Towards the Sun
https://archiveofourown.org/works/192528...s/45784264
Tropes page
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/F...ardsTheSun
Avatar TLA Want-of-a-Nail AU
In canon, Zuko went to Iroh's cell on the Day of the Black Sun (after confronting his father) to break him out but found Iroh had escaped on his own. Then Zuko went off to hook up with Team Avatar. In this timeline, he got caught right after checking on Iroh's cell and spent the rest of the canon timeline in a higher-security cell of his own. Then Ozai is defeated by Aang, Azula goes completely insane, Iroh is still missing and doing things considered treasonous to the Fire Nation, and Zuko is suddenly Fire Lord because he's the only member of the royal family left. He pushes forward in his characteristically well-meaning but stubbornly oblivious fashion and now has to hold the nation together while negotiating with a Team Avatar that has no reason to trust him.
I enjoy it for a downright adorable Iron Woobie Zuko as the primary PoV and believable culture clash and realistic consequences for some of the events in the canon ending, without making any of the canon hero characters into bad guys or warping them into different characters. At risk of starting a debate, I look upon it as giving me the intriguing elements of Vathara's Embers without the parts that irritate me.
I also recommend the author, MuffinLance, in general for stories about socially-awkward Iron Woobie Zuko in a Want-of-a-Nail AU that keeps spiraling into enjoyable chaos.
https://archiveofourown.org/works/192528...s/45784264
Tropes page
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/F...ardsTheSun
Avatar TLA Want-of-a-Nail AU
In canon, Zuko went to Iroh's cell on the Day of the Black Sun (after confronting his father) to break him out but found Iroh had escaped on his own. Then Zuko went off to hook up with Team Avatar. In this timeline, he got caught right after checking on Iroh's cell and spent the rest of the canon timeline in a higher-security cell of his own. Then Ozai is defeated by Aang, Azula goes completely insane, Iroh is still missing and doing things considered treasonous to the Fire Nation, and Zuko is suddenly Fire Lord because he's the only member of the royal family left. He pushes forward in his characteristically well-meaning but stubbornly oblivious fashion and now has to hold the nation together while negotiating with a Team Avatar that has no reason to trust him.
I enjoy it for a downright adorable Iron Woobie Zuko as the primary PoV and believable culture clash and realistic consequences for some of the events in the canon ending, without making any of the canon hero characters into bad guys or warping them into different characters. At risk of starting a debate, I look upon it as giving me the intriguing elements of Vathara's Embers without the parts that irritate me.
I also recommend the author, MuffinLance, in general for stories about socially-awkward Iron Woobie Zuko in a Want-of-a-Nail AU that keeps spiraling into enjoyable chaos.
I don't believe the world has gone mad, because I don't believe it was ever sane.