14 14. Pandora's moody weather

Two days later.

Liam stared at the waist-height hatchling who just woke from its sleep after eating at least two kilos worth of food, and it stared back at him curiously.

Gladius pecked not so gently at the feet of the workshop where Liam was working until this exact moment when he was rudely interrupted by the bird. 

He was working on a minor part of a fabricator that would help for the overall stability, well the term fabricator might be inappropriate considering the one he was building was incomparable to its 21st-century counterpart.

Evidently, the one from the game wasn't the same as the one translated into reality, but it was still vastly more advanced, versatile, and adaptable than the 21st-century one. The only real point in common was the name and their general purpose of making stuff. 

The problem however was that at the moment he could but do an extremely bastardized version of it. One that was needed to do the real deal, however. Tools needed to make tools themselves needed to make tools.

And he lacked resources notably a lack of silver, diamond, lithium, iron, and more, and in tools too, particularly of high precision as they are needed to produce highly processed material and components. 

Not forgetting that he also lacked fuel adapted for it, he had a small stock of coke, not the drink, he made that out of charcoal(itself made of heated carbon-reinforced bones and woods), by heating it extremely hot for long periods to get something as close to pure carbon as possible.

In other words, thermal distillation but coke was only for forging steel as it burned extremely high, he needed something like petroleum here. And it will need to be refined too.

Something he lacked. He lacked many resources, which was also why he was working on going into the giant grotto and hopefully finding some of what he was looking for.

"Hey buddy, it isn't food you know? Stop.", Liam said amusedly to Gladius who instantly stopped moving. Storing the metallic contraption otherwise known to him as the piece A-068B will go above A-070C and at the left by 70° up of A-069B.

He hummed pensively at various names of the piece and the many more that needed to be made before concentrating on the link between him and the alien baby murder chicken.

'Sit..?', he sent mentally commanded, it was more of a feeling mixed with intention than coherent words or sentences, just like he did unconsciously before when speaking. 

Though doing it consciously seemed… Not particularly harder but it was just strange, it was like a new metaphorical muscle that was used for the first time. Gladius did just that and sat while observing him with its four big round eyes.

In his left hand, a palm-sized fruit appeared, it was black with some blue hue, nothing exceptional about it if not its shape being a strange but homogenous mix between a pineapple, a banana, and a lemon. And It tasted like pure and high-quality apple juice.

Gladius caught the fruit thrown into its beak, it crushed then swallowed the to messily eat whatever mess the hatchling let fall to the ground before looking up at Liam patiently waiting for more food.

Liam continued to give the same type of fruit until Gladius stopped asking, a session of head scratch on the latter and Liam was testing what he could make his not-so-feathery buddy do.

It was a hatchling, not even half a week old at that, and it was visibly bigger than when it hatched not much but that's that. Still, it was a baby which means nothing extraordinary will come out after such a short time. Well in Liam's perspective that is.

Gladius was extremely obedient to him, with the capacity to communicate with it even if it was by unusual means being key to it as the hatchling had a rough understanding of what 'Father' wanted. 

The hatchling was smart, smarter than one might expect but it could only understand very simple commands such as; sit, stand up, stop, and follow me.

All things considered, it was beyond exceptional what just happened, all of it done in a mere hour which would at a minimum take days if not weeks, and this to near perfection. 

And it was but the start, though more complicated command will entirely depend on how smart Gladius' species can actually get. From his observation he would guess around that of a crow, he wasn't an ethologist, even less a xeno ethologist.

Something can be absolutely obedient and do what it's asked with all its heart and soul but if it can't understand what it was asked to do, to begin with, it won't go far. 

There was enormous potential, and Liam was sure his choice of not making an omelet out of Gladius was the right one. 

With this, he also got information on how to tame other animals, the part where he took care of the egg and made the chick imprint on him being the most important part to him. Building trust and a bond was key.

Trust, unfathomable and absolute trust or close to that; something that was impossible to get unless in very special circumstances. 

At least that's what Liam presumed, and frankly trying to play with his mind on something he didn't trust himself and adding that the creatures would be 99% of the time plainly aggressive to him didn't seem to be the best of ideas. 

Thought the possibility of forcing the taming process was here but with the wildlife general behaviors around him and the condition of the creatures needing to fully submit to him it seemed very unlikely to work. 

Feeding the exhausted hatchling until it fell asleep again Liam continued to work until the last of the three suns disappeared from the sky of Pandora and he stopped working. 

The irregularity of the day and night cycle was quite annoying as it could screw him if he wasn't careful, not forgetting the occasional eclipse be it total, partial, hybrid, or annual, and likely a dozen more as there were more celestials bodies to be taken into account than the good old Earth, Moon, and Sun.

He ate, as per usual at least one kilo of meat this time it was from the hexapede, and he also made salted French fries out of a potato-like plant that he cut and then fried in animal fat. 

His diet was less than healthy, constituted of protein with protein and supplement of fat. Dangerous to even suicidal for a normal man but he was far from being normal. The fact he ate so much was and still is strange to him. Though it makes sense considering how absurdly strong and active he was.

Anyway, he slept near the base of the tree in one of the carved areas, Gladius was peacefully snoozing next to him, head on his lap and splayed in such a way that made one think as if bones were a foreign concept to its body. 

The hatching was like a dog, a puppy, a strange thought for an animal that will rival a giraffe in size and puts to shame a swan and a cassowary combined in sheer aggressiveness for anything it doesn't like.

High-pitched squeaks echoed in the great plain, at first it was more than a dozen but it soon demultiplied and the sound of wings beating the air rich in xenon became louder and louder almost to the point of being deafening. 

In the middle of the night, Liam as the light sleeper he is just got his sleep cut short by a cacophony of screech resonating, it was irritating to one's ears like chalk scraping on a blackboard. 

The strange dream he just had where he walked on a dead and corrupted planet was rapidly vanishing from his mind as he pushed the sheet aside to look outside. 

His eyes gained instant clarity at the sight, dark clouds covered the sky, and below was wave upon wave of stingbats flying like an unending tide. 

The humidity was high, higher than usual, a distinct difference from a few hours ago, and the smell of ozone was thick in the air, his hair instinctively standing up. Liam had a bad feeling about what was going to come if the literal tide of bats wasn't a good enough indicator.

All of them were flying out of the ground specifically from the various caves and grottos that led below the plain. Liam saw one of the bigger swarms of alien bats flies off the closest grotto to him.

Then there were lightings of purple and white zipping and crackling through the dark cumulonimbus, their light almost blinding and the sound of their roaring thunder only delayed by how fast the sound could travel through the air.

This was followed by lightning slamming from where the stingbats flew out in swarms, the billion joule worth of energy transferring from one animal to the other killing hundreds upon hundreds but it had barely any effect on their number.

Liam's eyes widened in shock as the lighting hit the ground and half a second later with half the speed was sent back with a dulled light at the sky frying hundreds of bats as it did so too. 

This cycle continued as electricity rained down to only be sent back all moving faster than his eyes could perceive, only the return strokes were visible and wearable as thunders slammed against his eardrums. 

It looked like a war between the earth and the sky, and how it was naturally possible was extremely fascinating. His mind immediately went to the unique metal he found there. But it wasn't the time for that.

Gladius was awakened by it too and cowered behind Liam, while panic was rising in its being. The man sensing it through the link frowned, right they needed to move, immediately. 

He didn't want to try and see what getting struck by lightning felt like and he supposed neither did Gladius, considering it will very likely kill the hatchling.

He was surprised when the hatchling made a sudden neural link with him via the connection to his implant from one of its prehensile neural queues. Liam felt a short prickling sensation around the implant, and his grey eyes dilated.

The man looked down at his tame and its emotions, as different as they were from human ones were crystal clear to him, Gladius was afraid, and he reacted by sending emotions telling the hatchling that it was safe. 

It had mild results as Liam wasn't certain himself but Gladius visibly calmed down and that was good enough. 

Taking the bird below his left arm, keeping the neural link in the process. Liam picked a cover made of plants with hide sewn together and he jumped down to the ground.

Holding tightly and securely he landed softly even if he was pretty heavy after all, a stingbat, closely followed by four more flew low not seeing the two as food as they severely lacked in cerebral capacity to arrive at this conclusion then they noticed something shining, the anvil and attacked it with abandon. 

The only reason this aggressive species, even more so in this biome, with a total lack of self-preservation, were still thriving was their prodigious mating capability, that would rival mice, rapid growth rate mixed with an omnivorous diet from, nectar, fruit to Na'vi, and human alike. 

Though they were at the base of the food chain, even if they were also capable of hunting in a big enough swarm most of Pandora's wildlife, making them a keystone species as seed dispersers, pollinators, prey, and predators. 

The sound of thunder in the air only amplified and to Liam's horror, the thunderstorm rapidly gained in power, the winds starting to pick up, nearly blowing the cover he was walking under. 

Suddenly Liam hair on his neck stood on end, Gladius fear rose by several folds. He instinctively crouched, there was a blinding light from his back and…

*CRACKBOOOM!*

His ear rang at the sound. The highest branch of the tree was slammed by lightning, however, it didn't break nor took fire. 

Then Liam gnashed his teeth in pain as a tingling and sharp sensation flowed in the sole of his feet, then his leg until it dissipated around his navel. It was very painful, but incomparable to the great austrapede cry or having his back cut open.

Temporarily paralyzing him as it caused every muscle on the way to briefly and painfully spasm before regaining his full motor function and this encouraged him to move faster. 

Arriving at the trapdoor he opened the heavy wood panel with his right hand while still holding the plant-sewn cover and entered the hole in the ground, the roots of the tree visible inside and glowing, brighter than ever before. 

Liam realized that the tree had redirected a big portion of the electricity into the soil, a very conductive soil now that he thought about it, or it was the roots or both. It wasn't the time to idle on the unique alien flora biology or soil composition.

"Fuck.", he swore as he closed behind him, and walked farther, the air inside was hot and electric but it was better than outside in the middle of one the highest class of thunderstorms.

In front of him, one of the roots glow brighter, his eyes widened as he thought it was going to explode but it dimmed and the next instant he felt a painful shock similar to needles pricking his nerves through his feet. It was the same sensation as outside but less intense.

Not even half a second later the muffled sound of thunder echoed. The current was somewhat constant, making it harder to move but far from impossible.

It only stopped when he neared the end of the tunnel. Sitting down, back against a wood beam, Liam breathed in and out trying to calm down his sizzling anger.

Images of the chaos and damage brought down by the thunderstorm upon his base kept flashing in his mind. While he could stay underground and wait, just like after he killed the great austrapede.

The neural link with Gladius curled in a ball shivering was what snapped him back to the present at his hands and let him have a breather. Petting the bird's head with his right hand, sighing Liam slammed the back of his head against the wood beam and then groaned.

"Right… It's just material lost at worst and most of what was truly important is in or durable enough… But… Argg! Fuck it's still my shit!", Liam rationalized, but with clear frustration as anyone would have in such a situation. 

Gazing at the roots in the distance they slowly dimmed as they discharged most of their energy through their surroundings. At that moment he couldn't help but think that he would need to build an underground base in the future.

*

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