Chapter 15
(July 23rd)
(10:00am)
The smell of fresh food brought Aryn's attention to the real world from his sleep. The smell of fresh sausage and eggs made his mouth water, he slowly crawled out of his tent to find a small plate of freshly cooked food sitting by his tent, As he ate he looked around and noticed Krystal walking about the area examining the trees and surroundings a bit at a time. She still seemed a bit withdrawn but, for the most part a bit more herself, at the least she seemed to be smiling a bit. After finishing his meal Aryn went back to work looking over the information that they'd taken from Wolf's ship...still the only thing that seemed to stand out of the norm was the small list of transmissions to the same com channel. It was as Krystal seemed busy writing something down on a small notepad as she examined the area, that Aryn punched in the small string of numbers causing a small com channel to open up on his laptop. The face of an old ape appeared...
"GOD DAMN IT O'DONNELL! I TOLD YOU NOT TO CALL....." The ape froze up for a second, "Hello Drayvn...I take it this means O'donnell is dead."
Aryn's face twisted into an almost enraged snarl as something about the ape's eyes seemed familiar, "Eric..." He growled.
The ape's features seemed to shift dramatically forming into that of a dark furred fox, "Hello brother. Unfortunately the good doctor couldn't be here at the moment...you could say he's......lost his head at the moment."
"How are you doing this?"
The black fox smiled, "Isn't it obvious brother? Just another lab rat running through a maze."
"Where is McCloud?" Aryn demanded looking over to Krystal then back to the screen.
"Never mind him...he is safe for the time being. However I don't expect you to understand my motives. All I've ever done is looked out for you and your best interest. We were made perfect by the project, Emi...."
"DON'T YOU DARE FUCKING SAY HER NAME!!!" Aryn shouted pulling the laptop up to his face in an instant of rage as if it were allowing him to reach out and take the vulpine by the neck, this instantly called to Krystal's attention, "Make sure you don't forget this. My brother is dead......and so are you."
"Well then...if indeed Eric Dark is dead....then you shall call me...Albedo. Come find me if you dare, it will make no difference to me. Blood or mud they will all perish."
"Where is McCloud? He has nothing to do with any of this." Aryn said as Krystal walked up attracting Eric's attention.
Eric looked to the blue vixen then to his brother, "So be it. He is being held in Site-B on Katina....23 miles south of the main city. Near Shannah Lake. Perhaps you will find more there than you expect...Good bye Rubedo."
"Rubedo? What the fuck is he talking about?" Aryn asked himself.
"Who cares?" Krystal replied, "We know where Fox is so lets go."
Aryn thought for a moment, "Hang on......why would he just tell us where McCloud is? It hardly makes any sense. It's not right, he's always been smarter than me and patience as hell...he's planning something, probably an ambush waiting for us at this...Site-B. No sense in rushing into a place where we'll just end up dead...we're gonna need to do some sort of recon on this one." The black fox said scratching his chin, "Gather up your things and lets go. Something tells me we aren't going to get a whole lot of rest from here on out."
It took them almost no time to get their things packed together and get back to the ship, as they sat on the bridge Aryn set the ship's auto-pilot to take them out of the planet's atmosphere. As soon as they were had passed into open space, Aryn set NAV to retrieve clearance for a warp jump then headed out of the room. He had many things to sort thought, and he best did that while he was training. Krystal noticed as Aryn left the room, he took his sword with him, which most of the time wouldn't have seemed strange but, he never took it to the training hall with him. Curiously she followed behind the black fox, he vanished into his room for a moment returning wearing a pair of loose training pants of a deep gray color, opposed to what he normally wore these pants had wide opened legs and were tied about his waist by a long black sash that left a hanging length along the side of his leg that reached down to the knee, his sword was carefully tucked into the side of the sash, he didn't wear a shirt any time he went to the training hall, but he was wearing odd shoes, they were smooth looking and only came up to his ankles, his paws were covered by small gloves that only covered his palms. He didn't seem to acknowledge the blue vixen's following behind him at all, even as they entered the training room...it seemed odd to Krystal how he was acting, the black fox stepped into the center of the room's training ring and sat on his knees with his eyes closed. His shoulders rose and fell with as steady breath, his mind at that point must have been elsewhere. Without warning Aryn suddenly shot to a standing position and in a motion that Krystal had neglected to notice had drawn his sword in what would have most definitely been an incredibly lethal blow to the gut. As Krystal watched on the black fox began moving about the ring as if he were fighting some sort of unseen opponent, making strikes here and there some of which where thrown with speeds that Krystal had trouble noticing at all...she wondered how he could move the weapon through the air with so much speed, but seemed almost entranced by the sight of his movements, one flowing into another like some sort of beautiful dance of death. His bout with the invisible person behind his eyes went on for almost an hour before he finally whipped his weapon in a circular motion slowly sliding it back into it's scabbard, it was understandable that he was sweating profusely at this point...Aryn sighed as he looked to the floor of the ring...
"He's still better than me...I know it...He taught me everything I know about this sword." He said softly, "I don't think I could take him in a fair fight...but I want to, so badly. He held his swordsmanship in such high regard...it's the last thing that Eric has, that means it's the last thing I can take from him."
Krystal was still a bit shocked she'd never fully seen him use his sword, she could not even imagine what Eric's skill might be like if he was that much better than Aryn, "How do you move so fast with that thing?" She asked, "I wish I could move my staff like that."
"Well..." Aryn said, "I can make you a lot faster...but, there's a big difference between a staff and a sword...so I'm not so certain how much faster you'll become."
As Aryn said this he walked over to a tall locker and removed two large metal bars, their thickness was a match for the shaft of her staff, and their length was a bit less than half of her staff's. He tossed one to Krystal who felt as though her arms were being weighed down, it must have weighed at least 20lbs...
"What is this for?" She asked.
"This is how I became so fast." He said taking it back as he walked by.
After a brief stop at Aryn's room where he emerged wearing a pair of dark blue jeans and a white tank top, the two headed into the docking bay. Aryn welded the two poles together. As Krystal watched on Aryn tossed her the weighted weapon which caused her to loose her balance for a moment., she began to see where Aryn was going with this, if she trained her body to be used to swinging something so much heavier than her staff she should have no problem with the staff later. As they headed back toward the training room Krystal went inside while Aryn seemed to keep walking. Krystal was in a bit of a hurry to try training with the large pole; her first swing was a downward one causing the large thing to slip out of her paws, the end landing on her foot. The blue vixen let out a loud yelp, as she fell on her ass holding the injured foot. It was just then that Aryn walked into the room with a small stack of clothes in his arms. He stopped and laughed...
"You dropped it on your foot didn't you?" He asked still laughing, "Don't feel too bad...Emm did the same thing the first time she swung one of the practice swords. Here." He finished sliding the clothes into the ring behind her, "These can help your fighting too. They were Emilia's...you seem to be about her size."
Krystal looked over the small pile of gear; there was a sports bra, it was a bright red like the rest of the gear, a pair of pants with legs that were slightly baggy, though the bottoms of the legs would bind tightly to her shins, there were shoes a lot like the ones Aryn wore though these ones would reach up to her shins, a pair of punching gloves that seemed to be padded across the knuckles that would reach half way up her forearms, a pair of elbow pads, and a long sash of the same black color as the one Aryn had worn...
"Those aren't normal clothes...so be careful."
Aryn left the room and headed to the kitchen where he took one of his bottled drinks from the fridge before taking a seat...
"NAV why aren't we moving?" Aryn called noticing it'd been over two hours and Vox was still visible.
"The CHSA has issued an apology to all travelers of hyperspace as they are currently experiencing massive electrical problems due to an accident on the city streets. The CHSA's mainframe will be back on-line in approximately 12 to 24hours."
Aryn sighed with frustration as he ran a paw over his face, "Fine then take us to Katina as fast as the normal thrusters can get us there."
"Approximate time of travel at Warp-5 to Katina......122hours 30minutes."
Aryn sighed again, "I need a faster ship." He said, "Hopefully we'll get clearance sometime soon. Blood or mud they will all perish...I don't like the way he said that."
Aryn figured Krystal was getting used to using the weighed down staff...from the way she was going about it he was certain for a short while that she was going to ask him to teach her more about the way he fought. He had to admit at least to himself that she was a very well trained fighter, had she been on Cerinia he was certain that she would be many times stronger than she was out here in Lylat. For some time the dark furred fox simply sat there thinking to himself about what was going on, he was actually happy that Krystal was with him, without her he never would have found out about any of this without her he'd still most likely be wandering around waiting for something to come up. Soon enough the hiss of the bridge door opening caused Aryn to spin his chair to face the door, the sight of Krystal made him nearly break out in laughter; she had a horribly angry look on her face and was panting incredibly heavily, her fur practically laid down with sweat, and she was supporting herself on the wall as if her feet refused to hold up her own weight. With some sort of slight difficulty she walked across the room and flopped down into a seat still giving Aryn a hate filled look...
"What are you looking at?" Aryn half laughed, "You asked how I got so fast and now you know. Just like my training gear, Emilia's was also weighted."
Krystal lifted her right arm allowing it to fall back to the chair's arm rest, "How....how. How fucking...heavy....is this stuff?" She asked between breaths.
"Last time I checked...Emm was wearing....20...50...75......about 90 pounds of extra weight. If you ever actually punched someone with those gloves on your paws you'd probably kill 'em."
Krystal gave Aryn an unsure look, "It...feels like...a fucking ton."
"That's just because your muscles aren't used to it yet." Aryn replied, "Trust me when Eric gave me my first set, it wasn't any different. Just wear that suit around the ship for a day or two then take it off...you'll feel the results."
Krystal did as she was instructed and kept the suit on all day, by the end of the day every bit of her body was sore, muscles she wasn't even aware she had screamed in pain at the very thought of her moving. Of course that didn't stop her from quickly shedding the gear and her underwear before walking into her own personal bathroom. She wasn't about to bother with a shower, it was in times like these when every muscle in her body hurt that she'd come to appreciate what a bath was. The blue vixen steadied herself for a moment as she lowered herself into the tub, even her backside seemed to have problems with her sitting or laying down even in a bathtub full of hot water. As she let the water's heat soak into her sore muscles relaxing them slightly, she thought back to all the training she'd ever done...and compared it to this and could only come up with one outcome...Emilia must have been incredibly strong and fast if her and Aryn both did this kind of training. She winced a bit as she stretched out her legs. It was her legs and back that hurt the most, but, as she lay there massaging her legs the pain began to slowly subside. Once her water began to put a chill to her Krystal climbed out and dried off before walking back into her room where she found a new bra and pair of panties before dropping onto her bed, there was not doubt in her mind that she'd have no problem sleeping tonight.
Aryn tried his hardest to ignore it but, the claw marks that Krystal had accidentally left on the side of his face had needed stitches, her claws were kept at an incredibly keen edge to have dug so deeply into his flesh. The black fox had not used the medical bay of his ship in so long that it actually took him about 15 minutes to find the place. There was a thick layer of dust about the place, but he wasn't there for any of the common stuff or to clean the place, all he needed was some alcohol and a stitching kit. After finding what he needed he headed back to his room and using his bathroom mirror began the short process of patching up the small slashes on his right cheek. After a short time he looked away from the mirror and headed back into his room, hopefully to get some rest and wake up in orbit above Katina waiting for their chance to save Fox and hopefully find out some more things about what Eric was up to. Aryn's sleep however was less than uneventful. His dream was not of his usual variety...
A very young Aryn ran across small stepping stones attempting to cross a small river, shouting to someone off in the distance who had already crossed...
"Eric! Wait for me...it's no fair you're bigger than me!"
As the young kit finally made it across the water, he began to look around but his much older brother was nowhere in sight. He then began to call out to Eric but the fox never appeared. For the longest time the little fox rushed about until he found himself sitting at the edge of the small lake at the river's end crying. He didn't know the way home Eric said there was something he wanted to show him way out here. As the distraught little fox sat there something hit the little kit from behind sending him several feet out into the water. Aryn instantly began thrashing about the water attempting to stay above the surface, the little one still didn't know how to swim. As he fought to stay above the water, the little one saw a familiar shape standing near the shore. The kit attempted to cry out but was silenced as the water rushed up over his head pulling him down into the lake...it felt like an eternity as the world went black before the kit's eyes fluttered open, looking at two blurry light brown figures standing over him...
"Dad is he gonna be okay?!" A young voice half shouted.
"He'll be find Fox..." A more grown voice added, "I'm proud of you son...not just anyone would have jumped into the lake like that. Let's get him to a hospital."
Aryn shot up into a sitting position struggling to breath, it felt as though his lungs had been deprived of air, like he was drowning. He fought for a bit attempting to catch his breath, and eventually threw up over the side of his bed before sitting back up and wiping a mass of sweat from his face. His face developed into a hate filled snarl as he thought back to that day...
"Errric..." He growled as his teeth were clenched together so tightly that he could taste the blood from his gum line.
He wasn't sure how much of the dream he could trust but, he did remember the way it had all happened now. Oddly enough he was out to save the very soul that pulled him from his death. A young Fox McCloud and his father on a simple vacation had stumbled onto the young vulpine's first act of heroism, in saving Aryn's life. It all felt like a memory rather than a dream, and every moment of it drove into Aryn's determination his brother had much more than one death to pay for. After such and experience Aryn found it impossible to sleep again...luckily as he looked to the clock on his night stand he realized that it was 5 o'clock...much more sleep that he was used to getting. Aryn, like every morning, shook off what the dreams had told him and headed to the bathroom soon emerging dressed in his training gear that Krystal had seen him wear earlier before heading to the training room to work off whatever feelings he might have at the time. He wasn't sure what they were going to find on Katina or even if they were going to find anything at all...but, he knew that things were about to go from rocky...to a full on landslide, and as much as he hated the idea his own brother was at the source...
A/N: Wow...chapter 15 already. Hey thanks for all the support and the stream of reviews. Hope you all enjoyed the chapter as much as I did writing it. Especially since the next one will start one hell of a long series of fights. Till next time all...R&R and thanks for reading c'ya.
The footsteps in the darkness- SkullFox