So, You Want To Learn Waterbending
One day, young ten-year-old Tony Wyzek was sitting on the bank of the East River in New York City watching the water leap and dance around him as it usually did. He was so entranced by the movement of it that he failed to notice a young woman approaching him who wore a long light blue skirt with a pattern of waves on it and a light blue top. She sat down next to him and said, “Beautiful, isn’t it? It’s amazing what you can do with water. You can play with it, form it into certain shapes, useit to put out fires, even use it for defense. You already seem to have a knowledge of how to form it into shapes. How would you like to learn to do more with it?” “What do you mean? It does that on its own. I’m not doing that,” Tony protested. “Actually, you are doing this. Let me explain. You’re what some people would call a ‘bender’ a person who can manipulate and work with one of the four elements: fire, earth, air, or water. You’re not a mutant. You were merely born with a special gift for manipulating the water in your own way. Skilled waterbenderscan do more than just play with the water the way you’re doing. They can use water for self-defense, heal by realigning someone’s chi, and many more things. Would you like to learn how to do those things yourself?” she asked him. Tony thought that at least the healing aspect sounded good, so he told her yes. “Good. We have a school for benders down by the docks. If you want to learn what you can do with this talent of yours, come there tomorrow. You’ll be a professional in no time. There’s a secret way to open the door where the waterbenders enter. We have a door each type of bender enters through that only they can open, so that no one who isn’t supposed to be there may enter. I will meet you there tomorrow and show you how to open the door until you get the hang of it yourself. My name is Lyn. If you need me, just call,” the woman replied.
The next day Tony arrived down at the docks to find Lyn there waiting for him. She greeted him and then instructed him to watch her. Lyn then moved her hands in a circle gently, stepped forward, then thrust her hand straight out, slamming water from the river against a small mark on the door. The door opened and they stepped inside. Tony looked around, amazed, and saw that the room they were in was designed to look similar to a dojo with areas that opened onto the water, enclosed areas, and areas that opened onto cliffs and paths outside. In the areas near the water, Tony saw several students in blue practicing sparring with water flowing between them, while over in the enclosed areas, Tony could see some students in red and orange outfits practicing shooting fire and lightning at each other. Still others wearing yellow were scooting around the room on balls of air that were almost transparent, and others wearing green were moving boulders without even touching them. It was an amazing sight. Tony noticed that even though all of their uniforms were different colors, all the uniforms were the same essentially, pants and/or leggings with protective pads on the knees and thighs, non-slip shoes a short-sleeved shirt covered by a top similar to the gi worn by karate practitioners, and a belt also similar to karate students. The main difference was that the girls had a sort of long cloth piece over the leggings and protective gear. Other than that, the uniforms followed the same standard for all students.
Lyn then took him to the boys locker room, where he found a uniform similar to those worn by the waterbenders he’d seen waiting for him. To his surprise, it fitted like a glove. When he asked Lyn how they’d known his measurements, she only smiled mysteriously and motioned for him to follow her. He followed her over to where the other kids in blue were sparring and introduced him to the other students. It turned out Lyn herself would be his teacher. She told him he would have an opportunity to meet the other students and teachers later. Tony began to practice with the others, and even though he got very wet, he had a lot of fun and learned a lot. He even actually looked forward to going back the next day. Finally, Lyn announced that they were done for the day and the students all went to change. In the locker room, Tony met a young boy named Aiden who was a firebender, Adam, an earthbender, Keanu, an airbender, and Dax, another waterbender. They changed quickly and headed out of the locker room, where they met Moria, Aeola, Assana, Brande, and Terra. Terra was an earthbender; Moria and Aeola were airbenders; Assana was a waterbender, and Brandewas a firebender. The ten of them quickly became fast friends and hung out together frequently outside of school. The next day Tony met the teachers of the other groups: Zola, the earthbending teacher; Kai, the fire-bending teacher, and Makani, the air-bending teacher. All of them were very nice, but Zola and Kai seemed a little tough. Tony began to really enjoy himself at the school and Lyn was a patient teacher guiding him in the use of his power. Soon Tony was among the best students in the class and could spar with the others on equal footing. One day, however, his secret would be discovered by the last people he wanted to know.
One day a week later, Riff and the other Jets were walking down near the docks when they saw a flash of light around the corner. They snuck around there to see what it was and were suddenly hit by a wall of water that knocked them down. “That’ll teach you to come sneaking around here like that. Now, who are—?” Tony broke off abruptly in shock as he realized exactly who he’d just attacked. “Oh my gosh! Riff! Are you guys okay? Here let me fix that,” Tony said as he began working on realigning their chi to get them back to normal. Finally, they all sat up and said they were fine. Riff had a lot of questions for his friend, though, such as how he did it. Tony explained everything to them, demonstrating his waterbending to open the door and showed them the school. The boys were amazed to see all the kids sending fire at each other, scooting around the room on air balls, shoving boulders across the room, and even flicking water at each other. Just then, Lyn came over and got upset that Tony had brought non-benders into the school, but when they promised to keep it a secret, she allowed them to see the school. However, she cautioned them not to come back too much because the other teachers weren’t as understanding as she was.
During one of their visits a week later, Makani offered to teach the boys some of the martial arts style moves they taught young airbenders. Only Baby John accepted because he wasn’t as tough as the other boys in the gang. It soon became clear that Baby John wasn’t as ordinary as the rest of the boys, though. The air began to act funny around him and Makani realized they had a fledgling airbender on their hands. They offered to let Baby John start at the school the following day, at which point they’d have a uniform in his size. So the next day Baby John came down to the school and met Makani outside the airbenderdoor, where he was shown how to open it. Within a few days, baby john had it down and could open it himself. It wasn’t hardly a week later, though, before things began to go wrong. The government found the bender school and saw what the students were practicing. They quickly lumped the bender kids in with the mutants and treated them the same. Several of the firebender students began to rebel, led by Aiden, which pitted friend against friend and student against student. Tony ended up pitted against his friend Brande, who was sorry to fight him, but felt she had no choice.
Tony, Baby John and the others defended the townspeople against the rebels, and soon they began to realize that the benders weren’t the problem—they were. They’d immediately assumed that the bender kids were like the mutants and the kids had only acted to defend themselves. The people then promised the kids that if they would swear not to use their powers destructively ever again, that they wouldn’t be persecuted. Brande immediately apologized and promised, but Aiden and some of the other more stubborn firebenders took longer to apologize. Finally, they did, though, and the battle was over. The benders and normal people lived together in peace from then on.
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