[ Korra reminds him of an effigy, stiff and cold, holding herself together with a layer of scotch-tape and frostbite. Ironic, when Naga's the one who's dead. But inevitable too. He's been where she has, years ago. Floating, numb in the soft, cool cocoon of distance. Unloved and unloving. No great pains and no great joys. The tepid haze of time just slipping by, while he watched the world's stories unfold in the safety of distance. Every day, in the early months after Heaven's War, was like that. He'd whet his blades and make his kills at night, perform his katas and drink his tea at dawn, perch by the window in the evening and watch the rain make things grow and rot, and grow again. He'd sleepwalked away half a decade -- before he was reassigned to Tokyo. Before being around Yin, Mao and Huang had sparked a frisson of genuine interest in him. ]
[ But he's not here to compare notes with Korra. Been there, done that, got the I have post-traumatic emotional detachment, ask me how! T-shirt. Instead he meets her gaze calmly, feeling the cold inevitability of truth drip -- drip -- drip slowly down into the pit of his stomach. ]
About who killed Naga. [ The words echo flatly in his ears like a robotic drone. But he's already continuing, syllable by empty syllable. ] That monster who attacked you ... that was me. I was cursed.
[ The last remark is neither an excuse or a plea. It's a simple statement of fact. ]
no subject
[ But he's not here to compare notes with Korra. Been there, done that, got the I have post-traumatic emotional detachment, ask me how! T-shirt. Instead he meets her gaze calmly, feeling the cold inevitability of truth drip -- drip -- drip slowly down into the pit of his stomach. ]
About who killed Naga. [ The words echo flatly in his ears like a robotic drone. But he's already continuing, syllable by empty syllable. ] That monster who attacked you ... that was me. I was cursed.
[ The last remark is neither an excuse or a plea. It's a simple statement of fact. ]