical error had given Beacon the budget for two scholarships. Not until registrations had closed however, which made it pointless. Now however…
Ozpin smiled to himself with pride.
'Initiation is tomorrow Prince Zuko, I think you'll find that your life hasn't ended just yet.'