The recording paused mid explosion, alien metal and technology filling the screen. A series of clicking emerged from the being watching. The recording was a week old, sent in by a ship of Blooded Yautja returning back from a hunt.
It intrigued her. What could cause a Yautja to destroy his own ship? Their ship was considered a sacred place, one they made their own to fill with their trophies. Yet as the recording showed the ship was not destroyed as an act of battle, but rather triggered from the planet.
Curious.
The planet was a game preserve, a land for kv'var, the hunt. It was often used when the most favored hunts were out of season, to hone ones skills.
Those of Blooded rank were not permitted to land on the planet; only those above it were allowed. The planet was a privilege for the most successful of hunters.
She crossed her legs and trilled, it had been a while since anything besides a hunt had caught her interest.
Her claws moved over the controls, making clicking noises as she did.
She would investigate this; after all she was an Elite hunter.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
They had been doing well. They were surviving, hunting. Isabelle had killed her first Hunter. Her aim was impeccable; the bullet blew through the brain leaving the mask unharmed.
Just as they had wanted. Noland had been smart to take one, it was a big help. The camouflage hid them from the other Predators, giving them a chance at rest when they needed it.
The next round of humans brought in didn't last long. Half of the group was killed the first day. Isabelle had wanted to warn them, to tell them what was to come, but in the end she didn't.
They were too loud. At first they had been disturbed by that fact. Royce had turned away after Isabelle had voiced the fact. It was true though. They had a better chance of survival by sticking together than with a group.
The newest trio of hunters didn't know they were alive, which gave them the advantage. A small one but an advantage none the less.
She had taken down the smallest of the three when it had made a move on an unsuspecting soldier. Green blood had splattered over the woman's face making her scream in surprise, alerting the rest of the group who quickly game to her aid. When there was no sign of the other two hunters the duo had moved.
She and Royce silently made their way to the startled and agitated group. As expected they shot question after question, none of which were answered. As Isabelle had taken the mask from the Predator and anything else that she deemed necessary Royce stood guard. Eyeing the others with a cold glare, weapon at the ready.
He would shoot them down if they made a move towards him or Isabelle. It registered to Royce that at one point of time, he could have been hired on to fight side by side with one of these people. That was a void point now. Now all he needed was Isabelle. He had promised that he would get them off this planet one way or another and he was going to fulfill that promise. To do that though, he would turn his back on his own species. They would survive.
When she had lightly tapped him on the shoulder he nodded and they backed their way into the forest, disappearing from sight leaving a screaming and pissed group of people behind.
Isabelle and Royce would hear their dying screams later that night as they huddled in a cave by the waterfall not too far from the Predators camp. She had shivered and moved closer to Royce who in return held her close.
It was then that they saw the second ship land. Royce had muttered a curse and Isabelle felt her stomach drop to her toes. They had waited, barely breathing for any movement to come from the ship. Hours they sat like that, not moving, just watching the new ship. It was different than the others, sleeker and slightly bigger.
Nothing happened. Morning came and finally the two dared to move outside the cave to gather food and see if there was any ammo left behind from the fallen humans. It was a mistake. They walked straight into the remaining two Predators who had been going to investigate the ship.
They realized too late, not able to use the masks to help them. Had it been only one Predator they would have been fine. However this time there were two and they were pissed. The minute they saw the masks they threw their arms back and roared so loud it felt as though the ground beneath them trembled.
The battle had not lasted five minutes. They were quickly beaten down and taken back to the camp. Isabelle had been thrown into the pit while they took turns in beating down Royce.
It seemed that they were taking out their anger over the masks on him. One punch sent him flying over the pit and into a pile of bones. As one neared he grabbed the nearest bone and with a surge of adrenaline impaled the approaching Predator in the heart, killing it instantly.
The leader charged him with a roar, enraged that he had killed yet another of his kind. The impact had been painful and when he plummeted back down to the ground a snap surrounded in the area. They both knew that he had broken something on impact. They both knew that his injury would cost him his life.
Isabelle had screamed and howled, throwing anything and everything she could lay her hands on, trying to get the Predator's attention away from Royce to no avail. She could only watch as it reached forwards and picked her companion up by his neck.
It had been a good run, while it lasted, but they had reached the end. Royce knew that when the Predator's wrist blade slid out. He had stared at the metal as the Predator raised it high, preparing to slice through him. At the last second his eyes turned to Isabelle, who held his gaze.
The Predator swung his blade down...
...and froze as a second wrist blade punctured through his chest, spewing green blood over Royce.
"S'yuitde."
Feeling the grip loosen on his neck Royce took the chance to push away from his captor, falling back onto his rear he dragged himself away to watch as the hunter died.
When the dead Predator's body fell Royce and Isabelle finally had a chance to look at the newest one.
Their mouths went dry and they forgot how to form words for a moment. The new hunter...
...looked entirely too human.
Her skin was covered with scars but it was tan and smooth, just like theirs. She was tall, maybe taller than Royce, but she had a slender build that was packed with muscle. She wore a mask and her armor was just a cloth that covered her breasts, with a mesh like material over it that went a little past her navel. The difference with her armor was not that it was made for a female...but it had skulls hanging from the waist. This hunter was much more skilled than the others.
Her wrist blade slid back into place and Royce saw that her skin wasn't like theirs as he first thought. A huge patch of scaling covered the middle of her stomach, arms, and legs. The coloring was black, with hints of red.
She may look human, but she wasn't. She was one of them, and she was a threat.
"Human."
The statement was followed by a series of clicking that immediately put Isabelle on edge. Her gun was on the ledge above the pit, she hated this fucking thing, if she could just grab it...
"No more hunt."
Royce and Isabelle locked eyes, both thinking the same thing.
Could this be our way out?
Slowly the hunter reached up and took her mask off.
She had black hair that was held up much like the male hunters before her. Red war paint, or at least what they assumed to be war paint, was smeared across her eyes. Her face held the characteristics of a Native American woman. With a few exceptions. Her eyes were the same molten gold color that the other hunters had. More scales were on her forehead, giving her a very intimidating look. A pity because she was quite pretty.
"Take you back...to Earth."
"Yes. We," He said pointing to Isabelle who was still in the damn pit. "want to go back. To Earth."
She nodded and walked over to the pit where Isabelle was and reached down to give Isabelle her hand. The sniper hesitated, looking to Royce who after a moment nodded, then firmly slid her hand into the offered one.
She was lifted easily by the other woman who didn't seem to give any effort in moving her.
"Stay. Must look around n'ithya." Then she walked away from the two to observe items from the camp. Touching things here and there, emitting a low growl time from time, all the while with her mask held by her hip.
Isabelle made her way to Royce and examined his leg, as she touched it he grunted.
"It's broken."
She looked up at him and after a moment of silence nodded. "Shit."
"Hey, it's ok though." He grunted and she reached out to touch his face.
"We're going home. It's over."
He seemed to mull those words over before finally sighing. "It's over." He let a small smile and leaned against her palm, kissing it slightly.
"We're going home."
A moment passed before the huntress returned. Her face was turned into that of a scowl, her gaze darkened on the hunter she had slain.
"Tarei Hsan." She growled as she bent forwards, and seemingly without trouble, hoisted the dead hunter over her shoulder. Turning her gaze to the two humans she motioned with her head towards her ship. "Come, we leave now."
Isabelle scrambled to her feet and helped Royce stand. The trek to her ship was short but painful for Royce as they had to climb over a few rocky areas to make it to the sleek craft. Upon entry Royce realized just how different it was from the one he had been in, and then left to get Isabelle, previously.
While the other had been dark and perilous looking, this one was dimly lit and while not welcoming, seemed to be a bit less dangerous. The two followed, more like hobbled in Royce's case, behind the tall female. She led them down a hallway to a door that opened when she stepped in front of it. Motioning for the two to enter they were welcomed with the sight of a table, a massive table, and chairs that were just as massive. It was circular and behind it was another door like the one they just passed through. There were also two more of the doors, one to the left and another to the right.
"Sit. No more harm." Shifting the massive hunter on her shoulder she walked over to the door to the right, which also opened as she neared, and disappeared from their sight. Deciding it was probably best to do what they were told the two made their way over to the table and sat down in the chairs. Royce shifted in his and hissed as his leg pulled the wrong way.
"Damn it." Isabelle chuckled at his profanity and after a moment he grinned at her. As her chuckles died down Isabelle let out a yawn and Royce found he followed after.
"Sleep, I'll stay awake." He said gruffly, making Isabelle roll her eyes. "You're just as tired as I am."
"Yeah," he said chuckling. "but you don't have a broken leg to keep you awake." He said motioning to his leg. When Isabelle didn't answer he sighed.
"I'll take care of you, don't worry." Isabelle visibly relaxed back into the chair. "Alright." She said before quirking an eyebrow at him. "Don't do anything crazy."
Royce rolled his eyes before motioning to his leg. "Don't worry, I'm not going anywhere."
Isabelle smiled at him. "Good."
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
An'ika was pissed. These Yautja had no clan markings or ranking, meaning they were bad bloods. Bad bloods who were hunting on a planet saved for only those honored to use it. Not only that, they were hunting younger, non ranked Yautja as prey. She grabbed the dead bad blood by its mandible and jerked the head down.
He was deformed. Instead of the normal Yautja facial structure, this one had an elongated head, and an even wider mouth. His eyes were also larger than a normal Yautja's. Which means that this bad blood had been experimenting with his body in order to become stronger. Yet these modifications had deformed him, while leaving him stronger also marked him out from the others of his species.
He wasn't the only one to have done this though. The second Hunter, the one the human male had killed was also deformed such as this one. Their camp had shown that they had been doing this for a while. Three staying and hunting until they were killed and another batch sent in.
Her blood boiled at the signs of younger less experienced hunters being tortured by the deformed ones. An honorable Yautja did not hunt his own kind unless they were bad bloods, the dishonored, and even then it was a task that most did not want.
Yautja were a close community, when one needed something a clan mate would provide. If they were not off planet, then most of a Yautja's time was spent with the clan. Often times it was spent with the males avoiding the anger of the females, whose temper and strength was legendary.
Still...
Many skulls were at the camp site. Human, Yautja, and other species that they have hunted in the past. All put around the camp as trophies, just like an honored hunter would do. She spat on the corpse. He was not worth her time, she should not have needed to go to that hunting reserve. He should not have been there. He was unworthy of both the planet and her time. Her curiosity that led her to the planet soon turned to disgust.
She needed to alert the clan to this, the council members were going to be furious. She could already see the way their mandibles would flare and their backs would arch. They would send a team to hunt and kill the rest of the bad bloods that were no doubt going to be sent down to the planet.
Letting go of his deformed face she walked out of the door and into the hall where she leaned against the hall. Slowly she rubbed her temples to ease the ache that her anger had caused. She could faintly hear the humans talking in the eating room. They had fought against a dishonored Yautja, quite a few of them she imagined, and won. That was enough to send them home, back to Earth.
They were probably hungry and both were injured. Pushing off the wall she reached back into the room that the bad blood was in and grabbed a medical supply kit from the wall and made her way back towards the eating room.
The male, although he hid it well, tensed back up when she entered the room. The female was sleeping and An'ika knew that though she appeared to be in deep sleep, a word from her companion would more than likely wake her.
"Hurt. Fix." She said motioning first to him then to the bag. He eyed her untrustingly. He nodded towards the bag as she put it on the table.
"Why don't you open that up first before you come any closer?" She felt a flash of irritation. If she had wanted to kill them she would have done so without them even realizing she was there. She had let them on her ship for pauk's sake! That alone was an honor itself.
As if sensing her irritation the male pushed farther back into his seat and eyed her with a new colder look. This amused her. He thought to intimidate her. She chuckled with made his eyes darken even more. She did not know fear; it was a foreign emotion that she had never experienced in all her long life.
"Are you really taking us to Earth? Or are you going to drop us off on another one of those planets to be hunted?" He would assume that she was a bad blood? A dishonored hunter? The flesh around her skull tightened as her body registered her fury, making her hair stick up further and her lip curl.
"No Bad Blood." She closed her hand into a fist and crossed it over her chest. "Honorable." With a few angry trills she pushed a button on her wrist computer and a holographic image of Earth appeared. This seemed to placate him some.
She gave him a dirty look to show she was displeased with his actions and reached for the bag again after the image disappeared.
"Fix now, then food." Her mother had been human, which makes the language easier for her to learn than most others, but compared to her native Yautja language it was still a bothersome thing to use. It had too many words in it. However the idea behind food was the same in every species and her anger quickly died away as she saw a very small light go off in his eyes when she mentioned the word food.
"It's broken." He motioned to his leg as it hung limply from the chair. She gazed at it for a moment. She didn't have to heal his leg; she could just lock them in a room and render them unconscious for the rest of the journey then dump them when they arrived. She could...but she wouldn't. She would fix his leg and let them eat.
"Hurt." He snorted at her and nodded. "Yeah it hurts like hell." She shook her head and motioned for him to lift his leg up to the table. After a moment filled with a pain filled groan he lifted his injured leg up to the table. She grabbed a needle and a sharp blade from the bag, to which the male promptly turned pale.
"What are you doing?" He growled at her, alerting the female who awoke with a start. "Royce? What's going on?" She noticed An'ika and shot to her feet, hand diving to the gun on her back. An'ika's blood boiled and in her anger she threw her head back and roared, long and loud.
The females of her species were stronger and bigger than the males, making the males respect them with a healthy dose of something akin to fear. One wrong move and a male could get sent through a wall and into the medical bay for a few days much to the laughter of the others. So when she roared, even though a half-breed the males cowered before her just as they did with the full-blooded females.
As she wanted the female dropped her gun back onto her back and covered her ears, keeping them like that well after An'ika had stopped her roar. When the female finally turned her eyes to An'ika she pointed to the male. "Fix. Heal." When it seemed like she still didn't understand the male, Royce, turned to her. "I think our friend here wants to fix my leg Isabelle."
Isabelle snorted. "Then what does she need the knife for?" The two humans looked to her in explanation. Pointing to Royce's leg she put her two fists together than forced them in and upwards motion. Isabelle nodded. "It's broken we know." An'ika then pointed to the strangely colored liquid filled needle. Motioning to her skin she shook her head, waiting for them to understand. Finally it was Royce who did.
"It won't work on the skin." Pleased An'ika nodded then pointed to the scalpel and back to Royce's leg. "She has to cut the skin open. Fuck." Pleased that they understood her she gave a slight purr. Royce sighed and rubbed his hands over his face. "Can you not numb it first?" Isabelle questioned as she moved behind Royce's chair.
An'ika shook her head. "H'ko. Slow heal." Isabelle frowned. "How long will it take if you don't?" Isabelle slid her hand into Royce's and gave it a squeeze. An'ika couldn't seem to find the right words to say, so instead she held up two fingers. Isabelle's eyebrows shot up in surprise. "This will heal his leg in two days?" A nod. "Royce..."
"I know. Let's do this." Pleased that the male was going to participate willingly she motioned for Isabelle to get closer to him. "Hold down." Then without seeing if she did so or not An'ika retrieved her mask form the previous room she had been in. When she approached Royce the mask gave her a clear view of his injury...and how she could fix it. One of the two had pulled his pants up to his thigh, allowing her access to his lower leg, something she greatly appreciated. Resting a hand on his leg she gripped it with enough force to not allow him to move, but not enough to break his leg even further.
"Now." An'ika said, gripping the blade. "Now pain." She plunged the blade into his skin.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
"Will somebody please tell me what the hell is going on?" The director of S.H.E.I.L.D. stood with one hand on a desk and another on his gun. Any agent that walked by was awarded with a death stare that made them fear for their lives.
"Sir, it appears that a pyramid has been found." Maria Hill walked towards him without a care in the world, ignoring his death stare. "Why the hell should I care about some Pyramid, Hill? We have plenty of them already." The woman, much to her credit, didn't flinch under her boss's bark.
"Sir this Pyramid isn't like the ones we already know of. This one is off the coasts of Antarctica on a small island that is several miles out from the continent." Fury rolled his one eye and crossed his arms. "Again Hill why should I care?"
Maria squared her shoulders and looked her Director straight in the eye. "Sir, not only is this pyramid under the ice, but it also seems to be of the same design that the late Charles Weyland and his company discovered. His group however was never found and the pyramid was destroyed seemingly in a matter of hours. The only survivor, a woman named Alexa Woods, claims that inside the pyramid they found a slumbering nest of aliens. Hostile ones sir."
Fury stared at her as he processed this information. While they would be the first ones to discover this pyramid others soon would as well. Sighing Fury nodded at Maria. "All right Hill, I want a team sent down there. I want to know for sure if this is the same kind of pyramid that Weyland discovered. If it is I want every single alien in there wiped out. If need be we'll blow the whole damn pyramid up." Hill nodded and backed away to get started on her work. "Oh and Hill?" The woman in question stopped to look back at him. "Sir?"
"Find Alexa Woods and bring her here. I want to know exactly what we're dealing with." Hill nodded and stalked off, issuing orders left and right leaving Fury to his thoughts. Sighing Fury rubbed his head, a headache was forming and for once it wasn't caused by any stupid stunt Stark had caused. Although one resounding thought echoed in his head.
I fucking hate aliens.
Yay! Thanks for reading! Tell me what you think! : ) ~Kanna