Time stretched on in the darkness of the tunnels, with nothing but the fire held by Korra to guide them and the never-ending death howl of the spider rat swarm behind them to keep them running despite the protests of their bodies and minds. It seemed that their training as chiblockers had lent Suzume, Li, and even the aged Huan a great deal of physical stamina as they were able to keep up with Korra after what felt like hours of running but even she had her limits. Her breathing was becoming heavy with lungs burning desperately to get enough air, her vision was blurring around the edges making the darkness seem closer than she knew it could possibly be, the fire in her hand nearly flickering out with each breath, her arms were becoming heavy and numb as the running kept her wounds open and blood fell to the ground behind her, and every step felt like walking on glass with the blisters that had formed on her feet.
The one who suffered the worst of it was Huan though. He was no longer able to keep his head up as he ran and was using Li as a support to guide him while making the most desperate sounding gasps for air, as if his lungs were tearing themselves apart with the force of it. The blisters on his feet seemed to have burst as he was leaving behind bloody foot prints to mix with the drops of blood from Korra's arms, making a very nice trail for the spider rats to follow.
"Keep going. Just keep going." Korra chanted to herself as the howling of The Swarm got louder, signaling that they had slowed and needed to run faster. 'We're going to find an exit. A tunnel with some light at the end of it or we'll loop around and end up back at where we landed.' She thought desperately just wishing to be out of this nightmare, just wishing she were home and safe and not hunted in the dark. Korra grasped onto the thought of home, both Air Temple Island and her home town in the South Pole even the little she actually got to see it growing up. She thought of her friends, times spent hanging out and fighting Equalists and Probending. She thought of her family, of the differences between her mother's and Pema's cooking and Tenzin teaching her airbending and her father teaching her how to hunt and maintain its tools. She thought of how the push and pull of water was always present through her bending, either from the snow of her homeland or from the bay around Air Temple Island. She could feel it even now as though it were calling to her from down… that… tunnel…
"This way!" She commanded, her voice hoarse and rough, and pointed to a tunnel coming up on their left. Unlike the two farther down that just split from the original this was a hard turn and they had trouble making it while keeping their momentum, afraid to slow too much for even a second, and slid along the floor. Previously they had just been going down whichever tunnel the person in the lead chose, trying their hardest not to go in a circle and end up at the rear end of The Swarm, but now they followed Korra's instruction blindly as she sought the push and pull of the water somewhere in the darkness. The push and pull grew stronger and stronger and Korra felt some of the terror previously gripping her heart rise with it. She guessed The Swarm was only at most ten seconds behind them so she'd have to be fast.
The wall to their left gave way to reveal that they had entered into a chamber so large that even the fire light couldn't find the opposite side of the water. Yes glimmering in darkness was a large pool of still water that rested throughout the majority of the chamber, a small dock being the only "land" available for them to stand on other than the continuing strip of the tunnel that led to another doorway that continued into the darkness. Korra quenched the fire as she ripped a wave of water out of the pool and sent it over their heads and crashing over the mouth of the tunnel they just left and freezing it solid. For a moment there was only their desperate gasping as they fell to the floor in exhaustion and the sound of waves hitting the metal dock and walls for the first time in who knows how long before The Swarm slammed into the ice.
Korra was the closest to the ice barricade and called up what little fire she had left in her, the urge to just collapse to the floor and pass out inhumanely strong, and gazed at the wall of ice. She had made it as thick as she could so only faint shadows of the spider rats could be seen. They had quickly scaled the other side looking for any opening along the edges, their claws digging into the ice with a fair amount of difficulty, unlike when ripping into human flesh, if their slow movement was to be believed. Soon they dug and bit not only at the edges but at every inch trying to tunnel through and feast, until there was nothing but single moving shadow of death on the other side.
"Will it hold?" Suzume asked and Korra turned to find them all but collapsed on their knees looking at her, pleading her to have saved them for now.
"For a while." Korra admitted and they tensed, ready to get back up and run. "But I can just reinforce it if they get too close to breaking through." She reassured pointing to the water and they all collapsed to the metal floor and let their pained bodies try to find relief on the hard ground. However Korra got back onto her feet and staggered to the mouth of the opposing tunnel and brought a wave out of the pool to seal it too so that The Swarm couldn't swing around and use it. But she still wasn't done as walked to the pool in the darkness letting the call guide her and fell besides it, a hand falling into the lukewarm water as blood from her arm wounds dripped off the edge into it. Her head began to swim and drift off but she struggled to sit up, unable to slip into unconsciousness just yet. "Get over here." Korra commanded and the other three crawled over as she brought a blob of water into her hands and it began to glow with healing power.
She trailed the water up her arms first to ease the process for the others and try to bring some life back into her damaged appendages, the healing movements much too stiff than it should have been. When the water had closed her wounds, and accelerated the regrowth of her skin over them, she brought the water to Huan's bleeding feet to heal his burst blisters and then to everyone else's to try stop the same thing from happening. Once that was done they all gathered at the edge of the dock and dipped their shaking hands into the water and cupped what little they could to bring to their lips. There was a distant thought in Korra's head about purifying the water but that was pushed back with the animalistic instinct to just get the water over her parched tongue and to try to soothe her burning throat. Soon the desperate slurping died and they just laid there in the darkness, their gasping slowing to panting and eventually becoming just heavy breathing.
"What do we do now Huan?" Li asked the older man who laid next to her speaking in between his pants for air.
"Why are you asking me?" He responded with his own question.
"You were second under The Captain." Suzume reminded. "Now that she's… gone you're in charge." The pause brought back the image of the spider rat digging into The Captain's face and its after effects right before she died. Korra suddenly had a very strong urge to clean the blood from when The Captain had stopped her from healing her off of her wrist and dipped her arm into the pool and scrubbed it clean.
"Oh, no. No, no. I was only second because I had been in The Equalists since the beginning." Huan got up of the ground and staggered away from the pool until he probably hit the wall. "No, no no. The Captain's the only one who can lead." Korra brought her hands out of the water and summoned some fire, letting her see the tired and worried expressions of Suzume and Li with Huan curled into a ball against the wall muttering to himself.
"Well what do we do now?" Korra asked. "We can barely stand let alone keep running and Huan isn't fit to lead. Who was next in command of your squad after him?" She cast another glance to the man as he hid his face in his drawn up knees.
"That would have been Wakaki." Li explained simply as a shadow passed over his face, no doubt remembering how the middle-aged man had met his end to that… thing. She still refused to believe that a spider rat could grow to such a size or split its face apart and have acidic saliva despite having come so close to the creature. "And we're the same rank," he gestured between him and Suzume, "we joined up right before The Revelation so we're just grunts."
"Well then who's going to be in charge?" She asked and Suzume and Li shared a glance before looking back at her silently for a couple of seconds until she got what they were implying. "What?! You can't be serious!"
"You're The Avatar! Didn't the White Lotus or somebody teach you how to lead wars and survive the most hellish conditions on Earth?" Suzume asked, crossing her arms over her chest as she stood. "And trust me; asking The Avatar to lead us isn't easy for us either. The Captain was great, she got that scar because she took a metalbender cops whip blade to the face for us." She scowled at Korra. "She believed in Equality like us but she understood necessity. Which is why she asked her own oppressor," she pointed to The Avatar who glared in response, "to help us escape and then asked her with her dying breath to see us out safely. Or did you forget that?"
"The hell is your problem?!" Korra growled out, her blood beginning to boil as she too stood. "In case you haven't noticed I'm the only reason any of us are even alive! I've burned dozens of spider rats and healed us all and erected the barrier that's making this conversation even possible!"
"Last time I checked burning chunks out of The Swarm doesn't do shit. They fill in the ones you've killed just as fast and they don't seem to be hurting for numbers!" She gestured to the ice barricade which was still dark with the number of spider rats trying to get in while Li glanced uneasily between the two, trying to decide what to do or say. "And where was this great spider rat killing skill when The Captain got her fucking face torn apart?! Li and I had to rip it off and stomp it to death! Or when Wakaki got grabbed by that thing in the floor?! You think one fiery blast from your leg is going to kill something that big!"
"I was trying to block passage into our tunnel with some fire and I couldn't do anything because I got jumped by one of those hidden ceiling spider rats too!" Korra yelled while holding her arm out to show the damage it had done and she had attempted to heal. "And you weren't in front of that thing when its… tongues burned through Wakaki's flesh to the fucking bone!" She looked to Li for support on this as he'd been carrying Wakaki with her but found him just flicking his eyes between them and rubbing his hands together. "You were the one who told us to let him go when he died anyway!"
"Because you two were practically pissing yourselves with fear! You'd have let that thing eat you because you would have forgotten something as simple as letting his corpse go!" She brought an accusatory finger to both Li and Korra. "I would have expected more from the woman who stood up to and defeated Amon or Noatak or whatever his fucking real name is." Her angered face took on a sneer. "But I guess having your ass wiped for you since you could walk because you're The Avatar makes you soft. In The Gut you gotta be able to defend yourself by the time you leave the cradle."
"Well at least I'm capable of defending others from a swarm of them! You can't even protect babies in cribs from regular sized spider rats!" Korra shot out with a fair amount of venom, bringing up her supposed battle with Noatak and her unresolved fear of him even in their final encounter setting her on edge. She had expected Suzume to fire back with own accusation but her eyes narrowed at The Avatar and she sucked in a breath and clenched her shaking fists. Korra barely had time to dodge the fist that was swung for her face.
Suzume didn't use any of her fancy chiblocker moves and was too enraged to do anything other than savage fists and kicks along with trying to get a hold of Korra so she could beat her. Korra for her part had to fight her exhaustion, which Suzume in her rage had forgotten, and keep the fire in her hand lit and away from actually hurting her. Unable to use firebending or waterbending to keep her in place, solid ice enclosed around bare skin never ended well, so she was limited to airbending to fight off her furious opponent. Korra took a step and fell back to avoid an uppercut, landing back on one hand so the light wouldn't go out and kicking out to trip Suzume. She stumbled but gained her balance only for a blast of air from Korra's other leg to send her off her feet and nearly into the pool. Back on her feet Korra began to cock back her arm to unleash another blast of air while Suzume charged forward until a pair of fists with two fingers extended struck Suzume along her left side. Korra almost breathed a sigh of relief before Li struck along the arm she was going to airbend with, blocking the flow of chi.
"Li you fucking traitor!" Suzume cursed as she fell to the ground, all movement from the limps on the left side of her body paralyzed.
"I'm sorry but we're not going to get anywhere with you two fighting!" Li apologized as Suzume snarled and used her functioning limps to drag herself away to rest by the wall next to the dock, careful to not let her paralyzed limps to fall into the water. He sighed and turned to The Avatar who gave him a glare of her own as she tried to work feeling back into the arm by shaking her shoulder, it'd take a while before she could bend out of that arm. "I'm sorry but I didn't know if you were gonna attack her after I disabled her."
"What the do you take me for? I'm not going to attack anyone who can't fight back!" She would threaten people sure, like that annoying Equalist protestor in the park, but never do any lasting physical damage. "Besides what could I do with airbending? If I wanted to hurt her I'd deliver a water whip across her face!" She said loud enough to make sure that Suzume heard.
"I've heard stories about what Avatar Aang could do with airbending, knocking people into buildings hard enough to break backs and split skulls. He racked up a sizable body count before he even got to the Northern Water Tribe." Li explained, pointing out how the stories of Avatar Aang's adventures told to children usually let out the consequences of his more powerful bending feats. Master Katara had told what had really happened during a few noticeable incidents and… damn. "But you pushed her over the edge with your comment."
"Did she really lose a kid?" Korra asked looking away feeling the weight of guilt settle in. In retrospect that was a bit harsh but she wouldn't stop with the fucking criticisms! Without her they would have been dead, swarmed by the spider rats whenever they decided to jump them in the dark unable to get out.
"No she lost her brother." He whispered stepping closer to her. "Her parents let her babysit one day and she left the room for a couple of seconds to get a glass of water. She came back when he started screaming and she found his crib just coated with blood as they ripped him apart. He was a year old and she was eight." Korra's eyes went wide at the image of it. "We, we're the new blood to the squad and joined at the same time so anytime something boring or unpleasant needed to be done we always got paired. Lot of time to talk and share." He turned to look at her as she glared back at him. "I'll talk to her. Can you talk to Huan?"
"Huan?" She asked confused looking to the older man still curled up against the wall.
"He didn't even lift his head the entire time you two fought." He explained. "He's always been sort of quiet so I don't know him that well."
"Then what the hell am I supposed to say to him?" She asked. "Should I try to connect with him over fights we had when he was in the chiblocker uniform?"
"Maybe." He replied beginning to turn. "We all got launched up into the air with your earthbending on Avatar Aang Memorial Island." Then he strolled to Suzume, leaving Korra to try and pick out which of the numerous masked chiblockers that had attacked her during her first meeting with Noatak could have been them.
Leaving the dockside as well she walked, and no pain from her former blistered feet making it seem like heaven to the previous few hours, over to Huan and knelt in front of him. The older man kept his face against his knees and just kept muttering to himself as Korra placed a hand on his shoulder to get his attention. His head shot up and he gazed at her with bloodshot eyes, seeing through more than looking at her. "I'm sorry is it time to go? If you're asking me if we should I can't. I just can't." He began to shake his head but Korra stopped him with her response.
"No, I… I think I'm going to be in charge." Relief washed over his face when she said this and he smiled at her.
"Oh that's good. That's good. I'm not fit to lead anybody." His smile faltered. "We're gonna die down here." He held up a hand when she made to counter. "Not you, you're the Avatar. Avatars don't die in dark holes. They die in battle or peacefully in bed. But we won't." He gestured to himself and then to Suzume and Li who were having a hushed and heated argument. "The spider rats brought us here for that reason. So we can die."
"I brought us here. I followed the push and pull of the water." Korra explained while Huan just shook his head.
"How is it we ran down the one tunnel without a swarm of spider rats hiding in it directly opposite from the one we found? That The Swarm would wait for us to spot them before attacking when they had plenty of time to do so?" Korra's eyes started to widen when she realized what he was implying. "They recognized the pattern you searched the tunnels in, giving you false leads by letting the light hit their eyes in the other tunnels, and then they gathered in the last one and cleared the one directly behind us so we'd run into it."
"Huan these are animals!" She reminded, not liking how serious or delusional he was. "Animals that have brains the size of marbles! How could they plan anything you're suggesting?"
"Animals that will readily sacrifice themselves if it's for the good of The Swarm, that big one sacrificed itself to become a bridge for the others, and what about that thing that killed Wakaki? Was its brain the size of a marble?"
"That thing was a fluke. A freak of nature." She shuddered at the memory still. She could even smell Wakaki's flesh being boiled away and his bones being scorched.
"More evidence that these aren't just animals. It waited until you, Li, and Wakaki walked over it before attacking when it could have gone for Suzume and me." He looked past her to across the pool with its flickering waters. "It wanted Wakaki."
"What makes you say that?" She asked, casting a worried glance to Li and Suzume who were still arguing but not as fiercely.
"He was the dead weight." He said simply and without mercy. "He would have dragged us all down to the point that the spider rats would have overwhelmed us. But they don't want that, they want us scared and moving to somewhere. Maybe here." He continued staring out at the water. "That's why they killed The Captain; that spider rat aimed at her, not the wounded Wakaki. Kill the leader and break morale, we just ran deeper into this place instead of holding our ground."
"Huan you're taking some pretty big jumps here. They laid some traps to get prey like any animal would; it doesn't mean that they're planning something." Korra countered. She needed a way to end this conversation or divert his line of thinking. Maybe…
"Then why haven't we at least encountered anymore spider rats burrowed into the ceiling?" He gazed up at the ceiling to look for any and found none. "There haven't even been any burrowed craters for them to hide in. Because you're here they knew you'd feel the water and push us to go he-"
"What was The Captain's name?" She asked suddenly and Huan dead stopped in his explanation and he tried to answer, opening and closing his mouth. "I've been referring to her as just The Captain. I'd like to know her name."
"It, it was Ty Lee. Captain Ty Lee of 38th Chiblocker Assault Squad." He said looking away. "And before you ask yes she was named after who you think."
"I'm not surprised. A lot of people are named after heroes from The Hundred Years War." She smiled at the thought, trying to imagine the number of hands that would be raised in a group of old people if you asked "Who's named Aang or Zuko?" Huan started to draw further into himself and Korra decided to press on with her plan. "I heard her and Wakaki talk about their spouses and someone named Biming when I was healing him."
"Biming is The Captain's son. He's going to turn 14 in about three months." His head fell to his knees. "Oh spirits who's going to tell him and Jian about her? Or tell Seiko about Wakaki?" He clutched his head at trying to think of possibly explaining Captain Ty Lee getting her face torn apart or Wakaki getting eaten by a giant spider rat.
"You will." Korra said firmly. He started to shake his head but Korra stopped him. "We're all going to get out of here Huan. You, me, Suzume, and Li. I'm going to speak for you guys at your trial and when we find them you're going to tell Captain Ty Lee and Wakaki's families what happened."
"No you should do it. You're The Avatar; if anyone survives it'll be you." He tried to draw into himself again but she placed her hand on his chin and forced him to look her in the eye.
"I'm giving you an order Huan." Korra commanded in the firmest voice she could muster and he starred at her for a second before he threw his arms around her and enveloped her in a hug and a whispered "Thank you." She awkwardly gave him a pat on the back, now very much aware that they were still both naked, and a "You're Welcome." After a moment they separated and she helped him to his feet and walked to meet with Suzume and Li who sat by the dock side, staring out at the water.
"So what now?" Li asked when they settled down next to them. "I don't think we're going to be able to keep running." He gestured over his shoulder to the other ice barricade where a small number of shadows were gathering at the bottom and starting to scale it.
"Shit." Korra whispered to herself as the shadow of the spider rats grew larger, effectively trapping them inside.
"Great, the fuck are we going to do now?" Suzume repeated Li as she gazed across the chamber to the darkness in front of them, the other side shrouded in the shadows. "Swim across?"
"Won't have to. I got us a way out. " Korra said to their confused looks as the fire in her hand moved to the tips of two of her fingers and went from a natural crackling fire to a sharp point, burning with even greater intensity. "My bending's' returned to the point I can bend two elements at once," she bent some air into the other hand and Suzume glared at it, "and more importantly bend fire hot enough to cut through metal. I cut a hole out of the metal walls until we hit earth and then just bend a tunnel out of here." She stood from the dock side and walked over to the wall, ignoring the frantic scratching from the spider rats at the nearby ice barricade. "We'll be out of here in no time."
"WHAT! THE! FUCK!" Korra swore as the sharp fire at the end of her finger tips sparked against the metal. She pulled back the flame and lowered its intensity to examine the lack of progress she had made over what felt like the past hour. Only a faint scorch mark left any indication that any damage to the metal had been made and Korra drove her fist into the wall with an angry roar, trying her hardest to make the metal bend to her will.
"So how's that escape tunnel coming along there Chief?" Suzume asked from where the three of them were relaxing, Huan staring up at the ceiling next to Suzume while Li dangled his legs into the water and kicked them back and forth, sending waves out into the darkness. "Cause at this rate I'm pretty sure that you'll be able to learn metalbending like The Great Toph Beifong did."
"Suzume one more word and I'll launch you into the pool." Korra responded as she went back to trying to cut the metal. Suzume huffed but fell back to the ground in silence, joining Huan at staring at the ceiling.
"Water's not that bad actually." Li called from the pool side. "A bit on the cold side but enjoyable enough."
"You're going to get your ass killed over there." Suzume warned. "Some giant fish or squid thing is going to just grab your legs and pull you under and that'll be it. All we're going to see is a spreading pool of blood in the water." Li was silent for a moment then he quietly lifted his legs out of the water and slid away from the edge of the pool to join Suzume and Huan.
"What about the glowy Avatar thing you can do?" Li suggested. "I bet then you can get the fire hot enough… as long as you don't accidentally kill us in a blind glow powered rage."
"Oh gee the Avatar State!" Korra replied sarcastically as the fire flared a little brighter. "I'm so glad you reminded me that I can tap into the collective power of all the past Avatar's! Sure wished I remembered to try that when we were being chased through the tunnels! Oh wait! I did! And! It! Didn't! Fucking! Work!" With each exclamation the fire grew hotter and brighter and the metal still didn't melt. "DAMN IT!" Korra screamed as she gave up with a final flare of flame and stormed away from the wall to join them. "Guess we're going to have keep running. Anyone remember which direction we came from?" Before anyone could answer a crack appeared along the icy barricade of the doorway they had originally entered through and a single spider rat leg squirmed its way through, swiping fruitlessly at them as it tried to squeeze the rest of its body through the opening. Korra brought a stream of water from the pool and sealed the crack, freezing the spider rat inside the barricade. "Because if we burn our way through The Swarm maybe we can loop our way back around to the entrance." She resumed as if nothing happened.
"So we're going to just run on burning spider rat carcasses?" Suzume challenged and Korra began to massage her temples in frustration. "Off into the darkness? With no idea how thick the swarm actually is?"
"I can move the bodies out of the way with airbending." Korra explained slowly. "And it doesn't matter how many of them there are; we only need to kill enough to cut a safe path through even if they go all suicidal on us." She sat up off of the floor to meet Suzume's gaze as she did the same. "What's your idea? Is it still swimming across?"
"What if you make a boat out of ice to get across with?" Li asked as he sat up to join the conversation. "If there's a dock here then there could be another across the pool. One that probably doesn't have a shit ton of spider rats trying to eat us." Korra and Suzume decided to cast their glares to him at his suggestion. "What? It's just a thought."
"You want us to put our bare skin to solid ice? For who knows how long it's going to take to cross that?" Suzume asked with a raised eyebrow while throwing a thumb over her shoulder to point out across the water. Not that the ice would have bothered a waterbender, let alone The Avatar, but Korra had to agree with Suzume. "And I was joking earlier." She said looking back at Korra to answer her earlier question.
"What about you Huan? Wanna chime in with an idea?" Li asked the only person not sitting up. "One that hopefully doesn't involve us going back into the tunnels?" Korra's eyes narrowed as her idea was once again meeting resistance. It seemed that her being in charge didn't warrant more trust in her decisions.
"Avatar Korra is in charge. It's her decision." He answered, not bothering to sit up or even move his eyes from the ceiling. While his support was appreciated Korra wished had come from someone who hadn't had a mild breakdown only an hour ago.
"Fine but I'm still casting my vote to not going back out there." Li resigned from the debate as if voting was a part of this. Maybe under Captain Ty Lee it was but not under her. "But it will at least get us away from the sound of them trying to eat their way in here. I swear it's going to drive me mad." And when he finished speaking the spider rats ceased there attempts to get inside, the shadowy mass on the other side of the ice breaking apart and disappearing. They all shared quick glances with each other as they cautiously got to their feet, backing away from the frozen barricades to the edge of the pool. "I swear if it's a rescue party it's going to drive me mad." Li called out hoping that he could repeat whatever made their tormentors leave for a rescue.
Instead of flashlights or at least human shaped shadows a massive one appeared out of the darkness at the original tunnel and rammed the frozen barricade, a crack appearing along the left side and spreading out towards the center. Korra brought a stream of water to seal the crack just as it reared back and rammed it again. "What the fuck is that thing?!" Suzume yelled as another massive shadow appeared at the other tunnel barricade and began slamming into it, cracks spreading outwards to be quickly sealed by Korra. Back at the original tunnel the shadow ceased its attack, perhaps realizing that Korra's hasty repairs made it a useless endeavor, and for a moment it seemed to just rest there before the ice at the center began to thin and melt, steam rising off as four tongue like appendages wormed through and set about making the hole bigger.
"Oh come on!" Korra shouted as she tried to apply more ice only for the water to evaporate as soon as it hit a tongue, the hole becoming large enough to see the burned face and withered chelicerae of the colossus spider rat monster behind it. "Get in the water! We're leaving!" Suzume and Li bolted off the dock and into the water while Huan remained, switching between looking at the monsters behind the barricades.
"Why is it above ground now?" He mused, seemingly detached from the danger that they were in to the point that he didn't hear the others orders to get in the water or notice Korra until she had shoved him into the pool and dived in after him.
"All right so what no-" Li began to ask before Korra began to circle an arm around her body, careful to not collide with the other holding the fire, and the water began to swirl around them. Soon they began to sink, their own circle of water never going past their waists, as it drained away and they were forced to go deeper and deeper until the walls of held back water grew tall enough to collapse. But with a swing of her arm Korra forced the water to remain above them as they continually sunk, the light of the fire soon no longer able to illuminate the dockside or the dark shapes of the monster spider rats as they peered down at them through the water, leaving them with nothing but darkness all around them and a side of smooth metal at their backs as they descended.
"Well, this isn't what I was expecting." Suzume muttered as she peered out at the impenetrable darkness of the water outside of their little bubble of air. "This is a… odd feeling." She said as she looked down at her kicking legs that kept her level with the water.
"Better than the sub at least." Li said and they all murmured in agreement.
"You guys had a submarine?" Korra asked. Although since Hiroshi had invented gigantic humanoid tanks and those flying machine things that dropped bombs, Asami had dubbed them "biplanes", it shouldn't have been surprising that they had something as simple as a sub.
"Yeah some cramped piece of crap that we used when we had to get out of the city by sea and had to go undetected." Li answered. "I think Captain Bo and the 27th Engineer Squad bugged out with it before Commander Bumi showed up though." Great, now she'd have to tell General Iroh that there was an entire submarine filled with Equalists on the loose.
"Assholes are probably on Ember Island. Just relaxing on the beach staring at Fire- at Fire N-Nation tail." Suzume stuttered out momentarily and Korra raised an eyebrow at her before she felt her feet touch something solid and looked down to find that they had reached the bottom of the pool. The squishy, cold, discolored, and most certainly not metal bottom.
"What the hell?" She said, feeling the ground seep in between her toes as the water rushed away. Well mud was still earth so she brought her right leg up, distantly realizing that she was running out of limps to bend with, and brought it crashing to the ground trying to force it to solidify and give them something more comfortable to stand on.
Nothing.
"This… this isn't earth." She whispered before her head shot up. "We should get out o-" None of them were listening to her, instead far too busy turning into crying and blubbering messes. Tears streamed down their reddening eyes as their lips and shoulders quivered, trying to form words but coming up with gibberish. "What the hell is wrong with you guys?!" She demanded as Li and Suzume fell to the ground and moaned, curling inwards and covering their heads. Only Huan remained standing, his knees shaking and his hands clawing at his face.
"He's here. Oh spirits he is here." He managed to blubber out as Korra extinguished the fire and placed a comforting hand on his shoulder in the darkness which was difficult given that she had to keep her other arm moving so that they wouldn't drown.
"Huan! Stay focused! Who's here?!" She screamed in his face.
"He is singing but he is still asleep! He is asleep but he is still singing!" He blubbered as he collapsed onto her frame, forcing her to take a step back to not interrupt her waterbending. He fell to the ground and joined Li and Suzume in weeping, leaving Korra the sole standing member as she reignited the flame in her hand so she could look at them. There was a shift in the shadows around their bubble of water and Korra stopped and stared, her blood going cold. The shadows remained still as Korra kneeled down and hissed to Huan.
"Get up! We got to go!" But Huan continued to blubber and Korra groaned, looking at them as they wept.
"He's mad! Absolutely mad!" Suzume cried clawing at the air. "He sings so terribly! …It's beautiful!" She breathed, to mad to notice what was wrong with what she just said.
Korra sighed and extinguished the fire in her hand switching which arm she was using to maintain their air bubble, letting the oppressive darkness rush in and leave her with the sounds of her companions crying and mad mutterings. 'What are the chances that the spider rats are gone now?' Korra wondered to herself desperately. 'They're animals so once they break through and notice we're gone they'll leave. Just got to wait awhile.' She decided as a whisper of disagreement slipped into her mind.
'They led you to the pool. They grew tired of waiting and sent the big ones to force you in.' It whispered in Huan's voice, naturally because he was the one to come up with this theory. 'They want you here.'
'They're animals. They can't plan.' She responded to her internal argument.
'Maybe something is doing it for them.' It responded preposterously in her opinion.
'That's even more ridiculous!' She argued back.
'Then what's driven them mad?' It asked and Korra summoned the fire back to look at her companions.
'It's just the stress of the situation.' She reasoned with herself as she examined Huan, still muttering about someone being here, and Suzume, still crying about singing, and then moved to LI who was… silent? Maneuvering past Huan and Suzume Korra kneeled next to Li as he stared up at the darkness and his mouth formed silent words. "Li?" Korra asked as she moved to him, kneeling next to his side, the ground oozing around her knees. It was difficult to get close to him what with having to hold fire in one hand and keep the water going with the other but she edged his side with her knee to get some reaction out of him but he remained still and quiet. But when Korra set her leg back down it hit something warm.
Looking down Korra found a rapidly spreading pool of blood emerging from under Li.
"Oh shit!" She yelled to herself and repositioned herself so she could kick Li over, dispelling with the fire and bringing forth some healing water to replace it from outside the bubble, the harsh orange of the fire light turning to a cool blue. Placing a foot on his shoulder she tried to push him onto his side only to be met with resistance when he was lifted a few inches. Laying him back down Korra quickly scooted over and fell to her side, ignoring how the blood felt against her face and seeping into her hair, and pushed him up with the back of her hand holding the healing water. Her eyes strained to see what was causing his bleeding with the low angle and lighting she was working with but in a moment she saw it.
Rising up the ground itself dug into Li's back, her lifting him off the ground stretching it tight as it strained to cover more of him. The ground shuddered and inched farther along his skin and holes opened up along the base of the raised ski and blood spewed out before sealing and the skin shuddered to start the process all over again. It took Korra half a second to rebend the fire to her hand, the healing water evaporating into steam, shift Li to be supported by her upper arm to angle her fire filled hand at the monstrosity, and scream as she began to attack the ground with a stream of fire.
Li cried out either from the fire licking his back or from some sort of shared pain with whatever was consuming him Korra wasn't sure. She also didn't care, simply wanting this carnivorous or absorbent floor or whatever to die and free Li. The ground blackened and peeled under the flame quickly revealing yellowed fat that stank when it touched the air, smelling of rotting wood and pus that made Korra nearly reel back. She persisted as the flames made it bubble and boil before this gave way to corded pale blue muscle that snapped loudly due to the heat. She was so concerned with destroying whatever it was that held Li that she didn't hear Suzume get up and come over to her.
"He is favored!" She cried as Korra swung her head to the side to look up at her quick enough to see the foot Suzume brought down strike her square in the gut. All the breath was knocked out of Korra as the flame died and Li collapsed to the ground as Korra withdrew her supporting arm to try and knock Suzume away only for her crazed opponent, who seemed to have no problem see in complete darkness, drove her fist into Korra's left cheek sending a numbing shock through her head. Fighting off the stars that suddenly danced in her vision against the darkness as Korra felt the water bubble around them begin to collapse and with a quick flick of her wrist she sent a blind gust of wind in the direction of Suzume. Hearing her cry out and a splash of water Korra knew that she had knocked Suzume out of the bubble and quickly worked on getting it stable again with a swirl of her arms, leaping to her feet when it was stable and resummoning the fire.
Suzume stumbled back into the air, coughing up water as Korra quickly checked on Li and Huan and thankfully found them still in the same positions. "Suzume calm down!" Korra ordered as the crazed Equalist got to her feet and glared back at her.
"Their voices join His song. They come for him." She replied with more mad nonsense. "He is to be prepared."
"Priests and Priestesses of He Who Sleeps." Huan muttered off to the side in his own mad daze. "Those He Favors."
"Whatever that thing is is killing him Suzume!" Korra reasoned, not noticing Huan's use of the name that Mother Chiyo had sacrificed them to. "Why would you be okay with that?! He's your friend!"
"This is not our end." She replied and leapt towards Korra with a fist raised. When they had fought little more than an hour ago Li had stepped in and disabled both of them but with Li consumed by the floor and Huan sobbing to himself there was no one to step in and stop Suzume as Korra struggled to dodge her strikes and keep the air bubble and fire going. Korra dodged to her left and jumped back to avoid the jabs and put some distance between them, stalling to think of a plan.
'I've got to restrain her.' Korra thought. 'I can do that easily enough with some ice but if it's on there to long she could get frostbite. Spirits I wish I had some earth!' Earth wouldn't cause any harm other than bruising from the impact and she'd be able to transport her much easier although where to was a different matter entirely. Dodging another kick Korra muttered a "fuck it" and tore some water from around them and flung it at Suzume, catching her wrist and freezing it against the metal wall. "You just stay there until you calm the fuck down." Korra ordered as Suzume struggled against the ice. With a sigh of relief Korra turned around to get back to Li.
And came face to face with a corpse.
"Hello." The skull face spoke, a bloated tongue inside its jaw held together by spirits knows what somehow forming the greeting as its stale and rotten breath drifted up to her nose. Korra's heart screeched to a stop as she gazed into the pits that its eyes should be resting in and drifted around its face trying to find something not horrible to gaze at. She jumped from few long hairs that still sprouted out of the top of the receding flesh at the top its head down to its jaw line where flesh still clung to bone and helped hold the jaw in place. The flesh below the head was much less rotten and hung off the bone in tatters, the ends of the fingers pulled toward the earth by gravity and bony feet and lower legs held by tied flesh that looked manipulated to hold this unnatural creature together. And the chest riddled with a sunken stomach, and groin that hid any indication of gender with the state of the chest, and holes that hinted at some shifting thing inside locked behind the rib cage. "LCK MORW TRATH."
Something about the words felt wrong to Korra as they drifted to her ears and pushed against her brain. The corpse brought a hand up and pushed a finger between her breasts and over her heart, the tip of the finger sagging until a sharp bone poked her through the flesh. Korra was thrown off her feet and flung through the air until she crashed against the wall next to Suzume who squealed in glee as Korra coughed and shook her head clear. When the stars subsided Korra looked back up to find more corpses walk into the bubble over by Li, their skin sagging and tattered as bone peaked and moved on its own. "This is where you go back up to the surface little Avatar." The first corpse said as the others knelt down next to Li and began dragging fingers along his sides.
"Get away from him!" Korra shouted as she threw the fire from her hand to over the corpse's heads, trying to force them to back off. Instead all they did was look at her with she assumed if they could make the proper facial movements a glare and then look to the first corpse. Taking some silent cue the corpse placed its hands on its chest and easily punctured the skin, its fingers gripping the rib cage and pulling it open. The skin around the chest gave way as the rib cage broke and something fell out onto the ground.
Korra watched as the shape, the size of a regular spider rat and seemingly made entirely of tentacles as long as her fingers, began to convulse and grow in front of her. The tentacles slapped the ground and waved in the air trying to grab whatever they could as its skin stretched and its body grew larger, a deep breathing sound coming with it. A few seconds later the creature was the size of a cat owl and the tentacles were as long as her hand and the deep breathing was replaced by a sharp hiss. After ten seconds of being outside of its cage the monster was the size of a wolf and had tentacles the length of an arm and was growling deeply. And Korra thought with a cold dread that she saw teeth somewhere behind all of the swirling and grasping tentacles. She responded by hurling a fireball at it. The flames slammed into it with a snapping crackle as the flesh of the tentacles burst and split due to the heat and it cried out with a screech not unlike the horde of spider rats.
It didn't stop it from growing though.
'Run.' The thought reverberated through her mind as the monster quickly reached the size of the monstrous spider rats. Korra's gaze flicked to Li as the corpses began to drag their fingers along his face and the pool of blood once again emerged out from under him. "I'm sorry Li." She whispered as her eyes stung and throat burned flinging herself over to Huan who had remained quietly mad by himself and hooked her arm around his side and lifted him onto her shoulders. She looked to Suzume who had thrown out an arm and was leaning forward still bound to the wall by the ice with a wild grin on her face.
"abr yhklo wvmnt! zrtu polt!" She cried out and Korra felt the same pressure on her brain as the corpse's words that had flung her into the wall. The beast seemed to understand it though as it turned in a manner and moved closer to her, which made Suzume smile all the wider. "You are a star. I wish to burn." She said and that was all the beast needed before it rushed forward and Korra cried out, unable to take her eyes off of what was happening. Before Suzume was obstructed from view the tentacles pulled back and Korra saw the teeth, long and solid white and looking very sharp, as they descended down on Suzume. Before the beast fell entirely on her Korra saw a tooth tear through Suzume's cheek and another tear her eyebrow off as the mouth closed around her head.
She never stopped smiling.
As blood fell to the floor Korra summoned the air around her legs and shot up taking the bubble of air, fire, and Huan with her, quickly leaving the horrible scene behind. Soon the water broke and they were back at the dock and Korra quickly scanned for any spider rats that might have been waiting for them, holding the flame out in front of them in an attempt to fend anything that came at after them off. There was nothing, the ice barricades were even still standing with some slight acidic damage. With a sigh of relief Korra swam to the dock and lifted Huan onto the solid ground where he continued to mutter to himself as Korra pulled herself out of the water and collapsed next to him. Releasing the fire the world was plunged into darkness and with it the last pillars of strength Korra had.
Her eyes stinging as tears fell Korra cried as the images of the corpses plagued her in the darkness, the way that the flesh clung to the bone and the way that their dark words pushed against her brain. She thought of losing Li, the one person who seemed slightly right in the head and who spirits knows what was happening to him right now, and of the mental breaking of Suzume who had given herself willingly to a monster that for all of Korra's knowledge should not have been. The worst part however was Huan who even now next to her continued speaking of things that she didn't understand or want to, completely unable to act on his own or even interact with her now. She cried at her failure to protect them and at what she had seen. She cried at what she now knew.
She was alone down here.
And she could hear skittering on metal.
Still got one more chapter. We still got to meet the All Mother after all.