Jeannie Bug 🐞

“I’m still fucking colorblind!” Lopez hissed back from the electrical panel on the other side of the open research area. How Lopez still carried this genetic trait from his human self? Not important at the moment...

While getting power to the whole outpost would be great, the first goal was to kickstart the air filtration system for the shack. When Zdinarsk and Lopez scouted it during the time Quaritch made his way to Devin, they only scoped it from the outside. The sealed part of the outpost had the living quarter basics, or so it looked through the mossy windows. Cramped sleeping quarters and minimal kitchen necessities, but it had solid, uncracked windows and a working filtration system for its previous human inhabitants. When it had power, of course.

Wainfleet watched Zdinarsk’s and Lopez’s banter while Ja was causing a ruckus clearing space inside the open lab. He pressed thumb and forefinger to his throat comm, “No dying, brothers.”

A crackle of static then silence as he pulled the earpiece out and turned off the communication device completely.

Radio silence. The recoms had no choice. They’d done more than deserted their point; they’d commited downright treason.

And yet...

Here they were. The 1st Recom Unit had seen Earth and the RDA as unworthy of their service.

All because of one human kid with a heart of gold tarnished by human cruelty.

If there was anything the recoms found worth protecting in their second life, it was sitting barely alive in a rusted outpost left abandoned by other humans who recognized what was and was not worth protecting long ago...

“You’re ok...nice and easy...real slow...” Ja repeated softly as he moved Spider’s arm like it was made of glass. He used medical sheers to cut off the sleeve of the once white lab coat Devin had offered the kid in the last bit of kindness he’d experienced before the daring rescue attempt. He repeated himself but it was more like he was talking to himself the way the teenage boy didn’t respond.

No words. No winces. No reactions whatsoever.

The doc could slit his throat slow and methodically with a scalpel, and Spider wouldn’t budge.

It had started raining hard by the time the recoms reached the abandoned field lab. It was crazy how many of these little metal structures, most taken over by nature from years of abandonment, the recoms had found in their missions. Quaritch thought it was a waste of resources back then, but now? A lifeline for his boy. Breadcrumbs for them to follow to get further and further away from Bridgehead and the RDA...

He’d scooped Spider up in both arms as soon as Cupcake landed and sprinted into the open-air research space, vaulting up all the metal grate steps at once.

“I got you, tiger, papa’s got you.” Quaritch said as he held him close for a few seconds before hearing more footsteps behind him. He cleared his throat and immediately followed Ja’s lead as he dropped a large medical bag on a dusty workbench. The medic swiped his arm across to clear off old tools and dirt for the Colonel to place his son down.

Quaritch didn’t want to at first...but knew he had to let go for Spider’s injuries to be assessed and treated.

He would let go...for now.

“Sir, I’m going to need you to sit down before you fall down.” Ja said firmly as he didn’t stop tending to Spider.

Adrenaline and pure stubbornness gave Quaritch the willpower to put any weight on his right leg. He would’ve congratulated whoever the marksman was that turned his kneecap into a jigsaw puzzle if they weren’t aiming at him. And if they’d survived the completely reckless and barely planned coordinated attack with the Mangkwan.

‘Barely and ‘coordinated’ were an exaggeration; ‘planned’ was an outright lie.

Quaritch knew very little about the Na’vi clans beyond the fertile Pandoran forests. When he was human and in charge, he didn’t care able the barren lands and what crawled out of it. ‘Mangkwan’ was just another clan to them that they would shoot on sight.

It wasn’t until his second life, listening to the ramblings of his son and his life among the Na’vi, that he learned how truly different the clans of Pandora were. Without even realizing it, Spider had planted a seed in Quaritch’s mind to learn more about his enemy. Not just how to kill them...

Ja’s sighed when he heard the shuffling of Wainfleet scrambling up the metal grate steps to catch Quaritch when he did finally fall. As much as he did want to tend to his superior, the good doctor had to prioritize one patient at a time and the screeching reprimand he would get from the colonel wasn’t worth it. Besides, he could only see the surface damage of the teen. And it was bad...

There was so little natural-colored flesh on Spider’s body that Ja was stunned the boy was able to disassociate enough to be touched. Dark bruising, almost black in some places, marred his chest and his arms. Open cuts and burns from fast contact with something long striped his skin in the worst way possible. Ja managed to remove all that remained of the soiled lab coat and had to suppress his gag reflex at the full sight of the crazy kid he’d learned to love like a little brother.

Quaritch was breathing heavily after crashing back into a workbench, knocking dusty glassware and tools to the ground with shattering and clatters. Wainfleet caught his best friend by the arm before he completely collapsed and helped him to the floor.

“Easy, Miles.” Wainfleet managed to say, purposefully looking at his friend over the kid. He might not be able to contain himself if he looked at Spider...

“My boy...” Quaritch huffed as the own pain in his body burned his senses as the adrenaline receded like floodwaters. He didn’t realize he was starting to hurt all over and drip with sweat from a cold chill.

“Left forearm broken in two places.” Ja said as quietly as he could, but loud enough for the recorder in his vest to pick up. Everyone’s hands were too busy to take notes for him and both of his were needed to inspect the teen’s body while keeping him upright.

Quaritch growled. A terrible kind of strained rumble from his throat. His fury was spiraling, but his body was failing. Blood oozed through his heavily blood-soaked camo pants and continued to drip slowly from a through and through gunshot wound in his left bicep. He may have been hit more than twice, but it didn’t matter.

Quaritch would face a firing squad a hundred times over to save his son from any more pain.

“Lyle, sedation and tourniquet.” Ja said, managing to find rifling through his bag without looking. He tossed them over to where Wainfleet attempted to restrain and console the colonel.

Quaritch thought both were for the boy until they bounced across the floor.

“NO!”, Quaritch roared, “I NEED TO SEE MY BOY! FUCKING STAND DOWN, LYLE!”

“Not following your fucking orders today, Miles.” Wainfleet said, grabbing the syringe and stabbing it into Quaritch’s right thigh as fast as possible.

The impact of Wainfleet’s fist coming down had Quaritch seeing stars and screaming in pain. The air left his lungs, and he couldn’t inhale from the agony. But he did feel strong hands jerk him forward into a powerful embrace of arms around his shoulders. He managed to start breathing again, though hyperventilating was a better way to describe the wheezing from his nostrils as he clenched his jaw tight against the quick-acting sedative.

In those brief microseconds before unconsciousness, Quaritch stared over Wainfleet’s shoulder as his Spider. His sweet boy; the only thing that mattered.