Codex Entry: Lylat: History: Apparoid Crisis: The Apparoid Crisis was a War between the extra-systemic Xenomorphs known as the Apparoids. Capable of using a form of FTL Travel capable of penetrating the Greater Wall Belt, and directing bio-synthetic War Machines into the heart of the Lylat system. This incident allowed the death toll from this incident to scale rapidly, Surpassing the total death toll of the Andross Incident three fold. All traces of the species were annihilated when a virus was injected into their hive mind in their central home-world, utilizing a vastly over-powered gate jump to reach it, and a select team of mercenaries and military professionals planted the Viral-Bomb, triggering a self destruct code in the bio-synthetic machines.

Location: O'Donnell Arms Factory, Alabaster, Artuslu, Zoness

Time: 2171 Cornerian Standard Year, 25th May, 15:30 SST

Wolf O'Donnell looked at the three small headstones, sighing. He still had more to make. They didn't have their own graves in the city graveyard. This rotted hunk of laser burned glass and steel had served as their grave marker for years.

Of course, Wolf, now, looking at the three headstones – His Father, grandfather, and his foster sister – felt the remorse for his loss like a sharp knife, slashing into his heart and pulling it out inch by painful inch. He sighed, loud and long, as he heard the sound of an approaching vehicle.

He turned around, looking at the road to the ruins – he couldn't tell how many there were, but, a group of young punks – mostly Wolves, like most Zonessians – were accelerating up the short slope. As they saw him, they began to whoop and holler. He sighed. "Idiots..." The group of boys and girls let their bikes swing around him in a circle, hooping and hollering as they tried to intimidate him.

As they slowed down, and got off, they yipped and yowled, howling at him, banging their bats on ruined pieces of metal, slapping chains against the ground, trying to spook him. Then they got quiet as a really tall and burly son of a bitch came up, his black fur barely showing up in the dim forest light. Wolf didn't even look up at him. "Lookie here, lookie here! Someone let their feral get loose, eh boys?"

Wolf wasn't intimidated in the slightest by this. The whole charade – It was just pups trying to show how big and bad they were. Lungs full of hot air, and skulls full of mush, fresh out of their schools, trying to show off. He was like that, once.

Lylans grew up fast. At 10, they were technically sexually mature, and by 14, they were expected to have a college degree or have completed a specialization in military school. But Wolf, in his older, more wizened age, thought that it was bull shit. Fourteen years of life experience, no matter how intelligent his race was, was hardly enough time to have accumulated to the wisdom necessary to be an adult.

"Nah, boss, it's probably that kid from school. What's his name? Maxwell?"

"Oh, Mackerel, huh? Think you're all big and tough, mackerel?" The boss flipped Wolf's hat off, and suddenly, they all got quiet. They looked at him, wondering who the fuck this guy was. "What are you doing here, old timer?"

Like Wolf thought. No wisdom, all balls.

He finally spoke up. Wolf's voice was harsh, grating, and filled with a rugged rumble. "Old timer? I'd like to know what a bunch of high school fuck ups like you are doing on my property?" Wolf raised his eyes to the boss of the gang gracefully – the kind of motion that threatens people. The movement of a predator, sizing up his prey.

"YOUR Property? Feh, bull shit, This is Razor territory!" He heard the gang hoop and holler. "You're a little lost, old man! You need to get back to the -Ghuck!-"

It was time to intimidate this little shit.

Wolf tightened his grip around the bigger, heavier man's throat as he slowly lifted him off the ground in one hand. The rest of the gang snarled loudly, and geared up to charge – but they backed off when they saw the blaster pressed against the side of their Boss's head. "... Feh. Waste of ammo." He muttered, and tossed the blaster one way, and the kid another, his cloak opening up, and revealing the wolf underneath as he got low and began to charge, undoing his cloak's clasp as he ran towards one of the kids.

The young man he rushed took a healthy, hard swing for his head – but he didn't expect Wolf to go on all fours, and then leap onto him. The Poor, unsuspecting youth screamed in agony as he felt Wolf bite clean through his ear as he delivered a bone cracking punch right to his stomach. The kid lost his wind as he went over backwards, the older, more experienced Wolf O'Donnell jumped off of him, and barely pulled himself into a standing position, looking at the others in the circle he'd just broken. The boss staggered up, holding his throat. "GET HIM!" he said in an attempt to scream, the rasp of his voice coming out as a croak. Wolf smirked.

A chain came in from his right, but Wolf just let it wrap around his arm and snap against his Leather Duster's sleeve. He snagged the chain with his hand, pulling the kid close to him as he raised his left leg, and smashed the kid in the side of the face with a roundhouse kick. The kid was out cold, leveled in a single move. He pulled the chain free of the brat's grip, smirking. Another reached him, swinging his Baseball Bat like a madman. Wolf Ducked the first swing, and snarled as the second barely pulled at the leather. He got ready to swing the chain to hit the kid's legs, but another chain, held by one of his assailants, came smashing across his back. Leather might help cushion the blow, but damn that still hurt.

He snarled, taking a swing of the bat to his right arm. It stung, but the kid swinging had very little real technique. The elder lupine's roll with the hit got him off easy, just a really bad bruise. He ducked the chain again, and jumped, barely dodging the bat wielder's swing for his legs. He shot his hand out, catching the batter in the face, eliciting a sound much like a ten story belly flop with a quick backhand punch and sent him stumbling away to the ground in defeat.

He grabbed the Chain kid's elbow as he prepared to swing again, and pulled him to the right, putting him right in line with another brat's swing with the steel piped – it caught him across the face, and sent him down quick. Wolf snatched at the Second downed kid's chain, pulling it tight and using it to block the Pipe a second time. The stunned youngster stared at the chain intercepting his pipe assisted bash and gulped. Wolf wrapped the chain around and up to pull the pipe out of the kid's grip.

He stumbled back, even before Wolf snapped the chain at him twice, across each knee. The kid dropped, and grunted, too surprised to feel the pain – and truly shocked as the older wolf pulled on the chain, sending the pipe Rotating into the pup's chin, knocking him out cold, simultaneously releasing the chain to his grip, so that he had a pair of the heavy metal lengths.

Wolf snarled, backing up, slipping into a fighting stance this time. "Really unfair, Ain't it, pups?" He smirked, and tossed the two chain lengths aside, and raised his hand. "Come on then." He beckoned them on with a motion of his hand.

The moment between his taunt in the heat of battle, and the moment it resumed stilled the air. The more calm parts of Wolf's mind silently begged the Goddess for an old, grainy, black and white camera and poor dubbing in Venomian. The wind that whistled through the ruins, stirring dust just made it too perfect. This would make an excellent Moon-Claw movie.

They screamed, and charged again, holding their weapons like they were the extras about to get their asses kicked. Wolf just laughed. His thoughts were barely gracing the surface of his mind as he watched the movements, muscles acting on their own.

First kid, chain, high to the right, duck, right hand to the sternum, sweep his legs, step to the right, turn with left backhand, smash second in the ear – missed. Compensate with duck and sweep to the right, take down the third. Two steps forward, left to the rib cage, right to the lower stomach, fourth – Ghck! Pipe, barely missed. Roll out, regroup!

Wolf snarled as he came up from his roll, mind still sizzling with the training he had received as a child. His heavily awarded father used to be the butt of a few odd 'fact' jokes. Of course, Wolf was better than him...

The next kid to come in was just screaming his head off, trying to smash the older, more experienced wolf across the face with his pipe – but seeing it in your head, and actually hearing the savage bark of a furre cornered by a group of kids were two totally different things. And of course, what's worse, is feeling the selfsame wolf wrap his fangs around your neck, and squeeze hard enough to bruise and hurt, but not tear the flesh, and then feeling his left hand smash right in your chest, sending you backwards, fur barely able to hit the ground before you smashed into two of your buddies behind you is completely, completely different.

The kid Shrieked in terror as Wolf gnashed his teeth again, sending the trio of kids nearest him reeling back. The smell of piss slammed Wolf's nostrils, and he nearly gagged on it, the bright yellow stain covering the stupid kid's crotch and ass, leaving Wolf with a momentary sense of revulsion.

Pissing one's self in war? Acceptable. When one is locked up from a concussion, stuck in the pugilist's stance? Acceptable. When terrified of a psychotic, murder machine furre who had yet to actually kill anyone?

… He lazily reached the conclusion that is was possibly somewhat kind of acceptable. He gnashed his teeth again, and the kid passed out. There, better.

Lull in the action. Breathe. Inhale... exhale... He reminded himself how to act in combat, his older age, vastly increased experience, and general badassery had allowed his brain to run away with his sense of self preservation and combat instincts.

Move! Instinct ripped through him as the boss of the gang fired his blaster right next to Wolf's body, the more agile, older lupine looking at the brat incredulously. And then, Wolf started to growl. "Oh FUCK!" One of the kids near wolf said, smelling the scent spike in Wolf's body. It wasn't fear. It was FURY.

That mother fucking piece of shit! Waste of goddess-be-damned afterbirth! Useless knuckle duster baby! He fucking shot at me.

Kids screamed as Wolf cut loose, bloody instincts roaring to the surface. Tempered only by the O'Donnell sense of justice, Wolf had turned into a killing machine. Two instincts roared through his mind ,the only things driving his combat trained body. Protect the pack. Protect yourself. After that, his mind was utterly blank. His motions were concise and brutal, powerful and unrestrained. Thinking in a battle got you killed.

Wolf was the poster child of blind fury. Guided less by sight and more by smell and sound now, he could smell the fear – the scent of an animal pissing it's self is sheer terror, the sound of every excited heartbeat around him. That intoxicating scent of a prey creature, walled in, unable to fight back.

"ROAAAARRRR!" The lion's roar of a battle call alerted him to a new combatant. He instantly stopped his pursuit of the nearest, bratty punk, and turned, an older, fitter Lion, male and furious, charged him. But Wolf had lost himself to the predator's instinct. The movement was brutal, and the attack, nearly fatal. The lion had his claws out, readying a broad slash at Wolf's face, but the kid wasn't braced for a counter attack, like a fool.

Wolf ducked down, and spread his jaws wide as he lunged up, his claws readied and locked, smashing into the younger, and vastly stupider, lion pup's ribs, knocking the air out of him as his jaws smashed into the kid's throat. Puncture wounds and bloody trails were left behind as Wolf rolled with the kid's jump, planting his combat boot right in the brat's manhood, and sending him flipping head over heels over his back.

Wolf continued his roll as he released the kid, and came up on all fours, charging the biggest, most challenging prey he could spot. The blaster bolt ripped through his left shoulder, scorching bone and flesh as Wolf let the ecstasy of the hunt overwhelm him. Wolf wasn't afraid to admit it – the violence was not arousing, but it was intimate. It was pleasurable. It was exciting!

This was it – the kill stroke. TheCoup de grace! He rushed against the big wolf, who suddenly screamed in terror. Wolf smirked. Blood rushed through him like a torrent, a parade of life's force pulsed under his claws as he leaped onto the young man, and bared his teeth, lunging for life's sweet, sweet sustaining liquid.

As he prepared to issue the kiss of death, to tear his fangs into the pup's throat, and shake him like he'd shake a game rabbit, he stopped. He panted, loud and low, his fangs, as sharp as a tack right now – or, at least, they felt that sharp against the pup's pulsing, fevered throat – wouldn't close. The predator in him screamed for dominance, tearing for the surface, screaming, scratching, clawing, tearing at the uppermost layers of his mind – and then, silence. His mind rested. Easy. Silent. Quiet.

That inner demon he battled with, his hate, his rage, his fury... He pushed it down. Quashed the inner fire bringing all the turmoil of his past to the surface. He refused to use it as a crutch any more. He wasn't Wolf O'Donnell, terror of the space lanes, lord of pirates, demon of the night, or any such fool moniker. He was -just- Wolf O'Donnell, terrible victim of circumstance and pain.

The sound of a voice reached his ears as the sound of his pulse... and the pulse of his prey... faded away. "Pleasedon'..." The stench of fear assailed his nose, and he snarled, silencing the boy. He slowly stood up, looking at the kid. "Shut up." he said quietly, the battle-high fading as he locked away the predator he'd let himself become. "You don't get to speak to me. You don't get to beg for your - "

"DIE!" The kid pulled the blaster up, ready to fire – but Wolf was faster. The kid gurgled as he fired the gun wildly into the air, his arms gripped at the elbows, broken apart as Wolf berried his claws between bones, and tightened his fangs to the point he felt the kid's larynx snap – a soft cracking in his mouth.

The others fled. The sound of revving motorcycles assaulted his still too tender ears. The sensation of gravel hitting his body covered him, enveloped him as he watched the cowards flee the scene from the corner of his eye.

The gun in the boy's hand went off again, Wolf shook his head. The boy screamed. He shook harder. The scream took on a bloody, wet tone, the sound tore though his body, and Wolf jerked his head up, pulling the younger wolf's throat out. He panted, blood covering his muzzle, as the young man expired. Wolf sighed, and closed his eyes. "... Another dead, on these grounds..."


Wolf looked at the small pile of rocks, and the piece of wood, carved by his claws in Venomian Kanji. "A life, too soon taken, for his own folly. Rest peacefully." Wolf read it back to himself, and sighed.

He couldn't take a life like had just then. Never once in his dreams had he done something... so foul. His fangs... his mind... his very soul had betrayed him. The predator within had emerged victorious. But the part that made him sick... is that the primal, savage side of his mind, hadn't been what killed be boy.

I remember. I remember what I thought when I shook him as I tore his throat open. I thought... that he was too young. That he was just a fool, caught up in his own ego... but... Now, I know who he was. A son. A brother. A man who had his problems. He was sick in the head... but that gave me no right. It's different, in war, as a mercenary... I always thought that... but now... Am I really so different? Am I supposed to excuse myself, with pretty words on a stick? I took that man's life. But, it was kill, or be killed... I can't forget... and I won't forgive myself... So I will remember. I will not ever CHOOSE to take a life like that. I...

He sat down, and cried. The other, more reasonable, more factual side of him knew. It wasn't a choice he made. It was the Kid's choice. The young man made the choice for him. The savage, the hunter within acted to preserve his own life, rather than show mercy to another predator who would not leave his territory. But still... Wolf cried.