A/N: As promised, this is a long one, so grab a snack and buckle up.
It's fair to say that the three of them entered the police station with their hearts on their throats. Even clueless Akemi could feel something was wrong and remained awfully quiet.
She sat on Korra's lap in the waiting room while Asami talked to the agent at the desk. Korra pulled every trick up her sleeve to try and keep Akemi distracted in the meantime, spinning a pellet with airbending for the girl to catch. But as an officer stepped into the room along with a lady that looked quite uptight in her brown pencil skirt, Korra knew all sense of calm was about to be thrown out the window.
She let go of the pellet as she saw her approaching. It spun out of her hand, clattering on the ground in rhythm with the woman's heels against the floor.
"Hi there, Akemi, right?" The woman said in a sweet-sounding voice, as she knelt in front of the girl. Akemi already wanted nothing to do with her and clung tighter to Korra, only glaring at the stranger from the corner of her eye.
Asami approached and took a seat beside them.
"Sweetie, this is Jin-Li, she is here to help you" Akemi didn't seem to change her mind about the woman "You are going to stay with her for a little bit while we talk to the officer" Asami pointed to Lao-Tzu, the agent she had talked to earlier on the phone.
Akemi caught the part about them leaving her alone with a stranger and all alarms went off. She looked up at Asami with terror in her eyes and shook her head side to side adamantly. Korra's shirt creased between her little fists as she tightened her grip.
"I have puzzles and games we can play with in the other room" Jin-Lin said, not really helping the situation.
"It's okay, tiny, later we can-" Korra was about to promise her a ride in her glider that would definitely freak Asami out, or their nightly stroll with Naga, or if everything else failed, the umpteenth ice-cream. But it suddenly dawned on her that her promises might be in vain. After all, she didn't know if there was a later to talk about. She cleared her throat instead. "We'll be back before you know it"
"Please don't leave me" Akemi muttered, and Korra's heart shattered inside her, hit with the blunt force of reality. She looked away, blinking fast, trying to will her tears out of existence. She let Asami take that one.
"We are not leaving" the engineer said, squeezing the Avatar's hand picking up on her distress "We'll be right there in the other room" The way Akemi held her gaze told Asami the girl wasn't talking about them leaving the precinct.
Lao-Tzu waited impatiently behind them, sighing loudly and tapping his foot on the floor.
"Okay, enough, let's get moving" he said, prompting Jin-Li.
"It's gonna be okay, come here" this one said, before grabbing Akemi, forcing her down from Korra's lap and away from them. Said action was promptly reciprocated with a high-pitched scream.
"Hey, lady" Korra shot up from her seat ready to take her head off, but Asami grabbed her by the arm. The girl squirmed and whined as the woman forcefully led her by the shoulders to the room next door. But no fire, Korra noticed proudly.
Regaining composure, Korra earthbent the lost pellet into her hand just as Akemi was stepping into the room.
"Hey, Tiny" Akemi turned around despite the strange woman's firm grasp on her shoulders. Korra tossed the pebble at her, that aided with a little airbending, landed right into Akemi's cupped hands. "Hold that for me, would you?" Akemi nodded, closing her hands protectively around the pebble as she disappeared into the room.
Korra and Asami then approached Lao-Tzu.
"Thank you for not making things any harder" he told them, his voice coated with a thick layer of disdain. If Korra hadn't given Akemi the pellet she would've pecked him in the forehead with it.
"Was that really necessary?" Asami snapped at him, her temper free to roam loose now that Akemi was out of earshot. "If you are going to get Social Services involved, you better find one who actually knows how to deal with kids. Either that or you give us enough time to deal with it ourselves, in a sensible manner. You don't get to..." Korra thought about calming Asami down for the briefest of seconds, but concluded that it was more satisfying seeing her wife have a go at the man.
"Asami, leave my officer alone, please" a door opened behind Lao-Tzu, Lin coming through it. The flustered officer immediately straightened up "Come on you two, you'll want to see this"
The two women followed Lin through a long corridor, Lao-Tzu following them closely. But before he could make it into the room, Lin intercepted him.
"Not you, you lead the interview" the officer stood in its place looking rattled "What are you waiting for? Go" she shushed him, and closed the door behind him.
"I don't like your second in command" Korra grumbled.
"It's not my fault Mako left the force" Lin protested.
Korra and Asami looked around. The room they stepped into was dark and narrow, lit only by a lone light that flickered above them, threatening to give out at any moment. The center of attention was the one-way mirror that covered half the wall to their left. Behind that wall was the interrogation room, where a scrawny man sat at a table.
He wasn't Nilak, Korra noted with a hint of disappointment, neither was he wearing cuffs. He didn't look like a perp at all for that matter, judging by his empty almost bored demeanor. Something about him gave Korra the impression he carried a weight so great, he had simply ceased caring.
"We found him by pure chance in Misty Palms Oasis" Lin pointed at the man with her chin "My men talked to various groups of merchants without luck for weeks on end. It wasn't 'till they stumbled upon a bar from around there, out of duty and half-drunk that this poor bastard appeared. He tended the bar, and overheard them talking about the lost tribe. He happened to lose his a few months back"
"And you are sure he's from the tribe Akemi's been talking about?" Asami asked.
"Positive" Lin responded "He gave an accurate description of the girl, unprompted, along with other details about the rest of the members of his tribe. Specially this woman, Jaya. Did you know about her?" Both women shook their heads. "You will soon" she knocked on the one-way mirror twice, indicating Lao-Tzu at the other end to begin.
"Tell us your full name, please" this one said.
"I'm Ghan, I'm a sandbender from the Si Wong desert. Or used to be, at least" It wasn't hard to believe, the man was visibly tanned, his skin a darker shade around the eyes where the traditional sandbender wrappings wouldn't cover him. He had brown stormy eyes that looked around compulsively, more creases around them than his age called for.
"How about your origins?" Lao-Tzu followed.
"Lived in the desert all my life. We stem from the Hami tribe, but aren't- sorry, weren't as numerous. If I am honest, I preferred it that way, less power struggles" he half-smiled "My father, grandfather all the way to my great great grandfather were sandbenders. The tradition now ends with me" he said regretful, you could hear the pain in his voice, despite his impervious look.
"Can you tell us about the incident dating around nine months ago?" Ghan draw a big breath before he began speaking.
Ghan knelt close to the ground, digging with his nails looking for that pesky peg burrowed somewhere deep in the sand. It held in place the last of their sailer's guy-lines, meant to keep it secure to the ground, safe from smugglers and sand storms.
Had you asked him a day before, he would have told you they were useless and all part of a tradition meant to entertain old men's paranoia, always so convinced something or someone was out to get them. After all, the desert was huge and they rarely encountered someone they didn't mean to find, and most storm would burrow the sailer in mountains of sand rather than make it fly into the air. Hence why he thought the guy-lines and pegs were a waste of time. Their sailer wasn't going anywhere.
But he may have been due for a change of mind, watching how the wind was picking up around him, making the nose of their ship rise from the sand.
"Ghan, help Jaya onto the sailer" his father yelled at him over the roaring wind. He looked behind him at the woman hunched over, shielding the bundle between her arms from the wind.
Ghan finally lost his patience and yanked the peg by its guy-line, hitting himself on the forehead as it came loose. He rubbed the sore bruise through his wrappings while coiling the guy-line with his other hand, slowly making his way towards the woman, fighting the wind.
"Let me help you" he placed a gentle hand on Jaya's back.
"Help Akemi first" Jaya said, pointing to the three-year-old fighting with teeth and nails not to lose her footing on the shifting sand.
"Come here, tiger-monkey" he tried getting ahold of the girl, but she wouldn't let him, squirming away from his grasp. She alone made it onto the ship, only accepting a gentle push once she was halfway there. "I don't bite; you know" Ghan told Akemi. The girl stuck her tongue out mockingly, earning herself a mouthful of sand.
Ghan laughed at her for a while longer than it was appropriate for a grown man to be laughing at a child, before hopping into the sailer besides her, and sticking a hand out for Jaya.
"Hand him to me, It'll be easier to climb up" he said, referring to the bundle the woman was cradling.
"It's fine, I can do it" Jaya refused. Ghan wasn't surprised, he had hardly seen the boy's face since he had been born. Jaya carried him everywhere all the time, reluctant to give him up to anyone at any point, not even Ghan. Not that he blamed her, of course, it couldn't be easy to lose a husband so close to giving birth, and Ghan could only imagine how hard it would be to hand out the last piece left of him, even for a second.
"All set?" His father howled once they were all on the ship, Ghan taking his position at his side. He didn't wait for any kind of confirmation before starting to sandbend them out of there, away from the upcoming storm. "Do you see them?" His father yelled at him, and Ghan adjusted his wrappings, trying to block the sand from clouding his view.
"Nothing" all of the other sailers had left before them, as it usually happened as of late. After all, with a postpartum woman, a baby and a small child, it was natural for things to go a bit slower than usual. They knew that would happen when they took Jaya and Akemi in, but in the end in didn't matter. His father was too honorable to turn away a fleeing pregnant woman.
Ghan couldn't care less, it made it a fun race to try and catch up with the others, and as far as he was concerned, Jaya's presence alone was worth it.
"Wait, I see something" he speeded ahead trying to get closer to the six shadows in the distance. What he didn't see was how the sky turned a full shade darker in a matter of seconds.
"Son, slow down" his father warned him, standing motionless across from him.
"Why, we are almost the-" it didn't take him long to understand why. The sky had darkened not due to the storm, but because of the mythical beast that rose forty feet above ground "Is that a sand shark?" Of course it wasn't, and he knew it. Sand sharks weren't purple with tentacles.
Ever since the portals were opened, it was rumored that evil spirits started inhabiting the Si Wong Desert, but Ghan wasn't superstitious and had never had a single reason to believe such nonsense. Until now.
The beast screeched and burrowed itself on the sand, the world around them suddenly falling silent. He could no longer hear the wind, the whirling sand nor the crackling of sails, only desperate mutters and orders to turn around.
Orders that never came to fruition. As soon as the beast emerged from the depths, it sent every sailer ahead of Ghan's up in the air, now turned to mere nails and planks, completely shattered.
"NO!" Ghan yelled, his voice drowning in the sea of chaos around him. He ducked as a piece of the wreckage flew right above his head, dragged by the wind.
The beast wasn't done yet. Whatever damage it couldn't inflict on its first blow, it imparted with his tentacles, wrapping around any men and ship still whole in its proximity.
Ghan's ship was far enough not to be noticed, but that didn't mean they were safe. They still had an avalanche to survive: the spirit emerging from the dunes had caused a wave that now threatened to bury them beneath a mountain of sand, never to be found again.
Every passenger was fighting against it with everything they had, even Jaya sandbent one handedly, while covering both kids with her body.
They made it out by the breath of a hair, but in the meantime, the beast grew bored of fishing for what little remained of their fleet and finally noticed them. It was their turn.
"Save yourselves!" Ghan heard someone said, and not a second after, his men were all jumping off the sailer, manipulating the sand around them to make it out of there as quickly as humanly possible.
He would have done the same if it wasn't for Jaya. Despite having two of her own to take care of, she was helping Ghan's father out of the ship, as a plank from one of the destroyed sailers had impacted him, injuring his arm.
His father made it out of the ship and helped Akemi down. Ghan backtracked and aided Jaya. Once in the ground, everyone opened their own way through the dunes, trying to make it out alive.
But there was nowhere to run, the beast was upon them, and even though Ghan didn't want to look back at it, he could still hear it, he could feel it in his bones. And when a tentacle rose above them, he knew there was nothing else to do. He closed his eyes.
But much to his surprise, when he opened them again, he wasn't dead. Jaya had bent them a shelter to hide in beneath the surface, solidifying the sand above their heads and around them, saving their lives, at least for a little while longer.
"Where is my father?" He looked around.
The shelter was barely big enough for them as it was, and didn't seem solid at all with cracks beginning to creep up the walls. Jaya would have killed for some solid earth right then.
"I'm sorry" she managed to say through the strain of keeping the shelter up, both of her trembling hands raised above her head, almost knee deep in sand. Akemi was between them, struggling to hold the baby in her arms.
Overcoming the initial shock, Ghan mechanically followed suit, also raising his hands to better support the shelter, seeking to take some of the load off of Jaya, but the left wall had already begun crumbling. They were living on borrowed time.
"Please take them out of here" Jaya almost cried, but Ghan hesitated. There was no way she would be able to keep the walls up by herself "Please, Ghan" but she already knew that.
Ghan cradled the baby, and told Akemi to hop onto his back and hold tight. He opened a way out of the shelter and without looking back broke through the surface, hearing the sound of crumbling debris behind him.
He wanted to curl up in a ball and cry together with Akemi and the baby, but he knew he couldn't. He had to honor his words to Jaya.
He surfed through the dunes, bending the sand beneath his feet to propel him forward until he saw the Si Wong Rock in the distance. It wasn't ideal, but he'd take a buzzing wasp over a gigantic purple beast any day.
They reached one of the craters on the side of the rock. It was dark and deep, incredibly moist given they were in the desert. And it could also be the home of a murderous insect. He put Akemi down.
"Shoot fire, as much as you can" he instructed, his voice raspy and dry both from thirst and grief. Akemi looked up at him, confused. Firebending was forbidden. "You won't get in trouble. I promise" Akemi then obeyed, and extending both arms in front of her, scorched the walls of the tunnel with blue fire, the musk of organic matter burning filling their noses.
Ghan sat Akemi on the ground with the baby placed on her legs at the far end of the crater.
"No matter what, you stay here" Ghan grabbed Akemi's face to force her gaze on him, wiping her tears away with his thumbs "And from now on, use your firebending, protect yourself, protect your brother" Ghan pointed at the crying baby. "I'll be back with help"
Ghan exited the cave leaving two crying children behind. He found a stick that might or might not have been a wasp's severed limb, and nailed it to the ground next to the crater's mouth. He unbound his wrappings, and tied them around the end of the stick making a bootlegged flag. That way he would be able to find the crater among all the others. To find them. Cause he would find them. He would be back. Everything would be okay. It had to be.
But when Ghan came back, only his bindings remained, waving at the mercy of the wind, the children already gone.
A/N: I did not write this chapter as much as I birthed it (tmi?). I hope you liked my word baby.
Be kind to it, wash your hands, and don't hord toilet paper.
On that note, I don't know how many of you are quarantined, but I'd be up to upploading twice a week to help the time pass by, I know I've been writing more than usual.
So, tell me in the reviews if you'd want that or to stick to once a week uploads. Take care!
-TypingMitten
