#trudy stan

[meenawrites]

Trudy Lives AU: Spider's Hair

We all know hair is super important to the Na'vi in general, but I think it's doubly important to Spider because his hair represents his connection and wanting to belong to the Omaticaya. 

Obviously with Trudy being Spider's mom, he doesn't have as strong abandonment and self-esteem issues as he does in canon. I think he would still have some because obviously kids feel a lot and notice a lot even if adults don't specifically say anything. Plus he just loves Na'vi culture so he would still want to belong. 

Trudy notices this desire from him early on as a kid when he freaks out whenever someone tries to give him a haircut and how he holes up and cries afterwards on the rare times someone succeeded. She hadn't understood the first few times until he saw him stare at Lo'ak's braids and queue when the kids came to the lab to visit him and Grace and touched the short ends of his own hair with something like shame. 

From then on, she stopped letting anyone give the kid a haircut. If he wanted his hair long like the Na'vi, he could have it long, what right did they have to stop him. He's already having a tough time as it is being a human born on this planet, a person torn between both races and cultures, an orphan of such a bloody conflict. So she just lets him be; what's most important to her is his happiness after all. 

I'd imaging in the short time he's with the McCoskers in this AU, they tried to humanize him a bit, which is another part of Trudy chewing them out and taking him in herself because they can clearly see how miserable it makes the kid and still insist on it as if short or long hair is such a big deal or end-all, be-all.

Obviously his curly hair starts getting tangled and unruly and tangled though and Trudy doesn't have much experience dealing with his hair type. So she scrounges up some old youtube videos maybe or talks to one of the remaining scientists who DOES have curly hair for tips and tricks. If there is a scientist left with curly hair (which I'm just gonna say yes there is), I'd imagine she has figured out what natural plants she can use to take care of her hair in the years she's been there, so she helps Trudy out with that. So Trudy takes care of his curls for him, but also finds herself trying out different hairstyles on him.

Like I mentioned in a previous AU post, Trudy learns to braid for him so he can feel included in Omaticaya culture (and it also frankly helps her deal with his curly hair). But none of this matted loc nonsense for Spider this time around, not while she's alive and in charge of his cleanliness and hair. When his hair isn't in a protective hairstyle, she tries out a lot of different styles on him, and it ends up being something she really enjoys doing. It's good mother-son bonding time for the two of them as well because he'll like sit between her knees on the floor and talk to her about his day or something in a very relaxed setting while she works on his hair and he loves her motherly touch on his scalp (because again he still has touch starvation issues). She does a lot of hairstyles on him that like Earth people might consider girly but he loves them and thinks he's an icon. She does stuff like french braids, dutch braids, waterfall braids, fishtail braids when she dries his hair straight. She's definitely given him a braid crown before, and Tuk went gaga over it and begged Trudy to do one to her too. 

She basically switches between protective hairstyles, full on big braids to keep his hair out of his face, and letting his hair go curly. Because his hair is so well taken care of now, I'd imagine that Omaticaya kids an adults see his golden braids and curls and like kind of break the ice there is between him and them and approach him to touch his hair or ask about his braids. 

Also, Spider 100% learns to braid and insists on braiding Trudy's hair every once in a while because he insists she has nice hair and it's a waste for it to just be put up in a ponytail all the time. So he gets really good with hair, and starts braiding some of the Omaticaya's hair when they ask like on special occasions if they want waterfall braids or a braid crown; it gives him a role in the village that he didn't really have before and he loves it. Not all the animosity held towards him goes away with this obviously, but no one can deny that the boy is talented. I'd like to say even Mo'at gives his skills a go one time when she notices him staring at her hair repeatedly for a week preceding some sort of big Na'vi celebration and relents to him. 

Anyway, yeah hehe, I just want to talk about little things like this that improve in Spider's life under Trudy's care. 

[meenawrites]

any ideas in the Trudy Lives AU for when Spider gets taken by the recoms? her reaction? what she tells the sully’s when they admit that he was with them when he got captured? what she’d do after in the following months, planning, etc, and finally her seeing him again? sorry if this is a bit much, I am just very invested in what you’ve created.

YES thank you for asking!

I have actually been thinking about this for the past two days. I'm still not entirely sure sure about how it would go down, BUT! Here are my thoughts so far!

So I think it would actually happen on a day Trudy is like preoccupied with something back at High Camp. She'd had a bit of a bad feeling in her gut that day, but had elected to ignore it. The raid had gone well after all, and things were generally in their favor.

But then the Sully's come back frantic, Kiri is crying, and her blond little son (though not so little anymore) is nowhere to be seen.

Jake wants to leave right then and there to protect the clan, but Trudy forces him to stay to get a proper explanation out of him. He's trying to quickly say what happened but Kiri interrupts him and says they took him, the RDA has him.

And Trudy loses it because clearly Jake was about to leave without Spider.

Now here's where I have a bit of a dilemma. I feel like through actually watching Trudy parent Spider and Neytiri and Trudy being kind of friends, I'm not sure Neytiri would have as much hatred for the boy as she does in canon. Then again it could have been triggered again because of the appearance of the recoms. What I'm saying is maybe Neytiri would oblige Trudy here and go back for him or maybe not. I'm still debating but for the sake of canon let's go with the fact that she doesn't.

Trudy goes on a whole angry rant about what an asshole move it was to just let him be kidnapped and they have no intention of going back for him. Jake's like he's a tough kid and human he'll be fine. And she's like BULLSHIT, do you know why he's a tough kid? Because everyone aside from me made him so! And how could you say that? You don't know what they're gonna do to him. They'll do anything to find out where you are. He's SIXTEEN, Jake! SIXTEEN!

Again, don't know if Jake's friendship with Trudy here would compel him to make a rescue attempt or not, which is why my idea for this event with my Trudy Lives AU isn't solid, solid, but let's continue as if it had gone in canon.

Once she sees he's not going to budge, she's gonna be like, "I respect the fact that you're leaving to get a target off your clan's back. But I will never fucking forgive you for leaving MY kid!"

I think Trudy's spiel would have given Kiri the courage to be like hell yeah how could you leave him that's my best friend! I think the others might be too cowed by her parents' decision to actually go for him right then and there.

Right before the Sully family is going to leave, I think Kiri would run to the lab where Trudy is and tell her she wants to stay to help her get Spider back. Trudy is super touched, but she'd not going to make the same mistake Jake did and let a kid get swept up in this war. So she's like, "I appreciate it, kid, but I can't let you." Kiri starts protesting and she's like, "I can't drag you into this. The whole reason I'm pissed with your old man is because he's fine with Spider getting dragged into this, a KID getting dragged into this shitshow. And I'm not gonna do the same with you. I'm gonna get him back. Ya hear me, Kiri? I'm gonna get him back to you, alright?"

Kiri thinks that if anyone can do it, it's gonna be Trudy so she reluctantly leaves with her family.

Trudy's trained military and a practical woman first and foremost so no matter how much her mama bear instincts are raging at her to just go in guns flying to get her kid back, she sits and tries to make a plan. She ropes the other scientists into it because she knows she won't be able to do it lonewolf-style.

I think first off she'd scout out Bridgehead with the help of some (maybe three) Omatikaya warrior friends she's made over the years (if anyone has suggestions for names or personalities for them I'm all ears). But Bridghead looks basically impenetrable and she'd have no shot of getting in. Besides the whole point of Jake leaving was to get them off of the Omaticaya's backs so she can't really mobilize them to attack the base. She doubted they would follow her anyway.

So she waits, clocking guard shifts and watching. Eventually, whenever Quarritch decides to pull Spider out of the torture machine and be his Na'vi guide, Trudy starts tailing the recom group from afar.

She'd heard about the recoms but had never actually laid eyes on them herself, and seeing Wainfleet's and Quarritch's sends shivers down her spine. And those guys have her son.

For plot reasons, I think she wouldn't be able to make a move for Spider until they start raiding Metkayina clans. For drama reasons anyway. And besides, the recoms are all trained military as well but now in bodies suited to the planet. It would be no easy feat.

Now part of me wants her to go for it before then anyway and get captured. Spider says he won't do anything for Quarritch anymore if he so much as lays a hand on her, so now Trudy is also just traipsing with them as another captive.

The other part of me wants her to take her shot when the RDA is preoccupied with hunting tulkuns to send a signal to the Sully's. Amidst the chaos of the hunt, I think she would be able to drop down onto the boat unnoticed (possibly with the help of a Na'vi friend of hers' ikran and her own kestrel is nearby or something). She hides on the ship until she sees Spider come out of the mouth of the tulkun looking absolutely sick to his stomach.

Because of how long he's been with the recoms, I think they'd probably keep less of a watchful eye on him, which would allow Trudy to signal him and make a run for it under their noses. She nabs Spider and they jump off the boat together, getting picked up by her Na'vi friend along the way on the back of her ikran. It would be a good half hour to an hour before Quarritch even noticed the kid was gone since he had been busy plotting with the tulkun hunters. And he can't justify going to get them.

Luckily because Trudy's a smart and skilled adult, she'd have more spare exopacks and once Spider says there's a tracker in his, she gives another one and they ditch his somewhere in the middle of the ocean or something.

From here, Trudy would probably pilot her kestrel towards Awa'atlu. I imagine that she's such a good pilot, she'd long since disabled any tracking signals or anything from her kestrel and flies solo/manually (so the RDA can't track her). She's going there because as pissed as she is with Jake for leaving her son and running, she knows he deserves to know how close Quarritch is and what his plans are.

I'd imagine in this version, since Trudy got him back NETEYAM DOESN'T DIE AND ALL IS WELL.

Need Jake to do some apologizing and shit but well that's out of the scope of this question rn.

Hope that answered the question. If you guys have any thoughts about what I mentioned I was uncertain about, please feel free to share.

[meenawrites]

Again with Trudy y’all!

Okay SO! We all know that Trudy HAS to have excellent taste in music. Like look at her.

I’m sure this woman has been gradually building up her musical library since she could afford it and now she has like 10 000 songs or something.

I think she sings a lot by herself like just jamming as she works on her kestrel or does stuff around the lab and eventually she starts sharing the music with Spider.

So it becomes like a mama-son thing for to give him one of her earpieces and they just sing at the top of their lungs together and have dance parties. Trudy used to be way more private about people seeing her sing or dance but like after the shit she’s gone through on Pandora it seems pretty trivial, plus it makes the kid happy so she’s just like whatever.

I also think that Trudy would have a great voice. Like I think she’d have a strong belt with a bit of a rasp to it (think kind of voice like Persephone from Hadestown’s voice). Like she can go pretty deep in her voice, her range is good. She can’t hit super high notes though, her throat tightens up at those and just like refuses to work.

Spider also has incredible range. He’s been a good singer since he was a kid both in Na’vi and in English and Spanish. He just has an ear for music and he loves it because it’s a different form of storytelling for him. He can hit those high notes even as he grows older, not like soprano level but mezzo-soprano or something.

Now I’m not enough of a music connoisseur to give a definitive look at what Truyd’s taste in music is but I can try from what I know. I think her vibe would be like 80s and 90s rock and some indie music. Like Spider, she also really listens to the lyrics of songs and not just the sound so most of her song collection has what she considers to be meaningful lyrics, with only a few staple generic pop songs that she can’t help but like. I think she’d be into indie music as well and some grunge. The type of music that comes to mind from my limited knowledge would be Paramore, Pink, Pink Floyd, Nirvana, Journey, Aerosmith, etc. I think she’d have some Taylor Swift songs up in there; though I’m not like a die hard Swiftie, I’ve listened to her lyrics and her writing is honestly great so yeah she’s on there. I also think her guilty pleasure would be musicals; she doesn’t even show Spider those at first because she had a bad experience for her fellow soldiers judging her about it when she first joined the army, but eventually Spider gets unlimited access to her collection. And he eats that shit up! Yet another form of storytelling for him to explore that mixes narrative and song and sound and she finds out because she finds him belting along to like a Heathers song or something cause he has already memorized the lyrics.

I also am so sure Trudy has some sort of sex playlist listed an an obscure name with some dirty songs. That isn’t really my area of expertise though so I don’t know what would be on there per se but yeah. Though I am picturing this one song I know called “Kiss or Kill”. I don’t think she’d have any songs on there that are like super explicit but more just capture the feeling of when she’s in a sexy mood. I’m also picturing Dove Cameron’s “Boyfriend” being on there.

And we can’t forget her roots! She’s gotta have a huge Spanish playlist. Again this is not my expertise but I have a friend who does know! So hopefully I will make like an update post for that to include some songs she would have on there soon! If anyone does have any ideas I’d love to hear them.

So yeah Spider and Trudy have song alongs and dance nights together and that fills my brain tbh.

If anyone is interested in submitting songs you think Trudy would listen to, I would love to see them and maybe make a playlist out of them to share on here!

[meenawrites]

Trudy Parenting Spider

SOOOOO here are some random thoughts I had about Trudy figuring out parenting and she's going to go about it!

I 100% think that she just barely sees a tiny Spider outside, somehow having breached the airlock on his own. His little cheeks are puffed out and he's holding his breath and she realizes that this kid is going to be an absolute menace to her heart and his own safety. So when he's finally allowed to go outside because he can fit into an exopack, she fashions a kiddy leash or something for him because she just knows if she doesn't watch him for a second he'll go bounding into some cranny or another and get himself eaten by a palulukan or something. The Sully kids think the leash is hilarious but Jake having Lo'ak as a rascal and Kiri who just randomly wanders off something totally gets it and applauds her decision. He can't get Neytiri to agree to one for the kids though. 

Trudy couldn't help but coddle the kid in Spanish when he was a kid so he used to go around as a toddler mixing up English and Spanish as a toddler, then eventually English, Spanish, and Na'vi. As soon as she decides she whole-heartedly taking this kid as her responsibility, she decides to teach him Spanish. Spanish becomes a language that connects just the two of them and it creates a tight bond between the two. Spider thinks Spanish curses are funnier than English ones so he'll randomly curse in Spanish under his breath and Norm will be like "I don't know what that means, but I know it isn't appropriate, young man!"

I think Trudy's go-to when addressing Spider is "Kiddo",  followed closely by "Bud" or "Buddy", "Rascal". I have to assume she uses some Spanish terms of endearment as well, but I'm not as well versed in those seeing as I'm not Hispanic (though I do get looked up and down and immediately get spoken to in Spanish most of the time so I'm flattered). I think she'd try to stay away from terms like mijo (my son) for a bit because she's unsure whether she should be putting some that distance between them or simply doesn't want to encroach on his feelings about his mom, but at some point when he's older it kind of slips out and Spider almost cries (he totally does and Trudy does too).

I think she would probably sit and watch Grace's video logs with him or with him and Kiri when she joined in because Spider's a voracious learner and he loves watching Grace talk about the biology of Pandora and its interconnectedness. Trudy learns a lot about Pandora in this way as well, and she misses Grace a lot while she's watching them. 

Like I think I said in a previous post, I think she definitely helps Spider prank the scientists here and there and they both run away from the aftermath laughing maniacally. 

Once she realizes how much Spider wants his height to be measured like the Sully kids, she totally carves a pole out of some fallen wood and sets it up in the room that they share and starts marking his height and cooking him whatever he wants when she sees he's grown taller. 

I imagine they share a room mostly because there probably aren't that many rooms to go around and when Spider was little and after the McCoskers, she wasn't okay with leaving him alone at night and neither was he okay with being alone. I think eventually, if the construct of the base allows for it, they would have like knocked a wall down or something and expanded the room for both of them, maybe drawn a curtain in the middle for some semblance of privacy. 

In my characterization of Spider (which I revealed in the latest installment of my Spider Chronicles fic) Spider is a great artist and he's been drawing since he was little so Trudy definitely has like the biggest collection of Spider's drawings and keeps his old sketchbooks and stuff. She notices that a consistent topic of his drawings is Kiri and she only gets portrayed more and more beautifully as he gets better, and she thinks it's hilariously adorable. She worries a bit for him and his love for the Na'vi girl with him being human and all, but at the moment they're too young for it to matter and frankly she's not quite sure what to do about it, so she just teases him about it every now and then. 

Trudy would definitely teach Spider how to pilot her kestrel, and one of his favorite activities with her since he was little was flying with her. He becomes better than Norm at piloting eventually which he doesn't cease to remind him. 

I think Trudy knows what it's like as a kid to not really get much physical affection from your parents and being touch-starved and she recognizes the signs in Spider almost immediately. It's a lot worse after the McCoskers who didn't even speak to him, let alone hug him, so she starts communicating to him as best (and awkwardly) as she can that it's okay to ask for hugs or to hold her hand, or just generally ask for anything he needs from her. He doesn't really go for it at first and never initiates anything because he doesn't want to be a burden so she changes tactics and just kind of demands physical affection from him like, "hold my hand" or "Spider, I need a hug" , and he slowly gets more comfortable with just grabbing her arm or holding his arms out for a hug or just generally wanting to be held. 

I think Trudy's always worried whether she's doing a good job for this kid or if she's missing something vital so she does watch how Neytiri and some other Omaticaya parents interact and handle their kids and like actually takes notes. Neytiri's really unnerved by her less than subtle staring until she sees her notes one day or something and is endeared. She tells her she can just ask her whatever questions she has in like a very tsundere way. 

If you guys have any ideas or asks please let me know! I finally figured out how to add the ask me questions button online so hopefully that's there for you guys.

[meenawrites]

Trudy's Back At It!

Sorry for the lack of content for the Trudy Lives AU, my brain's just been consumed by what I'm just going to refer to as the Spider Project for now since I'm shit at coming up with titles. 

NOW THEN

Some random thoughts about the AU:

Like I've mentioned a bit before, I think Trudy has like a Na'vi best friend who is a taronyu of the Omaticaya clan. I'd say he thinks Trudy is cool and a badass, especially for a Sky Person and loved the way she takes care of Spider. I think he would kind of be like a big brother or like babysitter figure to Spider and I'm thinking he's a lot younger than Trudy and looks up to her. I want to name him, but I'm just not familiar enough with how Na'vi names work to do that yet, but hopefully will be doing that soon. 

I think Trudy probably spends more time with him than with Jake and they're both just like chill people. Like a lot of them hanging out is just doing their own thing and not talking or playing with Spider or something. But Trudy also just feels at ease enough with him to talk to him about random stuff from her life back on Earth, which is why he respects her all the more for giving her all in raising Spider when she didn't really get what she's endeavoring to give the kid. 

I think during the first movie, he was probably one of the younger taronyu of the clan, one who had just recently completed his iknimaya or something and he still has nightmares about that time. I think he met Trudy because he's the one who dragged her out of the wreckage of her kestrel (cause she crashed instead of getting blown up by Quarritch thank you very much). He had gotten separated from his party and was frankly terrified to death when he saw smoke rising from her copter and Na'vi battle paints across the sides. He figured she was with Jake and pulled her out, securing a mask on her. They've been friends ever since because of that. 

As to how he connects to Jake and Neytiri, I think he would have been one of the kids in the original school Grace had built before the beginning of Avatar I, so he and Neytiri were close, maybe she babysat him every now and then when he was younger. I also think he probably would have been kind of fascinated by the humans when they first arrived, especially learning under Grace who's just such a cool lady so he takes more of an interest in human things than the others did/do.

I think he admires Jake a lot. He was Toruk Makto after all, a figure they'd only ever heard stories about. 

I think he'd probably often be sighted either hanging back with Trudy or holding Spider's hand to keep him from running off into the woods or something. 

I'd also say that because he's interested in human stuff, he would ask Trudy to teach him Spanish so he's like the only Na'vi who comprehends a human language other than English. Except maybe Jake who probably had the crappy American teaching version Spanish in like middle school or something and can understand things here and there (mostly the swear words). 

If anyone has any name suggestions for him, please tell me! I imagine his name starting with either a 'T' or 'S'. 

[meenawrites]

AU: Trudy is Spider's Mom

That's it, guys, I'm fixing Spider's parental situation with an AU: TRUDY NEVER DIED! I don't know how okay like she managed to eject herself or her helicopter didn't blow up or I don't know okay but the point is TRUDY DIDN'T DIE!

And I just know she would take one look at Spider post-battle and be like well shit, I guess the kid is mine now. (There will be more nuance to this in later posts but for now just roll with it).

Like Trudy also never really pictured herself as a mom or having kids but she sees this poor orphan who is kind of just being passed around from adult to adult, and is like I  guess someone has to take responsibility

And I just know that Trudy would love the shit out of this kid. Like he'd be mischievous and funny and full of heart and Trudy would just be like can't believe a kid like this came from the likes of Quarritch. 

I imagine her venturing out with Spider when he's old enough to have a mask and watching him play with the Sully kids. She sees keeping up with Spider as good exercise for her too to keep in shape on this planet. 

She probably takes Spider up on a kestrel with her whenever she can, and he loves the aerial view, taking in the entirety of this planet he loves.

I feel like Trudy would be one of those girls that was never super concerned with things like doing her hair, makeup, and nails, especially seeing as she was in the army. But Spider's hair starts getting hard to manage and this woman barely knows how to do a braid, and I'm sure she sees him staring at the Sully kids' hair. So she finds herself asking for lessons either from Neytiri or Mo'at maybe just to be able to do his hair. 

I imagine she would have a bit of a strained relationship with Neytiri. Like she understands her dislike for Spider because of her trauma, but she can't help but get angry and protective every time she sees her glare at Spider or just be displeased at his presence. 

Trudy would probably be the one to accidentally teach Spider swear words cause she has a hard time filtering her language. At one point she gives up when she hears little Spider use the word "dipshit" and just finds it fucking hilarious that this tiny kid is walking around swearing. She pointedly ignores the glares Norm gives her every time baby Spider swears and just sticks her tongue out. 

I have so many ideas for this AU and SO SAD it's not real, but I will be indulging in this in future posts. 

(Also I am Trudy's wife thank you very much)

[meenawrites]

Trudy and the McCoskers

So... we all know Spider had a shitting time with his supposed foster family. Now in my AU, I imagine he'd still be given to the McCoskers at some point because a majority of the involved parties are saying that it would probably be better for Spider to be raised in a two-parent environment, and I'm imagining the McCoskers are the only real couple on Pandora. I think Trudy would be pretty against it at the beginning, but the others wear her down and she doubts herself because what the hell does she know about raising a child. 

(The below is like a pseudo-writing summary of how I would see it going down. I'm considering turning these into an actual fic but we'll see. Just going to share my ideas for now.)

So she lets him go but she makes sure to take him aside before them. She crouches to his level holds him by the shoulders gingerly. 

"Kiddo, I want you to know that I'm here if you ever need anything. I'm sure they're nice people, but if they say anything you don't like or even look at you in a bad way, you don't hesitate to come find me okay? You got that?"

I imagine Spider wouldn't really understand why he has to go live with these people but he's comforted by the fact that Trudy is there as his backup. 

The few weeks Spider is in their custody, Trudy's a bit of a mess. Now that she's not constantly looking after Spider, she doesn't know what to do with herself anymore and finds herself pacing aimlessly. 

She tries to give them time to adjust and maybe be a family, but eventually she caves, and she has to go see him. At first, she thinks Spider seems fine, though there is something off about him. He doesn't seem super comfortable with the McCoskers but Trudy thinks they just need more time. Her instincts are screaming at her that something is wrong though, so she starts dropping by unannounced, and figures out after seeing through a few of their bluffs that the McCoskers have no idea where this kid is most of the time. She realizes it with certainty when she drops in and they're having dinner, but Spider isn't there. It's almost Eclipse and he's not there, and his supposed foster parents seem not to give a damn. 

Trudy is about to snap but decides she'll deal with them later. She immediately goes out to look for Spider, who, when she finds him kind of just sitting near the edge of the forest, holding his knees to his chest, looks shocked that she came. Or that anybody came to find him period. He seems completely fine though otherwise, and she pulls him to her. All she notices is that Spider immediately clings to her and buries his fists in her clothes, as if scared she'd let him go, or as if he hasn't been held in a long while. Trudy has never been so angry in her life. 

She takes Spider back to her room, tucks him into her bed, and promises to come back as soon as possible. She unceremoniously goes to wake Norm and Max the hell up and drags them to wherever the McCoskers live because THEY were the ones who convinced her to give Spider to them and yet no one but she had bothered to actually check up on how he was doing and she is FURIOUS. She gives all of them a good verbal lashing, barely holding it together enough not to start throwing punches. She calls the McCoskers all the swear names in the book (and she's got an expansive repertoire so it doesn't end quickly) and threatens their lives should they ever so much as pull on a single hair on Spider's head. 

Then she wheels on Norm and Max and shouts at them for not following up with Spider, for thinking that being raised in a two-parent household was the primary thing to secure for him. It doesn't mean shit if they don't actually care for him. She's just so incredibly angry, especially at herself for not having checked in on him sooner, for not having been more interrogating and assertive about his wellbeing, and for letting the scientists convince her this was the best course of action for the kid. She might not know much about good parenting, but she knew what NOT to do. And more than that, she CARED, so she decides to bury all her doubts and declares that Spider is HERS from there on out, and stomps out. 

Spider's been waiting anxiously for her to come back, and she softens upon seeing his scared eyes. She comes to him and sits on the edge of the bed, telling him in a gentle but fierce voice that he would stay with her from now on and he would never have to go back to those people. That Spider belonged to her now. It's this claiming of him, the feeling of belonging to someone that starts the kid's rare display of waterworks. He clings to her fervently and she eventually gets him to confess that the McCoskers hadn't done anything violent to him or anything, they had simply... ignored him. Which hurt so much more. They didn't really look at him, told him where the food was but didn't make any for him, got annoyed when he asked for permission to go outside, and just generally barely talked to him. They basically just dismissed his existence, made him feel incredibly unwanted and a burden. Spider started spending more and more time outside of the house because of that, not wanting to come back to a house so lacking of warmth. He thought parents were supposed to give off the feeling that Jake and Neytiri did with their kids, so when they did it, Spider thought it was his fault, that something was wrong with him and that was why they didn't seem to want to interact with him. 

Trudy mentally contemplates going back and committing murder, but decides to focus back on the kid. He's hers now and she's going to give him the best and most love and care she could. 

[meenawrites]

More about Trudy and Spider because I have no chill

SO we don't know much about Trudy unfortunately other than the fact that she was an absolute badass who could fly like nobody's business and had a good moral compass. 

But I've been thinking about what her backstory could possibly be like, and thinking that she would probably reveal it to Spider after she finds him in despair about his parentage. 

I think the scene would go something like this:  (also warning this is written immediately and with no editing so not my best work)

Trudy finds Spider crouched in one of the scientists lab chairs, some video log playing before. She blinked several times, trying to chase the sleep from her eyes. His eyes were wide as he watched. Fat, silent tears shone in the screen's light as they rolled down his cheeks, and the voice finally hit her. That familiar lilt and baritone voice, the commanding air.

"Papa Dragon is–"

She slammed the off button, breathing heavily. Spider jumped at the violent action, and she swiveled the chair to face her. 

Fear was etched into his small face, fear and horror. He hiccoughed as she crouched down to his level, holding his knees to his chest. 

"He's my dad..." he whispered in a voice so small, so broken, Trudy was sure her heart broke with it. He had been bound to find out someday. It wasn't even really a secret, but she had wanted to be the one to break it to him, to gently talk him through it. Perhaps unfiltered access to the lab's computers hadn't been the best move. 

"Yeah, he is," she said delicately. There was no sense denying it, and the kid deserved the truth. 

Spider's eyes welled up with fresh tears again and he buried his face in his knees. The kid didn't cry often, refused to really. He hadn't even cried when he'd broken his leg catching baby Tuk when she'd al but walked off a tree branch. But this, this was what made him cry. 

Trudy's face hardened, and she wrenched Spider's face up to look at her. 

"Hey, kiddo, look at me. Look at me. It doesn't matter who your parents are, alright?"

"This-this is why Neytiri doesn't like m-me. It makes sense," he stuttered, fighting her hold. "She should–"

"Hey! You listen to me, that is not true. You are not your parents, and that damn Neytiri should know that."

Spider was still hiccoughing and trying to pull himself from her grasp, so she grabbed his from his underarms, sat in the chair herself, and pinned him in her lap. 

"You are not responsible for whatever your dad did, you got that?"

"But–"

"Not buts!" she insisted, tightening her hold on him. "I need you to get it through your brain that it has nothing to do with you. You didn't choose who your dad is. No one does."

Spider finally relented, turning his face into her chest and allowing himself to be held. She pressed her nose to the top of his head, rubbing her hands down his arms. 

"What if I become like him?" He mumbled into her tank top. "I don't want to hurt anybody."

"You won't," she asserted, shaking him once. "Just because you're someone's kid doesn't mean you'll turn out like them."

Spider's continuing hiccoughs and chest spasms told her he wasn't convinced. 

"I mean, look at me, bud. I'm nothing like either of my parents."

He stilled in her arms at this admission, peeking up at her through tear-clogged eyelashes. 

She sighed, resigning herself to her fate. 

"My dad was a hard-ass who never wanted a girl, so he didn't really know what to do with me. He was what you'd call a workaholic and was hardly ever home. And my mom..." She bit her lip, rolling the words in her mouth. "she had no self-esteem to speak of and let my dad walk all over her. She raised me to be the opposite of everything I am now–don't be independent, stay quiet, stay submissive and you'll find a husband. As if any of that crap had worked for her. 

"And I decided I would be nothing like either of them. I joined the military as soon as I could, which went against all the bullshit feminine standards they wanted me to fit with. I got my education, became the best damn pilot I could, didn't give a shit what people wanted or expected me to be."

She glanced back to the kid in her arms, smiling a bit as she noticed that he was no longer crying. 

"Moral of the story, kiddo: it doesn't matter who your parents are. You can be whatever you want to be. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise. If they do, you come running to me, and I'll beat them up."

Spider cracked a watery smile at that. 

"What really matters is in here," she said, knocking on his chest. "You've got a good, strong heart. Listen to it, and if you ever doubt it, you come ask me, okay? Cause I've got you, you know that right?"

Spider nodded, one of his hands clenching in the fabric of her shirt. 

"Good. Now let's get your ass to sleep. You're sleeping next to me today, got it, ya rascal?"

She stood before he could respond, his arms looping around her neck as she adjusted his position. 

She'd remind him as many times as she had to that he wasn't his parents, wasn't anything like Quarritch. She could spend her life doing that if it stopped him from crying.