AN- Hello! I only own Lucius in here. Now, onto the story!

Chapter 3: The First Battle

In the sickbay of the Great Fox, Peppy was studying the ooze with interest. He had performed several chemical tests on it, trying to determine what it was exactly. He had found that it was alive, but scientifically it couldn't be alive…

"Hey Slippy!" Peppy called. "Come over here! I have something to show you!"

"Hold on, Peppy!" He yelled. "I'll be there in a second! I'm just working on some modifications to the Great Fox!"

"But this is important, Slip!" Peppy replied. "This is about the ooze we found!"

Grumbling, Slippy walked into the room. "Alright, Peppy, what was so important that it couldn't wait?" He asked, clearly agitated.

"It's the ooze, Slip!" Peppy told him. "Did you know that this stuff has its own DNA, but it doesn't have any vital organs, like a heart, lungs, a brain, or anything else?" Slippy stared at him blankly. "It's alive, but it shouldn't be."

Slippy shuddered for some reason. "That's kind of creepy. Is there anything else?"

"Yes. Remember how the ooze on your Arwing was only a small glob?" Slippy nodded. "Take a look at this!"

Slippy gasped as Peppy showed him the ooze. What used to be a small glob of ooze had grown to fill up the container Peppy had kept it in.

"This is strange." Slippy muttered. "What is this stuff?"

"I don't know, exactly." Peppy told his friend. "I do know that it doesn't like heat very much. And I also know that this stuff is corrosive. I'm going to put it in a bigger container." As Peppy went to put the ooze in a new container, he thought he heard a soft chuckle.

"What's so funny, Slip?" He asked his friend.

"What do you mean?" Slippy asked quizzically. "I wasn't laughing."

Although Peppy went back to work, he heard the sound again after he put the ooze up, only it had become mocking laughter. "Alright, Slip, what's so funny?

"Nothing!" Slippy said defensively. "Look, lets go. This room is creeping me out."

Peppy nodded in agreement. They left the room to escape the laughter of the Dark Matter.

*******

Fox looked sadly at the planet of Fortunata. What had once been a beautiful, snowy planet had become a wasteland with the ooze flowing all over the landscape.

"Alright, guys. I'm going to take the Landmaster and go into the core to see what's the matter. I'm pretty sure that stuff has done something to the core of the planet. Falco, you go to the planet with me in the other Landmaster. Lucius, I need you to provide air cover. Rob, blast a hole in the ooze for us!"

"Affirmative!" Rob said. At that, the robot fired the Great Fox's lasers at a pile of ooze nearby. It flew into the air, propelled by the force of the laser. As Fox and his friends were about to leave, Peppy and Slippy ran into the room.

"Fox!" Peppy yelled. "Fox, I have something to tell you! That ooze, it's not very fond of heat!"

"Heat?" Fox said, getting into his Landmaster tank. "Alright, I'll remember that! See you guys later!" At that, Fox drove out of the Great Fox in his Landmaster, leaving Peppy to wonder if his leader heard what he said.

"Just like his father…" Peppy muttered.

*******

The trip into the planet's core took a long time because of the thick ooze. It took a while to blast a path through it, and the little of it that Fox couldn't blast away stuck to his tires.

"How much longer, Fox?" Falco asked. "I don't want to be driving through here all day!"

"The crater's right over there, Falco." Fox told his friend. The crater led straight to the bottom of the planet, to a place few people would ever see; the planet's core. The crater was covered with the black ooze, and no light emerged from it. A strange humming noise could be heard throughout the crater that they went through. When Fox was beginning to think that the crater would never end, he finally saw the core.

Welcome to your doom, Fox McCloud A voice said, laughing at him. Fox gasped. The core appeared to be a sphere of the black ooze. The humming increased as the core began to retract and dim.

"That ooze is absorbing the core!" Fox yelled. "We gotta get rid of it!" Saying this, they fired their lasers at the ooze-covered core.

You fools! It laughed as the lasers bounced off of it. I'm too powerful for your pathetic weaponry to harm me! Saying this, globs of the ooze ruptured from the core at Fox and Falco. Although they destroyed some of them, they were still hit by much of the barrage.

"Warning!" A voice from Fox's Landmaster said. "Energy shield damaged!"

"Wait!" Fox yelled. "What did Peppy say?"

"He said that stuff didn't like… Heat!" Falco yelled. "That's it, Fox!"

"Alright," Fox yelled, "charge up your plasma cannons!" At that, they began to charge a burst of plasma from their cannons. The emission of the Plasma caused some of the ooze to crawl away.

You… You can't win! The ooze yelled, shooting more spheres of ooze at them. Their plasma cannons destroyed all of the projectiles as well as clearing more of the stuff from the core. Finally, the ooze had all vanished.

Nooooo…The ooze moaned. How did you…

Suddenly, a tremor ripped through the planet. "We have to get out of here, Falco!" Fox yelled. As the tremors continued, Fox and Falco boosted out of the crater as fast as their Landmasters could carry them. As they finally exited the core, an explosion rocked the planet, incinerating all of the ooze in its path. Fox watched as the ooze disappeared before his very eyes.
"Let's go back to the Great Fox, Falco." Fox told his friend. "I think we need to talk to the General."
*******
"Good job, Fox!" Pepper told him from a hologram. "You've saved the planet from total destruction. Even though the ooze has stripped Fortunata of life, it will heal itself in time."
"General," Fox asked Pepper, "what is that stuff?"
"I don't know, Fox." Pepper said stroking his chin. "If I understand this right, I think that ooze is a danger to the entire galaxy. You have a new order, Fox. You must destroy that ooze wherever it is found! You must save the galaxy! Pepper out."
After Pepper had disappeared, a voice emerged. "The General is right. It is a danger to everything. I would know."

Fox turned towards Lucius. "Lucius, I think you know something about this ooze. Tell me what you know about it."

"Alright, Fox." Lucius sighed. "I'll tell you."