Dark Dreams and Waking Nightmares
She was here again. In this place. It was the place where Fox's mother had died, she knew that now. In a vague and distant way, she knew it was a dream, but even still she couldn't wake. Ever since she had touched him, back in that bar on Corneria, she had dreamed his dream again and again. Each night she came here, and was forced to watch as Fox sat beside his mother. He would struggle here in this sterile little hell, and suffer, a young boy, so small and vulnerable, so unlike the man he would become, unable to help the woman he loved so dearly. And each night, when he could no longer take the pain, he fell. Fell away into darkness. She would try to follow, try to catch him, to help him, but she couldn't. He was always just out of reach, going where she couldn't follow. As they plunged into the dark every night she felt as though they were being watched, hunted by something terrible, but always they were saved, released to consciousness by a fiery colored bird. It would fly in a circle, a continuous loop, chasing its tail feathers, and she would reach out to it, waking as she touched it. That's how it was supposed to go.
But tonight something was different. Krystal sat in the same hospital room with its porcelain white walls and sparce furnishings, but it was empty. Everything was still, as lifeless as a ruin. The bed where Fox's mother normally lay was vacant, and Fox himself was absent. He failed to appear in his own dream. It was cold. She hugged her knees to her chest and shivered, her breath hanging in the air each time she exhaled. Frost crept across the rooms surfaces, accenting everything in a ghostly white. She was alone, and that was somehow worse than watching Fox in his torment. When he was here she felt his pain, and it hurt so badly, but without him she felt… helpless, abandoned. The windows were barred, and a fear in the pit of Krystal's stomach kept her from looking through them, but when a breeze blew in through the gaping, frozen bars she shivered. Had the window been open before? Her curiosity compelled her to it, and she realized why she hadn't wanted to see. Outside was the blasted, ruined expanse of a dead world. Wind drove dust through necrotic trees, and distant city skylines stood empty, hollow. She knew this place. It was her home.
It was Cerinia.
She remembered, what seemed like so long ago, running through green fields just outside the sweeping, ornate architecture of its planned cities. It was all a blur, memories from a long forgotten childhood. Something had happened. She couldn't remember what. She woke in a room far underground. Alone. She remembered stumbling, her head in a fog, following… a voice? She emerged from a bunker of some kind, and what she saw then was exactly what she was seeing now. The grey light of her world's distant star shown down without warmth. Whatever great engine had once made her world habitable had somehow failed. She had wandered the grounds of a strange compound finding no one, not even a trace of another living soul. The temperature dropped with each passing hour, until, scared and nearly frozen, she had found a ship. In its navigation system she had found the coordinates for a single, distant star. For years after that, she had wandered, following a pre-programmed route, stopping on worlds both empty and abundant with life, finding supplies in hidden caches, or foraging on life bearing worlds. She had been looking for answers, and for the system called 'Lylat.'
Tears streamed down her face as she looked upon dead and silent surface of her world. The distant cities began to crumble in a perversely accelerated advance of time. The dead vegetation returned to dust and from all directions ice and snow fell and covered the dry bones of a once proud civilization. The world froze over, and the passage of time no longer seemed to matter. After all these years she was back here again. After all she had gone through to get away. Whatever life she would have lived with her own kind had ended here, and she had fled. But now, there was no escape. She was trapped inside this building, the place where Fox had faced a similar fate, where he had lost everything, and she was so cold. She shrunk back into the room, away from that horrible scene, and she shivered alone in a corner. She wanted to wake up. Why couldn't she just wake up?
She sat there, unable to escape, alone, and chilled to her core, shivering in the dull grey light for what felt like hours. Then something stirred.
At first she didn't notice it at all, but eventually, growing stronger bit by bit, she became aware of something. A feeling. Something familiar. Her eyes were draw back to the window. She didn't want to look out there again, but her feet moved her unbidden, her hands wrapping around the bars, unable to look away. The world remained frozen and lifeless, but her eyes were drawn upward, to the sky. Long before she could see it, she could feel it, growing closer, growing stronger. She stared as if in a trance until she saw it, a bright dot flying down toward her like a falling star. Fiery orange, wings spread, eyes gleaming - it was the bird! Relief washed over her as she reached through the bars toward its still distant form. It was coming! She could finally wake up!
As she watched, her smile faded and she slowly withdrew her arm. The feeling grew stronger, easier to recognize, and as it did, the image of the bird became clearer. It was different from before. As she squinted to make it out, she realized it was not just the color of fire. The bird was wreathed in it! Each feather burned a flickering orange. It's long, sweeping tail blazed like the tail of a comet, changing from orange to white hot flame as it roared downward. Her eyes met those of the advancing phoenix. Her mouth went dry. Her stomach tightened.
Hatred. The closer it grew the stronger the feeling became. Hatred with all the heat and intensity of the sun focused into a creature that plummeted toward her like a herald of the end of days.
At the edges of her vison, Krystal could now see the comfortable, albeit Spartan room in which the criminal Vaccini had held her captive for several days now. She stared out at the frozen wastes of Fachina's non-reclamated regions through reinforced glass, gazing up at the startlingly blue sky. She knew she was awake now, and though she could no longer see it, she felt its approach like fire in her veins. Entranced, she waited. It called to her, terrible, frightening, yet somehow inviting, familiar…
. . .
"Sir?" an ensign called back over his shoulder, frowning as his attention remained on the ship's sensor suite. The various enlisted crew members under the young officer's command were all chattering back and forth quietly as their hands flew over their instruments.
Captain Grison, commander of the CDF task force protecting Fachina, who had received precious little sleep since Venom's declaration several days ago, sighed deeply and acknowledged the man, asking, "What is it?"
"A few moments ago we detected two warp signatures dangerously close to the planet's gravity well."
As the young man spoke, his crew displayed the highlighted warp trails on the tactical screen.
"And where are the vessels that created them?" Grison asked, wearily, "Have we hailed them?"
The ensign's frown deepened as he said, "That's just it, sir, we lost them before we could lock onto their ID transponders."
Grison cursed inwardly, but kept an outward calm. He was in command. Any perturbance he allowed himself to show would potentially spread to his men. A failure in the case of any leader, in his opinion.
"Black box transponders or stealth systems?" he asked, evenly.
"We're not sure, sir," the young man said, "It could be either,"
"Or both," Grison mused. He sat upright in his chair, and gave his commands, "Dispatch a cruiser group to the location of the warp trails. Launch a wing of interceptors and begin screening the sector. Is there anything out of place? Satellites or unidentified objects?"
The bridge was coming to life now as the crew snapped to relay his orders to the rest of the force. The ensign from earlier refocused on his station, and after a moment, his head snapped up to one of the three terminals he was responsible for. He muttered urgently to the crewman at that terminal, then reported.
"Sir, we have a weather satellite that seems to be on the wrong vector. It's too far away from the planet, and not on its speed is irregular."
"Bring it up on screen," Grison ordered.
An image imposed itself on the tactical screen, and it was immediately apparent that the object in question was not a weather satellite. It was a small gunship, just outside of weapons range of most of the force's capital ships.
He smiled to himself. He knew he should just delegate the pursuit to a subordinate ship, but, to be honest, he had been on edge for days now. Maybe a little sport would help ease his nerves.
"Battle Stations! All Hands!" he bellowed. His order was repeated by lesser officers, and red lights began to flash as the klaxon wailed. God he loved that sound. "Group Alpha, dispatch fighters on an intercept course, get between them and the planet! I want you to herd these smugglers into weapons range! Group Charlie, hold back and maintain defensive perimeter – start deploying the phase net. And someone hail those scoundrels – let them know I would like to have a word."
"They're not responding," a lieutenant junior grade responded from the communication section.
"They're going weapons hot!" someone else shouted.
Grison scowled. Alpha group was effectively cutting off their path, and his own command group was closing in from behind. They were pitifully outnumbered and completely outgunned. Despite this, they weren't even changing course. What did they hope to-
"Sir, nova warhead detected!" was all someone managed to shout before a bright red ball of fiery energy burst into existence at the head of the first group of fighters to reach the enemy. Several smaller explosions joined it before the same crewman said, "Estimate five casualties!"
The remaining fighter groups spread into wider formations, then engaged. Laserfire flashed across the vacuum of space as they began to trade fire with the enemy vessel, and to Grison's initial disgust, all friendly fire missed by what seemed to be several meters on all sides of its hull. The gunship did not suffer the same inaccuracy, and immediately began to return fire on multiple fighters with its cannons.
"Get us within weapons range!" Grison ordered, "I want a firing solution!"
He watched as the gunship danced among his fighters, firing its thrusters to move in jarring shifts, spiraling as it fired on his men, all while hurtling along its trajectory. Two frigates from Alpha group closed to within firing range and began to spray a lethal barrage from their point defense systems. Missiles swarmed out into space as the gunship began to maneuver in ways that would sheer a larger ship in half. Grison frowned. How was her crew not being crushed by those g-forces? The missiles initially tracked, but once they began to close on the small ship, the explosive projectiles all veered in random directions. The frigates, like the fighters before them, seemed to be having difficulty locking on.
"Someone is running interference," Grison growled, "There were two warp trails, weren't there?"
The young ensign, Larkson, he believed his name was, answered in the affirmative.
Someone else announced they had achieved weapons range.
"Manually triangulate their position, hard beam and laser cannon only! Watch out for our friendlies out there, people, we are Danger Close here!" Grison commanded.
Moments later, forward facing 406s fired a salvo, and lances of hardlight cut out from the ship's sides. They streaked into the void until they were a safe distance from the cruiser, then changed direction mid-flight, snapping ninety degrees and cutting through space toward the fleeing gunship. The first salvo was far off, but each consecutive burst of fire grew closer. Eventually the gunship was forced to begin evasive maneuvers. The enemy vessel moved among the sifting beams of hardlight as if they were opposing magnets, moving in ways that defied reason all while it hurtled toward Fachina. The remaining fighters backed off as the cruiser leading Alpha Group opened fire as well, positioned between the gunship and the planet. Grison's crew began coordinating fires with the other cruiser, and between the two, they began to hem in enemy's movements. Each cruiser had a compliment of six hardlight beam batteries, and three forward-facing heavy laser cannons. Their combined firepower flashed and cut through the vast distances between them. The gunship now struggled to continue its advance. The pilot was remarkable, there was no denying that, but soon they would have to choose between continuing on their course or avoiding this onslaught. No one could keep up both for long.
"That can't be a living pilot," one of his officers remarked, shaking his head in wonderment even as his eyes flashed with frustration, "the g-forces would kill him!"
"Secure the chatter!" Grison boomed, making the lieutenant jump.
A moment later, there was a bright flash, and Grison hoped the target had been hit, but instead a second vessel, showing external damage, de-cloaked a safe distance from the gunship. It had apparently taken a hit from a stray lance. It immediately began to bug out, setting a course for open space. They were unable to target the second vessel, as it was clearly the source of the interference and was now focusing its efforts on self-preservation. At the same time, the gunship hurtled headlong toward the planet and the cruiser blocking it, apparently going for broke.
"We have a lock on the original target, sir, but the second ship is fleeing faster than we can follow," his weapons specialist shouted.
Forced to focus on one of his two fleeing targets, Grison personally hailed the commander of Alpha group aboard the other cruiser.
"Commander Falon! Do NOT allow that ship to break atmosphere!" he ordered.
Falon, an older, grizzled Aquan barely suppressed a sneer as he responded, saying, "He's a slippery bastard, sir, but he's not getting-"
The channel cut abruptly as a nova erupted meters from the cruiser's hull, rippling its shields but doing little damage as the ship's point defense systems had managed to take it down before the torpedo had impacted.
"Sir, we've lost the target!" the ensign yelled, but before Grison could respond though his clenched teeth the younger man shouted again, "Wait, there it is!"
Grison looked up in time to see the gunship burst clear of the dissipating nova, streams of red enery licking its hull as it hurtled past the Falon's vessel. The cruiser began to turn to pursue, and as it did a wing of interceptors flew past it, hot on the gunship's trail. A swarm of micro-missiles erupted from the enemy and scattered it pursuers. The interceptor pilots were forced to evade, some failing to do so and meeting with fiery ends. Tongues of fire signaled reentry as the gunship charged on, slinging fire back at the pursing fighter craft, scattering them as they dealt with the rigors of entering Fachina's atmosphere.
Grison slammed his fist on the arm of his command chair, snarling as he pointed to the comms officer.
"Get me in contact with the Provisional garrison!"
. . .
Fox stood on the sealed ramp in the belly of the ship. A belt of rigged grenades dangled loosely from his waist, their pins daisy chained to a ripcord. He only had one pistol strapped to him, and he held a device in his hand, something Slippy had made a long time ago. A lucky discovery that he'd dug up along with his weapons cache on Fortuna. He stared at Fay, the ships internal cameras projecting her onto the screen of a virtual HUD which floated in the air a few inches away, a trick of the nanites in his brain. Her body was firmly secured to one of the bunks in the sleeping quarters so she didn't move despite everything that was happening.
She looked like she was sleeping.
He'd done his best to clean her up. She deserved a proper send off, but this would have to do. Orian had control of the ship now that they'd made it this far. Vaccini's facility was several thousand feet below them, its position marked on an aerial map in the back of Fox's mind. It was an old, former military outpost, and had a few working anti-aircraft systems, so this was as far as the gunship could take him. Her shields were just about gone after that stunt with the nova bomb anyway. That was fine. It had done its job. Just had to outrun the fighters for a little longer now.
"Kid," Roddick's voice came across the ship's comms, "I gotta bail. They're hard after me, and the stealth system isn't coming back online."
"That's fine," Fox said, "You held up your end, old timer. Orian is using Horus's network as we speak. As far as Lylat is concerned, your body was found not far from where we picked you up. Ship's yours. Get clear."
A brief silence stretched between them, then Roddick let out a heavy breath and said, "Thank you, McCloud. Give 'em hell."
The line cut, and Orian announced that the old Avian had made it to warp. After making atmo, they had jumped IDs on the black box several times, which would make them difficult to track right away. It wouldn't fool anyone for long, but it would buy a little time.
"We're in position," Orian said a few minutes later.
The ramp began to lower itself as he stood on it, one hand clasped firmly on one of its struts as it did. Harsh winds ripped past Fox, stirring the hairs on his face and neck. He hardly noticed. Beneath his calm there was something black, oily, seductive, something feral screaming for release, for a spark, an excuse to burn! It was part of him, but he kept it back for now, buried beneath an icy, well-practiced calm. Soon enough. He could let go soon enough.
He closed his eyes, breathing the frigid air that blew in from the open hatch behind him as he allowed himself one last look at Fay. This girl that had given up everything because of him. Part of him, a distant, detached part, couldn't help but feel as if this was all a bad dream. A nightmare he just couldn't up wake from. He clenched down on the devise he held in his free hand, the device Slippy had designed while trying to puzzle out how G-Diffusers worked. The thing looked like a technophile's take on a fourty-millimeter grenade launcher. As his helmet slithered up his neck and formed around his head, little tendrils slithering and snaking, the sounds of rushing air and screaming engines were muffled. With a sigh, he cut the feed that showed Fay's final resting place. The world was black for a moment. He knew what came next. The only way to end the nightmare. Fox released his grip on the strut, leaned back…
And he fell.
For a few timeless seconds, he was weightless. Adrift in in the dark. There was a sort for freedom in it. Relief. This would be the last time, and it was a thing of his choosing. Then he felt the gut wrenching pull of gravity as his body realized he had begun to hurtle toward the distant surface of a frozen world. His eyes snapped open and his suit adapted in an instant, scales opening like a thousand tiny airbrakes to right his position so that he soared head-first toward a blinking target far below. A series of square brackets were projected in his heads-up-display, guiding him to his target. He fanned out his limbs to provide resistance as he maneuvered himself onto the proper decent vector. The brackets all changed from red to green, and he tucked his limbs to his side, causing him to plummet like a stone. A rapidly decreasing number told him his elevation, and two different timers ticked away second by second. The air was a deafening roar as he cut through it on his way down toward an endless sea of frozen white, toward Vaccini.
A rush of adrenaline wore away at the last vestiges of his calm, thawing it even as the burning hatred he'd been holding at bay boiled its way into his mind. His teeth gnashed, and a shiver rolled over his suit. He had walked alongside death his entire life. He'd fought it at times, run from it at others.
The numbers continued to tick down as the ground seemed to be gaining speed.
But he accepted it now. He wouldn't just walk alongside it, helpless while it took or spared arbitrarily, snuffing out innocence an sparing corruption!
He adjusted when necessary to stay on course, and Vaccini's facility gradually became discernable amidst the endless glaring white. He continued his descent, but lost direct visual as he hit one of a sparse number of thin clouds. He trusted the brackets to guide him, and emerged on course, now able to make out the shape of the facility's courtyard and main structures. The target was dead center of that courtyard. A fifty square-yard space, it was the most open area within the walls, assuring the greatest chance of success.
If death was going to be his companion to the end, then so be it! He would wear its damned mantle! He'd swing the scythe himself, and if there was a price to be paid for it then he would pay it, not the ones he cared for!
It all grew quickly now, the ground rushing toward him with rapidly increasing menace. He was too small to be detected by the AA-system's radar, so the turrets on either end of the facility were quiet. With the assistance of the suit, Fox leveled Slippy's device toward the target. The timing had to be perfect. He could just make out the shape of several individuals walking the grounds when the first timer expired. Fox pulled the ripcord and the grenades on his belt all released without pins, fanning out around him as their levers popped. The second timer hit zero, and Fox fired the device. A cylinder launched downward, tiny airbrakes helped Fox flip so that his feet were angled toward the deck, and seconds before he met terra firma, the cylinder impacted.
A green field of energy erupted from it, and Fox plunged into it feet-first. With a stomach turning sensation, the field absorbed Fox's inertia, draining it from him and transferring it outward, shattering the frozen earth and blasting air away from the point of impact. There was no way to describe the feeling this produced, but if his mouth hadn't been sealed by his helmet, he would likely have retched. The field would last two more seconds.
Vaccini's men, startled by the nature of his arrival, were initially too stunned to react. They were frightened by Fox's appearance. They went pale when the grenades landed all around them. The explosives went off, a mixture of smoke and fragmentation. Shrapnel dug into the field, halting mid-air with a slight hiss signifying the arrival of each jagged piece of metal. The field flickered, faded, and then failed, dropping Fox onto the ground as white smoke obscured the world.
His helmet switched to thermals, a slow, vehement breath rolled out of him, and he started off amidst the screams of the wounded, the dying, and those about to join them.
. . .
Krystal squeezed her eyes shut, trying not to see, trying not to watch what was happening though something else's eyes, but it did nothing. She watched helplessly as it hunted Vaccini's men. It moved through billowing smoke, savagely cutting through men with blaster and claw. One man it dragged with its tail, crushing his neck wile thrusting a taloned hand into another's chest and firing its blaster through the haze to hit a third man between the shoulders as he attempted to work the door controls and flee further inside. The first man finally stopped thrashing, and the thing's tail uncoiled like a snake. She could feel panic sweep through everyone in the facility as the sounds of struggle in the courtyard continued, slowed, then went silent.
The thing emerged from the smoke, stabbed its hand into the door control. Seconds later the lights in Krystal's room flickered and went out, the small window now the only source of light. It moved thought the dark inner corridors at a walk. Men fled from it, firing wildly in an attempt to slow it, their blasters rippling harmlessly off its shields. The televid in her room came to life, the screen split down the middle to show two scenes. On one side she could see the thing's steady advance through the station as captured by the installation's own cameras. It was monstrous. Man-shaped, but twisted. Its scaled skin shimmered a nearly black shade of blue, a long, pointed tail snapped behind it like a whip, and its hands and feet ended in sharp, menacing claws. Krystal winced as it began to drag a single talon along the adjacent wall, the metal singing out in a spine rending squeal. On the other side of the screen, she saw Vaccini. He was holed up in his office, covered in a wavering shield and flanked by two heavily sweating guards. She imagined he was seeing much the same thing, as all color ran from his face. The thing stopped to look into a camera, a low, menacing growl hissed over the installation's intercom, and the feed cut.
Through its eyes, she saw a man slam down a manned turret and release a hail of heavy blaster fire. Bolts tore through the creature's shields, and she felt its pain as one grazed his shoulder, but it hurtled down the hall, digging into the floor with its claws for added propulsion, and leapt over the man with his turret. Clinging to the ceiling like a reptile, it then pounced on the man from above. It's claws dug into the man's shoulders, dragging him down to the ground as it used his weight to flip and land on all fours. The man's cries of pain only lasted a few seconds, the creature slashing and mauling him until his burbling screams finally stopped.
In a horrifying moment, Krystal realized she had actually heard those screams though the walls of her cell. She shrunk back into a corner of the room as she looked to the door, seeing the other side of it through that monster's eyes. Her heart beat in her chest like a drum as it lingered for a moment. The camera in the far corner of the room made a mechanical whir as it angled toward her, zoomed, focused, and she knew it was looking at her. As it did, she felt something. Something strange.
Recognition. It wasn't something she recognized, but something it did. It recognized her? She tried to delve deeper, but this thing was a churning mass of hate, bloodlust, and a storm of raging emotions that stung her even as she tried desperately to separate with it. The idea of intentionally going deeper was like trying to convince yourself to stick your hand into a fire. A thousand tiny, screeching voices masked whatever was underneath. It was too much.
Then it left. A breath that had been stuck in her throat released in a sigh of momentary relief as it strode purposefully away from her. Moving toward Vaccini's office. After it had gone a safe distance, the door to her cell clicked, its lock disengaging.
The thing reached the outer door of the fat Katinese man's last refuge, but, rather than open it, it broke through a vent in the ceiling, followed it outside, crawling along the outer wall until it was above the large, reinforced window of the office. It attached a grappling line to the wall, dug in with its clawed feet for purchase, then sprung outward. The line snapped taught, and it pulled back against it fiercely, bringing it swinging back at the glass with blinding speed. The glass broke free of its frame and flew inward, crushing Vaccini's two guards in a grotesque display as the creature landed in front of the bloated, quivering crime boss. The man cried out, jamming a button beneath his desk. An escape hatch opened behind him and he fled as the monster threw itself at the shield that blocked its path.
. . .
Vaccini ran as fast as his thick legs could carry him, looking back over his shoulder as that fucking monster thrashed against his office's quickly failing shield. He emerged from his escape tunnel breathing raggedly. It deposited him at the far end of the facility's small landing pad where a shuttle waited, its pilot having already warmed up its engine. He smiled as he ran toward it with renewed strength, making a mental note to make the man at the controls fantastically wealthy once they were safely aboard his yacht which waited in orbit. A distant rumble in the sky above him gave him pause. He looked up in time to see a vessel, smoke and flame billowing from it as it screeched down from the sky. A pack of interceptors hounded it, but pulled off as it made a terminal path toward Vaccini. He let out a scream as he threw himself to the ground, and as second later a world-shaking impact rattled his bones. Debris pelted him, and something stabbed into his right leg. He yelped from the burning agony it sent through his leg, and when he finally looked up, his shuttle was gone, replaced by the burning ruin of the slightly larger vessel that had just committed suicide on top of it.
His heart plummeted into his stomach like a stone as he staggered to his feet. Fire lept and snapped at the air as the heat and acrid smoke began to sting his eyes. He held up a hand to shield his face as she stumbled back, but he froze in place when he heard the scraping of claw on concrete. Slowly, he turned to find the monster, walking upright, moving toward him across the burning hellscape of the now ruined landing pad with the patient stride of hunter cornering its prey. Vaccini held a hand out toward it.
"Please," he pleaded through cracked and bleeding lips, "We can discuss this, yes? Please, just give me a-"
The thing's helmet turned to liquid and ran down and away from its face as it drew closer, and Vaccini's heart nearly stopped.
"McCloud?" he hissed. He stared, dumbstruck.
"Vaccini," Fox answered, the look in his eyes making his blood run cold.
"Fox! Wait!" Vaccini stammered, backing away painfully on his wounded leg with each careful stride the man made in his direction, "Please, you – you are here for the girl, yes? She is unharmed! I swear to you! Come, I will take you to her…"
He took a step toward the facility, then cried out in pain as a blaster shot tore into his good leg. Vaccini collapsed onto his side, whimpering as he pushed himself up onto his elbow. Fox stood over him, glowing blue hexagons cut across the whites of the man's cold green eyes as they seemed to burrow into Vaccini's soul.
"Please…please," he whispered, "I… I can give you anything! Anything you want!"
Sharp fingers cut painfully into his shoulder, wrapping solidly around bone as McCloud lifted him off the ground. Vaccini's voice became hoarse from screaming before he some part of him broke, his head lolling back while he was left dragging in stuttering breaths and pleading incoherently for his life.
"Give her back."
The words brought him back to his senses, enough to look into those terrible eyes and force out the words, "I told you… she is… unhurt."
"No," Fox said, "The girl your man Horus killed instead of me. Give her back."
Before he could make any sense of this, before he could even try to respond, Fox's other hand plunged into Vaccini's gut like a spear. The pain made his eyes bulge. His head sagged as he stared down, Fox's arm disappearing into the fat of his stomach all the way to the elbow. Blackness swam at the edges of his vision, and the next instant he was thrown, like garbage, through the air and into the roaring flames of the ruined ship behind him. He couldn't even scream. He felt his flesh sizzle and pop, then, thankfully, his heart gave out from the strain.
. . .
Krystal stood frozen at the edge of the ruined landing pad. She had initially fled to the other end of the facility, hoping to escape and take her chances in the frozen wastes outside, but when she'd heard Vaccini through that thing's… through Fox's ears… when she'd seen the realization in his eyes, and he'd said Fox's name, she had come back. She had to see.
And there he stood.
The hate and the anger, the storm of emotion had now passed, and as it did, she had felt him. It was Fox McCloud, standing as still as a statue. The light of the fire reflected in his eyes as he watched it burn, even as the fire that had burned inside the man now died to embers. She wanted to call to him, but her voice was trapped in her throat. She tried to reach out to him with her mind, taking one step toward him. Without looking toward her his lips moved, and his voice spoke into her mind.
"Why are you still here?"
She stopped. The words cut into her. She realized she had been holding onto hope, that she held it even now.
"You… didn't come here for me, did you?" she asked, weakly, but with a sudden certainty that made her heart ache. She looked to the fire where Fox had thrown Vaccini's bloated body. "You came here for him?"
Was it revenge that brought him here? Did he care about her at all?
Fox turned his head enough to fix her with one eye. There was no accusation in it, no denial, no empathy.
"I came here for him." he affirmed, turning back to the fire, "And I came here for her."
Images of the collie girl, Fay, rose from the murky depths of Fox's mind, images of her final moments. They were so jarringly clear, blood pooling around her stomach, tiny pieces of metal sticking into her arms, that Krystal's hand came up to cover her mouth and she inhaled a sharp breath.
"And I came here for you," he finished.
She didn't know what to say. Part of her was actually happy, a brief thrill running though her at the thought that he had come for her. But the images of the dying girl still swam through her mind, and she was at a loss.
"How did she...?" she began, but then trailed off.
"You should go," Fox said, his voice flat and nearly lifeless, "they'll be here soon."
"Who?" she asked, drawing a few steps closer.
Fox gave a resigned, mirthless smile and shook his head, "The CDF? The Agency? Who knows. Somebody will be here. Whenever there's blood in the water, something always comes to take a bite. You're gonna want to be gone before that happens."
"What about you?"
He didn't answer. He just stared at the dancing flames.
"Fox," she said, "Fox you're not just going to wait for them…"
"I'm done, Krys," he rasped.
She opened her mouth to speak, but found no words. She looked at Fox, then the door leading toward the exit, then back to Fox again.
"Come with me," she offered, a hint of desperation in her voice.
His lips pulled back in a sneer, fangs glistening in the firelight, but he made no other response.
A sudden anger welled up in her, but she resisted it.
She took a deep breath and continued, saying, "My ship should still be here somewhere. It's probably anchored just outside the wall."
Nothing.
Krystal suddenly felt very alone. Fox was right here, she could touch him, hear his breath, see it rise in the cold of the air, but he was so far withdrawn, it was as if he were a million miles away. Tears welled in her eyes as the tiny hope she held began to die. He wasn't pushing her away. No, he just didn't seem to care if she stayed of if she left. She turned, flinching, and was about to walk away when she heard a voice.
"Don't go."
She spun back toward Fox to find him still staring into the fire. His mouth didn't move, but she heard the voice again.
"Please," it said, "he needs help."
It wasn't Fox, but if it wasn't him, then who…?
"Orian," the voice supplied, "we spoke once before."
She eyed Fox, then answered without speaking. You're his A.I. The one I spoke to on Corneria?
"Yes," the voice answered, "Please, Fox is highly unstable. He needs help! He's been too reckless! I don't think I can keep the anima from spreading much longer."
Before she could form a response, the sound of distant engines and the whir of levicoils approached from somewhere beyond the wall.
"Fox…" Krystal said, warily, "Fox, we need to go. We need to go now!"
He turned toward the sound and pulled his blaster free from its holster. The look in his eye was one of scorn. Not the burning anger he had held earlier, but the cold reproach an animal held for its hunters, knowing it had been run to ground. He would make his stand here. He would fight, he would take his pound of flesh, and then he would die.
"Damn you!" she shouted, grabbing his arm and pulling as her own anger welled, rallying against Fox's apparent fatalism. She managed to rock him slightly, but that was all. She balled her hands into fists, and she started hitting him. "Damn you, damn you, damn you! You selfish bastard! What about your father?! Have you given up on him?!" she screamed. This made him flinch, but that was all, "What about your friends?!" He turned, ever so slightly toward her, but still avoided her eyes. "What… what about me…?"
She sunk to her knees, clasping his hand as she slid down.
"You're all I have left, Fox," she breathed, hardly even a whisper, "Please. I… I don't want to be alone anymore."
His expression softened, and he opened his mouth to speak, but at that moment the sounds of the approaching ship washed over them, drowning out everything else. Refuse was thrown about the landing pad as a small drop-ship finished decloaking directly above them and began to descend. Krystal looked up to find that Fox now seemed conflicted. He looked to the ship as it's landing gear extended to met the concrete, then he looked back at her. As he did, something warm surfaced in him. It was almost nothing, but to Krystal it was like seeing a tiny leaf break through the cold and lifeless snow. A sign of life after a hard winter. It made him wince, and she understood. She knew it was painful, coming back from the brink, but she would give anything to see that little bit of life grow.
The ship settled behind him with the scraping of metal and the hiss of settling struts. A large ramp dropped from the ship's side, and a team of four heavily armed men rushed out, quickly forming a well practiced perimeter around the two of them. And in that moment Fox made his decision.
"I'll get us out of this," he said, his voice level as his helmet reformed around his head. His desire to protect her had won, at least for a moment, against his earlier resignation. He turned to the new arrivals, positioning himself between the men and Krystal, his shields rippling to life as she got to her feet, "I don't make any promises after that."
She nodded. It was good enough for now.
Weapons came up, and one of the men nervously requested orders.
The answer came from a man still inside the ship. A second team emerged with him as he appeared from within the shadows of the dropship, even strides carrying him into the light. The second team moved past them and into the compound, apparently after a different objective. The man, meanwhile stared with wide eyed scientific avarice at Fox.
"My God," the man breathed, walking out into the light. The first thing Krystal noticed was that he was Vulpan. He was middle-aged, stood sternly at about five foot five. His eyes were a pale blue, his hair a mix of black and grey, and one arm was concealed by a skin tight glove that ran up to his shoulder. He appraised Fox from a distance, and said, "How are you still alive?"
"Who are you," Fox growled, his mind churning as he tried to think of a way out of this without putting Krystal at risk, "and what the fuck do you want?"
The man shook off his curiosity, and frowned, as if deciding whether to answer. Then his eyes fell on Krystal, and they gleamed in a way that made her uncomfortable.
"My name is Sirus," the man answered, "and I am here to retrieve two things. One being the location of the Cypher, the other being that woman there."
"Look around you, Sirus," Fox said, "there's a whole lot of dead men here that wanted the same thing."
"Sirus?" Krystal asked, "Sirus Vekkar?"
The man smiled and nodded.
"You must be the Cerinian that Vaccini mentioned," he said as he assessed her with sharp eyes from behind his line of men, "I had to see you for myself. I had intended to liberate you from that bloated carcass, but I can see that someone else has saved me effort," his eyes practically danced to Fox as if he knew the answer already, but he asked anyway, "and who might I thank for that?"
Fox didn't answer, but his finger moved onto the trigger of his pistol. Krystal could feel him picking his targets, feeling out the timing, planning their escape route.
Vekkar smiled sadly, and said, "Mr. McCloud, I understand you have been looking for answers. Rather than kill a fellow Vulpan I would like to make you an offer. Come with me. I have all the answers you will need, and I can help with your… condition."
"And why should I trust you?" Fox asked, a threat in his voice, "Andross's fuckin' understudy."
Vekkar sneered at this. Fox had struck a nerve. The man sighed while reaching into a pocket. He produced a small spherical device and held it in his un-gloved hand.
"I'm sorry," he said, with mixed sincerity, "but we don't have time for this."
He pressed a button which caused the device to emit a barely audible sound, one that clawed at Krystal's ears like nails on a chalkboard. It was uncomfortable, but all it did was make her uneasy. She wondered what he was trying to pull, but then she heard Fox cry out in pain.
He clasped his head between his hands and stumbled back as if in agony as the suit he wore began to melt off of him. His pain hit Kystal full force, it ripped though every fiber of his being, as if he were being torn apart from the inside. The effects quickly became visible. It started as a kind of blue sweat, little azure beads forming and then streaking downward, but soon currents of liquid were streaming off of his body to pool on the concrete beneath his feet. He screamed, and staggered, dropping his pistol and falling to his knees. She had seen him in pain before, but he had never made sounds like this! She had never heard anything so agonized. There was madness in his cries, pain that pushed the mind past reason or resistance.
"Stop!" Krystal yelled, "Stop it! You're killing him!"
Vekkar ignored her, walking closer while still holding down the button on his strange device.
Fox fell forward, his face and parts of his body now showing through the quickly vanishing suit. Wounds opened where what had appeared to be flesh dissolved into torrents of blue ichor, intermixed with blood red and real. Unable to stand his suffering any longer, Krystal leapt for his pistol, bringing it up and aiming at Vekkar's head. She bore her fangs and put a bead between the man's eyes with more ferocity than she'd ever felt before! One more cry, one more spasm of pain and she would start putting holes in that bastard until his men pried the weapon from her cold dead hands!
All of Sirus's men responded by aiming at her, but the black Vulpan held up a hand to stop them, releasing the button on his device as he did.
Fox's writhing stopped a few seconds after that, and he lay still. His chest rose and fell, and Krystal moved closer to him, standing between Vekkar and Fox's unconscious form.
"We're out of time, miss," Vekkar said, "As he is, he will die without my help. I am the only one in Lylat that can save him. And I'm the only one that knows what happened to your homeworld. Now, we are going to carry him into our ship, I would like you to come with us, and then we are going to help you both."
Men began to close in from all side, moving slowly, carefully. Unsure what to do, Krystal cast her eyes from man to man, hovering protectively over Fox. Finally, resignedly, she lowered her weapon, and looked Vekkar in the eyes. Then, with every ounce of strength she had, she tore into his mind. His eyes flew wide, but he provided a strong resistance. It was a similar to the mechanical interference she had felt from Fox when she'd run into him on Corneria. But this was different. This wasn't just listening or feeling. She was tearing at his mind!
"Swear to me!" she hissed.
"You have," he answered, eyes narrowed and voice rough from the mental strain, "my word."
She felt that this was the truth, and she released his mind.
The man blinked back his surprise, then he gave a curt nod to his men, eyeing her warily as they went about their task. They all moved quickly. The second team returned and proceeded into the ship while a stretcher was brought out. Fox was lifted up on it and carried inside. Krystal stayed at his side every step of the way, and after a few moments, the hatch sealed, a sound like cloth snapping in a strong wind washed over them, then all sound bled from the world. The stealth systems were active, and the ship took flight almost immediatly.
She took Fox's hand in hers as they made their way deeper into the small vessel and hoped against hope that she hadn't just made a terrible mistake.
(Note from the author; Musical recommendations: After Fox breaks atmosphere until the detah of V., I suggest Metallica's 'For Whom the Bell Tolls". It's what I listed to as I imagined the scene.)
