Chapter Text
“No, no, no, you can’t do this. You can’t. Dad.” Sokka’s voice got more frantic with every word, his eyes wide and his shaking only worsening when Hakoda placed a hand on each of his upper arms. He didn’t get the chance to speak. “Dad, please. You can’t do this to me. You can’t. I— I need to do this. I won’t just walk away. I can’t— I can’t just—”
“Sokka, breathe.” The pressure on his shoulders was too much. Sokka ripped away on the left and his dad must’ve understood, because he fully released the grasp of his fingers, only resting his hands on his son instead. “I know you don’t want to stop helping us, but you can’t do it anymore, okay? I won’t make you go home on your own, you can stay here with us, but you admitted it was the fact that you blamed yourself for the plans that drove you to relapsing in the first place. I can’t let you keep helping if it’s hurting you. I’m sorry.”
More than anything in the world, Sokka wanted to fight back. He wanted to tell his dad that he was overreacting and that working would really make him feel better, but it wasn’t true. Everyone knew that it wasn’t true, so he gave up. He mostly gave up because he was too weak to fight back—due to blood loss from cutting, dehydration from purging, and just being way too overwhelmed from all his panic attacks according to Katara—but also because, deep down, he really wanted a break. Even if he did feel stupid sitting around while everyone else worked hard every day. Even if he did feel pathetic when all his friends inevitably came to check in on him at least once a day. Even if everything did still hurt and not working made it only marginally better.
He spent a lot of time at the cliff, though he was never allowed to be on his own. Sometimes, Sokka managed to sneak away, but someone would inevitably come up beside him and he knew that meant they’d been there all along. Not that he could really blame them. After all, the last time he was left alone, he’d shredded his own knuckles until there was nothing left, and only days before that, he’d nearly killed himself by cutting his own arm. Still, that didn’t make it any easier for Sokka to accept the help. He tried to push everyone away the best he could, repeatedly reminding them that focusing on the war efforts was more important than anything else, but they never listened. They kept taking care of him. They kept making sure he ate. They kept checking on his arms twice or more a day.
They kept treating him like a fucking baby and words couldn’t describe how much he hated it.
Without being allowed to work on the strategies themselves, there was little left for Sokka to do. He spent the majority of his days depression napping, being forced to spend time with his friends, and depression napping after passing out while being forced to spend time with his friends. Generally, all Sokka wanted to do was run away. Physically, he was incapable of walking more than a little way without his cane and someone following close in his tracks. It was like living in a prison, having to go about his day however his family planned it and being unable to do anything to get away. Part of him almost thought it would be better to just go back to the tribe. At least then he could be alone again.
Some amount of time after everything came to light—Sokka lost the last of his ability to tell time when his days turned into a never-ending cycle of sleeping and being force fed—and several more plans failed, Sokka was taking another nap. He wasn’t in his tent that time, nor was he using a pillow. Instead, he was resting on Zuko’s lap, the Fire Lord gently stroking his hair with one hand as he worked on something with the other. Sokka couldn’t be bothered to ask what it was. It wasn’t like Zuko was going to answer or let him help with it anyway, so there was no point. He just closed his eyes and did his best stay asleep. It was the next best option once they took away the cliff.
Because of course, the second they noticed the way Sokka stared over the edge and connected it to when he accidentally cut too deep, they stopped him from going over. They stopped him from going to the one place that brought him comfort in the middle of that disgusting Earth Kingdom forest. He’d done it every day for ages and nobody cared before. He couldn’t count the number of times that Zuko sat down beside him, talked to him there for hours, and nobody said a thing. Now suddenly, he wasn’t allowed to go on walks anymore? Granted, they did stop him a lot when he was intending to push his leg too far, but still. It was his body. It should’ve been his choice how he wanted to take care of it, and it wasn’t. Nothing was his choice anymore.
“Hey. Open your eyes, Sokka.” It wasn’t the words that got him up, but the gentle stroking of his cheek. Slowly, Zuko was able to coax him back into reality, pulling him from whatever nightmare he’d been on the cusp of. Sokka nuzzled into Zuko’s leg, his eyes drifting shut again as Zuko slid the hair on his cheek back behind his ear. “You’re okay. It was just a dream. Nobody can hurt us here.”
“Mm. Sorry.” The moment Sokka spoke, Zuko leaned forward and kissed his temple, smoothing out his hair one more time. He really needed to cut it or at least pull it back, but it felt pointless when he was sleeping away his life regardless. “Don’t remember what I was dreaming about.”
“It’s all right. You were just mumbling about— never mind. It doesn’t matter. Just try and get some—”
Presumably, Zuko was going to finish that sentence by suggesting that Sokka get some rest, but he didn’t get the chance. Before he could say anything else, the tent suddenly shifted open and Hakoda poked his head in, looking to Zuko for permission before stepping inside. Sokka sat up when he saw his dad, accepting the arm Zuko wrapped around him and leaning into his embrace once he was up. Hakoda sat down on the floor near them, hesitating and reaching out to give Sokka’s shoulder a reassuring squeeze. His hands were still wrapped in bandages but it was for comfort more than anything else. His knuckles were sensitive to contact and having an extra layer of protection helped.
“Listen, Sokka,” started Hakoda, his words slow and his tone uncertain, “I’ve been wanting to talk to you about what happened. If you’re not feeling up to it, that’s okay, but I think it’s really important we talk and kind of figure out what your triggers are so we know what we can do to try and keep this from getting worse again. You all right with that? We can do it alone later too if that’s better.”
“No, it’s okay. I want Zuko to know.” In response, Zuko pressed another kiss to his temple, wrapping one hand around the other side of Sokka’s head and carefully playing with his hair. “I treated you like shit. You deserve an explanation for it.”
“I don’t deserve anything,” Zuko argued, “but if you want me to stay, I will.”
Sokka nodded and leaned back into Zuko’s shoulder, accepting the hand that wrapped around his and gently squeezing his fingers. Having a hand to hold made it easier to deal with. It made him feel less guilty for everything he said during his panic attack when his dad started apologizing for things he said he should’ve talked about years ago. Sokka tried to insist he was out of line with his own comments, but Hakoda took the entirety of the blame. He should’ve been there for his son growing up and he wasn’t. That was on him, regardless of whether there was a war going on, and the same thing still applied even if Sokka was an adult now.
The start of their conversation was just about that. How Sokka’s childhood was affected by Hakoda’s absence and others being gone, Katara’s powers, his mom’s death. He felt sick by the end of it, but that was just the start. Then they began to talk about what drove him to binging and self-harm the first time around—because Hakoda did know that already, of course—and Sokka wanted to hurl because he knew that the next part was coming. The part where he would have to explain himself again. When Hakoda inevitably asked him to share whether he thought any of the same kind of triggers might have been involved that time around, he froze. When he asked his son to start at the beginning, he wet his lips six times before even trying.
“It was after the first casualties, I think,” Sokka started, his thumbnail still at the edge of his mouth. “I came up with the plans that backfired on them. Little help from anyone else, even in the final stages. Everyone said it wasn’t my fault, but I— I blamed myself. I couldn’t sleep. I thought I deserved some kind of punishment and no one would do anything and I saw the scars on my arms and I just thought— the binging was later. I had the snacks because they reminded me of home. I didn’t mean for it to get out of hand like that.”
The only part that wasn’t true was that Sokka couldn’t remember it well. He remembered both instances very vividly. The first time he relapsed on his self-harm, Sokka was pacing around his room after finding out they’d lost half a dozen men in the crossfire. Because his plan went wrong. He’d begged for some kind of punishment the best he could without straight up asking for it, and upon taking his shirt off for bed, saw the scars and decided to take care of it himself. Sokka didn’t sleep a wink that night. It was too hard to doze off with such a heavy conscience due to the casualties, not to mention the guilt from relapsing after so long being clean.
On the other hand, the binging was entirely an accident. It was well into the conflicts and all Sokka wanted was to go home. He went for a snack, hungry after skipping dinner in favor of work, and ended up eating seal jerky and sobbing because he was so homesick. Feeling like he was at home put him at a sort of peace, and so instead of stopping after a healthy snack, he kept going. He kept eating, kept crying, and didn’t stop until he felt like throwing up, so he did. The whole process barely registered as unhealthy until he was there on his knees. Until he went back the next night and did it all over again until he threw up not from overeating, but from the guilt of it. Because he knew what he was doing and he couldn’t stop.
He couldn’t stop binging. He couldn’t stop cutting. He couldn’t stop anything, and it hurt.
“I don’t even really know what it was after that, if I’m honest.” And he was being honest. Normally, Sokka would’ve done anything to hide from the people he loved to avoid hurting them at any cost, but not that day. He already had a way out of it. “It’s just like… once I started doing it, I didn’t know how to stop anymore. It just became part of my day, you know? I didn’t— I didn’t binge every night but I always cut. Usually when I got frustrated with myself. It was never because of anything you guys did, I swear. It was just… me. I hate me. I’ve always hated me.”
Despite how long he’d known that, it wasn’t until he said the words that everything really started to sink in. Sokka genuinely never stopped to think about when exactly it started, and when he did, he realized it never really had. From the time he was little, Katara was the special one, and he was that kid on the side whether intentionally or not. When his mom died, he didn’t know how to take care of himself anymore and since he was the big brother, everyone just assumed he was more responsible. When his dad left, he became the man of the tribe and nobody cared about his identity beyond that. He didn’t care about himself because he never really had a reason to. His life was about taking care of the people he loved, not the other way around.
“Why?” More than anything else, Hakoda’s word sounded hurt, and Sokka immediately felt a stab of guilt in his chest. That was what he didn’t want to do. He didn’t want to harm anybody. “It’s okay if you don’t have an answer, I’m just trying to figure out how we can help you.”
“I— I don’t really matter, I guess,” Sokka mumbled, reaching up to chew on his thumbnail. “I think I said something during my panic attack but everyone else is so special and I’m just… not. I’m not even fun to be around, I’m just rambly and sarcastic. I annoy myself. And I’m a failure. I’ve always been a failure, I don’t even know why you guys brought me on as a good strategist because I’m not. Plus, I haven’t been able to move right since the comet and I know it’s not my fault everything that could heal wrong did heal wrong but it just… it sucks. It really, really fucking sucks because being a warrior was the one thing I was okay at and I can’t even do that anymore. I can’t do anything.”
“That’s not true, Sokka, you—”
Ironically, the universe didn’t seem to agree with that statement because the second Hakoda started to explain why Sokka wasn’t utterly useless and a failure of a human being, Aang poked his head in the tent, followed by Toph’s feet peeking out through the cloth. He looked a little guilty to have interrupted what they were doing, but whatever was going on must have been urgent because the slight awkwardness wasn’t enough to stop him entirely. Aang stepped inside, wrapping his hands behind his back as his gaze shifted over to Zuko.
“Hey, sorry to interrupt,” he started uncomfortably, glancing over to Sokka and his dad. “I didn’t know you were all in here and, well, we think we figured out a plan. There are still a few problems with it but we’ve been working on the details all morning and we were wondering if you might be able to take a look at it? Since it does directly affect your people, and since you’ll probably have some different ideas for the places we got stuck at. Unless you’re busy! We can keep working on it alone if you want.”
“No, it’s okay.” Zuko shook his head quickly, reaching out when he realized Toph was holding something behind Aang. “I can take a look at it.”
And that was where things got seriously shitty because Sokka was a dumb fuck and didn’t leave when he had the chance. It quickly went from just the two of them to Hakoda joining in, then Bato, Suki, and Katara all showed up by request. Apparently, an entire plan had been going on without Sokka’s knowledge. He listened, watched, and ached to be a part of it, but he knew they wouldn’t let him, so he didn’t join in. He just leaned against his dad’s shoulder when Zuko had to move to work on the plans, nodded when Suki asked whether he was okay because apparently he looked a little weird, and ate lunch with them when they took a break because he was in no physical or mental state to be fighting back.
It was almost three hours into the strategizing when Sokka started to lose the ability to hold his tongue. He knew what was wrong with the plan. He could see the impact point that was cracking the whole operation, but he couldn’t say anything because they would stop him. Already, every one of his friends had asked at least one time whether he was okay, and he couldn’t take it anymore. If he tried to interrupt at all, they’d tell him off. But the more time passed, the harder he bit his tongue. He tried to convince himself that if he let them go long enough, they’d figure out the answer on their own, but they didn’t. The problem was staring them right in the face and they didn’t even know how to see it. They didn’t get it at all and at a certain point, Sokka felt like he had to interrupt for the sake of his own sanity.
“You’re not taking into account the fact that these people hold entirely different core beliefs.” It was the first time he’d spoken in over an hour and either everyone realized that or they were so concerned they were shocked to see him interject on something that used to be his specialty. “You’re assuming they’re all good people and they’re all going to react to this the same way but they’re not. We’re working with different colonies, different leadership, and most importantly, different nations. The Earth Kingdom sees this completely opposite from how the Fire Nation does. And don’t get me wrong, I think they’re both fucking stupid politicians, but it’s true. Here, let me—”
“Sokka, stop it.” Of course, it was Hakoda who wrapped an arm around his stomach to stop him from moving forward. All he wanted to do was draw a few lines on the paper, scribble down a couple of words to get his point across. Apparently, that was too detrimental to his health. It was bullshit. Writing never killed anyone. “I know you want to help and thank you for that, but we agreed that you’re not doing this anymore.”
“That was before you spent the last hour on the wrong track because I ‘wasn’t allowed’ to fix it. This is different. Just give me five minutes, okay?”
“I wasn’t gone for one before you had your panic attack.”
The only reason Sokka didn’t immediately shoot back was because that sentence made him realize that Hakoda wasn’t trying to be controlling. He was genuinely terrified that Sokka wouldn’t be okay, and that it would be because of him. Because he didn’t do enough. They were stuck in the same mindset of taking responsibility for things they had no part in, and Sokka felt like shit for not realizing it sooner. He had to get his own self-deprecation from somewhere, he figured, he just never would’ve guessed it to be his amazing dad. Sokka swallowed hard, turning his gaze to meet his dad’s before he tried again.
“Please, Dad. This is bigger than us.” Instantly, Hakoda looked like he wanted to retaliate, but Sokka didn’t give him the chance. “You’re all in here, right? You, Bato, Katara, the gang—you’re not going to let anything happen to me, but if I don’t get my point across, this isn’t going to stop. So just let me try. Please. If I start to get overwhelmed or disappointed in myself, I’ll tell you, and I’ll stop, okay? I promise. I’m still putting myself first but just let me make this second.”
Though still clearly hesitant, Hakoda eventually nodded and released his son. Immediately, Sokka slid forward to reach the plans, not resisting when Zuko tossed a pillow over to Katara and she slid it under her brother’s leg. He was already deep in his thoughts, scribbling out various things his friends had written and adding in other details as he mumbled to himself. Before he could even start to explain what he meant by his interjection, Sokka needed to make a visual to show them. The only problem was that the longer he wrote for, the worse his hand started to ache. He used to just switch hands when he got tired, but that wasn’t an easy option anymore with his bad shoulder. Sokka stopped when Suki reached out to take his chalk, but nodded and mumbled instructions as he dropped his hand into his lap.
It took a little longer than he would’ve preferred since Sokka wasn’t able to write himself, but Suki was good at translating his ideas and within minutes, they were bouncing ideas back and forth again. Sokka almost never stopped talking, though he found himself freezing whenever Zuko reached out to touch his arm or pull his hair back, or when Toph’s foot shifted in that way which said his heart was racing too fast. It wasn’t because it annoyed him, but because for once, it didn’t. He understood that his family was just looking out for him. That Katara didn’t offer to heal his hands because she thought he was weak and Aang wasn’t overly gentle with his occasional arguments because he thought Sokka was fragile. They just wanted him to be okay, and he wanted to be okay too.
Sokka felt better when he was at work. When he wasn’t alone boiling in a pot of his disgusting, self-detrimental thoughts. Having his family there to help him through everything made it easier. Once or twice, Sokka still got frustrated with himself and what he perceived to be his failures, but someone always talked him down. Bato helped him work through his struggles and Zuko hugged him or kissed his ear when he started to get overwhelmed. It was a long afternoon and it bled into evening but before he knew what was happening, the plans were drawn and Sokka was done. They were all done. At least, they were out of ideas as to how to expand beyond what they came up with, and everyone seemed too satisfied to try.
“I think we did it.” Toph sounded almost in awe, her hands wrapped around her feet but her eyes narrowed as if she were still running over everything they’d planned in her head. “I mean, I could be wrong, but I rarely am. Don’t you think this sounds like it’ll work? I can’t think of any way this could go wrong! Normally we have at least a couple potential casualties in there but assuming they don’t just open fire, I’m pretty sure we’ll all get out alive.”
“Everyone?” Sokka blinked, his hands shaking out of nowhere. He hadn’t seen the spirits in days—furthering his theory they’d been hallucinations all along—but their memory still lingered on, invading his dreams, and twisting them into nightmares. “You really think so? Nobody else has to die?”
“No, not if we— are you okay? Your heart is beating really fast all of a sudden.”
Regardless of whether he wanted to, Sokka couldn’t give her a thorough answer. He nodded the best he could, but his body was too mentally and physically overwhelmed to provide anything more sufficient. It wasn’t easy to find a way to explain himself when the core sense of his emotions was the flooding feeling of relief. If no one else was going to die, then no more spirits would ever be able to haunt him, and maybe he could even make peace with those who already were. Maybe he could finally make amends for where he’d failed and move past all that pain.
Sokka must’ve been a little too obvious in how much he was shaking because Hakoda pulled him back into his arms without a word. He allowed his eyes to drift shut, taking a deep breath in a failed attempt to steady himself. He was more than aware that his ridiculous overreactions were all due to how poorly he’d been treating his body, but given he’d been trying to correct it, he felt his emotions were still too extreme. Sokka swallowed hard, accepting Zuko’s hand when he reached out to give Sokka’s a squeeze. He needed something to ground him. That was it.
He was it.
“Sorry,” Sokka mumbled as soon as he found it in him to speak again. “I didn’t mean to— I’m just really glad that it’s okay. Or it will be okay. Hopefully. You know what I mean. It’s just, I— I’ve— I’ve been seeing the spirits of the men who died in battle and I feel like I’m losing my fucking mind every time and that’s why I kept cutting because I felt so bad and they wouldn’t leave and I just think maybe if this works, they— they won’t keep—”
“Oh, Sokka.” It was almost comforting that Hakoda was the first person to respond to the confession. Whether it was him or Katara didn’t matter, but Sokka needed his closest family to let him know that it was okay. That it didn’t change how they felt about him, regardless of how uncomfortable and weird it was. “You should’ve said something, bud. We asked if there was anything else and you know— you know we never would’ve judged you for that, right? Especially with how badly you’ve been treating your body, hallucinations wouldn’t be too out of the—”
“I know, but I didn’t want to say anything because it feels real. I— logically, I know that it’s probably just hallucinations and it fits with when you all made me start taking care of myself again but that doesn’t— it feels real and it hurts, okay? It— I don’t know how to explain it, I just didn’t want anyone to know. I didn’t think it was a good idea to let anyone know. I’m sorry. I’m not going to keep anything from you guys anymore.”
When the words formed on his lips was when Sokka realized that he really wanted them to be true. He was desperate for himself to be okay, for everyone to be okay, but it was starting to feel like that might not be possible. Sokka was so good at bottling things up that, at a certain point, he wasn’t even sure that he knew how to dig them out anymore. He wasn’t sure whether he would be able to follow through with his promises or if they’d become empty just by way of the fact that he didn’t know how to do it. He barely knew how to consciously express himself, let alone open up about the things that hurt the most.
He tried it anyway. Despite how hard it was for Sokka to go to his dad and Bato when he wanted to cut, he dragged himself out of bed and he did it. Despite how hard it was to go find Zuko or Katara when he didn’t want to sleep alone, he did it. Despite how hard it was to open up when he needed support, he asked for it. He went to Suki, to Toph, to Aang, to anyone who he trusted to listen to his problems and help him cope in a way that kept them all safe. That kept him from cutting himself when it hurt, from standing on the cliff when it got too hard, from forcing himself to help deliver the proposed treaties because his leg was too fucked up and at a certain point, he had to accept that.
It was easier to do when he was in the arms of someone he loved. Not always physically, but at least when he was close to them. Lying beside Toph, Suki, Aang, Katara, between Hakoda and Bato, or even lying right on Zuko’s muscular chest, he felt okay. Though they were around the same height, Sokka realized that Zuko held more muscle mass than him and somehow, it wasn’t even bothersome. It wasn’t the same as when he looked at Suki and all he could see was what his injury cost him. Not after talking to everyone and realizing that there was always an upside. That maybe he was smaller than Zuko, but that made him perfect for being the little spoon. For crawling into his arms after a bad day and nuzzling into his warm chest.
That was the biggest thing he had to accept, regardless of how impossible it sometimes seemed to be. Everything started because he felt like he was alone, insignificant, worthless, stupid, pathetic—the adjectives went on, but they weren’t true. They felt like they were true, like it was his destiny to be that way, but every day, people told him that wasn’t true. Every day, his friends and his family told him they loved him and they cared about him and at a certain point, it started to feel like they might not be lying. Like Sokka wasn’t quite as terrible as he always thought himself to be and there was a chance that, if he held out for long enough, things might start to be okay.
Not that his occasional moments of optimism made it significantly easier to live through the pain or that he magically wasn’t anxious when it came time to draw up the final drafts of the treaty. Sokka didn’t tell anyone when he was hurting that day because it felt irrelevant and it felt like a one-off thing. They were all busy working on the plans, working on saving lives, and Sokka wasn’t important enough to get in the way of that. He convinced himself not to binge when he felt the need but he scraped his arm by accident and the urges took over from there. Sokka didn’t stop himself from cutting the back of his arm open the rest of the way. From peeling at the wounds until he cried.
But really, he was just draining old failures, so what did it matter anyway?