Chapter 20: Better Living Underground.
Vippy and her group steered Smoke through the seemingly endless warren-like tunnels that without his little reptilian guides he wouldn't have a snowball's chance in a Yautja's house of navigating on his own, though what shocked him was they didn't appear to be using any kind of navigation system, they seemed to be navigating the place by memory.
They still had hold of both of his hands which was making Smoke feel kinda odd as he was beginning to feel like a small child being led around by an overprotective parent, plus the others hadn't shifted from their close protection positions, it appeared that Raptorians weren't exactly big on personal space as he had barely enough space to take a step which he was having to watch where he was placing so that he didn't step on one, he''d already found out how hard these girls hit and didn't fancy going another round with one despite having access to his armour this time.
Eventually, they shepherded him into a large room through a covert door that appeared to be camouflaged metal covered with the same volcanic glass coating it which Smoke thought was rather smart, he didn't even see the biometric scanner embedded that scanned Vippy's handprint, beyond it was what appeared to be a conference room of some kind where the command group from earlier had gathered, it was surprisingly well decorated and lit, all the walls seemed to have been decorated with jungle wood panels that had various screens embedded into them and he noticed that each of them seemed to be displaying images that appeared to be medical scans and Xray like photos as well as actual photos of him and his injuries.
As soon as they saw him the black scaled commander made a beeline for him parting his circle of little bodyguards like Moses with the red sea, she grabbed both of his hands pulled him from the circle much to the obvious annoyance of Vippy and her pride by the ruffling head feathers from all of them, "Ahh there you are, I'm glad you could join us but firstly I'd like to wholeheartedly apologise to you for the way you have been treated by both our soldiers and by even by myself, I feel so deeply ashamed of myself for so very nearly striking you, I-I-I just never imagined in a million years that we'd end up plucking a male of all things off a battlefield, I thought you were trying to trick us and to confuse us, so please forgive me and us for your poor treatment" she said all the while stroking his gloved hands with both of his.
"Umm sure I can understand your confusion I guess, I mean you were not expecting to find an ally out there so I understand your caution and I don't hold it against you, I'm sure that we ourselves would do the very same if we didn't have one of our Seekers of Truth with us to be able to get the truth out of our captive, so please don't worry thanks to the superb medical staff there's no lasting harm done, in fact I'm sure our Battle Angels and queen Zara would love those nanites things of yours, they do an utterly wonderful job," Smoke said using his best diplomatic voice.
"Thank you I was feeling so bad and guilty about what I did, I'm so glad you can forgive me and us and did you say queen? So you have a monarchy, does that mean you are a prince?" she asked looking at him her eyes wide which now seemed to match the eyes of the entire pride still surrounding him.
"I hit a prince?" he hears Vippy whisper under her breath barely audible but he still caught it and Smoke chuckled softly and shook his head.
"No I'm not a prince but now that I think of it I'm sure our Xeno loving girls will love that little iota of information," he said clocking the looks of confusion being passed around so he decided to capitalise on it before they said anything else or got any other ideas.
"Ok how about this, let me introduce myself properly and I tell you about both myself and my society, as well as my organization and what we are doing here on your soil, would that be acceptable to you?" he asked looking around at them and the black scaled commander looked at her fellow commanders and there were nods all around, she gestured for him to take a seat at the centre of the large oval-shaped polished jungle wood conference table that took up the centre of the room, as he was about to take his appointed seat the commander actually pulled out his seat for him which was a little small as it was made for Raptorians not larger humans, so his knees were kinda up around his ears, he felt like he was sitting on one of those chairs they had a preschool.
But once he was on the seat the commander proceeded to push it forwards so he was tucked up against the table, "Thank you" he said a little awkwardly, she smiled brightly and warmly before taking her seat on his left while Vippy quickly snatched the seat directly on his right before anyone else stole it from her and ran for the jungle with it, or at least that's what he imagined would happen by the vigour by which she rushed for it and grabbed it.
"Ok please proceed sweetscale," the black scaled commander said using what he guessed was their version of sweetheart which actually made him feel a little huffy because while he was sure she didn't mean to be condescending but it came across a little that way, but he just chose to ignore it.
"Ok my name is Peter Samson but everyone just calls me Smoke, it's kinda like a code name or nickname if you like so feel free to call me it too, I am a fully blooded Hunter of Clan Mason, more specifically I am an Electronic and Counter Electronic Warfare Specialist, basically a very specialized version of a field SIGINT, my job is to do things like break jamming frequencies, hack into enemy signals networks and just generally cause all sorts of merry hell with their electronics like targeting systems for things like CWIS systems," Smoke said proudly and rightfully so, his job was incredibly difficult to do under normal circumstances like in an office or something, but he did it under fire, so yeah he was proud of what he did and what he'd earned.
They all looked at one another with an obvious air of surprise but gestured for him to continue, "We of Clan Mason got a message referred to us from our new allies the Serpentinus that their allies were under attack by the Scalathor and Draconis, now we had just assisted them from repelling an assassination attempt on their royal pack by Scalathorian commandos and Nightmare Assassins who also tried to capture or kill their Ghost Slitherer community, our Grand Patriach took them to safety back on our home world to be trained at our Seeker Temple which specialises in the training of Dream Warriors like them, our Grand Patriach is a Dream Warrior himself probably the most powerful one in the known universe as he is the chosen one of our Lady of the Hunt Paya, but I digress, so we received message of the attack on your homeworld by the Scalathor and Draconis and Clan Mason will always defend our allies and innocents, whoever and where ever they are, so our Grand Patriach and Matriach put out the call to arms and assembled the Clan, we brought what we could of our fleet here as some of it is still defending the Serpentinus homeworld, now we discovered that they have over twenty cruisers and frigate class ships in orbit, so while our Grand Matriach stays in orbit with our fleet to take care of their support ships our Grand Patriach led an assault force made up of Seekers, Hunters and Battle Angels to the surface to see what assistance and aid we can render to the Raptorian people" Smoke said taking a deep breath after such a long explanation but he wanted to get all the basics of what was going on out.
"Your Grand Matriarch sent her male down here to brave the dangers of our jungles while she stayed in the safety of orbit!? What kinda monstrous female would send her male to fight while she stays in safety!?" one of the commanders exclaimed and this sent a shot of white-hot anger through Smoke, there were many things he would forgive, but insulting Grand Matriarch Tik eleth Mason directly in front of him was not one of them and the usually soft-spoken man exploded.
"Hey! Don't you dare insult our Grand Matriarch in front of me!" he snarled loudly and slowly making them all jump at not only the volume but the pure anger in his voice directed at the commander who had spoken.
"I-I'm sorry, but no female should ever place her male at risk like that! It's monstrous!" the commander exclaimed looking around at the others who were all nodding in agreement.
"Maybe that's how you do things here but that is NOT how we do things, in our society, nobody has any greater value to the Clan than anybody else, not even our Dream Warriors as rare as they are above anybody else, the only thing that gives anybody superiority is rank, nothing more and certainly not gender, look I don't pretend to know how your society works and I am certainly not judging you or your kind as one of the things that our Clan prides itself on its unity and our acceptance of everybody no matter who they are, one of our missions here is to learn about your people and your ways and customs, but I ask you to be respectful about ours as well," Smoke said trying to stop his voice shaking, he wasn't exactly comfortable with public speaking and he was doing his very best not to deploy his cloak and flee into the tunnels in embarrassment.
The room was stunned into silence and he could see them all glancing at one another and then a few nods before they looked at the black scaled commander sat next to him and even though no conversation was occurring somehow they seemed to be communicating their thoughts, she began to speak.
"We are sorry if our lack of understanding of your ways has offended you Hunter Smoke, but please understand that to us your ways to us seem monstrous, to us to put your males on the front lines or anywhere near the surface let alone a war zone is truly and utterly unthinkable, but if our lack of understanding has caused offence then we apologise," she said and Smoke nodded.
"Thank you and I apologise for my aggressive outburst but please try to understand that to us our Grand Matriach is a true hero of Clan Mason, she is an idol of strength, courage and the true power of an unchained heart, to insult her is to insult everyone of us that wears this gold uniform with pride, the Hunters are the personal unit of Grand Matriach Tik eleth Mason and she leads it from the front and there is not a single thing this woman would not do for any member of the Clan, she has and will spill her blood willingly for any member of the Clan as would any one of us who follow in her giant footsteps and wear her colours with pride, believe me when I say that there is nothing that angers her more than not being able to fight at her beloved life mate's side, but she is an incredible tactician and she knows exactly where she is needed most within the Clan and she does her duty" he said and they nodded seemingly placedate to find out that Tik eleth Mason was a great warrior and this seemed to fall more in line with their thinking.
"Now first I should probably give you a little understanding of our society and its species, firstly human, Yautja and Xenomorph are the three species that currently makeup Clan Mason, the males of each race are neither smaller nor weaker than their female counterparts except in the case of the Yautja as the females tend to stand over nine feet tall to the males who stand at about seven and a half to eight feet tall, but with the humans its usually the opposite with the males being bigger and physically stronger than the females, with the Xeno's there's no difference other than the Hive queens who are absolutely huge but all of which have human kings and you do not ever want to mess with a queen's king, we have a saying hurt a king, answer to his queen", Smoke said proudly and the high-speed chittering that ensued broke his translator again.
But finally, they turn back to him and the black scaled commander spoke again, "so you are a human?" she asked and Smoke nodded.
"Yes, we are a warm-blooded mammalian species evolved from primates, hence our light fur and opposable thumbs," he said.
"How many females are in your pride?" one of the other commanders asked in an interested voice.
"My pride?" Smoke asked before remembering what the doctor had told him about Raptorian prides.
"Yes your pride, your family unit, Raptorian prides are usually six to eight females and if they are lucky a single male," the commander who had white scales that looked like snow said happily.
Smoke nodded, understanding now, "Our family groups are not like yours or those of the Serpentinus, I'm going to assume your birth rates are different to ours like the Serpentinus, males and females are born at the same rate, one male to one female, we are solitary creatures, we remain with our birth parents from birth to the age of eighteen years old, once we hit that age we are considered a legal adult by the Clan, from that point we are on our own, we move out and make our own choices, though unless we have a romantic partner of any species we tend to live alone in housing built and provided for us by the Clan, I did not wish to be Mate Hunted as I wasn't ready, so I signed a non consent form, then I joined the Hunters because I wished to give back to the Clan which gave me life, so I joined the Hunters and passed out as a full blooded Hunter, there is no prouder moment in my life than the moment I stood before our Grand Matriach and received the mark of the Hunter" Smoke said lifting his hair to show the scar of Yautja language which marked him as a full blooded Hunter.
There was even more chittering among them and then they looked at him again, "Males are solitary on your world?" the white scaled commander asked and he nodded.
"As are females, we don't live in large family groups like yourselves or the Serpentinus, we are pair bonders, one male, one female, well those are mated to species from our world anyway, Seeker Silver Dimondscale is mated to a pack of Serpentinus, but other than that it's one male to one female, or if you are homosexual one male to one male or one female to one female" Smoke explained and this set them off into an even bigger chittering storm that made his translator have a full-blown meltdown, it was probably one step away from ejecting itself from his armour and going on strike.
"Imagine! One male each! Oh, how deliciously deviant that sounds" one of the commanders said and there were a few chuckles from the others.
"Ok so your turn now, please explain to me how your society works," Smoke said.
"Our birth rates are greatly different to yours, only one male is born to every eight females, it is said to be our punishment from the Great tree for ahem past indiscretions, but our males are smaller, weaker and far more emotional than our females and each and every male life is supremely precious to us, they are protected at all costs, just a single lost male life can be disastrous for our population because his life could cost a possible eight more from the pride he is lost to like the females in that pride may now never be impregnated and while that might not sound like a lot to you now do the math of two males, now three, you see? So to us, every single male born is a cause for celebration and he will be protected from the moment he exits his lucky mother's womb and opens his beautiful eyes to his new world to the very moment he lays his head down for the final time upon his death bed, his pride and all others will guard him" the black scaled commander said proudly.
"So do males work in your society? I mean I believe your translator group were made but I have not seen enough of your kind to immediately notice the differences" Smoke asked and the entire commander group nodded.
"Males are generally homemakers, they care for the children of their pride and keep the pride's home, but a much more modern trend is for males who haven't gotten a pride of their own yet to work and many of them keep their jobs afterwards until they are ready to raise a family, our males are very skilled in things like languages, arts, programming things like that, much more caring and mental work than physical as I have said they are smaller and weaker than us, so they would never be up to the physical requirements and there's no fucking way in a million rotations that we would ever let a male go anywhere near the surface, only very specialized elite military units we call Surface Stalkers like Vippy's pride go anywhere near it and it takes years to become one of their numbers and only very very few ever make the cut required," the black scaled commander said proudly, a pride that was echoed by Vippy and her pride echoed in their body language.
Smoke nodded, "having seen the place I can tell why, Goddess I've got no doubt that if our people's create an alliance your surface is going to be utterly crawling with Yautja girls and boys trying their hardest to get a trophy to impress their peers, or indeed humans trying to get a trophy to impress the Yautja girl of their dreams," Smoke said which confused the Raptorians.
"Buckle up I'll try to make this as swift as possible and then we can get onto the more important topic of the war going on up there," Smoke said and he began to launch into an explanation and description of the species of Clan Mason so that not only would they be recognizable but so they would be a bit better understood.
Smoke spent the next hour explaining the basics of Clan Mason, of their principles and of how the Clan operated and what they stood for, the Raptorian's were curious about absolutely everything and utterly barraged him with questions about, his species, about the other species, about how the Clan operated, how it was built, it's hierarchy, everything.
In fact he spent one hour telling them of the Clan and then the next four answering the barrage of their questions, during this time he noticed that Raptorian really had a curious habit, when they had first spoken to him they had done so one at a time like they were controlling themselves somehow, but the more used to speaking to him they became it was like their true selves began to shine, like they dropped their guard somewhat, it started with them beginning to finish each other's sentences, but then it became much more than that.
It was like they were so in tune that the act of speaking was reserved for communicating with others and not the members of one's own pride, like every little feather or tail twitch had some hidden meaning that he just wasn't privy too and soon all six members were not involved in ending each other's sentence, but the whole sentence was being carried by every member of the pride, like each one of them would choose a word to say and that whole thing formed the sentence, it was like having a conversation with eight people with them all speaking at once and yet he was not only able to understand it but it flowed so perfectly and smoothly that it was truly incredible, suddenly all the high-speed chittering made sense, they weren't truly speaking to one another but all saying the same thing at the same time only one part each.
"So you are like Special forces then? The Hunters, Seekers and Battle Angels of Clan Mason are like its special forces, much like our Surface Stalkers?" the command pride asked with each member chirping one of the words at him to form the sentence, the whole group was like one entity and Smoke had had to get into the habit of trying not to follow the words around the pride but instead focusing on them as a whole.
"Yes, each group specialises in a different form of combat, our Seekers are Dream Warriors each of them focused on one of the Dream Warrior specialist disciplines, there are Soul Knights, Tamers and the Seekers of Balance, each of them is basically a one-person army, you have to witness a Seeker in combat to truly believe what they are capable of, the things I have seen them do beggar belief but they are also known as the Goddess chosen, souls touched and chosen by the divine ones before they are born to carry incredible gifts, but there is a flip side to that" Smoke said.
"A flip side?" Vippy's pride asked and Smoke nodded.
"If they are not found early Dream Warriors almost never know what they are or why they can do what they can do, it can scare their birth species into exiling them or hunting them to either harness their incredible destructive power or to cast them out leaving them alone and scared, this is when they so very ofteren wind up being lured by the Darkness, seduced by things like this Dark Seed what ever the fuck it is, hell I'm no expert I just do computers, things that go beep whir and click are my poison, you'd have to speak to one of our Seekers or better Jack Mason our Grand Patriach himself, all I know that if they get touched by the Darkness Dream Warriors can go bad, real fucking bad, they become things our Seekers call Nightmare Assassins, where our Seekers embrace life and joy and beauty, they embrace, darkness, pain and death, they are vile and evil beyond compare, four of them nearly killed the Serpentinus royal pack and their entire Ghost Slitherer community if our Seekers hadn't intervened they would have succeeded" Smoke said.
There were shared glances between the two-pack, their scales were rippling colours and their feathers were bristling, he couldn't tell if it was communication or just anger, "And what of the others? Like your Hunters or Your Battle Angels?" the command pack asked.
"Hunters are predators hence our name, our job is to hunt down the Clan's enemies and destroy them, but its more than that we hunt down evil and those that would carry it out, those who would harm the innocent fear The Guardian Core's Hunters because if you become our prey there is nowhere that we will not find you, we hunt our enemies to the ends of the universe if need be, but the Hunters has its factions too, different groups that specialise in different areas of combat, for example the Pathfinders are our scouting specialists, Beserkers like our Grand Matriach herself can whip themselves into a righteous frenzy that makes them nearly unstoppable on the battle field like living tanks, then there are the Guards who no matter what hold our lines together a living breathing bulwark against evil, then there are the Templars who are like modern day Knights, then you have our Battle Angels who are warrior doctors and medics, their creed means they will do no harm to innocent life and will fight to save it and heal it no matter what, finally and these guys aren't on the ground at the moment well other than the odd member who is kinda something in between and those are the Saviors, they are the broadest members of the Clan doing everything from Combat Engineers to Snipers to police" Smoke said.
This seemed to interest them greatly, "So which are you?" the command pride asked.
"Well I'm kinda one of the inbetweeners, I'm a full-blooded Hunter but because of my skills with computers and electronics our Grand Matriarch sent me to train with the Saviors so that I could be training in Electronic Warfare and Counter Warfare as well as Signals, once my training was complete I was badged as a full Savior and Hunter that's why I have three badges not two," Smoke said proudly.
"Badges?" Vippy's pride asked curiously and he pointed to his right chest plate where three ornate badges were mounted.
"The Sword of the Hunters, the Shield of the Saviors and the Tree of the Pathfinders, most of the Guardian core only ever get to wear two of these symbols of honour and its both my honour and my pride to wear three and to serve my people however they need me to," Smoke said his voice dripping with pride for the place of his birth, growth and strength.
They all seemed very interested in the little tree on his chest and both prides jumped up from their chairs and crowded around to look at the little tree that if you looked really close had a little person sat in it watching, finding the way for those following to take, it was the symbol of the Pathfinders which was the unit that pretty much all the Savior trained Guardians that returned to the Hunters and didn't remain with the Saviors themselves entered into, "It looks like a little Great Tree!" Vippy's pride said and the command pride nodded in agreement.
"Do you think it is a sign from her?" Vippy's pride asked looking at the command pride questioningly.
"It could be, it is a hell of a coincidence if not, if what he says is true and that this symbol is given only to their pathfinders and he is one of the rare ones to wear three upon his chest what are the chances that it is he that we plucked from the jungle?" the command pride said.
Vippy's pride all nodded in unison, "It has to be it has to be some kinda sign that he was meant to find us, in all the time that there have ever been Surface Stalkers no other sentient race has ever found one of our number, not once, till now and he found us and hunted us through the jungle, avoided by all the dangers of the jungle itself and found us and we captured him and brought him here, a male of all things from another world another race, in our jungle hunting us with a little Great Tree upon his chest, the alien prince who fell from the sky" Vippy's pride said all of them looking at him very intently, especially Vippy whose eyes seemed to be utterly glowing as she scrutinized him.
"Err not a prince guys" he muttered softly feeling very embarrassed and self-conscious under the intensity of their gaze.
"We believe you are," Vippy said with a smile that was one part predatory and one part happy, it kinda made him uncomfortable and he looked away then looked back and then looked away again and when he glanced back he saw the edges of her scaly lips turning up into an odd sort of smile that kinda reminded him of a Xeno for some reason.
"We should take him to the pride of high priestesses," the command pride said and there were nods all around.
"What's that?" Smoke asked curiously glancing between various members of the two prides.
"They interpret the will of the Great Tree, they dedicate their entire lives to listening to the Great Tree, looking for signs and messages, if anyone will know if your arrival is a sign they will," Vippy's pride said.
"Very well after discussing what Hunter Smoke can tell us about what he saw on the surface along with a detailed description of his people present so that our Surface Stalker teams can locate them, then maybe we can begin to work together to solve the problem and drive these tail holes from our beloved world and home," the command pride said and Smoke nodded eagerly.
"Now that's more like it, ok let's get to it, do you guys have any surface scanners still operational? Or mapping?" he said and the command pride opened up a comms line that was internal and hard-wired into the wall kinda like an old school phone as the Grand Patriarch called them, they were in every main branch of the military of Clan Mason just incase of jamming, king Yoshi had installed them himself with the help of his army of children.
A few of the screens that had displayed images of him and his injuries changed to show satellite images of the surface, though they were obviously not real-time as they were obviously being jammed or were currently flaky debris raining down on the planet, Smoke jumped to his feet and moved over examining the photographs and scans, "Ahh ok, this is where I believe I came down, this was our flight path right here my team would have dropped in here and this is where I spotted the FOB from and this is where it was located" Smoke said circling his fingers around the lake like an area where the rivers met.
"Now from what I saw they have a whole armoured division right here, plus what I believe are Scalathor commando units, I saw one of them stalking through the jungle through the trees probable ate them knowing what you got up there, I also saw Draconis aerial scout units, the FOB is armed with multiple gun turrets in a series of guard towers at each corner, plus artillery and CWIS in the centre, but the biggest prize is the jammer unit which is dead centre, now to my eyes it's big and powerful yes but it's not big enough or powerful enough to blanket both the entire planet and the surrounding space, so that means there's most likely a network of them and well as few in space but our Grand Matriach should be able to take care of those" Smoke said.
"Do we need to take down all of those towers?" the command pride asked and Smoke scratched his chin.
"I've only done a preliminary analysis on the frequencies being used but I don't believe so, think of it like dropping stones in a pond in different places, if done right the ripples become waves and create a form of perpetual wave interference, but if you interpret the pattern you can create gaps and holes which will allow us to get certain types of transmissions through, but if you take down enough of them then the holes get bigger and that will allow us to stabilise some forms of communication and that is all we really need to begin co-ordinating both Clan Mason and the Raptorian military, it will mean we can all communicate and sync up or attacks and intel, our teams on the ground can tell your Surface Stalkers where to assault and visa versa," Smoke said confidently.
"Now it sounds like we are getting somewhere, good we can work with this but in the meantime, you have had quite the day and I imagine you require rest and recovery, plus we need to take you to the High Priestess pride, so Surface Stalker Vippy's pride here will take you to our city and will care for you, they will put you up for the time being at their home as part of their order of protection," the command pride said and Smoke felt himself flinch.
"Oh that's alright I wouldn't want to impose, I'm a man of simple tastes and needs, I just need a bunk to crash for the time being and something to eat and I'm good," he said with a wave of his hand but as he was turned around he found Vippy's pride al standing and all around him in a circle all looking at him very intently making him jump in surprise as he had never heard them move at all, suddenly the Stalker part of Surface Stalker made a lot more sense, they moved like ghosts.
"Nonsense! You are not only our guest here you are male and that might not mean very much where you are from but here it means a great deal, you will be protected and you will be cared for, I assume that your people respect the laws and rules of other species correct?" the command pride said and that kinda caught Smoke a little off guard.
"Well err yes of course we do, we would never deliberately breach the laws of a sovereign species, that's not how Clan Mason works, we are here to protect and aid, not take over or invade," Smoke said a little indignantly before he realised not only had he just put his foot into a trap he'd full-on stamped on the trigger before smacking it with his ball sack.
"Good to know that's what we hoped, so it is settled in keeping with our laws and customs Vippy's pride will take care of you, guard you and be fully responsible for your upkeep, you are male and that means a great deal here, so you are protected and safe here, end of story," the command pride said and Smoke opened his mouth to argue but Vippy grabbed his left hand and another of her pride grabbed his right and he was instantly surrounded on all sides.
"We will guard him with our very lives, no harm will befall him on our watch this we swear," Vippy's pride said in utterly perfect unison each of them saying every word this time and the command pride nodded in acknowledgement.
"Good, bring him back here tomorrow when he has had a chance to rest and recover and we will discuss what is to happen next," the command pride said before Vippy's pride saluted and steered the resigned and somewhat defeated Smoke out of the room.
The tunnels they passed through seemed endless and Smoke was getting a lot of very very curious glances as he was led past pride after pride of the little Raptorians going about their duties, eventually, they led him to what appeared to be a set of very well hidden elevators, infact he didn't know they were elevators until both Vippy and the other holding his hands place one of their hands into a set of hidden scanners, which let the wall open right in front of him into a smooth large cylindrical tube, the cab they stepped into was a little low and Smoke had to stoop as they led him inside, he couldn't help but smile as he thought of a Yautja girl crammed into one of these lifts, it would be like Yautja in a can.
Vippy seemed to notice his curious look, "A security measure, it takes a minimum of two Raptorians from the same pride to open so that without it no-one can make it down to the city without the aid of a pride, plus it measures pulse, heart rate, pheromones and a few other things, if it detects any form of duress or stress it will not open, if the hand is not alive it will not open, only those worthy to enter our cities ever reach them" Vippy's pride said proudly.
"You guys take your security very seriously," Smoke said and the whole pride looked very happy with that and there were nods all around.
"It comes naturally to us, our entire society is built on the principle of defence, when you are one of the smallest creatures on the planet you have to learn not only to defend yourselves but also what is yours, when our society was nearly destroyed a couple of thousand years ago we were forced to abandon the surface in order to rebuild, our ancestors swore that nothing and no-one would ever take away what was ours ever again," Vippy's pride said and Smoke cocked his head curiously.
"What happened?" he asked and the pride all looked at one another.
"We can do better than tell you we can show you, we'll take you to see the memorial," they said smiling.
The slightly cramped elevator slowed before coming to rest with a soft ping noise before the doors opened with a whoosh and what presented itself to Smoke made his mouth fall open, they were inside an utterly huge cavern but that wasn't the impressive part, as his eyes roamed the ceiling it glittered in a million different shades and hues that seemed to ripple like a wave of light was passing over it as he moved his head, greens, yellows, reds, blues, pinks and blending together like a moving rainbow, hell it was like being inside a rainbow.
It took Smoke a minute to realise what he was looking at, it was a geode, the entire place was inside a giant geode, "It's beautiful" Smoke exclaimed looking up and Vippy's pride smiled proudly.
"It allows us to make the most of the natural light down here, the natural elements in those crystals perfectly reflects it on to the city," Vippy's pride said while Vippy gestured to the ceiling to show how the angle of the crystals was perfectly aligned to reflect the light back onto the city and from what he could see they appeared to have been carved.
"That's incredible," Smoke said and that's when his eyes lowered and he got his first glimpse of the city below them and what he saw made his mouth utterly drop open again, it reminded him of a giant medieval castle carved right out of the volcanic glass, a huge outer wall carved right out of the incredibly thick volcanic glass with circular turret tower-like structures rising up beyond it in places, the whole thing was also surrounded by what appeared to be a moat of molten lava, "The whole city runs on geothermal energy, it powers everything from our industry to our homes," the pride said proudly.
"What about the air? How do you guys get that and water down here?" Smoke asked.
"Oh the water comes from underground rivers that were converted into a resviour and the waste can be converted to steam to run the geothermal power stations which cleans and recycles it for other uses," the pride said as they began to walk along what looked like a giant metal draw bridge over the moat of white-hot magma but somehow the heat was bearable, hell the metal wasn't even warm, it must have some kind of special coating, he instantly knew that if Citrus's hive got down here they'd be crawling over fucking everything.
"The air comes through a series of vents and is continually renewed by a system of natural convection though just in case of emergency there is a series of pumps that can draw air down from the surface," they said as they reached the large metal gates where there appeared to be four prides of guard on duty all dressed in black military-style jumpsuits.
As the pride approached the guards all snapped to attention and saluted and despite all of them wearing helmets that hid their faces Smoke could tell they were looking at him, "Welcome back honoured Surface Stalkers umm who is this?" one of prides asked looking at Smoke up and down.
"This is Hunter Smoke he is under the protection of our pride" Vippy's pride replied and again despite the helmets Smoke could literally feel the eyes of amazement.
"Ummm forgive me Surface Stalker Sema did you say HE?" one of the prides asked and Smoke looked over the pride trying to guess which one was called Sema.
"Yes, I did" the Raptorian with white and blue scales who was still holding his right hand said on her own.
"A-A-A male!? On the surface!? You found a male on the surface!?" all of the guard prides exclaimed in perfect unison that made them sound like a choir.
Vippy's pride nodded and while the guard prides were stood in utter silent shock Vippy's pride led him through the small gate that stood in the corner of the much larger gate that Smoke still had to duck to pass through, suddenly Smoke was getting a new appreciation for how Yautja girls felt.
The city was utterly incredible, circular turret-like towers had been carved from the volcanic glass as was everything else, the whole city appeared to have been carved from a single giant piece of rock within the centre of a giant geode, the streets had carved and the rock had been roughed to make it non slip, it reminded him of cobbles the way it had been shaped, it was lined with large circular lamps that looked like large glowing blue orbs it was only got closer that he realised that they were actually ant farms, "Holy shit your street lamps are glowing ant nests?" Smoke exclaimed looking closely at one of them.
The ants were about the size of his little finger and their abdomens glowed like those of fireflies casting a form of blue light which had a collective effect and cast soft blue light around the surrounding area, "The Great Tree provides us the tools and we make use of them, the ants get a stable safe colony that is protected and fed by us and we get light, it's a win-win, nature must always be preserved, it is the greatest gift the Great Tree provides all" Vippy's pride said as they guided him down the street, as they walked the pride seemed to close ranks into a tight protective circle.
"Umm guys you don't need to worry about me so much I am a full-blooded Hunter I'm quite capable of protecting myself," he said and no sooner had he said it he felt both Vippy and Sema both squeeze his hands in perfect sync.
"Nonsense while you are here you are under our protection and we take our responsibilities very seriously, especially where males are concerned," Vippy said which made Smoke groan with frustration, he kinda felt like he wasn't being taken seriously at all, his pride was taking a serious knock with all the hand-holding and leading him around like a child, he understood that their culture was very different from his and while he was here he had to act as both a warrior and a diplomat and the diplomatic part meant obeying their laws and he sighed heavily, but there had to be some way of proving to them that he didn't need their protection, but how?
Out of no-where, an alarm began to blare sounding like an air raid siren, "Attention all citizens there has been a report of a mimic in the vicinity of the recreation zone! All civilian prides report the nearest shelter! All guard prides please converge on the recreation zone!" a series of voices came through speakers that Smoke couldn't see as they sounded like they were all around him.
"A mimic! It must have got in through the air pipes again! We must protect Smoke! Quick get him to the shelter!" Vippy exclaimed but Smoke had other ideas, this was his chance, it was like Paya herself had heard his prayer and sent this chance to him and he was not going to miss it, the Goddess of the Eternal Hunt was giving him a chance to prove himself, so he would hunt this Mimic and he would kill it.
With a quick movement, Smoke was able to use the pride's distraction to pull both his hands free and engaged his helmet, "Smoke! No! It's too dangerous! You don't know what you're up against!" Vippy yelled in panic but before she could even finish her sentence Smoke's cloaking systems engaged and he vanished from sight.
The running prides of civilians heading for the towers made it easy for him to slip away from Vippy's pride unnoticed and honestly he felt kinda bad for ditching them, but then he had to do this, he had to show them and everyone what he could really do, that's when he noticed the guard prides all seemingly running in one direction so quick as a flash he fell in behind them using the shadows to move without being revealed as his cloak shimmered as he ran.
The guards led him to what appeared to be a cross between a park and a miniature jungle, there were trees, all kinds of amazing plants and large flat areas of grass that looked to Smoke to have been set up as a kind of picnic area of some kind, there was a park with all kinda entertainment for their children like climbing frames, swings etc.
He got close enough to listen in to what the guard was saying, "I want tight groups people, you've all fought these things before, eyes open you know these things can look like anything so if anything out of place catches your eye call it out, nothing is stupid, I do not want to have to write 'Killed by a fucking park bench' on anyone's burial urn today, so eyes fucking up and are on the watch for civilians we also have an unsubstantiated report that there might be still a group of males with children in here somewhere, but the shelter reports are not in yet" one of the command guard prides was saying to the others.
Smoke slipped passed the guard prides and into the trees, he had absolutely no idea how they grew trees underground but here they were, he was sat on the end of a branch when he saw Vippy's pride appear at the entrance to the area and by all the arm-waving at some of the guards he got the feeling they were telling them that there was an alien male in the area, because everyone suddenly went into overdrive.
Smoke flicked his vision into thermal mode and began sweeping the surprisingly large area using the trees to move silently, this place was utterly incredible having what looked like a pond that was filled with some kind of aquatic avian species and even a form of warm-blooded fish that attracted his attention, that's when he saw a large heat source coming from what appeared to be a public toilet on the far side of the pond area.
Smoke moved slowly and silently towards it noticing what appeared to be a high up window well outside of the climbing range for the average Raptorian but not for a human equipped with specialist hunting gear made for climbing, so as quickly as he could without compromising his cloak Smoke made his way over to it and jumping up he gripped a ledge and looked through the window.
What he saw instantly set his heart on edge and he flipped to normal vision to confirm it, inside the toilet block were a small group of four Raptorian adults and they appeared to be clustered into a corner and behind them were what appeared to be six small children, Smoke dropped down and swiftly moved around to the front opening the door and entered the block, the Raptorian's immediately cried out in alarm upon seeing a gold suited creature bursting in through the door and they immediately attempted to shield the small children further.
"It's ok! I'm not going to hurt you I'm here to help, my name is Smoke I'm a human and a member of the Guardian Core of Clan Mason, I'm a human" Smoke said rapidly in what he hoped was good enough Raptorian for them to understand.
The closest Raptorian lifted their head and Smoke realised that they looked remarkably like the translators, their little heads had various forms of jewellery all over them and what appeared to be made upon their faces the one closest to him had fire red scales and the make up was in greens and blues and it really stood ou.
They were all dressed in brightly coloured flowery style open shirts that showed off their necklines, along with pants that reminded Smoke of the yoga pants that had become popular among Yautja girls, they clung to their legs and really showed off the shape of them, these must have been the lost males that he'd overheard the guards mention, "Y-Y-You're here to help us?" the closest one chirped softly looking at him with incredibly bright purple eyes.
"Yes, my name is Smoke, is anyone hurt?" he asked and the Raptorians shook their heads, the little ones were beginning to pop their heads out from the group like little baby birds in a nest, they all looked up at the large, golden strange-looking alien.
"We were trying to make it to the recreation area shelter but the mimic trapped us in here! It's outside somewhere and we can't risk going out there! We can't risk it getting the children! Please Miss Smoke you have to help us!" the closest Raptorian said and Smoke nodded.
"Don't you worry, I'm going to protect you and the little ones, where did you see the Mimic and what can you tell me about it?" he said.
"It was near the pond it was pretending to be a bin and it changed as we got near it so we ran in here, it's still out there somewhere we've heard it" one of the little ones chirps their voice sounding scared.
"Don't you worry little one, I'm going to get this thing, you and your daddy will be fine I promise" Smoke said before turning and getting ready to leave when he said over his shoulder, "Lock the door behind me and don't open it untill either I or the guards call for you ok?" he said and the males nodded.
Smoke recloaked and he leapt up onto the roof of the toilet using the power-assisted movement, he heard the door lock being engaged below him and he began scanning the area with his thermal vision but honestly, he didn't even know if this thing he was hunting was hot-blooded and would show up under thermal so he decided to try something else and low and behold it worked.
Another couple of the mask's vision settings had been originally designed to pick up Xeno's back in the days when the Yautja still hunted them, one of them picked up pheromonal pockets and the other picked up bioelectricity, specifically those generated by muscles and organs, as soon as he activated this one which made everything appear a kind of gold colour a bench right at the corner of the pond lit up bright white on a gold background, "Gotcha fucker! Smoke hissed as he watched one of the water avians jumped out of the water next to the faux bench and began to waddle along the water's edge pecking at the ground with its odd semi-circular bill as it looked for food, as it got close to the bench the mimic struck like a cobra.
A spike of flesh shot from it and speared the bird before it knew what hit it, it pulled the still struggling and squawking bird into itself, it literally absorbed it into what looked like a mass made of putty, the bench rippled and undulated before becoming solid again, "Holy shit no wonder these guys are scared of these things, fucking glad I didn't fancy a sit down" Smoke breathed.
Reaching behind himself he gripped his combi stick and with a flick of his wrist extended it, immediately as he lifted it into the throwing position an aiming reticle popped up in Smoke's vision, with a roar of effort he threw the combi stick like a huge spear right at the fucking bench pretender, the huge stick flew through the air only becoming visible as it struck the creature dead centre and pinned it to the ground with a solid and wet sounding thud noise, the stick buried its bladed end into the soil behind the fake bench.
To his utter surprise, the mimic bellowed in pain sounding like an angry tiger as it began to thrash around the combi stick, it actually split itself in half and began to pull away from it, "No you fucking don't!" Smoke yelled bringing his rifle up from his back, the barrel extending into the firing position as it was raised, the coils along the barrel sides crackled with electrical energy as Smoke fired with the rifle in rail gun mode, a sharp and loud crack issued as it fired leaving a blue energized smoke trail right from the tip of his barrel to the huge hole that the tungsten slug about the size of Smoke's thumb punched right into the creature's centre mass it blew a hole the size of a basketball right through it and kicked up a crater out of the soil it hit behind it, the hole immediately began to seal itself up only seconds later.
"Fuck!" Smoke yelled realizing that regular projectiles were not going to do much to the putty mass like creature, so he quickly flipped a switch on the side of the weapon while the creature tried to reform itself in order to escape him, the weapon immediately reconfigured with a series of clicks and a low energized thrumming noise, once light in his HUD lit up to tell him that it was ready he raised it again, taking aim centre mass again he decided it was time to up the ante on this shape changing fucker. so he also activated the targeting on his mask, this caused his plasma casters to pop up and the tri laser aiming modules kicked in and triangular targeting reticles lit up in his HUD.
"Eat plasma you child killing mother fucker!" Smoke roared and fired all three weapons at once creating a hellstorm of glowing blue plasma shot that lit up the entire area in a bright blue light as it flew towards the creature, three orbs of super heated plasma gas struck it all at the same time, this worked beautifully as the super heated plasma not only blew fist sized holes in it but set it on fire, causing it to thrash around in agony, rapidly shifting between a multitude of shapes like the pain of the plasma fire coating it was causing what ever intelligence the creature had to short circuit, it let out a final blood curdling roar before falling flat onto the ground and actually melting into a burning puddle.
After checking the creature was dead which thanks to his electro vision was easy as the electrical charge dispiated into the ground, which left it as dark as the ground upon which it lay.
Smoke retrieved the combi stick from the ground with a hard yank shaking the soil from it as he did, he replaced his now powered down rifle on his back but kept his stick out and his casters powered up just in case, they hummed softly next to his head as their magnetic cores spun keeping their charged plasma held in suspension within their breaches.
Turning and heading back to the door he banged on it with his fist, "It's Hunter Smoke, it's safe to come out now the Mimic is dead" he called.
The door opened and a little head poked out and looked around, "I-I-It's really dead?" he asked and Smoke nodded pointing at the smoking still burning body of the Mimic, with that the little male opened the door and out they came all looking at him in utter amazement.
"Y-Y-You killed it? All on your own? Where's your pride miss?" the male with purple eyes asked.
"Not a miss I'm as male as you are and I don't have one, I'm a human and we do things a little differently" Smoke said smiling under his mask.
"Y-Y-You're a male!?" one of the kids exclaimed looking at him in utter shock and awe and instantly Smoke found himself surrounded by the males and the kids all looking at him in utter awe.
Just then the sound of running feet filled the air, he turned just in time to see a literal army of guard prides arrive having all been drawn to the sounds of gunfire and combat, they stopped dead to all look in utter shock at the still burning Mimic corpse, out of the centre of the guards a familiar group burst out like little scaly missiles heading right for him.
They ran low to the ground, leaning forwards and extending their tails to act like rudders, it made them incredibly quick on their feet plus they could change direction incredibly quickly.
"Smoke! You're ok! Oh thank the Great Tree!" Vippy yelled her voice a mixture of anger and sheer relief as they surrounded him again though this time not grabbing his hands as they noticed his weapons appeared to be powered up, though by her eyes she was internally debating either hugging or slapping him.
Smoke calmly retracted his combi stick and with a very practiced movement spun it in his hands before he replaced it on it's mount above his hips, next he powered down his casters which were currently tracking the movements of his head and the laser targeting it was emitting, the pair of them powered down with soft high pitched whines before lowering on their gimbal mounts and locking back into place on his pauldrons, before finally retracting his mask to reveal his smiling face.
"Sorry about that guys, I didn't mean to worry you but I told you I'm a Hunter, when I heard that there were people in danger I couldn't still back and do nothing especially when I heard there were children involved, protecting innocent people is what Hunters do, it's our most absolute creed, hunt down all who would spill innocent blood, it is the oath all Hunters swear before the Clan and Paya and nothing will ever make me break it" Smoke said softly and apologetically but also proudly.
"Mr Smoke saved us from the Mimic!" one of the children chirped happily and soon the others were all joining in and that's when Vippy's pride seemed to notice them.
"M-Males! There really were males and male children in danger!" Sema started and they all joined in, instantly the pride spilt and surrounded the entire group defensively, Vippy spun toward the guards.
"Males! We have males over here!" she yelled at the top of her lungs and every single guard head popped up and snapped towards them before they utterly charged towards them, the entire croup was surrounded in layer up on layer of circles as the guard prides formed up, instantly the males were plucked from the group and rushed away buried protectively inside a pride of females all while being wrapped in blankets that were appearing from somewhere but not before they all gave Smoke a wave of thanks which he returned happily.
"Ok lets go, I could really use something to eat" Smoke said gesturing with his hand and giving Vippy a smug smile, he got the feeling that he'd gotten his point over as he could actually hear the guards chittering and he could hear the words 'Male' and 'Killed a mimic on his own' being thrown around.
She nodded and without saying a word grabbed his hand while Sema grabbed the other one and once again Smoke found himself in the centre of the group being led away towards the towers, as he went he could see literally every single guard gawking at him in utter shock, he sighed heavily again as they passed them but just couldn't help but smile to himself, at least he'd proved his point, even if he was probably in for a bollocking of some kind for it and by the very conflicted look on Vippy's surprisingly pretty face, it was coming and probably soon.