Squawk! Squawk!
"Stupid possum-dodos" Muttered a restless Maro sniggled deep in the warmth of her beddings; but not for long as she rolled off of the bed and hit the floor with her blanket.
She meagerly stood up, leaving the blanket to continue its rest on the light brown carpeted ground.
She left the small bedroom with nothing but a desk, chair bed and small closet and entered the living room with some sofas and a broad table in the middle, where the doors to the kitchen, bathroom and Mayka's room. Mayka must have been already up, since her door was open. She had also wound up the large metal clock, which was the only ornament decorating the walls that made up this room.
With squinted eyes, Maro dragged herself into the bathroom where a blurred Maro could been seen peering back at her though the mirror.
Maro outreached her hand and rubbed a window into the mirror where a now clear and defined Maro was looking at back her, her hair as long and radiant as ever. A Maro with skin that was nowhere near as pale as before, and hair that didn't go past her shoulders.
She finished up her morning ritual and even had a bite to eat before left put on her thick coat and left out into the hall where the doors of all her neighbours could be seen. So many doors.
She walked out of of her dormitory building and into the snowy academy, now hastening her footsteps of fear that she'd be late; her peers around her doing the same.
It didn't take her too long before she found the building she was looking for and familiar faces within its corridors.
"Maro, you won't believe. Joani's back at it again" came the voice of a Grio who appeared beside Maro walking along with her.
"What the fuck! Why?"
"She remains a mystery to all of us"
"Oi listen we need to get rid of her soon… This is stupid. Like what the fuck…"
"You don't need to tell me that"
Another familiar face spoke out standing next to the doorway "Are you guys talking about Nayke?" came Frayin
"Go away" said Giro. "You weren't supposed to hear that"
They walked off before Giro parted ways "Ima head off to SRC. See ya"
"Nah, you won't I'm busy later today"
"Oh what? Why?"
"Training with Bartoq. Only took him like, what, 5 fucking months?"
"Haha I don't understand why you have such a hard-on for him… Ya skank"
"Hahaha I'm not the one screwing Leir"
"Oi, fuck you, ok?" was her final remark before she made with a smirk before she made a turn to another corridor and Maro arrived at her destination.
She pushed the large door open to find the blue classroom filled with water up to her ankle (as it should be) and all the 22 younglings sitting down in the center of the floor. The chattering between them faded to a halt as the smile widened on Maro's face and the door went back to the closed state it was in before.
"Morning class" she sang in a mildly enthusiastic manner
"Good morning Maro" replied the synchronised class
Bartoq who was laying on the floor with his back firmly pressed against the wall gave a slight nod of his head as a sort of approval for Maro to start the class.
The classroom was a large square room made of ice like the rest of the building with two doors that were smaller and then main one on either side.
She walked over the side and opened up the equipment room which was the door on the right of her and took out two contraptions as well as a water tank. Each contraption was a slanted half pipe held up high by four poles; two Vs that came out of each end of the half pipe and at the end of each leg floats were situated on the bottom for easy movement around the classroom.
A float meant the bottom end of the pole split into 3 like a tripod and at the end of each leg was a small air filled disk which was angles parallel to the ground.
One of these contraptions was slightly shorter than the other.
Maro brought them in front of all the younglings and posed a question:
"Does anyone know what this is?"
A hand went up.
Maro called on him: "Yes Pippin"
"Is it a cladding?" came his soft pre pubescent voice.
"Ohhhh that's a really good guess, but no. This is something else.
Anyone else know? No? Ok, about another question, can anyone guess what the point of these things are. I'll give you an obvious clue. It's to help teach you waterbending. No? No one? Merry, any ideas?" Merry shook his head "That's ok, we're going to learn together. Can anyone tell me the most basic principle of waterbending?" Almost all of them put their hands up. Maro chose one
"That water flows?" replied the youngling to her question
"Yeah, nice Samwise! So in this exercise we're going to help the water flow. The water must be able to make it from the larger pipe to the smaller pipe, but there must still be a gap between these. They're called Fallers by the way, so when I say smaller Faller I am talking about this one here" she put her hand over the smaller one "and when I say larger Faller I am talking about this bigger one here. They were named after the waterbending teacher who first created and used them to teach waterbending; Michack Faller. Now, we don't have enough room for everyone to have their ones ones, so you'll need to form groups of 3"
The younglings shuffled around and organised themselves for some minutes, with the help of Maro.
"Ok, now before we bring them out I wanna show you how this needs to work, and then I'll come around and make sure you're all doing it right. So, first you need to install the water tank on top the larger Faller and loosen the valve" She did so as she instructed and water started flowing through the larger Faller, slithering down the pipe and finally trickling onto the classroom floor "Now, I want you to make sure that the gap between them is at least your shoulders width apart. Otherwise there's no point" She adjusted the Fallers "Now, I want you to guide the water to the smaller faller. Remember, the water is already flowing here. You don't need to force it or move it. Just let it do what's it's already doing but give it a little nuge in the right direction. With that in mind, take your hand that is closer to the larger faller and lift it up, almost like you're pointed to it. Grip the water with that hand but lets the water continue to come out of the pipe without resistance. Then take your other hand and and try to touch your wrist, like this. The slide your other hand along your first hand as though you're guiding the water through your hand. Then mode your other hand along your body and along the path you want your water to take so that it may reach the pipe of the smaller Faller" Maro outstretched her other arm towards the smaller Faller and fully extended and locked it.
Surely enough the stream of water came along with it and tucked itself nicely into the pipe of the smaller faller only to proceed to fall out of the other side
"The key is to keep this motion going" was Maro's final remark as we moved her other arm back and forth along her first arm, continuously guiding the water along its path through the air.
She did this for a while and then preceded to hand out Fallers to the groups, keeping to her word and making sure every student had gotten the idea eventually. The room started to fill with the sounds of trickling water.
"Remember" she continued "the water will move no matter what you do. It'll keep flowing. Your job is to make sure it end up in the correct place"
As soon as all the children had left the class and off to their next one, Maro closed door and shed a sigh of relief. She turned a glance over at Bartoq whom she found snoozing on the wall he was leaning on. She moved over to him and nudged him. He didn't budge so she kicked him softly with her foot.
His eyes now snapped open: "Oh…" he looked around "Sorry. How was the class?"
"Shouldn't you be telling me that?"
"Yeah, I know. I'm sorry. You know why though, right?"
"Yeah, Sue told me. She told me about your sleeping disorder"
"I can't help it"
"I know"
"Are you ready for our own class?"
"Yes, let's go"
"It's a bit of a walk away, you know. Do you mind a long walk?"
"Are you kidding me?"
"Right, right..."
She helped him up by linking elbows and pulling him up. They walked out past the cold corridors and icy buildings away from the institute and into the city.
They talked a bit on the way. Bartoq started:
"Did you hear about the chiefs newborn child? He'll be the future of our great nation"
"Yeah! They named him Tonraq"
"Oh really? Seams you're more ahead than me then"
They walked a while longer before they changed the topic.
"You know…" started Bartoq. "There's only 2 months left before your scheduled army enlistment. Maybe you should postpone it a bit"
"No, I wanna enlist soon!" The topic made Maro feel a bit uneasy. She just wanted to move on with her life as quickly as possible.
"But I've been talking to Marika. He says you're short range combat has a long way to go. He was surprised when I told him your enlistment date"
"Argh… Why do you hate the army so much? You have such a rich history with it"
"I was poor and didn't have any better way to make a keeping. But wait, what am I even talking about? This has nothing to do with how I feel about the army! Maro, listen to me, I really feel like you're not ready yet. Being a soldier is horrible. Not because of the physical labour or the hard work. No, in fact that's the best part. It's extremely mentally taxing. Trust me, you may think you're disciplined because you managed to walk halfway across the world, but you have no idea. Don't get me wrong, it's definitely no small feat, but still, you don't know what it's like being shouted at every day. Constantly being being punished for non-sensical things. Your life becomes a time table. Be here then, do this in this amount of time. Wanna go to the bathroom? Be back in 7 minutes or you're punished. And what am I even talking about once again? All this still has nothing to do with the fact that you're clearly not ready!"
Maro spoke coolly in contrast: "I'll take my chances. What do you think I walked halfway around the world for? To wander around the academy and eat food all the time? I can do that in the swamp. I came here so I can make something of myself! So I can have the opportunity to learn and to be me..." The last part of the sentence slipped out accidentally. She had meant to say 'to be something'.
"You can't be you when you're dead…"
This statement infuriated Maro. She decided to hold it and and let it out, like a tea pot after it finished boiling.
And finally they left the city for a while and came to a massive frozen lake.
"Here we will learn. When you're ready, stand over there" he said softly and pointed out into the distance.
The lake stretched further than Maro could see in the direction she was walking. Snowy mountains painted the edges of the lake to the sides. It was a clear day with few clouds despite the cold, and it was around midday now, though Maro had no idea because it was sunny all day long this time of year. There was a period of 2 hours in the evening when the light would dim as though the day was about to go into twilight, but it would become sunny as midway right after.
Maro felt the cool wind on her face as she looked over the stretch of the ice going ever into the distance.
She turned back to face Bartok. The mountains spun around her has his small figure came into focus. She stood facing him at a 45 degree angle; her left side closest to him.
'I'll show him my long range combat is awesome!' she thought to herself as she get into her waterbending stance. She kept her feet close together, took her left arm so that it was bent but facing him and put her right arm long her body under her chest. Her hands were flatly opened, palm side up.
"Nice stance" his voice came in response. "But you shan't be needing it. We're not practicing waterbending today"
"Wait, what?" put lowered her arms a bit.
"At least… have a stance like this" he said as her as he now stood perpendicular to her position, widened his legs, put out his elbows and put his fists to his body.
She didn't attempt it and lowered her arms down more in her confusion.
"I want you to bend the ice" he said, but before he could demonstrate she said
"Ohhh… I can do that" She put her arms back into her stance and and with a digging motion from her left arm melted a pool of ice in front of her, levitated it into the air and froze it with a motion like she was pulling open two sliding doors at once. She then proceeded to move it around in the air.
"Not like that. Have a look" he proceeded to lift his right foot into the air, and brought it down with a swift, powerful circular motion. A large block of ice bounced up from the ground in front of him and flew into the air directly upwards. He then lent his body over to the side away from the the ice block, wound his foot into his body, and right before it was about to fall, he sprung his foot into a fierce kick in the direction of the block.
It flew towards Maro in a projectile manner, but missed her on her left side. She turned to watch it as it slid away on the near frictionless surface.
"Woah!" she said in a soft tone that Bartoq couldn't hear.
"Not listen, I'm going to explain it to you. The first step is to root yourself into the ice. That is what this stance is for"
But Maro didn't listen. She was too keen on trying it. She lifted her foot from her own stance and slammed into into the floor, poorly mimicking Bartoqs motion. The result was a few cracks in the ice around where her foot fell.
"Maro, look at me" came the voice of Bartoq. Maro did so
"After you've rooted yourself, your goal is to pass energy into the ice. The ice is stubborn and won't want to move. It's your job to be more stubborn and force it to. It's not like conventional water bending. There's no flow here. Only the force of the ice against your own"
"I'm sorry" she said "Could you demonstrate it again?"
"Certainly" he said and redid the swift motion creating a new block and a new square hole in the ice in front of his. This time Maro watched him more carefully and only heard the ice slide by and away from her.
She attempted it again, better following his movement, but still to the same result.
"You're trying to find an energy to move the ice. It isn't there. You must make your own energy and resist the energy from the ice"
Her third attempt proved just as futile.
"Ok, how about this: I will kick there rocks at and you ary and stop them with your force"
She nodded
"Show me your stance"
She copied his stance
"Good, good. Can you feel yourself rooted? You must root yourself"
"I think so…"
"Alright, here comes the first one. Remember, use your energy to resist it"
He kicked a block from the ground and kicked it awards her feet, a bit more gently. She pushed her hands at the block which was now sliding and managed to slow it down, but it still found its way to her feet and she still found her way to the floor. He was slightly annoyed at this.
"Good attempt! I can feel you are starting to project your energy, but try rooting yourself. You have you bend imaginary roots into the ice to stop you from falling. Nothing can knock you down"
She got up and anticipated the next block. Exact same result, but this time as she got up, she found another block heading towards her, she got down and pushed it but it pushed harder and she did a flip tumble onto the floor. She lay there for less than a second feeling sorry for herself, but her solace as quickly interrupted by the sound of an ice block sailing awards her. She flicked herself back up and tried to stop the right one, completely ignoring the left one and failed leaving here on the ground once again. Now her blood began to boil. She got up and found another block, this time not sliding but flying at her general direction. She got out of its way, melted a part of it and using wave like motion get the water stream around her and tossed in ferrocialy like a dart at Bartoq. The only thing Bartoq could see was the backside of an ice block he was sending, followed by the dard of water less than an instant later. It hit him on the side of his rib cage under his pectoral, tore his clothes, and started a stream of blood.
"Ahhhhh!"
He fell to his knees.
"FUCK" she ran to him.
She meted some water and placed it on his wound. It was freezing so he screamed some more at the cold.
"Don't you know how to heal?!" she sounded.
"No one ever taught me" he muttered pointing his teary eyes to her
"Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck"
He wearily got up.
"I'll live" he said, his voice more steady now.
"What shall I…"
"Training is off for today. We shall resume another time" He said and walked off clutching his wound.
Maro let herself fall to the ground in between the many new craters Bartoq has made. She lay there with her eyes open for a while and hardly any motion. She welcomed the pain of the cold from the ground along her body. Pain was something she had become overly accustomed to ever since she left.
Eventually, feelings of boredom overtook her feelings of self pity and guilt and she found the energy to push herself back up again. The snowy mountains rotated from sideways to upright around her as she did so.
The young waterbender looked back at the path from which they had come and dragged herself to that direction; a blood trail leading the way.
"I must have around 2 hours to kill" came a stray thought.
She walked back along the path for a while, occasionally seeing a droplet of blood in the snow, until she decided to deviate from the way she came from and went north around the city. The trail that took the outskirts of the great trbe wound around the blue shimmering houses and buildings as she walked along. At this time, she would be the only one she could see on the trail.
Eventually, she deviated again onto another trail that took her even further north still. She knew where she was going, and eventually she got there.
She walked past the great tall water temple as she reached her destination. It's layers towered over her in a formidable fashion. Maybe next time she will go inside.
There was a small amount of people going out of the gate in water tribe colours as she got to what was her destination. The gate was the entrance to a cave in a tall cliff. It was about a head taller than Maro, and stretched out about twicer her size. It was made up of two parts, and was oddly made of wood. Not too many things in the tribe were made of anything but ice. On the side of the gate was a small sign. Maro read it at the pace of snail for she was not adept at reading quite yet:
"Quee… oh, that says Quiet. Zone. Please no no-iss… oh, noise. Inside. Quiet Zone, please no noise inside" she repeated it all at once and replied to the sign "Ok then" before she pushed the right door of the gate and went in.
Inside was the spirit oasis. There were people all around mediating, basking in the spiritual energy. One of them was even wearing fire nation attire.
Maro walked very slowly and very carefully, so as to not make any noise on the grass.
The air here was rather warm, despite all the walls made of ice, so maro took off her large coat and hung it on the hook by the entrance, next to some more coats.
The Oasis was a large room with a very high ceiling. Except it wasn't a room so much as it was a cave that's was taller than it was long. Deep water stretched along its floors and grassy ways that were only just taller than the height of the water were also present, and connected by small, low bridges with no rails or any kind of support like that. People were meditating on the grass, and in the shallow areas of the water where the earth was just transitioning from it's grassy land to its deep bottom.
In the center back of the Oasis was a perfectly round grass Island connected by two bridges coming from either side. In the front center of the island was a perfectly round pool of water. Behind the pool and on either side of it were two small plumeria trees, blossoming the most beautiful pink flowers with petals under their branches. In between these small trees was a wonderful bamboo bush which was dense and leafy at the top, like a canopy that stretched above the height of the two trees. Some rocks of various sizes lay the base of this vegetation patch, and finally, to complete the island, right in front of the bamboo was a small blue torii gate, whose top was just below the canopy of the bamboo and that had a water tribe moon and ocean symbol glimmering in its center. There was a couple of people meditating on the Island.
Maro couldn't see what was inside the pool in the island from the distance she was at, but she knew. This wasn't her first visit here.
She crept along to the island where she stealthily weaved around the meditators as she had done until now, got on her hands and knees and crawled to the edge of the pool in the center of the island. She leant over and gazed as Tui and La circled each other in an infinite and hypnotic manner. Round and round and round and round.
Tui and La were two koi fish who were the moon and ocean spirits. Also known as push and pull; yin and yang. One fish was black with a white spot on his head, the other white with a black spot on his head.
Though she was caught in a trance of their movement, she couldn't help but think "Why do they bother? They only keep doing the same thing over and over again… destined to always end up in the same place, but keep moving anyway…"
After some minutes her eyes got tired, and Tui and La slowly faded out of focus to reveal a Maro in the foreground instead. The Maro on top stared down at this new Maro in the pool, and she returned the stare back at her. She lifted her hand and reached it out. Lower Maro followed along. She nearly touched the water, before she folded her arm back into her body and stood up by the pool now facing away from it. She walked back out of the Oasis, small tear now coming down her face. She grabbed her coat and put it back on before pulling the gate and leaving.
She turned left after coming out, and instead of going back to the city, she went around the natural structure that formed the exterior of the Oasis. Eventually, she found what she was looking for, which was a sharp set of stairs that led to the lookout on top.
As if she didn't feel lifeless enough already, now she had lost breath, but was at the top. There was no one else there.
She walked over to the front and lent her full weight on the rail. She peered over the entire tribe, seeing it in all of it's glory. It stretched out further than she could see, but she knew the great docks were not too much further than her line of sight.
She looked behind her. She saw a great valley of many icy and snowy mountains. Behind them was the north pole; the tip the earth.
She looked forwards and saw a glorious sight.
She looked backwards and saw a glorious sight.
But the young traveler just stood there, frail and helpless, wondering what should she do with it all.