Summary: Jake Sully only wanted the best for his daughter. It's the least he could do after he insisted he wanted that child. Iara Sully is everything to him. She is his daughter, his duo, his life saver, his ipê.
Hello everyone! Here is the first chapter of my Avatar fanfic. You'll find the summary down below.
@ladysoupmuncher - "rise of the dragon dreamer" makes me want to punch men's faces
Iara: ee-AH-rah
Ipê: ee-PEH
word acc: 3.6k
Masterpost
· · ─ ·𖥸· ─ · ·
The thing about love is that it comes to you when you least expect.
Love had found me when she came into my life. She was the tinniest baby I had ever seen, and she was perfect. Hazel green eyes, a small tuft of red hair on the top of her head, and her chubby little hands.
All I ever wanted in my sorry-ass life was a single thing worth fighting for. And she was it.
Iara was born in the year 2143, tenth month, and she was perfect, my little baby girl.
Iara’s mother was a brazilian woman I had met while on a mission some years ago. We became sort of friends, and on a night of heavy drinking together, with some other ex-colleagues, came our baby. She had told me she didn’t want contact with us; she already had a family in Brazil, and I had convinced her I would take care of the baby, raise her. Forty-one weeks later, Iara was born. She came out of the womb, went to the doctor’s arms, and then finally mine.
After our parents’ deaths, my brother's and my lives were already a little hard. I know I didn’t make the smartest choices, but I would try, for her; she deserves it, she didn’t ask to be born, so, from now on, everything is about her, for her.
And, for our unlucky asses, the strong prey on the weak. A guy with a knife took all Tommy would ever be, for the paper in his wallet.
“You see, Jake, your brother represented a significant investment. We’d like to talk to you about taking over his contract.”
The box with Tommy’s corpse was sealed with a tape dispenser, like it’s a package for shipping. The cardboard coffin is rolled into the furnace.
“The egghead and the jarhead. Tommy was the scientist, not me. He was the one who wanted to get shot light-years out into space to find the answers.”
I watched my twin’s body being engulfed by the bright orange light.
“Me - I was just another dumb grunt gettin’ sent someplace I was gonna regret. And I have a 5 year old daughter, she would have to come with me, she doesn’t have anyone else, her last relative alive, besides me, is burning right there.”
“Yes, we know about your daughter, your brother liked to talk about her, had a couple of pictures of both of you in his office, we talked about this with the high-ups, and they said they would make an exception for your case. She can come, but you will have to be aware of the risks.”
“Say it.”
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I woke up with a sharp breath, trying to remember for a moment where I was, and then, everything came back. Tommy, the Avatar program, the ship, and the most important - Iara. I didn’t know what to expect. They told me that putting her into cyro would mess with her - our body, and she would age so little that it would be like a couple of months had passed instead of 6 years.
She should be 11, but she would still be 5, almost 6.
Yeah, maybe we will deal with something in the future.
I hope not.
“Are we there yet?” I asked the med tech in a hoarse whisper.
“We’re there, Sunshine. Come wake your daughter with me.”
He helped me get out of my capsule, and after getting the feeling of my limbs again, it must have taken about 10 minutes, we went to wake my baby. The med tech pointed to the capsule above mine.
“Do you want to wake her, or do you want me to do it? You just need to press this button right here.” The guy said while pointing to a red button.
“I’m gonna do it.” I answered him. He nodded with his head and gestured to the button with his head.
“Go ahead.” And I did.
I pressed the button and waited for 5 minutes while the capsule began shutting off. When it stopped and opened itself, I saw her.
She didn’t look even a few seconds older than she was when we left Earth.
She opened her eyes and looked at me.
“Hi daddy.” Iara said with a big smile on her face.
“Hi, babygirl. Did you sleep well?” I asked while running my right hand through her face.
“I did! I even dreamed about this lady in the water, singing! I think she was a mermaid.” She answered while sitting up on the capsule. Or trying to because of the lack of gravity. The med tech guy looked at her, then she started to float a little. I kept one hand holding her. “I’m so excited! I get to discover a whole new planet, daddy! And we are together! I just wish uncle Tommy were here with us. I miss him so much, and he would be so happy too! And I would get him to teach me Na’vi.”
“Wow, baby, don’t need to rush, we have all the time in the world now. We are going to do everything together.”
“Do you promise?” She asked.
“Damn right I do.” I answered her.
“Papai! Bad word, don’t say it!” Iara scolded me.
“Sorry, sorry.”
While we were in our own little world, the med tech guy, seeing that everything was alright with us, moved on to the next person and started waking them up.
Soon, we heard the voice of another guy in charge.
“People, you have been in cryo for five years, nine months, and twenty-two days. You will be hungry, you will be weak. If you feel nauseated, please use the sacks provided for your convenience. The staff thanks you in advance.”
I took Iara's hand in mine and started floating to our locker. Since we came in two, we shared it. Iara was amazed by everything, her hair floating around, the people around us, all that technology, just everything.
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The ship started heading towards the largest moon of the Polyphemeus planet, which they called Pandora. Looking at it from this distance, everything is blue, unlike Earth, where everything is grey.
We passed through sapphire seas and unknown continents of the moon; it was insane to think this place really existed, and we were going to live on it now. I was doing all of it for her.
I was back in my wheelchair, with Iara on my lap, me adjusting her mask - they called it exopack, actually - so she could breathe the air. She was calm, but looking around at everything, taking all these military-like things in the aircraft (is this named an aircraft? At this point, I feel like I don’t know anything anymore).
“Are you feeling okay, baby?”
“Yes, daddy.”
“If you start to feel anything, you have to tell me, okay? You don’t have to keep anything from me. I’m here to help you, okay?” I tried to assure her (or me, I was so nervous that if I still had my legs, they would feel like jelly right now, so many things could go wrong, I have to make everything right so she can have a good life).
“Don’t worry, papai, if I feel anything I’ll tell you, but you must tell me too, okay? So I can help you!” She told me with the most serious face ever. I would kill and die for Iara, and sometimes, as she is growing up, I feel like she would do the same for me.
There has been a couple of times, where kids her age would make fun of her - of us - because I’m disable, and one time, a boy was making fun of her for only having me, and me being sutck on a wheelchair, she turned to the boy and said: “Well, at least I have my dad with me, where are your parents? I only see that old man with you, is he your grandpa?” The man was the boy’s butler. He went home crying, and when he got home, there was only his nanny there for him. I didn’t know if I should be proud of her or feel bad for the boy. Karma really came quickly for him.
“Thank you, baby, I already feel better knowing that I can count on my ipê to protect and take care of me.” I said to her and then kissed her cheek.
“You don’t need to worry, papai, I will always be here with you. We are a team!”
I don’t know how she is part of me. All my good genes must have gone to her. She is the sweetest kid I could ever have.
Soon, we heard the crew chief:
“Exopacks on!” Everyone around us started putting theirs, me included. “Remember, people, you lose your mark, you’re unconscious in 20 seconds, and you’re dead in four minutes. Let nobody be dead today, it looks bad on my report.” He passed by Iara and me. “Exopack on, let’s go!”
The cardo ramp opens.
“Go directly into the base! Do not stop! Go straight inside!” The crew chief screams, so we can hear him.
Iara holds onto me by my shoulders, and I start rolling us down where people are going. We pass by some men inside some kind of machine that resembles a skeleton.
“Look at all that new meat.” One of them said.
“Check it out, man. Meals on a wheels with a kid.” The other answers.
“That is just wrong. I have seen a lotta guys leave this place in a wheelchair. Never seen anybody show up in one. With a kid, nonetheless.”
But Iara and I didn’t listen to a thing; we kept rolling and looking around. My kid looked at everything with apprehension in her eyes.
“Don’t worry, babygirl, daddy is here to protect you.” I told her, and she looked at me with a smile on her face.
What we didn’t know at that exact time was that a corporal was watching us.
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“… You are on Pandora, ladies and gentlemen. Respect that fact every second of every day.” I heard a man say while rolling Iara and me into the room.
He points out the window. “Out beyond that fence every living thing that crawls, flies, or squats in the mud wants to kill you and eat your eyes for jujubees.” Iara’s breath catches for a moment while her eyes grow big.
“We have an indigenous population of humanoids here called the Na’vi. They’re fond of arrows dipped in a neurotoxin which can stop your heart in one minute. We operate -- we live -- at a constant threat condition yellow.” Everyone held their breath for a second.
“As head of security, it’s my job to keep you alive. I will not succeed - not with all of you. If you wish to survive, you need a strong mental attitude, you need to follow procedure...”
Nothing like an old-school safety brief to put your mind at ease.
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While rolling Iara and me towards the direction I hope is right, a man comes up to us. He looked 6’0 or taller, white, brown hair, and was a nerd.
“Hey, you’re Jake, right? Tom’s brother? You look just like him.” I looked at him like he was crazy, and Iara pursed her eyebrows. “Sorry, I’m Norm Spellman, I went through avatar training with him. And you must be Iara! Your uncle Tommy talked about you all the time! You look exactly like the sweet girl he used to describe his niece!” He offered his hand for me to shake, and I took it. “He was a great guy -- funny. It was a big shock to all of us.”
“Yeah.” I go back to rolling my chair, and Norm follows us. Iara kept looking at him like he was kind of crazy, but she didn’t seem to mind him.
“And duh! -- obviously you look like him. I mean, if you weren’t genetically identical, you wouldn’t be taking over his avatar.”
“Yeah, that’s one of the reasons why I’m here.”
“So -- you want to go check it out?”
“Check the avatar?!” Iara asks, and Norm agrees by shaking his head up and down. “Can we go, papai? Pretty please!” She makes the abandoned dog eye.
“How can I say no to these pretty eyes?” I ask her. “Show us the way.” I say to Norm.
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As we begin to enter the bio-lab, I can already see that this is a complex with some adjoining rooms. And then, another man comes up to us.
“Norm Spellmen? Jacob Sully?”
“Just Jake, please.” I answered him while Norm shook his head.
“Sorry, I will keep it in mind! And this little lady right here! You must be Iara Sully, right?” Max Patel was a light brown man with black hair and brown eyes, almost 5’9.
“Hi, Max! I’m Iara, my father’s daughter, and almost 6 years old!” Iara answered Max with a big smile on her face and showed him 6 fingers.
“Wow! You’re already 6 years old?! Give it some years, and you will pass my age, kid!”
“Oh, but I think it will take some time, no?” She tilts her head while Norm and I are trying to hold a laugh, he even looks the other way.
Max looks kind of shaken. “Yes, it will take some time… Anyways!” He started walking, and we started to follow him. “Me and Norm were out here to drive these remotely controlled bodies called avatars. They’re grown from human DNA mixed with DNA from the natives here.”
Soon, we came up to the containers holding the bodies. They were giant, and the bodies inside them seemed even bigger up close. Iara squirmed out of my lap into the ground and came close to one of them, I followed her.
“Damn. They got big.”
“Yeah, they mature on the trip out.” Norm turned to Max. “So the proprioceptive sims worked pretty well.”
“Yeah, they’ve got great muscle tone. Give us a few hours, you guys can take them for a spin.”
Iara and I were watching one of the bodies inside the tank.
“It looks like him.”
Iara turned to look at me.
“It looks like you, daddy.” She says with a serious face. It scared me, not gonna lie, this kid is too serious sometimes, she understands more than I give her credit for.
“She’s right, Jake, it looks like you. This is your avatar now.” Norm says to me, while looking at Iara with a smile on his face, which she returned.
I turned to the tank and watched the body, mesmerized.
“I want one too. Can I get one?” Max, Norm, and I laughed at the question. “Why are you guys laughing?! I’m serious!”
The idea is -- every driver is matched to his own avatar.
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“-- so their nervous systems are in tune. Or something. Which is why they offered me this gig, because I can link with Tommy’s avatar, which was insanely expensive.” I looked at Norm and Max. Iara was with Norm, looking at what he was doing. “Is this right? I just say whatever in these videologs?”
“Yeah. You just need to get in the habit of documenting everything -- what you see, what you feel -- it’s all part of the science. Good science starts with good observation.”
“Right.” I answer him and look back at the camera. “So, whatever. Here I am. Doing science.” I look around and stare at Iara. She feels my gaze on her and looks at me, and smiles. It’s the prettiest smile that has ever existed, and I smile back at her. “Never been in a lab before.”
“Log off. It’s time to meet your boss for the next five years.” Max said to me, I turned the camera off and started following him. Iara came up to me and tried to sit on my lap, I helped her. Max starts to lead us through the short corridor towards what I learned to be the link room. This is where the magic happens.
“Grace Augustine is a legend. She's the head of the Avatar Program, and she wrote the book -- I mean literally wrote the book -- on Pandoran botany.”
“That's because she likes plants better than people.” Max says to us in a low whisper, and Iara starts to look at everything, marveling at the sight of high tech.
Soon, a white woman with auburn hair, brown eyes, and about 6’0 sits up in one of the links, stretching and cracking her neck. She’s around fifty years old, with a strong face and a look that tells me she’ll hate me the moment I open up my mouth.
I can only hope she likes Iara.
“Who’s got my goddamn cigarette?!” She yells.
A tech scurries to bring her the cigarette, and it’s already even lit. Wow. It seems like around here they jump when Grace barks. She stands, scowling and looking like she hates life, and, unfortunately, we start to approach her.
“And here she is, Cinderella back from the ball. Grace, I’d like you to meet Norm Spellman and Ja --”
“Norm. I hear good things about you. How's your Na'vi?”
𝖬𝖺𝗒 𝗍𝗁𝖾 𝖠𝗅𝗅 𝖬𝗈𝗍𝗁𝖾𝗋 𝗌𝗆𝗂𝗅𝖾 𝗎𝗉𝗈𝗇 𝗈𝗎𝗋 𝖿𝗂𝗋𝗌𝗍 𝗆𝖾𝖾𝗍𝗂𝗇𝗀. Grace nods at him approvingly, taking a drag on her cigarette. She really is going to hate me.
“Kaw'it fe'. nga txampam 'a'aw tìpängkxotsyìp henga.”
𝖭𝗈𝗍 𝖻𝖺𝖽. 𝖸𝗈𝗎 𝗌𝗈𝗎𝗇𝖽 𝖺 𝗅𝗂𝗍𝗍𝗅𝖾 𝖿𝗈𝗋𝗆𝖺𝗅.
“Tsatseng 'ìp still nìtxan plltxe räptum nìyewla.”
𝖳𝗁𝖾𝗋𝖾 𝗂𝗌 𝗌𝗍𝗂𝗅𝗅 𝗆𝗎𝖼𝗁 𝗍𝗈 𝗅𝖾𝖺𝗋𝗇.
Norm tries to get her to acknowledge me.
“Uh, Grace, this is Jake S----”
And then, finally, she turns to me.
“Yeah, yeah, I know who you are, and I don’t need you. I need your brother.” Grace turns then to Max. “You know -- the PhD who trained three years for this mission.”
“He’s dead.” I say to her. Iara looks uncomfortable, so I put my hand on her back. “I know it’s a big inconvenience to everyone.”
Grace looks at me, and then at Iara, who, even nervous as fuck, tries to smile a little at her. And whatever my baby did, I think it pulled some strings with Grace, and she asks me as she sighs.
“How much lab training have you had? Ever run a gas chromatograph?”
“No.” I answer her honestly.
“Any actual lab work at all?”
“High school chemistry. But I ditched, if I’m being honest with you.”
She got really pissed at my answer, and the new victim is Max.
“You see? You see? They’re pissing on us without even the courtesy of calling it rain.” She starts turning away from us. “I’m going to Selfridge.” She shoves past Iara and me and starts heading towards this ‘Selfridge’ office.
“Grace, that’s not a good idea.” Max tries to persuade her to stop this decision, but she is already out the door and clomping down the corridor. Max turns to the rest of us with a pained look.
“Here, tomorrow, oh eight hundred. Try to use big words.” And then he leaves us, probably going after Grace.
“Well… That could be worse, right?” Max asks.
“She didn’t even say hello to me!” Iara complains.
Honestly? I don’t think I would like a ‘hello’ from Grace after everything we just went through.
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The next morning, after waking up with Iara’s feet on my face, helping her dress, brushing her teeth, and taking her to eat something, we head to the lab, in the link room, and we approach our link units. Norm soon slips into his link bed, messing around with it.
“How much link time have you logged?” Grace asks him.
“Five hundred and twenty hours.” Norm answers.
Grance looks at me.
“Like — an hour.” She stares at me.
“Tell me you’re joking.”
“He’s not, I was there.” Iara comes to my rescue. “Daddy didn’t have much time to prepare to come. We left only a week after the men in black came to talk to us after uncle Tommy’s death.” Have I ever said that she is the sweetest kid to ever live?
Grace looks flabbergasted, she looks like she couldn’t believe what she was hearing, and then looked at me in question. I only nodded my head.
She then turns to the link unit and opens the hood of it, and tells me to get closer. I wheel my chair close to it and then I start hauling myself across from my wheelchair. Grace tries to reach out to me to help me, but I don’t let her.
“Don’t! I got this.” She steps back, hands raised. I drag myself into the unit.
“So you just figured you’d come out here to the most hostile environment known to man, with no training of any kind, and see how it went? What was going through your head?”
I meet her eyes with a defiant glare.
“Maybe I was just tired of doctors telling me what I couldn’t do. I do have a 5 year old to raise.”
Grace watches me pull my legs into the link, I then finally settle into the warm fluid gel pack; it’s a strange feeling, it seems to enfold me. Grace is messing with something, and then lowers the skeleton thing.
“Relax and let your mind go blank. That shouldn’t be hard for you.”
“Kiss the darkest part of my lily white -” I can finish my sentence because she slams the hood.
I try to let my mind go blank, but I’m so worried about Iara. I really try not to let it show, but, what will be of her? Did I really make the smartest choice for her?
I can’t lose her.
With this thought in mind, I woke up in a new body.
