...Heroes are often found in the most unlikely of places...
A/N: Don't worry, Piston will get important soon enough. Another chapter, steadily getting longer. Merry Christmas, and please review!
Why was she doing this? This wasn't right. He was meant to be at his squad's table, enjoying chow and laughing with them. He was a squaddie, now! Enjoy that companionship, his head said. Chibe on about Shaka's size, tease the Jacque's about his accent, laugh at Yu-Sin's impressions; get laughed at equally. But don't sit over here, talking to some science lass...It was bad for you, it was bad for here, and it made you look like an arse. But Piston couldn't help it. The tiny brain in his groin wouldn't let him, for obvious reasons. So, he was sitting at the Square's table. Laughing at they jokes, enjoying chow with them.
"So, Private, where are you from?"
Why the fuck did they always ask that question? Couldn't they just assume 'Earth' and move on? Yeah, he would be leaving pretty soon. As in, now. Emily, the square who'd dragged him over here, tensed and grimaced for him. Still with a smile on his face, Piston gripped his mess tin and said, politely.
"England."
Then he left, his army boots clattering precariously over the floor as he looked over towards the Squad. There was his space from yesterday. But the way all their eyes turned on him; it was scary. Before he even got there, Sarge stood up and asked "Why were you over there?"
Piston hesitated, wanting to tell the truth, but knew he'd be called out on it.
"I'm a lia-"
"Bullshit. It's latrine duty. Real reason."
Not much for it, now.
"Got a thing for that Emily one."
The reaction was instantaneous. Sarge grinned, a rare occurence if there ever was one, and nodded; the Squad laughed, and began shooting cat calls at him, varying from 'Lover-boy' to the much louder 'Hey! Square! Pist over here wants you in his bunk, 1900 hours, sharp!' Sarge was never particularly subtle. Emily turned, went red, stared at Eric's back for a second, before returning to her meal. He, on the other hand, took the insults and jibes on the cheek, sat down, and got back to eating. Couldn't look her in the face, though.
"I cannot fault your choices, mon ami." Jacques said, turning towards Emily and licking his lips. Cheeky sod, Jacques. Blonde, short hair, spindly, devious like a Fox; but fast and the best translator in the Squad. To assert his rights, Piston dealt a punch to his arm, from which Jacques yelped. Well, that was hilarious, so Piston was back in and laughing. Enjoying the useless slop. After a few minutes of this, Sarge turned serious.
"Alright, boys. We got a combat mission; being dropped into the Bush, near a thing called 'The Tree of Souls'. Our job is to get in there, scout out a defensive position, hail HQ, then bug out. No questions, no fucking heroics. From what the Guv says, we shouldn't have any trouble with the Smurfs, but you never know. Sack time for 2 hours after mess, then get your arses into the Utility sheds and suit up.." There was a communal nod. Things went FUBAR all too quickly these days, even Piston knew that. But now they knew their duties, they could get to the business of discussing the perks of all the female Squares.
Mess continued, with the same joviality that would come to define the Rifles. The other squads were on similar missions; the rest of the Company as well as the 5th had landed, so the base was now at max capacity. 1800 Men, along with their assorted tanks and aircraft, were topside, orbiting on the other side of the planet to avoid the meteor shower.
These were the men of the UN Expeditionary Force 'Forlorn Hope'.
Sarge slapped his metal spoon into the tin.
"Alright, lads, I'm off to read a book. Utility Sheds in 120 minutes; no fucking excuses." With that, he picked up the tin and marched smartly from the hall, a smirk on his face.
Banks looked around, his eyebrow creasing up in utter surprise.
"Sarge can read?"
They chuckled, and finished their meals quickly. Don't want to waste any sack time. As usual, Piston found himself the last around the table; he just wasn't as accustomed to shovelling your food down at a moment's notice. But he was consummate going at it, as Emily came and sat across from him. Now, having vegetable pulp dripping from your upper lip isn't exactly the best way to get a girl to like you. Lucky, that, since she was fuming.
"What did you tell them?" She asked, calmly, coldly, like a viper hissing before it struck. Piston swallowed and wiped his mouth, keeping eye contact with her.
"I told them I had a thing for you."
"And do you?"
It was his turn to lean forward, glaring at her, and speaking through gritted teeth
"What if I do? I'll be dead in a few weeks, anyway. You can forget me." He said it. The truth that lay between them. He was going to be dead soon. They all knew it. Well, maybe she didn't, as was obvious by the fact she still stared at him coldly.
"You'll beat them. You'll have the Na'vi on your side. You bea-."
"Have you ever heard of the term 'Pyrrhic victory?'
"...Yes."
"Then you'll know what I mean. Not a single man who has come with us is expecting to live. Greyson and Demar had state funerals on embarkation. My family buried my old things. Noone." That broke her, he thought. She leaned back. Eyes softened, like they did.
"You expect me to cry for you?"
That was harsh. That stung. Without a thought, he stood up. His messtin was empty anyway.
"I have a thing for you. You're smart, you're beautiful and you treat me like a person. Doesn't mean you have to do anything about it." He was off. The conversation had been in a pretty much abandoned hall; everyone else had left. But he didn't hear his own boots taping against the floor. He turned left, heading into the maze of corridors that was the Hell's Gate. And who should grab him and turn him around?
She kissed him, and he kissed back. They moved to her quarters, and reminded each other that they were still alive, human, and energetic.
Longfang had to say one thing about the Na'vi; they knew how to recover. He strode into the base of the hometree; above him, the branches of the massive sapling were entwined with that of it's dead forebearer, accelerating it's growth immensely. From nowhere, more of the Na'vi people appeared. They looked with intense relief at their members, and Jake rushed to meet them, being the center of their attention. A tall, proud, beauty emerged and embraced him with genuine love. Longfang was left, like so many times in the schoolyard, alone and abandoned.
For several minutes, Jake and the beauty argued fiercely, making gestures at Longfang and towards Hell's Gate.
"The Sky People are here to help us."
"What? How do you know?"
"They told me. They've shown me what will happen if we do not help them."
"How can you believe such lies?"
"I've seen them. They have brought no mining equipment. Max and Norm say they could have killed us awhile ago."
"They lie! They are liar, they cannot be trusted!"
"I was once one of them...Trust me, Neytiri."
That had ended it. But she still needed answers. Glaring at Longfang, she stormed up to him, looking down at him like an insect.
"What is he doing here?" It was a hiss.
Longfang bowed, elaborately, grinning the grin of a dead man. He was unique. For he knew no fear. Not in the way Jake did; saw fear and chose to be brave. Longfang was clinically impossible of feeling fear.
In English, Longfang proclaimed.
"Hello, my name is Longfang and I'll be your resident maniac for the Current War."
With speed and grace that matched an ikran, Longfang dodged around her. It quickly became obvious that there was a lot of the Na'vi, but Longfang just grinned, stepping between the humanoids until he was looking up at Jake once more.
"Well, Jake. Looks like we've got some work to do." He tapped his ear, quizzically.
"Go and gather your clans. Every last one. From the furthest Warrior to the nearest Elder." With a flourish, Longfang ran up a nearby tree branch and squatted on it, luminscent lights dazzling the viewers with the sudden burst of colour.
"Look. For all those who understand English; translate." A peculiar sight appeared as Longfang looked down at them. For the first time; he really looked at them. They were primitive; wearing little clothing, beads, leaves, that sort of paraphenalia. But they were beautiful...Graceful blue bodies stood tall and proud. Carrying themselves like they were one with the Planet. From what the Scientists had deciphered; they essentially were.
"I know that my Race has done much to anger you. I know that I seem like the physical manifestation of that greed. That heartlessness. But we're not here for the Ore. We're here to protect our families; like you did. We're here to fight with heart and soul; with gun and blade, with tooth and nail. Because really?" With a leap that would make Na'vi gasp with amazement, he sprang to the branch above.
"We're all dead men." He shrugged. Holding up 3 fingers, he seemed perfectly at ease with the next statement "We have 3 months. As a statement of the Sky People's faith, here I am. Your hostage. The Warleader's son. Teach me, beat me, kill me. It matters little. As long as you guys cooperate with my father, it's fine with me. But I'll give you alittle show of what you're facing." With the finesse that was becoming characteristic of him, Longfang threw a small metal cube up into the air, dropping gracefully to the forest floor. Quiet, and then light shone, and a massive creature spawned from the cube. The Na'vi screamed at this beast from the abyss! 12 feet tall, with most of it's body slithering along the ground, with great scything talons. Only Jake noticed that it did not move; merely rotated. Neytiri was the next to realise, and slowly the Omaticaya turned.
"This" Longfang spoke, before dropping from the branch. "is a Jormungadr. The mainstay of the Roach." He allowed sometime for his words to be translated. To him, it merely resembled a great centipede with claws, great gaping jaws. Fighting them had changed that perception. They could keep going with a head; fought through the greatest injuries, and never stopped coming – unless you knew how to pinch their one weakness.
"He's virtually invulnerable. One weak spot." The Wolfman drew his combat knife and passed it through the center of the rearing Jormungadr's chest. "5th segment down. It's brain. One decent arrow, spear or shot there, and it's done."
The Na'vi were utterly awed by this great monstrosity. The children were kept behind terrified parents; but Jake and Neytiri examined it closely.
"You can teach us how to fight these?"
That grin again.
"I can teach you how to kill them." Snorting, the hologram dissipated into the air, and the Na'vi sighed with relief. Looking in their eyes, that mix of apprehension and terror, Longfang knew they believed him; simply because it was too risky not to. Such was life. Now he saw them...Really saw them. Not a single one hid themselves, they hid others. He saw the honour that the ancient Indians of the Plains must've had. The tenacity of the Vikings; who quivered together with cows and pigs in the cold; the ferocity of the Celts, who feared no being; living or otherwise. From that moment forward, Longfang knew that he was among warriors.
Speaking the only Na'vi he knew, Longfang echoed "I see you."
Jake smiled.
***
"WHAT?" Just looking at the thing made Longfang want to kill it. It had 6 legs, which was normal, but other then that it looked like a cross between a Horse and a Rhinoceroes.
"I want to see if you can ride it without the braid." Jake gestured at his long, flowing braid of hair – a Neural uplink, as Longfang had quickly deciphered. Bad thing about the request of mounting the Direhorse was it's back reached his eyeline.
But he wasn't the kind of guy to refuse.
Trying, he quickly discovered two things;
1) Pandoran Mud tastes extremely dissimiliar to Terran mud.
2) Direhorse's do not like humans.
Well, they accepted that Longfang wouldn't be going through the same interesting learning process Jake had. Many were still incredibly suspicious of him, even after 2 days of him indulging in their customs, and hunting alongside them with Loki. Neytiri had been impressed at how he had waited, still for 3 hours, amongst Hammerhead Titanotheres, for a single strike at a Calf's underbelly; not a movement, not a sound. To him, it was just Sniper Training all over again.
So, they agreed to let him teach them. All of them were shocked when he suggested it.
But he knew how to kill. These people, proud and noble they were, but they hunted; instead of killing. Longfang had been raised to do it.
It was the morning of the 3rd day. Jake had cleared an area, and drawn his knife. Around the two, about two dozen hunters had gathered. Neytiri and Mo'at stood to the side, still sceptical of the Sky Nantang.
"Okay. Neytiri. Translate." Longfang said, nodding. He had removed his combat vest, and drawn his combat knife. Jake had drawn his hunting knife.
"A Jormungadr is stronger then you. It's bigger, tougher and bred for War. So what's your advantage?" He held his arms out wide, his pale skin sweating in the heat. Scars dotted his perfect torso, and he nodded at Jake.
"Attack me."
Jake went in for a single, powerful strike. Any human would have died; knife through the skull. Longfang, on the other hand, dodged to the left as the knife was barely a few centimeters from his eye, stuck out his foot, brought the knife up and dragged the flat of it against Jake's stomach, before hitting him hard on the back with the pommel.
Jake toppled, to the collective astonishment and chagrin of the Na'vi. But they were getting used to it.
"But we have three advantages; we are fast. We are fierce. And we are smart." There was no amused expression on his face, nor some stark grin. It was a look of concentration and focus.
"I will teach you how to kill these things with knifes, hands, arrows, and their own scythes. Because while everyone was in cryo, guess who was awake, studying and observing these things?"