The first town Mako came to, after Chung's farm, was filled with people who said they had seen the girl he described to them - polar bear dog and all. He had reached the main street of the rural, shantytown late in the after noon, as the sun had started to drift toward the horizon, and the people said they had seen her that morning. Mako was half a day behind her.

The second town, he reached two days later, this time at high noon. On the aged, wooden signs at either end of the main street, the town had been named as Shi-something. The people of Shi-something said they had seen her two evenings ago, and that she had stopped for supplies. Mako was a day and a half behind her.

By the time he reached the fifth town, past sundown, having walked three weeks west from old Chung's, he was a week and a half behind Korra, and falling further and further back.

In this fifth town, Mako ambled into a bar and sat himself down at the counter. He ordered a bottle of the strongest stuff the bartender had in stock, and put down a ten-Yuan note. The bartender took the ten and handed the firebender two Yuans' change, a large bottle of a dark amber liquor, and a shot glass with ice in it. Mako found himself staring at the ice in the glass for a moment, thinking about it, before he finally poured in the whiskey and knocked back his first shot of the night. He had been searching for nearly five months now, and had almost found her. Rain had come, a week ago, and washed away all the tracks left in the dirt, but Mako knew Korra was heading west, and sticking to that usually kept him on her tail. If it didn't rain again, he supposed he might start seeing the tracks again.

Mako knocked back another shot and looked up to the bartender, who was leaning against the counter, a little further up the bar, polishing a glass and talking to an older gentleman, also sat at the bar. He sharply rapped a knuckle on the countertop to catch the man's attention. The bartender turned around and arched a brow at him.

"Something else, son?" he asked dryly, narrowing his eyes and putting the polished glass down on another counter behind him.

Mako nodded tiredly. "Do you have a telephone I can use?" he asked slowly, the day's walking having taken a lot out of him.

The barkeep exhaled as if irritated and turned to take a rotary phone from the counter behind him. He set the phone down on the bar, before the firebender. "Ain't free, you know," he snapped sharply, pushing his lips together beneath a bushy moustache.

Mako pushed his two Yuans' change at the bartender, and muttered out an equally put-upon "There," before he slid the phone closer to himself and punched in a number, lifting the receiver from its cradle. He heard nothing for a while, holding it to his ear, and took a few more swigs of his drink.

When a voice finally came on, it sounded like someone was gargling marbles. Mako actually recognized the voice as one of the White Lotus sentries. "Pass phrase?" the sentry asked briskly, the paranoia of responsibility thick in his tone.

Mako drew a breath and pushed his brows up tiredly. "Is Aunt Kann there?" he grit out the rehearsed reply, equally curt, "It's Bolin," he added breathily, the hint of an irritated grunt in his own tone. He lifted the shot glass, once again filled, to his lips. To anyone around, he sounded like a perfectly normal an unsuspicious person. After all, he looked like a traveler, and travelers called home to talk to relatives. In reality, it was a clever way of casually stating whom you needed to talk to, remaining anonymous to those around you, and assuring the sentries on the other end that you were cleared to speak to that person.

There was a slight pause. "Mako?" the voice assumed, the original paranoia fading away.

"Yeah," Mako responded quickly.

A longer silence ensued, and Mako waited while the sentries went to fetch Bolin to the phone. This took about four minutes (the bunker was quite large, Mako remembered) and several shots of his drink. When his brother finally came to the phone, Mako was in a slightly altered mood, better or worse, he wasn't yet sure of. The wonderful thing about a drink every now and then was that it took the edge off whatever it was you were feeling. The crappy thing about that was that Mako rarely knew exactly how he was feeling these days.

Mako first heard some quiet talking, before his brother actually spoke to him. "Mako? You there?" Bolin asked, his voice sounding hopeful.

The firebender had called his brother twice since leaving the bunker, along his travels, this being the third time. Mako left long spells between calls because he hated calling to say he hadn't yet found Korra, but this time was different. Slightly. "I'm here," Mako began with a breath, and swirled his drink in the glass, "How are things?" he began slowly.

"Things are … good," Bolin started awkwardly, and Mako immediately got the feeling that something wasn't right. "Any leads on finding her?" Bolin suddenly blurted, and Mako's worry was instantly overtaken by the question. Yes, there was a lead, but it didn't look like he would find her anytime soon. In fact, things were going to be a lot harder, now that Korra was actively running away from him. Mako didn't miss the way Bolin refrained from saying her name.

The older brother sighed heavily, eyes falling on the swirling drink in his hand. "Not really," Mako answered glumly, before tilting his head back and swallowing the contents of his glass in one big gulp.

He heard his brother's innocent gasp at the realization that Mako was at a bar. "Are you drinking?" the earthbender hissed, and Mako was sure Bolin's eyes were wide and shocked, wherever the phone in the bunker was.

Mako uttered out a tight-lipped, post-gulp, "Yep," with minimal contrition in his voice.

Bolin seemed to give a resigned breath, as if realizing just how badly the search for Korra was going. "You alright?" Bolin asked, sounding worried.

"Not really," Mako admitted, with a sad smile growing on his face. He didn't know when the thought had entered his mind, but it spilled from his mouth all of a sudden, in a quick block of words that caught him off-guard, "I miss her."

Bolin was silent for a short spell, and Mako was grateful for this; it gave him a moment to come to terms with what he'd just said. Those three words didn't even come close to conveying just how he felt about this whole thing, but it was a start. He missed her, and he blamed himself for her being gone, and at the same time, he was angry that she had left, and disappointed that she had failed, and on top of that, he was painfully in love with her - which really didn't help matters.

He was drunk, he concluded, and all these feelings would go away if he sobered up.

Still, he poured another glass, and another.

"Don't do anything stupid, okay, bro?" Bolin tried tentatively, unused to telling Mako what to do, "And don't drink too much, or you'll never get up early enough to make good time tomorrow," he held a concern in his voice that made Mako feel guilty for even getting the bottle in the first place.

Mako breathed out through his nose. "I won't. And don't you do anything stupid either, alright?" he couldn't help but add, his brows coming together.

Bolin laughed nervously. Mako worried a little more. "Right. Got it. 'Kay, night, Mako!" Bolin chirped out, and then Mako heard a click.

"Hey, don't-," Mako tried to stop his brother from hanging up, but now all he heard was a repeating beep. He gave a long blink, pulled the receiver from his ear and set it in its cradle. The bartender snatched the phone away and put it up on the shelf behind him. If he'd been looking, he might have caught the glare the barman gave him. He shook his head and drained the bottle in his hand, before moving to get up from the bar.

Mako's legs were weak on the floor, and he wondered how long he had sat there for. He walked - or at least, assumed he had walked, and not stumbled drunkenly - out of the bar and across the street, to the hotel that sat there, warm light spilling from its windows and laughter carrying from its walls. He paid for a room, climbed the stairs to it, and collapsed on the amazing softness of the bed inside, before falling into blissful darkness, and dreamless abandon.

The sky was a creamy kind of morning color when Mako realized he was both awake and hung-over. Once he noted the color of the sky through the window, he was suddenly aware of just how bright it was, and quickly shut his eyes again. He cursed himself, forcing himself up into a sitting position from the face-in-the-pillow position he had originally been sprawled in. With the difference in altitude, he felt his skull trying to compact inside his head, and suddenly wanted to throw up. Not physically, but figuratively. He never drank enough to empty the contents of his stomach, but he had come pretty close to that line last night.

He sat for a moment regaining his wits, before he felt around and found his pack on the floor at his feet with his eyes squeezed shut. He finally forced open the pale gold orbs in his head, toughed out the blaring brightness and resisted the urge to fall back to the bed, until he finally felt able to attempt a more vertical position. One arm slung his pack over his shoulder, while the other found something to hold onto while getting up. He found a bedside table nearby and pulled himself to his feet.

Now on his feet, the sun was no longer staring him in the face, and he could take a quick look around without wanting to die. The room looked cheap - understandably, as he never spent too much money on room and board - but not intentionally so. Whoever had set the room up had at least tried to make it nice.

Mako took the first step away from the bedside table, now weighed down by his pack, and was pleasantly surprised by how functional his legs were. He carefully made his way into the bathroom adjoining the hotel room, drew out some items from his pack and had a brief bird-bath, brushed his teeth, etcetera. After a few large gulps of water, his hangover began to reluctantly fade away. He left the room, and left the key in the door, before leaving the hotel and taking to the road again.

It took a few hours for his brain to wake up, but that was to be expected.

The slow return of normal mind function was significantly increased when Mako found more polar-bear-dog prints at his feet. At least he knew he hadn't lost the trail. He was falling further and further back, yes, but if Korra ever came to a lasting stop, he would be on her like buzzard-flies on a dumpling. That's all there was to it. He'd find her, or die searching.

See? He had told himself things would be better if he sobered up.

Mako was now one week and five days behind Korra, and that was okay. Eventually, she'd slow up, and he'd catch her.

Luck seemed to be on his side today, too, because after only four hours of walking, a cart pulled by elephant-horses came by, pulling what the driver was calling 'railway bits', whatever those were. The driver, a half-northern-water-tribesman who didn't quite know what percentage of what he was on the other side, going by the name of Tooki (Mako wondered what kind of parent(s) would name their child such a thing) was quite interested in telling Mako all about this 'railway' thing that was the big craze in the Fire Nation now, and so he invited the firebender to join him on the cart.

Apparently, these 'parts' were made in a metalbender factory in the southeast United Republic, carted across the republic to the northwest coast, and then shipped to the Fire Nation to help complete the railway system they had there. Mako knew very little about technology in the Fire Nation - despite being a firebender - and listened intently. According to Tooki, it was cheaper to have metalbenders make the parts for the railway than it was to use Fire Nation factories, and this was causing a huge decline in the job market for factory workers over there. Protests and the like.

"Why not buy parts from the Earth Kingdom directly?" Mako asked after a while, "There have to be more metalbender factories there, right?"

Tooki considered himself an amateur political commentator, and answered, "Well, United Republic's closer to the Caldera, for one thing - less time to ship the finished product if they order it from here," he thought aloud. "And them in the Fire Nation ain't exactly known for patience."

Mako gave a half-hearted, semi-interested reply that he forgot about within moments of saying.

"So, where you headed?" Tooki suddenly chirped, turning a curious smile at Mako.

"Everywhere - Nowhere," Mako responded dully.

Tooki gave a snorting kind of laugh and proceeded to allow the young man some silence. Mako didn't see fit to ask this man if he'd seen Korra; he was just another traveler, like himself. There was a camping pack and several sacks of ostrich-horse feed in the cart, along with the railway parts. The elephant-horses didn't move that much faster than he had on foot, but they were faster; that was undeniable. He was making good time.

Korra slid the tip of her index finger between her wrist and the red thread tied around it. In the back of her mind, she marveled at how long the threat had lasted; it had been around her wrist for two years, and was in the same condition as it had been on the day Mako had first tied it there. Korra looked at the knot itself, still the very same knot he had tied. She grunted in her throat, let go of the thread and focused on the reins in her hands.

She had passed through another town about four hours ago - the seventh since Chung's farm. Mako had to be at least three days behind her by now.

Regrettably, her backside was sore from hard riding all day, and she never stopped long enough for the soreness to go away, but the scenery kind of made up for it, at the least. Naga didn't seem to even break a sweat cantering all day, every day, with only five-minute stops every three hours, but Korra was under the impression that the polar-bear-dog didn't want to stop for too long for fear that she'd have to sit around with nothing to do like she had at Chung's.

Korra's favorite part of the whole being-back-on-the-road thing was the brief two days where the sky had opened up and poured rain down on them. It had reassured her that Mako would have trouble following her tracks in the dirt, and also been a nice change from the usual hot sun out here. She'd found the rain comforting; not enough to wonder if her Waterbending senses were coming back, but enough to remind her that she was from the Water Tribe, and that a certain affinity for the water would always be with her. And that had made her feel pretty good.

It was dark now. Korra didn't even know how the day had gone so quickly, having been lost inside her own mind. The trees she could see on the high mountain-esque hills up ahead were only black silhouettes against a deep, dark, blue-purple sky, littered with stars and small, lavender-colored clouds. The moon existed only as a sliver of white, crisp and clean, its light bouncing off the highest edges of the few clouds in the air.

Briefly, Korra wondered what it would be like to soar like a cloud. She remembered Tenzin, and the airbender kids, and trying with all her might to airbend. Korra had never airbent in her life, and never would. For a long time, she had wanted nothing more than to be able to airbend - after all, since age six, it had been the only thing she was unable to do. Korra tried her best to push this thought away, but it still niggled at her consciousness. It was late, and she was tired. Things would be better in the morning.

Korra slowly pulled back on the reins. "Whoa-up, Naga," she patted Naga's shoulder, as the polar-bear-dog came to a steady walk beneath her. When Naga finally came to a full stop, the ex-Avatar freed her feet from the stirrups and kicked her left leg over the saddle behind her, dismounting with expert ease. Upon feeling her feet hit the ground, Korra began to pat her backside, hoping to return some feeling to it.

They didn't have any camping supplies, and without firebending or spark-rocks, she couldn't build a fire, either, but she knew how to find a soft spot in the grass to sleep. She could see an old, thick oak tree just a ways off the road, and it looked like the perfect spot to sleep; secluded and private, and only in peripheral view from the road. Anyone riding by would have a hard time seeing them. Naga seemed to catch on to Korra's train of thought and started toward the tree.

It wasn't the first night she'd spent out under the stars - not even the first since Chung's. But it still took her a while to get comfortable, lying back against her animal companion. Naga was out like a light the moment she curled up on the ground, but it took a while for Korra's mind to shut down.

A small part of Korra wanted to stay put and wait for Mako to find her; partly to confront her problems head on, and partly just to see him again. The rest of her wanted to run until she couldn't run anymore. She couldn't go back to Republic City. She couldn't. What could the remaining benders there possibly want with a non-bending, useless, failure of an Avatar? And didn't she deserve to spend the rest of her days running? Countless people had lost their bending to Amon. Korra knew exactly how large a part of her bending had been, and because of her, thousands of people had been subjected to losing theirs.

"Dammit," Korra muttered into the cool air, screwing up her face and lifting a hand to rub at her tired eyes. Things had been so much simpler at Chung's.

Hopefully things would be better in the morning - and if they weren't, then that was just her penance to deal with.

Korra waited for sleep to come. It didn't. She flopped down to a more horizontal position beside Naga, hoping that would help, and then turned on her left side, then rolled onto her stomach, and then back onto her back, staring up into the tree over her. A pout formed on her face. She needed to sleep; didn't her body get that? Insomnia wasn't a luxury she could afford right now.

It wasn't as if she wasn't tired; she was exhausted, physically, mentally and emotionally. She'd have liked to count the minutes that passed as she waited for sleep, but she didn't have any kind of time-telling device - probably couldn't read one if she did, knowing her uselessness. Korra tossed around a few more times before hitting the ground in annoyance. She couldn't help but be surprised when there was no dent in the earth after it. Two years of non-bending hadn't undone seventeen years of the opposite.

Ultimately, she gave up on sleep and decided to wait until Naga woke up to move on. She'd get a nice, large cup of bracing tea in the next town they stopped in, or something. Patience wasn't exactly Korra's strong suit. She could sit tight for maybe five minutes without fidgeting, but this time she waited for a good half-hour before she was frustrated with it, and then she had to get up and stretch.

Once she decided she wasn't sleeping, the fatigue faded away and her body became restless.

Mako grumbled under his breath. "Stay still," he furrowed his brow, eyes closed, where he lay with his back to the tossing Avatar.

Korra turned onto her back again. "Sorry," she apologized, clenching her jaw and squashing her eyes shut. Korra even tried counting koala-sheep, but it felt weird to keep her eyes shut; her body didn't want to go to sleep. Forgetting about Mako, she threw herself back onto her side, her back to him, huffing in annoyance. Her brows came down and together, her mouth slipping into a pout.

Korra heard Mako growling under his breath, and she wanted to be still, if for no other reason than to let him sleep, but she couldn't hold still for any length of time. She couldn't find a comfortable position to sleep in, and probably wouldn't be able to sleep even if she did. She wasn't troubled or anything; she just couldn't sleep. She frowned harder and rolled from one side to the other, until she was facing Mako's back. She moved to roll onto her stomach, but stopped when Mako suddenly jerked himself into a sitting position.

When her eyes focused in the dark on him, she saw him staring at her, irritated. "What's wrong?" he asked sharply. Honestly, it was bad enough that she shot the temperature under the sheets up into the hundreds, but she was keeping him awake. He loved her, but she was really, really bothering him right now.

Korra groaned and rolled onto her back. "I don't know," she grumbled. "I can't get comfy."

Mako turned himself toward her and reached out for her pillow, pressing on it. "Is your pillow too lumpy?"

"Nope."

"Too hot?"

"Nuh-uh."

"Too cold?"

"Temperature's fine, Mako," Korra exhaled, sitting up. "Maybe I'm hungry," she thought aloud, a hand coming up to push her messy hair off her shoulders.

Mako arched a brow. "We just ate. A huge meal," he pointed out, and then sighed heavily, brows pushing up toward his hairline. She was usually asleep before he even had a chance to say 'good night' - and a heavy sleeper too. Most of the time, he had to physically peel her out of bed in the morning. "Have you tried counting-,"

"Four hundred and thirty-two," Korra cut him off, a weak smile playing on her face.

Mako exhaled, as if annoyed, and then allowed the corners of his mouth to tilt upward. He moved his hand from her pillow to her shoulder, and guided her back down to the bed, closer to him. He pulled her into his arms, so her back was pressed to his chest, and kept his hands loose around her forearms. She slowly settled into his embrace, a sleepy look taking over her face. She fidgeted, but only once; when she did, Mako tightened his hold on her arms. "Stay still," he repeated, but only as a reminder. "Relax, meditate, whatever …" he trailed off tiredly, and dropped his jaw to allow a yawn to escape.

Korra was surprised to find that he was able to hold her still even when asleep. Ultimately, she had no choice but to go to sleep as well, and remarkably, it came a lot easier when his arms were wrapped around her, and his mouth was snuggled into the nape of her neck. Korra didn't know what it was that had kept her from sleeping, but she knew that Mako was the cure for it.

The initial ghost of a smile that came to Korra's face at the thought of Mako's touch faded before it had fully formed. She suddenly felt cold. It was unexplainable; a foreign kind of feeling that she hadn't truly experienced before. Thoughts and feelings were flooding her mind, and tight, choking sensations were taking over her body. She wondered if she was having some kind of fit or seizure, but then a horrid sound ripped itself from her lungs.

And she realized she was crying.

Korra didn't remember this - hadn't done it in so long. Hot, wet, stinging tears were leaking from her eyes, down her cheeks, and it felt wrong. It was like her very soul was spilling out and she could do nothing to reel it back in. She sobbed out a ragged, wretched choke, and inhaled a disgustingly desperate breath, only to sob it back out as well. She found herself pushing away from Naga, onto her hands and knees, trying to stop it.

It felt bad - it hurt. Everything hurt. Her chest, her lungs, her stomach, her throat, her eyes, her head; they all simultaneously burned and stung and clenched inside her. She wanted to throw up, to die. Why? Why was this happening now? She had held herself for two years, strong and resigned and at peace with her failure as the Avatar. Why, after two years, was it all tearing its way out of her now?

Korra screamed between sobs. She was in agony, and she was helpless to save herself from it. Her head hung from her neck so that the tears rolled toward her hairline instead of her chin, and her fingers dug into the dirt. She was alone, and there was nobody around for miles. Maybe it was best that this had happened out here, where she was alone. Oh, but she was so alone. She deserved to be alone, but it hurt right now. Everything hurt, and she wanted desperately to cling to someone who was telling her that she would be okay.

Korra found herself staring at the mud between her hands, tears pouring from her eyes and misting her vision, as she caught the flash of blurry red around her wrist. She missed him. She missed him so badly. Korra hated it with every fiber of her being, but right now she wanted nothing more in the world than for Mako to be here, sucking her into his grip and holding her until the pain went away. But Mako hated her, and that hurt too.

And Bolin … she felt her stomach twisting, and she was sure she really was going to be sick. She opened her mouth and sobbed again, hands pushing her back to sit on her own calves. Naga was awake now, and Korra could feel the animal's comforting breath on her back. Korra tilted her head back and wailed at the sky through the leaves above her. It was a horrible, gritty, agonizing shriek of a sob that broke out of her with each breath, and an equally painful inhale that followed, until she was sure she couldn't breathe anymore. She couldn't breathe, couldn't sleep, couldn't make the torture stop.

Bolin. Mako. She missed them so much.

Korra's fingers gripped the grass and her legs suddenly threw her upward, away from Naga. She felt her stomach stirring again, and a hand went up to her head, to push her already wet hair back from her face. She deserved this, she told herself. She deserved every agony that the world could throw her way. Korra stopped when she could no longer walk, and held her hair back with one hand, breathing hard. She was going to throw up; she knew it. She was sick. She was dying. And she deserved it.

Korra gripped her head with both hands. She wanted it to stop; she wanted the pain to stop. Korra's throat was hoarse, and she was babbling unintelligible nonsense, but she couldn't stop it. It was her own fault, she told herself; she had killed Bolin, and she had made Mako hate her, and she had burnt down Republic City. Naga approached Korra from behind, and the ex-Avatar couldn't stop herself from turning, grabbing onto soft white fur, and burying her face in it, still spouting tears and sobs and nonsensical words between the names of people she had failed.

Her legs failed her and she fell down again, ignoring the inconsequential thump of the ground against her knees.

She didn't know when the agony of tears stopped and the torment of the nightmares began.