Chapter 4: Water
Days past. Jen mastered blue fire and no sign of Trevor yet. It seemed that Trevor was waiting for a right time to strike when they weren't noticing. Jen kept her guard up. But today was time for some waterbending. It felt weird for her to go from fire to water. She had to follow the cycle though. Rishuv and Jen went to the training room, setting the scene at a beach. As usual, after they transformed, Jen went to change her outfit. This time, her clothes was an Under Armor sports apparel.
"Waterbending is a calm, flexible power. Hope you can be after mastering fire," Rishuv joked.
"I pretty sure I can," reassured Jen. "Another thing that can get me in a struggle is that my main power is lightning. Water conducts it."
"True. But I bet you'll do fine," he gave a smile to her. "Though water and fire are opposites, they can have same techniques. For example, the lightning redirection that Peter did before against you. Waterbending is about using your opponent's attacks against them. Peter was able to find the same particles of your lightning to his fire so it can go through him and back to you."
"I remember that. No wonder he can do it."
"Yep. Let's try to levitate some water. Move your hands like this and breathe in a constant pattern," he showed her the way to move a ball of water out of the ocean. Jen imitated his motions. But when the ball raised about a feet above the water level, it kept dropping. She was about to get irritated. Rishuv tried to calm her down and told her that anger won't help.
"Let's try something else. I'll shoot some light streams of water to you and try to block them, not dodge." He made some water streams circle around him. Then he turned and shot one at her. At the right second, Jen smacked the water but she didn't create a force around her so she was still drenched in water.
"Great." She said lowly.
Rishuv ran to her. "Sorry."
"It's fine." She put on her fire aura around her to get dry off.
Then Rishuv asked, "Can you sense the water movement?"
Jen didn't fully get what he meant, "Huh?"
"You told me before to go with the flow. Sense how the water travels and follow it."
Jen did remember when she taught him that. Why didn't she think of that? She thought she could control the water path more than follow it. "Let's try again," she insisted. Rishuv continued to splash her with the water jets. But she couldn't stop them still.
After a few more splashes, Jen had enough, "How about we call it a day?"
"Sure," Rishuv agreed.
Jen dried herself up again by using her flame aura and then went outside. "I just need to cool down," she laughed. "Not like I didn't have enough of that during the training." While she flew in the sky, she thought of why she couldn't waterbend. Was it that lightning and water didn't match up? Then how did the past Guardiankeepers master it? Still pondering, she flew with her back facing the ground. She didn't notice ropes coming straight at her. Before she can turn around, the ropes tied her body and wings up. Jen came falling down to the hard ground. Someone grabbed the Heart from her neck. Good thing that she could still be in her battle suit. Three chi-blockers surrounded her and put her into glass case in a truck.
"Trevor and the King will be so proud," one of the chi-blockers said as he holded the necklace up. The case that Jen was in was double-layered but water running in the middle.
"Don't even think about getting out. The water will conduct your lightning and shock you back and fill up the case that you're in. There is a water supply right next to you so water will keep filling the container. Trevor rather have you alive," the second chi-blocker explained. Jen was thinking, "So they don't know that she was a pre-Guardiankeeper yet. Not these chi-blockers." She kept it a secret but she still didn't know how to waterbend. The three closed the truck and drove off. Jen was confused of why they didn't use a portal or why Trevor didn't come to steal the heart himself. Why did he wanted her still alive? Anyways, Jen used her hand to burn the rope up so she was free. Then looked at the flowing water around her. With one hand on the case, she thought back at what Rishuv said. Go with the flow, something that she told Rishuv during his training. When her mind was back to reality, she looked at the water one last time. It's now or never.
She put both hands on the top of the case and stomped on one foot at the same time. Then slammed either side of the wall of her and stomped the other foot. She used the back of her hand to hit the back of the wall behind. Then slapped the front wall with her palm. She can actually feel the flow of the water now, like she was controlling how they move. Before another hit, she took a deep breath. Then hit the ground with one of her foot back a little and punched the glass harder. "Come on, water," she said as she struggled. She punched the glass again and the water broke out from the outside so it didn't flow in. Jen shook on her hand and said, "Whoo, Jen, you rule." She swung her arm which made more water break the case with its powerful force. Once the most of the water was out of the case and the extra water supply didn't interfere as much, she used lightning to break the rest the glass and making sure it didn't touch the water. The chi-blockers heard some noises in the truck so they pulled over to check it out. When they opened the back, Jen splashed them hard with water jets. The three were thrown back from it. Jen managed to take back the Heart from one of their hands and fly away. She wished she knew how Instant Transmission, going in the speed of light that Kylie, the former leader, developed. It was also a Dragon Ball Z reference. But Jen was going pretty fast for the chi-blockers to catch.
"Boss is not going to be happy about this," one of them said.
When Jen returned back to base, she went straight to bed. Exhausted from the day, she quickly fell asleep. She did managed to untransformed, brush her teeth, and change.
For the next day, Jen and Rishuv went back to the training room with the same setting. Rishuv was trying to think of an easier way for Jen to learn waterbending.
"Waterbending can really tough for you I guess, since your natural power is lightning. But I know you'll get better," assured Rishuv.
Jen nodded. She wanted to keep what happened yesterday a secret so she can surprise him and not to worry about it. They started by levitating some water. Jen pretended to struggle but eventually lifted a puddle up. Then a huge wave came up. Rishuv cheered for her. He was so proud of her.
"I knew you would eventually get it," he said.
"Thanks for believing in me," she hugged him. It was still a genuine hug because without his support, she wouldn't have gotten out the water glass case.
After a more days of practice, Rishuv thought she was ready for icebending. He set the scene in an ice cave.
"Ice is just a solid form of water, similar when you'll have to learn earthbending. You can use your breath to freeze the water," he demonstrated it by unfreezing the water and then blowing on the water slowly with some hand motions. "Or wherever water you touch can turn to ice." Rishuv found some water and rode on it, leaving and an ice stream behind him. "Pretty cool, huh?"
"Totally! I saw those before in shows," Jen exclaimed. She practiced icebending with him and soon got the hang of it. Jen's hands were usually cold in general and thought it could help too. Another week past. Rishuv flung some icicles at her at an unexpected time. Jen unfroze them quickly and created a force field around her so the remaining water won't get to her.
"You have mastered waterbending," he congratulated. Jen stared and smiled at him.
