Cornered

The ensuing chase prolonged itself due to Fox’s inability to pull the trigger. As long as he spent hunting down Raven, he was never able to draw his gun, long having left it behind as he put his all into running after the boy. They ran like that for what felt like forever, almost as if they were just playing tag.

Eventually, Raven had been chased so far that the two of them found themselves by a wide open lake. By the time they’d reached the very edge of the area, Fox had been conditioned to follow his partners every step. And so when the rogue agent seized a jetski, stolen from a quiet dock, before he knew it, he’d done the exact same. Soon both of them were out on the water, the mad pursuit unable to be contained to just the land.

“RAVEN!” His echoing, pained scream was intense, but the sound of the waves and the motors and the pulsing in his head made it all but silent to the culprit. He just kept clawing through the water, without a destination, only looking back to see how much distance he had between him and Fox. His old partner was tenacious, however. Even being behind to start, his ride seemed to possess an ever-so-slightly higher power within it. Try as he might to escape, Fox was gaining.

With the Sarcophagus tucked under his leg and his own pistol left behind in the sprint itself, Raven had little means of defense against his pursuer. He zig-zagged in front of ride as much as he could, letting his wake splash in his eyes, but it could never deter Fox. Even as Raven pushed his speed to the limit and forced himself into turns dangerously close to small landmasses in the water, he couldn’t get his fellow agent to slip up. The young crow soon began to panic. In a brief respite from the intensity he made a sudden duck behind a lengthy islet separating the two of them, but once he emerged onto the other side, Fox had grown even closer to him, so much that he could’ve simply spoken his name and been heard. But Fox had nothing left to say at this point.

The both of them intuitively realized this was the final stretch. Any second Fox could crash right into the back of his vehicle and take them both down together. There was no port or bystander in sight- just the two of them, racing on the empty water in the early morning sun, one chasing the other to the ends of the Earth in what could’ve, in any other context, been little more than a recreational getaway.

The space around him ran out in seconds. Soon there were no turns, no escape routes, no tricks. The only thing ahead of Raven was the cold, hard land- and the only thing behind him was his partner.

Trapped, helpless, and desperate, he made the only decision he could.

Refusing to slow down, Raven sent his craft heading straight for the ground- his own person still very much on it. Fox was forced to slow down as he watched the idiot press forward-

-And crash straight into the shore.