When dealing with an evil Earth Queen and her Dai Li agents, it's best to have someone there who knows what they're doing. For Korra, the first person she would consider for a mission in Ba Sing Se is her grandmother.
Warning: Contains headcanon that may very well upset canontards. Mentions of Sokka/Azula. Also, some spoilers for Book Three.
Don't Mess With Granny
Korra stormed out of the Earth Queen's throne room, thoroughly enraged over what had transpired. There had to be Airbenders in Ba Sing Se, there just had to be. As Korra returned to where she and the others were staying for their visit in the so-called impenetrable city, she began to make plans for how to deal with her current predicament.
"Korra!" Bolin exclaimed as he and Mako rushed over to her. She had been wondering where they were.
"Guys, what is it?"
"Kai! Tricked us! Lower Ring! Trash pile! Fruit stand! Cousins! Grandma! Airbenders! Dai Li!" Bolin sputtered.
"…what?"
"What Bolin's trying to say is that Kai tricked us onto a train that took us to the Lower Ring," Mako explained. "We were stuck there and had to sleep on a trash pile in an alley for the night. When we got up, Bolin tried to convince me to steal from a fruit stand, which led to us getting tackled by a guy who turned out to be our cousin. We then got to meet our dad's family, including our grandmother, and learned from them that one of their neighbors had started Airbending and that the Dai Li turned up several days ago and took him away."
So, the Earth Queen did know about the Airbenders," thought Korra. She was lying to try and throw me off the trail. Who knows what those people must be going through?
Korra didn't say anything and simply led the two boys into the residence that had been provided for them.
"Korra, what did the Earth Queen say?" Tenzin asked at once. "When can we meet the new Airbenders?"
"Her majesty insists there are no Airbenders in Ba Sing Se," Korra replied walking towards the nearest phone. "However, Mako and Bolin proved my suspicion that she is a liar."
"Korra, what are you doing?"
"I need to call in someone to help us."
Mako and Bolin's statement about meeting their grandmother reminded Korra of something, or, rather, someone that could easily resolve the situation. Korra had had a long and very close relationship with her mother's family, considering most of them lived at the Southern Water Tribe since her grandfather moved the family back home after he retired from the Council. Since her grandfather's death shortly after it was revealed that Korra was the Avatar, Korra's grandmother had taken a particular interest in Korra's Firebending training, considering the fact that the woman was, herself, a Firebender.
A wrinkled but still elegant hand picked up the telephone. The woman to whom both the hand and the phone belonged was currently reclining on a lounge chair at her family's old beach house on Ember Island. She had taken a vacation there for a month, meaning she had not heard about what had happened in the South Pole until after the fact, but one phone call to her youngest daughter, Senna, had assured her she need not cut her vacation short. Sometimes she wondered if her children didn't want her around, though she couldn't begin to imagine why.
"Hello?" she said.
"Grandma?"
"Korra, my favorite grandchild, how are you? Has that half-wit father of yours destroyed the tribe already?"
"What? No, nothing like that."
"Phooey, now I owe my brother ten yuans. How can I help you?"
"Uh, we're kind of in Ba Sing Se looking for Airbenders. Funny thing, when I opened the Spirit Portals I caused some kind of cosmic shift that's been making Airbenders pop up all over the place."
"I see. What do you want from me? I haven't seen any Airbenders lately."
"Well, we kind of have a problem here. The Earth Queen has been having her Dai Li agents abduct the Airbenders and now we can't find one of the Airbenders we already recruited. I thought that if anyone could help us, it would be you, Grandma."
The phone went quiet for a moment.
"Expect me there tomorrow afternoon, Korra."
With that she hung up. A smirk graced the old woman's lips. She had been dying for some action and returning to Ba Sing Se to face off with the Dai Li once again sounded like a great deal of fun.
"Hana, ready my bags," she declared to the one servant on the premises. "I'm going to Ba Sing Se."
As Korra, too, hung up the phone, she turned and saw Tenzin staring at her with a look of dawning horror.
"Korra, what on earth did you just do?"
"Asked my grandmother to come over," Korra replied simply. "She said she'll be here tomorrow afternoon."
"WHAT?! This isn't happening. This isn't happening." The Airbending master began pacing the floor while nervously rubbing his hands.
"What's wrong with Korra asking her grandmother to come over?" said Asami.
"Yeah, Mako and I met our grandmother and she was super nice," said Bolin.
"You don't understand!" Tenzin exclaimed. "Korra's grandmother is the most deranged, psychotic, and evil woman to ever attempt to take over the world, and that is really saying something. Worst of all is that she was married to my Uncle Sokka, which means I had to put up with her at family gatherings for years."
"I always thought Auntie was nice," Bumi stated. "A little loopy, but who in our family isn't?"
Tenzin shot his brother an unamused glare.
"Wait, so you and Korra are related?" said Mako.
"Yes, Korra's mother is our cousin," Tenzin conceded with a wince as terrifying memories of childhood experiences of being trampled by arctic buffaloes, pushed off of cliffs, and nearly being eaten by tiger-sharks surfaced in his mind. "And now Korra has invited her grandmother, the source of all evil in the universe, here to Ba Sing Se."
"Tenzin, how many times do I have to say it?" said Korra. "My grandmother is not evil."
But Tenzin was on a roll.
"If you take everything we went through with Vaatu and Unalaq, combined it with the sheer mind-numbing terror of when we were fighting Amon, and multiply it by a thousand you might come close."
"Wow, that's a lot of evil," said Bolin.
"If she comes to Ba Sing Se, it will be a repeat of the last time she was here," Tenzin continued. "Only this time there will probably be even more violence."
"Well, knowing Granny's habit of being punctual, she's already left so it's too late to call her off," said Korra.
Tenzin retreated to a corner of the room where he promptly curled in a fetal position and began sobbing.
The next day was unusually hot for the time of year. Kai still hadn't returned, Tenzin hadn't budged from his spot in the corner, and everyone besides Korra, Bumi, and Jinora was starting to get nervous about the impending arrival of Korra's grandmother. Bumi, who had never had any problems with his aunt, kept insisting that Tenzin was overreacting, while Jinora, who had also met the woman, thought her great-aunt was positively fascinating because of her extensive knowledge of the Hundred Year War.
Suddenly, there seemed to be a strange surge as the sound of an airship landing nearby rocked the building. Everyone tensed as they could practically feel something likened to a force of mass destruction getting closer and closer. Mako, Bolin, and Asami all got that feeling of impending doom that they had all experienced the night Firebenders had taken away loved ones from them. Pabu ducked down the collar of Bolin's shirt and began to shake while Naga lay down in a submissive pose, shielding her eyes with her giant paws as she whimpered like a frightened puppy-cub. The temperature of the room seemed to go from hot to scorching in a matter of seconds.
That's when there was a knock at the door.
Korra took hold of the handle and pulled the door open to admit an old woman. Her hair, once a rich black, was now snow white and long, though still kept pulled back and fastened with a topknot. While she often wore Water Tribe clothes when she was in the South, she had donned an old set of Fire Nation royal armor that still fit her from when she was a young woman just for the occassion.
"Korra," she said fondly.
"Granny," Korra replied with a smile.
"DUCK OR DIE!"
The old woman sent a blast of bright blue fire right towards Korra's face which the Avatar quickly avoided, allowing the blast to harmlessly impact with a wooden table, which promptly caught on fire. Korra responded to the sudden attack with a blast of her own, which her grandmother easily deflected with a kick. As the others scrambled to put the fires out, Korra and her grandmother both burst out laughing and pulled each other into a hug.
"Oh, you've gotten so strong," the old woman said proudly. "And I see you've inherited my natural good looks and charisma."
"Korra, your grandmother just sent a blast of fire at your face!" Mako declared.
"Yeah, I kind of know that," Korra replied. "Don't you do that in your family?"
Mako and Bolin both shook their heads.
"Huh, weird."
"Hi, Auntie 'Zula," said Bumi warmly.
"Bumi, how lovely to see you," she said. Her face fell when she saw Tenzin. "Oh, and I see you brought the runt."
Bumi laughed as he pulled Tenzin out of the corner. The Airbending master tried to pull out of his older brother's grasp and flee, all to no avail.
"Hello, Aunt Azula," Tenzin said with a terrified squeak.
Mako's, Bolin's, and Asami's jaws all dropped open. Mako turned to Korra in disbelief.
"Your grandmother is the infamous Princess Azula who masterminded the Fire Nation's plans to destroy the Earth Kingdom?" he said.
"Yep," Korra replied simply.
Mako suddenly felt a twinge of fear for his personal safety if Korra should reveal anything about their past relationship to her grandmother. He was already thinking up what to put in his will and making plans for his own funeral.
"So, what's this I hear about a problem with the Dai Li?" said Azula with a sinister grin.
Considering the fact that Azula, at only fourteen, had accomplished in less than a week what dozens of Fire Nation generals had failed to do in a hundred years, with only two accomplices instead of vast armies, it was inevitable that she would perform a repeat of her famous conquest of Ba Sing Se in half the time, especially considering she now had the Avatar and several others assisting her.
It had taken her less than an hour to figure out where the captive Airbenders were being held, one hour to get to them, and fifteen seconds to bust them out. The Dai Li and the Earth Queen had shown up to stop them, of course, but they certainly had not been prepared for Azula to be there.
"You know, it's funny, but you all look just like the Dai Li agents who sold out both their king and Long Feng in order to ally themselves with me," Azula had said in that silky tone of hers, sending chills up everyone's spines. "Unfortunately, these Airbenders are not yours."
"They are citizens of the Earth Kingdom and are obligated to serve their ruler," said the Earth Queen.
Azula's smirk widened and the Earth Queen found herself taking an involuntary step back.
"A ruler, are you?" said the Fire Nation princess. "You hide behind your idiot father's throne, feeling like you have some right to call yourself a queen when you have to rely on your underlings to do everything for you. I took down your entire city with only two people to back me up and singlehandedly swayed the Dai Li to my cause. While you sit around and shout at people, only concerned about your ridiculous topiaries and koi ponds, I have faced the heat of battle, doing things to show that I deserve the royal title I was born to. Compared to that, you are nothing but a pimple on the backside of the world's smallest amoeba. And if you continue to stand in my way, I will crush you like the pathetic Earth Kingdom insect that you are."
She stared the now shivering Earth Queen down.
"And you know I can do it."
In retrospect, it could've been a lot worse…for Ba Sing Se and the Earth Queen, obviously. The Airbenders had been only too happy to join Tenzin and the others on the trip to the Northern Air Temple, especially when their alternative was being enslaved by the Earth Queen or possibly incinerated by Princess Azula.
"Korra, sweetheart, didn't you tell me there were some Airbenders outside Ba Sing Se that weren't being cooperative?" said Azula. "I'd be more than happy to help convince them to join your little group."
"Yes, Grandma, just go easy on them."
Just then, another Firebender and three Waterbenders happened to arrive.
"Zuzu, what are you doing here?" said Azula brightly. "And I see you brought my idiot son-in-law."
Tonraq withered under the gaze of his mother-in-law while Lord Zuko simply scowled at being addressed by his hated childhood nickname. Eska and Desna simply looked on with their usual nonchalance, reminding Azula considerably of Mai.
"We kind of have a situation with some escaped convicts and came here to warn Korra," Zuko explained.
"You mean those four people that tried to kidnap my granddaughter when we found out she was the Avatar?" Azula said. "Zuzu, why on earth would you let those psychos escape from prison?"
"I didn't let them escape!"
"You really can't do anything right, can you?" Azula gave a frustrated sigh and patted her brother's shoulder. "Don't you worry about the big, bad criminals, Zuzu, I'll make sure they won't be a problem ever again."
A shiver of fear rippled through everyone present at the maniacal look spreading over the old woman's face. Whoever those criminals were, Korra couldn't help but feel sorry for them if her grandmother got to them before they could be recaptured.