Meredith Sharp

""At the time I had every intention of just doing my job like everyone else. But then, things changed." - Meredith Sharp, in Homecoming."

Meredith Sharp (born July 23rd, 2120) is a scientist who originally arrived on Pandora in the year 2151, roughly three years before the Final Battle between the RDA and the Na'vi clans. A trained geologist, energy specialist and Avatar Driver she had the responsibility of researching, analyzing and prospecting new areas to exploit for the much-desired mineral, unobtanium.

Early History
To begin with Meredith's story it must start before the beginning, roughly three years prior to the sixth coming of Toruk Makto, Jakesully. On Earth, and at age twenty-six, Meredith Sharp had finally finished her extensive avatar-driver training and with her strong academic accomplishments in geologic studies she was a great candidate for working in the interests of the Resources Development Administration, also known as the RDA. She made her five-year journey to Pandora to begin her work, and little did she know that such a world would bring about great personal change.

Meredith was put under the supervision of a specialist team for geologic survey research and development. Dr. Sullivan Mandu was her team leader, and six others (including herself) were under his jurisdiction for the work they were tasked with: it was even considered by some to be the next large-scale area of resource extraction (including, naturally, unobtainium). Dr. Mandu and his team were located to a new site (not quite dissimilar to Dr. Augustine's own Site 26) to begin the great task of wide-scan survey: the great expanse of the eastern coastline...the homeland of many Na'vi, also know as the Ikran Peoples.

Contact with these Na'vi was inevitable and the team of humans, using their abilities as avatar-drivers, attempt to communicate amicably with the locals. However they are cautious and wary of these "alien newcomers" to their lands; peace is settled between them but trust is another matter entirely. Meredith accepts this pact of tolerance between her people and the local Na'vi, but soon her innate curiosity for them grows.

It is this curiosity that her gradual desire to understand the Pandoran world manifests. She begins to expand her rudimentary knowledge of Na'vi language with diligence. Reading resource material on the Na'vi that is readily available to all RDA personnel leaves something to be desired to Meredith; it is clearly biased in some aspects against the Na'vi and she knows that, if she truly wishes to understand them she must do so first-hand.

This shift in focus, from working solely as a geologist under the supervision of their survey project, did not go unnoticed. Dr. Mandu in particular confronted her in an attempt to realign Meredith back to the task at hand; they were not scientists meant to study the Na'vi or any Pandoran life; what was important was getting the results the RDA wanted for the future of resource extraction in the region, nothing more. Nevertheless, Meredith was resistant.

Eventually the initial survey results were completed by Dr. Mandu's team. The findings were somewhat favorable, good news for his team's prospects of further work, but their data needed further research and from there the higher chain of command would decide the next step. Two team members were chosen to watch their research site while the rest would travel back to Hell's Gate with their findings; Meredith was one of them, and the other was Mason Gelrick. With the majority of the team's departure Meredith acquired a surplus of time to try and further her integration with the locals, free of being constantly under the eye of her team supervisor. Time passes, and although it is slow, Meredith is finally being allowed some trust by the Na'vi. She observes them intently and is also taught by-hand some of their ways of life.

But all is not as well as it would seem. Gelrick, suspicious of Meredith and her loyalties, begins to spy on her and reports his findings back to his superiors, thinking it prudent that they ought to know her true behavior. The prospect of Meredith becoming a liability to their project, and to the RDA as a whole, allows for paranoia to rise in Gelrick's thinking; tension rises between the two researchers as a result.

A confrontation is inevitable at this point; in his own avatar body, Gelrick approaches Meredith during her return to the site from the clan village. He tells her what he has done and that her role on the project is finished. Meredith is shocked, but her shock turns to anger and they begin an argument. He threatens her, claiming she has begun to turn savage by becoming so close to the Na’vi; this sets her off and they come to blows where she unwittingly wounds his avatar body badly in the fight. The shock ends up putting Gelrick into an induced coma due to the trauma and his avatar body is killed. In the aftermath of their confrontation Meredith realizes what she has done to him was grounds for imprisonment or banishment off of Pandora and it throws her into a panic. Her only choices at that point were self-imposed exile, or to appeal to the mercy of the Na'vi. Revealing the grand scope of the RDA’s intentions for the local clan’s land she offers, in exchange for their support, all her knowledge and efforts to thwart future RDA activity on their land and along the sea coast. After careful deliberation, they accept.

The Return to Hell's Gate
After almost four years of being removed from the RDA's authority Meredith, now a learned taronyu of an eastern sea clan, decided it was time to confront her past and see if there would be any way to mend her past transgressions. She traveled to Hell's Gate and was confronted by the doctor Riona O'Ceirin who listened to her story and how she came to be a part of the People after the schism she caused by her traitorous actions. O'Ceirin does not punish Meredith however, seeing it needless to pass judgment on her for actions against humans who no longer remained in Pandora. In the years that had passed since her departure many changes had come to Hell's Gate and the RDA; after the Final Battle and the frightening Kitwin Disease peace between the humans and the Na'vi seemed to have been achieved. Meredith is allowed back to the RDA with open arms to continue her previous position as a geologist.

Acceptance into the Omaticaya
The Spring Gathering in the year 2158 was a success. Hosted in the Grasslands to liven up the spirits of the Na'vi clans Meredith, along with other humans and Na'vi, participated in a number of events such as ikran and pa'li racing, as well as fishing contests. She makes a name for herself by winning the fishing contest and catching the feared dinicthoid. Meredith also makes some friends of the Omaticaya clan, such as with Sunu and Ayunil.

It is after the Gathering that Meredith, shouldered with her accomplishments and her past deeds with the sea clan, approached the Omaticaya Hometree and appeals to them for friendship. Loneliness from being away from the People inspired Meredith to try and make allies with one of the nearby clans in the jungles and, after some deliberation as well as some support from her newly made companions, the Omaticaya clan leaders grant her permission to stay and prove herself to the clan. In the months that follow Meredith stays with the Omaticaya and learns their ways, their stories and how to live in their forests. Her bonds with Sunu and Ayunil grow, creating strong friendships.

Current Events
With the new arrival of humans to Hell's Gate in the late summer of 2159, Meredith has finished her proposal on how the RDA can continue their mining of the unobtanium mineral. With the future of a permenant human colony becoming a reality on Pandora Meredith hopes that her work over the past year will yield positive results so that the RDA will continue to receive support from the Earth governments.

Outside of her responsibilities for her work as a geologist she has continued to be an active member of Na'vi society with the Omaticaya. She has even taken up new training to become a tsamsiyu through the instruction of Sunu's brother, Tompa. This new training is not without a deeper level of meaning, however; in the months prior Meredith has become a target of aggression by one of the Tipani's own warriors, Sorruk, for reasons she cannot fully understand. Be it a personal vendetta the Na'vi has against her, or because she is simply a Dreamwalker, Meredith knows that the Pandoran jungles had become much more deadly; she must prepare herself.

Appearance
Before her journey to Pandora Meredith appeared as a normal, typical Caucasian female, standing at around 5'7" and with an average weight at about 129 lbs. She is very thin for her height with no prominent bust or hips. Her musculature was of a fit person and her overall health was relatively normal. She has blond hair, gray eyes, and her nose is slightly crooked due to having it broken in her youth in an accident. Otherwise the rest of her is unremarkable.

In the years that followed after the incident with team mate Mason Gelrick it became difficult to keep her human body properly nourished and healthy, mostly due to lack of RDA support. Human food and supplies were in short supply and in present time her health is somewhat unstable but Meredith has tried to acclimate her body to take more Pandoran types of food. She is also more susceptible to respiratory agitation and illness due to using the same Exopack to breathe over an extended period. She has lost weight and musculature due to consistent and long period use in the link bed.

Now however, after being back within Hell's Gate for the past year, she has been able to receive a more adequate diet and has regained some of her health back.

Her Avatar is a bit more unique in that she dresses in more typical Na'vi fashion than that of the usual clothing meant for drivers to wear. She has adorned her body in various and identifiable Ikran Na'vi dress, as well as blending in some Omaticaya textiles into her wardrobe. Her dark brown hair is braided with sea animal bone and shells. Around her neck, arms and about her waist are leather-bound accessories and jewelry also made of shell beads, feather and stone. Her ears are not pierced. Meredith has adopted the standard loincloth, leather belts and also possesses a hunter's knife. Her bow is typically strapped in place on her ikran, Tezu, when she is in flight and almost always brings it with her when she ventures out into the jungle. What is perhaps most unique to her is the use of red ocher body paint that she puts on parts of her body and her face most every day in two horizontal stripes across her cheeks. This is a habit she adopted while living in the east by the sea and to this day she uses it to identify her home clan.

Personality
In the years since coming to Pandora Meredith has had to adapt in order to survive. Leaving the familiarity of Earth for the lush and deceptively dangerous moon five light years from home, she has morphed from a curious young woman with a love of geology to a budding hunter of the Na'vi.

Despite having undergone the perilous tasks of becoming a trusted and fledged member of a clan, Meredith knows all-too well the human emotions of fear, guilt and doubt. She does not know if she will ever become a good Na'vi hunter, despite her accomplishments, and every day she is reminded of her human identity and past despite the years that have passed.

But there are moments when she can be at peace with herself, such as looking to the other moons in the Pandoran sky, or overlooking the sea from atop of a cliff's edge. And even around the village hearth where her fellow clan mates socialize and communicate. Then, she is one with herself. The self-doubt and concerns of what the future will bring fade into the back of her mind, and she accepts the new life the Na'vi have given her. Her abilities and strengths at being Na'vi are ever-improving while at the same time her responsibilities as a geologist for the RDA are ever-growing. Even now she still feels herself walking along the edge of what it means to be human, or Na'vi.