The forest was damp, dark, and suffocatingly humid. Every creepy-crawly of the night was out and about, their relentless chirping turning the jungle into a loud, buzzing orchestra—definitely not the kind of place for a peaceful night's sleep if you weren't used to it.
Ava lay in a makeshift hammock that clung to her like a wet sock, the fabric soaked with moisture and sporting a musty odor that assaulted her nostrils with every breath.
The smells and sounds of the forest were a stark contrast to the sterile lab she once called home. Back there it was all concrete, cold fluorescent lights, and the sharp scent of alcoholic cleaning supplies that obliterated her sense of smell.
It was etched into her memory like a tattoo, clawed deep into her mind.
Footsteps and the low, ceaseless hum of machines once echoed through those sterile hallways, now replaying in her head like a broken record.
Ava shifted in the hammock, causing the branches it was tied to to creak loudly, as if groaning in frustration with her.
She glanced over at her companion, who was out like a light in a hammock a few feet away. The bioluminescence of the forest cast a gentle glow on his figure, his chest rising and falling in a way that made her want to throw a rock at his head.
"Ugh, why does he get to fall asleep so damn fast?" she muttered, rolling her eyes in frustration. Seriously, it wasn't fair.
Kit, the one she had escaped the lab with four years ago, had a talent for knocking out faster than you could even say sleep.
Although it was a running joke, it had become a bit of a problem when they were out gathering supplies; she often found him slumped against a tree trunk, snoring peacefully while she was busy playing jungle ninja; crawling up trees, hiding in bushes, and collecting bark, fruits, and other necessities for their survival.
Despite his well-meaning promises to help, Kit would inevitably drift off into dreamland under the Pandoran sun, which filtered through the thick canopy above, leaving Ava to do the dirty work.
She huffed and turned over in the hammock again, her legs restless as she grunted in frustration.
Sleep, rest—her body craved it, yet her mind refused to shut up for once.
For weeks, her thoughts had kept her awake, plagued by memories of the lab, the explosion, and the constant struggle to survive in Pandora's unforgiving wilderness. Every time she closed her eyes, these memories played out in her mind like a horror-movie she couldn't turn off.
Ava was an experiment, just like Kit and all the other poor children who had the pleasure of growing up in that horrid lab.
The RDA, responsible for the inhumane exploitation of Pandora's resources, hadn't stopped at creating Avatars and Recombs when it came to their twisted experiments on DNA.
In a secluded lab hidden within Pandora's lush jungle, beneath what appeared to be a weapons storage facility, they conducted their most classified experiments.
Even most of the researchers at Hell's Gate were unaware of its existence or what was going on in there.
In that lab, Na'vi DNA was mixed with human DNA, and sometimes, other extraterrestrial DNA gathered from the humans' endless crusades. The goal was to create soldiers—superhumans who wouldn't need exo-packs or Avatars to fight for the RDA's objectives. Exo-packs could be ripped off, the robots the humans piloted could be destroyed, and no matter how advanced, machines were always prone to failure. Avatars could be de-linked, or the link itself could be faulty. Even Recombs, which didn't require psionic links, were difficult to create because it required a willing individual to download all their knowledge, memories, and experiences into a foreign, blue body.
The RDA was keen on working around those pesky limitations to pawn off their work on someone else entirely.
And so, they turned to even more experiments.
The lab had been a cold, unfeeling place, filled with the sterile scent of antiseptic and the harsh hum of fluorescent lights.
Ava's memories of it were a mix of pain and confusion, of endless tests and gruelling training sessions.
Growing up there was a lonely existence. Few of the tampered embryos survived, and those who did were trained with zero mercy.
.Ava could still see the younger kids, crying as soldiers made them reload their guns, forcing them to shoot at yet another cardboard target. Their small arms would tremble, their shoulders aching from hours of pointless target practice. Ava couldn't help but scoff at the memory—who in their right mind thought a six-year-old was ready for war?
There was no warmth or love in that place, except for the occasional hug from the few kind-hearted researchers who'd sneak them some stale candy or let them watch old movies. The kids had to be each other's family. When they weren't busy shooting at cardboard, they were learning how to survive in the jungle—hunting, lighting fires, figuring out which of Pandora's critters were safe to eat and which ones would eat them. They were also taught to avoid the Na'vi and move stealthily through the forest, approaching targets, striking quickly, and leaving no trace.
Kit was the only kid Ava's age; the others succumbing to the severe tampering of their bodies by the RDA.
Naturally, Kit and Ava stuck together, spending long nights with stolen books, learning about the Na'vi and Pandora, the planet they were born on but were taught to hate.
They'd picked up bits of the Na'vi language from those books, giving them a way to talk in private since none of the soldiers bothered to learn it. To the soldiers, the Na'vi were just big blue apes- hostiles and targets, nothing more.
To the children in the lab though, the Na'vi were something else - their ancestors, in a real twisted way.
None of them were born of a womb; none had parents. Grown in petri dishes and artificial amniotic sacs, they had no family apart from each other. They all looked different—some more human, some almost entirely Na'vi, and some were something else altogether.
Few hybrids had extraterrestrial DNA apart from Na'vi, as it was largely useless on Pandora.
Ava was one of those really mixed up hybrids, like a cocktail with too many components to be good anymore.
Along with Na'vi and human DNA, she carried the genes of the Ashari, an extraterrestrial species the RDA had encountered on a distant planet called Yamara.
The Ashari were a peaceful people, their society built on harmony with their planet's unique environment.
They had crystalline structures embedded in their bodies, allowing them to thrive in the toxic atmosphere of their homeworld.
The RDA, always real happy to exploit yet another species, saw potential in the Ashari's resilience and their ability to manipulate light through the crystals embedded in their bodies.
In Ava, the Ashari DNA manifested in subtle ways.
The crystalline veins beneath her skin glowed faintly in the dark, especially in moments where she felt heightened emotions.
She didn't like that about herself. No matter how stoic her pokerface was, those pesky glowing veins would act like an alarm she couldn't turn off, blaring out into the world that she was feeling some type of way.
Her eyes, more reflective than a typical Na'vi's, allowed her to see clearly in the dim light of nighttime.
And sometimes, when the forest was silent and still, she could almost feel the electromagnetic hum of the planet, a sensation that seemed to vibrate through her very bones.
But these gifts came at a cost.
Ava's hybrid nature set her apart from everyone else, even Kit. She could sense it in the way he sometimes looked at her, like she was something strange, something... different. Kit never said it out loud, but she knew he was a little jealous of her abilities. He didn't have the Ashari DNA, just the Na'vi and human mix, which made him stronger and faster than a human, but not as perceptive as Ava. That difference between them had always been there, a quiet tension that neither of them talked about.
As Ava accepted she wasn't going to get any quality sleep tonight, she couldn't help but think of Dax.
He was one of the boys she had taken under her wing back at the lab.
As one of the oldest, she felt it was her duty to make life a little less awful to the little ones.
She saw all of them as siblings, every single one of the children stuck at the facility, and she felt responsible for them. Like a big sister would.
Dax was timid and shy, and the soldiers were especially hard on him because he didn't perform the way they wanted. But he was kind—too kind for the life they were forced to live, not cut out for war.
Ava remembered the time during a survival exercise when Dax befriended a Tikeyan—a cat-like predator that usually hunted bugs and small reptiles.
He'd tried to keep his little buddy a secret, sneaking off to play with it in the forest. He even named it Whispie, short for "whisper," because it moved so quietly through the trees.
But, of course, the trainers found out and made him shoot it. No room for compassion in the RDA's playbook—they crushed any hint of empathy as soon as they saw it.
Ava could still hear Dax's cries, the way he mumbled Whispie's name in his sleep.
It was something he never got over, and it only fueled Ava's anger toward the RDA.
They all slept in a common room, and Dax would often climb into Ava's bed, hiding his face against her as she rocked him to sleep, softly singing a lullaby.
He was one of those hybrids with more than just Na'vi and human DNA—he had two kurus, and his skin shone with golden hues speckled with spots that resembled pure sunlight.
Although Ava swore to protect all of her siblings, she was especially fond of Dax.
The memory of Dax hit her hard, tears welling in her eyes. She had failed him. The day of the explosion, she had failed him.
Ava's eyes burned as she pushed the memory away, trying to lock it up in the back of her mind, only leaving behind a dull ache in her chest.
She couldn't help but wonder where the others were—if they were even alive.
At the end of the day, what were the odds?
She turned her gaze back to Kit, whose face was peaceful in sleep. He had always been able to escape into his dreams, even when the world around them was falling apart.
She envied him for that.
They had been on the run for four years, ever since the Na'vi had launched their attack on the RDA storage facility. The explosion had torn through the jungle, shaking the ground and lighting up the night sky. In the chaos, Ava had tried to gather the other children, to keep them together. But the lab was a complete mess, alarms blaring, smoke filling the air. Scientists and soldiers alike were running, shouting, dying.
She had screamed for the kids—called out their names as she fought her way through the wreckage. But in the end, she had only managed to find Kit. He had been half-conscious, bleeding from a gash on his forehead. She had dragged him into the forest, away from the flames and the falling debris, away from the cries of the others.
The guilt never left her. It gnawed at her every day, every night, driving her to search for them, to believe that they might still be out there somewhere, hiding, surviving just like her and Kit.
Kit didn't share her hope.
"They're gone, Ava," he had told her time and time again, his voice heavy with a mix of resignation and anger. "You have to let it go. They didn't make it. We're the only ones left."
But Ava couldn't accept that. She couldn't let them go. They were her family, the only family she had ever known. She had to believe that they were still out there, somewhere in the wilderness of Pandora, waiting to be found. She had to find them.
The arguments between her and Kit had become more frequent as time passed. He wanted to settle somewhere, to stop running, to find a way to live in peace. But Ava's obsession with finding the others kept them moving, kept them searching, even when the trail had long since gone cold.
Kit stirred in his sleep, mumbling something under his breath before settling again. Ava watched him for a moment longer, her heart heavy with the weight of her unresolved guilt. She knew he was right in a way—chances were, the others hadn't survived. But she couldn't stop looking. She couldn't stop hoping.
The forest around them was alive with the sounds of night, the bioluminescent flora casting an ethereal glow on everything. Ava sighed and turned her gaze to the canopy above, the stars barely visible through the thick foliage. Somewhere out there, her siblings might still be alive, lost in the wilderness, waiting for her to find them.
And she would keep searching. No matter what.