"Ikki? Ikiiiiiii?"

Bolin had been listening to Tenzin yell his daughter's name for a few minutes now. It was starting to get on his nerves, but he knew better than to say that.

"Over here, dad!"

That high-pitched voice came from the bushes. "I think I found her, Tenzin!"

Bolin hadn't. "Just kidding, it's me!"

Tenzin groaned at his older brother's antics, while his sister approached from behind. "There's no sign of her anywhere near the temple."

"Why would Ikki run off like this?", Tenzin wondered. "It's not like her."

"Maybe she just needed some space. I know when me and my brother get on each other's nerves we just like to avoid each other for a while." Bolin winced internally, since that described exactly what he was doing right now without realizing until he'd actually said the words.

"I know what you mean", Tenzin agreed. "But it's probably my fault."

"Probably."

"Excuse me?" He'd probably been looking for sympathy, but Kya didn't offer any.

"I'm guessing you've been so focused on your 'duty' to Republic City, that you neglected your duty to your children."

Bolin and Bumi giggled. "Duty."

"What are you, five years old?"

"Seventeen."

"I was talking to the man old enough to be your grandfather", she clarified, looking at her brother with annoyance.

"You're right, Kya", Tenzin spoke, preventing a lecture. "I haven't been spending enough time with them. I just wish I could be as dedicated a father as dad was to us."

His older sister groaned. "That's the problem, you're exactly as dedicated as he was. Dad was so concentrated on saving the world and doing his duty -don't laugh- that he forgot to make time for us."

"Dad didn't forget about us. Every time he had to travel, he sent letters and pictures, and he always had gifts for us when he came back."

"Yeah, usually because he missed something important", Bumi pointed out to Tenzin. "Like a birthday, or a ceremony."

"And he didn't always come home the same as when he left."

"What do you mean?" Tenzin glared at Bolin for speaking up, but Kya answered anyway.

"There were times he'd been injured and he'd need a healing session from Mom when he got home." Then her expression sank a little before she spoke again. "A couple of times it was really bad."

"That's ridiculous, I don't remember anything of the sort!"

"Because Mom and Dad didn't want you to see him hurt like that. You were really little. I only knew because I helped her when it wasn't too serious."

"While I babysat you and kept you away from where they were healing", Bumi revealed. Remember those rides on Appa I took with you over the city?"

Tenzin looked like he'd lost some of his innocence. "That's why we used to do Appa airtime?"

"Anything for Dad's favorite little airbender", Bumi teased, pinching his cheeks before he got pushed away.

"He loved us all equally! All this talk of favorites, I could say you were Uncle Sokka's favorite, Bumi." Then Tenzin turned to his sister. "And the same of you and mother, Kya."

"We-"

But he didn't let them interrupt. "And Dad was under a lot of pressure! What would you have him do, Turn his back on the world and abandon everything the Avatar stands for just so he could be at all your recitals?"

"I-"

Tenzin was basically ranting to himself now. "Why are we even talking about all this now, anyway? It all happened a long time ago."

"Because you seem to think we all had a perfect, happy-go-lucky childhood where nothing ever went wrong", Kya explained. "Well guess what? We didn't, and sometimes things weren't fun!"

"Enough. We need to focus if we're going to find Ikki before dark."

"You see that, Bolin?", Kya teased. "Classic airbender technique. Cutting and running when things get uncomfortable!"

"Yeah, did Dad teach you that one?", Bumi added.

Bolin decided it was better to keep his mouth shut rather than pile on, and followed Tenzin in searching for his daughter.

(-)

"And that's why they call me Two-Toed Ping."

"Because you have two extra toes", Asami realized, staring at the gangster's feet with a mix of being amazed and being a little creeped out. "But why don't you go by Twelve-toed Ping then?"

"There was already one on the South side of the city", Shady Shin told her. "And that guy won on the Lei Tai, so he got to keep the name."

"Lei Tai?"

"It's how groups like ours...settle differences. Only rule is that use of weapons or bending is agreed to beforehand. Other than that, anything goes."

"I like to think I put up a pretty good fight, at least until I got this beauty mark right here", Ping told her while pointing to the scar on his face."

"You got that from an argument about a nickname?"

"He's lucky that's all that happened'', Mako explained. Nobody argued his point. "Daofei matches on the Lei Tai aren't over until the winner says it's over."

Asami felt uneasy at the implication of that rule, and she hoped Mako hadn't been a firsthand witness to that sort of thing. Something else piqued her interest, though. "What's a Daofei?"

Shin and Ping sputtered. "Mako never told you about the Daofei? Groups of outlaws that have existed for centuries? Sacred oaths that require being hacked to death with knives if broken? None of this rings a bell?"

Mako had told her that he'd been involved with gangs as a child, but none of what they were saying now made any sense. But from what he'd described, he'd only worked for them to survive on the streets, since he and Bolin had no better options.

The gangsters took her silence as a yes to their questions. "Figures. Now that Mister High and Mighty has a badge, he doesn't even wanna act like we exist. That's some gratitude, and after all we did for you and Bolin."

"You want to bring him up?", Mako challenged. "Fine. Let's talk about how you gave him jobs behind my back when you promised me you'd protect him."

The triads were caught off guard, and Asami hadn't expected him to say that either. From the little Mako told her about their Triad jobs, he'd never done more than running numbers with Bolin.

"Mako, come on. We didn't have him doing anymore than what you were doing."

"And I remember what you guys put me up to, so that's not really comforting, Ping."

"He wanted to do it", Shin argued. "And we had to do it too when we were your age, so what's the big deal?"

"The big deal is that he's my little brother. I didn't want that life for him. For either of us."

"And that's the problem with you, Mako. You wanna act like you're better than us. Ya think we didn't have dreams of a better life? I wanted to be a pastry chef!"

"And I wanted to get into probending too, but we already had criminal records, so that plan went kaput before it ever had a chance to go anywhere."

"I don't care about your crushed dreams any more than you care about Bolin", Mako snapped. "Just do the job you came here to do and keep an eye out for any ships approaching ours!"

Shin had been keeping a relatively friendly demeanor, but it was gone now. "Mako, buddy, I get that you're mad, but come on. Remember who you're talking to."

If her boyfriend was intimated, Asami didn't see any signs of it.

"Alright, Shin, calm down", Ping intervened. "Mako didn't mean nothing by it. I mean look at him. He's obviously grumpy because it looks like he took a rock to the face."

A smile crept back onto Shin's face, though it looked more menacing now. "Yeah, it does. How'd that happen, anyway?"

Mako looked out into the bay. "Don't worry about it."

"Nah, come on, let us help you out for old times sake. Tell us who needs a new set of kneecaps."

"Nobody!"

It was hard for Asami to watch them treat Mako like that and not do anything, but he'd warned her beforehand that getting involved in a situation like this would only make it worse.

"He probably doesn't wanna tell us because it's embarrassing", Shin figured. "What happened, did you try brown nosing Chief Beifong?"

Ping chuckled before piling on. No no, he must've been sticking his nose where it didn't belong!"

"Knock it off", Mako told them as they cackled.

"Then just tell us!", Shin told him through laughter.

"It was Bolin, alright?"

"What?" Asami had blurted that out of shock, but if the gangsters thought Mako's injury was funny before, it was hilarious now.

"N-No way!", Shin guffawed. "Your baby brother beat you up?"

Ping opened one of the doors and yelled inside. "Hey guys, it was Bolin!" More laughter.

"Why didn't you tell me?", Asami cut in. "Wait, why did you lie in the first place?"

"Not here, Mako told her as he guided her to a different spot on the ship, away from the men too busy laughing to notice them walking away.

This didn't make sense to Asami at all. She couldn't even remember a time she saw Bolin even get angry, let alone do something like this, to his brother of all people.

"So what did Bolin do?", she asked, now that they were in private.

"He punched me. Caught me off guard."

"Why? And how come you didn't just tell me that before?"

"I don't know. I just...didn't want you to worry. You're dealing with enough important stuff already."

"I can handle helping you with something like this too. You two patched things up yet?"

"No."

"Have you even talked to him?", Asami asked.

"I've got it under control."

She scoffed. "Obviously."

"I'll take care of this, you don't need to...hold on."

"Don't brush me off, Mako, let me-"

"Be quiet for a second", he whispered.

Asami followed his instruction, but only because she was surprised that he'd cut her off in such a manner. So it was lucky she heard the same conversation he did coming out of a nearby door.

"How much longer do we have to stay out here? She recognized the voice. It was Viper, but who was he talking to?

"For a few more hours", a different voice said. "Why, you got a hot date or something?"

"No, just bored."

"Well, too bad. We were paid to keep Mako and his lady friend busy, so that's what we're gonna do."

Asami and Mako backed away. "We gotta get out of here."

But they bumped into Ping and Shin before they could come up with an escape plan. "Where do you think you're going?"

Mako chose to dispatch Ping by tossing him overboard instead of answering his question. He managed to defeat Shin with firebending too, but not before he warned his friends. "They know!"

Then Mako used his firebending to release a speedboat attached to the ship, while Asami drove them back into the city, avoiding their pursuit as best she could.

Viper was hot on their heels, though. He'd managed to get a speedboat of his own to chase them, and to make matters worse, he was a waterbender in his natural element. He took full advantage of this, sending ice spikes that Asami had to dodge, and a geyser that sent her and Mako flying into the air.

"He's getting closer", Mako noticed when they landed.

"Not for long", Asami told him. She noticed two ships crossing paths, then steered between them before Mako could object. And when they looked back, Vipers boat was in pieces.

"We lost him."

"Yeah, but what were they distracting us-" Asami realized mid sentence. "Oh no."

(-)

Bolin was wondering how it had gotten dark out so fast. It felt like they had only started their search for Ikki a few hours ago.

"You know, this reminds me of a search-and-rescue mission I commanded years ago in the mountains outside of Ba Sing Se."

"Here we go", Tenzin groaned, not enthusiastic at all about hearing his brother's story.

"For five days we scoured the beast of a mountain, fighting our ways through blizzards, sandstorms, and...three typhoons."

Even Bolin could see it was obviously a load of dung, but he was entranced.

"Finally, we found the men huddled in a cave, seconds from death. With no time to lose, I piled all twelve of those poor souls on my back and single-handedly carried them down the mountain to safety."

"And how exactly is that supposed to help us find Ikki?", Tenzin snapped, the instant after Bumi finished talking.

"It was supposed to inspire you."

"Inspire me to what, fling myself off this cliff so I don't have to hear your drivel anymore?"

Bumi huffed. "Clearly you know nothing about being a leader of men. That's probably why the Avatar fired you."

"I'm sick of your far-fetched tales. Three typhoons?"

"Well, I might've thrown in an extra typhoon or two for dramatic effect, but-"

"Quit arguing and bring those lanterns over here", Kya interrupted. "I found footprints."

They all walked over, and sure enough there were child sized footprints that made a trail down the path.

"Let's go."

"No, follow me!", Bumi yelled. "This'll get us down fifty times faster." He'd found some rocks that stuck out from the nearby waterfall, and he thought to use them to climb down.

Kya didn't think it was a good idea. "Bumi, it's pitch black, and the rocks are slippery. Walk down with us or you'll hurt yourself."

"Oh, come on! If I can handle it, then it shouldn't be a problem for a few benders!"

"Fine." Kya descended the waterfall using her waterbending to guide her, while Tenzin jumped off, using airbending to cushion his landing. Bolin thought for a moment, then created a large rock that jutted out from the cliff to ride down safely.

Bumi growled, but his siblings seemed unbothered. "You were right, Bumi, that was way faster!"

"At least fifty times faster, by my calculations!"

"Oh, so Tenzin's the funny guy now."

"If you want an airlift down, just say the word!"

"I don't need your help. I've got everything under contraaaagh!" Bumi picked a bad time to lose his grip.

"I've got him!" Bolin tried to pull out a rock that would stop his fall, but he didn't pull it out far enough, so Bumi's upper body ended up bouncing off it while he pinwheeled into the pool of water below.

"Bumi!"

Kya didn't voice her worry like Tenzin had, but she fished him out right away and started her healing.

"You idiot", she fretted. "You're lucky you didn't get your head split open."

Bumi rolled his eyes. "You done with the lecture, Mom? I'm fine, despite the help from 'Mister Rescue' over there."

"Sorry."

"Don't blame him", Kya intervened. "I told you those rocks were slippery. Over sixty years old, and you still can't let it go? You haven't changed one bit since we were kids. You're still trying to prove you can do everything a bender can. Well, you can't, so deal with it before you try something that'll get yourself killed."

"And you're not our mother. You don't get to tell me what I can and can't do. Deal with that.

Kya released the water, letting it soak her older brother. "All right, fine. Good luck healing yourself with your special nonbending powers."

"Hey, hey, back me up here, Tenzin."

He didn't give Bumi the support he was hoping for. "Kya's right. You're the oldest of us, but you always acted like the youngest. Instead I had to become the responsible one."

"You think you're the responsible one?" Kya asked as she walked over to Tenzin. "Where were you after Dad died and Mom was all alone? Because I was the only one who packed up and moved my whole life to be with her."

"Sure, after years of flitting around the world, trying to 'find yourself'", Tenzin reminded her. "It was time for you to settle down somewhere. Even Suyin got her life together before you did."

Compelled by some force to say something even though every other part of Bolin told him to keep his mouth shut, he asked a question. "Who's Suyin?"

The response was simultaneous, from all three siblings. "Not now!"

Tenzin continued, now that the interruption had been dealt with. "I don't even want to discuss this with you two. Neither of you know what it's like to have the future of an entire culture on your shoulders!"

"Here he goes again with the savior complex."

Bumi agreed with his sister. "Yeah, poor you, flying around the world with Dad, riding on Elephant koi all day."

"Oh, so that's what this is all about."

"That's what it's always been about!", Kya yelled at Tenzin. "You keep acting like you're the only person who can carry on Dad's legacy.

"Well who else is going to do it?"

"How about all of us?"

"Yeah! We're Aang's kids too!", Bumi reminded him.

"That's a surprising change, considering you were acting like he didn't give a flying lemur fart about you two a few hours ago."

"Quit twisting what we've been telling you!", Kya told Tenzin. "You know, it wasn't even that Dad treated you like his favorite, it was that you kept trying to rub in our faces when we were kids."

"Well...that's only because you two would always tease me when I spent time with him!"

"Because we hardly ever got time alone like you did!", Bumi retorted.

"We all could've spent more time with Dad if you joined his lessons like he wanted!"

"We're not airbenders, remember?"

"He taught me more than that!" There were meditations, and spirituality, and the history of his people that were nearly wiped out! Dad wanted all of us to learn about it, but sure, keep acting like he's a bad father because he wasn't able to be there for a birthday or two!"

"That's not what we..." Kya paused to collect herself. "I should've known you'd react like this, it was a bad idea to come on this vacation."

"I couldn't agree more", Bumi added.

"Well I never wanted you to come along in the first place!", Tenzin told them. "All of you go back to the temple, I'll find Ikki on my own!"

"What did I do?" Bolin had no clue of how he'd ticked him off enough for him to tell him to leave.

"Just go!"

"Come on, kid", Bumi offered while draping his arm over Kya. "Baby brother isn't any fun to be around when he's in the middle of one of his 'Tenzin tantrums'." The youngest of the siblings didn't acknowledge the parting insult.

Bolin followed the other two at a few paces behind, the walk quiet for a while, apart from everyone's footsteps and Pabu sniffing at his ear.

"Thanks, by the way", Bumi said out of nowhere. "For looking after Mom like that."

"Of course."

"I understand if you don't want to tell me, but what happened to your Dad?" For all the stories and legends Bolin heard about Avatar Aang, he still had no clue how the man had died.

"We're still not entirely sure," Kya answered quietly. "We think it had something to do with him being in that iceberg for so long."

"Dad saw it coming, though", Bumi explained. "A few months before it happened, he started getting things set up. Having training compounds built in the North and South, making sure the White Lotus was prepped to find the next Avatar...while he kept getting weaker."

"Then, one morning, Dad couldn't get out of bed", Kya said, choking up. "We took him outside so he could be next to Appa, got everyone together to say goodbyes, and..."

"I'm sorry", Bolin told them. "That must've sucked to watch."

"Mom was a wreck afterwards. She tried every healing technique she could think of to fix him, but none of them worked. Tenzin offered to have her stay on the Island, but I think it reminded her too much of Dad."

"You said she was alone, though. Didn't she have her brother Sokka?"

"Yeah, but he had responsibilities as Chief, and she needed someone that would be around all the time, so that's why I moved in with her."

All of this stunk. Aang must've loved all of his kids, right? So why were they fighting about it so much? And maybe he wasn't around all the time, but at least they'd had a Dad and Mom in their life. It was more than he and Mako had gotten.

Bolin didn't want to see the family tear themselves apart, but he knew that he couldn't be the one to fix the issues they had.

Notes: So I guess the Kyoshi references are pretty easy to spot if you've read the books. I just finished them and highly recommend them

Some more depth added to the fight between Aang's kids, along with my headcanon for how he passed away. I'm not sure whether it's well-timed or poorly timed that I finished this chapter on Father's day.

Kinda off topic, but what do all think of the announcement that we're getting three Avatar movies? For me it's a combination of nervousness and excitement, but I think we should be getting movies about Iroh and Sokka first.