So, I think this is the longest chapter I've written, and I think it's also the best one so far. This chapter has the big battle in the floaty mountain area. I change who dies just a little bit, as well as who kills who, but for the most part it follows the movie timeline.
The day after we helped them move the mobile link site, Jake flew into the Omaticaya camp on Toruck Macto. He managed to get help from them to try and heal Grace, but despite our efforts, she died. At the moment, messengers were roaming the air and countrysides to find other clans that would help us drive the humans away. While they were out doing that, I was on Hope repairing our only remaining fighter.
It was a very small fighter, but was all we had left. It was hard to work on it since the hangars had not been pressurised and we had to wear space suits to work on it. The fighter was a light Striker class ship, and had 4 wings that extended up, down, right and left. On each wing was an energy cannon. The body of the fighter was mostly cylindrical, and was where the pilot sat. The wings were able to rotate around the body, allowing for increased maneuverability. They were also able to rotate to help aim or dodge projectiles being fired at it. It was a rather fast ship, but had weak shields and armour. The cockpit had been smashed, so it could only do in atmosphere flights.
We had fixed it so it could fly and shoot, but the shields were still unoperational. I was to be the pilot in our next fight with the humans. "Try that, " I said after tightening the bolt for the seventh time. It rumbled and coughed some smoke, then turned off. "Something with the third chamber is broken. I think I know what it is. How's the shield coming along?"
"Shield is almost finished, just a minute. Got it!" Ben said. The shields flickered on, a light blue sphere that extended out to the tips of the wings, ending just before the cannons.
"Good job. " I took off a cover plate on the third engine chamber and removed a few pieces of shrapnel. Once they were out of the way, I found a leak in an oil line that I managed to fix with some tape. "Try that. It should work now. " The ship sputtered for a few seconds, then roared to life, lights blinking. I leaned in the cockpit to check all the settings. "Fuel is low, shields good, guns good, all good. I saw some fuel barrels earlier. I'll find them. " I walked over to a corner of the hangar and began moving things out of the way to find the fuel barrels. After i found one, I grabbed it and brought it over. It was weightless at the moment, since we hadn't yet restored the artificial gravity on the ship. The fuel the ship used used a similar concept to the burn fuel, except it didn't give off as much energy.
I refilled the fuel tank and folded up the wings for transport. We were going to strap it to the underside of the maintenance shuttle and bring it down, which worked out a lot better than I expected. We brought it down on one of the Hallelujah mountains, where the Humans would have to pass through to get to the Omaticaya camp just on the other side. At the landing site, gabe and Abigail were waiting, where they undid the straps and lowered it to the ground on its own landing gear. Once it was detached, I sent Ben to the main camp with the maintenance shuttle to pick up the plasma cannons.
When both of them were brought over, we positioned them on the sides of two mountains, so that they were invisible until they had passed them. May and Catherine would be manning the plasma cannons, I would be in the fighter, and the rest would be on the ground.
The next day, other Na'vi started pouring into camp. It was impossible to tell exactly how many, but it was definitely a lot though. The humans started moving in after about a week since Jake arrived. Once I saw they were moving in, I got the others together and we brought some clouds in. This would help mess up their thermal images from satellites, but not by much. I also instructed ARC to use plasma cannons on Hope to shoot down any satellites he saw. After we got good cloud coverage, We took up our positions. I was in the fighter, disguised behind some foliage we placed there earlier. It was perched on the edge, ready to dive off at a moment's notice. I had made my own canopy of ice, which was mainly just to keep the wind out of my eyes.
"Enemy sighted. Units appear to be a very large bomber, a troop carrier, and about a hundred helicopters. It's their whole military, " ARC said.
"Start counting down to when we need to attack on all frequencies, " I said.
"Yes sir. Four minutes. Three minutes. Two minutes. " I saw the lead helicopters coming around the mountain. "One minute. " More kept coming, it looked like ARC was right about their numbers. "Thirty seconds. FIfteen seconds. Ten. Nine. Eight. Seven. Six. Five. Four. Three. Two. One. Go. " I started the fighter, and it dove down the mountain. The wings unfolded and I sped up to slightly less than full speed. I turned to my left and came face to face with the entirety of the humans army. I set shields and weapons to full power and began to fire. Jake had said he would take care of the two larger craft, so I concentrated on their escort. As soon as I was in range to fire on them, my wings started rotating to maximise the hits and dodge enemy projectiles.
I took out the lead helicopter and started weaving all around the ships. The first four were easy to kill, but after that they began to fight back. I was on the tail of one when the door gunner of another began to fire at me from a helicopter above me, forcing me to pull away. I strafed the bomber once as I passed it, then redirected my focus to the helicopters. The troop carrier was lowering, most likely unloading troops. A few minutes later, it rose and joined the fight again.
"Gabe, Ben, Abigail, land troops have unloaded, be careful down there, " I said over our comms.
I turned left and took out another helicopter and kept fighting. After a little bit, we had lost a lot of our air forces. The ground forces were being pushed back, despite our best efforts. My ship had lost most of its shields. The bomber had been taken out, but any one of the helicopters could just as easily destroy their camp. The rogue helicopter was in a dogfight with the troop transport, and didn't seem to be doing too well. I turned towards it, firing on the way, knowing I was too far away to bring it down.
But maybe I didn't need to. A helicopter started tailing me, firing as my shield began to drop. A second one was on my left as well. I got a little closer to the shuttle, then sped up and rolled left. The helicopter behind me tried to keep me in his sights, but I had ducked behind the helicopter that had used to be on my left, which was now being hit by his own side. Mid-roll, I fired before I had a chance to miss. The bullet from the left wing traveled from my cannon to the missile housing on the transport, blowing up all half of their missiles and killing their forward gunner. Their chain guns however, where still firing.
I flew under the ship and fired as I pulled up in front of them, taking them out.
"Thanks John, I owe ya one, " The pilot said over the comms.
"You're welcome, " I replied as I shot down another helicopter. We were still losing, and it wasn't looking good for us, but I refused to give in.
"There's too many down here! We're falling back!" said one of the Avatar operators over the comms.
I looked at my damage report. Shields at 24%. Overall integrity 62%. Ammunition low. Fuel for fifteen more minutes. Gun 1, 3, and 4 operational, but gun 2 was at 20% efficiency. The plasma cannons had been destroyed, leaving May and Catherine to commandeer helicopters.
"This isn't looking good. There's still too many. About sixty helicopters left. May, get close to our rogue pilot. Get her out before she's shot down. Catherine, with me. " I banked sharply to avoid a missile launched from behind me and took out the person who fired it. Catherine flew in beside me and we began to take out as many helicopters as we could.
"May, how are you doing?"
"I got her out, but we're being swarmed. I've got to get out of here before it's too late. "
"Bail out and get to the mobile link site with Trudy. "
"Got it. "
"Catherine, how are you holding up?"
"Not the best, these helicopters aren't as maneuverable as I'm used to. "
"They came! Eywa has listened!" somebody said over the comms.
I looked up and saw about a hundred more of the flying creatures swoop out of the clouds, immediately engaging the helicopters.
"This is ground force, we're pushing forward again, thanks to the local wildlife. "
Shortly after, the transport lost an engine and began to fall. "Catherine, stick with the fighter. I gotta do something first. "
"Don't let anger cloud your judgement John, " Catherine said.
I plugged ARC into the ship and took it out of my ear. I got rid of my canopy and then jumped out. I made bands around my arms and legs and flew down to the shuttle crash. I landed and surveyed the damage. The shuttle was destroyed, but there was a fresh trail leading off into the woods. I followed it. I caught up to the suit ten minutes later, where it had just sighted the mobile link site. May and Trudy were most likely inside, and didn't see it coming. I raised the pistol and shot the ammo chain on the suit. One of the rounds exploded, severing the chain about fifteen bullets from the gun. He turned and fired, but the ammo soon ran as I dodged out of the way.
"You killed Paul! " I yelled.
"And now I'm gonna kill you, " Miles said back.
"Unless I do it first. "
"Really? I don't see any water around here, and you only have a pistol. "
"Who said I needed water?" I charged, holstering my gun. The fighter flew overhead and three objects detached from the bottom. Hoverdomes. I jumped on the first as it landed and caught the two other smaller ones. I hooked them onto my hands with some straps I'd put on earlier. I could steer the hoverdome I was standing on by leaning, and could easily adjust the height of it. Same with the two smaller ones, although I would be using them to shove the suit around.
As soon as I had them on, I shot at max force at the suit with the hoverdome on my right hand. It staggered backwards and I glided around it, staying facing towards it. He drew a knife and swung at me, which I easily dodged. I went in close and busted the cockpit easily with the left one and got out of range as I waited for the hoverdomes to recharge. Miles just put on a mask and continued the fight. It was a while before I attacked next, I just kept dancing around his attacks. When I was ready, I went under his arm after he swung at me and used both hoverdomes at the same time on opposite sides of the suit's left leg. It was buckled in beyond use and could only sit there. He wasn't knocked over though and could still pivot the upper half. It was another five minutes before I attacked for the third and final time, and I raced forward, suddenly raising the larger hoverdome so it faced him and the hitting the larger one with the two on my hands. This shoved Miles back twenty feet to rest against a tree. He climbed out of the suit and drew his pistol.
"Who are you?" he asked.
"I am John Smith, Captain of Hope, survivor of Mundar invasion, Major in the Atlantian army, and avenger of Paul, " I replied.
"Why are you with them?"
"I already told you that. " I raised my hand towards him and froze the firing pin in his gun. "You are avenged and am free to leave this world, Paul, " I whispered as I turned the water in Miles' body to plasma, leaving behind only a puddle of muddy water. Atlantians believed that until they had been avenged, their soul is stuck at their death place, most of the time doomed to stay forever. I lowered my hand and flew up to find that very few enemy helicopters were left airborne.
I quickly eliminated them by lobbing chunks of ice at them. The enemy air force was obliterated, and their ground troops were in a full retreat. I got back in the fighter and put ARC back in my ear. By flying low over the hoverdomes i had used to fight Miles, they attached themselves to the underside of the fighter. I rose up from under the canopy and flew towards the human base, meeting no resistance on the way.
"ARC, who did we lose?"
"We lost Tsu'tey, Hund'ri, and almost a thousand Omaticaya. Plasma cannons are destroyed. It was a costly battle, but I think we ended the war. What's our next step, sir?"
"Get the humans out of here. "
"And after that?"
"Rescue Resilience. "