Aye sat in the "staff lounge/kitchenette" of Emperor Reginald Zophricaties' lab with nine other Ayes. The tenth was missing.

Everything had happened too fast. The large line up of Potto clones waiting to get onto the Garax ship caused a panic. He had watched the real Potto grab the hand of one of his clones and drag him off. By the time he had finally gathered up his remaining clones (which was no easy task for they had scattered in every direction like a brood of chickens cooped up with a werewolf), everyone had left.

Now they all sat in the lounge/kitchenette, munching on stale and rotten snacks that had spilled out of a broken vending machine many, many years before. There were "raisins" in everything, including the snacks that didn't start off with raisins.

"I don't think these are raisins," an Aye clone muttered.

"Just shut up and eat. Raisins...real or not...are good for you," Aye snapped. He was a tad ornery, but trusted Potto would come back for him when the mistake had been realized.

Though he doubted Potto's ability to realize anything, his fragile ego refused to believe that these horn-deficient hunchbacks looked anything like him. Even Potto would be able to tell the difference. Surely. Probably. Maybe.

"What's a raisin?" asked another clone.

"I dunno, something with legs," answered the first clone as he munched away on what definitely wasn't a raisin but certainly had the texture of one. And legs.

Aye looked around at his clones. He was disappointed. He was hoping they'd be a little more Blankton, and a little less Yaygher. And that was saying something.

He closed his eyes and tried to ignore the inane conversation the clones were having about expired snack foods. He tried to remember his mother's face, but too much had happened since his dream of her. He couldn't even remember his wretched father's face for that matter, but that was a very welcome memory blip.

Like Potto, he had a wall up, a block of sorts in his mind. Something horrible was buried so deep he couldn't access even the smallest detail, and he had nothing from his past to jog his memory.

Nothing remained of his life up until this particular moment, apart from the clothes on his back. The now filthy, worn and torn Node Pilot's uniform with a faded "1st Lt. Jonas Perrish" nametag-badge carefully stitched on the jacket's chest was all he owned.

He perked up upon hearing the low grinding (and feeling the buzzing vibrations) of a ship docking to the lab.

"There ya go, Sport!" he said aloud.

"Sport? What sport? Water polo?"

"Potto. He's back for us. Well for me," Aye scowled. He didn't want these idiots following him around.

He raced out of the lounge/kitchenette, slipping on a few snack wrappers but catching himself.

He waited with bated breath for Potto to come through the lab entrance, while practising his stern, scolding face. He was happy and relieved to be rescued, but wanted Potto to know it wasn't okay to be left behind, and worse, mistaken for one of these "Aye-ghers".

It wasn't Potto that came through the door. It wasn't a Potto clone. It wasn't the dangerously dashing clone they had made together. It wasn't even a Shiv-sniffing puppy or a wayward ostrich.

It was his father.

But not his father. It was an artificial abomination with the glowing blue floating holographic head of his father. He stared at this floating head-upon-a-large-robotic-body like he was looking through the lens of an old video camera that wouldn't autofocus without effort. Though he had known about his father's current form, he had not seen it in person.

He had not seen his father since before he was Mel Million Max. Since Mel-Aye moved on two legs and not a rolling tank-like tread.

"My son! My baby boy!" Mel Million Max called out. The blue face was smiling wickedly. The time had finally come. "I know this is probably a lot to take in, so I'll give you a moment. Because I really want it to sink in. I have waited so long for this. Let it sink in before you die, you little shit."

And Aye let it sink in. He really let it sink in.

He didn't think about dying. His father's crabby old face crawled deep into his brain and broke down the wall. It unblocked the block. It dug up what had been buried so very, very deep. It triggered a tsunami.

His father hadn't killed his mother. It was far worse than that. His father had driven his mother to kill herself.

He had berated and beaten, humiliated and belittled, bruised and defamed her. He had stolen her work and passed it as his own. He had pimped her out to his friends and blamed her, strangling her while calling her a whore. He had imprisoned her with blackmail. If she had left he would not only have hunted her down and tortured her, he would have killed their son before his time. The physical and mental pain he had caused her was so unbearable that even one more breath for her was poison.

Even by Topher standards he had been a monster. The worst kind of monster: a cowardly monster that only preyed on those smaller and weaker than himself. A cruel, cruel, cruel, cowardly monster.

And he had done it all while his wailing son watched helplessly.

The last Aye saw of his mother was in her library. Sitting by the fire. She had made him sweet tea and she read him a story; the same comforting story she had read him a million times. He fell asleep in her arms.

He forgot that she had been crying, her already shattered heart breaking into even smaller shards as she squeezed him tighter.

Her tea had been a funny colour. It had smelled like death.

"There it is, yeah? You remember..." Mel Million Max laughed.

It was this laugh that finally broke Aye. He calmly turned and walked away. He had never felt so much rage. And it was a calm, focused rage.

"Where are you going, dickhead? Don't you walk away from me!" shouted Mel. "It's not like you can go anywhere now. There is no running. There is no hiding. You are mine! I win!"

Aye returned moments later. Mel's holographic eyes widened. There were ten Aye's staring him down. Each clone inheriting the same horrible memory. Each clone feeling the same rage.

Mel Million Max fired his shoulder laser, taking one clone down, but another clone was upon him. And soon two, and soon three and four. They pulled at wires and panels. They snapped off brittle parts, antennae and ornaments. Mel spun in a full circle on his tread and shook them off. He shot a few more, but within seconds others were on him.

He had been an arrogant fool. He had come alone, not even bothering to power up his army of robots. This was supposed to have been easy. Aye was stupid! Aye was weak!

By the time all nine clones were lying dead at his feet, part of Mel's foot tread had been dismantled, one of his "arms" was on the floor beside him, and many of his special upgrade chips were ripped out and crushed.

He looked about but the original Aye was gone. His built-in ship monitor started counting down. On a nearby console screen he saw his son's face.

Aye had left the fight and was on Mel's own ship. He was broadcasting from its escape pod.

"I won," he said through tears. "But then again, I won a long time ago, didn't I? Because this is not you. You only think you are Mel-Aye...but my terrible father died broken, shunned and lonely, and even that was far, far better than he deserved. But I want YOU to know, whatever the fuck you are...that I won. Twice."

"What have you done???" the robot screeched and crackled.

"Your ship, you, and everything that ever was you is about to self-destruct. It will take out this lab, and most importantly, you with it. Though you self-destructed a long, long time ago, didn't you?"

One of the chips inside Mel Million Max that an Aye clone had not torn out and damaged was his F.C. (Fear Chip). He had only invented and implanted it to keep him on his toes, to keep him sharp, to make him more life-like. He was cursing the creation of this chip as his entire electronic body filled up with an excruciating terror of dying.

"This is for my mother," Aye said in a cold whisper as he hit the eject button, mere moments before Mel Million Max, and any sign of his existence, other than Aye himself, was blown out of existence.

Forever.