Appearance: Jampa seems pretty unremarkable at first glance. He's a lanky man with an average, almost forgettable face and an overall unremarkable appearance except for his shaved bald head and his airbender style robes and staff. Underneath his loose fitting robes though, he's actually incredibly wiry and muscular in spite of his noodle-like build, and in combat his face and eyes both take on sharper and more intense expressions. Jampa lacks the full-body blue arrow tattoos many people associate with airbenders, and his demeanor is hardly typical of his people, so to the uninformed it's easy enough to mistake him for just some guy in monk robes, a mistake that would be made even easier if he ever decided to ditch an air nomad's traditional outfit.
Age: 25
Personality: Likes-Combat, training, traveling and meeting new people, sweets, getting to be lazy on days when he takes breaks from training, practical jokes.
Dislikes- Most of his fellow airbenders, pacifism, spicy food, people he perceives to be bullies, people that don't stand up for themselves.
Background: Jampa was always a little different from his fellow Air Nomads, though the true extent of his differences only became clear as he first started to formally study Airbending. The feeling of studying for combat awoke an intense desire in the young monk-to-be to perfect his bending as more than a means of self-defense and discipline, but as a true fighting form equal on a battlefield to any of the other forms of Bending. As he grew older, the desire to truly test his skills and fight only grew with him in spite of his ambitions being scorned by his friends, family and teachers.
When furtive discussions began among those who worried that their peaceful ways would be threatened by the increasingly aggressive outside world, Jampa was one of the loudest, least subtle voices among the hard-line hawks. Though in truth, his desire to fight played as much of a role as his desire to defend his people. He wasn't satisfied with simply concocting plans and defenses in case of an attack that might never come. Instead, he began teaching his modified, more aggressive versions of techniques to younger students and others willing to learn, in secret. Eventually he was discovered, and when refused to admit that what he was doing was a mistake or swear an oath that he would stop teaching his 'blasphemy', he was exiled from life among the Air Nomads.
Penniless and alone, Jampa still wasn't exactly unhappy. In truth being forced to go through life on his own would force him to become a better fighter and test his ambitions and way of life, or so he hoped. Since then Jampa's taken to made his living as a mix of beggar, mercenary and thief, living out the Air Nomad creed of freedom, mobility and detachment in his own unusual way. He's occasionally started looking for the Avatar on his journeys, mainly under the hope that if he succeeds, his fellow Air Nomads will be forced to recognize him again.
Bending Ability: Airbending. While not officially recognized as a Master because of his exile, Jampa has reached at least the 35th level of Airbending ability as recognized by the Elder Council of Air Nomads. Prior to being exiled, he was also one of the most skilled and vocal Benders to advocate for a more offensively focused curriculum of Airbending techniques, and had begun altering his style to align more closely with those ideals. The slicing-based Air Blade staff technique would have been his required addition to air bending knowledge to become a master, if he hadn't been exiled before being officially acknowledged as such.
Other: Just a typical Airbender's Staff and the clothes on his back, with the addition of a dull brown, worn cloak to keep the rain off his clothes and bald head.
Sample Post: "LYCHEE NUTS! LYCHEE NUTS! GET YER LYCHEE NUTS HERE! FRESHEST IN BA SING SE OR I'LL TEAR OUT MY OWN BEARD!"
From the rooftop above the lychee man's cart on Market Street, Jampa eyed the fruit carefully. Life had been hard since coming to Ba Sing Se, and the thick-skinned morsels might as well have been made of gold to the former Air Nomad. He had hoped to make his living here as a mercenary, a fighter for hire or maybe a bodyguard for a traveling vendor like his would-be target below him but he had encountered well...
difficulties. There was no way around it, the truth was Jampa just didn't have a very marketable look. He was thin and lanky, all muscle underneath his robes but not exactly the sort of big mountain of manliness that'd deter thieves and bandits with one flex or sneer. He had no weapons except for the glider staff he was balancing across his shoulders, and never mind the fact that he was deadlier than any swordsman, a stick just didn't inspire confidence in potential employers. Armor interfered too much with his fighting style, so a big, impressive suit of the stuff was right out. Even his face was plain, and it didn't help that he had no mastery tattoos to prove his credentials to skeptical investors.
In truth for all his skill and airbending power, Jampa made a lousy bodyguard and mercenary because he was just too dull looking, and the lack of money left his stomach as empty as his coin purse. Hence, Jampa had been stalking The Lychee Vendor. The man was a highly successful fruit merchant, typically tanned and atypically stout for a citizen of the Impenetrable City, proud of his money and even prouder of his well-groomed, bushy beard. Once in a while he still traveled outside the city to collect fruit, or sold his own wares on the streets from his cart, probably because he thought it kept him sharp and in touch with his customers. He was probably right too. But even the most successful merchants rarely thought to look
up for thieves. Jampa just had to swirl his hands in tiny, fast circles and before long a little tornado formed between his palms and started sucking up the lychees from their pile, right into his waiting arms.
By the time the Lychee vendor turned around to see what passersby were gawking at, Jampa had already amassed most of that day's crop and bundled them up with his cloak tied around his staff for a bindlestiff. He gave the Lychee Man a cheeky wave and hopped down to the street to make good his escape. Well, that wasn't actually true, Jampa could have easily hopped across the rooftops with his ill-gotten harvest and gotten away clean. Instead he was choosing to give the Lychee Vendor a chance to confront him, because the man kept a few big, musclebound thugs nearby and Jampa was after something even more important than food.
Publicity.
Jampa repeated his little wave with his free hand as he hefted the sack of fruits over one shoulder. "Sorry, but your pitch was just so convincing that I thought to myself, 'I've gotta get some of these!' and then I did!"
What little was visible of the Lychee Vendor's face through thick beard and angry spittle was bright red, and he poked at Jampa's chest with a finger like he hoped it'd impale the wiry Airbender. "YOU! YOU...THINK YOU CAN STEAL FROM ME...AND THEN STAY AND
CHAT ABOUT IT?!"
Jampa quirked an eyebrow at the "Well that is sort of what I'm doing, but I thought I might also make fun of you a little, and then-"
The Lychee Vendor started bellowing like a wounded Platypus Bear "NIU! MA! WHAT DO I PAY YOU LUMPS FOR!? GET OVER HERE AND BREAK HIS ARMS! AND HIS LEGS!
AND HIS FACE!"
Jampa obligingly planted his staff into a crack in the street for his sack stuffed with fruits to hang off of while he waited for a man with the heft- and likely the brain - of a particularly big Hippocow and his friend of a similar nature but with a much longer face, to stumble their way out of a nearby bar while their apparent boss continued to yell instructions and threats.
The big hippocow of a guy spoke up, which surprised Jampa a little since he assumed the man was too dumb to speak any language but fist.
"Awright little twig, ya were dumb and ya got caught, so we're gonna hafta snap ya!"
With that, he lunged in for a big, obvious bear hug while his friend stood by and laughed, apparently figuring just one of them was enough. Jampa leaped up over the big thug's head, pushed off of it like a stepping stone and unleashed a blast of air from his foot at the same time, driving Hippocow into the stones of the street before floating down on the other side. By this time, Longface had stopped laughing and was looking at his now unconscious friend in disbelief.
Jampa grinned at the remaining bruiser, ignoring his bearded boss's angry spluttering. "Soooo...wanna maybe go back inside, finish your drink, lemme take my stuff?"
Longface nodded and started to back away.
"TOO LATE!" Jampa thrust both hands outward, open-palmed, and sent twin blasts of air slamming into Longface's chest so that he went sprawling and rolling across the ground and into another vendor's cart in a cloud of splinters.
Jampa dusted off his hands, plucked a fruit from the bulging sack of lychee, and tore it open with his teeth to taste the juices in front of the still incoherently raging vendor. Then he dropped it and spat.
"Eugh, forget working for you, these things are lousy! Anyone else though, I'm available for hire!" Jampa undid his cloak so that the lychees spilled over over the ground, snatched up his staff so that it whirled in an arc that whisked it through the red-faced Vendor's beard, then walked away whistling as the man's whiskers fell to the ground, perfectly shaved.
He hadn't gotten any closer to a job, but at least he'd had some fun.
