The world stands still around you. Your conscious mind departs your body, driven by an ancient instinct, seeking to merge into the vast mysteries of the cosmos. You can feel emanations of energy pulsing around you. They aren't unknown to you anymore as you've tapped into their unparalleled potential before. They welcome you in your journey and you feel comforted by their presence. As your spiritual projection floats further away, you catch a glimpse of your body sitting cross-legged inside the cavernous opening of the Tree of Time. Something compelled you to this place again. You sense you're searching for something but you're not sure what you're searching for. You glance around as your mind runs through countless images flashing inside your memory, struggling to make sense of what it sees. "Something's missing", you whisper to yourself and the words feel like a scream against the silence, a silence so overwhelming it sucked sound out from everything that surrounds you except yourself. A silence so profound that makes the beating of your heart in your ears almost unbearably deafening.
You glance around, then shut your eyes tightly and open them again in the small hope you'll find what you're looking for. For a fickle instant, you feel elated to see faint outlines of shimmering auras lined up in a single file spreading into the infinite space. "No, this is wrong", you say as your hand extends toward the echoes of what it used to be but no longer exists. You shake your head. The vision feels as frustrating as the missing piece of a puzzle. Every fiber of your being protests against the dissonance of what you perceive is wrong. It's like a gaping hole, evidencing what once used to be whole, and it feels like an affront against your own nature as Avatar.
"I lost something" you remember "something important." The unnerving certainty of the loss suddenly brings attention to the throbbing pain that has been with you since you began your journey and you can no longer ignore it. You become startled by your own panicked gasp as you find yourself staring straight into a void. From its depths, ice-cold long tendrils slither out and now they encroach around your heart, overwhelming you with a dull ache you can't explain. Light is snuffed out and the world goes pitch black around you. The only thing that you can perceive with despairing clarity is emptiness. The faint memories stand as reminders of your loss. How something that is absent can make you hurt so much? you wonder. The phantom limb of the severed connection to the other yous from other lifetimes throbs in outrage as the only answer to a question that's kept plaguing your conscience.
"This is my fault." You know where the culpable party lays because the finger points at you. "Aang, Kyoshi, Kuruk…they're all gone and it's all because of me."
"Raava made a mistake choosing you," a sinister voice affirms with such glee that it makes you wince. You remember the voice and you shudder as pressure moves further from your chest to your torso like a vice squeezing slowly. The muscles of your neck tense as cool sweat drenches your brows.
"It was because of you that it happened!" you snap back. You move toward the source of the voice when all of a sudden, metal binds wrap around your wrists and ankles. You realize you're being lifted by your limbs as the telltale clinking of chains brings a shiver down your spine. A fiery burst blasts from your mouth along with a growl as you frantically struggle to free yourself from the shackles.
"You failed Raava and you know it! Deep down, you know it's true!" a cacophony of disembodied voices rises from the shadows, paralyzing you for an instant. Countless pairs of eyes crimson and menacing, emerge from the darkness as they slowly surround you. Some peer from Amon's mask, others from the somber and disappointed visage of your slain uncle Unalaq. And then you finally spot Zaheer with the rest of the Red Lotus as they join the throng of your accusers.
"You failed Raava, you failed Raava!" they chant over and over. You forcefully pull at your chains but they won't budge. Desperation seeps in. You shake your head as you try hard to block their perverse voices from reaching your inner defenses but you realize it's all in vain. They've already succeeded in revealing your wounded inner core.
"I didn't mean to! It wasn't supposed to be this way!" you scream in desperation.
"You are a failure, Avatar Korra!" the vitriol reaches a fever pitch.
You shut your eyes tightly. You can no longer stand to watch the hatred that stares back at you.
"Raava, I'm sorry!"
"Korra!" You hear your name being called but not by the crowd surrounding you.
"Korra, wake up!" The voice calls you again insistently. Slivers of light punch through the oppressive darkness. You almost break out in tears as you perceive the profound concern seeping into every syllable. The malevolent chorus begins to fade away, her voice drowning theirs completely until they're just a faraway echo. Elated, your memory matches the voice with a face, and a realization dawns upon you: you must go to her now if you want to escape and leave the nightmare behind.
"Korra, Kor, are you okay? Korra!"
You are no longer bound by the chains and before you can react, you find yourself falling down until you sit upon your bed, startled. Your mind is still sunk into a haze as you struggle to make sense of your surroundings. You feel drained as if you had waged battle with an elusive enemy throughout the night. Your hand instinctively rests over your chest and you make a conscious effort to calm the erratic drumming of your heart.
"Korra?"
You lift your head up and you encounter a pair of green eyes as they gaze deep into yours with such tenderness and intensity you can't help but feel remorseful for making her worry.
"Kor, what's wrong?" She rests her hand over your forehead, pushing back brown strands of sweat-soaked hair. "You were talking about Raava in your sleep."
"Vira, I'm sorry! Did I wake you?" you ask, although you could anticipate her answer. You can see the dark shadows under her eyes that speak of a sleepless night.
"No, I couldn't sleep. Yesterday you came back from Air Temple Island feeling indisposed and went to bed early. You've been tossing and turning the whole night so I've been keeping watch in case your fever worsened. I'm used to pulling all-nighters anyway, " she adds with a lopsided grin.
You reply with a gentle smile as you go back to the events of the last hours in your mind. You remember festivities on Air Temple Island. The resurgence of the Air Nation. It all made sense now. Even if you have moved away from the wound your enemies left in their wake, the scarring remains.
"Kya said you might've been upset by what was commemorated yesterday…" Kuvira says as she dries the remaining sweat off your forehead with a small cloth towel.
"Harmonic Convergence," you finish the sentence. It's a memory that fills you with contradictory emotions. History will always regard you as the Avatar who brought the Air Nation back and as the Avatar who lost the connection to her previous lives and with it, the legacy of wisdom and memories that were as integral to the identity of the Avatar as the ability to bend all elements. Your biggest accomplishment and your bitterest failure joined together by the same life-altering event. The memory of the pain inflicted never really fades away, but that's something you admit only to yourself, but you sense that she knows even if you haven't told her. The way she stares at you, probing beyond your calm facade. It's as if she can see you beyond the wall you still keep for your own protection. The biggest scar is invisible and yet it is there with lasting consequences for you and for your successors. Most days you've been able to handle these emotions but this time, something gave way.
"Korra…" you snap out of your reverie and face Kuvira as you let out a small hum of acknowledgment.
"There are still many things I don't know about you. After all, we met in the most unorthodox manner, and against all odds, we ended up together." She pauses for a moment and her hands reach for yours. You find this small gesture immensely comforting.
"Yeah, we sure have everyone beat when asked how we met. The love of my life? She used to be my enemy."
"Sure gives the phrase "sleeping with the enemy" a whole different dimension, don't you think?" She's chuckling at her own little joke and you laugh along with her. You feel your spirits lift a little.
"What I want to say" she continues, "what you were saying in your sleep, it's about losing your past lives, isn't it?"
Kuvira is as perceptive as always. You were right. She knew all along and there's no reason to keep her in the dark anymore.
"Yes, sometimes I feel so overwhelmed by the guilt that I lost something so precious and that there's no way I can recover it."
"Korra," she brushes a lock of your hair behind your ear. "There's nothing you need apologizing for. You did your best. It was Unalaq and Vaatu who did that to you. They're the ones who are guilty. You are the victim here."
"I know," you admit. "And yet I can't shake off the sense of guilt and shame that overwhelm me when I remember that my successor will never meet his predecessors. It's as if I've deprived them of their legacy."
"Kor, I can't fathom how it must feel to have the connection to millennia of your lifetimes severed but I do know something for certain: the world owes you a lifetime of gratitude. It cost you your link to your past lives but you protected all of us from ten thousand years of darkness and oblivion. You Korra of the Southern Water Tribe, are the Avatar of a New Era. We owe you so much and we can never thank you enough for that."
You feel the words you want to say choke up in your throat. Instead, you open your arms and you bring her close to you.
"Thank you," you whisper after what feels like a lifetime and a heartbeat simultaneously.
"You don't need to thank me. Now let's grab some breakfast before I collapse from exhaustion. The all-nighter is taking its toll," she punctuates with a dramatic yawn.
"How about we bring our breakfast here so we can both collapse together undisturbed?" you propose with your trademark lopsided smile.
"You are a very wise woman, Avatar Korra. I'll start in the kitchen while you take Naga for her morning walk. Poor thing has been worried sick for you."
"Deal!" you reply as you steal a kiss from her that leaves you both dazed and grinning just before Naga comes rushing in and gives you a big, slobbery kiss of her own. And is in that simple moment beholding your two best girls that you realize you have too much to live for to be dwelling on the past. The phantom pain might never go away but with the support and care of your loved ones, you feel ready to fight and face life and its challenges one day at a time, and you have the certainty that is all you need.
The End
