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Jake's not sure, exactly, when shit goes FUBAR. When the Dragon crashes into the rock as the crew all start yelling about a fire extinguisher? When the fucking tulkun attacks? (nonlethal, his fine blue ass) When Scoresby's people start getting themselves taken out like little bitches, and Jake's pretty sure he can see Scoresby's arm soaring merrily above the horizon?
He doesn't know. All he can see is that it starts and it doesn't stop, and it doesn't stop, and part of Jake wonders if this is how Sully felt, seeing things go crashing down for him when that tree fell all those years ago. Something you'd woven yourself into, something important, something new, turning out to be far more fragile than it should have been.
Quaritch comes in over the ship, one of Sully's brats yowling and thrashing in Cupcake's grip. A difficult burden, to be sure, but Cupcake's handled worse, so Jake doesn't understand why she's swaying and weaving through the air like a drunk.
They come to an awkward semi-crash, Cupcake's wings slapping against a wall as her prisoner sprawls across the deck. Quaritch disconnects the bond and slumps forward, bracing himself against Cupcake's side as blood drips from his nose.
The brat books for the side of the ship, but Jake's already there, snatching her up with a grunt. Up close he can see it's the bizarre little Augustine recombinant that Sully adopted, the one Spider calls Kiri.
"C'mon now," he huffs as she writhes and spits in a way that reminds him of Spider, although her blows have a lot more force. He braces his feet and hoists her into a better position, fumbling for the cuffs on his belt with his free hand.
Bioluminescent dots flare all over her body, brighter than he thought they could get. Her palm shoots out, pressing hard against his temple, and it's
PAIN pain pain white hot pain burning spitting electricity humming through his veins flying through the jungle as he crashes against hard ground tommy on the slab tommy with a stack of books his own features written onto the face of a creature in the tank the weight of a gun in blue hands quaritch's braid sliding through his fingers spider on his back with his legs spread wide naked sobbing desperate
He's on his knees, gasping for air, and she's vomiting next to him, shaking all over. She lifts her head to look at him, face blank with revulsion, terror, disgust.
"Monster--" she whispers, voice cracking.
Jake grits his teeth and grabs the back of her head, slamming it against the deck. She goes limp and he staggers to his feet, fumbling for his gun with shaking fingers.
"Easy, Corporal." Quaritch's hand steadying on his arm. "She can still be useful."
Jake turns to stare at him, fighting the urge to collapse with relief into his arms. "Sir?" he breathes.
"I'm good," Quaritch huffs, swiping a hand over his nose. "Little witch tried to fuck with the bond 'tween Cupcake and me, but it was too much for her, got overwhelmed. She goes after one of us the rest can take her down." He bends down, slinging the girl over his shoulder with a grunt.
Something about the bloody nose, maybe, or Augustine's body dangling over Quaritch's shoulder like Spider had, or the memories that have just been dragged to the center of his brain, reminds Jake of a very important question. "Sir," he says slowly. "Where's the kid?" At this point, he doesn't need to clarify who he's talking about.
"I'll send someone to look for him," Quaritch answers, jaw tight the way he is when he's trying to keep shit locked down. "Tracker's gone screwy with the water, but he can't have gone far. We'll get him back, we always do."
We always do, Jake repeats to himself, trying to believe it.
Augustine stays unconscious/semiconscious while they're chaining her up, only just starting to stir for the pitiful rescue attempt. Seriously, is Sully trying to build his crack squads out of underage girls?
Jake considers going after the Metkayina girl who fell in the drink, but he's busy trying to help Quaritch and the others keep Sully’s littlest one from wriggling away. She fights as fiercely as her sister did, as Spider used to, writhing in their arms like they're trying to contain a whole pack of viper wolves.
"I hate you!" she screams as Jake cuffs her to the rail. "You're not my daddy, you're a demon and a devil and mommy and daddy are gonna kill you!"
Her eyes are screwed up in a way that reminds Jake of Tommy during childhood tantrums, which makes him feel like he should either let her go or snap her neck. Neither would do much to put this shitshow in any semblance of order, though, so he backs away instead.
Jake does his best to ignore the carrying on as he helps patrol the perimeter, bouncing lightly on the balls of his feet. His every instinct screams at him to go find Spider, to track Sully down and take Tommy's body back for good, but this is the best position that they've got and he's under orders to stay here and defend their leverage.
And he'll obey, always. He'll listen to his superior officer and he'll listen to the man he loves and he'll watch Quaritch like a hawk as his colonel stands nearby, listening to his comm. He lowers his hand slowly, fingers curling into a fist at his side.
"That was Lyle," he tells the air. "They grabbed Spider off the ship."
Jake closes his eyes. Breathes in, breathes out. The deck does not feel quite as stable beneath him as it did a second before. The sun is sinking, fire spilling across the horizon like the end of the world.
“Lyle thinks he winged one of the kids, though,” Quaritch says quietly. “The older one.”
The Augustine recom lifts her head from where it’s propped up on the railing, even though she’s too far away to hear them. “No,” she rasps, shaking her head wildly. “No–”
In the distance there’s an earsplitting scream, loud and ragged, the voice of a woman getting her heart ripped from her chest. Jake spins, ears swiveling as he scans the horizon. He grabs for his binoculars, zeroing in on a cluster of figures gathered on a rock across the water.
They’re all gathered around a body, lying limp on unforgiving stone. He can see a shock of light hair at the edge of the group, the glint of an orange life jacket. He can see light glinting off the profile of Tommy’s stolen body, glistening as if with tears.
“Sir,” he murmurs, passing the binoculars to Quaritch and pointing. He watches his colonel look in silence.
“Well,” Quaritch says slowly, lowering the lens. “Let’s finish this.”
Behind them, Augustine sobs.
It took a while for Jake to get the right to see his first version’s recordings. Quaritch finally forked them over the first time Jake shot an enemy banshee out of the sky (a few days later, he kissed Jake for the first time, and not long after that Spider was in their lives, and then–).
He remembers the way Sully had mooned over her, eyes hazy like he was fucking stoned. The way he’d talked about their first meeting in the woods, how she’d come out of nowhere to save his stupid ass.
Like an angel, he’d said, eyes soft. Like something out of a dream.
The woman who cuts through Project Phoenix feels more like a demon to him, all burning yellow eyes and fury, a nightmare wrapped in skin. Soldiers fall around Jake like prey shot down in the woods, soldiers he’s fought with, served with, soldiers who forgave him for the sins of his counterpart against all odds.
No time to mourn. He raises his gun, teeth gritted–and she kicks it out of his hand. She’s stronger than me, faster, Sully had said, like that was a good thing. Like that was wonderful.
She whirls to face him, sighting down her bow, and Jake freezes. Quaritch, Tommy, Spider all flash before his eyes, faces blurring into one, a single cry of loss.
Then she blinks, the yellow in her eyes flickering for a heartbeat. Like she’s remembering something deeper than blood, deeper than pain, something woven into her core.
A second later, her eyes flick overhead and she’s gone, dodging a strafe of fire from above. It cuts out as Lopex falls with a scream, an arrow in his guts, and when Jake looks her way again she’s long gone.
Later, he thinks. He’s got work to do and a lot of people to kill.
He finds Sully, the other Sully, chopping off three crew members’ heads with a single blow. He’s scanning the ship, looking for his brats, and he doesn’t sense Jake sneaking up behind him until he’s tackled into a wall, knife pressed to his stupid fucking throat and blade yanked out of his grip.
It’s the closest they’ve been since Jake woke up and for a moment all he can do is look. Sully’s face is lined, worn by time and care, laugh lines around his eyes warring with frown lines around his mouth. He’s fucking old, and it makes Jake's skin crawl, thinking of Spider spending so much time crushing on this wreck.
Sully’s got blood crusted on his face, the faint aftermath of tears. When he speaks, it sounds like dad.
“It’s you.” His eyes flick over Jake’s face, and it’s impossible to tell what he’s seeing. “They told me that one of the demons wore my face.”
“Did they? That’s funny.” Jake presses the knife in just a little, watches red sprout over Sully’s throat like a kiss. “They told me that one of the lying, killing, shiteating, backstabbing traitors stole my twin’s body.”
Sully sighs, wearing an expression of something like….sorrow? pity? that makes Jake want to peel Tommy’s skin off of him. “This isn’t what Tommy would have wanted, you know that–”
“He tell you that? Huh?” Spittle’s flying from his mouth, drenching Sully’s face. “You’re walking around in his bones, you think you know him better?”
Sully lowers his eyes. “He’s only been dead a few months for you, hasn’t he?”
“Shut the fuck up.” Jake drags his hand through Sully’s hair, giving him a little shake. “Everybody calls you ‘the original,’ you know,” he hisses. “But see what I’m wearing? This body? This was made for me, not my brother, not anyone else. Made so I could clean up your goddamn mess.”
“Jake–”
“Don’t. Call. Me. That.” Jake grits out, fingers shaking as they wrap around the hilt. “I know what I am, I know where I came from, I am more Jake Sully than you will ever be, Toruk Makto.”
Sully lets out a breath. “Listen, I know you can’t imagine it right now, but it doesn’t have to be like this. You have options, the Na’vi–”
“I don’t need the Na’vi,” Jake spits. “I’ve got my own family. I’ve got the colonel, I’ve got our tiger.” Sully’s eyes narrow in confusion, but Jake barrels on. “I don’t need you trying to save me, I’m not one of your fucking brats.”
His lips curl into a smile, sharp and hungry. “Lucky me, huh? Maybe I’ll actually get through this alive.”
Something slams shut behind Sully’s eyes and he surges forward, knocking Jake back a step. One hand comes up and thuds into Jake’s back, into his spine, right where–
Whizzing sound out of nowhere, pain and nothingness tearing at each other, falling falling falling he’s stumbling, gasping, and Sully hurls him into the water. Jake thrashes back to air, heaving for breath, and Sully’s looking down with a knife in his hand, looking like he wants to jump in after.
Then somewhere in the distance the little girl screams and Sully’s ears twitch. “Stay down, kid,” he barks, and he’s vanished by the time Jake hauls himself back onboard.
But they finally, finally turn the tables on him, on all of them. The elation Jake feels at the look on Sully’s face when Quaritch drags the Augustine recombinant out of the shadows–still dazed, hands bound so she can’t pull her tricks–is matched only by his joy when Spider emerges to join them, ocean-drenched and beautiful.
“I think you’ll be needing these,” Jake tells Sully sweetly, tossing him a pair of cuffs. Oh, they’re going to have fun when the fucker’s helpless.
“You fucking sons of bitches,” Sully rasps, hand shaking as he slaps the cuffs over his wrists. Behind him, the little girl whimpers.
“Careful, that’s Mom you’re talking about,” Jake teases.
His eyes flick towards Spider, still standing there. “Sweetheart,” Jake calls, holding out a hand; he feels Sully tense at the name. “Come here.”
But Spider isn’t looking at him; his eyes are on Quaritch and the girl. He’s got his hands raised, light reflecting off the blood staining his palms, his shaking fingers.
“Let her go,” he begs. “Let her go, daddy, please.”
Sully frowns. Jake resists the urge to roll his eyes–trust Spider to only call one of them that, so easily and in front of outsiders, when he wants something.
Then there’s a flicker of motion. Behind you, Jake wants to shout, but it’s too late, she’s already lunging out of the shadows and grabbing hold of Spider, pressing her blade to his throat.
“Shit–” Jake goes for the pistol on his leg, but it’s waterlogged, of course it fucking is. He shoots a look at Sully, wondering if this is when that high horse of his is going to make an appearance, but the asshole just stands there, jaw tight.
The woman makes her threats, and the only thing that keeps Jake from cursing her out is the look Quaritch sends his way– keep your shit together, soldier. So he does, even when every muscle in his body is screaming to tear them all apart with his bare hands.
Spider begs–not for his own life, of-fucking-course, but for the Augustine recom. And she begs for him, too, which surprises Jake; he didn’t think any creation of Grace Augustine's would be designed to care for something besides the precious goddamn wildlife.
Quaritch tries to get the situation under control. “He’s not mine,” he says, and Jake tries not to flinch at that, even though he knows Quaritch is lying. Because it’s wrong, so wrong, Spider belongs to Quaritch the same way Jake does, and Spider to Jake, and they both belong to Spider no matter how many times he tries to reject them.
So, when the woman cuts Spider’s chest open, Jake can’t stop the sound that rips out of his mouth, pure fear and pain and protective fury surging him out as a snarl. Blood splashes over the body he’s learned to love more than his own and he swears he can feel it bubbling acidic over his skin.
“Bitch,” he snarls, staggering forwards. “Fucking bitch, I’m gonna kill you–”
“Stand down, Corporal,” Quaritch barks, even though his own hands are wide and his knuckles whitened around the knife. Jake hisses, but keeps still, even as the world blazes red before his eyes.
There’s no rage when she almost kills Spider, though, just fear, cold like ice shot straight into the vein, cold like a piss-stained alleyway digging into his back, cold like Tommy’s body, cold like cryo and space’s unforgiving mouth and the words dead or alive splashed next to his own, older face. He screams, loud enough he can barely hear Quaritch giving in, can barely hear the girl gasping as the knife leaves her throat and she’s shoved across the death.
The bitch lets Spider go, too, shoves him away, as blood drips down his stomach. For a moment Jake thinks he’s going to Quaritch, but no, he grabs for Augustine, yanking the bonds from her hands. The little girl runs to them, throwing her arms around Augustine’s waist.
Spider stands there, wide-eyed and empty. His gaze flicks across all the people on the deck without really seeing any of them.
“Tiger,” Jake says gently, the way he always does when Spider’s on edge. “C’mere, we need to look at that cut.” Spider zeroes on him, light flickering off his lashes and making them glow.
Like an angel. Jake might never understand Sully, but he understands this.
The Augustine recom seizes Spider’s hand. “He’s not going anywhere with you, you fucking rapist,” she spits, all venom, and yanks Spider away.
Rapist. Sully’s eyes go wide, and Jake thinks the expression must be mirrored on his own face. The word hits worse than demon or devil or clone ever did, because it makes no goddamn sense.
He opens his mouth, wanting to demand what the fuck she’s talking about, but Sully cuts him off. “Neytiri,” he says slowly. “Get them out of there.”
Them. Like Spider is one of their children, like Spider is theirs.
The woman blinks, that haze over her eyes flickering again. “Ma Jake–”
“It’s all right,” Sully says. “I can handle two knockoffs.” He shifts the knife back into his hand, ripping off the cuffs.
“Mom,” the little girl pleads, tugging on her mother’s hands.
The woman bites her lip, then nods and starts to lead Spider and the girls away, back into the water. Away, away, to people who can shut off the tracker on Spider’s mask, people who are willing to throw him away at the slightest provocation.
Jake meets Quaritch’s eyes. The two of them can take this asshole together, Sully’s arrogance aside–Jake isn’t falling for that little spine trick again. But in the time it takes to bring him down, Spider will have disappeared.
Quaritch nods, ever so slightly. He bares his teeth in a grin.
“Yessir,” Jake says, and takes off running, shoving Sully aside. He hurls himself over the edge and takes a deep breath before crashing into the deep.
He almost loses them in the water–he’s not even sure they know he’s following–but the fire is building and it sends them all splashing back to the ship. He gets his second stroke of luck when the little one falls through an access hatch and Sully’s wife fucking jumps in after her.
The girl screams for her mother and Spider grabs her hand. “Come,” he rasps. “Kiri, we gotta–” He catches sight of Jake and freezes
Jake hauls himself back onto the boat with a grunt. The girl stares at him with wide eyes, but doesn’t melt his brain–good, he’d calculated her range correctly, at least when it came to Na’vi/Na’vi adjacent beings.
“Kid,” he says to Spider. “What the hell have we told you about running away, huh?”
A pause, and then both teens turn and sprint across the sinking ship. Jake sighs and gives chase.
The longest Spider has ever outlasted them in the woods was two and half hours; the kid had been out of commission for days afterward, thanks to both exhaustion and the severity of his punishment. He had the climbing skills and knowledge of the territory, sure, but he simply couldn’t beat Jake and Quaritch when it came to stamina, speed, senses–hell, even the length of their legs, not to mention the good old tracking chips that meant he couldn't even stop for a minute.
He’d never tried to outrun them on the Dragon–whether out of a growing understanding of his place or paranoia about what they’d do to the locals after he bolted. He’d certainly never tried to run while the Dragon was fucking sinking, deck tilting crazily under Jake’s feet as metal and crap skitters around his ankles.
The kids manage to help each other, giving one another boosts, kicking trash and bodies out of each other’s way, shouting encouragement over the roar of the flames. Whenever Spider starts to lag behind the Augustine recom just snatches him up and shoves him ahead, letting him pull her up after.
Still, Jake’s gaining, slow and steady. He wraps his bare toes around a girder and hurls herself over with a grunt, chasing them across the bottom of the ship (he wills himself not to think of Quaritch and Sully right now, where they are, who’s winning their fight).
“Spider!” he yells. “Spider, get back here, goddamnit! It’s dangerous!”
“Not real,” he hears the girl gasp to herself. “Not really, it’s not him, it’s not real.”
“Oh, you’ll find I’m plenty real.” Jake growls. He banks left, towards the shattered wing of a plane skidding across the deck, counting one two three–months of eating shit while chasing Spider down have worked and it’s the perfect boost, sending him flying into the air over their heads.
The kids cry out as he lands in their way, rising to his feet and spinning to face them. Augustine crashes to the ground and Spider almost follows, but Jake seizes him by the shoulder, pulling him close.
“Whoa, there,” he calls. The girl sits up and Jake holds out his knife, letting the firelight glint off the blade. “Hands behind your head, missy, ” Augustine hisses, but does as she’s told.
Jake kneels down by Spider’s side, brushing a lock of hair away from the kid’s face. “You okay?”
Spider squirms. “Please–”
“Shhh.” Jake rubs a soothing hand up and down his back, tracing his spine. “Easy, baby boy,” the girl flinches at the word baby , “you’re safe.”
Spider’s eyes flick in Augustine’s direction, and Jake follows. “Is that it?” he asks gently, tipping Spider’s chin. “Were you lonely, tiger? Did you need a friend? Must be hard being alone with us old farts all the time, right?”
He shrugs. “We can keep her, if you want. Give you someone to talk ‘bout kid stuff, all that jazz. Would you like that?”
Spider shakes his head wildly. His hair flashes in the firelight, glowing like it’s on fire, too.
“Okay,” Jake says calmly. He turns to the girl, keeping one hand on Spider’s shoulder and adjusting his grip on the knife with the other.
Wham.
Jake goes flying, knife skittering from his grip as he lands flat on his ass, a-fucking-again. Another wham sends him crashing painfully into his back, grating cutting into his shoulder.
Cold water splashes over him–it’s that fucking tulkun surging up out of nowhere, waves washing against its sides. Yet another of Sully’s brats, Luke or whatever the fuck they call him, balances on top.
Jake stares for only a second, but the girl’s already on him again, pinning him down. It would only be the easiest thing in the world to shrug her off, if only her hand wasn’t pressed to his head.
She doesn’t get distracted by his memories this time. Her focus is arrow-sharp now, plunging to his core like she’s been waiting for this moment a century.
She just burns him, bright and hot and endless, lightning plunging straight into his spine, and it’s worse than gunfire, worse than broken bones and shattered teeth and everything he’s ever known, he’s got fire inside and out, he’s dying–
“Kiri…”
He’s falling–
“Kiri–”
He’s melting, bones burnt to liquid, hurtling towards ash–
“I–”
He’s falling–
“You’re killing him–”
He’s screaming–
“Kiri, stop!”
–he’s not the only one.
“Kiri!”
Blink. Blink. There’s still fire inside and out, but it’s died down enough he can see two figures looming over him, shivering through a red haze. One on their knees in front, the other standing behind, hand on the first one’s shoulder. Jakey, I wanna turn!
The girl turns, hair brushing his shoulder. Jake can feel her concentration wavering, fluttering, a planet spun off its axis.
“Monkey Boy,” she says softly, and it takes a second to realize who she's talking to. “He hurt you. He hurt me, he hurt everyone.”
“I know. I know. But, Kiri, I can’t…I can’t explain it, but I can’t let him die.” It’s funny, Jake thinks how Spider’s voice always trembles in that one special way when he’s begging for someone’s life. “Something–something bad will happen if I do.”
“He’s not my Dad.” Her fingers drum lightly on Jake’s skull. Energy pulses in him, his eyes slipping closed again. “Not even close, not anymore. They don’t look anything like each other from the inside.”
“I know,” Spider says again. “I know, I know he’s not. But he’s still…just. He’s my d–” His voice cracks, hitches, twists off into a gasp. “Please. Kir, just…just leave him.”
In the distance, Luke-or-whatever yells something Jake can’t make out. The ship rattles again, things shifting around him, bodies crashing, and the hands on his forehead are abruptly yanked away. The pain spikes again as a parting gift and he doesn’t even hear them go.
By the time he cracks his eyes open, he’s alone on the sinking ship, blood dripping from his mouth, nose, ears, eyes, the ocean reaching for him with icy fingers. Jake staggers to his feet, wiping his face, already knowing he’ll see nothing when he looks out over the water. He takes a few slow, deep breaths and prepares to jump in again.
He grabs one of the weird floating winged things Garvin had said could help Na’vi breathe as he sinks into the deep, poking through the Dragon’s remains. Something in him starts to fracture when he finds the Colonel (not you too, not now) but Quaritch is breathing, life pulsing under his hands.
It almost kills him, hauling the Colonel back, but Jake Sully has dragged himself through hell before, and he won’t stop now. Tommy’s gone, Spider’s run, he’s got no one except for Quaritch now, and he ain’t letting that go, no matter what.
His hands are numb by the time they reach the rocks and he collapses to his hands and knees, blinking under the fresh haze of light, puking water and a bit of blood into the surf. Next to him, Quaritch coughs and gags, heaving for air as his eyes flicker open, gaze slowly sharpening.
“Spider,” he croaks. It isn’t a question.
Jake stares at his reflection in the water, the warped, twisted mirror. “He ran, sir.”
Silence. It feels worse than rage would have been, like a cold knife scraped across his skin.
“He–” Jake coughs. “He stopped the girl from killing me.”
“Did he?” A twinge of something in the colonel’s raw, scraped voice. Hope?
“Yeah. He…” Jake rubs his nose, watches crusted blood come off on his fingers, and thinks of Spider doing the same in the interrogation room all those months ago. “He’s stubborn as ever, but he knows where he belongs, now. He just pretends he doesn’t.”
Flapping overhead, and Jake looks up to see their ikrans circling in; both a little battered-looking after what must have been a skirmish with the Sullys’ birds, but none the worse for wear. Cupcake lands first and Alex settles in after her, ruffling his neck feathers and whickering.
Jake reaches out, taking Quaritch’s hand. “We’re gonna find him, sir.” He’s not sure whether he’s referring to Sully or Spider, and in the end, it doesn’t matter. They’ll be found, and they’ll break or die as they have to. Jake simply cannot imagine any other option.
Quaritch squeezes their hands and then they’re climbing onto their ikrans. Takeoff is rocky, difficult without Spider to guide them through it and bitch about their flying skills, but then they’re going up, up into the blue. Jake lowers his head, savoring the way the wind stings and scrapes his face.
Sullys stick together, that was what he and Tommy used to say to each other. And even if the name Sully has been corrupted in so many ways, he knows that family is still his greatest weakness, his greatest strength, his fiercest and most hungry love.
Jake’s gonna bring his family back together, or die trying. There is no other way.