Author's Notes: This took too long to write (I do have a life, yes. Besides, how many people read this again? Lol ). Anyway, I'll be converting all of the previous chapters into 1st person perspective, starting with this one. The sequel, which may involve some characters from "MORE Friends of Mineral Town" (oh jeez, can you guess who :D), is coming up soon. Oh, and for you people just DYING to flame me, go ahead. I don't care anymore, go ahead.
Prey to a Hunter
Chapter 12:
One, ugly…
As the sergeant's body fell, crumpled and broken, Mira and Karen sprang into action. The Predator landed slightly behind us, sprinting towards the hole in the ground. Karen swung her rifle around and opened fire in short, erratic bursts. The hunter was already gone, however, and pulling out the long spear that had pierced Jenkins' chest. Twirling this weapon several times through the air, he jump-kicked one of the General's guards. The man had no idea what hit him.
The second guard turned to face the hunter. It, in the blink of an eye, leaped and rolled towards the man and, bringing it's spear up and around, sliced the man from shoulder to groin. The man stood there, blinking stupidly for a second, before his two halves split, and the chunks of flesh hit the ground.
A white, milky fluid burst from the bisected man and sprayed all over the General's uniform. Wait a second…white? Instead of red blood shooting all over the place, a white, sticky fluid seeped everywhere. The fallen guard twitched once, and lay still. The entrails of the man didn't look like, in my opinion, organic human innards should. It almost looked…synthetic, but that was impossible, right?
But then what was the white fluid?
The other guard fired off a three second burst of automatic fire, from his prone position on the ground. The massive slugs sailed through the air in almost slow motion. The hunter spun its spear around in a tight circle and absorbed the bullets with the weapon's handle. The last shot managed to snap the weapon in half, and the slug pierced the hunter's arm. The creature roared in pain, and slammed the spear through the man's head, sending more of the white fluid, and this time, something completely unexpected, flying out the other side of the skull.
A large microchip, about the size of my finger, was impaled on the end of the hunter's spear. My eyes widened in realization as I figured out what these men were.
"Synthetic humans?" I mumbled to myself. Grey and Karen had come to the same conclusion as I did, because they were both staring incredulously at the fallen guards.
The General snarled and stood, baring his teeth and brandishing a huge pistol. He fired two shots at point-blank range, hitting the hunter twice. Green blood dribbled down the hunter's armor.
I could tell this thing was really pissed with us now. We had wounded it multiple times, shot it, blew it up, and buried it under a building, and it still came back, time after time. He was rightfully mad at us. He had probably come here, expecting an easy hunt, to destroy us all within days. So far, it had been weeks since the hunter had first landed and Rick disappeared.
The hunter stepped forward and grabbed the pistol out of the General's hands. He crushed the metal and plastic of the weapon, and slammed it down into the General's head. He crumpled, a heap on the ground, and lay still.
Karen, however, was anything but still. She opened fire with her carbine as soon as the General hit the ground. Five bursts of fire spat from her carbine, the military carbines being set to three round bursts, unlike their rifle counterparts. The hunter grunted as he absorbed the first burst of fire, and was out of the way by the time Karen's finger had squeezed the trigger for the third burst. He had leapt high into the air, and to my surprise, landed right in front of Gotz. Gotz never had a chance. The hunter stabbed his wristblades deep into Gotz's gut. As the large man stumbled backwards, the hunter slashed at Gotz's neck. He fell to the ground, eyes blankly staring at me from across the field.
"No! Gotz!" Zack yelled, firing both of his carbines at the hunter. The roar of gunfire was eclipsed by the hunter's snarl of anger, and Zack slowly backed up as the hunter's blades snapped the barrel of his left rifle cleanly in half. He continued to fire his carbine, however, until the weapon clicked empty. I then remembered that being smaller than the rifles carried by the Marines, the carbines held half of the ammunition the rifles did. Zack gasped in fear as the hunter's clicking gurgle accompanied its raised fist.
Grey, however, had other plans. He, in an act of courage that surprised me, heroically stepped in front of Zack, and depressed the firing lever for his flamethrower. The napalm shot out like a demented squirt gun, catching itself on fire as it passed the primer flame. The burning liquid coated the hunter thoroughly, eliciting a roar from the alien.
"Get away from him!" Grey yelled, just as the flamethrower ran out of napalm. Dropping the weapon, Grey pulled out the sidearm, and fired six armor-piercing shots at the hunter.
The creature staggered under the force of the armor piercing rounds. It panted for breath as it finally caught up with Grey. It lifted him into the air and tossed him aside like a rag doll. Grey crumpled to the ground and didn't move.
It seemed to favor one side over the other as it turned to face us. Cliff, Karen, Mira, Zack and I all stood our ground, our weapons raised high. The hunter seemed to relax for a second, cockily, before reaching a hand up towards its face.
"What's it doing?" Cliff silently whispered. Karen merely narrowed her eyes and took a bead on the hunter's head, but hesitated as she saw what the hunter was about to do next.
Several tubes connected to the blackened helmet were pulled out of place by the hunter's dexterous fingers. Steam hissed and spewed forth from these for a second.
And, to our collective curiosity, the hunter put both of its hands on the sides of the helmet, and tugged. More steam issued forth from behind the helmet, and slowly, the mask came off. It fell to the ground with a clang as the hunter slowly looked up at us.
To say it was ugly was an understatement. Quite possibly the understatement of the century, to be exact. I had never seen anything like the creature standing before me, ever, in all of my years.
"You're one, ugly, motherfucker…" Karen gasped. The hunter threw its head back and roared. The red scaly skin of the hunter's face was covered in scars, and the beady, yellow eyes of the creature were focused.
Quickly, the hunter leapt forwards, dashing towards us. Cliff and I were frozen, too startled to move. Mira, however, acted faster than all of us. She stepped in front of a startled Karen, and flung her to the side.
The hunter paused for a moment, and stepped right in front of Mira, glaring impressively down at her. Mira fearlessly glared back. The hunter reached out and grabbed her by the throat, lifting her into the air. She dangled in the hunter's massive grip, at least two feet off the ground.
Cliff shifted next to me.
"What are you waiting for?" Cliff hissed, raising his rifle and firing at the hunter. That proved to be a big mistake, as the hunter merely absorbed the bullets and held Mira in front of him, preventing any future attacks. Cliff tried to angle for a better shot, but the hunter left no openings for him to exploit.
"Come on, Jack!" he yelled, fumbling with a grenade. Karen held up her hand.
"Stop! You'll kill Mira! And besides, one grenade might not kill that thing!" she warned. Cliff snarled angrily and slid the grenade into the launcher, pumping the action of the gun and aiming at the pair…
-
The Yautja silently gazed into the defiant eyes of the human before him. Or was it truly human?
It is you. I tried to meet with you before, but fate had us separate too soon.
The human stared back with glazed eyes.
Only Jenkins and I knew…you, you have been stalking me. Stalking me for all these years. Why? The human silently asked. The Yautja was not surprised that this special human could communicate mentally to him as well. Then again, this was not an ordinary human.
You do not know by now? Allow me to show you
As the Yautja concentrated for a moment, the human screamed.
-
As Cliff was about to take a risk and fire the grenade, Mira twitched in the hunter's grasp and screamed. Screamed louder than I had ever thought possible.
The hunter's eyes seemed to shine as Mira dropped to the ground. The marine landed with a dull thud, splayed out across the earth and soil. She thrashed and screamed, holding her head as if in pain.
Cliff stepped forwards, intending to rush to aid Mira. The hunter, however, glared at him and stepped in front of her, almost protectively. Why was he doing this now?
"Back off. I don't know what he did to her, but I think you should back off, Cliff" Karen cautioned. Cliff glared at both of us, but kept his rifle aimed at the hunter. It laughed mockingly at him as Mira stopped thrashing on the ground.
-
(Mira's POV)
I instantly understood everything that had gone throughout my life. Why everything about me was so odd. Why the majority of my life had been in military duty.
I was an adopted child, supposedly found in the back alleys of the big city, close to Mineral Town, in fact. My adopted parents had been drunkards and drug-addicts, but they did supply me with the basics needed for life. But my father was abusive, and he became intolerable. So I ran away at the age of fourteen and joined the Marines.
The recruiting officer had been reluctant to let me join. After I punched him in the face and held him over a ten-story drop, however, he quickly changed his mind. I had felt that the Marines had been the best choice for somebody like me. I was nobody, a weird freak of nature. People stared at my odd complexion, the four small bumps on my face, said to be marks left by my supposed surrogate parents from when I was very young. But I always remembered having them, and when I really tried, I could make an odd-clicking sound from the back of my throat with them.
But it wasn't until my second assignment in the jungles of Brazil that the strange things began to happen. We were sent to put down a local terrorist cell, quietly. It was a covert op, to assassinate the leaders of the cell, who were influential in the Brazilian government.
It wasn't until the skinned bodies started appearing that things became complicated. Members of our unit would disappear, and their bodies, mutilated and missing their skulls, would turn up, days later.
And one night, about one month into the mission, it came. In the dark of night, the thing came. Private Jenkins, who was part of my squad at the time, was there. He claimed to know nothing about the incident, but I know he saw the hunter as well.
These telepathic alien creatures were merely coming to earth to hunt. Like a human on safari, they would find the strongest "clan" of human warriors, and kill them. One by one. Some were honorable, killing only one or two humans. Some even detested killing us, settling for observing the human race slowly killing itself off.
These creatures were far beyond us. We humans would never be able to compete with them alone. But then, I wasn't human. Not fully, anyway.
All of this knowledge had been imparted to me thanks to the hunter. It stood in front of me, guarding me from Cliff, who aimed his grenade launcher directly at us.
Cliff, the poor, lonely traveler with a mysterious past. He never said anything, but I knew. I knew because the hunter knew, and now, we knew and understood what the other did.
Cliff had been part of the rebel action at the legendary battle of Somalia. He had killed a female Army Ranger. And in the end, she died, trying to protect him.
That woman was my mother. Or, at least, said the hunter. My biological mother was a soldier, just like me. She had been alive only a decade ago, having abandoned me after realizing what I truly was.
My biological father was even more startling to me, but made the most sense. I had always had a talent for knowing exactly what people were going to do before they did it. I could avoid fights easily, or effortlessly win any battle due to my uncanny physical speed and strength. And now I know why, because my father…was a Yautja.