ATLA: Nari's tale

01- The southern air temple

Nari had lived alone in the air temple as long as she could remember. She had also been alone as long as she remembered. Sometimes a flicker of a memory would be seen in her dreams, but most consisted of the blurry face of who she assumed to be her mother. Her oldest memories were from when she was around six years old, and even in them she was alone. Now she was 15 and had never left the temple.

Saying she was fully alone in those 9 years would be a lie because, as she would constantly remind herself, she had the flying lemurs and she wouldn't be bored if she could read books from the library about the history of air bending, run around the air temple and practise air bending.

Nari was running around with the flying lemurs- they were playing a game of sorts- when she heard voices.

"But aang, no one could have survived in there for 100 years" the voice was soft, feminine and sounded distant. 'Where is it coming from?' she wondered. Hearing a voice other than her own and now, after years, was strange but delightful. However, as much as she wished she could talk to the strangers, she had to determine whether or not they were a threat.

"I survived in an ice burg for that long" this time the voice belonged to a male and was louder, either she had moved closer to them or they had moved closer to her. Too lost in her thoughts she didn't even register the shocking fact.

Nari was so close now that she could see their shadows on the walls. Walking lightly on her feet towards the voices as they continued their conversation, she was practically buzzing with excitement. Peaking around the corner, she saw them. Standing there was what appeared to be two water tribe people and, to her absolute delight an air nomad!

As soon as she saw him Nari no longer felt threatened. Despite the fact they were complete strangers she leapt out from around the corner where she was hiding and hugged the young air nomad. 

Bad idea.

Utter chaos ensued, the water tribe boy - who looked about the same age as Nari- pulled out a boomerang looking ready to attack; the water tribe girl went to grab her in an attempt to help the younger boy.  

Due to the fact Nari had only eaten small portions of vegetables pretty much her whole life, and that both her and the boy were air benders and therefore light on their feet, neither of them fell over.

Confusion settle as they realised she was not, as they thought, attacking aang but simply hugging him. 

"Ummm- hello?" the brunette was the first to break the silence.

"Hello!" Nari was positively beaming at this point, she removed her arm that were previously around aang and leapt at Katara, embracing her instead. Katara just stood there awkwardly not sure what was happening. Nari then proceeded to engulf Sokka with a friendly hug. Sokka was as shocked as the other two and blushed as the pretty girl hugged him.

"Who are you?" Katara asked politely, she had been so sure all the air benders had been killed 100 years ago.

"I'm Nari" She said removing her arms from around the flustered Sokka and smiling widely at all three of them. They introduced themselves to her as well and asked if she wanted to come with them. Nari agree and thus their journey together started.

word count: 592