Breakfast was a tense affair, and it was no wonder why. Korra, Tenzin and his mom would be going to find and whip Amon. He, Mako, Asami and Iroh would go up to the mountains and take out the airfield. While that was going on, the equalized police would try to get more people and take their Headquarters back.

Because of this arrangement, his mom was beyond furious (as far as she was concerned Tenzin and Korra should be the last two people on the list to face Amon). She'd flown off the handle, but had went out to acquire a uniform Tenzin could wear. When she came back, man got knocked in the head with the gear before watching her storm away. She was still off fuming by herself while Tenzin was still off meditating in the other direction.

Iroh, being the only soldier of those present, kept trying to rally his troops, but he got little more than an eye roll or two. Pretty words were great and all, but they were all too worried to get rallied up for the charge. Sad part was, none of them were worried for themselves, but for their friends. Bolin was frankly scared out of his wits right now, and the depressing mood wasn't helping any.

"Okay...so where are we going to celebrate tonight? I'm thinking maybe the tavern on Hei Bai Boulevard. It's classy, but not too classy either. Good band plays there, too." He could hear flycrickets, "What? Amon's going down, this is a time for celebration." he turned to his brother with an evil grin, "We could have a party just like the one Mom had, what was it...two, three months after you came home, Mako. You remember?"

"Urgh...I don't want to celebrate like that." Actually, Bolin didn't want to either, but it was a good way to get a great conversation going.

"What?" The Beifong asked with counterfeit shock, "You don't wanna get sauced and sing 'The Village Defense' with me?"

"No."

"Aww, come on...bet the girls will sing with me." He put his arm around Korra's shoulder like she was a drinking buddy, held up his cup like a mug and started to sway it back and forth as if he were singing a drinking song at the bar of a tavern, "Well...

We saw some bandits comin' t'wards our village.

they thought they could loot us, and I guess they were wrong.

'Cause we called out the benders and we called out the soldiers,

and we met them a in gully that was thirty miles long.

Annnnnddddd...

We chased those bandits out of our village,

they ran away faster than roadrunner-deers.

The Earth Kingdom army caught them a full day later,

and they won't be seen for another hundred years years." he clanked his cup against Korra's in a toast. They all started cracking smiles, he was making progress, "You have not lived until you've heard this song at two-thirty in the morning, from a bunch of drunks, including your Chief-of-Police mother, while you're laying peacefully in your bed, just trying to get some sleep."

"Your mom doesn't sing." Asami knew this for a fact, or at least she thought she did,

"Yeah, unless she's drinks herself stupid." And there was a good reason she didn't sing, she made sealhounds howl when she did.

"Why didn't you tell me about this?" It was too funny not to tell your best friend.

"You were out of town, and we didn't want to relive the horror, alright? Apparently, it'd been Mom's turn to host the annual 'sleepover', as I like to call it. After they finished singing, they start passing out one by one, and we finally got to sleep." his lips thinned into a small wince, "Until mom bursts into the room, scaring the life outta us, shakes me and says...

'Boy, they all fell asleep. Come have a drink with me'. He imitated his mom's drunken demeanor,

'I'm too young to drink, Mom'. He groaned, acting half-asleep as he'd been that night.

'Good boy...come have a coffee with me. MAAAKKOOO! Come have a coffee with us!' he had to wait for them to quiet down before continuing.

So she pulls us out of bed, we go down to the kitchen, make a pot of coffee and sit with mom while drinks and sings until she passes out." A snarky comment from Mako was drowned out in the howling laughter.

"Dare I ask 'what's so funny'?" The matriarch's voice caused the cackling to stop instantly. Lin knew they must be having a laugh on her account, but she didn't have the time to deal with that right now, "All of you need to get ready, it's almost dawn." Everyone said more heartfelt goodbyes and they set off on there missions.

"This is it." Korra steadied her breathing as they looked towards the island.

"You're both fools."

"It is too late to turn back now." Tenzin reasoned. Lin had to agree with him, but only because the other teams were counting on them to get the job done. She straightened herself as Korra waterbended an air pocket enabling them to walk along the ocean floor all the way to Amon's new headquarters.

"There's Amon." Korra pointed out as the masked man boarded an airship.

"We're too late." Lin pointed out the obvious, "Now we need to find out where he's going."

"Perhaps we should stay here." Tenzin suggested, "We know this island better than they do, Lin, we could set a trap."

"That...is a surprisingly good idea." His student admitted.

"...coming from a pacifist." The airhead was suggesting an ambush, would wonders never cease?, "Let's get to the temple then."

"Then we'll ambush him." Korra finished the thought. Now all they had to do was get to the temple without getting the alarm sounded on them.

"What are you three doing here?" Oh no, she knew that voice.

"Transferred." She whispered only loud enough for Tenzin to hear, afraid that the lieutenant would recognize her voice if she spoke too loud.

"We were transferred here just this morning. Perhaps you could tell us where to check in." Tenzin still spoke like a politician, Lin wanted to smack him. It was 'report in' not 'check in' for crying out loud. As luck would have it, Amon's head-henchman looked too preoccupied to notice,

"You're being transferred again. Amon wants extra security at the arena today."

"We'll be there, Sir." Korra bowed. The main route had just been blocked, but they all knew there was more than one way to get in, "Let's hide in the attic." She suggested as they crossed the threshold.

"Tarrlok." Lin growled as she climbed the ladder and realized that they were not alone.

"I don't suppose you're here to rescue me?"

"Not a chance." Actually, the former chief was getting a twisted sense of satisfaction out of this.

"We had no idea you were here." the avatar and her mentor walked over to the bars, Lin held back a bit. "Are there other prisoners on the island?"

"No. I'm the only one."

"And what makes you so special?" That is exactly what Lin wanted to know, to. She didn't like that she and the avatar were on the same page, it frightened her.

"I'm Amon's brother." Well, none of them were expecting that, "Amon is from the Northern Water Tribe. He's a waterbender and a bloodbender, just like I was."

"You're a bloodbender." Lin sneered, "Why does that not surprise me?" It should. By all standards, the fact that there was a bloodbender on the council should shock the hell out of her, "Why the hell didn't you warn us about your brother?"

"I didn't know who he was until after he captured me. 'Amon' is not his given name."

"So how did your brother become Amon?" Why was Korra so curious? It didn't matter how he became what he was, all they needed to know was how to stop him.

"It all started with my father, Yakone." He said with a look to Lin, who drew in a breath before hardening her features, now he had her full attention. It was a awful tale, Yakone loved his own sons no more than he loved his henchmen. He forced them to learn bloodbending, and even made them use the skill on each other.

It filled in a lot of blanks for Lin. She spent the last forty-two years wondering how a man with such a large bounty on his head could survive. She wondered what had become of him and, right or wrong, she'd always hoped that he died a horrible death. He had, and finding that out gave her no pleasure. But there was one part of his story that didn't make sense.

"That's...one of the saddest stories I've ever heard." Korra admitted while Lin was still in the midst of her pondering. Tarrlok went on to apologize and explain that he finally realized that he'd become exactly what his father wanted him to be.

"Wait." She had to know and she had to know now, "Why would the son of Yakone go so far out of his way to keep the daughter of Toph alive?" His followers wanted to kill her, and he'd told them to leave her alone even after she'd hurt her guard. That decision had lost him some of the faith, however small the amount, that his men possessed in him. And he had to know that even the smallest doubt in his army might prove to have deadly consequences.

"He has tried to defy our father on every level. During our years of training, he would constantly make us recite a list of people we might have to kill in order to get control of the city. Yours was one of those names, but it was unique among them. He told us to kill you and any offspring you may have, even if you weren't a threat, unless it interfered with our plans to take down the avatar. To tie up a loose end, he said, and to punish your mother for the bounty she put on his head."

"Give me one good reason not to put this dart through your head!" She challenged, the picture of Bolin and Mako on stretchers popping into her mind.

"I don't have one. I am sorry I hurt your sons, but I want you to know I did not do that to please the memory of my father."

"That makes it so much better!"

"Lin don't!" Tenzin grabbed her arm just in case she decided to do something she... probably wouldn't regret...but was still wrong.

"Fine!" she growled at her friend, and then at the man in the cell, "Then tell me how Amon takes bending away so we can prevent it."

"When he took my bending, the sensation was somehow familiar. I later recognized it as his bloodbending grip, that's all I can tell you. I don't know how he does it, but then again, I've never encountered a bender as strong as Noatak."

"He uses bloodbending to take people's bending. How in the world do we beat him?" Korra asked hopelessly.

"I don't know, Korra." Tenzin knew what bloodbenders were capable of, and even if they fought together they couldn't beat him. His oldest friend knew of a way, she just didn't want to do it to anyone, not even Amon. He could stop them all with bloodbending, true, but she she caught him by surprise with a dart in the back...she'd become just like the coward that killed her mother.

"I got nothing." She shrugged. She knew where the line between protector and monster was drawn, and that an assassination would push her over it.

"So much for our ambush." Korra paced the floor, "If we stay here, we're toast. But there's another way to beat him." she brightened up suddenly.

"How?"

"This whole time, Amon has been one step ahead of us. But finally we have the advantage, we know the truth about him. If we expose him as a bender in front of all his supporters, we could take away his true power."

"His followers would abandon him." Tenzin guessed. With no equalist leader, they may be able to bring peace back to the city. Lin, however, had to pose a question.

"But how do you plan to expose him?"

"I'll go to the rally," Korra said will passion, "I'll tell everyone."

"And you'll get laughed off the stage." Lin flat lined.

"We will need to provide proof, Korra." And Tenzin agreed.

"We'll force him to use his bending, then."

"But he'll be well protected at the rally." Alright, so maybe she was being a little pessimistic, but if they were going to do this, they'd only have one chance, "He could fight us off with an order."

"Korra," the avatar's teacher put a hand on her shoulder, "we have found a way to defeat Amon. But this will take time to plan."

"I heard that Amon has the airbenders." Tarrlok pipped in. Three hearts stopped at once.

"Impossible." Tenzin declared, his world crashing down on him with a single sentence.

"What? How?" Korra demanded, not quite believing what she'd just heard.

"It could be a trap." Lin reasoned. Those kids were probably across the ocean and under heavy guard, and not even those closest to Tenzin knew exactly where. Amon probably wouldn't be able to find and retrieve them so quickly. " He could be trying to get you and Korra in his grasp."

"It could be." Tarrlok did admit, "But I thought you should know."

"We can't take that chance." Tenzin said desperately.

"I agree." Even if it was a one in a million chance, she couldn't even think about trying to stop him, or letting him go alone. They looked to the avatar to see if she was willing to walk into the den of a dangerous bloodbender on the chance that he had hostages.

"Let's get to the arena." She was in. Lin and Tenzin turned to leave, but Korra looked back, "We can't just leave him here."

"Yes we can." Lin scoffed. He should consider himself lucky that she didn't go in there and kill him right now.

"Go." Tarrlok urged, "Amon can't know anyone spoke with me. Defeat him. Put an end to this sad story."