The calendar showed 2159, i.e. four years after the eviction. Angie at the radio station had pulled the cargo manifesto and the passenger list of the ISV soon to arrive, and gave it to the triumvirate managing things at the Augustine Research Station. They for their part had made ready for delivery crates of unobtanium and two passengers. The avatar drivers Bill and Celia Gehrken had been kindly asked to return to Earth, their study fields – archaeology and paleontology – demanded lots and lots of digging and they simply couldn't accept that sometimes thirst of knowledge was far from enough reason to be allowed to dig. The solution to the dilemma was simple: Returning to Earth.
That was the departing consignment but there was a arriving consignment too. Angie read aloud for Max: "The cargo manifesto states the usual package of spare parts and provisions of all sorts. Including some more bloodlines of algae – more tasty than the previous species they have delivered us they claim – and hey, they are bringing us bantam hen!"
Max nodded and asked: "All right, and are they having some passengers on board?"
Angie looked down the manifesto sheet. "Usual stuff too. Maintenance workers, miners, soldiers, office clerks. Such guys we hardly take any interest in. If they do like we have asked them to do in that message we have sent them, those people will be kept down in hibernation and we won't see any to them. There are eight scientists on board though, six of them with avatars of their own. Those two without are to remain on board and in hibernation unless we decide otherwise. Those six with avatars can be awaken to see if they will want to do a two-year study term. Or may be they'll decide to stay on after too – depends on them."
Norm uttered: "So who are they, those scientists?"
Angie detailed: "Angus McPherson, metallurgist. Without. Melanie Foster, limnologist. Driver. Shlomo Ben Avnan, agronomist. Without. Mehsut Kökölut, linguist. Driver. Garret Bullard and Rostislav Jermolajcsik, botanists and drivers both. Kyoko Arikabano, ethnologist, driver. Rafik al-Haffin, comparative religion, driver."
Norm put the period mark: "Okay, then we have made ready for receiving them. I'll send Jake a reminder that they are coming so he can raise the customary na'vi 'welcoming party'."
When finally the Valkyrie space ferry landed, only six humans disembarked the ferry, everyone understood that it was the six of them with "driving licences". They showed to be awestruck indeed by the huge crowd of na'vi they saw eyeing them suspiciously – they of course didn't see all those who saw them but from hiding – up in the tree tops, from the roofs of the buildings etc. They were speedily brought into the main building and the "Augustine crash course" started without delay.
Norm, Max and Trudy took the podium in the auditorium of the base and Max took the first word. "Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Pandora! It is exceedingly important to inform you, if you haven't been told so already at the ISV before you came down here, that you have now arrived at an independent territory where the local, indigenous na'vi population is always setting the tune. The RDA corporation was evicted from this moon four years ago, under the restrictions imposed upon us by the na'vi this is to be strictly a research facility, no mining or any commercial activity of any sort is to take place here. A handbook detailing some rules we are to follow is now handed out to you.
You will be given a mentor while you are staying here, to advice you when you approach some risky situation. Heed those advices and it will be all right for you, your mentor will be keeping a watchful eye on you!
Another reason for having a mentor is that now that all the RDA people are gone us few who still are here have to take the chores needed to keep us alive and well in this, frankly speaking, hostile environment. So you will be given tasks to take care of that need to be done here, even with our much reduced building mass under maintenance. We will try to arrange them according to your specialties and your wishes but we can't promise too much."
Trudy continued: "You may be wondering why the RDA corporation has been sent off and most of their staff too. To explain you why you are now going to watch a movie explaining you why such rules are in power. I warn you, it is heady stuff!"
And the movie was truly an awful watching. Trudy narrated while huge massacres were committed, massive destructions of land were done and venerated places where desecrated. And Trudy added at the end of the movie: "Horrible to watch as this movie is, I assure you that you haven't seen the worst stuff, only what we could show you in picture! In the end the na'vi came together under the leadership of a former avatar with military experience, Jake Sully by name, he beat the RDA goons in battle. It was a really gruesome battle with lots of blood spilled on both sides but the na'vi won and the RDA people were given the boot. I am keenly aware of the bitterness of the battle – I took part in it! Only those avatars who gave the na'vi assistance with driving them off were allowed to stay on. Those scientists of you who intend to make a study here, will be allowed to do so only due to the plea of us and with the benevolence of Jake Sully, now the most powerful of the na'vi chieftains. So you disappoint us and him at your risk!"
Norm finished: "For those of you who live in this environment and decide that it is preferable to a life at Earth, like we the original avatars do, it will be possible for you to switch into a life permanently in the avatar body for the rest of your natural life. This of course depends not only on your decision to apply for it but also on your good behaviour and obedience to rules given you. I can now answer your questions, if any."
The astonishment, baffle and confusion were evident in the eyes of the six arrivals. After some seconds a grey-haired man with a big moustache put up his hand. "Name is Mehsut Kökölut. Did I get you correctly that we will work under the control of stone age people?" "Basically that is correct, whe can negotiate with them but they'll always have the last word." answered Norm.
"I am Kyoko Arikabano. Will we be living here without the benefit of a fully functioning civilized society?" said an oriental-looking woman. "To the best of our ability this is a research station with a functioning set of amenities. But it can't be a fully working city like at Earth – we have no restaurants for fine dining, once a week we arrange a movie show but our choice of movies is limited, there is no swimming pool here, and I could continue."
A bespectacled man with a full beard spoke up. "I am called Rafik al-Haffin. I see that our study is going to be hemmed in all around but isn't it possible to trade for goods, ideas, opinions with them? Can't we try to convince them that we have practices that are superior to their? Instead of just complying with rules hemming us in?" "Don't bet on it. Among tradition-bound peoples change is a slow and gradual affair, unless forced to it. Our own Jake Sully has instituted a good many such changes and the clans have accepted it – for the one and only reason that they will likely directly or indirectly improve their chances should a conflict with the RDA corporation come again."
"I am Garret Bullard and this is my study partner Rostislav Jermolajcsik. It will be possible for us to return to Earth in a year or two?" "It sure will, but thereafter the link will be closing. Permanently. You may need to think whether you will feel like living such a life."
Finally a young woman calling herself Melanie Foster, evidently a graduate student, put up her hand. "You declare that it will be possible for us to settle here if we can adapt to feel good in a life in nature like the na'vi lead? I'll happily go for it, if I am allowed. But how will I be evaluated if I am good enough for it?" She was explained a short version of how her project would have to be finished by the deadline in two years, how she then could choose a new craft to practice afterwards, how she would learn about ways and knowledges of the jungle, at last she would leave off her human body to reside in her avatar for all her days to come.
The booklet with rules to follow was handed out and the six of them were dismissed for the evening, to get some food and some time to sleep and ponder the question whather to stay or not. The next morning al-Haffin, Kökölut and Arikabano declared that, having read the rules handbook they had been given, they had decided to abort their study programs since too many restrictions had been put in front of them. Melanie the limnologist – i.e. expert in freshwater and the life in it – eagerly accepted the rules, she was put to be the assistant of Ernest Norbert Gumm the zoologist and food provider, and Garret and Rostislav were sent to assist Ella in the greenhouse. Their official project was to be assistants to Connie Benn, an avatar-less scientist who had refused to join in the rebellion that captured Hell's Gate during the time of the Great Battle, she had consequently been sent packing. Her project was to find plants of Pandora with medical potential. She had applied for a couple of assistants to collect plants for her, to not need to rely on dr. Augustine for providing her with plant material.
Miss Benn had dutifully sent reports back to her mentors at Earth how her project was working out. What Connie didn't know was that they were read by not only academics. They were leaked to people who took interest in medical plants – their euphoric properties at least… Namely gentlemen dressed in business suit with a bulge under the left arm and Italian surnames.
So Garret Bullard and Rostislav Jermolajcsik – the real scientists – had been captured on open street, assassinated and their places taken by Henry Melezzo and Albert Panaggi respectively, an RDA employee with a brother deep in gambling debt was pressed to replace the personalia with those of Melezzo and Panaggi in the RDA files. Their mission was to take the report of miss Benn, as complete as it was, and those plants she named "useful" for such purpose, back to Earth where they could be cultivated in specialized greenhouses with artificial atmosphere, to be harvested for powerful mindaltering drugs. And, if possible, to bring along some more of the same kinds too. With miss Benn out of the way it was all the simpler to lay their hands on her research results.
The governing trio at the Research Station didn't remark anything out of the ordinary at first. The two botanists behaved properly out of doors and with restraint indoors, no scandals came to pass concerning them and they did their given chores with care and zeal. But then one day Ella came in to Max, Trudy and Norm with concern written over her face.
"I remarked one thing recently, those two new botanists have a science project, to find Pandoran plants with medical uses and bring seeds or the like of them home to Earth. But I remarked something about the plants they are growing in those seed beds at the shed they have at the forest edge for this use. You would expect them to collect plants with disinfectant uses, with antibiotic or probiotic uses, with food additive uses, with insect repellent uses etc. But with one exception they are all for anaesthetic uses, and that one exception is a hormone similar.
The pattern struck me so queer that I walked to Bobbie in the pharmacy and asked her to take a look at the drugs they contain. She told me that in a human nervous system those drugs would work as very powerful narcotics – one of them is a powerful brain chemistry clutterer, producing hallucinations putting LSD into oblivion, another one is a stimulant the power of crystal meth yet simpler to hide in the body, yet another one is a sedative with all the power of heroine but none of the disadvantages of needing to be injected by syringe. And that hormone similar would lend itself exceedingly well to use as a sports dope… When she told me this, my alarm bell went off big time!"
Max got a very concerned gaze and said: "Are you sure about this? We will have to investigate this with great care. And should our suspicion be proven we'll need to inform Jake about it on the double."
They had a chat with Melanie about them and her face darkened too. "When we came out of hibernation at ISV 'Procyon' I remarked those two men, they didn't look like the men I met at the avatar course before departure from Earth. But when I took a look in the database on board I saw the same faces as before my eyes, so I just convinced myself that my memory was faulty."
Then they had a talk with janitor Todd. Would he mind opening the barrels they had made ready for transportation back to Earth? Certainly not when the leading trio of humans at Pandora asked for it. So they dug into those crates and discovered lots of frozen cell cultures of plants with narcotic properties, some with sports dope properties and even three with aphrodisiac properties – one of them was not even a plant but a water dwelling bug, the label on the lid to the cell culture was very revealing: "Pandora's spanish flea. Harmless unlike the real stuff". And not a single item for any other use…
No doubt was any more possible, shady people were active at Pandora. Now was time to bring it to the knowledge of Jake, Norm made sure to mention it when he was at one of his regular meetings with Jake. He got the whole story and he sat down to discuss it with Norm, Neytiri and Mo'at.
Jake wanted to simplify the affair: "Let me get this straight. You say that shady people have come to Pandora just to bring back to Earth some of our plants as illicit drugs for human use? And this is a problem for us here at this world?"
Neytiri commented: "You said that among others they intend to take the on'ky plant – those leaves are a powerful calming potion but we still use it only very rarely, it is very dangerous! But if this and other potions is consumed by very many and without properly careful control by skilled healers the effect will be very harmful to many human societies. (A sad smile shone up in her face.) May be human society as a whole will rot even worse because of their use of it, it may decay so bad that they can't organize expeditions to come to us and make any danger to us any more…"
Norm understood that Earth was getting distant to Jake, in emotions of every kind. Part of him simply couldn't care less about human trouble at Earth. He had problems galore as it was, demanding his attention closer to his presence, every day. And to Neytiri the prospect of eroding human kind's ability to go around in Space to raise up trouble would even have a tempting flavour to it. It was wise old Mo'at who put a stop to toying with such thinking, whether indifferent or wistful.
"Eywa's desire is for stability and harmony, wherever and however. It would be plainly wrong for us to allow balance to be rudely rocked at Earth, no matter what they have done here."
Norm added his own reasoning: "Also it would give even honest people at Earth a reason to come here to stop us assisting such bad people at Earth, they might establish a strong, STRONG military base here to stop us from doing that. Helping them or even turning a blind eye to their activity could land us in worse trouble than ever before. Furthermore, if we start to associate with criminals like those they may one day start to want to earn on na'vi people too, the corruption could turn back on ourselves. Jake, you have seen at Earth what drug abuse can do – don't you agree that we must do everything in our power to keep such a horror from appearing at Pandora?"
Jake turned his mind around. "So what are we to do further? If we are to deal with them we'll need an action plan. Any ideas?"
Norm took the word: "Actually I have one, for further elaboration at least. Let me explain.
What we want is an opportunity to pull the truth out of them, for that we have a very efficient technique which is unique to na'vi and avatars – the tsahaylu brain connection through the braid. For that to work we will have to capture them while they are outside, so that they can't run back to the station to hide there and may be even commit suicide so that we can't interrogate them.
First we offer them a bait they won't be able to resist if they are of the mind we now think they are, if they take the bait we'll get them where we want to have them, both of them. They will then be in our power and then they will face up to realities. Another advantage of catching them out in the field is that they don't have the forest smarts we have, they should be fairly simple to catch out there. These guys are most probably city slicks, inside the station they have the advantage with their street smarts."
Norm found the two impostors in their avatar bodies in a grove, looking for a fern said to be an antidote to hallusinogenics, good for returning to everyday life with a snap. A painful snap allright but still useful, they had already another one that could turn anyone into a totally disconnected schizophrenic in wild hallucinations within an hour, useful then to have something to switch the disease off too. He said: "Garret, some na'vi I met earlier today told me that there is a plant growing up in a tree with aphrodisiac properties, they even claim that it has rejuvenating properties."
"Garret" answered: "Are you talking about that epiphytic flower we saw day before yesterday? We already have something more powerful on store, ready for consignment to Earth."
Norm added petrol to the fire: "Not the be'ts'ts. This is a plant growing high up in the tallest trees, it stores its nutritients in thick roots shooting out. It may or may not be so powerful as they say, you can at least check it out. And among those nutritients there is said to be something doing 'interesting things' to a man beholding a woman. And likewise to women eyeing a man."
"Okay buddy, I can go and have a look at it" said the main purported to be Rostislav.
Norm then added: "This plant grows so high up in the tree and so far out on thin branches that you better have someone to rein you in should you start til slip. I saw a specimen from some ten meters down earlier today, up in that uninhabited hometree over there. I have no time for it, I need to go to a meeting with Max and Trudy, as one of the managers of the station I should be present at the grand meeting for all scientists, for all of them to present what they have cooking. You don't have to attend if you don't feel like, we all know that you are mostly in the business with making a summary to the research of miss Benn, the meeting is mostly for those who intend to make Pandora their home for all time. Since we know that you are probably not going to stay on after completing your project so affairs of Pandora are of less interest to you than to many others. This we all know so nobody will be missing you."
Norm walked away and knew that the trap had been well baited. They would sooner or later climb up to get that plant said to be growing up there. He walked into a thicket and found Jake and a kumpongu of warriors waiting. He told Jake about the trap being set and said: "Make the scouts look after them, if they now go up in that tree it means that they are taking the bait. I explained you what to do then Jake."
The scouts kept on the outlook and they really did climb up the tree – Jake had their gleeful report. He had had the tree mapped beforehand, he knew where the lianas they could use for escaping through backdoors were. They were watched as they climbed ever higher up, in the end they had come up to the very top at almost five hundred meters high up, far above any liana for escaping with. "Dude, it looks like Norm have sent us astray, I haven't seen any major epiphytes with big, fat roots growing up here, at any of the top branches we have been to. Is he cooking at something, or is he simply poking fun with us?"
Then suddenly they saw banshees in the air, alighting some fifty meters below them in the tree. "Rostislav" then said: "Calm down buddy, they are friendlies." Then suddenly that big avatar-looking na'vi chieftain Norm and the other "old-timers" called Jake came out of the tree trunk cavity, looking straight at them. "I have come to take you to an interogation, we have evidence to believe that you are involved in foul play. I ask you to come along without any fuss, you are so high up that there are no escape routes open to you. Should you try a lunge at me you and overcome me – I am as you know a seasoned marine – without falling down to your death during the shuffle, you will discover that there are warriors further down ready to apprehend you – I don't think you will contemplate jumping all the way down, will you? You are cornered, better don't try any useless attack."
It was clear to them now, Norm had tricked them into a trap. They went willingly along with Jake, down at the lower level they met some warriors who tied them up, when finally at ground level they were put on direhorse backs. When they arrived at New Hometree some time later they were brought down on their knees and Mo'at pricked them with her thorn. Her verdict was clear: "They are low level gangsters. Not so bad men themselves but they are working for extremely dangerous people."
Jake looked them straight into their eyes, with a gaze that could have cut through stone. "All right, now start talking. Do realize that I can dig into your mind through this (he held up his queue), connecting it to yours means that you can have no secrets for me. But tell me all I will be asking for so we won't need such a tedious process, and you'll be let off my hook. And most of the questions are for me to ask, I can give you some few concise answers in the end."
The two men took an anxious look at each other.
Jake: "First of all, what are your real names?"
"Henry Melezzo and Albert Panaggi, sir."
Jake: "Ummm. Next question: Who are you REALLY working for?"
"Alfred Gillebald. Big man in Houston. Ruthless guy, has killed more singlehandedly than any hired gun I could think of. He owns the city after killing or buying out all competition."
Jake: "Good. What is the real reason for you to come here?"
"An employee with an addiction to pay for sold a confidential RDA paper to the boss. It stated that miss Benn had been collecting some plants with medical uses at Pandora and would be sending cultures of them back to Earth. And the properties of some of those plants looked REALLY interesting to him! So those scientists sent to assist her were eliminated and we took their places, an RDA clerk with a gambling debt to pay down was made to 'adapt' the database for our use. So we came here to bring back those plant cultures she had left here when she had to leave, and if possible some others of 'interesting' uses too."
Jake: "All right. Tell me if there are any more of your ilk at Augustine Research Station. And are there more of you coming in approaching ISVs?"
"Not as far as we know. This goes for both questions."
Jake: "Happy to hear that. Who is your contact guy at the Earth spaceport?"
"Vince Gherardini. Truck driver. Or Maria Wang, canteen cook, she is a member of a Triad business associate of the boss. If Vince is for some reason unavailable when we arrive then she is the one to go to."
Jake: "Fine. Last question: What is your personal stake in this?"
"A hefty load of money and promotion to managing our out-stations at the Moon and Mars. And if you will allow us one single question in return: What is to happen to us now?"
Jake: "Very simple. You are to reside in the holding cell at the Augustine Research Station until the first ISV is calling in some few months, you will then be returning to Earth in handcuffs, bringing along a report about this case for law authorities at Earth to consider."
The eyes of the men took on a shade of mortal fear. "If we arrive at Earth without any cell cultures, do you know what will happen to us? And to our families?"
Jake: "Which is why you should beg to some divinity you still venerate that proper law people at Earth will take action and apprehend those two first of all and then see where they then will be lead, and put you and all your families under some witness protection programme. So my advice to you will be to cooperate with those law people with utmost zeal! What will happen to you in other case I can only guess, and as to your families – what will be happening to them in so case will probably be much the same as what will come to be if you don't return at all."
Norm came up: "But we can offer you a small assistance. We can put in some cell cultures of completely harmless sort, they will at least keep them hoodwinked for some time, until you have been able to get your beloved ones into safety. And we will make sure that only the captain aboard the ISV, and the skipper at the space ferry, will have the documents about your case, and only the captain will read them."
And then, a few months later, so took place. They were held in the holding room at the Station until the ISV hit Pandora orbit and then lead aboard the space ferry once the skipper had been made aware of them. They were given sedative injections so that they were unconscious when they were put aboard, then the space ferry crew could be told that they needed to return for proper medical treatment at Earth. The skipper were told so too and given a letter for the captain to read and him only, detailing the whole case. And then the space ferry took off and left, only one more visit to go before time for winding down the station would be arriving.
And, though nobody knew, it was still one year until storm clouds for the approaching 2nd Human – Na'vi War would be starting to appear.