Chapter 20

Drayvn and Iréa both headed into the massive structure leaving Drake's body where it lay. The inside of the facility was like any other munitions dump; there were drums full of god only knows what chemicals stacked along the walls, deactivated warheads lay about the rooms covered with tarps, the dark furred vulpine could only imagine that the facility dug underground. The two animals stopped for a brief moment as Drayvn called for Iréa to stop. He grunted in pain as he found a place to lean against the wall…

"You gonna be alright?" Iréa asked, "You don't look so good."

The black furred vulpine took a deep breath, "I think so…" He replied, "Lost a lot of blood back there. Feel'n kinda dizzy."

Iréa quickly looked over the animal's wounds, "Well…the bleeding's stopped."

"Huh…" Drayvn scoffed, "Best news I've heard all day." He said, "So you know anything about this place?"

Iréa thought for a moment, "All I know is that this place was build during the Lylat Wars, as a means of replacing a similar site that the Venomians took over, which Star Fox destroyed…"

"You mean the base on Macbeth?" The vulpine asked.

"Right…I know it's divided into three sections…but, other than that I don't know squat."

Drayvn though for a moment, "Well lets get moving…we'll learn the layout of this place as we go."

Drayvn could already tell that he didn't like this place, there were too many blind corners, and it felt oddly familiar to him, like he'd been there before. He found that he was effortlessly moving through the halls, it unsettled him that the place would come off as so familiar without him knowing it…but, altogether things had stopped making sense to him a long time ago. He made certain that his senses were on end, after all there were four more animals like Drake in this place, and most of them were much stronger than the Drogan was…especially the freak he'd seen the day Eric had attacked him and taken Krystal and Fox away. It was as he moved around a final corner that he held up his paw to stop Iréa…

"What is it?" She asked.

Drayvn studied the area for a moment, "This place's galley…someone's in there."

The small door slid open to the once busy galley; it was a much larger room that Drayvn had expected, with many tables and seats, he could only imagine how many people used to maintain this facility. As the two cautiously walked into the room a red furred vixen stumbled out of the kitchen area with a bottle of some kind in her paw, her steps were staggering and she seemed to have trouble standing up. She nearly tripped over several chairs before she gave up and sat down. Her ears perked up against a sound in the room, and she took a feint sniff of the air…

"I guess……Drake's dead huh?" She mumbled, "So I'm next?"

Drayvn stepped out of the shadows signaling for Iréa to stay where she was, "I thought you quit drinking years ago Rose. How long?"

"Since I watched……my best friend die…" She replied.

Drayvn took a seat across from the half drunk vixen, "Why'd you do it?"

"The general…" She paused, "What does it matter? I don't……deserve to live. Not after what we did. I guess jealousy was a main part of why…" She said, "I always liked you Dee…but, Emm was the only thing on your mind any time of the day."

Drayvn sighed as he reached to his left leg, he lay a small pistol on the table; it was an old revolver with a pearl handle and a gold cylinder, with the name Emilia inlaid on the handle.

"I guess…" She said staring at the gun, "If anyone is going to kill me, I'm glad that it's you."

Drayvn thought for a moment, "I'm not gonna kill you Rose…" He said sliding the gun across the table, "I don't think I could ever hurt you, even after what happened." He said, "That was Emilia's favorite gun, you and I bought that for her birthday remember?"

Rose lay her paw on top of the pistol, "I…remember." She said picking it up and examining it, "Is it…too late to apologize?"

"There was a time when I would have said yes…" He replied, "But, no. It's never too late to apologize, but, I'm not really the one you need to apologize to…"

"Eric…he's in the east block of the facility." Rose said, "But, he's got everything blocked off. The only way there is through west block, and Maxwell is supposed to be there waiting for you…I think he intends to make you fight McCloud too…" She said, "He's got a little fox girl locked up in the barracks in east block…I don't know who she is but he claims she's McCloud's daughter…"

Drayvn thought for a moment, "Daughter? I'll have to look into that, but, first. This Maxwell guy, what is his power?"

"I don't know…he never really says much. He just does what Eric tells him." She replied, "All I've ever seen him do is turn into that big metal thing…he's strong, but, for some reason when he's like that he gets winded really easily." The red vixen looked to Iréa before looking back to the pistol in her paw, "Now get out of here…and promise me that you won't let Eric beat you this time."

Drayvn stood up and signaled for Iréa to follow him out of the room, the pale furred Lupine was however hesitant to turn her back on an enemy holding a weapon. She still followed after Drayvn until they left the room where the black furred fox stopped for a moment and lowered his head…

"Goodbye Rose." He whispered softly before walking away.

"Are you crazy?" Iréa half shouted walking backward while standing in front of him, "She could tell everyone that you're here… and……"

Iréa cut herself off as she heard the cannon like gunshot of the pistol that Drayvn had left with Rose…

Drayvn sighed deeply, "Rose made her peace…just let her be. We have real problems to deal with. I'm not sure how hard it'll be dealing with this Maxwell character, but, I'm pretty sure he won't go as quietly as she did."

"She said we have to go through the west block to get to the east side of the facility…I think I saw a sign a ways down the hall that mentioned west block." Iréa replied, "Come on it was this way."

Drayvn and Iréa rushed back down the hall the way they'd come, and after a short run they found themselves near another hall. The next hall however gave Drayvn a bad feeling in the pit of his gut, which caused him to place on Iréa's chest stopping her…

"You feel that?" He asked.

Iréa slapped his paw away from her chest, "Yeah……and they happen to belong to me, paws off."

"Get a grip…" Drayvn said, "No that…like a sort of pressure weighing down on your mind, almost like a headache. I felt like this once before, but, it was a long time ago, we're being watched…by an old friend." The vulpine said looking about the room.

"What?" Iréa asked.

Drayvn shook his head, "Forget it…Lets just go."

The two animals rushed off down the hall, still something nagged at Drayvn's mind, something was seriously wrong about this whole situation…of course he knew that Eric had things set up in case he came, but, it felt more like he wanted his brother there…that these little road blocks were set up on purpose. He couldn't understand why Eric would go through such elaborate measures to make Drayvn fight the other members of Black Star; maybe it was just to weaken the black furred vulpine up before attempting to fight Drayvn himself. Not to mention there was the slight possibility that Rose was right, and the kit held in the barracks really was McCloud's daughter. Then this entire thing could get a lot worse, after all he was here to save McCloud, not fight him. It seemed Eric had planned just about every aspect of this little meeting out, every little detail seemed to have been covered.

The end of the hall led into what appeared to be a massive storeroom; it was dark, far too dark to see anything, "I can't see anything…" Iréa said, "It's dark as hell in here."

Drayvn sighed, "Yeah, no kidding. Hang on." He said.

There was a small flicker of light before a small space around them began to glow a light blue from the flames that burst from his arm, climbing his forearm and rising off of his fist like a small torch…

"Huh…" Iréa half laughed, "Thanks."

As the two looked about the large room Drayvn noticed that the place was covered with tall metal shelves stacked over with boxes, and large metal drums lay against the walls, some of which bore very disturbing labels. Iréa moved about the room staying within the radius of Drayvn's flames…

"What kinda room is this?" She asked.

Drayvn approached a large drum and examined the labels on it, "It's a storehouse, an illegal one at that. This drum has nuclear materials in it." He said standing up quickly moving his flame away from the barrel.

"Wait a minute…" Iréa said, "Nuclear weapons were banned by the Trinity Accord over 300 years ago, when the humans had their first nuclear war."

"Right…" Drayvn replied, "We saw what that did to Earth, and didn't want that to happen here, but, who in the government would be making nukes again…they aren't even that powerful compared to modern weaponry."

"I think maybe it's a bit more fear of what it would do to the land itself…" Iréa replied, "There's still not a weapon in creation more feared than an atomic bomb. It's technology has been outdated for more than a millennium, but, in terms of fear itself, there's nothing like it."

"I guess you're right…" Drayvn replied, "After all, nukes don't just destroy target enemies, they ravage everything, land, air…life itself, they can make an entire place completely devoid of life."

"This has to be reported to the proper authorities…" Iréa said, "They could still be making these things."

"No…it has to be reported, but not to the authorities; I'll leave it to McCloud, he'll know the best place to take the information." Drayvn said, "Just one of those things could destroy the Trinity Accord, and start a war."

As the two walked a bit further along the large shelves Iréa shrieked in surprise as Drayvn pushed her to one side; she hadn't even heard the heavy footsteps that were approaching them when whatever it was ran into Drayvn plowing through the wall nearest to them. Iréa waved her paw in front of her face attempting to clear away the dust in the air that was making her cough uncontrollably. She finally stood up to find a massive hole missing in the wall, the concrete wall was crumbling slightly but, still holding up. She looked outside to see a black fox laying on the ground cradling his ribs as a large otter with what appeared to be metallic fur lumbered toward him. Iréa thought for a moment as she watched on; Drayvn was rolling about on the ground with his arms wrapped about his ribs, he finally rolled onto his back where he let out a enraged scream. The lumbering, metal otter stepped forward and rose one foot over Drayvn's head; however as soon as the animal brought down his foot, the black furred vulpine's paws caught the massive animal's foot. Iréa could only imagine what the pressure was doing to Drayvn's clearly injured ribs as he let out a scream of pain before managing to push the large animal away. Drayvn rolled away from Maxx and onto his feet where he grimaced in pain as he kept one paw grasping at his ribs…

"Maxwell?" He asked in a pained voice, his opponent simply bowed his head lightly while holding his arms out to his sides, "Interesting ability you've got there."

"You killed Rose…" The otter replied.

"Not quite, the guilt killed her before I could." Drayvn said wincing a bit in pain, "I'll give you the same chance I gave Drake. You have nothing to do with this so get the fuck outta my way…and you'll live to see your next birthday."

The otter chuckled, "You think that killing us will make you feel any better for what happened to your happy little family?"

"This isn't about me feeling better……" Drayvn replied finally standing up against the pain in his side, "It's about knowing that the ones that took her from me know just how badly they fucked up, as soon as they laid a paw on her."

"Awe…that's very chivalrous of you." Maxx taunted the angry vulpine, "But Eric saved my life. If you're gonna kill him, you're going through me first…"

Maxx stood there for a moment, he expected to see something, a flame, a spark, anything having to do with the fox's powers. However, the only sign of any kind of offense was the long blade that Drayvn pulled from it's sheath. The otter smiled, how could the fox possibly hope to beat a metal skinned animal with nothing more than a sword? Maxx rushed in as fast as his body would allow, however he found that Drayvn's movements, despite his painfully injured ribs, were still quite swift. He felt two distinctive and potentially lethal strikes from the metal blade, one across his chest, whereas the other chimed off of the side of his neck. The metallic otter quickly shot about, catching Drayvn's shirt, tearing it free as he whipped the helpless vulpine into the air with an ogerish strength that flung the poor animal several yards away, into a chain link fence. Drayvn struggled to climb to his feet, barely managing to use his sword to hold up his weight. As he finally stood, supported by his own two feet, the young, dark furred vulpine's arms again burst into intensely hot flames…

Maxx looked on with a smile, he'd never seen Drayvn's ability for himself, only heard of it. He admitted to himself that the blue flames were beautiful, but, he knew that with such a bright color came intense heat. He raised his head slightly and held out his arms, presenting his chest as an open target…Drayvn quickly took it. The ball of flames that shot from Drayvn's paws was powerful enough to force the metal creature's body to slide back a bit, but, it did little more than that. The hit was completely ineffective on the otter, who again darted forward this time managing to grasp the vulpine by the neck slamming his body into a nearby wall. Iréa gasped in shock as she watched Drayvn's body press through the stone wall, and looked on with increasing horror as the vulpine's limp body was tossed back from the large hole he and the metal otter had created. Drayvn could hardly move, his insides felt as thought they'd been dashed into a thousand pieces, and merely breathing was bringing him endless trails of agony. He opened his mouth only to watch a small pool of blood trickle to the ground in front of him. It seemed to take forever to climb to his feet this time, but, Maxx watched on with intrigue, it seemed that, no matter how many bones he broke then animal simply wouldn't stay down. Drayvn stumbled a bit hardly catching himself before the otter charged, Drayvn in step simply readied his sword for the impact that was to come…

Iréa watched on only hoping that Drayvn would find some way to win this fight; but, just as they were about to collide the she wolf turned her head away from the carnage. If he was going to die her she didn't want to see it happen…especially not when she had no idea what Eric's little family would do to her when Drayvn was gone, but, all the sounds had stopped. There was no sound from the fight anymore. The white lupine looked back to the grounds only to see the two frozen in place for a moment, Drayvn's sword lodged into the animal's eye socket, which he sharply twisted before tearing it free allowing the otter to fall to the ground. Iréa wasn't sure what to think at the moment, she was amazed that Drayvn was even standing up, much the less still able to fight. Apparently not every part of the otter's body could become as dense as metal…

"Drayvn?" Iréa called as she approached the bleeding and beaten vulpine.

The black fox slowly turned his head her direction before collapsing, luckily the white wolf managed to catch him on her shoulder, "Come on…I've gotta find a safe place to treat these wounds." She grunted as she helped him stagger back toward the building.

Drayvn groaned a bit, "I-I'm fine……"

"No you aren't…" Iréa replied, "I could practically hear your ribs crack from where I was standing."

Drayvn spit out a large spot of blood, "No…no exceptions. We don't have the time to worry about my ribs, that can come later…" He said, "Right now, concentrate on the kid that's somewhere in that building. She's just a kit, her life's a lot more important that mine."

"What's with you caring about other all of a sudden?"

Drayvn took a labored breath as he tried to lighten his weight on the lupine's shoulder, "Emilia……always wanted a little girl…"

"Anyone ever tell you that you're a fucking idot?" Iréa asked.

Drayvn chuckled before grimacing in pain, "All the fuck'n time…" He smiled, "Was one of Emilia's favorite lines."

Iréa kept walking as she held the black fox from falling over, helping him into the halls of the eastern block of the facility; there were two more animals in between them and Eric, and Drayvn was already severely injured…

Author Notes: Okay that makes 21 apparently this fic will pan out to 22 maybe 23 chapters...but, it is coming to a close soon. Either way Drayvn has taken down another member of Black Star and is one step closer to Eric. Thanks for the support, R&R, and I'll see you next update...

The Footsteps in the Darkness ~ SkullFox