Scene: Great Council Fire – North Pacific Coast, Near the Old Village of Alert Bay
A cedar longhouse crackles with sacred firelight. The smell of salmon, cedar smoke, and sweetgrass fills the air. Jake Sully, still wearing his ceremonial Na’vi beads, sits cross-legged beside Trevor Carpenter, who wears a woven robe patterned with eagles and waves. Around them, elders and youth listen in silence.
Jake Sully (calm and direct):
Trevor…
I’ve seen a lot in two worlds.
I’ve seen what happens when trust is broken… and what happens when it’s never honored to begin with.
So let’s talk real.
What are you going to do about the Indian Trust Fund?
That money’s been sitting there for generations—collected from land leases, oil royalties, stolen time.
But barely a dime ever reached the people.
Trevor Carpenter (speaking low, but with fire):
You’re right, Jake.
It’s blood money that sat in American vaults, gathering dust while our kids drank from poisoned rivers and our grandmothers buried their languages.
So here’s my plan:
I’m not using it for pipelines or bureaucrats.
I’m using it to throw the largest Potlatch the Pacific Coast has ever seen.
Gasps ripple among the crowd. A young Gitxsan boy grins wide.
Trevor (rising to his feet):
We’ll feed thousands.
We’ll raise poles again, carved with truth.
We’ll give away wealth, not hoard it—like our ancestors did before the Potlatch Ban.
We’ll sing our titles back into the land.
We’ll make the ancestors proud—and remind Ottawa and Washington both:
This wealth was never yours.
Jake (smiling):
Now that…
That’s how a real Chief of all Chiefs moves.
With memory, not vengeance.
With feasts, not bombs.
That’s civilization.
The drums begin. A young woman begins to sing in Kwakʼwala. The fire flares brighter. And somewhere far away, a trust fund ledger trembles in its silence.