Work Text:
The noise was truly horrifying, a foghorn amplified to an ear-shattering level, drowning out every other sound - the explosions, the distant screams, even the sound of Asami’s own frantic heartbeat as she watched the huge plumes of smoke rise from the factory.
The earth shook, toppling the typically-graceful woman onto her knees as she stared at the building, willing her eyes to be wrong. Her dragonfly mechs, the Beifongs, the airbenders, Mako, Bolin…Korra.
Korra.
Everything else fell away in that instant as she scrambled to her feet, an incoherent scream falling from her lips as she tore down the still-trembling pavement at full speed. She could feel the heat from the wall of flames that had erupted from the foundation of the building as she grabbed hold of a chunk of rubble and threw it aside.
“Korra!" she screamed, tears obscuring her vision as she dug furiously through rocks that grew increasingly hotter, leaving burns and blisters on her palms and knees. She paid no mind to the pain, it was nothing, nothing compared to the agony Korra must be feeling trapped under the rubble. Her mind refused to consider any other alternative. She couldn’t be gone. It wasn’t possible.
"Asami!" she almost didn’t hear the sound of her name being called, almost shrugged off that hand that came down onto her shoulder in a request to halt. "Asami, please, let me."
She dimly recognized Lin’s voice, but it did nothing to stop her from heaving a particularly large, smoking rock to the side. “I have to find her!” The tears were falling freely now, but she worked around them as the hand retracted.
After a moment, the rubble in front of her lifted into the air and flew to the side as Lin began to tunnel into the rock. Only then did she pause, breath coming out in short, frantic gasps as she watched the metalbender carefully toss bits and pieces of her broken factory aside.
"Can anybody hear me?" Lin called, somehow keeping a firm voice of calm authority despite everything.
A single groan answered her, and Asami zeroed in on it immediately, falling back onto her scorched knees and throwing debris aside before a hand emerged from the rubble, reaching out for her.
"Asami?"
She locked eyes with Bolin through a twisted piece of metal. His face was covered in crimson, flowing freely onto the rocks below, but his expression was one of mild relief as Lin stepped forward and very carefully bent the metal out from around him. Asami offered her hand and began to pull him out, but it quickly became apparent that his legs had been crushed under the weight of some fallen piece of the roof.
"I…I can’t feel my…" he was white as a sheet and fading quickly.
"One of you, take him to a hospital!" Lin called over her shoulder to the group of police officers who had just arrived on the scene. "The rest of you, start digging, now!"
Asami did what she could, feeling powerless among the crowd of earthbenders who were tunneling into the skeletal remains of the building’s foundation. She glimpsed pieces of her broken dragonfly mechs among the rubble they tossed aside, but she spared them barely a thought.
Her stomach hit the floor when an officer emerged carrying Mako’s still body, but she had no time to examine him before he was riding away on a metal cable in the direction of hospital. One by one, more emerged, a very shaken and bleeding Suyin even managing to lift herself onto wobbling legs and aid in the dig.
Asami’s hands were charred and black by the time she lifted a rock to reveal a familiar, limp hand lying against the ground.
“Korra!”
No answer, not even a finger twitch, but Lin immediately turned from her section of the rubble and began to clear the area around the fallen Avatar, revealing a puddle of blood that was way too large…
"Korra, please, say something!" Asami called, darting into the free space that Lin had just cleared, reaching down with trembling hands to brush away a lock of hair that was matted with sweat and blood.
Korra was still as Asami’s fingers flew to her neck, searching desperately for a pulse.
"Asami…" came a soft groan as she felt the weak beats of the Avatar’s heart against her hand.
"Oh, spirits," she muttered in relief, watching Korra’s eyelids slowly flutter open.
"Asami, I…I can’t move…"
Asami knew that phrase all too well, had heard it called out in the Avatar’s fitful nightmares, growled in frustration as she was pushed around in her wheelchair, admitted softly on the occasions when Asami had had to lift her up and carry her into bed. It had broken her heart to hear every time previously, but hearing the words while seeing Korra covered in blood and fading in her arms was too much to bear.
"I know," she choked out, another fresh wave of tears falling down her cheek. "I’m going to help you. Please, Korra…hang on."
She hesitated for only a moment before leaning forward and doing what she had always wanted to do during those long nights spent watching over the Avatar as she struggled with her pain and her memories of Zaheer. The kiss was brief and chaste, a gentle brushing of lips against lips, soft enough to feel like a dream.
When she looked up again, Lin was at the ready, face locked in a grim expression as she scanned the growing pool of blood on the ground.
"Take her to the hospital," Asami requested in a trembling voice, "Please."