Author's Note: What's this? The last of the mating ritual arc? Woo-hoo! -celebrates-
Warning: Dude, whatever, we're finally getting off this rock!
Disclaimer: All unfamiliar names and locations are mine, if you recognize anything, it isn't.
Haven
Scar awoke to the scent of blood. Ooman blood.
Fearing the worst Scar jumped up in a panic. He rushed out of the crashed ship following the scent to where Lex stood outside… And got the reprimanding of a lifetime for invading her privacy when his intentions were entirely noble, it seemed Lex's emotional outburst yesterday had something to do with her menstruation cycle. Scar couldn't be sure; he didn't understand how the female body worked, Ooman or Yautja.
Retreating to the safety of the ship, Scar contemplated the last mission the science division had assigned them. The Tattu'k, as it was called, was a plain dwelling creature, and the plains were a few days travel from here. A playful bark reminded Scar of the river-pups they'd captured. Lex adored them and given her current…situation, Scar feared what she would do to him if he suggested leaving them unattended, but just as bad would be taking them along.
Scar shook his head and tried to concentrate on the Tattu'k. Looking at the sky it had been almost two of the planet's moons already, and time was running out, if the plains creature was as smart as the Navt'ghil they didn't have time to waste studying the creature's behavior and giving it the fight of its life. They needed to trap it.
Scar quickly made an inventory of the entire arsenal they had brought with them; aside from the weapons they were most comfortable with they'd brought nets harnesses, rope…Scar mentally put together a mechanism to capture the Tattu'k. He'd just gone outside to draw a few blueprints in the dirt when he bumped into Lex again who started to apologize for biting his head off, but quickly changed to apologizing for yelling at him.
Scar put a hand on her shoulder, "Forgiven." He growled and lowered himself to the ground, using his dagger to carve images into the ground explaining to Lex his plan. "It's a basic pit trap." He pointed to his diagram, "We bait a few traps for the Tattu'k, they crawl across the ground unaware that it will break under them, they get caught in the net and we have our Tattu'k."
"What if we don't catch an adult male?" Lex asked.
"That's why we bait multiple traps." Scar replied, "We're bound to catch at least one, right?"
Lex gave a soft giggle, and then nodded to the ship where the Whahali pups were waiting, "What about them?" She asked, of course referring to the pups.
Scar sighed. "I haven't gotten that far. Any suggestions?"
Lex was quiet as she thought, her silence assured Scar that she'd come to the same conclusion he had: None.
The discussion of what to do with the pups could have gone on for hours, but fortunately both Lex and Scar were aware they did not have that kind of time, that and Scar really didn't want to argue with Lex while she was fully armed and he'd only brought his dagger out with him. What they eventually agreed on was to leave the pups some of their rations, and then head out to the plains, set up the traps, come back and feed the pups again, and go back out to the plains to see if they'd caught the Tattu'k and repeat as often as they needed to.
Lex carefully placed some food out for the pups, who happily wiggled they're way over and nibbled at it experimentally. She cocked her head at them and turned to leave, praying to whatever deity looked after this planet that the pups were smart enough to not eat it all at once.
Scar led the way through the trees once again. After a day or two, Lex saw the trees thinning; the large grasses of the plains went as far as her eyes could see. They dropped out of the forest and scouted around for an ideal place to set up their trap. Lex was passing a boulder when it moved making her scream. Scar turned toward it immediately throwing his combi-stick out of reflex.
The creature shrieked and attacked. It was a Tattu'k, Lex realized, but noted with disappointment that this one was female. That would have just been too easy right? Scar had hit it in a fatal area anyway; the science team wanted it alive. Despite its obviously fatal wound the Tattu'k kept fighting, trying to kill Scar with the last ounce of its strength which didn't last much longer, it collapsed and bled out.
"Vicious." Lex commented.
"Stupid." Scar corrected.
Lex might have made another comment, but Scar was busy looking around them. The camouflage of the Tattu'k was incredible. With his vision mode on a setting that would allow him to se things relatively close to how Lex did naturally, he spotted three more, once he knew what to look for, and a fourth rustled into view. He quickly switched his vision mode back to heat seeking to find the whole plain was littered with Tattu'k.
Lex noticed the same thing.
"I guess a pit fall trap is out of the question now." She said, "They wouldn't fall into something they watch us dig."
"I suppose not." Scar agreed.
"So what do we do now?" Lex asked.
A large Tattu'k, a male, crawled closer to them curiously, sniffing and growling, but in a non-threatening way. Scar lifted his arm, "This." He answered Lex and fired a net at the male that approached them.
The net enveloped the Tattu'k and tightened, making the creature roar with fury and pain. The other Tattu'k waited doing nothing, but beginning to snarl. Blood seeped out from the nets intersecting cables as they pierced the flesh. The Tattu'k did not stop struggling; in fact the pain only made it fight harder, Scar soon realized that the creature would bleed to death before it stopped. He reached into his medicomp for a dart of yellow-green liquid, a sedative used in medical emergencies to knock patients out for hours, or sometimes used by hunters to knock out incredibly feisty prey.
Scar threw the dart with enough force for it to land painfully in the Tattu'k's shoulder. The creature continued to squirm for several minutes before the drug took effect. When the male Tattu'k laid still the others turned away and vanished.
"Cowards…" Scar accused as Lex had with the Whahali, but Lex stepped up to him.
"No…" She said, "I think it's a rite or something…"
Scar cocked his head, "What?"
"He was struggling to get free, and the others were waiting to attack when he did. I think that they did that to see if he was worthy of them coming to his rescue…He didn't escape so they didn't come help him…he wasn't worthy…"
Scar snorted disbelievingly, but found the theory entirely possible, it was the same principle that the Yautja themselves used in the Kainde Amedha trials; if you fight your way through it the clan will back you when you get in trouble. Scar decided not to make any further comment on it. They had a new issue to deal with.
How were they going to get the Tattu'k back to the ship?
It was much too big for either of them to carry on they're own, and to do it together they wouldn't be able to use the trees. It was too heavy.
Again the debate over this issue could have taken hours, but they didn't have time, So Lex and Scar dragged it across the ground still in the net. The Tattu'k woke up three times and resumed its struggling; they put it out again by whacking it in the back of the skull. The day or two it had taken to get to the plains from they're ship using the trees, took a full week to get back. They were starving, exhausted, and irritable when they caught sight of the ship up a head.
The Tattu'k regained consciousness after they got inside and moved it into a cage. It too, was hungry and looked at the Whahali pups with the same ravenous look the cannibalistic male had the day Lex and Scar had rescued them. The pups also whined about hunger. Scar approached the computer to inform the clan that they had finished they're missions and needed transport, while Lex went into their stores looking for something to give each of the creatures, and something for Scar and herself, only to discover they had an uninvited guest.
It was feathery and snake-like; Lex remembered Scar mentioning seeing such a creature up on the mountain. It stared at Lex and hissed. The Ooman warrior returned its stare and did nothing while it determined whether or not she was a threat. The creature curled up, and waited for her to make the first move, like a rattle snake on Earth it was warning her that it was dangerous and ready to strike.
Lex targeted it with one of her nets. She lifted her arm and it sprang to attack, Lex fired the net just in time. Scar came running when he heard her cry out. He looked delighted to see the creature in the net and quickly captured it, making a passing message to Lex that the cargo ship to take them back would be here by sunset as he walked off with his unidentified specimen. Lex shook her head and continued the job she had come in for and grabbed a few pieces of meat and some dried fruit.
The pups scarffed down the food in seconds and curled up to sleep, the Tattu'k eyed the food suspiciously, but when he saw that Lex was eating it, munched uneasily on it in his cage. Scar was too busy watching the feathered snake to care about the food.
"What do we call it?" He asked.
Lex looked up "What?"
"We discovered it." He answered pointing to their specimen, "What do we call it?"
"A Basilisk." Lex said without thinking. The serpentine creature reminded her of an old legend from Earth, and somehow the name just seemed to fit.
"Bas'l'is-k." Scar repeated, his growls made the name sound even more dangerous than it already did, he nodded and finally turned his attention to the meat and fruit Lex had brought out.
The sun finally started to set, and Lex gave a shout when she spotted the pick up ship on the horizon. It landed in minutes, Dodge and Burn exited it and greeted them with warm congratulations on their victories as they helped moved the animals onto the transport, but among their well wishes there was some frightening news.
"Just as we entered the atmosphere," Dodge told them, with a concerned growl "We received a distress signal from the ship."
"A distress signal?" Scar repeated, "Why?"
"We don't know." Burn replied, "Jaev'len told us to find you first and get back as soon as we did."
Lex's heart pounded with dread as she wondered what could have possibly happened that the clan had issued a distress signal. "Hurry!" She said as she carried the pups onto the other ship, Scar planted a bomb on the crash site to destroy any evidence of their presence.
Dodge and Burn had been moving the ship slowly so that they could see Lex and Scar when they came down, but now they took off at a fast speed to get to the ship as quickly as they could. As soon as they moved into view of the ship they understood why the distress signal had been issued. There as a second ship landed on theirs, and damage to both vessels, the four young Yautja glanced at each other with worry.
They were under attack.
Author's end note: YAY now that I'm off V'mali-on I can get back to my original plan, which includes the upcoming scene that has been in reserve since Lex joined the Yautja clan. -is very proud of herself-