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.

I would like to thank TuckingFypo and RandomNumber1000 for taking time to review my story. I appreciate your input.

Also, I would like to credit Christopher T. Shields, as some of the machines in this story were inspired by his works.

Chapter 3: The hermit

He had gotten up out of bed, washed, and dressed himself. His breakfast consisted of the usual foodstuffs, nothing very noteworthy, or tasteful for that matter. The remaining stock wasn't what it used to be, however. He figured he could keep living like this for an additional six months at maximum. After having finished his breakfast, he prepared to go outside. As usual, he stopped in the doorway to the lab for a few moments, staring at his experiment, letting his thoughts wander for a while. Then, he continued with his routine. He put on his gas mask and his usual cap bearing the RDA logo. After having locked the outer airlock door, he made his way to a large truck, climbing the ladder towards the cabin. Once inside, he removed his mask and let out a sigh. No matter how many times he did that, he never forgot that he was relying on a device to keep him alive. Not that he had anything against technology in general; it was quite the opposite. But he just couldn't fully trust something that he hadn't made himself, or at least had had a hand in developing. He now started the engine of the vehicle and set the audio player to shuffle. Retro rock music masked the humming of the engine as he drove off to the worksite.

John Simons was a technical engineer formerly employed by the RDA. He had been on Pandora for over ten years now. On Earth, he had begun his career just after he had graduated the engineering school. Though his end results had been quite average, there had been one thing that had set him more or less apart from the rest of the graduates. He had a very strong faith in himself and his ability to achieve any goal. And to him it wasn't just self-confidence. It had almost become a religion, though one could consider it to be somewhat of an obsession as well.

A few years later, his employer offered him a chance to live and work on another world: the Saturnian moon of Titan. He had gladly taken it. Of course, this moon, while different from Pandora in many ways, was almost equally as hostile. The atmosphere was unbreathable as it lacked oxygen and it was filled with poisonous substances. The temperature was also so low, that travelling the surface with a heavily insulated spacesuit was an absolute must. This didn't keep him from his work however. He had built his own customized spacesuit for daily uses. His job was to keep the methane collectors running, a job that was done by twenty out of the total of thirty-five people stationed at the outpost.

Titan was a rich deposit for methane, which could freely be collected from the air and the various lakes on the surface. Despite this fact, the company was unable to maintain a profitable business and went bankrupt after twelve years of operation on the moon. The personell had no other choice than to leave the outpost. After having been gone for over eight years, John finally returned to Earth. Unable to return to the cycle of his former life, he turned to his interest in technology. The years on Titan had yielded him experience with all sorts of technology and ways to maintain it with limited resources. This prompted him to set up a Do-It-Yourself shop. And this kept him going for several years. It was not until he met the scientist Gerald Hamilton that he began to think about taking his life into a new direction. Gerald told him all about the RDA, the moon Pandora, and the project he had been assigned to. The project's goal was to improve the relations with the natives of the moon. Members assigned to the project would pilot remote bodies that resembled the appearance of the locals. This was unlike anything John had ever heard before. He felt that he still had to do something significant with his life, as he was already approaching his early forties.

As Gerald and John became good friends, Gerald attempted to get him recruited into the program. Not long after, he was called in to be interviewed and screened. After a few weeks had passed, John received word that he had not been selected due to his specialization on an inappropriate field of study. He did however receive an invitation for an interview concerning a different job: engineering technician. Being somewhat disappointed, he was thankful that he still got the chance to go to the moon, albeit not in the way he had imagined.

Getting hired for this job was not a problem for him with the record he had. He then sold his shop and everything else he owned, as he anticipated he was never going to return to Earth again. A few days later, he, together with Gerald and many others, were shipped out towards the interstellar vessel in Earth orbit. Once he had arrived on Pandora, he was assigned to an outpost outside the perimeters of Hell's Gate. His superior, Mark Dodgson, was the leading engineer there, who also held a military rank. His goals were not that different from John's, but his way of achieving them was. Mark was quick to resort to violence and often used his broad shouldered physique to intimidate those who did not obey his commands. This was in contrast to John, who disliked the use of guns and who didn't have any commanding presence. In time, he got used to the new surroundings and his superior nonetheless.

During his first year on Pandora, while he was performing maintenance duty outside, he had his first encounter with the native population. John had noticed earlier that two Na'vi children had appeared on one of the edges of the quarry. Fearing that his superior would notice them too, he made all sorts of gestures in an attempt to get them to leave. That didn't help however. Suddenly, one of them lost grip and slid down the edge. He had to do something. Therefore, he ran towards the edge to investigate.

The girl desperately tried to climb back up again, but couldn't as it was to steep. In an attempt not to scare her, John approached slowly and low to the ground. He was also a bit scared himself, having never seen an alien up close before. Talking in Basic English, he told her that he wanted to help her. She seemed to at least understand the word 'help'. John pointed towards a ramp, which was used by the various mining machines to enter and exit the quarry. Then, he asked her to follow him, making more gestures as he moved towards the slope, while still facing her. It took a few moments before she actually started following him. She was initially scared and unsure of this alien's intentions. Once she saw the way back up, she ran back to her brother. By that time, however, an adult Na'vi, armed with bow and arrow, was also standing near the edge. John instantly put his hands up. At first he kept the arrow aimed at John, but then put his bow down. The adult muttered something to him in Na'vi language, before the three went back into the jungle, leaving John still standing with his hands in the air.

Though he did not realize it himself, the Na'vi had respected him for this act. This was one of the main reasons he was still on Pandora today. The years following this event were relatively quiet, and John didn't have any further encounters with the natives. After the RDA assault on the Omaticaya Hometree seemed to have backfired, however, the order at the outpost began to fall apart. Mark Dodgson began to organize a local army on colonel Quaritch's orders. He also commanded John to participate in the planned attack. John acknowledged this order in front of his superior, but secretly planned to disobey it when the attack would commence. His reasoning behind this choice was that he wasn't a soldier, nor should he be commanded as one. Besides, he would probably only get in their way.

John went hiding in the basement a few minutes before Mark rallied all personell, assuming that they were too busy preparing themselves to notice his absence. He was right about that. In the chaos at Hell's Gate, the scientist Gerald managed to steal a buggy, and with it he made his way to John, who had secretly contacted him earlier. By the time he arrived there, the troops had already gone into battle. The two waited patiently until the last sounds of machine gun fire in the distance had faded. As the hours passed, they began to wonder if anybody would even return. More and more it seemed that there hadn't been a victory. At least, not for the RDA. This was quite worrying. The fact that they hadn't fought for their race didn't mean that they didn't care about who would win. A RDA victory would guarantee that they could stay here, while a Na'vi victory, on the other hand, would not. Then, a few Na'vi appeared on the grounds near the main building. Gerald persuaded John to reveal themselves, so that they would know what would become of them. Gerald convinced him of the fact that the Na'vi weren't bloodthirsty and that they wouldn't kill them without a good reason.

As the members of the two races met each other outside, the Na'vi expressed to them that they were to be sent back home, just like the rest of the RDA personell. The humans then expressed their desire to stay on Pandora as they had no intensions of fighting them or harming the environment. One of the Na'vi, Wukan, now seemed to recognize John from the incident a few years earlier. He remembered how this human had tried to help his sister, Ney'ite. As all of the Na'vi present were somewhat convinced that their intensions were harmless, a verbal truce was then formed. John and Gerald would be allowed to live at the outpost peacefully. Their territory would also include the quarry and a small part of the forest to help sustain themselves. Crossing the border was not allowed. In exchange for this, the Na'vi would leave them alone.

Now, he really was alone. Gerald had died recently of a sudden stroke, as John believed. John realized he could have had a wife and children if he had stayed on Earth, but he had instead chosen this life. Though his future didn't seem very bright, there was one last hope: his experiment…