Well this is the big battle chapter. Thank You for all of the reviews! Now the big question for this chapter is...will the trio survive? And also, a special appearance will be made by an Alien Queen, which I do not own, in this chapter.
Predator 3: Homeworld
Chapter 8: Gladiators
The trio was quickly bound without much of a fight. Dutch guessed the Predators on the ship were holding out a bit on them, because the aliens that were tying them up had no qualms whatsoever about using all possible force to make them cooperate.
They were lead out of the cell, and onto the docking platform. The Predators pulled the trio into the forest surrounding the spaceport, following a path that the trio couldn't locate. As abruptly as the forest started, it ended to reveal a large, rectangular building, made of the same black metal that began to look familiar, with hundreds of intricately carved pillars wrapping around it. Large statues of Predators stood between the pillars; each held a spear, sword, or one of a multitude of strange sharp weapons.
They were taken through a large door and pulled through numerous corridors, and then down a large staircase, finally though a door where three Predators stood. Harrigan recognized one as the lead Predator that abducted them, but the other two were unfamiliar.
One was dressed in a loincloth and battle shawl that the familiar Predator also wore, and the other, slightly larger one, was an imposing sight. He wore full body armor, inlayed with gems, a blood red cape hung from a jeweled shawl, flowing around his ankles. His dreadlocks, instead of the usual black, were a smoky blue-gray and scars were numerous across his brow.
"This can't be good," Harrigan muttered as the Predators approached them.
An'tir'de was speaking to the High Elder and Sel'in'de, the Yautja in charge of the events, when a group of Yautja burst into the room, dragging the humans with them.
The Elder abruptly cut off the conversation and walked swiftly over to the humans.
"So, this is to be the day's entertainment?" he inquired. He looked each of the humans up and down. They should last a little while at least. He had hunted humans before, and didn't expect much, but from An'tir'de's report, they should be an interesting group.
"Take them to the containment room and arm them each with two different weapons. Armor is not necessary. And make sure the other beasts are ready as well."
The group bowed respectfully to the Elder and left the room, taking the humans with them.
The trio was taken into yet another large room. Two Predators left, only to return with weapons. Two different spears, a dagger, one of the alien disks, a long, thick black sword, and a small short sword were dumped at the trio's feet. Without a word, the six Predators left the room.
"What the hell are these for?" Harrigan asked picking up one of the spears.
"I'm not sure I want to know," Jean replied trying to pick the heavy sword.
"Whatever they are for, I suggest we arm ourselves," Dutch replied, taking the large black sword from Jean and handing her the smaller, short one.
Harrigan picked up the disk and one of the spears, Dutch grabbed the other spear while Jean picked up the dagger and tucked it in her belt.
Suddenly, a bright light in the ceiling lit up the ceiling, illuminating the room and a hidden door way. There came loud, almost screams or cheers from behind the hidden door. The door opened upward and the trio cautiously approached the opening.
Thousands of Predators lined the walls of a large stadium-like building. The ground was sandy and devoid of the white gas. The trio stepped completely out of the room and looked around.
"Good God... I know what this is," Dutch replied looking around.
"What?" Harrigan asked, having no idea what was going on.
"It's a coliseum... and we're the gladiators."
With a loud clank, the door shut behind them.
Saren'te and his fellow hunters sat in prime seats to watch the battle.
"This shall be interesting," Saren'te thought, barely checking his excitement.
The humans stood close to where the entrance for the warriors was. They seemed unsure of what was happening; good. With a loud shout and raising his hand, the High Elder called for the battle to begin.
The trio watched as three different doorways, much larger than their own, slowly opened. They could see something moving in each of the shadowed cells. Loud cries issued from each of the cells as the monstrous beings stepped out of them.
In the first door, a creature that looked like a cross between a lion, spider, and scorpion walked out of its cage, multiple black eyes glittering, pincers snapping and a large barbed tail arching over its back. It had four pawed legs and golden fur covering all of its body except the grayish barbed tail, and was about seven feet tall.
In the second door, an almost human figure stirred. Yet, once it entered the light of the stadium, it didn't look that human. Humanoid in shape and size, except with an extra pair of arms, it had black skin with sharp barbs sticking out of its skin; sharp, silver talons were on its hands and feet, and bright glowing red eyes with silts like a snake for nostrils, and a lipless mouth completed the creature. It held a spear, supplied by the Predators, and smiled baring sharp white teeth.
In the final door, the largest of the creatures stepped out. It looked like a huge, twelve foot tall, deranged bug. A black, slime dripping, exoskeleton covered the creature. It had four arms and a long whip-like tail swayed back and forth, kicking up dust. A large crest adorned the creature's head and it opened its mouth exposing sharp teeth and an extra set of teeth in its mouth.
"We're in trouble," Jean muttered, gripping her sword tighter.
"And I don't think we will have any luck that those things will fight each other and ignore us," Harrigan replied, noticing that all of the creature were staring at them, menacingly in the case of the small black humanoid.
"Right. I think our best chance would be to stick together," Dutch said hastily, raising his sword. No sooner were the words out of his mouth, the large black bug roared and charged at them.
The trio leapt out of the way of the charging bug, Harrigan and Jean jumping to the left toward the black humanoid, while Dutch jumped to the right toward the lion/scorpion/spider thing.
The bug spun screaming, preparing for another lunge, only this time it tried for the lion/scorpion/spider thing. (A/N: I don't want to keep typing lion/scorpion/spider, so I'm going to refer to the creature as LSS.) The LSS dodged the rampaging bug, and charged at Dutch in a mindless rage.
Dutch picked up his black sword and swung as the LSS's scorpion tail lashed out at him. The sharp alien sword easily cut thought the thick shell and membrane of the LSS's tail. Black blood gushed out of the severed limb and was absorbed by the sand. The creature screamed in agony and instinctually retreated away from Dutch.
Meanwhile, Harrigan and Jean weren't having as much luck as Dutch. While they watched the bug rampage and Dutch fend off the LSS, they completely forgot about the black humanoid that was behind them.
Jean spun as the thing's fist connected solidly with her temple. Once she hit the ground, the thing was on top of her, the talons of its foot cutting through her clothing and flesh.
Jean tried to bring her sword up, but her flailing was to no avail. The creature was about to stab Jean when Harrigan tackled it to the ground.
The creature roared in anger and punched Harrigan with its two right arms. Harrigan stumbled backward as the creature slowly stood. It spread its arms wide as the metallic talons on its fingers extended six or seven inches.
The creature was about to charge when its glowing red eyes focused on something behind Harrigan. Harrigan turned to see the large bug racing towards him. As the bug reached him, Jean jumped in and swung her short sword at the bug's leg. The sword dove deep into the bug's exoskeleton, but did not manage to lop of the limb.
The bug screamed as its blood bubbled and gushed out of to the sword. Unfortunately, a few drops of the blood landed on Jean's arm. The acid burned quickly thought Jean's clothing and started on her skin.
"Damn! That thing has freaking acid for blood!" Jean thought as she tried desperately to wipe the burning blood from her skin without burning any other part of her body.
Harrigan had once again engaged in combat with the humanoid. It seemed intent on shredding him to pieces. Harrigan was currently using his spear to defend himself when he remembered about the disk. As he groped for it on his belt, the creature raised its left upper hand to slice his face into ribbons.
Harrigan quickly threw the disk which, like he did to that Predator bastard in '97, loped the creature's hand off. It shrieked and fell to the ground, two lower arms catching its self while the other favored the now useless stub that was once its hand.
The LSS that Dutch was fighting seemed to have calmed down. Dutch saw that the other two weren't doing as well.
"Maybe you could help me out," Dutch though as he approached the LSS. The beast did not move for fear of more injury. Dutch saw the large bug looming over Jean as she desperately tried to fend it off with the humanoid's abandoned spear, making small cuts in the thing's arms and chest.
Dutch carefully touched the LSS, which remained still. Dutch grabbed on to the beast's fur and hauled himself up on the creature's back.
"Just like riding a bull," Dutch whispered to himself. Dutch took his black sword and give the LSS a sharp slap on the hindquarters with the flat of the sword to get it going.
The LSS lurched forward, nearly knocking Dutch off of it.
"Yeah, a 2000 pound bull that could slaughter me easily at any moment," he corrected mentally. Dutch leaned to the side to get the LSS to turn, which it did. Dutch aimed the creature towards the black bug and had it charge.
Saren'te and the other Yautja shouted and watched in amazement as the humans fought. The kande amenha queen proved to be more than a match for the humans, as did the small forest dwelling Nichat. One of the large humans, the one who supposedly murdered his grandfather, was having an easy time with the Mithclara beast.
Saren'te smiled when the Nichat began to fight his father's killer; yet the human was fast and a good fighter.
"Perhaps...good enough to best my father?"
Saren'te tried to shake the though from his mind, but it still lingered. There is no honorable creature that could best a Yautja... Or is there?
The bug approached Jean for the final kill after knocking the spear from her grasp. Just before the queen brought her clawed hand down on Jean's chest, she turned with a roar as the LSS barreled into her, Dutch jumping of a second before the collision.
While the two monsters battled Dutch helped Jean up, told her to tend her bleeding acid burns and ran to help Harrigan who was having trouble with the, now seriously pissed off, humanoid.
Jean backed into the wall of the stadium tearing off a bit of cloth to wrap the wound. When her back hit the wall, Jean heard a hollow noise. She turned to see a grate that was filtering out the white gasses.
From what she could see, a metal shaft, big enough for a human to fit into, lead away from the arena.
Jean raced over to where her sword, knocked free of the bug's leg, lay on the ground, the acid that covered it still potent. Jean raced over to the grate and spread the acid onto the grate, which the acid quickly ate through.
"I guess they used cheaper metal for the grate; how typical."
The crowd roared as the human mounted the Mithclara beast and attacked the Queen.
"How very clever," Saren'te thought. Soon, the crowd's attention was focused on the two larger, fighting, humans; but not Saren'te's. He was watching the little human with interest. When he saw the acid burning though the air shaft, he realized the human's plan.
Saren'te was about to warn the Elder when he realized he would never be heard above this racket, and if he was wrong he may be punish.
"Pauk," he cursed to himself. Saren'te stood and left his seat and walked out of the arena. If he was right, he needed to leave now if he wished to head the humans off.
Harrigan and Dutch fought the humanoid. It was a very capable fighter. Every attack made by Dutch or Harrigan was fought off. Finally Dutch was able to get in the creature's defenses and stabbed it straight through the stomach with his spear.
The creature grabbed Dutch's arm, pulled him to towards itself, and hissed menacingly, baring its teeth.
"Dutch! Get down!"
At Harrigan's shout, Dutch dropped and Harrigan swung Dutch's black sword, decapitating the creature.
The creature's body fell dead to the ground as Dutch stood up.
A few second's later, the LSS screamed its death cry and toppled to the ground dead from a mortal wound to the neck by the bug.
Dutch and Harrigan grabbed their weapons as the bug advanced. They fought it for a few seconds when a loud, high-pitched whistle caught their attention. Harrigan turned to see Jean gesturing to an open grate and screaming for him to, "Get your ass over here!"
Harrigan called to Dutch who turned and saw Jean. With a nod, Dutch dropped the heavy sword, and sprinted towards the opening picking up a spear as he ran; out of the corner of his eye he saw Harrigan do the same.
Jean finally caught the attention of the two guys and saw them running towards her. The bug, angry that its prey was getting away, raced after its prey.
As the bug approached, Jean pulled out the small dagger she still had tucked in her belt. The bug opened its mouth and screamed. Jean threw the dagger which flew through the air and down the bug's throat.
The bug screamed and clutched its neck as the dagger sliced into its windpipe.
The trio quickly raced into the piping leading out of the arena and prayed that these tunnels lead to freedom, and not to a trap.
Whew... that was a long chapter, but I enjoyed writing it. So, review and tell me what you thought of the battle chapter. I'll try to get chapter 9 up as soon as I can. (The more reviews, the faster I'll write!) Hope you enjoyed it!
Predator 3: Homeworld
Chapter 8: Gladiators
The trio was quickly bound without much of a fight. Dutch guessed the Predators on the ship were holding out a bit on them, because the aliens that were tying them up had no qualms whatsoever about using all possible force to make them cooperate.
They were lead out of the cell, and onto the docking platform. The Predators pulled the trio into the forest surrounding the spaceport, following a path that the trio couldn't locate. As abruptly as the forest started, it ended to reveal a large, rectangular building, made of the same black metal that began to look familiar, with hundreds of intricately carved pillars wrapping around it. Large statues of Predators stood between the pillars; each held a spear, sword, or one of a multitude of strange sharp weapons.
They were taken through a large door and pulled through numerous corridors, and then down a large staircase, finally though a door where three Predators stood. Harrigan recognized one as the lead Predator that abducted them, but the other two were unfamiliar.
One was dressed in a loincloth and battle shawl that the familiar Predator also wore, and the other, slightly larger one, was an imposing sight. He wore full body armor, inlayed with gems, a blood red cape hung from a jeweled shawl, flowing around his ankles. His dreadlocks, instead of the usual black, were a smoky blue-gray and scars were numerous across his brow.
"This can't be good," Harrigan muttered as the Predators approached them.
An'tir'de was speaking to the High Elder and Sel'in'de, the Yautja in charge of the events, when a group of Yautja burst into the room, dragging the humans with them.
The Elder abruptly cut off the conversation and walked swiftly over to the humans.
"So, this is to be the day's entertainment?" he inquired. He looked each of the humans up and down. They should last a little while at least. He had hunted humans before, and didn't expect much, but from An'tir'de's report, they should be an interesting group.
"Take them to the containment room and arm them each with two different weapons. Armor is not necessary. And make sure the other beasts are ready as well."
The group bowed respectfully to the Elder and left the room, taking the humans with them.
The trio was taken into yet another large room. Two Predators left, only to return with weapons. Two different spears, a dagger, one of the alien disks, a long, thick black sword, and a small short sword were dumped at the trio's feet. Without a word, the six Predators left the room.
"What the hell are these for?" Harrigan asked picking up one of the spears.
"I'm not sure I want to know," Jean replied trying to pick the heavy sword.
"Whatever they are for, I suggest we arm ourselves," Dutch replied, taking the large black sword from Jean and handing her the smaller, short one.
Harrigan picked up the disk and one of the spears, Dutch grabbed the other spear while Jean picked up the dagger and tucked it in her belt.
Suddenly, a bright light in the ceiling lit up the ceiling, illuminating the room and a hidden door way. There came loud, almost screams or cheers from behind the hidden door. The door opened upward and the trio cautiously approached the opening.
Thousands of Predators lined the walls of a large stadium-like building. The ground was sandy and devoid of the white gas. The trio stepped completely out of the room and looked around.
"Good God... I know what this is," Dutch replied looking around.
"What?" Harrigan asked, having no idea what was going on.
"It's a coliseum... and we're the gladiators."
With a loud clank, the door shut behind them.
Saren'te and his fellow hunters sat in prime seats to watch the battle.
"This shall be interesting," Saren'te thought, barely checking his excitement.
The humans stood close to where the entrance for the warriors was. They seemed unsure of what was happening; good. With a loud shout and raising his hand, the High Elder called for the battle to begin.
The trio watched as three different doorways, much larger than their own, slowly opened. They could see something moving in each of the shadowed cells. Loud cries issued from each of the cells as the monstrous beings stepped out of them.
In the first door, a creature that looked like a cross between a lion, spider, and scorpion walked out of its cage, multiple black eyes glittering, pincers snapping and a large barbed tail arching over its back. It had four pawed legs and golden fur covering all of its body except the grayish barbed tail, and was about seven feet tall.
In the second door, an almost human figure stirred. Yet, once it entered the light of the stadium, it didn't look that human. Humanoid in shape and size, except with an extra pair of arms, it had black skin with sharp barbs sticking out of its skin; sharp, silver talons were on its hands and feet, and bright glowing red eyes with silts like a snake for nostrils, and a lipless mouth completed the creature. It held a spear, supplied by the Predators, and smiled baring sharp white teeth.
In the final door, the largest of the creatures stepped out. It looked like a huge, twelve foot tall, deranged bug. A black, slime dripping, exoskeleton covered the creature. It had four arms and a long whip-like tail swayed back and forth, kicking up dust. A large crest adorned the creature's head and it opened its mouth exposing sharp teeth and an extra set of teeth in its mouth.
"We're in trouble," Jean muttered, gripping her sword tighter.
"And I don't think we will have any luck that those things will fight each other and ignore us," Harrigan replied, noticing that all of the creature were staring at them, menacingly in the case of the small black humanoid.
"Right. I think our best chance would be to stick together," Dutch said hastily, raising his sword. No sooner were the words out of his mouth, the large black bug roared and charged at them.
The trio leapt out of the way of the charging bug, Harrigan and Jean jumping to the left toward the black humanoid, while Dutch jumped to the right toward the lion/scorpion/spider thing.
The bug spun screaming, preparing for another lunge, only this time it tried for the lion/scorpion/spider thing. (A/N: I don't want to keep typing lion/scorpion/spider, so I'm going to refer to the creature as LSS.) The LSS dodged the rampaging bug, and charged at Dutch in a mindless rage.
Dutch picked up his black sword and swung as the LSS's scorpion tail lashed out at him. The sharp alien sword easily cut thought the thick shell and membrane of the LSS's tail. Black blood gushed out of the severed limb and was absorbed by the sand. The creature screamed in agony and instinctually retreated away from Dutch.
Meanwhile, Harrigan and Jean weren't having as much luck as Dutch. While they watched the bug rampage and Dutch fend off the LSS, they completely forgot about the black humanoid that was behind them.
Jean spun as the thing's fist connected solidly with her temple. Once she hit the ground, the thing was on top of her, the talons of its foot cutting through her clothing and flesh.
Jean tried to bring her sword up, but her flailing was to no avail. The creature was about to stab Jean when Harrigan tackled it to the ground.
The creature roared in anger and punched Harrigan with its two right arms. Harrigan stumbled backward as the creature slowly stood. It spread its arms wide as the metallic talons on its fingers extended six or seven inches.
The creature was about to charge when its glowing red eyes focused on something behind Harrigan. Harrigan turned to see the large bug racing towards him. As the bug reached him, Jean jumped in and swung her short sword at the bug's leg. The sword dove deep into the bug's exoskeleton, but did not manage to lop of the limb.
The bug screamed as its blood bubbled and gushed out of to the sword. Unfortunately, a few drops of the blood landed on Jean's arm. The acid burned quickly thought Jean's clothing and started on her skin.
"Damn! That thing has freaking acid for blood!" Jean thought as she tried desperately to wipe the burning blood from her skin without burning any other part of her body.
Harrigan had once again engaged in combat with the humanoid. It seemed intent on shredding him to pieces. Harrigan was currently using his spear to defend himself when he remembered about the disk. As he groped for it on his belt, the creature raised its left upper hand to slice his face into ribbons.
Harrigan quickly threw the disk which, like he did to that Predator bastard in '97, loped the creature's hand off. It shrieked and fell to the ground, two lower arms catching its self while the other favored the now useless stub that was once its hand.
The LSS that Dutch was fighting seemed to have calmed down. Dutch saw that the other two weren't doing as well.
"Maybe you could help me out," Dutch though as he approached the LSS. The beast did not move for fear of more injury. Dutch saw the large bug looming over Jean as she desperately tried to fend it off with the humanoid's abandoned spear, making small cuts in the thing's arms and chest.
Dutch carefully touched the LSS, which remained still. Dutch grabbed on to the beast's fur and hauled himself up on the creature's back.
"Just like riding a bull," Dutch whispered to himself. Dutch took his black sword and give the LSS a sharp slap on the hindquarters with the flat of the sword to get it going.
The LSS lurched forward, nearly knocking Dutch off of it.
"Yeah, a 2000 pound bull that could slaughter me easily at any moment," he corrected mentally. Dutch leaned to the side to get the LSS to turn, which it did. Dutch aimed the creature towards the black bug and had it charge.
Saren'te and the other Yautja shouted and watched in amazement as the humans fought. The kande amenha queen proved to be more than a match for the humans, as did the small forest dwelling Nichat. One of the large humans, the one who supposedly murdered his grandfather, was having an easy time with the Mithclara beast.
Saren'te smiled when the Nichat began to fight his father's killer; yet the human was fast and a good fighter.
"Perhaps...good enough to best my father?"
Saren'te tried to shake the though from his mind, but it still lingered. There is no honorable creature that could best a Yautja... Or is there?
The bug approached Jean for the final kill after knocking the spear from her grasp. Just before the queen brought her clawed hand down on Jean's chest, she turned with a roar as the LSS barreled into her, Dutch jumping of a second before the collision.
While the two monsters battled Dutch helped Jean up, told her to tend her bleeding acid burns and ran to help Harrigan who was having trouble with the, now seriously pissed off, humanoid.
Jean backed into the wall of the stadium tearing off a bit of cloth to wrap the wound. When her back hit the wall, Jean heard a hollow noise. She turned to see a grate that was filtering out the white gasses.
From what she could see, a metal shaft, big enough for a human to fit into, lead away from the arena.
Jean raced over to where her sword, knocked free of the bug's leg, lay on the ground, the acid that covered it still potent. Jean raced over to the grate and spread the acid onto the grate, which the acid quickly ate through.
"I guess they used cheaper metal for the grate; how typical."
The crowd roared as the human mounted the Mithclara beast and attacked the Queen.
"How very clever," Saren'te thought. Soon, the crowd's attention was focused on the two larger, fighting, humans; but not Saren'te's. He was watching the little human with interest. When he saw the acid burning though the air shaft, he realized the human's plan.
Saren'te was about to warn the Elder when he realized he would never be heard above this racket, and if he was wrong he may be punish.
"Pauk," he cursed to himself. Saren'te stood and left his seat and walked out of the arena. If he was right, he needed to leave now if he wished to head the humans off.
Harrigan and Dutch fought the humanoid. It was a very capable fighter. Every attack made by Dutch or Harrigan was fought off. Finally Dutch was able to get in the creature's defenses and stabbed it straight through the stomach with his spear.
The creature grabbed Dutch's arm, pulled him to towards itself, and hissed menacingly, baring its teeth.
"Dutch! Get down!"
At Harrigan's shout, Dutch dropped and Harrigan swung Dutch's black sword, decapitating the creature.
The creature's body fell dead to the ground as Dutch stood up.
A few second's later, the LSS screamed its death cry and toppled to the ground dead from a mortal wound to the neck by the bug.
Dutch and Harrigan grabbed their weapons as the bug advanced. They fought it for a few seconds when a loud, high-pitched whistle caught their attention. Harrigan turned to see Jean gesturing to an open grate and screaming for him to, "Get your ass over here!"
Harrigan called to Dutch who turned and saw Jean. With a nod, Dutch dropped the heavy sword, and sprinted towards the opening picking up a spear as he ran; out of the corner of his eye he saw Harrigan do the same.
Jean finally caught the attention of the two guys and saw them running towards her. The bug, angry that its prey was getting away, raced after its prey.
As the bug approached, Jean pulled out the small dagger she still had tucked in her belt. The bug opened its mouth and screamed. Jean threw the dagger which flew through the air and down the bug's throat.
The bug screamed and clutched its neck as the dagger sliced into its windpipe.
The trio quickly raced into the piping leading out of the arena and prayed that these tunnels lead to freedom, and not to a trap.
Whew... that was a long chapter, but I enjoyed writing it. So, review and tell me what you thought of the battle chapter. I'll try to get chapter 9 up as soon as I can. (The more reviews, the faster I'll write!) Hope you enjoyed it!