::The Last Avatar::
Gamer Edition
BOOK ONE
LEVIATHAN
1.9
Training Montage
Part One
November 1996 -January 1997
Story Quest Discovered!
*Survive Avatar Training: Water Style*
Story quest #3
…
The first portion of your Avatar Training starts now!
You have been given access to four different trainers who each cover a certain area of expertise.
The goal of this Quest is to become proficient enough in each portion of training that you are able to defeat your trainers.
In a spar, naturally.
...
Shake's Agility and Dexterity Training 0/1
Chekhov's Materia and Bending Training 0/1
Gorky's Combat Training 0/1
Staniv's Weapons Training 0/1
…
Only after passing certain checkpoints in your training will the other Trainers become accessible.
You will start with Shake's Training and continue from there.
Make it good brat or I'll throw some crazy shit at you.
When Rue saw this quest pop up in her face as she was eating her breakfast on the day of her first training session with Shake, she should have known nothing good could come of it. Unfortunately Keiko's optimism seemed to be catching and she ignored the rising tide of 'badness' that had started to make itself known in her middle.
If she had listened to her gut, Rue may have turned on her heel and run for the hills Gaia be damned.
November
Rue groaned as she peeled herself off the ground for the she-didn't-know-how-manyth time, she honestly hadn't thought it possible for her entire body to hurt this much. She was also fairly certain that Shake was enjoying throwing her about as much as Chekhov was enjoying watching Rue get thrown around. Which was entirely too much in the teenagers opinion. Though, she couldn't help the breathy laugh that escaped as she staggered to her feet, it did feel good to be doing something for once in her miserable life.
Rue was currently on her third day of training, needless to say her first had been murder, her second abysmal and today, well, it wasn't going heaps better if she was honest. She suspected the fact that Yuffie was cheering her on from the sidelines had as much to do with her getting up every time she kissed dirt as her own stubborn nature. Because, really, getting thrown around a training field by someone that much shorter than her was just embarrassing. She wasn't even sure getting thrown around by Shake was what they were supposed to be doing. Wasn't this something to do with Agility Training or some other vague crap? Oh. Rue frowned as Shake swept towards her without warning again. Suddenly understanding the point of the exercise that had not been explained with words, perhaps it was all the blood that had rushed to her head as she was thrown about that had done it, Rue dove out of the way and tried to roll with her own momentum as well as someone not used to running around fighting shit and training could without being shown how. She heard a 'whoop' from the sidelines, probably Yuffie, as well as an irritated snort from Chekhov, who didn't seem to like Rue very much.
"Well, at least it seems you are capable of learning, brat," Shake told her haughtily. The older child-like woman looked at least a little satisfied that Rue had managed to dodge her attack for once. Of course, now that Rue understood what she was supposed to be doing, the dodging thing got a whole lot harder as Shake started to move in more and more complex patterns to keep the teenager moving rather than simply diving to the ground to get out of the way.
CONGRATULATIONS!
Quest Completed!
*Five for Five *
…
Well the Alice in Wonderland reference was a bit lame, but then again this is you we're talking about.
The goal was to believe five impossible things for five days running.
I'm surprised you managed to remember to, brat!
As already stated:
Every time you complete this quest you'll be awarded a EXP bonus.
You also get an item from our Sponsors for this first completion.
Only the EXP will be awarded from now on
…
Impossible things Believed in: 25/25
Days Completed: 5/5
…
350 EXP
Flying Bison Plushy (Made by Cabbage Corp.)
Rue stared at the small, cuddly, stuffed Flying Bison in her hands. She was desperately suppressing the urge to squeal girlishly at the cuteness that was the plushy. Of course, there was no-one around and she was in the safety of her own room. With that thought Rue did, in fact, squeal girlishly and hug the stuffed Bison to her happily. 'Morris the Bison' was now her new favourite, replacing 'Sokka on Cactus Juice' with remarkable ease. Earning the Bison pride of place on Rue's futon, though she didn't sleep with the Bison. Rue didn't sleep with stuffed toys. No matter how cute they were.
Of course it was hardly her fault if 'Morris the Bison' magically appeared next to her in the futon by . It was all Morris. He was needy.
Chekhov was in charge of Rue's Water Bending training, much to both women's annoyance. Rue had found the woman to be both irritatingly stuck up and seemed to have a superiority complex the size of Wutai. At least in regards to Rue, though the reasons were a little lost on the teen.
The training itself was harder than the young Avatar had been expecting, initially focusing on simple forms without any bending actually performed and using any Materia Rue had come across thus far. Needless to say Chekhov had been surprised that Rue had more than one Materia, Steal in particular had raised an eyebrow. At the woman's direction Rue had moved her Materia around a bit, placing her Ice Materia in her bow and the Steal in her bracer next to Restore. It was unfortunate that none of Chekhov's training would give any of her Materia extra AP, but at least it would give her personal experience with using it.
As it was, with her Materia training going reasonably well, Rue was relieved to find she did, in fact, take to Water Bending quite well and while she was still only on basic forms, they came easier to her after only a week of practice. To say that Korra was remarkably pleased would have been an understatement. The constant movement was something that Rue found herself quickly appreciating after a life spent mostly sitting inside doing other things. Though she could have done without the occasional snide comment about her physical fitness from Chekhov. Rue was very aware of how out of shape she was after a month of training with the two of the Wusheng and didn't need anyone else telling her what level she should have been when she was miles behind.
December
The weather got colder rapidly as Rue's training entered December and said training was moved to the dojo rather than stay out in the frigid air. Rue was having a rest day before her hand to hand training with Gorky began. She'd been told Chekhov would also be present in these training sessions to help her integrate the Water Bending forms she was learning into normal fighting. The hope was to bring back the old Bending Styles using this dual method of training as there wasn't exactly anyone left to teach her the traditional old forms. Unless one counted long dead, non-corporeal past Avatars.
Yuffie and Keiko had opted to join Rue for lunch and the little girl was entertaining the other two with highly exaggerated tale of how she'd gotten out of rope escape class again. Yuffie was reenacting how she'd crept down a hallway when a young soldier raced over to them asking if they were well, and Yuffie, not impressed with being interrupted, demanded to know what was going on. When the soldier explained that a monster had somehow infiltrated the Imperial Compound and was now tearing through the place with little trouble Rue had to wonder if her furry friend had simply gotten bored and had decided to look for her mistress.
So when a somewhat harried Tera tore around a corner nearby, being chased by a squad of Wutian soldiers Rue had to laugh a little, the Coeurl looked like she was enjoying herself immensely after all. The soldiers managed to corner Tera against the garden wall, though it didn't seem like she was very concerned by this when she caught sight of Rue standing a few hundred metres away. With an excited growl Tera easily leapt clean over the soldiers and loped over to Rue to Yuffie and Keiko's horror as they watched the Coeurl pounce of their friend.
Rue's back hit the ground hard as Tera knocked her off her feet and when she opened her eyes the Coeurl snarled at her furiously before head butting Rue and snuffing around the teen's face making her laugh uncontrollably.
"Okay, okay, Tera I get it, I'm sorry," Rue managed to get out between helpless giggles. "I'm fine, you can see that, now get off me you great lump!" it took her a moment to push the worried creature off of her so she could sit up properly. The soldiers were surrounding her, keeping Yuffie and Keiko back as Tera's long whiskers poked at her, making sure her mistress was, in fact, okay as Rue had claimed.
Looking about her Rue grinned up at the soldiers around her and waved them off. "Don't worry boys, Tera is mostly harmless, she was just worried about me is all," she assured them. She ruffled Tera's fur as she stood up slowly and noted that everyone seemed a little uncertain of her furry friend. She really needed to do something about that.
Rue wasn't sure how she felt about her hand to hand training, it was hard, like the rest of her training was, but she wasn't really physically built to beat the shit out of people. At least that was the opinion Rue held and Gorky, though a reasonably man, was not helping with that opinion. At all. Getting bruises on bruises after all, was not a promising thing for a student. Though the man had mentioned that Rue seemed to be better at defence than offence, so that was something. Though all of Rue's teachers assured her that she would get better with time, Rue wasn't as convinced. That may have had more to do with her own self doubt than anything though. The silent belief that she was failing miserably at her lessons didn't help either in the long run.
Tera hadn't liked watching Rue get beaten up much, though Godo hadn't liked having Tera in the compound Rue had put her foot down, and had repeatedly stopped the lessons by getting between Rue and her teachers, spitting and hissing at them defensively. This had caused some problems at first, until Rue had sat the Coeurl down and explained that it was just training and she was in no real danger. Eventually she'd had to resort to threatening to lock Tera in her bedroom while she was training. The Coeurl had grudgingly sat near the wall of the dojo watching Rue train with Shake, Chekhov and Gorky during the day.
As the weather got steadily worse and snow began to fall on Wutai, it seemed like Shinra had decided to back off until the weather cleared up. It didn't stop Godo though, he steadily sent out troops to reclaim ground lost over the warmer months. He'd asked for her help a number of times by the end of December, but Rue refused to go on a mission barely trained and in such unpredictable weather. Yuffie hadn't been impressed at all with his reaction to Rue's refusals and had, amusingly, lectured her father about acting his age.
!*~*~*BONUS SCENE*~*~*!
Genesis glared out at the snowy landscape outside the command tent. He was starting to hate this godforsaken country, first it was too damned hot in that stupid forest and now, now it was beyond freezing. Damnable place couldn't make up it's mind apparently. Banora had never had this problem, it was nice and temperate. Warm was warm and cold was cold, none of this one extreme to another the rest of the world seemed to employ. Genesis didn't want to be in Wutai. He wanted to be a Hero.
Looking back into the tent Genesis was mollified slightly at the sight of both Angeal and Sephiroth looking as miserable as he felt. Especially Sephiroth. Even after the disaster in the valley Sephiroth's interest in this girl he'd met hadn't waned, in fact it had only made Sephiroth want to find her even more. Which was absurd. It was obvious the girl was working for Kisaragi, now, if she hadn't been before. And it had been months. Months! Since she'd been sighted. The man who'd seen her, spoken with her even, had described the teenage girl as 'fierce' and 'surprisingly kind' when he'd explained that the girl had given him one of her potions after her battle with his squad. Genesis thought she just sounded annoyingly goody-goody.
Angeal had, apparently, decided to support Sephiroth in his opinion that the girl had been coerced into working for Kisaragi, or something. They'd tried to get him involved with their little 'save the girl' plan, but Genesis wasn't interested in saving some irritating little girl who would undoubtedly swoon at the sight of Sephiroth coming to her rescue. The very thought made him want to gag.
No. Genesis would watch and wait this insanity out. This was just puberty catching up with Sephiroth and soon things would go back to normal. With a dramatic roll of his eyes Genesis turned back to the white covered landscape outside and pulled out LOVELESS, if they were going to ignore him then he would throw poetry at them.
"When the war of the beasts brings about worlds end," he began. Grinning to himself as Angeal and Sephiroth groaned in annoyance with him, Genesis continued with his impromptu recital.
Maybe if he beat it into their heads enough, they'd manage to grow some culture of their own.
!*~*~*~*~*!
January
Rue had just finished having a surprisingly nice chat with one of the soldiers stationed at the compound after her training session with Staniv, a remarkably standoffish man that did everything he could to rub Rue the wrong way. The soldier had been assuring Rue that Staniv was like that with everyone, not just her and had commended her on how she'd handled that first mission. He'd even admitted that his first mission had gone abysmally to make her feel a bit better, though she suspected he was exaggerating his own failings a little by that point.
They hadn't talked long, however, January it may have been, but that didn't mean it was any less cold outside and both had had other places to be. Kadan, for that was the soldiers name, promised to say 'hi' when he was about before they parted ways and Rue was left with the odd feeling that the young man had been flirting with her. Though Rue would be the first to admit that she was a little oblivious to that sort of thing when she was interacting with people.
She was just beginning to wonder if she'd, unknowingly, flirted back and the repercussions if she had when a screen exploded in her face for the first time in weeks.
CONGRATULATIONS!
Quest Completed!
*Make the People of Wutai Talk to You*
…
So you FINALLY finished this stupid quest. About damned time brat!
Godo ordered you not to talk to his people and you didn't really listen.
Probably a good thing really.
You're far more interesting when you're doing things.
Like training.
Watching you get your ass handed to you is fucking hilarious!
You've also gone and made some friends.
Good for you shortstop.
Now go get beaten up some more.
…
People Engaged in Conversation: 5
People Irritated into Engaging in Conversation: 3
People Charmed into Engaging in Conversation: 2
Friends Made: 3
Total: 10/10
…
200 EXP
1000 Gil
Rue's eyes rolled at 'B's typical harassment, it seemed the woman was enjoying her pain, not that Rue was all that surprised by that information. It was a shame she didn't get any AP from that quest, but the EXP and Gil were always a good thing. She certainly wasn't getting any from her training. And then;
And yes, brat, the dumbass was indeed flirting.
We couldn't tell if you were flirting back or just being your usual awkward self.
Because you're irritating like that.
Now go do something entertaining before I throw that Piano I promised that time!
With a grimace Rue dismissed the screen, it wasn't her fault she was so hopelessly socially awkward! She was just, bad, with people and shit. Growling to herself Rue stomped off towards her room her mind a whirl with how much she really didn't like people. Because she really didn't. Most days. Though lately her dislike of people had been lessened considerably. Maybe it was like Elle had said. 'Exercise gives you endorphins, endorphins make you happy. Happy people just don't kill their husbands'. Not that Rue was married, but hey, she was exercising more and did feel, just a little, happier or whatever. Less murderous too, now she thought about it.
Rue was very much, not a happy camper of late. Between trying to get her stupid arrows of her stupid practice bow, they wouldn't let her use her own for training, to hit the stupid targets and trying to get the hang of hand to hand combat the young Avatar had just about had enough. She had bruises on bruises on bruises now and was fairly certain that she couldn't perform a proper roundhouse kick if she tried for another ten years.
Would her trainers listen, however? No. Of course not. Close combat was something the Avatar needed to be proficient at after all. Rue wanted to know who had written that particular rule so she could plaster them to a ceiling of a cave with ice. Because, yes, she could totally do that now. Mostly. When she wasn't completely flipping out because people were throwing shit at her in a controlled environment.
Collapsing onto her futon bonelessly Rue pulled 'Morris' over to her so she could hug him and tried her hardest to push away the homesickness that had begun plaguing her in December, her mothers birthday had been in December and Rue hadn't been able to say 'happy birthday' because she was 'dead'. She missed her family, her friends and she wanted to go home. Where things made sense and people didn't throw things at her. Where she didn't have to be a hero.
AN: So here we have the first part of Rue's Training Montage! I'm honestly surprised how this chapter came out, I wasn't expecting that low point at the end at all, but I think that part of this entire scenario kinda needed to be addressed just a tad. As such, consider this to be her 'wall' and the next part will be Rue pushing past that as much as she can to get shit done.
I have to say, I enjoyed writing Genesis. I just hope I can do him, and the others, justice in this fic.
Kadan came out of nowhere, I don't know if he'll be a recurring NPC or not, but he'll probably be around until the tail end of Book One in some way. IDK.
I wish I had a Morris of my own~
Also, any and all references in this fic are entirely random, unplanned and are generally just from things I'm familiar with that seem appropriate at the time. Expect some rather obscure ones as well as popular ones from me in the future.
Alright, I'm going to head back and throw myself at the next three months of Rue's Training Montage now!
As always, reviews, faves and alerts are beyond appreciated. They make me glow inside. Like a herald-thingy. You know.
Till next time,
RLK