The telephone began ringing.
Zolt looked up from the cigar he was rolling between his fingers. He had a private line wired into his office and very few people knew the number. He was not a man for idle chatter. He liked productive conversations, exchanges with meaning and benefit, usually for himself. He did not receive telephone calls without purpose. Zolt considered the sleek black candlestick standing to the side of the desk for a quiet moment. Then he leaned forward to pick it up.
"Zolt," a low, toneless voice filtered through the listening device into his ear, "you are going to have the police biting at your heels soon enough."
He settled back into his chair as the man on the other end of the line spoke, picking the telephone up off the desk. "Let them," Zolt said. "This is how we entertain the public from time to time, when Beifong decides a show of apparent competency is in order. All it amounts to is harmless poking and prying."
"Harmless," the man repeated carefully. "Beifong is a persistent woman, I will give her that. Your man appears to have let his tongue slip."
"I can afford little loses like this. The property was one among many," Zolt said. "The Chief can have her moment in front of the cameras. She can fire off her reports and statistics to the Council. In the end, nothing can be traced back to me."
"And Bao."
"Let me worry about that. I'll deal with him."
"Ah, but I do begin to worry," the man replied. "The situation has given me little choice, Zolt. I assume some thought has also been given towards how you're going to deal with this Equalist woman."
Zolt shrugged, though of course the other man could not see it. "She's no threat to me, whoever she is. Let her –"
"Whoever she is managed to find out that Bao was in your pay when the police had not a clue," Zolt was interrupted. "Then she tracked him down and apparently beat him to within an inch of his life. You have no idea what he could have told her."
He sat up in his chair, mouth downturned at the corners. "Bao only knows what I needed him to know, nothing more. I gave him a few yuans to rub together and he put certain files out of sight. That's it."
"Men tend to let things slip when there is wine and women at hand. Other men hear things they shouldn't."
Zolt spoke derisively. "The Equalist is no one to be worried about. She's one, lunatic of a woman trying to play at the game of heroics. Bao was a lucky break."
"A lucky break," the man on the end of the line said coldly. "Listen to me, Zolt. I will not be undone by some fool running around in a mask and costume at night. I have come too far."
Zolt, his mouth a tightly pressed line, said, "I see."
"We need to meet," the man said then. "I have a new list of names for you."
"And in return," Zolt said shortly.
"The deals are being made. We can start moving weapons soon enough."
Zolt leaned back against his chair. "One of your ships is scheduled to arrive tonight. My men will be there to meet it at the docks, as per usual. Sometimes I like to observe the proceedings in person. Goods have a funny way of disappearing."
"I'll be there," the man said, and hung up without another word.
Zolt set the telephone back down on the table, pushing it back into its corner. He gave it a lingering look, the shadow of a glare upon his face, before rising to his feet and heading towards the door.
"This is the one chance you get, Asami, because if I see or hear about the Equalist again, I will stop you for good."
It was a threat she challenged vehemently, her belly full of fire and each breath stinging her with pain. But as she donned her uniform, body armour and equipment, Asami could not push those words from her head.
Picking the firearm up off the table, she turned it carefully over in her hands. The handgrip was mostly straight and smooth, the inside edge moulded to provide a comfortable, secure grip for the individual fingers when curled around it. Asami held the weapon naturally and lifted it to eye level, thumbing a small lever sitting just above the trigger. The firearm began to generate a high, tell-tale whine and an arc of electricity flitted between the electrodes situated at the muzzle. Few things mechanical managed to stump Asami for very long when they sat before her astute scrutiny in need of repair. The firearm, though of a different breed, was no different.
Reaching around her utility belt, Asami fixed the weapon into place. The weighty absence of her grapple hook launcher was glaring. She did not realise it was missing until the morning after Korra confronted her. No matter how she tried, Asami simply could not remember losing it. The utility belt felt strange, being that much lighter this time. She hoped more than was confident she could manage without it. It was always better to have options. And not knowing where the thing was did not leave her with comfortable thoughts. She was uneasy.
And that brought her back to Korra's threat, to the actions she was planning to carry out tonight. Asami reached for the cold determination that drove her boldly into the night before, but right now it seemed to be slipping through her fingers. Her mask was no longer secure, even if it was in place. Korra and Mako now knew exactly who she was, and the last words she spoke to the latter as the Equalist, knowing his field of work, was to tell him of the information she divulged from Bao. Mako was not stupid; he would know what her plans were. He was a smart man. But Asami knew this when she told him of her identity.
She did not reveal who she was to Mako to earn his sympathy. She could protect herself should he come out and try to expose her, and had all the resources to do so. But Asami was confident he wouldn't. It was not his way. Instead, it was the fact that a line had at last been drawn between them that, as she reached back behind her shoulders for the mask, made her pause. They stood on opposite sides and the divide was clear. She made sure it was. And because of that, Asami could not help but wonder what would happen if, as the Equalist, she came face to face with him again.
She was a vigilante – a wanted criminal, and he was a police officer. He would have to try and stop her. That was his obligation. And she would defend herself, there was no question. Asami decided that was as far as the thought should go. Korra's voice rang in her ear and she did not want to entertain it. But she was not afraid of or intimidated by the Avatar. She had no reason to be. They had fought one-on-one, no holds barred, and Korra made the mistake of hesitating. Anything went in a fight; Asami was ruthless in taking advantage of it. She escaped and left the Avatar crippled. She had won. She had won…
Asami's fingers gripped the edges of her mask, the one Korra tore from her face after pinning her to the ground. The one she lifted so that Mako could see her for what she truly was. The one she first donned so that she could put right the wrongs everyone else was afraid to. And then she slowly lifted it up and over, pulling it down into place. Because in the end, that was what Asami had set out to do. She wanted to know the truth. And even then, from the beginning, she knew that there might be lengths she would need to go to in order to find it.
It was not new to Asami to put everything on the line, on the slimmest chance that lightning would strike twice and by some miracle things would work out. That was how she rescued Future Industries from the brink of bankruptcy and international failure. Now, she was going to do it again, with the hope that her actions could help put a stop to the injustice being committed in plain sight every day in the city. Checking over her armour and equipment one last time, she rose to her full height and turned to the door.
Asami was ready.
The crisp smell of seawater was on the air as Zolt stepped out of the sienna brown Accord. Night had fallen, accompanied by a chill wind that lifted the hair at the back of his neck. He tugged his coat closer around himself, moving away from the car. The man who opened the door for him pushed it shut again. Zolt paid him no mind.
A seemingly endless stretch of large metal shipping containers stood at his back, stacked one atop another. A ship was being unloaded ahead of him when he turned his eyes to the left, a vast, towering crane procedurally hooked up to the containers and then transferring them from the vessel down onto the docks, adding to the height of existing stacks or building the base of new ones. There were two containers that stood apart from the others in an open space however, and Zolt's men were already converging upon them. The larger of the two, rusty green in colour, had its doors thrown wide and men wielding flashlights sidled between the cars packed close together inside.
Zolt did not announce himself as he walked up to the back of the number gathered around the container. A man did a double take when he glanced over his shoulder, hearing footsteps. Zolt declined to address him, striding forwards and allowing his presence to push the man aside. An invisible wedge cleared a space in front of him as he moved to the open doors of the container.
When he got there, Zolt stood at its mouth, hands pushed into the pockets of his coat with an impassive expression. It took a while for the men inside to notice him, flashlights shoved into the nooks and crannies of the cars as they pulled out small, clear plastic bundles packed with a white powder. Their conversation soon faded away. Zolt let the tension in the silence around him stretch just a touch longer.
"Evening, boys!" he called out into the container. "I trust you're hard at work shifting my goods."
The response was a unanimous chorus of acknowledgement and nodding heads whilst Zolt's eyes fell upon each of them.
"Good," he said before turning to the men around him. "Let's get the other one open, boys. Time's ticking along and I like keeping to schedule."
He turned his gaze towards a large, industrial grey building as they began to move away around him, a cargo loading bay situated towards the stern of the ship currently drawn up alongside the docks. The majority of the loading bay's gates were closed, the others blocked from view either by the trucks or large transport vans parked in front of them. So the sleek, black Satomobile sitting in their vicinity, angles smoothly curved and windows dark, looked decidedly out of place.
Zolt lifted his hands to tug at the lapels of his coat and went for a walk.
The officers were donning their armour all around her, bodies cocooned beneath curved, polished sheets of metal. At the insistence of their will, the armour sprang out from the confines of lockers, snapping tight around their limbs and torso.
Korra was standing at her little table, a set of body armour similar to that of the taskforce she briefly served on years before lying in front her. She could not put it on as swift and naturally as the officers around her, who transformed from men and women to hardened enforcers of the law in seconds. It was their second skin.
Korra, however, did not share the same comfort with the equipment the Chief provided her. Her armour had always been her bending, her physical strength and skill. She knew intimately her own flesh and blood. But Lin was refusing to take any chances. They did not know exactly what they could be going up against, what the triad might be capable of throwing back at them. Despite all that she might be, Korra was not invulnerable.
Though she may not have said it aloud, Korra could tell that her run-in with the Equalist had shaken something within Lin. She was one of the few who had never made a point of sizing Korra up with the man who came before her, but she had lived in his day and never witnessed him fall. She was now reminded however that in the end the Avatar was a mortal being like the rest of them.
With that thought consciously in mind, Korra felt doubts creeping up on her as she looked down at the armour.
Lin told her that there was evidence enough to assume the Equalist would make an appearance tonight. Mako's department was being fully involved in the operation. Everything had been a blur over the past several hours and she was not afforded the chance to speak to him. Worry was there, lingering just beneath the surface. Korra knew the Equalist's face and Mako did not. She had not told him, was not sure if she should. Her confrontation with the woman beneath the mask was fresh before her mind's eye. The look she wore, the fierce anger, bitter resentment and cold determination – Korra could not help but feel unsettled.
The feeling was compounded by the vision of herself knocked to the ground in ruthless fashion. The crack of Asami's fist across her face was a pain she would not soon forget. Korra might have stripped the mask off the woman, but she had lost the fight. To some deeply rooted sense of being that fact meant so much more. She hesitated, had been intimidated. Korra, clutched in sudden, real panic, had been made afraid for her very life.
Flicking her eyes around the room once more, Korra then turned back to the equipment waiting for her on the table. The blue, long sleeved vest she typically wore was replaced with a light, flexible undersuit, dark in colour. It would allow the armour to slip on and fit comfortably to her body whilst preserving mobility. She began to put it on at last, having to spend a minute adjusting it at the shoulders to accommodate her width. Clearly this particular set was not meant for a woman with her frame. Right now considering the circumstances, it was the best that could be done.
Korra joined the metalbenders in the briefing room once she was appropriately dressed. None had taken the chairs placed around the room, but gathered about the long table that the Chief was standing at the middle of, leaning forward. Sheets of paper large and small were spread in front of her, heavily marked with ink: maps of Republic City's port and its surrounding area. Lin looked up as the last of the officers entered behind Korra. She wore her determined resolve for all to see, mouth a thin line and eyes hard.
"Ladies and gentlemen," she began, gaze moving steadily between the faces looking back at her, "I will be perfectly honest with you. This is one of the most rushed operations I have ever conducted, but the fact of the matter is that there is very little time at hand. If we are to move it must be now, or we risk this opportunity slipping us by. I cannot allow that."
Perhaps it was the rigid figures of discipline that surrounded her, or the palpable tension that intensified the silence as the Chief paused, but as the woman rose to her full height, Korra practically snapped to attention, hands pulled behind her back, feet spread apart, shoulders broad and straight and her expression framed with utter seriousness. She was not exempt from the Chief's words or her eyes as they passed over her. The requirement of the men and women around her was no less important than her own. She stood with them, not apart from them.
"However, despite the circumstances," Lin continued, "you are my elite. You are the men and women I can trust above all else to get the job done. I had a personal hand in training each one of you that stands in this room and I know that you are far and beyond capable. So while we may not be ideally prepared for this operation, we are far from ill equipped to succeed nonetheless. Am I correct in saying so?"
Korra felt the air ripple with pride as every last man and woman, herself included, answered in the affirmative.
The car rocked slightly as Zolt pulled open the back door and got inside. Parked beneath the shadow of the loading bay, the interior of the saloon was dim, its distinct features blurred by strips of darkness. Zolt casually cast his eye around as he tugged his coat straight and settled into the backseat. "Interesting choice of vehicle," he commented. "I wouldn't have thought you to make use of your competitors' products, particularly this one."
The man sitting at the front of it looked over his shoulder. "No one looks twice at a Satomobile passing by anymore."
The corner of Zolt's mouth twitched. "Indeed," he said.
The angle that the car was parked at allowed Zolt to look through the passenger window and observe his men grouped around the two containers. He watched a pair of them moving across towards the loading bay. Two of the vans parked in front of it, unmarked and boxy in shape, were Zolt's. From the second, more compact container, its doors now pulled open, a straggle of migrants were emerging, clutching their meagre belongings close to hand. Zolt shifted his gaze back to the occupant of the driver's seat.
"To business then? We are both busy men, I'm sure."
His eyes were directed back to the passenger side window by a pointing hand. "I thought you came to supervise them."
"They've seen my face," Zolt said lightly. "That's enough. They'll know to keep their hands where I can see them."
"It is a costly investment you're making, importing these…goods, yet you trust them with men prepared to steal from you."
Zolt shifted his head minutely, catching movement in his periphery. The large vans trundled away from the loading bay out towards the containers. Upon reaching them, the way the men swung the vehicles around and parked obstructed Zolt's view of the larger container behind the first.
"I trust my men to know fear," he said, as they began to hustle the migrants into the back of the vans. "Now, I believe you have something for me."
The man did not move immediately, face wrapped in shadow still turned out towards the docks. But then he shifted, attention moving to the seat beside him. Reaching across he lifted an envelope of medium size into view.
"What names shall I find in there this time?" Zolt asked pleasantly.
The man did not smile. "I've gotten wind of the finer details of Sato's latest project. She is pushing hard for its integration into multiple police forces across the United Nations. If successful, she will put me in a very difficult position. I refuse to allow her to do that again," he said before almost brandishing the envelope in hand. "This is her primary research and development team. I've already had you remove one of them, the prestigious metalbender leading the project."
Zolt leaned forward to reach for the envelope as the man moved his arm to hand it over.
A sudden shout from beyond the Satomobile pulled his eyes back to the window.
"Cops!"
Silence stole over the two men. Both turned immediately to look through the windows and the envelope was forgotten.
Faint, pulsing red and blue light was beginning to emerge over the top of the foremost container. Brown faces not yet bustled into the crowded back of vans were slack with shock, eyes wide with panic. Zolt's men were staring out across the docks at something he could not see, feet dragging through numb backward steps. He found himself with his hand pressed to the flat of glass in front of him as the pulsing light grew vivid. Then he heard the chilling screech of tyres beyond the vans, rubber burnt and shredded.
And in that instant he knew fear.
Before a word could be uttered, a sound made, Zolt had thrown open the door and fled.
The roof of the loading bay was wrapped in shadows, and amongst them a woman lay in wait.
Masked and armoured, the Equalist carefully crept forwards along a shallow dip in the sloped metal panelling, keeping low to the darkness that shrouded her. Her golden eyes peeked over the edge of the building and observed the triad men congregate around the containers laid out in the open space of the docks. She watched as Zolt strode into their midst and spines went rigid with surprise. Then, pressing herself lower still to the cold metal of the roof, the Equalist tracked the man's path towards the Satomobile parked underneath the building's shadow.
Through less convenient means, she managed to scale the heights of the loading bay in time to see the car slow to a stop in front of it. She was suspicious even as the driver tucked themselves between the large vans and larger still trucks. To say the sleek black saloon looked out of place was an understatement and further, its windows were darkened. The Equalist could not pierce the tinted glass to determine the outline of an individual she could just about make out inside. The light by which she saw was already dim. Her brow tightened beneath the mask as Zolt walked towards the vehicle.
He got in and the door snapped shut behind him. The Equalist pondered for a long moment. She wanted to know who the triad boss was sitting in the car with. She wanted to know exactly why he was here in the first place. Through Bao she knew that the hulking metal crates the triad men were cracking open contained a big shipment. At first glance, Zolt was here to oversee its delivery. But the man wore a purposeful expression as he walked over to the Satomobile. The gears of her mind were turning as the Equalist looked down upon the roof of the car.
Just who had he come to see?
She was crawling forward with the intent to reposition herself and try to get a better look into the Satomobile, but fell deathly still as a pair of voices floated up towards her. She turned her gaze to see two men moving towards the vans parked up in front of the gates of the loading bay. The Equalist was on her stomach almost at the lip of the building. Were they only to look up, the bulk of her shadowed form lying there would look distinctly unusual. But they did not. The men walked forwards, disappearing from her sight as they stepped into the rank of parked vehicles.
The Equalist waited until the vans the men climbed into were moving away before she moved herself. Carefully pulling her body along the roof, she positioned herself towards the opposite side of the truck nearest the Satomobile. Flicking a cautious gaze both at it and up ahead to the activity taking place around the containers, she turned her body to line up with the edge of the roof and slipped her leg out into open air. Eventually hanging off of it with two hands and then one, eyes turned to the ground to gauge the distance of her fall, the Equalist let go. She landed with a lunging roll into cover behind the truck.
Pressing her back to the thick, wide rear tyre, the Equalist winced as pain briefly flared in her ankles. Turning her eyes out towards the docks as it passed, she saw people emerging from the depths of one of the containers, looking lost and confused – and the triad men were shepherding them into the backs of the pair of vans. Women, some quite young, appeared to make up most of the number. Mouth grimly tight, the Equalist turned her head and began to move out from behind cover. She could not let herself be distracted.
Leading first with a precautionary glance, she crept around to the back of the truck, keeping low and moving slowly. The Satomobile was parked slightly angled to the right, bonnet pointing at the vast cargo ship moored beside the docks. The Equalist just needed to see who was inside.
"Cops!"
Her eyes went round beneath large golden goggles as she heard the shout. Flashing a look around the corner of the truck, pulsing red and blue light over the tops of the containers confirmed what her ears disbelieved. And then the Equalist slammed herself back into cover as the rear door of the Satomobile was suddenly thrown open.
Zolt almost seemed to leap out bodily, the hem of his coat flailing through the air behind him. But the Equalist did not have eyes for him, for Zolt in his panic left the door partway open, and from her vantage point she could look through and glimpse the side of another man's face, turned towards the passenger side window. Fury was written upon it, mouth twisted into an ugly snarl, and the Equalist was moving as the engine of the Satomobile roared to life, powerful strides driving her forward without a care for being seen, because she was sure of what she had just seen, and that was the face of a man with which everything suddenly began to make sense.
Running up to the side of the car, she drew back her left arm and slammed her elbow straight into the passenger window. Harsh cracks splintered across its surface and the man inside jumped, startled. He flung his arms up when she put her fist through the window, spitting shards of glass into the car, but when the Equalist put her face to the gap torn into being she saw enough.
Eyes wide and jaw loose, Liwei Hong, CEO of Red Sun Technologies, stared back at her.
The doors at the back of the police van were thrown open and Korra leapt out into a warzone. A hunk of concrete spun through the air and smashed into the side of the van just as she cleared it. She and another officer hit the ground without their feet beneath them and the scrape of armour was harsh to her ear.
There were voices shouting all around her as Korra was pulled up by a hand underneath her armpit. Scorched metal filled her nostrils as she was dragged into cover behind the van. She and the two officers with her braced themselves as a bolt of flame arced over the top of the vehicle. A strike of earthbending origin moments later was powerful enough to push the van back into them.
"Avatar, we need to move!" the metalbender to her left spoke. He pointed upwards and behind her, directing her eyes to the stacked containers at their backs. "I'll get up there and cover you both."
Korra nodded her understanding and stood to the ready. The man threw his wire into the air and then counted down, expression fierce. He leapt upward on three. Korra and the remaining officer jumped out from behind cover a second later, just as the van teetered beneath a combination of earth and firebending.
She glimpsed the pair of containers standing out in the open before two slabs of concrete were pulled up to shield them. Korra tucked herself behind it as fire licked around the edges. Then with a swift, fluid movement she lowered her posture, weight shifting onto her leading leg as she punched her arm forward. The woman at her side mirrored the action almost perfectly, sending the earthen slabs rocketing into triad ranks.
Men scattered as the concrete sailed towards them. One was clipped on the shoulder and sent spinning, arm flung out at an unnatural angle. There was a loud crash as Korra's slab smashed into the open door of one of the containers, breaking apart and scattering itself across the ground. A van parked in front of it squealed its tyres and began pulling away. Unsecured, its rear doors fell open as it turned sharply away from the fight.
Even as she ran forwards, Korra's eyes grew wide as a young Water Tribe woman was violently thrown clear of the vehicle. She saw more clinging to the tiniest scrap of a handhold with desperate fear as the van sped away. Her mind was made up in an instant, not a shadow of a doubt deterring her.
Korra charged after it.
A wall of fire roaring into being at the periphery of her sight stole her attention. She was running, halfway through her powerful stride when she saw it, saw him.
Zolt.
He was bending furiously, swathing himself in his element and driving back the officers who challenged him. And for a moment, one eerily tranquil moment, Korra was entranced by the flames, by the way he wielded them with such authority and poise, so unlike the ugly, uncoordinated aggression of a thug – or even the contained, sharp precision of a pro-bender. He moved like the benders of old. His fire flowed with him, billowing outwards with burning heat. Korra could feel it rippling through the air, despite her distance from the fight. And that was the thought that shattered the moment, snapping her back to reality.
Zolt was fighting to escape. She saw him standing in front of her, the two of them alone in his office, a bulb of flame in his hand and a dangerous light in his eyes. And Korra was torn, a fire scorching through her and driving her to chase. But her gaze flicked away from the fight and saw metalbenders in hot pursuit of the van. She had not a hope of moving as swift and fluidly as they did. Every moment she waited was one wasted, and the van slipped further from her reach.
So Korra turned back to Zolt, because he was not beyond her, because she was the reason he could fight all, because she once made him a promise she had never forgotten and now was the time to honour it.
She would make him pay.
The Equalist would have had a hand around his throat, except the man flattened the accelerator to the floor and punched out at her. She jerked her head back, avoiding the reach of Liwei's fist, but then her eyes widened beneath the mask as the air grew hot and a spark was struck alight at the tip of the man's knuckles.
Pushing off the car, the Equalist threw herself to the side, falling into the partially open rear door and just avoiding the flames belched out of the window. The wheels of the Satomobile screeched, the car shooting forward as her impact with it snapped the door shut and she hit the ground. She scrambled in vain to chase after it, stumbling to her feet. But the only thing her grasping hand caught on to was smoke.
The Equalist's eyes darted about, wide as her chest sharply rose and fell. Then they found a man fleeing in her direction, making desperately for the line of vans sitting in wait in front of the loading bay. She was standing right out in the open, but he had yet to see her, attention fixed solely on his means of escape. The Equalist sprang into motion without wasting another moment, her own desperate hope all pinned to a single possibility.
The man began turning as he belatedly registered her movement. By the time he was coming around to face her, arms rising reactively, she was on top of him.
The Equalist looked up from his splayed out form on the ground as she heard the jangling sound of metal. The keys the man had been carrying flew from his hand when her fist crashed into his jaw. The Equalist chased after and scraped them off the ground. Then she covered the rest of the distance to the nearest van, eyes finding the tail light of Liwei's Satomobile as it whipped around the far corner of the loading bay. She violently threw the door open and by utter miracle managed to ram the key home into the ignition slot first time.
Engine rumbling with a heavy, oily voice as she gripped the wide steering wheel of the bulky vehicle, Asami floored the accelerator and kicked the van into motion.
Everything seemed to go south the moment Korra joined the fray.
Zolt's men rallied to him from all sides as he fought his way through the police ranks. A pair of cars swung in out of nowhere and skidded to a halt in front of him. Zolt arced torrents over their roofs, forcing back the officers trying to chase him down. Korra narrowly avoided being slashed across the face by a water whip, ducking low and to the side. Triad men were pouring into the Accords as she rose with a vengeance, for a moment fighting each other. She slapped aside the whip as the man in front of her snapped it forward. Crushing his will beneath hers, Korra stole the water from his control and entangled his legs in solid ice.
The squeal of tyres stole her attention from him as he fell backwards with widened eyes. Abandoned men were chasing after the pair of cars as they took flight. Fire billowed out the windows of both, heat rolling off the burning walls. Korra threw herself aside as the drivers angled right through the middle of the fight, flames expanding above her head. Metalbenders in her vicinity followed suit – if they were quick enough.
They all scrambled to find their feet again as the Accords tore past. One officer lashed out hurriedly with earthbending, ripping through the ground and kicking out the rear end of the trailing car. But it quickly straightened out again, burning rubber as it gunned for the gap between the nearest stacks of containers.
Korra was running long before she consciously realised it, but again the distance between her and her quarry only grew. She was breathing hard when pain stabbed at her lung and her stride faltered. Her eyes were wide and hot as she watched the cars become smaller with every passing moment.
Zolt was getting away.
She couldn't catch him now. He was too far away for even her bending to be of any use. There was nothing Korra could do. And the thought filled her with such impassioned rage that she screamed right there, fists clenched as her voice rang through the night. And then the ground was quivering beneath her as Korra clenched her teeth and her lips curled, tiny cracks splintering its surface as bright blue eyes began to shine.
White and fierce, power erupted out from within her.
The wind whipping up around her, Korra turned her left foot outward and slid it backwards. The ground fractured beneath her sole when she crouched low, the hard, scuffed surface of the boot grinding into the concrete. She looked upward with blazing eyes, light spilling from their depths, up towards the huge containers stretching far and stacked insurmountably high. Beneath her the earth rumbled, growling her promise. Tonight, she was not going to let Zolt get away.
Strength attained from a thousand lifetimes, from the thousand men and women that came before her, flooded outward from her deepest core and saturated every last fibre of her being. And when Korra leapt, legs powering her upwards into the sky, the combined will of earth and air shattered the ground beneath her.
She was flying again, soaring, rising high with the rush of the wind in her ear. And Korra reached, arms stretching out and hands grasping for that impossible height, because she was still only human and upon her Nature imposed its limits. And despite her great strength, she was falling short. But yet she reached. In the grip of her power, light blazing through all of her being, Korra was defiant.
She crashed onto the edge of the highest container, more than thirty feet from the ground below. The landing was ugly and painful, Korra's arms circling wildly through the air. Momentum from her ascent spilled into a roll across the corrugated roof of the container. Her hands scrabbled for purchase, Korra shouting her impatience.
Her balance was ungainly as she managed to find her feet, staggering forward into a run. Shining eyes turned to sweep across the vast, almost labyrinthine layout of the docks. Shipping containers of all sorts and sizes were stacked high and in lengthy rows everywhere she looked. But her eyes were only searching for one thing: Zolt's car, speeding through the dock's corridors.
And then she spotted it.
Korra was moving at full tilt when she veered to the left and leapt off the container. Her arc through the air was high as she soared over the concrete gap and then began her descent. Metal clanged with her fall, Korra diving into a roll to save herself as she stumbled upon landing.
With the next jump she made, glimpsing her quarry disappearing behind another row of containers, Korra gathered her knees to her chest and leapt even further still. Air swirled rapidly beneath her feet as she landed once more, softening the otherwise sharp impact. Picking herself up with eyes narrowed and arms pumping, Korra drove herself forward. She was not going to let Zolt get away.
Her last jump carried her the furthest. Korra curved out towards the far edge of the containers, knees high and boots a rapid beat upon ridged steel before she swung sharply back inwards. Her scream was a declaration as her foot hit the edge, lips split wide in fury and eyes alight with power.
The leap carried her far, far beyond any feat of strength Korra had yet performed in all her years. She sailed through the air, clearing concrete and container alike before Nature desperately grabbed at her feet. She was human; she was not meant to fly. But with arms spread wide and a furious gaze, the Avatar did just that.
A tight funnel of wind spun itself into existence as she hurtled towards the ground, rising up into the air at a steep angle to catch her. Folding itself around her lower body, the funnel stole the lethal momentum from her descent, widening at the base and driving upwards. Nevertheless, Korra landed hard, hitting the ground and stumbling into a falling roll.
With hands scrabbling for purchase she tried to find her feet, but still carried by momentum staggered backwards and almost took a nasty fall. A harsh growl escaped her throat when her back slammed into the side of a container, legs just about holding her up. Her eyes still burned as she pushed herself off of it. But then Korra winced as pain stabbed at her left knee, folding as the brunt of the shocks her legs had absorbed in landing caught up with her. The roar of dual engines lifted her face however, and she bared her teeth as the triad cars raced towards her. They would be on top of her in moments. Two men leaned out of the windows of the foremost car, one already with flames in hand.
Korra pushed past the pain tearing through her limb and stood tall, drawing back her left arm. Air whistled in towards her curled fist, spiralling furiously into a condensed, near visible ball. Korra roared as she then threw her arm forward in a vicious overhand hook. The funnel of cyclonic wind exploded outwards from her fist, curving down through the air in the blink of an eye and driving straight into the bonnet of the leading Accord.
The force it carried buckled the metal and drove the front of the car violently downwards. Sparks were thrown every which way as its floor screeched along the ground, the Accord jerking wildly out of control. Korra lashed out with earthbending and struck the car again as it began fishtailing, hitting just in front of the passenger side door with an angled spike. The Accord was smacked aside, losing completely control and crashing straight into the side of a container.
Korra didn't have time to survey the damage she had done – the second car swerved to the right, barely avoiding clipping her. A familiar face was leaning out of the window however as she spun around.
Zolt pushed another wall of fire out in front of her, filling her view with billowing orange. Korra's eyes flared and she swept her hand upwards, pushing aside the flames with air to see the back of the car growing smaller. She reacted on pure instinct and reached with an arm flung forward. But she was grasping at air. The car was beyond Korra's reach. Or so it would have been, were her will not made of iron. The sheer power flowing through Korra magnified the reach of her metalbending, and with a snarl she latched onto the back of the Accord.
Despite the strength in her back and arms, Korra pulling backwards with all that she had, the machine was stronger than flesh, and though inhibited the forward momentum of the car carried it onward. Korra was dragged forwards several steps behind it, eyes wide and filled with light. She was in danger of losing her feet entirely. The driver was grinding his foot into the pedal to fight her influence. So she switched gears, reaching into the chassis and finding a grip on the Accord's rear axle. Korra screamed as she pulled.
The tearing of metal was a terrible sound. Even more so was the piercing screech as the rear end of the car slammed into the ground and spat out a torrent of sparks. Korra stumbled backwards and fell hard as the opposing pulls on the axle wrenched it free.
The world slipped out of focus as her eyes lost their light. The ache of nausea pulsed through her as Korra blindly pushed herself up onto her hands, pain lancing through her muscles. Her head turned at a familiar sound: the whistle and thunk of a metalbender's wires slicing through the air and finding its target. That sound was multiplied over and again, all around her, and Korra heard voices shouting, "On your knees! Hands on your head!"
Her sight cleared and she turned to look behind her, seeing the officers that had converged on the first car she took out. One of the men roughly pulled from the front seats sported a nasty gash just above the eye. Korra had no sympathy for him, and she did not spare him her attention for much longer. Her eyes turned again as metalbenders were swinging down from the containers toward the second car. Behind her an arrest was taking place; ahead there was a fight.
Korra pushed herself to her feet even as she heard her name called. She felt sluggish, drained by the use of massive power she had tapped into. Nevertheless, as her eyes locked onto Zolt fleeing under the cover of his men, driver and cohort slinging fireballs and earthbending projectiles through the air, she drove herself forwards into a run.
Before she even reached them, Zolt's men were face down on the ground with police officers kneeling on their backs. "Avatar!" someone yelled after her, but she was not going to stop now. Zolt had just disappeared around the nearest corner, the hem of his coat flicking against corrugated steel. He threw a hurried look back over his shoulder, the expression of a hunted man carved into his features. Korra caught only a glimpse of it and smelled his mounting panic. It stirred something primal within her and she pushed harder after him, hearing metalbender's wires whistling behind her.
Zolt was an older man and Korra young and hot-blooded in pursuit of him. He wasted a moment to half turn and wildly firebend at her, which Korra only swerved from her path to avoid. She bore down on him as the man dragged his hand along ridged steel and propelled himself around the next corner. When she reached it herself, metalbenders hot on her heels as she turned into the narrow gap, Korra began to slow from her sprint.
It was over.
Zolt ran right up to the dead end with the air of a desperate man. He had seen it the moment he turned the corner. A stack of shipping containers cut off the end of the path, tall and unyielding. Korra was merely walking now, expression cold as she watched Zolt pound impotently on the metal wall in front of him.
She did not take her eyes off him as the officers tailing her arrived on the scene. Several congregated around her, swinging down from the heights of the containers to land smoothly at Korra's side. The remainder preserved the advantage of terrain, moving along the tops of containers on both sides to truly corral the triad boss into a corner.
"We'll take things from here, Avatar Korra," a voice to her left spoke, but she was paying little attention. Her eyes were fixed on Zolt.
The man's gaze was flicking all around him with increasing dismay. His back was pressed to the cold steel behind him, hands flat against the container as she and the officers closed the distance between them. And for a moment Korra was disgusted by his display of weakness. This was the great Lightning Bolt Zolt, whom had maintained a hold of the city's largest criminal organisation despite adversity for years, now reduced to a pitiable figure who could not accept his fate? But then suddenly Korra stopped, because suddenly Zolt moved.
Eyes narrowed as they found her, the man's expression shifting into a fierce snarl. Without thinking, Korra threw out her arm to stop the metalbender beside her. She knew the look Zolt was wearing. They had relentlessly chased him down and driven him into a corner with no way of escape, as a predator would its prey. Except that this predator was the Avatar, who when she fell upon his throat would almost certainly tear away his bending. And he had already faced such a circumstance in Amon, all those years ago, where he had stolen away Zolt's bending.
Korra watched him when he fought the masked revolutionist. Amon tightened the cage around him until the inevitable was Zolt's only reality, and the man in his final, desperate act unleashed a lightning storm that threatened to destroy half the building. Zolt was a mere shadow after that, grasping at every last straw in order to survive as the threat of betrayal hung over his head. Bending was his power, the root of all his influence. He would kneel at the Avatar's feet to get it back. And now, trapped and threatened with no way out, Zolt would do anything to save it.
He pushed away from the wall at his back, with a fluid movement bringing up his hands towards his chest. Korra leaned forward, gaze intense upon him. Zolt was bending, but this was unlike anything she had seen since stepping foot in Republic City. This was the bending of old, of the firebending masters who had instructed her, of the scrolls she was made to study for hour upon hour, of the stories Katara whispered to her when as a child she could not find rest. And it was only at the last possible moment that Korra recognised the technique, as the officer she was holding back threw aside her arm in impatience and called to his fellows.
Her eyes went round as Zolt's flashed.
There was no time to think, no time to lift an earthen wall to protect herself and the men and women moving to action around her. Korra leapt ahead of them instead and thrust her hands forward into the oncoming firestorm.
The explosive force of the flames as they smashed into her almost overcame Korra and threw her arms wide apart. Her sheer force of will held them at bay, massive tongues of fire licking the air mere feet from Korra's face. The heat was painfully intense, scorching the air as flames surged into the barrier she erected before them. Their roar was deafening, a furious shriek of power. There was nothing but rolling hues of burning orange before her eyes and try as she might it was inching closer, second by second.
Zolt was stronger than her. It was a shocking truth that hammered her in the chest and tore a gasp from her lips. Korra could feel her arms being pushed apart as her face and neck grew unbearably hot. She was losing the contest of wills. Half a dozen lives were at stake at her back and she, the Avatar, was losing to a man fighting only to preserve himself. But that man was desperate, willing to do anything to protect that which defined him.
And he was pressing her back onto her heels, threatening to engulf Korra whole with flames she simply could not hold back. Fire was who she was; it was her element. She was its master with the first orange bulb she cupped in her little palm. But the plain fact of the matter, as Korra clenched her teeth and visibly shook with her arms forced wider and wider apart, was simply that in this moment Zolt was stronger.
He knew the world years beyond her own experience, had trained in the old ways that many in the modern day saw little and less value in. Zolt was in the seat of his power, holding nothing back. He had everything to lose and refused absolutely to do so. And she was tired, drained, hurting as her body strained with all it could give and intense heat rolled over her flesh. She could not do it on her own. She just didn't have the strength. But Korra had learned many lessons over the years.
She was no longer too proud to ask for help.
An old man stood with her, tall and regal with white hair and beard. He too had his arms outstretched towards the depths of the firestorm, deep crimson robes billowing all around him as the flames screamed. "Help me!" Korra gasped, eyes wide with fear as she felt herself slipping.
Roku did not speak with his voice. Korra watched as he brought his hands in towards his body, palms turning to face upwards. Then he began to move them in smooth, circling motions, inwards and outwards, before pushing his arms out to either side of him. Korra understood. She had to let the energy of the fire flow along its natural course, rather than press back and try to contain it as she was doing now. The firestorm would only continue to grow with Zolt fuelling it and would soon explode beyond the remains of her strength; an inevitable end. But she shook her head at the old man.
"I can't! Not there!"
Korra could sense the men and women behind her, hiding enclosed behind shields torn up out of the ground. The flames wanted to surge past her, swallowing the space between the stacked rows of shipping containers and bursting out into the docks. She knew its intent, could feel the fire's energy pushing directly against hers. But to let it naturally flow would be to scorch alive those at her back. She didn't know what else to do.
Roku showed her.
With a roar of her own, unearthed from deep within her belly, Korra stopped fighting the storm.
Zolt's flames swallowed her whole in a moment and the man grinned madly, triumphant. But his cheer was premature, and his face fell as he felt his influence over the flames suddenly begin to wane. Their ferocity was cooled and they started to wind their way forward, converging on the spot where the Avatar had once stood. And still she stood there, her will shaped as a concave of clear space ahead of her and thick, swirling fire beyond it. But the storm was in her power now. Its roar was music to her ear. Korra joined her own voice to it as she gathered the last of Zolt's flames to herself before lifting her arms upwards.
A thick, burning column blasted high into the night sky.
Zolt could only stare, impotent as the torch burnt itself out. A woman with eyes ablaze stood at the edge of a swath of scorched, blackened concrete when it finally dissipated. Behind her, metalbenders were slowly beginning to emerge from their cocoons. Not one of them spoke a word and all had their gaze fixed upon the Avatar. The air around her shimmered with the heat of her rage.
She moved to take a step forward and the blackened concrete turned itself over like fresh soil beneath the shadow of her boot. Her will forged a path as she stalked inexorably towards him. Zolt was already aware of the wall at his back, of his legs folding underneath him. But then instinct flared urgently within the man and action preceded thought. Lightning, cold, white and blinding, surged to his fingertips and Zolt knew only a single intent as his eyes found the Avatar's.
He flung out his hand and she stretched out hers, but her intent became action long before his. A mere pebble sliced through the space between them, invisibly quick. Zolt yelled when it struck the very tips of his pointed fingers. The harsh shock travelled right through the digits and fractured bone. Lightning fizzled out harmlessly in the air as Zolt snatched back his hand. The shadow of a woman gradually fell over him.
And the Avatar at last stood in front of him, full of wrath, armour scorched black and flayed away skin glistening pink. She looked down on him with cold fury radiating from her eyes, seeing all that he had done, all who he had thought to grind beneath the heel of his shoe. And when she spoke, uttering a promise that had clung like a parasite to the depths of Zolt's consciousness, he shook. A voice of thunder issued from curled lips, merciless as it rang with the finality of his judgement.
"I told you I would come for you."
And then she descended upon him.