Krystal flew closer towards Necross as Fang and Topaz followed behind in their arwings, keeping their eyes open for anyone who may have been watching them at that moment.
"Okay, Necross is within range…" Fang spoke through his communicator.
Krystal nodded slowly. "Slow down everyone. If there are Cybers here, then we need to approach this place cautiously."
Topaz thought to herself as she slowed down her arwing, and spoke. "Krystal…one of us should go ahead of the others, and try to draw the Cybers' attention. We could very well get them to open up one of their hidden entrances in the process, and at least two of us could squeeze in through it, while the other one kept them occupied."
Krystal thought this over for a moment. "All right. Which one of you two want to do it?"
Fang quickly answered. "I'll do it…I know you probably had your heart set on it, Topaz but-"
Topaz interrupted. "Actually, I was going to suggest you do it too." She smiled lightly.
"Oh…ok then." Fang chuckled a bit, nervously, as he slowly pulled out ahead of his partners, heading straight for the surface of Necross.
Before he could get too close, however, shots suddenly sailed out from the distance behind the team.
"Fang! Behind you!" Krystal shouted, dodging the shots with Topaz as Fang grunted and pulled on his controls, the blasts barely missing his craft.
"Damn it!" He growled. "They know we're here already!"
The trio steadied their ships as Topaz looked at her scanners. "Krytal, I'm detecting three enemy craft behind us…it looks like the three stolen Star Wolf ships!"
Krystal's eyes went wide as she heard this, before she was also shocked by the next image that suddenly came up on her communicator, the face of what looked like a green-furred Cerinian Vixen looking sternly at her, as well as Fang and Topaz on their ships.
"We have you in our sights, organics…" Diamando spoke aloud. "If you disarm your weapons and surrender your craft now, then we promise no harm will come to you."
Topaz looked on at her face, stunned. "Who…are you?"
Diamando shot back. "That is none of your concern. Disarm now."
All of Krystal's team just sat there, pondering this announcement.
"You know…" Fang spoke to his allies. "Surrendering now might mean we could be taken to the heart of the enemy base, where we could strike at the best place, at just the right time."
Krystal immediately responded. "Or it might mean our immediate deletion, or being forced to become Cybers ourselves. Do you really want to take that risk?"
Fang thought it over, before quickly gripping his controls. "Hell no!"
With that, Fang's ship pulled down quickly, while Topaz's went off to the left sharply, while Krystal's went straight up.
"So, we want to be stubborn about this, eh?" Diamando said to herself, before communicating to the two Cybers piloting the other fighters. "Dispose of the other two in any way you see fit. Leave the leader to me."
"Affirmative." One of the Cybers responded, turning off in Leon's former ship to chase after Topaz, while the other turned down sharply in Panther's ship, in pursuit of Fang. Diamando pulled up on her controls with a computer's precision, going up and after Krystal.
Fang spun his ship in a barrel roll, to avoid the shots from the one Cyber's ship, turning sharply to the right as Topaz quickly bobbed her ship up and down to confuse the aim of the Cyber pursuing her.
Diamando nearly hit Krystal with her blasts from behind, aiming to cripple her arwing rather than destroy it. Krystal grunted and pulled her controls off to the left as one shot slightly clipped her right wing, shaking her a little.
"Damn!" Krystal grunted as she pulled. "She's good, whoever she is!" She turned sharply off to the left as Diamando stayed right on her rear, firing again as it barely missed Krystal's ship.
Diamando was so focused on crippling Krystal, however, that she didn't fully recognize Fang pulling in closer and closer behind her, with the one Cyber still right on his back. He dodged a shot every so often, and on purpose, let the Cyber get a clear shot at him, as he got closer to Diamando's ship.
"Go ahead and fire, you bastard!" Fang yelled, waiting for the Cyber to get its shot off, before suddenly diving down at the last second, the shot slamming into the back of Diamando's fighter instead!
Sparks flew from the Wolfen craft, as Diamando was shaken hard by the impact. Her brain was wired to experience certain emotions, so she was clearly angered by the friendly fire.
"Explain yourself, HG304!" She addressed the Cyber.
"My apologies, Diamando." The Cyber responded. "I was aiming for the enemy craft, but he proved much too swift."
This distraction allowed Krystal to fly off, while Topaz was busy evading the shots of the other Cyber's ship, turning and heading towards Krystal, before Topaz quickly fired at the Cyber, encouraging him to come back and chase her.
Krystal flew very close to the surface of Necross now, looking to find a way to get inside of this underground base. She didn't need to linger for too long, however, for a passage suddenly began to open on what had looked like a big boulder on the surface.
"Welcome, my dear." Xerxes' image came up on her communicator, smiling as Krystal's expression changed to one of complete shock.
"Well…I'm starting to see how fruitless this dogfight is going to be. All of your flying skills have advanced far beyond my expectations." He gave a signal to Diamando, who nodded, and called off the attack with her other ships.
Topaz gasped as she saw the spitting image of what was once her father's full organic body on her screen. "You're alive…"
Xerxes gave her a dirty look. "No thanks to you, treacherous child."
Topaz scowled and readied her weapons, preparing to go storming into the entrance as Diamando suddenly turned and aimed her guns at the blonde vixen.
"You stay right where you are, traitor!" The cybernetic green vixen stated firmly, Topaz exchanging glances with her as Xerxes addressed his creation on the comm.
"Now now, play nice, Diamando. Even if Topaz does want to try and rush in to kill me, she's going to find that task exceedingly difficult, if not totally impossible."
Diamando nodded slowly as she eased off on her weapons, Xerxes turning his attention back to Krystal. "I know you must have a million questions for me now, after discovering that I'm still amongst the living, and that's perfect, because I have about a million answers for you. So how about you come down into my new home, settle down for a bit, and the two of us can have a little chat?"
"About what?" Krystal narrowed her eyes.
Xerxes shrugged. "Oh, about the future…mine, yours, that of my precious Cybers…and of course the future of a very close acquaintance of yours." He made a split form in the screen, now on the left side, as the right side showed the image of Fox McCloud, floating in the stasis tube in the lab.
"What have you done to him!" Krystal sat straight up, growling, as she looked Xerxes right in the eyes.
"Calm down! Calm down!" Xerxes put up his hands. "I haven't done anything to him…yet."
Krystal frowned as Xerxes slowly put his hands down. "Just come and chat with me, Krystal…that's all I ask of you."
"Only if I get to come with her!" Topaz stated firmly from her ship, jumping in on the conversation.
Xerxes thought this over…and decided it wouldn't hurt. They'd both be on his turf anyway, and he could have Topaz "deleted" at a moment's notice.
"Very well." Xerxes nodded, as he looked over to Fang. "You're welcome to come as well."
Fang shook his head. "No thanks. I think at least one of us needs to keep an eye on things out here."
"Good thinking, Fang." Krystal smiled a bit, as she spoke to Topaz. "Well, let's go then…"
Topaz let Krystal pass her as she nodded and soon followed after, Diamando giving the two Cybers instructions to watch Fang in his arwing, as she followed behind the two as well.
The three ships dove down into the opening, the rocky passageway slowly changing into smooth polished steel, lights from the circuitry whizzing by them as they slowly moved down into the hidden Cyber base, seeing Cybers patrol the metal grounds every so often, the base a complex network of large rooms connected by narrow, almost claustrophobic corridors. The landing pad for all of the ships, which they were now heading towards, was the largest of all of these rooms.
Krystal looked on nervously as she landed with Topaz, seeing Fox's arwing in one corner, under heavy guard of a group of Cybers.
She and Topaz slowly disembarked from their arwings, keeping close to each other, as Diamando walked in front of them, her long metal staff at her side.
"This way…" She spoke, leading the two vixens along, as Topaz and Krystal followed her cautiously.
The path led them through one of the narrow corridors, Diamando just walking on with a blank look on her face, as she twisted a handle off to her right, and made a door open in front of them, leading the vixens into large, circular room, with a huge monitor in the center.
Just as Topaz and Krystal stepped into the room, seeing the Cybers standing guard around them, the imposing image of the new Xerxes came up on the big screen.
"So…what do you think of it?" Xerxes smiled, motioning around his room.
Topaz narrowed her gaze. "All this time you've been only appearing to us on screen? Where are you hiding?"
Xerxes chuckled a bit. "Oh you want to see the real me? Then I'm afraid you'll have to go digging into the computer systems, to find my brain, because that's all that's left now."
Krystal nodded slowly. "So…you've finally become one with technology you love so much, with the steel you value over precious life itself."
Topaz nodded and added. "You may look like your old self on that screen, but deep down, you still have the same black mechanical heart you had when you were partially cybernetic, I'll bet. Filled with the same deceit, the same lies…so how do we know that what you're about to tell us isn't just another pack of these lies."
"This has gone beyond the point of simple manipulation, child." Xerxes sneered. "I have nothing to hide anymore." He looked to his Cybers, and over to a star chart on another screen. "I may have lied when I said that the plague that swept through Mondas was due to the pollution on that planet, but I tell you, I did not lie when I said that those people were deathly afraid of what was going on, with all of the warring between worlds, that led them to seal themselves away from everyone. The very same fear that was beginning to grab a hold of Cerinia as well."
He watched a few of his Cybers working before talking again. "Look at them…do you see any fear? Do see any malice? Do you see any reason for my Cybers to hate, to persecute, or to go to war with one another? This is the future I envision for the galaxy. Why can't you people accept this?"
Krystal lowered her gaze at Xerxes. "It may have something to do with the fact that you'll kill anyone who gets in the way of your twisted vision, including your own people, and your own family!" Topaz nodded firmly in agreement.
Xerxes shook his head. "It can't be helped. There are simply those who will not accept the inevitable future that I bring…and they are exactly the ones that must be deleted, for the greater good my future offers."
Topaz stepped forward, impatiently. "I've had it up to here with your nonsense! Let's just cut through the garbage and get to the point. Where did you put Fox?"
"All in good time…" Xerxes spoke firmly. "First I need to discuss something very important-"
Krystal lost her patience as well, speaking up. "To hell with your discussion! There is nothing that a murderer like you can offer that we'll ever accept! Now where the hell is Fox?"
Xerxes frowned. He was hoping he could use his hostage to get her to co-operate with him, but if this was how she wanted to play it, then it was fine by him.
"You want to find your Fox?…fine. But you're going to have to find him all by yourself…and don't expect any help from my Cybers, because I am now giving them orders to delete you on site!"
The Cybers immediately turned and held out their arms, firing their laser weapons as Topaz quickly turned and swung her staff from her left to her right, smacking one of the blasts right back towards the Cybers, making it hit one as it sparked and fell over. Krystal rolled out of the way of another blast and held out her staff with her right arm, getting a fireball off as it hit one Cyber right in the mouth, making it spark as it fell forward.
They both jumped out of the way of more blasts, as Diamando stepped forward and held her staff off to the side.
"Hold your fire! I'll handle this!" She proclaimed, before holding out her staff with both arms, the head suddenly splitting in half as a bolt of electricity shot out of the spot underneath.
Topaz rolled quickly out of the way as the bolt-made impact between the two vixens. "Whoa! Who is this girl?" Her eyes were wide open.
Krystal didn't know what to say in return, as Diamando yelled out and jumped down towards them, somersaulting before landing and swinging her staff out to her left, knocking away Topaz's as she tried to run in and swing for her with her right arm. Topaz stumbled as Krystal twirled her staff above her head, making a swing from her right towards Diamando's head. Diamando ducked with amazing precision, and brought her staff forward, jabbing the head into Krystal's stomach.
Krystal bent over from the pain, as Diamando made a small leap up, smacking Krystal right in the face with a hard jump kick, as Krystal's head snapped back from the impact, grunting and falling over as Topaz let loose with an Ice blast, holding her staff out with her left arm.
Diamando quickly spun out of the way to her left as the ice flew over and froze one of the nearby Cybers instead. Diamando came out of the spin and tossed her staff, making it fly right towards Topaz, and smacking it into her left hand perfectly, making Topaz grunt and drop her staff.
Diamando then ran in and fought Topaz hand to hand, expertly slapping away all of the blonde vixen's punches as she threw lefts, rights, and even a spinning backhand with her right. It was from this spinning backhand that Diamando quickly caught Topaz's right arm, and let her have it with a hard series of kicks from her left foot, that went right into Topaz's back.
Topaz grunted and groaned with each kick, as Krystal got back up and went behind Diamando, trying to get a hold of her as she put her staff across her neck. Diamando simply kicked Topaz out of the way as she grunted, and grabbed a hold of the staff, using her momentum as she bent over to flip Krystal over onto her back. Krystal groaned from the impact of her back hitting the floor, as Diamando held onto the staff with her left hand, and held up her right, as a threatening, long metal needle suddenly shot out of her wrist.
"Holy crap! She's Cyber!" Topaz quickly realized, as Krystal nodded and rolled out of the way with her staff just as Diamando let go of it and thrust down at her, her needle piercing the metal floor instead, as Krystal got back up and quickly brought her right foot over, kicking Diamando across the face as she was getting back up, giving the two time to blast and push any Cybers out of their way, as they escaped into one of the other corridors.
Diamando simply looked on as she made the needle retract into her wrist, looking to her group of Cybers. "Find them…"
As this was all going on, Fang was now quickly trying to fly away from Necross, now that the other two Star Wolf ships had suddenly moved into attack formation, and were trying to shoot him down.
"This is Fang to Peppy!" He shouted into his Communicator. "Fang to Peppy! Something's happened on Necross. I don't know what, but Topaz and Krystal are stuck down there, and the Cybers are trying to take me down. I'm holding my own out here, but I don't know for how much longer. Request assistance! Repeat: Request assistance!"
He quickly dove away once more as the two Cybers came together and fired at the same time, hoping his message would reach the Great Fox.
At the same time, Diamando walked into a lab room, one different from the one where Fox was being held, as she went past the generator that had created her, and covered her in her special flesh.
"I was a fool to let Topaz come in with her." Xerxes lamented on one of the screens in the room. "She knows all too well about my systems and layouts. She can hide easily." He then smiled a bit. "No matter though…luckily I've done some studying of my own, about our friend Krystal…her strengths…her past…her adversaries, other than us."
He then grinned down at a cryogenic chamber nearby, as Diamando walked over and stroked the fogged glass some.
"What is the Saurian's condition?" She inquired.
"Stable." He answered. "Mind you, a creature like this, who I couldn't salvage too many surviving cells from, and who's been dead for such a long time, takes a while to put back together. But once the replicators are done, and the re-assembling is complete, along with my special enhancements, this big fellow should be well worth the effort.
Diamando nodded gently as she wiped away the fog, revealing the closed eyes of a green, scaled, reptilian face…