his name
ebonyquill
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v. gahno (gone-o)
"Look, it's Gahno!"
Tahno's expression darkens as he turns towards the direction of the Avatar's voice. The corners of his mouth lift into a mocking smile. He points to one of many posters covered with his face and his name.
"I guess they didn't teach you how to read while they were teaching you how to bend," Tahno takes a step closer to her as Korra's eyes narrow. "You know, my offer still stands. I can always rearrange my busy schedule to accomodate your private lessons."
Korra glares at him, fiery rage evident in her azure eyes. This only makes Tahno's smile grow wider.
The Firebender on her team steps in between them. Mako turns to him with a severe look on his face. "Tahno, our fight is next week. We," he pointedly looks at Korra, "don't want any trouble until then."
"There's no trouble here," Tahno sneers. "I'll see you next week, Avatar. And when you're on the losing team, come visit me and I'll give you some... instruction."
"Yeah, right! You're the one who's gonna be gone-o after our match!" Korra is drunk with giddiness and confidence - and possibly from a lick of authentic Fire Nation Firewhiskey.
Her juvenile insults seem to please her juvenile-minded teammates. The idiot Earthbender boy gives her an undeserved high five.
But Tahno can only think about how he's going to detach the boy's hand from his body and how, one day, he's going to make her remember his name.
iv. bahno, taco, geronimo
"What was that jerkbender's name?" Korra's question is half-muffled by the sweet bun in her mouth. "Bahno? Taco? Geronimo?"
Mako flips the frying pan, sending seared meat flying into the air. One of his eyebrows rise to the edge of his hairline. "You mean Tahno?"
"Oh right - Tahno!" Korra says the name like an afterthought, immediately forgetting it as Bolin sets three plates onto the table and the smell of Mako's amazing cooking wafts through the entire attic aparment.
"Also known as the creepiest, weirdest, most ridiculously not handsome guy in the world," Bolin adds. Korra laughs even though she slightly disagrees with Bolin's final notion.
iii. vahno (vain-o)
Korra rubs her neck and grimaces. Their practice had been rough and they had promised each other not to hold anything back. And spirits, they didn't. Korra can feel the heat of Mako's fire in the aching of her bones and the strength of Bolin's earth in the bruises across her body. She walks into what she thinks is her locker room.
To her horror, she sees an unhealthy amount of Wolfbat posters plastered onto the walls.
"Lost, little ferrett? Or did you finally come to your senses?" Korra grits her teeth. Tahno sits at a vanity, lightbulbs tinging his skin with an unnatural glow. An attractive girl with a black bob combs his hair while another girl with brown curls massages his hands with lotion.
Korra raises an eyebrow. "Vain, much?" - she pauses, then grins at her new nickname for her least favorite Waterbender - "Vahno."
Tahno's expression sours. He violently pulls his hands out of the grasp of his manicurist and disentangles the comb from his hair as he glowers at Korra's retreating figure.
ii. mahno (mano)
Their faces are mere centimeters apart. He hadn't been planning to visit Republic City Park, but he craved the fresh air. The stadium had been stuffy and filled with reporters which was usually a welcome sight, but only when they were visiting him. But no, they were always looking for the girl who was presently glaring at him.
"Are you following me?" Korra's hands are on her hips; her lip, curled with indignant displeasure; her tone, accusatory.
"Please, Avatar," Tahno rolls his eyes. "If I wanted to follow you, I would have paid someone to do it for me. And don't flatter yourself. You're not the only girl on my roster."
Korra's face contorts with disgust. "You're a bull pig!"
"Wolfbat," Tahno corrects her, a playful smile on his lips. "I'm sure you'll remember the name when the announcer declares the winner of our match."
"When he announces you as the team that the Fire Ferrets beat? Maybe. I'm really going to enjoy fighting you - mano-a-mano." Korra mulls over her words and smirks. "Mahno."
She's starting to like the reaction she gets when she blatantly says his name wrong. In today's case, she happily notes that she's never seen rage redden the face of a non-Firebender more quickly.
i. tahyes
After Korra's mouth is full of dust and her hair is slightly singed, the Fire Ferrets' practice time in the arena is over. She feels like hell and she's positive that she looks like it, too.
"O-vatar Korra? You look a bit sore-a. Don't let the door-a hit you on the way out."
She doesn't even have to look at the purveyor of terrible name puns to know who it is. Even though she'd been abusing Tahno with mispronunciations of his name for the past week, she hadn't realized how annoying it was until the embarrassingly bad puns were directed at her.
She turns around and opens her mouth to hurl back an insult, but her mouth stays agape. She immediately finds out that the Wolfbats like to practice in the arena without wearing their shirts.
Although Tahno is conceited and condescending and creepy, Korra can't help, but superficially note that he does have a very nice chest. And abs. And forearms. And -.
"See something you like?" Korra quickly tears her eyes away from his body and her vision rests on Tahno's face which is dominated by a gloating, knowing smirk. Her first instinct is to glare at him, but she knows that her incense only fuels his pleasure.
"Just a loser," she spits out. Korra mentally slaps herself for the poor retort before she practically runs towards the locker room, making sure that her eyes are fixed on the ground. But in every slab of tile on the floor, she can see Tahno's dumb smirking face and his stupid well-proportioned, lean, muscular body.
She turns into an empty hallway, her back pressed against the wall. She places a hand over her pounding heart, closes her eyes, and steadies her breathing. Then Korra feels the name slip out of her mouth. It feels foreign, but it already fits perfectly against her teeth, rolling over her tongue. "Tahyes."
She quickly opens her eyes, lips pursed with disgust, breaking herself out of her lust-filled reverie. "Tahno. Tahno. No."
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Disclaimer: Korra and co. belong to Bryke and co.
Author's Note: Thank you for reading - you're awesome! So I wish I could forget Tahno's name, but judging by all of the Tahno fics I've written, I don't think that will be a possibility. Haha. Thanks to alwaysherealwayswaiting on Tumblr for the fun prompt: "In where Korra constantly gets Tahno's name wrong, and he goes to great lengths to get it corrected. (For example, Bahno, Taco, Yano, Sano, Geronimo and so forth)."