Avatar: What if you were there?

14: Ranger Rick

You were taken and shown the video of Jake hitting the camera.

"So, what?" said Quaritch "You find yourself some local tail and just completely forget what team you're working for?" Oh yeah, this reminds you. Jake mated with Neytiri. Now you were mad at him too, you could have mated with Tsu'tey if it wasn't because of Neytiri. But Jake just does whatever Jake wants.

"Parker, there is time to salvage the situation," said Grace.

"Parker-" you were cut off by Quaritch.

"Shut your pie hole!" he yelled.

"Or what Ranger Rick?" asked Grace.

"You gonna shoot us?" you added.

"I could do that," replied Quaritch. You stared him down.

"You need to muzzle your dog," Grace said to Parker.

"Yeah, can we just take this down a couple of notches, please?" intervened Parker.

Jake spoke up, "You say you want to keep your people alive?" They both focused on him. "You start by listening to her."

"Those trees were sacred to the Omaticaya in a way you can't imagine," began Grace. Parker scoffed and circled around you.

"You know what? You throw a stick in the air around here, it's gonna land on some sacred fern," he said and mockingly added, "For Christ sake!"

"Well the same could be said for this room, Parker," you replied. "I could simply drop coffee anywhere in this room and cause a lot of damage."

"And I'm not talking about some kind of pagan voodoo here," added Grace. "I'm talking about something real, something measurable in the biology of the forest."

"Which is what, exactly?" asked Parker, crossing his arms.

"What we think we know is that there is some kind of electrochemical communication between the roots of the trees, like the synapses between neurons," said Grace. Parker wore your same, confused expression. "And each tree has ten-to-the-fourth connections to the trees around it. And there are ten-to-the-twelfth trees on Pandora."

"Which is a lot, I'm guessing," said Parker.

"Well it won't be if you keep cutting them down," you replied coldly.

"It's more connections than the human brain," said Grace. "Get it? It's a network. It's a global network and the Na'vi can access it. They can upload and download data. Memories."

"At sites like the one you just destroyed," you added.

Parker thought about it for a second. "What the hell have you guy-"

"Just because you don't understand it, doesn't make it false," you interrupted. "How can you accept the fact that DNA codes your entire body, that everything you are is a mere double helix, but not the beauty surrounding you?" He was quiet. "You will either go down in history as a heartless tyrant who destroyed our opportunity to grow or the one that saved an entire planet."

"If you want to share this world with the Na'vi then you have to understand them," said Grace.

"Fine," he said. You finally got something through his thick skull. "I guess we can-"

"I'd say we understand them just fine, thanks to Jake here," interrupted Quaritch. He was just not giving up. "Hey, Doc, come take a look." It was a video of Jake. He told the video log that the Na'vi were not going to give up their home, that no deal could be made. That it was all a waste of time. "So, since a deal can't be made. I guess things get real simple. Jake, thanks. I'm getting all emotional. I might just give you a big wet kiss."

You all sighed in defeat.