/*Thank you for reading! I am having fun writing this, and I am glad you all seem to be enjoying it so far.*/
-Midnight Mischief—
Mako looked over the edge. A steep drop. Seventy-something floors in this building. Standing on the roof gave him extreme vertigo. O-Ren walked out of the door.
"There he is!" O-Ren shouted, directing the comment to Mako. "Ready to do this thing?"
"Yeah, it'll be a piece of cake. You think a lot of people see this building?"
"Of course, it's Cabbage Corp. Everyone passes this building. Cabbage man sold himself out. Money was more important? And he was making great strides in his technology, too. A sad day, indeed. Guy just fled the city. Abandonment. Anyway, building is all ready for ya."
"We could have gotten a better building I think."
"Yeah, but enough people see this one, I'm telling you. Plus the absorption of this company kinda hit me hard, man. My pops had a job here. Loved it here. Raised our family so well because of this job and then that scumbag Graft swoops in and my pops is a goner. You know what he was doing? Making a machine to mold and shape parts so earthbenders wouldn't be needed. It sounded so cool, but then Graft thought for only a second about it, and my pops was gone. Just like that. Graft shuts the project down and throws in a bunch of benders to do the job. Put his life into this place and he gets thrown out so quick? Not on my watch. If Graft thinks he can just take something as he pleases, he hasn't met O-Ren. Okay, you ready?"
"Whenever you are," Mako said. O-Ren gave him a thumbs up and Mako rappelled down the front of the Cabbage Corp skyscraper on a harness tied to the top of the building secured by O-Ren. He let out strong blows of fire at each consecutive window he passed down a single column. Once he got down far enough, O-Ren pulled him up. Mako repeated this down three columns of windows to ensure the inside would burn away. The sirens sounded shortly after they ditched the scene.
"Dang, that is the most legit thing we've done so far. That building is gonna get seriously torched inside before they can stop it. Felt so good to throw it back in Graft's face for real this time. He's not taking anything my dad made, now," O-Ren said as they strolled along the rooftops of the connected buildings once they were far away from Cabbage Corp. "Nice work, man!"
They high-fived.
"You really have a bone to pick with him, huh?" Mako asked.
"Yeah, didn't I tell you? They screwed my old man over."
"I mean since before that happened, though. You never seemed to like him, either," Mako said.
"He got his hands all dirty in the police business when I was a metalbender for Republic City on the force. Kept coming in and expecting things to change. I never came into contact with Amon so I was able to keep my bending. I always thought Lin was a great chief, and even without her bending could still be a kickass leader. But then this damn Graft strolls in and decides to change up her force. I was kept when she came back and reorganized everything. I thought it was going to be normal again but she makes this new chief, Qu, and Lin gets pushed to the side. They pretty much forced her to believe only a metalbender could run the force. I didn't even see it coming. Somehow this whole government was forming all of a sudden: the Chief of police and the councilmembers. The new chief and his henchmen started conducting secret meetings with the council and before I knew it I wasn't even fighting crime anymore. I hated the way things were going. Then, ugh, other things started going wrong, and I started drinking a lot and got demoted so far down to the point where I was just kicked out. The chief was a joke, a puppet. Graft controlled everything, they just didn't want us to see that. They do all these things behind closed doors because the decisions they are making seem so wrong but they are afraid of all these citizens disagreeing with them so they just make it seem like they are doing what is right."
They continued along. O-Ren got toward the ledge to see if he could balance himself.
"How much about Graft do you know, O-Ren?" Mako asked. He realized how little about this whole thing they really were aware of.
"I guess not much about Graft himself. Maybe he is a nice person or something. But I see what is actually happening because of him and I see the puppet strings controlling people in power that he is holding. I see how he halts progress. That's enough for me to go through any trouble to make people hate him. But no one believes what we say, we just gotta do crazy stuff like this to show we are serious. I don't know, it's hard to say anything about the man when you never see him. He is somewhere doing some kind of crazy stuff that apparently our benefactors believe is so necessary and ingenius that everything must be devoted to it even if the citizens don't care. I don't care what it is; it isn't worth what it has been costing."
"What do you think it could possibly be?" Mako asked. Mako, though, already had a general idea.
"Who the hell knows, man. If it really can save the world? Why can't they just tell us more? Why is everything so secret? What is so wrong with it that no one can know!? Ugh, and then, the world is saved, we have some tyrannical government in place. You think they will give that up so easily? Doubt it. Why, man? What do you think of them?" O-Ren asked, directing it at Mako.
"Yeah, I agree. The whole thing is just a mess and people don't want another war so they're just closing their eyes. You said it."
"Well what do you know about Graft? You seemed to dislike him from day one too. Remember that day we met back in the plant?"
Mako remembered and he knew why. "Yeah…I knew him. I knew Graft before he showed up that day. I knew the guy before he got here. I didn't really talk to him when I used to be around him. I didn't even know his name. It was a long time ago. I was a broke orphan who was willing to do work for any money. My brother depended on me then. I agreed to help this man for some cash. Filing. That is all I did. I was to never look in them, just organize. In a small office of files. Damn was I a good filer. The guy, Graft himself, the guy who found me and decided to hire me to do that job, complimented my work. I was never to look in the files. They were sealed shut so I didn't. Just organized. The labels were really weird anyway, I couldn't understand them."
"Wait, you did work for Graft?! Really?"
"Hey man I needed any kind of money and he paid really well. It was just some office somewhere. Then, I came to work one day and everything was abandoned. My pay was left. Nothing else. I never saw Graft again until that day in the plant. Graft has no idea who I am anyway."
"It's just so weird, man," said a stunned O-Ren. "I don't blame you, though. You turned out all right at least."
"Yeah."
"You ever see anything weird there?" Mako had. He had a glimpse into a file once. For a brief second he saw strange drawings. Like organs with labels. One was an organ changing over time. Mako really didn't have time to analyze it, but it looked freaky. A lot of cases with tons of writing. He thought for a second that Graft might have been doing human testing, but he tried to put the idea out of his mind.
"Nothing really. Just cases," Mako said. "I never tried to find anything out. I didn't know weird stuff was happening then and I didn't want to get in trouble."
"Heard that, man. Gah, just so weird! It's exciting! Going against your old boss! So uh, orphaned as a youngin, eh? How was that?"
"It was tough, man," Mako reflected. "Had to do a lot of work to take care of ourselves before we got a deal with the gym owner for pro-bending. Lot of shady business. Nothing came easy."
"What happened to your parents?"
"Killed by a firebender."
"Damn, I'm sorry man."
"It's old news. I was eight. All I remember are the flames, the heat, my brother crying. It happened so fast my dad was killed, and then my mom trying to protect Bolin and me. Then he killed her, too. Somehow. She was an earthbender, like my brother. "
"What do you remember about the killer, dude? I used to be in the force maybe I could help you find the guy. I did that kind of work sometimes."
"It's kind of hard to explain the killer."
"Why is that?"
"Well, I don't remember ever really seeing a face. His body sort of just blended in with the ashes. All I remember are glowing red eyes. That is seriously it. It was like a nightmare but I swear that is what I saw."
"Well, then never mind. I don't know anyone like that."
"It's all right," Mako laughed. "I'm not real sensitive about all that now. What I remember about it that is really strange, though, is how easily the firebender evaded my mother's earthbending attacks. He anticipated her actions so well. Almost like he knew earthbending. But I doubt the Avatar was responsible for my parents' deaths since she would have been the same age as I was…and in the South Pole. Anyway, I've been pretty desensitized over the last year after I seriously ruined any chance I ever had at not being alone."
"Girl troubles?"
"Asami Sato."
"You dated the CEO of Future Industries? Mad props, not only is she one of the private companies left, she is a huge babe! Why'd you let that slip through?"
"Screwed it up," Mako shrugged. "Thought I liked someone else. Didn't work out. Asami had so many bad things happen to her and then I go and dump her one day for another girl."
"Ha! Man you suck."
Mako lightly punched O-Ren. "Shut up, you ass." He laughed.
"Why don't I take you to a club or something man? Lighten up the mood a little, eh? Celebrate?"
Mako thanked him, but just decided to head home for the night.