A/N: Sorry for the cliffy but at least it got people to review again. And I am happy to see that most of you aren't heartless. Started this one a bit late, and now to the chapter!

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Katt jumped out of the cockpit and ran to Falcos downed arwing. The crash devastated the arwing. The back end was almost completely destroyed by the missile blast; there were pieces of engine and other arwing pieces strewn across the blowing sand. The front end was crushed upward from the force of the crash. The canopy glass was shattered in places. Katt looked through a large hole in the canopy and saw Falco. Katt climbed over the smoking wreckage to the cockpit. Katt was afraid to push the glass into the cockpit, fearing it would hit Falco. Instead Katt grabbed the glass and pulled it out. While pulling out the glass Katt felt a knick from one of the glass shards. Quickly pulling away her hand Katt saw a cut across her hand. Blood trickled down her hand and onto her wrist. Ignoring the flowing blood and pain, Katt worked on. While she pulled at the glass a raging battle had started overhead. Katt didn't hear any of it; she was focused on her goal. The glass was finally removed and Katt wasted no time. She reached into the cockpit and grabbed Falco under the arms, pulling him out swiftly and placing him on the ground next to the arwing's wreckage. Falco wasn't responsive. Falco had a large wound on his forehead and gashes on his chest, arms and legs. Blood was coming from his wounds, but Katt saw his chest move, he was unconscious. Katt felt hope surge through her body as she placed a bloody hand on his chest. There was a heartbeat! Katt seemed to regain the power of thought and started to work on the wound on Falco's head; the other wounds didn't seem serious enough to cause much harm. Katt used a knife on her belt to cut a piece of her suit from her leg into a long strip. Katt's leg was whipped by the flying sand. Katt cringed but continued tending to Falco. She placed the strip of suit across Falco's head and tied it at the back to stop the bleeding.

Falco moved his head to one side and grimaced. Lifting his head slightly he opened his eyes for a second. He groaned and then let his head fall back. Tears welled in Katt's eyes as she looked down at Falco. Katt heard a loud noise, looked up, and finally noticed the battle that was going on above her. A large Cornerian ship flew down to them and landed near the wreckage. There was a large red cross painted on the side of the ship indicating it was a medic's ship. Three Cornerians came out, two of them went to assist Falco into the ship and the other addressed Katt. "Hello sergeant. We can take care of him from here. You should probably get back to the battle."

Katt wiped the tears from her eyes before she spoke. "Thank you, and yes I agree I probably should join the battle." Katt headed to her fighter but was stopped unexpectedly.

Falco had regained consciousness before he was put into the medical ship. "Hey, Katt! Kill a few for me alright!" The medic's told him off for being active and brought him up into the ship.

Katt smiled as she watched the medical ship return to the Cornerian military base. Remembering what she was doing, Katt returned to her ship. Gripping the controls tightly she shot upward into the raging battle.

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There was a burst of activity in front of the cell Fox and his team were being held in. Almost the entire staff of the base was being put into their fighters to repulse the Cornerian forces. Krystal was looking through the bars watching the passing guards intently. Most of the other pilots had already made it to their ships as one started going by the cell walking slowly towards the hangar. Krystal yelled to him. "Hey you, what's going on?

The pilot looked towards the bars, seeing the prisoners for the first time. He smiled smugly at them as if it had been he who had captured them. "Not like it's any of your business, but Corneria just attacked the base and we're defending it."

Krystal nodded. "And you're staying behind, hoping the fight will be over before you get there."

The pilot moved closer to the bars looking from side to side nervously. "Listen I have a wife and kids; I don't need to go getting myself killed. I didn't mean to get mixed up in this rebellion anyway. If you tell anyone about this I will…"

The pilot was cut off as Krystal reached through the bars and smashed his head off the bars. "Oh I'm really sorry I had to do that, he was telling the truth. I saw he had the keys to our cell so I had to go for him. I really hope nothing bad happens to him because of this."

Fox stepped forward and placed an arm around Krystal's shoulders. "Don't worry about it. You had to do it. Let's just get out of here. Krystal nodded and Fox took the keys off of the guard's belt.

After the door was unlocked the three of them stepped out of the cell and found themselves a new problem. Peppy was first to state his confusion. "Do either of you remember the way we came in?"

They both shook their heads. The problem seemed as if it wouldn't be fixed until Peppy remembered something very important. "On our way in we saw a hanger, so where that pilot was headed must be the way out!"

Fox smiled and shook Peppy's hand. "Where would we be without you peppy?"

Peppy returned the handshake and smile. "You'd probably be lost. Now let's get going! I hope the battle isn't over by the time we get out of here."

The three of them sprinted down the hallway passing many doors and occasionally a guard or two. The guards never held them up long as they were always too surprised to put up much of a fight. They came to a halt in a large area before the main doors. Fox looked outside of the base. "Oh of course they took our ships! I can't believe I didn't think of that. They're probably in the hanger, let's go!"

The whole building shook and a section of the ceiling fell inches from the team. The battle outside was shaking the building violently, and it was coming down! The team ran with the speed of desperation. They entered the hanger and found their ships. To their dismay, their ships were buried underneath huge pieces of the building that had fallen. Fox shouted his orders to the team over the rumbling of the collapsing building. "There's nothing else for it we've got to run for it!"

But Krystal had spotted something very important among the debris. "Fox, that is one of Andross's machines!"

Fox looked over near the back of the hanger and saw what looked like, in all respects, a super computer. It was huge. It had a large screen that made up most of the machine. A picture of Andross appeared on the screen. Fox almost charged it but Krystal held him back. "We've got to get out of here! It's just an image!"

Reluctantly Fox agreed and the team started to run back to the entrance. While they were running they heard a loud blast and the building shook even harder than before. A large section of the ceiling collapsed. Everything that was above it fell and landed on Peppy. Peppy collapsed under the weight and lay there senseless. Fox cried out as if it was he who were hit, and started to dig at the debris. Another loud explosion came and Fox was knocked out by the blast.

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Fox awoke to find himself lying in the bed of a white room. Fox looked around confused. "Where am I?" Fox saw that Falco was lying in a bed next to his. A beagle came into the room and jumped slightly seeing Fox awake. "Oh gosh I hadn't expected you to be awake yet."

Fox looked at the beagle with hazy eyes. "What happened? Where am I? Why does my head hurt so bad?"

The beagle introduced himself as a doctor and started his explanation. "Well you were caught up in the enemy base while it was under attack and got a nasty bonk on your head. It's lucky you were found before they blew the place up. You were brought to me unconscious, and I've been trying to heal you since."

Fox suddenly recalled the whole disturbing episode. "I was knocked out… Oh no what happened to Peppy, and Krystal?"

The doctor looked down at the floor and shuffled his feet. "I was really hoping you wouldn't ask me. Well Krystal is okay she recovered much faster than you but Peppy… He was gone before he even made it to me."

Fox was devastated. He felt as though he had been hit by the blast a second time. He didn't cry, he was saddened deeply but he was too shell shocked for it to sink in fully. After sitting in silence for awhile Fox asked. "How long have I been out?"

The doctor seemed delighted that he could talk about something else. "Two days, and I need to go now; I promised some friends of yours that I'd tell them when you awoke."

The doctor left and Fox laid back in his bed. He felt as though he couldn't think correctly and he wondered whether it was because of his head wound or Peppy's death. He still couldn't really handle the fact that Peppy had died. His mind kept telling him that Peppy still was alive, and was going to just show up soon and tell him it was a joke. He knew it was true but he couldn't fully grasp it. Peppy had always been there; even when his father died Peppy was there. Fox finally fully realized what had happened and cried. This was the first time he cried since the death of his father. The tears flowed freely down his cheeks; he did nothing to stop them. It felt good to let loose his emotions for once. For a time after he just laid in bed thinking.

Then Katt, Slippy, and Krystal entered the room. Fox wiped away the wetness around his eyes. Krystal felt bad for Fox and was going to attempt to comfort him when he said. "I already know what happened to Peppy… I think we should just leave it alone for right now. Tell me what else happened while I was out."

Katt spoke up in a tone attempting to cover the sadness in the room. "Well we showed those rebels whose boss, they weren't very well equipped, and they didn't have very large numbers. We were able to take some prisoners but most of them fought to the death, even when they crashed. The prisoners we did take are saying they had nothing to do with the rebellion! Can you believe that, like they never knew that they were fighting. It's too bad you guys missed it. It was a great battle."

Fox sat up in bed and grasped his head in one hand while pointing a Falco with the other. "What happened to Falco? I thought he would be one of the ones who did best in the battle, especially since you guys came from behind."

Katt decided not to mention how Falco had gone on his own to try and save them; it might not be the best thing for Fox to hear right out of an injury. "Yeah well he got shot down pretty early in the battle; he had it worse than you did. For awhile the Doctors didn't know if he would live or not. He's been in and out of consciousness for a couple days now. Are we going to get back to the search when he's healthy or sooner?"

Fox for once had something to be happy about. "I don't think that will be a problem. Corneria bombed the hell out of that base. That's where the machine was being held. And I've been thinking. When I saw that computer, it had an image of andross, I'm wondering if that could have been the source of this rebellion. Maybe andross put them up to it, or maybe they were brainwashed or something. Either way I think we can stay here for a while longer; I don't think we're in any immediate danger here. We can wait for Falco to heal before we make the push to that other machine."

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General Scales was sitting in the captain's chair of his vessel when it happened. An intense pain formed in his chest and his head. He flinched severely but tried to show as little weakness as possible. He knew what had happened and was genuinely scared for the first time since he could remember. He turned to his Sharpclaw chief Krakter and pulled him close with a clawed hand. "Get us on a course for Venom!"

The dangerous glint in Scales eyes told him not to argue, and Krakter quickly distributed the instructions to the Sharpclaw crew. While his crew got to work Scales stole away to his quarters. When Scales finally got into his room he let out a loud scream. Tearing off the robe he was wearing he looked in fear down at his chest. There was a large section of skin that had proceeded to rot away in the middle of his chest. He lifted a trembling hand to reach under his helmet where he felt more rotted skin. The rotten skin was also reaching down onto his forehead. The general pushed away his pain and reached into a large chest he brought with him on this journey. Inside the chest was a full leather helmet and a leather jacket that had straps all around it. Scales took out the jacket and put it on. The jacket caused extreme pain around his torso, but he knew he would have to deal with it to keep himself together, literally. Bracing himself against the pain Scales tightened the straps so it would be next to impossible to remove. Next he pulled on the leather helmet; the only areas that weren't covered were holes for his eyes, horns, and small breathing holes near his mouth. Scales looked in a mirror at his work. He looked even more barbaric than usual. "I will have my revenge!"

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A/N: Wow creepy ending huh? I'm sorry about the whole Peppy thing, but I had that planned from the start. Although I never planned on killing Falco. It doesn't seem like the team will get much time to mourn since the threat is still out there. I'm really sorry about killing peppy but it's a plot mover, had to do it. Hope you guys don't hate me :P