Chapter Text
The air of the Western Air Temple had always smelled cleaner than most other air, and Bolin wasn’t sure why that was. Maybe it was all the heat. Maybe it was because everything was upside down and all the gross smells were somehow on the ceiling. Or was it the floor? The one he wasn’t standing on.
“So, Avatar Korra, what can you tell us about your new initiative? There’s been a lot of rumors, but not much meat to ‘em. I don’t even know what it’s called!” commentated Shiro Shinobi, his voice not quite as cheery as it used to be.
“Well, there’s a lot I’d like to say, but not much I’m able to divulge. You understand.”
“Of course. How ‘bout a name?”
“That I can actually give you. The Unity Defense Program.”
“Fancy!”
Bolin looked up at the inverted architecture and followed the contours toward the center of the temple. He’d gotten lost one too many times in the short while he’d been assigned ‘official Avatar guard duty’. Not that he was guarding the Avatar, that’d be weird. No, he was guarding things that the Avatar needed protecting.
The New Air Nation. Well, what was left of it.
Bolin rubbed his wedding ring with his thumb. Equal parts silver and platinum. Integrity and greatness. The inscription read the same, with little love thrown in. Just to be safe.
“My wife of ten years, Asami Sato, can’t even believe it’s been that that long, came up with a brilliant new way to supplement to our existing correctional system. I can promise you, right here and now, that it’s going to save millions of yuans, if not millions of lives.”
“Wow! If that isn’t a good sign, then I don’t know what is! Got a good feeling that the next thing you’ll announce is lower taxes!”
“That’s...not really up to me, Shiro.”
“You sure? Coulda sworn the Avatar had that kind of power.”
He checked his watch. It was a nice place to live and protect. Of course, it wasn’t just him alone. The White Lotus were a constant presence as well. Membership had gone up in the past few years, so some of the best benders and non-benders in the world were members all over again. Or so Korra had told him. He really needed to read up on his history.
“I’m not saying I couldn’t, but I have more important things to deal with. Oh, but I can announce that capital punishment should be discontinued within the next few months or so. Once this new system is in place, it will be completely unnecessary.”
“I think that’s gonna make a lot of our folks listening at home very happy, Avatar Korra.”
“Good. It’s inherently barbaric, but I think most would agree, at times, necessary.”
“No arguments here!”
Bolin passed a patrol of sentries with a wave and smile. They returned the gesture and one of them even struck a pose that was distinctly ‘Nuktuk’. He laughed and copied the fan so that they were flexing side by side. Which, of course, tore his jacket.
“What?” Bolin huffed and looked at his shredded sleeves. “Not again. Sorry guys, but I guess I gotta go change.”
Bolin trotted off and walked into the temple proper. He stuck his hands in his pockets and brushed his thumb against the ring as he passed the massive inverted archway. The dormitories for the White Lotus were on the other side of the compound, but thankfully Korra hadn’t seen a problem with him sharing a room with his wife. Why would she? They were married!
“I’d be surprised if there were, Shiro. Now, on to less important manners. The 185 Probending Season. I’m partial to the Future Industries Fire Ferrets, but everyone knows that. What about you? Who are you rooting for this year?”
“It’s gotta be the Ba Sing Se Badgermoles. They’ve got a fresh new earthbender this year and I think she’s got what it takes to get them to the top!”
“Should be an exciting season, then! You know I heard they might be reinstating the Wolfbats? Tahno as well.”
Bolin rolled his eyes and knocked on Opal’s door. Yay. Wolfbats. He adjusted his collar and winked at the four sentries posted outside dormitory. Always lookin’ good, no matter the occasion. “Hey, hon? I tore my sleeves again. Need to grab another jacket.”
Opal opened the door and looked up at him blankly for a moment. Her eyes lit up as she poked the large holes in his top. “Wow, you really did a number on this one. Didn’t you?”
“Yeahhh…” he said, scratching the back of his head with a goofy grin. “Just something that happens when you’re married to Nuktuk.”
Opal smiled sadly and pulled him inside. She locked the door behind them and inspected her ring. “Damnit. I am so sick of her stupid ‘fireside chats’. Pretty sure I’ve heard this one over a hundred times by now. Never any music on the radio anymore...” she whispered. She grimaced, dug through their drawers, found his spare jacket and tossed it to him. “Careful, now. This one’s a little heavier than the last one. I don’t want you getting dehydrated if you get too hot in it.”
“Can’t say I’m a fan of that ruling.”
“Neither can I, but I’ve made sure to remind him of the consequences if he were to cheat again. It makes a mockery of the sport, if you ask me.”
Bolin switched jackets and smiled wide. “Think that might be a problem, since I’m already so…” He trailed off as he patted the sides of his jacket. They were quite a bit heavier than normal. Bolin raised his brows, but only slightly. “You know what? It’s perfect.”
“I thought it might be.”
Bolin checked his watch and then, once again, his ring. His heart skipped a beat. The inscription had changed. Instead of a loving message, it displayed only a single character.
十
Ten.
Opal pulled him down for a passionate and all-too-brief kiss. “I love you,” she whispered, gripping his hands so tightly that he lost circulation. Not that he minded.
Bolin narrowed his eyes and dropped all of the warmth he’d been holding on to for the past week. He took a deep breath and unlocked the door. “I love you, too.”
Kuvira kept her breath slow, calm and steady. Focus. She brushed her bare palm along the smooth stone wall of her hastily earthbent tunnel. The earth could see more than she ever could, and it only shared its knowledge with those who had mastered it. Mastered control, mastered neutrality. Waiting, and listening for the earth to speak.
She let the jagged, ornate architecture of the structures beyond the wall guide her senses. Four fully armed airships, two hundred sentries, fifty two members of the Air Nation and, most importantly, no Avatar.
Then, mercifully, she found the two small bits of silver and blindness she had been searching for. She planted her feet further into the ground and meticulously curled her fingers, bending the silver impurities to manipulate the platinum.
Kuvira opened her eyes to the flare lit tunnel. She looked back at her team, a dozen warriors hardened after a decade of service, benders and non-benders alike and gave them a thumbs up.
One of her earthbenders pressed himself against the stone wall beside her and mirrored her stance. She held up five fingers. Four. Three. Two. One. In tandem, the two of them opened a perfectly smooth hole in the wall, revealing the inverted and confusing architecture of the Western Air Temple.
Light burst into the tunnel, washing over her and those beside her. She motioned for them to advance, and two by two they left through the hole. She checked her watch as she walked into the temple herself. They were right on schedule.
Kuvira looked across the hall and made eye contact with Bolin and Opal, who were chatting up four of the sentries with some old ‘war stories’. She reached out to her metal strips and bent them razor sharp.
“...so we’re flying through the air, right? Hundreds of feet up, and look at me. Earthbender. I was scared out of my mind, but I knew we’d be okay because I had my big bro strapped on the other side of the plane, and Asami Sato, best pilot in the world, was the one in the cockpit. So we swoop down, dodging thousands, and I’m not even kidding here, thousands of giant icicles.” He waved his arms around. “Mako sets the whole thing on fire, and I mean really on fire not the stuff you see in probending, and I’m slinging earth disks packed with plastic explosives. We fly back up, I click the detonator and---” He clapped his hands together and a series of deafening explosions echoed throughout the temple, rattling the very foundation and dislodging centuries old dust and rock.
Kuvira flicked out her hands, metalbending her blades into the back of two guard’s heads. Bolin snapped the neck of the third while Opal stopped the fourth from calling for help by asphyxiating him in a manner she truly wished she didn’t have to see. Past the edge of the temple, she spotted two airships falling out of the sky, their engines burning and smoldering as they spiraled down into the blackening fog.
“Any plans for your next initiative, Avatar Korra?”
“Well, nothing’s been set in stone; you never know what might come up. But at the moment, my wife and I are planning to take a well deserved vacation in the Ember Islands. I won’t be gone too long so there’s no reason to worry.”
Opal shot Kuvira a hard look. “Took you long enough.”
“If I could have gotten here sooner, I would have.” She turned her attention to her brother-in-law. “Bolin.”
Bolin frowned and looked up at the hanging buildings. What was once a gaze of wonder and joy had been battered down into one of regret and exhaustion. He cracked his knuckles. “Five minutes, right?”
“Five minutes.”
Jinora’s eyes shot open as her spirit was pulled back into the material world. She held her meditative posture, as instructed, and slowly looked around the room. The White Lotus were in a frenzy, barking orders at one another and trying desperately to discern who was actually in charge at the moment, since most of their leadership had been present on the airships.
“But enough about me. How have you been doing, Shiro?”
“Oh, you know. Commentating and enjoying life day by day. Not everybody gets to be the Avatar’s personal interviewer!”
“Very true. And how is Mrs. Shinobi?”
“She’s waitin’ back home with a nice hot cup of tea and warm smile.”
The airbenders and acolytes around her sat as still as they could, but they shook. They shuddered, all of them huddling close to another in fear of what was to come. She offered them a kind smile and looked over at her sister. Ikki, somehow, didn’t seem at all bothered. Mostly impatient. And Meelo looked...bored.
How they were related, she had yet to understand.
“That’s wonderful, Shiro. You must love her very much.”
“That I do, Avatar Korra. That I do.”
Jinora took a small breath and channeled her inner spirit, reaching out to the energy surrounding her and wading through. She focused on a familiar connection and projected herself in front of Opal and Kuvira. “They’re disorganized. Go.” She drew her spirit back into her body and felt a wave of calm flow over her.
The doors to the meditation chamber exploded open and, in a manner of seconds, every single sentry in the room was dead. Metal blades cut through the air and straight through their throats. Their hands grasped helplessly at their neck as the rest of them were struck down with a combination of lightning strikes and brutal hand-to-hand.
Blood pooled on the ground and Jinora spun to her feet, refusing to shy away from the massacre. There were no other options, but witnessing another mass killing at an Air Temple felt wrong in so many ways. In her lineage, her culture, and deep within her spirit.
Jinora looked over at her friends and family. She forced her expression to remain calm and composed. Fear was okay, but only if one accepted and moved through it. “It’s time to go. Gather everything you possibly can and don’t look back. No matter what happens, keep moving.”
The Air Nation didn’t hesitate, much to her relief. They ran around the room in a controlled panic, uprooting false wooden panels and passing off crate after crate of irreplaceable culture. Artifacts, centuries old scrolls, ancient blueprints of the temple itself. The Air Nation had been all but destroyed once, but they had rebuilt themselves. They could do it again.
Kuvira broke away from her infiltration team and made a series of gestures to them. Half of them sprinted out of the room, while the rest rushed to assist the airbenders and acolytes with their desperate attempt to salvage what they could. “Is this everyone?”
Jinora nodded and picked up the crate she’d packed herself. It was heavier than most, but also the most important. “We couldn’t save everything.”
Kuvira frowned. “I know. I’m sorry.”
“I just hope this was worth it.”
“It is. I know it.”
“At least one of us does.”
Bolin slammed a lavadisk into another two sentries as they advanced, hurtling the off of the temple and to certain death. That made twenty. Ugh. His stomach lurched and he covered his mouth. It had been a stroke of genius to sew two earthdisks into the lining of his jacket. He’d have to thank Opal for that later, even it made it much easier to kill people.
“I think that’s all the time I have for now, so I really must be going. The world can’t save itself, after all!”
“That was another exciting edition of ‘Avatar Korra’s Fireside Chat’, our weekly conversation with the Avatar. Until next time, this is Shiro Shinobi, signing off.”
“Bolin!” barked Kuvira. She and Jinora quickly made their way into the tunnel behind the rest of the airbenders and acolytes, carrying several large, overflowing boxes. “Thirty seconds!”
Bolin nodded and took a deep breath. He planted his feet and turned them outward, tapping into the natural, latent energy of the earth. It was the only way to tie up all the loose ends, and it had to be him that did it. Dozens of sentries formed up at the entrance, yelling and readying fire, water, lightning and metal. He drowned them out and grasped on to every part of the temple’s foundation he could find.
The ancient stone cracked and splintered as it grew an unhealthy orange glow. Lava flowed and seeped out of the walls from every direction, melting everything that stood in its way. He collapsed the ceiling above the sentries, burying their screams under an avalanche of lava. He backpedaled, lavabending every inch of earth he could find as he neared the tunnel. The moment his feet were safely inside, he roared and destroyed what little was left of the foundation.
“How was that?” he asked. Bolin took several deep breathes and wiped sweat off his brow. He felt like vomiting, but he’d have to wait until later. Not until they were safe could he let go.
“Perfect,” said Kuvira. She stared down the seemingly endless, road flare lit tunnel, the rest of the infiltration team and the remnants of the Air Nation having gotten a decent head start. “We need to catch up or we’ll be left behind.”
Bolin sighed and took one look back at the growing glow behind him. All of the lava he’d made would cover their escape and collapse the tunnel. There would be nothing left by the time reinforcements arrived. And that was his job.
Clean up.
“Okay. Let’s go.”
Kuvira sprinted alongside the airbenders and acolytes, her boots just barely skimming the smoothly bent tunnel. She’d been running the route for months, earthbending the tunnel and collapsing as often as she could...it was almost a blur to her at this point. All for preparation.
She did another headcount. Fifty two, and not a single casualty on her side. So far so good.
Beams of bright, shaky red light flashed over them, the flares that her team were carrying rattling up and down as they ran. Flashlights could break. Batteries could die. Flares could not, unless they wanted them to.
The tunnel was uniform stone for five miles straight. Perfectly level and even throughout. Everyone in her party was in perfect shape, of course, but it was often the little things, the tiny details, that made all the difference in these kinds of situations.
When mistakes meant death, one needed to create breathing room.
As they approached the end of the tunnel she slid to a stop, digging her boots into the ground in sync with Bolin. They worked together to tear open the wall, revealing a large, empty and round room. Two of her soldiers tossed road flares into the darkened room, lighting it up in an eerie red.
The Air Nation didn’t miss a beat and filed out of the cramped tunnel, all fifty two of them, and not a missing box among them. Kuvira waited for her team to pass before hopping into the room herself. She sealed the tunnel behind her and took a few deep breathes. One step closer. Just a little longer and they’d be okay.
They’d make it. They would. They had to, so they would.
Kuvira checked her watch and gestured for her team to take up positions along the wall of the circular chamber. “All right! We’re going to be dropping around forty stories to the next tunnel.”
Jinora glared at her. “This wasn’t part of the plan.”
Bolin’s brows vanished into his hairline. “It wasn’t?”
Kuvira frowned. “Think of it like an elevator,” she said, bracing herself against the massive rock wall. Kuvira cleared her mind and steadied her breath, once again letting the earth guide her. Smooth, perfectly carved. One slip, one jagged edge and the cavern would collapse.
Falling was failure.
She grasped onto the edge of the room, her portion of the rounded wall, and, in perfect, practiced parallel with her team, slowly lowered the room like one would slide down a rope. Down and down, but with just enough friction to remain in control.
The earth slid around them, giving way to their combined will with minimal resistance. Crack. Kuvira felt it before she heard it. A tiny splinter, but growing faster and faster from the center of the room. “Bolin! The center!” she yelled, her voice betraying the smallest hint of panic.
“I got it!” Bolin barreled into the center of the clumped Air Nation, knocking most of them over along with their boxes full of culture, He slammed his palms into the earth, quickly sealing the deadly breach and holding it in place. “Sorry. You guys okay?” he said, glancing around at the displaced airbenders and acolytes with a sympathetic frown.
“They’re fine. We’re all fine,” said Kuvira, closing her eyes and hoping against hope that she was right. “We’re almost there, so just hold that a little longer.” She searched through the stone, listening for some sign, anything, to tell her that they’d arrived. Her internal clock wasn’t wrong, it never was, but there was nothing there. No gaps in the earth. No shell of obscured blindness that screamed steel and platinum. Had they left? Damnit, where were---
There.
“We’re here!” she yelled, elated. She worked together with her team to slow their makeshift elevator to a careful stop. They held it in place for a few moments to confirm that it would indeed stay. Sweat rolled down the back of her neck as she gently released her hold on the earth.
Kuvira took a very deep breath as she backed away, glancing between her team members to confirm that everything was in order. Good. She gestured for her team to stay by the walls, just in case something went wrong. Not much further. Just one more. One more step, that was it. Then, she could rest.
They all could.
Kuvira closed her eyes and extended her reach far beyond the stone in front of her. She grasped on to the outer edge and pulled it apart with everything she had. Slowly, the wall split in half, leaking bright white light into the room. With one last push, she roared and opened the wall completely.
And there it was; the 10:15 Express. Right on time.
The compact magnet train sat stalwart at the other end of the tunnel, its platinum shell gleaming triumphantly in the warm blue glow of its outer lights.
The Air Nation, and Bolin, sprinted past her as she caught her breath, bumping her shoulders a few times, but not quite enough to knock her off balance. The earth elevator hadn’t been a new idea, or even a new technique, but on that scale...that was new.
And it had worked.
Kuvira sighed and began walking toward the train, but stopped once she saw that one of the crates had been left behind. It was cracked open and little trinkets and scrolls were scattered around it. She knelt down and carefully repacked the crate, ensuring that each and every piece of a once dead culture kept its integrity. The last piece was a little ways away, so she metalbent it into her hand.
A golden locket, half ajar. She flipped it open and her blood went cold.
Let go your earthly tether.
Just a slip, that was all it took.
Enter the Void.
A second too late; she couldn't see his dark blue tunic as he fell from the peak. It was black against black. Too dark.
Empty, and become wind.
When the clouds shifted, revealing the full moon, Kuvira knew it was over.
Kuvira shuddered and instinctively reached out to the metal with every intention of crushing it, but stopped herself. It was still an artifact. It was still part of their culture. It was their decision whether or not to destroy it. She slipped it into her pocket and grimaced.
Focus.
She carried the final crate over to the train and entered the cargo hold. It was buzzing with controlled chaos; her people working side by side with the Air Nation to secure their irreplaceables. Bolin, clearly on autopilot, took the crate from her and tied it down to the floor in a manner of seconds.
Kuvira blinked and went to work doing the same, organizing the several dozen oddly shaped crates by importance and fragility. With the Air Nation, everything was important and fragile, so it wasn’t the simplest of things. Scrolls and other written works at the bottom. Artifacts and trinkets in the middle. Gliders and tools at the top. They could always make more of those.
She reached out to the metal cables and tested their tensile strength and integrity. Not a common practice, but something important all the same. Strong, immaculate, that one needed a little correction… It was monotonous work, but then that was what made it calming.
Kuvira took a step back and took stock of the hold. Forty seven boxes, and one locket on her person. She walked across the first hold and into the second, smiling slightly at the sight of, again, fifty two members of the Air Nation cramped into the train car. It wasn’t ideal, and they didn’t look comfortable, but, for the moment, they were safe. And that was what mattered most.
“Jinora,” she said, crossing her arms. She cocked her head back toward the first hold and walked back into it. She turned around once the door slid open and closed behind her a second time.
“Another problem?” asked Jinora.
“No.” With a heavy sigh, she fished into her pocket and held up the locket. “What do you want to do with---”
Jinora’s eyes widened in rage. “Destroy it.”
“Are you sure? It’s still---”
“That is not a part of us. Destroy it,” she growled, stomping back to the rest of her people. While it wasn’t possible to slam a sliding door, Kuvira certainly felt like Jinora had found a way.
Kuvira crushed the locket, twisting and contorting it at its very core. She placed the worthless chunk of gold into her pocket and began marching to the other end of the train, passing her team’s own car on the way. They were silent and still very much tense, she knew. It was not a victory until they were home.
She approached the engineer’s cabin and smiled sadly as she saw Opal and Baatar. Opal was bawling and Baatar wasn’t quite so composed either. Kuvira stood to the side of the door and gave them a moment of much needed peace.
Kuvira dug into her pocket and glared at horrific gold chunk. It had stood for freedom once, millennia ago. At that point, though, in the modern era, there was nothing about it that she could associate with freedom. Only terror and destruction.
The doors slid open and she quickly pocketed the golden chunk. Opal walked out, her eyes red and puffy. She perked up as she spotted Kuvira.
“Oh! Hey.” She frowned. “Thanks.”
“Don’t thank me yet. We still have a long ways to go,” she said, knocking her knuckles against the door. The train slowly began to move forward, slowly gaining speed as it went.
“Okay.” Opal nodded. “About that, actually. How are we supposed to cross the Mo Ce sea?”
“Simple. Underwater train tunnel.”
Opal squinted as the magnet train approached the light at the end of the tunnel. Once it passed the threshold and into the open air, the light was simply too much for her unadjusted eyes. She clenched them shut and shielded them with her forearm. As she felt the train slow to a stop, she hesitantly opened her eyes.
What she saw nearly gave her a heart attack.
Zaofu. She saw Zaofu. Metal on metal, twisting and curving to form the most breathtaking architecture in the world. Pristine and untouched. Steel and platinum molded together in one massive dome, protecting them from the horrors outside of the gates. And that was when it hit her. The light that had blinded her wasn’t the sun, but rather a series of hundreds of oversized flood lights bolted to the roof of the dome.
Just one dome.
They were underground, they had to be. Hundreds and hundreds of feet underground. Smoke stacks stretched as high as the bunker would allow, the black smog of industry being sucked into oversized vents. She looked around, wide eyed with wonder, and saw airbenders flying freely through the air. Their gliders soared, and she couldn’t stop herself from smiling.
Kuvira rested a hand on her shoulder and smiled sadly. “Welcome home, Opal.”
Avatar Korra stood on the cliffside overlooking the remains of the Western Air Temple, the loose rubble scuffing her leather boots. The once beautiful and perfectly unique bastion utterly destroyed. The last Air Temple. The very same that had once housed Avatar Aang and his companions near the end of the Hundred Year War. All of that beauty, all of that history, culture and magnificence reduced to an oozing, rancid lava flow.
There was nothing left.
She balled her gloved hands into fists and turned away from the destruction, her braided hair flipping over her shoulder. It was too bright to see with the sun still up. Too bright to process the sheer magnitude of loss. Jinora was dead. Ikki was dead. Meelo was dead. Bolin and Opal were dead.
Too bright. Too bright. Too bright.
Asami was crying. She was crying and Korra couldn’t do a damn thing to stop it. Screeching, bawling, torturous pain in her ears that felt like bleeding. It was sickening to the point of madness. She wanted...she needed to---she pinched the bridge of her nose and flashed her teeth.
Korra spun towards the Grand Lotus, an old fat man whose throat she should have torn out years prior when he’d suggested that the Air Temples be left alone and in peace. Oh, what a wonderful idea that was! She stomped over to him and grabbed his windpipe before he could scream or run or do anything else that could fuck everything up.
He choked and struggled, but Korra just glared at him. “How did this happen?! This was the most secure and remote location on the entire fucking planet!” she snarled, letting up on her grip just enough for him to breath. “Explain yourself!”
“The Red Lotus---”
Korra resumed choking him and smacked his face with her free hand. “That’s not what I asked you! How. Did. This. Happen?!” She growled and her eyes twitched wildly, tears dripping down her cheeks. “You had one job. One fucking job and you couldn’t even do that. I gave you everything. Every tool. Every resource I could find and they’re still dead!”
Asami stepped beside her and dried her eyes. “We don’t know that for sure.”
Korra bit her lip and tossed the man to the ground. “You said the same thing about the Southern temple, and the Eastern temple. And the Northern Air Temple. Even Air Temple Island. Look, play optimist all you want, Asami…” She stabbed her finger at the boiling flow of lava below them. “Everyone down there is dead. I can’t feel anyone. Nobody. Not a single body. Maybe, maybe the airbenders from the other temples were kidnapped and brainwashed. I am willing to entertain that possibility if only because the alternative makes me want to---” She clutched her head and took several deep breaths. “I can’t…”
“I know.”
“Turn around.”
“You know I won’t do that, Korra.”
Korra considered forcing---no. No. No, calm down. There are lines. There are things you don’t do. Rage is energy. Energy can be redirected. She focused her bloodshot eyes on the Grand Lotus, that pathetic piece of human garbage, and looked past his skin. Once she knew what to look for, how to find them, how it all worked together, veins and arteries weren’t so difficult to manipulate.
Amazing how much practical knowledge one could find in medical texts when you’ve no other option.
Korra twisted the man on the ground, eliciting a desperate call for mercy that no one would ever answer. She folded her hands behind her back and glared at him, her eyes shaking in a frenzy as he was brought back up to standing, organs and meat resisting in every manner possible. And that only made things much more painful.
She focused on the pockets of blood inside his skull. One by one, two by two, four by eight by fifty. Pop. Pop. The Grand Lotus seemed to realize what she was doing and began bawling like a lost child. He tried to close his eyes, but she forced them open.
Neither blinked, even after his tears turned to blood, blinding him. Then, he screamed as she expanded her rage. She shredded the rest, starting with his vocal chords. Blood seeped out of every part of his face. Ears, eyes, nose, gums, lips, tongue. It all flowed down his scruffy, disgusting beard and stained his dark blue robe a deep black.
“Korra. That’s enough. We still have Rohan. It’s not over.”
Korra snapped out of her...ministrations and crushed the man’s heart, ending his suffering. Too soon, for her tastes, but if...if Asami thought it was enough, then it was. Probably---no, it was. She knew when to stop. That’s what she’d said. She’d stop her. When she---Korra rubbed her temples.
They still had Rohan. The Last Airbender. The cruel irony of that statement made her sick. Her stomach festered and she roared, setting the Grand Lotus’ corpse ablaze with flames that licked blue at their peak. She breathed and looked back at the remains of the temple, searing the image into her mind as another source of fire.
“Yes. You’re right. It’s not over. Not yet.”