Entering Venomian airspace proved an easy task, for most of Andross's followers had deployed for Bolse and Area 6 and few remained behind now to deter Celestra's landing. She suspected that she was the first non-Venomian to set foot on this planet of her own volition in years, an accomplishment lost on her as she padded about in search of a battlefield that favored her. The ground had some give to it, imparting a squishy sensation every time she took a step; great clouds of brown steam wafted up through cracks in the rock, and trickles of some eerie yellow liquid ran in rivulets along the uneven surfaces. The sky was similarly clouded by a veil of unnatural brownish-green fog, and Celestra almost wished she didn't have to breathe for the disgust she felt.
"Is this whole planet dead?" she mused aloud, pitying the unthinking lackeys Andross had snared into his grasp that were forced to endure such pollution.
A little further on (she guessed she was heading generally eastward) Celestra stumbled upon something that seemed somehow familiar. It was a pentagonal-shaped dias carved out of the rock underfoot, bearing the symbol of Andross in its center; five crumbling steps led to a brass nameplate that read simply THE ALTAR OF FALLEN STAR. The ruin was encompassed by eight pillars, each one representing the creed of Andross: chaos, destruction, greed, hatred, betrayal, dominion, cruelty, and deception. Celestra spat on the dias in resentment.
"Beware your actions," came Reivin's voice behind her. "You are very far from home; such things are considered blasphemy here."
The tone in his voice suggested that he wasn't finished speaking; Celestra continued to study the nameplate as Reivin scaled the stairs and halted at her side. His weapons were sheathed and his arms were crossed, and she made no moves to draw hers. For several moments they stood in some kind of revered silence, then he continued. "This is one of the last sacred places still intact from the first Lylat War, and the only one of such places upon this planet."
Celestra nodded once to show that she understood; she had visited other such places with Bill before. "And its significance?"
Reivin's empty jade eyes were glittering strangely. "This altar marks the final battle in that previous war, in which Lord Andross cast down and killed Star Fox mercenary leader James McCloud. It is also of importance to me because this is where I swore fealty to Andross eight years ago."
"With what to gain?" Celestra responded instantly, and her adversary raised his eyes to the heavens.
"Power and domination. It was all I desired from the beginning--the power to change all that I despised and the dominance to be seen and worshiped by my underlings." Reivin stepped down from the dias and stood facing one of the pillars, fingers gently tracing the ancient Venomian rune for dominion. "I knew well enough that Andross could easily grant me both if I remained loyal to him, so I did his dirty work for the amount of time needed to enter his trusted inner circle. Predictably it paid off in the end--as you can undoubtedly tell, I am Andross's most trusted follower."
Celestra turned on him then, breaking the string of almost docile conversation. "You mean slave? Because that's what you really are, you know."
If she had hoped to raise an infuriated tirade from him, she failed; Reivin closed his eyes and chuckled softly. "Tell me something, Celestra--you and I were very close in our younger days, just as close as you and Bill. Why didn't you follow me to Venom? You could have achieved greatness here, and we would fight so well together."
The female assassin's blue eyes widened, as if she could hardly believe what she was hearing. At a loss for words she merely stammered, "Are you . . . kidding?"
Reivin looked up, and the curious glint in his eyes faded to one of eerie calm; the unexpected change gave Celestra chills. "Far from it."
"You killed half our friends from the Cornerian Flight Academy!" Celestra raged, regaining her composure. "You hunted me from age sixteen on up to exact revenge on Bill! Why would I follow you, my would-be assassin, and leave Bill, my greatest friend who has never betrayed me?"
"Opportunity," Reivin countered simply, as though the answer was obvious. "The two of us shared so much more; it only made sense that we continue on in the same manner."
Under another circumstance Celestra would have felt certain that Reivin was merely trying to spite her, to keep her at odds with herself, but the quiet, even tone to his voice and that awful calm lingering about his eyes made her feel that he was speaking truthfully. "We shared nothing!" she spat back forcefully, but she was now more intrigued by his continued lack of hostility than angry. "You just took the cowards' way out!"
Reivin subconsciously carressed the rune of deception and shook his head. "You know as well as I that we shared many unspoken feelings. We were both orphaned at early ages; we both wished revenge upon those who destroyed our families, and to accomplish that we turned to natural talent and ambition to make us the very best. We both let our loneliness grow into depression and at last to hatred--"
"And there's the difference between you and me!" Celestra burst in loudly, pale eyes flashing. "You took your hate out on those responsible for rescuing you from the same fate; I channeled it into fighting the ones who brought on my solitude!"
"You're wrong again, my dear Celestra. I turned on those who would presume to sugarcoat my parents' deaths with some tragic and heroic tale; Andross told me the whole truth, no compassionate strings attached. The Dark Lord never one tried to sublimate my capabilities, opting instead to help me harness and control them; General Pepper feared the talent I had in store, and would have suffocated me in his ranks before ever giving me the chance I deserved!"
Celestra was shocked; here at last was the grand scheme behind Reivin's long-past betrayal! Slowly she approached and placed one delicate hand to his cheek, the first non-aggressive contact between the two since their childhood years. The touch issued sudden eye-contact between them, a look that lasted many moments before Celestra asked, "Why now, Reivin? Where was all this eight years ago, when all I wanted was a reason?"
Reivin slapped her hand away, and the cold, emotionless sparkle returned to his eyes. "Because I wanted you to understand everything . . . before you died today."
Celestra leapt back a step as though truly stung, scowling and drawing her switchblades. Reivin casually smoothed out a stray feather before doing the same, now shaking his head in remorse. "I had hoped there was still a chance you would submit to Andross willingly, that he might open your eyes to your greatest potential as he did for me. Regrettably I see that is impossible, so you leave me with no choice--I must end you life here and now."
"What makes you think I'll lose?" Celestra gritted.
"I have my assurances." Reivin nodded his head to indicate something behind her; Celestra turned to look.
The four mercenaries of Star Wolf were standing on the dias, surveying her with malicious pleasure.
"Recently the five of us came to an understanding," Wolf began to explain with a sneer.
"We really don't care how you die," Pigma added dismissively.
"So long as you die, here and now," said Andrew.
"We won't resent the one who delivers the final blow," Leon finished deviously. "We'll congratulate him."
Celestra took one step away from them and flinched when she nearly ran into Reivin. "I don't believe this . . . you . . ." She fixed Reivin with an angry, steely look. "You let me believe you and I would finish this on even terms, and you meant to call them here all along!"
"Very good, Celestra," Reivin congratulated with a sinister laugh. "Now . . . what do you say we get this over with? I don't want you to suffer . . . too much."
With an enraged battle cry Celestra dove at Reivin, coming in fast with a one-two combination aimed for his ribs. The evil assassin side-stepped the first strike and parried the second harmlessly wide with a nonchalant sweep of one arm. A shot fired form one of the mercenaries at her back, and she ducked just in time, watching it sail over her shoulder and singe a few of Reivin's feathers. Celestra pivoted as Leon came in close and batted one of his daggers away from her thigh; Pigma kicked out, lashing her across the backs of the knees, and she fell to the dirt. Laughter filled her ears; someone grabbed a handful of her ebony hair and jerked her mercilessly to her feet, and then a punch came flying out of nowhere and everything was dark.
"We can be there in an hour," Fox said with a sigh. "We're moving as fast as we can."
"And I thank you," Anilora returned absently, focusing more on the battle before his eyes than the mercenaries trying vainly to capture his attention for a fleeting moment. "But I fear the battle will have ended by the time you arrive, if that is the case."
Peppy nervously twitched his whiskers at this. "General Pepper hesitates to take us into hyperspace; if we overshoot Area 6 it will take us longer to reach you."
"And if it succeeds?"
"We could be with you sometime between ten and fifteen minutes," Fox hypothesized, glancing over at the two quiet members of his team. Slippy was sitting wordlessly in the middle of the couch, staring down at his hands incomprehensibly, and Falco was sitting on Celestra's familiar windowsill, frowning out the window.
"Beg him to take the risk," Anilora pleaded, at last focusing fully on Fox. "If the jump into hyperspace does not fail, we may yet take the defense station. Anilora, over and out."
"I'll tell him," Slippy offered softly, and he slouched out of the room. Falco leapt off the windowsill and strode up to his mercenary leader.
"Something's not right," he said, clearly in a state of unease. "Contact Celest, will you? Make sure she's still okay."
Fox offered only a slight frown before re-booting the G-Diffuser system. "Bringer of Chaos, this is the Great Fox. Do you read me?"
No one answered. Falco's anxiety intensified. "Where is she? Why won't she answer?"
"Somebody call?" came Bill's voice, and the three mercenaries shared a quizzical glance. Thankfully the Katinan assassin caught on quickly, because he chuckled and added, "Or were ya lookin' for Celest? Bringer of Chaos has a re-routin' transmission device; if somebody tries to get ahold of her and she's not in her Arwing, it gets sent to me. What do ya need?"
"'Not in her Arwing'?" Falco repeated tensely. "Where's she run off to? Why isn't she at Area 6 with you guys?"
Bill blinked once, uncertain, then said, "Oh . . . didn't she tell ya? She's gone to fight Reivin on Venom."
A nervous, very sickening silence settled darkly upon the mercenaries' hearts. Fox ran a hand down his face and said, "Star Wolf took off hours ago for no reason--"
"--'Pressing matters to attend', Wolf said," Peppy recalled, voice trembling.
"She's been played by that good-for-nothing Frost!" Falco howled, pounding his fist into a wall. "He two-timed her into thinking it would be a fair fight, then he called in Star Wolf for back-up to ensure he wouldn't lose!" He whirled on Fox, eyes wild. "We've got to go after her!"
"We have a more pressing obligation," Fox reminded sullenly, though he was clearly against the idea. "If we back out now, the Cornerian-Zonessian alliance will suffer without us, and any cripple in forces could lose it all at Area 6."
"So we leave her for Frost and Star Wolf?! Look what happened the last time we abandoned her!" exclaimed Peppy, referring to the wreck and follow-up mission in the deserts of Titania.
Bill broke up the escalating feud with a short cough. "I've really got to run, mates, but let me tell ya this--if it was me doiwn there, surrounded by Andross's top five supporters, I can tell ya who'd be the first one to come chasin' after me. And that's countin' all personal matters and battles to be fought; that's no matter what."
Anilora was more than a little surprised when he recognized the Arwing of Sensenic Morray skirting around near Bill's, fervently attempting to penetrate Venomian defenses and strike at the defense station. Signaling for his pilot to carry on, the Katinan captain quickly moved to the G-Diffuser and asked, "Sensenic, what in the hell are you about?! Why aren't you piloting FrigidFire?"
"My greetings, respectable Captain! Regrettably my post was taken up by Erik, who seemed to crave the comfort of its destructive prowess far more than I." Morray was tailing Bill closely, preparing to sneak through an opening if the assassin found one. "William has been lost, sir."
"W-William has--?"
"Don't say it!" cried Erik, letting loose numerous detonators into patches of concentrated enemy craft. His eyes were emotionless, his facial visage set into cold stone. "No one speak of it now! Too much must be done, and if I again succumb to despair I fear I shall never destroy the battleship responsible for--" Erik clenched his hands around the twin joysticks controlling the magnificent Fortunan starship and squeezed his eyes shut, stubbornly combating grief.
Morray nodded. "The conversation has ended, dear Erik." Coyly the elder Fortunan turned back to Anilora, whose eyes were sad. "Now I am reminded that you, Captain, are doing no one any good hiding out in your cruiser. Haven't you a perfectly good Arwing of your own?"
Bill laughed, albeit briefly. "Join us, Cap'n! We always said if we were gonna go, we'd go out together."
Less than five minutes later the grey Katinan craft could be seen in pursuit of Fury of Katina, calling out, "Reform the defensive lines! All cruisers advance into the red zone; break their primary lines and attack the station!" Then Anilora smiled. "Hiding out in my cruiser, bah. I was waiting for the precise moment to strike!"
Seeking out a certain defensible pattern was not easy, but Anilora found the formation he was looking for and dove in eagerly. Bill and Morray, sensing some upcoming chaos, quickly sped in after him and together the trio launched the first real assault on Area 6. They flew in below the giant, rotating disk of a defensive base, and at Anilora's command they opened fire with a various assortment of weapons. The defenses were considerably weakened (after all, Bolse had been downed a while ago), so all their attacks went through and rattled the intimidating structure.
All through the battle Anilora had been pondering the use of the seemingly ornamental structure precariously built onto the top of the disk; it was a conic-shaped apparatus that appeared to be of no great value. This, unfortunately, proved very false; a beam like lightning struck from the spindly point of the cone, connecting with deadly force with the Katinan captain's Arwing and sending him sideways to bang into the side. Upon impact the craft's systems all aborted, leaving his defenseless, in the dark, and without communications. Yet by some strange design he was not dead, his craft hadn't exploded, and still seemed completely intact. Anilora frowned, confused.
Bill and Morray skittered back a short distance, mouth agape. An electrical current had surrounded Anilora's ship; slowly the beam of white light was tugging their captain toward Area 6!
"A magnetic tracking beam!" Morray observed. "What a clever device . . . how did they manage it?"
"Morray!" Bill scolded. "How do we get rid of it? It's got Gilraen!"
"Get rid of it?" Morray stroked his chin thoughtfully. "Well, a significant amount of destructive energy ought to do the trick, but we can't cross a certain point or we'll be rendered immobile and captured too."
"Captured?!" Bill shrieked in dismay; surely enough, Anilora's Arwing had disappeared. "Ya failed to mention that!"
"They won't hurt him," Morray reassured, turning around and making a beeline for FrigidFire. "Andross would want to see him first, I expect."
"You expect?!" Bill was almost to the point of explosion. "I don't think ya understand what's just happened--the captain of all Katinan forces, one of Andross's top five most wanted, has just been captured! When Andross sees him, he'll kill him!"
Morray's brow furrowed in anxiety. "Now what did you do that for? You've gone and got me worried!"
Anilora's curiosity changed rapidly to confusion when he started gliding further away from his comrades, and then to utmost fear when he was wrestled out of his Arwing and marched off deeper into Area 6, surrounded on all sides by Venomian soldiers. His wrists were manacled tightly behind him; every so often he shook them to restore circulation, earning him a crack on the back of the head from one of his captors. Eventually he and his entourage arrived in what seemed to be a briefing room, awaiting the arrival of some Venomian by the name of Rhazed.
Rhazed turned out to be a hulking elk of at least seven feet, brutal horns nearly brushing the ceiling as he stooped his head to enter the room. His hooves clacked menacingly upon the cold cement floor; he halted a foot or so from Anilora, shoving his enormous snout into the frightened captain's face and snuffling a few times. "What have we got here?" he ordered more than asked, voice a malevolent baritone.
"First guy stupid enough to pass in range of the tracking beam," explained one of the guards. "No identification on him--haven't got a clue who he is."
'Thank heaven,' Anilora silently praised. 'They haven't guessed my station! Andross would send for me immediately if told the Katinan captain was in custody in Area 6!'
As Anilora and Rhazed sized one another up a warning siren rent the air; many of the Venomians present clapped hands over their ears. "A thick, northern-accented voice squealed into the intercom, "All reinforcement battalions to the ships! The Cornerian-Zonessian fleet has just exited hyperspace; they've dropped right on us!"
"Precise timing!" the Katinan captain whispered excitedly; Rhazed overheard his words and nailed the smaller human with a heavy punch to his jaw. Dazed, Anilora swooned backward into the rough grasps of his guards, and Rhazed cracked his knuckles and swore.
"Bring him!" he growled viciously, and he strode off down a dark hallway at a rapid pace. Anilora struggled to focus his violet eyes as they dragged him along, but the punch had been solidly dealt and he reeled in and out of consciousness, only vaguely aware of the blood trickling out the side of his mouth.
His armed sentries threw him haphazardly into a steel cell; there he was manacled to twin chains securely welded to one of the walls. The silhouette of Rhazed the elk filled his cell door, and Anilora barely heard him speak. "A word, if you can hear it. Not all of us are as stupid when it comes to our captives, and the first envoy that can be spared will be taking you straight to Andross--Captain Gilraen Anilora." The door abruptly clanged shut, snuffing out the last remaining light.
"Damnation," Anilora slurred, and he passed out.
Just as Anilora lost consciousness within Area 6, Celestra's eyes fluttered open on Venom. The first thing she surmised was that she was tightly bound, her hands secured over her head to one of the eight pillars encircling the Altar of Fallen Star. Glancing down she noticed her feet were similarly tied up against the pillar. A single knife was wedged in a crack an inch or two shy of one of the assassin's armpits; she swore and blinked a few times, bringing her vision into focus.
"Oh, Celestra! Magnificent of you to join us," drawled Leon coolly, twirling one of her own butterfly knives between his fingers. "You are perhaps wondering which of us missed? We allowed Pigma to throw the first blade; you'll have to forgive him, he is not accustomed to this art of fighting."
Snickers erupted from behind the chameleon; the other mercenaries and Reivin were grouped pell-mell at his back in a line, looking on in delight.
"However, it is my turn now," Leon continued, readying for the throw. "I never miss, though, so I think I'll call my shot."
"Where will it hit?" Wolf pressed.
"Oh . . . somewhere difficult. Her right ear, I think." With an effortless flick of his wrist Leon sent the blade flying, grazing her right ear as promised. Celestra winced but bit her bottom lip to keep from crying out. If this was to be her end, she would give them no satisfaction. To prove that point, she firmed her jaw and eyed the five of them menacingly.
"Try not to waste time if you're going to kill me. I want to be able to find a suitable point in the afterlife from which I can watch all of you burn in hell."
Great peals of laughter echoed back at her at that proclamation; Wolf replaced Leon at the front of the line, cocking Celestra's other butterfly knife. "Cocky to the very end, I see. How disappointing. At any rate, I too will call my throw, and I'll be aiming for your left hipbone." Wolf's blade also found its mark, but thankfully enough it didn't go deep; the tear in her ear was seeping blood down her neck.
Defiantly Celestra spat at them, "I wish I could be around for your long months of torture and public executions when Lylat is freed, you pathetic Seperatists."
Reivin smiled devilishly at her, unearthing the first of her switchblades. "Yes, yes; that's all fine and good, but it's my turn, Celestra. I will be aiming for your wrist, and that could sever any one of several vital veins. This should be interesting, so pay close attention." Carefully sizing up the throw her rival assassin let fly the knife; at the last possible second Celestra twitched her bindings roughly to one side in a desperate attempt to at least lessen the fatality of the blow. Sure enough she succeeded; the knife struck the outside joint of her wrist, sinking in deep and sending blood down her arm, but Reivin was scowling nonetheless. He had expected to slit the tender part of her wrist, a critical blow that would slowly and painfully cause her death.
"Bad luck, Reivin," Leon chuckled, stepping up to the front for his second attempt. "As a professional torturer, I waste little time--right elbow, just above the joint."
The blow struck home; Celestra growled low in the back of her throat and sank her teeth deep into her lip to stifle a scream. This particular wound would quickly become a problem; it was in a weak spot, and blood already spurted freely from it.
As for the five hired killers before her, the sight of unbreakable Celestra Marquette, bound and bleeding helplessly before them, incited sadistic laughter that brought hysterical tears to their eyes. Wolf had to wipe his single electric-blue eye before drawing a wicked dagger of his own and tossing it idly from one hand to the other. Behind him, Pigma and Andrew could not stifle their amusement; Reivin shot them a venomous look, and they grudgingly silenced themselves.
"Game, set, and match," Wolf recited dangerously, savoring the growing pale in the female assassin's cheeks. She couldn't stop her body from trembling, trapped between the sensations of cold, pain, and fear. "The first mortal wound belongs to me, I'm afraid, and I think I'll stick it in your kidney. Try not to despise me too much." With that manic, possessed look lingering in his eye, the lupin cocked his hand for the throw.
Behind the pillar a shot fired, sending the knife spinning end-over-end out of the mercenary leader's hand to fall into the dirt. Wolf looked up in hatred, evidently searching for the assailant, and his face turned ghostly pale as he stumbled a few steps back.
"It's . . . not possible!" he stammered awkwardly.
A soft rumbling echoed across the sky like thunder, and seemingly from the air itself a single Venomian spacecraft dropped down into their midst; in the nick of time the five of them scattered, diving or rolling to all sides. As the ship crashed into a state of slight disorder and the cockpit opened, Slippy poked his head out and cast his gaze about in earnest. "Did I miss anyone?"
Blasters were going off behind Celestra, three in all; armed only with close-combat weapons, having discarded their guns, Reivin and the mercenaries scrambled out of the way and dove behind protective surfaces. Slippy leapt out of the cockpit, firing a gun that left a peculiar cloud of green smoke; Fox, Falco, and Peppy sprinted up in front of the injured assassin. "They were all too quick, unfortunately," answered Peppy with a scowl.
With a few quick shots at her bonds Falco had freed Celestra; she fell limply into Fox's outstretched arms, and with the help of his comrades they all lowered her carefully to the ground.
"Puncture wounds to the ear, hip, elbow, and wrist," Slippy detailed, checking the injuries with a handheld medical device. "The one to her elbow could be fatal if we don't seal it off soon; the wrist harbors no severed arteries or veins, so don't worry about that."
Falco was still on his feet, clutching a pair of laser pistols and waiting for their adversaries to resurface. "You guys are just plain sick!" he shouted at the unseen group, firing at random at all possible hiding places. "I'm even ashamed to call you my enemies!" Fox had just returned from Slippy's spacecraft, arms laden with gauze and tape, and in a somewhat softer voice Falco asked, "She going to be okay, you guys?"
"She should be." Slippy set to work, feverishly swabbing at Celestra's elbow until it was partially clean and hastily wrapping up the wound with surgical tape. "I think she's gone into shock, what with the blood loss and near death experience and all." Tearing off the wrap with his teeth the youngest mercenary sealed the work he had done, focusing now on her wrist. At that moment Reivin rose, dusting off his pants and raising his knives.
"Now, where's the honor in guns?" he taunted Falco, the nearest to him.
The avian tightened his grips on the pistols and leashed a barrage that would have killed a normal man; Reivin ducked down again, merely singed. "Yeah? Well, where's the honor in target practice on a bound, unconscious woman, you twisted psychopath?"
"A valid point," Peppy congratulated, rising to Falco's side and similarly unsheathing his guns. "Gentlemen, I do believe out adversaries lack guns of any kind," Fox pointed out, stepping up to them and whisking a plasma rifle into his hands. "Let's flush them out like the rats they are!" On that note the three Star Fox members took to firing madly everywhere, determined to destroy the opposing team. "Slippy, keep it up on Celestra! We'll cover you!"
Slippy had just finished quickly and thoroughly tending the assassin's four wounds, and was now prying open a small hip flask filled with water. Gently he pulled the cap off and poured a few drops on her forehead, stirring her back into consciousness. Her eyes were blurred and tired, but she blinked a few times, coughed, and murmured his name in recognition.
"Hey, we made it," Slippy told her lighly, holding the flask to her lips so she could drink. "We'll take care of everything from here, okay? You rest now."
As he made to turn away Celestra's hand darted out and clutched his forearm, and he marveled at the surprisingly strong grip from someone who had just come out of shock. She pulled him closer with some effort, fighting against coughing fits, and when his ear was millimeters from her lips she said, "Not Reivin. He's mind, understand?"
Perfectly understanding an act of vengeance when he saw one, Slippy nodded and hurried to his friends' aid, leaving the weakened assassin to rest.
Celestra closed her eyes, laboriously returning her breathing to a controlled, deep rhythm. The pain and fatigue she felt was beginning to subside, replaced by a bubbling, seething hate the likes of which she had never felt before. It was empty and consuming, like a void into which she had willingly fallen, and she opened her mind, body, and soul to embrace it.
The problem with harboring the Macbethian child inside for so long was that she always felt the conflicting views from the assassin she was now and the girl she was then. Such disability to accept her past had kept her from ever growing at ease with herself and her situation, largely because of her unwillingness to set aside long past tragedy. Now that she had released the influence of the child from her existence, now that the time had come for an action and atonement of some kind, Celestra no longer questioned what she had become.
She was an assassin, a dark angel serving the forces of good for a shot at retribution. When her eyes opened again all the torment and tiredness had evaporated from them, replaced only by a hungry revenge and a demanding hate.
Measuring her course of action Celestra rose, seeming to float effortlessly as she gained her feet and set off across the barren, lifeless Venomian expanse. Her face remained expressionless, her mind a blank and empty slate, her heart the engine that drove her body on its course that led to deliverance. Through it all there stood one task at the moment, one goal that seemed above all others.
Kill Reivin Frost.
Leon had dredged up a blaster from somewhere, and as he was stalking Falco he paused for a second and fired once at her. Celestra inclined her chin a few inches, never one looking at him or the shot, and the beam whizzed harmelessly past. Then at last she turned and fixed him with such a horrible glare that he gasped audibly in trepidation and took one step back. A plasma laser was in her hand before she could even comprehend the action, and she fired once, burying a blast in his right shoulder. The chameleon shrieked and fell back, clutching his wound, and Celestra paid him no more attention.
The other mercenaries were all darting about, fiercely attacking their foes in abandon. She marched determinedly past all of them.
Reivin was standing above a circular pit in the ground when she approached, and upon seeing her he sealed the dark opening quickly. Those knives were in his hands, those wicked blades that had spilled the blood of so many of her and Bill's childhood friends.
She hated him so much.
"Very well," he muttered to her. "Let's end this private war of ours, shall we? You are becoming rather a nuisance, and I tire of dragging this out. Come--put away your guns, draw out your blades, and let us be done with it."
Celestra let her gaze slip to the plasma lasers, marveling at the perfect contour of their grips in her hands. 'Put them away?' she pondered to herself. 'Why? It doesn't matter how this ends, does it? No; only that it ends now.'
She raised the blasters and fired; Reivin screamed, horrified, cursing her lack of honor and the sudden change of heart. She fired until he was panting in the dirt, his blood spilling freely from dozens of burning laser holes. Silently she stalked up to stand over his body, aiming the barrels for his heart.
"What . . . are you?" he gasped out, and his eyes held an incomprehensible fear that sent ripples of pleasure through the female assassin's body.
Celestra pulled the trigger, ending her enemy's baleful existence. Turning away she stated monotonously to his body, "I am the assassin."
"I don't want to go down there, man; I know who's down there."
Falco was hugging himself in a desperate attempt to shield his anxiety; Slippy knelt, studying the copper plate that sealed off the circular tunnel leading into Venom's core. "It could lead to any number of places, you know, but yes; it'll probably send us straight to Andross."
Fox and Peppy were taking it in turns to study the complete devastation of Reivin Frost's body, then shoot unreadable glances at Celestra. The assassin herself seemed back to normal, arms crossed and staring at the grate with mild interest. Slippy traced his fingers over a tiny keyhole in the center of the tunnel door, then looked up with a frown.
"If we had the key--" Before he was even through with his sentence Celestra dangled a thin silver chain in front of him, the key gifted to her from Captain Anilora hanging from it. Slippy snatched it up gleefully and worked it into the slot, and it swung the grate open with perfect ease. Staring down into the fathomless pit Slippy swallowed hard and stuttered, "I don't know about this, you guys--"
Celestra looped the chain and key back around her neck and tucked it under her shirt, saying, "We can't stop now! We've faced and defeated everything Andross has thrown at us for months, and you guys want to go back?" Leaving that as her parting note the assassin disappeared down the hole with a graceful leap.
"I can't go back," Fox murmured, more to himself than to his fellow mercenaries. "Andross killed my father--I don't have a choice." Tucking his knees up close to his chest the vulpine performed an amusing cannonball dive and fell away out of sight.
Falco uttered a stream of curses, and against his better judgement he stepped up to the desolate opening. "Man . . . if we don't go, they'll never let us hear the end of it, so let's--" Before the avian could finish speaking the grate clanged back over the opening with a bang of finality; Slippy dropped to his knees and rapped frantically with his knuckles, but they were solidly deterred and cut off from their two friends.
"Fox!" Peppy shouted, cupping his hands over his mouth to project the sound. "Celestra! Can you hear me?" No reply could be heard beyond the grate; Falco flung himself to the ground in dismay.
"Great," Slippy sighed. "Now what?"
"Jam that key back in there," Falco offered.
"Yeah, okay; Celestra's got it. Any other ideas?"
"Peppy collapsed beside Falco, rubbing his ears, clearly distressed. "Should we wait for them?"
"I don't think that's the best idea." Slippy rattled with the offending copper door once more before running a hand down his face and checking their surroundings. "We're not doing any good to anyone just sitting here; I say we head back out to our Arwings and rejoin the fleet at Area 6. With any luck the general made the hyperspace jump okay, and they're still holding strong."
"You want to leave them here?" asked Falco incredilously, gesturing at the chute.
"Slip's got a point," Peppy put in softly. "Sitting and waiting is no good, especially when there's still a battle to be fought. At least we know Celestra and Fox are alive, and unharmed, and together. We can't help them now."
Falco heaved a sigh and stood up. He truly despised the idea of leaving two of his closest friends anywhere, and if he were to go without them he would certainly not choose Andross's lair within Venom as the place of abandonment. But Slippy and Peppy were right; they had each other, and that counted for something.
"Alright, you win; let's go and give Pepper and Anilora a hand."