-1Star Fox: “Comrade”

By Katie “morrie-chan” McNicholas

Pairing: None; Krystal-Falco friendship. Hinted Fox/Krystal if you squint.

Rating: PG-13

Warning: Hinted violence, and swearing. Some spoilers for Command, I guess. Schizophrenic Falco? XD Oh right, and ANGST. D:

Disclaimer: I don’t own Star Fox, Nintendo does.

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Chapter 1

Falco woke up, looking at the smoky yellow sky. Immediately, pain was felt in his back and legs; he knew his back wasn’t broken, but one of his legs definitely was. He couldn’t move much, the pain was bad enough, but he felt rather weak as well. Judging by that, and some dampness he felt here and there, he must have lost quite a bit of blood.

‘Oh wait, that’s right. I got taken out.’ he thought, licking his beak and tasting the bitter taste of blood. His ego chose to speak then, saying in an outrage ‘How can the great Falco Lombardi be taken down by a fleet of nobodies? Someone truly has a death wish, because this is unacceptable!’. His common sense retorted ‘These nobodies caught my ass off guard. It happens to the best of us, sometimes. Y’know, remember James McCloud?’.

He then heard someone walking over to him. He knew exactly who it was, being that only one member of the team was sent with him to this desolate planet. The entire team split themselves between three planets. Miyu and Fay made one team, Fox and Slippy another…which left Falco with Krystal.

Falco was actually kind of relieved that he was teamed with her; when she initially joined, he didn’t trust her completely. However, as he got to know her, the avian decided that she was alright. She was a pretty talented pilot, but where she really excelled was hand-to-hand combat; she proved to be a very good, if challenging sparring partner. Hell, she kicked his ass whenever he took her on. It didn’t hurt that she was very comfortable to talk to, and that she had the same kind of sense of humor he did.

And yeah, it hurt like hell when Fox kicked her off the team. He remembered that night on the Great Fox, he left the team again because of how angry he was at Fox, much to the tearful objections of Slippy and Fay. “You’re a God damn idiot, Fox. She loves you, and you push her away. What’re you gonna do, push us all away?!” he scolded the vulpine before walking out the door.

Of course, that was all in the past, and the team was back together again. Back to current events, Krystal knelt over Falco, her face purely concerned. “Good, you’re conscious. I’ve already called ahead to the others. They’ll be here right away. Just hang on, alright?” she spoke, her accented voice soothingly soft. She sat beside her severely injured teammate, protective yet still on guard in case an enemy came to ‘finish the job’.

Falco wanted to say something along of the lines of ‘I’m fine, don’t you worry about me’, but a sudden rush of pain to his chest made him cough hard. He managed to turn his head to the side (hurt his neck like a bitch, though) and cough frothy blood into his blue feathered hand. He settled back and looked up at the vixen, deciding instead to just go with a “Thanks”, just before slipping back into dark unconsciousness.

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A few months had passed since the accident. Falco had just about fully recovered; his back pain was gone, and he just had his leg taken out of it’s cast. His ribs, which had also broken, had healed as well. And even though he still was a little shaky on his feet without the assistance of a cane, his piloting skills didn’t suffer at all.

The team was just about finished with a mission on Titania, to explore an abandoned laboratory to make sure everything was alright. Again, Falco and Krystal teamed up. They picked to check the area where experimentation took place. Falco was a little slow, but Krystal was very patient.

“Shit, this place gives me the creeps.” the avian muttered, holding his blaster in the hand that didn’t hold the cane he used. Krystal nodded in agreement, holding her staff up defensively. The two stepped carefully around the lab, their steps echoing in the wide, empty room.

It was way too quiet in the room for Falco’s taste. It usually took a lot to creep him out, but this room, for whatever reason, made the feathers on the back of his neck stand up. Krystal wasn’t so afraid; once you’ve lost your home planet, there isn’t much left to fear. She was more concerned with protecting Falco; he hadn’t fully healed yet.

Falco actually wasn’t even supposed to be doing anything like this. The doctors recommended that he’d stay out of active duty for at least another few months, but the avian was stubborn, dead set on going on this mission after months of being cooped up in a hospital. Krystal had overheard a conversation between the doctor and Fox…if anything happened to that leg before it fully healed…

Krystal shook the thought off. Nothing would happen. As his comrade, no, as his friend, she would make sure of it.

That’s when a loud stomp was heard. And felt. Falco clenched the head of his cane tightly, part in fear and part in anticipated excitement. Krystal’s defensive stance strengthened, concentrating her telepathy to find whatever was the cause of it.

It was right behind Falco.

A warm, really bad smelling wind blew around Falco. He slowly turned his head to look at the monstrosity that stood behind him. It was some sort of rat; but this rat was about 7 feet tall, severely mutated, missing it’s lower jaw, and it’s eyes; it’s big, red, bloodshot eyes were glowing. Glowing. ‘How cliché.’ Falco thought.

The monster lifted his arm, it’s long, way too sharp claws reflecting the dim lighting of the room. Falco stared at them, freezing completely. Those things looked like they probably could rip him in half with just one swipe. He just gotten out of the hospital two weeks ago, and now this giant rat was about to fillet him. Isn’t life just so fucking grand?

“FALCO!” Krystal screamed, rushing over and hitting the mutant with her staff, sending it back against the wall. Falco unfroze, aiming his blaster at the freak. “Damn it, what the hell is that thing?!” he cried out angrily. Krystal shook her head, not taking her eyes off their opponent. “I have no idea, and I’d much rather kill it before it gets the chance to kill us.” she spoke.

The mutant moved fast--way too fast--to the other side of the room, then rushed at them. Krystal ran to meet it with her staff, meeting with it’s claws with a loud, unpleasant clang. Krystal immediately felt her arms strain against the force; this thing was strong, maybe too strong. Falco managed to get on the other side of the enemy and fired a few shots from his blaster at it’s back. At first, it seemed that it was wounded; but then, the wounds sealed themselves back up again. “Fuck.” Falco muttered.

Krystal was sent flying across the room, hit with the back of the mutant’s monstrously big paw. Her back hit a metal wall, HARD. She coughed up a bit of blood as she hit the ground, her arms breaking her fall. Falco jumped back, tripping over his cane and falling to the ground. His leg was already hurting from strain, but he nonetheless raised his blaster, holding the trigger. Maybe once it charged enough, it would have a greater effect.

The beast hovered above Falco, frothy drool forming from the tongue that hung from it’s mouth. Falco aimed straight for the mutant’s face and fired, but the bastard dodged. Blood sprayed into the air. A loud, gruesome crack was heard, followed by a painful scream. Falco panted frantically, his blaster being knocked across the room, and now having one of those incredibly sharp claws through the knee of his bad leg. Fuck times infinity.

‘Shit. SHIT! I’m screwed. So fucking screwed!’ the avian thought, frantically, his shaking coming out of his pain and his fear. The mutant raised it’s other claw emotionlessly. It probably took absolutely no though whatsoever for this freak show to kill it’s prey, or so Falco assumed.

Krystal rose slowly, shaking off the blow. She looked over, eyes widening at what could be the death of Falco Lombardi. Unless, of course, she did something about it…

-To Be Continued-