#zuko with synesthesia

Zuko with a sound-to-color synesthesia

Imagine tiny Zuko seeing pretty lights flashing as people talked or there was music or he heard some sounds. He'd get distracted easily, so he'd be reprimanded all the time, but he couldn't help it when there were colors moving in his field of vision, and how didn't Azula get distracted either? It was impossible

And people's voice color would change sometimes, and he hated it because mother's beautiful green-blue color would darken sometimes but she'd keep smiling and saying it was nothing, but he knew it was a lie because he had seen that furrow in her brow after the long talk she and Father had in their chambers

Zuko loving his mother's color even if it wasn't red and he had no name for that hue of green-blue. Zuko hating how Father and Azula had bright and strong reds while his own voice only produced a stupid hue of light red-sort-of-pink, like salmon octopuses

Tiny Zuko having a panic attack after going somewhere clustered with people and being overwhelmed by the sheer amount of colors he saw at once

Zuko: so, you know the sound of armor clinking? that’s gray. and the sounds appa makes are brown

Toph: awesome

Zuko: and momo’s orange. water splashing is pretty much blue - soft voices are usually blue too. katara’s is a blue kinda green, though. like leaves ruffling

Toph: aw, sugar queen’s color had to be more like an ostrich horse neighing

Katara: exCUSE YOU?

Aang: people have colors too???

Zuko: yeah?? i just said i see sounds

Sokka: isn’t that just the colors of the places we come from?

Zuko: well, no. not really. uncle’s a forest green

Sokka: wait wait wait! so we ALL have COLORS?? ANY colors???

Zuko: didn’t i just say that???

BUT ALSO! Zuko using smells to explain colors but kinda being terrible at it because he uses too many spice names to describe them and Toph just, doesn’t know them??

Zuko: and yellow is like ginger

Toph: uh

Aang: kuzon loved ginger! it’s all spicy and hot, but sorta sweet too, right?

Toph: oh!

Zuko: ...yeah

There you go. I wrote the fic with Zuko with synesthesia.

AO3 link

Summary: A turdleduckling approached the edge of the pond and quacked at him. The flash of yellow that accompanied the sound, usually so comforting, sent a spark of panic through Zuko’s chest. He hid his face on his folded legs, tightening his hold on them despite the burn stinging in his wrist, and started his breathing exercises anew.

Zuko sees colors whenever people talk or he hears sounds. That changes everything and nothing at the same time.

Word count: 7,181

The whole thing got a bit big, so I recommend reading it on AO3. I’ll leave a small part of the story underneath here, though, for those of you curious.

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“Prince Zuko, are you paying attention?”

Zuko’s eyes snapped back to his tutor, who tutted in annoyance. Dark grey flashed on the left side of Zuko’s vision, a spot of dull color that overlapped the bright pink that skittered on that side along to the pace of the chirps of a bird-butterfly.

“I am, Mr. Fo!”

He wasn’t, and they both knew it.

“Then what is the name of the general that lead our people to a glorious victory on the first conflict against the barbaric Earth Kingdom army at the western Earth coast?”

“Uh, General Shogi?”

“Was that a question or an answer?”

Zuko flushed in embarrassment.

“An answer,” he said. His grip tightened around his pencil when his tutor sighed.

Posting this here so I can keep better track of the prompts. I’ve got three written - two for bnha (tododeku) and one for atla (zukka).

The ones marked as WIPs are actually just the ones I have vague ideas for lol nothing solid yet. Tears of fear would be tododeku, but I wrote smth along that line recently so I don’t wanna repeat it so soon. I don’t know whether to go with dehydration or passing out from pain. They’re both gen atla and I miss that hnnnnn 

Unsurprisingly, that helps wonders in the creative process. Note to future self: when it comes to changing canon, outline your things before you start banging your head on walls you created yourself.