Entombed in fear, I watch

As it all crashes and dies

There is no hope

Only darkness

Wolf knew he was making a huge mistake as soon as he crossed the threshold of the Great Fox, but what choice did he have? It was either go with the people who hated him and wished for his eternal damnation, or stay on Corneria City and die out there fighting: or worse.

Fox gave him a choice in a desperate moment, and Wolf chose to go with his only chance of salvation. He had clambered up the landing ramp numbly as crowds of other citizens did the same, albeit a little more panicked than he, while that bird- Falco, he remembered- stood guard and Fox ushered everyone in, his eyes darting around the place, worry darkening his features.

Wolf wasn't sure what to think at that moment; he'd been separated from his team and nearly died in the last hour alone, and for the first time in recent memory, he was truly terrified.

When he entered the spacious hangar, he turned around to stare at the burning Cornerian skyline, high rises collapsing into ash and rubble as they fell and the world crumbled and civilization died. Wolf dropped his gun and looked on hopelessly at the red horizon, realizing they were doomed to fail.

He couldn't recall much after that mind-rending thought, but he vaguely remembered the vixen, Krystal, gently leading him past a very full hangar of Cornerian citizens to the infirmary, where she gave him a shock blanket and pat on the shoulder, whispering soothing words he didn't register. He had curled up on one of the beds in the infirmary, and watched injured people filter in and out while the toad took care of all of them as he shivered alone and unnoticed in that fuzzy blanket.

Wolf wasn't sure how long he laid there, but it was long enough for him to feel the Great Fox take off and see the toad almost pass out from exhaustion. He might have laughed if he even had the energy to do so. He could hear muffled sobbing from one corner of the room, and he truly felt remorse for whoever that was. It wasn't every day that the center of civilization in the Lylat System was destroyed, after all. He would've laughed at the thought, but he didn't have the energy.

Eventually, he got up from his bed when he realized someone else would need it more than him, and he clutched his blanket as he exited the infirmary, the toad barely giving him a glance as he left. They must be just as scared as Wolf if they weren't even going to try to hate him.

Wolf wasn't surprised to see the halls filled with refugees clinging to each other as if even the lightest gust of wind could possibly tear them apart. Nobody cared about the big bad wolf trudging through the ship with a too-small blanket covering his large frame.

He hoped his team was okay, and that they'd somehow survived whatever happened. They tried to stay together when it all went to hell, but it was a lost cause, and Wolf lost them both. He wasn't even sure what had happened himself, but he remembered thousands of stampeding Cornerians and military fighters headed into the central part of the city. There were flashes of… things that he couldn't quite remember, so he reasoned he must've hit his head while everyone fled.

Wolf somehow stumbled upon a lift, and upon careful consideration, pressed the button which would take him to the top floor. Just before it had closed, a dog in a military uniform and a pink feline crowded in with him, and they both looked as scared and tired as he did.

"Friends of Fox?" Wolf questioned, looking down at both of them on either side of him. They nodded solemnly, meeting his gaze.

"You're Wolf O'Donnell," the pink one remarked as she looked down at her nails, voice shaky. "Not that it matters, though. We've all got the same problem to face."

Wolf was glad to see nobody felt like treating him as the monster he was, at least for the moment. "Do you two know what's going on right now?" He asked, this time looking at the dog for answers. The grey hound shook his head.

"Dude, nobody told me anything, except to head to the center of the city to take care of 'the situation.' I saw all of the people trying to get away, and not one soldier was helping them get away, so I went AWOL to help. I'm sorry I can't give more info, man," the dog stated with a shrug, taking his battered green helmet off.

"Who are you two?" Wolf continued with a raised eyebrow, too exhausted to ask more about their accounts of the incident.

"Katt Monroe," the cat stated, reaching her hand out for Wolf to shake, which he took, surprised to see how strong of a grip she had for having such small hands.

"Bill Grey, Cornerian Army officer, dude," the dog murmured with a single nod, catching Wolf off guard with how calm he was. He knew he wasn't off his rocker because the shock from earlier was still set in his system, but this Bill person seemed completely fine, strangely enough.

The lift arrived at the top floor and deposited the trio into a bridge filled with a group of tired souls huddled around a table in the center of the area with a holographic projection of Corneria shown in the middle of it. They'd apparently already broken through the atmosphere and left the planet, as evidenced by the sea of dim stars outside the windows wrapping around the room. Wolf saw Krystal, Falco, Peppy, and Fox all swivel their heads to look at them with mixtures of shock, joy, and relief on their faces. Wolf realized it was probably all directed at the two who had arrived with him.

Wolf admitted he breathed a sigh of relief to see Fox's team safe and sound, but he knew they didn't feel the same. He moved out of the way as the others embraced tightly, laughing or crying. Well… everybody except Krystal. He gravitated towards her where she stood by the table, and she smiled softly at seeing him.

"Nice to see them reunite," Wolf murmured, to which she nodded in agreement. He sighed as he held his blanket around himself.

"Of course, but I'm sure Fox appreciates that you are also here," Krystal replied with a friendly smile, to which the lupine snorted in disbelief.

"I know you all hate me, and you're only being so nice because the end of the world just started, so you can drop the pleasantries," he shot back a little too fiercely, his ears drooping in hurt and loneliness. He was an outcast among outcasts.

Krystal opened her mouth to disagree, but she shut it when the others finally walked back over to the table and huddled around it, staring up at that hologram with expressions of confusion, fear, and calculation running across their faces.

"Wolf," Fox greeted, surprising the lupine that he actually acknowledged his presence. Wolf nodded at him in return, probably looking a little hysterical with the blanket draped over him.

"What's going on?" He asked, hoping someone would have the answers he was looking for. Unfortunately, Fox merely shrugged, his eyes darkening significantly.

"I… I'm not sure, none of us are. First it was a simple Cornerian day, and then citizens started running away and buildings caught fire, and. Military went to check on the situation, and I haven't heard a single word from Pepper all week," he explained, running a hand through the fur on the top of his head. The hologram of the city flickered uselessly in the air, nobody knowing what to do with it.

It wasn't much more than Wolf knew, which was annoying. He guaranteed if he hadn't hit his head, he would know more than all of them combined. He groaned, feeling it start to erupt in pain. The day really had been awful, hadn't it?

Bill cleared his throat to speak, and Fox gestured towards him. "Higher ups wouldn't tell me anything except that we weren't supposed to evacuate anyone, so I jumped ship. I don't know anything else, dudes," he reported sadly, hanging his head.

Katt looked over at him with a frown, setting a hand on his arm. "We came here together after trying to figure out what was starting the panic. There wasn't a lot to go off of, but I could hear some nasty explosions coming from downtown. Maybe that old hound is trying to hide something?" She suggested, crossing her arms as she looked at Fox.

He placed a hand on his forehead, and Peppy rubbed his shoulder comfortingly. "We don't have nearly enough pieces of this puzzle to start pointing fingers," the hare remarked. "We just have to put some faith in each other and start solving this."

Wolf snorted, ears lowering. "Then I shouldn't even be here if you're so concerned about that," he spat out, hurt and anger stinging his chest. Even faced with a common threat, he knew these people would throw him to the flame without a second glance.

Krystal shook her head roughly just as Fox- of all people, him- made a noise of protest. "Nobody here wants you to leave, not with you so… so…" he trailed off, weak excuse for a persuasion faltering even more.

Wolf raised an eyebrow, his natural defense of self hatred kicking in. He dug his hands into his blanket and growled. "The word you're looking for is weak, isn't it? You don't trust me, you can just say it," he shot back, eye narrowed. He had forgotten that his eyepatch had fallen off sometime when he was running away on the ground, revealing the scarred flesh for all the world to gawk at.

Fox merely sighed, his ears pinning to the back of his head. "Do what you want, Wolf. There's no point in arguing about this anymore," he murmured, dropping the subject for once instead of trying to retaliate further.

Falco shot Wolf a glare after his outburst, and he scowled, too tired to provoke the bird into a fight, which would've been all too easy given their exhaustion and temper. Instead, he glanced at Krystal, who looked genuinely concerned for him. He knew she was probably looking into his head, and very pointedly thought about how rude it would be for someone to try that, and she looked away right after, refocusing on Fox. So even she thought he wasn't trustworthy. Wolf groaned, his head pounding like a drum.

"Wolf, are you feeling alright? You look worse than the rest of us," Fox remarked worriedly, starting to edge towards him. He growled, backing off from the other canine as his headache grew worse.

"Leave me alone! You're just trying to get rid of me!" He shouted hysterically, trying to get the others away from him. His hearing was starting to fade and his vision becoming hazy as the others surrounded him.

"Go get Slippy, Wolf's in trouble!" He vaguely heard Krystal shout to someone. He tried to swipe at whoever was grabbing his arm, but he was just too tired to keep trying. He gradually fell into unconsciousness, a sinking feeling creeping into his stomach.

All he could see was fire. It was burning away everything in sight including the buildings, ground, and even the sky itself. He was terrified, and he desperately wished for someone to help him out of his nightmare.

Shadowy figures were creeping towards him through the never-ending flames, making strange choked sounds as they danced around him, reaching their arms out as if to grab him and take him away.

Wolf screamed for help, for anyone to heed his call and drag him away to safety where he could curl up and pretend nothing existed anymore. Those beings edged closer to him, and he could start to make out their eyes, shaped oddly like the eyes of a person, except they were bloodshot and the sclera was a sickly yellow color.

Wolf reached inside his leather duster for a gun, but he found nothing inside but a few playing cards and some spare change. He knew then that he was helpless and completely at the mercy of these things trying to kill him.

He actually sobbed in anguish, reaching a hand into the burning orange and white sky before the creatures pounced on him. There still was no answer to his cry, and Wolf closed his eye in defeat, accepting his inevitable fate.

Before his limbs were torn off, it all went silent, and Wolf reopened his eye, finding himself face to face with Fox, who wore a small grin on his face.

But before he could say anything, it all went black again.

Wolf shot up with a shout, his surroundings quickly coming back into focus as his adrenaline kicked in. He found that he was back in the infirmary, IV tubes stuck up his left wrist and some weird patches on his head. He noticed that the entire Star Fox team was standing around his bed, fearful and concerned looks on their faces. Wolf reached for the shock blanket, and Fox wordlessly handed it to him.

"You're- you're awake," he mumbled numbly, making Wolf raise his brow. His head felt a lot clearer than it had before he'd passed out and had that strange dream.

"What the hell happened to me?" Wolf asked nobody in particular, looking at everyone's too-close faces.

The toad seemingly appeared out of nowhere from behind the others, some kind of tablet in his hand. "When you fell unconscious, we brought you here and I scanned your brainwaves and took blood to figure out what was going on. It seemed that a heavy amount of PCP had entered your bloodstream and caused your paranoia and aggression. You just about died from overdose, but I was able to save you" he explained, Wolf barely keeping up as he spoke.

His eyes widened, and he pulled the pads stuck to his head off as well as his IV, clutching his stupid little blanket closer to his chest. "Then how did you get it out? Why didn't I die from it, like a drug overdose?" He asked fearfully.

"I flushed the majority of it from your system and let the rest run its course. You're completely free of the PCP, but the question is how so much got in your bloodstream. Is there anything you… took before boarding the ship with us?" The toad questioned hesitantly, turning his tablet off to get Wolf's full attention.

Wolf sighed, resting a hand on his forehead. "I'd know if I took drugs, but there's a point from earlier in the day that I can't remember. I think I hit my head pretty hard then," he murmured, head throbbing as he tried to think of what happened earlier in the day.

He remembered hearing the explosions, and he saw the people running away… and then he was knocked down. Wolf had a blank spot in his memory after that, with hazy figures clouding his mind, and then the next thing he knew he had been running towards the Great Fox.

"Can you tell us what you do remember about earlier?" Krystal asked, snapping him out of his thoughts when she rested a hand on his shoulder.

Wolf then proceeded to relay all he could to the group around him, his ears drooping as he did so. That odd little hiccup in his memory was annoying him to no end, because he knew something important had happened there, most likely the reason he'd had so much PCP in his system.

After he had finished, Bill hummed to himself. "I'll bet that whatever caused that chaos in the city was also what put those drugs in your body, dude. Not sure about the memory loss, but this all just feels too strange to be a coincidence," he stated wisely while scratching his chin.

"If only we had more clues about this whole situation!" Fox exclaimed, whining in frustration as he kicked at the ground.

Wolf looked down at his feet, hugging his knees to his chest. Nothing felt right anymore, and he wasn't sure what to do about it. "I'm sorry about earlier," he whispered, scratching at the scarred flesh on his eye, guilt racking through his body.

Krystal sighed, sitting next to him on the bed. "Wolf, you can't blame yourself for actions that weren't under your control. Just let it go; you didn't hurt anyone during that outburst, and now you're healthy again," she said comfortingly, laying a hand on his shoulder.

"We have a job to do now," Fox stated, nearly interrupting Krystal in the process.

"And what would that be?" Wolf pondered, his shoulders relaxing a bit from the vixen's comforting words. He got up from the bed, finally glad to be looking back down at everyone instead of the other way around. He stretched his limbs as he looked over everyone for his answer.

Peppy cleared his throat to speak. "First, we're going to drop all of these people off on Katina, at the capital city. I've made arrangements with the Katina Defense Force, and their military will take care of the citizens. Then we're going back to Corneria to figure this out," he explained quickly. Wolf imagined they all had jobs to take care of before then, so he simply nodded.

"Now if you don't need me anymore, I'm going to go and take a walk," Wolf replied as he walked towards the infirmary exit.

Nobody tried to keep him from leaving, so he continued, the door silently sliding open for him as he came out into a blank metal hallway filled with some Cornerians huddled together. A few stared at him incredulously, but Wolf doubted he looked very intimidating while he dragged a dumb blanket around.

Wolf chose a direction and stomped off in it, guilt and uncertainty plaguing his mind like a tumor all the while. He had just been dragged into a conflict he knew next to nothing about, standing with who he thought were the people who hated him most, and they just willingly saved his life. He wasn't sure what to think anymore, but he certainly knew his old life, his start of redemption and his descent into anonymity was just ripped away from him and torn into shreds, and he wanted it back.

Wolf was vaguely aware of someone following him down the corridors, but he paid them no mind, stopping in front of an elevator and pressing a button.

Krystal was the one to stand next to him as they waited for the elevator doors to open, wringing her hands as she glanced between Wolf, the door, and the metal ground. He snorted, picking his nails as he waited; as far as he was concerned, he didn't need to talk to anyone in the ship.

Apparently, she had other ideas. "You know, we aren't out to kill you. That's just senseless violence," she remarked as the doors opened. They both walked into the lift, and Wolf hit the button for the hangar, which was on the lowest deck.

"That's just because we share a common enemy," he murmured under his breath.

Krystal chose not to respond, the two staying silent for the rest of the ride. Wolf was grateful that she wasn't being hostile to him, and was trying to encourage him nobody else was a threat, but he knew they weren't treating him like a monster because they had to work together. The second this all ended, Fox would go right back to hating his guts.

The doors opened, and Wolf walked out into the hangar. It was a spacious place, if not a little more empty than anything else. The space consisted of four docks for the Arwings elevated above a flat metal floor with workspaces and ship parts scattered about the place. Catwalks led up to the Arwings which were pointed to the hangar door that was closed at the moment.

Wolf was surprised at the messiness of the place, having considered Star Fox to be organized and millitaristic. It reminded him of Sargasso in a sense, he mused. He walked over to a discarded ship wing near the hangar door, and sat on it with a sigh. The wing didn't look like it fit on an Arwing, he noted offhandedly as he watched Krystal walk to her own Arwing and climb into it.

Wolf was seriously considering just ditching the team when they landed on Katina. He certainly wasn't an asset, and staying would most likely start a conflict, but at the same time… he needed answers. Wolf needed to know what that bioweapon was and if it did anything terrible to him, and he needed to know where his team was.

He still had his reservations, however. Wolf wasn't so sure it would be a good idea to rush straight to Corneria recklessly without more information, and he certainly didn't want to meet whatever injected that PCP into his bloodstream. He huffed softly to himself, deciding to think more on it later.

Taking a closer look at the wing he was seated on in a fit of boredom, he noticed it looked oddly similar to the wing of a Wolfen. Wolf saw the scorch marks and scratches scattered about the wing, and he hummed, wondering if it was from one of his old fighters. He resolved to ask the question later, and got back up, leaving the blanket as he did so.

Wolf needed to have a talk with Fox.