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“I need to know, Iroh,” Makani spoke, her voice barely above a whisper.
Iroh recognized the expression on her face as the one that she wore after a long series of internal deliberations. Usually, it was after some kind of confrontation about her role as one of only two airbending masters in the world. And it typically came up after a long meeting with the White Lotus.
But Iroh knew that the conversation that Makani wanted to have with him was not about the White Lotus, or the Air Nation, or her family—though, perhaps they were all related to the issue at hand.
It was about their relationship. Their steadily crumbling relationship.
They sounded like a bad idea in the first place. They were both grandchildren of members of Team Avatar and were always in the spotlight. He was a Prince of the Fire Nation and a member of the United Forces. She was one of the last hopes for a dying race.
A firebender, the descendant of the man who had ordered the execution of her people, and an airbender, one of only six in the world, should not have worked on paper. He was a general in the United Forces. She was devoting her life to peace and nonviolence.
It was obvious to everyone, except for perhaps the two of them themselves, that a relationship between them would be a bad idea.
Doomed, even. Cursed, perhaps.
But they didn’t care.
It started out as simple childhood interactions. Aang and Zuko were always close confidants of each other, and Makani and Iroh were both incredibly close with their grandfathers. So, every time that Aang visited the Fire Nation or Zuko visited Republic City, the two children would spend a lot of time together.
And then, of course, they got older, and friendship turned into small crushes. And then full-blown crushes. Makani couldn’t look at Iroh without blushing, to her grandmother’s amusement and her grandfather’s horror. And it seemed a bit of a one-sided crush until one fateful afternoon.
Iroh had been curious about air gliders for a long time and asked Makani all kinds of questions until she offered to take him for a flight. The peak on Ember Island seemed like a great launching point. Of course, Makani had never taken a second rider with her, and she was much smaller and lighter than he was. But that was part of the adventure.
They aimed for the Royal Beach House private beach and ended up crashing into the cove.
They had to swim back until Katara bended the two of them into shore. They were reprimanded for being so reckless, but when they were supposed to be sent to bed early, Iroh snuck out and offered Makani some mochi as an apology for getting her in trouble. She sent him back to his room with a kiss on his cheek.
Then Iroh became the one who couldn’t look at Makani without blushing.
They officially started dating when they were still teenagers, though it was largely long distance. But with Makani’s sky bison, frequent trips with Iroh’s grandfather and mother to Republic City, and lots of letters and telegrams, they made it work.
A lot of teenagers claimed to be in love with their significant other. And Makani knew that she was young to think that, but Makani knew that she loved Iroh. And he knew that he loved her in return.
Makani earned her airbending tattoos at fifteen.
And she was so proud to finally join her grandfather and uncle as an equal. She was proud of her arrows, to uphold the teachings of her people. And everyone was so happy for her. They scheduled the ceremony to line up with her father’s leave too so that he could be there for it.
But her newly shaved hair, which would take years to grow back to its original length, was a blow to her self-esteem. More than she was willing to admit. But the day after her ceremony, Iroh showed up to Air Temple Island with an equally bald head and Makani nearly cried at his display of support.
Iroh decided to enlist in the United Forces the next year, to the shock of most of the world, but Makani wasn’t surprised at all. Iroh talked to Bumi all the time about the United Forces and talked to her about having some big adventure to help protect the world like their grandparents had.
The night before Iroh shipped out, they snuck out on Air Temple Island for a quiet evening together. Makani wasn’t sure what to physically give him with to remember her by, but she settled on a small arrow pin that he could hide easily within the folds of his uniform.
But after Iroh joined the United Forces, the burdens of reality became more apparent.
Avatar Aang died the following year. And then Makani was one of only two airbenders in the world
The burden was much more on her Uncle Tenzin since she was only seventeen, but Makani felt it too.
And watching Lin and Tenzin’s relationship, which easily paralleled Makani’s own relationship, crumble to dust so quickly after so many years, was jarring.
Makani never wanted to hurt Iroh in the same way that Tenzin hurt Lin. She was quite sure that she’d never forgive herself for it. And all she could think about during the planning for Tenzin and Pema’s wedding was what if she and Iroh were doomed to fail just like Lin and Tenzin did?
It didn’t happen immediately.
The next few years were relatively smooth sailing for Makani and Iroh. He was the youngest general in UF history and she timed her trips to the Southern Water Tribe and the Air Temples around his leave so that they were always in Republic City at the same time.
And it worked. And they fell more in love.
But Makani knew that her biological clock was ticking. And Iroh did not hear it ticking, which led to more than one fight about one of the few topics that there was no hope of compromise on—children.
Iroh didn’t want children.
He wanted to focus on his career. And he didn’t want to be a distant, unattached father.
Makani wanted children.
Or even, just one child. She never pictured her adult life without children, but she was not interested in repopulating the Air Nation alone. She wanted children on her own terms and not on anyone else’s.
Makani wanted a baby yesterday. Iroh didn’t for several years, and maybe not even then.
And, well, there was no compromising there.
It led to more than one fight between them. And the outside pressures from the press and general public didn’t help. They worsened the situation.
Iroh was accused of trying to seduce Makani away from helping repopulate the Air Nation. Makani was accused of trying to undermine the Fire Nation Royal Family. They were both accused of other ridiculous plots against the leadership of the United Republic.
And those were just the accusations that people bothered to write down.
Makani couldn’t drag out the painful inevitable. She wouldn’t. She watched it happen before and she could not—would not—make the same mistakes that her Uncle Tenzin did. And she knew that Iroh was never going to break up with her. Everyone who knew them knew that.
So, she had to stop acting like an airbender and face her problems. For Iroh’s sake. For her sake.
“Know what, Kani?” Iroh asked, sounding confused.
Makani looked away from him, trying to gather herself. Her arms were wrapped protectively around herself as her eyes pooled with unshed tears. Iroh wanted to reach out and reassure her, to wipe the tears away, but he knew that she needed a moment.
“I need to know . . . will you ever be open to having children?” she asked, dropping the final metaphorical bomb on Iroh.
“We’ve talked about this, Makani,” he reminded her gently, causing her to purse her lips together. “I . . . maybe one day, but not now.”
“I don’t have that kind of time, Iroh,” Makani told him softly. A beat of silence passed between them before Makani took a step towards Iroh. “I need to know . . . are you willing to have a child with me soon or not?”
“Kani—”
“—Iroh, I need to know,” Makani interjected, her voice clipped with emotion. “Are you or are you not willing?”
“. . . No,” Iroh whispered out, causing Makani to look away.
She nodded, seeming to gather her thoughts for a moment. She closed her eyes, allowing a few tears to drip down her cheeks, before she turned back to Iroh. Makani tried to compose herself, she really did, but she was far too emotional in that moment.
“Then I can’t do this anymore, Iroh,” she whimpered, staring up at him with more tears streaming down her cheeks. “I’m sorry . . . but I can’t.”
“Kani, I . . .” Iroh trailed off. He tried to find the words to soothe her, to make her stay, to let him explain, to make a case for him, to make a case for them, but Makani shook her head. “Kani, I . . . please, we can find some way to fix this.”
“I don’t think there is,” Makani whispered, wiping some of her tears away. “Not unless you want to trap one of us into a life that they didn’t want. And I can’t do that to you, Iroh. Can you do that to me?”
“No, of course not!”
“Then I think we have our answer. As painful and horrible of an answer as it is,” Makani stated, biting her bottom lip. “I love you, and I always will, Iroh, but I can’t keep forcing us down a path that has clearly split us apart from one another.”
“I love you too, Kani . . . and I’m sorry,” Iroh replied, tears streaming down his own cheeks.
“You shouldn’t be sorry,” Makani replied, wiping more tears from her cheeks. “You didn’t do anything wrong. No one did. We just . . . it wasn’t meant to be.”
They tried to fight the universe and the universe won.
He begged for her to stay, at least for a little longer. Makani wanted to leave, to cry in peace about their shattered relationship. Somehow, they ended up in each other’s arms, in a tangle of lips and groping hands before they fell into bed together one last time.
They collapsed in a heap together afterwards. Makani rested her head on Iroh’s chest, and despite the rational part of her mind screaming for her to leave, to move on, she fell asleep in his warm arms that night. Iroh held her as physically close as he could, as if he wanted to never forget the feeling of having her form in his arms.
But when Iroh awoke the next morning, Makani was gone. And so were all of her things.
He held his head in his hands and let out a noise that could only be described as raw, deep, and pure pain, before slamming his fist onto the bed. Tears streamed down his cheeks as he dug his nails into his scalp, mourning the loss.
Makani arrived in the Southern Water Tribe a few days later on her sky bison. Her grandmother and aunt were waiting for her outside the house with brave faces. But when Makani saw her family standing there with reassuring smiles, she broke down again.
“Shh, let’s get you inside. Come on,” Katara urged, leading her granddaughter inside the house.
“I’ll kill him,” Bumi vowed, letting out a growl as he got to his feet.
“Dad, no!”
“Bumi, sit down!” Katara snapped, pointing at the ground. “You’re not going to kill or hurt anyone! You’d be court martialed anyways.”
“Well, he can’t just knock my daughter up and run off to live his own life! I won’t stand for that! He’s got responsibilities now and—”
“—He doesn’t even know about the baby!” Makani interjected, causing Bumi to freeze.
Makani spent the last four months—the four months after she broke up with the man that she intended to spend the rest of her life with—throwing herself into Air Nation duties. Checking on all the temples, helping with the budgetary considerations, and supervising the Acolytes before she inevitably would have to bow out.
And she had wanted to tell her father Bumi in person. Because she knew if she sent the news in a telegram it could be found and read, and her secret would be out. But really it was because she knew that her father wouldn’t hesitate to fling Iroh off the side of the boat. And Iroh would probably be too confused to fight back.
“What do you mean he doesn’t know?”
“I didn’t tell him,” Makani admitted to her father, though she couldn’t look him in the eye.
“And why not?”
“Bumi,” Kya warned, not wanting to stress Makani out more.
“I asked him directly before we broke up if he wanted children and he told me no,” Makani stated, somewhat forcefully. “He wanted to focus on the United Forces, and I couldn’t take that away from him.”
“Kani, plenty of people have children in the United Forces!”
“People who point blank declare that they don’t want children?” Makani huffed, rubbing her face tiredly. “It doesn’t matter anyways. What’s done is done.”
“What do you mean what’s done is done? You’re going to do this all by yourself?” Bumi questioned, sounding like he completely disagreed with her choice.
“You did,” Makani pointed out, a bit more aggressively than she intended.
“That’s different.”
“How?” Makani demanded, straightening up. “I would have thought that you out of all people would understand this situation!”
It wasn’t exactly a secret that Makani’s existence was an unplanned occurrence in Bumi’s life. One that he wouldn’t trade for the world, but still an unplanned one. And Makani had never really known her mother, who dumped Makani at Air Temple Island before setting out to live her own life when she was just a baby.
And while it hurt that her mother never wanted her, at least it was cut and dry, in Makani’s opinion. It was better that her mother left and never came back, and Makani was able to grow up with other positive female role models in her life rather than her mother sticking around and ruining her life. It was better to get all of that out of the way while Makani couldn’t remember it.
“Bumi,” Katara called, reaching out to her son. “Makani is more than old enough to decide what she wants to do with her life. We have to respect her wishes and give her and this little baby all the support in the world.”
Bumi sighed, rubbing his face tiredly, before turning to Makani.
“You’re sure that this is what you want, Kani?”
“Yes, it is.”
“And what happens when Iroh finds out about this whole secret?” Bumi asked, crossing his arms over his chest. “What if the kid’s a firebender?”
“We’ll deal with it when it happens,” Makani replied, using an ancient airbending technique of dodging hard questions that she didn’t want to deal with. “But as of right now, Iroh doesn’t know, and I don’t want him to find out. Ever, really, but if he does, I want it to be from me. He made it very clear that he didn’t want kids.”
“I’m sure that he’d change his tune if you told him that you were pregnant.”
“Which is exactly why I didn’t tell him!” Makani snapped, crossing her arms over her chest. “Then I trap him in a situation that he never wanted, and I’ll never be able to live with that burden on my shoulders! I can’t do that to him!”
A period of silence passed through the room before Bumi spoke again.
“So, am I at least allowed to punch him once for good measure?”
“NO!”
“Bumi!”
“Honestly!”
“I won’t aim for the face! I just think a good gut punch—”
“—Dad!”
“Bumi, I’m going to punch you if you keep this up.”
“Is Master Tenzin with you?” Iroh asked Korra as she healed the burn on his arm.
“Masters Tenzin and Makani fled with Chief Beifong and their families,” Korra replied, moving her hands back and forth along his burn. “Tenzin said that he would return with reinforcements once the kids were safely away.”
Korra’s implication that Makani wouldn’t be returning gave Iroh some pause.
Though she was an airbender, and therefore a pacifist by nature, she was not afraid to throw a punch. She was the daughter of a Commander of the United Forces, after all. Airbender or not, she was more than willing to defend herself and others if needed.
It was out of character for her to not itch to fight in this battle.
But that wasn’t the important part. The important part was that Makani was safe.
“That’s good,” Iroh agreed, staring at the floor. “The last airbenders need to be protected from a man like Amon at all costs.”
“Absolutely,” Korra replied, bending the water away.
Standing up, Iroh immediately went into ‘General’ mode. After the message was sent along to Bumi and the general direction of the airfield located, Iroh dismissed everyone to get a good night’s sleep. They were going to need it.
Laying on the makeshift cot that he was provided with, which oddly smelled of instant Varri-noodle packets, Iroh stared up at the canvas sheet above his head. He reached up with his uninjured arm and opened the small breast pocket in his jacket.
He slid his fingers inside, tracing the cold metal arrow pin that he still wore.
Makani told him years ago that she completed an Air Nomad blessing on it, to give him some protection in battle. And he had never taken it off his United Forces uniform since.
Letting out a sigh, Iroh rolled over and tried to fall asleep.
They had come so close to losing everything.
Makani understood the anger that the Equalists felt against the bending world. She witnessed the prejudice thrown at her father and her Uncle Sokka because they were nonbenders and dedicated much of her time to trying to help nonbenders in Republic City and later around the world.
But the Air Nation was their big ‘victory’ celebration? Really?
The Nation that had been brough back from the edge of extinction just barely? The Nation that could honestly say that it was not personally responsible for any deadly attacks on nonbenders? The Nation that took in nonbenders in droves and had historically been the most equal nation?
That was Amon’s choice? That was his big victory to stick it to the bending world?
For fuck’s sake.
Also, newsflash Equalists, the jackasses who kidnap and imprison small children and rip crying babies out of their mothers’ arms are never the good guys. For fuck’s sake, Makani didn’t think she’d have to explain that. She’d never been so close to completely throwing out her vow of nonviolence before.
Makani hadn’t put Kuzon down since getting him back in her arms. And he hadn’t been willing to let go of her either.
They regrouped on Air Temple Island, which had been successfully emptied of Equalists earlier. It felt weird to Makani how the island that she had grown up on felt so foreign, so unlike itself with the remnants of the Equalist occupation everywhere.
Everyone was taking some time for themselves or to be with their families to deal with the results of the last few days. And for Makani, that meant trying to keep her son in good spirits. He was still a baby, not even two-years-old yet, but he knew that something was horribly wrong.
So, Makani focused on her son and not who returned to the island.
Iroh managed to propel himself down from the Equalist banner on Avatar Aang Island and eventually regrouped with everyone else on Air Temple Island. And when he saw Tenzin and his family, but no sign of Makani anywhere, he set out to check on her.
Iroh eventually found Makani with her back to him in one of the back pavilions on the island. One that they had spent countless hours in during their youth playing Pai Sho, meditating with Aang, and just enjoying each other’s company.
“It’s alright, Kuz, Mama’s got you,” he heard her say, which made him freeze in his steps.
So, she did move on then.
The little bout of laughter he heard next clearly came from a baby in her arms. But then where was her partner? The baby’s father? What kind of man wouldn’t be there for Makani and their child after what they had just been through?
“Kani?” Iroh called, causing Makani to freeze and turn around slowly.
But when she turned around, Iroh caught sight of the baby in her arms. And while Iroh wasn’t an expert on babies, he knew that baby wasn’t a newborn. The kid had to be at least a few months old, maybe somewhere around a year. Iroh was hurt by how quickly she moved on until he actually studied the baby’s features.
Particularly the golden eyes that the baby had, as opposed to Makani’s blue.
Iroh stopped breathing for a moment as he studied more of the baby’s features. He could clearly see Makani in the boy, in his coloring, and his round cheeks, but there were also a lot of Fire Nation traits that the baby had.
His traits, Iroh realized.
He took a step back with his mouth dropped open. Iroh glanced between Makani and the baby who she had called ‘Kuz’ before, his chest rising and falling rapidly as he struggled to control his breathing. Makani held her son—their son—to her chest, her eyes shining with guilt.
“Iroh,” she started, trying to pick the right words to use, “I—”
“—How old is he?” Iroh demanded, finding his voice. His gaze flickered over to the baby who was staring at him curiously with wide gold eyes. “Kani, how old is he?”
“Almost a year and a half,” she answered truthfully, glancing down at Kuzon.
She seemed to be waiting for him to ask the questions, not wanting to push him as he began to pace, doing the math in his head and lining up the dates.
“Did you know?” he choked out, his jaw clenching and unclenching without his control. “Did you know that you were pregnant that night?”
The night you broke up with me, he wanted to add, but he didn’t.
“Iroh—”
“—Did you know or not, Makani?”
“Yes . . . I knew,” she admitted, hugging Kuzon closer to her chest.
That was all Iroh needed to hear before he stormed away, ignoring Makani’s calls for him to come back.
Of all the people he was expecting to come comfort him after the less-than-ideal reveal about the fact that he was a father, Iroh was not expecting the baby’s grandfather, Makani’s father, Commander Bumi to be the one to sit down with him.
Bumi placed a glass of unidentified hard liquor in front of Iroh before taking a seat across from him. The plans that they had drawn up to regain full control of the city were rolled out on the table even though Iroh was nowhere near in the right headspace to think about them.
“Regulation states that officers are not allowed to consume alcoholic beverages while on duty,” Iroh replied, shifting the glass back towards Bumi.
“Consider yourself relieved from duty then,” Bumi returned, pushing the glass back at Iroh. “I won’t tell, and you’ll sleep it off before the morning. And frankly, most guys in your position would be finishing a bottle of this stuff by now.”
Iroh didn’t disagree. He picked up the glass and took a sip before instantly regretting it. Iroh grimaced at the taste but decided to just go ahead and finish it anyway. Taste and everything else be damned. He needed some kind of release.
“You knew then?” Iroh asked, staring at the glass.
“I did,” Bumi confirmed with a nod. “She requested that I not tell you, and I honored my daughter’s wishes even if I wasn’t the biggest fan of them.”
“Of course.” Iroh paused for a moment, staring at the glass again, before turning back to Bumi. “I . . . what’s his name?”
“Kuzon,” Bumi replied, folding his hands in front of him.
“And his . . . is he . . .?”
“An airbender,” Bumi answered, seeing the question on the tip of Iroh’s tongue.
Iroh took a moment to process the new information and Bumi used the opportunity to pour him another glass of whatever that horrible liquor was. Iroh wasn’t a particularly big drinker but being in the forces didn’t exactly tend to create sober and non-smoking people. So, he just took another sip of whatever it was.
“Does anyone else know?”
“Outside of the Air Nation, our family, and Korra’s new friends . . . not that I’m personally aware about,” Bumi replied honestly. “She wanted him to grow up without scrutiny from every angle. Protect him from all that mumbo jumbo crap.”
Like we had to deal with, Iroh knew.
“And . . . how . . . how are they?”
“Kuzon’s a happy baby,” Bumi replied, leaning back in his seat. “A big grabber though. Nearly yanked Tenzin’s beard straight off.”
“I see,” Iroh mused, a smile twitching at his lips before it dropped again. “And . . . Kani?”
“Well, she seems . . . content is the word I’ll use. She loves being a mother, but I think the burdens that she has to bear haven’t changed much since the two of you were together.”
Iroh sighed, rubbing his face tiredly. The half-empty glass sat next to his elbow as he tried to gather his thoughts and make sense of them. And there wasn’t really a way to process the overload of information he had just been given without a slight mental breakdown.
“Did she ever say . . . why she . . .?”
“I’m probably not the best person to ask that question to and the only person who’s going to give you a completely accurate response is Makani herself. But . . .” Bumi trailed off as he watched Iroh’s expression change, “. . . I think she thought that she was doing the right thing. For everyone involved.”
Their last argument, the night that Makani had broken up with him, was now shed in a different light to Iroh. Makani wasn’t asking him if he wanted to think about having children. Makani was asking him if he wanted to be a father to the child that she already intended to have. He let out a groan at the realization, before reaching for the liquor again.
Iroh didn’t know what to do.
He was a decisive general in battle. But when faced with problems with love and family, he always struggled to make any kind of decision. He always had been, and it contributed to his breakup with Makani. And he knew that.
But he still didn’t know what to do. How to react.
On one hand he felt incredibly angry. He had a right to know that he was a father, that Makani was pregnant with his child. They had been together for over a decade and a half. He had the right to know about the fact that he had a child. Makani should have told him about Kuzon.
On the other side, however, he felt so guilty. Makani was always someone who tried to be selfless, and he knew she wouldn’t decide that without stressing herself to the max. And he felt guilty that she had thought the best solution to the situation was not telling him.
Did she think he was going to be angry with her? Did she think that he was going to be a bad, and maybe even neglectful father? Did she think that he would leave her, abandon them, because he had declared he didn’t want children?
Iroh didn’t know what to do.
“Iroh—and I’m saying this as Bumi to Iroh, not Commander Bumi to General Iroh—I don’t think you should beat yourself up too much about this. Really, I don’t,” Bumi stated, causing Iroh to pick his head up out of his hands. “And frankly your reaction right here is probably why Makani thought that she was doing the right thing.”
“What do you mean?”
“From what she told me, she thought you’d completely fly off the handle to keep her and the baby happy at the expense of your own happiness,” Bumi replied, causing Iroh to sigh.
“Does it really matter? It’s . . . when there’s a child involved . . . I should have . . . I would have . . . I would have been there. In a heartbeat.”
“I assure you that I wouldn’t be offering free liquor and having a calm conversation with you if I thought you wouldn’t have been,” Bumi stated, somewhat jokingly and somewhat seriously. Which made Iroh wonder how he survived the last two years unscathed from a Bumi attack.
“I . . . I don’t . . .” Iroh let out a groan of frustration.
“Iroh, I think, honestly, that you should take some time. Think everything through with a clear mind. Maybe drink some tea and meditate or whatever cockamamie routine you have to get yourself into a good headspace. And then I think you need to talk to Makani because all the answers you’re looking for . . . she has them.”
“And she’ll want to speak with me?”
“She knows that she owes you that at the very least,” Bumi replied, before getting up from his chair. “I know she does.”
Iroh was left alone with his thoughts after Bumi left. His thoughts of one airbender woman and their shared child.
Kuzon.
The Fire Nation name that her grandfather, the last airbender at the time, had used while in the Fire Nation as a disguise.
Iroh groaned again at the realization, holding his head in his hands.