The fight with Guan's soldiers didn't last long. With their bending back, they didn't stand a chance, some of the soldiers were earth benders but not all of them. What was troubling the group though was that they didn't seem that bothered that they lost.
There was a cave not far from them and Sukara took steps towards it but one of the soldiers started to chuckle.
"What?" Sukara asked, turning on her heel to face them again.
"He's not there," she said, a smirk on her face as she sat tied to her peers.
"Then where is he?" Bolin demanded, spinning some rocks in his hands.
"You will never find Commander Guan," she laughed, "he is far too clever to be caught by the likes of you. He was defeated before but he has come back stronger than ever. Commander Guan has come to save the Earth Kingdom from ruin."
"Guan's not saving anyone from anything," Asami snapped at her, crouching down so that they were eye to eye, "he's stealing your minds. He's not letting you decide what you want for yourself."
"I give my mind willingly to Commander Guan," she smiled at her, her eyes glazed over slightly as she looked at her, like her personality was gone and she was but a shell spouting out Guan's propaganda.
"What do we do now?" Asami asked, looking up at Tenzin who was frowning down at their prisoners.
"We'll have a look around but I doubt they're lying," he sighed, starting to walk towards the cave, "he probably escaped during the fight, its why they wanted to do one on one. It drags it out, so that they had more time to get him out."
#####
"This is ridiculous," Kai sighed, kicking the stones as they came back out of the cave, "he was probably right here. And we missed him."
"It's alright," Sukara smiled, reaching up and ruffling his hair, "we'll get him sooner or later."
"What happened to you?" Sukara's favourite voice asked, causing her to turn to see Kuvira and the others coming to join them.
Sukara smiled and hugged her once she reached her. Kuvira lifted her hand to Sukara's cheek and tried to rub some of the mud off with her thumb.
"I fell."
"She took on a one on one match with the dead guy," Kai corrected her, nodding over to the body that had been put neatly by the side of the cave.
"Which I fell in."
"And then he tried to drown her in the mud," Kai continued, causing Sukara to get an annoyed frown from her girlfriend.
"Which was a result of me falling," Sukara tried to make the most innocent face she could as she looked up at Kuvira, "so really, where's the lie?"
"I think you know where," Kuvira sighed, giving in to the cute smile on Sukara's face and giving her a kiss on the cheek.
"You guys should go and get a couple of Fire Nation soldiers," Lin told them, ignoring the small reunions that were going on around her, as far as she was concerned the mission wasn't over, "to give us a hand with this lot."
She gestured over to the six soldiers tied up behind her.
"Stick with the same groups," she continued, getting eye rolls and annoyed groans from the rest of them, "no arguments, the mission isn't over. You can all canoodle later, right now we have work to do."