Chapter 1

Preface: It has been a few days after the most recent defeat of Andross on Sauria. Krystal has been staying at the Great Fox preparing to continue her quest to discover the cause of the destruction of Cerinia and her parents death. One of the team, however, doesn't want to see her leave.

Fox stood on the outside of the airlock, looking intently through the large window in the chrome-metal door. With him was his friend and confidant Falco, the tall, lean, hot-headed avian and chief pilot of Star Fox, the short and stocky frog Slippy, engineer extraordinaire, and finally Peppy, the old, battle-hardened hare. On the other side of the thick doors, smiling back at the mercenaries was Krystal, the beautiful blue-furred vixen Fox had rescued from a floating gem on his most recent mission to Sauria. She'd been used to channel the energy of the Krazoa sprits to revive Andross, Fox's archenemy.

She walked up the rusted ramp into the body of the rickety transport ship. After a moment, she appeared again behind the windshield at the controls. With the press of a button, it sputtered lazily into life, and rose slowly from the sleek floor of the airlock.

Behind her, the main doors of the airlock unlatched with a thud, and slowly pulled themselves apart, opening up to reveal a majestic view of the stars. Krystal urged the ship towards the gate, and pulled away from the Great Fox.

She and her ship began to shrink from Fox's vision as they flew off into space, until she had disappeared into the endless void of blackness.

From that moment, time spurred forward, passing in a blur. Years passed in seconds, and soon, Fox found himself all alone aboard the Great Fox, which had fallen into decay due to years without repair. Peppy was long since dead, Slippy had left, now a respected member of the mechanics guild. And Falco, Fox's dearest friend, had never been seen in years.

Now it was just him and ROB. The general that had replaced Pepper was much less fond of mercenaries than his predecessor, and Fox had not had an assignment for decades

Life became dull and uninteresting. The day consisted of an endless patrol of the Lylat system, meticulously searching section after section, always finding nothing. The inactivity took its toll on the vulpine. Due to a combination of disease and aging, his formerly athletic build had collapsed, leaving him a sickly old man.

Then, one day, while mapping the outer region of the ever-expanding galaxy, Fox suffered a heart attack. His He dropped from his chair, the controls slipping from his hands. He clenched his dying heart with his paw, knowing he would die. He felt a surge of pain wipe through his chest.

His life flashed before his eyes, and he realized with a growing sense of dread just how pointless it had been. It hit him like a slap in the face; all his life, he had been concerned only with money, with the next job, and never with actually living. He also realized that he had the perfect opportunity, Krystal, and he'd done nothing to act on it.

His mind flashed back to that day when she left. He wished now, more than ever, that she'd stayed. He could have been happy, but he had been too thickheaded to see her as anything more than a burden. And now, he would die alone…

Fox sat bolt upright, panting heavily and drenched in sweat. 'It was all a dream' Fox said to himself with a sigh of relief, falling back upon his bed. 'Today, Krystal leaves´ He thought sadly. He didn't want that dream to become a reality.

Fox sat on his bed, his head hung low in depression, trying to marshal his thoughts. He glanced around his room, needing a change in view from the threadbare carpet. The walls were a simple chrome metal, a A few trophies from different missions lay on a low-lying table in the corner, including a couple of artifacts from the temples of Sauria. A framed picture of his father occupied centre stage.

"What would you do?" Fox asked the photo.

.'Man, I haven't felt this way about anyone before. I don't get it; I only freed her from that floating gem a few days ago, and already, I get this weird feeling when I'm around her. I want her to stay, more than anything. Aw, but what if she says no, I mean, she has been on her own for so long, maybe she likes it that way. But then why would she bother to come onboard the Great Fox in the first place just to leave?'

Fox heaved a heavy sigh, and returned to debate raging in his mind.

The vulpine was jarred from his thoughts as ROB's familiar, detached voice came from the speaker in his room. "Attention crewmembers: Guest Krystal will depart from Great Fox in ten minutes."

Upon hearing this, Fox stood up from his bed. 'If I want any chance at her staying, then I need to ask her now. If she rejects me, then at least I will have no regrets about letting the opportunity pass unnoticed' Fox strode confidently out of his room and into the hallway, his mind set.

(Krystal)

Krystal was slowly walking toward her newly acquired ship from Sauria that she'd found after she'd been freed of her prison. A bag stuffed with what few possessions she had was hung over her shoulder, and swayed from side to side as she walked.

Her thoughts stumbled back of the one who had rescued her from her floating prison, the one who had offered her his home and a spare room, the one who, unbeknownst to this very person, had shown Krystal more compassion than anyone had in several years. She didn't want to leave him. She was thinking of Fox McCloud. 'I wish he would let me stay. I would ask him, but what if he said no? Seems that I'm no good at anything other than getting captured'.

She longed to ask Fox to stay, even if just for a few days. But if he refused and sent her on her way, then she would be crushed. And if he didn't ask, she would assume that he didn't care. All these thoughts and more continued to plague her mind as she approached her ship.

(Back to Fox)

Fox changed his previous walk into first a jog, then a sprint, fearing that Krystal would depart before he could find her.

He entered into the hangar bay just as Krystal was entering the cockpit of her ship.

"Krystal!" he called out just before the ramp closed. There was a short silence during which Krystal got out of the ship.

"Yes, Fox?" She replied hopefully. Fox ran over to her.

"I'm glad I caught you before you left. I have a question I wanted to ask you. Would you uh… like to …stay on the Great Fox for a few more days? I mean, you don't have anywhere you need to get to real soon, right, so why don't… you stay a little longer? It's nice having you around."

"Really, you want me to stay?" Krystal asked with mixed surprise and joy. Fox was taken of guard by her sudden and emphatic response.

"Well, I mean, if you want to, you can," Fox said, hoping to God he wasn't dreaming again.

"Of course I'll stay. I'd love to spend more time with around the Great Fox," she answered. 'But mostly I'd love to spend time with you'. A brief moment of silence passed between the two vulpines, during which they stared into each other's eyes.

'He has the most captivating green eyes,' Krystal thought. Her memory flew back to the moment when he saved her from the six-story fall on Sauria.

The moment of silence was broken by the footsteps of first Slippy, then Falco. They were hoping to see Krystal off. They both rounded the corner and saw Fox and Krystal standing together, gazing into each other's eyes. "Sorry, hope we're not interrupting anything." Falco said in his characteristically sarcastic tone of voice, smiling mischievously.

I"Hey guys, guess what? Krystal can stay on for a while!" Fox said, ignoring Falco's previous comment as he turned to face his crewmates.

Upon hearing this, the avian and the amphibian looked at each other for a brief moment, then burst out laughing. Falco collapsed to the floor, unable to breathe, and was followed by Slippy. After a moment of rolling around on the floor, the laughter subsided and the two managed to stand again.

"Seriously, you're gonna let her stay just like that?" Falco said, calming down a little and starting to act serious.

"Well, she doesn't have anywhere else to go. So what are we supposed to do, leave her alone?" Fox retorted.

"No," Falco answered quietly. While he was perhaps the furthest from being a gentleman that anyone could be, he did have a heart. "But, where would she stay? She slept on the couch last night, but if she's gonna stay for a long time, she needs a good room."

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(A/N: Sorry this took so long to get up, but this week has been hell. My mom got in a car accident on Halloween, but she's okay, and I fractured my growth plate or something in wrestling, so I'm in a cast for three weeks. Thank God it's Friday.)