Disclaimer: I am a simple writer producing this story for entertainment. I do not own the video game series, Star Fox, nor any of it's characters. Star Fox is property of Nintendo. NOT Link McCloud. Got it?
Note: Well, hi! It's been a while huh; just about 2 months. Sorry 'bout that. I hit a writer's block (if anyone didn't notice) and I was very, very (very) slowly working on the chapter you are about to read. I believe that I won't have a problem with a block again. I have surpassed a difficult part of the story, and the rest of "The Catastrophe of War" should be suspenseful action. But, there are no guarantees.
Now, read on, my fellow readers.
The Catastrophe of War
Chapter 8
As Krystal pulled the rest of the team into the safe-to-breathe atmosphere that surrounded Krazoa Palace, Fox noticed that it was raining again, just like it was when he was on Sauria for the first time. But this time around, the rain had a red tint to the drops, and instead of the bright white lightning bolts, they were flashes of blinding red electricity. Fox blankly stared out of his cockpit window, faintly thinking what they had to do to save Sauria again.
The rest of the team seemed to have similar reactions. Slippy was hyperventilating, Falco, for reasons best known to himself, was punching the cushion of his seat like there was no tomorrow, and Peppy had his paws together and was praying. Krystal, however, didn't show too much remorse; she had an expression of extreme concentration, didn't show any concern in any part of her body language, and was muttering, inaudibly, under her breath.
Before the team exited the clouds, everyone heard an unexpected gasp come from Krystal. They all asked her what was wrong, and she just said to wait. When the Arwings and escape pod emerged out of the dense gray clouds above Krazoa Palace, the team still didn't know what was troubling the vixen. Besides the red glow coming off of the Palace, there seemed to be nothing wrong with it. Fox asked Krystal what was wrong again; he couldn't see anything too alarming. She replied in saying to look at the roof of the palace. At first, no one could see anything wrong, due to the fact that they were too far above the Palace. But when they were one hundred yards above it, Falco spotted what was upsetting Krystal.
Dozens, upon dozens of motionless Earthwalkers littered the smooth tiled floor. Many were missing limbs, about five of the dinosaurs were decapitated, it seemed some had internal organs ripped out, and each of the dead or dying Earthwalkers were laying in a huge pond of blood.
Fox recoiled like he got slapped in the face. "Krystal! Get over there-"
"Fox. You yelling at me won't make me go any faster. This Arwing is going as fast as it can when pulling you three." interrupted Krystal bluntly.
Fox was about to shout again when Krystal glanced at him over the communicator; Fox bit down on his tongue, making it bleed slightly.
When the team neared the ledge of the roof, Fox saw that one lone Earthwalker was standing, and very, very slowly walking toward them. He couldn't identify it from this distance, so he asked Krystal.
"Hey...Do you have any...idea...who...Why are you crying Krystal?" asked Fox as he noticed the steady flow of tears coming out of Krystal's eyes.
She shook her head wildly, tears flying off of her face, and looked at Fox through her communicator, with wide, horrified eyes. Her mouth started moving as though she was saying something, but no sound came out.
"Let me be more specific." Krystal's scared look was making Fox extremely worried. "What are his or her injuries, and what is his or her name, if you know it." he asked with a very shaky voice.
Krystal swallowed visibly. "He... has a broken leg...a fractured skull...a broken jaw...a failing heart because of massive blood loss from fatal wounds...one of his...eyes were ripped out of it's socket..."
"And who is he...?" asked Slippy.
Krystal stared at Fox, teary eye to eye. "Oh, Fox...that dying Earthwalker...is...is...it's...Tricky..."
Fox's mouth slowly opened in horrified astonishment. He clamped his paws tightly together, and started rocking back in forth in his seat, while staring at the figure of Tricky slowly limp towards them. His back left leg was the one that was broken, and he was dragging it behind him, each step making him wince. He had massive gashes on his flanks, which were bleeding so badly, Fox had to look away. Tricky's jaw was split in two right down the middle, and his right eye socket was bleeding steadily.
Falco was staring at the slow moving Earthwalker with an expression that he rarely has on his face; pity, and Peppy was doing the same. After looking at Tricky for a couple seconds, the hare got out of his chair, and went to the back of the escape pod, to look for a medical aid kit. Slippy, predictably, was crying uncontrollably. Fox, who was still rocking in his seat, gave an order.
"Lets...lets go down there...see what we can do...and...and find out who did this, and what...we can do to help..." he said in a dull voice.
Krystal nodded faintly, and boosted forward, yet she didn't see the reason why they should go down there; Tricky was in no condition to talk.
When Krystal's Arwing was fully over the top of the roof, she pushed a green button in the cockpit, and the wires that were towing the other vehicles disconnected; they swirled in the air, tearing away from each other, and they were pulled back into Krystal's Arwing. Fox's, Slippy's, and Falco's Arwings twitched when they were disconnected, and slowly lowered to the roof of the Palace, with a low, loud hiss. Peppy's pod, however, stayed airborne.
"How...?" asked Slippy as he looked back at the pod, while unbuckling his seatbelt.
Peppy was scratching the back of his head in embarrassment. "Eheh...I forgot that this pod only needs Arwing fuel to fire weaponry systems. The thrusters are powered by batteries, which run off of hydrogen and I have a good...supply...of...the gas..." his voice trailed off as Krystal shot him a glare over their communication screens.
"At times like these I think the phrase 'When you get older, the mind is the first thing to go' is actually true; I could have saved so much fuel if you knew that earlier Peppy."
Peppy only smiled, and ROB was ramming himself into the wall repeatedly, seemingly punishing himself for forgetting the batteries.
"Enough of that." said Fox roughly. "We need to help Tricky."
With that, he pulled two blasters out of the storage compartment under the Arwing controls, and attached them to his belt. When Slippy noticed this, he asked why Fox was arming himself.
"The creatures that killed all of these Earthwalkers, and injured Tricky that badly may still be in the Palace. I don't want to be caught in an ambush unarmed."
Falco, upon hearing Fox's words, dived into his storage compartment, and grabbed two machine guns, while Slippy rummaged frantically in his to find a sniper rifle.
When Fox was reaching for the lever that opened the cockpit window, he noticed that Krystal hadn't gotten any weapons out of her storage, and she was about to get out of her Arwing.
"Krystal?" she looked at him, "Aren't you going to get any firearms?"
"No, I'm not." before Fox could ask why, she added, "I never liked using them. I'll just use my staff."
"Well, ok..." muttered Fox. "But just take a standard blaster, just in case."
Krystal shrugged, retrieved a blaster out of the storage compartment, and opened the cockpit. She jumped out swiftly, with her unextended staff in her right paw, and a blaster attached to her belt. As soon as she landed on the soaked tile of the roof, she started sprinting towards Tricky, slipping slightly on the wet tile.
Fox opened his cockpit. When it was open, wind and rain blasted at his body. His fur became soaked and gathered a very small red tint, and the wind shot him in the face, momentarily making him incapable to breathe. He turned his head away from the wind, gulped down two big breaths of air, and jumped out of his cockpit. Upon landing, he slipped, and fell to his side, banging his head, hard, on the tile.
Fox let out a muffled scream, and clutched his head tightly, while rolling around in extreme pain. It was like getting hit in the head with 10 fully charged blaster shots at the same time, at the exact same place, and every second afterwards it felt like he was getting hit in the head with a sledge hammer. He rolled around on the tile, sometimes bumping into an Earthwalker carcass, or a small ledge on the roof. After a couple minutes of dealing with the pain, he realized he almost received a concussion, and was thankful that he still had his head on his shoulders.
Fox raised his head slightly, and opened his eyes. Through his blurry vision, he saw an outline of Krystal backing away from Tricky, with her now extended staff still in her right paw, and a raised, charging blaster in her left. Fox became confused, so confused in fact, he almost forgot about the fact that he almost got a concussion, and his mind filled with the question, "Why...?"
He pushed himself to a sitting position, and shakily stood up, with one paw on his throbbing head. He heard a faint voice and a light tap on his waist.
"Fox, are you ok?" asked Slippy as he prodded Fox.
Falco added his concern. "Yeah man. When we saw hit your head on the ground like that we thought you were dead. That kind of blow can kill someone...when we saw you roll around like that, we were relieved but still...whoa." he added when Fox swayed and nearly fell down to the ground again; the only thing that stopped him was that Slippy was holding him up with two hands pressed up against Fox's back.
"I'm-I'm fine. I...I just need to find out why..." Fox pointed up at Krystal, who was still backing away from the advancing Tricky, to finish his sentence.
"I don't know why she would back away from Tricky." grunted Slippy, as he pushed Fox on to his own feet. "Didn't they become friends when we came to Sauria during the Apariod invasion?"
"Why don't you ask her with your thoughts Fox?" suggested Falco quietly as he pointed the two machine guns toward Tricky; Slippy took his sniper rifle off of his back, and hoisted the rifle up to his shoulder and took aim at Tricky.
"Ok...Krystal, why are you-"
"This isn't Tricky." interrupted Krystal fiercely.
"What? Of course that's Tricky! Look at the crown on his head! What other Earthwalker would wear that? And you even identified him as Tricky as we were approaching the Palace!"
"Let me be more critical. Tricky is no longer in control of his body. I think he has been possessed by a Krezoa." Krystal thought as she glanced backwards briefly.
"Why didn't you figure that out sooner; when we were approaching the Palace?" asked Fox.
"Like I said a while ago, the Krezoa can block my telepathic abilities. I could not tell that he was possessed."
"But being possessed isn't too bad right? I mean, we were possessed and we were ok."
"This is not like when we were possessed by a Krazoa, just having them in our bodies to be transported. No...the Krezoa can fully possess the mind and body of it's victim, and have them attack the victim's allies against their will."
"If you couldn't sense that a Krezoa was in control of him, why can you tell now?"
"His eyes, and his thought patterns...continuously saying some...thing...Oh, my God..."
"What? What is it?"
"N-nothing. Just...just start charging your blasters; he won't just fall over dead with a simple blast in the side."
Fox's blurred vision was starting to become normal again, and when he could clearly see what was in front of him, he saw what Krystal's concern about Tricky's eyes. His eyes were glowing a deep red, just like how Krystal's were when she was back in her Arwing, and the same color as the Krezoa Spirits.
"Fox?" came Slippy's voice. "Why are we going to shoot Tricky?"
"...Krystal thinks that Tricky is possessed by a Krezoa. Look at his eyes. That is the same red that the Krezoa glow." even though Fox was concerned about what Krystal heard in the possessed Tricky's mind, he dismissed the thought so he could concentrate on the moment.
"Thats just great." said Falco roughly. "What are we supposed to do? Wait here and let him kill us, or blast the hell out of him?"
"No...I think we should try to reason with him...see if we can get the Krezoa Spirit's control to slip before either of us do any damage to the other." said Fox as he took one blaster off of his belt.
Falco and Slippy didn't say anything.
"Fox!"
Peppy's voice made Fox jump; he had forgotten that the hare was still here.
"Hm? What is it Peppy?" asked Fox as he started to charge his blaster when Tricky came within 100 feet of them.
"I know I'm rusty with the field work, so I don't think there is anything of use I could do down there. What can I do to help with this dilemma?" asked Peppy. "Remember, this pod's weapon systems don't work."
Fox thought for a second. "You said that the boosters on that thing still function right?"
"Yes."
"Good. Go back to Corneria, and get reinforcements."
Fox heard a small gasp come from Peppy. "But...but that's a 3 day flight! How long will you guys last in the Palace with limited supplies?"
"We are going to have to manage." said Falco gruffly.
"...Ok then...I'll go and get an army...I'll be back. And don't do anything stupid! YOU ONLY HAVE ONE LIFE TO LIVE!" yelled Peppy as he turned the pod towards the sky.
"We won't Peppy." said Fox. "Good luck."
"You too Fox." and the hare disconnected the com link.
Fox noticed Krystal's left ear twitch. She glanced backwards at Fox, and smiled lightly. Before Fox could ask, she had backed into line with the rest of the team, and had a finger up to her lips, telling Fox not to ask at this moment. Fox heard an engine rev, and looked back and up to see Peppy's pod fly away into the storm.
"You...why are you here…"
A menacing voice made Fox look back sharply in the direction of Tricky. The dinosaur had stopped 40 feet away from them, glaring at each of the team members in turn. And for some reason, he was staring at Krystal longer than the others. Slippy's entire body was shaking, Falco narrowed his eyes and tensed his grip on his machine guns, and Krystal raised her staff slightly.
"I…asked you a question…answer…" said Tricky; the sound of his voice had changed dramatically. Even though there was a small tint of his original voice in the background, there was a much louder, deeper, and machine-like sounding voice that was more prominent. He was in a stance as if he was going to charge at them at any second.
Fox stared at Tricky in extreme shock for a couple seconds, then gathered enough courage to speak.
"…Tricky? It's me, Fox! Don't you remember me?" said Fox in a desperate voice; he wasn't going to answer Tricky's question just yet. He wanted to get through to the real Tricky to ask about what happened to Sauria.
Tricky didn't respond but he tensed up more. Fox tried again.
"Tricky! It's me! Fox McCloud! Remember when I came here a year ago, and you adventured with me all over Sauria?"
Tricky started to growl; Slippy nearly dropped his rifle.
"Remember when we came here to help you with the Apariod invasion? And when you were taking me and Krystal back to our Arwings after-"
"Fox."
"Not now Krystal." thought Fox without looking back at her.
"Yes, now. I just realized something that you need to know…something about the Krezoa's possessing ability."
"What is it then? We need all the advice we can get to get that spirit out of him. I need to ask the real Tricky something."
"That's just it…we can't ask Tricky anything ever again…"
"What…what do you mean by that?" asked Fox, finally looking back at the vixen, who had the expression like someone just died.
Krystal sighed, slowly and sadly. "After…after someone has been possessed by a Krezoa for over a week…the spirit…it eliminates it's host."
"No…then…that means…"
"…Even though his body is standing in front of us…the Tricky that we knew is dead."
Fox turned his head slowly back to the Earthwalker in front of them. The dino was now snarling, and had his fangs bared. Fox started to take small steps backwards, while taking his other blaster off of his belt.
"What is it Fox?" asked Slippy. Falco watched Fox step backwards while keeping one keen eye on Tricky.
Fox shook his head, not believing that Tricky is dead. He couldn't be dead, he just couldn't.
"That's it…if you won't answer me…then I'll MAKE YOU ANSWER!!" yelled Tricky, and, despite his broken leg, he charged at the team.
Slippy screamed and dropped his rifle this time; Falco, without Fox's orders, opened fire on Tricky, but the plasma rounds just bounced off of him. Krystal threw her blaster behind her, and crouched with her staff in both paws. Fox didn't do a thing; he just stood there looking at Tricky with an expression showing that he was struggling with indecision.
When Tricky was about 10 feet from them, the team, expect Krystal, scattered; Fox and Falco ran off towards the area in which Krystal was held when Andross captured her, and Slippy quickly picked up his rifle and screamed all the way to the Arwings. When Tricky noticed that only Krystal had stood her ground, he smirked slightly, his jaw moving in ways that it shouldn't, and veered toward her.
"Krystal! Get out of his way!" yelled Fox, stopping a few feet from a ramp, and started back towards the vixen.
"STAY BACK FOX!"
Krystal's yelling voice in his mind made Fox stop in his tracks, and he nearly slipped again.
"YOU ARE OURS, VIXEN!" yelled Tricky, and he tilted his head forward so the horns on his head would go through Krystal's skull.
"NO!!" yelled Slippy, Falco and Fox simultaneously. At the exact moment when Tricky was going to make contact with Krystal, a bolt a lightning struck the rod on top of the Palace. The blast of red light blinded the others, and they could not see what had happened.
When Fox stopped seeing stars, he looked around frantically, and saw Falco flat on his back, with his eyes closed.
"Oh, crap...He must of got hit with some of the electricity from the bolt..." muttered Fox.
Fox moved towards to Falco to help him; he put his ear near his slightly open beak. He was breathing very slowly but he was out cold. Then he remembered Krystal's defensive effort to stop Tricky. Fox looked back where they should have collided. Tricky was still standing in the spot where Krystal was, with his head bowed, and Krystal was no where in site. Fox looked in the direction in which Krystal would have flown backwards from the impact. But, she was not there. Then he realized that with the amount of speed that Tricky was going, if he hit the vixen, she would have flown over the edge of the roof. Fox was about to run over to the edge when Slippy's voice sounded off of his wrist.
"F-Fox!"
"What?"
"Look!"
Fox squinted at the toad to see that he was pointing at Tricky. Fox looked at the dino again, and saw something very odd that he didn't notice before. A small, glowing purple gem encased in gold sticking out of the side of Tricky's body, blood dripping off of the end. He stared at it for a couple seconds and noticed a blue leather boot under Tricky's body. The gem disappeared. Tricky slowly fell to his side, reviling Krystal, in a stabbing stance, holding her blood-coated staff.
"What? Krystal!" shouted Fox when Tricky's body hit the ground with a dull thud.
"Haha! That was brilliant Krystal!" yelled Slippy into his communicator.
Fox and Slippy ran over to the vixen just as she was wiping the blood off of the end of her staff.
"How did you-" began Fox as Slippy prodded Tricky's body with the tip of his rifle.
"I side-stepped just before he hit me. In the split second in which he was passing me, I stabbed him in the heart with my staff, and you can see the result." said Krystal, tilting her head down the dinosaur's body.
Fox stared down at the dead dinosaur's seven and a half foot long body. Slowly, but surly, tears started to appear in his eyes.
"Oh, Fox." muttered Krystal sympathetically, and she put left arm over his shoulder just as Fox clamped his paws over his face.
"I-I can't b-believe that h-he's d-dead." sobbed Fox through is paws. "I-I just...c-can't..."
For some odd reason, Krystal couldn't think of any sympathetic words for Fox. Slippy shook his head; it's been a while since he saw Fox break down like that. Something caught his eye, and Slippy looked up.
"Uh, GUYS!"
Fox and Krystal looked beside them to see Slippy pointing his rifle just slightly above Tricky's body.
"What is it Slippy?" asked Krystal.
"LOOK!"
Fox and Krystal looked at Tricky; they let out a yelp simultaneously and jumped several feet backwards, Slippy scrambling after them. A Krezoa Spirit was coming out of a gash on his side, like something coming out of a narrow tube; it was rolled up in a tight cylinder. While it uncoiled, it kept a hard gaze at Fox, Krystal, and a trembling Slippy. Fox, in a zombie-like state, due to his grief for Tricky, raised his blasters at the floating Spirit. Krystal pointed the tip of her staff at the Krezoa, while charging a Fire Blast shot, and Slippy raised his rifle slowly.
The Krezoa's eyes' narrowed, and glared at each of them in turn. Then it looked back towards the prison area, and at the unconscious Falco.
"...Wait a minute..." muttered Krystal.
The Spirit looked back at the trio, and with the glint in it's red eyes; it showed that if it smile, it would be doing so right now. It did a back flip in the air, and flew rapidly towards Falco.
Fox and Krystal started to run forward; Slippy ran back to the Arwings.
"OH, NO YOU DON'T!" Fox yelled while charging both of his blasters. "YOU ARE NOT GOING TO USE ANOTHER ONE OF MY FRIENDS AGAINST-" Fox was cut off by Krystal grabbing his shoulder, and pulling him to a stop.
"Why did you-" Fox was cut off again when Krystal put one paw over his mouth, and the other pointing towards the sky. Fox looked up, and let out a muffled yell due to Krystal's paw over his mouth.
About fifty Krezoa Spirits were descending to the Palace roof, each with a gaze locked on to a dead Earthwalker. The two stunned foxes watched them go down and enter an Earthwalker's body, with a loud, high pitched hiss. When each of the Krezoas had entered the carcasses on the roof of the Palace, the dead dinosaurs' bodies glowed a deep red, and they twitched slightly.
"No they didn't..." said Krystal while staring at the dinosaurs on the ground.
"I...I think they did." thought Fox, and he raised his left blaster; his right arm was pinned to Krystal's side, because she wouldn't let go of him.
Fifty possessed Earthwalkers slowly rose to their feet, some having difficulty because of missing limbs. Their scales were blood red, and so were their eyes. The blood that was flowing out of their bodies stopped, and the wounds healed very quickly. And as Fox and Krystal stared at the resurrected Earthwalkers, they noticed with extreme horror that the ones with missing limbs were growing them back. Loud pops and snaps filled the air as legs were sprouting out of the Earthwalker's bodies; litter's of blood shot out of them when the legs formed.
"Ugh..." thought Fox. "That's disgusting!"
"It sure is." agreed Krystal.
The Krezoa that possessed Tricky was no where in site, and they looked up at the sky, and around the Earthwalkers, but couldn't see it.
"Oh, no..." came Slippy's voice off of the wrist communicators again; he was back in his Arwing, looking at the possessed dinosaurs with his sniper rifle scope.
Fox pushed Krystal off of him. "Did you find the Krezoa that possessed Tricky, Slippy?" asked Fox.
"...You can say that..."
"What do you mean by-Oh, shit!" gasped Fox; he realized what Slippy meant. Krystal seemed to know what the toad meant too.
Fox and Krystal turned around quickly. They noticed a figure walking down the ramp, through the crowd of red Earthwalkers. When it pushed it's way past the lead Earthwalkers, Fox's jaw dropped, and Krystal let out a low growl.
"So, let's see if you can manage to kill this bird as well, vixen." sneered a possessed Falco, with one machine gun pointed at a far off Slippy, and the other at Fox.
Note: Yeah, thats all. I could have made it longer, but this is a good place to stop, so...I did. I don't have the slightest idea when I'll post Chapter 9, but it will be before the end of time, I can assure you that.
Just as a heads up, you'll be a 'wee' bit confused with some of the stuff in Chapter 9. It will be explained in chapters 10-11 I think...but, thats WAY far off in the future.
Oh...Tricky fans...DON'T-FLAME-ME FOR KILLING HIM! He was annoying anyway. No loss...I'm ready for the mob now.
ONE MORE THING! If I'm "slipping" (you know, getting worse) let me know politely. I'll be glad to punish myself for screwing up...wait...I-I mean fix the problems...yeah...