BANG! BANG! BANG!
The blast-doors rang and shook as the Hork-Bajir relentlessly hammered them with powerful punches. Little by little the blast-doors bent further and further inwards.
Qi'ra looked at Inu. "Can't get through, eh?"
Inu smiled nervously.
"Activate ray shields," Qi'ra ordered.
Inu pressed a button and a bright red shield went up on their side of the blast-doors.
"Now what?" asked Inu.
"Now we wait," Qi'ra said.
And thus Qi'ra and her six henchmen waited.
The door shook, again and again, bending ever so slowly inwards, but the shields held.
Muscles tense, weapons at the ready, Qi'ra and her henchmen waited.
But then, to their enormous surprise, the doors stopped shaking.
Qi'ra and her men waited for over two minutes… but there were no more noises from outside.
Finally, Qi'ra broke the silence. "Why have they stopped?" she asked no one in particular.
"No idea," Inu replied.
Qi'ra and her henchmen waited for another two minutes, but nothing happened.
They were so focused on the door that they did not notice a large, hairy black spider crawl out of the air vent in the ceiling and jump onto the desk. The spider scuttled onto the other side of the desk and out of sight.
Qi'ra and her henchmen waited and waited, but still nothing happened.
Then, from somewhere in the room, they heard a strange and soft rustling sound. They looked around, but saw nothing. The rustling sound quickly died away. They turned their attention back to the door.
Seconds passed in silence.
Then, out of nowhere, something grabbed the thug that was closest to the desk and threw him as if he was nothing into two other thugs, knocking them both out.
Qi'ra and her remaining three henchmen spun around… and their mouths fell open.
Standing in front of the desk was another towering Hork-Bajir, staring at them with mockery in his red eyes. Unlike the other Hork-Bajir, it surprisingly did not have a gun.
"How did you get in here?!" asked Qi'ra, her eyes wide with shock.
The Hork-Bajir made no answer. Instead, it charged.
Inu and the other men all raised their guns, but the Hork-Bajir was too fast. With one slash of its arm blade, the Hork-Bajir sliced the guns' tips off and then felled all the men with one swipe of its powerful, bladed tail. One of the thugs hit Qi'ra as he went down, causing her to drop her pistol.
The Hork-Bajir kicked the thugs' guns aside and then looked at Qi'ra.
She glared back at it.
Qi'ra didn't know who this Hork-Bajir was or how he had gotten in, but she was not going to go down without a fight. She may have lost her pistol, but she still had her vibro-knife. She drew it and got into a battle stance.
The Hork-Bajir charged and the fight began.
Qi'ra made several attempts to strike at the Hork-Bajir's eyes and neck, but it managed to dodge her strikes.
The Hork-Bajir also made several attempts to strike Qi'ra with its fists, but she managed to dodge its blows.
Then, the Hork-Bajir attempted to tail-whip Qi'ra, but she jumped and rolled out of the way just in time, ducking behind a desk.
As Qi'ra crouched behind the desk, her thoughts whirled. There was something funny going on here. The Hork-Bajir had knocked down her men easily and effortlessly. Sure, they were less skilled than she was, but at the end of the day, they were just physically ordinary humans, like her. But the Hork-Bajir had moved just slightly more slowly when fighting her. And she realized, it had missed her on purpose when it had ambushed them. It's not trying to kill me, she realized. It wants me alive. But why?
Qi'ra heard the Hork-Bajir approaching, and then it stopped just a meter or so behind where she was hidden. She could hear it sniffing. Qi'ra tensed, a plan forming in her devious mind. "Stop playing with me you slimy reptile," she called out.
The Hork-Bajir made a strange hissing sound that Qi'ra realized was a laugh.
Then, just as the Hork-Bajir poked its head around the corner, Qi'ra made her move. Using all her reflexes born of her time as a thief and her training under Dryden Vos and Lord Maul, she sprang to her feet and jabbed her long vibro-blade at the Hork-Bajir's face. She was aiming to plunge it in between the Hork-Bajir's eyes and straight into its brain, but the lightning fast reptilian reacted quickly and pulled to the side. As a result, the vibro-blade stabbed into the side of its head instead.
To Qi'ra's surprise, the Hork-Bajir didn't cry out, as most would have done when stabbed in their head. But it did pause briefly, as if impressed by her move. Then, it reached out and grabbed her by the neck.
Reacting quickly, Qi'ra pulled her vibro-blade out of the Hork-Bajir's head and then stabbed it into the arm that held her. But the Hork-Bajir did not let go, so Qi'ra pulled out her blade again and stabbed it with ALL her strength into the Hork-Bajir's chest. She pushed and twisted the blade deeper, searching for the Hork-Bajir's heart.
But again, to her shock and surprise, the Hork-Bajir seemed unfazed. It tilted its head in what Qi'ra realized was a mocking expression. Then, before she could pull the blade out of its chest, the Hork-Bajir lifted Qi'ra up off her feet and threw her across the room as easily and effortlessly as if she were a ragdoll.
Qi'ra flew through the air and landed hard on the floor.
The Hork-Bajir pulled the vibro-blade out of its chest and stalked towards her.
Qi'ra noticed an electro-staff which one of her henchmen had dropped. She grabbed the staff and as the Hork-Bajir reached her, she stood up and swung it at the creature's wounded head. The Hork-Bajir caught the staff in its clawed hand and snapped it.
Bad idea, Qi'ra thought.
Hork-Bajir punched Qi'ra in the breast, knocking her backwards into the wall.
Dazed and disoriented, Qi'ra tried to stand up, but she only managed to lean back against the wall and look up into the gleaming red eyes of the Hork-Bajir as it stalked toward her like a cat closing in for the kill.
The Hork-Bajir loomed over Qi'ra and tilted its head, its beak curling into something resembling the nightmare of a smile.
For a moment, the wounded Hork-Bajir and the beaten, dazed, exhausted Qi'ra simply looked at each other.
Then, the Hork-Bajir closed its eyes, as if concentrating on something.
What happened next happened so fast even Qi'ra's sharp eyes could not follow it all, and even if they could, what happened boggled her brain more than anything else that had happened today.
The Hork-Bajir's massive body and muscles shrank. Its long neck became short. Its dark green scales changed into smooth, pale skin. The razor-sharp beak and horn blades vanished. The wounds on its head, arm and chest vanished too, healing completely. The long, sharp claws and talons shrank into short, dull fingernails. Wild-looking jet black hair sprouted out of the head. Skintight blue clothes appeared. Next moment, a human man was standing where the Hork-Bajir had been. When he opened his eyes, he revealed that the left one was still blood-red, like the Hork-Bajir, but the right eye was icy blue.
Before Qi'ra could recover from her shock and surprise at the transformation, the man reached out very quickly and grabbed her throat tightly with both hands.
Struggling uselessly, Qi'ra gagged and choked, trying to pull the man's hands off her neck.
The man held on tight and closed his eyes, as if concentrating on something more than just throttling Qi'ra.
Then, something very strange happened. Qi'ra fell into a trance of some sort. Her body became went still and felt lighter, yet heavier than ever. Her mind became foggy, dreamy. She felt as if something was happening to her that had never happened before.
The man opened his eyes and then pushed Qi'ra, pinning her against the wall, keeping his hands on her neck.
Snapping out of her trance, or whatever it was, Qi'ra glared at the man. "Who the hell are you?" she asked again.
"I am Asmodeus," the man said.
Qi'ra's eyes widened. He was Asmodeus?! "You're a shapeshifter?" she asked in disbelieving amazement.
"I prefer the term 'Animorph,'" Asmodeus said lightly.
Qi'ra struggled against Asmodeus' grip, but even in his human form, he was too strong for her. He tightened his powerful grip around her delicate neck and whispered menacingly in her ear. "Be still, Qi'ra, or I might do something you'll never forget."
Qi'ra froze.
Smirking triumphantly, Asmodeus roughly dragged Qi'ra by her neck to the door and pressed the opening button. The shields lowered, the door opened and the Hork-Bajir rushed in, their weapons pointed at the unconscious or dead henchmen.
"Spear, Hatchet, would you two please take these pathetic bullies away?" Asmodeus said with surprising politeness to two of the Hork-Bajir while gesturing to the motionless thugs.
"Yessss, Asmodeusss," two of the Hork-Bajir hissed, nodding obediently. They set about moving the henchmen, dragging their motionless forms away with ease.
The other two Hork-Bajir stayed behind.
Only then did Asmodeus let go of Qi'ra and stepped back.
For a split second, Qi'ra considered making a run for it. But she was outnumbered and the Hork-Bajir were pointing their guns at her, so she immediately decided against it. Besides, she had a few lock-picks, a com-link and a very small knife hidden in her clothes. It didn't look like Asmodeus planned to kill her. If she played along, she might be able to escape.
Asmodeus looked at Qi'ra with considerable interest. "Hand over all your weapons and communication devices, please, Qi'ra," he said suddenly.
"I don't have any more weapons," Qi'ra lied in an innocent tone.
Asmodeus wasn't fooled. "So you really don't have any weapons or communication devices left on you?" He asked.
"No I don't," Qi'ra lied, though her voice shook very slightly for the first time. There was something about the way Asmodeus was looking at her that reminded her disturbingly of the way Jabba the Hutt had looked at her. There was an almost hungry look in the mismatched eyes of Asmodeus.
For a very long moment, Asmodeus looked at Qi'ra. "I don't believe you," he said at last. He gestured to the Hork-Bajir. "Take off her clothes," he commanded. "All of them."