Falling Star

Part 8

Exhale. As if trapped under water until that moment, Fox broke from his comatose state to a coat of blinding diffuse light breaking through the overcast above him, and the smell of burning metal and wire filling the cockpit. A wince of pain having passed from the adjustment, he rubbed the disorientation from his eyes and took a moment to look himself up and down, feeling for any sign of injury, internal or otherwise. Nothing, save for a minute tingling sensation which pervaded his entire body, and a chill that ran up his spine, dredging memories of swimming in ice water as a kid. Bringing his hands to view in front of him, the particularly muted feeling at the very tips of his fingers became apparent. Pondering on some kind of justification to this, his visual focus slowly shifted from his hand to what lay beyond. It was then that something of greater immediate concern occurred to him, staring back at him from beyond his mangled cockpit. His gaze, stricken with morbid curiosity, kept him as he opened the canopy.

Stepping out onto the mound of agitated gravel cradling the Arwing, its volume a culmination from an angled point of impact some distance behind them, his eyes befell the unmistakable carpet of grass. Green grass, and massive evergreen trees sprouting from a nearby tree line which encompassed him abreast a backdrop of jagged, ice crowned mountain peaks; blankets of fog sweeping through the valleys between. The overpowering silence on the backdrop of occasional gusts of hollow wind, however, occupied him most of all. Even the Arwing, crippled where it lay, was still. Scars of intense struggled riddled its exterior, and overheat emanated from its hull, yet it gave no indication of anything mechanically detrimental.

Spooked by the ominous atmosphere, Fox lept up the mound and back into the Arwing's cockpit. His eyes darting back and forth from control module to tree line, he attempted to get it started. Nothing; not even a desperate choke for life. However, the faint illumination of the control interface upon the attempted ignition meant electricity remained in some capacity. Picking his visor up off the cockpit floor, he threw it around his head and began transmitting.

"CRN Tredegar, this is Fox McCloud of the Great Fox, over." he began, finding his throat unusually dry as he spoke. "CRN Tredegar, do you copy?" Naught but a thin static replied. Shifting back to the control interface, he diverted what power he could salvage to the comms relay, boosting the signal as much as he could. Still, only the drone of cosmic radiation answered his call. Plopping back down into his seat, curiosity turned to confusion, an undertone of fear swiftly washing over him. Even an underpowered relay would be able to reach a friendly ship in orbit. This was assuming, of course, that he had indeed found himself on the surface of Titania, a notion the feasibility of which had long since wavered. Returning once more to the interface, a seemingly just as farfetched notion having occurred to him, he adjusted the output frequency. Having last tuned to it at the onset of the Cornerian invasion, he hoped he had remembered it correctly.

"Corneria Terrestrial Guard, come in," he began again, "this is Fox McCloud of the Great Fox, are there any outposts receiving me?" His heart racing as he lifted his finger from the input button, a horrifying reality befell him as yet again he was met with the empty wail of static. An urge to vomit crept up on him as he slowly exited the Arwing, anxiously scanning the tree line for signs of potentially hostile life. Just as he was about to collapse onto the base of the gravel mound, a distant memory of days past in basic training caught him. Every recruit had undergone survival training, despite the notoriously low probability of them ever needing to use it for any extended period of time. This was no time to fall victim to panic, and the reassurance of his having apparently cheated death filled him with a newfound determination as he pulled his blaster from its holster and checked its battery. Seventy-one percent.

"Great day to forget to charge it," Fox groaned, slipping it back onto his waist as he planned a path through the forest before him. Water, food shelter. Water, food, shelter. This descending order of basic necessities dominated his thoughts as he entered the threshold of the alien flora. That is, until his ears perked upwards, catching the emergence of a distant hum. Behind him, no, above.

Squinting to find any break through the cloud cover, he could only watch and listen as the hum turned to an aery roar. A microburst of pressurized agitation developed in the overcast, and from it began a rain of fire and metal. The ground beneath him shuddered, and its roar only intensified as ever increasingly large bits of artificial machinations descended from the heavens. Though they landed easily days' worth of walking in distance from him, their impact sent palpable shockwaves through the planet surface. Then, as if sentient of some great threat, the same agitation above turned to a chasm opening up in the sky. An adrenaline-fueled fascination overcame Fox as his eyes refused to break from what could only be described as most of what used to be the Troades crashing to the very planet he needed to escape in a cascade of flame and scrap metal. A gust of wind whipped up from its dramatic effect on local atmospheric pressure rustled Fox's cold fur as he watched it disappear behind one of the many mountain ranges surrounding his crash site, his feet sensing the unmistakable thrush of its impact. Stamping out the opposite facing tracks of his previous steps, he made for its landing site.