**UPDATE: To avoid confusion, I combined the prologue and first chapter into the same chapter. And me and my editors went through and fixed(or attempted to) some errors kindly pointed out by a reader. And I would like to point out that if there is an error, feel free to tell me and I will see about fixing it.**
Author's note:
-Yes, another lame author note! To clarify something not directly said in the text. Sensoo is a planet made up for the purposes of this fanfiction, it is located outside the Lylat System. Many years ago, they set up a research facility on it, similar to the ice planet Fichina, except it being so far out made the government regret its decision. Now the Planet is mostly independent, being almost two weeks distant from the Lylat, self-sustaining itself. The majority of the citizens on this planet are too poor to afford a trip back to the Lylat System.
-There is no explicit sexual content; however, there may be some action that isn't directly sexual, but is technically OK.
However.
-There is cussing, morbid content, sexual language, pairings and slash, so read at your own risk!
Prologue
The Curse of the Telepath
Wolf O'Donnell
Pre-Abduction
He was told that if he took the job, he would be forced to work with some dislikable people he had worked with before, yet he could not recall anyone he disliked to that extent (except maybe Pigma). As he entered the dining hall, he recalled his most recent assignment: hijacking a drug operation in Sargasso. Wolf still wondered how no one had detected him in his disguise, even though he was only in charge of that facility months ago.
Working for Peppy, the new general, just might have been more boring than before his years working under Andross during the Lylat Wars.
"Your new assignment," Peppy told him a few days earlier, "is to take the cruise ship to Zoness, and sniff out the remnants of Oikonny's army. We suspect at least half of the deserters during the first Aparoid attack fled to that planet. Our sources also tell us that some may be aboard the next cruise back."
Apparently searching an entire planet for hundreds of people was easy, not to mention preventing every single one of them from boarding a cruise ship that arrives in only a few days.
I would love to know where he gets his sources, he thought as he spotted two familiar faces.
The fucking lovebirds: Fox McCloud and the girl whose name he still couldn't remember.
The girl had a hand on McCloud's shoulder. They stared at each other, like they had become stone. The way she had her hand on his shoulder annoyed the hell out of him.
No one can ever get a room these days.
Wolf had his way with hiding in plain sight, even in places like this that were almost deserted. He had an odd sensation in his temple, like someone was probing it. He ignored it as he moved closer to the two.
He then realized that the girl didn't have her hand on his shoulder. She had a single finger on him. They weren't staring at each other either. While their heads were turned toward each other, their eyes were off in space, as if they were only physically here, and there minds off in another universe.
Wolf nearly jumped when the girl said, "Yes, we would like another chair please."
Wolf hadn't even noticed a waiter approach them, and somehow the girl did, with him behind her.
"The chair is for you," the girl said after the waiter brought a chair and left.
"Humph," he sat down, in between McCloud and-
She looked at him, something about her gaze stopped him in his thoughts.
"Krystal,"She said, and after a few more moments, "my name."
"Oh," most people didn't baffle him the way she did. It was like she could predict everything-
She looked at him again. "I am a telepath. Attempt to get used to it."
"Is something wrong with him?" Wolf asked after a few moments of silence. "It looks like he's gone to Wonderland."
She smiled. "Oh, he's just in a trance. At the moment he is reliving a moment of his childhood that he hadn't been remembered since he was young. What brings you here? The chances of us being on the same cruise ship are quite slim."
"No particular-" he began to say.
"Hmmmm. You were also hired by Peppy."
"How did you-"
She rolls her eyes as she repeats the word "Telepath".
He was really beginning to hate this woman.
Ten minutes passed, as Wolf stared out the window; Krystal said nothing, continuing to touch McCloud with one finger.
The bitch is inside my head, Wolf thought. She can hear every thought that I have!
If she heard him, she gave no response.
This assignment was going to be more troublesome than he originally thought. He's never worked with anyone who could read him that easily. He wondered how StarFox was able to work with her. On the bright side, however, sniffing out the remnants would (hopefully) be easier.
The silence broke when the waiter came back, telling them that the place would be closing soon, and that they needed to leave.
Krystal took her finger off of McCloud. He blinked several times, like he had just woken up. She handed him a pair of sunglasses, which he eyed as he put them on and stood up, using the table as a crutch.
"For clarification," McCloud said. "He isn't a hallucination?"
"No," she told him. "He's not."
Even with the sunglasses blocking his eyes, Wolf could tell he was looking at him in a strange way. They walked out of the cafeteria, and could now see the mile long deck that took up this side of the ship. This deck was teeming with people, all shoving their way to get to their next destination. Fox was walking in a sluggish manner.
Technically, these were considered cruises, they still had the sunlight pouring in through the glass overhead; and no one needed to worry about falling overboard or pollution resulting from this form of transportation.
"Did we even get our order?" McCloud asked.
Wolf was beginning to wonder about that.
"No, they're still trying to figure out which foods are covered in the pox and which ones aren't."
"What?" Wolf asked.
"They don't know that I know," she said. "After being told our food might not come before closing time, without an explanation, I decided to look into it. I didn't have to move from my seat to hear the conversations from the kitchen where they debated about who touched what. And my God did they talk a lot about that."
Krystal stopped speaking and looked at the glass deck below them.
"I found a few remnants, " she said.
Wolf looked in the same direction she was, but couldn't find them.
"Where?"
"They're not down there," she explained. "I'm making sure they don't know we've become aware of them. I need you to take Fox to the deck below, and stay out of sight. I'll go take care of them."
"Excuse me?" Wolf said, "When did I start taking orders from you?"
"Trust me," Krystal told him. "I'm more prepared to deal with these guys. And I am not capable of dragging Fox around in this loopy state he's in. Besides, you'll get plenty of action in Zoness."
She brought her mouth close to McCloud's ear. "Stay close to the tall wolf guy next to you."
McCloud nodded without looking at her.
They set off in opposite directions, Wolf and Fox going down the escalator. Wolf scanned the deck, looking for a place to hide out. Fox had difficulty keeping up with him.
"Are you okay?" Wolf asked him, certain that Fox was in some sort of drunk and cognitively impaired state.
Fox had to think for a moment.
"Almost," he said slowly, "I have almost no idea what's going on."
"Well," Wolf paused. "We just need to get away from here. That's all you really need to know."
Fox nodded.
Wolf recognized a familiar looking shop he remembered Panther talking about Jasmine Tea, the perfect place to disappear if you wanted some alone time with someone.
Slut, he thought as he pulled out his smartphone.
Panther Caroso
Leon Powalski and Falco Bombardi glared at each other from opposite sides of the table, having previously agreed to follow the principle of "If you don't have something nice to say, don't say anything at all."
"You know what?" Slippy stood up. "I'm going to go."
"No you're not," Panther said.
Slippy sat back down.
There was something about the way Falco and Leon stared at each other. They looked like they could be a couple.
"Shouldn't we get started?" Panther asked.
The rivals sighed.
"Yes," Leon agreed; "well, where do you suggest we start? Or are you forgetting that's how this argument got started?"
"No," Panther told them, "but let's think about it. There's only a few places in Corneria City that we can check."
"Oh please tell," Falco said.
"Shut up," Leon snapped. "I am the only person here with the right to criticize him."
"Oh really? What were you going to say differently?"
After a brief pause, Leon said, "Panther... continue."
Panther badly wanted to laugh. "Well let's think about it for a second. There's the airports with limited security. It'd be a simple matter to check each of them. Which might give us a lead. While at the same time, we can check the ghetto part. It is almost as big as the richer part of town, but it's easier to search through without raising suspicion."
"There's only four of us," Leon pointed out. "and there are multiple airports and ghetto towns. Are you intending on splitting us up into two small groups?"
Panther's phone rang.
"Excuse me?" Leon said, "you are not answering your phone while we are having this discussion."
"For once in my life, I agree with you."
Leon and Falco exchanged unreadable glances.
"What do you want?" Panther said into his phone. And remind me to thank you later. I needed to get away from that.
"I'm on that cruise to Zoness," Wolf said. "Didn't you say there was a place where you could hook up in the back of that tea shop, and why do they even have a tea shop here?"
Panther gasped. In the years he's worked with Wolf, he's always called Panther vulgar names, all implying that he was a slut.
"Since when do you hook up in public places?" Panther asked him.
Leon stopped what he was in the middle of saying to Falco.
Panther put a finger to his lips as he hit the speaker button.
"I'm not being a whore like you," Wolf growled. "I need a place to hide out."
"Sure you do." Panther smiled. "Question is, with who?"
"This is on speakerphone, isn't it?"
"Nope," Falco said, and Leon threw a fork at him.
"Ugh, I'm not going to ask about him. Anyways, I need that password you use to get in."
"There is no password. You just ask about a private room. You still haven't answered my question."
Leon and Falco began focusing on the call again when they heard his voice.
"I think," Fox McCloud said, "I'm going to pass out."
Panther dropped his phone, while Leon and Falco's heads turned to look at the phone. Slippy either didn't hear that, or he didn't get what it meant.
Fox McCloud
"Let go of my arm please." Fox found the words surprisingly hard to form. This is the last time he decides to go into a trance in a public place.
"You just said you were going to pass out."
Fox didn't know what to say to that. What was left of his mind's crippled processes were focused on all the wrong things. Fox felt like he looked familiar. He couldn't be sure until his mind cleared up... and he stopped staring at him.
Wolf shoved his phone back into his pocket and started pulling Fox forward faster.
They entered some sort of coffee shop, and the wolf asked about getting a private room.
The next thing he remembered was being put in a cramped, dark room. The couch he laid on wasn't comfortable, but his mind was too scattered to care.
Fox jumped when he heard, "So... how are you feeling?"
It was Wolf O'Donnell he heard. Fox opened his eyes to see his figure standing on the other side of this cramped space. Which means the person he was staring at uncontrollably earlier was…
"Shit," he face-palmed himself.
"Um... Are you okay?" Wolf might have looked at him then, but it was too dark for Fox to tell for sure.
"I-" Fox started, "just how long exactly was I staring at you on the way here? Also, we are hiding out or something like that, right?"
Wolf made a noise. "I wasn't aware you were staring at me. And yeah, we're hiding out in here until Krystal does whatever she's doing. Now, why exactly were you-"
"Where are we?" Fox asked, able to think more clearly.
"Some sort of place where couples go to when they want to hook up. This is best hideout we got. Now, why were you-"
"Why are you here?"
"MY TURN!" Wolf practically yelled, before he looked back at the door. Without looking away from the door he said, "So why exactly were you staring at me earlier?"
"You know," Fox said. "I'm still not even sure what's going on. Doesn't help that I don't know why you're even here."
Wolf leaned back against the wall, since it looked like the only piece of furniture in here was the dirty old couch Fox laid on. "Apparently we're working together, got hired under the same job by the general."
"I'm not... here on a job." Fox's head began pounding.
"What? Then what are you here for, to hang out with your girlfriend?"
"She's not my girlfriend anymore," Fox snapped. "hasn't been since right after the Apparoid crisis ended. I'm here because I didn't want to deal with Falco or any of the others this Christmas."
Don't ask why.
"So," Wolf said after thinking for a minute, only to have nothing to back it up with.
"You're working for Peppy now?" Fox asked.
"Yeah, I guess so," Wolf said as if it didn't occur to him.
Shit, Fox thought. We need a new topic to talk about.
"Are you okay?"
Fox's breathing sped. "No. My head was still spinning, but it being dark in here helps. My brain has less to process."
Wolf might have nodded. He wasn't sure.
"So," Fox started again. "How have the past few months been for you?"
"Ugh, I have been working for Peppy. Which sucks, but it's the best alternative to becoming a fugitive again, I suppose.'
"I know right," For once it's convenient that the two teams didn't get along. "He keeps trying to get me to work for him. I don't know how to put it to him more bluntly."
Did the expression on Wolf's face change?
"You don't work for him?" He asked.
"No," Fox was surprised he didn't already know. "Our Great Fox was destroyed during the Aparoid Crisis. That thing put me under a several million dollar loan. It'll be a miracle if I can pay it off before the dept passes down to my own children. Plus, StarFox has broken up ages ago."
Processing it took him a few moments, before he could find something to say. "I thought it was your father's loan. Why are you paying it off?"
"Ugh," Fox grunted, turning his head away from him.
He wondered if Wolf was ever going to understand the simple concept of inheritance.
Fox's phone rang as Wolf began to say something.
"Where are you?" Falco asked him over the line.
"Um," Fox looked at his surroundings. "Hiding in a closet. What do you-"
"WHY ARE YOU IN A SEX CLOSET WITH O'DONNELL OF ALL PEOPLE?"
"Since when do you care who I'm screwing?" Fox snapped before changing the point. "wait, you do know that he is a guy, right?"
"What are you two talking about?" Wolf asked.
"I'm not saying you're gay!" Falco told him. "I'm saying he is probably gay."
Fox's mind shut down as a result of what he was hearing. Falco never cared before; and Fox didn't understand why Falco thought he and Wolf were doing the thing- not to mention how he knew he was in a closet with Wolf in the first place.
"Or at least, he's into guys." Falco continued. "I don't know, actually."
"I was about to say-" -how would you know?
"Wait! Leon just told me. He's bi, but he's slightly more attracted to women. Apparently."
Apparently he said it loud enough for Wolf to hear, whom snatched the phone from Fox.
"Ask Leon how he would know this," Wolf said.
"EXCUSE ME," Falco said loudly. "I was talking to someone."
"Yes, and I could hear your entire conversation from across the room. Yeah, how in the fuck would you know anything about my sexuality. And don't say that Leon told you, because he literally knows nothing!"
"YOU LIAR!" Falco yelled.
Was he talking to Leon now, or Wolf?
"Why is he in the same room as Powalski?" Fox asked.
"Good question," Wolf said, "what are you two doing in the same room?"
They didn't get their answer, for the door smashed open and Fox lost consciousness.
"Why can't I be next to you, my dearest friend?
It hurts, it hurts.
Please come save me now.
One day I will see you again.
I will be able to say thanks.
For all the time you've spent with me.
I won't forget you.
Please rescuse me.
But where am I to run now?
I can't touch you now.
This darkness is too deep!
What will I do, but sleep?
One day I will be able to laugh again.
I will remember.
Remember your face.
One I will be able to laugh again.
I won't forget you.
Forget you.
Forget you my friends.
Please rescue me.
Please rescue me.
Please rescue me.
It hurts.
Help me."
- HetaOni Soundtrack, "Yggdrasil" with lyrics written by Charissachu/Sapph.
"I said I loved you as I left you.
Regrets still haunt your saddened head.
But I promised you, I will see you again."
- The Black Veil Brides, "The Mortician's Daughter".
Chapter 1: I Did Not Miss You
Zoness
Post-Abduction
Krystal
Crowds gathered around the empty space marked off with stripes placed on the ground. Krystal, Leon, and Panther were stationed. in different positions, Krystal being the closest to the ship while Leon and Panther held further back.
Almost a year and a half ago, she joined StarWolf, not that it made any difference. She still worked for the same person. That was one of the few perks of working for this team.
"The ship is arriving soon," Krystal told Leon over their headset channel. After yawning, she adds. "I'm glad Wolf decided not to join us this time."
"You said it," Panther agreed. She felt Leon nodding, but he didn't want to say anything out loud. No one needed a telepath to figure that out.
According to Peppy, the person they were hired to escort to Corneria was on this ship from Sensoo. Krystal has been to Sensoo only a few times. It's mainly a desert planet, with wild animals bigger than the dinosaurs on Sauria. It wasn't a good planet to live on, according to people who originated from there.
"Aren't there kids on this flight?" Panther asked.
"Yes," Leon said, "we've only heard the news dozens of times. The real question should be how this relates to the terrorism that has been occurring lately. Has Peppy told you anything, Krystal?"
Panther was about to say something when Krystal cut him short.
"He hasn't told me anything," she told him. "despite me being his favorite. I imagine that there is some technology in Sensoo that we still don't have. According to some of Peppy's sources, they are quite advanced in biological warfare and their medical treatment, despite it being the poorest planet that we know of. And I also read that their arwing research has skyrocketed. They didn't even have arwings on that planet fifty years ago."
For the next several minutes, Krystal and Leon discussed different theories, merely to pass the time, as Panther attempted to keep up with their conversation. At least he was trying.
Some time later, the ship had actually appeared in the sky, far in the distance. It came in dangerously fast compared to most cargo ships Krystal has seen.
"Something's wrong," she decided.
"We noticed, " Leon told her, "when the ships lands, you investigate that cargo ship while we make our way there through the crowd."
"Got it," she minded it much less when orders were given by him, despite him being the more cocky member of the team. When he gave an order, he had a reason.
Less than five minutes later, the ship had already landed on the dock. The airlock leading inside opened without delay, letting a gust of cold air rush out.
The news cameras began flashing as the children came pouring out. That wasn't put of the ordinary.
Except they were covered in blood.
Alongside the kids, three older looking people ran out. As the three worked to shut the airlock from the outside, Krystal noticed who two of them were.
"Panther," Krystal increased her pace towards the ship, "you didn't tell me Spade was going to be on that flight."
"WHAT?" Panther yelled. "What the fuck was she doing on Sensoo?"
She stopped listening as she focused on them.
Spade and a teenage fox covered their eyes to block out the light. Fox didn't seem to notice the mind the sudden change in light, wearing sunglasses.
Krystal ignored the military telling her to back away as she approached Fox.
Something did not add up.
Leon Powalski
The scene standing before him had taken him aback. Military personnel interrogated the children about the events that took place on the ship. He saw Fox leaning back against the side of the ship. Krystal seemed to not be happy to see him, despite the circumstances.
"You could just tell her," a young vulpine next to Fox said. "then again, maybe you shouldn't."
The boy's body was riddled with scars in the same areas where his fur had stopped growing; Fox seemed to appear the same, except his left ear had been replaced with a bionic ear. Something didn't seem right about the sunglasses, the way they seemed to be glued to his face. The red scarf that covered the lower part of his face reminded Leon of James McCloud.
Fox turned his head toward the boy, as if the pubescent child was worth more than his attention.
"Oh yeah," Krystal said. "what are you doing here, Spade?"
The young panther seemed even more cheerful than usual as she answered.
"Peppy hired me to keep an eye on the escorts," she said, looking at the group of kids talking to the soldiers, "and to make sure the documents get delivered to him safely."
"What do you know," the vulpine-boy said, "almost all the escorts have shown up."
"Who's missing?" Panther said as he walked up beside Leon.
One of the things that set the whole group off was the fact general Peppy didn't bother describing who the escorts were. Instead he told them, "They'll know you."
The boy had to think for a moment.
"Lombardi," the boy said. "some sort of blue bird?"
"You're shitting me," Leon mutters.
"What's your name again Miss?" Fox asked, after not being yelled at for an entire thirty seconds.
"Shut the fuck up," Krystal redirected her attention toward him.
Panther and Spade flinched at Krystal's new vocabulary.
Fox didn't seem fazed.
"Kusu, here. I'm done. He said as he handed the boy an envelope before attempting to walk off, only to be sent back by a soldier, with instructions to wait until investigation going underway was finished.
"What happened?" Leon asked.
"More of Oikonney's Rebels," Spade said, "they weren't happy when they discovered that Midori was stealing their documents. Midori being him." She pointed at Fox.
After several months of searching, Peppy decided to send scouts to Sensoo, thinking that maybe they should at least check the planet once. They surprisingly hit a jackpot, discovering what appeared to be Oikonny's former base of operation.
Spade continued. "They had a few dozen of their men on the ship, disguised as workers. Whoever sent them decided they also needed to kill everyone else aboard."
That made little sense to Leon. What threat did the kids on this flight present, or are these documents that valuable that they would take no risk?
"At least half of them died," the boy said before gesturing to himself, "I'm Kusuri Ishi. Son of John Ishi, the head of the biological warfare research department of Sensoo." He points at Fox. "Midori Ishi. Apparently you already know him as Fox, but we're not going to bother explaining why he goes by my family's name."
Krystal's eyebrows raised, the way she does someone crosses her line.
"Why bother saying that?" Krystal asked. "And why are you, a little brat, telling me this instead this ball-less man?
Kusuri looked at Fox. "Should I say anything?" Her insult did not faze him.
Fox shrugged. "I don't really care what you tell them."
"Okay," Kusuri stopped slouching against the wall and stood up, which wasn't much of a difference, since he still several inches below her.
"Ma'am, what would you do if someone you cared about had no idea what was going on, due to some sort of mental state? And your "friend" was only getting more and more confused because he or she had people asking questions he or she could not answer? Would you just sit back and watch? Do you expect me to-"
The air-lock into the ship opened as soldiers walked out, guns aimed at the heads of people they brought out from inside.
Kusuri smiled. "I wonder what they did to incriminate themselves before they even exited the ship. You should see it, Midori. They already have guns pointed at their heads."
"Hmmm?" Fox looked at the boy.
"I see rapist number one," Kusuri said. "Rapist number one, rapist number two. Oh, even John!"
Fox's mouth spread into a wide grin.
Kusuri seemed to be in agreement. "Maybe if we don't move he won't see us."
Leon looked at the group of men with guns pointed to their heads. A vulpine stood out, not because he was a vulpine, but he wore a labcoat stained in blood. His head twitched around as if he was looking for something. Eventually, his head turned their way.
"Kusu," the man called. "Kusuri! Please help me!"
"What shit is he on?"
Of course he would show up to ask that question.
"You don't want to know what he's on," Kusuri told Falco.
"Okay?" Falco remarked before gasping. "Fox?!"
"Ask him anything," Kususi said. "and I will castrate you. Don't think I won't."
"He will," Fox said, "he's a bit screwed up."
"Very," Spade agreed.
"Wait, why are you here?" Falco asked her.
"I'm a teenage girl, and I needed money," she made a two in her hands; "rule number two of dealing with teenage girls, they always need money."
Panther didn't like hearing that. "Just because you-"
"Why are you here?" I asked Falco. "You just love getting in the way, don't you?"
"Now you sound like me," Kusuri laughed at Spade. "minus the teenage girl part."
"Shh," Fox said.
Panther was about to say something when Kusuri put a finger to his lips and looked at Fox.
"I hear him," Fox said. "he followed us here."
"You're playing the pronoun game," Kusuri told him. "who?"
"Masanori," Fox said. "and the fucking pig."
"Where?" Kusuri stood up even straighter. "And why? Since when do they do anything together?"
"Who?" Krystal asked.
"A few people from Sensoo," Fox said, "one is a greedy swine who wants our organs, Masanori-"
"What the hell do they want with your organs?" Falco asked.
But Fox didn't stop speaking. "-is Kusuri's grandfather."
Leon found it odd that Fox said Masanori's name aloud, but not the swine's.
Other than Pigma, who was dead now, there weren't any other notorious pigs that he knew of.
"Why would they be here?" Krystal inquired. "All the way from Sensoo? That's over ten days of travel."
That statement left Leon to wonder how the three survived on the ship for so long.
"Why did we come all the way from Sensoo?" Fox asked. "To hear people like you ask us completely random questions that we obviously don't have the answers to."
"My questions aren't random. I have legitimate reasons to be asking you these things."
"Really?" The entire past five minutes, Fox hadn't even looked at her once. "Mind telling me me these reasons."
"I shouldn't have to!"
"Um," Panther said. "Krystal, I think-"
"Do you know anything?" Krystal snapped. "Were you ever friends with him? Did you spend over a year wondering what the fuck happened to him? "
Unknown to her as she yelled at Panther, a soldier had come up telling Fox that the general sent them a message, and that he and Kusuri were free to go. She didn't notice they were gone until Spade spoke up.
"I'll take care of it," Spade said as she walked off after them.
"Take care of what?" Krystal looked away from Panther.
Falco spoke up. "The fact you were being..."
"That's not the best thing to be saying to her," Leon told him.
Falco pivoted on his right heel to look at him. "Well, I worked with her for over a year. I think I know how to deal with her."
"So have I," Leon countered. "the fact we've worked with her for almost equal amounts of time means I automatically know more."
"Being a what?" Krystal asked. "if you know me so well, Leon, you can certainly say it out loud what Falco meant."
"You're being a bitch," Panther said flatly.
Krystal turned to him, as surprised as the rest of them.
"This is the worst we have ever seen you. When I imagined you seeing him again, I thought you would be happy that he was alive. But no, you were busy interrogating him. I don't know about you, but Fox didn't look happy to see any of us. And if you paid any attention, he wasn't even looking at you or Falco in the eyes. Not once. He didn't even sound surprised when you started interrogating him."
"So you're saying," Falco said. "that he left for a reason?"
While that was possible, Leon couldn't help but find a way to disagree with him.
Leon glared at him. "No, he's simply saying that something was obviously wrong, and she was too busy yelling at him to realize that. And now he's run off with Spade following him because he got tired of her."
The realization hit Krystal hard.
"Fine," She sighed. "I'll go after him.
Corneria
Wolf O'Donnell
I should have joined them when they left for Zoness, Wolf thought as meeting continued. Anything was better than sitting through another meeting about terrorism in Corneria City.
In the past two years, Corneria's economy not only recovered, but grew exponentially higher than it was before the Apparoid attack.
Although, about eight or nine months after the recession ended, a terrorist group, presumably the remnants of Andrew Oikonny's army, began laying attacks on Zoness; immediately afterwards catching a ride to Corneria and confusing the military.
The army's small size has made it difficult for them to track, and they had an uncanny ability to be able to move around anonymously once they reached Corneria.
After they started attacking Star Wolf, and the remaining members of Star Fox's homes at random, everyone was forced to move into government owned quadrants, which general Peppy claimed were the safest places to be. It was easy for Peppy to take authorization of Krystal, Falco, Slippy, Slippy's girlfriend Amanda, and Star Wolf's arwings and force them to stay on Corneria. They were only allowed to leave for mercenary work; most of which involving these Oikonny soldiers.
If Wolf had any resentment towards general Peppy before, it had skyrocketed after his forced move into the quadrants.
Can they just hurry up and win? Wolf thought. Which is worse- their torture, or this fucking meeting?
Zoness
Krystal
She had almost caught up to the three when she heard a man start speaking.
"Since when do you wear sunglasses, Ishi?"
Krystal made it out of the crowd to see some sort of cat, also with numerous scars, in Fox's face. With every word he poked Fox in the chest. Fox stood there, taking the man's taunts.
"Hiding something?" The man yanked his sunglasses off, pulling out fur with it. Krystal could now see that Fox's left eye socket was empty.
Is this why he didn't look at any of us? Wait, he wouldn't be able to walk off on his own if he was blind.
Spade wasn't okay with this man's treatment. "What do you think you're-"
"It's fine," Fox told her. "I got this."
"The man is literally touching you!"
He smiled in her direction. "I'll touch him back, don't worry."
Krystal struggled not to use her telepathy on the man.
"You wanna go?" The man yelled, throwing a punch before Fox could react.
The man's fist smashed into his nose, knocking Fox back. Now that Fox's head had turned, she could see that his right eye was still there, but something didn't seem right.
The next swing didn't hit, and Fox managed to land a punch on his jaw. Fox still didn't look at him.
Was Fox suddenly a telepath? It didn't make much sense, but the only logical explanation she could find.
Is this why he was so weak all the time back then, she wondered. His mind was altering its structure to accommodate this?
If so, then this may all be her fault.
As the man aimed another strike at him, smacking Fox in the chin, she noticed something else.
Fox swung with his left arm.
During their time on Sauria, and every mission afterwards, Fox had been using his right hand; and when Krystal looked at him more closely, she saw that his entire right arm looked skinnier than she remembered, like dead weight hanging off his shoulder.
Fox somehow ended up on the ground, the man now able to land punch after punch on him.
The man had left three blows on Fox's right eye as Krystal decided that was enough.
"I got this Spade!" Fox said as Krystal approached him, mistaking her for Spade.
So he definitely is not a telepath.
The man had his knee on Fox's chest, pinning him as he punched right on top of his right ear.
Krystal was in the middle of saying that she wasn't Spade when the man brought out a rushed over as the blade had already swung down.
Too late.
In a flash, roles had reversed. Fox now had the man on his stomach, using his good arm and legs skillfully to pin him down. The knife rested in between Fox's teeth.
Fox let the weapon fall to the ground.
"Word of advice," Fox brought his mouth close to his ear, "don't fist fight with someone who has three robotic limbs. Unless of course, you're trying to get a concussion or some sort of internal injury. I went easy on you this once. But next I won't hesitate to hit you with full force in your nose and I can guarantee you will not walk away from that."
Fox stood up and began to walk away, but the man reached for his knife again.
The blade flew out of his hand as Spade grabbed his wrist and spun him around onto the ground. She pulled his arm back far enough for it to be near breaking.
"He may go easy on you," she spat, "but you don't want to cross me. I am Spade Caroso."
She stood up, eyes deadlocked with the man, and rejoined Fox.
He didn't get back up until she was several feet from him.
Spade put a hand on Fox's shoulder and smiled. "You have to look at them in the eye."
To Krystal's surprise, Fox laughed at that offensive comment.
"But seriously," Spade said. "you might want to replace that one soon."
"What happened to your eye?" Krystal asked before regretting it, "uh never mind about that. I just wanted to apologize for earlier."
"For what?" Fox asked, "oh yeah! Wait, no... I don't know what you're talking about."
"Shouldn't we be going?" Spade interjected, "it's going to take us a while to reach Corneria. You'll have plenty of time to talk then. Three whole days actually."
Krystal wasn't sure whether she liked it or not.