Korra and Mako used their Equalist disguises a little differently in this timeline.
Originally written 06/12- another piece I found on my computer. I like my Makorra kinda angsty. Enjoy.
Characters c. Nick, Mike and Bryan
They had twenty more minutes until the tunnel was supposed to collapse. Twenty minutes until Bolin would make sure this particular set of tunnels was buried under layers of the city already falling down around it. They'd made him swear to it, no matter what. So that gave them exactly twenty minutes to exit their hiding place, force their way through the alerted throng of Equalists, and avoid the explosives Asami had been able to smuggle them under the guise of Hiroshi Sato's reformed daughter. She'd been very convincing; she'd had to be, in order to prove her loyalty to her father.
The air shaft was narrow and roughly cut from stone. It carried a bitter damp air throughout a network that splintered out to supply the compound with oxygen.
They'd taken refuge in the shaft when they'd been attempting to escape the labyrinth of tunnels, and had found themselves blocked at every turn. So far so good. The place was on high alert after their cover had been blown. The trick now was getting out.
Twenty minutes didn't lend them a whole lot of time in which to consider their options. Prospects being what they were, they were probably going to be buried down here with the people they were trying to stop. Fighting their way out, or not making it out- they would still be dead.
And as Mako contemplated this, those twenty minutes- nineteen now- seemed incredibly brief to live in.
He could feel every deep inhale she took, being pressed together in the narrow space as they were. Her stomach and breasts brushed against his stolen Equalist uniform with every breath. The heat between their over-exerted bodies was cloying. The clothes stuck to his skin and the draft chilled the sweat running down his neck, back and felt ill.
Their harsh exhales blocked out the faint sound of the alarm and the frequent thunder of urgent footsteps just beyond the wall beneath them.
Eighteen minutes.
They were going to die in eighteen minutes.
Mind racing as fast as his heart, Mako weighed choices.
He tucked his chin to consider Korra, half pressed half grasping onto his front. Brave, exhausted, wilful Korra. They hadn't made it this far in without their share of injuries which were making themselves known as the adrenaline waned and the cold air stung at the torn and braised skin showing through tears in clothing.
He knew what she'd choose to do in the end- in the next seventeen minutes. She would fight her way through as far as she could, hair loose and eyes wild until she couldn't stand and even then she'd bite at any hand that came close enough to sink teeth into. The thought of her body broken and still did awful things to his stomach.
Mako raised a hand between them and ran his thumb across her brow, curling sweaty hair behind her ear and smearing blood down across her chin. She met his gaze lacking the same look he always associated with her; a fierce determination. When he saw that look in her eye he almost believed she could bend the universe to her will. Now he saw resignation, fear. Her bravado wouldn't hold out this time.
"Are you still confused?" He felt her ask, hot breath condensing against his throat. Surprised, but he knew the exact memory she was recalling. It was a regret they shared.
"No. Not anymore. Now things are pretty clear."
"Good." Korra rested her forehead against his sternum. Makos hand smoothed to the back of her neck, fingers slipping through tangled damp locks of her hair.
"So you know I need to go out there right? I have to fight."
"I do. And you're not going alone."
"Thank you, Mako." For staying with me.
"Don't thank me for something I'm not giving you a choice in. I'm not letting you do this alone Korra. But before we go there's something I have to do."
"There's not a lot of time." The tight gusty quality in her breath told him she was biting back tears and it tore at him.
"That's just it- there isn't any time. There's not enough time in the world to do what I want to do with you. There never was. So I'm making the time right now. It won't ever be enough, but it's better than not knowing you this way at all."
Mako wasn't wrong.
The kiss wasn't enough.
Between the enthusiasm and the regret it was a messy meeting of lips, tongue and teeth; artless but yet so satisfying. He'd happily stay this way the rest of his life- sixteen minutes of it - attached to her in this way, tasting her mouth and biting her lips but it wasn't enough. It will never be enough.
There was no time to remove clothing. It was the curves underneath he was feeling as they pressed impossibly close, Korras arms wound around his neck, breasts flattened against his chest. Mako released her lips long enough to tear off a glove between his teeth before leaning into her and taking possession of her mouth once more. Both hands now unfettered he held onto her jaw, easing the kiss to a tender absolution before delving his tongue back to meet her own.
Raking a hand down the space between them to her hip, Korra gasped when his other hand found her bottom and simultaneously pulled their hips flush together. His teeth traced her jaw before he placed open mouthed kisses along her neck, pausing to nip at her.
Mako rocked into her. The slow grind of their hips created a sweet friction.
Korra was quick to forget herself. Mako grabbed her ass with both hands, bent his knees and hoisted her up to wrap her legs round his hips. Pressed close, Korra moaned into his hair, blood stirring.
"I don't want to die." She surprised herself by gasping.
"I know." Mako murmured, nuzzling against her chest.
"I don't want our first time to be in an air shaft."
"I know. I'm sorry."
"I don't want it to be because it was our only chance. That's not something I want to tell the children we won't ever be having."
"I'm sorry."
"And I don't want you to be sorry!"
"I know."
"I know you know!" she cried as Mako peppered her face with kisses.
"We're on borrowed time, remember? I wanted to do this right- there should have been a date, and I would have made dinner and then we'd walk down to the warf-"
"There was supposed to be years, Mako, years. And we'd have a place with lots of space for Naga, and enough room for my parents, and Bolin, and Asami, and Tenzins family to stay in when they visited, and we'd have to force Lin but I know she'd come eventually-"
She clutched at his shoulders pressing her mouth to his in one last urgent bid to curl herself up inside of him; to instil some lasting impression of him in herself.
"It's not enough."
"It has to be." Mako whispered against her ear. "It's all we have."
Urgency waned in the face of absolute truths and after a long moment he reluctantly released her. Although he could barely see her, Mako knew they were sharing a glance at one another in the dark space between.
They didn't have years, so a moment would have to do.
Mako brushed her clammy cheeks where the tear tracks should have been had she let herself. But this was Korra; the stubborn, fool hardy, beautiful girl that drove him crazy. And he would rather spend the next ten minutes with her getting swarmed by Equalists then spend lifetimes without her.
"Are you ready?"
"No." She smiled.
" Me neither." Mako took up her hand, laced their fingers, and prayed it would offer her enough comfort to do what she was about to do.
Korra squeezed back and let go.
Her palm sent the walls crumbling outward and then they were running through smoke, strange bodies and debris. He momentarily lost her amongst the confusion between lances of fire and lightening. Struck sharply in the shoulder he dropped out of the crackling hot reach of a cable, and continued blindly towards where he'd last seen her.