Teenage Dreams

## Synopsis

In 2004, 15-years-old Zuko, Azula, Mai, and Ty Lee are sent on vacation to Lo and Li's beach house on Ember Island while Fire Lord Ozai holds restricted meetings with his advisers. Ty Lee is excited, but Zuko expresses his displeasure of being sent away on a forced vacation, stating that he feels like he is being treated as a child. The boat pulls into the small port, and Lo and Li greet the teenagers. All of them, except for Ty Lee, express their disdain at their beach house. According to Mai, the pink seashell bedspread looked like "the beach threw up all over [it]." The sisters urge the teenagers to give Ember Island a chance, as the beach has a special way of smoothing even the most jagged edges and revealing one's true self.

Meanwhile, Aang and friends relax in some secluded hot springs, where they believe they are safe from being spotted by the Fire Nation. Playing in the water, Aang is unknowingly seen by two bored Fire Nation soldiers, who recognize him and send a messenger hawk to Fire Lord Ozai, reporting the Avatar is still alive. The message is later intercepted, however, by a raven eagle, owned by Combustion Man, a firebender assassin hired by Zuko to eliminate Aang.

Zuko, Azula, Mai, and Ty Lee go down to the beach to have some fun. Azula nastily crushes a kid's sandcastle, while Ty Lee soon finds herself being approached by several boys, and she ends up being shaded and fanned by them. Zuko makes several unsuccessful attempts at impressing Mai with pretty seashells and ice cream. Azula pulls the group into a game of kuai ball with some other teens, plotting their strategy as if plotting a battle. Using their various skills, they easily overwhelm their opponents. Azula gets carried away, setting the net on fire and sinisterly gloating as if she has just crushed an enemy. Their game arouses the attention of two boys named Chan and Ruon-Jian, who invite Ty Lee and Mai to a party; after some persuasion, they reluctantly invite Zuko and Azula as well. Azula makes a point of not revealing her or her brother's royal identity; she explains that she wants to see what it is like to be a normal person for a change.

The group arrives at Chan's house early for the party. Chan notes this, and Azula notes that they are the perfect party guests and very punctual. He warns the group that his father does not know about the party and not to mess anything up. Chan awkwardly thanks her. Azula tries to compliment Chan's outfit by saying it is "sharp" but gets carried away and says that it is sharp enough to puncture the hull of a Fire Nation empire-class battleship, leaving thousands to drown at sea. Meanwhile, inside the house, Zuko gets jealous of Ruon-Jian, thinking Mai is interested in him. Later, Ty Lee is flanked by a crowd of adoring boys and is forced to render them unconscious to escape. Seeing this, Azula calls Ty Lee a tease and says that none of the boys really care about her. When Ty Lee starts crying, Azula hastily apologizes and confides that she was just jealous before asking Ty Lee to give her some tips. She tells Azula just to smile and laugh at anything a boy tells her. To practice, Ty Lee pretends to approach Azula with a generic guy impression, but Azula laughs way too loudly, drawing everyone's attention. Meanwhile, Mai tells Zuko that she is bored and hungry, prompting him to find him some food, much to his chagrin.

Fully confident, Azula asks Chan for a tour of the house, after which they go to the veranda and flirt. After the two share a kiss, Azula loses control of the situation and maniacally exclaims that they could be the world's strongest couple and dominate the Earth, while creating blue fire in both her hands. Chan freaks out by Azula's sudden change in behavior and leaves in a hurry, leaving her disappointed.

After fetching her some food, Zuko finds Ruon-Jian talking to Mai. Zuko violently shoves Ruon-Jian into a large pot across the room, smashing it. Disgusted, Mai angrily tells Zuko that his temper is out of control. He tells her she does not feel anything and is a "big blah". Hurt and confused by this accusation, Mai tells Zuko that their relationship is over. Chan hears the sound of the shattering vase, and after Ruon-Jian accuses Zuko of breaking it, he ejects Zuko from the party. Zuko heads off and goes to his family's abandoned vacation house, where he reminisces about memories of himself as a child with his mother, father, and uncle. He spots a stone imprinted with his own baby hand print, only for his eyes to be drawn to an old family portrait hanging on the wall.

Meanwhile, Combustion Man arrives near Team Avatar's campsite. Toph wakes up, sensing the enemy's approach, commenting that a "*metal man*" is coming. Combustion Man attacks, projecting rays of energy from his forehead tattoo that explode upon impact. His bolts counter anything the team throws at him, forcing them to take cover. Aang tells his friends to get on Appa and get ready to escape as he himself tries to lead the enemy away. Aang uses both airbending and earthbending to fend off Combustion Man's attacks. Aang eventually escapes and rejoins the group on Appa. Though Toph comments on the randomness of the encounter, Katara says that she feels that this new enemy seems to know exactly who they are.

Azula finds Zuko and tells him to come to the beach with her. Zuko tries to reconcile with Mai, but she is still cold toward him. Zuko burns his family's painting to help kindle fire to keep them warm, prompting Ty Lee to wonders out loud why he would burn something so precious. He snaps at her to mind her own business and that she does not understand him. When Mai comes to the defense of her friend, ordering Zuko to leave her alone, Zuko starts to mock Ty Lee and calls her a circus freak. As Ty Lee bursts out into tears, Azula laughs, while Ty Lee tearfully reveals that she has six sisters exactly like her and joined the circus to mark herself as a unique individual. She snaps back that being called a circus freak is a compliment. Mai says that her lack of attention while growing up is the reason Ty Lee wants so much of it now. Continuing to critique Ty Lee's attention-craving issues, the acrobat turns on Mai, remarking that, despite Mai having been an only child for most of her life and receiving a lot of attention, she still has a "dingy, pasty, gray" aura.

Mai says she does not believe in auras; Zuko retorts she does not believe in anything. Mai sarcastically apologizes for not being "as high-strung, and crazy as the rest of [them]." Zuko goes on to state that she did not keep all of her emotions bottled up. Mai goes into her own past, talking about her parents, who gave her everything she wanted so long as she behaved exactly as she was told. Her father's political career meant that Mai would always be under a spotlight and could not live as freely as she would like. Azula deduces that that is the reason Mai stifles her true feelings so much and why she cannot express herself, finally eliciting a sharp and emotional outburst from the normally indifferent Mai. When Zuko says that he likes it when she expresses herself, Mai refuses to let him touch her, saying that she is still angry. The two former lovers begin to argue, prompting Ty Lee to claims that negative energy is bad for the skin. Zuko states that he does not have the luxury, as his father taught him a "permanent lesson on [his] face". This pushes Zuko into a rant about his own life, where he admits that he is always angry, but unsure why. The girls all pressure him into giving an answer, and he finally screams that he is angry at himself while shooting fire in the air because he does not know the difference between right and wrong anymore.

Finally understanding what bothers Zuko so much, Mai returns to his side and says that the one thing she cares about is him and kisses him once again. They turn to the last member of the group; reluctantly, Azula delves into her own past and says that her mother thought she was a monster. Azula admits that she was correct in thinking so, but that it still hurt to hear her own mother say so. With all their secrets out in the open, the heaviness between the four seems to vanish. Ty Lee says she will remember this night forever, and that Lo and Li were right about the beach's ability to reveal people's true selves. She also states that she feels all 'smoothed'.

To celebrate their revelations, Azula decides on a fitting end to their night – the four head back to Chan's party to wreak havoc. When the door is answered, Zuko tells him that the party is over and the four of them begin trashing the house, each in their own unique way, leaving Chan sobbing. Together, the four of them forge their own memory of the place, uniting as friends for the first time in years.