Master of the Pielements [open]

[jesushasayak.livejournal.com]

The Person: Aang, the Avatar, master of all four elements, truly an individual to be reckoned with.

The Place: The Lounge. Right now, he was in the kitchen practicing his Airbending via the highly deadly art of--

Making fruit pies. What? It took some very precise Airbending to get the fruit fluff all fluffy on top. Good practice.

And eating the fruits of his labor was, uh...exercise for his jaw, yeah. And stomach.

Okay, so he was just hankering for cake after all that time with GLaDoS. It was still good Airbending practice, though.

And he brought the rest out to be served to whoever had a hankering for confectioneries.

"Hey, do you want a piece of fruit pie?"

Come and let me bake you the pie of my people.

Comments

[ayasofia.livejournal.com]

"No, you. I want to know what an airbender is." If only one of them had a coin.

[jesushasayak.livejournal.com]

Aang giggled.

"How about whoever finishes their pie first has to go second?"

Of course, he had a tiny sliver.

[ayasofia.livejournal.com]

"That's not very fair!" She was grinning as she protested.

[jesushasayak.livejournal.com]

"Leff talkink, mo' eatink!"

Ulp ulp ulp--too slow, Sofia.

Aang raised his arms in victory, then swallowed.

"Oh nooo," he said in an exaggerated way. "I guess I have to go second."

[ayasofia.livejournal.com]

Sofia laughed. "Alright. It's complicated. Where I come from there are mutants, usually born to normal people, but for some reason have a genetic mutation. That mutation makes them different in some way, it can make you look different or give you powers, sometimes both. I was- I am one. I went to Xavier's, a school for mutants like me. Most people hated us, so it was safer there and we learned how to use our powers." Looking back, it was one of the happiest times of her life. Then she sighed as she related the next part. "I don't know why, but one day, most of the mutants were depowered. They weren't mutants. They didn't have the gene anymore. If they looked different they were now normal. I lost my powers. They sent us all away from that school. Most of my classmates were killed on the way home." She'd leave out the exploding bus. "And some others who were still mutants, who were supposed to be protected, were killed. So, I had lost all my friends when I was sent back home only to lose them again, but worse, because they were dead.

"There is a happy ending, at least a little. When Stacy took me, she healed me and now my powers are back. I'm a mutant again. And my best friend, who had died, she is here too. So my other friends must be also be here."

[jesushasayak.livejournal.com]

"Stacy might have saved them," he said. "But if she didn't save them all, I'm sorry."

He shook his head. "I don't know what a genetic mutation is, but I understand powers. We have people like that we're I'm from--I am one. Benders. All of my people were Benders, but in other Nations, only some people are. But no one sees it as a bad thing. Why does it make people angry where you're from? I don't understand."

[ayasofia.livejournal.com]

Sofia shrugged. "I don't know. I think it's because we're different. People are scared of that because they don't understand."

[jesushasayak.livejournal.com]

"It must be hard to live with that. You must have to be very brave just to be who you are."

[ayasofia.livejournal.com]

Sofia blushed. "Me? Oh no, I- I'm not brave. I- I left my friends when they needed me. That's not very brave."

[jesushasayak.livejournal.com]

"If you stayed, you might have died, too."

[ayasofia.livejournal.com]

"Maybe, but I wish I had taken the chance... and I could have left in a better way." She mumbled.

[jesushasayak.livejournal.com]

"Then you made a mistake. People make mistakes. That's what makes us people."

Aang reached across the table and gently held her hand.

"I think what matters is that we regret it, that we care about other people enough to regret it. That we try our best to fix our mistakes. I'm someone that's...made a lot of mistakes, that hurt a lot of people, and in the end, the only thing I could do was forgive myself and do all I could to fix them. Sometimes that's all you can do."

He went on, "And sometimes that's enough."

[ayasofia.livejournal.com]

"Sometimes it isn't. I try and do my best and move on, but it's not easy." She took in a deep breath. "That is my story. What about you? What happened?"

[jesushasayak.livejournal.com]

"That depends on whether you want the long version, or the short version," Aang said, trying to think of a way to put it into words. "It's...complicated."

[ayasofia.livejournal.com]

"You can tell me the long version, unless you'd rather give me the short." She said. "I am not going anywhere."

[jesushasayak.livejournal.com]

A sigh.

"Okay. Well first of all, you need to know what I am. I'm what's called the Avatar, the spirit of my world in human form. I've lived more than a thousand lives, dying and being reborn into a different nation each time."

Got that?

[ayasofia.livejournal.com]

"Oh." That was a bombshell. She wondered if- no, questions could wait for later. "Alright."

[jesushasayak.livejournal.com]

"I found out I was Avatar when I was young. They wanted me to start training right away and wanted me to leave the monk who had raised me," Aang explained.

"So I ran away, and got caught in a storm, and me and my flying bison nearly drowned but on reflex, I froze us in ice. I went a hundred years frozen in the iceburg, and eventually was freed by Katara and Sokka--you've probably seen them around the ship."

[ayasofia.livejournal.com]

"Oh yes, I've fought with Katara- I mean alongside." She quickly corrected.

[jesushasayak.livejournal.com]

He smiled at that.

"One of the best things that ever happened to me was being found by them, being woken up from my sleep," he said, "but a hundred years had passed. I figured everyone I had known was gone or really old, but that my people--"

His voice broke.

"I thought that my people themselves would be still there. But what the monks had wanted me to train early for was the threat of the Fire Nation. The Fire Nation saw me as a threat."

How did he put genocide into words?

"There weren't any Airbenders left. The Fire Nation killed my people, hoping they were killing me as they did it. All of them."

[ayasofia.livejournal.com]

Sofia felt a chill go through her body. "Oh, oh Aang, I am so sorry." She put her hand on his shoulder, though she knew she couldn't do anything to take away his pain.

[jesushasayak.livejournal.com]

He looked over at her, his expression half-happy, half-rueful.

"So to see somebody else Airbend..."

[ayasofia.livejournal.com]

"You thought you weren't the only Airbender." She rubbed his back. "I know you have been here longer, so maybe you know more, but Stacy did say she brought our friends and family. My best friend was taken before she died, and others have their friends and family. There might be some of your people who are still in the pods."

[jesushasayak.livejournal.com]

"Maybe," he said, "but that's not a whole people."

He refused to mope, though. Refused.

"I know you're not an Airbender, but I'm glad I met you, because I think--I think you may as well be one."

The similarities were...obvious. He could tell her compassion was genuine, her gentleness was obvious.

"Would you like to learn Airbending techniques sometime? Some of them you might know know--Airbenders have to create their own technique to become a master, so a lot of techniques that are passed around are original."

A pause.

"And I don't want them to be lost when I'm gone someday."

[ayasofia.livejournal.com]

If her heart could actually grow, she would swear it was doing so now. Sofia couldn't keep the smile, or the blush, from her face. "I would be honored."