I do not own Star Fox or any of the characters. The only Star Fox games I've played are Star Fox 64 and Star Fox Adventures. So, keeping that in mind, this takes place just after Adventures, since I don't actually know what happens after it.

Distress

Fox crouched, readying himself as Krystal did the same across from him. She was holding her staff while he held a standard metal bo staff. His martial arts training wasn't lacking in anything. He had been trained in practically every style of martial art that a bipedal, two-armed race could be trained in, and with every kind of weapon that fit the same requirements. However, when Krystal had joined their team a few months ago, it had become painfully obvious in the first sparring match they had that his staff skills were severely lacking compared to her. In a matter of minutes, she had beaten him so bad the bruises showed through his fir. Then, she had all but ordered him to let her train him with a staff.

She had adjusted to life aboard the Great Fox rather quickly. It had been a bit awkward at first, since they had no spare rooms and she had to sleep in the captain's cabin with Fox, Fox finally feeling grateful for the couch he had always complained about, but as soon as they reached Corneria, they had had a room for her built along with the repairs. It had taken a little longer than planned, but it was well worth it.

Fox sprinted forward, Krystal smirking knowingly. He swung the back of his staff around at her head and she met it with the front end of hers. Then, she ducked as his staff's other end swept over her. She moved to sweep his legs out from under him and he drove his staff into the ground, stopping hers then jumping, kicking at her. She flipped backward, avoiding the kick before stepping forward and swiping at his head. He ducked under it and stood, swinging upward at her snout. She knocked the strike aside, spinning and bringing the other end of her staff around at him. He ducked under it, standing and beginning to jab the end of his staff at her, only for her to evade the jabs. Finally, she knocked one aside and he swung the staff around behind himself, swinging it at her and she flipped over it, landing on her feet and sweeping his legs. Then, in the blink of an eye, she was on top of him, the pointed end of her staff to his throat, the hand holding his staff pinned under one of her knees and her other knee trapping his blaster in its holster.

"You've improved," Krystal said in her Cerinian accent. "You're still too slow, though, and you telegraph your movements."

"I don't telegraph anything, you're telepathic," Fox argued.

Krystal merely shrugged and stood, letting him up and smiling. "So what are we doing for today?"

"Well, I was thinking of finally letting Falco try and prove he's a better pilot than me," Fox said. "The simulator's finally working again, plus I'm getting tired of him calling me out. Aside from that, we're just going to keep flying and hope we either pick up on a distress signal or General Pepper decides to send us somewhere."

"He does seem to hire us a lot," Krystal laughed as they stepped into the elevator, heading up to the main floor.

As they stepped out on the bridge, Krystal smirked, seeing Falco waiting with a staff of his own.

"Absolutely not," Fox said. "The simulator's working, so if you want to prove you're better, let's go."

Falco grinned, nodding. "One planetary battle, one zero G battle, and one with no G defusers."

"I know how the challenges go," Fox said as the three of them walked to the simulator room they had also had installed to teach Krystal to fly, a talent she had picked up remarkably fast, allowing Peppy to finally retire as a pilot, instead staying on the ship with ROB.

Krystal sat in one of the chairs off to the side, watching on the monitor as both sat in the two simulator pilot seats, putting on the virtual reality helmets. Krystal enjoyed watching how they acted when they got shot in the simulation. Slippy was funniest due to his tendency to forget it was a simulation and panic, which also explained his lacking skill in actual combat. Falco and Fox, on the other hand, were almost identical. They kept their cool, they always knew exactly what to do, and they knew the controls well enough to fly a couple of obstacle courses blindfolded listening to Peppy telling them what was coming up. that trick was impressive, and had sparked Falco's recent demands of a dog fight to prove the better pilot.

Fox loaded the simulation, a battle in the middle of a random Cornerian city. He began to fly, checking his sensors just as Falco's arwing registered on his radar. He turned, slipping between two buildings just as the building he had turned at was hit by a laser, the laser exploding. He grinned, dropping his altitude and beginning to strafe side to side as he shot along the road, lasers flying at him in seconds. He grinned, gunning it before slamming on the brakes and cutting left between a pair of sky scrapers. Falco followed, the buildings around Fox beginning to explode. Finally, a shot grazed his shields and Fox boosted his engines, yanking upward on his controls and beginning to flip, Falco instantly doing the same. However, as he was pointed toward the ground, again, Fox cut the engines, shoving his controls and shooting the other way, Falco swearing over the comms as he finished his flip. Fox circled around a building, boosting to catch up to Falco, beginning to fire at him. Falco swore again as one of Fox's shots slammed home on his shields, then began to flip. Fox dipped, firing a bomb into the ground and Falco was hit by the concussion, beginning to flip and spin, his ship stalling. Then, at the last second, the engines flared to life and he shot off, beginning to zig-zag through the buildings, Fox hot on his trail and raining lasers all around him.

Falco kept out of the way, shooting toward a bridge and blasting both ends, barely getting underneath it, Fox yanking his controls and squeaking past above the bridge, his arwing scraping the bridge. His alert light began to flash. His shields were fried. they were never designed to hit solid things. They were designed for lasers. The next hit Falco got would punch through his shields no problem.

Just then, Falco shot out from between two buildings on Fox's side, firing a bomb at point blank range. Fox swore, killing his engines and shoving the controls, before boosting, barely slipping under the bomb before yanking the controls, once again killing then boosting his engines, shooting straight up, Falco behind him and closing, firing rapidly. Fox boosted for several seconds before killing the engines and flipping, beginning to barrel roll as he fell, firing at Falco. Falco began to try to evade, only for several shots to slap into his shields before Fox's left wing smashed into Falco's both wings exploding off sending both into a tailspin. Fox boosted his engines, his arwing slowing its spin, allowing him to recover just as Falco began to recover as well, heading for a gap between two buildings. Fox spun toward Falco, firing at him rapidly. Two shots slapped into Falco's shields, which had barely survived the collision, also barely surviving being shot again. However, the shots had knocked him to the side. Falco cursed loudly as he slammed headlong into the building, managing to plow halfway through in the simulation before hitting a support strut and bursting into a fireball. The simulation ended, Falco slamming a hand into the simulation cockpit's wall before glaring at Fox, who was already loading the next simulation, Sector Z.

Sector Z was a location in space where several battles had taken place. As a result, there were eternally massive chunks of steel and floating girders crowding the area. It was Falco's favorite zero G location due to the ease with which the wreckages could be used as cover and obstacles at the same time.

The two arwings appeared in the simulation, headed toward each other with a massive floating mess of steel girders in the center. Fox turned to the right, starting around the girders only for Falco to appear out of them, shooting at him. He began to boost instantly, swearing as he was caught in the open. Several shots slammed into him and his warning lights flashed. Falco had his his fuel storage.

"Son of a bitch!" Fox cursed, diving and boosting into a mess of girders, Falco following him in. The two had separated a little, and Fox used the distance to turn around, the two firing at each other as they came into view. Both managed to escape the shots, beginning to zip around and around the girders, firing any chance they had. Finally, Fox's alert read that he had three minutes of fuel. He let Falco catch up before boosting, Falco doing the same.

"What are you up to?" Falco mused, more to himself than Fox.

Suddenly, Fox cut his engines, yanking his controls and pulling up before gunning it. Falco began to follow, flipping before hitting the brakes, screeching almost to a complete stop before flipping over and shooting back down as a massive chunk of starship crashed into the wreckage he was in. Falco dodged and weaved through the girders as they came alive, shooting around and around, gaps closing as others opened. Finally, he shot out of the bottom just as one of his wings was clipped and taken off. He swore but turned, flying after Fox, who was heading for one of the auto-repair drones the simulator had staged, drones matching the ones ROB was able to send from the Great Fox to help if needed. Just as he neared it, Falco fired, destroying the drone and making Fox swear loudly, his engines dying.

"God dammit Falco!" Fox shouted seconds before Falco's bomb slammed into him from below, destroying him.

Falco grinned as Fox began to type in the last simulation, starting it up. It was a battle that was in low gravity, the perfect balance between their skills, but with their G defusers offline. Both took off instantly, the simulators using magnets to simulate G force. They began to fly toward each other, both opening fire instantly. After a few shots had hit each, they both peeled off, flying around and beginning to fire again. In this one, the only obstacle was G force. And for good reason. Falco got behind Fox, opening fire and Fox flipped, gritting his teeth and hitting the boost as he finished his flip, firing as the pull on his arms made him pull up too much. He corrected, firing at Falco again, but Falco boosted and cut to the left. Fox followed, charging a shot. Then, just as soon as it locked on, Falco flipped, flying straight at Fox and firing. Fox shoved hard, flipping downward under Falco and turning to follow, locking onto Falco again. Then, he launched a homing missile, Falco swearing.

"Cheap move Fox!" Falco shouted, swerving to the side, the missile curving around and back toward him.

Falco shoved the controls, cutting his engines and flipping upside down, the missile shooting over him. Then, Falco made the mistake of hitting the boost before flipping. His arms yanked and his arwing responded, driving itself directly into the ground. It bounced, however, and Falco cranked the controls around, flipping right-side-up again just in time for the homing missile to slam into his cockpit, exploding. He swore loudly, yanking the helmet off as Fox pulled his own off in a calmer manner.

"Happy now?" Fox asked.

"I'm still a better shot!" Falco said, storming out of the room.

Fox laughed, climbing out of his simulator, Krystal walking over while clapping.

"Could you have won without the missile?" Krystal asked.

"Maybe," Fox shrugged. "Guess we'll hopefully never have to find out."

Just then, a red light flashed overhead and they sprinted to the bridge, Falco arriving a half second later and Slippy a moment after that. As soon as they stepped into the room, Peppy turned to them while ROB continued to work the ship's controls.

"What's going on?" Fox asked.

"We found a distress signal," Peppy said.

"Then why the emergency signal?" Fox asked. "That's not really-"

He stopped as Peppy began to play a holographic recording of a pink cat.

"Katt?" Falco blinked.

"If anyone can hear this, I need hep!" Katt said. "I was ambushed by-"

The hologram went to static for a moment before returning.

"-sh landed on...eed evac! Please! Fox! Falco! Anyone! Please!"

The hologram faded and Fox stared at Peppy.

"So where are we going?" Fox asked.

"Here," ROB announced, another hologram appearing with a solar system showing.

Then, one of the planets began to flash before it zoomed in, identifying the planet as X3219: Haven. It described it as a vacation resort planet, and described the climate similar to that of Sauria. The hologram zoomed back out, plotting a course from the Great Fox to the planet.

"Let's go," Fox said. "ROB, get us there now."

The hologram disappeared and everyone felt the Great Fox shudder as it jumped through a warp gate.

"Warp Gate jump successful," ROB announced. "ETA to destination, five hours."

"What?" Falco said. "Can't we go any faster? Katt needs us now!"

"Falco, Katt's going to be fine," Fox said. "Have faith in her abilities."

Falco growled in annoyance before sighing. "Okay. I'm going to go fuel the arwings."

He turned, walking to the elevator and shooting down to the hangar. Slippy left to get his gear ready, and Fox and Krystal did the same.

"What's with Falco?" Krystal asked.

"He's in love with Katt," Fox said. "But he broke her heart once and she left the team. Then, when he had the chance to get her back, he let her go for fear of hurting her again. They haven't spoken since."

"I see," Krystal nodded. "Well, maybe after this he'll finally grow a pair of balls and win her back."

"One can only hope," Fox snorted. "Anytime she comes up in a conversation he either gets mopey or angry. Plus, if she rejoins the team, Slippy can go back to being the mechanic, rather than a pilot."

Krystal grinned, nodding. It was horrible to say, but it was annoying to have to save Slippy seemingly three times per fight. Finally they reached their rooms and branched off to get their gear.

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