Tenzin always had horrible timing. Out of all of his siblings, he was the most likely to walk in on their parents making love. He walked in on Bumi and who knows what girl, Kya and some girl she had over; it was always him and it didn't have to be their bedroom. It could be by the lake near their house or in the barn in Bumi's case. If there was sex to be had and Tenzin didn't want to know about it, then he would find out about it, visually
He was worried about Pema's safety. There was another attempt to kidnap Korra and who knows what type of plot is afoot. None of the criminals would talk, no matter how hard they tried. He wanted an investigation done here to see if there was any connection to the criminals who got caught in the Southern Water Tribe and Republic City, but an investigation of this sort required the chief's go ahead. There had been no crime here, so the officers in the precinct lacked the authority to start digging around until she said for them to dig around.
"I don't know why she's not here," an officer told Tenzin. "She's kind of been working obsessively ever since (you announced your pregnancy to the media)" Oh I probably shouldn't tell him that.
"I'll try her at her home."
He called, but he received no answer.
He decided to pay her a house visit, the first time he went to her home since they broke up. Her car wasn't there. He wondered if she was home at all, but he knocked anyway.
Lin was in the shower. Kuzon was making her breakfast, when he heard the knock. It wasn't his door, so he didn't answer, but the knocking persisted, getting louder and louder. Finally, Kuzon flipped over the pancakes and went to go get it.
"Can I help you?"
Tenzin was not expecting to see a buff Fire Nation man who was only wearing pants. Given the bite marks on his chest and his messy hair, it was clear why he had been there this morning.
"Where's Lin?"
"In the shower. Hold on, I have to make sure breakfast doesn't burn." He went back to the kitchen and flipped over the bacon and the omelet before turning the stove to low.
The shower turned off. Kuzon knocked and told her she had a visitor.
Lin rolled her eyes. She skips work once and gets a rookie sent to check on her. What did they think she did, od last night?
She dried off and put on her bathrobe and slippers before coming outside.
"What the hell are you doing here?" It was Tenzin.
"I wanted to talk to you about a protective detail for Pema and investigating an attack that happened in the Southern Water Tribe."
She couldn't just throw him out. "Well, I'm going to put on clothes and you can tell me whatever you have to tell me over breakfast."
She went to her bedroom to get dressed. He would show up when she got a little nookie.
Tenzin glared at Kuzon.
"What are you mad at me for? It's not my fault she prefers a man with hair."
Before Tenzin could respond, Lin came back out. She dressed herself in record time, not wanting to leave the two men alone together.
"This smells awesome." Tenzin rarely ever made her breakfast and never bacon for obvious reasons.
"I wasn't sure what you liked, so I made some of everything."
"Well, you should know a Bei Fong will pretty much eat anything that has meat or chocolate in it."
"Good to know."
She filled her plate with pancakes, mixed fruit, eggs and bacon. He even made coffee, which he had left black for her. It was how she drank it anyway.
"So why do you think Pema needs protective anything?"
"Do we have to talk in front of him?"
"He's not the one attacking Pema is he?"
"Well, no." It was possible, but highly unlikely.
"Then pretend he's not there."
"Fine." He glared at Kuzon again. Lin saw it but didn't comment. "There was a second attempt to kidnap Korra. Again, no one knows why and the suspects won't talk. Since they are targeting her before she can even bend, I must assume that they want to raise her to believe in whatever they are trying to accomplish and I am concerned that they would also want my child."
"Assuming it's an airbender and assuming that they would need an airbender other than Korra."
"Well yes, but no one else has anything right now."
"And how am I supposed to investigate what happened in the tribe. I have no jurisdiction over it."
"You don't, but can't you at least find out if the kidnapping suspects have ties to Republic City."
"I can do that, but why didn't you just go to the precinct?"
"I did, and they said they couldn't start a goose chase unless you told them to."
"Well I did tell them that. I'll call it in and have them nose around. As for the protective detail, I'll reserve judgment on that until I see if there's anything going on in Republic City that could be related to Korra. She will obviously be protected at public events, but having her followed by guards all day sounds too big for our budget, especially with no threats having been made against her or you.
Are we done here?"
"Yeah we're done."
Tenzin didn't know why it mad him so angry seeing her with that guy. He wasn't surprised Lin was mad when he replaced her with a younger woman. He never thought she'd move on to a younger man."
"I'm sorry about him. Tenzin kind of expects the world to just be ready for him when he feels like showing up."
"Nothing to apologize for. Your ex wouldn't be jealous if there was nothing for him to be jealous of."
When Lin did get to work on Monday, she had pep to her step. She hadn't felt this happy in quite some time. Kuzon had ended up staying over all weekend, only leaving on Sunday evening since he had work on Monday as well.
The officers were all wondering why they didn't see her all weekend.
"Don't take this the wrong way Chief, but why are you so happy?"
"Can't a gal just have a good weekend?"
"You got nookie didn't you? Oh yeah, a lot of it!"
She didn't deny it. "Don't make me send you to sensitivity training!"
"I'll send myself if you tell me about him."
"Not gonna happen."
"Aw!"
Her officers didn't find anything to suggest that these kidnappers were based in Republic City. In fact, they seemed to have come from all over the place, the Northern Water Tribe, Ba Sing Se, Omashu and other places.
"Audit their financial records and check into their work histories. Maybe there is some kind of pattern."
Lin wasn't going to spend too much time on this, but since it involved Korra, it seemed worth looking into, even if it was just Airhead trying to think too hard.
If Lin thought she could hide her new love interest, she was mistaken. On Tuesday, she received a big piece of chocolate cake and a card that asked her out to dinner on Friday.
"OOH! Chief's gotta boyfriend!"
She wanted to kill her squad sometimes, but it was a good time for cake. It was always a good time for cake.
"Hush up!"
At the end of the day, she was going to leave work at a normal hour when Tenzin came by.
"I haven't found anything involving Republic City and those kidnappers."
"I'm not too surprised by that."
"We're going to keep looking for Korra's benefit, but it we don't find anything soon, we'll have to leave this to the authorities that actually have the case."
"I see. How have you been Lin?"
"What?" Why is he making personal inquiries?
"We haven't seen each other in a while."
"I wonder why," she said dryly.
"I know we have our past but …"
"No, you have a past. I get stuck with the present. Do you have any idea how much it sucks being your ex-girlfriend? Anytime anything happens to you, the reporters drive across town to me and see how I will react. Councilman Tenzin announced his pregnancy. How do you feel? Should it have been your child and not Pema's? You could sneeze, and people will ask me if I could have kept you healthier better than she does."
Tenzin knew the media liked to talk, but he didn't realize how much it bothered her.
"Lin, I'm sorry, I didn't realize …"
"No you didn't. You've always been an airhead. Now if you don't mind, I'm going home."
He just got to walk away. She was the one who got daily reminders of him. Maybe it wasn't his fault that the media sucked, but he didn't have to keep feeding them every time something happened to him. Lots of people have babies. Very rarely, do they feel the need to make a public announcement about it and do an exclusive interview. Could he be anymore of an asshole?
"And I was having a good day too," Lin mumbled as she got into her car, and then I got stuck with an airhead.
She drove off. Tenzin was still at her desk. He felt frozen in time. He was hoping that someday they could be friends again. He wondered if that was impossible now.