Returning for Survival
As he returned to Earth, Parker sat on his couch since he returned from Pandora. He watched as the Earth died, his home, Earth, was dying, and fast. He counted the days left until some sort of air poisoning would kill the Earth. It doesn't rain, there is no more green, all there was left was ashes, and regret. People started to die for no apparent reason. Maybe it was the huge hunger running around Earth? Maybe because of all the Carbon Dioxide accumulated in the atmosphere? Well, Parker doesn't care. He just only remembered how green was Pandora, with all the green collecting on his forest. He wished he could come back to Pandora to apologize. He regretted causing so much pain. One night, as Parker sat on his couch once again, there was a knock on the door. He got on his feet lazily and opened the door.
"Parker Selfridge?" Asked a man dressed in a nice suit, the kind he used to wear back in Pandora, with a smell of new shoes and a hint of men cologne.
"Yes…" he spoke softly.
"I am from the RDA, if you could let me in we could sell you something of your interest" the man spoke.
"yeah, sure, come in, make yourself comfortable" Said Parker cleaning two chairs from all the laundry and set some snacks on a small table in the living room.
The man looked disgusted by the conditions of the room: everything was out of place, there were a lot of pictures from Na'vis in one of the walls, there was cans of beers by the couch, and dirty dishes in the sink by the small kitchen. Tons of pizza boxes piled in a corner of a room; still, Parker was slim and tall since he returned from Pandora.
The man sat on the chair that Parker offered and sat his suit case on the table.
"Parker, the government is sending people to different planets, so the human race survives. Only the healthy specimens get to leave Earth and return within 500 years. As the spokesperson of the government, we ask you if you would like to go to Pandora." He took a bit of the snack that Parker offered.
"So… I get to have my own Avatar and stuff?" Asked Parker with a hint of excitement.
"I must believe so… yes, and we are transferring your mind to the Avatar permanently, so we can keep the body and use it for other people in 500 years" he stated looking at the papers in his suit case, that were neatly piled one over each other.
"Are any people coming along with me?" asked again Parker.
"I am concerned that a 10 year old girl is coming with you" he piled the papers neatly on the suitcase again and closed the suit case.
"A ten-year-old? This is child cruelty!" Parker exclaimed angrily and hissed as the Na'vi did.
"She is one of the 7 healthy children left in Earth, it's the only hope we have to continue with the human race" said the man.
"Okay… I guess I have to accept if I don't want to rot in this sick planet" Parker mumbled sad.
"The ship will be waiting for you tomorrow, with your Na'vi fetus in it, we took the liberty to take some DNA samples from you to start on the Avatar, we knew you would accept " Said the man picking up his suit case and arose from the chair.
"well, pleasure meeting you, we will see you tomorrow" Said the man again.
Parker sat on the chair and waved good bye with his hand, and watched how the man disappeared out the door. He sat there for a while; he was going to Pandora to save the human race. In a small knap sac he took an electronic journal, to keep him sane in Pandora, a picture Jesus, maybe he could introduce Christianity among the Na'vis and a bunch of oversized clothes. He knotted the knap sac, took a shower and fell asleep instantly.
The Next morning Parker woke up at the sound of honking cars, ambulances and people screaming, like every single morning. He jumped into some clothes, his favorite clothes, since that was the last time he would wear them. Combed his hair, cleaned his face, shaved and brushed his teeth. He finished by dropping some cologne on his hands and rubbed against his neck and chest.
He opened the door and stepped outside with the Knap sac on his hand. He couldn't remember the last time he saw Earth, everything was grey and there were a lot of cars, some people fell to the ground dead by all the contamination. He walked towards the Airport, once there, he entered the immense door and a huge amount of people were there. Parker saw a lot of sad faces, families where broken and send to different planets, babies where put in instant cryo state for health issues. There he saw the man he spoke the last time with a small girl following him.
"Parker, great to see you, if you would like to proceed right here and these pilots will take care of you" the man spoke.
"Yeah sure" Parker agreed and looked to the little girl "are you leaving to Pandora too?" I asked.
The girl nodded her head sadly. Her shiny brown curls bounced with the movement of her head.
"What's your name?" I questioned.
"Marie" she said quietly.
"Well Marie, I bet you are going to like Pandora" I said happy, remembering how beautiful was the forest and how much I hated myself for destroying such a precious environment.
She only lowered her head and we walked towards the pilots. They proceeded to take their belonging into small compartments and set them into compartments that were bigger locked them inn and set Parker and Marie in cryo state.
Over 5 years Parker dreamed of foggy forests, wide horizons and exotic views. He dreamed of a place where the people actually accepted him, he dreamed of equality. But dreams are not always happy, sometimes his dreams turned into terror, there was fire everywhere he looked, the magnificent views turned into ashes and he saw people dressed in huge armors protecting them. He dreamed of falling. Falling without an end. For moment he felt desperate, he could hear the shrieks of Marie. Until he opened his eyes
"Mr. Selfridge, we are here" said a nurse from the shuttle
Parker floated out of the little compartment and made his way to his belongings; Marie followed quietly and from the little cabinet took a big bag with her name engraved in it. With the bag came a huge teddy bear, and hugged the teddy bear.
As the nurse spoke about the side effects of cryo, Parker closed the cabinet door shut and looked at Marie that she looked quite sad.
"Marie what's wrong? Why are you sad?" Parker asked.
"I miss planet Earth… I miss my brother… he went to Mars…" she commented sadly.
"I am sure that in the RDA center you can talk with your brother over the visiophone" Parker smiled sadly at her.
"Do you miss your family?" asked Marie.
"To be truthful I don't have any family, they all died" a knot was made in Parker's throat he really missed his family.
"You can be my new family…" she spoke softly, letting a spark of hope run thought her mossy green eyes that shone like gems.
"All right" Parker accepted, since he was starting a new life Parker decided to start a new way of living, instead of the complete son-of-a-bitch-complete-asshole he was before. He wanted to become nicer and appreciate the little things that life has, although he was already 34 he could change.
"come on, stop the chattering and get into the shuttle" commented one of the pilots as he gave Marie and Parker.
Marie and Parker boarded the small ship; they secured their belts and launched into the beautiful skies of Pandora. That was his new home, he would rebuild his new life and apologize to everyone for what he did, thing that he doubted, because with all he caused he would have to regain their trust. He watched by the small window the tree tops, gazed the foggy air suspending on the air, he watched carefully the mist running with the wind. Then in the view he could watch a huge crater with abandoned machines, there were vines that grew around them. He could still remember when he pissed on Dr. Grace's plans, and without a word she died. He regret those days, Parker could still hear Jake's screams for pleading so they don't move the natives. Well what was done was done. Parker can't change anything now.
"Lady and gentleman welcome to Pandora" welcomed the pilots; Parker took the gas masks and collocated a mask on Marie and another on him.
Rapidly the speaker spoke again, about how they were going to exit and enter RDA, Parker took Marie's hand and Marie looked at him.
"is Pandora going to be our home now?" she spoke carefully and innocently.
"Pandora is home" he mumbled.
When the doors opened, the warm weather of Pandora welcomed them. There, the RDA scientist stood outside with gas masks. Parker couldn't recognize any of the faces, all the smoke was collecting on his view range; he also saw some of the Na'vi standing outside with their spears. When all the smoke disappeared he recognized all the faces, surprised that any of them had changed in ten years.
"Parker? What the heck are you doing here?" exclaimed Dr. Max.
"I am sorry for all the inconvenience, the earth is dying and we are trying to save the human race, remember how many people there was when Jake left?" Parker spoke, trying to get their trust back.
"Bullshit! Don't believe him!" screamed a random scientist.
"About 30 billion" I shouted "want to know how many people there is left now? Les then 3 millions, they have to save the human race, that's why we were send here"
All the doctors and scientists looked in disbelieve, they shook their heads and gave a stare death to Parker. Parker only let a breath go, and tried to persuade them harder.