Author's Notes: Hey, I'm aware that this chapter's a long time coming, but between a much busier personal schedule and 'the beer thing' going on, it hasn't been a priority for me. You would think I'd have much more time to be home and do things like finish this story, and… yeah, I got no defense for that. Most of the chapter was written in December, though things have been shifted and scrapped throughout the months. I really intend to finish this story this year, (which is what I said last year, but whatever) so hopefully there won't be any more months-long delays in the future.
Stay safe out there!
Turn and Burn
The peace of the midday sky was put on hold as a pair of fighters floated comfortable over the empty sky, its inhabitants surveying the empty wilderness before them, where scorched terrain and other common range identifiers lined the dry fields at carefully marked distances.
The blue vixen casually reached behind her back to adjust her flight suit, which although was designed to fit her years ago, had become a bit tighter ever since she stopped flying regularly. She sank into her seat until she was comfortable and set aside her bulky helmet on a slot behind her, knowing that the day's work was mostly over now.
"You know, you two should fly together! You'd make the perfect red team, I can't think of anything more romantic than pretending to be the bad guys." The rabbit flying beside her squealed.
"Well… we did." Krystal nodded to herself. "We flew for the first few months, but after that, well… it was mostly a 'him and Bill' thing. I don't mind, I like doing ATC work."
"But you'll do it again when he gets back, right? Right?"
Krystal held her reply, drawing the implication that she'd implanted in earlier conversation. "You know Lucy, Fox and I, we do have other plans."
Lucy gasped. "Oh puppies! I almost forgot! It's going to be sooo exciting to see y-"
The two women sprang to attention at the interruption of voice chatter. There was rarely any communication of this sort outside of clearing the range and preparing for exercises, so an out of bounds alert was well worth listening to. The message was barely audible and clouded with an indecipherable static, as though it were being transmitted out of range.
"Erh, say again station? You're not coming in clearly…" Krystal worriedly pressed the audio test indicator the confirm the problem wasn't on her end.
The voice queried again, this time adjusting its sound with just enough clarity so that the words "base" and "return" were construed.
"Base? What's the confirmation handle?" The vixen waited in hopes that the voice returned the correct countersign, which would confirm their legitimacy.
No response came.
"They don't know the handle." Lucy shuffled, her movements starting to become less sure. "What's going on?"
"Nothing good." Krystal reached the comms toggle to switch to the base's secondary channel. "CAB control, this is Red Flag One, comm check, please advise."
Again, the response was empty for both pilots, lacking even a muffled response. She tried again and waited about ten more seconds to no avail.
Krystal closed her eyes and managed to compose herself enough for her extrasensory functions to take precedence. There was a raw aspect of confusion and betrayal, she couldn't make out from where, but the feeling was evident, nonetheless. There was an odd sense that something was amassing, a force that had to be on Corneria. But for what?
"Lucy, listen to me. Station's been compromised somehow, someone's spoofing them, and they want us to return to base."
"Compromised? How are you-"
"You have to trust me, Lucy, I can feel it. Someone wants us out of the picture. You must get to Site Blackrock, you have to warn them that something's going on! Whatever you do, don't go back to base, we don't what they're planning."
"What? Who? Krystal-"
"You have to go, Lucy! Something nefarious is underway. They think I'm alone and they likely don't know you're with me! If you go, I can stall them!"
"I-" Lucy could hardly form a response, still shocked by the sudden. "Alright, I'll do it… but, Krystal- if you're wrong about this, they can…" The vixen didn't need to utter another word to allay her worries. Begrudgingly, she found herself breaking off from her pattern and to reduce her visibility during exfiltration.
~X~X~X~X~X~
"Falco? Falco you in there?" A series of knocks carried into the confines of the small briefing room where the avian had hidden himself away for a rare moment of privacy.
"Damn it, get up." Falco whispered to his feline companion, pushing her away so he could stand and shuffle back into his clothing.
"Falco, I know you're here. I can smell you and… ugh, seriously?" The vulpine's voice echoed through the door, signaling that he was at least aware of the pair's activities.
"His nose is still that good?" The avian shook his head before responding in a more audible voice. "Gimme a second, will ya Fox?"
"A second? You gotta be- you know we have a meeting with the review board in five minutes, right? You can't just keep these people waiting." Fox folded his arms, snarling in an irritated manner. He wasn't wrong as military review boards were characteristically stringent about being on time, as they generally followed a tight schedule that was filled down to the very minute. In addition, these boards were more often than not staffed with higher ranking officers, the type you didn't want to piss off if you valued avoiding courts martial.
"Yeah, yeah." Ten seconds later, the door to the briefing room opened, revealing a slightly ruffled and clearly disheveled figure of the blue avian. Falco barely looked Fox in the eye, instead tracking either corner of the hallway to make sure nobody else was looking.
"You're doing this now? You can't be serious. Can you even wait ten minutes until we're clear?" Fox scolded, pointing to the back of the room where Katt was still busy sliding her arm down her jacket sleeve.
"Since when are they doing it now? I thought they said it was going to be at one. That's a-" Falco looked back at his wing to manually count the difference. "few hours." He replied, realigning his belt.
Fox raised a paw to cover his eye, shaking his head all the while. "Cornerian Universal Time. That's 10:30 local time. Haven't you been paying attention?" He said, pointing to his perfectly synced watch.
"Well they didn't say CUT, so I assumed they meant local. If they wanted- no, Katt- pants." The avian pushed the feline away from the door after realizing the deficiency in her lower region, pointing to somewhere behind the nearby briefing table.
"You know how these military types are. They need standardized times for logs and- you know what, not important. Katt, get your pants on and let's go."
Katt soon shuffled into her remaining clothes and the trio rushed to reach the other end of the administrative building before the review board lost their patience. The finally reached the door where Bill and Fay were waiting, the bulldog holding a distinctly irritated demeanor to go along with his tapping foot.
"The hell? Where've you been? We've been waiting for- damn it, you could've at least tried to look decent. Did you sleep in a dumpster last night? And what's that-" Bill's nose twitched in response to the whiff of scents emanating from the avian and feline. "You're kidding, at a time like this?"
"Look, we didn't know they scheduled things on Cornerian time, that's their job, isn't it?" Falco defended.
"You're supposed to- alright, forget it, point is you're here. Would've liked for you to look a bit more professional but can't help it now. Listen, the board in there is basically going to recite a script to us and we're going to sit there quietly like good little pups and take it. You don't need to say anything unless they ask you, which they won't. Keep your maws shut and don't react to anything they say, got it?" The group nodded compliantly. "Let's all be cool about it, kay? Good."
The bulldog leaned in towards Fox and whispered something along the lines of "Are you serious?". Fox shrugged, knowing there was nothing that could be done in the moment. He eyed Falco with a piercing glance, though it was barely noticed if at all.
Without a word to delay them further, the members of Icepick entered the conference room and shuffled individually to their seats, waiting eagerly for the board to give their judgement and be over with it. Sitting at an opposite table was a trio of stodgy looking officers, each with an uncomfortably long list of the group's escapades sitting in front of them.
"Now then, Commander Grey, Icepick, I must first express my condolences over the loss of Captain Wiesel. We're all aware of what he meant to the team and we recognize his passing as an immense tragedy."
Fox half-shifted his head to see Fay's slightly trembled but still composed reaction.
"As you may have heard, this review is mandatory in the event of a lost wing member, it is not conducted under a pretense of wrongdoing or misconduct. The goal of our review is to determine the continued airworthiness of Icepick and whether it's actions require further review or grounding."
Fox grunted, though quiet enough so that none of the others could hear.
"Our determination, based on the telemetry data recovered from Specialist McCloud's flight data recorder and partial telemetry data sent from Captain Wiesel's aircraft, is that downing of Captain Wiesel's aircraft was the result of individual pilot error. This includes the manual disabling of warning systems, the failure to recognize mission-critical objectives, and flying his craft in a confined area against the judgement of Commander Grey."
Fox exhaled in relief. Bill however made no reaction, staring in a stoic silence.
"It is with this determination, under the direct recommendation of General Kittinger, that Icepick be reinstated immediately, with Commander Grey continuing to function as leader of both wings in a non-pilot role."
"Uh, excuse me, but- non-pilot role?" Bill interrupted with a spin of his head, requesting clarity over the board's summary decision.
"Kittinger's orders, Commander, not ours. You are to retain executive control over both Icepick and Hatchet in an administrative fashion, though you are not called to provide air support for the time being."
"I- Understood." Bill nodded, accepting his position rather than arguing over its merits. It did come from the top.
"With that, there's nothing else to discuss and this meeting is adjourned, you're all dismissed." The officers began to shuffle their documents together, arising from their seats as if they had somewhere more important to be (they did).
"Wait, that's it?" Falco looked around the room, wanting to ensure he wasn't missing anything.
"Yeah, that's what adjourned means." Fox answered, watching as the last board member had stepped out of the staff exit.
"Well, I know, but… what was that?"
"As I said, they're going to read us a script, and we're going to sit there and take it. That's just how these things tend to go, unless one of us was suspected of something." Bill pressed a paw forward, almost jabbing Falco in the chest by accident. "I didn't expect Kittinger to be involved in this though. The meeting would've lasted ten minutes without his input."
"Kittinger, what are they talking about Kittinger? What kind of strings is he pulling?" Falco leaned in.
"Does it matter? We're back in business, aren't we?" Katt replied, still looking a bit disheveled.
"Yeah, I guess…" Falco meekly whispered.
Icepick shuffled out of the briefing room rather unsure what to do next. Bill paced around, resting a paw against his chin as he contemplated his orders.
"So, Bill… Looks like the team's back to four. I mean, if they say you won't be flying-" Fox leaned in to form a more private arena for conversation, resting his paws on his hips.
"I know why." Bill replied, stern and unmoving. Fox's expression dropped. "I just don't know who…"
"Who?" Fox raised an eyebrow.
Bill took a moment to gather his words carefully, curling his mouth when the time came. "Fox. We know there's a lot of things that don't make sense at our level. We only see a microscopic part of the real picture, the little bit that we're given is only enough so that we can fulfill our mission and forget about it the next day."
"And they want you to be part of that picture…" The vulpine concluded.
"You know, Fox. There are things that don't make sense about this conflict at all; it should've been over by two weeks and yet here we are wondering whether it'll be two months or four. They had every opportunity to put an end to the conflict before it went hot, before the local forces collapsed, before we had anything to do with it. We talked about this with Wiley, remember? They had fifty sorties lined up to decapitate known FLF positions and they were told to hold off, there was no reason for them to do that unless they wanted the FLF to gain ground."
"Yeah. And that's where the who part comes from?"
"I don't know…" Bill shook his head. "Kittinger, Sommers… I don't know. But whatever's going on isn't a game anymore, it's killed Wiley, it's killed others, it's put the Lylat on the edge of civil war, for what? If they want to use us, then let's drop the charade and put our own convoluted plan into action."
"You're telling me our orders are worthless?"
"No, I'm telling you to do what's necessary. I'm giving you a blank check. Use whatever weapons you want, take whatever targets you want, I don't care, I'll authorize it. Just- whatever you decide to do, don't go around civilian areas, we'll approach that when the time comes." Bill finished, making a subconscious effort to avoid eye contact with Fay. "We're not playing by Icepick rules anymore, we're playing by Star Fox rules. And what Fox McCloud says, goes."
A smile found its way to the vulpine in recognition of the Bulldog's surrender of authority. "Yeah? I like that."
~X~X~X~X~X~
"I want them loaded with high yield incendiaries, stuff that'll burn long." Falco relayed the request to the crewman standing by his Arwing, who was making note of the loadout on his tablet. "Load up whatever fits the bill and set them to cluster at maximize range."
The crewman paused, soon lifting his eyes from the tablet with a shudder of uncertainty.
"What, there a problem?" The avian leaned over the ordinance handler, spreading his wings to make himself bigger.
"It's uh- I've never really done this before, specialist. I'm sure I could do it, but I- don't think it's even practical, or legal."
"Legal?" Falco repeated, jerking forward. "What the hell 're you talking about, clusters are perfectly legal, we use them all the time. Just load 'em up."
"Well- yes, but… I don't think they're allowed to be used with incendiaries, they're too unpredictable, they might damage more than you want, collateral I mean."
"That's the idea, idiot. The FLF are holed deep in that jungle and we're going to deny them any chance of escape." Falco punched a miscellaneous diagnostic panel in the nose of his Arwing closed, generating an audible sealing sound. "Now can you load these things up, or do I have to tell Kittinger himself that his raid needs to be put on hold?"
The crewman shook a moment before meekly complying, wheeling his cart to the munitions loading area just as Fox was departing it, helmet by his side.
"How's it going?"
"As good as it's going to get. Crew's finally budged." Falco's head snapped in the direction of the nearby weapons depot, where the crew was busy fitting in his requested parameters.
"Good. Still trust the plan?"
"Of course." Falco answered, unflinching.
"Just checkin." Fox nodded. "You know, I was wondering about a callsign change. I figure it's our team now, so our rules. What do you think about bringing back Star Fox? I figure the four of us could be the official fourth iteration."
"Star Fox? Well, duh. I was kinda partial to Star Falco, but for karma's sake, I wouldn't want us to split up and go down in flames."
~X~X~X~X~X~
Fox thumbed the nav toggle on his main console to check their position, flying over an endless layer of indistinguishable trees left him without any visual cues, and so it helped to eye the nav display every once in a while to gauge their absolute location.
"Alright, Star Fox, coming up in… let's see, three minutes. Still got nothing in the air?" The vulpine turned to Falco, who was flying near his left.
"Nah, we're clear. Thought I picked something up a minute ago but looks like they're gone."
"You think they have anything left? Pretty sure we took out the bulk of them during the counterattack." Katt noted, checking her own radar to see the empty skies.
"Intel says there's at least 70 fighters in their Litore Inventory, so I'd say they really have about 200." Fox answered. "Now competent pilots? That's going to be hard to come by."
"70? Shoot, we could take that all by ourselves. Man, back in the Star Fox days- real Star Fox days, that's a day's work."
"Yeah, day's work." Fox twisted the knob on his nav screen to adjust its sensitivity, noticing the strange scattered pattern that swept across the distance. "Hey, are you seeing this?"
"Yeah, looks like a storm. Pretty localized." Falco dismissed.
Fox toggled the infrared selection on the screen, a feature generally used to find vehicles or other targets of interest. "That's no storm… take a look at the heat signature."
"What? You're kiddin." Falco toggled his switch and found himself without explanation. "Is it a wildfire?
"Can't be, look at how the pattern, there's even streaks parallel to each other." Katt pointed out.
The pilots glanced at each other in the realization of the unthinkable. Someone had been here before them, and it wasn't one of theirs.
As they drew closer to their target area, it became clear that this was no minor brush fire. The visibility of the Fortunan haze gave way to a massive column of dark smoke, and then the glow of a very artificial conflagration.
"What the hell are they doing? What would the FLF gain by bombing themselves? None of our guys are anywhere around here!" The avian glanced again at the weather radar in disbelief.
"I don't know, something doesn't smell right." Fox cautioned.
"And? You wanna abort the mission because the FLF's deciding to help us all the sudden? Gonna turn 'n burn now or are we lightin these tailholes up?" Falco's tone grew increasingly combative.
The vulpine hesitated, not knowing whether the sudden revelation was worth discarding the mission. Was he really doing this?
"You want to light them? Go ahead. We got nothing but clear skies." Fox could tell the avian was waiting for that cue, as he dashed forward without any effort to maintain a formation.
Fay's fighter accelerated gently into a similar combat dive, following Falco's general trail. Katt however remained in formation with Fox.
The two lead fighters entered a shallow swoop to best optimize the dropping of their munitions. They began after the extent of what their predecessors had given, dropping their unguided cluster bombs at properly timed intervals to deliver their maximum effective yield. The weapons themselves fell with a strange otherworldly grace, searing the forest below in an unbearable and immense heat, so much that the surrounding trees were immediately set ablaze and felled like lit matchsticks. After Falco had expended all six of his armaments, Fay continued the line in a southward direction until her munitions were also gone, shouting vengeful remarks at the jungle below all the while.
Fox and Katt had intentionally held themselves back while this went on. They traded signals with each other for a few back and forths until the vulpine finally go the message that he needed to end it.
"What's wrong, Fox? We got enough dumps on your hardpoints to light it up all the way down to the sea. Let's show these bastards-"
"Falco…" Fox took a moment to gather his words.
"Falco… I think that's enough." Katt added, having disengaged herself so far from the whole ordeal.
"Enough? What do you mean enough, we're halfway done, and we've already covered 20 klicks. They still have all this room to bypass!" The avian retorted, casting his gaze to the massive column of flame behind him.
"Looks like a mission accomplished then, let's pack up and go." Fox responded with a rigid voice.
"Yeah? Whatever happened to trusting the plan? Whatever happened to ending this war?"
"This isn't about-" Fox paused, having caught himself mid-yell. "Whatever we're doing here isn't going to win the war. We've already won, the only question is how soon. We don't have to destroy Fortuna to destroy the FLF. They've had enough. Star Fox, regroup. We're going home."
Falco didn't argue with the decision, his catharsis already satisfied. He did however take one more peek out the back of his Arwing to take in the ashes that lay in his wake.
"That's for Wiley you scum."
~X~X~X~X~X~
The rumbling of the APC as it rolled through the dense forest was barely in the forefront of his mind as the general drifted off into a half-lucid sleep, clouded with a darkened vision molded by both perception and imagination. If he could only reach down deep enough, then maybe, just maybe, he could see what lay beyond, and peer into the presence of distant settings. Having been granted a minimal serving of sleep over the recent days, he soon lost grip on his focus, drifting into an indiscernible state of consciousness as his body rushed to find a moment of rest. Even though he had done his best to prolong the inevitable by artificial means, the collective forces of his body had begun to signal that now was the time to bring an end to the unwinnable conflict.
The thoughts swelled for some time, until a flash of light revealed a raucous conflagration, with neither nature nor machine spared from its impenetrable blaze. At the edge of the travelling wall of fire, he could see a company of Venomians attempt in vain to outrun the stream of flame. A tremor of primal fear revealed itself from within the immense shape, soon enveloping more than the distant figures. As touch of flame licked his shoulder, he turned around in desperation to try and hopelessly outrun the overwhelming heat.
"General?"
Kosi did not respond at first to the calling voice, his senses still removed from conscious matters.
"General…" A shake on the civet's shoulder woke him from his stupor, a moment of reevaluation brought his eyes to the expressionless facemask of the APC driver sitting next to him. "General, are you ok?"
"Yes, I- was just- what's going on?"
"You were looking a bit… off." The driver noted, stealing a glance at the pair of enflamed spots stretching down the general's left arm.
Something from within the civet's immediate memory crossed into focus, stealing a moment of lucidity from his otherwise forgotten dream.
"We're headed for danger, something ahead, it's- something's not right." The general braced himself against his seat, preparing himself for imminent peril.
"Uh, what do you mean?"
Kosi began to mutter the first half of the word 'fire' but was interrupted by the very same word echoing over the radio.
"Fire! It's everywhere up ahead. There's too much of it… We can't drive through."
"Those fools! Incompetent wastrels!" Kosi snarled. "They went too far! There are no Venomians this far south!" The general cursed the work of his retreating forces, whom in their haste to burn the Venomians behind them must've miscalculated the yield of their incendiary strikes.
"We can't keep going this way, we have to turn south and go around."
The general reached forward and grappled the receiver sitting on the APC's dash, clicking the transmit tab.
"The- get- we need to get west as soon as feasible. Take whatever path is needecessary." He ordered, stumbling over his own words.
Too far near the river plate and they'd be easy targets for Cornerian strikes, not to mention that it would extend their retreat beyond any tenable range. They could only change course and hope for the best.
"Understood, standby for further directions."
Kosi responded with an affirmation of the convoy leader's message, not realizing that his finger had slipped off the tab so that his message was no longer transmitted. He tried his best to stay awake and consider how his orders could be misinterpreted so poorly, but before he could realize, his gaze dulled into an unguided float to the edge of his vision, and he soon found his head crashing against the backrest, his eyes shaking into an eventual state of closure.
~X~X~X~X~X~
"I pledge my loyalty to Fortuna and Fortuna alone!" The walls of the cave echoed with the shout of the former Venomian as he lifted a paw to his chest in a traditional salute. The overseeing decanus shuffled in front of the next soldier in line, waiting for him to proclaim his oath in turn.
"I pledge my loyalty to Fortuna and Fortuna alone! Ducit amor patriae!" The next one uttered, deciding to conclude his vow with a traditional Lylatin phrase that proclaimed one's trust and devotion to their country.
Decanus Tolvi continued with his orders, barking out a message direct from General Kosi to all those present.
"…The treachery of Venom has once more reared its ugly head, as it threatens to upend the rightful order of Fortuna with a claim to the title of the greatest murderer the Lylat has ever known. It is under this directive that all Venomian forces swear an oath of loyalty to Fortuna and renounce any recognition of these illegitimate pretenders or be purged in a great rain of fire."
The cave's inhabitants visibly shook at the severity of their supreme commander's words.
"We can only achieve our independence through the expungement or expatriation of foreign invaders and illusioned irredentists. We must stay strong in the coming days and remove any measure of weakness or disloyalty that resides within us. Those still holding to the legitimacy of any claimant of Venom must be dealt with immediately and with maximum severity. As a matter of principle, they will be shot at once, whether they are captured during operations or met in the field of battle. It is only with the application of our full resolve that can we achieve this ultimate victory. Fortuna Fortis."
Morbus sat quietly at the edge of the cave room, flanked on either side by a fellow soldier making sure that the opossum stayed put. Decanus Tolvi finished his orders and dismissed the line of seven soldiers.
"Sir?"
"Not now, I ha- oh." Tolvi's eyes rested on the black opossum, who was clearly positioned in a captive stance between the two soldiers. "Isn't this of greater interest to Keir? I'm trying to make sure we have enough supplies so we don't starve in this damn cave."
"This cowardly bitch is going to get us all killed, Decanus! Do you know what he did? He's going to lead the Cornerians right to us!" One of the soldiers gripped Morbus by the arm, pulling him to his feet.
"Ugh…" The ranking member raised a paw to grip his forehead. "Look, unless there's a severed head somewhere, or you've caught him directly communicating to the enemy, I don't want to hear about it."
"Well, I mean-"
"What the hell did you do, worm?" Tolvi struck forward with an aggressive tone, making casual reference to the dark opossum's contrastingly pink hairless tail.
Morbus cowered, defensively waving his paws in front to deflect the oncoming judgement. "Nothing I- I didn't mean-"
"What's going on? Tolvi?" Out of the corner of Morbus' eyes walked in Decanus Keir, definitely the more likable of the two.
"You better come see." One of the soldiers holding Morbus by the arm pulled him into the nearby tunnel, leading the others to the unremarkable section of the cave where they'd stored most of their clothing and medical supplies.
When they came to the entrance of the storage section, one of the soldiers ran pointed to a secluded corner, revealing to the rest what had caused such a commotion.
"Oh my… well this complicates things…" Keir admitted.
"You fool! They were right, were they!" Decanus Tolvi threw up his arms, nearly striking Morbus in his anger. "They know where we are now, we have to abandon the redoubt, we can't risk-".
"Hold on, Tolvi. Hold on." A calming paw from Keir stretched out to divide the furious Tolvi from Morbus. "Is he…" a finger pointed at the pile at the end of the chamber, receiving a nod from the accompanying soldiers.
"Right." Keir signaled his fellow decanus to back away and converse with him in private. They communicated for a few moments in hushed whispers that Morbus could barely make out with the added echo, then Tolvi finished with a nod and a glance back at the opossum.
"He's still endangering us all with this stunt. You better hope that a Cornerian strike team doesn't descend on our location during the night." Decanus Tolvi retreated into the cave's inner hub without another word. Keir returned to the remaining trio, confident in his action.
"We've come to agreement. The situation is resolved for now, you two may be dismissed." The simian proclaimed, much to Morbus' shock.
The two soldiers traded glances in their momentary confusion, but soon followed their decanus' orders and followed Tolvi back to the main section of the cave system.
Keir paced silently around the room, stealing a glance at the so-called 'problem' when he neared its corner, nodding while he retreated to the opossum's side. "You have to realize this was not expected. I heard we'd scored a hit on one of their fighters, but…"
"I know." Morbus looked away from his superior. Despite knowing of Keir's fair treatment, he was still somewhat afraid of repercussion.
"What they said about leading the Cornerians here, it may not be accurate depending on some things. Tell me, how long did it take?"
"Take what?"
"To get back. How long did it take for you to drag yourself here after your retrieval?"
An air of nervous sincerity swept across the opossum's dark muzzle. "I don't know. Less than an hour?" He scanned his memory, hitting himself internally over the fact that that he hadn't kept track.
"Hmm, well they likely knew which direction we went, but it's doubtful they know our current position. The canyon should've protected our location." Keir gripped his chin while eyeing the unfamiliar helmet sitting atop a pile of clothing. "Did you retrieve anything else?"
"I- no. I mean, there was this." Morbus reached behind him to retrieve a small holster that he'd thrown in his satchel while out, handing it to his superior.
Keir unclipped the holster and slid the firearm halfway out to admire its two-tone frame. "Model 72 compact. Made in Macbeth. Good taste." He noted, slipping the gun unassumingly into his own empty holster. "I'm surprised they didn't take it from you, though I doubt they knew you were armed."
After securing the weapon in his own possession, Decanus Keir adopted a stronger stance, bearing down on the poor conscript with a commanding fold of his arms.
"Now then… why'd you do it? You knew by doing this there's a good chance they've tracked us here, you know each one of them is implanted with passive beacon to locate their bodies, don't you?"
"I- I didn't know… The thing was on fire, was I supposed to leave him?"
"Yes! You were… but you didn't." Keir withdrew from his more aggressive tone, resting a paw on the opossum's back. "It can't be mad at you. You did the right thing, son. I know you have a good heart, and you don't like to see anyone suffer. Just remember from now on that we're at war, and every one of us needs to fight for what's best for Fortuna. That means we cannot take actions that will endanger our fellow comrades, we must act as a unit, guided strictly by the goal of ultimate victory."
Morbus cast his gaze back to the ground, both shamed and relieved.
"You've done well today, Morbus, more than should be expected. You may not realize it, but your actions have the potential to affect thousands."
A cold shudder erupted throughout the opossum's spine.
"Now, I have much to get back to, Morbus. I'm sure you've heard that some logistical oversights need to be covered. A fair warning though, we weren't intending on holding position here, so there may be a- food situation if we don't get that Venomian resupply."
"We're getting a resupply though, right?" Morbus returned a doubtful glance. "They're coming for us?"
"That's- well, the situation's grown quite complicated with the Venomians as you might have heard, but that's not your concern. For now, ignore it, we have enough provisions to hold out in the near term, and we're sending a couple of our men out at a time to gather fruit and other necessities. You though, you need to stay here- I'm entrusting you to watch over our guest."
Morbus' eyes rose, somewhat surprised at his commander's order.
"Well? It's not like we have anything else for you to do right now… we are all contributing in whichever way we can, but right now that means hunkering down and waiting for new orders. We have no idea if the Cornerians have a drop on our-" The squad leader paused, eying the figure of their splinted guest. "Listen, if he wakes, alert one of us, and don't speak to him. I don't know how stable his condition is, but- it would be best for all of our sake if we didn't lose him." He finished in hushed tones.
Keir exited, leaving Morbus alone with the unconscious weasel.
~X~X~X~X~X~