Predator synchronized playing

Nearby Dillon heard a faint disturbance, then silence. He shrugged and moved on, stalking down a narrow alley between two clusters of vines leading to the sheer rock wall. His face was utterly alert, showing no signs of fear, his weapon ready. He sensed a slight movement ahead, an undulating distortion that drifted through the hanging vegetation as if an errant breeze had passed.

The black man stopped, ears and eyes burning. The hints of movement were so slight he couldn’t be certain if his imagination were playing tricks with the steaming jungle.

It was the alien, of course, drawing out the game of stalking just like cat-and-mouse. It had won so many battles now that it seemed to take the time to savor the thrill of the chase, as if testing its own skill and mastery over this elusive creature man. But also like the cat it only appeared to be playing. In its mind, its emotionless brain, it was simply honing its wits and combat tactics, as if it would move from this border war to clash with whole worlds. It synchronized its own movements to match Dillon’s precisely, and its sounds and silences were timed to the pulsebeat with the black man’s. So that when Dillon stopped to listen, the alien froze at exactly the same instant.

Still, the soldier sensed its presence. Dillon crouched and spun around, leveling his rifle at the black-green background. Yet the path he had taken was undisturbed, silent. Nothing in the lie of the trail suggested the presence of a predator. But as he scanned the brace of rubber trees behind him he didn’t realize that for an instant he looked directly into the alien’s eyes. The creature was peering out from the crook of a tree, examining his prey. But the golden eyes were so otherworldly that Dillon didn’t even register them as he searched the jungle. He saw them yet he didn’t. They were like a pair of yellow hummingbirds or a couple of orchids or a nest of fireflies, just more of the same tropical excess. So the black man turned and moved on, and the alien resumed its prowl, continuing to match the man’s movements, footfall by footfall.

Dillon made it to the granite outcrop expecting to find Mac in place. He signaled with a whistle very like Schaefer’s. No response. Then he turned cautiously from left to right. “Mac . . . Mac,” he whispered eagerly, beginning to get a bit anxious about being alone.

As he moved closer to the rock wall he literally stumbled over Mac’s face, which was staring up at him with a ghastly pallor, eyes frozen wide in death. Dillon cringed, then spun around as if expecting the alien to be right behind him. But again he was faced with the blank solid wall of undergrowth and no sign of the attacker. He looked from one side of the path to the other. Then something iridescent among the vines caught his attention, and he stared hard at a fall of tree moss.

For a moment the afternoon sun and forest shadows blended at the perfect angle for Dillon to catch a flash of the alien’s yellow eyes. As quickly as they materialized they disappeared, but at last there was no mistaking them for any other aberrant bit of lushness. Dillon pulled up his rifle, sighted it swiftly and let go a rapid round into the tangle of moss where the eyes had teased him. The vegetation exploded into fragments, but already it was too late.

The alien had leaped aside, and as the dust and leaves were flying in a hundred directions it activated its weapon, seeming to erupt it from its arm, then hurling the spear at Dillon.

   The Predator (1987 novelization), chapter 15