The First Citizen Chapter 3: Schismatic
They're in the middle of apprehending the terrorists when she arrives.
Bolin slowly lowers the unconscious body of a Red Lotus insurgent to the floor of the ruined podium as the Grand Secretariat of the Dai Li walks up the stairs. The clack of her polished slippers is echoed by the thumping of her escorts' rock boots, the loud rapports ringing in unison as the espionage specialists march with a clockwork precision that speaks volumes of their impressive training.
The elderly stateswoman looks very angry. She glances down at the helpless anarchists, and Bolin catches a glimmer of disappointment in her expression. The terrorists seem to melt away from her glare, looking ashamed. That's odd. They never flinched like this before her arrival. On the contrary, they struggled like wild cats. Is there something going on between the Dai Li and the Red Lotus? Or are they afraid of the wizened crone's forces? His train of thought is suddenly disrupted when a manicured fingernail almost takes his eye out, its owner red with rage.
"And just where do you think you are taking these prisoners?" she exclaims, nearly spitting with her fury. "In accordance with Article 6, Section 1, Subsection 3 of Ba Sing Se's Great Charter, all criminals guilty of crimes against heads of state are to be directly handled by the Dai Li! You will break the law if you do not give those anarchists to me!"
"Glad you finally decided to show up, Secretariat." Hu retorts as she joins the argument, placing her hands onto her hips as Bolin folds his arms. "Guess we should've waited for your manicure to dry out before fighting back, hmm?"
"Hold your tongue, Lieutenant-General! This business is strictly between me and the Secretary-General's retainer!"
"No, it's not." Hu spits back, her expression blackening with fury. "According to Bolin, your men vanished right before the attack. Thanks to their absence, Kuvira was almost assassinated, and twenty people lost their lives as a result. Twenty innocent people, maybe more. My men haven't finished assembling the bits on the field. This is disgraceful. The protection of innocent lives is our number one priority, and we failed thanks to your uncaring attitude."
"The Dai Li's primary objective is to insure that the head of state is protected above everyone else. I would rather sacrifice the lives of some farmers than risk the life of our leader!"
"So is that why you decided to abandon us?" Bolin takes a step forward, breathing deep as he tries to prevent himself from attack the Secretariat. He's never felt this angry before; hearing the official talk about innocent lives as if they are meaningless disturbs ghosts that he had buried long ago. Her attitude disgusts him.
"It was your insistence on not having any Dai Li in the crowd that led to the bomb being detonated! All our men could do was attempt an evacuation! Your behaviour is not-on."
"You had undercover agents in the crowd?" The Secretariat is furious by now, eyes bulging as she verbally harasses the Inner Circle members. "You broke our agreement, boy!"
"Your agreement can go drown in a pile of monkeyfeathers, you hag!" Hu is screaming back at the Secretariat, looming over the bureaucrat as she yells her down. "People died today, and it was all your fault! As a result of this, I am ceasing operations with your men! These prisoners are under our jurisdiction. You aren't getting them, no matter what you do to try and stop us. Come on, retainer. Let's go."
They turn to leave, marching back to the captured Lotus members, but freeze when they hear the shifting, grinding noise of rocks being bent. The terrorists' faces light up with amusement, and they rotate back around.
The Grand Secretariat has her arms folded behind her back, hostility cut into her face. Behind her, her squad of Dai Li have assumed wending-tu stances, their palms pointed towards the duo as their rock gloves shift around their fingers, legs braced into a sturdy position for ease of bending.
"This is non-negotiable, I am afraid," the Secretariat claims with glee. "We're doing this out of a concern for your safety. Those terrorists have already proven themselves as able to overcome you and your compatriots, and we have reason to believe there may be more of these anarchists lurking in the city. Give them to us. We will take good care of them."
"I don't think so." Hu retorts. "I already told you that I won't work with you any more. They're ours now. Get out before we both do something we will regret."
"You're in no position to argue, Lieutenant-General! Those prisoners won't say a single word while they're under your control. They are trained to resist your techniques of interrogation. We, on the other hand, will make them sing like screeching birds, and we'll know everything about the Red Lotus. Now give us the prisoners before we take them by force!"
The metalbenders are taking battle stances; one of them detaches strips from her suneate to form a small shield, while another uncoils long spools of wire, the steel threads writhing around the bender like pythonacondas. They all have their own unique forms of metalbending, a habit they picked up in Zaofu; their former boss insisted that her Security force developed their own styles of bending, and Kuvira ensured that decree remained in place, training new metalbenders the basics before leaving them to discover their own forms.
Hu tears a chunk of rock out of the ground, levitating it to head height as she takes on a wending-tu stance as well, mirroring the Dai Li exactly.
"These prisoners aren't going anywhere. Now back away, before we make you!" While his disgust of the Secretariat almost forces him to side with Hu and the metalbenders, Bolin is perfectly aware that engaging the Dai Li over such a trivial matter is ridiculous, and he resolves to calm things down. He's about to jump in between
"What do you think you're doing?! Stand down, immediately!"
Bolin clamps his jaw shut, the words stolen right out of his mouth, and he wheels around to salute the figure walking up the stairs, blood-bags mounted on a transfusion stand running into her arms as her weight is supported by a bespectacled man, his frames doing little to hide the concern he has for the injured woman.
"Kuvira?" Bolin cries out. "You're supposed to be in the hospital!"
"I'm fine," she replies, managing to keep a stoic expression on her face despite her injuries. "I can still walk. I needed to check up on the situation back here."
"She insisted, Bolin," Baatar apologises, helping Kuvira up another set of stairs. "I couldn't stop her from coming here if I wanted to." Bolin shrugs in response; he'd have done the exact same thing in his position.
"Regardless of my physical condition, I am demanding that both of you stand down. The Dai Li are our allies, Lieutenant-General Hu. Without them, securing this city would have been impossible."
The Secretariat smirks at that, but the expression falters when Kuvira turns her ire towards her.
"That does not mean I will support your side of the argument. You lost any claim to my prisoners when you ran away to save your own hides. Not only that, you appear to have countered attempts by emergency personnel to assist my guards, putting many lives at stake."
"We did not run away!" The Secretariat thunders at the new leader of Ba Sing Se, her face a contorted picture of fury as her implacable Dai Li shuffle around her, facing the emergent threat of Kuvira as they reposition their stance. "We merely withdrew back to tactically important positions and awaited reinforcements so that we could come back and obliterate the Lotus scum. However, it appears that your new toy beat us to it. And we countered the emergency cars to prevent any more deaths from the Red Lotus! They had compromised dispatch."
Yao moves behind Kuvira, circumventing the wounded Zaofucian as he points angrily at the Dai Li.
"That's not what I could tell when I talked to dispatch! As far as I could tell, they were ordered to not send anyone down to assist us! You set us up to fall!"
"Absolutely preposterous! These claims have no base whatsoever! Secretary-General, is this how you let your rabble talk to their superiors? Punish him immediately!"
"I will do no such thing, Secretariat." Kuvira draws herself up higher, spine straightening as she recovers her pride. "I support Yao's claims, to a reasonable point. I don't believe that you organised the attack. However, I do believe that your horrible sense of timing was more than just coincidental." The Zaofucian glares at the Ba Sing Seian.
"You disqualified any chance of getting those prisoners when you abandoned us at a crucial moment. If you want custody of the Red Lotus terrorists, you're going to have to prove your loyalty to me."
"Why, you-"
"You what?!" Kuvira is looming over the Secretariat now, fire and fury coursing through her bruised body. The last time Bolin saw Kuvira this angry, she was fighting the team that had turned the Kingdom into a political quagmire, and had turned his best friend into a paraplegic.
"Out with it, Secretariat. What am I that makes me so insolent in your eyes, so disobedient? Tell me!" Cowed by this sudden display of authority, the Head of the Dai Li averts her eyes.
"Nothing, Secretary-General. Forgive me. I won't bother you until my agents come across something worth your precious time." And as rapidly as the situation has escalated, the podium returns to its sense of calm. The Dai Li begin to take their leave as the metalbenders reattach their armour, recoiling their whips back around their holsters and returning to the job of securing the insurgents. But Kuvira isn't done yet.
"Secretariat?" The elderly woman turns to the injured woman, a thin veneer of patience carved into her face.
"Yes, oh Secretary-General?"
"Don't take me for a fool. I've read up on what little history there is of you, and trust me; I am nothing like the Kueis. If you try to manipulate me or my Circle in any way, all you'll find is an empty jail cell with your name written over it. I am in charge here now. You would do well to remember that, Dai Li, if you want to keep your title."
The Secretariat bows in response, her grimace stretched so far that Bolin fears she might tear the skin on her face, and she wheels around to march away with the rest of the black-robed secret police. He's aware that the confrontation that took place before him was significant; it signifies the end of Dai Li control over the city's ruler, however temporary this reprieve might be, and once again, he's filled with respect for Kuvira.
"Way to go, Kuvira!" Bolin hoots, fist pumping the air in celebration. "Show those Dai Li who's boss! They know who's in charge now!"
"Kid, that was barely a victory," Hu mutters. She's sat next to her husband, who's gained a new scar for his collection, a fresh one that's nicked off an earlobe and stretches down to his chin. She dabs the wound with iodine-soaked cotton, eliciting sharp hisses of pain from her partner as he digs his fingernails into his knee as a distraction from the stinging sensation the chemical gives to him.
"Sure, Kuvira gave the Secretariat a good tongue-lashing," she continues, "but that woman's had to deal with far worse tantrums from far more powerful people. She's got backbone, and she won't give up her power without a fight. This battle may have been won, but the war isn't over yet."
"As much as I hate to say it," Bingchen replies, gingerly touching his new, iodine-stained trophy, "my wife is right. Secretariat's used to getting her way, and Kuvira fighting back is the last thing she expected. This feud won't end until she goes or we do."
Two days after the Resumption Disaster
Bolin stands outside the entrance to the Avatar Kyoshi Memorial Hospital; the grand, imposing structure dominates the surrounding blocks with its sheer scale. While it's nowhere near as tall as the skyscrapers back in Republic City, the complex more than makes up for it in square miles; Bolin estimates that the building has to be at least 20 acres across.
Somewhere inside the mammoth building, his family are sitting in a lifeless, antiseptic room, waiting for Tu to come out of his chemically-induced stupor. He got the call from Yin last night, when Kuvira was dragged back to the hospital and the Unificators went back to their embassy, emotionally exhausted from their first catastrophe. According to Hu's final count, thirty people died in the bomb set by the anarchists, and their sacrifice has set the city alight with rage against the Red Lotus, against the Dai Li, who fled with their tails between their legs and abandoned the city's new leader to die. Once the journalists came back and started taking films of Corporal Yao posing in front of hog-tied terrorists, the city proclaimed its fealty to Kuvira and her Unificators, marching onto the streets to protest against the horrifying violence inflicted onto their people.
The following day, Kuvira had to make a public address from the confines of her hospital bed, electing to wear her uniform as she narrated to the cameras that she would exact revenge on the perpetrators of this horrifying massacre, that she would bleed for this city. The crowds absorbed her pledge for vengeance like a sponge, and they're now as loyal to the Secretary-General as her Inner Circle; Bolin lost count of how many Unificator sigils there were once he turned down Badgermole Avenue and was met with a literal canopy of the steel-green flags, draped between the apartments in a show of solidarity for their injured leader. Hordes of supporters filled the streets, forming chanting queues of eager young men and women as they signed up with Unificator Corps recruiters, waving flags and clothes that bear the sign of their new masters. Bolin was very impressed at how fast General Qiang could work; he may be a rickety old man, but he's a genius, and those hours-old recruitment booths will bolster the Corps for years to come.
After navigating the crowds for at least two hours, he finally arrived at the hospital foyer, where he now waits as the receptionist contacts the Burns Aftercare ward for any information on a young man, black hair, explosive burns all over his back, a family of thirty waiting for him in the Aftercare lobby, oh you have him? All right I'll send him through, cheers Deshi-
He thanks the receptionist who barely registers the gesture, and he makes his way to the Burns foyer. He's greeted by the welcome embrace of his family, jostling and interrupting the relatives of others as they come to hug him. Chow looks as though someone has poked a hole in him and let out all the air inside; he's dishevelled, miserable with worry at what's happened to his son, and his mother consoles him with an arm around his waist, telling him that it could have been so much worse, you have to try to count the blessing, not the curse. She's upset as well; her grandson is injured beyond her capability of care, and she dreads the idea that a nurse might come out, staring at them with pity and sorrow. Bolin moves to sit next to Yin and embraces her, a gesture she does not notice. Chow suddenly looks up, noticing Bolin for the first time since he entered, and he manages to smile.
"I came as fast as I could," Bolin mentions as he tries to comfort his uncle. "What happened?"
"Tu wanted to get us some snacks so he went to a vendor. He was coming back when the bomb detonated." His uncle sighs. "Thank the spirits that he was on the outskirts of the explosion."
"How is he, uncle? Is he..." Chow looks up at him, tears glistening in his eyes.
"The flames got him. He's recovering, but it's going to be difficult. The doctor says that his entire back's got 'second-degree' burns, whatever they are, and he's going to need to spend a while recovering." He buries his face in his hands. "His back's ruined. The doctor's say he won't be able to move for a long time. What kind of a dad am I, to let that happen to his son?"
"It wasn't your fault, uncle." Bolin drapes an arm around his uncle's shoulder as the older man bites back tears. "You couldn't have known there would have been a bomb. No one did." Bolin exhales, sighing as he pinches the bridge of his nose.
"We messed up. I wanted to put more people in the crowd who could find this sort of thing, but the Dai Li prevented us. And now, Kuvira's having to write thirty condolence letters to families whose only crime was attending what was supposed to be a great ceremony. It was my fault, Chow. I should have never got you those tickets."
"Don't blame yourself, Bolin," Chow assures his nephew, grasping him in a one-armed hug, "you didn't know about the bomb either. I don't blame you for anything; you did everything you could. I'm just thankful that Tu made it out alive. You know that your men drove the injured here?"
Bolin nods. Yao gave him the debrief; he had to take matters into his own hands after it was clear that the city's Royal Guard weren't sending any ambulances to help them.
"Then you understand us when we say that we can't thank you enough," Chow admits. "Your soldier saved the lives of many people that day, Tu included. He may be injured, but at least he's going to live. Nothing I can do can repay you for saving their lives. Thank you, Bolin. San would be proud of you."
He smiles at that remark, and he wraps his arms around his uncle, pulling him into a tight embrace.
"That means a lot to me, Chow."
Their display of familial bonding is interrupted by a polite cough, and Bolin notices a doctor standing beside the entrance to the aftercare ward, a clipboard clasped in his gloved hand.
"Are you Tu Song's family?"
Yin nods her confirmation.
"Well, I'm here to say that Tu has recovered from his anaesthetic. He's still a little woozy from the drug, but he said he'd like to see a man called Bolin?"
He stands up and raises his hand.
"That would be me." The doctor smiles.
"If you'd like to follow me."
"Spirits, coz. I'm sorry about this."
Tu is lying on his front in a white, pristine hospital bed. He's holding a newspaper in his hands, turning the pages idly with his fingers fingers. His back is a red ruin of exposed flesh and huge, yellow blisters, a swathe of destruction stretching from his hips all the way to his neck. If it causes him pain, he takes no notice; Tu's hooked up to a wide array of IV bags, tubes running into both arms. Bolin's reminded of spiderwebs when he first catches sight of the mass of plastic wiring that connects his cousin to life-saving fluids and chemicals. A button that's connected to one of these bags hangs loosely of the side of the bed, ready to pump poppy milk into his system at the first sign of discomfort.
Currently, Bolin has his full attention, even though it may be clouded with the chemical haze of medicinal opium.
"Nah, man, you got no reason to be sorry!"
"You sure, Tu?"
"Yeah! I mean, why would I be upset," his cousin proclaims, nodding towards his cousin, "with you? You saved me! And I'm ok! No harm done."
"Uh, how much painkiller have you had?" Tu pauses his rambling, and strokes his chin in thought.
"Hmm. Maybe too much. Yeah, to be honest with you Bolin, I'm a little mad. I mean, what am I going to do with this?" He gestures to his blistered back, grimacing with disgust at his injury. "I can't work the fruit stand with burns all over me, can I? And what will the girls think when they see my back? This sucks."
"Yeah." Tu sighs.
"Doctors said that they'd need to bring in Water Tribe healers to fix the damage done to my back, and even then I'd still have my scars. I could probably get them tattooed over, but I'd be waiting a year for that to happen." He smirks, barking out a short laugh.
"Spirits, listen to me. I'm alive, ain't I? I should be happy about that. Seriously, Bo, I know you know I'm a tough guy, but if your friend hadn't gotten me to the hospital in time..." He leaves the remainder of his sentence unfinished, the conclusion left hanging in the air.
"I'm happy you're alive, Tu," Bolin states, trying to break the awkward silence that has settled between the cousins as he stands up, adjusting his collar. "I kind of have to leave, though. Got work to do, catching terrorists and all that," he admits, ruffling his hair in an attempt to shake off some stress. "Sorry about having to leave so soon."
"No worries. I mean, it must be hard, having to rush around kicking terrorist butt while I'm stuck here in the hospital." Bolin arches an eyebrow at his seemingly envious tone.
"Rushing around? I have paperwork to sign. Lots of it. The Dai Li weren't happy we beat them to the punch in capturing the Red Lotus cell. We have to get through plenty of red tape before we're allowed to do anything to them." Tu grimaces in sympathetic pain.
"Oosh. I'd prefer being stuck here than having to do that. Here," he says, as he gives him the newspaper he was reading, "you'll need this more than I do. Check out the front page when you get out of here. You'll love it." He winks and gives Bolin a thumbs up, followed by a hiss as he presses his poppy milk dispenser.
"Do me a favour and send dad in on your way out. I'd like to say some stuff to him before talk with everyone else, yeah?"
"Yeah. See you soon, Tu."
"Likewise, Bo! Crack some anarchist skulls for me, you hear?"
As he turns towards the door, Bolin does what Tu tells him to, opening the folded newspaper to the headline, and he's surprised to see that his face is plastered over the issue of the Southern Telegraph. He looks like he's straight out of a comic book; teeth gritted directly at the camera in an expression of fury as he supports a staggering, injured Kuvira, a pained expression on her face as she clutches her side. They're rushing out of smoke, the particulate mist parting from their touch. A glowing snake of magma is frozen in time, the end slowly flash-cooling into obsidian as it wheels around to face the cameraman. ANARCHIST ASSAULT ON KINGDOM'S CAPITAL FOILED, the title screams, emblazoned at the top in bold letters for extra emphasis. Bolin smiles as he reads the piece by an Arnaq Mirou, which stresses the role that Kuvira and the Inner Circle played in bringing the Red Lotus to justice, and concludes by proclaiming that they are the right choice for the Earth Kingdom. Maybe the paparazzi aren't so bad after all, Bolin acknowledges as he strolls into the waiting room.
"Uncle, Tu wants to see you." Chow hurriedly rises to his feet, concern in his eyes.
"Is he OK?"
"He's fine, Chow. He just wants a chat." He points towards the exit. "I gotta head off, guys. Got a mountain of paperwork to deal with, and that's going to take some time, so if you - oh, another group hug? Yeah, alright, I'm ok with that, just don't-aag! Man, Little Chu, you have got to stop hitting me like that..."
Four days after the Resumption Disaster
"So...who's next?"
The Inner Circle has convened once again. Qiang's heading the meeting this time around, and he passes around a dossier that contains information on all the Red Lotus members they captured in the aftermath of their brutal struggle at the podium. Bolin selects one of the files at random, poring over the information contained on the paper.
"What about her? Earthbender, 5'4, 22 years old. Think she'll tell us the info we need?"
"We already interrogated her," states Qiang, hobbling to a chair on a cedarwood cane. Everytime he opens his mouth, his impressive whiskers bristle like a white-haired caterpillar, and Bolin still finds himself forcing down a chuckle at the sight. The last time he laughed out loud during a Circle convention didn't end well.
"It's no use," the wizened old man continues, moustache vibrating. "We've tried everything up to physical altercations, and they don't break. Whoever taught them to resist verbal interrogation was a master at it. We might as well give them over to the Dai Li; they're trained to deal in information extraction."
"Unacceptable," Kuvira thunders as she slams a gloved fist on the table. "I've been dealing with wheedling Dai Li representatives for the past three days, pestering me non-stop to release these criminals into their care. We are not giving them these prisoners. I don't trust they'll handle the situation with any sort of tact."
"I wasn't suggesting that, ma'am. But we can't get them to talk. Having them in our custody is useless. They won't blag."
Kuvira pinches the bridge of her nose, elbow resting on the table as she contemplates something. It must be quite something, if she reacts like that.
"Qiang, it's painfully clear that verbal methods aren't working. We're going to have to step up our operations."
The colour drains out of the old general's face. An uneasy silence settles over the Inner Circle as they contemplate the true meaning of Kuvira's order.
"What? You mean...torture?" Bolin stands up. He's shocked that her friend would suggest such a drastic measure. "Kuvira, that's illegal under the first article of the Yu Dao Charter!"
"I know that, Bolin!" There's an tone to her voice that Bolin has never heard before; a razor-sharp edge that fully proclaims to the other members of the Inner Circle that what she says is law. She has absolute authority here.
"Thirty people are dead because these anarchists planted a bomb as a distraction so they could try and kill me! Thirty innocent lives, gone! The psychopaths we have locked up in our cells have shown no remorse whatsoever for their actions. If we need to apply a little pressure to get them to talk, so be it. The ends justify the means."
A horrified quiet is her only response. No one has seen Kuvira this angry since the schism at Zaofu.
"Kuvira, we can't stoop to their level." Bolin is worried. Seriously worried. He never signed up for this. "If we start hurting them, the terrorists win. They want us to lash out in panic; Amon had the exact same tactics as these guys, and all the UR did in response was make themselves look like bending supremacists."
"Bolin, they won't talk-"
"Let me talk to them, then. I mean, who's this guy? Nonbender, 5"5, 17? He's my age! You want to be remembered as the woman who beat up a kid in an act of revenge? At least let me try to get him to spill. I won't let you down."
The silence that follows is cloying and awkward, and Bolin is worried that Kuvira will shut him down, or remain quiet. But something in her eyes soften, and she relents.
"Alright. You need to find out if they're planning anything else, and how many other conspirators there are. Find out who headed the operation, too. I've got a feeling that the Dai Li aren't as innocent as they claim to be."
She locks eyes with him, twin pits burning deep into his spirit, scouring him for any sign of weakness.
"Don't make me regret this, Bolin."
"So that's him?"
Staff-Sergeant Chong nods, handing him a couple of sugared tanggao.
"We've only asked him the basic questions. How old are you, what's your name, and so on. You need to find out who gave the order, how they managed to get past both us and the Dai Li, and what he's doing tied up with known anarchists. You've got ten minutes to do whatever you want. Talk to him, yell at him, scare him, as long as you don't actually harm him. Once it's up, Kuvira's pulling you out and I'll replace you." Bolin doesn't need to imagine what Chong has been ordered to do, and the sergeant's cold disinterest at that issue unnerves him. He raises one of the sweet doughnuts to his lips, but falters when Chong shakes his head.
"Don't eat the tanggao. That's for leverage. If I were you, I'd give it to him after scaring him a little. You used to be an actor, right?"
Bolin nods. He still receives an unspeakable amount of money from the Nuktuk royalties and trademark.
"Then I'd use those skills to your advantage. Scare him, maybe even with a threat of violence, and he should sing like a bird. Don't use actual violence; Kuvira wants to get him to talk without actually hurting him first. Are we clear?"
"Yep!"
"Good luck getting that information." Chong salutes him and turns away, walking to take a seat behind a two-way mirror. Qiang and Kuvira are also standing there, watching the insurgent with steely eyes.
He takes a deep breath, and pushes the door open.
The terrorist is fastened to a chair, his wrists bound around the back of the seat by hemp rope. He looks dishevelled; his clothes are a mess and there's patchy black stubble growing on his cheeks. He has Kingdom-green eyes, glittering like emeralds behind his black fringe.
It's like looking into his reflection. Bolin gulps as he settles into the chair opposite the terrorist, planting the plate of tanggao between them, noting the way that the captive takes a sudden interest in the fried dough. He must be starving, and his expression reminds Bolin of the starving, mangy strays that roamed the back alleys of Republic City in packs hunting for scraps.
"Sorry, but you won't get these until you answer a few questions." The words are bitter in his mouth, and the memory of a police station flashes in his mind; a gaunt metalbender holding a pen and notepad as he tries to extract answers from a young Bolin. The terrorist locks eyes with him.
"I don't talk with fascists." He spits on the table for emphasis.
"We're not fascists," Bolin stammers. "That's stupid! We're not looking to make a dictatorship. We're rebuilding the Kingdom."
"And forcing everyone to bow to the whims of one woman. Admit your crimes!"
Talking isn't working. What did Chong say? Scare him a little? Bolin can do that.
"Hey, hey, ok, if you wanna play that game, I'm ok with that. Let's see... Alright, out of the two of us, who's the one that's tied up?"
The insurgent grumbles under his breath, attempting to adjust his restraints.
"I thought so. Next question; out of the two of us, who belongs to a terrorist organisation?"
Crickets.
"Eeexactly. And final question."
Bolin shoots up as he slams his palms down on the table, leaning into the terrorist with a furious expression carved into his face. The ceramic plate shatters like glass, the tanggao scattering over the floor.
"How did you manage to plant a bomb in the audience?!"
The sudden change of attitude spooks the teen, and he nearly falls off his seat to try and get away from a now irate Bolin. He makes a sound like something's jammed in his throat.
"Who ordered the hit?! Who authorised you to bomb innocents? Tell me!" His silence serves to irritate Bolin further, and he snatches his collar.
"Thirty innocent people died because of your bomb! A good friend of mine's in the hospital right now because of you! Who ordered the hit?!"
"You d-don't scare me," the anarchist stammers, clearly about to break.
"I don't scare you, huh?!" Bolin tips the chair onto its side (taking care to avoid bashing the man's head on the stone floor) and stands over the captive's immobile form. Though he doesn't show it, Bolin's quite impressed that he still has the skills. Maybe I should consider going back into the acting business.
"Do I scare you now?! If you think I'm scary, wait until I call my friends in. They know how to send threads of metal into your blood! Do you want that? Tell me who ordered the hit!" The terrorist blanches.
"Oh spirits, alright! Please don't put snakes in my blood. I'll talk!"
It's as if a switch flicks inside Bolin. He smiles as he helps the terrorist back onto his chair as he picks up a tanggao, brushing it down on his uniform before he hands it to the now-compliant hostage.
"That's good news, really great. So, you mind telling me who ordered the hit? Zaheer? Xai Bau? Some other Blossom?"
The teen pauses mid-mouthful.
"Never heard of them."
A surge of confusion fills Bolin.
"What do you mean, you've never heard of them?"
"Those Koh-cursed snakes! They've played us for fools!"
Kuvira paces like an enraged armadillo lion, hot with anger. The other members of the Inner Circle sit around their conference table in the offices of the Royal Council. They share in Kuvira's rage, and they brood with anger at this revelation. Even Zhu Li, who only displays emotion in extreme emergency is furious. They've been tricked.
"After all this time, the culprits have been right under our noses the whole time. I can't believe the Red Lotus were paid to do this," Gao mutters darkly.
"They weren't paid to do anything," replies Qiang, moustache shivering like a boar-q-pine. "There was no Red Lotus. It was a false flag operation. Red Lotus haven't been in Ba Sing Se since Zaheer and his cronies got taken out by the Avatar. The entire operation was Dai Li, from top to bottom."
The captive had admitted to everything. He and everyone else that had launched the attack on the Inner Circle were Dai Li agents. There were signs from the very beginning that they were up to something; the Secretariat's refusal to allow more Unificator guards, how the Dai Li vanished moments before the attack, why they nearly resorted to violence in order to get the prisoners. Seemingly unrelated events all clicked into place like a masterfully executed pai sho manoeuvre, the revelation of a presumably months-long game played by the Secretariat. Despite their hatred for her, the Inner Circle has to admit that she is a tactical genius.
" The Secretariat's a clever girl," states Bingchen, his expression as bitter as his wife's. "Framing the death of their new leader on the same men who killed their Queen? If she had pulled it off, no one would have been the wiser, and the Dai Li would have cemented their grip on Ba Sing Se forever."
"We have to confront her," asserts Gao, ever the firebrand. He's more Fire Nation than he is Earth Kingdom; only his bending and his eyes hide the fact his father was from the volcanic islands to the west. "We have to take her down. Arrest her in full view of the city. It's time for the people to know that the Dai Li are over."
"Doing that may spark more attacks from Dai Li sympathisers," cautions Baatar. "We don't know how deep the Dai Li have infiltrated the authorities, and Ba Sing Se's populace in general. I don't want to risk the lives of civilians by being too drastic with our actions. Maybe we should send in a small elite team to arrest her quietly?"
"I dunno, Baatar," Varrick chimes in, sipping from a mug of hot chai that his assistant has brewed for him, "she may know we're coming, and simply have us all taken out! Caught like a winged lemur in a cage! And besides, where are we going to get evidence of their involvement? I managed to get away with causing the Southern Rebellions until I got exposed in the act, and that was because no one had any evidence on me!"
"Yes, well, what about the kid Bolin interrogated?" Hu rests her elbows on the table, leaning forwards as she steeples her fingers. "We still have him in custody. Drag him along and make him confess to the Secretariat and the courts, and we'll have the Dai Li held to justice." Qiang turns to face Hu.
"Lieutenant-General, for all we know they've infiltrated the courts as well! We can't trust the authorities at all; if they managed to infiltrate emergency dispatch during the attack, what other government agencies have they taken over?"
"What are you suggesting, sir?"
"Well, I would send some men to apprehend the Secretariat on charges of treason, conspiracy to commit treason, and so on. Search their quarters in the Palace for any sort of list on their affiliated figures. Maybe have some others go search around the cells they were holding airbenders in. If they haven't destroyed them and relocated that is. Once we get that list, we can kick those judges out and replace them with our own. Remove the Dai Li, and secure the courts in our favour. Two birds with one stone." He mimes a throwing motion as Kuvira halts her pacing, moving to sit in a padded chair at the head of table.
"That could work," she admits. "Qiang, that idea is an excellent one. Now, the remaining question is whom to send on this mission. We need Inner Circle members to do the arrest; the Secretariat water-weaselled her way out of being arrested by anyone save those under direct orders from the ruling body, and taking a security team with you will only raise suspicion."
Gao's hand rockets upwards into the air.
"Secretary-General, I am more than willing-"
"Yes, General Gao. You can be on the team. I'll need two more volunteers."
"I can help him," claims Hu, raising her hand. "I've dealt with her before; she's a stubborn hag, but I can bring her down to size."
"Very well, you're in too, Hu. Bolin, as my retainer, you must present my seal and my warrant to the Secretariat. Are you willing to act as the arresting officer?"
Bolin nods, cracking the knuckles of one fist with his other hand.
"Absolutely, Kuvira."
A.N. Christ these chapters keep getting longer and longer it's out of control D:
Chapter 4 will be the last segment of the Ba Sing Se quaternary, I hope. Writing has gotten slower due to educational concerns, but fret not, I shall try to write as often as I can.
Reviews are my lifeblood, please give 'em to me fresh and hot and fulla compliments/criticisms :)
