*ੈ✩‧₊˚ gentle breeze •°. *࿐

disasters

It was odd how things played out in the ways that they do.

You started your day happy as you were spending it with Neteyam "teaching" him. In reality, the two of you were riding around on ilus, him on Nane and you on another ilu. It was almost a habit for the two of you to get sidetracked and to go off swimming away from whatever duties you had. You had decided to take Neteyam to the Cove of the Ancestors, and even though he had been there before with his siblings and friends, you wanted to be there with him one-on-one without the distractions of others. You wanted him to truly see the beauty of the cove.

Riding over there was fast since it was just the two of you, it felt like no time had passed at all. Diving into the water and disconnecting your bond from the ilu, you get closer to the tree that was so familiar to you. You look over to Neteyam, holding a hand for him to hold, a hand that he gladly took as he swam closer to you. You watched him connect his queue to the tree as he closed his eyes, while you looked around for a second. You admired the beautiful coral that laid around the tree, decorating it with a neon pink-purple colour that you adored. The bright colours of life never ceased to fill your heart with joy.

Despite being in a space where you could see your mother again, you didn't know if you were ready to. You also weren't ready to see her the last time everyone went to the cove and some time had passed since then, but still, your heart was still sore from the sight of the gentle woman you could only see the spirit of. Instead, you watched Neteyam's face with a tenderness that you didn't know you could feel. You saw his face scrunch from time to time, his lips twitching to a smile and back to a neutral, wondering what he was seeing that was causing this happiness. You wait a bit before his eyes open all of a sudden, you swim back a bit in surprise, wondering why he had opened his eyes so abruptly instead of slowly.

'Are you okay?' you ask in sign, wondering if something bad had happened when he connected to the tree. Instead of a sign back, Neteyam pointed upwards and you got the message, he just needed air. So the two of you swim up back to the surface, your heads poking up above as you both tread water. You noticed that it started raining as you had to blink away the rain from your eyes so you called some ilu to pick you up. Only Nane arrived, so you took the front while Neteyam sat behind you.

When you get on the ilu, you turn to him, "what did you see?" you ask your words sparkling with interest.

"I saw a mighty warrior from our clan," Neteyam starts, an unreadable expression on his face, "he died while protecting the forest from the sky people. He was my dad's brother and the olo'eyktan before my dad."

"That's cool, I hope the two of you had a beautiful reunion," you say to him with a smile. He sends you one back, putting a hand on your waist as you go into the water to head back to the village.

Going back to the village you were met with a contrast of faces, your and Neteyam's smiling faces stood out amongst the sad faces of the rest of the Metkayina. You look around and see Ao'nung standing alone, you look back at Neteyam and nod your head toward Ao'nung, signalling him to go over to him. When you reach him, you immediately ask him questions.

"What happened? Why is everyone sad?"

"Something happened out in the waters, I'm not sure yet but my mother said she felt something was wrong. Specifically with her spirit sister," he explains to you as a worried expression found its way to your face.

"What? Her spirit sister?" you ask, Ao'nung nods.

"There's a small group of us going out to investigate, are you coming?" he asks you.

"Yeah, I'll go," you say, "Neteyam, you should probably stay here."

"No, I'll go with you guys," he says.

"This is a matter for the leaders of the clan and our warriors," Ao'nung says, you look at him questionably knowing that you both weren't the leaders yet nor were you leaders. He doesn't look at you as you wave to Neteyam as he got off Nane and Ao'nung calls for an ilu for himself, the both of you going to catch up with the group that just left the reef.

The group was made up of you, Ao'nung, Ronal, Tonowari, Jake, Neytiri, your father, and a couple of the warriors. It didn't take long before Tonowari was able to spot a group of tulkun swimming toward your group, you guys stopping in order for Tonowari to communicate with the tulkun. You look at Ao'nung with a concerned look, the both of you knowing that the tulkun would not be this close to the reef at this time of the year, especially not so soon after visiting.

A moment later all the adults start to swim again, you and Ao'nung swimming not too far behind them. It felt like a thousand years had passed before the tulkun led you far out into the ocean, they had all spread out into a circle with what was like a passageway to what they had wanted you to find.

In the middle of them all was a dead tulkun. Not just any tulkun, but Ronal's spirit sister, Ro'a and her newborn son.

The sight brought goosebumps to your skin, the feeling bringing shivers throughout your body as you drifted closer to the body. Your heart aching for Ronal, knowing that this moment was going to be hard for her to process, and it was. You all watched as she got closer to Roa's body with disbelief plastered on her face, her own body still with unspoken grief as she went up to her spirit sister whose eyes were greyed out and without life.

She places a hand on Ro'a and gets up to sit on her fin, caressing Ro'a's lifeless eyes, holding on to her as if there was a chance she would come back to life. A distant sound of thunder could be heard as she turned a bit, seeing the calf that Roa had just had dead beside her, hiding under his mother's fin. Ronal chokes out more cries, not knowing how to react to any of this.

You and Ao'nung had rode up beside the dead calf, looking at each other then back toward the calf. It hurt to know that the calf had stayed beside his mother despite the chance to go under another's care.

"Her name is Ro'a," Tonowari says out loud. You look up at him, it looked like he was saying so to Jake and Neytiri. You silently listen as Ao'nung goes over to comfort his mother, placing a hand on her side.

"She was my spirit sister. She was the composer of songs, much reverend, we would sing together," Ronal takes a second to recollect herself, "she waited many breeding cycles to have this calf. The clan was so happy for her."

Ronal lets out a wheeze, trying to catch her breath from the crying she had been doing. You felt your heart sink seeing the strong woman in front of you in a deep state of mourning and grief, tilting your head down as continued to stare at the floating calf in front of you.

"What is this, Tonowari? What is this?!" Ronal yells out, her voice full of desperation as another crash of thunder could be heard, Ao'nung continuing to support his mother.

The group spends a good chunk of time at Ro'a's body, letting Ronal mourn before the tulkun swim the two bodies away for their own burial ceremony. As you all swim back, a growing anger starts to wash over the group except you, all you could feel was the pain that radiated from the scene before. You knew death but this was the first time you had witnessed it so close up, and it hurt. You didn't cry but the heavy feeling in your heart had never left. Even when you arrived back in Awa'atlu, even when everyone had gathered around Ronal and Tonowari at the meeting point with Jake and his family right in the middle.

"My spirit sister and her baby have been murdered by the sky people!" Ronal yells out loud, gasps echo throughout the crowd. You stood beside Tsireya, looking down as you had a hand at her back as she was crying for the loss of someone important to her mother. She had always been so sensitive compared to everyone else and you knew she needed the support.

"This war has come to us!" Tonowari yells out, after letting out a call that somewhat resembled a snarl, "we knew about this hunting of our tulkun people, but it was over the horizon far away. Now it is here!"

The rain soaked into the hair and skin of everyone as it poured down. Multiple yelps could be heard from the Metkayina people as some of them stuck out their tongues showing that they were ready for far.

"You have to understand how the sky people think," Jake tries to explain over everyone's voices. You look up at him, getting ready to hear what he had to say, "they don't care about the great balance!

"Death to the sky people!" someone yelled out in the background.

"Now listen to him!" Neteyam yells, hoping that the others would calm down. He looks over to you, seeing that you were still looking sad and holding on to Tsireya.

"The sky people are not gonna stop. This is only the beginning, you've got to tell your tulkun to leave," Jake continues, pointing to a random direction at the end, "you've gotta tell them to go far away!"

"Leave?" Ronal yells out, "you love among us and you learned nothing?!"

"We will fight to protect our brothers and sisters!" someone called out in the crowd, hitting his chest while creating the same battle face as the others.

"No, no, no! If you attack, if you fight then they will destroy you! They will destroy everything that you love!" Jake shouts, uses his arms to exaggerate his words, what he got back were more battle cries and na'vi lifting their spears up and down.

"Hear my words! Hear my words!" Jake yells while trying to calm down the crowd. Instead, things got rowdy.

"Now listen to my father," Neteyam says, trying to get the people around him to listen. You and Tsireya look at each other, both of you not knowing what to say to each other.

"Damn it," Jake says softly before he walks over to Neteyam who was holding something that you have noticed before.

"He speaks the truth!" Neteyam yells out as his dad takes out what he was holding out of his hands. He looks for you again, seeing how your eyes were only following Jake.

The crowd settled down as Jake displayed a red object, circling around to ensure that everyone was looking at his outstretched arm. Ao'nung could be heard making clicking noises, playing with the tension.

"Tell the tulkun, that if they are hit by one of these, they are marked for death," Jake pauses for a second, "call for me and I'll silence it. Saving their lives, that's all that matters, right? Saving your family."

The silence is loud at the last of his words, the true reality of why everyone was mad was settling in. The tulkun, their spirit siblings were in danger, they wanted them to be safe and a war would only bring more danger to them. Tonowari takes a deep breath in before looking toward Ronal, she only holds on to his arm, closing her eyes giving him a silent nod.

"Tell the tulkun," he says.

"Go, go!" Ronal yells out.

You look to Tsireya and saw her eyes looking toward the crowd, you try to follow her eyes but she shakes her head, "c'mon, let's go."

You nod your head and follow her, Ao'nung and Rotxo following the both of you, Ao'nung walking up to stand beside you.

"Are you okay?" Ao'nung asks, placing a hand on your back.

"Yeah, it's just a lot to take in. It's like our lives have gotten too eventful," you say, letting a deep breath out.

"I get that, it'll be okay. It'll pass soon," he says, getting into the water and calling for some ilu. The four of you ride in the water for a bit, planning to follow the others and preparing to tell your own spirit siblings what was going on. All of you were about to leave the shore when you heard Tsireya gasp.

"I need to check on Lo'ak," she says, before swimming ahead. The three of you look at each other and follow her, soon spotting Lo'ak and Neteyam on one of the docks, "Lo'ak!"

You all get on the dock when you see Lo'ak dive off the dock, both Neteyam and Tsireya calling for the boy. Neteyam hits Ao'nung's chest with a bit of frustration, "come on, he's going to Payakan!"

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[a/n]: be thankful i didnt kill off inaka (your spirit sister) <333 i had the opportunity right at my finger tips hehe this is the longest that ive gone without updating im so sorry ):

did you know: in this part of the movie, their battle cries are inspired by haka ! the haka is a ceremonial māori war dance or challenge. haka are usually performed in a group and represent a display of a tribe's pride, strength and unity (this is copy and pasted from the website lolol). the origins of haka stems from a maori legend that paints it as a celebration of life. 

mini rant feel free to skip ! because this is inspired by a cultural thing i hate when other authors/people in edits write "they become agressive" like..... do u know u are contributing to the stereotypes that make non-western/white people seem like bad/violent people ?? even if indirectly or if you dont know you should at least know that avatar is inspired by so many indigenous groups so the audacity you have to write without at least acknowledging that we are seeing something that important to people of a certain group, the pride they might've felt to see themselves presented in such a popular movie only for you to call it aggressive ?? bro... maybe say they got riled up or that you see anger in the movements 

but i cannot speak for the maori people ! i can only use the knowledge that i have researched and things i have learnt from classes. so if any maori people found that they didnt like how the haka was used in avatar, we should listen to them and if they believed it was used wrong !

tldr: don't call something important from another culture aggressive if you don't know what it stands for !

if any of my maori readers would like to work with me to assist me in revising that part to be more accurate, my messages are gladly open !

though this is only a fanfic writing website, using the did you knows / my platform to bring awareness to what i think should have some attention on is only right.

there is currently a project stinky biden whats to started called the willow project, which will essentially destroy the artic and we don't want that, do we? there is a petition going around and if you could sign it, that would be amazing !