Work Text:
Late at night - or early morning - Korra stands in a dark little office in a police station, wondering why she agreed to be on Tarrlok’s stupid task force. They’ve just completed a raid. It’s been a long night. The office smells like the locker rooms at the probending arena. Everyone in the team looks like they’re about ready for death.
Tarrlok is giving a debrief.
Korra has remembered about, what... maybe five percent of whatever Tarrlok’s spoken about for the past half hour. He’s the sort of guy who’ll use five words when one would do the same job.
Korra looks at her shoes, and waits for Tarrlok to run out of steam.
Eventually he shuts up.
The rest of the team then wanders off, intent on finding a shower or a bed. Korra watches them go. They’re all older than she is, and therefore more tired, she guesses. Then she eyes Tarrlok, as he doesn’t seem like he’s in a hurry to go anywhere even though he seems as grumpy and burned out as the rest of them.
Tarrlok leans against a wall and glowers at the sheaf of notes in his hands, oblivious to Korra’s presence.
Then Korra’s stomach rumbles, and that makes Tarrlok look up.
“Can I help you?” he asks, in that tone of voice cops use when they say ‘excuse me, miss’ or ‘move along, miss’. Mako has warned her about cops who use that tone.
Korra straightens her shoulders. “Yeah,” she asks. “Where’s the nearest food stall around here?” Exercise makes her hungry.
“Go out the main door, turn left,” Tarrlok grumbles, looking back at the notes.
Fine, okay. Tonight’s raid is done and dusted, so Tarrlok has no further use for Korra, therefore he’s not interested in being friendly. Korra gets the hint. She resists the urge to smack the notes out of Tarrlok’s hands, and head out.
She’s halfway through the door when Tarrlok says, “I thought you didn’t have any money on you?”
How would he know, and why does he sound so suspicious when he says that? “I get some from the White Lotus,” Korra says, then takes a few coins from one of her pockets.
She then feels the need to show Tarrlok the coins. He’s lucky she doesn’t throw them at him. She could ding one right off his forehead.
Tarrlok eyes the coins, then takes a hard look at Korra’s face, then says, “Follow me. I’ll get you something.”
“I can pay,” Korra says, because Tarrlok’s the last person she wants to hang around with right now.
“You’re the Avatar. Don’t be ridiculous.”
Ugh. So now she has to accept a favour from him. Does he expect her to be like, ‘ooh, you’re sooo generous, thaaaank you’? What’s his angle? Doesn’t he have anywhere better to be?
Come to think of it, she barely knows anything about the guy. Maybe this is an opportunity to suss him out a bit.
Korra keeps a neutral expression as he walks towards her. She waits for him to take the lead, then follows him out the building.
--
Tarrlok leads her to a food stand that’s only a two minute walk away. It might be late, but it’s not so late that everywhere has closed.
The smell of frying onions wafts pleasantly through the cold night.
The middle-aged man behind the stall nods at Tarrlok, then sizes Korra up and looks away, as if he’s making a point of not staring.
“Mok,” Tarrlok greets the stallholder, then asks Korra, “What do you want?”
The stall seems to specialise in fried buns. They smell kind of fishy, so Korra ventures, “Crab?”
The stallholder nods deeply and scoops some fried buns into a bowl. He gives Korra a huge serving, then asks Tarrlok, “Usual?”
“Sure.”
Tarrlok gets a slightly smaller serving from a different frying pan. Korra waits, taking a moment to enjoy the warmth from the cooking fires. The cold air makes the heat more delicious.
Korra grabs a bun and blows on it to cool it down, then shoves it in her mouth. The crab is delicate, tasting faintly of ginger and onion.She licks the oil off her fingers.
She looks over at Tarrlok, who is eating with chopsticks. He’s quiet, as if he’s done with being Tarrlok for the day and now he’s just some cranky guy who regularly eats dinner at weird times.
She notes the lines under his eyes, and wonders what he looked like when he was younger. Would he have been prettier, or would he still look kind of craggy and severe? And what would his personality have been like? Would he have been less of a tryhard?
Ehh, maybe Korra should say something to him.
“Thanks?” Korra ventures.
Tarrlok gives her a puzzled look.
“For the food,” Korra adds.
Tarrlok grunts.
Okay, whatever. Korra abandons the hope of conversation. She bites one of the fried buns in half so she can see the contents. The bun contains a respectable amount of crabmeat, not like the ones Bolin gets sometimes, which are mostly chewy onion bits.
For a while, there’s just the sound of the cooking fires, and the clatter of pans as the stallholder tidies up.
Then Tarrlok asks, “What’s it like, being the Avatar?”
Korra searches his tone for anything sarcastic or nasty, but his voice is bland.
“I… don't know?” she answers, but very carefully, because she doesn’t want to sound sarcastic either. What does he expect her to say? The question is just… weird. “I mean, I’ve never been any different.”
“Fair enough,” Tarrlok mutters. “Not much point in wanting to be normal if you don’t know what normal’s like.”
Right, is he insulting her now? “I’m normal,” Korra says peevishly.
Tarrlok keeps his neutral tone as he replies, “Sorry. I wasn’t trying to insinuate anything. I just meant you’re someone who’s significant to a lot of people.”
“Yeah, well,” Korra murmurs, now kinda wishing he’d let her focus on her food. “I mean, sometimes I imagine what my life’d be like if I wasn’t the Avatar, but that seems kind of… pointless.”
“Right. Not much point thinking about the what-ifs,” Tarrlok says. “You are what you are.”
Sheesh, why does he look so grim? Korra tries to change the subject.
“You eat here a lot?” Korra asks.
Tarrlok grunts again.
Fine.
Korra picks up a chopstick and stabs a bun with it.
“He’s been coming here for years,” the stallholder interjects.
“That so?” says Korra.
“Yeah. Even when he worked at least two miles away.”
“He ever bring a date here?” Korra says, to see if she can get a reaction from Tarrlok..
Mok opens his mouth to answer, and then Tarrlok clears his throat.
Mok says, “He’d prefer it if you graciously respected his right to privacy.”
Korra gives Tarrlok a sideways look, then gives him a smile that’s meant to be disarming. He gives her a blank stare in return.
Korra reflects back upon the night’s events, and tries to figure out if a particular thing might explain why he’s so quiet. Granted, he’s kind of a dick at the best of times, but it’s a very different type of dickery.
The raid was on a small munitions factory under a fireworks shop. They arrested ten people, a mixed bunch of different ages and races. Three women, seven guys. Korra still remembers the looks of disgust they gave her. (If anyone should be sulking tonight, it’s her, not Tarrlok.) One guy broke an arm while resisting arrest, and one of the women - technically a teenager - flipped out when she saw it and started fighting tooth and nail. It turned out later that the guy with the broken arm was her cousin.
Yeah, that doesn’t really explain much.
“So what’s it like, leading the Task Force?” Korra asks, because her gut feeling is that the Task Force kind of sucks.
Tarrlok speaks as if someone has flipped a little switch and fired up his daytime personality again: “It’s a vital step against the Equalists. The Equalists seek publicity, and there are two ways to deal with an enemy like that: you deprive them of attention, or you upstage them. We’re long past the point of being able to deprive them of attention, so the next step is to publicly demonstrate that we can outperform them.”
Korra suspects she’s expected to smile and nod at this bit of wisdom, but instead she says, “Yeah, but what’s it like leading the Task Force?”
“It’s a privilege,” Tarrlok says automatically, then puts the focus of the conversation back on her. “Do you think that being in the Task Force is a useful learning experience?”
This is the point where she’s meant to be like, ‘yes sir, I appreciate your mentorship so much, you’re so knowledgeable, tee hee’. “Er. Yeah,” she says.
Tarrlok turns to face her, and studies her for a long moment. Then, using that bland voice again, he says, “You don’t really like me, do you?”
The question knocks Korra off guard.
She wants to ask him, ‘Why do you care?’
“I thought you didn’t like me,” she mutters. Is that the wrong thing to say? Probably, but it’s true.
Tarrlok actually looks surprised by her response. It’s as if the thought hadn’t occurred to him, which is a bit nuts given the number of times he’s spoken to her with fake friendliness. Maybe he doesn’t think she can see right through him.
“Where did you get that idea?” he asks.
Is he trying to mess with her head? He can’t be that clueless. “Just the general… impression I got,” Korra says.
There’s a very uncomfortable silence.
Then Tarrlok says, “I think you’re a capable young woman with a bright future ahead of her.” His voice has a terseness that reminds her of Mako, although the difference between Tarrlok and Mako is that Mako can seem like a complete tool but isn’t, while Tarrlok is a complete tool.
“Thanks,” Korra says, not feeling very reassured. She shoves a fried bun in her mouth so she can’t say anything further.
Tarrlok goes quiet again. His demeanour makes him look like he could use a cigarette and some alcohol to go with dinner.
Korra seeks an ally in the stallholder. “These fried bun things are good,” she tells him through a mouthful of fried dough, and he smiles at her.
“You really think I don’t like you?” Tarrlok says, unwilling to let it drop.
“Yeah,” Korra says, still through a mouthful of food. Meanwhile, the stallholder gives Tarrlok a shifty look.
Tarrlok twirls one of his chopsticks around in his fingers. Is he going to apologize? Or is he going to say ‘I’m sorry you feel that way’? Or even ‘you need a thicker skin’? Nope. What he actually says is, “Don’t mind me.”
Okay.
Then Tarrlok adds, “People have told me I can be difficult.”
How should Korra reply to that? Is Korra now meant to lean in and say, ‘I don’t think you’re difficult, tee hee’?
She wants to ask him, ‘is that why you’re sitting outside on a cold winter night eating dumplings instead of going home like a normal person? Because people think you’re difficult? Do you have someone back home who’s also decided that you’re bossy, two-faced pain in the ass?’
Korra’s curiosity gets the better of her. “Which people told you you’re difficult?”
Tarrlok gives her a sharp look and just says, “People. In general.”
Okay.
“You think I should mind my own business, huh?” Korra says.
Tarrlok bristles. “No. I’m just too tired to name specific individuals right now.”
“You’re a pretty private person, though,” Korra observes.
“Force of habit. When you’ve spent enough time in the public eye, privacy becomes second-nature. You’ll see.”
“Yeah, but… I’m not gonna go running off to the papers to sell them secrets about your personal life, bub,” Korra says, mildly affronted. “I’m the Avatar.”
Tarrlok stares her down for a moment. He silently drums his fingers against the counter of the stall.
Then he says, “Alright. My personal life really isn’t that interesting, though.”
“So are you single, or what?” Korra asks, just to put him on the back foot.
It works. His expression doesn’t change, but his left eye twitches. “Why are you asking?”
Korra looks right at him. “Does that mean ‘yes’?”
Tarrlok stares back at her without blinking, and asks, “Are you asking me about this because you need relationship advice?”
What? Where did that question come from? “I don’t need relationship advice,” Korra says.
“Because I cannot possibly imagine why you’d ask a male colleague about their relationship status, unless you’re after relationship advice.”
Why the hell would Korra want relationship advice from… wait. This conversation isn’t developing in the way that she expected. Shit shit shit. Now she’s on the back foot. “I’m not-”
Tarrlok interrupts her, “What with you being a young lady who’s new to the city, and everything. If you weren’t about to ask me about relationship advice, then your question could have been interpreted as being very inappropriate.”
The word ‘inappropriate’ hangs in the air like smoke.
Tarrlok then looks to Mok. “Am I off-base, or does it seem like she’s working towards asking me for relationship advice?”
Mok makes a noise that might be an affirmative.
Korra screams internally.
“My advice is, don’t bother with relationships until you’ve been in the city for a few years,” Tarrlok continues blithely. He’s found his angle and he’s going to roll with it. “You’ll encounter a lot of people who’’ll only be interested in you because they think they can get something from it. You need some time to weed them out before you can identify who your real allies are.”
Korra… can’t think of anyone in her life who’d be drawn to her purely for her status, apart from Tarrlok. “If you haven’t noticed, I’m not that popular,” she grumbles, without thinking. “Not with guys. Or anyone else.”
“I find that hard to believe,” says Tarrlok. “Still, maybe it’s a good thing if there isn’t much romance in your life. That’ll make it easier for you to keep your mind on the job. Less material for people to gossip about, too.”
“There’s romance in my life,” Korra declares, even though that’s absolutely none of his business. There is romance. A bit. More romance than she had previously, anyway. And… she should probably shut up actually, because he’s now playing her like a cheap erhu.
“Well, don’t put too much stock in it,” says Tarrlok. “All relationships are transient.”
Korra needs a moment to remember what ‘transient’ means, then fumbles for a smart response. “What about reincarnation?” she asks, because she wants to challenge him on principle. “People can be together for, uh, different lifetimes.”
Tarrlok pauses to reflect on this. He doesn’t look keen on the idea. “I’m exempt from that.”
“That’s… What. Why?”
“I suspect that life as a human is highly overrated,” Tarrlok says, so casually that Korra can’t tell if he’s joking. “I aspire to be reincarnated as some sort of insect.”
Korra doesn’t laugh. Her money is on him being reincarnated as an eel. Or maybe one of those sea birds that grab food from tourists. “Why? That’s… Ugh, you’re weird. Look, never mind. Even if relationships are transistor-”
“Transient.”
“Transient, even IF relationships are transient, it doesn’t mean they don’t matter,” Korra declares, then feels very smug with herself for saying that.
Tarrlok looks at her as if he’s this close to saying, ‘shut up’, then says, “Maybe I should take relationship advice from you. Go on, then. What other insights can you share?”
“Uhhh. Well.” Crap. Now Korra has to think of something clever again. “Relationships work when… You have to be straightforward and honest and tell people how you really feel, and…” Yeah, that’s terrible advice.
“Does anyone actually know how they really feel?” Tarrlok interrupts.
“Yes,” Korra says, which is a huge lie. “Wait. Are you saying that you don’t know how you feel?”
“No. I just don’t credit the average person with that much self-awareness.”
“How do you feel, then?”
“About what?”
“I don’t know. How do you feel right now?”
Tarrlok looks at her as if this is the first time he’s ever been asked that question..
He eventually answers, “Tired. I feel tired. Are you done eating?”
“I guess.”
Tarrlok pushes his bowl away and stands up. Korra notes that at no point has he paid for the meal.
“You really think it’s a good idea to go around telling people how you feel?” Tarrlok asks wryly, putting the focus back on Korra again.
Korra doesn’t like how he’s now standing while she’s sitting. She’s not the tallest person at the best of times. “Yeah. Why not?”
Tarrlok shrugs, and looks away, staring at something further down the street. “A word of advice, because it might keep you out of trouble: it’s a bad idea for a girl to be honest with men.”
“Why?”
“It makes things too easy for them.”
Korra remains seated, and crosses her arms. “What things?”
“You’re seventeen years old. What do you think?”
Korra wants to bang her head against a wall. “How does honesty make things too easy for them?”
“All transactions involve an asymmetry of information. You want to be on the right side of that asymmetry.”
“That doesn’t make any sense!”
“I mean,” Tarrlok says slowly, “the people you encounter will always want things from you. Think of it as like a game of mahjong. If you’re honest with them, you’re showing them what tiles you have.”
It takes Korra a moment to figure out what he means. “If they’re only after my frickin’... mahjong tiles, I wouldn’t talk to them in the first place!”
Tarrlok opens his mouth to reply, then appears to think better of it. Korra is left wondering what he was about to say.
Korra looks at the stallholder again, as the guy is eavesdropping anyway. She asks him, “What do you think? Should I be honest with men?”
“Avatar Korra, I just make fried buns,” the stallholder says apologetically. “But honestly… No.”
Wow, okay. “I don’t have time for people if I have to lie to them,” Korra grumbles. Maybe the opinions of Tarrlok and the stallholder say more about Tarrlok and the stallholder than people in general.
She adds, “Thanks for the food,” then stands up and walks slightly ahead of Tarrlok.
“Anyway,” she announces, “I’m going home. Night.”
“What, you’re going to walk back to the ferry to Air Temple Island by yourself?” Tarrlok asks, back to using the bland tone again.
“I’ll be fine,” Korra says, and can’t resist adding. “Unless you want me to walk you back to your house. For safety.”
Tarrlok stops walking, gives her a very odd look, then says, “I think I’d be alright, thanks.”
“Where do you live?”
“Ten minutes from here. Straight down this road, in fact.”
Korra sneaks a furtive look at him, then says on a whim, “I was heading in that direction anyway.”
Tarrlok remains put, and assesses her. “Wouldn’t that take you further away from the ferry?”
“I’m taking the Jade line, not the Diamond line,” Korra clarifies. “Last time I was on the Diamond line, the guy taking the tickets started ranting about politics and now I’m avoiding him.” This is technically true.
“You should report that to his boss,” Tarrlok says automatically.
“Eh,” says Korra, because she really has better things to be doing. If she was that bothered about the guy on the ferry, she would have thrown him overboard.
“Would you like me to do something about him?” Tarrlok asks.
Yikes. No. “No… thanks,” Korra says, holding up her hands.
Then she just stands there, and waits for Tarrlok to move again.
Tarrlok gives her an unreadable look, then resumes walking.
Korra wants to distract him from whatever weird shit he’s thinking about, so she asks, “Do you really think relationships don’t matter because they’re… transient?” She pauses. “That’s the word you used, right?”
“That’s not what I said,” Tarrlok says, with the practised ease of someone who’s made that statement many times before.
“Uh, you told me to not worry about relationships because they’re transient,” Korra says. “But I think that’s bunk. Transient means temporary, right? But everything is temporary, right?”
“That’s an uncharacteristically morbid thing for you to say,” Tarrlok mutters.
“No it’s not. Look, just because everything is temporary, it doesn’t mean it doesn’t matter. If I kicked you in the leg, it’d be temporary, but it’d still matter, right?”
“Is that a threat?”
“No! I’m not going to kick you in the leg.”
“Good.”
“I’m just trying to prove a point.”
“I see.” Tarrlok cracks a faint smile, and says nothing further.
They walk in silence, until Tarrlok eventually stops by a discreet door set in a large building. Korra looks up, and just sees rows and rows of windows. The building is tall and modern, but also pretty forgettable. No fancy brickwork, no laundry hanging on balconies, no people in the windows, nothing.
“My apartment is up there,” Tarrlok says, nodding upwards. “Are you sure you don’t want me to walk you to the ferry, though?”
“No, I’m good,” Korra tells him, and forces a smile. She gets the hint that this is the point where she’s meant to skedaddle, because there’s no way in a million years she could set foot in his apartment without stuff getting weird real fast. “Thanks for the food. I’ll see you around, right?”
Tarrlok nods, and gives a very brief smile in return. “Be safe out there,” he tells her.
He gives her that faint smile again.
Korra finds herself smiling back, although it isn’t forced this time. “Yeah,” she says. “You too.”
Then they go their separate ways, with Korra walking slightly faster than is necessary.
Korra walks until she thinks she can’t be seen from Tarrlok’s apartment building, then turns a corner, scales a wall, and crouches on a rooftop.
--
So, she wants to see Tarrlok in his natural habitat. Why? Because he’s weird and she’s dumb, that’s why. It’s pretty easy for her to earthbend some handholds up the wall of an adjacent building. She’s quick and it’s dark, so the chances of being seen seem slim..
A vague sense of embarrassment nags at her. She tells herself there’s something off about Tarrlok, and that’s why she wants to keep an eye on him.
When she finds a good lookout spot, she hunkers down, and studies the windows.
She doesn’t know which apartment belongs to him, but she’s lucky enough to spot one with a Tarrlok-shaped silhouette in a window. He has his back to the street. It looks like he’s reading something, maybe a newspaper.
Korra tries to see past him, into the room beyond, but going by what little she can see, it looks pretty empty.
Korra waits, curious as to whether anyone else is in the room.
She speculates about what sort of partner he’d have, if he had one. Some sort of trophy girlfriend, maybe. Like… a really pretty girl with fancy makeup and long legs. Or… maybe not. Korra hopes he doesn’t have a girlfriend with long legs, because the girlfriend would probably deserve better. Although, what if it was a guy? Eh. He’d be similar. Tarrlok would probably still want someone pretty who he can order around. Or does Tarrlok get tired of bossing people around all day? Would he prefer someone to boss him around instead? That’d be… funny, so Korra hopes this is the case.
He seems like the sort of guy you’d expect to have a girlfriend or something. He’s not bad looking. Korra wonders what he’d look like with his hair down, then reels at the thought. Picturing Tarrlok with his hair down seems only a few steps away from picturing him half-naked. Korra doesn’t need to have that image in her head whenever she sees him. She’s had enough trouble already with trying to avoid thinking about what he’d do if she gently tugged one of his braids.
No one’s ever mentioned anything about him having a girlfriend, though. Maybe he meets up with someone in secret.
Korra wants to see his girlfriend, whoever she might be.
Korra waits until she gets cramp.
Then she wonders what her problem is.
Right, she’s seen enough. Tarrlok is definitely alone in the apartment. No pretty girlfriend.
Maybe she should invite Tarrlok to dinner, if Pema’s okay with that. Or maybe not. Tarrlok would invite himself to dinner if he really wanted to go.
As Korra climbs back down to street level, she tells herself to concentrate on avoiding being seen, but she still wonders: is Tarrlok okay?
Then she lets out a quiet groan at herself, startling an owlcat lurking on a nearby ledge. It seems an awful lot like Korra is now worrying about Tarrlok just because he bought her dinner one time, which is nuts. The guy has openly tried to bribe her before, so it’s not like a dinner would be anything special. And Korra isn’t quite deluded enough to think that, deep down, he’s really a nice person.
Still, he didn’t have to buy her dinner.
And she didn’t have to go spying on him, either. That was, in hindsight, pretty dumb.
“Inappropriate,” she mutters to herself, and slips away into the night.
As she walks, it occurs to her that he should have asked him what filling he had in his fried buns, as if that would matter.