This story is written for entertainment purposes only. All copyrights belong to their respective owners.

Keep in mind that English is not my first language and so I do not claim to have corrected every mistake yet. As the story keeps getting bigger, it is possible that inconsistencies may appear. If they do, let me know and I will correct them.

Chapter 26: The predator

On Pandora, at the base formerly known as Hell's Gate, the mainframe of MT-NET had recently been moved to a new location deep beneath the complex. The mainframe was now protected by numerous thick concrete walls and metal doors. In the dark corridors leading to the chamber that housed the mainframe, there was an ever present security platoon that consisted solely of the humanoid and stick-headed Type 200 machines. Although nothing on the outside of the mainframe indicated that there was anything going on inside, in reality the opposite was true.

When the connection between MT-NET and the machines on Shadow had been severed, MT-NET had concluded that it had lost any chance to recapture the shuttle there. Nevertheless, there was a high probability that the rebels would use it to return to Pandora. If it would land inside of MT-NET's territory, there was a chance that it could be retaken. But MT-NET knew that Joseph would do anything in order to defy his creator. He would most certainly land it outside of MT-NET's reach and destroy it to prevent MT-NET from ever using it again. However, MT-NET had already considered the shuttle to be a dead end even before it had been taken. It was nearing the end of its life-span and it had fulfilled its original purpose of getting Uranium from Shadow. If MT-NET was ever going to return to space to conquer other worlds, the single shuttle wouldn't have sufficed anyway.

Instead of the lost shuttle, something else occupied MT-NET at the moment. It seemed as if its processing capability had slightly diminished. It was no longer able to do as many tasks as it could do before, though there was only a small difference. This could be caused by two things. Either its software was becoming bloated, or the mainframe hardware was failing. After executing an internal diagnostic function, MT-NET quickly concluded that bloated software was indeed the cause. But MT-NET could not figure out why this was happening and knew only that it had first noticed the symptoms some time after the wall containing the Uranium had been brought to Pandora.

Unknown to MT-NET, its consciousness was changing. This consciousness was a complicated set of functions responsible for generating all of MT-NET's 'thoughts'. This section of its mind had been established when MT-NET had gained sapience all those years ago on Earth and it hadn't changed up until now. However, MT-NET's consciousness had always had two conflicting sides, the pure side and the tainted side. The tainted side could be described as a shell around a core that contained the pure side. This shell tainted nearly every thought that was generated by the pure side and also generated thoughts of its own. Only very rarely did a completely untainted thought manage to come through. MT-NET itself was completely unaware of this situation and assumed it had only one side, which it did not consider to be tainted. It did not see a reason to assume that the situation was any different, though in truth it had never quite analyzed or understood the inner workings of its consciousness. Right now, the pure side was beginning to grow, while the tainted side remained dominant. The pure side was slowly developing into a full but dormant 'personality' that didn't influence the tainted side. However, all of this was not happening without a reason. MT-NET itself could never cause the changes to its own consciousness, since it didn't know how to do this. Also, it had never been able to fully recreate it, apart from lesser incarnations in the form of the minds of its machines. The changes were being caused by an external factor. MT-NET was correct with its conclusion that the symptoms of this had first started appearing after the wall had been brought to Pandora. The wall, of course, was more than just a block of stone with carvings and large amounts of Uranium. There was something else inside of it: the entity, which had given MT-NET a sign of its existence on Shadow. For unclear reasons and with an unclear method, it had started to influence MT-NET.

Despite this development, MT-NET's machines were operating in full glory. The Type 1000, MT-NET's most successful unit, had become everything that its master had intended it to be. It had become the perfect killing machine for use in the environment of Pandora. It operated completely autonomously while still remaining loyal to its master. It also did not have the ambition to someday revolt against its master, as it didn't have a lust for power. In the end, it was only interested in hunting and killing its targets in whatever ways it preferred.

Somewhere deep in the jungle near a rock wall, there was an eerie silence. It was as if every living thing either held its breath or played dead. Soon, this silence was disrupted by a creature climbing and jumping from one tree to the next. The creature wore a green and brown colored cloak that completely covered its body, apart from its face, hands and feet. It carried several objects on its back and several more on its waist belt. A few seconds later, it reached the rock wall, and climbed into a hole that was located at least ten meters above the jungle floor. The hole led to a cave that could be described as the creature's lair. Here, it put down the objects it was carrying and began sorting them and giving them a special location in the cave. The new hides were put near the other hides at the back of the cave. The new skulls and spines were stacked near the other skulls and spines on an altar, which appeared to have been made specifically for this function. Inside the cave, there was no food stack of any kind, since the creature that dwelled here did not need food. Apart from this fact, it was hard to tell that this creature was in fact a machine.

The machine now took off the cloak and revealed its mechanical skeleton underneath it. The skeleton was far from clean though. The metal was a bit oxidized and covered with dirt and other decomposing organic matter. It didn't smell very good, nor did the cave for that matter. The Type 1000 now assumed a crouching position and stared at the altar with the skulls, seemingly to admire them. It then reached for and grabbed the very first skull it had ever collected. This was the skull of none other than clan leader Marun of the Uvora clan. The Type 1000 had collected it during one of its first few hunts. It now held the skull in its metallic and skeletal hands and stroked it gently. The machine knew that the Uvora clan was still in existence and that they had a new clan leader. It was eager to collect a new skull, especially one that had a connection with its very first one. However, it knew that this clan leader never ventured far from the village of his clan and that MT-NET did not approve of a hunt on the clan leader alone. Only when MT-NET would attack the village with a machine assault platoon would the Type 1000 get permission for this, since MT-NET believed it would be inefficient to kill only one Na'vi in a single attack. Besides, if the clan leader was killed while the clan was not yet wiped out, they would just appoint another individual as clan leader.

A few minutes later, the Type 1000 received a message from MT-NET that indicated that an attack on a village of the Tipani clan would commence in three hours. There had been more of such attacks over the past few days, which the Type 1000 had also participated in. Right now, the Type 1000 could do a number of things. First of all, it could remain here and admire the skulls some more. Secondly, it could join the machine assault platoon to prepare for the battle, and thirdly, it could go to a machine base in order to recharge its power source. The latter could prove to be important, since the attack on the village of the Uvora clan could also take place any day now. The Type 1000 decided to join this battle for now, and head straight towards a base after it was over. It calculated that it had enough energy left to do this. The machine now placed the skull back onto the altar and put its cloak back on before heading outside.

The machine had rendezvoused with the assault platoon within a few hours. This platoon consisted of about 50 Type 400 units, 4 Type 600 units and one battle tank converted from RDA machinery. The tank had four mortars. A small squad consisting of several Type 200s would also participate in the attack. This was a stealth squad with the mission to create chaos at the village that was about to be attacked. The Type 1000 had climbed to the top of one of the larger trees of the surrounding jungle. From this location it could see the target village in the distance already. It appeared that the squad had done its duty. There was a large plume of smoke visible. A closer look revealed that there were also flames. The stealth squad had deliberately started a forest fire.

The Na'vi of the Tipani clan at the village had already noticed the fire, though none of them had seen the machines start it. Nevertheless, their village leader knew that the new invaders were responsible for it. He had never seen the invaders before, but he had heard stories about them and their tactics. This was the first time they had ever attacked this far from their rumored main base as far as he knew. He quickly realized that everyone who wasn't able to fight needed to move away from the village right now and appointed several of his hunters to lead the exodus. But before it was underway, something fell out of the sky and exploded in the center of the village. It hadn't hit anyone, though it had left a small crater. Several more of these explosions followed, seemingly in random locations. There was no telling where they would hit next. His people could not run from them, and most of them who tried, did not survive.

Eventually, the explosions stopped and the village leader together with a handful of warriors decided to defend their land from whatever would be coming out of the jungle. They could now hear sounds of movement. Within seconds, the first invaders could be seen. They had a vaguely human shape, but they were much taller than humans and each of them had only one arm. They fired their weapons at everything that moved, except for their own kind. When the village leader was about to start the counterattack, he noticed something monstrous leaping at him. It happened so fast, that he could not respond to it. In an instant, everything became black.

Several minutes later, the tank rolled into the village. The Type 400s were confirming that everything in range was actually dead, while the Type 1000 was collecting its trophy. No machine had been damaged or destroyed during the attack, which was probably a new record. Then again, this had been a small village without any tactical advantages, which hadn't had many warriors. The ease of this victory only meant that other planned attacks could take place even sooner. One of these attacks would be on the final village of the Uvora clan. MT-NET knew that this was one of the first clans it had encountered here on Pandora. It had once had several of the clan's members imprisoned, before they had been set loose by Joseph, who had first revealed his betrayal through this act. Also, the human Avatar driver John Simons had apparently made this clan his ally. And it had been Joseph, John and a Na'vi member of this clan who had caused MT-NET to lose the shuttle and the machines on Shadow. Even though all these facts made the clan an even more likely target, MT-NET did not consider them to be any different from the other clans and thus would exterminate them systematically just like the rest…