The bottle of whiskey on the table was slowly emptying. Whiskey and alcohol in general, was a very rare commodity on Pandora, as none of the humans had had the capacity for brewing yet. But the two drinkers didn't seem to mind. The bottle slowly emptied.
The lumberjack crews had set up their plantation directly next to the mines. As well as being in the already existing protection of the mining base, the landscape was ideal for harvesting timber. The lumber yard itself was located inside the confines of the mines perimeter, and on the other side of the base laid the great hole in the ground that was the mines. The yard itself was comprised of a group of prefabricated buildings, comprising of offices, a small cafeteria, and various workshops. It was here that the humans would breakdown the Pandoran timber into planks and then treat it for storage. None of the lumberjacks had any of the monstrous Slash Cutter's that so typified human presence on Pandora. Slash cutters were used for clearing land, not harvesting timber. They would often rend the timber useless, and even if this wasn't the case, they often cut down trees far too quickly for the lumberjacks to keep up with.
Although the chief export of the colony was Magnium, wood came at a close second. With most of the Earth's forest now eradicated or under total environmental protection, wood was a material that could fetch exorbitant prices on the market. Lumberjacks knew this, and prided themselves that they were delivering on one of the richest resources in the galaxy. Unfortunately, gone were the days of red tartan swandri's and hairy chests; all lumberjacks wore the standard colony exo-suit, helmets and reflective vests for safety purposes. Despite this tragic loss, many male lumberjacks grew great hairy beards, as homage to the Old Ways.
The disturbances had been going on for a few days when the militia was called in. The standard procedure of the lumberjacks was to first mark the appropriate trees for felling, then restrain the tree with cables, cut through with a mixture of chain sawing and thermite, let the tree down slowly, chainsaw off the limbs and finally haul the tree away for processing. The problem was that even with militia and merc guards watching out for threats, the na'vi were continuously harassing the operation. They'd fire arrows at the trees surrounding trees, they'd tamper with the equipment, which would usually cause it to backfire when the workers needed them and many workers had a constant nagging suspicion that the na'vi were leading animals to the site with baits and lures. The veteran mercenaries figured that it was the work of young upstarts, and kids who were feeling brave enough to stick it to the humans. They were basically the na'vi equivalent of hippie students who wanted to stick it to the corporation… except they were far more aggressive and they had more dangerous tools at their disposal.
About a day before Alex and Noh were sent out, a 'representative' from the Omaticaya tribe came to the colony: Ar'kadi. He said that the tribe knew about the disturbances, and wanted to meet with the liaisons and the lumberjacks to sort out the problems. While the na'vi engineer stayed behind with a few others tribesmen, Alex and Noh, along with their prospective militia squad got sent to the mines to meet up with the Omaticaya to sort the mess out.
They were a little surprised to run into Jake yet again. He was a little more relaxed when it came to dealing with Garnett as opposed to Noh, and he was as friendly as a Na'vi could be with a whole party of warriors at his back. Overall, Alex was pleased with how the day went. The lumberjacks were far more pleasant to work with than with the miners and mercenaries, and were willing to make concessions themselves. Some of the na'vi that Jake had brought along was willing to back down. Alex reminded everyone that there was a deal between the two people, and that both sides had to make it work. Overall, everything had gone well.
Now night was falling over Pandora. The militia and Na'vi were watching Emile's fire breathing and dancing, the lumberjacks had gone to bed, and now Alex was sharing a bottle of whiskey with Jake.

"How's the kid coming along?" Alex asked, pouring himself a glass.
"Fine… Why do you ask about her?" Jake frowned.
"Well, it's just…" he paused. "I did notice something out of place in her."
"You saw the fingers, right?"
"Yeah."
"What about them?"
"I just wonder, do people think of her differently?" Alex asked.
Jake thought for a moment. "She's got the same level of respect as what you would come to expect out of a chieftains daughter. And her friends are still her friends."
"What about everyone else?"
"I'm not sure."
"What is her name?"
"Miri."
"Ah."
Alex already knew that, but he thought that it would be better to ask, than accidently blurt it out. It would have sounded a little strange.
"What about you Alex?" Jake questioned, taking a sip. "You got any family?"
Alex was silent for a moment. He stared at the bottle.
"Oh right… I forgot…." Jake said quietly. He remembered Alex's speech back at the Hometree.
"It's okay, it's okay."
"Where exactly do you come from?"
Alex slumped back in his chair. He looked at the bottle again.
"I grew up in Toronto." He began.
"East Coast Sprawl?"
"Yeah. Not as bad as down south, but it still had its fair share of dark places." He sighed. "Dad used to work in one of the factories, making data pads. He died from cancer from the heavy metals involved. Medical bills weren't covered by insurance. They never are. Mom used to work in cleaning at one of the arcologies, but she died in a train accident when I was young, and Michelle was still a baby."
"Was she your sister?"
"Yeah… I took care of her when I wasn't in school, and dad was in work. We had to be careful with hiring babysitters 'cause we didn't have much money, and neither of us trusted those robo-nannies. I was about twelve when she came into being, but after a while, I started to feel like a father as much as a big brother. More so when dad died."
"What happened when he did go?"
"I was just leaving school. I joined the police force because I always wanted to help people, you know? I wanted to stop any crime and injustice I saw." He shook his head and took another sip. "Anyway, the new job came with a better pay check than my dad's factory job, so we got to move to a better apartment. I could pay for a decent sitter, Michelle was growing up great and I was enjoying my job. On Earth, I'd say that we were doing pretty well."
He was silent for a while, staring into the amber flask of alcohol.
"Remember when I said my sister was raped and killed? That probably didn't happen, although in my darkest of thoughts, sometimes I do think that could have happened."
"What did happen?"
"I pissed off the wrong people. I was a nice upstanding part of the force and the cartels didn't like that. This was during a big crime war, and things were pretty bad. They wanted to make an example of us. So they hit us where we lived."
What slightly scared Jake was just how matter-of-fact Alex sounded.
"I was out taking a longer shift in order to be a part of a drug bust when I heard the call on my radio. I was there faster than anyone else… Not that it made a difference once I got there."

They were silent for a while. Outside, they could hear some Pandoran bird call out. Alex was about to break the silence by changing the topic to something less grim, when Jake asked Alex a question that he sometimes asked himself.
"So why did you come here?"
Alex frowned in thought.
"I don't know…" he thought for a while. "I think a part of me just wanted to get the clean slate. I just wanted to start over again." He paused. "Or maybe I was running away. Maybe I was trying to forget what had happened. I don't know."
They sat there silently in thought, Alex in his chair and Jake on a crate, thinking about what to say.
"Do you ever think about your old human life?" Alex asked. "The people you've left behind?"
Jake thought for a while. He knew that Alex hadn't asked him about whether or not he missed the crappy old life he had. He asked whether he missed any people.
"Do you want to know something?"
"What?"
"This isn't actually my body."
Alex sighed something disappointed. "Yeah, we kind of already knew about the whole avatar thing…"
"Nah, nah, nah, this isn't actually my avatar." Jake clarified, pointing at himself.
"What do you mean?"
Jake shifted himself. "I had a brother once. He wasn't a jarhead like me, he was a scientist. His name was Tommy."
"Sooo…" Alex began "Let me guess, this was HIS avatar?"
"Yep. He was supposed to take it when he went to Pandora, but he got mugged before he went." Jake sighed. "Suddenly there was this big growing na'vi in a tank somewhere, that cost a bazillion or so dollars to make and somebody had to pilot it. Since only a person with similar DNA could do so, guess who they went to."
There was more silence.
"Sometimes… sometimes I feel like all of this is happening… me being here, me doing all of this, me living…. Because Tommy died." He looked guilty. "It makes me feel like…."
"Like a thief?"
"No… Like a fucking grave robber."

They sat in the cabin for a while longer. They talked about less grim aspects of their time, the people they met, the colony, the Hometree, the moon, the general works. They were just talking about children when Alex said that he needed to go and check the other guys. Jake nodded and said that he would wait.
He didn't really feel drunk. He was surprised that he could stomach the human liquor to begin with, and he linked it to just his bigger body. He didn't feel very bad anyway.
He was just thinking about the homeland, when he was hit by the most blistering headache he had ever had. He had headaches before, but this one was easily on the top three. It caused him to clench his head, as if it was splitting apart. It felt like someone had managed to cram a crowbar in his head and was prying it open. Jake couldn't focus right.
The pain was slowly subsuming. It was low enough to allow him to think well enough, but large enough to make sure it was the only thing to be thinking of. His vision had been affected though. He thought that everything around him had been covered in lint; everything was fuzzy, opaque and certainly not clear. He noticed that the chair in front of him had someone in it. He briefly felt like an idiot for having one of these episodes in front of Alex.
Then he realised that the person in the chair wasn't Alex. Neither was it human or na'vi.
The figure in the chair was as big as a na'vi, but he was vaguely human shaped. He couldn't really think of any other details, because it was as if the figure was completely shrouded in shadow and smoke. Completely, except for the eyes, which seemed to almost glow a dull red. They seemed strangely familiar, although Jake couldn't think why. The figure was seated comfortably; his leg crossed on his knee, and gave the strangest sense of looking like an evil psychologist. Jake could feel himself shivering at the sight.
"You've been getting pretty friendly with the invaders Jake." The figure said. Jake instantly recognized the voice.
"Stay the hell out of my head." He snapped. "I don't need you."
"On the contrary Jake, you do need me." The shadow man smirked. "Hell, I couldn't leave even if I wanted to."
"You're not even real!"
"Not in the ordinary sense. That said, you're going to need to be able to tell the difference between the physical and the intangible really soon."
"What the hell do you mean?"
"It's awakening Jake." The figure said with seriousness. "You've felt it ever since the humans came back, now it's finally awakening after millennia of being abandoned."
"What's awakening?" Jake nearly screamed. "What the fuck are you talking about?"
"You'll know." The shadow man said with maddening simplicity. "In the meantime, the only advice I can give you, is to take care of your people. They're going to need you now more than ever."
Then just like that, the shadow man blinked out of existence.

Jake sat on his crate with disbelief. He looked at the empty chair, and then he looked at the empty bottle. He really wanted to believe that what had just happened was just the result of alcohol affecting a na'vi body. He knew that that would just be wishful thinking though.
The door opened up for the militia leader Alex.
"Sorry about that Jake, I just had to-"
Alex stopped mid-sentence. He just stood there, staring at Jake.
This was really starting to get at the chieftain. Enough weird shit had happened.
"What?" he almost shouted, desperation edging into his mind.
"What happened to your glow?"
Jake paused for a second, and then started looking at his own body. Alex was right. The once beautiful pattern of glow spots that once adorned his body was gone.
Jake got off the crate and strode over to the window. He saw that the forest wasn't glowing anymore.
"Get the lights on." He shouted. "Get the fucking lights on!"