Author's Note: omg…I'm so sorry that I haven't put this up sooner! Shame on me! I've had it written out for a while too…but every time I went to get it on the computer something came up and put it off for a few more days!

TheMadPuppy: Inu wasn't brought up to "save" people—I think that the Yautja world is all Darwin: survival of the fittest. I don't think he would've saved his comrades even if they died at his feet. Lex, though, would be considered an inferior creature, so he probably felt that he owed her some sort of assistance because she was "weak." Not sure if that makes sense…

To others: 3 Thank you all so much for the support and your love! Sorry about the typos, but as I believe I mentioned in the first chapters, this was actually written in my class notebook (oops) and typed up onto the computer without much editing after the fact. This chapter, though, kept getting messed up, so it might get icky Oo..sorry! And I realized something when I was driving home from work one night (what a place to think of this). I became paranoid that I never put in the part where Inu/Scar lost his cannon during chapter 7…and when I checked this out later and discovered it was true, I was very mad. So instead of adding it into that chapter, I put it in here….I think that's the only thing I did miss Oo

Enjoy!

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

8. Friends

Inu had landed on his feet, but the impact made his knees buckle and his hand lose the spear. He noticed Lex had fallen flat on her face. He was relieved that the falling land didn't continue on, otherwise they wouldn't have made it.

The Yautja stood up, Lex doing the same, both turning to face the crisis finishing its decent to the darkness below. The bomb did what it was designed to do—wipe out all life for a mile-wide radius. The only living things left was he and the human. Evidence of the hunt was completely gone. Smoke and dust rose from the massive crater, but all else was silent and still.

Now that the rush was over, Inu had a chance to collect his thoughts and sort out for a quick second what had just happened. His legs didn't ache all that much, since he was built to run. The hole in his shoulder stung with the cold air sweeping through the gap in his torn mesh, but it was tolerable for the time being. The one thing he noticed now that he hadn't before getting out of the grotto was that his cannon was gone. The signal was off in his mask and the weight of the back pack was not there. It probably fell off when that damn kainde ameda dropped down on him.

Inu turned slowly towards his human companion and was highly impressed that she had made it with him. He never thought that a human would out-do a Yautja. He idly wished Prient'De and Boccob could have seen that they were now a class below a human.

There was one thing, though, that he had a terrible urge to find out—could she possibly still be intimidated by him? He knew, obviously, that humans were highly different in physical attributes than his kind. Their face alone was enough to send a chill through any ordinary Yautja…except he wasn't bothered by her appearance. Her face was almost…nice.

Slowly did he raise his hand to the two pressure hoses that attached to his mask. One at a time he snapped them off and didn't let them go until all the air had hissed out. Then, with both clawed hands, Inu held the bottom of the metal face plate, parting it from his head. He gave a small trill of his throat at the sudden coldness of the air that swept over his exposing face. Cautiously, he brought down the mask, his amber eyes quickly glancing at Lex for her reaction.

To his surprise she stood still—not even a harsh gasp escaped her mouth. She wasn't disgusted at all? He had heard stories of his people meeting a human only to be screamed at because they couldn't take the differences. Surely she thought his face structure compared to her own was weird—after all, he certainly had when he first saw an image of an average human years ago when he was just a junior scout.

He would try again to get her to flinch. He roared out loudly, his mandibles flaring as far as they could go. She blinked, perhaps flinched and breathed a few quick breaths, but her footing stayed. This human wasn't scared of him. The respect he had slowly gained for her jumped even higher. If anyone was worthy of acceptance from this day, it was she.

He sighed with a purr, his face relaxing as he started at her. Glancing down, he took hold of the alien finger he had taken from his first kainde ameda kill. He squeezed the tip, a very small hint of the green acidic blood seeping out of the tip. Holding it up, he watched as Lex stared for a moment, obviously contemplating about letting him mark her. He tilted his head, giving her enough motive to nod slightly and turn her head away.

Inu's hand moved forward and with steady ease drew the two lines on the side of her face, forming the identical Yautja symbol that decorated his forehead. She flinched this time and pulled in a sharp breath. He knew the burning sensation from the monster's blood hurt like hell, but if she wanted to feel pain she should feel his shoulder right about now, especially using that arm to mark her.

The symbol was traced and Inu backed away. Lex looked up at him with an expressionless face. He wondered if she could tell that he was proud of her. She had endured what his dumb-ass Yautja companions could not. She was a true warrior.

He softly said, "Friend," in his own words, but he knew she would not understand.

Using his foot, he tossed up the spear and caught it with his long fingers. With a soft hum he held it out to her. She took it without hesitation, her eyes still locked with his own. An amazing creature, this Lex was. He would be honored to fight along side her again—even if she was a mere human. Respectively his head bowed, eyes closing, and mandibles turning in.

The moment was short lived and completely destroyed by a sudden rumble beneath them. Ice cracked and split away. The air was disturbed by an angry growl. Inu turned his head sharply, hair spinning around and the metal clasps on each strand clanked against his armor. What emerged from the ground made him feel like he was about to be terribly sick, just because he thought it was over for now and he could go home and rest.

His worst fears were recognized—curse any god that could read minds. They deliberately helped the queen of the kainde ameda survive the bomb—something Inu had though impossible. Yet the beast screamed into the dark sky. Inu's mask had long fallen to the ground and was now forgotten because it was useless.

"Oh fucking shit…" he said as his eyes became wide when the bitch rose from the ground. He started to back up, Lex following suit; he risked a glance at the human—she was just a tad bit more scared than he was….maybe.

He couldn't let any possible hint of fear cloud his senses. He had to think quickly and move even quicker. First thing to do was to use long distance weapons…yes…that was probably the best move.

Inu immediately pulled back the case of the twin blades upon his gauntlet. With a distinct click they shifted inside. The hunger raised his arm and barely allowed a second for aim. Tightening the muscles in his forearm, the trigger snapped and both elongated blades shot forth with lightning-fast speed.

"Shit," he mumbled after they struck home in the alien queen's shoulder, but barely caused enough sufficient damage to put an end to this. He had hoped he was sending it straight into the monster's throat—that was the first time his aim was completely off.

But it did give Inu just enough time to detach a shuriken and press it open in front of his face. The gigantic kainde ameda, standing nearly twenty feet tall, stopped its hissing and looked back at the attacker. Inu flung the shuriken up, the six-bladed weapon slicking through a chunk of the monster's neck. Inu smiled to himself as the creature reared its head back; he caught the returning weapon perfectly. Not a moment later, Inu tossed it back up, cutting through a piece of the monster's largely-crowned head. It yelled out again in pain and anger, swinging its head around.

The weapon headed back again, Inu having his arm extended and prepared to take hold of it. His fingers were only inches away from touching the metal handle when a very long tail shot out from behind his prey unexpectedly, although he should've seen it coming. He didn't have a second to react—the tail gave a powerful swipe and swatted him away like an insect.

Inu felt the harsh impact against his side and wondered if a few ribs had been shattered. He completely lost sight of where he was as his body involuntarily flew over Lex and smashed face first into some sort of piping and wood supports some fifty to sixty feet away. A few splinters scratched at his face and hands, but nothing major except a new developing throbbing headache.

Quickly—at least as fast as he could manage—Inu pushed himself to his feet, but not easily. His footing wasn't stable and he stumbled back a few steps, trying to maintain what balance he had.

Inu barely knew what hit him—something very heavy pounded against his back, causing his balance to fail completely; he fell forward, warms flailing all the while trying to break the fall. The wind had been harshly knocked out of him and for a moment he forgot where he was altogether.

As Inu tried desperately to push himself up for a second time, he heard heavy footsteps behind him. This was it; he had survived the temple only to end the day going from hunter to prey. There was no point of struggling now. Either way—whether he remained still or rolled over in attempt to get up—he could be killed. Inu accept his fate.

Letting his body completely collapse, he waited for the blow. But it never came. Instead he heard an ear-shattering screech and the sound of something—a building?—falling under immense weight. He wanted to look. He had to look. The pain in his body was terrible, but he found the strength to look over his shoulder, hearing a roar of terror behind him as he did so.

Inu couldn't believe it; the kainde ameda giant was struggling to dislodge a spear from its neck—the spear he made for Lex.

She had saved his life.

Seeing this, he decided to screw giving up and go for that possible chance of survival, no matter what the odds were. He would go for the glory of being the first Yautja to go into battle with the mother of demons without a clan at his heels.

Inu rolled over and forced himself to his feet. By now the kainde ameda had thrown away the primitive weapon and left the building it had fallen into behind to burn. Ahead, Lex was running for her life with nothing to protect herself with; not even the skull he made into a shield.

If he didn't hurry, she would be squashed, chewed to pieces and spit out. Grabbing the spear from his back—his remaining weapon—Inu raced after them as fast as his weakening legs would carry him. His shoulder seemed to hurt more now and he felt drops of his neon-green blood drip down into his armor; his ribs felt cracked at the very least, but neither injury was going to stop him now.

Lex was doing well, but the strides of the kainde ameda were much too big to give the short human any sort of lead. She was lucky she was still carrying her head, even with running under a tunnel of massive bones from who-knows-what animal. He expected the bitch of a monster to smash through them like they were small twigs.

A large, round structure standing on wooden stilts lay dead ahead and Inu saw Lex dive beneath it. Good. This gave him the chance to catch up now that the beast stopped and tried to find a way to get its prey. The only bad thing about this was that that thing didn't look like it could hold up to the kainde ameda's head bashes—it already started falling back a bit.

Inu gripped his spear with both hands as he approached. Within seconds he was coming up on the creature's left side; he leapt up into the air just as the long tail shot under the rickety stilts; he hoped it missed Lex. Upon leaving the ground, he spun around in a complete three-sixty to give his spear enough power behind the thrust. He couldn't see Lex, but he knew she saw him plunge the spear deep into the thick head of the monster.

The kainde ameda fell back and struggled to remove the offensive weapon. Inu, on the other hand, had landed not far from where he jumped. His knees bent to break the impact, hands touching down on the wooden surface that met his weight. The Yautja let out a triumphant roar, mandibles spread wide. He dared that bitch to try killing him again.

But although he pierced that monster's neck, it was still taking in breaths. Inu snarled, but was stopped from the sight of Lex pulling a large chain. His eyes followed it and saw it was attached to the queen—probably from when it was held captive in the pyramid. Lex, being the brilliant human he realized her to be, was trying to attach it to the round structure that was threatening to fall off the cliff.

Inu jumped back into action, hustling over and taking hold of the chain with Lex. Even with his injuries, his strength tripled that of the human's. He pulled and pulled, trying to give Lex enough slack to do what she had to. He looked back to see her tying the chain around a small extension of the tank-like configuration. He gave one last tug and held it tight.

"Got it!" Lex yelled.

"Good!" Inu said back in his native tongue; a look of relief washed over his face.

The synthetic contraption snapped and tilted towards the edge of the cliff…but something went wrong. It only creaked as it came to a sudden halt for some strange reason.

Then…it happened. Something long…something sharp plowed its way through Inu's back and out of his stomach. An immediate yell of pain escaped his lungs as he felt the tail of the kainde ameda jerk and move up—that bitch was lifting him up in victory.

Inu was helpless. His body screamed in agony as his feet left the ground unwillingly and his weight strangled around this bony appendage. The beast brought him around so he could see his huntress face to face.

"Fuck you!" He yelled as its mouth opened to deliver the final blow.

Without warning, however, the body of the monster was wrenched back. The long tail lost control and violently whipped around, throwing Inu off its tip. He tightly closed his eyes, knowing that hitting the ground would hurt like pure hell.

It did. This time he landed flat on his back. He knew if nothing was broken before, it most certainly was now. This day turned out to be nothing but horrible. Screw Prient'De and Boccob…somehow this was their fault. He wasn't sure how, exactly, but he'd blame all of this on them anyway.

A sharp shrill broke his remaining thoughts. With every last bit of strength and a tremendous amount of willpower, Inu turned just enough to watch the kainde ameda being yanked away and tumble over the cliff and out of sight. Somehow Lex managed to make it work—somehow, she became the day's hero.

His head fell back. It was over. The kainde ameda queen was gone; but so was the feeling in his body. Blood started to rise into his throat, causing him to gag on the liquid. Every breath he forced himself to take was pure misery.

Out of the corner of his eye he saw the human…Lex…arrive and kneel down next to him. He could see the pity in her face. That was the only thing he could see…

He tried desperately to say something…her name if possible…but the blood filled his lungs and he gave one last struggle for breath.

Then…all was dark and quiet.