Archive of Our Own

Before the monsters, things were easy. Things were simple.

Ao’nungs life was filled with the rhythmic ebb and flow of the ocean currents and the soothing lullabies of the deep. Each day began with the soft glow of bioluminescent creatures lighting up the underwater world that was his home, guiding him through the dark depths of the sea or the coral gardens where vibrant colors danced in the filtered sunlight above. He would swim alongside schools of shimmering fish, while the gentle sway of seaweed created a calming backdrop to his thoughts.

He was a hunter. A warrior. Protecting his clan from predators, catching prey to feed his people.

Days were spent exploring caves, where the echo of his voice mingled with the haunting melodies of the ocean, and he would often practice a haunting tune that resonated through the water, calling to the creatures that shared his realm. He spent time expanding his territory, clearing it of danger and keeping akulas away from the clan. He would hunt for sustenance, diving into the rich tapestry of life that flourished around him, feasting on the delicacies of the sea, like shellfish, small fish, and the occasional sweet-tasting sea plants.

And as the sun dipped below the horizon, the ocean transformed into a canvas of deep blues and purples, and Ao’nung would gather with others of his kind, where stories were shared through songs and laughter. His people had celebrated their existence, reveling in the beauty of their home, the way the currents embraced them like an ancient dance. They were the people of Eywa. The people of the sea. Peaceful and one with the creations of their great mother.

But then came the monsters.

Humans, with their strange vessels and bright lights that pierced the tranquil darkness. They didn’t hunt for hunger, but for greed and curiosity. Nothing that lived and breathed was safe from them. Their songs were harsh, disrupting the harmony they had known for centuries, and his world began to change for worse. For years now, each day carried the weight of uncertainty, as he navigated the shadows of once healthy waters, trying to recall the simplicity of life before their arrival.

The demon ship that carried itself through the waves at the surface was known to destroy everything in its way. It bought death, his father, the chief, warned his people. And they were yet to figure out how to destroy it, without destroying themselves.

Once a day, the demon ship came to an halt, releasing a handful of humans from its wide mouth at the bottom like a pest raining from the clouds in the sky. The humans would sink as far as they could reach, until their tiny fins touched the sand of the reef and they would begin wandering around, drilling deep holes into the ground and prodding at whatever poor creature couldn’t flee fast enough from their greedy hands and frightening instruments.

The noises they produced behind those strange masks and coverings that wrapped around their bodies always hurt his sensitive ears as they communicated with each other and the ship that had spit them out.

Ao’nung knew that much.

It wasn’t the first time that he had watched them, not by far.

His younger sisters call him an idiot, his father; infatuated. They urge him, time and time again, to leave the monsters be. He can’t win against their machines, can’t win against their metal and their bullets and the painful sounds that make ears bleed whenever one dares to come too close to their ships.

But he couldn’t sit around and do nothing, accept that these aliens destroyed the waters and the creatures in it without a care or a sign of remorse. That they left death and destruction wherever they went. He needed them gone.

And so a plan had formed in his mind, manifesting itself with the will and determination of a warrior.

The day Ao‘nung had stumbled upon this particular human, it had been an accident. He had been so sure of himself, had thought that they would never dare come this far into his territory again.

They had wandered far off their usual route on the reef, into depths he thought were too far for them to reach safely without their oddly shaped and entirely clear underwater ships.

Ao‘nung had really thought he had made a name of himself among their kind and they would not dare to swim outside of the shallow reef without fearing for their lives. Especially as unprotected as they were in this very moment. He couldn’t even count on both of his hands how many ships he had sunken, how many throats he had cut, how many masks he had shattered and how many humans had been swallowed by an akula that he had purposefully led to them.

And yet, something had stopped him to intervene this time. Some instinct, some ingrained curiosity that had prevented him from granting these humans the same well deserved fate as their kinsmen before them. So he'd stayed, tucked himself up against a rock and watched.

Humans were awfully loud, these none the less, even behind their masks. Their high, bird-like voices made him think of the wretched shriek of a dying animal and he shook his tail as a shiver run through him at that.

Since the first time he had came across them, Ao’nung catches himself watching this specific swarm of humans more times than he would like to admit. Not over his dead body, at least. They come each day, but don’t make it very far. He can’t help but grin at this. He knows they’re too afraid of him, he can smell the sour stench of their fear and the anxiety that comes from stories that must’ve been told about what he had done to other humans that wandered too far into his territory.

All of them had carried the same disgusting scent on their skin. Everyone, but not this one particular human. A female, that much he could tell.

The humans laughed so rarely when they were down here, but when you did, it tickled in his ears for hours afterward, and he thought that none of your kind had a voice so pleasant. And your hair always danced so freely in the rhythmic sway of the ocean, it was mesmerizing. Despite your odd appearance, you looked like you belonged. You didn’t touch with the purpose of destruction, but with careful curiosity. You were mindful, a trait those others didn’t seem to possess. And you were smaller looking than the others. An easy prey, unable to fight back.

Today you were far too busy with whatever it was that you were doing, murmuring small things that no one seemed to pay attention to, too quiet even for him to hear, if it weren’t for the way they elicited bubbles of air to escape from your mask. You were so busy, so wrapped up in your own thoughts as if they were seaweeds that tangled themselves around you, that you didn’t even realize how far away from the rest of the humans you had swam. Oh great mother, you made this far too easy for him.

This one it is. Ao’nung could feel it in the flutter of his gills, as he took you in. That you had to be the missing piece for his plan to work out. You were the one.

Ao’nung needed a human. One, that he could reach and snatch and take away and bring to reveal how to destroy the demon ship and all its contents and passengers once and for all. How to make them never return again. He could take you away without risking his own life or bringing yours at risk. He needed you alive after all. If you ended up hurt, you could just refuse him an answer before you would simply die of your injuries, and he couldn’t have that. This one he could just take and he’d be out of their sight by the time they realized you were missing. Ao’nung was a fast swimmer, faster even than those of his kind.

In that final moment before he struck to snatch you away, Ao’nung had a single, bitter thought: this human will be mine.

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Pandora, in all its glory, is nothing but ocean.

Just miles and miles of water in every direction, stretching so far it makes you feel small, like nothing you do really matters. 97% of the exo-moons surface is covered in water, to be exact. It’s pretty, sure. Breathtaking even, but it’s also wild. Unpredictable. Dangerous in the kind of way that doesn’t care who you are or where you come from.

People think it’s some untouched paradise, like it’s all calm waves and glowing fish. On earth, there’s always land somewhere. Even if it would take hours and days, somewhere there’s always an end where water meets land. But out here, it’s different. And the ocean doesn’t care if you’re curious or careful. One wrong move and you’re gone. No warning, no second chances.

Of course they tell you about this. They prepare you, with books to study and training lessons to attend to. And yet, nothing could’ve ever prepared you for the way it would feel to be dragged into the depths of an ocean that never ends.

Suddenly the light‘s gone. It’s cold, darker than anything you’ve ever seen, just that pitch black nothingness. Your ears pop from the pressure, your limbs flail against water that feels more like cement, and nothing makes sense. You don’t know which way is up. You don’t even know if there is an up anymore.

Panic doesn’t come all at once, it sneaks in slow, like the cold. It starts in your gut and crawls into your throat until you’re not sure if you’re shaking from fear or just the chill sinking into your bones.

Still, you go deeper.

At first, you think it’s the current, that maybe you drifted too close to a drop-off and the ocean decided to yank you down like it’s done to unlucky divers before. But then something tightens around your waist, firm and Intentional.

And that’s when it clicks.

Of course they prepare you for the animals and the creatures that live in these endless waters as well. The monsters.

They tell you to be cautious down there, to not go to far and stay within reach of the ships radar so the guys up there could keep an eye out on you. They tell you to never go unattended, always take one of the heavily armed marines with you. Stay within the high-frequency sound barrier protection. And never. Never ever walk out of sight and separate yourself from the rest of the group.

The monsters, or sirens as some humorously call them, are actually the planets one and only intelligent indigenous species. Na‘vi is what the scientists call them. By far not humanoid, but close enough. They live within the depths of the sea, deeper than any of the submarines or any sunlight could even travel to. Only on very rare occasions do these species come up, but when they do, it usually ends deadly. For us, most of the time.

Na‘vi are able to hunt in groups or on their own, but they’re dangerous regardless. They’re intelligent enough to build and make use of different types of weapons, such as spears and nets, but also daggers with blades covered in poisonous squid ink. Despite their enormous size, they’re insanely fast and very agile in the water. So far, every encounter with this species has been described as aggressive and dangerous.

All of this has lead the RDA to classify Na‘vi as a level A Threat: Severe risk of attack. Life threatening. Do not engage. Kill on sight.

Days and weeks and months and years you’ve spent training for this opportunity, to accompany the RDAs scientific research team to the exo-moon that is Pandora. You knew the risks, knew of all the dangers and possibilities that would await you the second you stepped foot in these waters. But nothing could’ve prepared you for this.

You try to twist, kick free, but your movements are clumsy, useless against the drag of the water. Your body’s in full-blown survival mode, but nothing you do matters. Bubbles explode all around you, a chaos of silver and white that blinds you in flashes. It’s like being caught in a storm beneath the sea. You can barely see past your outstretched hand, and every time you open your mouth to shout, your mask hisses uselessly with the sound of panicked breath.

You fumble for your throat com, but there’s nothing. No ping. No voice crackling back at you to ask what’s wrong. Just dead silence in your ear. The kind of silence that makes your heart hammer in your chest because it’s the only sound left.

He drags you down for what must be minutes, but it feels like hours. All you know is your chest is screaming, your vision’s starting to tilt sideways, and your brain is going fuzzy around the edges like it’s getting ready to check out. The water gets colder, thicker, like it’s trying to press the life out of you. Any deeper and it might will.

You can barely see the monster that’s dragging you down, just flashes of teal skin and a long tail slicing through the dark like a whip. Strong arms are locked tight around your waist and for a moment you consider clawing at them. You try, but it’s skin is far too thick for it to even notice you’re trying to damage it.

Panic, real panic, is crawling up your spine now, hot and electric. Part of you’s hoping this is some kind of sick dream, that you’ll wake up in your bed with a headache and a story to share with coworkers over breakfast. But no, this is real. Very real. And suddenly your brain is throwing every worst-case scenario it’s got at you.

It’s gonna eat you, you think. Maybe it’ll drown you first, make it slow and painful, whatever might be worse. But you know for certain that you’re going to die today.

Shit, shit, shit, you think, over and over like a broken record.

You grit your teeth, jaw tight, stomach twisted in knots. You want to scream but it’d just waste air. You’re too far gone for that kind of mistake, but it doesn’t really matter much anyways, because on your next short, rapid inhale you realize that you’re starting to black out.

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She’s dead.

Ao’nung squints at the limp, soggy human sprawled out in the middle of his cave like a piece of washed-up driftwood, arms flopped at weird angles, your head tilted just enough to make you look dramatically lifeless.

The air bubble in the cave is more than big enough, he made sure of that. You should have no trouble surviving in here, so why weren’t you waking up? It had taken him weeks to find this pocket: half-hidden behind a wall of coral, filled with breathable air, bioluminescent plants glowing softly like lazy stars overhead.

He’d dragged you all this way, avoided the patrol routes of his clans warriors, swam until his muscles burned— and now you were just lying there like you’ve decided to take a nap mid-kidnapping.

Ao’nung frowns, breaths in through his gills and out through his nose holes, blowing bubbles from where half of his face disappears in the water. Are you… broken?

Cautiously, he raises the upper half of his body out of the water. Draped on one of his thick forearms, he leans over you, then pokes your shoulder once. Nothing.

Pokes you again, harder. Still nothing.

Staring down at you with a frustrated glare, he mumbles, "I didn’t swim halfway across the reef to deliver a corpse to myself."

He runs a hand through his damp curls, flicking saltwater everywhere. Perhaps you needed something for survival that he didn’t consider? Humans were so annoyingly fragile. Weak bones. Weird body temperature. Not enough gills. Couldn’t even go five minutes in the water unless they had those stupid face-shell things strapped to their heads.

A pause.

He winces. "Ah. That’s probably it."

The mask is still covering your face and this skin suit thing you’re wearing is wet and wrapped tight around your body. He’s no expert in human physiology, but it has to be something to do with the weird contraptions you need to stay alive underwater. Ao’nung scowls at it like it personally offended him.

He’s seen the sky demons wear these things when they’re out in the water, and he’s pretty sure it’s meant to keep them from freezing or possibly from getting hurt. It’s tough to figure out. To him, all it looks like is extra weight. Too many layers to a body that’s already too weak for the ocean. But you’re not in the water right now. Technically.

No wonder you couldn’t breath! Not only did it look more than just uncomfortable to wear outside of the waters, but Ao’nung thought that your face shield would eventually run out of air if you’d wear it for long periods of time.

That means he’s got to do something if he doesn’t want you dying on him after all this trouble. If anything, he wanted answers, and he wouldn’t let you go until you gave him those.

With a grunt, he pushes himself up out of the water, tail flicking in the air as he uses it for balance. The water splashes around him as he sits besides you.

Carefully, he reaches for the mask, his fingers brushing it, but he stops before actually trying to pull it off. It might be doing something important, right? He’s not sure if just ripping it off will help or make things worse. Instead, he moves to the edges of your skin suit first, which looks as confusing as anything else. It’s wrapped tightly around your body, clinging to you like some kind of second skin.

Ao’nung bites his lip, inspecting it for a second before trying to peel it back, fingers slipping under the edges. The material’s slippery and his grip isn’t great, but he pulls it with more force, trying to loosen it.

"Why do you wear so many things, tawtute [human]?" he mutters, his frustration building. "This doesn’t make any sense."

It takes several attempts, more than he’d like to admit, before he finally gets a decent grip and starts tugging at the suit. The first pull catches, and the material stretches a little too much. Then, with a horrible rip, it tears. Ao’nung curses, jerking back as part of the suit comes apart in his hands, exposing more of your body than he intended.

"Wíya [damnit]," he mutters, flicking the torn piece of the suit to the side with an irritated shake of his head. He doesn’t have time to sit and feel sorry about it, though. His tail flicks impatiently against the stone ground. That should be enough, right?

Ao’nung lets out a frustrated sigh. "Good. Now, breathe."

He leans over you again, checking your chest for signs of movement, scanning your face for any change. Half of the suit is still on, but now, at least, you’re free of some parts of the suffocating layers. His gaze flicks from your exposed skin back to your covered face.

He leans in closer, eyes narrowing. "Is this some kind of human trick? Like… defense sleeping? Or fake death? Do they do that?" With a heavy sigh, his hands reach for your mask once more. There’s no way around it now. "Eywa help me," he mumbles, praying that this will work or he‘ll be out of ideas. And off it goes, revealing your alien looking face to him.

Ao’nung was so used to his kind's angular faces. The sharp edges and hard jawlines were strong and proud, and he was certain you must find him equally as terrifying in a way. But you had a face like the shape of the moon. There’s a softness to you, like a curve that the ocean might carve into stone if it had enough time.

Your cheeks were so soft looking, with rosy hues of a blush, skin smooth, not like the calluses and toughened layers of his, but soft, as if it could never withstand the wear and tear of the ocean’s currents the way his would. Your lips are soft, too, with the kind of delicate curves that make him pause.

Suddenly, you let out a tiny snore and Ao’nung jumps back like you just exploded.

"…She lives," he says flatly, blinking. "Great. And she is a snoring one."

Which is worse, actually. He needs you awake. Talking. Explaining. Not sprawled out on the cave floor like a dead eel. Rolling his eyes in irritation, Ao’nung moves to slip back into the water nearly soundless. Only his head breaks the surface as he watches you from a short distance, waiting.

"Wake up soon, little sky-leech," he says. "You and I have much to discuss."

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You dream of waking up.

The first thing you realize is that you know it’s a dream. How could it not be? When you blink your eyes open, you’re not back on the sea dragon, not in your room, curled up in your bed. This isn’t your usual reality, it’s too quiet, too… off. There is no sound of waves crashing against metal and the heavy machinery of the ship.

You’re aware of your body like it’s separate from you, heavy and disoriented. It’s almost like your mind is still floating in the fog between sleep and waking. You try to push yourself up, but your arms don’t obey. They feel sluggish, like lead.

Instead, your surroundings hit you first. The air around you is cold, making your skin prickle, and when you look around, you’re staring at stone walls. Rough, jagged walls. Water droplets fall from the ceiling, echoing in the space, breaking the silence like an unsettling countdown. The soft, rhythmic drip-drip-drip fills the air and it’s enough to make your heartbeat quicken, but only slightly. You’re still half-dazed, too foggy to really process where you are.

You blink again, but nothing changes. The ceiling’s low, barely high enough for you to stand, and the whole place feels like a… Is this a cave? The walls are damp, the air thick with the smell of saltwater and mildew. It’s all eerily quiet. If you didn’t know any better, you’d swear you were still underwater.

A pool of water is close by, just inches from your face, too close for you to feel at ease, especially when you can’t remember how you even got here. It stretches out like it leads into nothingness, into a dark, swallowing abyss and for a moment, you swear the water moves, ripples flicking outwards.

This… this is a dream, right? Right?

The thought comes to you like a soft whisper, only increasing the dread slowly creeping up your spine.

Sitting up slowly, you’re trying to piece together what happened. Everything‘s aching like you’ve been hit by a boat. Your head throbs, your limbs are stiff, and your skin feels clammy and cold beneath the damp remnants of your wet suit that’s torn on several places.

The bioluminescent plants, thin, glowing vines and anemone-like leaves strung across the ceiling and rocks give off just enough light to see. Kind of pretty, you think, in a creepy, I might die here and no one will ever find my body kind of way.

You know it’s silly, but your first instinct is to reach out and pinch the skin of your forearm. Nothing. Shoulders slumping in defeat, you realize that this is, in fact, not a dream. You’re very much awake and very much trapped inside what appears to be an underwater cave.

You swallow hard, chest tightening as your eyes flick to the dark water next to you.

It’s probably still here, the na’vi that’s taken you. Watching. Waiting. For what, you don’t know.

Maybe he prefers his dinner warm and alive. A shiver runs through you at that.

Hours pass.

At least, you think it’s been hours. It could’ve been thirty minutes or a whole damn day, you don’t know. Time’s slippery here, since there is no visible sunlight, no clock, no nothing, just that steady drip-drip-drip of water. You’re alone and it’s driving you out of your goddamn mind.

You’ve walked the cave twice, if shuffling like a stunned crab counts as walking, but there’s no exit except the water.

Strangely enough, the na‘vi that bought you here hasn’t returned.

Did he leave, you wonder? Or is he still lurking beneath the surface, watching you flail around like a bug in a jar? Maybe this is some sort of game for him. But it could also be his way of torturing you. Maybe he’s just letting you rot in here, one breath at a time, because it’s fun to witness. Seems fair, considering all the damage your people have caused since their arrival.

You’ve got your back pressed to the rock wall now, knees pulled up to your chest, eyes locked on that pool of black water like it’s about to bite. You haven’t moved in what feels like an eternity.

And then, after hours of finding closure that this might be the end, something happens.

The surface ripples, just once, soft and subtle.

Your whole body tenses. Every nerve goes haywire, panic spiking like a lightning bolt down your spine. You stop breathing. And truthfully? You’re not even sure your heart’s still beating.

A fish then slaps the stone floor inches from your feet.

You shriek, full on yelp, scrambling back like it might attack, but it doesn’t move. It’s… dead. Gutted clean through the underside, still twitching slightly like it hasn’t figured out it’s a corpse yet.

You stare at it. It stares at nothing.

What the…?

When you glance up and back to the pool of water, your blood runs cold in your veins.

Two very blue eyes, half lidded, unnerving calm and a shade too bright for comfort are staring back at you from a safe distance. The rest of his face is hidden, but you know it’s him. The Na’vi. Siren. Freaky ocean kidnapper bastard. Whatever you might call him.

He doesn’t move, doesn’t even blink. Just floats there, as if he were some sea monster out of a fever dream, eyes sharp and unreadable.

You can’t move. Hell, you can barely breathe.

He slowly, so slowly, sinks a little deeper, until just the top of those glowing eyes are visible, still watching.

When a moment passes and neither of you have made a move, you slowly exhale.

What the fuck is he waiting for?

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Without a doubt, Ao‘nung must’ve been cursed by the great mother for catching himself the dumbest human there is.

Is she not recognizing food even when it’s thrown at her?

You’ve been asleep for hours and now that you were awake and using all of your energy for shivering and trembling against the cold, wet floor you must be starving. Then why weren’t you eating when it was presented to you? Eywa, please don’t expect him to feed you.

With a groan that bubbles through his throat, Ao’nung slowly dips beneath the surface again, circling just below the waterline, thinking.

This wasn’t going how he imagined. He thought the hardest part would be the snatching, getting a human away from their metal ship and their noise-blaring tech and dragging them down here without accidentally breaking their soft little bones.

But no.

Apparently the real challenge was this. The aftermath. The figuring out what the hell to do with her part. Figuring out if you’re even smart enough to know how to help him.

He didn’t want to hurt you. Not yet, at least. He needed you alive, needed answers, real, useful ones, about the demon ship and its insides. How to destroy it for good. How to keep your kind from ever coming back. And for that, he had to be… what was the word?

Tactful.

So, he decides, food. Food is a peace offering. Food means I’m not a threat. Yet. If you play along, that is. Food might soften that rigid, wary look in your weirdly round eyes long enough for you to start talking.

He surfaces again, just enough for his voice to carry across the still cave air. His accent thick, vowels pulled low and slow, but clear.

"Eat," he says, nudging the fish a little closer with the knuckle of a finger.

The blank, confused stare you give him tells him all he needed to know.

Ao’nung fights the urge to throw his hands up in frustration. Ugh! He is the stupid one!

Of course you don’t understand him. Of course the weird little alien couldn’t speak his tongue. He mentally slaps a hand over his face, dragging it down in exasperation, bubbles slipping from his mouth when he exhales too hard.

Stupid, stupid.

Refusing to give up so easily, he tries again, more slowly this time.

Reaching over and lifting the fish carefully in one hand, he brings it up near his mouth, exaggerating the motion like he’s explaining it to a child or a particularly dense ilu. He pretends to take a bite, his sharp teeth flashing in the low glow of the plants, then points at you, eyebrows raised expectantly.

The message is simple: Food. You. Eat.

You just blink at him at first, still wound up tighter than a knot in a fisher’s net. Your hands twitch slightly, like you’re not sure whether to flinch or bolt. If there was anywhere to go, he’s sure you would’ve ran by now.

You look so damn skeptical it almost makes him laugh. Almost.

Instead, Ao’nung just tilts his head a little, watching you as if you’re the dumbest, wettest thing to ever wash up in his cave, and jabs the fish toward you again with a low grunt that roughly translates to: "Come on already."

"I‘m–," you swallow nervously, "I‘m not hungry, b-but thanks."

Good, then.

Ao’nung shrugs, dropping the fish right where it is without another thought. If you weren’t hungry, that just meant he could skip the formalities and get to the real reason he dragged your soggy ass down here in the first place.

His hand gestures between you and him, then he taps his temple with two fingers, clearly trying to mime thinking or understanding.

You, however, just stare at him in shock and confusion.

Ao’nung groans, tipping his head back toward the glowing ceiling for patience he does not possess. "Humans," he mutters under his breath, as if it’s the dirtiest word he knows.

Still, he squares his shoulders, eyes narrowing at you with laser focus.

"You," he says, pointing directly at your chest, "tell me. Big ship." He shapes a crude boat with his hands, palms flat and moving apart like describing something enormous. "Boom," he adds, miming an explosion with a flourish of his hands and a raised brow.

You gape at him like he’s lost his mind.

And honestly? He’s starting to wonder the same about you.

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What the hell is going on?

Sitting there, stiff as a board, dripping wet and heart pounding so loud you swear he can hear it across the cave, you wonder when the fuck you’ve started to loose your mind.

You try to piece it together, rapid-fire thoughts scrambling in your head like scared fish. Okay. I was on the reef. I wandered too far. Something grabbed me. Dragged me down. I blacked out. And now—

You glance sideways at him, at this giant, impossible, alien creature sitting there like it’s the most normal thing in the world to kidnap a person and then play charades.

He is a male, you’ve decided. If his physical appearance is anything to go by.

The upper half of him, the part not swallowed up by the dark water, is propped lazily against the slick rock edge, muscles flexing with each subtle shift to keep himself afloat. His skin is a deep, stormy teal, almost blending into the water if it weren’t for the soft pulse of bioluminescent markings running across his face, chest and arms like faint, tribal constellations.

His hair is a dark, messy mass of black, long, curls, tied back into a loose, wet bun at the crown of his head. A single thick braid runs straight down from the center, disappearing into the water, sleek and heavy with the weight of it. You can’t see the end of it. You can’t see much of his lower half at all, honestly, just the suggestion of movement.

But if the size of his torso is any clue, the rest of him must be massive. You hazard a guess: easily six, maybe seven feet tall above water. But his tail, which you’ve only caught a few flashes of, must be longer. Altogether, he’s probably close to thirteen feet, maybe more, if he uncoiled fully.

Your stomach twists and you swallow.

He could snap you in half without even trying.

With a heavy sigh, the na‘vi gestures again, hands slicing through the air in that same big, wide shape, like he’s trying to sculpt the word between his palms.

He points at you, then at his hands, then back at you again, eyes practically burning the meaning into your brain.

"Uran [Ship]," he growls. "Uran. Uran. Uran. [Ship. Ship. Ship!]" Every word is a little more impatient than the last.

You flinch a little at his tone, scrambling mentally to make sense of what the hell he’s even asking. Your heart is hammering in your chest, and you’re already cold and miserable, but somehow the sight of this massive, dripping Na’vi getting progressively more frustrated at your stupidity is weirdly grounding.

Your tongue trips over itself as you blurt out, "A… a boat? Ship?"

The second the words leave your mouth, his ears perk up like a cat catching the sound of a food bowl rattling.

He points both fingers at you now, nodding aggressively, a wild gleam flashing in his eyes. "Srane! [Yes!]," he barks, practically vibrating with excitement. "Ship," he mimics the sound.

You blink at him, stunned for a second too long.

He can talk.

Well, kind of. It’s not like a conversation or anything. It’s more like a really aggressive parrot situation. The word "ship" leaves his mouth all clunky and strange, like he’s just copying the sound you made without really knowing what it means. But at least he seems to be partially aware of what you are saying. He‘s intelligent and capable of speech.

Your heart stumbles into a sprint again, your mind racing right behind it.

Okay, okay, okay— he can kind of talk. Which means he wants something from me.

You manage a shaky nod, because what the hell else are you supposed to do?

This goes back and forth like that for a while, him teaching you universal stuff and you speaking the words out loud for him to mimic.

A hand to his mouth means eat. Two fingers to his throat and then flicked outward: water. A fist and then an open palm: something like give. It’s painfully slow, a brutal grind of trial and error.

Yes. No. Ship. Food. Water.

Over and over again until your throat is dry and your hands feel like they’re gonna cramp from mimicking his weird, broad fingered signs.

It’s clumsy and frustrating, but it’s something.

Two days, or what you think has been two days, drag themselves by painfully slow.

You don’t so much live here as you persist, curled against the jagged rock wall like some sad shipwreck survivor, counting your own ragged breaths. Sleep is rare and eating is worse.

He comes and goes like a ghost, never warning you of his arrival. He‘s just there and then he’s gone.

He never fully leaves the water, either. Always hovering half-submerged, his massive tail flicking lazily beneath the surface, keeping him afloat with the smallest shifts.

Every time he reappears, he brings offerings, like dead fish with glassy eyes or odd rubbery plants that look like they’d sooner wrap around your throat than be eaten. You tried one once and gagged so violently you thought you might turn yourself inside out. Salty, bitter, with the texture of old boots soaked in brine. But you forced it down. Pride and survival don’t mix well.

Communication is… painful.

But he tries, you’ll give him that. Big, deliberate hand signs carved into the air like he’s teaching a particularly dense child. You learn a few more, enough to form short sentences, mostly through embarrassing trial and error.

A flat palm shoved toward you means "stay." A sharp jab at his chest is "me," the same at you is "you." A closed fist tapped twice against the rock is "danger." Circular motions mean "go" or "move," depending on how frantic he gets about it.

He mimics sounds a lot, rough, strange attempts at human words that roll awkwardly off his tongue. It’s not speaking so much as copying, like a bird that’s heard a phrase enough times to get close but never quite right. Not exactly a bird though, more like a whale.

You’ve also learned his name is Ao’nung.

You notice it the third or fourth time he motions for your attention. He brings the tips of his fingers to his chest, right over his heart, then drags his hand outward in a wide, fluid arc, like he’s tracing the shape of a wave cresting in slow motion.

You blink at him, unsure, until he repeats it —palm to heart, sweeping outward, head tilt. It’s slower this time, pointed, like he’s saying pay attention, little human, this is important.

You copy him the best you can, but it’s stiff, awkward, the movement jerky and far too fast.

You immediately know you got it wrong by the way his head snaps toward you, those sharp, unblinking eyes locking onto yours like a harpoon finding its mark.

He pushes off the rock with an effortless ripple of his arms and tail, gliding closer until he’s right there, towering over you with his shoulders broad and dripping, the glow of the bioluminescent plants casting ghostly patterns across his skin.

You sit frozen as he reaches out, impatiently taking your wrist in his large, rough hands.

Your breath stutters painfully in your chest. He mutters something low in his native tongue and you know he‘s cursing, before he lifts your hand again. Placing your palm flat over your own heart with a surprising gentleness, his fingers brush along yours to correct the angle.

Your cheeks burn so hot you half expect the whole cave to steam up.

Then, still holding your wrist loosely, he guides your arm outward in that same wide, fluid movement. Slow this time, like sculpting something invisible between you.

You swear you can feel the heat of his skin even without him touching you fully, the weight of his attention pinning you there like a butterfly under glass. When he lets go, you pull your hand back like you’ve been shocked, curling your fingers against your palm.

He watches you for a long moment, expression unreadable, before finally giving a sharp nod of approval.

"Ao‘nung," he says.

"Ao…nung," you try to mimic. "What does that mean?"

He points a finger at his chest. Oh. That’s his name.

And so you’re starting to understand him.

Not fluently. Not even comfortably. But you can tell when he’s angry. When he’s impatient. When he’s weirdly trying to be patient with you, like he’s throttling his own temper because you’re just too damn stupid to move and understand quicker.

And you, in turn, start to expect him. Start to brace yourself for the ripple in the water that means he’s coming. Start to wonder what happens when the lessons stop, when he finally decides you’ve outlived your usefulness. Or why he is teaching you this at all.

Because you know he’s not doing this out of the kindness of his heart.

No one puts this much effort into a pet.

✩⋆｡‧₊˚⭑˚₊‧｡⋆✩

At the rate things were going, Ao’nung figured his whole damn species would go extinct before this human understood even half of what he was trying to teach you.

Ao’nung clenches his jaw as he watches you from where he lurks half-submerged in the waters. His patience, what little of it he possessed to begin with, is starting to fray at the edges.

You stumble through the hand signs he’s taught you, fumbling over words like a hatchling.

Every damn time he signed the word for "ship" —a sharp sweep of his hand followed by a flat palm slicing through the air, you froze up like a reef-crab caught under a rock.

Sometimes you’d go wide-eyed and pretend you didn’t get it, blinking up at him with that same dumb, innocent look he was starting to despise. Other times you’d fumble with your hands, acting confused like you’d forgotten every scrap of communication he had painstakingly beaten into that soft little skull of yours.

It made his teeth grind.

The longer it went on, the more obvious it became that you were doing it on purpose. Playing stupid. Refusing to give him what he needed.

And Ao’nung, who had never exactly been blessed with an abundance of patience to begin with, was starting to feel that ugly, sharp-edged frustration building under his skin.

He snapped the sign again, sharp, clipped and aggressive now, but you immediately dropped your gaze to your lap, lips pressed into a tight line.

Coward.

"Ship," he growled, the sound low and rough in his throat, half a snarl. "Tell me about the ship!"

When you just stubbornly sat there like a rock, his tail slapped the water with a loud, echoing crack that made you jolt, but otherwise kept your gaze away from him.

Stubborn little female, he thought. If you really thought you could just sit here, all quiet and with your eyes low, and avoid the inevitable you had another thing coming.

Ao’nung narrows his eyes as he studies you.

You’re still wearing your half ripped skin suit, but it has dried over time. Following the way the lower half of your body dangles awkwardly off the rock you’re perched on, his sight lands on the little nubs you have there. Ten of them, like fingers, but chubby, with the tiniest claws he'd ever seen on the tips of them.

Strange little fins, he thinks.

Soft, small, with blunt edges, nothing like a proper tail or even decent webbing. He doesn’t understand how you humans survive like this, flapping around uselessly. You must be horribly slow in the water.

His gaze lingers, studying the odd shape of you, the delicate stretch of skin over bone, how you tuck your legs closer under yourself like you’re trying to make them disappear. His gaze draws up.

"What?" You ask self consciously, eyes flicking nervously to and away from him.

Ao’nung signs the gesture for a question and watches your cheeks turn pink.

"They’re my feet," you grumble in a slightly annoying tone.

"Strange," he says finally, voice low and rough as gravel, the word thick with his accent. The blush on your face deepened at that.

"Well, I didn't pick them and then affixed them onto myself…"

He gestures lazily at your feet, then swirls the water around him with one flick of his hand.

"Small fins. Bad swimmer."

There’s no real insult in his tone. Just the simple, blunt fact of it. But still, you glare at him, hugging your knees to your chest like they might shield you from him somehow. Your mouth pulls into a stubborn line.

His brow furrows in confusion. So speaking the truth was an offense for your kind? With a grin, Ao‘nung stored this newfound information away for later.

"Soft," he then points at you, "Soft, small. Break easy. Bad swimmer."

It’s not meant to be cruel. It’s simply what he sees. But your pride bristles at the words all the same.

"And you’re rude," you shoot back without thinking. His ears flick. Bold little female, he thinks. You’re easy to provoke, like the rest of your kind. His smile, if you could even call it that, was all teeth and sharp amusement now.

With one powerful sweep of his arms, he then hauled himself halfway out of the pool. Water was sheeting off the lean, carved lines of his body and the long braid down his back slithering over his shoulder.

You scrambled backward instinctively, a fearful squeak leaving your lips and Ao’nung couldn’t help the smirk that tugged at the corner of his mouth.

Good. You should be a little scared. Perhaps that would get you to talk.

Before you could scramble farther away, a strong, calloused hand shoots forward and clamps around your ankle with an iron grip.

You yelp, kicking at him, but it’s useless. He’s way stronger than you, and with one smooth tug, he drags you back toward the pool’s edge. Ao’nung simply holds your ankle high like you’re a wriggling catch he pulled out of the reef, utterly unimpressed by your struggle.

You twist in his hold, cheeks burning, but he doesn’t seem the least bit bothered by your squirming. If anything, there’s a lazy sort of amusement dancing in his eyes, the barest flicker of a grin tugging at the corner of his mouth as he inspects your little fins.

Then, with deliberate slowness, he presses a finger against the sole of your foot.

You jerk instinctively, a little strangled noise escaping you.

"See?" he says, prodding the arch of your foot with a single blunt fingertip. "Soft."

Your cheeks burn hot, humiliation prickling under your skin. You open your mouth, ready to fire off some sharp, defensive retort, but the next thing you know, his fingers poke again, and you let out an uncontrollable, snorting giggle.

Ao’nung’s brows lift in surprise.

You clamp a hand over your mouth, mortified, but it’s too late. The more you squirm, the more fascinated he becomes. A slow, wicked grin spreads across his face as realization dawns.

Sensitive, are you? Interesting.

Before you can react, he drags his fingers across the underside of your foot again, slower this time.

You shriek a laugh you couldn’t hold back even if you tried, twisting like mad to escape him, your hands slapping uselessly at the ground. The sound bounces off the damp cave walls, echoing your complete and utter betrayal by your own body.

Ao’nung’s grin turns absolutely devilish.

"Ah," he says, a mockingly thoughtful noise. "Soft. Weak. Noisy."

Then, with the smugness of someone who’s just discovered their new favorite form of torture, he shifts his grip, freeing one hand so he can properly tickle the bottom of your foot.

And you completely lose it.

Full-blown hysterical laughter tears out of you, loud and desperate. You try kicking at him once more, tugging your foot back, but it’s completely useless.

"Stop—!" you gasp between peals of laughter, tears starting to prick at the corners of your eyes. "Ao’nung, p-please!"

But Ao’nung only watches with lazy amusement, while he is toying with you. Testing how much you could take before you’d break.

"Talk," he demands, punctuating the word with another quick, ruthless dig of his fingers against the arch of your foot.

You hiccup out a wild, breathless laugh, half-panicked now. "I don’t— I can’t—! I don’t know what you want!"

"Ship," he says again in that broken mimicry of your tongue.

When you still don’t answer, too busy trying to breathe and not die of laughter, he doubles down, moving his hands mercilessly, sliding them up to the other foot now, drawing out shrieking giggles from deep in your chest.

✩⋆｡‧₊˚⭑˚₊‧｡⋆✩

It’s unbearable.

Your laughter tears itself raw out of your throat, leaving you gasping like a fish out of water. Tears blur your vision, the bioluminescent glow around the cave smearing into a hazy mess. Every nerve ending in your body feels electrified, every scrape of his fingers on your skin a fresh, maddening jolt.

You thrash, twisting and wriggling uselessly against the firm grip he has on your ankles, but Ao’nung barely moves, holding you down like it’s the easiest thing in the world, smirking all the while.

"Ship," he says again, voice filled with the dark promise of more of this torture if you didn’t cooperate.

Your mind scrambles desperately to make sense of this, for meaning, anything to make him stop tickling you.

Ao’nung repeats the word over and over. He wants information, is that it? That is why you’re still breathing right now, because he thinks you know the secret to breaking the ship apart. He occasionally signs the word for weak, hurt, destroy. Is he looking for a weakness in the ship?

But you barely knew anything. You weren’t in engineering or defense planning. Everything you knew about the ship were scraps overheard in mess halls, small snippets of information passed between tired soldiers over cold meals.

But even scraps might be enough to keep you alive.

"I don’t—!" you wheeze, trying to suck in a breath, "I don’t know anything!"

Another ruthless flick of his fingertips across your foot makes you yelp helplessly.

"Lie," he accuses in that rough, accented voice.

"Okay! Okay! The ship— the— it’s… there’s a weakness!" you blurt between hiccuping laughs, struggling to form the words. "At the bottom! It’s at the bottom!"

Ao’nung’s hand pauses mid-swipe.

His gaze sharpens, a sudden keen interest flashing across his face.

You grab onto that flicker of distraction like a lifeline, panting hard, trying to calm the dizzy spin in your head. You weren’t exactly lying, the sea dragon had definitely been having problems lately, but you were bending the truth enough to maybe buy yourself some time.

Ao’nung’s ears twitch, his expression thoughtful now.

"You lie," he snaps.

You shake your head frantically, still half giggling, half sobbing from the lingering aftershocks of his assault. "N-no, it’s true! It’s bad. Real bad. There was a hole on the bottom that leads to the machinery of the ship. It’s from one of your attacks with those big whale things— T-Tulkun! They’ve been trying to fix it, but it’s not working. I swear! That was the only time one of your attacks caused some real damage on the ship."

And there goes your job. As long as any possible way for you to get off this planet ever again if the na‘vi actually managed to destroy the ship.

Ao’nung watches you closely, the slight tremble of your limbs, the ragged rise and fall of your chest.

He doesn’t look convinced. Not even a little.

Just when you thought he was done torturing you, Ao’nung’s hand slides up again, dragging from your ankle to the firm curve of your calf, then to the sensitive hollow of your knee. You suck in a sharp little gasp, your body tensing instinctively.

"More," Ao‘nung demands.

His rough fingers trace a slow, lazy path higher, gliding over the soft skin of your inner thigh. Is he… trying to tickle you there? Oh god.

The way his fingers move, that same teasing, searching pattern as before, suggest that’s exactly what he’s aiming for. His fingers make the same motion as they did on the sole of your feet, a feather-light friction that made your nerves scream in confused alarm. But it feels different now. Your skin prickles under his touch, heat blooming in mortifying places.

You big dumb fish, this is anything but tickling!

You clench your jaw, willing yourself to stay still, to stay calm, even as your entire body burns traitorously under his wandering hand.

Then, before you can stop him, Ao’nung’s hand slips under the shredded edge of your ruined wetsuit, fingers brushing against the bare, vulnerable skin of your thigh hidden beneath.

You stiffen, a choked, embarrassed sound catching in your throat.

He doesn’t know.

You realize it in a sudden, blinding flash.

He’s not trying to be cruel or lascivious, he doesn’t even seem to know what this kind of touch would mean to you.

The truth is, Ao’nung doesn’t even seem aware of what he’s doing to you, not entirely. To him, you must seem like some small, helpless creature he’s trying to prod information out of, a creature who just happens to twitch and gasp and blush when touched a certain way. But even that knowledge doesn’t stop the molten heat crawling up your neck, flushing your cheeks in a humiliating red. You couldn’t help it.

Your body betrays you with a little twitch when his fingertips graze too high, too close, and he immediately notices, tilting his head curiously.

Another sharp flick of his fingers across your thigh, testing.

You gasp again, squirming against the ground you’re pinned to, and his lips curl at the corners, pleased with your reaction and your helplessness.

"Speak," Ao’nung commands, his voice almost a growl now, rough with impatience.

But your brain can barely form words, never mind full sentences, when his big, calloused hand is still resting so high on your bare skin, heat radiating between you like a live current.

You squeeze your eyes shut, humiliated, heart hammering.

His hand remains firm against your thigh, broad fingers splayed over too warm skin, thumb dragging thoughtlessly back and forth in a slow, absentminded rhythm that has your entire body locked in a state of miserable, paralyzed awareness.

You gulp down a ragged breath, trying to force your voice steady, trying to find some scrap of dignity to cling to as his thumb ghosts a little higher, and you flinch so hard he feels it. Your mouth works uselessly for a second before the words tumble out, tumbling over one another in your eagerness to comply, to survive.

"It’s the engines. If you want the ship to sink… you have to break the engines," you croak, "I suppose if you manage to hit the same spot that’s already damaged you can get access to the engines once it floods with water."

You’re brabbling now, desperate to fill the space with something other than the heavy silence and the unbearable weight of his hand still pinning you so easily.

Then, slowly, so slowly, Ao’nung leans in, the wet braid slithering over his shoulder and dripping cold beads of water against your already overheated skin.

He’s watching you with a sharp, unsettling intensity, like he’s weighing the truth of your words by the tiniest flickers of your expression.

You swear you can feel the heat of his breath brush over your cheek with how close he was now and your body hums with confusion. When Ao’nung leans closer and you feel the tip of his nose brush against your cheek, all you can manage to do is squeeze your eyes shut.

That’s it. He‘s gonna make you dinner now that he has all that he needs from you. He‘ll eat you until there’s nothing left but bones in this cave and nobody will ever find out what happened to you.

Your heart is pounding so loudly it feels like it’s rattling your ribs apart when, suddenly, he moves again.

You feel it before you see it, the abrupt, jerky tug of his hand as he attempts to withdraw it from where it had been wedged under the torn seam of your battered wetsuit. But instead of pulling away cleanly, the stubborn material catches against his rough knuckles and claws and rips.

You yelp an embarrassingly high-pitched squeak that echoes off the wet stone as the already ruined fabric gives way with a sharp snapping sound. Cool, damp air rushes over newly exposed skin, kissing the sensitive flesh of your hip and thigh, and you instinctively clutch at the remnants of your suit in a desperate, clumsy attempt to cover yourself.

Mortification hits you like a crashing wave, burning through your veins hotter than any shame you’ve ever known. Cheeks flaming so hard it feels like they might ignite, you tug at your own leg in an attempt to free yourself from his grasp, but he keeps his hand wrapped around your ankle.

With his sharp gaze pinned to you, he then signs two words with his free hand: Smell. Different.

✩⋆｡‧₊˚⭑˚₊‧｡⋆✩

It was strange.

The moment he had shifted his touch, trailing fingers from the sole of your little foot up to the softer, thicker muscles of your thigh your scent had changed.

You had stopped making those sharp, high-pitched sounds that he knew by now meant distress, laughter, resistance. Stopped fighting so much. The writhing, the twisting, it hadn’t exactly ceased, but it was different now. Less frantic and more confused. Your small body had stiffened, gone tense in a way that sang to instincts buried so deep in him it wasn’t conscious thought anymore.

And still, you had spilled your words for him. Good. That was what he had wanted, wasn’t it? Your secrets. The human ship’s weakness, finally dragged out of you without needing to crack you open like a clam.

As he pulled his hand free, feeling the suit tear and your soft, bare skin brush against his fingers, that scent had deepened even more.

Smell different, he’d signed. And then, after a beat, why?

He frowned slightly when there came no response, just the deepening of your blush as his nostrils flared without meaning to. It was subtle, but unmistakable. A sweet, heady scent had unfurled around you, clinging to the damp warmth between your legs, the place where your odd little fins joined, the place his hand had brushed, however accidentally.

Curious, he leaned in without hesitation, lowering his nose toward the source of that sudden change in scent.

He needed to understand. Needed to know what had caused this shift, this instinctive spark he could feel lighting up between his bones. Maybe it was some sign of weakness. Perhaps another trick of your species, something he should be wary of. Better to investigate now before it became dangerous.

He nudged his face closer, angling toward where the scent was thickest, breathing deep. And just when he was about to catch a glimpse of that little spot you were trying so hard to hide, a sharp, frantic kick caught him just under the jaw.

Jerking back with a startled grunt, more surprised than hurt, Ao’nung blinked at you.

You were staring at him now, wild-eyed and furious, your cheeks a fiery red and your whole body coiled like a struck eel. Your small fists were balled up tight and your chest was heaving as if you’d just run a mile.

Still holding your leg with one hand, Ao’nung slowly rubbed his jaw with the other, more amused than anything, his mouth pulling into a lopsided smirk.

"Why?" he signed again.

"Why, what?" You shot back with an irritated look on your face.

"What is that," Ao’nung paused to smell the air once more, "scent?"

He tilted his head slightly, studying you with a new sort of interest. Different now from the way he had studied your odd looking feet. This was something more primal.

The scent radiating off of you was starting to tickle his gills with how prominent it was and he was dying to see where it came from.

Meanwhile, you just looked at him like he had offended you. Again.

Involuntary, Ao’nung’s nostrils flared, pulling in another lungful of the scent that practically clung to the air around you.

It was stronger now, almost maddening.

To his deep confusion, he felt something inside him shift at that. Behind the seam of his groin, something stirred awake at each breath he took of that strange something.

Meanwhile, you were fighting harder to hide this than you had fought his grip, his questions, even his torture. That alone made something dark and eager coil low in his gut, an instinct thrumming awake with interest.

Stubborn as you were, you didn’t answer his question. You only glared, your face burning hot enough he could practically feel the heat radiating from your skin, especially through the cold air of the cave. Your limbs were locked tight together now, your hands scrabbling to cover the ripped seam of your suit, as though sheer force of will could undo what had already been revealed.

Strange little female, thinking you could keep secrets from him now. Especially when you reeked of them.

He shifted where half of him still floated in the water, muscles rolling under his slick skin as he adjusted his grip like a hunter calming a cornered animal before the final pounce. His skin felt hot, dry despite the constant lapping water around his waist, and his head buzzed faintly.

"H-Hey, stop it!" You gasped when he brought his face closer to the exposed part where the wetsuit had torn wide.

There, he thought, nostrils twitching as he drank it in. There it is.

"Zun nga pxek oe nìmun, oe nga nekll fa txampay. [If you kick me again, I will tie you down with sea weed]," Ao’nung murmured in his tongue, uncaring that you couldn’t understand him.

With both hands around your trashing fins, he was holding you open for his curious eyes.

The scent was strongest here, thickest where your warmth bled into the cool air. And if you thought you could keep it from him with your blushing and your squirming and your stubborn little fists, you were dead wrong.

With a clawed finger, Ao‘nung cut away the last remnants of your suit in one fluid motion, although careful not to hurt your delicate skin. When all fabric fell away, he lowered his face to where you still so desperately tried to hide from him.

"No, don’t! Y-You can’t just look there," you wheezed, "get off!"

Your strength was truly pathetic. All it took for him was the nudge of his nose to swat your hands away and let them cover your face in shame instead.

"Oh god, this is really happening," you muttered under your breath.

Ao’nung however cared less about your strange human antics, because what you were hiding there took him by surprise.

It was a slit, not much different from his. But where he was flat and the color blended in with the rest of his scales, yours was the complete opposite. You had lips there, soft and puffed up, and when his hands moved to pull them aside, he was greeted with a pretty shade of pink.

Also, and most importantly, there was no cock nestled in your slit like there was in his. Huh. That made sense, but what surprised him was the fact that human females were more similar to those of his kind than he originally thought.

Careful, as to not hurt you with the claw of his thumb, he brushed the digit along the outline of your full lips, feeling its softness and the damp texture of your skin. The more he did so, the more did your scent deepen.

When a shiver runs through him on a particular deep inhale of air, the small fins on his back and forearms momentarily straightened and raised before they slowly laid flat on his spine again.

"Nga tìng ontu devine fìtseng, hì'i fnele. [You smell devine here, little female]," Ao’nung said under his breath. "Kehe nga wer wan fì'u ftu oe. [No wonder you were hiding this from me.]"

More and more did he caress the wet slit between your legs, until soft pants of air were escaping your parted mouth. Even your hands lowered slightly and he could see your round eyes peeking up at him, with those odd hairy brows bowing.

Ao’nung kept touching and prodding, until even the tension in your legs slowly eased and he was free to move without worrying about another kick to the jaw.

That’s right, tawtute, he thought with a grin. I mean no harm. Relax for me so I can see what else you are hiding.

At the top of your slit there sits a small nub, reminding him of the inside of a clam. It’s shiny and wet and Ao’nung knows when he’s found himself a gem he wants, so he reaches for it. His thumb nudges against it and the reaction is instantaneous. Your spine arches and a moan tumbles from your lips that you desperately try and fail to keep inside with a hand clasped over your mouth.

Oh? What an intense reaction to such a small insignificant looking button.

Immediately, an idea bloomed in his mind. If tickling was enough to make you talk, then…

"Oe wo‘ 'upe nì'ul se nga oe zun oe sweyn nga fìfya. [I wonder what more secrets you will spill for me if I keep touching you like this]," he grinned to himself.

A whimper broke out of you as you laid there, legs angled up in the air and nearly folded in half to accommodate his giant size looming over you. Most of your weight was now pressed to the space of your shoulder blades and Ao’nung would’ve thought this must’ve been the most uncomfortable position to be in for such a fragile thing, but the look on your face was anything but.

With an arm wrapped around your middle to keep your lower half up, he continued his prodding at your slit. It was leaking more of this sticky fluid the longer he rolled your little button under his thumb and even your scent grew thicker the more time passed.

Behind his seam, Ao’nung felt uncomfortable tightness. It was odd. Mating season was nowhere near close, but still. Movement behind his groin made him shudder uncontrollably. Your scent mixed with the sight so close in front of his face was threatening to make him extrude out of his slit.

The thought alone should’ve been enough to put an end to this. What was he thinking? He couldn’t possibly be extruding over the image and smell of a humans body. It should disgust him beyond measure. It was dishonorable! So why was salvia pooling behind his lips when his intrusive thoughts lead him to wanting to lick you there? See if you taste as sweet as you smell.

If Ao’nung was made to decide between mating the small demon in front of him or just getting a taste of you to sate his curiosity, it would’ve been the latter. For obvious reasons. He was a man of honor after all, a seasoned warrior and hunter that was trained in patience and control and no scent as sweet as yours would rob him of this title!

If anything, this was just a means to an end, a test of his discipline, nothing more. Just another way to torture information from you.

And yet, even as he repeated these words like a prayer in his mind, Ao’nung’s fingers tightened slightly around your ankle, betraying him. His body betrayed him more cruelly still, the heat prickling along his skin, the restless flick of his tail disturbing the water around him, the dry rasp of his throat no matter how deeply he tried to breathe.

It was just a means to an end, he told himself again. You were a vessel for information, nothing more.

"Way si for oe, hì'i tskxe. [Sing for me, little pearl]," Ao’nung said so low, he felt the waters ripple slightly around his tail from the bass of his voice. Then, to make you understand, he repeated the meaning of his words in your tongue, "Talk."

"I- I don’t know what else you want me to sa—ah!"

Your response was cut short and morphed into the most beautiful song when his tongue licked a board stripe from your slit to the button at the top of your mound. Sweet taste exploded on his tongue once your nectar settled there and Ao’nung couldn’t stop the groan from escaping him.

With a hum on his lips, he went to dive down again. Not knowing where to put his focus first, the movement of his tongue started messy, just curious flicks of its tip to see what would get the most reaction out of you.

"P-Please," you whimper softly, hips desperately bucking in his hold. Here, it seems, are you most vulnerable, the most susceptible.

Yes, little female. Beg for me. Spill your secrets and I will stop. But until then…

Ao’nung moved to breach your entrance, sliding his tongue in deep, and you moan, something high and pitched, hips canting upwards again. Here, too, he thinks. You’re sensitive in many places, but it’s still different from when he was torturing your feet with tickles. Now it’s wet and messy and he kind of likes it. He likes the way you taste. The way you smell. And the pretty sounds that tumble from your lips as you gasp and writhe beneath him.

Your slit is swollen now, leaking fluids that mix with his spit. Your little button throbs like a tiny heart outside of its chest so he continues to lick and tease it until tears prick at the corner of your eyes.

Tell me more. Go on, tawtute.

He licks and sucks at you, tongue moving from its caress of your nub to explore your slit, dipping inside, tasting where you’re wet. You convulse around his tongue when he curls it upward in the same way he would when he was trying to reach the tasty inside of a clam and your breath stutters in your chest.

"Oh!" You exclaim in a sharp gasp, your back arching. "Don’t stop, I’m– so close!"

What? She does not want me to stop?

A deep frown crosses his face. You are… enjoying your torture?

Ao’nung watches as your hands find the softness of your breasts and you begin to claw at your suit as if you suddenly wanted it off completely. Odd, considering that earlier you were holding on to the torn pieces that were left of it like they truly belonged to your skin.

All of this was odd. He’d come here for answers. For tactics, for the weak points in the demon ship. He’d told himself he needed your knowledge, that he was enduring your strange presence only out of duty.

But this, whatever this had become, was dangerously far from duty.

Suddenly, Ao’nung felt too warm in his own skin. This wasn’t right. This wasn’t the plan. But even as his mind spun through logic, his body refused to obey.

There grows a force behind his movements, a need desperately restrained because he doesn’t want to break you —yet.

Behind the seam of his slit builds up even more uncomfortable pressure and Ao’nung wasn’t sure anymore for how long he’d be able to withstand it.

Talk, little human. Come on.

His tongue moves faster, lips coming to aid as he began sucking on your button. The muscles in your legs tensed, hard and corded and your feet curled and you squirmed and sparked right on the brink and then you came, wet, wet and deep and throbbing against his mouth, around his tongue, as he moaned again and swallowed.

Chest heaving as if the pleasure you’ve experienced was shared between the two of you, Ao’nung slowly retreated back into the water until his navel was right below the surface. The gills on his throat fluttered once the skin of his tail moisturized enough for comfort. The little demon that was still in his grasp raised her head to look at him, vision seemingly swimming.

She didn’t tell me more. Pxasìk [fuck.]

He should be angry at that, furious even that his efforts weren’t rewarded.

He had done everything to crack you open and extract what he needed. But what had you done instead? Distracted him. Derailed his thoughts. Found pleasure in your torture which pulled him off course like a current dragging him away from the hunt. However, he couldn’t bring himself to feel rage.

Only hunger.

Not the kind for food. Not the kind for violence. But for you, little tawtute [human].

With a low sound that rumbled in his throat, Ao’nung pulled you gently but firmly toward him, until you sat at the edge of the pool with your small fins dangling in the water.

He felt conflicted. There was no excuse anymore for what he was doing with the human.

Your eyes were still distant, not quite realizing yet what was happening. Your chest was heaving in deep breaths, but your scent hadn’t changed. You, too, were still hungry. The slit between your thighs was still gleaming in spit and slick, a little red and the lips puffed up from his mouth teasing it. What a sight.

Eywa forgive me, he thought. Forget talking, little tawtute. I can not hold myself back any longer.

Taking a shuddering breath and inhaling more of your sweetness, Ao’nung allowed his slit to open up, completely and utterly revealing himself to you.

The gasp that followed was so loud that if it hadn't been sucked inwards, it would have come out as a scream.

"You have two!?" You squealed.

Yes, little female. I have two cocks.

✩⋆｡‧₊˚⭑˚₊‧｡⋆✩

Somewhere between the way Ao’nung was looking at you like you were a tasty meal served on a silver platter, him giving in and getting a taste of said meal and then the way the water wrapped around your legs as he pulled you towards him for more, you slowly began to realize what exactly you were getting yourself into here.

However, and that came as much as a surprise as everything else that has happened so far, you didn’t care as much as you thought you would when an alien sea monster would decide you were good enough for mating, now that he’s gotten all useful information out of you.

But what did made you pause and consider for a second if you were truly loosing your mind down here, was when the odd slit that sat right on his groin opened up and not one, but two pink and strangely looking dicks poked out of it.

At least, that’s what you assumed they were.

"You have two!?" You squealed. With wide eyes you stared at the firm tentacles that wiggled free. Each of his cocks was slightly tapered, and both were puffed in the middle to keep their tips apart as they sat side by side. However, they did mesh together to create one large shaft he could pet if he held the bases in one fist.

As if to demonstrate, Ao‘nung did just that, giving himself one languid stroke before he released them again with a grin. Yeah, those are definitely his cocks.

Both were inhumanly long and lacked any kind of foreskin. Instead, there was a dripping, slimy lubricant that protected the hard, jutting muscles.

And he— oh god. He wants to shove those into you?

There must’ve been some sick kind of drug or a horrible case of stockholm syndrome involved here, because why on earth were you actually considering it?

It wasn’t even the girth that scared you, although they were definitely thicker than the average humans, even if they weren’t fused together. At least their tips were small enough it looked manageable. But it was the length that scared you.

"T-That won’t fit," you whispered as your gaze switched between Ao‘nungs lust filled eyes and his wet cocks. He made a gesture at that, signing a simple "yes" as if that would ease your worries in any way. Well, thanks a lot, big guy.

With his hands over your thighs, he slowly spread them to settle himself right in between. Then he draped your legs over his board forearms. You squirmed a little when his cocks laid neatly on top of your abdomen, showing you just how far they would reach once they were inside of you.

"Mawey," Ao’nung said in that low rumbling voice that made you shiver.

"I- I don’t understand."

"Calm," he replied, which reminded you of the breath you were still holding and the tension in your shoulders. With a slow, measured exhale you tried to calm your racing mind. Slowly you let your eyes slide shut to put your whole focus on loosening up your tense muscles.

"If I’m dying down here, I can at least die knowing I’ve fucked an alien," you murmured with a dry, humorous giggle. "And I‘ll never make it to heaven. Wonderful."

"Nga lu nìtxan 'ekxin 'ur, tawtute. [You are very tight looking, human." Ao’nung said in a low tone which bought you back to the reality in which you were somehow supposed to take these two huge things. Before you could even process the possible meaning of his words, you inhaled sharply.

The blunt tip of his tentacle-like cock hadn’t simply ‘pushed in’ as you expected it would— violent and animalistic. Instead, it slid along your pussy, wet and teasing at your folds. It nudged your lips apart and settled over your clit, moving with a subtlety and dexterity that shocked you as much as it pleased you. The other one however, was seeking a different part. The slimy cock slid along your backside, and you shivered once it teased your hole.

"N-Not there," you squealed, "you’re gonna break me! And not in the good way…"

Ao’nung just tilted his head at that, which for a strange moment reminded you of a seal. Nothing but big, clueless black eyes staring down at you. Oh god, don’t make me explain this to you.

With shaking hands you reached down to redirect his cock, even though you had no idea how to make any of this work in the first place, no matter which hole they were supposed to go. They, as in both of them, you internally shook yourself. You had to work with not one, but two of them!

"Just here," you whispered, then signed: "Slow. Soft."

With a knowing look on his face, Ao’nung lowered himself to speak so close to your face it made heat creep up the nape of your neck.

"Ke'u ma Na'vi kem si lu hewne, hì'i tskxe. [Nothing my people do is soft, little pearl.]" He said in that strange language you were unable to understand, yet he kept going. "Tsal lu tsaktap si. Slä for nga oe will nari si. [It is violent. An act of dominance.]" His lips were so close now, you swore he’d lean in and press them against yours.

"Oe will ke kxakx nga. Hì'i 'u. [But for you I will be careful. I will not break you, small thing.]"

It was so incredibly hard for you to maintain eye contact with his lips so dangerously close, his words a hushed whisper that sent goosebumps down your skin, but the moment one of his cocks teased the slit of your entrance, your eyes went wide as they met his. And then his tip pushed in.

The first inch was more of a stretch than any of your own fingers could imitate, but it was manageable. You were slick enough and his tip narrow and wet.

Above you, Ao’nung was cursing.

You didn’t know what exactly he was muttering and groaning, but you knew that look on a man’s face well enough to guess that he was and that the language he was using was more than just foul.

His forehead was pressed against your own as you both watched his cock slide inside, inch by inch by inch until you were full. Stuffed beyond thinking, beyond existing. All you could feel was the sensation of him, the fullness, the slick slide as he plunged deeper and deeper into you body.

Meanwhile, his other cock was nestled against your abdomen, hot and heavy as it laid there. Parts of it were pressed against your poor clit and the combination of both sensations made you feel dizzy.

Your mind fractured, breathing coming even faster, your heart thundering in your chest. And then he stopped pushing in when your folds were pressed against the scales of his tail. For a moment you forgot to breath. He was so deep, you were sure nothing has ever reached so far into you and nothing would ever compare.

Taking in a deep lungful, you finally looked up at him to see that half lidded gaze transfixed on the space where you were joined with him.

"Nga munge oe nìltsan, tawtute. [You take me well, human.]" Ao’nung purred almost proudly. Reaching out a hand he pressed it against your belly and you looked down to see a bulge there, a bulge that was him inside of you. Holy fuck.

You’re not even sure if humans were supposed to go through this process, but you’re way too overwhelmed with everything that’s happening right now to care.

But it does feel good, having him so deep inside. It’s like an ache that burns up your muscles from where you’re too tight around him all the way up to the top of your head, fingers tingling, teeth rattling as you clench your jaw and swallow thickly.

There are no ridges or veins that you can feel, but you shiver at his warmth, at the mixture of fluids, the slick wetness inside and outside of your core. The tip nudges against your deepest spot, making you feel hot all over. His other cock is moving on top of your clit, tickling your belly button. It’s good. Good, but too much and not enough at the same time. You needed him to do something and do it quick or you‘ll loose it.

Ao’nung however, stays almost unmoving above you, just watching, admiring, breathing with his gills fluttering. Your walls spasm around him and your toes curl as your brain scrambles to process what’s happening.

"I- I think I’m gonna come," you wheeze. "Move. Please, I need you to—"

Oh! The first thrust knocks the very air from your lungs. It’s harsh and unexpected in a way you wouldn’t have expected him to actually understand what you were saying. Or maybe he didn’t. Maybe he just decided it was time to move and fuck the little human until you broke clean in half. Because that’s what he did then.

For a moment you forget how to breathe, only how to cry out in pleasure and call for his name. His back is bowed, trying to bring his face and hips as close as possible with so much height difference between the both of you. Wild, blue eyes look all over your face, blown out pupils putting the beauty of your lewd expression to memory as your orgasm crashes over you like a tsunami, sudden and violent. His eyes lock onto your mouth, your parted lips, glistening and red from desperately biting on the bottom one.

You’ve never came that quickly before. Hell, it’s a miracle to even come at all with the men you’ve been with. But with him, it was only a matter of seconds.

The thing inside you squirms then, making your legs twitch at the sensation of having something buried so deep in you, filling you out and completing you like a puzzle.

His thrusts find rhythm and then Ao’nung jams his thumb onto your clit and the shock of sensation snaps your spine taut, breasts rocking on your heaving chest.

"F-Fuck!" You curse as he begins to expertly move his thumb in small circles. That stupid fish is a quick learner and he‘s entirely too confident in his newly acquired skills. But just as you’re starting to clench around his tentacle-like cock again, he suddenly pulls out, leaving you sore and chilled and hollowed out.

With furrowed brows you glance up at him, a question clearly written across your face. You’re about to reach down and snatch him to put him back where he belonged, when Ao’nung shifts his hips and pushes his other cock into you.

A loud keen leaves your lips as your head falls back again and your spine arches off the ground.

You can't think, can't move, can't even speak properly.

"Hì'i tskxe, nga lu fìtxan 'ango mìfa. [Little pearl, you are so soft inside.]" He huffs above you, nosing your temple and the top of your hair. "Nìftxan sang. Pefya oe ke new nga wrapped pxaw oe? [So warm. How could I not want you wrapped around both of me?]

The next stroke hammers deep, pounding you cervix, straining you till you crackle and throb, overfilled like a glove shoved onto an overlarge hand.

"Oe teya si nga fa sì. [I will fill you with both of my cocks.]" He purrs, flashing sharp canine in a grin before his tongue glides along the shell of your ear in a teasing lick. "Nga wí munge tsal. [and you will take it.]

In no time he’s pounding into you again, noisy slaps of flesh echoing in the cave. Your mewls become wanton yelps and pitched moans, lost to the euphoria that is you being filled to the brim with each push. He doesn't stop unless it’s so switch to his other cock then back again, determined to take you higher and higher. Both hands are on your thighs once more, and he spreads you wide, giving him every inch of your sloppy pussy. There’s only a single cry of pain, but it’s nothing to make you want to stop, and nothing that will make him stop.

You don’t know if it’s the circumstances or the endorphins mixed with adrenaline, but you feel high. There is not a single coherent thought left in you, not enough to even begin doubting what you are doing here. No morals and no rational sense left to anchor you or bring you back to reality.

Your instincts should be screaming at you to pull away, to fight back, to do something sensible. But instead, you’re leaning into it, captivated and unsteady, too far gone to remember why you shouldn’t want this.

You are his for the taking, and you have no qualms with that. There are no searing kisses to silence you, so your voice shamelessly echoes off the walls. When he straightens his spine and puts a hand on the wall behind you for leverage, your face to face with his abdomen, forehead pressed just at the first part of his ribcage. He’s so goddamn tall. His tail moves to put more force behind his thrust and the water splashes behind him.

In and out, he’s hitting your cervix, but you don’t think he realizes that— the na‘vi above you is far too gone, left to primal instinct you almost forgot he had in him.

Ao’nung switches you constantly on his cocks, and at one point you were too dazed to know where the one not currently being pushed inside you to the base was slipping. You just kept your muscles loose and relaxed, body limp and completely unbothered that he kept pulling out of you so long as one of them always shoved back in.

Ao’nung growled every time the walls of your pussy snapped tight around him, which send a wave of goosebumps and full on body shivers through you, because it reminded you just what exactly was above you, ruining you for all the other human men there were.

After another long moment of harsh, merciless thrusting, he glances down, straightens his spine and leans back a little, and you follow his gaze down to where he's pressing into you.

The bulge moving on your lower abdomen is breathtaking. He’s so big inside of you that he’s stretching you out, and seeing it as well as feeling it makes you keen. He, too, seemingly enjoys the sight of it, if the way he’s cursing under his breath is anything to go by.

"Oe kin nga tsonta za'u for oe nìmun. [I need you to come for me again.]" He groans low and dangerously and distinctly you wonder what these words might mean. "Oe new tsonta zir tsal, tawtute, lisre oe teya si nga hu my rina'. [I want to feel it, human, before I fill you with my seed.]"

But then his thumb is back at your clit and you gasp a moan when you realize he’s trying to make you come again. Immediately you feel the tickling clench of your inner muscles, prelude to an intense orgasm, and then again, an irregular canter of muscles faster and faster until you come, hands clawing at the ground to push back against him at the same time you arch your back, biting your own lip to muffle the sounds you’re making.

Ao’nung fucks you through it and a bit longer, steadily, as if to prove he can, before he leans over and nearly swallows your body whole with his on top of yours. His abs constrict and his arms flex and he releases a deep moan right into your neck and the hair sprawled out on the cave floor as hot liquid fills you to the brim. He pumps his cock into you once, twice before he pulls out so sudden and fast that you whimper at the loss of contact.

It’s not for long, though, because then his second cock pushed back inside just as fast and hard as the other had left. You choke back a gasp at that, oversensitive nerves burning as he pounds into you at a much quicker rhythm. His cum being fucked back into you makes wet, sloppy noises that would normally make you want to hide your face in embarrassment, but you’re too far gone to care.

You feel another wave of intense pleasure and another orgasm hits you quicker than you could even process. Toes curling and legs shaking, your walls begin to spasm and more cum bubbles and gushes out where his cock takes up most of the space inside you. And then his cock stills, with Ao’nung pressing himself so close to you, you fear you might choke or suffocate with how deep he’s holding himself into you. A heartbeat passes and you whine and writhe beneath him at the uncomfortable pressure against your cervix.

Just as you thought he couldn’t get any deeper, Ao’nung begins to envelop you in his arms and the rest of his tail. You feel wrapped up like a prey about to consumed by a snake. His face is entirely buried in your hair and the nape of your neck. Then he shifts, moves his face so his lips are level with your ear.

"Tsìltsan 'eve [Good girl]," he breaths and you shiver and clench around him when hot air tickles your lobe. "Munge tsal. Munge sälipx oe yomtìng nga. [Take it. Take every drop that I feed your hungry little cunt.]"

And when he comes a second time, your eyes go so wide and round, your vision blurs at the edges.

His cock throbs as it empties his seed inside and you feel its heat travel up the entire length of your body as its intent seeps into each and every one of your nerves. It comes and comes until it overflows around his girth, and then, with a heavy and very content sigh, Ao’nung just lays himself on top of you.

The air is practically crushed out of your lungs from his weight, but you don’t mind in the slightest. It’s wet and cold and uncomfortable on the ground, so you’re thankful for what little aftercare the giant siren is willing to give. And he’s warm. So warm.

Everything feels sore between your thighs, but it’s a good kind of burn. The kind that reminds you of how fucking good this had felt.

Once you feel his twin cocks retract back into the safety of his slit, you become painfully aware of how slick and sticky you are. And also, how hollow you feel without him there. Your thighs begin to ache from being spread wide for so long, and awkward embarrassment slowly starts to prickle under your skin. You shift slightly, trying to reclaim a sense of reality.

"H-Hey, big guy," you say, clearing your throat, voice soft and hoarse. "I think I need to, um… clean up."

Ao’nung doesn’t reply, not verbally. His expression slips back into that frustrating, unreadable blankness, and with a low grunt, he raises, then turns and slithers smoothly back into the water.

Your heart kicks hard in your chest. He’s leaving!

"Wait!" You call for him and Ao’nung pauses, turning just enough to glance back at you over his shoulder. His piercing blue eyes staring back at you make you feel embarrassingly exposed and very much naked.

Panic rises, uninvited and sharp. You sit up immediately, as your arms fold around yourself, trying to trap the leftover warmth still clinging to your body before it fades.

He has what he wanted, you think. That’s it. He‘ll leave and you’re going to die down here.

"Where are you going?" You ask warily, and you feel stupid for even doing so.

He doesn’t speak, just lifts his hand and signs a single word.

Ship.

Right. Of course.

Your throat goes tight. He’s going to take what little information you gave him and maybe finally finish what his kind has tried and failed to do for years. End it.

And leave you behind.

You try not to let your voice crack. "What happens after?" You don’t know what you’re asking, not really. Ao’nungs eyes narrow for just a split second and you almost missed it. There’s comes no respond.

"When they’re gone." You say, barely above a whisper. "What about me?"

His gaze drops from your face, trailing over your folded arms, the curve of your shoulders, the vulnerable way you’re curled around yourself.

Then his eyes lift back to yours.

"Oe lu alaksi ne rip fì'u vrrtep ship apart sì every tawtute fa tsal, sì tsatseng lu ke'u fula will ftang oe set… [I am ready to rip this demon ship apart. Every piece and every human with it and there is nothing that will stop me now. But…]"

"I will come back for you, little pearl."