Starfox Universe Fanfiction:

Rising Phoenix

Chapter 2: Welcome to the family

A/N: Okay. Beer in hand, ideas in mind, the second chapter is just getting out, fresh from my PC! Albeit with a slight slip-up, because, let's face it - I can't, for the love of me, keep up a schedule.

I would also like to ask you to cut me a little slack in the language department, I'm not a native speaker, and even though I try my best to learn the craft of English writing, I can make mistakes! Don't hang me, just pont out errors please!

Without further ado, Enjoy!

"Why am I even doing this?" Mike thought to himself as the doors closed behind him.

The med lab wasn't a big place, and with him and another person inside there was hardly any room to move. When the medic finally left, Mike sat down on a small stool across the room from the bed and inspected the patient.

It was clearly a Cornerian, a female at that. Its body looked completely human, except fiery red fur all over its body and addition of a muzzle.

It was a fox, or something similar, judging from the look of it. It was sleeping soundly, helped by an anesthetic.

He wasn't sure why he rescued her. She was a Cornerian, and, according to the outfit it was wearing, a military. Mike as a soldier knew that there was a calculated risk that once she wakes up and, it will at least try to fight her way out of their facility. There was no way she would just accept the fact that a random human soldier committed an act of goodwill, most of his kind would simply murder her on sight, in fact, that's most likely to have caused the recent escalations in the conflict between humans and cornerians in the first place...

...But he as a person was also aware that he simply couldn't leave her there to die, or worse, at the mercy of an Imperial patrol. He promised himself that the conflict wouldn't change him and he was damn committed to upholding this promise. Despite all the risks, Mike ultimately decided to take her in. For better or worse, he had already made up his mind. But even despite that, he sat beside her bed for more than an hour, quietly contemplating about all the choices he had made up until that point. If he stays true to his morals, will it affect his squad's mission negatively?

"I can't think about that in such a way," he stopped his train of thought, "More importantly, she is an it. And it won't be grateful at all for what I've done."

When the faint, constant beeping sound of an electrocardiogram finally made it's way to her conscious, Nora opened her eyes. This time around, there was nobody to be found inside her room. Not that it mattered anyway since all that these humans have done to her was tending to her injuries and monitoring her vitals.

Many thoughts crossed her mind during these brief moments between the anesthetic kicking in and her waking up, but the most important was - why? They had to have some motivation behind saving her life. Most likely they are going to interrogate her... But that ultimately didn't have any sense - they would have done so much earlier. Torture? Or maybe taking her as hostage...?

All those questions had yet to be answered since there was no one to talk to her, and she was confined to her bed.

"It's all strange," She thought, fixing her gaze on the blank ceiling. "there HAS to be something I can provide to them…"

Nora's train of thought was interrupted by the motion of sliding doors on the other end of the room. Two scientists entered the room, and she instantaneously felt the desire to get back to sleep. Having nothing as an alternative, she simply let her mind wander off.

"The Cornerian's vitals are getting better with every day, Mike," Matt cleared his throat and handed the PDA to his superior.

Michael gave the device a quick run through. The data showed great, almost unbelievably fast tempo of recovery of the Cornerian's body. There were still bone fractures, especially in the chest and its right arm, but most, if not all, internal wounds were almost completely healed.

"You sure these readings are right?" Mike said, pointing at the device. "Nobody with wounds that severe would recover THAT fast."

Konieczny shook his head, "You think I'd give you unprocessed and unverified data? These are correct... Somehow." The scientist scratched his head while looking at the research results, "You know," he said, "There's only so much we know about Cornerian anatomy. It's not like we had any chances to study them thoroughly in the past..."

"I wonder why."

"...But there can also be another explanation."

A glimpse of surprise crossed Mike's face for a brief moment but quickly returned to the usual, tired look. "We've searched for more than a week, Matt," he said, getting up from behind his computer. Walking slowly across the room, he slid his finger across the PDA screen, projecting its contents on the screens hanging on the wall. "That is a proof of nothing. If it was still there-"

"You can be right," Konieczny replied, crossing his arms and leaning on a wall behind him, still closely surveying the research results. "In my opinion though, it looks more than a mere coincidence. We should search the base again."

Mike sighed, clenching the bridge above his nose. "You know I trust you, Matt," he said. "But I think we looked through every nook and cranny here, and we found shit."

"Give me two men and three days, tops."

"We really should get the fuck out of here as soon as possible. You've forty-eight hours."

The scientist's face beamed with motivation as he ran out of the office, "Thanks, you won't regret this!"

As the doors closed, the man was once again left alone, standing in front of now blank computer screen. Still having the data in his mind, though, he weighed the options he had at the moment.

"If we're going to get out of here soon, I'm not leaving the Cornerian here. Time to tie up at least one loose end."

"Meyers, tell the med guys to wake the Cornerian up," he said through his radio. He sat behind his desk before finally adding, "And bring me a gun."

As the anesthetics' effect wore off a bit, Nora was finally able to focus her thoughts. The first thing she noticed were two scientists standing next to her bed and chatting in a language she'd never heard before. One of them then approached her and connected a syringe to the drip-bag.

"Great, they did their shit, and now it's "Goodnight, sweet princess" again…"

Much to her surprise, however, she didn't feel the sleepiness. If anything, she felt more energized.

"What the fuck?" she said under her breath, becoming more stressed as the time went on.

She didn't have much time to spend by herself before she heard the magnetic lock springing to life just as the doors opened.

A tall human soldier in a lab coat entered without a word. Not looking at her, it took a seat on a small stool in the corner of the room. She examined him quickly - it was definitely a male, with a long ponytail and shortly cut hair on his chin. Its eyes, distinctively green, were bloodshot and had swollen bags under them. It wasn't wearing a lab coat. Instead, it wore a flak jacket with nothing but a white T-shirt under, coupled with black cargo pants.

There was no doubt in her mind - it was a soldier, most likely one of the important ones. She recalled it visiting her before, with the other two scientists, or with the even taller one, with whom it talked much more freely. Her muscles tensed as she tried to decipher what was happening. It was the first time they deliberately woke her up, and now she was left alone in the room with a soldier. Was it going to interrogate her?

...And if yes, then how was it going to do it, she didn't know human languages.

The human looked composed and concentrated, if not a bit overstrung. It just sat there on the stool, with its stare locked into the ground.

"Hello." It said after a few moments of tense silence, causing her to jump in a bit of shock and disbelief. It was speaking Cornerian!

Having noticed the stress that appeared on her face, the human looked directly at her, "I'm Sergeant Michael Archer, it was me who brought you here."

Nora blinked a few times in disbelief, "H-how do you know my language?"

The human cleared its throat and adjusted itself on the stool, resting its elbows on its knees while placing its chin on folded hands. "We're at war," he said. "We've learned most of your language from the intercepted radio talk, but our scientists also salvaged the tech from your watches," the soldier smiled, tapping a small device on his wrist. "Putting it all together, we kind of deciphered your language and made a makeshift translator."

The vixen choked with her own saliva for a moment. Was that really possible? The software on Cornerian wrist-coms, especially the military-sourced ones was not an industry standard, even on Corneria - it had one of the best-encrypted systems in Lylat! There was no way...

Cold shivers ran through Nora's spine - as it turned out, humans not only had the necessary technology to reverse-engineer the software, they also were able to sideload their own languages into the thing.

Not that it really mattered, though, since she had no idea where she was at the moment and what was the purpose of her confinement.

"Why are you keeping me here?" she asked, trying to adjust herself better on the bed, but as soon as her chest moved, a wave of pain flooded her mind. Gasping painfully, she instinctively backed herself up to the original position.

"Take it easy," the human said, clearly worried. "You shouldn't do things like that until the hole in your chest heals up."

"My wh- what!?" The vixen stuttered. Driven by adrenaline and sheer shock, she threw the sheets off her body, revealing the terrible state of her body. She couldn't even see it, though, because the rapid movement she made brought an another wave of pain over her thoughts. A pain filled scream escaped her lungs, leaving her light-headed, but she endured it. Whispering curses between her teeth, she once again tried to readjust herself on the bed to be able to see her own body.

"I told you, you should-," the man once again tried to calmly stop her.

"Shut up." She snapped. She couldn't let the human see how weak she was at the moment. Further enduring the pain from the fractured rib cage, she put her elbows behind her and tried to push herself a bit upwards, but ended up falling on one side instead.

"She's stubborn, I give her that," he thought, forcefully stopping himself from smiling. He watched the despaired Cornerian's futile attempts to use the paralyzed hand and not noticing that something's out of the ordinary. He wanted to help but knew all too well that the vixen had to go through this herself.

"Oh my god," she gasped when she finally got a good look at her chest area. Because of her wriggling, all bandages were soaking with fresh blood, mostly in a place where her heart was.

"I'd say it's a miracle you're still breathing," he said, "Until now, I haven't seen one person to be shot by a fully charged railgun through the chest, and still live to see another day."

The dumbfounded look on her face told him she had no idea what was he talking about. "I found you about two weeks ago under a pile of rubble," he explained, standing up. "You have two chest wounds. One is from an assault rifle; the other one is from a sniper's railgun."

He walked over to the wall opposite of the Cornerian's bed and turned on the display, displaying her body under x-rays. "Most of your vital organs are intact; others are already healing quite well. Same goes for your right arm."

"My right arm…?" the vixen murmured, clearly trying to raise her right arm before finally noticing she's not able to. "What the fuck happened to my right arm!?"

"Relax," came the response. "It's paralyzed, but it's not irreversible. Aside from being fractured in two places, your nervous system has been severely damaged. We've deployed nanobots to fix that already. You'll know when it'll be ready."

The Cornerian slid back onto her bed, visibly conflicted and unsure of what to ask him. She was clearly exhausted by everything, so Mike decided he'd postpone the talk until the next day. Without saying anything, he turned away and left the room.

"You think that was a good idea?"

Mike smiled and turned around. Matt was standing right next to the doors and switched on the magnetic lock just as they closed, "What was I supposed to do?" Mike replied, "We'll have to free her sooner or later, I just want to minimize the risk-"

"Risk of what, it attacking us?" Matt snapped back, "You think I haven't noticed? This ain't just a good-hearted operation. It reminds you of him, doesn't it?"

"Matt-," the soldier tried to explain, but was once again interrupted.

"This is a CORNERIAN, Mike. It is not a 'she', nor is it a person. It is an enemy soldier, mate. An animal at that. And it definitely is not a part of your squad."

Mike pushed back his friend a few steps then leaned on the wall behind him. "I am aware of that. I am not dropping my guard down if that's what you want to tell me."

Konieczny shook his head, then headed down the hallway, "Whatever, man. I'm just worried about my pal. Tread carefully, or squad 21 will not only lose a leader but will also have to murder a hostage."

"It's not that I'm not prepared for anything," came the response. "One wrong move, and sh… 'IT' gets a new hole in the head. I'd just like to avoid that."

Matt sighed loudly. "It's not what I wanted to tell you, though."

"What is it, then?"

As the doors closed behind the human, Nora was once again left alone with her thoughts. She was utterly confused; her mind was blank.

"What the fuck is the bigger picture here?" she asked herself aloud.

"They're humans. Rotten, filthy humans. They destroy everything on their way, just like they did with Vaintas, Greino or Steinass." The vixen grinned with disgust. Her thoughts brought back images of corpses. Lots of them, thrown onto piles and left to rot. "They didn't even spare children…"

Despite the pain, she smacked her left hand on the bedside table with enough force the light furniture jumped into the air a bit, before finally falling to the ground.

"And now this happens… Are they brainwashing me or something? I don't get it"

Nora looked around, examining her surroundings. It was the very first time she was fully awake, and she intended to make a full use of that time. Much to her dismay, however, nothing in the laboratory was out of the ordinary. Nothing looked like a brainwashing device, neither - she wasn't connected to any apparatus, even the electrocardiogram was cordless.

But who was she to judge? Even if the device had a nameplate with "MIND CONTROL DEVICE" written all over it, she wouldn't be able to read that. She finally laid back on her bed, focusing on the regular sound of her own pulse in an attempt to gather her thoughts once again.

"Okay, relax. It doesn't look like I'm being brainwashed. At least I don't FEEL brainwashed… Maybe they put something into me? A tracking device, perhaps?"

It certainly was possible - the wound in her chest could be, in fact, a stitching from surgery made to conceal the tracking device inside her. On the other hand, she distinctly remembered being shot twice before she fell. That meant it could just be a railgun wound.

"Damn it. At this rate, I'm going to get paranoid"

Further, prolonged examination of the light didn't give any answers to the questions lingering at the back of her head. The stresses of the now passing day quickly dug into her energy, and she once again felt tired and sleepy. Having nothing better to do, she closed her eyes and let herself fall asleep. After all, she was - relatively speaking - quite safe there.

"Warp drive disengaged" a cold, metallic voice stated as the stars morphed from lines to dots and the engine sound died down to a mesmerizing hum.

A short figure chuckled with excitement, "ROB, what's our drift?"

A humanoid robot with a golden chassis turned its head around. "Drift 1,200 thousand," it replied.

"Fuck!" the figure exclaimed. "Okay. It's not terrible. Add calibration to the to-do list; I know she can do way better."

Even though it didn't go with a hiccup at the very end, the Cornerian prototype dreadnought vessel had just passed its first space jump test. It also meant that Cornell "Rusty" Toad, the ship's designer, creator and, at the moment, also the pilot, has just christened his first ship in his life, finally catching up to his lifelong dream of living up to his grandfather, Beltino Toad.

He slid out of the maintenance shaft below the main computer and sat on the captain's seat in the middle of the bridge.

Despite the fact the ship was a dreadnought, the bridge was designed to be pretty minimalistic, with space for two pilots, a navigator, head mechanic, comms operator and, of course, the captain. Even though the room wasn't spacious, the short amphibian still looked relatively small, being the only person in there.

He brought up a diagnostic console on the captain's computer, which in turn projected all sorts of diag data all over the HUD display on the walls around. He quickly glanced around these, making sure everything was in perfect order.

The main doors behind Cornell slid open, and a lynx entered the room. Her military boots clacked loudly as she walked up to the captain's seat and rested her arm on the back.

"So… I guess we're alive," she said indifferently. "We're also not in the middle of space, from the looks of it."

The amphibian glanced at his friend with a smile, "Yeah, she passed every test," he replied, tapping on the projected glass keyboard in front of him.

Miyu smiled as she walked across the room towards the navigator's seat. She sat on it and rested her feet atop of the console. "So," the lynx looked at the frog, placing her hands behind her head, "What's next?"

"I dunno," came the response. "I guess Phoenix Labs will send the ship to the military somewhere around this week, and I'm gonna get paid."

"Wow," Miyu chuckled. "If you want me to compliment you, Rusty, you're not gonna hear it."

Cornell rolled his eyes. "I know. Still, thanks for going with me."

"I didn't do it for you," she smirked, taking her boots off the console and opening up the interface.

"Umm… What are you doing?"

The ship's engines roared in response to Miyu's commands.

"Engaging jump drive. Target - Sylve," the computer voice announced.

Cornell jumped out of his seat and rushed towards Miyu, who was already standing guard in front of the computer with her arms crossed.

"Damn it Miyu!" he shouted, desperately trying to get to the console. "You're gonna get us suspended again!"

"The only thing that's getting suspended is your ass," came the response as Miyu grabbed the amphibian by his jacket and threw him on his back with ease. His attempts to yank his arms out of her grasp were futile, though.

"Jump in 3… 2… 1…"

"Consider this a punishment"

The words echoed through her mind as she abruptly woke up from sleep and almost jumped out of her bed. She immediately regretted the decision when her broken ribs reminded her of their presence.

Nora hated the nightmares. Ever since the attack on Ther, she couldn't get a night's worth of sleep, always visited by the memories of that day, of what happened to Shane, what happened to her.

The vixen was trembling, struggling to contain the fear and pain residing in her head. She thought it was all over, that she had learned how to cope with her memories, but the ambush and subsequent fear of death seemed to break the stress out of control. She had a hard time breathing as the panic overtook her rational thinking.

She remembered the moment when she was left on the ground in the pool of her blood, gasping for air with every breath. The cold was unbearable, comparable only to the amount of pain she experienced at that moment.

Nora's heart raced as the fight for self-control continued. She closed her eyes and attempted to slow her breath. Slowly, but steadily, she managed to push the images out of her head, just enough so the terrible numbing panic stopped.

"Okay," she said to herself, "I seriously need to stand up."

The pain in her chest wasn't as terrible as she thought at the beginning. Her outer wounds were already fully healed, except for the two railgun ones, but these were also on the right track to close themselves. After a bit of struggling, especially with the paralyzed right hand, she managed to get herself up and to sit upright on the edge of the bed.

Carefully, to avoid any unnecessary sound, as well in an attempt not to hurt herself, she slid her bottom down off the bed, trying to weigh herself, and gauge how weak her legs were. As soon as her weight shifted from the hand and back to the legs, however, her body collapsed on the floor.

"Damn it," she growled.

Her face hit the ground pretty hard, causing her ears to ring like hell. She didn't hurt herself in any meaningful way, so she was quite safe at the moment…

...That alone, though, wasn't the vixen's biggest concern at the moment.

"How the fuck am I going to get back on the bed again now?"

The scientist's eyes opened wide as he monitored the whole situation on the screen, "Markoff, Wendel! Red fell on the floor! Get your asses there and-"

"No," Mike abruptly stopped the man, keeping his eyes on the screen, "Let her handle herself."

"Okay… Let's see if this piece of junk is suitable for something more than being just a big paperweight," she said to herself, looking at the rail that kept her right hand in a proper position for better healing. She grabbed the bed with her left hand and pulled herself into a sitting position, leaning on one of the bed's legs.

"Okay, well, that's a start," she sighed, then pushed her right hand behind her back as a support, then pushed herself higher. Despite moaning a bit, the rail on her arm didn't give in and provided the vixen a nice little push towards getting into a vertical position. Besides the bed, however, there was nothing to grab around.

"F-Fuck," Nora growled with annoyance, "What the hell can I-" she stopped herself and got to work. Using her right arm as a support, she inched herself towards the door, then grabbed its handle.

"I really wonder why humans put handles on automated doors, but, damn, am I grateful they do," she smirked triumphantly as she got on one knee, and, slowly but steadily stood up.

Her knees were hardly able to lock in a straight position; her stance was unsteady - it was a challenge to just keep her weight on her two legs, let alone do anything more than that.

"Great. Now, let's take a little stroll across the room."

"I call bullshit!" One of the spectators repeated for the third time while counting his money, before throwing a bunch of it onto the pile before him.

"She'll make it," Mike said firmly, his arms crossed, not looking away from the screen.

For everybody gathered in the observation room, everything that had happened up until that point in the med room was a spectacle.

"Moreover," the soldier continued, "She's gonna try to break out tomorrow."

"Now THAT'S what I call bullshit, boss," another soldier chuckled as he threw forty bucks on the table.

"She's stubborn," Mike thought. He looked at the pile of money on the table and smiled to himself, knowing that this money will surely be his in a few moments.

With every step, Nora was feeling more and more comfortable on her own two legs. The wobbling stopped with the second lap around the med room, and now she was about to finish her fifth one. She was still limping a bit, which was understandable, given the fact her left leg was shot through the other day, but other than that she regained her strength almost terrifyingly fast.

"Damn I'm good," she laughed when she finally got back on her bed. She wondered what kind of meds was she under that her wounds healed so quickly - it was a little over a week since she was "rescued" by the humans, and despite the severity of the wounds sustained during the ambush, she already was able to walk.

That, however, was not the time for thinking. The vixen yawned loudly, tired with all that happened during that day, and quickly fell asleep.

"Miyu, for the love of the Creator, let's go back, Fara will surely make us regret that!" Cornell repeated once again, tailing the careless Lynx through the streets of Termina, Sylve's capital city.

Sylve was an outskirt planet known for all kinds of tourist activities. During one year, more than a half of Lylat system's population visited the planet's tropical beaches and winter resorts. That wasn't the cause of the Lynx's visit to the place though.

She strolled casually through the streets, sipping the strawberry smoothie she just picked up from the restaurant.

"Where are we going anyway?" The amphibian asked, trying to get any response from his friend.

Miyu stopped and turned around, "Rusty, I really don't mind you going with me, but please shut up before I change the shape of your face. Permanently."

"Fuck you, Miyu! I'm taking the shuttle back to the ship! I'm gonna leave in forty minutes, and I don't care if I leave you here!"

The lynx rolled her eyes, "Yeah. Like I'd believe you'd leave your sister alone. Do you think I'm stupid?"

The annoyed frog shrugged, "Do what you want, but don't expect me to put up with you! I'm so gonna file a report on you when we get back!" he continued to ramble as he went around the corner, finally disappearing from the lynx's sight.

"Okay, now that I got rid of him…" she said, turning on her wrist-com and dialing a number from her phonebook. After a few dial tones, an image of a white dog with bows tied to the ears appeared on the screen.

"Oh my- Miyu?! Long time no see!" she said enthusiastically.

"Hey Fay, likewise."

A/N: That concludes chapter two of Rising Phoenix. I mainly attempted to fix the pacing and description side of things, given that in the original project all that was terrible.

Once again, I am truly and deeply grateful for your interest in my writing! Please share your insight on what should I improve, I value your thoughts very much.

Take care heroes, and see you in next two weeks!