Please read "It's a Reflex" by laughuntilyoucry ( s/10695460/1/It-s-a-Reflex) .
"Welcome back, Mom!" Wing and Wei exclaimed clapping her on the back as soon as she got down from Oogi with her sister and Tenzin's help.
"Mom!" Opal cried throwing herself into her mother's arms.
"How are you feeling?" Baatar asked gently approaching his weary wife more slowly than the children.
"Not quite a hundred percent but still a lot better thanks to Lin," Su replied glancing back at her sister who had climbed back onto Oogi to unload some bags from her apartment in the city.
"Dad!" Jinora, Ikki, and Meelo ran over, Jinora carrying Rohan. They swarmed him with hugs.
"You're back!"
"I went to get Lin and Su. The doctors finally allowed Su to leave the hospital—"
"You know, I could have just treated her here," Kya said with her hand on her hip and an eyebrow raised.
"Well I'm here now, so there's no reason to argue," Suyin reminded them as she adjusted the metal collar of Huan's robes.
"Mom, stop! You're crushing my individuality! I'm a metalbender too, I can do it myself!" Huan said trying to shake her off.
"You can't stop a mother from fussing over her babies!" Suyin replied simply swatting away his arms and straightening the last panel.
"Jinora, Ikki, would you mind helping Lin with her bags? She's agreed to stay with us for a while to help out," Tenzin asked his children.
"Really?" Jinora asked launching herself and Rohan into Oogi's saddle with a mini tornado.
"Woo hoo!" Ikki cried launching herself onto Oogie's tail to sit on the opposite side of the luggage rack as Lin.
"You are my hero!" Meelo said to Lin, landing directly in her lap.
"How long will you stay?" Jinora asked shifting Rohan in her arms.
"I don't know. I guess, as long as I am needed," Lin said leaning away from Meelo.
"So that's forever then!" Ikki decided untying her bags from the saddle and launching them towards the house with air bending.
"Ikki be careful with Lin's belongings!" Tenzin scolded, his bald head turning various shades of red in his fury.
"Relax Airhead. It's just clothing." Lin said sliding off of Oogi with the airbender children
"Is the chief- not in her uniform?" Bolin asked Mako as he, Asami and Korra emerged from the house.
Lin stood as Ikki and Meelo twirled around her with excitement, riding on their air scooters Jinora held her hand and she held Rohan. She was wearing earth kingdom green caprees and a tan tunic with green seams and a green sash around her waist.
"You can have the room next to mine. Then in the evenings, we can read together..." Jinora offered Lin.
"No! Lin will you take the room next to me?" Ikki yelled coming of her air scooter to stand in front of Lin and Jinora.
"But I'm in the room next you you," Jinora reminded Ikki, rolling her eyes.
"Exactly! Then Lin could be between us and act as a buffer when you get mean?"
"When do I get mean? You always provoke me!" Jinora replied.
"Only because you deserve it—" Ikki argued.
"Enough you two! Another word from either of you and you're SHARING a room and both sleep equidistant from me." Lin interrupted.
Both airbender girls fell silent and walked with Lin into the girl's dormitories.
Su and Kya chuckled while Tenzin and Team Avatar looked surprised.
"I can't believe it, the chief handled that surprisingly well." Korra commented once Lin was out of sight.
"I still can't believe she owned any clothing other than her police uniform," Mako replied.
"She didn't. I dragged her to the deserted shops in the city on our way here." Suyin confirmed to them as she passed them on the way into the kitchen wing in search of a snack.
In the the dining room after dinner, Baatar, Junior, Asami, and Varrik were working on the plans for a new Republic City located about twenty miles south of the the epicenter of mass destruction. It was a mountainous region that would be no problem to navigate for earth benders and air benders, but a pain for everyone else. The previous rail way system and maglev train only worked across flat land so, the engineers had to devise a method of transportation to work on steep slopes.
In The living room, Su, Kya, Bumi, Opal, Korra, Mako, Bolin, Wei, and Wing sat relaxing each with a cup of tea in their hands.
"Hey, do you guys know where Lin is?" Bolin asked.
"Since being tasked with the care of the air bender children, she decided to secure the perimeter of the island before going to bed," Suyin explained pouring over some paperwork from Zaofu.
"Do you know when she'll be back?"
"The perimeter of the island is pretty sizable when walking it on foot, so I'd say about an hour." Kya replied.
"Okay good, I've just been really curious, like REALLY curious, what were Lin and Tenzin like when they were together I mean, from when I first met them, I thought they hated each other!"
"It wasn't real hate. They just— made a couple mistakes; people change," Suyin tried to explain.
"Bolin's question was about before all that, Su!" Kya said rolling her eyes.
"They were perfect for each other in all honesty." Suyin said with a warm smile as the memories danced across the front of her brain.
"Lin was consumed with work,"
"Like always," Su muttered.
"And Tenzin was consumed with her!" Kya described. "He would bring her lunch at work when he knew she was too stressed to take a break to eat, he practically joined the police force to be with her. He listened to the police channel and suddenly appeared at the scene of every altercation that could potentially turn violent to protect Lin,"
"He even tried to learn how to fake metalbending and join the police force, but mom caught him and forbade it declaring he would be a distraction to Lin!" Suyin added enthusiastically.
"And Dad wanted Tenzin to to finish his airbender training so he took Tenzin on a journey all over the world for a few years separating the two for a while."
"And when Tenzin returned, they were both still just as in love!"
"And then what happened?" Korra asked.
"I don't know I was gone by then," Suyin replied.
"Dad and the white lotus had convinced Tenzin that he had to repopulate the air nation and Lin wasn't willing to do that. She was too worried that she wouldn't be a good mother no matter how many times Mom and I tried to explain to her that instinct would take over and she'd be fine."
"That was probably my fault. See, our mom was raised with so much restriction that she basically gave us all the freedom in the world. Lin took it upon herself and tried to raise me and when I started acting out, she probably blamed herself for not raising me properly," Suyin said with a sigh.
If you were too busy to read laughuntilyoucry's amazing piece of work, then I'll summarize it here:
In the first part, Tenzin comforts Lin after she sacrifices her bending for his family. She is feeling distraught because she believes it was not enough since Tenzin and his family still got captured and it is all really sweet so go read it!
In the second part, (I think it takes place after Zaheer obliterates the Eastern Air Temple because Kya and Bumi and Tenzin are all in really bad shape) and Lin climbs through a window and comes to check on him. At first things are pretty normal, until Lin tells Tenzin that he could have died and they realize just how much they care for and worry for each other.
In the third part, Somehow Su and Pema are attacked by some guy wearing a ring, and Lin could only save one of them and ended up impaling a guy through the head. Afterwards, Su is in such bad shape that Tenzin wouldn't let her own children see her, and Lin is overwhelmed with guilt because though she saved one mother, she couldn't save the other. She had to chose between saving her sister that she only just reconciled with and the wife of her ex-boyfriend. Tenzin comes to try to convince her that it is not her fault that Pema was killed. Tenzin has this revelation that while he loved Pema, he loves Lin(Past vs. present tense). She tells him he should be grieving and helping his children, and asks her to help him with, saying how he can't do it all alone and she agrees.
Idk who it was who killed Pema and nearly killed Su, so I will just leave him as some nameless character that further destroyed Republic City. We all know Suyin was fine after Kuvira got to it soooo... yeah... Enjoy!