Chapter Text
“Who’s the mighty warrior?”
“Bro!”
“Come on, let’s go - Lo’ak!”
“They’ve got Spider, we’ve got to get him. Come on, bro. We can’t leave him.”
Lo’ak sprinted across the deck and Neteyam followed, still hissing under his breath even as he reached Lo’ak’s side and they slipped into the belly of the ship. Their feet slapped against cold metal. It hurt, in an unfamiliar way. The steel had no give. It was nothing like beach sand or the soft dirt. It left Lo’ak’s feet tingling. The metal leaching all of the warmth from his skin, biting into his bones.
“Stay close,” Neteyam gritted through clenched teeth.
They moved like they’d been taught, low and fast. The ship groaned beneath them, a deep, unsettled sound. Above the open deck floor, a lattice of metal walkways crisscrossed. Lo’ak and Neteyam slipped up the thin beams until they were high above the deck, pressing into the piping there, crouched against the highest railings.
Below, boots thundered. Human voices barked.
Lo’ak leaned forward, trying to peer through the grating, but Neteyam hauled him back with a shake of his head.
Spider emerged, caught in a swarm of other humans. His hands were bound behind his back with plastic restraints and he had an escort on either side of him. His face was bruised, one eye swollen and dark, dried blood at his lip.
Lo’ak glanced back. Neteyam met his gaze, nodding.
They dropped.
The first human barely had time to shout before Spider twisted, slamming his shoulder back into the man’s chest as Neteyam hit the second escort from above. The impact rang through the walkway. Lo’ak hit the walkway and grabbed for the nearest rifle, yanking it sideways as the human fumbled.
Spider was feral, all elbows and fists, driving a knee up hard, then ripping the oxygen mask clean off one of the soldiers. The man gasped, panicked, hands flying to his face. Spider shoved him once and the human toppled backward over the edge of the walkway, his shout cutting off as he vanished into the ocean. Neteyam moved like water and stone. He twisted a wrist, disarmed one soldier, drove an elbow into another’s throat, sent a body crumpling to the deck.
A human, only a few feet away, raised his rifle, sighting down the barrel at Neteyam’s exposed back.
Lo’ak moved. He was across the space, his hands tightened around the gun, before Neteyam had even turned. He tore it from the soldier's arms, pulling it close - just like their father had shown him - and pulled the trigger.
The sound was deafening. The human jerked and then collapsed, his body going still.
Lo’ak stared. His arms felt as numb as his feet.
Spider appeared at his side. “Took you long enough.”
Lo’ak forced a grin despite himself, eyes still stuck on the human. He tore his focus away so he could cut Spider’s restraints, but the man’s body was like a beacon. He found himself looking back to it every few seconds. “You miss us?”
“Desperately.”
There was no time to linger. The ship had erupted around them. Alarms screaming to life, lights flashing along the walkways. Neteyam grabbed Lo’ak’s arm and shoved him forward, slowing only to catch Spider by wrist and drag him along. “Move. Now.”
They ran. Down the walkway and across another, up a crooked flight of steps and down two others. The ship tightened around them, metal corridors filling with bootsteps and shouts.
They almost made it.
The corridor opened into chaos. Shouting, gunfire and smoke errupting from all sides until they were shrouded in it. Two Avatars had rounded the corner ahead of them, filling the narrow, human passage. Their rifles came up in the same smooth motion and they opened fire. The blasts tore into the metal of the ship, sparks spitting outward in sharp bursts.
Everyone scattered. Lo’ak’s heart lurched violently into his throat when Kiri and Tuk sprinted out into the open on the deck, just ahead of them. Kiri dragged Tuk with her, moving fast, and they were swallowed by smoke. For one terrifying heartbeat, Lo’ak couldn’t see them at all.
When the gunshots paused and the smoke cleared a little, Lo’ak spotted them pressed into a tight space just around the corner, further up the deck, half-hidden behind a jagged support beam. Kiri’s eyes were wide, luminous in the dim, strobing red light, glowing almost eerily against the smoke. Tuk clutched her hand with both of hers, small fingers locked tight.
Neteyam saw them too. Lo’ak didn’t need to look to know - he felt the shift beside him. Neteyam’s body tensed, his head snapping in the same direction.
Another burst of gunfire screamed overhead.
Neteyam’s jaw set. He seized a hold of Lo’ak’s upper arm and moved, pushing forward, winding his way closer to Kiri and Tuk, keeping cover as best he could. Lo’ak followed, heart hammering. Spider stayed close by his side.
When they were close enough, they moved as one, instinct and training blurring together. Kiri pulled Tuk forward, ducking low and sprinting until they side-by-side, all crouched behind a line of massive pipes on one corner of the deck.
Gunfire erupted again and Lo’ak threw out a hand to push Kiri and Tuk back against the pipes. Neteyam’s hand shifted from his arm to his chest, shoving Lo’ak against the pipes as well and pressing in close. The gunshots were closer now, and deafening. Lo’ak half-wanted to slap his hands over his ears but he was still holding the rifle in one hand. He couldn’t make himself drop it. His fingers felt fused to the grip.
The gunshots continued, ricocheting off of the piping.
Neteyam swore sharply.
“Give me that-”
He tore the rifle out of Lo’ak’s hands, turning so his back was braced against the pipes, and fired wildly out onto the deck.
“Go!” he shouted over his shoulder. “Go-go!”
Spider shoved Tuk into Kiri’s arms and pulled them forward. All three of them launched towards the railing, where the deck opened to the ocean. Neteyam fired over his shoulder again, giving them the cover they needed to slip over the railing and into the water.
Lo’ak watched them go but didn’t follow. He planted himself at Neteyam’s back, ears flat and alert.
Neteyam shoved him back a step.
“Lo’ak, go!”
Lo’ak held his ground. “No. Not without you.”
Neteyam hissed and shifted, lifting the rifle a little higher and firing out over the deck again.
“Fine - now!”
They made a break for it together - lunging towards the opening in the hull.
A sudden, violent yank at Lo’ak’s kuru - so sharp it tore a scream from him - had him stumbling before he could reach the railing. His breath punched out of him and his feet left the deck. The world tilted, spinning.
Neteyam was shouting his name.
Blue hands with too many fingers gripped Lo’ak’s arms, his tail, dragging him backwarrd. He kicked and twisted, panic flaring white-hot in his chest, as his hands scraped uselessly against metal. Neteyam was frozen just ahead of him, partway over the railing. He shifted, adjusting his weight to pivot, eyes wide, reaching out.
A gunshot cracked through the air.
Lo’ak saw it happen as if underwater - everything slowed, distorted.
Neteyam’s body jerked, his mouth opening in shock. A thin mist of blood bloomed in the air, and then it poured down his chest from the neat hole below his shoulder.
He fell.
He fell backward, over the edge, fingers brushing empty air. His body vanishing into the roaring seawater.
The scream tore out of Lo’ak.
“Neteyam!”
The soldiers slammed him down onto the deck. Pain exploded through his shoulder and ribs. Rough hands forced his arms behind his back, restraints biting into his wrists.
He beat at the metal anyway - fists slamming again and again, skin splitting, pain flaring.
“No! No, no-!” he sobbed, thrashing, straining against the bonds. “Neteyam-”
The alarms wailed. Smoke burned his eyes. The deck was cold beneath his cheek.
Lo’ak screamed until there was blood in his mouth but the hands holding him against the deck did not yield.
And Neteyam did not surface.
Jake was on his knees, heart hammering and hands slick with blood.
The sea was calming, as if it hadn’t just swallowed one of his sons and wasn’t still trying to take the other. Waves lapped at the shore, brushing against Neteyam’s legs where he lay half on rock, half in the shallows. With every pulse of the tide, blood thinned and spread, blooming pink in the water before Eywa carried it away.
Jake pressed his hands down harder. Neteyam groaned.
“Breathe with me,” Jake said, voice low and steady by sheer force of will. “In. Out. That’s it. Stay with me.”
Neteyam’s breaths were wet and wrong. Each one rattled, caught deep in his chest. His eyes were glassy.
Jake had found them in the water. Kiri first, her arms locked under Tuk’s, holding her above the surface. Spider next to them, clinging to a piece of wreckage. Then Neteyam, limp on the floating debris next to Spider, his head lolling as blood clouded the sea around his chest.
Jake’s heart had faltered. A violent, sickening misfire.
He hauled Neteyam up, one arm under his shoulders, one hand slapping hard over the wound. Neteyam had gasped and clawed weakly at his vest.
“Dad,” he choked. “Lo’ak - Lo’ak’s still on the ship-”
The words punched through Jake.
He got them up onto the rocks, then sent Kiri, Tuk, and Spider scrambling higher up the shoreline, yelling at them to find help. He didn’t look back to see them go. He couldn’t afford to. He packed Netyam’s wound as best he could with torn pieces of his vest, hands already soaked with blood. Neteyam’s fingers clutched at his arm, grip weak and frantic.
“You have to go back,” Neteyam whispered hoarsely. “Please. Dad. Please-”
Jake swallowed hard, the world narrowing until there was only the sound of his son’s breathing and the distant roar of the sea. He leaned forward and pressed his forehead to Neteyam’s, breathing with him.
“I will,” he promised. “I’ll find him. I swear.”
He said it again. And again. To Neteyam. To himself.
The promise tasted like ash even as he gav it.
Around them, the rocks erupted into motion. Ronal’s voice cut through the air in sharp bursts and. Metkayina warriors splashed into the shallows, forming a perimeter. Someone shouted for a healer. Jake heard it all as if from underwater. All he could see was the way blood bubbled every time Neteyam tried to inhale.
Through-and-through, his mind supplied with brutal clarity. He’d seen wounds like this before. Human bodies, Na’vi bodies, it didn’t matter. Air where air should not be.
And somewhere out there - alone on cold steel - Lo’ak. Taken.
Dead.
The not knowing was its own kind of agony, a vice tightening around Jake’s chest until he couldn’t draw breath at all.
Norm, in his avatar, skidded to a stop beside them, tail lashing for balance as his feet slipped on the rocks, medical kit slung over one shoulder. His eyes went wide as he took them in - Neteyam half in the shallows, blood pooling around him, and Jake hovering over him, hands pressed hard against his chest.
“Jesus-” Norm hissed, then caught himself, glancing at Jake. “Okay. Okay. Let me see.”
Jake couldn’t move his hands.
“Jake. I need to-”
For a moment, Jake felt like he was the one drowning. His vision blurred. His chest burned. With a shuddering breath, he forced himself to move. Norm went to work immediately, re-packing the wound with practiced urgency.
“How long since he was hit?”
“I don’t know.”
Norm nodded, jaw tight. “We need to get him somewhere dry. Stable. I can seal it for now, but-”
“But?” Jake demanded.
“But he needs real treatment. Soon. That lung is not going to hold for much longer.”
Jake stood, Neteyam clutched in his arms as if he weighed nothing at all. Neteyam gasped, fingers clutching weakly at Jake’s shoulder.
“Easy,” Jake murmured, voice breaking. He adjusted his grip, pulling Neteyam closer.
Neteyam’s head lolled against his chest, and Jake shifted to support his neck, the same way he had when Neteyam was small and fearless and refused to stop climbing things he wasn’t ready for.
Jake clenched his jaw and forced the memory down. He moved. One son in his arms, and the empty space at his side, where the other should have been, taunting him.
Lo’ak woke to white. A harsh, sterile white that stabbed straight through his skull and hummed faintly. His body felt heavy, distant, like it no longer belonged to him. Every limb ached. His head throbbed.
He couldn’t move. He could even feel-
Hands grabbed him.
Human hands.
They hauled him upright and dragged him down metal halls that smelled of something so strong and so accidic it burned in his nose. Doors slid open at their approach and whispered shut behind them, sealing him in again and again. His feet never touched the floor.
When they finally stopped, he was in another white room. This one wasn’t empty. A machine waited at its center.
It loomed, tall and angular. It had a metal frame woven through with articulated arms and needle-thin probe and thick cables snaking out from its spine. The chair at its center was shaped too precisely to the curve of a Na’vi body to be accidental. A high back to cradle the skull, grooves marked where his tail would be pinned. Metal clamps and padded restraints hanging open. A crown of thin, glinting filaments hovered above where his kuru would rest.
Lo’ak wanted to scream but his voice had abandoned him hours ago. His brother’s name - screamed over and over like a prayer - had stripped it from him.
Neteyam.
Neteyam falling. Neteyam’s eyes wide in shock. Neteyam disappearing over the edge.
Neteyam, Neteyam, Neteyam-
They forced him into the chair. Cold metal kissed his skin, then bit. Restraints snapping shut around his wrists, his ankles, his thighs, his chest. One clamped his tail. Another locked his head in place, forcing his gaze forward.
Quaritch stepped into his line of sight, loose-limbved and unbothered. There were bruises littered across his face, which stark under the white light. His avatar filled the space in front of Lo’ak like a wall.
“Well,” he drawled, voice almost conversational, “you’ve sure caused a hell of a mess, kid.”
He looked to his left and nodded once. A tech moved to the console.
“This thing?” Quaritch continued, gesturing lazily at the machine. “It’s gonna help you, help me.”
His gaze sharpened.
“You’re going to show me exactly where your daddy’s been hiding,” he said, voice dropping, “and then you’re gonna help me kill every last resistant Na’vi on this god-foresaken moon.”
Lo’ak’s chest hitched. His teeth bared in a silent snarl.
Quaritch smiled.
When the machine activated the pain was intimate. The filaments descended, brushing his kuru, and then sinking in.
The world fractured.
The machine tore into him like hands ripping pages from a book - his mother’s voice, the reef, laughter, his brother’s hand on his head-
And Lo’ak splintered.
The first night fell without ceremony. Pandora’s bioluminescence blooming across the shoreline. The beauty of it felt obscene.
Jake stood at the water’s edge, staring into the dark. Every sound had him flinching. The distant call of an Ilu, the rustle of palm fronds, the low hum of the reef. His body throbbed; adrenaline refusing to burn out, leaving him sharp and shaking even when exhaustion seaped into his bones.
The days pressed down, the weight of them growing nearly unbearable as they passed without change.
Scouts returned with fragments. Footprints half-erased in sand and fleeting sightings of human movement. Jake chased each one, sleeping only in stolen moments and taking food only when it was forced into his hands.
Neteyam survived the first night. Then the next. And the next after that. Norm and Ronal worked in careful, quiet precision. The wound was sealed and his lung repaired synthetically with Norm’s equipment. His every breath was still fragile and tentative, and he hadn’t woken since he fell limp in Jake’s arms, halfway up the beach. Between the sightings and the searching, at night, Jake sat by his side, listening to him breathe, counting each rise and fall like a prayer. Neteyam drifted in and out of consciousness, feverish and pale. Sometimes he called for Lo’ak. Each time, Jake flinched.
Jake felt it first in his joints. A deep, grinding ache in knees and shoulders that worsened with each day of fragmented, stolen sleep. From there it spreads outwards. His head throbbing and hands taking on a treacherous shake. Pandora’s sun rose and set with indifference, painting the reef in golds and violets, while time stretched thin and merciless.
When Jake slept, he did so beside his son, one hand always resting on Neteyam. When Neteyam stirred, Jake was there. When he cried out, Jake was there. When, hoarsely and without opening his eyes, Neteyam whispered, did you find him? Jake answered without hesitation.
“Not yet.”
He never said no.
Ten days after Lo’ak was taken, Ronal confronted him.
“You are burning yourself hollow,” she said, standing squarely in his path as he prepared to mount his skimwing. “You cannot hunt shadows forever.”
“Watch me.”
“You are Toruk Makto,” Ronal said, pushing closer as he stepped past her and started to climb into the skimwing. “You are Olo’eyktan. You are father to wounded children who still need you.”
“And one who is still missing,” Jake shot back. A reminder to himself, and the world, of the hole in his chest that Lo’ak’s absence had carved.
Silence fell, heavy and deliberate.
Ronal exhaled slowly, carefully choosing her words. “If he lives,” she said, “he will need you whole when he returns.”
“He lives,” Jake hissed.
He pushed the skimwing past her and launched into the water.
The search widened.
Jake sent scouts north and south along the reefs, inland toward the mangrove forests, and out past the coral shelves where the water darkened. He coordinated with the Omatikaya through long-range signals, brief, coded exchanges that spoke of sightings and losses and nothing concrete.
Human tracks dissolved quickly on Pandora. Metal ships left scars - crushed growth, poisoned water, the faint lingering stink of oil and ozone - but they had learned. Even humans could adapt with time, and they had learned just enough to be able to hide.
Jake followed every sign like it was a lifeline.
He flew until his muscles screamed, eyes burning from salt and wind. He dove until pressure crushed his chest, lungs aching, vision narrowing. At night, he returned empty-handed, jaw set, eyes haunted.
Neytiri watched. She did not argue. Not at first. She sat with Neteyam day and night, singing softly in the evenings. Mo’at’s songs drifting across the water like a plea. The melodies wrapped around grief and held it gently, giving it somewhere to rest. When Jake heard them, something inside him cracked. One night, he woke choking on air, heart pounding, convinced he had heard Lo’ak’s voice calling hi name.
He shot up, scanning the dark. Nothing. Just Neytiri curled close to his side, with Tuk and Kiri pressed close. Just the steady sound of Neteyam breathing beside him. Just the ocean, endless and unconcerned.
Jake pressed his palms into his eyes until sparks danced behind them.
Get up, he told himself. Move.
Because stopping meant thinking. And thinking meant the last words he and Lo’ak had exchanged creeping back.
You have brought shame on this family.
Lo’ak had said nothing. And Jake had left the space between them to stretch until it felt impossible to cross.
Now, in the dark, that distance pressed against him.
Neteyam woke properly on the twelfth day. Jake was there, kneeling beside his mat, hand tightening around his, as Neteyam’s eyes fluttered open, gaze unfocused at first. Neytiri lay on his other side, Tuk tucked close to her chest and Kiri curled into her side, exhausted. She had not stirred, not even when he shifted.
The marui smelled faintly of sea salt and herbs from the days of care, blankets rumpled around the mat where Neteyam rested. The soft, pulsing glow of the ocean lit the room in gentle blues and greens, casting shadows on the woven roots of the marui and the small trinkets the children had left scattered across the floor.
“Hey,” Jake said softly. “Easy.”
Neteyam swallowed hard, breath hitching. “Hurts.”
“I know,” Jake murmured. “You’re okay. You’re safe.”
For a moment, Neteyam’s gaze drifted to the low ceiling of the marui. Then it snapped back to Jake.
“Lo’ak…” his voice was ragged.
Jake hesitated, the familiar, heavy weight pressing down on his chest. “We’re looking.”
Neteyam breath hitched, hand clenching tight in Jake’s. “No - he’s not… he can’t-”
Jake tightened his grip, trying to ground Neteyam, even as panic gnawed at him. It leaving him unmoored and unsteady in the marui’s soft, familiar glow.
“No-no-” Neteyam’s sobs grew more frantic, chest rising and falling in short, uneven gasps. Jake could see the effort it cost him, the strain on his damaged lung each desperate intake of air.
“I didn’t-” his voice broke again, words tumbling over themselves. He twisted slightly on the mat, pressing his forehead into Jake’s chest. “I should’ve - he can’t - Dad-”
Jake wrapped his arms around him, holding him upright, letting him tremble, tucked as tightly against Jake’s chest as Jake could get him.
He pressed his forehead to Neteyam’s, voice low and firm. “I’ve got you. I’ve got Lo’ak, too. I promise you. I’m gonna bring him home. You hear me? I won’t let him go - I swear.”
Neteyam shook violently. He didn’t speak anymore, he couldn’t. Raw, ragged gasps and hiccups stole every breathe before he could try.
Jake stayed with him, kneeling on the mat, holding him through the tremors, as his son - his strong, calm and unshakeable, oldest son -fell apart in his arms.
Time dragged.
The Metkayina began small sharing circles at dusk. Quiet gatherings where grief was spoken aloud so it would not fester.
Jake attended just one. He stood at the edge of the small group, arms crossed, listening to the sofvt murmurs. When it was his turn to speak, his throat locked. He left without a word and did not return.
His world narrowed to two things: Neteyam’s breathing and the empty space where Lo’ak should have been.
Neytiri confronted him on the fifteenth day.
“You are fading,” she said bluntly, both of them sitting at Neteyam’s side as he slept.
Neteyam spent more of his time asleep than awake, which Jake was glad of. Sleep was good for him, and it spared him the full force of his grief, which otherwise erupted in near-inconsolable waves whenever he was conscious. Even in his exhaustion, Jake kept a hand close, ready to steady him.
Neytiri never left the marui, always close enough to press a hand against their son, smoothing blankets, adjusting pillows. It was an unspoken agreement between them, so Jake could search for Lo’ak. Jake was there too whenever he wasn’t out searching, a constant sentinel hovering at the edge of exhaustion.
Jake was sharpening a blade he did not need, the metal scraping against the whetstone with a hollow rhythm.
“You think I do not see it?” Neytiri added, shoulders rigid.
Jake didn’t look up. “I’m fine.”
She knocked the blade from his hands. It clattered against the stone block. The children were out. The only other sound was Neteyam’s shallow breathing.
“No,” she said, voice trembling. “You are not.”
Jake met her gaze. “I can’t stop. If I stop,” he said hoarsely, “I start imagining what they’re doing to him.”
Neytiri froze.
The room shrunk around them - the soft scent of herbs she had placed to soothe fever and fear, the faint salt tang drifting in through open walls. Even the rocking of the marui in the tide felt sharper.
Neytiri reached out, placing a hand against Jake’s chest, fingers splayed over his heart. “Then imagine him strong,” she whispered.
Jake closed his eyes, leaning into her, letting the warmth of her anchor him. Then he pulled away.
The third week broke him.
Sleep became optional and he did away with eating altogether. His hands shook when he wasn’t moving, so he made sure he was always moving. Sharpening a blade, radioing the scouts, checking over Neteyam with an intensity that bordered on manic. Flying patrols. Anything to keep the tremor at bay. He flew patrols alone, pushing his ikran harder than was fair, farther than was safe. The wind cut against his face, the salt and tang of the sea stinging his eyes.
Each night, he returned empty-handed.
The lead came at dawn on the twenty-second day.
Jake was returning from another patrol, shoulders burning, vision swimming with exhaustion, when one of the reef scouts flagged him down from the shallows. The morning light painted the water in muted blues and greens, waves lapping quietly.
The scout’s expression was taut.
“There is a place,” she said, gesturing east, toward waters the clan avoided, the reefs twisted and sharp there, shadows hiding eddies and deep channels. “Metal touched the sea there. Recently.”
Jake’s pulse spiked.
“How recently?” he asked, voice hoarse from lack of use.
“Two tides ago. Maybe three,” she said.
That was enough.
Jake knew he was in the right place the moment he crossed the unfamiliar reef line.
The water was colder. It carrying a faint metallic tang that coated the back of his throat. The coral was pale, stunted and twisted. Fish darted nervously around the edges of the reef but avoided the center entirely.
Half-hidden beneath camouflage netting and illusionary plating, a base rose up out of the ocean. It clung to the cliffside like a parasite, metal sunk deep into living rock. Pipes and conduits pulsing, breathing gas against the cliff.
Jake’s hands curled into fists, knuckles whitening.
“They didn’t leave,” he murmured. “They dug in.”
Behind him, Metkayina warriors moved with quiet precision, their skimwings weaving through the waves. Tonowari’s voice crackled through the comm, edged with warning. “We cannot attack that directly.”
"We're not going to,” Jake replied, his voice low. “I’m going in alone.”
There was a pause. Then, hesitant, “Jake-”
He didn’t need a squad inside. That would draw eyes. That would draw fire. No- he needed a distraction. Something big enough to pull attention outward while he slipped in.
He glanced at the warriors - Tonowari, Narat, Neteyam’s older friends. Their calm grated roughly against the churrning in his chest. Somewhere in that twisted heap of steel and rock, was his son. He had to be. Jake wouldn’t accept anything else. He willed it to be true with everything that was left of him, as pitiful as those pieces were. A quiet, desperate prayer whispered to Eywa.
Jake signaled to the warriors with a low whistle. Tonowari, Narat, and the others nodded. Their task was clear: draw eyes and weapons outward, make enough noise that any sentries inside the base would assume a frontal assault.
“Make it loud,” Jake ordered across the comm..
The warriors moved, launching toward the jagged cliffs beyond the reef where the tide pooled in sharp channels. From the surface, Jake watched them send sprays of water into the air, cracking branches and shoving coral to create flashes of motion.
The water near the cliffs was pale and the currents tugged at Jake with unnatural strength. He’ad landed his ikran in the ocean, keeping low to the waves to stay out of sight. It was clear how little the creature cared for the water, though. Jake slipped from its back, letting out a sharp whistle, sending it soaring up and towards the ridge of the cliffs where the base loomed like a predator in the dark, pipes and vents only visible through gaps in the netting.
Jake took a deep breath and dived.
He found the first vent easily enough. It was narrow but wide enough for him to slip inside. An air pocket opened up a few feet up. Jack exhaled slowly, pressing his hands and knees against the slick metal, pushing his way up. It carried him deep into the bowels of the base where the pipes and vents ran like veins. There, the vent narrowed, forcing Jake to move inch by inch, chest pressed against cold metal, fingers scraping along seams to keep balance. Steam hissed, hot and sudden against his skin, but he held fast.
The corridors beneath the vent system twisted like a labyrinth. Jake paused at varioys junction,s listening. The muffled chaos above floated down in distorted echoes. There were shouts, the ringing of metal clattering against rock and the unmistakable crack of gunfire.
The vent opened into a larger shaft. Jake paused again, listening, chest pressed to one of the grated panels. The vent grate rattled under pressure. Voices whispered below -two humans, moving slowly, unaware.
He drew one slow breath, then drove his shoulder into the grate, putting his full weight behind it. The metal shrieked before tearing free, the panel collapsing inward. Jake followed it down. He hit the catwalk hard and fast, momentum carrying him straight into the first guard before the man had time to turn or shout.
H hit the floor with a muted grunt, caught completely off-guard. Jake’s weight and momentum slammed him into the railing. One sharp twist, a sickening snap, and the man went still.
The second guard was faster. He twistedfor his rifle. Jake him, tearing the gun from his hands before seizing him by the next and slamming him against the grated wall. The guard struggled, kicking and twisting. Jake held tight, leveraging his full weight against the man’s throat until was gasping for breath.
Jake pressed his advantage, voice low, cold, and unrelenting. “You’re keeping a boy here. Where is he?”
The guard’s eyes darted, searching for escape, for some hint of mercy. “I-I don’t-”
“I’ll make this easy, or I’ll make it slow.” Jake’s grip tightened. “Tell me where he is!”
The guard swallowed, eyes wide and sweat running down his temple.
“Second floor- just above us - memory chamber!” the man gasped, voice cracking.
With a swift, precise motion, Jake yanked the man close, locking his head into a firm hold, and snapped his neck. He didn’t pause to catch his breath. He dropped the guard and pressed on.
The stairwell ahead was exposed, a narrow metal frame hugging the side of the base. Jake tested it with one foot, then grabbed it with both hands. He climbed quickly. A corridor opened up on the next level, wide and mostly empty. A massive, cement chamber rose like a dome from the floor, doors reinforced with metal. No markings, no windows.
Jake sprinted for the chamber, pressing both hands to the door. The metal was cold and unforgibing under his palms. He braced his feet, planted firmly on the grated catwalk, and pulled.. The metal shuddered. Slowly, he peeled it back -bending until it yielded with a final, tortured groan, peeling back just enough for Jake to wedge his body through.
Inside everything was white. It was so bright that it took Jake’s sensitive eyes a couple of seconds to adjust, fighting his every other sense as they did. The sickening stench of antiseptic and iron lingered hotly enough to bring up bile. Eventually, though, his eyes adjusted.
And there he was.
Lo’ak.
His son was hung upright in the belly of a machine, straps biting into his shoulder and sides, his head tipped forward at an unnatural angle. His kuru had been shaved back to a brutal, jagged strip, and the surrounding skin was raw. Clamps and ports were clamped to him. Blood crusted along blue skin.
“Lo’ak,” Jake breathed.
Lo’ak didn’t move.
Blood trickled from his nose, mixing with the already dried blood along his upper lip. His ears were streaked with red as well.
Jake lunged forward, heart pounding, falling to his knees as he reached out to cup Lo’ak’s face. He pushed two fingers hard against his carotid. For a long, torturous minute, he felt nothing -then, a faint, thready pulse.
A swell of relief so strong it sent stars scattering across his vision left Jake swaying, clutching at Lo’ak just to keep himself upright. He let it wash over him for just a moment and then he forced it back. His training surged up, the reflexive precision slicing through his panic and relief. He checked everything. Breathing: shallow, erratic. Pulse: thready, weak. Pupils: uneven, sluggish. Eyes: flickering, unresponsive to light. Skin: cold, clammy.
The straps around Lo’ak’s sides and shoulders had chafed, leaving blood smeared across them. Jake’s fingers moved with calm precision, loosening restraints where he could, whispering reassurances even as adrenaline sharpened his every movement.
“Stay with me, Lo’ak,” he murmured, voice low, steady. “You’re okay. You hear me? You’re gonna be okay.”
Without warning the base shuddered, sending tremors up Jake’s legs. Gunfire cracked somewhere above him.
Jake didn’t flinch, didn’t think - he just moved. He grasped the thick cables snaking from the machine and yanked them loose. Sparks flared where connections tore open. The machine howled. He ripped at the restraints next, metal biting into his palms.
And then somehow, against all odds, Jake had his son back in his arms.
His relief was short-lived.
The moment Lo’ak came free his body jerked violently. A seizure racked him, limbs spasming with brutal force. A guttural sound tore from deep in his throat. Jake barely caught him, arms straining as Lo’ak flailed.
Another convulsion hit and Lo’ak smacked against Jake’s torso. Jake adjusted, hauling Lo’ak into a fireman’s carry; head cradled carefully, neck aligned and spine protected. Lo’ak’s body slammed against him again, breath stuttering, chest heaving with shallow, uneven gasps.
“I’ve got you,” Jake panted, voice breaking as he ran, pressing them both through the opening he made in the machine’s doorway. “I’ve got you. Just hold on.”
The base was coming apart at the seams all around him. Gunfire, shouts, engines roaring to life. Smoke curled upward in thick, choking waves. Metal groaned and cracked somewhere deep, the scent of burning oil and iron stinging his nose.
Jake ran for the stairs, catwalk underfoot rattling under his and Lo’ak’s weight. He kept his fingers splayed across the railing, supporting them both, while his other arm held Lo’ak tight. A volley of gunfire cracked behind them and Jake pushed harder, taking shallow breaths. His every nerve screaming, every muscle taut. His grip tightened where Lo’ak’s small frame was pressed against him.
He started up the stairwell, taking it two rungs at a time. The base shuddered again. Jake’s fingers dug into the railing, knuckles white, muscles burning.
At last, the stairwell ended, opening up onto a small section of rock and the sharp air of Pandora. Jake’s ikran waited high above on the cliffside, wings tucked, talons scraping against the rock. At Jake’s commanding whistle it dove for them, landing heavily on the small section of smooth rock.
Jake’s chest heaved, a sickening combination of relief and terror coiling in him.
He knelt, pressing Lo’ak to his chest, pulling a wide strap from the ikran's harness and looping it around them. He cinched it tight enough to hold, careful to leave enough give to let Lo’ak breathe. Lo’ak sagged against him, head lolling, limbs limp except for the trembling spasms.
Jake held him as though he could slip through his fingers at any moment.
“Stay with me,” he breathed.
He tightened the strap just a fraction, swaddling Lo’ak to his chest like he had when he was a newborn, pressed heart-to-heart. Then, in one brutal, fluid motion, he mounted the ikran. The creature tensed under him, talons digging into the rock, wings unfurling as Jake’s weight shifted. They shot into the sky, leaving the base behind. The living scent of Pandora rushed up to meet them.
Jake pressed his forehead to Lo’ak’s temple, eyes closing briefly.
“Stay with me,” he whispered, his voice mostly lost to the wind. “You hear me? Don’t you dare leave me.”
Lo’ak convulsed again, body stiffening in his arms. Jake gritted his teeth.
“I’m here. I’ve got you,” he repeated, over and over.
When the convulsing settled back into tremors, Jake put a hand to his throat, pressing down on his comms.
“Norm!” he roared over the wind. “Norm, I have him - I need you at the outpost!”
Static hissed. Then Norm’s confirmation cut through.
Jake took his first, full breath in twenty-two days but didn’t dare slow. He leaned forward, pressing his body closer to Lo’ak, guiding the ikran through the rising currents of air, dodging smoke and debris curling upwards from the base. Above them, the sky was a blur of green and gold.
Lo’ak’s seizures came in ragged waves. Every spasm threatened to throw them both from the narrow ridge of the ikran’s back. Jake held on tight, arms locked, legs braced.
“You’re coming home. I swear it,” Jake murmured, each word riding the rhythm of Lo’ak’s fluttering pulse, which he could feel through his chest.
The ikran surged upward.
After nearly forty minutes of flying the outpost emerged from the thick copse of trees, a patchwork of canvas and corrugated metal. It had risen in days, a fragile bastion after the RDA’s focus shifted from forest to sea.
The ikran hit the clearing hard, talons scraping the moss. Jake didn’t wait for the creature to steady before sliding down, his feet skidding against the grass, arms tight around Lo’ak. He was moving on nothing but adrenaline, sprinting toward the center of the makeshift outpost.
Inside, the air was warm and humid. Alive with the smell of the ocean, and antiseptic mixed with the faint tang of metal. Papers, maps and medical kits were scattered across tables. Equipment hummed faintly.
Jake stopped by the first gurney he found, sweeping the stacks of papers on it onto the floor. His hands lingered on the harness holding Lo’ak against his chest for a fraction longer than he should have. Reluctantly, he began unfastening the straps. When he was free, Jake lowered him onto the gurney, cradling his head. He kept a thumb brushing against the sweat-soaked skin of Lo’ak’s cheeks, grounding himself in the warmth and the faint pulse of life beneath his fingers. He leaned close, forehead hovering near Lo’ak’s temple, and inhaled. The scent was wrong, iron-heavy and sharp like iodine. Underneath, though, it unmistakably his son’s. Lo’ak had always smelt like the forest after rain. Of a storm broken. Jake knew the scent better than he knew his own, and he breathed it in like a drowning man.
For several long minutes, Jake just held his boy, memoriziing the rise and fall of his chest, the faint pulse beneath his palms.
“It’s okay,” he whispered. “I’ve got you.”
Lo’ak’s breathing stuttered, shallow and uneven. Jake pressed his hands gently against his chest, feeling the fragile, uneven rise beneath his fingers.
A tremor ran through Lo’ak, a shuddering wave that made his small body jerk and twist on the gurney.
“It’s okay, it’s okay - breathe,” Jake murmured, more command than comfort.
Norm’s voice cut through the haze of panic, crackling across the comm.
“Jake? Status?”
Jake pressed two fingers to the comm at his throat, eyes never leaving his son.
“I need you now, Norm,” he rasped.
“I’m moving,” came the sharp, precise reply.
Lo’ak convulsed again, harder this time. His arms jerked, fists clenching, shoulders tightening, jaw clamping down as a guttural sound tore from deep in his throat. Jake’s arms locked around him, trembling with the effort of keeping Lo’ak on the gurney.
The seizures waned after too many minutes, leaving tremors in their place and Lo’ak even paler than he had been when Jake found him.
Jake tilted his chin, to open his airway, and bent close. He was still breathing, each shallow with brief, terrifying pauses between. His pulse was thready and weak. Pupils uneven. Sluggish.
Jake catalogued in silence, falling back into the familiar comfort that was his training as dread coiled tighter in his chest.
He kept two fingers pressed against Lo’ak’s carotid and a hand over his chest, watching for the faint rise and fall. Waiting for the next breath. Praying between each that there would be another.