I still remember the day I first stood beneath the poisonous veil of the yavä', heart pounding as I realized I was about to retrace a childhood I could barely recall. The Ambassador Program—or TAP—had taken me from my clan so young that my memories before the RDA felt like half-remembered dreams. Now, in 2026, with Okul's antidote finally flowing through my veins, I could finally step into that deadly fog and uncover the truth. My ikran's wings sliced through the thick air as I headed east of the Den of Solitude, entering the Great Crimson Wood. The question that had haunted me my whole life was finally within reach: Who was I before they made me into a soldier?
I spotted the old RDA crash site long before I reached it. A downed Scorpion gunship hung in the trees above a murky pond, its metal carcass twisted like a broken promise. Dismounting carefully, I climbed up to the wreckage, my hands steady even as my mind raced. The first clue I found was a survival kit, lying on a raised island just past a hollowed-out log. Why would a simple kit stir such unease in my chest? Nearby, a cage sat beside a fallen log that had become a precarious bridge. That cage—cold metal, just big enough for a Na'vi child—made my fingers curl into fists. The TAP Con-1 logo stamped beside it was something I recognized all too well. And beneath the decimated Scorpion, I uncovered the black box, still blinking weakly despite years of decay.
Linking clues felt like assembling fragments of a shattered soul. The survival kit and the cage told a story of captivity and forced endurance, while the TAP Con-1 logo and the black box pointed to the facility where it all began. I hacked the black box using my SID, and coordinates flooded my interface—a destination I never wanted to see but knew I had to find. "What did they do to us there?" I whispered into the fog, but the forest held no answers yet.
I flew north, following the data stream, until the yavä' parted to reveal an abandoned outpost swallowed by vegetation and ghostly mist. TAP Con-1. Even the name tasted like dust and guilt. Climbing over the rusted gate, I dropped into a courtyard where silence pressed against my eardrums. Power was dead, of course. A vent beside a massive orange door became my way in, and after a precarious crawl, I tumbled into a computer room thick with shadows. Restoring power with an override sent lights flickering across the facility, humming with a life I immediately regretted giving it.
Six clues waited inside, each one a wound reopened. The cages and restraints leached cold terror into my palms. Bedding with Sarentu toys and a simplistic mural—toys no child should have to cling to in a place like this—broke something inside me. I touched the small woven figures, feeling the texture of a home I cannot recall. Showers with disinfectant and identical clothing stripped identity as sharply as any blade. "This is where they tried to erase us," I muttered, realizing the truth was darker than I had feared. Yet I pressed on, drawn by a distorted recording that echoed through the hallways like a vengeful spirit.
The deeper I went, the more certain I became that I was not alone. Stalked by something that moved just outside my field of vision, I hacked door after door, each one revealing more unsettling fragments of my history. I found an abandoned laboratory and, most chillingly, Alma's avatar grow tank—the very vessel that had once held one of my captors. Then came the vents again, my only path leading me headlong into a chamber with two feral thanators. How appropriate, I thought, that the RDA's creations would try to finish what the TAP program started. I dispatched them quickly, my arrows singing the only song of justice I could offer.
Swimming through a sunken chamber to repair wiring felt almost cleansing, the cold water washing away the grime of memory. When I reached the computer terminal and accessed Alma's recording, my breath caught. Her voice, fragmented and weak, revealed the systematic destruction of the Sarentu. She spoke of children being reshaped, of a clan nearly extinguished, and my mind reeled as flashes of crying faces and distant chanting merged with the present. What remains of a people when you steal their children and smother their songs? I had my answer then, but it was not comforting.
No sooner had the recording ended than the RDA descended on the outpost like scarab beetles on carrion. I had a choice: slip away silently or leave a trail of fire. My arrows sang again, taking down soldiers one by one as I climbed a rope and squeezed through a narrow passage. The hangar echoed with gunfire, but the forest welcomed me back with open branches. Once safe, I called Nor, my voice shaking as I recounted what I had learned. The Resistance needed to know.
My final journey took me southeast of TAP Con-1, to a place the elders whispered about: the Circle of Songs. Hidden under a mountain tangled in vines, it was the last known location of the Sarentu before the attack. I arrived to find it deserted, yet heavy with memory. RDA weapons and ammo lay discarded by the entrance, their presence an insult to this sacred ground. I observed rock wall paintings—ancient and still vibrant—that seemed to shift as I stared.
Off to the side, wrapped gifts rested untouched, as if waiting for hands that would never return. I pieced together the clues, and with each observation, my mind pulled back the curtain on that terrible night. I saw my clan—my family—falling to RDA gunfire while we children were dragged away. The rock wall became a cinema of sorrow, and I wept without shame. I remembered.
With the truth burning in my chest, I returned to the Hollows and found Okul. The Kame'tire had long held their grievances against the Resistance, but when they heard what the RDA had done to the Sarentu—and saw the proof standing before them in me—their eyes changed. That day, the Kame'tire joined the Resistance, and I understood that my past was not just a scar but also a spear. The Clouded Forest had taken my innocence, but it had given me back my name. And now the sky people will learn that you cannot steal a song from Pandora without the world singing back in wrath.
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