"Bo!" The firebender called as he searched for his little brother, "Bo! Where are you?" He'd only left Bolin in the alley for a few hours. 'Stay here', that's all he had to do. Questions filled Mako's mind. Where did he go? Why had he left? It hadn't taken either of them three months on the streets to know that there were bad men all around, and what would happen if someone where to be caught by them. Was he okay? Panic started to worm its way into Mako's heart. Not quite sure what to do, the boy ran around the back alleys and shouted for his brother and hoped that he'd answer back.

"Mako!" The little boy yelled toward the tiny window of the jail cell. Over by the wall, a woman could be seen laying on her side, pressing a pillow against her ear in a vain attempt to drown out the noise.

"Kid, go to sleep!" Lin growled from her cot, making a mental note to have Saikhan 'randomly selected' for next month's beating...ahh..."training exercise" for helping the boy get his voice back.

"Mako! She put me in jail!" He yelled, completely ignoring her. Lin rolled over to give the boy a glare. If he had just stayed put on the cot she'd set up in the break room, he wouldn't be in the cell. And if he would have stopped crying her officers wouldn't have felt sorry for him and guilted her into spending the night on the second cot. Well, she hoped they were happy, because two seconds after he stopped crying in fear he started shouting for his brother again.

"You're only in this cell because you tried to run off again! And thanks to you, I'm stuck here too. So shut it!" She was trying to be patient, but patience really wasn't her strong suit.

"Mako will come and save me." He defied her, "He'll beat you up." Lin sat up and crossed her arms.

"Oh really?"

"Yeah, he's a firebender. And he's almost a grown-up, he'll come and save me." Now, when in a good mood, Lin might begrudgingly find this a little cute. She had seen the file on Bolin's brother, he was only eight-years-old. And odds were that he wouldn't be able to take on a forty-year-old Metalbending Master. But Lin was not in a good mood and the boy was about one shout from being tied up and gagged.

"Challenge accepted. When he comes to get you, I'll throw him in here too."

"MAKO!"

"Urgh! That's it!" She jumped up with every intention of putting a gag in his mouth and getting a decent night's rest. Bolin's eyes widened as he made a run for it. He jumped on his bed, followed quickly by the Chief. Her fingers barely grazed his shoulder before he jumped off the other end. Running across the room he was about to get up on Lin's cot, but Lin cut him off so he made a quick right turn and headed for the door.

Meanwhile: In the hall

Thud, tump, stomp, stomp, 'humph', 'Get back here!', stomp, pang...

"What's going on in there?" Fen, whispered to his partner. Jiang shrugged,

"Don't know." he whispered back, "Chief went in there an hour ago."

"You...wanna check up on them?" the first officer suggested, however hesitantly.

"You...wanna go on through the training exercise next month?" Jiang asked sarcastically.

"Hmm..." Fen turned his heel and started to whistle a song as he walked down the hall, his partner right behind him.

Back in the cell:

"Ha, ha. You can't catch me, Copper!" Bolin boasted. Somehow this had turned into a game for him. He ran in circles around the room...and Lin would lie to anyone who said she wasn't putting any real effort into it just to hear the kid laugh...including herself.

"Gotcha." She put her arms around him and lifted him off the ground.

"Hey!" he cried as her fingers lightly brushed his side, "That tickles." Well, who could resist that? Soon Bolin was giggling in delight and trying to squirm out of her grip, "Stop!" he finally cried when breathing became difficult. His attacker paused for a moment,

"You surrender?"

"N-No!" He yelled, so she went for his ticklish spot again, "Yes, I surrender! I surrender!"

"Good. Now you know who's in charge around here." She crossed her arms. Bolin got a bright idea. This place wasn't so bad. He got fed, and a bed and a lady to play with...so when Mako came, she'd throw him in here, and then he'd teach him this great game.

"When Mako comes to save me, we can all play in here." He smiled and ran to the spot by the window, "Mako!"

"Kid." at least her voice had softened, "Mako can't hear you."

"Yes he can, he always comes and gets me." In Bolin's mind, it was only a matter of time.

"How often does he leave you alone?"

"He goes and gets food." He looked down like any child would when admitting that they broke the rules, "But my belly was growling and-"

"And you saw a woman with food. Look, Bolin," She knelt down in front of him like her mom used to do with her. How to say this sensitively, "Mako probably doesn't know your here."

"So...we'll go get him. And you can put him in jail, too."

"No, kid. I can't go looking for-" His lower lip started to quiver and Lin groaned. Damn conscience.

"...Fine kid, if it will make you happy, I'll go look for Mako." It'd be quieter on the streets anyway. With a quick stop by her office to pick up Mako's picture, she was back on the streets. Peace and quiet at last. The only clue she had to his whereabouts was the alley Bolin had hidden in. But a quick seismic scan told her that if Bolin's brother had come back here looking for him, he was long gone. Well, that was the end of that. Right. She'd done her job...and there was still a kid roaming on the streets out here. An eight-year-old kid. Who was probably alone...and in the same shape Bolin was...damn conscience!

"Mako!" She yelled, walking to the end of the street and using her seismic sense again, "Mako!"

"Hey lady, shut up!" A man leaned out of his window and shook his fist at her.

"Police business!" Lin shouted back. He slunk back inside, but obviously wasn't happy about it. This was going to be a long night.

The sun had come up by the time the Chief trudged back into the station, coffee in one hand, breakfast in the other. She caught one burglar, two lovesick teenagers, a vandal, and a streaker, but she still had no idea where Mako was. It was only an hour until her shift started so with no time to get any sleep she decided to go eat breakfast in her office and then break the news to the kid.

Instead of a well ordered squad room, Lin found a huddled mass surrounding the desk in front of her door. This could only mean one thing...

"Hello, Mother." Her men jumped at the sound of her voice, saw her scowling at them and quickly retreated to the safety of the crime ridden streets. There on the desk sat her mother with Bolin. She continued to tell her story as though she hadn't noticed the crowd leave. In her hands was a piece of metal that kept changing shapes in her hands, something that was keeping the kid's attention. And speaking of the kid, she noticed that he was clean and in a new set of cloths. Wasn't important, she decided, one of her officers probably brought in some hand-me-downs or something.

"Oh, hey Pup. I heard you were arresting little kids now-"

"Tenzin." She seethed. That loudmouthed windbag.

"and I came to find out whats going on. But you weren't here so I thought I'd entertain your guest by telling him the story of how I invented metalbending." Yes and if Lin hadn't come in, Toph would start telling war stories. By the time she was finished, she'd fought off two-thousand firebenders, took down the entire air fleet (Sokka and Suki helped a little), and held down Firelord Oazi so that Aang could deliver the final blow.

"Where's Mako?" Bolin looked up from the metal in Toph's hands.

"Sorry, Kid." She really didn't want to have to tell him this, "Couldn't find him."

"You said you'd find him!" he pointed a finger at her, "You promised!"

"I didn't prom-"

"Chin up, kid," Toph chimed in, picking Bolin up and placing him on the floor, "we'll keep looking."

"We?" she put her breakfast on the spot Bolin had vacated focused her attention on to her mother, "Look, I'll put out a BOLO for the kid, but I have a whole city to worry about. And you have a class to teach in a half an hour."

"Nah, I took the day off. And so did you."

"What?" Funny. She didn't remember making that decision.

"I thought you could use a day off. So I told your second to take the reigns today." Toph grinned. Lin opened her mouth to reply but felt something nudge her arm. She looked down to see Bolin trying to hand her something. The urge to tell him to wait was suppressed by the memory of yesterday, when he actually had something important to give to her.

"What is it, kid?" She held out her hand. Bolin placed bits of paper that he apparently picked up off the floor. She only gazed in puzzlement for a moment before the little boy walked to the desk and took her food.

"What was that about?" Toph asked as Lin's breakfast quickly disappeared into the boy's mouth.

"Nothing, Mom." Well, she wouldn't begrudge the kid a meal, even if it was her breakfast. He needed to put on some weight. And after all, she felt a small smile forming, he did help clean a mess and he didn't try to escape...a deal's a deal.

"Well, after he gets done, whaddya say we all head out?"

"Do I have a Choice?" Lin flat-lined.

"'fraid not." With an evil smirk, Toph delivered her verdict.

"Do I at least get to take a shower?"

"Make it quick. And don't scowl at your mother, my little badgermole." Her mother waved her off. Lin growled, how did she always know?! The thought crossed her mind to demand an answer, but she doubted she'd get one. So Lin just wiped the scowl off her face and headed towards the locker room. A full day looking for a kid who could be in any nook or cranny within a twenty mile radius. No sleep, no breakfast. Wonderful.

"Hey, Pup. You finally ready?" Finally ready. Like ten minutes was a long time.

"Yes. Just let me get my...where's my coffee?" She answered her own question when she saw Bolin sitting in the floor using an empty cup as the villain for a heroic pen.

"Oh, was that what your drink is? It smells bitter. Don't know how you two can drink it." Lin did a face-palm. Coffee was a fairly new drink to enter Republic City, and her mother didn't know what it was...or the effects. Maybe it was her idea of a joke, drink the coffee and say the boy did just to feel her heartbeat skyrocket. But her hopes came crashing down when she saw Bolin's eyebrow start to twitch.

"Oh no."