The Interview
(A/N: Well, my first story for . I actually had this account for a little while, but only now did I actually decide to post something on here. This fic in particular isn't really much but an exposition-fest for how I think some characters in Star Fox grew up and met each other.)
The hallway was silent, save for the faint sounds of typing and ringing phones. A young feline, around 19, wandered through it, observing the gray carpeting that seemed to be standard among places like this. Miyu never really had a sense of urgency outside of combat, everything felt too slow compared to it. She scanned the walls, searching for the room number the receptionist told her of.
"A13, A14...here we are. Room A15.", she thought to herself.
At the mahogany desk sat a white-feathered avian, somewhat of a rare sight on Corneria. Most avians had lived on Zoness, and after the numerous Venomian raids there during the Lylat Wars, their numbers only dwindled further.
"Good afternoon, Miss Lynx, in case the receptionist hadn't already informed you, my name is Sarah F. Bosch, and I'll be interviewing you today. On behalf of Yasunori Media, I'd once again like to thank you and the Star Fox team for accepting our request to be interviewed, following the recent downfall of Andross's forces once again.", Sarah spoke, her voice as soft as the wind.
"It's really no problem at all, I'm glad to be here.", Miyu replied. Of course, she didn't mean it, she despises interviews with a passion, sitting in the same place for a couple hours wasn't exactly too appealing to her, but the media would decimate her reputation if she implied otherwise.
"I'd also like to remind you that if there are any questions you feel uncomfortable about, you may refuse to answer them. You are free to use any language necessary to answer these questions, but be aware that explatives may be censored. That being said, any opinions possibly implied in the questions do not reflect the opinions of me or Yasunori Media in any way. "
More reputation bullshit. Miyu despised the media for this. They're so careful about their own image but don't mind at all if they keep someone from ever showing their face in civilization again.
"Let's get started, anyway.", the bird said, preparing to make a transcript of the ensuing interview. "Your name, and if possible, the origin of it?"
"Miyu Yamaneko Lynx. My first name means "beauty" in an old language my mother's ancestors used to speak. My middle name also came from her, it was her maiden name."
Sarah typed out Miyu's words, pausing for a second when trying to put together how to spell "Yamaneko".
"Okay, next question.. Place of origin? If you were born aboard a starship or space station, could you include the classification of said object?'
"I was born aboard a starship owned by some slaver bastards. Never got the classification of it, but I knew it was a prisoner transport. Parents were sold out by a 'friend' of theirs, and were captured by slavers while my mother was pregnant with me. A couple of months later, I was born."
Sarah was taken aback by the sudden darkness of the conversation. For all her life she had never once met someone in person who had to grow up in such a place, and now, here she was, talking to one for her job.
"If it wouldn't disturb you too much, could you describe the conditions of living in such a place?"
"I've gotten over that place anyway. Of course.", Miyu lied. She could remember the details of that damned ship like yesterday, whether she wanted to or not, but it wouldn't help anyone if she just danced around the past like that. Sooner or later she'd have to bring it up, and it might as well be now.
"We were always hungry back then. Us and a lot of others. The rooms we stayed in weren't so much rooms, but repurposed brig cells. Not like it felt much different, anyways. The guards always ended up dragging some random slave out and beating them for doing so much as looking at them the wrong way. Back then, of course, I never understood why they were getting beat up, but the few definitions of morality I was developing back then told me that they were bad, and that my family and I did something bad to get in there. For first eight years of my life, it was like this."
"I'm...really sorry you went through that, Miss Lynx..", Sarah apologized, repulsed at the conditions she had described to her.
"Call me Miyu. And I haven't even gotten to the worst part yet.", the feline replied.
"When I was about six, the ship landed near a remote part of Papetoon to sell some members off. My mother was one of those sold there, despite my father's numerous attempts at intervention. After she was sold, my father devised numerous ideas on how to escape, always muttering someone about the ventilation system or accessing the management system. Back then, she never really felt like a mother to me, more of someone who'd just be with me, and be very protective of me. I kind of regret never fully appreciating her nowadays."
At least that last part was true. Miyu strongly regretted never seeing her mother as who she really were, someone who put her family above all else, even in the harshest of conditions. But she had to hold together. Sarah continued to type all of this information in, witnessing the horrors of crime in the system.
"My father was a lot more silent from then on. He always did that when he was either really sad, or thinking very hard. At the time, he was probably doing both."
Sarah didn't want to push too hard on the feline's days as a slave, and decided to focus the interview on something else.
"So, how did you get off the ship?"
The small amount of pride Sarah got when she decided to change the topic was quickly met with a wave of self-criticism. How could she be stupid? Escaping from the ship must've been one of the most stressful events of her childhood, and now she's gone ahead and put her on the spot for it!
Miyu grinned. Now she gets to talk about the fun stuff.
"When I was eight, resistance among us was at an all-time high. I guess when you're constantly hungry for years of your life, with dozens of others feeling the same, something just overtakes you. Especially when word comes out that there's a whole stockpile of food the crew's been hiding behind their backs while they tell us that 'supplies are rare when we're in extrasolar space'. That spread like wildfire among us, and even if it wasn't true, we were pissed. This culminated in a massive uprising that took place for several days. Some slaves managed to escape their cells, access the starship communicatons systems, and grab the attention of several freelancers and pirates who weren't big fans of the whole slavery thing. Combine this with all the cells being opened, and the guards might as well have been on their knees, begging for life. Which most of them ended up doing anyway. Most of the freelancers ended up freeing the slaves, but unfortunately some ended up not making it as they all opened fire. My father and I escaped and got aboard a pirating vessel, the HLS Radiance of the Stars, though we just called her the Radiance for short."
"How was life aboard the Radiance?", Sarah asked, relieved that her client didn't react the way she expected.
"Wonderful. Or, at least, much better than it was with the slavers. The ship always hung around the farther regions of Lylat, never somewhere like Corneria or Zoness, but I wasn't complaining. Being able to see all these different planets, ships, and objects from my room for once was mind-blowing for a kid my age. My father made good friends with the ship's captain, I think his last name was Towers, very quickly. I always used to call him "Uncle Crockie."
"I assume he was a crocodile, then?"
"Actually, he was a giraffe." Miyu replied sarcastically. "Yeah, he was a crocodile. A Gharial, I think. Loved seafood."
"Smartass." Sarah thought, worrying that she accidentally said it out loud for a second.
"He really was family to me. I mean, yeah, he was a crocodile, and he didn't exactly look friendly, what with his messed up eye and claw marks all over him, but he loved kids. Kids that weren't scared shitless of him, that is, and fortunately for him, I wasn't. Hell, he and I are still good friends to this day, though now he runs a shipping company, instead of intercepting said shipments."
"Important memories or events from then that you'd like to describe?"
"Too many for words.", Miyu replied. "But I'll try."
"Probably my favorite memory from then, and pretty much my childhood as a whole was the first birthday I actually had. Back as a slave, we didn't really have time to celebrate birthdays, especially when the slightest thing could piss off a guard, but things were different on the Radiance. For once, I actually had a birthday. For the first time in my life, I actually felt happy. Most of the people who attended the little celebration were the friends my father made aboard the ship, but some were mine. I scarfed down the pieces of the cake we had, and opened up a whole bunch of presents for the first time. Most take that for granted, but that was one of the defining moments of my childhood."
"Anything else?", Sarah asked, typing away.
"When my father first taught me about flying starfighters. I was about eleven at the ti-", Miyu described, only to get interrupted by a confused Sarah.
"Eleven?"
"Yup. Dad always yapped about how it's never too early to learn how to fly, and he was kinda right. The Radiance never had a simulator, so I ended up in the real thing. Controls were pretty big for a kid like me, but I managed. Crockie let my father use a heavily modded Cornerian CL-2X interceptor. Old thing barely held together from the numerous raids it saw, but my father saw the two-seater as a great starter ship, able to teach me both pilot and gunner controls with one vessel. Hooked it up with a training module, flew us out to a derelict ship, and before you knew it, I was learning about diverting power, managing shields, targeting subsystems, and, probably the only part that matters to most, firing weapons. He tried to teach me about piloting other ships, too, but he picked up pretty quickly that I only cared about starfighters. I think he was just happy to see his daughter shared the same love for piloting that he did."
"First time in space combat?"
"When I was 13. Another group of pirates tried to raid us, and they starfighters were too fast for the Radiance's anti-starfighter cannons. Crockie scrambled any interceptors we had, and before you know it, I was in the seat of a 2X with one of the best gunners on the Radiance, I forget what we call him, but what I do remember was that he kicked ass out there. No one dared to tail us. Eventually, after knocking out the attacker's fighters and gunning down some of their subsystems, they got the message and ran off. Or at least, they tried to, but most of our wings took out their engines. Heheh. Watching them drift there while they apologized and asked for our help was one of the most satisfyingly hilarious things, I've ever seen. I think we even got the captain crying at one point."
"You met Fay while working as a mercenary, correct? Care to tell us about that?"
"Gladly!" Miyu replied, her tone much different than what the rest of the interview had.
"I was at Talon's Peak, home to pretty much any and all scum in Lylat. I still remember the smell of that station, it was like they pumped in smoke through the vents or something. But let's save the horrors my nose had to suffer through there for another day. While there, I was looking for a client that either wanted someone's head, or needed to be defended from someone who wanted theirs. That was when I saw this Cocker Spaniel gettin' harassed by two wolves. Poor thing looked like she was on the verge of crying. So what do I do? Come over there and spit out some witty one-liner to get them backing off? Fuck no, I knock these sons-of-literal-bitches out. And maybe grab a little bit from their wallets. Oops. Point is that she thanks me and I ask what a nice girl like her's doing in Talon's Peak. Tells me that she wanted to get back to Corneria, and was defenseless outside of a ship. Seems innocent, so I decide to help her out, free of charge. Though I admit that last part was just so I could see if she was legit or if she was another one of the scammers that plagued this part of the system. After some coaxing from her side, as a 'thank you', she pays me 6,500 credits to escort her out of here. We head to the hangar, where she shows me her Seraphim interceptor. She told me that her primary engines failed on her, forcing her to land here. After some jerry-rigging, we get it working again."
"How was the flight to Corneria?", Sarah interrupted.
"I'm getting to that. We depart from the Talon's Peak station, and while passing by Solar, we get ambushed by a good amount of thieves hoping to force us out of our ships."
"But, why would they want to get you off your ships like that? Couldn't they just threaten you to transfer credits?"
"Think of it like this: You're a thief, and you have the choice between forcing some money out of two random civilians who may just report you afterwards, or get them on your ship, kill them, and then steal their fighters to either use or sell off for a good amount of money. I think the choice is obvious. But let's get back on topic. We're surrounded by about 14-something ships, including a pirate freighter, and they're already preparing to fire. Here's where things get good. Before I even have a chance to divert power to weaponry, Fay's already taken out, or at least heavily damaged a good amount of the group. Like, 8 out of the 14 there, somewhere around that number. The ship starts firing at us, and when I'm rolling away from the shots, trying to find a good place to strike from, Fay's ripping away at their turrets. It was like defending the Radiance all over again, only this time a cute Cocker Spaniel was stealing the show instead of the Lynx. By now I'm wondering why she'd even need an escort when she can handle herself like this. But I learned a valuable lesson that day. Don't fuck with the cuties. You can fuck the cuties, yes, but don't fuck with them."
"And when you got there?", Sarah asked, counting in her head how many expletives she had to censor so far.
"When we arrived at Corneria, she paid me an extra 2,000 and thanked me deeply, also giving me her contact info. Next thing you know, it's a couple days later, she's gifted me a Seraphim much like hers, we've talked way too much over video chat, and now we're teaming up as mercs, ready to take on anything. Time flies when you kick the ass of some guys and help someone get back home."
"Generosity seems to be a very big thing with her.", the avian commented.
"It actually would be a little scary if she wasn't so damn adorable."
"Let's get back on track. Could you describe how you got the attention of, and joined, Star Fox?"
"Well, between the two Lylat Wars, a lot of mercs were contracted for work, assisting law enforcement when the Cornerian government started to crack down on slavery in the system. Among those contracted were Fay and I, Star Fox, and lots of others. To most hearing about this, Star Fox was really the only group that mattered, though. We got grouped with them on several raids when we disabled their defenses. Disabled, mind you. Our ships were fitted with EMP cannons to minimize casualties. But I digress. While we were out raiding their defenses, well, we showed off a little bit..okay, a lot.", Miyu described, fondly remembering the sight of the turrets as they shorted out.
"And how did you get in the group?", Sarah continued.
"Well, they were already familiar with our handiwork, and knew we both shared the same sense of morality, so when the Second Lylat War broke out, and they needed some interceptor pilots, take a wild guess who they called. We tried to seem all professional when they contacted us, but I don't think we hid our excitement very well."
Suddenly, the ambience of the room was interrupted by the synthesized ringing of a desk phone.
"Sorry, I have to take this, if you'd excuse me for a quick second..", Sarah informed, accepting the call. Miyu took this as an opportunity to just lie back in her chair and relax for a bit, thinking about the little amount of assignments she had nowadays.
"Oh, I wasn't aware it was for two..Anyways, send her in. A15.", the avian spoke, tapping away at her keyboard while on the call.
Miyu could hear footsteps down the hall, presumably someone else being sent in for the interview. Another round of 20 Questions, another 20 hours of her life gone. At least it felt like it. All she wanted to do was just fly out to the scrapyard and blast everything to kingdom come. Not like there was much else to do nowadays.
"If you don't mind, the next part of this interview will have another member of the team included. Some questions may apply to her, some to you, and some to the both of you.", she informed Miyu, still typing away at her keyboard, wrapping up her call.
The bird's typing was overshadowed by the sudden appearance of a young Cocker Spaniel at the door, her fur so white it seemed almost angelic. Miyu turned around to her, as Sarah welcomed her in.
"You must be Miss Spaniel, yes? Please, take a seat."
(A/N: And there we go. I might put together a second chapter focusing on Fay, my personal favorite of the two, though this idea was really a way to just get my headcanons on their pasts out without having to put together a chain of events that would have her flash back to those things. Let me know what you think of it.)