A/N: Hello again! Hopefully some of you actually remember who I am ^^; After A silence that I believe has lasted me at least a year, I have come offering the newest instalment in my series! For those of you that read Oban Sarr, I will not be continuing with that work, and instead have combined Wolf's origins into the coming works.

Enjoy!

Cerberus O'Donnell: GUILTY!

The verdict came down today, ending the three month, high profile trial of the famous energy Baron. Found guilty of all three counts of treason, he has been handed down consecutive life sentences with no chance of parole. Rumours are already flying around this sensational case. It has been reported that James McCloud, who's testimony was heavily relied upon during the case, had tried shortly before the close to retract his statements, apparently claiming "We've got it wrong", but was silence by official channels.

Another report: His assets being frozen, his young family has supposedly been left out in the cold by the Lylat government. Two of his children have secured visas to an unnamed planet in the system, but nothing has been said of his third child or his wife, who is rumoured to have serious mental issues. The treatment for which had been cut off preceding the trial.

It stands to be noted that none of these allegations have been proved to be true.

- Excerpt from the Cornerian International Times

XxX

"Usually, anyone that comes to Eladard is left on their own, but due to your condition, and the fact that you've got a baby to take care of, the government has decided to take your case into special consideration. We've got some spaces in the subsidized housing district, so at least you'll have a roof over your head." The last part was little more than a mutter from the shabby fennec that was leading the fearful young mother through the streets, trying desperately to calm her squalling baby while at the same time racing to keep up with the man's quick strides.

"Can't you shut that little brat up?" the man snapped. the rest of the shady characters nearby seemed to share the man's sentiment as they glowered angrily at the crying child. The young woman shivered, terrified that if he wasn't quiet soon, one of the rogues nearby would silence him permanently.

"He's cold," the woman offered as a feeble explanation. the fennec glared at her.

"If that's all he's got to cry about, he's doin' great. Right through there, you'll find it." He was pointing into a dark, narrow corridor. It turned a sharp right, out of site. Any number of monsters could be hiding back there.

"Are you sure that it's safe to go in there alone...?" When she turned, she found she'd been addressing the shadows. The man had gone and left her. She glanced back fearfully at the dark passage, then at the people around her. Most had already lost interest in her and gone back about their bleak lives. Only a few continued to stare in that way that could make someone's skin crawl. They all looked the same; dirty, hungry, and hopeless. Like they had nothing to live for and were just waiting for death to come and take them. She gazed sadly down at her still crying son, tears rolling down her cheeks as she contemplated all of the nothing that lay waiting for him.

She jumped a mile when a hand pressed against the small of her back, and a female's voice spoke in her ear.

"Looks like a finicky baby you've got there."

She jumped back, out of the reach of the avian that was speaking to her. She was copper coloured, and the clothes that she was wearing made her look like a girl for hire. Not exactly threatening, but the young mother was still terrified. "Who...?"

The avian smiled warmly. "Sorry, didn't think you'd spook so bad. But I guess since where you come from'n'all. I'm Wrya, you're living in the same unit as me." She held her hand out for the lupine. When she didn't reciprocate, the avian began to walk into the dark side street. "So I'm thinking you don't wanna' be walking this street yourself? That's what it looked like to me."

The lupine mother watched Wrya walk backwards, slowly being swallowed by the dark. "Wait!" She finally cried, running after her. Wrya held out an arm to wrap around the young woman's shoulders when she got nearer. They walked together, Wrya's sharp glare and serrated beak enough to keep most predators at bay. She warned the mother to keep her baby close, about how easily he could disappear on such a dark world.

Eventually, the passage deposited them in a wide cemented courtyard, walled on every side with brick, some of which still kept it's red colour. In the center of the open space was a square stone box that looked to have once been a planter, although all the plants had long since withered and died from lack of care and sunlight. it's ceiling was the dirty, sulpher yellow sky. Children's laughter brightened the dreary place, as they ran around playing. Older men, the fathers she presumed, watched as they played so that none wandered off.

Wrya led her charge through the maze of happy children to the door on the opposite side of the court. Inside was dimly lit, but warm from so many bodies inside a small space. It looked like what had been a house before Eladard had become a slum planet. It was was made up of about eleven rooms, or units, in which 44 people total now resided. Mother and child made 46. The only room not used for living in was the small, cramped kitchen. The entire place smelled of filth and disease. Wrya mentioned this was one of the less crowded dwellings.

She led the mother up a set of rickety stairs to a makeshift nursery full of cots and dirty bedrolls and toddlers that were too sick to play outside. Toddlers it was plain to see would never play outside again. In the far corner, near a tiny fire, were three cribs. Wrya gently took the pup, despite it's mother's whimpers, and placed him in the third crib, since the other two were already full with three babies each. His crying, which had abated with the sound of laughter, started up again in whimpers. His mum rushed to his side, stroking his cheek with her fingers. The baby next to him coughed dryly.

"I know this ain't what you're used to," Wrya piped up as she scurried around the room, doing what little she could to tidy the place up, "but there's worse places to be. The people here'r nice, they won't try to steal from you or anything. And there's a nice place for the kids to play. The fathers look after all the kids here ya'know, not just there own. Some places, if they saw your kid wandering off, they'd let him go so there'd not be another mouth to feed. And... ah, um... I'm not helpin' am I," she decided to herself when she saw the lupine's hopeless expression. She walked over and put a hand on her shoulder. "No one ever wants to come here, but you gotta' make the best of it. You make the best of it, and you'll be alright."

"Whozat, mum?" a tiny voice said from around Wrya's knee. Wrya took up the hand of a skinny avian that matched her in colour and markings, it had to be her daughter.

"This is the woman they said was coming to live with us. She's from... Corneria? You know, I never did get your name."

The mother looked up sadly from her child. "I am Varanessa O'Donnell, and this is my son, Amadeus Wolfgang... But you can call him Wolf,"

XxX

The ungodly hours, those were the ones that seemed Wolf visited most often these days. He sat quietly on the porch glider, watching the fresh morning sun peak over the white wash fences and manicured trees, lighting the world and blotting out the twinkle of distant stars. It was early spring, and the earth smelled of dampness and rebirth. Besides the chirps and calls of freshly emerged insects, not a living thing stirred. In the weak light, a passerby could have even missed the ex-mercenary. Sitting as still as one could on a swinging seat, the man seemed to blend into into the shadows, as if he'd never existed at all.

"Wolf?" a gentle voice asked from the glass sliding door. He turned his head just enough to acknowledge he had heard his name. When a few seconds passed and there was no more, he grunted for his wife to go on. Instead he heard soft, bare footsteps on the wood of the porch.

A tall, lithe figure appeared before him, a sprite from the darkness. A darkly furred lupine, she would have blended in with the dawn had she not been wearing a thin white nightgown. It made her seem like an angel. She smiled gently at Wolf, a comforting smile that she'd offered him many times ever since the letter had come. He looked away, not wanting to be comforted just then. The glider creaked softly as she sat down next to him.

"You know, it's a little frustrating, falling asleep next to my husband and waking up alone."

"I can't sleep."

He glanced down as her long, thin fingers wrapped around his own, squeezing his hand gently. It embarrassed him. He was supposed to be the strong one, the protector and comforter. He wasn't supposed to fall to pieces like this.

"Look, hun, Dr. Regal will be able to figure this out. Her prescriptions worked wonders on Sloan, you've got almost perfect vision in your unaugmented eye thanks to her. She'll find a way. Trust me. Conrad's at the medical centre on Fortuna right now..." Silence. "...I got a call, he's in stable condition, doing really well. She'll figure it out..."

He nodded, trying at the same time to shake the stinging in his eye. If only he could have such faith. He looked again at the papers in his hand. A letter and some test results confirming the worst. Malignant, rapidly spreading, terminal. There was nothing the doctors at Corneria General could do. He shifted the papers slightly to reveal a slightly tattered photo. It was the one he used to carry with him, his young and healthy son frozen forever in his arms. His only son. He looked up at his wife, no longer able to hide the despair in his eyes.

"What if she can't, Bristol? What if Conrad..."

His voice caught in his throat. He couldn't even voice the horrific possibility.

xxx

"Up and at 'em, ladies and gentlemen! Breakfast is hot and we're on a deadline!" Fox called through his whitewash, open concept home. Krystal entered the kitchen carrying a little pup -three year old Marcus- on her hip.

"Mmm, smells good."

"Doesn't it always? Sit down before it gets cold."

"It's great, thanks. Hey, I got a call from the Fortuna Medical Centre, Miasma is doing great. They've got her stabilized."

"Thank god." Fox sat down at the table with a cup of coffee, looking over the results from the fresh battery of tests that had been performed on his young daughter. The McCloud family problems had started when Miasma was sent to the emergency room at Corneria General for sudden heart failure, even though she was just a toddler. Her condition steadily worsened until she was dependant on life support and nearly comatose. The doctors told him they'd never seen anything like it before, but it was spreading quickly and would very likely be deadly. They then told him that another child had recently come in with the same symptoms, and had been transfered to the new and innovative Medical Centre for Integrated Health Sciences on Fortuna. It had been reported that the boy's condition had improved, and that Fox take the same course of action. It had been almost a week since she had been sent over, and they were planning a visit.

Breakfast was the same loud affair, started and finished in a whirlwind of noise and toddler complaints. Fox didn't have anything much besides his coffee, to nervous to really eat. A part of him couldn't quite believe that whatever had suddenly stricken Mia would clear up as quickly and tamely as a cold. He quietly got up from the table, telling Krystal he still needed to pack a few things. He left for the open suitcase in his bedroom, sporadically half-packed from the night before. It was a long weekend coming up, and they planned to stay over it so they could spend time with Mia without Marcus missing school. The tickets for the shuttle over was sitting on the top of his luggage, and he took them out and but them on the dresser, as not to lose them while he ripped everything out to repack. The tickets ended up next to his PDA.

He picked it up, wondering if he should take it or not. Krystal would say absolutely not, that his daughter was more important than his job. After the fall of the Aparoids, he hadn't retired from duty. In fact General Hare had a direct line to him via his PDA, but Peppy knew that Krystal didn't like Fox running off to defend the solar system all the time now that they had started a family, so he only called him in the most dire of emergencies. Due to that, Fox had barely worked since the birth of his son. He turned it over in his hands once. There was nothing on it that he would need, no booking information or shuttle times. In truth, he'd only ever really used it for business. If he left it, it would be no loss. Still, even now a part of him hoped that it would go off. It was hard for a warrior to put down his sword.

He heard Krystal coming down the hall. He just had time to throw the thing back on the dresser and go back to packing before she entered.

"I just need a shower and we can leave." She stopped on her way to the master bathroom to give her husband a quick kiss before moving on. "Do me a favour and make sure our darling child doesn't kill himself while I'm in the shower." She slipped into the bathroom.

Fox was about to go out to where Marcus was playing, when a green light flashed from the bedside dresser. It was the colour of the PDA display. He glanced into the open door of the bathroom. Krystal was hidden safely behind the shower curtain. He picked it up. It was from Peppy, of course. Another glance, this time out the bedroom door to make sure Mark wasn't chewing on any electrical wires out in the family room, before turning his attention to the words on the screen.

The message was short and sweet:

Extreme danger. New Aparoid signals found coming from isolated portion of Fortuna rainforest . Problem must be contained before outbreak. You are our only hope. Co-ordinates are as follows:

Fox gasped as he read the numbers. The Aparoids had been located within a breath of the Medical Institute.

Within a breath of his daughter.