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Things have gotten a little ancy since the Claxan attack from the Magus Sisters. After Angulo finished reporting to General Pepper the planetary patrols had increased over ten fold. Star Wolf was also dispatched on another mission. I couldn't help but begin to think on how lucky they are because of all the missions they get to go on. Even through all this training I couldn't help but think that I could have something better to do with my time.

On a different note I had spent a particularly good amount of time throughout the last week practicing my new healing spell element, although I didn't seem to be making much advances. Fortunately Angulo and Krystal brought in someone one day who would be helpful in bringing it up a little.

"Zio," I said to the red dragon, "how have you been?"

"Doing alright Ryan," he said, "I don't have a lot of time today to help you with your healing spell training, but perhaps another time when I'm not so busy."

"Sounds great," I said. I was about to begin training with Krystal for today when Slippy ran inside and bumped into Zio.

"Oh," Slippy said regaining his composure, "sorry buddy."

"Don't mention it," Zio said. Slippy nodded and approached Krystal and me, he was quickly followed by Peppy, Fox and Falco.

"Two things Ryan," Slippy began, "the first is Kenji and Robert recovered nicely today and want us to bring thank yous. Also I inspected the new motorcycle they made for you, it's quite excellent if I do say so myself. You ought to come up with a name for it later."

"Secondly," Falco continued, "we got a message from General Pepper. Something about a new mission." Fox brought up his communicator and turned it on, showing Pepper's face in the hologram.

"Star Fox," he said, "we have a new miss..." He stopped when he saw me. "Ryan, what in the world? You can't be standing over there." I heard some loud noise in the background like some confusion, but no one could be more confused than I was.

"Why the hell not?" I asked him.

"Because you're standing over there," he said, tilting the view to show another human who looks exactly like me in the exact same uniform. He gave the same look of confusion as I did.

'This has to be a trick,' I thought, 'Something the Claxan is trying to come up with. It won't work, I'll expose this fake.'

"What the hell?" Falco shouted.

"Two Ryans?" Fox asked. Either he was a clone or a very convincing doppelganger, and yes there is a difference between a doppelganger and a clone. Besides I could easily tell that this wasn't my brother Eric at all, especially since he was wearing the same clothes as I was. That was mistake number one for him.

"This is indeed a problem," Angulo said.

"Alright enough," General Pepper shouted, "arrest both of them, and take them both to the park, that's where we'll settle this thing."

"What?" I shouted, and before I could protest Falco had his blaster pointed to my face, while Fox put me in a pair of handcuffs, behind my back.

"Sorry Ryan," Falco began, "we got to make sure that you aren't the fake one first."

"But of course I'm the real one," I said, "don't you guys believe me?" This was going to be a lot harder than I thought. This looked even weirder to all those seeing me leave the building with the whole group in a pair of handcuffs. Before we knew it we were at the park where General Pepper and his group which consisted of Fara, Nordic, Jovey, and of course the fake himself also in handcuffs were waiting for us.

"Alright you two," he said, "line up side by side." We did so, and I couldn't help but admit how exactly accurate he was in looking like me. I'll expose this fraud no matter how long it takes me.

"They look exactly the same," Pepper stated, "Fara, run a full physical scan." She nodded and took out a small device, turning it on and letting it fly over around us. After a few minutes of this it returned and to her and she examined it.

"They're exactly the same," she sighed.

"How in the," Pepper stated, "Jovey, Nordic, any ideas?" They examined both of us intently for a second and shrugged.

"It's impossible for me to tell," Nordic said, my blades have a hard time telling.

"I can't tell them apart either," Jovey said, "I can only heard souls, not distinguish between two."

"Wait a second," Fox said, "Krystal, can't you read into their minds?"

"I've been trying," she said, "I seemed to be blocked out by some unknown force. Let me get in closer." With that she got up closer to me. I was pretty sure she read my mind enough times that she knew almost everything about me now, so I had no problem distinguishing my mind. But if she could get blocked out from that distance, I wasn't sure if getting closer would make much difference. She started by examining the clone first, concentrating hard like she was trying to get inside. When she finished she turned to face me and seemed to examine my mind. I closed my mind and searched through my childhood memories to see if anything would convince her. After a few minutes she stopped and pulled back.

"No good," she said, "I'm blocked out of both minds." Both minds? I wondered, this clone is good, he has to be a Claxan member, I was sure of it, especially if he had that kind of power. This was getting old really fast, we heard another voice give another pointer.

"Why don't we quiz him?" It was Bill, approaching with a party of his own, which included Kazuma and Nokemy as well as a few of his own fleet, "we'll each ask a question about him and see if only one of them can answer it. Whoever is the most successful by the end should be the real Ryan?" Everyone thought about it for a moment and agreed on it.

"Alright then," General Pepper began, "I'll ask first, where did Ryan come from?"

"Planet Earth," I said quickly but the other added to it.

"In the United States of America."

"In St. George, Utah." I said not to be outdone. Pepper sighed and stepped aside while Fara asked next.

"What's the name of the school you attended?"

"Pine View High School," The fake said.

"Where I was the star player of the chess team." I added.

"This is a question for the fake," Falco said, "what's Ryan's favorite color?" Neither of us answered. I wasn't going to fall for a simple trick like that and neither was the fake. "Damn, I was hoping that would work."

"Shut up Falco," Fox said pulling him back, "How old is Ryan in seconds?" How in the hell was I going to answer that one. The fake smiled and answered that one.

"I'd have to admit it's a clever trick question." Fox smiled and backed down. Everyone each took a turn asking a question, which each of us either answered really well, added to each others, or answered in unison. When everyone finally finished General Pepper slapped himself in the forehead.

"This is getting us nowhere," General Pepper said, "I really don't want to have to take to drastic measures, but we have no time for this idle chatter. Both of you will be taken into arrest and transported to Planet MacBeth until the real one is discovered, which I guarantee is a painful process, but it is necessary. If either of you resists, there will be brutal consequences." This is not good. I can't train or fight down the Claxan if I'm rotting in a jail on a barren lava based planet. I had to think of something quick and right now that might settle this. Fortunately Kazuma came up with an idea rather quickly though.

"I have an idea," he said, "that just might work." Everyone looked at him seriously.

"Explain," Fox said.

"If one of them is indeed a fake and he can imitate Ryan in almost every way, including clothes, memories, and even physical appearance, could he truly be a fake? There has to be some physical difference of some kind. So this is my idea, strip both of them naked right here. I'm pretty sure the real one has to have accumulated some scars over some point in his life." It doesn't take a genius to tell that I wasn't tuned into the idea of stripping naked in front of a whole bunch of people at all, especially out here in public, even if it is the more desecrated section of the park.

"It's crazy," General Pepper thought, "but it actually might just work, untie them so they can strip." A look of total worry crossed my face now as the handcuffs came undone, did I really have to go through with this. The fake seemed nervous about this as well. Strange, everything else made him completely confident. Now he seemed to be just as nervous as I was. I decided to take advantage of this.

"Alright," I said, "I'll do this." I took off my vest and black undershirt showing off my chest. I didn't go any further as to wait for the fake to do the same. "What's the matter? The real one got your tongue?" He scowled at me.

"I'll show you who's fake, fake," he said and took off the top of his uniform as well, "well go on." I was reluctantly about to when General Pepper stopped us.

"That's enough for now," he said, "Fara, examine them." She nodded and came up to us, examining every part of our torsos. I really didn't have any scars so to say, although if you looked closely square in the middle of my chest you could see the remains of small scars from a horrible acne breakout I had a few years back. Fara examined it with a small smile brushing her face, then she moved on to examining the fakes. I noticed it too, his skin was too perfect, too flawless, like nothing ever touched it before. I knew it, the fake couldn't copy everything about me. Fara also spent a few minutes feeling around the skin, as if checking the texture. What happened next was about as quick as lightning. Fara noticed it and backflipped just in time to avoid a sword slash from out of nowhere as a sword similar to my own materialized into the fake's hand. That's a confession if there ever was one. I summoned mine and went to Fara's aid as everyone else drew weapons of their own. Almost everyone had blasters except for Jovey, Nordic, Nokemy, Angulo, and Kazuma who had their own weapons with them.

"Well we know who's the fake now," Fox said relieved but still pointing a blaster at the fake.

"Who are you?" I asked him.

"Number 24," he sneered, "you know, the one who followed you around to all those planets and killed off those other members. I'm a clone of you created to simulate you in every way, or so I thought." So he was the one, it was my clone all along who followed me and killed his own members.

'Number 24,' I thought, 'does that mean that the Claxan are recruiting more, that there are actually more than 23 now?' This was not good, now I had over a dozen new incentives to hunt down the Claxan, if ever I find it. No matter, the point now was to go and capture this clone.

"Enough of this," General Pepper said, "arrest him." As everyone moved in he moved in to attack me, and I only brought up my blade just in time to block the blow, shit he was fast. The rest of Star Fox got to him first and with a nice triple team attack, Fox, Falco, and I got the aggression on him. And trust me with everyone else there, it was a lose lose situation for him. He growled and slammed a button on his belt, and in a split second, he was gone. It took me a bit to register what just happened in my head that must be how the Claxan get around so quickly. That was going to be my goal the next time I kill a Claxan member was get my hand on one of those belts. Everyone else just froze for a bit before they put away their weapons.

"What the hell just happened?" Falco asked.

"He teleported away," Slippy asked, "maybe he went back to the base."

"If that's true then we need to get a hand on one of those," Peppy stated.

"Now we have one more headache to worry about," General Pepper said, "we've got to find some way of keeping track of you Ryan while we look for the clone. This will keep Fara busy well into the night I'm afraid, everyone is dismissed." Everyone started leaving the area while I grabbed my uniform tops and put them back on. Jovey and Nordic each gave me a nod before heading off, Kazuma and Nokemy stuck around to talk a little, along with Zio and the Star Fox team.

"Glad that ended well Ryan," Nokemy said.

"We'd best be careful," Angulo said.

"We wouldn't have gotten this far without Kazuma," I said looking at the wolf, "thanks a lot."

"Don't mention it," he said, "it was my pleasure." Nokemy and Kazuma waved before heading off, while Angulo did the same, saying that I should take a break.

"Ryan," Fox said, "as long as No. 24 is around it's best that you don't go wandering around without supervision, so we'll leave you with Zio for the time being, if that's all right."

"I understand," I said, "that okay Zio?" He looked at me and then nodded.

"I trust you'll do a good job," Slippy said. The rest of the Star Fox team gave me farewells before taking off as well, saying I'll meet them at their house later. I looked at Zio with a slight smile.

"Well Zio," I said, "now what?"