cyclicality | Welcome to Republic City!

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Welcome to Republic City!

It was a bright and sunny normal day in Republic City. Children were playing, spirits were chirping about, and everything was going along like normal. Well at least that's what everyone seemed to think. That is until so many people seemed to be appearing out of nowhere. For some reason Republic City seemed to be more lively and the crowds bigger.

The spirits have grown restless as if something important was about to change, and to try to fix that change, the spirits with their big long tree like limbs dragged people into the world left and right. Even the vines covering Republic City seemed to help. Although the spirits had the best intentions in mind, some people were more affected by the grab than others. There's talk that people in this city don't even know what this place is. People who have never heard of the words "bender" or "non-bender."

Welcome to Republic City! And to those who already live here: Happy Saturday. Please make yourselves at home and don't mind a little spirit gunk. It's mostly harmless. Go enjoy yourself a classic mover. Maybe you're the athletic type. If that's the case, come watch a few Pro-bending matches or form your own team. Just watch out for any Satomobiles. They can be deadly no matter how pretty the driver is.

Please remember to enjoy your stay and don't cause too much trouble. The Republic City Police don't need more riffraff to take care of. And don't stray too far. To make the the peace is kept, there's a huge spirit barrier around the perimeter of the city. It seems pretty strong, but it won't be able to last forever. Still, it's worrying. Radio signals and telegraphs don't seem to be getting past it.

[ OOC: The game is officially open! From this point on, feel free to make any posts you want or tag into this. Please remember to tag your posts with Canon: Character. Finally, although the game has no real network, you're free to respond with prose or brackets, whatever you're comfortable with. With that said, have fun! ]

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Aang step closer, to try to get a better look at him. He's not sure why he keeps thinking of the family photo that he saw at the museum. The pieces aren't clicking together yet.

Appa gives a friendly growl as Momo seeks a perch to enjoy the spoils of his battle. Aang gives a slight, nervous smile. "Aren't they the best?"

The boy speaks again. It's not a voice Bumi would recognize, but the fact that it comes as part of a packaged set that involves Appa, Momo, and those particular tattoos...

"They...they always were," he says quietly, giving Appa's nose one more pat. Feeling the familiar sensation of bison's breath on his hand as he does so.

Eventually he turns his attention to the boy. The boy who shouldn't, it doesn't...none of this makes sense. But yet there he is, and he looks as real as the weight of Appa feels.

"....great rutting badgermoles," he swears under his breath.

Aang leans forward curiously, blinking as he tries to make sense of the bearded man.

"What did the badgermoles do...?"

Bumi's taken aback, though by this point even he's not sure why. That's the exact same thing Jinora said when she caught him swearing the first time, and it's because of this that Bumi begins to laugh. It's dry and quiet at first, but as he starts to replay his afternoon in his mind it's all becoming more and more clear.

He's dead.
He fell off a cliff and did not survive the landing.
That's why he thought he could airbend. That's why he's seeing Appa and Momo and...and...
Or maybe it wasn't the fall that killed him at all, maybe he died in his sleep. Afterall, he is getting a little long in the tooth and the men of his family don't tend to last all that long.

This is nothing like what the sages and philosophers said this would be like, he muses as he regains control of himself long enough to ask the boy, "Want to give me a hand here?"

He's still not sure what's going on. But he nods and draws closer, extending a tattooed hand to the man. "Um, sure! Sorry that my buddies knocked you down... They must think you're really neat!" Or in Momo's case, his jerky was neat.

One old-man grunt and Bumi is back on his feet, brushing himself off, and eventually patting down his pocket to see just how badly Momo had fleeced him.
Pretty badly judging by the strength of the eyeroll that follows.

"They'd better. Him especially," he says jerking a thumb in the direction of the lemur. "I see you've met BumJu."

The little blue spirit chirps a greeting to Bumi, but pretty much stays put. Aang has good sitting shoulders.

"That's a cute name!" He tries to give a friendly poke at the spirit. "Nice to meet you, Bumju!"

And he looks up at the bearded man. "But what about you?"

Bumi just looks down at the boy, a bemused smile on his face.

"I'm Bumi. And he's Bumi Junior, or BumJu for short. And I think that's my coat." He gestures to the oversized-for-Aang United Forces uniform coat that he's carrying.

Aang presents the coat to him with an almost automatic movement, as he's now mostly staring at Bumi in bewilderment.

"Bumi?! But... but... How'd you get so young?" And oddly Water Tribe-looking...

In confusion he silently mouths How did I get so... until he finally gets what Aang is asking. What follows is a loud peal of laughter.

"No, no. Don't let the hair fool you, I'm not King Bumi of Omashu, though I am named after him." He slides into his coat and then runs his hands through his hair for emphasis.

"I thought you looked different from that Bumi!" he says as if he had discovered this vital clue. "It's nice to meet you, New Bumi! Your parents sure must've been fans of him."

"I guess you could say that. He was my father's oldest friend, and I mean that literally. He'd died not a few years before I was born. Been doing my level best to live up to the man's legacy ever since."

For a moment, he idly wonders who this man's father could be, but that train of thought is derailed by another part of the sentence. "Bumi's... gone?" He says with a silent gasp. He knew he was far in the future now... but Bumi had seemed timeliness. Aang focuses his attention on the ground, sniffling slightly. "I... I'm sorry to hear that. But... I'm sure you're doing a good job with his legacy."

Bumi knew that posture all too well, he'd seen it too many times to count, though if pressed he could probably come up with a number anyway. He made it a point to visit the families of those who fell in the line of duty under his command. It was the very least he could do.

"It was his time," he says quietly as a formality that wasn't there before slips into his voice. "I'm sorry for your loss, Aang."

"Thank you." He spares a light smile as he glances up towards Bumi's eyes, while blinking back tears in his own. "Ih- it's okay. It must have been his time. He lived a really, really long life... and it must have been full. I guess I... I'm lucky he was still around after I got out of the iceberg. And... your dad must have been a great friend for him, too."

Bumi offers a small smile and nod in return. It warms Bumi's heart to see his father as a child be as free with his emotions as he was when he was much older. People used to joke about his mother's penchant for 'tear-bending' but it was usually his father who misted up first.

He's not sure what to do next, and so Bumi looks to BumJu for advice. The little dragonfly rabbit spirit nods his head once, as if he knows Bumi is looking for permission to keep going.

It's then that Bumi starts to shift his hypothesis. Maybe he isn't dead. Maybe BumJu is leading him on a spirit quest. Maybe now instead of seeing cannibals everywhere, Bumi is getting a similar conversation with his father that Tenzin had in the mists.

"They were really close for a while, and then there was a long stretch when they didn't talk, but they picked up right where they left off when they did see each other again. And Dad was even really extra forgiving when Bumi trapped his friends in creeping crystal as a joke.

It was a weird relationship."

He's certainly a tearbender in his own right. But as he listens to Bumi's story, he ends up exclaiming eagerly.

"Wait, did you say creeping crystal? That's what he did to my friends, too! I wonder how often he did that joke!" Despite the arrow pointing down on his head, some things tended to instead go directly over it.

Bumi just blinks, and in that moment sees so much of his little brother before him that it's all he can do to not smile.

"Well, the way Mom tells it...a Lot. It's just no one ever fell for it again after that one time."

"Wait, just one time? But then... what about the time Katara and Sokka got stuck... in... it...?"

His eyes slowly widen as a possibility starts to unfold.

"Yoooouuuuu wouldn't happen to be related to any Avatars, would you?"

Watching Aang catch up was like watching a house catch on fire; slowly at first and then all at once. All the while Bumi's grin merely widens.

"Only on my father's side," he says as matter of factly as he can manage. Then he looks up and to the right. "Well, I guess in a way I'm also related to Korra. Water Tribe being one big family, after all..."

His eyes certainly are catching on fire, as he remembers the family picture that Bumi showed him. He stumbles back several steps while pointing at him.

"You... you... you're a baby!" He shakes his head as his visualizes it more accurately, reading into Bumi's face. "No, you're the smiling kid! You're..."

And then he manages to take a step closer, breathing shallowly as he looks that bearded man in the eyes. "...m-my... son?"

"Only when I don't get my way." His smile morphs into one much like the one he has in the family photo on Memorial Island. It's unclear if this is in reference to "the baby" comment, "the smiling kid", or the "my son."

Bumi nods once.
BumJu is THRILLED by this turn of events, and trills loudly with apparently glee.

He can see it now clearly. And he looks on speechlessly. This funny old guy... he's family.

Aang manages to find words only by looking towards Bumju. With a light scolding tone, he went, "Bumju! How long did you know?"

But then he faces Bumi again, and uncertain of what more to say, he scurries forward to try to hug him.

If the amount of preening to his ears/wings is any indication, BumJu knew for a very long time indeed.

Spirits can be so smug sometimes.

Bumi sinks down to one knee as Aang rushes forward to hug him. The man has a black-belt in hugs, but only because he learned from the best: his father.

It's only after he's gathered Aang up in a hug that he brokenly whispers, "It's good to see you, Dad."

It was scary, seeing proof that his time on this world was limited. Even moreso, living in a time where he was only known as a long-dead hero.

It felt better to be known as a father. He might not have met his son before, but hugging Bumi helped him feel so alive. It's a powerful grip, so Aang tussles with his own mastery of hugbending.

"It's good to see you, too," he murmurs softly, likely feeling a light tickle from the beard. "Bumi."

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