Aonung

Ao’nung was no friend to change, and he never imagined it would find him. For as long as he could remember, life in Awa’atlu had followed a steady rhythm—familiar, predictable, untouched by chaos. Nothing unusual ever happened, and that was exactly how he liked it. He had heard whispers of unrest in distant lands—tales of war, displacement, and fire falling from the sky—but as long as those troubles never reached his shores, they remained someone else’s burden.

As the son of the chief, his path was carved in stone. His future wasn’t a question, but a certainty. And in that, he found peace. Until the rhythm broke.

A group of Ikran descended on the outskirts of the village; fierce, winged beasts he had only heard of in passing. He had never seen one in person, but the moment they landed, he knew: they did not belong here. And neither did their riders.

They were Omatikaya, forest dwellers, driven from their home by the relentless march of humankind. Among them was Toruk Makto himself, and with him, his family. They were strange in appearance, markedly different. All but the one he presumed to be the mother bore a trace of something foreign. Five children, unmistakably touched by the blood of men.

Ao’nung crinkled his nose in quiet disdain, his gaze sharp with mistrust. And then it happened: his eyes met yours—one of Jake Sully’s children. The moment was brief, fleeting, but something in it caught deep in his chest. A tightness formed in his stomach, as if the ground beneath him had shifted.

He didn’t know why, but it felt like the beginning of something he wouldn’t be able to stop.