For the People
An Avatar dabble fan fiction by Denis De Plaen
Disclaimer: Avatar and all included trademarks are copyright by the 20th Century Fox, Lightstorm Production, Ubisoft and other licensed groups. This is work of amateur fun without any profiting purpose nor infrightment of copyright meant.
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Annoyance flashed in the ancient creature's mind as it --he felt the light blue skinned mammal land on his back. Didn't their creatures' impudence know no bound? He couldn't fathom how his smaller brethren ever endured being rid by them. They were delicious and challenging preys, but to him, there rested their sole interest.
He was in a foul mood. The smaller, pink skinned mammal the blue ones had called the Tawtute have invaded his hunting turf looking for Eywa's heart with ill intend.
And they were using those stenched metal made contraptions. He had hunted a few, for the sake of novelty in his preys, but not only their hide were thick as stone, but the taste was positively disgusting!
Letting a growl resonate in his chest, he banked on his left, but the blue skinned mammal held strongly on his neck. Flapping his wing, he stopped dead short and plummeted to the limit of what was safe to, feeling the treetops scraps his belly and wings span.
But still his stowaway held on his neck!
And then it happened. And then he felt his antenna's ends touching others, and thoughts not his own enterred his head. Sensation so foreign brushed his senses that he lost concentration for a split second, which nearly prove fatal to him and his Tsahaylu linked passager.
--
Jake had jumped off his Ikran, ignoring his mental protest.
=Jake, you fooli-* = was all he perceived before the Tsahaylu disconnected.
That was a bold, an all-in move. If he missed, his Ikran couldn't both catch him and dodge the Leo at the same time, and he would end up as blue and red pizza on the ground, hundred of feet bellow.
His bare feet impacted with the wingspan that would have bounced him off, if he hadn't grabbed the orange skinned predator's neck.
The beast rolled and banked wildly, roaring, trying to throw him off, but Jake's held solidly with one arm, while trying to connect a Tsahaylu with the creature. He almost let go when the Leo stopped and started to drop like a stone
« Oh craaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaap! » Jake screamed at the top of his lungs, holding for dear life. The trees were coming at them in a hurry, and at the last second the saurian spreadt its wings to stop the fall.
There was little doubt in Jake's mind that, if he had been a human at this moment, he would have suffered of the black veil he had heard from his fellow marines who piloted airplanes. He had landed on carriers and ground alike pretty fast, but never had he felt like this, with his stomach flipping inside his tummy.
Barely conscious, gasping for air, he somehow managed to establish the Tsahaylu with the creature…with the Toruk.
A rush of wild sensations, feelings and images filled his mind as his own had filled Toruk's.
Deep in his mind a voice erupted loudly, an angry roar.
= WHO DARES BIND MINDS WITH ME?! =
Jake knew, from Neytiri's teaching that not actual words were exchanged but their minds interpreted articulated thoughts as words in their respective native languages. Therefore there weren't such things as accents and brogue in Tsahaylu bonds. Merely the tone and timber would change with the gender.
So why on Pandora does Toruk speak with a distinctive British accented and the tone of the angry Gandalf in the old Lord of the Rings TwoDees?!
Toruk felt the memory of the blue one pour into him.
Could that puny creature be the cause of such grief as the destruction of a Kelutral -a Hometree- and worse, an Utral Aymokriya, a soul tree?! That sounded so preposterous, but the feelings did not lie.
Like this feeling of guilt this blue one felt. He had been overconfident in his brethren, that Colonnelilesquarritch male who has twisted his sense of duty, his patriotism, his honor into something the one on his back, Jake sully -no, Jake(pause)Sully- though akin to a genocide.
Toruk, above felt this punny Jake Sully's need to protect his mate and clan. Something Toruk could empathize with.
But the lot of the Blue Skins weren't of consequences to him. Eywa lived before they came to be, and she would be after they were gone.
Jake could feel the impatience of Toruk in his head. He knew that the magnificent creature knew exactly what role he had played in the destruction of the place he had come to call home.
« Hear me, mighty Toruk. » He spoke aloud and throught the Tsahaylu both. « I respectfully request that you hear me out before you kill me. »
These words made Toruk's though mark a pose.
=You call me Toruk, young Jake Sully.= Toruk's voice resounded in his mind. No longer like the grey temperamental magician of Jake's teenaged cultural experience, but of an earlier figure of might and power in his life, in the equally majestic form of a lion. =But I hear other names in you. Gandalf. Arslan. Those are names, boundaries, limits. Creation needs no name, nor the sky nor the sea or the river. = he marked a pause =But I understand the meaning behind them, and the respect they show. I'll hear you out. But be quick about it, I am becoming hungry and your Ikran companion is looking more and more appetizing.=
Jake wasn't sure if the winged monarch of Pandora's skies was making fun of him or if he was truly meaning to eat his companion.
« I need your help, Toruk. » He said simply.
Though he knew what for, he was curious what the dream walker had to say.
=What for, Jake Sully of the Olomatikaya Clan?=
~So far so good~ Jake though, oblivious that Toruk could hear any though he had through the Tsahaylu.
« To help the Na'vi repelling the humans, to reclaim their lands… »
=The lands belong to every living being, not merely to the ones you call the Na'vi. That is still a human concept you carry with you.= Toruk admonished.
Jake was silent for a moment. He had the feeling that he was loosing this argument. He had expected to convince Toruk appealing to…to pride, he guessed. But while he had indeed encountered pride in the large creature, he also encountered a wisdom many times older than him. Toruk was right, he was still thinking as a human, but a tiger can't change his stripes. Not right away, at least.
Had he truly let the woman he loved down? Had he betrayed her again?
Jake sighed deeply.
« But you and I, together, can bring something that was theirs and was taken from them by my fault. » Jake finally said. Toruk seemed to arch an eye ridge, and his pupils turned toward his passenger.
=And what do you intend to return them that has been taken from them?=
Toruk felt determination in Jake's mind and inwardly smiled.
« Their hope. »
There was a long pause, one Toruk prolonged on purpose. Jake Sully's chief sin, as those of his kind, Toruk had seen in Jake's deepest corner of his psyche, far beyond his consciousness, where resided the memory of his whole species, was hubris, so deeply ingrained it was part of them, a meme of their kind.
But he, Jake, wasn't human anymore, not fully, nor would he ever be again, Toruk knew. There was hope for him, he has touched Eywa, he knew. And it had changed him.
=Very well, Jake Sully. Toruk Makto will ride again, then our path will separate.=
Relief flood over Jake's entire mind, making Toruk chuckle of his deep psychic voice.
« You got yourself a deal. »
Mirth crossed over the Tsahaylu as Toruk responded using a concept familiar to his temporary partner, but utterly foreign to him, himself.
=Good. My lawyer will get in touch with yours, then=
That reply was so random, so unexpected and out of character from the mighty Toruk, the Last Shadow of the Na'vi folklore, Jake couldn't help himself but burst out laughing.
An exhilarated, triumphant and so relieved laughter.
When Toruk releashed control to Jake, he was ready, and together, as Toruk Makto, for the sixth time in sung history, they glided. Ahead of them, the stone archs were already in sight.
Epilogue
Jake climbed down from Toruk 's shoulders.
This experience, the battle they faced together, and that nearly killed them both, had changed them.
In a few days, Jake Sully will forsake his crippled human shell, and his Avatar, as he called it, would become his true form. Jake Sully would be his true self.
« I will miss you, my friend. » Jake said sullenly.
=Now, now, Jake.= Toruk chided =This partnership was temporary, and you knew it from the start=
Jake nodded. Though standing on the ground, the Tsahaylu was still there, from the bundle of nerves closely knit together.
Toruk felt that, to Jake, it was like loosing a brother, maybe a father figure, as much as Toruk could represent one to a bipedal mammal.
Still gently he nudge Jake's prone form with his muzzle.
Jake smiled and rubbed his hand on the orange skinned flaps of flesh covering the sharp fangs.
From there standing points, they saw the Valkyrie shuttle shooting through the skies, leaving a trail of white clouds behind.
=It will be years before they can return here. But if they return with beligerent intends, Toruk Makto will be there.=
Jake smiled and nodded. Neytiri, Jake's mate, landed nearby. Her new Ikran partner stood several meters away from the majestic creature.
The last thing Jake heard from Toruk before the Tsahaylu ceased was an amused if disdainful snort
And so, he took off, not looking back, and flew away, heading toward the Hallelujah Mountains.
THE END