Noxx heard the ratcheting coming from the dark void of the casino floor, could even have fired in the general direction of the sounds if desired, but why? Let the human turn on a light if he wanted, reveal your position to the Zetan ape, be my guest. The sudden blinding light did not catch Noxx off guard, it wasn’t as if that hadn’t been the response expected from the start, and though hardly the best shot in the known universe it was simple enough to understand that at this distance there wasn’t a chance of missing, especially since the Zetan had no need to actually hit first. “Blam!!” The blast was deafening at this range, obfuscating any sounds of the human rolling about and, if the flashlight hadn’t been left on, the rat could simply have returned to scurrying about looking for somewhere to hide while the Zetan casually sauntered about after it. The flashlight itself could be a ruse, but there wasn’t time to have stashed it atop a slot machine and gotten anywhere far enough to matter, couldn’t cover enough distance in the moment after getting to the machine and theoretically dropping the light atop it to escape the Zetan blaster at such close quarters. 

If the human could see Noxx clearly in the second or two spent barrel rolling about on the floor like the monkey he is, he would notice an inexplicable silvery sheen pervading about the Zetan’s figure, like some effect added to a picture by some digital editing software but in real time, and would almost certainly notice that the figure was tall, ridiculously so, probably six seven with the four inch heels taken into consideration, wearing a skin tight alabaster latex cat suit for no apparent reason that, had it not been bathed in the same visceral glow from the lantern, and then the pervading darkness from lack thereof, as everything else in the room would have given the Zetan away in an instant from the beginning. If his eyes were particularly perceptive he might note bits of electronic scrap floating about seemingly suspended in mid-air, gunk from what remained of the hollowed out slot machine Noxx had been using as cover, as well as a single forty four round. The scrap and the bullet hadn’t been stopped by anything, or at least nothing visible, and it all seemed as if by magic to simply not be following the laws of gravity at the moment. 

I have you now, silly little monkey. Hell, the flashlight is even still on, what a ballsy one this human must be. If his shot had missed anyone with a gun and half a brain could --, clunk. Some spherical piece of, well, something wacked Noxx upside the head as the Zetan was training a blaster on the foolish human’s position, something that seemed altogether familiar, like something from one of those moving picture flicks Earthlings love so much --, “Fuck,”. This thing was going to explode in a second, wasn’t it? Who the fuck just happens to walk around carrying grenades!? Would the inertia suppression kick in again this quickly? Not reliably. But the ape was right there, could end its life here, this second. Even if the flashlight was a ruse there hadn’t been enough time for the human to move far enough not to get clipped by a blaster if Noxx fired now, and getting clipped by a blaster is like getting clipped by a forty four, it’ll still knock you on your ass. “Dammit,” the Zetan dove for the overturned slot machine, certainly not out of the kill radius of the explosive but perhaps more likely to survive if there was enough time to scramble behind the row of slow machines and get down, could kill the human in a second, no reason to risk getting blown to bits.