trans_9 | Winter Wonderland: Southern Tribe Style

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alex furest

Winter Wonderland: Southern Tribe Style

She thought it would be impossible at first: the idea of keeping the area around the Outsider's hotel that cold, and keeping snow on the ground with just the use of water? It sounded crazy, and Katara had been wondered if she was skilled enough to do it. It was why she and Sokka hadn't had their Southern Water Tribe thing: it would have just been re-imagined in the Sensorium, and in a way that was almost cheating. The real experience, ice cold water and all, needed to be had, and there were certainly enough people on Trans 9 who could have used a little playtime.

That was, of course, before she had time to think. In time, she was beginning to see that where she had failed was really in her own confidence level: she could see her limitations, and didn't go further than what she could do. The longer she did that though, was more time she realized she had to be trained in other ways, if water wasn't available. It was hard to think about, but she had to be ruthless in her ability to be able to take down a person if she needed. This kind of fighting, though, felt much like murder. So after the Yeerk incident, she made a promise to never raise a hand against a person in that way, like her anger towards Jet or Zuko in the past. To do that would edge closer to that place, and she needed to remember the true goal: standing against the Ohm.

That said, she learned a great deal of other things, like how to super extend her breath, how to manipulate her body much more than she had before, and how to strengthen your feel of "wave" so much your arms were hardly ever tired. Now she found that this was possible, all that was needed was the water. With Stacey's approval, this happened.

And so Katara got to work, bobbing and weaving, guiding the water to solid water, using force to create that into powdered snow. It was work that would have severely diminished her in the past, but now it was simply a joy to be bending again, to have her element all around her instead of just contained in a small pouch, and she let loose. The snow was an interesting sensation, it was like shaping ice and then shaking it between her fingers: it littered the ground all around the Outsider's backspace, and she was glad that they had that backspace to begin with. She figured that once this was over, the water would bee used for the sauna, so she figured one last bit of fun would be a good thing.

"Okay!" She said after awhile, looking around her. "Now hopefully people will come!"

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The Overlord looked at Alex, one eyebrow raised in mild surprise. "Huh. You got sassy. What's been going on with you?"

Alex went red. "Oh, uh," had he really changed that much? "A l-lot, I g-guess."

The Overlord simply switched which eyebrow was raised, waiting for elaboration.

He smiled a bit, "W-well, Luna, K-Katara, Tavros, Billy," he went a little redder as he repeated, "Luna."

"I g-guess I've grown a b-bit."

Zetta smirked a little, but refrained from open mockery. "Good. You need strength."

Alex still probably wasn't strong enough to deal with open mockery too well. "Y-yeah, I g-guess I've been tryin'."

"Hyaaa ha ha ha! Now you get it, Alex! The path of strength is all about trying! Take the challenges! Face the foes you don't know if you can beat! And enjoy the hell out of it!" The book sounded approving as it grinned.

He shrunk away from Zetta a bit, "I th-think... I'd r-rather not have foes ta f-face, b-but I think I might be a l-little more o-okay with challenges. I really jus' w-wanna be strong enough t-ta stand on m-my own."

"There's always foes, Alex," Zetta said -- sounding almost -- a little -- maybe -- sympathetic? "'Specially when you can do fancy stuff like you. Someone's always gonna want a piece of that, or try to take out something important to you. Whether you want it or not. But hey, part of strength to stand on your own is strength to deal with that crap too.

"...And you're a friendly guy, so you can call for help and all that if you need it."

"I-I think I-I'll try ta avoid f-foes, but I guess y-you're right. I w-want to be able ta p-protect m-myself and m-my friends." He thought of Katara and all her fighting experience and amended that, "O-or at l-least myself."

He shook his head, "O-once Sam f-figures out wh-what gave m-me these powers though, w-we're reversing it, so I w-won't need to w-worry about doing f-fancy stuff any more."

Hmph.

We'll see about that.

"You think that's a good idea? I mean, sure, it won't happen here on the ship, but just because you don't have the powers any more doesn't mean you never had 'em to begin with. Either way, I'd bet a lot of people would wanna take you apart and figure out why you got 'em, how you got 'em, and what could make other people get 'em."

Alex shook his head, "I-if we c-can get rid of them, then I'll know how I g-got them. A-and back home, they a-already know why they were there, s-since they m-made it s-so I had them. I d-don't even know if I'll go b-back to my planet." He never fit in there. Even as a muggle he'd rather live with Luna in her world then go back to the hell that was his own.

"What, you can't imagine someone who doesn't know wanting to get that?"

He attempted to shrug, failed, nearly fell over, and glared at the snow bank as if it was somehow responsible.

"Anyway, I'll tell you this, Alex. If I gave up my mana and power tomorrow, and retired to the life of a hermit, there'd still be people coming after me. Whatever you are, you can't pretend you weren't what you were."

"Th-they c-can have it."

He wanted nothing to do with it any more. He just wanted to get rid of all of it. It might have helped him in his reading of people and intentions, but losing that would be worth being able to survive off of normal food. Like a normal person. Because he would be a normal person. "B-besides, p-people don't n-need to know that I was e-ever any different."

The Overlord looked at Alex in silence for a minute or so.

"You're an interesting kid, Alex," Zetta said. "I never knew anyone who hated power as much as you do."

"Power j-just brings c-corruption an' g-greed, and g-gets more p-people hurt. Physically or e-emotionally. I've seen it my whole l-life." The government, the doctors, the scientists, his father. Some people got corrupted more easily than others.

The Overlord stared a moment, then burst into laughter. "Hyaaa ha ha ha! Alex, you forget who you're talking to! This Overlord has seen his share of heroes with power over the years, remember! And I'm sure of one thing: It's not power that corrupts you humans. It's love of power. The evil ones? The nasty ones? They're the ones who want to be powerful! They're the ones who amass as much power as possible and don't care who they step on on the way up. And let me tell you," he said, suddenly serious. "They're worse than demons. No joke.

"But the people who take power for strength? The people who don't care about the power, but DO care about something enough to use power to fight for it or whatever? The only way they go wrong is if they forget what they're fighting for."

He looked up at Zetta, shocked. That was a good point. Mikel was powerful, but he didn't ever use it for himself.

But Mikel also had control. "B-but, I c-can't c-control my emotions th-the way s-someone with m-my powers should. I'm d-dangerous."

You're gonna have to do better than this.

"Hmph. You learned computer programming right? Did you just start knowing everything you should? Or did you quit because there was a chance you might have fried something?"

His voice cracked a bit as he insisted, "B-but that's a c-computer! These are people and th-their emotions! Y-you c-can't just replace those!"

"People's emotions get abused every day," Zetta said dismissively. "Mean words, stupid things happening, even just crappy luck. That's like saying you shouldn't have kids because you MIGHT MAYBE be a bad father. Or that you shouldn't date Luna 'cuz you MIGHT be a bad boyfriend or hurt her or something. You do the best you can, and if you screw up, you do the best you can to fix it. Oh yeah, that's another sign of the people who've gone bad -- they don't CARE who they hurt and they don't try to fix it!"

He shook his head, "I-it's not just that though! I-I'm b-basically m-messing with their minds! I'm j-just yanking s-stuff out! It's a l-lot more than j-just saying something, o-or doing s-something like a n-normal person!"

"Yeah, so it's bigger scale." Zetta shrugged, or at least sounded like he was doing so. "That just means you be careful and don't screw around. It means that if you have a big potential to do bad stuff, you also have a big potential to do GOOD stuff."

He fixed Alex with a challenging stare. "But bad stuff happens whether it's you or someone else doing it. You gonna tell me that you can just sit back and let it happen? Something important gets taken away from you, you're gonna let it go without a fight? Someone close to you is in trouble, you'd be fine knowing you CAN'T help, even though you COULD'VE if you hadn't given up on the powers that would've let you?"

"B-but," Alex protested weakly before sitting down in the snow. He buried his face in his hands shaking his head. He didn't want to listen to Zetta, but the damned demon made sense. How could someone so stupid make so much sense sometimes? "I-it's o-only ever c-caused me an' m-my friends t-trouble. I c-couldn't even e-eat anything m-more than a t-tier o-one shadow o-on my own before I g-got here. E-even now, j-just a t-tier two c-can hurt me. A-and then, I get overshadowed, a-and....

"I-if I c-can't do anything, th-then I also won't screw up wh-when they need me."

Zetta didn't let that look up, even if Alex couldn't see him. The strongest mana power in the cosmos had enough of a presence to make that look known without it needing to be seen. "Try, and you might fail, but you might succeed. Don't try, and you NEVER succeed. And if you try and fail, at least you know what not to do the next time."

HERP S'OKAY

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Zetta, how is it that you influence Alex so easily? XD

All his stats are awesome, including Charisma!

PFFFT

Re: PFFFT

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