Story - Secret Origin

[loopy777]

Title: Secret Origin
Rating:  T
Characters: Zuko, Mai, "Lady Rei!"
Notes: Mai gets Meta about something other than her rival ships and reception with the fandom.

Comments

[vickygal]

Reading this had me flailing around in my seat (for perfectly innocent reasons!).

It was SO awesome and hilarious, and I loved how perfectly in-character it all was - not just Zuko (gah, awkward/sneaky/awkward-again!Zuko was so very in character) and Mai (who is pure awesome in practical pants and scary reading habits) but also the freaking Fire Nation itself! I love that one line about the law protecting parodies, because of course something like that had to exist for the Ember Players to even exist.

I could pick out a whole bunch of other lines I loved too, except it would just end up being the whole thing copy-pasted in here. Seriously, wonderfully done.

[fairladyz2005]

This is awesome! So funny. I can really relate to Mai from my own comic book reading experience over the years. I love awkard Zuko defending his wife's honor. Now you're making me wish the adventures of Xiangyu were real. And it was great to see the Blue Spirit vs. Mai. Now I'm curious to find out what else is in Mai's trophy room.

[loopy777]

To be fair, the Blue Spirit was holding back a bit, there. Of the pair, he was the only one who knew that his opponent was his spouse. As for Mai's trophy room, none have seen it and lived, but I have it on good authority that's she's trying to add a Boomerang to it. ;)

Mai's comic-reading habits were interesting to explore, because the Fire Nation depicted in the cartoon as the least sexist country, but there's still the fact that almost all of the authority rests with men. It struck me that the Fire Nation would thus be fine with female action heroes, just, you know, subtly subordinate to men and always written by them. (Hm, that sounds familiar.) Mix that with the Dangerous Ladies, and there's room for some nice commentary. It makes me wonder how Azula reacted to such trends in literature. If she bought into the Fire Nation's culture so much, perhaps a lifetime of indoctrination explains why she always bowed to Ozai and even supported Zuko when he wasn't being a traitor, despite her own superior abilities?

[loopy777]

Thanks much! The fun little details are what makes writing a joy, so I'm very glad that they're so well-received on the audiences' part as well. Those details are what, to me, also make writing the Fire Nation and it's characters interesting, too; there are so many contradictions to explore, especially in humorous ways.