One minute, Korra was fast asleep, burrowed under soft, warm furs and curled into the mattress that was much softer than the one she'd been sleeping on back home. The next minute, she was awake, sitting up in bed and clenching her small hands over the spot where Master Katara said her heart was. It beat strongly against her small ribcage but it also ached deeply. So deeply and suddenly that it ripped Korra from slumber.

Crying followed after, as she looked around her new, foreign room in the White Lotus compound, tracing the blue, icy walls and finding no trace of her home, her family. Sniffling turned to sobbing and though she tried to be a big girl and not call out for the comfort of her parents, it was only a beat later when she moaned, "Mommy."

The door to the bedroom slid open and a man in White Lotus guard robes rushed in. Torchlight from the hallway lit up his face and Korra recognized him as the guard who usually wished her a goodnight every night before she went to bed and sometimes even told her funny stories about how he learned to fire bend. "Avatar Korra, is something wrong?" His head whipped around the room as he approached, and only knelt beside the bed when he saw nothing out of the ordinary. "Are you hurt?"

Korra followed the path of his golden eyes. He was staring at her hands, still clutching at her blue pajama shirt with an otter-penguin on it. "I want my mommy," she whimpered. "My heart hurts and I want her."

"Your heart? I'll fetch a healer at once." The guard made to stand but wavered as the ground beneath his feet trembled.

"I want my mommy!" She beat her tiny fists against the mattress and the guard had to leap back at the volley of flame shooting from her mouth.

Several footsteps clomped down the hallway and the door was thrown open further. Two more guards crowded in after a short, balding man clothed in the blue robes of a Grand Master Lotus. "What's wrong with her?" he asked, bustling forward.

The guard beside the bed shrugged. "I heard her crying so I came in to see what was wrong. She said her heart hurt but before I could do anything else, she started demanding to see her mother."

The Grand Master stepped forward, running a hand through what little of his dark hair remained. He turned to the guards behind him, who straightened immediately. "One of you, fetch Master Katara and the Avatar's mother. The rest of you return to your posts."

There was a murmuring of, "Yessir," before the room emptied of the White Lotus guards. The Grand Master sat on the end of Korra's bed. The young Avatar sniffled, rubbing her eyes with one clenched hand before turning her stunning blue eyes on the old man before her.

"I'm sorry. Am I in trouble?" Though she'd only been here a few months, Korra understood that this man only showed up when she wasn't listening to her teachers and he often talked to her about the importance of, well, big words she didn't understand.

He shook his head and offered her a smile. "No, little Avatar. We're just worried something is wrong. You said your heart hurts?"

Korra nodded and placed her right hand over the spot. "Right here."

"Does it hurt a lot?" The man's face wrinkled around his mouth and eyes, but Korra relaxed, glad he didn't look frustrated with her.

She tried to think about how she felt. "It doesn't hurt like when I fell and scraped my knees yesterday. But it makes me cry."

"Are you sad, Korra?" Master Katara asked as she entered the room, drawing the eyes of the child and the man. "Because that can make your heart hurt, too."

Korra shook her head no, but paused. "I was asleep. But then I woke up and I was sad and I wanted to see my mom." She sniffled again and the Grand Master reached out and patted the top of her head.

"Both of your parents live here in the compound, just across the training yard. But if it would make you feel better, I'm sure we can arrange a room much closer," the Grand Master said, standing up from the bed.

Korra shook her head. "No, I'm the Avatar. I don't need my mommy or daddy really close like some baby." Though if she were honest, having her parents right next door sounded really nice right now; Korra tried not to let that show on her face, trying to look tough in front of her mentors. "I don't know why I hurt, though."

The man and the woman exchanged a look. After a few seconds, he gave a brief nod and Katara sat in the chair beside the bed. She rested her hands on her thighs and smiled. "Korra, have your mom or dad told you about soul mates yet?"

Korra frowned. "No. What's that?" She sat up a little more in bed.

Katara laughed. "More like who. Everyone is born with a soul mate: someone who they are meant to connect with in the best of ways. This person can be your best friend, your partner in love, your other half. You can know them your whole life or you can meet them randomly. They can be anywhere in the world."

"Ew, love." Korra stuck out her tongue.

"You might think that now, but I bet you'll change your mind about it later." Katara stroked the necklace around her neck. "Your dad is your mom's soul mate, just as she is his. They found each other and knew they were meant to be together."

"So a soul mate is the person you're supposed to fall in love with and get married to and live with happily ever after?"

Both of the adults chuckled. Katara reached over and ruffled Korra's hair, making the girl pout. "They can be, sure."

Korra leaned forward, the twinge in her chest temporarily lost in the wave of new information. "What else? Who's my soul mate?"

Katara chuckled again. "You have to find him or her yourself."

"But you said they can be anywhere in the whole world. What if my soul mate is in the Earth Kingdom? That place is huge! I'll never find them." Korra threw her hands up and sighed.

"It's not as hard as you think, but it's also not easy." Katara said. "When your soul mate is in pain, you will feel some of it, too. It won't be as much pain as they feel, because what's happening to them isn't happening directly to you. But you can use this to find out who you're meant to be with."

Korra scratched her head. "I don't get it."

She watched as her water bending master shifted in her seat. After a moment, Katara spoke again. "My hands were burned once by some out of control fire bending. It made my soul mate's hands hurt, too, though he said it was like putting his hands a little too close to a campfire."

"Oh!" Korra's eyes brightened and she fidgeted in her spot. "So the reason my heart hurts is 'cause my soul mate's heart hurts right now? And hers hurts a lot more than this?"

The Grand Master blinked back his shock before smiling. "Very perceptive, young one."

Katara nodded and tapped the end of Korra's nose with her index finger. "Exactly right, Korra. It's usually physical pain that you'll feel, like when you scraped your knee, your soul mate probably felt a little bit of that. But you can also get hurt without getting physically injured. Just because you can't see it doesn't mean it's not there."

"But…" Korra frowned and tried not to cry again. "What's happening to my soul mate to make 'em hurt so much?" Tears slipped down her cheeks anyways.

"Oh, Korra, dear." Katara thumbed away the tears. "I don't know. My guess is that he or she is very sad and not bodily harmed, though. Maybe he or she lost someone close to them. A friend or a family member. That would make a heart hurt very much."

Korra jutted her lip out and wiped her tears away with a fist. "I don't want them to feel like this, Katara. I don't want them to be this sad. It's not fair."

Katara leaned over and pulled Korra into a strong hug. "I know.

A knock on the door interrupted them. Korra peered around Katara and broke into a smile. "Mommy!"

Senna was across the room in a flash, pulling Korra into her arms. "Sweetie, what's wrong?" Korra nestled close and smiled when a kiss was pressed to the crown of her head.

"My soul mate's heart hurts, so mine does too and I really missed you." Tears dribbled down her cheeks and dotted her mother's pajamas.

"I'm sorry, honey. I'm here now, though." Senna stroked the back of Korra's head and hummed tunelessly.

Though her heart still ached, it wasn't long before Korra found herself growing sleepy again. She snuggled deeper into her mother's embrace.

Not even the smell of her father's aftershave or the wisp of motor oil lingering on his skin could make Asami feel better. The warm, strong arms around her were not as comforting without the smaller pair wrapping around the both of them, without the press of her mother against her small back.

It used to be flowers, vanilla, aftershave and motor oil swirled together in a perfume all its own, but now Asami could only smell half of the home aroma she was used to. She tucked her head against her father's neck, holding her breath, hoping that the next time she breathed in, the missing scents would be there. Her father rocked her where he stood, ran a soothing hand up and down her back, whispered her name and a soft, "It will be all right," though it didn't sound like he was talking to her.

When her head swam and her throat burned for air, Asami breathed in again. Flowers. Shifting in her father's arms was easy; his arms moved with her as she turned to face the large dining room where they stood. Police officers darted by the door, blocking off the hallway where a white sheet lay over a form on the floor. Asami didn't look that way very long though because daddy told her not to.

Instead she looked for the familiar floral scent drifting around her, hoping to see the source walking forward, ready to wrap her arms around Asami and her daddy. A fresh batch of tears streamed down her face and Asami folded her small hands over her heart when she spotted the vase of flowers an officer had just knocked off an end table outside of the dining room entrance.

She buried her face back into her father's chest and cried, knowing, somehow, that she'd never smell that specific mix of flowers and vanilla again.

Hi guys! I've seen a million different soul-mates-feeling-each-other's-pain AUs all over tumblr, so I thought I'd give it a shot because why not.

I hope this gives a good idea of what to expect in this AU when it comes to soul mates feeling one another's pain. I tried to integrate it into the story without it seeming too much like an outright explanation, but not sure how well I succeeded there. Anyways, limitations and more specifics should get clearer as I proceed.

I'd like to think that Korra's parents moved into the compound with her when she was younger, because she just doesn't act like she's been isolated from her parents from a young age in my honest opinion. I also headcanon that the White Lotus aren't as strict/mean when it comes to training Korra at that age because again, she's really young when they first discover her and you can't expect a ton from a 5-6 year old.

Any comments/questions/feedback are appreciated! I have a ton of ideas for this already in the works so I should update soon, though I don't have any schedule planned.