Towards Love

10.confessions

The lessons didn't stop at riding a direhorse. Neteyam taught Lola to use a bow, a discipline they discovered she was quite good at. He also showed her what food was edible or not which was kind of mandatory for Lola to survive with them. 

They were out until sunset and got home by the time the stars appeared in the sky. Lola was still amazed by the bioluminescence and how even Na'vi were glowing in the dark. It was like they had light freckles, different for every single one of them. Neteyam's formed a shape around his nose and eyes making them stand out. "I love this." the young woman let out moments before they arrived at the village. Curious, Neteyam stopped "What?" She pointed at the bioluminescence on his body. "This. It is the most beautiful thing I've ever seen. I don't know how it looks like on me." Smiling he approached and raised a hand at the level of her face. "May I?" Lola nodded. 

She soon felt Neteyam's touch on her face, gentle. He traced shapes on it, following her own light freckles. She closed her eyes to try to picture what it could look like and smiled because it seemed as beautiful as his. "It compliments your face. Starting from here." He traced a line from her temple to the inside of her eye. "And going there." He now had his hand on the top of her forhead going down to the center of her eyebrows, forming kind of a moon. "Thanks" She opened her eyes to find the boy's face inches away from hers. Letting his hand down he gave her a teeth smile. She loved his way of smiling. It gave his face a little bit of innocence. 

"Lola!" They both turned towards the voice. Kiri was waving towards them from the top of the tree where the village was. "Our parents want to talk." Grimacing, Lola walked quickly towards her, Neteyam on her heels. "Do you know what they want to talk about?" Kiri shrugged. "We're all allowed to listen so I guess it's all of our business." Sighing anxiously, the girl walked hesitantly toward the Sullys' hut. Neteyam walked quickly past her to open the cloth door. He leaned towards her, smiling reassuringly, "It's going to be okay." He entered and let the two girls enter the room after him. The rest of the Sully family was already there. Tuk was redoing Lo'ak's braids, Spider sitting next to them, repainting his body with blue stripes while Neytiri and Jake were preparing the evening meal. They all looked up from what they were doing once the three of them were in.

Jake got up to sit on another mat, asking them to come join him. "Lola, we need to talk about yesterday." She nodded nervously. "What were you doing in this room when Neteyam came to look for you?" Unconsciously (or not) the others had stopped their business after Jake spoke. Lola didn't have the choice, she had to tell them about her mission. She needed their help anyway. "I ... was looking for what I could take before escaping." The former human tilted his head on the side, curious. "I took images of the massacres that we are responsible for. I want to send them to Earth for the right people to find them." Silence couldbe heard for seconds that felt like hours. The next question came from Neytiri. 

"How are you going to do that?"

"I don't know yet. But now that I am sure to have them, I can find a solution." 

"Do you know to whom you can send them?" 

"The chief of the pilot program I am a part of is as turned towards learning about the Na'vi as I am. If he sees what happens, he will definitely talk to the right people." 

"Where are those evidence now?" Jake looked directly at her. He knew that having these kind of documents here endangered his people. And he didn't like that. "In my pants' pocket. On my human body." Nodding, she could see him think. "We need to find somewhere safe to put them while we figure out a way."

"I hope for you that you were not seen getting to that base." Neytiri had anger in her voice. And fear. Fear for her village but above all, for her family. Lola could understand that. If she made one mistake, the woman would not hesitate to make her pay for it. 

"Mom, she is trying to help us." It was the first time that Lo'ak spoke. It was bold of him to try to stand up to his mother even if he thought her behavior was unfair. The others wouldn't have tried. Neytiri glared at her son, who made no further attempt to be a hero. 

"I am not trying to put you in danger. I just want the truth to be heard so that justice can be done. I can lay low for a while. Sending something to Earth would mean, send a message to my teacher and then catching a ship going there for him to receive the evidence. It is definitely too risky to do it in the coming days. We can think about it and if you think that it is too dangerous, I'll do it on my own." 

They all looked at the young woman surprised by her sudden outburst. Since she was there, Lola had tried to blend in as much as possible fearing of not being allowed to stay. But her mission was to help them. She wanted to succeed and save as many Na'vi as possible before it was too late. Being passive wasn't the answer and she wanted to change that, starting with showing she knew what she was doing and standing up to anyone who would hold her back. 

"Lola, what does Earth look like?" Tuk had intervened at the best possible moment. The little Na'vi was tired of hearing conversations she only half understood. One spoke to her all the time about the Earth these last days, without her being able to picture it distinctly. She wanted to know more. Lola smiled at her and got up to get closer. "You want to know about where I grew up?" The girl nodded eagerly. 

"The Earth is a planet that looks a lot like Pandora. We have plants, animals and people. But everything is on a human scale. On the other hand, in many places on Earth, the houses are not huts. We often live in hard buildings. And we don't hunt. We have places where all the food is already available and we just have to come and get it and take it home." Everyone was listening to Lola now. Neteyam and Kiri had gotten up as well to sit next to Spider. Neytiri and Jake stayed back but didn't miss a word the young woman said. "You don't have to kill or harvest to eat?" Lola smiled to the fact that they couldn't understand the principle of a supermarket, it seemed so natural to her. "Some do but not where I come from. Basically, we enter a building where we can find everything we might need to eat, wash, dress..." Spider was looking at her with envy. In a way, he must have been eager to see what he could have called home looked like. 

"That must be so cool! Some time I wish we didn't have to hunt. It can be soooo boring!" Everybody laughed at Tuk complaining. "Well, I like the fact that you can go and do whatever you want whenever you want. You ae more free than we are on Earth." 

Suddenly, Norm entered the hut. "Lola, you need to go back to your human body. It needs to eat." The young woman lost her smile for a few seconds. No one really noticed but Jake did. He was wondering how she was going to manage two bodies. He feared that she might feel like him when he was in her situation. At some point, he rejected his human body. All he wanted was feel free like Lola said Na'vi were. And he was wondering if it  would end up to be the same for her. He would need to check on her about that some time. 

Lola got up and went towards the entrance where the scientist was waiting for her. "I'll tell you more about Earth another time, duty calls!" She had spent such a day in her avatar form that she had forgotten her human body. Part of her felt bad about it, but on the other hand, she felt like she belonged. As if this life had been all she had expected. Lying on the bed, ready to close her eyes and return to her original body, the only thing she could think of was: I can't wait for tomorrow.

Author's note
Hey guys! So, only one chapter today but I promise to give you two as usual tomorrow! 
Please feel free to comment and let me know what you think about the story, I would love to have your opinion :)