Korra spun with the blast of the explosion, bending the shockwave around herself at the moment of impact. With a full turn, she sent the blast back the way it had come from. P'Li's eyes widened at the sight of her own blast surging through the air towards her, and she lunged away to avoid the redirected explosion. Chunks of ice tore into the ground as the explosion hit, opening a crater in its wake where P'Li had been standing seconds before.
Amon and Tarrlok seized the momentary distraction to make one more attempt at bloodbending Korra. A futile effort, in the face of her raging Avatar State. Unlike the first time they'd subdued her, power ignited within her stronger than before, unyielding even to the combined might of the bloodbending brothers. She would not be stopped this time. She could not be stopped. Korra whirled a kick towards them with an arcing slash of wind. Amon and Tarrlok launched airborne like a pair of dolls and slammed against the cave wall, rupturing cracks through the ice on impact. Without hesitation, Korra raced forward with shards of ice tearing up from the ground behind her in preparation to strike.
The familiar pop pop of a combustion blast streaked towards her. With a sharp turn, she liquefied her ice and smothered the explosion with a stifling sphere of water. A clench of her fist, and the sphere hardened into ice. She kept pushing, guiding her arm forward to launch the frozen orb through the air. P'Li stepped back, shielded herself with a lash of fire. Not quick enough. Ice exploded against her chest in a cloud of frozen shards that cut like razors into her flesh. P'Li crumpled to the ground with a scream, multiple jagged blades of ice piercing her body. She landed flat on her backside. No getting up from that. She lay there twitching and unable to sit up right, each breath wheezing outward with shrill gasps of pain.
Amon and Tarrlok both slid forward across the frozen ground, attacking in tandem while the Avatar was distracted. Tarrlok pulled a swirling orb of water around himself and unleashed a barrage of icy blades from the surface, while Amon tore apart a portion of the ceiling and melted the ice into water. He coiled the water through the air in a twisting torrent and brought it crashing down upon his target.
Without even looking, Korra whirled her arms and redirected the torrential stream before it could strike her. The spiraling current took a sharp turn towards Tarrlok, flooding his frozen projectiles and lifting him from his feet. Korra shifted her stance again and expanded the water into a crushing wave that crashed over Amon as well. The impact jostled his mask free from his face and threw off his hood, before flattening both him and his brother once again into the cavern wall.
"You cannot win!" Korra said, with a booming echo to her voice.
Amon heaved a deep breath, as he sat up on his knees. "We don't have to, Avatar. We only need to keep you busy."
"Yes, by now the rest of your friends should have been dealt with," Tarrlok said. "It's almost sad, really. All that power and you still won't be able to save them."
Korra's glowing ire burned hotter, as a whirling cyclone lifted her into the air. She raised her arms, causing two spiraling streams of water to lift up from the ice under her control. As she rotated her arms, so too did the water, until the spinning streams began to glow bright yellow.
"Wait, what are you doing?" Tarrlok questioned, with a critical glare.
Before he had a chance to question further, the same yellow light burst from his eyes and mouth, lifting a panicked scream into his throat. Amon suffered the same, and within a short few moments the light dissolved into countless tiny flecks that slowly dimmed and vanished into the air. When the light was gone, both bodies crumpled limp and unmoving to the ground, nothing but empty, vacant husks. Their spirits had returned to the Spirit World to be at peace, no longer inhabiting the artificial shells Sen had created for them.
With both Amon and Tarrlok taken care of, Korra turned back to P'Li. The combustionbender grimaced, as she slowly removed each of the frozen shards from her body. One by one, she plucked them from her flesh, stifling a grunt of pain with each one she freed. When she removed the last one, she let her head fall back against the icy ground and closed her eyes, heaving deep, raspy breaths into her lungs. Korra took a few steps closer and stood over the woman, glaring down at her with the merciless, burning gaze of the Avatar.
"Where is Sen?" Korra asked.
"I don't know." P'Li cracked her eyes open to look up at the Avatar. A brief cough burst from her throat, expelling a mist of crimson droplets into the air. "He just told us to wait here. Said he knew you'd be coming and we were supposed to stop you. Then he left."
Korra's gaze narrowed, but she said nothing. She merely shifted back into her spiritbending stance and began to whirl her arms once again. If P'Li didn't know anything, she was of no use. Better to send her back to the Spirit World where she belonged.
"I didn't want to do this, you know," P'Li muttered, wiping a line of blood from her lips. "I didn't ask to be brought back and enslaved by some spirit. If it were up to me, I'd... I'd find Zaheer, and you'd never see us again."
Korra paused. Her glare softened, and she lowered her arms. As far as she knew, the spirits Sen brought back were supposed to be completely under his control, mindless outside of their servitude to him, and yet P'Li was expressing regret? Straightening her posture, Korra allowed the light in her eyes to flicker and dim. "I heard you back at the palace say you didn't care about Zaheer anymore."
"No, that's not—that wasn't me talking." P'Li forced herself upright to her elbows. In spite of the visible agony creasing across her face, she held firm. "Sen, he has this... this hold over us. It makes us think things, say things, act like we normally wouldn't. Some of us, at least. I'm sure you knew that already, but it... it's like it slips sometimes. I don't feel it right now. Like his presence is gone, or something. Maybe it's the pain, I don't know."
Korra's mind raced with sudden thoughts. If that was true, if Sen's hold over those he'd brought back could slip in such a fashion, it meant his control was weak. If it was weak, perhaps she could figure out a way to sever it completely. If she could do that, she'd be able to help Suyin and Zuko.
"Just get it over with already," P'Li muttered, as she let herself collapse flat against the ground. "I'm ready to go back. This whole experience has been a nightmare."
Korra focused a careful stare on the fallen woman. After a moment of consideration, she knelt down at P'Li's side and held her hands against the combustionbender's forehead.
P'Li blinked in confusion. "What are you doing?"
Korra didn't answer. She remained silent and still, closing her eyes as she reached into P'Li's mind with her own chi. Like water filtering through cracks in a wall, she slowly pushed her way deeper, until she found what she was looking for: a solid, unmistakable connection to the woman's very spirit. With that connection made, she opened her eyes again. They burned white, as the glow of the Avatar State once again fueled her. P'Li uttered a shrill gasp, her own eyes flaring wide with a blank stare. Moments later, her eyes glowed an identical white, touched by Korra's Avatar Spirit.
When the glow faded from both their eyes, P'Li turned her head and coughed out a bloodied gasp. "What did you do to me?"
"I think I just freed you from Sen's control," Korra said, with a furrowed brow. "I felt the connection he had with you and I overpowered it with Raava's energy. It should be gone now. Permanently."
P'Li blinked at the Avatar in confusion. "So, I'm... I'm free? And alive..."
"Yes, for the moment. What happens next is up to you."
"What do you mean?"
"Well, by all accounts I should send your spirit back to the Spirit World, just like I did to Amon and Tarrlok. For everything you did in your previous life, it would only be fitting."
P'Li swallowed. "Then why haven't you?"
"Because I believe in compassion, and I think you've already suffered enough." Korra shifted on the ground, sitting cross-legged next to the combustionbender. "I'd rather not have to spiritbend you, to be honest. Bending spirits is always so sad. If you surrender, I won't have to do that. Better yet, if you help us... well, who knows? I've seen people get second chances who you'd never think could. I've seen them embrace those second chances. What about you?"
P'Li's eyes narrowed with skepticism. "What about me?"
"You have a new life right now," Korra said. "That's as good an opportunity for a second chance as I can think of. The way your life was before, the running, the terrorizing, the constant fear, all of that? It doesn't have to be like that the second time around. You want to make a difference? You want to help people? Then you do it a different way. A better way. You can start by helping us stop Sen from destroying humanity."
P'Li stared at the Avatar in utter silence. Her lips floundered, as though struggling to come up with the right words to respond. She settled with a deep exhale out her nose, shaking out of her disbelief. "You would give me that chance, knowing the things I've done? Knowing how I feel about everything?"
"Yes, I would. The real question here is: do you want that chance?"
Another pause. P'Li shifted her focus towards the frozen ground, deep in contemplation. "Even if I did, I wouldn't be much use to you right now. I can't even stand."
"I can help with that," Korra said, calling a bubble of water around her hands. She held her hands over the woman's wounds, and the water began to glow. "I should be able to heal you enough to walk under your own power, at least. Should only take a few minutes."
P'Li's wounds gradually shrank and closed. In the limited amount of time that they had, Korra couldn't heal them completely, but they'd be manageable. Within a short few minutes, P'Li's pained grimacing eased and disappeared. She sat upright and flexed her arms, testing her muscles now that they were free of pain.
Korra stood up, looked down at the woman sitting in front of her, and held out her hand. "Well?"
P'Li stared at the Avatar's hand for a long while, eyes flickering with careful thought. The beginnings of a decision sparked moments later, and her gaze sharpened. With a firm grasp of Korra's hand, she pulled herself upright and looked down at her. At her full height, she towered over the Avatar by nearly a foot. "Lead the way."
Eska and Desna attacked in perfect unison with each other. Over the years, their twin telepathy had only grown stronger, as had their connection to each other. As a result, their combat skills had increased to new heights. They attacked together, defended together, and covered each other's blind spots with expert precision. Ming-Hua learned the hard way exactly how much the twins had improved, as she ducked and weaved around an unrelenting barrage of ice spikes raining down from the ceiling.
The first time they'd fought, Ming-Hua had outmaneuvered the twins' attacks and incapacitated them with little effort. Not this time. No, this time they forced her to stay on the defensive, each strike closer than the last. A pair of frozen spears crashed at her feet, forcing her to stumble backwards. A following barrage swarmed toward her. Freezing her water arms into frozen scythes, she furiously cleaved away at the projectiles to protect herself. The assault only grew fiercer. Within seconds, she became buried beneath a crushing pile of ice. The twins held their stance and waited.
Ice ruptured and exploded, as Ming-Hua burst free into the open atop a rippling wave. With a fierce shout, she propelled herself towards the twins. A pair of water streams swirled around her and lashed out at either sibling. Once again, Eska and Desna defended in unison, bending the water around their bodies and redirecting it back at their attacker. Ming-hua countered with a shift in stance, causing the water to freeze solid into a single, solid mass of cascading icy streams suspended in midair. With a following spin of her body, the ice exploded into a shower of frozen shrapnel. The twins stumbled backwards, shifting frozen walls in front of themselves for protection. Ming-Hua seized the opening, and raced forward to press her attack.
While the twins kept Ming-Hua busy, Hari made his move against Gahzan. He shifted his stance with a half step, pushing his cloud of sand through the air to surround the lavabender. With a firm clench of his fingers, the coarse grains coalesced into solid lances and shot forward. Gahzan smirked, raising his fists to lift a pyramid of earth around himself. The moment the lances struck the wall, he pushed his arms outward and melted the earth into liquid fire.
Lava burst out in a scorching spray, forcing Hari to lift his own defensive wall. It didn't last. Dark earth glowed red, as his wall swiftly melted down into another mass of lava. Hari jumped back to keep his distance, and Gahzan countered by spreading the pool of molten rock towards him. Within moments, Hari found himself backed against the cave wall with nowhere to go, lava pooling steadily towards him. Quite possibly the most literal game of The Floor Is Lava he'd ever seen. With a desperate shift in stance, he called his sand beneath his feet and packed it together, dense and firm. Upward force pushed him into the air above the burning ground below, as he hovered near the ceiling of the cavern atop a sandy cloud.
"Neat trick," Gahzan said, "but it's not going to help you."
The lavabender threw molten plumes into the air. Hari guided himself left and right, weaving around the attacks. One of the burning streams scorched dangerously close, singeing one of the sandbender's sleeves and melting part of his sand cloud. With a swift, sharp turn, he escaped further harm. He dodged twice more and guided himself into better position above solid ground, leaving the lava behind. Now he could strike back. Standing upright atop his cloud, he punched his fists forward in rapid succession. With each thrust, a solid clump of sand fired downward.
The volley of projectiles thudded into Gahzan's body like cannonballs. He reeled backwards, dropping to one knee with his eyes wide in shock. Hari leaped from his cloud to solid ground and pulled his fist back. Sand raced forward and clumped together into a much larger fist, mimicking his actions. With a swift punch, the giant sand fist launched towards his opponent. Condensed sand drove square into Gahzan's chest and smashed him against the cave wall, rupturing a spiderweb of cracks outward from the point of impact. When the sand pulled back, he crumpled to his knees with a groan.
"So, is my sand still 'cute'?" Hari asked, as he coiled the grains around himself in a flowing stream.
Gahzan scoffed, lifting his head to meet the sandbender's eyes. "A little." His gaze shifted sharply to the left, as he raked his fingers across the ground and tossed a molten wave through the air.
Hari's eyes flared when he realized the target—not him, but an unaware Eska busy defending against one of Ming-Hua's attacks. "Eska!"
Eska spun around at the sound of her name. Not quick enough. No time to defend herself or move out of the way. She could only turn and cover her head with her arms in the split second before the molten stream crashed atop her. In that second, a stream of water raced forward and cocooned Eska within a defensive bubble. When lava met cold water, a cloud of hissing steam erupted throughout the chamber. Within seconds, the lava cooled and hardened, solidifying into solid rock.
Eska stumbled out out of the steam cloud and looked to her brother. "Thank you, Desna."
Her brother gave a simple nod. "You're welc—hurrkk!"
A spray of blood exploded from Desna's lips, mixing with the steam in the air. An icy scythe emerged from the haze, skewering him through the left side of the chest—straight through his heart. Ming-Hua emerged from the steam with a wicked cackle, smirking triumphantly at the twins. She gave the scythe a single yank and pulled it free from her victim, allowing Desna to crumple to the ground in a rapidly growing pool of his own blood.
"You really shouldn't turn your back on your enemy," Ming-Hua said. "It's poor manners."
Eska screamed. It was a horrid, guttural shriek, unlike any sound a human should ever utter, incoherent and incomprehensible in its agony. She collapsed to her knees, clutching a hand over her chest as though she could feel the same pain as her brother. Even as Ming-Hua approached her, she remained paralyzed on her knees, staring with wild, tear-streaked eyes at her brother.
"Don't worry, you'll be joining him in a moment," Ming-Hua stated, as she raised her icy scythe blade for another strike. Desna's blood trickled down the curved edge, dripping steadily onto the earth below. "Try to enjoy the afterlife. Speaking from experience, it's a real drag."
Ming-Hua pulled the scythe back, ready to cleave it forward. Her body froze. Clumps of coiling sand wrapped over her torso, down her legs, and crept over her shoulders, severing her connection to her water. Ice crumbled away, and the scythe arms disappeared. Ming-Hua's eyes flared, panicking as she struggled to break free. No use. The more she fought against it, the more the sand encased her. Within seconds, the sand had entombed her up to her neck. It hardened, became denser, and pressed tight. Bones cracked and snapped beneath the pressure, lifting a shrill scream of agony from the waterbender's throat.
Hari stepped forward with a fist clenched, glaring at the waterbender with seething, unrestrained fury. "You will not hurt anyone else. Ever."
"Ming-Hua!" Gahzan sprang to his feet and shifted his stance, preparing to attack the sandbender. He never saw the cold wave of water crashing down atop him. The water froze instantly, encasing him with a solid block of ice.
Still trapped in a partial daze, Eska lowered her arm and raced to her brother's side. His face was pale, weak, and fading. Relaxed, in a way, as though merely asleep. There wasn't even any pain. Spirits, how close to death was he?
"Desna, don't worry, you'll be fine," she insisted, with a strained stutter in her voice. No telling if he could even hear her, but the reassurance was as much for herself as it was for him. "I will fix this."
Hari knelt beside her with a frantic stare at Desna's wound. "How bad is it?"
"I-I... I don't know, I'm not..." A hiccup broke her voice. Tears streaked down her face, staining her cheeks with running makeup, but she did nothing to stop it. "What do I do? What do I do?"
"You have to heal him," Hari said.
Eska snapped a disbelieving look at him. "But I don't know how!"
"You've been taking lessons, haven't you?" Hari raised an eyebrow at her. Eska had been trying to keep it a secret, but Hari knew she had been meeting with Northern healers in recent weeks to learn the art.
"I... I've only just started learning. I practice on fish. I do not have the skills for this." She shifted attention back to her brother, and her heart skipped a beat. He'd stopped breathing. The normally stoic woman lurched forward with a panicked squeal. "Desna!"
"You have to try!" Hari grabbed Eska by the shoulders and turned her towards him, so he could stare into her eyes. "Please."
Eska swallowed when she saw his eyes. They offered a strange sort of comfort, and reassurance. Strength, even. When she finally tore her gaze away from his, she floated a bubble of water around her hands. Her heart pounded against her chest and her hands shook, but still she pressed the water to Desna's wound. With a deep, shuddering breath, the water began to glow. "It will be okay, Desna. You'll be alright. Please... please be alright."
