A gentle breeze filtered through the blinds, carrying the scent of cooking fat along with it, taunting Mako. He had lied to Bolin, and claimed that he had already eaten, leaving the very last of the noodles to him. It really was the very last too; Bolin wouldn't stop reminding him about that, as if he didn't know. The big lummox was asleep now on the couch, snoring pleasantly while Mako sat in his favorite chair, turning their bleak situation over and over in his mind.
There was no money in the house, not a single yuan. Their tournament winnings were sucked up by room and board, and extra fees that were always tacked on afterwards. He had managed to secure a job at the power plant, a fairly coveted and competitive position, but one that didn't start for another two weeks. There was a gap there, he could feel it in his brain. They couldn't starve for a week and still perform well out on the arena floor, that much was certain. They had been through that more than once in their lives, and despite their resolutions to the contrary, would probably have to go through it again, unless their fortunes improved and they won the tournament.
He rubbed his aching forehead angrily. Why did there have to be so many moving parts? So many things to keep track of? Hasook's tardiness was bad enough, but taking care of his brother was an additional weight that he carried every day, just as he had since he was eight. There were many ways to make money in the city, if you knew where to look, and Mako had one source in particular that was now sorely tempting him, but he was trying to think of something, anything else. At last he came to the realization that he could find none. Triple Threat Triads it would have to be.
"It must be nice, Bolin, not having to compromise your morals to keep us both alive. I wish I could live in your world for a day, only worrying about the pretty girls. Must be real nice." He said sulkily to Bolin's large back, which was rising and falling gently as he slept.
He stood up, fastened his father's scarf about his shoulders and strode out without another word. As he hit the street the memories came flooding back, as they always did. The square was old, and packed with them. Every place he walked past, every tobacco-stained lamppost, every grimy manhole cover had a memory draped across it like a cobweb. He brushed off the clinging strands of the past and continued on. Tonight was about his future.
The Triad's hangout was directly across the parkway from their apartment. It didn't look like much, a rickety back stoop and a beer-drenched door, but that was the point. No one would ever suspect that the local boss for the whole south side kicked it in such a run-down shithole. The muscle at the door glanced at him, and then jerked his head, indicated he could go in.
The odor of alcohol and stale bread assaulted his nostrils as he entered the hallway. Two figures were embracing against one of the walls, a local grifter kid, and a girl he knew.
"Evening Stella."
They broke apart instantly, the girl shoving him off. The kid took one look at Mako's sour expression and fled back down the hall, but he had eyes only for the girl in front of him. She still made his insides squeeze up in a little ball, even after all these years.
No, he thought, that life is over.
Then what are you still doing here? Another part of his mind asked in a quiet voice. He ignored it.
"Oh, Mako sweetie, hi…"
"Don't let me interrupt you." He said, pushing past her.
She grasped at his arm and stepped closer, trying to prevent him from continuing down the hallway.
"Please, Mako, just give me another chance-"
"I have business to attend to with Sharkie. We can talk later."
The living room was trashed. That was the only word for it. Every piece of furniture had at least one limb missing, and the couches were nothing more than sagging masses of slashed and burned fabric. The radio was playing a strange jazz fusion mix, and the air was thick with a pungent smoke. Two men were sitting on couches, and several women lay sprawled on the floor next to the speakers. The women looked up and smiled beguilingly at his approach, but he paid them no mind.
"Mako! Long time no see!"
Sharkie was in his element. Nobody knew quite how he kept his position in the triad, let alone run a successful contraband ring while high as a kite, but he had done it. Everyone who had tried to knock him off his totem pole had found themselves dead or simply vanished, leaving at most a bit of blood and a hat spinning in the empty street.
"Sit, sit!" He said, scooting his large body over and making room for him. Mako held his nose and sat.
"I came to put in some work for the triad."
Sharkie nodded.
"All fine and good, my boy, but things have changed. We have professionals doing the books now. Nothing personal, it's just the way we operate now. Word comes down from Zolt that we gotta run a tighter ship, so I do what he says. No more independent contracting, at least not for the pencil pusher jobs."
Mako suppressed a devastating eye roll which was threatening to break out across his face. Nothing in the world could be a more perfect antonym for the phrase "tight ship" than the room that surrounded him.
"Doesn't have to be white collar. I'm at the end of my rope Sharkie, and I'm not about to take out a loan."
"I hear you, man, I do, but I got nothing at the moment. It's all farmed out. I will drop you a line, though if anything comes up. You still living in the attic at the old-"
At that moment the grifter kid that Mako had originally scared off reentered the room at approximately the same speed as before, holding a badly overstretched telephone in his hand.
"Hey boss?"
"What do you want?" Sharkie snapped.
"Shady Shin and his crew are in the lockup. They crashed the car on the way to a shakedown. Shin's babbling about an avatar or something."
"You tell Shin he had better come up with a better excuse than that, or I'm not bailing his skinny ass out. For the life of me, I can't understand that-"
He waved his flabby arms in the exasperatedly.
"Never mind. It just so happens I have a man already on it. Hang up on those morons, let 'em sweat it out in the holding cells for a few days, then send someone who's pledged over to bribe the jailer. Pledged, you understand, don't just hand money to any old errand boy."
The grifter kid nodded and disappeared into the back room once more.
"So, Mako, you up to it?"
"What's the job?" Mako said, a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach. He had promised himself he would never end up in this position again, and yet here he was.
"One of my satomobiles has crashed a few blocks down, on Comstock Street, just before you hit the market. There is a box in the trunk, underneath the upholstery. I want you to get it to me before Chief Beifong and her rats find it, savvy?"
"What's in it for me?"
Sharkie tossed a small fold of yuans into his lap.
"One grand now, to get your feet wet, nine more when I have the box."
"You can count on me." Mako said, getting up to leave.
"I know. Otherwise I wouldn't have given you an advance. Straight there now, don't dip into any skinny bars on the way."
With a sigh of relief Mako left the musty apartment block and hit the streets. The sun was low in the sky now, casting an eerie red light over everything. His feet carried him almost automatically down the directions that Sharkie had given him. When he reached the intersection with Comstock, he peeked down. The street was a mess. Several storefronts looked like they had been bombed out by explosives, and there were multiple deformations in the cobblestones, as if earth benders had had a brawl in the middle of the street.
Sharkie was behind the times. The street was still buzzing with police activity. A single van was parked down at the far end, and pairs of officers were patrolling up and down the sidewalk. The satomobile in question was flipped onto its back, and resting part of the way through a display window where it had come to rest. The whole thing had been cordoned off with yellow tape.
He stepped back around the corner and took a footpath that lead behind the buildings on either side. He moved past the overflowing garbage bins and backdoors until he found one that was different from the rest. The brick wall next to this door had been deformed outwards in an almost perfect impression of the back of a satomobile, headlights and all. The knob moved under his fingers, but it was locked. He closed his eyes and concentrated, sticking one finger against the lock. It was a difficult technique, and best performed by airbenders, the same people who were least inclined to be involved in criminal activity. Nevertheless, fire provided its own wind, but not enough, as Mako learned. He had been able to pick locks before, but his concentration was not the best now. At last, in a fit of sheer pique he simply melted the knob with a jet of yellow flame and gave it a smack with the back of his hand, redirecting the heat absorbed in the process.
The whole bolt assembly came clattering out of the door, and Mako pulled his foot out of the way just in time to avoid what would have surely been a third degree burn. He pushed the door inwards carefully. The countertop to his left had been anhilatted by the flying mass of metal, but the remaining rubble provided him with cover from the group of police that were standing just outside the front entrance, talking.
"No, I'm not joking. The actual avatar, here, in Republic city."
"Great spirits, how'd they take him in?"
"Not easily. And it's a her. Korra, or Chorra, or something like that. I hear Beifong herself is conducting the interrogation."
Mako crouch-walked down the ruined aisle to the car's chassis. The trunk fell open the moment he touched it, as it apparently had been hanging by a thread. Sure enough, a small brown cardboard box tumbled out of it's hiding place and into his lap. It tumbled across him and split open noisily on the floor, expelling a half dozen tightly wrapped packages in every direction. Mako scooped them up quickly and refolded the box so that it would stay closed, conciouss of the fact that the conversation had stopped and there was now a single pair of footsteps headed his way. He was just turning to flit out of the room when a flashlight beam caught him.
He didn't stop, even when the man shouted out for him to freeze. His adrenaline spiked, and just like that he was back in the arena, dodging the elements. Footsteps echoed behind him as he sprinted up one alley and down the next. He dared look over his shoulder only once, and this was to confirm that they were indeed feet away from laying hands on him.
A pair of cables grabbed at him, but he kept running, shaking off the metal ropes and yanking their owner off his feet. Up ahead the alley ended in a solid brick wall that was taller than he was, behind it the chain link fence that separated the canals from the street. He hopped up onto a dumpster and propelled himself over without hesitation, unleashing a torrent of flame behind him as he did so.
He tried to roll, but it turned into an uncontrolled summersault, and he smacked himself hard on the pavement. He only had time to look once to verify that he was no longer being pursued before he was off again. The sprint lasted for another few blocks until he ran out of breath, and his lungs ached in his chest, pulsing in time with the numerous other aches throughout his body.
After a few minutes he had come full circle, and was now back on the street where he had started. The muscle at the door was no longer there, but there was somebody sleeping in the chair on the stoop, a large blanket draped over their shivering form. He went in with trepidation. The music was playing even louder, and the smells were more pungent. In contrast with the subdued atmosphere that he had just left, everyone in the room seemed overpoweringly happy to see him, Sharkie most of all. He snatched he package from Mako's barely outstretched hands and slit it open with a long hunting knife, stuffing a wad of money and a fresh pack of miniature cigars into his breast pocket.
"There you go old boy, an early Christmas bonus for a job well done! You want to stay and sample the merchandise with us?"
Mako turned back, having already made a motion toward the door. One of the packages was now open on the table, and a white powder was spilling out. The people in the room were now all huddled around the table and a snorting noise could be heard. Something about the sight made the bile in his throat rise.
"Thanks but no, Sharkie. I have to be going."
"Hah! Suit yourself!"
The noises of the revelers echoed down the hallway as he left, closing the door behind him. Something drew his eye to the figure beneath the blanket that he had ignored on the way in. It was Stella. There were deep red rings under her eyes now, and she was shaking gently. These eyes immediately gravitated to his shirt pocket.
"Mako, please, I haven't had a hit in days, can you just spare a few yuans? It's my last one sweetie, I swear, and then we can be together…"
The hardest part wasn't turning his head and walking away, he had done that many times before, and he would do it many times in the future. The hard part was maintaining his silence on the seemingly eternal walk out of that decrepit alley, with Stella's sobs to keep him company. Even after he was out of earshot, those pitiful tears staid with him, an endless playback in his head.
In something of a daze he wandered through the park to his favorite spot, a bench just in front of the fountain. Nobody else was there now, save for a few vagrants sleeping in a row on the grass. He watched the water bubble over each little step before splashing into the base. Gradually, he became aware that he had nine thousand yuans sticking out of his shirt pocket. He quickly stashed this in his pants pocket with the rest of the money. Then his fingers traveled back up and grasped the package of cigars. He took it out and stared at it awhile, an old vice that he had long ago given up in the interest of keeping them both fed. That's what his life amounted to, he realized. One long struggle to stay fed, to get somewhere, a destination that never seemed to be coming, or even to appear on the horizon. With Hasook so unreliable, even entrance into the tournament was a long shot, and after the pro circuit was over they would be super-rookies, and the crowds would loose what little interest they had in the upstart Fire Ferrets.
He pierced the wax paper and withdrew a single cigarillo, placing the rest in back in his shirt pocket and the butt in his mouth. His finger snapped together and a small flame appeared, lighting a glowing cherry upon the end of the tobacco leaf. He leaned back and blew a great cloud of fragrant, flavored smoke skyward, sending it to join with the rest of the choking smog through which a few brave stars shone.
What was he waiting for, he wondered? A new girl? A new job? Another life?
The sky stared back at him, featureless and devoid of answers. Sooner than he would have liked, the cigar had burned down to a stub. He stood wearily and dropped it to the ground, extinguishing it with a twist of his heel. Life didn't allow him to sulk for long. There were people relying on him. Fans. Bosses. Associates. His brother.
The weight of his burdens fell back upon his shoulders, and he couldn't help but crack a wry smile, despite himself.
"Okay, Mako. Time to face the world."