Chapter Text
“Asami,” Opal said, savoring a drink from the cup in her hand. “Of all the inventions you've ever made, this truly is the most brilliant.”
Asami chuckled, sipping her own as she enjoyed the breeze beneath her skirt. It was a hot day, and the metal city of Zaofu didn't exactly dissipate the heat well. “It's just tea with ice in it, Opal. And it was Korra's idea.”
“Well, tell her to patent it,” Opal suggested, tilting her cup around to settle the ice.
They looked out over the wide park, where Korra, Bolin, and Naga were playing with Mian and three of Bolin and Opal's four kids. Their youngest, Jade, was napping inside. Little Kyoshi—or Kiki, as her dad called her—wasn't quite able to keep up with her brothers, but Mian did her best to help her keep up.
Asami smiled at all the kids having fun—and she included her and Opal's spouses in that group—but was happy to have a few days to relax. Or try to—but how could she, knowing how big the mountain of paperwork had already been on her desk when she'd left? “Honestly, it feels like Korra gets more chances to invent things these days than I do.”
Opal quirked an eyebrow at her. “You okay, girl? Sound a little glum.”
Asami shrugged. “I mean, I'm not sure I have any right to be. All three of us are healthy and happy, my business is finally doing so well that people have gotten it through their heads I'm not just coasting on my father's successes, and the city has managed to go a decade without needing me to rebuild it.”
Opal snorted. “What's the problem then?”
Laughter bubbled up from below, where Korra had Kyoshi in her lap, air-scootering circles around Bolin and his other two kids. Mian had climbed on top of Naga, and was chasing after.
“Asami?”
She sighed. “I dunno. It just feels... so... rote, anymore.”
“Sounds like you need to shake things up a bit,” Opal said, her voice husky.
“That hasn't gotten boring at all,” she said tartly. Opal snickered. “I swear, if Korra and I could conceive naturally, we'd have more kids than you two.”
“Do you want more kids?”
Asami paused. Mian always loved visiting Opal and Bolin's family, and she made friends easily at school—at least, as easily as anyone could when their classmates were overawed by her hero parents. “Mian is such a little sweetheart... I'm so busy all the time, and we never know when Korra might be needed somewhere.” Asami remembered the long hallways, the tall, empty staircases, the dozens and dozens of furnished, empty rooms. How forbidding it all was, as her father withdrew into himself. “We agreed when we adopted Mian, we'd give her all the love and support in the world.” Desperate attempts to make friends, growing up. Have somebody she could relate to, somebody her own age. Anyone. “What if we adopted another child, and it took away from Mian? That wouldn't be fair.”
Opal set down her drink and crossed her arms. “Do you think we love Chikara any less than San? Is Kyoshi any worse off, with Jade around now too?”
Asami winced. “Opal, I didn't mean—”
She waved her off. “I know what you meant. You're being an engineer again, Asami.”
If only. How long since she'd drafted a new design? “How do you mean?”
“I mean... you're acting like love is a finite resource. Like you only produce a certain amount of it, and that can't be changed. When San was first born, obviously he was the most perfect and beautiful child the world had ever seen.”
“Obviously,” Asami smiled.
“And babies are tough, really... really tough. So very... very...” she coughed. “So when I was pregnant like right away again, part of us kinda dreaded it. But then, Chikara came, and we loved her too, and when they were old enough to play with each other, it's like our love just kept... increasing. There was ample room in our hearts for the both of them.”
Asami nodded, distantly. “So... while our apartment might be too small for four people as it is, we could always move to a bigger one?”
“If that's the analogy that works for you, sure,” Opal said, but her lip turned down. “Doesn't feel complete, though. No, the family thing, it's... one of those, the whole is greater than the sum things?”
“Hmm...” Asami tapped a curled finger against her chin, pondering. “So adding more kids created a sort of... constructive feedback loop, in the amount of love you and Bolin had to offer?”
Opal blinked at her, then laughed. “Spirits, Asami, you're a dork. Sure, why not?”
“Opal!” Korra greeted, airbending herself beside them, her skin coated in a sheen of sweat that made Asami's heart beat just that much faster. “I have no idea how you keep up with that army of yours.”
“That's because you're not thinking strategically,” Opal said, tapping the side of her head. “The trick is, you let them tire each other out, while you sit and drink iced tea.”
“Oh, do you have that here?”
“Yeah, of course,” Opal said, waving the question away. “We've had it for years!”
Asami snorted, looking out at the field. Mian was running with—outrunning, as it happened—the other children, while Bolin was leaning down, hands on his knees as he gasped for air. Mian's own breathing looked fine—her lung problem wasn't curable, but weekly healing kept her as energetic and capable as any other eight year old. More, even.
Korra took a chair, scooting it close to Asami's so she could hold her hand. The thin lines on Korra's face presaged the smile that broke out across it, once she looked in Asami's eyes. “Enjoying your time off, Sparks?”
“Of course I am. Getting to spend more time with my girls is always worth it—and it is nice to get out of town for a few days.”
“Right?” Korra smiled, patting their clasped hands.
She set down her drink, giving her wife an even look. “What did you do, Korra?”
“I... may have asked Tenni how long she thought Future Industries could run without you being in the office.”
“Korra!” Asami scolded, eyebrows furrowed. “I know you were looking forward to this, but you can't just interfere—”
“She said seven months. Apparently it's company policy to have plans in place for temporarily assigning duties for every department head and executive for at least the length given for parental leave.”
“Parental... I'm fairly certain we're not going to get pregnant, Korra.” Opal started snickering, and Asami's glare did nothing to stop it. “And that sort of leave is there to make sure my best people don't have to choose between their lives and their career.”
“That's exactly what Tenni said!” Korra leaned over the armrests, clutching Asami's hand in both of hers. “I didn't bring it up before we left town, but now that we're out and about... are you really happy at work Asami? Don't tell me how much they need you or how you just want to see such and such a project done, in fact don't answer me at all, but just think about it, okay?”
Asami pressed her lips and narrowed her eyes. “How long am I supposed to just think about it?”
“Fffffffour weeks?”
“Four weeks!”
Korra locked eyes with her, pouting her lower lip out. “Pleeeease?”
Asami sputtered, not ready for that assault. “Korra, I haven't taken that much time off in... in... I don't know how long!”
“You kinda just proved her point, there,” Opal said, kicking her legs. “Look, can I make an observation?”
“Please!” Korra said, a little too quickly, while Asami merely sighed.
Opal leaned against the table. “Asami... you've done a fantastic job at Future Industries. Nobody is going to dispute that. But the way you took it over to begin with, just sorta... by default, because of everything your father did... you didn't have any say in that. Maybe you didn't realize it at the time, maybe it just felt natural, but did you ever ask yourself if you wanted to be running a multinational corporation?”
“I... I mean it was my father's company. I had to restore the family's reputation...”
“Did you?” Opal asked. “Your father didn't deserve it, and nobody blamed you for what happened.”
“I remember being a little surprised at the time,” Korra said. “After everything that happened, I figured you'd take what money you had and just... run away from everything.”
“I couldn't do that,” Asami said firmly.
“Of course not,” Opal smiled. “But look at my aunt. She did the whole police thing to make her mom happy, because she thought she was supposed to, and she was miserable for years. Or Tenzin—how long did it take him to realize he could be his own person, and not just Aang Jr.?”
“Are you saying I'm still in my father's shadow?”
“I'm saying you've lived your life around an emotionally-driven choice from when you were a teenager. Maybe, just maybe, that's a little young to permanently determine your career path?”
“I... Korra, what do you think of this?”
Her wife shrugged, resting her head on Asami's shoulder. “Don't ask me. I've known my career path since I was five. But... I do know that you don't come home from the office happy, very often. Or even on time. I know how many nights you barely make it through dinner before conking out.”
Asami winced. Her fatigue wasn't merely a work-related thing—she'd tired more easily than she liked ever since they'd sealed away Vaatu. It was something they dealt with, just like Korra's trauma—and just like that, not something they normally talked about in public.
Korra sensed her misstep, and was already backpedaling. “What I mean is... I love you, and Mian loves you, and we know your work is important to you but it feels like work gets more of Asami than we do sometimes.”
“I never let work intrude on weekends,” Asami defended, frowned. “Barring emergencies. Which I always make up for.”
“So your family gets two days a week?” Opal asked, ice clicking against her cup as she sipped her tea.
Asami took a deep breath. “We'll talk about this later. And I'll think about the four weeks when I'm in a better mood—okay?”
Korra recognized a good deal when she saw it. She leaned over, kissing Asami's cheek. “Okay.”
She already felt herself melting, and not from Zaofu's heat. “Hypothetically, though... what would you want to do, in all that time? Anywhere in particular you'd like to visit?”
General Toshiro surveyed his desk, papers neatly arrayed, electric lamp buzzing on the corner. Battle plans, war games, contingencies... useless. What was the point of the Fire Nation maintaining a military, if the royal family was intent on giving everything away? Once, the Fire Nation had been the dragon that enveloped the world... what had it fallen to, now?
He filed the plans away, again unchanged. Why would they need plans to defend Capital City, if the other nations could take what they wanted anyway?
Toshiro was halfway toward pulling the Fire Whiskey out of his drawer when his aide-de-camp came through the doorway and stood at attention. She was more a secretary than a soldier. Not that the Fire Nation had many true soldiers left to speak of. “Sir, urgent news from the capital. Also, a woman is here to see you, citing Lieutenant Shu as reference.”
Toshiro sighed, shutting the drawer. “What's the news?”
“Fire Lord Izumi has announced her abdication, effective in three weeks.”
The bottom fell out of Toshiro's gut. Scuttlebutt had been predicting this for weeks, but to finally hear it... “Iroh?”
“Is to be the new Fire Lord.”
He slumped back in his chair. That simpering, internationalist would-be general, on the throne? Izumi was at least a capable administrator, and loyal to her nation, even if she carried guilt for crimes so long ago as to have passed out of memory. Iroh, though, had spent more time abroad than home. He was more a product of Republic City than of the Fire Nation.
“They're going to make a colony out of us,” he lamented to his desk.
“Pardon, sir?”
“Nothing,” he said, absently. “Who was the woman?”
“I'll send her in.”
Toshiro sighed, his mind again wandering to the back of that drawer. How could he still serve, when his nation refused to serve itself? He turned, regarding the red flag, the flame of the Fire Nation, once the most powerful and advanced nation on Earth. Now...
An afterthought.
“General,” came a voice from the door. He looked to the woman entering his office, her attire high-class, but well-worn and a few years out of fashion. A boy in a cloak came behind her, his face mostly obscured by the hood. “I assume you heard the news?”
The general stroked his short beard, placing an elbow on his desk as he assessed her. Her flowing pants and the way she walked suggested firebender, but she wasn't in the military... “Who are you? And how have you already heard it?”
She smirked. “You can call me Meisa, and I have my sources. Sources that tell me you are not particularly thrilled about the idea of a Fire Lord Iroh, bringing us deeper into the Avatar's bright and perfect world order.”
He leaned back as she stalked into the room, the child following close behind. “I don't know you. Certainly not enough to discuss unpopular political stances.”
“They're not as unpopular as you think,” she said, looking at his map on the wall. A relic from the Hundred Year War, frowned upon by most of the other generals, but permitted for display due to its personal nature, a family heirloom. “Your grandfather fought at New Ozai?”
He quirked an eyebrow. Omashu held that name for less than a year. “The entire occupation, yes. What do you want?”
“Why... in the end, that's what I wanted to ask you. What do you want?”
Toshiro stood. “I'm not terribly impressed with your cryptic song and dance. Speak plainly or I'll show you out.”
“You're cautious,” she said, crossing her arms. “That's fair. So am I. Perhaps you haven't considered your desires, for lack of opportunity to attain them. If you don't know your options, after all, why bother pondering it? But tell me—do you want somebody besides Prince Iroh on the throne?”
Toshiro sighed. “What I want doesn't matter. And even if I did get a say, his sister wouldn't be any better.”
“Who says the next Fire Lord needs to be from that same family?”
He took a step back. She... she was talking about more than politics.
She was talking treason.
“The royal bloodline has run it's course,” Meisa said, pulling the child with her to the center of the room, then standing behind him, wrists resting on his shoulders. “Sycophants or lunatics, the lot of them. What the Fire Nation needs is somebody who can restore our former glory. Who remembers what the Fire Nation truly was, who has fire burning in their veins. Not some paper general who's been defeated by rabble. Somebody with experience. Who the other world leaders would respect enough to leave alone...”
“Lieutenant Shu had nothing to do with this meeting, did he?”
“He is... a friend. Someone who, like us, has felt the need to hide his belief that the Fire Nation has long been on the wrong path. But we think the time has come to restore its former glory. For if we do not act now, we'll go the way of the Earth Kingdom before much longer. And we all want to prevent that, don't we?”
Toshiro leaned forward on his desk. “Ma'am, I don't know who you think you are, but if you're trying to talk somebody into a coup, you have to bring more to the table than some pretty words about our glorious past.”
Meisa waved the objection away, then brought her hand down to the boy's hood. “General Toshiro, I'd like you to meet my son.” She pulled the hood back, revealing a hardened gaze for such a youthful face—and a third eye tattoo at the center of his forehead. “General Toshiro, meet Sozin. Sozin... if he'll accept our help, you're looking at the next Fire Lord.”
