A group of young girls screamed as Kiet poured an iced bucketful of water atop their heads, but giggled after looking up and seeing the handsome earthbender waving at them from Indira's second-floor window. Indira rolled her eyes as she tied her hair up—the last adjustment before departing the safety of her apartment to the jungle of the Republic City's streets during New Year's.

Chie closed her fan and followed Indira and Hinto out the door. Kiet trailed in the back with a refilled bucket.

The streets really were wild—automobiles had to swerve around people just to get through the streets; Chie noticed a group of boys slinging water balloons at them. Indira gasped after being hit with one of them, especially since it had been frozen to slush, but the ice was a welcome change to the blazing head and humidity of the day. Hinto gave each of them a discreet hit of his water whip, all in good fun.

No Gong Xun could see a little bit of water bending through these crowds.

"I want food," Chie shouted over the noisiness around her.

"Yes," agreed Kiet.

On the way, each of the group ended up becoming soaked to the bone, mostly after passing a water refill station. Hinto rejected Indira's request for him to dry her off. "I'm not interfering," he said, "with the ancient festival of cleansing for the New Year," Indira frowned and he smiled. "Get into the spirit."

Indira grabbed an abandoned, running hose from the sidewalk and sprayed her three friends. Hinto laughed and retaliated, and then heaved the firebender over her shoulders and paraded her around to be the target of everyone who saw her.

The restaurant they went to gave all customers towels for the duration of their visit, but the stone floors were soaked anyways. Chie paid for the large platter of food. "Did Meelo say he was coming today?"

"He probably got distracted with the parade."

Meelo had, in fact, gotten distracted by the parade on his way to the non-bending districts. More specifically, he had gotten distracted by the float with all the pretty girls waving at him. He was even further distracted when one invited him onto the float and handed him a bucket of candy to throw onto the streets. By the time that he was invited to stop for lunch with them, Meelo had forgotten why he was even in the city at all.

He remembered shortly after a screaming man kicked him back onto the street.

From the hulking buildings, Meelo knew he was in the city's center—or at least its urban center, because this part of the Republic was right on the harbor.

The airbender began his blind trek to get to the bending districts, which he knew much better; but in the crowd of the festival, especially in the crowd of this festival, it was difficult. He figured that getting off of the main street would be a good first order of business, but he was struck by a sight he saw on the way there.

There was a tall girl—Water Tribe, from her appearance and her clothing—unashamedly bending any airborne water away from her; with a flick of her wrist, it fell to the ground, sometimes freezing on the way. An animal, huge and white and furry, trotted at her side; it opened its mouth to take in any water offered. Meelo followed behind them slowly, but when he noticed more and more eyes turning in the girl's direction, he ran up beside her. She didn't notice him, or didn't care; her eyes seemed to be scanning for something far off. "You have to stop that," he warned.

She quirked an eyebrow at him. "I don't want to get wet."

Meelo looked around, confused. "You know about the ban, don't you? It came into effect months ago."

"I know about it," she said, continuing her illegal bout of bending. "I don't care."

He searched around for people looking at them and, of course, there were many; Meelo couldn't see any in Gong Xun members (obvious, as they wore long, black robes even in the hottest of weather), but he knew it would only be a matter of time. He pulled the waterbender onto a side street. She resisted successfully, being much stronger than him, but followed along after hearing Meelo's pleas.

"Are you crazy?" he asked after checking for suspicious company in every direction.

"Am I crazy?" the girl asked, giving Meelo the up-and-down.

Meelo coughed awkwardly and squeezed the water out of a handful of his hair. The waterbender shrugged and walked away; the airbender caught up with her. "You must not be around here." From her clothes, she had obviously come from the Water Tribes.

"Nope."

"Why would you come here? Didn't you know about the ban? Before you came here?"

"I did. Everybody does," After a deep breath, she answered his first question. "Look, kid. I'm trying to find somebody. I've been searching for a week but nobody I ask has even heard of him. His name isn't even in the census records," She leaned, defeated, against a brick wall. "I think he might have left when they banned bending, or something."

Meelo looked around them and sat on the base of a streetlamp. "He's a bender?"

She nodded.

"How much of the city have you searched through?"

The girl pulled out a half-crumpled, half-folded map of the city. Parts of it had been shaded in—parts of the non-bending parts of the city. "All the shaded places. Nobody recognized his name."

"No wonder," Meelo said, shaking his head. He traced the Quanzi River on the map. "Everything north and east of this river isn't accessible to benders."

"What?" she knitted her dark eyebrows together and turned the map around to get a better look at it. "That's just a rumor. The people at the immigration bureau told me not go to here because these are all people who live off the government," Her voice began to trail. "I know this man to live comfortably…"

"Hah," was all Meelo could think to say. The animal at the girl's side sneezed.

The girl looked very angry for a second, and Meelo realized he recognized her.

"Wait a second!" he shouted.

"What?" she asked, a bit startled at the sudden outburst.

Meelo looked around again, eyeing passers-by, before saying in a very loud whisper, "You're Avatar Korra, aren't you?" He fiddled around in his pockets but realized her picture was probably lost somewhere months ago.

"Yep," she said casually, before kicking off from the wall and beginning to walk again. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got an airbender to find and an immigration officer to speak to."

"You're looking for an airbender?" he yelled down the street, despite the people who undeniably heard him. Korra turned around and nodded, and Meelo ran to her side. "Is his name Meelo?"

"No."

The airbender frowned and trudged beside the girl for a few seconds before asking. "Is his name Tenzin?"

Korra stopped. "Do you know him?"