Black Skies
Author's Note: And after a long while, we've arrived here at the final chapter for Book I: Lylat. Thank you to everyone who left a review for Black Skies so far!
Quick note- this chapter can be well read to this music (Aces High): http // youtube . com / watch?vPQociBLRfds
From here, we move into Book II: Eloria, where we will follow the story of Star Wolf, and Star Wolf alone, on their foray into Grall. If anyone has ideas for this section of the book, please let me know. And with that...here's Raphael, signing off Lylat for the last time!
Chapter 35 Fires of Hope
The Cerulean Blue trembled as its prow pierced a Gatekeeper's Forcefield, shimmering waves of blue sparks running down the Arwing's length. The forcefield remained in place, flickering slightly where the squadron had passed through it.
The group was passing close now into the atmosphere, the first and second incarnations of the elite Star Fox team, a wing commander of Venom, and a general of Corneria. Such a group had never been seen before in Lylat.
Nor had a war of this scale. Krystal felt a tiny pang of regret twinge her nerves. The Time Spring had been a huge opportunity for her. Touching it with the staff would allow a person a brief view of the future or the past, but touching it, the point where the fabric of space and time converged, would have taken her to another era, perhaps even the one where her home was still full, vibrant, and coursing with vitality.
But she was here, now, and she focused with ever-stronger resolve on the situation at hand as flames, a violent red-orange in color, began to lick up from the nose of her ship.
Buckley O'Reilly's streamlined Silverian was outstripping the other ships in their bid for the surface until a determined Century Shorehm ignited his boosters to hurl the Jet-Lag forwards.
Fox stared through the sheet of rippling flame coursing just above him, deflected only by a thin layer of glass and the glow of his shields. Ahead, he could see the ionized sphere of plasma driving the Silverian, and the long, trailing streams that were falling back from Century's boosters, a twisting, rippling ribbon of blue that whipped by his cockpit and vanished behind them.
Fox's eyebrows knitted. His paws deftly manipulated a series of levers, switches, and controls to send power roaring into his engines, the white plasma ion stream widening and gathering intensity until even through the flame curtains shrouding the view of those behind him, it was brighter than Solar and painful to the eyes.
At last, the flames of reentry died away, leaving trails of dark, ugly smoke streaming from the wingtips of each ship.
Below them was the hellish scab of Sauria, rivers of magma coursing through huge canyons and chasms so deep, the bottom could not be seen but for the glow of lava.
Walls of jagged rock whipped by the cockpit as Fox navigated a canyon, a river of lava promising a fiery death should he hit the rock face. Before him, the walls of the canyon suddenly diverged, a tremendous expanse of nothingness opening up before him.
The lava river plunged in a dramatic, cascading waterfall of molten metal, the planet's lifeblood coursing down into the abyss in a glowing thread of fire that disappeared into a darkness that swallowed it completely.
Fox pushed forwards on both control rods, plunging his nose downwards. The horizon teetered in his viewpane, then rushed upwards and was lost to sight.
Spinning in a loose barrel roll, each of the ten fighter craft plunged downwards into the darkness.
As the makeshift squadron faded from view, the space around Sauria was filled with flashing, explosive stars as almost a hundred warp streams were collapsed to facilitate reentry of their occupants into normal space.
On one side, the fading, azure remains of decaying warp streams were spewing forth Cornerian battleships and cruisers, destroyers and carriers. Drifting into formation, the Cornerian fleet hovered above the surface to await orders.
On the other side, a tremendous series of starbursts signaled the arrival of the Venomian fleet, red explosions fading away to leave the might of the Venomian First Fleet in plain view. While the Cornerian fleet hovered, unsure of what to do, their Venomian counterparts had no such qualms, and fighters streamed from their launch bays in swarms of silver, lit from behind by a sphere of azure plasma ions. These banked in sharply and swung towards the depression in Sauria's surface, avoiding Dragon Rock on their way.
Arwings and Lerowings rushed from Cornerian ships, many breaking down towards the planet as ordered- but some changing course for Venomian lines.
Andross, aboard the bridge of his ship, the Omen Bird, watched the situation unfold with a practiced eye. Using fingers on both paws, he deftly dragged squadrons of fighters to various locations, leaving most to continue towards the planet's surface, and ordering the others to form a defensive screen.
The CSS Halcyon, commanded by Fleet Admiral Gevan, was awash with near-constant communication relays. Employing extremely low-yield lasers, the Venomian fleet was simply keeping the Cornerians at bay. Sure that this was a ploy that the unknown fleet, doubtless under Andrew, was using, Gevan gave an order that directly countermanded that of Pepper's just minutes before.
Gun turrets swung slowly towards Venomian lines.
"M'lord, the Cornerian ships are charging weapons!" called an advisor, watching power levels across the other fleet spike. Andross gave his orders within seconds.
"Break the fleet. No ship will fire weapons- scatter and continue launching fighters. Move!"
The order was hastily obeyed, the Emperor's fleet breaking apart as ships surged everywhere at high speeds, turning a well-ordered formation into a whirlwind of flashing armor and a melee of confusion.
The first rays of streaming cannon fire lanced into the middle of the fleet, where a ship had been just seconds ago, and passed on, burning white and blue. The Cornerian ships pounced upon the dispersing fleet, confident that this was the greater threat.
The Omen Bird was the most frequently targeted ship, struck repeatedly by Cornerian weapons. As the battle continued to escalate, so did the anger within Andross. And at last, he exploded, a comm line to the Cornerian flagship opening as his iron control broke in rage.
"You are firing on ships of the Venomian First Fleet! Stand down, or we will destroy you, as well as the aparoids!"
The darkness of the surrounding abyss was expelled at last as the unseen, yet present bottom of the expanse rushed up and then narrowed into a shaft, smaller streams of lava coursing into it from where it had spattered at the end of its fall. The fountain of lava was breaking upon a stout projection of rock near the shaft rim with a fearsome roar, great beads of red and orange spraying into the air, some winking out, others dropping back into the turmoil as it poured down into the tunnel.
Without hesitation, Fox turned his Arwing into the aperture, the Krystal Fire being followed most closely by James. Father and son entered the shaft side by side, followed by comrades who had stayed with them for decades without question, steadfast and faithful members of Lylat.
The craggy, red-lit walls were shooting by at enormous speeds, a blurred rush of rock and lava. The tendrils of lava that descended into the bowels of Sauria would explode upon contact with various projections from the rock face, forcing the ten fighters to jink and roll in various positions to avoid sustaining damage. Slippy kept a wary eye on his radar, but it was Falco who first voiced his concern.
"We see a dead end, we're screwed. There's got to be a way to find out if it's really a tunnel that goes anywhere.."
"Forget radar," answered Slippy, groaning. "Magical interference is so strong here, it has no chance of giving us anything but what's in front of our noses!"
"We'll just have to play it by our instincts, then," replied Fox. "Just like we always have." This was a lie, and the vulpine knew it- but it was still true that Star Fox relied less on instruments then any other team in Lylat. As such, everyone let the comment stand without question.
Fox, giving warning well in advance, began to slow, the rest of the team following his lead. Abbey turned her head curiously.
"Why did we stop, Fox?" she asked, looking around. She then saw the fork in the tunnel. "Oh."
"Well, we can't fire lasers to check," said Slippy, some time later. "We could bring the entire area down on our heads."
"He's right," said Century. "I'd suggest we send someone down and come back if it doesn't end within, oh, ten minutes of cruising."
"Both could be very long, time consuming, dead ends," answered Peppy. He shifted in his seat to look back towards Krystal's Arwing. "Krys, can you sense anything that might help us?"
The vixen ruffled the back of her head uncertainly, words coming from her maw in slow spurts. "I'm not sure...I'm...no! Don't turn left!" she screamed. The others turned wildly about to see who she was referring to, only in time to see a Mark III Arwing plummet down from above, and turn left, where it suddenly exploded in a blizzard of burning metal and plasma.
"It was a trap, it was a trap..." she sobbed, crying in her cockpit. Fox shook his head slowly and sighed. It was General Pepper who first broke the ensuing silence.
"Friends, that pilot was a member of the Cornerian Army, who had probably accepted he would not make it back alive. This was a volunteer mission. He knew the risks."
"We have to press on," said James, voice firm. "I'll use my grappler and collapse the shaft. Then we can move on."
"C'mon, Krys, don't break on us now," cajoled Fox, worry coloring his voice. The vixen sniffed, drew an arm across her eyes, and gave a slow nod.
The burning wreckage of the Arwing was buried by many tons of rock as James's grappler pulled down a stone slab onto it. There was a dull thud, and then silence once more.
Pigma looked up through the roof of his cockpit. "We'd better get going, before we cause a roadblock."
A tense standoff in the skies above Sauria continued without an end in sight, Andross and Gevan positively glaring at each other through miles of empty space. The silence on the bridge of the Halcyon was broken only when a sensor officer came up to the hound's shoulder and began to speak.
"Sir, we're getting anomalous readings from the surface," he said. When there was silence, he shifted upon his paws. "Sir?"
"Yes, ensign, I heard you," said the admiral, voice distant. "Can you get a visual?"
"I'll take a crack at it," replied the junior officer, and he moved back to his console and tapped a few keys.
A CloudRunner soared past the screen area, a bolt of blue magic shooting from its open maw. The spinning orb rolled through the air until it struck something, something with a crystalline body that glowed with an unnatural light.
Gevan's breath caught in his throat. Then his eyes hardened. "Recall all ships! Attack the aparoids on the planet surface, now!"
Andross gave a small sigh of relief as the Cornerians peeled away, rushing to the Saurian atmosphere. His fighters mostly deployed, he gave an order to take the ships to the surface, and his fleet drew into formation once more for a final drive.
Bill Grey and Fara Phoenix spiraled into formation to join the makeshift squadron of ten, both flying Lerowing Vs at the moment. Bill gave a nod to Fox over the comm.
"Be needing us?" he queried, voice dripping with sarcasm. Fox smiled, then gave a nod.
"As timely as ever, aren't you? Let's go, Bill!" As he said it, the vulpine glanced into his rear-view monitor, and was struck dumb by what he saw.
The shaft was filled with the brightly-burning engines of what looked like hundreds of Cornerian and Venomian fighters, all jockeying for position to claim a spot near the head of the charge. He shook his head, attempted to speak, failed, and then reached for his boosters and ignited them with an explosion of blue light.
Rallying his troops upon a craggy mountainside, Prince Tricky threw back his head and gave a thunderous roar, calling out as he did, "Fight, brothers! Let us throw back their clawed paws! Fight to the last!" And lent strength and valor by the role he had assumed, Tricky took in a great breath and expelled a column of violet flame from his maw which ripped into the air, causing the air to shimmer with heat as it passed upwards in a solid, unbroken stream of deadly heat.
CloudRunners, LightFoot, SharpClaw, HighTops, and EarthWalkers cheered at his words and fought on as destroyed and blackened husks of dead and dying aparoids fell to the ground in impotent piles of ash and debris which broke upon the ground in showers of dust.
Sauria shook and rumbled from Tricky's Mountain down to its core. Rock wrenched itself free from tunnel walls and columns to fall into the infinite abyss below which seemed to stretch without even a hint of an end. Perhaps the Queen was not there after all, and this entire venture had been but a waste of time.
The lava continued to fall in a winding stream which dropped away into the endless well. At last, however, a dim glow began to suffuse the air around them. Fox was forced to pull up abruptly to avoid slamming into a pool of lava which flowed into an adjoining tunnel.
An explosion rolled through the side shaft, causing Fox to grit his teeth. Somewhere, behind him, a pilot must have misjudged his control and hit the rock face. But grieving would mean the end of him as well, as the shaft was twisting and turning now with increasing frequency, projections of rock stabbing out into the air.
At last, the tunnel shot sideways into open space, a huge room filled with a great, pulsating diamond crystal in the room's center, connected to the ceiling and floor by great, textured and raised discs. Smaller pillars spanned the chamber in a grid, many reaching up to connect with the central crystal, the others turning the chamber into a veritable maze of pylons and crystal.
One by one in an unbroken stream, the Cornerian and Venomian forces, Star Fox at their head, flew into the expanse, only to be greeted by a hail of lasers which flew from the gaping maws of a swarm of aparoids banking around a set of pillars, energy bolts breaking apart upon the raised shields of the attackers.
The response to the attack was flawless, smoother than any preplanned routine. Instinct and intuition graced their movements and oiled them to near perfection. The Cornerian wing swept forward their wings into all-range mode, peeling hard to starboard to unleash a murderous hail of blue and white lasers.
The Venomian fighters turned the other way, taking a circuitous approach to rip into the aparoid flanks, milling with loose fighters, with streams of red lasers, a continuous cascade of crimson light.
Crystal shards and steel fragments were exploding everywhere into deadly clouds of debris that whipped through the air, cast to the winds as lasers pelted through the enclosed spaces to strike their targets and rip them into oblivion.
Pepper banked sharply around a pillar, smiling with grim, cold satisfaction as the furious thunderclap behind him told him that his pursuers had been destroyed. High-yield lasers came streaking across his vision, and the hound fired retro-rockets and threw his ship into a hard climb, rotating his ship on its horizontal axis to come in down upon his attackers. Pearl lasers winged out from his guns like avenging angels, shredding two aparoids- and a Venomian fighter beneath it.
Unexpectedly, the hardened general felt a pang of regret lance through him, a poignant surge of emotion that momentarily left him stunned and defenseless. Recovering quickly after his shields began to dip, Pepper shook his head, gritted his teeth, and flew on, avoiding aparoids whenever possible to allow his shields to regenerate.
Pigma's nerves were fraying fast. Although he and James had been sent to do recon into known Grallian hotspots, those had always been intense fights- but in open space. Sweat trickled down his rolled face as structural pylons whipped by at insane speeds, yet the pig knew that slowing down could only mean certain death or assimilation.
Streaks of red fire slammed into his vision, erupting into an enormous, crimson fireball as the stream of lasers crashed into a crystal pillar, shattering it to pieces. Looking back, Pigma could see it was a Venomian, who had clearly mistaken him for an aparoid.
Deftly shaking the errant pursuer with a barrel roll and a stiff dive, the swine nevertheless found himself running into another screen of viridian death, bolts of infectious and high-yield energy spraying up in what seemed to be almost a continuous screen of blazing light. Blinking to clear his star-filled vision, Pigma banked hard to avoid hitting a crystal pillar. Firing out blindly into the luminous inferno of destructive energy, the swine was rewarded by a flare of light different from that of laser fire- crimson fireballs that blasted outwards in horrendous conflagrations which signaled the passing of a life into the next world. Rounding a pillar, he found himself coming under attack yet again, and taking his chances, Pigma threw his engines at full power and roared through the chamber, dodging and twisting through the maze of crystal, which lit up almost constantly to the flare of lasers, explosions of bombs, and the detonations of Venomian missiles.
Buckley O'Reilly was a distinguished pilot, a hardened fighter, and an exemplary daredevil. Yet this, only his fifth combat mission in his short life, was proving to be a harrowing glimpse into the full realities of war in all their brutality. All around him, Venomian and Cornerian fighters were exploding, destroyed by pilot error or by the lasers that seeked their tails at all times. He banked left and right, barrel rolling when necessary to prevent enemy fire from raking his stern, and the vulnerable technology within. A blipping tone informed him his computer had achieved a missile lock, and two thin, green-glowing warheads shot out from small bays on either side of his ship, streaking out towards their target and destroying it in a hail of crystal and broken memories.
All at once, every aparoid in the area seemed to concentrate upon him, inundating the tiger with their numbers. A sudden break in the near-solid barrage caused him to look up.
Above him, the distinct, unmistakable silhouettes of Mark IV Arwings and the predatory, custom-built Jet-Lag passed through the gauntlet of weapons fire, buying him precious moments to analyze his options.
A second later, the beleaguered Silverian shuddered, shields failing in a tremendous burst of light. Rippling lances of crackling azure flew over the craft as projectors failed and burned out, the engines dying as the red glow of G-Slipstreams faded to nothing. There was a great flash and a hollow thud, and then the ship was gone, broken into so many pieces of blackened, charred, and twisted debris which flew in all directions as if from some monstrous fountain.
Century looked back in time to see the detonation, but unknowing that it was that of Buckley's ship, he merely smiled and moved on, confident that the resourceful feline had utilized the brute force of his ship to escape.
The Jet-Lag swooped between two closing aparoids, both of which whirled away from each other and swung back around to engage him, pelting his ship with green lasers. The ovular shields surrounding the ship flared, turning the attack. A swift modification to the shield grid caused the barrier to shimmer and turn a hazy color of blue. The following assault on the Jet-Lag was not only turned- it was reflected, lasers spitting back along their original flight path to destroy the pursuing aparoids in great explosion of violet light.
Century whooped and flew on, spinning his ship vertically and moving to intercept another group of aparoids that whirled past his flank, firing at a Cornerian Arwing. The group was decimated by a spray of hyper lasers within seconds.
James's Ancient Fire was roaring about the cavern like a juggernaut, pursuing almost as many aparoids as were pursuing him. Yet as hard as the enemy behind him strove to bring him down, they could not touch the ace, whose Arwing leapt and darted about as if it had a mind of its own, kicking up its stern and bows, rolling from side to side, and jinking in all directions to avoid being hit, all the while emitting a near-solid stream of weapons-fire in a devastator attack. The shimmering spectra of green, blue, yellow, and white laser rounds was a dazzling spectacle, almost creating a carpet of incandescence brilliance which would let no aparoid pass in one piece.
Peppy had been the least productive member of Star Fox in kills, having only dropped the occasional aparoid to wander into his sights, but tactically, his views were indispensible. Surveying the battle in a careful loop, the hare began to notice troubling signs, besides that of the appalling losses the allied fighters were sustaining.
Aparoids seemed to be melting out of the crystal support pillars, and so even while the overall number of them was falling, the regeneration promised to make this battle a long one. It wasn't long before the hare decided to act, and as one, Star Fox swooped through the pillars- not dodging them, but tearing them to pieces with tremendous displays of firepower, lasers breaking one apart with kinetic and thermal energy, Nova bombs simply blasting them apart and shattering them with concussive force. Great swaths of clear space began to appear in the aparoid-infested grid of girders as more and more of the crystalline were destroyed.
At last, the majority of the drones had been sent plummeting to the cavern floor in flames and heaps of ashes. Fox directed the squadron towards another shaft set into the wall, and the remaining ships followed him into the tunnel.
They emerged into a battle-scarred room, lit by a sinisterly glowing crystal, flanked on all sides by crystal supports, many cracked and broken. A network of tunnels pierced the walls, and choosing one at random, Fox pulled through.
As soon as he saw crystal girders in front of him, a swooping, sickening feeling seized his gut, filling him with cold fear which slowed his thoughts and battered at his resolve. The battle damage in this room was the same as the one in the last- and the one before that. Which could only mean one thing- that they as a whole were victims of a deception.
He was looking back, rotating slowly as he hailed Bill when it happened. The air blurred, and something crashed into a milling body of allied fighters. One instant they were there, the next, they were gone, broken hulls falling in complete silence. Some ships had disappeared entirely.
"It's a trap!" roared Bill, bulldog voice booming out over the comm. "Scatter, now!" Panic rippled through the task force like a wave, but even before it could sweep the fleet apart upon its wings of fear, the blurring of air had struck again, snatching several more fighters from their midst.
His sharp eyes lending him aid, Falco Lombardi was able to spot a disturbance tracking him, lunging at him. With one deft movement, the GaleStorm flipped up and away. The shimmering air passed beneath him, and for a split second, Falco saw it. A indistinct, but massive form of purple, silver, blue, and gold, with massive, beady crimson eyes with horrible black pupils spinning about, watching him intently. Then the apparition was gone, and only the wavering wake of the thing could be seen.
Falco glanced down at his scanners, which showed nothing. Something seemed to click within his brain, and reaching for the fleet comm, he yelled, "It's a hologram! It's hiding under a hologram! Shoot, shoot it!"
Lasers pelted in all directions, most missing, others being absorbed by an unseen obstacle which would then turn to destroy fighters upon its whims. Amidst the screaming cries and general chaos, Slippy, in a stroke of unbelievable fortune, flew past the discs connecting the giant crystal to the floor and ceiling. His computer chimed a piercing tone as he passed near it, energy levels spiking to unbelievable heights. Slippy opened his comm channel.
"Those discs are the holographic projectors! Shoot them first!"
Laser fire came crashing down onto the discs in a luminescent cascade, but it had only hammered into the objects for several seconds when the image shimmered and disappeared. Fox, however, was firm in his orders when he realized what was happening.
"All ships, maintain fire! It's a hologram- it may vanish, but that one can't move!"
Nova bombs went blazing out into the air to explode with tremendous force. The entire room shimmered, flickered, and then the monstrous figure of the Third Queen swam into view as the supposed shafts in the cavern walls vanished as if they had never been. The Third Queen, still moving in an indistinct blur, flew through the large crystal standing firm upon smoking supports, and emerged, bursts of violet-crimson light roaring from ports and weapons all over its horrible body and tearing into the remains of the fighter fleet.
Fox gritted his teeth and swung his ship around. The real battle was just beginning. Before him was the stiff, roughly cylindrical form of the Third Queen, its four aft wings likening it to a missile. Rippling beams that looked almost like focal lasers were cutting swathes through the allied fighter cover. Fox swore as one such beam flickered towards a franticly maneuvering pilot, who could not have known that his dodging was reducing his speed, and thus, chances of escape.
The vulpine threw his ship between the lancing beam and its intended target, his onboard computers redirecting his shields to cover his dorsal side. Even as his ventral shielding began to take a beating from some aparoid below, the Krystal Fire seemed to shudder like some rock in water, bearing the assault. Fox turned his ship into the beam, and his shields began to rotate, covering his prow with a protective envelope of sparkling energy.
His entire field of vision was inundated by the purple and orange beam which threatened to rip him apart. From wingtip to wingtip, even the massive breadth of the Arwing IV was not enough to show through the energy beam.
But it was enough to weather it. The purple and orange hue surrounding him in its embrace suddenly sparkled and lit up to a different spectra, white, green, and blue lasers exploding from his Arwing in a huge, rippling wave of firepower. Two Nova bombs winged out of their launchers, the first unable to weather the barrage and exploding. The weapon's detonation frequency harmlessly passed over the Arwing's shields.
Flanked by an entourage of multihued lasers, the second Nova bomb spiraled on in, detonating with vicious force against the Third Queen. The beam receptacle was instantly shattered, and the lance of energy faded within seconds. Fox glanced to his shields even as he peeled off, avoiding another spray of lasers. They were reading at just above sixty percent.
Slippy's sensors were sweeping all over the Third Queen, even as it wavered and vanished, its holographic skin having regenerated. Two Nova bombs, expertly placed within the foe's flight path detonated, throwing rays of light outwards which battered at the Third Queen. Although the local holographic projectors were not yet taken offline, the empty space pushing through the explosion was indication enough of the enemy's position.
Slippy flashed by, passing within the influence of the holographic cloak. Below him, he could see the rippling skin of the queen, and opening fire, he pelted it with lasers of all strengths and hues. Explosions rippled upwards for several instants before they were quelled by some unseen force.
Outside of Slippy's battle with the Third Queen, Abbey and Krystal were looping around each other in a continuous maelstrom of firepower, weapons reaching out to shred pylon after pylon and sending it crumbling to the ground in ashes. With the destruction of each girder, the flying area became clearer and clearer, affording the queen fewer and fewer places to hide.
A flock of determined Cornerian pilots, following Bill and Fara's lead, were dogging the Third Queen, pounding it in hopes of rupturing its cloak. Gouts of fire were blasting upwards and through the holographic skin from where Slippy continued to dog the massive aparoid, and even though the Queen fired back at its tormentors, the relentless hail of lasers never abated, and not one Cornerian was hit.
Venomian fighters were breaking back towards the tremendous crystal in the room's center, assailing it again and again. Laser fire would illuminate the gemstone as it refracted within the object, lending the Third Queen more energy to continue its assault. But it was not long before Pigma realized this, and rallying the Venomians, turned them in one, sweeping attack to slam the crystal with volleys of missiles and bombs.
The concussive force proved too much, and the large stone was blasted to pieces in a tremendous, rippling explosion that cast a visible shockwave which bent and distorted the very air out. Riding the wave, the Venomians continued towards the room's center, were a crackling strand of energy was struggling to maintain cohesion between the ceiling and the floor.
Four Venomian pilots were killed by a desperate attack from the Third Queen, but the rest locked weapons and attacked again, severing the energy strand. Explosions rocked the chamber, and the Queen gave a deafening, screeching cry.
For a moment, James thought it was over, and he adjusted his sunglasses with a cool air of quiet triumph. But then, the holographic skin of the Third Queen disengaged, and it was surrounded instead by a rippling barrier which distorted the air with its effects. Turning, the Third Queen plunged into a solid wall and disappeared.
Slippy could not believe his eyes- his Arwing was traveling through solid rock. But it was only the work of a moment for his sensors to give him the story, and falling back and free of the Queen's jamming envelope, he sent a call to the allied fleet.
"The field's interphasic! Hurry up and hit the wall, now, or we'll never catch it!"
There was no time for doubt, no time for second-guessing. The allied fleet followed and plunged into the solid barrier, still shifting in and out of phase from the effect of the Queen's flight. One or two unlucky ships were trapped in the hardening rock face as it came back into phase, their sudden arrest destroying them in blasts which threw flame back into the ruined chamber. The rest of the fleet, drawn by Slippy's beacon, continued on, racing through solid rock to emerge into a chamber almost a hundred times larger than the last.
Fox recognized it instantly- the vaulted ceiling, the shifting lava, and even the set of bridges connected to a towering pillar above a void. Three SpellStones lay dimly, their energy ripped from them by the Aparoid Queen.
One had been unable to survive the loss of energy and lay in pieces upon the ground.
A roaring filled the vulpine's ears, and he charged after the cloaking aparoid, pummeling it with a brilliant barrage of lasers.
The comm line was silent for mere seconds before, with a unified war cry, fighters, Venomian and Cornerian, joined Star Fox in their attack, swooping down and in like avenging angels to rake the Third Queen from head to stern with a hail of weaponry.
Bill and Fara, banking and rolling in a sharp turn came about and fired at once, their Lerowings exploding in a dazzling blast of energy that rippled out and struck the unseen Queen. At last, its holographic projectors failed and it swam back into view.
No weapon marked its skin, but its shields were smoking badly. Giving a cry of rage, the Third Queen threw a powerful shockwave in all directions, trying to shake its attackers in its fury. All fighters turned into the disturbance and weathered it out, emerging without harm from it to open fire again.
The shockwave had been the dispelling of the Third Queen's shields, a desperate gamble to end the battle then and there. Laser rounds pounded into the aparoid armor, many being absorbed and refracted. But where many volleys struck at once, the protective coating was melted away and vaporized, leaving green smoke, the Queen's lifeblood, to trail away from the breaches.
A titanic lance of light shot from a glowing violet disc between the Queen's four eyes and connected it to the SpellStone pillar. The three remaining gems dimmed further, and the tendril of red energy that ran up towards the surface was nearly exhausted by the Queen's draw of energy.
The battle might have been over there, the Queen regaining almost all her strength. Through his entire life, however, Falco Lombardi, usually the least spiritual of his team, would never forget what happened next. General Pepper, who had commanded and watched scores of the bravest furs in Lylat die to protect him, could never put this sight from his mind.
A Cornerian and Venomian fighter together flew into the beam and were destroyed, breaking the connection. Pieces of flaming debris from their flying coffins mixed and intermingled with one another on their path to the ground.
The room was silent. Then, there was a roar of rage and defiance, a howl for revenge.
Bill and Fara, each leading a compliment of twenty fighters, came banking in for an attack run from one side.
General Pepper, the entire remaining force of the Venomian fleet behind him, pulled in for an attack from above.
James and Pigma attacked from below and behind.
Falco and Abbey streaked in from the Third Queen's left flank.
Century and Slippy dove together in a spiraling attack from another side.
Krystal and Fox dove together, straight towards the Third Queen. They looked at each other, knowing what they had to do. Nova bombs poured in a waterfall from their ships, one after the other, each trailing an aura of azure light behind its red-glowing shell. Both ships fired five warheads, each of which tore apart the Queen's front, sweeping aside the pathetic attempts at shielding the aparoid had mustered.
As laser fire, bombs, and missiles poured in on all side, Fox threw a switch, reversing his wingtip polarity. The world spun around him as his Arwing began to roll, shooting past sixty revolutions a minute within seconds. Everything but the Third Queen, directly before him, swam out of focus in a dizzying haze that disoriented him and threatened to sweep him into the darkness.
The Krystal Fire slammed into the Third Queen, right between its four eyes. The Arwing drove through, disappearing into the bowels of the beast in a whirlwind of flying plating and crystal.
Krystal closed her eyes and fired her remaining Nova bombs, three in number, directly into the opening made by her mate.
A second passed, and then another.
The cerulean Cernian pressed a button, and from within the Third Queen, the triad of Nova bombs detonated in harmony, just as Fox, borne upon a spire of azure light from the explosion, tore out the rear end of the aparoid, Arwing trailing smoke and plating, but still in working condition and the pilot untouched.
The Aparoid Queen plowed on for a moment before it was shorn apart from within, disintegrating at once into a storm of particles, broken crystal, and a final, dying cry.
The remains of hundreds of brave pilots were strewn through the depths of Sauria. Many would never be recovered. Buckley O'Reilly had ejected moments before his Silverian was destroyed, but had not survived. In the air, knowing he could not even hope to make landfall in one piece, he had grabbed ahold of a flying aparoid and forced it down with him.
Hundreds of others, many of whose names might have never been known but for the later efforts of General Pepper, were strewn far and wide, dead in their quest to protect Lylat. But they had died in peace.
Krazoa Spirits rushed from nowhere, whispering air marking their paths. The remains of the allied fleet, hanging in place, watched in stupefied and weary awe as these gods of peace swooped through the air. The broken SpellStone came together, and as one, the four regained their lost light.
Injured pilots and broken machines were mended in a rush of cool light that flowed over them, polarizing the dramatic scene into white and black before freezing it entirely.
They were in space. Solar shone brightly upon the wearied and bloody group of fighters that had survived the battle. Many looked towards each other now, not as enemies or even allies, but as friends, brought together by bonds only war could forge.
Fox watched as Cornerian and Venomian carriers moved to retrieve their lost men, taking them up almost as a mother might collect her lost children. But some of those would never return, never see their wives and loved ones again. Victory had come, but at a heavy price.
Exhausted and battle-wearied, Fox looked on beyond the approaching figure of the Great Fox, towards Grall. War was still present, and this had been just one more to mark in the pages of history. Yet Fox felt an odd peace take him, and for a moment, he could swear he saw someone smiling at him, through all those light years of empty and desolate space.
For a second, he could see the approving visage of Wolf O'Donnell.