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He wasn’t supposed to wander unaccompanied. Omashu was a labyrinth of rail lines and highways, serpentine back alleys untouched by time. A network of pneumatic tubes snaked through the city, delivering packages and people at astonishing speeds. Or they did, before the Earth Empire arrived. Now the metropolis was still, a whisper of what it had been when they’d arrived two weeks ago. Omashu’s constant drone of pressured air had all but quieted. Citizens no longer lingered in the streets, preferring to stay indoors- and out of trouble. After all, peace negotiations were still underway. Since their forces had occupied Omashu, Kuvira had spent nearly all of her days with the King, prying him to accept a favorable agreement. The city would be theirs, but this kind of thing took a delicate touch.
Baatar rounded the corner on an empty side street, a former warehouse district turned housing complex. He had a memory of the place, if vague impressions can be considered a memory. The Beifong family had taken one trip to Omashu when Baatar was a child, an “educational venture”. His mother never viewed any place as a vacation destination, not when she considered their home to be one.
Somewhere between the dining and the sight-seeing tours, there was a subliminal lesson for him and his siblings. They were supposed to see that other cities didn’t have it so easy, that not all societies were progressive and modern. Not that Baatar saw anything wrong with the place. It wasn’t quite as clean as Zaofu, maybe not as orderly, but Omashu had an eclectic character. A personality. Merchant huddled in the streets, selling colorful wares and delicious meals, meats and spices and flavors he’d never had in Zaofu. The buildings were a bit disordered, sure, but many of them were careful renovations of old structures. Things moved quickly here, quicker than at home, and Baatar admired the pace.
His mother urged them to “count their blessings”.
But their blessings must have come up a bit short, because days after their return from Omashu he’d found his father hard at work on a pneumatic tube system of his own. “A spark of inspiration” he’d called it. Strange, Baatar thought with a dose of doubt and irony, to source inspiration from a place they’d found so primitive. More like stealing, he’d reasoned. But these were the days when Baatar held his tongue, when Baatar was Junior. By the year’s end, Zaofu had a functioning pneumatic tube postal system.
They never did manage the larger packages. Or the human transport. Perhaps because his father had other things to think about; perhaps he’d never figured it out for himself. Or perhaps because his parents feared making too conspicuous of a copy. Baatar reasoned it was all of the above.
This evening the creations his parents envied sat dormant on the streets. A pang of guilt shot through Baatar as he passed a tube station, knowing its emptiness, to one degree or another, was his own doing. He tried to shake the thought from his mind and quickened his pace. Almost there. He could tell by the slowly descending buildings on the horizon that he was a block away, two at most.
Baatar kept his course, following the road until it made a sharp decline. This was the view he was waiting for.
Omashu’s west district spread out before him in the setting sun. Light glinted off tube railways and green and gold rooftops, rippling like the surface of the ocean. In the distance, dusty hilltops poked through the clouds, an impressive horizon if he’d ever seen one. Baatar took a deep breath as the breeze rustled his hair. Normally he would have fussed to fix himself, but nothing mattered now. No one was here. Just Baatar and the mountains and clouds.
He strolled over to a humble park on his left, a postage-stamp of dirt and a singular tree that overlooked the city. It was lined with a wooden fence short enough to step over, but a small sense of reverence sent him through the gate. It creaked as he stepped inside, rattling in the wind. Baatar turned to latch it closed and settled on the park’s only bench, a small stone slab engraved with the Earth Kingdom emblem. This was the spot he remembered.
Baatar couldn’t remember the last time he’d sat in such silence. Their maglev was always abuzz with activity, even during the evening hours. The faint murmur of distant conversation and the rattling of the train on its tracks were familiar and unnoticeable as his own beating heart. Omashu was no different. New noises replaced the old.
And spirits, when was the last time he’d be alone? That Baatar could scarcely remember. If Kuvira wasn’t glued to his side, there was always someone. Varrick, Zhu Li, a lab assistant of some sort. Before that it was his siblings- and in the lab- his father. Solitude and silence had always been rare commodities.
But both were necessary for this experiment, if he had any chances of dulling his nerves.
Not a soul in the distance. The only sounds were a storefront tarp flapping in the breeze and the whisper of the wind in the air. Subtle sounds. Constant ones. That was what he needed.
With a sharp inhale, Baatar extended his palms, flexing his fingers. He stared at his long, tan hands, cupped them into fists and relaxed them again. They were deft enough with page-turning, with hours of note-taking and long dives into the belly of a mech. But whether they were still suited for this, he had no idea. But he had to try. The curiosity was killing him.
Bending over, he planted his hands on the ground, feeling the warm earth between his feet. The ground was soft here, malleable. Baatar dug his fingers in the earth, allowing the dirt to coat his hands and fill his fingernails. He didn’t enjoy the mess, but it made things clearer somehow, connected. In moments he sensed movement from beneath. It’s size and shape were unclear to the touch, but a thin worm snaked its way to the surface, revealing itself and wiggling away. So he could sense worms. He chuckled at his own pathetic accomplishment.
Encouraged, Baatar buried his hands further now, pressing them until the dirt buried his entire hands and encircled his wrists. If anyone was watching, they would have wondered why a grown man was bent ninety degrees over a bench, but today Baatar was alone.
He closed his eyes, urging his mind to focus. He’d theorized that if he returned his body to the source, submerged his hands in the earth, the contact would spark something akin to a static charge. He’d theorized that he’d be able to bend.
Watching this, one might assume that Baatar Beifong was not a smart man.
Baatar was brilliant, but for everything he knew about science, he knew next to nothing of bending- the theory or the practice. None of his rules applied here- no amount of friction would ignite an ability inside him. Not that he knew better.
When it came to matters of bending, Baatar had no family he could consult, none that would speak to him anyway. Kuvira was his only confidant, the only human in the world he truly loved- and she was far too precious to ask. He could only imagine that conversation.
“Oh Kuvira, nevermind the better things you could be doing right now- I’ve been a bender all along and I’m worthless at it, but can you help me toss some pebbles around?”
He shuddered at the thought. Baatar was not a well-rounded man, but what he did, he did well. Kuvira’s raised brows when he solved a design flaw, or her soft smile at his paperwork- any pinch of validation from her was enough to make his heart leap out of his chest. Her admiration was sacred. It wasn’t worth risking for a passing curiosity.
So he’d traveled two hours on foot to the only place where he’d been able to bend, the only place without his mother breathing down his neck or the twins’ disappointed stares.
On his childhood trip to Omashu, he’d broken away for the evening “to read”. His family accepted reading as an excuse for anything. He’s the academic one in the family, why not let him practice his craft? That was the thought anyway. They assumed Baatar found books more interesting and urgent than anything else. Sometimes that was true; sometimes “reading” was a simple excuse to get away.
That evening was the latter. He’d sat through a particularly long lecture from his father at dinner. Wei shot a vegetable mash across the table, splattering it all over Baatar’s plate. By the meal’s end, Baatar was irritated and spent. He played the “reading” card, cleaned his glasses, and set out for fresh air, wandering to nowhere in particular.
Baatar landed at this small city park. The place was as empty then as it was now, the horizon just as beautiful. He’d felt as if the city arranged itself all for him, as if the buildings stepped into alignment for his pleasure. Total bliss, complete calm. That evening Baatar bended on his own for the first and last time, tossing dirt between his hands and shaping it into a soft, round sphere.
For years Baatar had ached to replicate that feeling again, to feel the earth between his hands. But that moment felt like a dream, magical almost, something he could never replicate anywhere else, even if he’d tried.
There was no logic in that reasoning, no science. But here he was, in the same city, at the same park, burrowing his hands in the ground like some superstitious hag. Ridiculous. But still…
Baatar sensed that worm. If he could feel here, if he could see, he could do more. Surely he could do more. Satisfied, Baatar pulled his hands from the dirt and sat up straight, arms still extended in front of him. Rather than shake the dirt off his skin, he decided to will it off.
He closed his eyes. Limb by limb, he tried to relax the rest of his body, to disconnect from his legs and chest and neck and focus every nerve in his body on his bare hands. He felt the dirt. He saw it.
Baatar flexed his palm downward and his fingers higher, tracing the dirt with his mind. Slowly, the smallest, most imperceptible weight was lifted from his skin. Baatar blinked his eyes open cautiously, afraid to break his focus, afraid to see nothing but dirt on his hands.
He opened his eyes.
Baatar Beifong was a bender. He was still, despite everything, a bender.
A small cloud of dirt hovered over his hands, vibrating gently in the breeze. He had moved it. He was suspending it. A giddy feeling rose up his chest, setting his hair on end. Baatar lost himself in excitement and the cloud began to dip, but he locked his focus and set it right again. He savored the moment, admiring that cloud of dirt like it was the most beautiful thing on earth, as if a jaw-dropping sunset wasn’t unfolding behind it. It wasn’t much, but it was something. It was something.
“Baatar!”
That voice. He dropped the dirt in shock as he snapped his head to the sound.
Her.
Kuvira stood in the street, mouth agape. In seconds she composed herself, face and jaw relaxing to her trademark steely expression. The woman turned and raised a hand to halt someone he couldn’t see.
“Stay back. It’s him. Watch for citizens.”
Several footsteps, ten or twelve by Baatar’s estimation, faded into the distance as Kuvira’s troops guarded the road for them. If the men had walked a few more steps, they would have seen everything.
“What is this?” Her voice was calm, but she hadn’t moved an inch.
“Kuvira, I’m sorry it’s late. I should have said something, sent a message, or-”
“You can bend.” It was a statement and a question all in one.
He straighten back in his seat and ran a hand through his hair, suddenly aware of his appearance.
“I- no, I can’t really.” Baatar cleared his throat.
“What are you talking about?” She raised an eyebrow, irritation clouding her voice.
“Please. Sit.” He scooted to his left and patted the seat beside him. The sun was still setting, the view still gorgeous. That would soften things. He hoped it would soften things.
Kuvira sighed and strode over to the bench. She had clearly come from negotiation meetings, still clad in her Great Uniter regalia, greens and armor and all. Baatar looked like a peasant by comparison, dressed from head to toe in civilian clothing he’d bought just for the occasion. A muted gray shirt, drab brown pants, just the kind of thing that didn’t draw attention. How else would he walk so far unrecognized? Baatar didn’t have the kind of public image his fiancé did, but Omashu was a city of 3 million people. At least 2 million of them were frustrated with the occupation. And perhaps a solid 200,000 wouldn’t mind Baatar’s head on a platter. So he took precautions.
But now, sitting next to the Great Uniter of the Earth Empire, hands fresh from juggling dirt, Baatar felt positively microscopic.
Kuvira looked at him expectantly, clearly waiting for him to speak.
Baatar took a deep breath and cleared his throat. “Yes, I can bend.”
“Clearly.” Her voice dripped with frustration.
“But, I can’t really bend.” He clarified, wiping beats of sweat that had gathered at his brow.
“Clearly.”
Of course. She was disappointed. Who wouldn’t be disappointed by that display?
Kuvira reached for the pins that held up her hair and let it down with one simple flourish. Long black waves washed over her shoulders, messy and drenched with sweat. How long had she been walking like this? He never imagined she’d worry, never mind send a search party.
Just as Baatar opened his mouth to ask, she continued.
“Is this new?”
“No. I mean, I’ve always been this way. I think-”
She rolled her eyes. “No, I know that. You don’t just catch bending. Your sister’s case was unusual. Bending is something you have from birth or you don’t. I’m talking about the awareness. Is that new?” Kuvira leaned forward, folding her hands in thought, eyes trained to the dirt he’d just bended. “Is it new that you know?”
Baatar pressed his frames up the bridge of his nose and steeled himself. “No,” he said firmly, fighting to keep his face expressionless as Kuvira shot up in surprise. Her eyes were wide, a dangerous blend of surprise and hurt that made him weak to the knees. He hated doing this to her. He hated all of this.
“I’ve always known. Mother and father had me tested, when I was young. I was the first born, so of course they were eager.” Baatar winced at the thought. “And I was an earthbender, just as they’d hoped. So mother trained me, just as she trained Wing and Wei. Huan. And you.” Kuvira’s face softened and she sat back now, listening intently. “If I’m honest, I don’t remember training that well. I think I tried to forget. But my father told me that it didn’t last long. They pulled me out at stage two.”
“Stage two?”
Baatar laughed darkly. “Mm, yes. Mother used to have a twelve-tier system for training benders. A magic formula, she called it. For a while she tried to pitch it to other bending schools in the kingdom, to share Zaofu’s wonderful wisdom with the world.” He shot Kuvira a knowing look and she laughed.
“Her system didn’t stop anyone from learning, but it didn’t help either. Wing and Wei learned that way. I guess they turned out alright. It was even a standardized practice in the city for a while. But that was long gone by the time you came around. Turns out, bending has nothing to do with textbooks and rules. Who knew?” Kuvira stifled a laugh. “If it did, maybe I’d be decent at it.”
Baatar stretched his legs. The sun was almost set, hidden behind a hill in the distance. The long shadows that had graced the hill were gone and the city fell flat.
Dusk has a way of swallowing things.
“We should go,” he said abruptly, standing to leave.
Kuvira tugged him back on the bench and locked her green eyes with his. “You’re not finished.”
“There’s not much more to say.”
“There has to be!”
“Look, I just…I wasn’t good. And I don’t mean I needed work, or that I was slow. Kuvira, I was atrocious.” Baatar looked at her with pleading eyes, desperate to end the conversation. But he thought better of it and carried on. “I was truly atrocious. They pulled me out, ended my training entirely-“
“They can’t do that!” Kuvira shot her face towards him, eyes boring into his soul. Baatar relaxed his shoulders, suddenly warm despite the angry woman inches from his face. There was something about Kuvira’s righteous indignation that melted him, especially when she fumed on his behalf. “They didn’t have the right!”
He sighed. “They did. They decided I wasn’t fit for training and removed me immediately. When they realized I was bright like my father, well, I think mother must have slept well that night. At least I was good for something.”
“Baatar, I swear-“
He raised a hand to pause her. “Stop. Their opinion isn’t mine. I- I know better than that now. Because of you.”
Kuvira ran a hand through his hair in reply and for the first time that night, he smiled.
“That trip my family took here- I went to this park, just found it by chance. And I bended on my own for the first time. I thought that if I went back, maybe I could do it again. That was all.”
“At least you told me about the park,” she fired back. “If you hadn’t, I would never have found you.”
“Isn’t a search party a bit much?”
Kuvira bit her lip. “A bit much? Baatar, we’re in an occupied city- you’re Second in Command, in case you forgot. And you leave for hours, no note, no way to defend yourself-” Kuvira’s words caught in her mouth as she realized what she’d said. “Spirits, I’m sorry-”
“It’s okay.”
“I didn’t mean-”
“I know.”
They sat in silence. Baatar wrapped his arm around Kuvira and rubbed the small of her back as night fell over Omashu.
She was first to speak.
“Why didn't you tell me?”
“Hmm?” Baatar had been deep in thought.
“All these years. You never said anything."
He'd dreaded this question, but Baatar resolved to tell her the truth. In all honesty, he didn't know if his nerves could handle drawing this out.
"Listen, I... I never wanted you to see this. I don't like you seeing me fail."
"But I already knew you didn't bend."
"You thought I was a non-bender. That I couldn't bend. There's a difference. But to be a bender, a useless one..." He shook his head, disgusted. Kuvira placed a hand on his cheek and turned his face towards her.
"Do I seem like I care?"
She didn't. Baatar exhaled as if he'd surfaced for air. How long had he been holding his breath?
"I could teach you. There might be a time, maybe not now, but soon, when you’ll need to defend yourself.”
“There’s guards for that.”
“Guards can go down. I could show you the basics.”
“But Kuvira,” he protested, “I’m-”
“Horrible. I know. You didn’t learn when you should have. And you might never be good. But promise you won't hate me by the end and I’ll teach you.”
-
That was the easiest promise Baatar ever made.