Author's note: Well, here we are again! Thanks for checking out An Old Friend's Request. This is the sequel to The Wolf of Sector Y, and I would suggest reading that story to fill you in on the back ground information.

All character associated with the Star Fox franchise are Copyright © Nintendo.

Storyline, original characters, location names, and anything else not found in the Star Fox games comics etc. are copyright © Fira Astrali.

"Panther, watch out!" Sloan screamed over her comm.

"Wha?" Panther jerked hard on the joystick, sending his Wolfen into an awkward corkscrew to avoid being broadsided by a piece of hull that had ripped off the nearby enemy battle ship, which Sloan had assaulted with a nova bomb. The missing piece of hull had left behind a raw gouge in its side, showing off its once magnificent interior and proving that even if these guys didn't have talent, they certainly had money. The air escaping the deck blew all sorts of debris out into space, and Panther could see more than a few of the battleship's crew members being blasted out along with the bits and pieces.

Sloan, momentarily distracted by her comrade's slip, slammed back against her seat as a missile struck the back of her fighter, sending it jerking forward.

"You prick," she growled, watching a black and red ship dart away from behind her like he had over and over again. Posers the lot of them. Not a single one was brave enough to stick around and leave a chance that she might just get them back.

Star Wolf was currently fending of a newly formed mercenary group that were looking for territory and had tried to encroach on Star Wolf territory in Sector Z. Wolf wasn't going to lay back and lose face to a bunch of rookies, and there had been absolutely no action around the station for months, so he had gone out himself to handle the situation and stretch his wings a bit. Only after the rival group had him out in the middle of nowhere did they bring their two battle ships in radar range and deploy their cargo tug full of fighters, hoping to overwhelm the seasoned professionals. Leon had gone back to the station to get reinforcements, but not without much grumbling about not being the rookie "go-for" and saying how it should have been Sloan's job.

"Looks like you've got an admirer, Sloan," Wolf teased.

"I'll give him something to admire," and she shot off after the bogey. Wolf settled back to the bogey he had his eye on, but just as he had him where he wanted, his radar started beeping a warning signal. Two on his six.

"You people need a better strategy," he said on a public comm. channel. "It gets a bit obvious after awhile." No one answered. He shrugged. "Have it you way." He let the Wolfen's new and untested Nuclear Wave engine unwind, blasting along at twice the speed of anyone else in the space zone. His pursuers, not wanting to loose the chance to take down the great Wolf O'Donnell, boosted to keep up. He watched them try in vain to get back on him, speeding up to there limit to do it. He clicked his tongue. No control at a speed like that without the engine he was sitting on.

He focused on the second battle ship, vertical in space in front of him. He was heading straight for the bulging, fly-like head of the ship. His gloved hands grip the controls tightly, one miss-calculation and it would either end with too much time left over and two bandits on his ass, or not enough time left over. Either way it resulted in a messy end for Star Wolf's fearless leader. He waited, eyes glued to the glass canopy that enclosed the bridge, watching for his signal.

There it was, he was close enough to see one of the bridge crew get up from their seat. He suddenly turned sharply upward until he was parallel with the ship. Even with the top of the line dampeners, the g-forces pulled at his body. The battleship next to him blurred at such a high speed. The two enemy fighters, left without time to slow down, tried in vain to follow the turn, and crashed into the hull of the ship, exploding into balls of flame.

"Like 'skeeters on a windshield," Wolf chuckled, his only criticism that he had been able to cause them to shatter the glass of the bridge. He followed the contours of the rust coloured hull, being careful to stay out of the way of their particle beam and shooting off harmless laser rounds here and there. Their response was a hail of plasma fire. They were pissed over letting him get away with that ploy and were overreacting.

Panther hadn't seen Wolf's little trick, he was too busy with a fighter that definitely wasn't a rookie. The two were tangled up in a dizzying acrobatics display, canopy to canopy. Panther was staring into icy grey-blue eyes on a vulpine face. The fur colouring was more lupine though. The look on his face was one of a cold, angry, mechanical mind. He was focused on his task, and his task was to kill Panther. The macabre smile on his face told the Star Wolf pilot he was enjoying it, too.

Panther tried to catch him off guard by suddenly breaking hard and slipping in behind him, but by the time he opened fire, his target had moved out of the way and mirrored his actions. They were staring each other in the face again.

"Listen, I know I'm beautiful but…" he cut himself off. There was suddenly a blue sheen on the cockpit. He'd activated a shield. Panther screwed up his face in confusion. He wasn't yet a threat to him, so why had he…

By the time he figured it out, the missile had already been deployed. With such little space between them there were no evasive manoeuvres possible. It shot out and struck Panther's under belly. The explosion sent them both flying apart, but the enemy's shield absorbed the impact and the bogey righted himself first. He turned back around for the kill. To bad his prey had disappeared.

Panther had tumbled behind the shrapnel cast off from the first and more badly damaged battleship, and was currently lurking amongst the debris that had gathered, licking his wounds. He was silently thanking god that somehow the missile had missed the "sweet spot" that would have detonated his Wolfen's nuclear core. It had however shorted out some of the energy coils and he was now running low on power. Both lasers would not fire at the same time if he wanted to keep his engine running. He cursed himself for his stupidity and hailed Wolf privately.

"Where are those reinforcements?"

"Don't tell me you're done already." He could tell from his voice that Wolf was having a good time.

"I…" Motion to his left caught his attention. "Got to go, light a fire under Leon will you?" and he closed the channel. Wolf checked to see if Leon was in comm. range. It was odd that he had taken so long to get back out in the fight. The battle had to be going on two hours by now.

He was distracted by a bogey limping past him, wing torn off and sparks jumping away from the ship. Wolf recognized it as the one that had been continually sneaking up on Sloan. The young girl's ship came screaming over him at top speed to intercept. The enemy fighter panicked and tried to manoeuvre his injured and sluggish ship out of her way. Sloan filled him full of laser fire and flew triumphantly through the resulting explosion.

"We don't need reinforcements, we've got them on the ropes!" she shouted gleefully. Wolf shook his head. She had a habit of getting a little overworked.

"Funny you should mention that," Leon's voice hissed at them. He had finally arrived. Following him were three battleships, armed to the gills and bearing Wolf's insignia, and what looked like half of the fighting population of Sargasso in single seat fighters.

"Finally you show up, I'm getting tired of this little frolic. What took you so long?" Wolf questioned.

"There was some commotion at the station. Something about a shipment and a message for you?'

"You've got to be kidding me," Wolf growled. "Alright, let's leave this to the fleet, we've wasted too much time here. Sloan, why the hell do you need a private invitation to do what I tell you!?"

"I'm coming, I'm coming, jeez." Wolf glared over at her ship. Over the six months that had past since the Aparoid war came to an end, Sloan had developed a bit more of an attitude as she had become closer to and more trusting of the team. Wolf should have expected it. She was, after all, a 14 year old, and she more than made up for herself with her incredible aptitude for processing knowledge. In those six short months she had learned more than most people could ingest in years. Flight, self defence, the intricate technologies that make the Wolfen tick, she had soaked it all up like a sponge and hungered for more.

She managed to tear herself away from another target and followed him out of the space zone.

"I still think we should stay and fight. Finish what we started, ya' know?"

"You're opinion is duly noted, now keep it to yourself."

The station was a flurry of movement and confusion as the Cargo Crew tried to sort out the unscheduled delivery. It was a few dozen crates, all black steel, all unmarked except for an insignia. Wolf kneeled down next to one of the crates to get a better look at the symbol printed on it. It was gold and chocolate brown. There was a coat of arms with stylized vines curling around a medieval style Z. Wolf was sure he recognized it, but hadn't seen it for years. A young vixen with dyed blue hair ran up to him carrying the data pad that had come with the crate.

"They just-" Wolf grabbed the data pad without letting her finish her sentence. He stood without looking at or talking to anyone. He seemed to be absorbed by the contents of the message on the pad. Sloan had to jog to keep up with his fast strides.

"So who is it from? What's it about?" Sloan asked. She didn't get an answer, he just kept walking to his quarters. Sloan watched him go. Panther couldn't help but laugh quietly.

"Just because you're on his team doesn't mean you can't be ignored,"

XXX XXX XXX

Wolf's quarters were, of course, dim. There was a small light sitting on a coffee table in the living room, and on the rare occasion they were turned on the T.V. and computer screens offered some illumination, but otherwise the only light came from the stars outside the huge bay window behind the couch. He sat down in his study and looked over the message that had come along with the crates. There was no inventory of what the crates were, just a little note:

Don't open the crates. Ship to this address. Can't wait to see you again.

XZ

The address of the warehouse the sender wanted the crates shipped to was added at the bottom of the note.

"XZ," Wolf murmured, searching through his mental stock of every business partner he'd ever had. How many people could have initials like that? Maybe they weren't initials of a person, but some obscure company that he had worked for way back when, and wanted to hire him again, what else could they be?

Then the answer hit him, and it made a smile flash across his face.

"XZ, yes, we have a lot to catch up on, don't we. An odd way to say hello after all these years though." He threw the data pad on the desk and stared at a framed picture on his desk as he contemplated what this meant.

Going back there? After all this time? He looked back at the initials in the note and wondered why it just had to be him that hauled those crates. Those initials came from a time in his life he thought he would never have to face again. His eyes crawled back to the picture, the one he shouldn't have put up in the first place, the blown up version of the one in his pocket. Sweet god, he didn't dare contemplate what would happen in someone were to find it. It fuddled his thoughts even more. Did he want to go back there? That opened a whole new can of worms, a can that he had long ago welded shut and pitched into the nearest fast flowing river in the hopes of preserving that precious picture.

"Funny how shit always seems to find its way back home." Finally, he just shook his head and sighed before pressing a button on his comm.

"Sabre, get the Nicell ready for me."