XXIX: Transient
Somewhere in the void between Fortuna and Katina, a long, cargo laden freighter cruised through open space.
The vessel was accompanied by a trio of escorts, dagger shaped fighter craft that drifted around the transport as they continued along. They moved like a planetary system, smaller entities sticking close to the larger ship in the center. All four were branded with the blue and white insignia of Blue Arrow Shipping, a blue arrow facing up overlaid atop a white circle.
Their presence was typical for an interplanetary freighter. Most commercial shipping firms made it a policy to steer clear of troubled regions of space unless absolutely vital, and even then the route was laid out only with additional security escorts in mind. But for an open space burn like the transport's current run, a light fighter escort was enough to deter any would-be opportunist hijackers. The trio of snubfighters wouldn't be a match for any sort of organized attempt on the vessel, but then if that were the case, there was little even the most conservative minded of security coordinators could realistically prepare for.
Still, despite the isolation of their position, it wasn't uncommon to pass other interplanetary freighters and convoys on their way from one station to another. Shipping firms and independent traders were prevalent in that particular sector of space, running trade routes around the triangle of Katina, Corneria, and Fortuna, as well as the numerous stations in between. So when the navigator of the Blue Arrow freighter Transient picked up what appeared to be another freighter's radar signature approaching their general vicinity at cruise speed, he didn't raise any immediate alarms.
He was less indifferent, however, when that single radar signature abruptly split into three, and the transponder for the largest of them changed from a freighter to that of a known warlord ship.
"Dusk Flight away," Gamma Crendon reported, holding the com set attached to the jackal's right ear. "The Transient's distress beacon is active. EMP blast in four, freighter contact in five. Stand by McCloud."
Fox nodded in response, shifting in place and adjusting the grip on his weapon. The silver combat shotgun had come from Jason's stash of guns, carried over from the Great Fox after boarding one of Wolf's frigates, the Osgard. Fox's own pistol was strapped to his right hip, with a small pouch of spare shells and ammunition attached to the other. Wolf's men had been kind enough to give each of the mercenaries a small allowance of grenades as well, though their use would be limited in the freighter, given the potential risk of an explosion breaking a window or damaged piece of the exterior hull.
Fox's armor felt solid and stable as he shifted his weight, a nice change from the street clothes he and his team typically wore during contracts that involved ground work. In the tight corridors of a freighter, it only took the blink of an eye to miss an ambush from behind a bulkhead, and while the armor Wolf's men had offered him and his team wasn't impervious, it felt much better than nothing.
His ears, poking through the holes atop the light, dura-plast helmet, perked in surprise as his vision flashed, and he felt someone rap on the head covering. He turned and saw Falco standing behind him with a smirk, lowering his submachine gun.
"You always did think too much with your head."
Both Falco and Miyu were stacked up behind Fox, decked out in nearly identical suits of black armor, trimmed in red with the insignia of Wolf's soldiers on the shoulder. The only exception was Falco's helmet, which was conspicuously absent in contrast to Fox and Miyu's. He had said before that a helmet was too constrictive, and that in the confines of a freighter, nobody would go for headshots anyway.
Falco's smirk turned into a wince as Miyu's submachine gun tapped his bare scalp, probably a bit harder than was necessary for the joke. The lynx offered a fake grin in response to Falco's halfhearted glare back at her, quickly letting her expression drop back to a somber seriousness when he turned back around.
Behind Miyu, Fox could hear the nervous breathing of Jason, clutching a pistol and trying to get himself to relax.
The small room they occupied was shared with, and mostly taken up by, a half dozen of Wolf's marines, split into two groups of three. One group, led by the same Gamma who was apparently the commanding officer for the soldiers, was dressed in the same light armor as Fox and his team, and armed with similar weapons. Their load out, like Star Fox's, was clearly biased towards mobility and speed.
The other squad, however, seemed equipped to take the opposite approach. Adorned with various scars from battle and sprayed on insignias and symbols, the soldiers were fully encased in heavy, powered armor. A series of interlocking plates of what looked like some steel and ceramic material covered every inch of the marine's bodies, save the joints, where the powerful hydraulics that responded to the soldier's movements, as well as some partially exposed wires, were mostly hidden by simple black sleeves.
Their helmets normally differed depending on the species of the suit wearer, but in this instance, all three were clearly lupine, their sharp muzzles prominent, predatory eyes shielded behind tinted plastic eyepieces. Whenever one of them shifted, everyone could hear the quiet whir of various motors activating, as well as the solid metal thud of their steel boots on the deck. Their weapons looked like exaggerated rifles, though they were connected to a bulky pack worn on their suits' backs by a pliable cord. Fox had never seen such a weapon's discharge before, but part of him was eager to witness it. Taking up the space and a half of their more lightly armored compatriots, the three formed an intimidating wall in front of the Osgard's breaching room.
Another part of Fox wished that he could be in the dogfight Wolf's Dusk Flight was undoubtedly engaged in; he always did feel more comfortable in a cockpit than outside it. But he knew that he didn't trust the retrieval of Peppy's whereabouts with anyone else. While Wolf seemed to have genuinely carried through on Fox's request so far, there was still something nagging at the vulpine about the whole situation. Perhaps some residual wariness from their encounter during the Lylat War. Fox reasoned that if Wolf really wanted him dead, he wouldn't still be alive at this point, but he couldn't shake the feeling entirely.
Falco's voice caught his attention.
"Hey Jason, how long are you gonna need?"
"You'll be fine, you'll be fine, you'll be fine…" came a mumbled response. Jason's head snapped up, eyes wide, torn from whatever mental safety place he was trying to keep himself in. "Hm?"
Falco laughed. "Take it easy man; you'll scare the kitty. Now when we get to the bridge of this boat, how long are you going to need to get our info?"
"Oh," Jason replied, gaining his bearings. "Right. Um…well, if we ignored efficiency and just did a full database dump, probably around a half hour or so."
"Right," Fox said, turning around and joining the conversation. "So, seeing as we're not doing that, how long would it take for you to find any videos or records of Peppy?"
"Two minutes," Crendon called out. His marines checked their weapons one last time, muttering status reports and grim jokes to each other.
"Well that's the problem Fox; they're not exactly gonna label their tapes 'Station where we dropped off the prisoner' are they? It might take some rooting around in their records, some ah…creative database mining, if you will."
"Translation?" Falco quipped.
Jason sighed. "Won't be able to tell you 'til I get there, I'm afraid."
"Great. Hey Gamma, I don't suppose we could take some of your walking tanks with us to the bridge, could we?"
The armored jackal turned towards the avian from his men, giving him a deadpan stare. The soldiers in the full armor shifted their stances too, staring Falco down with their angled, harsh looking eyes. The stomp of their boots rang through the small space, vibrating up into the legs of the mercenaries.
Falco stopped and the room became quiet as a low tension slowly filled the air. For a moment, for some reason, he flashed back to the first time he was caught shoplifting candy as a kid.
"Our Heavy Troopers are entry security only, Zate. They'll stay here."
Another moment passed, and while the faces of the heavy troopers were entirely concealed, Falco thought he could see the smirks beneath their helmets. He could certainly see them on the others.
The Gamma huffed, turning back towards his men, resuming his final orders.
"Zate?" Falco questioned under his breath, acting as though he wasn't fazed, but keeping his voice down anyway.
"Zeta," Jason answered, equally quietly, leaning closer. "Probably a low rank, based on what I've heard of their ranking system so far."
"Fighter cover has been neutralized," the Gamma reported suddenly, halting any further conversation as he pushed his earpiece. "As soon as Dusk Flight brings down the freighter's shields, we'll launch the EMP. Prepare for breach. I want to be in and out before any local patrols get wind of the Transient's distress call." He glanced briefly at Falco before turning to Fox. "Are you and your ladies ready, McCloud?"
He opened his eyes.
The brief thought that he didn't remember his bed being so much like the floor flashed through his mind before a thunderclap rattled through his quarters, shaking pictures on the wall and causing a few to fall.
The stout husky struggled to push himself to his feet, even as the small room around him slowly began to stop vibrating. He glanced at his waist-high cot with its sheets in disarray, reasoning that whatever had caused the freighter's structural quake had undoubtedly thrown him from his sleep and dumped him onto the deck plating. His captain's uniform, so neatly laid out on a chair a few hours ago, lay in a heap at his feet, next to the overturned seat itself.
'Did we hit something?'
A tinny, frantic little voice was calling at him from somewhere, and it took a moment to realize that it was from the wall com next to the door.
Stepping over to it, he jabbed the call button.
"Calm down Lieutenant," he said, rubbing a fresh bruise on his head. "What happened?"
"Sir!" the voice said urgently, "We're being boarded. It's Warlord O'Donnell. We need you on the bridge, now!"
"On my way," the captain replied, suddenly wide awake and jumping back to his uniform, throwing the jacket on over his undershirt. It would have to do for now.
Slapping the door controls, he dashed from his room, sprinting down the corridors of his freighter as fast as his stubby legs could take him.
He had been boarded by pirates before; it was a sad fact to state, which reflected the continued neglect of an outstanding public issue, but any mercantile officer who had served as long as he had in the Lylat System could say the same. But that wasn't why he was hurrying this time.
Before leaving Yohan Depot back at the beginning of the Transient's cargo route, the Blue Arrow CEO had contacted the captain personally, informing him of a special condition involved in this particular mission. It had seemed odd at first, but like most business-related hoops he had to jump through, he didn't think much of it.
The captain would have a heavily armed escort detail up to a certain point in his route, which wasn't too surprising. Blue Arrow often shipped large amounts of valuables for private companies, who often offered to supplement Blue Arrow's security forces with their own ships. They would usually accompany the freighter in question until the delivery was complete, at which point the freighter would continue on its scheduled journey, and the private security would break off. A transport still had to finish the rest of its rounds, after all.
However, the CEO had given clear instructions that, in the event of a boarding, the captain was to erase the freighter's entire database, something prohibited by interplanetary law. Pirates had no use for most of the records anyway, and government officials used the data to keep track of tax and tariff information. In some extreme cases, eliminating the records of where a freighter docked and when was something tantamount to corporate fraud for a shipping company.
The captain had been given a code that he alone knew, to enter into the system to execute the sweep should the need arise. He had no idea why such an action was needed; he had looked over the cargo manifest for his freighter, and found nothing of particular interest on the list that a pirate would be interested in. Just some labeling irregularities. But he accepted the order without question, like he always had. He had made quite a career out of Blue Arrow, and it made no sense to question what he was sure was probably barely a misdemeanor in the grand scheme of things anyway.
The captain rounded a corner and met up with a pair of his security team, huffing as he began to run out of breath. Sadly, years of captaining an interplanetary freighter left little time for physical exercise, evidenced by the burn he was already feeling as his legs pushed onward. He was in the hallway that ran just inside the outer bulkhead of the Transient, dotted with windows at regular intervals to showcase the blackness of space.
As the captain glanced at them, however, he noticed that instead of the normal field of stars, the portholes were entirely filled by what looked like the plating of another ship. He could see the rivets holding the sheets of armor in place.
In the hull of his own ship, next to one of the portholes, he also noticed a small hole, just large enough for the small, metal cylinder that had just fallen through.
He stopped.
That was odd.
The metal bulkhead peeled away like a perforated piece of cardboard as the heavy troopers of Gamma Crendon's boarding party charged through. Their steel boots pounded like a blacksmith's hammer, their footfalls clanging through the entry way into the freighter beyond. A thick shroud of smoke blanketed the immediate vicinity thanks to the plasma torches used to slice through the transport's outer hull, hiding any visual observation from those left in the breaching room of the Osgard. However, the sounds of combat were enough to fill in the gaps the lack of visual input left.
The sound of staccato small arms fire punctuated the halted clanging of the heavy troopers and the hissing of their powerful hydraulics. Bullets pinged off of the bulkheads of the ship, and the resilient armor plating of Wolf's soldiers. Cries of panic and retreat could be barely discerned amongst the gunfire, clearly coming from some sort of security force within the transport who had just realized what they were up against.
Strangely enough though, Fox couldn't make out any return volleys from the cacophony of sound.
Then Wolf's armored soldiers opened fire.
Every blast from their heavy rifles felt like a punch to the chest to the vulpine, rattling his bones as the pressure waves struck him again and again. Though he couldn't actually see what sort of havoc the weapons were wreaking, Fox couldn't help but wonder how the Transient's bulkheads were even holding up to such an onslaught, much less the security forces within them. It sounded like every blast threatened to puncture the hull, venting the entire entry corridor into the vacuum.
Finally though, the sounds abruptly ended, and a strange silence reigned in the breaching room.
Fox heard Falco whisper a curse of amazement from behind him. "Glad they're on our side."
The clanging of heavy boots resumed, though much more slowly and deliberate than before. A few moments later, they stopped again.
"All clear," a voice called through the smoke, clearly from the external speakers of one of the heavy trooper's suits.
"Move out," Gamma Crendon commanded, leading the remaining pair of Wolf's troopers, more lightly armored than their frontline counterparts. They disappeared into the smoke that still separated the Osgard from the Transient, though it was beginning to clear.
"Wait for the call," Fox said, turning behind him and speaking to Miyu and Jason.
After receiving positive responses from both, he glanced at Falco and motioned with his head towards the breach. Tucking the stock of his shotgun into his shoulder, he nimbly hopped over the jagged threshold, and entered the Blue Arrow freighter, the avian close behind.
For a moment, the vulpine found himself swimming through a sea of fog, blurring outlines and diffusing the sterile lights of the freighter's hallway. A shadow coalesced towards one side of the cloud though, and he jogged towards it.
After a few steps, the smoke thinned and disappeared, revealing the Gamma and his troops circled around him. Off to the side, a couple bodies dressed in the uniforms of the freighter's security team, as well as a shorter man in a captain's jacket, lay in a heap, their thin armor failing to protect them from the boarding party's superior weapons. Those same weapons scorched the otherwise clean, metal bulkheads of the corridor, dirty black streaks marring the pristine walls. The trio of heavy soldiers were arrayed facing outward, scanning the corridor's connecting hallways for further Blue Arrow security forces, while the Gamma and the two remaining men stood close together, waiting for the mercenaries.
Upon seeing them, the Gamma spoke up.
"Our EMP should have knocked out most of the freighter's boarding defense systems," he reported, "As well as a good deal of their surveilence equipment. Anything on this ship still powered is running off of backup generators, and those will be mostly tied up with life support, so we shouldn't encounter much electronic trouble. At least not for as long as we should be on this boat."
"Great," Fox replied, glancing at a digital map of the freighter's internal layout, displayed on the small monitor attached to his forearm. "Let's make this fast then."
"My thoughts exactly," the Gamma agreed with a grim expression. He turned to his men, the three heavy troopers and the pair of less armored huskies. "Delta Heavy, hold the breach site, report any activity. Lemarc, Aush, you're on me." Tucking his weapon, the jackal turned back to the mercenary. "Lead on, McCloud."
Fox nodded, noting which hallway to take on his mini map and starting off at a jog with Falco close behind. Further back he could hear the clanging footfalls of the heavy troopers repositioning, and the lighter steps of Crendon's squad following him. Fox couldn't help but smile, realizing for the first time just how much firepower he had at his disposal for the mission. Combined with the armor he wore, he was feeling extremely confident about the results he expected to come away from the Transient with.
At least until the first slug winged off his chest plate.
Instinctively diving forward, Fox cleared the four way intersection he had been crossing on his belly and quickly scrambled to his knees, taking cover on the opposite side hugging the wall. Falco slid past him, having just entered the junction when the bullets started flying past and making a running leap. Opposite them in the direction they had just come from, the Gamma's squad stopped short of the intersection, stacking up along the hallway wall.
Fox risked sticking his head around the corner, noting the security forces were only a stone's throw away, advancing in a fast crouch before fire forced him to duck back. He glanced at Crendon, his sensitive ears still ringing from a near miss.
The Gamma motioned for the mercenaries to continue on; the soldiers would stay and cover their rear.
Giving an affirmative hand signal, Fox scrambled to his feet and continued on, Falco close behind. A few moments later, the hallway behind them erupted in return fire as Wolf's soldiers opened up.
After passing another cross corridor without incident, they reached the main artery of the freighter, a doublewide hallway that ran from bridge to engine block, almost without obstruction.
Luckily for the mercenaries, several chokepoints dotted the length of the passage where it had narrowed to a single doorway, compliments of the freighter's hull partitions. The partitions broke the passage down to manageable twenty meter sections, each capped on both sides by a thick bulkhead and a door that no longer automatically locked due to the Osgard's EMP.
The side corridor had dumped the pair into the middle of one of these sections. Carefully checking both directions to make sure it was clear, Fox stepped out into the open and jogged towards the door leading closer to the bridge. Falco followed suit, stepping to the left of the door and grabbing the heavy manual handle while Fox put his back against the bulkhead to the right.
They locked eyes, and counted silently to three.
With a grimace of exertion, Falco yanked the heavy door open, allowing Fox to swing in and level his weapon to his eye in one fluid motion.
Time slowed.
In the next section, Fox saw three men, clustered only five meters away. Apparently they had been discussing something, as none of them looked prepared to fight. Fox caught the final words of their conversation.
"…the captain hasn't checked-"
As soon as they saw the vulpine, two men ducked and dove for the walls on either side, while the middle reached for his sidearm.
Fox's shotgun barked once, sending the middle guard sprawling to the deck amidst a thin cloud of red.
Pumping the quick action weapon, the ejected shell hadn't even reached halfway to the floor before Fox retargeted, sidestepping to the left while still moving forward, and lining up the closest Blue Arrow in his sights.
The man had no weapon.
Fox's finger vibrated but didn't commit, and he averted his shotgun to the right, where the last man already had a pistol aimed at him.
Both weapons fired at the same time, and both combatants fell. Fox's momentum sent him sliding forward on his side, while the security officer slammed back against the wall before crumpling to the ground.
A quick burst from Falco's submachine gun announced his entry into the fray, finishing off the wounded Blue Arrow. He then flipped his attention to the unarmed man, whose hands jumped into the air when the avian turned his weapon towards him. They stared at each other for a moment.
Fox groaned from the floor, flipping himself on his back with enough speed to indicate to Falco that he was alright. Propping himself up on his elbows, the mercenary got to his feet, apparently having been hurt more in the fall than due to a bullet, thanks to a fresh dent in the armor over his chest.
Seeing his friend stand up, Falco's intensity dropped a notch, and he stepped forward, lowering his weapon and motioning for the man to stand as well. Turning him around, Falco grabbed the back of his uniform and pushed the unarmed man against the wall. The avian did a quick pat down before grabbing the man's shoulder and spinning him around to speak to him face to face. He made sure to stand uncomfortably close while he spoke, driving his point home.
"We've got friends coming up behind us; stay visible, don't try anything stupid, and you'll get out of this alive. Got it?"
The man nodded, clearly shaken that he had just saw two of his fellow employees shot in front of him, but with enough presence of mind to comply.
"Good."
Fox pumped his weapon again, sending another empty shell clinking to the deck and calling Falco's attention back to the mission.
The pair of mercenaries collected the weapons of the fallen security guards, grabbing their ammunition clips and leaving the guns behind. The surviving Blue Arrow didn't look like he was in any mood to turn on Fox and Falco when their attention was drawn in a different direction, but it made no sense to allow him the opportunity. And taking the weapons themselves would slow them down.
Bending down to retrieve the last clip from one of the bodies, Fox noticed a piece of laminate pinned to and largely hidden beneath the guard's vest, reflecting the lowered backup lights of the corridor. Slipping the ammunition from the guard's belt into his own pocket, Fox touched the clear material, sliding it out from behind the cloth to reveal it as a security badge. The guard's picture was prominent, as well as the rank of 'Sergeant,' but what caught Fox's attention the most was the barcode that ran along the bottom edge of the card, along with the phrase 'Level One Security'.
'This might come in handy,' he thought, pocketing the badge as well before jogging to join Falco at the door to the next hallway segment. Along the way, he reached into his hip pouch and grabbed a pair of shotgun shells, loading them into his weapon's ammo tube one at a time.
Once there, the mercenaries lined up against the door as they had before, with Falco grabbing the door handle. This time though, instead of readying his shotgun, Fox plucked one of the grenades on his belt, pulling the pin free but squeezing the clip shut for the moment.
Chances were if there were guards on the other side of the door, they had heard the gunfire and were prepared for the mercenaries to storm in. Therefore, another tactic was called for.
Fox nodded to Falco, and made sure to stand clear of the doorway. With another heave, the avian hauled the heavy door open, the construction groaning on metal hinges.
Before he had even pulled it all the way open, a gunshot rang out from the other side, and a slug pinged off the steel door. The bullet ricocheted back and forth down the section of the hallway the mercenaries occupied, finally losing momentum at the far end and skittering to a stop on the deck.
Fox popped the clip on the explosive, cooking it for a few moments before slipping the grenade through the open entry and ducking back to ready his shotgun. A cry went up from the other side, just before the characteristic bang of an explosive's shockwave contained by walls shot through the ship. The shrapnel clattered to a halt a second later.
Without waiting further, Fox stepped into the room in a crouch, swinging his weapon rapidly from side to side but unable to spot any targets. Falco entered immediately after.
The middle of the section of hallway was covered with debris caused by the grenade. A pair of bodies lay slumped around a small shipping container hastily pushed to the middle of the floor, the box having caved in by the force of the explosion. In the relatively tight confines of the room, the shrapnel in particular was devastating: despite apparently landing in front of their cover, the grenade still managed to account for both guards behind it.
Advancing to the container, Fox waited until checking behind it before relaxing. As Falco serviced the guards' weapons, removing their ammunition, the vulpine checked his map, noting their location relative to the bridge.
"We should be close," he said, tapping the small screen to zoom in. "Past the next door is the last section before the bridge." He then touched his ear piece, speaking into the thin microphone that extended halfway down his muzzle. "Gamma, we're almost to the bridge; what's your status?"
"On our way," the Gamma responded after a short burst of static. "The path up is secure for your tech to advance. My men will wait halfway between the breach and you and escort him up."
"Roger," Fox replied. "Appreciated Gamma. Miyu, bring Jason and hook up with Wolf's men."
"Got it," the lynx's voice came through.
Miyu tapped off her microphone and looked at Jason, across from her in the Osgard's breach room. His face barely contained a nervous dread, his eyes meeting hers with a clear urge to be somewhere else, preferably far, far away. One hand was wrapped tightly around the pistol he had taken from his own stash of weapons, while the other rested on a satchel of electronic tools that hung over his shoulder. The grey fur on his face was starting to dampen with perspiration, and his breathing was short and shallow.
He offered Miyu a thin smile.
"You know, for someone who sells weapons, you seem awful nervous about potentially using them," she noted, searching her submachine gun for the safety and tabbing it off. Looking back at Jason, she motioned with her head for him to follow.
"Yeah, 'cause I haven't heard that one before," he replied sourly. He slipped a thumb under his shoulder bag and lifted the strap over his head to the opposite side, securing it across his chest. "It's not so much the 'using them' part; it's the 'other people using them on me' part."
"Well it's strange, that's all I'm saying," she stated as she stepped over the jagged lip of the entry point, and into the Transient. "Not to mention you were trained as a soldier, right? I mean, I know you're not front line, but you're still-"
"Okay, I get it," Jason cut her off as he followed. "Let's just get this over with. Why the hell am I even here…"
The trio of heavy troopers on the other side regarded them briefly as they stepped through, but quickly returned to watching their sectors of the entry point. One of them raised a plated, gloved hand and caught their attention, waving them over to his particular hallway. The sound of hydraulics and metal lightly scrapping on metal accompanied his motions as the mercenaries trotted over.
"This way," he said, his voice sterilized by the external speakers of his suit. The trooper then gestured down the corridor with his weapon, pointing out the path his commander and Fox and Falco had taken.
Nodding in understanding, Miyu started off down the designated hallway at a jog, Jason trailing just behind her and to the side.
They followed the corridor for a little ways, stopping before each adjoining hallway and carefully making sure they were empty of any straggling Blue Arrow guards. At the first intersection, they ran across spent shell casings and other visible signs of skirmishes, but otherwise their journey to the center of the Transient was uneventful.
At the point where their corridor joined the central artery of the freighter, Miyu and Jason spotted one of Wolf's soldiers crouching at the wall. The armored marine was apparently communicating with another solider within the artery proper, with one gloved hand flashing signals and the other firmly gripping the handle of his assault rifle. The fact that he was engaged in silent communication seemed to suggest that he had just been or would soon be in combat. He seemed unaware of the mercenaries approaching him from behind.
Miyu slowed to a quiet creep, unsure of how to announce her presence, and wanting to make sure she didn't startle the marine into thinking the freighter's security had flanked them from behind. She searched her mind but was unable to come up with any sort of universal 'we're on your team' phrases.
The marine, and the mouth of the hallway, was only ten meters or so away when she settled on clearing her throat.
"Er, don't shoot," she added, standing up right and trying to look as nonthreatening as possible.
Her first indication that she made a mistake was when Jason jumped close behind her in a way that seemed like he was diving for cover.
Her second was when the lightly armored soldier cursed, almost before she realized he had turned around and leveled his weapon at her.
"Guh; for the love of god, merc," he breathed, lowering the weapon. He continued to grumble to himself as Miyu and Jason approached, the latter having come out from behind the lynx. "How the hell did you survive this long pulling that shit? Mommy ever teach you not to sneak up on friendlies like that?"
"I said 'don't shoot,'" Miyu retorted, now just a few feet from the solider. She kept her voice low because the marine was, though she wasn't sure why given that she hadn't heard any of the usual noise of combat recently. As close as she was, she could see the named 'Lemarc' stenciled in white on the soldier's black, red-trimmed chest plate.
"Yeah. Except what do you think the first thing an enemy trying to take you alive would say?"
"Screw you," she replied with a sneer, waving his criticism away. "What's going on here? Which way to the bridge?"
"That way," Lemarc whispered, jerking his thumb down the main corridor in the direction Fox and Falco had taken a few minutes earlier. "But you're not going that way yet because we've got company coming from that way." He turned his hand to point in the opposite direction. He smirked and gestured to Jason. "Or at least, your techie friend isn't going down that way; it'd put him right in their field of fire. You can feel free to though."
Miyu rolled her eyes and said nothing, save a choice curse or two for the husky. Instead, she leaned out from the side corridor into the larger one, and took stock of the situation herself.
The subsection of the wider, main hallway was capped at both ends by bulkheads, each with a heavy steel door in the middle. The doors in both directions were open, though from the side corridor, Miyu couldn't see much through either of them. Flattened against the bulkhead in the opposite direction of bridge was another of the Gamma's soldiers, standing in a crouch with both hands occupied by what looked like grenades. When he spotted the lynx looking at him, he lifted a finger to his mouth, an indication to be quiet. He then pointed down the artery through the door whose wall he was hiding behind.
Miyu stopped to listen for a moment, her ears straining to pick up any noise beyond the background humming of the freighter's backup generators. For awhile there was nothing, but gradually, she could pick up the soft footfalls of approaching security forces. It made sense to her why Lemarc had told them to stay put; when all the doors of the artery were open and one stood in the doorway, one could see all the way from the bridge to the engine block. However, anyone hiding just inside a hallway partition would be invisible.
"Alright; so what's the plan?" she asked, ducking back into the side hallway.
"Wait until they get into the adjoining partition, chuck some grenades in, and close the door on them. It won't lock, but they'll think twice about coming through it." He looked at her. "Then we break for the bridge and hook up with the Gamma and your buddies. This whole causeway is littered with side hallways, and the bridge is a dead end, so it's more defensible."
"What're you doing here then? Seems like a bad place to hole up."
"It is. We were coming back to meet you when we heard a gunshot. Think one of the guards doesn't know how to use a gun and misfired. The security guys on these freighters are always all sorts of green. So we stayed and set up the trap."
"Fair enough. Where do I help?"
"You don't. Sit right there and shut up."
Miyu's eyes narrowed and she looked like she was about to make a comment, when Lemarc suddenly turned and peered around the corner of the hallway. He raised his weapon to his eye and made a quick hand gesture to the other soldier at the doorway.
From behind her, Jason leaned closer and whispered, "I like this guy's plan."
Miyu huffed quietly but did as she was told, and stood still, though she poked her head into the hallway anyway to observe.
The other marine tensed, inching silently closer to the lip of the door. He carefully transferred both grenades to one of his hands, spreading his fingers to grip them. With his free hand, he looped a finger through each of the spring-loaded safety rings and pulled them loose, arming the explosives.
However, one of the rings popped free with more force than expected, and jumped from the solider's hand. He bobbled with it for a second, mindful of the now live explosives he was holding, before it finally eluded him and fell to the deck, pinging loudly against the metal floor in the silent hallway.
A shout sounded from the adjoining partition, and abruptly the element of surprise was gone. Bullets began streaming through the door, even though the security guards presumably couldn't see anyone there.
"Aush, throw 'em!" Lemarc shouted, and his compatriot complied, blindly tossing the grenades into the next partition. As the marine reached in to close the door, which unfortunately opened into the next partition, he stopped and quickly ducked back.
A Blue Arrow security guard rushed boldly through the threshold, jumping into their partition to avoid the grenades and opening fire wildly. Aush couldn't reach his weapon in time, and instead delivered a vicious kick to the guard's side, sending him sprawling to the floor even as he took several of Lemarc's bullets to the chest.
A moment later, the grenades detonated in rapid succession, briefly drowning out the other audible confusions of battle.
"Move!" Lemarc shouted, grabbing Miyu by the collar of her armor and pushing her towards the door in the opposite direction, leading towards the freighter's bridge. He returned his attention to the process of covering their exodus.
Firing in short, controlled bursts, his magazine managed to hold out until Aush could retreat, hugging the far wall as much as he could. Both marines rose to a walking crouch and began backing up towards the door Miyu and Jason were running towards, spacing their weapons' bursts of fire to cover each other and ensure there was a constant stream of lead pinning the Blue Arrow guards down.
Miyu was first through the hatchway, jumping inside and quickly sweeping the subsection to ensure it was clear. Jason slipped in close behind, breathing harder than he normally would for a quick sprint of the sort he just took.
As though they had practiced that exact maneuver, Lemarc and Aush smoothly backpedaled into the subsection behind the mercenaries, still laying down cover fire as they went. Just as both of their weapons began giving off the characteristic click of an empty magazine, they crossed the threshold into safety. Lemarc swung his weapon over his shoulder and grabbed the door, leaning back and pulling it shut with both hands. It fell into place with a heavy thunk, and it seemed as though the freighter around them abruptly settled.
"That oughta hold them," Lemarc said, satisfied with his work. He wiped his brow and reached behind him, grabbing his weapon and bringing it back around front, though he now gripped it in a much more relaxed posture. "I swear, freighter guards never get any smarter."
Miyu glanced back at him for a moment, perplexed by his statement.
"I thought you guys didn't make a habit of raiding private freighters," she said, recalling Wolf's earlier speech about the subject.
"Well sure, not as much as we should be," the marine admitted, the four of them progressing in the direction of the bridge at a comfortable walk. Unlike the one they just left, none of the subsequent partitions sprouted any open hallways to be wary of; only hatchways, which were all closed. Aush walked backward, keeping an eye on the door they had just shut. "But c'mon; these guys are easy pickings. We'd be stupid not to help ourselves if they have something we needed."
Miyu mentally cocked her head. 'Then why'd Wolf tell us he never raided commercial transports?' she thought, suddenly getting an odd, ancy feeling in her stomach.
"Er, that'd make sense, I s'pose," Jason filled in for the lynx while she remained silent, lost in thought.
"And see, that's why I like you," Lemarc replied, smiling a wide, toothy canine grin at the vulpine mercenary.
The group of four proceeded through another couple subsections of the freighter's main hallway, passing a few dead guards which had been neatly pushed out of cover into the open, but little else of note. A few partitions later they reached the Transient's bridge. There they encountered a slightly larger door than those they had been passing through, flanked on one side by an elaborate security pad. The hatch was open, allowing the quartet to see through into the bridge, and further out into a framed vista of space through the front viewports.
Miyu put a finger to her ear, concerned at the lack of movement. "Fox, we're outside the bridge."
A beat of silence passed before they heard his reply from within the room itself.
"Yeah, come on in," he called, though he remained hidden from view. His voice sounded strained.
The lynx led the way, followed closely by Jason as they stepped through the threshold and onto the bridge. Lemarc and Aush remained outside, taking up defensive positions within the partition in case of further counterattacks from the remaining security force.
The bridge was relatively small for such a large freighter. The floor space was enough for perhaps a dozen or so people to stand comfortably, though standard operation clearly utilized a third of that in crew. Considering the entrance as the back, the front and sides of the bridge were lined with instruments and monitors, grouped by function into discernable navigator's, helmsman's, and communications stations. Above each bank of instruments was a continuous viewport, stretching around the room like a 'U', though it filled out to nearly the entire wall along the helmsman's station in front.
In front of each of the stations was a chair, unoccupied. For a brief moment, Miyu wondered what had happened to their occupants, but the line of bodies along the inside wall answered her question. Propped up against the bulkhead, they were watched over by the barrel of Falco's weapon as he paced in front of them, all three of the uniformed crewmen having chosen to give up without a fight. It made sense to the lynx as she continued to scan the room; a stray slug could easily cause grave damage to the controls housed in the room, and neither party wanted to risk that. Plus, while none of the weapons present in the room could have realistically punctured the high grade viewport material, when the bridge crew were threatened with guns, analytic thought probably fell fairly low on their totem pole of considerations.
Gamma Crendon stood by the navigator's station, his weapon held loosely in his hands. The jackal's armor sported some fresh scoring, but his eyes told Miyu he was as combat ready as ever as he watched the mercenaries enter. He had probably been watching the door before Miyu made her call.
"Glad you made it," Fox said from behind the pair. He offered a slight smile as they turned to face him, leaning against the inside wall opposite Falco and the prisoners. The way he shifted his weight brought Miyu's attention to a white strip of gauze wrapped around his thigh, just under the armor there. His smile turned into a smirk as he caught her line of sight. "Ricochet," he explained, shrugging. "Nothing serious. Just gonna be sore for a couple days."
"Jason, the navigator's station over there should have what we're looking for," Fox went on, motioning towards Crendon. The other vulpine nodded and unslung his pack, walking over towards the appropriate chair. "The Gamma's been kind enough to get things started while we waited for you."
"Never was much for computers," Crendon growled as Jason approached. "I'll watch the corridor with my men. Go ahead and jack in, techie; time is survival."
Jason took the chair and removed a pair of devices from his pack as the Gamma left the bridge. The first device, a black, card-like data chip, slid into a receptacle on the second, a boxier object with a standardized cord jutting out from one end. The cord's head plugged cleanly into the matching port of the navigator's computer, causing the connected drive to audibly whir to life. A small, foreign looking progress bar popped up on the navigator's console, filling slowly but steadily as the device worked.
By the time it finished filling, Falco was beginning to lose his negligible amount of patience.
"Great, are we done then?" the avian asked once he heard Jason's breath of accomplishment, glancing over his shoulder from watching the crewmen.
"Not quite," the fox replied, "I just got into the mineshaft; we've still gotta find the gold."
Falco sighed. "Always a metaphor with this guy…"
Fox hobbled over to stand behind Jason, peering over his shoulder at the stream of information scrolling by in response to his fingertips. Far from the practical and graphically appealing method of operation the console usually offered, the characters streaming down the screen were simple white text on black background. They were all of the same language Fox was used to, but the way they flowed and what they represented lent themselves to some hidden code.
Jason sensed the other vulpine standing above him, and guessed what he was thinking. "I found a command prompt," he explained, sounding much more comfortable than mere moments before in the corridors of the ship. "Whoever initially programmed this console put a secondary link here to the Transient's main memory banks for some purpose and must've forgotten to take it out. It bypasses the ship's navigation interface and cuts straight to the juicy, 'query and answer' portion of the database. Probably looks like Macbethian insurance language to you, but it makes things quite a bit easier on my end."
Despite his pain, Fox managed a short laugh. "Jason, did I sense some smugness there?"
Jason grinned. "Probably."
"Hey, nothing wrong with smugness when you know you're right," Falco commented, softly kicking the leg of one of the prisoners who was muttering something to himself. "Ain't that right, tough guy."
"Alright," Jason continued, like a craftsman who had just finished laying out his tools and was eager to get to work. "You wanted records of unusual cargo displacement, yeah?"
Fox nodded. "Anything that makes it look like something was unloaded that wasn't supposed to be. Do freighters get weighed for mass at any point?"
"Sure do," Jason nodded. "Before and after they leave port for tariff reasons. Docking tolls. That sorta thing."
"Is there any way to check if the Transient's difference in cargo mass doesn't match up with what's reported as offloaded? A freeport might not check for that sort of inconsistency."
"…Should be. Gimme a sec."
After some more furious typing, Jason's screen was cut in half, with one side showing a list of numbers, the other a list of items from the ship's 'offloads' records. Both foxes scanned the columns closely, Jason putting out a finger to the screen to help himself mentally link columns.
Meanwhile, from outside the bridge, a pair of gunshots cracked through the corridor, signaling the arrival of the security forces. There was no call for assistance though, so Fox assumed Wolf's soldiers had the situation under control. Jason jumped a little though, momentarily distracted by the staccato din.
"There!" Fox half shouted, pointing to a row. "A single palette of low grade sidearms was offloaded at Hrakness Station outside of Sector Y, but the weight difference is enough for twenty."
"Could be our stop," Jason nodded thoughtfully. "Certainly shows something under the table is going on there. But unless your friend weighs considerably more than your average hare, I doubt he was only thing offloaded. To be honest, I'm not sure the difference of single person's mass would be flagged as strange."
"It's a lead though. Can you bring up surveillance of any sort for that stop?"
"Maybe."
"See if you can."
"You ladies need anything else besides time in there?" Crendon barked, calling into the bridge between weapon discharges. "We might as well take over the ship at this point. There isn't going to be anyone left by the time you-"
A cry cut the Gamma off, causing him to swear. Miyu couldn't tell for sure, but it sounded like the shout of pain was from Lemarc.
"Miyu, go help them out," Fox commanded, turning briefly towards her before looking back at Jason's screen.
The lynx fought the urge to tell Fox to shove it, remembering that that part of her was a side she was trying – quite successfully – to correct. Instead, she focused on the tactical reasons behind the request and complied, jogging out to the corridor. She surprised herself both at how easily the initial, angry urge had come to her, and then again how easily she had been able to suppress it. It was a sign of progress to be sure, but also a reminder of the nature that had been ingrained into her during her last few years alone.
Just as Miyu left, a window opened on Jason's screen, depicted a grainy, low resolution version of the Transient's cargo ramp, taken from a camera within the cargo bay itself.
"Got it," Jason announced, tapping a few more keys. The soundless video began speeding up, indicated by a small speed multiplier in the bottom corner of the screen increasing.
For a few moments, despite the added speed of the playback, nothing happened in the image of the cargo bay. Occasionally, a shadow or two would pass by underneath the extended ramp, due to the angle of the camera, but no bodies ever accompanied them on screen. Finally though, a cargo bot danced its way to the top of the ramp from somewhere within the Transient's hold. The bipedal machine's slow, normally heavy gait was depicted as a comic shuffle by the playback's speed as it pushed a wheeled palette down the ramp onto the hanger deck below.
"That's the sidearms," Jason muttered, slowing the video down a bit. From out in the corridor, the sounds of sporadic defense raged on.
A cargo officer had accompanied the robot up to the top of the ramp, but stayed onboard the Transient when the robot descended down it. A few seconds ticked by, almost a minute in the video's real time, before another man walked up the ramp and met the cargo officer. The two engaged in a quick conversation before the cargo officer turned behind him and waved to someone off camera. The men then nodded to each other and returned along their respective entry ways.
A few moments in the video passed, again, about a minute in real time, before whoever was being waved to finally showed themselves. Hefting in groups of four, the large, uniformed men stumbled under the weight of their burdens.
Fox's eyes narrowed. "Wait, hold the picture."
Jason complied, freezing the video where it gave a good still shot of one of the coffin sized containers in the center of the screen. Its four bearers, one on each side, were leaning away from it, struggling against the mass.
"I think I recognize that box…" the mercenary captain trailed off, cocking his head a little and staring intently at the monitor.
The staccato report of Miyu's weapon outside the bridge triggered something in his mind.
"That's it. That's him," he said, sounding as sure as if he were arguing the existence of gravity. "He's in one of those containers."
"Inside them?" Jason questioned, arching an eyebrow and looking back at him. "What makes you so sure?"
Fox sighed, as if trying to convince someone arguing against gravity of its existence. Shaking his head as he spoke, he said, "It's…it's a long story. Just trust me on this." He paused for a second, gathering the right words. "A while back, we ran across a large group of those boxes at what we later found to be one of Bauker's depots. Yohan. Inside them were people, sedated and prepped for shipping."
"They were just laying there in the box?"
"No there was…something else. It was way more elaborate than that. I don't know why. I didn't think about it too much." Jason began to ask another question, but Fox interrupted him with the answer before he could finish. "Because I had other things on my mind at the time. Point is, if they're shipping Peppy around, they'll probably do it in one of those boxes."
Jason considered what was said for a moment, then turned back to the navigator's station. "Alright. Gimme a minute and I'll download everything I can about the Transient's stop at Hrakness Station."
"Then we can go, right?"
"My thoughts exactly, Falco."
Miyu didn't feel the tap on her shoulder pad the first time.
The lynx was too focused on the iron sights of her submachine gun and what lay beyond them. It wasn't an accurate weapon by any means, but in short bursts, it could paint a rough target the distance from where she was crouching to where the Transient's crew and security forces were mounting a final push for the bridge.
The second time Fox patted her, she angrily glanced at him to see the vulpine standing over her, shotgun in hand with a look of determination.
"What?" she spat, clearly annoyed he was distracting her from her shot.
"Time to go," he replied. Stacked behind him were Jason and Falco, looking frightened and relieved to be back in the line of fire, respectively.
"Oh."
"It's about time," Crendon chimed in from the other side of the open corridor hatchway. "They'll be bringing the main generator back on any minute now." He leaned out and fired a few rounds from his weapon, punctuating the sentence.
"I thought," Miyu began before ducking back from the doorway, milliseconds ahead of a series of angry slugs meant for her. "I thought the EMP was supposed to-"
"Only temporarily," the Gamma replied, shaking his head. "We weren't supposed to be here this long. Once they get the power back, they'll be able to vent select portions of the hull into the vacuum by remotely sealing everything but the rooms we're in. Provided a Cornerian patrol doesn't happen upon us first."
"Let's not be here when they figure that out," Fox said, canting his head towards the security forces. "Gamma, is there any way to get your heavy soldiers to help us punch through from behind? Break this pin they've got us in?"
"Thinking the same thing, merc." The Gamma ducked for cover again, this time moving away from the doorway and allowing Aush to take his place. He slid back further along the wall, over to where Lemarc was lying slumped against the bulkhead, and put a finger to his earpiece.
"Delta Heavy, send two of your unit to the midpoint of the Transient, following this com's signal. We're pinned at the bridge." There was a pause, punctuated by a gunshot from Aush's rifle, and a scream of agony from further down the main corridor. "We're breaking policy; we'll be back at the Osgard before they realize two of you have left the egress site. Double time it, Delta."
Without speaking it out loud, the group realized it would be a minute or two before they could expect any help from the suited soldiers. Their armor and firepower, while intimidating, left a little to be desired in the mobility department. And in a firefight, a few minutes could mean all the difference. If they could only hold out a little while longer…
Miyu peered out into the hatchway, quickly ducking back as a bullet tore through the air far too close for comfort. Swearing, she hefted her submachine gun into the threshold and unleashed a burst, blindfiring down the ship's central corridor.
"So did you find your grandpa?" she yelled to Fox over the sound of small arms fire, weathering a return volley from behind cover.
"I think so," he shouted in reply, looking restless in his inability to do anything. The hatchway was only large enough for two to fire from, and with Crendon taking the spot opposite Miyu, there was no direct way to contribute. Far more than getting shot in the thigh minutes earlier, being unable to help made him uncomfortable. "We've got a lead to Hrakness Station in Sector Y."
"Our rendezvous with Lord O'Donnell is in the same sector," Crendon reported, glancing at Lemarc for a moment before continuing. "It's in an area of space controlled by Warlord Siona. I'll talk with the Alpha, and he'll talk to Wolf; we could probably work out a search party to check it out."
Fox blinked, his jaw slightly agape in a mild shock. "Gamma, that's…really kind of you." His words came out almost as a question.
Falco canted his head. "Yeah. What gives?"
For the first time since meeting the man, the mercenaries of the Star Fox team saw Gamma Crendon's lips twist into something approaching a smile. It tugged at one side of the jackal's muzzle over the other, turning it lopsided and even, Miyu dared think, slightly…endearing.
"I've seen you fight now, McCloud," he said, his voice as commanding as ever, only adding to weight of his words. "A man like you fighting for a cause like your friend…nobility's a strange thing to find in these times. And I'm happy to help it where I can."
Fox heard Aush snort with derision, but kept his gaze leveled at the Gamma. The jackal's intense eyes betrayed no dishonesty as they looked back. Perhaps Fox had misjudged the man; perhaps he had misjudged Wolf's entire organization. Either way, a small smile spread across his features, and he nodded. "Thank you, Crendon."
"Don't mention it," he replied, taking a few more shots at the Blue Arrow security forces down the corridor before turning back to the vulpine. "I think I hear my boys now."
Fox's orange ears perked, and he unconsciously tilted his head. Over the staccato of weapons fire, he could -very faintly at first, but building in volume quickly – make out the sound of heavy boots clanging on the metal deck. Crendon began communicating again through his headset, issuing orders and motioning for the mercenaries to get ready to move out.
The security forces must have noticed the new sound as well, as their fire quickly faded until the clanging sound felt like the only noise on the ship. Panicked questions could be overheard from the other side of the corridor, escalating in pitch and urgency.
The questions turned into screams of panic as Wolf's heavy troopers finally entered the fray. Fox felt the now familiar whump-whump in his chest as the deep bass tones their weapons gave off rumbled through him.
"Let's go!" Crendon shouted, leading the way into the next partition, now free of suppressing fire.
Aush quickly dropped in behind him, followed by Miyu and Falco. Theirs was a relieved gait, a confident jog towards their saviors in metal armor. Jason brought up the rear, still maintaining a death grip on his pistol. As he began into the next partition though, he stopped and turned around, looking back at Fox, remembering the other vulpine's wound.
"You need some help there?" he asked, noticing that the mercenary was looking off in a different direction.
"They're just going to leave him?" Fox asked in return, presumably directing his words at Jason, though he could have very well been asking nobody in particular. His eyes pointed to the body of Lemarc, propped up against the bulkhead. His armor was still in one piece, but a slug had found its way just above the collar, implanting itself in the canine's throat. The deep red matting of his fur around the wound site suggested it had once bled profusely, but it had since dried to a trickle.
"Looks like it, Fox," Jason answered, shrugging. His breathing showed through in his voice, and it sounded as though saying the sentence had lifted some sort of weight from him. "They can't all be saints up in the black, you know."
'I suppose not,' Fox thought in reply, shaking his head slowly. 'So much for nobility.' This wasn't right. He had no connection whatsoever to Wolf's soldier, lying dead against the bulkhead, but he couldn't help but feel wrong leaving him there. It hit him suddenly, but he couldn't say he didn't expect it.
Peppy. It felt like he was looking at Peppy there.
Hadn't he and his team done the same to the hare as Crendon and his soldiers were doing to their own? Left him dying or dead in a prison somewhere, or worse? It was a thought he had been contending with every few days, though it was less frequent once a few days had passed after the incident at Yohan. It was a strange thought, coming and going seemingly at whim, immobilizing the vulpine with guilt when it hit, and leaving him with remorse as it left.
Of course the answer was always the same. No, this wasn't similar; Fox and his team were actually doing something. Everything they were working at was working towards finding Peppy and rescuing him from whatever conspiracy had taken him from them. Every mission the mercenaries contracted increased their bank accounts, which were under fake IDs of course, given their status as wanted criminals. Every credit in their accounts meant they could afford another information broker, another lead to follow. None had been so potentially successful as what they had just found on the Transient, but they were far from sitting idly by, waiting for Peppy to fall into their laps.
But then why couldn't he ever shake the feeling when it came up? Why did he have to content himself with letting the guilt run its course?
Jason sighed, guessing the surface of Fox's thoughts. "There's nothing you can do, Fox; if they don't look out for their own, it's not on us to tell them to. …Now we've got to go."
Fox nodded, snapped back to the situation at hand. He took a final glance at Lemarc.
'Don't worry Peppy; we won't leave you. Just like you never left us. I promise.'
'It's a little like an aquarium, to be honest.'
Joseph Bauker stood tall and inhaled deeply as he gazed upon the curved bank of monitors before him. Arranged along the largest wall of his communications room, the viewscreens formed an intimidating barrier, one which, despite their current lack of subjects, would immobilize a lesser, more timid man with stage fright.
Luckily, Warlord Bauker was not such a man. The cougar was no stranger to public speaking or oration; in fact, it was what he insisted gave him an edge over his fellow military leaders. Any commander could pace his forces into a battle. Any captain could call a charge. But in order to be a great military leader, Bauker felt, you had to lead your army. Make them want to follow you. Make them need to.
He knew he didn't have the longest history of strategic brilliance of the Warlords; that title belonged to Raymund. Nor did he have the largest fleet. That one went to Norwood. But he was more than pleased being the most charismatic of them all. After all, he reasoned, for all of Norwood's hardware and Raymund's military exploits, they would both be appearing on their own screens amongst the sea in front of the cougar, reporting to him.
Bauker smiled, his dimming yellow fur creasing in response to the skin beneath. His facial features were close to immaculate, something he was well aware of. His build, tall but strong, fit the model of an ideal vid star, right down to the calluses of his palms. He was rugged yet handsome; wise but youthful.
If there was one man and one many only to lead the revolution the Warlord had been nurturing, a rally point for all freedom loving beings of the Lylat System to gather behind, he figured he could do much worse than himself.
He straightened the hem of his uniform, brushing it flat across his stomach. The old Admiral's uniform had held up well in the ensuing years of Andross' demise; the faded Venomian olive drab having been spruced up a bit with dye, brought back to the full vigor it had shown upon arrival after his last promotion. His various campaign ribbons and medals from the Lylat War were garish and obnoxiously extravagant in most situations, especially considering they were from the losing side, but this was one of those times when one had to truly lead. And sometimes, followers needed to be reminded of why they were following.
'Besides,' he thought as the first viewscreens began flickering to life, their signals having been established. 'We didn't so much lose the war as we had a swift change in management.' He suppressed a shudder as he thought of the last time he had seen Andross, the mad engineer who initiated the conflict in the first place. The ape was a twisted monstrosity, the victim of self experimentation in the extreme.
Bauker turned the shiver into an innocent shifting of weight. 'Good riddance.'
The first viewscreen snapped into focus, showing the reptilian face of Warlord Raymund. The long, wide snout, covered in green scales typical of his species, was twisted into a self confident sneer. If Bauker hadn't been aware of the fact that this was a normal expression, he may have taken offense.
"Raymund, my friend," Bauker said, sweeping his arms out as though receiving the reptile in person. "It's good to see you again. I trust the Cornerians have blunted many a sword against you since we last spoke."
Raymund snorted, and his sneer somehow increased. "Their ships are strong, but they have no…creativity." The way he said the last word forced Bauker to suppress another shiver. "They are like children with tanks."
Next to connect was Admiral Gage of the Cornerian Seventh Fleet, followed immediately by a small number of his highest ranking command staff on their own screens. Bauker recognized the hare, Bishop, from an earlier meeting, but the others were new.
Before he could great the weary looking husky and his subordinates, the rest of the screens flipped on in quick succession. Warlord Norwood, the CEO of Blue Arrow, and a few others filled the viewscreen wall, each with a subordinate or two. Everyone who had joined his coalition was present, ready to hear the news he had called the meeting to report.
Even he was present, one monitor filled by a shadowed silhouette. The Warlord tried not to look at this viewscreen. Like the other screens, Bauker knew the transmission was two-way, and that if the man wanted to, he could have simply turned off his transmitter, allowing him to view the presentation without worrying about being seen, but it appeared as though the entity appreciated the image the lack of lighting literally presented. Only a few of those present would be able to see the shadowed figure's transmission, and Bauker considered himself lucky he appeared to be one.
There was one screen suspiciously blank, however; Warlord Ypson's.
Bauker was about to call a subordinate to question what was keeping the commander when that very subordinate came scurrying up to him.
"Warlord Ypson reports he is unable to attend the conference," the leopard said, reading from a hand screen. "The Cornerian Fifth fleet recently engaged him in battle and he is still occupied."
"Ah, that would make sense," Bauker nodded. "Thank you Major Wilkens. We shall begin then."
A soft hum of conversation had risen since the various monitors had filled, mostly from various officers and leaders discussing with members of their party off camera, though a few had been more enterprising and were discussing items of importance with other delegations present.
Bauker raised his hands, calming those remotely congregated and gathering their attention. He let them focus on him for a few moments, letting the silence build, before breaking it again with his sturdy, orator's voice.
"Gentlemen," he began, knowing a couple attendees were female but choosing to eschew their collective pronoun. The phrase 'Ladies and Gentlemen' had too much of a showman's feel to it. "I know many of you are busy, some urgently so, so I will keep this as brief as possible. Our struggle for Lylat's freedom is ever in motion, and I won't tie up talents like yours in a logistics meeting like this. Not for too long, anyway." That got a few chuckles, though more thin smiles and unimpressed frowns.
He casually strode to a small podium, equipped with a flat datascreen, tilted so only he could see, though he knew the information would be transmitted to all those present. Tapping the screen, he opened the first folder of the package, causing the data to spill out across identical datascreens in the Warlord's and various leaders' offices across Lylat. Even as he spoke, the information scrolled down the screens, automatically at first, but fully reviewable after the meeting had concluded.
"Project Afterlife, I'm pleased to announce, has produced viable results, and is proceeding into full scale operation. As most of you know, Project Afterlife was a theoretical project started under Andross before the war, aiming to tap a new resource for soldiers. In this sense, it has succeeded, and those of you with ground commands can expect to see the fruits of our labors shortly."
He paused, letting what he said sink in for a few moments, and allowed himself a smile. Project Afterlife had been quite a risk, but the reward, if successful, was great. And the project was. And justly, the reward was. Though little ground was gained against the Cornerians in a ship to ship battle, once on the ground, the Project's results would come into full effect.
Bauker tapped his personal screen again, opening the next folder in the presentation. Just as before, various pictures and graphs scrolled by, displaying all sorts of information on his next subject.
"Second, Project Lithium. Though nearing the end of its projected development cycle, our top technicians and researchers are projecting delays-"
"Warlord Bauker," one of the screens interrupted, the speaker a rotund canine whose voice Bauker immediately recognized as Warlord Norwood. "You have been absorbing our credits for Lithium since nearly the end of the Lylat War. And while Afterlife is most impressive, this project is significantly less so. What advantage will this give us against the Cornerian Armada?"
Grumbles of agreement followed closely in the wake of Norwood's objection. Bauker waited patiently for them to die down. He spread his arms again once they did.
"Have a little faith, my friends. The forerunners of Lithium have already produced incredible results, have they not?"
Norwood's image nodded, though his voice became no less accusing. "Absolutely; the sector jumpgates have made it nearly impossible for us to be ambushed in those regions of Lylat." He added, tapping the desk in front of him with force. "But that was not the question. Will Lithium truly be worth the investment?"
"Gentlemen, need I remind you of the Battle of Sector Y?" he asked, beseeching those assembled. "How our ships ambushed the Cornerian fleet due to their radiation shielding? From close to the sector core, we were able to decide the place and strength of our ambush."
Raymund snorted, crossing his arms. "If I remember correctly, Joseph, a flight of mercenaries penetrated the entire fleet during that battle and took down those secret weapons you developed yourself."
"Inconsequential," Bauker dismissed the statement. And it was. He had gotten over the disgrace of losing the battle suits surprisingly quickly. "The point is, the Cornerians could not guess where we would show up in that sector, since we could hide where they couldn't go. That is the essence of Project Lithium. The jumpgates are only the first step."
"And to that end, we already have the key to Lithium in our care." Bauker glanced down at his datascreen, just as an image of Peppy Hare scrolled down it. "It's only a matter of time before we find the proper methods to withdraw it for our uses."
Bauker knew he would get a mountain of questions for that one, but it appeared as though those gathered were content to raise their concerns after the meeting had concluded. He suppressed a smile. At least he could be honest about how short he planned the meeting to be.
"Things are beginning to come together," he continued. "Admiral Gage had recently reported the destruction of our friend Wolf O'Donnell's assets near Fortuna. Without his band of former mercenaries and Venom's dregs, our final loophole has been filled."
"A great day is coming for Lylat, my friends; I look forward to sharing it with all of you."
A/N:
chaos Leader: Thanks for the review cL; I'll be sure to keep an eye on scene placement. I've read a few different books which treat chapters in two different ways. In the first way, a chapter is a period of time, and if the plot involves different points of view, any changes in any POV that occurs during that chapter's time period takes place in that chapter. This can lead to a lot of jumping around. In the other way, a chapter is the opposite in that it focuses on one POV for some amount of time. In both ways it works, and I guess I'm still having trouble deciding which works best in this story. In any case, thanks again for the review!
RedBay:I literally laughed out loud when you mentioned the type with 'shirt.' Sophia's rescue was something that I spent a great deal of time thinking through, but I guess, like chaos Leader mentioned, it could've used some more work with scene placement. Hopefully this chapter was a bit better in that respect; everything happens in a linear sense. I understand how attempts at getting 'cute' with stories (i.e. trying to misdirect the reader, work in time period jumping, etc.) can fail, and I appreciate you pointing those things out. Thanks for the review RedBay :)
TheFrustrated: Thanks for the kind words TheFrustrated; while reviews like RedBay's and cL's are genuinely helpful and appreciated, your words put a smile on my face. I'm sorry this chapter has been so long in arriving; responsibilities have sadly dragged my attention elsewhere. But I will always keep working on this story until completion, I can promise you that. It's been nearly five years now. It'd be a shame to give up on that :)
Thanks to everyone who reads this story, and again, I apologize for the delays in updating. Life has a way of dragging us away from what we like doing, and for me, this is one of those things. But if you guys keep reading, I'll be sure to keep finding time to update. And reviews, both quick ones and critical ones, while entirely optional, are entirely appreciated too.
-Irish Redd
