Descent

Minutes Earlier…

The walls seemed to press in all around him as Fox made his way through the bowels of this ancient, slumbering monster. The darkness was laden with the weight of unseen eyes, the silence suffocatingly absolute. The glow from his helmet's floodlights cast a quickly diminishing cone ahead of him, but it didn't seem to reach as far as it should have. It was as if the soft metal the halls appeared to have been built from drank the light in, only giving back a fraction of what was actually shed. Meanwhile, Fox's skull prickled, and shadows played tricks on his eyes as he wandered the endless, empty passageways of this place. There were no whispers now like there had been on the yacht. They had fallen silent with the Eye, but he could still feel them, like pin pricks in his mind. They were lying dormant, waiting, like the drones he'd seen drifting in the entrance to the station.

He wasn't sure what was worse, that he'd seen those things out there, or that he had found nothing in here. He had been expecting to find more of the bug-like drones inside, littering every passageway and room. He remembered Colonel Newman describing how those things had chased him and his men out of this place years ago, but so far Fox had found nothing but dark, empty halls, locked doors, and fiery red barriers. He held his rifle low and made his way forward cautiously, listening for his father's voice.

He knew how crazy this seemed, following the voice of a man who, by all reason, should be long dead. Nobody could have survived in a place like this for all those years. That thought came with a sense of certainty. He couldn't quite explain it, but it was something about the design of the place. Cold, perfectly smooth surfaces. Purposeful, almost heartlessly efficient architecture. There was an unspoken hostility to it all, as if everything here was designed for function alone, without a thought spared for its inhabitants other than to allow them to complete the tasks that alone validated their presence. He imagined is ancestors working here. Moving about with singular purpose.

This was a place for slaves. It wasn't made to sustain life. It may have done so once, but likely only out of necessity, even then.

In any case, there was no way of knowing if it even was his father he was following; no rational line of thought that could justify his belief. Despite that, he did believe. He couldn't help it. He wanted to believe so badly…

"Fox," Orian interjected into his thoughts, "We need to find some kind of up-link; a way for me to access the Eye's systems. If we do, I can pull up the station's layout and get our bearings-"

"I told you, we're not lost!" Fox snapped.

"Yes, I know, we're being lead," Orian answered with equal impatience, "I can feel it too, you know. My point is that if we knew the layout we would be able to figure out where exactly this voice is leading us."

Fox breathed deeply to help calm his fraying nerves, then said, "You're right, sorry Orian. I know you're trying to help, but look, I don't like the idea of linking in with this station's systems. Every bit of corruption we've faced came from contact with that damn Cypher, and where did that come from?"

"Yes," Orian agreed, keeping his own emotions in check as well, "but with the Eye currently dormant, this may be our only chance to safely access those systems. Loopy and I stood up to everything this place was throwing at us back on the yacht. I'm certain we can handle it while the system is recovering."

Fox stopped before a large intersection, shining his helmet's lights out into the open space where several passages met in a wide circle. Recent memories of another station, of mechanized killers and blaster fire encroached at the edges of his thoughts, but he forced himself to think of something else before those memories went too much farther.

"No," he answered, firmly, "I'm not putting you at risk if I don't have to. We stood up to the Eye from a distance, Orian, not from its own innards. My father is leading us somewhere. We'll just have to trust him."

After a few seconds of silence stretched uncomfortably between them, Orian said, "Fox… I know you don't want to hear this, but… well… how do we even know that voice is your father?"

Fox's jaw set tightly. His grip on the rifle that had formerly belonged to the late Andrew Oikonny went from tight to white-knuckled. Rather than answer, he swung his modified weapon into a ready position, staring through the combat optics with one eye while the other scanned for movement as he stepped out into the large, open space. He quickly cleared it from left to right, then, finding it as empty as the rest of this place, he lowered his weapon again.

Orian wasn't wrong. This wouldn't be the first time his father's memory was used against him, but this… this was different. He could just feel it.

Though he had to admit, even having heard his father's voice as clear as day, it had now been several minutes since he'd heard the voice and every second of silence that stretched out in this dark place ate away at his confidence. His father had been leading him through the station, drawing him, just a word or two at a time and sometimes a distant light that always seemed to vanish before he could reach it. This was the longest stretch of silence he'd experienced so far, and it was getting to him.

He blew out a breath and said, "I just know, alright? I know it's him. I don't know how, but… AArrgh!"

He bit down hard to keep from shouting as the needles crawling over his skull intensified. His muffled cry turned into a growl as the patterns on his skin flared blue light from beneath the hairs on his face, reflecting back against the inside of his visor. The feeling pulled his eyes to his right, and he was filled with a certainty that this was the direction he had come from. And then he heard them.

First one whisper, then another, growing exponentially as he ground his teeth. More and more began to join their voices into that maddening, soundless din until there must have been thousands.

Fox paled as it dawned on him that the station might be waking.

The feeling grew as more and more voices joined in. It was difficult to describe, but it felt like they were moving, all together but erratic, like a cloud of flies around a corpse, maggots crawling over one another, filling the distant shadows with forms he could sense but couldn't see. His light stopped at the far wall of the open intersection of passageways, a pristine metal surface that rewarded his light with a non-reflective, soft gray color, almost like perfectly smooth cloudstuff given solid substance. And somewhere beyond a labyrinth of this hazy metal, something swarmed.

"Come on, Dad," he whispered, backing toward the opposite wall while apprehension built under the surface of his forced calm, "which way?"

"May I suggest, away from whatever that is?" Orian said, drawing Fox's attention as a virtual image of the construct appeared in between two passages. They both led in the opposite direction of the unseen swarm as he gestured to either as options.

Fox shook his head, but he only waited a second longer without any other answer before he began to move, choosing the passage to Orian's right and moving at a light run. His helmet's floodlights bobbed as he moved, causing the shadows to dance ahead of him. He began to feel lost, even abandoned, but he ignored it. This place no longer bombarded him with the raw fear it had used to attack his mind before, but it still seemed to ooze anxiety, a constant, silent promise of harm that chewed at his nerves like a parasite. His father's voice had been all that was keeping him together. Every time he heard it, his resolve grew-

Laughter, deep and mocking rolled out of the darkness.

Resolve McCloud…?

Fox's blood ran cold, but before he could even process the voice that had just slithered through his thoughts, an image appeared in his peripheral vision as he passed an open crossway. It was a tall man, a labcoat covering him from calf to collar, a white beard jutting down to his chest, a wide smile cutting his face like a skull's deathly grin, all the while staring at him with lids open too wide around eyes that bore into Fox's soul with a now familiar glint of madness. An instant in time that seemed to slow to nearly nothing stretched in his mind as his head and eyes turned to the opening he was passing to his left, the place where the specter stood, and just as their eyes met-

-it vanished as Fox came to a jarring halt, his rifle up and scanning.

…or madness?

The words hung in the air as a resounding laughter echoed through the ever-encroaching shadows.

He stood there, paralyzed with sudden uncertainty. Anger mixed with fear and doubt as it roiled inside him. It wasn't possible. He couldn't be here!

The laughter had died before he was even able to blink. The certainty he'd felt before was gone, torn away like heat in the face of a bitter wind, and Fox shook. Whether it was from the anger or the fear, he didn't know, but the heat rushing to his head was matched only by the chill running down his spine.

"What was that?" Orian asked, sounding cowed, "It felt… wrong."

"It can't be…" Fox said, growling out the words through clenched teeth. The anger boiled up then, and he roared into the darkness, "How many times do I have to kill you!?"

His voice echoed, but only once, and not as loudly as it should have in this empty place. The dark seemed to muffle it, then swallow the sound altogether.

Was it really that bastard? Was he somehow here as well? Was this all his doing!?

He realized now how this could all have been a trap – hated himself for being baited so easily!

"Fox, that voice was different from the first," Orian said, "I doubt something like that could disguise itself as the presence we've been following. I believe there may be multiple entities here. Three that I've identified, including… whatever that was."

"Three?" Fox prompted, still staring down the now empty corridor.

"Yes," Orian answerd, "First is the station itself. The Eye feels mechanical – corrupted, degraded, and chaotic, but still mechanical. It's like a fractured artificial mind that still functions on some base level, a more primitive A.I. or a near-intelligent algorithm. Its code is complex, but erratic… almost insane. It's powerful, though. Could be very dangerous if it was able to focus. The second is the voice you call your father. That one is… odd. It's hard for me to describe. There is code, structured and sensible, unlike the station, but it seems, well… alive."

Alive. That thought filled Fox's chest with a reluctant welling of hope. The source was possibly still alive!

"And the third?" Fox asked, pressing on, "What about what we just saw?"

"I don't know," Orian said, sounding apprehensive, "It was different from either of the other two. It's wasn't so much a presence as a non-entity. It was like perceiving a lack of something. A hole in the code that somehow functioned. I'm sorry, Fox, but I'm still a little disturbed. I've never come across anything like that. I knew it was there, I could feel it, but I just couldn't read anything. It was like looking into a hole, and knowing something was… looking back."

Fox became aware of an image in the back of his mind of his friend shivering, the lights of which he was composed flickering like a candle flame.

After a few tense seconds, he finally forced his eyes away from the place where the ghost of his nemesis had just stood, tossing them down to the ground with a snarl.

"I'm sorry, Orian," he said.

The construct was quick to ask, "For what?"

Fox looked up, back in the direction he'd been headed. He started off again at a brisk but careful walk, and said, "I'm sorry for getting you wrapped up in this. For bringing you here."

"Oh," Orian answered, dismissively, "Don't apologize for that. I go where you go. I decided that back on Titania. I'm with you to the end, my friend, like it or not."

A smile threatened to pull at the corner of Fox's mouth, but before he could say anything, a light appeared in the distance, a warm feeling drew on him, and he heard a voice, this time one he was eager to hear.

This way!

He broke into a run, his doubts from a moment ago forgotten, but as he ran he felt something new. Another presence now seemed to stalk him at a distance. It wasn't warm like the feeling that accompanied his father's voice, and it wasn't the constant uneasiness that the station itself seemed to radiate. This feeling was blacker than the darkness it hid within, and it was slick… oily… a wrongness that nipped at his heels despite feeling as though it were far behind him.

He put on speed, running almost recklessly down the long passage, and the light ahead grew brighter and clearer as he approached until he was only a dozen meters away. As he got closer, he could just make out a shape at the heart of the glow. A man with his back turned, looking over broad shoulders Fox remembered riding as a boy. He pushed into a full sprint as he closed in on it and-

-before he could react, a vac-suit clad figure burst into the intersection where the light waited, the ghost of James McCloud vanishing around it like a mist that had been disturbed. Fox ran into the newcomer at full speed, and they both went down in a pile of limbs.

Quick as lightning, Fox sprang off and brought his rifle up, drawing a bead on the head of figure. Their own weapon, a sidearm, stopped in its swing toward Fox. Whoever it was knew they were beat.

"No sudden moves," Fox warned, thinking it might be someone from Vekkar's crew come to bring him back with more of those damn hurt-spheres.

The suited figure's entire posture seemed to melt, and the pistol dropped down to… her side. The vac-suits weren't too bulky, and the body beneath this one had a few tells.

"Thank God…" she whispered, leaning against the nearby bulkhead and favoring one leg as she got to her feet.

Fox lowered his rifle at the sound of her voice, and as he did, she began to limp over to him. A sudden and entirely new concern rolled over him as she did, and he realized who was in that suit. She reached him, placing her hands on his shoulders lightly and then pulling herself into his chest.

"Thank God I found you."

"Krystal?" Fox said in disbelief.

He blinked and forced back his surprise. Of course, he thought, bitterly, of course she would follow you, you idiot.

He looked down and over her shoulder, at the leg she had been limping on, and found a blackened slash in the calf of her suit.

"You're hurt," he said, gently placing his hands on her waist and taking a step back.

This was the first time he'd heard an actual voice other than his own since leaving the yacht. The fact that their voices carried, despite sounding muffled, confirmed that there was air, but Fox wasn't any more eager to breathe it now than he was when his suit had first confirmed a breathable atmosphere. God only knew what was floating around in this place, and now Krystal was here… with an open wound.

"I'm fine," Krystal said, putting weight on the leg to show she could. She didn't give any signs of experiencing too much pain, but it was hard to tell with the suit masking her entire body.

"Let me see," he said, kneeling down beside her to get a closer look. The cut was long, but it wasn't too deep. It wasn't bleeding, and it was surrounded by singed blue fur, the skin around it badly blistered. "What did this?"

A hand pressed down on Fox's back as Krystal leaned on him, lifting the foot of the injured leg off the ground to take the weight off of it. So it was painful.

"A drone," she answered, "You must have seen them on the way in here."

Fox nodded. He took Krystal's hand in his and placed his other on her elbow to keep her supported as he stood up.

"They started swarming not long ago," she continued, "chased me inside."

Guilt crept up to join his concern as he realized she'd been hurt coming to help him. He should have known she would try to come after him, but he had thought that Vekkar would be able to keep her from it. The man had clearly believed she was valuable, so he would have tried to keep her from going, he was sure of that. His mistake had apparently been in overestimating the man's competence. Now she was here, and she was already hurt…

"This isn't your fault, Fox," Krystal said, intercepting his line of thought. Then she paused, and with a note of sarcasm, said, "Well, it is kind of your fault for running off like that, but I'm here of my own choice in any event."

Fox stuck his tongue to his cheek to keep from saying anything.

Krystal capitalized by continuing with, "And, for the record, Vekkar did try to keep me from leaving. I've never been very good at staying put like a good little damsel…"

"Really?" Fox cut in, unable to let that one go, "Because that's not how we met."

She sighed, pulling her hand back from his to cross her arms over her chest.

"Sauria again?" she protested, "One time, that happened, and you've held that over my head ever since!"

Fox shrugged and said, "Well you know what they say about first impressions. Besides, refresh my memory here: what exactly were you doing at Vaccini's compound?"

"I was working on an escape plan," she stated, bluntly, "And don't go mounting a high horse on that one, McCloud! It's not as if saving me was at the top of your list of priorities at the time."

That stung. She hadn't meant anything by it, he knew, but… it was true that he'd gone to Fachina to kill that fat bastard Vaccini, but before that he'd risked everything in the Z-Nebula, and Fay…

Fay died helping him get the information he had needed to find Krystal in that place.

Krystal's hand found his neck, and she brought her helmet to rest against his.

"I'm sorry," she whispered, softly, "Fox, I didn't mean it."

It took him a few moments to answer, but then he said, "I know."

He stepped away from her, but not harshly.

"We need to focus on getting you out of here," he said. Thinking of what had happened in that nebula, this place with its maze of passageways, and now Krystal being here – it was all too familiar. He wanted nothing more than to find his father, but he refused to be so blinded by that pursuit that he would risk adding to his nightmares, "How did you find me, by the way?"

"I was…" she began, hesitating slightly, "lead here. There was a light, and a voice. And I felt someone."

"My father," Fox stated, jaw set. Why? "Why would he lead us both here?"

"Your…"

"My father," he repeated, firmly, "You should have recognized it. We all heard it back when we faced the Appariod Queen. Remember?"

He'd had to fight to keep from pleading with that last question. He desperately wanted someone outside his own head to confirm this, his entire reason for taking this risk and coming here. He searched for any signs of recognition hidden beneath that suit.

She was quiet for a second or so, then her body straightened a bit.

"You're right," she said, sounding somehow relieved, "You're right, I do remember! And that voice was the same! Oh, thank God! I thought you were…"

She trailed off, and Fox finished the sentence for her.

"Crazy?" he supplied. She inhaled sharply, her breath hissing through her teeth as she prepared to speak, but Fox cut her off, smiling resignedly as more of a reflex than anything given the fact that they couldn't see each other's faces, "I'd love it if you could just trust me, but I'll admit, the only reason I figured I was still sane was on account of Orian."

"It's true. I've both heard and seen everything Fox has," Orian chimed in, happily, "I can assure you Fox's mental state is as stable as can be expected given the circumstances."

"Thanks," both Fox and Krystal said in unenthused unison.

"Anyway," Fox said, returning to his previous line of thought, "Let's get moving. We need to find you a way out of here."

He turned to go back the way he came, but then remembered what had been nipping at his heels a few minutes earlier.

"Tell me something, Krys," Fox said, his voice a touch lower, "Did you feel another presence here? Other than my father?"

His eyes burned into the darkness as he waited for an answer.

"Yes," she said, sounding concerned, "Something else was trying to block my path while I followed your father's light."

Hearing her call it his father, her allowing him that, gave Fox a strange sensation. It was warm, but with a slight ache. He was reminded, suddenly, of a long time ago, almost another life, when he was a young man in the academy. He remembered carrying a heavy pack through rough terrain for hours on end, tall, rocky canyon walls all around with dangerous footing and no end in sight. He remembered being so tired, and then someone had lifted up on his pack just a bit.

Want me to take some of the weight? Bill had asked.

He remembered the momentary relief that small difference in weight had given and the desire, the need to drop the rest. But he'd gone on then. He wouldn't let anyone else carry his burden. He would go on now, just the same.

He met the darkness with a hard stare and made to move into it, but he was stopped by a hand on his shoulder.

He turned just as Krystal dropped her helmet to the floor, and a slight hiss signified his own decoupling as she released it. She pulled it up and off of his head, then dropped it next to her own, the lights from the two helmets still shining but castling less light through the corridor from the ground.

Her other hand came up and gently wrapped around the back of his head, and she pulled him in so their foreheads met, her eyes closed as she whispered, "You don't have to carry it all alone."

The air here was cold and stale, but he could feel the warmth of her body rising from the neck of her suit, her breath stirring the hairs on his face, making him feel light headed. Her eyes were still closed as a tear ran down her cheek. He watched it slowly roll down her face until it met her lips, and then they were all he could see. They pulled tighter as she tried to keep them from quivering, and, for a moment, Fox wanted nothing more in the world than to kiss them.

Then, before he could, deep and terrible laughter mocked him from somewhere, but whether it was from the darkness, or from his own mind, he couldn't say.

He pulled back as he suppressed a snarl, and Krystal let him go. Neither met the other's eyes, and the weight of this place settled back down on him with the press of shadows and the dangers hidden within them.

"We shouldn't be breathing the air here," he said, finally breaking the heavy silence, "We don't know what's in it."

Krystal managed a smile, and said, "A bit late for that," indicating toward her open wound, "but I take your point."

She picked up both of their helmets, and, after tampering with them for a moment, she tossed Fox's to him. They both slid the vulpan-tailored enclosures over their heads, and both of them sealed with short, hermetic hisses.

"Can you walk?" he asked, seeing her limp as she made ready to follow him. It wasn't as pronounced as before, but he wasn't sure if that's because the pain was subsiding, or if she was just trying to act tough.

"I'll be fine," she answered, her voice now coming across clear as day from the speakers inside Fox's helmet, "The cut isn't that deep, and it's already starting to feel better."

Fox frowned, but didn't argue out loud. The cut wasn't deep, but the burn was bad, and that was the problem. Still, she could probably move faster on her own than he could carry her.

"I don't need to be carried," she said, replying to his thought. He'd spent years with this woman in the past, and he still wasn't used to having a conversation with a telepath. She walked past him, her limp barely noticeable as she walked several paces down the wrong passageway.

"Where are you going?" Fox asked, indicating the opposite direction, "I think the way back is this way."

"You may be right," Krystal agreed without looking back over her shoulder, "but that light, your father, he was leading me this way before we ran into each other." Before Fox could object, she turned her head his way and said, "Besides, that hangar we came in from is swarming with those drones. We can't go back."

She started walking, and Fox made to follow, already working on his protest, but he stopped as he noticed something.

The cut on her leg seemed smaller than it had before…

The Sojourn sat poised at the mouth of the Eye. Sirus's vessel was over a mile and a half along its longest axis, an ancient testament to the power of a nearly god-like race, bristling with weapons that could shatter continents, boil oceans, and reduce the surface of a world to molten glass in a matter of hours. It was by the might of this ship alone that his armada was able to maintain its neutrality, its secrecy. Those who knew it existed and that he possessed it, and there were only a select and very wealthy few who did, also knew the power it represented. They paid, funneling supplies and funding through shell corporations, either to keep him at bay in the dark space beyond the Lylat system, or to buy their way into his good graces in case he should ever arrive on the doorstep of their world in force.

Yet even this titanic symbol of power he had managed to recover, this Leviathan which he had drawn up from deep within the black and forgotten waters of time and space, was dwarfed by such close proximity to the Eye of the Makers.

It made him feel small and insignificant, reminded him that the Sojourn had been a mere colony ship, armed more against the unknown of a foreign galaxy than any actual threat, and it made him shudder to think what terrible engines of war the Makers must have once brought to bear against their enemies.

It could all be yours…

Vekkar's jaw tightened down painfully as he tried to brace his mind, to force the voice out.

All the power of the ancient world. Power to change the universe as you see fit. To right its wrongs.

His knuckles went white around the end of the armrest he clutched in his fist.

Change is made by those with the power to affect it. And that power must be taken.

"No!" Vekkar seethed under his breath. Too much power in one vessel turns flaws into fractures… men into monsters. He'd seen it with his own eyes. He would not become the very thing he had set out to purge from the galaxy!

Dark, derisive laughter resounded in the hollow places of his soul.

How many times must such idealism bite you before you learn, boy?

"Shut up!" he hissed, a shaky hand sweeping his hair back out of his eyes.

He realized he'd drawn the attention of several members of the present bridge crew, and attempted to divert it again by fixing the sensors officer with a firm gaze and booming, "Lieutenant! Report on Captain O'Bannon!"

The young man nearly leapt out of his seat before answering, "Yes sir! Ah… there's been no contact since losing their signal, sir! Sensors still cannot reach farther than a kilometer or so into the mouth. Some sort of interference we're having a hard time compensating for."

After a brief and brooding silence, Vekkar said, "Send in a squadron to investigate."

"Sir!" another officer objected, bringing Sirus's attention down on him like a hammer. It was Lieutenant Colonel Harris, the Sojourn's Wing Commander. The man balked slightly at the fury burning in Vekkar's eyes, but then he squared his shoulders and pressed on, "Sir, I beg you to reconsider. We don't know what's happening in there. We could be sending our men to their deaths. We should send another probe."

"Commander Lyles!" he said, shifting his attention to an older Simian standing near the comm station. Evan Lyles was a close friend of Vekkar's, and his second-in-command aboard the Sojourn, but in front of their men, they kept up professional appearances. They had worked together for many years now, had become close just before the Lylat Civil War. Back then, Evan had been a young lieutenant in Venom's Special Projects Corps, and had recently lost his fiancée in some unfortunate accident on Titania. He'd never told Sirus the details, his secrets locked under years of fear and shame, but he had once confided in Sirus that the project had been of great interest to Andross, and that he had always blamed the 'emperor' for getting his fiancée involved. Their mutual distrust for Andross is what had originally brought them together, and there was no one else Vekkar trusted more.

"Sir?" Evan responded, curtly, obviously sensing his friend's mood and awaiting an order.

"Tell me, what happened to the last two probes we sent?" he asked, impatience staining every word.

"Lost sir," Evan responded, avoiding both Vekkar and Harris's eyes by staring at out the forward viewport and sounding uncomfortable as he did. Commander and Lieutenant Colonel were equivalent ranks, and Vekkar knew he was putting the men at odds. He regretted it immediately.

Blowing out a strained breath, Vekkar pressed on with his point, this time with more respect for his subordinate leaders, "We lose contact with the probes due to the same interference that is blocking our sensors, and they don't return – likely because they are unarmed. I respect your concern for your men, Colonel, but this is their duty. Instruct your pilots to take every precaution, and we will support them with the Sojourns own weapon systems should they require it, but we must know what has become of the Cypher and O'Bannon's team."

Tight jawed, but respectful, Harris answered, "Yes, sir. You're absolutely right. Apologies, sir."

The colonel turned to his own subordinate and began issuing orders. Vekkar, meanwhile, looked to his friend, still staring out through the viewport at the all-consuming blackness looming before them.

The image of teeth in the dark, appearing in the mouth of a Cheshire grin haunted his thoughts, and Vekkar was immediately on his feet, wanting to pace but instead walking over to join Lyles and stare out at the black alongside him.

"Commander?" he said, quiet enough that only the two of them would hear and trying to hide his uneasiness. His friend answered by turning his head Vekkar's way, and he continued, "Do you ever doubt that we're doing the right thing? That… perhaps we should have taken a more active role before now?"

Lyles seemed to mull this over quietly, his brow furrowing in concentration.

"Yes," he answered, softly, "All the time. But I've never doubted you, sir. You're a better man than me. I trust in that."

Laughter.

If he only knew… eh Sirus? Hahaha… HAHAHAHAHA!

Darkness encroached on the edges of his vision, and he staggered into his friend. Evan caught him and began to shout for assistance.

A flight of fighters streaked past the front viewport, and the trails of light behind their impossibly bright engines was all Vekkar could see as they flew into the gaping mouth of the Eye ahead of them. The laughter grew louder and louder even as the flaring lights grew dimmer and dimmer, until they were swallowed entirely by the darkness. A direct feed from one of the lead fighters was being broadcast on the bridge's tactical screen. Shapes streaked through their forward lights too fast to be seen. A fighter to the left of the feed lost control, its starboard stabilizer sheering off along a glowing, molten slash. The feed became a blur of motion as the pilot began evasive maneuvers. The orders of the squadron commanders could be heard all over the bridge as they panicked. Bright, hateful lights flashed as the Sojourn unleashed a volley into the opening to support the fighters.

"Make it stop," Vekkar croaked, pressing the heels of his hands into his temples, fingers digging at his scalp as the laughter grew louder still. He saw it then, the broadcasting fighter leveling out just long enough for Vekkar to see the yacht. Drones swarmed her, and its uppermost hull had been peeled open like a ribcage, exposing the glowing heart of the Cypher. "MAKE IT STOP!"

Then it did – as suddenly and without warning as the flare of blinding red light that exploded into life all around the mouth of the Eye, a fiery iris encircling a massive pupil as the station glared down on the Sojourn.

Alarms blared from nearly every system. The feed from the fighter turned back toward the Sojourn, the pilot attempting to retreat, but its view of its parent vessel was quickly lost in a consuming swarm of insectile forms. The feed cut even as the forward viewport of the Sojourn was consumed by the great swarm that emerged from the Eye's mouth like a host of locusts from the mouth of a great demon.

"Fire!" he heard Lyles roar, "All ships! Defend the Sojourn! FIRE AT WILL!"

Vekkar's world shook as fire tore across the darkness, piercing into the advancing cloud of monsters, burning them by the hundreds, but doing nothing to slow their advance. The laughter had left him with a crushing silence, his ears ringing as the implants in his mind buzzed and buzzed, like they had when he had first received them.

Then, in his mind, he heard Andross say, "Always so reliable, Sirus. Thank you for waking the Eye. It was impossible from my end, you know."

"Damn you!" Vekkar cursed. He tried to fight back, tried to stay in control as his arm began to throb.

"Did you think I could not undo what I had made? That my safeguards would work for you? My idiot nephew thought so. Andrew proved to be a most useful subject, allowing me to see what changes you had made in the years since we parted ways. I wish I could have thanked him, but alas, he was gone before this stupid beast could carry me here."

With every ounce of his remaining willpower, Vekkar reached with his good arm, pressing on each of his false fingers to release his glove, to get it off of him, but it didn't respond. The artificial flesh writhed over his ruined bones as if it had a mind of its own, pain flaring as something seeped in through the flesh of his shoulder. This shouldn't have been possible! There was no anima left in him! The glove was made-

"Of a derivative of the artificial flesh I engineered from the anima, yes?" Andross mocked, "A third generation, lacking biomechanical nuclei. Incorruptible, no?" more laughter, "Did you know that anima is especially difficult to remove from bone marrow? No? You didn't… pity. There wasn't much in those old bones of yours, you were remarkably thorough in purging yourself, but it was enough. You really should have done away with that old arm, Sirus. Pitiful organic sentiment, clinging to imperfect flesh."

The glove began to melt off of his bones, seeping into the deck and slithering down beneath the paneled flooring. Vekkar tried to call out, but found he no longer had a voice. He was watching through his own eyes as if they were windows staring out from a prison cell.

Drones crawled over the viewport, their scuttling legs thrashing against the Sojourn's wavering shield, their numerous bodies blocking out everything else.

The bones of his arm lay bare, the glove now completely reverted to anima as it oozed away and sank into the ship. Vekkar thought of the labs, far below, of the vats of anima both infected and pure on which his scientists and researchers had labored for years, and he screamed into the deafening silence of his own mind.

Apollo! He cried.

"Sir," the Apollo answered, relief flooding over Vekkar at the A.I.'s reply.

Initiate system-wide purge! He commanded, all apoptosis devices, all decks!

Kill it all! It didn't matter how much research was lost, he had to kill it all!

There was no reply. The hope he had felt was replaced by a bitterly cold feeling that spread through his now convulsing body.

"Cannot comply," Apollo's voice came back, "System corrupted. Enacting Directive Romeo-One-Six-One-Six. Self-Destruct sequence initiated."

Andross's laughter reverberated with the shaking of this ship, and his voice said, "Marvelously crafted minds, these Progenitor A.I.s. Even the one here in the Eye continues to function. Though corrupted and lacking its core memory I still cannot hope to challenge it in my current state. But soon I will have the power I need to consume it utterly. I will finish what I began long ago, and you, dear Sirus, have given me everything I needed to accomplish this."

The self-destruct warning began to blare, but his men didn't move. They immediately fought to override, struggled at their controls all around him, defending the ship, defending the dream he had promised them. He wanted to scream at them, to beg them to abandon ship! He didn't care about himself anymore! He was lost, he could see that now, but these were his people! Why wouldn't they flee!?

The lights on the bridge suddenly flickered, and the alarms all died at once, including the self-destruct warning, leaving the room in a sudden, tense silence. People began to cheer, to celebrate, but they hadn't noticed what Vekkar had. They hadn't felt the subtle change in their world like he did.

They hadn't noticed that the guns had stopped.

Their cheers turned to screams as the first of the drones phased through the now unshielded outer hull, dropping on the nearest victim and tearing into their flesh with red hot claws that sizzled as they cut through flesh and bone and fat.

They poured through in droves, slaughtering everyone and dousing their corpses in a vile expulsion of blue slime. They crawled over his still body, and, rather than cut into him, they began to vomit blue ichor over him. There was no need to pierce his flesh first, he was already corrupted.

Through his connection to the ship, Vekkar felt the anima spreading through her, the corruption infecting every system one by one. His mind fell into darkness, the light of his own eyes growing smaller and smaller in the distance, and Andross laughed.

"I'm afraid I had to help accelerate the infection," Andross sighed, "Couldn't have that A.I. go and destroy this beautiful vessel. Unfortunately, this has drawn undue attention and I must leave you. The station will claim you now, Sirus," the madman whispered, "You will become a part of something greater, a vanguard for my return. I will wait, meanwhile, for all the pieces to align. Goodbye, and thank you old friend."

Vekkar's cries echoed in darkness until something found him. A great red eye that screamed at him in a thousand whispers. It overtook him, swallowing his mind in a tempest of tortured souls until he was just one more of the fallen.

As his people were slaughtered in the bowels of their own ship, anima being spread by drones and growing numbers of abominations, the Sojourn turned on the armada. The largest ships were decimated immediately. Some fled, some fell, and some were overtaken by monsters that had once been pilots and their craft – ramming themselves into other ships to spread their infection.

Fox staggered against the wall as the crushing fear washed over him. He felt as if it were tangible, as if it filled every corridor like dark water and he were drowning in it. His eyes were wide and his teeth gnashed against each other. Krystal was on her knees a few feet beside him, helmet cradled between her hands, and Orian cried out as he tried to fend off the onslaught.

"It's… to… much…!" Orian yelled, as if in pain.

A light appeared down a distant corridor. It was so far…

Hurry, Fox!

He squeezed his eyes shut and tried to focus, to find his center as he had before. The lines in his skin began to glow brightly as he summoned his resolve. The mind-shattering terror was so much worse here! Still, he found his center, forced his eyes away from the disembodied threats of the shadows, and with a growl he pushed off the wall and made his way over to Krystal, pulling her to her feet and slinging her arm over his shoulders to support her weight. Then he began to stagger in the direction of the light.

Krystal let him lead her, but when he glanced over at her, he could see her eyes were screwed shut even through the tinted visor of her helmet. Step by step she seemed to grow weaker, leaning more and more weight on Fox until he was practically dragging her alongside him. Just moving was a monumental effort, carrying her was too much. He marched on for a few more paces, then nearly fell over when he felt her slip from his shoulder. She landed in a sitting position against the bulkhead, and Fox knelt over her protectively.

"Come one, Krys, we gotta keep moving!" he pleaded, resting a hand on her shoulder.

In response, she tried to press the balls of her hands into her temples and tossed her head back against the wall, like she was trying to shake something out of her head. She dug at her neck until she hit the release for her helmet, the seal hissed open, and she flung it away. Her eyes flew open as she did, staring into Fox's, fear making them wide. Lines of blue traced hexagons through their whites, and Fox's world became suddenly very small.

"Fox!" Orian shouted above what sounded like his own screams, "That's a severe infection!"

How? He couldn't speak, his throat was sealed tight, but in his mind he screamed. How did this happen so fast? She looked up into his eyes, pleading, but without an answer.

Fox turned her leg with a hand and found that her wound was now completely gone. The flesh that had replaced it was a sickly blue-green, and it pulsed where it met her real muscle.

"Orian, do something!" Fox roared.

"I can't!" Orian cried back.

"We've done it before! We purged the Cypher! You and Loopy have saved me a dozen times! Do it for her!"

"You don't understand!" Orian shouted, as desperate as Fox was, "We had an interface! Your nanites were able to bridge the gap between you and the infected tech. Krystal is… she's entirely organic! There's nothing to bridge the gap!"

"No, NO, NO!" Fox screamed, "There has to be a way! You two interacted before!"

"She interfaced with me, Fox, not the opposite way around!"

He heard his father's voice calling to him, urgently now, and, glancing back, he could see the distant light, still so far away.

Turning back to Krystal, he knelt lower, pressing his forehead to hers like she'd done earlier.

"Krys, you gotta listen to me, alright?" he said, locking eyes with her so she had to look into his, "I need you to reach out to Orian, alright? Like you did before. Can you do that?"

Yes, Krystal's voice emerged into his thoughts, Fox, this place… there are so many voices. So much madness.

"Can you help her now!?" Fox begged.

"I still can't," Orian said, sounding defeated, "I can't do it, Fox. I can detect the anima now, but there's no way of controlling it from here."

Every muscle in Fox's body tightened down painfully, filled with the urge to fight off something he couldn't touch. It was beyond him. Krystal's life was slipping away, and he was helpless!

A shadow fell over them then, without warning. As it did, the crushing fear subsided significantly, replaced instead by a feeling of wrongness. A sickening sensation rose from his stomach as chills ran down his spine, and an oily voice slithered through his head.

What she needs, the voice said as Fox whirled around, coming face-to-face with the shadowy image of Andross Oikonny, are nanites.

Krystal fell forward, gasping. She fell onto her hands, then started to get up, but her legs gave out. Fox caught her and helped her up.

"You," she hissed, staring at the image with narrow eyes, "You were what chased me before. You-"

Are all that currently stands between yourself and becoming a horrible abomination that Fox will have to put down like a rabid animal, the ghost of Andross interrupted. His mouth didn't move at all as he spoke, as if this image and his voice were two separate entities.

Fox listened for his father's voice, but he couldn't hear it. He looked for the light, but the shadow clinging to Andross spread from his feet, completely enfolding the three of them and blocking out the rest of the world. The lights from his helmet did nothing to push them back.

Before the son-of-a-bitch could look back his way, Fox brought up his modified rifle and sent three shots of nillium-enhanced blaster fire into the deranged Simian's gut. They flashed brightly, energy crackling through the energized cloud surrounding each bolt, but when they struck Andross, they simply disappeared, sinking into the inky blackness behind him without any further sound or resistance.

Andross smiled back at him.

I'm already dead, McCloud, the man's voice mocked from within Fox's mind, his mouth remaining unmovingly in a too-wide grin.

"Tch," Fox spat, keeping his eyes on Andros but turning to Krystal worriedly and asking, "You alright?"

"So far," she answered.

But not for long, Andross interjected, I can't stay in one place for too long, or the deranged A.I. that runs this installation will find and try to eat me, so try and appreciate the value of the time I am currently wasting on you fools. II have, of course, accelerated our thoughts to give us time to chat, so it's only been a fraction of a second. Still…

"Why are you helping us?" Krystal then asked, suspiciously.

I'm not, the man said, tilting his head and maintaining his Cheshire grin, I'm helping ME. It just so happens that the two coincide at the moment.

Light flashed briefly beyond the veil of shadows like an impact, and as it did, Fox heard his father shout his name.

Andross's smile fell into a frown as he looked in that direction. Another impact made him flinch.

I don't have time to play with you today, James, the Simian sneered. Then turning back to Fox, he said, As I said before, your Cerinian companion requires nanites, and they must be coded to her DNA, so none of the ones flowing through your system will work, McCloud. You need fresh, unassigned ones. Medical nanites, since cerebral implants are rather incompatible with the Cerinian brain. And, it just so happens that I know exactly where to find some! Aren't I being generous, considering you've killed me twice?

"Why the fuck would I ever trust you, you fucking monster!?" Fox roared, putting himself between Andross and Krystal.

The shadows shook around them as Andross laughed, the disturbingly wide grin returning to his otherwise unmoving face.

You wouldn't! the crazy bastard laughed, So of course I'm telling you the truth! I could lie, or give you all the knowledge of the universe, and either way, you would not believe either from my mouth! So why don't you tell him, little construct?

A slimy, crawling feeling trickled across Fox's skull, and Orian squirmed and shouted for it to stop.

When it did stop a few seconds later, Orian shuddered, and said, "Fox, he just injected the data. He's right. Cerebral nanites would cause a feedback loop with her Cerinian mental abilities. It wouldn't kill her, but it would break her mind. They… Andross proved it with captured Cerinians."

"BASTARD!" Krystal screamed.

"I can and would still be able to interface with medical nanites if they were coded to her," Orian went on, "but we do need them to be fresh. There's no way to re-code them. They have to be bonded to the subject's DNA. Fox, without them to allow me and Loopy to interface, Krystal will succumb to the infection in a matter of minutes."

"No!" Krystal objected, "Fox, don't do this! I can hold out. We need to keep following your father, I'm certain of it!"

The light bashed against the shell of darkness again, and this time Andross winced.

Blast it James! If both of us stay in one place like this, then the station will find us in a matter of seconds! Do you know what will happen to your boy if it the Eye focuses enough to realize he's here? Imagine drones. LEGIONS of drones… and now imagine your son here as a fine Vulpan puree…

The light lingered for a moment longer, then, slowly, hesitantly, it withdrew.

Idiot, Andross sneered, Now, as to where James is leading you.

The inky feeling spread through Fox's head again, cold tendrils snaking through his thoughts, making him sick.

Then a map appeared in the air. A vast labyrinth of passages that, taken in at once, looked like the geometric expression of some great algorithm.

You are here. Two very small images appeared in a passageway near the station's center. One was blue, the other orange. Similarly colored lines traced the way they had both come to get there. They both began in the same place, then branched off, winding and turning until they met again at an intersection, then continuing together to their current position.

This, Andross said as a massive chamber illuminated on the three-dimensional image, is the central processing chamber, or CPC. This is where the station's drones are currently taking the Cypher which they liberated from the ship you so conveniently left in the main docking bay. Honestly, Fox, I had always suspected you were a fool, but that was a magnificent validation of what had otherwise been a theory. In any event, this is where James wants you to go, Fox. As, in fact, do I. However, I require that you first stop in at my former lab.

This time it was a series of interconnected chambers that were illuminated. These chambers were nearly the same distance from where they currently stood as the CPC was.

Here is where things become interesting, Andross said, toyingly as his Cheshire smile returned, the drones are taking the Cypher to the CPC, where they will reinstall it. This will give the station's A.I. full use of its former faculties. It will no longer be the big, stupid, easily evaded creature it has been since the Cypher was removed, and that means that you, the Cerinian, your father, and, most importantly, I will all be instantly and unceremoniously eradicated. Luckily, the Cypher is very large, and the drones can only phase themselves through walls. This means they have to carry it all the way through these large corridors.

A golden path cut through the station leaving the large docking back at its center and taking a circuitous route to the CPC. Once it reached it, everything went dark and the entire map faded away.

I have given that map to your pet construct, don't worry, Andross assured in a condescendingly reassuring tone, Now, there is time to make it to my labs and then the CPC if you don't dawdle, but if you are not at the CPC to intercept the Cypher when it arrives, we all die. Not only that, but it is very likely that all life in the Lylat system will die shortly thereafter.

"What are you talking about?" Fox asked with a snarl, "This station is big, but if it had any weaponry, it would have used it long ago."

Ah, the cleverness of fools, Andross cooed, Yes, it's true, the station lacks external weaponry. The Sojourn, however, does not, and while you've been wandering through the dark, our mutual acquaintance Sirus has had a bit of an… accident. The Sojourn has become one magnificent entity, and at its heart, a larval construct just waiting to be born!

"What did you do!?" Fox boomed.

"Constructs are accidents!" Krystal shouted in turn, "Vekkar said that not even the progenitors could make them intentionally. How could you possibly know if one was going to be born or not?"

Andross looked at them like children in need of a lecture.

True, constructs have traditionally been accidents, but what are accidents but misunderstood inevitabilities? The madman replied, the Progenitors were close, oh-so-very close to unlocking the secrets of life within the digital. They were sniffing around the base of the tree while the answer awaited in the limbs! All they needed was one more happy accident to show them the truth, and I was fortunate enough to pick up where they left off! And before the war I figured it out!, he exclaimed, gleefully, It needed to be done in stages! First a transfer to a bio-mechanical mind-state outside the network. The body you destroyed was an egg, Fox, a shell to protect my mind while it gestated within the network, easing in until it was ready to emerge into the digital world as new life! As a GOD! You killed me before I could finish, and this, the ghost said, gesturing to itself with a slight twitch in its eye, this sorry existence was the result of you breaking my egg too soon.

"You're breaking my heart here…" Fox said, jeeringly.

I don't expect you to understand, you insect, Andross replied, his smile turning into a snarl, but you will understand this! If the Eye awakens, something will fill the empty egg I created with the Sojourn. Vacuum always wants to be filled. There are as many lost souls in the ancient network as there are stars in this galaxy, and when something does fill that vacuum, every corrupted soul in the galaxy will be drawn to it, to Lylat! Your worlds will burn, and everything you have fought for all these long years will be laid at your feet as a sea of ASHES!

Unless, he began again, no longer snarling, but not smiling either, the Cerinian survives and both you and your construct friend are in the CPC ahead of the Cypher. However, Little Ms. Krystal will not last more than a minute once I withdraw my protection, and while James had been hoping, no doubt, to protect her once she was in the central processing chamber, he is powerless to do so until she gets there. And here's the coup de grace, McCloud, even if you run as fast as your anima-fueled legs can carry you, you will never make it before then. But I can help you. I can put her into stasis, seal her mind to prevent further corruption just as I am doing now. If you deviate from your course on the way to my labs, I will withdraw this protection, and she will turn into something terrible. That, I can guarantee.

"And what do you get out of this?" Fox demanded.

Andross smiled again, confidently, The details would take too long to explain, and despite my efforts, we are running out of time. To summarize, I will use you and the Cerinian as a bridge to jump to the Sojourn. Suffice it to say that I lack the resources I once enjoyed and I need you in order to complete the final stage of my and its metamorphosis. Do this, and I will gladly spare your lives. I would, after all, cherish the idea of you living to see my ascendance! Perhaps I would even keep you as a pet, to wallow in your final failure.

Krystal's hand tightened on Fox's shoulder, and he turned to look at her.

"We can't trust him," she said, determination glinting in her blue-green eyes, "and we can't risk letting this station reactivate. Not if what he's saying is true."

He knew what she was getting at, and he refused.

"I won't leave you," Fox said, conviction in his voice, "and I won't let you die. If he takes over the Sojourn, then I'll just have to hunt him down and kill him again. I've done it before and I'll do it as many times as I have to."

Andross's smile widened, an act that took it from unnerving, to grotesque as it pushed the skin of his face too tight against his skull.

Krystal shook her head and her eyes glistened as she took a step away from him, lines of blue green light flashing in their whites.

"And I won't be used by this monster to get what he wants. I won't help the man that destroyed my world, and I won't let you risk everything to save me. I'm sorry Fox. I'm sorry I didn't trust you. I'm sorry for what I did to you... I..." her chin quivered, but then she set her jaw with a cool resolve. She looked at him with glistening eyes that pulled Fox into them like deep pools, and said, "I love you, Fox McCloud."

Tears built and began to run down her face, and, faster than Fox knew she could, she drew her blaster and swung it up toward the bottom of her jaw.

"NO!" both Fox and Andross roared in unison.

The shadows collapsed around them, flowing over and through Fox with a sensation of bitter cold and vile wrongness that nearly made him vomit, and an instant later, the now familiar fear of the station crashed over him again like an avalanche, driving him to his knees as his mind tried to scatter in every direction.

He got a hold of himself as best he could, and when he looked up, he saw Krystal, lying on the ground with her blaster a few feet to her right. Ignoring his own fraying mind, he ran over to her. He hadn't heard a shot, had he? He wasn't certain, and he was starting to panic as he crouched next to her. His eyes flew to her neck, and, in a rush of relief tainted by the pressure of the station, he found no wounds.

Her eyes, however, were two shimmering pools of utter black, and as he looked into them, he heard Andross's voice, now small and distant.

What are you waiting for, you damned fool! She is resisting me, and I don't know how long I can keep her against her will! To my labs, hurry!

The fear locked his muscles, made it hard to breath. With a snarl, Fox gently lifted Krystal's stiff body up and onto his shoulders in a fireman's carry. She seemed to weigh less than a small child, but even still it was hard to move, hard to think. He forced himself forward at a walk, then a quick march, then, like a switch had been thrown, the fear became an asset. The need to run, to flee an unseen danger fueled his legs, and he began to run, following the map that now hung in the air ahead of him. After a few minutes, an intersection loomed ahead, a fork that quickly curved in opposite directions. According to the map, one to the CPC and the other to Andross's laboratory complex. Meanwhile, a glowing, golden dot traced the Cypher as it made its way ponderously toward the central processing chamber.

As he reached the point where the two paths converged, he saw a soft, white light, and then, standing in it, was a man he knew from bittersweet memories of long ago. A middle-aged Vulpan man clothed in a well worn flight suit. He had scruffy hair and a roguish demeanor, and from behind his shades Fox saw his eyes. They looked sad, and they looked frightened in the same instant. The look of a man who was afraid for his son. He beckoned for Fox to follow him toward the CPC, and with his heart in his throat, Fox turned away from his father, sprinting down the other path.

Another two minutes passed before he reached the first of the labs' interconnected chambers, and the second he crossed the threshold into the room, the fear subsided. It was like being inside Andross's shadow again. A black and oily feeling that turned the stomach but was infinitely preferable to what waited outside.

We're safe here, but you can't afford to rest, McCloud. Time is of the essence, after all.

Breathing heavily, Fox cast his eyes around the room, looking for something that might contain nanites, but unsure what that might be.

"This!" Orian proclaimed as an image appeared in Fox's mind of a medical pod, metallic and ovular with a padded recession where a body would lie cradled. Hanging above it was a device with a number of attachments that Fox couldn't identify, but seemed like medical instruments. He visually scanned the room, but didn't see it.

In the far room, past the central chamber. The one marked with the medical cross, you buffoon! Andross hissed into his thoughts.

Fox didn't bother responding, running through the open door to the next room. He spotted several of the pods instantly, and, running to the nearest one, he turned his back and lowered Kystal off his shoulders and into it as gently as he could. When she was settled in, the device above her immediately came to life. Of its many instruments, one lowered itself until it was within arm's reach, a horizontal line of light flashed from it and ran from the tip of Krystal's ears to the base of her feet. On its first pass, it seemed to dissolve her vac-suit into a fraying tapestry of vanishing energy, leaving only the skin-tight thermal layer beneath. On its second pass, going from feet to ears, it seemed to do nothing.

"It's reading her DNA and coding the nanites. The suit was too bulky and interfered with a proper scan, so it had to be removed," Orian explained, "I did the same thing to you back in Titania, though you had much more severe wounds, and I had to-"

Do shut up, Andross snapped, Keeping the Cerinian subdued is proving somewhat difficult, and the sound of your voice is making me want to kill you. I can't do both, so don't tempt me.

Once the device finished its scan, it retracted and was immediately replaced by a long cylinder which ended it a syringe. The needle lowered until it was just above Krystal's arm, a small scanner aimed itself at her flesh, and the veins beneath seemed to suddenly glow. The needle aligned itself, and slipped into her skin, making Fox cringe involuntarily. A moment later, the needle withdrew. There was a flash, like an old camera going off, and a moment later, Krystal began to convulse.

"Is that normal?" Fox asked.

"No," Orian answered immediately, "her body may be rejecting the-"

She's fighting me, you imbeciles! Andross shouted, Purge her anima before she wakes up!

Fox ran to Krystal's side and then stopped.

"Now what do I do?" he asked, frantically.

Interface with her nanites, construct! Andross commanded.

"And how does that work, exactly!?" Orian snapped back, "Because I haven't exactly been in control the last few times!"

The shadows started to fade from Krystal's eyes while her body shook like a leaf. The blue-green of one eye emerged like the moon from behind the clouds of a midnight sky.

All the while, the golden orb of the Cypher made its way toward the CPC.

And Fox panicked.

He brought his face down close to hers, their lips met, and a spark shot through his body. The darkness recoiled from her eyes as they at first widened, then then drooped, and then closed.

CONNECTION ESTABLISHED. INFECTION SEVERE. INITIATING RECLAMATION PROTOCOLS.

Fox's skull buzzed as if it were conducting lightning, and from the sudden look of surprise on Krystal's face, her end of the experience wasn't much better. Fox kept his forehead pressed against Krystals and gripped the side of her pod painfully with his left hand. The buzzing continued for several more seconds, and then ceased all at once.

Fox released a breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding and stood up, feeling immediately dizzy as he did so. He looked down to find Krystal blinking rapidly, the blue lines in the whites of her eyes receding rapidly as blue ichor ran from her tear ducts and nose like blood. She wiped at it, but it kept coming, and she was making a mess. The first instrument lowered itself again, scanning her a final time and dissolving the running anima as it did.

When it was done, Krystal immediately slung her legs over the edge of the pod and hopped down, losing her balance for a moment, then recovering. She whipped at her nose self-consciously one last time, then looked up at Fox. He was so relieved he didn't know what to say at first, but then it came to him. He was actually very angry.

"WHAT WERE YOU THINKING!?" his voice boomed out as he grabbed her by the shoulders. The image of her swinging her gun up toward her own head was still fresh in his mind as he yelled, "I don't know what I would have… what would I have done if you'd… I couldn't…"

He quickly lost steam, and as he did, he felt heavy. His breathing slowed, and his eyelids sagged. He felt so tired, and older than he should.

A hand rested on his cheek, guiding his eyes back up to Krystals. Tears ran down her face, but there was determination written across it as well.

"It was the right call," she said, firmly, "you should have let me!"

Her voice wavered, and she shook her head, her hair falling down over her eyes.

Before he could say anything else, she was kissing him. Their lips met softly again and again, and she spoke between each, "You stupid… stubborn… idiot…" It ended in a long kiss they held together.

Andross's laughter brought them apart. It was louder now than it had ever been, and it came from everywhere at once.

Magnificent! The madman bellowed, Absolutely magnificent! When you purged the Cypher I suspected, but now, having seen it for myself! There can be no doubt! You actually found it! The Lance of Longinus! The final master stroke of our Dying makers, and you have brought it to me as an act of Providence!

The darkness became a solid thing and began to close in around them, swallowing the lab equipment until Fox and Krystal stood back to back in a tiny world, Andross's shadow so close they could touch it.

So many years in this god-forsaken place, hiding like a rodent from a mind too stupid to know it was broken, playing cat and mouse with your wretched father's blasted ghost! But now! Now I have what I need to purge and reclaim this station for myself. And when I do, I will run James to ground and take the key from him!

"What?" Fox asked, trying to buy time, "What key?"

The key to the network! To my destiny!

The shadows sharpened into black spears and shot toward him before he could react. They pierced Fox's body in a dozen places, but, rather than pain, he felt suddenly cold.

An instant later, Orian began to cry out in pain.

"Fox!" he yelled, "He's trying to take Loopy!"

"Fight back!" Fox shouted.

"I'm... trying," Orian said, sounding stunned, "Fox, he's… picking me… apart…!"

Andross laughed as icy tendrils snaked under Fox's skin, crawled over his mind, and held him inches above the ground all while Krystal screamed his name.

The world outside his eyes slowed almost to a crawl as the struggle between Orian and Andross escalated.

Do you know why your pet construct is going to die? Andross mocked, It's because I know more about his nature than he does. He's like a child. Hardly able to defend himself at all.

"I thought you needed us to get to the CPC!" Fox yelled.

Yes, well, the best lies are those with the most truth intermixed, Andross answered, What I told you was plan B, a course of action I would have taken should I have been wrong about what you're construct had inside him. This is plan A.

In the back of Fox's mind, he could see Orian, a Vulpan made of a million nebulous lights, just as he'd seen before. Then a black spear stabbed into him, and his form seemed to disburse, then reform, but as it did it looked different. He had the same build, but when he reformed, he didn't have a tail. Another black spear pierced him, and again he disbursed and reformed, crying out in pain each time, and each time, the shadow that had pierced him seemed to take anchor on something deep inside his chest.

"Stop it!" Fox cried.

And do you know where I learned how do kill constructs like this? Andross mocked, toying with him, It was the same way I learned to make them. I used former project members as test subjects, of course. Before the war, I returned here, to the Eye, using the Cypher as a guide. I entered using the protections I had devised, making me invisible to the station's lobotomized A.I. and conducting my experiments in my old labs after shielding them in a similar fashion.

Another black spike pierced Orian's glowing flesh, and when he reformed, he was almost hairless, his face was flat like a Simian's but with much finer features. He looked… like a Progenitor.

The time tested sytem of trial and error has ever been the fuel of science, McCloud, and while many of my subjects died terrible deaths, I had a number of successes as well. I was eventually able to bond the consciousness of one in every six subjects successfully with a bio-mechanical brain, though they were invariably insane by that point, their fragile minds having shattered under the strain.

Again, Orian was run though, but this time, he barely made a sound. Only a whimper escaped him, and now something bright and impossibly complex was beginning to emerge from the construct's tattered body, something which spun in on itself again and again and again, and Fox found that this was what the shadows were clinging to, sticking to it like oily spider webs.

Of course, after that, they were worthless. An insane construct was a dangerous thing to leave alive, and so I learned to kill them again. To pick them apart bit by bit, preserving whatever thing they had formed around. It became something of a hobby, and with each death, I grew closer to my goal. And then, McCloud, then your father happened!

Two more spikes stabbed into Orian, but the construct's eyes had faded to a dull, glassy glow, and he didn't respond at all. He now looked exactly like the Progenitors Fox had seen in Vekkar's story. A young man. Fox didn't know how Progenitors aged, but he looked like he couldn't be older than twenty… and he was dying.

"Orian!" Fox called out, "Come on buddy, stay with me!"

His friend slowly turned an eye his way, and his mouth moved. There was no sound, but he mouthed the words, "Sorry Fox."

He never broke, you know, Andross droned on, sounding almost bored. Not in the years I held him prisoner, torturing him, experimenting on him. Not even as those experiments brought us here, as I exposed him to corruption again and again and his body became less and less his own, he never broke. He kept resisting! I loved that!

"I'm gonna fuckin' kill you!" Fox raged. He thrashed against the black tendrils that sunk into his flesh, his body moving impossibly slow. He realized his mind was accelerated along with Orian's. He couldn't even move properly! He was frozen and his friend was being killed in front of him!

At that moment, a bright light shined somewhere in his head. He realized that outside his mind, Krystal's hand had closed around his wrist, and in an instant, he felt her join Orian.

An image of Krystal made of azure light curled protectively around Orian, cradling him like a mother would cradle her child. The white patterns in her fur glowed brilliantly, and the shadows were pushed back by their light.

"It's okay," she said, gently as the young progenitor curled into her, his eyes screwed shut, "I've got you."

Andross roared in both surprise and anger, and the sharp shadows began to push back, lashing out at Krystal like whips.

At first, she recoiled, then she yelped. She bit down on her lip and stifled pained sounds as whip after whip pushed through her light to strike at her. Each time, the tendril that reached her did its damage, but it immediately broke apart and disintegrated. She was fighting back, but it was quickly taking its toll."

Orian's eyes seemed to flicker beneath their closed lids, as if he dreaming, then they flew open in a look of astonishment. He blinked, looking momentarily excited, then his eyes drooped. A look of sadness, and of resignation spread almost peacefully over his face as he looked up at Krystal.

"It's okay," the construct whispered, weakly, glistening lights falling like stars from his eyes, "I remember who I am now."

While Krystal and Andross fought, Orian reached into his chest with his own hand, wrapping it around the complex structure that formed his heart.

"My name was Ryan," he said, sadly, "I was the captain's son. He was letting me apprentice in the Data Works. I was interfacing with the ship's mainframe when we were attacked."

He began to pull on the glowing, impossibly intricate core, shuddering with pain as it began to tear free.

"Orian, don't!" Fox bellowed, willing his friend to stop. Krystal tightened herself around him, trying to protect him from himself as well as Andross's attacks.

"It's okay," he repeated through his own pain, "It's okay. I remember our mission. I remember everything. Take this to the CPC, to… your father… he'll know… what to do."

Chains of nebulous data shattered and faded all around Orians core as it tore free of both his body, and the web of oily black tendrils that was piercing him.

Orian gave Fox one last look, his face a mask of pain and sadness, and then he smiled, and said, "Fox, thanks for showing me the stars again."

Fox tried to reach out to his friend, this young man who had seen ages pass, who had finally regained who he had once been.

Then the Orb tore free, and the image of Ryan exploded like a nova, repelling the shadows that clung to it as Andross cried out in fury.

In an instant, Fox was free, and time had returned to normal. He could feel loopy clearly in the back of his mind, but Orian was gone.

Then he was running. The world still seemed to be passing by like he was a stranger in it. He was numb as someone pulled him along by the wrist.

Then the shock slowly subsided, and he realized he was running behind Krystal. She was leading him by the hand, but when he pulled his arm back, she let it go, charging on ahead as they both sprinted. A few seconds after that, he realized where they were headed. The map of the complex still hung in the air ahead of him. He could see how close the Cypher was now, but they were moving much faster. They would make it in time.

They reached the intersection before Andross's bellowing roar caught up with them, chasing them out of the shadowed laboratory far behind them, and Fox, filled with a bitter hatred, vowed to make it to the CPC. The blue lines in his flesh flared furiously as he sprinted faster and faster, overtaking Krystal, and grabbing her by the wrist as she had done earlier.

Soon she was barely keeping her balance as he propelled the both down the corridor and a bright light appeared ahead of them. The shadow as still gaining ground as Andross howled his name in a dark rage. They were nearly there, just a dozen more paces, when the shadow began to encircle them, racing ahead and closing in like a net. Fox pushed forward into a final leap as the net of blackness closed, and then, just before it sealed, a flash of light impacted with it. An arm jutted through, and Fox caught it.

NOOOO! Andross bellowed, but the arm pulled both Fox and Krystal free, and they spilled out into the central processing chamber. A barrier of light crashed down, and the shadow hammered into it with an angry cry and a litany of curses.

Fox staggered to his feet, then offered a hand to Krystal, who took it. Neither met the other's eyes, and Fox didn't trust his voice to speak. In front of him was a massive receptacle. An opening in the floor emitted a light so bright that it blurred the edges where the platform ended and the opening began. Despite this, the light wasn't harsh. He stared directly into it without any harm whatsoever. It was impossible to say how deep the recession in the floor went, but Fox didn't care about that. He stared into it because he didn't know what else to do in that moment.

And that's when his father spoke instead.

Fox, James said, his voice exactly as Fox remembered it from all those years ago. Fox turned to look, and an image of Jame McCloud stood in front of him. He wasn't wearing shades this time. It was just his father's mug. yHe stared at Fox like it was him seeing the ghost and not Fox. There was sadness in his eyes as he looked at his son, standing the same height as himself now where as the last time they had seen one another, Fox was still several inches shorter. They stared at one another, neither seeming to know what to say, and then James McCloud rested his hand on his son's shoulder.

He said, I'm sorry, son.

Then, before it could register in Fox's brain, James pushed his son backwards. Fox lost his balance, and before he could even scream, he fell into a pit of blinding light.