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Chapter Text

It was early in the morning when the Predator touched down on the dusty surface of the planet, ready and eager to begin his latest hunt.

To tell the truth, the locale did not impress the hardened Yautja warrior much. The desert was vast and remote, with great, towering rock formations scattered across the landscape- along with many deep canyons and valleys that the Predator had spied as his ship flew overhead. However, as far as terrains for a hunt went, it was fairly standard. It did not have the variety of a gravity forest, nor the hidden dangers of a acid swamp or lava jungle.

It was, more or less, what it appeared to be. A large, empty stretch of land with naught but huge rocks to keep one company and minimal signs of life.

Save, of course, for the prey that the Predator had come here to hunt.

The Predator tapped at the computer on its gauntlet, bringing up the factfile for his target. He had already read the file, heavily censored as it was, forwards and back during his flight here, but it was worth glancing over a final time.

On the face of things, the prey he was hunting would not appear to fit the designation of a creature worthy of a Yautja hunt. It was an avian creature, small and skinny, without even the ability to fly to its name. It was not carnivorous, possessed no claws or fangs or poisons of note and had naught but feathers to cover its skin. It was capable of moving at very high speeds, that was for sure, but that alone was no tremendous feat. The Soundjumper Hare, native to a planet a few solar systems over, was much faster.

Frankly, as far as prey creatures went, this 'Roadrunner' seemed absolutely pathetic. Hardly worth the time of a true Predator, even one as youthful and inexperienced as this Yautja was.

And yet, the Yautja's research suggested otherwise. He had trawled through hundreds upon thousands of historical records and reports and had come across dozens of attempts by fellow Yautja warriors- many more accomplished and famed than he (at the moment)- to hunt this beast. And all, without exception, reported the same thing.

Hunt failed. Creature judged impossible to kill.

Frankly, the hunter had assumed it was some great practical joke. Dozens of Predators, mighty Yautja one and all, all defeated by this small bird? The very idea was laughable.
And yet, when he had approached some of the 'survivors' of these hunts in search of more information, the answer was almost universally the same.

A look of shell-shocked horror, deep abiding shame and an utter refusal to answer any of his further questions.

(Hell, one time, he had asked a survivor about the Roadrunner while in the midst of hunting a Nine-Fanged Mountain Eater and the hunter had chosen to actively throw himself into the jaws of the creature rather than continue the conversation further.)

It wasn't enough to fully convinced the Predator that the whole thing wasn't just some practical joke, but at the very least, it made him interested enough to investigate personally. As far as he was concerned, if it was just a big joke, that would become obvious quickly and he could at least play into it.

And if it wasn't a joke… Well, successfully hunting a creature that no Predator had managed to catch before certainly felt like one hell of an achievement. A chance to create his own legend, to earn the respect of his elders and the first step to bigger and greater things.

And all he needed to do was catch or kill some stupid bird.

Seemed easy enough.

Attempt 1

It didn't take the Predator long to find his prey.

He had begun his hunt for the Roadrunner on foot, as was only natural. The creature did not have any guns or crafts capable of flight, so the Predator would limit himself to the same. He would not use guns, nor his spaceship- which was currently parked and camouflaged on top of a rock formation- and would limit himself to melee weapons, so as to approach this hunt on equal footing with his prey.

(Some might've pointed out that since the Roadrunner did not have technologies such as cloaking devices and infra-red vision, it surely would have been even fairer if the Predator removed those as well, but despite pretending otherwise, the Yautja had never been quite as honourable as they liked to claim they were. And most people who tried to call them on it tended to wind up decorating their trophy walls.)

He had started by tracking the beast via its footprints. There were several large, empty roads running through this stretch of desert that his research had informed him were favoured by this Roadrunner. Which made sense, of course. It was the Roadrunner. Not the Random-Patch-of-Desert-runner. The Predator already had plenty of trophies made from the latter.

And indeed, upon following one of these roads, the Predator quickly came across a series of fresh bird-like footprints that fit those of the prey he was hunting. The size, the weight, the three-pointed toes, they all matched perfectly with the data in his factfile.

There were also another series of footprints, in hot pursuit of the Roadrunner, that appeared to match that of the native coyote. Strangely, the coyote's footprints lasted right until they reached the blast zone of what appeared to be the aftermath of a large explosion, at which point they vanished completely.

Strange, the Predator thought, but not especially relevant right now.

The Predator continued to follow the Roadrunner's footprints, making sure to remain cloaked as he went. Though the bird could likely run much faster than he could, it would need to stop for a break sooner or later, so if he just kept following the trail, the sensors in his mask would eventually pick up the…

Ah. There. Just as he predicted.

It was a live Roadrunner, lounging by the side of the road, occasionally picking at the dirt in search of sustenance.

In person, the Roadrunner appeared even less impressive than it had been described in his factfiles. It was a goofy-looking bird, with a long thin neck, bright blue plumage, stretchy legs and a near-constant doofy grin on its face, even as it tapped-tapped-tapped its beak against the desert floor. It hardly resembled the sort of animal that could sent hardened Yautja warriors fleeing at the mention of its name and the Predator became increasingly convinced that somebody had been playing a joke on him, and that he would repay that joke by shoving the creature's tiny bleached skull down someone's throat.

It also seemed completely unaware of his presence.

Perfect.

The Predator approached quietly, using every inch of his stealth training to muffle his footsteps. The cloaking device he wore naturally rendered him invisible to the creature's sight, but the Yautja knew from experience that there were still many ways to accidentally reveal its presence to its prey. A noisy footstep, a deep breath, an unfortunate moment of gas in his stomach, the list was endless. And when approaching a creature as lightning fast as the Roadrunner was rumoured to be, the Predator needed to make certain he was not detected.

Thus far, his efforts seemed to be working. The Predator grew closer and closer to the seemingly-oblivious bird. When he was within a few feet, he slowly extended the two razor-sharp blades strapped to its wrist. The blades made an audible 'shink' as they emerged, causing the Roadrunner to suddenly look up from its meal and scan the horizon, in search of threats.

The Predator froze, not daring to move or even breath, as the bird's beady eyes stared straight in his direction. His heart thundered in his chest as it stood on the precipice of success or failure.

But the Predator's disguise held. After a few moments, the bird returned to its meal, having clearly dismissed the noise as not a threat.

Beneath his mask, the Predator smirked and took one more step forward.

It was finally within range.

Time to strike.

The attack was sudden, violent and utterly without mercy. One second, the Roadrunner was perfectly safe, happily enjoying itself in a quiet, empty desert, content in the knowledge that it was far away from anything that might hurt it.

The next moment, that peace was violently shattered, as the Predator leaped upon it, screeching as he swung its wrist mounted blades and plunged them deep into the Roadrunner's torso, the Yautja-forged metal cutting seamlessly through feathers, flesh and bone as if they were no more than air, gutting the beast before it could even squawk.

Finally, as a finishing blow, the Predator grasped onto the bird's spindly neck and tore its head clean from its body, roaring triumphantly as…

…

…the entire body suddenly turned into smoke and floated through his hands.

The Predator blinked, surprised at the unexpected disappearance of its prey's corpse. It glanced down at its wrist blades, only to find there was no blood or viscera or stains of any kind marking the metal surface.

What had just-?

"Meep Meep!"

A triumphant cry echoed through the desert air, startling the Predator. He looked up to see the Roadrunner, zipping cheerfully away down the road at phenomenal speed, kicking up dust and smoke and smoke in its wake.

It took the Predator a moment to understand what had happened.

An afterimage. That was what the Predator had skewered. Nor the Roadrunner itself, merely the faded remnants of where the creature had once stood, the bird having moved so quickly that said image had appeared almost identical to the real thing.

The Predator let out a frustrated click of his mandibles.

It seemed the rumours of the Roadrunner's speed at least were not exaggerated.

If he was going to catch this prey, this Yautja hunter was going to need to approach things in a much smarter way…

Chapter Text

Attempt 2

It did not take the Predator long to come up with a trap.

In particular, the inspiration had come from a memory of when he accompanied a small band of experienced hunters on a hunt against a Greater Krocodilian in the Dokodah system. The creatures were enormous water-dwelling beasts, each the size of a regular Yautja spaceship and fought with more ferocity than almost anything else on the planet.

In the water, the Krocodilians were almost impossible to kill so, for the hunt, the Yautja hunters initially lured their target prey onto dry land first and gave time for the sun and heat to dry out its scales and make them brittle and easier to gouge out.

Most of the hunting party had gone after the creature there and then, slicing and cutting with their weapons, attempting- and usually failing- to pierce deep enough to hit some vital organ or artery, while avoiding the beast's thrashing and swipes, with mixed success. The Predator had wanted to join them, but he had been held back by a elder of their pack, who instead had him set up wooden stakes across the floor of the swamp.

At the time, the young Yautja warrior had not seen the point of this. He wanted to join his brethren in search of blood and trophies and the glory of the hunt. A part of him had wondered if the elder was a coward, shying away from danger in her dotage.

But she was not a coward. She was intelligent. She watched the other hunters battle with the Krocodilian, taking careful note of the damage each side caused to the other and, when she judged the creature to have been sufficiently hurt, she used the recorder in her mask and projected the sound of surging waves- specifically, those native to the type of water sources that Krocodilians preferred to dwell in.

Krocodilians were nigh invincible in water. The one they had been hunting knew this as well as any. When it heard the surging waves, it broke off from the fight and charged straight towards what it imagined would be safety...

...At which point, it ran straight into the sharpened stakes the Elder had set up earlier and promptly skewered itself upon them- the creature's own mighty bulk doing what the hunters' strength and tools could not.

The elder was triumphant that day and, in recognition of his assistance, the young Yautja was allowed to take a Crocodilian tooth as a trophy- one that still hung in a pride of place in his trophy room.

However, more than the Crocodilian tooth, the true prize that the Predator received that day was the lesson he had learned from his elder.

A competent hunter targets his prey through their weaknesses. A truly great hunter targets them through their strengths.

The Roadrunner's greatest strength was its speed. At its fastest, it could run miles in mere seconds. The Predator could not hope to match it whilst on foot and, while it did have a hovercycle and some other tools in its ship, it felt dishonourable to utilise them against a mere flightless bird.

So the Predator prepared a trap. A way to use the Roadrunner's own vaunted speed against it.

It started with a tunnel; a long dark passageway built through one of the larger rock formations.

The Predator had noticed the Roadrunner using this tunnel quite often during its many jaunts around the deserts and an examination of the footprints in the area indicated that it was a common path for the bird.

Making it a perfect spot for the Predator's trap.

The trap itself was very simple. A thin length of razor wire stretched from one end of the tunnel to the other, all but invisible in the dim light.

The Roadrunner would come speeding down the dusty road, as it always did, enter the tunnel without a thought in its empty head and by the time it realised anything was wrong, it would have been sliced into two clean pieces courtesy of the razor wire, its own speed and momentum doing the work that even the sharpest of knives would struggle to match.

Not that the razor wire itself wasn't very sharp, of course. It was hideously sharp. So sharp and thin and easy to miss that the Predator had to wear special gloves to handle it and actively set the sensors in his mask to detect its presence, so he did not wind up accidentally cutting himself on it.

Frankly, the Roadrunner could be walking at a normal pace and would still likely lose its head if it walked into that trap. But the Yautja race as a whole had never really objected to the idea of 'overkill', so long as it technically played by the rules of what was 'honourable'.

Once the trap was set up, the Predator retreated to a safe distance away from the road, engaged his cloaking device and waited.

It didn't take long for his prey to make its appearance.

He heard the Roadrunner's approach before he saw it; that distinct, unmissable 'Meep Meep!' echoing through the desert plains. Then came the cloud of dust in the horizon and the whir of avian legs moving honestly much faster than normal biology should have probably allowed, before the Roadrunner rocketed past, kicking up dust and sand and dirt in its wake.

The Predator braced, even as the dust washed over its invisible form. He had switched to the infra-red mode in its mask as soon as the dust cloud appeared and was able to follow the bird's movements with it.

That was how he knew the Roadrunner had gone straight into the tunnel, without a second's thought.

The Predator smirked and leaned back, turning to the other end of the tunnel and waiting for two distinct pieces of Roadrunner to come bouncing out.

But they didn't. Instead, the Roadrunner emerged completely unscathed, still moving at its normal abnormal running speed.

For the briefest moment, the Predator thought the bird might have been acting on a posthumous instinct, the motions of a creature that had not realised it was dead yet. It might continue running for a little while, but as soon as it reached a corner or anything that would require active brain function, it would inevitably stumble and fall apart- figuratively and literally in this case.

Then the bird proceeded to hurtle down a winding road, taking each swerve and corner perfectly and the Predator was forced to admit that maybe it hadn't secretly been decapitated.

But how was that possible? The wire was set up at the perfect height to kill the bird. Had it spotted the wire somehow? Reached at the last possible microsecond to dodge the trap? Or had the wire simply snapped of its own accord?

This required further investigation.

The Predator decloaked and entered the tunnel to investigate for itself, relying on the mask's sensors to locate where the wire had been positioned.

The wire was still there, but the Predator could not locate any traces of blood, nor signs that the wire had been disturbed in anyway. An analysis of the footprints below did not seem to indicate that the Roadrunner had changed its pace in any way, nor that it jumped over the wire.

So what had happened? What had gone wrong? Why hadn't the trap worked?

It was a credit to the Predator's precision and expertise that he was not willing to walk away until he had found answers that satisfied him. He examined the wire incredibly closely, filtering through the various different functions in his mask in hope that one of them would tell him how the bird had escaped. The focus on his task was absolute.

Unfortunately- and something that was less of a credit to the Predator's skills- was that this focus caused him to develop a mild case of tunnel vision.

As such, he was completely unaware of the Roadrunner suddenly appearing behind him.

The Roadrunner- having doubled back for reasons that only it could explain- examined this mysterious new stranger standing before it, dressed with spikes and armour and dreadlocks, with its usual doofy smile. Whether it sensed the danger that such a being represented was unknown, for Roadrunners were rarely forthcoming with their feelings and, as is well known, cannot read.

What the Roadrunner did decide to do, however, was give this new arrival its loudest and most cheerful greeting.

"Meep Meep!"

The Predator naturally startled at the unexpected noise. He instinctively leaped back, reaching for the weapon at his belt.

Unfortunately, he had forgotten about the razor wire.

About an hour later, the Predator stomped back into his spaceship, dragging his own severed arm behind him.

With a noticeable hiss of frustration, the Yautja plopped the severed limb down onto the medical bed and climbed up after it, waiting for the craft's advanced medical system to heal and reattach the missing arm, trying not to look like he was sulking all the while.

Alright, so that basic trap had not worked. But that did not mean the Predator was ready to give up.

All that meant was that the next trap needed to be a little more… elaborate.

Chapter Text

Attempt 3

It was the singular nature of the wire that had been the problem, the Predator decided.

He was still uncertain as to whether or not the Roadrunner had noticed the wire itself when it approached the tunnel- there was evidence both for and against- but the fact that only one wire was present meant that it was easy to dodge, regardless of whether the bird had done so deliberately or by accident.

Therefore, logic dictated that if the Predator included more wires, enough that the Roadrunner couldn't avoid them, then he'd be able to avoid a repeat of the previous 'failure'.

However, that in itself had some issues. After all, the more wires he included, the more visible the wires became, meaning the more likely it was that the Roadrunner would notice and subsequently stop before it could run into them. And the Predator had seen for itself just how quickly that damned bird could stop on the Yautja equivalent of a dime (which, since they didn't really have a standardised physical currency, was basically just a small bone taken from some variety of ferocious creature.)

Then the Predator realised he was being silly.

Why bother with tripline wires when you could just use a net?

That was how this latest scheme had come to be born.

Amongst the equipment the Yautja had brought along on its spaceship was a very basic net-launcher. The device itself was very simple. You pointed the net-launcher towards whatever you wanted to launch a net at, you pressed a button on your gauntlet and voila, a net was launched, ready to entangle your target… 

...and then slice it into small gory chunks, because the net was designed to shrink around its target, the wires involved were very sharp and the Yautja were generally of the opinion that normal nets were for pussies.

The Predator's plan was simple. Bury the net launcher in the ground, hide himself somewhere nearby and when the Roadrunner approached, he would activate the net and promptly turn the irritating bird into a small pile of chicken nuggets.

It was simple, uncomplicated and naturally, doomed to failure.

It wasn't a complicated failure admittedly, not like the earlier wire trap. But the fact was, the Predator simply did not have the reflexes to press the button in time to catch the Roadrunner.

By the time he heard that detestable 'Meep Meep!', saw the approaching dust cloud and activated the trap, the Roadrunner had already passed by, leaving the net with nothing to do but flop uselessly on the ground, burning a crisscross of holes into the dusty road and/or occasional unlucky tumbleweed.

So the Predator readjusted. This time, instead of relying on his reflexes, or trying to judge the Roadrunner's speed and distance by eye, he set the net launcher to automatically track and register the presence of a nearby Roadrunner and launch as soon as the bird was detected.

Unfortunately, this revealed the second problem with the trap.

Specifically, the net launcher was designed to only launch its net in a single direction. If the Roadrunner happened to be approaching from a different direction then the net would be gloriously launched at just the perfect time to catch the bird… only to flop onto the ground uselessly again, because it turned out to be approaching from the east this time, instead of the north.

But again, the Predator was nothing if not adaptable and this problem too could be solved with a hint of forethought.

Specifically, all he had to do was mount the net launcher on a rotating platform, linked to the aforementioned Roadrunner detector. The device would detect the bird's presence, automatically rotate towards it and launch the net with perfect timing to entangle and subsequently dissect the thing.

It wouldn't leave much of a trophy, but the Predator would be satisfied dining on Roadrunner steaks for the next solar cycle.

(Note: If the Predator had been a teensy bit more self-aware, he might have noticed at this point that more-or-less all the work in this 'hunt' had now been delegated to autonomous machines and therefore the Predator himself was not really doing any of the hunting.)

(In the Yautja's defence, however, he was still really upset about that arm getting chopped off.)

So, the Predator set up its net launcher with the appropriate settings, buried it in the middle of the road and dashed back to the nearby trench it had been using as a hiding place.

He dived back into the shallow trough, flattened himself to the ground and was just about to tap the button to reactivate its cloaking device when it suddenly realised it wasn't alone.

"Meep Meep!"

The Roadrunner was there, standing on the edge of his trench and staring down at him with that familiar happy-go-luck smile.

The Predator froze. A thousand different thoughts swam through its mind at that moment, before coalescing into one simple overwhelming realisation.

The Roadrunner was within combat range.

Sching!

The Predator's claws came out. Letting out a screeching battle roar, he launched himself at the Roadrunner, who proceeded to let out another whooping 'Meep Meep!', click its heels half-a-dozen times in mid-air and promptly skedaddle, leaving the Predator to expertly perforate a cloud of dust and smoke.

The Yautja let out a yell of frustration when it became clear his prey had escaped once again.

He had been so close! The bird had been right there! He had nearly been able to slay it with his bare hands, as was proper, instead of relying on some self-targeting, self-launching net that had been metres away from the Roadrunner it was supposed to catch and had yet completely failed to-

The Predator stopped.

It turned back towards the road, just in time to see a net soaring through the air, launched towards the Roadrunner's last known location.

Aka, exactly where he was currently standing.

…

Uh oh.

Several minutes later, the Predator limped back into its spaceship, trailing green blood behind it.

It was fortunate that the creature's reflexes and the razor blades on its wrist were both so sharp, sharp enough to slice apart the deadly net before it could turn him into a series of Yautja cubes.

Unfortunately, the net itself was also very fast and had managed to cut into him deeply enough to leave an… interesting-looking criss-cross of wounds.

Despite their healing technology, it was normal for a Yautja to keep their scars, as trophies and reminders of their mighty struggles and the ferocity of their prey.

These scars…?

The Predator did not plan on keeping these scars.

Not unless he could persuade his fellows that Roadrunners have very sharp talons and attack in a suspiciously net-shaped pattern.

Attempt 4

It was a generally unspoken rule among the Yautja that when hunting, a Predator did not use firearms unless the targets they were hunting were themselves capable of doing the same.

This was done as a matter of fairness. Firearms were so powerful and so lethal against so many species that it was frankly unfair to use against opponents who couldn't return in kind. It was a dishonourable tactic, that ruined the hunt and lessened the achievement of any Yautja who sunk to such depths.

(If an outside observer had somehow survived their last attempt to point out a Yautja's hypocrisy and simultaneously not learned their lesson from it, they might have pointed out that, outside of the advantages that cloaking, infra-red trackers and so on brought, a lot of the 'melee weapons' that the Yautja tended to use had technological advancements that often made them every bit as overpowered as firearms, if not functionally identical. 

They would also have been promptly ignored and/or had their spine removed. The Yautja were keen on matters like fair play, but they weren't that keen on it.)

The point was, on the face of things, the Predator had no real justification for utilising firearms to assist in this hunt. It would've been overkill, unfair- or, well, unfair enough for the Yautja to care about- and dishonourable.

However, the Predator had an excuse in this case.

Though the Roadrunner itself was not known to be a particularly martial species, there were other species on the planet that regularly used firearms. Which meant that firearms were available on this planet. And a brief scan of the Roadrunner's anatomy indicated that in theory- a very dodgy theory that certainly had not been peer reviewed- the bird was capable of picking up a gun in its claws and pulling the trigger. Not to mention, there were lots of potential hiding places for firearms to be stored within this desert.

Therefore, since firearms were available on this planet, the Roadrunner was theoretically capable of using a firearm (technically, kinda-sorta, don't-look-too-deep-into-it) and there were plenty of locations for firearms to be hidden nearby, it was perfectly reasonable to conclude that the Roadrunner might potentially be fully armed at all times.

Therefore, it was also perfectly reasonable for the Predator to use his shoulder-mounted plasmacaster to blast the shit out of it.

The premise behind the plasmacaster was perfectly simple. Wait until the three dots of the laser scope were in position, fire the cannon, boom, one fresh Roadrunner skull (along with significant amounts of detritus) for the trophy wall.

Of course, that did then leave one with the question of how to actually keep the Roadrunner still long enough for the Predator to shoot at it. The bird was far too fast to snipe in motion, as had been proven with the net launcher.

Fortunately, the Predator had done some more research while waiting for his skin to be knitted back together and discovered that the creature had a strong fondness for common birdseed, the kind of which could be found in a nearby town.

One quick jaunt on his spaceship later, followed by a stealthily cloaked trip into a human store- distracted only by a brief consideration as to whether a group of paintballers counted as 'legitimate targets'- the Predator returned to the desert and set up his trap.

Not that the trap was complicated, mind.

A small pile of birdseed poured in the middle of the road. A little hidey-hole for the Predator to hide, cloaked. A plasmacaster armed and ready. And that was about it, really.

The Predator had deliberately set up its ambush in the shadow of a tall, but narrow rock formation. Partly to keep the sun out of its eyes, partly to reduce the number of directions the bird might run to, partly because this was a desert and even for Predators, deserts were obnoxiously hot.

It was a good choice too. The sun was sweltering, almost eyewatering in its intensity and the heavy armour that the Predator was wearing did not make enduring it any easier.

Fortunately, the hunter did not have to wait long. He was barely there for an hour when he heard the familiar signs.

"Meep Meep!"

The Roadrunner took the bait without hesitating. It did not question for a second why there might be a suspiciously uniform pile of birdseed located in the middle of the road- a place where some might note, birdseed was not often found. It simply stopped its run and began pecking happily at the offered treat.

Right in the sights of the Predator's plasmacaster.

The Predator was not the type to jump the gun, however- pun somewhat intended. He would not fire early and risk missing and alerting the bird that something was wrong. He would wait until he was certain he had a clean shot.

Slowly, the red dots symbolising the Predator's scope moved across the ground, towards the oblivious Roadrunner. It crept up those long yellow legs, even as the bird's beak went up and down, before landed dead centre in the middle of the creature's torso.

Behind its mask, the Predator smirked. A perfect shot.

He fired.

...right as the bird stepped around to peck at the other side of the birdseed pile.

The bolt of superheated plasma whistled harmlessly by the Roadrunner as it continued to nibble at its dinner. A short distance away, the Predator muttered a series of coarse Yautja swearwords as the bolt subsequently- and explosively- detonated harmlessly against the nearby rock formation.

However, the situation was not as bad as he feared.

While the Roadrunner certainly looked up, upon hearing the plasma bolt, it did not seem to recognise the danger it was in and when no obvious attackers emerged, it shrugged and went back to eating the birdseed.

The Predator let out a deep breath.

Alright, it had a second chance now. A new opportunity to snipe its prey. And one it would not take lying down.

Once again, the Predator lined up its shot. It waited until the scope was dead centre on the Roardrunner and fired the plasmacaster.

...right as the Roadrunner stepped to the side, once again.

Okay, was the bird doing that on purpose? The Predator couldn't help but wonder about this, as yet another plasmacaster bolt exploded futilely against the rocks. Once he could dismiss, but twice now it had dodged his killshot at the last second. Surely that couldn't be a coincidence?

And yet, the bird was still showing no signs of having spotted him. It was still there, pecking at a greatly diminished pile of bird seed, paying absolutely no attention to him or the exploding rocks behind it.

Well, faked or not, the Predator was not going to waste the third opportunity it had been given.

This time, with a few taps of its gauntlet, it deliberately removed the limiters on his plasmacaster and began to charge it. By doing this, he could fire a much more powerful plasma shot than was usual.

It wasn't a tool he often used- since the excess heat usually damaged the barrel of the plasmacaster- but assuming everything went to plan, the resulting shot would be large enough and wide enough that the Roadrunner would not be able to simply sidestep it like it had the others.

Admittedly, the resulting explosion would not leave much in the way of trophies, but the Predator was willing to accept some scorched bone fragments this time around.

(It wasn't like he'd be telling many people about this hunt, after all.)

Just like before, he waited, he aimed and, when the weapon was fully charged, he fired, sending a streak- nay, a ball- of white-hot plasma towards the unsuspecting bird.

Unfortunately, he'd been a second too late.

The Roadrunner had finished the birdseed.

"Meep Meep!"

With the jubilious exultation that came from finishing a delicious meal, the Roadrunner clicked its heels and took off at supersonic speed down the road, kicking up dust behind it and missing the plasma ball entirely.

The Predator watched the hyperactive bird disappear into the horizon with a slightly numb feeling of resignation. He supposed he should've expected that.

No matter. While this particular attempt might've been a bust, it had nevertheless provided the Predator with plenty of information for its next attempt. He now knew that the birdseed did indeed work as a lure for the beast. He knew that when shooting at it, he needed wide-reaching shots to guarantee a hit. And he knew that-

Wait, what was that strange noise?

Craaaaaacccckkkk.

The strange noise, on this particular occasion, was the sound of the rock formation that had stood opposite his position. Specifically, the tall and narrow rock formation that had just had several plasma shots- including one heavily charged one- shot directly into its base, cracking and damaging the stone badly enough that it was beginning to shift and collapse.

See, the Predator had forgotten about the consequences of its missed plasma shots. The Laws of Physics had not.

And so, as the enormous rock formation inevitably began to topple and fall forwards, directly towards the wide-eyed hunter, the Predator had time to think only one thing.

God damn i-

Thump.

Chapter Text

Attempt 5

So, the plasmacaster alone had been a failure.

That was alright. That was fine. There were plenty of enemies that such a weapon had failed against before. The Predator knew this and could adapt.

(Admittedly, most of those enemies were usually heavily armoured and/or had comparable weapons themselves, but the Predator ignored that part).

The problem had been the bird's energetic nature. The Predator was not sure whether the Roadrunner had dodged the plasma bolts through good luck, through having seen the attack coming or through simply having an exceptional instinct for danger that let it move without thinking, in order to avoid his shots.

Either way, it occurred to the alien hunter that the best method to avoid such a problem was to fire something that the Roadrunner could not dodge.

This was where the Smart Disc came in.

The Smart Disc was a perfect mix of the Yautja's preference for traditional hunting weapons, mixed with their advanced technology. Put simply, it was a discus, lined with razor-sharp edges, that could be thrown at a creature, whereupon it would automatically track and follow it, irregardless of where they went or what was in its path.

All the Predator had to do was throw it in the general direction of the Roadrunner, make sure it had locked onto the bird and then sit back and wait as the whirring blades of death inevitably hunted down its prey and sliced it in two.

Oh, the Roadrunner's tremendous speed meant the bird would certainly be able to outrun it, at least at first. But unlike the bird, the Smart Disc did not need to rest, nor stop for food, water and sleep. It would follow and follow and follow and follow, until the Roadrunner inevitably slipped up, at which point- Shlurk!

No more Roadrunner.

Not that the Predator was satisfied with that fate for its intended foe, mind. It may have been willing to… bend the rules of the honorable hunter a little for its own advantage, but simply sitting back and letting the Smart Disc do all the work for it was too much for even the Predator's flexible rules of engagement to allow.

It was fortunate then, that the Smart Disc was not the entirety of the plan.

As a matter of fact, it was only Step 1.

Attempting to line up a shot while dangling off the side of a rock formation was not an experience the Predator was used to.

It wasn't a situation he was completely new to- (Yautja training covered all sorts of weird situations, hence why he also knew how to snipe while skydiving, upside down and doing the Charleston)- but neither was it a scenario that really came along too much on most hunts.

Firmly secured as he was to the side of the tall and narrow rock formation, courtesy of a grappling hook line, the Predator peered out from beneath his camoflagued cloaking and refocused his efforts to aim his plasmacaster towards the small pile of bird seed and bowl of water that he had placed on the side of the road.

On the face of it, the plan was simple. Launch the Smart Disc towards the Roadrunner- as he had already done about an hour ago. The Smart Disc would chase the Roadrunner all across the desert. Inevitably, the bird would grow tired and seek water and nourishment. It would find the seed and water that the Predator had left out and, irregardless of whether it suspected a trap or not, would feel compelled to stop and eat.

At which point the Predator would snipe it with the plasmacaster, while it was too tired to dodge. Specifically at an angle that wouldn't risk toppling a rock formation on him if he missed.

Now, this all was fairly straightforward. Which might lead one to question why exactly the Predator needed to be hanging halfway down the side of a rock formation for it?

Well, that was because, believe it or not, the Predator was intelligent (debatably) and more importantly, capable of learning from his mistakes.

More specifically, he recalled the mistake made earlier with the net launcher, where his attempt to use a weapon capable of automatically tracking the Roadrunner had resulted in the Roadrunner coming up behind him and, as a result, said weapon promptly being fired towards him.

And frankly, he didn't trust the Roadrunner not to pull the exact same trick with the Smart Disc.

So that was why he was currently halfway up the tallest rock formation he could find, far away from where the Roadrunner could reach and by extension, far away from where the Smart Disc could follow.

It was an intelligent plan. It might almost have worked.

Unfortunately, there was one thing the Predator had overlooked. Specifically, the rock formation he had secured himself to was very tall, yes, but much like the rock that had fallen on top of him earlier, it also had a very narrow base.

Not a feature that seemed like an obvious problem right now, but when the Roadrunner approached the carefully laid out trap, filling the air with its customary 'Meep Meep!' it happened to pass right by said narrow base. Very close in fact.

Which meant that the Smart Disc also passed by said narrow base.

Whiiiiiirrrrrrrr...

And since the Smart Disc was not as intelligent as a living creature, did not have instructions to avoid objects, and frankly, was sharp enough to slice through said objects like butter, it decided to take the shortest possible route it had towards its prey.

Specifically, by cutting straight though the rock formation.

Causing it to topple.

Directly on top of the Predator.

Thump.

Attempt 6

The theory behind Attempt 5 had been sound, the Predator decided, after he'd painstakingly dug his way out of his latest failure. It was simple bad luck and bad planning that he'd chosen a rock formation that could be knocked over so easily.

Hence why, for his most recent attempt, he had chosen a much more uniformly solid rock formation from which to dangle, while attempting to snipe the bird. As a matter of fact, according to his scans, the rock in question seemed to have once been the location of a mining facilty of some sort, as the rockface was littered with a variety of holes, small and large. Which frankly, was a bonus, as some of the smaller holes gave him a foothold to steady his aim.

And more importantly, even if the Roadrunner ran past it like last time, and the Smart Disc chose to follow, it would not do enough meaningful damage to topple the entire thing by itself.

Beyond that, the plan itself was mostly the same. The Smart Disc was still following the Roadrunner, sapping away at its stamina, while a fresh set of birdseed and water had been set up for the bird to enjoy.

From there, it was just a case of staying there, cloaked and dangling from the rock face and waiting for its prey to-

"Meep Meep!"

…stick its head out of one of the small holes on the rockface, right next to his elbow.

The Predator startled. How had it-? Wait, no, that wasn't important right now. Quickly, he drew his wrist blades and swiped at the beaked menace that had suddenly appeared within reach. Naturally, it missed, the bird vanishing back into the hole as quickly as it had appeared.

The Predator snarled, plunging its arm into the narrow hole in the hope that it could snatch the bird before it escaped.

No luck. All it could find was dirt and air.

How had the bird gotten up there in the first place? Had it entered the mine through a different entrance? Crawled its way through the tunnels up to him? That seemed like the most likely explanation, but then where was-?

A horrified thought suddenly struck the Predator.

Where was the Smart Disc?

A low whirring sound suddenly became audible from behind him.

Whiiiiiirrrrrrrr...

He didn't need to look to tell what it was. The Smart Disc, in tireless hunt of its prey, ready to cut cleanly through anything in its path, be it rocks, trees or the Predator itself.

The Predator tried to swing out of the way, only to find that his arm was now stuck in the hole. Because of course it was. Fortunately, at that moment, he recalled that there was a way for him to remotely deactivate the Smart Disc via a function in his gauntlet.

Unfortunately, the gauntlet in question was attached to the arm stuck in the goddamn hole! 

The Predator pulled and heaved and struggled, desperately trying to get free, even as the whirring sound grew louder.

Whiiiiiirrrrrrrr...

There was no choice for it. He was going to have to make the ultimate sacrifice. He activated the wrist blades on his free, non-stuck hand, braced himself and with a defiant screech, sliced cleanly through his trapped limb, severing it at the shoulder. Then, right as the whirring reached its crescendo, he threw himself wildly to the side, missing the deadly spinning blade by inches, as the latter burrowed into the old mine.

The Predator let out a pained, but relieved sigh. He had escaped being cut in half.

Sure, it might have cost him an arm, but he could get that reattached back at the spaceship. What was important was that he was alive and untouched and…

…currently holding the severed end of the grapple line he had been attached to.

Uh oh.

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Thump.