"I snuck into her room even though her father said not to, I just look at her on her bed. It looks like she hasn't slept or eaten in days. She finally looks at me with the same look i remember all to well. When she finally looked at me she didn't care to smile at me, yell, turn away from me, she just looked at me. I wanted her to do something but instead she stayed there quiet. She was numb, she didn't care, nothing mattered to her anymore. The same look I saw all those years ago in the emergency room, a look I thought I'd never see again." -Rafe Delilah Elle Summers, a beautiful girl with a beautiful soul. Best friends with Sarah Beth Cameron, they met through their mothers who were also best friends since they were little. With the Cameron family also comes Rafe, he's aggressive, he's complicated. But Delilah doesn't care, she knows Rafe and chooses to see the good in him. "You're screwed up and brilliant Look like a million dollar man So why is my heart broke? You've got the world But baby, at what price? Something so strange Hard to define It isn't that hard, boy To like you or love you I'd follow you down, down, down You're unbelievable If you're going crazy Just grab me and take me I'd follow you down, down, down Anywhere, anywhere" - Million dollar man lana del rey

𝘞𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘸𝘪𝘭𝘭 𝘪𝘵 𝘣𝘦, 𝘐𝘬𝘢𝘳𝘪? 𝘋𝘦𝘢𝘵𝘩, 𝘰𝘳 𝘴𝘢𝘭𝘷𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯? He reaches out and runs his rough palm over her skin. His fingers come back damp with ash-grey powder. He remembers the light line of her smile as she swooped around him. That smile had cost him everything. He doesn't catch it. She'd saved his life. He was sure of that, but why would an ash na'vi help him? And why does he help her? 𝘞𝘩𝘰𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘳 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘢𝘳𝘦, he mutters, wiping her blood off onto the rock beneath them. 𝘠𝘰𝘶'𝘥 𝘣𝘦𝘵𝘵𝘦𝘳 𝘣𝘦 𝘸𝘰𝘳𝘵𝘩 𝘪𝘵. ❥ Aonung was supposed to be strong. He was supposed to protect his people, as a good Olo'eyktan would, but following the battle with the RDA and the mangkwan, the Metkayina are grieving and his duty is greater than ever. Now he must overcome his own loss to save not only his family, but his clan. ❥ Ikari doesn't know how to live without her people. Injured and stranded in the reef without any word from the Mangkwan, she needs to adapt to a new life as learns to heal. With the son of the grieving chief seeming to be just as lonely as her, she might just find this harsh change manageable. She knows a thing or two about duty.

As the future Olo'eyktan of the Metkayina, Aonung prides himself on control-over the reef, over others, over himself-until Kel 'Hani disrupts it with a single laugh and a look held too long. She tells herself she dislikes his arrogance; he tells himself she's too stubborn. Yet the space between them tightens all the same, heavy with things unsaid and moments unfinished. Where restraint is tested, denial becomes habit, and the sea quietly shifts along with something neither of them is ready to face.