Star Fox

Cerinian Adventures

Chapter 1

Arrival

Fox leaned his head against the headrest inside of his Arwing. Three days. Three days following a phantom signal with nothing to show for it. Well, at least nothing to show for it except being tired, hungry, and definitely a little smellier than usual. Arwings didn't come with showers, he would probably reek when he finally got out of his ship, whenever that might be.

He had been following this phantom signal for the past three days at the request of general Pepper of the Cornerian Defense Force, apparently it matched the signature of one of Andross's old monstrosities, though the general had told him regretfully that the CDF wasn't quite sure which one of the many monstrous science experiments of the late researcher turned dictator it belonged to specifically. Fox still hadn't hesitated, if it belonged to Andross he had every intention of helping his fellow Lylatians destroy it. Andross's creations possessed a bad habit of being both lethal and insidious, prompting the necessity of their destruction. There were still lingering concerns about the implications of the recently discovered evidence that the mad scientist had been experimenting with nanotechnology just before Fox had killed him.

Fox tried not to think about all of this too often, many of his friends worried that he might be becoming borderline obsessive since the death of his father, and there were times when Fox worried about it as well. He could have moved on with his life after finally defeating Andross, could have gotten any job, any position he wanted. The payment from the Cornerian government alone would have been enough to live on for years. But, well, that just wasn't the kind of vulpine he was. He didn't feel quite right about settling down to a quiet and ordinary life, not when there were still so many things left undone, so many wrongs left unrighted. Peppy worried that Fox wouldn't let himself rest until he had solved all the world's problems, which of course meant he would keel over dead from exhaustion long before his time. Fox tried not to worry about that though, for now he had a signal to follow, and it looked like it might actually be leading him somewhere after all.

The image of a star system began to resolve on his sensors. The system had only one planet, though the planet possessed a pair of moons, one of which registered as habitable. Those same sensors indicated that the planet itself possessed a breathable atmosphere and was mostly water, though there were several large islands and tens of thousands of smaller ones. Most of these landmassess were clustered around the tropical zones along the equator, and the scanners were also detecting life signs on both the moon and the planet. "Hmmm. Strange, most of the places where we've been finding Andross's lost toys have been uninhabited." Fox checked again to make certain the signal was indeed emanating from the planetary system. It was.

Ordinarily his Arwing would never have been able to take him there on its own, its sublight engines and maneuvering thrusters would never have been enough to travel to another star system, even traveling between two planets would have potentially taken weeks unassisted by a carrier vessel. Slippy however, working in conjunction with Fara Phoenix at Space Dynamics, had come up with a rather ingenious solution, both of which were currently clamped onto his G-diffusers. The Attachable Warp Flight Engine had been proposed by the Cornerian military in response to the shortage of available capital ships in the wake of the Lylat Wars. Since the Defense Force needed ships that could effectively patrol the space lanes as well as take on scouting missions such as the one Fox currently found himself on the idea had been floated that perhaps a warp drive that could be attached to a starfighter would solve the problem. Now, several years after the original proposal Fox and several hundred other pilots were field testing the first model. The device, in Fox's own humble opinion, was junk. Sure it could get you where you were going but it drew so much power that weapons and shields would take a minimum of thirty seconds to come back online after dropping out of warp, an eternity in a hostile situation. It was, however, Fox's only option at the moment.

With a sigh Fox keyed up the system, maxed out his inertial dampeners, and initiated warp flight. As the Arwing began to accelerate the stars turned into lines, then blurred, and finally resolved into a simple whitish-blue glow. He was thrown back in his seat, straining against the g-forces even with his inertial dampeners at maximum. Then once this ship's velocity stabilized he found he was able to breathe again. Yet another thing Fara and Slippy would have to work out for the next model. True the g-forces wouldn't kill you, but they were still bad enough that it made Fox worry just slightly. No one, after all, wanted to be turned into a sticky paste clinging to the back of their seat, it would just be far too embarrassing when the techs popped the hatch and saw you there, dripping all over your cockpit.

Settling in for the trip that, even at the speed of several multiples of the speed of light, would take at least five hours, Fox decided to get some much needed sleep so that he could continue the search in this new system fully awake.

Fox woke with a start to the beeping noise of his engine monitor informing him they were about to decelerate into normal space. Seconds later Fox felt himself thrown forward in his seat as the Arwing came out of warp and..."What the!" Fox exclaimed as a searing bolt of crimson energy lanced past his cockpit. Was that laser fire?

"Alert, hostile target lock." His tactical console informed him.

"Yeah, thanks." Fox grunted. "Time to do some real flying." Fox could feel the adrenaline rush, the spike in his alertness that he sometimes found himself craving, a spike that could only really be found in combat, knowing that your life was very much in your own hands, something few people ever really managed to experience in their lives.

Flipping his Arwing into an evasive roll he tried to get a reading on how many hostiles there were. His scanners were picking up three ships, not the worst odds he had ever faced by any stretch of the imagination. Another bolt of laser fire flew past him, grazing his starboard wing. The hull plating glowed and several centimeters melted off before Fox could go evasive again. "Dang it, shields still aren't up." He needed to get these guys off of him, at least for the ten or fifteen seconds it would take to get defensive systems back online. Fox decided a different tactic might be in order. Touching a control on his communications panel he said, "Attacking vessels this is Fox McCloud of team Star Fox, I am on official business for the Lylatian government, please break off your attack." His attackers responded with more laser fire.

Another beeping noise coming from his tactical console distracted him. "Damn it." Fox breathed. Three more vessels were inbound, and judging by the vector of their approach they weren't coming to lend a hand. The Awring's shield system came online just as another burst of laser fire connected, the shields on his port side flared from the impact. "That didn't work. Alright boys, time to make you work for it." Fox brought the nose of his ship up, or at least what passed for up in space, before proceeding to face the oncoming ships head on. His targeting reticle landed on the first vessel and Fox squeezed the triggers. BANG!

Fox was thrown against the side of his cockpit as the hull around him reverberated with what felt like a physical impact. Consoles sparked and Fox looked out at his starboard side. His eyes confirmed his worst fear, his starboard wing, damaged in the initial volley, had buckled and torn off under the stress of his maneuvering. He could still fly, Arwings were designed to be flyable even if both wings were lost, but it still wasn't ideal. "Fuck." He breathed. "Six ships, no weapons, one wing gone. Only one option left."

Sending his ship into a sharp dive he made for the planet, hoping against all hope that whoever had decided to attack him would be unwilling to follow him. His descent into the atmosphere of the as-yet unidentified planet did prove to be a deterrent to his attackers, though not enough that they were unwilling to launch the guided missile they sent after him. All of the aileron loops, rolls, spins, and every other trick Fox knew weren't enough to do more than prevent the missile from impacting on his engine core. Instead he lost his last remaining wing, this prompted his desperate though marginally controlled descent towards the planet to turn into the equivalent of a large shiny brick falling towards the nearest island he could aim for. "Great." Fox said through gritted teeth. "Here comes the fun part."

Krystal's eyes opened slowly as she woke from an impromptu mid-morning nap. The soft, cool grass of the ground near the small, secluded stream felt heavenly on her back, especially as her front was warmed by the rays of the Cerinian sun that shone through the break in the foliage over the stream. Nothing like a nap in the sun on a lazy day.

Her ears perked at the sound of splashing coming from the stream. Glancing over she spotted her sister, Fiora, emerging from the water. She still wore her loin cloth, though it seemed that in the time since Krystal had fallen asleep her sister had dispensed with the brass top. "I see you've arisen." Fiora said. "Sleep well?"

Krystal stretched her limbs and let out a moan before turning on her side to better regard her sister. "Wonderfully. I see you managed to get your top off."

Fiora laid herself down on the grass next to her sister. "Just letting them breathe a bit. These tops were not designed for the women of our family."

Krystal laughed and nodded. "This is true. Course it never bothered mother all that much."

"No." Fiora's muzzle curled in a crooked smile. "No she was too busy dancing nude in the fertility rites with father to be bothered with these things." Fiora grasped her top which lay concealed under the fronds of a nearby fern.

"Mmm. No wonder father fell in love with her." Krystal replied. "Where's Decius?"

"Oh he's still under the waterfall."

"Doing what?"

"Meditating. Or at least trying to. What else?" Fiora answered, closing her eyes and taking a long breath through her nose. "I love the smell of the forest."

Krystal's tail swished across the grass as she picked at it with her fingers. "Of course you do. You were always running away and getting lost in it as a child. It must be a second home to you."

Fiora regarded her younger sister for a moment. "Do I sense a reproof?"

Chuckling Krystal said, "If you were using your senses you would know those were fond memories. After all, with you away I could sneak into your room and play with your toys." There was silence for a moment as Fiora digested this, then Krystal added, "I still do you know."

"What? Sneak into my room and play with my toys?" Fiora's own tail began to wag. "Sister, if I had known I would have gotten you one or two of your own. Which ones do you..." Fiora stopped suddenly, ears perking up and her eyes raising to the sky. "Do you feel that?"

Krystal's own gaze traveled up to the cloudless sky with her sister's. She sensed something. Desperate, tightly controlled fear, bordering on panic. Not an animal, her senses would have filtered that out as she had learned to do as a child, so this was definitely a person. "Where is it coming from do you think?"

"Up." Fiora said, standing and clasping her brass top on. "Decius!"

Decius emerged from behind the waterfall a second later, waving. "I sense it too. What do you need?"

"Go back to the town and tell my mother and father we've gone to investigate, they'll have sensed it as well." Fiora looked at her sister only a moment before a loud noise like a clap of thunder shook the trees down to their roots. All three vulpines clamped their hands over their ears.

Krystal looked up and saw what looked like a meteor hurtling down towards the ground. "Xec jxak." She intoned. The hurtling object disappeared behind the trees and a moment later an impact shook the ground. "Did you see that?"

Decius, who had made his way to shore nodded. "Looked like a meteor."

"Meteors don't have minds that would be crying out for help." Krystal responded. "It was a ship."

Fiora, eyes closed, said, "I can still sense whoever it was. He's injured though, fading in and out." She opened her eyes to look at her sister. "Your sixth sense is stronger than mine sister, can you lead us to him?"

Extending her telepathic senses outward Krystal locked onto the mind of the stranger who had just crashed. "Yes. Decius, go back to the town like my sister told you, tell them we'll be bringing back an injured person."

"Alright. Good luck." Decius said before heading off in the direction of the town a mile or so distant.

Fiora extended her arm and said, "After you sister."

Crossing the river Krystal led the way through the thick forest. The area in which they were in was not one of the more traveled areas, thus there were no real paths to speak of. That didn't make much of a difference to Krystal and Fiora however, both had spent their lives exploring the wilds around their village, and they knew them like the back of their hand.

As they walked, keeping a brisk pace, Krystal maintained a tenuous connection with the mind of whoever had been piloting the craft. She could discern very little about him, in fact for all she knew it might have been a female, or perhaps a species with completely different sexes. All she could tell for certain was that the person in question was alive and that they were injured, their consciousness fading in and out.

Batting aside a collection of vines in her path Krystal said, "Shame you didn't bring your sword, we would make better time if we could just cut through all this."

"Oh come on sister, where's your spirit of adventure?" Fiora said. "Our ancestors never had any fancy cutting implements to help them through the jungle."

Krystal huffed and replied, "We aren't our ancestors."

Fiora laughed and patted her sister on the shoulder. "No, I suppose we aren't."

The two girls continued to trek through the dense vegetation of their native jungle. Under ordinary circumstances the riot of green trees and ferns, the multicolored flowers, and the background noise of bird calls and animal cries would have been quite beautiful, especially thanks to the current lack of insects, but these weren't normal circumstances. Right now Krystal wished whoever had crashed would have had the courtesy to aim for a field or clearing, somewhere where help could have reached them more easily. Instead she and her sister would be forced to cut through the jungle and hope that they would be able to return to the town in time to get the help they would need. Inconvenient or not though both Krystal and her sister didn't intend to shirk their responsibility, someone needed help, and they would never have considered not giving it.

Krystal's nose twitched as an acrid scent began to fill her nostrils. "Smell that?"

Fiora nodded. "Smoke. We must be close. Can you still sense whoever it is?"

"Yes. They're weak but steady."

A few moments later Krystal pushed aside a pair of fern growths and looked out at a long stretch of devastated jungle. Trees were sheared down to their stumps, the soft wet soil upturned everywhere, and, at the end of it, the smoking wreck of what looked like it might once have been a rather proud vessel. Krystal and Fiora sprinted for it, making their way around the engine which was belching smoke.

Reaching the cockpit Krystal gazed inside through the clear glass, spotting the pilot. He was a fox, probably a bit older than her, and his fur was orange. Strange, she had never seen orange fur, only ever her own blue, her sister's blood red, and Decius's far more uncommon black and magenta. Orange seemed so...well strange was really the only word for it.

She didn't dwell on that for long however, she needed to get the cockpit open, and she didn't like the way the engine was smoking. "Help me get this open."

The two vixens began straining against the cockpit, trying in vain to force it open. Both of them quickly realized that something meant to be vacuum proof was probably also proof against a pair of vixens trying to open it from the outside. Looking back inside Krystal spotted what looked like an emergency release, which, of course, wouldn't do them any good unless they could get inside. The pilot didn't look like he was in any shape to help though.

"There's a crack here." Fiora said. "Maybe we could break the glass?"

"Best bet." Krystal responded.

Fiora hopped down and grabbed one of the thicker dismembered branches. Hefting it she returned to the cockpit and bashed it against the glass once, twice, three times, and on the fourth time it broke just enough for one of them to reach inside and pull the lever. The cockpit unsealed with a hydraulic hiss, and both girls were then able to lift it the rest of the way. Once they had opened it enough to reach in Krystal grabbed the pilot and dragged him from the cockpit. He was a bit heavier than he looked, no doubt owing to the hard muscle Krystal could feel on him.

Krystal heard something then, a long, pained squeal that seemed to be coming from the engine. Eyes widening she looked at her sister and said, "Run!"

Fiora didn't hesitate, breaking off at full tilt for the cover of the jungle. Krystal slung the pilot's arm over her shoulders and did her best to keep up. Just as she reached the thick foliage of the jungle the heat and force of an explosion shoved her off her feet and face first into the ground. For a moment she wondered if she might be dead, then she heard the ringing in her ears and realized that that probably wasn't a feature of the afterlife.

"Sister!"

She felt Fiora begin to help her up. "I'm all right." She breathed. "Help me with him. We need to get him back to town."

"Right." Fiora grabbed the pilot's other arm and put it over her shoulders. "Time to get some exercise."

Krystal shook her head and grunted. She would be covered in sweat by the time they reached home, but at least this stranger wouldn't be incinerated.

A/N: Putting these on the bottom now. Anyways this is my new multi-chap. After much back and forth between myself and myself I have decided on doing and posting another Star Fox multi-chap in conjunction with my original stories. After all the important thing isn't what you write it's just that you make sure and write.

So basically this story is my own version of Star Fox Adventures taking place on Cerinia, though it won't follow the Adventures plot line too closely. I came up with the idea because I think it is criminal that Krystal didn't play a larger role in Adventures, that and Adventures is a better basis for my preferred style of story. Fox/Krystal romance! Revel in the canoness.

Other than that I just thought I would mention that, yes, Fiora and Decius are back. I've been trying for months now to integrate my OCs into stories of their own and...well I think they all wanted to stay in Lylat despite me, so they're back. And that includes Bonny!

Now that's quite enough from me, though before I go do please leave a review if you can, I love to know what you guys are thinking about my writing!

-general whitefur