The prologue <3
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Little Percy Jackson's life changed one day when he was eight.
The catalyst for this change was simple. A TV show called Avatar: The Last Airbender.
It was without a doubt the coolest show ever! Percy was certain of that.
Aang could control all the elements and that was awesome (especially the water bending). But Aang wasn’t Percy’s favorite character.
The coolest character in the show was without a doubt Katara.
She could do amazing things with water! She could stop the rain, or make a tsunami, or make ice daggers, or heal with water, or slice up her enemies or make bridges or or or… She was just amazing.
Percy wanted to be able to do that. Katara was his absolute favorite character ever, and after this fateful day, she also became his role model.
You see, today Percy was at the beach, Montak, with his mom. It was a lovely day, the sun was bright, the water was perfect (though it always seemed to be) and Percy was playing in the waves after making a sandcastle.
Today he had just watched the finale of the whole Avatar show and it was amazing. He’d loved it so much. Katara had trapped Azula and beat her and it was incredible. He loved how she'd just... frozen it, then used that cool breathing trick and tied Azula up. Best thing ever.
He wished he could do what Katara did with the water. He swung his arm out, imagining the water sweeping out and rippling over in a wave like Katara could do, and nearly screamed when it did.
He stared at the water but it just lapped gently at his feet.
He slowly reached out, and pushed, trying to copy that first move Katara learned.
His eyes widened when the water seemed to push back.
Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.
Did he imagine it?
He narrowed his eyes, no way he imagined it.
What did Katara do when she was learning?
The first thing was… push and pull the water to make that little wave thing. That’s what Katara said in the waterbending scroll episode.
Percy tried to stand like how he thought Katara did, his feet spread out and standing slightly turned. Then raised his hands and pushed the water.
He focused on the water, willing it to do as he said as he pulled back then gasped in delight when it did.
It was moving! He nearly squealed as he jumped up and down.
Then he realized that he’d stopped doing the movement and the water went back into the normal waves of the sea. He quickly picked it up again. Push and pull, push and pull.
The water was doing it exactly! This is the best day of his life.
Okay, if he had the first step done…
Little Percy thought for a long moment as to what he was supposed to do next.
He thinks its… streaming the water?
Yeah!
Katara had drawn out some of the water and pulled it into a ballish shape in her hands. Then she'd shaped it?
Okay, he'd start with getting the ball thing.
He focused hard, willing a stream of the water to rise as he raised his hands.
Slowly, ever so slowly, the water rose.
He focused on pulling it to him as he drew his arms in.
He beamed when it did it, only to scowl as the water fell when he lost focus.
Okay, he could do this!
Percy played with streaming the water for a good hour, pulling the water in and shaping it as a ball. It took a lot of tries before it would actually keep the ball shape without falling apart but he'd finally done it.
It was only when his mom called him for dinner that he realized how much time had passed.
He had finally managed to get it to where he could move the ball around and change it's shape some. Now he'd been practicing making the water different shapes when his mom called.
“Mom, mom!”
He ran over to her.
“I’m a waterbender!”
She laughed, ruffling his hair, “Are you sweetie?”
“Yeah! I moved the water! Come look, look, look!”
Percy excitedly dragged his mom to the water, her bright laughter following them.
“Okay Percy, I’m here, show me the waterbending.” She smiled gently at him, her currently sea green eyes sparkling.
Percy let go of her hand and focused on the water, carefully moving his hands up, he lifted a strand of the water, then pulled it to him, sticking his tongue out as he shaped it like a star.
He beamed up at his mom and faltered at her pale expression.
“Mom?”
She stared at the water in his hands with her eyes wide and her mouth open in horror.
“Mom? What’s wrong?”
The water fell from his hands with a splash.
Her expression tightened, “Percy, how did you do that?”
He blinked, “I just copied Katara. I’m a waterbender!”
She swallowed hard.
“Ah.”
"Mom?" He whispered in confusion.
She gently grabbed Percy’s hands, “Percy, I need you to promise me you’ll never do this in front of others.”
Percy blinked, “What? Why?"
“It’s not safe Percy, you have to promise me.”
He nodded slowly, frowning slightly.
He didn’t want to not waterbend, he was a waterbender! He wanted to show everyone! But mom looked so serious and scared…
“Okay mom, I promise.”
She let out a breath. “Okay. Okay. Let’s, let’s eat dinner now, okay?”
“Okay, can I practice more waterbending later though?”
She grimaced, staring down at him in worry. “Yeah, sure, as long as you always make sure no one sees you.”
He beamed up at her, at least she wasn't stopping him altogether.
This was going to be amazing.