Chapter 8
Kim walked out of the cell, locking it and turning the screens back on. She left quickly and rummaged through the next room. she only found the two belts again and no armour. If I were a stuck up general who thought he was indestructible, without a care in the world, where would I hide the one thing that would turn the tables into the tired hunters curt. A safe perhaps? Kim eyed a steel door with numerous locks on it. she smirked knowing this was just up her ally. She was after all a computer expert and could hack, lock, decode, enter and leave any system and any computerized object without a sweat or a trace. She opened up the panel and grinned at the primitive punch code security pad in front of her. 5 minuets and I will have this baby open without detection. She closed her eyes and ran her fingers over the buttons. If the armour was behind this door, then it would be checked and monitored. So some of the buttons would be more warn than the others. Se smiled, feeling bigger dips in 5 of the 16 buttons on the panel. That meant she had 20 different combination to choose form and after the first 3, she would be detected. She could afford to trial and miss. Foot steps alerted her and she dropped to her feet and rolled under the table. She lifted herself up the body of the table and had her ands and feet in each corner, so she had her back to the underneath of the table, hidden from view.
In walked a tall, skinny man with ruffled brown hair, glasses, a white lab coat and a pocket guard. Nerd...OO! Useful nerd!
The 'nerd' pushed his glasses up his nose and slowly pressed the keys on the pad. Kim smirked, memorising the combination and then ducking from view as he disappeared into the room. Kim waited a full 15 minuets until he left, ticking a clip board in his hands. She almost fell from her hiding position as he mumbled something.
"Now to the basement and that Jones girl." She held her breath until he left, waited 5 minuets, just to be sure and lowered from the underside of the table. She clambered out and ran to the door.
If I can just see if the hunter's stuff is in here I can try and follow that nerd guy and find out what has happened to Terre. He said Jones and unless there is more than one person on this base with that name, then something, that happened this morning, involved her.
She retyped the code into the wall and it opened effortlessly. Kim ran in and smiled madly as the only things that occupied the room were strange looking metal plates that looked to go over various parts of your body. She saw a huge, chunky glove with small metal plates covering the knuckles. It looked to weight a ton, especially since it had some sort of bulky wrist guard. She ran her fingers over it and jumped as part of the guard opened up and ejected a smaller wrist piece. Out of pure curiosity she retrieved it and slipped it over her own wrist. Only to feel it tighten and adjust to her left wrist. She walked over to a mirror to see how it looked...to not see how it looked. Kim's mouth dropped wide open as she gawked at...nothing. She waved her hand in front if the mirror and couldn't see anything in the mirror. Now she had heard the rumours about the 'Predators' and their abilities to vanish. But this was unbelievable. She was invisible.
"Terre!" Kim smirked evilly as she realised she could go down to the lower levels without detection. She replaced everything other than the cloaking bracelet and ran out of the door, shutting it on her way out.
Kim ran past people, amazed that they didn't even blink as she ran past them. She soon caught up with the person she had dubbed 'Nerd' and tip toed behind him. She followed him into the escalator and through a long hall. They came to an open room and she had to clamp her hands over her mouth to stop herself from gagging. The entire place rank with rotting flesh and corpses. And just to make her feel just that little bit worse, rotting flesh and corpses littered the floor.
Kim's eyes opened wide as she saw that the bodies were not only human, but Alien too. Masses of black, rotting Alien bodies had been heaped into one large pile and their Green blood was sizzling at the air, adding to the stench. She watched 'Nerd' walk over to someone she recognised straight away. General Snide.
"General sir?"
"Ah. Bollemy. She is right over here." Kim silently followed the general and Bollemy to the centre of the room. Then she gasped to herself.
In the very middle of the room was a huge cage. It stood as tall as a building, a tall building, and as wide as a small park. But in the cage was what caught her attention. Sprawled out on the floor was a blonde haired woman. Her face was hidden beneath her hair as it cloaked her face. But she still recognised her. Terre!
"Sir? Why is Jones in the Queen pen? And where is the Queen?"
"The Queen has been moved to be disposed of. If not, her blood would have rotten he floor away.
"DISPOSED OF! But without her."
"Calm yourself! She died and we did everything we could of to help her. But we failed and she died. She didn't half go out with a yell though. My headache went to a migraine in seconds."
"She just...died?"
"No, she summoned her army to take out 153 of my men first. But yes, she just died. She didn't even manage to finish killing her last victim. Which brings us to Miss Jones here. The Queen tried to eat her no doubt, but died before she could finish her off. I tell you it was the weirdest way to eat her I have ever seen. But she is alive and just shocked we think. We haven't dared moved her because we don't know how damaged she is. That is why you are here. You are gonna go straight in there, give her a physical, medical or what ever you damn walking degrees do and tell me what the damage is. And if we can move her yet."
"Now sir?"
"No Bollemy, I just told you I wanted you to go for the hell of it. OF COURSE I MEANT NOW! GET TO IT!"
"Yes sir!" Kim ran after Bollemy and stood back as he went into the cage. He shouted back after about 10 minuets of constant prodding and rolling her over to her side and back. "She is alive sir. No broken bones but may have a concussion. There are eight points of entry left on her forehead. She will not have a scar but will have one hell of a hang over when she wakes up."
"Anything else?" Kim, the general and Bollemy turned to see a man rush in as he asked the question. "Is she alright?" Kim had to smile as she looked over the new man. He was tall, had no shirt on (meow!) big blue eyes and a strong chin. His army uniform consisted of his combat trousers and boots, not to mention the huge plasma riffle like gun over his shoulder.
"Dan, let the man tell me first before you interrupt."
"Sorry sir."
"Well Sirs, there might be a concussion and she will feel the need to vomit, continuously for a few hours once she wakes up. But other than that she got off pretty luck I would say. I mean, the Queen did try to kill her so to say she will just be sick for a while; I say she is damn lucky. Sir."
"Well then get her out of there and get her to the infirmary!" Dan barked and ran to Bollemy, helping the sleeping body that was Terre off of he ground. Kim followed them as they took her to the medical wing and the female doctors dressed her into medical robes. They put a huge sanitary pad on her head to help her heal the still bleeding cuts on her forehead. She looked like she had had brain surgery. Kim sat on the side of her bed once the doctors left to let her sleep and stroked her head. Terre stirred slightly but fell back to sleep.
"You better get better you hear me damn it. who will I argue with if you don't?" Kim smiled at her and held back the urge to laugh. "So miss stubborn, I should have known that you were stupid enough to stand up to a Queen. So you took her on did you? Good for you. I am just glad you survived it. Damn why did you have to be moved down there? Why did I let you, no, tell you to go down there? Well if you have any sense you will not be going down there again. I bet you go back." She giggled and brushed a stray lock from Terre's face. "Well I have been good while you were fighting the mother of all ugly asses. I smiled twice today, twice! And over the same guy. Well, I think he classes as a guy. I wish I could tell you what I have been up to Terre. And how I have been offered a one way ticket to outer space. To hunt and explore with this real, strong and powerful man. He can even over power me! I have never met anyone stronger than me until I met him. He doesn't really like me, but I don't like him either. But that doesn't mean I am not attracted to him." Kim laughed and couldn't help but imagine how Terre would react. Over the moon she supposed. And would probably tell her to 'go for it'. "Well I will help them escape from their confines and tomorrow I will take them their weapons. Part of me wants to go with them, but I couldn't leave you here now can I? And I don't know Katel very well so I cant just get up and go, off impulse. That would be risky. Katel is his name by the way. Well I should leave and let you rest. I am glad you are alright you stubborn Yankee mule. Well, 'till I see you next." Kim slowly pulled away from her best friend and made her way reluctantly from the medical wing, back to her station. Luckily for her, no one had come to check on her and didn't interrupt her as she slipped back into the safe door, replacing the cloaking wrist band. She couldn't resist and turned everything off again and opened the door silently. She looked in through the gap and saw that both Katel and Maktel were laid quiet comfortably on the ground. She ignored Maktel and crawled over to Katel. So she didn't see Maktel look up at her.
Kim kneeled next to him and watched him sleep. She found herself breathing in sync with his chest. Rising and falling deeply. She leaned forward, lowering her face to look at his, closed her eyes and whispered to him. "Tomorrow I will bring you your weapons and armour. I hope you smile at me again. And I hope you find yourself a mate. I didn't mean to insult you, a lot; by saying you were insensitive and couldn't get a mate. I am sorry. Sweet dreams."
"Thank you." She opened her eyes to meet two large amber ones, which were open and smirking at her." she sat up slowly, making no sound. However he sat up with her and kept their faces close to each other.
"No problem." Kim said cautiously, not to give away her surprise.
"Do you watch every male you are attracted to? Or just the strong ones?"
"I wasn't staring." She whispered to not wake up Maktel, who was already awake. But he pretended to sleep so Katel didn't know he was watching.
"Yes you were, I saw you. And you only denied watching me. You didn't deny being attracted to me." his smirk grew larger as she blushed, but scowled.
"Don't let it go to your head. I only like that you are stronger than me." she paused and sat down, her legs curled around her and her long braided hair falling forward to make a black veil on each side of her face. "I have never met anyone who can over power me before. Nothing more. And I am not attracted to you, I admire you."
"Really?" he smirked, going closer to her.
"Really." She also smirked, closing the gap between them too.
"So you would feel nothing if I were to do this?" He leaned forward and opened his mandibles slightly. They gently ran over her face and brushed against her cheeks. She closed her eyes and basked in the warm fuzzy feeling. This wasn't kissing like she knew it, but assumed it must be kissing how he knew it. Kim turned her head to one side and brushed her lips, softly across his lower right mandible. He pulled back and looked at her, his eyes glazed slightly with desire. "Anything?"
"I don't know. do that again and I will tell you." He clattered, laughing slightly and leaned in again.
"Please Katel! I can smell your musk from over here! Wait until you have her alone on your ship and then take her. Please don't put me through your courting of her." the two pulled away instantly and Kim stood up. Katel jumped up too and took her arm before she could go.
"Will you be coming with me?"
"I thought you didn't want me to come?"
"I may have changed my mind. Will you?"
"I would like to but."
"That is good enough for me." he pulled her into a tight embrace and brushed his lower mandibles over her forehead. She leaned up and kissed his right lower mandible and then the left.
"See you tomorrow."
"I will wait for you." Kim left and Maktel smirked at Katel. "Not a word you or I will beat you myself!"
"I didn't say anything." Maktel smirked to himself but couldn't resist. "I will wait for you."
"Damn you!" After more teasing from Maktel, they fell to sleep but only after Katel threatened a form of torture if he didn't give up.
Kim however didn't sleep much that night. Her general came and dismissed her and she skipped all the way to her room. But she soon grew sad. She had finally found the one who could send her blood boiling and her senses wild, only for him to be from outer space and for him to leave the day after tomorrow. Well no matter. She dreamt of the here and now and couldn't help but smile like a giddy little school girl with a crush. She had never felt this way before. Sure she had been arguing with him earlier, but it had been an act. To be honest, she had enjoyed rolling around on the floor with him too.
But little did she know that Katel had purposely cut her off so that he could take her with him the next day. She wasn't at all pleased when he surprised her either...