AN: Here is the next installment. Things should be picking up here soon. It seems that Amon has gone silent in our story. That can't be good...

Mako took one last drag from his cig which he had bummed from a patron standing outside of the bar. He didn't smoke very often and he hated himself each time he did but he was stressed and didn't want Korra to keep pestering him about it. He tossed the butt into a nearby puddle and made his way out of the alley.

"Hey stranger" Korra said with a smile, as she turned to see him walking towards the group of people she had been mingling with for the past few minutes. She hadn't realized that he had left when he had so she immediately came looking for him. Usually when he disappeared something was bothering him. As he came closer she quickly noticed that his face looked a bit paler than normal and she also detected a hint of cigarette smoke which was foreign to his normal warm scent.

"Sorry if I was keeping you" Mako replied.

"You smoke?" she asked cocking an eyebrow and placing a hand on her hip showing her disapproval. This was one secret she had wished Mako had kept to himself.

"It's something I do when I need to clear my head and usually only happens when I drink" Mako said dismissively as they made their way back into the pub.

"Well I don't want to catch you 'lighting up' around me. It's a pretty disgusting habit." she said flatly as she slid into one side of the booth they had previously vacated.

"Yes, your Highness" he said curtly, saluting her with two fingers. Just as they got comfortable Bolin and Opal soon made their way over to them.

"Well if it isn't the two love birds!" Wu said loudly, not caring that he made a fool of himself as he gave Opal and Bolin a hug.

"Easy Wu. Bolin doesn't like his love life to be meddled with" Korra mocked as she shot Bolin a glance.

"You're damn right I don't" Bolin replied matter of factly as he slumped down next to Mako causing him to squeeze in close to Korra. Mako muttered an apology of sort to Korra for bumping her, his eyes finally met hers, something that he avoided doing when she went looking for him outside. The normal spark in his eyes was missing and replaced with something of an uneasiness. She tried to study him a bit longer but he immediately averted his gaze back to the newcomers as they made idle chitchat. After a few minutes of listening she noticed that Mako moved a bit closer to her so she decided to get to the bottom of whatever was causing their 'date' to go sour.

She hesitantly placed her right hand over his causing him to jump a bit.

"I know something is bothering you" she said in a hushed tone into his ear, causing them to prick as the softness of her breath hit them. She gave his hand a gentle squeeze trying to calm him a bit more. Mako tried to make sense of what she was doing but he was coming up empty. Why was she getting so close to him, a bit too close at that?

"It's nothing. School is always on my mind and everything Bo and you...I just needed some air is all. Just trying to enjoy the evening" he replied sharply, quickly drawing his hand out of hers and folded his arms signaling that he was beginning to close himself off to her.

"Mako" Korra pressed, wanting a bit more than that. She knew how he could get but she couldn't stand not being able to help. It was silly that he didn't trust her enough to be able to just open up to her. She had earned that much over the summer from him. Mako started to fell himself getting annoyed with this.

"I already told you...it's nothing. Can we please drop it?" he said through gritted teeth "Can't we just enjoy the evening?"

"I was but now you made it all about you with your one man sulking party" she spat back, fed up with his antics. She got up from her seat, grabbed her things, and stormed off to the exit leaving a few disgruntled patrons in her wake. Mako let her leave without so much as flinching. He knew she needed a minute to cool off before he went after her to try to settle her down.

After a few minutes he felt his knee start to bounce in aggravation as he played the argument over again in his head. Why did she care so much? Mako could handle thing himself, he always had. Just because she had spent time with him over the summer didn't mean he would lump his problems on her. Growing up, Bolin never questioned Mako he just trusted him. Bolin had seen Mako at his wits end but never pressed for information. He continued to sip his drink and allow the slight buzz to take his thoughts.

Soon, Mako gave a nod as if to say a silent 'Thank you' to Wu and weaved through the now crowded bar towards the exit.

/~~~~~~\

Korra walked briskly through the humid evening not quite sure if she was headed toward the orphanage or the edge of town.

"Stubborn boy!" she yelled, startling passersby. All she wanted to do was help him. This whole summer he had taken on the burden of protecting her, the orphanage, all the while meeting with Tenzin and Bei Fong. Maybe he was beyond help at this point but she couldn't stop the small ache in her heart whenever she saw him stressed. It was a new feeling that she played off as guilt but what was she guilty of? It wasn't her fault that he jumped to the task of being her makeshift bodyguard, he loved being the 'go-to' for every project imaginable. As much as she hated when he got like this and how she often times wanted to be done with him she couldn't fight the feeling of breathlessness whenever he smiled at her. How she looked forward to their walks home from the pitch after a long day. She let out a laugh of disbelief and shook her head.

"Maybe I had too much to drink tonight" she muttered to herself, partly blaming the cause of her wondering thoughts on the elixirs. She closed her eyes and took in a deep breath as she tried to calm her slightly spinning head. Once she felt herself calm a bit, she opened her eyes and stared up at the night sky and watched as the moon began to hide behind oncoming clouds. She took in another breath and noticed that there was a hint of rain in the air.

"Perfect ending to a shitty evening" she grumbled with a scowl, pulling her sweater tighter around her body and placed the hood over her head. She walked a few more feet as she stared at the ground more upset then she was prior due to the change in weather. Once she stopped she realized where her feet had carried her. She looked up at the hulking stadium that held the quidditch pitch that they had been playing on a few hours ago.

"I figured you'd come back here" a warm voice behind her said through the patter of the oncoming rain. She balled her fists, angry that he had followed her but relieved at the same time.

"You think you know me?" she scoffed in reply as she turned to face him, making sure to take up as much of the doorway as she could. She glared at him as he tried to come out of the rain and he soon realized that he was safer where he stood at this point.

"I'd like to think I do" he said with a shrug that was meant more coming to grips with his current predicament then it was about her.

"And yet here I am trying to know more about you but instead I'm hitting the impenetrable stone wall that is your emotions" she replied sharply "why can't you just let me in, Mako?"

"It's not that simple, Korra. I've been open with you to a point but this" Mako said trailing off a bit "you just have to trust me"

When he said those last few words he saw Korra's jawline clench and her eyes narrow. He knew this wouldn't end well, at all. If he budged anymore he would say something he'd regret.

"Don't you dare say that to me. This isn't a one way friendship, Mako. You have to be able to confide in me" she said, walking out into the rain. She was going on adrenaline now. He took a step back, recoiling almost, worried about her temper.

"I do confide in yo-"

"Well then obviously it's you who isn't trusting" she said getting closer to him, the anger in her voice becoming fiercer "this is a two way street, I'm not Bolin"

"Clearly" he said with a snort which caused her face to immediately turn into a snarl.

"How can you be such a jerk, Mako?" she asked almost, rhetorically "Your head is so wrapped up in your own ego that you can't be helped. You're still the same person who couldn't let his brother out of his own shadow. When will you learn that you can't control everything and that's why you need your friends to help you?"

She felt her chest rise and fall as she finally unloaded everything she had pent up over the summer.

"Korra" he said calmly, annoyed with the situation and figured this didn't need drive more of a wedge between them "I'm leaving"

"Fine!" she snapped.

He shook his head, if she wasn't upset now she soon would be.

"I'm actually leaving. I won't be going back to school and I won't be following you around anymore" he said, standing his ground, but was a bit hesitant.

"Good" she said flatly. Mako's face stiffened as the words continued to roll off her tongue " I can take care of myself. Good luck with whatever you're doing"

He didn't move an inch as Korra glared back at him. He could see the tears at the corner of her eyes as he heard her breathing quicken. He hastily reached to put a hand on her shoulder in order to help her calm down.

"Don't" she started to say, her voice cracking a bit as she moved out of his reach "touch me"

"Korra" Mako pleaded, relieved that the rain had started to let up a bit

Korra didn't answer and just continued to stare at him. Her one constant over these past months had been Mako, her protector of sorts. Now he was leaving, not just for a few week but, now, what seemed like forever. She cursed herself, realizing that part of the emotion tied to all this happened because she may be falling for him. Neither of them had moved for what felt like ages. Mako wasn't going to leave Korra, not this way at least. Korra didn't move because she was afraid of how her body would react. She had kept it together this far and she'd be damned if she'd break down in front of him.

"How about we head home?" he asked softly, afraid to upset her even more.

"Fine" she muttered and started off to the orphanage. Mako followed a few yards behind her and she already began to feel a change between them

/~~~~~~\

The next few weeks were even worse. Neither Mako nor Korra uttered a word to the other, really only when they were forced into an awkward situation. Korra began to notice Mako was coming back later in the day and gone before she was up for practice. She also noticed a change in him. He snapped a lot at the kids in the orphanage and also at Bolin, which was rare. One day, Korra had decided to put aside whatever was going on between she and Mako but was meet with a door slamming in face.

"Why won't you just talk to me" she whispered at the aged door, placing her forehead on it and running her fingers down the worn wood. She heard him muttering to himself and throwing things around his room. She jumped away from the door when a glass slammed into it, maybe he was going crazy or he had actually snapped.

It wasn't just Korra who had noticed that Mako had become a ghost, everyone did. Wu started to chide Korra about it but after getting one of her icy glares he knew that she was taking it harder than any one. Her play changed too. She stopped showing off and instead worked on cleaning up her game. Coach called it a 'Big Step' but to Korra, she just wasn't into the sport as much anymore. Maybe because the rivalry at school was now over.

"So did he tell you what he's been up to?" Wu asked as he glided next to Korra. She shrugged and continued to scan the sky for the snitch. She didn't want to take the bait.

"Come on, Korra" Wu pressed

"I just know whatever he's been doing has turned him into someone I don't even know anymore. He loses it every time someone crosses him, he even flipped on Bolin. All I know is that I hope that all this is worth it." Korra replied, sick of the fact that every memory of him recently made her so angry. She felt a hand on her shoulder, it's fingers gripping her collarbone.

"I can guarantee you, Korra, that whatever he is doing is more than you and I can try to stomach" Wu said re-reassuringly, his usual joking tone gone from his voice "just think of how much the orphanage and Bolin mean to him. It must be tearing him up inside to see himself doing this and not being able to stop it"

Korra knew Wu was right, as hard as it was not to blame Mako for all of this. She also had done some digging to support Wu's words. It seemed that Mako's changed coupled with the aftereffects of consuming a high dosage of polyjuice potion. She had done some research in a few of her school books about how a person mental state could change so quickly. She stumbled upon a few case studies in which researchers were trying to test the limits of how long a polyjuice potion could last in high doses. It was a good bit of information and pointed her in the right direction especially since a few of the articles noted that immediate change was seen in test subjects. She tried to poke around in his room a bit to try to find the potion he had been consuming but the room was mostly empty and whatever had been left in the room was locked away.

"Hell Korra" Wu continued pulling Korra's sleuthing thoughts back to practice "you mean the world to him"

Korra immediately snapped her neck to look at him, her eyes widening.

"What did you say?" she asked breathing a bit more deeply as her heart quickened.

"You're everything to him, Korra" Wu replied, realizing that he may have said too much but it wasn't that hard to see the signs "Do you honestly think that any one would put their life on the line for someone they barely know? Look at all that he needs to come back to, who he has to come back to. I don't agree with whatever he's doing but now looking back on it, it probably has something to do with you"

Korra tried to find the words to answer Wu but couldn't find them. To be honest she didn't know to say about any of this. Maybe Mako was a fool.

"You two girls done chatting? We still have a match before the season is over. " their coach barked from below them, starling the both of them.

"Sorry, Coach" Korra yelled back and took off away from Wu, cursing herself that she allowed him to distract her from practice. She still was a bit hesitant to believe everything Wu had just told her. She didn't want to believe that Mako was putting himself in some sort of harms way because of her. Still, the side of her that had grown attached to him found solace in the fact that maybe her feeling weren't one sided in all this.

/~~~~~~\

Mako finally began to feel the aftereffects of the potion wear off. He let out a loud grunt as his fingers turned from their current fat, sausage shape into the slender ones that he recognized. He jotted down a few notes into the pages of a worn journal and snapped it shut once he was done. Tenzin wanted to up the dosage so that Mako wouldn't have to worry about it wearing off while he was in the field. The only issues that he had found was that the mental and emotional effects were wearing off slower and slower. When snapped at Jinora, that was the last straw. Every time he returned home he had made sure he was back to his normal self. He took a few more deep breathes and did a once over in the mirror as a double check.

"Looking good ole boy" he said into the mirror mimicking his alter ego's accent. He threw on a new shirt he had brought with him from the wash, tossing the tattered remains from the one he had worn earlier in the trash. During the transformation he tended to outgrow his shirts. As he pulled the shirt over his head his eyes grew wide as the smell that was hidden in the fibers of it filled his senses. It was Korra's. He took a moment to take in the smell as he thought back to the last night he had talked to her. Since then, he only had small glances when the two crossed paths in the house. He pulled his thoughts back as he splashed water on his face. As he dried his face with the towel he looked down at the boot that was his ticket home. He hated this part. He threw everything into his knapsack and held his breathe as he latched on and felt his body get sucked forward.

His body came to a screeching halt as he came out near the edge of town. He immediately dropped his things, ran over to the nearby bushes, and threw up. Oh how he hated that part. Mako wiped his mouth, collected his things and began the journey home.

As he walked home, he welcomed the cool night air as it helped settle his now upset stomach. He had hoped that no one was awake when he got home. Mako could handle the normal tongue lashing from Toph but he didn't need the questions from everyone, especially Korra. Once he rounded the corner and saw that all the lights in the old house were out which was a good sign.

He crept through the back door, closing it quietly. He made his way through the dark and finally up to his room despite stepping on various toys and stifling the pained yells. What he found was a slumped Korra, who had placed herself right in the middle of the door, sound asleep in what appeared to be another one of his stolen t-shirts. She had to stop stealing his clothes or else he'd have nothing left to wear. Mako slumped down across from Korra, resting his back against the banister that lined the opposite side of the landing and watched as she slept. He hadn't been able to really get a good look at her since they both had been avoiding each other. He noticed that hair had grown a bit longer and that her face looked older. He missed her, more than he thought he would. Even though she was down the hall from him they seemed like they were worlds apart at this point. He let out a long sigh, she and Bolin would be heading back to school by week's end but without him. There would be no more classes or long hours pouring over potions books in the library, no more quidditch. He chuckled to himself and shook his head, after all these years of wanting to get out of school here he sat missing it more than ever.

"Didn't think you'd be this sentimental" he muttered to himself. He looked back at Korra as he heard her stir and thought it'd be best if he got her to a more comfortable sleeping arrangement. He stoop up and made sure the letter he needed to leave was in his back pocket. He bent down and scooped up the slumbering girl and slowly took her back to her room.

Mako saw that the door was ajar so he gave it a nudge and was met with a disheveled room which was textbook Korra. Clothes were scattered on the floor and her quidditch broom leaned lazily against the headboard. He laid her down on the least cluttered part of her bed and gently brought a blanket up to her shoulders. He turned to look at the room, fighting every instinct he had to clean up behind her. He saw his old 68' Quidditch National Team sweater hanging on the end bed post and decided he could at least fold it. He took the folded sweater and laid it on the bed side table and took the letter out of his back pocket, fidgeting with the edges a bit as he contemplated if this was the best way to do this. This letter would tell her 'Goodbye'. He couldn't do it face to face and expect himself not to break down. He had written it over and over to make sure he didn't sound too desperate along with making sure he didn't make any promises he couldn't keep. He owed her this much at least, he owed her the truth of how he felt about her. He slowly let the note slip out of his finger and fall softly onto the folded garment. He cut off the small lamp that took up the rest of the table and headed to the door.

"Goodbye, Korra" Mako said softly as he closed the door and rested a hand on the knob for a bit longer. He didn't know when he wou-

"You're up late" a voice barked from behind him, startling the living daylights out of him.

"Christ, Toph" he said trying to catch his breathe

"In there for one last cuddle?" she quipped as she followed behind him.

"You know better than I do that I never get attached to people" he replied as he started unpacking his current bag and started putting clothes in another.

"Well, I thought we had a winner this time" her worn voice said "I at least thought she'd knock some send into you and keep you from going on this trip"

"No one, not eve the silver tongued Toph Beifong could talk me out of this one" Mako said with a laugh as he finished zipping up his last bag and did once last glance around his room to make sure he wasn't forgetting anything. He met Toph in the doorway and flicked off the light as they proceeded into the hallway.

"So you're going to be escorting the Minister of Magic to Parliament, eh?"

"That's the plan. Should be pretty easy but Tenzin wanted extra security due to Amon's recent movements" he said tightening the straps on his knapsack.

"It seems like they're here" Toph said as they walked into the kitchen. Mako looked out the small window above the sink and saw a few wizards congregating in the backyard. He took once last look at his old friend, tempted to give her a hug or a handshake.

"Keep any eye on the kids and go easy on Bolin, OK?" Mako asked as he put a hand on her shoulder, and gave it a squeeze.

"I'm not making any promises with those little rugrats. I'm sure Opal will keep Bolin in line for now" she grumbled as she folded her arms, content with the contact that he was displaying.

"Thanks for everything, Toph. I'll see you soon" Mako said as he walked to the backdoor, which garnered a simple nod from her. He unlatched the lock and walked out to join Tenzin and Lin Beifong. Together they place their hands on the worn boot and disappeared from sight

AN: I know I haven't given much Makorra in the story but I wanted to add a bit in there for us. I'm already working on the next chapter. Have a great and remember, folks, make sure to review your authors!