Chapter Twelve: "9,000 Degrees--and Rising"
Far from sleeping soundly a third of the galaxy away, Captain Anilora was awoken by an unnatural chill circulating in his room at the Cornerian Army base. The evening had been warm for that time of year and he had dismissively left the window open, but two in the morning had come and the curtains were fluttering eerily in a strangely cold breeze. Taking a moment to let his eyes adjust to the twilight, Anilora rose and padded softly to the gaping window, making to close it but instead resting his forehead against the sill and finding some measure of solace in the semi-frigid bite across his bare upper body. \
Lylat had remained menacingly quiet since the destruction of the sub-aquatic bio-weapon four days ago; far from comforting anyone the increasing silence only irked everyone's nerves. What worried the Katinan captain most about the entire out-of-place scenario, though, was Bill. Anilora had left his companion in command of those forces still occupying their posts on Katina, but the assassin had, for whatever reason, not been seen at the base since the Aquas mission and was not responding to G-Diffuser transmissions. Pepper assured both Anilora and Celestra that Bill was on a mission of his own at the moment, but the entire story sounded wrong to the ever-calculating captain. No, something had undoubtedly happened to Bill, Anilora convinced himself, and Reivin Frost was likely the perpetrator.
Shivering with cold now, Anilora shut and latched the window, after which he returned to his warm bedsheets and drifted feverishly back to sleep.
Less than an hour later he found himself sitting bolt-upright again, one pillow a clammy bundle on the floor, the other wrung feverishly in his sleep. With a start the Katinan realized that his window was open again, the curtains dancing ominously with the intruding breeze.
As quietly as his bedsheets would allow Anilora rose from his bed and stared curiously out the window. There was nothing truly remarkable from what he could see; the single enormous beech tree that normally shaded his room on the more unpleasantly warm days was swishing its branches against the wall and window panes, and the starlight continued its faint, incessant twinkle. Conincidentally or not he could hear no aircraft motors in the sky, unusual since the army base was normally overrun by all sorts of intergalactic ships. Cautiously Anilora took a few steps toward the window, inwardly trying to convince himself that he hadn't shut it properly, or that the latch was faulty, but his pounding heart betrayed him and he paused yet again, curtains just rustling at his ankles.
"You're twenty-three years old, for heaven's sake," Anilora exhaled in exasperation, shaking his head with a bemused chuckle. "Pull yourself together--it's just a window." With that he strode to the open window, grasping both sides to close it again.
"Good evening," a smooth voice hissed, and before he could cry out Anilora had been tackled to the carpet by Leon Powalski, whose charcoal eyes were glittering with malice.
Anilora was quite surprised at Leon's sheer strength, but he was a captain and had seen his share of hand-to-hand combat during his ascent to said position. With a deft turn of one wrist he had freed his right hand and hooked the chameleon around the neck, flinging him precariously off-balance and shoving him back. Leon recovered quickly and punched Anilora across the jaw; Anilora spat out a mouthful of blood, snapped his head up, and plowed into Leon's nose, wincing when he heard the bridge snap. Leon cursed and curled his fingers around the captain's neck with a growl, and Anilora flailed his arms helplessly, beating at Leon's shoulders in a futile attempt to free himself.
His fingertips brushed a hard porcelain surface; Anilora's eyes widened when his hands grasped his bedside lamp and he smashed the thing down upon his assailant's head. Leon toppled backward, stars swimming in front of his eyes, and Anilora flung his pillow off his bed, leveling a small laser barrel at the mercenary's forehead.
With a menacing cackle, Leon summoned his camoflauge abilities, perfectly mimicking the hue of the tan carpet in the moonlight.
Knowing that he would be fighting blind if he continued this battle, Anilora turned and bolted out the door, sprinting down the hallway and firing randomly over his shoulder in a desperate hope to keep the chameleon at bay. Leon, mere feet behind the captain, brought forth a small dagger and slit the back of Anilora's shoulder so precisely that the primary muscle severed painlessly. At first Anilora didn't realize he had been attacked, but when he lifted his arm to fire again the entire limb refused to respond and he collapsed to the ground in agony.
Far from giving in, though, Anilora took the weapon in his other hand and held the trigger down, firing with abandon and filling the entire hall with white laser energy. One bolt struck Leon in the ankle and he skidded to his knees; another just grazed the side of his face and he reflexively clapped a hand over the wound. Catching the wary captain would be far too dangerous now, he realized, for many of the rooms lining the hallway had light streaming from beneath their doorframes and Anilora was calling for aid.
'No matter,' Leon thought to himself. 'All in good time.' With that, the ever-crafty chameleon rose and darted down the hall, limping slightly as he ran.
When Anilora and General Pepper conducted a full search of the army base twenty minutes later, Leon Powalski was already long gone.
~~*~~
Only Celestra appeared fully awake when the five companions and ROB convened in the briefing room at four that morning; Fox and Peppy were very tousle-furred and Falco's feathers seemed to be possessed of their own volition. When the G-Diffuser sceen flickered to life a moment later not only were they looking at General Pepper by at Captain Anilora as well. His violet eyes were wide with strain, fury, and exhaustion as a pair of cyborgs tended to his wounded shoulder, and Celestra's face contorted into an expression caught somewhere between pity and rage.
"Obviously if our information were not important, we would have waited to contact you at a more decent hour--" Pepper tried to explain.
"Get on with it," Celestra snapped, her ever-intense crystalline-blue eyes smouldering as she studied the surgical tape covering the upper-right quarter of Anilora's back.
"Two hours ago, Gilraen was attacked by a member of Star Wolf," Pepper elaborated.
"Which one?" Falco asked sarcastically. "There are four."
"Powalski," Anilora gritted, and Falco ground his beak in frustration. "He snuck in through my bedroom window. It was difficult to tell whether or not I injured him; for the majority of our battle he used camoflauge."
Celestra punched the wall nearest to her with such force that everyone stared. "Of all the spineless, cowardly--"
Anilora held up one hand to silence the assassin; with a profound sigh, she complied. "These tactics of Star Wolf also lead me to believe that Bill's disappearance is far more than suspicious coincidence."
"You sent him after Frost!" Celestra accused Pepper heatedly, rising from her chair so quickly she knocked it over.
"Celestra, please--" Pepper begged.
"You sent my best friend to his worst enemy knowing that Star Wolf would fight fair!"
"--He willingly accepted--"
"You walked him into the hands of Andross's top supporters, and if you think I'm going to sit back and let it happen, you're crazy," Celestra finished icily, eyes narrowed. She turned on her heel and righted her chair, then stopped and swung her knapsack over one shoulder.
"You're walking out on a mission," Pepper warned.
Celestra straightened, set her hands firmly on her hips, and said, "Then don't pay me, General. But I'm going after Bill."
"No you're not," Anilora whispered calmly. "At least, not without me."
The entire room fell very silent, Pepper's eyes simmering with fury, Celestra and Anilora staring at one another quizzically, and the Star Fox team all wearing expressions of disbelief. Anilora tested his arm, wincing a bit but seemingly satisfied as he wrestled into a flight shirt and groped around for the matching vest. Pepper glared at the Katinan captain.
"You can't just walk out on your entire army," he protested.
Anilora shrugged and offered a wan smile. "I'll leave someone trustworthy in charge; the men all respect my judgment and will understand the urgency of my departure."
The Cornerian general turned on the female assassin, who was now smirking confidently. "I've hired you--I refuse to relinquish your uses."
"Then I'll quit," she threatened, and the mercenaries uttered sounds of amazement. "I'll take myself out of the system and you'll never see me again."
"And I'll be right behind you if it comes to that," Anilora assured. Celestra flashed her beautiful smile at him; Falco cast his gaze jealously on the floor.
Pepper sighed and shook his head, avoiding the unyielding glares from undoubtedly his two strongest supporters. Withour their aid his hand in the war would weaken substantially, possibly to the verge of failure, and it was logic that he could not deny. "Go after Bill Grey. I wish you luck."
"Rendezvous in Katina's capital city," Anilora informed his female accomplice. "I can meet you there in a little less than one day."
"I'll be waiting for you," Celestra assured him. He nodded and strode out the door, out of view. The dark-haired assassin made for the exit, but stopped and turned to face the mercenaries. "Fox, I will be back in time for the next mission after this, and I regret very much having to--"
"Get going, Marquette," Fox said, waving a hand dismissively.
With a smile of thanks, Celestra departed for her Arwing.
"On to business," Pepper began again irritably. "As Andross's sub-aquatic bio-weapon has been successfully destroyed in the oceans of Aquas, another weapon of mass destruction has recently been constructed. Until about twenty minutes ago tacticians hadn't the slightest clue of where this new bio-weapon is located, but after several thermal scans we have traced a radical power signature to the core of Solar."
Slippy and Peppy were already bringing up thermal and skematical grids of their newest mission site, but Fox interrupted them by shifting uncomfortably in his chair. "Er, General, you know that Solar is a nebula, don't you?"
"Of course I do, McCloud."
"So you are also aware that we can't possibly fly there, penetrate the core, and destroy a bio-weapon of any kind?" the vulpine pointed out. "The temperature fluctuates radically once you penetrate the heat zone--our Arwings will be incinerated in seconds."
Slippy shook his head and gestured to his thermal readouts. "You're not exactly right there, Fox. Logic would denote that we would just be walking into a frying pan, but technically our Arwings could resist meltdown for a short period of time."
"You do realize you're not being comforting," Falco pointed out, pouring himself a mug of coffee.
"How hot is the general temperature?" Peppy asked.
Slippy studied his readouts. "Approximately nine-thousand degrees," he answered. "Sometimes higher."
"And how long do you figure we can sustain vitals in that inferno?" Fox mused.
"Somewhere between six and seven minutes."
"That's it," Falco began, setting his mug down with a clatter. "We're screwed."
Peppy was studying a revolving skematic that detailed the quickest route into the nebula's core. "We're looking at a two minute journey straight to the core aat the longest," he informed them, pointing to the dotted flight path. "That leaves us with a two or three minute battle."
"No offense, guys, but we'll be hard-pressed to accomplish this without Celestra," Slippy admitted. "We're a formidable enough group, but we'll be noticeably weakened without such a strong pilot."
"Agreed," said Fox, now pacing in front of the G-Diffuser screen as General Pepper watched the scene unfold. "But the four of us have been in tight spots before without Celestra." The vulpine ceased his pacing and glanced at Pepper. "You can go--we'll handle everything from here."
Pepper complied, rolling his eyes irritably.
"How much time do we have until this thing goes on the rampage?" Falco asked, crossing his arms and kicking his boots up on an endtable.
Slippy leaned over to the mainframed, typed in a few commands, and perused the computer screen nearest to him as thousands of numbers spiraled across the screen. "I give it no more than two days; by that time every minor tactician in Lylat will have noticed abnormal activity within the nebula."
~~*~~
It was about one forty-five the following morning when a sleepy-eyed Captain Anilora stumbled into the most prestigious coffee shop in Nexxus, 'Riva's Remedy'. The wind was kicking up violently through the not-so-busy streets already, and in contrast to the day before it was a rather cold morning. Anilora was huddled beneath a dark green traveling cloak as he entered the coffee shop, but the interior was warm and cozy and he had soon thrown back the hood.
Celestra was bent over a mocha cappuccino and what appeared to be a slightly damp bit of paper at a corner table by a window. The only addition she had made to her flight attire was a floor-length black cloak that boasted a Cornerian Flight Academy symbol on the back.
Anilora ordered a regular coffee and seated himself across from her. "Ever you amaze me with your impeccable speed," he began. "How did you get here so quickly?"
She looked up and said, in all seriousness, "I was carried on the wings of desperation." Without further explanation she pushed the paper across the table and into his outstretched hand. The Katinan glanced down and was quite alarmed when he recognized Reivin Frost's handwriting.
My dear Celestra,
I have no doubts that you have by now heard of the regrettably failed assassination attempt against Captain Gilraen Anilora. You may thank our friend Leon for that. As I do not doubt your conniving intelligence, I will assume that you have guessed that Bill's absense is no tragic coincidence.
I must as the least commend you and your crafty friend Falco for escaping me on Fortuna, but even you must have known that this has been but a temporary reprieve. You have my word that Bill is very much alive, but will obviously not remain thus if you do not grant me the opportunity of a rematch.
I trust you will bring Gilraen along at your heels, therefore I have called upon Wolf O'Donnel to keep him company. I also trust you know where to find us, so I will spare both of us precious time in telling you. You have one day--but I have no doubts you will fly faster upon the wings of desperation.
My best to you and your dearly beloved captain.
~Frost
Anilora shoved the letter back across the table in disgust. "He's a sick, twisted man," he remarked coldly.
Celestra's eyes slipped down to the steam wafting from her mug, and suddenly she appeared very tired. Seeing this, the Katinan reached out and tipped her chin up, cupping the side of her fair face in his hand. "Don't you start thinking for a second that the three of us aren't going to make it out of this," he warned gently. "Have you forgotten everything I taught you? People like Reivin have no heart, and without it they will always lose. Hold to your faith, Celestra. We will save Bill."
The assassin thought of Falco then, and with a pang of guilt she brushed Anilora's hand away.
They finished their coffee in an uncomfortable silence, and in half an hour they had exited Katinan atmosphere via Anilora's personal cruiser, Silhouette.
~~*~~
The four mercenaries fell expertly into a 1-3 formation just outside of the Solar nebula heat zone. No one could find any reassuring words to say as they all stared fearfully down into the molten lava that oozed across the entire radical core. Every few seconds the flames would falre up, emitting chunks of rock and flecks of lava, and at times these outbursts were so bright they squinted. Fox, leading his team, rubbed his eyes anxiously and activated his G-Diffuser system.
"Slippy, Peppy, do you have the coordinates?"
"We're directly above the bio-weapon in our current position," Slippy reassured his wing commander.
The map detailing their chosen route materialized onto Fox's screen as Peppy booted it back up. "If we follow this map, it'll be a straight run to the core in a minute and forty seconds, two minutes maximum."
"Assuming nothing goes wrong along the way," Falco pointed out. "So what's the game plan, coach McCloud?"
Eyes still perusing the flight path he had made, the vulpine began slowly, "If we all try to cram ourselves into the core, this whole missions will be nothng short of chaos. Since we're on a strict time schedule--something we're not used to--we won't have the opportunity to make this assault perfectly uniform. We can't fight with our natual style today, so here's the plan--I figure if we get separated, the first one or two to make it to the core should proceed to the bio-weapon. The others--return to our cruiser and keep out of the heat zone. Everyone clear on that?"
"Crystal," Falco responded, booting up his main thrusters. "Let's kick it into high gear, boys."
Without further delay the Star Fox team sped into the heat zone of Solar nebula. The instant they entered the figurative boundary, their shield cried out in unison and the energy slowly began to drop.
"We're gonna have to move!" Slippy called, yelping in surprise when a flaming boulder whizzed within feet to the right of his Arwing. "All thrusters to maximum, Fox--hold nothing back!"
"Slippy's right!" Fox cried, evading another rock and squinting through the blaze. "Everybody break formation! Get to that core!"
Falco dipped low with an unpleasant lurch while his three wingmates shot up high over the next enormous rock; instantly he knew why they had taken the opposite course as him, for the closer he flew to the nebula surface the more rapidly his shield gauge decreased. The warnings screamed throughout his cockpit as he evaded with unbelievable speed, and eventually he had left his comrades far behind him.
"Oh, shut up," Falco hissed at the incessant bleeping, and he flicked off his shield gauge monitor.
"Lombardi, where are you? We've lost visual!"
"I'm turning into Celestra," Falco muttered to himself, and with a sigh and a shake of his head he disabled his G-Diffuser system as well. "Sorry, guys, but I'm goin' for it." Swerving in and out of spurts of magma and airborne boulders, the avian piloted MeteoRiot in far better form than his comrades, not even thinking about his flight path as his hands seemed to be possessed of their own volition. Several hundred yards away he spied the core opening, a dark, cavernous tunnel that led vertically downward. Dodging a final stream of lava, Falco boosted his thrusters in a powerful spurt of speed and disappeared down the chute.
Fox was sending his Arwing through frantic barrel-rolls when Peppy came back over the radio: "Thirty-six seconds have passed, and Falco's already through."
"Damn," Fox gritted admiringly. "One more person through and we'll be in business. Hopefully Falco can cover himself until then."
Slippy, furthest ahead of the remaining three, could just see the core gaping like some hungry mouth of a fire demon. Thrusters already at their maximum, he powered down to his normal boosters and velocitized back to a more manageable speed just in time to avoid a rock that would have maimed his spacecraft. "I don't think I can get through, guys, I'm being blocked!"
Peppy stirred his Arwing into a quick rush of speed and skivved around Slippy and his predicament with a tight turn to the right, but he didn't get much further as a wall of magma exploded upward in front of him. The shield gauge cried out as the cascade erupted, and it was all Peppy could do to come to a complete stop befor he flew into the molten inferno.
Fox was only a few hundred feet behind the hare; in a flash he had killed all of his thrusters, coming to a near halt, then angled up and boosted the engines back to their maximum and running parallel to the magma wall barring Peppy. The ninety-degree angle lasted no more than four seconds, and Fox shot down the core's tunnel, heat increasing as he descended.
"Fall back, Slip!" Peppy cried, and they shot back up toward the outer atmosphere; the hulls began to cool several hundred degrees as their elevation grew, and in a minute they burst out of the heat zone and rejoined Great Fox.
Fox and Falco had less than four minutes remaining.
~~*~~
"Reivin's cruiser is emitting a universal signal," Celestra pointed out as Silhouette penetrated Fortuna's atmosphere. "Ten to one he's trying to lure us to the battleground of his choosing, an unfamiliar terrain that he has most likely eroded to his fighting style by now, no doubt."
Violet eyes scanning the ice-glazed trees for a clearing within which to land, Anilora nodded. "Scanners have picked up Bill's life force within half a mile of the Venomian craft. How near to the site should we land?"
A familiar clacking sound resounded throughout the ship's interior; observant Anilora did not have to turn around to discern its source. Celestra had taken to pacing the control room, mystical boots assaulting the floor in her irritation, and she aimlessly twirled a plasma gun in her right hand. "Bring us down three quarters of a mile from Reivin's ship; chances are they'll be fanned out away from Bill to track our progress." For a few seconds the only noise within the hull was the click-clack of the assassin's combat boots, then she added, "Are his vitals stable?"
The captain frowned, partly out of remorse for Bill but also out of rage for Reivin and Wolf. "Fluctuating between poor and critical. We need to get to him quickly, Celestra, or we may lose him."
Celestra winced at her comrade's cold logic and closed her glacial blue eyes in thought. "A direct, frantic attack is exactly what the pair of them will expect; they'll have already thought through our limited options and assumed that course." She opened her eyes again, a faint touch of worry lining her indifferent facade, and glanced out the nearest window. "If we charge in over-confidently, we're dead; if we tread cautiously, Bill's a goner. I just remembered why I despise emotion."
With a slight shudder the graceful Katinan cruiser touched down just outside of the thickest line of frosted trees. Anilora went to the rear of the control room and zipped up his flight vest, then took up a large, double-barreled proton rifle, securing it into a leather holster that ran diagonally down his back, and Celestra did not miss the slight wince on his face as the weapon clunked against the tender portion of his back and shoulder. "We were never quite the pair to deal in caution and reluctance, my friend--Bill's life is at stake. Better our own lives and not his."
"Agreed," said Celestra, doing a quick check to ensure her utility belt was fully equipped. "Our first priority is Bill, whether or not personal injury is at stake. We go in hard and strong."
The hatch whirred open and a blast of icy wind reddened their cheeks, and together they advanced through the forest, Celestra's boots now as perfectly silent as a stalking predators' paws.
~~*~~
Without warning the tunnel opened up into an oblong cavern, and with a yelp Falco swerved unceremoniously to the right. The bio-weapon had seemingly been awaiting its quarry just off to the side; the wary avian, so agile, had narrowly avoided collision with it.
The thing oddly resembled an enormous praying mantis, only encased in a protective outer shell of reddish-brown rock. Its red eyes gleamed with a sinister inner shine, so illuminating in the lava-filled cave that Falco squinted and cursed under his breath as he rebooted his G-Diffuser system.
"Hey! Is anybody back there behind me?"
"Your recklessness is going to get you killed one of these days!" came Fox's voice over the radio, and Falco breathed more easily at his commander's presence. "You okay up there?"
Falco cornered and brought himself in line with the distant earthen monster, bringing his lasers to bear and firing at will, knocking off great chunks of rock and letting them fall into the swirl of angry simmering magma. "For now, but it's getting harder to breathe in here. Do yourself a favor and cut hard right when you reach the battle zone; our new buddy is blocking the left side."
"Roger that," the vulpine answered, and he finally boosted his thrusters to their highest output. For a split second Fox caught sight of the volcanic-like cavern ahead, and before he could draw another breath he had shot along the wall to the right, inside wing inches from the boundary of the cave. Falco was easy to locte--he was shooting madly with cerulean beams that contrasted starkly with all the vivid reds and oranges of the lava--and skirting around to the rear he joined in the frantic assault. "You turned your communications off."
The avian gritted his beak, frustrated when his laser energy dealt little or no damage to the rock creature. "No way! How did you guess?" he asked, voice dripping with sarcasm.
Fox made a derisive sound through his nose. "Why?"
For a moment the other mercenary did not respond, then he murmured, "Sometimes you just gotta grit your teeth and do it, regardless of orders."
"You're turning into Celestra," Fox teased, and Falco let out a squawking laugh.
"Three minutes!" shouted Slippy, who was safe within the control room of Great Fox with Peppy and ROB beside him. "Hurry, you two!"
The bio-weapon, apparently realizing it was being shot at, let loose an unearthly shriek. Opening its mouth wide it gave an ear-splitting coughing sound and a stream of flaming boulders erupted from the thing's cavernous throat; Fox and Falco frantically evaded the onslaught but still emerged extremely battered.
"This is getting us nowhere!" the vulpine cried out, fighting to regain control of his shuddering craft. "We've got to think of an offensive plan, and fast!"
Falco killed his engines and hovered, immobile, in the air. "I've got an idea, but you've gotta get out of here."
"What? Why?"
"I've got one bomb left from the Katina mission," the avian explained solemnly. "I'm gonna bring the whole cavern down on Andross's friend here, and you're not getting caught in the crossfire."
Fox hesitated for only a moment, then proceeded to shut down his Arwings' primary systems. "I can't let you do that, Lombardi. We're a team. We're in this together."
With a horribly pleasant laugh Falco said," That's why Slippy and Peppy are on our cruiser and Celestra's on Fortuna, right?"
The Star Fox commander cursed, but could think of nothing to counter the irrefutable logic. "You can't . . . what if--"
"Get going!!" Falco screamed at him, booting up his engines and whipping his spacecraft around to face his wing commanders'. "Go or I will shoot you myself!" The avian's features were drawn, stern and serious; Fox noticed with a squirm of discomfort that Falco's dark eyes were ablaze with a suicidal intensity. It wasn't until his comrade had proceeded to warm his lasers did Fox know he was being deathly serious.
"Damn you, Falco Lombardi!" he cried in fury, and with a heart-wrenching sensation in his chest he turned and sped up the tunnel and out of the core. With a knowing smirk the avian let his laser energy fizzle into nothing.
When Falco was certain his wing commander had fully exited the core tunnel, he asked, "Hey, idiot--did you honestly think for a second that I, your best friend, would shoot you?"
"Falco!!" cried the other three mercenaries, despair and trepidation evident in their voices, and the avian clicked off the G-Diffuser system yet again. It was extremely difficult to draw breath now; the intense heat in the air burned at his lungs and often left him coughing and gasping. He wasn't at all prepared when the volcanic-based creature spewed another great barrage of fiery stones his way, and MeteoRiot took the heavy blows with depleting stoicism. A particularly devastating hit sent Falco reeling sideways, and with a grunt of pain his right temple collided with the metal clasp of one of his safety restraints.
Eyes blurred and swimming uncontrollably, Falco struggled to right himself. Hand resting on his bomb release and waiting for the opportune moment, he dared to manuever closer to the rock-encased praying mantis.
Its mouth widened, preparing to attack again.
The avian meant to say something brave and intelligent when this had at last occured, but air was more precious at the moment than satisfying his ego. Flying as close as good judgment would allow, he ground his beak and let fly his only bomb.
He was frighteningly certain that the weapon had been incinerated in the heat, for at first nothing notable transpired. Then the bio-weapon retched, flailing and clutching at its throat with its clawed hands, and Falco grinned maniacally as the bomb detonated in his enemy's throat. The explosiion sucked at the oxygen in his lungs and he gagged, pummeling with the controls until at last his engines gunned and he shot up into the tunnel. Behind him, a great cloud of toxin fallout expanded, seeming to chase his as he fled.
Only vaguely aware that he hadn't escaped death yet, Falco's craft narrowly escaped the narrow chute before the toxin cloud exploded upward onto the nebula surface. Only then did the mercenary turn his communications systems back on, just in time to hear Slippy shout, "One minute!"
"Wonderful," Falco muttered sarcastically, and somewhere in his subconscious he realized that his words were slightly slurred and something warm and thick was oozing through the feathers on the side of his face. As his altitude raised the vice around his lungs seemed to lessen slightly, but he was coughing in fits now and his brain swam from lack of oxygen.
"Thirty seconds! Falco, can you hear me?!"
But the avian couldn't respond, could hardly breathe or see; his vision darkened every few seconds, as though someone was turning a light switch on and off. The exterior of his Arwing was smouldering, his wingtips blazing; the craft resembled a grat phoenix rising up from the fiery depths.
And then it was all over--at last MeteoRiot broke through the heat zone, carreening into black space, and the flames extinguished as though he had plunged into water. Aboard Great Fox, Peppy, Slippy, and ROB all shouted in joy as Fox collapsed into an armchair in the briefing room, trembling with relief. Falco's lungs drank in the oxygen, chest heaving, and he thanked God that he was alive.
Only a few minutes later Peppy and Fox were unstrapping the battered avian from his restraints; Slippy had already begun a medical scan of the wound in his head, but even as his boots hit the floor Falco descended into unconsciousness.
~~*~~
Anilora nudged Celestra hard in the shoulder, perfectly aware of how exposed they were, but the female assassin heeded him not, continuing to stare at Bill in horror. He lay crumpled at the foot of a frosted ash tree, seemingly unconscious, his left knee shifted into a sickeningly wrong position. She re-holstered her plasma guns and let her hands fall to her sides limply; her every being compelled her to run to him and spare him his torment, but whether she knew in some still-functioning corner of her brain that it seemed a cruel bit of bait or that Anilora's hand was firmly on her shoulder she did not move.
"It's a trap," the Katinan informed her, praying that she would see reason. "A twisted trick set by Reivin to deceive us. He knows the sight causes us great anguish."
Celestra blinked once and did not move for Bill, but neither could she look away.
"Do not--" Anilora began, but then Bill gave an incoherent moan and Celestra's reason fell away.
"Bill!" she cried, and she sprinted into the clearing, weapons sheathed, arms wide to embrace him. The captain cursed mutely when a shadow off to the right stirred and erupted into motion, and neither he nor Celestra was really surprised when Reivin drew his rival to him, a blade held steady millimeters from the exposed flesh of her neck.
"Hello, my dear Celestra," he crooned into her ear, turning the her so that she was facing the ragged form of Bill, who was now gazing blearily up at them. "I can't tell you how pleased I am that you could join us."
Celestra was struggling against him, raging more strongly than even he had thought possible, but the knife pricked ever-so-lightly at her throat and she grew more still. "Let him go, you damned monster! If you want a fight you've got one, but I swear if you ever touch Bill again I'll kill you!"
Reivin now saw his greatest opportunity yet shining right in front of his malevolent green eyes. Quietly, delicately, he asked, "You are a flawed human after all, aren't you?"
"No!" Celestra screamed, thrashing again.
"You finally made the mistake of exposing your heart to someone, didn't you?"
The female assassin hesitated, but only for a split second before she countered "No!" with equal hatred.
There was a mocking laugh in the raven's voice now. "This must be what happens when you sell yourself to people. Ever since you joined those mercenaries you became soft. You're not even worth my efforts anymore, are you?"
Before she could stifle it a dry sob escaped Celestra's lips. "No . . . " she gasped out, but it was a sad, pathetic excuse for her normally commanding tone. Reivin knew she had almost given in.
A tear trickled down Celestra's pale cheek as her adversary stated with conviction, "And you're in love, you weak, worthless fool. You've given your heart to foolish emotion when you were invincible in the beginning. Everything deadly and dangerous about you, all the qualities you possessed that made you my fighting equal, have faded into this worthless shell you've become."
Celestra fell limp in Reivin's arms, sobbing, even as Bill struggled to rise in a new surge of fury and failed. Smirking, feeling ultimately superior now, the evil assassin released his captive, turning her to face him so that he could revel in her broken and defeated helplessness.
"Now draw your switchblades," Reivin ordered her, businesslike again as he unsheathed his own. "Fight me again. We will see how your emotions have rewarded you today."
Choking back another sob, she felt for the two switchblades at her utility belt. She unsheathed them slowly and exposed the blades, but did not raise her arms to strike.
"Fight!" her enemy shrieked, now circling her menacingly. "Prove that these useless feelings are worth your current weakness! You were convinced you could defeat me fueled by passion--where is your motivation now, when you have been exposed for a coward? But come then--fight me!"
Celestra gave a whimper, anguish apparent upon her sodden face, and whispered, "Let him go."
Reivin threw his head back and cackled so manically that Celestra shivered uncontrollably. "And how do I gain? Let him go, certainly; he has played out his uses, but at what price?"
"Let him go," she repeated, almost inaudibly. "Take me instead."
At these words, Reivin Frost lowered his knives. "You would give yourself to me in order to save Bill?"
Her icy blue eyes caught his, glimmer slightly restored. "I would."
"Then take him," Reivin said with a malicious grin. "He is no longer worth my time." Re-sheathing his weapons he stooped over Bill and dragged him in the direction from which Celestra had come. A tree root obscured the path but Reivin ignored it, even when Bill's twisted knee knocked against it and he shrieked in heart-wrenching agony. The assassin deposited Bill just shy of the treeline and turned back.
Celestra tackled him to the ground, pinning him beneath her roughly and forcefully, eyes blazing with barely contained rage. The perplexed expression on Reivin's face spoke his amazement in volumes.
"You actually believed that cheesy bit of acting?" Celestra growled through gritted teeth, and she reared her right fist back and punched him in the beak. "You're not the only one around here who puts up a facade, Frost! Fake sorrow is so easy to manipulate!"
Reivin growled low in his throat and forced her back; Celestra sprawled at the foot of the ash tree, fumbling with her plasma lasers. As he advanced, Reivin glanced back over his shoulder at Bill.
The Katinan assassin had disappeared.
"Very clever!" the male assassin praised, taking his knives out again. "A brilliant performance to rescue Bill Grey! But all in vain, I must say--for many weeks now you have been my target."
Celestra didn't respond; instead she spun her plasma lasers up into a ready position and fired several times. Reivin's hands blurred as he became a flurry of motion, and when all was still again he stood unscathed, having deflected all of them with little more than a quickened heartbeat. Seemingly satisfied, the Macbethian reverted to switchblades and they clashed, the sun and the shadow, weaving a dance of death beneath the frozen sky.
~~*~~
"Can you stand, my friend?"
Bill grunted and shifted up onto his feet, crying out as a figurative chainsaw sliced into his knee. Anilora, luckily, was only inches away, so when Bill toppled the captain was there to support him. "I've seen better days, that's for sure."
Anilora hefted Bill over to the nearest tree and helped him get settled and as confortable as possible, then stood back and surveyed him. Better days was an understatement, he decided; the welt on the back of his head was swollen to the size of a chicken's egg, and the fur around it was nearly black with bruising and mottled with dried and caked blood. The knee was a repulsive mass that had been shifted ninety degrees too far to the right, Anilora deduced, and they were more than a day away from Katina and the nearest medical facility.
"She's brilliant," Bill croaked, breaking the silence. "Celest. She even had me fooled."
"I'd be lying if I said I hadn't been panicking," Anilora agreed. Then he shifted and his visage grew more stern. "I know for certain that Wolf O'Donnel is somewhere in the near vacinity; Frost sent Celestra a letter--"
But the rest of his sentence was lost as Bill's eyes grew large; recognizing the expression as a warning Anilora ducked his head just in time to avoid a flying fist. Whirling about on his half-boots the Katinan captain found himself facing Andross's second most powerful supporter, Wolf O'Donnel.
Unlike Reivin and Celestra these two dispensed with idle pleasantries; Anilora swiped out at Wolf with his left hand, snagging Wolf's forearm and clawing at the fur with his fingernails. The lupine uttered a feral sound within his throat and lunged for the human, clamping his teeth down on the exposed hand and ripping chunks out of the flesh. Crying out, violet eyes wild, Anilora uppercutted Wolf's jaw, shaking the deadly canines free, and with a swipe of one leg Wolf had buckled the captain's knees and sent him crashing to the ground.
When next Anilora looked up, Wolf had forced a trembling Bill to his feet. As he rose, the mercenary moved his claws along to Bill's stomach, fingers ready to deliver the most fatal blow.
"I would not advise moving," Wolf warned, and calculating Anilora held up his hands.
At that time Celestra and Reivin crashed into view, the latter leading, the former backing steadily into the clearing. Wolf swiveled his head around to view the climaxing battle and those sparse seconds were all the captain needed to act. Bill set the stage, rearing his elbow back and plowing the lupine in the stomach, thus breaking free and crashing back into the cold leaves in agony. As soon as Bill was out of range, Anilora whipped the proton rifle out from his back and leveled it at Wolf.
"I would not advise moving," Anilora mocked with a wry grin.
Wolf's hackles raised as he bared his canines, and before Anilora could pull the trigger his enemy had smashed a tiny orb against the ground; a blinding flash emitted, and although their eyes were wide open neither Bill nor the captain could see. When their watering eyes had at last ceased to flash and blur, Wolf had already bolted.
~~*~~
Celestra let Reivin back her out of the clearing, knowing full well that they were headed to a sharp dropoff that fell roughly fifteen feet and into some more trees. She could almost feel the unprecedented hatred emanating form him, for he had been deceived in such a manner that he cursed himself and his ignorance. Now his emerald eyes burned livid holes into hers as their battle sped up; Reivin was forcing her backward with every ounce of his skill, and she knew that if she couldn't edge her way to the bluff soon his rage would prove overpowering.
"A fine performance," she congratulated him slightly breathlessly. "But can you hold?"
"Don't you worry about that!" he snarled, and he came at her in a flurry of whirling blades. His first knife came in a wide arc, and she deflected; the second came low and aimed for her midriff, but she foiled him again. They danced around one another as acrobats would compliment one of their fellows at a circus, now nearing the dropoff.
Anilora limped into view supporting Bill, whose face had taken on a slight greenish tinge to it. He cried out a warning as Celestra slipped on the rock mere inches from the brink, and leaving Bill to relax and wait the captain un-holstered his proton rifle again, searching for a decent shot. Reivin and Celestra skipped along the edge, feet working frantically to keep in time with the rhythm of battle and to avoid the drop. He was just putting pressure on the trigger when he was tackled from behind; rolling onto one side Anilora cursed as Wolf kicked the rifle out of his hands. The Katinan captain felt a knot of fear wrenching in the pit of his stomach, for Wolf was drawing out a length of chain now and he, Anilora, was unarmed.
Bill was dozing in a numb, hazy state when he was jerked back into full consciousness by a dull clattering sound. Forcing his watering eyes open he discerned the source of the noise: the proton rifle had landed a mere five feet away. With a groan the battered assassin flopped onto his stomach and began crawling frantically toward it.
Anilora was scrambling along the ground for a means of defending himself as Wolf rose menacingly, lovingly coiling the spiked chain around his wrist. His hands grasped a stick and he raised it up before him just as the lupine lashed out; the stick was obliterated by the blow and Anilora cried out in agony when the spikes dug deeply into the right side of his chest. Near the bluff, Celestra couldn't help but glance his way in worry, and Reivin, never one to dismiss an opportunity, struck. As she turned back he lunged in, too close for a counterattack, and sank one of his cruel knives between two of the ribs in her right upper torso.
At first Celestra didn't feel a thing, just the edge of a cool sensation emanating from somewhere in her lower diaphram. But then Reivin cackled with glee and wrenched the blade free; without warning, the pain intensified tenfold and she swooned forward in shock. Her adversary caught and supported her almost carefully, then pulled her close so that she leaned against him and hissed in her ear: "You see your error now, my dear Celestra? Your passions have cost you your life."
Reivin pushed her back and brought his knife to bear; Bill hefted the proton rifle up onto his shoulder and fired. The baseball-sized energy ball struck Reivin full in the chest and he wordlessly went limp and fell to the ground. Not wasting any time on further speculation Bill set his sights on Wolf and blasted again. The lupine's entire right side when numb and immobile and the chain fell to the ground as Anilora gasped out and swayed unsteadily.
Celestra dabbed gently at the wound and couldn't really comprehend what it all meant when her fingers came back stained with red. Then her knees ceased to hold her weight and she carreened over the dropoff.
The Katinan assassin gasped for breath, clutching at his throbbing knee, and forced himself to get to his feet. The only sound that penetrated the frigid air was that of his, Wolf's, and Anilora's breathing; Reivin, fully paralyzed for the moment following the proton blast, could neither move nor speak, and Celestra had fallen out of sight. Firming his jaw Bill detirminedly limped his way forward to help his friends.
He had not taken three steps before he blacked out from the pain.
When Bill came around again some thirty minutes later, he found that his knee had been crudely braced with a plethera of twigs tied together with some manner of sweet grass. Swiveling his head he found Anilora kneeling a few yards away, cradling Celestra in his arms. The captain's shirt was torn and bloody from the chain spikes, but he seemed quite coherent; Celestra lay limply in Anilora's lap, awake and with her wound wrapped securely with strips of cloth torn from Anilora's own traveling cloak, but her eyes were glazed and her face more pale than was normal.
"Where are those damned--" Bill began heatedly, but Anilora cut him off with a raised hand and pointed at the sky.
A cruiser had just risen above the treeline; by the look of things Wolf and Reivin had called for aid, for the ship was not the assassin's. Bill narrowed his eyes; doubtless Leon Powalski had come to their rescue.
Anilora stroked Celestra's hair soothingly, and the three companions followed the cruiser with their eyes and continued to stare long after it had faded from view.
Far from sleeping soundly a third of the galaxy away, Captain Anilora was awoken by an unnatural chill circulating in his room at the Cornerian Army base. The evening had been warm for that time of year and he had dismissively left the window open, but two in the morning had come and the curtains were fluttering eerily in a strangely cold breeze. Taking a moment to let his eyes adjust to the twilight, Anilora rose and padded softly to the gaping window, making to close it but instead resting his forehead against the sill and finding some measure of solace in the semi-frigid bite across his bare upper body. \
Lylat had remained menacingly quiet since the destruction of the sub-aquatic bio-weapon four days ago; far from comforting anyone the increasing silence only irked everyone's nerves. What worried the Katinan captain most about the entire out-of-place scenario, though, was Bill. Anilora had left his companion in command of those forces still occupying their posts on Katina, but the assassin had, for whatever reason, not been seen at the base since the Aquas mission and was not responding to G-Diffuser transmissions. Pepper assured both Anilora and Celestra that Bill was on a mission of his own at the moment, but the entire story sounded wrong to the ever-calculating captain. No, something had undoubtedly happened to Bill, Anilora convinced himself, and Reivin Frost was likely the perpetrator.
Shivering with cold now, Anilora shut and latched the window, after which he returned to his warm bedsheets and drifted feverishly back to sleep.
Less than an hour later he found himself sitting bolt-upright again, one pillow a clammy bundle on the floor, the other wrung feverishly in his sleep. With a start the Katinan realized that his window was open again, the curtains dancing ominously with the intruding breeze.
As quietly as his bedsheets would allow Anilora rose from his bed and stared curiously out the window. There was nothing truly remarkable from what he could see; the single enormous beech tree that normally shaded his room on the more unpleasantly warm days was swishing its branches against the wall and window panes, and the starlight continued its faint, incessant twinkle. Conincidentally or not he could hear no aircraft motors in the sky, unusual since the army base was normally overrun by all sorts of intergalactic ships. Cautiously Anilora took a few steps toward the window, inwardly trying to convince himself that he hadn't shut it properly, or that the latch was faulty, but his pounding heart betrayed him and he paused yet again, curtains just rustling at his ankles.
"You're twenty-three years old, for heaven's sake," Anilora exhaled in exasperation, shaking his head with a bemused chuckle. "Pull yourself together--it's just a window." With that he strode to the open window, grasping both sides to close it again.
"Good evening," a smooth voice hissed, and before he could cry out Anilora had been tackled to the carpet by Leon Powalski, whose charcoal eyes were glittering with malice.
Anilora was quite surprised at Leon's sheer strength, but he was a captain and had seen his share of hand-to-hand combat during his ascent to said position. With a deft turn of one wrist he had freed his right hand and hooked the chameleon around the neck, flinging him precariously off-balance and shoving him back. Leon recovered quickly and punched Anilora across the jaw; Anilora spat out a mouthful of blood, snapped his head up, and plowed into Leon's nose, wincing when he heard the bridge snap. Leon cursed and curled his fingers around the captain's neck with a growl, and Anilora flailed his arms helplessly, beating at Leon's shoulders in a futile attempt to free himself.
His fingertips brushed a hard porcelain surface; Anilora's eyes widened when his hands grasped his bedside lamp and he smashed the thing down upon his assailant's head. Leon toppled backward, stars swimming in front of his eyes, and Anilora flung his pillow off his bed, leveling a small laser barrel at the mercenary's forehead.
With a menacing cackle, Leon summoned his camoflauge abilities, perfectly mimicking the hue of the tan carpet in the moonlight.
Knowing that he would be fighting blind if he continued this battle, Anilora turned and bolted out the door, sprinting down the hallway and firing randomly over his shoulder in a desperate hope to keep the chameleon at bay. Leon, mere feet behind the captain, brought forth a small dagger and slit the back of Anilora's shoulder so precisely that the primary muscle severed painlessly. At first Anilora didn't realize he had been attacked, but when he lifted his arm to fire again the entire limb refused to respond and he collapsed to the ground in agony.
Far from giving in, though, Anilora took the weapon in his other hand and held the trigger down, firing with abandon and filling the entire hall with white laser energy. One bolt struck Leon in the ankle and he skidded to his knees; another just grazed the side of his face and he reflexively clapped a hand over the wound. Catching the wary captain would be far too dangerous now, he realized, for many of the rooms lining the hallway had light streaming from beneath their doorframes and Anilora was calling for aid.
'No matter,' Leon thought to himself. 'All in good time.' With that, the ever-crafty chameleon rose and darted down the hall, limping slightly as he ran.
When Anilora and General Pepper conducted a full search of the army base twenty minutes later, Leon Powalski was already long gone.
~~*~~
Only Celestra appeared fully awake when the five companions and ROB convened in the briefing room at four that morning; Fox and Peppy were very tousle-furred and Falco's feathers seemed to be possessed of their own volition. When the G-Diffuser sceen flickered to life a moment later not only were they looking at General Pepper by at Captain Anilora as well. His violet eyes were wide with strain, fury, and exhaustion as a pair of cyborgs tended to his wounded shoulder, and Celestra's face contorted into an expression caught somewhere between pity and rage.
"Obviously if our information were not important, we would have waited to contact you at a more decent hour--" Pepper tried to explain.
"Get on with it," Celestra snapped, her ever-intense crystalline-blue eyes smouldering as she studied the surgical tape covering the upper-right quarter of Anilora's back.
"Two hours ago, Gilraen was attacked by a member of Star Wolf," Pepper elaborated.
"Which one?" Falco asked sarcastically. "There are four."
"Powalski," Anilora gritted, and Falco ground his beak in frustration. "He snuck in through my bedroom window. It was difficult to tell whether or not I injured him; for the majority of our battle he used camoflauge."
Celestra punched the wall nearest to her with such force that everyone stared. "Of all the spineless, cowardly--"
Anilora held up one hand to silence the assassin; with a profound sigh, she complied. "These tactics of Star Wolf also lead me to believe that Bill's disappearance is far more than suspicious coincidence."
"You sent him after Frost!" Celestra accused Pepper heatedly, rising from her chair so quickly she knocked it over.
"Celestra, please--" Pepper begged.
"You sent my best friend to his worst enemy knowing that Star Wolf would fight fair!"
"--He willingly accepted--"
"You walked him into the hands of Andross's top supporters, and if you think I'm going to sit back and let it happen, you're crazy," Celestra finished icily, eyes narrowed. She turned on her heel and righted her chair, then stopped and swung her knapsack over one shoulder.
"You're walking out on a mission," Pepper warned.
Celestra straightened, set her hands firmly on her hips, and said, "Then don't pay me, General. But I'm going after Bill."
"No you're not," Anilora whispered calmly. "At least, not without me."
The entire room fell very silent, Pepper's eyes simmering with fury, Celestra and Anilora staring at one another quizzically, and the Star Fox team all wearing expressions of disbelief. Anilora tested his arm, wincing a bit but seemingly satisfied as he wrestled into a flight shirt and groped around for the matching vest. Pepper glared at the Katinan captain.
"You can't just walk out on your entire army," he protested.
Anilora shrugged and offered a wan smile. "I'll leave someone trustworthy in charge; the men all respect my judgment and will understand the urgency of my departure."
The Cornerian general turned on the female assassin, who was now smirking confidently. "I've hired you--I refuse to relinquish your uses."
"Then I'll quit," she threatened, and the mercenaries uttered sounds of amazement. "I'll take myself out of the system and you'll never see me again."
"And I'll be right behind you if it comes to that," Anilora assured. Celestra flashed her beautiful smile at him; Falco cast his gaze jealously on the floor.
Pepper sighed and shook his head, avoiding the unyielding glares from undoubtedly his two strongest supporters. Withour their aid his hand in the war would weaken substantially, possibly to the verge of failure, and it was logic that he could not deny. "Go after Bill Grey. I wish you luck."
"Rendezvous in Katina's capital city," Anilora informed his female accomplice. "I can meet you there in a little less than one day."
"I'll be waiting for you," Celestra assured him. He nodded and strode out the door, out of view. The dark-haired assassin made for the exit, but stopped and turned to face the mercenaries. "Fox, I will be back in time for the next mission after this, and I regret very much having to--"
"Get going, Marquette," Fox said, waving a hand dismissively.
With a smile of thanks, Celestra departed for her Arwing.
"On to business," Pepper began again irritably. "As Andross's sub-aquatic bio-weapon has been successfully destroyed in the oceans of Aquas, another weapon of mass destruction has recently been constructed. Until about twenty minutes ago tacticians hadn't the slightest clue of where this new bio-weapon is located, but after several thermal scans we have traced a radical power signature to the core of Solar."
Slippy and Peppy were already bringing up thermal and skematical grids of their newest mission site, but Fox interrupted them by shifting uncomfortably in his chair. "Er, General, you know that Solar is a nebula, don't you?"
"Of course I do, McCloud."
"So you are also aware that we can't possibly fly there, penetrate the core, and destroy a bio-weapon of any kind?" the vulpine pointed out. "The temperature fluctuates radically once you penetrate the heat zone--our Arwings will be incinerated in seconds."
Slippy shook his head and gestured to his thermal readouts. "You're not exactly right there, Fox. Logic would denote that we would just be walking into a frying pan, but technically our Arwings could resist meltdown for a short period of time."
"You do realize you're not being comforting," Falco pointed out, pouring himself a mug of coffee.
"How hot is the general temperature?" Peppy asked.
Slippy studied his readouts. "Approximately nine-thousand degrees," he answered. "Sometimes higher."
"And how long do you figure we can sustain vitals in that inferno?" Fox mused.
"Somewhere between six and seven minutes."
"That's it," Falco began, setting his mug down with a clatter. "We're screwed."
Peppy was studying a revolving skematic that detailed the quickest route into the nebula's core. "We're looking at a two minute journey straight to the core aat the longest," he informed them, pointing to the dotted flight path. "That leaves us with a two or three minute battle."
"No offense, guys, but we'll be hard-pressed to accomplish this without Celestra," Slippy admitted. "We're a formidable enough group, but we'll be noticeably weakened without such a strong pilot."
"Agreed," said Fox, now pacing in front of the G-Diffuser screen as General Pepper watched the scene unfold. "But the four of us have been in tight spots before without Celestra." The vulpine ceased his pacing and glanced at Pepper. "You can go--we'll handle everything from here."
Pepper complied, rolling his eyes irritably.
"How much time do we have until this thing goes on the rampage?" Falco asked, crossing his arms and kicking his boots up on an endtable.
Slippy leaned over to the mainframed, typed in a few commands, and perused the computer screen nearest to him as thousands of numbers spiraled across the screen. "I give it no more than two days; by that time every minor tactician in Lylat will have noticed abnormal activity within the nebula."
~~*~~
It was about one forty-five the following morning when a sleepy-eyed Captain Anilora stumbled into the most prestigious coffee shop in Nexxus, 'Riva's Remedy'. The wind was kicking up violently through the not-so-busy streets already, and in contrast to the day before it was a rather cold morning. Anilora was huddled beneath a dark green traveling cloak as he entered the coffee shop, but the interior was warm and cozy and he had soon thrown back the hood.
Celestra was bent over a mocha cappuccino and what appeared to be a slightly damp bit of paper at a corner table by a window. The only addition she had made to her flight attire was a floor-length black cloak that boasted a Cornerian Flight Academy symbol on the back.
Anilora ordered a regular coffee and seated himself across from her. "Ever you amaze me with your impeccable speed," he began. "How did you get here so quickly?"
She looked up and said, in all seriousness, "I was carried on the wings of desperation." Without further explanation she pushed the paper across the table and into his outstretched hand. The Katinan glanced down and was quite alarmed when he recognized Reivin Frost's handwriting.
My dear Celestra,
I have no doubts that you have by now heard of the regrettably failed assassination attempt against Captain Gilraen Anilora. You may thank our friend Leon for that. As I do not doubt your conniving intelligence, I will assume that you have guessed that Bill's absense is no tragic coincidence.
I must as the least commend you and your crafty friend Falco for escaping me on Fortuna, but even you must have known that this has been but a temporary reprieve. You have my word that Bill is very much alive, but will obviously not remain thus if you do not grant me the opportunity of a rematch.
I trust you will bring Gilraen along at your heels, therefore I have called upon Wolf O'Donnel to keep him company. I also trust you know where to find us, so I will spare both of us precious time in telling you. You have one day--but I have no doubts you will fly faster upon the wings of desperation.
My best to you and your dearly beloved captain.
~Frost
Anilora shoved the letter back across the table in disgust. "He's a sick, twisted man," he remarked coldly.
Celestra's eyes slipped down to the steam wafting from her mug, and suddenly she appeared very tired. Seeing this, the Katinan reached out and tipped her chin up, cupping the side of her fair face in his hand. "Don't you start thinking for a second that the three of us aren't going to make it out of this," he warned gently. "Have you forgotten everything I taught you? People like Reivin have no heart, and without it they will always lose. Hold to your faith, Celestra. We will save Bill."
The assassin thought of Falco then, and with a pang of guilt she brushed Anilora's hand away.
They finished their coffee in an uncomfortable silence, and in half an hour they had exited Katinan atmosphere via Anilora's personal cruiser, Silhouette.
~~*~~
The four mercenaries fell expertly into a 1-3 formation just outside of the Solar nebula heat zone. No one could find any reassuring words to say as they all stared fearfully down into the molten lava that oozed across the entire radical core. Every few seconds the flames would falre up, emitting chunks of rock and flecks of lava, and at times these outbursts were so bright they squinted. Fox, leading his team, rubbed his eyes anxiously and activated his G-Diffuser system.
"Slippy, Peppy, do you have the coordinates?"
"We're directly above the bio-weapon in our current position," Slippy reassured his wing commander.
The map detailing their chosen route materialized onto Fox's screen as Peppy booted it back up. "If we follow this map, it'll be a straight run to the core in a minute and forty seconds, two minutes maximum."
"Assuming nothing goes wrong along the way," Falco pointed out. "So what's the game plan, coach McCloud?"
Eyes still perusing the flight path he had made, the vulpine began slowly, "If we all try to cram ourselves into the core, this whole missions will be nothng short of chaos. Since we're on a strict time schedule--something we're not used to--we won't have the opportunity to make this assault perfectly uniform. We can't fight with our natual style today, so here's the plan--I figure if we get separated, the first one or two to make it to the core should proceed to the bio-weapon. The others--return to our cruiser and keep out of the heat zone. Everyone clear on that?"
"Crystal," Falco responded, booting up his main thrusters. "Let's kick it into high gear, boys."
Without further delay the Star Fox team sped into the heat zone of Solar nebula. The instant they entered the figurative boundary, their shield cried out in unison and the energy slowly began to drop.
"We're gonna have to move!" Slippy called, yelping in surprise when a flaming boulder whizzed within feet to the right of his Arwing. "All thrusters to maximum, Fox--hold nothing back!"
"Slippy's right!" Fox cried, evading another rock and squinting through the blaze. "Everybody break formation! Get to that core!"
Falco dipped low with an unpleasant lurch while his three wingmates shot up high over the next enormous rock; instantly he knew why they had taken the opposite course as him, for the closer he flew to the nebula surface the more rapidly his shield gauge decreased. The warnings screamed throughout his cockpit as he evaded with unbelievable speed, and eventually he had left his comrades far behind him.
"Oh, shut up," Falco hissed at the incessant bleeping, and he flicked off his shield gauge monitor.
"Lombardi, where are you? We've lost visual!"
"I'm turning into Celestra," Falco muttered to himself, and with a sigh and a shake of his head he disabled his G-Diffuser system as well. "Sorry, guys, but I'm goin' for it." Swerving in and out of spurts of magma and airborne boulders, the avian piloted MeteoRiot in far better form than his comrades, not even thinking about his flight path as his hands seemed to be possessed of their own volition. Several hundred yards away he spied the core opening, a dark, cavernous tunnel that led vertically downward. Dodging a final stream of lava, Falco boosted his thrusters in a powerful spurt of speed and disappeared down the chute.
Fox was sending his Arwing through frantic barrel-rolls when Peppy came back over the radio: "Thirty-six seconds have passed, and Falco's already through."
"Damn," Fox gritted admiringly. "One more person through and we'll be in business. Hopefully Falco can cover himself until then."
Slippy, furthest ahead of the remaining three, could just see the core gaping like some hungry mouth of a fire demon. Thrusters already at their maximum, he powered down to his normal boosters and velocitized back to a more manageable speed just in time to avoid a rock that would have maimed his spacecraft. "I don't think I can get through, guys, I'm being blocked!"
Peppy stirred his Arwing into a quick rush of speed and skivved around Slippy and his predicament with a tight turn to the right, but he didn't get much further as a wall of magma exploded upward in front of him. The shield gauge cried out as the cascade erupted, and it was all Peppy could do to come to a complete stop befor he flew into the molten inferno.
Fox was only a few hundred feet behind the hare; in a flash he had killed all of his thrusters, coming to a near halt, then angled up and boosted the engines back to their maximum and running parallel to the magma wall barring Peppy. The ninety-degree angle lasted no more than four seconds, and Fox shot down the core's tunnel, heat increasing as he descended.
"Fall back, Slip!" Peppy cried, and they shot back up toward the outer atmosphere; the hulls began to cool several hundred degrees as their elevation grew, and in a minute they burst out of the heat zone and rejoined Great Fox.
Fox and Falco had less than four minutes remaining.
~~*~~
"Reivin's cruiser is emitting a universal signal," Celestra pointed out as Silhouette penetrated Fortuna's atmosphere. "Ten to one he's trying to lure us to the battleground of his choosing, an unfamiliar terrain that he has most likely eroded to his fighting style by now, no doubt."
Violet eyes scanning the ice-glazed trees for a clearing within which to land, Anilora nodded. "Scanners have picked up Bill's life force within half a mile of the Venomian craft. How near to the site should we land?"
A familiar clacking sound resounded throughout the ship's interior; observant Anilora did not have to turn around to discern its source. Celestra had taken to pacing the control room, mystical boots assaulting the floor in her irritation, and she aimlessly twirled a plasma gun in her right hand. "Bring us down three quarters of a mile from Reivin's ship; chances are they'll be fanned out away from Bill to track our progress." For a few seconds the only noise within the hull was the click-clack of the assassin's combat boots, then she added, "Are his vitals stable?"
The captain frowned, partly out of remorse for Bill but also out of rage for Reivin and Wolf. "Fluctuating between poor and critical. We need to get to him quickly, Celestra, or we may lose him."
Celestra winced at her comrade's cold logic and closed her glacial blue eyes in thought. "A direct, frantic attack is exactly what the pair of them will expect; they'll have already thought through our limited options and assumed that course." She opened her eyes again, a faint touch of worry lining her indifferent facade, and glanced out the nearest window. "If we charge in over-confidently, we're dead; if we tread cautiously, Bill's a goner. I just remembered why I despise emotion."
With a slight shudder the graceful Katinan cruiser touched down just outside of the thickest line of frosted trees. Anilora went to the rear of the control room and zipped up his flight vest, then took up a large, double-barreled proton rifle, securing it into a leather holster that ran diagonally down his back, and Celestra did not miss the slight wince on his face as the weapon clunked against the tender portion of his back and shoulder. "We were never quite the pair to deal in caution and reluctance, my friend--Bill's life is at stake. Better our own lives and not his."
"Agreed," said Celestra, doing a quick check to ensure her utility belt was fully equipped. "Our first priority is Bill, whether or not personal injury is at stake. We go in hard and strong."
The hatch whirred open and a blast of icy wind reddened their cheeks, and together they advanced through the forest, Celestra's boots now as perfectly silent as a stalking predators' paws.
~~*~~
Without warning the tunnel opened up into an oblong cavern, and with a yelp Falco swerved unceremoniously to the right. The bio-weapon had seemingly been awaiting its quarry just off to the side; the wary avian, so agile, had narrowly avoided collision with it.
The thing oddly resembled an enormous praying mantis, only encased in a protective outer shell of reddish-brown rock. Its red eyes gleamed with a sinister inner shine, so illuminating in the lava-filled cave that Falco squinted and cursed under his breath as he rebooted his G-Diffuser system.
"Hey! Is anybody back there behind me?"
"Your recklessness is going to get you killed one of these days!" came Fox's voice over the radio, and Falco breathed more easily at his commander's presence. "You okay up there?"
Falco cornered and brought himself in line with the distant earthen monster, bringing his lasers to bear and firing at will, knocking off great chunks of rock and letting them fall into the swirl of angry simmering magma. "For now, but it's getting harder to breathe in here. Do yourself a favor and cut hard right when you reach the battle zone; our new buddy is blocking the left side."
"Roger that," the vulpine answered, and he finally boosted his thrusters to their highest output. For a split second Fox caught sight of the volcanic-like cavern ahead, and before he could draw another breath he had shot along the wall to the right, inside wing inches from the boundary of the cave. Falco was easy to locte--he was shooting madly with cerulean beams that contrasted starkly with all the vivid reds and oranges of the lava--and skirting around to the rear he joined in the frantic assault. "You turned your communications off."
The avian gritted his beak, frustrated when his laser energy dealt little or no damage to the rock creature. "No way! How did you guess?" he asked, voice dripping with sarcasm.
Fox made a derisive sound through his nose. "Why?"
For a moment the other mercenary did not respond, then he murmured, "Sometimes you just gotta grit your teeth and do it, regardless of orders."
"You're turning into Celestra," Fox teased, and Falco let out a squawking laugh.
"Three minutes!" shouted Slippy, who was safe within the control room of Great Fox with Peppy and ROB beside him. "Hurry, you two!"
The bio-weapon, apparently realizing it was being shot at, let loose an unearthly shriek. Opening its mouth wide it gave an ear-splitting coughing sound and a stream of flaming boulders erupted from the thing's cavernous throat; Fox and Falco frantically evaded the onslaught but still emerged extremely battered.
"This is getting us nowhere!" the vulpine cried out, fighting to regain control of his shuddering craft. "We've got to think of an offensive plan, and fast!"
Falco killed his engines and hovered, immobile, in the air. "I've got an idea, but you've gotta get out of here."
"What? Why?"
"I've got one bomb left from the Katina mission," the avian explained solemnly. "I'm gonna bring the whole cavern down on Andross's friend here, and you're not getting caught in the crossfire."
Fox hesitated for only a moment, then proceeded to shut down his Arwings' primary systems. "I can't let you do that, Lombardi. We're a team. We're in this together."
With a horribly pleasant laugh Falco said," That's why Slippy and Peppy are on our cruiser and Celestra's on Fortuna, right?"
The Star Fox commander cursed, but could think of nothing to counter the irrefutable logic. "You can't . . . what if--"
"Get going!!" Falco screamed at him, booting up his engines and whipping his spacecraft around to face his wing commanders'. "Go or I will shoot you myself!" The avian's features were drawn, stern and serious; Fox noticed with a squirm of discomfort that Falco's dark eyes were ablaze with a suicidal intensity. It wasn't until his comrade had proceeded to warm his lasers did Fox know he was being deathly serious.
"Damn you, Falco Lombardi!" he cried in fury, and with a heart-wrenching sensation in his chest he turned and sped up the tunnel and out of the core. With a knowing smirk the avian let his laser energy fizzle into nothing.
When Falco was certain his wing commander had fully exited the core tunnel, he asked, "Hey, idiot--did you honestly think for a second that I, your best friend, would shoot you?"
"Falco!!" cried the other three mercenaries, despair and trepidation evident in their voices, and the avian clicked off the G-Diffuser system yet again. It was extremely difficult to draw breath now; the intense heat in the air burned at his lungs and often left him coughing and gasping. He wasn't at all prepared when the volcanic-based creature spewed another great barrage of fiery stones his way, and MeteoRiot took the heavy blows with depleting stoicism. A particularly devastating hit sent Falco reeling sideways, and with a grunt of pain his right temple collided with the metal clasp of one of his safety restraints.
Eyes blurred and swimming uncontrollably, Falco struggled to right himself. Hand resting on his bomb release and waiting for the opportune moment, he dared to manuever closer to the rock-encased praying mantis.
Its mouth widened, preparing to attack again.
The avian meant to say something brave and intelligent when this had at last occured, but air was more precious at the moment than satisfying his ego. Flying as close as good judgment would allow, he ground his beak and let fly his only bomb.
He was frighteningly certain that the weapon had been incinerated in the heat, for at first nothing notable transpired. Then the bio-weapon retched, flailing and clutching at its throat with its clawed hands, and Falco grinned maniacally as the bomb detonated in his enemy's throat. The explosiion sucked at the oxygen in his lungs and he gagged, pummeling with the controls until at last his engines gunned and he shot up into the tunnel. Behind him, a great cloud of toxin fallout expanded, seeming to chase his as he fled.
Only vaguely aware that he hadn't escaped death yet, Falco's craft narrowly escaped the narrow chute before the toxin cloud exploded upward onto the nebula surface. Only then did the mercenary turn his communications systems back on, just in time to hear Slippy shout, "One minute!"
"Wonderful," Falco muttered sarcastically, and somewhere in his subconscious he realized that his words were slightly slurred and something warm and thick was oozing through the feathers on the side of his face. As his altitude raised the vice around his lungs seemed to lessen slightly, but he was coughing in fits now and his brain swam from lack of oxygen.
"Thirty seconds! Falco, can you hear me?!"
But the avian couldn't respond, could hardly breathe or see; his vision darkened every few seconds, as though someone was turning a light switch on and off. The exterior of his Arwing was smouldering, his wingtips blazing; the craft resembled a grat phoenix rising up from the fiery depths.
And then it was all over--at last MeteoRiot broke through the heat zone, carreening into black space, and the flames extinguished as though he had plunged into water. Aboard Great Fox, Peppy, Slippy, and ROB all shouted in joy as Fox collapsed into an armchair in the briefing room, trembling with relief. Falco's lungs drank in the oxygen, chest heaving, and he thanked God that he was alive.
Only a few minutes later Peppy and Fox were unstrapping the battered avian from his restraints; Slippy had already begun a medical scan of the wound in his head, but even as his boots hit the floor Falco descended into unconsciousness.
~~*~~
Anilora nudged Celestra hard in the shoulder, perfectly aware of how exposed they were, but the female assassin heeded him not, continuing to stare at Bill in horror. He lay crumpled at the foot of a frosted ash tree, seemingly unconscious, his left knee shifted into a sickeningly wrong position. She re-holstered her plasma guns and let her hands fall to her sides limply; her every being compelled her to run to him and spare him his torment, but whether she knew in some still-functioning corner of her brain that it seemed a cruel bit of bait or that Anilora's hand was firmly on her shoulder she did not move.
"It's a trap," the Katinan informed her, praying that she would see reason. "A twisted trick set by Reivin to deceive us. He knows the sight causes us great anguish."
Celestra blinked once and did not move for Bill, but neither could she look away.
"Do not--" Anilora began, but then Bill gave an incoherent moan and Celestra's reason fell away.
"Bill!" she cried, and she sprinted into the clearing, weapons sheathed, arms wide to embrace him. The captain cursed mutely when a shadow off to the right stirred and erupted into motion, and neither he nor Celestra was really surprised when Reivin drew his rival to him, a blade held steady millimeters from the exposed flesh of her neck.
"Hello, my dear Celestra," he crooned into her ear, turning the her so that she was facing the ragged form of Bill, who was now gazing blearily up at them. "I can't tell you how pleased I am that you could join us."
Celestra was struggling against him, raging more strongly than even he had thought possible, but the knife pricked ever-so-lightly at her throat and she grew more still. "Let him go, you damned monster! If you want a fight you've got one, but I swear if you ever touch Bill again I'll kill you!"
Reivin now saw his greatest opportunity yet shining right in front of his malevolent green eyes. Quietly, delicately, he asked, "You are a flawed human after all, aren't you?"
"No!" Celestra screamed, thrashing again.
"You finally made the mistake of exposing your heart to someone, didn't you?"
The female assassin hesitated, but only for a split second before she countered "No!" with equal hatred.
There was a mocking laugh in the raven's voice now. "This must be what happens when you sell yourself to people. Ever since you joined those mercenaries you became soft. You're not even worth my efforts anymore, are you?"
Before she could stifle it a dry sob escaped Celestra's lips. "No . . . " she gasped out, but it was a sad, pathetic excuse for her normally commanding tone. Reivin knew she had almost given in.
A tear trickled down Celestra's pale cheek as her adversary stated with conviction, "And you're in love, you weak, worthless fool. You've given your heart to foolish emotion when you were invincible in the beginning. Everything deadly and dangerous about you, all the qualities you possessed that made you my fighting equal, have faded into this worthless shell you've become."
Celestra fell limp in Reivin's arms, sobbing, even as Bill struggled to rise in a new surge of fury and failed. Smirking, feeling ultimately superior now, the evil assassin released his captive, turning her to face him so that he could revel in her broken and defeated helplessness.
"Now draw your switchblades," Reivin ordered her, businesslike again as he unsheathed his own. "Fight me again. We will see how your emotions have rewarded you today."
Choking back another sob, she felt for the two switchblades at her utility belt. She unsheathed them slowly and exposed the blades, but did not raise her arms to strike.
"Fight!" her enemy shrieked, now circling her menacingly. "Prove that these useless feelings are worth your current weakness! You were convinced you could defeat me fueled by passion--where is your motivation now, when you have been exposed for a coward? But come then--fight me!"
Celestra gave a whimper, anguish apparent upon her sodden face, and whispered, "Let him go."
Reivin threw his head back and cackled so manically that Celestra shivered uncontrollably. "And how do I gain? Let him go, certainly; he has played out his uses, but at what price?"
"Let him go," she repeated, almost inaudibly. "Take me instead."
At these words, Reivin Frost lowered his knives. "You would give yourself to me in order to save Bill?"
Her icy blue eyes caught his, glimmer slightly restored. "I would."
"Then take him," Reivin said with a malicious grin. "He is no longer worth my time." Re-sheathing his weapons he stooped over Bill and dragged him in the direction from which Celestra had come. A tree root obscured the path but Reivin ignored it, even when Bill's twisted knee knocked against it and he shrieked in heart-wrenching agony. The assassin deposited Bill just shy of the treeline and turned back.
Celestra tackled him to the ground, pinning him beneath her roughly and forcefully, eyes blazing with barely contained rage. The perplexed expression on Reivin's face spoke his amazement in volumes.
"You actually believed that cheesy bit of acting?" Celestra growled through gritted teeth, and she reared her right fist back and punched him in the beak. "You're not the only one around here who puts up a facade, Frost! Fake sorrow is so easy to manipulate!"
Reivin growled low in his throat and forced her back; Celestra sprawled at the foot of the ash tree, fumbling with her plasma lasers. As he advanced, Reivin glanced back over his shoulder at Bill.
The Katinan assassin had disappeared.
"Very clever!" the male assassin praised, taking his knives out again. "A brilliant performance to rescue Bill Grey! But all in vain, I must say--for many weeks now you have been my target."
Celestra didn't respond; instead she spun her plasma lasers up into a ready position and fired several times. Reivin's hands blurred as he became a flurry of motion, and when all was still again he stood unscathed, having deflected all of them with little more than a quickened heartbeat. Seemingly satisfied, the Macbethian reverted to switchblades and they clashed, the sun and the shadow, weaving a dance of death beneath the frozen sky.
~~*~~
"Can you stand, my friend?"
Bill grunted and shifted up onto his feet, crying out as a figurative chainsaw sliced into his knee. Anilora, luckily, was only inches away, so when Bill toppled the captain was there to support him. "I've seen better days, that's for sure."
Anilora hefted Bill over to the nearest tree and helped him get settled and as confortable as possible, then stood back and surveyed him. Better days was an understatement, he decided; the welt on the back of his head was swollen to the size of a chicken's egg, and the fur around it was nearly black with bruising and mottled with dried and caked blood. The knee was a repulsive mass that had been shifted ninety degrees too far to the right, Anilora deduced, and they were more than a day away from Katina and the nearest medical facility.
"She's brilliant," Bill croaked, breaking the silence. "Celest. She even had me fooled."
"I'd be lying if I said I hadn't been panicking," Anilora agreed. Then he shifted and his visage grew more stern. "I know for certain that Wolf O'Donnel is somewhere in the near vacinity; Frost sent Celestra a letter--"
But the rest of his sentence was lost as Bill's eyes grew large; recognizing the expression as a warning Anilora ducked his head just in time to avoid a flying fist. Whirling about on his half-boots the Katinan captain found himself facing Andross's second most powerful supporter, Wolf O'Donnel.
Unlike Reivin and Celestra these two dispensed with idle pleasantries; Anilora swiped out at Wolf with his left hand, snagging Wolf's forearm and clawing at the fur with his fingernails. The lupine uttered a feral sound within his throat and lunged for the human, clamping his teeth down on the exposed hand and ripping chunks out of the flesh. Crying out, violet eyes wild, Anilora uppercutted Wolf's jaw, shaking the deadly canines free, and with a swipe of one leg Wolf had buckled the captain's knees and sent him crashing to the ground.
When next Anilora looked up, Wolf had forced a trembling Bill to his feet. As he rose, the mercenary moved his claws along to Bill's stomach, fingers ready to deliver the most fatal blow.
"I would not advise moving," Wolf warned, and calculating Anilora held up his hands.
At that time Celestra and Reivin crashed into view, the latter leading, the former backing steadily into the clearing. Wolf swiveled his head around to view the climaxing battle and those sparse seconds were all the captain needed to act. Bill set the stage, rearing his elbow back and plowing the lupine in the stomach, thus breaking free and crashing back into the cold leaves in agony. As soon as Bill was out of range, Anilora whipped the proton rifle out from his back and leveled it at Wolf.
"I would not advise moving," Anilora mocked with a wry grin.
Wolf's hackles raised as he bared his canines, and before Anilora could pull the trigger his enemy had smashed a tiny orb against the ground; a blinding flash emitted, and although their eyes were wide open neither Bill nor the captain could see. When their watering eyes had at last ceased to flash and blur, Wolf had already bolted.
~~*~~
Celestra let Reivin back her out of the clearing, knowing full well that they were headed to a sharp dropoff that fell roughly fifteen feet and into some more trees. She could almost feel the unprecedented hatred emanating form him, for he had been deceived in such a manner that he cursed himself and his ignorance. Now his emerald eyes burned livid holes into hers as their battle sped up; Reivin was forcing her backward with every ounce of his skill, and she knew that if she couldn't edge her way to the bluff soon his rage would prove overpowering.
"A fine performance," she congratulated him slightly breathlessly. "But can you hold?"
"Don't you worry about that!" he snarled, and he came at her in a flurry of whirling blades. His first knife came in a wide arc, and she deflected; the second came low and aimed for her midriff, but she foiled him again. They danced around one another as acrobats would compliment one of their fellows at a circus, now nearing the dropoff.
Anilora limped into view supporting Bill, whose face had taken on a slight greenish tinge to it. He cried out a warning as Celestra slipped on the rock mere inches from the brink, and leaving Bill to relax and wait the captain un-holstered his proton rifle again, searching for a decent shot. Reivin and Celestra skipped along the edge, feet working frantically to keep in time with the rhythm of battle and to avoid the drop. He was just putting pressure on the trigger when he was tackled from behind; rolling onto one side Anilora cursed as Wolf kicked the rifle out of his hands. The Katinan captain felt a knot of fear wrenching in the pit of his stomach, for Wolf was drawing out a length of chain now and he, Anilora, was unarmed.
Bill was dozing in a numb, hazy state when he was jerked back into full consciousness by a dull clattering sound. Forcing his watering eyes open he discerned the source of the noise: the proton rifle had landed a mere five feet away. With a groan the battered assassin flopped onto his stomach and began crawling frantically toward it.
Anilora was scrambling along the ground for a means of defending himself as Wolf rose menacingly, lovingly coiling the spiked chain around his wrist. His hands grasped a stick and he raised it up before him just as the lupine lashed out; the stick was obliterated by the blow and Anilora cried out in agony when the spikes dug deeply into the right side of his chest. Near the bluff, Celestra couldn't help but glance his way in worry, and Reivin, never one to dismiss an opportunity, struck. As she turned back he lunged in, too close for a counterattack, and sank one of his cruel knives between two of the ribs in her right upper torso.
At first Celestra didn't feel a thing, just the edge of a cool sensation emanating from somewhere in her lower diaphram. But then Reivin cackled with glee and wrenched the blade free; without warning, the pain intensified tenfold and she swooned forward in shock. Her adversary caught and supported her almost carefully, then pulled her close so that she leaned against him and hissed in her ear: "You see your error now, my dear Celestra? Your passions have cost you your life."
Reivin pushed her back and brought his knife to bear; Bill hefted the proton rifle up onto his shoulder and fired. The baseball-sized energy ball struck Reivin full in the chest and he wordlessly went limp and fell to the ground. Not wasting any time on further speculation Bill set his sights on Wolf and blasted again. The lupine's entire right side when numb and immobile and the chain fell to the ground as Anilora gasped out and swayed unsteadily.
Celestra dabbed gently at the wound and couldn't really comprehend what it all meant when her fingers came back stained with red. Then her knees ceased to hold her weight and she carreened over the dropoff.
The Katinan assassin gasped for breath, clutching at his throbbing knee, and forced himself to get to his feet. The only sound that penetrated the frigid air was that of his, Wolf's, and Anilora's breathing; Reivin, fully paralyzed for the moment following the proton blast, could neither move nor speak, and Celestra had fallen out of sight. Firming his jaw Bill detirminedly limped his way forward to help his friends.
He had not taken three steps before he blacked out from the pain.
When Bill came around again some thirty minutes later, he found that his knee had been crudely braced with a plethera of twigs tied together with some manner of sweet grass. Swiveling his head he found Anilora kneeling a few yards away, cradling Celestra in his arms. The captain's shirt was torn and bloody from the chain spikes, but he seemed quite coherent; Celestra lay limply in Anilora's lap, awake and with her wound wrapped securely with strips of cloth torn from Anilora's own traveling cloak, but her eyes were glazed and her face more pale than was normal.
"Where are those damned--" Bill began heatedly, but Anilora cut him off with a raised hand and pointed at the sky.
A cruiser had just risen above the treeline; by the look of things Wolf and Reivin had called for aid, for the ship was not the assassin's. Bill narrowed his eyes; doubtless Leon Powalski had come to their rescue.
Anilora stroked Celestra's hair soothingly, and the three companions followed the cruiser with their eyes and continued to stare long after it had faded from view.