Chapter 149: A Fight Between Females
The Saalistaja female raced to the back of the cabin, where I was, like a bat out of hell, but didn’t realize that the ceiling wasn’t tall enough for her to be able to stand upright. Her upper back and shoulders were pressed against the top of the ship, almost wedging herself into place.
She sneered at me as she swiped her arms back and forth, trying to get her claws into me.
"A male cannot touch a female," shouted one of the males who was rushing to get into the ship, only to be held back by GA.
"She is a female," growled GA. "And the laws also state that males cannot get involved in a fight between two females," he continued, his wrist blades once again unsheathed. I looked to see Ye’tab standing shoulder to shoulder with the other male, a spear of some kind in his hand.
"You lie. Females do not have nano armor. They don’t need it," snarled a second male. Well, that explained why she wasn’t wearing a suit. It also explained why the males needed to.
The female, noticing that my attention was divided, tried to go in for a kill shot. Swiping her claws at my head, they bushed harmlessly across the visor, not leaving so much as a scratch.
"Sweetie, are you okay? I am registering an attack," came a voice that I hadn’t heard for a while. Stumbling back to where the ceiling was even lower, I paused to respond.
"Hey, Sha Shou," I grunted as the female bent over even more to the point where she was almost on her knees. "How are things going on the hunt for a spaceship?" I asked, not bothering to answer her question.
I unsheathed my three wrist blades and waited for the female to make her next move. I was hesitant to actively attack her. I didn’t know the first thing about fighting a Saalistaja except for the fact that it wasn’t a good idea, and I didn’t want to rush in and put myself at a disadvantage.
Darting out to the side, I quickly moved around her and back towards the hatch.
I had overheard GA say that males couldn’t get involved, and I thought forcing the fight into the vast, barren land would be preferable to my ship sustaining any internal damage. I would lose any advantage that my smaller size gave me, but once again, I would need to worry about her destroying the inside of my ship.
There was no way I wanted to be trapped on this planet because she hit my command console and broke something.
I had almost made it to the hatch when she barreled into the men standing there to block my way. Maybe she was worried that if I got out of the ship, she wouldn’t stand a chance. After all, I had my camouflage mode, and there were a lot of places to plan an ambush outside.
She, once again, tried to slash my face, not learning her lesson from the last time she did it. But this time, instead of taking the full brunt of the attack to my face, I ducked under her arm to the left and brought my right arm up with my blades fully extended. There was a splatter of neon green around me, and I looked down to see an ever-growing puddle of green goo.
Three chunks of her arm fell off from where my blades cut through her flesh and bones like butter. She let out a roar of protest that I could feel throughout my body. Luckily for me, I wasn’t able to hear anything, or else I think I would have gone deaf.
"Returning volume to normal levels," said Sha Shou, coming through the speakers of my helmet. "For my readings, you have greatly injured a Saalistaja female. Your best option will be to continue until she is dead. Do not leave her alive. All fights between Saalistaja females are to the death. Any female seen as giving mercy to her opponent will be viewed as weak and constantly challenged until she is dead. Don’t let that happen to you."
Now, I am sure that there are many human women *cough* *Pippa* that couldn’t stand the idea of a fight to the death. But I was smart enough to know that she would not afford me the same grace if the shoe was on the other foot.
"Understood," I grunted. Now that I knew what was actually happening and what was involved in this fight besides a pissed-off woman, I didn’t give the other female a chance to regroup. I watched her stumble back through the hatch, the men behind her giving way, and I picked up my speed.
I didn’t even have to bend over to grab her by the waist, using my forward momentum to carry her backward into the snowy landscape. She screamed her outrage, and Sha Shou quickly lowered the volume of my helmet to the point where I couldn’t hear it.
As soon as she fell into the snow, I let go and engaged my camouflage mode, disappearing from her sight.
I was originally worried that she might be able to make out my footprints in the fluffy white stuff, but when I looked around at the ground beneath my feet, I saw that the snow had been trampled down by the intruders. As long as I stayed on the beaten path, there would be no problems with me remaining invisible.
I watched as she struggled to stand up, falling back down a few times as her severed arm couldn’t support her. Her blood was dying the snow around her bright green, the sight of it making me more than a bit nauseous.
When she managed to get to her knees, I crept forward, making sure that the snow beneath my feet didn’t squeak. I paused for a moment before retracting my blades, relieved that they didn’t make a sound.
Once I saw her looking around, her left hand on the ground, holding her body steady, I continued my approach until I was standing right beside her. What both delighted me and stressed me out was that she had no idea I was a breath away from ending her.
It made me wonder just how close my males were able to get without me knowing. And that left me thinking about a whole lot of things that I shouldn’t be thinking about in the middle of a death match.
Shooting out my blades, the middle one pierced her through her neck while the outside blades sliced through muscles and bones like it was nothing; I watched as her head fell to the ground. Her body quickly after it.
