A/N: this chapter and the chapter before it went up at the same time. Thanks for reading! :)


VI

Unravelling

For the past fifteen minutes, Korra has been huddled in a ball by the doorway, trying desperately to distract herself from the obvious sounds of pleasure next door. The moans and grunts and cries and the soft slap of damp skin is horrifying her on an intellectual level, but awakening some deep, primal arousal on a physical level, and that makes her feel even more horrified.

The only thing worse than getting guiltily turned on by it is the knowledge that these are two men she has always hated. They were easy to hate, before, because she saw them as monsters, not as people. To hear them so obviously enjoying each other's company adds a human dynamic to them that she would rather not consider; the second she starts seeing them as people, she's going to start connecting with them, and that's only going to make her job harder.

They're quiet now, at least, and she hopes that means they'll be discussing strategy and tactics soon. Her ear presses against the door.

.*.*.*.

Noatak had been willing to accept death, but now that he's looking it in the face, he realizes he isn't ready.

Adrenaline engulfs his mind as blinding white pain shoves through his body. Kwan leaps away from him, and Noatak tries to sit up, but he is pinned by the knife, and bleeding, and he's going to die, he's going to die.

His arms and legs flail, and his foot hits the wine glass on the bedside table. It topples to the ground and smashes.

.*.*.*.

The sound of a yell and shattering glass startles Korra to her feet.

She throws open the door, and has a split second to register a naked Amon bleeding out on the bed and his ex-lieutenant hunched over a bag on the floor. The moustached man yells and draws glinting metal from the bag, rushing at her with startling speed. She was prepared to see his kali sticks, but instead he's wielding two knives. She dodges just in time to avoid a slice to her throat, blasting flame at him in response, but he lands a clean hit on her thigh. The knife buries into her muscle, and she shrieks and drops.

He turns to run.

Before she can think, her hand claws into the air.

She flicks her wrist. Kwan slams into the wall, then falls to all fours, his body shaking under the strain of her bending.

His eyes lock with hers, wild and panicked, and she's sure hers look the same.

No, not again!

She can feel every vein in his body, can feel his quickened pulse, can tell that a good portion of his blood is still pooling in his groin from his escapade with Amon, leaving his brain sluggish. The world begins to tilt as her nightmares become reality.

This can't happen. I'm not a bloodbender. I'm not a bloodbender!

Flashbacks from Asami's death crowd her mind, disrupting her concentration. Her stance falters, and her bloodbending falls away. The ex-lieutenant gives something close to a shriek and scrambles from the room; the door slams behind him. She almost chases after him, but there is a loud gargle from the bed.

The mattress around Amon is soaked red; he's pale and shaking, and his eyes and cheeks are sunken. The knife is below his collarbone - no vital organs, but the blade went clean through, and he has already lost too much blood. She knows he'll die if she doesn't heal him. The objective was to get the lieutenant, it's true, but as much as she hates this man, she's determined that they're both going to survive this mission.

The knife in her leg is so deep that she can barely move; she can't remove it yet, or she might bleed out, too. She screams as she staggers to the sink, blinking back a veil of darkness that threatens to envelope her. She jerks at the water tap and streams the water into the room, gathering it in a blue glow at Amon's throat. It's a delicate balancing act, staying conscious and healing him at the same time, and she's afraid one or the other is going to give way.

The knife needs to come out of him. Removing it will probably kill him, but what choice does she have?

With sobbing breaths, she hobbles toward him, maintaining the blue glow on his wound. He's unconscious now, his breaths too quick. Her fingers wrap around the hilt, and she yanks.

A fountain of blood begins to squirt from the wound, and again, instinct kicks in: she claws her hand in the air and redirects the blood back into the artery, holding it in place while she mends the wound with her healing. His body thrashes, but the wound closes. It isn't pretty, and it's going to need a few more rounds of healing before he is mended, but at least he won't bleed out.

Stop bloodbending, her mind screams, but she won't let herself consider what's happened until they're both safe.

She jerks the knife out of her own leg with a howl, and then tries to heal her own wound, but there's so little energy left in her reserves that she can barely close it. The ground is pitching beneath her, and everything is dark and very far away. She feels herself begin to fall, and then she feels nothing.

.*.*.*.

At first, Noatak thinks he's dead.

His eyelids open, and his memories crash down on him. For a moment, he lays still, paralyzed. There is agonizing pain, just a few inches left of the hollow of this throat, but when he touches his fingertips to the wound, they come back dry. He vaguely remembers a blue glow. His body is cold and shaking, and realizes he must be in shock. Confusion is fogging his mind, and he fights it, trying to maintain focus for as long as he can.

His head tilts to the side, with great effort, and he sees the Avatar lying in a heap on the floor. Gingerly, he sits up. The mattress is soaked with blood - is that all his? He's dizzy and nauseated, and black spots are swimming in his vision, but adrenaline gives him the strength to move to the Avatar and roll her onto her back.

Her skin is sallow, but her breaths are even. Blood has soaked through one thigh of her pants. His fingers crawl through the fabric until he finds a small cut. Knife wound. The blood here is still wet.

She's an invaluable tool to the mission - already, by healing him, she has proven how useful she is - so he can't let her die. He grits his teeth and gingerly pulls her pants off her hips, praying to the spirits that she doesn't wake up while he's doing so. The wound is small, but deep, and it isn't quite closed; it looks as if she passed out before she was able to finish healing it.

He hauls himself over to Kwan's satchel, and tries not to notice the condoms scattered on the floor. At last, he finds what he's looking for: a small pouch that contains a needle and thread. His trembling fingers trace the gold writing on it: "To K, This should be of use until you finally learn to dodge. -A." His chest aches as he remembers the good-natured punch on the shoulder he received upon presenting the gift.

The Avatar gives a small groan behind him, and he realizes he has to hurry: an unconscious patient is far easier to stitch than a conscious one. His hands are shaking so badly that he can barely thread the needle, and he curses. He needs to get all this done before the adrenaline wears off and he suffers the full brunt of his injuries.

It's a clumsy stitch job, but it will hold until she can heal herself properly. He quickly uses his discarded shirt to wipe the blood off her thigh - though it smudges it more than cleans it - then bandages the wound with more supplies from Kwan's satchel.

Once it's done, he scoops his arms beneath her knees and upper back, using all his strength to lift her. He drops her unceremoniously on her bed; she doesn't move.

He's shivering now from the cold, and he recognizes that his body needs some time to shut down and rest. No way he'll make it back to his own room. He falls to the bed beside her, pulls the corner of the blanket over his body and closes his eyes, finally giving in to unconsciousness.

.*.*.*.

Kwan flees the hotel, banks into an alley, and keeps running. He knocks over garbage cans in his haste, and puddles of mud spray up his body, mingling with bloodstains. Sobs choke him, so painful that he gasps for breath, but he still keeps running.

But no matter how far he flees, he can't outrun what he has done.

Exhaustion finally overtakes him in a dark alley a few miles from the hotel, and he collapses against the wall, sliding to a seat in the mud. He screws his eyes shut, but he can't erase the sight of the knife going into Amon's flesh. Words taunt him, sing-song:

He let his guard down, and you betrayed him, right when he was at his most vulnerable. All to try to retain your power. You're just as bad as he was.

The heels of his hands drive into his eyes, trying to block out the imagery and the taunting, and he realizes he is yelling. Across from him, a man in a chef's uniform stands in the doorway, petrified, a bag of garbage forgotten in his hand.

Kwan tries to apologize, but he can't control his sobs.

"You okay, pal?" asks the chef hesitantly.

Taking deep breaths, Kwan manages to regain control over himself enough to say, "I need to get to the roof." There's only one way to end this; he can't go back to the Equalists as a failure, he can't go back to Amon now that he's committed this atrocity, and there's nowhere else to go.

The chef is still hesitating. "Why do you need to get to the roof?"

But as he's speaking, Kwan's eyes lock onto a fire escape beside the man. It starts at about a foot above his head; he can easily pull himself up that distance. Shakily, he stands and approaches it.

"Hey," says the chef. "Whatever you're thinking-"

"Go away." Kwan's hands tighten onto the rail at the bottom of the fire escape, and he effortlessly pulls himself up to the platform, then begins to climb the stairs. Calmness floods him. No matter how much his mind is racing, soon it will all be quiet.

"I'll call the cops," yells the chef.

Kwan looks down at him. "I just need a vantage point," he lies.

The man doesn't look convinced, but clearly wants to believe him.

Mustering all his calmness, Kwan smiles. "It's okay. I just had a little breakdown, but I'm fine now. Sorry to have frightened you." Then he turns back to the ladder.

The escape route goes up seven stories. Each rung is more and more soothing, and by the time he reaches the roof, he feels high, as if he has reached a state of zen that he never once managed to attain in all his years of meditation. It's a clear night, the moon nearly full, and stars are so thick and bright in the sky that when a tear blurs his vision, it looks more like a flowing field of clouds. He blinks away the tear and smiles, stepping onto the rooftop.

Wind caresses him, tousling his hair and fluttering his clothes, and he spreads his arms wide, trying to catch the wind and sail on it. Slowly and with determination, his feet pad toward the far edge of the rooftop. He can see the entire city from his vantage point.

I won't trouble you any longer, he apologizes to the city. His feet settle on the ledge, toes curling over it. I'm sorry. I failed you.

His eyes close as he prepares to fall.

"Hey!" calls a woman's voice from below, so commanding and rough that he is immediately reminded of Qing.

His eyes open again.

A woman stands at street level. She looks about forty, with a portly figure, dark hair in a bun and an apron.

"Hey!" she calls again. "You get off my damned roof."

A sign. His arms spread further as he prepares to jump.

"Not like that!" she yells. "Climb back down the blasted ladder."

"It's too late for me." His voice sounds feverishly high, even to his own ears. "I'm beyond saving." His limbs are shaking, and her distraction is making him question himself. The wind suddenly seems threatening, trying to force him off the ledge, and the moon is cold and hard, as if Yue herself is judging him.

"Look," yells the woman. "If you want to kill yourself, that's fine, but at least come in for a drink first. On the house."

He hesitates.

"Afraid I'll talk you out of it?" she adds. "I don't think you really want to do this."

She's right. He looks down, realizing the enormity of what he's about to do. The ground suddenly dips away from him, and he leaps back from the ledge, terrified. A wave of bile rises in his throat, and he doubles over. "Oh, spirits!"

She's waiting for him at the bottom with a mug of beer. "That's more like it."

"I've done something terrible," he confesses.

"Haven't we all?"

"I can't live with what I've done. I'm not the man I thought I was."

She waves him inside. "Then come drink for awhile, and maybe you'll forget to die."

Kwan recognizes the chef from the alleyway as they pass by the kitchen. The bar is almost empty, and the woman polishes the counter at the end, offering him a stool. He accepts it.

"I don't have any money," he says, unable to meet her gaze. He left the bag with all his possessions when he fled the hotel room - but thinking about the room sends a fresh wave of anguish crashing over him, and he wraps arms around himself.

She shrugs. "Pay me back when you can." She slides him a shot of clear liquor. "Take that, too. It'll help."

"Why are you helping me?"

Another shrug. "Bloodstains are bad for business. You want to talk about it?"

What can he possibly say without horrifying her? Miserably, he shakes his head.

"Then drink and forget. I'll be back in a few minutes." She taps the countertop as if patting his shoulder, then moves to greet another patron.