Chapter Text
It wasn’t as if she had to hide the fact that she had spent the better part of the last two weeks in her new office. It was no secret; her subordinates knew she had hardly left, except on official business and it almost seemed like everyone had expected this of her. No one bat an eye at the fact that there was a consistent stream of paperwork flowing into and out of the Chief’s office between the hours of 6AM and 11PM, maneuvering around her sunrise workout and brief breaks for food. Freshly appointed Chief, Lin Beifong was no stranger to long workdays, though she was anything but reckless with her health and wellbeing.
Her response to taking over from Chief Liyang seemed to be working out in her favour. The chatter that came with the Beifong name being reattached to the title of Chief had died down significantly. Her subordinates had noticed that, in spite of her own tendency to work overtime, she did not demand unreasonable hours from anyone and would in fact encourage junior officers not to neglect their family lives in order to “prove themselves”. Quality of work on the clock, rather than the quantity of hours one was willing to put in, was key to earning her trust.
The two-week period she had promised Kya she would keep to in the face of the transition of power would end that day, though, and Lin knew that Kya would not hesitate to drop the combined power of both herself and Izumi onto Lin if she continued to devote inhuman hours to her job beyond their agreed-upon deadline.
It wasn’t like there was much else for her to devote herself to. Her apartment in the city was not spartan by any means, but it was empty except for her. Two bedrooms and a study, together with a decent amount of communal living space made for a comfortable place to return at the end of the day, but it did not necessarily pull her away from her desk when there was so much to do at work. Liyang had been a competent Chief, the second since her mo––Toph had retired nearly a decade prior and Lin’s mentor for much of her later career, but Republic City never slept, and the workload now put on Lin’s lap proved it.
The day was winding down. Through the retracted soles of her boots Lin could feel the bullpen outside her door emptying itself steadily, as did the desks downstairs. The night shift was beginning to trickle in as well, the characteristic gait of the night desk sergeant approaching his desk near the elevator revealed.
Perhaps it was time to call it a night.
She and Liyang had been putting the pieces in place to ensure that the transition between Chiefs was smooth over the last year since he announced his impending retirement, and the finishing touches on that plan were enacted a couple days ago. The necessary promotions had been handed out, personnel redistributed, and Lin had spent the better part of the past two weeks making nice with various City Council members who she would have to work with going forward.
She hated politics, but she was good at it and she had to be.
Setting her pen down on the last report of the day to cross her desk, Lin allowed a certain clarity she had rarely settled on in the last ten years to wash over her—she was now, and had been for nearly a decade, the only Beifong left in the city.
There had been infants born and grown into full-fledged children in that time, who never knew a city whose police force was run by Toph, whose streets were Suyin’s playground.
It was not quite loneliness she felt, but stillness instead. The past decade had started off hard on her. With the breakdown of her immediate family also came the breakdown of her fifteen-year long relationship on the back of an over-eager young acolyte. She had found her footing in time, maintaining friendships from her childhood and forging ones in the force independent of Toph’s influence and oversight.
She had become the grass that grew through the concrete, a voice much like Uncle Aang and Great Uncle Iroh’s reminded her.
Perhaps it was time to call it a night.
Brushing her hair back with her right hand, the other gathered her belongings. Instead of bending the door open, she allowed her hand to settle on the coolness of the doorknob, grounding herself in feeling every piece of earth in the metal reach out to her, before pulling the door open.
So much for stillness.
“Hello, Lin—”
The woman in question beckoned her unexpected visitor into the now-darkened office, flicking the lights back on on her way back to her desk.
“Is there something I can help you with?” Lin asked as she sat down, gesturing to the chair in front of her.
“This is a calmer reception than the one I was expecting, I must admit,” the visitor responded, before leading a small child into the office with her, shutting the door behind her handlessly.
Lin shrugged before speaking levelly, “I figure it must be something important if you would resort to looking me up. It’s been ten years, after all. Our personal… grievances can wait.”
“Time has mellowed you, jiejie,” Suyin observed with a slight smile, “But you are right.”
The younger woman nodded towards the girl who had come in with her, speaking quieter, “She needs a home. A good one. A stable one. One where her bending is not going to be looked at as a burden but as a gift, and where she is going to be treated well. Where she won’t be given up on.”
Lin took a closer look at the child in question, scanning her long dark hair that had been braided back neatly, her green eyes, her small stature. She could not be more than four, maybe younger. She was a shade or two paler than Suyin was, and the glint in her eyes belied an intelligence that Lin recognised from her sister’s youth.
“Is she yours?” Lin intoned.
Suyin shook her head, “She was given up by her parents a few months ago. They said they couldn’t handle a child like her. My husband and I were going to raise her as our own, but—”
She trailed off, resting her hand on her abdomen. It clicked for Lin.
“You can’t take her because you’re expecting, is that what you’re saying?” Lin probed, trying to maintain a level tone, “Because she isn’t your flesh and blood, she is worth less to you than a child who doesn’t yet fully exist?”
Suyin’s eyes flashed, “I knew you hadn’t changed that much. Ever the judgmental older sister. You always knew what was better for me than I did, didn’t you? You always had to tell me, too, and everyone else.”
“For what it’s worth, Suyin,” Lin sighed, “I don’t actually think you’re making the wrong choice. I just think the reasons for it being right are despicable. She deserves to be fully wanted and accepted, not to live her whole life being reminded that she’ll always be one step away from being your full daughter.”
“Lin, I came to you because I know you’ll make her feel loved. I know you’ll push her potential,” Suyin tried to reason, “She is already a strong, if uncontrolled, bender at this age. She just needs a steady guiding hand.”
Lin rolled her eyes and leaned back in her chair, retorting, “What she needs is to not be abandoned yet again. And she won’t be. You’ll be the last one.”
Taking the papers her sister handed to her, Lin filled in the necessary information and signed where she needed to. She left the second set of spaces blank for the moment, momentarily worrying her lip as she considered her partner’s potential reaction to this sudden decision.
That was a concern for herself later. This child needed a home. She could provide one. It was simple.
“Tell me about her,” Lin asked.
Suyin beckoned for the child to come closer, nudging her towards Lin, “Kuvira, I want you to meet my big sister Lin. She’s going to take care of you. Do you want to tell her a bit about yourself?”
The child—Kuvira, Lin reminded herself—stepped forward, a section of her braid coming loose and framing the right side of her face.
“My name is Kuvira. I am four years old. Mommy and daddy said they couldn’t take care of me anymore.”
Lin raised her hand to Kuvira’s face slowly, waiting for the child to lean closer before she attempted to tuck the loose section of hair behind the child’s ear, speaking softer than Su had heard since their childhood, “Hey kid. You seem awfully strong for a four-year-old. Are you sure you aren’t older?”
The joke made the girl laugh. Lin allowed the shimmering sound to settle over her, finding herself smile back as the stillness she had relished earlier returned.
“Would you be okay with coming to stay with me, Kuvira?” Lin asked gently, “I can’t promise I’ll know how to do everything right immediately, but I do promise to try my best and to not give up on you if you don’t give up on me?”
“Are you my new mom?” Kuvira asked, “Will I have a new dad?”
Lin paused, acutely aware of her sister leaning forward in her seat at the mention of a romantic partner.
“It is up to you who I am to you. I will do all I can to take care of you, but you don’t have to call me anything you’re not comfortable with. You can call me Chief if you want, or even Lin,” Lin shifted in her seat as she contemplated the second question, “I don’t have a husband, but I am married. If you come live with me, you’ll meet my wife later.”
“Wife?” Suyin interjected in surprise.
“I didn’t know you got married; why are you surprised that the reverse is the same?” Lin teased.
“Last I heard, you’d destroyed half of the Island and Uncle Aang’s statue was floating away in the bay,” Suyin retorted, “Forgive me for being surprised!”
“That was a decade ago, Su,” Lin shrugged, allowing the weight of their time apart to settle on her younger sister, “I got married four years ago next month.”
“Who?” Suyin pushed.
“Me,” a voice spoke from the now-open door, before turning to Lin and addressing her unasked question, “You forget I went to school with your night sergeant’s sister. Yong called me when he saw you try to head out and get stopped by someone he didn’t fully recognise. Wanted to make sure I didn’t get mad at you for not holding up your end of the bargain.”
“You told Yong about our agreement?” Lin exclaimed.
“I had to get someone on my side to make sure you actually left the office when you promised to,” she teased.
Suyin stood up and interjected, “Wait, when did this happen? What happened to Tenzin?”
“My kid brother wouldn’t know a good thing if it hit him in the face,” Kya snarled, before calming at Lin’s hand on her shoulder, “We’ve been together what, six, seven years now? A couple years ago she finally put a ring on it.”
It was only then that Suyin noticed the necklace around Kya’s neck and the ring on her sister’s finger.
“Please tell me Izumi has been doing us all a favour and giving you shit for this, Linny—”
“Language!” Lin flicked a small fragment of a meteorite paperweight at her sister’s shoulder, “If Kuvira starts swearing, I don’t care if we’re not in the fire nation, I’ll take you in an Agni Kai.”
“Kuvira?” Kya asked.
Lin sighed, but gestured to the child who had found her way to Lin’s lap, “Kya, meet Kuvira. Kuvira, this is my wife, Kya. She’s a master waterbender and a great healer. Kya, Su brought Kuvira here—from Zaofu, I assume—because she needs a home. I was thinking—”
“You were doing more than thinking, if the child on your lap is any indication,” Kya interrupted, before squatting to be at eye level with the child, “Hi Kuvira, I’m really happy you’re going to be living with us.”
Eventually, Suyin made her way back to the hotel she was staying in while Kya and Lin took their new charge with them to City Hall to file the paperwork that Su had brought with Kuvira. As they left Lin’s office, she nodded to Yong at his desk, and Kuvira kept her head down. She had taken easily to both of them, her energy still tentative and tense though she allowed them both to hold her hands as they walked. They felt safe, Kuvira decided. Safe enough at least, and warm in a way she hadn’t been in a while.
It would be their luck that Tenzin was leaving his office the exact same moment they walked into the building, He did not notice them immediately, though the striking blue of his sister’s usual attire combined with the distinctive metal of Lin’s uniform were an unmistakable combination that eventually caught his eye.
His attention zeroed in on the child—yes, child—between them, holding their hands like it was something the three of them did every day.
He dropped the papers he was holding in shock, bending to pick them up as the child peered over at him oddly.
“Councilman Tenzin,” Lin greeted sterilely as they paused a few steps away from him, “Good evening.”
“Chief Beifong,” he nodded towards her, then his sister, “Kya, what a surprise.”
“Have a good evening, Tenzin,” Kya’s words were clipped as they continued past him, her shoulders stiff well after he was out of earshot, “I could feel his judgment assaulting us the moment he noticed we were here.”
“He was probably just surprised, love,” Lin assured, softening as the exhaustion of the past two weeks caught up with her, “He has avoided seeing both of us together since we got married, and in the little he has seen of us he has never asked about our lives. We could have had Kuvira this whole time without him knowing. Besides, to him, I never wanted children.”
“You didn’t want children who would be treated like Bumi and I would have been, and he’s always been too much of an airhead golden boy to get that,” Kya sneered.
Lin hoisted Kuvira onto her hip, seeing the child begin to drag her feet as the day wore on her, then turned back to Kya and squeezed her hand, “He doesn’t matter. Let’s get the guardianship paperwork filed and head home so Kuvira can get some rest. She’s wiped, aren’t you badgermole?”
The child in her arms didn’t speak, simply burying her nose in Lin’s neck and allowing the low thrum of the metal armour against her skin lull her to sleep as they walked.