[Kana] Sparring Match

[Konei Kozuki]

His skin felt raw, and he would have bet fifty yuans that he was going to burn. It didn’t feel too bad, more like sunburn than blisters, but it was going to hurt like hell once he got his shirt back on.
She caught the sword, and Konei let go of it. She couldn’t firebend while she was holding it. What now?

He acted on impulse. His brain told his hands where to go and the fingertips obeyed. There should have been some kind of conscious thought process or intermediary moderator to block the electric signals in his brain and say, ‘No, Konei, that is a really dumb idea’, but it seemed that Kana’s fire had burnt his rational thought as well as his skin.
His brain told him to go for the chi points down her arm and Konei – like a moron – did it.

[Kana Saitou]

When the tension in the sword from him holding the hilt and her the blade disappeared completely, she started, having half expected him to use her grip on the sword against her in other ways--Toss her to the side, twist her around, push her back, trip her while she was distracted. But let go? That wasn't something she'd expected.
From what she'd grown up learning about Water Tribe warriors, it was rare one would relinquish his weapon, and if he did, it wasn't willingly. Usually.

It was then, in the short timespan of her trying to figure out what to do with the sword in her hands, that his own hands seemed to ghost over her arm at a speed once again, rather unexpected. The hand connected to the arm released its grip on the sword entirely. He hadn't done it so hard that he immobilized her arm, but she felt a sudden change in... Well. In how her arm felt. There was no tingle, no burn, no warmth she was used to. Within seconds it felt cold, like the rain falling over their skin.

"What the---" For a moment, she simply backed up, raising the arm and inspecting it for a moment, before throwing a punch in the air in Konei's direction. "Woah! What the hell? I can't---" she tried another punch, just to be sure. When no flames erupted from her fist, she gasped quietly. "I can't fire bend."

She looked at Konei, jaw slightly dropped in a mild shock. She didn't look... angry, though. She looked... curious.

Kana didn't let this deter her though---they were still sparring, after all. And she still had another hand and two feet with the ability to bend. She skipped back a step towards the wall, taking the sword in her now fire-less hand (Ignoring the fact that there was an almost numbing feeling circulating through her veins, a weakness following), her other hand drawing a whip of flame out of the air, smacking it in the other's direction.

"Is that Chiblocking?"

[/blockquote]

[Konei Kozuki]

A split second later, he finally realised what he’d done. In a real fight, instantaneous reactions like that would have saved his life. In fact, they had done quite a few times. But he was just sparring now. Here it wasn’t called for. He hadn’t needed to resort to that, there had been other ways.

He mentally reeled, staggered back a few steps, his hands spreading suddenly, open-palmed. He was used to using such a gesture of peace but here it was too late. He tried to reason with himself, to justify what he’d done, but couldn’t find anything. All he could do was remember the lick of the flames against his skin and maybe that, maybe the pain had made him lose himself.

He hadn’t meant to use chi-blocking. Not here. Not on Kana.
But the firebender seemed curious. Startled, certainly, but not angry. Perhaps she’d never run into a chi-blocker before, she’d probably never heard of the Equalists, and maybe she didn’t really know what to make of what he’d just done to her. It was a good thing if she didn’t know of the Equalists; their strong anti-bender sentiment was likely to piss off any bender, and that was exactly what had made Konei decide to keep the skill under wraps in the first place.

"Shit, Kana, I am so sorry." He made to take a step towards her, but caught himself. He didn’t want her to feel that he was attacking her again. "I didn’t mean to, I just-" His words trailed off into silence.

[Kana Saitou]

The other's actions made her pause, blinking a few short, quick times, before finally her fire sparked, then disappeared entirely, leaving only barely visible little plumes of steam in the air above her fist, a fog of which she hardly even noticed while her flames burned. Water hitting fire would have that effect, she supposed.

His defenses, and his offenses dropped entirely it seemed, and in response, so did hers.

Kana's brows knit together, as her attention turned finally away from the other, her flame-colored orbs staring at her arm. She placed the sword in her hand to lean against the wall, before raising her arm in front of her chest. She seemed to examine it for a moment, eyes dancing over her arm, as if searching for something that wasn't there. As if trying to see through her skin and muscle and bone, as if trying to see the halted flow of chi.

"Relax, Konei. It's not permanent, I know that much. It's just... interesting." She turned her opposite hand palm-up, a small flame appearing there. She considered it for a moment, before running her chi-blocked hand over the flame, letting out a quiet hiss, other hand automatically closing around the flame, extinguishing it. "Huh."

She'd heard of Chi-blockers, obviously. More specifically, she'd heard of the style. To be perfectly honest, Kana viewed it as a perfectly viable alternative for non-benders. They could protect themselves from benders, and get away quickly.
But that was just it. She viewed it as a defense.

Kana didn't know much about the Equalists. After all, her attention was more on the bending gangs of Republic City, than the non-bending was. She knew Anti-benders in general existed, but hell. There were Anti-Benders everywhere. But she had little idea that there was an entire group of Antibenders skilled in Chiblocking who dreamed of destroying all Benders from the ground up.

[Konei Kozuki]

She wasn’t angry? Thank Agni, she wasn’t angry. That probably meant she knew little, if anything, of the Equalists, and wasn’t about to connect him to them. But he could expect a few questions about where he learned it from, and he didn’t want to have to mention his rough affiliation if he could help it.

"You’re... not mad at me?" he dropped his hands slowly, as though they were sinking through treacle. "I swear I didn’t mean to use it, but my mind drew a blank and that’s just what came out. It was an instant reaction."

He watched her stare at her arm, and then meddle around for a few moments with her firebending. Just as he had no idea what it was like to be a bender, he had no idea what it was like to have it removed. Even temporarily, he imagined it to be a horrible, empty thing. Like suddenly not being able to see, or hear, or smell. Like having an arm lopped off and being forced to function like the other one-armed people of the world. Only Konei didn’t think of himself as disabled. He once did, back in the North Pole, where being himself was a terrible and crippling thing. Here he was just... average. Average in a city of extraordinary people. That was almost as bad.

"I’m sorry," he echoed, moving towards her. He wished he had the ability to re-tap her chi-points and restore them. It would almost be like healing. But he couldn’t, and re-hitting the pressure points would only double the damage. His eyes flicked from her face to her numbed hand and back again, studying her closely. "Have you ever encountered chi-blockers before?" If she liked, he could teach her how to defend against the style. Not all chi-blockers were as bender-friendly as he was. There would probably come a time when she would face anti-benders and there would be nothing she could do to defend herself. Konei didn’t want that to happen. Ever.

[Kana Saitou]

"What? No. Why would I be mad? It's a fighting technique, no different than my bending. If I can burn someone's arm to the point they can't use it, or a water bender can freeze someone's feet in place, an earth bender encase someone in solid rock, why can't a non-bender disable someone?" She stared at the other with the most quizzical expression for a few heartbeats.

Kana was rarely naive. She was never clueless. In this situation, she was simply uneducated. She had only been in Republic city for just over a month. It was hardly surprising her background knowledge of Chi-blockers was limited, allowing her to form such a lighthearted, positive opinion on the art.

Granted, that might change, should she ever see a chi-blocker attack someone and completely immobilize them simply for being a bender.

"No, I haven't. I just know a little bit about the fighting style itself: Fast, direct, sharp hits to specific pressure points. Hit em hard enough, you can stop them from moving completely. Can't imagine how anyone manages to memorize all the spots, though." She stared down at her arm for a moment, fingers twitching only the slightest. The cold, numb feeling was beginning to be replaced by a dull, but noticeable ache, that made her grimace slightly. It wasn't painful, but it still wasn't exactly a welcome feeling.

Kana leaned back against the wall then, looking up at the other through her soaking bangs, which now stuck to her face here and there. "I think we're going to have to call this round a draw. Even if I do have bending, not sure if it's fair for me to only have one working bending-arm. " Her lips curled into a smirk, head lolling to the side as her unhindered hand moved to rub along her forearm again absentmindedly.

[/blockquote]

[Konei Kozuki]

"I never found it difficult to memorise the chi points," Konei said. "It’s all there, like a map in my head. I... I used to spar with my little sister after her healing lessons outside the huts, I saw those chi path statues so many times that I already knew all the points and what some did before I even started to learn how to block them." The chi path he had struck on her arm was the one that began under the armpit, twisted across the elbow and ended up on the back of the hand. It was the main chi path down the arm, the line that airbender arrow tattoos followed when they mastered their element.

"One round each. I assume that’s it for today, considering..." he gestured a hand to her arm. "It would be unfair to continue on with you only having one firebending arm, and I can only keep up with you for so long. Maybe sometime I’ll show you how not to get caught out by my chi-blocker trick." He wanted to be able to restore the flow of chi down her arm. But he couldn’t, so he fought the urge to take her hand and end up just standing there, holding her hand like the most awkward lion turtle ever.

He wiped back stray strands of hair that had been plastered wetly to her forehead, and stood there for a second, not entirely sure what to say. Then he pointed inside. "Shall we, uhh...?"

[Kana Saitou]

He speaks, and she hums softly, nodding her head. Chi-blocking to him, was like bending to her. It just came naturally, for the most part. Like walking, or breathing. Now whether or not either of them were exceptionally good at their art was up for consideration. Though Kana could tell this much: The two of them were pretty evenly matched. At least, evenly matched, sparring.

It was obvious neither of them was using their real power. If they were, either he would have been burnt to a crisp, or she would have been completely immobilized on the ground without the ability to even move her pinky toe.

When he spoke again, her smirk widened slightly, and she let out a quiet, feminine chuckle, squeezing the base of her arm, just above her wrist, trying to ignore the strange mix between ache and numb that seemed to consume her entire arm.
"Yeah. That would be fun. Maybe I'll teach you a few ways to avoid a Firebender's attacks." After the words left her mouth, her gaze ghosted over his chest, and her smirk faded halfway. "...Better yet, maybe I'll show you how to treat bad burns." Growing up, learning how to Fire Bend on her own hadn't been easy. Just because her blood was naturally warmer than most, didn't mean it wasn't possible for her to give herself some pretty nasty burns as a kid. Often, she was too proud to go to the healers. Instead, she'd sit there with her hand on whatever burn she had, in a way sucking the heat out of the burn. Granted, whenever she'd pull her hand away, the pain would return.

She stilled when his hand touched her face, brushing away her bangs. She stared at him, that second, two seconds, whatever it was seeming slightly longer, before finally he spoke, making her blink. If she were the blushing type, she would have just then. Instead, she simply grinned, nodding her head once. "Oh--Yeah. I like the rain, I guess. But if I had to chose..." she trailed off intentionally then, pausing a moment, before finally turning on her heels, and stepping towards the door, pulling it open for her and the other, before stepping into the dry gym.

[/blockquote]

[Konei Kozuki]

The fleeting brush of his knuckle against her skin lingered with him. She had been warm, as firebenders were, and his knuckle now seemed to glow with a heat softer yet more intense than any of the faint burns that were beginning to form across his chest.

She offered to show him how to evade firebending attacks, and to Konei, that sounded pretty damn good. He wouldn’t have to end up with a new set of blisters every time he faced one. Not that firebenders were any more or less potentially deadly than earth or waterbenders, but their fire sure did leave lasting pain.

Konei followed her inside, pausing only to retrieve his boots from under the bench. They had been sheltered from the rain, and Konei felt them for a second, thanking the spirits when he found that they were still dry. Walking around in damp footwear was one of the worst things to have to endure. He stepped inside, pulling the tie from his hair and letting rainwater dribble down his neck and shoulders. He stooped to pick up his towel and roughly towelled off his hair and back, but left his chest damp, for now. The cool water was soothing, especially now as it began to evaporate off his skin. Then, leaning against the wall he began to dry off his feet one by one.

"So," he began, trying to make conversation. "Do you have anything planned for the rest of the day?" It was an innocent enough question, but Konei would be willing to bet that she’d not have anything to do.

[Kana Saitou]

Just after the other stepped in, she quickly stuck her foot in the door, holding it open as she leaned back outside just long enough to wring as much of the water as she could out of her thick, nearly-black strands of hair outside, before finally pulling herself back inside, closing the door behind her as she let out a quiet Houff...

"Man, it wasn't even that wet up north, and there, it's all covered in snow." She raised her good hand, holding a small flame in her hand, which now, with the lack of rain, quickly dissolved away the droplets of water that covered her skin, little popping noises, followed by quiet hisses as the cold water disappeared completely. She ran the flame around particularly soaked areas, before finally giving up in her efforts, deciding to just let the dry air of the gym's interior do it's job.

Just before the other spoke, Kana had let her eyes once again begin to dance over the other's chest, and she Hrmm'ed quitely at the rosey flesh. "Man, I wish you hadn't charged through my flames like that. I feel bad." She muttered quietly, slowly stepping over to the other, inspecting the slight burn there. "...Well.. It's not that bad... but.." She began to say, more to herself, before the other's words met her ears, and one of her brows automatically tilted up in response.

"Why? Trying to get me to go get more noodles with you? Spend the rest of the day with you?" There was a bit of playful laughter mixed into her words, her head tilting to the side, and back slightly, as she looked up at the non-bender, standing not even a foot in front of him again. "Maybe you're hoping I'd give you that massage I mentioned? Or maybe,..." Once again, her words intentionally trailed off, and she chuckled quietly, her good-hand raising to the other's chest, pads of her fingers gently touching the irritated flesh.

Her touch would feel completely different than it usually did against his skin. In fact, it would feel almost cold where her fingertips touched. Fire bending wasn't simply that. It was thermal-control. That meant, of course, both adding heat, and taking it away. It's how fire benders controlled the size of their flames. It's also how they rarely burned themselves while cooking or anything of the sort--It was as if they could suck the heat out of something.

Though in the case of burns, it was only temporary. As soon as her hand moved away, the heat would return, perhaps only slightly duller than before.

Finally her expression softened, and she shook her head, slowly rolling her still numb shoulder as proper feeling slowly began to return to it. "No, I don't have anything planned. I was hoping I'd get to spend the rest of the day with a certain non-bending fellow Tribesman, but, if that fell through, I'd probably just go home and read a book or something." Her voice was more gentle now, less teasing, but still carrying that playful air.

[/blockquote]