The RDA and their security escorts are en route to Pandora. The 26 ISVs will be traveling at 0.7 times the speed of light, putting them at the satellite moon in a little over 5 years. Most personnel will be in cryosleep for the duration of the trip. If all goes according to plan, each one of the crews will disembark at roughly the same time and lay siege to the planet, until it is deemed safe for mining platoons to land.

Pandora:

I landed the banshee at the clearing where the Omaticaya and Pongupizayu congregated. The scene was a mess. Children crying, mothers hushing, cries of "Omaticaya is cursed!" and "Evil follows the dreamwalker!" rang out in the circles. I got off the banshee and sprinted over to Eyman'ya, the other tribe's clan leader, to have a word.

"No! No, Jakesully! Omaticaya has brought curse to our lands! Out hometree is sick."

Neytiri interrupted. "That's not true."

I asked, "What do you mean, Neytiri?"

"Mo'at told me the truth." Both Eyman'ya and I looked at her. "The truth of the earth."

Eyman'ya spoke, "Grim news I hear, is this true? Mo'at killed herself?"

"No, her spirit was gone before the flesh died. She is with Eywa. Before she fled from life, Eywa gave her a message…" tears welled up in the large yellow eyes of hers, "for me, and Jake, Olo'eyktan."

"Does it have to do with the tree, with it failing?"

"Yes, Jake…" she let out an echoed wail. It took all the strength in me not to rush over to her and embrace her, but some voice, in the confines of my mind, telling me this was not the time. Déjà vu or something like it swept over me, showing me vision of a scorched hometree, not unlike what Colonel Quaritch did to the Omaticaya hometree not long before, but on a grander scale. Fire lept up from huge fissures in the earth, spewing up boulders of rock along with magma. The light from the magma merged with the bioluminescent scene of the Pandora night, the greens and blues of the landscape, and for an instant, reveling in the bask of orange, then cringing, escaping into itself, avoiding certain doom. The lava was quick, almost water-like, and engulfed Hell's Gate, Norm and Max, and the Tree of Souls, the direct link to Eywa. The lava gathered itself and seemed to form upon itself, and rose like the crest of a wave over the Hallelujah Mountains. The forests turned to ash and were blackened. Pandora, once Earth-like in her younger eons, became useless, pitiful, depressing. Finally, me and Neytiri embracing each other, at the ruined Tree of Voices…

But it was just a feeling, and I came back from the vision to see Neytiri cock her head at me, like she sometimes did when I did something human. "Jake, what is it?"

"Nothing, sorry."

Eyman'ya spoke, "And? What was the message?"

"It is hard put into words, Jake." She started to cry again. "Eywa sees the Sky People coming back, but much stronger. They have a weapon that will kill everything here. Eywa despairs. You must understand, Jake, our Mother does not show us her sadness. It is not her way. For her to show… this," she motioned to the huge creaking tree, "is bad. The Fire has sensed her weakness and will return, Jake, so that the Sky People will not abuse her anymore."

I looked at her incredulously. "You don't mean from the legend? The Fire? That makes no sense at all. First, that doesn't make sense. Second, why would the Fire protect Eywa from the Sky People if it KILLS Eywa?"

She let out another wail. "I don't know how to say it, Jake! What do you kind of warriors call it when one of your own asks to die?"
"A mercy-kill?" But then the conversation was cut short. A millisecond of silence, then a horrendous GROAN came from the Pongupizayu hometree. Whip-like snaps were then heard as the columns supporting the tree sprang loose. The remaining banshees in the roost took off into the night. The lumber giant looked like it may hold for a second or two, but with the final snapping of its roots, at the same time minutely slow and harrowingly quick, slammed to the ground.