Pikea has only ever known the Southern Water Tribe, and it has allowed her to learn something most Firebenders never fully do. Control. But while she has gained one, she has lost the other. Pikea had no Passion. And then she met Zuko.
Tempered By Water
Chapter 1: The Water Tribe's Firebender
Despite the rumors to the contrary- there were in fact two benders still residing in the Southern Water Tribe. One was the young waterbender, Katara. The other... the other was an older girl named Pikea, and she was a firebender...
Her mother was Nukka, a water tribe girl who was taken prisoner in one of the raids. Her father, Durhi, was a firebender- one of the soldiers guarding the water tribe prisoners. Durhi fell in love with Nukka; he fell in love with her beauty, with her kindness, and her great cleverness. He did his best to make her like him back, but it was not until he almost lost his life to protect her from danger that Nukka finally gave in to the feelings she had been slowly developing for him.
Their love for one another was great, but their fear kept them from trying to escape together. It was fear, however, which finally moved them to run. Fear... when faced with perhaps the one thing which should have brought only joy.
Nukka was with child.
Durhi knew that even if, by some miracle, Nukka survived the process of childbirth in the Fire Nation prison camp- their child would not. They had to escape.
With the aide of the other water tribe prisoners- they staged a breakout.
Nukka got away.
...Durhi did not.
Heart heavy with grief for her lost love, Nukka led the other water tribe escapees across the unforgiving tundra, back to their home. Although she had clearly loved a firebender, the tribe still accepted Nukka back into their hearts, and they loved the dark haired, pale skinned girl-child that she birthed as one of their own.
Pikea was wild and willful; it was no great shock to any of them that she became friends with the warrior-to-be Sokka, –Whom conveniently 'forgot' her gender except when he used it to make a point in an argument.- instead of the calm Katara, –At least, she tried to be calm, Pikea just found her to be a nagging killjoy most days.- but despite these things, she was still a good girl at heart who cared about everyone in the village. If she was asked for help, she almost always gave it, even if she really didn't want to.
Her mother passed on from the world when Pikea was nine years old. Sokka's family took her in and loved her as if she belonged with them by blood. Although she was grateful for their kindness, she was despondent. Her heart was full of grief for a very long time after that. She learned to hide it, to spare them worry.
Her only consolation was that her mother was finally with the man she'd only every heard tales about- her father. She took comfort in that, and she liked to imagine that they were watching over her from Spirit World.
It did not help on those bitingly cold nights when all she wanted was a hug from her mother to make the dark feelings within her heart go away.
When, approximately a year later, Pikea discovered that she could firebend- she disappeared for two whole months. When she came back, it was with an Arctic Foxowl at her side and a subdued air about her that was completely unlike the girl they knew so well. Whenever she lost her temper and used her firebending instinctively, she would disappear again for another month or two.
At first, Sokka thought Pikea was running away out of fear for the tribe's reaction, but as the time between incidents stretched, he realized she left to train herself. To learn control. By the time she was fourteen, she no longer needed to leave.
She still did though, that was a thing he couldn't understand. It was Katara, instead, who came the closest to understanding it. Bending was in their blood; to not bend, it was like denying a part of your soul. What only Pikea knew, though- was that she left to do it, not to protect everyone from her fire, -she had learned the art of control- but to keep them from being reminded of all the horrible things visited upon them by firebenders. She was protecting them from memories.
She always left in the summer, during the time of the midnight sun, and returned with a look of peace on her face. She had the temper, the rash nature, of a firebender, but it was tempered by growing up in the Southern Water Tribe.
Although the only bender was Katara, the people of the tribe all had a certain air about them, a flow. They understood the nature of Tui and La, even if they could not relate it to bending. It taught her to be flexible, taught her how to let go. It could not change the fierceness of her spirit, but she learned that the fierceness did not have to be big in order for it to burn brightly. It was a lesson that many firebenders had long since forgotten.
Pikea's bending was beautiful, almost fluid in her motions, and she had absolute control, but there was no strength to her movements. No force. No true, undying passion. She could fight with her fire, but against another firebender, she would undoubtedly lose. That would not stop her from trying her absolute best.
Especially if she was fighting to protect the tribe.
The people she loved with all of her being.
She would do anything to protect them.
Pikea understood the harsh nature of the war. The very blood in her veins, despite the great love that created it, was a testament- an everyday reminder of the war.
So she understood Sokka's caution when they met the boy in the ice, but that did not mean that she agreed with him. "What do you think Sokka? The Fire Nation sealed him inside the glacier for us, in our fishing boats, to find? You think it's a trap? An elaborate plot to take us down with adorable little kid smiles? Sounds positively devious to me. Truly."
She could not, in that moment, decide which was funnier- the expression on Sokka's face, or the Bison-drool covered airbender boy that had inadvertently put it there.