Chapter 5: Lethal

After three grueling months, Toph was finally getting out of Lin's Hair. "Next time I come over, that little girl BETTER HAVE A NAME!" Toph yelled as she boarded the train headed south.

"Yes mother," Lin replied tersely seeing her off before returning to the Police Station with Tenzin.

"I suppose we should start thinking of names for her," Lin said that night laying beside Tenzin after he returned home from work.

"I don't know. I've gotten kind of used to Baby No. 2," Tenzin replied caressing her unmarred cheek as he gazed into her beautifully emerald green eyes.

"Tenzin," Lin pouted. "I call my prisoners by their number. I cannot possibly continue to treat my only daughter the same way!"

Tenzin laughed pulling her closer to him by her waist. "I was only joking," he replied softly pecking her sweet pink lips.

"So what were you thinking, for names?" Lin asked gazing into his blue-grey eyes.

"I was thinking something like... Chin Bai maybe..."

"Golden place of purity?" Lin asked with a furrowed brow.

"Fang He?" Tenzin then offered making note of her disapproval of the first name.

"Pleasant smelling lotus flower? Tenzin, you know how much I hate the White Lotus right now," Lin reminded the love of her life.

"Fang han?"

"Pleasant smelling country? That is just silly to me," Lin said with a soft smile.

"Well then, what do you want to name our littlest baby?" Tenzin asked.

"I was thinking..." Lin said with her finger pointed at her chin as she paused.

Just then their thoughts were disrupted by a massive quake.

"What the-" both Lin and Tenzin leapt out of bed in their pajamas. Tenzin was wearing orange-yellow striped pants and Lin was wearing green shorts and a white tank top. Then they heard crying from their daughter's nursery.

"Baby No. 2!"

Lin made it there first followed closely by Tenzin who nearly crashed into her when she stopped suddenly in the doorway.

"What-" Tenzin asked grabbing onto her arms to balance himself. When he looked up, he saw why she froze. A man sat on the window sill with one leg already out the other end, their child in the crook in his arm, with a knife to her head.

Tenzin didn't need to be an earthbender to feel his love's heart beating through her chest. He didn't need to see her face to imagine her fear. He knew.

"Wrap her in white so no one will recognize her orange and red clothing!" the man whispered to an accomplice.

"No!" Lin screamed lunging forward. The man pulled the child back from his accomplice and moved the knife closer to the child's head.

"Careful Beifong, you wouldn't want to hurt this pretty little thing!" the man taunted touching the knife to the child's pink skin.

Lin fell to her knees. "Speak your demands!" she yelled desperately. She could do nothing. She nor Tenzin. One move and they would kill the baby, or drop her in their attempt to flee. She was so small, so delicate and fragile after three months of fighting a fever without a fully developed anything. She was sooooo fragile.

"We don't have any demands. We just wanted a girl, a young earthbender for our ranks. Fortunately this one's cute. She will make a good messenger. The targets will trust her," the man said smoothly. "It is a shame you will never see her again," the man said turning the blade away from the child's face to touch her squishy little cheek with his fat, coarse, and hairy index finger. The baby turned and bit his finger with her gummy little mouth.

"WHA?!" he yelped. Before he could yank his finger out and dislocate the infant's jaw, a narrow jut of earth speared through the wooden wall and floor impaling the man, killing him instantly, causing him to drop the baby. Lin couldn't move. Tenzin swept the child up in a wind current right into Lin's arms, saving her from the fall, then took off through the window after the man's accomplices.

"What happened?!" Katara asked appearing with Hungjian in her arms, and Aang at her heel.

Lin just knelt frozen on the ground, clutching her crying daughter, and shaking with trauma. Her glassy eyes stared forward, avoiding the sight of the baby's face and clothes splattered with blood.

Katara and Aang looked where Lin was looking, and covered Hungjian's face.

Aang put a hand on Lin's shoulder and turned her away from the scene. Attention broken from the sight of the body, Lin bent over further and began to cry with her baby, holding onto her for dear life while Aang knelt beside her and rubbed circles on her back.

Tenzin stood over the two attempted kidnappers where they were both tied to a tree by the White Lotus. "WHO SENT YOU?!" Tenzin demanded.

"Persephone Ranok! She wanted to know if the chief had a daughter! We weren't going to originally take the baby, but when started crying, the leader worried the baby would wake the house so told us to get it out before anybody came but-"

"YOU THOUGHT YOU COULD SNEAK INTO THE HOUSE OF THE AVATAR, THE CHIEF OF POLICE, THE GREATEST WATERBENDING MASTER IN THE WORLD, AND ME, TO PEEK AT A BABY, AND THOUGHT YOU WOULD GET AWAY UNSCATHED?!" Tenzin yelled.

"Son, Lin needs you right now," Aang said placing a silencing hand on Tenzin's shoulder, sending him back inside.

When Tenzin came in, he saw Lin at the kitchen table with their daughter in her lap, and Hungjian sitting on the edge of the table beside her, Katara moving water around her head to ease the pain of that evening.

"Lin," Tenzin said softly picking Hungjian up off the table, pulling up a chair, and taking a seat beside his lady.

Katara pulled the healing water away.

Lin took a deep breath and leaned over on his shoulder. "This is exactly what I was afraid of. I thought with hard work and persistence, dreams would come true. I didn't think the nightmares would too," Lin whispered in Tenzin's ear as Hungjian picked at his father's few chest hairs.

"I'm sorry,"

"Don't be. This wasn't your fault. Its mine,"

"How could it be your fault? Ranok's wife, the mother of whispers just wanted a story on you-"

"And I should have seen it coming. Ever since I returned to work, they have been suspecting as much. I didn't lose all the weight immediately. I heard the secretaries talking about the size of my hips and breasts," Lin said.

"Nobody loses the weight immediately. Don't be so hard on yourself!"

"But I didn't even try!" Lin replied.

"You shouldn't have to-"

"If we're going to hide them until they're old enough to protect themselves, I must, Tenzin. You have to understand! As much influence we have, and as much as we want to and can change the world, we can't stop people from gossiping." Lin insisted looking down at the new baby sleeping soundly in her lap. "I think I have a name for her,"

"What?" Tenzin asked.

"Huifan," Lin replied. "She is already clever enough to bite the man's finger, to distract him since she can't do any real damage, and lethal. Even in infancy, willing to kill if necessary," Lin said gazing down at her baby.

"I hope she never has to again," Tenzin sighed looking down at their daughter with unease.

"I do too," Lin sighed.

However much it hurt, they predicted that night would not be the last time the small, but beautiful and strong girl would have to kill for her right to live her her life.