For the amount of anger and regret stewing in the car, the outside sure looked calm, what with the clear skies showing all of the beautiful stars of the galaxy and the small random cricket beeping in the grass. For once, it wasn't a dark and stormy night, though the incoming argument storm was pre-emptively giving ol' Peppy Hare a mild migraine. You sure you're up for this, old man?
"With. A. Wheelchair."
"Oh my god you're still on that?"
"WITH. A. WHEELCHAIR!" Peppy yelled in the car. Even his voice was getting hoarse in anticipation.
"WHAT WAS I SUPPOSED TO DO? Just let her try to shank me?" Lucy argued.
"What you're supposed to do is either run away to an adult or at least defend yourself using something on your person or around you. Shoving a disabled man off his wheelchair in order to beat Cassie back IS NOT WHAT YOU DO."
"You're the one that taught me to use whatever I got, don't get fucking mad if I gotta use someone's crutch to beat back somebody that was LITERALLY TRYING TO KILL ME?!"
"THAT'S WHAT THE ORDERLIES ARE FOR, LUCY!" Peppy argued back. "YOU RUN TO THE PROFESSIONALS, NOT HOSPITALIZE FOLKS!"
"THOSE FUCKERS WERE LOOKING AWAY THE WHOLE TIME, I TOLD YOU. THAT'S WHY I HAD TO DEFEND MYSELF!"
Peppy raised his hand, and then lowered it. It wasn't as if he didn't chew out the staff themselves for not stepping in, he could tell the difference between indifference. Saved us a bunch during the Fortuna Uprising, right buddy?
His eyes wandered to the front of the parking lot, where the sign for the institution was lit up in a dim underlight: Cornerian Academy for Troubled Youth. He internally scoffed at his 20s daughter still being stuck here for infractions, years after she should have gotten past her teenage rebellious phase. He'd hoped years ago that he could take her out of it by bringing her to Star Fox and keeping her close instead, but Fox ultimately vetoed it. Falco had just left them and Fox did not want to immediately replace him just yet. To be fair to my son, he also probably just didn't want anything to do with girls after poor Fara dumped him. I never liked her father anyway, so good riddance, but speaking of fathers, yeesh Peppy.
You know, you really weren't the best father to your daughter, especially after Vivian's death. You thought at least at her age now she should have been the bigger adult, not act like a child and make a bigger mess of things. But because she couldn't stop getting into trouble, poor ol' Peppy had to pull strings to enroll her in the asylum instead, where she had to deal with mentally unstable juveniles and delinquents whose own rich parents paid up to make sure no one knew of their black sheep in their families.
And all you had was a black sheep and me.
Shut it, James.
Peppy took a moment to collect his thoughts, ignoring me in the backseat. He decided to still press on the issue, to see if Lucy knew the resultant action was at least wrong. "That still doesn't mean you can defend yourself using an extreme method like yours. You got more people hurt that way Lucy, you can't just toss others health away for your own health."
"Oh that's rich coming from you, Dad," Lucy replied, with an edge that made Peppy's hair stand on end.
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"How many lives you tossed aside in Star Fox then? How many times you had to protect Fox instead of CDF forces or civilians?" Well that's just mean, Lucy. Just 'cuz Peppy tossed me aside ain't mean he also tried to save others. It just ends up that Fox gets the credit.
"Wha- that is completely different and irrelevant! Who tells you these things?!" Peppy raised his voice again, agitated by the implied accusation that he could clearly see under Lucy's words.
"...Cassie." Lucy finally responded, looking away from her father. "That's how the whole thing started. She started talking shit, and I overheard it, and I started thinking she couldn't just say all that without some pushback. I didn't know she was off her meds, but that's not my fault, my fault is… my fault is panicking and getting someone else hurt just so I didn't have to hear her talk."
The academy's investigation amounted to little more than punishing both parties, asking only how it happened and not why. Peppy was caught off guard by the confession, but Lucy continued. "Honestly it ain't the first time, lots of folks say shit about y'all, but usually under their breaths, and usually because they lost folk in the war. Almost all the time I ignore it because… it's easier to not think about it when I don't have living proof of it living under the same roof as me."
Lucy turned back to face her father. Oh, you're definitely not gonna like what you're gonna hear next, buddy.
"I've been talking to my therapist in there, and she agreed with me. I was actually doing good right before you came, my grades were passing me up to getting into a degree program, I could have transferred out of the school entirely, but then you finally came back and I got all stressed and now I'm at a breaking point where if I fail one more time, I'm never getting anywhere in life. Dad, I'm sorry, but… I don't want you anywhere near me."
This time Peppy had to break contact and look away from his daughter, his body almost physically trying to reject Lucy's words. Fucked up being a father and now you fucked up being a figure in her life. Vivi's gotta be facepalming at you right now.
SHUT IT, JAMES.
She noticed your incoming hissy fit and tried to calm you down, "It's not like I mean forever, just, up to the point where I can feel like I'm better by myself, maybe when I can get my degree and a job I can contact you back. But right now, Dad, my problem is that you are the problem. I can't keep pretending that I'm someone else's failed daughter, I can't keep pretending that losing mom didn't wreck you more than it did me, I can't keep pretending everything is fine. Not anymore."
Peppy still kept his eyes forward. There was so much that he could say. So much to defend himself, so much to attack Lucy for. Lemme help you with this one, old friend: all your words wouldn't change the incoming future. You still have a job to do.
"...Wish granted," Peppy muttered under his breath.
Lucy's rabbit ears twitched. "What? What do you mean wish granted?"
Peppy thought about his next words carefully, more so out of habit than of the usual standard operating procedure he worked under for General Pepper. "Fox is too busy training Krystal while Falco and Slippy are too busy catching up with the ship's repairs. Pepper asked me to commit to something dangerous in a few days, and Ah accepted. You want me out of your hair, you got it."
"What? Oh stars, didn't you tell him you're supposed to be retired after Krystal?" Lucy pleaded.
"Ah gave him a chance to explain, and he did, and Ah think it's a mission that has to be done. Ain't nobody else we could trust anyways, CDI's been more of a nuisance than usual."
"CDI? What do spies have to do with… NO," Lucy suddenly demanded, remembering some of the stories of her father before the current Star Fox team. "No no no, you can't! You're not like your younger self, a mission like that could literally kill you!"
Peppy opened the driver's side door of the car and stepped out, not once looking back at his daughter, and definitely not making eye contact with me. Can't ever look someone in the eyes when you leave them alone, can you? "Gotta be done. You know your way home, Ah was already packed for it. Call me when you think you're ready for me."
Lucy stared speechless at her father suddenly leaving her as quickly as he tried to enter her life. Her ears tried to listen to anything else, but soon even the old hare's footsteps were gone, leaving her with just the crickets and bugs of the otherwise quiet night. For the first time since she had to put back on her tough girl persona for her stupid father, Lucy began to cry at the loss of her father again. She hoped, and she prayed, that nothing would happen.
"How you doing, old timer?..."
"You sure you're up for this, old man?..."
"You're not like your younger self!..."
Pain. The body's way of reacting to any external force that could potentially cause it harm. Yet the paradox of pain requires that in order to understand that something hurts, that something still has to hurt you. Remember those words from our sarge back at the academy?
Peppy wouldn't have felt the pain until he woke up. After that, his body would realize there's a new hole in his mouth, and it did not like that. I thought that you would have screamed at the pain, but I guess sarge made us tougher than that.
I mean, look at me. Chock full of bullet holes and I can still laugh at it. Oh c'mon, don't act like it's the first time the first thing you see is my old mangled corpse all hallucinated right in front of you.
Peppy blinked, and his eyes certainly didn't deceive him. Right in front of him laid down the broken and shot-to-high-hell corpse of one James McCloud, smiling a death smile back at the pained hare, with his signature sunglasses still shining on the fox as if it never broke. If it was any other man, they would scream, but for Peppy, it was just another dream or hallucination. It happened whenever he got close to death or to an extremely high stress situation. Considering the bullet hole in his mouth, the old hare guessed the former was the one causing the psychosis at this moment.
At least this time it ain't a dream, that pain in your mouth certainly tells you so.
Ah really need to see a shrink after this.
Don't act all huffy, at least I'm not telling you "Oh it's so good to see you again my old friend! Come, Vivian's been waiting!" at the pearly gates. Yeah, guess what buddy, you're still alive, and I'm still dead and abandoned back at Venom right where you left me.
Fox buried your body when we found you. He still visits, you know.
And where's my visit from you?
Fuck you, James.
It also didn't help that the hallucination was oftentimes hostile to Peppy. The hare figured long ago he would have some sort of PTSD from all his stunts in his earlier life, mistakes and pains come to haunt him in his later years, but when they started haunting him while he was still in the field, that should have been the first sign to the hare he was getting too old for this.
But Peppy Hare was a stubborn man. His mistakes had no choice but to survive him instead.
Speaking of mistakes, his memory of what happened to him came one by one. His secret stealth fighter that he got on loan from Pepper was easily discovered and captured in a tractor beam, he was held at gunpoint as the small but heavily armed militia in the corvette converged in the hanger to hold him at hostage, and he was soon kicked and punted until his bones felt weak and bruised.
Don't forget one of the pilots suddenly recognizing you for killing her son. Gotta love rebels, huh?
Peppy grunted through the sharp pains that kept biting at his lower jaw. Fighting the urge to touch the affected area and possibly make it worse, he dodged eye contact with the dead James to look around where he had ended up. The few seats with a massive amount of seatbelts plus a barebones terminal with a single flight stick told him that he must have been jammed into an escape pod for the corvette, though everything else was dark as there were no lights turned on save the emergency lights on the ground that were always on to mark the way in case of a power loss. Utilitarian way of dealing with random bodies if you didn't have an onboard morgue.
Not the first time we've been shoved into one thinking we were dead. Remember the People's Liberation of Fortuna? Fortuna Uprising, freakin' socialists thought they dealt with just two lapdogs of Corneria and shoved us into their flagship's escape pods because they wanted to show us off to their leader. Played dead with those fake death pills our handler gave us and then got back up and took over a whole heavy cruiser just by ourselves.
…Think you can take on a corvette?
Remembering the standardized escape pod layout of Cornerian ships, Peppy looked around the almost pitch black cabin to find a specific green case with a white cross on its front. Right where it would be left, he found it sitting next to the pilot's seat and took it out, quickly opening it to find what he needed. SynthSkin Foam and Nano-Heal canisters were mixed to patch the bullet wound and start fixing the damage, though of course the med kit wouldn't have the painkillers he also needed to grunt through the healing process.
Junkie rebels probably raided everything they could get their mitts on. Great…
Afraid of a little pain, buddy?
Peppy looked up to see James standing right in front of the doorway, another death smile mocking him with half-worn fangs and a familiar wound now appearing under his lower jaw.
Afraid of slipping up at the wrong moment. We still have a job to do.
"We"? Always with that old phrase. At this point in our lives we'd be hiring folks to do our jobs for us as we laid back rich and powerful.
Don't remember you always being about the money.
Don't remember you having a plan outside of work. That's why you're still stuck here in this job, doing odd errands for Pepper again, and getting stuck in bad situations, again.
For all his sense of duty, Peppy's patriotism for Corneria certainly took him to weird places in the Lylat. Been a while though since he had to stop a rebel force, discounting the whole Lylat War with Venom where Fox took the reins of the group. Fortuna taught him a few things about rebels though…
If the medkits were right where Corneria leaves them, chances are this whole ship is based on Cornerian design, rather than Venomian. Pepper was right, this newest bunch of rebel forces have to be supplied on the inside. If Ah can get to the data core, Ah can extract the logs of how such a ship was missed by logistics and trace the hierarchy of traitors from there.
No shortage of anger against the Cornerians this time though. Might be an actual force trying to destabilize things again instead of just being a distraction for power plays in the government or private sectors. I miss the old days where politics was the backseat for things.
Now Ah know you're a hallucination. You know Ah never liked the politics of anything in the first place.
Yeah, you liked just doing the work and completing the mission, no matter the cost. Remember anything else?
Peppy tried to comb his memories while they kept coming back. He remembered he was then dragged to some lizard woman dressed in full officer's regalia, of what nation though he couldn't tell through his pain. What he could tell though was a camera suddenly being set up right at his face, and the woman giving a random speech to the camera, before putting a cold metal object right to his head.
He remembered suddenly realizing what that object was and tried to move his head right at that moment, before everything suddenly went black.
Ah was used in an execution video? What purpose does that serve, if they're only a fringe group that just means they'll be hunted to the last man for hurting me.
Yeah, anything or anyone bearing any small resemblance to a rebel group is going to be blown to bits. And you're standing right in the center of the crime scene. If my son comes across this ship and realizes these are the people that killed my buddy Peppy, you think he's gonna have a rational thought of telling them to surrender?
…Oh. Oh shit. Even if Peppy survived, he still had to get off the ship before every Cornerian with a torpedo strapped to their backs wanting revenge for killing a Star Fox member found the suspects and blow up everything to space dust.
Peppy turned back to the pilot's terminal. It would cause an alarm to the ship if they sensed an escape pod launching, but he's dodged hairier flak before in lesser vehicles.
Like that time in Khan Tengri where we dodged both the mountain militia and a whole avalanche in snowmobiles. We buried that base and it wasn't even our explosives that did it.
Several times in that mission, Peppy wanted to call it quits and just get out before the situation was too dire. But that was his first defining mission for Star Fox, and the start of his motto: no matter what happens, you still have a job to do.
…Even if Peppy left with the escape pod, the corvette was still technically masked and there wouldn't be any way to trace where or how far up the chain the rebels were to get this much equipment. Not without devoting months and months of time to the CDI, and that's if they managed to find the culprits, giving the rebels enough time to strike major blows to the still recovering fleets of Corneria.
Peppy Hare still had a job to do: find out the missing link between the stolen ships and the newest faction of rebels against Corneria.
Feeling the tingle of the healing canisters start to work their magic, Peppy tried to ignore the burning sensations as he turned away from the flight controls and walked past James to the escape pod exit. The windows for the pod didn't show anything, so either Peppy was about to eject himself with no spacesuit out into the cold dark, or the escape pod was still connected to the ship.
The footsteps coming to the door from the outside confirmed the latter.
You hear that?
Peppy quickly shuffled to the side of the pod, hopping on one of the seats to get as much distance away. The cramped quarters wouldn't offer anything more than a quick element of surprise, so he had to act quickly.
"And then he just slumped to the floor, and that was it! Honestly, I thought she would fire more shots in him, but I guess revenge is a dish best served - LOOKOUT!"
Two ape guards walked into the pod, for what reason Peppy didn't care. He shot his legs out as fast as he could, with the metal hips helping the piston of his rabbit legs strike clean into one of the guards' heads, knocking him off his feet and faceplanting to the other side's wall with a terrible crunch. The other guard watched in horror only for a brief moment before Peppy tackled him down to the pod's floor, and went for the finishing move at the guard's neck.
"You're-! Supposed-! To be dead!" the guard yelled, trying desperately to claw and strike back at his assailant before Peppy grabbed the base of his neck and twisted his shoulders. The other guard went limp, but Peppy long ago tuned out the sound that would have told him he finished the job.
Geez, couldn't have snapped his neck any louder? The door is still open, you know?
Peppy quickly turned to see James was right, the pod's door was open and the guards' screams definitely would have been heard.
"Carl? Gustave? What happened?" Peppy heard down the hall. Amid the incoming footsteps, the hare looked down hoping for weapons that the guards dropped.
The gears on the side of their helmets meant they were mechanics. The guard that had his head kicked in had only a wrench in his hand. These weren't guards, they were just curious onlookers with no weapons to defend themselves.
Time seemed to slow down, as Peppy's heart dropped from his incoming fate. If they didn't kill him before they would certainly try to do so now. He had nary a gun or even a good defensive position to fight from. The only way out was to die forward.
Giving up that soon? As if I didn't teach you anything about CQC?
Peppy looked to see James sitting right next to the fallen mechanic on the far side of the wall, his dilapidated skull staring at the wrench in their hands, somehow able to see in the dark even with his sunglasses. With precious seconds ticking by, Peppy quickly dove down to grab the wrench, not caring about the pool of blood he could feel on his boot from the attack.
The only way out was to die forward, or die trying. And James was right. Shot in the face, captured by the enemy, and still needing to complete the mission? Giving up now was just too soon.
James McCloud walked down the main hallway of the Cornerian Hammerhead Corvette. His boots carried an unsteady rhythm, each step echoing in the emptied hallway.
Emptied. Each step hit with a sickening wet and mushy stomp, as his yellowed eyeballs surveyed the scene behind his shades. Bodies, upon bodies, upon bodies. Some had multiple bullet holes ridden through them, while others were mangled and missing whole limbs and parts. All laid strewn around and on top of each other in an unorderly fashion.
How could they be orderly? Had to use em when you needed them and dropped them when you didn't. Pretty sure dead bodies as a shield counts as a war crime, you know.
…Fuck you, James.
At the end of the hallway, before one would walk into the bridge of the corvette, there was a mirror that worked as a propaganda piece for the brave Cornerian sailors that would serve on this ship in the navy, saying at the top "The next hero of the Lylat System!", and at the bottom saying only "You!"
How convenient that the hero of the Lylat System was an old hare crimsoned everywhere on his body. Arms, red. Flightsuit, red. Legs, dripping red. And his face?
Not a single gray or white hair on his fur.
Feeling like a hero yet, buddy? The Cornerian Navy certainly says you'll be one, riiiiiight there.
Peppy kept breathing heavily, ignoring the several lucky jabs and close blaster calls that the rebel crewman managed to hit on him, in order to catch his breath. His eyes darted down to see the "You!" part of the mirror, though defaced with red smears from the last crewman that yelled out some kind of war cry trying to strike at Peppy with a fist, before receiving several blows to his head with the now heavily crimson wrench in the hare's hand.
Don't rest yet though, hero.
His muscles ached in pain, stretched and pushed beyond their limits even from their prime. Peppy looked back up to see James in the mirror walking even closer to his reflection. The corpse fox was so close, the hare could swear he could hear him breathing, as James lifted his arms up and placed his hands down on Peppy's shoulders.
It was a sudden cold sensation, hitting right down to his bones.
You still have a job to do.
Peppy screamed in anger as he swung his wrench behind him, only to hit nothing but air. James was gone.
The hare seethed through clenched teeth as he lowered his wrench. Between pained breaths, he turned one more time to the mirror to look at himself, seeing that there was one place that wasn't yet crimson: his eyes were bloodshot, but still his same color as he remembered them.
He was Peppy Hare. One of the team members of the mercenary team Star Fox, specializing in aerial attack and defense missions. And before Star Fox was a mercenary team, they were an elite team consisting of the best independent soldiers that Corneria could trust to always finish the mission. It was their job to complete the most impossible missions.
And Peppy Hare still had a job to do.
Looking to the left of the mirror showed one of the doors that led to the main common room, where the elevator to the bridge would be. Ignoring the pain in his legs acting up again, Peppy used the side wall to lean-walk his way over to the door, trying to keep his balance as the adrenaline began to fade off.
He opened the door with one hand, letting it swing out as he leaned onto the inside wall and hooked his way in. Once in the main common room, he could see the elevator leading up to the bridge, but the rest of the common room caught his eyes.
The hallways of a Cornerian corvette, when not painted with the blood of rebels and dissidents, would usually have several paintings and motivational posters, which had been mysteriously missing while Peppy had been fighting his way through the ship's entire crew. The corvette must have been an extremely recent retrofit, as the Hero mirror wasn't even taken down yet, and the main chamber was the only place that had rebel propaganda now hanging up.
"Rally for Andrew! Remember Andross!" and other such slogans were plastered in several walls, giving Peppy the direct answer he needed for his mission. Andrew Oikonney must have survived the big battle between Star Fox and Star Wolf over Venom, and had apparently been rallying several dissident rebel forces back under Venom's flag, considering several symbols for Lylat gangs and fringe militia forces were also strung about. This was even worse than what General Pepper thought it could be.
Peppy needed to get up to the bridge and alert Cornerian command of the impending rise in forces. The traitors within Corneria would have to wait, as a Venomian would be able to rally Venomian factories before long and missing Cornerian ships would be the least of the Lylat's worries next to another full-blown war. Walking up to the elevator, he pressed the button he knew was for the bridge, his knowledge of Cornerian ships catching up to him as he also tried to recount the security codes for an emergency transmission that should head straight for Cornerian High Command.
What he missed in his thinking was the bridge still being possibly occupied, and it was, with a lizard woman aiming dead center at the opening door of the elevator. The shot missing over Peppy's head saved him and snapped him back into focus, as he quickly stepped aside and got into cover in the elevator away from the opened door.
"You… you killed them all!" the lizard yelled, with hints of being tearful and frightened that Peppy's ears picked up on. "You slaughtered them all like they were just animals! Is that how you butchered my son!?"
"Your son signed up to be a soldier, same as Ah am! Sometimes, some of us don't come home!" Peppy yelled out back. It was rare for him to have to deal with the parents of the enemy fallen, and rarer still for it to be the mother. But sympathy clouds decisions of survival, that cold and cruel lesson was drilled deep into Peppy and James by their sarge all those years ago.
"You call yourself a soldier? What kind of soldier slaughters a whole ship full of people?!" the lizard yelled, Peppy hearing her slow footsteps come closer every so often. She was trying to surprise him in the elevator, and Peppy had to think of something fast to surprise her back.
"Well, in all the years Ah've had to fight, Ah can tell ya there's two kinds of soldiers. Those of us who have to live with their mistakes, and those of us who have to survive them," Peppy answered. He sensed the footsteps walked even closer before suddenly stopping, and experience could tell him she was only a half-step away from the door of the elevator itself.
"...And what kind of soldier are you?" a much closer voice answered only a few feet away from the door.
With mere seconds to act, Peppy tried to calculate his next move as fast and as much as he could. But then another voice echoed in the elevator.
Duck below chest level, and strike low.
Peppy ducked from his corner in the elevator and swung his wrench where he thought the lizard woman might be. He gave no thought if his strike connected or not, only looking up to see the pistol the lizard carried fire once more over his head, before dropping his wrench in one hand and trying to reach for the gun in the other hand. The strike did connect, throwing the lizard off-balance and in pain as she reflexively dropped the gun, conveniently right into Peppy's other hand.
Using his legs, he instinctively kicked the lizard to both push her away and regain his balance to stand back up, his assailant thrown back several feet by the powerful hare legs. She grabbed her abdomen in pain as Peppy switch the gun to his dominant hand and aimed it right at the lizard woman.
"Ah got captured while in a stealth ship and Ah was shot in the head. And yet, I still lived. My mistakes have to survive me."
Before she could even respond, Peppy pulled the trigger and fired, the quiet slump to the ground letting him know the fight finally ended. He didn't have any holsters on his person, must have been looted off his supposed corpse while he was out cold, so Peppy committed to the old trick James used to do where he stuffed the gun right into the back belt loop of his flightsuit.
Looking decisively away from the lizard's body, he spied the bridge console and terminal for the corvette just in front of him, which showed a viewport of the Mateo Asteroid Belt. The hare all but sprinted towards the console and began inputting the numbers he remembered for the hidden CDI Mateo base. The radio began crackling with static until there was a voice response.
"Charlie Nevada Sierra Niner Two Alpha, our flight logs show no record of your activation nor your flight path to be passing through here, you are under obligation by the Cornerian Defense Intelligence to respond or we will assume you are an unauthorized ship with unauthorized codes and will open fire."
"Do not fire! This is Peppy Hare of the Star Fox mercenary squadron. Ah have commandeered this ship after it was being held by rebel forces against Corneria. Send confirmation code Zero Two Two One One Niner Niner Three to High Command!" Peppy responded.
Several agonizing minutes passed, making Peppy wonder if he said his confirmation code wrong and there was already a torpedo heading for the ship in secret, when the radio crackled again, "O-Okay, confirmed agent Peppy Hare reporting back. Oh my stars, Peppy, how are you alive? Those Oikonney rebels broadcasted that tape everywhere, everyone in the Lylat thinks you're dead!"
It was going to be a long debrief when he got back home. As much as he knew Lucy wasn't going to meet him at the landing pad in Corneria City anymore, at least he hoped someone could tell her first that her pops ain't bought the farm yet.
I'd say tell her yourself.
Peppy looked behind him to see his James again, only this time the fox didn't seem like the body that Peppy remembered the last bit of him before he was gone forever. Instead of a battle flightsuit torn up and bloodied in battle, James wore his old base flight jacket, and his glasses were perched up right above his head instead of on his face.
You heard her, she doesn't want me in her life anymore.
Sure, but then that's how you're gonna end up with another rogue ace pilot Fox like my son. Remember how I wasn't around for him those last few months because I didn't want anything reminding me of Vixy? All he had of me in the end were stories of my exploits, and that's what he lived up to, up until he had to fight a whole war in his young age, a war you and I were trying to make sure no one in our families would get caught in.
But…
No buts, buddy. Oikonney and the Venomian forces are trying to come back, and stars knows that if a kid hears the enemy killed their parent they're gonna grow up to try and kill the enemy back, and that tape probably got to her if the CDI couldn't stop the broadcast in time. Fox is gonna want a piece of the action, there's no stopping that as much as you tried to stop me being a hero every chance I could get, but there's still time to make sure your daughter doesn't get caught in our shadows.
Peppy gave it a long thought. Lucy was almost back to normal, and she was certainly wanting to make something better of herself without her father. While she tried to stay out of his shadow, she still feels connected to him if she tried to stand up for him back at her academy and almost ruining her chances at a normal life. If he could at least steer her away from his path and guide her to continue on her own path, he'd at least keep his promise to Vivian. Lucy would be safe, and Peppy fought through hell and high water to make sure she stayed safe, and he wasn't going to give up now.
But what about your promise to little old me? James smirked, goading his old friend even from beyond the grave to remind him of the McCloud ego, something Peppy tried to make sure Fox never fell into as a goad back at James.
… That's a good point, actually. This is an enemy you and Ah had to fight on multiple fronts, it's not going to be like how we were only air support and offense back in the war. Fox is gonna need to learn how to fight on the ground, more so than with just a gun or with the Landmaster or with a strange gold magic staff from an amazonian princess he's head over paws for.
…I'm sorry, Fox is fighting with who and what now?
Long story, let's just make sure we get back to the Great Fox, old friend…
"How you doing, old timer?" Falco immediately asked as soon as Peppy stepped down from the shuttle.
Once the Great Fox was notified of the position of the rebel corvette, as well as the news that their teammate was actually alive, it sped right to its coordinates, where a few other ships with mysterious censored names and hulls were investigating the stolen Cornerian ship. With celebratory fanfare that a hero of the Lylat Wars was still alive and then sudden horror at how he managed to stay alive, CDI agents boarded and began to sweep the corvette's halls, letting Peppy borrow a shuttle to fly back to his team onboard the Great Fox.
"Well, to tell ya the truth Falco, Ah feel like Ah died."
Peppy had to hide his smile as the Star Fox team, with wide smiles and a few flowers to celebrate their teammate's return, suddenly dropped their faces as they began a thousand yard stare at the hare.
"What's the matter, y'all? You look like someone died!"
This time, Peppy couldn't hide his wicked smile, and Falco also had to smirk as soon as he caught on what Peppy was pulling. Slippy began to smile again but had to shake his head and roll his eyes at the joke, while Fox and Krystal began to frown. Fox was more of an angry frown while Krystal seemed just confused.
She still ain't used to some of the jokes we say here? Fox, what are you even doing with this poor gal?
"Uh uh, nope, we are not doing gallows humor with you, Pep! Not after the sh- crap you pulled! You could have just told us you needed to do a mission, we do work pro-bono too, ya know!" Fox admonished Peppy, while still walking up to the hare to give him the biggest hug in his life. "Please, Peppy, don't do something like that again, yeah?"
He still doesn't swear?
Ah threaten him with washing his mouth with soap if he ever swears. We're pilots, not sailors.
Good man.
Krystal suddenly became scared as she physically began to scan the hanger, as if she was trying to find someone else around.
"Hey, hey, best way to come downl from high stress situations is always with a laugh, it's what your father used to say," Peppy replied, returning the hug to comfort Fox.
I did?
We're saying you did.
Krystal looked around again.
"What even happened in there? Besides the whole, they tried to execute you on video bit? When we got here, freakin' CDI announced themselves and then told us to stay this far away. Apparently they had to quarantine the ship?" Falco asked, coming up behind Fox.
Thank the stars the shuttle had an autopilot and a quick-shower pod.
"Oh, just another day for this old hare in the air. But this mission certainly taught me Ah'm way past my prime, and it's time for me to stay on the Great Fox in the future. Stars know we're gonna need some logistics back here with what's coming."
Slippy widened his eyes. "Uhhhhh, what's coming Peppy?"
Peppy had to gather himself by breathing his first sigh of relief, before breaking up his hug with Fox. He kept the vulpine at arm's length as he turned towards him. "Fox, we've got a storm coming, and we're gonna be needed now more than ever. But the way we've built Star Fox so far ain't gonna cut it."
Fox stepped back from Peppy, folding his arms together and straightening his back as he prepared to listen.
Heh. He really is becoming more like me. Just needs the shades.
Krystal turned towards Peppy but focused behind him, as if someone was standing and watching over Peppy and Fox.
"What do you mean the way we built it isn't gonna work?" Fox asked.
"Star Fox is built as an air wing mercenary squad, but the next wave of rebels are a unified force of pilots, sailors, and infantry. If we're gonna fight all three, it's time we learn how to take the battle to them with boots on the ground. We're not gonna be a star wing anymore. Once we get home to Corneria, Ah'm gonna be teaching you all everything we knew as the best soldiers of Corneria in our heyday."
The team looked up to Peppy as he finished his speech. "We're gonna be a Star Fox Assault team!"