[@MelonHead]

[i]Silence, once again. Silence, and no sign of the monster. Well, that left just one place it could be. Had it been squashed like a bug? Perhaps it was now stuck to the back of the m-[/i]

[color=ed1c24][b]*CRUNCH!*[/b][/color]

[i]Unless Higan had an answer to what was going on, something heavy would crash down on top of the mech. On top of the precious optical sensory unit. Everything would go black. From within a powerful war machine, a weapon of mass destruction in and of itself, no doubt one is greatly distanced from the outside world. Not just by a physical barrier, but a mental one. No wise warrior considers himself invincible, but over time a certain confidence develops. Down in the deeps, hundreds of feet below ground, a man who once fancied his armor a comfort could soon find it more comparable to a prison. Confidence could be a fragile thing. This was no-man's land, far beyond the barrens, past the meadows, and below the hills. No living thing that had ever ventured here had lived. Without the aid of his primary sense, Higan would no longer be able to ignore that the only thing between him and absolute darkness, between him and the worst fate that could befall a sentient being, was a layer of metal. Something on the other side probably had one of its long, wavy ears pressed against the hull, listening carefully for the smallest noise...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The Magna Pater recognized what the little thing on top of the mech was. It was a tiny window. Things looked out of windows. It knew that it was the god of the sightless. If it could take away the metal things sight, then the metal thing would belong to it. With its right claw, it would have scooped up a large rock from the cave floor as it pushed off to mount the machine's leg. As slick as grease, it'd have darted from one leg to the other as the mech launched itself into the wall, scurrying up the outside of the left leg and just out of sight. Not fast enough to avoid having its favorite appendage severely damaged. The end of its tail was smashed like a pancake by the right leg, and the upper-middle was left torn badly by the other leg. It wouldn't be able to move as fast or as deftly as normal until the next time it ate. If the battle came down to a chase again, without having the means to regenerate there would be virtually no chance of the monster getting away again. It didn't need the full use of its once-proud tail to finish the task it had set for itself, however. It could move along the metal as easily as it could the walls of its lair, perhaps even more so. Its secretions were sticky enough to let it cling to the ceiling by the tip of its tail, yet at will it could become as slippery as an oiled up bar of soap. By secreting first a layer of the adhesive mucous and then sliding along via the wet mucous, it could easily traverse even the smoothest of surfaces with ease.

The Magna Pater would snake up the mech's back as it came off the wall, but not for long. It only needed a moment. The rock weighed more than twenty pounds, a solid chunk of basalt. With this blow the Magna Pater swung with all its literally monstrous strength, mouth agape at nearly ninety degrees, a noiseless scream of inhuman fury. If the attack were not enough to smash apart the optics, the Magna Pater would then try to grasp the likely damaged protrusion with its freshly freed right paw (the rock having been obliterated either way) and wrench it right off with a brutal jerk. It remained wary of the guns and the possibility of another wall smash during this onslaught. It felt that perhaps, the metal thing was also aware of this weakness and might be ready to try and defend it. Not that the creature wouldn't just reposition itself and try again immediately, should a problem arise. After having given blinding its enemy the good old college try, it would be quick to slither back out of the way in case another counter was coming. It would move to the metal thing's right flank, below the arm and still out of sight just in case the optics still worked. It wanted to be sure that its enemy had been deprived of vision before freely sneaking about. It would press its left ear against the hull, trying to hear what was inside. It had begun to suspect that a two-legger was inside. After all, usually when there was a window, there was also something soft looking out from the other side.[/i]