"Like the changing of the seasons, the Avatar Cycle began again."
- Tenzin.
Korra swept one arm forward with an airbending slice, and the other weaved in with a water whip. Temuji struck with a flaming punch and followed through with an earthbending right hook, chucking a small boulder at her.
The elemental attacks collided in mid-air, the sheer force of the shockwave knocking back both Avatars. The white-haired boy recovered more quickly, launching himself skyward with a rising mound of earth, then coming back down with a sweeping kick of air, knocking Korra back as she crossed her arms in front of her, trying to dispel the sudden gust of wind. She went skidding back but thankfully it was not sufficient to knock her off her feet. He followed up with a series of firey punches, lighting up the sky with flames. Korra took a moment to draw some water up out of the bay and threw herself onto it, riding it as it partially solidified into ice, sliding her around Temuji towards his back where she could make another attack.
But she hesitated.
"You were a healer! You helped people!" she shouted, conjuring a wall of wind to deflect his next attack, bouncing it harmless into the bay.
"I'm still helping people!" he retorted, slashing the water out from underneath her feet and sending her tumbling to the ground once again. "I'm going to save the entire world! I'm going to make it a better place!"
Korra landed awkwardly, sliding around in a crouch defensively. "You can't help people by hurting them!" she retorted with a blast of fire.
He sneered at her naivety as he batted it away, shaking his head. "Was I ever once that naïve? Pain is not something to be feared, Avatar. It's a teacher. It makes you strong."
She disagreed, violently. Korra threw a rapid series of punches, punctuating them with hot fire. "This isn't pain, this is death!"
"This is the death of a few so the WORLD can be healed!" he retorted, knocking aside the fire blasts like they were nothing. Though neither of the combatants were scorched by the hot flames, they were setting ablaze various buildings on Air Temple Island as they continued their duel.
"And who decides who lives and who dies? YOU?!" she whipped up a foot and swung it down, slinging a whip of water his direction. He batted it aside.
"You know someone better?! Yourself, maybe?! Don't put on airs with me, Avatar!" he thrust out his palms, letting a wave of fire ripple through the air. Korra rolled across the ground to dodge, coming up swinging, sending smaller rocks rapidly at Temuji in an effort to keep him off-balance. Alas, he knocked each one out of the air like they were pillows, harmlessly deflecting them. He could do anything she could, bend every element she could throw at him. And evidently he'd been practicing with his newfound powers. She needed to get creative if she was going to win this. Find some way to throw him off his game.
"You always claim you know what's best for this world! You set yourself up as some sort of living GOD!"
"NO!" she protested. She was almost cut off by a wave of water that she narrowly ducked underneath. "That's not what-!"
"I won't let you and others stand in the way of what's right! I won't let this... this mental illness fester any longer!"
"Temuji!" she had to get through to him. He was a good person once, surely there was still a way to save him?
"No! No more of your rhetoric! You're wrong, Avatar! You're just as sick as the rest of them! This isn't how the world should be! I know it! And I will not rest until she... IT... IS SAVED!"
Korra was beginning to think there was no chance Temuji could be saved. He was too far gone. But on the off chance she was wrong, no matter how remote the possibility, she would continue to fight. Not only for the safety of the world, but also for one lost soul.
No longer hurling boulders and great chunks of rock, Fumiko had crushed those remaining stone on the roof into a fine sand, and set it to writhing about the rooftop like the tentacles of an octopus. Whenever Asami's bi-plan and the bending brothers got too close, she sent the sand chasing after them, trying to either swat them out of the skies like a spider-fly or else crush them in her grainy grip. They barely avoided the last swipe meant to take out their tail fin.
Firing off some shots of hot fire, Mako hadn't managed to score a decisive hit on the sandbending girl. Bolin was having even greater trouble with no available ammunition close at hand. They needed to get closer if they wanted to take her out.
Time for a different tactic, Asami thought, and angled them upwards, higher into the sky. They skirted dangerously close to the cloud cover as lightning flashed overhead. The next strike could easily hit their biplane, but they couldn't very well land now. They had to take the fight to Fumiko, or else countless lives were going to be lost.
Asami tightened her grip on the plane's controls, the wind whistling past her as she dove steeply, almost on a collision course. Great spikes of sand erupted from the Cabbage Corp rooftop to try and impale her plane like the many thorns of a cactus.
"Hold on!" she shouted.
She rolled the wheel, and the plane complied, skimming over a razor sharp blast of sand that threatened to tear off their wings and send them crashing to the ground. Bolin and Mako held on tight, unable to tell up from down, their stomachs doing flip-flops as Asami finished her roll, angling around for another try.
"Get ready!"
The brothers shared a look and nodded.
Their daring pilot dove sharply, speeding towards the rooftop, then pulled up at the last minute, the grainy weapons of Fumiko grazing the bottom of her plane in the process, nearly tearing the tail off.
"NOW!" Asami shouted.
Mako and Bolin unhooked themselves and leapt, going immediately into freefall towards the roof of the Cabbage Tower. The older brother fired off blasts of fire from his hands and feet to steady his flight and slow his descent, landing in a tumble on the left side of the building. Bolin drew the roof upwards to catch him, landing awkwardly and rolling off one rock to another before finally landing on the right side of the roof. Both brothers immediately came together as their opponent drew all the sand on the rooftop to herself.
"Mako! Bolin! So good to see you both again!" Fumiko said with a grin, the sand weaving and waving around her feet like the tentacles of a shark-squid. "Been up to anything fun?"
Bolin collapsed onto his knees, resting his hand on the rooftop to keep his balance. "Oh, you know..." he said non-challantly. "Death defying stunts get kinda commonplace when you hang out with the Avatar... oooh... think I'm about to lose my noodles," he said, his face turning a sickly shade of green.
His brother, however, was all business, and got into a ready stance with fists upraised, sternly addressing his inner ear and telling it to keep him steady. "Miko, by the authority of the Republic City Police Department, you are under arrest! Come peacefully or you'll regret it!"
She tittered eerily, even as she shrugged off her dark cloak and rolled her shoulders. "You're funny. That's a good joke, May-ko. I think your old chief said something similar... before big bro barbecued her, that is."
Fury, already building inside of Mako, was reaching a boiling point, but he kept his cool under fire as he always had, and stayed focus on the task. Take down Miko, save the city, then back up Korra when she took down her Anti-Avatar brother.
Throwing a series of quick but controlled fire punches at Fumiko, Mako pressed in, even as she swung the sand around to form a barrier then let fly a number of spear-headed tentacles made of the same grainy substance, hoping to impale both Mako and his brother both...
The battle had even spilled into the Little Ba Sing Se shopping district, where civilians had been hiding out to escape the chaos. Tu, cousin to Bolin and Mako, had come up with the bright idea of bringing the family here, including Grandma Yin, with the belief the strong walls of the district could hold off any sort of attack. The Sato Manor was not built for long term siege, but rather as a show of wealth and opulence. It wouldn't have lasted long under an attack like this. By contrast, the shopping district had very thick walls and lots of gates to keep looters away from all the valuables. What kept merchandise in would keep trouble out, he reasoned.
It helped he worked at one of the clothing stores in the Middle Ring.
Sadly, Tu's beliefs were proven wrong. The undead piled en masse against the walls of Little Ba Sing Se and climbed up and over one another to tumble into the district. Falls that would have seriously injured a living attacker were only a momentary detriment as the dead bodies stood back up, snapped limbs and heads back into place, and continued their relentless attack.
"Everyone behind me!" he said, throwing up his arms and creating a stone barrier. He may not have been some big hero like his cousins Mako and Bolin, but Tu could at least protect his family. Or so he believed. Another belief shattered by the dead men simply pushing over his flimsy barrier and continuing to advance without pause. Yin hid behind Tu and her son as they watched and waited...
Fortunately, help was on the way.
Three men in black robes and identical hats dropped down from the rooftops above. With a strong throwing motion they let flew a flurry of deadly rocks from their hands, impaling dead bodies and breaking apart their rotted flesh. One of them created a stone staircase for another to join them, climbing down nimbly from the rooftop above. While not fighting, he seemed to be directing the earthbending warriors who were single-handedly cleaning up the dead men trying to kill them all. Moreover, Tu recognized him.
"King Wu?!" he asked in shock. "What're you doing here?!"
"Regretting it," the faux ruler replied, pulling on his collar and looking around nervously. "It's super scary being in a battle. But I had to come. And I brought help."
"Help?" asked Chow.
Wu gestured down the street, where another pair of Dai Li stood, distinct with their black robes and hats. As more dead men came pouring into the street, they did not hesitate, but threw fists and feet of stone, smashing dead flesh into so much dust and ash beneath their powerful attacks. There was no hesitation in their movements, no fear on their faces. To them, it was simply another fight to protect Ba Sing Se.
"The Dai Li are... helping?" Tu asked, puzzled by their sudden helpfulness. And so far from home, for that matter.
Wu nodded. "Oh yeah, they make great bodyguards. See ever since the government changed in the Earth Kingdom they think I'm the last remnant of our cultural heritage or whatever, being the royal bloodline, so now most of them just work to personally protect me. I asked as many as I could to come along and help out the Avatar."
"Well we're most grateful you did," Yin said, greatly daring to take the King's hand in hers. "You're such a kindly ruler to think of your people so."
Technically she and the rest of the family were naturalized Citizens of the United Republic now, and Wu was barely a figurehead of a King. None the less, the words struck a chord with him, and he knew he'd done the right thing. It felt good.
Shopping district, hospital, museum, docks, everywhere in Republic City was falling under attack by the relentless forces of the walking dead. In fact, one of the few places the dead men were downright ignoring was the abandoned Cultural Center. Ever since it had been attacked years ago no one had bothered to make use of it, and it had fallen into disrepair. Or so it had seemed on the surface.
In truth, its owners had simply found a more covert use for the structure.
Suddenly the doors were blown wide open, and a light emerged from within. Out of the light stepped a shape. A big, hulking, metallic shape. Vaguely humanoid, with a domed head, long arms and short legs, the enormous mecha suit stomped to the edge of the stairs and primed its weapons, of which it had more than a few. Embossed on the chestplate was a single sailboat insignia, now with a crescent moon arcing over it.
The new symbol of Varrick Industries.
Inside the two-person cockpit, Varrick took a moment to reach over his shoulder, his hand closing over his wives hand as she likewise reached for him.
"Zhu Li, let's do the thing!" Varrick exclaimed dramatically.
"On it, dear," she replied with a tiny smile, using the same inflection for 'dear' as she'd once used for 'sir.' Her hands and feet deftly worked the levers and pedals with ease.
Their joint mecha suit sprang into action, and a pair of flamethrowers built into the wrists extended and shot out great bursts of hot flame, igniting the dry dead flesh of their enemies. Several of the walking corpses managed to get in close, but Zhu Li expertly killed the juice to the flamethrowers, turned the mecha on its heel, and lashed out with buzz-saws in the forearms, slicing apart the dead men into pieces.
With a vertible walking death machine under her control and a genius by her side, Zhu Li soon ran out of enemies to fight. Either the dead retained enough awareness to realize attacking the two of them was futile, or else Fumiko was directing them elsewhere to easier prey. Down the street, some started to congregate at another building.
This peeked Varrick's interest. "What's that?"
Zhu Li glanced at the map of the city in her cockpit. She'd put it in specifically so they didn't get lost. "Town library dear."
"So what're all the dead heads doing there? Since when do corpses read?!" he exclaimed with his usual dramatic flair.
Curious herself, Zhu Li maneuvered their joint mecha closer to the building, smashing more bodies and knocking aside others to get there. Any damage they did was less work for others, after all. As they got closer, however, they saw the source of the undead interest. A lone woman in a purple robe and royal regalia stood by the doorway, defending the library by hurling its contents at the dead men.
"Stop! Disrespecting! This! Library!" she punctuated each remark with a thrown book. They bounced off the heads and chests of the undead creatures, making them do little more than stumble, but Princess Koko refused to back down or be intimidated by their presence.
"Should we help her dear?" Zhu Li asked.
"I'd say so, she's a big investor... oh and uh... it's the right thing to do of course. Alright... let's do this!"
Their mecha suit came pounding down the pavement, smashing through the sea of dead bodies like a great boulder. Princess Koko could only blink in astonishment as the two of them continued their devastating wave of destruction, crushing dead bodies beneath steel soles and roasting corpses into so much ash.
Rain began to sprinkle down upon the combatants as they dueled, soaking Korra and Temuji in water as they sped back and forth across Air Temple Island, smashing apart buildings with tremendous force as their bending was each taken to newer and ever more terrible heights. Those structures not outright destroyed were set ablaze by fires too hot and powerful for even the rain to quench. Their battle tonight would truly be the stuff of legends.
But only one was going to survive it.
Korra ducked under a rock aimed at her head, wincing as it smashed into the Air Training Course, which she knew from personal experience was over two hundred years old. Tenzin would've given them an earful for destroying such a priceless relic, but she couldn't focus on that now. She had to find a way to beat Temuji and end this madness. Korra threw an airbending kick and followed up with a rock slide as she considered her opponent.
He could match any element she could use against him, making him a unique enemy she'd faced in her lifetime. And what he may have lacked in experience he more than made up for with incredible raw power, even managing to surpass her own. He was strong, but lacked restraint.
The irony was not lost on her.
Emerging from the museum and taking the fight back onto the streets, Kai and Jinora were a literal whirlwind of death. The eldest daughter of Tenzin proving to be a lethal instrument of destruction with her newly acquired fans, while the former rogue was proving devastatingly efficient with his newly acquired black sword. Formerly owned by a councilmember of Republic City, it was said to been forged by a meteor into the strongest, sharpest, and most beautiful weapon in living memory.
Opal had declined picking up a weapon of her own, but was still providing excellent back-up, scattering the broken pieces of bodies before they could be re-assembled or continue to pose a threat. Even if deprived of an arm and a head, each of the dead men could still kill with what limbs remained to them. To say nothing of a snapping head and a crawling arm on the ground still to deal with. Fumiko's forbidden technique would have been truly impressive, if it wasn't so terrifyingly evil.
Jinora spun and blew away a series of corpses as several UR soldiers hurried down the streets to join them. Kai slashed off the head of another, then their arms for good measure before kicking them flat on their back to flop about helplessly.
"We should really get out of here!" he said, spinning in the air and landing another strike with the meteor-forged blade.
"We can't, we have to buy Korra and the others more time," Jinora replied immediately.
He shook his head. "But we don't need to get killed doing it!"
With the aid of the soldiers, they were able to make some more progress, but unfortunately they'd already been driven back pretty far, as airbenders naturally retreated during fights to gain ground. They'd already lost the museum and were now fighting for their life in an open street intersection. Opal wracked her brain, trying to come up with a strategy to defeat the dead men. Killing them obviously wasn't an option anymore. Luring them away from trouble was out. Driving them away wasn't working... if anything, the dead only pressed further in each time that...
Further in...
Further IN...
Inspiration struck.
Suddenly, Opal had an idea. It wasn't something she'd ever tried before, or even heard about during her airbending lessons, but it just might work. Opal threw out her arms across her chest, palms up and fingers splayed. Then, with a mighty heave, began to pull them both away from her center until her hands were open to one another.
All around the town square, the air began to pull, drawing combatants from both sides towards the center, towards Opal. She wasn't just bending the air to create a gust of wind, she was sucking it inwards towards a total void in the space between her fingers. The dead stumbled and fell, falling towards her, while those still alive and on her side were able to brace themselves or catch their bodies on various landmarks to slow their draw towards her. The power of her technique only continued to build. Unlike traditional gusts of wind, which lost their potency the further they were shot from an airbenders body, this technique was built around the premise of drawing closer, increasing its potency.
Seconds before the mass of decaying bodies smashed into her, Opal threw her hands down and unleashed the pent up energy of her vortex to propel herself upwards and out of the way. She flew up about thirty feet or so before gravity started to reclaim her, well above their heads. Another gentle push guided her away from the ensuing mess. Dead men slammed into each other with enough force to shatter limbs and break bodies, piling up atop of one another. True, they were still animate, and continued to move, but their positioning allowed soldiers to surround them and set them ablaze before they could recover. Jinora and Kai surrounded the outermost edges of the ring, bending the air in such a way that it kept the flames focused on the circle, burning away everything within to nothing more then ash.
Breathing out a sigh as she landed beside Jinora, Opal staggered, almost losing her footing. She was exhausted, but her technique had worked. Her fellow airbenders finished fanning the flames then quickly moved to either side of her to offer their support.
"Well done, Opal," the younger girl complimented her. "That was an amazing technique...
"Think you'll earn your tattoos for that one?" Kai asked beside her.
Opal smiled wearily. "Thanks, but I think I'll pass... I don't know if it would be a great look for me."
Korra's eyes glowed with the power of light and a surge of energy filled her body, driving her bending to incredible new heights. With a strong kick and a tidal wave she sent Temuji's latest attack right back at him, knocking the rocks out of the sky and dousing the flames. She then started to raise an earthen barrier around Temuji to contain him. He may have held the same bending powers as she did, but she had Raava's spirit within her, and there was no way that...
Temuji's head snapped up and his eyes opened, blazing like hot coals, and Korra took a hesitant step back, eyes wide. He'd actually done it. He'd actually gone and created his own sort of Avatar State. An Anti-Avatar State.
"RRUAAAAAAAAAAAGH!"
Throwing out his arms and giving an almost draconic roar, Temuji shattered the barrier Korra had tried to erect, making the entire island quake with his power. Thrusting up his hands, he made huge spikes of earth erupt along the ground, speeding towards Korra. She vaulted herself skywards and back, needing some space before she landed in a crouch, smashing the ground to pieces before it could reach. Her opponent took the opportunity to reach towards the bay, drawing up a funnel of water and knocking aside her next fireball with it.
One blast of water split into three, and Temuji spun in the air with a series of kicks, sending one, two, then three spouts of water speeding towards Korra. She dug in her heels, slapping aside one with her palm, knifing aside a second, then kicking up to counter the third. Without putting her foot down she shifted her stance and thrust out with her leg, unleashing a blast of flame at the crazed albino. He cackled, dropping out of the sky and back down to the ground, lifting up his arms with a mighty heave. Following his movements, the earth split into great chunks. Huge boulders bigger than he was were hurled through the air, but not at Korra. Puzzled, the dark-haired woman tried to follow their movements, but in doing so left herself open to Temuji as he sped through the air and slammed into her gut with his foot, knocking her back.
Korra caught herself with well-contained fire blasts to halt her movements then cushioned herself a few floors up with a controlled air funnel, using it to lift herself back up into the sky.
This, however, positioned her right between the great boulders that were now speeding towards her from opposite ends of the sky.
"Now it ends, Avatar!" roared Temuji, slamming his palms together.
The boulders impacted hard, shattering into a billion pieces... but when the smoke cleared, Korra still stood, her palms out-thrust. The point of impact had been her hands, where she'd broken up the rock herself. Not so much as a bit of dirt had touched her, though she felt drained from such a powerful block. The rain was pouring in earnest now, splashing down on the island as thunder boomed in the distance, setting a backdrop for their vicious duel to the death.
There was no reasoning with him, and no way to defeat him by holding back. Korra's eyes blazed as she let the full power of the Spirit of Light flow through her body again.
It was time to finish this.
Authors Notes:
Please review if enjoyed.