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"Miles!"
Spider hisses, knowing he's caught and hating the man behind him even as he does so. But he doesn't stop running, doesn't turn and bare his teeth, imitating the Na'vi to the best of his ve'kì tawtute nature. Neteyam would smack his head and call him a skxawng for it, for how he hates the way his body is stubbornly human no matter how he wants differently. How his ears are always dulled and static, not flexible and sharp like the Na'viyä Mikyun were. And it's not like he has anywhere to run either. He's in the middle of the forest, down low on the ground where the ikran Colonel Quaritch rode couldn't catch him.
But that didn't matter much. Not when he had a tracker in the oxygen mask letting him continue to live. And that stupid name. Spider didn't answer to Miles, hadn't been known as Miles since before the skypeople had been forced from Pandora years ago. He was sixteen and almost a man, by human standards though by Na'vi standards he'd always be nì'eveng. Always a child. But he's not. He's fast, and strong and--
"Son!" Close, too close! Spider can run, can duck and try to hide and everything else but… but the Colonel is too close on his kxetse for any kind of comfort and the man is in a Na'vi body, he's close. Close enough Spider can hear the boots digging into the ground, while his own feet are bare. The Colonel is too close, too close to evade and Spider makes a split second decision, turning and finally baring his teeth at his genetic donor. If he did have a tail, Spider is sure it'd be lashing at the air behind him, his mikyun tight against his skull. And he wouldn't have the mask making it impossible to bite even if his tawtute teeth made any sort of dent in a Na'vi skin.
"Oe ke lu 'itan ngeyä! Kalweyaveng!" Because he wasn't. He wasn't the man's son, and the man was a son of a bitch if Spider ever met one. Of course, that means exactly nothing when his arm is grabbed. Hauled up high above his head by the blue skinned hand. And the rest of his body follows. Until he's at least a foot off the ground now, held hostage and stupid and afraid. Because he remembers the words the Colonel had told him, after pulling him free from the whirling machines, the brilliant sickly neon glow that stabbed into his brain as much as it read it, the awful woman's cold coaxing. The promise that Spider would be caught in under two minutes and the absolute threat that the Colonel would give him 'an old fashioned whipping' when he was caught. When. Not if. Because even if Spider wasn't sixteen, he knew when the difference was important and right then…? It was.
"Stop with that shit. You're a human, kid and you're going to speak English when I'm talking to you. Got it?" Fear breeds defiance and Spider can feel the white hot sting of it through his entire body, even past the warning pain in his arm. Even a dreamwalker body, a uniltìranyu body, had more than enough strength to accidentally break his comparatively fragile bones.
"Pxasìk!" And even if the Colonel didn't speak the Na'vi language, he understood the rejection when he heard it. He may not have heard 'screw that, no way!' that Spider wholeheartedly meant, but considering he was still refusing to speak 'Ìnglìsì like the Colonel insisted, it probably wasn't too difficult to read between the lines. And Spider knows his heart is beating too quickly, thrumming in his chest and causing his breathing to hitch almost desperately in his throat, trying to break free from the other's hold, but he can't help it. Can help the snarling hiss coming from his throat, defiance and fear so strong they make him tremble.
Defiance, however, no matter how thrilling and how Spider almost felt freefor the briefest moment, at the look of surprised anger on the Colonel's face; had its consequences.
"That's how you want to play it? Deep breath, son." And thick blue fingers are reaching for his mask. Both of Spider's hands were wrapped around the trunk of a limb holding him up, trying to prevent his own body weight from pulling his shoulder from its socket, and his kicks don't even connect before the Colonel reaches his goal. Heaving in a desperate gasp of human safe air, Spider tries not to look, not to know what's coming: his death. Completely ignoble and humiliatingly quickly, choked out without the possibility to survive more than a few minutes in the poisonous air. But there's no sound of creaking plastic. No hiss of precious oxygen escaping the machine. Nothing.
Until there was.
A crack of skin to skin and Spider almost doesn't feel anything at first. Not until his body flies out from the Colonel's released hold, slamming into the base of one of the massive trees Pandora grew. Then, and only then, pushing himself up on arms that desperately shake and with lungs burning in protest because he'd stupidly released a gasp of shock when he was dropped, does the pain come. Throbbing. Sharp, and radiating from his chin all along his jaw to the side of his skull. Uniltìranyu hands were so much larger than tawtute skulls after all. And then, the hand is back. Thrusting his mask back on his face and opening the valve that pressed sweet oxygen back into his nose and mouth. Safe. And Spider gasps greedily, hauling the breathable air deep into his lungs. The pressure of his mask sends the fresh pain throbbing even harder and Spider isn't quite sure if that wasn't what the Colonel wanted, because his head is tilted, careful fingers checking the seam of mask to skin.
"Now. Do you want the other side to match, or do we have ourselves an understanding?" There's no mercy in him. No kindness. Only tìzevakx. Only a human kind of cruelty, and Spider knows the Colonel wouldn't hesitate. Would strike again, and he already hurt. So he hangs his head, bows it until his eyes no longer meet with the others and nods.
"Yessir." It's muted, soft and near painful as he mutters into his mask but uniltìranyu ears are sharp and the Colonel nods. Something very near to ve'ki-- to poisonous hatred-- burns in every vein Spider has but he refuses to let it show, keeping his gaze lowered as he's set back down on the ground, his dreadlocks gathered to give the older man a hold on him. It's tight, but not currently painful and Spider doesn't try to escape it, not yet, mostly because the Colonel wouldn't listen to it anyway. And he is already moving, already pulled to the Colonel's Ikran and thrown roughly up onto the saddle, tseheylu made and the Colonel rising up to sit heavily behind him, one arm wrapping around Spider's waist to hold him securely.
"We're going to have a talk, back at base kid. And you aren't going to be doing much talking. You best remember what I told you before, and prepare yourself." Like a stone thrown from the tops of the hallelujah mountains, Spider's stomach drops and he can't muster so much as a smile. Normally flying on the back of any ikran is borderline magical, and he whoops and screams in childish glee, but now he's silent. Quiet even though the Colonel directs his Ikran through several swooping loops and tight banks, things that normally made Spider at least laugh once. Eventually, he stops trying and the rest of the flight is for speed, larger bulk pressed tight against Spider's back, and every breath forcing Spider lower over the smooth skinned back, unable to even consider falling off with the bulwark of steely muscle behind him. It was both nothing like the sämyam, the hugs, his friends gave him or even the slightly stiffer embrace of Jake; but it was… almost strangely comforting in its own way. The Colonel was strong, if he didn't want Spider falling, there wasn't a way in all of Pandora he would be able to. And it felt nice to have a steady-strong heartbeat behind him, felt even through the Colonel's shirt. The comfort did little to ease the ache in his cheek, but it maybe helped him feel a little less despondent over the entire messy situation.
The wind made it nearly impossible to hold a conversation, and the base wasn't far from where Spider had managed to run: they'd only taken a moment to scout when Spider had bolted into the trees. Within minutes of his freedom, it comes crashing down. Once his ikran landed, the Colonel had a hand fisted in Spider's hair again. Again, it's tight enough to prevent even the slight consideration of escaping, but not actively painful. And it didn't turn painful. Not until Spider saw they were headed towards the Colonel's tent, slightly larger than any of the others though it was the same dull puke green as any other. Just as battered by the elements of Pandora, and just as rugged as Spider vaguely remembers his human father, gruff and brisk with hardly any care for a kid too easily mistaken for worm food. And when he did start to struggle, the Colonel just firmed his grip, until a cry rips from Spider's throat without his permission, pained and protesting at once as his head is jerked back, throat exposed despite his struggles to keep it down.
"I promise you an old fashioned hiding, son. And I keep my word. Your only choice in this is if you want it done in the privacy of my tent or out here where everyone can see us." Like it was a choice at all. Spider stops his struggles, going with the press of the Colonel's body behind him, and trying desperately to ignore the quiet twist of something in his chest when his compliance earns him a gruff 'atta boy' and the minute easing of the near painful grip in his hair.
The Colonel was nothing to him, even before he died and came back as a demon, a vrrtep, without even the decency to have limited time in his Na'vi form. Still, the twisting feeling continues, somewhere between pride and disgust and fragile enough to be shattered the moment the Colonel seals his tent and removes Spider's mask, forcefully without the edge of cruelty Spider half expected as he takes several swift steps back. Out of arms reach and tenderly lifting one hand to prod at the achingly sharp hurt on his face.
"That's going to bruise." Like he didn't already know. No one lived on Pandora without knowing the pulsating pain of a bruise, or how to tell when it was different from the pain of a broken bone. His entire face hurt, with an added bonus of a wicked headache, but Spider wasn't in any danger and he just nodded. As brusk as the Colonel was just outside his tent, now… now he seemed just as uncertain as he had been the first time he entered the cage of a room they had Spider in at the humans home base. Half apologetic, half commanding and completely awkward trying to be neither of those. The Colonel was good at hiding his emotions in his human form, Spider could vaguely remember that, but the avatar body he was in had more tells than a tawtute. And Spider had been half raised by the Na'vi, he could read the twitch of a tail and the flex of an ear more easily than almost anything else. The Colonel was uncertain. He didn't know what to do in this situation. How to proceed.
The knowledge is enough to have Spider's defiance coming back full tilt, resting his feet wide and easy, ready to move at the smallest hint he needed to. Like he did playing with the Sully kids, having to account for his smaller, weaker body by being quicker, more agile. Except instead of trying to get at a tail to pull, he's trying to avoid a full grown uniltìranyu who was trained. Just like Jake was, and Spider could never even hope to take down the man, never in a million years, but evade… evade he could maybe…
"Txanfwìngtu!" He swears, violent and furious, hands curled into loose fists at his sides, narrowing his eyes back just as the Colonel narrows his.
"Don't be going native on me, son." That word again. Spider doesn't care he's heard the man refer to most of his subordinates in the same too-familiar tone, the same word meaning nothing more than 'kid' or 'jarhead'. It was just a word. No particular meaning besides underlining the Colonel was older, was higher on the food chain. But Spider hated it, jumping onto the cot at the end far side of the tent, a pitiful attempt to try and equal their heights.
"Oe ke lu 'itan ngeyä! You kurkung!" That makes the other man pause, surprise and maybe something approaching approval in yellow eyes.
"That one… I know that one. You cursin me out, kid? That was… asshole, or something right?" Spider just hisses back, jutting out his lower jaw to show he wasn't kidding. If the Colonel got close enough, he would bite. But that just gets him another laugh, low and with more approval than Spider would think since he was exactly right about what he thought the word meant. "You got balls, I'll admit that. Good to know you got something from me, even if you've gone feral."
He's moving. Deceptively slowly, easily over the floor of the tent, like he has nowhere to be and all day to get there. Like Spider is trapped and… well, he is. The thought is just distracting enough that Spider misses the moment the Colonel strikes. Nothing one moment, and the next Spider is caught up again, held by first one arm and then the other when he lashes out in a panicked, terrified flail.
"Now here's what's going to happen, son. You broke the rules. You could have endangered my people. I look after my people, and that means sometimes giving out licks when someone fucks up. And you? Fucked up." With nothing but serious intent in his tone, the Colonel slips a finger into the back of his tweng and pulls it down with a few hard tugs, until it is taunt around Spider's knees, hobbling him as much as the Colonel's arms. Which were in motion again. Pulling, arranging. Forcing Spider down over suddenly prone legs, the Colonel sitting on the cot where Spider had just been standing. "Normally, if someone fucked up as bad as you did, they'd consider themselves lucky to get out without my belt busting their ass. On top of any other shit chores I can come up with and extra training."
He says it so nonchalantly. So casually. Like it was normal. Na'vi as a whole didn't takuk their children. Not a slap, not a strike, not a hand lifted in anger. But Spider knew enough about tawtute to know that wasn't the same there. Corporal punishment was shockingly common among humans, both young and old subject to it. And in the military it was practically the standard. But to use on him? And a belt? Spider had seen the man's belt, of course, had noticed how wide and thick the leather was. Intimidating. And now, even the thought of it bruising his txìm… Spider tries to squirm, to get free, but there's one heavy hand on his back, pinning him with all the ease of a predator pinning its prey.
"Consider yourself lucky, then. That you're just a kid and that this hiding is less than I give my men." And with that he moves. A breathless moment of suspense, Spider's entire body tingling in excruciating awareness of the other man and his current ability to hurt Spider. And then the moment is over.
Like in the forest, like his burning, throbbing cheek, at first all Spider knows is the sound. The hard crack of flesh to flesh. And then the hurt. The sting. Spider gasps, squirming hard in the man's hold. But another spank comes. And another.
Soon, Spider can hardly breathe around it. Around the hard rhythm that rocks his body forward in sharp staccato, or around how suddenly hard it is to focus on anything but the sting, the pain. And it hurts, enough that before long Spider isn't just squirming to be defiant but because it actually hurts badly enough he can't sit still, can't stoically accept the punishment. Can't breathe through it, even though he managed to do that exact thing when he needed stitches last year, or when he broke his arm the year before. Because it's a different kind of pain, an embarrassing sort of pain. The kind he can't help but react to, crying out with each swat to his poor, sensitive rear. The Colonel's hands were, after all, large. They covered the entirety of Spider's backside, with every single strike there wasn't a single inch of skin that wasn't burning. Not a part of him that didn't feel the Colonel's disapproval. And all through it, the man was silent, deadly quiet. Until Spider cries out, a single word in two languages ripped from his throat.
"Ftang! Stop!" He should feel embarrassed, at the sudden relief when the Colonel actually stops. Actually withholds the next searing swat at his sudden shout. And… lays his hand down. Gently lays it down. Up higher than the skin he was attacking, laying it gently against Spider's lower back. It radiated heat in an almost comforting wave, the same kind of strange comfort that he felt everytime he rode on the ikran with the Colonel, the bulwark of steely muscle holding onto him. He shouldn't feel that comfort, not when the same hand had just been beating his ass but… well, he did and he wasn't going to question it.
"Miles?" Spider doesn't have it in himself to protest, not again. Not that name and not again, breathing hard and furiously blinking away stray tears that are gathered in his eyes, trying to overflow. He'd managed to keep them at bay, but not… not for much longer if the Colonel kept it up. "Talk to me, son."
"Not… not your son." Defiance again. But, like he half expected, there wasn't a reprimand. Not another bone shaking swat or a hard word. Just…
The Colonel sighs, and his hand that had been pinning Spider's back eases to swipe down the length of his spine. Trying to relax him, Spider realizes when the motion is repeated twice more, long slow strokes that… actually kind of work. Spider can relax into the touch, going limp over the Colonel's lap. Fuck, but he hates this, dragging in lungfuls of air in a vain attempt to stop how he wants to cry.
"Not mine, not exactly. I know that. But I have all the memories of you dad, Miles. And you were… you were something to him. Something important. And I'm going soft on you because of it." It's said with something like self recrimination, something close to disgust at how he's going 'soft' but the Colonel continues anyway, stopping the motion of his free hand. "If you weren't, I would have let the science pukes keep leaning on you. They would have gotten what they wanted eventually, but you'd be hurting for it. Now, I can't keep you out here, away from them, if you're going to be a little shit. You need to understand this, Miles. I give the orders you follow them. Tslam?"
It's not an actual question. A command, softened only by the man's awkward attempt at the language, strange on his tongue, but familiar enough from hearing the word so often in both his forms. There's only one reaction Spider can give, pressing his face into the pillow helpfully close to his face and shuddering just remembering what that awful bitch had done to him. Torture, just not a kind that required any of them to actually touch him. Maybe it's worse, like this, held down and spanked like some errant tawtute child. But maybe it's better. Because no matter what he's done so far, even going as far to leave out the Colonel should have used a yìmkxa on his ikran and the possible death it could have caused, the Colonel hadn't done anything like that. Hasn't done even this much until Spider tested the rules today. He's been afraid, of course. Afraid from the violence in the man's form, how he sees the Na'vi as animals to be put down, how he could be so senselessly cruel… but not for himself. Spider is safe from the Colonel, and he is almost sure that goes further than just being safe from the man killing him. He's safe because of him… maybe. So he gasps, struggles against his clawing loyalty to the Na'vi, to the Sullys in particular and nods.
"Tslolam." Understood. He'd obey.
"Atta boy." Yayayrnga. The entire situation is confusing. How Spider isn't even sure if he wants to feel the almost pride the almost praise gives him, shuddering again when the heavy, warm hand that was on his lower back lifts again, getting back into position. "I'll admit this much, kid. You've got enough grit to handle this without bawling, you've got the guts to get wherever you're going. But we're going to be finishing up here, and it's not going to be easy. Cry if you need to, no one out here to hear besides us."
And like he hadn't even paused, the hand claps down again. Spider doesn't even try to hide his surprised yelp. Because the Colonel isn't just striking his ass anymore, has moved down to the tops of his thighs. And it hurts so much worse there, and after the brief pause that made the skin more sensitive, instead of less. Again, and again, the spanks land. Spider doesn't know how many he took before the minor break, or how many come down after. But he's sobbing by the time the Colonel is done. Sobbing and clutching both hands into the pillow under his face, half suffocating himself in the attempt to keep from being loud enough the Colonel would be able to hear him. It's a stupid thing to try, but he does anyway. And when the spanking is done, when the final all mighty slap lands with horrible effectiveness across both his thighs and where his weight sits the most, Spider can't do anything more than lay limply.
Even the Colonel's hands, oddly soft for the pain they just delivered, can't make him do more than sway drunkenly as he's set on his own two feet. Unstable, and hating it and when the man stands, looks to be heading for the door to just leave Spider… well, he can't exactly blame himself for what he does next: stumbling forward and clinging blindly to the man that just spanked him, face pressed tightly to his chest and even going so far as to climb the man a little, his legs were tree trunk thick enough to handle it.
Spider climbs and shoves his way into the man's embrace, knowing it's wrong and frankly not caring. The Na'vi never hesitated to reach out in their pain, never told each other to grow up or just deal with the pain, but rather understood and helped. And maybe… Maybe an old army dog could do that as well, because there's an iron arm around his waist and a hand on the back of his skull, terrifying power gentled to a protective cage guarding the most fragile aspects of a stupid human boy. And though the embarrassment, the fwìng, still cut deeply and his cheeks stained red, nothing in Spider could bring himself to hate it when a rough voice hesitated over a word, speaking it quietly between them.
"Maitan. My Miles." It's so incredibly tempting to rebuke that. To deny he's not the man's son but… well, Spider is fading to sleep quickly and if there's one battle he wants to pick…
"It's Spider." He slurs, blinking once more but only managing a weak flutter of his eyes before he completely loses the battle and falls asleep.