Episode 5: ENEMY AT THE GATES

Flying into the city of Zaofu, Korra saw just how considerable Kuvira's Army was. The green fields had turned metallic gray; a valley of ash with airships and rail-cars bordering the hundreds of mecha-suit soldiers. Crossing into No Man's Land Korra had no idea what she could say to Kuvira to stop this invasion. It was already here. When she landed Suyin was waiting for her and was polite enough considering her city was surrounded.

"Don't worry, I'll talk to Kuvira and stop this rebellion." Korra tried to sound convincing. But she barely had herself on her side.

Suyin however gave her a warm smile, "You're not the only one," and nodded to an official looking woman standing off to one side.

Korra looked at her for a long moment before recognizing her as Yully. She walked up to her for closer inspection then embraced her. They laughed, realizing it had been a long time since either of them had had a good laugh.

"Look at you," Korra looked her up and down, "with the hair and all that shoulder!" Korra was amazed at how well she looked; brown knee-high boots with white pants and a low collar red shirt.

"And you!" she flicked Korra's hair back, "Rocking the short hair!"

They marveled at each other. Each had the same thought but neither said it aloud. They really had switched places from when they first met some three years ago.

"You look great!" Yully hugged Korra again. Knowing how much she'd been through, she was happy to have Korra here.

"You too," Korra broke the hug, hoping she wasn't too late, "So have you…?

Yully shook her head, "No she'll be coming in an hour to talk."

"To give us orders," Suyin corrected with a hint of annoyance that made Yully look down. She then lead the girls away to discuss the meeting. She had been a supporter of Kuvira since the beginning but since Kuvira's declaration of war and her march onto Zaofu, Suyin took it as a personal treachery.

LATER

Kuvira's demands were just as Suyin expected. No matter the demands, there was no way that'd she surrender the city. They stood in the empty space of No Man's Land with an army on one side and the city on the other. Suyin refused Yully's plea for a city-wide evacuation, but agreed to let those incapable of fighting to evacuate somewhere safe. For the people who did fight, Suyin swore that they would fight Kuvira until the city was melted into the ground.

Kuvira however seemed unfazed by Suyin's stubbornness as she directed her attention to Yully, "And it is a pleasant surprise to have you joining us today Yully. Your presence will make this so much more revealing."

Kuvira tossed a bundle of scrolls to Suyin. The scrolls depicted detailed notes and diagrams of Zaofu's escape routes, secret tunnels, and weak points. Suyin flipped through the scrolls in disbelief as confidential information that even Baatar Jr was unaware of were scrawled down. The last few scrolls were outlines of different invasion strategies for the city.

"Your handwriting is abysmal Yully, but you're battle plan drawings are quite illuminating." Kuvira triumphantly complimented.

Suyin clutched the scrolls then threw them into Yully's face, "What is this?"

Yully unclenched her jaw but couldn't meet her gaze, "Suyin, I drew those up right after the Red Lotus, I was upset! And I made those plans for you to show you Zaofu's vulnerability."

"I never saw them!"

"I gave them to you months ago!"

A recollection of Yully's last trip to Zaofu: She did hand over the plans to Suyin but Baatar Jr had swapped them out while Suyin wasn't looking for the discarded letters Huan had sent Yully. Suyin didn't think anything of it. She assumed that Yully didn't want to keep them but couldn't throw them out.

Kuvira interrupted their memories, "As you can see Suyin those scrolls mark every tunnel, weak position and foothold in Zaofu. We can hit you at any of those critical points and Zaofu will be defenseless. Surrender the city or the consequences will be on your hands. As I am a generous leader I will give you 24 hours to respond under a friendly truce." And with that she left them speechless.

Back in Zaofu, Suyin looked over every scroll with an invasion plan and each one resulted in a successful take over. Yully was frantically redrawing the scenarios where the invasion would fail but there were less of them and Kuvira had had months to study and alter the plans.

"What are the weak points in Kuvira's Army?" Suyin demanded.

Yully didn't look up from her work, "I don't know," she said quietly.

"What?" she scolded. It was only her, Korra, and Yully in her office but the pressure from the outside made the room unbearably small.

"I don't know," Yully shouted, "I never was in her army, saw a formation, or an attack plan. I didn't even know she had this many airships and rail-cars."

"How could you possibly not know!" she accused.

Yully slapped down the pen and glared back at Suyin, "Oh I don't know maybe because I was busy negotiating treaties between every village and town in the Earth Kingdom for them not to go into total chaos like Ba Sing Se!"

"Well you did a great job. Especially by handing the plans-"

"I didn't hand them over!"

"Well you might as well have," Suyin shoved the scrolls off her desk, "what other cities did you exploit to her?"

They stared at the silence coming from Yully's agape mouth as she stared at the wall.

"You didn't…" Korra dreaded.

"When I learned of Kuvira's plan…I drew a rough outline of a defensive strategy for Republic City," she admitted to the floor.

"For crying out loud!" Suyin tore her eyes from Yully.

"I gave them to President Raiko! There's no way she could get to them!" she looked up to see that no one was looking at her.

"We have to get a call out to him," Korra confided to Suyin.

But she waved towards the fields of metal, "We haven't been able to contact anyone since-that!"

"I can go-" Yully started but was cut off.

"You've done enough!" Suyin punched a button on her desk. The doors opened to a saluting guard. "I don't want her farther than your reach. Understand!"

The poor guard frighteningly glanced at Yully before looking helplessly back at Suyin, but she knew what really tied Yully down. Yully stood petrified as she looked at Suyin and Korra pleadingly.

But Korra couldn't meet her gaze, she couldn't-didn't want to help her. It had taken Korra years to trust Yully, and now that was all gone. She thought she could trust Yully while she was healing, but Yully had taken advance of her absence. She had made alliances with this threat that would ruin everything Korra had worked for. And whether Yully had meant to or not, she had helped Kuvira.

Suyin motioned for the guard to come forward. Seeing her limp ambition the guard grasped Yully's scarred arm and lead her out of the room.