Korra put her hands on her knees and took a breather. She couldn't get Zaheer and P'li's voices out of her head. She was in front of the spirit portal leading to the South Pole, and its energy hummed quietly as it streamed upwards into the sky. She glanced over at the Tree of Time, and contemplated meditating in there. Maybe it would help clear her head.
"No, nothing spiritual for the next while," she said to herself, remembering her talk with Aang and Gyatso. "But that hardly includes mediating?"
Her tongue swished around her mouth as she thought of what the consequences of it could be. The time when she had turned into a blue giant, she had had Raava ripped out of her. And Tenzin had said something like the ancients used to meditate in there, so surely that had nothing to do with the Avatar State?
But she shoved all her thoughts aside as she saw the outline of someone coming through the portal. She cursed and ran around to the other side as they solidified.
A random water-tribe man walked through casually, reminding Korra that anyone could come in and out now. She couldn't risk anyone noticing her as the news would've spread pretty fast. Maybe the media didn't know the full story, but she was just better off unseen. She walked through the portal from the side she was hiding from, and ran behind the nearest tree when she emerged. Even though there was no official limit, people tended not to be queuing up to enter. Out of the entire population of the South, only a hundred or so people came through daily when she had been recuperating after her fight with Zaheer. It wasn't a resort; it was common knowledge that the spirit world was full of dangers.
She walked around the back of the forest near the frozen tundra, taking a route no-one took casually, intent on finding her way back home as discreetly as possible. It was approaching night-time, and the streets were beginning to emit a dim glow. She took deep breaths and her body temperature rose to a comfortable level. This was barely even bending to her, and she felt no strain from it, so she saw no harm in it. Her arms and hands fell limp, soaking in the heat despite the fact that she only had a t-shirt on with no sleeves. She made her way around into the outskirts of the city, and stuck to the shadows the entire time while walking through. As she was going through a small alley in between two houses, she heard her name. She naturally stopped to listen. It was a radio broadcast:
"…the police have neither confirmed nor denied the conspiracies that have been running riot in Republic City. The Sun journalist Hazukk Arahonov has released an article claiming that none other than Avatar Korra was bloodbending! Witnesses report that she blew a hole in the police headquarters and assaulted multiple officers in her attempt to escape capture. This is the same Avatar Korra that exposed Amon for being a bloodbender and rightly damned him for it, so the jury is still undecided.
"But Arahonov says that if she was afraid the authorities would follow her into the spirit world, then it can't have been something small. The new portal here in Republic City was shut unexpectedly a few days ago by the Avatar after she created it roughly seven months from the present time. We have Hazukk Arahonov with us here now in the booth. Thanks for coming, Hazukk. What can you tell us about your claims?"
Korra clenched her fists together and edged up to the open window, her head just below the rim. How did he find out? she wondered.
"Thank you for having me," Hazukk's smug voice buzzed out, the radio quality poor. "I am reiterating that my report is 100% accurate. I was working with her while trying to bust a joint drug operation with Red Monsoon and the Agni Kai Triad, when the truck driver drove into a warehouse full of Triple Threats. I tried to defend us but was picked off as she hung back, hoping to avoid getting her hands dirty-"
That snake! she thought. That's a complete lie! I was trying to help him and he kept on walking away from me!
"… I was rendered defenceless and tossed to the side, even if I don't like to admit it. I watched as the Avatar first used lavabending to ward off her opponents. I think we all remember how Jaram Sau collapsed the Imapry Tower seventeen years ago when using lavabending as a weapon? Very reckless, who knows how much more damage she could've done to the city with her lavabending."
"You didn't mention that in your article," the reporter told Hazukk. "Why are you only bringing it up now?"
"It's not illegal, despite the glaring public opinion that it's too dangerous to let anyone play around with, so the editor told me to leave it out," Hazukk answered. "But when she was truly cornered, she used the Avatar State. This is perfectly fine; she was using it to protect our city."
"And then, according to the paper in front of me, she 'only used it for a few seconds to dazzle her opponents, when she decided that she could experiment on these people'," the reporter quoted.
"I didn't understand why she had left the Avatar State," Hazukk began, "but a few moments later, I felt my body being incredibly unresponsive. It was extremely frightening, and I didn't know what to think. But when I saw her being the only person out of the thirty odd other people in the room moving perfectly fine, I knew that it couldn't be anything else other than bloodbending. To add to that, I felt the blood rising vertically to my head, and I passed out there on the spot.
"When I woke up, there were police milling around, securing the shipment. I was forced to write a general article at the time and leave out those details because I feared for my safety. But now that she has fled the city, I know I now have substantial proof that she's not the angel she portrays herself to be, but rather an authority figure abusing her power."
"That is an extraordinary claim," the reporter said, "and we hope dearly that it isn't true-"
"It was hard to open up on," Hazukk interrupted.
"-but let's say that we have undeniable evidence for a moment, that we have multiple witnesses and photos as clear as day, hypothetically," the reporter continued, ignoring Hazukk's comment. "Shouldn't all the good things she's done for our city in general maybe discount the fact that she used bloodbending this one time against a known criminal organisation, and would we risk bigger issues in general by having no Avatar to help us when we really need it?"
"You have a good point there," Hazukk appreciated, "but how many problems does she create whenever she fixes an old one? She publicly kept the portals open after Harmonic Convergence when she was fully capable of closing them, which wrecked the economy of Republic City by leaving the vines there. She only came back to help the Earth Kingdom when her close friends in Zaofu were in danger of being taken over by Kuivera. According to the soldiers in her former army, she had Kuivera at her mercy but then simply just fell over. From what? The exhaustion of taking three long years off in a mansion in the South Pole!?"
The reporter chuckled at the last sentence.
"But when she had to face Kuivera again, where does she do it? Right in our own city!" Hazukk slapped the table wherever he was to emphasize his point. "There are probably a lot of people who have been forced to scavenge for their food, and their children's food as well as a result of Kuivera's invasion, listening to this. So, if you're one of those many citizens of Republic City, I'd ask you to kindly consider my next few words.
"When the nights are cold and you have nowhere to sleep, ask Avatar Korra to help you. When you are considering emigration for a better life, ask Avatar Korra to find you a new home. When our streets are plagued with criminals and pickpockets, who are unable to get by lawfully, ask Avatar Korra to use whatever means she sees fit to stop them from putting food on their plates. She may not be willing to face the consequences of when she breaks the law, but she is the divine ruler when others do, unquestionable in her actions. That's what I really wanted to get across. That's all I have to say. Thank you for taking the time to listen to me."
"21-year-old Hazukk Arahonov with a brief but powerful message," the reporter announced, signalling the end of the interview, and started to talk about other issues.
Korra stayed there hunched silently. She was fuming at how he had portrayed that. He didn't have the slightest clue about how hard it had been for her; she didn't want most of the city to be blown in half!
"Can you shut the window there, dear, it's getting a bit chilly," Korra heard a man say, and scooted away into a bus shelter across the street. There was no one around at that very moment to see her, so she sat down and milled over what she had just heard.
He's the one who reported me! she realised suddenly. Who else could it have been? That snake doesn't have one piece of gratitude. I'm going to smash his face in when I get back!
But then she remembered that she wasn't welcome back now. If that reporter had been telling the true story, then she would probably have a mob out for her head. She'd been tipping on the edge of popular and unpopular recently, and now she was definitely unpopular, to put it lightly. I had to stop them somehow, who know what the Triple Threats would've done with all that cocaine, she reasoned.
Then Zaheer's words from earlier hit her. She didn't want to believe him, but that report there had proven how she wasn't going to be able to stay on the public's good side all the time. All the things she had ever done had been for the greater good, but she had no-one to help her back in the city now, apart from Bolin and maybe the airbenders, but they weren't realistic options. She got up and continued on her way to the palace, which rose what seemed like miles above everything else in the city.
When she reached the front, she used waterbending to open up the wall and then cleanly shut it again, freezing it over with a tiny bit of difficulty. She hung to the shadows in the courtyard and the guards walked right by her on their patrol. She'd identified so many spots she could sneak in through being able to metalbend as well while recovering, but she never thought she would need to use them. Bloodbending was first made illegal in the Southern Tribe by Katara except for emergency medical operations, so Korra guessed that she might be unwelcome to the public. Her parents wouldn't give her away for the world, but it was so much easier just to remain undetected.
She passed through walls with a little bit of trouble, but she wasn't found out. There were very few guards on the inside of the palace, ironically. Ever since the Civil War had ended, there was only ever two or three break-ins due to her dad's, Tonraq, general high public standing. She snuck her way to in front of their door after jogging up a few flights of stairs. There wasn't even anyone guarding the door, surprisingly. Korra thanked her lucky stars, however irregular they seemed, and knocked on the door. She heard no response, and then knocked again. A gruff order from what sounded like her dad called her in, thinking she was a servant. She took a deep breath.
"Hey, mom, dad," Korra greeted tamely, as she opened the door and stood in the doorframe. Tonraq and Sennas' mouths dropped in the bed they had sat up in, and stayed like that for a moment, before Tonraq leaped out from the covers and pulled Korra right into his chest. He shut the door and practically suffocated his daughter with his bear hug, but Korra didn't mind. Senna joined a second later, and they all just stayed there silently, not letting the moment go. Finally, when Korra's lungs were about to burst, she released herself from their, mainly her dad's, grasp.
"You don't know how worried we were," Senna told her, breathing rapidly. "What we've heard… is it really true? We won't let them take you away, Korra."
"The bloodbending part, yes," Korra admitted sadly. "But I have more news to tell you. First of all, Asami and I broke up."
"You broke up?" Tonraq repeated, and Korra nodded. "What did she do to you?"
Korra sighed, and walked over to the edge of the bed, landing in a heap. Her parents followed suit, sitting either side of her. She didn't look at either of their eyes, just staring at the wall straight in front of her. She gulped, struggling to find the right words, and was also extremely tired now. It showed what a sorry case she was at the minute, the amount of effort she could put into bending already nearing its limit.
"Korra, we won't judge you for whatever you've done," her father reassured her, putting a hand on her shoulder.
"I don't know how to say this," Korra stammered, then decided to cut to the point. "But it's going to be a shock either way. I'm pregnant."
A moment of silence.
"You're… you're… what?" Tonraq asked, hoping his ears had deceived him.
"I'm pregnant," Korra repeated, looking her dad dead in the eyes. He found no way to deny it, and fell silent, brooding over his next words. His wife didn't though.
"Sweetie, that's brilliant!" Senna congratulated her. "What did the dad say? How long have you been expecting?"
"Two months," Korra responded. "And about the dad… it's complicated."
"What? Did he run away?" Tonraq asked, his voice suddenly starting to rise.
"No, dad, lower your voice," she said, wanting to avoid any servants coming in. "I've was trying to think of a way to break it to him, but it was never convenient. I was going to a few days ago, but then I got chased out of Republic City. He'll find out eventually though, I just don't know how."
"Do we know him?" her dad asked. "Maybe we can send a messenger to him secretly."
"No," Korra lied. "And I'd prefer if you stop asking about him. I'm not in the mood."
"That's perfectly fine, darling," Senna said, understanding her daughter instantly, and then hesitated before her next sentence. "But we need to hear your full side of the story. About…"
"Bloodbending," Korra finished for her. She had known that this conversation was coming and had planned her words out for about an hour. She confirmed what her parents had heard from the radio broadcasts, but when she got to Hazukk. Her mood changed considerably.
"It's all that little cunt's fault," she cursed. A little crack appeared in one of the walls. "He damned me the first real chance he got despite the fact that he was lucky to even come along in the first place and I saved his sorry ass! And he didn't do jack-shit when it came to fighting. Of it weren't for me, he'd probably have been killed by the Triple Threats right now!"
"Korra, please," Tonraq said gently, although the tone didn't suit his deep voice, now asking his daughter to quiet down. "We don't want to let anyone know you're here, and if you raise a fuss, you could collapse this place on your own. You know the extent of your power are better than anyone."
"I'm sorry," Korra apologised, her anger switching to sorrow immediately. "This is all my fault."
"You're still young, Korra, nothing goes exactly as planned at your age," her father told her, pulling her into another hug. Her mother joined, and they stayed in each other's embrace for three minutes, not saying anything. After that period, Senna spoke up:
"We didn't plan on having you," she revealed, "but life is full of surprises, and when we found out that I was pregnant all those years ago, we were so, so happy."
"I couldn't agree more," Tonraq added.
"Thanks," Korra said, tearing up slightly. "But I don't think this bloodbending problem is going to go away on its own. It came up first when I faced the Triple Threats, but now I think it's going to be really hard to contain if I don't learn how to control it." Korra suddenly remembered how she had bloodbent the old man who had been homophobic to her after she had talked to Aang. But that had been during the rising sun.
Am I that strong a waterbender? Korra thought. I didn't feel Raava back then, but maybe I'm as strong as Tarrlok or Amon?
She decided against telling her parents this, out of having no urgency to it. She hadn't told them how she had unintentionally bloodbent Asami. They could both wait.
"Do you have any ideas as to who you'll be learning it from?" her mom asked, even though she had the answer herself.
"Even if she wouldn't teach me when I was younger, there's only one waterbender who we can really trust to keep my presence hidden and teach me how to control bloodbending," Korra said, both her parents obviously on the same wavelength, but she said it anyway. "Katara."
"Are you sure she'll teach you bloodbending?" Tonraq asked. "She didn't rest until it was outlawed back in her younger days."
"We're not exactly blessed with options, and from what I've heard, she's the closest thing to a reputable bloodbending master in the world," Korra said. "I'll wait a while until I see her, when maybe it's died down a bit."
"You'll probably have to stay holed up in the attic until then," Tonraq said. "I'll have only my most trusted servants tend to you. They won't say a word."
"Where are you going to sleep tonight?" Senna asked. "You're more than welcome to sleep with us if you want."
"No thanks," Korra declined. "I'll sleep in the bathroom for tonight."
"Are you sure?" her dad asked her again. "You're pregnant, you need to be resting easy."
"It'll be fine," Korra reassured them, and walked over to the bathroom en-suite. She locked the door after her and lay on the cold yellow towel that was hanging on the edge of the bath. Despite how uncomfortable she was, it took her no time to fall into another deep sleep.