Thanks for reading, everybody.

I honestly meant for Bonds to be just a one-shot, but bruisedreed at Kataang Forever got me to thinking about what else might have happened from Lin's point of view, so you can thank her for this. :D This is written, of course, with the benefit of what did happen in the story, so there's this, and hopefully one more.

Thanks again for reading, everybody. :D It's greatly appreciated.


Bonds II: Ties

Strangled. That's what it felt like.

Lin had given her last, best effort in the defense of her former lover and his family, and she had gone down fighting.

She had defied Amon. She had insulted him to his face. And he… had reached inside her and strangled what had been a part of her essence.

Her Earthbending was gone. Or more to the point, it was still inside her, dead, like a corpse inside her living body. Senseless. Nerveless. Without feeling or connection. What had been part of what had made her who she was.

She had been Lin Bei Fong, the best Earthbender in the world, Metalbending Chief of the Metalbending Police of Republic City, known, respected, and feared throughout the world. The tried and proven daughter of Toph Bei Fong, the founder of the Metalbending Police.

Now she was… Lin.

Initially she had left off the Bei Fong part of her name as she had come to grips with what had happened, what had been done to her, what she had allowed that Equalist scum to do to her. Her mother wouldn't have stood for it. Her mother wouldn't have gone down without a fight. But she had.

Could she really call herself her mother's daughter anymore? She didn't think so.

At first.

She had curled up fetally in her metal-barred cell—a metal barred-cell. Another reminder of what had been taken from her, another slap in the face, another taunt of her soul. Of what she'd been.

Eventually she had reached a resting place, a place to rebuild from, as she slowly took stock of what and who she was now. She still lived. She still breathed. She had been put in this prison because the Equalists were afraid of what she might do if she were free.

She would rebuild. She would form a resistance to the Resistance. She would show them what being "equal" truly meant.

On top of that was a salving thought, a soothing balm to the wound she'd suffered—that even though she had lost her bending, the Airbenders had not lost theirs.

There would be other Metalbenders. Her mother's gift would not be lost. But Tenzin and his family were all that was left of the Air Nomads. They had to be protected, at all costs.

And she had done that, successfully.

That thought also brought a new presence, a new approval: her mother's. That's right, little Nugget, she heard her mother say. You did the right thing. You did good out there. You took care of Twinkletoes' kids. You did the right thing.

That thought—that approval from her mother—made her smile and laugh a little, even shed a tear. It felt… good. After everything that had happened. After all these years.

A metal gate creaked and swung open—not hers. An Equalist dragged a sobbing woman down the hall, threw her into a nearby cell, slammed the door shut, and walked away. The woman rushed the cell door.

"Please! Please, don't hurt them!" Pema.

Lin's eyes went wide in shock and denial.

The Equalist turned around. "Don't worry, Bender scum," he said, his masked face unseen but his voice sneering. "We won't do anything to hurt your little darlings. We're going to make them just—like—us." He turned and walked away again.

Pema sagged into a heap at the cell door and cried uncontrollably. In horror, Lin's mouth dropped open, grappling with the thought that if Pema was here

Inside of her, a forge ignited.

An unquenchable rage took hold of Lin. Her lips peeled back in a silent snarl. She started looking around her cell for anything she could find, anything she could use to open that door.

She was going to get out of this cell. She was going to leave this place, and take Pema with her. Together they would find Tenzin and the kids and break them out too. And together, however long it took, whatever it would take to do it, she was going to make Amon less than "equal" again—with his crushed face beneath her metal-shod feet.