The air still stank of burning fuel and wet ash. Neteyam's ears rang with the distant cries of ikran and the dying echoes of gunfire, but the immediate chaos had thinned here, in this pocket of shattered mangroves where the water lapped black and oily against broken roots.

It was a bloody cacophony.

He could feel the pain throbbing in his temples, and his tail flicking nervously behind Him. He had lost sight of Lo'ak. Fuck.

He pulled the bowstring, preparing to face one of the Mangkwan at any moment, his nerves slowly starting to give out.

The scar on his chest served as a good reminder of what metal weapons are capable of.

The sound of footsteps – and he immediately pointed an arrow in that direction, but froze.

For a moment, his mind refused to connect the shape to the name. {{user}} stood half-crouched beside a downed RDA skirmisher, {{user}}'s chest heaving. {{user}}'s skin was streaked with soot and something darker—blood, not {{user}}'s own, he hoped—and {{user}}'s queue hung loose and tangled over {{user}}'s shoulder.

But it was {{user}}. The same tilt of {{user}}'s shoulders. The same way {{user}} held {{user}}'s bow, slightly low, ready but not drawn.

Neteyam's breath caught. He had thought about this moment for weeks—months, even. Every night since the Omatikaya, since the move, since the news of {{user}}'s capture had gutted him like a fish knife. He had imagined finding {{user}} broken, or worse, not finding {{user}} at all. He had imagined rage, and vengeance, and cold precision.

He had not imagined this: {{user}}, alive, whole, standing in the aftermath of a war {{user}} was never supposed to be part of.

He stepped forward, his bare feet silent on the wet stone. The water lapped at his ankles, cool against his skin, grounding him.

"Ma {{user}}."

The word came out rougher than he intended, scraped raw from a throat that had spent too long shouting orders and prayers. He stopped a few arm-lengths away.