Author's Note: Okay so after Five weeks of continuous vacation time I'm back to work as of tomorrow. Now don't get me wrong getting away from my co-workers for a month was good and all but it has been boring as hell. That said please read, review, favorite and Enjoy!
Chapter 20: A Taunt Too Far
Manny woke up after his impromptu trek through Nether canyon, looking mighty dissatisfied with not having had the opportunity to fight anything. Currently he was wondering what he was going to do now. He was in the jungle that surrounded the Thug's Make Shift arena, tangled up in the vines that he quickly tore himself free off in spite of said vines being strong enough to crush steel bars like they were gazelle in the grip of a python.
"Well that was a dirty trick but I don't see why I can't rejoin the fun!" After saying that Manny was rudely interrupted by his head being blown off. That said what was on Manny's face when his head regrew was sheer joy. "And here I thought you guys had gotten bored!" Manny stated turning back into his ghost form.
While Manny faced off against the latest batch of Yautja Dani was still inside of Nether canyon being swarmed by the things. Luckily Dani had stocked up on Mr. Zurkon's, and had the Omni-pistol which she had adjusted for ecto beams, together it was a combination that managed to eliminate the Nethers guarding the refueling stations, allowing Dani to top herself off periodically, which is a good thing when you realized that she had modified her pack for power. It was this that allowed Dani to make it through the other side with enough time to turn her pack back into a factory model in time for the inspection from a Thug's engineer. And it was what allowed her to take generous samples of the nethers DNA for the Nemetrix. However in relying on technology to fight Dani revealed a rather fatal weakness, that she was vastly weaker than her idiot brother.
"And now for a Rematch!" Dani had a very ominous feeling from the Thug Ringmaster just now. For one thing she can't for the life of her remember ever having done this before to set up a re-match. "On our benefactor Ephemeris's last run it picked this girl and her brother. But he also picked up our main event!" The Ring master pointed to the crate which had been suspended above the arena, which then snapped dropping the crate on the ground and busting it open.
"RRRAAARRRGGGHHH!" Several clawed arms swung their way through the dust clouds before slamming into the ground. Then the dino-cat's eyes locked on Dani, the four slits narrowing into a glare. "You...!" Keep in mind that all that Asura could see from up there was a mass of white hair, as it so happened that gave her a lot in common with someone who recently had gotten quite a bit of amusement out of ruining Asura's day.
"Me?" Dani for her part didn't even know that the big stupid monster even existed let alone that he had some kind of grudge against her.
"Asura remembers you little ghost boy!"
"I blame Manny for this." Dani stated instantly figuring out what was happening. Asura slammed his hand into Dani, picked her up, before throwing her across the arena slamming her into the Ghost Shield separating her from the audience and causing her to spark.
"Ugh." Dani peeled herself off of the shield and adjusted her neck with a crack before she looked up at her opponent. "Fine you want a fight." Appoplexian, Tetramand, Vaxasaur hybrid, use extreme force to disable. "You'll have one." Dani expended her remaining Zurkon's and they loosed a mass of rail gun bullets into Asura, not his hide that was far too thick and invulnerable for those to work, rather the drones flew up to the face and the rear and started loosing rounds into any hole they had available.
"GGGAAAHHH!" Asura was not amused. It did however give Dani time to finish another mode for her Omni pistol, someone needed to remind her to streamline that process in the future. "Asura is gonna murderized little ghost boy!" Asura shouted as he smacked Zurkon's out of the air, and was greeted by a blast of anti-matter to his face destroying the molecules in his head.
"Well that bites." Dani wasn't expecting the recoil from that gun, anti matter has a bit of a bite to it when you're not using it as a grenade, she should look into getting a rifle version of the Omni-gun. "I at least feel like I should've told him I'm not a boy before..." Then Asura's head grew back and he stood back up, albeit hunched over in his gorilla walk. "...I killed him?" Oh Dani wanted no part in this.
The Thug Ringmaster was quick to panic, Dani's win condition was to kill Asura, with the revelation of Asura's immortality it now looked like they had rigged the match.
"Ah Ahem! Ladies and gentlemen this match will resume after a short intermission." Thugs moved in with Chronal blasters immobilizing Asura by freezing him in time while others moved in to rebuild the stupid thug's cage around him, most likely the same tactic they had used to restrain the stupid brute in the first place.
Dani wasted no time in trying to get away, though she had already wasted her supply of Zurkon drones the Thugs had made a critical error in planting their ghost shield inside of the arena. Always one to punish the enemy for their stupidity Dani took aim and fired at the ghost shield generator, then just to be extra spiteful she blasted the thugs restraining Asura before taking off at full speed while the stupid brute covered her escape.
"ASURA HATES THUGS!" By the sounds of things the Thugs would have to find a new mascot.
The fight between Manny and the latest group of hunters was even more difficult then it was the last time, the use of personal ghost shields and plasma casters tuned to fighting the halfa gave them some defense and offense. Some, not a lot. A ghost shield did approximately bupkus against a tree being chucked at them, nor did a plasma caster do them any good when your opponent is a immortal who can instantly regenerate from the most grievance injuries. Manny's response to getting blasted again was to let loose with his ghostly wail picking up rocks, branches, logs and dirt in the process and hurling them all at the Yautja at the speed of sound.
"Don't get me wrong fellas you're good and all." Manny closed the distance with one of the Yautja, turned back to human form, before promptly plucking the head from one of the Yautja. "But if you wanna beat me: send a reaper next time!" Saying that Manny crushed the head he held in his hands. "Now, unless any of the rest of you wanna go another ten rounds: I'm off!" As fun as Magnus has been, Manny felt like leaving now, preferably before Dani yelled at him again for some mis-perceived grievance and so left for Ephemeris: just in time to miss the reaper portal that had opened.
Dani was able to use the bolts she earned to restock her supply of Zurkons at the Gadgetron vendor, and purchase some heavy weapons chief among them being the Omni-Rifle, a counter part to the omni pistols with just as much potential for customization and destruction. But she wasn't off the hook yet, the thugs were closing in on her and they had brought their heavy gun ships.
"Great." Dani looked at the vendor again in search of something to give her a bit more bite, and found what she was looking for. Thus using up a sizable number of bolts Dani whipped out two huge ten barrel Gatling guns with each barrel being ten centimeters wide and both being strapped to the fore limbs of a huge set of battle armor. An oh crap reaction spread across the thug's faces as the barrels loosed their projectiles, each one exploding taking out several thugs in tune to what suspiciously sounded like opera music. After ten seconds of sustained gunfire Dani released the trigger, having closed her eyes while she fired and was greeted by a scene of ruin. "Rip Ya a New One doesn't even begin to describe it." Dani commented looking down at the suit. "Now I know how I can get this thing off, but how am I supposed to get out of this?" Fast as it had appeared the suit disappeared, folded off of her body before being compressed down to a humble chest plate on her person. "Well that's one question answered." Dani turned to a surviving Thug, walked over, picked him up by his neck, and glared into his very soul. "If you come after us again, any of you, and I will make all of you wish Asura ate you. Clear?"
The thug quickly and fearfully nodded before Dani let him go and he ran away. With that said Dani debated the benefit of going back to the market to pick up equipment to replace what was lost when the station blew, and dismissed it when she saw that Ephemeris was moving again.
"Oh for the love of!" Like that Dani took off into the air straight towards the station and landed on one of it's platforms inside as the massive creature collector was preparing to take off again. Aside from the Nethers Dani hadn't had much opportunity to expand upon the creature database she had started back on Monster Island, luckily Ephemeris had a predisposition towards collecting samples of the creatures it snatched up. Once again Dani would have to sort through the mass of genetic information, and hope that one of them would be enough to unlock the Infi-Map. Though Dani thought about that the chances that they would be returning to earth any time soon were promptly put on a kibosh as a explosion sounded off of the side of Ephemeris causing it to promptly crash into the ground. "Meat head." Dani snapped her eye twitching with a dangerous glare.
Manny, for once, was innocent, just as confused as his sister when someone decided to take a pot shot at the side of their ride off world. The chief suspect however made his appearance known, a Yautja with black armor and blades coming out of his fore arms with a sinister glint about them making a screeching sound as he ran it across the ground. He almost didn't notice the white bone for all of the armor, not decorating his armor as Yautja are one to do, though there was elements of that, but rather the bone that was beneath the armor, and which should have been below Yautja flesh.
"So a Predator Reaper eh?" Manny smirked as he felt himself getting excited again. "Well, I did tell them to go get one didn't I?" Manny cracked his fingers as he stared down the enemy before him.
The Yautja Reaper walked forward, a second reaper blade popping from his other arm as he began running down the corridor stabbing both blades into the wall/floor of the ship and grinding them through with alarming efficiency. Manny took the first slash across his torso allowing him to get a hold of the Yautja Reaper's blade and deliver a point blank ecto artillery shot to the undead's face. Not his brightest move when you then see him swallow the ecto grenade whole, and channel it's power into his fist to then slam it into the ground in a shock wave knocking Manny back a rather considerable distance. "Right. Reaper's like ecto." The wound left on Manny's chest stung like you wouldn't believe, chiefly because it was still there, but more so because his immortality was trying to fix it but couldn't, instead just building up tissues around it like something was going to pop out of it. "Well then, time for plan B then."
Deducing both that getting slashed again and blasting with ecto were bad ideas Manny grabbed hold of the flooring, ripped it out, and slammed it back down again. The shockwave was transmitted through the soft metal and like a rug being pulled out of someone the Reaper was knocked over, briefly before getting back up, still it was long enough as the predator had lost sight of Manny.
"Come on don't you want to play!?" Manny's own mocking tone was spat out as a recording from the Yautja Reaper.
"HELL YEAH!"
Manny popped out from the floor to deliver a upper cut to the Alien's jaw. Manny put the alien into a joint lock ramming his blade into the floor before snapping it with his fist. Before the Yautja could retaliate with his other Blade Manny disappeared into the floor again.
"Marco." The Yautja echoed again making use of Manny's mocking tones.
"Polo!" The Yautja spun around swinging one arm blade where he heard Manny but nothing was there, instead getting slammed with another section of ship propelled by his Ghostly Wail. Credit where it was due this one was good with voices. Dani meanwhile, seeing what was happening from afar, could only shake her head in dismay before she got to work.