Chapter 22: trust and friendship

Normal POV

Not much later the whole clan was sitting around the campfire with a bowl soup in their hands while each of the Red Lotus members openly told their stories, even Zaheer.

"Hold the phone, so Unalaq was one of you?" Bolin asked, scratching his head.

"Bolin, Korra told us that years ago." Mako replied.

"He told us were we could find Korra, though we should have been more suspicious when he said he was unable to join us that night." Zaheer said as he finished his meal.

"You think he informed the White Lotus you were coming?" Femke asked sadly but also a bit worried.

"Aiwei told me he suspected it while I was in prison, not long after our first capture" Zaheer answered. "I still think he did as well. It's just too strange that just then, so short after they discovered the new Avatar. Lord Zuko, Master Tenzin and Councilman sokka were already with her."

"Yeah." Femke said as she looked down as well. "It doesn't add up, unless they were tipped off."

"Which would fit in his plan to free Vaatu and become the Dark Avatar" Ghazan added.

"He was already the odd man out of the six of us." Ming Hua added.

"So was Aiwei but he was never a problem for us." Zaheer remarked.

"Because Aiwei was afraid of Zaheer. Unalaq on the other hand..." P'li said.

"First week in Zaheer got in a fight with Unalaq." Xai Bau smirked, ruffling Zaheer over his hair, which Zaheer shrugged off.

"He had a black eye for weeks." Ghazan said as he put his feet up.

"You two fought? I thought you were friends." Korra asked with a surprised look on her face.

"We saw eye to eye on the important matters but that was about it." Zaheer replied with a smile. "Your uncle loved to get me into trouble with the others of the organization, especially in the first few weeks."

"He suspected something. He told me himself. He suspected you and me were related and that this was why I didn't kick you out by the first broken rule." Xai Bau replied. Zaheer just looked away. "But I told him you had great potential and were determined to prove yourself."

"Unalaq couldn't stand it." Tziza smirked. "He was headstrong, prideful and often refused to follow up my commands."

"You wouldn't believe the punishments he got from that." Ghazan smirked.

"It wasn't funny." Ming Hua said.

"It was to me." Ghazan replied.

"Hey, everyone." Femke called all of a sudden, making everyone look at her surprised. "If Sokka was there, does that mean you would have..." Femke didn't finished her question, looking at her friends sadly.

Zaheer's POV

Hey, everyone." Femke called all of a sudden, making everyone look at her surprised. She had been so silent I almost forgot she was there. "If sokka was there does that mean you would have..." She didn't finish her question, looking at us sadly.

"Why ask now?" P'li asked her with a sad look.

"I have wondered about it all along and just never had the courage to ask before." Femke stammed as she looked down. "Sokka was a friend of mine and I want to know what happened to him."

"I see." I replied as I looked at her with a small smile "Are you sure you want to hear it?"

"That's why I ask." Femke replied firmly.

"Alright, but it's not going to be a pretty story." I sighed. "We didn't kill Sokka. He was there and I beat him but I didn't have the time to kill him. Lord Zuko and Master Tenzin managed to take me out before I had a chance." I said.

"Master Tenzin, you can interrupt me if you remember things differently. A different perspective is always welcome." I told the Airbending master, who nodded in reply before I started.

"Alright, we're almost there. Keep cool and follow my lead." A younger version of Zaheer told his friends as they sat in the back of a truc, which was parked a few metres away from a village.

"P'li, I want you to stay as close to me as possible. We're not sure who is in there." Zaheer said as he looked his girlfriend firmly. "In the best scenario only the parents are with the kid but i have a feeling there might already be others there as well."

"Understood." P'li nodded firmly.

"Ming and Zan; take out any guards. Kill them if needed. We need the Avatar." He told his other two friends firmly, who nodded in reply.

"Almost looking forward to resistance." Ghazan commented.

"Get serious or you won't even make it out of this car." Ming Hua replied firmly. "We need the Avatar to make our plans work. No time for extra brawls."

"Ming hua is right. Lets hope there are no White Lotus guards, it would make things a lot easier." I replied sternly, at which ghazan sighed.

"Fine" ghazan said. After this we drove as close to the village as possible without throwing away our element of surprise and got ready. I had a dagger in my one hand and a curved sword in the other.

"Weapons?" Femke wondered, interrupting the story.

"I was still a non bender back then, remember?" I told her.

"Right. I keep forgetting you didn't have your bending back then. I'm so used seeing you with it." The brunette beamed to the great amusement of some of the Team Avatar members.I smiled at her. "Back then I was just a skilled martial artist which still got me in a high guarded cell."

"Not as bad as the rest of us." Ghazan commented.

"I still was sent to the top of a mountain." I said.

"Can we get back on topic?" Ming Hua interrupted.

"Right." I coughed.

So we headed in, weapons at the ready and we saw Master Tenzin, Lord Zuko and Councilman Sokka sit around the table with Korra. This surprised me but I knew we had to do it. The fate of many depended on it. Or so we taught.

"Excuse me, what do you want?" Korra's mother asked calmly when she saw us, not understanding what we were doing here.

"Give us the Avatar and no one will get hurt." I called as I held my weapons out.

"You won't get the Avatar." Tenzin said as he blew a blast of air at Zaheer, who was thrown in the back wall.

"Senna! Get Korra out of here! We'll hold them off." Zuko told the parents as he got up and into a bending stance while Sokka got his boomerang from his pocket.

"Just like old times." Sokka smirked, dodging Ming Hua's water whips P'li's Combustion Blasts.

"Stay out off her line of sight." Zuko called to Master Tenzin, who looked up when he realized we had a combustion bender in their team.

"The last one almost got us killed." Sokka said as he hid behind some boulders and looked around. "We have to get her down if we want to take the rest down."

"I reckon you have a plan?" Zuko asked with a smirk on his face.

"Yes. Zuko, try and distract the non bender, he seems to be the leader of the crew." Sokka said calmly as the three man were behind the rock now.

"Tenzin, I want you to blast the Lavabender against the wall on my signal. That way his lavadisk will strike the waterbender, so she will lose her water arms." Sokka explained. "If she can't bend anymore she will be easy to take out."

"Good thinking. Do you think one hit will take her out? She seems tough." Zuko asked as he looked at us.

"Just watch the Earthbender. That guy is bending lava. If that stuff comes at you as fast as he makes it move she will stop bending for a moment to make sure she's safe. Boomerang and I will do the rest." Sokka smirked as he held up his boomerang, throwing it at P'li, who dodged in the nick of time, after which Ming Hua and Ghazan crumbled the rock they were sitting behind.

"Now!" Sokka called, at which Tenzin started to face off against me while Zuko fought Ghazan.

"That must have been epic." Femke commented, smirking.

"We held our own for quite a while butt in the end sokka's plan worked." I replied, looking down.

"P'li!" I called as I looked at my girlfriend lying on the ground close to me, yet I was unable to reach for her because I had been beaten down by her attack backfiring on me. On top of that my face was bleeding badly.

"Make sure they can't harm anybody until we can lock them away properly." Lord Zuko commanded after which I fell I was being chained. I tried to resist with all I had left inside me but I was unable to move because two soldiers were holding me down.

"Sir! This one is still awake! Should we knock him out?" One of the guards called.

"We still need to find out why he wanted to take the avatar." The voice of the Firelord called, before I felt a sting in my neck after which I passed out, the last thing I saw was P'li being chained down.

I wouldn't see her again for thirteen years.

"No wonder they couldn't keep their hands off each other once they got together again." Ghazan joked.

"You'd probably have done that too if you knew back then what you know now." Femke said with a teasing smile.

"Two out of three, got it right!" Bolin smirked as he elbowed Ghazan.

"Everybody knows you can't grow a moustache at age ten." Ghazan smirked.

"How come you never told her before?" Bolin asked out of the blue, which made both Ming Hua and Ghazan look at him a little confused.

"At first i wasn't sure if she felt the same way about me. Then we got in imprisoned and after that the mission became our top priority." Ghazan replied.

"Why not ask her in between missions? Your a dashing fellow. When you're not destroying things." Wu said.

"Whatever you say, I guess. " Ghazan looked at Ming for a moment then smirked

"Also, Ming's someone who's hard to read. Didn't want to ruin what we already had."

"You wouldn't have. Coward." Ming Hua replied.

"Or just smart." Ghazan smirked.

"Could be." Ming replied. The other Red Lotus members started laughing. Everyone else just shrugged.

"You had to be there." Femke said at which Korra nodded.

Femke's POV

"Femke, I have to ask, why did you never tell the airbending kids what you could bend when you returned?" Opal asked after a moment of awkward silence. I looked up a little shocked. She brought it up now?

"Because I didn't feel like telling back then." I said while looking down. "There's also the fact that I had no idea how everybody would react to the fact that Zaheer taught me airbending."

"What?!" Everybody except the Red Lotus members exclaimed in unison.

"It's true." Zaheer smiled a proudly as I made a small tornado appear on my hand just as Zaheer had done when he had come to the Air Temple as Yorru.

"How did you manage?" Tenzin asked.

"It wasn't that hard. She trusted me." Zaheer explained with a smile on his face.

"Before I found out he lied to me. Twice" I smirked as I gave my boyfriend a small shove, who gave a me a small shove back.

"You had to mention that didn't you?" Zaheer teased.

"I wasn't gonna let you get away with it too easily." I winked at Zaheer as I gave him another shove. Zaheer played along as he toppled on top of me and slipped in a kiss.

"Femke." Opal whispered as she looked at me with shocked eyes, sounding hurt.

"You two better stop before someone faints." Ghazan called after which Zaheer gently got up and moved away, I noticed he moved somewhat stiffly.

"I should stop doing that, it's making me ache." Zaheer apologized while dusting himself off.

"During training a few weeks I notice you were out of balance. Are you sure you shouldn't go see a healer?" I asked worriedly. I started to realize that over the last couple of weeks he lost his stance far easier then he used to during firebending practice together, and he had gotten a lot paler as well.

"I'm fine. You're more powerful now, remember? And it's a full moon tonight, don't fret about it" Zaheer replied.

"What does the full moon have to do anything?" Opal asked. Oh, right… I hadn't told her about me being a werewolf yet.

"Well, you know what they say about couples and the full moon." Ghazan joked while I locked eyes with Opal.

"The full moon does more then just give waterbenders a extra boost of power." I started. "It also reveals horrible things. Humans who have a whole different side."

"The children of the night?" Opal asked. "I once read a book about them."

"I once encountered one and got bitten by it." I said calmly as I pulled my shirt down and revealed the mark of my powers; the bite scar, at which Opal looked horrified but before she could ask me anything else, men in blue uniforms with hats over their faces suddenly appeared.

"Give us Ming Hua and no one gets hurt." One of them said with a deep voice.

"Now ain't that familiar?" Ghazan said as he grinned at Zaheer.

"My thoughts exactly." Zaheer nodded as he got up and in front of Ming Hua. "And what do you want with our friend?" He asked.

"That's classified. Please just hand over the woman." Their leader said.

"We're not going to do that. Ming hua is our friend and ally."

"Her parents sent us because they wanted to see her." A man in the back said, which made their leader turn around and look at his subordinate with a disapproving look.

"That is classified information." The man barked as his subordinate cringed.

"Wait." I commented as I got next to my boyfriend and looked at the man firmly. "What do Ming's parents want with her?"

"Still classified. All you need to know is that she needs to come with us." The leader said.

"Tell them I'm not interested." Ming Hua said firmly, after which she launched a gust of wind at the man, who dodged it.

"Air? They said she was a Waterbender." The man in the back said, astonished.

"She must have been part of that wave of new airbenders." One of the men called while dodging the attacks of Zaheer and Ghazan, who also started fighting.

"She's not the only one." Zaheer smirked, blasting some fire from is fists as far as he had learned from P'li and me.

"This wasn't part of the briefing!" one of the man in the back shouted as I used a fierce combination of lavabending and firebending to keep some of the men at bay while ghazan made a moat around us.

"Femke, help me make some cover. We have to get out of here and fast." Zaheer called, propelling towards me with airbending since the man were advancing on us.

"One cover, coming up!" I called as I got back to back with zaheer while Jinora and Opal threw off more men before they joined us.

"When did these guards learn how to fight like that?" Ghazan commented as he and Bolin lavabent as many of the man away as they could.

"My bet is that it's another one of Darkars tricks!" I called as I airbended a few men away from Ming, who nodded in thanks before she continued to fight.

"Darkar or not, let's take them down." Ming Hua snapped.

"We have to drive them away without hurting them!" Korra called from a corner, were she and Asami were facing off against four men back to back.

"Easier said than done." Ghazan said, using a lava disk to get a man away who had managed to take Ming Hua out and had slung her over his shoulder.

"Leave her alone!" Ghazan called, but the man was faster and before he knew it Ghazan was knocked out.

"Guys!" I exclaimed, wanting to go to help them, but the men were still surrounding us and we had to stick together to make sure we wouldn't be struck down as well.

"We have her! Let's go!" Their leader commanded, carrying an unconscious Ming Hua over his shoulder.

"Yes, Sir." All other men replied as they started to retreat with us on their heels, trying to get Ming back but soon they used a smoke curtain and when we cleared it away with our airbending it was already to late. She was gone.

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And with that I end the chapter. I hope you all liked it!

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Beta written by Paranoidgirl