She had been falling for so long in an endless pit of darkness that it no longer frightened her. It felt soothing to be hurdling head first into nothingness; all the pain, sadness, joy and love had withered away into the abyss and she felt renewed. As calming as it was, something was pulsing in her chest and it bade her to stop the fall. She brushed back a strand of silky, white hair and stretched her arms outward. Air rushed through her forearm and she blasted a hole into the nothingness; a bright light overtook her and the fall was broken - she had returned.
As she blinked open her eyes, she felt a blanket of warmth surround her. She groaned at the ache in her head and gripped on to the mass of black fur to pull herself up. A lazy huff emitted from the gigantic lion as he roused with his master.
"Kuro, where are we?" Kyra scanned her surroundings and saw sand, sand, and more sand.
The large beast stretched its limbs and shook his mane free of as much sand as he could. Kyra laughed at his futile attempts but assisted her friend by blowing the sand out of his hair. She blasted the air until his mane poofed uncharacteristically. If that much sand was in Kuro's mane, she could only imagine all the sand in hers. She leapt in the air and straddled his back. Before she could think of anything else, a loud rumbling sound came from her stomach.
"I guess we should find some food." She grinned at the lion.
Kuro agreed and beat his wings as he took off running. Kyra held onto his mane and was glad to be high up above the sand and heading toward the ocean. They needed to find a city; anywhere that had decent people that would feed her and Kuro. She didn't have any money, but she could work for her meal. After a few hours, Kyra saw something marvelous in the distance. A city unlike any she had seen before with tall spires and a marvelous bridge. She didn't remember such a grand city in any of her travels, so she landed a good distance outside of its limits just in case. Kuro would be safe up here in the mountains, and it wouldn't be hard for her to get back up here with her airbending abilities.
"Stay here, Kuro, we don't know how if they're friendly." She pet the creature's nose and hushed his whines.
She didn't understand why she was practicing such caution, but she knew she had to keep Kuro hidden; not to mention she had an unexplainable wariness of firebenders. She must have suffered from extreme heat exhaustion, or maybe she hit her head hard on something. She massaged her temples as a keen headache came upon her. She jumped off the edge of a cliff and tried to bend air to break her fall, but something was wrong. She tried the movements again, but nothing happened. She yelled as she continued to plunge, and with one last attempt, she directed her palms to the earth and thought of pulling the earth towards her.
Kyra prepared for a painful landing and clenched her eyes shut, but realized she had stopped falling.
"Great, I'm dead… I just know it." She muttered as she opened her eyes. "Or not…" she looked down and found that she had caused the mountain to rise to her before she could fall. "But that's impossible, I'm not…" she clenched her fist and willed the earth to bend, and it did. "an earthbender…"
She felt dizzy and fell on her haunches. She had just earthbend, but she was definitely an airbender. She stood up slowly and did one of her airbending drills and successfully produced the sought after effect. She focused on her breath and pointed her fingers towards the sky and felt awe and fear as a zap of lightning emitted from her fingertips.
'It can't be…" Kyra looked at her hands and then back at the city. In the midst of the bay was a huge statue of an airbender; nearby was an island temple. It sort of looked like an air temple, but much more humble…. perhaps the monks had decided a new location was needed. Kyra cocked an eyebrow, it wasn't as exclusive as the other air temples; she wondered if the airbenders had finally lightened up on all their rules of enlightenment- she doubted it.
She walked towards the shore and outstretched her arms; she should be able to bend water too. She moved like the water and sure enough she was able to solidify the water into ice. Was she the Avatar? There was only one way to find out. She quickly made a path to the lone monument and felt a rush as she slid all the way. She grinned and sped up her progress by having the wind push her.
Once at the shores of the giant statue, she heard a man's voice. She quietly jumped to the the knee of the statue and spied on the man below.
"Father… I'm trying my hardest to keep your dream alive." The man stood solemnly and kept his eyes on the ground.
Kyra noted his airbender tattoos and found that he looked awfully familiar to her. She looked up at the statue she was directly under and wondered who his father had been.
"As the Avatar, you healed a world at war and created Republic City, a hub where all people, benders and non-benders alike could live in harmony, but without you here, I can feel the foundation of the city shaking… the balance is being upset. Avatar Korra isn't ready to fill your shoes… she's still in training after all."
Kyra's heart dropped as the man continued talking to the statue. There was already an Avatar.
"It will still be another two years before I head down to help her master airbending, but-" The man felt himself being watched and looked up at Aang's statue-nothing was there.
"Tenzin!" He turned to find his wife coming towards him.
Kyra felt her heart beating quickly as she pressed into the statue. He would have seen her if she hadn't reacted so quickly. Avatar Aang had been an airbender… the new Avatar would be a waterbender… then she was… an accident? Also, what air temple did the old man come from, she was positive none of them were nearby. She glanced back down and saw him surrounded by three children flying on gliders. They were his? She hadn't known monks to have children… none of the monks she had known anyways. Her keen headache returned and she couldn't help but sigh as she returned to the shore of the monument.
"Hey there!" A dapper voice caused her to jump. She turned to find one of the three airbender's children right behind her.
"Oh sorry, I didn't mean to scare you, what are you doing here? Do you come here a lot? I haven't seen you here before, so probably not, right? My name's Ikki by the way, what's yours?"
"Uh…" Kyra wasn't sure which question to answer first. The girl continued to smile up at her. ""Nice to meet you, I'm Kyra. I'm new here, so it's my first time" She placed her hand at the back of her head and chuckled nervously; she really didn't want to be seen by the girl's father. Before she could worry further about being seen her stomach emitted the most embarrassingly loud rumble.
"You must be really hungry; here have these." Ikki handed her a bunch of seaweed wrapped food. "My mom always makes too much."
"Thank you." Kyra smiled and took the delicious smelling treats. She hadn't eaten traditional airbender's food in forever.
"Will you come over and play with me! You're really pretty and you seem nice. I have a sister and a brother, and you could be their friend too! We could play all kinds of games; you're a bender right? I saw you bend the statue, so you must be an earthbender, how cool!"
Kyra felt like the small girl could go on forever so she interrupted her by saying, "I actually have to get back to my camp as soon as possible. You see, I have a friend who also hasn't eaten in a long time, and I'm sure these would help him out a lot… though he might be mad there's no meat in them."
Ikki's face immediately turned into a pout, "Awww ok…"
"I'm sorry, I really wish I could after all the kindness you showed me. I know, I'm looking for the Avatar, and when I find her, we'll both come and visit you." Kyra had just thought of a plan.
"You're looking for Korra? I know her, she's my friend too!"
"Really? Would you happen to know where she is?"
"She's training in the South Pole with the White Lotus, I think. I'm not really sure exactly where, I've only gone with my dad."
"Alright, well thanks Ikki. I promise to visit you soon, oh and… also are you from that strange tower that looks like a miniature air temple? "
"Sure, we're the last airbenders and my grandpa started that temple!" The small girl was proud to report.
"The last airbenders?" Kyra cocked her head, "What do you mean the last?"
It was Ikki's turn to cock her head. "Well my grandpa was the last airbender, and then he had my dad who was also an airbender, and now me and my brother and sister are also airbenders, so that makes us the last airbenders." Ikki gulped for air as she finished her run on sentence.
"Ikki!" Kyra heard Tenzin call for his missing daughter in the distance.
"Well it was nice meeting you Ikki." Kyra smiled warmly and Ikki was taken aback by the girl's beauty. "Also, one last thing, could you keep our meeting a secret until we meet again?"
"I'll keep it a secret, see you later Kyra!" The young airbender waved bye as her friend waterbended her way out towards the ocean. "Huh… I thought she was an earthbender." Ikki scratched her head, "oh well!"
Kyra rushed back up the mountains to where she had left Kuro. She wasn't the Avatar, and the airbenders had somehow dwindled down to only four people- it was a lot to take in upon waking up in a sandy desert.
"Kuro," Kyra took out her bundled food, "I met a nice girl who gave us food for free!"
Kuro yawned and raised his nose to sniff at it. He growled and threatened to paw it away.
"Aww come on, don'f be piffy! If's all we haf for now." Kyra had already stuffed two in her mouth. "So good!" She chowed on the rest.
Kuro gave an annoyed roar and refused Kyra's offer. He swatted her with his tail and shook his mane.
"Ok, ok, we'll sneak into the city at night; you're much harder to see then." She knew he wasn't going to settle for anything less than cooked meat. "I learned a lot of strange things when I was out there, Kuro." She held a ball of fire in her hand and then simmered it out with water, and then threw a rock surrounded by a ball of air out into the distance. "See that, I can bend all four elements!"
Koru didn't seem too impressed and rolled his eyes as he lay back down on the ground.
"You're just angry you haven't eaten." Kyra meekly offered an apologetic smile. "the sun is setting now so it shouldn't be too long until we can venture out."
When the sun set completely and night fell upon the great city, Kyra headed out on Kuro's back. It wasn't easy to hide a massive creature like Kuro, but his black fur and mane let him hide in shadows exceptionally well. Kyra avoided busy streets filled with strange, 4 wheeled boxes that didn't need an ostrich horse or buffalo yak to pull it, and kept to dark alleys. Eventually she found a park with a rather large lake.
"Kuro, I bet you I can catch a fish!" She whispered and began to waterbend until she caught a fish. She chuckled and found a nearby stick. Then she roasted them with her newfound firebending abilities. She did it a few more times until she had enough for a feast.
"My, my, what have we here!" Another whispering voice startled her from the nearby bush. "Mind if I have one of those?"
Kuro looked at the man, looked down at his pile of fish and decided he could spare at least one. He pushed it towards him, and began devouring his pile.
"Whoa, I didn't even see you there big fella!" The man was startled by Kuro's presence but took the fish all the same. "Let's make sure the guard never hears about this, I'm sure they'll notice this large amount of fish missing."
"They keep track of how many fish are in the lake?" Kyra asked.
"this missy is a pond- man-made, and fishing in it is illegal." The man shined a toothless grin at her. "But I'll never tell on you."
"You're telling me they made a lake, put fish in it and don't let people eat the fish?" Kyra was astounded by this strange city.
"I'm glad there are still people out there with a sense of humor!" The man roared with laughter. "Oh, that's the guard now." A pair of flashlights were seen in the distance, "Why don't you join me for dinner?"
"Sure, but…" She looked tentatively at the bush, "Kuro can't hide in there."
"Yes, he can" the man in rags revealed a rather large secret door that led underground.
Kyra smiled and signaled Koru to follow the man. She jumped in and was amazed at what she saw-below was a whole other city.
"Welcome to my humble abode!" The man boasted and spread his arms out wide.
"Wow, this is amazing, it's like a whole other town."
"You know, you're not like most people, where are you from?"
"My name's Kyra, I'm from…" the keen headache returned, "well not from here that's for sure." She ignored the pain as best she could.
"I could tell as much, well I'm Go, nice to meet you. Are you a traveler?"
"Just about, I'll be heading to the South Pole soon." Kyra recalled what Ikki had said to her. "But if I could stay here the night I would be much obliged. I can pay you in fish?" she offered the five that she had left.
"How about I take one, and you keep the rest for your journey." The old man smiled and showed her to a pile of rags. "You can sleep here or wherever. I take it you sleep on your mythical beast." He casually referenced Kuro who gave him a big lick.
"Thank you for your hospitality. Kuro thanks you too." She gave him a slight bow and bade him goodnight.
As she rested against Koru's fur, she smiled and drifted off to sleep. She wasn't sure where she was, or what had happened to her memory, but tomorrow she would set out to search for the Avatar. She felt like when she met the Avatar, she would figure things out and that was enough to keep her mind from racing too far ahead.