AGE — 22

NATION — Southern Water Tribe

BIRTHPLACE — Small village in the Fire Nation

FACE CLAIM (+BACKUP) — Alia Bhatt (+Keerthy Suresh)
 

PERSONALITY — 

If there's one thing Kaiya is used to it's putting on her brave face and facing the world. By now, she can't tell the difference between pretending and being strong in front of others. She's concealed herself any emotions she had chosen to be weak for so long she may struggle when it comes to actually expressing them. Whether that's a flaw though, it's up to the person. For Kaiya, she finds it to be an advantage, enemies can't get to her. Not anymore, not after years of torturing grandmother and taking her parents away from her for good. They can't, and they won't, ever get the pleasure to see her hurt by what they've done to her. Of course, there is most of the rest of the world that thinks she's a freak for being like this. Never crying, never sad. It's almost as if the hundred years of war never touched her.

As crazy and bloodthristy she may seem at first, you can't forget her grandmother is Hama. Who yes, may be the creator of bloodblending but she was also known as the sweet old lady that owned in the in the small Fire Nation village. While at times (most times) Kaiya may not seem to care for life, espiecially others', Kaiya is fully capable of taking care of people. The real question is would she really. She takes care of herself for starters, she knows it's stupid to try continuing on without and eating or sleeping properly and does her best to maintain her physical health (we can't really say the same for mental can we?).

One of the only reasons most people trust her is because they know she has a plan. Behind that murderous stare and hungry eyes begging to kill is a girl with a plan. There may need to be some modifications when it comes to it ("No Kaiya there's a better way than just mass murdering all the fire benders.") when no one else knows what to do Kaiya is quick thinking and doesn't seem to panic or stress in highly stressful situations, if not at all. While she lacks the charisma and watchful nature that takes away from making her a leading force of the group, she makes up for it in enthusiasm, strength and strategy.

Speaking of enthusiasm, Kaiya has a lot of it! When it comes to fighting the Fire Nation of course, when it comes to anything else results may vary. But hey, seeing her talking about how they'll one day defeat the Fire Nation and restore the Water Tribes to their former glory may be the most anyone has been able to relate to her and the most human she's seemed to others. It means that she actually does care about this, no matter how uncaring, yet strong, she may seem at times. Truth is though, like most people nowadays Kaiya was raised into the war, most importantly, she was raised into wanting to end it.

Kaiya seems quite willing to do anything when comes to anything really. She goes for it with a complete disregard to any impending dangers or the risks at stake. If it has to be done, it will be done according to Kaiya, even if she has to do it alone. "I'll take care of it."  Are most likely going to be her last words with the rate she's been going journey alone and with the others. Ask any villager along in the Fire Nation, they'll most likely say that's the last thing she says before disappearing. 

While her efforts are for good most would definitely regard as a terrible person, if not a complete madwoman. Kaiya seems to take a bit too much pleasure when it comes to fighting, more importantly when it comes to bloodblending. A gentle smile graces her face underneath her cloak when she watches a person, especially of the Fire Nation, twitch and go against their will. She loves watching, and inflicting, pain upon others to points it seems to be the only thing that makes her so... vibrant.

A main factor that plays to most of her behavior is her inability of identify not only the emotions of others but also her own. She knows that hurting others feels better than when others are hurting her, so she does it so they can't hurt her. She doesn't understand too much about the pain that inflicts upon others and how much pain she truly causes when she bloodbends someone. She doesn't understand why people raise their voices when she's done the job she promised. Hurting them? What else could she do? Most importantly, she doesn't understand the fear that she can inflicts in people with her abilities.

Due to this, Kaiya never knows when to stop, giving her image ofbeing absolutely merciless and ruthless when comes to combat. She refuses to let anyone escape from her wrath, make everyone feel the same twisting in their gut that she always had when she was little. Not only had she vowed to never feel that again, she vowed to make sure the Fire Nation feels the exact same way.

Violence, sadly, is the only way she knows how to deal with her problems. That's how grandmother always solved them, when a firebender came into town it was simple: just use bloodblending and lock them up them torture them. There was no other way Kaiya was taught how to deal with problems, it doesn't help her inability of knowing when enough is enough before she does permenant mental or physical damage. She'll resort to using her hands before her words simply because she's never quite known how to properly used them.

Finally, Kaiya has a thing for being in control. Again, a thing that she's used to when it comes to her upbringing. Grandmother had always taught her how to control others, Kaiya even getting strong to a point that she could control her own grandmother. Kaiya isn't used to letting someone else take control, and having to listen to someone is something that she may never get used to.

                  "Feeling trapped? Like there's no hope?
                                                      I felt that once too."

BACKGROUND — 

The story of Kaiya Arya, moreso how she is who she is, starts off long before she was even born. It starts when the Fire Nation invades the Southern Water Tribe for the first time and kidnaps a young waterbender, a woman named Hama. She, along with many other waterbenders, was held prisoner and tortured. That was until one day Hama realized that water flowed everywhere, even within a firebender. By practincing on rats in her small cell Hama slowly mastered a new form of waterbending: bloodbending. She escapes successfully and goes off to hide in a small village in the Fire Nation where hatrd continued to grow for the Fire Nation. Hama's village quickly gains the reputation of having a witch that kidnaps people every full moon, as Hama begins to her revenge by kidnapping people on the full moon with her blood blending as that is when she is the strongest. 

The Fire Nation continued their assaults on the Southern Water Tribe, but they were infrequent due to long distance. Kaiya was five when she was taken in one of the Fire Nation raids. Despite the efforts of the few other waterbenders and her parents, Kaiya was found by a group of soldier who were exploring beyond the tribe grounds to be able to find any runaways. She was the youngest waterbender to ever be imprisoned by the Fire Nation, but she got the exact same treatment as the rest of them. Kaiya lived in a box, her hands were bound when water was given to her. Not that it would matter at the time, Kaiya was too young to have any waterbending experience, now being nine. Sometimes, the soldiers got bored and threw rocks through the cell or even heated up her manacles until she almost burned her wrists. They threatened more than once to just set her on fire and end it all there. Luckily, the news had eventually reached Hama's village after four years, a soldier who just returned home had spilled to his wife there was a five year old, now nine, among the prisoners from their last raid.

Hama goes back to the prison where the hold waterbenders for one last time. Nine years old was too young, five years old was even worse. She could imagine the potential the girl had, young and most likely willing to go along with Hama vengeful plans. Kaiya immediately took to Hama as a grandmother figure, as Hama was reaching her fifties at the time. Kaiya was kept a secret from the village, knowing the soldier may recognize her. While Hama handled the in by day, Kaiya would stay in her room for the most part with water and plants to practice technique that Hama gives her. At night when everyone was sleeping, Hama would take Hama out to the woods to they would practice together. Kaiya's favorite nights were full moons, when she got to bloodblend people instead of just animals she came across. Her complete dedecation to waterbending helped to evolve quickly from not having any experience to become very much an expert, quickly learning everything Hama has taught her. 

While Hama did love and care for Kaiya greatly, both were much too focused on something other than repairing each other's mental states: revenge. To this day, Kaiya still gets flashbacks and nightmares to her imprisonment. Her dark feelings for the soldiers eventually brings her to kill the soldier who resided in the village, when she was twelve years old on one of the full moons she managed to kidnap him and suffocate him with his own blood. Hama was prideful to say the least, Kaiya was on her way to becoming her weapon. Kaiya didn't have much to her life but training, no time to make friends when you're busy training. Her skills continued to grow rapidly, Kaiya even learning from new skills beyond Hama thanks to Hama's social skills with travelers passing through the in. Kaiya would wear her cloak around them and they'd tell her about their skills.

Of course, Kaiya does eventually separate from Hama, deciding it's time to do something instead of just locking people up everyone full moon. It eventually wasn't enough, no she wanted to see the whole Fire Nation locked up for their crimes to the rest of the world. So she left, cloak, water skin and all.

                  "If violence is not the answer...
                                                  what causes war?"

SKILLS — 

Bloodbending Easily Kaiya's strongest skill as it is her most practice, she got to a point of strength where she was even able to control Hama, without her hands. Kaiya shows great capabilities towards the manipulation of humans and animals alike, while her signature for bloodblending is putting the person through pain given them a twitchy appearance.

Waterbending Hama was already a master of waterbending long before she was captured. She taught Kaiya a majority of the technique and skills that she knows. Due to this Kaiya can not only perform masterful skills of waterbending but also make up and improvise, making her unpredictable and flexible in combat. Not only this but Kaiya has minimal practice in bending without need for her arms and legs, she is still very weak in this art but she able to move water in some sort of form, however it is definitely too weak to attempt for fighting and needs lots and lots of practice before she even deems it useable.

Icebending As well as waterbending, Hama also taught her how to manipulate ice. Aside from bloodbledning, iceblending is her go to fighting style despite being more skilled with water. Like with blood blending though she can be very subtle with it, hiding razor sharp ice shards under her cloaks she can attack quickly without the need to from razors beforehand. As well as razors, Kaiya can also make her breath ice, weapons of ice, and ice shields. However she is also flexible with her ice like she with her waterbending.

Advanced Water Seeking Thanks to her years of imprisonment, Hama has become very capable of finding water anywhere and naturally passed on this skill to Kaiya. Like Hama, a waterskin is unnecessary (though she still uses it) as she is able to pull water out of thin air from the water vapor in the atmosphere. Not only that but she can pull water out from plants and from other liquids that are made up of water.

Strategy Even Kaiya would admit to this being her weakest skill but it's better than nothing. While she does tend to just use the most violent method possible she has also been able to come up with decent plans that sadly usually need a couple of adjustmentsand lots of thinking through or else they are usually too unnecessarily violent.

"Let's fight and make the whole world drown."

LIKES — 
— Night Afterall this is the time when the moon is shining the brightest, Kaiya has grown used to being outside in the nighttime more than she is under the sun as night is when Hama would take her out to train.

— Red Poppies Just outside of the village, there's a large field of red poppies where Hama let Kaiya practice her waterbending and play by herself. Kaiya was taught to extract water from plants from them. Over the years red poppies had become a symbol of strength for Kaiya because it gave the ability to fight and let her know that there was water.

— Ice It was dangerous to use, and Kaiya loves it. She especially loves when she has ice blades concealed in her cloak, she's holding a big secret that could potenially kill someone, and only she knows about it. Not only that but she loves how cold it is, compared to a hot Nation like the Fire Nation it's good to have something to cool down.

— Sleeping As much as Kaiya loves to be an active person, she will not deny herself the beauty of lying down and falling asleep. Aside from bending, sleeping is Kaiya's favorite thing to do. If she not out fighting the fire nation or something, then she's probably tucked away in a corner taking a nap.

— Training Okay fine, maybe I lied about that last one. Aside from sleeping, Kaiya loves to train. She's always looking to improve her bending afterall. If she had a long training session already then she will sleep but she always has to train at least once a day for a good hour.
 

DISLIKES — 
— Fire/Fire Nation A few reasons add to this... Like kidnapping her when she was just five years old and throwing her into a cage where she was deprived of her childhood and is forever facing truama from that event, of course they are also raging war and ruined Hama's life as well.

— Tight Spaces As most of Kaiya childhood memories are in a cage, she isn't very fond of small spaces. They make her feel trapped, Kaiya finds it hard to breath and starts to feel sick when she is confined to a small area especially cells or cages.

— Loud Noises For starters, Kaiya has a hard time falling asleep already, she doesn't need loud noises to bother even more from being able to go to her dreamland, and one should never disturb Kaiya's sleeping. Not to mention it's like an alarm to Kaiya and she tends to get too worked by even a scream or yell.

— Rain Just because she's a waterbending doesn't mean she has to like getting soaked in water! While it is handy for combat, Kaiya may be the only waterbender that can't with rain. She also may be the only waterbender that has problems with water getting in her eyes all the time, and gets distracted trying to blink it away. Not to mention how long it takes for her cloak to dry up after getting soaked by rainwater.

— Her Hair When she has complained about it being too long and thick, people tell her to cut it. As if it would solve anything, it doesn't of course it just makes it thicker looking and like a puff ball and worse of all, she wouldn't be able to tie or plait it back. It's too much of a mess that Kaiya doesn't want to have to handle.
 

"Something wrong? It's like you lost control?"

RELATIONSHIPS — 

• Guardian | Hama, 76, Innkeeper, acts like a sweet old lady but is cruel and calculating.
  
  How Hama treats Kaiya is drastically different depending on the perspective. According to Kaiya, she is sweet and caring and has always been with Kaiya since the day she rescued her. However, to anyone else they seem more like a manager and employee, Hama telling Kaiya what to do and Kaiya not saying anything and obeying happily. Apparently that's Kaiya's idea of love and affection. Some even argue with Kaiya that Hama might not even care about her acutal well being, but just wants someone who can go and fight the Fire Nation for her. Kaiya, naturally, denies this and while fight to defend her "grandmother".

I'll admit, this might be a bit ambitious but I'm kind of hoping for Kaiya to be able to see Hama for who she really is and realize that there's more to life than fighting the Fire Nation. Also if she could somehow understand the pain she inflicts with her bloodbending.