A/N: Sorry for the late update...but, I've been under a lot of stress these last few days...and have gotten very little sleep in the process. Add all of these things together and I pretty much can't concentrate on my writing. I'll get back up to COF asap, and probably put in something new for Relaxation just for the hell of it later but, until then my next update may take a little time. Promise it won't be too long though....Thanks for the support guys/girls...C'ya...

Chapter 17

The darkness surrounded and embodied everything that was the world around him...the other side, it was nothing like he'd dreamed it would be, there was nothing; No lights, no happiness......no Emilia. Instead the void he faced was as deep and dark as the hole in his heart, This was where he truly deserved to be, in darkness...alone. Without anyone to show him even the smallest fleck of hope, the void that he faced was instead simply empty and cold, he would have compared it to space but, space had majesty, and beauty to be found everywhere in the countless stars, and nebula, and worlds that were scattered about it. He felt nothing, he had failed...and this was the fate that failures deserved...he'd lost the only friend he could remember and there was nothing he could do to stop it...

I knew I'd be no different...He'll always be stronger than me. His thoughts seemed to echo off of the nothingness before him.

Then why try? The echoes fell back on him. Why give your life for something so...meaningless?

I made a promise...I swore......to avenge her.

For a short while he heard nothing...Then why not stop wallowing in self-pity? Wake up Drayvn......

WAKE UP!!

As Aryn's eyes shot open an unreal amount of pain shot through his body the instant pulse of agony a sure sign that he still lived, he would have screamed out in pain but the agony was so intense that it instantly robbed him on his voice, his mouth gaped open and his head fell back in a silent scream that only the gods could hear. There was more than agony to his pain, he'd given up, called it in and was ready to simply lay down and die. Moments of blinding pain led him to climbing to his feet which seemed to refuse to hold him upright, soon his sheathed sword became his only leg, it's sturdy construction the only possible means on which walking became possible for him now. It took what seemed like forever to simply reach the lift that would take him to the surface, but Eric and his metal head friend had disabled it, he was forced to climb up the shaft as his consciousness threatened to fade from the constant blood loss from the gaping wound in his chest...but, he refused to let such a thing stop him. Over an hour passed before he found himself limply trudging through the streets toward his ship's hanger, his vision was half gone by the time he collapsed to the metal floor of his ship's docking bay...

"NAV...Corneria...now." He said in between labored breaths.

As he lay there on his back Aryn ran his claw along the middle of his shirt cutting blood soaked fabric in half. He didn't even have the strength to lift his head to inspect the wound he instead pawed around his chest until he found the deep crevice left from his right breast to his side just short of his naval. As expected, it was a deep cut, life threatening even, he was amazed with himself that he'd even gotten as far as he had...he couldn't wait to find help for the injury...and as such he was left with no other choice. He lifted his shaking paw into view which effectively burst into flames as it had many times before...the flame was weak, and roared with almost none of the ferocity that it had in past applications of this ability. It was however enough for the job. A scream of absolute pain rushed from Aryn's lungs as he placed a fingertip into the open wound, he could smell the singed fur and the putrid smell of burnt flesh, the most intense pain he'd ever felt in his life as his flaming appendage cauterized the wound that Eric had left behind. He was close to passing out but he had to seal off the wound before he completely bled to death in the docking bay of his own ship. His screams carried on throughout the entire procedure which to him felt like an eternity within an eternity, He could have sworn doing this had taken hours when it in truth had only taken mere seconds. And as he felt the final section of the wound close behind the flames that surrounded his finger, after the process was over he no longer fought the urge and finally allowed his body to pass out from the pain...

(July 27th)

(10:11am)

Aryn's sight slowly made the blurred mess of a world around him fade slowly into focus, his chest felt like it was on fire...how long had he been laying there? He only really remembered Eric's attack, then burning, and pain. As he managed to get a clear look at his chest he remembered everything at the sight of the massive burn scar across his chest, Eric had very nearly killed him. Aryn fought to his feet and took a step only to stumble and fall flat on his face...he'd lost more blood than he'd thought, his motor functions were all fucked up and his head was pounding. It felt like someone had run him over several times within the same few moments. He knew however that the main thing he needed at the moment was liquid, lots to drink, it was the only cure for blood loss that he had ever learned about. Using his sword as a crutch once again Aryn managed to make his way out into the halls where the walls would hold him up as he stumbled toward the kitchen of the ship. After some time of sitting there Aryn found that the fogginess in his head had cleared up a bit, he didn't feel quite so dizzy anymore either, but, his head still hurt like nobody's business...

"NAV..." He called wincing a bit at the sound of his own voice, "Where are we?"

"Current location...Planet Corneria Outer Aerospace...reached approximately 32hours ago."

"My god..." Aryn said to himself, "How long was I out?"

"The captain's presence was isolated to the Docking Bay for approximately 41hours."

"Wow...two days. I must have been worse than I thought...NAV. Get Nex on the com link...channel 470-116-3428."

Aryn simply sat there with his head resting on the table in front of him when he heard the familiar voice call through the PA system, "Hello....Aryn? This is your number but I can't see you." It was Nex's voice.

"He's alive Nex....Eric." Aryn replied.

"What!? Are you sure?"

"Yeah I'm sure......he tried to kill me. He damn near did." Aryn said, "I need a favor."

Nex's sighed carried through the PA even if he hadn't wanted it to, "What?"

"I need you to see if you can find anything in this system that looks like suspicious activity...and..."

"And what?" Nex asked as Aryn had paused for a bit.

"Anything you can find about four names; Albedo, Rubedo, Nigredo, and Citrinitas. I'm in no condition to do anything right now...but, I have to find Eric. He has another Cerinian and I don't want to think about what he may want with her, cuz I think he's gonna reenact the experiment or something, something about needing her blood...McCloud's too..."

"I'll see what I can do...but get your ass to a hospital." Nex replied in a worried tone, as Aryn was breathing heavily.

"You know I can't do that Nex, too many people in this system know my face."

Nex went silent for a moment, "Fine...I'll send someone up to your ship. She's a friend, you can trust her."

"I...don't think...this is a job for..." For some reason Aryn was finding himself short of breath.

"She was a medic for the military...best there is...just shut up and take help where you can find it." Nex said, "Hang on..." For a moment Nex went quiet and a minute later his voice came back, "Alright she's on her way. Her name's Irea. Try not to be an asshole to her...she deserves a bit of respect."

"Nex..." Aryn called out.

"What is it this time?"

"Thanks....for always being there..." Aryn replied in an uncharacteristic manner.

"You're welcome...just hang tight and help'll be there soon. I'll see what I can dig up on that information for you in the past time."

As time passed Aryn could feel his vision blur again, his temperature was rising pretty rapidly...normally that wasn't such a bad thing but not when he wasn't using his abilities. His breathing was becoming labored and he was sweating profusely, something was horribly wrong. Soon enough he could hear a ship docking with The Dragoon and he made his way wearily toward the docking bay, his balance was shit as he'd stumble from wall to wall...he didn't know who this person was but he knew that he needed medical attention and Nex had never steered him wrong before. His vision had gotten so bad by the time he'd reached the docking bay doors that he couldn't make anything out but a massive blur of color, he could see a white blob of color that was moving around that, in a slight state of delusion from his overheated brain, he'd mistaken for Emilia, he managed to smile at the blob of color before collapsing to the metal floor...everything went dark. His vision would cut in and out, he could see his past playing before him in fast forward and every so often could hear a voice hovering over his body...

"You're gonna be alright." Though the voice was faded and sounded like distant echoes it was clear enough to make out.

Aryn woke to find himself in much less pain, his chest was no longer on fire, his fever, though still present was much less intense, he found it a bit difficult to breath at times as his chest and lungs seemed to flare with pain whenever he'd do so. The wound across his chest had been clearly reopened and then stitched up for some reason, and cleaned before he was placed in his bed. It was as he lay there that his bedroom door opened to the presence of a rather lovely white wolf; she was a bit more femininely proportioned that Krystal, her body's curves were much more defined, there was a single blemish of dark fur that started above her right eye hooking down the side of her face like a sort of upside down L shape stopping just above the corner of her mouth, her eyes were a very deep dark green, and her very long hair was held back by a single small tie half way down it's length, she wore a pair of loose fitting black jeans that had a long wallet chain hanging along the right leg, and wore a rather tight fitting black tank top, her arms were deceptively tone for her size, she looked like she wasn't even as tall as Krystal...

"Whew you're awake...Nex was really worried about you." She said in a soft voice that belied her appearance.

"How long was I out?"

The white furred lupine looked to the ceiling in thought, "About a day....maybe a little longer." She said holding out a thermometer which the fox took under his tongue, "You did right sealing that cut as soon as you did...but, it was already infected when you did it. You kind of locked the infection under the surface of the wound and I had to sort of cut you back open to get that infection out." She said pulling the thermometer from his mouth, "Well good news...you're fever is almost gone, but, you should get a few days rest before you start moving around."

"No can do...sorry." Aryn said turning his head away from the she wolf.

"Hey...if you wanna get yourself killed...it's no fur off my ass. It's just friendly advice..." She shrugged.

Aryn chuckled a bit, he liked her spirit it felt familiar, "Sorry...but they have my friend. She's the only one I've got...and nobody fucks with my friends, and stays alive. Eric already had enough to pay for..."

The girl sighed, "Look I can understand that...I'd wanna help my friends too, but, if that wound opens at the wrong time...or the infection sets back in you're as good a fucked. Those kind of infections went out with the medieval ages, you running around playing with swords?"

Aryn looked to the weapon sitting in the corner of his room, "Something like that. Look, thank you for the help...I pretty much owe you my life, but regardless of my condition I have to help Krystal and Fox...I owe him my life too."

"You know you're just as much of a stubborn asshole as Nex said you were?" She stated half storming out of the room.

Aryn chuckled to himself, "Wow...what side of who's bed did she wake up on?"

After a bit of time Aryn tried his hardest to get out of bed...but, it was a no go his legs didn't much appreciate the idea of him trying to stand up at all...Aryn had little care for what his body told him however. Though it caused him great pain he stumbled out of his room, and slowly made his way to the bridge. Irea had only been in the hall for a few moments taking her time to relax for a moment. She sighed in irritation as she saw Aryn stumble idly down the halls, it was just like Nex had told her, there was nothing she could say or do that was going to keep the black fox in bed for any amount of time while his friend was in trouble. It was as she stood there that the lupine produced a small cell phone like device from her right pocked and held it up in front of her face after pressing a few buttons...

"Nex...this guy is impossible, if he keeps up that wound is gonna kill him."

"I am sorry Irea that is just the way he is...when a friend of his is in trouble, he'll put everything aside to help them..." Nex's voice echoed from the small com device, "Even his own health."

"He's as stubborn as a certain uncle I know..." She replied.

Nex's laughter boomed from the small device, "I'll take that as a compliment. Just do me a favor...stick around there and make sure the idiot doesn't get himself killed...and try not to be too hard on him, he's had it pretty rough."

"Yeah for how long?" Irea asked looking toward the fox who was still limping down the halls.

"Pretty much his whole life."

After some time of trudging painfully through the halls Aryn finally relaxed into his seat on the bridge, and secretly vowed never to get up again. He took in a few settling breaths before turning on the green screens in front of him, for a short while he simply sat there. He didn't like the idea that someone was more important to him now than killing Eric but, it was the way he'd always been, his friends were the most important thing in his life next to Emilia, and things were no different now. After a few more moments he patched in a familiar number, soon being met by Nex's face...

"Did you get the information?" He asked.

"Yes...I'm sending the data right now. Just remember that you're no good to anyone dead."

Aryn sighed a bit before looking to the old lizard, "I'm not dead yet...I can't die......not yet."

"Aryn...I've told Irea to stay with you for now. There's not telling how many hours you'll go without hurting yourself again." Nex said.

"Hours huh?" Aryn asked.

"Yes...hours...and that may be stretching things a bit."

The reptile cut the link after a bit longer, and Aryn simply sat there on the bridge for a while reading over the files that Nex had sent him it was a full record of all of the ships leaving Katina's orbit within the last few days. There was one in particular that had left orbit only an hour or so before Aryn's ship was recorded leaving the planet. The Lylat government didn't want anyone to know that they kept track and full record of every ship that entered or exited Cornerian Alliance territories...and this ship that left before his was the only one that made any sense in following, as opposed to most of the others it was headed away from Corneria...but there was nothing on this Albedo and Rubedo talk that Eric had gone on about. Aryn knew however that it was important, how else would he know the name that was on the tank he was placed in so many years ago? As he sat there stewing about it, his mind finally gave in and he turned his attention to something else. He referanced everything that Nex had sent him through the CHSA's major databases, another company that didn't want you to know they were keeping record of your travels. The ship in question registered for a warp jump to Papetoon of all places, a quiet, calm place.....

"Perfect place to hide another research facility." Aryn assured himself.

"NAV...get clearance and get us to Papetoon."

The bridge remained in silence for about a minute, "Clearance acquired...Jump time 4 minutes 32 seconds. ETA to destination 6 hours 23 minutes."

As Aryn exited the bridge Irea moved to one side of the hall to let him pass as he staggered down the hall, "Where are we going?" She asked.

"Papetoon..." Aryn answered in a flat tone before continuing down the hall toward the kitchen, "There are plenty of rooms on the ship...find one...and stay out of mine."

As the lone black fox sat there in the kitchen he watched the voids of space almost instantly be replaced by a stream of passing lights of every spectrum of color. As he sat there he looked around the empty, insanely quiet room...and for the first time in however long he didn't feel like he belonged in such a place. He wanted his friend back, she'd made it easier to go about the endless days in space, it wasn't until now, when she was finally gone that he realized...just how much he'd wanted someone to be there. It all made him think that much harder at what he had to do, Eric was no longer important at the time. Aryn realized that he didn't stand a chance against his brother, but at the very least he could get Krystal back and Fox as well. He didn't know Fox all that well...but, as he thought about it he really wouldn't mind getting to know the person that saved his life all those years ago. His only problem now was figuring out how he was going to pull this off while horribly injured, he thought hard and long on the subject...and unfortunately he only had about 6 hours to come up with something...