"Korra!" Asami yelled. "We've been at this all day." Her voice echoed like thunder in the metallic sewers beneath the foundations of Zaofu.
"No." Korra said bitterly, the wick of flame in her palm fluttered angrily as she tromped through the splashing muck that crept up the sides of her boots. The air was thick with fumes and the bitter cold of the slurry slipping past their feet dragged the heat right out of the bodies. "I'm not stopping until we get a lead on the Red Lotus." She snapped.
"And then what? Bolin's still in debriefing, Opal's still getting over the riot and Lin's keeping the Security Force in line whilst Mako's still going over the forensics for us." Asami retorted. "We've got no backup; and no sanction, what do you think we're going to do when we catch up to him."
"You think I can't handle this?" Korra exclaimed, she whirled around to face Asami. Her makeup had smeared and her hair was coated in debris, as was her clothing. "I'm the Avatar! I can handle some…..cultist with freaky bending."
"I know you can handle this." Asami answered tenderly. "But we should do this the smart way, organise a search, comb the sewers and take him down with the rest of Team Avatar."
Korra's snarl broke and so did the flame in her hand. They were drenched in darkness but Korra waded through the stifling sewer until she was within arm's reach of Asami. She clasped Sato's hands in her own. Asami's hands were covered in fine leather driving gloves and Korra's were coated in dirt but she felt better for having hold of Asami all the same. "I know, really I do but….I can't let anyone else get hurt because of this guy."
"Korra I-" Asami stopped as a weak lantern light crept around the bend of the sewer.
In an instant Korra spun on her heels and bought up twin spheres of flame easily three feet in diameter. "Get behind me!"
"Oh spirits above!" The man holding the lantern said in fear. As the light washed over him they could see he looked more like a victim of the Red Lotus than a member. His hair was nothing but patchy stubble and he had a milk-pale, jowly face plastered with dirt much like his faded, threadbare clothing. "It's the Avatar! You're Avatar Korra." he exclaimed happily, apparently oblivious to his brush with incineration.
"Um…yeah." Korra answered, nonplussed. The fire in her palms shrunk to a small candle-like globe. "Can I help you?"
"Can the Avatar help me?" He cackled, revealing a checkerboard smile of yellow teeth where any were still present. "A knock-kneed hog-monkey could help me." He said, his blithe laughter followed after and echoed obnoxiously in the cramped sewers. "Follow me." He said with his mischievous smile and then bounded around the bend, expecting the couple to follow after him.
After some hesitation they did indeed follow him and shortly after arrived at an intersection in the sewer, a large chamber where streams of sewage converged and gushed out into a swirling cesspool below. High above that, on a series of rusted catwalks and a patchwork duckboard of salvaged scrap and blankets sat around a dozen refugees. Each of them seemed sickly but all the same they clutched to their ramshackle weaponry, mostly old lengths of piping.
"Rami Is that-" One woman said as she fluttered her one good eye.
"The one and the same." Said Rami, the old scavenger. "Told you I'd find something good today."
"Have you told them what's going on?" The one-eyed crone asked.
"No…." Korra merely mumbled as she took a look at the almost magnificent squalor. "What is going on though?"
"Oh Avatar you've got to help us!" Rami pleaded. "We've tried talking to the guards but they kept telling us they're too busy."
"Don't care, more like." One man grumbled from the corner.
Rami ignored the older, more weathered man and carried on speaking to Korra, gesturing wildly as he did so. "People keep disappearing. And not just our group, whole families are going missing down here and no one seems to care."
"Do you think it's our guy?" Korra asked as she turned to her girlfriend.
Asami thought for a moment "These tunnels are just metal and earth, a skilled metalbender could take whole groups with him if he wanted to."
"If you're right there's no way we could catch him, he'd just keep rearranging tunnels." Said Korra.
"We could bring in the guards, if enough of them go into the sewers we're bound to flush him out." Korra smirked a little and then Asami grinned back as she realised what she had said. "That pun was an accident, I swear."
"No, the Metalbender could just keep looping around in circles. What we need someone who can find them and keep track of them." Her face brightened as the realisation dawned on her. "We need Toph." The avatar announced as she dragged Asami back down the tunnels towards the surface. "We'll be back!" She yelled back to the refugees.
There was a knocking at the Villa door. And another, and another. Kuvira sighed deeply and made her way through the hallway until she could reach the front door. "I'm coming, hold your hog-monkeys." She groaned as she staggered through her dishevelled home. She quickly fastened her robe and tried to pat out some of the wrinkles in it.
When the door finally opened up she was greeted by the sight of Bataar. He leaned heavily on a wooden cane and half his face hung limply even as the other half lit up at the sight of his bride to be. She had obviously slept poorly and by the smell she hadn't washed in the days since she saw him.
"Bataar!" She almost squealed as she ran up and squeezed him. "I wanted to visit but they wouldn't let me."
"Ooph, I know." He answered with a weeze. "I kept asking mother to let you up but she said she's got to keep you out of the loop." He explained as he waved away his escort. Even that simple movement seemed clumsier than normal.
Bataar' entourage departed back beyond the walls all save a middle aged woman in white and green robes, a doctor laden down with canvas medical bags. "Bataar, what's going on?"
"I'm afraid whilst your husband is fit enough to move he's still going to require medical supervision." The doctor explained, never deigning to look the Great Uniter in the eyes.
"I convinced mother that your first aid training was enough to help out." Bataar said breathlessly as he hobbled over to the nearest chair. It was just a small step to that seat but he seemed drained by it all the same.
"Of course. What do I need to know doctor?" Kuvira asked as she sheparded the doctor to a chair that hadn't been strewn with one of Kuvira's robes.
The doctor spouted a dizzying stream of medical jargon. As the conversation progressed Kuvira found herself unable to keep pace and then unable to even hear what the dull, droning Doctor had to say. In her own head Kuvira imagined herself trailing after Bataar in this tiny little Vila in a city that hated her for the rest of her life. And she went pale at the thought.
"Did you get all of that?" The doctor said slowly. There was no answer. "Should I tell you again?" She condescended, peering over her half-rimmed glasses.
"Yeah, I got all of that." Kuvira said quietly. "If you'll please leave." She added in the same empty tone. With a harrumph and nothing more the doctor gathered herself and headed out the door and back into a Zaofu that might as well have been miles away.
When he heard the door shut Bataar finally collapsed into a tearful embrace in Bataar's arms. His grip was tenuous and his sobbing was even more inelegant than usual as he clumsily ran a palsied hand over her. "I was so scared." He finally admitted, blubbering it into her shoulder.
"We'll get through this." Kuvira sobbed in response, and as she said it she could not help but feel as if she herself were a liar.
Opal and Juicy flew across the city, as high as either of them dared go, so high that they could see the top of the Metal Mountains and peek at the golden sands of the Si Wong desert. It was cold so high up and lonely, but it put her far away from her city, far enough away that she didn't have to look at the crowds of vagrants or the smell of countless unwashed masses. But mostly she didn't have to sit around her family. Her mother grew wearier by the day and her father followed dutifully after. Wing had abandoned power disk in place of sparring matches with the guards and Wei could only watch, bored. Huan had hit a block in his art and Junior….poor Junior. Eventually the growling in both Opal's stomach and the growling in Juicy's persuaded them to land.
She flew in to land in one of the gardens of the Beifong estate, converted into a bison stable. Without much prompting, or time for Opal to disembark Juicy shuffled over to fresh bale of hay and began chewing into it with gusto.
"Opal!" Korra yelled as she ran into the barn, freshly washed from her expedition into Zaoufu's underside.
"Hey Korra." She said with the same gentle little smile she always had, though somewhat pained in the corners of her eyes. "Is there anything you need."
"Yeah, we need some help tracking down the Red Lotus." Korra said as she approached Juicy and ruffled her perennially dander filled hair.
"Oh…uh sure, well if there's anything you need." She responded as she pulled packed lunch a lemon juice from a cooler in the bare metal stables.
"Actually we need your grandmother. Toph's the only one around who can keep track of the sewers all at once.
"So you just need me to give you a lift?" Opal asked evenly. If she was offended she didn't show it.
"Yeah, most of the private ships are too busy and Su says sending a government ship might set Rhee off."
"I could use a break from this city anyway she said bitterly."
A quick lunch later and they were back in the air headed for the foggy swamp. Every now and again another airship out of Zaofu would float past below them. Even further beneath them they could see the vast no man's land between the edge of Zaofu and the beginnings of Rhee's army. It was immense, easily as large as the army Kuvira had marched on Republic city and then some.
"I don't understand, if Rhee's army is so huge why does he still let people in and out of Zaofu. Korra asked as she peaked off the edge of Juicy's saddle.
"Wing says it's because he's afraid that putting up a blockade might cause us to go to war." Opal shouted over the wind. "But Wei thinks he's just trying to squeeze as many people out of the city as possible."
"What do you think?" Korra asked.
Opal took a deep breath before she looked over her shoulder and declared ominously "I think something bad 's coming either way."
It was a long, quiet flight towards the Foggy Swamp until Korra chose to speak. "I haven't seen you since the riot. Bolin told me you were pretty upset after wards." She said gently before scooting to sit alongside her on Juicy's broad flat head.
"Yeah." Opal balled in on herself for a moment. "It was pretty rough." She mumbled, her voice half taken by the wind.
"The riots are never easy." Korra grumbled. "You feel like whatever you're doing its wrong." Korra added.
Opal nodded and then said "I just….I didn't think it would go so badly."
"Lin told me that in a riot the more force you use the more you're the bad guy, sometimes things are just out of your hands." Korra answered slowly. Opal nodded but she didn't say anything. Juicy seemed to snuffle in agreement.
It was nearly sunset when the immense tree of the Foggy Swamp reared over the horizon. At the base of the largest tree, peaking between roots as big as houses was the beginnings of a camp fire. "There!" Korra exclaimed as she saw the tiny little fire. "That's Toph."
"Alright, girl let's bring her in for a landing." Opal said and yanked the reins on Jucy's horns.
Toph had just about gathered her things into an old carryall when she heard the familiar groaning of a bison coming in to land followed by the heavy reverberations of the ten ton beast coming in for a landing. It was heavier and clumsier than gentle old Appa's and the sound of snuffling carried through the air. It was Juicy, no doubt about it.
"Bout time Avatar!" She grumbled as she headed out of her hovel to meet the landing party.
"You were expecting us?" Korra asked as she hopped off the bison.
"Of course I have, twinkle toes." She said exasperated as she handed her rather cumbersome bag off to Korra. "I've been watching Zaofu through the vine since this whole warlord thing started." With a grunt Toph bought up a pillar of mud until she was within stepping height of Juicy's saddle and clambered aboard. "Well, it's a long flight back to Zaofu, and I hear its Avatar Day tomorrow, so let's go!"
"Uh….Juicy, yip-yip." Opal said uncertainly.
Asami leaned over Su Yin's war table and peered at the map as if the hundredth glance at Warlord Rhee's forces might give her some hidden insight into a new strategy or a new scientific breakthrough. She huffed and slipped back into her chair and returned to her design notepad.
"Any insights?" Su Yin asked from her perch over the map. Asami shook her head. "Either of you?"
"None, I told you, I'm a police officer not a general." Lin huffed and then softened for a moment. "I know you don't want to hear it Su, but Kuvira could be big help here."
"Have you seen my popularity figures? If I let her back in here my own people will wreck the city long before this Warlord even sets foot in the city." Su remarked bitterly.
Before the conversation could go any further the door flew open and in ran a flustered young Guardsman. "We've got airships coming in over the Si Wong Desert, dozens of them!" He reported between deeply laboured breaths.
"Rhee's got an airforce now?" Su exclaimed. "Asami, get Korra Lin I want you to-"
"No ma'am." The guardsman reported. "The airships transponders, they're….they're Fire Nation and Water Tribe Military, we've even picked up a few United Forces signals."
"Chief Tonraq must have come through." Lin exclaimed.
"When will they be here Guardsman?"
"By midnight tonight, ma'am, ready for Avatar day." He said briskly now that he had gotten his breath back.
"Looks like our luck is finally turning around." Asami remarked.
As Juicy rounded the horizon back to Zaofu they could see lights above the city. There were dozens of them, and slowly descending towards the lights of the city itself. "What are those?" Opal asked nervously.
"What are what?" Toph grumbled from her seat at the back of the saddle.
"There are lights in the sky." Korra reported. "It looks like Airships, lots of them!"
Toph curled deeper in on herself in the chill of the high altitude night. "Well bother me when there's something I can do."
"We're breaking radio silence, we need to know what's going on right now." Korra said as she snatched up the radio set mounted in Juicy's harness and set it to all bands and all frequencies. "This is Avatar Korra, to the fleet over Zaofu, who are you and what are you doing here?"
There was little in the way of a response for a few moments until the radio crackled back to life. "Korra!" A familiar voice boomed happily. "Asami told us you'd flown off."
"Dad, what are you doing here?" Korra asked perkily as she heard her father's voice
"It's Avatar Day soon we're here to help you out. Lord Zuko, Tenzin and General Iroh, we're all here to help you out, Katara even agreed to come along to visit." Tonraq elaborated cheerily.
"We're coming in to land now, I'll see you on the ground, dad." Korra said with an unseen smile and then turned the radio off.
"I think we're going to be alright." Opal said hopefully as they swooped down towards Zaofu.
In a nook deep within the underground labyrinth beneath Zaofu a man in a set of tarnished red and black robes sat surrounded by banks of radio equipment, and workbenches. He looked up as he heard boots splashing into the sewer. "The avatar took the bait." Rami said as he appeared on a catwalk beneath the robed man's lair. "She's bringing in Toph Beifong."
"Excellent, my pupil." He declared from the shadows. "According to my equipment the Fire Nation, the Water Tribe and even the United Forces are preparing to bring in their forces by air, is that true."
"Yes, sir I'm afraid the three great armies are assembling behind Zaofu to force Rhee to back down. I'm afraid even with all of Rhee's armies even taking Zaofu will be a difficult proposition" Rami reported uncertainly.
There was a long, tense pause as the shadowy figure sat in contemplation, lit only by the weak diode glow of his blinking banks of equipment before he leaned forward and simply answered. "Excellent."