Jia pushed Ikki behind the desk, kicking it over as the large glass windows overlooking the city shattered into thousands of razor sharp pieces. She used her body to further shield the airbender, until the glass stopped raining down. She peered over the desk in time to see men and women in red hoods swinging into the office. She grabbed Ikki's hand and pulled her out of the office. "Run!"

A blast of fire followed them. Jia ducked and rolled, spinning around long enough to throw a stream of flame back at the Red Lotus soldiers. Ikki stopped at the elevator but Jia grabbed her again. "No. Stairs. Elevator will be a death trap."

She slammed her fist into the fire alarm, then pulled the door open. "Hurry!"

"I didn't know you were a bender." Though Jia seemed to be moving quickly enough in her heels, Ikki created a ball of air underneath her and picked Jia up to hasten their descent. She didn't have her airsuit, but she could make do.

Jia clung on tightly. "Not many do. We need to get to Research and Development."

"Why?"

"There are projects we really don't want them getting their hands on."

They burst out of the stairwell on the first floor. As soon as Ikki set her down, Jia took off at a full sprint down the hallway and through the heavy doors that led to the rear of the Future Industries complex. Towering three stories was the R&D department. A Red Lotus airship was hovering over it, strange tubular protrusions on its deck and what looked like Asami's new engines mounted to the back. In front of the entrance stood two soldiers, conversing with someone.

Jia recognized Ai Li immediately. The head of Future Industries' aeronautics department, deep in conversation with the Red Lotus. Ai Li spotted then a moment later and shouted something before rushing into the building. The soldiers moved into attack stances, but a blast of air from Ikki threw one man into the wall, and a swift punch to the throat from Jia brought the other down.

"What do we do?" Ikki asked.

Jia looked down at her hands, then calmly removed her earrings and hiked up her skirt. "Get all the employees out of the building. I'm going to burn it to the ground."

"Won't Asami freak?"

"It'll be better than these terrorists getting some of this technology," Jia replied. Fire flared to life in her palms and the unflappable woman looked thoroughly flapped. "Lets go!"

They rushed in together, Jia sliding low and lobbing fire at the nearest soldier. She could see Ai Li climbing the stairs into one of the cat walks. Ikki followed her gaze. "Do you want me to get her?"

"Save people first."

"What about the rest of the city?"

Jia swallowed her fear. She wasn't exactly a fighter. "Lets just do what we can here. And try not to die."

Ikki glanced at Jia, then ran forward. She swept her foot underneath a soldier, and he jumped to avoid it. She hit him in the chest with a blast of air, swirling more wind around her as she spun back to her feet. Two more unlucky soldiers were thrown into a wall. She pulled open a door to an office. Several employees were inside. Two men were cowering inside and a woman was making a weapon from a mop and what looked like the blade from an industrial paper-cutter. Ikki grinned at her, recognizing her from a now famous ad. "It's clear to the door! This place is about to burn down."

"Come on." The woman hauled the men to their feet and shoved them out the door. She brandished her weapon. "I'll protect your scrawny butts."

Something heavy slammed into Jia and she hit the ground hard. Rough hands grabbed at her, but she scrambled and rolled away. Back on her feet, she realized the heel on one shoe had snapped off. She picked it up from the ground, set it on fire, and threw it at her assailant. The soldier swatted it aside. Jia adjusted her stance. She had basic training in the basic forms, but the extent of her combat training had been the occasional sparring session with Asami or her friends. Heart pounding in her chest, Jia swung out a foot, an arc of fire following her movement. The soldier dodged it easily and advanced on her.

She remembered something Asami had shown her, a way to hold her hand and where to strike someone. A jab to the throat and then a punch in the chest and the soldier went down. Jia looked up, trying to find Ai Li again. The engineer was nearly to the room. She looked around wildly, spotting Ikki ushering employees out of the building. She pointed at Ai Li, and Ikki immediately airbent up to the catwalks. Jia grabbed one of the fleeing employees, a man she knew was a firebender. "I need your help. We're burning this building to the ground."

Ai Li moved quickly along the catwalk. Her extraction was on the roof and in just another minute she'd be airborne and safe. She didn't think Jia was a threat but the airbender could be a problem. The catwalk rocked suddenly, and she glanced behind her, fingers tightening on a file under her arm. "This doesn't concern you."

"That's the line you're going to open with? I'm an airbender, I'm more balanced than you." A gust of wind punctuated Ikki's words and the file was ripped out of Ai Li's hands. Another burst of air and Ikki flipped over Ai Li, grabbing the file in mid air and landing between her and the exit. She glanced down as smoke started to billow up, then held the file out over the fire Jia was creating below. "I'm going to guess that we don't want you taking whatever is in this folder."

"What are you doing? That's years of work!"

"Were you with the Red Lotus this whole time?" Ikki untied the clasp on the folder and thumbed through it. She closed it and then slipped it inside her shirt. "You've been using Asami to develop weapons! You stole her-"

Ikki's accusation was cut off as Ai Li slammed bodily into her. They both toppled over the railing and plummeted towards the fiery inferno. Ikki pushed at Ai Li, kicking and biting until the older woman let go of her. As the flames licked up around her, she punched at the fire, a whirlwind of air forming a cushion that she then used as a springboard. Ikki landed hard, rolling past Jia. Ai Li's cry was lost in the roaring fire.

Lin had spent the better part of lunch picking at her food and occasionally staring intently at Kya. It was driving Kya a little nuts. She was only in Republic City long enough to wait for a transport to the Fire Nation so she could help with healing efforts, but she'd wanted to spend at least some of her time catching up with an old friend. Of course, that only really worked if said old friend was in a talkative mood. But talkative and Lin Beifong weren't things that commonly went together.

"You know, I'd tell you that if you keep wearing the same expression your face will freeze like that, but that's kind of already happened," Kya said, pointing a finger at her old friend.

Predictably, Lin scowled. "It would be a month before I retire and there's suddenly chaos."

"Were you even looking forward to retirement?"

"Yes."

Kya leveled a bemused look at Lin. "Really? Truely? You? What were you going to do with your free time?"

"I don't know. Travel." She shrugged, rolling her eyes. "I can't be Chief forever. The position needs new blood. I just…" She sighed, and sank back in her chair. "I don't know what I'm going to do with myself."

"So you think it's the best thing for the city, but it's not the best thing for you," Kya guessed.

"Yes." She'd been dreading retiring, but it was the right thing to do. She'd earned her rest.

"With mom gone, I feel like I've been cut loose. Tenzin and Bumi have their little boys airbender club now. And the kids are all grown up. I don't feel needed anymore." Kya snorted. "Not that I've felt all that needed in recent memory. At least you had the police force. Tenzin has his family and his airbenders."

"You know," Lin replied. "I've never once envied my sister. Not her city, or her family. I've been content with my life."

"That doesn't have to mean that your life has to be over once you retire. Maybe...it could just be getting started." Leaning forward, Kya slapped her palms on the table. "You know what? Lets do something crazy."

"You've been spending too much time with Bumi," Lin retorted.

Kya laughed. "I haven't even said anything yet." She held up a hand to cut Lin off. "After this crisis is over, lets travel. Just you and me. You've more than earned the vacation."

"I'll think about it." Lin's scowl softened. "but...I'm not joining any circuses."

Smiling triumphantly, Kya picked up her chopsticks. Before she had a chance to stir her noodles, an air-raid siren went off. She glanced at Lin, and then both women jumped to their feet and ran for the door.

Lin looked to the sky in time to see black puffs of smoke from an unusual airship. A sound like thunder reached her ears just before a police airship went up in flames.

A hatch on the bottom of the attacking airship slid open and a mecha tank fell out. It landed nearby, rocking the ground. The top half swiveled, then it rolled forward. Lin darted to the side, lifting the ground in front of the tank and pushing back at it. It rolled back, then surged around the barrier. Kya drew water from her pouch and lashed at it. It twisted away, and one of it's arms swiveled. Lin readied herself for cables or electricity. Instead, there was a flash of white light and a sound like a firecracker. Blood sprayed across Lin's vision.

It splattered across her face, hot and wet, as Kya's back hit the ground. Time seemed to slow for Lin Beifong. The feeling of the earth around her became more pronounced, and she could almost taste the metal of the mech in the air. Where they'd gotten enough platinum for this army was a question for another time. Something shifted in Lin's consciousness as she charged towards the tank. Another click, another firecracker sound and something impacted her shoulder. The pain spread like fire down her arm, and she could feel a metal ball lodged in her flesh.

Click. Crack. She bent the metal of the next shot enough to spare her heart. It bit into her torso on the left side of her stomach and exploded out the other side. A third shot she deflected and it sank into her thigh. She stumbled, but she was close enough to feel the iron and steel inside the tank. There were hundreds more of those balls, and every one she could feel.

Holding her hands out, she blanked out the pain. The tank started to rattle as it's ammunition bounced around inside it. Smoke poured out of the cockpit and then the vehicle exploded.

The impact knocked Lin back and she skidded on the ground. For a few moments she lay dazed, watching the battle in the skies above Republic City. Kya groaned nearby and Lin crawled towards her. "Kya. Can you hear me? I'm coming."

She reached the waterbender. The front of her tunic was soaked with blood, and ignoring her own wounds, Lin hovered her hand over Kya's stomach. "I can get that thing out of you but you've got to be healing while I go."

"Sounds like a party," Kya whispered. Somehow she found the strength to pull water from nearby. "Hey, if I don't…"

"You aren't going anywhere," Lin ordered.

The fighting was bad enough before the Red Lotus literally dropped into town. A two-war riot had quickly turned into a three way war, but there was something fishy about it. Jinora crouched behind an overturned satomobile, peering through a spyglass as Kai kept watch behind them. "Oh, this is bad."

"You mean it's somehow getting worse?"

"Looks like some of the Red Lotus soldiers are really friendly with those New Equalists." The word left a bad taste on her tongue. While she generally supported the idea of equality there were too many bad memories surrounding that exact word.

"Either they're not purists or they don't really understand who they're working with," Kai mused.

"Both. A lot of benders have come out in support of the idea that the system is stacked against non-benders." Jinora closed the spyglass and secured it to her belt. "They're not wrong. But most of them aren't going to put themselves in the middle of a fight."

"So we need to show them that the Red Lotus only wants anarchy and that we're on their side."

Jinora nodded and stood. She smiled at Kai, then reached up to scritch at the beard on his jawline. "We need to expose them for who they are."

"How are we going to do that?"

Jinora tapped her finger on her nose. "We need to stop whatever is blocking the radio. Once news starts to get out again and people realize what's actually going on, we'll see a sea change on the ground."

"Okay," Kai replied. "What do you need me to do?"

"We need to find Varrick."

It proved to be easy - he was still in his office. Getting into the office was the hard part. There were seventeen layers of security and it took Jinora a solid five minutes to convince him that they were who they said they were. Jinora folded her arms as the door swiveled open. Varrick strolled out wearing a pair of pink goggles. The lens over his left eye dilated. "Well why didn't you say who you were?"

"We did, six times!"

Jinora put a calming hand on Kai's arm. "We need to shut down whatever is jamming the radio and get the news to report what's really going on."

"Oh! Well then you've come to the right place. That's the easy part. I think I have just the doohickey to solve your news broadcasting woes." He led them through his lab, then pulled open a large door and started to rustle through some equipment. "Say, have you heard from Korrasami?"

"Have we...what?" Jinora furrowed her brow.

Varrick straightened up, holding out an angular doohickey with assorted wires sticking out of it. "Korrasami. You know. Korra and Asami. I shortened it to Korrasami. Less syllables. More efficient."

"...Right." Jinora took the device from Varrick. "We haven't heard from them since the dam broke. What does this "doohickey" do?"

Varrick pointed up. "All you have to do is take it to the source of the interference press the big blue button and presto! You've countered the interference. You see, it works on matching Varrick-Waves with counter Varrick-Waves." He flapped his hand. "Very scientific. But that's the easy part. Getting to the source of the interference, now that's the hard part!"

"Where's the source?"

"The President's office!"

Jinora walked to the window and looked out. A red lotus airship rested above the President's office. "You don't think they've hurt her…?"

"What are you waiting for?" Varrick shoved her lightly. "Go find out!"

Leaping out the window, Jinora soared towards the office. Like many of the buildings in the new Republic City districts, it was a tall one, and the President's office took up the entire top floor and had the best view. Not as good as Future Industries, but Jinora was biased.

It was obvious something was wrong the closer they got. An audible thrum in the air gave Kai a headache and he found himself having difficulties staying aloft. He landed on the roof hard, absorbing most of the impact with a roll. By the time he was standing both him and Red Lotus soldiers were caught off guard. A whirlwind attack from Jinora sent the soldiers slamming into a wall. She deployed Varrick's doohickey, and the thrumming immediately stopped.

"There, lets go check on the President." She led Kai inside, and the two airbenders crept along the corridor towards President Tuyin's office. As they got closer, they could hear Tuyin's voice.

"Yes, everything is going as predicted. I just got word from our operatives in Harbor City, they've successfully deployed the bombs and the Chief and Council know what hit them. What about the Northern Tribe?"

There was a muffled response from whoever the President was talking to.

"He's dead? Finally, some good news. Keep me posted on the other sieges. I think our automatons have proven themselves." Tuyin hung up the phone, and walked to the window to look out at the city. Airships were still engaging other airships. She clenched her fists a she saw Avatar Korra's airship in the distance.

There was a sound on the roof, and then two figures flew past her window, and towards Korra's airship.