Predator If It Bleeds 40

Then he saw a ripple in the air, like a ghostly silhouette of a large man. The shape seemed to be made out of air, water, and invisible motion. The gruzzly didn't see the three red dots on its scaled chest plate, like a targeting mark. With a whistling roar, an energy burst ripped through the air. It came out of nowhere and struck the gruzzly, leaving a smoking crater of flesh and black blood. The big beast reeled backward, raised its paws and clawed at its wound.

The hulking thing turned to find its attacker, but could see nothing. Jerrick heard a rattling, clicking sound... an inhuman sound. The air shimmered again, and the camouflage faded to reveal an armored man standing there-no, it wasn't a
man. It wore a strange metal mask with blank eye slits; tufts of hair dangled like tentacles fastened to its skull. The strange hunter let out its clicking, clattering challenge again, like a growl made of rattlesnakes. The hunter was focused on the wounded gruzzly.

He held a cylinder in his huge, clawed hand, then squeezed inset controls. Long pointed ends snapped out of each end of the cylinder to create a javelin. Cocking back a well-muscled arm, the hunter hurled the javelin, which spun through the
air and plunged into the gruzzly's upper right chest with a crackle of blue lightning.

The big monster clawed at the high-tech weapon, snapped the metal shaft in half, then lumbered toward the barely seen hunter. The rippling mirror-like camouflage dropped away entirely, and Jerrick's strange savior let out another sound of clicking challenge. The hunter drew two
long, wicked blades, holding one in each hand, as it stormed forward to face his opponent. The injured gruzzly threw itself upon the mysterious hunter, who was a deft fighter. He slashed with the curved blades, drawing bloody designs on the beast's chest plate, and cut the thick, matted fur. The gruzzly snapped its powerful jaws, but the hunter drove a wicked blade beneath its scaled jaw and through its palate.

Bleeding from mortal wounds, the gruzzly thrashed, clawed, and struck the hunter aside, sending him tumbling into the grass. The hunter sprang back to his feet, close to where Jerrick lay frozen in amazement and terror. The stranger was at least nine feet tall and packed with muscles. From the
lithe way he moved, the hunter did not seem at all human. Bleeding, dying but not knowing it, the gruzzly attacked again. The masked hunter regained his feet, and another weapon popped up on his shoulder, spinning, acquiring a target.

Three bright red dots appeared over the gruzzly's
heart. Just as the monster spread its clawed arms wide to crush its opponent, a searing blast ripped through its chest, blowing a crater through the sternum and all the way out the back, leaving bent ribs and splintered vertebrae like a crown of bones and gore. With a hissing, choking rumble, the gruzzly collapsed to the ground. The alien hunter stepped back and regarded the carcass, letting out a long succession of clicking growls as he
inspected the kill.

The alien hunter took out a long saber-like knife, which hummed and then glowed blue. Bending over the dead with a single sweep of the vibrating blue saber, he decapitated gruzzly, the hunter tilted up the reptilian snout, and then the kill. The energized blade cauterized the stump of the gruzzly's thick neck, and the head rolled away, almost three feet wide. Jerrick could only guess how heavy it was, yet the alien hunter lifted the trophy with one hand.-pg.213 chpt.8