It's one of those April days, the kind that spring promises often but New York City delivers rarely. Warm enough to evaporate memories of the winter's blizzards, bright and hopeful enough to make even a Southside hardrock relax a little. And Tony Yayo is good, baby.

He's been out of jail for almost a year now, finishing up Thoughts of a Predicate Felon, the solo joint that's been on hold since his 2002 imprisonment. A couple of weeks ago, he and 50 Cent turned up the drama with "I Run New York," their latest salvo against certain Terror Squad, D-Block and Murder Inc. representatives. The first few tracks from the album leaked just a few days ago. For now, though, he's not thinking about music or his next career move; he's thinking lunch--he needs his Olive Garden fix. So we're out on West 31st Street in Manhattan, walking toward his man's car, when homegirl rolls up. "Tony Yaaaayo."

She's walking as slowly as she says his name, head cocked to make sure it's him. When she doesn't see recognition on his face, she turns mock-indignant. "What, you gon' act like you don't know me?"

Tony Yayo looks at her, a hesitant grin spreading on his face. "I don't know you..."

"Dre's baby mama...from 134!" (134th Avenue is the strip in Jamaica, Queens where Yayo used to grind.)

"Oh, okay," he says, noncommittal. "How you doin'?"

"Don't tell me you went and got an attitude, Mr. Superstar," she says, smiling. "You was real cool."

He smiles back. "Never, ma. I'm still that same nigga from the block. Just got a li'l bigger head."

That's the thing about the man born Marvin Bernard, the Talk of New York, the glue of G-Unit, the one whose incarceration touched off the strangest t-shirt craze since airbrushed zodiac signs. The last few years have been enough to test any man, but Tony Yayo's pulled through. It didn't change him, and it sho'nuff didn't make him doubt himself. Nothing, nothing, is going to be able to do that.

* * *

On the off chance you've been living in a cave for the past three years, let's run through Tony Yayo 101, the condensed version. He's rolled with 50 since the krills-pumpin' days, the Trackmasters-Columbia days, when "How to Rob" was hurting feelings all over the city. Then, right around the time 50 signed with Shady Records in 2002, Yayo got picked up for a homicide in his neighborhood. He had nothing to do with the situation, but the Ruger P89 he was packing violated the probation arrangement from an old possession case, so eventually he was remanded to deal with a gun-possession charge.

Instead of appearing in court, though, he opted to stay on the street, staying low-pro for the rest of the year, bouncing around the city, even going to Spain for Eminem's performance at MTV Europe's Music Awards. (How does a man with a warrant get a passport? By using his brother's name--but more on that later.) On Dec. 31 of that year, though, back in NYC, the fun stopped when Yayo rode with 50 and Lloyd Banks to perform at the Copacabana; cops searched their car, a gun was found, and all three were brought in to the 10th precinct station. Unfortunately, the warrant for Yayo's arrest meant he couldn't post 10 large and waltz out like his partners did.

When you're looking at a trifecta of probation violation, gun possession and bail-jumping, it's a fair bet you won't be seeing daylight for a while. Thankfully, a good lawyer and a barrage of support from Interscope and Shady Records--including letters from Eminem and Dr. Dre--convinced the DA that Yayo had a promising career ahead of him. So what could have been a three-to-nine turned into a much-more-manageable one-year bid. With that, it was off to Riker's Island, where Yayo sat for five months, writing rhymes to songs on the radio, staying out of trouble, and enjoying the few perks that well-connected prisoners can enjoy: Kentucky Fried Chicken, Alize, even weed. "COs is regular people like me and you," Yayo says with half a wink. "Read between the lines."

Meanwhile, G-Unit was changing. Young Buck came on board, and the whispers started about Yayo being replaced. "A lot of people thought the Young Buck situation really came because of me," says Yayo. "But 50 wanted to sign Young Buck ever since we started the mixtapes and Buck was down with Juvenile. Me and Buck is cool. A lot of people say, 'Yo, Buck's taking your place.' I don't listen to that shit. 50 got me right. For every show that they did on the Rock the Mic tour, I got paid. I was gettin' checks in jail, so it didn't really matter to me what anybody was doin'."

The crew held down Yayo in other ways, too. Like at the Grammy Awards, for instance. Someone from Shady Records called and told Yayo to watch the broadcast, promising, "There's gonna be a surprise." So Tony changed the channel in the dayroom, and the whole 60-bed dorm of C73 2 Lower sat there and watched Eminem take the stage in a t-shirt that read, in huge letters, "Free Yayo." "I went nuts," says Yayo. "It was the beginning of my career, and [the Riker's administration] didn't know how big I was on the streets. That's when people really started watchin' me in the building."

"I've been to Africa, Brazil, Iraq," says Banks. "And when I say, 'Do y'all know who Tony Yayo is?' they say, 'Free Yayo!' And they've never seen his face before. That's the size of the movement."

Soon after the Grammys, Yayo headed upstate to finish his sentence at Lakeview Shock, a military-style facility. He calls it one of the hardest things he ever did. "If you not strong up there," he says, tapping his head, "don't do Shock. It's a mental thing. They fuck with you to see how you react. Your hangers gotta be two fingers apart. Your shoes have to be in order, laces tucked and tied, bed has hospital corners. If your shit is not up to par, it'll be trashed. When you wake up in the morning, you gotta get dressed, shave clean, brush your teeth, have your shoes on, everything ready, outdoors ready to work out in two minutes. If you not dressed, you in trouble--they'll put you outside in a blizzard with shorts on, that type shit. You go through that shit, you never wanna get locked up again."

So when he was finally released in early 2004, and 50 and G-Unit president Sha Money XL braved the snowy tundra to pick him up, it was on. "As soon as I stepped out the door," Tony remembers, "Sha threw a chinchilla on my shoulders. Banks had bought me rings, 50 threw the Jacob on my wrist. I couldnÕt believe it. When I left, we had chains, but nothin' like that." They flew home, partied at a Manhattan steakhouse, and Yayo jetted to a hotel to meet the two ladies Banks had lined up for him. He was finally free, just like on the t-shirt. That was January 9th.

January 10th, he was back inside.

That morning, in preparation for his first appointment with his parole officer, Yayo had stopped to pick up a folder of his personal effects from the G-Unit offices--a folder that happened to include the fake passport he had procured for his European trip a year and a half earlier. So when his PO opened the folder and saw the passport with Tony's picture and his brother's name, it was a wrap. Of the serious variety. See, passport fraud is a federal crime. "They came in with the handcuffs," says Tony. "Boom. I was stressed. That was the most stressed point in my life, when I seen that US Marshal's jacket. The feds? I didn't think it was gonna be that big. I don't think nobody ever went to jail that fast."

He was in for another four and a half months, this time at the Brooklyn MDC federal detention center. Funny thing about federal prison: the cellmates get major. Not only did Peter Gotti and a few suspected terrorists call Brooklyn MDC home, but so did one Kenneth "Supreme" McGriff, the legendary Queens druglord whose ties with The Inc. are still under federal scrutiny, and whose problems with G-Unit are a matter of public record. "He was on a different floor, so I never saw him," says Yayo of Supreme. "But to me, he was really nobody. He's a person who's livin' on his past. I had messages sent to me: 'Fuck me, fuck 50.' And I sent messages back to him like, 'Suck my dick.'"

As his bid wound down, Yayo was once again faced with the prospect of going back to the career that was ripped away in its infancy. Banks was finishing work on his own album at the time, but held it past deadline in hopes that his man could jump on. So when, at 2 p.m. on May 24, 2004, Sha Money picked Yayo up in the Range, just like he had almost five months before, they drove straight to the studio. "When I came home the second time, I wasn't really thinkin' about pussy too much," he says. "I was just excited to get in the booth." The first thing he recorded became the final verse on "Ain't No Click," off Banks' The Hunger For More--and from his opening bark of "uno, dos, tres, cuatro," you can hear the exuberance in his voice. A year and a half of watching his crew from afar, waiting for his chance, all came out in that long-suppressed sixteen. After Yayo laid the verse, he stayed in the studio and finished three more songs. He was there all night. ****

By now, Thoughts of a Predicate Felon is just about finished, and though the final sequence is still up in the air, the tracks that have been leaked conform to G-Unit's shrewd and well-tested formula. There's "Dear Susie," a concept record inspired by fan mail he received in lockup; the Dre-produced street-creeper, "Live By the Gun"; and the similarly menacing "Homicide." All delivered with a vigor that's unmistakably Yayo. ("He's the energy god of the group," says DJ Big Mike, who's done two G-Unit mixtapes. "He just get real amped.") "So Seductive" is the club joint, with playful come-ons and an infectious hook that sounds like vintage 50. In the wake of Game's album, which attracted some controversy for 50's heavy songwriting involvement, the question naturally arises of Thoughts: where does 50 end and Yayo begin?

"I know people probably think 50 wrote the hook," Yayo says of "So Seductive." "But I'm not mad at that. I wrote this song before 50 wrote 'Candy Shop.' He liked it so much he said 'so seductive' on that song. I wanna prove to the world I can do it myself. I don't want 50 all over my album doing every hook, because I wanna prove that I'm a good songwriter too."

"He did write all those hooks," says 50, of Yayo's catchy raps, adding that a similarity in style is only natural. "And you know what it is....Where else would he take influence from? We in the same camp! He's been around me forever, I mean forever. Yayo's the first person with me. WeÕve been around each other every day since '97, besides him having to go to jail, so...."

Indeed, Yayo's history with 50 goes back to the days when the G-Unit Boss was known as Boo Boo. The bond is strong, and Yayo's allegiance is solid as cement. "Back when 50 was shot-up and recovering," remembers Banks, of the now-legendary May 2000 attempt on his boss's life, "through that whole time, Yayo was the one who was telling me, 'Trust me, don't do your deal with nobody else. Because I'm telling you, 50 gon' do it.'"

That loyalty is a big reason why Yayo jumped at the chance to inherit the Joe/Jada/Ja beef when he got free. "I look at it like this," he says. "50 started it. I'll finish it." He does his part on "I Run New York," jumping into the fray with glee: Style and Sheek Louche went double plastic/Yayo, Buck and Banks was puttin' out classics/A hundred shots, a hundred clips, y'all ready to die?/Fat Joe ain't a gangsta, he scared to fly/Automatic Mausberg, who want a piece of this, punk?/I'll have Ja Rule buried in some high-heeled pumps.

"To me it's more than rap," he says now. "If you feel you wanna say threatening words, you feel 50's a 'little nigga'"--this referring to Joe's comments in a recent issue of XXL--"you wanna take it there? Fat Joe's not a big nigga. He's a fat li'l nigga. I never respected Fat Joe's music anyway. Plus, I'm richer than Jadakiss, and I ain't even put out an album yet."

As for Ja, well, the roots of that conflict run deep. Back in February 2000, when 50 was ambushed by Ja and Murder Inc. in the Hit Factory, Yayo was there. "50 left with a scratch on his back. I left with this right here and that right there," he says, pointing to two small scars on his index finger and thumb. Some rumors have had it that Yayo was really the one behind the order of protection 50 allegedly filed against Murder, Inc. "That shit is all phony," he scoffs. "They printed that shit up to discredit a nigga's character. All I know is that we had a fight. And I know if 15 of my niggas come in the studio, we're gonna leave you on a stretcher."

Back on the block in Queens, it's another case of the more things change, the more they stay the same. "When I come through, a lot of people is more nervous than happy to see me," Yayo says. "A lot of people are scared of 50, so they think something's gonna happen." A couple of weeks ago, Sha Money XL was reportedly set up at a Southside barber shop, locked inside and robbed. "All I can say," says Yayo about the situation, "is you fuck with the family, you fuck with me. That's the most I can address on it. I don't wanna talk into it, and get indicted or some shit. People just hate us 'cause we're doin' it."

Those words resonate even more at the G-Unit offices, during a screening of footage recently shot for a forthcoming DVD. It's a homecoming scene, Yayo and his people back on 134th, and everything's love for a while. But like the song says, whenever Tony Yayo's in the house, there's always the possibility: bad news. "It's about to get a little violent here," he says. On the screen, as he walks into a vacant lot, his expression changes and he starts exchanging words with someone off-camera: "Maybe you should skiddaddle, man," he says. "I'm in a good mood, and I really don't wanna have to put someone in the hospital today." Things escalate, sounds of yelling and a scuffle, and suddenly a gut-wrenching crunch can be heard. The camera pans quickly to a man, an associate of G-Unit nemesis (and former member) Domination, laid out on the street. When dude gets up and runs off, Yayo yells after him: "Don't even come back on this block, nigga. Tell Domination that. And you better not come back with your fuckin' hammer!" Turns out, Yayo says, the kid's jaw was broken in three places.

He wants to keep things calm; really, he does. He's dealing with a 9 o'clock curfew every day as part of his parole agreement, and he needs permission to leave New York City. But as things loosen up some--he'll be touring this summer, and his parole should be over by next March--he's slowly reverting to the gale-force persona he was before prison, the unfiltered Yayo that everyone's been waiting to hear. "These rappers out there," he says, "they not stars. That's why they don't sell. I'm a natural-born star. People like me. I'm a people person."