This has taken me quite long to update. Why? No idea. I will be moving onto the good parts in the next chapter though. Excited! Please R&R, thank you!!


I stood there shaking. Breaking into tears, I ran towards Norm and collapsed onto the trunk with my photos in it. I sobbed.

"L-Lauren." Norm touched my shoulder, and I shuddered. I didn't belong here.

"If you do that, your mask will fog." Norm began lifting the blue body in his arms, and I took hold of the trunk, dragging it along behind me.

"Just leave that there. I'll get it later, okay?"

I stopped, unlocking the chest and digging about for Dr. Augustine's book. It was towards the top, so I was back behind Norm in no time.

"Why did they leave?" I asked, not sure of what question I wanted an answer to first.

"According to this," Mr. Spellman said, motioning to the girl in his arms, "I'd say they were planning it all along."

"W-well what is that?" I asked, stumbling along as he opened a door with his I.D. He laughed.

"Hello? An Avatar." He walked down the halls, which reminded me all too much of a hospital what with their being completely white and silver. I hate hospitals.

But really, how was I supposed to know what an Avatar was? They said it, but that didn't mean I got it.

"Come on, kid. Hurry up!" Spellman called. I followed him into a room filled with sharp instruments, computers, and a myriad of metal stuff.

"This is the lab." He says, ducking and weaving through narrow spaces carefully as to not knock anything over.

"Lab? You mean, like, where Dr. Augustine worked?"

"You know her?" He says, his eyes lighting up. He almost drops the girl in his arms, looking like he just might mess his pants.

"Well, I read her book." I reply sheepishly, holding it up for him to see.

"Ah, so she's read it too." I heard a male's voice and then a guy in a large orange t-shirt appeared.

"Is she here? Can I meet her?" I asked.

The men went silent.

"No. She…passed away years ago." The other man said. Both were obviously hurt by that fact.

"You into science at all, kid?" Norm asks. I've stopped thinking of him as Mr. Spellman. He's now 'know-it-all-Norm' in my book. I have a name, Norm.

"Yeah. I know about some biology and physics."

"That's good, you'll fit in here." The human man flashed a smile at me and held out his palm. "Max Patel."

"Lauren." I introduce myself and he leads me into another section of the lab. Here, there is a control centre in the middle and a circle of white coffins surrounding it.

"I'll go put this…" Norm walks off muttering something. I am too busy following Max as he shows me the controls.

"This is how you connect with an Avatar. You go inside one of the links," He motions to a coffin, "and then we monitor your brain patterns." I can tell he's trying to use small words. I inwardly thank him. "Basically, because an Avatar is matched to your DNA, you're brains are the same."

"You mean…I get in there and then I can…talk to it?"

"Become it." He replies.

"I become the blue thing?" I was feeling pretty skeptic, verging on the thought that those people were actually crazy. When Max nodded, I didn't reply. I simply looked at the different screens Max was lighting up and presenting to me.

"Hey, I checked it out. As long as she takes it easy, I think it'll be alright." A man comes walking into the room. He's average height, a bit on the thin side and has strawberry orange hair covering his chin and cheeks, as well as his head.

"Norm!?" I exclaim. Max chuckles, where Norm looks incredibly offended.

"What?!"

"You're a human!"

"Well, obviously!"

"But-but-I thought you were a Na'vi!"

Then it was Norm's turn to burst out laughing and Max began to go off on him about how I didn't know about Avatars and how if Norm was so smart why couldn't he explain.

"Look, she's here to see Jake. Why don't I just take her out there?"

"You?" Max asks. "She's just a kid; you'd better take care of her."

"Well obviously. Let's get her used to being in her body and take her to see him tomorrow."

"Where is he?" Suddenly, the two guys remember I am actually there. Norm looks to me.

"He's out in the forest shooting arrows and dancing." He chuckles, leading me to a link.

"What do I have to do?"

"Just lie down. Here, I'll take those." Norm takes off my glasses and suddenly I am blind. Have you ever seen a shower glass where it's bumpy and blurry so you can't see through? That's what my vision is like.

"Idiot." I say, rubbing my eyes naturally.

"Here." He's quickly got his arms wrapped around me in such a way that I can feel my face getting red. Once I am in the link, I push him off of me. "Just lie your head down and keep it there. When you're ready to connect, just let your mind go blank."

He closes something on top of me, and then the lid goes down. I can hear some soft whirring. The stuff I am lying on is soft and squishy, so I dig my fingernails into it, enjoying it.

"Let your mind go blank…" I think. "Just don't think…" I close my eyes, breathing quietly. My fingers soon relax.

"Hey, Laruen. You awake? …Lauren, can you hear me?"

At first, I see nothing. It's the black of my eyelids. I can feel myself shifting, tilting my head to the side. I feel as though I am waking up on a Monday morning, groggy and annoyed.

I peel open my eyelids with my mind and instantly see Norm's face peering over my own.

I reach up to touch my glasses, but find none.

"Yeah, you can see right?"

"Y-yeah." I say, trying to sit up. "Good, you're sitting…" I could tell Norm was worried about something. What was there to be worried about? I felt great. I could see everything so much clearer even more than I could with glasses on.

"Okay, move your fingers like this." He showed me what to do, tapping each finger, one at a time, against his thumb, I did as he said, but it was boring quickly. I was ready to get outside, to run around.

My hands and palms were varying shades of light and dark blue. My feet were much larger than normal and I could feel the power inside them. They were just as eager as I was to go outside. My hair was deep black now instead of blonde, and it was long. In fact…I think I have a ponytail…

"Ah!" I scream after I've taken the ponytail in my hand. Some weird worm things are crawling out the bottom.

"Lauren! Lauren! Calm down." Norm steadies me, holding my hands back so that I don't try to pull the weird things out.

"L-let me go!" I shout. Hastily, I throw myself onto the floor, wobbling and trying to steady myself. My new feet are much larger now and my body is much thinner.

"Lauren, listen to me. Just follow Norm's instructions." Max tells me through the glass. I look at him, and eventually nod.

"I want to go outside." I say to Norm who is shaking as he tries to pull off some wires that have been attached to me.

"Okay, just wait. I don't want you messing up any of the equipment that I can't repair."

I stand patiently as Norm circles me, removing the strings.

"Can I go see Jake today?"

"No." He says firmly. "We'll let you outside and you can learn to walk. Then we'll think about taking you to see him tomorrow."

I sigh, waiting impatiently for him to finish de-puppet-ing me.

"Okay, I'll get my mask on." He goes over to the wall, opening a case containing a respirator and locking it onto his face.

"Ready?" I ask excitedly.

Norm laughs.

"I'll be out in a second."


Disclaimer: I do not own Avatar. I am not James Cameron.

I also continously switch between...what is word..."tense" here. "tense" meaning the, like, time...sorry I cannot explain it. Basically I can't decided to use something like,

"He laughed"

or

"He laughs"

But yeah, anyway, thank you all...time for school. egh.