Book One: Spirits

“No, not that one, THAT one” the water tribe girl pointed toward another blue mask.

“This one?” the vendor’s tone betrayed his lack of amusement with the young woman’s antics. She looked to be about 16 and the man was frustrated with how childish she was acting.

“Yes!” the girl hopped up and down. “It’s perfect!” The vendor passed the mask over to be tried on. After sliding the painted wood over her face and examining herself in the mirror for no more than a few seconds, she pulled it off and tossed it back. The vendor barely reacted quickly enough to catch it before placing it in a large pile of other rejects.

“Nah,” she shrugged. “Not my style.” The vendor seemed to be losing his temper quickly. “Don’t you have anything more interesting? Something a little more-”

“This is the last mask I have!” the man shoved a mask on over her head and thrust a mirror into her face. She gasped happily.

“I’ll take it!” The mask depicted a cerulean wolf’s face, which complemented the cobalt blues in her outfit quite nicely. She wore common water tribe clothing - a blue tunic dress, simple pants, and tan animal skin snow boots.

“Five jaio” the vendor seemed to sigh with relief. The girl handed over the coins and attempted to adjust the mask. Her choppy, short brown hair had mostly cleared the decorative ribbons on the mask, but one of the two beaded strands of hair she left to hang in the front got caught. Despite giving it a few yanks, the hair wouldn’t pull free.

“Hey,” she turned back to the vendor. “Could you help me-”

“No!” he snapped, interrupting her sentence.

“Alright, alright...” she made a rude face before she walked away, taking advantage of the mask hiding her expression. She eventually managed to fix her hair without assistance while window shopping at the Republic City Fire Festival. She was content to finish up and find an inn to stay at for the night until something caught her eye.

A young woman around the age of 18 was creating intricate movements with fire on the side of the road. In comparison with others walking around, her dress suggested that she came from money. With the amount of red incorporated, one could be fairly certain she was a firebender from the Fire Nation. Her outfit consisted of a revealing halter top, arm warmers, and a skirt that fell to her ankles in layered spirals. Her golden jewelry, decorated with red gems, flashed in the sunlight - necklaces, bracelets, anklets, belts, earrings - and the waterbender felt a pang of envy.

A small crowd had gathered to watch, drawing in the Water Tribe girl in as well.

“Those other guys are better!” someone yelled from within the crowd, but the firebender seemed to be ignoring him. However, probably realizing that she wouldn’t be attracting a larger crowd, she stopped a short time later. The girl picked a bag up from off the ground in front of her and walked away, removing the coin or two she had received. The waterbender followed as closely behind as she could. She caught up to the other girl while she was browsing a trinket booth.

“Hey!” she attempted to catch the other bender’s attention. “What was that back there?” The firebender stopped to evaluate the masked female. Her outfit seemed a little worn and suggested she wasn’t the richest of travelers, but she certainly stuck out in this festival which gave the Fire Nation girl reason to pause. Not only was she the only person who could be seen wearing blue, but she was also dressed for winter in the middle of a summer festival.

“Dancing...?” She replied, curious. “Why?” However, she seemed to have lost the Water Tribe girl’s attention as she wasn’t responding. It was nearly impossible to tell what the other girl was doing with the mask on. Making an annoyed sound, the firebender turned and walked away.

“Hey!” the girl in blue chased after the dancer. “What, you think you’re too good for me or something? You just walk away in the middle of a conversation?”

“You weren’t talking.” the firebender shrugged, continuing to browse the tents set up in the streets.

“Oh.” the waterbender didn’t seem to believe the answer, but pressed on anyway after an awkward pause. “Who are you?”

“Karizibi, but you can call me Kari. Yours?” Kari asked with complete indifference.

“Rikkako” came the reply.

Hearing some kind of rhythm, Kari began to look around. Suddenly, she snatched her new companion’s arm and dragged her into the crowd.

“Where are we going?” Rika yelled, slightly panicked. If Kari heard, she didn’t make any indication. After shoving her way to the front of the crowd, the two stopped in front of a stage with two firebenders dancing similarly to how Kari had been, accompanied by a spectacle of flames.

“That’s where!” Kari yelled over the crowd. “So these are the other dancers.” she mumbled to herself. “I could do better than that...”

“WHAT?” Rikkako couldn’t hear anything over the sounds of the drums and the single Tsungi horn the dancers were moving to. “THEY LOOK PRETTY GOOD!” The dancers made their way off the stage a few minutes later and the music stopped. Their set was apparently over. Now that it had quieted, Kari spoke again:

“I said that I could do better than them.”

“Yeah, I could totally do better as well.” Rikkako crossed her arms, bluffing. Kari glanced to the side of the stage where the next act was setting up - a gentleman dressed in an eccentric manner was completely absorbed in jamming a long-eared rabbit into a hat, paying no attention to anything going on behind him. Kari turned and grinned at Rikakko. That was all the warning she received before Kari grabbed her arm once more and jumped onto the stage. Rika barely managed to keep from tripping as she was dragged along.

Karizibi wasted no time in producing a ribbon of fire and began moving her hips a little. The musicians seemed to catch on and, with a shrug to one another, started up a new song. Kari dove into a sequence she had clearly rehearsed before, stopping after about a minute. She turned to Rikkako, expectantly, making a motion of encouragement. Rika pulled water from her hidden stores and bent them into tentacles, using these to dance a short sequence before stopping and motioning for Kari to take a turn. The two went back and forth for a short while and the crowd was loving it.

“Hey! Stop that!” a man’s whiny voice called from behind them, but both girls brushed him off, having too much fun to care. A fireball suddenly blazed past Kari, just a little more than an inch in front of her nose, which was enough to make the pair stop. The drums came to an abrupt halt.

The two quickly took their bows and left the stage, making faces at the magician as they passed. When they came to the bottom of the steps, they ran into a young boy not quite making eye contact with the two. He appeared to be a young teenager, probably no older than the age of 13. He was dressed in an earth toned outfit indicative of an earthbender: a one-shouldered tunic with a studded belt wrapped around his middle, simple pants and feet wrapped in tape. Kari put on the angriest face she could muster. After years of living as a noble, she knew very well how to make herself look intimidating. She figured the kid deserved a good scare.

“Were you the person who ratted us out?” she demanded. The boy’s eyes grew wide as saucers and began to tear a little. Even Rikkako took a small step back. Perhaps she had overdone it?

“Y-yes...” he stammered.

“Well...Why?” Kari asked, making a conscious effort to sound a little less scary. Rika patted the boy’s head to chide him when he seemed hesitant to continue.

“Because...Because...You weren’t the next act?” Kari rolled her eyes, about to leave when the boy grabbed the arms of both girls.

“Hey, wait!” he smiled. “What are your names?” The two responded as basically as they could, anxious to get away. Their annoyed tones would have been apparent to anyone. Anyone except, perhaps, this little earthbender.

“Kari”

“Rikkako”

“I’m Pong!” he replied happily. Two glared at him before turning to attempt to walk away again.

“Stop them!” a new voice cried. The three turned just in time to see a group of four people dash past, a hinged, wooden box clutched in one set of hands.

“Thieves!” another person yelled. Without a second thought, Kari grabbed Rikkako’s arm and took chase. Rika reacted just quickly enough to grab Pong’s arm and drag him along as well.

They pursued the thieves through a few tents before the people with the box began to slow down, not realizing they were being tailed. Still at a jog, they took a turn down an alley and the trio followed. With a quick motion, Pong erected an earth wall. All but one of the thieves slammed into it, falling to the ground. The battle was quick, lasting no more than a few seconds. Pong still seemed to be mastering his earth blasts while Rikkako dealt some nasty damage with her waterbending tentacles she had been dancing with earlier. Nearly everyone had been on the dealing or receiving end of bending damage, but the fight ended when Kari dealt a heavy blow to the only member Pong hadn’t trapped behind another earth wall.

The metalbending police arrived shortly after to tie things up. Apparently they had been right behind the trio the entire time. Pong’s earth wall was lowered and the thieves held there were bound. As the police escorted them, Pong stopped one.

“Wait!” he cried. “What’s in the box?” The metalbenders glanced at each other before laughing a little and walking away. Someone else picked up the box and began carrying it in another direction.

“Please?” Pong called after them. “Pretty please?” It was then that the highest ranking metalbender stepped forward.

“Although we appreciate the help,” his voice was angry and gruff, “One of those men nearly died. You kids should leave these things to professionals. What were you thinking?” The man proceeded to give a short speech about responsibility and obeying laws. Although Kari and Rika simply tuned him out, Pong seemed to take the man’s words to heart and began to cry. When the man finally finished berating them, another metalbender approached.

“We can have you healed at the hospital.” he suggested. “As you were assisting us, it would be free of charge.” Everyone seemed to respond at once, grateful for the gesture.

Already, a crowd had gathered at the opening of the ally. Many questions were being asked, notepads were waved in their faces and accusations were made. Kari handled this gracefully, standing tall and waving to the crowd, a fake smile plastered on her face. Meanwhile, Rikkako noticed Pong hiding his face and his tears in her tunic. With a sigh, she removed the wolf mask from her face, tying it around his. In a mixture of gratitude and fear, he hugged close to her side, both attempting to get away from the crowd as quickly as possible.

None of the injuries they suffered left so much as a scar. After a few short hours with the healers, everyone made a full recovery. Pong disappeared without a word to the others, but Rikkako seemed happy to stay and find a healer.

“Excuse me” she finally flagged someone’s attention. “I’m a waterbender and I was interested in learning to heal. Do you know someone who could teach me?” The healer smiled warmly.

“We’re all very busy here, but if you’ll follow me to my office, I believe I have some scrolls that would be of use to you.” Excited, Rika followed him closely. Unsure of what else to do, Kari was left to follow along. The healer was able to produce a scroll from his desk for Rikkako.

“Keep it as long as you need to” he offered. “Just make sure you return it to me at some point.” Giving a quick “thank you” to the healer, Rika turned tail and had her nose buried in the scroll before she even made it out the door. She was so intent on reading the scroll that she nearly knocked into Kari, who barely stepped out of the way in time.

“Oh!” Rikkako seemed startled. “How long have you been there?”

“I followed you.” Kari seemed just as confused. “How did you not notice I was following you?” Rika shrugged.

“Where’s Pong?”

“No clue.” Kari didn’t seem too concerned. “Where’s the closest candy source?”

“Gift shop?”

“Then there’s your answer.” Sure enough, not five minutes later Kari was dragging Pong out of the gift store by the scruff of his shirt.

“But I want pudding!” he whined in protest.

“No.” both Kari and Rikkako responded at once.