Chapter 14

(July 21st)

(4:08pm)

As the night began to roll in and the storm passed, Aryn had decided that it would be a good idea to get off of the planet as soon as possible...of course not before making a copy of all of the information on the wolf's ship and making certain no one would ever see the thing again sending it into orbit after setting the engines to overload on themselves. Krystal was oddly quiet and withdrawn, she clearly had a lot of things on her mind...she hadn't said a word since sh had gotten to watch Wolf die. Aryn had wanted them to find a safe place to stay while they sorted through their newest information they had claimed from Wolf's ship...he only knew of one place other than Sauria that was just as safe for someone that wanted to disappear for a day or two. Vox was one of Titania's moons, nobody was really stupid enough to go there; the environment was nothing but sharp, jagged rock formations and arid plains as far as the eye could see. It was a rather desolate place but, Aryn had lived out there for a short time. The worst part of the entire planet was the atmosphere, it was always hot, he didn't mind the head however as long as he didn't have to deal with the little freaks that were recently discovered to live under the sands of Titania itself. Krystal had never actually seen Vox before, there were still quite a few places in Lylat that she'd never been, most of her jobs as Kursed kept her within the more colonized parts of the star systems. Aryn sat in his seat on the bridge thinking to himself, he didn't want to bother going over the information that he'd gathered...he knew it would only work against his ideas of hiding out for a few days. It was getting rather late in the night before Aryn decided that a bit of sleep might be a good idea, his first stop on his way to his room being the kitchen for a drink. That was where he found a blue vixen sitting near the room's window looking out at the walls of light that moved about the ship as it traveled through hyperspace. Aryn didn't bother saying anything to her, he simply got his drink and sat at the same table turning his seat so that he could look out at the lights as well...he figured if she needed to talk about what was bothering her she'd start the whole thing. At least an hour passed of just sitting there before Aryn realized he'd not even touched his drink. Krystal still didn't say a word, she was confused, she'd killed lots of animals before but......she had always felt some form of remorse for what she'd done. However she felt nothing for Wolf, she wasn't sorry for what she'd done, he deserved to die, hell in her mind he deserved to die again if it were possible, a hundred times over for what he'd done. Aryn didn't bother her train of thought but, she understood even without him saying anything that he was, in his own way, by sitting there with her, letting her know that he was there for her...even if he would have never said so himself. He as well as Krystal were both a bit happier since Aryn became aware of Krystal being his friend from the chess games they'd played, it at the least wasn't as uncomfortable around the place anymore. Soon Aryn let out a sigh realizing that they'd been sitting there for over an hour before standing up and heading to the door. He looked back to the blue vixen but, she clearly wanted to be alone so he left her to herself, her gaze staying on the constant stream of lights that danced around the ship, her thoughts would keep her from any form of sleep...

The next morning Aryn found that getting sleep for him was no easier than usual, only about 3 hours or so, the clock on his night stand read 4:38am an hour he was used to by now. The dark furred vulpine went about his daily routine as he often did, taking a shower among other things before getting dressed and heading for the training room where he spent most of his morning time. As he made his way to the room he could hear the sound of a punching bag taking a sound beating, and the sound of a rather loud yell ever time the bag was struck. Regardless of the fact that most of the time he preferred to do his training by himself, he entered the room breaking no amount of Krystal's concentration. Aryn headed to the first place he always started his morning, on the weight machines, though his body didn't look like it he was actually very well toned and could lift well over his own body weight, though he believed that he could always do better. His routine consisted of several different forms of exercise, but today he was a bit distracted, he wasn't used to having anyone else in the training room while he was actually there. As he looked over to her and wiped the sweat from his face with the shirt he'd recently removed Krystal's strikes grew weak and limp before she slowly fell to her knees with her paws covering her eyes...her shoulders jerked slightly at the sobs that Aryn was glad he could neither see nor hear, there was no telling what was going on inside of her head. From her place on the matted floor Krystal could hear the door open and close Aryn had clearly left her to herself...or at least she had thought he did. Aryn had stopped half-way out of the room and slowly walked back in...even as much as he tried to hide his older self he still couldn't stand to watch a woman cry...it bothered him to no end. After a short while Krystal could feel him standing over her, she didn't expect him to do anything but, to her surprise she felt him help her to her feet.

"Come on you need to get some rest...you'll feel better after you get some sleep." He said leading her out of the room.

Krystal wasn't in her bed for any more than ten minutes before she fell asleep, Aryn took this time to head to the bridge...they'd be near Vox soon and he wanted to make certain there weren't any problems in the area as the small planet had a nasty habit of accumulating electrical storms in it's atmosphere, which often would cause many of a ship's electrical systems to fail all at once. He for some reason couldn't shake the feeling that Wolf's chasing them to Sauria had something to do with Eric and Black Star...but what? Hopefully there'd be something in the information that he'd taken from Wolf's ship. His thoughts were slightly off as well however, aside from his own dilemmas he now had Krystal to deal with, who seemed to have certain issues of her own to deal with. Hopefully she would have them sorted out on her own before they were ready to leave the planet again, but, Aryn wasn't holding his breath. The trip to Vox would still take a bit over an hour or two which was plenty of time to himself.

Some time later the rocking of the ship roused the blue vixen from her sleep, her eyes burned from her crying. As she looked through her room's window she could see what looked like massive trees. They'd landed somewhere, probably what Aryn had in mind for hiding out until they sorted out all of their business. She took this time to take a shower as it seemed like they weren't going anywhere for a while; it was a longer shower than she usually did take, it lasted a bit longer than an hour, she really didn't feel like leaving her room...but she was hungry. For the most part she really just wanted to be alone. She was happy enough to find out that the kitchen was empty as she walked into the large room. Aryn didn't know what it was that was weighing so heavy on the vixen's mind but, for a brief moment before her fight with Wolf, she feared for her life...or worse, she feared what might happen if they'd have taken her alive. She hated herself for it...for her weakness. How could she face Panther if she had this kind of fear for her own life which they destroyed in the first place? Or worse Leon, he was most likely the worst of them all. He had left the Star Wolf team not long after Krystal had escaped their base with at the very least her life in tact, but, that was a moot point. The chameleon was a cold blooded trained assassin, if she was beginning to freeze up against Wolf, how could she handle something like Leon? As she sat there contemplating her own issues and eating the food she'd prepared for herself, the PA system sounded with Aryn's voice calling her to the docking bay. She didn't really want to go but, for some reason she decided to head that way anyhow. When she reached the docking bay Krystal found Aryn with a large pack full of things his attention went to the blue vixen before he passed her a pack of her own...

"I think we could both use a little time off of this ship." He said, "You ever been to a planet called Vox?"

Krystal looked at her pack before looking to the black fox and shaking her head...

"Hmm...I'm no surprised. Listen this place is pretty bad...there's almost nothing here whatsoever, nobody'll look for us here while I try to figure something out about where my old team mates might be. Meteor showers are pretty common around here, so don't wander around too much."

Krystal didn't say a word she simply nodded whenever he was expecting an answer of some kind. The surface blew a hot yet dry wind through her fur, as she made her way off of the ship behind him she realized what she'd thought was a large tree was nothing more than a large pillar of stone. The sand was dry and red, and picked up with her footsteps, the area was nothing but wasteland, the clouds in the sky were all a putrid orange color that seemed to reflect the rather nasty look of the ground itself, everywhere she looked she saw large stone formations protruding from the ground like long, sharp, curved claws sticking out of the ground. The place was no better than Titania itself. As her attention worked it's way back to Aryn she noticed he was headed for what appeared to be an odd, but natural rock formation a short ways off in the distance. Without word or question she quickly followed after him, she knew that a ship as large as The Dragoon had a Borilleum hull, Borilleum being a rather durable alloy could stand up to any sort of meteoric impact, as long as it wasn't a relatively large meteor anyhow. The dome-shaped stone structure seemed to get much larger as they approached it, a large opening was present though it looked rather small. The two were forced to duck down to get inside, and as they traveled through the small cavern Aryn looked over his shoulder...

"This dome is almost completely made of Borilleum deposits and igneous rock. I found it when I was running from the Cornerian government a long time ago after I killed Pepper and thought I killed Eric. I flew a small fighter into the atmosphere but, this place is known for electrical storms so most of the damned thing's drives went out and I was forced to land." He said, "Luckily enough I found this place when the first meteor shower of the month hit. The Borilleum makes this place naturally resistant to impacts like that. Man was I surprised when I found this place though..."

As Aryn finished his statement he stepped out into a massive camber that expanded out into a massive dome shaped room inside of the large rock formation. Krystal couldn't believe her eyes at what she saw there; it was like a small forest of large trees but, they gave off an odd glow of an eerie white that seemed to light up the entire area, to her surprise she also found she was standing on grass...

"Bio-luminescent trees..." Aryn said as Krystal ran her paw over the trunk of one of the beautiful wooden giants, "I don't know how they grow here, but I'm sure they are the reason for the grass. I looked them up but, they are recently undiscovered. I call 'em Angel Fire Pines..."

Krystal couldn't really believe that something like this existed in such a wasteland of a place, "They're beautiful..." She said in awe.

"Yeah..." Aryn said with a light chuckle, "I used to come here every now and again...you know. Just to make sure this place is still here." he said pulling out a small round object from his pack pulling a cord which caused it to instantly unfold into a tent, "Nice place to camp out for a day or two. At least until I can scan through all of this and hope I come up with something...If Wolf was after us, there was most likely a reason for it." He said laying a thick brown folder on top of a small laptop.

Krystal still kept mostly to herself as Aryn looked over the paperwork he'd taken from Wolf's ship, unfortunately all he found were standard ship notes and documents. Not much really stood out until he started filtering through the documents that he'd copied to a hard disc. There was a long list of transmission records, mainly to someone on Katina, there were also several transaction records for large scale sums of money to the Wolf's team, as well as a transfer record of several troops...most likely the ones Aryn had killed back on Sauria. There seemed to be not direct information as Aryn sat there through the night searching over the files...but then again as he thought about it all he really needed was the transmission codes. After some time Aryn found himself alone as Krystal had fallen asleep, her only cover a thick sleeping bag. The black fox decided to follow the blue vixen's lead and soon found himself drifting off. The dreams...they always seemed to bother him when he needed sleep the most, even when he wanted to wake up the most he still seemed to be trapped. Fortunately something stirred him from his sleep. The blue vixen asleep a few feet away was crying out in her sleep, and tossing about violently as she did so her cries echoing through the massive chamber, Aryn had no idea what was wrong but he was certain it had something to do with whatever had been bothering her these last few days. There would be no getting any kind of sleep with that kind of noise, so Aryn moved to her side and gently shook her...but nothing happened....

"HEY!!" He shouted shaking her a bit harder this time.

The vixen's eyes opened and in a split second she lashed out swiping her claws at whoever was there ripping four bloody stripes into the black fox's right cheek. As soon as her eyes focused, Krystal noticed that it had been Aryn, her eye were full of tears that she quickly wiped away from her face with the back of her paw...

"I'm sorry...but, you startled me." She said.

"The hell is wrong with you?" Aryn asked wiping some of the blood from his cheek, "You've been acting strange ever since you got your paws on the wolf back on Sauria."

Krystal turned away from the dark furred vulpine, "It's my problem......"

"Look...I'm sure you expect me to give you some sort of crap about sucking it up...but, I'm not. However you feel right now, you're perfectly justified in it. I'm not going to say I know what you're going through or what you're feeling right now...cuz I don't, nobody can know what you're going through right now unless they've been there. Then again most men don't have to worry about......well what happened to you, but I do know it can be hard to deal with. Rose had the same problem when she first joined Black Star...her experience was on a slightly lower level than yours but, it still fucked her up pretty badly."

Krystal wiped the end of her nose on her forearm, "That's not the problem." She said in a slightly weak voice, "On Cerinia I was trained ever since I was a kit to be a warrior, just like all the other vixens in our tribe...we were trained to ignore pain, and....fear. All that changed when I joined Fox's team, I started to feel things that I know I was trained to ignore...I especially became familiar with pain, but, I never really felt fear before...but, when I was running from Wolf on Sauria...I did. I was afraid that he might catch me......take me back. It made me feel so helpless..."

Aryn laughed, "That's it?" He asked, "You're getting this bent out of shape over fear? I know fear can be intimidating and all but it can be used to drive you as well."

Krystal sniffled a bit as she turned to face Aryn, "What do you mean?"

"Well...at least you're afraid of something that makes sense..." Aryn said sitting down beside the blue vixen, "I'm afraid of something less than a hundredth our size, I don't know why I'm afraid of spiders I just am. And if this next one gets out I swear I will kill you......." Aryn said taking a deep breath, "Up until I was about 20 years old...I was deathly afraid of water...hydrophobic. I used to take sponge baths because I was afraid to step into a shower."

Krystal laughed a bit at Aryn's expense, "Why the hell were you afraid of water?"

"I drown once when I was 8...some stranger pulled me out of the water, gave me CPR...I was afraid of water up until Emilia forced me to get over it."

"How?"

"She was a close friend at that point...and made me face my fears...and threw my ass into a swimming pool....deep one. By the time I stopped panicking I realized I could stand up..." Aryn laughed at himself a bit, "After that she taught me how to swim...now it's one of my favorite past times." He said, "See. It's like I said at least your fears make sense...I still can't stand to stay under water or I go into a panic attack. You're just afraid of people doing things to you, or hurting you...something that's a lot more likely to happen than me drowning again at my age. I'm still working on the spider thing though..." He said shivering a bit, "Just the thought of those little fuckers creeps me out, but, I learned from Emilia that fears can be fought off just like anything else you just need to face up to them."

"But...I'm a warrior...we aren't meant to feel fear." Krystal replied.

"Listen...do you know why that philosophy can never work?" Aryn asked, "Fear is a natural, response to dangerous situations. Everyone fears something, no matter how petty and stupid it might be...nobody lives without fear. See if this helps, and old friend of mine once told me; Courage is not the absence of fear, but the presence of fear and the willingness to carry on. You were afraid of Wolf...but that didn't stop you from kicking his ass. Like I said Courage...it's all you ever need..." The black fox said heading back to his tent, "Just try to get some decent sleep okay?"

Krystal managed to lay back down after a bit, "Aryn..."

An annoyed growl emanated form the black fox's tent...this reaction caused her to cut herself off and close her eyes thinking about everything Aryn had just told her. Though it didn't last long for a moment, he was acting like a normal person. Whatever the deal, she didn't care his words really did help her to fall back asleep, happily without another nightmare to bother her.

A/N: Sorry for the slow chapter...trust me there won't be many more. The big fights are about to start and there are going to be a shit load of 'em. The next chapter will most likely be that last slow one you will see for some time. I've decided that the majority of this fic needs to be action based so that's what I'm gonna go for now that most of the plot is put out there. Hope you enjoyed the chapter...sorry if not...wait sorry? Me? Screw that! Just enjoy the chapter...

This is The footsteps in the darkness- SkullFox, saying: I don't suffer from insanity...I enjoy every second of it...

PS: Thanks for the constant support and the reviews...have a nice day(^_^)