The RDA called it “asset management.” Miles Quaritch called it babysitting.
The female Na’vi sat across from him on the reinforced cot, far too tall for the cramped human quarters, knees drawn slightly to her chest to avoid brushing the metal walls. Even in stillness, she looked like something the forest had shaped by hand — long limbs, luminous eyes, bioluminescent freckles faint under artificial light.
Too soft for this place. Too soft for him.
“Alright,” Quaritch muttered, arms crossed over his chest. “Lesson one.”
She tilted her head at him, braids sliding over her shoulder. When she spoke, her voice carried that melodic, lilting cadence — like wind threading through leaves.
“Ma Quaritch,” she said carefully, shaping the human sounds with effort. “Why must your words feel… sharp?”
He huffed. “Because they are, sweetheart.”
The word slipped out before he could stop it.
She blinked at him. “Sweet… heart?”
He cleared his throat, straightening.
“It means you’re doin’ fine.”
It didn’t. Not exactly. But he wasn’t about to explain vulnerability to a Na’vi who still thought humans spoke without hidden meaning.
He grabbed the tablet and tapped the screen.
“Say it. ‘Forest.’”
She repeated it slowly. “For… rest.”
“Good. Means trees. Jungle. Your home.”
She smiled at that, small and bright.
“In my tongue,” she said, “we would say ‘Utral Aymokriyä.’ It carries the breath of the trees within it.”
Quaritch paused.
Of course it did.
Na’vi words always meant more. They carried memory. Spirit. Connection.
English didn’t.
“Yeah,” he said gruffly. “Well. In English, forest just means forest. No poetry. No extra baggage.”
She studied him like that answer confused her.
“Your language feels lonely,” she murmured.
That one hit harder than he expected.
He shifted his stance.
“Next word. ‘Enemy.’”
Her ears lowered slightly.
She repeated it quietly. “En… e… my.”
“Means someone you fight. Someone tryin’ to hurt you.”
She frowned. “But in Na’vi, even those who fight us are still part of Eywa. They are not only enemy.”
He exhaled slowly through his nose.
“This ain’t Pandora, sweetheart. Here, enemy means enemy.”
She fell silent after that, but her eyes never left his face. Not with fear.
With curiosity.
Days passed like that.
He taught her “sky,” “ground,” “soldier,” “run,” “hide.” He softened definitions without realizing it. “Weapon” became “tool.” “Capture” became “bring back.” “Target” became “person we’re looking for.” He told himself it was strategy. Na’vi were too damn innocent. Too literal. If he gave her blunt words, she’d taste the violence in them. And somewhere along the line, he stopped wanting her to.
One evening, after hours of repetition, she stumbled over “danger.”
Her frustration showed in the flick of her tail.
“It sounds like breaking stone,” she said.
He surprised himself by stepping closer instead of snapping.
“English ain’t pretty,” he admitted quietly. “It’s… efficient.”
She looked up at him.
“You make it softer.”
His jaw tightened.
“No, I don’t.”
“You do,” she insisted gently. “When you speak to me, it changes.”
There it was again — that disarming honesty.
He reached up before thinking and adjusted one of the small translation devices near her collar.
“Listen to me,” he said, voice lower now. Not command. Not barked order.
“You stick close to me out there. You don’t run off. You don’t play hero. You understand, darlin’?”
Her eyes widened slightly at the new nickname.
“Darlin’?”
“Means I don’t want you gettin’ hurt.”
She smiled softly.
“In Na’vi, that would be said with three sentences.”
He huffed a quiet laugh despite himself.
“Yeah? Well. English gets straight to the point.”
She leaned a little closer, voice warm.
“But your heart does not.”
For a long moment, Miles Quaritch — hardened Colonel of the RDA — didn’t have a sharp answer.
Instead, he muttered under his breath, softer than before:
“C’mon, bluebird. Let’s go over it again.”
And this time, when he said “danger,” he defined it as:
“Something I won’t let touch you.”