#sailin

Except her left side, where she pressed against the floor, was pulsing with harsher, sharper pains where the pieces of her armor dug into her ribs and shoulder and knees and ankles. But the prospect of trying to roll on her back set off alarm bells in her mind - it would leave her exposed and vulnerable, and curled up in this position, if her body needed emesis, her chances of choking were somewhat reduced.

She clenched her face, assessing whether she could make herself sit upright. Her sense of defeat hung in the balance, and she could feel it growing heavier.

The faint echo of her mother’s disdain somehow just made it worse.

With a sigh, she relinquished the tension in her face, still keeping her eyes closed. She splayed her right hand against the floor. Everything was so quiet and still that she could feel the pulse in her wrist. From the earliest days of her bending training with her mother until now, she could not remember a quiet so deep.

She drifted, too exhausted even to marshal her thoughts. The pain and quiet swaddled her, lulling her into a timeless state anchored only by her breathing and the pulse of her so very tired heart.

A thump in the distance disturbed her formless existence.

It was followed by heavy footsteps. Even if her bending was gone, her hearing was not. The sudden increase in noise was enough to push her off the floor into a sitting position. She shook her head and tried to look around at the space where she had been left.

She remembered having hidden in this attic with Tenzin when they were children, but it was apparent that the new acolytes had been busy. What had once been cluttered and dusty was now an empty, stuffy room.

Below her, she felt and heard the rumble of people, a few voices raised in anger. She pushed herself backwards, trying to be difficult to spot, and hopefully harder to grab.

The hatch cracked open and crashed against the floor. The head and shoulders of one of the Equalists broke through, but stopped before the person fully emerged. They looked around, slowly scanning the space at the far end of the room, as if expecting to find someone.

If only she had enough energy, she could have killed them.

The person turned and looked in her direction, pausing for just a second. Then they called back down below, “It’s only the woman from last night. She’s in the corner. Bring him up.”

Him? Oh, spirits, not Tenzin…

But when the Equalist scrambled up to get into a better position to bring ‘him’ up into the attic, her heart turned to dust in her chest.

Saikhan.

The bastards got him just barely above the floor before pushing and shoving his seemingly dead weight out of the way of the hatch.

He’s so heavy, she thought. The feel of his weight above her when they sparred - in public or in private - pressed against her whole body and stole her breath.

The Equalist dropped their feet back through the hatch, but paused with the hatch half closed, clearly listening to something below. They laughed, looked back at her, and called out, “Have some fun while you’re up here. Might as well, before we burn this place down.”

She just stared back, letting them think whatever they wanted to. She would kill this person if they had hurt Sai.

The terrorist shrugged and dropped down the ladder, pulling the hatch down with a crash that chilled her, now that her bravado had no audience.

She watched, oh how she watched, begging the spirits to show her a breath, any sign of life. She ached to crawl over to him, to feel for his breath, his pulse.

But the laughter from the monsters was still rumbling beneath her. If she attracted their attention, they might just start that fire early. She couldn’t risk him, she couldn’t risk the building. She had promised Aang to protect his son and his home, and she had given almost everything she had.

Selfish, she thought as her eyes rested back on Saikhan’s form. Selfish that I’ll spend my last breath defending the man who actually loves me.

When he rolled onto his back, she nearly fell over in shock and relief. She scrambled over, no longer caring about what noise she might make. In her haste, she nearly brought her knee down hard on his hand as it flopped out to the floor. She grabbed it and bent over his prone form. His face was pale, under a sheen of sweat, but he was clearly breathing.

She bent over him and pressed her lips to his forehead. The warmth of his skin flooded her with such a deep relief. He was alive. And they were together.

His hair was greasy under the fingers of her free hand, but she couldn’t make herself care. The welt just behind his right ear was already the size of a plum and probably getting bigger all the time. He needed to stay awake.

He gripped her hand in his, drawing a gasp from her.

“Sai? Sai? Look at me.”

She clenched his hand, hard, trying to draw his eyes to her.

And it worked.

The sob of relief escaped her before she could kiss him. She kissed his lips, his cheek, his forehead. His grip on her hand didn’t waver, but his other hand didn’t move from the floor on his far side. She reluctantly pulled away from him, searching his face.

“Are you injured?”

It wasn’t her real voice, the one that would command obedience. It was strained, pleading, desperate. She pressed her hand against his chestplate, but his heartbeat was too weak to communicate through the silent metal. She slid her hand up to grip his neck, the hair on his chin scratching the edge of her fingers.

His swallow brought her another wave of relief. His pulse was slow and weak, but he didn’t feel cold or clammy. She brushed her thumb across his lips.

He opened his eyes and kissed her thumb.

He swallowed again and met her eyes. “Found you.”

The amused snort escaped her, and his lips twitched. She bent over to kiss him again, resting her forehead against his.

He brought his free hand up to cover hers where it still held his throat. He flexed, telling her with his movements that he wanted to sit up. She tried to push him back down, but the strength of his hands reassured her that he wasn’t going to hurt himself. Half upright, they leaned against each other. Saikhan brought his hand around her face, cradling the back of her neck.

They looked at each other, and he pushed forward to give her a kiss.

“Lin, I know we’re still in the middle of this storm, but we’re together.” He stopped, pulled back, and searched her eyes. “We’ve survived worse, right?”

Her brow creased as she tried to find a way to say no, no we haven’t.

“You know you have to stay awake, right? Feel this,” she brought his hand up to meet his scalp. She saw the twitch in his eye when she pressed on it just enough to make her point.

“Tell me what we’re going to do when we get out of here,” she encouraged. “Tell me.”

He wavered against her, and swallowed. He closed his eyes, but opened them when he heard her take a breath, ready to cajole him. “I’m going to take you to that little cabin you like so much, down in that no-name town south of here. The one that has the porch out over the cliff where you watch the sunset. And the kitchen faces the mountains and gets all that morning light.” He paused, stretching his neck and searching the ceiling over her head.

“And I’m going to let my sister bring her kids for a day. They’ll have that lemur-mutt of theirs, but we won’t let it inside unless it’s snowing. Which it won’t be because it’s spring.”

She kissed him.

“And what do you want me to make you for breakfast?”

At that, the glint in his eye convinced her that he wasn’t in all that much danger. A thrill ran up her spine at the feel of his scratchy cheek against her ear and the sound of his whispered plans for ‘eating breakfast.’

She grabbed him by the back of the neck and pressed her lips to his.

It wasn’t a kiss. Not exactly.

But in this moment, it was as close as she could get to him. They still had to get out of there without being captured again. They had to find their friends, the Avatar, Tenzin…

“We’ll get to Katara,” she breathed against him. “She can make it right.”

But to get to Katara, they had to make it out alive.

They kissed, searched each other’s eyes -