The Cerinian

By Ariaz

Disclaimer: I do not own star fox in any way, I do own the characters Kirin, Pierce, Pinza, Connor, and Fiona and any other that is to be listed. I do not own Soul edge from Soul calibur.

Chapter 1

Questions with impossible answers

It was a night like any other night in the Mccloud home, quiet and secure, the peace of the planets kept in check and the action: Scarce. A couple monthes have passed since the incident of Grey Fang and his onslaught of possessing Kirin's body, only to be slain by his host when he was set free into the world. It was indeed like any other night. The scent of delicious turkey poured into the air and caught the attention of all within the home to be drawn to the table, the cooking of Krystal was beyond any nearby chef, and yet, being a native to corneria, she has become adaptive quickly. Yes, it was night like any other night indeed. The young teenager, Kirin, sat at the dinner table with a gloomy vibe from his body, too much peace meant there would be no action for him to take pleasure on cutting to pieces, not even attempting to pick at the turkey and veggies laid on the plate in front of him, this caught his mothers attention immediatly, as any dinner like this would send Kirin into a hungry frenzy and nearly end up destroying the plate with his jaws, only now she wondered why Kirin hadn't been eating for the past two days. Perhaps it wasn't a night like every other night.

"Kirin?" Krystal asked softly from across the table, a lovely soft blue gown worn and her hair in a long pony tail. Kirin took this time to simply eye his mother with the same gloom that lingered around him.

"Yeah mom?" Kirin replied with another, yet simple, question of his own, his voice wasn't low nor weighed down by fatigue, he spoke in a perfect, yet slightly curious tone.

"Something troubling you?" Krystal passed another question across the table, like a game of go fish but only with words and questions, and there would be no winner.

"…Kinda…I…" Kirin grumbled slightly, his words now beginning to meld into muttering, becoming too hard to understand.

Fox held his paw to his face and rubbed between his eyes slowly, groaning, wiping his paw across his muzzle and followed his groaning with a sigh, and soon gave Kirin a look that could say "Alright, spill it".

"You got a girl pregnant, didn't you?" Fox asked him a question that could make any son shudder, but kirin remained stiff.

"No I didn't…I…just wanna know more about my other side." Kirin finally spoke clearly enough for them to understand.

"Side of what?" Fox asked with a brand new question, though he could understand his words, the meaning wasn't so clear to him.

"Mom's side of the family, the side I know nothing of, what am I other then some blue furred gifted teenager?" Kirin ask in a steady and clear voice, getting his point along the table to both his parents; Fox quickly looked at Krystal, expecting the one reaction to anything that involved memories of cerinia: Sadness.

Krystal slowly pushed from the table and sighed with a hint of weeping in her voice, tears started to run down her face, she pushed her seat away from her and left the table as quick as he legs would move, crying softly as she went up to the bedroom in a hurry. Kirin was now beyond confused, and curiosity was only leading him further into the lions den.

"Did I say something?" Kirin asked bluntly, his confusion coming first before his curiousity.

"Kirin…your mothers race, her planet, her home…they died a long time ago, the whole planet and all, you and her, as far as anyone can figure out, are the last of her kind. It's best that you don't ask her at all." Fox explained as clearly as he could, as well as making sure Kirin understood. Kirin stood from the table and looked down at Fox, what he was about to say was his first sign of bravery againsts a parents advice.

"Dad…I have to hear this from Moms words, she knows, not you." Kirin boldly spoke and left the table after pushing his chair away and back in, leaving his plate untouched and his dinner uneatten, the dinner table was left quiet, only Fox was left their sitting alone. "I'm sorry dad, but I need to know."

Kirin walked up the stairs quietly as not to disturb his mother or make a loud set of stompings and headed towards his mothers room, Fox just placed both his paws in an ark and rested his head against the side of his fingers, holding his head up gently as he rested and gathered his thoughts.

"Your going to hurt her even more." Fox whispered quietly, knowing that Krystal was in enough pain already, but couldn't understand why Kirin couldn't just leave her alone about such matters.

Kirin grasped the door knob of room door slowly, turning it to the left as quietly as he could and entered the room without his clankin boots on, only the soft pads of his feet touched the ground, his attention as well as his gaze was caught and turned to look at his weeping mother who took the time to change out of her gown and into her blue T-shirt and her black shorts. With a soft sigh of regret, Kirin sat down next to her and began to rub her back, trying to comfort his mother.

"Mom…I'm sorry…but I want to know…who were my other grand parents…what was my other race like?" Kirin asked softly, his curiosity and eager spirit, as well as his longing needs couldn't be kept down, she was the only one he knew that had the answers.

Krystal slowly lifted her head away from her tear soaked pillow, move away strands of her hair away from her sight and looked her son, she felt that she was going to weep again, she just couldn't bare the pain to answer his questions that he wanted answered, she couldn't speak of the truth to him, she was to much filled with pain to even tell them that they were killed, along with every other Cerinian and Cerinia as well.

"Kirin…some questions…just have impossible answers." Krystal managed to speak and wipe her tears away, just because she couldn't tell the truth didn't mean she couldn't give a different answer.

"What do you mean?" Kirin asked her, his ears dropping to the sides of his head, he was confused completly.

"Sometimes, questions that are asked usually have many unwanted or hard to handle answers, leading into conflicts that can affect someone's life in the future, making living their life almost or completely impossible, and hence, Impossible answers." Krystal explained softly, wiping away more tears from her cheeks and her eyes, she then turned her gaze to Kirin.

"I think the thing is that you don't want to answer my questions." Kirin bluntly spoke with complete accuracy on the situation.

Krystal eyes suddenly became wide and again made tears flow down her cheeks, she just sat there trying to figure out how he knew that she didn't want to tell him the truth, did he just figure it out or had he known all along and made it known to her just now to throw her off guard and force her into telling him.

"Mom…" Kirin spoke softly, trying to get her attention out of her thoughts and onto him.

Krystal couldn't handle it anymore and quickly looked away from her child, her tears could definitely give him the answer that he had been searching for, the answers that he didn't want to ever know, the answers he didn't hope for, but completely opposite. He cleared his throat slightly from a sad fear that he imaged in his mind as he finally asked his last question to her for the night.

"They're not alive are they?" Was all he spoke, and waited for his mothers final reaction.

Krystal then shook her head slowly and laid down on her bed, doing her best to try to fall asleep so that she could put this night behind her; Kirin was right and being right about this only made him become filled with grief, his grand parents were dead and with them all his future questions of learning about himself, he couldn't believe it, and most of that time, he didn't want to believe it either, the side he wanted to know the most about, to learn more of his native side, was the one he would never learn about with ease and couldn't bare to put more agony upon his mother's soul; Kirin's heart fell into pain of heartache, he couldn't feel pain in many ways as he has trained himself very well, but this struck his heart like every planets army fleet of the most elite troops and elite ship striking Corneria with a relentless blow; this is the very equal of pain he felt in his heart.

The night passed on quickly and the Mccloud parents fell into slumber in each others arm on top of their comfy bed, however the light of Kirin's room remain on slightly from one source: His computer. Kirin looked on the internet for anything that could calm his hunger for knowledge, searching for information on the Cerinian race he desired to learn more about, but every information site, every dictionary, encyclopedias, even old reports, what he found amongst all those he could search…was nothing that could answer anything he wanted to know. The race was gone and slowly was his questions, his hopes of learning of who his ancestors were, he was never going to learn of his past ancestors, his mother wasn't going to assist in helping in his search either for this information he so desperatly hunted for, in this dilema he is on his own and finding answers to his past seemed impossible to continue, but he had to carry on in his search, he had to find the information he so long has hungered for.

"Damn it, of all the questions you can answer and information you can provide, you can't help with my research at all? Worthless thing!" Kirin snarled at his computer, his fingers rapidly dancing along the keyboard and the mouse flying across the screen, clicking again and again on different links that passed by the pointer. Kirin, through persistance and a slight amount of caffine, kept on searching on his family's blood line, never ceasing his desire to know, to learn, to discover, it all seemed hopeless as minutes passed quickly until one link caught his eye with the description saying: Cerinian family trees. "Damn, I can't find a…hello, what's this?"

His search finally paid off through a solid two hours of nothing but searching up cerinians; wasting not a precious minute he had to spare, Kirin immediatly clicked on one of his ancestors picture from Cerinia, he was so eager to learn everything about his family's past, the information inside the profile awaited him to read.

"Zagin Lavender was a highly ranked priest of the gods of the Lavender family, his teachings in all elements, even both life and death elementals, brought much progression to the planets developing period, but his teachings were not so free to perform as they came with great difficulty and consequences. "In order to use, one must offer for the spell to be permenantly affixated to the mind, but the tribute for the spell must be of great and equal value. This is the consequence to the art of magic."…huh…I wonder what the hell that means?" Kirin thought to himself as he rubbed his chin, it was clear to him that he has possession of the element of earth, but very little of it, but this type of magic that Zagin spoke of, the idea of giving something away to learn, this weighed on his mind heavily, pressuring his eager mind to look into it.

Kirin began a completely different search, though with little hope, his laptop, the internet, nothing could provide any information of the arts of magic, in this time, such things are considered ancient folklore, and not even scientists would bother studying it. Nothing could be found…but there was one last thing that also weighed heavily on his head, burdening his mind.

"My other last name."

Kirin closed his laptop slowly and gently, saving the information for later studies and searches.

"Is seriously."

Kirin fell back onto his bed and pulled the blanket half way up to his chest and yawned.

"Gay."

Kirin fell asleep slowly and peacefully, tomorrow would be a very eventful day for him, he was going to figure out these arts of magic that Zagin spoke of…even if it would kill him, or something far worse, he is determined, he had defeated a beast that would destroy sauria, he slew a possessive and manical demon and his human cohort, what could possibly be thrown at him that he can't take?.

Morning

The sun shone gently into the rooms of the house, the heat becoming very welcomed, but the sound of a loud explosive noise erupted from the back yard, and at such an early time? Krystal and Fox were immediatly awaken from these loud explosions coming from behind their home, thoughts of them being attacked or a surprise attack going wrong filled into their minds, and yet they were still curious of what was happening outside even if it meant that they were putting themselves in the line of fire. When they opened the window, they took a quick look outside as the smoke cleared from the view, Kirin was looking in a book, which if anyone knew Kirin completely is highly impossible for him to accomplish, however this book was familiar to Krystal with its cerinian text, it was a book from her parents that she had kept when she settled with Fox on corneria. Kirin was also doing something else that was also and only familiar to Krystal, signs being carved into the ground with his finger and nail, a sign of many of the elemental arts of magic, Zagin's arts of magic.

"What the hell is he doing?" Fox scratched his head as he was still only half asleep and barely able to keep himself aware of the situation, like any father, no man is able to keep his eyes open without his coffee.

"Oh dear god, he can't be using that, he doesn't know what he's doing!" Krystal quickly exclaimed as she remembered through old memories of what the arts had did to her father and the people who decided to use these arts.

Krystal immediatly rushed away from the window and got on her loincloth of when she was on Sauria since not much other clothing was in her reach at that moment and not a lot of time was on her side, she rushed down the stairs with not a moment to spare and sprinted towards the back yard, but what she didn't realize or didn't have the time to care was that she was topless.

"Kirin!" Krystal yelled through worry as she sped out of the door to the back yard, her breath quite heavy as she ran much faster than she needed.

"Mom I…" Kirin immediatly stopped speaking as he was stricken with terror to see that his mother was topless. "OH MY GOD! MY EYES, MOM, MY EYES! FOR GOD SAKE, WOMAN, COVER UP BEFORE YOU HEAD OUTSIDE!"

Krystal raised a brow through the confusion Kirin set on her and also to his yelling voice of woe, then she looked down as that was the problem Kirin was speaking of, and an embarrassed expression immediatly placed itself on her face, her visible breast were exposed for all who were able to see them, this being one of the many many things that Kirin didn't need to see at all.

"Oh my god, I am so sorry!" Krystal yelped and quickly crossed her arms over her breasts, hiding them quickly, preventing Kirin's pain in the eyes any more than it needed to be. Krystal rushed inside and placed on a normal set of clothing, her shorts and shirt of course, thus giving Kirin enough time to try the art he had been attemtping once more, and to his happiness, it was working, fully glowing on the ground. When Krystal hurried out to the back yard again, to her horror she realized that it was too late, Kirin had used and completed the preperation for the art, the element of life glowed a bright gold color through the carved in areas of its sign, but as it glowed to its peak, it was fading away, back into the ground.

"What's happening?" Kirin asked, he thought he had finished the spell, why wasn't it working?

"The only way you learned of the arts of magic would be that you looked up our family tree, am I right?" Krystal asked softly, she was full of worry, and wasn't doing a good job at hiding it either.

"How the hell…yeah." Kirin replied as he looked back at her slowly, he was very curious of how much his mother knew of this situation now.

"My fathers law was very clear about using the arts of magic, Kirin, that there would be...consequences, that to use and learn the spell, there would be a requirement of a "Tribute"." Krystal explained and reminded of Kirin of that one little section that he nearly forgot about on the computer.

Kirin had to bring back a Vulpine and a Vixen, being his grandfather and his grandmother, which means he would have to give up two things that were greater or equal to the value of their souls, but to bring back the dead would mean giving up something that living…or apart of the living.

"Kirin…" Krystal again spoke softly to her child, the worry slightly gone.

"Yeah mom?" Kirin spoke to her, the sign underneath him still glowing dimly.

"I want you to use this art to help you in your search, I want your questions answered not by me, but by my mother and father, they'll have a much easier time explaining to you than I can." Krystal explained to himself as she placed her paw on her chest over her heart, she felt as though she was going to lose her child again like so long ago.

Kirin's ears flew up as he finally heard the words he was waiting for from his mother, he could use the arts freely without anyone to stop him, but he also realized that to let him use them so willingly would mean that it would be entirely his responsibility to manage, any mistakes that would happen would be his and only his fault. Kirin had no time to spare, he quickly moved one of his fingers onto the dirt and started to carve into the ground a circle, then a two smaller circles inside it, then four smaller circles each inside the two circles, then he made a triangle, forming inside and out of the first circle; He clapped his hands together, gathering in the energy that he was able to build up and slammed them to the ground onto the sign, adding to the previous sign with newly built energy, the circles started to glow the bright gold color again, but before he could witness to see if he was successful or failed, Kirin fell unconscious from the aura of the energy, too passed out to hear the last sounds: a bloody rip.

Hospital

Kirin's eyes barely managed to open, but he was able to keep them open enough to realize that he was in a hospital and down on a hospital bed; out of all the emotions or thoughts he should have been feeling, instead, he was stricken with curiousity.

"Why the hell am I at the hospital? Did…did something go wrong?" Kirin thought outloud, he wasn't very much able to move, and areas of his body felt heavier and colder than usual.

"No everything went right." A voice from his left side spoke out from the silence, elderly and yet filled with wisdom.

Kirin didn't recognize the voice that came from beside him but with enough strength in his weak state, he was able to turn his head to see who this voice came from, it was a bearded Vulpine, weighed by age with long white hair and gold iris, dressed in a sleeveless gold robe with a black onyx like sash, but most importantly about this vulpine was that he was the one specie that struck Kirin with awe…A Cerinian.

"Are you?" Kirin couldn't even finish his question for this elder vulpine, he didn't want to spread an awkward aura nor ask a question to the wrong person if he wasn't who he thought he was.

"Yes…I am Krystal's father, Zagin Lavender, the priest who shared my teachings of the arts of magic." The old vulpine spoke down to Kirin, a smile planted on his muzzle, wrinkled by old age.

Kirin could finally get his questions answered that he had been desperatly searching for. With new strength, he reached out to give a hug to his grandfather and yet finally noticed a problem that involved the heavy and cold feeling in his limbs: His left arm was completely mechanical.

"WHAT THE FUCK HAPPENED TO MY ARM?!" Kirin let out a immediate yell as he examined in his left arm in a complete worry.

"Kirin…remember the consequences and the tribute system of my teachings: Give greater or equal to gain greater or equal, the cost of bringing back Kira and me back from the dead was a high one, your Your arm and your leg being the appropriate price." Zagin explained the situation of why it happened to Kirin, who was slowly managing to calm down.

Kirin's ears perked up when he heard the phrase "Your arm and your leg", slowly he looked at his left leg, it was also mechanical just like his arm, this entire thing was like his worst nightmares coming true, but this being the worst of all, he couldn't believe this had happened to him, even after he pinched himself, he had a hard time believing that it was real, he had to accept the facts: his arm and leg were gone for good.

"How did I turn them into machines?" Kirin asked, thinking that it was the problem that using the arts had turned his arms into machines.

"You didn't turn them into machines, during the process of the arts taking effect, the spirits of the elemental of life sprung out from the carved sign and observed you...finding that you qualified for being appropriate for the spell, they ripped off your arm and leg as a proper tribute, from the flesh, the bone, and the blood of your limbs, we were brought back from the dead." Zagin explained again, telling Kirin of the entire events that happened after he passed out and was rushed to the hospital to prevent death of blood loss.

Kirin tapped his mechanical arm curiously like a child watching an insect crawl away, it wasn't hollow either, it was full of meshing gears and loud gyros, the sounds could be heard inside the mechanical arm, which caused much annoyance to Kirin's ears.

"I don't really much like this." Kirin grumbled and sighed, already before even giving his limbs time to settle in, he hated them because they were so cold, so heavy, and so loud.

"Well…my daughter told me you have questions that my wife and me can answer." Zagin rubbed the between of his eyes and smiled again at Kirin.

"Yeah I do." Kirin managed to turn his attention away from the noises of his limbs and look at his grandfather.

"Then ask child." Zagin asked with the same wisdom in his voice as he rested his paws on his lap.

Kirin cleared his throat immediatly as he was ready to give a flurry of questions to the elderly cerinian, he was finally going to hear the answers to what his mother called "impossible questions", but the one he wanted to know the most, he thought he was going to die trying asking it; he had to take a chance, the question sprung pass his lips and into the air.

"Grandpa…I want to know about moms side of the family, why am I able to wield the Soul Edge, and why does our family have connections with demons like syphon for example?" Kirin released his flurry of questions only down to three as he couldn't think clearly of anymore.

Zagin just closed his eyes slowly, as though he was in a trance of deep thought, leaving Kirin eagerly waitng on the hospital bed, his breathes came in and out of his muzzle softly and out of his nose as well when he needed to rub his lip, but Kiring was getting very impatient due to his eager state, any longer would anger Kirin even more if he didn't get an answer soon. Zagin opened his eyes, an answer prepared.

"Go to Cerina to find out." was all that Zagin could say for an answer to his grandson, leaving Kirin in a jaw dropped state,

"One problem…its destroyed, how the hell am I suppose to search there?" Kirin barked at the elderly cerinian, such an answer seemed so thoughtless to him and so unable to do, since his mother and father had clearly told him that cerinia had been destroyed long ago.

"Not all of it is." Zagin shot back wisely and smiled down at him, like a game of chess, he was putting Kirin into a check.

"Huh?" was the only thing that Kirin could say back to the elderly cerinian.

Checkmate.

Zagin cleared his throat for quite a time and rubbed his neck gently, getting comfortable in the steel chair that was provided by the hospital with little comfort in its cushions, knowing that this was going to be a long conversation to tell the young vulpine about the "Destruction of cerinia" from his own point of view, of what happened in his eyes.

"Years of being dead have let us observe our destroyed home, my young grandson, and we have found out that one of our precious temples remains unharmed by the destruction, the temple of our fire god, Kirin, the very god who forged the soul edge you know hold. Somehow the temple survived the destruction, and since that time it has been floating around the area of our ruins of our home, waiting with infinite knowledge to be shared to his descendent." Zagin explained to Kirin clearly, giving him the proper answer he could settle for, yet only ready to raise more questions.

"His descendent…you mean the Soul Edge wielder?" Kirin asked, able to see that soul edge was resting against the wall at his right side, the eye closed, resting.

"Yes…the fire god Kirin was the first to control the legendary weapon after forging it, but after he was sealed inside his temple by the gods who shunned his added power with the sword, he made one final prayer upon his hand made weapon, that the ones born under the moon of his sealing shall receive his strength and the honor to learn of his knowledge of the almighty blade, as long as they are able to find it and return with it to the almighty fire god." Zagin continued his explaination to Kirin, hopefully clearing up any other questions involving him and soul edge.

"I must have been born on the same day he was sealed…how long ago?" Kiring shot another question to the tiring cerinian.

"Ten-thousand years ago…Kirin…you are the hundredth descendent of Kirin, the Hundredth wielder of the almighty Soul Edge, the creation of the almighty fire god." Zagin spoke and yawned, the old age afflicting his fatigue.

Kirin had to travel to the remains of Cerinia now, though he was eager, such a thing really pissed him off right up the scale of anger and fury, however though, he did have one more question for his grandfather that he also wanted desperatly answered as well, and wanted it answered as soon as possible.

"When the hell can I get out of the hospital?" Kirin sighed and fell back, resting on the hospital bed.