Chapter 9: Confessions.
'Hey guys and gals GhostNobody here again to say a big thank you to you all for reading and taking your time out to review, it really does mean so much to me that you guys are enjoying the adventure of Tik eleth and Jack. The suggestions you guys are filling my head with have got the voices all in a tizzy and as you can already see I kept my word by getting some of them in already, so keep them coming and I'll see how I can work some of them in. One point I felt I needed to address is a few of you seemed concerned about how early and fast Jack confessed his love for Tik, all I can say without ruining it is don't worry all will be explained. One last thing and this is more of a request, a few of my friends who have been reading my story have basically started an argument on how Tik eleth and Jack would really look together, so if anyone feels like having a crack at drawing them up feel free to PM them to me, don't worry I don't bite, the voices do but I don't and who knows if I like what I see I may even use it as the cover pic, so again with one last big thank you to you all for the amazing support this is GhostNobody signing off and saying on with the show….'
Pure seething hatred mixed with raw anger and fear drove Jack into a frenzy, everything he saw was tinted in the purest red he'd ever seen in his life, there were eight of those creatures left at the entrance of the cave, they'd dove for cover behind the rocks the second he went crazy and took out about six or seven of their number with a wave of bullets, but the creature now wearing Jack's skin was not going to be sated till all of them lay dead. The SAW clicked dry for the second time and in a flurry of movement Jack swapped out the belts, as the gun stopped firing the eight creatures got bold and broke cover and charged him, a few seconds before they reached him Jack snapped the cocking handle back and shouldered the gun, the last thing the closest ones to him saw was the look of pure hate in those burning eyes of his, then he opened up on them turning the closest five of them into instant confetti as the bullets tore through them as he wild sprayed the whole group.
Another one fell as it tried to get into cover, its legs and tail were torn clean off by the hail of lead that hit it, again the SAW clicked dry but this time he had no more belts to change for it so he simply threw it to one side, then drawing his handgun he knelt and took one of Tik's long daggers from the ground by his foot, then he stepped over the unconscious huntress and headed towards where the last two bugs were hiding between the rocks.
The first one dies in one shot as it was stupid enough to poke its head out of a gap in the rock to see what was happening, the massive round from Jack's Desert Eagle blew most of its ugly face clean off in a shower of green goo, the second one burst out of the gap and went straight up the wall, Jack emptied the clip at it and hit nothing but rock as it deftly dodged his shots, then he got the one noise that fills every soldier with dread, the dead man's click.
Instantly the bug dropped off the ceiling and charged straight for him, Jack rolled out of the way only a second before it struck the floor where he'd been standing with its massive tail, but he was able to get a strike in with the long dagger as he rolled past its legs,
"Just you and me now prick!" he said with a voice filled with venom as he stood up,
the creature turned and hissed at him menacingly, he noticed the massive gash he'd left in its long thin thigh, so it would be weak now on its left side, with a roar of primal rage Jack charged right at the now rather surprised creature it braced for the impact but it never came, it had been too busy looking at the body of the running man to noticed what his hands were doing, a flying dagger struck it hard in the shoulder and the force caused it to twist sideways, as it twisted back with an angry screech it found itself staring down the barrel of a rather large gun,
"Fucking checkmate" Jack said quietly as he pulled the trigger of the AS50.
The alien creature's head dissolved into a cloud of acidic mist that moved with the blast of the massive gun, the body dropped to the floor with a heavy thud, looking around himself Jack noticed that the cave was now clear but for the bodies, then his eyes locked onto his fallen ally, "Tik!" he yelled running over to her, she was unconscious and bleeding heavily from the wounds on her arms and torso, quickly he knelt down and felt for a pulse in the same place as he would on a human, he had no idea if their arteries were in the same place but he had to try, instantly he felt a pulse but it was kinda weak, "Don't you worry girl I'm getting you out of here but first I gotta stem those bleeders" he said, rapidly he searched through his pouches for the small medical kit that he'd seen earlier, he found it quickly and opened it he had no idea if the stuff would even work on her kind but at the very least the bandages should do something, using every bandage he had in the small pack he bound up all of Tik's wounds that he could see, her bright green blood seeped through the material but it seemed to at least have an effect.
Jack was still operating on pure adrenaline as he was being driven by fear here, but not fear of the creatures or of attack, fear of losing Tik, this was like Afghanistan all over again.
Afghanistan 2013
"Are we sure these fuckers are even up here Jack?" Sargent Sandra Michaels or Sandy to everyone who wasn't shit scared of her asked in a rather bored voice, Jack glanced from his scope over to his rather bored spotter,
"American brass seems to think so, their intelligence guys make a pretty good case" he replied looking through the high powered scope at the mouth of a cave about a mile opposite them on another mountain. Sandy snorted in response to this, "You know what Int guys are like, they see a smudge on the lens and suddenly it's fucking Taliban" she said sounding kinda grumpy, Jack looked over at his spotter again, she was tall coming in at 6ft 1in, solid built being a weight lifter that could bench her own body weight would do that for you, right now she had her blonde hair tucked inside her camouflage hood which was more like a net headdress than a hood, she had one of her emerald green eyes closed so she could squint through her camo spotting scope mounted on its little tripod in front of her, even with the camo pain and black streaks under her eyes to knock down the sun glare Jack still thought she was the most beautiful woman he had ever known and not just in the looks department.
"You know I can feel you looking at me" she said suddenly startling him a little, she moved her head away from the scope to look at him and flashed her perfect smile at him,
"Got bored of staring at an empty cave" Jack said with a grin, she just stuck her tongue out at him, he'd known Sandy a total of four years ever since she'd come from Delta Force to train with the SAS and had been paired up with him, he didn't know at what point exactly that they just stopped being just friends and had become lovers, it had just sort of happened, too many long cold nights hugging each other for warmth in various little observation posts or holes as they just called them and one thing had led to another, but now it was always said around the barracks that where you saw just one of them be worried as the other was watching through a scope.
Sandy had loved working with Jack so much that she'd done selection and officially transferred to the SAS as one of the only women that had ever made it into the Elite British special forces regiment, though Jack had no doubt in his mind that she'd make it, there wasn't a man alive brave enough to tell her that she couldn't do something, real emphasis on the alive part.
Jack smiled and shook his head as he thought about it, Sandy was the first girl he'd ever truly loved in his life, she was strong both physically and mentally, had a wicked sense of humour that would make even grizzled soldiers blush, she just seemed to have this aura of confidence around her that just drew you in and he loved it and he loved her, he was just waiting for the right moment to tell her.
Sandy being Sandy had told him in the first five minutes of their relationship, but he'd said that when he said the words that he would mean them with all his heart and he wanted them to mean something rather than be another throw away comment, as he felt the word got used way too much in everyday life, but the longer they'd been together the harder he'd actually found that it was to make the words come out, despite the fact that he wanted to say them now, but to combat this he'd hatched a plan, before their latest tour he'd bought a ring, he's spoken to a few waiters in their favourite restaurant in Hereford, it was all arranged, when they got back he was going to take her out for a meal once the obligatory waking up on pub floors was out of the way and he was going to bend his knee and tell the woman he loved exactly how he felt about her and exactly how much she meant to him and all of this was going to happen in just three days.
"I got movement" Sandy said suddenly snapping Jack out of his happy little dream, he quickly aligned the rifle and looked through the scope of the powerful Barrett, a small group of individuals all dressed in a mixture of traditional Afghani dress and combat gear were in the process of emerging from the cave, they were all armed with a verity of weapons from AK47's to RPG-7's and even a few light machine guns,
"Call it in" he said never taking his eyes off the group, they seemed to be setting something up on the mouth of the cave, as he watched he heard Sandy's voice reporting to HQ what was occurring,
"There's a patrol inbound along the valley floor, this is most likely an ambush" she said reporting back to Jack,
"Orders?" he asked,
"Observe and engage only if necessary" she said, he sighed heavily, he'd known she was going to say that, suddenly Sandy spotted the patrol moving through the valley it was a patrol of American Marines, a sudden series of smoke puffs told Jack exactly what they'd been setting up,
"They got fucking eighty-eight mortars up there!" he exclaimed at the four tubes they'd set up fired off raining death down on the Marines who were now scrambling for cover, Jack watched as a loader went to place a shell into the tube and he squeezed the trigger, the massive rifle roared and jumped, a puff of pink mist surrounded the loader and he fell dead, "Call the Marines and HQ advise them we are engaging" he said and he heard Sandy yelling into the radio as he fired off another series of shots at the mortar carriers.
Now that they were the ones under fire the Taliban scrambled for cover among the rocks as the shells from the massive .50 kept picking off anyone stupid enough to be out in the open, he saw men pointing and watching the hills, he knew that they knew where they were but they had nothing that could reach him and Sandy way up here, or so he thought, a sudden puff of smoke and a whistling noise swiftly proved him wrong.
"INCOMING!" he screamed and he and Sandy went to dive for cover behind the rocks, too little too late, the round burst right between them and sent them both flying. Jack's ears were ringing as he laid on the ground, looking over himself he was amazed to find that apart from a few minor shrapnel wounds his armour had taken the majority of it and he was pretty much fine, he rolled over grinning that was until he saw Sandy about six feet from him on the ground minus both legs, "Oh fuck Sandy no!" he yelled scrambling over to her, she was covered in a patch work of wounds that were all bleeding heavily, "Hold on Sandy I'm gonna stem these up, you'll be ok" he said quickly grabbing for both of their mini medical kits, "Jack?..." Sandy said weakly coughing up blood,
"I'm here baby girl, I'm here" he said grabbing her hand as she raised it up to him,
"I'm so glad I met you Jack and that I got to love you" she said through a coughing fit and with that he felt her grip slacken in his hands, her chest rattled like a cage and her eyes glazed focusing into no-where,
"No no no no no no, don't you fucking leave me, don't you dare go, please stay with me baby please!" Jack started in a roar that rapidly disintegrated into a whisper as the reality hit him, he cradled the limp body of his dead lover in his arms smearing her blood all over his armour and his tunic, hot tears burst from his eyes and ran down his face cutting rivers in the dust that clung to his skin, the pain was unbearable, but then another mortar burst on the hillside above him showering him with pebbles blasted free and he knew he didn't have time to mourn right now, with one final quiet word of goodbye he laid her body down and headed back to the rifle, he proceeded to pick off every single one of the Taliban fighters one after the other, even detonating their mortars in the boxes.
One Month Later.
Jack stood at her grave side staring blankly at the plain white headstone, I his hand he held the Military medals that both he and she had been awarded for their bravery, his awarded in person hers posthumously. Slowly he knelt down and placed both medals side by side on the stub at the bottom of the headstone, "I'm so so sorry" he said quietly, "I'm so sorry that I never told you how I felt about you, you were the star of my life and now you're gone and all I'm left with is a shiny piece of metal to remember you by, but I don't want their medals or their sympathy, I just want my Sandy back if only for a second just so that I could tell you the words I knew that you were dying to hear, that I loved you Sandy with all of my heart" he said tears beginning to wind their way down his face again, "Too little too late" he said stoking the bright white stone.
He spent an hour just sitting by the grave working up the courage to leave, but as he did he took one last look at the stone and he heard a voice in his head, 'Never forget and never repeat' it said in what sounded like Sandy's voice, he whirled around half expecting her to be stood there with that massive pearly white grin of hers, but there was no-one and his heart sunk, but suddenly he knew exactly what it meant, "I swear it Sandy, if I ever fall in love again I'll never hold back, I'll make sure that she knows it right from the off exactly how I feel for her, I won't wait till it's too late ever again, I swear it" he said looking at the grave stone, with that he turned and walked off never to revisit.
Present Day.
Once he'd thankfully managed to stabilize and bind up Tik's multitude of wounds the bleeding finally stopped, now he had the job of getting her back to the cave out of harm's way, so with a bit of ingenuity a few branches and some very strong vines he managed to rig a drag along stretcher together, though getting Tik onto it wasn't as easy as he'd hoped it would be as he had to be very careful not to reopen her bound wounds, he was hoping that she'd have something back at the cave which he could use to help her, as dead weight Tik weighed a ton and trying to lift her to put her onto the stretcher wasn't easy in any way shape or form, but finally with a lot of swearing and effort he was able to pick her up under the armpits and he was able to drag her onto the makeshift stretcher.
The trip through the jungle dragging the unconscious huntress on the stretcher took everything Jack had and then some, but he flat out refused to quit on her, now he was being driven not by fear or by anger, but by a recently discovered feeling, love.
He still couldn't believe it himself but when he'd seen her go down in the cave it had burst out of the shadows of his mind like a rampaging bull and had knocked him over the edge, all the strange feelings he'd been having all the flustered looks and the blushing, he'd fallen for her so completely that it had consumed his soul like a fire, he didn't understand how it had happened so quickly, but he didn't care all that was ringing in the back of his mind was a promise made long ago.
"Of all the girls I've met in my lifetime I have to fall in love with the massive alien huntress" he said to himself as he dragged her through the jungle, but he knew that it was love pure and true and the sheer power of it made him realize that he'd never actually felt it like this before, all the times that he'd thought that he was in love had just been a hopeful wish or a shadow of what it really was, but this, this was real and the sheer power of it had turned him into a wild animal with only one goal, to protect her and keep her safe, it also kept him going long after he should have collapsed of exhaustion, the worst part was he knew there was no way that she'd ever return these feelings of his, but at the same time he didn't care, there was no way he was going to let the universe be robbed of such a beautiful creature, not on his watch.
It was pretty much dark when Jack finally reached the foot of the cliff where Tik's cave was located, now he knew there was no way for him to carry her up the side of the sheer cliff face, so given that he'd tied Tik to the stretcher to stop her from falling off he decided the only way to get her up there was to attach ropes to each corner and hoist her up the cliff but that was going to be easier said than done.
Finding vines in this jungle was rather easy as the stuff was everywhere and it was super strong stuff like steel cable, which also made it rather a cunt to cut it but Jack focused on his goal of getting Tik to safety and it drove him on, he cut and twisted the vines until he'd managed to create about a hundred feet of the stuff. Next he climbed up to the cave and found and anchor point inside to use as a lever to hoist around, then the final part was securing and double securing the stretcher and Tik.
Finally Jack was now stood at the entrance of the cave with the vine rope in his hands, he pulled all the slack out of the rope and began to haul, it took everything he had to even get her off the ground,
"Fuck me! I'm never gonna be brave enough to tell you this to your face but you're FUCKING HEAVY!" he yelled as he hauled at the rope, the friction was burning his skin constantly as he pulled, it burned it and due to a couple of slips he lost a fair bit of skin from both his hands and his wrists, but after half an hour of constant pull, rest, pull, rest, he managed to get the Yaujta huntress up onto the ledge of the cave entrance.
Ignoring the pain and the fact that his hands were bleeding heavily Jack dragged Tik into the cave on the stretcher, then using the little plasma torch that Tik had left on the side Jack quickly lit all the torches and then pushed that huge piece of wood into the cave entrance sealing it completely.
Untying her from the stretcher Jack moved Tik from the floor to her large bed, now came the part that was probably going to get his head stoved in when she woke up, but he didn't care as long as she did wake up, slowly he undid the valves to the side of her mask which now had a rather nice dent in it, both valves hissed and sprayed a gas as they were removed, then with a little force he pulled the mask away from her face, instantly he stopped as he looked at the face of the unconscious huntress, "Why are you so beautiful to me?" he said quietly touching the side of her face with his hand, to most of his species they would have seen her as a monster pure and simple, but to him he saw so much more in her, a deep tribal pride and an unshakable code of honour that he admired so deeply, her skin was warm and sort of rough but it felt wonderful to his touch and he hoped beyond hope that one day she may even let him touch her of her own choice, as he removed his hand didn't even notice the perfect hand print in his blood that he left behind on her face.
Next up was the part that was probably going to get him a beating, slowly he raiser her arms and with a bit of fiddling to find and remove the clips he lifted her breast plate over her head to get a look at the wounds under it, fortunately for his blood pressure and for her modesty she was wearing a slim fitting leather top under it, it left little for the imagination but it at least preserved her modesty and her honour, it wasn't that Jack didn't want to see her naked but he didn't want it like this, if he was to receive that honour he wanted her to bestow it upon him herself through her choice.
Straight away he saw a long slice going horizontal along her chest below her breasts, there was a fair amount of dried blood next to it and it still seeped through the wound which though it had sealed itself was still weeping a bit of blood, Jack wiped her blood away from it to get a better look, in the process he left a couple of smears of a mixture of his and her blood on her stomach, although he didn't even notice them it was these little smears and that hand print that would carry enough weight to change his life later on.
Those bugs were really a fury when it came to slashing as it was only really now that he noticed just how many cuts Tik had all over her, he'd bandaged up the biggest ones but there were many littler ones all over her, he noticed some on her shapely thighs and investigate them more closely, right at this point he was actually hoping that she didn't wake up or it would be rather tricky to explain why he was looking up her skirt.
Jack decided it would be wise to remove all of Tik's weapons and gear and go through it to see if she had anything like a medical kit of her own, so he pulled all of her weapons off her and replaced them on their stand respectfully, finally he came across something he hadn't seen before, it was a large silver cylinder that was clipped to her hips at the rear, he turned it over in his hands trig to find a way of opening it, finally he noticed a concealed switch on the top and as he pressed it the cylinder opened with an audible hiss.
The cylinder opened like a flower revealing loads of little tools and vials inside it, although he had no clue what he was looking at he knew that this had to be what he was looking for, there was a small oval shaped device at the top of the tools and he lifted it out, the second it was removed he heard a sharp click to his left, he turned to look and for a moment he was confused till he noticed that Tik's wrist computer had popped open on its own, curiously he leaned in and looked at it, the display was covered in red symbols in what could only be the Yaujta language and he didn't understand any of it, but then she noticed a small oval shaped port on the left side of the computer,
"Hmm I wonder?" he said looking at the small device in his hand, slowly he touched the device to the port on the computer and to his surprise it clipped into place with a click, instantly all the lettering on Tik's computer changed to a blue colour and it started making a whirring noise, suddenly a hologram burst out of the computer which nearly made Jack jump backwards off the massive bed.
The hologram appeared to be a representation of Tik, there were loads of little red lines on it which seemed to correlated with her wounds, suddenly as he looked at the image the cylinder in his hand vibrated, looking down he saw two of the vials had lit up, so he set the cylinder down and removed the two vials, next a long tool with a small spoon like head lit up and so did a fan like object, so putting the vials down he pulled the tools out, the second her removed the fan object it opened out into a mixing dish,
"Ahh I get it you want me to mix the two liquids in the vials" he said aloud, so placing the mixing dish down her picked up the vials and popped them open,
he poured the contents into the dish and stirred it with the spoon tool, the concoction bubbled and fizzed for a second or two before calming down and turning a pale green, looking now at the hologram he saw the lines had been circled in green which he took to mean for him to apply the mix to these wounds, so taking the spoon he dipped it into the mix and began to spread it into Tik's wounds.
As he applied it the mixture fizzed and seemed to be cauterizing the cut shut, each left a rather nasty scar in its place, he had just enough of the mix to do every wound even the ones he'd bandaged shut, after he'd done them all he looked at the hologram again and he noticed that all the lines had gone green, next up a flashing red mark appeared on Tik's head, he took this to represent the impact she'd taken when she'd gone down, again another vial lit up in the cylinder, so Jack took it out and looked at it, then a tool that looked like a syringe lit up, as he pulled it out he realized that's exactly what it was, nothing else lit up so he figured that it wanted him to inject her with this stuff, so he pushed the syringe into the vial and drew the gold coloured liquid into it before tapping it and pushing the plunger down to remove any air, then he noticed a piece on her arm flashing on the hologram, he figured that's where it wanted him to inject the fluid, so taking a deep breath he pushed the needle into Tik's massive arm and injected her.
The device on her arm whirred and clicked a couple of times after Jack had administered the injection before finally the area on her head went green, Jack breathed out heavily suddenly realizing that he'd been holding his breath, the device now powered down and Tik's computer released the oval object, Jack took it and placed it back in the cylinder which now closed itself up,
"Looks like the operation was a success, now I guess I just wait" he said smiling at the unconscious Yaujta huntress, suddenly he became aware of his own pain, looking himself over he realized that Tik wasn't the only one who'd been pretty shredded by those things, but now he was totally out of bandages as he'd used them all on Tik, so doing the only thing he could he removed his shirt and tore it into strips with his knife.
His medical kit had a few sachets of antibiotics and quick clot, so he took the antibiotics and filled his makeshift bandages with quick clot before applying them, he'd found the water that Tik kept around in a large pot by the fire pit, he'd used it to wash off most of the blood from his body and then with the wounds cleaned up he applied the bandages leaving his hands till last to maintain their use, finally once he was done he sat back down on the bed and drank some of the water, it was only when the liquid touched his lips did he realize that his thirst had been hidden by adrenaline, he knew better than to wolf it down despite every instinct telling him to, so slowly sipping it he rehydrated as best as he could given how much fluid he'd lost, then after the thirst everything else hit him as well, the sheer pain and the full out exhaustion all kicked in at once, he found himself crashing down on his back on the bed next to the large female Yaujta, with one last glance at her he smiled, "Of all the girls in the universe I had to fall for the difficult one" he said and with that finally passed out.