Republic City
April 4, 12:04 RCT (Republic City Time)
"Jinora! Ikki!"
"Yes Asami?"
"Have either of you seen Dick?"
The two small airbender girls shared a sad frown. It was Jinora who spoke up, clutching her closed book to her chest. "He's up on the ridge over there overlooking the beach. He's been sitting there all alone for hours."
"Have you two girls been spying on him?"
"Not just us!" Ikki chimed in. "We're taking turns with Bolin and Meelo!" The younger of the sisters pointed at a clump of nearby bushes several yards away.
Asami sighed, thanked the girls, and went to the bushes. She stood there a second before deciding to get on her hands and knees and crawling to where the boys were sitting.
"Oh, hi there Asami," Meelo greeted without his usual exuberance before turning his attention back to the ridge. Bolin nodded at Asami and scooted over to give her a space to sit.
"How's he doing?" she asked.
"Really bummed out," Bolin said. "Ever since he got out of that meeting you guys had with him in Tenzin's office."
Asami frowned. "I feel really awful for him. I don't think it even hit him until that meeting that there's no real way for us to help him get home."
"Are you sure there's nothing we can do? Not even with Korra's Avatar mojo?"
She shook her head. "Seems that way." She sighed. "It must be so hard… Remember breakfast and how he talked about his friends and family back home?"
Bolin cast his eyes downward. "I don't know what I would do if I lost Mako like that…" Then he glanced at Asami. "…Or any of you guys. You're the best friends I've ever had."
"Asami?"
"Yes Meelo?"
"Can we do something for him? To make him feel better?"
Suddenly Ikki shoved her head into the bush, right next to her brother. "Yeah! Can we?"
Jinora stayed outside the bushes, but her voice carried through the leaves and branches just fine. "He might appreciate a distraction to take his mind off of his worries, and to let him know that even though he's new here, he's not alone."
Asami and Bolin shared a look, then smiled.
Up on that ridge, overlooking the beach, Dick sat beneath a tree with a depressed expression on his face. On his left wrist was the palm-top computer from his gauntlet. He'd removed it from his armored glove and put it on like a watch, hiding it under his long sleeves. Now, though, he was pressing a sequence of buttons for the umpteenth time since he left Tenzin's office.
A small blue ringed screen appeared to hover over his wrist, and Dick spoke into it.
"Nightwing to Watchtower. Nightwing to Watchtower. Come in Watchtower. This is Nightwing."
There was a moment of silence, then two words appeared on the virtual screen.
"—-NO SIGNAL—-"
Without hesitation, Dick punched another button.
"Nightwing to Mt. Justice. Nightwing to Mt. Justice. Come in Mt. Justice. This is Nightwing. Come in."
"—-NO SIGNAL—-"
Dick sighed, then tried to reach both Barbara and Tim at their personal comm signals, with the same result. Finally, with painful reluctance, he punched in one last code into the communicator. It was the one number he'd avoided contacting all morning, but had no choice now.
"Alfred… Alfred, it's Dick. Please… Please come in, Alfred. I need you. Please… Please come in…."
"—-NO SIGNAL—-"
Dick bowed his head. Then he pulled up knees and wrapped his arms around his legs. He stared at the water surrounding the island. "Tim…" he murmured softly under his breath. "Barbara… Alfred…." He closed his eyes and rested his head on his arms. "…Bruce."
The sound of crunching leaves and snapping twigs caught his ears. Dick lifted his head just enough to make sure he was hearing someone approaching, then turned off his computer. As soon as the virtual screen winked out of existence he pulled his sleeve back over the thick black band.
The scent of expensive perfume wafting through the air told him exactly who was coming up the path.
"Hey there, Dick," Asami greeted once she felt she was close enough for him to hear her, not realizing that he'd known she was approaching for over twice that distance.
"Hi Asami," he greeted back politely as he lifted his head from his arms, though he couldn't seem to find the motivation to put on even a hint of a smile.
The dark haired woman came up closer, a kind, sympathetic expression on her face. "How are you feeling?"
Dick shrugged. "About as well as can be expected in a situation like this."
"So pretty lousy?"
Dick managed a weak shadow of a grin and tapped the tip of his nose with his pointer finger. When Asami just looked at him in confusion, he chuckled a little. "Right on the nose," he explained patiently while repeating the gesture. "It's an idiom from my world. It means precisely correct."
"Oh. That's an unusual saying. Clever, but unusual."
"Heh… It was probably invented by the same guy who thought Dick would be a good nickname for Richard."
Asami smiled warmly at him. "Hey… Do you think you might be feeling up for a little walk?"
"Hmm?"
She inclined her head back down the path she came from. "The kids noticed you were all alone up here and pretty miserable after the meeting with their dad. They were hoping to cheer you up a little by taking you on a tour of the island."
Dick glanced back down the path. He wasn't looking for them before, but now that he knew they were watching, he could see three small faces hiding within a bush well out of range of his hearing. His expression softened. Kids could be so sweet sometimes. "That sounds like a wonderful idea," he told Asami with a nod before rising to his feet. "I need to stop brooding anyways." Dick stretched his arms high over his head, and relished the feeling of several vertebrae in his neck and spine popping back into place. "I was raised by a master brooder, and he was a very bad influence in that respect. If I'm not careful, I could be up on this ridge till sunset and not even realize it."
It was practically impossible to remain in a depressive brooding mood with three charming and high energy children excitedly showing off their amazing home. There were so many new things to see on the island that Dick was able to put his more immediate problems out of his mind for the time being.
"How… is that even humanly possibly?" Dick said in amazement as he watched the six-legged massive white bisons soaring right over his head.
"It's not humanly possible. They're flying bison, so it's bisonly possible," Ikki said matter of factly.
"I gathered as much," Dick remarked, still in a fair bit of awe, but unable to resist grinning at Ikki's word play. "But how are they flying? They don't have any wings, and they definitely land as if they have a lot of weight behind them. Is it magic? Some superpower?"
"It's airbending."
Dick looked at Jinora, then at the others as well. "Y'know, I've heard these bending words here and there, and I'm still not entirely sure what it means. I've heard of waterbending, spiritbending, and airbending so far. What does that all mean?"
"There's also earthbending and firebending too," Bolin added in an attempt to be helpful, but only succeeded in adding to Dick's confusion. Jinora, thankfully, took it upon herself to explain.
"It's all about bending the elements," she said. "Here in our world, certain people are born with the ability to manipulate the four natural elements to their will. Fire, water, earth, and air." Jinora set down her book. "Our father and the three of us are all airbenders." The eldest daughter of Tenzin made a sweeping circular motion with her arms and sent a controlled gust of wind straight at Dick. Ikki immediately showed off by creating a sphere of air and suspending herself on top of it. Meelo tried to one up his sister by creating a similar sphere of air and zooming around the others while sitting on top of it. However, he wasn't quite able to react quickly enough to avoid a grazing bison and ended up crashing right into its thick furry side. Jinora facepalmed in embarrassment while everyone else laughed.
Dick took it upon himself to go and check on the boy who was still lying on the ground, staring up at the sky. "Are you alright, Meelo?" he asked, amusement still lighting up his eyes.
Meelo reached up with one hand and gave him a thumbs up. Laughing once more, Dick helped the small boy off the ground, then lifted him up and sat him on his broad shoulders. Meelo delighted in suddenly being taller than anyone else there.
"Yeah… And I'm an earthbender," Bolin said. He stomped the ground hard, and immediately a sizable pillar of earth rose up in front of him. Then he made a motion and the pillar flattened itself back down again.
Dick was definitely impressed. "That's amazing." Then he looked at Asami. "So what kind of bender are you?"
Asami cast her eyes uncomfortably downward. "I'm not," she said with a shrug. "No bending in my family whatsoever. Just a plain old boring ordinary person over here."
With Meelo still on his shoulders, Dick went over to Asami and gently caught her chin with his hand. "Hey… Don't talk like that," he said with a reassuring smile once he caught her gaze. "I've only just met you, and I can already tell there's nothing plain, old, boring, or ordinary about you."
Asami felt her face grow warm, and she pulled her chin away from Dick's touch while lifting her hand to tuck a suddenly errant lock of hair behind her ear. "You certainly know how to make a girl feel good about herself."
"Hey, it's part of my charm." Dick turned to the other girls, both of whom were practically swooning as they watched the exchange between him and Asami. "So who can tell me about the other bending elements?"
Ikki's hand shot up quickly. Then she rushed forward to grab Dick's free hand and pull him along the path. "Oh! I can tell you all about waterbending. Our grandma Katara's the best waterbender in the whole wide world! She lives down in the South Pole with the Southern Water Tribe!"
"Really? We have a South Pole in my world. It's in a continent called Antarctica, and it's covered in ice and snow all year round."
Jinora's eyes lit up with interest. "That sounds just like the South Pole we have!" She dashed forward to keep up with Dick and her siblings. "Does your South Pole have half a year of mostly daylight, and half a year of mostly nighttime too?"
"As a matter of fact…"
As the airbender children peppered Dick with questions and answers, Asami and Bolin watched from afar. "Wow.. With lines like that, Dick must be some sort of lady-killer back in his world," Bolin remarked.
Asami watched Dick smile and laugh with the children, and she sighed. "Yeah… He seems like a really nice, sincere, fun guy."
Bolin looked over at his friend. "Y'know Asami…"
She shook her head. "No, Bolin."
"Why not? He's here and unattached… And you're here and unattached…"
"He may be unattached here, but he may have a girlfriend, or at least someone he really likes back home." She looked at Bolin sadly. "I don't want to end up being the other woman again." Asami took a deep breath, let it out slowly. Then nodded to herself and managed a small smile. "Better just to be friends. No need to make things more complicated than that."
The earthbender nodded with an understanding expression. "I hear ya, Asami." Then he slung his arm across her shoulder. "C'mon! Let's catch up with the kids before they kidnap him altogether!"
The rest of the afternoon went by better than anyone could've expected. Dick's spirits were lifted considerably, and through the course of learning more about the island and about the new world he was in, a spark of curiosity had been lit up, which in turn created a spark of hope.
Dick heard a knocking at the door to his room. "Come in," he said, not lifting his eyes from the book he was reading.
"Hello Richard," Tenzin said as he walked in and closed the door behind him. "I came to see how you were doing."
The young man pulled himself out of the book. "I'm doing… better now," he said thoughtfully. "I learned a lot from your kids today, and from Asami and Bolin."
"I heard you all had a busy afternoon," the old airbender remarked with a smile. He noticed that Dick had a stack of Jinora's history, geography, and nature books sitting on his nightstand. "So what did you learn today?"
Dick closed the the book and tapped the cover idly. "This world and my world may have a lot of differences, but there's a lot of similarity too. People here look physically the same as people from my world. I can't believe it took me all afternoon to realize that we both speak and write the same language. The animal life here seems strange to me, but that's mostly because everything looks like a combination of two or more animals from my world. Oh, and don't even get me started on the technology and culture."
Tenzin stroked his beard thoughtfully. "Why is that?"
"Well…" Dick tried to find a good, simple way to explain it. "My world is definitely more advanced in technology and stuff than yours here. However! All the stuff you have going for you all right now, is where my world was about a hundred years ago! Automobiles… Radio… Those airships I see out the window sometimes over the city!" Clearly the young man was excited by the discoveries he'd made, and it was an infection sentiment.
"It sounds like a fascinating discovery," Tenzin remarked.
Dick got up and moved to the window, where he sat on the ledge and looked out towards Republic City. "This world is fascinating," he said. "And I decided that I was stupid to let myself get all depressed earlier when I thought I couldn't go home. It's way too early for me to give up! There's a whole big world out here that needs to be explored and investigated. My way home might be waiting for me out there somewhere, and no one knows it yet, cause they don't know what to look for. I don't even know what I'm looking for." Then he smiled. "But I'll know it when I find it."
"You are a refreshingly optimistic young man, Richard."
Dick chuckled. "I've always prided myself on being a glass half full kinda guy."
Tenzin moved to open the door. "Oh, I almost forgot. It's dinnertime. Would you like to join us? Mako has returned from work, and he has been wanting to meet you."
"Sure! Sounds great!" Dick set his book down and stood up to follow Tenzin back to the dining hall.
Location Unknown
April 4, 22:37 RCT (Republic City Time)
In another part of the world, far from the hustle and bustle of Republic City, a slender man with a long thin mustache walked down a dark narrow hallway. He knocked on the door at the end of the hall.
"Enter."
The man walked in and closed the door behind him. He knelt respectfully before the large desk where a shadowy figure sat waiting.
"Report, Lieutenant," a hollow female voice ordered firmly.
"It is finally confirmed," Lieutenant said grimly as he reached inside his jacket and pulled out a familiar white mask. "Amon… That treacherous bloodbender… is dead." He set the mask face up on the floor in front of him. "All the work we put into the Equalist movement in Republic City has been undone." Lieutenant bent himself further forward, so that his forehead was practically touching the ground. "The mission has failed."
"Nonsense."
Though the Lieutenant's eyes snapped open in surprise, he knew better than to lift his head. He stayed perfectly still as he listened to the chair behind the desk push back, and the sound of footsteps and cane taps came closer and closer to him. They stopped right beside his head.
"Did you think I did not know about Amon being bloodbender?"
"Sir?"
"Did he, for even one moment, ever give any indication that he was faithless to our cause?"
"No, but—"
"Before he was revealed, did Amon ever use his waterbending for his own personal gain? Did he ever show sympathies or weakness of resolve towards waterbenders of any kind?"
"Never."
"THEN DO NOT INSULT HIS MEMORY IN MY PRESENCE!" The metal tipped black cane came down hard on Amon's mask, shattering it completely. Lieutenant flinched reflexively as shards of the ceramic mask struck his head. He relaxed marginally as he heard the footsteps and cane move back toward the desk.
"When I met Amon, he had sworn to forsake his bending heritage. He hated being waterbender. Hated all benders for how they used and abused their powers against those weaker than them. I was the one who persuaded him to use his bloodbending abilities to help cleanse the world of that which we both hated. He was an incredible weapon… A good solider."
Finally, at the calmer tone of the woman's voice, Lieutenant felt safe to cautiously lift his head. From his kneeling position, he respectfully gazed upon the hooded feminine figure sitting on the desk, watching him from behind her own white mask, the coloring on it resembling the facepaint once worn by Avatar Kyoshi in ancient times. Her ornate black and metal cane rested on her lap, atop her crossed legs.
"The battle for control over Republic City might have been lost, but the war against benders is far from over."
Author's Notes: After the heaviness of the last few chapters, the story felt due for a lift of spirits. Besides, it's never good to let Dick Grayson be depressed for too long. That's just cruel and unusual. I also wanted to add in a little plot twist at the end for future storylines… I hope my readers like it.
