He walked around the house. Her home. The generator that gave the place heat had since died, and it was cold. His hand brushed against the heavy chair in front of the dark fireplace. He turned his head and looked at the table, moving towards it. He lifted one of the empty picture frames and ran a claw against the glass before setting it down. He turned and moved to the bookshelf, running his claws against the texts he never got to learn. There were too many to take with him.
The kitchen inside was hollow, but he could still smell the blood from past meals. The door to the cold basement was open, the doorway was dark. It had been a wise place to hide his things. He turned towards the stairs, walked up them and into the room. He could taste his own musk here, so heavy it was, so long had he been there. He clicked in amusement, remembering the fight that had happened here, and of watching Hannah move around backwards everywhere she went. The fire here was cold as well, and the lights that provided him and the other creatures heat were out. The many-legged creature in the cage was unmoving.
He bent down and touched it, but it remained still, its many legs curled under it stiffly. It was dead. He grunted and looked over to the other cage, the one with the lizard within. He reached into its cage, and touched it. It moved but barely, enough strength to hiss a warning, but it, too was very cold and near death.
He stood and moved to the room that was across the way, where the door was shut. He pushed the door open and stepped inside. There was a weak rattle, much like his own, and he bent and pinpointed the source. The long legless creature sat coiled under the desk, desperate for heat. He recalled that it was dangerous, and it warned him of this in its own way. He did not fear it, however, and when it moved, striking at his mask, it fell to the ground in two pieces, the body writhing, and the mouth still chomping with a liquid pouring from its fangs. Even in death it tried to fight and kill him. He respected that. And he now understood that the creature was poisonous, and that was what Hannah had protected him from.
He stood and looked around the room, reaching out to the chair and feeling the course fur of the cape he had made from the antlered animal Hannah had taken for him. The pelt of the cougar and its skull was also within here. He curled his fingers around the cape and tossed it over his shoulder. He went around the home and gathered the important things, the weapons and the trophies, wrapping the cape around it all in a bundle that was easy to carry.
The house seemed so much emptier with the ornaments off the walls. He stood still and scanned it. He wished there had been more time. He wished he had more opportunity to stay and learn with Hannah about her world and her ways. Humans had always fascinated him, but this one… it had been a very long time since he had met a hunter such as he on this planet. The last time had also ended in death, a death he wished had not needed to happen.
He rattled sorrowfully, and looked at his wrist gauntlet, the bright red marks reporting that the device was on standby. He began to press the symbols, arming the device for a certain range and a certain time, to wipe out all the evidence of his being here. He set the device down on the floor, where he could smell the remnants of his own blood. He then took up the bundle, setting it on his back and walked outside to the hellish cold.
His head jerked to the side, noticing to the side of him a heat signature. It was one he recognized, the man who had tormented Hannah. Weyland, he was called, and he was wounded, bleeding from minor wounds on his body and face. A shame he didn't die in the crashing hover craft.
Jar-hidda rattled, his sights landing on the human's chest as he leaned heavily between two trees. All three guns swiveled to aim towards him, and then retracted and settled back down. No, he wasn't worth it, he was not worthy prey, just one of those humans with 'power,' who ordered the more capable warriors to fight for them. Disgraceful. Jar-hidda rattled, hearing the man take a shaky breath, having held it to see what his fate was.
The yautja tilted his head, and lifted his arm, tapping his now-bare wrist with the point of a single claw. It was a human gesture he had picked up a long time ago, and the man understood it. Panicking, his heart racing, and he took off down the mountain. Jar-hidda, watched him run away like a coward. He would not care if that man made it away in time or not. Either way, he was worthless.
He took the path up the mountain, trudging through the snow. His wounds hurt greatly, but he ignored them. They would not kill him, but they did tire him out and sap his strength. The barren trees aided him when the way was steep, and more than once he had to dig into the snow to find the stones and crawl up the slope. The bitter-cold snow washed away the drying blood from his body, hissing against his mesh. He would only be in this cold hell for a few minutes longer. And Hannah would never know the high respect he held for her for being able to live here, seemingly happily.
Once he was past the trees, he could see where his ship waited. A bright signature of heat surrounded by the cold bodies of the men who had almost defeated him, who had almost caused him dishonor. What a disgrace it would have been, to come to this place to clear the name of his friend, only to also fail. If it weren't for those humans, those that he laid out in the snow on their backs, weapons laid beside them, he would have failed.
He paid respect to the fallen warriors, then looked down the mountain where the blooded human had gone. She wouldn't stay with him, wouldn't go to the clan she belonged to. She had to remain on this planet, in case something like this happened again. She would be their warrior on this planet until her death. He respected her greatly, but he would not argue with her. She was not a blooded of his clan, and as a warrior, she could do as she wished.
He wondered for a moment what his friend would have thought of the woman that was blooded into his clan. If anything he would have been surprised, maybe also appalled and resentful, but the look of surprise on the old arbiter's face alone would have been worth seeing. Of course, he had gotten the story of how that had happened, how the abomination had come to be and the reason his friend had been sent there. It was part of the reason he was here in the first place.
Jar-hidda rattled and looked to the fallen warriors again, tilting his head in respect and then making his way to the ship. They would be gone soon, taken away in the bomb, a proper burial for such brave warriors. He had only taken the trophies of those he had killed, the other trophies would accompany the warriors to the afterlife.
The ramp of his ship closed behind him, sealing away the cold and bathing him in much welcomed heat. He walked down the metal hallway, his boots tapping against the floor. He made his way to the front of the ship, resting one hand on the chair facing the front and pressing the commands for the ship to return to space. He activated the autopilot and set a course for the outer reaches of this system, and felt the ship shift and groan as the engines started. This old ship of his would fly, even as damaged and ill-repaired as it was. It would take him far enough away from this planet that it would be legal to call for aid and trade for parts. And then he would travel to the eldresses to report a successful mission, and once more be left alone to his own devices; clanless and free.
The ship lifted from the ground and hovered backwards out of the cave. He stepped away from the chair, letting the ship do as it was programmed. He barely felt the sharp climb, but did feel the pull of his bomb activating, and sucking in the surrounding area. All the trees, the snow, the animals, Hannah's home… everything would be pulled into the implosion and taken care of. There would be nothing left.
His ship easily escaped the pull of the bomb, cloaking as it lifted and left the planet's atmosphere, slipping like a knife through the gravitational pull of the planet. He walked back to his trophy room, taking off the bundle off his back and opening it. He carefully laid out Hannah's trophies and weapons, finding places for them on the empty wall next to his own. It was a bit of work, but it was soon done, and he removed from the cape the small lizard.
It was warm now, and much more lively, warning and hissing at his hand as he lifted it up and put it on his shoulder. He didn't mind as it bit and chewed on one of his tresses, causing it to bleed, and took the snake's head to the side to clean. It would make a good necklace.
As he worked, peeling off the skin and cleaning it, he moved to another room in the ship. His medical supplies were laid out on the table against the wall, having repaired the blooded human before she left, and also himself before finishing the very basic last touches to his ship to enable it to fly. The small lizard had made a meal of his tress, having successfully chewed it off and was now swallowing the tip whole. Brave creature, but it was no real surprise knowing who its mistress was.
Jar-hidda stroked a claw down its scaly back, feeling the rough scales and the sharp spikes. It would have been such an impressive creature if it was much larger. Jar-hidda turned to the table and lifted a vial, then took a carefully measured amount of the medicinal fluid within, checked the measurement and moved to the side. He slipped the needle into a receptor on a metal device and injected it. The machine beeped then hissed in response. He pressed several buttons which flashed at him at a high heat, and then again with a lower heat, and then again at a lower heat before slowly shifting to show different statistics.
The readings on the device told him all he needed to know. The atmosphere in the chamber was good, the temperature was appropriate, but most importantly, the vitals were stable. Jar-hidda growled, pleased, and moved the lizard from his shoulder to sit on the glass of the chamber. Its small claws tinked lightly and it tilted its head at Jar-hidda, warning him again of his ferocity, but he was ignored by the hunter, who moved away and continued to clean the skull.
The lizard's large beard retracted and its head turned again, looking at the flashing lights and small noises the room made. He smacked his lips then turned his head at an odd angle, eye aimed downward, looking through the glass at the serene visage of the dark-haired woman, behind the receding reflection of the alien, as her chest lightly rose and fell.