Disclaimer: Only gonna say this once y'all. I don't own Avatar and never will. James Cameron's brainchild.
Tom sighed as he rolled out of bed into his wheelchair. He'd had permanent nerve damage in his legs for five years now in an IED explosion when he'd been visiting his brother on the way to his brother's base.
His brother had emerged completely unharmed, though very very angry with the Marines both for the explosion on the "safe" road, and because they wouldn't pay for the only surgery that would let his brother keep walking.
After the incident Jake had turned his back on the military and hadn't looked back yet. Instead he worked as private security for a couple of bigwigs in New York where the brothers lived in order to continue taking care of his brother.
Tom continued rolling through the apartment till he spotted the mail sitting on the counter. His brother often grabbed it and tossed it up there for Tom to sort through when he got up because more often than not Jake had to be out early.
Tom grabbed the mail and began sorting through it till he found something he'd been waiting for since he'd heard about the expedition. It was an offer to join them on Pandora and Tom just about shouted in happiness. Then he regained control of himself and decided to enact a plan he had been developing since the thought to hope that he'd be chosen occured to him.
Walking to their apartment's Hyper Luminol Terminal, a very expensive item but Jake was making enough money to pay for it though the surgery was impossible now since it was a time sensitive one, Tom dialed up Grace Augustine. Grace was an old friend of Tom's, she'd been one of his professors before she'd left for Pandora.
When Grace's face popped up Tom grinned, "Hey Grace. How're things on the planet of blue people?" Calling it that had been a sort of inside joke between the two scientists.
"Not too bad. I see you got your acceptance letter. See you in a year?" Grace asked, sure that he'd be there but wanting to be sure.
Tom hn'd in response before saying, "Well, there's a thing about that. I need my brother to come along."
"Your Jarhead brother?" Graces derision was clearly heard in her voice as well as her distaste for the marines.
"Ex-Jarhead," Tom corrected, the difference between the two was very very important to the two brothers.
"I thought there was no such thing as an Ex-Jarhead? They like to remind me enough here, those of them that were ever actual marines at all anyway," again derision and disgust coated the botonist's voice, even more than when she mentioned the marines the first time when she brought up the fake Jarheads. The ones who just liked being mindless soldiers, not the ones who had been more or less brainwashed.
"There is when the corps turns its back on you and yours and you get so disgusted you refuse a commission as Special Forces Colonel," Tom replied remembering the situation Jake had been in. He was the best in his division at jungle warfare and was about to be promoted to Colonel to take over his division when Tom had gotten hurt. His brother had implored the Marines to help his brother but when they refused Jake had turned his back on them and immediately resigned from the Corps.
Grace was silent for a moment. She hadn't known the full reason behind Tom's disability. Still, what could she do? "I'm sorry for insulting your brother, he sounds like a very honorable man. What do you want me to do to get him here? From the sound of him he'd kill half the marines here within a couple days if they started singing the Corps' praises as they usually do."
"We're perfect twins. That means we have the same DNA," Tom offered knowing the other scientist's brain would keep up.
"True, your avatar would work for him too but once one of your minds went in the other wouldn't be able to, the neural pathways would be set," Grace declined. It wasn't that she didn't want Jake on Pandora with his brother. She could certainly use a well trained guard in case one of the bigger animals came after them which they did do occasionally. She'd lost a paleobotanist just the other day to a Viperwolf pack because they hadn't had repulser's on them at the time.
"We're twins. Identical twins. Think about how easy it would be to tell Selfridge that it must have happened again and you had my brother come along to make use of the second zygote." Tom explained. It would work, the capitalist administrator would likely care more about making the most of his money than any scientific mumbo jumbo so he'd jump at the chance to get a second avatar and driver for the price of one.
"That would work... Before I do that though, are you sure that Jake won't be persuaded to help the RDA? Even if they promise to return your legs to you?" Grace was willing to help the brothers but not if it cost the Na'vi. She'd already been placed on shakey ground because of the school incident
"Positive, Jake has researched getting my legs back multiple times and not through any shortage of funds I'm still legless. It isn't happening," Tom replied with as much surety as he could.
Good enough for Grace. The older scientist nodded and half-ordered, "Ok. You just get you and your brother on the shuttle tomorrow, I'll take care of the rest."
"See you in a year." Tom replied then closed the call down and readied to tell Jake where they were going as of the next day.
"You did what?" Needless to say Jake was... surprised to hear that Tom had gotten him on the shuttle to Pandora.
"I talked to Grace Augustine, you remember her," Tom started, waiting for his brother to nod. He'd met the woman six years ago when she'd been Tom's professor for one of his courses while going for his Master's, once Jake nodded Tom continued, "Well, I managed to convince her to bring you with me. She's twinning my Avatar right now so you can even come with us out into the field."
"And if I wanted to stay here?" Jake asked though he knew he didn't. Just wanting to be sure his brother had thought things through.
"Don't give me that, we both know you hate it. You only do it because it pays so well," Tom refuted Jake's response out of hand.
With a sigh of defeat Jake nodded. He was getting sick of being the bodyguard of some rich dickhead. "Alright then. When do we leave?"
Tom winced, this would be a tad awkward. "Tomorrow. We have to be to the shuttle at eight AM that'll take us up to the starship where we'll go into cryosleep for a year to get to Pandora."
"You signed me up for an expedition to an alien planet without the assurance that I'd want to go and we're leaving tomorrow?" Jake asked incredulously. "Fine. But you're helping me pack. I'll call the building manager and have him sell our apartment five days after we leave while our stuff will go into storage. Now let's go pack."
Tom slumped in relief before he remembered their times camping as kids and quickly started rolling the opposite direction.
"Oh no you don't. You aren't getting away from packing this time," Jake growled as he grabbed the handles of Tom's wheelchair. "Just remember, there ain't no rest for the wicked."
A/N: No disrespect to the real life Corps. Nothing but respect for the Marines but this isn't the same Corps in their world. Same name, claims the same values, but unlike the real corps they can and have turned their back on their own. They no longer know the meaning of the phrase Semper Fidelis.