Faze
by Jadie Kiczenski
"Phew! This is...hard work!" Katt gasped, wiping her brow with the back of her hand.
"We haven't even started yet!" Bill grinned, lifting a pile of rocks from the heap of rubble in front of them. He carried the weight with surprising ease, dropping the rocks a few feet away.
"Incoming!" Slippy yelled, running over.
The three quickly evacuated the area as a shower of rocks pelted down from above, out of the mouth of a huge steel monster with humongous jaws. The monster finished off-loading its cargo and lowered its mighty head to the ground.
"Good going, Fox!" Bill called, as Fox dropped down from the machine and landed beside him.
"Hey, when do I get to drive one of those?" Falco asked, jogging over from the other side of the quarry.
"I don't know," Fox said, "But what I do know is that we've been working on this site for three hours solidly and I think a break's due. Agreed?"
"Yeah, I'd kill for a cup of coffee!" Bill said.
"Coffee?" Katt repeated disbelievingly, "How in Lylat can you want something hot to drink?"
"Because he's strange," Falco told her as they headed towards the shaded bunkers.
They were halfway across the quarry when there was suddenly a terrific explosion which seemed to come from beneath them, behind them, and all around them. A violent tremor distorted the plane of land beneath their feet, throwing them all wildly off balance.
"Woah!" yelled Slippy, as he flew through the air to land in a pile of junk.
The land beneath Fox slid away as he ran to help Slippy, and he wound up knee-deep in rubble.
Katt was stumbling blindly through the spiralling whirlwind of dust particles and flying rock debris, until she tripped over a flat piece of slate sticking out of the ground. She shrieked as she fell and landed sprawled on the ground, winded. Out of the corner of her eye she could see what looked like another, even bigger, shockwave heading towards them. She curled herself up tightly and prayed.
Bill had lost sight of everybody in the calamity, and he was desperately trying to keep his balance as the ground seemed to lurch and sway beneath him. It was very disorientating, but years of skilled officer training (and practise at standing on a surfboard!) meant that so far he had managed to keep his footing. But then there was an exceptionally hard jolt that made him stagger forward. He trod on an area of loose earth that gave way beneath him, tipping him down a pit. Bill landed hard on his back, a small shower of dirt raining down on him. He coughed and spat out earth. He wasn't aware of any pain, but there was a strange, warm, numbness in his left leg. He tried to move it, but nothing happened. It didn't take him long to realise that he had broken his leg, and he hoped like hell that someone would find him. Now he would just have to wait...
Falco was hurtling across the quarry, trying to keep one leap ahead of the enormous shockwave behind him that was threatening to rip the land out from underneath him and hurl him into a pitch black chasm. 'Any second now and it's gonna catch up and swallow me...!" he thought, as he almost tripped over a metal rod half embedded in the earth. In the distance (actually, it was only a few meters, but to Falco it seemed like miles) he could see Fox and Slippy waving. He couldn't tell if they were in trouble or not. The rumble behind him got louder, but just as Falco began to think that he wasn't going to make it, there was a high pitched screeching noise, like a thousand rusty bicycle chains, and the ground jarred horribly, before lurching violently forward and then ceasing all movement. The impending split stopped just meters from Falco's feet.
There was a long silence as everybody tried to get their bearings. Fox hauled Slippy to his feet, then helped Katt up. Falco was just staring at the meter wide crack in the ground. He seemed stunned.
"Falco, are you okay?" Fox asked him.
Falco looked up slowly.
"What the hell just happened?" he asked in a voice that wasn't quite his own, it was too quiet.
"Beats me," Fox said, "But...Hey, what was that?"
A low creaking noise had caught his attention.
"Oh my god, look!" Katt cried, so fast that it was almost indecipherable.
Fox and Slippy looked. One of the metal look-out towers was swaying ominously. The ground underneath it was unstable. (And) Falco was standing right underneath it.
"Falco, move! Get out of there!" Fox yelled.
Then everything seemed to happen in slow motion. Katt ran forward to try and pull Falco out of the way, but Fox grabbed her arm and pulled her back.
"Falco!" Katt cried, struggling to free herself from Fox's grip.
Falco span around just in time to see the metal structure rip out of the earth, showering him with dirt. He tried to run but he was frozen to the spot. The tower collapsed around him and then he saw a heavy metal bar swinging straight towards him. The last thought that crossed Falco's mind before it hit him was, 'I'm going to die...', then Katt screamed and a brilliant white light streaked across his vision as the bar hit him and he was thrown to the ground a few meters away, unconscious.
As soon as the dust clouds cleared, Fox, Slippy, and Katt ran forward.
"Oh my god, he's dead!" Katt cried, covering her eyes, unable to look.
Fox knelt down beside his fallen comrade.
"No...no, he isn't. He's still breathing," he assured the panicking felinian, "But I think he's badly hurt."
"Well go and get help then!" Katt cried, "Quickly!"
Fox nodded and quickly sprinted across the quarry, towards the HQ, yelling "Stay there!" over his shoulder. Katt watched him go and then caught Slippy's eye. Slippy saw how upset she was and awkwardly put a hand on her shoulder.
"He'll be okay," he promised.
Katt nodded and sniffed back tears, pulling her jacket tighter around herself as the wind picked up, a cold contrast to the earlier heatwave. She sat down on a metal bar and watched as Slippy took off his own jacket and placed it over Falco. Then she couldn't help herself. She put her head down and cried.
The bright light cleared almost instantly, and Falco looked around him.
'Something's wrong,' he thought, 'I should be dead! Ten tonnes of metal just fell on me!'.
He realised that he was standing on top of a small mound of rocks, about fifteen meters from the fallen lookout tower. He could see Fox, Slippy, and Katt kneeling in the wreckage of the tower, but he couldn't see exactly what was going on. He ran down the hill towards them and stopped about half way down when he realised with a start what they were huddling around. It was an unconscious person. And not just any unconscious person. It was Falco.
Falco's initial thought was the dumbest and most obvious one.
'Hey, that's me down there!'
He stared, dumbfounded and more than a little perplexed as Fox got up and dusted himself off before departing from the small group and sprinting towards the hill. As he got closer, Fox didn't even seem to notice Falco standing there. He was staring straight through him, at the silhouette of the HQ on the horizon, about a mile off in the distance.
Falco frowned, starting to feel seriously spooked. What was going on here?
At the top of the hill, Fox stopped for a moment to catch his breath and decide which way to go. Then he decided on left, ran straight through Falco, and disappeared down the other side of the hill.
Falco stared after him as he disappeared out of view. His mind was a whirl. Firstly, he was here and he could see himself unconscious at the bottom of the hill. (He also noted, with some curiosity, that Katt was crying.) And just now, Fox had run straight through him. (Charming!)
What the hell was happening?
He subconsciously reached to lean on a rock for support, and fell straight through it. He landed hard on his backside, but strangely he didn't feel anything. He got up and stared at the rock. It was an ordinary, SOLID, rock!
He tried again to touch the rock, and his hand passed straight through it.
'Damn you, stupid rock!' he screamed silently, 'you're supposed to be solid!'
He concentrated all his will power on that one thought, 'You are SOLID!' and pushed his palm up against the stone. He felt a momentary burst of glee as he encountered resistance, but the moment he stopped thinking about it, the rock lost it's solidity and Falco almost fell through it again. He slowly mastered the art of persuading the rock to be solid, but it was hard work so he soon gave up the bother.
He was at a loss as to what he should do next, so he just stood there and watched Slippy trying in vain to comfort Katt.
Slippy was starting to get cold. Without his cozy Star Fox bomber jacket, the chill wind seemed to strip him straight to the bone. He tried pacing up and down to warm up, but he felt as if he was slowly freezing to death. The sun peeked out momentarily from behind a dark stormcloud, but it no longer held any warmth. Slippy checked his wristwatch. Fox had been gone almost half an hour, and Slippy was worried. Falco had showed no signs of regaining consciousness, and the cold weather wasn't going to help. He hoped Falco wouldn't catch a chill...
"Slippy! Katt!"
Fox's voice hadn't sounded so welcome in a long time. Fox drew up beside Slippy and took a second to get his breath back. It was obvious that he had ran all the way there and back.
"They can't send a land vehicle over this terrain," he informed Slippy and Katt, who had wandered over too, "But they're going to dispatch a hover vehicle of some description to take him straight to a hospital. It might take a little longer to get here, though, because they weren't prepared for an emergency and there are no 'crafts ready."
"They should always be ready!" Katt said indignantly. Fox noticed that her mascara had smudged slightly, she had obviously been crying, but perhaps now wasn't the best time to mention it.
They sat in silence for several minutes when a thought suddenly struck Fox.
"Bill! Where's Bill?!"
"Oh no! I forgot about him!" Slippy cried, horrified.
"Did you see him when we were running?" Fox asked.
Katt nodded.
"He was running by me, but then I tripped over and I didn't see him after that."
"Well we've got to look for him!" Fox said. "Slip, you stay here with Falco. Katt check that way, I'll see if I can spot him over there."
Slippy and Katt nodded, and Katt launched herself towards the direction Fox had told her to go, calling Bill's name as loudly as she could. Fox went the opposite way, starting a thorough search for his friend. He hoped like hell that Bill was okay...another casualty didn't bear thinking about.
"Bill? Bill! BILL!!!"
Bill's head snapped up as he heard his name being yelled.
"Over here!" he tried to call back, but he only managed a croak that couldn't possibly be heard more than five meters away.
"Bill!!!" the voice continued.
"OVER HERE!"
This time Bill managed to get plenty of power into his voice, resulting in a yell of, "Katt! I've found him!" and then a more directed, "Bill, hang on. I'll be right there."
"Thank goodness, dude!" Bill grinned cheerfully, as Fox's silhouetted head came into view over the top of the pit.
"Bill! Are you okay?" Fox called down. His voice echoed strangely in the confines of the pit.
"No, I think I broke my leg," Bill groaned. He tried again to move it and winced.
"Hold on, we'll get you outta there!" Fox promised. He ran back to see if the hover vehicle had arrived yet. There was a small red blip on the horizon that was rapidly getting closer and Fox felt a surge of relief. He waved frantically, flagging the vehicle over. The craft came to a stop about ten meters away and hovered over the rocks. A couple of medics ran over and Fox told them what had happened. A swarm of medics descended upon Falco, so Fox couldn't see him. Katt tried to push through, but was shoved roughly aside. Fox grimaced and watched as the medics levered Falco onto a stretcher and lifted him into the vehicle. When one of the medics was free, Fox pulled him over.
"Can you help me? Another person is trapped, he fell down a pit. I think he's broken a leg."
"Should have called search and rescue," the medic replied, shrugging, "We're only medics."
"You must be able to help! You can't just leave him there!" Fox was getting worked up.
"I told you, we aint search and rescue..."
"Goddamit! Do something!!" Fox yelled.
The medic flinched. "Alright, alright..."
He dispatched another couple of medics (there seemed an infinite number of them) after Fox, who took them to where Bill was. After trying to get him out using a chain of people, a rope, and then a S&R harness, they had to use a construction site crane to lower a man down and lever Bill out. But they refused to take him in the ambulance and insisted that Fox and co drive him down themselves.
"We've already gone out of our way to help you get him out," the spokesman medic insisted, and after giving Bill a rather rough once-over check, deduced "there's nothing broken, he's just sprained it. You won't have to bother the hospital at all."
Then he and the other medics returned to the ambulance and the vehicle sped off in a cloud of jet fuel.
Fox coughed on the pollution that it spewed out, and stared after it. A low growl formed at the back of his throat, and he had to force it down. He didn't like the nasty and unhelpful attitudes of the medics at all, but they were the only people who could get Falco to a hospital quickly enough.
Fox turned back to Slippy, Katt, and Bill (who was able to limp now), and cleared his throat.
"Right. We'd better get back to the base and tell Peppy what's happened. We can check on Falco later. He'll be okay. I hope the earthquake tremor didn't hit the base. We can't afford to lose any more power, this place is a dump already."
"What a mega bad day to start this project, dude," Bill said, shaking his head sadly.
"Yeah..." Fox agreed, "Let's go."
He took one last look at the devastated construction site: the deep crack in the ground, the piles of scattered rubble that had been so painstakingly transferred from site to site, the fallen lookout tower...then he turned and started the slow walk back to the HQ.
Falco had watched the whole scene and couldn't believe his eyes. Now Fox, Slippy, Katt and Bill (who was using Fox as a sort of crutch to limp along) were heading across the dirt back to the HQ.
'What about me?' Falco thought, 'They don't even know I'm here!'
He watched the weary crew fade into the distance and then sat down on the ground. It was a touch and go process, as the ground kept changing in degrees of solidness, but at least he wasn't falling through it.
Now was a perfect time to consider what the hell was going on. Was he dead? No... from what he had seen, he had been severely injured, knocked out, but not dead. Unconscious... but he had been unconscious before and this had never happened... Perhaps he was dying then. Now that was a disturbing thought. Finally, Falco decided to try to track down his body and find out what was happening to him. The team had left tracks in the dirt, and there was no wind to cover them, so it would be easy to follow. Determined to discover what was going on, he got up... and then the world around him burst into a painfully brilliant white light. His last thought before his surroundings faded from sight was 'Oh boy... not again!'
Katt yawned and blinked, but she couldn't shake the tiredness nor the headache that was lingering over her eyes. The others had retired to their quarters for the night, but Katt knew that however tired she was, she wouldn't be able to sleep. The glare from the computer screen in front of her aggravated the dull ache in her head, but she refused to draw her attention away from it. Furiously she typed, deleted, paragraphed, and typed some more. But less than an hour later, her efforts looked like a hopelessly scrambled merge of semisufficient ideas so she deleted the file and started over. She was still typing at 4:00 am when Peppy passed by on his way to the kitchen to make some coffee.
"Have you been up all night?" he inquired politely.
"Yup," Katt replied, turning to face him.
Peppy could instantly see how gaunt she looked, pale and with dark rings under her eyes, although that could also be smudges of mascara, but Katt definitely looked tired.
"I think you should try and get at least a few hours sleep," Peppy advised.
"No...it's okay...I'll be alright..." Katt insisted, but she didn't stop Peppy from herding her out of the study and down the corridor to her room.
"Sleep well!" he called, as he shut the door on her.
Returning to the kitchen, Peppy passed by the study and realised that the computer Katt had been using was still on. As he went over to turn it off, he noticed that the file Katt had been working on had only six words, written in bold and underlined- Why does life suck so much?
Shaking his head, Peppy cancelled the file and switched off the computer at the mains before trotting off to the kitchen to make his coffee.
Despite her late night, Katt was already awake and in the VIP breakfast lounge before Fox, Slippy and Bill got there. She was staring into her cereal and stirring it occasionally with her spoon but not actually eating any of it. The moment Fox walked in, her head snapped up. But before she could even ask the question, Fox nodded.
"I phoned the hospital this morning first thing, Katt," he said tiredly, rubbing his eyes, "They said he's in a stable condition but he hasn't regained consciousness yet. It's kinda touch and go at the moment."
"Oh."
Katt sighed, visibly disappointed. Fox frowned. The atmosphere in the room dipped into a dangerously low depression... then Bill came bounding in.
"Hey dudes, check out the new look!" he grinned, showing off a neon-green ankle-support with an orange lightening bolt across it strapped around his injured ankle.
Fox blinked and shielded his eyes.
"Gee Bill...it's...er... bright!"
"I know," Bill beamed, "But it was the only one of the designs in the kids department that fitted!"
"Er...Bill? Why did you get it from the kids department?" Fox asked, a slightly incredulous look spreading across his face.
"Well, the adult ones only come in grey and white!" Bill explained.
Fox tapped the side of his head, indicating severe dementia.
"I suppose that explains the Pinky the Panther plasters and the circus design neck collar too..."
"Yup! You can't beat Pinky the Panther for highly entertaining comic antics!" Bill declared, raising his hand in a 'Eureka!' style pose.
"Whatever..." Fox muttered, not able to help an amused smile from creeping across his muzzle.
At that moment, a rather flustered Slippy (still in his pyjamas) came running in, practically colliding into the table.
"Fox! There's a.... it's.... the... the...it's a...!!!" he gasped, trying to fit several complex sentences into a couple of seconds.
Fox grabbed his shoulders and shook him.
"Now, Slippy, start again. What's the problem?"
"The computers! The mainframe! A virus! The power reactor core! I don't know the code!"
Again Slippy spoke at hyper-speed, but this time Fox could make out the keywords.
"What do you mean you don't know the code? You know everything there is to know about computers! Can't you override it?"
"No! Someone altered the code last night. From terminal 15," Slippy explained.
"Was anyone using the computers last night?" Fox enquired.
"I was," Katt mumbled, raising her hand like a schoolchild who is being asked a question and knows the answer but is reluctant to say.
Fox looked accusingly at her. Katt leapt up.
"Hey!!! Are you saying I did it?! Changed the code?!" she demanded, "Heck! I don't even know how to change a code!"
"Woah! Calm down missus!" Bill cried, restraining her with one strong muscled arm, "You're gettin' too hot-headed!"
'Too much like Falco for comfort...' Fox agreed to himself, 'And I don't need any more hassle so someone shut the bitch up!'
Katt stop howling but glared at Fox with a glower that expressed both hurt and anger at an unfair accusation.
'Please don't look at me like that...' Fox thought, glaring back, 'I'm pissed off enough as it is!'
The stare-out between Katt and Fox continued for several moments, until Slippy chimed in with, "Please! Can we just sort this thing out before the reactor fuses!"
Fox looked down at the ground, slightly ashamed at his own behaviour.
"Yeah, let's go see what's wrong."
Katt bit her lip and followed the other three out of the room. Peppy, however, was fast asleep in his armchair and nobody had noticed...
The next thing Falco was aware of, after the flash of white light, was the feeling of being deposited somewhere. A split second later and his vision returned, and he instantly knew that he was in his quarters at the base.
'Am I alive now?' he thought, sitting down on the bed. But to his dismay, the bed didn't creak or even give slightly as he sat, instead he fell through again.
'Drat!' he thought, 'But how did I get here? I just thought about getting back to the HQ...and here I am! Cool!'
But the feeling of glee didn't last, as a piercing blast of noise intruded the peaceful silence of his room. A familiar siren; Red Alert.
'Bill's put a pretzel in the coin-slot on the soft-drinks machine again, hasn't he?' Falco thought to himself dryly, not suspecting any major catastrophe.
Bored, he decided to try and track down someone he knew. Anyone. Just someone. Maybe if he tried hard enough, they would notice him and help him get back.
It didn't take long. They were all in the computer room. Katt was in the computer chair, trying to reconstruct the setup of the computer as she last recalled it from the night before. Unsuccessfully.
After an hour of fruitless searching for a wrongly entered command, everyone except Katt went for a break. Slippy to the library to look up alternative codes, Fox to the mess hall, and Bill to the surf simulator in the gym. The urgency of the situation seemed to have dissolved somewhat.
But Katt remained where she was, staring at the screen.
"They still think it's my fault, don't they?" she muttered outloud, "Well it's not! It's not!"
In frustration she slammed her fist down on the mouse, clicking it by accident. What she didn't notice was the fact that she had clicked on a small icon in the status bar at the bottom of the screen. It was a built in time-bomb, and now a countdown to system shut down had began. However, Katt was no longer looking at the screen where the instruction "Press Esc to abort!" read, above the countdown, which had began at 3mins45 but was slowly ticking away.
'Oh fuck!' Falco thought, slamming his fist down on the Escape key whilst willing it to be solid, but the key didn't budge.
'I can't move anything!' he realised, 'I gotta get Katt to do it!....But she can't hear me...'
"Well I gotta try..." he finished outloud. "KATT!!! OI KATT!!!! HELLO???"
No response. Katt had her head buried in her hands and showed no signs of budging.
Annoyed and getting worried as the counter ticked away, Falco tried to shake her, but to no avail.
"Please Katt! Look up!" Falco pleaded, but she remained blissfully unaware of his presence. The counter was at 1min53 and dropping. Falco passed his hand in front of her face, and to his surprise she flinched, as if feeling a cold breeze. Encouraged, Falco passed his hand through her shoulder. Katt shivered and looked up and around, seeming spooked.
"Yes! Good girl!" Falco exclaimed, "Now look at the screen!"
But Katt got up and headed for the door, looking nervously about her as she did.
"Nooo Katt! Go back! GO BACK!!!" Falco yelled, and tried to shove her in the direction of the computer. Unfortunately, something went horribly wrong and he went flying through her and across the room.
Katt felt a chill go right through her, freezing her to the bone, and it was a peculiar sensation that she'd never experienced before.
"What the heck was that?" she murmured to herself, looking across the room for an air vent where the ice cold draft could be coming from. The counter now read 0mins39.
"GOD KATT HIT THE ESCAPE BUTTON ON THE COMP!!!" Falco screamed frantically, but inside fearing it was too late.
Then Katt saw a vent beneath the computer and went to investigate. Suddenly she saw the countdown sequence on the screen and shrieked.
"Dearest Katt, now is NOT A GOOD TIME TO PANIC!" Falco screeched.
Katt stopped in her tracks, quivering.
"Falco?"
"YES!" Falco yelled, "Just hit the escape key! PLEASE!"
Then Katt hit escape and the countdown stopped at 0mins23.
But Falco had no time to gloat or feel good because he was suddenly aware of a tugging sensation, then a darkness closed in on him...then nothing for a long, long time.
Katt collapsed into the comfy computer chair, her fur soaked with sweat and her heart racing. She wasn't sure what had just happened, but if she hadn't turned back to investigate the air vent, the chances were that there'd be a central core melt-down and she (plus all the others) would be a goner.
Peppy chose that moment to return to the study with Slippy in tow, carrying a pile of computer manuals higher than him.
"Hey Katt! You found the virus and disabled it!" Slippy cried happily, dancing around the study whilst balancing the books.
"What did you do?" Peppy asked calmly.
"I don't know..." breathed a white-faced Katt. Peppy finally noticed her haunted expression.
"Why Katt, whatever's wrong?"
Katt took a deep breath and smiled weakly.
"Nothing's wrong... just tired... that's all..."
And with that, she excused herself from the room.
Three days passed in what seemed like seconds. Katt was praised as a heroine, and although she never told anyone what happened, she was convinced that something weird had saved her and everyone else's lives.
Fox had declared the 'quake site safe and work on it had resumed. Bill's ankle had healed and he was back driving diggers around the site and surfing on the minor tremors that the larger machines sent through the ground in their near vicinity. Slippy had discovered a website proxy server and was linking up a site to ArSpace Dynamics, the company endorsed by his father Beltino Toad, an acclaimed businessman in the present society. Peppy spent his time indoors, continuing development plans and staying in radio contact with the rest of the team. And at this precise moment, Katt was on the phone trying to get through to the Corneria City Central Hospital. After nine attempts, she slammed down the phone. It was constantly engaged.
'It's busy hours', she reasoned to herself, 'I'll try again later'.
But that didn't stop her going back to the phone less than three minutes later.
Finally a tired sounding receptionist answered the phone.
"Hello? Can I help?"
"Yeah, I'd like to inquire about someone," Katt said.
The receptionist sounded ticked off.
"Sorry hun, there's been an explosion at a chemical plant and casualties are pouring in, this is an emergency line. Bye."
Then she hung up.
Katt was speechless, holding the phone to her ear for several moments after the cut-off tone sounded. Then she stormed into the sitting room where Peppy was sipping his coffee and taking notes on an article in the newspaper.
"Peppy!" Katt said, glowering, "They wouldn't let me speak to anyone at the hospital to find out how Falco is! They said they're too busy! Can you believe that!"
Peppy didn't look up from his paper.
"That's probably because of an influx of patients after the explosion at the Jeopardy Science and Nuclear Physics Laboratory in outer Corneria City," he stated matter-of-factly.
"How did you know that?" Katt asked, gobsmacked.
Peppy lifted his newspaper to show the cover and the headlines:- CC News: Hundreds hurt in Chemical Explosion, state hospital under heavy pressure due to influx
"Oh," Katt said, stumped.
"It was because of the same virus we got hit by," Peppy continued, "A small icon that hides in the status bar with a built in timer that can only be switched off if someone notices it, activates it, and terminates it. I guess they didn't see it. We're lucky you did."
'But I didn't,' Katt thought, 'It was an accident! But hey! If it gives me status and respect in StarFox, then it can't hurt to take the praise...'
She was interrupted from her thoughts when Peppy suddenly said, "The virus could also be responsible for the earthquake, you know."
"But how?" a perplexed Katt asked, "This is a well known 'quake zone, it was probably natural! There was a 'quake last year too, wasn't there?"
"Yes, but by infecting meteorological stations, the virus can affect the nuclear-physics that determine when, where, and in what precise proximity an earthquake will strike. It's like a trigger," Peppy explained, using gestures as emphasis.
"Okay...I'll pretend I understood what you just said..." Katt murmured, "But right now I'm going down to the hospital to get some answers. Tell Fox where I am if he gets back before me."
"Is it a good idea to go in the middle of a crisis?" Peppy asked.
Katt's determined glare answered the question and put a full stop on the end too. Peppy raised his hands in surrender.
"Okay, but don't get in the way of people..."
Peppy's lecture was wasted as Katt was already gone.
The transport Katt took was stuffy and crowded, and she was more than a little relieved when it stopped. Getting off carefully, so as not to dirty her dress on the dirty rails that were publicly used, she walked the remaining 200 or so feet to the hospital. Even before she entered the grounds, it was obvious that there had been a major catastrophe. The injured were being offloaded by the dozen, corpses in bodybags being zipped up, and fretting relatives swarming the area like wasps at a picnic. There was even a distinct smell of despair. Not nice. All Katt wanted to do was visit her 'boyfriend', but even getting inside the building would take some cunning. Crouching behind a trolley, she waited for the automatic doors to open again and then darted inside. Under the roof of the building, things seemed even worse. Cornerian citizens were milling around aimlessly, some with hankies to their eyes, others holding each other for support. In the background a girl was screaming "No! He can't be dead! He wasn't even hit by the blast! He just had a broken wrist!" and a nurse gently but firmly stating that the worker had been killed by delayed radiation poisoning. Even as she watched, an elderly hound with a blood-soaked towel held against his temple pushed past, coughing violently and spraying a fine mist of red vapour from his mouth into the air. Katt gagged and stepped back, almost knocking a nurse over as she hurried past with her clipboard on her way to a ward.
Katt watched the scene for several minutes, thinking that it wasn't unlike the medical drama's she enjoyed watching at home, except the doctors here weren't as good-looking and the special effects were real.
The queue at the reception desk stretched right round the waiting room and progress was slow as the receptionist had to deal with constant phone calls as well. The thought of waiting in a queue for two hours was Katt's idea of hell: - stuffy air, people coughing and choking, heat... it wasn't going to happen. Katt barged her way to the front. The receptionist gave her a dirty look.
"Could you please wait your turn," she said gruffly, before turning to the next person in line. Angrily, Katt slammed her hand down on the bell three times.
"I just want to know where the wards are where I can find someone who was brought in three days ago!" she cried.
Annoyed, the receptionist swung an arm in the vague direction of a corridor then proceeded to ignore Katt again.
"Hello!!??" Katt demanded, ringing the bell again. The receptionist looked like a thundercloud that is about to burst. She tapped a comlink on her desk and another, nicer-looking woman trotted over to the desk.
"This little girl is looking for someone," the receptionist told her, "Take her away from me!"
"I'm not a little girl!" Katt objected, "I'm seventeen!"
"Alright...now who are you looking for?" the woman, a beaver with an oversized nose, asked, placing a hand on Katt's arm and speaking as though to a retard.
"You're patronising me," Katt complained.
"Sorry," the woman apologised, removing her hand, "Now what exactly is the problem..."
It didn't take long to find the right ward, the corridors on this side of the hospital were relatively uncrowded, but Katt complained the whole time and she was sure that the nurse was glad to leave after she deposited her outside the ward. Tenitivly, Katt eased open the door and tiptoed in. Although she had phoned the hospital about three times a day everyday since the accident, this was the first time she had actually visited Falco. She wasn't quite sure what to expect as she walked closer to the bed. She was instantly relieved to see that he wasn't hooked up to any huge machines, only a small monitor recording his heart beat and breathing. Katt crept even closer. Falco didn't look unconscious. He looked like he was in a natural sleep. He even had that semi-frown that indicates when someone is dreaming. Katt knelt down by the bed and sighed. The silence of the room, only punctuated by the soft hum of the electric lights and her own soft breathing, was getting to her. She had to break it.
"Hey..." she whispered, "Wake up Feather-Butt... it's me..."
There was no response so she grabbed his hand with her paw and squeezed it.
"Wake up, damn you!" she hissed in frustration, "Why do you always do this to me! I hate you!"
The threats didn't seem to have an effect, so Katt leaned over and kissed his cheek.
"There. Now you have to wake up..." she murmured.
The first thing Falco was aware of after an eternity of nothingness was pain. A dull ache in the back of his head that seemed to radiate right through him. For a while, that was all he was aware of. Then sound started to filter through, hazy and muffled like a poor quality radio transmission at first, but it got consistently clearer within moments. He wasn't sure he recognised the voice though. Then an incredibly strong smell hit him and he instantly recognised it as Katt's perfume. Katt was there, somewhere. The smell got closer and then he felt something brush against his cheek.
"There. Now you have to wake up..."
Katt sounded upset. Falco tried to piece together what was happening.
Katt grabbed hold of his hand again. Now was a good time to let her know he was there...
Katt yelped as her friend's hand closed around hers.
"Falco?"
Falco groaned and shifted slightly, then his eyes fluttered open.
"Katt..." he murmured groggily, "What the hell..."
Katt whooped. Falco winced.
"Not so loud...!"
"Sorry..." Katt whispered.
Falco tried to lever himself into a sitting position and was rewarded with an attack of dizziness.
"Damn," he cursed as he lay back down, then suddenly he remembered something.
"Katt! What happened about the Red Alert? The virus?"
Katt furrowed her brow in confusion.
"How do you know about that? You weren't there!"
Now it was Falco's turn to be confused.
"I don't know... but I remember you stopped the countdown at 23 seconds."
"That's right," Katt said, "But you weren't there so how do you know about that?"
There was a moment of silence then both Katt and Falco spoke at the same time.
"That's weird!"
"That's strange!"
Katt giggled and Falco rolled his eyes at her.
"You're the weird one, Katt. Oh and by the way...nice perfume!"
THE END
by Jadie Kiczenski
"Phew! This is...hard work!" Katt gasped, wiping her brow with the back of her hand.
"We haven't even started yet!" Bill grinned, lifting a pile of rocks from the heap of rubble in front of them. He carried the weight with surprising ease, dropping the rocks a few feet away.
"Incoming!" Slippy yelled, running over.
The three quickly evacuated the area as a shower of rocks pelted down from above, out of the mouth of a huge steel monster with humongous jaws. The monster finished off-loading its cargo and lowered its mighty head to the ground.
"Good going, Fox!" Bill called, as Fox dropped down from the machine and landed beside him.
"Hey, when do I get to drive one of those?" Falco asked, jogging over from the other side of the quarry.
"I don't know," Fox said, "But what I do know is that we've been working on this site for three hours solidly and I think a break's due. Agreed?"
"Yeah, I'd kill for a cup of coffee!" Bill said.
"Coffee?" Katt repeated disbelievingly, "How in Lylat can you want something hot to drink?"
"Because he's strange," Falco told her as they headed towards the shaded bunkers.
They were halfway across the quarry when there was suddenly a terrific explosion which seemed to come from beneath them, behind them, and all around them. A violent tremor distorted the plane of land beneath their feet, throwing them all wildly off balance.
"Woah!" yelled Slippy, as he flew through the air to land in a pile of junk.
The land beneath Fox slid away as he ran to help Slippy, and he wound up knee-deep in rubble.
Katt was stumbling blindly through the spiralling whirlwind of dust particles and flying rock debris, until she tripped over a flat piece of slate sticking out of the ground. She shrieked as she fell and landed sprawled on the ground, winded. Out of the corner of her eye she could see what looked like another, even bigger, shockwave heading towards them. She curled herself up tightly and prayed.
Bill had lost sight of everybody in the calamity, and he was desperately trying to keep his balance as the ground seemed to lurch and sway beneath him. It was very disorientating, but years of skilled officer training (and practise at standing on a surfboard!) meant that so far he had managed to keep his footing. But then there was an exceptionally hard jolt that made him stagger forward. He trod on an area of loose earth that gave way beneath him, tipping him down a pit. Bill landed hard on his back, a small shower of dirt raining down on him. He coughed and spat out earth. He wasn't aware of any pain, but there was a strange, warm, numbness in his left leg. He tried to move it, but nothing happened. It didn't take him long to realise that he had broken his leg, and he hoped like hell that someone would find him. Now he would just have to wait...
Falco was hurtling across the quarry, trying to keep one leap ahead of the enormous shockwave behind him that was threatening to rip the land out from underneath him and hurl him into a pitch black chasm. 'Any second now and it's gonna catch up and swallow me...!" he thought, as he almost tripped over a metal rod half embedded in the earth. In the distance (actually, it was only a few meters, but to Falco it seemed like miles) he could see Fox and Slippy waving. He couldn't tell if they were in trouble or not. The rumble behind him got louder, but just as Falco began to think that he wasn't going to make it, there was a high pitched screeching noise, like a thousand rusty bicycle chains, and the ground jarred horribly, before lurching violently forward and then ceasing all movement. The impending split stopped just meters from Falco's feet.
There was a long silence as everybody tried to get their bearings. Fox hauled Slippy to his feet, then helped Katt up. Falco was just staring at the meter wide crack in the ground. He seemed stunned.
"Falco, are you okay?" Fox asked him.
Falco looked up slowly.
"What the hell just happened?" he asked in a voice that wasn't quite his own, it was too quiet.
"Beats me," Fox said, "But...Hey, what was that?"
A low creaking noise had caught his attention.
"Oh my god, look!" Katt cried, so fast that it was almost indecipherable.
Fox and Slippy looked. One of the metal look-out towers was swaying ominously. The ground underneath it was unstable. (And) Falco was standing right underneath it.
"Falco, move! Get out of there!" Fox yelled.
Then everything seemed to happen in slow motion. Katt ran forward to try and pull Falco out of the way, but Fox grabbed her arm and pulled her back.
"Falco!" Katt cried, struggling to free herself from Fox's grip.
Falco span around just in time to see the metal structure rip out of the earth, showering him with dirt. He tried to run but he was frozen to the spot. The tower collapsed around him and then he saw a heavy metal bar swinging straight towards him. The last thought that crossed Falco's mind before it hit him was, 'I'm going to die...', then Katt screamed and a brilliant white light streaked across his vision as the bar hit him and he was thrown to the ground a few meters away, unconscious.
As soon as the dust clouds cleared, Fox, Slippy, and Katt ran forward.
"Oh my god, he's dead!" Katt cried, covering her eyes, unable to look.
Fox knelt down beside his fallen comrade.
"No...no, he isn't. He's still breathing," he assured the panicking felinian, "But I think he's badly hurt."
"Well go and get help then!" Katt cried, "Quickly!"
Fox nodded and quickly sprinted across the quarry, towards the HQ, yelling "Stay there!" over his shoulder. Katt watched him go and then caught Slippy's eye. Slippy saw how upset she was and awkwardly put a hand on her shoulder.
"He'll be okay," he promised.
Katt nodded and sniffed back tears, pulling her jacket tighter around herself as the wind picked up, a cold contrast to the earlier heatwave. She sat down on a metal bar and watched as Slippy took off his own jacket and placed it over Falco. Then she couldn't help herself. She put her head down and cried.
The bright light cleared almost instantly, and Falco looked around him.
'Something's wrong,' he thought, 'I should be dead! Ten tonnes of metal just fell on me!'.
He realised that he was standing on top of a small mound of rocks, about fifteen meters from the fallen lookout tower. He could see Fox, Slippy, and Katt kneeling in the wreckage of the tower, but he couldn't see exactly what was going on. He ran down the hill towards them and stopped about half way down when he realised with a start what they were huddling around. It was an unconscious person. And not just any unconscious person. It was Falco.
Falco's initial thought was the dumbest and most obvious one.
'Hey, that's me down there!'
He stared, dumbfounded and more than a little perplexed as Fox got up and dusted himself off before departing from the small group and sprinting towards the hill. As he got closer, Fox didn't even seem to notice Falco standing there. He was staring straight through him, at the silhouette of the HQ on the horizon, about a mile off in the distance.
Falco frowned, starting to feel seriously spooked. What was going on here?
At the top of the hill, Fox stopped for a moment to catch his breath and decide which way to go. Then he decided on left, ran straight through Falco, and disappeared down the other side of the hill.
Falco stared after him as he disappeared out of view. His mind was a whirl. Firstly, he was here and he could see himself unconscious at the bottom of the hill. (He also noted, with some curiosity, that Katt was crying.) And just now, Fox had run straight through him. (Charming!)
What the hell was happening?
He subconsciously reached to lean on a rock for support, and fell straight through it. He landed hard on his backside, but strangely he didn't feel anything. He got up and stared at the rock. It was an ordinary, SOLID, rock!
He tried again to touch the rock, and his hand passed straight through it.
'Damn you, stupid rock!' he screamed silently, 'you're supposed to be solid!'
He concentrated all his will power on that one thought, 'You are SOLID!' and pushed his palm up against the stone. He felt a momentary burst of glee as he encountered resistance, but the moment he stopped thinking about it, the rock lost it's solidity and Falco almost fell through it again. He slowly mastered the art of persuading the rock to be solid, but it was hard work so he soon gave up the bother.
He was at a loss as to what he should do next, so he just stood there and watched Slippy trying in vain to comfort Katt.
Slippy was starting to get cold. Without his cozy Star Fox bomber jacket, the chill wind seemed to strip him straight to the bone. He tried pacing up and down to warm up, but he felt as if he was slowly freezing to death. The sun peeked out momentarily from behind a dark stormcloud, but it no longer held any warmth. Slippy checked his wristwatch. Fox had been gone almost half an hour, and Slippy was worried. Falco had showed no signs of regaining consciousness, and the cold weather wasn't going to help. He hoped Falco wouldn't catch a chill...
"Slippy! Katt!"
Fox's voice hadn't sounded so welcome in a long time. Fox drew up beside Slippy and took a second to get his breath back. It was obvious that he had ran all the way there and back.
"They can't send a land vehicle over this terrain," he informed Slippy and Katt, who had wandered over too, "But they're going to dispatch a hover vehicle of some description to take him straight to a hospital. It might take a little longer to get here, though, because they weren't prepared for an emergency and there are no 'crafts ready."
"They should always be ready!" Katt said indignantly. Fox noticed that her mascara had smudged slightly, she had obviously been crying, but perhaps now wasn't the best time to mention it.
They sat in silence for several minutes when a thought suddenly struck Fox.
"Bill! Where's Bill?!"
"Oh no! I forgot about him!" Slippy cried, horrified.
"Did you see him when we were running?" Fox asked.
Katt nodded.
"He was running by me, but then I tripped over and I didn't see him after that."
"Well we've got to look for him!" Fox said. "Slip, you stay here with Falco. Katt check that way, I'll see if I can spot him over there."
Slippy and Katt nodded, and Katt launched herself towards the direction Fox had told her to go, calling Bill's name as loudly as she could. Fox went the opposite way, starting a thorough search for his friend. He hoped like hell that Bill was okay...another casualty didn't bear thinking about.
"Bill? Bill! BILL!!!"
Bill's head snapped up as he heard his name being yelled.
"Over here!" he tried to call back, but he only managed a croak that couldn't possibly be heard more than five meters away.
"Bill!!!" the voice continued.
"OVER HERE!"
This time Bill managed to get plenty of power into his voice, resulting in a yell of, "Katt! I've found him!" and then a more directed, "Bill, hang on. I'll be right there."
"Thank goodness, dude!" Bill grinned cheerfully, as Fox's silhouetted head came into view over the top of the pit.
"Bill! Are you okay?" Fox called down. His voice echoed strangely in the confines of the pit.
"No, I think I broke my leg," Bill groaned. He tried again to move it and winced.
"Hold on, we'll get you outta there!" Fox promised. He ran back to see if the hover vehicle had arrived yet. There was a small red blip on the horizon that was rapidly getting closer and Fox felt a surge of relief. He waved frantically, flagging the vehicle over. The craft came to a stop about ten meters away and hovered over the rocks. A couple of medics ran over and Fox told them what had happened. A swarm of medics descended upon Falco, so Fox couldn't see him. Katt tried to push through, but was shoved roughly aside. Fox grimaced and watched as the medics levered Falco onto a stretcher and lifted him into the vehicle. When one of the medics was free, Fox pulled him over.
"Can you help me? Another person is trapped, he fell down a pit. I think he's broken a leg."
"Should have called search and rescue," the medic replied, shrugging, "We're only medics."
"You must be able to help! You can't just leave him there!" Fox was getting worked up.
"I told you, we aint search and rescue..."
"Goddamit! Do something!!" Fox yelled.
The medic flinched. "Alright, alright..."
He dispatched another couple of medics (there seemed an infinite number of them) after Fox, who took them to where Bill was. After trying to get him out using a chain of people, a rope, and then a S&R harness, they had to use a construction site crane to lower a man down and lever Bill out. But they refused to take him in the ambulance and insisted that Fox and co drive him down themselves.
"We've already gone out of our way to help you get him out," the spokesman medic insisted, and after giving Bill a rather rough once-over check, deduced "there's nothing broken, he's just sprained it. You won't have to bother the hospital at all."
Then he and the other medics returned to the ambulance and the vehicle sped off in a cloud of jet fuel.
Fox coughed on the pollution that it spewed out, and stared after it. A low growl formed at the back of his throat, and he had to force it down. He didn't like the nasty and unhelpful attitudes of the medics at all, but they were the only people who could get Falco to a hospital quickly enough.
Fox turned back to Slippy, Katt, and Bill (who was able to limp now), and cleared his throat.
"Right. We'd better get back to the base and tell Peppy what's happened. We can check on Falco later. He'll be okay. I hope the earthquake tremor didn't hit the base. We can't afford to lose any more power, this place is a dump already."
"What a mega bad day to start this project, dude," Bill said, shaking his head sadly.
"Yeah..." Fox agreed, "Let's go."
He took one last look at the devastated construction site: the deep crack in the ground, the piles of scattered rubble that had been so painstakingly transferred from site to site, the fallen lookout tower...then he turned and started the slow walk back to the HQ.
Falco had watched the whole scene and couldn't believe his eyes. Now Fox, Slippy, Katt and Bill (who was using Fox as a sort of crutch to limp along) were heading across the dirt back to the HQ.
'What about me?' Falco thought, 'They don't even know I'm here!'
He watched the weary crew fade into the distance and then sat down on the ground. It was a touch and go process, as the ground kept changing in degrees of solidness, but at least he wasn't falling through it.
Now was a perfect time to consider what the hell was going on. Was he dead? No... from what he had seen, he had been severely injured, knocked out, but not dead. Unconscious... but he had been unconscious before and this had never happened... Perhaps he was dying then. Now that was a disturbing thought. Finally, Falco decided to try to track down his body and find out what was happening to him. The team had left tracks in the dirt, and there was no wind to cover them, so it would be easy to follow. Determined to discover what was going on, he got up... and then the world around him burst into a painfully brilliant white light. His last thought before his surroundings faded from sight was 'Oh boy... not again!'
Katt yawned and blinked, but she couldn't shake the tiredness nor the headache that was lingering over her eyes. The others had retired to their quarters for the night, but Katt knew that however tired she was, she wouldn't be able to sleep. The glare from the computer screen in front of her aggravated the dull ache in her head, but she refused to draw her attention away from it. Furiously she typed, deleted, paragraphed, and typed some more. But less than an hour later, her efforts looked like a hopelessly scrambled merge of semisufficient ideas so she deleted the file and started over. She was still typing at 4:00 am when Peppy passed by on his way to the kitchen to make some coffee.
"Have you been up all night?" he inquired politely.
"Yup," Katt replied, turning to face him.
Peppy could instantly see how gaunt she looked, pale and with dark rings under her eyes, although that could also be smudges of mascara, but Katt definitely looked tired.
"I think you should try and get at least a few hours sleep," Peppy advised.
"No...it's okay...I'll be alright..." Katt insisted, but she didn't stop Peppy from herding her out of the study and down the corridor to her room.
"Sleep well!" he called, as he shut the door on her.
Returning to the kitchen, Peppy passed by the study and realised that the computer Katt had been using was still on. As he went over to turn it off, he noticed that the file Katt had been working on had only six words, written in bold and underlined- Why does life suck so much?
Shaking his head, Peppy cancelled the file and switched off the computer at the mains before trotting off to the kitchen to make his coffee.
Despite her late night, Katt was already awake and in the VIP breakfast lounge before Fox, Slippy and Bill got there. She was staring into her cereal and stirring it occasionally with her spoon but not actually eating any of it. The moment Fox walked in, her head snapped up. But before she could even ask the question, Fox nodded.
"I phoned the hospital this morning first thing, Katt," he said tiredly, rubbing his eyes, "They said he's in a stable condition but he hasn't regained consciousness yet. It's kinda touch and go at the moment."
"Oh."
Katt sighed, visibly disappointed. Fox frowned. The atmosphere in the room dipped into a dangerously low depression... then Bill came bounding in.
"Hey dudes, check out the new look!" he grinned, showing off a neon-green ankle-support with an orange lightening bolt across it strapped around his injured ankle.
Fox blinked and shielded his eyes.
"Gee Bill...it's...er... bright!"
"I know," Bill beamed, "But it was the only one of the designs in the kids department that fitted!"
"Er...Bill? Why did you get it from the kids department?" Fox asked, a slightly incredulous look spreading across his face.
"Well, the adult ones only come in grey and white!" Bill explained.
Fox tapped the side of his head, indicating severe dementia.
"I suppose that explains the Pinky the Panther plasters and the circus design neck collar too..."
"Yup! You can't beat Pinky the Panther for highly entertaining comic antics!" Bill declared, raising his hand in a 'Eureka!' style pose.
"Whatever..." Fox muttered, not able to help an amused smile from creeping across his muzzle.
At that moment, a rather flustered Slippy (still in his pyjamas) came running in, practically colliding into the table.
"Fox! There's a.... it's.... the... the...it's a...!!!" he gasped, trying to fit several complex sentences into a couple of seconds.
Fox grabbed his shoulders and shook him.
"Now, Slippy, start again. What's the problem?"
"The computers! The mainframe! A virus! The power reactor core! I don't know the code!"
Again Slippy spoke at hyper-speed, but this time Fox could make out the keywords.
"What do you mean you don't know the code? You know everything there is to know about computers! Can't you override it?"
"No! Someone altered the code last night. From terminal 15," Slippy explained.
"Was anyone using the computers last night?" Fox enquired.
"I was," Katt mumbled, raising her hand like a schoolchild who is being asked a question and knows the answer but is reluctant to say.
Fox looked accusingly at her. Katt leapt up.
"Hey!!! Are you saying I did it?! Changed the code?!" she demanded, "Heck! I don't even know how to change a code!"
"Woah! Calm down missus!" Bill cried, restraining her with one strong muscled arm, "You're gettin' too hot-headed!"
'Too much like Falco for comfort...' Fox agreed to himself, 'And I don't need any more hassle so someone shut the bitch up!'
Katt stop howling but glared at Fox with a glower that expressed both hurt and anger at an unfair accusation.
'Please don't look at me like that...' Fox thought, glaring back, 'I'm pissed off enough as it is!'
The stare-out between Katt and Fox continued for several moments, until Slippy chimed in with, "Please! Can we just sort this thing out before the reactor fuses!"
Fox looked down at the ground, slightly ashamed at his own behaviour.
"Yeah, let's go see what's wrong."
Katt bit her lip and followed the other three out of the room. Peppy, however, was fast asleep in his armchair and nobody had noticed...
The next thing Falco was aware of, after the flash of white light, was the feeling of being deposited somewhere. A split second later and his vision returned, and he instantly knew that he was in his quarters at the base.
'Am I alive now?' he thought, sitting down on the bed. But to his dismay, the bed didn't creak or even give slightly as he sat, instead he fell through again.
'Drat!' he thought, 'But how did I get here? I just thought about getting back to the HQ...and here I am! Cool!'
But the feeling of glee didn't last, as a piercing blast of noise intruded the peaceful silence of his room. A familiar siren; Red Alert.
'Bill's put a pretzel in the coin-slot on the soft-drinks machine again, hasn't he?' Falco thought to himself dryly, not suspecting any major catastrophe.
Bored, he decided to try and track down someone he knew. Anyone. Just someone. Maybe if he tried hard enough, they would notice him and help him get back.
It didn't take long. They were all in the computer room. Katt was in the computer chair, trying to reconstruct the setup of the computer as she last recalled it from the night before. Unsuccessfully.
After an hour of fruitless searching for a wrongly entered command, everyone except Katt went for a break. Slippy to the library to look up alternative codes, Fox to the mess hall, and Bill to the surf simulator in the gym. The urgency of the situation seemed to have dissolved somewhat.
But Katt remained where she was, staring at the screen.
"They still think it's my fault, don't they?" she muttered outloud, "Well it's not! It's not!"
In frustration she slammed her fist down on the mouse, clicking it by accident. What she didn't notice was the fact that she had clicked on a small icon in the status bar at the bottom of the screen. It was a built in time-bomb, and now a countdown to system shut down had began. However, Katt was no longer looking at the screen where the instruction "Press Esc to abort!" read, above the countdown, which had began at 3mins45 but was slowly ticking away.
'Oh fuck!' Falco thought, slamming his fist down on the Escape key whilst willing it to be solid, but the key didn't budge.
'I can't move anything!' he realised, 'I gotta get Katt to do it!....But she can't hear me...'
"Well I gotta try..." he finished outloud. "KATT!!! OI KATT!!!! HELLO???"
No response. Katt had her head buried in her hands and showed no signs of budging.
Annoyed and getting worried as the counter ticked away, Falco tried to shake her, but to no avail.
"Please Katt! Look up!" Falco pleaded, but she remained blissfully unaware of his presence. The counter was at 1min53 and dropping. Falco passed his hand in front of her face, and to his surprise she flinched, as if feeling a cold breeze. Encouraged, Falco passed his hand through her shoulder. Katt shivered and looked up and around, seeming spooked.
"Yes! Good girl!" Falco exclaimed, "Now look at the screen!"
But Katt got up and headed for the door, looking nervously about her as she did.
"Nooo Katt! Go back! GO BACK!!!" Falco yelled, and tried to shove her in the direction of the computer. Unfortunately, something went horribly wrong and he went flying through her and across the room.
Katt felt a chill go right through her, freezing her to the bone, and it was a peculiar sensation that she'd never experienced before.
"What the heck was that?" she murmured to herself, looking across the room for an air vent where the ice cold draft could be coming from. The counter now read 0mins39.
"GOD KATT HIT THE ESCAPE BUTTON ON THE COMP!!!" Falco screamed frantically, but inside fearing it was too late.
Then Katt saw a vent beneath the computer and went to investigate. Suddenly she saw the countdown sequence on the screen and shrieked.
"Dearest Katt, now is NOT A GOOD TIME TO PANIC!" Falco screeched.
Katt stopped in her tracks, quivering.
"Falco?"
"YES!" Falco yelled, "Just hit the escape key! PLEASE!"
Then Katt hit escape and the countdown stopped at 0mins23.
But Falco had no time to gloat or feel good because he was suddenly aware of a tugging sensation, then a darkness closed in on him...then nothing for a long, long time.
Katt collapsed into the comfy computer chair, her fur soaked with sweat and her heart racing. She wasn't sure what had just happened, but if she hadn't turned back to investigate the air vent, the chances were that there'd be a central core melt-down and she (plus all the others) would be a goner.
Peppy chose that moment to return to the study with Slippy in tow, carrying a pile of computer manuals higher than him.
"Hey Katt! You found the virus and disabled it!" Slippy cried happily, dancing around the study whilst balancing the books.
"What did you do?" Peppy asked calmly.
"I don't know..." breathed a white-faced Katt. Peppy finally noticed her haunted expression.
"Why Katt, whatever's wrong?"
Katt took a deep breath and smiled weakly.
"Nothing's wrong... just tired... that's all..."
And with that, she excused herself from the room.
Three days passed in what seemed like seconds. Katt was praised as a heroine, and although she never told anyone what happened, she was convinced that something weird had saved her and everyone else's lives.
Fox had declared the 'quake site safe and work on it had resumed. Bill's ankle had healed and he was back driving diggers around the site and surfing on the minor tremors that the larger machines sent through the ground in their near vicinity. Slippy had discovered a website proxy server and was linking up a site to ArSpace Dynamics, the company endorsed by his father Beltino Toad, an acclaimed businessman in the present society. Peppy spent his time indoors, continuing development plans and staying in radio contact with the rest of the team. And at this precise moment, Katt was on the phone trying to get through to the Corneria City Central Hospital. After nine attempts, she slammed down the phone. It was constantly engaged.
'It's busy hours', she reasoned to herself, 'I'll try again later'.
But that didn't stop her going back to the phone less than three minutes later.
Finally a tired sounding receptionist answered the phone.
"Hello? Can I help?"
"Yeah, I'd like to inquire about someone," Katt said.
The receptionist sounded ticked off.
"Sorry hun, there's been an explosion at a chemical plant and casualties are pouring in, this is an emergency line. Bye."
Then she hung up.
Katt was speechless, holding the phone to her ear for several moments after the cut-off tone sounded. Then she stormed into the sitting room where Peppy was sipping his coffee and taking notes on an article in the newspaper.
"Peppy!" Katt said, glowering, "They wouldn't let me speak to anyone at the hospital to find out how Falco is! They said they're too busy! Can you believe that!"
Peppy didn't look up from his paper.
"That's probably because of an influx of patients after the explosion at the Jeopardy Science and Nuclear Physics Laboratory in outer Corneria City," he stated matter-of-factly.
"How did you know that?" Katt asked, gobsmacked.
Peppy lifted his newspaper to show the cover and the headlines:- CC News: Hundreds hurt in Chemical Explosion, state hospital under heavy pressure due to influx
"Oh," Katt said, stumped.
"It was because of the same virus we got hit by," Peppy continued, "A small icon that hides in the status bar with a built in timer that can only be switched off if someone notices it, activates it, and terminates it. I guess they didn't see it. We're lucky you did."
'But I didn't,' Katt thought, 'It was an accident! But hey! If it gives me status and respect in StarFox, then it can't hurt to take the praise...'
She was interrupted from her thoughts when Peppy suddenly said, "The virus could also be responsible for the earthquake, you know."
"But how?" a perplexed Katt asked, "This is a well known 'quake zone, it was probably natural! There was a 'quake last year too, wasn't there?"
"Yes, but by infecting meteorological stations, the virus can affect the nuclear-physics that determine when, where, and in what precise proximity an earthquake will strike. It's like a trigger," Peppy explained, using gestures as emphasis.
"Okay...I'll pretend I understood what you just said..." Katt murmured, "But right now I'm going down to the hospital to get some answers. Tell Fox where I am if he gets back before me."
"Is it a good idea to go in the middle of a crisis?" Peppy asked.
Katt's determined glare answered the question and put a full stop on the end too. Peppy raised his hands in surrender.
"Okay, but don't get in the way of people..."
Peppy's lecture was wasted as Katt was already gone.
The transport Katt took was stuffy and crowded, and she was more than a little relieved when it stopped. Getting off carefully, so as not to dirty her dress on the dirty rails that were publicly used, she walked the remaining 200 or so feet to the hospital. Even before she entered the grounds, it was obvious that there had been a major catastrophe. The injured were being offloaded by the dozen, corpses in bodybags being zipped up, and fretting relatives swarming the area like wasps at a picnic. There was even a distinct smell of despair. Not nice. All Katt wanted to do was visit her 'boyfriend', but even getting inside the building would take some cunning. Crouching behind a trolley, she waited for the automatic doors to open again and then darted inside. Under the roof of the building, things seemed even worse. Cornerian citizens were milling around aimlessly, some with hankies to their eyes, others holding each other for support. In the background a girl was screaming "No! He can't be dead! He wasn't even hit by the blast! He just had a broken wrist!" and a nurse gently but firmly stating that the worker had been killed by delayed radiation poisoning. Even as she watched, an elderly hound with a blood-soaked towel held against his temple pushed past, coughing violently and spraying a fine mist of red vapour from his mouth into the air. Katt gagged and stepped back, almost knocking a nurse over as she hurried past with her clipboard on her way to a ward.
Katt watched the scene for several minutes, thinking that it wasn't unlike the medical drama's she enjoyed watching at home, except the doctors here weren't as good-looking and the special effects were real.
The queue at the reception desk stretched right round the waiting room and progress was slow as the receptionist had to deal with constant phone calls as well. The thought of waiting in a queue for two hours was Katt's idea of hell: - stuffy air, people coughing and choking, heat... it wasn't going to happen. Katt barged her way to the front. The receptionist gave her a dirty look.
"Could you please wait your turn," she said gruffly, before turning to the next person in line. Angrily, Katt slammed her hand down on the bell three times.
"I just want to know where the wards are where I can find someone who was brought in three days ago!" she cried.
Annoyed, the receptionist swung an arm in the vague direction of a corridor then proceeded to ignore Katt again.
"Hello!!??" Katt demanded, ringing the bell again. The receptionist looked like a thundercloud that is about to burst. She tapped a comlink on her desk and another, nicer-looking woman trotted over to the desk.
"This little girl is looking for someone," the receptionist told her, "Take her away from me!"
"I'm not a little girl!" Katt objected, "I'm seventeen!"
"Alright...now who are you looking for?" the woman, a beaver with an oversized nose, asked, placing a hand on Katt's arm and speaking as though to a retard.
"You're patronising me," Katt complained.
"Sorry," the woman apologised, removing her hand, "Now what exactly is the problem..."
It didn't take long to find the right ward, the corridors on this side of the hospital were relatively uncrowded, but Katt complained the whole time and she was sure that the nurse was glad to leave after she deposited her outside the ward. Tenitivly, Katt eased open the door and tiptoed in. Although she had phoned the hospital about three times a day everyday since the accident, this was the first time she had actually visited Falco. She wasn't quite sure what to expect as she walked closer to the bed. She was instantly relieved to see that he wasn't hooked up to any huge machines, only a small monitor recording his heart beat and breathing. Katt crept even closer. Falco didn't look unconscious. He looked like he was in a natural sleep. He even had that semi-frown that indicates when someone is dreaming. Katt knelt down by the bed and sighed. The silence of the room, only punctuated by the soft hum of the electric lights and her own soft breathing, was getting to her. She had to break it.
"Hey..." she whispered, "Wake up Feather-Butt... it's me..."
There was no response so she grabbed his hand with her paw and squeezed it.
"Wake up, damn you!" she hissed in frustration, "Why do you always do this to me! I hate you!"
The threats didn't seem to have an effect, so Katt leaned over and kissed his cheek.
"There. Now you have to wake up..." she murmured.
The first thing Falco was aware of after an eternity of nothingness was pain. A dull ache in the back of his head that seemed to radiate right through him. For a while, that was all he was aware of. Then sound started to filter through, hazy and muffled like a poor quality radio transmission at first, but it got consistently clearer within moments. He wasn't sure he recognised the voice though. Then an incredibly strong smell hit him and he instantly recognised it as Katt's perfume. Katt was there, somewhere. The smell got closer and then he felt something brush against his cheek.
"There. Now you have to wake up..."
Katt sounded upset. Falco tried to piece together what was happening.
Katt grabbed hold of his hand again. Now was a good time to let her know he was there...
Katt yelped as her friend's hand closed around hers.
"Falco?"
Falco groaned and shifted slightly, then his eyes fluttered open.
"Katt..." he murmured groggily, "What the hell..."
Katt whooped. Falco winced.
"Not so loud...!"
"Sorry..." Katt whispered.
Falco tried to lever himself into a sitting position and was rewarded with an attack of dizziness.
"Damn," he cursed as he lay back down, then suddenly he remembered something.
"Katt! What happened about the Red Alert? The virus?"
Katt furrowed her brow in confusion.
"How do you know about that? You weren't there!"
Now it was Falco's turn to be confused.
"I don't know... but I remember you stopped the countdown at 23 seconds."
"That's right," Katt said, "But you weren't there so how do you know about that?"
There was a moment of silence then both Katt and Falco spoke at the same time.
"That's weird!"
"That's strange!"
Katt giggled and Falco rolled his eyes at her.
"You're the weird one, Katt. Oh and by the way...nice perfume!"
THE END