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They never fixed this part of the Brig.
Where the soldiers trained and practised with the AMP suits didn't exactly bring fond memories for the people who remained. The sleeping quarters could be reused, the armoury was transformed into a communal kitchen, and even parts of the control room were used for repairs in the rebuild of the labs after the RDA left. But nobody bothered fixing the bullet holes, and blood staining the floors of the training grounds, Jake told her once that it send a message: “ the blood we spilled could never be forgotten.” So much for a new beginning after the war.
And it wasn't like anyone actually came here other than her; nobody at Hell’s Gate had connections to Iron Brig, and the ones who did would never come back. It was a great place to think, and an even better one to be alone.
It crossed her mind that someone might look for her, but not that it would be Norm.
“Mind if I join the misery wagon?” He approached her much like she was a scared baby Pali, not a 30 year old woman with mild explosive episodes. Leaving his Ikran, which was probably annoyed at having to leave High Camp so early in the morning, at the top of the Brig.
“Putting trackers in your colleagues now, Norman?” She didn't move as he sat next to her.
“No, only on the flight risks I’ve known for the last 20 or so years.” In his human body, they would be talking at eye level, but his avatar towered over her, making Isabella feel like a much younger version of herself, back when Norm still had to play babysitter.
“I ought to feel special then, not many of those around.”
“Yeah, yeah” He laughed weakly.
They stayed quiet for a moment, avoinding eachothers gaze. Then she looked back at him, too tired to continue entertaining this. “What do you want?”
“You know, just seeing if you’re ok.” He said, pointedly looking away from her.
“Norm” She pressed.
“What? It’s true-” His ears now flat against his head.
“Norm”
He looked pained as his eyes found her form.
“Can't I just be worried you might’ve taken off and gone look for him on your own?” His tail thrashed behind him. “Or that you might’ve been taken too?”
“I’m not stupid.” She paused for a second, “ And if I were, I wouldn't need to look for him, I know exactly where he is. That’s the entire fucking problem.”
Norm looked more grim now, probably reminded that she wasn't down here just to throw a tantrum, well, she was. But for reasons that were much more valid than the ones she had when she was 10. He forgot it sometimes, that she was grown, no longer the little girl who followed him around the lab asking to help her practise Na’vi, or that would beg to go on fieldwork with him and Max. She forgot it too, sometimes.
“I’m not-” He sighed, “I’m not trying to say you’re, it’s just that you don’t have a great track record for impulsive decisions Isa.” He looked up at his Ikran, or maybe to Eywa, so that this conversation could end sooner. “ And everybody worries that with Spider involved, you might just go, you know, nuclear.”
“With everybody worries, you mean that they're worried they might lose one of the only working brains of High Camp if I fail to save him?” She said, not withholding any poison from her words, “ Can’t afford losing people, yeah? Unless it’s the old bastard's son! Because then we should clearly give a fuck more about which nutsack he came from than the fact he’s one of our own, that he’s a child, that he’s better than most of those shitheads back at camp combined, and that he’s my brother, my little brother.” Her voice lost its bite as she crumbled a bit more into herself.
“Look kid, the situation is shit, really, but we can’t risk resources, people, on a suicide mission.” He paused. “ Maybe if he was at one of the lower bases, or if we had more info, more firepower , then we could-”
She interrupted him “Or if he was more important, right?”
“Isa, c’mon-” Norm tried.
“Cause I’m sure if it were Lo’ak, Kiri, or Tuk in there, we wouldn’t even be having this conversation. We would be brainstorming and making the impossible possible to save them. And we would save them, Norm. Jake wouldn’t allow otherwise, just like me.” She took a deep breath in a mask she didn't need. “If it were any other kid, people would at least try to hear what I have to say. You would. The lab. Fuck, even the clan! But it’s not any kid, it's mine. The one they called the demon's son, even though he was Paz’s child too, like they forget all she did for us, for Grace, for me.” Her voice came out choked “ No one’s gonna admit that they don’t think it's worth the hassle to save him, and I’m sick of playing good for people who’ll leave my brother in the mud.”
She dared him to rebuke her, to search in his mind for anything that would prove her wrong. As they glared at each other, much like they did when they were younger, when things were simpler, when Doctor Grace Augustine was still alive, and when their biggest concerns were whose translation was right.
Looking at his misty eyes and hard frown, she watched as he understood that he couldn’t.
Because truly, if she was wrong, then why was Jake going to an archipelago halfway across the world to hide? Why were the people who saw Spider grow up not at least trying to hear his sister's pleas? Why was more than half of Camp acting like she was crazy for wanting to save her family? And why was Norm siding with them?
The man didn't say a word, but Isabella noticed the way his ears didn't go back up and how his eyes now shared the same exhausted tint as hers.
Alpha Centuri was announcing a new cycle by the time neither of them spoke again.
“I usually avoid doing this sorta thing in this body.” He started rummaging in the vest's pockets, pulling a normal-sized pack of cigarettes, which looked meant for a child, sitting in the palm of his big blue hand. “But I feel like that doesn't matter much right now.”
She stayed silent, watching him ignite and put it on his lips.
“You want one? It feels kinda weird offering it to you, but maybe you need it too.” He extended it to her, almost insisting.
“I don't really...” They had to go back soon; she had to say goodbye to her sister, to all the kids, before they left. Tuk wouldn’t let them leave if she didn't, and Kiri would never forgive her. Smoking would delay them, but he was already halfway through his first cigarette, and she would have to wait to get on his Ikran to go back anyway, unless she went on foot. Stalling now wouldn't make a difference.
And looking at Norm’s hurt eyes , she remembers that she used to never understand why people smoked.
It didn't make sense to her why so many of the mechas, pilots, and even some of the scientists would bother inhaling fumes when there was already so little space where they could actually breathe. Why the heads of the RDA would bother to occupy storage in the ships with crates upon crates of common brand cigarettes when they could bring more useful things, like preserved seeds, data, or fucking oxygen tanks for the people they dropped into a planet that wouldn't let them breathe. So, no, Isa didn't usually get what was so alluring about burning tobacco, decaying lungs, and stained teeth.
But sitting at the abandoned training grounds of Iron Brig, with a war at their doorstep, a helpless knowledge that no one but her would do something for Spider, and with rose colored memories of Grace with her cigs, Isabella reached for the pack.