Кристофер Голден: The Predator: The Official Movie Novelization

He didn’t really expect an answer, and he didn’t get one. Instead, as the swamp muck continued to pour down into the crater, the wounded alien’s one good eye flickered to regard Rory. For a moment, it almost seemed to McKenna that the dying Predator was favoring the boy with a look approaching fondness or admiration, or both.

Then it lurched and hurled itself out of the crater, talons bared, lashing out for Rory.

McKenna spun Rory out of its reach, and in the same moment raised his gun and put two bullets through its left eye.

The Predator slumped, sliding back down into the muck, its last breath wheezing out of it as it finally died.

McKenna turned to study Rory, both of them spattered in the creature’s green blood.

“Sorry.”

“That’s okay,” Rory replied. “You can shoot him again if you want.”

McKenna shook his head and grinned. “I’m good.”

Trudging back through the clump of jungle that was sandwiched by the swampland on one side and the quarry on the other, Rory came to a sudden halt. McKenna halted too and looked at his son. All three of them were exhausted, filthy, and pretty banged up, and he wondered whether Rory had finally reached his limit, whether he was about to break down and crumple into tears.

He didn’t, though. Instead, he took something from his pocket and placed it almost reverently on the ground beside him. And then he started to dig a hole in the soft earth with his hands.

McKenna knelt on one side of his son, and Casey knelt on the other.

“Whatcha got there?” he asked softly.

“Stuff from the guys,” Rory replied.

McKenna and Casey exchanged a look. McKenna’s raised eyebrows said it all: He’s been collecting mementoes? All this time? And I didn’t know?

He looked more closely at what Rory had spread out on the ground beside him—a bandana, which he guessed must have belonged to one of the guys, its corners turned up to create a little parcel. He glanced a question at his son— May I?— and Rory nodded. McKenna reached out and carefully peeled back the four corners of material.

Inside was a crumpled cigarette packet, which had belonged to Nebraska, an equally crumpled Tootsie Roll, fortunately still in its wrapper, which Coyle must have given to Rory from the stock he’d acquired back at the Iron Horse Motel, and one of Lynch’s pornographic playing cards.

McKenna swallowed hard. He looked again at Casey, and saw her eyes shimmer with tears. Gently, he wrapped the items up again and said, “Son, these are the forgotten ones. The ones no one’s gonna remember.” He gestured at the three of them. “Just us.”

Rory finished digging his hole. His hands were caked with dirt.

As if handling some ancient and invaluable artifact, McKenna pinched the four corners of the bandana together with his fingers and lifted it. “What say we lay ’em to rest, huh?”

Rory nodded, and McKenna gently lowered the bandana into the hole. Rory was about to start scooping dirt over the little package of treasures when Casey told him to hang on, and unslung her backpack from her shoulders. She opened it, rooted inside, and with trembling fingers withdrew the small foil unicorn that Nettles had left at her bedside back at the motel—it seemed a thousand years ago now. She sighed, and placed the unicorn on top of the bandana, then nodded to Rory to cover everything up.

When he had done so, they all rose wearily, McKenna groaning as he stretched his stiff limbs.

Looking up at the dawn sky, a swirl of pink and purple streaked with yellow, stars still flecking it like diamonds, Casey said, “So… what’s next?”

McKenna and Rory looked up too. After a moment McKenna said, “Hey, you on the left…” He pointed. “I see you. We’re still here. Come and get us, motherfuckers.”

Rory gave him an admonishing look. “Language, Dad.”

They all laughed.

Then Casey hoisted her backpack onto her shoulders once again, and they trudged wearily away.

The Predator toybox is such a fun one to play in, and we’d like to thank everyone at Fox for allowing us to do so – and, in particular, Nicole Spiegel for sending us reams of cool reference material. We’d also like to thank our agent Howard Morhaim, and our editors at Titan, Steve Saffel and Gary Budden, for smoothing the process. And in a more general vein, we’d like to thank our fabulous wives, Connie and Nel, and our equally fabulous children, Nicholas, Daniel, Lily Grace, David, and Polly.

Christopher Goldenis the New York Times bestselling author of Snowblind , Ararat , Of Saints and Shadows , and many other novels. As editor, his anthologies include Seize the Night , Dark Cities , and The New Dead , among others. Golden has also written screenplays, radio plays, an animated web series, short stories, non-fiction, and video games. He is one-third of the popular pop culture podcast Three Guys with Beards.

Mark Morrishas written over twenty-five novels, including the Obsidian Heart trilogy and four books in the popular Doctor Who range. He is also the author of two short story collections and several novellas. His short fiction, articles, and reviews have appeared in a wide variety of anthologies and magazines, and he is editor of Cinema Macabre , a book of horror movie essays for which he won the 2007 British Fantasy Award.

THE PREDATOR: HUNTERS AND HUNTED

by James A. Moore

THE PREDATOR: THE OFFICIAL MOVIE NOVELIZATION

by Christopher Golden and Mark Morris

THE ART AND MAKING OF THE PREDATOR

by Dominic Nolan

THE COMPLETE PREDATOR OMNIBUS

by Nathan Archer and Sandy Schofield

THE COMPLETE ALIENS VS. PREDATOR OMNIBUS

by David Bischoff, S. D. Perry, and Steve Perry

PREDATOR: IF IT BLEEDS

edited by Bryan Thomas Schmidt

THE RAGE WAR

by Tim Lebbon

Predator™: Incursion

Alien: Invasion

Alien vs. Predator™: Armageddon

THE PREDATOR

Print edition ISBN: 9781785658051

E-book edition ISBN: 9781785658068

Published by Titan Books

A division of Titan Publishing Group Ltd

144 Southwark Street, London SE1 0UP

First edition: September 2018

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

TM & © 2018 Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation.

All rights reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.