Miles Quaritch

**Colonel Miles Quaritch** was a RDA Security Operations commander, serving as the chief of security on Pandora in the early 2150s.

Serving as the senior RDA commander during the Pandoran War, he directed the destruction of the Omatikaya clan's Hometree and led SecOps forces in the Assault on the Tree of Souls, where he was killed in action by Neytiri at the age of 51. It was also around this point in time that Quaritch fathered a son named Miles "Spider" Socorro.

In 2170, Quaritch's duplicated consciousness was put into a 20-year-old Recom under Project Phoenix. He was chosen as the commander of the 1st Recom Squad. Upon arriving on Pandora, he was ordered by General Frances Ardmore to hunt down and kill Jake Sully for his role as the leader of the Na'vi insurgency and the strategic raids he had been leading against the RDA.

## History

### Before Pandora and First Days

Quaritch was born in the year 2102 or 2103. Before joining SecOps, Colonel Quaritch served as an infantry officer in the United States Marine Corps. He saw combat in numerous Earth military engagements without injury, most notably three tours in Nigeria with the Marines' First Reconnaissance Battalion.

On his first day on Pandora, an encounter with the wildlife dealt him a trio of trademark scars to the right side of his head and face. He was given the option to return home to Earth for reconstructive surgery but opted to stay on Pandora. With his impressive record, he was eventually chosen as the chief of security operations on Pandora.

### Chief of Security (*Avatar*)

Quaritch was the chief of security for at least two years. He was responsible for the security of the RDA operation and its personnel, which necessitated keeping the Na'vi in check. He had his own Dragon Assault Ship, which was personalized with an orange-colored Chinese dragon painted below the cockpit. During this time Quaritch also included a sexual relationship with one of his scorpion pilots named Paz Socorro which resulted with the birth of a son named Miles Socorro shortly before the Assault on the Tree of Souls.

Quaritch was impressed by Jake Sully and made Jake a bargain that, in return for intelligence on the Na'vi, he would talk to the RDA corporate executives and get approval for Jake to receive the expensive treatment for his spinal injury, which would return the use of his legs. However, as time passed, Quaritch began to question where Jake's loyalties lay, becoming suspicious that his contact with the Na'vi to be distancing him from his humanity and mission.

When Jake, in his avatar form, attacked and damaged a bulldozer, Quaritch personally went to arrest him. Quaritch, based upon Jake's video logs, which lamented the hopelessness of convincing the Omatikaya to leave Hometree, along with the report from Corporal Lyle Wainfleet that the Na'vi had retaliated for the destruction of the Trees of Voices by burning the bulldozers and killing the squad of troopers protecting them, came to the conclusion that the Omatikaya were a threat to the RDA's operation and could not be peacefully convinced to vacate their hometree. Quaritch personally led the operation that destroyed the Omatikaya's Hometree, first launching non-lethal gas canisters to force out the Na'vi, then ordering the destruction of the tree using missile strikes. Despite the attempt to flush out the Na'vi with gas, this operation resulted in the death of a number of Na'vi, including the Omatikaya's Clan Leader, Eytukan.

When Jake Sully, Grace Augustine, Norm Spellman and Trudy Chacón escaped custody, Quaritch was the first to act, moving outside of the Operations Center without an exo pack, attempting to stop their escape by firing on their SA-2 Sampson with a CARB Submachine Gun and his Wasp sidearm. He fatally wounded Dr. Augustine, but failed to stop the team from escaping Hell's Gate.

### Assault on the Tree of Souls and death

Quaritch devised the Assault on the Tree of Souls as a means to permanently sever the Na'vi's connection with Eywa and to decisively end the Pandoran War. He personally led the operation against the Na'vi in his Dragon Assault Gunship. While the Na'vi's numbers initially appeared to give them the advantage, Quaritch's heavily armed and well trained SecOps soldiers quickly dispatched the lightly-armed Na'vi, despite some losses. During the battle, while pursuing Jake, his gunship was attacked by the rebel Trudy in a stolen SA-2 Samson, allowing Jake to escape being killed. Quaritch's gunship was able to destroy the Samson and killed Trudy. Advancing relatively unopposed towards the Tree of Souls, the tide of the battle is unexpectedly changed when Pandora's wildlife, seemingly at the direction of Eywa herself, attacked RDA forces in mass. With all escorts distracted or destroyed, Jake was able to board the Valkyrie shuttle containing two "daisy cutter" bombs, and destroyed it, leaving only Quaritch in his Dragon gunship. Despite Quaritch's best efforts, Jake still managed to inflict catastrophic damage to the gunship, causing it to lose control. Boarding his AMP suit, Quaritch jumped from the Dragon before it crashed.

Now alone, Quaritch advanced to the Tree of Souls, where he stumbled across the module containing the link pod being used by Jake, but was attacked by Neytiri riding a thanator before he could destroy it. He lost control of the GAU-90, but killed the thanator with his AMP suit knife, leaving Neytiri trapped beneath her slain mount. Jake's timely arrival caused Quaritch to focus on him, saving Neytiri. Using the bayonet of the wrecked GAU-90, Jake was able to deflect Quaritch's attacks in a fierce bout of melee combat long enough to destroy his AMP suit knife and land a piercing blow to the glass canopy.

The damage to the AMP suit canopy reduced visibility to near-zero and allowed toxic Pandoran air into the suit, forcing Quaritch to don an exopack. Realizing Jake's same weakness, Quaritch made a break for the module and managed to smash a window and an empty link unit open before resuming combat. This exposed Jake's human body to the toxic air, interrupting the link between Jake and his avatar, allowing Quaritch to subdue Jake. He picked up Jake by his hair, intending to use Jake's own dagger to cut his avatar's throat in a symbolic act of retribution for his betrayal of humanity. However, before Quaritch could do so, Neytiri, who had taken the time to free herself from under the thanator's carcass during the fight between Jake and Quaritch, fired two arrows into the Colonel's chest, ending Quaritch's life.

### Recombinant (*Avatar: The Way of Water*)

Before the death of his human body, Quaritch's memories were backed up using a Soul Drive. A Recom body for Quaritch was engineered on Earth and was sent to Pandora in an amnio tank in the ISV Vindicator. On the roughly 6-year transit, a daily dose of proprioceptive neuromuscular simulators conditioned, matured and strengthened his new body. His identity and memory were uploaded from the previously created backup on the Soul Drive. As a result, the Recom can only remember events that occurred before the person underwent the backup process. The Recom Quaritch has no memory of human Quaritch's death. He now serves as the commander of the 1st Recom Unit with Lyle Wainfleet as his lieutenant, although he is outranked by Frances Ardmore.

At the moment of awakening in his new Recom body, Quaritch is terrified and confused and attacks the doctors and his colleagues before realizing that he is in a blue body. He watches a recording made by the human Quaritch before the assault on the Tree of Souls, in which he asks his Recom version to take revenge on Jake Sully. While still in Pandora's orbit, before boarding the shuttle and landing on the moon, Quaritch conducts a briefing for his new squad, beginning with the same words he used to greet the newcomers in his original body: "You're not in Kansas anymore." He explains the objectives of future missions, paying special attention to the fact that they have been reborn in the bodies of their enemies, which, however, are better adapted to the environment of Pandora.

They then board a shuttle and land at the Bridgehead base. There, Quaritch is greeted by general Frances Ardmore, the new manager of the RDA's interests on Pandora. She informs him of the new goals of human operations on Pandora, which this time are focused on colonizing the planet, as Earth is now virtually uninhabitable. She tasks the Recom group with the task of pacifying the Na'vi so that they do not pose a threat to the colonists. Ardmore shows Quaritch footage of native attacks on RDA industrial and transportation facilities, including footage of the recent train attack by the Omatikaya led by Jake Sully. Quaritch recognizes his old enemy and decides to find him, which becomes the main objective of his Recom team's mission.

### The Search for Jake Sully

The team heads into the jungle, Quaritch and his 1st Recom squad visit Site 26. Quaritch grimly discovered his decomposed remains, pierced with Neytiri's distinctive arrows, and crushes his own skull. The Recoms easily capture Jake's nearby children. Quaritch identifies Spider as the son of his human counterpart. Although Jake and Neytiri attempt to rescue their children, the Recom squad abducts Spider.

Aboard the command ship, RDA scientists unsuccessfully attempt to coerce information about Jake from Spider via mental torture. Changing tack, Quaritch approaches Spider and asks for his aid in understanding the Na'vi and their culture in exchange for avoiding further torture. Although uncooperative, and unaware of Quaritch's assassination mission, Spider does grudgingly agree to assist Quaritch. With Spider's goading, Quaritch and his remaining Recom squad are able to successfully bond with ikran mounts.

When he learns Jake and his family retreated to the oceans of Pandora, Quaritch allies with a whaling vessel hunting tulkuns for their brain enzymes to find them. Using brute force to interrogate the aquatic Na'vi and mercilessly killing several tulkuns does he track down Jake after his children rescue Payakan, the rogue tulkun who was being tracked by the whalers. Quaritch offers to spare his hostages if Jake surrendered himself. However, the whalers are intercepted by Payakan damaging their main vessel, causing it to capsize. Jake leads a successful attack against the whalers, killing a majority of them, at the cost of Neteyam's life, his eldest son.

Once Jake manages to reach Quaritch, he holds Kiri hostage, taunting Jake for betraying and murdering his own kind. However, Neytiri also holds Spider hostage, who Quaritch at first denies as his son, only to desist when Neytiri cuts Spider's chest. After a long fight, Jake ultimately defeats Quaritch by strangling him to unconsciousness, letting his body sink into the water. Spider, however, chooses to rescue his father and drags him out of the sunken vessel and onto land. Quaritch begs his son to come with him, but Spider refuses and rejoins Jake's family, leaving an injured and weakened Quaritch to fly away on his banshee.

## Appearance

Quaritch had the appearance of a lifelong military man. He wore his hair short and was covered with battle scars, most notably a trio of claw marks on the side of his head which he sustained during his first day on Pandora.

His Recombinant body was similar to that of an avatar, being 9 ft tall and having a queue, tail, four fingers, and eyebrows, but also had more characteristics of his human counterpart than an avatar would. It was given the same tattoos and hairstyle as the original Quaritch, though his hair was now more black, but it lacked the battle scars. Like the original Quaritch, he rarely wears anything else than military attire.

## Personality

Miles Quaritch looked and acted like a lifelong military man. He wore his hair short and was covered with battle scars, most notably a trio of claw marks on the side of his head which he sustained during his time on Pandora. He valued brute force and dominance and his long-running military career was representative of his personality. He regularly worked out to offset the low gravity on Pandora so he did not get soft. He was in outstanding physical condition, despite being middle-aged, and he was known to leave his exopack back in his base for short periods when entering combat in the poisonous atmosphere of Pandora when he felt the situation demanded it. An expert with his AMP suit, he was still familiar with combat techniques as demonstrated by his marksmanship, hand-to-hand and melee combat skills; he can even use his knife combat skills.

Quaritch was apathetic and callous towards the Na'vi due to their resistance against the RDA. He would refer to the Na'vi as aboriginals, savages, "dumb bastards" and also compared them to roaches. He actually had some faith in them, saying he bet they would be willing to evacuate Hometree. He told Parker that the evacuation of Hometree would be humane "more or less" with minimal casualties and they would use tear gas first. He was surprised when the Na'vi began to fire back with arrows, causing him to authorize destroying their Hometree using incendiaries, killing numerous Na'vi in the process. After it was over, he saw his actions as merely a mission and remained mostly indifferent about the destruction. He also seemed very concerned about the idea of race. When he fought Jake, he called him a race betrayer and when he was a Recom, he tried to claim he did not care about Spider being killed due to them being different species.

Despite his menacing actions towards the Na'vi, Quaritch was not completely evil and had some redeemable qualities. Quaritch believed he was fighting for humanity's future and he took care of his own, and had good relations with his SecOps soldiers, who respected him as a commander and leader. As a Recom, Quaritch also cared for his Recom crew. However, he also acknowledged during an initial briefing that he would not be able to save all of those he was charged with protection, due to Pandora's harsh environment. He showed great admiration for the dedication Jake showed by willingly performing covert intelligence gathering from within the Na'vi people, and he promised to repay Jake by paying for his spinal operation. Although he threatened Jake, there are various instances during their conflicts where Jake began fighting first. For example, when he threatened to kill the Sully family, Jake had the opportunity to escape but instead said "let's get it done" and attacked first.

Upon becoming a Recom, Quaritch remained mostly the same in many ways and didn't seem to take much issue with his new body rather than be surprised and he did adopt a few Na'vi mannerisms such as speaking their native language and bonding with an ikran. He believes that understanding one's enemy is key to victory and so he feels one step close to defeating them already. In rare instances, he also displayed a sense of mercy, as demonstrated when he spared the life of the Ta'unui Tsahìk and chose not to kill Kiri when Neytiri used Spider as a hostage against him.

## Abilities

Quaritch was an outstanding soldier and a deadly opponent in combat. He claimed to have survived three tours of Nigeria without a scratch. Quaritch was an expert marksman, managing to fatally wound Grace Augustine during the avatar team's escape from Hell's Gate. He's also shown to have a high tolerance for pain, easily ignoring his shoulder when it was set on fire.

His prowess in close range combat was also considerable as it took the combined efforts of Jake and Neytiri to finally defeat him. Quaritch was an expert with his AMP suit, which made him even more lethal due to the protection the suit provided. He killed Neytiri's thanator during their encounter, stabbing it several times with his AMP suit knife.

## Relationships

### Family

#### Paz Socorro

Quaritch had a sexual relationship with Paz Socorro, one of his scorpion pilots around a year before the banishment of the RDA from Pandora which resulted with the birth of a son named Miles Socorro which Paz apparently named after the boy's father. Any details on their relationship, such as if lasted until her death, are unknown.

#### Miles "Spider" Socorro

Although the Recom Quaritch admits that Spider is technically not his real son, he still feels a degree of compassion and empathy towards the boy's welfare. Despite his ruthless nature, he consistently shows attachment towards Spider. For example, when the boy is tortured to reveal his family's location, Quaritch is shown to be visibly upset and quickly intervenes, convincing the scientists to allow him to get the information through different means. The two bond during their months together, especially as Spider tutors Quaritch into the Na'vi language. Spider is able to talk the Recom out of murdering a Na'vi. Quaritch ends up freeing Kiri as a hostage to prevent the boy from being harmed by Neytiri. Spider later begrudgingly rescues the Recom from drowning. The Recom calls Spider his son and offers him to come with him, but Spider runs off.

### Friends and Allies

#### Lieutenant Lyle Wainfleet

Quaritch appeared to get along well with Corporal Lyle Wainfleet, sending him to examine a squad that had been killed by the Na'vi as revenge for the destruction of the Trees of Voices, and referred to him by his first name while Wainfleet gave the report. Wainfleet was loyal to Quaritch and was in command of some of the ground forces during the assault on the Tree of Souls while Quaritch had overall command.

Wainfleet is also brought back as an Recombinant as one of SecOps' most loyal and trusted soldiers. Wainfleet remains loyal to Quaritch and the RDA by serving as Quaritch's lieutenant in the 1st Recom Squad during their hunt for the Sully family. He is also the only confirmed member in the squad to survive the final battle with the Metkayina, along with Quaritch.

#### Parker Selfridge

Quaritch and his boss, RDA Administrator Parker Selfridge, appeared to have a good relationship and a mutual liking for each other, however Quaritch's more dominate presence greatly undermines Parker's authority over him and isn't afraid to disregard his orders, as shown by his deliberate escalation of forcing the Na'vi to leave Hometree, leading to massive casualties. While Parker just wanted the Na'vi to leave the Hometree so they could mine, Quaritch planned the destruction of the Hometree, although Selfridge was not as ruthless as Quaritch and was concerned that killing the Na'vi would look bad on the RDA's report on Earth. Quaritch manipulated Parker that he would force the Na'vi to leave the Hometree in a humane way. However, he purposefully escalated the disaster, leading scores of Na'vi were killed in the assault, and Selfridge, unlike Quaritch, became more reluctant to proceed with any further attacks on the Na'vi.

Recom Quaritch was watching a video in which Parker and human Quaritch were teasing each other while Parker was explaining Recombinants. Quaritch seemed annoyed.

### Enemies and Rivals

#### Jake Sully

When Jake first arrived on Pandora, Quaritch was very interested in him, as Jake was both in the Avatar Program and a former Marine, much like Colonel Quaritch. Quaritch soon made an offer to Jake, that if he gained intelligence on the Na'vi, Quaritch would speak to the RDA executives about paying for Jake to have an operation to fix his spinal injury and regain the ability to walk. Jake at first agreed, and willingly gave Quaritch intelligence about Hometree and the Tree of Souls. Quaritch was impressed by Jake, and the two shared a mutual respect, only until Sully began to show a noticeable affection for the Na'vi. This led Quaritch to start questions Jake about his loyalty after he did not report in to him for two weeks. Their relationship changed after Jake assaulted an RDA bulldozer and defected over to the Na'vi. During the assault on the Tree of Souls, they faced one another in combat and prior to his demise, Quaritch refused to stand down against Jake.

During Jake's comatose state in *Avatar: The Next Shadow*, Quaritch appears in Jake's dream as a giant living dead with the two arrows still in his chest, taunting Jake for only causing destruction as Jake still blames himself for the destruction of the Omatikaya Hometree.

After becoming a Recom, Quaritch became more ruthless and determined than ever before, calling Jake Sully out for his supposed betrayal. He sought to get to Jake through any means necessary. Quaritch would go so far as to threaten the lives of Jake's family, other Na'vi, and native wildlife all so he could get to him.

#### Neytiri

As with all the Na'vi, Quaritch viewed Neytiri with contempt and despise. Since she was the one who killed his human body during the Assault on the Tree of Souls, Quaritch holds a stronger animosity towards Neytiri, exclaiming that they have 'unfinished business' with each other after refering to Neytiri as "Mrs. Sully". Neytiri threatened Quaritch, exclaiming that she would kill him as many times as she had to, even calling him "demon". During the Skirmish at the Three Brothers, Quaritch reminded her that he owes her a death, hinting that he would try to seek revenge for what happened sixteen years ago.

#### Grace Augustine

Colonel Quaritch and Dr. Augustine were visibly opposite forces from the beginning, as their conception of Pandora was completely different. While Grace considered Pandora to be a miracle from her own scientific point, the Colonel considered the place just to be a wild planet full of deadly creatures that had to be exterminated. Also, they had little respect for each other, as both disagreed with the way that the Na'vi should be handled. Quaritch wanted to use military force to get the Na'vi to cooperate, Grace on the other hand was against any form of brutal force or aggression towards the locals. Grace was later shot by the Colonel while escaping from Hell's Gate with Jake, Norm and Trudy. She died of her injuries before she could be saved by the Omatikaya.

### Naruto Uzumaki

Despite being rivals, Quaritch is interested in Naruto and his past, but the two remain rivals after Naruto was informed of who he was by Jake.

### Boruto Uzumaki

Being the son of the Hokage, Quaritch is interested in his son but Boruto has a strong hatred for him

### Himawari Uzumaki

Being the daughter of the Hokage, Quaritch is interested in his daughter but Himawari has a strong hatred for him

### Kawaki

Kawaki began to hate him when he knew his intentions

### Kisame Hoshigaki

Quaritch is not the least bit intimidated by Kisame and his family and finds them interesting