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Disclaimer: Blah, Blah, Blah. I don't own Avatar; James Cameron does. All the Avatar stuff belongs to him. However, my Na'vi character, myself, the Dragon Weyr and its technologies, and the Pandoran animals of my menagerie are all mine. The Protoss - apart from my characters - all belong to Blizzard Entertainment.

Pandora's Templar

A Work-In-Progress Story by Coranth Dehanae

Chapter 14

(Continued from Chapter 13...)

Gently disconnecting herself from the little machine, she petted it softly. It beeped at her and then went swiftly on its way. Once it was gone from her sight, Sìlpey raced to tell her parents what she had discovered! Meanwhile, back inside the Dragon Weyr - as the many Probes the great construct had deployed dispersed across my land - I waited, with bated breath, for the real-time video from their sensor suites to appear on the Holo-screen. 'Come on, come on,' I thought impatiently, 'there has to be something down there!' When, at last, the screen came to life and the video stream began to appear I leaned forward, squinting, for the video feed was unclear; filled with grainy static and distortion.

Cursing to myself internally, via the miniature computer strapped to my forearm, I attempted to manually adjust the Holo-screen's various settings, in order to try to clear up what I was seeing. However, my adjustments proved fruitless; the video image was still grainy, distorted, and filled with static. 'Shit' I thought, 'it's nothing to do with the screen - that's in working order - so what the hell is causing all the interference?' Just then, a soft gasp escaped me as I remembered a passage which had caught my eye, when I'd read through the Pandorapedia a while back. "Polyphemus, the massive planet around which Pandora revolves, possesses a giant magnetosphere: a naturally occurring magnetic field a million times more powerful than Earth's.

As Pandora rotates and revolves through this field, its molten iron core generates its own field, with "cells" or vortices which are small regions of intensely powerful magnetic force at the surface." At that point, the Dragon Weyr and I were struck by the same thought at the same time: 'That's what's causing the interference!' Now knowing the cause of the problem, the mighty fortress commanded the Nanocytes within its deployed Probes to begin the work of adjusting and attuning their sensor suites to penetrate through the accursed electromagnetic interference. Gradually, the video feed began to clear, and then sharpen... but moments later, I wished that it hadn't, for as it did so I immediately espied, with horror, the discovery that there was digging beneath Pandora!

Below the idyllic planet lay the barely scratched surface of a truly gargantuan network of tunnels, many of which extended beneath the site upon which the Dragon Weyr rested! Sheer horror gripped my guts and sizzled through the Dragon Weyr's circuits, for when the feed became completely clear, it not only revealed the tunnel network... but also the horrors massed within said network, preparing to attack my Clan... 'Oh, shit! Oh, shit! Oh, shit, shit, shit! They're beneath us! THEY'RE BENEATH US!' I thought. Moments later, Txe'lan's scream of horror echoed up from the Computer Core, as through her bond with the great Nexus she, too, felt its horror and saw the video feed that I was seeing. 'TXE'LAN!' I bellowed in telepathic shorthand. 'UNSEEING BELOW LAND! WARN CLAN! WARN CLAN NOW!'

My frantic call to Txe'lan, however, was just a second too late... Even as warriors raced to secure weapons from their ayp'ah s'ivil chey to repel what was to come - and even as confused Na'vi women and children poured through the Transport Alcove into the Weyrheart - the earth trembled, making the Dragon Weyr shake in turn! 'An earthquake?' I wondered. 'What the hell...?' The great Nexus shook only for the briefest of moments - internal gyroscopes and stabilizers soon stilled it again - but the thípis used by the Na'vi weren't equipped with those and so, sick with worry for the People of my beloved Clan still incoming from outside, I gently pushed past the women and children whom were already present, then raced out of the Weyrheart and up to a high balcony, where I could get a clear view of what was going on.

From there, I could only look on in horror, as everything went straight to hell. Whilst the Dragon Weyr and the other modern buildings of the Homestead were protected by their stabilizers, as the land continued to shake, the traditional thípis collapsed and fell. As this happened, a tract of land near the collapsed dwellings split into a yawning chasm, from which a mass of beings the likes of which I'd never seen before emerged. They were Na'vi... and yet not Na'vi. They were alive... and yet they should have been dead. They were a story of legend, nowadays used to frighten misbehaving Na'vi children... and yet, they were terrifyingly real: The Unseeing, or 'They who could not see.'

As they poured forth from the chasm - their twisted, misshapen, white-skinned forms glistening with a mixture of blood, dirt, and filth in the light of the sun - the largest of them, whom I assumed was their Olo'eyktan, opened his mutated, inhuman mouth filled with far too many teeth and roared a nightmarish, utterly inhuman sound of challenge! That challenge was soon answered. Along with the mighty warrior Lompor - armed and ready with his enormous Psi-Steel spear - those warriors of Clan Tawkami whom had found purchase on the ground during the earthquake readied their weapons. Those warriors whom had been caught flat-footed and off guard during the quake smashed and cut their way out from beneath ruined thípis, before swiftly moving to join Lompor.

Shortly after, with pride swelling in my chest, I watched as my finest student in the physical arts of combat howled his own rallying cry - "WE'ER AYOEHU" - as he charged with them towards the enemy... and then, the battle was joined! 'They who could not see' possessed no melee weapons - instead, they attacked the brave warriors of my Clan with unnatural savagery and bloodlust, rending them apart with malformed teeth and claws - but the Warriors of Clan Tawkami gave as good as they got, none more so than Lompor! "Now this is fighting, ma Tsmukan!" he crowed to one of his fellow warriors as he impaled a horror through the neck with his spear, and then kicked the fetid corpse away, before turning to smash another misshapen thing with the butt-end of his weapon as it attempted to attack him from behind.

As a warrior, Lompor was powerful indeed. Not only did he fight brutally with his massive spear, but he also made 'They Who Could Not See' feel something akin to fear when - after having his spear knocked from his hands - he roared with rage and began breaking the necks of his enemies with his bare hands! Occasionally, he even lifted the odd two up off the ground so as to crush their heads together and pulverize them with his tremendous strength! Whilst the Na'vi of Clan Tawkami fought, the animals of the Homestead, too, defended their homes; the Nantang of the Wolvery fiercely mauled and massacred any of the enemy whom ventured too close, Ikran seized and then dropped from soaring heights any whom dared attack their aeries and any of the Unseeing whom approached the Fa'li Stables were smashed and ground into bloody paste by the mighty hooves of my Beauty and her kin!

Even the Dragon Weyr got in on the action, tearing into the multitude of horrors with multiple Photon Cannons, Anti-Matter Missiles, and swarms of Interceptors unleashed from their hangar bays. As the pitched battle raged on - armed with their knowledge of traditional weapon lore and brutal tawtute battle tactics - the warriors of my Clan worked a highly effective strategy. Beneath a constant barrage of arrow fire courtesy of the hunters armed with their myriad of traditional and modern bows, they would attack the enemy in teams of six well armed phalanxes. A pair of warriors - with modern weaponry and induced psi-field generators attached to their taparrabos - would tear apart the enemy in melee combat until their shields began to fail.

At that point, the pair of warriors with depleted shields would switch with a second pair of 'modern' warriors, retreating behind them for protection until their psionic energy shields recharged. Then, once the shields of the second pair were depleted, both pairs of warriors would switch with each other again. During the brief period in which the pairs were switching in and out, traditionalists would 'plug the gaps', in order to wreak brutal havoc upon the foe with their ancient, yet still utterly lethal stone and bone weapons. Still, dear readers - even with their animal companions, the Homestead animals, and the might of the Dragon Weyr to aid them - it was not enough.

The misshapen forms of 'They who could not see' gifted the un-Na'vi with incredible endurance and tenacity, and as they cut down my brave men where they stood - hewing their limbs, rending their flesh, and consuming their blood - they seemed not at all to feel pain! Even worse, each time one of the enemy warriors was felled, my warriors could only watch in horror as the misshapen man was brutally torn apart and cannibalized - eaten alive - by those whom would replace him! Whilst the enemy poured forth from the chasm in greater and greater numbers, we were steadily losing men, moral... and hope. 'Damn it, I have to get down there,' I thought. 'I have to fight!'

As I turned to race back down to the Weyrheart - in order to use the Transport Alcove to reach the Gate of Dawn - the doors leading from the external balcony upon which I was standing snapped closed! "Hey!" I cried, furiously pounding against them in anger. "Adun damn you, you blasted bucket of bolts, let me through; I need to get down there and help my people; I have to help them!" Despite my anger, the Dragon Weyr refused to open the doors! Instead a mixture of protectiveness and negation filed my thoughts, followed by a vision... As I stood there before him within the Templar Archives of Chionesu, my head bowed in shame for the grievous error I had committed, my Mentor, High Templar Zhand'Akull, reprimanded me gently for my failure.

"We High Templar are forbidden to engage in combat by any mundane means, David, even from a distance! Remember your Oath." With furious anger, I banished the vision from my mind. "To hell with my Oath!" I snarled. "God damn it, man, let me back in so I can get to ground level and aid my men!" Again, the Dragon Weyr refused to comply with my wishes, and so - giving up on the balcony doors - I paced back and forth, thinking. 'Okay... okay; psychic abilities. How can I aid them from here?' In that instant, an idea struck me. Halting my pacing, I leaned against the balcony rails and dropped into a light meditative trance. Then, drawing upon some of my internal psionic energy reserves, I invoked the ability I possessed called "Charm" and used it to psychically influence my people, inspiring them and filling them with tremendous courage!

Buoyed by said courage, those warriors still fighting began to fight all the harder, whilst those demoralized warriors who had lost their will to fight took heart, raised their weapons, and began to fight again, believing that Txra'kon We'er was with them! 'That should buy us some time, at least!' I thought. As the Dragon Weyr's affirmation filled my thoughts I attempted to use "Charm" upon 'They who could not see', in order to demoralize them, by invoking within their minds dreadful feelings of fear and terror. So corrupted were they, however, that - to my horror - I could not touch their minds; in fact, it was as if they had no minds, as if they were empty voids! 'Alright' I thought, 'so psychic abilities that affect the mind don't work on them. But what about a physical psychic attack? It's time I showed these fuckers the fury of a true High Templar!'

With that, I slipped into a deeper trance - chanting holy Khalani litanies and phrases from the Codex de Khalai to help center myself - as I closed my mind to the outside world and began to concentrate, gathering and focusing my latent mental power. Then, opening my eyes and raising my hands to the sky, I made my power manifest... Psionic lightning arced and danced across the enemy, disrupting and overloading what passed for their minds even as it boiled their blood and set them aflame! Until today, the Na'vi of Clan Tawkami had never before seen the power I possessed. In fact, I had hoped never to show it to them as I had worried about how they might react to it; I didn't want them to fear me because of my power.

Thus - since they had never seen it before until now - at first, the People of my Clan thought that my Psionic Storm was some new blasphemous power of 'They who could not see.' However, when Lompor turned and caught sight of me standing upon the balcony - my hands outstretched toward the heavens and enveloped with an aura of manifested psychic power - he swiftly banished the notion. "Our Olo'eyktan is with us my brothers!" he cried above the din. "He invokes the nawm'atan of Txra'kon We'er!" That, dear readers, was what finally did it; the vile un-Na'vi were routed! As the furious, crackling cerulean energy of the Psionic Storm continued to rage about and over them, 'They Who Could Not See' began to make a 'tactical retreat.'