Part Three

"You're supposed to be in bed," Mako protested weakly.

"I need the exercise, but I'll sit if you talk," she bargained, folding her legs and sinking to the ground.

"You want to know about our first date?" He asked.

"Yes. Please," she added when she saw how confused he was.

"Well," he began slowly, combing through his hair. "It was really awkward at first. Neither of us knew how to act. We'd become such good friends but didn't know how that would translate to us dating.

"I took you to the zoo. You loved it," he smiled fondly at the memory. "There were so many animals you'd never seen before, and a lot you hadn't even heard of. You were like a little kid. I even got you some of that cotton candy and you got so hyper."

He chuckled. "You tried feeding some of it to the flying pigs, but the keepers yelled at us and we ran away. That seemed to break the ice and we were ourselves again."

He looked at her, watching her eyes, and said, "I kissed you goodnight when I dropped you off at your door. I was so happy that you didn't punch me. I was terrified."

Korra smiled.

"After that, I tried to take you out whenever I could, but your training interfered a lot, so we'd mostly spend time together here." He motioned to the pavilion. "This was a popular meeting spot, since you can see so much of the island from here."

"Is that why you were here tonight? Remembering?"

He smiled sadly. "I suppose so. I just started walking and ended up here."

Korra's heart twisted. "I wish I could remember," she said softly.

"Me, too."

"Thank you for telling me."

"Anything you need, Korra. Anything at all and it's yours."

—

It became part of Korra's routine to meet Mako at the pavilion to talk and watch the sun go down. He would tell her about their relationship and she would listen, trying to remember. Her feelings for him were starting to rekindle, but she didn't feel she could trust them just yet.

"Tell me about our fight," she finally asked, leaning against the rail of pavilion beside him, needing to know what had happened that was so terrible.

"Are you sure?" Mako hedged, "I don't want to make you regress or something."

"Don't worry, it'll be fine. I reacted that way when I first saw you because I was confused and tired and all I had were all these emotions. Tell me. Please."

As he spoke, bits of memories started stitching themselves together.

"We'd been having little fights all week. You'd been having a lot of long nights, and I missed you and lashed out."

He could see it all playback in his mind, and as much as he wished he could, there was no way to change it.

Korra had come home to see Mako waiting by her bedroom door, sitting on the floor and slumped against the frame. He looked up as he saw her approach and quickly rose to his feet.

"Were you waiting for me?" Korra asked, confused.

"Yeah. We were supposed to meet me for dinner tonight. That was four hours ago."

"You didn't wait for me this whole time, did you?" She looked at him sharply, and his stomach groaned in answer.

"I was worried something had happened to you. You've never been that late before."

She closed her eyes and said, "Let's go in my room, I'm tired and don't want to talk out in the hall."

He followed her in and watched in stony silence as she took her hair down and brushed it out, kicking her shoes off as she worked.

"Well?" She finally said in a tired voice. "Didn't you have something to say?"

"Don't talk to me like that."

"Like what? Mako, I'm tired, can't whatever this is wait until I've had some sleep?"

"No, it can't, because every time I try to talk to you, you seem to disappear."

"If this is about the gala again, I swear – "

"Every time I tried to get you alone, someone else whisked you away. You didn't dance with me once."

"You don't like to dance at those things!"

"I do if the alternative is my girlfriend flirting with all those ambassadors!"

"I was doing my job! And I was not flirting – "

"You are not your job, Korra! You liked –"

"I liked what? Having fun? Being able to relax after a long day of counting up casualties and being shuffled from meeting to meeting where my presence matters but my opinion doesn't? Feeling beautiful for once instead of just this entity that only exists to fight?"

Mako swallowed. "Korra, you know I always think you're beautiful."

"You're obligated to. I'd beat you up if you didn't." She shrugged, wanting the conversation to be over and turned away from him.

"Hey," he walked over to her and turned her face to meet his. "You are, though."

She sighed and rests her forehead on his shoulder. "I'm just so tired, Mako."

He tried to massage away the knots in her shoulders. "And I just miss the girl I fell in love with. You're so far away from me now."

She tensed. "Are you trying to… end things?"

"What? No!" He looked at her, horrified. "Of course not, what would you ask that?"

"All we do is fight lately."

"That's what we do best. And we're both under a lot of pressure. Once these attacks die down, things will be better."

"Maybe…maybe it's not such a bad idea," she started to say, pulling away and refusing to look him in the eye.

"No."

"You said it yourself, we're drifting apart. This war isn't ending anytime soon. Maybe we should cool it until this whole thing is over."

He yanked her chin up. "Korra, don't you dare leave me now, not after everything."

"It might be for the best," she started to say.

Mako couldn't believe his ears. After all he'd sacrificed for her, after she'd turned his life upside down, after he'd nearly died for her, this was what she wanted? His temper flared and he shouted, "The best thing would have been to have never met in the first place!"

She stared at him with shocked eyes, hurt flashing briefly in them before being replaced by her own temper. "Then maybe you should have picked a better waterbender before me and I never would have had to save your sorry behind!"

He glared at her. She knew Hasook had been on the team because no one else wanted to take a chance on him. "Maybe you should learn how to mind your own business and you wouldn't get in to so much trouble!"

"Maybe if you weren't such a narrow-minded jerk, there wouldn't be trouble to get into!"

"That doesn't even make any sense!"

"I'm calling you a jerk! Is that simple enough for you!"

"Simple enough for me? This coming from the girl who been ambushed and outsmarted how many times? You don't know what to do with any problem you can't punch in the face!"

That was a low blow after she'd been ambushed just the week before, resulting in one officer she was with being very seriously injured, and he knew she was still sensitive about it.

She saw red. "At least I face my problems head on instead of moping about them for ages before saying or doing anything! How long have you been stewing over that gala thing? Or that time you waited two weeks to tell Bolin he needed to stop coming with us when we were trying to be alone?"

"I'm his brother, I didn't want to hurt him!"

"You think you'd be better off without me, but maybe he and everyone else would have been better off without you!"

He reeled back and stared at her in disbelief for a long, hard moment. Then, coldly, he said, "You have changed, Korra. I don't want to be with someone so hard."

She looked down at her clenched fists, biting back angry tears. "You've changed, too."

"Maybe you're right."

The fight left her in a flash at the thought of him actually leaving. But her pride couldn't say anything other that, "Maybe I am."

"Good night, Korra." He turned and left her, and she immediately collapsed on her bed, horrified at what she'd said and done, but too ashamed and proud to apologize.

"The next morning was awful," Mako said, picking up the story again and jogging Korra out of her still re-forming memories. "I regretted everything I said, but I was still hurt, and you wouldn't look at me, let alone let me talk to you. You didn't say two words to me until it was time for the mission. Even then it was just 'Are you still in?' I just looked at you and said, 'Of course, I'm not going to let the love of my life have all the glory.' You softened a bit after that, but of course we didn't have time for anything else.

"The next thing I knew, we were at the base and under attack and you were hurt. And you know what happened after that."

"Mako," she said softly, taking his hand in hers. He jumped at the contact – the first instigated by her since her memory loss. "Thank you for telling me."

"I told you I would do anything for you." He smiled sadly at her, then said, pulling his hand back and getting to his feet, "I'm supposed to meet Bolin in a little bit. I'll see you later."

Korra suspected he was lying, but let him go. She needed time to herself to think anyway.

—

The first thing Korra did when she saw him the next evening was apologize. "I don't remember much, but I remember enough. I shouldn't have said any of that. I was tired and stressed and that's no excuse, but I'll never talk to you like that again."

Mako chuckled, a little surprised. "It's okay. It doesn't really matter now, does it?"

"Of course it does!" She insisted. "I… Mako, that was awful of me."

"We were both awful. Let's just leave it at that, okay?"

"You must really love me, to stay by my side night after night after we'd almost broken up. And then after I threaten you and kick you out of my room."

"Korra," he placed his hands on her shoulders and looks deep in her eyes, and she swears she can see straight to his heart. "Whether or not you remember me now, or ever again, and whether or not you ever love me again, you will always be part of me. One stupid fight isn't going to change that."

"Still," she bit her lip, uncomfortable with how personal they were getting. "I just wanted to say I'm sorry."

"Then apology accepted. So. What do you want to hear about today?"

"Tell me a story about a time we made up."

He raised an eyebrow at her.

"What? With as much passion as we apparently had, you have to have some good stories."

He laughed. "I'll tell you about the time we broke the bed."

—

The days passed quickly and quietly, much to Korra's relief. She began training her body again, and the familiar movements soothed her. Even if her brain still continued to fail her, her body did not.

Tenzin reluctantly let her rejoin the council meetings, though she was forbidden to join any missions until she was completely healed. She still had a few bruises and deep cuts that would not heal if she was running off into danger every five minutes.

She was a little restless, but – much to her surprise – hearing Mako tell her about the two of them every night provided enough adventure and excitement to keep her wandering spirit at bay. She was starting to understand why she had fallen for him in the first place.

—

Korra woke up in the middle of the night, her heart racing and her body covered in a thin sheen of sweat. She gulped down breaths, her eyes flashing around her dark room, but she could not settle.

She remembered.

Everything.

She ripped her blanket from her body and raced down the hallway to Mako's room, trying to be quiet but not really caring or succeeding. Throwing open the door without bothering to knock, she launched herself at him and wrapped her arms around his middle, crushing her cheek to his chest.

Jarred back to the world of the waking, Mako's first instinct was to attack the thing that had latched itself to him, but stopped just in time.

"Korra?"

"Mako, I remember. I'm so sorry, I remember now," she mumbled over and over again, holding him so tightly he thought his ribs might crack.

But that was the most welcome pain. He buried his face in her hair and kissed the top of her head again and again, reaching his arms around to hold her.

He was content to simply hold her as her revelation sank in, but he needed to see the truth of it in her eyes. He needed to see the love in them again. Gently tilting her face up to his, he found what he was looking for.

"You really remember me?"

She nodded, smiling shyly, her eyes searching his, and she said, "I woke up and suddenly everything was back. I remember the time you took me to the ice cream shop with the sweet potato ice cream, and the time I walked in on you making dinner and singing in your underwear, and the time you kissed me under the bridge – "

That was enough for Mako, and he pressed his lips to hers, cutting her off, and putting every ounce of passion and gratitude into that kiss that he could. Korra eagerly met him and the two moved together desperately, making up for lost time.

He kissed down her neck, tugging at her shirt when he stopped, abruptly realizing, "You're wearing my old shirt. To sleep in."

Korra blushed, pulling the hem down to cover her exposed legs. "I didn't know it was yours when I put it on. It just…comforted me somehow."

"I didn't even know you still had it. I thought I'd lost it ages ago."

"I stole it," she whispered, a spark in her eyes that he had dearly missed. "To take with me when I had to go back to the South Pole for those few weeks."

Comprehension dawned on him. "You little imp," he said, wrapping her back up in his arms and pulling her down to the mattress.

The both laid on their sides, inches from each other, breath mingling, letting the weight of the return of Korra's memory settle over them.

"I missed you," Korra admitted.

"I missed you so much," Mako replied, brushing her hair out of her face then placing one hand on her cheek. "Don't you ever do that to me again."

"I didn't exactly plan on doing it the first time."

Mako was about to argue, but bit his tongue. He would let her have the last word this time.

That was just how much he loved her.

Besides, he'd learned his lesson about fighting when they were both tired.

He reached around to the back of her neck to bring her forward for another searing kiss that they both felt down to their toes.

"I love you," Mako said when he released her so they could catch their breath.

She smiled at him and placed a sweet kiss on his lips. "I love you, too."

"You don't know how happy I am to hear you say that again."

"I think I can guess," she cocked an eyebrow at him and glanced meaningfully down at their intertwined bodies, laughing at the faint blush in his cheeks.

"You'll pay for that," he growled teasingly, nipping at her shoulder.

She yelped and nipped back. "Show me what you've got, hot shot. Let's break another bed."

And then, just like that, they were Mako and Korra again.

End.