A/N: So far, so good, eh? My goal is to update at least once a week starting now. Not just this story, all of them, which means Return one week, Amends another, with Outcast here and there. But these two are my main priority right now. I'm also surprised how no one mentioned the clue I dropped at the end of the last chapter. No, not about Kursed, that's what some people thought, but as far as I'm concerned, I only said that the wolverine wanted to use her, no one seemed to notice anything about… a blue falcon?

--

1453 Hours, 25 April, 2439. (Cornerian Military Calendar). Starscream Hanger Bay, Skies above Venom.

"Are you ready to deploy, Captain McCloud?"

The orange vulpine grabbed the dual sticks of his Arwing II, "As ready as I'll ever be."

"Right," the holographic image of the raccoon began to fade, leaving nothing but a voice, "Release the lift lock. Captain?"

"Yes?"

"You are clear for launch."

Fox growled in satisfaction as the engines of the fighter howled to life. He jammed the dual sticks forward and flew out over the surface of the planet. Unfortunately for the vulpine, the place brought back too many memories of when he had first arrived there so many years ago.

"Was it really you dad?" the fox asked himself, "Guiding me out of Andross's base? Or had I just been hallucinating?"

He shoved the questions out of his mind and scanned the area, the Great Fox wasn't anywhere in sight.

"Did you get rid of that as well Falco?" the fox chuckled dryly, "Just like you did everything else? Or are you just hiding from me?"

McCloud shoved on the throttle again and banked to the right as a bright gold laser flew past him. The vulpine rolled his finger over the trigger and waited for more. When it did, Fox rolled to the side quickly again and unleashed a stream of green plasma, at whatever was firing at him. He looked down at the radar and saw no ships approaching.

"D-mn stealth," the fox growled and fired again, there were several explosions and the ships appeared as they tumbled to the ground.

"Hey that was mine!"

Fox's head jerked up at the high squeaky voice, "Who are you? What do you want?"

"Wow, you don't recognize me, Fox?"

He huffed and put his nose up into the air, "Well I know you're not Krystal that's for sure."

"You were always a bad liar McCloud, now say it," the voice was demanding.

"Nope."

"Say it."

"Fine!" the vulpine shouted, "Nice kill… Katt," he grumbled the last word out of the corner of his mouth.

"That's a good Foxy," the feline cooed, there was a pause and her voice dropped to a more serious tone, "Wait, what are you doing here anyway? We've got it all taken care of already."

Fox rolled his eyes, "I'm sure you do. Where's Falco? I wanna see him."

"Oh…" there was a tension between the communication lines. Was he dead? Why was Katt so reluctant to answer?

"Uh… He was captured several days ago. He got too cocky and his ship was shot down."

Fox held back laughter, "Why am I not surprised?" he stuck his tongue into his cheek, it was just like the falcon to so something like that, "Then how do you know he's alive when his ship was shot down rather than killed in the explosion?"

"We saw him eject, but none of us could get to him on time."

"None of who?"

"The team dumb a-s. Zach, Harrison and me."

McCloud flew in a slow one-eighty degree turn around the feline's Arwing, "Anything else you want to tell me, Katt?"

The feline spun the fighter around, "Why would there be anything else I want to tell you?"

"Oh stop it. Don't think you're a good liar and I'm not," the fox charged a plasma laser and locked onto the other Arwing, "Come on, spit whatever it is you have to tell me now and no one will get hurt. You think I don't have the guts?" he tilted the nose of the ship up a small amount and fired. The red ball flew over the glass of Katt's fighter. She squealed in fright and took the ship down a few yards.

"Don't do that!" she piped.

"Try me," Fox charged another laser.

"All right!" the cat's voice went up a whole octave. The vulpine closed one eye and cringed, her voice ringing in his ears, "We… we think Krystal is here as well."

"What?" the fox released the trigger and Katt screeched again as she lowered the arwing even more as the charge sailed over her.

"Stop doing that!" she squealed, "I just said that Krystal might be here!"

McCloud narrowed his eyes, "Well sorry. Forgive me for not giving you the reaction you wanted. Do you know what this means?"

"No. What would it have to do with me anyway?"

Fox slammed his head into his paw, "Yeah but that's not the point!" he snapped, "If she sees me here, I'm dead meat."

"Yeah, well, I'm dead meat just sitting here talking to you. I'm surprised we're still alive. Let's go back to the Great Fox and talk more there," Katt spun around and began flying in the other direction. The vulpine followed the other fighter up into the atmosphere where a huge grey ship sat in orbit above Venom.

"Well. Looks like you haven't changed the ship much," the fox observed.

"Great job captain obvious," Katt said, unimpressed, "Now get in before you give our position away."

Fox flew into the hangar bay, the other Arwing next to him as he jumped out. There were two other Arwings, but Falco's Sky Claw was nowhere to be seen.

Katt was already walking to the bridge, "Hey Foxy, you gonna stand there all day and wait for the enemy to kill themselves or are you coming in?"

Fox turned and kept following her, "Will you stop calling me that? You're just like Falco."

The black and white feline held her left paw up to show a glistening ring on her fourth finger, "That good enough for you? You should have done the same for Krystal while you still had the chance. She's probably engaged to Caroso."

"Thanks Katt, you make me feel so much better. Are you joking? If she were engaged to Panther, there would be a lesser chance of her being here. Which is highly unlikely."

"Whatever, just come on, we're wasting time."

McCloud followed the feline into the bridge and took a good look around. Falco hadn't changed the place up much, as a matter of fact, it hadn't changed much at all. Katt lounged back into one of the chairs and called to a small brown lizard in the front, "Hey, get the general on the line."

"Yeah." The reptile set to work and the black and white feline signaled to a seat but Fox shook his head, "I'd rather not."

"Your loss," she muttered and swung the chair back around towards the screen. The screen flickered on and General Peppy's familiar face became visible.

"Katt. Good to see you and… Fox! You did make it."

The vulpine shrugged, "Yeah, and I'm beginning to regret it," he added under his breath."

"Good, very good. Where's Falco?"

Fox looked at the cat and smirked, she looked down and sighed, "I'm sorry, general, he was captured."

"Don't apologize to me. You'll have to wait until you get him back."

Katt's eyes widened, "Wait, you want us to go get him?" her voice was rising to a squeak, she glared at the fox and looked back to the hare, "I'd rather cough up a hairball than work with McCloud here."

"Well, would you risk the death of your leader just because you don't want to work with Fox?"

The feline looked at him, "No, I suppose not. Tristan, go get Zach," she grinned, showing her sharp teeth as she looked to Fox, "Looks like we've got some work to do."

--

Unknown

The blue vixen's eyes fluttered and opened up. The first thing she could hear was her own heavy breathing. Something wasn't right; it was still dark as her sight cleared.

"What's going on," she growled.

Her question was answered as the cloth was ripped off her eyes, she flinched as a bright white light attacked, wreaking havoc in her retinas.

"Well, the sleeping princess finally wakes up."

Kursed adjusted to the brightness and looked around. At first, nothing was visible from the light but then a figure stepped in front of it. She looked over it and tried to stand, but her paws were held by something clasped behind her, leaving her completely open for any attack, "I said, what' going on," she lowered her voice to a deeper snarl.

That was a mistake, something hard and blunt was driven into the vixen's stomach, knocking the breath out of her. She coughed and brought herself up. "Who are you?"

She immediately regretted speaking again as there was a flash of grey and a fist slammed against the side of her head. It snapped to the side and she could soon feel blood soaking into her fur. As the shadows cleared more, all she could see was that she had been struck with her sniper rifle. She dropped her head, "What do you want from me?"

Something sharp began tracing along her dark blue arm, pressing into the hide, but not enough to cut through it. It found its target, right at her throat, lifting her neck up. Kursed lifted her head and turned it to the side with the direction of the object, and now looked directly into the light above her, with a knife at her neck.

"What's your name?"

The vixen blinked against the light, "Kursed, what's it to you?"

The knife pushed harder, still not cutting, but enough to tighten her throat, and make breathing harder.

"Kursed? What kind of a name is that?"

The fox bared her fangs, "It's my name, you got a problem with that?"

The blade pressed even harder, "Where are you from?"

She knew what they wanted from her, she tapped into his mind, they knew she was different, so she left out a few details, "I'm from Kew, I work as a bounty hunter there."

"Is that all you want to tell me?"

Kursed tightened the muscles in her legs, realizing that they were strapped to the chair as well, "Yes, why do you care anyway?"

"I suggest you answer the question," the blue fox could tell the man was losing his patience.

"Why?!" she scoffed, "So you can kill me in the end. Why don't you just do it now?"

"I wouldn't mind doing that. Or I could make it more entertaining for me by simply slitting your throat and watch you slither around the floor like a worm. That would be quite a show for me and my men here," the blue vixen's head dropped as the knife was jerked away, "At least… I would kill you, but I have orders."

Kursed laughed, "Come on, are you seriously gonna be a f-ck up to your leader. You can branch out, you know you wanna, I won't stop you. Or you can just be a coward and leave me here. Then you can go to h-ll."

"What was that?"

"Go to h-ll."

"Wow, that's brave for the hostage in the situation."

The light was pulled away and the fox was able to see her interrogators were. An orange tabby feline was holding the knife in his paw. As she looked closer, she could see that it was her own. The man holding her rifle was a black hawk. His red eyes stared into hers like the knife, only much sharper and deadlier.

"She's not gonna say anything," the bird said, "Maybe we should just deal with her right now. We can just say that we accidentally beat on her too much."

Kursed grinned, "Looks like your partner here has the right idea."

The cat's tail lashed back and forth, "My partner here knows nothing. Now answer my question."

The blue vixen shrugged, "That could be difficult, you've asked me a lot of questions. Maybe you should tell me which one."

"The one about where you're from."

"Didn't I already tell you? I'm a bounty hunter from Kew."

"And I know that what you're telling me is not completely true."

"Are you calling me a liar?"

"Maybe I am!?"

Then it was all a blur.

As the hawk raised the sniper to strike her, the door to the room exploded. The metal struck the feline in the back of the head, knocking him unconscious. The bird spun around but he was struck down from what the vixen recognized as a standard M12 Plasma Machine Gun.

"Falco?!" a high pitched female voice echoed through the room.

"No, but you could do me a little bit of help by getting me out of here."

"Who are you?"

"Get me out of here and I'll tell you."

"Fine," a black and white feline stepped forward and dug a pair of keys out of the other cats pocket and unlocked the handcuffs, "Now will you tell me who you are?"

She sighed, "My name is Kursed, I'm a bounty hunter from Kew."

"No… I know you, I've seen you before."

The vixen grabbed her knife and sniper, "No, I don't think so."

"Whatever, let's go. We need to get out of here."

"Good observation," Kursed said sarcastically, "You lead the way, I don't know the place."

"Yeah, I'm on it," the feline replied and jogged out of the room, the blue fox following close behind. As they got to the hanger, she sprinted ahead and jumped into a Venomian fighter and prepared to take off. The black and white cat ran up to the jet and put her paws on her hips, obviously upset.

"Hey! I just probably saved your life and you jump into an enemy fighter and get ready to leave. A simple thank you would suffice."

Kursed looked out the glass, "Uh… Yeah, I would, but I work alone."

The cat opened her mouth but the engines of the plane flared to life and the vixen took off into the atmosphere.

Katt groaned and ran to her Arwing, "It's not like it matters," she muttered, "She wouldn't be any help anyway."

She sat in the cockpit of her Arwing and waited. There was a heavy slam as the doors to the hangar were opened and closed. She looked out of the cab of the fighter and gasped. Falco and Fox were entering the hanger, though the falcon didn't look very happy to have McCloud with him.

"Who let McCloud come?" he yelled.

Katt leapt out of the Arwing and jumped on Falco, he grunted and laughed softly as he returned the hug.

"You haven't changed a bit," the vulpine muttered from the side, "Come on, you can have your little love fest on the Great Fox."

"Yeah, yeah," the avian climbed into the feline's fighter, "Let's go, Foxy here and I need to have a little talk."

Fox rolled his eyes, "Sure," he climbed into his own fighter and took off.

Falco looked to Katt, "Seriously?"

She shook her head, "It wasn't my decision okay."

"Whatever. Get in here, I'm not to happy about this."

"Trust me," Katt climbed in, "Neither am I… Neither… am… I."