Tale Of Two Avatars

The Firebending Masters

Zuko, Aang and I stand on the balcony of a pagoda in the temple the next day, both Aang and I ready for our first firebending lesson. 

"Aang, I know you're nervous, but remember, firebending in it of itself is not something to fear," Zuko advised.

"Okay. Not something to fear," Aang sighed heavily.

I put a reassuring hand on his shoulder, smiling at him. "You can do this, Aang."

"Thanks Suzume," he smiled back, sounding a little more confident.

"But," Zuko raises his finger, interrupting both of us. "if you don't respect firebending," Zuko raises his voice, making some sort of a scary face. "it'll chew you up and spit you out like an angry komodo rhino!"

Aang yelps, jumping back a little in fear.

"Zuko, that's not helping," I scolded, turning to Aang and putting my arms around him. "Don't worry Aang, I'm here, Zuko's here, we'll make sure you don't hurt anyone so just give it your best shot, don't worry about anything."

Aang nodded and gave me a small smile. With that, Zuko immediately puts us through the paces. "Now both of you show me what you've got. Any amount of fire you two can make."

Aang inhales nervously and shifts his palm to the side, a small amount of smoke only dissipating from it. Meanwhile, I get into the firebending stance Jeong Jeong taught us, inhaling in the way he taught us to as well, concentrating on the heat of the Sun. Using a combination of energy and a little pent-up anger that was stored within me, I start to feel my palms heat up but instead of fire, light comes streaming out of both of them. 

"Dang it!" I shout in frustration, relaxing my stance. "I'm too used to lightbending!"

"So the rumours are true then, you really can lightbend," Zuko looked at me curiously. "I've never seen it for myself and no one in the Fire Nation can lightbend, not even my uncle. Can you teach me how to lightbend?"

"Well, it's certainly easier than firebending that's for sure. Aang, you may also want to listen to this, it's kind of a less extreme form of firebending, you can use it instead of firebending for now if you find firebending a little too extreme for you." 

Aang's ears perk up in interest. "Let's do it!"

"Alright," I point at the Sun. "As we all know, firebenders draw their power from the Sun and there are two things the Sun emits, heat and light. What firebenders have been doing in the past is just focusing on extracting heat from the Sun but what if, instead of drawing heat, we draw light from the Sun? Ever thought of that?"

"Oh, that's pretty smart," Zuko commented.

"All you have to do is point your fingers to the Sun, concentrate on the light the Sun emits, drawing it instead of heat. And after you do that, you just need to redirect it with your fingers on your other hand. Once you're able to do that, you can even start adding heat to the light from the Sun to make your light beams even more effective. Of course, you'll have to control the amount of heat or else you'll burn it. And if you master it, you'll be able to manipulate light into any shape or form you desire. Like so."

I point my fingers to the Sun and concentrate on the light particles from them, drawing them in and redirecting them through my fingers on my other hand.  I aim the light at a nearby wall, slowly drawing and adding heat to the sunlight. Wisps of smoke start to trail from the wall and Aang and Zuko start to stare at me in shock. 

I release the heat from the sunlight, forming the sunlight that was travelling in a straight path into a scythe aimed directly at the wall. 

"Wait, Suzume, don't cut the wall!" Aang pleaded.