.
Star Fox: First Contact
Chapter 7: The Cage
For the third time, Miyu tried using her personal code to unlock the cell. For the third time, the words ACCESS DENIED popped up. Because not only had she been grounded, but she'd been locked out of the Great Fox's security systems as well. Efi, onb the other side of the door, looked at her sympathetically. Miyu, rubbing her hand, still bandaged, found herself unable to make eye contact.
"Forgot your password?" Efi asked.
Miyu said nothing.
"Yeah, I have that problem too. I can hack pretty much anything, but remembering passwords? Nah."
Miyu, still silent, turned around.
"You know, for what it's worth, if the roles were reversed, you'd probably be in the cell right now." Efi laughed nervously. "What goes around, comes around, right?"
Miyu, now slumped against the brig's wall, knew that Efi was trying to cheer her up. Unfortunately, it was failing.
"Like, aliens turning up in the Atlas system? Yeah. Not saying we'd have gone full Warden, but, well, you know how it is."
Or maybe it was fortunate that Efi was failing, Miyu reflected. After all, she felt terrible, and given what had happened, and what was about to occur in fourteen minutes time, with the arrival of the Epona, she had every reason to be. Being at ease with horrible things often allowed those horrible things to keep occurring.
"You okay?" Efi asked.
Miyu looked beyond the force field and smiled. "Am I okay? What about you?"
"Oh, yeah. Fine. Absolutely fine." Efi forced a smile. "Fine."
Miyu didn't return it. Efi was brave, but she was a terrible liar.
She'd arrived in the brig six minutes ago. Up until that point, she'd remained in her quarters. Grounded, as the case was. She knew it was cowardly, that in a sense, she was on a ship of cowards. But on the other, Fox had been right. They were mercenaries. They'd been contracted to do a job, and the job demanded turning over an extra-terrestrial lifeform for study. Likely sent to Area 15, joining Venomian prisoners. Only while they had a planet they could be repatriated to in the end, Efi hadn't. Frowning, Miyu took out her old CDF medal and looked at it. Once, she'd been proud to wear it around her neck. But now? She rubbed her finger over its gold. It showed a constellation in the shape of a dog. Canis Majorum, the brightest of which was Irisus, the Dog Star When it had come over her neck, she'd felt a sense of pride. Now? It was as if Irisus himself was mocking her.
"What's that you got there?" Efi asked.
Miyu held it up. "Distinguished service medal. Back from when I was in the Cornerian Army."
"Army? But you're a pilot, right?"
"I was. Army still has aerospace fighters though."
Efi walked up to the force field. Miyu managed to look her in the eye - there was no anger there, she noticed. Just weary resignation. How Efi had reacted to Falco taking her into the brig, she hadn't said, and Miyu had been afraid to ask either of them.
"So what's your story then?" Efi asked. "How'd you go from an Army pilot to a mercenary?"
Miyu didn't say anything.
"Hey, come on. I told you my story, least you can do is tell me yours."
Miyu snorted. "What, the scientists on Corneria aren't going to tell you stories?" She sighed. "Actually, they probably wouldn't."
"Why?"
"Because the story of the Lylat system over the past few years isn't a pretty one, as...as I'm sure you..." She hit her head against the brig's wall.
"Miyu."
She hit it again.
"Miyu!" Efi exclaimed.
Miyu didn't hit it a third time, however much her morality urged her to. "I thought we were better than this," she whispered. "That after all the shit that's happened, we could make first contact with an extra-solar species and not screw it up."
"What, like you did?" Efi asked.
Miyu looked at her.
"Kidding." She sat down in her cell, her brown and grey clothing standing in contrast to the sterile white of the surrounding walls. She looked tired, Miyu reflected. Hungry too. Poor girl had had nothing but tea since she'd woken up after all. And weren't prisoners entitled to last meals in times like these?
"So what did happen?" Efi asked. "How'd you get here?"
Miyu, cradling the medal in her hands, and giving her chrono a look - eleven minutes until the Epona arrived. Sighing, she began to speak. For her own sake, as much as Efi's.
"Corneria was a peaceful planet," she began. "I mean, we had our scuffles of course. Army kept the peace on our worlds, Fleet fended off space pirates and the like. We'd had a century of peace until Andross came along."
"Andross?" Efi asked.
"A scientist," said Miyu. "A brilliant scientist, no matter what he did with his mind. In a better world, he could have created incredible things. Miraculous things. Pushed the frontiers of science to the absolute limit. Made life better for everyone." She paused for breath. "Only he didn't do that."
"So what did he do?"
Miyu scowled. "He built weapons. Experimented with teleportation. Dangerous experiments. Illegal experiments. Experiments that led to the creation of a miniature black hole in the Lylat system, and got himself banished to Venom as punishment."
Efi remained silent.
"What happened next is still vague. Venom's hardly been explored by Cornerians - proximity to the sun gives it a temperature range that's inhospitable to most Cornerian species, and its cloud cover makes it hard to survey. Honestly, most Cornerians are content to stay on their homeworld, and there's better candidates in the system for colonization, like Fortuna and Papetoon. But Venom? That was unknown to us." She winced. "Until it happened."
"It?" Efi whispered.
Miyu sighed. "Andross made contact with Venom's indigenous population. Somehow, he took control of them, using a device called a telekinetic amplifier. Most of them, he enslaved. Some of them joined him willingly, forming the core of his Imperial Guard. Rest of them..." She trailed off, not wanting to give voice to Andross's atrocities. And given the look on Efi's face, she understood.
"Within a few years, Andross turned Venom into a fortress, devastating the planet's ecosphere in the process. Years of skirmishes with the Cornerian Defence Force - our leaders dithered, the CDF refused to commit to anything, and then it happened. Andross's invasion. He invaded Corneria itself. And if not for the Star Fox Team, he'd have succeeded."
"But he didn't, I take it?"
"Nah." In spite of everything, Miyu smiled. "Back then, Fox, Slippy, Falco, Peppy...they were on Papetoon. Raiding Venomian ships, fighting the good fight, all that fun stuff. Fox had pressed the CDF for years to take Andross seriously, and he and his gang got sent to Papetoon as punishment when they refused to toe the line. Still, those guys were...are...the best pilots in the Lylat system. Which is why General Pepper gave them control of the Arwings." She sighed. "It's like a dream, flying one of those things. Best speed, best guns, best shields, best maneuverability...only reason the entire fleet isn't outfitted with them is that they're so damn expensive."
Efi didn't say anything. Maybe she thought Miyu was rubbing it in. The lynx's smile faded, as her mind went back to the Cornerian invasion.
"I was in the Army at the time," she said. "Assigned to pilot an atmospheric fighercraft. One sortie after another, watching my planet be taken over by those lizards...watching everything burn...right up to when I got shot down over Nerith." She paused for breath, only now aware that her right hand was trembling. The same hand that had clutched onto her joystick for dear life as she engaged in dogfights with Venomian fighters. The same hand that had pushed the eject button when she'd taken a hit. The same one that had grabbed her fighter's blaster rifle after she'd unstrapped herself, and used it to join the Cornerian troopers in the firefight waging in the streets.
"That was the first day I saw them," Miyu said. "Four fighters, flying in formation. Like nothing I'd ever seen. Tearing up everything the Venomians threw at them. I'd heard how they'd successfully defended Corneria City, how the four of them had taken down an attack carrier all by themselves, but to see them then and there..." She sighed. "I got a distinguished service medal after that battle. Service above and beyond the call of duty. But I didn't want it. I wanted to fly in one of those Arwings. I wanted to soar, dive, and roll like them. Even after the Star Fox Team won the war for Corneria, I still wanted in."
Efi blinked. "One fighter squadron singlehandedly won a war?"
"Wouldn't say singlehandedly, but...yeah. Kind of. They fought their way from Corneria to Venom and took down the mad scientist themselves." She smirked. "Didn't I say they were that good?"
"The Arwings, or the pilots?"
"Both." Miyu allowed herself to smile. "Four pilots, taking out everything Andross threw at them. Right up until Venom...became five for a bit in that last attack." She paused, thinking of Fara. Wondering what, if anything, would be different if their roles had been reversed. "But yeah. The war was over. And I knew even before the confetti stared falling from the sky that I wanted to join them. Fly with them. Be the best of the best. And Fay, bless her, had a similar idea.""
"Fay?"
"Fay Canum. The dog you saw with me on your ship. She was a pilot too, even if she was assigned to a different squadron. We knew each other growing up, even if we came from different backgrounds. Went to school together, went to the arcade together, flew in simulators together, joined the Army together, and kept in touch afterwards. Her family even took me in for a bit after the first war, since all of mine was..." She paused for breath. Her parents and brother had been in Lockstead when the Venomians had bombed it. Technically, they were missing, but then, so were many people in that city. Being atmomized by tactical nukes did a number on the Cornerian body. Thinking about it now...no. She didn't want to talk about that. Efi was an orphan. Fox was an orphan. She was an orphan too. But as the last few hours had shown, especially with Fox, that didn't guarantee common ground.
"Notice Fay isn't with you now though," Efi murmured.
Miyu frowned. "Suppose not."
"But she followed you into Star Fox."
Miyu didn't say anything. She didn't think of it as a case of Fay following her. Not long before the Second Lylat War, Fox McCloud announced that they were in the market for two new pilots, and she and Fay had been among the dozens of aspirants who'd shown up and given it their all.
"Took a lot out of both of us," Miyu said. "A lot of pleading, a lot of flying, a lot of sweat and tears, but yeah. Team had made a down payment on this ship, as well as two more Arwings, and we made the cut. We defeated Andross when he returned, we outfought Star Wolf, we saved Corneria from IPBMs, we became legends. Only now..." She pocketed the medal. "Now I'm grounded. Fox is going to turn you in to Whinnyham. And..." She looked at Efi. "And I...I..."
A tear ran down her cheek, much to her shame. Efi, for her part, said nothing. Sympathy shone in her eyes, even if Miyu didn't want it. Sympathy was fine. Avoiding this horrible situation was another. She looked at her chrono - eight minutes, she reflected.
There was more she could have told Efi. She could have told her the details of the wars. Of Andross's clones. Of the countless stories that made up the history of the Lylat system. But none of that mattered now. All that mattered was the injustice of it all. And her diminishing window of opportunity to deal with it.
"So what now?" Efi whispered.
Miyu said nothing.
"You have a shuttle, right? Could we take it?"
Miyu shook her head. "We're on the fringes of the system. Even if we headed for the nearest planet, we'd run out of air before we even got close."
"Then...your Arwing?"
"It's a single-seater. And while it's got increased range, it still wouldn't make it. Even if the g-diffusers didn't give out, we'd run out of air long before we made it to a planet."
"Then-"
"Efi, if there was a way to get you off Great Fox, I'd have done it by now," Miyu said. "But there isn't, okay? Even if we took the ship, even if I somehow took out the entire crew, we couldn't outrun the Epona. And if we attempted a warp, there'd be no time to charge the warp drive, or to safely plot a course." She sighed, resting her head against the brig wall. "There's no way out of this."
Efi shook her head and began to pace back and forth. "No. No way. I didn't survive the Wardens, and stasis, and heck, you, to be a lab rat."
Miyu sighed. "I know."
"Then you...you..." Efi trailed off, before collapsing down against the wall of her cell. "How much longer?" she whispered.
Miyu said nothing.
"You've been looking at your chrono ever since you came in here. How much longer?"
Miyu looked at the time. "Seven minutes," she murmured.
"Right..." Efi gave a small smile. "Well, maybe that's a bit longer, right? Like, the ship has to arrive, but then I have to be transferred, and-"
"Alert - CSS Epona has entered visual range."
ROB's voice sounded over the intercom. Miyu's ears pricked up. She's early.
"Fox to crew, report to bridge."
Fox's voice sounded as well. Miyu's chest tightened - his voice sounded almost as robotic as ROB's.
"Well," Efi whispered. "Guess this is it."
And her voice sounded dead to the world. Miyu looked at her.
"You going up to the bridge?"
Miyu grunted. "I'm grounded."
"Yeah, but you're still part of the crew, right? I mean, you came here, didn't you?"
Miyu said nothing.
"And if your friends are as good as you say, then you must be one hell of a pilot as well. Grounded or not."
Miyu grunted, before getting to her feet.
"So," Efi whispered. "You going up there?"
Miyu looked at the girl. At the alien. At Efi. At the one who'd travelled across the stars, only to find darkness at the end of her journey. The one who, in less than half an hour's time, would be on the Epona. On her way back to Corneria. Taken into custody, by way of a greeting. Was this what Corneria had fought for? Had it been what she'd fought for?
"Miyu?"
What she'd joined Star Fox for?
"Hey, you gone mute or what?"
She knew the answers. And looking at Efi, listening to Efi, listening to the voice inside her heart...she knew what she had to do.
"You're not going on that ship," Miyu whispered.
Efi frowned. "Didn't you say there's no way off this boat?"
"I did. And it doesn't matter. You're not going anywhere."
Efi bit her lip. "Miyu, if you-"
"Your world burnt," Miyu said. "My world burnt. You're here. You're alive. You're talking. That has to count for something. Because if not, then nothing we fought for mattered. Nothing at all. Not on Corneria, not on Venom, nothing." She drew out her pistol, making sure that this time, it wasn't set to stun. She pointed at the cell panel, hesitating...
What if this is a mistake?
She tore off the bandage that had been wrapped round her hand. The fur was still a bit mangled. But the wound had healed. And no more blood would be spilt on her account.
"Miyu?" Efi asked.
This wasn't a mistake, she told herself, as she opened fire on the panel. With its destruction, the force field deactivated.
Efi stared at her in a mix of hope and terror. Miyu remained silent, just nodding at her. Beckoning for her to come along. It wasn't until Efi actually stepped out of the cell that she spoke.
"So what now?" the girl whispered.
Miyu grimaced. "Crew's meant to gather at the bridge. Best not keep them waiting." She checked the sights of her blaster. "Or Whinnyham."
Efi nodded. She looked like she wanted to say something, but couldn't find the right words for it. But it didn't matter. Translator or no, Miyu didn't need to hear them.
"Alright. Follow me."
The strangest thing about this was that she didn't know if this was the best plan she'd ever come up with in her life, or the stupidest. Whether she'd stay on the moral high ground, or tumble off its adjacent cliff in disgrace.
Either way, she supposed she'd find out in a few minutes' time.