Red Clouds can be Dangerous

Less than a minute has passed, and through the Sharingan, Madara could spot Zuko's ship already preparing to turn back towards the Earth Kingdom.

Looking towards another spot, he can clearly see Sokka's gobsmacked face.

'Gosh he has almost as much of a punchable face as Jackie… '

Then scanning fast, he can spot a worried Katara, 'Typical', and a hyperactive Avatar, staring in his direction with excited eyes and a huge smile. 'Even more typical….' He couldn't help but chuckle at their reaction.

Immediately he dismisses the flames on the red cloud, forcing the heat to spread toward the sea of clouds surrounding the vicinity, completely hiding his position once more.

It may look like he was showing off, but that's not quite it. He knew how the events transpired, Zuko would follow Aang alone, Zhao would follow Zuko and everything would end up well due to plot armor.

The point is… Zuko now isn't the same Zuko, he is more careful and stronger, yes, but he is also more confident in his skills, especially after the Agni Kai. Madara obviously knew about it, he is second in wealth only to the Beifongs at this point, and as his old pal Lao used to say… "Having money gives you the power to disregard many things."

One of them is the barrier of information, which Madara has been investing heavily for a year now, he might not have that much control over the Earth Kingdom, but the Western most area of the Earth Kingdom is already "his land", the King can enjoy his life in Ba Sing Se, Madara had no desire for it, but this region is already in his pocket.

'And with it… Comes the ownership of at least half of the future Republic City lands!'

He couldn't help but grin at that thought, until his gaze turned downwards, towards the Fire Navy blockade, toward one man in specific...

"Zhao…" his serene and somewhat playful expression disappeared instantly as he walked toward the edge of the platform, staring down as the heated clouds started to darken due to the change in temperature.

Extending his right hand and all his fingers, as if he was holding a ball, a circle of lightning cracked, connecting all his five fingers, rotating at a blinding speed.

"… And just like that… you would die… no one would even know how… not even yourself…"

His tomoe spun slowly, impacted by his anger.

A sound of thunder echoed through the skies, rain slowly fell on this region of the blockade as lightning kept circling, connecting his fingertips, almost as if he was charging a ki blast from Dragonball.

"… No…"

The lightning in his hand dispersed as he lowered his hand, staring down at Zhao's ship as his Sharingan worked as a scope, zooming in on Zhao's confused face 'the fucker doesn't even know what's happening or who is above his head with a sharpened blade right now…' Madara sneered.

"That's not how I want you to die… I want to see you with despair and hopelessness… I want to crush all of your efforts and plans… and after, to see everything that you worked for evaporate in front of your eyes until you finally see how worthless your existence is… only then… you have my permission to die…"

Madara's voice was low and stern, he didn't want to kill off Zhao like this, with an instant airstrike that wouldn't even be felt. 'He will have to suffer for almost killing my little sister and tarnishing the best battle I had by fleeing cowardly…'

According to his intel, Zhao would target Zuko way more harshly than before, he was humiliated in front of his soldiers. During canon he also lost, yes, but it was Iroh stopped him, it was Iroh who gave him the final words, not Zuko… but this time…

"I bet you want to kill Zuko way more than you would've wanted during canon, eh?"

Not only that, by killing Zhao right now it would create an issue… the one to replace him during the siege of the Northern Water Tribe would probably be Azula.

'Crazy bitch…'

Azula might be many things, but an idiot she is not. Madara has no doubt that she might even be able to pull a win over the Northern Water Tribe. That girl captured Ba Sing Se while bringing only her two teenage friends from the Fire Nation as aid, subduing Dai Li and conquering the unconquered capital of the Earth Kingdom without any apparent effort.

"Neither Aang nor Zuko is prepared to face her yet, at least during Book 2 when she appeared… Aang was already proficient with both Water and Airbending, and Katara stopped being a useless waste of oxygen after being taught by Pa-…. That fucking bastard…" His eyes narrowed as a natural lightning went down, hitting absolutely nothing but it gave Madara a plan anyway.

'But I can't let you go without suffering a loss here… Little Zhao…' he grinned as he pointed two fingers towards Zhao's ship and took a deep breath, using his Sharingan to have a near perfect aim.

"Enjoy your time swimming…" As his grin grew more and more evil, a heavy electric discharge escaped his fingertips, crossing the sky while aiming toward a specific ship.

…

Below the stormy clouds, the Fire Nation Navy was clearly confused about how the rain started in the first place and it was even worse for Zhao who saw the Avatar using the darkened clouds to hide their position from his sight.

'Of all times! Why did it have to rain just now?!' He couldn't understand, although cloudy, there was no hint of rain for the next few hours, not according to the specialist that they kept in their ranks to always monitor the climate changes, as they had to always be prepared after all.

"Sir! We can't locate the Avatar and it seems that the ship coming towards us also retreated back towards the Earth Kingdom!" said the Captain, waiting for orders.

Zhao didn't reply, he simply kept staring at the skies trying to figure out the location of the Avatar, but he couldn't, the rain ruined their plan to strike him down with fire.

Because of the location of Madara in the skies, almost no soldier spotted the quick appearance of the red cloud. He was already over them, while both Aang and Zuko were still coming from the east. Obviously, all the soldiers were paying attention to the East because of that.

Only Zuko who had the advantage of position and line of sight could see them from below. Aang could as well, but he was also in the skies, almost at the same height as Madara's airship.

As natural lightning ran through the clouds, Zhao gave up on trying to spot the Avatar and moved on with his next plan.

"Prepare To-"

But before he could complete his command, a powerful lightning bolt descended and crashed right into their engine room, not only causing massive damage to the overall structure of the ship, but it also created a chain reaction by igniting all of the flammable materials that were on board.

The ship trembled until an explosion occurred from within.

"ABANDON THE SHIP!" shouted Zhao in panic as he jumped into the sea.

Not even ten seconds after Zhao reached the water the ship exploded, sending debris all over and not only killing a significant number of soldiers but also injuring many more.

Zhao, after waiting for the explosion to subside, finally emerged from the water with a pained face 'Why?!' he was furious, this simple explosion was enough to buy the Avatar enough time to escape, and considering how long it would take to regroup with the other ships, five to ten minutes, his target would be long gone and the trail would be lost.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARGH!" He shouted in fury, staring at the sky as if he was cursing the deity or spirit that cursed and ruined his plan, in one moment he had both the Avatar and the exiled Prince in his reach, in the other… he didn't even have a ship, how cruel fate is!

…

"How unlucky…" Sneered Zuko as he stared at the remains of the ship, almost commanding his men to turn back towards the Fire Nation waters once more to take advantage of the breach, but he managed to control himself.

Iroh on the other hand was staring at the billowing smoke of the destroyed ship while caressing his grey beard with one hand and with the other folded behind his back, an odd glint could be seen in his eyes if one paid enough attention to it, but he remained silent.

"Let's go, men!" shouted Zuko, "In half a day all the high ranks of the Fire Nation will be alerted to the Avatar's intrusion, he will be coming back and we will be ready to catch his trail!"

The old General turned towards Zuko with a smile on his face. 'You are learning to use your head, Zuko.'

…

"WHAT THE FUCK ARE YE DOING?!" Shouted Kaliya, sweating bullets while trying her damn best to keep the cloud around their ship from dispersing, which became even harder after Madara's little red cloud stunt.

Scratching the back of his head with an apologetic smile, Madara approached her "…. Er…. My apologies… It seems I overdid it…"

"OVERDID IT MY ASS!" She shouted in anger "I'VE BEEN HOLDING THIS CLOUD FOR OVER AN HOUR NOW, AND YE HAD TO MAKE IT HARDER FOR ME!"

She had a point, not only did the temperature increase make her control waiver, but it also caused her major discomfort which made it even harder to keep the required control to keep that kind of bending.

Avoiding the Northern Tribe girl's furious gaze, Madara placed his hands in his imaginary pockets "…I won't do it again…"

"I HARDLY DOUBT THAT!"

"Okay okay... I won't do it again in these circumstances, come on! We made a literal Red Cloud! We should be proud!"

"…."

Noticing that it would be better to wait until they reached an abandoned island before having that kind of talk, Madara tactically decided to walk inside in silence, avoiding any confrontation with his employee/lover.

As he walked inside and sat on a lavish and comfortable sofa chair in the control room, Nari eyed him up and down and asked.

"Why did you do that?"

"Do what?"

"You don't have to play dumb with me Mr. Uchiha, we've known each other for almost a decade now, and I know that although you are a showoff.. You wouldn't place such burdens on Kaliya just for the sake of it…"

Madara stared at Nari for a few seconds and sighed. "You know… Sometimes I miss the dumb old Jackie that didn't catch things that fast…"

Nari simply chuckled at that comment.

"Well... if you want to know… there was someone I wanted to kill, someone I wanted to protect, and someone that I wanted to mark with a striking first impression…."

"Oh?" Her eyebrows raised.

After spending a few minutes explaining who Zhao was and why he was on Madara's hit list, how Zuko would be in danger if he decided to venture inside the Fire Nation like a hotheaded idiot, and how important it would be for their future to have a unique first impression on the Avatar, Nari only had one question.

"Why didn't you kill him?"

"Not satisfying enough…"

"Mr. Uchiha, I am not my husband…"

"Sigh…" staring at the ceiling of the room he couldn't help but feel helpless when it came to the wits of this woman.

"Two reasons, one is that although I can control lightning like no one else due to my eyes… it's still hard to have a perfect aim on such a small target at long distances, lightning is a bit… wild… to aim properly… I don't think I could do so while being so far away…"

"And the second?"

".. Him dying now would make most of my plans useless and it would throw a variable in the equation, a very dangerous one at that…"

He didn't have to explain why he didn't just jump down and attack the Navy, it was obvious, this was a covert mission, the Fire Nation higher-ups were the last people on this planet that he wanted knowing that he left the Resort.

There's no doubt that they already figured out his identity and are bidding their time, the moment he leaves his metaphorical gold mine unprotected, they would launch an attack to take over it, they only haven't done so yet because the last ten times they tried last year ended up in disaster for them, with not a single agent coming back alive to tell the tale.

Noticing that Madara wouldn't explain any further, Nari didn't press him, simply returning to piloting the airship with a gentle smile on her lips.

"And where are we going from here?" she asked, trying to change the subject.

"To a northern island of the Fire Nation."

"Oh? And what would such a remote place have that made you take such a risk in coming here?" she asked, legit intrigued.

"There's a group of interesting warriors that live there… and they worship a couple of even more interesting beings…" A smile appeared on Madara's face. "Beings that I am looking forward to forming a good friendship with… at least one of them."