Losing Game ~ Lo'ak Sully

.+Chapter One+.

One Year Later...

    I'm currently flying with Lo'ak and Neteyam. The rest of the Clan's warriors aren't too far ahead of us. We're going on a war party with them as spotters. We're supposed to be watching for bogeys and calling them in when we see them. We fly through the forest with the clan and make our way out into a clearing where an RDA train is on course. We fly above it waiting for the right time to attack.
    "Ground team, go!" Jake commands into the comms. I hear war cries in the distance and see the track in front of the train get blown up. The wheels of it screech and try to come to a stop but it doesn't work as the rain gets thrown off the track. All of the train cars come apart and get thrown in various directions. The ground team starts to move in and gathers supplies from the train cars. "Let's go. Two minutes, people. Let's go."
    As the three of us fly above the destruction, Lo'ak turns to me and Neteyam. "Guys, we have got to get down there," he says to us.
    "No way!" Neteyam exclaims. "Dad will skin us!"
    "Well I guess we will just have to go by ourselves," I tell him, "Unless you wanna join in on the fun." I smirk at him.
    "Come on. Don't be a wuss," Lo'ak teases him as he starts to fly down towards the battlefield. I salute Neteyam and quickly follow.
    "Lo'ak! Reya! Get back here you... argh!" Neteyam yells with irritation as he follows us. We land our ikrans and quickly dismount them.
    "Bro, let's go," Lo'ak says. "Come on!"
    "Lo'ak!" Neteyam yells, "Leyreya!"
    "Okay, let's go!" I completely ignores Neteyam.
    "Guys!" he exclaims with irritation. Neteyam runs after us. We reach the guy handing out weapons and we both take one. Lo'ak lets out a war cry and Neteyam finally catches up to us.
    "You don't even know how to use it," Neteyam tells us with an annoyed look on his face.
    Lo'ak loads the ammo and cocks the gun with a smirk on his face. "Dad taught me," he boasts. He aims the gun and plays around with it a little.
    "Gunship's inbound!" Jake shouted through the comms, "Fall back!" My eyes widen and the three of us start running. As we try to get out of the way the ships start to shoot at the ground causing an explosion to send us flying through the air. As I start to get up I wince and feel a throbbing pain in my abdomen. I look down and notice a piece of metal sticking into my side.
    I pull myself up on the side of one of the train cars for stability. As I'm about to start walking away to find Lo'ak and Neteyam, I see Lo'ak rush over to me. His eyes widen when he sees the metal sticking in the side of my stomach.
    "It's gonna be okay," Lo'ak reassures me, "Just keep pressure on it." I nod and do as he says. Jake runs towards us when he spots us and checks us over for injuries. When he sees my wound his face turns to worry.
    "Where's your brother?" Jake asks Lo'ak," Where is he? Where?"
    "That way," Lo'ak points.
    "Get her outta here!" Jake exclaims, "Go on!" He rushes off to find Neteyam as Lo'ak helps me on his ikran, sitting me in front of him so I don't fall off. We take off and start to head back to base.
    "Reya, just stay with me," Lo'ak says as he holds me close to him, "Stay awake. Don't close your eyes." It's very tempting, but I stay strong. I stay strong for him. We quickly arrive back at the base and land in the cave system. Mo'at quickly rushes over to us and takes me from Lo'ak along with some help from Kiri.
    They rush me to the infirmary and lay me down on a woven bed. As Mo'at works on my wound, Kiri goes to see who else is wounded now that the war party is back. Kiri eventually arrives with Neteyam, who has a few bruises and scrapes. Lo'ak follows not long after but he is ok. They quickly fix up Neteyam and then make their way back over to me. Mo'at applies some kind of paste to my wound and I wince in pain.
    "I would use yalna bark," Kiri suggests to Mo'at as she picks some up to take it over to her.
    "Oh, you would?" Moat asks, "And who is Tsahik?"
    "You are, Grand- Move!" Kiri says as she pushes Lo'ak out of the way so she could reach me, "You are, Grandmother. But yalna bark is better," I wince again as Mo'at puts more paste on me, "It stings less." They continue to treat me until they are finished with their work.
    I sit up and say, "Thank you Mo'at, Kiri." They smile at me before Mo'at turns to me again.
    "My dear," she says, "What have I told you about calling me Mo'at?" She raises her eyebrows at me.
    "Right," I said, "Sorry Grandmother." Ever since Jake and Neytiri adopted me about a year ago Mo'at has insisted that I call her grandmother. They took me in when my parents died. They were killed by the blazing fire that surrounded Pandora when the Sky People invaded our lands again. It still pains me every day. But you've got to move on.
    "You're free to go now," Mo'at tells me, "Just take it easy for a few days. That wound is still healing." I get up and start to walk away until I hear Kiri call out to me. I turn around when I hear my name.
    "I'm going to head down to the labs. Wanna come with?" She asks.
    "Sure," I agree. We head towards the labs and Spider and Lo'ak decide to join us. We take a shortcut through the avatar sleeping quarters, with Spider leading the way.
    "Hey, Spider," Norm calls out to him as he hits his ass with a towel. Spider jumps at the contact.
    Spider chuckles and says, "Your ass is mine."
    "I'm right here," Norm says gesturing his arms outwards.
    "Avatars only, go around!" an avatar, Jocelyn warned us. But Kiri just mimicked her mockingly in response.
    "Sorry," Lo'ak apologizes.
    "We won't do it again," I shrug my shoulders with a smirk, knowing for sure that we will. Eventually, we make our way right outside the labs. Spider and Lo'ak are having a conversation about Spider's blue stripes.
    "Yeah. Those blue stripes don't make you any bigger, bro," Lo'ak teases as he opens the lab door.
    "Yeah, well, I can still kick your ass," Spider counters as we all enter the lab. When we get inside the avatar drivers are just now starting to exit their pods.
    "You're like an annoying little bug," I joke.
    "Yeah, ha-ha. Real hysterical, guys," Spider says sarcastically. Lo'ak and I grab a breathing mask. "You know what really sucks though? Is you can breathe Earth air for hours and I can only breathe your air for, like, 10 seconds."
    "Yeah, Monkey Boy, that really sucks," Kiri teases.
    "For you," I chime in. Kiri turns around to also grab a breathing mask and Spider quickly pulls her tail and starts to hiss at each other playfully.
    "What's with all the flirting?" I whisper to Lo'ak. He just shrugs in response, not knowing what to think either. "Hi, Max," I say to the scientist standing with Norm.
    "Hey, kids," he responds.
    "Hey. What's up, Max?" Lo'ak greets. Spider goes over and gives Max a fist bump. "What's up Norm?"
    "Lo'ak," Norm acknowledges as he just got out of the link pod. Kiri rushes off to go see her mother while we all stay and chat with the scientists. Eventually, we go over to her to see her watching a video of her mom talking about the global connection of the planet with Eywa. Kiri watches her mother with awe and breathes into her mask. Lo'ak and I hang back a little to see Spider staring at Kiri.
    "He definitely likes her," Lo'ak says to me.
    "For sure," I respond. "Look at how he's looking at her." I point at him. As Kiri goes back over to her mom's container, we approach the pair.
    "So..." Lo'ak starts. "Who do you think knocked her up?" I hit him on the back of the head, throwing him forward a little bit. "Hey!" He rubs the back of his head trying to soothe it. He continues anyway while I glare at him. "Pretty sure it was Norm."
    Spider chuckles with him and agrees, "Totally."
    "You do not deserve to live," Kiri says to both of them.
    "Yeah I agree with her on this one. Sometimes it's impossible to love you. Loving you is a losing game, Lo'ak," I say shaking my head as he just chuckles.
    "No, no, no. Think about it, right?" Lo'ak starts to covey his argument. "I mean, he's the teacher's pet. He's out at the lab with her all the time."
    "I would kill myself," Kiri expressed. "I would drink acid."
    "Bro, your right. He's, like, in every shot," Spider added. "Bro, look, look, he's giving her looks."
    "Hey!" I glared at Spider and he laid off.
    "See, I'm thinkin' their two avatars were out in the woods all alone..."
    "Gross!" Kiri exclaims, pushing him. "That means nothing. You and Rey are out in the woods all the time. So if you're implying what I think you are..."
    "Kiri!" I shouted. "Disgusting."
    "Yeah," Lo'ak agreed. "That is not at all what I meant."
    "Guys," Spider chimed in. "I mean, sometimes it's not so great to know who your father was." All of us stop joking around and look at Spider with solemn expressions. "Whatever," he says and jumps off of the tank, turning away from us. "Don't even remember him."
    "No, Spider..." Lo'ak starts but Spider cuts him off.
    "Dude," interrupts.
    "Spider..." I try to reason with him. Kiri goes up and hugs him from behind.
    "You are not him," Kiri reassures.
    "Yeah, well let's go do something," Spider says trying to change to subject. We all agree not wanting to push him further than his limits. We all decide to go to the old battlefield even though we know we aren't supposed to. But we've never been there and thought it would be fun. So we all split ways to gather our stuff for the journey there. Spider, Kiri, and I are waiting for Lo'ak at the end of the base. We eventually see him show up with Tuk.
    "She was persistent," Lo'ak grumbles with annoyance.