Chapter 2:

"Mulo! Wait!"

The pond was gone, and in its place was a swirling, shifting soup of energy. Every colour in the spectrum danced before Mulo's eyes, but she didn't even blink.

She knew Arlin was trying to follow her. But she wasn't going to make it easy for him. The scene changed, and suddenly she was standing in the forest, right where they had been playing less than hour ago. She paused, waited for him to appear, and as soon as his blue skin materialised she was gone, through the energy and out into a clearing, overlooked by a mountain. If she were in a better mood, Mulo might say hello to it, as the giant rock spirit always told very funny jokes. But instead, she vanished again.

She flitted from spot to spot, traversing the entire spirit world in a matter of minutes, until, finally, she reached her destination. She appeared in another forest, one filled with orange-and-purple trees, covered in a thick purple moss. She sat down, and let a moth wasp land on her arm. She could relax here. Only the very brave – and very deadly- spirits dared enter this part of their world. Even if Arlin could find her, and he couldn't, she thought, he would never pluck up the courage to follow her in.

But of course, the universe had a habit of proving people wrong.

"Ouch!" cried Arlin, appearing beside her just a few inches off the ground. He crumpled beside her, sighing in exasperation. "I wish you hadn't made me do that. You know jumping like that makes me sick."

Mulo got up. "I didn't make you follow me," she snapped.

"Iroh wasn't done talking to you."

"But I was done listening. He invited a human here. He told a human where I was in a letter, and invited him to come talk to me."

Arlin reached a hand toward her. "He only wants what's best-"

Mulo swatted him away. "And not just any human," she went on. "A Nomad. If I didn't know better I'd say he was just clueless, but he's well aware of how hard I tried to get away from them."

"He didn't invite the whole air nation. Just one person. A friend, he said. Someone who can help you."

"I don't want any help!" She took a step away, and just as green light began building within her, Arlin spun her around, and looked her right in the face.

"What's wrong? Why are you acting like this?" She opened her mouth to reply, but he continued, "and don't tell me it's just because you're afraid of getting caught, we both know no human can catch you here."

Mulo said nothing, refusing to look at him. To their left something roared in the distance, and Arlin gave her a nervous look. "Let's go."

"I'm not going back to Iroh no matter-"

"You won't have to."

He offered her a hand, the webs between his fingers shining in the forest's purple glow.

Mulo lowered her head, sighed, and grasped it. Together they appeared on a hill, surrounded by more hills. And in the distance, a great beam of light shot into the sky.

"There. No one will look for you so close to the portal. Now tell me what's going on. What happened between you and Iroh?"

She sat down again, facing the distant light. Arlin sat beside her, and waited for her to speak.

After several minutes, she whispered "I did it again."

He looked at her. "What?"

"We were just talking, he was telling me about his nephew, about teaching him how to lightning bend. And I relaxed my mind without thinking and-"

Arlin's eyes widened. "You mean you…"

"I saw his mind. Like when I practised on you, except he wasn't ready for it. I hadn't told him to focus on anything, hadn't warned him." A tear rolled down her cheek. "I didn't think it would happen here. I thought I could control it."

"What did you see?" He spoke quietly now.

"He was thinking about Zuko, his nephew, because we were talking about him, but also… also his son. Lu Ten. He died in a battle. A battle Iroh started, where he was leading an attack. And he wasn't focusing on anything, and I didn't know it was going to happen, so I felt it. I felt it all. His guilt, his anger, his pride in both of them, his sadness. He's so sad, Arlin. And he sensed what was happening, and..."

Arlin looked at her, crying into her hands. "He doesn't blame you. Surely you know that. How could he? Oh, Mulo, you-" He paused. "What do you mean, you didn't think it would happen here?"

Her head snapped up, and she looked at him with shame and fear in her eyes. Arlin shook his head.

"You never told me you had this ability in the human world. I mean, I knew you were powerful, and you're obviously connected to the spiritual energy in a big way, so it makes sense you could read our thoughts, we are spiritual energy. Even Iroh's, since he's pretty much a spirit himself now. But being able to read normal human minds, in the human world, without any help from a spirit…"

"Yeren said it shouldn't be possible. That's why he took me in. He said he would protect me. That people would try to use me."

Arlin nodded. "I always wondered why you were with them. I thought it was strange that they would go to such great lengths to keep you from leaving, just because of your great-grandmas."

"Adopted great-grandmas. No one seems to remember that part. I don't actually share any blood with Korra, or Asami."

"But they adopted your grandfather. That's gotta count for something."

Through her tears, now drying up, Mulo rolled her eyes. "Yeah, right."

"You don't really think you got all this power by accident, do you?"

"I don't know how I got it, and I don't care."

He sighed. "You should. I've been around for a long time, and neither I nor anyone I've ever talked to, spirit or human, has ever heard of someone like you. Humans shouldn't have your abilities. It's just not how things work."

"And yet it is. Deal with it."

Arlin raised an eyebrow. "Clearly I'm not the one having trouble dealing with it. You should at least talk to Iroh's friend. He's here now, and I doubt he'll leave our world before he's even met you."

"I'm not talking to a Nomad."

"Why? I know you didn't exactly have a lot of fun while you were with them, but they were just trying to protect you, you said it yourself."

"No, I said he told me he was trying to protect me."

Arlin paused. "What do you …Ah"

"He made me practise, every day. He said I needed to learn how to control it, that it was dangerous for me to just slip into everyone's minds all the time. He said he cared about me. But he never let me practise on him, only acolytes, people I didn't know. So one day I got curious, and I looked in his mind, and it was awful. When I practised, he had the acolytes focus on something, so all I would see was one train of thought. But when I do it when someone isn't expecting it… I can't help it. I can't stop feeling and hearing everything they're feeling and thinking."

"And what was Yeren thinking?" asked Arlin, already knowing the answer.

Mulo looked at the ground. "He wanted to use me too. He was worried, really worried. I felt so much fear, fear of the White Lotus, of the President, of so many things. He thought he could use me, turn me into his special little Nomad agent. Send me into government buildings, have me read people's minds and gather intel. He said he wanted to protect me, but I felt almost nothing in connection with his thoughts about me. He saw me as a weapon."

"So when you asked me to help you escape, you didn't just want to be free from their rules, and their bedtimes, and their boring rituals. You were trying to escape a war."

Mulo scoffed. "I never said that. The Nomad elders might be stupid, and the President might be arrogant, but no one's going to risk a war. Humans are past that sort of thing."

"Hmmm. Right. Well, I might not know anything about human politics, but I know humans. You aren't the first one I've met, even if you are the first I've liked. Fighting is all they know."

"Well, good thing they aren't my problem anymore." Mulo stood up. "Let's go. I'm tired."

"Fine. But you need to promise me that you'll at least consider speaking to Iroh, about speaking to his friend. I know you don't trust humans, and that you really don't like Nomads, but you said you saw everything Yeren thought and felt, and everything Iroh thought and felt. Tell me, how do they compare?"

Mulo gave him a withering look, and opened her mouth to speak. Then paused. Thought for a moment. Sat down again. Arlin swished his tail back and forth impatiently. He was just about to prod her to see if she was still awake when she stirred, raising her gaze.

"Fine," she said. "I'll talk to Iroh. Find out if this guy really can help me. But the moment this friend of his suggests taking me back to the human world, I swear, I will pick him up and drop him in Koh's lair before he can say 'whoops'."

Arlin laughed, then froze. "You're not joking, are you?"

"Nope."