trans_9 | In my element [Open]

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In my element [Open]

After all, here was where water was plentiful, and she had lots of space to move. The past few days had been amazing of course: she got to know several different people and experience certain parts of their world. If anybody stepped in here though, they would know the part of Katara's world she stopped being a child. Her inquisitiveness was a way she coped with a truth she knew, and was sure some of the other "kids" shared: certain experiences were adult, and they called for adult action.

She had her hair free, and was breathing a little to ready herself. She'd already flexed and stretched enough: she planned to get a workout. She entered the nearest Sensorium and closed her eyes.

"The Earth General who went too far," Katara said, and the world materialized: there were the Earth Nation banners towering, and there were members of the Dai Li, coming at her full force. This was of course not accurate: there WERE no members of the Dai Li when they approached earth general Fong that attacked Aang in order to force him into the Avatar state. Still, Katara wanted them a part of this program anyway: it would be harder to get to that Earth general.

First they erected the rock pillars, like the day they'd uncovered Lake Laogai. That was fine: Katara knew what move would come after. There were fifteen strong: seven at the back and eight at her front. They hovered on the rock, waiting a moment, and then the ones at her back slid down quickly, the rock hands coming for her, the ones in front following suit.

She froze the hands first, then crouched down and arose with water tentacles. Katara hadn't gotten her octopus water attack down just yet then (that would happen when she fought Azula) but she did now, and the several tentacles went toward those at her back, knocking three down. Katara jumped up from that formation and rode a wave from the lake nearby, going to meet with the front attack of the Dai Li. She met them with a tidal wave and froze them all for several seconds before thawing, and the men, in a state of shock, fell uneasily to the floor, cold and beaten. Katara turned to the four remaining Dai Li and took them out with a far reaching water whip. Once they'd fallen, she turned her head toward General Fong and rose with a wave again. He looked shocked for a moment, then came at her with a rock pillar aiming toward her head.

"HA!" Katara grunted and split the rock easily in two: she'd learned a thing or two from Toph, a true Earthbending master. She flung her whip to the ground beneath the kings feet and froze, making him slip and ruining his stance. Katara was there in an instant, outstretched hand to his neck, her face grim with determination.

"You lose," the girl said, and froze the bottom part of his body. He growled and tried to free himself, but could not, of course. This was how Katara would have like their terms to end. In reality, General Fong had caught her by surprise and used her to push Aang into the Avatar state against his wishes.

If there was one thing Katara hated, it was being a victim. If there were another thing...it was being used to hurt Aang.

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"I'll get to that a little later. But thanks," he added in.

"Right now I'm bit more curious about how this waterbending works. I knew someone who could do something similar, but only with ice."

Katara nodded. Made sense, anyway. He WAS the leader, and Katara had no wish to take that away from him.

"How it works?" Well that was unspecific, and it wasn't as if she could teach anyone who wasn't a bender. Of course he probably didn't know that, considering they were from different worlds. For all she knew, her ability could be witchcraft to him. "Waterbending is shifting through your element, really. Its not like the other elements, which are either stubborn, flighty or lightning quick with an edge of uniform. Waterbending is more of an element of flow, and you go slow at first when you're learning the moves. Once you get better, the movement is like dancing, and the faster you are the more of an impact you can make."

She demonstrated with the waterwhip. She moved it around slowly, as if it were a pet she was taking out to walk, except in the air and around her. Gradually, Katara began to move quicker and the pet became something like a snake, moving almost independently of the bender. Finally Katara let go, and it hit the ground with the impact of a boulder, and that made sense: the water had become ice.

He watched with curiosity and interest. It was really the combination of movement with control that caught his attention.

"Can you control it while you're sitting still? Or is the movement necessary?"

Katara nodded. "Well, you can't do as much sitting, since its only your arms moving, but you can still do some damage. Not that our tribe believes in going out and fighting if we can help it. We're mostly a peaceful tribe. The fighting came out of defense against certain enemies, especially the Fire nation later. But for the best Waterbending movement is pretty essential."

She looked over at Julian. "The only bending I usually do sitting down is healing though. It's not something you usually stand up for."

"Interesting. I've--" He started to stick out his arm, but cut the movement off midway. He currently didn't have any powers to manipulate. He played it off by running a hand through his hair. "--found that my friend would use some movement to focus, but he didn't really need it.

"It was more a matter of ease of concentration than necessity."

"That is pretty interesting," Katara said, noticing the odd movement but saying nothing. "In my world its actually all about movement. Each source of bending requires the person to resemble the element and how its abilities are able to make them stronger. It's pretty safe to say benders resemble their element quite a bit. we kinda have to."

Katara sighed. "Is your world full of magic too? I've already met a few interesting people."

"It has magic, but most of the powerful people on my world get their abilities from elsewhere. Unfortunately my world isn't exactly the best place to visit right now, though. Especially if you have powers." To say the least.

"Are benders fairly unique on your world? Or can anyone become one?"

"Hmm. I've heard a little about certain people getting angry over other people's powers. Actually, I even think I heard about it happening here, from certain people." Katara knew nothing of Daimon and Roxie's encounter, but she will soon, and will not be happy. "Not that Stacy will allow it if its not in the City. Violent situations are supposed to be prevented, right?"

Next question. She guessed she was a little like this to captain Picard. "No one can become a bender in my world, you have to be born with it, and even then how good you are is determined by how much work you put into it. Studying and training definitely helps."

"From which people?" It kind of figured that there'd be at least one jackass like that around here. He'd like to know who they were so he could shove them out an airlock.

He was interested in her answer about benders, though. Seems they did have more than a couple of things in common. "I see. No wonder Stacy put you on my team."

"I've heard a fight broke out on the city," Katara said. "Something about someone's beliefs and there was an attack. I don't know the details, but I'll probably find out once all of this is through. It might be important to find out though, just so we know who to avoid."

"Oh? How do you figure?" Besides being the only girl on the team, Katara wondered why she might be on the team.

He'll have to keep an ear out for that.

"Well, in my world, there are people born with special abilities. Called mutants, and I'm one of them. I used to be part of a group of mutants called the X-Men. It was our job to find and help mutants control their powers, and to protect them-- well, protect anyone really..." That was all part of the job.

"'Protect a world that hates and fears us,'" he kind of mused to himself. But he got himself focused quickly enough.

"Anyway, it makes sense that you'd be on my team."

"Oh, now I see why you asked," Katara said. That was definitely not a scenario she wanted to think about: enemies coming onto the ship. What if...but no, surely that wouldn't be a possibility. Stacy couldn't be that uninformed. Besides, she hadn't met anyone too obsessed with hurting others, right? They'd be thrown off the ship.

"I talked to a mutant named Gambit earlier, he told me about that. So I can see I ft the team all right. What about these other people though? Do we know anything about them?"

"Not much, if anything. I haven't met the rest of the team, and I've only met a relative handful of people on board. Though about the only people here I'd be worried about are the Avengers." Those bastards.

"I've met a few people, but I don't think they were anyone from our team. Just a witch, a priestess, a Starfleet captain, Gambit, this cool author lady..but nobody by those names."

Katara paused. "The Avengers? What are they, an anti mutant group?"

"They're not an anti-mutant group, per se. But they're dangerous.

"They're from my world," he explained further. "They like to call themselves heroes, and consider it their job to 'police' anyone who has superpowers, make sure we all play nice. Except they make the rules and they can change them at any time."

"That is pretty dangerous. What kind of heroes do that?" Katara was a little annoyed to hear about these kind of heroes. They reminded her of Jet the first time she met him: eager to kill off a whole town just because it had some Fire Nation soldiers in it. There were some things that Katara was simply not willing to give leeway for.

"There's no excuse for someone to do that," Katara said.

"They're not heroes. They just call themselves that," he corrected.

"Don't worry too much, though. They can't do much to you here. And if anyone tries to bother you, I'll deal with them."

"I think I agree with that," Katara said. "Those kind of people just turn into a different kind of oppressor."

Katara gave him a smirk. "Hey, you saw what I can do. I can defend myself!" Still, she appreciated the gesture. Katara realized this must be what Roxie thought when she acted all defensive.

"You got that right," he muttered in reference to the Avengers.

He smirked back, "Hey, you're on my team now. I'm the only one allowed to mess with you."

"Oh?" Here Katara got a little playful. "And what makes you think I'll go along with that, hmm?"

He only grinned, and put an arm around her shoulders. "It wouldn't be fun for me if you did."

"I don't have to do what you think is fun," Katara replied, sticking her tongue out. "But I won't anyway!"

Oh, he was full of himself, but confident, bold. Katara knew from experience that made a decent leader. As for how he applied that, they'd have to wait and see.

"You keep thinking that," he told her, giving her a little wink. Julian tended to have confidence to spare, even under these circumstances.

"But I'll let you get back to your workout now. Maybe sometime soon I'll join you. There might be some techniques from my world that might help you in your bending." Like iceslides. If you can make things freeze, then you need to learn how to make iceslides. This is a rule.

"Oh, I will," Katara shot back, returning the wink.

"Well hey, I'm always willing to learn something new. Maybe it'll improve what I already know."

"Can't hurt," he told her, finally heading for the exit.

"See ya around."

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kaya-waterwave.livejournal.com - 2009-08-14 21:31 (UTC) - Expand

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