Mako woke to a gentle nudge, a whisper he couldn't understand, and another nudge. Someone was tugging persistently on his arm and their voice carried a hint of panic. With every intention of telling whomever it was to go away and let him sleep, he groaned in reply.

"No! You've got to get up!"

The voice came in clearly this time, and Mako recognized it at once. It wasn't Bingwei; it wasn't any of his squadmates. It was Toru.

"Come on!"

Mako opened his eyes and stared at her. His head hurt. He felt vaguely sick. He recalled the night prior, the odd movers and strange foods, and he noted a significant emptiness in his stomach. Everything up until Guan's speech had been clear as day in his mind, but anything that came after had gone utterly blank.

"What happened?" Mako grumbled. As he sat he groped about his head. "Where am I?"

"In the commons. You fell asleep here."

"What are you doing here?"

"Making sure you don't get in trouble."

When Mako looked to Toru she had put on a pleasant smile, an expression that indicated that everything she'd said had been genuine. Last time he'd seen her had been hectic and slightly frightening. It had been during his quarantine at the Boiling Rock, shortly after he woke from the explosion. She had given him a key, told him to look around, and advised him that a meeting would be taking place in which his fate would be discussed. He hadn't seen Toru at all after that.

"What happened?" Mako said again, and this time he felt more urgency and the slightest indignation. "What…Why am I here? Where is my shirt?"

"I'll explain as we go. Follow me."

Toru pulled at his arm again, and Mako rose from the lounge upon which he'd apparently fallen asleep. It took all his effort to stay on his feet; his legs were wobbly and weak, as though he'd run a million miles. His whole body racked with fatigue.

"Where are we going?"

"First, to get you dressed," she explained. "Then you're due for training."

"And why are you here?"

Toru rounded on Mako then, and stared at him with a hard expression. "I'm here on the arm of His Excellency, but…" she paused and looked down. "Well…That's not important. You're here. And I'm here. And we're going to work together."

Confused, Mako continued to follow her. "So," he said thoughtfully and slowly, hoping he wouldn't upset her. "What happened?"

"You were with the men last night," Toru explained gently. "Enjoying the company of some of the captive women. Well, the rest of them were. You were having none of it."

Mako felt a heat rush into his face. "What now?"

"You're a man of real moral fiber," Toru said with a genuine smile. Mako could hear it in her voice. "There was a lovely young girl who wanted to…Well, you told her no, and that she should go get a real job, and that she needed to put some clothes on, and then when she got upset you left."

Mako's face screwed up. He was confused. He remembered none of this interaction whatsoever. Further, he wasn't certain if he should be more embarrassed that he'd declined a strange girl's invitation or angry that he'd been put in such a situation to begin with.

"How do you know all of this?"

"I was there," Toru replied flatly. "I watched it happen."

They had stopped outside of the door to Mako's apartment, and he stared at her appraisingly. On a better day, he might have tried harder to understand the implications of her words. On a better day, he might have been able to read between the lines. Everything about her from her tone of voice to her body language to the way she was tiptoeing around the point suggested that she was either ashamed or guilty or embarrassed.

She motioned for him to open the door, and Mako complied.

"Go get dressed. You should've been given a second uniform. We can worry about finding the other half of this one later. Now hurry up."

Again, Mako complied. As he did so, he recognized the automacity of his motions, the way he responded to such orders without question or hesitation. He'd done the same with Bingwei yesterday. He'd done the same ever since he'd gotten off the boat from the Boiling Rock. The same wave of self-doubt he'd felt the day prior hit him again. He wondered if the fact that his compliance had become so instinctive was motivated by something more than the need to survive. He wondered if he was doing the right thing. Yes, he decided as he pulled on his shirt, this was right. This was the correct move. Gain intelligence and get back to Beifong.

But what was Toru doing there? She'd said that she had been watching, that she had been a part of whatever festivities had happened the night before. Mako stood for a long time in his empty apartment with his hands atop the chest of drawers from which he'd pulled his spare uniform, staring hard at the wood and willing his sluggish mind to think.

It hit him all at once.

When Mako left the bedroom he did so with purpose. When he approached Toru in the sitting room where she stood staring out the balcony window, he spoke as gently as his current mood would allow. To his dismay, it wasn't as gentle as he would have liked.

"They used you," he said curtly. "Last night."

Toru said nothing.

"And me? I was supposed to… Last night when they…" Mako stammered for a moment, his brain lagging far behind his mouth. "What's going on here? What kind of place is this?"

This time, Toru turned around, and the same sad smile she'd worn since the day Mako had first laid eyes on her returned to her face. "Everyone has a place in His Excellency's Society," she said coolly, "even me. I can reassure you that my role isn't what you think."

An anger welled up inside Mako that he'd not felt before, and indignation and embarrassment and horror all rolled into one gut-wrenching emotion. He groped for words for moment that felt like forever, but suddenly it seemed that there were too many thoughts in his head trying to come out all at once. He couldn't decide what to say first.

Instead, Toru spoke quietly. "Everyone has their place," she said again. "And now that you're a member of the elite, you have yours, too."

"But you said you were his fiancée!"

"I was," Toru said. "I was. But you see, that was before."

"Before what?" Mako roared. And then he stopped, uncertain of why he was angry with her at all. In the greater scheme of things, if what he believed was correct, he was in the much better position. After a long pause, he said quietly, "I'm sorry. I just don't understand what's going on, and I don't understand what you're doing here, and I'm confused."

Toru smiled again, and this time it seemed genuine. "I know," she said gently. "There isn't enough time for me to explain everything right now, but there will be time later. For now, I've got to get you to the yard so that you can take your place with the others. You're already late, and it won't do to have you in trouble on your first real day."

Toru's smile widened, and she walked past Mako toward the door. She opened it and gestured him into the hallway.

"Why are you smiling?"

"Because you're different."

Mako didn't press the point. Instead, he followed quietly as Toru led him out of the apartment, past the commons, and out the front door. She spoke quietly as she walked.

"You're going to go train with your old squadmates today," Toru said, "and then you'll return to your apartments tonight." She stopped and turned around. Beyond, Mako could see the open courtyard. Bingwei was there, yelling, and behind him stood only three of his old squad: Yaozhu, Fa, and Jing. Yaozhu waved timidly at Mako. "Mako?" Toru prompted. "Tonight you have a choice. You can partake with the men or retire to your room. Say you're staying in, and then meet me in the commons at midnight. We can talk in private."

Mako nodded, and Toru left without another word. Though Bingwei and the others gave him strange and skeptical looks as he took his place beside them, no one said anything about her presence or why he had been late, and Mako took that as a blessing.

He spent the rest of his day with Bingwei and his squad, and by lunchtime felt significantly better, both physically and emotionally. Perhaps it was because he'd had the chance to think about his conversation with Toru, about what she had said about his behavior the night prior, and though she'd left him with even more questions, particularly about potential human rights abuses, he couldn't help but look forward to getting some answers and explanation. There had to be a reason for all of this.

The training was not difficult, not even for Yaozhu and the rest. Mako had assumed that he would be learning how to yell, how to command, and how to generally mistreat his charges as Bingwei had done when they first arrived. Instead, they focused on items of a more tactical nature, on building trust and understanding of one another and their unique abilities. Bingwei had explained this as preparation for the mission, and had refused to elaborate.

Adding to Mako's decent mood was the knowledge that his squad had fared relatively well in his absence, short as it may have been. He never thought that he would miss them, but now he was surrounded by their familiar faces Mako felt a comfort that he sorely needed. More, as he learned about each of them he felt able to empathize, to understand their motivation for participating in this poor excuse for a society. He already knew, in part, that they were acting out of the need to preserve themselves and their safety. But he also learned that each of them had a larger stake in the operation. Yaozhu was seeking honor and status among his tribe of combustion benders. Fa's family had been threatened outright, and it seemed that his willingness to follow orders came of his desire to save them. Jing had no family that he ever mentioned and as large as he was Mako could see no real benefit to having him along physically, but the more Jing spoke, the more Mako recognized his brilliance. He was thoughtful and more than capable of strategizing, which he demonstrated over dinner. When the lot of them were presented with a hypothetical scenario, Jing had organized a solution within ten minutes which played perfectly to the others' strengths. But he lacked confidence, and Mako imagined that his participation was borne from his need to validate himself.

None of it was unreasonable.

Well after sundown, Bingwei dismissed Yaozhu, Fa, and Jing back to their dormitories and escorted Mako back to their own apartment, where they went their separate ways. Mako retired almost immediately to the showers—he still felt particularly dirty—and when he returned to his bedroom he lay on his bed in comfortable quiet. Bingwei returned after a time, explained briefly that he'd been in the kitchens, and then mentioned the possibility of going back down again later. Half dozed, Mako remembered his earlier conversation with Toru.

"I'm going to stay in," Mako said, sleepily. "You go ahead without me."

With a mischievous smile, Bingwei nodded. "I figured as much, a lightweight like you. Well, rest easy, then. We've got another long day tomorrow, and it won't be nearly as easy as today."

Then Bingwei left.

It took an hour of laying on his bed idly for Mako to begin feeling hungry, and when he exited to the kitchens he did so without much in the way of contemplation. The place was mostly empty except for a few older men who sat in a corner playing Pai Sho, and Mako took his dinner alone. He ate quickly, and once the food was gone he left.

Halfway to his room, a clarity struck him: He was alone with all the time in the world. The bunkhouse was mostly empty, or it seemed mostly empty. No one had spoken to him all night long. No one had even looked at him. It was as though he were invisible.

Perhaps he could explore.

All at once, Mako no longer felt a captive. All at once, he felt a detective, an investigator, an outsider taking a deep look into a world where he did not belong. It was in moments like this that he felt most comfortable, and now was no exception. When he reached the top of the stairs leading to his apartment he paused only briefly, and then headed the opposite direction.

Mako discovered immediately that the whole upper floor was symmetrical, with the same long hallway on one side as on the other and what he presumed to be apartments on each side. At the end of his hallway and the other were doors leading into the same common bathroom and shower facility. There were the same number of doors, the same décor. Everything was the same down to the color and style of the doorknobs.

If there was one thing Mako could glean from his exploration of the upstairs, it was that the society was more established than he'd thought. If each room housed two officers the same as his, and each officer was charged with the command of at least three other people, there were more than one hundred soldiers ready to deploy at any given point, and that was in his dormitory alone. There could be no telling how many similar housing units existed on this island. As he made his way downstairs, he promised himself that as soon as he was able he would explore beyond his dormitory and beyond the yard, would venture into places on the island he hadn't yet seen.

Mako's knowledge of the lower level of the dormitory had thus far been limited to the kitchens, and seemingly for good reason. This area was not as deserted as the upper level had been, and periodically he passed by older men in nicer uniforms that looked at him with skeptical and oftentimes angry expressions. Though it was arranged in much the same way as the upper level, the doors were sparse and many were guarded. It did not take long for him to turn around and head back to the foyer. He would have to pursue his search at a time when the building was empty.

For the rest of the night Mako lounged in the common area. He spent a long time watching men as they came and went, sometimes with food from the kitchens, sometimes with girls hanging on their arms, sometimes completely alone. When that grew tiring he lay back and listened, eyes closed, and drifted in and out of a very light sleep.

"You're here early."

Mako sat up, mildly startled, and looked about. Toru stood at the top of the stairs, staring at him kindly, and he found himself fighting unexpected nerves. "I figured I'd wait."

Toru approached, but did not sit. "I see. Shall we go somewhere private?"

Mako's face screwed up with confusion. Where could they go that was private?

"To your apartment," Toru prompted.

"But Bingwei told me that there was no privacy there," Mako protested. He hadn't been back to his apartment in a few hours. It was entirely possible that Bingwei was back, and if such was the case there would be no way to have a personal conversation. Bingwei had said so himself.

But Toru seemed undeterred. She grasped Mako by the hand and pulled at his arm. "We can cross that bridge when we come to it. But I can't stay here for long. Out in the open, I mean. Let's go."

As he led Toru back to his apartment, Mako's insides twisted with anxiety both good and bad. He would be getting answers to the questions he'd had for near two weeks, and would be getting them from a trustworthy source. But Toru's behavior was unusual. She seemed nervous. What she had said about not being able to stay out in the open had struck Mako as strange, but considering her status in the society, if it was as he believed, it wasn't necessarily surprising. More, the apprehension came from Toru's mere presence, her proximity, her touch, and Mako didn't know why.

A walk through the apartment confirmed that it was empty and Mako gestured for Toru to sit on one of the couches, but she did not. Instead, she made her way to the enormous windowed doors overlooking the yard, and she opened them to the balcony. Mako followed her out, and joined her in leaning against the railing, looking out.

"It's nice to get outside," Toru said gently. Now that Mako thought on the matter, everything about her seemed gentle. "I don't get to be outside often."

Mako didn't know how to respond. He said nothing.

"I suppose you want to get down to it, then, and I can't blame you. I promised you answers, and it's time for me to make good on that promise."

All the questions Mako had had bubbled to the surface. He didn't know which to ask first. There were too many. "Who are you?" Was the first thing that came out of his mouth, and as soon as he'd said it he felt slightly foolish.

But Toru just smiled. "You know my name, obviously," she began. "And you know that I'm from the Northern Water Tribe. My parents moved us to Republic City when I was three years old and I lived there for a while. I learned healing there."

"Why are you here?"

"My parents arranged for me to marry. I didn't think that political marriages existed any more, but they do, and mine was supposed to be that way. My parents traded me for power and money. But things weren't so bad for a while. I didn't mind. I wanted to help."

Again, Mako didn't know how to respond. He didn't even look at her. All he could do was stare out into the empty yard, watching the firelight flicker against the buildings from the beheaded fountain on the beach. He felt the slightest offense at her story, but it wasn't his place to comment.

"Guan used to treat me well," Toru continued, needing no prompting. "But then he lost his bending and things changed for the worst."

At this, Mako did respond as if on instinct. "Lost his bending?" he asked, an air of disbelief in his voice. He looked to Toru, but she didn't look back. She was still staring out at the night the same as he had been. "What do you mean?"

"I thought you'd know, being that you were in with the Avatar. He was a victim of the Equalist movement. He lost his bending. It was taken from him."

Dumbfounded, Mako stared. The Equalists had fallen apart so long ago he'd forgotten that they had ever existed. The whole event had had such a minimal impact on him that it didn't seem to matter, it didn't seem that he needed to remember it. But now he thought on the matter, Amon must have taken the abilities of countless benders, not just those at the revelation he attended with Korra. More striking than this, perhaps, was the realization that the leader of this firebending society was no longer a firebender himself. He was just as much a fraud as Amon had been, though certainly in a different way.

Toru sighed deeply. "He was never the same after that. He got angry, didn't have an outlet, and without his bending he was of no real use to his family. They were Triad, so nonbenders weren't of much use."

"I know," Mako said automatically. "I was Triad once, too." He looked back into the yard and dropped his chin onto his hand. "But that was a long time ago. Probably before you were even around."

Toru shrugged. "It doesn't matter now, I suppose."

"No, I suppose it doesn't."

For a while the quiet lingered, and for that time Mako was content. But the longer he stood there idly the more restless he felt. There were still questions. There was still information to be had, and he knew that he should take advantage of Toru as an informant while he was able.

"Why am I here?" Mako asked.

"If you want to think about it philosophically, it must be fate," Toru replied quietly. "The concrete answer is that you're a firebender, and you're valuable. Well, that's not entirely true. We didn't know who you were at first, but we had informants in Ba Sing Se who let us know that there were firebenders who needed liberation. We sent a quad of combustion benders..."

"What's a quad?"

"A group of four," Toru said, and the tone in her voice told Mako he should feel stupid for ever asking the question. "You've got your quad as well, and you'll go on missions with them soon."

"Oh," Mako grunted, and now he thought on the matter it made perfect sense. There would be no way for him to keep track of eight other people, not as a rookie captain. To have his squad split into halves was the only reasonable solution.

"We sent a quad of combustion benders to Ba Sing Se and set up the extraction," Toru continued, unfazed by Mako's contemplation, "and during its execution they noticed you. They brought you home with the other firebenders who were liberated that day."

"They blew up the upper ring!" Mako protested. "There was no extraction there, just explosion!"

"And you should be glad. That explosion is the only reason you're here. My understanding is that you firebent it to protect Earth King Wu."

"He's not the king."

Toru shrugged. "At any rate, it took a powerful bit of firebending to protect you and him from that blast. Our men saw you, and you were brought in and put under my care. That part was purely coincidence, you understand. Like I said, we didn't know who you were to begin with. It wasn't until I interviewed you and reported back to Guan that things got interesting. But I knew you were special from the start. I had a good feeling about you."

"You keep saying things like that," Mako said contemplatively, "that I'm different and that I'm special. What does that even mean?"

"It means exactly what you think it does. There's something about you that makes you stand apart from the others who I've worked with. Maybe it's kindness; maybe it's your willingness to defy. I don't know." Toru looked at him squarely, and Mako felt himself tense under her gaze. "I like you," she said flatly, "and I can't say that for the others. You're easy to talk to, and you listen. The others just fight or argue or order me around. They take advantage of me. You don't."

Mako felt self-conscious now. "Thanks?"

Toru giggled, and the anxiety in Mako's stomach swelled. It was a strange feeling that he couldn't place. His gut told him that something here was desperately wrong while his mind told him that all was well. But Toru's smile faded fast, and she said, "But you're different for Guan, too, not just for me. He did some digging on you and discovered your affiliation with the Triads."

"Former," Mako corrected. "Like I said, that was a long time ago."

"It doesn't matter. You're in, and there aren't many others who can say that. Guan is planning to send you back to Republic City to negotiate with the leaders of the Triads on his behalf, to pull them into the society and invite them to work alongside us. He wants them to act as our eyes and ears in the city. It's a very important task."

"He's sending me back to Republic City?" Mako echoed. He fought a sense of elation at the news. He'd be able to contact Beifong. He'd be able to tell her everything that had happened. And he'd be able to see Korra and Asami. He'd be able to see Bolin. "When do I go?"

"A week, two weeks, maybe. It'll depend on the strength of your quad," Toru said with a shrug. "I don't know the schedules, I just know the destination and that your mission was marked as vital. It's extremely risky. A lot of preparation has gone into your deployment."

"What do you mean, preparation?"

Toru looked to Mako with unmasked incredulity now, brows raised, eyes opened wide. Then her expression turned grave and with a tone of disbelief that he hadn't expected, she said, "I thought you knew."

"Thought I knew what?"

"About the preparations," Toru replied. Her voice contained some urgency now. "About your brother."

Mako's stomach dropped out. In the chaos of the days following his transfer he had almost forgotten the conversation he'd heard between Guan and his advisors in which they had discussed ways to do away with the brother. But he had done all he could. He had sent the letter, had communicated the risk to Beifong. There should have been protections in place. And considering the strength of Bolin's relationship with Opal, Mako reasoned that Beifong would pay close attention: He was practically part of their family by now.

But what if the letter never arrived? It had been a long shot to begin with. What if she hadn't received the warning? Could all this have happened so fast? It had only been a few days since he sent the letter. It had been just over a week since he arrived here. Hadn't it? Now that he thought on it, the time seemed a blur.

"Mako?"

The anxiety had come back with force, and Mako's whole body felt cold, his limbs numb. His stomach had tightened and his throat seemed to close. "What happened to my brother?" he asked in a deadly voice.

Toru stepped back. The urgency on her face had changed. She looked distinctly afraid, perhaps worried, maybe concerned. Mako couldn't really tell, and he didn't really care. She had information. He could see it in her reaction.

"What happened to Bolin?" Mako demanded again. A tremble had crept into his voice; a heaviness had taken residence in his chest, an overwhelming dread pressed down on him.

"I..." Toru stammered, her concern persisting through her voice, "I'm so sorry. I thought you knew."

Mako shouted now, "What happened to my little brother?"

By now Toru had backed up against the railing. Concern had turned to fear. "There were a few agents in the city," she said, her voice very quiet and very fast. "There were a few combustion benders in the underground awaiting orders. Guan has them everywhere, well mostly everywhere. They act as security; they carry out difficult tasks in hard-to-reach places. They work as special operatives."

"What did you do?" Mako put emphasis on every word.

"They brought down the building," Toru said vaguely. "It's all hearsay, I don't know exactly what happened, but I heard that they brought down the building he was in and...Well..."

Mako couldn't understand the words. Certainly he heard them, but they made no sense. Silence took hold while his mind worked to decode the message, the implication. Meaning would not register. He repeated Toru very quietly, very slowly, his eyes locked on her face. "They brought down the building," he uttered dumbly, all his anger gone, "while he was in it."

"I'm so sorry," Toru repeated. "I thought you knew."

Mako leaned against the railing not of contemplation, but of necessity. His legs seemed unable to hold his weight. Words wouldn't come into his brain. He stared at the ground for a time, struggling to comprehend, and then with enormous effort he said, "Are you trying to tell me that my little brother is dead?"

Toru nodded. The motion was short, scarcely more than a twitch, but it was all Mako needed. The idea exploded in his mind. They hadn't received the letter. They hadn't provided the extra protection. His message hadn't been received in time. Bolin had been attacked. Bolin had been killed.

Bolin was dead.

"Mako?"

He didn't hear Toru speaking and didn't see her approach. His eyes had locked on the ground and his mind racked with incomprehension. There was no way. It couldn't be true. Bolin wouldn't have gone like that. He would've bent the rock around him. He would have protected himself. He'd done it a thousand times. But if he didn't have footing, if he couldn't ground himself... Mako knew enough about earthbending to understand its limitations. There would be no drawing forth the rock if there was no contact with the ground.

"Mako?"

Tiny spots of darkness crawled around his vision. Toru touched his arm so tenderly that he scarcely felt the connection. Everything was numb, his legs had gone to jelly and he slumped to the ground. He couldn't breathe. A silent hysteria had come upon him that he couldn't begin to bury. All he could do was sit and stare and hold his breath.

Mako woke up on the ground.

"You scared me."

He looked up to find Toru closer than she had been before. Somehow she was cradling his head in her lap, was holding him at least partially off of the cold concrete of the balcony. She wore a look of pity.

"You fainted," she said, and she put her hand softly on his cheek. Her skin felt warm to the touch. A sheen of cold sweat covered his whole body. "I tried to catch you, but..."

Mako felt his eyes go very wide as the haze of unconsciousness faded. His mind was catching up to reality. He remembered what she had said. "No," he whispered, and the piteous look on Toru's face deepened. "No!" He fought to sit upright, but Toru held him down, her hands firmly on his shoulders. The hysteria was coming back, and this time it wasn't quiet. This time it was violent and overpowering and uncontrollable. Mako's head was swimming, his mind was stuck focused on one unfathomable and unacceptable truth. Bolin was gone. He was dead. He had died alone. It could have been horrible: He could have suffocated. He could have been crushed by the weight of the building. If a combustion bender had attacked him straight on, he could have been burned to death or worse. Mako imagined the remains, and his body gave a mighty jerk against Toru's grip, but she held on tighter, bent over him and wrapped him in her arms.

"I'm so sorry," she said. "I'm so, so sorry."

"No," Mako said. It was the only word that would come to him. It was the only word he could force past the lump in his throat. "No."

"I thought you knew. You shouldn't have found out like this. I'm so sorry."

"No," Mako said again. His face had grown very hot, but his skin remained so cold that goosebumps sprang all up and down his arms. His body felt both immovably heavy and filled with unmanageable energy. For a while he tried to suppress it and for a while he succeeded, but then his body started to tremble. At once he clapped his hands over his face and broke.

Toru held him close while he cried, and Mako didn't care. She said nothing and moved only to draw him in. She stayed curled over him, her arms around his shoulders, and he pressed his face into her middle to muffle his noise. Eventually he found himself laying there with his eyes closed, and all the tension and anxiety and grief he had felt was replaced with an emptiness so complete that he felt it would swallow him whole.

He hoped it would swallow him whole.

"It's late," Toru whispered. "Let's get you inside." She straightened and wrapped her arm round Mako's shoulders to help him sit upright.

But Mako could only sit and stare at his feet, unthinking and unfeeling, and she allowed him to stay that way for a while. When she pulled him to his feet and ushered him toward his bed, he moved along with her. She mentioned briefly that she was glad he had already changed out of his uniform, but Mako barely registered that she had spoken. She sat him on the bedroom chair, fussed with his bed, and then helped him to it. He sat in the quiet as she situated the blankets around him, and then she moved to leave.

"Don't go," Mako said. His voice sounded flat and listless, the words seemed to have floated out of him without thinking. "Don't leave."

Toru rounded back on him, and the look she gave him filled the emptiness with a dull jolt that sat in his belly like a rock that grew ever more dense with each step she took toward him. Then she sat and the rock shattered into a jumble of conflicting emotions. He felt empty but full. Warm but cold. Destroyed but somehow intact, as though her very presence was holding him together. What else did he have? Who else did he have?

Bolin was gone, and he was all Mako had. His extended family was too far removed to really matter. For a fleeting moment, he considered Korra and he considered Asami, but when he considered them together he recognized that there would be no room for him. He wondered if they even thought of him. He wondered if they had moved on with their lives, believing that he himself was gone. Yes, he'd be going to Republic City, but how would he be able to face anyone? How would they react knowing the truth of his absence? Had he been in Republic City he could've helped, could've prevented Bolin from...

Mako's breath caught in his throat, and he pressed his face into his pillow as another wave of grief came over him. He forced himself to breathe deep, hold the inhale, breathe out. But when Toru touched his shoulder he broke again. She murmured at him quietly, in a voice that was altogether motherly, repeating words that Mako neither heard nor understood. But somehow it calmed him. It comforted him, and more than ever he would accept that comfort without question.

She was still there when he fell asleep.