Learning to run(6)

In the coming years, things went as smoothly as humanly possible. I presented Mako and Bolin to my friends and told them to keep the fact that we are now friends with two benders a secret from Master Wu and the fact that we are learning chi blocking from the brothers. We hanged out in the afternoon with them, every day was an adventure with those two.

The lessons with Kai's father have become more and more in-depth and have started covering more subjects. We learn chemistry and literature as well now.

I can finally make concrete designs for my weapons and if I ever have a problem I talk with mister Li. Of course, I don't tell him what the designs are for and I think he didn't figure it out because I usually work with individual pieces so it's kind of hard to see the big picture. We usually talk for hours about how to make the designs more efficient and such.

The problem I had with the fact that I didn't have a place to practice was easily solved by mister Li as well. Apparently, he had a small workshop in the basement of his house so after we learned enough theory we went there to put it to good use.

Now about training, progress is coming along nicely, scratch that, it's way, way better than I expected. Because of my memory and my 'limbo state' progress comes in leaps and bounds. This made Master Wu very happy, and he finally let us practice with the other. By doing this I was hoping he would ease up on the physical exercises but the reality is a cruel mistress and instead, he increased it.

While I had an easy time with this, my friends struggled at first, but I helped them. Before and sometimes after the lessons with Li, we practiced hitting pressure points. Since I had a perfect memory I build some puppets for them and since I was more proficient I gave them advice on where to improve.

Zane was the best, calm, methodical, precise. It took a while for him to get the basics down but after that, he became a fighting machine. Kai is fast, vicious, reckless, unpredictable. While with Zane when you see him fight you see a machine executing precise movements with pinpoint accuracy Kai is more like a tiger he starts by stalking his prey and then with an unimaginable speed he strikes, and there is Nya, she's elegant, beautiful, graceful, her fighting style is like a dance, a beautiful ballet, it's mesmerizing to look at.

My friends and I are the best students there and usually got paired with each other, but after a started to beat them every single time with ease I started sparing with Wu. In the many spars we had since then, I didn't get to beat master once. I tried to use 'limbo state' once and was very close but the moment I started using master changed his attitude and stopped pulling his punches. I don't think I got beat up worst than that ever and the worst part was that Master Wu knew that I did something. Since lying was not an option I tried to be as vague as possible and that seemed to satisfy his curiosity although he was intrigued, he told me to only use it in the only case of emergencies, when I told him the side effects.

The only bad thing is that grandma is getting older and it became hard for her to take care of the shop alone and while she says that it's fine and I know she can handle it, I can't bear to watch her struggle so I help how much I can in the shop.

It was a chilly summer night and only the four of us and Master Wu were in the makeshift dojo, that was now under a grocery shop. We were doing physical exercises and talking with the master about our day when suddenly it was a knock on the door. When we heard it, we stopped what we're doing and got in battle positions but the master calmed us down.

"Don't worry they are friends."

While my friends calmed down, I still had my body tensed up ready at any second to attack the person that came in, when I feel a hand on my shoulder.

"Ethan it's ok they are from the Equalists. They heard about how good you all are and want to give you a proposition and a gift. They are good people, that have the same dream as you, to help the helpless."

"If master says so."

I calmed down as well.

'Since they are equalists then they are probably here to recruit us.'

Master went to the door and opened it and I saw Amon. While the others were mesmerized my body tensed up and entered 'limbo state' involuntarily perceiving him as a threat. I took my fighting stance ready to make my move when I felt a hard slap from behind.

"What are you doing didn't I tell you that they are friends."

I came back to my senses and saw my master, my friends, and the other people that came with Amon looking at me.

"Forgive me master I felt he was dangerous and my body moved on its own."

"He's Amon and he's the leader of the Equalists, you should show more respect for him."

"Yes, master." I approached, millions of thoughts going through my mind.

'Should I try to kill him now to save so many people that will get caught in the middle? No, I shouldn't if I do it now it would push the right of non-benders by about a century. What should I do....?'

"I'm terribly sorry for how I acted, please forgive. It's a great honor to meet you, sir."