Disclaimer: I don't own Avatar.

Thank you to those who reviewed and put my story on their story alert list and/or favorites list. I love you guys and gals!! I was so pumped by the feedback of my latest reviewer that I couldn't stop writing. The words just were flowing. See what a little review can do. :) A lot, that's all I have got to say. I was going to post this story last night but my internet was down. The more you review. The faster I get chapters out. I don't like to bargain, but the energy and enthusiasm that I draw from the reviews, which I receive, really does help to motivate me to continue this story. Enough of my babbling.

Without further ado…

Oh just for you information: thoughts. Alright now read on and enjoy:)

Restoration

Chapter 9

Hana remained silent, and of course Xin Fu was loosing even more of the little patience which he had left.

Turning to Master Yu, Xin Fu asked, "So what do you do when they don't talk?"

Master Yu just shrugged his shoulders saying, "I'm sure that you can think of something."

Finally, Hana got the slashes in the earth to become deep enough. But it seemed almost too late. Xin Fu earthbended a large boulder into his hands, holding it above his head as he stood in front of Hana.

"Fine if you won't talk without encouragement. Maybe this is enough encouragement for you." Xin Fu said angrily.

Very quickly, Hana started to freeze the water in the deep slashes with her hands. Hana had been pushed into a hard spot, and she knew that now she had to literally fight her way out of this one. As the water froze, it pushed the earthen sides of the deep gashes causing the wall to begin cracking under the extreme pressure. Xin Fu heard a cracking sound and began to look around to see where it was coming from. Looking back at the girl, he soon saw long cracks appearing in the earth encasing the girl.

As soon as the walls began to break, Hana forced water up around her obliterating the rock walls imprisoning her. The pieces of earth flew outwards in every direction. Xin Fu stumbled back in surprise. In a split second, Hana sliced the large boulder, which Xin Fu was holding, in half. The two halves fell upon Xin Fu's shoulders, and Xin Fu cursed in pain. Before Xin Fu could retaliate, Hana brought up a frozen wall of ice within seconds, thus blocking Xin Fu's and Master Yu's sight as she ran to grab her clothes off the branch. She found a large tree a short ways away from the river and ran to it extending the ice wall along the way. Xin Fu let out a yell of anger as he quickly shattered the ice wall.

"Damn it! Where did that weasel girl go?!" Xin Fu exclaimed.

The only response, which Xin Fu got, was Master Yu heaving a tired sigh and then saying "Maybe if you didn't threaten people off the bat, the girl would have let us know if she's seen the kid and his uncle."

"Well, you're the one who told me that I would think of something. And that's what I did!"

Phew, that was close. Thank goodness I was able to get out of that tight spot. Hana thought as she hastily waterbended the water out of her undergarments. Hana then quickly put on her robe and pants. Maybe I can sneak away if they don't try to search the area too thoroughly.

"She couldn't have gotten far." Master Yu said as he began to look about behind trees and shrubs. Xin Fu began to do the same.

Hana looked about herself to see if Lee had brought the ostrich-horse further into the forest. As she scanned around, the gleam of something reflecting the sun caught her eye. Hana peered further around the tree. There is someone hiding behind that bush. Is that Lee's sword? Dang, that is probably Lee. Why did he come here?! If he is here then where is the ostrich-horse? This is just great. The one person, I don't need right now, is here. Oh no, Master Yu is getting closer to Lee! I have got to distract him somehow without drawing attention to myself. Oh gosh, how the heck am I going to do that!

Hana climbed up the tree as quietly as possible without using her airbending. Using her airbending to only balance herself out when needed, Hana moved silently through the trees to get closer to the river. She held her breath as she passed over Xin Fu. Hana stopped on the branch overhanging the water. It seemed that Xin Fu, Master Yu, and Lee didn't even notice her movement through the trees. But she was terribly mistaken. Xin Fu had heard something move through the trees, but he was having a hard time pinpointing where she had stopped. While Xin Fu was busy trying to figure out where she was hiding, Hana used this moment to bend a water whip and smacked the back of Master Yu's head as he was about to pear around the bush where Lee was hiding.

"Ouch! What was that for?!" Master Yu exclaimed rubbing the back of his head to try and dull the pain.

"What? I didn't do it. What happened to your head?"

Looking at his hand, which had been placed on the back of his head, Master Yu replied, "Something wet just hit the back of my head."

An expression of a light bulb going off washed over Xin Fu's face as he turned to look at Master Yu.

"She's a waterbender!" Xin Fu exclaimed. Master Yu only shook his head slowly.

Xin Fu said with a smirk, "This should be fun."

Like turtleducks, it's going to be fun! He only figured that out now. Geez, this guy may have some big muscles; however, he is lacking in brain power. Hana thought to herself. Thankfully that worked. Lee should be safe for now. But, somehow, I have got to get rid of these guys so that Lee and I can make a clean escape. If that's going to be possible…no, I got to think positive. I can't let Lee's negative attitude rub off on me.

At that moment, Xin Fu assumed the horse stance and began to heave the ground under the ring of trees up and back down again. When he came to the trees on the fringe of the riverbank, Hana gasped as she lost her balance and slipped off the branch. She tried to stay on the branch by grabbing on to it as she fell, but her grip wasn't strong enough.

"Aah!" Hana cried as she fell into the river on her back. Since the water was shallow, Hana hit the riverbed hard knocking the breath out of her. She came up sputtering water and gasping for air.

"There you are little weasel girl." Xin Fu said in a dark tone as he faced her.

In between her gasps, Hana shouted, "I am not…a weasel!!"

"That's right get angry." Xin Fu said as he got ready to fight seriously.

While she stood dripping soaking wet in the water, Hana said "You jerk." in a low tone as she glared at Xin Fu.

Oh wow, she's scary looking when she is angry. She kind of reminds me of Azula. I hope she never gets that angry at me. Lee cringed as he thought this to himself while the tension thickened rapidly in the air. He could feel the pressure of it building, causing him to feel like he was shrinking. Looks like I am going to have to step in soon.

Xin Fu earthbended several medium sized boulders out of the ground and kicked them one at a time. Hana clenched both her hands with only her index and middle fingers extended and cut the boulders in half easily with curved blades of water. The pieces of rock fell harmlessly on either side of her.

"You're going to have to do better than that to get me." Hana smirked keeping her arms raised defensively.

Hana began to move her arms in rapid succession. Xin Fu began to ready his second wave. Numerous streams of water waved back and forth around Hana, creating a perfect defense barrier. This should make it harder for him to get those rocks any closer to me and allow me to deflect any attacks from the other guy. I may not have fought earthbenders before, but it looks like I can handle these guys.

Xin Fu then sent even larger boulders at Hana with tremendous velocity. This time Hana had more difficulty deflecting these boulders. There were three reasons why. First, they were larger, which caused her to have to change their path instead of slicing them into smaller pieces. Furthermore, with using only the liquid form of water this proved to be difficult. Secondly, they were moving faster, and this speed combined with their weight caused them to have greater momentum. Thirdly, they were spaced closer together giving her only milliseconds to deflect the next boulder after the first.

Xin Fu felt confident seeing Hana struggling with this second onslaught. I can't continue with this defensive course. I am tiring to quickly staying in one spot. I have to move. I am too vulnerable in this stationary position. Hana quickly thought of another strategy, only soon enough it seemed, as Master Yu finally decided to join the battle.

Hana bended the water as she did a roundhouse kick slicing the trunk of the tree nearest her. As the trunk of the tree began to slide to the left, Hana propelled a large stream of water towards the tree with both hands, causing the tree to fall towards Xin Fu. Hana then turned her attention to Master Yu. Yu slid his foot forward while punching outwards sending a block of rock towards Hana. She easily obliterated it with a strong water stream. Hana answered back by rapidly shooting small shards of ice towards Yu. But Yu easily blocked them with an earthen sheild, which disappeared as fast as it had appeared. Master Yu then tried to break Hana's stance by shifting the ground beneath Hana's feet. Hana quickly leaped out of the water onto the grass as she threw four water disks at Yu's feet. Yu dodged them effortlessly as the razor sharp disks sliced the ground. Hana could hear Xin Fu grunt in pain as his effort to stop the falling tree was not entirely successful. Hana glanced over and saw that Xin Fu had bended the earth upwards horizontally instead of at an angle. Consequently, the tree teetered off the raised plateau and still ended up falling on Xin Fu as he tried to dodge the trunk of the tree. Ha! It got him. Alright Master Yu lets play. Hana smirked back at Yu as water began to cover her body and her arms forming long tentacles. Yu put up a rock wall as Hana tried to hit him with one of her tentacle arms. But Hana easily sliced it in pieces using both tentacle arms. Next, Yu tried to use Xin Fu's tactic with the medium-sized boulders. Even though Yu sent them at an even greater velocity than Xin Fu, Hana deflected some of them, and the last two boulders she caught within each of her water tentacles.

Lee watched all this in astonishment. Hana can definitely take care of herself. She must be from the northern water tribe, because she's using some high level techniques, which only a waterbending master would know. But that still doesn't explain her airbending ability, though she is doing well without using her airbending. Why isn't she using her airbending? Uh oh, ugly is back.

"You stupid water tribe brat, you aren't going to beat the great Xin Fu of Earth Rumble Six!!" Xin Fu shouted angrily as he emerged slowly from the thick branches with leaves and twigs sticking out of his clothes and hair.

Hana only giggled at how Xin Fu could never see this coming. She leaned back as she waved her right arm backwards thus flicking the small boulder she was holding in her right tentacle. Xin Fu didn't realize the true intention of Hana's movement until it was too late. Splat! Mud covered Xin Fu's face. When Hana had caught the boulder that Master Yu shot at her, it had started to soften into mud in the water.

Hana didn't wait another second using this moment when Yu was distracted. She whipped the right tentacle back slamming Master Yu back into a tree. Hana swung the left tentacle in Yu's direction but Yu was able to dodge the mud ball, which hit the tree harmlessly. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Xin Fu had got the mud out his eyes and was preparing another assault.

Hana thought that Xin Fu was going to try propelling some more rocks or something at her again, but she was terribly mistaken. Xin Fu was pissed. He couldn't believe another small girl was beating him at his own game. Xin Fu bended the ground underneath Hana upwards, causing her to loose her concentration. Her water tentacles fell away, and she rapidly accelerating up towards the thick tree branches of the canopy overhead. Hana jumped off and hit the ground hard rolling away from the wide pillar of earth, which now towered over her. She got up quickly huffing from the shock of Xin Fu's attack. He almost killed me. She didn't want to admit it, but she was a bit frightened of Xin Fu.

"Don't you think that was going a little too far, Xin Fu."

"Shut up! I wasn't going to kill her. I am just going to make sure she won't be able to bend again." Xin Fu replied with vengeance dripping from his mouth.

While both benders were talking to each other, Hana started to run along the bank of the river.

"Oh, no you don't." Xin Fu bended a rock wall in Hana's path. She halted and turned around. I guess I'll have to stay and finish this, though I don't want to. Ha! And I thought I would be able to run. Dang. Hana put on a determined face even though she really was scared that she wouldn't get out of this one without just a few bruises. She took charge of the situation and began running back towards Xin Fu pulling a wave of water with her. Master Yu saw that Hana's attention was directed toward Xin Fu. He took this chance and bended the earth so that it jetted out right in front of Hana at a forty-five degree angle. Hana reacted in a split second and flowed with the motion of the earth using it to fuel her momentum as she did a back-flip.

Dangnabit!! I forgot about Mr. Toothpick for just a second, and it nearly cost me. Hana stood facing both waiting to see which was going to make the first move. Then she spotted a way to fight one of them at a time. I can hide behind the earthen tower Xin Fu made and attack one of them at a time. This just might work. She quickly put her plan into action. Hana ran up to the side of the rock wall facing Master Yu pulling water from the river with her. Yu was pushed up a large oak tree and frozen up to his chin in ice. Hana knew that this wouldn't hold him for long since it was a hot day, but it should buy her enough time to deal with Xin Fu. Pulling the water from the moist ground, Hana came out of the shelter of the rock wall holding large globs of water on either side of her. Xin Fu bended two slabs of rock in front of him like a fortress.

"Are you scared of me?" Hana said amused. "Why don't you fight me, face to face?"

"Aaaahh" Xin Fu yelled in frustration and anger as he bended one of the rock slabs towards Hana, but she easily side stepped it. Gotcha!! Hana bended one of the globs of water into an ice spear and propelled at incredible speed toward Xin Fu. Xin Fu barely had enough time to bend a small slab of rock and held it up to block the spear. The spear shattered as it hit the rock's surface. But the small shards grazed across Xin Fu's face leaving small cuts all over.

"Uuggh!!" Xin Fu cried raising a hand up to the side of his face. Looking at the small specks of blood on his hand, Xin Fu shouted, "You fricken brat!!" He bended the other rock wall towards Hana, but she dodged it the same way as before. However, no later than when Hana sidestepped to the left of the attack that she realized her mistake. She was standing with her back to the rock wall, which Xin Fu had made minutes before. Xin Fu was not aiming at her. He was aiming for the rock wall behind me! Hana turned to see the tower of rock begin to crumble from the top down. Xin Fu bent the rocks to fall faster towards the girl. Hana shut her eyes and raised her arms in a futile attempt to protect herself. The last thing running through Hana's mind, during those last few seconds before the rocks would crush her, was Oh dear spirits, please protect me.

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Muahahahahaha!! A dreaded cliffhanger! Will Hana unleash some incredible spirit power? I think not. But oh gosh what's going to happen? Hahaha. Review and I just might get the next chapter out by the end of this week. I can't guarantee it because I have a physical chemistry lab report and homework problem set due next week. But I will definitely try my best. But reviews do motivate me so much, that I might blow off the homework just to finish the next chapter. smirks mischievously Senoritus is sinking in fast. lol