"What's wrong with the air?" Bolin asked, completely annoyed as he pulled at his collar and wiped the sweat off of his face, "It feels like it's choking me." He walked around the office cabin and attempted to fan himself. Instead of cooling anything, it blew the hot air around.
Miski replied, "There's so much water in the air! I can feel it pooling on my skin." She waved her hands and fingers around her head and water collected on them and down her arms. Then she pulled it off of Bolin's skin.
"Gross," he said, turning his nose up, "but thanks."
Kuvira explained, "It's called humidity." She wiped sweat off of her forehead.
"Whatever this is, it sucks," Baatar complained. He pulled away from Kuvira for a moment as they sat next to each other, and their clothes stuck together.
Meanwhile she turned her attention out the window. This feeling of sweating in the wet heat was familiar. She felt it before as a little girl. Back then she didn't know any different, she just knew it felt like a warm blanket was around her at all times. As she looked up to the mountains they were heading straight for, she froze.
"Baatar," she said, desperately trying to keep her voice steady, "where are we headed again?"
"Some town in the far east," he answered, unaware of her growing discomfort, "I don't remember the name off the top of my head but it's on the water."
She asked, "Which region are we in right now?"
"Yulin," he replied.
Kuvira knew those mountains. She collected herself. Maybe no one would notice. Maybe they could keep traveling by. As they entered a tunnel cutting through the very mountains recognized, she calmed her breath. Maybe she should excuse herself. Maybe she should go back to her cabin. No. She opened her eyes just as the train exited the tunnel. It would be fine. No one knew.
"What's all the way over there?" Bolin asked, pointing out the window of the right side of the train.
In the distant meadows of tall grass, small buildings stood in a collective town. The mountains were covered in thick rainforest, but the valley was smooth with tall grass and other vegitation.
Baatar stood up and checked the region's map. "It looks like it could be a town," he said, "but I don't see it anywhere on this map. We should be right here by this mountain range but there's nothing on here indicating a town is right there."
Miski asked, "What else could it be?"
"Can we stop and find out?" Bolin asked, "We're not on a tight schedule this time, right? Let's check it out! Maybe there's something good like secret treasure buried down there!"
Kuvira watched as more members of the crew noticed the town and wanted to check it out. "Sure," she said coldly, not looking at any of them, "we can see what's down there."
The train stopped at the bottom of the valley. Unlike most towns that already had the tracks laid, there was no train station for anyone to walk on. They stopped on uneven ground. The grass was up to Kuvira's waist. As much as she wanted to stay on the train, she knew if she insisted on avoiding the town people would notice and start asking questions. Instead, she walked forward behind the rest of the crew.
Baatar said, "I don't see any signs of life." He tripped and caught himself. As he stood up, he noticed a massive crack in the ground, overgrown.
"Whoa," Miski said, "that's a lot of damage."
Baatar stood up and pointed to a second of roofing to the right. "Look at that, there was a landslide here. Looks like it took out a few houses. Any survivors must have left, afraid the rest of the mountain would topple on them." He looked up the mountainside carefully.
Jae said, "It must have happened a long time ago. Clearly no one's lived here for a while."
Kuvira walked through the tall grass and remembered it as she used to know it, back when she was six years old. Meadows surrounded her original village. The foot traffic of the people and ostrich horses stopped it from growing in the middle of the small-town square. She remembered the overwhelming emotions she had the last day she was there. As hard as she tried, she couldn't remember exactly what she was so upset about. But her earthbending made sure no one else forgot. The screaming, the fear, the anger at her for causing more problems with the landslide. She remembered it all and desperately tried to keep the emotions off her face.
Miski said, "There's barely any buildings here. This village was tiny to begin with. They didn't stand a chance against any sort of natural disaster."
Baatar walked ahead of them, carefully watching his feet. "Hey," he said, "there's an old fence over here. Must have been where they kept their animals."
"No way," Jae said, "there too many buildings back there for it to be just an old farm." He jumped over the ancient wooden fence and stepped inside. It had shorter grass, still overgrown, but easier to walk through. "This looks like that other town we stopped at, the one with the abandoned military base right next to it that we turned into camp 18."
Baatar snapped his fingers. "That explains it," he said, "I heard about places like this. During the 100-year war we built our training bases in the far east, far away from fire nation attacks. About 10 years ago now the queen shut most of them down, since we're now in a time of peace."
Miski said, "I bet she used that money to party."
"Yeah," he added, "I'd believe it."
As they continued to talk about what the town must have been like, Kuvira stepped away from everyone else and made her way back to her original home. It was just as overgrown as the rest of it, but she used earthbending to get rid of the extra plant growth.
Underneath it all was well worn wheelchair tracks in the dirt ground. She looked at the wall and saw the one and only wedding painting her parents had, back when her mother could still walk. She hesitated down the hallway. The same hallway her father would chase her down when he was angry. She took tender steps, as if she were a little girl again, not wanting to wake her parents in the middle of the night. She stepped inside her old room, removing the overgrowth of plant life.
Meanwhile, outside, Baatar noticed her step inside of a house and clearing away the plants. Just as he was about to stop her, wondering if they should be careful around ruins, he stopped himself and took a good look around. A tiny village, in the far east, next to a military training base, an earthquake causing a landslide, he put it together quickly. He took small steps behind her, careful not to make a sound and startle her. He watched as she walked down the hallway and entered a small bedroom.
He saw her clear the plants away some more and reveal and child sized bed. Kuvira extended her left hand, and metal chains came up from the bedframe underneath. They were rusted and had small shackles on the ends, perfect for child sized wrists and ankles. He watched her quiver and shake.
Instead of startling her, he silently stepped backwards at the front of the house and called out, "Kuvira? Where did you go?"
She gasped quietly. "In here!"
He stepped inside and joined her in her old childhood bedroom. The chains hidden away again. "This is it, isn't it?" he asked gently, "This is where you were born."
"No," she said, turning to him, her eyeliner smudged and turning her cheeks black, "I've never been here before in my life." She clutched a small doll in her hand. She looked him in the eye to see his understanding face.
"Okay."
She smiled at him. "Thank you."
"Kuvira," he said tenderly, "your make-up, it's running down your face." He gestured to her face.
She blushed. "Oh." She ran to the bathroom of her childhood and stared in the mirror. It was much lower than she remembered to the point where she had to bend down in order to see what he was talking about. Her cheeks had black lines drawn down them.
She quickly fixed her make-up and stepped back outside. Baatar said, "Come on, let's get out of this dump."
Back outside, the crew made their way back to The Iron Maiden. Miski said, "I wonder where everyone went. It was a small town, but they had to go somewhere, right?"
"I couldn't imagine uprooting my entire life and going to live somewhere else," Bolin said, "must have been hard."
Kuvira said cryptically, "I wonder what they left behind." She didn't bother looking back as they all made their way back onto the train and headed to the town that was awaiting their arrival.
Inside her private cabin, Baatar asked, "Are you okay?"
"No," she sniffed.
He sat beside her on her bed and hugged her tight. "It's awful that they left you behind," he said softly, rubbing her back away from her metal, "but look at all you've accomplished without them."
"You're right," she said, "if they hadn't abandoned me, I never would have moved to Zaofu and met you. There's no way we would be doing what we're doing right now." She sat up. "Meeting you was worth it." She smiled at him.
He asked, "Did you ever imagine this would happen? That they'd abandon your original village?"
She shook her head, "No. Out of all the scenarios I've dream about, abandoning the village wasn't one I thought up. Part of me wonders where they are now but part of me knows I'll never find out."
Baatar asked, "Are you going to tell your family in the south pole about this?"
After Kuvira was officially adopted, she wrote a letter explaining everything to Baatar right away, while the emotions were still fresh. He was the only soul she told. Kuvira nodded and said, "I think I will."
"How's Korra doing?"
"She still hasn't written to Bolin," she answered, "but she wrote to me that she's still so overwhelmed with her own emotions she doesn't know what to say to him. The last I heard she's walking on her own again." She shrugged, "Thank you Baatar, for being there for me."
