"... cannot BELIEVE you would withhold information of such importance from the Avatar," Master Tenzin declared, his stentorian voice echoing around the cave.

"Once we determined that it was not a Spirit Portal, the elders of our order concluded that it was not a phenomenon with which she should be concerned," the lead Fire Sage insisted.

Tenzin waved his arms in frustration. "That is for HER to decide! Not you!"

Some distance away from the argument, Avatar Korra glanced at Asami Sato; both women grinned wryly, remembering a time when Tenzin's attitude toward Korra deciding about things was rather different. Then, with a mutual shrug, they turned back to examining the silvery distortion that was the Veil Nexus, leaving the Grandmaster of the Air Nomads to his argument. Tenzin was often happiest when he could have a good argument with somebody, anyway. Sometimes Korra obliged him just to brighten his day; this time, Master Fire Sage Zanei was doing a fine job by himself.

For upwards of ten minutes, Tenzin and Zanei argued ever-more-vociferously about the role of the Avatar in the investigation of strange spatial phenomena. This led straight into an even louder argument between Tenzin and all five present Fire Sages about whether she should be participating in, and lending her imprimatur to, a scheme as hare-brained and potentially blasphemous as Ambassador Zuko's mad idea of a rocket mission to Yue. While the Learned Masters were busy with that, Korra and Asami walked around the shimmering portal several times, considering it from all angles.

Then, unnoticed by all the red-faced, gesticulating masters, Korra turned to Asami with a twinkle of mischief in her eyes.

"Shall we, Professor Sato?" she asked, offering her hand.

Asami smiled slyly, lowered her goggles over her own eyes, and took the hand, replying conspiratorially, "Through the looking-glass, Avatar Korra."

The argument carried on without them for another quarter-hour or more. Not until Tenzin, making some point or another about the Avatar's wholehearted belief in the non-blasphemous nature of the Phoenix Flight, turned to solicit her confirmation of the fact, did any of the masters think to look and see whether the woman they were all arguing about was paying any attention. When they did, they discovered to their dismay that not only wasn't she listening, she wasn't even there.

"... Korra?" said Tenzin, skidding to a mental and verbal halt. "Korra! Where are you? KORRA!"

The Fire Sages looked at each other, then at the airbender, and then all started talking at once. This quickly escalated into a shouting match between the Fire Sages themselves, all vying to be the one to say they tried to warn Tenzin, until the sudden reappearance of the Avatar startled them all into silence again.

Well, part of the Avatar, anyway. Korra's head and shoulders emerged from the shimmering surface of the Veil Nexus, as though she were leaning out of a window, while the rest of her remained within.

"Hey, you guys, come check this out!" she said cheerfully. "It's really neat in here."

Tenzin's face, flushed from his argument with the Sages, went bone-white. He stared at her in disbelief for a moment, then burst out in evident concern (if not incipient panic), "KORRA! What are you DOING?!"

Giving him a puzzled look, as if to ask what kind of question THAT was, Korra stepped fully out of the Nexus, then back in, then out again, then in, and leaned back through as she'd done at the beginning. Next to her, Asami's head appeared as well, a curious what's-the-holdup-here look on her face.

"Bridging the worlds," Korra told Tenzin matter-of-factly. "You coming or what?"

"I - you - " Tenzin sputtered, attempting to appeal to Korra's intermittent sense of caution. "Please, Korra, we need to STUDY this phenomenon MUCH more thoroughly before we can attempt - "

Korra rolled her eyes. "Pigchickeeeeen," she said with a challenging grin. "Bawk bawk squeeeal." Then, turning to her fellow explorer, she said, "C'mon, Asami, I thought I smelled something cooking over there," and the two women disappeared into the other world again, leaving Tenzin and the Fire Sages to stand looking at each other in utter bemusement.