Chapter VIII

Falco immediately sprung up, Sarah gave an exasperated look and exchanged nervous glances with Katt, Bill looked worried, Fox and Eclipse seemed ready and Krystal was tending the out-cold Eric. Fox began giving orders. "Falco, Eclipse, get in your ships, Krystal doesn't have one suitable for battle so she's staying behind, Bill, get your Defender IV, Katt, get the Katt's Paw, and Sarah, you don't know how to fly, correct?"

"Nope." Sarah seemed exasperated. Eric probably did, he had WAY too much free time on his hands (he played SF64 on cockpit mode just to see the buttons and guess what they did, for crying out loud) but Sarah didn't. Fox and the rest dashed to get their ships while Krystal and Sarah just sat behind to tend the people in the medical ward, which was basically only Eric and another fox that either had a hood over his face or had his muzzle buried into his pillow, among few others. How he took breath was anyone's guess but he somehow managed. However, he seemed to be sleeping while Eric just sort of lay there in a coma.

Dashing out of the hospital ward, roughly thirty seconds later the sound of ships could be heard through the walls. Sarah was silently mumbling under her breath, hoping that nothing serious would happen while Krystal could be heard cursing about being dead weight.

Unfortunately for them, MacBeth was already prepared…

(Fox and Co.)

"Come on, let's move it." Fox ordered while Falco and him got suited up in ArWings. Slippy and Peppy manned the Great Fox's weapon systems and when they hit space, Fox and Falco flew out into space.

Through the inky blackness of stars, Bill and roughly two dozen Husky squadron members were flying from Katina, along with Eclipse piloting the Silver Fox and Katt in the Katt's Paw. Everyone (especially Falco) sat there with their fingers on the triggers, ready to blow any sight of a foe straight to hell.

After about thirty seconds, Bill muttered something about unpunctuality when maybe a five foot wide space craft that looked like a flying saucer literally flew under Katt's ship's nose. An odd sound like a bunch of wind came from behind them as the darkness lit up in several dozen laser shots!

(Eric)

"mm… I'm tired, my back aches, lemmealone…" Eric grumbled into his pillow. Krystal was massaging his back, something Eric took very private pleasure in. Or he would if his sensory organs were working…

"Eric, doze. Rest. Sleep a bit. That was quite a beating you took." Sarah said, trying to get Eric to calm down. It wouldn't be the last major injury in his career, far from it.

"I hope Fox and the others are okay in space…" Krystal said, worried. Both she and Sarah were giving feelings of unrest being unable to help out in the inevitable combat above. Eric was actually trying to do something about it all but was easily forced back into his bed by Krystal. Eric started to stir and tried to get up, only to be forced back into bed by Sarah.

Meanwhile, the hooded fox in one of the other hospital beds seemed to be moving his hand up and crooking his finger, then instantly getting back into bed whenever anyone was looking. He had Eric's attention, as much of it as he could give, anyway. Krystal and Sarah had gone to tend patients in another room and Eric seized the opportunity to investigate. Limping out of his hospital bed, it took every ounce of willpower he had to keep from screaming. He actually slumped to the floor in pain and fought (with the help of Krystal's enchanted bandages) to his feet and limped over to the bed of the hooded canine.

"Eric…" It was the fox from his dream! Before Eric could open his mouth the being spoke. He spoke with such tenacity that Eric felt an almost involuntary will to obey. "You are needed, Shroud. The hanger…" And with that he handed him a map.

Nodding agreement and with such disappointment that he would not figure out the identity of this enigma yet, he slumped his newfound vest over (Peppy let him keep it and Sarah had patched the holes) his back and hid the submachine gun holsters and Murasma's scabbard within the back. Eric noted with some dismay that Murasma's blade was glowing red again; he felt that was a warning sign about his physical condition, even if he felt otherwise. Taking a look at the map, it showed the entire floor of the Husky HQ. Limping through the corridors, he saw an elevator off of the next T section to the right.

Every step brought agony, but Eric had to go on. Danger lurked somewhere, and either Eric was a moth to the flames or he felt a sense of duty to his newfound friends. Hell, he had none before who would do something for him, and after Krystal patching him up he felt obligated to her husband. Something like that, Eric thought.

Footsteps! Breaking into as fast as he could possibly go with his back protesting everything and dove into the elevator. Checking all of the buttons… "F1, F2, F3, B1, B2, B3… Ahah! Here it is! Hangar." Mashing the button, the door closed and Eric got a view of Sarah with some medical supplies walking just as the door closed. Just as it closed, he saw a, "What the…?" look on her face but she walked it off.

All he could do know was wait for the moment when the doors would open. He'd be expecting several dozen guards who would force him back to the hospital bed (or worse, Krystal and Sarah who would chew him out) but he had no choice.

The elevator was open, Eric ready to sneak out quietly, but his hastily-laid out plan went out like a mild firecracker when the entire hangar was practically empty. Almost all of the Huskies were out in battle! If they failed… it would not be pretty.

Ducking around some of the Defender III ships in the hangar to hide from the few guards set to defend the planet rather than go out to meet the rebels and found two ships that seemed to be set aside. One said "Silent Arrow," the other said "Thunder Hammer."

"Hmm, now that's what I'm talking about." Eric said, getting up silently to the Thunder Hammer and quickly finding the ignition key was lacking. "D'oh!" Eric muttered by way of habit. Trying to climb into the Silent Arrow proved as fruitless, Eric was going to have to improvise. He noted some of the design notches; the engine of the Silent Arrow seemed to be much closer to the cockpit than that of the (huge, bulky) Thunder Hammer. Quietly opening the hood, he peered inside to see if he could find any way of improvising the engine running for either ship…

(Fox and Co.)

The fight was not going very well. MacBeth (somehow) had a cloaking ship, rendering the naked eye null. Radar could have picked them up but most power was aimed at the weapons and shields, not enough was dedicated to radar. Several huskies either had found their doom at the cold vacuum of space, several others were able to back off before an untimely demise. In addition, Bill had already had to back off while Eclipse, Fox and Katt were already feeling rather battered. The Great Fox helped, but it wasn't nearly enough to stem the tide. Didn't help that the rebels looked nearly identical to the Huskies…

Some radio clips could be heard through the com-link system. One of which was very welcome and the sound of Corneria sending some backup for the group, but many others could be heard, like Venom battle cries and aircraft reports. Then one came that puzzled the living hell out of Fox, the only one good enough in the air to be able to think about something different than flying at the same time…

"Embrace The End."

Something about how The and End were capitalized on the textual aid seemed unnatural… and the ship it came from was definitely high quality and was piloted like a master. There was no way that was a mere lion piloting that ship…

(Eric)

Now or never. Bite the bullet. Something or other. He had found what seemed like an outlet in the engine through a part in the hull which had absolutely nothing through it. There was even a little opening in the hull that was sealed perfectly in the size of…

"Murasma." Eric pulled out the blade and made a few quick measurements about the small hole the size of Murasma's point. After bracing himself, he muttered, "In the name of science." And plunged the sword into the hole. From behind, which was quickly proven to be a rather stupid idea.

The engines immediately erupted, now that a power source was available. Emitting an involuntary scream in surprise as the rumble tossed him to the ground, he unwittingly gained the attention of the Huskies on ground guard! Amidst the calls of "What the…?!" Eric dashed around the red flame spewing from the engine, jumped onto the foot lift and rolled into the cockpit. Looking around for the takeoff button, he found it in a blue button with big bold letters. Crunching the "TAKEOFF" button, the shockwaves emanating from the ship caused the huskies to back off. Right around now Sarah and Krystal marched in to check the distress calls, and more than one look of desperation crossed Krystal's and Sarah's faces. Great, I'm going to be facing a chewing when I get back here… Eric thought. The VTOL function of the jet was kicking in marvelously, and Eric flew out of the open hangar doors, heading for space. Kicking on the radar, he booted up shields and lasers. Weapons: 50%. Shields: 25%, 15% on radar and the remaining ten percent go to… hmm… miscellaneous… could come in handy.

(Fox and Co.)

The remains of the huskies, Eclipse and Katt had their hands full dealing with the MacBeth rebels, Fox and Falco went to engage the new ship.

It wasn't easy. The creatures ship could turn on a dime, so much it seemed like it floated rather than truly flew. It even sent a Husky crashing to Katina in a single blow!

Flying through the inky blackness with lasers flying all around, the new ship was ripping through the battlefield like it owned the concept of violence. Letting loose a bomb, it scattered Fox and Falco and began to take pot shots at Falco's rear.

"I can't shake him!" Falco shouted desperately. Pulling a U-turn, Fox tried to get on the lion's tail. Hamming the trigger of the joystick as fast as it would possibly fire and got in a few hits. The first few spattered off of the shields like rain off a window pane, but some got through as the lion broke off of the attack, leaving Falco's now completely battered ArWing in relative safety. Moving more power from radar and other things besides the lasers and bombs to shields, Falco pressed the attack as Fox let off a Nova Bomb.

The lion's ship took it without missing a beat, although it looked like the shields were lowered quite a bit. The hull, however, lost none of its integrity. U-turning back, it proceeded to press the attack!

Making a pass, Falco let off a volley of lasers as the lion barrel-rolled, deflecting them at random angles. One of which caught a rebel, piercing a hole through its center. It took a hit from Fox that it didn't reflect in time, but it seemed that energy particles in the fabric of space itself started collecting around its center… Fox's danger alarm in his head went off. "MOVE!" Falco had barely enough time to barrel-roll out of the way before an incredibly concentrated laser of rainbow appearance cut through space like a hot knife through butter. It literally incinerated one of the rebels and took off one of the Katt's Paw's wings! The rest of the group nearly had the rebels under wraps, but this lion in this unbelievable ship was taking all of their skill just to maintain! Nearly hopeless! The ship barrel-rolled to the right turning almost 100 degrees to confront Fox face to face. It seemed to be regaining strengths from the incredibly-strong laser and was coming around for another pass at Fox. Fox couldn't miss this chance to get rid of this guy. Letting off another bomb, it sped towards the lion… impact in three… two… Falco was lining up behind ready to give the ship a killer laser enema…

"No!" The lion had pulled out of the way at the last possible second, leaving Falco to swallow the bomb! The shields down, the hull would be crushed, Falco would die. Time slowed to a crawl as Falco was trying to fly out of the way and the ArWing crumpled. Falco would be screaming at the shattered windshield as the pressure gauge dropped like a stone.

"Not this day, Falco." A voice said, seemingly out of nowhere. Strange energy beams were connecting Falco to seemingly thin air as the pressure gauge slowly crawled back up to 100%.

"What the…!" Falco cried out as the other end of the strange white beams washed over the background of Katina and had a slight water-ripple effect to it. Before their eyes, the ripple turned into the Silent Arrow out of thin air!

The other ends of the grappling beams latched from Eric's ship to Katt's, which was already headed for Katina to patch up the wing. "Take Falco back, that ship is nearly dead." Eric commanded. Katt didn't really have an objection, as Falco's life hung and she was backing off anyway. Most of the rebels and all of the Huskies had either backed off or been killed (most of the Huskies had survived and vice versa) All that really remained a threat to each other was Fox, Eric and the mysterious, god-like in power lion.

"Be drained of life!" A hoarse-sounding voice came from the comlink of the lion. It was charging up the hyper-laser again! Fox was out of bombs and the ones on board the Silent Arrow sucked hell. This complicated things…

Charging up a laser, Fox locked onto the new ship. Eric did the same and almost over-steered; the Silent Arrow was THAT maneuverable. The lion locked on to Eric and started pounding Eric's shields a new one (which wasn't exactly that hard) as Eric tried every trick in the book to shake him. He almost had the laser up to finish the job! Fox, without another second to lose, fired at the back of the ship. The powered-up homing blast was aimed directly at the shields, which subsequently powered down. Eric was nearly turned around and had the Silent Arrow's puny lasers aimed at the lion too, as it flew away at surprising speed as it escaped into hyperspace.

"We'll meet again!" Was called as the lion escaped into space.

"Yeah!" Fox called. Space was desolate, save for Fox and Eric, the rebels had given up. The Huskies trekked back to Katina while Eric was telling Fox he'd back him up.

"You go first. You're ship is banged up, mine's in relatively perfect health."

"But you were taking some heavy hits there…" Fox pointed out.

"Uh… no I wasn't." Eric said, hastily assigning more power to the coolant system.

"OK. Try not to get killed patrolling out here while I limp this thing back." The Great Fox was already headed back for Katina, and it hadn't gotten on a bead on the lion throughout the entire fight so mainly helped subdue the rebels.

Eric was watching Fox's ArWing fly into the Great Fox, almost lazily, slipping back into the cockpit and yanking out one if the Smarties candies he kept as a secret stash when maybe four lasers flew over his head!

"What the…?!?" Out of the corner of the rear-view mirror, another ship, Eric couldn't tell if it was some new Wolfen model or a Defender III, was shooting lasers at him!

Spinning around to deflect them, Eric tried to get a better view at the pilot. Demanding into the microphone for the comlink, Eric yelled, "Identify yourself!" To no avail. The aim of the other being sucked hell and probably couldn't hit the broadside of a barn, but the fact that Eric was spinning around probably didn't hurt.

"Who are you and what the hell do you think you're doing?!" Eric demanded through, when he saw it.

Through the other windshield, a terrifying image like Fox on cocaine stared back malevolently through the dark, tinted glass.