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Beta: Chaos-PSD.

Book Four

Balance

Chapter V

Battle Of Zaofu.

Kuvira threatens to take Zaofu by force. After tensions flared between Su Beifong and her former protege, Korra brokered a truce. But it was too late. Su and her sons were already on their way to put an end to Kuvira. Meanwhile, Bolin and Varrick learned of Kuvira's true tyrannical intent and deserted her army. But they were captured and betrayed by Zhu Li. Now they're being held against their will.

Kuvira's Camp, Night.

In the middle of the night outside Kuvira's camp, a guard making his way around the perimeter is ambushed and bound by Suyin. She and the twins pull themselves up on a tree branch, surveying the camp. Wing asks his mother whether assassinating Kuvira is a good idea; Suyin answers that most of the army's soldiers are there against their will and that taking out Kuvira will remove their reason to fight.

As they enter the camp, skillfully dodging patrolling mecha suits and searchlights, Suyin uses seismic sense to confirm that Kuvira is indeed asleep in her tent; they burrow into the tent from underneath, only to discover Zhu Li sleeping in Kuvira's bed; the tent falls away around them, revealing that they have walked into a trap.

Kuvira steps forward and tells Suyin that she has always been a coward, and orders her troops to take them prisoner.

In Suyin's house, Opal and Jinora are talking to Korra about what to do next before hearing Kuvira say she caught the Beifongs. "Korra, you can't let Kuvira get away with this. We have to go break out Mom and my brothers."

"You swore an oath of nonaggression when you became an airbender. You can't just attack Kuvira." Jinora said to Opal who begged Korra.

"I don't care about the oath. I have to save my family."

"No, Jinora is right. Your mom attacked the camp first." Naruto said, crossing his arms. Kuvira will say to the leaders of the other nations she was just defending herself."

"Defending herself? She was going to attack our city!"

"I know that!" Naruto bit back. "But when your mom said no to doing this, they chose Kuvira and as far as they know, the Earth kingdom loves her as they're 'Joining' her," Naruto explained as the others walked up in pajamas or still clothed with Baatar.

"Why is that loudspeaker lady talking when I'm trying to sleep?" Meelo groaned, rubbing his eyes.

Korra, what are we going to do?" Baatar asked Korra who sighed.

"Naruto, Jinora, and I will go talk to Kuvira at dawn, and maybe we can work something out. I promise I'll do everything I can to keep the peace."

"I'll go with you," Opal said from her spot before Ikki spoke.

"We'll go, too."

"No. Dad told us to find Korra, and we found her. Now you need to stay safe." Jinora told her sister.

"Come on, let us help."

"I can't risk anyone else being captured. You can stay with Baatar and Huan while I work this out with Kuvira." Korra said, kneeling to be face to face. "Make sure they get back to Tenzin safely if anything goes wrong." She finished looking at Baatar who nodded and took the two back inside.

"Aw, man. When am I going to see some action?"

Dawn, Kuvira's Train.

In Kuvira's train, Varrick and Bolin are imprisoned together, the former of which is having a nightmare; muttering about a life devoid of luxury and assistants, Varrick jumps awake in terror, screaming Zhu Li's name. As he takes in his surroundings, however, he sits up and dejectedly realizes that his assistant really is gone.

Baatar Jr. and two metalbending soldiers enter the room, having come to coerce him to continue his work on the spirit vine project. Varrick reminisces pleasantly that Zhu Li always greeted him in the morning with a hot cup of tea; as a guard grabs him roughly, Baatar Jr. tells him that he will get his tea when he starts working.

Varrick responds to this by pointing out that he is only productive for fifteen minutes every day, a comment which leads Baatar Jr. to have Varrick slammed against the wall and told to show how the device works. The noise wakes Bolin, who asks what is happening and is told by Baatar Jr. to go back to sleep: he will need to save his energy, Baatar Jr. claims, for his time in the reeducation camp.

Varrick complains that he cannot work without an assistant, declaring himself to be helpless without Zhu Li. When Baatar Jr. assigns one of the guards to be his assistant, however, he spooks the guard by recounting the uncontrollable blast of energy created by the experiment the last time it was run, pointing out that the man may lose his hands.

At the terrified guard's suggestion, Baatar Jr. acquiesces, appointing Bolin to assist Varrick. The earthbender's unhappiness with this new development goes unheard by the dispassionate guards, who grab Bolin and forcefully drag him off of the cell.

Kuvira's camp.

"Release them now!"

Opal yelled at Kuvira as the group stood in front of her. "If Su agrees to bow to me and turn over Zaofu, she and the rest of your family will not be harmed."

"Never! I'll never bow to you!" Suyin yelled from her full-body cuffs.

"There must be some way for us to resolve this." Korra sighed at Kuvira.

"I've already laid out my terms, and I think they're very reasonable. After all, Su did try to take me out during our peaceful negotiations."

"You call bringing an army to threaten our city peaceful?" Wei yelled out as Opal glanced around.

"Where's Bolin? I know he would never go along with this!"

"Bolin is with my fiance, working on something very important, but I assure you he's on board with my plans. You two have been apart for some time. I guess you don't realize how much Bolin has grown up. Now turn over Zaofu." Kuvira

"I can't just let you take the city," Korra said, narrowing her eyes.

"Avatar Korra, you are interfering with the internal Earth empire business and letting your personal feelings get in the way of reason. Zaofu cannot continue to rule itself. They have been hoarding their riches and technology for too long. I'm here to distribute those resources fairly throughout the nation. This is about equality."

"You don't care about equality! This is about control! Just take her down. You know it's the right thing to do. You have to stop this!" Opal said to Korra before Kuvira narrowed her eyes

"The only way you're going to keep me from marching into Zaofu is if you physically stop me. Now what are you going to do?"

"It looks like you're not giving me a choice."

"Fine. I want you all to know that I would never ask any of you to do something that I'm not willing to do myself. So rather than risk your lives, I will fight the Avatar one-on-one. Korra, if you win, then you can do whatever you want with Zaofu. But after I beat you, I want you out of my business for good. I'm the one who brought peace to the Earth Empire, not you. You're not relevant here anymore."

"Fine. You want to fight the Avatar? Then let's finish this right here, right now!"

"You sure about this?" Naruto asked, crossing his arms.

"Just stay back and let me handle this. It's been a while, but I got a lot of pent-up rage."

"Don't mess around. Kuvira is too good. Just go into the Avatar state and get it over with." Opal said as Korra shook her head.

"No, I'm only going to use that as a last resort."

"And you're rusty from not fighting for a long time… Be careful." Naruto said before walking back.

As Naruto, Opal, and Jinora leave Korra, retreating to a safe distance, Korra cracks her neck and takes up a fighting stance. Kuvira steps forward to challenge Korra. "Use whatever you want, all the elements, the Avatar state, anything you need. I know you're a little rusty."

"Enough talk."

The Avatar fires two jets of flame at Kuvira, who sidesteps the first and ducks under the second, slightly off guard. She spins back around to face Korra, who, jumping toward her opponent, flings an arc of fire at her. Kuvira dodges again as another blast of flame misses her. Korra bends a stone up at Kuvira's face, but she swings her head out of the way barely in time.

Dodging another fiery punch, she very rapidly bends a slab of earth between her and Korra, breaking the Avatar's attack and pushing her arm up, leaving her side unprotected. Utilizing the opening she created in Korra's defenses, she bends a chunk of rock right in Korra's stomach. As the Avatar stumbles back, she flings two metal clasps at Korra's extended wrist and ankle and uses them to fling her tumbling through the air.

Korra crashed to the ground, tumbling to a stop and momentarily unmoving. The soldiers in Kuvira's army cheer loudly, though as Zhu Li is clapping unenthusiastically with a disinterested look on her face. Kuvira straightens up, laughing as she resumes her fighting pose. "Looks like the Avatar's a little off her game!"

Korra struggles to get to her feet; as she finally rises, Opal calls out to her. "Don't let her get you frustrated! She wants you to make a mistake!"

Korra launches a fissure at Kuvira, but she rolls out of its way and also dodges Korra's airbending attack. The Avatar launches herself into the air and shoots an air blast at Kuvira, which she dodges again. Korra shoots fire, but the metalbender moves the earth under Korra, causing her to lose balance, and knocks her down with a rock to the chest.

Korra shoots a couple more fire and air blasts, but Kuvira dodges them all and traps Korra's foot in a fissure before blinding her with a metal band and hitting her again with a rock. Tearing the metal from her face, Korra rises to her feet once more, firing another fire blast at a waiting Kuvira.

Kuvira's Train.

Varrick, as instructed, continues his work on the spirit vine project, closely supervised by Baatar Jr., though Varrick deems Bolin a lesser assistant than Zhu Li since he needs to have what "the thing" is explained to him. When Baatar Jr. curiously ordered Varrick to walk him through every step of the project.

The eccentric inventor pushes the second-in-command back and starts telling that he envisioned the spirit vine energy as a potential source of clean, unlimited energy, rather than a weapon of mass destruction. Bolin readily agrees with this assessment and requests they make that instead, but Baatar Jr. denounces the notion, noting that it is their responsibility, as scientists, to push the boundaries of the possible once a discovery is made.

Varrick mocks him, inferring that he could not discover a wolf bat if it was building a nest in his butt, much to Bolin's amusement. Baatar Jr. labels the inventor pathetic, and states that wolf-bats do not build nests; Varrick mocks Baatar Jr.'s correction of him and tells Baatar Jr. that he will never know how it feels to give birth to genius only to have it kidnapped and raised by fools, but is cut short by Baatar Jr. threatening to order the guards to roughly force him to continue his work.

After an argument with Bolin, Varrick fires up the machine; when it begins to emit a beeping noise, Baatar Jr. inquires about its origin, and Varrick reveals that he has turned the spirit vine machine into a bomb, which will blow up anyone and everything within range when it detonates. Baatar Jr. attempts to arrest Varrick but backs off when the latter, pulling a remote detonator out of his pocket, tells them he will blow up the train himself if anyone removes him from the bomb.

Korra Vs Kuvira.

Kuvira dodges a couple of blasts from Korra, before shooting a few metal plates at her, all of which miss Korra. The Avatar launches herself high into the air and tries to land a hit on Kuvira from there, but is knocked down again. She gets back up but continues to fail, landing a hit on Kuvira. The metalbender traps her hand in a plate, launching her far away again.

Kuvira shoots a few rocks, but Korra throws up a wall of cover for herself; the two opponents push the wall back and forth in an attempt to knock the other down, to no avail. While Korra is holding the boulder at bay, close to herself, Kuvira disintegrates the rock, causing Korra to fall to her knees.

"Come on, Avatar, get up! Show me what you've got!" Kuvira spoke smiling as Naruto held Opal back.

"They both agreed to a duel. Getting involved now will have Kuvira win by forfeit… Remember, a lot of leaders are still backing her at the moment."

Korra then shoots fire at Kuvira who turns the ground under Korra's feet, so that she faces the other way. Korra recovers and bends a boulder at her opponent, but she bends a metal plate around Korra's ankle, somersaulting her through the air, and falling a few yards away.

"You have to go into the Avatar State! Do it!" Su yelled at the Avatar.

Korra watches Kuvira lunge for her and suddenly goes into the Avatar State, stopping Kuvira and blasting her away with airbending. Kuvira gets up again, but Korra launches herself after the metalbender, blasting her even farther away. Kuvira's hair untangles in the process; Korra rises from the ground on an air spout, taking an enormous boulder with her, preparing to crush Kuvira.

Kuvira pulls herself to her hands and knees, slowly raising her head to face Korra; Korra sees herself in the Avatar State instead of Kuvira's face, the same way she hallucinated. Shocked, Korra panics and falls out of the Avatar state, dropping the boulder as she falls helplessly to the ground.

"I don't understand. We got the poison out; what's wrong with her?" Jinora mused as Naruto clenched his hands.

"I knew you were weak." Kuvira gets up and shoots two plates at Korra and suspends her in mid-air by her wrists.

The metalbender smiles, before slamming Korra into the ground and encasing all but her head in a mound of earth, trapping her. She walks closer and, taking six metal plates and bending them to give them a razor's edge, prepares to kill Korra. Jinora and Opal, seeing what is about to transpire, send simultaneous blasts of air at Kuvira; caught off guard, she flies through the air, landing hard on her back in front of her troops. Rising to her feet with the help of two of her soldiers, she angrily cries out at the airbenders.

"You broke our agreement!" Kuvira yelled before ordering her army. "Attack!"

The army charged forward Only to stop as the lava came up out of the ground and Kurama in his giant size stepped down. "What should we do?"

"Nothing," Naruto said, getting shocked looks. "Korra agreed to this so we're following the terms… But, I didn't so you send anyone after us, expect to get them back in a pine box. I see anyone from your army attack anyone, they'll need help eating for the rest of their life… Jinora, call the others." One mech tried to attack only for Kurama's tail to flick him away high in the air until he disappeared. "Anyone else? I'm fine killing you all as you attacked first and broke the agreement."

Kuvira glanced at Kurama who snorted, having fire come out. "STAND DOWN! They're agreeing to the terms of the duel, we will not attack."

Meelo and Ikki arrive on Pepper, and after Opal and Jinora lift Korra onto the bison, they take off. With Kurama shrinking. Although Opal wants to try to free her mother and brothers, she is held back by Jinora and Ikki; Suyin yells after Opal, assuring her that they will be fine. Tearfully, Opal promises that she will come back for them. Kuvira watches Pepper fly away and claims her victory over the city of Zaofu.

Kuvira's Train.

"This is everyone. Our half of the train is clear."

Bolin said as the guards moved to the other train. "That's good. We're almost out of time."

"You're insane." Baatar Jr said to Varrick who grinned.

"You knew that when you hired me. Bolin, do the thing."

"Uh…"

"Unhook the cars! Oh, come on, that was an easy one!" Varrick yelled as Bolin unhook the car from the train.

"Man, that was great. I gotta admit, you had me going there for a while. I really thought you were going to blow us up. Now, how do we turn this thing off?" Bolin asked as Varrick shrugged.

"Oh, we can't turn it off. We're going to blow up." Bolin jumped at that as Varrick continued. "But we had a pretty good run, right?"

"What are you talking about, a good run?" Bolin asked the mad genius as he waved his arms before looking over the machine. "I'm still running! I like running!"

"I'll see you on the other side, Zhu Li," Varrick said as Bolin found a floor hatch and then stood to slap Varrick.

"I want you to know, I hate you."

They then jumped out as the car blew up.

BOOM!

Up ahead, Baatar looked at the explosion. "I can't believe he actually blew himself up. That man was crazier than a sewer-pipe elephant rat. Let's get back to Zaofu."

Back at the explosion, Bolin and Varrick came out of the hill as Bolin made a tunnel before Varrick started laughing as he sat up. "Yes! You did it, Bolin! You did the thing! Mwah!" He finished kissing Bolin on top of the head.

"I can't believe Zhu Li worked for you as long as she did."

Later, Zaofu.

Inside, Kuvira gathers the citizens of Zaofu and declares that she will deal with them as full citizens of the Earth Empire, so long as they bow to her. If not, they will be considered traitors, like Suyin and the twins.

The entire city bows, save for Baatar and Huan alone, who are the only citizens of Zaofu to refuse to acknowledge Kuvira as the rightful leader and even refuse to bow, much to the chagrin of Baatar Jr. Infuriated by his family's refusal to bow, Baatar Jr. confronts his father and demands him to bow to his rightful leader.

A calm Baatar refuses; before he and Huan are taken away on the orders of Baatar Jr., Baatar simply tells him that he is disappointed in his son.

Later, in the courtyard, Baatar Jr explained what happened on the train to Kuvira and Zhu Li. "Are you sure there's no way they survived?"

"Positive, but I think I can replicate his work with the spirit vines and get us back on track. I'll just need an assistant."

Kuvira looked at Zhu Li at that. "How would you like to help Baatar build the most powerful weapon the world has ever seen?" She asked as Zhu Li bowed.

"It would be my honor, Great Uniter." She said before turning to leave.

"Begin dismantling the domes," Kuvira ordered as Zhu Li left.

To Be Continued.

A/N: Thanks for reading and let me know of any mistakes.

Beta: Chaos-PSD.

Remember to vote if you haven't!

Nothing else to say.

Talk To You Later,

Lone Wolf Out.🐺