Hello all! I know I had promised this story in what now feels like eons ago but... Well I honestly didn't know how to proceed. But fear not I am back and this trilogy will go out with one hell of a bang.
First thing is, most chapters will probably be longer than this one; however I wanted to get the story published so excuse all of the un-awnsered questions this first chapter will leave you with. Second of all special thanks to Kusa for his use of an OC. And finally everyone just review, lemme know if I have the same crowd from the other two books back, or if I have some new faces. Thanks and I promise to be as prompt as I can with updates my Duckies. Enjoy.
CHAPTER 1
"Target locked." Came a smooth voice throughout the Red Fangs cockpit.
"Alright I'm goin' in." Said the large grey lupine within un-strapping his safety buckle.
"Is that wise? The others aren't in position-"
But Wolf didn't wait for Panther to finish speaking before his canopy opened with a 'SHHHH'; and then with practiced timing and a certain amount of grace one would not expect from someone so tall Wolf's body sailed through the air in a slow back flip. And his frame then sliced down through the air as he bent his knees into his chest and came crashing through the skylight of a skyscraper. He landed on an expensive looking red carpet with a plop, and kept his gaze downward as glass fell all around him like tinkling wind chimes.
"Wow…" His deep voice began as he slowly looked up at the security guards surrounding him in panic. "Security here stinks…"
Then with a long, smug grin he squeezed his fists until he heard a click from the large black gloves covering his claws all the way up to his forearm; they pulsed to life with energy. A painted Labrador standing before him came at him with a nightstick and a battle cry. Wolf instantly rose up to his feet and sent a punch right into his chest; with a loud cry of pain the Lab flew back onto the floor and contorted like he was having a seizure. He had just taken a large amount of electricity from Wolf's glove.
"Next." Wolf said without missing a beat and turned to meet the other three guards behind him; with a roadhouse kick from his right leg he sent the Golden Retriever down with a bloody mouth.
And then he proceeded to send his open right hand into the face of a Golden Eagle who had nearly brought down his nightstick on Wolf's head. Wolf gripped his face in his large hand as the avians body seized with the electric current until smoke arose from the ruffled feathers of his face. He released the eagle at the same moment he gripped the wrist of the last guard with his left hand; just before he could land a strike on Wolf. All Wolf had to do was grip the Chocolate Lab and watch his body contort with pain.
"Boy they really should have given you guys guns." The tall lupine chuckled as he tossed the canine aside.
Looking down at the smoking bodies piled around the red rug before him he squeezed his fists tightly once more, until the same click could be heard and his gloves once again became mere fabric. And then he turned himself around and headed to the huge white desk all the way at the end of the room; he clicked a finger onto the empty surface, and with a pleasant little tone the top of the desk lit up like a computer screen. After a feminine computers voice said 'Welcome' he moved his hands all around looking through the files saved on the desk.
Wolf's ear flicked as he heard something pat on the carpet behind him; he quickly turned as he heard laser fire. With a smirk cracking its way across his face he saw the Golden Retriever he had kicked fall over before him. Then his gaze moved to the large double doorway where there stood a curvaceous hooded figure.
In a black cat suit that hugged everything in just the right way, accompanied by a red flowing scarf with a hood attached in the center, half of a familiar face was visible from under the shadow it was cascading down over her head. The white tail of the individual swished as she holstered her gun in a brown leather combat belt hugging her hips; and then the black steel toed boots stepped forward as the brown laces swished in a pattern similar to her tail.
"You're late; as usual…" Wolf gruffed to his wife as she pulled her hood back over her short black locks; revealing her twitchy white ears.
"Good to see you too dear." Billie said with a wink.
She glided across the massive room taking in the sight of the guards lying about, either smoking or with foam at their mouths. The room itself was quite a lovely sight however; on Billie's side was a luxurious looking pair of double doors, the crimson carpeted floor led all the way to Wolf's end where the lonely white desk was pressed up against the wall, with a swirling wooden carving that matched the doors above it. On either side of the room the walls were little more than windows up to the ceiling, letting the light stream in accompanied by the light from the now broken skylight. But now was not the time to stop and smell the roses; Star Wolf was on the clock.
"I see you are enjoying your new toy." She said lightly taking up space directly in front of him.
"I can't ever seem to resist making use of your tech." He shot back to her with a flex of his fingers. "Where's Leon?"
"Still in a dogfight with the cops we distracted so you and Panther could press forward…" She rolled her eyes.
"Thought Panther was keeping them distracted around the tower…" Wolf said turning back to the desk and letting his fingers quickly glide over the surface as his eyes followed.
"Oh, you know him; he can't leave a dogfight until everything is dead… Even when I said to break."
"He's getting worse lately…" Wolf muttered.
Billie opened her mouth to speak but at that moment they heard an explosion outside.
Billie flipped out her red lens and Wolf touched an index finger to the side of his e-patch.
"Positions." Wolf said over their private chat line.
"Right above you; I'm taking quite the beating out here…" Panther said in a velveteen tone seemingly free of fear.
"Where's Leon?" Billie asked looking up through the shattered skylight.
"He's not with you?" Panther said as another explosion was heard from outside, rattling the walls of the building.
Billie let out a long groan, and Wolf pulled a plastic disk case out of his vest and slid the disk within into a drive.
"Panther can you buy me about three more minutes?" Wolf gruffed in annoyance.
"Not alone." He returned quickly
"Billie-" Wolf started as he turned around.
"I'm on it." She cut him off summoning her baby to her location with her headgear.
Her golden necklace glinted in the sunlight as she blew Wolf a kiss in a sassy pose. Then unzipping the sleeves of her cat suit down to her elbows, her wrists erupted in black and she flew up through the skylight in a swirling circle of Shadow Lace.
"You're getting good at that one; almost too good…" Wolf smirked looking out of the windowed wall to his right seeing her baby do a barrel role after she had landed in it from above; cops close on her tail.
He turned back to the screen on the wall and watched the disc burning at a glacial pace.
"Come on…" He muttered impatiently.
"Where the FUCK is Leon?!" Billie said after what seemed like more than three minutes later.
She then took several shots to the right side of her ship and sent her baby into a downward spiral. Hot on her tail the slew of police model Arwings zoomed down after her.
"Woooolf?" She said with an overbearing amount of annoyance in her tone.
"Just a minute!" He snapped back trying to call Leon.
Billie hit her gravity break right over the highway; and several cars screeched to a stop, sending the ones behind into a pile-up of flipping, sparking destruction. As she pulled back up and hit full speed in a straight shot just above the highway one of the Arwings that had been on her tail slammed with the horrible scraping of twisted metal onto the highway. Droves of panicked pedestrians fled the scene, and many other onlookers watched the chase from inside of the buildings as Billie began to weave her way through the maze of skyscrapers.
"What are you doing?" Panther questioned as he made another loop around the building Wolf was in, and then headed downward into the city after her.
"They won't open fire among the onlookers!" She said pulling up and looping backwards; with the police now finally in front of her she matched their speed.
"But that doesn't mean we can't." She said opening her turrets upon them in hails of rhythmic explosions.
"What I wouldn't do for a smash ball…" Panther said making himself scarce among the buildings.
"YES!" Wolf cheered as the disk ejected.
He proceeded to replace it back into the case and stuff it into his vest when his ears heard a deep rumble of a voice behind him:
"Well, well… Thought if I followed little red riding hood I'd run into the big bad Wolf…"
Wolf turned to face the owner of said voice; a narrow pair of cold grey eyes looked back at him.
"Who the hell are you?" Wolf snuffed looking dejectedly at the seemingly mirror image.
The one standing before him was a large black Wolf with just a bit of white around his nose. He had the same enraged face that Wolf himself sported from time to time; but he looked much younger, Wolf guessed he had to have been in his late 20s at most. But he sure was dressed for a fight that much was clear; Wolf recognized the military issue combat boots and green cargo pants tucked into them. He was also sporting a Cornerian military issue jacket over his blaster proof second skin shirt, but it looked old and worn with either time or just a variety of fights.
"So where did little red hood go?" The large ebony lupine asked chewing on a lollipop stick.
Wolf just shrugged, and fingered his pistol.
"Damn, was hoping to haul in more than one Star Wolf member… but I guess the leader will do. You are worth the most after all Wolf O'Donnell."
'Great, another bounty hunter.' Wolf thought. Since the incident at The Cage three years ago where Billie saved his life; all of Lylat had been recovering from an economic depression due to the accumulated damage caused by Aparoid invasion; in the grip of which his line of work was very generous. However that was a double edged sword in that bounty hunters became more and more eager by the day to get him for the absurd amount of credits on his head. Wolf loved his work, but three years dealing with both strong and weak bounty hunters they had all blurred together in his mind and become little more than a day to day annoyance.
"Look as much as I'd love to hang around and see if you could give me a good fight kid, I'm in a bit of a rush today." Wolf said dismissively taking a step forward.
"I'm sorry, you've mistaken me for someone who cares." Said the bounty hunter slinging a six round shotgun off of his back and aiming it forward.
"Whoa… that's a bit old fashioned aint' it?" Wolf said slowly putting his hands up.
"Gets the job done better than most people care to think. Case in point." He chuckled at the seemingly surrendering Wolf. And with that the still nameless bounty hunter stepped forward slowly across the great hall of a room.
"Is that right? I might have tah look into that myself…" Wolf kept on baiting him as his left thumb, barely noticeable tapped on the side of his e-patch. This kid was clearly a rookie, thinking he could simply approach a target face to face like that.
Step by patient step the black wolf grew closer; but then he saw it; the smallest of tells as Wolf's poker face tugged up into half of a smirk. He stopped in his tracks, Wolf broke out into a toothy grin as his tail swished behind him, the bounty hunter aimed and fired, and in the flash that was an instant Wolf's right hand moved to his back and he became surrounded by a pinkish white energy barrier.
At the moment the tiny round bullets cascaded with the barrier only to deflect outward and away, Wolf made a mental note to thank Billie for buying the technology from that toad he hated so much. Of course Wolf had tinkered with it himself, thinking it was lacking something to be desired as it was. And as off thrown as the kid was by the blinking shield, he was definitely not expecting what happened in the next instant; he turned to his right to see a ship shattering the massive window and barreling into the room.
The Red Fang's canopy was slowly opening as it blurred in between the two lupines, Wolf leapt upwards as the bounty hunter leapt back to avoid getting decapitated by the wing of the vessel. With Wolf quickly plopping himself into the cockpit, he and his ship shattered on through the windows directly on the other side of the room, and were gone into the blue. The bounty hunter pulled himself up and swore under his breath.