He knew the moment the wreckage of The Last Psalm had been born anew as a neutron star, that his world had changed, likely irreparably. The old marshal could only assume that the creatures had infiltrated the wreck and laid the seed for its destruction. A familiar tactic shared by the humans, no less effective in alien hands.
A realization that offered no solace.
Unexpected, that the natives of this star cluster were of a tenacious breed. Perhaps his disdain had been premature, a falling of character, he was starting to realize, that seemed bound to the genetic heritage in his people's blood. Arrogance had been the rightful demise of Covenant operations throughout the war, at the cost of countless lives, and was certainly a leading factor in its protracted length. But that was far from a concern of his now. The Last Psalm had fallen, eradicated from existence, and this forced him in a position not dissimilar to the spartan.
Ju'das wondered at the current whereabouts of his adversary, likely far gone, and in a position that was, unlike his own, quite tenable.
The aging swordmaster elicited a sigh from his lungs, mandibles flexing in irritation as he favored his injured side with a delicate palm. A memory of his overzealous rage that would linger long and unfavorably. Hubris, as ever, proved the bane of his existence.
"Do you fair well, Marshal Rasumai?"
The voice that punctured the nefarious bubble of his grousing was unusual, soft and feminine, quite a rarity to his hearing that had been blasted by battle cries and battle for decades. He focused on the voice, his head turning to the one seated across from their primitive firepit, a far cry from the privilege of heating coils usually afforded to the Covenant army. They were lucky to have this much, as it were.
The nights on this planet seemed quite cold.
"I will live." He answered with a terse brevity, glancing past the young female, shadowed by the looming form of the phantom hovering at the edge of this roughened clearing they had scouted from the air. He watched, exasperated, as the small crew of unggoy bickered and shoved under the purplish light of the gravlift. He knew the source of their schism of course, a blight that lay on his own mind and another concern to waylay his thoughts of the future.
The transport was stocked with a full combat load of methane canisters, enough to keep a clutch of unggoy warriors, field ready for a week, but that supply would soon be limited, and they would not be likely to return to Covenant space any time in the near future, if they ever could. He allowed the primitive squabbling as it suited him currently, better to let the dimwitted creatures vent their fears on each other while he was within supervision. Dimwitted was, to him, not an insult, but a stark observation. The Covenant's education of the unggoy was more religious dogma than schooling of any sort. Considering their position in the pecking order, the Ministry of Scholarly Education felt there was no need to edify such short-lived beings, especially in consideration of their fragility in combat and their usage as expendable resources.
Once he had thought nothing beyond amusement at this.
Now, it was simply another dark stain on the purity of the religion centered so firmly in his mind's eye. Nevertheless, he would have to endure. While not as numerous as once before, he still had the faithful to protect, despite all the burdens they leveraged upon him.
Thus, he inured himself to their incessant chattering as an irritant that he would likely be forced to adapt to in the coming days. He would need to find a solution to the survival of his unggoy, and quickly, for Nipnup, if not the others. He could not allow dissension amongst the already pitiable number of comrades he had left, not to lament further about the dire nature of their position.
The loss of the Psalm had greater ramifications than their marooning on this alien world.
Mainly, in the realization that the quality of his allies had suffered severely.
He mused, with some levity, that such companions almost made him long for the presence of the stoic human. There was something to be said of professionalism, even from an unsavory character. And he was in dire need of competent allies.
"What are we to do now?" The young female asked softly, her voice carrying gently across the fire.
Ju'das pitied the young one, even as he considered her prompt. She was both fortunate and cursed. Of the military disaster that was the loss of the Psalm, she escaped without injury and was one of a handful of known survivors. Her reward? Left stranded on some unknown planet rife with hostile aliens and no resources, with only himself and a pack of bumbling unggoy. Perhaps he should have left her on the human world, she would have been the better for it.
Even so, the sangheili field marshal took a measure to ponder her question.
What to do indeed.
That seemed to be the question that swirled through his own thoughts. What was there to do? There was an innumerably high chance that they were the only survivors of the Psalm. The precept of Covenant eminence made the consideration of retreat the pronouncement of fools and cowards. And the late Shipmaster was a dogged adherent of the doctrine, he remembered as much during his service aboard. Their existence was merely resultant of the simple conclusion to evade the heavy AA presence around the fallen vessel.
He supposed, at the moment, the answer was quite simple.
"We survive, Lady Sudomi." He answered sagaciously, nodding with grim resolve as he lifted himself from the log he had drawn to the fire. The sangheili warrior stretched his muscles with a quiet groan that was near inaudible. Most warriors his age spent their days in their keeps, orating about their past glories and lording over the next generation of future soldiers. Though to be honest, it was often a rarity to see a veteran of such age, on Sangheilios or its numerous colonies.
Heroes usually had a penchant for dying.
Ju'das still remembered when the Hierarchs had promised a swift and righteous war. He was unsure how many remained who did.
The old warrior sighed.
I am becoming far too old for this.
XX-XX-XX
A tired grunt passing through him, he thrust forward quickly.
The meaty thunk that followed, drowned the hiss that failed to crawl out of the snout of the creature trapped under him. The alien gurgled, thumping its fist against his shoulderplate with increasingly weakened vigor, choking on the length of curved steel buried in its collarbone. The damned thing was resilient, the natural armor of its scales and the layer of alloy armor, softening a fatal blow into something drawn out and tedious. It was dead, but too fucking stupid to realize it yet. If he had not been so weakened, he would have cut the alien's head from its shoulders in a single blow, as he was now, he struggled to keep the spasming reptile from alerting its squad in its death throes.
With an annoyed grunt he tore the kukri from its wound, the back of the blade bouncing off the closeness of his breastplate before he thrust it downward once more, severing its trachea and lodging deep into the vertebra of its neck.
The reptile alien under him shuddered violently, its tail thumping wildly against the mossy soil of this cursed world. Noble Six lay firmly atop it, quieting the worst of its trashing as he noted to be more considerate when dealing with aliens bearing this physiology. Their reptilian nervous system shared an unfortunate similarity in their primitive ancestry, and recognition of brain death was less than satisfactory.
The spartan remained unmoving, even after the body stilled, focused on the muted chatter of the marshy rainforest, waiting, listening, for the possibility of discovery. Grabbing the corpse by the vest, he shimmed lower, focusing on the communications device on its forearm. He listened, to the alien chatter. Calm, rational, no audible distress. Its death was likely unknown to its companions. This was fortunate, as his injuries were not getting any better.
He needed access to real medicines, and a location not in a live combat zone. However, he was not privy to such niceties. Once more, he focused outward, on anything was not the deep pain wracking his body, and plunged his gauntlets into the dirt, carving out a shallow pit to dump the body. Not ten meters away he could hear footsteps, a prescient reminder of the proximity of the remainder of the alien patrol. His work was quick and silent, the spartan stifling a groan of pain as he leveraged the body down and covered it in wet soil and rotting leaves, a grim luxury he would not be afforded if these base creatures were somehow able to kill him.
He imagined they would cart his corpse off and strip him of his armor, a resource he could not allow to fall into foreign hands. Despite its condition a suitably advanced culture could still glean information about humanity's most advanced technologies. He could not allow that to happen. Having unvarnished the corpse before burial, the familiar weight of a rifle was a welcomed assurance, and the handful of cylindrical explosive devices would hopefully be enough to blast his body beyond recognition and value should the worst come to pass.
Six studied the weapon as he crawled away from the fresh mound of dirt. Short barreled, stocky, large magazine, likely a close quarters weapon, sufficient but not preferable in his current environment. It would have to be enough.
The spartan eyed the next closest hostile, armor profile similar to those he encountered aboard the fallen Covenant warship, the dark reds and blacks replaced with the interwoven geometrics of digital camo, the varied shades of mellow greens and dark browns hard to discern from the natural undergrowth.
He didn't know why they were here with any certainty, but considering he had been following the strange party of aliens beforehand, he could safely hazard a guess. And given that these soldiers were skirting silently through the terrain in a pursuit pattern, it was a high possibility their allegiances were not intertwined.
A curious disclosure, another unanswered wonder to follow with the myriad of other such pondering concerns that threatened the frangible, tattered shards that had once been his peace of mind.
It mattered little to him now.
Whatever their origin, they were in his way.
Noble Six pulled his beaten body into a crouch, knees tensed and shoulders bristling with coiling muscle. He gunned forward, as silent as he was swift, impacting the next target in his chain of execution. He leveraged his weight judiciously, pressing enough force on the simian's spine to crush bone, forcing the alien bodily to the dirt below without a sound, his gauntlet enfolding around the dying creature's throat and squeezing hard. He heard and felt bone snap like rotten wood, the rubberlike vacuum seal of its gorget compressing so tightly he could feel the mesh rub together between his palm and fingers.
Its death was instantaneous, and he left it within moments, brushing the body over and stripping its weapons with practiced efficiency. He fell upon the next without relent, passing through the chain of soldiers before they had time to realize they were dropping.
The last of the squad was a fairly large ape, possibly some abstract relative of a gorilla, he was neither interested nor inclined to understand its zoology. Whatever its specifics may have been, the creature was unable to even let out a surprised grunt before he caved its head in with a rock, the heavy chunk of granite cracking the helmet and splitting cranial bone like an egg, hemorrhaging dark grey matter and blood in a smashed slurry.
Death cared not for such intricacies.
Noble Six glanced at the stone, dripping with fluids and flakes of the peculiar plastic-metal alloy of alien armor, and smashed it against the corpse's pate again for good measure, before discarding the instrument and husking the bodies. Once done, half a dozen rifles draped across his frame from various straps and the tattered remainder of his ammo harness festooned with whatever ammunition he could pocket, the spartan took a moment to recall his course, using tracking skills learned on Onyx and honed through the merciless battlefields of the Human Covenant War, to identify the targets of his pursuit.
Eliminating the pursuit force had delayed him considerably, and he had little doubt that they had reached the wreckage of the cruiser, for whatever purpose they had in securing its ruins. As it happened the site of the wreck had been the last coordinate, he had read for the UNSC IFF the seraph had picked up on, and that left him in a rather unfortunate position. It seemed as if everything was converging on a single point. His answers, hope for survival, and well of conflict, all lay at the foot of the great skeleton of the iron beast that lay ahead, and he had little choice but to walk right into it.
Soon his concealment would be a nonfactor and he'd be forced to face threats on the open field. Though he would be surprised just to live that long. The spartan pressed onward, exhausted beyond human limitation and hoping for some light at the end of this arduous tunnel.
And that was when the tree beside him decided to explode.
XX-XX-XX
Fox froze, his foot half raised for the next step, when a loud percussive blast snapped through the boughs and furrows of the trees around him. Krystal, similarly posed, halted, her staff extended and raised defensively. He glanced in her direction, meeting her gaze with a grimace. Both assumed the sound was likely from only one source.
Something had set off one of the IFF mines they'd left behind. Judging from the volume of the blast, whatever set it off had not been all that far away. So… either an unfortunate animal had stumbled onto their trap… or they were being hunted. Given Star Fox's penchant for finding trouble, and the confirmed presence of Remnant forces on Fortuna, he was willing to wager for the latter. And he never made the poor habit of being a betting vulpine.
His comms unit buzzed.
"Hey Fox… what was that?" The tinny echo of Miyu's voice buzzed as it bounced from the trees around them.
The vulpine inhaled slowly, running his tongue across his dry lips. The blue vixen matched his stare, as her head slowly turned in delayed tandem with the pointed triangles of her ears, the pale cream tufts of fur at the tips twitching involuntarily. Her focus shifted west, and her expression, once calm as a patrician, morphed uncertainly.
Burying his unease was a quick but difficult task, as he formed his reply. "I hope you're ready, Miyu, because I think we are about to have company."
XX-XX-XX
"Well…" Miyu glanced down from the lip of the massive crater rimming the wreckage of the colossal starship, towards the gaggle of misfits under her supervision. The feline tugged on the rifle sling digging into her shoulder and considered how to reply.
Fay, precariously balancing a warm hunk of debris between her arm and chest, was distractedly tapping at the dense material with an inquisitive claw, muttering to herself in that irritating techno jargon that always drove Miyu up the wall. Whatever interesting anecdote she had found to absorb herself in, it seemed to have stolen the technical canine's attention and spatial awareness.
This of course, proved the perfect opportunity to the bane of her existence.
Something flashed across the air, the glint of sunlight reflecting of a miniature UFO as it flicked off the back of Fay's head. The fluffy white dog yelped exasperatedly and hopped in place rather comically, rubbing the offended spot as she grimaced at the now cackling bird, who had perched himself on the lip of a massive gash of metal in the side of the giant iron beast laid to rest in the heart of this cavernous deformation.
A sharp whine filled the air as Miyu adjusted her rifle's power pack.
Falco's gloating crashed into a shrieking halt as a blaster bolt slogged him right in his feathered ass. The coarse and abrasive pheasant, distracted from his mockery, loosed a rather girlish screech as his backside suddenly caught fire.
Up on the ridge the lynx enjoyed the sight of the bird rolling across his makeshift perch and smacking the seat of his pants, puffs and whiffs of black smoke ebbing from his flailing figure.
"We'll be ready by the time you get here, Boss."
XX-XX-XX
Fox, bemused by the delay in her answer, and the whimsical tone in her voice, nevertheless brushed his concerns aside. He could take a guess, but that would be an unnecessary distraction. Instead, he focused. "Copy that, Miyu. We'll be there soon." He cut the comm call and gestured forward.
"Come on Krys, let's get moving. If the Remnant is following us, the ship will make for a better defensive position."
"Agreed." She dipped her head in acknowledgment, shifting fluidly from a standing posture into a loping run.
Fox followed in her shadow, having learned long ago that his stamina, while impressive, was nothing compared to her ethereal vigor. It took effort to keep pace with her, and even so he knew that if she chose, she could have left him in the dust. Long ago he had been put in his place on the track, and he was fine with that. There were benefits to second place, benefits that were hard to ignore.
Fox tried to focus on the footpath ahead of him, avoiding roots and uneven patches of brush and rock, and yet even so his eyes could not help but wander, dipping low as he followed her sanguine form gliding naturally through the trees and underbrush, to the way her tail weaved gracefully above her rolling hips and her body flexed and contorted. Krystal was the picture of athleticism, robust thighs, long… slender legs and a figure that many models and celebrities struggled to emulate with artificial plastic and extreme diets.
And that heft outback….
Fox stumbled, the toe of his boot snagging on a tree root, and just barely recovered his balance before flinging himself headlong into the trunk of a tree. The vulpine shook his head, and then thumped himself in the jaw.
Hard.
"Come on, McCloud." He growled at himself as he committed his mental faculties to his run, massaging at the soreness he had self-inflicted. If Fara knew what you were thinking she'd skin you alive.
If life was like some of those Katinan animated shows, he'd probably be sporting a raging nose bleed. Instead, he adjusted the tightness in his pants and tried not to look like a total idiot. He'd just have to see how that turned out. He'd like for such wandering thoughts to go the way of the Papetoonian Bufflox, but the idle recesses of his mind were a curse, as they were for most males he imagined.
He'd long since given up on pursing any romantic interest in Krystal. He'd learned that her otherworldly beauty came with an equally otherworldly disposition. She was not all that different from the protagonist of an old holoshow his dad used to watch as a kid. She was a warrior princess from a world lost to Andross' predation. She was kind and regal in conversation, but fierce and virtuous in battle. By compare his cavalier attitude and roguish humor had been unable to hold her attentions. He had made his peace with that, and found happiness in his old school crush. He was simply glad that his somewhat embarrassing efforts at courting her had ended in a close friendship, rather than chase her away.
And as he'd like to keep it that way, he crushed such primal, hormonal thoughts and focused himself forward, to the difficult task ahead. This was not the time to be waylaid by immature distractions. The Remnant would be on their heels shortly and they were about to explore the wreckage of a possibly alien ship. Right now, his team needed him focused and committed.
Fox upped his pace to a comfortable stride beside Krystal, and tried very hard to ignore the eloquent smirk she was giving him. He failed, miserably. The vixen's jade eyes glinted with the faintest shine of mischief, and her expression made her thoughts quite known to him, the upwards tilt of her delicate lips so slight and unassuming that he recognized their intent only because he had come to understand the nuance in her mannerisms. In the end he was simply thankful that she did not comment on the bristled fur on his cheeks or the way his eyes scanned far ahead.
Something told him he would not be living this down for quite some time.
XX-XX-XX
Miyu stared into the yawning, black abyss ahead of her, to its unknowable depths and untouched secrets, and she felt her paw tighten around her blaster. Her eyes traveled upward, past the gaping blemish in the warped hull of this alien vessel, to the strange italic script etched into its silvery metal. The fact she could not read the ship's designation was more damning than its unfamiliar design.
"So… what are you thinking?" Falco proposed from beside her, the pheasant, thankfully, adopting a more serious outlook. The avian eyed her with hesitant respect, as he nursed his backside.
Miyu smiled. Falco talked tough shit, but she'd learned how to handle him. He just needed a… heavy hand.
The feline hummed thoughtfully, brushing her paw across an earlobe studded with small golden loops. "Thirty creds we find some alien eggs or some shit, total infestation scenario." She glanced left. "Falco you'll become a disgusting, bloated egg carrier for their toothy young." She glanced right, scratching at a cheek musingly. "Fay, you'll probably die heroically saving my life. And I…" She looked ahead to the gaping maw of darkness theatrically, resting a paw on her hip. "I will tragically escape and warn the Federation of this horrid danger, receive many awards and an ass load of credits, and shack up with a handsome celebrity and make B rated films for the rest of my life."
Falco inhaled long and slow, and she could practically hear the irritation that boiled and frothed between his feathery ear holes.
"Fuck you. I hope you get mange."
Fay frowned, and twiddled her paws timidly, looking to Miyu askance.
"Can I, like, maybe not die?"
"I don't know." Miyu shrugged coolly.
"I guess we'll just have to find out."
The lynx ignored the mutterings of her friend, and the angry muttering of the mite, and opened her comm line. "Hey Boss, perimeter is clean, no sign of Remnant assholes. Permission to investigate the totally alien ship?"
"Negative." The vulpine's denial crackled from her wrist. "I'll be at the site in two minutes, maintain your position. We'll take a look at the totally alien ship together. Copy?"
"Copy that, loud and clear. We'll be loitering outside this hole Falco found. Don't worry, it's hard to miss."
"Understood, Fox out."
The connection severed abruptly, and Miyu let out a long-winded sigh as she found the least pointed hunk of metal to park her ass. "Well, looks like you won't be an alien baby factory yet, Falco. Good on you."
Unfortunately, he did not rise to the bait, merely grumbling to himself as he propped a shoulder against the wreck, focused on the distant tree line. She was somewhat surprised. He was usually stubborn enough to generate some amusement. Oh well, even a bird can have his day she supposed. A little disappointed, she looked to Fay, who seemed once again distracted by the admittedly interesting nature of the crashed starship.
The canine walked a distance along the hull, tracing its material with a paw while she thumbed a stream of text into her datapad and used her little gadgets. She mouthed a string of tech gibberish as she worked, prattling on and on in a low voice, probably words too big to fit in the lynx's brain. She looked busy, but unfortunately for her, Miyu was bored.
"Hey, Fay!"
Stumbling in place, startled by the call out. The spaniel was shaken from her academic brainstorming.
"Back at the academy, are we?' The feline inquired with some whimsy and a brow quirked high.
"Well… uh…" The canine sputtered gawkily in that cutesy way Miyu loved so much. Even after college the poor girl had deplorable people skills. Right now, she looked no different from every project presentation she ever gave.
Miyu bid her time, letting the girl formulate her answer, which, after a few moments to gather her composure, she did.
"It's just that… this is rather fascinating." Fay answered hesitantly, thumping a paw against the dense metal of the starship's keel. "The composition of this vessel's hull is entirely… well… alien. It doesn't match military or commercial shipbuilding materials. I mean…" The spaniel pressed a small device against the wreck, and after it beeped, she pulled the thing away to show Miyu. "The indenter can't even get a solid reading on it. I'd have to bring down the machine from the shop on the Fox to get an accurate interpretation. It's no wonder so much of the ship survived reentry."
Miyu hummed and nodded along, standing from her uncomfortable makeshift chair and approached the spaniel who started to go on about wanting to set up a whole operation to peel the ship's secrets from its unfinished grave. "Hmm, yes… very interesting. And I'm sure the numbers on this little doohickey," She gently pushed the idinter or whatever from the dog's field of view, "must be very exciting. But Fay…" She dropped a friendly palm on the canine's shoulder and leaned in close to whisper. "We are in an active war zone. The Remnant is out here somewhere, probably wanting to kill us something fierce. Soo… maybe we can put the little science expo till after we get the big guns down here eh?"
"I…" Fay looked around, and her expression titled from scientific frenzy to humble embarrassment as the high became a low and she remembered where she was. "Oh… yeah of course." She nodded abashedly. "It's just…"
"I know." Miyu nodded, wearing a warm smile. "Honestly your excitement is super cute, but I don't want you to accidently wander off where I can't keep an eye on you. My job is difficult enough with this eye sore around." She inclined her head to blue and red pheasant loitering nearby like an inner district vagrant.
"I can hear you; you know." Falco muttered blandly.
"I know." Miyu cut him a winning smile.
Fay laughed softly beside her, the young dog seeming to quickly take back her high spirits. Truly they were few things that could shake her endless optimism for very long.
He took a deep breath, presumedly to utter one of his usual quips he was infamously known for, when his eyes flickered, focusing past Miyu. The cat followed his attention to notice a pair of figures slide out from the foliage bordering the impact crater.
"Thank the gods." He heaved heavily, his shoulders shifting in a wry gesture, watching as a familiar pair of vulpines started their slide down the lip, kicking a cloud of hard baked dust around their legs. "Never thought I'd be so glad to see the arrogant bastard."
"Fox… arrogant?" Fay wondered, eyeing Falco skeptically.
"Yeah, just look at that smug shit." Falco gestured to their leader as he trotted up the incline, weaving merrily through the debris, a winning grin cut into his squared muzzle. It was the same expression plastered all over Federation recruiting offices and posters across Lylat space. Most people thought he looked charismatic. Falco was not most people.
Falco thought he looked like the backside of an ape.
An ugly ape's backside.
It was telling, that Falco made no comment to the lissome vixen that followed up after him. Unlike Fox, she did not tolerate his "good-natured" ribbing. And a quick spar had seen fit to change his perceptions. Of the Star Fox crew, Krystal was the only one he bothered to show a moderate, continuous respect for. Miyu smiled at the memory. That'd been the hardest she laughed in years, though to her disappointment she had yet to successfully bait Falco into a repeat performance. Say what one will about his abrasive nature, there was the faintest spark of intelligence behind his eyes that was more than a trick of the light.
Miyu, long since used to his skewed perception of reality, parted from her group at a light jog to meet Fox and Krystal halfway. "Howdy Boss, welcome to our little dig site." She gestured broadly, her tone flavored with a slight tang of academic panache, fitting of an eager explorer. "As you can see, progress is well underway."
Fox, slowing to a stop, glanced at the looming hulk and the scattered debris, and huffed good-naturedly, hardly appearing fatigued despite what must have been a lengthy run. "I see someone has been staying up late watching old holovids." He commented with an amused smile, glancing pointedly at his traveling companion. "Though I do wonder where this inspiration may have come from."
The vixen returned his gaze calmly, her paws primly interlocked at her waist. "I see no reason to concern yourself with such wild speculation. Miyu's excellent taste in cinema is simply a result of good character." She answered cordially, her tone fit more for the functions of high society, than the ruggedness of her chosen occupation.
Fox, shook his head, knowing a lost battle when he saw it, and instead turned back to Miyu. "So... what's the damage?"
"Well damage isn't the word I'd used, more like completely and utterly borked. No sign of bodies about the exterior, as you can tell, but Fay has a lot to say about this thing. Come on," she gestured up to where the rest of the crew was. "I'll fill you in on the way up." With a nod they followed in behind her as she began to gesture. "As you can see, this ain't anything the Federation has built, at least as far as our clearance goes, and that's pretty fucking high. Fay had something to say too, some kind of wiz jargon, you'll have to question her for the specifics. But, bottom line. This ship is made from a material we don't seem to have. It's not any kind of known metal, military or civilian."
Miyu worked her boots into the uneven dirt as she climbed the slope, inclining her head toward the wreck as Fox and Krystal came up behind her. "And I'm guessing, if we head inside, we likely won't be finding any bodies we'd find familiar, if you catch my drift."
"Are we looking at extra-system?" he inquired, his focus naturally splitting to Krystal, who seemed invested into the conversation more than usual.
Miyu, with a glance back, nodded confidently. "Further than that I'd wager, Boss. I figure a ship like this has to belong to a Type-II civilization like ours. And I think if they existed in or near the Lylat System, we'd have found 'em by now." Then, suddenly, something seemed to have occurred to her as she shifted focus. "Hey Krys, I know it's a long shot, but does this thing look at all familiar?"
Fox followed the feline's attention to their third as she studied the unfamiliar starship, who stroked the deep blue fur along her arm in thought as she took in the vastness of the alien ship from under its shadow. After a time, she shook her head, the smallest trace of disappointment visible in her expression. "Cerinia was an advanced society and held many wonders, but ultimately their interest had never lain within colonization or expansion. My people had no desire for the stars for more than their study and the development of small pleasure craft. My father had just only started work on our planetary defense when… when…"
Her words slowed to a halt as she adopted a distant appearance. Her eyes became glassy, and she fidgeted in place. Fox and Miyu shared a glance.
The pall upon her did not last as something seemed to flick inside Krystal's head, and her proprietary coolness fell upon her like a blanket, and she became her usual self. The vixen, with a slow, composed tilt, inclined her head softly in the negative. "No. I fear a project of this scale was not within our means." She concluded despondently.
"Well... it was worth a shot anyway." Miyu carried on without missing a beat. She knew Krystal well, knew the poor girl didn't like to be seen in a moment of weakness. So, the lynx wiped it from her mind, wham, clear slate. What were they talking about again? She didn't know. Must not have not been important.
"Yes well, that leaves us with a few options." Fox admitted, rubbing a thumb under his chin in consideration. "The op goal was simply to maintain coverage of the crash site until Federation assets could be assembled and deployed to secure it. Technically, our job is half done. We can just wait out here and keep any Remnant probing elements from securing it. But…" He drawled.
"But you totally want to explore a crashed alien ship." Miyu guessed in a flat tone.
"But I totally want to explore a crashed alien ship." He conceded with a sheepish smile her way. "I mean, how many opportunities do you get like this in a single lifetime?"
"I believe the answer is none." Krystal informed him as they began moving once more to where Falco and Fay were waiting. "I do not think this is something that occurs all that often."
"It'd be positively criminal to waste such an opportunity." Miyu supposed with a thoughtful hum.
"You guys are fucking crazy." Falco countered, the stare he leveraged against them filled with such heat and intensity it could scorch the paint off a landmaster. "This is an alien ship. Did any of you watch those old horror movies, cause from what I remember they start pretty much exactly like this."
He huffed, gesturing heavily to Krystal. "I know she's technically an alien or whatever, but I don't think we should base our assumptions on finding more posh aristocrats, because this looks a lot like a fucking warship to me."
"Come on, birdbrain, where's your spirit of adventure? Not too shriveled up I hope." Miyu thumped him on the shoulder and jogged toward the opening. "I mean…"
"Ohh…" Don't say it. He moaned, holding his face in his hands in despair.
She looked back, flashing a roguish grin, her eyes glimmering with mischief.
"What's the worst that could happen."
Hey readers, Drake here with an important update.
It's been a long time since I have been active, so I wanted to drop a message explaining that I've been busy. I've been using this time to do an ungodly amount of background work, writing outlines for current and future stories, Legacy included. I've written about 100k's worth in planning and note taking, a new method I'm trying as I've come to the decision that I can't write freeform anymore, as I tend to corner myself or lose focus halfway through a story, to the disappointment and irritation of myself and my readers as well I imagine. This is my attempt to fix that. So far I think it is going well, though it is slowing my updates drastically, at least until I catch up on a considerable back log. I've already finished the preliminary work for a new project, and am halfway through the second, both of which have at least 20-25k in plot outlining, setting, character notes, the whole deal. And I hope to finish the outline for Legacy some time this month. But instead of waiting to finish the outline before uploading, I thought to release the next chapter, As I don't think I could live with myself if I did not at least post something at the start of 2021, after being dark for so long. So to round off, I have not been taken by the rona, I am still a healthy boy, and I am going to try and make 2021 a better year for my writing.
If my forgetful, swiss cheese brain can remember or if I feel inclined enough I'll probably upload the summarization of my outlines into the storehouse, since I did say I was going to use it.
Until then I hope this chapter will provide some alleviation for my lack of activity, and I'll try to have the next one out as soon as I can bludgeon my writers block into a coma and toss its body off a bridge. As always, reviews are very much appreciated as they put a nice pep in my step, really strokes my fragile, author ego.
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Anyways, I've been working on this chapter and outlines for the better part of eight hours so I'm gonna play some games and dwell in existential terror.
Later