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Ima and Kya lore !
The pair first met the night Ima landed in the South Pole, Ima had gotten herself into a situation with a polar bear dog and it had almost tore her arm off. Her rat dragon (Omo) companion carried her to the village and had villagers guide him to the healing hut, Ima was somehow still conscious throughout the whole thing despite the quick blood loss. Getting into the healing hut she was assigned to a healer named Kya, who she immediately found beautiful. Kya healed her immediately and Ima was pretty much head over heels already. Kya decided to speak to Ima, sparking up conversations, asking her about herself and life to try keep her conscious. It worked and Ima opened up to her, telling Kya about herself worldly travels, her ability to animal heal, her interests, things she enjoyed.. and Kya felt so intrigued the whole time. Kya also spoke about herself, bringing up how she also traveled the world and had similar interests to Ima. Turns out they had a lot in common, they traveled to many of the same locations and told their stories about them.. absolutely loving listening to one another.
They spoke for hours upon hours and clicked really quickly.
Kya learned Ima’s living situation, she had no where to go since she moved without making any arrangements or taking any sort of money. So Kya decided to invite her to stay with herself and her mother, Katara. She obviously spoke to Katara about it and whilst she was a little hesitant, she gave in and invited Ima into their home with open arms. She even offered Ima to place Omo in Appa’s old stable where Kya’s own bison slept, what was very useful. Of course, Kya and Ima made sure their companions got along and they did! They seemed happy enough to play around with each other and then settled in the stable together. Kya found it awfully sweet to see her bison have a friend.
Ima was given a spare room they had, Kya decided to help her get settled in and they ended up talking a lot during the night. Ima opened up about old struggles she had or ones she currently dealt with and surprisingly Kya seemed to have some similar issues, ones with being lost on who you are, what you want to do with your life, issues with keeping themselves going, blablabla. Ima felt so relieved to have someone who could actually relate to her and someone who didn’t seem to just pity her, Kya seemed to think the same way.
Another conversation they enjoyed having was talking about their cultures, their own ways of life and how they see life with them. Ima was so interested in Kya being both air and water, she thought it was so cool.
Kya noted people do just tend to see her as a water tribe woman instead of her sir heritage and Ima reassured her, she’d see her as both and already did, had Kya feeling really happy.
Eventually Kya opened up about her dad, her frustrations with him and his death. How she dealt with helping everyone and always felt like she never truly got that grief out on her own, since she was more worried about her families grief. Ima told Kya she’d gladly listen or just be there whenever she needs to let that grief out and not to worry about when or where that is. Kya felt a huge weight lifted off of her shoulders, she hadn’t had someone to rely on so much. Sure they only knew each other a few hours at this point but Kya really felt like there was just something about Ima, something that made her feel safe, like she could be herself, she could open up about struggles and it was exactly what she had needed.
Kya also mentioned her preferences and turns out Ima had the same ones, and for once Ima actually felt confident in her sexuality. She’d always been really insecure about it just from how she was brought up, but Kya was so accepting it made her feel.. good and comfortable.
They bonded very quickly and enjoyed hanging out very often. They enjoyed going into the village to try out restaurants or bakeries since they both had a love for food. They enjoyed exploring the markets that had them learning more about each other, Ima found a love for gifting Kya stuff and Kya was very insistent she don’t spend her money on her, but Ima didn’t listen and continued on buying Kya things she knew she loved.
They occasionally flew around the world together, on their companions. They’d go to places they had younger that they enjoyed and wanted to show the other, or places they knew they both loved and revisited them together. Kya showed Ima a lot of air heritage locations and Ima was so fascinated by the culture, she thought it was beautiful.. and she could definitely see it in Kya’s personality.
Adding on, Kya and Ima got along with each other’s companions really well. Kya loved Omo and Ima loved Noa! (kya’s bison.) Kya took a liking to the accessories Ima gave Omo and asked her to help her make some for Noa. Ima gave Kya stuff to carve a pretty crystal, whilst Ima made her little crystals that she fills with water as a spare water source to add on to Noa’s saddle. Kya asked Ima to make some with spirit water too, what Ima happily done.
Kya really liked learning all the little things about Ima, she’d never found herself so interested in a friend before. She loved that Ima had so much respect for all life, she loved that Ima had such a love for the world despite everything she’d gone through.. something about Ima’s appreciation for life just made her feel so, warm. She herself had always appreciated life but the way Ima did was just different and she really admired it.
Ima was the same, she loved every little thing about Kya. She lived how sweet and kind she was but how she could easily turn around and become rather snarky, grumpy or a little snappy, she liked that Kya balanced herself out so well that way. She loved Kya’s way of life, her love of traveling and how much love she had for her family. She loved all of Kya’s interests even if she herself wasn’t into some of them.
Ima eventually opened up a lot more, about stuff she’d never told anyone. She told Kya about her child loss, about how it happened considering her preferences, how that loss lead her to multiple attempts on her own life and sh issues, how it still affects her mental health, how shitty her mh is in general. Kya just hugged her after that, for such a long time.. it did feel good to finally tell someone about it, Ima had kept it cooped up for years until now.
Kya had Ima a room made in the healing hut for her animal healing, since she knew it was what Ima wanted to do with her life and decided to give her that to start out. Ima LOVED it, and was so happy when people started coming in to visit her for her healing. It really had her come out of her shell, she was a very shy and reserved person but with Kya and now all these positive interactions, it had her enjoying being more social and open about her abilities. Kya did have Ima not put her name out there completely, since she knew Ima would just be flooded with patients and it’d absolutely kill her working constantly with no time for breaks or herself. Ima ends up being very thankful for this since she tended to get exhausted with hardly any patients, more so because the healing takes so much out of her now that she can finally use it. Whilst before she never had many opportunities to use it, meaning her body wasn’t used to using the power and energy it needed.
In the city, Kya has her own clinic and offered Ima to come and help her out at times, what Ima gladly done. One to help out Kya but also put her human healing to use since her primary focus was animal healing. However Ima stayed out of the way often since the clinic was a lot busier than she could have ever imagined but she did help when asked. In the city Ima found an interest in the police, but more so the investigation side and Kya brought up forensic pathology to her. Ima loved the sound of it, despite it being a brutal job the idea of giving answers and doing some kind of investigating really intrigued her. She looked into it and took up lessons that would teach her about it and get her qualified for a proper job. What she eventually landed, more specifically she was hired under Lin Beifong.
Kya was ecstatic when she heard Ima’s work paid off and took her out for a fancy meal to celebrate. Kya found herself by now having a rather more than friendly interest in Ima. Ima was such a good person towards Kya, Ima saw Kya for the person she wanted to be seen as, Ima respected all Kya’s boundaries and never pushed them, Ima offered to take over Kya’s duties when Kya needed time off or she wanted to take a solo trip around the world, Ima understood Kya on another level too and Kya felt so much comfort in finding someone like that, someone she could lean on without feeling guilty what was such a relief for her.
Ima had, had an interest in Kya since they met and it was probably obvious with the way she was around Kya, she was always a lot more open with Kya, always happy to see her and just be around her in general.
Time went on as they continued their lives, either working, separately or together, travelling, solo or together and just growing more closer as the days went on. By this point they’d been friends for about three years, Ima was so much happier with her life and Kya honestly was too, she had someone to help her get through her grief, someone who respected her as a person and who she identified as.. plus Ima just helped her a lot in general and made her feel very loved.
Ima however eventually got herself into a more friends with benfits with Lin that, Ima had given Lin a warning that she liked her but she also liked Kya a lot too.. Lin just seemed to brush it off since it wasn’t actually a proper relationship, just casual friend hookups.
ima was pretty happy about what they had at first. Lin was a good friend to her but the more it went on the more they seemed to grow apart and more reserved from each other and only ended up hooking up rather than what they used to have.
Basically it wasn’t great. Ima often went to Kya talking about it and how she was so unsure of what to do, she did love Lin, but she didn’t want to keep going like this ,she seemed a lot happier when her and Lin were just regular friends. (I can’t be bothered writing all of the ima lin thing but it lasted about 8 months.)
During the whole situation, Kya actually felt pretty hurt, usually she just moved on but this time she actually felt hurt and honestly a little lost. I mean she had an interest in Ima and Ima got herself into a messy fwb situation and she also just saw how miserable it made Ima, Kya didn’t like seeing anyone she cared about hurt or sad.. but she cared about Ima a lot more than a regular friend.
Eventually Ima did leave that behind and decided to just stay regular friends with Lin.
So her and Kya went back to their stupid flirty friendly relationship that they had going on, Kya was well aware Ima was into her.. Ima on the other hand didn’t seem to catch onto that Kya was into her. So, Kya decided to leave it for a while and also let Ima heal from her situation with Lin.
Kya even spoke to Katara about her interest in Ima, Katara could tell anyway and tried to encourage Kya to tell her. It was odd seeing Kya nervous but also was sweet to see her so happy. Katara had seen the way they were together and knew how good they’d be, they got along so well and were amazing comforts in each other’s lives, they had so much respect for each other.
It was around over a year later when Kya finally decided to just tell Ima, because she was well aware Ima wouldn’t make the first move. So, after a long day of working at the healing hut they got home together and Kya took the opportunity. She asked Ima if they could talk and Kya listed that Ima meant a lot to her and that she was pretty in love with her.. Ima, was very taken aback but clearly was overjoyed and they shared a kiss and maybe got a little carried away (freaky ladies) what was the start of their relationship.. Ima was originally nervous to be bare in front of Kya, more so for her own scars and imperfections but Kya ended up kissing absolutely every single one and continuously called her pretty or beautiful.. Ima had never had her scars called anything positive, or looked at so lovingly. Ima took note that Kya had some similar ones, smaller and a lot less of them but Ima absolutely done the same thing, kissing them, calling Kya prettyyy..
They both felt so happy to finally show their love to each other that they’d kept cooped up for years because they wanted to make sure each other was ready for the dedication to a relationship.
They had a really good discussion about their relationship and what they want in it. Kya mentioned she does enjoy being on her own at times and Ima immediately butt in telling her she’d never stop her from having alone time, even if it was one of those week long solo adventures Ima didn’t care. She wanted Kya to be happy and nothing was going to prevent her from wanting that, even if it meant they’d be away from one another. Plus Ima wanted the same, Ima enjoyed her own time or adventures. They both knew relationships didn’t mean you had to be connected at the hip 24/7.
WIP WIP WIP WIPPPPP AUHH