The Unheard Voice

Among the many islands on the numerous chains and archipelagos of southern Zoness, Partasti was by no means an anomaly. It was placed in an insignificant point politically, garnering no interest in strategic or otherwise governmental forces, and offered no substantial advantage when it came to scientific or agricultural usage, bearing few qualities that would promote it above the other prospects. The island of Partasti, as it would eventually be called, was too small to be considered of any value, and so, it lingered on in a cold, negligible existence, practically untouched by those whom controlled its jurisdiction for years.

However, an overtly ambitious company made it their effort to change Partasti's status as an irrelevant little blip on the Lylat's radar. They formed out of an idea, out of a hope, and soon, they decided to make it a resort.

This, they concluded, would be the perfect escape for the millions of vacationers which flocked to Zoness every Cornerian Standard Cycle. It was far away from any other civil establishment, and would make an excellent getaway for those tired of the city's overbearing noises or the eye-bleeding boredom of deep space. And so, plans were made, buildings were erected, and reservations were set for the grand opening of the Overlook Hotel. Everything was perfect; everything was going according to plan.

But all that changed when the Lylat descended into chaos.

Streaking across the view of Partasti's pink beaches was a fire in the sky; falling downwards in a twirling flash of spectacular destruction before finally becoming one with the silent waves below was a fighter, belonging solely to the Southern Archipelago Union's Defense Force. Never before had such a violent event been seen surrounding the island, and so the inhabitants left, one by one, in very for their very lives. The Lylat itself had changed, and so had Partasti.

After then, the island was empty. All that had been prepared for the future resort still remained, however, even though no one was there to use it. But after the dust had settled on the campaigns to gain and regain Zoness' capital city, Partasti remained unchanged, waiting for it to be claimed by its long-gone owners.

But one day, after a year or so had elapsed, a small, unremarkable watercraft cut through the darkened fog and ran aground on the island's pink shores. The boat remained still, until one of its inhabitants stepped off of it, his boots marking a wide impression in the sand. Others followed, but not with the same intentions as the first one held.

He had been running far too long and needed somewhere to hide. He sifted a lump of wet sand through his paws before scanning the open beach. He stared intently into the green rim of trees and surrounding reddish-brown plants which lied behind them. And then his eyes were drawn towards a plainly marked sign detailing the danger posed by possible contamination of the surrounding area, and that all wanderers who happened upon the island were advised to leave. A relieved smile slid its way down his muzzle, as he knew that he'd finally found what he'd been looking for.

"This will do…" Mr. Whittle said, stepping further up the trail leading to the resort.

~X~X~X~X~X~

"Major Whittle!" A soldier ran up to the dhole, who for some reason had foregone his attentive monitoring in order to gain what few minutes of sleep his body would allow him. He sprung from his seat, alert and ready to face any danger which would dare approach him. In the past few days, he'd been getting a few hours of sleep at most, and the effects of the deprivation were starting to sink in.

He had waited far too long for these tense moments, and the toll that it took on his wellbeing was starting to take notice. Every elaborate scheme, every word and every motion that he made sure was executed perfectly, the plans that were followed down to the second, all voided by a moment's distraction of basic safeguards and electronics malfunctions.

Now awake, the sleeping leader swiveled his head around to make sure everything was the same as when he left it. "What? What is it?" He asked, beating himself mentally for not listening to general frequency like he should have.

"They've found him."

"They've foun- Where?" The dhole asked instinctively. However, instead of waiting for a reply from the soldier, he rushed to retrieve his earpiece from the nearby desk and spoke into it as soon as he feasibly could. "Khaya! This is Whittle… where is he?" He asked in more of a yell than a whisper.

"He's running, we've got a general sense of sense of his location, in the area west of the main building."

The dhole's expression changed to a much more confused one than before. Why would he be there? He thought.

"Khaya, I know what we need to do. Flush him out, and make sure to lead him towards the secondary labs entrance. We'll trap him there. He'll have nowhere to go. Be sure to stun, we need him alive."He immediately hung up and signaled to the nearby soldier to make haste. "Alright, I'm going to the labs, stay here and protect the systems."

~X~X~X~X~X~

For a moment, Fox felt the strange sensation of freefall as he descended from the lofty heights of the hotel room balcony. It was a hasty decision, and one that would have seriously injured him if it were not for the swaying branches below him which caught his falling body and kept him from decelerating to greatly once he finally reached the ground. After a very long few seconds, the vulpine's body finally hit the ground, his arm pushing against the dirt as the last tree branch snapped away from him.

Breathing faster than his mind was racing, Fox rushed to his feet in an effort to get some distance between him and what lay behind him, the charging horde of certain death. But as he took a few steps, he paused, and thought carefully about the emptiness in his paws; he was missing something, something that he neglected to hold on to during his violent descent. In a desperate rush back to his previous position, Fox searched the darkened Partasti ground for any sign of Mitch's weapon, but it was nowhere to be found.

'No! Not now!' He thought, almost forgetting for a moment that his current position had been compromised and that they were hot on his trail. He had to make a decision; either stay here a few more moments and continue the search for the weapon and risk being overrun by Partasti's finest, or make a run for it and hope for the best. His ears perked and his eyes locked on the small ridge above and in front of him, close to the resort. He could make out what appeared to be a dozen lights waving themselves around and growing closer with each passing instant.

And so the decision was made, he ran.

Although he was now essentially defenseless, he still had two working feet and two mostly working eyes. It was dark, very dark, but for some reason that he was unable to fathom, the area in front of him was as easy to maneuver through as a clear Papetoonian plain on a cloudless day. It was then that he realized in the back of his mind that he was not 'seeing' the environment as he would at any other time, but rather 'feeling' it, through some unexplained guidance which he could not apprehend or control. As he made his way through the twisting bends and overlapping structures of fallen trees and branches, he couldn't help but noticing that the approaching figures were closing in on either side as well as behind him. No matter how well he could maneuver the environment, they still managed to follow, and if he couldn't escape, they'd catch him soon.

He dodged every overhanging branch which hung down to catch his head, stepped around every rock which hoped to trip his feet, and struggled to keep up with the demanding quota that his lungs required to keep his strenuous pace. Although he was giving everything he could, it was never enough to flee from the approaching pursuers. He had to do something more, but the hopelessness became only more apparent as time passed on. Undoubtedly he would reach the edge of Partasti, nowhere to turn to except back towards the mysterious figures. And then, it would be too late.

But at that moment, the unknown entity jerked him away from his current path, leading him in a direction which seemed to hold no significance other than the will of the vulpine's invisible guidance. It wanted him to be there, it needed him there, perhaps as a way to evade the inevitable in this predicament. The options were limited, there was nowhere else to go, and Fox, or whatever force was making him move, understood that.

Shots rang out from the wooded slopes behind him; beams streaked close to the vulpine, but never close enough to actually hit him. Most of the crossfire ended when it hit the countless number of trees surrounding the fleeing vulpine, but a noticeable minority whizzed by him at an uncomfortable distance.

He kept running, hoping that there would be some route of escape. But all his hopes were in vain; the enemy was closing in, and Fox was quickly running out of room. He ran until there was nowhere else to go, a steep gray cliff face signaled the end of his fruitless evasion. He reached onto the sharply angled rocks, attempting to claw his way up the cliff to no avail.

Panicked, he managed to turn around just in time to see the approaching lights come closer. Twenty meters, fifteen, ten, the figures which held them were now in sight. They raised their weapons to the level of the cornered vulpine, fingers ready on the triggers. Beads of cold sweat slid down Fox's back, as his eyes stared into the wrong end of the sights.

After then was a flurry of shots, all set to non-lethal so as not to damage their intended subject. Fox braced for the oncoming pain which would be met with each strike, but instead, he received no sensation as the bolts streaked towards him at high velocities. As Fox opened his eyes to see what was going on, he noticed that every shot seemed to begin with its truly designated aim yet due to some unforeseen influence, seemed to curve around him each time they grew near to his body.

After what sounded like a few dozen shots which somehow missed their intended target, the soldiers caught on to the odd malfunction and began to confusedly scan their weapons for any defects.

"Wha-" One of them said, frantically recharging the handle to his weapon in an attempt to fix its oddly timed malfunction.

"What's going on?" Another asked, nearly throwing his weapon to the ground in frustration. "They're not working?"

"None of them are! Why aren't they working?!"

Fox scanned the group of about nine soldiers, all of whom had given up using their weapons as a means of neutralizing the vulpine. They looked afraid, as if they knew a lot more about what was inside of Fox than the vulpine understood himself. In one united moment, the soldiers slung their guns over their shoulders and pulled out what appeared to be at first glance stun batons. They each held one in their outstretched paws, nearing closer to the vulpine in carefully coordinated steps.

Fox peered at the oncoming group, ready to defend himself.

'My turn.' He didn't even need to say.

One of the soldiers to his right foolishly decided to rush towards Fox in an attempt to strike him with his baton.

Bad move.

With one swift motion, Fox turned the attacker's lunge into a complete reversal, using the attacker's momentum to pull the outstretched arm forward and away from him while pushing an opposite force on his neck, sending him crashing into the hard ground. The vulpine then struck the attacker with his own baton, sending him into a jolting spasm of uncontrolled muscle movements.

'Eight to go…'

The next one charged from behind, nearly catching Fox off guard. But the vulpine instinctively reacted by lowering himself on one knee and allowing the soldier to roll over him while Fox grabbed hold of the inactive part his stun rod, using it quickly and efficiently to match his fate with the last one who dared rush him.

That was all that was needed to piss the others off. The vulpine barely had time to react before three more of the soldiers came forward, their footing more cautious than the previous assailants. Fox tried his best to slide away from the closest one's swing, but part of the rod came in contact with his chest. Fox reacted with a pained yelp, but immediately returned to his fighting posture, pushing the soldier back and crashing into his comrade behind him, disarming them in the process. This gave him enough time to spin around and land a well-placed kick on the next assailant's jaw, his attempt at approaching him from behind working just as well as any other attack.

The other five, whom had yet to properly enter the fight, thought it wise to move in as a single unit instead of individually. Fox was unable to defend against multiple strikes at once, falling victim to more than one painful thrash as he did his best to recover from each one. Though simply one of these strikes was usually enough to put someone down, Fox seemed to shake them off with relative ease. There was something strange that was protecting him, mitigating the shocks and allowing him to carry on. He turned around just in time to dodge an oncoming punch from one of the disarmed soldiers, twisting his arm and turning him around so that he maintained a tight hold on the soldier's neck.

The others backed off for a moment before regrouping and trying the same thing they'd done moments before. Fox reacted to this by throwing the disabled soldier towards the bulk of the group, temporarily hindering their movements while he managed to land an upwardly angled kick on the only untouched member of the group. Although Fox's struggle was working in his favor, he knew that he couldn't keep it up for much longer, as there would most likely be more closing in on him at any moment.

It was then that the unheard voice inside his head began to warn him of the oncoming danger; telling him that now was his opportunity to leave while he still could. The majority of the soldiers were dazed or otherwise unable to move, so the vulpine made haste, rushing over to grab one of their discarded firearms that had slipped off one of the fallen soldiers before turning it on them and putting a few rounds into each one. All this had taken the span of about fifteen seconds.

'Nice… automatic, good rate of fire, low recoil…' Fox thought as he discharged equal amounts of fire into his unlucky targets. 'Lightweight, but solid…'

The weapon which he held was instantly recognizable as being manufactured by Phoenix, the texture of the grip seemed to be an instant giveaway. The design was too idiosyncratic to be adopted as standard by the Cornerian Armed Forces, as they needed things that were simple and easy to fix when broken, and instead was usually reserved to the likes of mercenaries or private contractors; frankly, Fox was beginning to wonder why he didn't own one himself.

With a new weapon in his possession, Fox made his way further down the path until he reached the point where he could barely make the outline of the shore. He recalled this place as being the epicenter or Angela's birthday disaster, a memory which Fox had previously attempted to banish from his recollection. It was then that the strange force inside of him began to resume its direct guidance, altering the unconscious will of the vulpine so that he moved in paths that would be considered futile by any outside observer. The force led him to the edge of another cliff face, where Fox's outstretched paws felt for any artificial textures, until he was able to feel the partially obscured profile of a metal door, the bold lettering at shoulder height spelled out in red 'Employees Only'.

He did as the unheard voice willed, and the door slid open without the slightest sense of hesitation. Fox stepped inside. It was dark, but with the interloper aiding his every movement, light was an unnecessary formality. He could 'see' that the room in front of him was full of computers and monitoring devices which had for one reason or another been shut down, not a single blip of light or whirring of fans could be heard, only absolute emptiness.

The unheard voice willed that Fox approach one of the consoles and turn it on, though Fox was confused at first as to how this would work. The mysterious guide seemed to spread out from Fox and consume the entirety of the room, and before the vulpine's natural senses could understand what was going on, a bright flash sprang from the room's largest monitor, reverting the vulpine back to the dominant sense of sight.

The monitor flashed with a plethora of indiscernible, frequently changing images; faces, aerial photographs, x-rays, brain scans, without context, every image was more meaningless than the last. The monitor finally ceased its barrage of random pictures and instead focused on a still frame of what Fox could barely decipher.

By the looks of it, the image was of Khaya, Luther, and Truman each sitting in their own chair, looking up towards something he couldn't see. The image was taken at a downward angle, probably from the ceiling of some enclosed room, and the walls were that of a blank concrete found only inside of the island's airfield. Behind the seated few were others which were too obscured to make out, not that their identities mattered at this point.

The image began moving, it was a video, of what though, Fox couldn't tell.

"Thank you everyone… May I have all your attention? Good. Let's see, it's six seventeen right now, local time, so we probably don't have a lot of time, maybe only a couple hours so I'll make this brief…" The distinctive voice of Mr. Whittle could be heard from the other side of the recording.

"First of all, I'd like to address yesterday's… encounter with Break-Fast… I know some of you are wondering why it had to happen, but let me assure you that it's done us more good than we could've hoped for, and that it fits in with our end goals. As a result of what has happened, however, Khaya has requested that Gregory Powalski be immediately removed from all further events in our operation. I'm sure no one here would disagree with that decision." Mr. Whittle paced back and forth as he spoke to the carefully attentive group.

"Today, we intend to entice McCloud into relaxing as much as possible, getting used to the island. After yesterday's close call, we can't afford to have any uncontrolled variables determining the situation. Lombardi should be free to do whatever he wishes, just make sure he doesn't linger too far from the predetermined areas." Mr. Whittle took a deep breath before addressing the others one more time.

"I don't need to tell you all how critical these upcoming days are to this operation. Ever since Dave and Luther recovered their ships from the staging area up north, it seems none of has have had the chance to rest, but we need to stay focused. This takes us one step closer to Phase Two. When The Interloper surfaces, we'll be switching our entire operation over to the offensive. That is all; you each have your schedules with you, divide the sleep shifts and patrols as you see fit." The video cut to black, and nothing else could be heard. The room returned to the darkened silence, that is, until the screen lit up once more.

For what felt like minutes, the blank white display remained empty, until the cold space dissipated into a recorded image of Khaya sitting in front of a plain wooden table set against a dull gray wall, staring directly into the camera. A voice could be heard from behind the image, speaking directly to the husky.

"…Don't have to worry about anything more, we merely need to know more about you and your history before we continue…"

"Fair enough," Khaya answered, nodding. "Go ahead then…"

"So, first of all, how did you learn about our organization?"

Khaya took a thoughtful breath before answering. "I was one of the original sleeper agents during the beginning of the conflict; I helped take down CDF's Early-warning Radar systems in preparation for the invasion. When things went south, I had to hid-" The recording began to fade, eventually giving way to nothing but static, a message on the screen in a plain black box appeared, displaying the words 'FILE CORRUPTED'.

A loud bang could be heard from the direction of the room's exiting door, which had automatically locked itself the moment that Fox had entered. Not two seconds later, the sound of a torch being lit was then followed by showers of sparks pouring out of the door's edges. Apparently, whoever was trying to get in was willing to do it the hard way.

'Run!' the voice inside of him urged. Instantly, the senses which guided him when no others could activated, leading him onward through a door at the end of the room. Even though the room seemed to have no power, the door opened for him as he approached, as if it were due to the sheer force of his expressed will. The door then closed behind him without barely a thought, Fox found himself inside of the same halls in which he'd escaped only hours before, although now the scene was almost entirely devoid of any light. Fox ran down the hall to where the interloper guided him, a long, familiar corridor stood before him, bringing back the terrifying memories of him running away from the pursuers, evidently, little had changed since then.

He kept on his way, not stopping to observe any of the laboratories on either side but instead following the internal guide's assured direction. But then reached the point where he could go no further, a solid steel door stood directly in front of him, opening up into a windowed lab room where instruments and computers lay strewn about and disorganized. He had to enter somehow, but the door in front of him was mechanically locked. He raised the gun which had remained in his hand for some time up towards the window and pulled the trigger, shattering the glass into thousands of tiny fragments and allowing the vulpine to climb inside.

Though it was mostly dark inside of the lab, the peculiar format made navigation oddly simple, as all that stood out was a central rectangular table while everything else was laid out along the countertop lining the chamber's edge. One item in particular amidst the layers upon layers of instruments caught his attention; it was a familiar piece of hardware that he'd received from Vincenzo, it was a part to his Arwing, a necessary replacement for a deteriorating piece of hardware. If he could get to his ship, maybe, just maybe, he could use this to help start the damaged Arwing; after all, those things seemed to have a paradoxical toughness to go with their paper-like fragility.

He smiled as he unlocked the solid steel door before leaving the room. Upon stepping outside, however, his sight was met with the familiar figure of the husky; she was holding a pistol outwardly, aiming it directly at the vulpine.

"Step back slowly, McCloud." She said a stern, unbroken tone.

"Khaya… Khaya, why are you pointing a gun at me?" Fox asked, his temperament a slight bit afraid and confused.

"I said step back, McCloud." Khaya returned, making the presence of her weapon more visible with her demanding motions.

"Khaya? Why are you doing this? What's going on?"

"Put the gun down, Khaya…" Another figure came into view inside of the darkened corridor, this one of Wolf. He too held a weapon up, but this one was aimed not at the vulpine, but at the husky.

"Wolf? Wolf, why are yo-"

"Put the gun down, Khaya. I have no qualms with shooting an armed woman."

"Wolf, I-"

"Put it down!"

Khaya slowly knelt down and placed her sidearm directly on the floor, spreading her paws out as a sign of her disarmament.

"Good, now McCloud, move forward and pick i-"

"I thought I'd find you here, Wolf." Mr. Whittle said, approaching the lupine from behind. "Looks like my suspicions were correct. It seems your loyalties belong to no one."

"Damn it!" Wolf growled.

"Now, I'd suggest you do the same as Ms. Vernuun here, and place your weapon on the ground."

"Do it, Wolf." Khaya urged, still facing the other way.

Wolf lowered himself to the floor, doing the same as what Khaya had done moments before.

"Now since this is a strange predicament, I suggest we-"

"Drop the gun!" Falco yelled from behind the dhole, approaching him until he was only a meter away.

"Another one? Anyone else behind you?" Mr. Whittle asked, hesitating to discard his own weapon.

"I said drop it!" Falco screeched once more.

"Yes, yes, I know. I'd just like to inform you that even with your… additions you're still outnumbered."

"Shut up! This whole time you've been playing some sort of game! I'm tired of all the shadows, and all the damn lies! You tell me what this whole operation's about, before I end this myself!" Falco demanded, growing only more impatient the longer he explained what he wanted.

"Give it to them, Whittle, no deception; just tell them what's what."

The dhole gave a disconcerted sigh, figuring that his explanation was rather meaningless at this point in time. "I can tell you, but I'm afraid you'll never truly understand."

"No! Enough of that deflective shit!" Falco yelled, his gun shaking in his grip. "I want to know who you work for, and what your damn goal here is!"

Whittle mustered a few deep breaths before speaking. His internal principles advised him against what he was about to do, but the uncharacteristic situation he was in demanded that he act otherwise.

"Ok, I'll tell you…"

He glanced over to Khaya, who nodded back at him with an understanding gesture.

"We're the remnant of a Venomian Special Tasks Unit, a shortly lived organization which according to the public never survived the Great Lylat War. Ever since the dismantling of Venom's command structure, we've been hiding in the darkest reaches of Zoness, struggling every day to avoid the eyes of Cornerian espionage groups. Setting our operation on Partasti was the perfect escape, as Vincenzo's presence assured that we could properly funnel whatever we wanted onto the island while also providing him with some much needed protection. It's been years since we've been affiliated with Andross' struggle, all we intend to do is continue his research."

"What do you want? What's all this about?"Falco furthered his query.

"What remained of Andross' research allowed us to discover what his true plans were for when he died. He was no fool, but even he was prone to failure in his planning; he believed that the Lylat could be taken down from the outside, but later in the war, he came to the conclusion that even if one maintained an iron grip on Corneria, the citizenry would fight back until their cities were reduced to rubble. He figured that the only true way of winning was to master the internal influences of biology."

"That doesn't add up…" Wolf commented. "Andross' research was systematically wiped out by the Cornerian Tactical Espionage Agency shortly after the conflict had ended."

"That's what everyone believes, yes. But Dr. Andross had found ways to store information so that they were without form, attenuating it to the point where he could imprint it on the very existence of biological subjects. As long as their hosts lived, so would it; it's the perfect escape for almost any information. It was almost forty years ago that a Cornerian Army excavation team on Fichina recovered an intact processing center of an ancient and long gone Aparoid; it was kept in secrecy for years, only allowed to be studied by a select few scientists…" Mr. Whittle turned his head to look Falco in the eyes.

"Would you like to take a guess at one of their identities?"

"Andross? But-"

"Yes, Andross was the most dedicated of the researchers, and worked harder than anyone else to unlock the secrets behind the recovered vessel. He continued on with his research, working at first on small insects, but soon it had grown to the point where full subjects were being pulled from the prison system in order to satisfy the growing complexity of the project. Once the Cornerian Government understood the potential of what he was doing, they knew that they had to put a stop to it. They decided to fabricate an explosion, make it look like Andross was responsible for conducting the numerous counts of ethics violations all on his own. And that's when they tried in vain to eliminate him from the equation."

"Alright, enough of the history lesson… what's going on now? What's with this whole resort? What do you want?" Falco wondered.

"We want what we've been waiting far too long for, the final culmination of Andross' research. Call it what you will, Big Boy, Interloper, it doesn't matter, what does matter is that whatever this thing is, it's inside of you McCloud, you might not know it, you might not be able to tell, but there are forces acting inside of you that are not your own."The dhole explained in the best way that he could.

"You didn't answer my question! Why all this elaborate setup? What's it about?"

"The… Interloper is influenced in a large part by fluctuating patterns in the subject's amygdala. By scheduling everything you've experienced in your lovely stay on Partasti, we've been able to observe and manipulate it in preparation for Phase Two, the moment when we can properly extract the secondary consciousness which lies buried within the underlying facets of your very being. Tell me, McCloud, have you had any strange experiences with dreams?"

"I- I can't remember much… I- have a feeling of being in these places, I… I don't know…"

"What you may have experienced is not merely dreams, but memories, memories of a being whose physical manifestation has passed long before anything we recognize had even existed. There were many other interlopers, many other subjects which had similar experiences, but none of the others remain. You, McCloud, are the only one who can help unlock what Andross left behind. If you were to be lost, so would everything else that we've worked so long to achieve. Like all things, The Interloper is subject to atrophy; every day we spent waiting for the opportunity was one which we could not afford. That's when we arranged for Big Boy, the transportation of the Aparoid processing center that had been recovered all those years ago, the sole reason for everything that has happened."

It took an uncomfortably large amount of time for the reality to sink in for both Fox and Falco; everything here was a complete fake, an elaborate construction directed at the study and control of unseen forces.

Wolf spoke first, shattering the silence. "You know, Venom was great and all when I was offered the money for what was supposed to be a simple job, but muddling into all this Aparoid business is starting to get on my nerves. If what you're doing has anything to do with those butterflies from hell, I'm not letting any of this last a day longer."

"Then I'm afraid we'll have to do this the hard way." In a quick, barely noticeable motion, the dhole spun around and reached for Falco's gun, twisting it out and away from the bird's body before sending him crashing to the ground. He immediately grabbed hold of the discarded weapon and aimed it at Wolf, discharging three shots before the lupine could let out any of his own. Wolf let out a pained yell before dropping to his knees and clutching the agonizing pain coming from his gut. This however, failed to prepare him for the approaching vulpine, who in an impulsive rush tackled the dhole to the ground below, throwing a flailing punch with his right paw in the center of the Major's surprised expression. The dhole retaliated by throwing the slightly lighter vulpine up against the nearby space in the otherwise featureless corridor, sending him crashing through the window of one of many lab areas.

The vulpine landed to the sound of rattling metal, as his back touched down on what felt like a grated catwalk overlooking the room that he'd been suspended in only hours ago, before his escape. Mr. Whittle leaped through the now open window, stepping towards the injured vulpine with an air of assurance. He peered down at vulpine, who to him was now a pathetic figure of helplessness as he stepped his black boot on Fox's neck and began gradually applying pressure.

"You know, McCloud, all of this could've been avoided if you had never killed Andross…" The dhole stated with a deep emphasis on making sure that the vulpine would soon pass out from the lack of oxygen. "Of course, things can never be done the easy way."

*PLFH*

There was a loud gunshot which echoed through the vast reaches of the underground corridors, and afterwards a moment of complete silence. With one final gaze, Mr. Whittle's eyes locked onto the nearby vulpine, before his body slowly tilted forward and careened off the catwalk's low railing and into the small pool of water below.

Wolf stepped forward, Khaya's gun securely in his right paw. He neared the vulpine and helped him onto his feet. Throughout all this, Wolf remained silent, forfeiting the ripe opportunity for crafting one of the best one-liners to ever exist.

"I knew three shots weren't going to keep you down…" He said, noting the lupine's clutching of his own gut.

"Yeah, well it would've felt a lot better if he'd gotten away with one. Damn it stings..." He turned to face the poorly lit area behind him, to ensure that Falco and Khaya were both where they were before.

"He, he's dead…" Khaya said, primarily to herself in a tone which revealed her bewilderment at the situation.

"Right… he's dead, and so are the insane plans he had in store for us." Wolf grabbed hold of Khaya's arm with a strong, yet somewhat gentle hold. "Khaya, we're getting off this island, and you're going to help us."

"It's not that easy. Even if I wanted to, I don't have the authorization codes to activate Partasti's transportation." Khaya asserted, weakly attempting to pull her arm away from Wolf.

"Oh? Well where can we find the codes?" Wolf asked politely.

"There were only two of us here who knew the codes, Major Whittle and… Vincenzo. You can't access the hanger doors or the transports without them."

"Damn, well, one way or another, we're getting off this island, I don't care if we have to swim our way to Hyperion, but I've had enough of this place."

"I wish it were that simple…" Khaya continued. Her expression grew solemn, and especially dim. "Major Whittle had a safeguard in place, in case he ever died, the entire island would be forced to immediately evacuate, it's known as general order twenty-five."

"Why would they have to evacuate?" Falco asked, entering the conversation as he struggled to limp towards the others. "Was he that important?"

"Because…" The husky began, struggling not to let her internal sense of terror overwhelm her speech. "There's a seven megaton nuclear device that's been set under Partasti, meant to destroy any evidence that any of this ever happened. And it's rigged to detonate once his life signs stopped transmitting…"

Her demeanor changed to that of fear, fear for her very life.

"We have one hour…"

~X~X~X~X~X~

Author's Notes: Well, it's been a good two years on this story now, maybe one more chapter and then that will be the end of it… Wait what's that? The colony of writing gnomes who reside in the underground sugar caves have gone on strike and there's not enough plot to finish the story? Hmm…

I'll be back, just need to grab my whip… until next time!