1I've wanted to write this story down for a while, but couldn't find the will to do so until just recently. The Yautja have always interested me so very much ever since I was young, but I've always felt disappointed with the stories and situations they're put in (e.g. them simply being put in human situations WITH other humans, such as helping them out in Hurricane Katrina or World War II—yeah, not joking). I always thought they held a lot more potential than they're accredited for, and skimming through many other AvP fics just made me realize that there is so much that could be put to paper-or should I say, screen.
With that said, I hope you all enjoy. This story will be multi-chapter, updated, and revised often. Feel free to leave feedback, reviews, and critiques. I always love to hear what my readers have to say.
Warning: This story is rated hard "M" for violence, language, drug and alcohol use, and sex/sexual content.
Chapter 1
Pai'ata sat in his living room across from the fellow ample-bodied Yautja decked in dapper black and gray uniform, his dearest friend and colleague, Lieutenant Taihen, who sat there in the dim orange light shuffling a electronic pen over a datapad.
Pai'ata merely watched him with complete attention forward. They were normally in more amiable disposition, joshing and nattering about the latest news they had heard regarding Celebrity X, or if their section of Yautja Prime had managed to fall into a technocratic nuclear war with any of the other nations that threatened to destabilize their precious city-state of Mal'dara. The mass media was doing everything to stir up every inkling of possibility that there was going to be a conflict, and Pai'ata and Taihen often found themselves wasting a good hour or two debating on the likely possibility, in which their usual conclusion was that the media was full of politically-biased hypocrites who would pounce on every opportunity to create tension between the states.
This time, however, it seemed that conversation was not going to come up this time. Taihen would simply not allow him to bring any off-topic subject up in their tête-à-tête, clicking his mandibles in frustration if Pai'ata did so much as to jokingly side-track their current conversation.
Taihen was an obstinate one, and the fellow Yautja could deeply respect that.
"You wanted me to go out and find the best candidates for this hunt of yours," Taihen said with an air of frustration, looking sternly into Pai'ata's eyes, "which I have done with the greatest possible scrutiny."
Pai'ata sat calmly back in his animal-hide recliner, feeling the small scar that ran along its armrest. It was truly a symbol of a hard fight that had eventually been conquered by a brave hunter.
Something that was now completely underestimated and scoffed at in their contemporary culture.
"And I sincerely thank you for that, friend," Pai'ata obliged calmly. "I am lucky to have you as a cohort. I cannot think of anybody else who would do a large favor to fulfill what many would consider a pipe dream."
Taihen broke his gaze to look timorously onto his lap, subtly brushing a chestnut dreadlock behind his arm. One thing Pai'ata appreciated about his friend was that he was easy to please.
"I've been on board with your plan ever since you proposed it all those years ago," Taihen said. "when they recruited you as Allied Commander of the Mal'dara-Hireri territories."
Pai'ata thought back on when, after years of blood, sweat, and the faintest glimmer of tears had been shed during his ordeal of ranking through the Mal'daran army, had finally been given the incredible opportunity of accepting the role of being the Allied Commander, a position he now held for far longer than any other ranking he obtained through his ascent of the militia ladder. He always had to mentally remind himself he most likely wouldn't have gotten so far if it hadn't been for Taihen.
"It's really been so long since I first spoke of it…" the Yautja reminisced. "In honesty, it was a dream I held since I was a pup, but didn't speak of it to anyone outside of family, except you, nearly a decade ago."
Taihen nodded. He had heard Pai'ata say this many a time before, but it never failed to make him feel proud.
"Nobody else would have been interested?"
Pai'ata laughed at that question. "Are you kidding me? They would of laughed me out of the army for proposing such a—" he held up his fingers to mimic quotation "antiquated system of primitive tribalism."
The other Yautja burst out laughing.
"That's how those smarmy professors in upper-remedial education address it, anyways."
Taihen put a hand on his chest to calm himself down, not able to will himself to stop his wide smirking.
"Oh! The nerve," the lieutenant said, shaking his head. "Most people in our society express no interest in learning about the roots of our nation or learning the old ways of our people. We have changed so much in the last century, it's concerning."
Pai'ata nodded in agreement, yet didn't feel the urge to comment on the issue once again. It had been spoken between them gods-knows how many times in the past, and there was plenty of time to discuss it in the future amongst future coterie.
Speaking of which.
"So, Taihen," he changed the subject. " Tell me who you've got 'recruited'."
Taihen's face brightened, his mandibles spread to show his smiling maw. "I was eager for you to ask." He turned to focus on his data-pad and entered a series of codes to unlock the device. He scrolled through it, murmuring softly to himself before his yellow eyes widened with excitement.
"Ah, here they are. I have their profiles listed in the dossier."
"Excellent. How and where did you find these individuals?"
The Yautja kept his eyes secured to his data-pad. "Connections and a keen eye for tenacity."
Pai'ata accepted the vague statement. His only friend had never let him down before. "Tell me who they are."
Taihen glanced up from the pad, exchanging his signature mischievous look. "I would, but I thought you'd might like them to all come here to you place to be formally introduced."
The Commander's small smile began to fade. "You invited these Yautja to my house?"
Taihen didn't seem bothered. "Yes, of course. You told me specifically that you wanted them to come and meet you."
"In my own residence?"
The lieutenant wasn't a bit flustered. "They're all people with some sort of professional background. I thought it was be the most comfortable atmosphere. It would be free from interruptions or distractions." He leaned forward, as if sharing a deep secret. "And besides," he whispered dramatically, "I thought that you might like to show off your grandfather's prized trophy collection."
Pai'ata glanced up at the hallway that lead to the basement. In that side room contained an assortment of bones and skeletons from the multiple prey that his noble Elite-blooded grandfather, Yeyinde-Kirsethwei, had killed during his hunts. Those were the waning years in which the skill of hunting and clanmanship had begun to transition into an era of advanced technology, mass media, and the emerging of various city-states that brought forth a need for labor in sciences, technologies, and other occupations that formed an industrious economy governed by different territories, oligarchies, and states.
Gone was the art of the hunt, the pride that came with it, the social structure it had established in different clans. Kins, themselves, for the most part, had dissolved along with the emergence of metropolitan landscapes and capital economies. Pai'ata's grandfather, along with many other individuals of that generation, had been the last, dying breed that tried to mingle their roots between these two worlds of the tribal and the municipal. Yet, in the end, the feeble threads these elders created to keep the values of the old had torn apart, the former surrendering to the metropolitan environment that dominated their small world.
Pai'ata wanted that to change. He wanted to find others who shares the same interests and philosophies as he, to form a comradery of like-minded individuals whom he hoped would come together to form an adhesive bond.
"You're dreaming about it all again," Taihen teased.
Pai'ata shook himself back into the material world. "How can I not?" he queried softly. "Now that we've put the foot forward to actually turn these collective dreams of ours into a reality."
Taihen was clearly just as elated. "Yes. We've waited far too long for this to happen."
"Indeed." Pai'ata stretched his arms and slowly stood up to his 7'8" form. "Why don't you send out my address to these people. Mark an official date for them to arrive. I would be available next weekend for our official meeting."
Taihen was delighted. "Oh yes, Commander!" he chippered eagerly, addressing Pai'ata by his military status whenever he was so. "I shall do so right away."
"Good," Pai'ata affirmed. "I have some lovely Ca'naranei brew if you'd like. I have a feeling you'll be staying here for a good while."
The Lieutenant chuckled. "My wife won't notice either way. Break out the bottle! I'd love to try it."
Pai'ata nodded before he graciously made his way out of the study area into the kitchen. Taihen watched as the Yautja slipped into the darkened hallway and turn down to where he kept his finest liquers. When Pai'ata had disappeared, he looked gently out the large window that displayed the horizon of cobblestone walkways, trees, and in the distance glistening glass towers that decorated the urban sprawl in the distance. The Commander had been lucky enough to afford a nice area to where he wasn't subjected to the typical noise and other pollutants of city life that Taihen loathed, and yet sitting there, in the dim room looking out on it all, even with the countryside that Pai'ata was offered around his abode, he could see why the Commander was coming to dislike it all collectively.
Their planet was naturally arid and hot, brimming with volcanic activity and sulfuric gasses that polluted the atmosphere long before the Yautja had even existed as a species, and yet, the dust-like haze that permeated the air seemed to have increased with time, bringing forth with it unpleasant smells of pollution, hot concrete, and alloy that were a signature mark of bustling urban life. Along with that came the stone-faced apparitions who had grown accustomed to the clinical modernity of it all, and took little heed to their surroundings, living their lives in introversion and repetitiveness all while acquiring a jaded outlook of it all.
Taihen shuddered. He couldn't wait to escape from it.
Hearing the familiar tinkling noise of glasses from the galley, the Yautja grinned and, with clearness in mind and good-naturalness filling his being, he looked attentively down at his data-pad, and silently began rereading the names of those who had expressed a mutual interest in their new coming Hunt.
