Falco Quietly Sends Fox a Thank You Card
Star Fox's ace pilot shows rarely-seen modest side
CORNERIA — Fox McCloud, the leader of the elite Star Fox mercenary team, was reportedly touched after he received correspondence from a grateful Falco Lombardi, his squadron’s ace pilot.
“Falco likes to put on the whole ‘tough guy’ act, but it’s just a facade,” said McCloud as he fixed the card to his refrigerator with a magnet. “He’s actually really sensitive and sincere in private. I mean, look at this card. He went out of his way to thank me, and all I did was save his life by shooting down the enemy fighter that had him dead to rights. Some hotshot pilots might get all sarcastic or even resentful after something like that, but not Falco. He’s not afraid to set his heart to All-Range Mode.”
Another member of the Star Fox team has a very different opinion of Lombardi.
“Falco is a huge dick,” said Slippy Toad, the team’s mechanic. “Like, a huge dick. He’s constantly bullying me and dodging responsibility for his mistakes. Any time he screws up, he blames it on his ship. ‘Something’s wrong with the G-Diffuser.’ Yeah, man. Sure. Now I’ve got to stay up all night running diagnostics because some bogey got the drop on you. And you know he’s gonna drunkenly walk down to the hangar while I’m trying to work and ask me how many fighters I shot down. I bring value to this team, damn it! Flying isn’t the only skill we need.”
McCloud’s fellow mercenary and rival Wolf O’Donnell criticized the fox’s leadership skills.
“Good communication is paramount to a team’s success,” said O’Donnell, who noted that his outfit’s ships are also superior to Star Fox’s Arwings. “I’m not saying that sending a thank you card is a bad thing, but it shouldn’t really be necessary in this situation. Ideally, Falco would have given an earnest expression of gratitude right there, in the moment. At worst, he could have approached Fox immediately after they had returned from the sortie. In light of this story, I’m not at all surprised to hear about his behavior towards Slippy. This is exactly why we brought in a human resources contractor to work with us at Star Wolf. You want your pilots to save all of their vitriol for the enemy. If they’re up all night insulting each other, they might end up in a dogfight without the energy to quip about how they killed their opponent’s father.”
After a more recent skirmish that went sideways, Fox had reportedly received a second card with a cartoon illustration of Albert Einstein on the front.