A/N: Sorry for the long gap in between updates. I won't make any excuses but, life has been hectic lately. I'll try to update more.
Anyway, enjoy!
Chapter 7
"… and then we just left the restaurant. She took me home, after." Korra says, recounting the events of her dinner with Asami, to Mako.
Nodding, Mako makes a turn into a, fairly nice, neighborhood. The houses are big. Easily triple the size of Korra's apartment.
"Don't take it personally. Asami pushes everyone away. Honestly, I'm impressed. You've actually made the most progress with her."
"What? We haven't spoken in two weeks. If that's progress, I don't want to know what her pushing me away is." Korra snorts.
Mako pulls over, in front of a house with a police car and a sedan in the driveway. Korra moves to exit, but he grabs her shoulder, effectively halting her exit.
"I'm serious. It's not that she doesn't like you. She's got it worked into her head, that anyone she cares about will end up leaving her. Like she's cursed or something. So, she cuts them loose, before they get ripped away."
"That sucks." Korra huffs, falling down into her seat dejectedly.
Thinking over everything she knew about Asami, Korra muses that it isn't unfair of her to have such fears. Though it isn't fair to herself, to just give up. But something doesn't make sense to her.
"Why does she feel like that? The only person she's lost, that I know of, is her mom. Her dad might be locked up, but they can still see each other, right?"
Mako looks to her with a saddened expression. "He tried to- Actually, I think Asami should tell you this. It's not my story to tell."
Understanding, Korra nods. It is kind of rude of her, snooping around Asami's past like that. Besides, who better to explain Asami's feelings, than the woman herself?
Noticing a shift of the curtains in the window, Korra turns her attention to Mako. "I think it's time to go in."
They both exit the vehicle and walk up the pathway, towards the door. Korra raises her fist, preparing to knock, when the door swings open, revealing Kya, beaming at the two.
"Hey guys. What brings you here?" She stands to the side, inviting them in.
Once inside, Korra gives Kya a hug. "Hey Kya. I came to speak to Lin."
Kya's eyebrows shoot up, almost comically. "What could you possibly want with that old grouch?"
"I might have a possible lead for her."
"Hmm." Kya grasps her chin, and looks to the ceiling, pretending to be in deep thought. "I dunno Korra… today was supposed to be her day off."
Korra can't help but grin at the goofy woman. "It won't take long, I promise."
"Oh alright. Let me go wake her." Kya disappears down a hallway.
Korra wonders why, Lin is asleep so early but the thought leaves her mind as they hear Kya whispering while they wait. The whispers get louder, until they just completely stop. A few moments after, they hear Lin yelling in protest.
Kya walks back into the living room, with a satisfied grin, plastered on her face. Lin soon follows in a silk gown, and her hair in a sloppy ponytail she'd obviously just done. She also has Kya's lipstick all over her face.
Korra releases a chortle at the look on her face. "Nice look, Chief."
The angered woman glares at Korra. "What do you want?"
She turns her gaze to Mako and he releases a cough. "Hey Chief."
"I have some information on The Triple Threats."
All eyes lock on her, with shocked expressions, besides Mako.
Lin motions to a couch and couple of chairs. "Well, have a seat and tell me about it."
Korra and Mako sit in armchairs facing the coffee table. On the other side of table, Lin and Kya sit on the couch, practically on top of each other.
The sight makes Korra miss Asami. If Kya could get through to Lin, maybe Korra could crack Asami's shell.
"So? We don't have all day." Lin says, impatiently.
Korra can tell, by the way Lin has her arm wrapped around Kya, that they want to enjoy their time together while she's free. So she'll make this short.
"Right. Well two weeks ago, that Sunday after getting my crutches, Asami took me to this go-kart place-"
Lin cuts her off. "Wait. Asami? Whose that?"
"Remember the girl I was telling you about? The one who hit Korra to begin with." Kya says.
"Oh yeah."
Korra looks at them curiously. Kya had told Lin about Asami? What did she tell her? Hopefully nothing bad. Well it doesn't matter now.
"Anyway, she took me to the place. I don't know what it's called, but it has go-karts and laser tag. I know the location. After we finished racing, some kid snatched her purse. I tripped him before he could get away. He told me that he didn't want to rob her, that The Triple Threats made him rob people, so he could eat."
She stops and looks around at everyone. Mako has his jaw clenched and fists balled. Lin is still staring at Korra with a focused expression, and Kya has a saddened look on her face.
"Apparently the kid is told who to target. The staff gave Asami different goggles, from everyone else. He said that's how he knows who to get. I didn't get his name, but if I saw him again I'd recognize him. Hell he'd recognize me too. I gave him two hundred bucks, so it's possible he could be lying low, until the money runs out. But two hundred yuans can only last so long between one person, let alone two, so it's likely that he's back to robbing."
"What do you mean 'two people'?" Mako asks.
"He and his sister are orphans. He takes care of her." Korra says, sadly.
Mako looks down. "That sounds exactly like me and Bo, a few years ago." He looks back up at Korra. "I'm glad you helped him."
"Why didn't you say anything two weeks ago?" Lin asks.
Korra shrugs. "I was busy with school and work. Plus I didn't want to come so soon after talking to him. If the cops showed up too soon, it's likely that, whoever the corrupt people are, would know he told me about their operation, since at least three workers saw me talking to him."
Lin nods, seemingly satisfied with her reasoning. "I'll check into it tomorrow. Nice work, kid."
Korra grins at Lin.
"How's Asami doing anyway?" Kya asks.
Korra's grin immediately falls. "Uh, good I guess."
Her mind jumps to their last encounter right away. It hurt her to think about, more than she'd like to admit. Screw this. She had to see Asami right now.
"Actually, I'm going to see her after we leave here." She glances at Mako and sees him smiling like an idiot.
Kya suddenly jumps from Lin's grasp, and grabs Korra, dragging her to the door. "Well don't let us hold you two up. You got what came here for. Now scoot." She shoves Korra out of the door and turns to Mako. "You too."
"I'll see you guys around." Mako says, as Kya closes the door.
He walks past Korra's pacing form and gets in his car. "You coming or not?"
Korra looks at him with worry dripping from her expression. "I'm not ready to see her again! What- what if she doesn't wanna see me? Or- or… I don't know!"
Exiting the car, Mako walks towards Korra. He grabs her shoulders. "Calm down."
"I'm scared Mako."
He can see the anxiety, in her frantic eye movements, and decides to do something, before she has a panic attack. "Hold on."
He runs back to the car as she watches. Not understanding his plan, Korra watches on, confusedly, as he digs around in all of his pockets. He pulls out his phone and her heart stops.
Dialing Asami's number, he silently prays that she answers. The voicemail sounds, and he decides to improvise.
"Hey Asami. Yeah, I know you're at work, but I wanted to bring you something." He looks to Korra, then turns back forward. "Sure. Okay, cool! I'll be there in a few."
Pocketing his phone, he turns to Korra again, watching her in amusement. "Come on."
"That didn't help at all, Mako." She says, forcing her feet to carry her to the car, despite the pounding in her chest.
"What? I told her I was bringing something. Just not that it's you. Technically, I didn't lie." He shrugs, starting the car and heading towards Future Industries.
Actually he did lie. But Korra doesn't need to know that. Neither does Asami.
In his mind, Mako figures Asami will be working. From what Korra told him about what happened at Kwong's, he assumes Asami will spend every second possible working. She always buried herself in her work whenever she was stressed. Hopefully that hadn't changed. Or Mako's plan is ruined.
Asami considers hate to be a very strong word. But as she sits behind her desk, watching this man try and analyze her, she can find no other word to describe the feeling coursing through her. She doesn't let her annoyance show, hidden behind a blank expression. They had been this way for almost a full minute.
"Did you come here just to stare at me? Because if you did, I'm sure you could've found a few pictures on Google, instead of wasting my time." Asami says, almost sounding bored.
Viper chuckles. "I'm just wondering how long it's going to take, until you show your true colors. I heard the apple doesn't fall very far from the tree. Does it?" He smirks, obnoxiously.
Asami's face remains blank.
"Straight to business, eh? I like it." His smirk grows, until he's leering at her. "I know you're not stupid, so I won't waste time on details. You know what I want. And you're going to give me what I want, without any resistance. You'll save yourself a lot of time and pain if you just play along, because this is all going to play out, regardless of if you comply or not. You, however, do have a very important role to play. So to make this easier on you, I've come to deliver a message: big things are going to happen. And when they do, make sure you're on the right side. Understand?"
Asami isn't threatened by him in the slightest, but she decides to take this meeting a little more serious with his last declaration.
From the sounds of things, he's working with, or for, some very bad people. Regardless of his involvement with them, whoever this mystery person is, has their eye on Asami.
Maybe if she keeps him talking for a while he'll reveal something she can use. Asami decides to play along, for now.
Leaning back in her chair, Asami analyzes his speech and decides the best way to proceed. "Alright. What does your boss want?"
"The usual. Communication devices. Cars. Guns. Big guns. Bigger than the ones your father made us. But that's not why I'm here, right now. We can sort out the details later. I'm here to find out if we have your full cooperation." His leer is replaced, by a more serious look.
Asami slightly narrows her eyes in thought.
So he is working or someone. She needs to find out who it is and why they need so much stuff. Maybe she can get him to give her some more information.
"What happens if I say no?" Asami knows, full well, what he's about to say.
Viper glares at her briefly, before releasing a deep breath and smirking once more. He stands to his feet and walks to the side of her desk.
He trails his finger slowly across the surface. "If you don't cooperate," He picks up a framed picture of her mother, "well let's just say it won't be pretty." He drops the photo on the ground, and the frame shatters into tiny pieces.
"Get out."
Viper's grin widens. "Whoops. Guess it slipped."
Asami shoots out of her seat and is standing right in front of Viper in an instant, glaring holes up into his eyes. "Get out of my office. Now."
Backing away, Viper raises his hands in surrender. "Whatever you say. I'll be in touch." He says while exiting.
Asami soon follows suit. She has to calm down or something terrible will happen. She doesn't know what, but she can feel it.
"Ms. Sato? Is everything alright? I heard something break. And Viper jus- Ms. Sato?" Li is stopped mid sentence, by Asami's form dashing into the elevator.
"I'm going to take that break we talked about, starting today." And with that, she disappears behind the elevator doors.
Li sticks her head into Asami's office and notices the broken picture frame on the floor. "Oh, Asami."
The elevator ding brings Asami back to reality and she starts the trek to her car, mindlessly. While walking, she ponders what she'll do since she just left work.
A wild idea forms in her mind and she checks the time on her phone. Getting in her car, she makes up her mind and heads for Narook's.
"Are you alright?" Mako briefly shifts his eyes off the road, and onto Korra. "You haven't said anything since we left Chief Beifong's house."
"I feel like I'm gonna throw up."
"Well don't. We're right around the corner."
They pull into the parking lot, and sit in the car waiting for the other, to exit.
"What are you waiting for?" Korra huffs.
Mako crosses his arms. "I'm not going."
"What?! Why?"
"I just came to bring Asami her surprise and I did. I never said I was actually going in." Mako grins.
"Fine. Wait here in case I need to make a quick escape."
Mako salutes her, while she exits the car. She enters the building and spots the empty security desk. She finds it odd that the security guard isn't at his post, but doesn't let it deter her. Getting inside the elevator, she clicks the button for the top floor. Once the elevator finally stops she steps out and looks for Li. Oddly enough, her desk is empty too.
"What the heck is going on?" Korra spins around in a circle, looking all around her, multiple times, while scratching the back of her head in confusion.
She walks up to Asami's door and hesitates. "Oh, let me guess," She opens the door, "Wow! It's empty too!"
Despite the weird feeling she gets from the empty building, she enters the office anyway. Maybe something happened and she can find some clues in here.
But after searching the office for a solid five minutes or so, she finds nothing of interest but a loose picture of Asami's mother laying on her desk.
Deciding she shouldn't stick around any longer, she quickly makes her exit. Passing by the security desk, she stops and decides to check it out. She notices a half eaten sandwich and a key card laying on the desk.
"That's weird. Who'd leave a sandwich laying around like this?" She checks for anything else but finds nothing out of the ordinary.
Something doesn't feel right to her about any of this. It could be possible that the guard went to the bathroom. But she doesn't believe he'd still be there after all this time.
She leaves the building and gets back in the car. Releasing a sigh, her eyes land on Mako and she sees him watching her expectantly.
"What?"
"I wanna know how it went, what else?" He says impatiently.
"Oh! She wasn't there. No one was. Not even the security guy." Korra says, looking down at her feet deep in thought.
"What? No one was there?"
Korra doesn't pay him any attention, as her mind races through reasons why nobody was anywhere to be found. She looks around the parking lot and sees plenty of cars, she assumes they must belong to the factory workers and the people who work inside the building doing business junk. Are they missing too?
She starts to get worried for Asami's safety, before she remembers that Mako had spoken to her, a while ago.
"What was Asami doing when you called her earlier?" She asks, with urgency.
Mako looks down and clenches his fists around the steering wheel. "She didn't really answer. It went to voicemail when I called, so I assumed she was in a meeting. I lied so I could bring you here."
Korra grabs his shoulder to get his attention. "It's alright. We wouldn't have come here otherwise, right? And she could be perfectly fine, so let's not jump to conclusions."
Mako meets her gaze, before giving a firm nod. "You're right. Let's go make sure she's safe."
Wasting no time he whips his car out of the parking lot.
"Where are we going?" Korra asks.
"To her house. If she's not there… we'll figure something out. We have to."
Just as Korra's about to respond, her phone rings. "Hello?"
Asami sits in her car, outside of Narook's, stomaching turning. She's excited about seeing Korra again but she's also nervous.
Korra hadn't tried to contact her at all, in their two weeks apart. Maybe her showing up at her job is a little weird. She could always say she just wanted something to eat. That was the case that night they met. That fateful night.
Deciding she wasn't some scared little kid, Asami quickly fixes her make up before entering the cafe.
This isn't her first time at Narook's. Even though she hasn't been here recently, she used to come here a lot.
She sits at a small table in the corner of the building, near the window, and briefly scans the place for Korra. Not spotting her, her attention shifts to her phone. She notices a missed call from Mako, but decides to call him back later, when her mood is in a better condition.
A full week away from work. What would she do? She could always work from home, but Li was right. She was tired and needed a break.
Her mind wanders to Li, and she finds herself very grateful for the woman. She hopes everything is going well at the factory, since she left so abruptly.
She should've been more cautious, especially with Viper's surprise visit. She'd have to check the cameras, when she got back home.
"Asami?"
She's ripped from her thoughts, and when looking for the person responsible, she's met with Opal.
"Oh hey, Opal. When did you start working this late?"
Opal takes a seat in the empty chair, on the other side of the table. "A few months ago. Right around the time Korra started working here." Opal watches Asami closely, at the mention of Korra's name.
"Oh? Guess I wouldn't have known." She shrugs
Opal slouches slightly, not getting the reaction she was hoping for. "Anyway… you haven't been here in a while. And I know the food didn't bring you back. So, what's up?"
"I had a long day at work, and…" Asami trails off, releasing a tired sigh.
"You wanted to see Korra?" Opal smirks, at the look of shock on Asami's face.
"How'd you know?"
Asami is beyond confused at how Opal could've known she was there for Korra. No one had seen them together besides Li and that Doctor. Her sudden appearance could have given it away. Or maybe Korra had been talking about her…
Opal shrugs. "Korra doesn't work weekends anymore. She's most likely at home. Maybe you could give her a visit." She suggests, knowing Asami wouldn't.
Nodding, Asami stands, ready to leave. Since Korra isn't here she no longer has any reason to stay. "I'll think about it. See you later, Opal. And thanks."
"No problem. See ya!" Opal watches as Asami gets in her car and drives away.
Waiting until she's sure Asami won't come back for whatever reason, she whips her phone out of her pocket and dials Korra.
"Hello? Korra, you won't believe who just left Narook's."
…
"Asami! She was looking for you!"
…
"Yeah! You should totally go see her. She sounds like she just had a horrible day, and she came looking for you, specifically."
…
"You're damn right I am." She says, ending the conversation with a satisfied look on her face.
"Where would they be without Opal, the matchmaker?" Pocketing her phone, she walks back into the kitchen.
A/N: I said I wouldn't make excuses, but you gotta understand. Aside from my life just kicking my ass, fortnite has taken over. And don't get me started on God Of War. I'll do better, I promise ;-;