trans_9 | Work and Play

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Work and Play

Aine panted, holstering her gun in the under the shoulder holster it came with. The Intar she collected from Weapon's storage was working well. Not needing to charge her own power when into the weapon was different though. The lack of bullets did help, and while it was not a killing weapon. Which really was more options than anything, the event with the blood drinkers proved that the ship was hardly a unified front. So having the choice between putting them down, or putting them down and finishing them with her knife was a blessing. Also Stacy wouldn't give her the other weapons she looked at.

She had spent the past hour testing the weapon, giving targets to fight with. Covering range tests, fire rates, accuracy, and a few test fights against AI opponents provided by Stacy. They were simple gunfights, no reason to remove the safety protocols. If you are hit in a gunfight like that, you're dead, healer or not.

Right now, though, she sniffed the air. She was sweaty and tired, and wanted to at least rinse off. She piled up her jacket, weapons, and holsters in the corner, "Give me a stream, clear water, clean. Afternoon sun, and..." She looked down at herself, now that the plantsuit was with her other items, "Something suitable for the water."

She started washing up, her preference would be to wash normally, sans clothes. However she knew this was both not a private location, and that her age seemed to be an issue with many. So she decided this should be a fair compromise if anyone came in. While she was out of that wretched suit, she might as well check her gemstones. That which let her powers flow freely, moving her fingers methodically from one gem to the next, a faint light escaping them as she checked them.

She looked around the fake world she was in, while her fingers checked the gems on her back. It was a very pretty creation, fake, but pretty. "Give me... flowers," several red blooms appeared on a tree and the grass near the stream. "No... blue flowers." All the flowers turned blue. That was neat to play with, this was quite a place.

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"If they want to look, that is their concern," Aine shrugged, "Camps didn't generally bother with personal showers, or gender split showers. I'm used to it." She eyed the extended hand, an odd greeting pose. Aine put her hand over the silver heart, the silver plate on her chest, with gems like on her back and arm. She then offered a bow to the other woman.

"White Aine of the Daingein," She considered the people name, of course her first thought is she's a Blue. "Pretty?" Aine looked at her own gems a moment, "They were installed when I was eight, everyone in my people gets them as a part of joining the military. They help amplify my Soul to use my abilities." Nobody ever called the Manastones pretty before, what an odd thing to think.

Katara sighed inwardly. Whenever she bowed, people looked at her strangely, so she started to do the handshake thing, It just figured that it would be the exact opposite effect in this situation. "Not that I'm saying there's anything wrong with that: I mean, the body is the body. People just tend to be, uh, particular about it on the ship, and even in their worlds. I don;t really care."

The gesture was unique though.

Katara tried not to look embarrassed. "I didn't mean to insult you! It's just...I'd never see anything like that before, and I wanted to pay you a compliment. Now I'm just really curious. Your soul has abilities? What can it do?"

"I didn't plan to stop wearing the 'clothes' Stacy provided me," there was a definite distaste in describing the plantsuit as clothes. And, for the record the thought had crossed her mind to just neglect the plantsuit, save the detail it would make carrying her weapons more difficult. She would rather find clothes. "However if after my training I want to relax with a cool bath. I hardly see how they can complain about walking in on me naked."

"Nono, I'm not insulted. Just that they aren't noticed like that. Beauty is saved for features, clothes, nature, and fighting skills." She rarely gained compliments, she was given a few for her calmness in the battlefield, while she was healing one boy he compared her to an angel. The most cliche of compliments a White can get. Aine was calm as she explained, "I'm a White, my soul extends out as a divine power to heal injuries. My guns are with my clothes, they help focus my power."

Katara nodded. "Trust me, I can agree with you on the plant suit. If it were up to me, I would be wearing my water tribe clothing most of the time. I guess the plantsuit is helpful in certain ways, but I really would prefer to wear my own kind of clothes." She could see what the girl was talking about though. "I agree there, its just...people from different places have different hang ups, or wouldn't think twice about looking at you in the bath. People on the ship can be strange like that."

"Oh!" Katara exclaimed. "You can heal injuries too? I can, but I don't need jewels for it, just water. It's a part of my element, and some of us are born with the power of waterbending. It means we can use the water as a weapon, in healing or even as a shield if we need to."

"Again, it is none of my concern who decides to stare at me," Aine lay back on the water to get her hair wet. She wasn't seeing what the big deal was, if they had such hang-ups over nudity they can just leave the area. If they cannot control their eyes it is another weakness that can be exploited. "Still don't see the problem with my activities, if my nudity was a concern for you, you would have left already. For instance."

A Blue with the power of healing? What a strange concept. However... a shield might be a good way to manifest her own Light, "The gems aren't why I heal. White is the Nature of my Soul, the gems simply help to take it from my core and turn it into something tangible. Like turning grain into bread."

"I see," Katara said. "That's a pretty enlightened way to look at things, actually. I'm sure my teachers on the ship think the same thing: the Bene Gesserit way aren't too shy about the secrets of the body with something as simple as nudity. I'm pretty sure that I might have averted my eyes out of politeness before, but not now, Besides, we're both girls, right? It hardly matters."

Katara was rendered speechless at that though. She wasn't used to hearing about colors being helpful in what one could do. This was another lesson in what she had to discover about people from different worlds. "I've never heard of anything like that, not really. How do you mean that 'White' is the nature of your soul?"

"Enlightened? More like realistic. Age eleven we move into housing with our unit," Aine offered, "Four boys and only one other girl. Most of our time out of studies were spent together. And with shower rotation done in groups of three it was not like we ever were without a male present. Gender really isn't a matter to me, and averting your eyes simply leaves you open to attack."

"Our Titles in the military are designed by the Nature of our Soul," Aine motioned to herself, "My title is 'White' because I hold Life magic. Healing powers. If 'Waterbending' is power involving water and ice, you would be a Blue."

"Well," Katara said, feeling a little dumb, "with most people and most cultures, they have the luxury of feeling shame about things like that. I guess it really comes down to taboos and things, maybe I used the wrong word for it. If I were to ever say something like that to my brother, he would probably freak out. There's no way he'd want any male looking at his baby sister with no clothes on no matter what anyone would say to him."

"Oh...I see." That did make a little more sense, actually. She always identified with the color blue, but she never thought it would indicate what she was. "What other colors are there?"

"Brothers still do that where I am from as well," Aine laughed, "Liam has a younger sister, he has threatened those in her unit to keep their eyes off her. Although his eyes do roam a little in the shower." She remembered him giving that little speech to the younger students near his sister. He also remembers that shouting when his sister found out he had no problem eying girls in the shower.

"Well, Liam is a Red, opposite of Blue and controlling heat and flame," Aine started, "My CIT is a Brown, mastering Earth, and our Commander is Green, Air. The rest of my unit are Orange, Grey, and Blue. Which are Animal and Manipulation respectively, and you know about Blue. There's also Yellow for Lightning, and Purple for Plantlife. Black is the opposite to my power, feared most of them all. Death."

Katara laughed. "Then I guess sibling protectiveness with a little hypocrisy is something that would be shared through other people's worlds. My brother would probably be roaming with his eyes too, though he does mean well. He;s just, well, VERY into the ladies if you get my drift. I guess he'll always be like that though."

She listened very carefully when she started to describe all the different colors, and when she was done, Katara did stare a little in awe. "In my world, while we are restricted to the four elements, within them are some others too. For instance, since everyone in the world is dependent on water to live and made of it, master waterbenders have the ability to bend the water within them, giving them the ability to control their actions, though there are only two who can do it where I come from, and I'm one of those two. Lightning is also an ability a firebender possesses, but very few have that too. Death though...no one possesses that. What can those with that color ability do?"

"Most of them do mean well, they just have to learn control, Liam is- was," Aine corrected, "the one with this problem in my unit. Although Ciara did her best to get this response from the others. And Liam did not simply let his eyes roam on us girls." All Daingein soldiers eventually found a mate, and had children. You could earn your mother a title if she died in childbirth. However so long as you had finished your first tour, what you did with whoever happened to be stationed with you, nobody batted an eye. So long as you managed to make duty stations on time and it didn't get you killed.

There was some sense to the words, although Greys did not manipulate through a known medium. A Blue manipulating the blood of another would be quite deadly, but she had never heard of it. "The four elements are the most common Natures. Grey and Yellow a little less so, but still most of the society. Orange and Purple are not as common, but you can generally find more of them than Whites and Blacks. Blacks have two of the most feared powers, most cause decay. Aging and dying from an interaction with a Black is common. However there are those that can cause death to those near them, even worse are those that go beyond death, raising those that fell near them."

"The touch of a White can remove some effects of a Black, save death. And we are the few that can safely free those souls twisted by a Black's revival," Aine let the powers flow to her hand, "We cannot heal a Black however, no matter what we try. Cursed Souls of those marked Black die from our powers, like their own powers were used on them."

Well. That was a whole big bag of more confusing things that Katara didn't quite get as far as colors and things were concerned. Elements seemed a bit more understandable than colors in her opinion anyway. Still, what she said about blacks was very interesting. She wondered what Aang would have said about it.

"Death isn't really something to be feared for me. I mean, I don't want to die or anything, but its that part of life no one can really escape. Death is kind of an eventuality that no one can escape. I kinda think its all a part of the whole, the balance. Obviously there's different kinds of death that are horrible, that shouldn't happen. I know a few people that shouldn't have died before their time."

And that was as far as she'd say there.

"What types of people are Black, anyway?"

"Blacks do not cause a natural death. At least those that can kill instantly, and raise those beyond this world," Aine tried to explain, "We do not fear death, we die in battle and will be remembered in stories forever. However to die without battle, to fall to the thoughts of a single man, is a cruel end. Worse still is not being allowed to pass, your soul twisted into an dark creature to fight not for your own will, but by the will of another."

She remembered fighting a Black, she was sent alone for she had to. He had both the powers most feared, "The only Black I have met ended a town, and the three units deployed there. The only sin he did not commit was to murder the children not ready to be conscripted. He raised them to be his own army and ways ready to move to the next town."

That was one of the few times she was either alone or afraid, let alone both. The only aspect of that night that settled Aine's mind was that her gun freed those souls from an unspeakable torture, to be dragged back from the dead a sin no man should do. The bitterness in her voice told exactly how the girl felt about this subject, "I don't care what type of people they are."

That was scary to Katara all right. She had no idea about her world, but she knew enough to know what kind of people did things like she was describing. Images of Azula on a throne of bones, hurting people and making them suffer was something she could see vividly. She'd never tell Mai about it of course: Azula had been her friend, but Azula was always the person she saw whenever she thought of a person that was pure evil. She could still see the craziness in her eyes when she'd struck Zuko down with lightning that was meant for her. In fact, were she able to see herself, she would have seen she'd paled a little.

"I apologize," Katara said. "I didn't know. No one in my world can do anything like that, but that's only because they don't know the method. I'm not a stranger to some of the evil that men do. For them, the only thing that matters is strength and power. What your describing...that's horrible."

She knew what kind of people Blacks were, all right.

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Work and Play

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