AUTHOR'S NOTE: I would say it's good to be back, but that would be a lie. I'm not so much back as making a ghostly reappearance. This story almost didn't happen. I've been working on it for more than a year, in the few gaps that a law student's schedule allows, and it's stopped and started and changed so many times that I almost abandoned it. I guess it goes to show that sometimes a story just writes itself. Kicking and screaming for someone to read it. This started out as a simple one-shot and just took off beyond my control. After all that I've written about Fox and Wolf and what happens to them after the games, I felt like James' story deserved to be written, especially after all the support I've received from you all. This is the first arc of James' prequel story, and even though each part makes up a quarter of James' life, they're intended to stand on their own. I wanted to give you what I've produced in a kind of serial format, because my work on this is going so slow with the schedule I have now and I don't want you all to get arc-fatigue. The other three arcs will come down the road eventually, but it's going to take time. You might even see the first few chapters of my last Fox and Wolf story before you see the final pieces of Legend. I wanted to create a character study of what James McCloud was really like and how he became such a legend in the minds of Fox and Wolf, and introduce new readers to my take on the Lylat System. It's also supposed to thematically prepare you for my final Fox and Wolf adventure. I wanted to produce a more polished, literary kind of work, something to pay tribute to classic sci fi and hard boiled detective novels that I'm so fond of, and ultimately bring emotional resonance to the core elements of Star Fox. Let's see how I do. As always, enjoy. -TU

-My Father's House-

The slam of a door down the hall somewhere leaks through the walls. The net of mortar between the bricks comes into focus after my eyelids fight enough gravity. I want to let them fall back down. Then my spine wakes up and reminds me it spent the night between two cement walls. They never saw fit to give me a mattress. The feeling spreads down my tail. The rest of my body stirs and remembers what they do when they drag me out of this cell. Figure I'd be used to the pain by now, and I am. That hasn't stopped me feeling it. Inflated lungs push against cracked ribs. Groaning breaths climb over my teeth to escape. It's a short trip to the durasteel commode in the corner, but I'm not about to write a check my body can't cash. Easier to stay put and let nature do what it will. They took my dignity for me at the door and I'm already wet with sweat and blood as it is. They're beyond asking questions, but they still want me to make noise. They're just not looking for words anymore. Unraveling me thread by thread, until I'm a frayed pile of string for them to discard. Breaking me isn't enough. They want me to lose myself. But I still remember.

I'm forty-three years old. My name is James McCloud, and maybe you've heard of me. If you haven't by now, you're running out of time to catch up. They're going to kill me soon, I think. Each time they haul me to that room with carts of blades and power tools, it feels like they're running out of ideas. You can count how many times someone's re-told a bad joke when it wasn't funny the first time, and vicious kids set their toys on fire when they're bored playing with them. Who knows, I could be wrong.

For all I know, it's been a few days and they're about to rotate in fresh monkeys with fresh material for Room Five. That makes sense. Cut off my stimulus, keep me guessing how long I've been here and how long they'll keep me alive and if Peppy is on the other side of the planet or still in the next cell. We used to whisper through a small crack in the wall, but its gone quiet. I try not to think about what that means.

It could be lunchtime or the middle of the night. If a bed was too fancy for this cell, you can bet they skimped on windows. Not that I'm complaining: a view of smoking, burning Venom would be another chain anchoring me to this place. There are other ways to look out. Memory is the only view I have. It's the only one I trust.

My eyeballs wobble like a top losing speed in my head. Things go fuzzy. Unseen lead weights tug at my eyelids but I fight to keep them open. The cement walls are peppered with little pits and holes, little deformations in the stone. Scattered everywhere, too many to count.

They look like stars.

The stars are everywhere, bright and unreachable and far, far away. I've flown among them, looked up at them so many times... I still remember one of the first.

It's one of those crystal, cloudless nights that people paint pictures of. Even with the amber haze of light pollution from distant Corneria City, the stars are like ground diamonds under a street lamp. I can't sleep, so I'm counting the stars through my bedroom window. I'm five years old and I lose track after what feels like a short time. My room is in the tower of my father's house on the shores of Nimbus Lake. It's the highest room in the mansion. The stars don't feel any closer than they do on the ground. I yawn and something moves out of the corner of my eye. The dark shape glides across the lawn below, out of the mansion's jagged shadow. It becomes a brown pit bull in a wool coat. In the moonlight I see the scar twisting down his forehead, between his eyes, down his muzzle. I've seen this man before. I know who this is.

My Aunt Sylvia's wedding was at Nimbus Lake, and I saw him wandering among the guests, speaking to no one. His scar made me nervous. I couldn't stop looking at it, so I asked Miss Sophie who he was. "Don't stare, kiddo, it's rude," Miss Sophie told me, "That's Jaster Moran. Your father saved his life, and now he does things for him."

"What things?" I had asked, and Miss Sophie shook her head.

"Only your father and Mister Moran know what Mister Moran does."

He looks scarier at night than he did lit up and surrounded by my father's friends and family. He looks like a monster. Jaster Moran glances up from the ground, at my window, and I scramble to my bed and hug my knees, my tail trembling. The floors creak outside my door and I suck in a sharp breath. The door knob twists. I whimper, wetting the knees of my pajamas with spittle because I'm afraid of the bad man and I know dad is taking care of business at the city house tonight. The door swings open.

My mother Moira comes in wearing a long purple gown. My heart slows from a panic as she moves across the floor and takes a seat on my bed. She has black highlights at the tips of her ears and over her hands, and fur like fresh autumn leaves. She trembles like a frightened bird about to take her first flight. For some reason I don't notice tears in her brown eyes. She holds the side of my face with a warm hand and tells me she loves me. It's in a soft voice I'll always trust.

"It may not seem like it, but everything I'm doing is to protect you," my mother promises, taking pauses for breath, "I'm going to do more than protect you. I'm going to give you the life you deserve. With the freedom to choose your own purpose for yourself."

She chews on her lip and looks at the window, turning my face towards the night sky. The stars glimmer in the blackness.

"You can have the stars themselves, as long as you never give up. Do you understand me?" my mother whispers, "Even when it's darkest, never give up."

I look back at her and she wipes at her eyes. She holds me close and I can feel her warmth. She kisses my forehead, whispers again in my ear that she loves me.

"I'll come back for you, James," she promises, and it doesn't sound like a lie.

She gets up and makes her way to the door, looking at me as if to check that I'm still here. She blows me a kiss before softly closing the door behind her.

I'm very confused, but I don't feel so afraid. After a few moments I carefully get up and look out the window. The bad man is gone. The stars shine bright and clear the whole night.

My mother doesn't come back.

I never see her again.

Until my last day I'll remember the musty smell of old bones and collected secrets in the crypt beneath the Nimbus Lake mansion. Curtains of the smell brush over my face as I follow dad down twisting steps into the brown shadows. I'm seven years old and I prefer sleeping in the city house these days. The mansion's foundation is mortared with broken promise, and the house is filled with things I'll never fit. At the end of the stairs we reach a long, cramped hall lit by dim yellow glowlamps. The passage is held up by stone pillars running two by two down the length of it. Every once in a while between the pillars there is an alcove with a dusty statue of some notable ancestor, but more often thick shelves are carved into the earth. Urns line the shelves, filled with the ashes of cremated McClouds. Each urn is topped with a molded ceramic head depicting the vulpine resting inside. Thousands of small faces follow me in the flickering light. It's not quite cold enough to see my breath. I stare at the flexing fabric over the back of my dad's suit, trying to listen and act grown up for him. My dad says that burial was always the traditional way, the Lylatian way, and that McClouds instead burn their dead and preserve them here in the crypts beneath Nimbus Lake.

"We've always been a family without God, son," dad goes on.

I'm trying to pay attention but my dad towers above and keeps droning, looking everywhere but at me. I imagine the heads on the jars are whispering.

He leads me to the end of the chamber, where carved into the rock is a cobwebbed family sigil covered by faded, chipping paint. It shows a fierce-eyed vulpine in robes with white wings spread out from his back. He walks across the surface of Lake Nimbus, holding a sword dripping with blood. Below are the words of Clan McCloud: We do not yield. Dad tells me that the fox depicted is Sirrus McCloud, the first of the clan, who lorded over the lands of Lake Nimbus thousands of years ago. The lake has stayed in the family since, and the mansion itself is more than five hundred years old. My last birthday was a lifetime ago and I try to understand the weight of five hundred years. It makes me feel very lost. Sirrus McCloud glares down scornfully, judging me, finding me unworthy.

I hug myself for warmth as my dad turns around and leads us slowly back through the chamber, spinning through the history of the family. In the time of the Old Kingdoms we were knights and barons, and during the millennium rule of the Cornerian Star Empire we were rich aristocrats. In these days of the Cornerian Commonwealth, we're just rich.

"Your ancestor Willem McCloud was very clever coming out of the Civil War," dad explains with a grin. I don't know anything about the Civil War, except it was a long time ago and there hasn't been war among the stars since.

On the return pass, the faces agree with Sirrus' verdict. They hiss as I walk by. I want to leave. My dad is talking about how science allowed the family to ensure that the first-born was always a boy to lead the family and carry on the name. It matters less whether you're born a boy or a girl these days, but this tradition matters to the family.

My dad suddenly drops to a knee, putting his paws on my shoulders. I don't know if he was wearing one at the time, but I always remember him in custom double-breasted suits. They were his armor. My father Connor McCloud is a platinum-furred fox with broad shoulders and cold blue eyes that I share.

"That's you, son," my dad says, "You're the family's scion. The son of McCloud."

I guess he's trying to sound paternal or something, but my father's reedy voice is better suited to rebuke and sarcasm. He was in a routine of getting his way long before I was born.

"It's a great responsibility. Wealth. Power. The world is yours, in ways that few others can enjoy. Some will fear you, many will envy you. Some will shun you. But that's the price of greatness, and your destiny is greatness, James," my dad smiles, his sharp whiskers spreading out around his muzzle.

I force a small smile of my own but the faces on the jars are all sneering, and I keep looking around and feeling cold even though my dad's hands are on my shoulders. It's hard to hear myself think so I don't realize what I'm saying until my words echo off the walls.

"Is that why Mom left?"

My father's face slides like melting snow down a window. He pats one of my shoulders lightly and gets to his feet, towering overhead.

"No," my dad says, "she didn't leave because of you. A coward named Jaster Moran took her heart. She turned her back on me, on this family, on everything we could've built. And on you, too."

"But why? Why did she leave?"

"I don't...know, son," my dad replies, his jaw a granite block as he stares into the faces huddled in the shelves.

My throat is tight and my face grows hot. My dad is a warped specter as water gathers in my eyes and I just want be out of his sight. I don't want to cry in front of dad and if he makes me stay in here anymore I know I will.

Dad scratches the back of his neck and sighs loudly, then tells me to run outside and play while Miss Sophie makes my lunch. Promising to tell me more about the family later, he gestures towards the steps and I take off ahead, wiping my eyelids clean. I emerge into the warm glow of the mansion's sun lounge. A chimpanzee in a gray frock is waiting for me, her hands clasped together over a small leather-bound book. She's wearing a pillbox hat that I've always thought was stupid and purses her lips in a smile like it's sewn that way. I wouldn't remember my mother's face without pictures, but I remember Miss Sophie's. She makes me lunch and takes me on a walk along Nimbus Lake. The water stretches out from the shore placid and reflective like it's made of quicksilver.

I tell Miss Sophie how it felt in the crypt as we walk along the shore. She comforts me, asks my permission to write a poem about staring eyes and stone darkness. She always writes poetry in her little book. Sophie taught me to read, taught me all the classics from Corneria's golden ages. Even shared some ancient poetry of her people from Fortuna. They don't teach me about that stuff in school. I've asked before why she works for my dad instead of teaching somewhere. The answer is different each time.

There's a conveniently placed log on the shore where we sit down to eat the sandwiches Sophie made. Staring back at me from the water is a small fox with golden brown fur and eyes like blue ice. I wipe some mustard on my coat and I don't care who notices. I ask why my mother would've left me, alone with my dad. Why she didn't take me with her.

"Your father loves you," Miss Sophie scolds, scribbling in her leather book with a charcoal stylus.

"He loves the person he wants me to be," I whisper, because it sounds true.

"Your father loves you, kiddo. He'd do anything for you," Miss Sophie says with a bit more force. I shrug and reluctantly agree, palming a stone and skipping it across the lake surface. I take a bite of the sandwich and start chewing. I can see the tower where I used to sleep comfortably and I think about the last words my mother said.

She loved me.

Then why did she leave?

The ring of the bell announcing the lunch period is musical in the same way that a car crash is musical. I've trained myself to anticipate the sound so that I'm up from my desk before I know I've heard it. The old avian professor snaps at me to sit back down. I forget his name… Felder, maybe? Everyone else knows its lunchtime and they start after me like he's not even there. A cattle stampede of students clogs the halls, the buzz of small talk drowning out the monotone instructions of monitor droids ushering us to the dining hall. I'm fourteen years old and it's my third year at Cynwyd College. It's pronounced like "kin-wood," and I don't know why they spelled it like that. Maybe it's supposed to look fancy that way. I've heard the tuition here can buy a house in some neighborhoods of the capital, but I wouldn't know. I've never been to those neighborhoods.

Others are finding mates and squeezes to chill with at the lunch tables. I'm finding my way to an exterior door, out of sight of the monitor droids.

I have friends, according to my dad. Business partners and associates of his send their kids to Cynwyd, and they're expected to pretend they like me. I'm not so good at pretending. I can only talk about cruises and my family's new starship and where I "summer" for so long before I get depressed. They're not the only reason I avoid the dining hall: Kellan Caroso, a sixth-year prefect and a seventeen year-old chucklefuck, is looking for me. He doesn't want to talk about summer.

I exit into the courtyard, the ghostly afternoon fog cooling the fur on my face. Someone left the grass out all night and forgot to dry it off in the morning. Green blades stick to my sneakers and I shrug my backpack westward down my shoulder. Stone paths divide the immaculate courtyard. Coming through the mist, brown and robed and solemn, is a statue of Cynwyd's founder, Regent Cassius Falchion. The carved face of the shepherd dog that ruled the Cornerian Empire and started a school and did little much else a few centuries ago does absolutely nothing while I search through the fog for a dry place to sit. I'm debating whether I want to make a trip to the dining hall to sneak out some food when I realize I'm not alone. There's a person-shaped shadow on a bench behind the fog. I come closer and the shadow fills out as a bespectacled ram a year younger than me, wearing a Cynwyd blazer with his face in a zine. I smile when I read the title. It's a Blue Spirit yarn, and it's pretty rare these days to see them in paperback instead of reader files. They're old-fashioned. Must be a limited edition. This kid reads the same pulp zines as me, figure he's got a thing for adventure heroes. The Blue Spirit is pretty schway.

I take another step forward and the kid's eyes peek over the edge of the zine. Amber eyes lock on like lasers. He's known I was here the whole time. He goes back to reading when he judges that I'm not a threat. I've seen the spud around. Ramsay Bolton. He's here on a scholarship to play chess. Dad says the Bolton name used to mean something, something big, but not anymore. Not every aristocrat emerged from the Civil War as lucky as the McClouds. Few are as lucky as the McClouds.

I try to make some talk. I get one word answers and no eye contact. Figure he's really into that yarn or he wants me to bump off. I guess it's the first, since he shares a thermajug of warm peppermint tea. I'm thankful, given how chilly it is. I lean back into the bench, making sure there's a comfortable space between us, and catch a peek of the tattered cloth bag at his feet. Poking out is a brown wooden box covered with checkered squares. I nudge the box with my toe and ask if he wants to play.

The ram looks at me like I've just asked to diddle his mom.

"Do you even know who I am?" Ramsay sighs.

"I know you're some kind of genius or something," I shrug.

"Or something."

"Look, I don't shiv. It's fun for you, right? I know how to play. My dad makes me play with him. It's something I know how to do," I come back.

The zine makes its way into Ramsay's lap. He keeps looking at me while he cleans condensation off his glasses. He strokes fuzzy whiskers that will grow into a goatee someday. Then he sets the chessboard up. It's one of those cheapo sets, all wooden, no electronics or holographics. I try to remember some of the stuff dad told me.

He beats me in twelve moves in our first game. In game two, he beats me in five. I'm still scratching my head, trying to figure out where I went wrong, when he starts putting the pieces away with a tired look. I ask for another round and he just shrugs, closing the chess set up. I ask why and he just replies, "Bored," in a tone not so much mean as it is honest. We spend the next few minutes making as much noise as two mugs next to each other on a cupboard shelf. He's not interested in talking and I can't think of anything to say. He splits his mushroom and sweet pepper sandwich with me along with the tea, but he keeps an apple cinnamon flapjack for himself. It's hard to feel sore at him.

I get up when I've had my fill. I wave. He nods, giving no eye contact, and puts his nose back in the zine. I've got a few more minutes of lunch period left. The door to the hallway slides open and I make my way to the refreshers. My three least favorite people in the world cut me off near the dining hall, by the trophy shelves. A tall black panther with golden eyes flanked by an athletic golden retriever and a burly equine, all wearing sleeveless sweaters with the Cynwyd sigil on the left breast. The panther's ears and jaw have a sporty look and his tail whips smartly through the air. He speaks like a tough guy and moves with the grace of a thoroughly bred sports elk. But he's neither of those things. He's Kellan Caroso. The goons behind him are Blake Hamlin (the golden retriever) and Corey Hoshi (the equine). They smell like new cars and hair product, except for Hoshi, who smells vaguely of feces.

They greet me like they're my friends. I try to go around. Hoshi grabs me by the scruff of the neck and flings me into the wall. My teeth lift away from my lips in a snarl.

A monitor droid appears around the corner and asks if there is a problem.

"Unauthorized student in the halls, prefect clearance 04-613," Caroso smirks.

"Command recognized," the robot nods, "As you were, Prefect Caroso."

The droid makes an about-face and disappears. Caroso smirks back at me and the three of them circle around. They lay into me with the usual barbs. Did I know how scrawny I was? That no one likes me? That I'm only worth anything because of my dad's name?

"Hear he's got a chimpo nanny that still lives with him," Hoshi grunts.

"Awww, that's cute, McCloud," Caroso chuckles, "She still live with you? Tuck you in? Breastfeed you when you wake up crying? How does shit-thrower tit-milk taste anyway?"

"I'm sure your mom can tell you," I return. Before Caroso can make a comeback I dodge around Hoshi and peel down the hall. Caroso catches me by the tail, yanks hard. I have to yell out. He's on the offensive line for the grav-ball team; I forgot how fast he was. He spins and throws me into the trophy shelf, nearly toppling several golden cups to the floor. No one is coming to help.

"Looks like I struck a nerve on the little bogan!" Caroso hoots, "I guess the monkey really did suckle you some."

"Figures," Hamlin smirks, "His mom peeled out, remember? Left with some pit-bull dreg for Macbeth, I hear."

I've shouldered Caroso's beef for a year and paid back with quick snark and quicker feet. Something is different today and I don't know what. A switch goes off.

"Scandalous," Caroso sneers, relishing every syllable, "Is that so, McCloud? Is your mom down with the splice? Did she like that big doggy cock more than your dad's, is that her kinda nasty?"

I don't know where my fingers get the idea to wrap around the base of the track and field trophy. Once they do, there's no stopping what comes next.

I answer his question with the trophy, hard across his face. The cup has a pair of curving wings and one of them catches him in the right place to carve open his cheek. The sound cancels out anything else I might've heard. I just keep bashing it into his face. I don't count how many times. But each time I bring the trophy back up, Caruso doesn't look as sporty.

Hamlin and Hoshi and a pair of monitor droids are on me in seconds. Professors follow. The trophy clatters to the floor as the four hold me against the wall. I can hear again, especially the sounds that Caroso makes. It sounds like he needs someone to tuck him in.

Hours later, I'm still sitting outside the headmaster's office. Miss Sophie is with me, but I've used up all the talk I had left. Her arm is around my shoulders and I'm staring at the floor. I can hear my dad in the office with the headmaster. He's been in there for a while. The conversation is muffled but I can hear words like "arrangement" and "endowment" in a voice that sounds like his. Words like "unacceptable" and "liability" in the headmaster's voice. Those words don't seem to bother dad. His whole life, money has been there to cushion him from consequences. Why would it be any different now? Dad comes out of the office a few moments later, scowling. He hisses at Sophie to bring me along and we storm out of the hallowed halls of Cynwyd College.

I'm in the back of dad's hovercar, speeding past the greenery of the Cornerian countryside. Sophie is riding in the front with Dad's valet droid, VZ-26. Dad is fuming beside me, staring out the window. His silver fur is made for overcast days like this. It would've been a bad idea to hold my breath waiting for him to speak. I would've passed out. My throat is dry and I try to think of something to say when he goes, "I don't think you understand how disappointed I am. Or how unbecoming this is of a McCloud. McClouds do not lose control and we do not act like idiots. I guess that's my fault for not bringing you up well enough. Did you ever think this might affect people other than yourself? I have business before Parliament, do you understand? You couldn't have picked a worse time to assault the son of the Banking Committee Chair."

"But... he-"

"I don't care why you did it!" my father snaps, "You've been expelled. Actions have consequences, James, and there's nothing I can do. McClouds have gone to Cynwyd for generations, an unbroken chain until now. Disgraceful."

The word churns in my stomach like bad oysters. I hang my head and look down at the hovercar's plush carpet.

"I mean... what would your mother think?"

My face snaps up and I can't wipe off the destroyed look. I stare at my father's back with disbelief as he looks out the window. He doesn't address me or even look at me for the rest of the ride home. It's the first moment that I truly hate my father.

I am flying. Wind whips through my fur, howling in my ears as the engine sings. The sun warms me, embracing me like a retarded child. The controls of the skycar have perfect sensitivity to my movements. The world stretches far beyond, the countryside greenery fading away into Corneria City's shining steel and glass in the distance. I could get used to this.

A terrified voice next to me squeals, "Do you have to drive so fast?"

She's ruined the moment. I glance over to the kitty in the passenger seat. She's wearing the tight facial expression that all felines have when things are out of their control. Her fur is cream and her blonde hair extensions billow in the wind like flames.

"Why not?" I shrug, throttling up. The skycar shrieks and g-forces hit me like a blaster bolt to the chest. I'm grinning and weaving the skycar through invisible obstacles in the air. Veronica mewls with fright. Some vicious part of me wishes she wasn't strapped in so tight. All it would take is a slow barrel roll and I could enjoy the car in peace.

Ask anyone but me and they'll say Veronica is my girlfriend. The only reason she gave me a second look is because of my last name. In a public school, a name like McCloud sticks out. Her dad runs the dealership we got the car from. Occasionally, there's a reason to keep her around.

I lean my head back in the seat, relishing the air blasting through my ears. Then there's a very distinct wailing sound. The sky is clear and cloudless up ahead. I see the cop skimmer coming up in the rearview mirror, flashing its red and blues. I shift upwards in my seat and grip the steering yoke with both hands. Seems he wants a word with me. Probably curious what an unlicensed seventeen year-old is doing with a shiny new bucket like this.

"... are you going to stop?" Veronica yells over the howling winds.

I sigh, loud enough for her to hear.

"You don't just descend for a cop and start apologizing," I explain, "It arouses their contempt. Plus we're just having a spin, why would I pull over?"

"Because you stole the damn car!" she shrieks.

"Oh. Right," I chuckle like I've forgotten.

The skimmer draws closer, the siren wailing in my ear like a fly that won't quit. I wave one of my hands as if to invite him to pass.

"Land! I want to get out!" Veronica cries.

"Don't go all billy. If you're uncomfortable open the door and get out," I shrug, making no move to slow down or drop altitude. Her claws dig into fine leather upholstery.

The skimmer speeds up beside us, blue and reds flashing so fast I want to have a seizure.

"Land! NOW!" an amplified voice commands.

I blow the skimmer a kiss and salute with my middle finger, then I cut in front and dive towards the ground. I can't hear Veronica scream as physics tugs back on my face. The trees roil below in a verdant sea as I level above them, snapping my head upwards to see more than one skimmer chasing now. The Corneria City skyline glitters in the springtime sun. The sirens are impossible to ignore; there's at least four of them descending behind me. They're tightening formation, gaining in my rear view mirror. They'll deploy tractor beams any moment.

"Hang on to something."

"What?!" Veronica yells, then I jerk hard on the control yoke and tap the gravity brakes. The car lets out a sputtering scream as it skids through the air and fishtails in the opposite direction. Veronica, unprepared, smacks against the passenger side door. The engines squeal as I throttle all the way up and blast straight into the cop formation. The skimmers frantically scatter and I gun the car back up through the skies, laughing like it might kill me.

Adrenaline speeds through the highways of my heart and I barely notice the comlink vibrating in my pocket. I let it ring for a few moments, then pull it out and smile at the contact name on the display. I patch the comlink feed through the skycar's sound system.

"What's shakin?" I cry.

"What are you doing?" Connor hisses through the speakers.

"Oh, nothing," I reply, "Just a nice county drive with the girl."

"You are on the NEWS right now!" Connor roars back. I scan the sky for a shuttle with the LNN or CBC logo on the side. I only see more police skimmers.

"Are they getting my good side?" I say, disconnecting.

The cops close in faster than I expected. This time there's six skimmers on me, and they shout one last warning from their amplifiers.

When I ignore them, beams of shimmering air converge from each skimmer. The bucket shudders with the force of the tractor beams. I throttle all the way up and the engine shrieks, but the car jiggles downwards. I keep pushing the car and smoke begins to rise from the hood. Internal safety systems ace the primaries and she goes quiet, repulsors whirring angrily. They force me down in a field near a stretch of paved country road, and I see the red and blues of police wheeljobs speeding towards me. The bucket trembles to the dirt with a heavy thump. Veronica pants like she's outrun a predator. I'm unclipping my safety harness. The wheeljobs are skidding to a stop on the side of the road as police droids drop out of descending skimmers.

"I think we should see other people," I tell her as I leap out and take off across the grassy field.

Cop droids ask me to stop in amplified voices as flesh and blood flatfoots yell the same thing in less polite ways. I sprint for the tree line. A skimmer drops from above to block my path. I glance back and see them surrounding me from behind, so I press my luck. I charge towards the skimmer, leap and slide across the hood. It looks schway when I start running again. I guess it was just the chance the cop in the skimmer was looking for.

I catch the blast from his riot gun in the back. My spine locks up and my arms twitch. Jaws and tongue go numb. My legs are chewing gum but I'm still standing, somehow. I stumble towards the tree line like I'm making some clean getaway. I glimpse the shadow of the cop that runs up behind.

I hit his baton with the back of my skull, right below one of my ears. A black pit opens up at my feet. I fall in. I never hit the bottom.

I wake up in one of the nicer cells in the county detention center. There's a holovision flatscreen on the wall and it's actually not the worst mattress I've slept on. A few hours pass before Connor comes in. His platinum fur is immaculately brushed and he's wearing his blue double-breasted three-piece. The one with the pinstripes. He must've gutted another company this afternoon. He paces in front of the reinforced transparisteel between us. Eventually a door opens and he steps through, scowling with disgust. I'm used to this silent treatment foreplay before he chews me out. I smirk like I've taken a dump in his shoes.

He shakes his head and glares.

"What did I do? Huh? How did I produce such a disrespectful ingrate?"

"You're right," I shrug, "I don't have much respect. Aced it a while ago. I mourn the loss on long, lonely nights."

He barks the usual points at me. I'm a disgrace to the family. I spit on all the gifts I've been given. I give him his moment. I've waited a while for us to be completely honest at the same time.

"McClouds are not thieves," he hisses, without any irony, "I could've bought you ten of those cars if you wanted. I would give you whatever you want, if it would grow you some maturity. But you don't care, about really anything do you? Except for this childish chip on your shoulder, and it really is childish James-"

"You want I should forget about her and pretend we're better off like you do?" I cut in.

"She's gone, son," Connor groans, as if I'm changing the subject, "She left twelve years ago. Grow up."

"We barely talked about it! Ever!" I explode, "It's not like you don't have the money to track her down and ask why she left!"

"You have got to stop blaming me and everyone else for her leaving," he huffs, pinching the bridge of his snout, "I... know I wasn't there all the time to watch you and I expect a lot from you-"

"Save it. You're more articulate when you talk like I'm an employee."

"But you need to stop acting like her leaving and my absence so I can provide for this family-"

"Figure we need the money for my college fund or something."

"SHUT UP!" he bellows, louder than I've ever heard him. I shut up.

"You need to stop acting like all that gives you an excuse for stupid shit like this!" Connor snarls, "You're practically an adult in the eyes of the law. This isn't about me, or your mother, it's you. Accept some responsibility! The world would open up to you with some effort and an attitude change. You've been blessed with so much, and you love pissing on all of it. Does the family name mean nothing to you?"

"Less."

His hand smacks across my face. My head almost spins around and I grunt more out of shock than pain. He's never hit me before. Connor can barely hug me. I turn my head to face him, hardening my eyes. I give him some silent treatment of my own.

"In that case," Connor growls, "You can see what it's like to go to jail without it."

He turns and goes through the door, disappearing without another word. I'm in county for two more nights after that. I spend a lot of that time wondering if I'm getting charged with car theft and resisting arrest. I spend the rest of it thinking of the price I'm willing to pay for a life free of Connor.

The guard lets me out next morning and tells me I've made bail. Connor isn't there in the lobby to pick me up. Instead, it's Miss Sophie. Most of her fur is gray by now, but she's finally stopped wearing the pillbox hat. Her hair is in a bun on the top of her head that gives it the same shape. She smiles as I draw near, animating the wrinkles in her leathery face.

"Kiddo," she whispers, wrapping her arms around me, "What are we going to do with you?"

I have to crouch just a bit to hug her back. I start to feel warm, and it's not just temperature. I guess that's how it feels to know someone loves you.

One of the cops mutters something about chimpos and I give him the same face I would make if I was breaking his fingers. Sophie pretends to be deaf and leads me through the automatic doors. She hands me a datapad with my discharge forms. It seems that Connor bailed me out after all. Even negotiated a plea deal for all the charges. Suspended probation and a few dozen hours of community service. He might regret that soon.

We get into Sophie's ancient wheeljob and slowly peel away from the parking lot.

"Where's it to be, kiddo?" Sophie inquires, "Nimbus Lake? The city house?"

"We've got to make a stop somewhere first," I tell her.

Two nights since Sophie took me home from county detention. I still haven't seen Connor yet. We've avoided each other, using Sophie and VeeZee to shield us from sleeping in the same house. Or maybe that's just me. I'm going to see Connor where he lives, just not where he sleeps. I walk through the automatic glass doors into the lobby from the bright, shrub-lined sidewalks of Corneria City's financial district. I'm wearing black pants, a tight black shirt and a green jacket in a room full of suits. I dare them to look at me like I don't belong. The lobby is all marble floors and mirrored columns and potted plants scattered around. Against the far wall, shining in the light from the massive windows, are the letters NBG in bold, sleek font. Willem McCloud and his sister Cassana founded Nimbus Banking Group at the end of the Lylat Civil War two hundred years ago. With the birth of the Commonwealth from the ashes of the old empire and the independence of Fortuna and Macbeth, the Lylat System found itself with a new interstellar economy. NBG was built to cash in on it. It's not the biggest bank in the Lylat System, but that's only because of a few monopoly laws my father is working to get repealed. I walk around the lobby's central pedestal displaying a thick bodied weirwood tree, bone white with leaves like bloody hands. I spot the fennec fox in the three-piece suit only a second after he spots me. I grimace and make for the turbolifts as he moves to intercept. I'm not in the mood for this.

"Jim," the fox smiles awkwardly, holding his hand out. I keep walking.

"Hey. Jim," he says again, wrinkling his brow.

I slow my pace and shake his hand. He's trained himself to have one of those strong, business-type handshakes. The kind they say you should have in books with titles like "How to Make it Big" and "The New Executive."

His eyes are an attractive jade color. They're small when you consider how big his ears are. As much as he hides it with that slimming gray suit and color-treated copper fur, there's a fleshy quality to him. Give him a few years and he'll be fat enough to look the part of the big-shot boss man.

"Icharos," I nod, "Did you know I was coming?"

"VZ-26 called me," Icharos shrugs, pressing the call button on the turbolift, "It thought I should talk to you."

"Figures my dad's robot would have you on speed-dial. You guys must get after-hours drinks."

"Jim," Icharos frowns, actually sounding hurt, "I'm just trying to help. There's no reason we can't be friends."

I can think of some. I could even list them if I had time. Icharos Phoenix is a few years older than I. Somehow he got Connor's attention, and my dad liked Icharos enough to give him a loan through NBG. He's using it to bankroll a hostile takeover of the company he used to work for, some shipbuilding tech firm called Space Dynamics. He's bought me lunch a few times. Tried to be a good influence on me. Maybe past Connor's attempts to mold me into his perfect son Icharos really thinks we can be friends. He's not a bad guy, for a money-fucking corporate sellout.

The turbolift rises with a sinking feeling in my chest. I'm counting the floors. We've got a long way to the executive penthouse.

Icharos tells me that it never helps to burn bridges, especially with family.

"You're not my family," I tell him.

He's good at closing his lips after that. So good he actually breathes through his nose for the rest of the lift ride.

The doors slide open at the building's top floor and we come out among scarlet wallpaper and carpets. I make my way to Connor's office and I don't stop to explain to the receptionist who I'm there to see. We pass Connor's android secretary the same way, and I open his office door like it belongs to me.

He's leaning against his desk, remarkably blank, as Corneria City lives and breathes through the panoramic window behind him. The rest of the office is all slate walls and stone floors. The chairs in front of the desk are stylish and metallic, while Connor's desk chair is made of thick black leather. He reserves for himself the room's only place of softness. He sets a datapad down on his desk and looks at the two of us with a sneer.

"Phoenix," Connor scoffs, "Come to choose a side in some family drama?"

"I'll wait outside," Icharos remarks, backing towards the door.

"Take a seat, Icharos," Connor snaps, "Just shut up."

Icharos slowly stops by the door. I think he's trying to decide whether he can defy my father. He makes his way to one of the metal chairs with a frown, and I give him a look.

Connor leans back against his desk, crossing his arms over his chest. He's a monument to authority in his red tie and black double-breasted suit.

"So," he says, "Have we learned anything from our night in jail?"

"It was two."

"Oh really?" Connor shrugs, "I guess I forgot about you for a night. Clumsy me."

"I did learn something," I reply, "My life would be better without you. And I know how to make that happen."

He coughs out a laugh.

"Alright then. Let's just table that, shall we? Listen, let me tell you what you're going to do. Because you want to, whether you know it or not. It's what you were born for and what you were raised for. And it's going to make you happy and a successful upstanding goddamn member of society. You're going to serve out your probation without a glitch and make the most of this public-school situation that you can. When you graduate-"

"I told you I'm not going to live with you anymore," I interject.

"And what do you plan to do with no money? No home? A suspended sentence for vehicle theft? If you think it's hard with me, you don't have a clue what the real world is like."

"I'll join the Commonwealth Marines."

Connor bursts out laughing, his sharp teeth clicking together. His cold eyes soften pityingly.

"That's your plan? You're joking," he remarks.

Icharos stares out the window, maybe wishing he could jump out.

"Talked to a recruiter yesterday. Took the tests. Signed my probation over to be served during my first tour of duty. The courts approved the request this morning, so my recruitment went through. Turns out I'm practically an adult in the eyes of the law."

Connor's cold eyes bulge out of his head.

"Do you have any idea what the military is these days?" Connor demands, "It's not even about the risk that a war breaks out and you get killed. There's never going to be a war again. Hasn't been one for two hundred years, we've outgrown them. So what does that make the military? A relic, an underfunded police force to keep our grip on two planets worth controlling and a handful of the biggest rocks in the Lylat System. It's a refuge for naïve patriots and emotional basket cases. It's a joke. A functionless parasite that we waste trillions of Liat feeding every year."

"Whatever it is... I'll deal with it," I tell him.

"You're doing this to spite me," Connor hisses.

"Wrong. I'm doing this to escape you," I reply, "If it spites you, that's a bonus."

I turn and make my way towards the door. I hear him move behind me.

"You're throwing the best years of your life away to play in space with some joke of an Army. You're throwing away all your potential!" he yells, "Turning your back on the only family you have!"

I stop before I reach the doorknob. I look back and he smiles like he's changed my mind or something.

"You know, you have a point," I say quietly, "Defying you, embarrassing you, turning my back on you...

what would mom think?"

Our ice blue eyes meet for a few moments and I let that sink in. Maybe he remembers it, maybe he doesn't. I don't care as much as I thought I might.

"Something tells me she'd be fuckin' proud," I finish. Connor's face hangs loose, his tail limp between his legs. I can't read what he might be feeling and I don't stick around to find out. I walk out of the office in silence. He doesn't move to stop me. For the first time, I have the last word.

I close the door behind me.

It will be more than four years before I see my father again.