The carnage in the hangar was surreal. The Shirxa sisters had begun a massacre of any yautja nearby, and they were still going at it. Myaz was leading the way, stalking two yautja as her sisters were doing the same. The body count was starting to pile up in the sister's favor, and florescent green blood was all over them and the floor. Lira was on the other side of the hangar, being hard pressed by three yautja who had surrounded her.
Setg'in was speechless. He hardly had time to process what he was seeing, and why it was so out of hand. He couldn't even focus on H'chak who was standing next to him with his arms folded over his massive chest, reveling in the mayhem unfolding in front of them. Setg'in went to make a move to stop it, anything to stop it, but H'chak blocked him with a menacing growl.
"They belong to me. If you touch them you die," he growled, but Setg'in had had quite enough of being ordered around. He let loose a growl of his own, and stood his ground.
"They are not yours yet, and I cannot allow them to continue, so if you won't stop them, I will. You'll have to kill me to stop me," Setg'in spat as he moved around H'chak.
The larger yautja extended his double blades and placed them at Setg'in's throat. With another growl, Setg'in extended his own blades and a fight seemed imminent. No one noticed a slight movement, nor the fact that a vessel had docked amid the fighting, until it materialized from seemingly thin air. It was a smooth reveal like pulling the tarp back from a beloved car. No crackle of blue electricity here.
H'chak turned his head to see what was happening, and it was then that Setg'in took the opportunity to kick at his knee, but it didn't even move. With a snarl H'chak belted Setg'in in the face and issued an order without even turning around to face him.
"Do not kill him! He is mine, but I will deal with these lesser yautja scum first!" He bellowed before making his way towards the new enemies.
Before the doors could open all the way, a smart disc whistled through the air, slicing the third Shirxa sister in half just before she delivered a killing blow to a roaring yautja young blood. Dteinou materialized to smoothly snag it out of the air, and deliver a roar of her own. She put the disc away and drew her sword before running towards Myaz. As she got closer she realized that this was not the same Shirxa that had poisoned her, but she would do. Dteinou didn't care anymore about the rule regarding this race. She was going to kill the other two, and any others present.
Kujhade stepped out along with K'var, Mar'cte, and T'chnde at his sides. Immediately Kujhade assessed several issues. One was that there were indeed Shirxa on board and they were causing the most havoc. The next thing was that they were able to move through a ship full of yautja so easily because these were the newly blooded yautja from the chiva earlier. They moved and looked inexperienced despite their fearlessness, and it was getting them killed two and three at a time. Lastly, but certainly not least, was the fact that there were four Berserker Yautja, one of which was holding a fighting Setg'in. The one who appeared the be the leader was making his was quickly and confidently past the fighting young bloods towards Kujhade and his group. There was only one thing these dishonorable aberrations understood. Kujhade would have to kill the leader first, and then perhaps the others would back off. This was easier said than done, but Kujhade was prepared for anything. He hadn't expected to see this breed here, but it didn't matter in the slightest bit.
Underneath his mask H'chak smiled gruesomely. Was this the group that Setg'in feared so much? Pathetic! There were five yautja one of which was a female, but then there was a very small female among them also. This one was no yautja, and when he sniffed the air he smiled a little more. If he wasn't mistaken, this was a small pathetically weak human female. He'd hunted many before, and found them marginally challenging at best, downright laughable at the worst. Then he saw a very pale yautja stalk through the crowd. He was looking right at H'chak and actually was making his way over. Foolish but he at least looked like he might be a few minutes' worth of a challenge.
K'var and Mar'cte made their way over to Lira who had just dispatched two young bloods who lay at her feet. Myaz saw this and thought to come to her sister's aid, but was cut off by Dteinou and T'chnde. Setg'in stopped struggling long enough to recognize that Dteinou was even there. His eyes bulged in his head, as he struggled even more to get out of the grasp of the scout who held him. How could she still be alive, and with Kujhade no less! Quickly he kicked backwards, and when the scout readjusted, Setg'in turned in his arms and stabbed him two times in the side and ran off. He disappeared in the thick of all the chaos, and the scout lost track of him just that fast.
It was Jasmine who saw that little transaction. She'd climbed a large stack of metal containers positioned just out of the way towards a wall. It gave her just enough height for effective shots, sort of like a deadly game of King of the Hill. She had on all her armor and her mask. She had two machete length knives at her side, a smart disc that she wasn't all that adept at using, and her bow in her hand. The very large yautja who had been holding Setg'in had ended up spotting her. There was something off about him. She'd been around plenty of predators, and they were all intimidating in their way, but these were different. They were much larger, and the biggest one of all was headed straight for Kujhade. Jasmine sighed nervously, trying to calm herself but it wasn't working. She was so afraid of failing because failure meant death. She thought about her twins, and she swallowed the lump of her fear and apprehension. She had to survive for them.
Three dots aligned themselves on her chest, and she only had mere seconds to dive out of the way. The blast just missed her, but knocked the crates out from underneath her. So much for that height advantage. She fell in the heap, the falling crates missing her by sheer dumb luck. Quickly she made her way to her feet just as her attacker began to toss the containers like cardboard boxes. He was growling and searching for her amid the mess. Being smaller had its advantages as she was able to scramble behind another stack without being noticed. This little hillock of stacked containers was just a bit higher up, and she wasted no time lining up a shot.
Thwang! Thwang!
Her bow began to sing its deadly song. This time they didn't miss their mark. This predator was scantily clad leaving most of his body exposed. Three arrows sank themselves into his side and thigh. He snarled as he angrily snatched the arrows from his body, zeroed in on her position, and lined up his own shot.
"Shit" she muttered to herself as she jumped down just in time to be missed by a plasma shot. She landed on her feet, but she knew he wasn't going to be distracted. Jasmine readied another shot, but just before she could find a better position, she felt the intense heat of his body and the nearly silent landing he made right in front of her. She only had a few moments to register just how large he was. Much bigger than Kujhade, and still not as large as the one fighting her husband. From her distance, she had grossly misjudged his size. All of this went through her mind in a fraction of a second before she found herself flying backwards through the air. With a resounding smack, Jasmine hit the wall behind her. Good thing she was wearing more armor than any of them. It saved her life, but didn't stop her ears from ringing or the air from being knocked from her lungs on impact.
Suddenly he was standing tall over her once more. Jasmine was struggling to catch her breath, before she found her windpipe cut off by a large hot fist, wrapping itself around her throat like a boa constrictor. He lifted her up and knocked the bow from her hand. He then raised the blade on his wrist and aimed it to cut her head off. Jasmine's vision was starting to narrow as her breathing became more and more restricted. She couldn't see Kujhade or the others, she could only see the monster before her. Setg'in had not interfered and even though she didn't know where he'd gone off to, she couldn't worry about it. Behind his mask he snarled, and she heard the distinct click of laughter afterwards. The bastard thought he had her beat, and maybe he did, but she would take him with her. Blackness and stars edged her vision as he was enjoying choking her. Images of her children flashed in her mind. The was Mili would scream 'yaya' to the top of his little lungs. The way Marcus would cuddle in her arms and purr as she rocked him. No, she couldn't leave her little babies. Jasmine reached down and grabbed one of the machetes from her side and gave his arm a quick slice. She was trying to cut it off, but couldn't put enough power behind the strike. He roared in surprise and went to gut her from the side, but she had just enough adrenaline running through her to kick that arm. Instead of running her through from the side, the blade made a smooth entry and exit through her calf. He pulled it out, a gout of blood rushing from the wound, and went to stab her again, but Jasmine kicked at his arm once more. He couldn't drop the weapon, but he did release her throat after she stabbed him through the upper arm with her machete. He howled in anger and pain as he dropped, her finally. She fell in a heap on the floor, gasping for air and trying to clear the stars from her vision. She began to crawl towards her bow, anything to get some distance between her and the monster yautja. She had only gotten a few feet before she felt a heavily booted foot kick her in the side and send her sliding across the floor. She banged against the landing gear of a ship, her wounded side taking the brunt of the impact.
Through the haze of her vision, she saw him stalking towards her. Jasmine didn't know how she was going to live through this with him. There was simply no way to go blow for blow with him, and he was on to her strategy of keeping distance between them. The pain in her side was nearly debilitating, but she had to tough it out somehow. The blood was still flowing freely from her pierced calf muscle, but it wasn't hurting as much as her ribs. Quickly she tried to take a deep breath, and was relieved to find that she could. Good. That meant that perhaps she'd avoided a set of broken ribs. Jasmine used the landing gear to help her into a sitting position, then slid her way up to standing. She could feel the coppery blood in her mouth and swallowed it back. That worried her, but she didn't have time to think about it. If she paid attention to the potential if internal bleeding, instead of the predator trying his best to kill her, she wouldn't have to worry about anything else ever. She readied both machetes now, one in each hand. She stopped leaning on the ship and crouched as low as possible, and began to circle him. The scout paused for a second, then seemed to nod as he took the time to address her open challenge properly. Jasmine swallowed hard but the lump was stubborn and wouldn't go down. Her circling was immediately taken as a one-on-one battle, something she didn't want to do. She preferred to stay on the outskirts, taking her shots when she could, but now she was in a gladiator match with an opponent many times stronger, meaner, and more experienced than her.
He took off his plasma cannon and dropped it to the floor, which in his mind somehow made the playing field more level. What a joke that was. Maybe if he shrunk a few feet, and lost a few hundred pounds, that might be remotely true. As it stood he kept all his other weapons, brandishing his single wrist blade which was a little longer than her machetes. Then he did something that really Jasmine could have done without. He took off his mask, his long talon-tipped fingers wrapping themselves around its front. HE removed it slowly and Jasmine couldn't help letting out a sound of pure disgust. He looked nothing like the predators she had become accustomed to. The regular yautja were not beautiful. She thought Kujhade was handsome mainly because she liked him and found him sexy. She stared into his face every day, and even though it was an alien face so far from a human countenance, in Kujhade's eyes was not only intelligence, but a capacity for something other than murder. This…. thing, didn't have any of that. There was intelligence in the eyes for sure, but a cold, hard, calculating intelligence. He was smart, but there was nothing in his eyes, or the set of his body or his demeanor that told her that he was capable of anything but wanton violence and death. In his face she saw nothing but a creature hell-bent on nothing more than spilling her guts on the metal floor, and hanging her polished skull on his trophy wall. His eyes sat back on his head, and his mandibles were so large and thick that she could not see a glimpse of his inner mouth except when he gave his terrible roar.
At once it was obvious that this was a different breed of yautja altogether, not just a different tribe. More like the difference between the Homo-Sapiens and the Neanderthal. He seemed to be waiting on her to do something. At first she was confused, then it clicked. He'd taken his mask off, and she was supposed to do the same. She hoped he would hold his breath for that one. If he thought she was taking off a single iota of armor, he was sorely mistaken. Suddenly, there was an uproar, and over the din of the fighting Kujhade's roar came to her loud and distinct from all other sound. Just out of instinct, she turned her head in that direction, but that was a terrible mistake. The Neanderthal she had turned her attention from, had closed the distance, but instead of running her through he gave her a gut punch.
"Oof!" was all she could muster, as she slumped over his fist. That was her fault. How many times had Kujhade warned her not to ever, ever take her eyes or turn her attention away from any enemy? Too many, and now it cost her for real. He grabbed her by the back of her neck and brought her close to his face. He spoke to her in his language, which seemed almost a bastardized form of the language Kujhade spoke. Her translator seemed to have a hard time of it, but she thought it came close.
"Pathetic ooman, not even able to handle a simple fight. Now you will just die," he snarled at her, with what seemed to be an annoyed chuff behind it.
"Fuck you!" she wheezed, once her diaphragm decided it still functioned. He growled at her and shook his head, his five thick dread-like tendrils swaying with the motion. He popped her in her masked mouth with the back of his hand. Her lips swelled immediately and blood filled her mouth. She was forced to swallow it. He was taking his sweet time to kill her, likely reveling in the psychological torture he was causing. This was wonderful, because only she noticed Setg'in creeping behind him. It was typically unacceptable for him to interfere at all in an official fight to the death between two other hunters, but a bad blood will do what a bad blood will do. In this case that meant creeping up on Mr. Neanderthal and literally stabbing him in the middle of his back.
She would never forget the look of utter surprise on his face, and the way he looked in disbelief at the double blades piercing his body. He dropped her like a piece of trash and turned towards Setg'in.
"You!" He bellowed as he attacked Setg'in with everything he had. Despite having only one arm, Setg'in was doing an admirable job of defending against a foe obviously stronger than him. Even so, Neanderthal was wounded. Setg'in had stabbed him even before he attacked Jasmine, and she had even managed a few attacks of her own.
"Yes me, the lesser yautja! You will not leave this ship alive!" Setg'in roared out, and then pressed an attack.
Once again Jasmine was in the position of trying to recover and not give in to her pain and injury. She'd witnessed Setg'in fight before and remembered thinking that if he applied himself more, he could be a force to be reckoned with. Today he was proving this to be fact. Too bad his opponent was as strong and durable as he was, and Setg'in only had one arm to work with. Neanderthal was striking Setg'in with all his force, which had the clan leader going to one knee on every block. Jasmine only had this one chance to make a difference. She had to force it out of her mind that she was helping Setg'in, and focus on the fact that she was killing one of these new kind of yautja.
She heard another uproar, this time coming from K'var and Mar'cte's direction, but she couldn't pay attention to that. If she wanted to help them, she would have to kill this one first. On her hands and knees, she scrambled across the floor towards her bow. Luckily her quiver was still on her back. A few bolts had been scattered everywhere while she was busy getting her ass kicked, but she had enough with her to close the deal, or so she hoped. Jasmine turned her attention back towards the fight between Neanderthal and Setg'in. Hurriedly, she took a position well away from them both and started taking shots.
One after another the bolts whistled through the air, each one finding their mark. One in the thigh, one in the calf, four in the back, three in the left side, one in the right arm. A few of them hit Setg'in but she was careful not to hit him in any vital spots. She needed him alive long enough to occupy Neanderthal. Jasmine let off another shot and that one landed in the larger yautja's back, and buried itself deep between his shoulder blades. He let out a mighty roar and turned in her direction. He raised his arm and soon she found a net flying her way. She had just enough time to get her hand on her smart disc before being pinned to the far wall.
"Fuck!" She yelled as she struggled to get her arm up just a few inches to cut the net. It was tightening fast and to her horror she could see thin red lines of blood where the netting was cutting her. She grit her teeth, and painfully raised her arm enough to start cutting it off. As soon as the first few threads were cut, the smart disc went through it like a hot knife through butter. She spilled out of it onto the floor, and looked up just in time to see Neanderthal on his knees before Setg'in, desperately trying to get the bolt from his back and being unable to do so.
"Must've got your ass right in your muthafuckin heart, bitch," she said to herself. Setg'in was saying something to him that she could not hear. He was toying around with him! Jasmine couldn't believe her eyes. He was standing there taunting big ugly as he died, but in Jasmine's estimation he wasn't dying fast enough.
"You're just about the dumbest asshole I've ever seen," Jasmine said as she took a running start towards the two. As she got closer she realized he had gotten a hand on the bolt and was in the process of pulling it out. Finally, Setg'in had raised his blades but Jasmine got there before his stroke fell. With her bow slung on her back, and now both machetes in her hands again, she buried both in Neanderthal's back with a loud war cry of her own. Just then Setg'in cut of the head of the dying super yautja in front of him cutting off his last roar. Green blood bathed the two reluctant allies, and she had to struggle to keep her balance, as she turned her attention towards Setg'in immediately.
Quickly she withdrew her knives and took up a stance against Setg'in himself, whom she had to admit didn't seem too interested in her presence at all.
"Well?! Bring it on you one-armed bitch! You talked all that shit, now back it up!" Jasmine yelled at him, attempting to goad him into a fight. She knew Kujhade or even Dteinou wanted that opportunity. She also knew that she had a snowball's chance in hell of defeating him, but if she let him walk away without even trying to fight and kill him, she would be worthless as a warrior. What was more, she'd be just a coward turning from an obvious fight. He kneeled to collect Neanderthal's head, then looked up at her as if just now noticing her presence. Asshole. He gave her a once over, shook his head as if to say she wasn't worth obliging the open challenge she had issued, and turned to walk away, cloaking as he did so.
"Oh hell no!" She said as she was about to lunge at him, or at least where he had been a second ago, until she heard Kujhade's roar cut through the cacophony of sound once again. This time she looked his way, and was relieved to find him in top position on the much larger yautja. However, there was a big problem looming. She supposed one of the ring leader's henchmen had had enough of Kujhade winning the fight. He was heading over apparently to "even the odds", and she couldn't have that.
In a growing panic she looked around to see K'var bleeding badly but fighting valiantly along with Mar'cte. They seemed to have beaten that snake bitch, and was all but putting the finishing touches on her. In any case, they were occupied and couldn't help Kujhade. She turned to her left and saw Dteinou engaged one-on-one with one of the other super yautja, and she saw a crowd of young bloods who were apparently still loyal to Setg'in surrounding T'chnde. It was up to her to help Kujhade and Jasmine wasted no time heading his way.
Her ribs and her calf were on fire, and she was limping more than running. That wouldn't do at all. They all carried small emergency medical kits, and Jasmine retrieved hers. Lijia had personally modified the dosages to fit her body, and Jasmine took a syringe and filled it with a quick acting pain killer. Lijia had told her to inject it in a muscle, as closely to an injury as she could. Jasmine followed instructions and injected herself just under the wound.
"Ahh, FUCK!" She screamed as the hot liquid burned its way through her leg. In a matter of seconds, the pain subsided instantly and it spread to her whole body. She wasn't numb, but her pain level dropped from a ten to about a three. She now got into a full sprint towards her husband.
Jasmine had to dodge fighting yautja, and jump over a couple of bodies. She slipped twice in puddles of blood, before she got her footing just in time to see Kujhade on top of the ring leader, and the other one stab him in the side. Kujhade howled in pain, trying to turn to his new assailant, but was being held by the leader.
"Nooooo!" Jasmine yelled, still running all the way across the hangar to Kujhade. In too much of a hurry and panic to get her bow out and line up a proper shot, she got out her smart disc and launched it. It clanged off of the other predator's mask and returned to her hand. She narrowly caught it without slicing off her fingers. Immediately she threw it again just as he was about to stab Kujhade again, but this time the blade caught him on his arm. It was at the wrong angle to sever the arm, but she still got him as she saw a fine spray of blood spurt everywhere. He roared and looked her way. He got off of Kujhade which was what she wanted, but now he was stalking her way. Definitely not what she wanted. Jasmine gulped down a dry lump in her throat. He brandished the blade, Kujhade's blood still dripping from its edge, and it was that sight that made her blood boil instead of run cold with fear. She backed up and this time had enough clarity of mind to draw her bow. Jasmine couldn't explain the level of calm that took over her mind now. She had never really experienced it, but was glad it was there. She felt around in her quiver, breathing a small sigh of relief that she was still carrying a few. She regretted not retrieving them from her fallen enemy, but there was no time to focus on it now. She placed one in the bow and drew. He was coming straight for her in a slow, menacing pace as if he were thinking of all the different ways he could tear her head off. She let the shot fly, but he easily knocked it away. Without hesitation she shot another, then another, all of them knocked out of the air. Then he shook his head and actually wagged a disapproving finger at her.
Giving up on the bow, she took out her two machetes instead and gave them both a little twirl, crouched, and started circling. He stopped, crouched, and let out a blood-curdling roar, then charged directly at her.
"Oh fuck," she mumbled to herself, just as he took a big leap towards her. Then he cloaked.
A/N: So, we've been building up to this point for so long, that I felt that we should just jump right into it. I didn't think there was any reason or room for anymore dialog between any characters. Now, my first critic (hubby) didn't like the fact that this fight scene is from Jasmine's POV, and he also thought her fighting was unrealistic. In a sense I can see what he's saying. By all rights Jasmine should have been dead a while back, but I don't want to kill her. She doesn't deserve to die :) In any case, I intend to write each fighting chapter from a different character's POV. I wanted to write Jasmine first and sort of get her out of the way, but I also wanted to really focus on each character's fight. So the next few chapters will weave in everybody's fight and hopefully keep continuity between them.