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Death is easy. It’s living that’s hard. Living is hard, especially when you realise you’ll continue facing the consequences of your choices every single day for the rest of your life. Some would say it’s a miracle, but you’re a man of logic, a man of science. You understand it’s not so much a miracle as being a statistical outlier with the roll of the probability dice.
The things that scare you are the things you don’t understand. And the bright beam of light is the one that scares you the most; a perpetual, mocking reminder that there’s a world out there you would never understand. No amount of logic and quantifiable definitions you can rely on to make any sense of it. Speaking of quantifiable definitions, feelings are another thing that defy rationality.
You try, but it’s so hard. It’s hard letting go of anger, of the beliefs you once held - hold. A part of you has accepts that. When you think you’re rid of your demons, they have a habit of making their way in surreptitiously, a cancerous gust of wind on the dying ember in your heart, your old hate glowing momentarily. They are the dark whispers at the edge of your mind, creeping in the quiet of the night when there’s nothing else to drown them, giving voice to your irrational fears. A bender who killed your wife. A bender used you. Benders took your daughter away.
Emotions caused you to lose everything, so you turn back to the solace of logic. It’s almost counterintuitive; only when you turn to cold analysis that you slowly regain your humanity within those four grey walls. You put that look of horror on her face. You let the guilt override your hate, and you slowly learn to remember to love again. That you’re the one who needs to be saved, not the other way around.
You quash that dark voice when it crops up just as the mega mecha turns up on your doorstep; of course she had to be a bender. Logic saves you again. Technology doesn’t exist in a vacuum; an awareness that your own invention led to that. Logic, and love. I love you Dad, please don’t die, she says over and over, echoing like a mantra and cutting through your haze of pain in your barely conscious state. Your life was saved by a bender, but you know it’s only the beginning of healing.
°°°
Not just the Avatar, or the firebending and earthbending street rat brothers.
Korra, Mako, Bolin; Korra, Mako, Bolin.
It becomes your mantra.
Prejudice is a tumour that wouldn’t stay dead all the time. Empathy is a constant struggle.
That, and the whole load of earthbend – no, Grandma Yin, Chow, Liling, Tu, Meng Meng… (that’s as far as you can go; you’re an old man, after all) – living in your home. As you watch Grandma Yin fussing over Tu for not tucking in his shirt as he nearly tears up part of your floor in a sparring match, you conclude they’re not so different after all.
°°°
Hiroshi, she says, breaking into your thoughts. Her smile is reserved, but no less sincere, as she pushes your wheelchair into the garden. You wonder how someone so powerful could be so gentle, so compassionate. Your heart swells with love as you catch sight of Asami approaching you. You feel you don’t deserve this.
°°°
A vacation to the spirit world. The thought fills you with trepidation, but the cause of it is an old man’s fear. Or to be more precise, a father’s fear.
°°°
The garden party is in full swing as you watch from your peaceful corner in the shade. You’re quite sure you never had that rock formation next to the fountain, but you don’t mind very much. Asami cuts her eyes sideways at Korra next to her, a familiar smile tugging at the corner of her lips. You recognise that look. It’s the one Yasuko used to give you, right before you kissed her.
And as a laughing Korra pulls her into an embrace, you stop feeling afraid.