This chapter I give the humans the knowledge that the Atlantians are there without letting them know much and set up the main plot for next chapter.
Since the marine had been allowed into Hometree, he had been learning about how the Omaticaya lived and the world around them. He was learning quickly, which was helped by the fact that some of the Omaticaya spoke english; a result of a school that had been shut down two years ago. The same building I had locked a worker in when I snuck into the base for updated information. So far, he has been learning horse riding and how to use their weapons. I had mastered the bow and knife five months after we landed, although the knife was easier to learn because I had used it numerous times on Atlantis, and all I had to do was adjust my technique a bit.
I was at Hometree when the marine saw me. I think he had seen me around a few times, but had never had the time to talk to me. I could understand why he wanted to speak to me. Atlantians looked like humans, although we were slightly taller than average and our eyes were mainly blue or gray.
"Jake Sully. Who might you be?" he said, holding out his hand.
"John Smith. " I replied, shaking his hand.
"What are you doing here with them? I thought I was the first to be allowed in Hometree, " he asked, releasing my hand. Obviously he thought I was a human and had arrived with them on an earlier shuttle.
"I'm not from your camp, " I said.
"Then where are you from? You speak english well. "
"I am not from here, or your earth. "
"Then where from?"
"There, " I said, pointing to the sky in the east, back towards Atlantis.
"You came from the sky?"
"We fell from the sky, but we did not come from there. " Someone in the distance called for him.
"Oh, I gotta go. I'll see ya around. "
"Goodbye. " He turned and left, leaving me alone. I left Hometree and went to the camp for the rest of the day.
Once it was close to dark, I flew to the human camp. A while ago, we realised that by using highly reflective ice crystals, we could reflect light around us and return it to its path without it touching us, effectively making us invisible to the human eye. However, we could not see because no light reached our eyes. To counter this, we had learned to sense water in a way that we could recognize our surroundings. We could easily sense life forms, and could recognize our surroundings easily as well.
I hovered above the camp and dropped in, cloaking myself as I went. I landed by a door and waited for someone to pass by. I was able to duck in behind a soldier coming in and found my way to the room where the Avatars were controlled. There were several places to connect to them, and it seemed that they used beds to hold the bodies while they were in the Avatars.
I waited until they started to exit the beds and then found Jake relatively easily. He looked just like his Avatar, but something I didn't expect was that he couldn't walk. He got into a wheelchair and then was ushered over to a computer where he began a video log. After he finished, he immediately went to two other Avatar controllers and began to talk with them. One was a woman named Grace and the other was a man named Norm.
"Somebody is there with them. I only saw one, but there are seven of them there, " Jake said.
"What do you mean? Humans are there?" asked Grace.
"I thought they would never let us in there, but you're saying that seven humans got in there before we did?" Norm asked.
"I only know what he told me. He looked like a human, but something was off I couldn't tell quite what though. He had some kind of earpiece communicator and wore a watch, so he came from somewhere besides here. He has been with the Omaticaya for some time now, possibly before we arrived. I could tell because they barely notice him now. He's like an equal to them. He could breathe the air here as well, which was really surprsing. "
"What did he tell you?"
"He said he fell from the sky in the east. He says he's not from here or earth. "
"Tomorrow, try to get him to talk to us here. He could really help us with negotiations if the Omaticaya trust him completely, " Norm said.
"I know. I'll ask him to meet you tomorrow around noon about halfway to Hometree. I don't know if you should come in the Avatars or not, but I'll bet Miles will want to send some troops along with you. He wants the Omaticaya to know we have a lot of troops. "
"I don't care what Miles wants, we're not trying to scare them. We're trying to peacefully negotiate the relocation of their home, " Grace said.
"Alright Jake, we're gonna think about this for a bit. You can go grab yourself some food and get some sleep for tomorrow, " Norm said.
Jake left the hookup room and went towards the cafeteria. I followed him, levitating myself above the floor to avoid making noise. Before the cafeteria, he turned left and went into a control room. There were several people sitting at monitors, but in the center was a holoprojector. Looking at it was two men, I could tell one of them was Miles, a colonel in the army, and the other was probably the man from the office in the corner. I looked at the nameplate on the desk and saw that his name was Parker.
"Hey Jake, I thought you got stuck out there. What do you have for me today?" Miles asked.
"Somebody is with them. Seven people, I think. They live with the Omaticaya. I think they came from off world, and not from earth. "
"What do you mean? We've never seen these people before. " Parker asked.
"I mean someone got here before us, and their friends with the Omaticaya. Grace and Norm will meet them tomorrow halfway to Hometree. I told them you might send a troop escort, so that's good cover for you to send someone to check it out, " Jake said.
"Nice work, I'll send a few troops with Grace and Norm tomorrow. " Miles said.
"Thanks. I also surveyed Hometree some, " Jake replied. I had been about to leave, but this was unexpected. Surveying Hometree? Why would he need that?
He manipulated the holoprojector some and pulled up an image of Hometree. It was only satellite footage, and the dimensions were off in some places by twenty feet or so.
"This here, " He said, pointing to the main entrance, "is actually about thirty feet wide, not fifty. "
After a few minutes, most of the scaling errors were fixed, but then I realised what this was for. He was giving them the schematics for Hometree, which would let them be able to easily destroy it. He was giving them a way to destroy Hometree, which meant that the negotiations were probably just a distraction, or were never expected to work. Once they failed, they would bring in their air force and blow up Hometree, whether or not the Omaticaya were still inside. I left quietly, and flew back to base camp once I was out of the building.