Title: Through the Looking Glass
Rating: T
Summary: Korra was named the newest Avatar and her mother hadn't approved.
Genre: Drama
Words: 2397
WARNING: If you haven't caught up on the information that was released on Korra at Comic-Con, then you probably won't know a lot of who or what's going on in this story. Bryke gave us teasers on characters, relationships, settings, designs, and much more at the panel. There are videos of the panel and the official trailer floating around YouTube, pictures of concept art and finalized designs on Tumblr… I recommend familiarizing yourself with that before reading this. After that, enjoy!
Disclaimer: Bryke owns every single piece of Avatar and I wouldn't have it any other way.
A/N: I can't believe I'm writing fic for a girl who hasn't even said a word yet. Just… consider this all AU. I have no idea what I'm doing.
Through the Looking Glass
Korra was named the newest Avatar and her mother hadn't approved.
"So, what, you're going out into the world to master the elements? That's it?" Kayara had stomped around for a good half an hour before confronting her daughter about her new status; disappointed, perhaps, that she had not tried harder to change the facts, rearrange history so that the needle would not point to her, would not take her away from home. "You're leaving me, too?"
Korra had lived with her mother long enough to know not to respond. Still traumatized by her father's death in the war, still in grief over her missing husband, still mourning the lost son that hadn't survived one of the coldest winters the Water Tribe had ever known ten years ago — it was no wonder Kayara woul want to cling tighter than ever to her only living blood relative. And Korra couldn't blame her for being angry, truly. She just couldn't bring herself to stay.
"You know how they all think Aang was some big hero, a little boy saving the world as a teenager — well, tell that to my father! Tell that to those people he was a hundred years too late to save!" Her hair was falling out of its ties, the ones Korra spent every morning arranging. She looked ferocious, all anger and heartbreak spilled out into the air between them, and almost even mad.
There was just something wrong with a mother that demanded so much and gave so very little in return. Korra used to be able to spend time with the other children of her village, make friends, be with people. Before her mother had lost so much of her immediate family and grabbed her daughter, the only one that had stayed, and clutched her tight, never dreaming to let go.
But of course, she would have to. It wasn't as if Korra could just say no.
"No," Kayara was saying now as Korra stuffed her extra coat into her bag, but changing her mind at the last moment, decided against bringing it. It was almost spring, and it was going to be warmer up north, at any rate. "No, sweetheart, you can't do this to me. We're a family. You are not leaving."
She hadn't snuck out in the middle of the night to master her waterbending skills since she was eleven to be told no by her mother at the last minute. She hadn't studied all she could as a child on the history of bending and Avatar Aang's legacy, like her teachers had encouraged, just to listen to her mother tell her no when she'd get home, tell her that the war took my family away, Korra, we don't need to give them the pleasure of remembering every detail, do we? Darling, don't worry, it's going to be you and me forever, okay? Just you and me, sweetheart. Just you and me.
Korra hadn't wanted this for either of them, really. Watching her mother deteriorate, from bitterness and anger to grief and desperation to, occasionally, violence, was not what she wanted to spend the rest of her life watching, taking care of forever, chained to a snowy ice cap at the bottom of the world. She did not know what came next in that sequence, only that it was something she did not want to see.
The look in her mother's eyes when she walked out wasn't something she wanted to remember. She'd planned on leaving quietly, slipping out to meet with Naga before dawn, to avoid the confrontation. Like the way her father had walked out when she was seven years old to hunt them dinner and never came back.
"What do you want? Korra? I know — I know you've always wanted to learn how to waterbend. I'm a bit — I'm rusty, I know, but I could teach you — "
Bitterness, anger, grief, desperation. Korra moved quickly, checking her bags one last time before heading out the door, knowing what was coming next.
A strong hand grabbed the wrist of the arm carrying her things and yanked her around. Kayara's face was sweaty, her eyes unfocused and wet. "You're not going."
Korra looked at her squarely, blue eyes serious. "Yeah. I am."
The grip tightened; Korra's free hand reached for the bags, pulling them onto her other shoulder in a final sort of gesture. She hoped she looked ready enough, determined enough, to convince anyone. And herself.
"Korra — "
"I can't stay here forever, okay? I've gotta go. You know that. Don't play this with me."
"I'm not playing any — "
"Trying to make me feel guilty for getting over his death, for Dad leaving — making sure I always had things to do around the house so you wouldn't feel so lonely when you realized how pathetic this is — " She let it out in one breath, then inched her left foot toward the doorway, so close to reaching outside and the rest of the world. "You make me sick."
So she wasn't surprised when Kayara slammed her hand back into the wall behind her and pushed at her, cried, and begged her to stay. She didn't wince when she accidentally dropped the bags and they landed on her feet. She didn't respond, yanked her sore arm away, still smarting leaving home as her mother yelling at her from the doorway and the early-rising neighbors watched, sending her their wishes and congratulations in silence.
Mako and Bolin helped. Runaways — so, yes, a bit like her. World-travelers. Friends was what she needed, really. Family wouldn't do any good at all, not now.
Bolin was tender, for an earthbender. Gentle with emotions and yet so strong and stable with the ground under his feet. She'd seen him move mountains and shift landsliding hills to save a tiny, red-furred fire-ferret (she'd never seen one in real life, never left the Water Tribe before now, and the world was so muchbigger than she'd thought, so full of new things) and promptly name it "Paboo" before making the decision it would be the newest member of their odd little group. Korra had questions, but the older brother, Mako, had simply taken it in stride.
Mako was all rough edges and sharp tongues. Witty, quick, hard and fast — the perfect sparring partner, then. She knew that firebending would come as the biggest challenge to her, and he was willing to teach her, it seemed, if she was willing to be patient.
"It's not hard," he explained, demonstrating a series of elegant movements on the beach of Chameleon Bay as she watched, enthralled. "It's actually quite the opposite. Firebending can be the easiest thing in the world, really. That's what makes it so dangerous."
Mako eyed Bolin, who was making sandcastles with Paboo near the lapping waves, and with a quick flick of his wrist, shot a string of tiny flames toward the fire-ferret. The creature jumped, shrieking, and bolted, dashing through the sandcastle and into Bolin's bag, spreading the fire onto their belongings.
Korra put the flames out with a quick motion, spreading the water to gently dampen their supplies and then slowly squeezing it out again.
"See?" Mako said, turning to her and brushing sand off of his vest as he ignored his brother's angry complains about animal abuse and destruction of artwork. "The tiniest of all flames can catch and spread. A spark can light up anything. If you can manage that, you can change the world. Easy."
Actually, it wasn't, and it took her a full week to produce something that Mako would even deem quality enough to be called a flame. It was hard, and firebending worked against everything that she knew. She was used to adaptability and change, elegance and gentleness. Fire was none of that.
"Think on the bright side," he said, grinning at her one night as they headed into their respective rooms at a hotel in Ba Sing Se. She was panting and exhausted from the day's efforts as he stretched easily, the practices all coming as natural to him as breathing. The tiny candle outside his room lit their hallway and she could hear Bolin snoring in the other room already. "It's not like you're Aang with a deadline to prepare for this time."
She scowled, knowing, despite what everyone had told her, that the Equalists in United Republic were threatening enough to make that entirely possible. Perhaps it wasn't like the Fire Nation in the Great War, no. But it could escalate into anything. In a city miles away, one man with an idea was changing people's beliefs and gathering followers. A tiny spark catching flame and spreading.
"I suppose I should count myself lucky the Equalists are taking it easy for now, then," she said, grim. She left him for her room, letting the door close behind her as she headed toward the warm blankets that the bed promised.
He chuckled and there was the sound of a key in a lock as he headed into his own room. "You probably should," his deep voice came from outside the walls, muffled. "Imagine what would happen if they declared war. What a hassle that would be."
"That's not funny," she said loudly.
"Perhaps not. But you've got to admit, it'll make for interesting history books. Think of how lovely you'll look on our postage stamps."
A sudden whoosh as he extinguished the flames on the candles, and the lingering light shining from underneath the door disappeared, leaving her in darkness.
Fire came. Not gently, not comfortingly, and certainly not easily, but it came to her with the strength and power she knew she would need for her last element. She sought to learn airbending ten weeks after leaving home.
Korra hadn't planned on keeping her childhood life to herself; it just wasn't a subject that came up to talk about, really, and she didn't press or offer it up for discussion.
Mako caught the secret once, her wrist, during a sparring match on a late afternoon in an abandoned farmhouse. Bolin was occupying himself with washing the Paboo's fur, who had been squirming in his lap since he'd been approached with the soap and brush. The creature startled Korra by leaping from Bolin's lap to the straw-covered ground, landing two feet from her right boot and scurrying over her feet as she lost balance.
Mako, eyes widening as he tried to abort his attack at the last moment, grabbed her hand tightly instead of cutting into her forearm to block her attack. The water she had been bending splashed to the ground, soaking their boots and trousers, as she winced, hissing from the rough way his calloused fingers grabbed bruises that hadn't quite healed right.
He noticed her pain and immediately released. "Rough brawling with that mutt of yours?"
Temper flaring, she immediately snapped, "Naga isn't a mutt, she's a — "
"Polar bear dog, yeah, I know," he said, waving it aside. Behind him, Bolin was chasing Paboo around the barn, coaxing it back into his arms as it climbed up into the rafters. "She's also the only thing on this planet I know to ever be able to catch you off-guard, so how could the Great Avatar Korra, who mastered earthbending in three weeks and is tackling firebending in four, be so human as to have an injury like the rest of us regular folks?" His tone was light, patronizing, trying to rile her up. One of his tricks to get her angry, mad enough to turn her rage into fire. But she wasn't in the mood. "Chi-blockers catch up to us without my knowing about it?"
"It was an old fight a long time ago," she said quickly. "I'm surprised it hasn't healed by now, to be honest."
Raised eyebrows. "You know, the Avatar's supposed to be quick and speedy. How are you going to bring peace to the four nations and balance between the mortal and spirit worlds if you can't bring peace and balance to yourself?"
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"It means your form is sloppy and you're determined to a fault when it comes to controlling your bending. Which, in firebending, usually means you're pushing yourself too hard." He settled back into position, hands flat and extended. "You're going to master airbending next. Isn't that all about freedom and light-heartedness?"
"So?"
"So," he said, smirking, "lighten up."
He came at her with a burst of flames, arm slashing through the air; she caught him in a crossfire, twisting his wrist away with her own, ignoring the jab of pain. Korra raised her other arm, shifting the earth as firm as Bolin had taught her, and toppled Mako's balance. He let out a sharp cry, a curse, and he fell roughly to the ground.
Bolin laughed. "Don't listen to him," the younger brother said, holding the struggling Paboo tight in his grip. "You're doing just fine. I'm sure you'll be a fine airbender. You'll have Tenzin teaching you, after all, and he's the son of Aang. Your reincarnation." He paused. "Or something. I'm never quite sure how that works. Are you guys related, then?"
She shrugged with one shoulder, eyes still on Mako, who was watching her from his position on the ground. He glanced at her wrist once more, then up to her face, but said nothing, and neither did she.
Korra came to United Republic with three elements and doubts. She had left home within less than a year and already seen two nations and the remains of one — a visit to the Southern Air Temple before starting her journey north. She had seen the reconstruction, the new breeds of flying lemurs that were returning to the area, and attempts at recolonization.
With the journey had come thoughts of Aang, her predecessor, her supposed mentor. How must he have felt upon waking up into the world again only to find skeletons and ghosts where there had once been friends and the living, breathing bustle of society. It was all lost to the ages, now, though the rest of the world had watched his attempts at reawakening the culture most had thought long lost. The only airbending son he had had was Tenzin, so it was to him she would have to travel.
Airbending was going to be difficult. Not as challenging as fire, perhaps, but the art was so ancient, nearly lost to such a large and ugly war, that it was most assuredly going to be unlike anything she had ever experienced. It seemed somehow elite, a secret that the rest of the world was still unaware of. And she was to preserve it, give it life, offer the respect it deserved.
Easy, she tried to convince herself as she stood at the gates of Tenzin's home, her hand raised to the elegant knocker. Like Mako had said. Easy.
She swallowed and rapped on the wood smartly, then stood back to wait.
It was less than a minute before the one of the gate doors was answered. She was startled to find the man facing her had the light blue tattoos of a master airbender — this was Tenzin, then. It had to be.
He eyed her, a quick glance up and down, before saying, "Avatar Korra, I presume. Of the Southern Water Tribe."
Korra bent herself into a graceful bow as an answer.
Tenzin opened his mouth to speak, but before he could gather his words, a loud shriek from behind the door sounded and the other door burst open with a bang. A young child with green robes and dark hair pulled into tiny buns zipped out of the estate, running —
No, not running — airbending.
Korra had never seen the practice with her own eyes; but then again, not many could claim to have, either. It was like watching an extinct animal awakening after sleep and wandering around the streets, as if it all came natural here, calm as you pleased. The girl was balancing on a tiny ball of wind, whirring, giggling.
"Ikki!" An older girl in pink ran down a small flight of steps behind Tenzin's tall form, yelling. "You're not supposed to be using the Air Scooter until you can handle a glider, you know that!"
"And neither of you are allowed to be using a glider until you are well-versed in the history of the ancient Flying Bison," Tenzin's calm voice said loudly, and with a motion of his hand, the ball of air disappeared, and he lowered the younger girl to the ground gently until her feet landed softly upon the earth. "As you are both well aware."
"It's Jinora's fault!" Ikki shouted, pointing to her sister. "She dared me, and I — "
"Enough," Tenzin said sternly, cutting off an argument before it had even begun as the girl fell silent. "Jinora, what happened to your lessons?"
The older girl looked to the ground and kicked at a stone. "I was waiting for Sifu Jinpa in the gardens, Father…"
"Then you will continue to wait for Sifu Jinpa in the gardens," he said simply, pointing her inside. "Ikki, with your sister, if you please." As the two girls glanced at each other and headed back up the steps, he turned back to Korra. "My apologies. It seems the humor and light-heartedness that my father approached airbending with has been inherited by a new generation."
Korra's eyes had strayed to the children, watching them hobble back into the estate. She stared at the doorway, Jinora and Ikki now long out of sight. "You have children?"
Tenzin looked at her, an eyebrow raised. "Yes. You were unaware?"
She nodded. "I knew Avatar Aang raised a family of airbenders. Wasn't sure how many."
"Well," he began as he began to move inside, "I was the only one of my siblings to inherit the skill. My children, however, have all shown signs of airbending abilities, and Jinora has already begun training." He looked back at her, his gaze questioning. "I'm assuming you will be doing so, as well? That is why you are here, am I correct?"
"Yes — please, Sifu Tenzin," she said immediately, then, remembering her manners, pressed her hands together and bowed. "I would be honored."
Tenzin gave a quick nod and turned to head inside, waving a hand as he spoke. "Arrive at dawn tomorrow. There is a temple two miles north of Republic on the bank of the river; we shall begin there." He paused. "You are, of course, welcome to join us for tea."
Korra stood there before the gates, at the bottom of the stairs that led up to the estate, feeling lost for the first time since she had left home. She had been determined, passionate. She had mastered earth and firebending within months, pressed herself to her limits. And yet, faced with her last element, the element of freedom and spirituality and fun, was overwhelming. It seemed, somehow, ridiculous.
Tenzin walked up the front steps and through the gardens, leaving the gates open for her. Something told her, as she stood there, that maybe she wasn't ready, should just turn around and head back, throw herself into another sparring match with Mako and Bolin for the comforts of the familiar. Hunker down and put it off until later. So close to the end, and yet she couldn't even take another step.
The hardest part was always just before one began. So many times it felt as if she was in over her head, perhaps biting off more than she could chew by deciding to challenge the Equalists head-on by coming to the city they had made their home base. But she'd never found herself at the beginning of something new, always in the hazy middle or the end: leaving home, finalizing her earthbending techniques, mastering firebending at long last. It was even worse when she knew that there was still time to save herself, and yet she couldn't even budge.
Tenzin didn't look back. He clearly wasn't going to wait. The children were zooming around in the gardens, laughing. Free-spirited, light-hearted airbending. Easy.
Korra sighed, wiped her palms on her fur wrap, and slowly followed him inside.
A/N: This came out of some discussions about Korra's possible weaknesses: maybe she's a loner, doesn't like attatchment… possibly because of family problems? In the trailer she looks so serious most of the time, and that quick one-second shot of her leaving the Southern Water Tribe was really striking to me. Didn't notice that there were two figures in the doorway to her old home (mother and father?) until I'd already written this, but I like the idea of her having a not-so-pleasant home life. I get the feeling she takes care of herself and she had to learn how to the hard way.
Of course, this is all like speculation until we get actual details, at which point this fic becomes moot and utterly useless, I'm sure. I don't expect the situations and relationships here to be at all accurate. I just have all these images in my head of possible situations and scenarios. Though I realize it's a whole new level of lameness to write a fic for a show that hasn't even said when it's going to premiere yet…