Rating: T

Word count:

Summary: Avatars must always be familiar with death, but whether they choose to go quietly is another whole matter in itself. Makorra.

Author Note: This fic based off the villanelle by Dylan Thomas by the same name so all credit goes to his great poem for that (and you should totally read). I don't usually use songs or poems to structure a fic but the idea of "dying of the light" and Korra being the fighter she is seemed like a fun jumping off point.

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Do not go gentle into that good night.

Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

For the first time since the Harmonic Convergence, Korra began to feel the life flow out of her. She felt her energy begin to ebb and her vision waned as lights flitted in front of her eyes. A few dusty streams of amber streetlight came down through the twisted canopy above. The weight of the rubble was unbelievably crushing. Experimentally she wiggled her toes and clenched her fists. Her right leg wouldn't respond and a sharp pain ran up her left arm.

Dazed and with an eye swollen shut, she had no idea how long she had been buried there. Cautiously, she tipped her heavy head up to further investigate her right leg. A metal spindle from the reinforced concrete was thrust through her thigh, before bending sharply to a side. Korra was trapped.

She hadn't expected the building to collapse on her. The twenty-story apartment district in the worst neighborhood was a hotbed for gang activity. An offshoot of disgruntled Triple Threats held up the whole building and controlled the bottom floor, preventing escape. Mako, now a Lieutenant in the force, led a strike team under cover of night while she landed on the roof and worked her way down, clearing as many civilians as she could with help from the metalbending squad.

Of course, that was before anyone realized that they had rigged the building to collapse.

"Mako…" she whispered.

He could have been in the building when it fell in on itself. If that was the case…Spirits she had to do something.

Slowly, Korra tried to prop herself up on her elbows. She faltered; her left wrist was most likely broken. Even the little shift in movement caused her to cry out as her thigh shifted, the rate of blood dribbling down into the dust increasing.

She let herself lie back, head dropping back to the crumbled concrete. The light within her began to stir.

"Raava?"

Ever since she discovered the true source of the Avatar spirit, Korra was much more aware of Raava within her. Never had she felt the light spirit so independently active in her. She could feel Raava wake as she lay gasping in pain, fighting to stay conscious.

"I-Is this…is this it?" Her voice could barely be heard.

"That depends." The voice came from within her.

"Oh what?"

"You always have a choice."

That was something she learned well as the first Avatar of the new era. Even when only one option seemed apparent and viable, there were numerous others to consider, and inaction was just as much a choice also.

To die or to fight; well that was a question she had never considered.

Korra always assumed that when it looked like the end, she would fight, just as she had before. When the end seemed inevitable against Amon, Vaatu, and the numerous other difficult fights she had over her lifetime, she raged forward and triumphed.

But now…she wasn't so sure.

Korra couldn't even be sure anyone knew she was alive, let alone searching for her in this heap of destruction. Mako, the love of her life and her husband, probably didn't make it.

Perhaps it would be easier just to let go. Let entropy do the work it had been fighting to do for forty-seven years to still her breathing and let her body separate bit by bit and flow back into nature. Life was a cycle just as the Avatar spirit was: everlasting, eternal, and wholly inevitable. At some point it had to be pointless to fight it.

Then again, there was so much to live for. If Mako survived…the thought of what her death would put him through was utterly gut wrenching. Then there were their two children. Although they had both moved out, that didn't make them old enough to be without a mother. Not to mention her own parents didn't deserve to through the grief of losing a daughter.

"Be selfish…just for once," a voice inside her hissed. But it wasn't Raava this time.

After all, with Vaatu within Raava this would happen occasionally. Only at her weakest would his voice be able to cut through her will. Korra remembered the first time she told Mako about such occurrences. Creases of concern formed on his face that she could only kiss away as he hugged her fiercely and reassured her that he would always be at her side.

He always wanted to have her happy. Happy was the exact opposite of what she was now. Wouldn't he want the pain to go away? Let her move on gently into night and leave the agony behind?

"Is letting go easy?" Each of her breaths was strangled from the force of her fall and the debris that hung in the air.

"I can make it easier than falling asleep."

"What do I have to do?"

"Make a choice."

She closed her eyes, a few tears slipping down her cheek. Maybe it was her time. For once, perhaps it was time to stop fighting and let the universe make a decision on what to do with her. The idea of giving up control like that was suddenly very appealing. As the Avatar, she spent her entire life making choices. Perhaps she deserved, just this once, to let it go.

Korra could hear a scuffling nearby. A spirit phased through the rubble nearby. The small sprite spotted her and flew through the rubble above.

"Someone over here!"

Part of her didn't want to be found. Letting go and dissolving into nothing would have been so much easier. Have the rescuers find her in a few hours so she could make her decision alone. Now she would be fawned over healers; a metalbender would have to free her leg surely.

The rubble canopy was opened up carefully above her, and a few harsh lights shone down into her tomb.

"It's Avatar Korra!"

"Hey Mako get over here!"

Korra's vision had faded, so it was difficult for her to recognize the shadowed figure that jumped down next o her.

"Korra…hey I'm here," he moved to hold her left hand that was outstretched on the ground.

She cried out, squeezing her eyes shut. "No…it's broken…"

"Spirits I'm so sorry," Mako gently guided her arm back to the ground. She felt him shuffle closer to her. "Can you open your eyes sweetie?"

Reluctantly Korra did. Her vision was clouded and fading in and out.

"Just hang on okay?" He cradled her head in his hands and met her eyes. "Lets see if we can get you out of here now."

"You can't…"

"Shit…you're leg…" his voice waivered. "No, it's okay," she could tell he was trying to be brave for her. "Hey, look at me!"

Her head lolled to the side and he cradled her face once again.

"We need a metalbender down here now!" Mako yelled upwards. "They're going to get that out of here okay? It doesn't even look that bad."

"You're lying…I know because it hurts so bad…"

"Hurting means you're still alive and with me," he was crying now. He grabbed her unbroken hand and gave it a comforting squeeze. "You know I love you right?"

"I love you too," she smiled. "But please…let go."

"Does that wrist hurt too?"

"No…let me go."

"Korra," his voice lowered. "Don't you dare. You need to hang in there."

Mako wanted her so badly to hang on and fight. He didn't understand her pain. He didn't understand how she yearned to feel weightless and float away and finally slip into the darkness.

"Everyone still needs you here Korra. We have two fucking kids that still need their mom," he was trying not to sob.

"I-I can't decide…"

"I need you. You know that I think we are meant for each other!" He turned his attention away briefly to yell to the other workers, "Will someone hurry up so we can get the Avatar out of here!"

"I just need this to stop Mako. The pain…" Korra coughed, blood gurgling at the back of her throat.

"I know, I know," he wiped some of the sanguine fluid that dribbled down the corner of her mouth.

Somehow this had to end. All she could think about was the pain.

A healer dropped down off the rubble with a metalbender.

"He can remove the rod while I heal the wound to stabilize it," the healer and metalbender crouched by her leg. "We need to get her out of her as soon as we can."

"Wait," Mako caught the attention of the healer. "Can you do something for the pain first?" His voice was pleading.

"Course," the healer pulled something out of his pack. "This should take away the pain. It might knock her out a bit."

Korra felt a small pinch on her arm and Mako took his place again, crouching with her good hand in his. Tenderly he soothed a hand over her hair. She loved him so much. He was an amazing husband, friend, and father.

"Now you just stay with me okay. I love you so much."

Her eyelids felt heavy.

"Korra, stay with me!"

"Korra!"

Her eyes closed.

Do not go gentle into that good night.

Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

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Author Note: Whew! Well that was a doozy I think? This might be a death fic, that's up to you. As usual comments, reviews, likes, and reblogs are well loved! Thanks for reading folks!