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ecriter · 9 months

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Make the Bond - Pt. 7

a/n: after 6 months....THEY'RE BACK.

warnings: smut, minors DNI

ao3 ver

Part 7 of ?

Part 6

Chapter 7 - Make the Bond

The ritual of mating beneath Eywa had been practiced in Navi culture since the first songs. To take a mate was to bond eternally with another being, two souls connected by the all-seeing mother. Mating was the most tender form of a promise, only breakable by death, and as you and Quaritch moved across the soft, damp moss that bloomed along the sloped roots of the soul tree, you could hardly believe it was an oath you were about to make.

You had dreamed of this day since you were an awkward, gangly teenager just coming into your womanhood - nights spent beneath dusk, your finger brushing the glowing fronds of your queue and imagining the completeness a bond would bring. The hazy face you had always imagined was clear now, a sharp relief that painted strong and straight features belonging to your dreamwalker. He was tangible, not just some foggy idea that you figured was a natural evolution of your future.

The intensity of your connection should have scared you, but you were still high on a cocktail of nerves and adrenaline from the soldier attacking you back in the jungle. It wasn't helping your rationality that Quaritch’s scent curled around you, perfuming your senses until you felt drunk on him.

You knew what lay ahead of you, past the bioluminescent plants that hid a glittering clearing. An almost transcendent pull guided you there, Quaritch in tow, and the closer you neared the soul tree, the tighter your hand curled into his.

“The clearing is just ahead now,” You murmured, words puncturing the heavy air. “We’re close.”

“Where’re we going?” Quaritch asked.

Your pace slowed so Quaritch could pull equal to you, steps in unison with yours. The clearing was ahead, hidden by pale pink fronds that seemed to drape from the sky. You reached forward to brush them away, allowing Quaritch to step first into the clearing that revealed the Soul Tree. The sheer majesty of it commanded respect - white bark shimmered in the moonlight that bathed the meadow, glowing tendrils weaving a blanket around the base of the tree, creating a curtain of privacy from the rest of the world.

“Here,” You whispered reverently. “Our ancestors. Eywa created these sanctuaries to allow us to communicate with our ancestors and herself. See here? We connect to these vines and can see the memories of our clans and seek guidance.”

With a gentle touch, you caressed the glowing chord in front of you, sliding it along your palm until its weight rested comfortably in your hand, then offered it to Quaritch.

At first, he looked uncomfortable - his fingers brushed the back of your hand, but he didn’t grab the vine nor indicate that he wanted to do so. Quaritch's depth and understanding of Eywa was still in its infancy, so you understood his reluctance to connect with her. But there was nothing to fear, nothing you would let happen to him.

“Quaritch,” You whispered, sliding your fingers to interlock with his. He looked at you, his brow creased a little deeper. He was pouting in a way reminiscent of a child, lower lip puffed out and wide yellow eyes glistening. It pulled a laugh from your chest as you smoothed a hand down his cheek.

“Quaritch, what are you afraid of? I am here with you, and I would not let anything happen to you.”

Quaritch cleared his throat in an embarrassed manner, then grinned shyly. “I know it's stupid. I guess I'm just not used to things being inside my head. Other than me.”

You laughed again and the tension eased. Quaritch slid his fingers along the chord, chuffing at the warmth and life of the thing. It glowed under his hand, almost inviting him to connect.

“See?” You teased. “Not so scary.”

The ex-soldier snorted, but his head tilted back, eyes crinkling with suppressed laughter. The movement brought candor to his usually guarded expression. You noticed an endearing set of dimples and small creases around his eyes, making your heart flutter. No one else saw him like this. Just you.

Your grin matched his as you looked down at the chord, sliding your braid over your shoulder. The tendrils of your queue curled forward, testing the warm air before twisting towards the vine and holding fast. Warmth poured into your limbs, a familiar peace you found with Eywa’s communion. Memories moved through you, warm like sunlight pouring across your skin - a sandy beach, cool water lapping at your toes, the flash of your mother’s kind eyes, and your father’s guiding touch. You felt soft fingers brush against yours and looked to your right to see Quaritch looking down at you.

“Is that you?”

“Yes. My father was teaching me to fish. I was terrible at it but he was patient and we spent all day together.”

Perfectly timed, your young figure fumbles the large trout hooked on the pole and it splashes back into the water, swimming away. Your father bends down, ruffling your hair with a smile. He says something and you remember the words - Plenty of fish in the sea, daughter. You only fail when you do not try!

“That's a good memory.”

You hum in agreement, drawing closer to Quaritch.

“Yeah. It was the last time we could spend time together before he became Chief and the duties of the clan took him away.”

After that, you saw your father less and less. Trips to the beach for lessons were passed on to the matriarchs that traditionally taught young warriors. It was a bittersweet memory. Your expression must have betrayed you, because Quaritch tucked his arm around your hip and pulled you into his side.

He wasn't one for words of comfort, so he pressed a gentle kiss to your hairline, lingering there. Your eyes fluttered close before you turned into him, burying your nose in his collar. Quaritch smelled like salt and summer, fitting perfectly into the landscape of your mind. His tail brushed low over the foamy surf. You could feel the tickle of his dark hair against your cheek, grown out from the closely-cropped cut he’d had when the two of you had first met.

The memory began to fade, the smell of the sea fading into cobwebs. Your eyes blinked open, back in the clearing.

When you looked up, Quartich was looking down at you. Suddenly, the air felt thick. Your breath caught in your throat. Quaritch was looking at you, communicating something to you through molten eyes. Your body was tingling, growing flush beneath his implication. Quaritch was disconnecting from the tree and you were dimly aware that you were, too. He was moving as if captured in quicksand, slow and deliberate. Then, suddenly, his fingers were curling into the messy strands at the base of your neck, pulling you into him, kissing you. It was all teeth and desperation. Quaritch licked along the seam of your lip, into your mouth, working you open with almost embarrassing ease. His large palms followed the curve of your back, pulling your hips into his, sparking delicious friction that made you groan.

Months of fleeting touches, flirtatious smiles, and tension that had boiled and boiled finally led to this moment.

Your mouths moved decisively against one another, his tongue sliding along your teeth and nipping at your mouth. It was like Quaritch wanted to swallow you whole, devour you and lay claim to you utterly and completely, ruin any thought or desire for anyone else but him. Not that you had any - Quaritch had consumed you since you'd met him.

His hand curled at the base of your spine, grazing along the sensitive skin of your tail - it was a sensitive spot, a bundle of nerves that sent your hips jutting back into his palm.

“ Miles,” You sighed against him, fingers clenching against his shoulders for stability.

“That feel good?” You could feel him grin against your cheek, nuzzling his wet nose down the line of your jaw and dropping soft kisses and nips.

You nodded, whining as he massaged that sensitive spot. The heat in your stomach turned tangible, weakening your legs so you collapsed into Quaritch, holding onto him desperately, craving every inch of skin and muscle.

Your hips moved to rut upwards again but were forced still by Quaritch’s grip around you. He tilted your head back, meeting your wet, pitiful eyes.

“If you look at me like that, I’m going to do some very bad things to you.” He sighed, a sly smile tugging at the corner of his mouth.

“What kind of things?” You asked, all innocence.

His ears flicked and he exhaled shakily. The virtue you exuded begged for corruption - Quaritch wanted to do things properly with you, ease you slowly open for him until you bloomed like a flower. But God, your big round eyes that glowed pink in the light of the tree and your swollen plush lips that would look so perfect wrapped around his cock made such formalities impossible.

“Lay down,” Was all he could manage, guiding your pliant form down to the earth.

The tree roots cupped your body like a small burrow built just for the pair of you, soft grass tickling the sensitive skin of your spine. Quaritch’s knees bracketed your hips, pinning you in place. You expected him to lean down and kiss you - he had other plans. Lithe fingers curled around the woven fabric off your chest guard, tugging at the material. It gave away with no resistance, exposing your hardened nipples to the cooling night air.

“Sensitive?” He asked cheekily, thumbing one of the peaks.

“Miles...” You complained, curling upwards at the stimulation of his fingers.

“Alright, alright.”

He reached for your braid, sliding it over your shoulder and kissing the tip of it. His pupils were dilated in the moonlight, cat-like slits taking in every detail of your body sprawled underneath him. His cock twitched under his cloth, heavy and hard and dampening the material with his precum. Quaritch reached for his queue, bringing it around his shoulder until the tip of it just barely brushed yours.

The pair of you stilled, the heaviness of anticipation in the air. You wondered if Quaritch could hear your heart hammering against your chest - it was almost deafening to you, amplified by the impending connection that tingled at the base of your skull. Quaritch’s tendrils curled forward, testing the air. Both of you were panting, gripped by weeks of lust and desire culminating in this garden of Eden.

Then, the tendrils extended, connecting, wrapping around one another in an embrace. The bond was instantaneous. Your head fell against the ground, eyes rolling back into your skull as every feeling and thought of Quaritch’s pumped into your nerve endings. He was all around you, a drug of scent and trace that had your fingers practically ripping the moss from the floor in wanton ecstasy. A shaking gasp ripped from your throat. You can feel Quaritch respond in kind, as gripped as you are in the throes of the bond, baring sharp teeth like a wild animal. Your body was shaking with the force of it. It felt like hours before you could come to enough to look at Quaritch through half-lidded, drunken eyes. He was already looking at you - amber pools of honey that drag up your slick form. His hips knocked against yours. You can feel how devastatingly wet you are from the press of his hardened cock against your slit.

On fire and smothered by the delicious scent of your mate’s lust filling the air around you, you recognized that you would be plucking this scent from crowds for the rest of your life, searching for your mate out in every room.

Quaritch’s mouth brushed against the lining of your jaw, warm breath against the shell of your ear. You turn into him, purring and mouthing at his neck like a kitten.

“Gonna fucking breed you, sweetheart.” He whispered hoarsely, raw from the force of your connection.

You can only whine, thighs spreading open in invitation. You feel the tickle of fingers sliding past your waistband, dancing over your mound. Quaritch could read you easily now - knew what you wanted before the words could gather in your throat, which was likely for the best - you were sure forming a sentence was an impossibility, especially as the ridges of Quaritch’s knuckles bumped against your swollen nub, prodding the entrance of your aching hole.

The pad of his thumb brushed over your clit, then down the dripping slit of your cunt. The slickness made him groan nice and low into your ear. “Already this wet, darlin? Ready to take me?”

“Yes,” You breathed, rutting into him again. “Yes, please, please, I’m ready ,”

Quaritch pinched your clit and grinned against your skin when you yelped. “You need to keep talking, baby, tell me what you want. Can’t help you if I don’t know what you want.”

He pulled his hand out of your bottoms, sliding them up your belly. It left a trail of sticky arousal that glistened on your sweat-soaked skin and he brought them up to your mouth, offering.

“Open.” He ordered softly. You complied. Quaritch slid his fingers into the wetness of your mouth, pressing his fingers back until you had taken them to the second knuckle. The taste was bitter but not wholly unpleasant. You moaned as the flat of your tongue slid over Quaritch's digits, lapping and sucking any trace of yourself off the blue appendages. Quaritch watched you, hooded eyes following the swipe of your soft pink tongue.

“Fuck,” He sighed shakily, sliding his fingers off your tongue and tugging at your bottom lip. “You’re so good at taking orders, sweetheart. Know you’re gonna be such a good girl f’me.”

He leaned down, kissing you slowly, sucking your tongue softly into his mouth.

Wet fingers glided down the curves and lines of your stomach - your legs parted gratefully when his digits found your wetness again, parting your pussy lips so his palm could fit into your cunt. Your hips worked a rhythm against his hand, so slick that you found no resistance with every desperate, heated rut of your pussy. Every response of your body, Quaritch countered it perfectly. He pulled sounds from you that you didn't know you could make, whines and whimpers splitting the quiet air of the clearing. When the stimulation of his hand wasn’t enough, his thumb found your clit again and began to rub harsh circles into it.

“God!” You sobbed, gritting your teeth against the almost-painful stimulation. Your orgasm was getting closer, filling up every crevice of your body. Your wails turned incoherent as Quaritch kept you drunk on his fingers - he hadn’t even stuffed his cock in you and you were already a goner.

Quaritch himself was barely hanging on to the threads of his sanity. His view was glorious, a fucking prize he felt undeserving of. Your puffy pussy glistened with cum, squelching as his fingers pistoned in and out of your heat. His cock had long broken free of its confinements, his lavender tip wept from neglect - he didn't care.

You were going to cum first before Quaritch would even think about satisfying himself. It wasn’t a selflessness he was used to feeling - for the first time, the ex-soldier found himself far preferring the view of you coming apart under him than any pursuit of his own pleasure.

And how good you looked, breasts heaving as you gasped for breath, fingers twisting into the grass beneath you.

You were close. Quaritch could feel it through your bond, the rising white blindness of your orgasm. It was preparing to strike, to send you toppling over the precipice.

Quaritch couldn’t help himself as he leaned down and licked a long stripe up the sweaty valley of your tits, catching rivulets with his tongue, lapping his way over the slope of your breast and across your nipple. He sucked the bud into his mouth, rolling it gently between his teeth despite your whining protests of no more, can’t take it, too much. Your fingers curled into the damp locks of his hair at the feeling - every nerve alive, burning you from the inside out. You could feel Quaritch’s length pressing against your lower belly, heavy and thick. A shift of his hips and the head of his cock caught your clit deliciously. He bit down on your bud and lightning arced down your spine. You felt a prodding at your entrance and Quaritch slipped a finger in deep, curling it against that soft, spongey spot inside you.

It was too fucking much - you could barely process the feeling, could only manage half-choked moans of Mile’s name. Your fingers curled into his broad shoulders, scrabbling for purchase and stability along the wide expanse of his muscles. He’d moved on from your nipple after pressing a lingering kiss to the bud, working now across the unmarked territory of your neck, a second finger sliding into your heat easily.

“Somethn's happening, Miles -” You squeaked, looking down to catch the sight of his fingers pumping out of your wetness furiously, the squelch of your arousal filling the air.

“Tell me what you feel, baby,” Quaritch panted, watching himself work your cunt open over the slope of your breasts.

“F-feels weird!” You whined, unsure of the tightening in your lower belly.

“Not weird, baby, say it feels good.”

“Ngh, it feels good, ” You slurred, your legs fell open even wider to allow your mate’s fingers more access to your pussy.

He took it as an invitation to curl a third finger into you and the delicious pressure against your walls had your cunt clenching furiously as your orgasm suddenly stole over you. It was powerful, overheating every nerve in its path until you were a shaking mess of overstimulation. The sounds of the forest, Quaritch’s gentle coaxing, the feeling of his hardened cock brushing against your hip, it all disappeared as a rush of euphoria whitening blinding you.

Your body convulsed, fingers digging deep into the muscle of Quaritch's shoulder - his fingers pounded into your hole, three wide as he stretched you out for his cock. A spray of liquid soaked his front and you squealed at the intensity of the feeling, toes curling. You think you blacked out for a second.

When you came around enough to regain your bearings, you were draped across Quaritch’s lap, arms wrapped around his neck. The grass under your hips was wet from your cum and you would have been embarrassed if you weren’t coming down from post-orgasm bliss induced by Quaritch’s finger-fucking.

“Good?” Quaritch asked softly, nudging the flat of his nose against your ear. You purred softly into his neck, feeling the curl of his tail around your calf. You felt numb in a deliciously pleasant way, lazy in the heat, and post-orgasm bliss.

“Good.”

Your voice came out slurred. You could feel the low laugh rumble out of Quaritch’s chest. He was warm against you and his scent hovered like a haze in your senses. Your thighs had stopped shaking enough for you to muster enough strength to push yourself up, meeting Quaritch’s glowing gaze.

Struck by the urge, you kissed him slowly because you could, enjoying the press of his mouth and a swipe of his tongue.

“So pretty,” He sighed, pulling away with eyes wide and glowing like planets. Then his smile became sly.

“I hope you’re not too tired. That wasn’t even the main event.”

Tag List

@capitanostella @kacchasu @nin3kyuu @perseny @onehalfshrimp @blossom618 @shuriri4life @lynlotte @ikranwings @disaster-in-waiting @gremlinfuck @deadpoolsvodka @naityelen @zilena9 @drinking-tea-and-be-obsessed @gaudesstuff @thedumboneforsomereason @philophobianprincess @mrmckenzie @waterstrawberry @phoenixgurl030 @azilove @skinmittensgoblin @nyylovestowrite @mckenzieriley69 @innerdogsspacekid @bob-the-ikran

#avatar #quaritch x reader #avatar way of water #miles quaritch #strangers to lovers #jake sully #enemies to lovers

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ecriter · 9 months

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long time no see.......you guys have been so amazing and patient while I've taken a longer than expected hiatus. between some family stuff and a lot of movement and change in my personal life, this fic definitely fell by the wayside but I have another chapter or two in the works and i'd love to finish this fic out strong! thank u guys for your patience :3

#makethebond #avatar #quaritch x reader

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ecriter · 1 year

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Make the Bond - Pt. 6

a/n: its heating up now stinkers next chapter is going to be THE chapter >:P

Warnings: Violence, gore, blood

ao3 ver

Part 6 of ?

Part Five

Chapter 6 - I See You

There was no mistaking those amber eyes, eyes that had haunted your dreams filled with melancholy, wrath, or whatever your brain chose to torture you with, now aglow in the darkness. At this moment they were warm and familiar, coaxing you into calmness. Quaritch was actually here, watching the grimy man above you with a promise of death in the curl of his lip, poised to attack and kill as his lethal body had been trained and honed to do. He raised a finger to his mouth and you bit back a sob of relief because you knew as well as you knew the sun would rise each morning that Quaritch would save you, wouldn’t let this soldier with the foul stench end your life, and despite the cold distance the two of you had shared, that seemingly unclosable rift hadn’t stopped him from coming to find you.

A thread of tension electrified the jungle as the man’s grip tightened around your braid, wrapping the tresses around his knuckles to ensure a strong grip for when he would slash your throat and watch the life pour from your wound. Your scalp stung painfully and you saw Quaritch shift in the brush, coiling tighter, prepared to pounce.

The man leaned down close, his nose brushing the hollow of your cheek and that disgusting, rank breath washing across your face. You fought the urge to gag, to shudder away, and could hardly respond to his sardonic question. “Anything to say, baby? Gonna pray to that stupid little god you’ve got? What was her name…Yewah, Eyah, Eyw-”

The man was ripped from your back, hand wrenching painfully from your hair. The force of the momentum sent you rolling off to the side, away from the snarling, screeching fray that had erupted across the clearing. Your elbow banged painfully against roots and downed branches and you tried to gain your bearings through the rush of adrenaline and fear, steady your shaking limbs on the forest floor but they twinged painfully and bloomed with bruises.

In the second the soldier had spoken, gotten just too close to you for Quaritch’s liking, he had seized the opportunity and struck. His exit from the underbrush had been silent as a breath of wind, on top of the soldier before the soldier could comprehend there was a third presence in the forest. It was almost impossible to believe this soldier had come from Quaritch’s old clan. Their difference in skill, in combat, was staggering as Quaritch dominated him, pinning him by the throat to the forest floor and landing blow after uninterrupted blow. The two grappled, the soldier struggling against Quaritch’s weight, elbows up to block his already swollen and bloodied face. His knife had been discarded in the surprise attack and his fingers scrabbled blindly for it to no avail. It didn’t make a difference; even if the soldier found the knife, Quaritch would have disarmed him in moments or, in his bloodlust, turned the knife upon him and cut him open.

You’d never seen Quaritch so unleashed like this, driven by rage and fury. But no, he wasn’t unleashed. He was completely in control, landing each hit in the most calculated and tender spots that exploited the holes in the soldier's figurative armor. Most of the noise came from Quaritch, curses, and snarls that filled the air with primality. He was all power, a weapon sent to kill, and he unleashed himself like an untamable fire onto your attacker. He would beat the intruder to death if he continued much longer and you were sure the slaying wouldn’t weigh heavy on his conscience, but it would weigh on yours, despite the fact the man had had you in the grip of death, prepared to slice you open like an animal. With the sheer brutality Quaritch had assaulted him with, you feared this soldier's death would send shockwaves back to whichever Command he had come from, whoever had sent him, and that would only cause more trouble for the both of you.

“Quaritch,” You rasped, shifting your aching limbs to try and push yourself up. “Quaritch, enough. Don’t kill him.”

Quaritch’s fists stuttered, then slowed to a stop, landing a final blow that smacked against the man's quivering cheek. The soldier gurgled weakly, spitting pink saliva from his mouth. Quaritch’s knuckles were split and bubbling with sticky blood both from himself and the man’s face and it was pure gore to see that hot crimson against his deep blue skin. It was clear the last thing he wanted to do was leave the soldier alive or allow any chance of escape but you were propped against a tree, tired and wincing and his number one priority was you. He pushed off the motionless figure beneath him and hurried to you, crouching against your side to get a good look at your face and wounds.

“What did he do to you?” He asked quietly, smoothing the pad of his finger over a red bruise already beginning to form at your neck where the knife had nicked you.

“I’m fine, I promise. How did you find me?”

Quartich’s eyes found the cut at your neck where the soldier had nearly split you open. His jaw ticked and his tail lashed and you were sure he was considering turning around and finishing the stranger off, but your gentle touch on his bicep stopped him.

“How did you find me?” You asked again.

“Followed ‘ya. Saw you get up and leave, knew you couldn’t go a second without trouble so I followed ya. ‘M glad I did. When I saw him holdin’ you like that, about to be…I’ve never felt like that in my life. I would have killed him without blinking an eye for touching you, touching what’s mine. I’ll still kill him.”

A shiver raced down your spine at the intensity of Quaritch’s words and gaze. It was a feeling you’d grown familiar with and were beginning to accept, that connection that had followed you since you’d first met and ignited an inexplicable warmth within you at his displays of possessiveness. You were his, had been since you’d first plastered coral weed across his raw back. He had become your whole world, your moon, and your stars. You suddenly felt overcome with tears and relief that he was really there, in front of you, and your lower lip wobbled.

“I was thinking of you, you know.” You whispered. “If I really was going to die, I wanted to see you one last time and when you were there I thought I was dreaming or that I’d already been killed. I thought it was too good to be true that you would save me and then you were there-” You choked off, crying freely now. Hot tears dripped off your cheeks and jaw, uncontrollably. To see Quaritch there and know he was real, know you were now safe, and that he would never let anything happen to you was a feeling incomparable to anything else. It transcended anything you could have ever been angry at him for, absolving him of the cruelest sins. He was your god, delivering you to the gates of heaven and away from the fear that pockmarked mortal existence. You couldn’t believe you had thought he would abandon you, barely pass a thought to your absence, when he had just fought so brutally for you.

“Don’t cry, sweetheart, ain’t no need for tears.”

His thumb swiped at your cheek, collecting the wet trails that dripped off of your chin. You closed your eyes and let yourself sink into the feeling of him, the smell that was so familiar and washed away the rank and filth of your violator. He smelled metallic, like blood, but more powerful was his sweat and the musk of the ocean, your home, that clung to him and evaporated all traces of the sterile chemicals that had emanated from him when he washed ashore. Quaritch’s warm forehead pressed against yours and the wet pad of his nose brushed your cheekbone. You could feel the rise and fall of his chest, heavy exhales of warm breath caressing your mouth. It was intimacy in its most basal form, the thrum of two hearts slowing to each other's rhythm and two souls connected across horizons. He was close, he was home, he was safety.

“I was scared,” Quaritch whispers. “I’ve never been scared in my life ‘cept for when that knife was against your throat and I thought…” He sucks in a breath and doesn’t continue, can’t continue. But you understand, know his fear intimately and exactly.

Out of the corner of your eye, you see the body stir, shifting out of its stupor. Quaritch sees it too and is immediately on alert, shifting so his broad body is guarding yours like an immovable wall of muscle. His tail, which you expect to be splitting the air like a whip, drapes calmly against the top of your thigh.

From over Quaritch’s shoulder, you can see the body half rise on its elbows, head lolling against its shoulder.

“You one of them now, Colonel?”

The man’s voice comes out garbled past broken teeth and bloody gums and carries none of the swagger you’d heard when he had you trapped beneath him.

Quaritch’s ears fold back and he hisses through bared canines.

The soldier wheezed out something that resembled a laugh, though it caused him more pain as he clutched his side lacerated with cuts and scratches.

“I didn’t think you of all people would turn, Colonel. You hated those disgusting savages more than anyone on base and now you’re shacked up with one of them, probably some whore-”

“Tell me what the hell you’re doing here before I kill you slowly. And painfully. I don’t recognize your face but it seems like you know me so you know what I’m fully capable of. Tell me before I lose my patience, soldier.”

The soldier says nothing, does nothing, and you wonder if the two are sizing each other up. The irritated twitch of Quaritch’s tail tip is your only indication that his passiveness is just a front and you have no doubt that he’s eager to finish off the disrespectful avatar across the clearing. He was practically itching for it. The display of such power should have been frightening but it instead sends a thrilling rush through you. It’s embarrassing, how attuned your body had become to Quaritch, and it was frightening the sway he has over you. You should be scared of him, of his ability to kill. He’d just nearly beaten someone to death with his fists and sported only cosmetic wounds that would heal in a day. He was ready to do it again, too, but it was all for you and that’s what sent such a delicious sensation through your blood.

The soldier’s gaze finally drops away and the silence is broken as he wheezes and struggles for a pocket on his left breast. Quaritch tenses like a snake prepared to strike at any sign the man was pulling a weapon, but instead, his shaking fingers pull out a bloody slip of paper. He holds it out to Quaritch, offering answers to his presence.

Quaritch doesn’t immediately advance forward. He’s clearly weary and though the knife is still out of reach to both of them and the soldier is in no position to make a move toward it, the sky people were unpredictable. Dangerous. But Quaritch’s analysis of the risk of leaving you seems to come up clean because he squeezes your calf bracingly, stands, and snatches the paper from the soldier's hands. As he reads, his face grows darker and darker. The material crumples beneath his fingers and you’re worried it will shred before he finishes reading it. But then he’s dropping it to the forest floor and crouching in front of the soldier, speaking quietly. You strain your ears to hear what he’s saying but it’s impossible because they’re speaking so low, so fast, that your rudimentary English skills can’t keep up.

It was unfair that you were always deprived of information despite how it concerned you and your clan. You remembered the conversation with your father, his concerns over the sky people and their will. Everyone had heard of the burnings in the clans to the west and north where the demons had slaughtered innocent Ilu and scorched villages to the ground so you were familiar with their brutality and you knew that is what your father thought of when he assessed the risk of housing Quaritch. But he had decided to do so anyway and despite the chivalrous gesture from your father and yourself, Quaritch kept you out of the loop anyway. Hmph.

The tense, hushed conversation between Quaritch and the bloody soldier came to an end. He looks distressed if his pinned ears are any indication and that gut feeling that something was wrong began to brew.

Quaritch rose to his feet and crossed the clearing back to you. He was grave and there was a coldness about him that hadn’t been there before their conversation.

“What did you talk about?” You asked softly, reaching out to hook your pinky around one of Quaritch’s fingers.

“I’m leaving.”

“What?”

Quaritch gently pulled his hand away from yours and crouched so he was looking you squarely in the eye. Some of the coldness had dissipated and was replaced with painful longing. A goodbye.

“That soldier back there is part of a group that’s looking for me. Before I came to the clan I was…important, and this group, they’re not the type to let important people go. It’s better if I leave so I don’t put the village in any more danger.”

“Danger? You don’t want to put us in any more danger?” You let out a sardonic laugh and pushed yourself further up the tree trunk and away from Quaritch. “You’ve already put us in danger by leading this man here, doomed our clan to perish beneath the sky people, and now you are going to run away when things look a little too dangerous. You are a coward, Quaritch, for abandoning us, no, me, so easily.”

“I ain’t leaving 'cause I want to, Princess.” Quaritch snapped. “I’m leavin’ 'cause if I don’t you, your father, your mother, and everything you love will be burned to the ground because of me. If I turn myself over and go back, that won’t happen. I’m protecting you!”

You smacked Quaritch in the chest, unable to believe him. “You are going to leave? After everything we’ve done for you? After everything I’ve done for you?” The tears were flowing now, unstoppable, impossible, and gutting. What had the soldier said to Quaritch to convince him to leave? The two of you were supposed to be in this together, or so you had thought, and now he was turning tail and running at the first sign of trouble. What was on that stupid paper? You wanted to know but knew it wouldn’t matter because whatever it had said, it was pushing Quaritch to leave you. You beat Quaritch against the chest, cursing him, and he didn’t stop you, let you relieve your pain out onto him.

“I’m not letting you leave. No, you won’t go!”

“I ain’t gonna hurt you anymore, dammit! Your pops will be glad I’m gone-”

“I will not be glad you are gone because I love you! I love you and I cannot, will not go on without you. I do not care if you don’t feel the same but I have learned and experienced more in these past months with you than before you. There is nothing for me after you, no air to breathe, no life for me to live. Nothing!” You grasped at Quaritch’s cheeks, leveling his face so you could pour every feeling and every memory into him. “I see you, Miles.”

Quaritch’s face went slack and unreadable. You felt your heart shrivel inside. You’d laid yourself bare in front of him and revealed the secret you’d carried inside you for months and it still wouldn’t be enough to make him stay-

But then he was surging forward and his lips were on yours, sucking you into him and consuming you like an unquenchable fire. You squeaked in surprise against his mouth, grasping at his wide, endless shoulders for balance. His wet tongue slipped against the bottom of your lip, tracing its curve and you shuddered into him, parting your legs so he could fall into you. Your hands moved from the divots of muscle in his shoulders to his wide, angular jaw, feeling its movement and fluidity as he kissed you breathless against the tree. The chatter of the jungle fell away and it was just the two of you there, the warmth of two bodies, two desires. His scent was all around you, heady and thick and him, intoxicating you into a drunken state in which you craved Quaritch more than you craved air in your lungs.

“I see you, Darlin’.” He breathed, breaking away to kiss along the corner of your mouth and the flat of your nose bridge. “If you don’t want me to go, I’ll stay. But I’m not sayin’ it’ll be easy or safe and I’m not saying I’ll be easy because if you know me, you know I’m not,”

You let out a watery laugh through tears that still beaded your eyes, pressing a lingering kiss to his mouth. “I don’t care. Just stay with me.”

Quaritch’s lips twitched into a half-smile and he pressed another kiss to your mouth before leaning back on his heels and rocking forward to his feet. He crossed the clearing, approaching the soldier who was laid flat and motionless on the floor. You thought he was dead but Quaritch kicked his side with his foot and the soldier jerked back to life.

“Your leaving by your damned self, pipsqueak. You better hope I don’t see you sniffing around here again or I won’t be so nice next time.”

The soldier spat at Quaritch’s feet, rolling on his side to get up. “You’re a damned t-traitor. You know they’re not gonna let you and your slutty girlfriend-”

Quaritch swung back and kicked the soldier in the cheek, forcing him back to the ground.

“Listen closely,” Quaritch said quietly, bending down with a snarl. “You’re gonna get the fuck off this island and you’re gonna tell the General that I’m dead. They ain’t gonna come looking for me because if they do, there ain’t no place on this planet you can hide from me. I’ll gut you like a fish and you’ll beg me to kill you,”

The soldier stared up at Quaritch before nodding slowly. It seemed he had no more cheek left in him, could barely talk through the swelling in his mouth, and Quaritch left the soldier to stand on his own feet and returned back to your side.

“How you feeling? Wanna get that looked at?” Quaritch asked, brushing the back of his index finger lightly against the cut on your neck. You winced and shook your head.

“I’m alright, it will heal quickly. Are you ok? Your hands…”

You took his large, warm palm and smoothed your index finger over his split and swollen knuckles. The blood had dried but you worried infection would set in or that the pain would be too much. Quaritch barely shifted when you touched the bone, didn’t flinch at your picking and prodding. He just looked down at you, the corners of his lips barely curled upwards, and those yellow eyes were glowing with something overwhelming and rich, hypnotizing. Your hands fell away from his, slid up his forearms and biceps, feeling the curve of his muscle. They slid over his wide back that rippled with strength and power, and around his neck. You pulled his head down, catching his mouth in yours and pressing him close against you, trapping you against the tree. The soldier had picked himself up and stumbled through the brush, leaving a flattened patch of grass speckled in dark blood as any sign he’d been there at all.

Quaritch’s large palms gripped the back of your thighs, pulling you into his lap and your legs wound around his narrow waist. He kneaded at the soft flesh of your ass, slipping his thumb just beneath the twine that formed the string of your loincloth. His tail, whether he knew it or not, had slipped across the soft earth and curled around your calf in the way it liked to do. The warmth from before was back, this time an inferno that fed your desire, electrifying your blood and body and sending a thrill down your spine. Between your thighs, you throbbed, and your entire being sang for Quaritch.

“Miles,” You whimpered, licking at the seam of his lips. He kissed the tip of your tongue, sucking softly, kissing his way to the base of your ear. “Miles,” You breathed again, pulling away to look down at him. He was flushed pink and heaving and his eyes were heavily lidded, unable to pull away from your swollen lips.

“I want to mate with you, I want to be with you until we return to the earth, to connect with you and…feel you.”

Quaritch squeezed the side of your thighs, nuzzling the underside of your neck.

“What do we gotta do? To mate?”

You smiled coyly, pressing up and off of him and holding out your hand.

“I will show you. We must go to Eywa.”

Tag List!

#avatar #avatarimagines #avatar way of water #quaritch x reader #quaritch fanfic #colonel miles quaritch #quaritch imagine #recom quaritch #miles quaritch #enemies to lovers #strangers to lovers #jake sully #make the bond

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ecriter · 1 year

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update is imminent 👀

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ecriter · 1 year

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Make the Bond - Pt. 5

a/n: wait no longer! chapter 5 is here. you all have been so awesome and understanding of my crazy updates which I appreciate :) enjoy this new chapter my friends

Warnings: Knives, fear

ao3 ver.

Part 5 of ?

Part Four

Chapter 5 - Under Enemy Eyes

It poured for weeks. Sheets of grey rain pelted the tops of the village pods, whipping the sea into frothy white caps that broke across the surface of the walkways, and drenched everything in sight. Lighting split the sky followed by pregnant pauses that carried the warning of thunder. Boats had to be lashed to moors and ilu took cover in their underwater pens where the currents tended to be calmer. It was monsoon season, a time when village life came to a standstill, and time was spent recuperating and foraging in the oceanic depths, away from the violence of the wet storm. It was when clanmates and families exchanged stories, siblings tussled into puddles, and friends communed in front of warm fires. Being shut in all day also meant that you spent more time around Quaritch. A lot more time.

Since the kiss you’d shared the night of the akula attack, you and the soldier hadn’t done much of anything and had very little to do with one another save for the required training. It felt like the dynamic between the two of you had shifted drastically; if someone looked at your pair, they’d think you were strangers who had never spoken before. The one-eighty of the situation threw you for a loop and worsened the confused thoughts you’d been harboring ever since the kiss and while you weren’t familiar with human culture and didn’t have the proper understanding of courting practices, you were sure it wasn’t normal to practically swallow another person's tongue and then ignore them in the following days. The distance from Quaritch was painful and you wished for your relationship to return to what it had been before, sans the senseless drama that made it difficult to teach the numskull. In the awkward no-mans-land that had developed between you and him, some resentment had admittedly begun to fill the void. Most of it stemmed from the insecurity you felt at his sudden abandonment, unable to understand his neglect, so you turned to what you knew: Quaritch had possible ties to sky people who had hunted your spirit brothers and sisters, the tulkun. He may have also skirmished with Toruk Makto, which certainly meant there were other not-so-honorable acts he could be hiding from you. That same persistent anger at how much you had revealed of yourself versus how little he had told you was back with fervor and it made it incredibly annoying to sleep just across the tent from him, the object of your frustrations and, unfortunately still, your lust.

Quaritch certainly wasn’t making the situation any easier. He was a wired, pent-up man on the best of days, exerting his energy on the endless tasks set before him. It had been that way since his time with the sky people and it was still true when he spent endless hours beneath the sun sparring or fishing. Quaritch and being cooped up didn’t work well together and he had become downright unbearable since the rains started. The two of you slept on opposite ends of the pod now, in your own cold corners, and the bioluminescence of the flora dimmed from the monsoon meant nights were black, cold, and empty. Your anger ebbed away the most as you lay curled in on yourself and reflected on the messy situation you had gotten yourself into when you’d saved him that day. You wondered if Quaritch thought about you at night, too, laying awake and regretting the yawning distance and chill that followed your two isolated bodies. If he did, he made no indication of it and would wake up before you, eat, and go about the little tasks that could be managed in the storm. Typically away from you.

In all honesty, it really didn’t help the anger you kindled, stoking the flame until every time you looked at the idiot you wanted to scream and kick and smack that smug little smile off his face. It was getting harder to hide it, especially when you’d wake up alone to the whistling of the wind outside and dread the moment you would have to see his face and realize the freshness of him in your memory, when he’d laughed and teased and shone like an angel in the sun, was fading. You knew he was catching on. You snapped more often and when you did, those brows would furrow into a frown and a scowl would pull at his mouth. Yet he never said anything back, never spoke a word against you. You wished he would, desperate to pick a fight and feel some type of emotion from him. But he seemed to have a second sense for stopping conflict before it could reach its crescendo, letting the pieces fall for you to pick them up again. It hurt when he did that, too. Were you not worth fighting for?

Some two and a half weeks after your kiss, two and a half weeks of ignoring one another and exchanging blows in the way of dark looks and scathing words, you were startled awake by a loud crack of thunder. The rain wasn’t slashing at your tent as it had been for the last few days and the unusual silence was near deafening. A dark lump in the corner speckled with glowing dots like stars indicates Quaritch’s form. You thought he was sleeping if the slow rise and fall of his shoulders were any indication. You try to roll over and go back to sleep, burrow beneath the warm pelt you were using to stave off the cold, but your brain is turning over, pulling at those same threads that haunted your waking consciousness whenever you weren’t busy with a task. It’s almost torture, being so close to the someone you want so desperately but can’t reach out to, can’t even speak to.

There’s no use in trying to sleep. You’re wired and feel like you’re suffocating in the pod. You need fresh air, need to breathe, feel the water lapping at your toes. As quietly as possible you shuck the blanket off the sleeping mat and creep to the entrance of the pod. The curtain is drawn but there’s no light to block out so your exit is seamless, like a ghost slipping down hallowed halls. The rain is only a mist and it feels so good against your skin, washing away the tense knots in your shoulders that had accumulated over the endless days. Pools of water stream off the docks, funneling into the ocean in foamy white swirls that burp up air bubbles and suck in debris from the storms. Much of the waste has washed up on the beach's sand, thick driftwood trunks tied with seaweed like a gift from the reef, and small shells shucked by crayfish reflecting in the blackness. The sand is cold underfoot when you step onto it, but in a way that has you digging your toes deeper into its granules and savoring the iciness that splinters up your feet and legs to your chest. You welcome the numbness like an old friend, electrocuting your nerves back to life. Even though it had been hardly a month since Quaritch had first come to the village, time had passed at a crawl that made it feel like an eternity. In mere weeks you’d encountered more danger and stress than all of your years combined and you’d be glad to never face it again. You missed the days of warm tide pools and sandbars, a glowing sun that toasted your skin and left a soft pink along your green shoulders. Somehow, you felt older now, wisened beyond your years by emotional and physical toil.

Meandering along the shore for a while, you collected pebbles smoothed by years of currents as you had in your past. You hardly had time for hobbies anymore and your collection of trinkets had become dilapidated and neglected, now only a few wilted plants that sat morosely by your bed roll. Though you tried not to, your mind conjured images of Quaritch as you searched, especially when you found a rock or shell you thought he would like in particular, and so you would throw it far out into the ocean to resist the urge to pocket it for later. As you walked, the rain began to thicken, the steady drizzle intensifying into a solid sheet. You figured you should turn around and head back to the village before daybreak highlighted your absence and anyone came looking for you, especially when the last thing your father needed was a missing daughter. As you turned back towards the village, your foot stumbled over an unnatural divot in the san, nearly sending you tumbling flat onto your face. Steadying yourself, you bent down to get a closer look and in the dim light, your stomach plummeted.

Boot prints. Recent, too. The tide hadn’t washed them away yet, nor had the rain, and they hadn’t been scuffed from the wind. They were large, an indication of another Dreamwalker masquerading as Na’vi, likely a sky person, which meant trouble. Had a Dreamwalker just accidentally stumbled onto your home and stumbled off to take shelter from the storm? Or was there something more sinister going on, something calculated? Your stomach curdled at the thought that your father had been right in second-guessing Quaritch’s intentions, desperately wishing you hadn’t found yourself the victim of another betrayal, so sure it would break you. But how else could another sky person find their way to your island, your sanctuary, where a former Dreamwalker now resided?

The footsteps meandered off from the sea in loopy arks as if the sky person had landed in the water and trudged into the horizon of the jungle that stretched out past your village. It wasn’t inhabited, far too thick and unruly to support life, but the Dreamwalker wouldn’t know that, which meant he had likely cut an obvious path through its underbrush to hide from the rain. Which meant it wouldn’t be hard to find him.

A plan was beginning to spin together in your mind, threads of thoughts that formed into a bad idea that would certainly place you into trouble. What if you were to follow this Dreamwalker, stalk him carefully to gather as much information as possible, before reporting back to your father? He was likely armed and trained, and his combat skills were close to the level of Quaritch’s, you wouldn’t stand a chance against him in combat. No, it was better to watch the stranger from afar if you could find him and make a stealthy escape before he was the wiser. It was too early in the morning to wake your father up over something that could turn out to be nothing anyway, and it would take too long to mobilize a hunting party at which point the Dreamwalker could be gone.

You had to investigate now before you lost your chance.

The jungle started a few yards from where the tide met the shore, grains of sand transforming into wisps of grass, which turned into gnarled roots and creepers tangled against the dark soil of the forest floor. The boot prints weren’t visible anymore in the soft dirt, but the calamity of such a large body traipsing through the growth gave you plenty of navigation as you ventured deeper. Faint starlight broke through the tall canopy overhead and the call of jungle creatures provided a soundtrack to the terrain. The jungle got darker the deeper, causing you to stumble and trip across the ground. The air felt heavy and wet against your skin, sticky with the scent of wild plants that spritzed their perfume into the air. Your fingers wrapped around wide tree branches that prickled with rough bark and stalks of leafy plants, which helped guide your way, but it was hard to see where you were even going, and you suddenly began to feel that this hadn’t been a very good plan at all the farther you went. You weren’t familiar with forest terrain. In fact, it was completely opposite of your element, and as you banged your foot on another damn tree root, you began to wonder what the hell you were thinking, being so out of your element. When had you ever stalked someone, especially through geography that required a particular set of navigational skills? What if the Dreamwalker was already gone and you were alone in the forest, trapped and confused? What if you couldn’t find your way out?

Your feet were starting to ache from rocks and bumps underfoot and the muscles in your calf burned, not used to the strenuous climbing the jungle required. You were sure you’d lost your lead a while back, the brush underbrush no longer cutting a clear path for you to follow. You really were lost, could barely hear the dull thrash of waves crashing against the sand and the smell of salt in the air.

A twig cracked somewhere nearby and you whipped around, eyes darting across the black landscape. A sniff at the air did nothing to discern any foreign smell, the perfume of plants and greenery masking anyone who might be in the area. Were you just being paranoid?

The jungle had gone quiet and still and your skin prickled with goosebumps at the feeling of something or someone watching you, hunting you like a predator. You felt frozen by fear, limbs mechanical and rusted into proneness, unable to spare yourself from the danger you were sure was lurking just out of sightline. There was another snap, closer now, and it was enough to break you out of your position and propel you back the way you came, crashing through the greenery without care for the noise you were making. Your only goal was to make it to the jungle line and get the water in your sights, find the safe haven you knew would protect you from whatever had begun to chase you, cutting through the path you were forging.

Your breath whistled from your throat in panicked gasps and your legs pumped hard to pull you away from your hunter. A glance over your shoulder gave you no indication of what was following you, just a large dark figure you guessed was the Dreamwalker you’d been following. His heavy footsteps pounded behind you like a drum of death, counting his paces as he closed in on you until suddenly your foot caught on a creeper that curled, unsuspecting, from the darkness and you crashed to the floor, skinning the length of your arm and knee. It stung painfully and tears pricked your eyes as you tried to scramble to your feet and push on.

But the stranger was already on you like a shadow, one large hand gathering your wrists together and the other pinning your head flat to the floor. His crushing weight rested on your lower back, pinning your legs and tail to the floor so you couldn’t throw him off. The hold felt familiar, like when you’d trained with Quaritch and he would wrestle you to the ground. It had been playful and fun when there was no threat of harm or danger but now it set your heart racing in your throat, the whites of your eyes flashing like a cornered animal. The figure leaned down so the flat of his nose brushed your quivering ear and the reek of his hot breath almost made you gag.

“Now what did I catch here? Someone following me?”

You hissed at him and lunged at an awkward angle, baring sharp canines that only just grazed the hollow of the stranger’s cheek before he was pulling you away and pressed your face further into the dirt. You caught the flash of a strange device on his wrist, a black strap with a shiny, reflective mirror in the middle. It looked distinctly human, the same device you’d seen on Quaritch when you’d recovered him. It only confirmed your fear that this Dreamwalker was tied to your avatar.

“No biting,” The man scolded you. “I need you to cooperate, honey. You’re one of the savages, ain’t ya? One of them Na’vi? I hope you speak English, cause this could go real sideways for you if you don’t. You know where the Colonel is?”

The man’s grip slid from the back of your skull to the braid nestled in your hair and he yanked on it hard, pulling your head up. A cry ripped from your throat and you strained to relieve the tension on your scalp. Your back and neck ached from the painful angle this man had you in and you struggled to peek over your shoulder at the mean face looking back. He had yellow eyes, like Quaritch, and the same closely-cropped hair, but he carried none of the grace or power that Quaritch commanded. You sincerely hoped the two weren’t familiar because this strangest was the ugliest, stinkiest person you’d ever encountered. You shuddered to think Quaritch may have once been like him, cornering young Na’vi in the forest.

“I no know…a Colonel,” The man yanked harder on your braid, twisting your head to an uncomfortable angle and you screeched. “I not know! I not know!”

“You need to be a little more forthcomin’ than that, sweetheart, I’ve got higher-ups to please.”

You trembled beneath the man's weight, hot tears streaking down your cheeks and dripping off your chin. Sweetheart was the name Quaritch called you and it had sounded so sweet coming from his mouth, like the juice of the ripest fruit. From this man, it made anxiety bubble in your belly and your tail curl inwards protectively.

Your pain seemed to goad some sick pleasure within the stranger because his lips curled upwards and a strange glint entered his eye. His face came close again, that foul, sour breath wafting across your face and this time, you did choke.

“I know nothing,” You sobbed. “Please let me go, I will tell no one I saw you!”

A soft click broke the heavy breathing behind you and a glint caught the moonlight. The man brought something forward and you saw the reflective blade of a knife, jagged edges rusted in what looked like rust or old blood. The metal was cold as it pressed to the soft skin of your throat, slicing a shallow line that stung painfully. You whimpered out a strangled sob, closing your eyes and submitting yourself to whatever was about to happen. You would be gutted like an animal, left in the jungle where your family could never find you, and you would fade away into a memory. Not even Eywa could save you here, in these lifeless, endless woods where nothing but misery clouded the air.

“I’m goin’ to ask you one more time,” The stranger whispered, pressing the knife even harder into your jugular and pulling your head back as far as possible until your neck curved in presentation. “You know where the Colonel is?”

You let out a warbled cry, scrabbling at the ground to break the man’s hold on your wrists which proved impossible as they were unmovable like iron shackles that only tightened, cutting off circulation to your hands. Your eyes broke open, blurred by tears, and one last plea slipped from our mouth. It was a prayer that your death should be quick, and painless, and that you nor your family should suffer. Your mind drifted to Quaritch, who had saved you and betrayed you, and broken your heart, all of which seemed trivial as you faced your brutal death. You wished you had taken every moment to tell him how you had felt, not wasted those weeks away with your stubbornness. You remembered the feeling of his mouth on yours, wet and warm and enveloping like the greatest comfort, of which you longed for now.

You could imagine him in all his glory, sapphire skin slick with sweat beneath the glittering sunlight and that cocky little smirk pulling at the corner of his mouth as he would look down at you. Those black locks, even longer now, would curl against his temple and he would ask, “you need a break, sweetheart?”

Would he miss you, think of you, when you were gone?

You could almost see him now, imagining those golden-slitted eyes watching from the brush like two glittering stars. How you wished to have a savior at this moment, as the stranger draw his arm back in preparation to strike his killing blow. Your scalp and back throbbed. You blinked away your tears, focusing on those floating eyes, searching for a last moment of peace. They seemed so clear, speaking to you. The bushes rustled, barely noticeable to you, and were completely ignored by the attacker. A long blue finger emerged from the dark, sliding over a downturned mouth. Shh.

You weren’t imagining it.

Quaritch was here.

Tag List Let me know if I missed you!

#avatar #avatar way of water #avatar imagine #quaritch fanfic #recom quaritch #avatar quaritch #recom quaritch x reader #navi quaritch #quaritch x reader #quaritch imagine #colonel miles quaritch #enemies to lovers #strangers to lovers #jake sully #navi reader #eventual smut #nfsw

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ecriter · 1 year

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hello friends i know this new update is taking a while :p I’ve just been super busy with projects and class BUT it should be ready to go by friday at the LATEST so stay tuned and thank u for ur patience

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ecriter · 1 year

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could i be added to the tag list for ‘make the bond’ please??

Yep! I'm also going to add a tag list to the master list just to do some housekeeping

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ecriter · 1 year

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Can I be added to the 'Make the Bond' tag list, please?? It's so good!!!

absofruitly

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ecriter · 1 year

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Make the Bond - Pt. 4

A/N: AHHH I know it’s been a while everyone apologies!! i’m a little swamped with classwork, so updates might be a little slow for a week or two. I’ll let yall know if a chapter is gonna take especially long :P anyways enjoy !

ao3 ver.

Part 4 of ?

Part One Part Two Part Three

Chapter 4 - Trust

You and Quaritch returned back to the village looking rather worse for the wear. It would have been cause for alarm, your bleeding arm, and tangled hair if it weren’t for the large grins smeared across both of your faces. Despite the close call with the akula, you couldn’t find it in yourself to mope over your near death when Quaritch’s warm body was pressed against yours in support, easily lugging more than half your weight like he was carrying a basket of fruits across the pods.

Up ahead, bonfires flickered against canvas walls as families prepared meals for the night, fish caught earlier in that day ready to be butchered and ripe bushels of sea plants washed and chopped. The idea of a meal had your stomach at attention and you realized you hadn’t eaten since earlier that morning before you’d gone to fetch Quaritch from his tent. No wonder you lacked the energy to swim, carried only by pure adrenaline demanded from your body’s fight or flight response. As a matter of pride, you would chalk the losses in sparring up to your hunger, too.

The bioluminescence of the beach paved the way for the two of you across the rest of the sand and Quaritch lifted you up onto the webbed pathway, minding the scratches up your arms. They hadn't been deep and were already beginning to scab over, but it was better safe than sorry to wrap them. They stung painfully, though, and it created cause to wonder how Quaritch had managed three horrific lacerations across his back and survived when you felt like you were going to keel over any minute.

Hobbling along toward your tents, you expected to turn left on the way to your own pod while Quaritch would go to his and the two of you would settle down for the night and prepare for the next day, but the avatar's large hand curled around the nape of your neck and tugged you gently towards his pod instead. Your stomach lurched in surprise and you glanced up at him.

"Your tent?" You asked in surprise, ignoring the flush that crawled up your cheeks at the feeling of his long fingers on your sticky skin.

Quaritch hummed. "You thought I'd let you take care of those cuts yourself? You'd mess it up somehow, can't trust you with yourself, remember?" He smiled down at your toothily, those blunt fangs pressing into his bottom lip in a way that had you looking to the ground before your deepening flush could betray you.

"I took care of you, didn't I?" You protested and Quaritch’s squeeze of warning sent a trickle of satisfaction through you. Childish as it was, verbal disputes were the best way for you to get beneath Quaritch’s skin, and often times you did it well. The man wasn’t known for his patience and when you couldn’t best him in combat, it was easier to poke at how he’d relied on you like a little baby. It always shut him up.

His tent was the only one dark in his grouping, generally quiet as Quaritch had kept to his own space and his neighbors kept to theirs. He brought a fire to life on the dormant coals of his firepit when you entered, another indication of his survivalist past that you were desperate to unravel. The pod filled with warm flickering light, curls of smoke caressing the chimney hole in the roof. Quaritch took a small closed basket from the corner and gestured for you to sit down. You sat farther from him than you usually would, feeling nervous to be in a space that was decidedly his, marked with an accumulation of clothing, feathers, and weaponry, all of which he had gathered since coming to your village. Most of the trinkets were gifts from you and you were flattered that he had chosen to keep them and display them, despite having done so with military and borderline obsessive precision.

When Quaritch glanced up from his mysterious basket, his brows furrowed.

“Why the hell’d you sit so far away? I can’t treat you from across the room.”

Reaching across the space between you, he cupped the side of your knee and tugged you into his side. Five fingers brushed your long hair away from your shoulders and the tenderness of his touch wasn't what you would expect from such a burly, grumpy man.

"You're gentler than I would think," You remarked, speaking on your musings. "Also, where did you get that?" You pointed to the slick bundle of salt weed Quaritch was pulling from the basket.

"Sometimes the scars on my back reopen so your dear momma gave me some. They work pretty well for being herbal mumbo jumbo."

You would have bristled at him calling your medical practices mumbo jumbo, but you were more concerned with the fact that his wounds had been reopening and he hadn't told you or asked for any help, though you supposed you couldn't see Quaritch ever asking for help.

"Why did you not tell me they had opened again? I could have wrapped them for you!"

"It's nothing, trust me, I've dealt with much worse than some scratches."

"Still," You grunted, peeking over Quaritch's shoulder to spy the wound. It was the same three pale scars but some dark splotches of fresher skin disrupted their pattern. The wound was puckered and clearly hadn't had the care and attention it needed, which deepened your dissatisfaction. "Your application is very poor. Next time, come to me, please. Now I'm not sure I trust you with helping me."

You expected an indignant look but he huffed out a laugh instead. "Sure sweetheart, I'll come to you. Now if you don't sit still I'm going to have to tie you down."

The idea of Quaritch wrestling you down to the floor wasn’t a bad one but you complied anyway and presented your left bicep to him, which was now crusted over with gunk. The sight of it made your stomach roll in disgust and you had forgotten, just for a moment, that you'd almost been ripped apart in the akula's razor-sharp jaws.

Quaritch dabbed some antiseptic onto the cuts, wiping away any bacteria that could have lingered from the corals that had cut you. He handled you carefully like you would break apart at any moment, shatter into a million pieces of glass in his hands and blow away into the wind. He was focused, too, pink tongue peeking out from his lips and yellow eyes zeroed in on his fingers’ work.

You took the time to study him. His hair had grown longer from that ugly short buzz the sky people had given him. Short dark strands still damp from the ocean water brushed the tops of his eyebrows, and soft fuzz curled at the nape of his neck. You hoped he would grow it longer, let it fit beneath his ears in soft curls. How would it feel? Would the hair be soft like feathers or coarse like stalks of water plants?

"You're staring holes into me. Can barely concentrate."

Embarrassment snapped you from your stupor and another blush crawled up your neck. Eywa, how many times could this man turn you red without trying? You would have been annoyed if not for the fluttering in the base of your stomach that electrified your limbs.

"I don't know what you mean," You said simply, hiding your face in the shadows of the glowing coals. "I was making sure you didn't worsen my arm is all."

Quaritch clearly didn't believe you but didn't press you on it, a trend that was quickly developing in him. You were used to his mercilessness but it was nice to see this kinder side to him. Not many had seen it, you were sure.

Quaritch was bundling away the remaining salt weed when his tent flap opened and your mother stepped in. Her face was drawn but pinched even more when she saw your bandaged arm.

"I will not ask what has happened as I am sure I do not want to know. Your father wishes to speak with you in his pod. Alone."

Quaritch bristled a bit at the bite in your mother's tone, but you waved him off and followed her to your father's tent. He was sitting on the floor like he had been when he had first spoken to you a week ago, eyes dark in the same way. You sincerely hoped he hadn't heard of the akula attack, didn't know how he could have heard of it. He gestured for you to sit across from him, and you complied, folding your legs in preparation to leap from the tent if needed. He was silent for a second, then looked across the fire at you. "We have received some disturbing news. Reports from a clan to the north have described a sky peoples ship that was destroyed, by Toruk Makto no less."

Your heart shriveled In your chest and you felt a cold chill shudder over your body. Toruk Makto was not in the forest, as you had believed, but in the water clans? Quaritch had asked about Toruk Makto when you had pulled him from the water. Was there a connection between him and the destroyed ship? You couldn’t believe that the man you had gotten to know over this past week, who had shared food with you and tousled your hair with affection, had taught you combat and tended to your wounds could have been on that boat.

"I have also heard that there were avatars aboard the ship and that, while most of them perished in the battle, one was believed to have escaped."

You swallowed thickly, head feeling cloudy. "Do they know w-who?"

Your father shook his head slowly. "There was no confirmation of the identity, only whispers. However, he is rumored to impersonate a forest Na'vi, with-"

"Yellow eyes." Your voice warbled against tears.

It had to be Quaritch. The circumstances of how he had washed up on your shores, half-drowned and sporting wounds from battle, how he wouldn't disclose his past had all seemed suspicious but you hadn’t pried. He had been through a lot, that much was sure, and sometimes it was easier to live in your blissfully ignorant bubble than to admit any sort of truth to yourself. You had assumed that he had come from the sky people but to have come from a ship this far out meant it had been a tulkun-hunting ship and it was almost too painful to think of that as the truth.

"Will you exile him for this?"

Your father sighed deeply, rubbing at his eyes. "We do not know for sure that it is him, but we will keep a close watch on him. We do not know if he is still communicating with sky people or if he came from that ship, but we cannot risk that he has. You must watch him during the day, during eclipse, and never let him out of your sight. I regret to ask this of you, daughter, but you must eat, train, and sleep beside the stranger."

"Papa!" You yelped, jumping to your feet. Your tail lashed behind you in indignation. Sleep in Quaritch's tent? This would surely be your end, breathing the same air as Quaritch in such close quarters. Was it not enough that you had abandoned your hobbies in order to spend every waking moment with the soldier? Now you had to lord over him like a mother to her babbling baby?

Your father raised his hand to settle you, but you wouldn’t listen, bristling with indignation at the suggestion that you take on an even larger duty than you already supported.

"Papa, you cannot! It is enough that I am with him all day training him until the sun sets, but to sleep beside him? And if he really is a traitor, could he not bring me harm?"

"Enough. My word is final. As I said when he first came to our village, if he had not killed before, he will not kill you now. I bow before you, daughter, and ask this."

So badly did you want to stomp about the tent and yell your fury at your father. You were so conflicted, angry and hurt at Quaritch for possibly being a traitor to your people but equally flustered at the fact that you would be sharing quarters with him. But your father was humbling himself before you, something he did not often do, and you couldn't turn him down. Especially when he had other worries concerning the clan and now had the task of searching out more information on this missing avatar, should he truly pose a threat to your village.

"Fine. I will do as you ask."

Leaving the tent and walking back to Quaritch’s pod felt like walking to your death. The night ahead of you loomed like a foreboding specter, cloaked in uncertainty and secrets that you weren’t sure you were ready to learn. First and foremost, you would establish boundaries with Quaritch. While his rejection in the macropod had nearly cemented your certainty that he had no interest in you, save for regarding you as a plaything or meddlesome little cousin that he could tease as he learned the elements of his survival, you didn’t want to risk compromising yourself in the heat of whatever lust had gripped you since you’d first met the avatar.

And then there was the matter of his supposed betrayal. You were still trying to sort the specifics of it out in your mind. There was no confirmation that Quaritch had been the sky person on that ship and even if he had, what of it? Dreamwalkers and avatars didn’t hunt tulkun as far as you were aware which meant that Quaritch could have been on that ship for a whole other reason entirely, an innocent reason. But even that sounded foolish to you because there were no innocent reasons that the sky people were anywhere. If Quaritch had been on that ship, he had been conducting something nefarious and likely something targeting one of the water clans. Had he been targeting your clan?

Quaritch was reclining on his mat when you entered, eating fish he had cooked over the simmering fire. It smelled divine but you’d forgotten your hunger in lieu of your conversation with your father. The skxawng watched you carefully as you took a seat in front of the coals, silent for the first time in his life. You were sure he could sense your tension if not smell the simmering emotion in the air.

Finally, he sat up to attention. “What happ-”

“Were you on that ship with the sky people?” You turned to look at him. “With Toruk Makto?”

The word was like a trigger. Quaritch was rigid in an instant, clipped ears quivering against his head and eyes sharp as a blade, turning over where you had gone, what conversations you’d had, and what actions you’d take next.

“Is Toruk Makto here?” He all but demanded.

“Answer my question first.”

Quaritch curled his lip, sniffed, weighing the repercussions of telling you the truth or telling you a lie.

He settled for a half-truth. “I did come from a ship of sky people. That’s the only way I could have ended up here, right?”

You hissed at him. “Do not play games with me now, Quaritch. Were you in the northern battle with Toruk Makto, yes or no?”

He looked at you flatly and the silence was enough of an answer. You felt a yawned pit open where your heart had been. Treachery. You’d placed your faith in this stranger and been fooled. You had chosen to take the path of goodness, of trust, and he had not done the same with you. For a moment you had forgotten why the sky people had come to your home and why Toruk Makto had rallied the clans to fight against them, but now you remembered and you would not forget it. But the anger was also too painful to bear and it gave way to hurt.

A shuttering whine pulled from your throat and you pushed away from the fire, unable to look at Quaritch. You had shown him the life and beauty of Eywa and he had learned nothing. He had taken that knowledge and beauty and thrown it back in your face.

“Why did Toruk Makto come for you? Are we endangering ourselves by having you here?” You demanded. “My father, my family are risking our lives to shelter you. Have you learned anything from what I have taught you or do you laugh at us, at our people? Are you communicating with the other sky people now?”

You could feel yourself spiraling into hysteria, trying to keep some sort of grip on yourself in the puddle of your despair. You had grown feelings for the stranger, feelings deeper than you were sure you could admit to yourself, but you would not endanger your clan for him. Your vision was tunneling and you carded through your memories with Quaritch, trying to dissect which of them were fabricated and which were true. Every moment turned over in the folds of your mind felt like a falsehood, a fabricated memory teasing you into his deceptive embrace.

“I ain’t betraying anybody,” Quaritch barked, standing from the mat. He was domineering, intimidating. You forgot you had been in the presence of a man trained to kill. Trained to kill people like you?

Quaritch tried to reach out to you, but you jerked away from his touch, rip away to the other side of the pod and away from Quaritch’s scent which surrounded you like a perfume, caressing your nostrils and awakening those traitorous flutters in your stomach. The anger was already cooling and you desperately didn’t want it to, wanted to hold on to any emotion you could use against him.

“Listen to me - Listen to me,” He cornered you against the side of the tent, grasping your shoulders in an iron-clad grip that left no room for struggle. “I ain’t no traitor, never have been and never will be. I was a part of the sky people and I’ve done things I’m not proud of in my life, but every moment -” He pressed your chin up, angled your head up so you looked into those glowing eyes that you’d seen your first night together when you’d nursed him back to health. “Every moment has been real, sweetheart, I’ll tell you that. I’m learnin’, see? You’re teaching me about these people and this planet and I’m learning.”

Your bottom lip quivered beneath the weight of tears, eyes pinned to the solemness of Quaritch’s face. His fingers had loosened on your face and his thumb brushed against the curve of your jaw, where the hollow of it met the muscle of your neck. His scent was still there, so close that it made you dizzy and flushed and you wanted to let it carry you away, soothe your worries and let you trust him again like you had just an hour before, feel that sweet relief you’d felt when Quaritch had pulled you from the sea, literally saved you from the jaws of death. You let yourself melt into the feeling for just a second, a moment of weakness.

“When my father told me…he said it was you. How am I supposed to trust you when I must put my people first? What if the sky people come for us and my father cannot protect them? You know everything about me but I know nothing about you.”

“Nothing’s going to happen to your village or you.” Quaritch promised. “I ain’t gonna let that happen. You saved my life, gave me food and a place to sleep. I don’t forget kindness too quickly. I know I’ve been…withholding some things but I ain’t used to talking about myself and there are certain things better left unsaid. I’m just asking you now to trust me.”

“You saved my life from the akula. Your debt has been repaid.”

Quaritch grunted lowly, frustrated that you didn’t seem to understand.

“You’re not picking up what I’m putting down, sweetheart? I don’t know how to make you understand.”

Half-lidded eyes fell to your mouth, digits tracing the pretty pink curve of your bottom lip, leaving a line of fire in their wake. The two of you were so close. Your defenses were failing, thawing, some primal instinct within you demanding forgiveness of the stranger that had stumbled into your life.

“I don’t understand,” You said softly, fingers sliding up between your two bodies, feeling the rapid-pound of Quaritch’s heart.

Suddenly, he was bent low, head dipping until his mouth caught yours and your voice died in your throat. You started, taken by surprise. You had never been kissed before, had never flirted past those awkward childhood games where you played Tsahik and some village boy would play Olo’eyktan. But a plush pink tongue pressed against your lower lip, swiping against the blunt edge of your teeth, and your brain kickstarted into motion. Kissing Quaritch was like melting into him, feeling the warmth of his hands pressing lightly into the column of your throat just above your scent gland, and long fingers curling on the outside of your thigh. He took control of the kiss in every sense of the word, stealing the breath from your lungs and breathing it back into you. His heart pumped the blood through your body and you keened against his mouth, pressing closer. Your fingers on his chest tensed, feeling the firm muscle and hot skin. They moved, traveling up to press onto his shoulders and guide you higher to take more of his mouth. He was so broad against you, swallowing you whole in his presence.

Eywa, you were drunk off of him, every motion of his mouth insisting on you, attuning every one of your cells to his presence. His tongue pressed against yours, slick and alive, exploring the parts of you that no one had felt before.

The two of you separated for a breath, a string of saliva connecting your lips. Quaritch took the pad of his thumb and swiped at it, smearing it across your bottom lip, then pressing it against the flat of your tongue. Your lips puckered around the digit on instinct, sticking softly. He tasted salty and you smoothed over the rough callus of his thumb, feeling every groove that marked his past. Quaritch groaned deep in his throat, leaning down and replacing his thumb with his tongue, licking into your mouth, biting at your lips until they were swollen and red.

You desperately wanted more of him, to take whatever Quaritch would offer you, but you were also frightened. You didn’t trust him, not completely, and you wouldn’t give yourself over to him if you couldn’t firmly believe in him.

“Quaritch-”

“Miles,” He sighed against your mouth, peppering kisses across your cheeks.

“Miles, we must not continue. It is late and…it is best if we do not continue.”

Of all the reasons you would not mate with Quaritch now, it was because you knew he would not bond you. First encounters with a partner were sacred, meant to be done beneath Eywa, and you could not give yourself to Quaritch if he had no intention of becoming your mate. But you had hardly described this concept to him and felt, disappointingly, that he didn’t much care for the significance of such a ceremony. So you would put a stop to this before it went further, despite the heat between your thighs.

Quaritch placed one last open-mouthed kiss to the column of your throat, hands splayed across your jugular to get the right angle. When he pulled away, you nearly leapt onto him again. His complexion was rosy and warm, golden eyes glazed from desire and somewhere far away. Despite this, he understood your words, the earnestness in your eyes, and pulled away from you completely.

“Alrigh’ Darlin’, I know. Training tomorrow and all of that, we better get some rest. I’ll walk you back to your tent-”

“Actually…I am sleeping here. With…you.”

Quaritch paused mid-turn, looking at you with incredulous eyes.

“Who the hell decided that?”

“My father. And if you are displeased with his decision, I’m sure he would love to hear your input.”

“He’d be anything but pleased to hear what I got to say, but I’m not gonna go picking a fight with your daddy right now. Just go get your bedding while I, uh, take care of some stuff.”

It was much easier to convince Quaritch of this new change in plans than you thought, so you flounced off to your pod to grab your sleeping roll. When you returned, Quaritch was already settled across the fire on his side, his back to you. Had he already gone to sleep? Your stomach sunk. Was he regretting that he had kissed you, now that he had to be in close quarters? You dearly hoped not as that kiss had been one of the more…memorable moments in your life. It had set you alight, awoken you to an entirely new world, and you were hoping there would be more in the future. Now, it didn’t seem like there would.

You settled your bedroll across the fire from Quaritch, watching the rise and fall of his shoulders. They seemed a bit labored, you thought. Was he anxious to be so close to you? Whatever it was, your mind could hardly dwell on it as the entirety of the day caught up to you and you all but passed out.

Tag List!

@capitanostella @kacchasu @nin3kyuu @perseny @onehalfshrimp @blossom618 @shuriri4life @lynlotte @ikranwings @waterstrawberry @disaster-in-waiting @gremlinfuck @deadpoolsvodka @naityelen @zilena9 @drinking-tea-and-be-obsessed @ @thedumboneforsomereason @philophobianprincess @mrmckenzie @gaudesstuff

#avatar #avatar way of water #avatar imagine #quaritch fanfic #recom quaritch #avatar quaritch #na'vi quaritch #quaritch x you #quaritch x reader #quaritch imagine #miles quaritch #enemies to lovers #strangers to lovers #jake sully #na'vi reader

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ecriter · 1 year

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hi babe! how many parts do you think ''make the bond'' is going to be? (i loved the first part but im trying to hold off until its finished so that i can binge it in one sitting 💀)

Hi!! I'm hoping at leaaasssttt 7? I'm not really sure yet but these chapters are beefy so it may be a little less than that!

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ecriter · 1 year

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Hi!! I'm new here and just dropping by to say that I'm loving your "Make The Bond" story and looking forward to the next chapter!! (I'm sorry for any typos, English is not my language…)

Thank you so much!❤️❤️ It means a lot to get these messages :)

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ecriter · 1 year

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Make the Bond - Pt. 3

A/N: erm this part got a little long but i had a lot to say ! anyways enjoy and let me know if I missed you on the tag list!

ao3 ver.

Part 3 of ?

Part One Part Two

Chapter 3 - Close Call

"Tss, watch it!"

The staff swiped past your head, almost nicking your ear. Your left shoulder was still smarting from the last blow, a purple welt definitely growing on the afflicted area. It had been over a week since Quaritch had first introduced himself to you, since your father had assigned him as your ward, and through that week you had gotten a better sense of who the man was. His Na'vi was infantile at best which made communicating with him difficult, yet he had worked hard over the days he had spent healing, intently watching your indications and repeating your words slow, syllable by syllable. Progress was minimal but it was still progress and he could manage stinted phrases of good morning, how are you? and The weather is very beautiful today. The formality always made you giggle when you arrived at his tent each eclipse rise. At the same time Quaritch was learning your language, you slowly began to pick up his. It was a mutual exchange of culture and employing the sky people's words when Quaritch was frustrated helped to calm him down. So far, you'd learned words like hello, goodbye, fruit, and fuck. The last one you'd picked up without meaning to. Quaritch said it often beneath his breath during your lessons and when you'd first repeated it, he'd stared at you with an open jaw before full peels of laughter erupted from his chest. It was the first time you'd heard him laugh and it left something warm in your belly.

After that first week, Quaritch had healed remarkably well with the proper diet and care and all that remained now were three pale stripes that sliced down his back, the only indication of the marred wound that had crippled him. The sight of those, too, left a suspicious curl of heat within you, which you chose decidedly to ignore. After linguistic lessons, you progressed to the more tactical elements of your culture. Fishing, combat, and swimming lessons were conducted from eclipse rise to eclipse fall and left the both of you (though you more than him) tuckered out as you went to your respective pods. Fishing was the worst of Quaritch's skills, having never been one for patience. He would cast the net too quickly, believing the glint of the sun on the water to be a fish breaking the surface and when he pulled it in it would be empty save for damp seaweed clinging to the fibers. His face would twist into a puckered scowl, reminding you of a sour child and you would stifle a laugh. These moments are where you heard the word fuck most often.

"You need patience. Patience! You are throwing too quickly." You would scold him, adjusting his grip on the net to the proper form. He would just grunt and flick his ears. You knew he could understand the gist of your words. Quaritch's listening skills were far more adept than his speaking, or he just preferred not to speak. You couldn't figure out which was the truth.

Combat is what you struggled to teach him the most. Quaritch clearly had training in his past because he bested you almost every time and when he didn't, it was because he was taking pity on you. When the two of you would return to the village, you often sported more bruises than he did, many of them to your pride. That's how you happened on where you were now, poised across from him in a sandy pit often used to train younger warriors. Qauritch had been jabbing at you with his blunted spear, only just missing your extremities. Your body was worn out and exhausted, but it seemed he had hardly broken a sweat if the fluid jabs of his staff were any indication. Spear limp in your hand, you kneeled over your knees and tried your best to catch your breath.

"Take a break?" Quaritch asked in his lilted Na'vi, smugness oozing from every crevice and pore. The cockiness was the worst part, particularly when you were aching with fatigue and not much in the mood to be gloated over.

"Not in your dreams," You ground out, meeting those yellow eyes that were squinted in a smile. You pushed yourself off your knees and leveled your spear at the avatar, grip admittedly weak and lacking any resemblance of proper warrior form, but you felt even lifting the spear was an achievement. Quaritch snorted at the pathetic attempt, hardly bothering to brace himself against the sand for the attack. His body was always coiled and prepared for defense, stance shoulder width apart by default, ears twitching at the rustle of the brush and shudder of the breeze. Your assault would be pointless, easily diverted, not even by Quaritch's spear but by his hands and then you'd be flat on your back again with a bruised tail. But you were way too stubborn to give up, especially as he smirked down at you, taunting you to make the first move. Weren't you supposed to be the teacher here?

Steeling yourself and trying not to think of the hurt you were about to endure, you stuck out your tongue in a war cry, toes digging into the loose sand underfoot. There wasn't much traction, at least not as much as you'd have liked, but you pushed off the ground anyways, leaping high and arcing through the air to bring the blunt end of your spear down on Quaritch's shoulder. For a second, you thought you had him right where you wanted him. You were so close, so close, there was no way Quaritch could avoid the swipe of your staff. Those stupid eyes looked up at you, lowly lidded against the sun, insultingly bored, and the wood of your spear brushed his blue shoulder before he was gone, and all of the sudden you were flat on the sand looking up at thick white clouds lazily sweeping across the sky. The familiar sting of pain was at the base of your spine, breath completely lost from your lungs. You tried to grapple for your spear in the sand, push yourself to your feet and recover but your muddled brain could hardly figure out how you had ended up on your back all of the sudden.

A broad blue frame came into focus in your swimming vision, blocking the sun like a monolith. Its mouth moved, saying something, and you blinked slowly back. How wonderful it smelled, like sweat and salt and musk. It held your arms and legs immobile, pleasantly heavy weight that left you stirring lithely on the ground. The hulking thing said something again, a warm paw pressing to your cheek. Its face was so close that it was the only thing in the world, warm breath fanning against your mouth and wet nose nearly brushing your own.

"Wazzat?" You slurred, tilting your head to the side and blinking sleepily. The creature shifted before a smack tilted your head against the sand hard and your surroundings came back to you completely. Quaritch was close, so, so close, golden eyes like the earth and moon and sun. "You awake kid? You dying?" He asked.

"Mm not dying and get off."

You heaved against the weight on top of you, struggling against what felt like solid stone but the skxawng didn't move, didn't even budge, only smirked down at you with those stupid blunt fangs and that sly look and you swear he purred at seeing you so helpless, but the heat was already crawling up your neck and cheeks in embarrassment and you didn't want to give him the satisfaction of seeing you like that.

Your head turned away, dark hair shielding your blushing face, and you shoved halfheartedly at him again.

"I said get off."

Quaritch's smile fell away, a look that was impossible to decipher passing over his face before he pushed off the sand, off of you, and got to his feet. You expected him to go for his spear and leave you in the dust to recuperate but instead, he offered you a hand, tail snapping behind him like a whip in agitation. What was he so annoyed about? You were the one that had faltered again and landed ass up on the ground like a youngling who'd never seen hand-to-hand combat before. The sting of insult was still fresh and you batted his hand away, getting up yourself. Quaritch's bared teeth brought you an inkling of satisfaction.

"I don't think there's much left for me to teach you," You said, brushing dust and sand off from your back and front and picking your spear up from the sandy bank. "You fight like a warrior. I think you are teaching me a thing or two."

"This ain't my first rodeo. My people call ourselves soldiers and train with more than sticks."

"Soldier, warrior, it is the same thing. And these sticks are what you will fight with while you stay here, so get used to them. " You mounted the spear on a wooden rack that housed other melee combat weaponry. "We will move on to something else. If you wish to continue combat training, I'm sure my father can assign a warrior to be your partner."

Quaritch flapped a hand in dismissal, placing his spear in the empty mount beside yours.

Indicating for Quaritch to follow you, you made your way toward the compacted sand at the edge of the tide. Your muscles were tired, your back hurt, and you didn't know if you could stand one more second in close proximity to Quaritch without your body betraying your frustration or other unfamiliar feelings, which meant you should probably move on to the third element of your training. It was where you were most comfortable and most confident and knew that Quaritch would be most out of his depth. His footsteps crunched behind you, pausing just at the edge of the water where foaming tides lapped at your feet. You thought you detected a trace of hesitation in his usually confident step but it was gone if it had even been there at all.

"We have practiced breathing for many days now and I have decided it is time to practice in the water. Are soldiers taught how to swim?" You asked.

The avatar scoffed, pressing forward into the waves, cool blue water lapping at his ankles. "'Course I can swim, I ain't no baby."

You shrugged. "I would have thought you couldn't when you washed up on my shores like a piece of broken coral. Did you swim then?" A teasing smile stole across your mouth but when you turned to look at Quaritch, to poke jest at his pride as he had done to yours, he had fallen silent and still. He wasn't looking at you at all, instead watching the horizon of the sea where three giant hazy spires broke the flat monotony miles and miles away.

"Quaritch?"

"Let's just go."

The dismissal stung a bit and your ears flattened. So he could dish it out but couldn't take it? Or was there something deeper, something locked tightly away in a little box that Quaritch had not and perhaps would not reveal to you, something about his past? You couldn't dwell on these mysteries long because the soldier was paving a path through the tides, bright bursts of white splattering his thighs as the waves knocked against his legs. He was leading you again and you hastened to keep up.

The water was warmed by the sun, so familiar that it soothed any tension, melting it away into swirling pools of brilliant blue. When it became deep enough, the water rising to the back of your thighs, you pressed your palms together and dived into its depths. The plateau of the shallows dropped off a few feet from the shore into a field of corals, deepening into a canyon teeming with life. Beneath the waves, fish darted between glowing flora, anemones that waved in gentle currents, and Ilu, freed from their pens, caught tides that ushered them into deeper and colder waters. The sea was penetrated by the clicks and chirps of ocean life, schools of fish bursting with vibrant yellows and oranges darting out from caves formed by archaic old stone. This was home, where you were most familiar.

The water behind you disrupted as Quaritch dived in after you, clumsy feet kicking hard at the water. He wasn't adapted for the water like you were, lithe limbs built for grabbing vines and leaping from tree to tree, and it made his endeavors beneath the surface twice harder to learn. Breathing, the most important element of diving, was where he struggled the most. Everything about the man was about control and under the waves, he was at the whim of the water, dictated by its ebb and flow. The bubbles escaping his puffed mouth indicated his anxiety.

Pressing a hand to your chest, you mimicked its rise and fall, urging him to slow his breathing as you had practiced. Slow heart.

His hiccuping chest stuttered into a slow tempo and you nodded, gesturing him forward with you.

Over sandbars the two of you swam, small crabs clicking their pincers up at you, through forests of bright pink salt weed whose stalks glittered in beams of sunlight. Fields of rock croppings peppered the sea floor, hiding creatures with many eyes and many teeth, who prepared to spring from their decrepit caves and snatch a fish. How wonderful to be in this activity, among the pattern of the ocean which thrummed with life, flush and fertile. Generations had lived here, died here, and still more generations would. What a wonderful life, you thought, to live in this muted silence, where vibrant colors filled the quiet and currents sent by Eywa caressed your face.

Ahead, macropods sprouted up towards the surface, reaching for light they couldn't receive in the cooler waters of the deep. Their vibrant yellow fronds rippled, like thousands of leaves tugging at their branches to blow about. You wrapped slender fingers around Quaritch's thick forearm, tugging him along towards one of the air pockets hidden in the cup of the pod's bloom. You could sense Quaritch's breath running out, the stir of a hiccup building in the back of his throat. No matter how frustrated you still were with him after sparring testing the extent of his limits in the deeper sea wasn't a wise move. You knew this field grew here, which could give Quaritch a breath and teach him about the resources of your home if he just knew where to look. You reached for the stalk of the macropod as you approached it, clasping its base in a firm grip to hoist Quaritch up before yourself so that he could breach the surface and take large swallows of air.

"Are you ok?" You asked, brushing wet curls from your face as you emerged after him, clasping the lip of the macropod to hold yourself afloat in the air pocket. Quaritch caught his breath, leaning his forehead against the wall of the pod where thin membranes stretched across its thin skin. "Yes," He gasped, wiping water out of his eyes. "I'm fine. Shit. I just keep running out of air. This breathing shit pisses me off."

You didn't know what shit meant but caught this tone. "It is your breathing. I keep telling you you are not doing it correctly!" You insisted. "Slow your heart. You are filled with too much worry and it makes your heart race, quickening your breath. If you focus on the rhythm of the water, your breathing will slow and you will hold it longer. Be calm." The flat of your palm pressed to the center of Quaritch's chest, feeling the gentle pulse of life under his pectoral muscle. The skin was warm there and damp. The pale blue stripes that arced like lightning across his torso were flushed pretty pink from the exertion of swimming, flush stretching up the cords of his neck and to the tips of his ears. The hollow between his ribs was thumping, beating so fast that you were almost afraid for him. When you looked up he was close, pupils dilated to slashes of black in pools of gold.

Your breath shuttered, pierced beneath those eyes. It was dark in the pod, the walls emitting a faint glow in the dying light. It illuminated the hard planes of Quaritch's cheeks and brow in soft amber, catching the strands of his braid that clung to the nape of his neck. There it was again, that heat in your stomach, unfamiliar and scary and yet so warm it was stifling. He was glowing, you thought, holy and ethereal, blessed by Eywa and you were lucky to be in his presence, share his breath, and feel the brush of his tail against your calf. Quaritch breathed something undecipherable, maybe English or maybe Na'vi. Its low resonance had your fingers curling against his hard abdomen. His eyes had dropped to your mouth but you weren't speaking, just breathing in soft puffs that were magnified by the stillness of the macropod. You were used to him watching your mouth for indications of speech but at this moment, where he had nothing to decipher from empty air, the look had you faltering. You wanted to kiss those eyes that looked at you so intently, that slender nose and plush mouth-

"I got something on my face?" He asked abruptly, shying away from you. "I’m good now. Let's go back."

The moment snapped like a rubber band pulled too tight and the tension that had thickened between the two of you, a tension you were sure would break into something, disappeared. You felt some strange sense of rejection even though Quaritch hadn't really rejected anything. You had been overcome at that moment, carried away in the swing of whatever fizzle had erupted between the two of you. It was too embarrassing, the idea that you had imagined a moment between the two of you or, worse, that Quaritch had sensed the very same thing you had and turned away from it. You wanted to dwell in the feeling, mortified at its millions of meanings, hide away and never come out but Quaritch was already gulping air into his broadened lungs and dipping beneath the placid water. You couldn't very well leave him to navigate back to the shore himself so you slid beneath the surface, too, black curls pulling away from your face. Had he thought of kissing you, too? Had he counted every glowing freckle on your face, like you had him? Traced the contour of his strong throat down to broad shoulders that could have been between your-

Quaritch was kicking hard away from you in the direction of the shore, powerful thighs rippling with muscle built from his life before you, before your clan. What life? you wondered. A life with another family, another woman? Where he was a soldier, meant for more than being trained by you? The man was still so shrouded in mystery, having revealed little of himself despite the hours you had spent together. He kept carefully to himself despite his cockiness, always a sturdy wall between you and any vulnerability he may betray. Had you not proved yourself? Shown him you could be trusted?

Lost in thought, you missed the dark shadow that passed over the ocean floor, blotting out the sun for only a second. It blocked out light, fish shrinking away into the coves the coral provided. It was a threat, a foreboding of danger approaching, and you'd missed it despite your duty to guide and protect, despite your familiarity with the sea and its dangers. You were always on alert, instincts humming, but now you were distracted, mulling over that moment the two of you had shared.

The shadow passed over you again.

Now you noticed it. The quiet of the ocean always seemed to buzz with life and atmosphere but now was devoid of any motion. You were paused in your tracks, grabbed hold of a long plant stalk that waved in the current beside you. Your stomach knotted and you looked up, seeing nothing but open sea, beams breaking through the surface. A warning fizzed in your brain, a reminder of something that you couldn't remember. Your head whipped over to where Quaritch had been just moments before but he was gone, disappeared in the corals towards the village. You clutched yourself tighter to the stalk, desperately wanting to melt into it. Something felt off. The sea had become silent when, just moments earlier, schools of fish drifted lazily in the warm sun-

A flash of black.

Bubbles escaped your mouth as you chirped, jerking back, and the ocean sprung to life again in a moment. The jaws of the akula barely missed you, reared open to snap powerfully. The stalk you had been holding snapped in half beneath the force of its beating tail and you somersaulted over yourself, hitting the wall of a stone precipice. Disoriented, you scrambled to untangle the situation. Where the hell had that thing been hiding? Quaritch was gone, hopefully far from the scent range of the akula. This was a small comfort, knowing you wouldn't have to worry about yourself and him, or worry that he would see the akula swallow you whole. The predator curved sharply out of the corner of your eye, whipping through plant fronds and breaking coral structures apart with its powerful jaws.

You needed to move. Now. How far were you from the village? Probably still a couple of meters out, an unswimmable distance with that beast on your tail. Your blood was rushing, forcing alert signals into your brain, pumping fear through your system. You pushed yourself away from the rock, tail propelling you through the water. At every beat, you waited for the blinding pain of the akula's teeth on your fin. A shattering thump behind you indicated the akula had made contact with the rock a breath after you jumped away, gouging out furrows in the stone's surface. You grabbed the arch of a nearby reef structure, pushing yourself deep into the web-like system. Behind you, you could hear the splintering of exoskeletons as the predator ripped apart coral, forcing itself into a space much too small.

Fuck. You were alone, quite nearly in open water, and flagging. You had seconds before the akula would be on you and the lattice network of your temporary shelter was coming to an end. Corals were here to shield you, but they were shorter in the shallows and could barely guard against the beast's gnashing jaws. You had gone too far out, too far from the shore, couldn't remember the last time you'd been away from the village this far out. This was almost the reef where your father warned you not to go especially without the Ilu, and now you were alone, moments away from death. Your chest was beginning to ache as your brain and accelerated heart ate up the oxygen reserves you had.

You darted out from the structure and into a shallow alcove guarded by fronds of saltweed, the only shelter you could spot before the akula would discover you weren't in the coral. When it did, it let out a powerful roar that shook the ocean floor, the final bell of your death. You pressed yourself flat against the back of the cove, tears beading in your eyes. This was it. This was where you would meet your end. There was no other way out, no genius plan for survival. Your moment of death had come.

The akula snarled, three pincers spreading wide and revealing its rows of teeth. Chunks of debris whipped past your head, crashing and sending plumes of dust up and out of the holes in the alcove as the akula ripped its way toward you. From the violent murk, you only saw the looming form of the akula, black as death, mouth opened wide to swallow you whole -

A painful, searing tug on your arm pulled you through a small hole that had broken open in the cove. The rough edges of it shredded your skin, plumes of red streaming into the murky blue. The akula broke through the corals and chomped at where you had just been, inhaling the scent of blood that curled through the water. The sight was haunting and would have stamped itself on the inside of your brain if your shoulder didn't burn in pain. You were positive it was dislocated, no other explanation for the pain that rocketed down your arm, but then your foggy mind connected the squeezing grip on your wrist. You looked up to spy your savior and there Quaritch was, arms and legs pumping powerfully in the water to pull you toward the beginning of the plateau that led toward the shallows. Your lungs were hiccuping for air, chest shuddering. You had to be dead, the sight of him too good to be true. Qauritch glanced over his shoulder, searching the empty and murky depths for the akula, but it seemed the animal had darted away after breaching your hiding place, too close to the shores to hunt you further.

The avatar squeezed your wrist, hard, demanding your attention. He indicated for your help and you paddled your tail and legs feebly to generate momentum to the shore. You were so tired and now had lacerations to add to your bruises. Your mind couldn't grapple with the fact you were alive, saved from the man you had lamented about moments before. It was like a sick twist, repaying his life for yours, but you thanked Eywa all the same that he hadn't left you behind as you thought he had, and that his timing had been so perfect.

The two of you breached the surface with a splash, your feet finding purchase on the smooth bottom of the ocean floor. Your lungs were searing, filling with great gulps of delicious oxygen that returned some sense back to your head. You tried to find your footing and steady yourself, but Quaritch was still pulling.

"We're not stopping until we're out of this cesspool." He barked, yanking you along. "That thing's gonna be back, gonna come for us if we don't-"

"Won't come to the shallows," You gasped. "Only stays in the reef."

Quaritch slowed, his grip loosening. The water was at waist height now and you bowed low, exhaustion pulled at every limb.

"You need a medic. And I don't want to be in this goddamn ocean a second longer."

You wheezed out a laugh, reaching for Quaritch's side for support.

"I second that," You wheezed. Your head was still spinning and you couldn't believe that an outing meant to be a training exercise, where the worst part of your day was just to be your wounded ego, had almost ended in your death. A gory death at that.

"Thank you for saving me," You said weakly, blinking away fresh tears brimming on the edge of your vision. You looked down at your hands, realizing they were shaking. You tried to get them to stop, press them together to still the tremor that seemed to take over your whole body. Larger hands crept into view, encasing yours. They slid up from your hands to your forearms, then to your shoulders. You looked up at Quaritch through watery eyes and found his expression had taken a softer edge than you could remember seeing, a gentleness you didn't think him capable of possessing.

"I can't take my eye off you for a second, can I? Just consider this as repayment for you saving me." He smiled and tapped the bottom of your chin. "Let's get you back to the village, kiddo. You look like a drowned rat."

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