A/N: Oh god, it's been so long. I hope you're all still there, everybody! Haha. Anyhow, still looking for a cover. I have an idea of what I want it to look like, and it doesn't involve drawing people, so please let me know if you're in any way interested in helping and skilled in digital art, let me know!

Otherwise: I've been getting some complaints from my friends who've read this that Su is a bit to bitchy. I know she isn't actually that mean! But having a tempermental teenager that thinks everything you do is a personal attack can put anyone on edge. Also, this is from the teenagers' perspectives (albeit through third person), so remember that the narrator might not always present a reliable representation of what Su (or anyone) is like. Narrator bias is a thing! Don't worry, she'll get a chance to defend herself coming up, and I plan the epilogue to be an exchange between Su and Kuvira, no Junior involved. I also *MAY* go back and change some phrasing so she doesn't come off so bitchy.

Thank you again to everyone for all of your support and encouragement, and especially comments and favorites. That's how I know you're reading and enjoying! As always, constructive criticism is welcome. Please enjoy Ch.6. It's been a long time coming...

Chapter 6: Darkness

"Hey, four-eyes, if you're going to nod off on me here, at least hand over those binoculars first."

Junior blinked absently as Kuvira's jeer pulled him from drowsiness. It took his eyes about as long to adjust to the darkness as it took for him to realise that he was slumped against Kuvira's shoulder.

"Oh! Ah, erm - sorry..." He scrambled to pull himself up, nearly fumbling the binoculars over the side of the two story apartment complex that he and Kuvira were perched atop. Junior could feel his cheeks burning against the cool evening air and silently thanked those stupid walls yet again for the moonless darkness.

"Here, uh, go ahead." He tentatively handed the binoculars over to Kuvira, who casually brought them up to her eyes.

"Mmph." Kuvira made a sort of mumble in acknowledgement as she leaned forward, propping herself up over the edge of the building by her elbows to steady the binoculars against her face. The lenses were focused a block away, on the train station that Junior was supposed to have been watching for at least an hour more before his shift was up.

When Kuvira had first suggested a stakeout, Junior had been more than a little unsure about the whole affair. Even Kuvira acknowledged that there was a good chance they'd have to be at it for at least a couple of days before noticing any patterns suspicious enough to give them any idea of what was going on with the trains and the plan thefts. Now, sleep-deprived and more than a little embarrassed after taking a nap on Kuvira, Junior was seriously regretting blindly following her to this rooftop. Like a well trained golden raccoon-dog.

He sighed, taking off his glasses to clean them. They must have fogged up while he was sleeping from breathing heavily... or from being so close to Kuvira's warm skin. Junior winced, feeling something uncomfortable twist into a tight knot in his abdomen, threatening to reach for a more conspicuous place if he couldn't get himself together. He didn't remember falling asleep on her, but for the first, glorious seconds after waking up, Junior could feel the warmth of Kuvira's bare shoulder against his cheek, the contours of her muscles against his skin. How long had he stayed like that? How long had she let him stay like that? Did she -

Snap out of it, Baatar. Just because you're an awkward pile of inappropriate feelings doesn't mean she's the same way. Just friends. Friends lean on each other, it's normal, right? Really, Baatar didn't know. He had never really been close to anyone outside of his family, and he could only assume that conventions for appropriate behavior were different for friends. Especially attractive, female friends. Hey, it could be worse. You could have drooled all over her...

"See anything?" He questioned cautiously, squinting into the this distance and without the binoculars, he could just barely make out the shapes of late-night train-goers passing in front of the station lights. Kuvira would have a much better view.

"Nooooope." She drawled, letting out a sigh before punching Junior in the shoulder without warning.

"Hey!"

"Maybe if you could keep your eyes open long enough to take a look yourself, you would have seen something." Kuvira explained cooly, keeping the binoculars close against her face with the hand that hadn't been preoccupied with bruising Junior.

"I don't know…" Junior rubbed his shoulder. He got the feeling she was just messing around, but it still hurt. Damnit, she's strong. "Do you really think we'll get anything out of this?"

Kuvira shrugged and without warning tossed the binoculars into Junior's hands before reaching for a box of take-out, whipping out a pair of chopsticks. They'd hit the Fire Nation restaurant earlier for a few boxes of spicy fried noodles to get them through the night. "I don't know," she confessed between mouthfuls, "but it's better than just sitting around and wondering about it, you know?"

She stabbed her chopsticks into the box - poor manners, Junior noted - and extended her arm, offering the box to Junior. He gingerly handed back the binoculars and accepted, taking a few bites. I guess we're already on food sharing terms, huh? If he weren't so hungry, he wouldn't even bother - the stuff burned going down and he had to stop to pant between mouthfuls. How does she pound this back like it's nothing? Kuvira told him earlier that she had a thing for spicy food. What he didn't realize was that when she asked for "really spicy" at Li's 24 hour Fire Nation Cookery, she was really asking for "slow death by fire of my taste buds and digestive tract."

Thinking about it, Junior realized just how little he did actually know about Kuvira - she was strong, beautiful, had a talent for mildly hurtful sarcasm, and liked spicy food. That, and she couldn't metalbend. Well, that wasn't exactly true. She could, as far as he gathered, at least sort-of move small meteorites and make shallow dents in iron sheets. She had the ability, it was just… blocked, somehow. What was puzzling was how secretive Kuvira was about the whole thing - she really didn't want Su to find out. That was another thing he knew about Kuvira: She would rather eat her own arm than let his mother find out about her little deficiency.

Why, though? Why does she care so much? And why can't she metalbend in the first place? She's a talented earthbender… Junior rubbed his thigh, remembering how Kuvira had launched him (without warning, of course) to the second story with her earthbending. Maybe a little too talented… While she landed gracefully, he managed to tweak his leg tumbling onto the rooftop. No, there was no denying she was powerful, so why -

They sat silently for a while, Kuvira eventually saving Junior from the box of tongue-scorching noodles and using one hand to hold the binoculars while she ate with the other. Stewing in a thick soup of his own thoughts eventually became too much for Junior. He just had to ask.

"Kuvira?"

"Yeah, Baatar?"

"Stop me if I'm stepping over a line or anything..." he continued, taking a deep breath. The more time he spent with Kuvira, the more confident he got with her, but he was still a far cry from suave. He still labored over every word, paranoid that he'd screw up this strange friendship thing they'd built with a poorly crafted phrase. "...but can I ask why you're so scared of letting my mother find out you're having so much trouble with metalbending?"

Kuvira didn't respond for a few painful seconds. Junior winced, nope, I definitely stepped over a -

"I'm not scared." She responded, voice softer than what Junior had been expecting. Still peering through the binoculars, Kuvira continued. "It's just - I don't want to let her down, you know?"

She put down her chopsticks, and readjusted herself so that her head was rested in the crook of her arm, which was folded across the raised edge of the rooftop. Her other hand still held the binoculars to her eyes. "Su's had these expectations for me for as long as I've known her, and, well, I want to live up to them. Of course she knows I'm struggling, I can't hide it from her at practice."

Kuvira sighed. "But she doesn't know how much I'm struggling. She told me, if I kept practicing, I'd get it. So that's what I did, I started practicing. But it's not working." Kuvira lowered the binoculars, setting them in her lap before turning to Junior, eyes burning green and cold as she held his gaze. Junior's pulse leaped against the skin of his neck, and he could only hope she couldn't tell. Then, she deftly unwrapped the linen strips curled around her left hand and placed it on his knee before reaching for his right, guiding his fingers to brush across the back of her hand. "Look." Kuvira nodded downward, inviting Junior's gaze to follow.

Junior gulped. Wrenching his eyes away from Kuvira's and sheepishly withdrawing his hand, he saw what he had already felt beneath his calloused fingers. Kuvira's hands were cracked and raw, her nails dented and scratched. The knuckles were the worse, rising like jagged, scabby peaks at the base of her long fingers, red and hot and painful.

"Don't you see?" Kuvira explained, pulling back her hand and beginning to re-wrap it in linen strips. "If she knew, if Su knew about this," She nodded at her hands, " I'd be a failure in her eyes. A defect. I don't want to give her an excuse to throw me back where she found me."

Junior's mouth dropped open. "What?" That's what this is about? " You think she'll abandon you if you can't metalbend? That's sick." He rubbed his temple. "I mean, seriously, Kuvira. My mom can be harsh, but not that harsh. I can't even earthbend and -"

"And what, Baatar? Are you really okay with being the other son?" Kuvira snapped. "Face it, you don't fit into her little vision, her perfect little family. She didn't know with you, so she just hired tutors to turn you into your father and tried to forget about you all together!."

Junior clenched his teeth, feeling his eyes begin to water. It's not like you haven't thought the same thing yourself, he thought, fingers clenching into angry fists. Next to him, Junior could hear Kuvira's breathing, at first ragged and buckled as she fought back tears, beginning to slow to a deep, steady rhythm as she calmed down. The heavy night silence fell upon them, suffocating and cold. Soon, Junior felt his closeted rage begin to dull as well, fading to that familiar muted ache: bearable, but present.

"I'm sorry." Kuvira offered, sheepishly.

"No, Its okay."

Silence again. But the tension had broken. We'll be okay, Junior thought, stealing a glance at Kuvira from the corner of his eye.

It went on like that for a few more hours. Behind the metal sky, the moon crept unseen towards the horizon. Junior was dozing again (this time on his own crossed arms, safely removed from Kuvira's shoulder) when Kuvira shook him awake.

"Hey, Baatar, wake up. Take a look at this."

Before he could so much as mumble "what?", Kuvira had shoved the binoculars into his hands and guided them up to his face, steering his vision to the train station.

"You see that guy? The one in the newsboy hat?" She whispered, as if their quarry could hear them talking from a block away.

Junior squinted, scanning the small crowd within his field of view before finding the man Kuvira was talking about. He wasn't anything special or suspicious. Just a tall fellow with a messenger bag, sitting on a bench. "Yeah, got him. What about it?"

Kuvira snatched the binoculars back, taking another look herself, as if to verify what she was about to claim. "I ran into him earlier when I was at this station."

"How do you know?"

"His eyes," Kuvira explained. "They're blue. You don't see too many people from the Water Tribe around Zaofu, so his image just kind of stuck with me."

"Let me see, again."

Sure enough, Junior noticed upon closer scrutiny, the man sported intense blue eyes that were more than out of place here.

He handed the binoculars back to Kuvira. "Okay, he's Water Tribe, and you ran into him before." Junior sighed. "That doesn't mean anything, does it?"

"I don't know…" Kuvira said, her voice tight with concentration. "Usually, I'd say no, but the thing is, he's getting on a train going right back the way he came earlier, the one that eventually goes to your place, Baatar. The one that's late all the time." She went on, energy building in her voice. "And the thing is, he's done this three times while we've been watching, and each time, he gets off the train, walks off somewhere to the west, and then comes back with a different bag. The last one was brown and had buttons. This one -"

"- Is grey." Junior offered, feeding off of her excitement. He gripped the edge of the building, leaning to try and get a better view. "Do you really think he's got something to do with this?

Kuvira bit her bottom lip, put down the binoculars, and ran her hand over her face, rubbing the sleep from her eyes. "Ugh, well, there's no way to know for sure." She turned to Junior. "That is, unless we follow him."

"What? Follow him?" Junior was taken aback. "What if he is a criminal? Wouldn't that be dangerous? And then, what if he isn't? It'd all be so embarrassing…"

"Get it together."

"What?"

Kuvira laughed. "You heard me." She stole a final peek through the binoculars before throwing them into Junior's bag and pulling out his notebook, fingers fluttering through the pages. "You're the one who wanted to do this in the first place."

Junior scrunched up his nose. "I said nothing about a stakeout and subsequent potentially stalker-ish activities."

"No, but you wouldn't shut up about it." Kuvira smiled as she reached the page she was looking for, drawing her index finger down the lines of text, searching for something."You said yourself, your mom won't listen to you, and you know she's wrong not to." Her grin widened, and she handed the notebook to Junior, finger indicating a time scrawled in one of his many train schedule tables. "This is your chance to finally do something other than what she tells you to. To do something because you know it's right."

Junior sucked in a breath, taking the notebook from Kuvira and lowering his eyes to where she was pointing. She's right, of course. I can't just be mother's little engineer-doll my whole life. I'm ready for this.

"And see, your chance is going to walk away and hop on the next train here in 6 minutes, according to your schedule here." She continued, beaming. Junior rolled his eyes, smiling. Yeah, yeah, you're right again, smug pain in my ass. He didn't mean it, of course. Kuvira, while she had earthbent him to back (and leg) pain on multiple occasions, was, he had to admit, probably one of the best things that had happened to him recently.

Junior nodded. "Alright. Let's go."

They arrived at the station, Junior huffing and puffing, after a three block sprint from their lookout. The man was still where they left him, much to their relief, clutching his bag tightly against his chest. Just in time, Junior noted as their train pulled up to the platform and he and Kuvira followed the water tribe man onboard, taking seats across and down the aisle from him.

The first part of the ride was uneventful - painfully so, and it took all of Junior's willpower not to quake with anticipation. Kuvira had told him on their way here that they had to act "normal," whatever that was. Junior knew that, he wasn't an idiot. But still, it was hard - hard not to stare at the man slouched up against the train's gleaming window, hard not to search through that mysterious bag with his eyes. He focused on his breathing instead, trying to match Kuvira's steady 20-count rhythm before he realized it was a lost cause after starting to get dizzy.

Junior could just make out Kuvira's eyes flashing uneasily as the train slipped down into one of the new subterranean tramways. When is he going to do something? Junior's fingers tugged anxiously at the buttons on his shirtsleeve as he eyed the train clock uneasily, eyes hinged on the second hand's painfully slow march from 12 to 6, 6 to 12, 12 to 6, 6 to twelve…

"Baatar," Kuvira's whisper was warm against the skin of his neck. She nodded towards the back of the train, where the man in the newsboy cap was disappearing through the sliding door connecting their compartment to the one behind them.

"Come on." Her fingers wrapped around his wrist and Junior found himself being pulled down the aisle after Kuvira. Just as they approached the door, a screeching sound cut through the air and the train shook, jerking as it was forced to decelerate.

"He's somehow slowing down the train!" Kuvira flung open the compartment door and burst onto the narrow connecting pathway between the two cars, Junior teetering unconfidently behind her. The wind suddenly ripping through Junior's hair made him acutely aware that they were standing on an open walkway between two cars of a train careening along its dimly lit track. Add to that the fact that we're chasing after someone who's more than likely dangerous, if he is who he thinks he is… and we're not in the most… ideal... situation, he thought, fingers clawing at the metal rail as he fought to keep his balance.

Kuvira peered through the window of the door to the next car before turning back to Junior and shaking her head. "No good."

"What?"

She cupped her hands to her mouth and raised her voice. "No good! He's not in the next car!"

"What?!"

"I SAID, NO GOOD! HE'S NOT -"

"No, I heard that! I mean, what? As in, what the hell happened to him, then?"

Kuvira's eyes widened. "I don't know, he could have -" He slowed down the train. That means...

"You don't think he -"

The two of them leaned as far as they dared over the sides of the railings, searching for some alternative to the obvious. He couldn't have just jumped. The maintenance walkway has over two yards of clearance from the side of the train. So how…

Then he saw it. "Ice."

Kuvira reeled around. "Wh-"

"I SAID-"

"No! Baatar, where's the ice?"

He pointed out a rapidly receding trail of shining white ice on the maintenance walk on their left. "He must have used waterbending to jam the train wheels and slow it down enough to jump to the maintenance walkway."

"You mean he got off while the train was still moving?"

"Seems that way. Though I guess this solves the mystery of the late trains. It'll take a few minutes for it to get back up to full speed. The tracks near here are still under construction in a few places, so the conductor probably just thought the slowdowns were some kind of problem related to that and didn't report them. " Junior peered into the blackness behind them. "That's one hell of a stop."

"Well it's our stop too. We're getting off." Kuvira grinned, maniacally.

"WHAT?"

"This time, I know you heard me." She started digging through her bag before pulling out a stone spike attached to a long line of rope. A grappling hook, Junior thought as Kuvira began wrapping the rope around her waist. "You trust me?" Kuvira asked, extending her hand to Junior. Her eyes glittered green in the dim light of the tunnel lights.

Yes. Junior took her hand. "More than I should."

"Oh, don't be like that." Kuvira retorted before pulling him to her chest and flinging her arm upward, sending the stone spike flying forward into the (luckily for them) unfinished stone ceiling. Before Junior could think twice, his feet flew up from the platform with a lurching movement and he was weightless: horrifyingly, and thankfully, briefly, weightless. That was, until he came crashing down onto the maintenance platform, falling painfully on his left hip. Kuvira's slamming down on top of him didn't help things.

"Ouch," Junior coughed, his vision swimming and a sharp pain shooting up his left leg.

"See? We're… fine." Kuvira wheezed, rolling off of Junior and sprawling out on the ground next to him.

"Mmph."

Kuvira took a deep breath, swinging up over her hips and onto her feet, extending a hand to Junior again. "Come on, we're going to lose him."

He winced, gripping her hand and allowing her to pull him to his feet before pounding off after Kuvira. Each step sent splintering pain up his leg, but the adrenaline burning in his veins kept him scrambling behind Kuvira along the narrow walkway.

"There's some ice on the railing, this must be where he leapt off the train!" Junior huffed, pointing ahead to where a chunk of white ice was clinging to the walkway handrail.

Kuvira nodded. "There's a trail on the ground too. He must have skated down the tunnel." She chambered her hands, fingers curling into fists before she slowly extended them in front of her, unfurling her fingers as she rotated her hands. The stones in Junior's bag followed her movement, flying out from under the folds of fabric to hover beside Kuvira for a moment. As they approached the slippery ground, she made a swift movement, sending the rocks tumbling forward and grinding against the ice, breaking it apart in front of her as she ran.

Amazing, Junior thought. He was struggling to breathe keeping up with Kuvira's brutal pace, and his leg felt like it was on fire, but Kuvira seemed like she was in complete control. It's like this is just a nice little stroll for her. She's barely even broken a sweat!

Turning her head so that she could just make out Junior in the corner of her vision, Kuvira shouted, "there's a turn up ahead and the ice leads around the corner! He must have gone that way!" She skid to a stop, swinging around to dive into the black tunnel.

"Wait, Kuvira! Hold up!" Junior stumbled as he tried to follow Kuvira around the sharp bank, nearly falling to the ground. His fingers clawed at the walls, grazing across a rough stone surface. Stone? What? He shook his head, pushing off the wall and scrambling along after Kuvira. Junior's eyes swept around, scanning the tunnel as he ran. It was unfinished, under construction. The metal walls were only partially built, and in places the rock face peeked through.

It makes perfect sense, Junior realized. Whoever is responsible for stealing the plans must have some kind of base down here, in the unfinished subway tunnels. The man we're following must shuttle the things they steal out the tunnels, to someone else. It's the perfect place to hide, a lot of these tunnels aren't scheduled to be worked on again for at least a year, and it'd be easy to access their base of operations from anywhere in the city…

"I see him! We've almost got him!" Kuvira called out ecstatically. She flashed Junior a maniacal grin before leaping into the air mid stride and executing a crisp aerial maneuver, bending a slab of rock out of part of the unfinished wall, cutting off the waterbender in front of her. Well, there's another 6 months of construction, Junior thought. Meanwhile, Kuvira had the man cornered, and he turned around to face her, a worried expression on his face. His hands drew down to the waterskin on his waist, and a stream of water bubbled in front of him as he readied a water whip. She's got him. We've got him!

Then, there was a flash of light and Junior heard the sound of footfall behind him. He reeled around, wide eyes falling on his pursuer just in time to duck from a fireball. The pungent smell of burning hair filled Junior's nostrils.

Shit. Reeling around, Junior managed to catch a glimpse of his assailant before she launched another blinding attack. She had a petite frame clad all in black except for her hands and gold eyes. A firebender.

"Baatar! Get over here, I -" Kuvira's words caught in her mouth when she looked behind her. Junior was on the ground, scrambling backwards away from the firebender standing above him. He tried to stand, but his assailant was faster, sweeping his feet out from under him before he could steady himself. She rushed forward, leaping into the air and igniting twin flames in both of her hands. Junior closed his eyes, raising his hands to his face. This is it. We should never have -

"Argh!" The firebender grunted as her right wrist was suddenly encased in stone. She struggled against the restraint, legs kicking helplessly below her in the air and sparking desperate flame bursts.

"Stay. Away. From Baatar!" Kuvira growled, flinging her victim across the tunnel. The firebender slammed into the wall on the opposite side of the tunnel with a sickening thump before slumping to the metal walkway in a limp pile. Kuvira grabbed Junior under the arms, hoisting him up onto his feet. "Are you alright?"

Junior was speechless. Did she just… kill that firebender? He turned to look across the tunnel. His attacker was pulling herself unsteadily to her feet. No. Junior let out a sigh of relief as he watched the firebender stagger away, gold eyes glinting fearfully at Kuvira from across the blackness. Kuvira was already running back for where she'd left the waterbender earlier. But she didn't care either way.

It was only as Junior turned around that the waterbender completely disappeared into the hole that had opened moments before in the tunnel wall. Kuvira pounded after him, but it was too late, before she could so much as bend a volley of pebbles his way, the metal warped closed behind him with a shrill shriek. The messy closure left a puckered mark on the wall, and Kuvira slammed against it, pounding her fists futilely against the steel. Junior could only watch on as she tried again and again to bend the passage open again. He watched her throw punch after punch, kick after kick, slam herself against the wall shoulder-first. It was only until Junior could see blood dripping from the stains blooming on the linen wrapping Kuvira's hands that he stopped her with a hand laid softly on her shoulder.

"Kuvira."

She turned around, face streaked with silent tears, and pulled Junior into a tight embrace. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry." She sank to her knees, dragging Junior to a kneel. Adrenaline rush fading, Junior winced at the pain in his leg, but gritted his teeth and allowed Kuvira to cling to him. It's not your fault. It's mine. If I had only been able to defend myself, you wouldn't have been forced to chose. I'm the weak one. Kuvira's fingers curled into the fabric of his robe. "I failed. When it counted, I failed." She whispered against his shoulder, clenching her eyes shut. "I'm sorry..." I'm sorry.