A/N: Here's the fifth chapter! I hope you all enjoy. Please leave a review, and if you really liked it, a favorite.
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Chapter Five: First Meeting
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It was eleven forty five, fifteen minutes away from the exact time the Arbiter had threatened to kill Southern Water Tribe Councilman Ulva, and Chief Lin Bei fong, along with most of her police force, had completely surrounded the councilman's mansion. Lin had made sure to take every precaution possible to make sure there wasn't a repeat of councilwoman Chitsanu's death. She swore to herself not to let another person fall victim to this psychopath.
Cheif Bei fong herself was in an airship, hovering around Councilman Ulva's mansion. At the first sign of trouble, she and an elite team of Metal benders were going to drop down and attack. She was going to show him that no one could commit such violent murder, threaten the life of another, and still retain his freedom. The Arbiter was going to pay for his crimes.
The mansion defense was very carefully organized and planned out. A handful of officers would watch the perimeter for any suspicious activity. After them, a small group of guards would be patrolling the different rooms of the manor, making sure no one but those employed, as servants are present, performing frequent identity checks on everyone. And, finally, in Ulva's oversized office, which was situated in the very center of the estate, there were to be dozens of officers and the avatar, all standing vigilante in case the other two lines of defense were broken.
Councilman Ulva's office was nothing short of incredible. The man really had a taste for grandeur. The room looked more like a throne room, adorned with banners from the water tribe and tall pillars that reached all the way up to the ceiling. Leading up to the desk where Ulva worked was an expensive blue carpet. To sum it all up, the room was huge.
Korra stood at the ready with Mako and Bolin next to councilman Ulva, who was sitting at his desk sweating profusely and mumbling nervously. The three of them had been standing in the same spot for over two hours, and were honestly beginning to hope the Arbiter had just given up.
"Maybe he got scared and wimped out?" Bolin suggested with a smile
Even Mako was starting to become convinced that the assassin would never show. "Yeah, so much for all that big talk two days ago!"
Korra wanted to join in with them and start bashing this self proclaimed Arbiter, but she knew it wasn't true. She had heard the man's voice, and she knew for a fact that he was going to show himself. His speech had such conviction, such emotion, it reminded her of those Amon gave to his equalist followers.
"Hey Korra, you alright?" Mako asked in a concerned tone
Korra made sure not to betray her true feelings and responded, "Oh, yeah, I'm fine Mako. Maybe you two are right, maybe this guy was just all talk."
"Oh, do you think so?" councilman Ulva hoped out loud, "Do you really think he'll just give up?"
Korra took a look at the high security, and the place did look pretty impenetrable. But she also knew that where there's a will, there's a way, and the Arbiter certainly sounded as if he had the will. But Ulva didn't need to know that. "I'm sure you'll be find councilman."
Ulva sighed with relief, and looked at ease for a second. But soon, his old worrying self returned as he began to fret, "But didn't he kill three officers on his own, not to mention more then half of Chitsanu's personal guard? What if he finds a way in? What if he manages to get me? Oh, all this worrying is making me thirsty!"
"Calm down sir," Mako told him, placing a reassuring hand on the councilman's shoulder, "Korra has this all under control. She is the avatar, isn't she?"
"Yes, I suppose so," Ulva agreed as he used a hanky to wipe the sweat from his brow, "I just wish I had a nice drink at the moment. Perhaps some tea?"
"We'll send someone out to prepare some in a bit, but right now we need to assure your safety," Korra told him, a bit put off by Ulva's apparent obsession with tea
"How much longer do we have to stay here?" an impatient Bolin whispered into Korra's ear
"Until the time frame in which the Arbiter had threatened to kill Councilman Ulva is over. Once that's finished, we can head out."
Bolin found the answer acceptable. With a goofy smile, he whispered again, "Maybe we can grab some seaweed noodles afterwards, I'm starving."
Korra laughed softly, "Yeah, I'm pretty hungry too."
"Focus you two," Mako snapped, shooting them both reprimanding glares. Both Bolin and Korra looked at the ground submissively and stood their ground without another word.
The three waited a little while longer, but still no sign of the assassin. It was actually beginning to the Arbiter HAD given up. Ulva was already starting to brighten up, seeing as he wasn't murdered brutally like he was assured he would be. Korra felt a little better as well. The timeframe in question had almost passed, and there was no sign of anyone.
"Well, I believe it is time for some celebratory tea," Ulva cheered in a jolly voice. He turned to Korra and asked, "Avatar, do you wish to stay for tea? I am aware that the man you were waiting for did not make good on his hollow threats, but I would still like to thank you for your protection!"
Korra smiled sheepishly, "Oh, it was nothing, really. Just, you know, doing my job."
"Nonsense, it would be my honor to serve the avatar tea."
As if on queue, one of the policemen opened the door, and in walked one of the servants, pushing a cart with a full tea set on top. Ulva smiled happily as the man pushed the teacart down the blue carpet and up to the desk, licking his lips in anticipation. Korra had to say, the set looked pretty nice. There was a whole assortment of different fine china, along with a delicious smelling herbal tea.
"Tea, councilman?" the servant asked in a cool voice
As soon as Korra heard the man speak, she felt a chill go down her spine. She knew that he was just another servant, and had seen him pass the identification inspection herself. Korra couldn't really get a good look at his face, since his saucer hat cast a shadow over most of it. But there was something wrong that she couldn't quite place her finger on.
Right as the servant began to set the tea set on Ulva's desk, though, Korra suddenly realized what felt so wrong. "Hold on," she said suspiciously, glaring at the servant, who had frozen as soon as she had spoken up, "We didn't ask for any tea."
"You didn't?" The servant chuckled to himself in a low tone, "My bad."
Korra's eyes widened as she jumped forward and yelled out, "COUNCILMAN ULVA!"
But it was too late. The servant reached for his belt and grabbed the hilt of a concealed sword, drawing the katana with a deadly diagonal slash, tearing open the councilman's neck. Time seemed to slow as the now dead councilman fell backwards, chair and all, blood gushing out from the fresh wound and splattering all over the top of the desk. Then, with a thud, the body landed on the floor.
Everyone in the room stared at the servant in disbelief for a bit, not moving or uttering a word. The killer grabbed his servant's attire and tore it off, revealing an armored cloak, a hood, and a mask. The Arbiter smirked under his mask and twirled the katana in his right hand. "Got the little bitch, didn't I?"
It was the first time Korra had seen the Arbiter and person, and she had to admit, it was intimidating. The man stood at a fair height, about a couple inches taller then Mako. His mask was cold and emotionless, concealing most of his face. The broadside of the large sword strapped to his back was looked as if it had screaming skulls imprinted in it, and the blade looked rugged and malicious.
The one, or rather two, things Korra could not taker her eyes off of were the Arbiter's black and red eyes. She had seen the strange coloration before, in the photo he had taken of himself holding councilwoman Chitsanu's head. But in person, they looked like they were staring into your very soul, judging your every action and thought.
She shook her head, trying to forget about the Arbiter's terrifying eyes. Korra roared in anger as she stomped the ground, tearing up two chunks of the floor in an attempt to intimidate her opponent. They floated next to her as she shouted to the officers, "One of you grab Chief Bei fong!"
One nodded compliantly while the others stood at the ready, waiting for the Arbiter to make his move. Mako and Bolin followed suite, the first taking his bending stance and the other pulling out two chunks of the floor like Korra had.
The Arbiter looked around at all the threatening stances and began to laugh. "This hardly seems like a fair fight," he teased, still twirling his katana in his right hand. The small spaces in-between the segments of the huge gauntlet on his left began to glow orange, as if it were powering up for a fight. "I mean, there's one of me and, what," The Arbiter began pointing to each one of the officers, counting in his head, "fifteen of you!"
"You kill a man by surprise like a coward, and then dare talk to us about fair?!" one of the officers shouted
The Arbiter laughed even harder at this, "I did tell you exactly when I was coming, didn't I? Not exactly a surprise attack."
"Put your hands up and surrender," another officer demanded, "Or else we'll use lethal force!"
The Arbiter turned to the officer who had spoken up and pointed his katana out threateningly. "I'd like to see you try."
The hotheaded metal bender shouted out angrily as thick cords shot out from his glove towards the masked killer. The Arbiter quickly stepped to the side and swung his katana through the metal wires, slicing them in half. Before the officer could react, the Arbiter grabbed the tips of the now shortened cords and yanked him forward, into the tip of the katana. The steel blade drove straight through his armor and out the other end as the officer gasped his last.
"Any more objections?" the Arbiter asked the rest, his sword still impaling the poor dead officer. The other officers backed off slowly, fearing for their lives at the hands of the vicious killer. Korra wasn't going to let the killer get away, though. As the Arbiter turned and made his way towards the door, she yelled out in anger and fired the two chunks of rock towards him. "You won't get away!"
The Arbiter turned around at the last minute and ducked under the attack, narrowly dodging the attack. He looked straight at Korra, who was panting furiously, and smiled under his mask. "I was starting to worry you'd just let me walk out." He charged towards her, his katana ready to strike. Korra stood her ground, though, using bending to pull water out of her canteen. She quickly lashed a tendril of water towards the arbiter, attempting to swat him away. The masked man wouldn't be stopped, though; he jumped over the water whip with speed and grace. The whip burst on the wall behind him, leaving a large puddle.
Korra conjured up several ice shards and launched them towards her rapidly approaching enemy, but each projectile was knocked away with several swings of the katana.
The Arbiter was almost within slicing range, so Korra made a desperate attempt to form a water shield in front of her. But she was too slow, and the Arbiter cut through her defense before it had even formed.
"And here I was, thinking this would be hard," he taunted as he prepared to deliver the final strike, to finish the avatar off once and for all.
Korra turned away, her eyes closed, preparing for her eminent death. She couldn't believe she had lost so quickly, and not one of the officers in the room had lifted a finger to help her. As she waited for the katana to carve through her neck like butter, she heard someone shout, "DON'T YOU TOUCH HER!"
She opened her eyes just in time to see Mako shoot a bolt of lightning directly at the Arbiter. The masked assailant turned around just as the bolt was about to hit him and she heard him mutter, "Son of a-"
The bolt made contact with a satisfying CRACK knocking the Arbiter off his feet and through the side of the wall. Mako quickly ran over to Korra, who was still sitting on the ground in disbelief. "Korra, are you alright?" he asked frantically, "Did he hurt you?"
"No, I'm fine," she told him. She looked over to where the Arbiter had been flung and saw a huge dust cloud where he had hit. Mako had just let him have it. Korra looked to her right and saw the Arbiter's katana lodged in the ground next to her. There's no way he's alive she thought after being hit point blank with lightning, he should be a well done corpse.
Just as the group began to rest easy, they began to hear an eerie sizzling noise coming from the dust cloud. A strange blue light began to eminate from the cloud. Korra stood to her feet and squinted, trying to see what exactly was causing such a noise. "Uh, guys, what's that noise," Bolin asked nervously.
Suddenly, several tendrils of lightning erupted from the dust, honing in on the metal armor worn by every officer in the room. The policemen and women screamed in pain as the electricity coursed through their bodies, killing all of them almost instantly. As their bodies fell to the ground smoldering and smelling of burnt fresh, the dust began to clear and out walked the Arbiter. His armor was slightly blackened and his hood was a bit singed, but overall he looked as if he was practically untouched.
"But, how?" Mako gasped, staring at the Arbiter in disbelief as the masked man casually approached he, Korra, and Bolin.
"You didn't seriously think you were the only one who could bend lightning, did you?"
Mako balled his fists angrily, put off by the Arbiter's snarky remark. "You're a fire bender!"
"What ever made you think that?" the Arbiter quipped, grinning insanely under his mask, "But if you still doubt me, allow me a demonstration."
The Arbiter stopped and lowered his stance, and raised his pointer and middle finger on both hands. He began to generate large blue streaks of electricity around him as he moved his hands. He then shot an arc of lightning upward, causing part of the ceiling to crumble and leaving a gaping hole in the roof.
"That's strike one avatar!" The Arbiter shouted over the sound of the crumbling ceiling, "I'm coming after Earth Kingdom Councilman Yi Ming next! Two days, avatar Korra, two days!"
"What do you want from me?" Korra demanded, "Why are you doing this?"
In a biting tone, the Arbiter responded, "Because you can't stop me."
With those final words, he sprinted towards his sword and pulled it out of the ground in one swift movement. The Arbiter then shot a stream of lightning from his fingers towards the ground, propelling himself out the gaping hole in the ceiling. Bolin tried to knock him out of the sky with a barrage of fist sized stones, but couldn't manage to land a hit as the masked killer disappeared from the crime scene.
Korra threw her canteen down on the floor and stomped on it, enraged. "What the hell just happened?" she screamed in frustration, "There were fifteen of us and one of him! How could we let him get away!"
Bolin squatted down over one of the officers' corpses and reported, "It looks like their metal suits made them easy targets for lightning. Maybe the police should consider not wearing these."
"Where were the other policemen when we were being attacked!" Mako snapped, "Did they not hear anything?! Did Chief Bei fong not see the lightning?!"
"Umm, Mako?"
Bolin directed their attention to the smoldering hole in the roof. Off in the distance, they could see a flaming blimp slowly descending towards the Republic City bay. The Arbiter had shot down the police chief's blimp with a single bolt of lightning.
Korra still couldn't believe how wrong everything had gone. They had a perfect plan, guards stationed almost everywhere, even air support! Surely the officers guarding the door must have at least checked him? There was no way that he could have walked right by them, unless they were…
"No."
She picked up the pace, sprinting towards the door and flinging it open, hoping and praying that she wouldn't find everyone in the mansion dead. What she saw on the other side, though, almost stopped her heart.
Guards were strewn out on the floor, all of them motionless. "No, no, no, no," Korra muttered as she knelt down next to the closest one. She put two fingers on the officer's neck and checked for a pulse.
"Please be alive," she she held her breath and begged quietly as she waited
Finally, she felt a faint beat. Korra sighed with relief; the officers weren't dead! They had merely been struck unconscious by the Arbiter as he made his way to the late Councilman Ulva's office. Her relief was short lived, though, as she soon remembered that the Arbiter had gotten away, and would soon come back to murder Councilman Yi Ming.
"Korra, where did you go?" she heard Bolin call from Ulva's office
Korra debated whether or not to respond. She honestly wasn't in the mood to talk to anyone at the moment. She had failed Ulva, the dead officers, Mako, and Bolin. The Arbiter had killed the councilman, just as he had promised two days ago. She had been warned and given time to prepare; yet it wasn't enough to stop the lightning bender. When Ulva's death was announced next morning, the people would riot, and Korra knew this. They would feel betrayed, like the Arbiter's sentiment that she was unfit to protect the Republic of Nations was true.
"Korra?" Bolin called again
The young avatar decided that she needed some air, and quickly took off, fleeing the mansion to clear her head.
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A/N: Thus ends the first confrontation between the Arbiter and the Avatar! Sorry there wasn't much of a fight, but I figured that the group should get thrashed the first time around. Things will get better, though, I promise! Please live a review if you can, they're really helpful!