Chapter 20
Mission Accomplished

With the destruction of the Aurora Unit, Andross's base began to self-destruct, and it was something that did not go unnoticed to Fox, James, Privaty, and even Andross.

"Looks like the others managed to destroy the Aurora Unit," said James, looking all around the place.

"Then we have to get out of here!" said Fox. "Privaty! Get on quick!" The Nikke nodded before jumping into the back seat of his Arwing.

The two Arwings began to fly out of the room when suddenly Andross lunged at Fox's Arwing and bit down on it. "What the?!" said Privaty in shock.

"You're going down with me!" said Andross as he held Fox's Arwing in his mouth, trying to bite through it.

"Ngh!" Fox tried increasing the speed of his Arwing to get out of Andross's mouth, but the villain held on tight. The screen was showing damages beginning to be done to the Arwing as Andross bit down harder and harder, and Fox and Privaty panicked, as they thought they were done for.

James turned back and fired at Andross's eyes, making the villain let go of Fox's Arwing. "Hurry!" James said loudly to Fox. The two Arwings hurriedly out of the room. Fox went ahead of James and exited first, but just as James was going to leave, Andross fired eye beams at the area above the door, causing debris to fall down and block the way forward. James hurriedly changed directions to avoid crashing into it. Looking at Andross he said, "So you want it to be like this, huh?"

Fox and Privaty continued to fly on ahead, and then Fox noticed on his radar that James wasn't following him. James then appeared on the screen and said, "Fox, I want you to get out of here and go on without me."

"You're still back in there, right?" Fox asked him. "I'll go…"

"Don't! You're going to throw away your life if you come back now! Leave something like that to me instead!" James told him.

Hearing this, Fox widened his eyes in shock as he realized what he was planning to do. "No! I won't let you sacrifice yourself!" said Fox loudly. He immediately changed his Arwing into its walker mode and descended before turning around to run back to the previous room.

"What are you doing?!" Privaty asked him.

"I lost my own father already, and even if this one isn't my actual father, I still won't let him throw away his life!" replied Fox.

"But he told us to escape! That's an order from the leader!" Privaty told her.

"I don't care!" shouted Fox in anger. There was then explosion that almost caused his Arwing to fall over, and the passage up ahead burst into flames, not to mention debris falling down blocking the way forward. Fox tried to shoot down the debris, but the layer was too thick to be blown away, and he ran out of smart bombs as well. "Darn it!"

"Fox! Listen to me! Listen to your father!" James yelled at him through his screen.

Back inside the room, James flew around while fighting a malfunction but still active Andross. James's Arwing was in a bad condition as well, and it looks like it could crash any moment. "It doesn't matter whether or not I'm your actual father, but since I look like him and has the same name as him, I will act as your actual father and command you to follow my orders! Leave this place now and find your way back to your own wold"! James ordered him harshly.

"What do the tell the others?! They can't lose a leader like you!" Fox told him desperately.

"They'll understand. They definitely will," James told him with a smile. The screen began to flicker, and he said, "Doesn't look like I have much time anymore, so get out of here and save yourself and everyone. Tell them that I went down like the true leader of Star Fox!"

"No! You can't!" cried Fox.

"Farewell, my son…" said James with a smile before the screen disappeared completely. He then turned his Arwing to Andross, who was charging at him with his mouth wide open. "All right, Andross! Let's find out what's in store for us afterlife together!"

He fired rapidly as he flew right into Andross's mouth, which then closed. Inside, James fired his last smart bomb, setting it off and causing Andross to explode from inside out.

KABOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!

Outside the room, Fox reluctantly turned the Arwing around to flee from the place as fast as he could. Behind him, Privaty watched with a look of concern and sadness. She might have only known James for a short time, but it was still enough to tell that he was a good leader worthy of respect, so knowing that he sacrificed his life for everyone was still a shocking and sad thing to her.

From within the Great Fox, Peppy, ROB 64, and Brid were in awe as they watched from the cockpit Andross's fortress breaking down. Flames burst out from various parts of it, and debris flew into the air. "Incredible…! They actually did it!" said Peppy in disbelief. "They destroyed the Aurora Unit and caused the whole place to go down!"

A large amount of Venomian and Space Pirate ships could be seen flying out of the exploding fortress, but the good guys paid no attention to them and allowed them to flee. Instead, they paid attention to see if there were any Arwings coming out.

"Are they out yet?" asked a worried Peppy. As soon as he said that, a number of Arwings were seen flying out of the fortress.

"Arwings detected," said ROB 64. "They have made it out safe and sound."

"All right!" exclaimed Peppy while jumping up in excitement and at the same time shaking Brid by the shoulder, causing her breasts to jiggle wildly as a result. "They made it out! They did it! Yippee!"

"Opening hatch," said Brid as she pressed the button that opened up the hatch for the Arwings to enter the Great Fox.

One by one, the Arwings flew inside the Great Fox. After the pilots docked their jets, they got out. "Yeah! We managed to get out in time!" exclaimed Elegg happily while throwing her arms into the air.

"Thanks goodness! For a moment, I thought we would never make it out…" said Diesel in relief.

"None of you would have made it out if I didn't led the way! You should thank me!" said Falco proudly with his arms crossed.

"You weren't even in lead. Krystal was," Wolf reminded him, but the pheasant ignored him.

Fox and Privaty got out of their Arwings last, and the latter placed her hand on the fox's shoulder with a look of concern, while his head was looking down with a sad expression. Krystal noticed Fox's behavior and walked up to him. "What's wrong?"

Fox didn't respond, and then Slippy asked, "Where's James?"

Everyone looked around for James, but didn't see him, and then Samus asked Privaty, "I thought he was supposed to be with you? Where is he?"

Privaty looked at everyone with a nervous expression, while Fox continued to look down. Privaty opened her mouth to speak, but no words came out. She was unsure how to deliver the message and even looked like she was going to cry.

The others continued to look at those two with looks of confusion, but slowly, they started to come to the realization about what happened to James. "No… Please don't tell me…" said Krystal as her face became more and more horrified.

"You have to be kidding me, right…?!" said Falco in disbelief.

"You mean… Our leader is dead?!" gasped Slippy, saying out loud what everyone feared.

"How… How horrible!" gasped Diesel with her hands over her mouth, while tears started to roll down the corner of her eyes.

Fox then finally broke his silence. "He wanted to let you all know that he went down… like the true leader of Star Fox," he said as more tears started to roll down his eyes.

The team was stunned and at a loss of words, finally having confirmation that James was gone. "Some things don't change, huh?" said Wolf in a tone that implied sadness, even if he didn't show it. "Though I'll say he went out more honorable this time around."

Jackal had a look of confusion on her face and asked, "Why does everyone look sad? Did something bad happen? And where is that fox with sunglasses? Is he not back yet?"

"He's not coming back. He died," Samus told her straightforwardly while petting her on the head.

A look of shock appeared on Jackal's face. "He's dead? But… we can bring him back to life, right? Nikke can sometimes be brought back to life when they die, so we can bring him back to life as well, right?"

"Jackal… James isn't a Nikke, or machine, so he can't come back to life," Delta told her. "He's gone for good."

A look of shock appeared on Jackal's face, and she looked at the others, seeing that they all had sad expressions on their faces. She then broke down into tears and cried loudly. Hearing her cry made most of the others began to weep one by one.

General Pepper, Gray Voice, and several Cornerian soldiers stood in front of the portal leading to Venom, watching the Great Fox return to Corneria from it. After the spaceship exited the portal, the latter closed up, and then the former made its landing.

After it successfully landed, its passengers came out, and General Pepper and Gray Voice went up to them to congratulate them on their return. When the two did not see James and asked about him, the crew members told them what happened. Needless to say, those two were shocked beyond words.

General Pepper took off his hat and placed it in front of his chest while lowering his head with a sad expression, while Gray Voice placed one hand over his face, shaking and sighing in disbelief.

Several minutes had passed after a funeral for James was held. By now, all of Corneria knew about the death of the great leader of Star Fox, and everyone mourned for him.

The good guys were all gathered together in General Pepper's office, and Gray Voice was there as well. General Pepper sighed and then said, "I know it's been a sad day for you all, but still, like I said during the funeral, James gave his life to save the galaxy, so let us be happy for him. I'm sure he wouldn't want us to be crying all day about losing him."

Fox wiped away a bit of tear he has and said, "You're right. He definitely wouldn't want us to feel gloomy all day long."

"James is an optimistic person and was always telling us to look on the bright side. Even now, I feel like I can hear him telling us to be happy that the battle is won, so we should be happy for him!" said Peppy in agreement.

"So… what of the team now James is gone? What will do here on forth, Star Fox?" General Pepper asked the group.

"I guess someone will have to step forward and lead the team," said Delta. "He wouldn't want us to quit and disband just because of this."

"Honestly, we're not sure any of us here are fit to be the leader… None of us here are as courageous and smart as him…" said Krystal.

"I'll be honest… I'd be aiming for the position of leadership in the past, but now… Let's just say I don't want to rush just yet…" said Falco.

Slippy turned to Fox and asked him, "You were the leader of your team in your world after your James passed away, right?"

Fox nodded. "Yes, and I'm afraid I'll have to turn down the offer if that's what you want, because I'm not from this world and am aiming to return to my own, so I can't be your leader."

"That is understandable," Peppy said to him. "You shouldn't burden yourself in doing the same thing here because it's not your world, but even so, since you have the experience of being a leader, it wouldn't hurt for you to give us some guidance until we come up with a better solution."

"As much as I hate to say it, Fox is indeed quite a leader," said Wolf. "I guess he should be watching after you folks in the meantime if he wants to."

Everyone looked at Fox and waited for his answer. He eventually said, "Okay, I'll serve as a temporary leader until you find a better one. I hope you don't mind."

"We don't mind at all! You're a pretty awesome guy!" Slippy said to him.

"Don't mind at all, leader!" Krystal said to him.

"Yeah, I guess you're not that bad," admitted Falco.

"I look forward to cooperating with you," Brid said to Fox.

"I look forward to your guidance," Delta said to him while saluting.

Elegg patted Fox on the shoulder and said, "Congratulations! You got a promotion!"

"Again, it's only for some time, until we find a way back to our own worlds," Fox reminded everyone.

"Which brings us back to this topic…" said General Pepper. "Since Andross has been dealt with, I will keep my promise of doing everything I can to get you back to your world."

"The Chozo will help as well," said Gray Voice with a nod. "You have to look for this entity known as Gatekeeper, right?"

Neon nodded. "Yep! You can't miss it out. It's a giant metal ball with an opening on one side of it. When everyone is displaced and out of their own worlds, it's sleeping nice and cozy unfairly somewhere. All you have to do is wake it up, and then everything will be back to normal!"

"Such a peculiar entity… I have never heard of such a thing!" commented Gray Voice with interest. "Nevertheless, we will use our technology to track down Gatekeeper and help you all return to your worlds, and perhaps we may even find more of your friends who may have been brought here as well!"

"You thank you for very much for your support!" Privaty said to him. "We will never forget this gratitude, even after we return to our world!"

"You helped us defeat Andross, so this is the least we can do," General Pepper said to with a smile. "In the meantime, please treat this place as your home. After the battle you've been through, you all deserve some rest!"

Neon then heard her smartphone making a sound, so she looked at it and found a message saying, "They're… same… p"

"They're same p...? Uh, what…?" said Neon in confusion.

The battle may be won, but at the cost of several sacrifices. However, such tragedy brought forth peace that will hopefully last forever, and one should take this opportunity to appreciate it. Even in a foreign world, our heroes fought battles that are not theirs yet are oddly familiar with. With the battle over, will they finally be able to solve the mystery of their peculiar situation and put everything back to normal?

In the vastness of space, the answer perhaps lies somewhere out there...

Looking around, Snow White saw a seemingly endless span of grassy terrain as well as… loops carved out of rocks...?

"Odd landscape…" she thought, staring at those loops.

"Never seen a loop before? You gotta got out and see the world some times! They're all the rage everywhere, you know?" said a teenager-like voice.

Spooked, Snow White leaped to the side pointed her gun at the person, a blue furry creature with long quills on his back. That strange creature held up his hands and said, "Whoa! Easy there! I'm just a friendly hedgehog coming over to say hi!"

"Hedgehog?" said a wary Snow White while lowering her gun. "Who are you? And what are you? You're a human wearing a weird costume or what?"

"Nope, a genuine hedgehog! Sonic's the name!" replied the blue creature while pointing at himself with his thumb.

Snow White stared at him in disbelief. She had a hard time that the creature standing before her was real and claiming to be a hedgehog, despite not actually looking one and being blue rather than brown or gray. "You're a hedgehog…?" she asked.

"Yep! Never seen one before? Or were you expecting the ordinary slow kind of hedgehogs? Sorry, but I'm the special kind!" Sonic told her.

Snow White stared at him silence and thought to herself, "I don't recall eating any weird mushrooms lately…"

Sonic was going to say something else when he spotted something that got him on his toes. He got to the other side of Snow White with his back towards her and said in a wary tone, "Be careful!"

Snow White looked and saw a group of people approaching, or rather, a robot and a group of people approaching. When Sonic saw the robot coming over, he said in a threatening, "Whoever you are, let's hope you have nothing to do with Eggman!"

However, Snow White recognized that robot and said, "T.A.L.O.S?"

The head of the robot opened up, and a green-haired girl poked her head out and asked, "Snow White? Is that really you?"

Snow White nodded. "Yes, it's me, Kilo. I was not expecting to see you here."

Sonic looked at Snow White and asked, "You know her?"

"Yes, friends, you can say," replied Snow White.

"Oh, got act up for nothing then," said Sonic, feeling relieved. "Good thing I learned to check first before acting nowadays!"

Snow White and Sonic walked up to Kilo as she got out of the robot named T.A.L.O.S and stood next to it. "What are you doing here, Kilo?" Snow White asked the green-haired girl.

"I have no idea…" replied Kilo. "T.A.L.O.S and I were in the Outpost, and then she suddenly warned me that there was a large spike in energy, so I got inside her quick for safety. Next thing I knew, we were both in this unfamiliar place…"

A blonde girl next to T.A.L.O.S then said to Snow White, "I know you! You're that Pilgrim named Snow White, aren't you?"

Snow White looked at her and said, "I think I may have seen you in the Outpost before… Who are you again?"

"Why, I'm the greatest hero the Ark has ever known, Laplace!" said the blonde girl smugly while posing.

Next to her was a young girl with gray and green hair tied into a long ponytail. She was also holding a hoverboard. "Are you really a Pilgrim?" she asked Snow White, and the latter nodded. "Wow… I think this is my first time meeting one in person! I'm Epinel. Nice to meet you!"

"I guess you all know each other," said Sonic, looking at both sides. "I get the feeling that you folks are lost or something?"

"Yeah, very lost, I think…" replied Epinel. "I was pulling off tricks on my hoverboard, and then there was this bright light that suddenly brought me here…"

"Me too! I was going to make a grand heroic entrance into the commander's building, but the moment I hit the window, I found myself here, wherever this is!" explained Laplace.

"Now that you said it… I did see some bright light happening before my eyes, but nothing seems to have changed," replied Sonic. "Okay, I was in a different location after the light died down, but it's still Green Hill regardless, just a different spot."

"I guess the same applies for all of us," said Snow White. "We all got here because of some strange light."

The last member of the group that was tagging along then raised his hand. He is a young boy looking ten to twelve years old. "I… also got enveloped in a white light that then warped me to this place…" he said. Standing next to him is a red robotic dog.

The others looked at him, finally realizing that he was there the whole time. "And who are you?" Snow White asked him.

"My name is Rock, though most people know me as Mega Man," replied the boy. He then looked at the dog and said, "And this is Rush."

"Well, nice to meet you, Rock! Or Mega Man," Sonic said to him while shaking his hand, and the latter greeted back.

"Mega Man… That almost sounds like a superhero name!" commented Laplace.

"Well, I am a hero where I'm from," replied Mega Man. "Saved the world several times from Doctor Wily and other evil robots…"

"Wow! So you're an actual hero? That's awesome! Fancy meeting another hero like me!" Laplace happily said to him while shaking his hand hard. "What can you do? Do you have super strength? Super speed? Got any awesome weapons?"

"I can switch to my battle form, and then I can use my arm cannon to shoot powerful plasma shots and even use weapons of enemies I fought in the past," explained Mega Man, which made Laplace excited.

"Sounds awesome! How can you do something like that?" asked Laplace curiously.

"My creator created me with the function to copy abilities of other robots. I was originally a housekeeping robot and lab assistant, but I asked to be converted into a combat ready robot so I can battle evil people," explained Mega Man.

"You're a robot?" asked a surprised Sonic.

"Scan results show that he is telling the truth," said T.A.L.O.S. "He is a completely mechanical being, with no traces of anything organic."

Sonic and Mega Man looked at T.A.L.O.S. in shock when they heard her talk. "You can talk?!" asked Sonic.

"Sorry that T.A.L.O.S. spooked you… T.A.L.O.S. doesn't talk much, especially to other people. She mainly only talks to me unless she has a reason to talk to others," Kilos said to them. "She's my companion and fights for me, since I'm too weak to fight and do most things by myself…"

Just then, they heard a sound similar to an explosion coming from a certain direction. They looked and saw smoke not too far away. "What happened over there?" wondered Epinel.

"Something tells me it's not anything good," said Sonic. "I'm gonna check it out. Keep up if you can!" He then ran off in that direction at a fast speed, much to the surprise of the others.

"Wow! What a speed!" said Laplace in surprise, and the others agreed before running after him as fast as they could.

Sonic arrived at the place where the smoke was coming from and saw a rock formation blown up by some kind of explosive, explaining the smoke. He looked and saw a two-tailed fox and a red-haired woman with horns wielding a sniper rifle standing side by side, looking up at a bald man riding a round-shaped flying machine equipped with missile launchers.

"The next shots will be sure to hit you!" the bald man said to them.

"Tails!" Sonic called out to the fox, grabbing his attention. He walked up to him and said, "What's up? Eggman causing trouble?"

"Um, who are you?" the fox named Tails asked him.

Sonic was confused to hear this, and then he laughed, "Haha! Very funny! You sure know when to crack a joke, right?"

"No, seriously, I don't know who you are! And now isn't a good time either!" Tails desperately said to him while pointing at the bald man. "Eggman over there is attacking us!"

Sonic looked at the bald man named Eggman and said, "Yeah, just your average Tuesday. What are you up to now, egg head?"

"Whoever you are, you'll regret insulting me!" Eggman angrily said to him.

"Okay, what's with the both of you acting like you don't know me?" asked Sonic, starting to sound a bit annoyed. "The two of you are not pulling a prank on me together, right? You don't even get along!"

Tails and Eggman stared at him in silence, and then they stared at each other and shrugged, which made Sonic even more confused and even a bit nervous.

The red-haired girl was also watching the conversation between those three with a confused look. Just then, the others arrived at the scene, and when Snow White saw that girl, her eyes widened in shock. "Red… Red Hood?!"

The girl turned to her and looked at her for a few seconds before widening her eyes as well. "Snow White…? Is that you?!"

Sonic continued to talk with Tails and Eggman, but the latter two insisted that they don't know who he is. Sonic then remembered something. Behaving like he was having PTSD, he said while sweating nervously, "Please don't tell me… it happened again…!"

TO BE CONTINUED

I hope you enjoyed the Star Fox/Metroid arc. Next up is a fusion between Sonic and Mega Man's worlds, because they have quite a number of things in common!

And knowing how things went previously, people are going to review this chapter and talk about their surprise at learning what the next arc is… before disappearing for the rest of the arc and giving little to no reviews to this story until a new arc begins… I've already accepted that this story is getting very little attention and therefore not really expecting reviews anymore, so go ahead and do whatever you want...