Of course Wen would have to disappear here. The village of Ku Gao was identical to any of a thousand such places in the Earth Kingdom, barely more than a few dusty streets and a collection of houses and stores that had been on the brink of failure even before the bandits. Only once had anything of note happened there. They had chosen to refuse to pay the Earth Queen's taxes rather than starve, and the queen had sent Avatar Korra to get them back. Asami had fought beside her. They had stumbled away, shivering with adrenaline and desperate to believe they were heroes.

Asami was beginning to believe the universe really did hate her.

She made a slight adjustment to their course and surveyed the vast expanse of rock and dirt below. Piloting large craft was both more difficult and more dull than driving a race car or flying a biplane but it kept her mind sharp and calm. Kept her from remembering whispered rumors that she was insane, that maybe Future Industries would be better off if Cabbage Corp's hostile takeover succeeded.

Asami tightened her grip on the steering wheel. Rebuilding the United Republic's infrastructure to accommodate spirits wouldn't have been easy at the best of times, but the chaos in the Earth Kingdom meant higher prices for metals and refugees surging into the Republic. Which meant a very angry Raiko demanding she do twice the work with half the resources. Asami was an engineer, not a magician. The vulture-sharks had scented blood and Asami had found herself in danger of losing Future Industries a second time. It was times like this she almost missed the days of Team Avatar. At least she'd been wanted.

So perhaps it was natural she'd volunteer to seek out Wen. He'd been on his way to Omashu in search of cheaper platinum when he'd vanished. Kuvira's forces were on the other side of the continent, but Asami Sato didn't abandon one of her own. Maybe the rest of the company would remember that once she brought him home.

"You know this is crazy, right?" Mako said as he entered the bridge. "It's going to be like looking for a needle in a, um, really big place."

"Well, it's a good thing I brought a detective." Asami smiled despite herself. "And you're the one who wanted to spend your last two weeks of freedom helping me."

"I owe you for, well, everything. And anything's better than playing bodyguard to a spoiled, stuck-up prince. Why did Wu have to pick me?"

"Being the one to finally arrest Viper probably had something to do with it. It sounded very dashing in the papers." Only Asami had seen the gouges and slashes from bullets and whips of ice. Just like she had seen Korra's vacant stare. It was a calling, what they did for the world, but it would never be glamorous. Even when they weren't the unwitting tools of tyrants.

Mako bowed his head. "I just—I wanted to do something with my life. Mom used to tell me stories about the Stone Warriors. I wanted to be one when I grew up."

Asami raised an eyebrow. "Blending into the Earth until evil struck and their swords glittered like the sun. My Mom read me those stories too." She smiled sadly. "And we had a good run."

"We did." His hands squeezed her shoulders. Asami relaxed slightly. Whatever else had passed between them, he was the last of those she loved. In a few weeks, they would have other responsibilities. But for now there was—

A bell clanged. Her navigator looked at her with pale, surprised eyes. "Air pirates, eight o'clock."

Asami bit back a curse. There were rumors of the scope of the lawlessness plaguing the remote corners of the Earth Kingdom. Entire states held in the grip of criminal syndicates and charismatic raiders building private armies. But she had thought a fast ship, minimal publicity, and her own training would be enough. Clearly, she had underestimated the pirates. She tapped another crewman on the shoulder. "Take the helm. Try to lose them."

Mako looked at her alarm. "What are you doing?"

"Preparingg for what happens if we can't." She took a deep breath and turned on the intercom. "Code Orange. I repeat: Code Orange. Nonessential crew report below deck. Security staff, I would appreciate you coming with me. We might have a fight on our hands."

Mako followed her as she sprinted towards the deck. "You don't have to, you know."

He almost smiled. "But I want to."

Asami breathed a sigh of relief and slid her glove over her hand. At least she still had something.

The warmth in her chest died as she saw what they faced. She had been expecting one or two planes Mako could shoot down with lightning bolts. A handful of boarders she and her men could dispatch. But behind and to the right of them and gaining quickly was another airship that seemed to fill the sky behind her. The body was roughly the same size and shape as the one that had crashed in the Si Wong Desert so long ago, but whoever owned it now had obviously ripped the guts out. The dark vertical bands on the hull and equally dark cover made it seem like a thing from a nightmare. And then the bottom shifted and planes came out, flying forward as if launching from a trapeze. Airships carrying planes. A hanger inside an airship.

She had seen such a thing only once before. A year ago one of her engineers had come to her with an idea for such an aircraft carrier. Asami had been intrigued, but the fuel costs and the lack of interest from the Fire Nation meant the idea had never gone beyond the blueprint stage. The engineer had left soon after, and Asami had turned her focus to more immediate projects, certain the design was six or seven years away from being practical. Another thing she had been wrong about.

Asami steeled herself. Three planes were coming straight for her. "Firebenders, on my mark." She waited until the nearest plane was in range and dropped her hands. Two of the Future Industries firebenders sent jets of flame at the wing. The pilot tried to dodge, but he was no match for the agility of fire. Mako pointed his two fingers and lightning arced toward the propeller. The craft exploded into a ball of flame and metal.

Before Asami could order another strike, the firebenders fell to the ground. Their legs and arms were trapped by bolas. Asami turned. Six pirates stood on the deck, men and women in olive and brown military uniforms. At the center was a tall woman with piercing green eyes in yellow and green, epaulettes glittering in the afternoon sun. She carried crescent moon knives in each hand. Well-crafted steel, the kind Asami would buy for herself. Her cheek bones were high and prominent. Despite her uniform, she carried herself with a relaxed grace that Asami had never seen in a soldier. The woman's smile was sharper than any blade. "Impressive. But I'm sure you'd prefer to avoid a further mess." Her vowels were rounded and smooth. If it hadn't been for their surroundings, Asami might have mistaken her for a forgotten boarding school classmate. "I am Tzu-Chen, and I am in charge here. Let us have a look. We'll send you on your way after you've paid the toll."

"I don't negotiate with criminals anymore." Asami glanced around. Six pirates, but seven of her men were still standing. Including Mako. She liked those odds.

Apparently so did the pirate. Her smile widened and the battle was on. A burly man sent an earthbending disc Asami's way. Asami ducked and somersaulted toward him. She thrust her palms upward as she came out of the tuck, striking him in the sternum. He staggered backwards but didn't fall. Asami struck again, her right hand wreathed in electricity. He swore and fell back. Another pirate fell to Mako's lightning. Two down, four to go.

One of Asami's men lunged at Tzu-Chen with a combat knife. She leapt in the air and twisted, and the blade found nothing but air. She disarmed him with the front end of her right hand blade. She landed with a fluid movement and jabbed the left knife into his neck. Before Asami could even quite process what was happening, Tzu-Chen spun and cleaved his head from his body. Blood spurted everywhere, and for a moment, Asami's mind just…stopped. She had seen death before, but it had been from great distances or from the tinted glass of a mecha tank cockpit. This was raw, primal. She had known this man for years, and his head was on the floor.

"Asami!" Mako's shouts rang out against the din of battle.

Asami felt rather than saw the attacker approaching her. Her mind was reeling, but she had trained for hours a day for over fifteen years so that what came next was instinct rather than conscious thought. She twisted and yanked her assailant's arm, wrenching it until there was a sickening crunch. She followed with strikes to heart and throat. Block the chi. Neutralize the opponent. Kill if she must. The assailant crumbled and Asami didn't bother checking to see if she was breathing before moving on to the next. Her vision was tinted red.

All around her, Mako and her men fought for their lives. Crumpled bodies littered the deck, some breathing, most not. She saw Mako and Tzu-Chen trading blows. Tzu-Chen was a deadly beauty, her knives a perfect extension of her hands as they whirled and flashed. Mako was equally beautiful and equally deadly with his fire. Blades and flame conspired to keep either from getting too close and the battle might have gone on indefinitely if Asami had allowed them to fight fair. But she was a non-bender in a world where people controlled the elements, and so she didn't believe in fair fights. She kicked Tzu-Chen in the calf. Tzu-Chen grunted in pain as she felt to one knee. Mako was on her.

Tsu-chen dodged a blast of flame that made scorch marks in the wood and kicked Mako in the stomach with her good leg. Mako doubled over and grunted in pain. Asami threw another female pirate to the ground as Tsu-chen staggered away from Mako and readied her knives. Asami eyes narrowed. Neutralize her weapons. Protect Mako. Finish this. But Tsu-chen looked from Asami to Mako and smiled, her mouth as red as Asami's vision.

"Perfect little pair. Let's give the lovers something to think about." Her voice was choked with blood. "Catch!" She threw one of the knives straight for Mako's head. Asami's eyes widened. No. No. Not after Korra. Not with the blood pooling around her feet. She wouldn't lose anyone else. She jumped in front of the blade and thrust her arm out wildly to knock it off course. Metal screeched as it collided with her glove. Hot pain filled Asami's hand and she could see nothing else. Think of nothing else. She could only scream. Metal bit into her flesh.

"Asami," Mako said again. His arms were around her.

"Hurts," was all she could say.

"It's all right." His voice was as gentle as she had ever heard it. "We drove them off. Let's get you out of here."

She was dimly aware of being led back to her cabin and of Mako ordering a waterbender to follow them. Her hand still felt like it was on fire. She looked down. Her glove was a ruined scrap of metal with wires poking in all directions. One millimeter's difference in the blade's trajectory and she would've been dead. Lucky, whispered some still functioning part of her mind. You were very lucky. But then she remembered blood spewing from a neck without a head and didn't feel lucky at all.

The waterbender dipped her hand in a waiting basin. The edge of the pain dulled and Asami could breathe again. "Well, your hand should be fine in a day or two and that's a mercy."

Mako knelt beside her. His face was bruised, but it was his eyes that made her feel like the knives were scraping at her insides. He looked at her like he had looked at Korra after she had escaped Tarrlok. Grieving and utterly helpless. "You saved me." There was the barest hint of a catch in his voice. "You could have died."

"Better than you definitely dying." Her own voice was a croak. "How many did we lose?"

"Don't worry about it right now. The first officer will take care of everything."

"How. Many?"

Mako hung his head. "I didn't count. Three, maybe four."

Asami closed her eyes. Since she had returned to Republic City and taken up her role as CEO in earnest, she had done all she could for the rank-and-file, even if management and fellow board members sometimes hated her for it. The assembly line workers, the drivers, the security staff. They were the muscle and bone that kept Future Industries running. She gave them sympathy, a living wage, safe working conditions, and trust. They, in turn, gave the best of themselves to the company. And today, some of that security staff had given their lives. Because of her.

Asami winced as the waterbender finished his work and bandaged her hand. "I should talk to the crew and staff. They'll be terrified, looking for reassurance."

Mako touched her shoulder. "You need to rest. You're running off endorphins, and it's not going to last."

"Just so long as it lasts a few more minutes." She flexed her fingers through the bandage. "My job isn't over yet."

But she felt as if she were standing outside her body as she surveyed the minor damage to the ship and assured everyone else that they had done their utmost and that she couldn't ask for more. They were, understandably pale and spoke little. She hoped her presence brought strength, if not comfort. A boy who couldn't have been more than sixteen and who looked as if he had just started shaving approached her as she was making course corrections.

He cleared his throat. "Ms. Sato?"

"Yes?" She peered more closely at him. His eyes were red-rimmed and bloodshot and his breath smelled of vomit.

"Does it…does getting your head cut off hurt very much? Rui, he was my brother and I want to know if he suffered. Nobody will let me see him."

Asami smiled sadly at him and kept her voice warm. "No, I don't think he suffered." And it was probably true. Decapitation was supposed to be quick and clean. Not like being burned alive. She didn't have to lie like the officers had lied to her. She stepped closer, ignoring the smell, and put her good hand on his shoulder. "We'll hold a service and do better for him once we get home."

"Better." His voice was hollow. "That Tsu-chen. She just… why do people do things like this? All we wanted to do was bring our guy home."

"I don't know." She has seen men who wanted to eliminate bending or destroy the world, but she was no closer to understanding greed and cruelty than she had been when she was six years old.

"You'll get the bitch, won't you?" He straightened a little. "She's not going to get away with this, is she?"

"No, she isn't. I'll talk to the police as soon as we get to Ku Gao. We're close enough that this is their responsibility. We'll give Rui justice and bring Wen home."

That seemed to satisfy him, and he stumbled off towards more grief.

Asami made it back to her cabin before she started throwing up. Her mind collapsed in on itself as the façade of composure broke. All she could see was the knife severing Rui's head from his body and that same knife speeding towards Mako's head. She had thought Korra had inoculated her against fear and trauma. That facing off against the embodiment of chaos meant she would regard dealing with an overdressed bandit as almost routine. But it was the bandit who had almost taken the last of her loved ones. She looked at her bandaged hand. Tsu-chen had even managed to destroy her glove.

Her eyes were wet with tears, but she didn't feel sad. Just empty and frightened. Her body shook. The coldness, fatigue and red haze took their turn swallowing her. Every noise seemed unnaturally loud, a harbinger of a new attack. She dutifully put on her and nightclothes and lay in bed until the bell sounded for midnight. Asami gave up and turned on the lamp. If she were going to go crazy, she would do something useful. While she lost her mind She would go to the police tomorrow. With luck, they would be able to do something about Tsu-chen and tell her where Wen was. But she was never going to depend on the goodness of the people in charge ever again. She tried to picture the village, where shady characters might spend their time, anyone besides the biker gang who had stood out. She had to be prepared to find her people on her own.

Her hand throbbed. And just how do you plan to do that?

"Any way I can. My people suffered. That makes it my responsibility." For all her father's fanatical devotion to bigotry and false equality, he had raised her in a world of hierarchy and obligation. They were wealthy and brilliant and that wealth and brilliance were to be used in the service of others. And no one who depended on them would ever be left behind. If she abandoned that creed, she might as well hand over the company already.

Her door creaked open. Asami was half out of her chair and into a fighting stance before she realized it was Mako. He didn't look like he had slept either, and the soft shadows of the lamp did nothing to disguise his bruises. "You too?"

"If you're throwing up everywhere, then yeah. Me too." She pulled sweat-plastered hair away from her face. "I thought I would be used to it by now."

"I don't think you ever get used to it. I mean I was sick too, and I'm Arson." He rubbed the back of his neck and just for a moment he was her Mako again. Not the dashing pro-bender, but the boy who had lost his parents too, the one who had let her curl against him and made her feel safe and warm, who said that he would never give up on her. "Anything I can do?"

And maybe just now she wanted to be something other than the leader who had to have all the answers. He had broken her heart twice, but she could still trust him a little. And they were the last ones left, the only members of Team Avatar not living their own lives or trapped in their private torment yet. "Sit with me."

He did, taking the chair closest to her. He carried the now-familiar odor of sickness, and she realized hereally was taking this as badly as she was. "I should have done better," she whispered. "About all of this. We stopped the Equalists. I should be able to handle one pirate band."

"You did handle it. They retreated. And considering the tech they had, I don't think this was Tsu-chen's first raid. We had Korra before. And nothing seemed quite as bad. Didn't hurt as much as it should."

Asami nodded. Korra had made all the difference. Asami had grown to love her for herself in time, but before that she had been the Avatar: the figure out of legend tasked to bring peace and balance to the world. She had given Asami purpose when her life had been falling apart. Korra had made them both believe they could be something more than a beleaguered heiress or a street rat. For as long as Team Avatar had existed, they had been heroes. And Korra, through her courage and her very nature had kept the death from quite touching them.

"I wish we had Korra now." They should have. Had her But not just for what she could do. Korra should never have been ravaged by that poison. She should never have had that vacant stare. Never felt like she had to go away. But she been nearly destroyed by another monster with no more right to victory than Tsu-chen. "But we don't. And so people like Tsu-chen get to murder my staff. And, like you said, it's not her first raid. I'm going to find a way to stop her. Start with the police."

"And when they don't help?"

"Fight anyway." Her hand throbbed yet again, mocking her. "You must think I'm being a total idiot. But the world…it shouldn't be like this. The Earth Kingdom is only in chaos because of the Red Lotus. Maybe I wouldn't have cared before, but..."

"Korra made you care," he finished for her.

"Yes." She forced a smile for him. "You must think I'm crazy."

"No." He stood and came to her. The lamp was reflected in his amber eyes, bestowing a hint of life on what had been dead only moments before. He knelt before her, and his expression was so dreadfully earnest that a lump formed in Asami's throat. "I think you're pretty amazing. And I'm here. And I'll do whatever you need."

Jets of flame seemed to work their way between them and neither of them looked away. There had been a time Asami would have begged for him to have that kind of faith in her. She had given him her heart with an almost reckless enthusiasm. She'd been half convinced she was the princess of an old tale and he was the poor but brave hero. All they needed to do was defeat the villain to live happily ever after.

But the stories were only stories. He had loved Korra, not her. And every villain defeated brought ten more in their place. She had fallen for Korra in her turn, but that love had had no power to rouse Korra from her stupor. There were no heroes; there was only them. Two people who had lost too much and kept fighting anyway.

He kept looking at her. "Whatever you need. We'll find Wen and do something about those pirates." He took her hands and they were large and calloused and slightly scarred, hints of a life on the street that he would never talk about. "We'll go to Ku Gao and see what we can do. Together."

See what she could do in Ku Gao. She had failed their once and oppressed the people she should have defended. Yes, she would see what she could do in Ku Gao. And what she had done to it. But at least she would not be alone.


It was almost dawn when Mako returned to his room. He was still bruised from the fighting. When he was younger with no sense, he had thought he was tough and sharp, that watching his parents die had conferred some special strength and street smarts. But violence was more like being a pro-bender. You could survive knocks to the head that would kill a lesser man, but tripping and falling would give you the concussion that ended your career. He had almost been killed by someone who would have been right at home with the Triple Threats. Would have died. If not for Asami.

She had been amazing. Maybe there was something perverse in seeing beauty in the way she fought, in the efficiency of her strikes, but that life on the street made him take beauty where he could find it. He had been dazzled by the fine clothing she wore and the gift sshe offered. Most incredibly of all, she haven't seen him as a street rat who would always bear the stink of the triads. She had felt safe with him. No one had ever felt safe with him before except Bolin. So it had been easy to forget how strong she was until body after body had fallen around him and he had had no choice to remember. And she had kept on doing her job, never letting her mask slip until they were alone together. On the ugliest day of his life since Korra had been poisoned, Asami had still managed to be… fantastic. He had been stupid to think of her as some mythical princess. Stupid not to recognize what he had and to choose it. He couldn't have loved the ideal in his head, but he thought he could have loved the bruised and battered woman with the bandaged hand whose eyes blazed with so much conviction.

But he had squandered that. Idiot that he had been. Now, all he could do was try to hold her hand as she forged ever onward into the darkness and tried to honor the memory of the woman they had both loved. And maybe, just once before he was at the mercy of Prince Wu, Mako could be a hero again.