Falco was walking through the empty corridors on the Cornerian Dreadnought Class Cruiser, The Survivor. His team had been hired by the military for basic jobs, such as patrols and escorting convoys, the pay was small, compared to what he got paid back in Star Fox. This time was something new, when the planetary sensor's picked up a Venom Warship entering Corneria's orbit, Star Falco were sent with an entire platoon of marines.

Though this ship was the same class as the Great Fox, there was very little about it that was the same. The Great Fox had individual rooms for the members of the Star Fox team, only the captain of the ship would have their own room on a Cornerian Military ship. The Great Fox had a pool, gym, firing range, a proper lounge and other luxuries; this had none of those things, so that there could be more storage room, more crew quarters and more defence weapons.

Falco signed to the empty corridor, he hadn't been able to afford a new carrier ship for his team. The Great Fox II had been sold since it was showing its age, and also he could afford some more fighters and equipment for his new team members. His new team mates however, he felt were worth the cost, having previous experience with two of them.

One of them was a Lynx, Miyu and the other was a poodle, Fay. Both of them had been members of the Star Fox team for a short time, but quit when things became boring. Miyu had golden coloured fur covered with brown markings in random areas and an athletic body. Fay had pure white fur, blue eyes and an athletic body as well. They final member of the team, Falco knew very little about, Jaws. Jaws was a great white shark from Aquas, his species had only been recently discovered a few months ago, living in the deepest darkest depths of the ocean.

Jaws was roughly Falco's height, give or take a few inches', his skin was bluish grey, with the exception of his face and possibly his chest, which was pale white. He had a long pointed nose with a pair of small beady black eyes, and had thin white lips that hid two rows of sharp white teeth. Jaws was a tribal warrior and a hunter amongst his people, having learnt several rare skills that Falco felt would be useful for the team.

Soon, he had reached the bridge of The Survivor, where he would meet the captain. The bridge had consoles running along the sides, next to the observation window. Crewmen could be seen at the consoles, analysing, flight paths, ship status and other things Falco couldn't bother to think about.

Standing in the middle of the bridge was the Captain, a light grey husky, wearing a green officer's uniform with gold trim. Several Sergeants were grouped in front of the Captain; all of them stood to attention as he approached. The Captain cleared his throat and began the brief.

"Alright, listen up because I'm not gonna say it again," began the Captain, "A Venom warship has been found entering Cornerian space and failed to respond to our message. This can lead us to assume that it's of rebel origin, therefore a possible threat."

Falco and the sergeants never once moved their eyes away from the Captain.

"Your mission is to get aboard and gather up any crewmen you come across, do NOT open fire unless fired on first. Captain Lombardi, your team will go first through the boarding passage, hold your position at the end until more units arrive on the scene. Is that understood?"

"Yes Captain!" replied the group, before they left the bridge.

-x-x-x-

The Survivor pulled up alongside the starboard side the warship, leaving a gap just large enough for an Arwing to fit in, allowing a small boarding tube to leave the middle of the Cornerian ship to cross the small void between the two ships. The tube made contact with the ships airlock, thanks to some careful accuracy, linking the two warships.

Star Falco were the first to head down the corridor, Falco was carrying a standard Cornerian laser rifle that had been heavily modified by Slippy. Katt had two blaster pistols equipped on her belt, and an incinerator pack on her back. Miyu was using a shotgun with a mini flamethrower attachment. Fay was using her own personal laser rifle, and Jaws had an unmodified semi-automatic rifle, and his personal war-blade.

The team marched down the passage to the airlock; the passage was nothing more than a dull grey corridor that extended over a short distance. At the far end, were the black metal exterior doors of the warship. Katt grabbed the handle of her incinerator pack, igniting a small white hot spark at the end, and began to cut through the airlock door. She slowly melted the door near the edge, leaving a glowing orange trail. When she had cut around the whole door, Katt switched off the pack and allowed Jaws to move to the door.

With a firm kick, the metal slab toppled backwards, breaching the airlock. To the team, it was surprisingly dark inside the ship, there should be some light from within, and another thing that was strange was the noise, it was completely quiet silent. No alarms, no rushing footsteps, nothing. Falco could guess that they were setting an ambush, had abandoned the ship, or something bad had happened, something really bad.

Falco took a small torch from his belt and shone it inside. There seemed to be nothing out of place inside the airlock, Falco stepped carefully inside, followed one by one by the rest of the team. The team readied their weapons as Falco opened the airlock door. The corridor was dark and lifeless, nothing was emitting light and no-one could be seen. Falco shone his light over the walls; they were black as the very void of space and were completely metal. He shone his torch at the end, where there was another corner; on the wall was a deep red liquid, splattered over it.

Falco shone the torch over it, and then lowered its glare to the floor. He froze at the sight of the next thing, on the floor, spread out, was the corpse of a soldier. The armour on his chest had been ripped apart, and his shredded organs were sticking out of his chest.

His team mates all had a look of horror on them as they stared at the corpse. Falco slowly approached the end of the corridor, and shone his light in both directions. Both littered with corpses sprawled across the floors and leaning against the walls, drenched in their own blood. Bullet holes and laser burns scarred the walls, a clear indication of battle. But who or what they were fighting was a mystery, and it scared Falco.

He returned focus to his team, their faces showed that they were uncomfortable from this development, but they had a job to do and were in need of the credits.

"Katt, Jaws, you two watch the left corridor. Miyu, Fay take the right," ordered Falco.

The team did as they were commanded in silence, clearly unnerved by the sight of the victims and not wanting to be like them. Falco activated the small communicator that was in his ear.

"Bridge, this is Star Falco."

-x-x-x-

On the bridge of The Survivor, the Captain waited for a reply from the team. Fortunately, he didn't have to wait long, as the bridges com-officer picked up a signal coming from the team.

"Bridge, this is Star Falco," came the bird's voice through the speakers.

"Captain Lombardi, what is your situation?" demanded the Captain.

"We have set up around the air lock and made contact. But Captain, all the crew in our area are dead."

The Captain was shocked and speechless. Dead, what had happened?

"Do you have any idea of what happened?"

"Well...there's clear indication of battle, laser scorches and bullet holes, but only Venom casualties. No indication of who, or what, they were fighting."

The word 'what' had the largest impact on the Captain. Something had killed the crew, but what 'it' was and was 'it' still on board were the most important questions.

"Captain Lombardi, reinforcements will be sent across," replied the Captain after a long wait, "Head to the bridge to find any clues to this mystery. If you come into contact with... whatever did this, inform us and with draw."

"Understood," replied Falco.

-x-x-x-

Falco didn't have to wait long for more troops to arrive; all of them had the same look of horror plastered on their faces the moment they saw the mutilated corpses. Several squads were sent to check sections of the ship.

The Star Falco team grouped together, and slowly walked down the corridor towards the bridge. Falco, Fay and Jaws had attached their flash lights to the end of their weapons, partially illuminating the battle scarred, corpse riddled corridor.

-x-x-x-

A five man squad slowly crept towards the cargo hold, deep in the bowels of the ship. The dark corridors were all destroyed from the marks of gun fire, and littered with the corpses of the dead men who were slain by something dangerous, wild and powerful.

Soon, they reached the shadow engulfed cargo hold; the inside was like a large maze of storage containers. The floor was covered with puddles of dark crimson blood, along with the shredded remains of soldiers. The Squad continued to slowly walk through the passages between the containers, checking every corner for any sign of the thing that did this.

As they moved deeper into the hold, the number of corpses slowly began to increase in certain directions. The Sergeant, a collie, ordered the squad to follow the trail of corpses. The trail continued to increase with the number of corpses and large pools of blood until the nearly the whole floor was covered by the crimson paint.

After following the gory path that had been created, the squad found the largest cluster of body parts surrounding a large chrome container that was stained with blood. The sergeant moved closer to inspect the container, judging from the large number of victims, they were most likely trying to defend this container. It showed no signs of damage, but whatever was inside must have been important, and if the crew were rebels, then it needed to be studied.

-x-x-x-

The Star Falco team were in a heavily battle torn corridor, the damage done to the corridor the worst they had seen so far. While one end only had a few scorch marks and bullet holes, the other was end was completely trashed, with wall panels blown off, corpses strewn across the floor, and a broken mounted machine gun.

The team had stopped when Jaws wanted to study the scene as to what had happened. To Falco, it seemed understandable; there was something odd that didn't make sense.

Jaws had checked the wounds on the corpses, revealing large bullets stuck in their flesh, and a closer analysis revealed that they were the same bullets from the machine gun that was broken.

"So, it seems whatever killed these men, was capable of using weapons," reported Falco.

"This just adds more to the confusion," Fay spoke up.

"That isn't all, canine," Said Jaws, his voice was deep and had a slight rasp, "There are almost two piles of these bullet chambers you speak of."

Jaws pointed at the two clusters of bullet chambers not to far away from each other, with a few more chambers scattered around. The largest cluster was nearest the corpses.

"Care to explain what's so important about the chambers?" asked Falco, failing to understand the meaning.

"I might still be learning from your life styles, but a good hunter must be able to study his environment, and I learnt a lot from your warriors."

"So what did you find out?" asked Miyu, annoyed from Jaws' time wasting.

"This pile is both larger and closer to these fallen warriors, if I am correct about your weapons, whoever was wielding this weapon, was fighting whatever killed them." Jaws explained and continued. "So if more bullets were used by the warrior, why is there so few bullet markings on the wall, and no body of the attacker."

"I see what you're getting at," said Falco, "but it feels nearly impossible."

-x-x-x-

Fox was stuck at the main console on the bridge, he was trying to find some way to get off the warship before Cornerian military found him, it was would be difficult explain how he was alive and what happened. After a lot of effort in trying to come up with a plan, one finally hit Fox, however, it was dangerous and would put innocent lives in danger.

Suddenly, Fox's ears twitched, he could hear the faint sound of footsteps, and voices. Maybe he could carry out the plan and not worry about casualties. He cast his gaze to the Captains corpse in the corner of the bridge.

-x-x-x-

The Star Falco team were standing just outside the door to the bridge it was surprisingly intact, all the damage indicated that whatever attacked was capable of unleashing damage of an unimaginable scale, and yet the door wasn't even scratched.

"Weapons ready, don't attack without my order," commanded Falco in the firm tone of a leader.

Miyu opened the door and the team were again greeted by another grim sight. Ahead of them was a short corridor door leading to the bridge, which was flooded with the severed remains of bloody corpses and large pools of blood. The team carefully threaded over the remains, due to the very little foot space on the floor.

"Does anyone find this odd?" asked Katt, "I mean, we find a closed door with the remains of savage attacks behind it, and yet its intact."

"Your point is?" replied Falco.

"Someone closed the door."

Unlike the rest of the ship, there was only the minimum light on the bridge, coming from a few lights and several consoles. As Fay, last one of the group to make it through the bridge door, a small wet droplet splashed on the end of her muzzle. The canine brushed it off with her left index finger, only a dark red smear across the end of her finger. Worry embedded itself into the young canine, and she slowly looked up to the small patch of space above the door way, her eyes widened in shock.

"Guys," Fay called out.

The others turned round to Fay and looked up to see what she had found. On the wall, written in dark red blood, was the word RUN. A trail of blood from the N, ran down the wall past the door, along the floor and ended at the foot of an intact officer's corpse on top of a console.

Falco carefully approached the body and hauled it off the console. Unlike the other corpses, this corpse had two large stab wounds in his chest that looked deep enough to have gone the whole way through. Blood continued to slowly ooze out of the wound, and onto the flashing red screen on the console. Curiosity took control of Falco, letting the corpse drop and wiping away the blood from the screen. Hoping to find some sort of answer as to what had happened, however what he saw had a far more shocking revelation. On the screen, in bright red writing, was: SELF-DISTRUCT ACTIVATED: 21:03 till detonation.

"MOVE!" roared Falco in a panic, the team was confused momentarily before Falco pointed at the screen.

Just as they were about to leave the bridge, a loud bang echoed from the corridor. The team aimed their weapons down the corridor, at a figure crouched down amongst the remains of the unfortunate crew.

The figure slowly turn its shadow engulfed head round to look at the team. Its glowing red eyes fully locked on them, everyone stared back at the thing that had, without a doubt, killed the entire crew of the ship. Even with their guns aimed at that thing, their fear was obvious to anyone. Their hands were shaking, distorting their aim, their grip weakened from sweat and their minds consumed by gruesome possible outcomes this thing was capable of.

Suddenly, the thing sprinted down the corridor and disappeared into the shadows of the ships depths, leaving the team in confusion. The shock from the encounter soon wore off when they remember their situation, and fled.

-x-x-x-

Back on the bridge of The Survivor, the Captain was pacing around. Cargo from the ship was being transferred to The Survivor, for analysis and permanent storage. Suddenly, the com-officer received an urgent transmission from the Star Falco team for the Captain.

"Star Falco Team, this is The Survivor, what do you have to report?" asked the Captain.

"GET EVERYONE OFF THE SHIP, NOW!" came a frenzied roar.

"Captain Lombardi! How dare you speak to your superior in th..." began the husky before he was interrupted by the avian.

"THIS SHIP'S SELF-DISTRUCT HAS BEEN ACTIVATED!" he yelled in reply.

True to his word, the ships surface flashed brightly as small explosions erupted along the ship. Everyone on the bridge instantly stopped what they were doing and stared in complete shock. When the blasts died away, only large holes marked the locations of where they erupted from.

"All units, report in!" commanded the hopeful hound.

For a minute there was silence, but soon the communicator was alive with the sound of the squad leaders. It had been fortunate that no one had been killed from the isolated explosions, which were meant to begin damaging the ship without endangering its former crew.

"All units withdraw from that ship!" commanded the Captain. Hoping to stamp out any dreams of glory from the greener recruits.

-x-x-x-

Fox was zooming through the shadow engulfed passages of the ship, based on what he could remember of the ship from his rampage, he was heading towards the escape pods on the port side of the ship, his plan was to wait inside one until the ship really began blowing itself apart. Then, thanks to all of the debris, Fox would be able to launch the escape pod with the Cornerian military realising, and if they did track the pod, he would be long gone.

At the end of the corridor, was a large metal that look completely sealed. A small smirk crawled across Fox's lips, and he increased his speed. Pointing his left shoulder at the door, Fox smashed through door in one solid shot. Much of the doors mid-section had been smashed into broken shards of metal, with the edges of the large dent wear Fox made his own passage. Along the wall to Fox's right, were roughly ten hatches that each lead to an individual pod.

The vulpine approached the nearest hatch, and opened it by pressing on the control panel beside it. The hatch whispered as it opened for Fox, allowing him inside, before sealing behind him. The inside of the pod had four seats along the edge of the pod, with a fifth in front of a a small observation window and control panel, with a control column. The vulpine sat down in the pilot in the cramp pod and waited.

But at the back of his mind, there was something Fox couldn't stop thinking about. On the bridge, after he dropped down from the ceiling, the last thing he expected was his old team mates. When he saw them, and they saw him, he could see their faces as clear as day. The look of shock and terror had upset him, if he had revealed himself how would they've reacted, would they be shocked but accept him even after what he had become, or would they refuse to believe it and just try to gun him down.

"They would have tried to kill you." Hissed a voice.

Fox looked around the pod in a panic, looking for the source of that voice, but it was empty. Only he was inside the pod. Shaking his head, Fox used the console to monitor the ships countdown.

-x-x-x-

The husky watched the Venom warship continue to blow itself apart. Another section was ripped apart as another explosion erupted from within the ships haul. When the flames died away, the captain could see a countless number of corpses and various body parts from the unfortunate crew. All squads had successful withdrew from the ship, but they still had get clear of that ship before it took them with it. The cruisers had already moved to a safe distance.

The boarding tube had just been withdrawn from the self-destructing warship. Allowing the Cornerian warship's engines to burn brightly as the stars themselves. Slowly, the Dreadnought Cruiser pulled away as the warship was about to explode.

-x-x-x-

Fox stared at the small timer on the console, roar of the ship destroying itself could be heard clearly from within the sealed Pod. There was fifteen seconds till the ship was completely destroyed, Fox moved a finger above the launch button and steadied his breathing. This would be close, and there was a large chance something could go wrong. The counter had dropped to ten seconds and the vulpine stared hard at it, refusing to blink if to miss a second. 10...9...8...7...6...5, Fox pressed the launch button and the pod shot out the ship, heading towards the planet below.

With the valuable seconds to escape gone, the already crippled warship was consumed in an enormous fireball. Pieces of debris were scattered everywhere, ranging from large chunks to tiny fragments. Because of how close Fox was, he battled amongst the rapid pieces of scrap. Large white hot sparks from the ship fired past the pod, casting dazzling light into Fox's eyes.

The vulpine shielded his eyes with his left hand, as he struggled against the seemingly endless barrage of scrap metal. Suddenly, the pod shook violently, leaving the struggling vulpine, fighting for control. Fox guest that something had damaged the pod, causing the controls to become unresponsive. The console was lit up with flashing red warning lights, as the pod continued to shake. Fox's eyes darted around the console, trying to ready the various warnings.

The pod shock again as it entered the planet's atmosphere, flames started to slowly consume the pod as its speeds increased. As the vulpine continued to fight for control, he could see through the flame engulfed window and spotted large city in the distance, with a large body of water behind it. Fox pulled the control column into his chest, hoping to at least avoid crashing in the middle of the city. Slowly, Fox felt the pod rise into the air, as it zoomed past an enormous skyscraper.

The vulpine held his breath as he tried to glide through the jungle of towers, and towards the sea. Fox could imagine the crowds forming below, all looking to see the burning object flying through the air. The pod continued rush past the tall metal spires of the city, leaving a long line of thick, black smoke over the city. As Fox flew past the last tower, the pod began to decline at a much quicker rate. Fox forced the pod to climb, or least stay in the air long enough to avoid crashing into the ground.

The pod was now flying over a residential area, shaking vigorously, and spewing out thick smoke. Fox looked out the windscreen to see he was nearing the beach head. The vulpine reached out to the console and grabbed the lever titled thrust, and pushed it as far as it would go. The pod shot forward moving at an incredible speed for a pod, however, the frame of the pod shock more vigorously, Fox could hear the sound of metal groaning and grinding under the stress. Suddenly, as the pod zoomed across the clear blue ocean, a loud bang could be heard from the outside of the ship.

The sound caught Fox completely off guard, during the brief moment of shock; the vulpine had lost complete control of the pod. The pod had begun a rapid decline, the vulpine once again battle for control, but this time, he had lost.

The pod smashing into the shimmering blue sea, creating large waves from the impact. When the Pod hit the water, Fox shot from his seat and into the observation screen, before landing on top of the now smashed console. A large cut had been made across his forehead, causing his dark red blood to leak out down his face and on to the console.

Slowly, he pushed himself back into his seat; he winced and hissed from the pain he felt across his body. His ribs felt like they had been smashed, his right paw had been dislocated and he could taste blood in his mouth.

What parts of the console hadn't been smashed, were no longer a light with the power gone. The bottom half observation window was covered from the dark blue water of the sea, while the top showed the bright orange sky of dusk on Corneria.

Gently, Fox grabbed his dislocated hand and fiercely forced it into place. The vulpine grit his teeth and growled from the agonising pain, as a loud click could be heard as it was put back in place. With his hand back in place, Fox slowly stood up from his seat, the vulpine wobbled from the unsteady floor and feeling of dizziness. The vulpine slowly made his way to the middle of the pod, and braced himself for the painful transformation of his left hand.

With his hand in its claw form, Fox tore three large tears into the roof of the pod, letting some light from the outside into the dark interior. The vulpine tore across them again, leaving a criss-cross pattern, then tightened his clawed hand into an odd fist and punched the weakened roof. Large shards of metal scattered everywhere as Fox's fist forced the damaged roof apart.

Using what strength he could muster, Fox scrambled out through the hole and sat down on the edge. With his mouth now bursting with blood, Fox spat out the crimson fluid over the side of the pod, leaving a small patch of blood, with droplets flowing down the side.

Despite all that had happened and the complete pain he was in, for a moment, Fox felt like he was at peace, the orange sky was beautiful, and the sound of the waves calmly lapping against the pod was calming. It was enough for him to think back to a more happy memory, back when he was with the Star Fox team.

They were on vacation on one of Corneria's beaches, after being able to get a private spot away from the crowds. The white sandy shore, the cloudless blue sky and the clear blue sea, something that was perfect. What had been interesting for Fox, was while he was alone, Krystal appeared out of the water in a black bikini, which was nothing but string, with a few patches that covered the small pink mounds on her large breasts and her downstairs front.

The sight of her soaking wet breasts jiggling and bouncing uncontrollably from within their flimsy restraints, and her hips swaying as she walked towards him, left Fox feeling uncomfortable inside his swimming shorts. He couldn't believe she convinced him to go skinny dipping with her, and after becoming excited during their time together, she was able to get him to have more 'naughty' fun as she put it, leaving his towel messy after that.

The vulpine smiled at the happy memory, even to this day; he still didn't know what he was thinking back then, or how they hadn't been caught. Returning his mind back to the present, Fox cast his gaze over to Corneria City in the distance. With his hand feeling better than it originally was, Fox dived into the water and began to swim.

Well here is chapter 8, it would have been up sooner if my computer hadn't chosen to crash again. Plus originally this one was going to be twice as long, but the other half will be in the next chapter. I'll try to get 9 finished, but I have two difficult exams coming up so I will spending more time studying and less writing this story. Sorry for your disappointment.