A/N: Hey, I just wanted to thank everyone for reading. When I first started writing this story, I never imagined that people would like it, so thanks for sticking with me so far. I'll try not to disappoint.
Badlander
Chapter 9: The Wind is Laughing
Andrea Jade Bowman huffed silently in the cool, darkened room. The breezeless air, haunting as it was majestic, crept gently down her spine. She shivered in the darkness of the room, the only place she ever remembered. The only thing she ever knew.
But she was not alone in that dark room. About that she was very much aware. Andrea could almost feel the horrid creature's breath cast a foul smog throughout the room. There was something familiar about the presence, its scent, its mannerisms, but she couldn't remember.
God damn it! Why can't I remember?! Andrea screamed inside herself, where no one else could hear.
"You're so cute when you squirm," a deep, familiar voice bellowed over the silence. In the darkness, Andrea could just barely make out the hulking form of her intruder. It – no, he Andrea was now certain, stood well over seven feet tall, easily dwarfing her own impressive six foot frame. The way the figure stood with supreme confidence told Andrea that the intruder could either seriously handle himself in a fight, or was the biggest idiot on Fichina for neglecting to tie her up.
How do I know these things? She asked herself silently. The room is cold, and I can remember… snow. When was the last time she had ever seen it snow on any off the other worlds of Lylat? Have I ever seen snow to begin with? An urgent part of her mind wondered seriously.
"If you're gonna kill me, get it over with. I don't have all day," Andrea taunted. She would be in no position to fight back if the distant figure had a gun. If the intruder fell for the taunt, moved closer and she discovered he were unarmed she might just have a chance. If not, well, she'd be dead, Andrea considered darkly. Deep down, Andrea understood that death might be preferable to whatever the intruder had in store for her.
A dark, chilling fit of salivating laughter echoed throughout the room. In spite of herself, Andrea felt another cool chill creep down her spine. There was something beyond menacing about that laugh, some distant memory or dream that haunted her, preyed upon her, demanded her blood for the sole sake of its own amusement. She tried once more to place the figure before her, but her mind would not allow it. The figure stood threateningly in the dark, rasping coldly with laughter.
A low metallic whine of a door interrupted her intruder's laughter. She heard small steps click over the sudden silence.
"WHAT IS IT?!" the gargantuan figure boomed suddenly, causing Andrea to jump slightly on the hard mattress.
"Um, um, um-"
"Spit it out!" The intruder demanded.
"Zogz wanted me to let you know that we've finished our analysis on the Device. Our scientists have determined i-it can be safely moved." The interrupter squeaked.
Andrea could just barely perceive the low rumble of the intruder's footsteps as he advanced on the unsuspecting newcomer. Sensing her chance, Andrea slowly crept from the bed and advanced behind the lumbering figure. She gasped as she beheld an over-seven foot tall silverback mountain gorilla. In the dark, Andrea could just barely perceive the various scars and pale markings that told of several battles fought throughout the years.
Those scars looked so familiar…
"Anything else?" the gorilla said darkly. Andrea instantly knew that the gorilla was bating his subordinate into giving him a reason to kill, but she didn't know how she knew that. Exactly who was this primate?
Andrea's luminous green eyes practically screamed from the blackness of the room as a sudden measure of pent-up energy began to coarse through her veins. An opportunity had surely arisen.
"N-no. Comrade Solarex, Sir." Taking the hint, the subordinate hastily excused himself from the room.
"Now where were we…" Solarex spoke softly, all trace of annoyance gone as he turned. His alien yellow-orange eyes fell upon her and widened with an almost imperceptible display of surprise.
"Hi, Andrea," Solarex said lightly and bared his dark, metallic teeth.
"Who the hell are you? And how do you know my name?" She hissed, prepared to pounce at a moment's notice.
The gorilla chuckled delicately and took a step forward. Andrea instinctively bared her teeth in a show of defiance. Andrea knew that aggressors usually retreated at a reactionary display of aggression, but Solarex seemed entirely unfazed. And it worried her.
"And here I thought the crash didn't damage you too much," Solarex replied almost dejectedly. "Pity."
"You can cram your pity up your ass." Andrea swore. "Now get out of my way."
"Not a chance," Solarex replied offhandedly and cracked his knuckles. "This is going to be fun."
The cold, lifeless air tore at every inch of his skin that lay exposed like open wounds as he plummeted through Fichina's atmosphere. Upon hastily letting go of his only grip on the shuttle which had ferried him and his allies to the icy wastelands of Fichina, he had made a crucial mistake. Sitting in the Ejection Survival Pack huddled on Gideon's back was his state-of-the-art reflective pilot's helmet that doubled as a filtration apparatus when EVA, or Extra-Vehicular Activity, was necessary.
Gideon swore inwardly as he tumbled uncontrollably through the atmosphere. He fumbled urgently at his pack, praying that the various built-in survival failsafes would prevent his gear from simply being blown off into air. But he had no other option. Without the protection provided by his helmet, Gideon knew it would be near-impossible for him to be able to find Hazel over the constant ripping sting of the wind.
As he tumbled towards the pale earth below, Gideon carefully unstrapped the left side of the pack so he could lean over and reach in. A sudden gust of wind sent him barreling faster toward the ground, shattering all preconceived notions of up and down. He ground his teeth as the wind slammed into his barely-protected body full-force.
"Stop it! Please!" he choked into the wind as the Child resurfaced. Immediately all the memories and feelings of the lightless Orphanage bled into reality, taunting him, howling at him, tormenting him from across the barriers of time. One by one, his torturers materialized in the wind, their cold dead eyes savoring the life and warmth they extracted from him like vampires hovering above a helpless man in the night, obfuscating the hopeful light of the stars he didn't even know existed.
He shut his eyes and reopened them. The figures had disappeared.
But the wind was still laughing.
"Fuck you!" Gideon howled back into the wind with every essence of cold hate that arose from the depths of his mutilated soul. His eyes narrowed and his gaze became cold, colder than whipping wind or sheering ice of Fichina, or even the lifeless vacuum of space that spread blackly across the heavens above.
He clenched his fists and drew out his emotions until they were gone, allowing himself to become the living machine that he had been trained to be; the machine that promised a reprieve from darkness and pain. Now, Gideon knew, there was only the mission.
Gideon robotically reached his left hand into the Ejection Survival Pack and withdrew his helmet, unflinching despite the howling, predatory laughter of the wind. He mechanically placed the helmet upon his head, savoring the empty protection of the pressurized helmet that shielded his bleeding face. Warm air entered his lungs as he re-shouldered the pack and leaned forward, descending ever-faster towards the gossamer world below, and his falling companion who cried out for his help from somewhere in-between
"Falco, look out!" Fox warned as an enemy fighter leveled itself within firing range of the avian's Arwing.
"I've gotcha, ya big bird," Fox heard Slippy croak loudly over the communications network before an Arwing fell upon the enemy ship, tearing it apart with a precise volley green energy blasts.
"Don't think this means I owya one," Falco retorted. Trying to save face as usual, Fox knew. His remark was met with chuckle throughout the group and Fox was ever-thankful with the sudden increase in morale. Falco might not have been as focused as Krystal or as intelligent as Slippy, or as professional as many hard-core Cornerian veterans from past wars, but Fox was beginning to wonder if that might actually have been more of an advantage to the team than even his unparalleled aptitude for fighter combat.
A sudden beep from his link to command communications networks across the planet brought him out of his silent reverie.
"Fox McCloud, this is Colonel Hare of the Horizon. Please respond." Fox narrowed his eyes and flipped the receiver. All the usual warmth of the hare's voice was gone.
Something's wrong, Fox thought silently as he cleared his throat.
"Peppy? What's going on?" he replied.
Fox narrowed his emerald eyes further and let out an exhausted sigh as Peppy told him everything.
Gideon narrowed his eyes and surveyed the sprawling landscape before him. He hadn't predicted how difficult it would be to locate a red vixen falling into a sea of white.
"T-thermal v-v-v-vision," Gideon stammered, and instantly his pilot helmet's heads-up-display lit up the world below in a writhing sea of cold navy blue. He scanned the horizon once more, praying that he had leapt in time, that he wasn't too late.
A distant red signature caught his eye. In the distance, the glowing heat signature looked to be nothing more than a tumbling shard of rubble from the craft above, but it was the only thing in range. Gideon concentrated and nosed down toward the tumbling object, clapping his legs and arms center-mass, grimacing as the cold air tore open his flight suit and gnawed hungrily at his flesh.
As Gideon drew closer to the object, he could just barely ascertain a familiar red silhouette.
Humanoid, he thought silently and urged himself further downward, falling brilliantly like an angel cast out of a tortured heaven. He clenched his fists as the cold drew him further into submission, cutting him in every place it hurt. As he fell further, his eyes threatened to close.
No, Gideon. Stay awake! He screamed silently. He bit his lower lip. The sudden jolt of proximal pain brought tears to his eyes, forcing them open. The taste of warm blood entered his mouth as the feeling in the rest of his body dwindled.
His eyes opened just in time to glimpse the beautiful vixen Hazel, who still flailed consciously despite the hellish chill of the Fichina atmosphere.
Oh god, if only I had fur… He wished as his body weakened and his vision blurred under the assailing cold.
Gideon felt the dull impact as he wrapped himself protectively around Hazel and pulled his survival pack's parachute ripcord that adorn the left strap of the bag.
Upon accomplishing his task, a slight smile played about his torn face as his eyes drifted shut for the final time.
Wishes are for children.
The cold, lumbering form of Gideon Waller slammed into Hazel with so much force, she felt very fortunate that she still retained her consciousness. Otherwise, she remarked matter-of-factly despite the fact that she had just nearly plummeted to her death, we might freeze out here.
The sudden deployment of the American's parachute almost shook her from him. Suddenly, his grip on her began to weaken and his helmeted head slumped into her shoulder, exposing his mutilated arms and back to her teary eyes.
Oh my god, what happened to him up there?
"Gideon!" She called to him as they swiftly but safely approached the snowy landscape below.
No response.
"Gideon, please!" She shouted at him over the dying wail of the wind. Please don't be dead. I can't… I can't lose someone... She didn't say. Over the past few days, this alien – no, this man in her arms had opened up to her more than most men had in her past. Gideon trusted her with a part of himself, but when he had asked the same from her, she had rejected him, deflected his questioning. Now he had saved her and she had no idea whether or not he was still alive.
She shuddered slightly when his grip further slackened and she was forced to hold on to his limp, falling form, lest she herself plummet to the ground.
They impacted into the ground with a low crunch as the snow beneath them yielded to their weight. Hazel looked on in horror as Gideon's body fell limply onto the snow and ice below.
She rushed up to him and turned him over.
"Gideon, wake up!" She shook him.
No response.
Hazel reached her paws to the sides of Gideon's dark, reflective helmet. She fumbled briefly with the device until her fingers met a button on the helmet's right side. She depressed the button and was once more met with the low hiss of the human's helmet, though this time it evoked feelings much more desperate than those of her initial contact with Gideon, which had taken place little more than a week ago.
But the sheer briefness of the time they had to get to know each other paled in comparison to what might be in the future. And Hazel, as much a dreamer as many pilots who glided across the stars, did not wish for that future to perish as she gazed into his cold, wounded face. She gently caressed his neck and checked his pulse.
A very faint rhythmic heartbeat met her fingertips and a feeling of warm hope cascaded throughout her body.
The dark green parachute touched to the ground as the wind subsided, and Hazel's teary amber eyes were immediately drawn to Gideon's oversized survival bag.
Malakhim water.
She positioned herself over the dark green bag and opened the lid. A cluttered mass of gadgetry, survival gear, and unrecognizable trinkets adorned the interior of the bag. She reached into the bag and her fingers met a cold, metallic surface. She withdrew her left paw and once more saw the strange device Gideon said had helped him during what the various Earthspace documentaries streaming across Lylatian space called the Great Depression. Her fingers caressed the nicks and grooves of the weathered device, lost in a momentary silence of thought, connected to the past of the man who had just saved her life.
Hazel blinked, chastising herself for wasting more time while Gideon was barely hanging on to life. She reached into the bag and felt the familiar smooth plastic of the bottle Gideon had given her the time he'd saved her from the burning wreckage of the Cornerian Air Defense Academy's emergency generator building.
She withdrew the same transparent bottle that housed the regenerative fluid described only as Malakhim water, Hazel considered wistfully. She unscrewed the lid and held the bottle to Gideon's crusted, bleeding lips.
As Hazel tipped the bottle, a drop of the transparent fluid fell upon his gnawed lips, wiping away the wound and invigorating the surrounding skin. She gasped at the healing properties of the new compound, something she thought she would never truly get used to seeing. She pushed the bottle further against his lips, forcing the fluid into his mouth.
Gideon gasped as the water entered his mouth and spread throughout his body. Hazel looked on in awe as the human's various scrapes and wounds closed up and subsided to nothing more than dull white marks on his wiry frame.
Quickly, Hazel withdrew the bottle and screwed the cap back on.
"Gideon! Did it work? Are you okay?" She pleaded with his immobile frame.
His eyes fluttered open. Those deep blue orbs gazed unendingly into hers. Hazel blushed slightly under his gaze.
"Nag, nag, nag," Gideon croaked and cracked a smile.
Hazel's heart skipped a beat. It was so interesting seeing the normally brooding human smiling. Because of her. She suppressed a grin.
Hazel reached down and offered him her right paw. He took it and she pulled him up. Suddenly, the parachute caught wind and vibrated slightly on the ground, forcing Gideon back down onto the snow.
Gideon grumbled lowly as she giggled uncontrollably. The human simply glared at her as if she had committed some ancient transgression or offended some distant god who happened to disapprove of laughing at people who fell on their ass. This of course only made her laugh harder.
Gideon frowned and reached across his back and depressed some mechanism or trigger with an audible click. Immediately, the survival pack detached itself from the parachute and Gideon rose again, shivering in the nippy air.
Hazel broke the sudden silence.
"Um, that Malakhim water sure did the trick, eh?" she said.
"Y-yeah," he stammered, obviously more affected by the cold than he was letting on. He scanned the surrounding landscape, his cool blue eyes shining across the world like bright blue lasers. It seemed as if every ounce of concentration went into whatever he wished it to.
How the hell does he do that? She wondered silently as she glanced about the landscape, determined to help as much as she could.
"There," Gideon said softly and pointed towards a small opening in a nearby sheer incline.
"You have beauti – I – I mean you have good eyes," Hazel remarked sheepishly. When he didn't respond with the usual tease, Hazel looked at him, fully expecting him to glare at her or chide her for her unprofessionalism. Instead, the human simply looked toward the thin white world above and sighed, as if considering some far-off memory. She wanted to pry, to ask him what he was thinking about, and maybe even provide him with some comfort if he would accept it, but she decided against it. After all, he had just saved her life; the least she could do was give him some space.
Gideon shivered in his torn flight suit and looked towards the distant cave structure before he decided to speak.
"Listen, Hazel," he glanced back at her, his eyes soft but serious. Not commanding, not suggesting, but ordering nonetheless, Hazel knew. "It looks like it's gonna be dark soon. I don't know much about the night cycle of this planet, but if it's any worse than what we have now, we'll need to find shelter and get a fire started," he said.
"What about Carson? We can't just leave him out here!" Hazel protested. The ferret techie had been pulled by the wind from their fallen shuttle mere moments before she herself fell from the shuttle. But the ferret had had time to strap a parachute to his back, if there was even the slightest chance her new friend could be alive, she wasn't going to give up on him.
"Someone say my name?" A high, unusually boisterous voice startled Hazel. She turned to gaze upon the beige ferret Carson, who had a slight smile on his face.
Andrea ducked swiftly to avoid the silverback mountain gorilla's killing blow. Solarex's wide fist smashed into the metal frame of the nearby wall, denting the seemingly indestructible material.
Andrea quickly slammed her foot into Solarex's barely-clothed right knee. She heard a low, sickening crunch as something in the middle of the primate's leg broke.
The hulking mass of muscles clutched his knee and cringed, though he did not scream.
"Now, now, Andrea, let's play nice," Solarex taunted and smiled fiendishly.
Andrea answered by driving a fist into Solarex's face. The gorilla recoiled and grabbed Andrea's retreating arm, dragging her towards him. Solarex lifted another hairy arm and wrapped it around Andrea's neck, holding her out in front of him.
"I'll be the last thing you'll ever see," he growled and clenched his hand around Andrea's throat. His hot, noxious breath seared the insides of Andrea's simian nostrils. She was surprised that she could still breathe despite the immense pressure placed upon her neck.
"Oh, you won't suffocate," Solarex indicated, seeming to sense her false moment of relief. "It's a common misconception of strangulation. Normally, it's nearly impossible to crush the windpipe through choking alone; additional force is needed. But strangling does cut off your carotid artery, depriving your brain of oxygen." He squeezed harder and chuckled chillingly. "Slowly, your vision will fade until all you see is black, and when it's all over and you spit your last breath, there will only be… me."
Never!
Andrea kneed Solarex in the… solar plexus. Heh. What are the odds? Andrea thought to herself as the gargantuan gorilla dropped her onto the floor. She quickly recuperated and stood back up. Solarex lay breathless on the floor, clutching the sensitive patch of chest Andrea had impacted.
Andrea moved unhindered to the entrance to the dark metallic room which symbolized all she remembered and everything she knew. She stood hesitantly on the threshold, eyeing the one obstacle between her and the unknown world beyond. What lay beyond the door? Was there nothing? Was this room everything? But if that were true, then where did she come from? Surely not the room, right?
Shut. Up. Andrea. She said to herself as she steeled herself for what lay ahead.
Her fist closed around the door handle and turned.
"So what are these?" Carson asked, gesturing toward the foil-wrapped objects that sat near their collection of firewood. Dark rock and earth coated the cave walls around them. Outside, the sun was just beginning to set, casting warm magenta hues across the hostile sky. From the cave, Fichina looked beautiful, Gideon realized. It was a conception he might have believed had he not nearly perished from the oppressive wind and cold that seemed common across Lylat's token ice planet.
"Burgers," Gideon said tastefully and licked his lips. There might not have been many things that Gideon needed for his own survival, but the notion of crash-landing on a strange backwater world without New York's finest bacon cheeseburgers would have very likely driven him insane.
"You mean like cheeseburgers?" Carson replied his voice high and excited.
"Mhm, a real man's meal," Gideon indicated and smiled. All traces of the Soldier within lay dormant as he anticipated the meal ahead.
"Hey, don't you guys realize how unhealthy that crap is?" Hazel asked from the mouth of the small cave the group had set up camp within.
"Hazel, don't be a killjoy," Carson said. "It's soul food. That's actually a technical term for feel-good food in the Cornerian Association of Food Awareness."
"You Cornerians know where it's at," Gideon replied as his stomach growled.
"Men," Hazel mused jokingly and turned her back to them.
Gideon and Carson chuckled and gave each other a high-five.
Hazel turned. "I heard that!" She said venomously as her normally peaceful amber eyes suddenly glowed as if prepared for war.
"Um, heard what?" Gideon asked, his confidence buried under his anticipation for a bacon cheeseburger. He averted her luminous eyes nervously. Instead, his eyes wandered over her shapely vixen anatomy, barely hidden from him by the thin material layer of her flight suit. He gulped audible and glanced back at Hazel's face, hoping she didn't see him peeking.
"That's what I thought," Hazel concluded and smiled knowingly at Gideon. Had she caught him?
I am so screwed. He thought silently as blood rushed to his cheeks.
"S-so how did you find us, Carson?" Gideon asked, changing the subject. "We lost track of you after that storm hit us."
"Yeah, that was a pretty rough patch," Carson agreed. "I landed a few kilometers south of here, but I was lucky enough to see you intercept Lieutenant Bartlett in time to make a safe landing. After that, it was a simple matter of walking in the right direction until I found you." He gazed longingly into the pile of firewood and massaged his arms. "D-do you guys have an instalight or something?"
"Better," Gideon said and smiled. He reached into his bag and withdrew his favorite weapon.
"A sword?" Carson asked. "I thought Americans used more advanced weapons?"
"We do, but this weapon isn't American," Gideon replied proudly and thumbed a small button on the hilt of the nearly-meter-long blade. Instantly, the gleaming bronze blade glowed a dull hue of red, brightening the darkened cave. He lent the tip of the blade into the firewood they had gathered from a nearby mass of fallen trees. Upon contact, the wood was immediately set ablaze. A warm, comforting aura spread across the interior of the cave.
Hazel knelt down and placed her paws near the flame. She glanced at Gideon's sword, which still glowed hauntingly red.
"Is that some sort of laser sword?" She asked.
"Um, lasers are actually beams of focused ligh-" Carson stopped when Hazel glared at him.
Gideon smiled slightly before held the blade in front of him. The dark red glow lit up his pale face.
"Before the Roman Empire fell, people traveled across the galaxy through wormholes; though today people use hyper drives because they allow for specific destinations," Gideon amended. Hazel and Carson stared at him, obviously ready for him to continue.
He nodded. "Well, one day, the Romans discovered a wormhole that lead them to a solar system they had never seen before. The Centurion in charge of the expedition team discovered an unfamiliar metal that, well, lead to this calogladius." he gestured to his glowing sword.
"Calogladius?" Hazel mused.
"Heatsword," Gideon translated.
"B-but what about that world? Surly it must be in the Lylat Archives, or something?" Carson wondered aloud.
"That's the strange thing," Gideon replied and frowned. "Soon after the Romans extracted a boatload of the mineral, the wormhole just closed shut, and no one was ever able to travel to that solar system again."
"Well, did anyone ever figure out where it was?" Hazel asked.
"The Martian Galaxy," Gideon said simply, and a cold chill radiated throughout the cavern. "Most people don't believe the story, especially since hyperspace travel across the Void is suicide. But the Malakhim still keep records." He glanced at his companions, who both had incredulous looks on their faces.
I've said too much, he realized silently and lowered his gaze.
"But that doesn't matter now," he said unconvincingly as he deactivated his sword and placed the burgers near the fire, hoping the proximal heat would be enough to catalyze the Formation Enzymes in the food. "It's too cold out for us to safely travel to the Research Base, so we'll have to stay the night."
"Yeah," Hazel agreed, glancing at Gideon's tattered flight suit. "Don't you have a spare change of clothes in that bag?"
"I do, but I was saving it in case you Cornerians chickened out."
"Hey!" Carson protested.
Hazel smiled warmly. "Don't be stupid, Gideon. Humans have no fur; you need it more than we do."
"Alright, fine," Gideon relented and reached into the bag, withdrawing a bundle of warm tactical clothing. He stood. "Now, if you'll kindly avert your gaze…"
"Yeah, as if we want to look at your ugly human hide," Carson teased and walked toward the cave entrance.
Hazel took a second glance at Gideon. He smiled at her. She smiled back and turned to leave. Suddenly she turned again to face him.
"How did you become a Malakhim if you grew up in an orphanage?" She asked.
Where did that come from? My explanation must have disturbed her more than I thought.
"I ran away from the Orphanage," Gideon said simply and sighed.
Hazel gazed at him, scrutinizing his face.
"Why?" She wondered.
"It's a long story."