EDITED 25.1.11. EDITS are marked.
The thing about open endings is, they incite readers to seriously think about how the story could end and to come up with a scenario that will allow the characters to find closure.
Over at #noselfcontrol, the awesome rufftoon posted an almost 450 pages long comic about how, after his siege of the North, Admiral Zhao ended up in the watertribe without his memories and was left alive, because it obviously was the will of the spirits. Zhao eventually redeems himself, but the story leaves many, many questions unanswered.
It's something that just wouldn't leave me alone (I have no self-control either *sigh*. I SHOULD have been working and got a lot less of that done than I wanted to. Ah well, who needs sleep anyway? ) and so I sat down and quickly typed something that might let the characters (and never mind ME), find some closure. So here's what I think that the characters (including the spirits) need and how the story could meet those needs and how the wh