Chapter Text
The next next morning Korra awoke hurting everywhere, but wrapped around a soft warm body and her heart jumped into almost painful activity when she discovered she had Asami in her arms.
She didn't think they had ever been this close; Asami's face was pressed into her shoulder, her luscious hair almost suffocating the avatar but lulling her in her beautiful smell of jasmine and oil.
Her face looked peaceful and Korra blamed her racing heart and the intensity of her stare to wake her up. When Asami opened her eyes and found Korra's she looked disbelieving for a moment. Then her eyes softened and she touched Korra's cheek with her hand. It was a simple touch but said a thousand things and Korra was so close to her and felt like there was something she should do... but before she could, Asami had begun to stand up.
Korra understood. It was rare for the engineer to completely let her guard down and with the pain inside her it was just Asami to now act collected again.
It was still early and they had breakfast with some of the air normads. No one talked to them, though everyone stared. Korra, however, didn't notice, for she couldn't stop looking at Asami, kneeling before her and eating slowly in the beautiful morning light, looking more delicate than she had ever seen her and spirits she was so beautiful.
When the engineer caught her gaze she just looked at her softly and Korra, for some reason, quickly dropped her eyes.
Asami insisted on taking a walk through the city or what was left of it. Korra was worried about that – from what she gathered, the engineer had spend most of the time she was away on redesigning and building that city on her own and she wasn't sure how seeing of her hard work in debris would help her getting her spirits up. But Asami insisted and finally Korra relented. She knew that she probably ought to be at some emergency conference or holding a speech but she was also sure that all of this could wait for the one person, who would most likely end up doing the real work anyway.
They had to take Nagga, since most of the streets had been destroyed and when Korra gave Asami her hand to help her up and the taller girl sat behind her, her arms around her waist, the avatar's heart began to flutter. It wasn't as if she hadn't noticed these feelings before, but it was only know, in the eery quietness of the battle aftermath, that she fully allowed herself to acknowledge them.
In the dark lonely days during her recovery in the south pole, she had found herself thinking much about Asami, off the terrifying days when she found she couldn't move her legs, and how the older woman had taken care of her. Off her shame when Asami had to help her dress and undress and of the gentleness in her touch when she washed her. How she had come every single night when Korra had awoken in screams from her nightmares and how she had embraced her closely, whispering soothing nothings into her ear until she realized she was safe. Only weeks later in the biting cold of home had she realized that Asami had basicly neglected everything to completely take care of her, so far as that she was even wiling to go with her, leaving her company and her city – and it was her city – to go with her, to a place where there was no jazz music, no Sato mobiles... and Korra knew Asami hated the cold.
The first letter that had arrived was from her and her shame had grown. That she never had said thank you for all the other girl did, that she was now working on incorporating the spirit vines into the city to help foster a peaceful relationship with humans and spirits – something Korra had also failed at. How the shame became so great that whenever she tried to respond to Asami's long letters, written in neat exact figures that Korra traced long after reading them – they were solid and meaningful – she felt unable to express what she was feeling and unable to admit her state of complete uselessness and desperation to the brave bright light that was Asami.
Korra thought of all of that now, that she had Asami so close behind her and when she signaled Nagga to start moving she put one hand on the two pale ones that lay weakly around her waist and gently took them. She felt Asami's head move up in surprise but then the other girl interlaced their fingers, so hesitantly that Korra almost didn't feel it.
The reality of what had happened sunk in when they took in the remnants of what once was the heart of Republic city. Korra's breast filled with anger and sorrow at the wasteland before her. She looked at Asami haughtingly, afraid at what she would see; but Asami's face was calm and expressionless. Sometimes she took out a little notebook and wrote something quick into it but other than that she showed no reaction. Korra didn't press her. She could only fathom how much it must have hurt Asami to see the city like this but she knew her well enough to not comment. They rode on for a while until Korra directed Nagga in the direction of the park she once had arrived in. How she had marveled at the sigh that was Republic city! Her heart sunk even lower when she saw that all that was left from the park was a small stretch of burned down grass and the muddy river.
Korra jumped off Nagga and stood, breathing in the dust filled air.
“You know, this was the first part I really saw of Republic city” she said, smiling sadly.
Asami twitched, it was the first time in a long while that either of them had spoken. Something strange flickered in her eyes.
“Really?” she asked. “Why here?”
“I didn't have any money and Nagga and me were very hungry. So I roasted three fishes, shared them with a homeless guy and he told me all about the equa-, I mean the city. Then I was hunted down by a police man for fishing. I didn't know a thing about how a city works. I just flung myself right in.”
A small smile appeared on Asami's lips. Korra returned it before letting her eyes wander over the area, trying to remember how it had looked like. What made her frown, though, was the huge pile of stone wreckage right in the middle of the park.
“What is this?”, she asked. “Did they build a building here while I was gone?”
Asami stiffened.
“That's nothing. Probably just the leftovers from the stairs – Korra, wait!”
But Korra had already airbend the small distance up onto the pile of stones. And what she saw made her almost loose her balance.
She stood on a giant replica of her own face; it was her in every detail - the shape her of her eyes, her lips. The right side was broken off but still it was recognizable.
Korra gasped in disbelief.
“Is that – did someone build a statue of me?”
She looked down to see Asami standing frozen beneath her, her hands clenched and her head bowed low.
“Asami?”
Worriedly she whirled back down to the ground and approached her friend.
“What's wrong? Are you-” And then it clicked.
Korra's mouth opened and she stared at the beautiful woman in front of her. She refused to meet her gaze.
“You build it?”, she finally whispered in awe.
Asami looked away.
“I didn't want the people to forget who saved them from Zaheer and Unoloq and the others. There were so many that blamed you for the unrests in the Earth kingdom and the problems with the vines. And I was just so... angry at them. So when I got the commission for making a better infrastructure connection to the park, I build this.”
Korra's eyes had widened so much, she felt if she opened them any more, they would be in danger of falling off. Also, she feared her face was red.
Her mind was racing. How did one react to this?
Finally, she grabbed Asami by her arms and the engineer met her gaze at last; and the avatar forgot everything she wanted to say.
For a moment she stood there, struggling for words until she said:
“I feel like if anyone deserves a statue to be build for them it's you.”
Asami tilted her head.
“I don't prevent wars. I'm an engineer. I'm just called when something needs to be repaired or build. There are no statues build for people like -”
She stopped. Korra wondered why when she realized she had closed the gap between them and pressed their foreheads together. She hadn't done that since she last was in the water tribe – it was an ancient gesture of her people to show gratitude or love.
“I've never done this before, but – when I return to my tribe I will make you a statue of ice.”
Asami blushed, but still her eyes lit up with her trademark curiosity and Korra felt a surge of happiness at that.
“Of ice? That's possible?”
Korra chuckled.
“Well I can't promise how it looks when I do it but it's technically possible, yes.”
Asami smiled, for the first time her true smile and Korra's heart melted.
“I don't need a statue of myself. But thank you.”
She lent forward and closed what little distance was between them to kiss Korra's cheek. Korra blushed so hard she was embarrassed at herself. Asami smiled, unusually shy for her, and put a hand on Korra's shoulder.
“Come on. You have to tell me about those ice sculptures at your home.”
Korra walked with her, back to Nagga, while trying to remember what little she knew about the old art and secretly thought she definitely would make use of it to capture Asami's likeness in her home. Somehow, the thought warmed her heart.