Star Crossed [an old and terrible Star Fox fanfic]

C26 - Acting On Your Best Behaviour

Fox awoke in a seemingly ultrasecure cell, for the second time in recent memory. However much further of a danger this time was, though, he still had so dulled of senses. He looked around, confused as to where he was. His eyes dilated, and he turned, trying to scuttle to a corner. He breathed heavily, his heart rate feeling lagged and staggered. These drugs had such a multitude of effects, on all his varied bodily systems, that he coudn't even begin to pick them apart. His fur felt like a coat of heat, his eyes seeing in bright monochrome, his ears folded in their vain attempt to stop the ringing. His movement was shaky, and he scuttled back up against a wall.

In the cell across from him, still unconscious, was Peppy Hare. Fox's mind raced with thoughts of his only senior member of the team potentially being already dead. He groaned... and felt like his stomach was going to explode. Then, he swooned for the squalid air in his lungs, feeling weak, down to his very bones. He felt, indeed, like he would die, if he lied down and tried hard enough to.

His effort, though, wouldn't be so grievously wasted. He instead focused his spirit on staying alive, at least enough to see where he was to go next. Fox recounted his last thoughts, knowing that his demise was to come shortly... Still laboriously breathing, he tried to recount what had just occurred. Andross was dead, Wolf was away, his team was likely imprisoned like him. He wished he could help, but what could he do? What choice did he have?

He lied motionless, after crawling up into this cell's corner, and curling himself primally. He sighed, and at least tried to rest, while keeping consciousness. He could at least hear two things: the ship, making its quiet way back to its mother planet, and his own heart beating. He thought of one thing, and one thing only.

Wolf. He knew it was so strange to have this former adversary, now strangely-allied mystery on his mind. It was something stirring within him, yet he couldn't tell what. It was troubling, in a way... but it made him feel good. He smiled, actually. Wolf... He wouldn't have made it anywhere near this far without him. Fox thought further to himself about how much he's learned about everything, now. Everything had so suddenly changed.

Wolf was a comforting thought. Comforting, actually, felt like an understatement. Fox wished badly that he were here, assuring him in this time of need.

What a fantasy this seemed to be now, though. Fox McCloud was going to die, to be executed by the regime that initially set him out. He only barely acknowledged this truth, for how unbelievable it was. Instead of dwelling on that, he just tried to keep himself awake, with only these visions of Wolf to motivate himself.

Then, though, a question came to him. Where was O'Donnell?

Off and away, to his own business, thinking that this was all over. McCloud resolved this, with a heavy sigh.

• • ● • •

Wolf had stopped a ways away from Corneria, knowing that landing back down there would mean risking his own life. He was still a highly coveted criminal, after all, and any slight slip of showing his face would mean an instant demise of his own part, the bounty on his head being just as large dead as it was alive. Besides, nothing worth risking laid on the surface for him. He was waiting for an interception. He knew that the Great Fox had to come home sometime, whether it be maneuvered by Fox himself, or any sort of substitute pilot.

He was going to get this, somehow. He was going to make this last stand, to at least see this chance through. There had to have been something there, in the Great Fox, of use to him.

Finally, he saw the silver, blue-winged ship itself, in all its soaring grace. For a decades-old mothership, it flew so well. It was making its due course over to the nearby planet, drifting in the emptiness back to its home.