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Disclaimer: it appears that I don't own a single shred of AtLa

Practice

Aang had been planning his arrival to Ba Sing Se for quite some time now. After he got the great news from the Council he immediately ran to the streets of the Fire Nation Capital to purchase the things he needed. He was so elated that he almost forgot to cover his tattoos with his Fire Nation hat. He had bought that hat shortly after he had arrived at the Capital, because he resented the attention he would receive when he would stroll through neighborhoods. Girls would giggle around him, storeowners would pushed him into their shop to offer some free token of their appreciation, if he ever did want to buy something, the owner would refuse his payment. Of course, he was grateful that the shopkeepers offered their merchandise, but he didn't free right about leaving the owner empty handed. Most of them would say something along the lines of, "I need no money, having the Avatar in my humble store is more than enough payment." And then after he would leave, they would post a sign on their store when read in big, red bold letters, "AVATAR APPROVED!"

That also unsettled him, always being called the Avatar. It was such a detached label for him, like he just another bender in a long line of special people. They seemed to fuse Aang with all of his past lives and he felt that it was a title that he didn't really deserve. Well obviously he defeated Fire Lord Ozai, but he hadn't done any real Peace work yet. He was hoping that after he made a big change in the world, they would recognize him as Aang, not just the Avatar.

Aang was sure to pay all the storeowners the proper price and a bit extra to help their families. Aang had run into enough needy families to know that storeowners were much too proud to show their poverty. He quickly bought a uniform from the Fire Nation Academy, which was tricky to get his hands on without playing the Avatar Card; he convinced the salesclerk that it was for his young brother, Kuzon. He also purchased a dark red cloak with a huge hood that he could cover his face with. Strolling through the Fire Nation market, he couldn't believe his eyes when he saw sea prunes in one of the crates. It was a good sign that the nations were intermingling, but even more important, Katara loved them. He searched high and low for other Water Tribe delicacy, but when he couldn't find any, he decided to buy some ingredients for an Air Nomad classic, fruit pies. He could vividly remember the days him and Monk Gyatso would practice their aim by shooting their pies across the Air Temple. He sighed, as he silently missed his old friend and the rest of carefree, humorous Air Nomads. Hopefully, the Gaang can stop me from being homesick, he thought.

He spent the rest of week rigorously training with the Council members. Iroh begrudgingly taught Aang how to Lightningbend, which he picked up a lot faster than Zuko. The Fire Lord envied that the Avatar could "split energy" as uncle Iroh put it. However, Iroh was quite pleased that Aang could feel the energy around them; it was a good sign for the budding Avatar. Aang and King Bumi worked on their Metalbending, which neither of them were too good at, but it was a useful skill, just look at all the times Toph used it to get them out of sticky situations. He even asked Chief Hakoda for a few Water Tribe Warrior lessons. To Aang's surprise, Hakoda accepted. The Avatar wasn't sure how the Chief would react, considering he abandoned his daughter a few weeks ago. Aang was relieved that Hakoda was willing to teach him. To keep up with his Airbending, Aang challenged Appa to a race across the city. Many people on the ground pointed up and gawked at the Sky Bison and the Avatar flying swiftly side-by-side. Aang and Appa splashed down at one of beaches and Aang yelled, "It's a tie!" and laughed as Appa floated on his back, resting from the speedy race.

At the end of week, Aang challenged all of the Council members a fight at sundown. They looked skeptical, but they indulged Aang, seeing as how he leaving in a few days. However, Chief Arnook and King Kuei didn't feel comfortable enough to attack the Avatar, and quite honesty, they were no match for Aang, so they decided to watch instead.

Outside, at dusk, in the courtyard of the Fire Palace, Aang sat mediating as the Masters stood around him in a circle. They had all removed their ceremonial garb that they wore to the meeting and instead donned their much more comfortable sparring clothes.

Zuko made the first move, he altered his weight to his front leg, and Aang smirked with eyes closed, feeling the ground shift beneath the Fire Lord. In a split second, Aang Airbended himself from sitting position to twenty feet above ground, as Zuko's fireball sailed underneath the Avatar, almost frying King Bumi who swiftly sidestepped the blaze. Then, all at once, the Masters unleashed their fury.

The moment Aang landed, King Bumi sent a volley of medium-sized boulders at him, while General Iroh sent an inferno in the Avatar's directions. Aang hit the ground and quickly look up at the incoming rocks; he swiftly redirected them at Iroh hoping the fire would act as a smokescreen. And then, with only a few seconds to spare, split the Iroh's inferno right down the middle with hands point forward towards the ground. Iroh didn't even have time to react to the boulders flying from his fire attack and when the smoke cleared, Iroh laid belly up with the boulders scattered about him. Zuko looked over at his uncle, trying to see if his hurt, but thankfully Iroh sat up, starting laughing, and holding his hand up said, "I honorably accept defeat, young Avatar Aang," and then walked over to join Arnook and Kuei on the sidelines. Before Aang had time to reply, Zuko jumped in the air and lashed out with his right foot, sending a stream of fire at Aang. The Avatar thrust his hand together and sent a wave of air that pushed the fire and Zuko off to the side. Aang barely had enough time to breathe when he felt footsteps closing in behind him. Without looking, he bended the water from the grass around him and flung it behind him and quickly froze it. When Aang turned around, he saw the blade of Chief Hakoda's sword hanging only inches away from his face. Aang breathed a quick sigh of relief before King Bumi attacked once again. Bumi stomped the ground and a pillar of earth shot Aang into the air while Bumi kicked some more boulders, as if he was hunting bird with rocks. Aang narrowly avoided the boulders in the air, and had soon he hit the ground he sent out a whirlwind of air around him. When the gust hit Bumi, he barely moved and the King sent more attacks at Aang. Now on the ground Aang made his air scooter and nimbly dodged the boulders from Bumi and the fireballs from Zuko. He let the scooter dissipate when he was right in the middle of the two. He stared at Zuko, hoping that Bumi's heavy Earthbending footsteps would alert him if the King tried to attack. After a few seconds, Aang smiled at his good fortune, just as Zuko was winding up to unleash more fire, Bumi was shifting his weight to his back foot to kick some more boulders. The Airbender waited until both men attacked and then he opened the ground underneath him, fell in, and then sealed it above his head. In the pitch darkness, he could feel the earth shake overhead, and after a few seconds, he spun upwards and broke the surface to examined his handiwork. Zuko looked just like his uncle, belly up with dirt and boulders covering him, while Bumi had his clothes and some hair singed, Chief Hadoka was still encased in ice, and Iroh, Kuei, and Arnook clapped at Aang's shocking success. He took a mocking bow and thanked his "audience" for their time. Slowly Zuko and Bumi stood up and Aang Airbended the dirt of the Fire Lord and smothered the embers on his old friend's clothes. Aang walked over to Hadoka and released him from the ice, smiling at the irony of freeing Katara's father from his icy prison.

Iroh stood up from his seat and said, "Aang, I must say I am quite impressed with your talents. Although you are young, you have bested us Masters who have had many years of experience. You are very resourceful and clever, using my ally's attack against me and even using my own attack to your advantage. I am glad you are taking your training seriously, but why did you do so all of sudden? I mean, the first few weeks you hardly bended at all, but this past week it seemed like you were preparing to fight my brother again," he finished with a hearty laugh, hoping the others would take the joke lightly. Aang smiled at Iroh, and replied with, "Trust me, Iroh, I'm expecting much worse in the near future."

0ooo0ooo0ooo0ooo0

After a few days of running the new training academy, Sokka, Katara and Suki decided to take Toph out for a little treat as a thanks for making this dream possible. They were all shocked when they saw the academy that Toph spent days trying find and improve.

It was a beautiful, 40-acre plot of land in the Lower Ring that was enclosed by a thin row dorms so that the students could stay 24/7. The inner courtyard was split into four 10-acre rectangles for specialized fighting. One for Earthbending that had boulders of all sizes scattered throughout it. One for Waterbending that had streams and even a small lake inside it in addition to meadow. One for swordsmen that had training equipment along with rows of swords along its walls. And one for Kyoshi Warrior training, which came complete with sturdy fans, suits of armor, and other Kyoshi essentials. Needless to say, everyone was incredibly impressed with Toph's work and they were all eager to teach their pupil in such a wonderful facility, which still remained nameless.

Toph had tried to come up with a name that conveyed a certain bit of tranquility and yet still was intimidating, so she proposed "Peaceful Pulverizers" as the name for their academy. Katara offered something more practical, "Ba Sing Se Training Academy," but Sokka shot down both of these ideas, claiming that the first one made no sense and that the second was much too bland.

Toph had done a fantastic job with recruiting members of the Northern Water Tribe. Within a few days of setting their equipment up, literally boats loads of female Waterbenders pulled into harbor at Ba Sing Se, eager to finally learn some bender from Master Katara. Stories about her were still told in the Northern Water Tribe, Katara was the girl who defeated Master Pakku. The new benders were old and young, some ready fight, other ready to heal, some were even good enough to be Masters, which Katara was relieved about. She couldn't imagine teaching them all bending and healing! That would just take way too much energy. So instead, she decided to rigorously train five other Waterbenders to ease the workload, and although it took a lot of effort, she was pleased at the results. She was also happy that training them was so time consuming that she no longer thought of Aang constantly.

The other three noticed the change in Katara, too. Finally, she wasn't just sulking everyday; she now had something productive to do with her time. They were all really impressed on how fast and well she taught her other Masters. They were hoping to follow Katara's example and, with any luck, they could find some more teachers to help them.

After word got out that Ba Sing Se had a training academy for both benders and non-benders, there was a constant waiting list for people trying to learn from the Masters. Sokka and Suki were having a blast teaching the little kids how to fight in a dignified way. Sokka passed on the knowledge that he had learned during his travels and from Master Piandao. He taught them how to use their surroundings to their advantage, but he didn't force the kids to paint a beautiful scene on the mountaintop, which he still didn't quite understand the relevance of. Quite frankly, Sokka wasn't sure why Master Piandao forced him to make a rock garden either, but he was certain that the Master knew what he was doing, and so, if the children were good, he would sneak them into Toph's arena to mess around her rocks in order to express themselves. Of course Toph wasn't pleased that they were moving rocks around as an art form, but what did she care? It took her all of a few seconds to reset the boulders back to normal.

Toph was even thoughtful enough to build in a little blacksmith shop so that Sokka could teach his pupils how to craft their own sword. He was proud of them, their swords were beautiful and deadly, although nothing could compare to his space sword. He tried fruitlessly to forge another sword like that, but there was no metal that seemed light enough and strong enough at the same time.

While, in the next arena over, Suki was teaching both guys and girls the way of the Kyoshi Warrior; how to use your enemies force against them. And if they behaved well, "Master" Sokka, and "Master" Suki would don their Kyoshi Warrior armor and fight to show them some more advanced moves. The kids loved watching how they deflected blows and then quickly returned them.

Toph was also pleasantly surprised at the turn out of Earthbenders, she figured they would be tons of Earthbending teachers in Ba Sing Se, but apparently she had become a legend. Tales of the blind girl who could see with her feet spread throughout the Earth Kingdom Capital along with how she was so strong she could even bend metal. She received pupils of all talents, some who just learning how to move pebbles and others were on their way to becoming Metalbenders themselves. However, no one seemed to be able to understand how to feel the vibrations of the ground. Aang was the only one who could come even remotely close to Toph's "seeing" feet.

Even some of their old buddies came to the now popular training center. The Duke and Pipsqueak visited in the early days of the academy. They figured it would be a good way to catch up with the Gaang and learn some new fighting moves; they heard word that some people were organizing a rebellion near their forest and they wanted to be prepared if things got ugly.

Sokka nearly burst out laughing the first time Pipsqueak held a five-foot long sword that looked like a toothpick compared to his immense size. Teaching him the ways of the swordsman was quite difficult considering his lack of agility, but some how he turned out to be half-decent with a blade; swinging his logs around for a couple years probably helped him adjust to the sword.

A few days later Haru and Teo arrived at the academy. They both helped run the center smoothly. Haru was becoming a phenomenal Earthbender and taught along side with Toph, which made showing offense and defense much easier for her. It was difficult to demonstrate proper blocking technique without someone to attack you and she was grateful that Haru had agreed to help at upon the academy.

Teo assisted Sokka and Suki by creating rudimentary sparing bots, essentially a dummy that would flail around so the pupils could practice defending themselves. This way, Sokka and Suki could walk around while the pupils were using the bots and give out helpful pointers that wouldn't have been able to do otherwise.

One afternoon, the Gaang decided to give their students off to rest and relax. Truthfully, the Gaang needed the break as much as the kids did. Though they acted mature while teaching, the Gaang members were still only teenagers. That afternoon they decided to head out to the more open land of the Ba Sing Se. They decided to spend their free time near hill with a dense forest and a beautiful stream running alongside it. Sokka planned a romantic picnic with Suki off near a willow tree. Teo and Toph talked excitedly off by the stream. Pipsqueak and the Duke were playing in the nearby woods. And that left Katara and Haru together, all alone. She glanced at the Earthbender and blushed slightly; he had grown even more since the Invasion. He had become more toned due to the hours of training of his pupils and it definitely showed. His muscles were more define and Katara took notice, blushing even harder. Maybe she could let go of Aang, of course it would a long time before she could ever love someone the way she loved Aang. But maybe if she just gave Haru a chance, her heartache would disappear.

And that's when the shadow descended from the heavens.

Don't worry Kataang lovers, they will be no Katara & Haru, I promise. I'm just doing it because I feel that jealously and such would strengthen Katara's and Aang's love for each other. And quite frankly, I don't enjoy the idea of Aang and Katara being hopelessly in love...yet. Trust me, they'll fall deeply in love in the near future.

Please don't forget to review! Just write a few words (and considering I already wrote over 10,000 words for you, I think you could write me a few)!