Disclaimer: I hereby claim no ownership or copyright to
Avatar: The Last Airbender. All rights to it belong to Nickelodeon and the source was created by Michael Dante di Martino and Bryan Konietzko. I only own the plot of this fanfic, anything you do not recognize from the show is mine.
The Final Testament of Phoenix King Ozai
Prologue: Condemned
The grand courtroom in the Palace of Justice was one of the most impressive in Agnishima, the Fire Nation capital. The courtroom was a vast circular chamber with the spectator area surrounding the center on three sides with the bench at the far end. The walls were painted red and paneled with gold, very much like the old throne room. Bright torches and lamps illuminated the room, and the ceiling was one large painting depicting dragons in flight under a reddish sunset. The defendant would usually have to stand on a platform in the center for the trials, but as there were many accused persons in this particular case, a sitting area was allotted to them.
During the war's hundred years, alleged dissenters, traitors to the Fire Lord, and prisoners of war stood brief trials and were sentenced to death or to life in one of the country's many notorious prisons, having it much worse than any common criminal could dream of. After the war, it became the site of the International Military Tribunal of Class One War Criminals, where the major living perpetrators of the war had faced justice. The most notorious of the accused was none other than the deposed Fire Lord Ozai himself. The Avatar had spared his life in the Battle of Wulong Forest, only removing his Firebending power, but the self-proclaimed Phoenix King eventually had to answer for his crimes along with Prime Minister Yu, War Minister Qin, Justice Minister Takahashi, Senior General Nguyen Thanh An, and twenty-one other lesser known names who had a major hand in the Fire Nation's menace.
There were people who were angry that the Avatar didn't kill Ozai, but the prosecutor, a regional Earth Kingdom magistrate named Khan, was certainly not. In his opening statement, the prosecutor made a point to mention that he was happy that the deposed Fire Lord was kept alive, because now he would face justice and the whole world would come to know of his atrocities, purging doubt from anyone's mind. For two years, witnesses from the three surviving Nations gave their testimonies against the accused. Six of the witnesses included the Avatar himself, Fire Lord Zuko, Katara and Sokka of the Southern Water Tribe, Toph Bei-Fong, and Suki – who had been detained as a POW and subjected to torture, mostly at the hands of Princess Azula – and they all gave strong evidence against the accused. Azula had been declared insane by the court, thus was unfit to stand trial. It was likely that she would never recover from her mental state. Now it was finally over. The council of judges had reached a verdict after three months of deliberations and it was to be pronounced today.
Ozai could only have been described as a shadow of the once intimidating, powerful Fire Lord that had almost ensured the victory of the Fire Nation. The loss of his firebending had turned him into a bitter, distant man who did not seem to care what had happened to him anymore. His prison robes were filthy; his hair was a matted cloud, and his beard unkempt, yet he still managed to retain his air of being above all. Although he had pleaded not guilty, the former Firelord did nothing to provide a good case for the defense. The only time he spoke in court was in angry outbursts, claiming that he was still the Phoenix King and that they would all pay for subjecting him to this disgrace.
The guards flanked the accused into the courtroom with Ozai in the lead. Jeers and boos greeted the procession as they were led to their seats. Ozai shot a disgusted glare at the spectators cursing and insulting him. He then shifted his gaze around the courtroom. The defense attorney, Mr. Tanaka, the head of the law department at Fire Lord Shinji University, had an unreadable expression on his face. The prosecutor stood on the other side of chamber with a hint of anticipation in his eyes.
The bailiff rapped his staff on the marble floor shouting, "Order! We shall have order!" The courtroom instantly fell silent. War Minister Qin shifted in his seat nervously, much to Ozai's distaste. "All rise!" There were five judges overseeing the trials, four of them representing the Three Nations. The Water Tribes had appointed a waterbending master named Pakku to represent the Northern Water Tribe and the Southern Tribe had appointed a warrior named Kuruko; the Earth Kingdom's judge was General Yung, and the Fire Nation's judge was a resistance leader named General Jiao. Avatar Aang was offered the position of the Air Nomad judge, despite his young age, but he declined saying that the world needed him elsewhere. The chief judge was another man from the Earth Kingdom; a war hero named General Hao. Once the judges took their seats at the bench, the court followed suit.
"Deliberations have concluded," Hao announced. "I shall now read the verdicts reached by the council for each individual defendant standing before this tribunal. Ex-Fire Lord Ozai!" Ozai stood up, looking the general in the eyes in defiance. He was the
Phoenix King, he thought to himself angrily. "On count one, general conspiracy," Hao lifted a sheet of paper off the table, and his brow furrowed as he read off the verdicts. "Namely conspiracy to commit war crimes; conspiracy to commit crimes against peace by waging aggressive wars against the Water Tribes, the Earth Kingdom, and Air Nomads; and conspiracy to commit crimes against humanity, the tribunal finds the accused guilty.
"On count two, crimes against peace. Namely the planning, preparing, initiating, and waging of wars of aggression against the Water Tribes and the Earth Kingdom with no regard to the peace and tranquility of said nations, the tribunal finds the accused guilty.
"On count three, war crimes. Namely the wanton destruction of cities, towns, and villages; devastation not justified by military or civilian necessity; and the maltreatment and murder of prisoners of war, the tribunal finds the accused guilty.
"On count four, crimes against humanity. Namely genocide, murder, extermination, enslavement, deportation and other inhumane acts against the populations of the Water Tribes and the Earth Kingdom and the persecution, enslavement, and murder of Fire Nation citizens based on political and ethnic grounds, the tribunal finds the accused guilty." The silence that fell upon the courtroom before the judges' arrival had only seemed heavier. "For these offenses, the tribunal hereby sentences the accused to death by hanging."
Ozai felt as though someone had punched him in the gut. They were going to
hang him? The former Fire Lord had known from the beginning that he would be sentenced to death, but this was the ultimate insult. "A hanging?" he growled over the cheers and the bailiff's call for order, barely stopping himself from lunging at the judges. "You're going to hang me like I'm some common thief?" In the Fire Nation, hanging was considered the lowest and most dishonorable method of execution. It was applied only to common criminals within the Fire Nation itself. Prisoners of war and traitors were executed by a firebending squad or were beheaded, but never hanged. It was sickening that they would do this to him, especially considering that he was once royalty.
"If you think you deserve a soldier's death, Ozai," Jiao replied, shaking his head and glaring at the defendant. "You are much mistaken. Take your seat." Ozai sat down heavily, seething with rage.
"Prime Minister Yu," Hao began, but Ozai was barely listening. So this was how his story was supposed to end, he thought. Standing in front of a crowd of peasants being hanged like a worthless dog. It was an outrage, a scandal, and there was nothing he could do about it. The deposed Firelord just sat there listening to Hao reading off the verdicts. Prime Minister Yu, War Minister Qin, Justice Minister Takahashi, Senior General Nguyen, and a dozen others were to be hanged as well. Out of the five others to be convicted, two were sentenced to life imprisonment in solitary confinement, one was sentenced to twenty-five years with hard labor, another to fifteen years in solitary confinement, and the last to ten years also with hard labor. The remaining three were acquitted.
"Death sentences will be carried out in thirty days and prison sentences begin immediately in Hulao Prison in the Earth Kingdom. This tribunal is adjourned."
The Fire Nation had specially designed facilities for people awaiting execution. These were not even referred to as prisons, but as "detention centers", and their inmates were simply called the condemned rather than prisoners. Ozai and the others condemned to death in the Agnishima Tribunals were brought to the detention center on the outskirts of the city.
The inmates were handed over to the guards unceremoniously and were lined up against the wall of the building. The doors swung open, and a high-ranking officer, probably the warden, marched out and paced the gravel ground in front of the inmates. "I won't waste time with words," he said shortly. "You have all been brought here because you have been sentenced to death. You'd all just be on your best behavior during your remaining days, and your time here will be easy. However, if you cause any trouble, disciplinary action will be taken." He stopped his pacing and faced the inmates, but Ozai knew that the warden was looking at him in particular. "Either way, it doesn't really matter in the end, but I suggest you behave. Guards, take the condemned to their cells."
Placing the convicts into the cells had taken less than an hour, and Ozai surveyed what would be his final accommodations. The cells here were larger than what they were in regular prisons, and they were private. The cell was virtually empty, save for a mattress in the corner and a chamber pot. The steel door had only a small window. Sighing heavily at his situation, Ozai paced his cell for a while. If he was to be here for a month before his execution, then he might as well do something to make the time pass a little more quickly.
The former Fire Lord made his way over to the cell door, looking out the window into the corridor. "Guard!" he called. Almost immediately, footsteps could be heard. A young guard's face appeared at the other side of the window.
"What is it?"
"I have a request," said Ozai disdainfully. "I would like a brush, some ink, and a pack of papers." The guard arched his eyebrows then nodded wordlessly. It took a while for the guard to return, and the former Firelord expected this, so he sat against the wall doing the one thing a bored prisoner can do; think. Even now, historians would be rushing to write about his downfall at the Avatar's hands. Ozai was not the first Fire Lord to have been deposed, there were two before him hundreds of years ago who probably sat in a cell very much like this one, recounting their lives to the emptiness of their accommodations before facing the sword the next morning. However, Ozai wanted to put his story on paper and have it published to Fire Nation historians. The world needed to know the story of the man behind the monster.
Soon the guard slid the papers, ink, and brush through the food slot and Ozai rushed to collect the items. Dipping the brush in the ink, he set one sheet of paper on the floor close to him and began to write:
I don't know who will read this, or if it will even be released to the public, but I don't care. I feel that my story must be told, and before I die, it must be put on paper. This will be the last and only autobiography I'll ever write. My name is Ozai, the Phoenix King, and this is my final testament
.
A/N: This is an idea that just popped into my head. I ask that you nitpick the hell out of it, show no mercy. I didn't like that the Fire Nation capital had no name, so I gave it the name Agnishima. Nguyen Thanh An is a recurring character in my fanfics.