AUTHOR'S NOTES: Just like there was no deus ex machina to magically learn airbending, there's no Aang to magically show up just because Korra's feeling sad. The gist of her past lives being the key to helping restore her bending is still a thing (as the Interregnums hinted a few chapters ago), but Korra's gotta do a bit of work for it. This chapter shows just how she goes about doing that—as well as showing the strength of the bonds between Team Avatar.
Happy Reading!

BOOK TWO: CHANGE

CHAPTER EIGHTY-SEVEN: TRUEST FRIENDS

There were a great many stories that had to be exchanged the next morning between the different people and parties. Bolin and Asami explained their altercation with Hiroshi, while Iroh recounted his rendezvous with the United Forces Second Division. Kuvira wore a smirk the entire time she recounted her dogfights with the Equalists, but despite her confidence, her story was actually fairly curt and humble. Kwan recounted a rather hilarious story about how she fought off the Equalist armies from the probending arena using improvised bludgeons and mechanical sabotage. As wild as it sounded, a similar story was in the newspaper that day, which indicated that her wild claims were actually true.

Korra was the first one to bear the bad news as she revealed that Amon had stripped her of her bending. Mako only made things worse when he recounted that Tenzin's family had also all been stripped of their bending. The only one that had any semblance of airbending remaining in them was Ikki, although even her airbending was severely inhibited due to the damage Amon had done, even if he had not managed to fully remove it before Korra had interrupted described it as "trying to breathe through a straw." at one point.

"Being the last airbender isn't fun at all," Ikki sighed, and the sullen look on her face as well as every member of her family only drove the point home even further, and Korra looked that much guiltier for 'allowing it to happen' (even if it was not her fault).

"Add that to Amon getting away," Lin frowned, "and I'd say this was a loss, all things considering. The Avatar, the airbenders, my police force… gone."

"I'm not staying here," Korra turned definitively towards the others. "This is goodbye."

Before anyone could so much as react, Korra took a dive off the nearest cliff into the water, disappearing beneath the waves. Even without her bending, she was still a fast and powerful swimmer, and right now, she wanted to be as far away from everyone as she could.

Korra knew that she couldn't swim to the Western Air Temple from Republic City, but she knew she had to get there by any means necessary. It was the only other place in the world besides Sato Estate that Korra had ever truly felt safe, and even if Hiroshi was gone, she didn't want to go back there this soon—not when there were so many fresh, painful memories for her, and even for Asami. While she accepted Asami's account, Korra knew that Asami was withholding details of the incident due to the way she had told the story—a knowledge she had picked up about her lover over the years of them being together.

"There is… little option for us here," Tenzin frowned, "I will take my children to see my mother in the Southern Water Tribe. I would have liked to take Korra with me, but she is out of our reach."

"You just give up like that?" Lin scoffed, pointing out in the distance where a small head poked out of the water before disappearing below the waves again, "she's right there! You've got boats, and you could pluck her right out of the water again if you wanted."

"That's the thing," Tenzin refuted, "I don't wish to stop her. After everything that's happened, I can understand her desire to be alone, and a foul-tempered Korra is the last thing any of us need to create right now; much less try and deal with."

"...An accurate assertion," Lin frowned, "damn… Amon must've done a number on her."

"I know where she's going though," Asami stood staring out into the bay with her hands crossed behind her back. "I guarantee it."

"Where," Mako and Bolin piped up as they, Lin and Tenzin all looked curiously at her.

"Western Air Temple," Asami and Kwan replied simultaneously. "She's had a weird fascination with that place for years now—wait, how did you know that, Kwan?"

"Barring that knowing things I'm not supposed to know is still what I do," the lavabender riposted, "she's talked about it a few times before. Sato probably knows more about it than me though."

"She's talked very highly about it lately," Asami turned to the others, "And ever since this whole Equalist mess started bogging her down with stress, she's talked about just running away there. I think getting her bending stripped was her breaking point. In fact, if I know Korra as well as I hope I do, I guarantee that's what happened. I need to go after her."

"I trust your judgment, Asami," Tenzin sighed, "Still and all, I will take Lin and my family to the south pole. I'm sure you will know how to contact me."

"I'll stick around to see how this shit gets cleaned up," Kwan grunted.

"I suppose I will assist in this endeavour," Kuvira added, "Ironic who I'll be working with."

"Yeah, yeah, rub it in," Kwan elbowed the metalbender.

"We're going with Asami," Bolin declared, and Mako stood by his brother in agreement.

"I was hoping you'd suggest it," Asami smiled, "Korra might love me like crazy, but she talks very highly of you both. And you both can offer her things that I can't. It works out."

"I know what you mean," Mako nodded, "and despite the rocky start she and I had, I'm glad I met her. She's a good kid, and suffers way more than she deserves to."

"Ain't that the truth," Bolin sighed in agreement.

"Well then," Kwan shoved her hands into her coat pockets. "That was remarkably easy."

Asami raided her father's old workshop, finding a small dirigible that appeared to be a prototype for smaller passenger aircraft or something along those lines. It was with this machine that she, Mako, and Bolin made their way to the Western Air Temple, in the hopes of finding Korra there. None of them could think of where else the Avatar would run off to.

Asami knew better than to leave Naga behind, and it seemed the Polar Bear-Dog could track Korra's location from anywhere, to the point where even she seemed confident that this mysterious upside-down temple complex would be where Korra was. True to this intuition, evidence of Korra's presence was found in the form of a small bag of gear and a great deal of rope, even if Korra herself was nowhere to be found.

"How did she navigate this place without her bending!?" Bolin was in awe of the many pagodas, not all of which were even accessible to him, an earthbender.

"I want to know what draws her to this place," Asami whispered, not necessarily to the brothers, but loud enough for them to hear her, "In the last three years she's been here 48 times, and I want to know what she finds so compelling about an abandoned temple."

With no one to explain the different parts of the temple to them, it took the trio several hours of wandering around before they spotted Korra far below them, on a platform with a large door leading right into the cliffside—the Avatar Chamber. However, without airbending, Korra was unable to open the massive door, and so she was in a heap on the floor just outside the door. It was unclear if she was asleep, unconscious, or simply despaired. It was also unclear how she had reached that platform in the first place.

"Korra?" Bolin called out, his voice carrying the best of the three, "Hey Korra, are you alright?"

"Take a guess, bro," Mako elbowed him, "she lost her bending, remember?"

"Right, right—sorry," Bolin stammered, "but you know what I meant."

Korra did not move or respond though. The brothers exchanged looks while Asami stroked her chin in contemplation before glancing at the wall.

"Bolin," she turned to the earthbender, "think you could get us down there?"

"Sure," He glanced at the nearby cliff face before bending a large jagged platform out which would allow them to descend to where Korra was sulking. The three of them (as well as Naga) boarded this outcropping, which Bolin promptly moved down the side of the cliff wall until they were nearly level with the large platform where Korra was.

She appeared to be either asleep or unconscious. She was laying on her left side, and the knuckles of her right hand were bleeding which made her already scarred hand look even worse for wear. Asami noticed a fist-sized crack in the wall near the massive Air Nomad emblem that served as the lock on the chamber Korra had clearly tried to enter, which was both disheartening due to Korra's inability to enter a place she had talked so fondly of; and also terrifying as a testament to just how much brute strength the Avatar had even without her bending.

"Korra?" she was naturally the first one to try and get Korra's attention, and did so this time by gently putting her hand on Korra's exposed shoulder.

"Leave," she murmured, proving she wasn't actually asleep or unconscious, "you never should have wasted your time coming here."

"Korra, don't do this again," Asami tried coaxing Korra to move but it seemed the Avatar stubbornly refused to budge an inch. "Don't keep this bottled in; don't cut yourself off and don't push everyone away from you like this. Nothing good ever comes from it!"

"She's right," Mako pointed out, "Korra, we came all the way out here to find you because we care about you. We didn't become friends with you just because you were the Avatar, or because you whooped our butts at Probending and taught us your tricks. It wasn't even because you were good-looking. Even after everything that's happened to you, we're your friends because you're a good person and an even better friend to us. If anything, we don't deserve you—not the other way around."

"And hey," Bolin chipped in, "even without your bending, we're still your Team Avatar, and we've got your back, Korra. Maybe I'm just a dumb optimist, but I think we can find a way to fix it. But even if we can't… as terrible as that'd be… we're still your friends. Always and forever."

Korra grunted and slowly pulled herself up into a sitting position, her eyes still watery.

"Damn it all." a weak smile appeared on her visage as she said this, betraying a sense of vulnerability and genuine appreciation for what her friends had done for her. "Seriously… what did I do to deserve people like you in my life?"

Her smile was short-lived, however. "But for real—it's not okay. Before my confrontation with Amon I spoke with some of my past lives. They said they had my back in this, and some of them even told me stories about Avatars who had their bending stripped and had to re-learn the elements. I need to get in there…" she gestured towards the large wall in front of her, "I can feel them calling out to me, but with my chi blocked and my bending gone, I'm all out of sorts, and there's no way for me to open that door anymore anyways! I'm so close and yet… nothing! I'd have asked Tenzin to come with me, but he and his family…"

Korra trailed off, burying her face in her hands in visible despair as she remembered what had happened to them too.

"Well, it's rock, right?" Bolin glanced at the cliff. "How hard could it be?"

"The Avatar statues inside are indestructible too," Korra warned, "I tried blowing the head off of mine and that didn't even nick it. I think the walls are the same way."

"It can't hurt to try though, right?" Bolin pointed out, to which Korra could not argue. "And wait, you have a statue in there?"

"That's not natural material," Korra pouted sadly, "whatever spirits make them, made them unbendable. But I guess being the Avatar means you get a cool statue. I just wish I could get in there and talk to them properly… I can't focus enough without that nexus."

"Well, that's what Bolin's here for!" Bolin grinned, rolling up his sleeves. However, despite his efforts to force the door open, none of the stone moved. Much like Korra's combustion beam against her own Avatar Statue, not even Mako's lightning had any effect on the door. Even the crack that Korra's fist had produced in frustration prior to her friends' arrival had been off to the side, rather than on the door.

"I told you it was no good," Korra sulked. "Still… uh, thanks for trying I guess." Korra got up and walked off, only for Naga to follow her. Asami glanced from the door to the brothers, and then back towards where their airship was parked.

"Are you seriously thinking…" Mako looked at Asami with a raised eyebrow. Asami did not reply, but nodded, and smirked.

Korra did not see her friends for the remainder of the evening as she distanced herself from everyone but Naga; and to her slight surprise, they did not come looking for her. That did not bother her as much as it might have seemed, but she still felt just as lost and hopeless that evening as she had earlier that day as she realized that her bending was gone and that so far there was no way to get it back. She screamed at the heavens, cursing the names of several of her past lives, particularly those that promised her that there were ways to restore her bending. Mako, Bolin, and Asami heard some of these screams, and while it pained Asami in particular, all three of them used it as motivation to work even harder on finding a way to help Korra.

The next morning, Korra woke up to Bolin shaking her gently.

"Murrgrghh…" Korra smacked her lips, moaning and growling. "Morning… evil."

"I promise this is worth it, Korra." Bolin's voice sounded exhausted as well, and the grey patches under his eyes were an indicator that he had definitely not slept very much last night—if at all, "come on; get up and follow me."

"I'm not the Avatar anymore," Korra mumbled, pulling herself to her feet, "you guys really don't need to be doing me any more favours, 'Team Avatar' or not."

"Sorry, not sorry, Korra; this was important," he took her scarred hand and almost dragged her along, "and I promise you'll like it. Be glad it's me and not Mako otherwise you'd get a lecture about how we're still your friends and such. I lack that charisma right now."

Having nothing to lose, and not realizing that Naga was gone as well, Korra followed Bolin as he earthbent a slab of rock on the cliff side to help them get back down to the platform where the door to the Avatar Chamber was. Waiting to greet them were Naga and Mako, the latter of whom approached Korra.

"Close your eyes," he gestured as Bolin put his hand over Korra's eyes just to be sure. Korra flailed her arms and tried to shake him off in a moment of shock, but he used his free arm to hold her waist, to her slight irritation.

"My birthday's not for another three weeks if that's what this is about," she complained, "why are we coming back here again?"

"That's… good to know actually," Bolin chuckled, "but like I said, Korra—I promise you'll love this! We spent all night trying to do this for you."

"Fine, fine, let's see what you…" Korra began, but froze as Bolin took his hand off her eyes and let her go. In front of her, the massive door to the Avatar Chamber had been opened, and there, leaning against the door with a slightly slouched posture, with disheveled hair and slightly disheveled clothing and an exhausted smile on her face, stood Asami. Korra approached her with an almost reverence and awe as she processed what exactly had happened here.

"If you were ever wondering how worth it you are to me—to us, Korra," Asami smiled, now close enough for Korra to notice the thick black circles around her eyes that betrayed an exhausting sleepless night, "I hope this can answer that question for you."

"How…" Korra stammered in little more than a whisper, "how did you do it…?"

"It took all night to figure out how the lock worked and how to trick it," Asami smiled, "but it was worth it. You needed to get in there, and so Mako, Bolin, and I worked on a way to get you in there. I hope you realize now how important you are to us, Korra."

Korra did not respond, but pulled Asami, Mako, and Bolin into a huge embrace, not even attempting to hide her tears as she held them close to her.

"Even… even if this doesn't… do anything," Korra whispered through sobs, "I… love you guys… so much. Th-thank you… for everything."

It was not like her to be crying like this (or so she told herself), but this moment of clear and shameless self-sacrifice on her friends' part: coming all the way out to the remote temple complex and then spending an entire evening trying to open a door just for Korra to have a better chance at contacting her past lives—these selfless acts finally helped hit home with Korra just how much her friends cared about her.

"Hey," Mako reached up to ruffle Korra's hair, "now you know how we feel when you go out and shamelessly put your life on the line for us."

"We love you, Korra," Asami smiled, "in slightly different ways, but for everything you've ever done for us, we're happy to repay that favour. It's like Bolin said: we're still your team Avatar."

"Even if… y'know—this doesn't work or anything; even if you're a plain ol' nonbender…" Bolin hummed, "we're still here for ya—not just as your Team Avatar… but as your best friends. I said it last night and I meant it last night. We meant it."

It was several minutes before Korra released any of them from her grip as she was overwhelmed with emotions that she was so used to concealing. Despite the deadweighted feeling she still held from being stripped of her bending, there was a part of her that mustered the will to carry on; the drive to support and be supported by her best friends, and the reassurance of knowing that there were people in the world that not only cared for her as much as she cared for them, but that cared for her as Korra—rather than merely as Avatar Korra. While some people might have thought the notion was trivial, to Korra, being referred to as a living person rather than a faceless entity meant the world to her—and it showed.