Chapter Text
Five years after the Elysian Assault, Fox and Krystal were sleeping in their Sauria apartment when their three-year-old son climbed out of his sleeping bag in a panic. Starting from the foot of his parents' bed, the kit's footfalls made a thumping noise that blended with the sounds of Fox's nightmares. Having not seen Bill's death, Fox's dreams had been plagued by dark imagery of hypothetical ways it could have happened. In his mind, he watched as Adolfo's asteroid's gravity pulse ripped Bill's fighter from the space above the malicious chunk of rock and metal. Gold lasers pierced through the Cornerian ship's airframe in a series of rhythmic thumps as Octahedrones piloted by Elysian children found themselves an easy target. Bill's fighter exploded against the surface of the asteroid. The dream had come to Fox regularly for the past four years, and every time it did, it shook him to his core. It was two in the morning and Lylat had yet to crest Sauria's horizon.
Fox bolted awake a few seconds after Marcus had climbed on to his chest. The son recoiled sharply from his father's sudden burst to wakefulness. He fell on his rear on Fox's stomach, right where Adolfo's toe had rammed into Fox's gut five years ago. It was a fast, firm impact. Fox flinched and Marcus entered his field of vision. Recognizing his son's silhouette in the predawn darkness, Fox breathed a sigh of relief. In the process, the elder McCloud caught a whiff of ammonia and groaned.
"Really, buddy?" Fox sighed as he turned on the light. Marcus had wet himself, as was evident from the sagging bulge between the legs of his bright orange pajamas. Krystal woke up, having sensed her husband's dark dreams and her son's awakening. She stroked Fox's chest. The fur there was slick with sweat.
"Sowy, daddy," Marcus whimpered.
"I know," Fox gently replied, "Let's get you back in bed with some fresh clothes. Hopefully, your night diapers can make my job a bit easier."
"If you boys want to talk after you've cleaned up," Krystal smiled, "I'd be willing to listen." She had cleaned up after Marcus' last night accident, and knew it was time for Fox to do likewise. They alternated caring for Marcus on a regular basis, with Krystal pulling an extra shift once a week when Fox was incapacitated by migraines. Fox's medicine reduced the inflammation caused by Adolfo's rusting nanomachines but didn't eliminate it.
As Fox escorted Marcus to the bathroom, the kit noticed Fox's tense expression.
"Daddy?" Marcus wondered.
"Let's be good for mommy and get clean," Fox forced his thoughts about Bill's death to the back of his mind, "okay, buddy?" He shut the bathroom door behind them. "Think you could stand on your towel so I can get you clean?"
Marcus nodded and stood on a towel in front of the shower. He raised his arms over his head, pulling up his nightshirt.
Fox helped Marcus undress, letting the kit's old diaper fall off before tossing it into the compost as a ball of recycled biodegradable plastic. He retrieved a new one from a cupboard over the sink and wrapped it around the boy's waist and tail.
"Wait there," Fox firmly ordered his son and set about retrieving some fresh nightclothes from the bottom drawer of the dresser in the bedroom. For his part, Marcus waited obediently, but picked his nose to distract himself from the boredom of standing still. Satisfied after a few minutes, he pulled his finger out of his nostril just as Fox reentered the room and set his son's new pajamas down on the toilet tank, using it as an impromptu shelf.
"Okay," Fox observed, "can you wash your hands for me?" Puzzled, Marcus shrugged, failing to see the necessity of doing so. He wasn't about to eat. He hadn't played in the dirt recently. He couldn't think of why his hands would be dirty.
"You were just getting them dirty in your nose," Fox explained, narrowing his eyes and struggling to hold back his irritation at his son's apparent apathy.
Confused by this explanation, Marcus began eyeing the ceiling, searching for patterns in the roughness there, trying to avoid thinking about his father's strange seeming reasoning.
"Eyes on me," Fox demanded sharply. Marcus continued to stare into space. Fox bluntly repeated his request, "Look at me." Marcus obeyed with a flinch. His father's scary voice was a rare sound, and he knew to listen when he heard it.
"Wash your hands," Fox warned, "otherwise you'll get sick, and we won't be able to go to the park tomorrow and let you fly on the swings. Get your sink stairs." Marcus startled and grabbed the step stool he used to access the sink. "Now turn on the water," Fox instructed. Marcus complied, not wanting to miss the chance to soar through the air. Fox verbally walked his son through the hand washing process, rarely intervening as he unfolded Marcus' nightclothes. A couple of minutes later, Marcus dried his hands, balling up the towel on the edge of the sink. Fox high fived his son with minimal fanfare, stooping to one knee.
"Let me see you put your jammies on," Fox requested, laying them at Marcus' feet. "Think you can do it yourself for me, buddy?" Fox wondered, "It's just like getting dressed during the day." Marcus gave a sharp nod. However, he was still new to dressing himself, having just turned three. He put his shirt on upside down and became frustrated when his head couldn't fit through the neck hole. He pulled the shirt off and threw it to the floor with a grunt. Fox took a deep breath to reset his mood.
"Come on, Marcus," Fox gently chided his son, "don't give up. You were so close. Pick up your shirt and try again." He pointed to where his son's white shirt had fallen in a heap.
Marcus bent down and grabbed his shirt. Father and son proceeded to play a game of hot and cold as Marcus tried to find the right hole to fit his head through. When Marcus tried to use an arm hole, Fox simply sighed, "Fichina." Eventually, with a joyful exclamation of "Solar!" Fox watched his son slide his shirt over his head. It got caught on Marcus' ears, and Fox pulled it down the rest of the way while Marcus threw up his hands.
"Okay," Fox smiled calmly, "Think you can try putting on your jammy pants?" Sitting down, Marcus turned his pajama bottoms over in his hands for a few seconds, inspecting them like a puzzle box, and then tried to slide both of his legs down the same pant leg.
Fox shook his head. "Come on, buddy," he gently sighed with great effort, "that's not how pants work! We talked about this yesterday!" Determined to force his solution to work, Marcus bent down and began to tug hard at the bottom's waistline in a vain effort to pull it up. Fox intervened before Marcus could cause any real damage to his clothes, grabbing Marcus' hands and disentangling his fingers from the waist of his pants. They fell slack.
"Let's try again," Fox advised. He brought his hand up to his forehead as he watched Marcus clumsily fiddle with his undergarments.
"No," Fox griped, pointing at Marcus' feet, "your pants are lower than your night diapers." Marcus lifted his leg and kicked his pants off. Barely catching the flying fabric, Fox held them out in front of him, splaying the waist open for Marcus to step back into them. The father's reflexes had slowed enough for him to be unable to fly an Arwing or even force him to crash in the simulator as bright lights overwhelmed him. He had never tossed Marcus in the air, only lifting him up and down.
"Lean on me," Fox instructed with a groan, "Put your hands on my shoulders." After a few seconds, Marcus obeyed. Taking things one leg at a time, Marcus worked together with his father to finish dressing. It was a struggle. Fox's PTSD induced irritability was something he'd constantly had to keep in check in the past, now, it was extremely important to avoid losing his cool.
"Guess we'll have to keep practicing," Fox shrugged with exasperation.
"Yes, daddy."
"Go to mommy," Fox told Marcus, "I need to clean up too."
"You potty too?" Marcus half-teased as he scampered back towards the bed.
"No," Fox replied bluntly.
"You pottied!" Marcus chortled over his shoulder, remembering the feeling of Fox's sweat on his palms. The youngest McCloud had conflated sweat and urine, reasoning that both were smelly substances that caused damp fur. Fox shook his head and stepped in front of the sink, splashing water into his face before taking a shower.
“Little snark!” Fox grumbled under his breath.
"Silly boy," he heard Krystal laugh at Marcus' claims as she lifted him into her arms, "Daddy doesn't need night diapers like you." Fox got dressed in his shorts, then walked back to the bed where his son had regaled his wife with rumors of his supposed incontinence.
"Alright, buddy," Fox lovingly smiled as he tousled Marcus' white forelock, "that's enough funny business. We'll talk about your dream tomorrow." He climbed into bed. Marcus sat between him and Krystal.
"Fox," Krystal said, "shouldn't we deal with it now? I don't want him to have another one tonight from worrying about the last one."
"Alright," Fox replied tenderly with a hint of reluctance. He turned to Marcus, "Let's hear it buddy. I want you to remember on your own, without mommy's help. What was your dream?"
Snuggled up against his mother, Marcus recounted a scenario from his favorite television program, Arrow Racer. It was an educational series meant to teach children directional orientation by having viewers follow a G-Diffusion powered race car along a series of courses. Arrows indicating the direction of the turn flashed across the screen at regular intervals when the driver had to steer, accompanied by an announcer whose voice had a static overtone. "Right, Left, Up, Down, Left, Left," the announcer would excitedly shout as the race car moved in the corresponding direction on the screen.
In his dream, Marcus had been flying down the racetrack at top speed when he took a wrong turn. His vehicle had spun out of control and exploded. His description caused Fox to remember his own vision of Bill's death. Normally, Marcus and Fox would sometimes watch the show together, as Fox made a valiant effort to spend as much time as he could bonding with Marcus. Fox had to watch the show through his father's shades and with the volume turned down to avoid causing one of his migraines. From now on though, Fox would approach the show with greater caution.
That fact saddened him. His emotional war wounds had driven a wedge between him and his son. Granted, it was a small one, but a wedge, nonetheless. He still loved Marcus despite it and would still plan many activities centered around the idea of high-speed movement. He and Marcus often raced each other around the apartment building where they lived, with Fox slightly suppressing his athleticism to give his son a chance to keep pace or pass him up at the last second. Marcus liked racing his father, but the apartment complex was getting a bit small for him, so Fox had started taking his son to the Thorntail Memorial Park to let him explore and play on the structures there. As Fox thought of playing with his son, he remembered the childhood games he had played with Bill, despite his best efforts to the contrary. His nanomachine-damaged neurons dragged him back to his nightmare. Sensing this, Krystal blinked away a tear. Despite four years of therapy, Fox continued to struggle with Bill's death. Krystal blamed the nanomachines in Fox's brain for making the therapy not take as effectively as it had in the past.
"Wha’ do you dweam, daddy?" Marcus wondered, hoping that hearing his father's dreams would somehow inspire him to make his own less terrifying. Krystal silently pitied Marcus' naivete.
Surprised at the question, Fox shook his head and paused before giving a firm rebuttal of his son's request, "Not now, buddy."
"Why?" Marcus was puzzled and a bit annoyed that his father didn't want to help him dream better dreams.
"I'm not telling you. You're not ready."
Marcus gave a pleading look, pushing out his lower lip. "But I big boy!" Marcus whined.
"No," Fox replied with irritation at Marcus' persistence, "I'll tell you when you're a man!"
Marcus pushed his lip out further. Tears welled up in his eyes. Fox sighed and turned away. James had regaled the young Fox with tales of his exploits, saying in whitewashed terms that he was a hero who soared through the air to defeat those who lived to cause sadness. While Fox had yet to do the same with Marcus, he wouldn't ever tell the kit about Bill's sacrifice, Pepper's assimilation, or anything he had endured fighting Adolfo. The memories were too painful to expose to Marcus. Nonetheless, Marcus tugged at his father's shoulder a few seconds later. "Pwease daddy?" Marcus begged.
"No," Fox furiously berated his son, "Go to bed!"
Marcus recoiled in shock, bawling in frustration and fright a few seconds later. The unsettlingly pitched wail stabbed into Fox and Krystal's ears, making them wince. In shock and on the verge of tears himself, Fox covered his ears and couldn't bring himself to look at Marcus' face. The child's mouth yawned open while his eyes were screwed tight. Tears rushed down his cheeks.
"Marcus," Krystal told her son with a gentle firmness, pulling him back into her arms and hushing him while he screamed into her chest, "let's get you back to sleep. Daddy's just feeling a bit sad." Marcus kept howling, his tears and snot staining her nightgown a darker shade of gray. "It's going to be okay," Krystal reassured him with her speech and thoughts, "Mummy will make sure you and daddy will be okay. It's going to be okay." Believing in his mother, Marcus slowly stopped crying. Stroking her son, Krystal carried Marcus back to his sleeping bag, where it rested on an inflatable mattress. She zipped the bag up around him, starting to sing a lullaby. She stooped down next to him, faintly smiling as she looked into his deep blue eyes.
"You are my little blue. We're so happy here with you. Think of all the joy you do for the weary wounded hearts, drifting through these many stars. Close your eyes and drift into the sky, where you'll see Lylat's good rise." She repeated the 4/4 presto stanza a few times until she felt Marcus fall asleep to the rhythm. "Sleep tight little one," she whispered, kissing his forelock. She climbed back into bed with Fox.
"Tell me, Fox," Krystal whispered, "Will you be okay?"
"I don’t know," he painfully replied as tears blurred his vision, "I just can't stop thinking about Bill. I really scared our little guy, didn't I?" He let his transgression sink in.
"It would seem so," Krystal dryly replied, looking at Marcus' thoughts. They were a mix of confusion and hope. Confusion over Fox's outburst and hope that Krystal would make good on her promise to calm Fox down. "The best thing you could do now is actually to not think about Bill at all," she advised her husband, "Just think about the family you have with you right now. We have a curious little boy who loves us. We have a home on a beautiful planet, and you have friends to whom you can talk. Tricky, Slippy, Falco, and Amanda all know how you feel."
"You're right," Fox whispered sullenly, "tell Marcus I really am sorry. Tell him now, in his dreams." Fox continued to shed tears of remorse. He clenched his teeth. Hot rivers ran from his eyes. Krystal held him close as he shook with guilt, then telepathically forwarded Fox's apology to their son. In his dream, Marcus saw Fox with his back turned to him, screaming before falling silent. Marcus approached his father, who turned around and pulled him into his arms as Krystal's message entered his mind. Daddy's okay, Krystal's voice whispered in Marcus' head, Daddy's sorry for scaring you. Daddy loves you. Mummy loves you. Sauria loves you. Lylat loves you. The parents drifted off to sleep. A few hours later, Lylat rose.
Fox formally apologized to his son over breakfast. “I’m sorry I made you cry,” Fox sadly eyed his child, “Can you forgive me?” Marcus cocked his head. He knew that forgiveness was a good thing, but still didn’t quite understand the particulars.
“Little one,” Krystal informed him, “just say yes. Daddy loves you, and he wants to know that you still love him too.”
“Yes,” Marcus nodded. Krystal telepathically suggested he elaborate. “I wuv you daddy,” the boy finished.
“I know,” Fox smiled as he finished his meal. He dressed Marcus in a yellow romper, careful not to pinch the boy’s fur in the zipper.
Later that morning, despite feeling it would be a tough experience for him, Fox asked Marcus if he wanted to watch Arrow Racers with his father. My own pain doesn't matter as much as my son, Fox told himself, even if I barely make it through this, I want Marcus to know I'll be there for him.
Eager to see his favorite TV show, Marcus replied with an enthusiastic "Yes!" Fox put on his father's shades and turned on the TV after breakfast while Krystal cleaned up the dishes. Adolfo's nanomachines and the traumas of war had hypersensitized Fox's vision to bright flashes of light, like the ones that dominated Arrow Racers. Fox tried everything he could to avoid thinking about Bill's death, forcing himself to focus on the toddler on his lap. The race car sped around the track, with Marcus calling out the twists and turns in its path. "Left, right," the boy shouted gleefully, "up, down, left!" Fox tilted the beaming Marcus around in his lap, matching the directions his son indicated in his jubilant voice. Nonetheless, the past loomed over Fox, and it entered his mind. Krystal looked up from the sink, nervous at first before smiling as Fox strenuously extricated a happier memory of his early days in the cockpit.
"G-Diffusor trouble," Fox exclaimed, remembering his first deployment with Falco and bouncing Marcus on his knee to simulate turbulence. Marcus laughed infectiously, and his parents smiled. Saving Falco twenty-one years ago had revitalized Fox after his father's death. The experience had shown him there were people he could protect. Now, Fox reasoned, it was his duty to protect and watch over Marcus as he grew from a little boy to an adult.
As the credits rolled, the exhausted Fox was overcome with relief and happiness. Any emotional pain or dark memories he had feared that the show would summon to his awareness had failed to materialize. Otherwise, he'd ensured his son had distracted him too much for those dark thoughts to register. Despite losing his father, despite having been through hellish wars multiple times in his life as a hired gun, despite the troubles that had once plagued his relationship with his wife, despite the ongoing struggle to raise the blue fur ball on his lap, Fox knew he would continue to persevere and overcome. He wrapped his arms around his giggling son and smiled. "I love you Marcus," he said, waiting for his son to stop laughing, "and I want to tell you something my daddy told me."
"Yeah?"
"Turn around behind you," Fox instructed, loosening his grip. Marcus looked over his shoulder. "Look at me straight on," Fox told his son, "Point your chest at me." The kit clumsily obeyed, swiveling on his bottom until he was squarely facing Fox. Fox gently took Marcus by the shoulders, sure that he had his son's full attention.
Marcus shot Fox a puzzled look. "He thinks your instructions are what your father said," Krystal clarified.
Fox sighed. "No, you goof," he smiled at the miniaturized blue version of himself, "I just wanted to be sure you were paying attention. What my daddy said is really important."
"But wha’d you daddy say?" Marcus wondered. Fox took a deep breath. He remembered Peppy's story of James taking him in his lap and holding him just like he was doing with Marcus. It was a happy memory, but one inextricably bound up in the death that had shaped Fox into who he had been for many years. Krystal looked on with a pensive gaze. Fox had suffered through a hell no one should have to go through, and now, he was passing on the spirit of his father to the next generation.
"Listen, no matter where life takes you," Fox said with tears in his eyes, "no matter what hurts you or gets in your way, keep living, never give up." Fox put a heavy emphasis on the last three words, and Marcus said them back with his father's encouragement. Overcome with a mix of a father's pride and sorrow for his own loss, Fox wrapped Marcus in his arms and held him tight. He smiled and closed his eyes, stroking the back of Marcus' head. They spent the afternoon at the park, just as Fox had promised last night. He did not tell Marcus that their play space was built on the site of a genocidal massacre turned mass grave. Nonetheless, the golden statue of an ankylosaur-like Thorntail in the center of the park's distant memorial area was a reminder of Adolfo's attack. While Krystal stayed home to fill out a job application to help make ends meet, Fox pushed Marcus back and forth on the swing set in ever higher arcs. Marcus imagined he was flying through the stars.