#im not saying azula is averse to/incapable of cruelty i just hc that she genuinely just thinks it's stupid

[hella1975]

tams azula is sooo fascinating bc while canon azula doesn't really show her age at all like she's completely desensitised to so much shit 'she is fourteen' is not a justification for ANYTHING both in her own mind and in other people's, in tams she has zuko. and yes the world has been abundantly cruel to her but zuko hasn't. he's basically raised azula and he's done so in a way that she's allowed to show her age, but she still only shows her age in very azula-esque ways. there's no reluctance to see violence like you'd expect from a fourteen-year-old, and like ive said before, that means zuko can't play on that reluctance in order to shield her, but he still wants to shield her from that violence because regardless of what SHE feels about it, as the eldest he knows fundamentally that she shouldn't be seeing certain things no matter how well she can handle them. and seeing zuko effectively PLAY azula in order to protect her is so interesting and complicated and fun

#and also a little heartbreaking bc it's the 'you protect azula but who protects you?' #like in order to shield azula from these things zuko is metaphorically standing in front of her and seeing them himself #as if he's not only sixteen and a child too #but yeah taking azula's canon traits and manipulating into the tamsverse is soooo fun #like the example that inspired this post is how canon azula is logical NOT cruel #like time and time again she follows only the logical route and even actively avoids the cruel route #e.g calling off torture in the boiling rock bc she knew that he was telling the truth and therefore continuing to torture him was illogical #im not saying azula is averse to/incapable of cruelty i just hc that she genuinely just thinks it's stupid #just like any other unnecessary act would be considered stupid. if it's not logical or being used for a greater plan then what's the point? #and tams azula STILL HOLDS THIS TRAIT except because i lean more into her age in tams bc she's been given the freedom with zuko #to liberally be a CHILD without any consequences as a result of that simple thing #her intense logic actually becomes a certain naivety on azula #like she cannot comprehend other people NOT coming to the conclusions she comes to #and that expands to needless cruelty. like she wont factor a person's cruelty into her calculations #because in her head all she needs to dismiss that calculation is 'excessive cruelty here would waste time which is illogical' #she assumes everyone is as smart and to-the-point as she is so when they ARENT and will actively waste time just to do dumb shit #it catches her off guard and she DOESNT PLAN FOR IT so it can really fuck them over sometimes #so this is one instance where zuko has azula beat despite it being STRATEGY aka azula's strong point #bc zuko's immense cynicism and assumption that Everyone Is Awful doesn't hold up against logic 9 times out of 10 #but the one time it does is the time azula gets caught out #i just think tams zuko and azula's dynamic is so fucking interesting im so clever for that tbh #twice as many stars