[ Several weeks later, Hei is forced to admit it. It's my fault Korra's stupid dog is dead. ]
[ He's tried to give her space, monitoring her intermittently from his safehouse. Tried to let the nights and days blend together, a phantasmagoric rill of insomnia and manic activity. He focuses on recuperating from his post-curse injuries. Spends time with Pai -- taking care of her, whisking her off on outings, cooking her favorite meals -- because she's one of the few people he can be easy with anymore. Someone who doesn't sling sugary dollops of comfort at him. Who lets him be, who grounds him with the anchor of her quiet, miraculous presence. He stays up late and gets up early and takes a lot of walks -- sometimes hand in hand with Pai, sometimes alone. He works double shifts at the cafes. He throws himself into grueling jiu-jitsu workouts. At first, he assumes he's having control issues not so different from what drives people with eating disorders. Then he thinks it's some kind of mortality-denial thing, because if you can do six hours of nonstop matwork in an airless room, it must mean you're invincible. But as the workouts grow more intense, resulting in a series of minor injuries, Hei realizes what's really going on. ]
[ He's trying to punish himself. ]
[ At nights, in the Underground, fighting enemies is one of the few times he gives Korra conscious thought. Sometimes one of the creatures might remind him of her -- a dancelike kick, a whoosh of momentum, a flash of angry eyes -- and he'll think, Oh. He tries to give no name to his both mistakes and desires. Let them be countless and faceless. Let them die an anonymous death. But one day, he does name them, and isn't surprised to find Korra's initials somewhere in both whirlpools. ]
[ It's late at night when he visits the Beach House. The starless sky, like a blank expression, matches the one on his face. But inside him, there's a fizzle as if from sparked fuses. Dread. Nervousness. Self-doubt. Since they've met, he's gnawed so many holes into Korra's life, corrosive as acid. She's forgiven him for so many wounds. But this one... ]
[ Hei isn't sure it's something you can forgive. ]
[Korra doesn't go out anymore. Since Naga returned to the Beach House, City!dead, Korra has resolved never to leave the polar bear dog's side, or to make her do anything she doesn't want to.
She's probably been fired from the Welcome Center at this point, but she doesn't care. Hasn't seen Chekov in longer than she can think of, doesn't care. Doesn't even go shopping anymore -- she hunts & fishes for their dinner, and now that she's dead, Naga doesn't need to eat anymore. It's amazing what a relief that is on the budget (and Korra hates herself for thinking that). She spends just enough time inside to feet the cats, and the rest of her time is outside with Naga. Naga no longer has any body warmth to share, but Korra still sleeps with her at night, so she has a thick quilt that she wraps around her.
Instead of the stupid nothings that used to occupy her time, Korra trains. She wakes up before dawn and doesn't sleep again until well after sunset. She runs through all her forms, pushing herself until she can hardly move and then some. And she spends endless hours meditating. She doesn't have any problems sitting still anymore, no matter how frustrated she gets.
She needs to access that state again. She needs that power. Naga died protecting her because she was weak. Korra refuses to let that happen again.
She's meditating on the beach, letting the sound of the waves wash away any extraneous thoughts. Naga is dozing a few feet away. She raises her head as Hei approaches.
She catches his scent on the wind and growls softly, and Korra immediately stops what she's doing.]
[ Naga's growl is a splatter of psychic backwash. Hei remembers, with arresting vividness, the night he killed her. Bridled with the longing to seize, take, break. And at the same time it seems disgusting to him, how he'd sunk his teeth into the animal's resistant skin, tasting the funk, sweat, the thick hairs, stringy muscle, tearing through it and -- ]
[ He shakes it off. Around him, the sky is so dark, clouds trembling at the edges of the horizon. He doesn't come closer. Even if Korra doesn't know who attacked her that night, Naga does. The knowledge leaves him feeling suddenly untethered, as unbalanced as anyone playing tug-of-war would be to find their opponent suddenly letting go of the rope. This is so idiotic. What's the point? What can he say to Korra? To him, Naga's just a damned animal. But Korra, like all isolated children, hinges so much more on her pet's presence. A lynchpin of familiarity. A constant companion. It's not too different, Hei knows, from how he regards Yin. A personification of bittersweet times. Now he's horribly murdered that animal, and he isn't going to be able to offer Korra any comfort. Saying sorry isn't his way. Tears and pleading aren't remorse. He's faked them enough times to know. ]
[ His whole reason for being here is just utterly selfish, anyway. ]
[ But instead of turning -- instead of running -- he slips his hands into his coat pockets. Hesitates, before marshaling his features into calm, expressionless order. ]
We need to talk.
[ Words that -- for him and Korra -- presage disaster. ]
[Naga's snarls ratchet up the closer Hei gets. The polar bear dog had adjusted quite well to being dead, really -- the heat no longer bothers her, although occasionally she will go tearing around like a lunatic, trying desperately to run hard enough to get her heart racing because she still doesn't understand where her heartbeat went. That doesn't mean she's forgotten the pain of dying, or who inflicted it on her.
Korra tangles her fingers in Naga's fur, trying to soothe her.] Shhhhhh, girl.
[We need to talk. The words would make her heart sink in her chest, except there's nowhere lower for it to go. She's numb. It's not the same numbness that afflicted her after killing Chekov; that had been brittle and easily broken, a thin sheathe of ice around a bleeding heart. This ice goes deeper, a thick coating re-inforced by resolve. Nothing else matters.]
[ 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. ]
[He's probably expecting her to be angry. She expects to be angry. She expects to feel furious, outraged, betrayed.
She doesn't. She doesn't even feel surprised. Of course it was him. Of course it was a curse. She can't blame him for it -- she remembers what it was like to kill Chekov. She had been powerless to stop herself. The curse was stronger than her, and stronger than Hei.]
It's not your fault.
[She strokes Naga's neck soothingly, the words directed as much to her as to Hei. He couldn't have stopped himself, any more than she could have stopped herself from stabbing Chekov. The person to blame is her. If she had been stronger, this wouldn't have happened.]
[ The remark bounces off Hei like a ball of wool, landing with a noiseless mushy plop at his feet. He isn't sure what he was expecting. A strangling, muscle-bunching rage, maybe. Curses, blows, tears. Anything that demonstrated that this was still Korra. That there was still a person in that dull-eyed body. He thinks of a line he once heard -- a song lyric or a poem, he isn't sure. After such knowledge, what forgiveness? But this isn't blame or forgiveness. It's resignation. He wishes she'd be angry; there is something too reasonable in her despair, as if she doesn't feel entitled to her own feelings. It reminds him, dimly, of his own rationalization for killing targets after tailing them. Admittedly rather simplistic ones, but they were especially true of fellow professionals. If he really wanted to live, I wouldn't have been able to get at him. He wouldn't have permitted himself that weakness/wrong move/slip up that did him in. ]
[ For a moment his concentration feels like it's ebbing, his thoughts stumbling out of order. Then he absorbs the implications of Korra's words. Understands, blink by blink, where her real anger is directed. ]
If you believe that. [ Not a dismissal, but not an acknowledgement either. Quieter, he says, ] But it's not your fault either.
Yes it is. [There's the anger he's looking for. She doesn't look at him -- can't look at him. She clutches the fur of Naga's neck as though to hold herself in place, because if he keeps pushing the issue, she doesn't know what she'll do.]
[ He prefers her angry. When she's angry, her emotions bristle to the surface. There's nothing to hide; nothing for him to calculate or gauge. He can map each star-pattern in the astrology of Korra's thoughts. And ... it allows his to sweep his own bullshit aside. The realization sparks like a matchstick glow in the dimness of his mind. He likes having someone he doesn't have to play a role for. She's seen so many of his shortcomings and frustrations, and taken so much of what he's dished out -- kisses and bites, caresses and blows. He's never known it would be possible to have a person who can really absorb his jagged edges, the full range of him. He keeps a lid on all the sharp barbs for Yin. He stays streamlined and steady for Pai. But not for Korra. That's new for him. And he finds he likes it. ]
[ He wants just one person in the City he doesn't have to play dress-up for. ]
I don't remember you 'sitting there.' [ It's flat but not cruel, despite the blankness in his eyes. ] I remember you waking up, disoriented. I remember that damn dog getting in my way [ My way -- not The monster's way -- because in his mind, the distinction is a thin one. ] I remember killing Naga. And planning to do worse with you. [ His eyes narrow for a moment, as if the disappointment of the aborted kill is still fresh in his memory. But then, almost gently, he says, ] I also remember you drove me off. I could have ripped everything here to pieces. Including you. But you made sure that wouldn't happen.
Not soon enough. [Torn between threatening Hei and comforting Korra, Naga's growls fade to a low rumble. Korra buries her face against the dog's fur. If she had just moved faster, if she hadn't let Amon take her powers, if she had been a better Avatar, this wouldn't have happened.]
[ Ifs. Buts. Maybes. They've never done Hei any favors. To him, they're a moron's mantra, talismanic sounds stripped of their animating magic. He functions on self-realization, not self-pity. He can't shrug his shoulders over what he did during the curse. He's bitter, but he's not that sort of brooding type. He'll have his moments of madness over it in the future, and has had his bad hours of flashbacks and nightmares since then. What he did to Yin, to Korra, to Chekov, even if he failed to do the worst -- that will always stay with him, and he means never to let himself off the hook for it. But the curse is over. He's made his mistakes. He can't forget them, but he refuses to let them paralyze him. That's as good as admitting defeat. ]
[ Naga's growl rumbles like a seismic quiver through the air. He ignores it, keeping his eyes on Korra. Simply: ]
Not this time, no. But that doesn't mean you'll be unprepared next time.
[ Because there's always a next time. Especially in the City. And because it's necessary in his line of work. Future visualization. Contingency plans. Holding your chin high and staring into the belly of the beast when all you have is riding on one inch of give in the rope at your wrist -- before you go plunging to hit rock-bottom. ]
[It's a good thing he's not closer, because she would probably punch him. She's trying to make sure she won't be unprepared. She's training, and meditating, and working her ass off, and this isn't helping. He's just poking at things that hurt. He's a distraction she doesn't want and doesn't need.]
[ She was training, meditating, and working her ass off before, too. Determination -- amped up, supercharged -- is never the only solution. To win, it's necessary to switch tactics. Attrition isn't as effective as strategy. It certainly isn't as successful as change. Because change creates movement. And movement creates new opportunities. If Korra wants to access her Avatar state ... she has to try something wholly different. ]
[ Hei doesn't say that. It's not his purview to offer her advice, much less lecture her. She needs to learn things at her own pace -- just as he does. She already seems right on the edge of losing it. He's not certain whether she's going to lash out or break down or scream. It doesn't matter; Hei knows it's the same feeling inside. Like lava setting fire to your insides. Like those people they discover three days later in a chair, totally incinerated with pair of perfectly unblemished feet. ]
[ Then she says What's your point, and the words work on him like an incantation, like a key in the lock. He was tense and aloof a moment before. But now everything softens: his resistance, his spine, his clenched hands. He stares at her with a quiet, solid focus. His voice is the same, but with an undertone that's almost like pleading, ]
Nothing. I know it's easy to blame yourself. Like if you'd been better or stronger, none of this would've happened. I also know self-hate is easier than clarity. But you're fooling yourself, or trying to. You're recovering from a bad situation. You're upset about what's happened to Naga. I understand that. [ He doesn't say Because I've lived it. But he doesn't look away from her either. ] Just remember this is situational. It doesn't define what you are. Don't let it.
[She needs this to define who she is, though. She needs the edges, the structure it provides. Otherwise who is she? A person who likes to fight? That describes about half the City's population. Take everything she knows about herself and she still could be just about anyone. It still doesn't tell her what to do with her life. Being a failure gives her a purpose -- to stop being a failure.
She doesn't actually realize any of this; that's a level of self-awareness she doesn't possess. All she knows is that his words make her cling tighter to her pain, as though she's afraid he'll take it away from her, like a doll that's gotten dirty. She hugs Naga's neck and breathes deeply, but the warm scent she's used to is cold & muted. Despite her best efforts, a few tears trickle down her face and into the polar bear dog's fur.]
[ Here's the thing about Korra: She isn't a failure. She's just mired in screw-ups. ]
[ Hei isn't one to pull punches. He doesn't make a show of hiding his impatience, because why should he? He never brings it up, that If you're measured against someone who stopped a fucking war, you're always second-best. Even if you aren't, but he thinks it almost everytime he sees her. Korra's made screw ups of the grandest proportions, but she's also a survivor. And Hei respects that enough to curb his sharpness -- because he's been there. Self-hatred is its own trap; a driving-force, but also an excuse to lacerate yourself with your own mistakes, to magnify them in your memory, which is a failure in its own right. Granted, it's a strong motivator. Hei knows enough people who've been driven to the top by self-hatred. He was one of them. But a fuel that volatile is also tied to self-destruction. It impels you to take stupid risks, to make bad choices. It leaves you a miserable wreck because you're always running from yourself. And no matter where you go, there you are. ]
[ Screwing up is different. It means you made a mess, but you're fixing it. It's not what defines you. Your choices do. ]
[ He doesn't say that. Korra's face is obscured, but the air around her is thick with dammed-up tears. He doesn't move, but after a couple of beats, he says quietly, ]
I'll leave you alone.
[ The sentence is weighted in expectation of the But I'd rather be kissing you, which never comes, though he takes the breath before it. The absence of the remark leaves his words sounding unfinished; his feet feel planted to the ground. ]
[It comes out without thinking, and she regrets it, kind of. She wants to be alone, doesn't she? (The answer is no. She's been almost entirely alone ever since Naga died. She's blown off work, blown off Chekov, blown off everything. And whether she wants to admit it or not, it's having its toll.)
[ The Please feels as if something small and hard has hit him in the small of the back, a pebble sharply flung. He shivers to his finger's ends, and represses it in the same breath. ]
[ For all his games -- the roughness and the mind-frags and the hot things on skin -- Hei is never all that comfortable with real closeness. Not that he's a coward -- he keeps the vigil. He doesn't harrumph and walk off like a lot of men, doesn't pretend like it isn't happening. But he keeps his distance, because this sort of pain is something he knows about intimately, and has never liked. Part of him can't help but think -- It's so fucked up. Korra, asking a killer for comfort. The same one who'd slaughtered her pet. Eerie, how you get so used to having somebody in your life, so comfortable with what little they have to offer, that no matter how lacking, or how jacked up it is, you don't know how to let it go. ]
[ It doesn't matter. He's selfish, and he'll snatch anything warm -- no matter how damaged or storm-tossed -- to consume for himself. Exhausted, confused, steeped in a peculiar self-loathing of his own. But selfish, first and foremost. ]
[ She looks so small and fragile, against Naga's massive whiteness. He approaches her sideways, leery of the animal's reaction. Hesitates, for just a moment, before closing the gap between them, wrapping his arms tight around her. The sky is dark, moonless, and Hei buries his face in Korra's thick, sweet-smelling hair, swaying a bit as if they're together on a dancefloor at the Crazy Mongoose, the night's crowd disintegrating to nothing around them. He doesn't talk. He just absorbs the tenuous tenderness in himself, and hopes it won't break too soon. ]
[Naga tenses, and her growls rise in volume, but Korra presses harder against her and murmurs soothing nonsense...or perhaps it's more accurate to say, pleading nonsense. She understands why Naga doesn't like Hei, why she'd be upset, but she doesn't want him to go. Please let me have this.
And because Naga loves her, and because she doesn't sense any impending violence in Hei's manner, the polar bear dog goes quiet.
Korra shivers when he wraps his arms around her. He's holding her too tightly to wipe the tears off of her face, but she manages to turn herself so that she can bury her head against his chest and wrap her arms around him. (Naga carefully butts her head against Korra's back, encouraging the humans to go somewhere else.)]
[ Hei ignores Naga's growls as they rumble through the air, like an idling engine. His eyes slip shut, and he breathes in that familiar Korra-smell, mingled with his own anxious sweat and the staleness of insomnia, clinging to his hair and skin. She doesn't have to hide her face; he knows she's crying. Can practically feel her sub-rosa sobbing, like a ghostly rime swirling in the air. It makes him squeeze her tighter. Because it's so wonderful to be in her arms, he can scarcely believe it. The idea of any contact, making his skin go hot, making his throat close like this. ]
[ When Naga nudges Korra, he gets the message. Steers her away, to the backdoor of the Beach House. He doesn't go inside. Just settles at the front step, nestling Korra against him. He stays like that for a while, just holding her. Dips his head, and kisses her brow, then her salt-damp cheek. Then her brow again. She smells so good, like the bright, tangled aroma of greenery blooming wild in the heat. A voice in his head cautions, Don't, but it's in Mandarin instead of Portuguese or English, which confuses him. As if, for a moment, the layers of facade have stripped away to reveal the outline of his basic self. It feels as freeing as it is disorienting. He kisses her webbed eyelids, then presses his mouth full and soft to hers. ]
[ Not a demand for anything more. Just to reacquaint himself with her heat and flavor, and perhaps to soothe that high-pitched clamoring under his own skin. ]
[She feels stupid, on his lap like she's a little kid. He kisses her face all over and she wants to push it into something familiar, hot and distracting and mindless. But she can't. She's too sad and too tired. Long days of hard physical work and short nights of poor sleep are taking their toll. She kisses him back when he reaches her lips, but it's not an invitation -- just a grateful acceptance of comfort.]
[ There's a tremor, bubbling just under Hei's skin, when she kisses back. It takes him a moment to recognize what it is. Gratitude. He didn't come here for comfort. As terrible as he is at offering it, he's a thousand times worse at accepting it. The kiss is hot, soft, damp, possessing a lovely feverishness, but that isn't really the point. The touch isn't sensual; it's just that. A touch, graphic in its sheer, snatching physicality. He's not sure if he's trying to reach Korra or just trying to reach anything. He doesn't know how she can respond to someone like him. But he's too busy leaning in, angling his chin as his lips skim hers. Touch, flutter, retreat. Repeat. It was the way he'd kissed her the first time, in that creaky shed with its flickering lightulb. But this time it's not voltage-hot. Just tender, a little unsure maybe, but welcoming the excuse to close the lid on his unnerving array of thoughts. ]
[ He keeps the kiss going for a long time. Breaks it, at last, to tuck her head in the crook of his neck. He's done this with her so seldom. Has always resented any intimacy, has kept a lid on all softness. Refused the few questions she dared put to him over the course of their head-on collision affair. And who knows if this interlude is an apology, or a genuine act of warmth. But Hei's voice is calm and quiet, his thumb rubbing small circles into the indent above Korra's hipbone. ]
I'll stay until you go to sleep.
[ It's many things. An offer, a request, an assurance, and perhaps a promise. ]
[ He feels the vibrations of her voice, full of a tipsy sadness, muffled in his jacket shoulder. Can feel her breath through the fabric when she exhales. He passes his arms more securely around her, rocking her very slowly from side to side. It's what he'd do, sometimes, for Pai. Like during the night when she was too wired for rest, her bloodstream crackling with post-battle adrenaline. Or when there'd be bombs erupting nearby, rattling the ground and gnawing at even Hei's superheated concentration. He winces at a flash of recollection -- the sound of the shelling he'd experienced in South America, the blasts and rumbles that drove him to tuck Pai deeper into the crook of his arm as they lay in a pallet, a few miles from the action. ('Pretend it's a thunderstorm,' he'd always tell her. 'It can't hurt you.' '... Unless it hits you, Carmine would mutter, slouched dull-eyed in her corner. 'Then you won't feel anything,' Amber would say, arch and singsongy, peering past the tent flap into the explosions coloring the dark night.)
[ (A lie, of course. Nothing died painlessly. Even a limb that's long gone keeps hurting.) ]
[ He wonders if that's how Korra feels, in the wake of Naga's death and resurrection. He wants to ask, but what's the point? What's done is done. Cradling her against him, her hair tickling his cheek, he lets a hum of energy buzz from his skin instead, heating his clothes, suffusing Korra's cooler skin. Right now, he has to concentrate on fixing this mess. ]
[She doesn't know how long they sit there, lost in feeling. Maybe even lost in thought, but she couldn't tell you what she was thinking about. Everything's in a fog.
But she does fall asleep, with a dull sense of sadness. It's easier to fall asleep against him than against Naga now; she's always preferred the warmth of a living body to even the softest and thickest blankets. But Naga's not warm anymore, and Korra remembers how lonely it was to always be cold.]
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Pick a date!!! :3
[ He's tried to give her space, monitoring her intermittently from his safehouse. Tried to let the nights and days blend together, a phantasmagoric rill of insomnia and manic activity. He focuses on recuperating from his post-curse injuries. Spends time with Pai -- taking care of her, whisking her off on outings, cooking her favorite meals -- because she's one of the few people he can be easy with anymore. Someone who doesn't sling sugary dollops of comfort at him. Who lets him be, who grounds him with the anchor of her quiet, miraculous presence. He stays up late and gets up early and takes a lot of walks -- sometimes hand in hand with Pai, sometimes alone. He works double shifts at the cafes. He throws himself into grueling jiu-jitsu workouts. At first, he assumes he's having control issues not so different from what drives people with eating disorders. Then he thinks it's some kind of mortality-denial thing, because if you can do six hours of nonstop matwork in an airless room, it must mean you're invincible. But as the workouts grow more intense, resulting in a series of minor injuries, Hei realizes what's really going on. ]
[ He's trying to punish himself. ]
[ At nights, in the Underground, fighting enemies is one of the few times he gives Korra conscious thought. Sometimes one of the creatures might remind him of her -- a dancelike kick, a whoosh of momentum, a flash of angry eyes -- and he'll think, Oh. He tries to give no name to his both mistakes and desires. Let them be countless and faceless. Let them die an anonymous death. But one day, he does name them, and isn't surprised to find Korra's initials somewhere in both whirlpools. ]
[ It's late at night when he visits the Beach House. The starless sky, like a blank expression, matches the one on his face. But inside him, there's a fizzle as if from sparked fuses. Dread. Nervousness. Self-doubt. Since they've met, he's gnawed so many holes into Korra's life, corrosive as acid. She's forgiven him for so many wounds. But this one... ]
[ Hei isn't sure it's something you can forgive. ]
October 30?
She's probably been fired from the Welcome Center at this point, but she doesn't care. Hasn't seen Chekov in longer than she can think of, doesn't care. Doesn't even go shopping anymore -- she hunts & fishes for their dinner, and now that she's dead, Naga doesn't need to eat anymore. It's amazing what a relief that is on the budget (and Korra hates herself for thinking that). She spends just enough time inside to feet the cats, and the rest of her time is outside with Naga. Naga no longer has any body warmth to share, but Korra still sleeps with her at night, so she has a thick quilt that she wraps around her.
Instead of the stupid nothings that used to occupy her time, Korra trains. She wakes up before dawn and doesn't sleep again until well after sunset. She runs through all her forms, pushing herself until she can hardly move and then some. And she spends endless hours meditating. She doesn't have any problems sitting still anymore, no matter how frustrated she gets.
She needs to access that state again. She needs that power. Naga died protecting her because she was weak. Korra refuses to let that happen again.
She's meditating on the beach, letting the sound of the waves wash away any extraneous thoughts. Naga is dozing a few feet away. She raises her head as Hei approaches.
She catches his scent on the wind and growls softly, and Korra immediately stops what she's doing.]
What is it?
[Then she sees.]
Hei.
October 30 \^^/
[ He shakes it off. Around him, the sky is so dark, clouds trembling at the edges of the horizon. He doesn't come closer. Even if Korra doesn't know who attacked her that night, Naga does. The knowledge leaves him feeling suddenly untethered, as unbalanced as anyone playing tug-of-war would be to find their opponent suddenly letting go of the rope. This is so idiotic. What's the point? What can he say to Korra? To him, Naga's just a damned animal. But Korra, like all isolated children, hinges so much more on her pet's presence. A lynchpin of familiarity. A constant companion. It's not too different, Hei knows, from how he regards Yin. A personification of bittersweet times. Now he's horribly murdered that animal, and he isn't going to be able to offer Korra any comfort. Saying sorry isn't his way. Tears and pleading aren't remorse. He's faked them enough times to know. ]
[ His whole reason for being here is just utterly selfish, anyway. ]
[ But instead of turning -- instead of running -- he slips his hands into his coat pockets. Hesitates, before marshaling his features into calm, expressionless order. ]
We need to talk.
[ Words that -- for him and Korra -- presage disaster. ]
no subject
Korra tangles her fingers in Naga's fur, trying to soothe her.] Shhhhhh, girl.
[We need to talk. The words would make her heart sink in her chest, except there's nowhere lower for it to go. She's numb. It's not the same numbness that afflicted her after killing Chekov; that had been brittle and easily broken, a thin sheathe of ice around a bleeding heart. This ice goes deeper, a thick coating re-inforced by resolve. Nothing else matters.]
About what?
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. ]
no subject
She doesn't. She doesn't even feel surprised. Of course it was him. Of course it was a curse. She can't blame him for it -- she remembers what it was like to kill Chekov. She had been powerless to stop herself. The curse was stronger than her, and stronger than Hei.]
It's not your fault.
[She strokes Naga's neck soothingly, the words directed as much to her as to Hei. He couldn't have stopped himself, any more than she could have stopped herself from stabbing Chekov. The person to blame is her. If she had been stronger, this wouldn't have happened.]
no subject
[ The remark bounces off Hei like a ball of wool, landing with a noiseless mushy plop at his feet. He isn't sure what he was expecting. A strangling, muscle-bunching rage, maybe. Curses, blows, tears. Anything that demonstrated that this was still Korra. That there was still a person in that dull-eyed body. He thinks of a line he once heard -- a song lyric or a poem, he isn't sure. After such knowledge, what forgiveness? But this isn't blame or forgiveness. It's resignation. He wishes she'd be angry; there is something too reasonable in her despair, as if she doesn't feel entitled to her own feelings. It reminds him, dimly, of his own rationalization for killing targets after tailing them. Admittedly rather simplistic ones, but they were especially true of fellow professionals. If he really wanted to live, I wouldn't have been able to get at him. He wouldn't have permitted himself that weakness/wrong move/slip up that did him in. ]
[ For a moment his concentration feels like it's ebbing, his thoughts stumbling out of order. Then he absorbs the implications of Korra's words. Understands, blink by blink, where her real anger is directed. ]
If you believe that. [ Not a dismissal, but not an acknowledgement either. Quieter, he says, ] But it's not your fault either.
no subject
I sat there, and I let her die.
no subject
[ He prefers her angry. When she's angry, her emotions bristle to the surface. There's nothing to hide; nothing for him to calculate or gauge. He can map each star-pattern in the astrology of Korra's thoughts. And ... it allows his to sweep his own bullshit aside. The realization sparks like a matchstick glow in the dimness of his mind. He likes having someone he doesn't have to play a role for. She's seen so many of his shortcomings and frustrations, and taken so much of what he's dished out -- kisses and bites, caresses and blows. He's never known it would be possible to have a person who can really absorb his jagged edges, the full range of him. He keeps a lid on all the sharp barbs for Yin. He stays streamlined and steady for Pai. But not for Korra. That's new for him. And he finds he likes it. ]
[ He wants just one person in the City he doesn't have to play dress-up for. ]
I don't remember you 'sitting there.' [ It's flat but not cruel, despite the blankness in his eyes. ] I remember you waking up, disoriented. I remember that damn dog getting in my way [ My way -- not The monster's way -- because in his mind, the distinction is a thin one. ] I remember killing Naga. And planning to do worse with you. [ His eyes narrow for a moment, as if the disappointment of the aborted kill is still fresh in his memory. But then, almost gently, he says, ] I also remember you drove me off. I could have ripped everything here to pieces. Including you. But you made sure that wouldn't happen.
no subject
no subject
[ Naga's growl rumbles like a seismic quiver through the air. He ignores it, keeping his eyes on Korra. Simply: ]
Not this time, no. But that doesn't mean you'll be unprepared next time.
[ Because there's always a next time. Especially in the City. And because it's necessary in his line of work. Future visualization. Contingency plans. Holding your chin high and staring into the belly of the beast when all you have is riding on one inch of give in the rope at your wrist -- before you go plunging to hit rock-bottom. ]
no subject
What's your point?
no subject
[ Hei doesn't say that. It's not his purview to offer her advice, much less lecture her. She needs to learn things at her own pace -- just as he does. She already seems right on the edge of losing it. He's not certain whether she's going to lash out or break down or scream. It doesn't matter; Hei knows it's the same feeling inside. Like lava setting fire to your insides. Like those people they discover three days later in a chair, totally incinerated with pair of perfectly unblemished feet. ]
[ Then she says What's your point, and the words work on him like an incantation, like a key in the lock. He was tense and aloof a moment before. But now everything softens: his resistance, his spine, his clenched hands. He stares at her with a quiet, solid focus. His voice is the same, but with an undertone that's almost like pleading, ]
Nothing. I know it's easy to blame yourself. Like if you'd been better or stronger, none of this would've happened. I also know self-hate is easier than clarity. But you're fooling yourself, or trying to. You're recovering from a bad situation. You're upset about what's happened to Naga. I understand that. [ He doesn't say Because I've lived it. But he doesn't look away from her either. ] Just remember this is situational. It doesn't define what you are. Don't let it.
no subject
She doesn't actually realize any of this; that's a level of self-awareness she doesn't possess. All she knows is that his words make her cling tighter to her pain, as though she's afraid he'll take it away from her, like a doll that's gotten dirty. She hugs Naga's neck and breathes deeply, but the warm scent she's used to is cold & muted. Despite her best efforts, a few tears trickle down her face and into the polar bear dog's fur.]
no subject
[ Hei isn't one to pull punches. He doesn't make a show of hiding his impatience, because why should he? He never brings it up, that If you're measured against someone who stopped a fucking war, you're always second-best. Even if you aren't, but he thinks it almost everytime he sees her. Korra's made screw ups of the grandest proportions, but she's also a survivor. And Hei respects that enough to curb his sharpness -- because he's been there. Self-hatred is its own trap; a driving-force, but also an excuse to lacerate yourself with your own mistakes, to magnify them in your memory, which is a failure in its own right. Granted, it's a strong motivator. Hei knows enough people who've been driven to the top by self-hatred. He was one of them. But a fuel that volatile is also tied to self-destruction. It impels you to take stupid risks, to make bad choices. It leaves you a miserable wreck because you're always running from yourself. And no matter where you go, there you are. ]
[ Screwing up is different. It means you made a mess, but you're fixing it. It's not what defines you. Your choices do. ]
[ He doesn't say that. Korra's face is obscured, but the air around her is thick with dammed-up tears. He doesn't move, but after a couple of beats, he says quietly, ]
I'll leave you alone.
[ The sentence is weighted in expectation of the But I'd rather be kissing you, which never comes, though he takes the breath before it. The absence of the remark leaves his words sounding unfinished; his feet feel planted to the ground. ]
no subject
[It comes out without thinking, and she regrets it, kind of. She wants to be alone, doesn't she? (The answer is no. She's been almost entirely alone ever since Naga died. She's blown off work, blown off Chekov, blown off everything. And whether she wants to admit it or not, it's having its toll.)
She's still not looking up.]
Please?
no subject
[ For all his games -- the roughness and the mind-frags and the hot things on skin -- Hei is never all that comfortable with real closeness. Not that he's a coward -- he keeps the vigil. He doesn't harrumph and walk off like a lot of men, doesn't pretend like it isn't happening. But he keeps his distance, because this sort of pain is something he knows about intimately, and has never liked. Part of him can't help but think -- It's so fucked up. Korra, asking a killer for comfort. The same one who'd slaughtered her pet. Eerie, how you get so used to having somebody in your life, so comfortable with what little they have to offer, that no matter how lacking, or how jacked up it is, you don't know how to let it go. ]
[ It doesn't matter. He's selfish, and he'll snatch anything warm -- no matter how damaged or storm-tossed -- to consume for himself. Exhausted, confused, steeped in a peculiar self-loathing of his own. But selfish, first and foremost. ]
[ She looks so small and fragile, against Naga's massive whiteness. He approaches her sideways, leery of the animal's reaction. Hesitates, for just a moment, before closing the gap between them, wrapping his arms tight around her. The sky is dark, moonless, and Hei buries his face in Korra's thick, sweet-smelling hair, swaying a bit as if they're together on a dancefloor at the Crazy Mongoose, the night's crowd disintegrating to nothing around them. He doesn't talk. He just absorbs the tenuous tenderness in himself, and hopes it won't break too soon. ]
no subject
And because Naga loves her, and because she doesn't sense any impending violence in Hei's manner, the polar bear dog goes quiet.
Korra shivers when he wraps his arms around her. He's holding her too tightly to wipe the tears off of her face, but she manages to turn herself so that she can bury her head against his chest and wrap her arms around him. (Naga carefully butts her head against Korra's back, encouraging the humans to go somewhere else.)]
no subject
[ When Naga nudges Korra, he gets the message. Steers her away, to the backdoor of the Beach House. He doesn't go inside. Just settles at the front step, nestling Korra against him. He stays like that for a while, just holding her. Dips his head, and kisses her brow, then her salt-damp cheek. Then her brow again. She smells so good, like the bright, tangled aroma of greenery blooming wild in the heat. A voice in his head cautions, Don't, but it's in Mandarin instead of Portuguese or English, which confuses him. As if, for a moment, the layers of facade have stripped away to reveal the outline of his basic self. It feels as freeing as it is disorienting. He kisses her webbed eyelids, then presses his mouth full and soft to hers. ]
[ Not a demand for anything more. Just to reacquaint himself with her heat and flavor, and perhaps to soothe that high-pitched clamoring under his own skin. ]
no subject
no subject
[ He keeps the kiss going for a long time. Breaks it, at last, to tuck her head in the crook of his neck. He's done this with her so seldom. Has always resented any intimacy, has kept a lid on all softness. Refused the few questions she dared put to him over the course of their head-on collision affair. And who knows if this interlude is an apology, or a genuine act of warmth. But Hei's voice is calm and quiet, his thumb rubbing small circles into the indent above Korra's hipbone. ]
I'll stay until you go to sleep.
[ It's many things. An offer, a request, an assurance, and perhaps a promise. ]
no subject
Thank you.
[Her voice is small & tired, but she's not sure she'll actually be able to sleep.]
no subject
[ (A lie, of course. Nothing died painlessly. Even a limb that's long gone keeps hurting.) ]
[ He wonders if that's how Korra feels, in the wake of Naga's death and resurrection. He wants to ask, but what's the point? What's done is done. Cradling her against him, her hair tickling his cheek, he lets a hum of energy buzz from his skin instead, heating his clothes, suffusing Korra's cooler skin. Right now, he has to concentrate on fixing this mess. ]
[ By any means necessary. ]
no subject
But she does fall asleep, with a dull sense of sadness. It's easier to fall asleep against him than against Naga now; she's always preferred the warmth of a living body to even the softest and thickest blankets. But Naga's not warm anymore, and Korra remembers how lonely it was to always be cold.]
I have to help her.
[It's her last thought before falling asleep.]