Chapter XLIX

Several hours passed and Lastrad's team finally set the massive ship to land in a hanger set by Omni. Syler seemed a bit annoyed that Fox's team was not found, but, he seemed a bit happier now that he had his ship back. Unfortunately for Lastrad's team, Gwen was not showing signs of waking any time soon. Whatever that object she'd found was, it had done something to her. Unfortunately at the time this meant that Lastrad's team was not leaving Omni anytime soon. His team was given permission to sleep aboard the ship until their team was ready to leave however the tests of time would see a slightly differing outcome to their current situation...


(Nemesis Docking Bay)

The docking bay of the Nemesis was completely silent...the ship had been looked over several times for any kind of tampering but, there was nothing that seemed to be out of place. Their teams had however overlooked one minor detail. One of the arwings' small cargo bays slid open forming a small ramp allowing a familiar light brown vulpine to step out who reached inside helping a blue vixen out into the open. Soon enough all of the crew was standing there in the docking bay, stretching their sore bodies as their confined quarters were rather cramped and uncomfortable...it had been an unusual plan but that was the beauty of it, no one in Omni would ever have thought of looking for them in such an odd place...now they were inside of Omni and most of the soldiers should be out still looking for Fox and his team. It was a perfect diversion that would seriously put a damper on Syler's defenses at the time...

the small team of animals gathered around Fox, "Alright everyone...that was the easy part. Remember what the teams are supposed to do?"

They had split into several teams; Fox, Krystal, Jared, and Shera made up one team, while Creed, Silver, Roxy, Jane, and Vixy all made up the other team...

"Our team finds and cuts out this station's power supply...hopefully causing some sort of panic to get the power back on-line...then we fall back to the docking bay and wait for your signal to move in and provide the distraction that you all need to get into Syler's office."

"Krystal..." Fox said turning to the blue vixen beside him, "How many soldiers are in the base?"

"Give me a moment..." She said as she closed her eyes to concentrate, "This facility is enormous. Most of the soldiers are out looking for us. There's a small team on this ship but, only one of them is even awake...I doubt we have to worry about him though, he's too busy worrying about his friends. Outside in the hanger there are about four men, and overall no more than 100 on the entire base. I'd look for Syler but, he might be able to sense me if I did."

Fox exhaled a deep breath, "Well then..." He said pulling out his father's old combat knife, "Looks like I'm up first. I'll call it in as soon as the area is clear."

Lastrad sat in the kitchen of the Nemesis...it was always hard dealing with it when Gwen had one of her episodes, he never knew the reason or purpose behind her abilities but...he liked to believe that there was a meaning to every such power, a particular use for it. He stood next to the viewing windows of the large dinning area, the heat from his coffee steaming up the glass pane before him, as he stood there something caught his eye however, unfortunately it moved by so quickly and stealthily that he barely caught a glimpse of it. The large hanger the massive ship sat in was no different that most hangers, spare for the fact that it was located inside of the Omni Complex it was relatively the same; it was littered about with small ships and transports for the Omni staff to carry out small assignments and such, and large metal crates full of god only knows what...knowing Omni Lastrad figured they were most likely full of weapons or something along that line. As he studied the room he saw it again, it was only visible for a moment or two but this time he could clearly make out a bushy tail as whatever it was ducked behind a large stack of crates seemingly vanishing from sight. His interest was peaked at this point. Soon an armed guard in black armor moved by the stack of crates, Lastrad's eyes only left the spot for a moment before the animal simply vanished, there was no sign that the ape had ever been walking there. Suddenly a fox's head stuck up from the crates, the head of a light brownish-red furred fox with a large scar across his face. The assassin's head was only visible for a moment before vanishing back into the shadows clearly he'd been scouting the area for his next target. Lastrad had heard about a short time when Star Fox had been short on work for roughly 8 years or so, and heard that during a small expanse of those years Fox McCloud had done some training with an elite group in Black Ops known as "Shadow". They called themselves Shadows because of their ability to strike completely unnoticed, and with deadly precision before simply fading back into the darkness they came from. He saw the truth behind this name now, there was no sign of the fox at all, and he doubted that he'd have seen it even if he was down inside the hanger with the guards that he was certain were all doomed. He was even more convinced of this when the next guard, a fox, was taken out right in front of his face. The animal was walking toward the Nemesis when a pair of furry arms extended form the shadows stripping him of his weapon as it took a hold of his muzzle drawing a knife across his neck before dragging him into the darkness. The next animal was walking along a small alley formed by a large row of crates. He never really saw it coming as the shadowed figure of Fox McCloud leaped from the shadows dragging the animal to the ground, the guard did not even twitch, the death must have been instantaneous. The sound of the two animals hitting the floor was enough to gather the attention of that last of the guards in the hanger, unfortunately as soon as he came into sight of McCloud the vulpine's knife whizzed thought the air burying itself in the animal's face. As Fox retrieved his knife, several other animals all joined him, Lastrad could see the massive fox that Syler had warned him about, he didn't see any neural-links...Wait were they all coming from the ship? As Lastrad realized this he rushed off toward the docking bay. He couldn't believe what he saw, several of the arwings that were on the ship had their cargo bays wide open...the launched arwings had only been a diversion to make everyone think they'd left the Nemesis when they were on board the docking bay the whole time, he rushed off to the bridge...

"Computer...open com link." He demanded.

"Access denied...voice print not recognized. All systems locking down." MIA's voice replied from the PA system.

Suddenly the ship's doors all slid shut, locking their palm scanners into lock down mode...Him and his entire team were now trapped.

Fox's team split up from the others and headed down the main halls of the large complex which looked strikingly familiar to the one they'd already destroyed. As Fox's smaller team headed into the complex Creed's team used a maintenance elevator to gain access to the place's lower levels where the complex's power grid was maintained. Luckily for them there seemed to be no real number of guards on duty there, most likely they were all guarding Syler's sorry ass, or were out looking for Fox's crew. Fox seemed more focused than usual in their search as his small team of himself, Krystal, Jared, and Shera made their way through the structure, which Krystal found surprisingly bare...she didn't like the feeling of it at all. As they carefully made their way through the complex the blue vixen made her was to Fox's side...

"I don't like this...something feels wrong about this place. It feels like every wall of this place is watching us." She said shivering a bit at the thought of thousands of eyes watching them from the darkness.

"I think you're right...something isn't right here." Fox replied, "Can you pick anything up?"

"Hang on." Krystal said pulling the four person group to a stop and concentrating as hard as possible, "Wait a minute something isn't right at all...all of the soldiers I sensed before......they're all gone. There aren't any thought patterns at all."

Fox took Krystal's paw, "Then lets hurry." He said before rushing off through the halls flipping open his communicator, "Creed change of plans get your team back to the Nemesis and prep from launch."

"But we haven't even...." Creed's voice started before being cut off.

"Just do it something is seriously wrong with this place and I don't want any of us caught here any longer than we have to be."

"Right then but what about the four on the ship?" Creed asked.

"There's only four...throw 'em into the brig and we'll find out what to do about them later."

Fox closed his communicator as his small force entered a large familiar looking room, a massive round room that scaled very high up, the main wall nothing by high density viewing windows. The team took a small elevator up searching floor by floor for Syler's office, and just as Krystal had predicted there was no one on the space station anywhere. Until they entered what was most definitely Syler's office...

"Oh my god." Krystal gasped as she placed a paw over her mouth.

The room was littered with the mutilated corpses of at least a hundred soldiers, each body had been slashed to death or completely dismembered in some way by an extremely sharp blade of some kind. Several of the bodies had been cut in half, but the results were all the same, the floor of the room was covered by a slick carpet of blood reflecting the merciless intentions of whomever had done such a thing. On a blood soaked desk at one end of the room a familiar golden staff lay, remnants of whatever battle had ensued here scattered about the length of the weapon. Fox stepped forward to retrieve the weapon, but as soon as it was in his paws he heard something from behind him. At the sound of Krystal struggling against something he shot about ready to strike whoever dared to lay a paw on her. He froze as he saw the familiar figure that held Krystal with an arm across her throat, Shera and Jared's weapons both ready to fire at a moment's notice. The black vulpine behind Krystal backed against the rail that overlooked the lengthy fall to the floor of the large lobby...

"You...how? Creed was certain that you were dead." Fox asked in amazement at the sight of Arlex.

Arlex chuckled a bit, "Not all is as it would appear...." As he said this the dark fox ran his nose along the side of Krystal's neck and up through her hair inhaling deeply, the act causing Fox to step forward, "I wouldn't do that if I were you." Arlex said drawing attention to his bared claws at the vixen's throat, "Quite a piece of work isn't she?" He asked running the back of his free paw along the side of her face, "Cerinians......they bare such a striking beauty, far more than your average vixen." His free paw rested on her chest just above her breasts, "This is your only warning McCloud...you have no idea what it is you are dealing with...there are powers at play in all of this that your feeble mind cannot even begin to comprehend. Take the staff by all means buy cross me again, and you...as well as every one of your friends, will all suffer the same fate as these pathetic animals." As he said this his paw released something that fell into Krystal's cleavage before pushing her forward. Fox caught Krystal as she stumbled forward and watched as the mysterious vulpine leaped over the railing still facing Fox's small team

Krystal quickly reached into her shirt and removed whatever it was Arlex had dropped, her eyes went wide as soon as she had a clear look at the small thing that now rested in her palm. Fox snatched the small cylindrical silver device from her paw, "HOLY SHIT!!!" He screamed throwing the small device and barreling out of the room toward the elevator.

The others followed behind him and Jared turned to Fox as soon as they were on the elevator, "What the hell was that thing?"

"I'll explain later but, we have about 10 minutes to get out of this complex."

"Or?" Shera asked.

"Or we won't need to worry about Syler...cuz there won't be enough left of any of us to fill a teaspoon."

Creed's small party had the Nemesis prepared to leave, unfortunately there was a small surprise waiting for Fox's small group near the entrance to the docking bay. A familiar looking silver furred fox stood in their path with an expressionless look on his face. Without warning the animal shot forward at Krystal, who Fox quickly knocked out of the way, unfortunately as she fell the blue vixen's head struck the hard metal floor knocking her unconscious...

"Silver what the hell is wrong with you!?!" Shera yelled checking on Krystal.

Fox pulled his knife from his belt, "This isn't Silver." He said squaring off with the fox, "You two get her onto the ship. If I'm not there in four minutes...leave without me."

"We can't do that..." Shera replied as Jared lifted Krystal onto his shoulders.

"You can and you will." Fox replied, "I have to handle this or he may try to stop us all...just trust me, I'll be fine."

As Jared and Shera rushed off toward the Nemesis, Fox simply stood there waiting for Silver's doppleganger to attack, yet the silver vulpine simply stood there studying Fox. Suddenly without warning the silver fox shot forward slashing at Fox with it's claws the attack left a set of tears in Fox's shirt. His attacker didn't even seem to pay notice to the deep cut that Fox's knife had torn into the animal's chest. This strange silver furred fox seemed to stare at Fox like a wild animal who's territory had been invaded. The animal lunged at Fox again, this time resulting in a long string of attacks from both parts of the fight that left each participant with multiple cuts and bruises. Suddenly the silver fox whipped about landing a brutally powerful kick to Fox's left shin flipping the light brown vulpine into the air, from the intense pain Fox could tell the kick had shattered his shin bone...he wasn't certain where this kid had come from but, he was immensely strong. As Fox's helpless body flipped through the air the animal leaped into the air driving a kick into Fox's chest which sent him flying into a nearby wall. It was in that moment that Fox could hear the PA system of the complex sound off...

"Warning. Explosive device detected in sector-32, 15, 41, and 66...Emergency evacuation procedures should be taken immediately. Repeat..."

As Fox heard this he fought himself onto his good leg, he already knew that the device was bound to set off the explosions soon. His opponent rushed him again, but his broken leg made it impossible to dodge the blow, which sent him several feet away causing him to slide into the docking bay where he could hear the Nemesis's engines preping for launch. After fighting himself to his feet again, the silver assailant rushed in on the injured vulpine, this time Fox managed to tuck and roll out of the way but...another kick sent him sliding across the ground back into the halls again. Something about the last attack caused him to spit up a large clot of blood...it felt like his insides had been pulverized as he managed to make it too his feet again. The silver fox rushed in on the beaten vulpine again, his fist felt like being pummeled by a slab of granite, the attack slammed his back into one of the hall ways walls. Fox had never thought about what it would have been like fighting Silver when he went off the deep end, but he was certain that it would have been something like this. No matter what he did or how he moved there was no way around the animal, the silver fox was fast, strong, and not injured. However, if this was a copy of Silver, it had to have had very minimal experience in these situations. As it once again rushed Fox ready to drive what could have been a potentially lethal punch...however, the silver fox's fist only met the metal of the wall, and before the animal could realize any better Fox's knife pierced the side of it's head pinning it to the wall for a moment before Fox removed the weapon allowing the silver corpse to fall to the floor.. The beaten and injured vulpine limped toward the hanger of the massive station only to find that his time was up as the first explosion rocked the complex...

Creed stood on the bridge of the Nemesis. The ship was far off into the distance when the entire ship was rocked by the shock wave of a massive explosion from the complex that was now erupting into a multitude of large blasts.. Soon there was nothing but floating debris left in the space station's place, which he could see bursting into flames as the small bits entered the nearby blue planet's atmosphere. His only worry now, how to tell Krystal that Fox had never made it to the ship. There were no words spoken on the bridge, there didn't seem to be anything anyone could say...they could only stand by and pray that some how Fox had managed to get away from the explosion. After the crew had all been seated there for a short time, the doors to the bridge slid open allowing a blue vixen to walk in holding the side of her aching head. As she walked forward she noticed that no one would look at her...oddly enough she didn't say anything, she simply made her way to the large viewing windows of the bridge. She was standing there for quite a while before turning around and rushing off of the bridge. Still remaining silent Krystal made her way to the docking bay where she boarded one of the arwings, before anyone could catch up to her the blue furred pilot tore out of the docking bay leaving the others wondering what she could possibly be thinking at the moment. Vixy soon boarded one of the small crafts as well...

"What the hell are you two doing?!" Creed yelled over the sound of the small fighter's engine.

"Call it a mother's intuition! Just stay here!"


A/N: Sorry for the late...and short chapter, but I have been incredibly busy these days. Not to mention I have a horrible case of writer's block, can't think of a thing to write for anything. Next chapter may be a little held back...sorry. I'll try my hardest to get it out sooner but, I'd really rather not rush it. Thanks for the support like always everyone, enjoy R&R, and I'll see you next time.

the footsteps in the darkness- SkullFox