174 AG
"Opal, Opal," one of the twins hissed, shaking Opal awake. Her room was still dark and her sheets were warm; she wanted to sleep. She twisted around in her bed, sleepily throwing a pillow at him, and shut her eyes tighter. Her brother was insistent, ripping away her bed sheets. Cold air bit Opal's skin and she was very tempted to use her bending on him.
"Opal!" he insisted, fingers pinching on her shoulder, shaking her roughly.
"What," she grumbled, sitting up in her bed and shrugging his hand off of her. She'd planned on sleeping in as late as she possibly could but her brother, Wing she thought, was bent on disturbing her rest. She rubbed her eyes with the butt of her palm before opening them, blearily, to look at him. The worry in his voice became apparent when she noticed his expression.
Gaining Opal's attention rendered Wing speechless. Opal rolled her legs over the side of her bed and looked at her brother. "Is she," she began.
"Yes," Wing said, breathless. That was enough.
Opal jumped out of bed and grabbed her uniform from off her chair. She pushed Wing out of the room and quickly changed into her Air Nomad uniform. Her mother had had it washed last night and while Asami had designed it to be stain and water resistant and not to absorb smells the cleaned uniform still felt better on her skin. Opal was too stressed out to properly appreciate it.
She raced downstairs and found her entire family sitting in her father and mother's joint office, gathered close together and looking lost. "Where is Kuvira?" Opal asked them breathlessly. Suyin's jaw twitched as she looked out the window to her darkened city.
"She hasn't arrived yet," Opal's father spoke up, voice gently breaking the buzzing silence. "Her army has." Opal glanced at her mother who said nothing, simply folded her arms. The warmth Opal had felt yesterday quickly shattered into the reality of war, the reality that Kuvira could take Zaofu and destroy it. Zaofu was built for defence, not offense, and they would be letting Kuvira into the city when she arrived.
There would be talks, and hopefully a battle could be avoided. Zaofu's domes were strong and made up almost entirely of platinum, but Kuvira had been the guard captain and knew the weaknesses and strengths of the city. The only thing keeping Kuvira from plucking Zaofu out of the Metal Clan's control was perhaps her image. Kuvira still wanted to look good to her people.
Everyone was too tense to sit and wait for the Great Uniter, but Opal wasn't going to let Kuvira intimidate her when she wasn't even in the room. She sat down on the table with the model her father and mother had created of their city so many years ago and she didn't get back to her feet until Kuvira entered the room, Baatar and Bolin in tow.
Opal acted coldly towards Bolin, no doubt wounding him. He'd turned her back on her when he'd sided with Kuvira, so she turned her back on him. Opal was furious with her boyfriend and she made sure he knew. Kuvira had her army outside Zaofu and he still refused to see that she was someone evil. Opal's heart was shredding itself; she and Bolin were as good as done.
Bolin still tried to sway her, and her family, even though they all knew it was futile. He was as enthusiastic as he'd been in his letters. He talked about how much they had helped the Earth Empire, about the progress they'd brought to towns across the nation. Opal shot him down by reminding him about the prison camps. Bolin refused to believe her. A small part of Opal was grateful that at least he hadn't known about them.
Kuvira was just as adamant about her cause as Bolin, but she was mysteriously silent about the camps. She became angry when Opal's mother accused her of bringing Bolin to try to manipulate them. Opal realized that Kuvira didn't want to think she could possibly be in the wrong. She thought it was all justified - using Bolin, Baatar, her entire army. She was derisive and defiant. Nothing was going to stop her from taking Zaofu.
Opal had forgotten just how dysfunctional her family could be, especially when they were angry at each other. Suyin and Kuvira were furious with each other and everyone else was either unwilling or too weak-mannered to step in. Suyin accused Kuvira of brainwashing Baatar Jr., Kuvira responded by saying she freed Baatar to accomplish more than he would in Zaofu. These talks were a formality but Suyin and Kuvira acted unprofessionally, even cruelly, towards each other.
Opal, still adept at blending into the background, took the opportunity to do so. She didn't want to think about Kuvira, who was just using these talks as a means to gloat and try to get Zaofu to surrender. Opal's mind wandered to her brother, standing strong and smirking by his fiancée's side. He'd said he had been living in their parents' shadow three years ago. Opal couldn't believe that he felt like that, he'd never given any indication of it.
It was clear that he felt injured by the way he'd been treated in Zaofu, though none of them had ever been treated particularly badly. As Kuvira strutted around the room, Opal chose to ignore her and watch her brother instead. She wished she could take him aside and talk to him, but she knew that when she'd yelled at Bolin for picking sides, she'd picked hers.
Opal should've tried harder with Baatar in the past, but he'd always fit in the family better than she had, nonbender or not. Despite being the only nonbending children in the Metal Clan, they'd never been particularly close. Opal had felt lonely as well at times, a misfit, but she'd never felt overshadowed. Opal had a hard time believing that Baatar, who had fit so neatly into the family, working with his father and constantly being praised by his mother, had felt bad back in Zaofu.
Opal's eyes fell on the miniature model of Zaofu and combed through the extensions that had been added in later years by Baatar and his father. Perhaps the reason she'd never felt overshadowed was that she had never tried too hard to be accepted. She'd never thought she needed to. Her family loved her, even if she wasn't Zaofu's ideal citizen. They loved Baatar as well but perhaps he hadn't felt it. Had he ever wanted to be an engineer, or was it just something he used to get closer to his father?
Suyin loved all of her children but she showed her love clearest when she was boasting about them. Her nonbending son working as an engineer had definitely made her proud. Opal herself had rarely been on the receiving end of that praise but her mother had always made sure Opal knew that she was loved. However, the only daughter had likely been coddled more than the eldest son.
Suyin lashed out angrily but Opal could tell his words were eating at her. While both Baatar and Opal were nonbenders, Opal had always known that their relationship to that was different. Baatar had accomplished many useful things, gaining scientific and mathematical knowledge that most benders wouldn't bother with and applying it to help others. Opal read, danced badly, talked to people. She'd been a good person but other than that useless.
And this uselessness had bothered Opal for a long time when she was younger. Opal realized that not only had she probably been treated differently since she was the baby girl in the family, but that her relationship with her grandmother also likely had affected her self-worth. Grandma Toph and Suyin had not reconciled with each other until Baatar was already busy learning how to be an engineer.
Opal, on the other hand, had been doted on by the world's first metalbender. Grandma Toph, whenever she had visited, had spent most of her time with one of the few nonbenders in the metal city and told her stories about brave, famous nonbenders like Sokka, Ty Lee, Suki, Mai, and many others. Without that, without being given such first-hand representation of how nonbenders could be good people who could help others, Opal couldn't be sure of how she'd turned out otherwise.
Since it had taken so long for her grandmother and mother to reconcile with each other, Opal suspected Baatar had never been given that foundation. If that was true, then the only representation of a nonbender that he had was his father. Perhaps this explanation was simplistic, most likely it was just Opal desperately trying to excuse her brother. He was still her family, but he was acting cruelly and callously. If this was true, it wouldn't excuse what he was doing now but it would explain it.
It didn't matter. Kuvira left with the threat of twenty-four hours. Baatar didn't even say goodbye. Opal knew that the first time he and Kuvira had left Zaofu they'd left with good intentions. Opal felt scared now. If this was just him getting back at his family then she was worried about how he'd treat people in the empire he and Kuvira were trying to make.
With the talks finished, Opal realized that she hadn't gotten any better indication of why Kuvira needed Zaofu so badly. Or why Bolin hadn't left Kuvira's side even while she was threatening Zaofu with an invasion. All Opal knew was that she couldn't sit and wait twenty-four hours for Kuvira to come and take Zaofu.
When Korra arrived Opal was momentarily distracted. She hadn't seen the Avatar in years, she thought she'd been healing with the Southern Water Tribe but now she was here. Korra didn't have time to catch up. She wanted to help, and Opal was sure Korra could mediate in a way none of the Beifongs were capable of. However, she was just as sure that Kuvira would not negotiate. Kuvira had had so many opportunities to turn back in the past that Opal doubted that even the Avatar could make her stop.
Korra and Suyin were talking in the courtyard but Opal felt antsy. According to Korra, the enemy outside was huge; composed of hundreds of soldiers and mechasuits. Opal doubted that as an Air Nomad she could do anything against them but she'd been herself longer than she'd been an airbender. There was still something she could do.
She spotted Huan walking in front of her outside the estate, probably headed to his studio. She hadn't really had a chance to catch up with him as much as she'd have liked to but she didn't have time now, not when she had to leave again. "Huan," she said, putting her hand on his shoulder to catch his attention. He turned around and let her hug him.
"You need my help," he deduced. She looked up at him guiltily. He'd dyed his hair green now. It looked good.
"What do you need?" he asked, Beifong loyalty overriding the insult he knew she hadn't intended. "Help me get outside," she said.
Huan glared at her. "What do you need outside?" he asked. He was right to be suspicious.
"I need to talk to Kuvira," Opal said. She'd avoided thinking about Kuvira when the woman was in the room but Kuvira's presence was becoming unavoidable. Opal needed to confront her.
"Do you think you can change her mind?" Huan asked dubiously, already beginning to walk towards the edge of the dome. "I know you guys got along before all this . . ." Huan always seemed off in his own world, thinking intensely on his current project, but he noticed more than most people gave him credit for.
"I, I don't know," Opal said. "But I need to talk to her."
"She might take you," he pointed out, hands feeling the walls to find a break in platinum.
"If she does then Zaofu and Korra will have justification to attack her," Opal said. "She won't take me. And even if she tried, she couldn't. Please Huan, I know what I'm doing." She didn't and he could tell. All the same, he pulled open a section of Zaofu. She knew it irritated Huan to use his bending for something so pedestrian.
"I'll be here," he rolled his eyes as she stepped through the hole he'd made.
"You don't have to," Opal said. "I can -" But Huan had gotten bored and started melding the metal back together. "Thanks," she said as he sealed the hole. The last glance she got of his face told her he was worried. She stared at the metal, stitched back together immaculately. "I'll be safe," she said, even while he couldn't hear. She had to have a word with Kuvira.