A/N: Almost to 2k views, soon this'll catch up to AO3 numbers in that respect, crazy.

CW for a vague description of a past severe injury, implied past arson, and general stressed vibes.

Enjoy!

"Looks like that went about as well as it could've," Courtney remarked as she saw Alejandro leave the room they were keeping their 'guest' in with a singed appearance and an angry frown on his face. "We should just kill him and move on already."

"One more word and I'll throw you back out on the street again, how about that," Alejandro said through gritted teeth, his hands in fists. "The show off…thinks he's above all this now and has the nerve to—" he started laughing. "To not even try to hurt me and escape!"

"Maybe you whittled down his confidence so much he doesn't think it's worth it?" Zoey suggested from further in the hallway, kicking her legs back and forth while sitting in a chair like a small child in a doctor's office.

"Or maybe he just pitied you," Courtney said under her breath, fully aware of what exactly had happened to Al because he'd told the two of them a vague version of the story pretty soon after they'd met and she'd filled in the details herself from there.

"He's more confident than he ever was before. And that's going to be a problem for us if we're going to keep him here." Alejandro appeared not to hear Courtney and replied to Zoey. "Especially if his little work friends come looking for him. If they're smart they won't try, and Junior's been smart enough to keep his mouth shut awhile."

"What if he starts being dumb? He looked pretty stupid when we blew up the store."

"I'm not worried about a fruit seller's son you nearly killed with shock," Al said sharply.

"Who are you worried about then?"

"Someone much worse."

"Yeah, it was definitely not the best day in the world for him. But on the bright side his arm is super cool looking now, he likes to play a game where he hides it with a glove and you have to uncover it by sneaking up on him and—" Izzy had described the incident in far too much detail. Her leg was basically slamming up and down into the floor and her fingers tapped away on the desk.

Mako, Korra, and Junior had all remained silent during Izzy's meandering storytelling. Now that she appeared to be winding down, Korra finally cut her off. "So he lost his arm because of police incompetence when mis-identifying him during a skirmish with Equalists."

"Wow, yeah, that's it!" Izzy confirmed. "I was about to pop quiz you and everything but I guess there's no point now. Oh well!" She grinned.

"I've heard of an Alejandro before…" Mako whispered to Korra. "He was one of Lightning Bolt Zolt's muscle guys before being put in charge of recruitment for a hot second, making the Triple Threats territory even greater than it already was. 'Course, that was before he stopped showing up to meetings and we all assumed he'd either left or been taken out on some job. I never talked to him myself, had no reason to and frankly I was younger and a bit scared of him. By the time me and Bolin made it out of the Triple Threats he hadn't been seen for at least a year or two." He wracked his brain for any other relevant details. "I think he's a bender, but I can't say for sure—"

"Is that all the questions you got for me? We have a date to go on still!" Izzy interrupted, having stood up.

"No, wait, we're not done yet," Korra replied, putting a hand up. "That was a lot of information but none of it's really helpful." She looked at Junior. "You also know Alejandro, don't you?"

"…maybe," Junior mumbled, even tenser. "Not really."

Korra leaned over him. "You want your friend back, right?" she asked with a lower tone of voice.

Junior returned a look of fear. This fear was not necessarily directed at Korra. "Why'd you have to say it like that?" he asked.

"We can be here all day. And he'll still be out there with those people that destroyed your family's shop because you won't answer a simple question, how can you not understand that—!" Korra was raising her voice.

"Woah, Korra—" Mako started to speak.

"He knows where we live! He could move a single finger and have someone destroy it, he's done it before," Junior blurted out, his eyes welling up. "He tried to do it to the store when we didn't pay the protection money but Mike or…whoever he was at the time stopped them! And now he's not here to stop them again and—" He covered his eyes with his hands and took a shaky breath. "My mom doesn't even know what's going on with all this. She wouldn't know what to do if they showed up at our house."

"He can't have that much power," Korra insisted.

"I don't know…the damage to the store was pretty bad. If he gave the order both times and it got as bad as it did, we should take him much more seriously," Mako said while tapping his chin. "He seems to be calling shots more than he ever did under Zolt."

"He sounds more like a coward to me, sending people to do dirty work for him," Korra remarked with a scoff.

"Yeah, like when he told me to pick up his order for him at the noodle place downtown. 'Make sure to deep fry them twice!' he said, so I did and then I came back but I forgot the noodles altogether and went back but the place was gone by then so no more noodles!" Izzy recounted out of the blue with a shrug.

"Gone as in…closed, right? You didn't just admit to burning the place down," Korra asked, blinking.

"I didn't admit anything. What are we talking about again?" Izzy had looked away for a moment.

"Your cousin or whatever he is—Alejandro?"

"Oh yeah. I forgot! He hates the taste of cold noodles!" she laughed. "Sometimes I think the smoke from all the fire I make might have gone into my head. That's why he asked me to fry them for him since he can't do it himself anymore. But I don't do that now, I got bored."

He can't fry his own noodles anymore.

Korra's eyes widened.

She could practically hear Amon laughing at her.

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