pandora (jake sully x reader)

part 1

The forest engulfs jake, grace and norm in cyan gloom. The shadows are alive with the chittering sounds of unseen alien wildlife.

jake moves through the foliage, hyper-alert -- looking around like a tourist in Hell. A prolemuris leaps from limb to limb overhead, flashing through the sunlight streaming down in shafts. a plant with swaying tendrils which reach toward Jake as he passes.

This forest is more alive than any on Earth, with plants that react and move like animals. Jake white-knuckles his rifle as if every shadow conceals razor-fanged death.

"Relax, Marine. You're making me nervous." grace chuckles pushes ahead of him on the trail, forcing him to lower his muzzle as he follows her. Grace moves nimbly on the path, seemingly unconcerned.

oblivious to the glowing yellow eyes starring the three of them down from the shadows.

as the party moves between the huge trees, tiny as ants. The trail has gotten steeper, the going tougher. They enter a clearing with an overgrowing school house made of timbers cut from the local trees, with a thatch roof. It is covered with vines as the jungle reclaims it.

"How will they know we're here?" norm questions, grace chuckles 

"I'm sure they're watching us right now." 

Norm gulps. Jake looks behind him as they approach the school, feeling unseen eyes. reze looks over the three once again before standing to her feet and rushing off. leaping over tree roots and under low hanging branches. 

Reze's feet carry her quickly from the school, bow hung over her shoulder. she drops to the ground and a chitterling noise leaves her throat. the tree's above shift and a loud screech echoes through the forest. 

from the sky, Zize , reze's ikran lowers down beside her, reze smiles. "heya girl" she whispers, running her hands over the creature's purple and green scales. her ikran had a beautiful face,  mix of green and purple, but yellow around its eyes, almost like a mask. 

"wanna go for a fly?" reze whispers, Zize ost chitters and reze climbs onto her back. 

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 after almost an afternoon of flying, the ear-splitting screech of a thanator makes reze shift. Zize tenses under reze and chitters. 

"grace" reze mumbles. her body was moving faster than her brain as she dropped off the back of Zize and ran full speed back to the schools direction. using the trees' and vines to keep her above the forest floor. 

reze signals for Zize to fly back home, not wanting to bring attention to herself. 

With a hideous bellow the thanator crashes under reze, she stops, looking down at splintering trees. the avatar that was with grace previously runs across the ground in a blur, dodging between trunks as a glistening black tornado shreds the forest behind him.

The thanator's jaws snap inches behind the stranger as he flies out into open space and jumps down into a swiftly moving river. The thanator leaps after him, pursuing from rock to rock, its claws swiping.

Jake ducks under as black claws slash past his face, the avatar swore he saw a flash of blue run overhead in the trees but he can't check because his body is swept over the falls, with the thanator lunging at him from a rock, just missing.

further down the river jake's head bursts through the surface, and he gasps for breath. He is carried along by the current, but manages to grab a limb on a fallen tree. He weakly pulls himself up, and just lies there gasping on the trunk. Above him, on the cliff, the thanator screeches out a roar which echoes across the jungle.