Authors note:

So, to match my timeline I had to change a few things. I am running off the idea that there are two ships in constant circulation between earth and Pandora, making the time between missions only 6 years instead of twelve. The larger ship, it used to transport personnel for the RDA, while the smaller ship is mainly used for resources and a few recruits. The smaller ship is funded by the backers for Grace's Program. Its not canon, but I needed to adjust it for my story. This way Jo arrives on base 6 years before Jake and Norm, because she came on the smaller ship. This idea kind of stemmed from Grace's lab having separate funding aside from the RDA- or before the RDA came along and funded her.

This will be addressed later, but because of the two ships thing it allowed me to make Jo the age I wanted her. In this she is 37 (counting the years lost in cryo), so physically and mentally she is about 30. She will have been on pandora for about 6 years, meaning she was 24 when she went under for transport. I will go later into detail with this later, but I wanted her to be slightly older than Jake and take on a kind of older sister role for him and Norm. There will be a physical description next chapter.

plus, I finally figured out what happened with my formatting. I'm gonna fix the first two chapters soon

"Na'vi"

Flashback/thought


Chapter 3

Between the two of them setting camp went rather fast. When the adrenaline from the jump had finally wore off it became apparent that Jo hadn't been completely truthful about her injuries. She had worked on building a small shelter using a few fallen branches when one jabbed her cut. It was kind of hard to hide the blood seeping into the bandages in the firelight.

"You're going to need stitches."

"Thank you, captain, obvious," she quipped. It was bad enough they were alone, in the dark, and without supplies. His comments about her injuries weren't necessary.

"just saying, Jes-"

"Finish saying that name and I will throw your blue ass off the waterfall next time."

"Jo," he corrected, "Why do they call you Jo anyway?"

"the Doc," She answered. She was using her hunting knife to carve a spear. If anything does find us, I don't want it close enough to use that knife, she thought. She tossed him the spear and pulled another branch into her lap and began whittling.

"She was not happy when I walked into the lab the first time. I barely dodged a tablet when she chucked it at me. For the first few weeks she kept calling me G.I Joe- like those old green soldier men- anyway, eventually it became a nickname. I like it much better than my given names."

"Makes sense. I don't think she had called me by name once since I got here."

"Consider yourself lucky, she has more colorful nicknames for the other military types on base." She shuddered at the thought. G.I. Joe wasn't the first name the Doc had used. It had been last in a line of phrases that would have made her drill sergeant blush.

"Can I ask you about something you said earlier?"

"Shoot," she said. She held up the spear to check her work. She hadn't done this since she was a kid. It was something she and her mother did together. They didn't have any trees where she lived so she usually ended up using old chair legs and stuff like that. Imitation wood was easier to carve away than actual wood; it was also flimsier.

"You said you were an honorable discharge, why?" He hadn't seen anything that made an honorable discharge make sense so far. She seemed to be perfectly capable in his eyes. but then again, looks could be deceiving.

"I was patrolling around in a zone that we had cleared a few weeks prior, when I set off a hidden mine. Blew my left leg below the knee clean off and I got scarring all the way up to my neck on my left." she glared into the fire, not willing to tell him the complete truth. It was years ago, but some days the wounds still felt fresh.

"I was wearing a baggy pair of cargos when we meet so you probably didn't see my leg," she said simply, "Anyway, I was shipped home, then air mailed up here."

"I'm amazed you survived that."

"so were the medics. I was just happy I could still use my left arm," she brought her hands up in a mock fighting stance, "I'm a lefty."

Jake smirked and prodded the fire.

"How far away from base do you think we are?"

"Hard to tell, maybe a day to two. This river feeds directly into our wells, so if we follow it West we should get home."

"Grace won't pull us both out until we get the avatars to a safe place." The Doc was more likely to chew off her own arm then pull them out.

"I'm going to go look for some more firewood." She got up and started walking towards the river. She'd seen a few fallen trees on the shore earlier. Leaving Jake alone at camp probably wasn't the best idea, but she needed some time to think. She wasn't going that far.


She dreamed of blood, raining down from an ash colored sky. It was all she ever knew, blood and battle. The sound of her prey fighting to stay alive- she envied them their death. They would at least be able to rest. It wasn't as if life had been fair the any of them, forced to fight a war for people to scared and selfish to compromise. They had ignored the signs of exhaustion from their planet until it was to late. Acidic water now ran in once clean rivers; forests of concrete replaced tall leafy trees; and scars ran across the land where iron and oil were forced from the earth. The planet had died long ago, yet no one had listened.

She once believed that they were fighting for the right cause, they all had. She once had people she wanted to protect, at least until a peace was reached.

What a lie!

They never wanted peace, they wanted more; more oil, more metal, more water. It was never enough. By the time they had realized the costs of their own actions it was too late. Her unit was gone, forced apart by trauma and anger.

And her she was, the once celebrated legacy, almost drowning in her cups. The liquid burned her throat, but it was one of the only things reminding her she was alive. She saw their faces where ever she went, faces she had justified destroying. She didn't want to be numb anymore, but nothing helped. Her medication only put her in a false sense of euphoria and wore off leaving her in a worse state than when she started. If it meant finding peace, she would have laid down and never got up long ago.

But her damned pride wouldn't allow it. It would not serve justice for her to roll over to her nightmares; her grandmother would never forgive such selfishness.

"if you want to be alone, fine. You don't need anyone else, then that's alright; but there are people who need you. Whether your willing to see it or not is on you, but they will still be there. Growing up is forcing the world to help, not you, but them." Isadora Garrison had said those words to a young Jo one summer. Her grandmother was filled with that kind of advice. Helping people wasn't an option to her, it was expected and something she didn't mind. Until they betrayed her.

She shot back another drink and scowled. Her prosthetic was wearing out again. She hadn't expected from such a cheap model, but she had hoped it would at least last for another few years. She couldn't afford another one until she got a better job. Cleaning out vents and air ducts didn't exactly pay well.

"Specialist Garrison?" she turned with a scowl still on her face. She didn't even need to take to this guy to know he was trouble. His black suit was clean, glasses free of smudges, and hair slicked back with some form of goo. This guy didn't belong in the seedy bar she had chosen to spend the night in.

"Who's asking?" she snapped. The asshole chuckled.

"I'm Peter Simmons. I have an employer who is interested in you." He smirked. She narrowed her eyes and scrutinized him as he handed her a card.

"My company owns a small research operation on Pandora, you know it?" of course, everyone knew about Pandora. She had kept posters of it on her bedroom walls when she was little. The place seemed like a fairy tale compared to here.

"Well, we are recruiting persona with your…" he paused, "skill set. It is my understanding you have quite the record of military service."

"how the hell did you get access to that?" she growled. There was a reason they had blacked out her file. She was almost positive all members of her unit were still under surveillance, the ones that were alive anyway. Considering how they left service it was a surprise they hadn't locked her up yet.

"like I said, you interest us." He signaled the bar tender and two more shots appeared between the two.

"I know quite a bit about you miss Garrison; like how you actually lost that leg." The glass she had been drinking from made loud clank as she slammed it down, her green eyes narrowing dangerously. But Simmons didn't take the hint.

"What if I told you that I have some work for you?"

"I would say no, I'm not looking to fight another war."

"and I don't expect you too. My people have raised some concerns about other personnel, I want you to act as a protection detail." Now she was curious, a job like protection tended to turn pretty quickly depending on who was in charge.

"Why?" she asked. He smiled again but it didn't reach his eyes.

"because we need the best of the best in order for this to be successful; I am just trying to ensure my clients interests."


She jumped slightly when she heard the laughing. It was feint, but surviving on Pandora meant recognizing even the smallest of sounds. The laughing that sounded like nails against a chalkboard. She stood up slowly, glancing at the surrounding brush.

Viper Wolves

She saw Jake's shoulders tense as he heard the sound too. He was sitting across the fire from her, and that's were she saw them.

"Sully," she said calming, pointing off into the woods behind him where sets of black eyes reflected the firelight. She moved slowly over to where he was sitting.

"I see them," he said as he reached for his own weapon. They had surrounded the camp. There was at least a dozen of the beasts. Small and agile predators that swarmed their prey before tearing it to shreds.

"Don't make any sudden moves or they'll strike."

"What's the plant then? We are sitting ducks." He whispered.

"I'm thinking," she hissed.

"Think faster, I don't think they are going to wait out there for long."

Jo tried to remember all the things Grace had said about these guys. She had made it a point to get Jo up to speed on the predators and deadly plants. Something Jo was endlessly thankful for. Becoming familiar with pandora was the first thing she did after coming out of cryo. She didn't know as much as the scientists; just enough to know what to do in situations like this. The worst-case scenarios.

"They can't swim, and can't climb. When I give the word, run for the river." The river still had a strong current that would carry him for a while.

"Follow the river back to base."

"What about you?"

"I'm gonna pull rank here Sully, just do it." She said lowly, her eyes never leaving the bushes.

Jake looked about to protest, but nodded instead. Separating while they were surrounded probably wasn't the best idea, but there was no way they could take on a full pack of these things. If by some miracle they both made it to the river, then the beasts would just try and follow them down river. But if she gave them something else to hunt, then Jake could escape. between the two of them, she had a better chance of surviving in the woods, even if the chances were slight.

"I'll see you back on base, Jo" he said. She nodded.

"ready?" she whispered. Her hands tightened around her makeshift spears, and she saw their hackles rising.

"Go!"


This had to be one of the most annoying research missions she had ever been on. Seven years she had been running missions; seven years with only one incident. They flew out, picked up a few sticks, and flew back. She had seen more of Pandora's wildlife in the last 24 hours than in six years.

So, here she was, slogging around in a forest lite up in bioluminescence with a bleeding leg, a torn-up forearm from an over eager Viper wolf and no clue as to her next move. She must have been absent when they covered 'what to do when stranded in the wild on an alien planet' in basic.

If she didn't die from blood loss, then the doc would definitely kill her. Avatars weren't exactly cheap. Plus, death wasn't exactly something she wanted to experience. The only bright side to all this was that she managed to kill a few more hours. The nights on Pandora weren't that short, and staying awake for this long was proving difficult.

She kept her eyes moving around, searching to anything out of place. It wasn't as if things could get

Any wor-

THWACK

"-se" she growled. Another arrow followed along the same path of the previous, tearing into a tree a few centimeters from her neck. She dove behind a tree as more arrows kept coming.

"Don't let it escape!" She heard one of them yell. She would have to thank the Doc for making her learn basic Na'vi.

She could here them moving from behind her tree, their stealthy moves not quiet enough to escape her trained ears.

She started scaling the tree, using some smaller branches and cracks in the bark to silently make her ascent. It was obvious that there was more than one, No one Na'vi could fire that many arrows at once. That voice was bothering her though, she recognized it from somewhere. She didn't have time for that now.

Safely concealed behind the leaves, she watched as they crept towards her tree. There were five of them, two with bows drawn and two more with spears.

The fifth was atop a dire horse, snapping orders at the others. He was either an asshole of the one in charge- probably both. He was directly below her perch as his men continued towards the tree.

She weighed her options. She could try to fight, but five on one wasn't exactly good odds. If she ran for it she would need to get out of bow shot, the Na'vi had little problem shooting in the dark. They had missed her twice now, she doubted there would be a third time. She might try taking the leader hostage, but that raised the question of what she would do with him when she got safe enough away- if he didn't kill her first.

So that left waiting. So now she was bleeding, hungry, tired and stuck in a tree while a group of less than happy natives waited to kill her; sometime she missed the simpler times.

Noe resigned to sitting in the branches for the night, her mind traveled back to that voice. She tried to get a better look at the one on the horse. Maybe seeing the face would help jog her memory.

"She is gone!" One of them called. Well, she wasn't 'gone' gone; maybe just not in that exact spot.

"That is impossible, keep looking." In the future she could see herself laughing at this incident. If she survived. Turns out the best way to escape the Na'vi was to simply climb a tree in the dark.

"could she have gone into the trees?" Some of them started to look towards the trees, an she stayed impossibly still. She could tell they were young, they were smaller than the Na'vi she remembered and not as cautious as they should be in the darkness.

There where days when she cursed her avatar body. While the Na'vi were typically lithe, avatars tended to have more muscle mass throughout their bodies. Their muscles structure took more from their human DNA. By the time they were developed they had to retrain the muscles to do certain movements, say climbing for example. It's why the obstacle courses were built. Their were a handful of other differences, but they were small. A few things that turned out slightly too human to ever be considered Na'vi.

"Ha!" one of them laughed, "the day a sky person manages to climb this- will be the day I become Toruk Makto." If she weren't thankful for their short-sightedness, she might be a little insulted.

"Tsu'tey!" she could barely hear the hoof-beats of an approaching dire horse as the name registered. She knew he had sounded familiar. I guess that answers that question, she thought. She peered between the leaves as two more dire horses approached.

He had changed a lot since she last saw him. But then again, she hadn't seen him for years. Her was taller, probably only a few inches taller than her, and carried an air of authority. The only thing that she recognized instantly was the scowl forever locked in place on his face.

"It's Neytiri, she returns- with a prisoner!" Jo winced; it had to be Jake. Their luck just wasn't there tonight.

At least he was a prisoner, which meant he was alive.

The Na'vi who had previously been searching for her returned to Tsu'tey and shook their head.

"We found a few drops of blood, but it's too dark to find a trail. Where ever she went she is injured," one of them reported. She cursed internally, had it been day they might spot a trail leading up the tree.

"Neytiri probably got her," one of them reasoned. She could almost see the wheels turning in his head as Tsu'tey contemplated leaving.

just go! She hissed internally. She almost sighed in relief when something she didn't understand was snapped and they started to leave. She needed to get to a safe place and get a message to Grace.

"I'm getting sick of saving him," she whispered.