First Look At The Ash Village, Home Of The Mangkwan Clan

“Wait, you’re human?”

“Ha Ha.”

Spider + self-soothing

Here are some more thoughts on my Neytiri/Spider mother-son relationship where she raises him to be her instrument and attack dog against the RDA and Quaritch. Bonds That Bleed AU ended ambiguously, so here are more headcanons that have been swimming around my brain.

-) Neytiri raised Spider with the ways of the Na’vi, but never let him forget what he was. A human. A creature of destruction. A son of the demon. Every lesson was laced with quiet loathing, every word a seed of hatred planted deep in his heart. "They are destroyers, Miles. They will never stop until our home is dust beneath their feet." She does not temper her words, does not shield him from the ugliness of truth because he must learn, must hate as she hates.

-) And Spider listened. He learned. He fought. He killed. It was easy to lie to him, to pretend to love him, to smile at his victories even when her Jake was deeply troubled by the boy's eagerness to kill RDA soldiers, even when her mother stared at her with eyes full of quiet disappointment. But somewhere along the way, something changed.

-) Oftentimes, Neytiri found herself reaching for him in the quiet moments, pressing her forehead to his like she did with Neteyam, Kiri, Lo’ak, and Tuk. She would find herself soothing his wounds, braiding his hair, smiling at his laughter, glowing with pride when he respected her customs and spoke her language fluently. The lines between tool and child blurred, and before she even realized it, she loved him. Her little blade. Her son.

-) But the damage was already done.

-) Jake had warned her. "You’re filling his head with hatred. This has to stop. You need to stop. He's just a kid." She ignored him. The little demon was hers. Hers to mold. Hers to teach. Hers to wield. He was hers.

-) Until the day Spider leaped on Quaritch's back like a starved animal, clinging onto his father in a death's embrace, blade flashing. The monster who once haunted Neytiri’s nightmares did not even get the chance to scream before Spider drove his knife deep into both of his own father's eye sockets. Once. Twice. Again. Again. Again. Again. A frenzy of violence. His face was expressionless, his hands steady, his body drenched in blood that should not have been on him. The blood of his own father. There is no hesitation. No mercy. He is everything she raised him to be and more.

And for the first time in her life, Neytiri felt fear.

Not for herself. For her son.

She had wanted this—had spent years preparing him for this very moment. So why did it feel like her heart was shattering?

Because in that moment, she saw him clearly—not as the boy she had raised and manipulated, not as the child she had grown to love—but as a reflection of her own hatred. And she knew, with cold, crushing clarity—

She had stolen his innocence just as the Sky People had stolen hers.

ADDING MORE TO THIS

Norm even gives Spider parents who aren't really his parents. He successfully crafts a plausible origin story for Julian by pinning his lineage on a dead man with the right looks and no one to contradict it.

The two even have the same shade of blonde hair!

There had always been whispers and rumors passed around in the mess halls that one of the scientists had gotten a pretty techie pregnant, a fun little tryst gone wrong. The rumor had never been confirmed. No proof, no details, just the kind of idle gossip people clung to when the days stretched for too long and boredom struck.

That scientist was said to be Phillip Shaw. Norm remembered him. Popular, golden-haired, silver-tongued, a total manwhore who slept around a lot, brilliant in the lab, but reckless on the field, and drove Grace crazy with his inability to take the dangers seriously because he thought he was God's gift to Pandora. He’d gotten mauled by a thanator while collecting spore samples. Phillip's body was never recovered, just his shredded pack splattered with blood and a few scraps of torn equipment.

Perfect.

All evidence of Paz Socorro is scrubbed. In her place: a woman who'd been a low-level techie, a casualty of the war. The perfect dead mother for a story about a little orphaned child. Tragic. Sad. Simple.

Julian Shaw. Son of Phillip Shaw and Amelia Perkins. Both dead. Orphaned. Adopted by his “uncle” Norm out of loyalty to an old colleague and acquaintance.

It was neat. Tragic. Believable. And no one would question it.

Norm leaned back, hands trembling slightly. Not from fear — from the weight of what he’d just done.

He was erasing the truth.

No, no, no...he was protecting a child from it.

“You're not the son of a demon. You're not a mistake,” he whispered, glancing toward the sleeping bundle across the room. “You're Julian Shaw now. That’s who you are.”

And that was who he would be… until the moons fell, or Eywa herself decided otherwise.

My thoughts were inspired by @detective-twinkachu's au where Norm and Max hide Spider's lineage.

I love the idea of an AU where Norm finds baby Spider and immediately realizes this child will never know peace if anyone learns who his real father is. So, like Eddard Stark, he makes a painful decision: He erases every trace of Quaritch’s connection to the boy and keeps it secret. He gives the child a new name (seriously, Miles? Way to make it obvious, Paz), forges documents, and creates a solid cover story in case anyone asks questions. He can’t bring himself to tell anyone, not even his closest friends, the truth. Quaritch has made too many enemies and caused too much destruction for anyone to overlook the boy’s lineage. There's already been enough tragedy. And this child, little Julian, is the first human ever born on Pandora.

Norm even steals the only photo of Paz and hides it away where no one will ever find it. He hates lying. Hates secrets. But Hell’s Gate is built on them, and children should never have to suffer for their parents’ mistakes. So he decides: he’ll raise Julian as his nephew. He’ll raise him to be kind, brave, and good. Maybe, just maybe, when Julian turns nineteen, he’ll sit him down and explain everything. Or maybe he won’t. Maybe Julian should never know. Norm will carry this secret to his grave… unless Eywa herself decides to produce a blowhorn and inform the entire planet. No. He'll hold this secret.

On the desk beside Julian's forged documents was a faded photo of Paz Socorro. Pregnant. Glowing. Laughing. Holding her growing belly as she smiled for the camera. Norm’s throat closed up. Guilt and anger were warring in his chest like a storm. What would Trudy say about all this?

“I’m sorry, Socorro,” he whispered. “You were… a good mother. You didn’t deserve to fall in love with a monster, you didn't deserve to die for his craziness, you didn't deserve any of this. But your baby boy? He deserves better. He deserves everything. I'm sorry...I'm so sorry."

He picked up the photo, stared at it, then opened up his desk drawer and hid it beneath layers of unimportant documents. Hidden in plain sight until he could find a tiny box and bury the picture so deep that maybe Eywa herself will forget about it. This was for the best.

Then, he burned everything else.

Ok so we all know that, in the movie, Miles had a special sort of stare that would make people back down when he wanted to go through with something, like with the “Let’s hunt” scene, so let’s take it a step further.

I like to think that colonel has his special death stare that he uses to win arguments or intimidate people into doing his bidding, and then even uses it on Spider when they argue. It works first couple times but then Spider learns to mirror it, and with down-turned brows like his it becomes quite easy.

So now the kid uses it as a defence mechanism. When he feels threatened he’d use the stare to make whoever threatens him to back down or to intimidate humans into letting him go places he might not be allowed in. Basically using it to his benefit to survive amongst humans.

And then, weeks after the Sea Dragon incident, he argues with Jake.

Jake grabs his arm.

Spider instinctively looks him in the eye.

And a shiver runs down Sully’s back…

…like he’s seen this gaze before.

I wonder if dragons on Pandora exist.

Not like our dragons here on earth, but I'm talking about a dragon similar to an ikran, but bigger, deadlier, and relies on their talons and teeth instead of breathing fire because they CAN'T breathe fire but can produce a strange blast that can wipe out an entire village except they rarely ever use that blast because they need two days to recharge.

They still lay eggs and are extremely intelligent.

So when Jake says "Get that crap off your face" to Lo'ak it actually irks me so bad bc like. 1. He's just a kid and 2. Don't call his war paint "crap" when he's clearly trying to live up to YOUR example

Headcanon that as Spider cares little for Jake and Neytiri then he lets on. One day, maybe after the 2nd movie took place, Jake just tells Spider he accepted him as one of his own and pouring out his heart to Spider.

And Spider just hits him with a "Okay, but I have never accepted you or Mrs. Sully." And just states matter of factly that he only cares for the Sully kids because they had never treated Spider like dirt. Maybe when he was little, he wanted a mother or father figure in the couple but he could only be let down so many times before he gives up on them and stop caring for them.

Just Spider tearing Jake a new one as he states that the only ones to matter to him in the Sully family are Neteyam, Lo'ak, Kiri, and Tuk. Mo'at also means a lot to him too. But how both Jake and Neytiri are on a similar level as Quaritch but for different reasons. It didn't hurt Spider when Neytiri cut him and he 100% believes she would have killed him that day, he expected it from her. Spider tells Jake that suddenly opening your heart, or your heart "always" being opened to him will not erase the years of hate and disrespect.

Spider let's it be known that he would never forgive Neytiri and Jake for causing the rift between him and Neteyam, and using their eldest son's people pleasing nature to their own benefit. Neteyam is gone and Spider will never get those years back and he blames Jake and Neytiri for that.

Spider holds little care for the couple and if Spider never saw either of them again he would be fine, it's only the love that Spider has for their children is what keeps him with putting up with their bullshit.

After saying all this, Spider just walks away without looking back, uncaring of a response, let alone an apology. Leaving Jake, who is still as a stone.

FREE TIDE

3/3 of my Avatar Illustrations exploring the beauty of Pandora!

This time it's a snippet from the reef!

I went for a calm but playful moment while still trying to keep that glittering wonder and awe pandora invokes.