Disclaimer: I don't own StarFox or the characters created by Nintendo.
Understand me? Good.
Introduction: I wrote this because if I continued on my other story, then things will get a lot less action-y. Everything is different, well, almost everything. You should figure it out by the end of this chapter. Some of it, anyway. Erm. History changed because some weird dude messed with a time machine. Yeah.
"Fox, how's that new engine coming along?" James asked as he flopped himself down on a bench near where Fox was working.
"Nearly done, dad. There are a few glitches. I think I may need a bigger jet battery." Fox whacked the metal container a few times with a wrench and it started up with a loud whir, "Ah, maybe not." James smiled. He was very proud of his twelve-year-old kit. Even though Fox McCloud didn't act like a kit anymore.
"Slow down, Fox. It really doesn't matter how fast you do it, it-"
"Is if you've finished it at the end. I know, dad."
Fox was always interested in astronomy and engineering, so he spent a lot of his free time making a new telescope or upgrading the design on his father's hover car. James didn't mind having a few cars blown up, just as long Fox was learning something. James, the leader of the StarFox team, wanted Fox on his crew after he was done elementary school. James decided that his old friend, Peppy Hare, could teach Fox the rest of junior high basics.
Fox was a very strong kit for his age. Born the only kit of Vixy Renard, who died when she was giving birth, and James McCloud, Fox proved very strong minded even though of early kithood nightmares. One of them including his best friend's, Bill Grey, death just last year because of a freak train accident. Besides Bill, Fox didn't have many friends.
James was sent on a mission by General Pepper of the Cornerian Defense Army to check out strange activity from a planet named Venom. Frankly, Albert Hemstrum, an evil fox scientist gone mad, wants war. James personally didn't like Fox on the mission, but the stubborn kit refused to be left behind and sneaked on board using one of James' old suitcases.
"We might need that someday, Fox," James pointed at an old screwdriver that Fox was aiming to throw into the garbage can. Fox nodded and set it down.
The Great Fox was pretty large, with three bedrooms, one for each Peppy, James, and Fox, a kitchen, a den, a cockpit, the engine room, and the vehicle bay. The last two took up the biggest spaces. It was painted either white or stuck on metallic for the most part of the walls. Everything else, except the clothes, was white, too. A lift was on Fox's right, and the vehicle bay door to the outside was closed shut on the other side. The halls were large as well, with florescent bulbs around the edges of the floor.
Suddenly, the lift dinged and Peppy came out of the elevator. Being a young rabbit in his early twenties, Peppy was energetic and excited most of the time. He was a good pilot and a good navigator, and he was really funny, too. Fox really liked him.
"Hey, James. I think we'll be entering Area 6 in a few hours, so ya might wanna get prepared. Just a thought, though."
"Good thinking, old buddy," James said, pulling his battle shades from his pocket and pushing them on, "Lets go. Fox, stay here, and remember to not be hanging around when the doors open."
"Yeah, I know, dad. Don't worry," Fox smiled as James jumped into the cockpit of his Arwing. Pointing at the lift and starting up his liquid hydrogen engine at the same time, James didn't look the least bit worried. Fox mouthed 'I know' to his father and ran to the lift. Just as the door to the elevator closed, Fox heard a whoosh and a hydraulic piston being moved. His father had just went into the depths of space.
Needless to say, Fox was worried about his father. This Albert guy seemed pretty mean, and Fox needed to make sure that his father was all right.
"Hey, Rob," Fox called over his communicator, "How long until my dad reaches Venom?"
"Approximation, two hours."
"Thanks," Fox opened the lift again and walked over to the Arwing that he had just finished building.
**
"Watch it, James!" Peppy yelled as a swarm of fighters zoomed from the large vessels and sped toward the two specks in the sky. James chuckled.
"If that's the best they can do, this'll be a cinch," James waited until they were close enough, then he dropped a Nova Bomb on them. Over sixty of them blew up right away and another forty swerved away and crashed into each other.
"I don't know. I think this is just a plan for us to let our guard down," Peppy said softly as he fired wildly with lasers.
"Isn't it always?" James smiled.
"I think it is," Peppy grinned back.
Two blue and white jets screaming across the skies suddenly punctured Venom's green atmosphere. Venom itself was a desert wasteland of death. If you used a shovel and dug a bit on the ground, you would find bones of the dead in less than a minute. The air was polluted with carbon molecules. It would be very hard to breathe, but it was possible.
"There's a landing sight there," James pointed. Peppy banked along with him and they both settled down a mile from a large base. Peppy and James both put on gas masks and jumped out, blasters ready at paw.
"Something's wrong," Peppy whispered over the com-link as they both trudged through the desert.
"Yeah. I'm cold."
"No, really, Jimmy. Why haven't they attacked us yet?" Peppy raised his gun in alarm as a clang sounded, "What was that?"
"Relax, Pep. That's just the door opening for us," James said with irony as he pointed at the base. The whole thing was metal. It looked all solid until a small door opened right in front of them, a few yards away.
"Uh, you go in first," Peppy stuttered.
"Tsk, ya should've been named Pampered Chicken."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"Did you ever really do that flight test back at the academy?" James asked as he walked right into the base, apparently unconcerned. The hall was rather wide, with no doors on either side, just halls branching off in different directions.
"No."
"Did you pass the test on ground combat?"
"Yeah, I think so."
"Then shoot," James said as ten Venomian soldiers popped out of the corner of the metal hallway. Peppy panicked as they started shooting madly. James shot back immediately, taking down four of them. Peppy followed suit, maiming down the rest of the roost.
"Wow. Good aim for a pilot," Peppy heaved out a sigh.
"Shut it, wise guy," James smiled as he threw off his gas mask, "This thing is really uncomfortable."
"Yeah," Peppy grunted as he pulled his off, too, and threw it to the ground next to him, "If I get another surprise like that, I'm g-"
"HI, PEPPY!"
"GAH!" Peppy fell over in shock. James just turned his head and scowled.
"I thought I told you to stay put," he frowned. Fox smiled and ripped off his gas mask.
"Yeah, but do I ever follow instructions?"
"You. Little punk." Peppy gasped between breaths. Fox's smile grew bigger, and Peppy couldn't help but smirk, too.
"Are you mad, dad?" Fox asked, turning to James.
"Oh, I'm fuming, but as long as you have a gun, come on," James pulled his two crewmen along as Fox fiddled with his rifle; the biggest one he could find in the engine room. The engine room also doubled as a weapons cache.
"A G-563, Katina design with some Cornerian upgrades. It has extremely heavy fire; one impact laser is enough to melt six inches of steel. Is that good enough?" Fox waved it around with one arm. The rifle had a clip the size of one of Peppy's ears, and the rifle itself was heavy titanium, half the height of James. Peppy stared.
"Wow, I can't even lift that thing!" Peppy shook his head is disbelief, his gray ears flopping side to side.
**
"Duck, Fox!" James shoved his son out of the way as a volley of lasers punched holes in the wall behind him. The metal melted and soon, the whole right-paw wall was deformed.
"Oh, crap. Is that Albert?" Peppy asked as he ran across the room, occasionally shooting blind lasers at the guys who were pouring in from the elevators. Among them, a black robed, gray fox was shouting commands.
"Yeah," James shot again. One of his shots hit a guard's head, spilling blood and brain fluid. Fox nearly threw up.
"Ugh! I'm hit!" Peppy fell down just as he reached the table that they were hiding behind. His left arm was bleeding furiously, spilling blood all over the metal floor. Fox tried to ignore Peppy's gasps as he aimed the rifle at anyone who came close to them.
"Wait for it," James said to Fox as he shot the guards. They started to back off. Fox let out a sigh of relief, but that was before he saw the grenade.
"Oh, crap," Peppy whispered as they ran out from the table. Peppy, being a fast runner, reached the hall first, ushering Fox and James on. Then the terrible happened: A stray laser shot James from the guards. Falling with a thud on the ground, James gave a hard look at Fox as he tried to help.
"Get lost, dog!" James then brought out his gun and shot a few warning shots at Fox's feet and that sent him fleeing. A moment after Fox ducked into the hall, a deafening explosion was heard, and the flash blinded Fox for a moment. James was caught right in the blast.
"No! JAMES!" Peppy brought his own grenade from one of his pocket and pulled the pin, "You'll pay, Albert!" Peppy then flung the projectile with his good arm and watched in victory as Albert the mad scientist was blown to bits from the explosive.
"Come on!" Fox pulled on Peppy's coat as more guards came out of the vents and shafts of the elevator. Fox's father was dead. Now, Fox had no more living family, except for Peppy Hare, his godfather.
***
"Princess? Dinner is served," Tacker, the royal servant fox, peeked into the young vixen's bedroom.
"Yes, just a minute. Are you.? Hey! Close that door!" The young princess turned her head at the butler and gave him a cold stare, quickly covering her naked body with a thin cloth, but with her buttocks exposed. Tacker immediately closed the wooden door. The hinges squeaked noisily as they allowed the door to swing closed.
The princess was a fair young maid, with short, shiny locks of hair and sleek fur. She was only twelve, but she was expected to do so much. She was to rule the entire planet when her mother, Queen Rainer, died. By her current condition, that was going to be a long time. The Queen liked to spend her spare time roaming around the forests and the mountains, using her bow and arrows to hunt down those walking mushrooms that she like so much. The Queen looked a lot like the young princess, only with longer strands of hair.
The princess was very stubborn for a member of royalty. She wanted to learn to use magic like a sorceress and use the magic staff of the Wizard of Ages. She was coming well in her lessons, but she still was too young to use it outside of palace grounds.
Speaking of the palace, it was a magnificent structure. Fancy stone walls on top of a large hill surrounded it over looking the village on one side and the ocean on the other. Towers and currents were built, but just for aesthetics: the kingdom was never really attacked by invaders. The palace, castle, more like, was built of colorful marble with glass windows and long corridors. The royalty, along with the Prime Minister and the people's representatives, dined in the main hall. The main hall was long and wide, big enough for at least twenty of a villager's house inside.
Gardens were outside, with ponds and two orchards. The sweet smell of flowers in the spring lured the princess to wander around outdoors often times. The princess loved the outdoors. She loved to keep the window open in her royal suite, which was very big and had many things inside, like chairs, desks, drawers, and a fancy bed with those silk overhangs. The princess liked her marble walls pale green, instead of her mother's bright blue. Her eyes were also a bright green, for that matter.
The princess was, in fact, not like other princesses at all. She was curious, for one, and she loved to talk with the peasants. She also loved to run and play sports, which was most unusual for a vixen in those parts. She was also very strong physically and mentally. She had endured her father's gruesome drowning, after all.
"Hmm. Tacker? You can come in now," the princess called. Tacker almost immediately opened the door and walked in.
"Yes, your highness?" The dog fox asked, his white tunic fluttering from the wind of the open window as he walked.
"Don't call me that," the princess said, turning around to face the servant, "Do I look nice?"
"Of course."
"Well, you're supposed to say that. But really, what do you see when you look at me in this dress?" The princess tugged at the green silks. The dress was of those old fashioned ones, the ones that were bigger and heavier.
"Well, truthfully."
"Go on, Tacker. I command you to speak your mind."
"You look beautiful. If I wouldn't be hanged if I tried to marry you, I would," Tacker smiled. He was thirty, but the normal age for males to marry in their planet was around forty. The princess hated that. What she really didn't want was some old hack proposing to her. She much preferred someone who was younger and someone who cared for her, like Tacker.
"Why can't you be like this all the time?" The princess asked, grinning widely. She bent over and planted a kiss on Tacker's furry cheek. He blushed furiously.
"Your mother would kill me."
"Hmm, point taken," the princess chuckled as Tacker escorted her out the door and down the marble staircase.
**
"This is a wonderful evening," the Queen said.
"Isn't it always?" The princess grinned as she helped her self to a plateful of tuna. Tacker, behind her, licked his lips. The princess saw him, "Here, take this." She shoved a large plate of it into Tacker's arms without anyone seeing.
"If I didn't have my head hanging on the line for saying this, I would tell you that I loved you," Tacker whispered in her ear before he ran off to his quarters to enjoy his meal instead of the potatoes that he usually gets. The princess smiled.
The table was heavy oak, and foxes were sitting around it, eating from different platters, each talking loudly about gossip or the latest joke from the court jester. Everyone was in a good mood.
The princess, the Queen, and the Prime Minister all sat in velvety, golden framed chairs. Guards stood behind them, each with swords or spears ready at hand. It was quite useless, but tonight, it wouldn't be. That's because just at the moment that the Queen was about to address the government officials about her new policy on taxes, a rouge fox crashed into the hall, with a knife on Tacker's throat.
"Drop your weapons," he shouted, but the guards didn't. They pressed forward, weapons raised. The intruder nicked Tacker's neck and he gurgled unhappily.
"Stop!" The princess shouted to the guards. They complied. She then turned to the attacker, "Who are you and what do you want?"
"I was supposed to be the Prime Minister, but that fool beat me to it! Do you know how much I sacrificed? I starved myself just for the education on government!" He ranted.
"The people vote. We have nothing to do with who becomes who. Now, let him go."
"No! I will have my vengeance first!" The attacker suddenly flung the knife at the Prime Minister. Maybe Tacker's sudden movement of kicking him in the shins distracted him, or maybe he just had bad aim, but the knife missed the Prime Minister totally. Instead, it cut a very shallow cut on the princess's cheek and the knife itself got lodged in the Queen's chest, right in her heart. The Queen managed to whisper a quick prayer before she died.
The attacker was horrified that he had killed the wrong person and decided to flee. He snapped Tacker's neck with a quick movement, but he didn't get anywhere after that: The guards' swords cut off his head.
"No." The princess whispered softly as she looked at the two dead bodies of the people that she cared most about. Her mother lay dead on the cold marble floor, and her loyal servant, who had just declared his love for her a minute ago, also laid on the stone, his neck and head in an awkward position.
The bodies were quickly taken care of, and the funeral was scheduled for an hour later. But, first, the people must acknowledge their new leader. The princess was made to stand on the balcony, and then the bells ran. People flocked into the castle grounds. A moment later, when the Prime Minister was certain that there was enough people, he bellowed out:
"All hail Queen Krystal, Ruler of Cerinia!"
**
A/N: Okay, if you don't get it, Fox is an engineer instead of a pilot. His mom died before he even looked at her the first time, and now his dad is dead. Peppy is made to take care of him, and the Andross equivalent, Albert, is dead. Krystal, on the other hand, is royalty. She still has a staff, but she isn't a warrior just yet, and she rules a planet that wasn't blown to bits. Tacker, the butler dude, died along with her mother in front of her eyes, and so did her father, although my story doesn't show. What a mouthful! This story shouldn't be more than four or five medium- sized chapters more.
Introduction: I wrote this because if I continued on my other story, then things will get a lot less action-y. Everything is different, well, almost everything. You should figure it out by the end of this chapter. Some of it, anyway. Erm. History changed because some weird dude messed with a time machine. Yeah.
"Fox, how's that new engine coming along?" James asked as he flopped himself down on a bench near where Fox was working.
"Nearly done, dad. There are a few glitches. I think I may need a bigger jet battery." Fox whacked the metal container a few times with a wrench and it started up with a loud whir, "Ah, maybe not." James smiled. He was very proud of his twelve-year-old kit. Even though Fox McCloud didn't act like a kit anymore.
"Slow down, Fox. It really doesn't matter how fast you do it, it-"
"Is if you've finished it at the end. I know, dad."
Fox was always interested in astronomy and engineering, so he spent a lot of his free time making a new telescope or upgrading the design on his father's hover car. James didn't mind having a few cars blown up, just as long Fox was learning something. James, the leader of the StarFox team, wanted Fox on his crew after he was done elementary school. James decided that his old friend, Peppy Hare, could teach Fox the rest of junior high basics.
Fox was a very strong kit for his age. Born the only kit of Vixy Renard, who died when she was giving birth, and James McCloud, Fox proved very strong minded even though of early kithood nightmares. One of them including his best friend's, Bill Grey, death just last year because of a freak train accident. Besides Bill, Fox didn't have many friends.
James was sent on a mission by General Pepper of the Cornerian Defense Army to check out strange activity from a planet named Venom. Frankly, Albert Hemstrum, an evil fox scientist gone mad, wants war. James personally didn't like Fox on the mission, but the stubborn kit refused to be left behind and sneaked on board using one of James' old suitcases.
"We might need that someday, Fox," James pointed at an old screwdriver that Fox was aiming to throw into the garbage can. Fox nodded and set it down.
The Great Fox was pretty large, with three bedrooms, one for each Peppy, James, and Fox, a kitchen, a den, a cockpit, the engine room, and the vehicle bay. The last two took up the biggest spaces. It was painted either white or stuck on metallic for the most part of the walls. Everything else, except the clothes, was white, too. A lift was on Fox's right, and the vehicle bay door to the outside was closed shut on the other side. The halls were large as well, with florescent bulbs around the edges of the floor.
Suddenly, the lift dinged and Peppy came out of the elevator. Being a young rabbit in his early twenties, Peppy was energetic and excited most of the time. He was a good pilot and a good navigator, and he was really funny, too. Fox really liked him.
"Hey, James. I think we'll be entering Area 6 in a few hours, so ya might wanna get prepared. Just a thought, though."
"Good thinking, old buddy," James said, pulling his battle shades from his pocket and pushing them on, "Lets go. Fox, stay here, and remember to not be hanging around when the doors open."
"Yeah, I know, dad. Don't worry," Fox smiled as James jumped into the cockpit of his Arwing. Pointing at the lift and starting up his liquid hydrogen engine at the same time, James didn't look the least bit worried. Fox mouthed 'I know' to his father and ran to the lift. Just as the door to the elevator closed, Fox heard a whoosh and a hydraulic piston being moved. His father had just went into the depths of space.
Needless to say, Fox was worried about his father. This Albert guy seemed pretty mean, and Fox needed to make sure that his father was all right.
"Hey, Rob," Fox called over his communicator, "How long until my dad reaches Venom?"
"Approximation, two hours."
"Thanks," Fox opened the lift again and walked over to the Arwing that he had just finished building.
**
"Watch it, James!" Peppy yelled as a swarm of fighters zoomed from the large vessels and sped toward the two specks in the sky. James chuckled.
"If that's the best they can do, this'll be a cinch," James waited until they were close enough, then he dropped a Nova Bomb on them. Over sixty of them blew up right away and another forty swerved away and crashed into each other.
"I don't know. I think this is just a plan for us to let our guard down," Peppy said softly as he fired wildly with lasers.
"Isn't it always?" James smiled.
"I think it is," Peppy grinned back.
Two blue and white jets screaming across the skies suddenly punctured Venom's green atmosphere. Venom itself was a desert wasteland of death. If you used a shovel and dug a bit on the ground, you would find bones of the dead in less than a minute. The air was polluted with carbon molecules. It would be very hard to breathe, but it was possible.
"There's a landing sight there," James pointed. Peppy banked along with him and they both settled down a mile from a large base. Peppy and James both put on gas masks and jumped out, blasters ready at paw.
"Something's wrong," Peppy whispered over the com-link as they both trudged through the desert.
"Yeah. I'm cold."
"No, really, Jimmy. Why haven't they attacked us yet?" Peppy raised his gun in alarm as a clang sounded, "What was that?"
"Relax, Pep. That's just the door opening for us," James said with irony as he pointed at the base. The whole thing was metal. It looked all solid until a small door opened right in front of them, a few yards away.
"Uh, you go in first," Peppy stuttered.
"Tsk, ya should've been named Pampered Chicken."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"Did you ever really do that flight test back at the academy?" James asked as he walked right into the base, apparently unconcerned. The hall was rather wide, with no doors on either side, just halls branching off in different directions.
"No."
"Did you pass the test on ground combat?"
"Yeah, I think so."
"Then shoot," James said as ten Venomian soldiers popped out of the corner of the metal hallway. Peppy panicked as they started shooting madly. James shot back immediately, taking down four of them. Peppy followed suit, maiming down the rest of the roost.
"Wow. Good aim for a pilot," Peppy heaved out a sigh.
"Shut it, wise guy," James smiled as he threw off his gas mask, "This thing is really uncomfortable."
"Yeah," Peppy grunted as he pulled his off, too, and threw it to the ground next to him, "If I get another surprise like that, I'm g-"
"HI, PEPPY!"
"GAH!" Peppy fell over in shock. James just turned his head and scowled.
"I thought I told you to stay put," he frowned. Fox smiled and ripped off his gas mask.
"Yeah, but do I ever follow instructions?"
"You. Little punk." Peppy gasped between breaths. Fox's smile grew bigger, and Peppy couldn't help but smirk, too.
"Are you mad, dad?" Fox asked, turning to James.
"Oh, I'm fuming, but as long as you have a gun, come on," James pulled his two crewmen along as Fox fiddled with his rifle; the biggest one he could find in the engine room. The engine room also doubled as a weapons cache.
"A G-563, Katina design with some Cornerian upgrades. It has extremely heavy fire; one impact laser is enough to melt six inches of steel. Is that good enough?" Fox waved it around with one arm. The rifle had a clip the size of one of Peppy's ears, and the rifle itself was heavy titanium, half the height of James. Peppy stared.
"Wow, I can't even lift that thing!" Peppy shook his head is disbelief, his gray ears flopping side to side.
**
"Duck, Fox!" James shoved his son out of the way as a volley of lasers punched holes in the wall behind him. The metal melted and soon, the whole right-paw wall was deformed.
"Oh, crap. Is that Albert?" Peppy asked as he ran across the room, occasionally shooting blind lasers at the guys who were pouring in from the elevators. Among them, a black robed, gray fox was shouting commands.
"Yeah," James shot again. One of his shots hit a guard's head, spilling blood and brain fluid. Fox nearly threw up.
"Ugh! I'm hit!" Peppy fell down just as he reached the table that they were hiding behind. His left arm was bleeding furiously, spilling blood all over the metal floor. Fox tried to ignore Peppy's gasps as he aimed the rifle at anyone who came close to them.
"Wait for it," James said to Fox as he shot the guards. They started to back off. Fox let out a sigh of relief, but that was before he saw the grenade.
"Oh, crap," Peppy whispered as they ran out from the table. Peppy, being a fast runner, reached the hall first, ushering Fox and James on. Then the terrible happened: A stray laser shot James from the guards. Falling with a thud on the ground, James gave a hard look at Fox as he tried to help.
"Get lost, dog!" James then brought out his gun and shot a few warning shots at Fox's feet and that sent him fleeing. A moment after Fox ducked into the hall, a deafening explosion was heard, and the flash blinded Fox for a moment. James was caught right in the blast.
"No! JAMES!" Peppy brought his own grenade from one of his pocket and pulled the pin, "You'll pay, Albert!" Peppy then flung the projectile with his good arm and watched in victory as Albert the mad scientist was blown to bits from the explosive.
"Come on!" Fox pulled on Peppy's coat as more guards came out of the vents and shafts of the elevator. Fox's father was dead. Now, Fox had no more living family, except for Peppy Hare, his godfather.
***
"Princess? Dinner is served," Tacker, the royal servant fox, peeked into the young vixen's bedroom.
"Yes, just a minute. Are you.? Hey! Close that door!" The young princess turned her head at the butler and gave him a cold stare, quickly covering her naked body with a thin cloth, but with her buttocks exposed. Tacker immediately closed the wooden door. The hinges squeaked noisily as they allowed the door to swing closed.
The princess was a fair young maid, with short, shiny locks of hair and sleek fur. She was only twelve, but she was expected to do so much. She was to rule the entire planet when her mother, Queen Rainer, died. By her current condition, that was going to be a long time. The Queen liked to spend her spare time roaming around the forests and the mountains, using her bow and arrows to hunt down those walking mushrooms that she like so much. The Queen looked a lot like the young princess, only with longer strands of hair.
The princess was very stubborn for a member of royalty. She wanted to learn to use magic like a sorceress and use the magic staff of the Wizard of Ages. She was coming well in her lessons, but she still was too young to use it outside of palace grounds.
Speaking of the palace, it was a magnificent structure. Fancy stone walls on top of a large hill surrounded it over looking the village on one side and the ocean on the other. Towers and currents were built, but just for aesthetics: the kingdom was never really attacked by invaders. The palace, castle, more like, was built of colorful marble with glass windows and long corridors. The royalty, along with the Prime Minister and the people's representatives, dined in the main hall. The main hall was long and wide, big enough for at least twenty of a villager's house inside.
Gardens were outside, with ponds and two orchards. The sweet smell of flowers in the spring lured the princess to wander around outdoors often times. The princess loved the outdoors. She loved to keep the window open in her royal suite, which was very big and had many things inside, like chairs, desks, drawers, and a fancy bed with those silk overhangs. The princess liked her marble walls pale green, instead of her mother's bright blue. Her eyes were also a bright green, for that matter.
The princess was, in fact, not like other princesses at all. She was curious, for one, and she loved to talk with the peasants. She also loved to run and play sports, which was most unusual for a vixen in those parts. She was also very strong physically and mentally. She had endured her father's gruesome drowning, after all.
"Hmm. Tacker? You can come in now," the princess called. Tacker almost immediately opened the door and walked in.
"Yes, your highness?" The dog fox asked, his white tunic fluttering from the wind of the open window as he walked.
"Don't call me that," the princess said, turning around to face the servant, "Do I look nice?"
"Of course."
"Well, you're supposed to say that. But really, what do you see when you look at me in this dress?" The princess tugged at the green silks. The dress was of those old fashioned ones, the ones that were bigger and heavier.
"Well, truthfully."
"Go on, Tacker. I command you to speak your mind."
"You look beautiful. If I wouldn't be hanged if I tried to marry you, I would," Tacker smiled. He was thirty, but the normal age for males to marry in their planet was around forty. The princess hated that. What she really didn't want was some old hack proposing to her. She much preferred someone who was younger and someone who cared for her, like Tacker.
"Why can't you be like this all the time?" The princess asked, grinning widely. She bent over and planted a kiss on Tacker's furry cheek. He blushed furiously.
"Your mother would kill me."
"Hmm, point taken," the princess chuckled as Tacker escorted her out the door and down the marble staircase.
**
"This is a wonderful evening," the Queen said.
"Isn't it always?" The princess grinned as she helped her self to a plateful of tuna. Tacker, behind her, licked his lips. The princess saw him, "Here, take this." She shoved a large plate of it into Tacker's arms without anyone seeing.
"If I didn't have my head hanging on the line for saying this, I would tell you that I loved you," Tacker whispered in her ear before he ran off to his quarters to enjoy his meal instead of the potatoes that he usually gets. The princess smiled.
The table was heavy oak, and foxes were sitting around it, eating from different platters, each talking loudly about gossip or the latest joke from the court jester. Everyone was in a good mood.
The princess, the Queen, and the Prime Minister all sat in velvety, golden framed chairs. Guards stood behind them, each with swords or spears ready at hand. It was quite useless, but tonight, it wouldn't be. That's because just at the moment that the Queen was about to address the government officials about her new policy on taxes, a rouge fox crashed into the hall, with a knife on Tacker's throat.
"Drop your weapons," he shouted, but the guards didn't. They pressed forward, weapons raised. The intruder nicked Tacker's neck and he gurgled unhappily.
"Stop!" The princess shouted to the guards. They complied. She then turned to the attacker, "Who are you and what do you want?"
"I was supposed to be the Prime Minister, but that fool beat me to it! Do you know how much I sacrificed? I starved myself just for the education on government!" He ranted.
"The people vote. We have nothing to do with who becomes who. Now, let him go."
"No! I will have my vengeance first!" The attacker suddenly flung the knife at the Prime Minister. Maybe Tacker's sudden movement of kicking him in the shins distracted him, or maybe he just had bad aim, but the knife missed the Prime Minister totally. Instead, it cut a very shallow cut on the princess's cheek and the knife itself got lodged in the Queen's chest, right in her heart. The Queen managed to whisper a quick prayer before she died.
The attacker was horrified that he had killed the wrong person and decided to flee. He snapped Tacker's neck with a quick movement, but he didn't get anywhere after that: The guards' swords cut off his head.
"No." The princess whispered softly as she looked at the two dead bodies of the people that she cared most about. Her mother lay dead on the cold marble floor, and her loyal servant, who had just declared his love for her a minute ago, also laid on the stone, his neck and head in an awkward position.
The bodies were quickly taken care of, and the funeral was scheduled for an hour later. But, first, the people must acknowledge their new leader. The princess was made to stand on the balcony, and then the bells ran. People flocked into the castle grounds. A moment later, when the Prime Minister was certain that there was enough people, he bellowed out:
"All hail Queen Krystal, Ruler of Cerinia!"
**
A/N: Okay, if you don't get it, Fox is an engineer instead of a pilot. His mom died before he even looked at her the first time, and now his dad is dead. Peppy is made to take care of him, and the Andross equivalent, Albert, is dead. Krystal, on the other hand, is royalty. She still has a staff, but she isn't a warrior just yet, and she rules a planet that wasn't blown to bits. Tacker, the butler dude, died along with her mother in front of her eyes, and so did her father, although my story doesn't show. What a mouthful! This story shouldn't be more than four or five medium- sized chapters more.