Just got into my head, WHAT IF Jake, running away from the Tanator, was lost in the woods so far and found by the Mangkwan, instead of the Omaticaya?
Grace is shocked, wondering how Jake's avatar wasn't killed or tortured there immediately, yet she has no chance but to let Jake go with the flow. Any information on the inside life of any clan is good, after all.
I wonder how his training there would've looked like. These people know no mercy. But Jake's used to harsh treatment, he bets nothing can be more difficult than an army camp.
He's run down the ground there, none of his so-called "mentors" are willing to slow down even if their student is barely keeping up. He falls on his face hundreds of times during the day and then forces himself up to try again and again.
When he wakes in his human body, he's exhausted beyond words, and keeping a video log is getting harder day after day. His mind is fogged, the trails of thought are all messed up. He finds himself not being able to remember exactly what he's done today and what days ago.
And there's also this woman, Varang.
Jake can't help but feels a pricking at the back of his neck every time he sees her. She doesn't like him, but he can work with that: at the end of the day, even after a month with the clan, nobody seems to like him here anyway. But with Varang it's different.
Grace says he must learn and try to delve into concepts of their life and traditions as deep and fully as possible. So Jake genuinely tries, going through everything these people teaches him again and again. Yet the things Varang says and does are harder to reminiscent on.
Jake can't even yell what's his fucking problem, but each meeting with her leaves him with a pounding headache and a feeling that his a walking pastilance on this planet. He's been a marine, and whatever she's doing shouldn't affect him, and yet the bile raises in his throat every time the memories are surfacing.
He doesn't talk about any of these on his log. It doesn't feel right. He knows Grace suspects that he's keeping something to himself, Grace sees there's something undergoing, but each time she tries to start a conversation, he just puts on his usual nonchalant mask and smiles her worried away. Jake doesn't know why he does it. He'd like to talk to someone about this strange feeling. He'd like to tell some friend that life just doesn't feel right anymore, that being in this body feels like betrayal of something he still doesn't quite understand, and that he simultaneously feels like a parasite who must be taken away from here and can't think of anything more terrible than being taken out of this all.
His avatar has gotten stronger, better coordinated and much more comfortable to operate. And yet. It doesn't feel right. He himself doesn't feel right, no matter the body he's in.
And there's a desperation, burning behind his rib cage, a slow fire that doesn't let him sleep at night and never lets to forget about itself. He must fix it, fix himself, do something to purify his horrendous demon being untill this fire consume him whole.
Grace warns him about the Dream Hunt. Of course, she does. But Jake doesn't care. He must do something, anything, to get rid of this burning and he doesn't give a shit about possible consequences.
He's on his knees, Varang, the Tsahik, is in front of him. There's a fire, circling them, separating them from the chanting crowd.
Jake's head is spinning. The flames around are so close their heat is pressing on his back and chest, making it hard to breath. Hid eyes watering, thick smoke makes a Tsahik's figure in front of him barely recognisable. However, Jake just know it's her. Feels it, sort of. He feels the acidic burning in his ribcage calling for her, leaning into her direction, sicking release.
Whatever Varang is saying is not distinctive, mixing up with growing chanting all around him, he's suffocating, and then her raspy voice is too close to his ear:
"You will be fixed, JakeSuli," she says. "We will fix what Eywa did not".
And then the world is a c kaleidoscope of sounds, sensations and feelings, and Jake cannot tell what happens around him and how long it lasts. He's probably been screaming, yet he doesn't hear his own voice but his throat is sore. He can't feel his body fully, like he's floating in a ice cold spring, the muscles convulsing and limbs hanging limp. Everything is black, like a smoke, and red. Like blood.
The pain comes in waves, far away, and then growing and growing, bringing him back into his body. Everything's red.
Everything's covered in blood, in his demon blood, and the only sensation in his libs is pain.
He opens his eyes with an effort one should make only waking up from a coma. Jake blinks.
"You are," Varang says, and Jake thinks he can hear a smile in her voice. "-is now one of us, JakeSuli".
Her four-fingered hand tentatively takes his four-fingered hand in hers. Skin thick and dark, burned in place where his picky used to be.
And now burning in his chest anymore.
