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iwantjaketosullyme · 1 year

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𝐢𝐟 𝐢 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝, 𝐢'𝐝 𝐛𝐞 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐥𝐢𝐭𝐭𝐥𝐞 𝐬𝐩𝐨𝐨𝐧 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐤𝐢𝐬𝐬 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐟𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐞𝐫𝐬 𝐟𝐨𝐫𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐦𝐨𝐫𝐞

…but, big spoon, you have so much to do and i have nothing ahead of me.

➺ pairing: jake sully x omatikaya!reader (fluff/angst) ➺ summary: seeing jake was easy, seeing toruk makto not so much. (w/c: 2.8k) ➺ warnings: minor mentions of war & death a/n: inspired by mitski's 'your best american girl' nd dedicated to our fav all-american boy <33 na'vi dictionary at the end !! gif credit goes to @/worldofpandora

─────── ･｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───────

Seeing Jake was easy.

It was shirking clan chores in favour of being held in the safe cocoon of his capable arms on a lazy afternoon, the two of you splayed out on the forest floor as it welcomed you into its clutch, soft grass embracing you, gentle breeze lulling him to sleep. As he slumbers you trace his features gently, eyes first, then nose.

You coast over the worry line that creases just like that when he senses a formidable threat, like the rogue palulukan that strayed a little too close to camp the previous week (or the persistent Omatikaya child that insists on having you braid his hair exactly when Jake’s sat down for you to rebraid his, meaning a rushed job and less scalp scratches for him).

Cautious fingertips are guided by the smattering of tanhi that litter his face, a map provided by Eywa, tiny stars aligning to lead you to your final destination - your favourite destination – his lips.

Being Seen by Jake was even easier.

- flashback -

Two weeks have passed since the fateful day your people reclaimed your ancestral home from the Sky People. The injured have been treated and deceased loved ones have been mourned and committed to Eywa. Now, the clan must celebrate.

Young ones chase after each other's tails (knowing the mood is good enough for them to escape chastisement from their parents), potential lovers dance around their feelings as they dance around the communal fire and elders thank the Great Mother for the privilege of witnessing another night like this – too many eclipses have passed since the clan could revel in shared joy like this.

The evening’s jubilations wind down as eclipse approaches, but the air is still charged with a sense of collective anticipation; you are yet to do what you do best. Gathered clan members form a blue sea, bioluminescent tanhi a mirror image of the stars in the skies above as they seat themselves on fallen logs.

Deep inhale, shoulders rolled back, head held high and gaze cast over young and old alike, you open your mouth and sing. Entranced, Jake looks up from where he was refilling his cup of pongu pongu (after falling victim to a particularly wily adolescent Na’vi bartering for the drink reserved for adults of the clan) and his amber gaze settles on you as he listens to the legend of a valiant Omatikaya warrior made song. His legend.

His song rolls off your tongue, volume ebbing and flowing like the waters of the Eastern Sea, reaching ‘ahhs’ and throaty ‘oohs’ conveying the highs and lows of his Pandoran alterlife. Sweeping peaks and troughs in the notes you belt out paint the picture in his mind of the mountains climbed and valleys traversed on his quest to find his humanity in a Na’vi body. Dulcet tones undulate from the soft pillows of your lips into the attentive ears of every clan member gathered around the fire, demanding the rapt attention of all that can and will listen.

Your voice betrays you, wavering slightly when you make sudden eye contact with Jake. He gawks at you unashamedly, his expression reminding you of the awe and excitement of a child watching kenten unfurl their luminous fans for the first time. Inwardly, you curse the power that this vrrtep has over you; you never get distracted! No doubt Ninat would be teasing you about this mishap til Eywa calls you home. That skxawng always liked to argue that she’s the better vocalist.

Final note lingering in the air and resonating in the hearts of those around you, you graciously accept the compliments offered. Soon after, you make a swift break for your marui, unaware of your newly acquired shadow following after your hurried steps as if still woefully caught in the spell your voice had cast upon him.

You flit about the marui, humming under your breath as you search for the herb and nectar concoction Tsahik gave you after overhearing you complaining to Neytiri about putting your vocal cords under too much pressure. An appreciative hum leaves your parted lips as the mixture soothes your throat, before a male, gravelly and obnoxious “Ah, shit!” cuts through your minute of peace, followed by the clang of a pot falling.

A stunned squeak escapes you before you have the chance to stop it, eyes widening as your ears fold back and your brow muscles raise in shock before furrowing in confusion. A moment passes.

You slowly crane your neck to look behind you, chancing a glance at whatever, whoever it is that managed to sneak into your marui and elicit such an embarrassing reaction from you. The fallen pot is still rattling on the floor as you lock eyes with the perpetrator and your upper lip raises into a sneer. Of course, you think to yourself, as if the vrrtep has not bothered me enough tonight he has come back for more!

“Oel ngati kameie,” Jake greets awkwardly, eyes shifting between your defensive posture and the offensive pot that he had tripped over in his dazed stupor. He brings his fingertips to his forehead before extending them towards you in a gesture of respect, and for a moment you are pulled from your derisive train of thoughts as your eyes follow the raised veins on his hands and you feel an unfamiliar feeling flutter in the pit of your stomach – much like the kindling of a new flame. Your examination of his anatomy comes to an abrupt stop when your eyes hone in on his outstretched fingers. Four fingers. Alien fingers.

“What is it that you want?” You throw the words at him, eyeing him up and down in an admittedly pathetic attempt to intimidate him. You are well aware of his prowess as a warrior; you’d only spent the latter part of the evening waxing poetic about it. Despite this, you cannot help but feel as if you must prove yourself to be a formidable threat to him, to this man who was once a tawtute imposter in a Na’vi body and has now made himself an imposter in your home.

He inches towards you cautiously, arms outstretched by his sides and palms open, intending to communicate his lack of malintention as he clears his throat and opens his mouth to answer you. Your eyes remain vigilant, ears pointing up, alert and awaiting his response. A series of unintelligible noises is all you hear, his mouth opening and closing in such a stupid way that you almost find it endearing. Almost.

Further incensed by the lack of answer, you jerk your head towards him, tail lashing behind you, impatient, “What is it then? Speak!” You begin to pace in front of him, agitated and expectant of an explanation. “Or do you only know how to stare?”

As if jolted back to reality, Jake blinks blankly before retorting “Damn, you sound just as good when you talk, pretty girl”. Astounded, your pacing comes to a halt, allowing you to baulk at his insolence – there is a notable pause as you compose yourself once more. His lips pull back into a self-satisfied smirk as he greedily absorbs your reaction, and there is a dangerous glint in his eyes, eyes too small to belong to a native Na’vi, that calls to you. You decline the call decisively.

“You still have not answered my question, Jakesully,” you attempt to regain control of this odd interaction, remaining firm in your affronted demeanour. “Speak!”

He lets out a huff of laughter under his breath, made bashful by the reminder of his inexplicable attraction towards you. “Well…I guess I heard ya singin’ out there and I-” he shakes his head, looks down and brushes a hand over his face, lips puckering to blow a gentle whoosh of air as he exhales. You feel his breath waft over your face and refuse to register the way it stokes the flame within you.

“I knew I gotta tell ya that you sound amazing, heavenly, even, unlike anything I’ve ever hea-” his reverent rambling is cut short by your cackle that pierces his ears that had perked up in delight while he sang your praises. He looks up to observe you doubling over in sarcastic laughter and waits, confused as ever, for you to explain yourself.

“Skxawng,” you rebuke, “do not insult my intelligence by suggesting you understood a single word other than your name. Neytiri has told me of your incompetence,” you lower your voice and let the venom seep into your tone, “Jakesully.”

He meets your narrowed eyes with a challenge in his stare, his right eyebrow, yet another tawtute feature, quirking up. “You’re wrong y’know,” he tilts his head to the right and nods as if still contemplating your rude interjection. In spite of his shock, he does not appear deterred in any way and for a moment you fear that your attempt at resistance is futile. Perhaps you have grossly underestimated his proficiency at your native language and have embarrassed yourself.

He continues, “I understood you calling me a skxawng just now.” A cheeky smile creeps onto his face as he basks in his ability to rile you up. “But I figure that might as well be my name with how many times Neytiri’s called me that”.

Insistent on finding a fault in his words, you give him an incredulous look and respond, “Now you dare to criticise the tsakarem?” A disbelieving scoff leaves your lips. “Impertinence!” Your words, however, do not have their desired effect as he remains unbothered by your jabs, seeing through them completely.

“C’mon pretty girl,” Jake tries to reason with you, “y’know that’s not what I meant.” Encouraged by the involuntary huff of defeat that leaves your body that has grown weary from the night’s activities and this back and forth that is honestly fraying your nerves, Jake perseveres with the determination of the Marine that he is. “Now stop deflecting ‘nd take the compliment.” You relent, albeit reluctantly. “Call me crazy but the way you sang out there…it felt like I knew exactly what you were sayin’, even with my thick Jarhead skull.”

He takes a breath before more words tumble out of his mouth. “I know you were singin’ about me. I never thought I would mean enough to the Omatikaya people for someone to write a song about me.” He surprises you by laughing self-deprecatingly – in the short time you have interacted with him you have become used to his natural bravado. “I never thought I would be enough for anyone to write a song about me.”

Jake wants to tell you more. He yearns to speak of the cosmic force, the pull he felt towards you the moment he heard your voice for the first time. The pull he feels tugging at his heartstrings now, plucking away at them, composing a tune to accompany the siren song of your voice. For a moment he thinks he might just really believe this Eywa shit now.

But he doesn’t tell you. For once in his life he holds back. Instead, he moves even closer to you, every inch of his eight foot figure towering over you as he encroaches on your personal space. Your eyes widen, pupils dilating as you take him in. All of him.

Spurred on by your favourable change in expression, Jake reaches forward to place a warm hand on the snug of your neck. His other hand’s forefinger and thumb frame your dazed face as he caresses your cheek with a reverential tenderness you would have never attributed to him. He shifts his grip down to your chin and tilts your face upwards, so that eye meets eye.

As your steely resolve weakens into something soft, something pliable, you are rendered boneless against your own will, putty in his hands – carbon fiber-reinforced bones be damned. He is held captive by the unexpected, soft trill of your laughter, spirited away by the light breeze that has entered like the melody of a windchime. Eyes of molten gold bore into your soul and he sees you. He Sees you.

- end of flashback -

Seeing Toruk Makto, however, was anything but easy.

You smile to yourself as you recount how you and Jake met, but are quickly sobered by the realisation that no other clan member would even fathom speaking to Jake so disrespectfully – speaking to Toruk Makto so disrespectfully. And so you are forced to confront the reason why you could not stand the man, even if he ensured your clan’s survival by bringing an end to The Great Sorrow.

You fiddle with the purple tassels of your breast covering, made up of the fallen strands of a tawtsngal plant that you had painstakingly braided to be in likeness to the whispering tendrils of the Utraya Mokri. The Tree of Voices.

To the ignorant tawtute that threatened to populate your beloved Eywa’eveng like pests it was simply one of the many flux vortex hubs that rendered their alien inventions useless, stripping them of their ill-perceived superiority and reminding them that they do not belong here. But to you, it was an awe-inspiring wonder that was the source of many a song composed by you and crooned into the ear of a fussy baby, sung to soothe an ill elder or belted out to relay the ballad of a beloved fallen warrior.

With the stories whispered in your ears by the ancestors, you weave the tapestry of the clan in song form. It is for this reason that Jake had taken to affectionately calling you ‘parrot’, explaining to you that they were birds that once lived on Earth and repeated what was said by others.

Your garment was not only of totemic value, symbolising your role in the clan as an esteemed singer, but was also a love letter to the sacred place that birthed your passion for the art of song - and in doing so established your roots in the intricate network of the clan.

If only you had known of what was to come, you lament. That a day would come when the very roots of the tree that planted you firmly within the clan would be so easily uprooted by the wretched Sky People and their demon machines. On that day, you felt as if your place in the clan was uprooted with it; you had lost your communication channel with the ancestors, and therefore your muse.

You sit up and detach Jake’s arm, limp with sleep, from your waist. As you look upon his face you try to reconcile all the affection he has extended to you with the fact that he once was a Sky Person, working for their destructive cause.

Before you can stop it, the familiar feeling of resentment stirs within your belly as you question why the Great Mother would choose to allow your life’s joy to be so mercilessly taken from you and yet bestow the revered title of Toruk Makto on such a man as Jake.

How could she turn her back on you? Strip your pride from you? Replace you with a man born not of Na’vi, but of the immoral tawtute? You cannot help but feel that Jake is more Omatikaya than you ever will be now, as you think of what you long to be.

His mate.

Mate to Toruk Makto, rider of last shadow, yet unworthy to stand with him, even in his shadow. The honour of being under this dark, ominous, yet protective shroud was reserved for a select few - the chosen ones. Proven warriors who have sacrificed their lives, their existence on this terrestrial plane for Toruk Makto, like Tsu’tey, or dutiful daughters who have overcome prejudices born from murder for Toruk Makto, like Neytiri. Not for glorified parrots. Not for you.

You heave a gentle sigh, banishing those thoughts with a soft shake of your head and rest your head back on Jake’s shoulder. Tense shoulders loosen as you shuffle back into the warm comfort of his body. Your finger begins tracing again, up, up, up his arm before a tentative hand opens up to grasp one of his larger ones.

Curious eyes explore the network of veins that branch out along his hand like the roots of a tree, like the roots of the Utraya Mokri. You feel the heat rush to your cheeks as you reminisce the first time you had been in such proximity to the veins on his hand and the feelings they aroused in you back then.

Perhaps, you muse, you could find solace in him the same way you once did in your sacred trees. You lean in, pursed lips relaxing to place a tender kiss on each of Jake's fingers, all four of them. The same fingers that once instilled a deep rage within you. The same fingers that held you with a love that can only be Eywa-given. The same fingers used to tame the mighty Toruk. A part of you, no matter how distant or small, knows that in these capable hands you can rest easy.

So yes, your struggle to See Toruk Makto may yet prevail, but Jake? Jake you would always See. It is with this conclusion that your hold on his arm slackens, and half-lidded eyes flutter close. You slot yourself into the space within his body that is made for you. Two bodies mould into one. Little spoon into big spoon.

─────── ･｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───────

na’vi dictionary

palulukan - thanator // tanhi - na’vi bioluminescent freckles // pongu pongu - na’vi alcoholic beverage // kenten - fan lizards // marui - tent // oel ngati kameie - I see you // skxawng - idiot // tsakarem - tsahik-in-training // tawtsngal - purple pandoran flower // tawtute - sky person, sky people // eywa’eveng - na’vi word for pandora

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