The Iron Sole Alchemist in the Benders' World (Chapter 11) Uprooting the Red Lotus
by Howlin
(Disclaimer: I don't own any rights to any of the universes, places, or characters, and only claim the protagonist, Sloth, and Loki as my own creation. This is fan fiction, and I don't profit from it. Please don't sue me.)
The next day, we arrived at the Fire Nation's capital city. The city itself was situated on a volcanically active, crescent shaped island. Sloth had been here when she requested the Fire Lord's aid, but this was my first time seeing the place. It was a modern metropolis, every bit the equal of Republic City. Like Republic City, electrical power lines ran alongside every street.
When Sloth, Loki, and I landed near the city center, armed soldiers raised their hands in greeting.
"We've heard rumors that Master Tenzin was training new air benders," said a soldier, apparently female from the sound of her voice. "Are you here to help the new air benders who've been showing up since harmonic convergence?"
"We came to learn about lightning bending," said Sloth. "What's this about new air benders?"
"You haven't heard?" said the soldier. "Well, ever since harmonic convergence, non benders have been spontaneously developing bending abilities. Here in the Fire Nation, it's mostly been fire bending, but a handful of earth, water, and air benders have emerged. The ambassadors from the Earth Kingdom and the Water Tribe have been a big help getting their respective benders a handle on their new abilities, but we didn't have anyone who could teach air bending."
"Well,it's not why we're here, but we're happy to help," I offered. "We can get them some basic control and they can visit one of the air temples for more advanced instruction if they're interested."
"Fire Lord Izumi will be happy to hear that," said the soldier. "You should speak to her and make your offer official."
"We will," said Sloth, turning toward the palace. "Maybe they'll have a good recommendation for a lightning teacher while we're there."
Sloth was recognized, and we got in to see the Fire Lord with no fuss. Fire Lord Izumi was a tall, grey haired woman with glasses. The throne room was a high ceilinged room with carved columns. The throne itself was a comfortable looking cushion situated behind a wall of flames. When we arrived, Izumi parted the flames so we could speak face to face.
"Sloth, it's good to see you again," she opened. "Your assistance during the southern invasion saved a lot of lives on both sides. And this must be Greed. Capturing Desna and Eska was a bigger help than you know. The two of them were instrumental in stabilizing the north with Ulanaq imprisoned in a southern jail."
"It's good to finally meet you," I said. "Thank you for being more reasonable about the end of the world than President Raiko."
"Your timing is fortuitous," said Izumi. "A situation has come up that we could use your help with."
"The new air benders empowered by harmonic convergence?" guessed Sloth.
"In a manner of speaking," said Izumi. "One of the new air benders is a dangerous criminal named Zaheer. He and three companions attempted to abduct Avatar Korra when she was first identified thirteen years ago. They were stopped and locked away in secure White Lotus prisons, but we were never able to find out what they hoped to accomplish by abducting the avatar or whether they were working with anyone else.
"Shortly after harmonic convergence, Zaheer used his new air bending abilities to break out of his prison and started springing the other members of his gang. His first stop was an earth bender named Gazan who has the unique ability to turn earth into lava and bend it in that state. Together, they rescued Ming Hua, an arm less water bender who can use water as replacement limbs. Now they're headed for a secret prison at the north pole where their last member, Pi Lei is being held. She's a fire bender with the ability to create explosions with her mind.
"My father, Lord Zuko, is on his way to Pi Lei's prison to intercept Zaheer and his gang. Any assistance you can provide would be appreciated."
"How did Zaheer know where the others were being held?" asked Sloth.
"We don't know," admitted Izumi. "We've long suspected they were acting on behalf of a larger group, but the locations of their prisons was a carefully kept secret."
"One more thing to ask them once we recapture them and dose them with veritasyrum," I said. "We'll have to come back for the lightning bending lessons."
"Not necessarily," said Izumi. "My father may never have achieved the inner peace to generate lightning himself, but he's studied it extensively, and trained Avatar Aang in preparation for his battle with Fire Lord Ozai. I'm sure he'd be happy to teach you as well."
"The fastest way to the north pole is to cut through the spirit world," I said, snapping and opening a black garganta. "It was a pleasure meeting you."
"Good luck against Zaheer," Izumi called after us.
My garganta got us to the valley between the northern and southern portals. Sloth, Loki, and I exited through the northern portal, and quickly made our way to the palace. Tanraq was waiting outside with his eyes on the sky.
"Tanraq," I said, waving as we approached.
"Greed, Sloth, thank goodness you're here," said Tanraq.
"Thank Fire Lord Izumi," said Sloth. "She told us what was going on."
"Then it seems I owe her yet again," noted Tanraq. "When Lord Zuko arrives, we'll meet with Desna and Eska, then head out to Pi Lei's prison. Zaheer won't get away."
It wasn't long before Lord Zuko arrived on dragon back. He was a white haired man with a beard, and a prominent burn scar covering the left side of his face. He dressed in red and black robes loose enough to fight in.
"So, these are the travelers from another world who appeared to help the Avatar in her time of need," said Zuko. "Are you here to help us with Zaheer?"
"Fire Lord Izumi told us what was going on," said Sloth. "We're here to help."
"Good. We should see the twins, then get going," said Zuko.
The responsibilities of state bored Desna and Eska to tears, so they were quick to agree to head out into the tundra with us. Aside from Zuko, who rode his dragon, the rest of us made the trip on snowmobiles.
The prison was accessible through a small ice cave in the middle of nowhere. Inside was a facility staffed by Northern Water Tribe soldiers. Apparently Ulanaq had been a part of setting up this facility, and he'd never told the twins.
"I can't believe we had a secret prison we could have been throwing people in," said Eska.
"I'd like to throw my tailor in here," said Desna. "He always gets my cuffs wrong."
"They aren't joking," Sloth confirmed telepathically as Zuko explained about Pi Lei.
"Fire Lord Izumi seemed to think letting htem take over was the best option once we removed Ulanaq," I thought back. "Does good government just not exist unless we get involved personally?"
"Izumi might have been making the best of bad options," offered Sloth. "After the hundred year war, the Fire Nation conquering another nation and putting a puppet on the throne looks bad. Desna and Eska were Ulanaq's heirs, so no one could object to them."
We rode an elevator down to where Pi Lei's cell was. While we rode, Zuko awkwardly reminisced about the time he'd hired a man with similar abilities to Pi Lei, which he called combustion bending, to try and kill Avatar Aang. Unlike the twins, Zuko was genuinely remorseful about his past before he switched sides and became Aang's friend and teacher.
Pi Lei was chained to the wall of her cell. The sub zero temperatures prevented her from fire bending, and a metal plate was covering her forehead, where the explosive beams would originate. Striking that point on a combustion bender didn't shut down their powers, but it did make them too dangerous to use for a short time, just as likely to blow up in the combustion bender's face.
"While we wait for Zaheer to show up, there are a few questions I have for you," I said to Pi Lei, drawing my wand.
"I've been on ice for thirteen years, and you think you're gonna make me talk just when Zaheer's coming to get me out?" laughed Pi Lei.
"You don't really have a choice. Legelimense!"
Pi Lei had a strong will, but no specific training against psychic intrusion. Even if the hope of escape after thirteen years of captivity hadn't been stirring up her emotions, I'd have had no trouble getting her life story. Holstering my wand, I walked back to the elevator.
"What did you see?" asked Tanraq.
"Our enemy is called the Red Lotus," I began as the elevator started back up. "They're a secret society that branched off the White Lotus after they went public. Their goals are the end of humans having authority over one another. No more nations and leaders.
"Given some of the leadership decisions I've seen since coming to this world, I can understand the temptation to just burn the system to the ground, but it's naive stupidity to assume everything will work out after that, and it wouldn't just open up a power vacuum for someone worse to occupy.
"Anyway, Ulanaq was a member, and the whole unleash Vaatu thing was their plan. His dark avatar plan was him going off script and making a power grab for himself. They tried to kidnap Korra as a child to raise her to help them. Now, they just want her dead. They plan to force her into the avatar state and kill her so she won't reincarnate."
"Do you know who else was involved?" asked Tanraq.
"This group was a mostly isolated cell," I explained. "They avoided learning too many names so they couldn't betray them. Zaheer was the one who maintained contact with the broader organization. We can interrogate him once he's recaptured."
Zaheer arrived within hours, under cover of an artificial snowstorm. All four members of Zaheer's gang had some measure of spirit energy backing them up, making them stronger, faster, enhancing their bending. The only thing it did in this situation was make their approach obvious to my spiritual senses despite their attempts at stealth.
"This isn't going to be a fight," I said, drawing my wand. "You guys might as well stay here."
I flash stepped into the artificial blizzard and saw Zaheer standing on top of a truck, air bending their cover. I pointed my wand and fired a red stunning hex into his chest. Before his body had time to fall, I got into the truck and knocked out Gazan and Ming Hua with identical stunners. Shoving Gazan out of the driver's seat, I sat down and stepped on the brakes, slowly decelerating as I pulled up to Pi Lei's prison.
"That was impressive," acknowledged Zuko.
"I screwed up going against Vaatu and became a liability," I said. "I wanted to make up for that."
"You had no way of knowing Vaatu would effect you like that," said Sloth. "Screwing up would have been doing what we did when we had some reason to suspect he could do that to you."
"Fair enough," I said. "I'm still glad I got the chance to give a better showing."
"Can you remove their bending?" asked Tanraq.
"I can," I said. With a quick gesture, I encased the three unconscious prisoners in blocks of ice using water bending. I went down the row, pressing my thumbs to their foreheads and chests, energy bending them and removing their bending abilities.
"That'll make containing them much easier," said Zuko. "It's too bad doing the same to Pi Lei would require me to remove the cover from her third eye."
"When they come around, we can help interrogate them," I said. "Meanwhile, I'd like to get some training in. Fire Lord Izumi said you could teach us to bend lightning. Would you be willing to teach us, Lord Zuko?"
"It seems the least I could do," said Zuko.
Tanraq, Desna, and Eska took the prisoners inside. Sloth turned her bracelet to fire bending, and we got started.
Generating lightning involved a wide, circular motion before thrusting the fingertips in the direction you want to send the bolt. This technique required an inner calm that many fire benders couldn't achieve, but fortunately, after facing our demons in previous worlds, Sloth and I had no trouble getting into the correct mindset.
"I'll admit to being a little jealous," said Zuko when Sloth and I unleashed twin lightning bolts. "I never could get the mindset right. Now, this next technique is Lightning Redirection. If you are struck by lightning, natural or produced through fire bending, you can take it in one arm, guide the energy into your stomach, then send it up and out the other arm. You mustn't allow the energy to pass through your heart, or it will kill you."
It took us a couple hours of practice, but before the end of the day, Sloth and I were trading redirected lightning bolts. Zuko looked pleased and marginally impressed.
"Since the other prisoners aren't up yet, do you want to work on combustion bending?" I asked Sloth.
"You shouldn't begin to a study of combustion bending lightly," warned Lord Zuko. "It is the most unforgiving technique in Fire Bending. If not performed perfectly, you will be lucky if the worst that happens is that you blow your own arm off. More likely, it will be your head that explodes."
"Pi Lei trained for years before making her first attempt," I confirmed. "The danger of death and dismemberment keeps most people from trying at all, and it forces those who do try to go laboriously slow."
"Fortunately, Greed and I are homunculi," said Sloth with a grin. "We have the ability to instantly regenerate any injury. We can make mistakes, learn from them, and not end up dead or crippled."
When Tanraq came out a half hour later, the tundra near the prison had been painted red with blood and gore. Between us, Sloth and I had managed one successful shot each, channeled through a point on our foreheads, along a perfectly straight trajectory, to blow up a target a hundred meters away. The slurry of bloody fingers, toes, brain, and bone strewn across the area testified to the dozens of unsuccessful shots we attempted.
"What... happened here?" asked Tanraq.
A wave of blue alchemic light passed from my severed elbow, reconstructing the bones in my right forearm and hand. A second wave layered on muscle and tendons, and a final wave layered on skin and nails. At the same time, Sloth was regenerating her head in a like manner.
"It's been fascinating watching," said Zuko. "Apparently, they weren't kidding about being immortal."
"What's up?" I asked.
"They're awake," said Tanraq, shaking his head.
"We're making good progress, but no reason we can't take a break and help with the interrogation," I said, stretching.
"You get the names out of Zaheer. I'll grab Gazan's knowledge of lava bending," said Sloth.
Tanraq led us to a room where the prisoners were chained up. They all looked defeated and disappointed. I approached Zaheer and smiled.
"You're going to help us roll up the rest of the Red Lotus. Contacts, members, meeting plans, passwords, everything. Legelimense!"
Zaheer wasn't evil. He was just an idiot. He genuinely believed that destroying the avatar, world leaders, and any other pillars of order he could get his hands on would inherently benefit the little people. It was the same naivety that underscored the Bount invasion of the Soul Society.
Zaheer had a lot of company in his delusional belief in anarchy. Members of the Red Lotus were spread throughout every nation. Many of Zaheer's contacts had spirit energy and enough training to leave their bodies and consult in the spirit world. Zaheer had stayed in touch with those contacts throughout his imprisonment, keeping up to date on world events.
When I finished rifling through his mind, I drew my zanpakto and stabbed Zaheer twice, destroying his soul chain and soul sleep, permanently destroying his spirit energy. Though my zanpakto was invisible, the motion of my hand and the twin spurts of blood from Zaheer drew Zuko, Tanraq, Desna, and Eska's attention. I grabbed some ice with water bending, liquefied it, and used it to heal the physical wounds I inflicted on Zaheer.
"What was that about?" demanded Tanraq.
"He's been leaving his body to stay in contact with his allies in the wider world," I explained. "I inflicted a spiritually crippling injury just like I did to Ulanaq. It'll keep him from casually leaving his body again."
"You mean to say locking him up all these years hasn't changed a thing?" asked Tanraq. "He's still been able to speak to whoever he wanted while inside his cell?"
I nodded. "Which is good for us. It means the names, passwords, and the like I got from him are up to date."
"It seems the Red Lotus just lost the game," said Zuko satisfied.
Zuko and Tanraq spent the next few hours on the radio, coordinating the resources at their disposal to take advantage of the intelligence I'd provided. Sloth and I resumed work on our combustion bending. By the end of it, we were no longer blowing ourselves up, and were instead working on our aim.
"It's time for dinner," said one of the guards. "Lord Zuko and Chiefs Tanraq, Desna, and Eska would appreciate it if you would join them."
"Thanks. We'll be right in," I said. I stepped toward the prison and deconstructed the blood and body parts in a wave of blue alchemic light originating from the transmutation circle on the sole of my shoe.
We headed down to a lower chamber where we'd asked Loki to stay so we wouldn't worry him with our combustion bending practice. Once our dog was at our side, we followed the guard to the mess hall where the royalty were waiting. Accepting trays offered by the guards, we went to sit down at the table with the others. The guards had prepared a special bowl for Loki, which I set down for him once I'd taken my seat.
"Greed, Sloth, I want to thank you for your help with Zaheer and his associates," said Zuko. "Not to mention everything you've already done to help restore the Air Nation, destroy Vaatu, and capture Ulanaq. You've both been of great service maintaining and restoring the balance of the world. I would like to offer you membership in the Order of the White Lotus."
"Protecting the avatar, preserving peace, fostering cooperation between nations," said Sloth, listing off the White Lotus' goals and principles. "We would be honored to join such an organization."
I bowed my head in acknowledgement. "Thank you, Lord Zuko."
"You've done more to deserve a place with us than some grand masters have," said Zuko, brushing off our thanks. "We'll go over the secret hand shakes later. For now, I'd like to talk about your first official mission."
"What's that?" I asked.
"Aiwei, one of Zaheer's spirit world contacts is based out of the Earth Kingdom city of Zaufu," began Zuko. "Aiwei has a trusted position where he could do a lot of damage. On a more personal note, Zaufu's leader, Suyin Bei Fong, is the daughter of an old friend of mine and I'd like to see her safe."
"Our next stop was going to be Republic City to see if we could find a metal bending teacher, but that can wait until Aiwei's dealt with and your friend's safe," I said.
"I appreciate that," said Zuko, "though you may find your plans aren't as delayed as you might think."
"An airship will arrive in the morning to take you to Zaufu," said Tanraq.
"In that case, we should try to work on our lava bending after dinner," said Sloth. "I'd like to at least get the basics while we still have Gazan's brain to pick."
As far as we knew, Gazan was the first earth bender besides the avatar to bend lava. Once Sloth revealed how Gazan did it, the success of previous avatars made more sense. Lava bending involved applying concepts of water bending and fire bending to one's earth bending. With the equivalent of ten thousand years of practice with all four elements, it wasn't difficult to apply Gazan's insights. We were successfully liquefying and solidifying rock and moving it around in its liquid state within an hour of practice.
Before I stripped him of his bending, Gazan had been fond of forming frizbee sized lava shurikens. When the promised air ship arrived the next morning, Sloth and I were playing catch with two spinning blades of glowing, liquid rock. As the air ship docked, we compressed the lava shurikens into black balls of cooled igneous rock and dropped them.
The air ship was a large propeller driven, lighter than air craft. There were spacious bedrooms and a large, high ceilinged common area. The crew were quiet and professional, mostly preferring to give us some peace and quiet on our trip.
With little else to do as we traveled, Sloth and I resumed our experiments with Jenomite. After deriving its chemical structure, we used alchemy to produce a new jenomite sample from base elements. Our transmuted crystals showed the same growth properties as the original samples.
"I don't think there's any escaping it," said Sloth after a certain point. "Jenomite violates matter and energy conservation laws, has an easily reproducible chemical structure, and is absolutely a fully scaleable, cruelty free solution to the problem of entropy. It isn't an obvious solution, but it probably isn't the only novel solution either. The incubators have no excuse for jumping straight to the witch system when they still had trillions of years to work on basic science and find one of the available alternatives."
"How do you want to play it when we go visit his world?" I asked. "Do you want to just tell Kyubey? Maybe earth bend some jenomite crystals through the heads of his bodies until he asks us what we're doing? Tell him there is a solution somewhere in organic chemistry and withhold the actual answer?"
"I don't know," said Sloth. "I mean, he doesn't feel pain, so I'm not sure smashing his bodies would be as satisfying as it should be, but I know I don't want to just give it to him. I'll need to think about it."
"There's no rush," I said. "Whatever you decide, I'll support."
This was a world of architectural marvels. The city of Zaufu was a collection of enormous metal flowers that closed into buds at night and blossomed open as the sun rose. A rail system connected the individual blossoms to one another. The enormous metal petals weren't strictly ornamental. Made from refined platinum, a material even master metal benders couldn't effect, the shell formed when they were closed would deter most armies.
Our air ship docked and Sloth, Loki, and I debarked. We were greeted on the platform by a barefoot, bald man with a thin chain running from a nose piercing to an ear piercing. He was the man I'd seen in Zaheer's memories, Aiwei.
"Hello. Will this be all the members of your party?" he asked.
"Just the three of us," I confirmed.
"Three?" asked Aiwei. Catching sight of Loki, he nodded and said, "Ah, I see. Miss Suyin Bei Fong wishes to see you."
"Lead the way," I said.
"Aiwei's isolated here," reported Sloth telepathically. "There aren't any other Red Lotus members in Zaufu. He's spent years ingratiating himself with Suyin and her family. He's the only truth seer in Zaufu and she trusts him implicitly as a matter of policy."
"Truth seer?" I thought back.
"It's the reason he's barefoot," thought Sloth. "There's an earth bending ability called seismic sense that lets you 'see' by sensing the vibrations in the ground. A truth seer takes it a step further, using their seismic sense to monitor breathing, heart rate, and basically act like a polygraph."
"No use against us, then," I thought, relieved. "Occlumency keeps those tells suppressed."
"He doesn't suspect a thing," confirmed Sloth.
Suyin was a grey haired woman dressed in a flowing green robe with a metal necklace. She was watching two young men play a high speed metal bending game that had superficial similarities to air ball.
"You must be Greed, Sloth, and is this Loki?" said Suyin, bending down to pet our dog.
"He is, and we are," I said with a smile. "You must be Suyin."
"I like to keep informed of the people who come to my city," said Suyin. "I hear you helped Tenzin rebuild the Air Nomads by granting air bending to the acolytes."
"We did," said Sloth.
"Tell me, while you were traveling together, did Tenzin manage to teach you any air bending?" asked Suyin.
"We're both master air benders," I said, forming and dissipating a small tornado in the palm of my hand. "And masters of the other three elements as well."
Suyin looked at Aiwei, who gave her a worried look and shook his head.
"Did you know that Aiwei here is a truth seer?" asked Suyin. "Thanks to Aiwei, there are no secrets in Zaufu. He can detect the slightest change in heart rate and know when someone's lying."
"It isn't a perfect ability," said Aiwei. "It works on the principle that everyone is at least a little uncomfortable with lying. A sociopath can lie and manipulate without a hint of guilt, and that I am unable to detect."
"We are trained in all four elements," I said, holding a flame in my left hand, condensing a small ball of water out of the moisture in the air with my right hand, and using my right foot to levitate a small bit of dirt off the otherwise immaculate metal floor.
"Of course, we are capable of undetectable lying," said Sloth as I released my hold on the elements. "My head is a red balloon. You see? We aren't sociopaths, but we are trained in a technique called occlumency that protects our minds and our secrets."
"In that case, I apologize for the suspicion," said Suyin. "I don't suppose you can grant others the remaining elements?"
"It was one of the first things we tried," I said. "I survived due to the unusual structure of my soul, and I can't completely duplicate that soul structure without a particular artifact I didn't bring with me when I came to visit this world."
"Well, it was worth a try," said Suyin, brushing it off. "Why don't I introduce you to my family?"
The two young men playing the metal bending game were Wei and Wing, her twin sons. Their older brother Huan was an artistic sort with a streak of green hair who used his metal bending to create abstract sculptures. Baatar Jr. was the oldest son, named for their architect father. A non bender, Baatar Jr. reached for his potential through science and engineering. Finally, we were introduced to Suyin and Baatar's only daughter Opal. She was tall with short black hair, olive green eyes, and an easy smile.
"Opal is one of the people who discovered they had air bending after harmonic convergence," said Suyin. "It would mean the world to us if you would stay in Zaufu and teach Opal about her new gift."
"There's no reason we can't teach Opal air bending while we study metal bending," I said, taking a quick glance at Sloth who nodded.
"While we're here, we can also teach lava bending classes," said Sloth. "We recently helped interrogate a criminal named Gazan, and among the things we learned from him was how to perform lava bending."
Sloth adjusted the dial on her soul bracelet then levitated a handful of pebbles, melted them, and fuse them into a lava shuriken. After giving it a quick spin around the courtyard we were in, she solidified it back into rock. All the while, Aiwei did an admirable job keeping a straight face. There were tells if you knew to look for them, but Sloth and I were the only ones who knew to look.
"That's amazing," declared Suyin with a nod of agreement from Opal. "When my mother, Toph Bei Fong invented metal bending, she expanded the horizons of what earth bending could do. This is every bit as significant."
"Before you go putting up any statues," said Sloth, glancing at several statues of Toph, "remember, we're just passing the knowledge on. It was Gazan who developed the technique."
Sloth and I were invited to dine with the Bei Fong family. Aiwei was at the table with us. Before dinner, we both slipped something into one another's drinks. I was pretty confident I'd noticed him, but he hadn't noticed me.
I smiled as I detected the characteristic flavor of almonds as I took a drink, the classic sign of cyanide. I loved being immortal. Some magically active poisons might have been able to effect me, but simple chemical poisons like this really were nothing more than flavoring to my homunculus body.
"I don't understand. You should be dead," said Aiwei as I took another drink and smiled at him.
"What do you mean 'he should be dead'?" asked Suyin.
"I poisoned his drink and planted evidence framing the chef. He should be dying right now," said Aiwei. "Why am I saying this out loud?"
"Because I dosed your drink with a powerful truth potion," I explained.
"What is going on here?" demanded Suyin.
"Aiwei is part of a secret group called the Red Lotus and has worked his way into his current position to undermine Zaufu," I explained.
"It wasn't that difficult," said Aiwei. "You are an incredibly trusting, easily led woman. Because of my abilities, I could tell you anything and you'd believe me. If Zaufu has a law, it's my word, not yours."
"If you're so confident you could get away with anything, why try and kill our guests?" asked Suyin.
"They arrived already knowing the truth," said Aiwei. "The lava bending criminal they mentioned was with the Red Lotus. Unfortunately, by the time I realized it, they'd already shown my abilities didn't work on them."
"How long is he going to be like this?" asked Suyin.
"About an hour unless we re dose him," provided Sloth.
"That probably won't be enough," said Aiwei. "I've been working behind your back for a very long time."
"Lock him up," said Suyin to her guards. "Would you be willing to provide more of this truth potion to help with his interrogation?"
"Of course," I said.
Aiwei was removed. Once he was gone, we resumed eating. The chef had done an impressive job, putting together flavors and textures I wouldn't have considered.
"Aiwei was right about you knowing the truth about him when you arrived, wasn't he?" asked Suyin.
"He was," I acknowledged. "We were sent here by Lord Zuko to deal with him."
"We wanted to assess the situation and decide the best way to do this before acting," added Sloth.
"I can't blame you for that," said Suyin. "I've known Aiwei for years and trusted him implicitly. I wouldn't have believed you if you'd just accused him first thing. What I want to know is if you're still staying to teach Opal."
"If you'll still have us after our little deception," I said. "We'd still like to study metal bending ourselves, of course."
"We'll get all the lessons started tomorrow," said Suyin.
Author's comments:
After assimilating the libraries of multiple modern worlds, Sloth and Greed are both familiar with numerous theories and philosophies of governance, including anarchy. Zaheer's ideas aren't new to them, and they have the tools to recognize the natural consequences of his intended actions. The Red Lotus was never going to be a physical or moral threat, only a source of new bending abilities for our heroes to pick up while they're here.