Chapter 6 is here! Enjoy. I had fun writing this chapter.

Chapter 6 : My Darling Sister.

Life was peaceful, and good. Amon had disappeared for a few weeks, probably plotting something nasty in a cave somewhere. Korra and her team were storming through preliminary match after preliminary match. And Tenzin liked to watch! So everyone was pretty happy, and this is what lulled me into a false sense of security.

As the baby of the family, I am treated differently from my siblings. When I was young, my parents seemed to think I was fragile and used to give me only praise, and no criticism. Of course, this only helped to inflate my ego and make me the idiot I am today. Tenzin saw me, for most of his life, as a bothersome nuisance. Like a gnat. He probably still thinks of me as a gnat.

The only person who sought me out to tease and torment me was my demonic sister, Kya. My childhood was cursed by her presence. Constant water-bending tricks. Get my trousers wet; claim to the class at school that I'd wet myself. Turn my drinks to ice as I was drinking. A lot of it involved being soaked on a daily basis.

So, I had a traumatic childhood. And this all came back to me one dinner-time.

I was sitting down, chomping on a root-vegetable of some kind – probably a carrot – when a figure appeared at the door. Tenzin blinked at her arrival; she wasn't expected, and she hadn't been in touch for years. It was only when she spoke that I jumped to my feet, knocking over the table as I went.

"Hey, baby brothers," she grinned.

And there she was. KYA. Evil, in its purest form. A water-bending demon with a taste for cruelty and corporal punishment. I could feel the colour drain from my face. Of course, Korra and Kya got along splendidly.

"Kya!" she cheered, getting up to greet her.

"Korra," a smiled, an embrace, and my sister seemed perfectly normal. "What's the matter Bumi? Lemur got your tongue?"

I tried to gulp down the sudden influx of saliva into my mouth. Come on! You're in your twenties! She's a grown woman, you're a grown man – you'll be able to get along, now!

Or so I thought. I grimaced a greeting at her, and went to take a drink. Splash. I looked down at my trousers, and almost screamed at her.

"Careful, Bumi," she teased. "I'll be having his room, right?" she asked Tenzin, suddenly ignoring my existence.

"Err, I-," Tenzin blinked stupidly.

"No!" I shouted, racing from the room and up the stairs to safety. And to change my trousers.

I spent the next few days avoiding Kya. Ducking round corners, hiding in cupboards and under tables, climbing around cliffs in order to avoid detection. Hopefully she'd get bored of the constant harassment and leave me alone. Right? WRONG.

I soon realised that the Island was too small for the both of us, and resorted to hanging out with Bolin whilst Mako was working at the power-plant, and Korra was at air-bending training. We had a similar sense of humour, actually, and Pabu was one talented fire-ferret.

I was leaving the arena one day, laughing to myself with the memory of one of Bolin's many mishaps when I bumped into Kya. Actually, I walked straight past her, but she whistled at me, causing me to jump.

"Argh!" I yelled, instinctively tensing into a defensive stance. "Away from me, witch!"

She rolled her eyes. "Relax, idiot. I want a drink, and Tenzin's teetotal. Know any good bars?"

I blushed guiltily. "Err, no…"

She raised an eyebrow, and I shrugged. Linking her arm through mine, she dragged me off into the city.

Looking at my sister, I was surprised to find her smaller than me. Her dark brown hair was tied back in multiple braids, traditional water-tribe style. She had more lines on her face now, as if she'd been through something troubling. It worried me, because now that I was this close to her, I could see she was run down. She probably needed a drink.

We stopped at a Fire-Nation bar, full of fire-benders and a few non-benders. I knew that Kya liked the fiery pepper-shots you could buy here.

"You're paying, right?" she told me, and I rolled my eyes.

"Sure," I agreed, as she called over the barman.

"So," she rolled her shoulders. "I hear you had some trouble with these equalists."

I blushed, and downed my shot. Fire erupted in my throat, and I had to fight down a fit of choking. My eyes watered and I nodded in agreement to her statement.

"Ah," she downed her own drink and called for some more. "Yeh, there's been a bit of trouble on Kyoshi Island."

"Kyoshi?" I raise my eyebrows; surprised. "A place that remote?"

"They're easy to appease," Kya took a bottle from behind the bar and filled her empty glass. "But I'm worried about the City. There's a lot of support for this Amon guy. Too much."

I nodded. She downed her drink again, bending it up into her mouth. To say my sister was a drunkard would be a lie; she drank a lot, but never got drunk. Unlike me. Or Tenzin, that lightweight. Though he'd never admit he'd been in a bar at all.

"Shall we move onto the next one?" she asks me, and I throw some coins onto the bar.

We walk out of the club, and I can feel myself becoming tipsy. We walk in silence through a run-down old square, and Kya frowns at something in the distance. A group of men, huddled together, going in through a door. I notice the sign sewn onto their coat-sleeves.

"Equalists!" I say, a bit too loudly, because of the alcohol.

"Shut up!" Kya hisses, but they've turned to us. "Listen, stay quiet, alright?"

I pull an imaginary zip across my lips and follow her as she approaches the group. I'm grinning like an idiot, but I don't seem to notice.

"Hail, brothers!" she laughs nervously. "Long live Amon! And stuff…"

"What do you want?" one asks harshly, cracking his knuckles.

"Oh, only to bask in the non-bending glory of the Equalist movement," Kya bows her head slightly.

I almost laugh, but my drunken mind remembers the imaginary zip, so I stay quiet.

The men look at each other. Kya begins to sweat; I can see beads of it forming on her upper lip. I push forward, and poke one of the men in the chest.

"Look, brother," I tell him, slurring my words. "If you don't want us to members, then you're brother of mine. And I have a brother! I know!"

Kya looks like she's ready to die, but the men shuffle in their positions, and move aside to let us in the doorway. Kya thanks them and pushes me through, furious.

"Hey, I got us in," I blink a lot, trying to stay focused on something. "How much did I drink?"

"Not much," Kya admits. "But I spiked your drink for a laugh."

"Eh?" my voice cracks. "Why?"

She shrugs. "Not the time right now. Come on, let's go."

We're in a dark corridor, and I almost fall down some stairs. We descend into the lower levels of the city, and soon find ourselves outside a single, locked door. I look at Kya, grinning because by this time I can barely stand up. I raise a fist mockingly, as if to knock.

"Are you nuts?" she hisses. "We've got to get out of here."

"Whoops!" I say, giggling slightly.

My fist taps against the door in three, uneven knocks. A tense moment follows, before the door opens slightly.

"Hail, brothers!" I say to the brown eye peeking around the door. "We're here to join!"

Before I know it, we're dragged inside, and sat in a dark room full of green, glowing eyes. I blink stupidly, and Kya's gripping my arm.

"Ow," I moan at her.

"My children," a familiar, terrifying voice. "Welcome, to the ranks of the Equalists!"

My chest is contracting with fear, my hear is pounding. I can see Amon's masked face, I can see-

"A projector?" whispers Kya.

A projector. Thank heavens, or else he'd have recognised me by now. Fake Amon is reeling off a list of Equalist duties and promises, ending with an oath that Kya and myself repeat, and learn that there are others in this dark room.

The lights are lit, and I can see a ceremonial fire being built. A brand is placed into the fire. I stare at it dimly, as I'm forced to the front of a queue by my sister, and the top of my arm is bared.

"Hang on-!" I object, as the brand is placed on my arm.

I cry escapes me as my skin blisters under the red-hot metal. I try to pull back, but the mass of people there are pressing me forward, into the heat.

"No!" I shout, pulling away.

I grab Kya, and we push through the crowd. Hands are reaching for us, one grips Kya's hair-

"Rargh!" she shouts, a blade of ice slices through her brown locks, and the water whips around up, pushing away our attackers.

"Quickly," I tell her, terror and pain forcing me to come to my senses. "Chi-blockers will be here any minute!"

We run, through the door and up the stairs. A blast of air opens the door at the top, ripping it off of its hinges. We flee, our feet pounding the street, our sweaty hands gripping each other.

Shouts bounce off the walls behind us, and glowing green eyes follow us in the dark. I can see the docks; I left my staff there, hidden between some cargo. I race towards it, and Kya twists her angle. I have to heave her onto my back; her moans of pain seem to hurt me as much as they do herself. I search for it frantically until-

"Found it!" I grin, holding it up triumphantly.

"Bumi!" she yells, her eyes glued to the green orbs getting closer and closer.

I jump from the end of the dock, glider open, and a hand rips my sash as I glide up into the air, just out of their reach. Triumph makes me hoot, and I soar into the dark sky, littered with stars.

Gliding when intoxicated isn't something I'd recommend. We crashed into a tangled heap in front of the house, and Tenzin came out with Pema, both in their night-clothes, looking extremely worried.

"Bumi!" Pema grips my face between her hands, concerned. "Are you alright?"

"He's drunk!" Tenzin sounds so pompous all the time, I just have to tell him so.

Kya waves my brother away. "Leave him be; it's not his fault. Get me some water!"

Her water-skin is empty because she used it on the way out of that den. Tenzin returns with a bowl of water, and Kya moves me into the light. Pema gasps at the blistering on my arm, and even Tenzin seems concerned at its appearance.

"He got a tattoo?" he asked uncertainly, holding his wife's shoulders as she stood in front of him.

"We bumped into some Equalists," Kya told him, levitating the water over my wound.

I hissed as fresh pain blossomed from the numbing ache that the brand had settled into. I looked at it carefully once she'd finished. It was a word:

Harmony.