Cave
Hick's head was pounding like crazy as he came about. At first, he thought it was from the blow of the spear, then he saw that it was not the case. Opening his eyes, he saw that he was hanging, upside down. His arms were hanging under his head, they were tied together, and so were his feet by which he hung. It was incredibly uncomfortable, and the worst part was that all his gear was gone. Dangling by his feet Hicks looked around, but found himself alone in something that looked like a natural cavern. His feet were tied with some sort of natural material that could probably be cut off with a knife… if he only had one! He tried looking around some more, but his feet hurt so much he stopped moving. Instead he slowly rotated around by the rope by which he hung. At least the cave looked inhabited.
He continued to rotate, but was then appalled when something began appearing in his field of sight. It was something that was hanging from the ceiling. Hicks' mouth opened, and then closed. He just stared at the red apparition in front of himself. Was it… human? Was it Turner? Stripped of his skin? Hicks could not blink before the thing had rotated out of his sight. He looked up and realized that he was actually hanging himself. That thought made his head almost explode. Was it these other aliens, were they responsible for this? Would they skin him next?! Before he could do anything, something heavy seemed to jump down into the cave from an opening higher up. Another thump was heard. So they were two… Hicks remembered Gabriel's words. Slowly he began coming within sight of them. And as he saw them… although he was upside down… he could not be sure they were prettier than the Xenomorphs… At least the Xenos were perfected for killing; the aliens in front of him looked…ragtag. They were…grunting at him? He could not explain the noises any better!
"What do you want?" He tried. One of them hissed at him. For a while they seemed to eat something they had in their crates. Hicks tried to untangle his hands, but they were tied too hard. It felt like he could go back into unconsciousness at any time, every part of him was hurting and pounding by the unnatural position. Knowing he would not wake up again if the lost consciousness, he gathered his remaining powers and flexed himself upwards. He grabbed his feet, feeling his eyesight improving as his head drained of the excess blood. He looked back at the two aliens… did they have hair? Or was it something else…? He now saw that they wore masks. Both of them looked at him and said something, the one posing as a leader brandished a knife. They both approached him.
For a moment, Hicks felt fear crawling through him, but then, he began to smile. Finally he broke out into a laughter, looking first at the two aliens, who looked angry about his laughter, and then behind them, where a Xenomorph had raised its razor sharp tail at one of the aliens. As it plunged its tail through him, Hicks fell down on the other alien, pulling the knife from his big bulky hand. It probably worked because he managed to take it in the second the alien was preoccupied with the fate of his partner. Hicks once again bent upwards and began filing at the rope. For a minute or so he completely focused on the task, oblivious to the raging fight below him. And then, he fell.
As he opened his eyes, his head was pounding, just not as bad as it had before. It was real physical pain now, from the fall. He looked over at the two aliens, they were still battling! Such stamina was non-human… He got up on his knees, feeling the water from the cave floor running down from his hair. He thought about that old saying that one could drown in a puddle of water, feeling lucky not to have fallen face down. A roar brought him back to the real world. Hicks looked over at the two giants brawling; they were caught in a stalemate on the floor.
Looking around, Hicks quickly located his stripped gear on the floor, and managed to drag himself there, as his feet simply could not stand being walked on after the strangling grip of the ropes. He scurried through the pile on the floor and pulled out a grenade. Pulling the splinter he tried aiming as well as he could with his still tied hands and tossed it. With a "pling, pling, pling" it jumped to a halt close to the two brawling aliens. Hicks dove down under his armour as the explosion rocked the cave. Peeking out, he saw that the hunter was quite out, but the Xenomorph… well he knew it would take more than one grenade to kill it. He pulled the splinter and tossed another one. Another great bang hurt his ears and scorched the left side of his arm. As he crawled on the cave floor he finally got to his pulse rifle, which he managed to pull towards himself. It was a two hand weapon, so it took a lot of strength to lift it solely by the right hand grip. Hicks managed to press it up with the help of his knees and then heaved it up on the rock. Spying over the ridge of the stone, he saw that the Xenomorph was recovering from the blow, although it was quite wounded. Hicks let loose half a magazine of bullets, trying to aim at the oblong black head. It noticed him and gave up a chilling scree before its head burst open from the bullets. Yellow acid spilled forth from the wound and drenched the alien underneath it.
Stillness fell over the cave. Hicks swallowed and looked around a final time. If there were any more Xenomorphs out there, it was not here. Sitting back against a rock, he surveyed his own situation. He could not do anything with his hands tied up, so he made it his first priority to free them from the chocking ropes. It took a good half hour of painstaking work before they were free. As the blood flowed back to them, they began to hurt tremendously. Trying to distract himself, Hicks pulled together his gear, or what was left of it, and strapped everything on again. His armour was, although in one piece, not wearable. It was buckled and it would cause more damage than protection if he wore it. His pulse rifle was OK though, so was his sidearm and ammo belt. As was his helmet. The communication radio and video link was out though, and he left them. He also took the big knife that the hunter had so kindly supplied him with. The grip was a little too big, but the blade seemed to be perfectly sharpened, so he could fix the grip later. That was, if he made it off this planet alive.
His feet still did not feel like they would hold him for long, so he slowly moved to the stash of goods that the hunter aliens had gathered from the ship. For a moment he wished to cut down the horrid remains from Turner, but decided against it, he could simply not reach him in his state. Besides, where would he put the body?
The noises coming from the jungle at night were different from those on earth. There were deep sounding mutters and sighs and none of the usual high pitched noises of Earth. Hicks had not set his foot on Earth for a long time, but he still remembered the training for the US Colonial Marines. It seemed like child's play compared to this. He dug down into the last crate, his fingertips moving over something cold. It was made out of metal and as he pulled it out it seemed to a thing resembling a Frisbee. A high tech Frisbee. It had holes enough to fit his fingers into them. After looking around the empty cave he dared let go of his pulserifle and try the Frisbee. As he set his hand around it, it seemed to vibrate. Cautiously he tossed it away. The sheer impact it made into the cave wall in front of him made him grab his rifle.
"By all that is holy!" Hicks exclaimed. Something behind him made a silent beeping noise. Hicks quickly pointed the rifle towards the Hunter that lay behind his back. It was not the dead alien that had made the noise. Slowly he crawled over and saw that the sound emanated from an armpiece. Once again he looked around before pulling it off from the arm of the dead alien. It had been activated by the flying disc. Ducking for cover, as he had a feeling something might just explode if he pushed a button, he pressed the small point on the interactive display. The disc, being lodged in the cave wall, dislodged itself with a high pitched noise, probably ultrasonic, and came flying straight at Hicks. He ducked as it was about to hit him, but it just powered down as it came within range of him, and fell down on the floor next to him. Amazed, he picked it up. It was like having an invisible dog, fetching the Frisbee for you!
Deciding it could serve him well, he found the clip that held it to a belt, removed it from the alien, and placed in his own belt. Now, he had his own trophy..! That thought made him smirk. He strapped the armpiece on and picked up the pulserifle. Feeling tired and wet as the adrenaline began wearing off and with his feet still hurting, he began looking for a way out. Finding a rope, he saw that it was the way out of the cave. Scaling the rock was easy, as there were many outcroppings. Besides, he could easily pull himself up without the use of his feet, just as he had in his ventilation maze back on Troy. As he emerged, the foul smell of death was replaced by a calm breeze coming down from the mountains. A full moon shone down on the jungle and a blue nebula filled half the sky. Showering the jungle in blue light.
The gentle rustle of the leaves calmed Hicks' worried mind. He went through his equipment, checking the few pieces of equipment he had left. His pulse rifle, a couple of grenades and ammo clips on his belt and his helmet. And of course, his new alien gear.
"Hicks!" He heard a voice call out. Startled he looked around. "Hey!"
"Who's there?" He called. He got up on his knees, feeling them turn wet from the ground.
"Stronghold! I'm here! In the tree!" Hicks looked up. Turning on the flashlight on the rifle, he saw that tied to the trunk, about three metres above ground, Stronghold sat, looking down on him. She was alive!
"You're alive!" He laughed. "That's great!" He stood up and walked over to the tree. It was as far as his feet could carry him and he sat down again. "I thought I was the only one here!"
"Those ugly bastards tied me to the tree and left med here! Are those the aliens that built the ship?" She asked. Hicks hung the pulserifle over his back and made a jump up to the nearest branch, heaving himself up on it. From there he could reach Stronghold's ropes and cut them off.
"They are, yes." Hicks said.
"Was it you shooting down there?" She asked, massaging her wrists.
"Yes, there were three aliens down there, two of these hunters and one Xenomorph. They're dead now." Hicks returned back to the jungle floor. Stronghold jumped down next to him. Besides the bruises from the struggle with the Hunters, she seemed fine. He wondered why.
"Dead?" She looked at him. He nodded. "Are you alright?" She asked.
"They hung me upside down." He said. "My feet are screwed." He showed her his swollen ankles.
"Oh." She said. "Well, that's why I'm here, right? We'll get back to the ship one way or another." Hicks nodded.
"Thank you." He said. He looked down into the lit up cave, deciding on keeping the fate of Turner to himself. Standing up and leaning on Stronghold, who held him up by his belt, they began walking back.