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You never really understand just how many airlocks Hell’s Gate has until you have a baby who can’t put on his own maskto watch over. Miles Jr, who had finally stopped crying through the night after Norm and herself had made him a blanket out of Quaritch and Paz’s old jackets, had been in the cafeteria when a malfunctioning door broke its seal and sent the entire room scrambling for emergency masks. Thankfully, Max had been on babysitting duty that morning and had acted fast, grabbing the baby from his playpen and running into the kitchen, which had its own seals. Junior had a mild case of hypoxia that cleared up with an hour or so in medical, but the event had freaked everyone out enough that Max and the remaining engineering team worked to retrofit a nasal cannula with a rebreather pack. It wasn’t perfect, but Alicia was grateful that she at least had one less worry about raising a human baby on Pandora.
Between the rogue Stingbat that broke into the Scorpion bay when Junior was there, rogue Nantang packs roving the area when Marissa came to visit, and finding out that half the Pa’li milk that they’d been using to feed him had gone bad, the day to day of raising a child on Pandora was adding silver hairs to her scalp faster than Marissa ever had.
But then Alicis would come home from a work shift, and see his gummy little smile as he howled and reached out his little hands for her. See his big brown eyes light up when Marissa gifted him a small toy Angstík that had been painstakingly carved and panted by hand. Alicia would laugh in the morning when she saw his curls sticking up like an electrified wheat field and thank Eywa, Freya and every other Deity she knew for her little dandelion.
And every night, she’d hold that ragged flight jacket patch, with a screaming Ikran skull and a faded Scorpion. Alicia would remember Paz’s smile that was sharp as a Viperwolf’s, and she’d tickle Junior’s feet and silently promise her old friend that she’d raise him how she hoped Paz would want her to.
Alicia thought all of this as she beamed so big and wide it felt her face would split in two.
Silently, she prayed to Eywa (and Paz, and Grace) for strength.
Because on this innocuous Tuesday morning on Pandora, at 11:30 in the morning in the middle of a crowed cafeteria, Junior pulled himself to his pudgy little feet and took his first wobbly step. Alicia felt her heart beating wildly in her chest as she took a measured sip of her tea. She didn’t want to bring attention to Junior, knowing he learned best by observing and mimicking others. If she drew attention, everyone would flip out and scare him. So, she watched in awed silence as Junior took one step, staring with fierce determination at his bare feet as he carefully picked up on foot and then the other.
One, then three, then five determined steps before Alicia dared to smack Norm and Max’s arms. They choked on their coffee in eerie synch, Norm whipping his own arm out at Marissa, who had stumbled in to Hell’s Gate from the Tiolang herds late last night. Marissa visibly jerked in shock, eyes going wide as she slapped a hand over her mouth to muffle her shriek of delighted joy. What made tears pool in Alicia’s eyes as she stood to quietly follow after the boy, was where he was going.
Step by careful step, wobbling and unsteady but bravely determined, Junior didn’t walk to her. He didn’t go to his aunt, nor his uncles. He didn’t go to his toys or his blanket, no.
One foot in front of the other, Junior stumbled right to the floor-to-ceiling window in the cafeteria. He didn’t quite make it, falling just short and crawling eagerly the rest of the way to plant his hands in the glass and press his nose against it.
On the other side of the glass, Alicia’s Ikran lowered its head to chirp curiously at the baby it had only seen through her memories. Marissa’s Angstík friend, the Red Matriarch bellowed in greeting while Junior squealed in delight.
The room absolutely erupted in pandemonium, the humans of Hell’s Gate loosing their collective minds at Junior’s first steps into Pandora, however figuratively.
Norm and Marissa were jumping with their arms wrapped around each other, Max frantically radioing Jake at Hometree to share the news. Alicia just moved to her knees, pulling Junior into her lap to kiss his cheek. He clapped his hands, reaching out and clasping and unclasping his fists at her Ikran, who trilled in greeting. “Well, then my little dandelion” she whispered, “there’s no stopping you now”.
All of Pandora was waiting for him, and she would have to learn to let him go.
*
Sixteen years later, Quaritch is struggling with that same realization as he watches Spider shimmy his way up a tree to get a better sense of their surroundings.
His ears twitch at every rustling leaf, tail lashing aggressively at every new scent. His fangs peeked out behind his lips as he held his rifle close like a teddy bear.
His jaw ached like an old bruise, the flesh rending claws of the Thanator scratching through his memory, despite the lack of scars. He remembered being human on Pandora, remembered being fresh out of cryo and watching an Ikran attack the shuttle.
Watched an angry viperwolf rip a scientist apart on day three.
Watched a Marine choke on poisoned air when their mask failed on day twenty-three.
He’d buried more bodies, more friends, on this God forsaken moon than he could count if he had eight hands to do it with. He’d fist fought a Thanator with the feral desperation of a man who knew he was going to die, to protect the little mousy scientist and injured Marine behind him (Alicia, who betrayed him. Turned her back on everything they fought to build for this planet that took so much from them both. Wainfleet was still with him, but he wasn’t sure if he recognized his oldest friend anymore with fangs and blue skin and a gentle wonder for this hellish planet).
Spider, le petit sauvage, wore no pants, boots or shirt. Though the loincloth and covering was carefully and caringly crafted by someone to be soft enough not to bother sensitive human skin yet durable enough to survive Pandora, Quaritch’s sharp eyes could see the red scratches and irritated patches of skin where the hostile environment left it mark on the boy. A thick and corded scar on Spider’s calf from something big, another on his right bicep. Callouses on his fingers from the bow he had carried with reverent care despite being offered a handgun by a well meaning Z-Dog. Pandora wasn’t kind to humans, young or old.
(Kathy Greene died at sixteen years old. Quaritch had to pull an arrow the size of her whole body out of her corpse so he could bring her back to her parents. She was a year younger than Spider was now)
Yet, as Quaritch watched in amazed terror, Spider was thriving.
He moved with the same thoughtless grace as any true born Na’vi through the branches, silent and graceful as any Thanator or Nantang could ever be. Comparatively, Quaritch watched his Recom team trip and stumble, falling over their boots and tails as they trekked. Bodies born for this planet, yet they fumbled through the world. Spider, conversely, had a body that was antithetical to life on Pandora, yet moved through the world as though he was born to it.
He shook away the thoughts, something uncomfortable crawling up his spine when he thought about it too long.
“Fall in, kiddo!” Quaritch hissed instead, tapping his foot expectantly and waiting for Spider to drop back down beside him, fighting the urge to snatch him up from the low branch and cling him close when a prolemuris hooted in the canopy above. Spider muttered something in sharp Na’vi, but dropped down to fall in line with a shockingly teenage-esque eyeroll.
He felt a headache coming on, the idea of trying to wrangle the little fucker in line and keep him alive through the long trek to the Hallelujah Mountains was more daunting (and nerve wracking) than Quaritch felt prepared for.
“C’mon skxawngs!” Spider calls, darting ahead through the underbrush. A flock of shimmyflys erupting to the sky and Quaritch’s heart stuttered in his chest. “Last one there is a lame Pa’li!” the boy cried with a grin that made his chest ache.
That was Paz’s smile, bright and wild, teeth gleaming like knives.
(Did he know about Paz? Know she loved the color yellow, ate spicy food with a straight face and cried at dog movies? Did he see his mama in the mirror or was she some foggy stranger in his mind?)
But his boy threw himself into the world with the same wild abandon as Marissa once had
(His stomach turned, memories of warm, thin flesh in his hand, blood slicking his blade. Marissa’s screams echoed through the trees. Even now, he heard them on the wind)
His eyes, big and brown, were wide with adoring wonder. He stopped to greet every viperwolf, meer deer and kinglor they passed with reverence. Quaritch marvelled at the difference between this wild child, this free-spirited hunter and the frail and heartsick child he’d seen when Spider was locked in the brig in a sterile while lab.
(He saw Alicia in Spider’s eyes, her love of the world around her, her fierce passion and devotion reflected back in the child she had raised. Did she raise him in the lab, or did she whisk him away to the trees and mountains to remake his son into something other than human? Did she ground him to the lab as punishment? Lock him away from the forests and rivers they both so clearly adored?
Was Spider still his son, or hers now?)
Quaritch loped after his son, keeping pace easily enough that he could watch all the ways he was still the same sweet little sunshine boy he’d held in his arms and all the ways he was something Quaritch couldn’t understand or recognize.
Spider spoke Na’vi with flowing ease and English with practiced fluency. Did he know his mama’s first language? Did he know Quaritch’s family preferred Creole? Alicia spoke Québecois along with English, had she taught Spider?
Maybe Quaritch could. Maybe while Spider taught him about Pandora, he could try to reclaim some part of his son. Keep him close and help him see reason instead of whatever tree hugger fantasy those traitors had put in his mind.
What was it his ma used to say?
“Petits enfants, petits problems. Grands enfants, grands miseres”