The small colony world of TY132, known locally as Forthis, was by anyone's standards a beautiful planet, even after 30 years of colonization the terrestrial world, just beyond the borders of Galactic Federation territory, had yet to see any noticeable taint from its human population. This was by no means indicative of a lack of expansion, but rather, the colonists were a one of those few groups who prized the planet as an enjoyable place to live, rather than being solely useful for its minerals and wide tracts of unclaimed land that wasn't subject to taxation, and the planet already boasted three large cities, each one with a functional space port. Of course, protecting the natural state of the planet had required strict restrictions on the rate of industrialization and the majority of the planet's galactic income came from the trade of agricultural goods rather. Trading wasn't particularly regular however, the planet lay beyond the borders of Federation military protection after all, few were willing to make deals with a colony that could, in their eyes, disappear at any point due to pirate attacks or an internal revolution.
The people of the TY132 were perfectly happy with this situation however, a quieter life, separated from the wider galaxy was what many of them had come to this world for, and without any munition factories or any notable deposits of rare minerals, they weren't a likely target for pirate attack anyway.
In the year 2059 of the Cosmic Calendar, TY132 greeted the new galactic year much the same way as it did every year, by carrying on with daily life. For the people of the planet it was more important to celebrate the planetary year, after all, the colony had been established to be an escape from the wider galaxy, keeping in time with the Federation wasn't a priority for most, and all but the planets leaders carried on their days, not knowing or caring about the event. And tragically, it would be a year that only one of them would ever remember…and here, slowly, we will unfold, piece by piece, her story.
The wind blew through the empty streets with a vicious whistle, it wasn't particularly strong, but it carried death along with it, death that had been, and death that was to come, to people, animals, plants, buildings, to the very planet, a world-wide funeral bell rung by a single word: Kiol. Even to those who are unfamiliar with the concept, the term 'Planetary Exterminator Virus' or 'PEV' is chilling, without any further explanation one immediately understands the terror of such a thing, a virus, so powerful and unstoppable in its workings that once released, an entire planet, with everything on it is sentenced to death. Kiol is a particularly vicious strain, while unlike some it lacks sentience, perhaps that makes it all the more intimidating, with no thought, with no will, it mindlessly sweeps over a planet, spreading rapidly throughout the atmosphere, reproducing at almost unbelievable rates, within mere weeks entire Earth-sized planets are barren spheres. Nothing is ignored by Kiol, while organics are the quickest to fall, as the PEV disassembles them from the inside out and the outside in, even inanimate objects are subject to its destructive power, it turns entire planets to a fine dust, levelling cities, hills, forests, leaving an empty wasteland devoid of anything but the stench of death.
Forthis was already 13 days into the infection process, the stage at which life had long since ceased, pets, plants, livestock, everything was dead, and now the cities themselves were beginning to fall apart, slowly eaten away by invisible death. One would quickly, and quite rationally at this far into the process, declare the population of the planet gone, but unknown to all, among all the dead, there was one who was still dying.
Between the city of Joreth and her countryside home, a young girl, no more than three or four years old, was slowly walking. Every day she made this journey, hoping to come home and find that everything was okay before finding it wasn't so and falling into a deep sleep alone in the decaying ruins of her parents' house. Each day when she woke up, she would walk back into the city that was rapidly falling apart and scavenge what food she could find, none of it was ever intact, and eating only caused her more pain as she took in food that was covered in the very thing that was consuming the planet. However, her body resisted, it wasn't unheard of for there to be people who were resistant to PEVs, but even those who could survive the virus itself never survived long, after all, there was only so long one could go before hunger and thirst took over, and no one was willing to risk landing a ship to perform a rescue operation for the sake of a single person.
The girl obviously wasn't completely immune to the effects of the virus however, her long, raven-black hair was missing in patches, her skin flaking everywhere it was visible, her breath ragged as each inhalation brought more decay to her lungs, even her clothes were tattered, the PEV slowly eating away everything she had. Her pale green eyes were beginning to fail her as she stumbled forward, not even sure anymore if what she was doing had any meaning, yet she had no choice, what else was there for her but to give up and die.
The young girl paused, stopping, looking around her, her failing sight didn't make much of a difference, blurred or not, the scenery would look much the same, a pale brown wasteland littered with distorted buildings lying strewn about as if dropped out of a giants toy box. Perhaps she should just give up, she herself didn't quite know what was going on, but in the presence of such death, it was impossible not to glean even a little understanding of the concept. Would it hurt? Could it hurt any more than what she was going through now? In the end, she just wanted it to be over, it was why she made the journey, on the slim hope that this was all just a bad dream of some kind and that if she could just make it home, her mother would be there, her father, people she could wrap her arms around and cry to, people who could make it all better, but part of her knew that this journey would end the same as all the others.
That part of her quickly had to correct itself however, as a faint hum suddenly began to reverberate through the air, an unnatural, mechanical wind. The girl turned her gaze skyward as a dull, bronze-coloured, three-thruster spacecraft descended from the sky, a faint purple field pulsing out from the ship, forming a meter-wide buffer between itself and the atmosphere. She fell to her knees, the mere thought of the possibility that someone might be coming to rescue her filled her with such hope that she no longer had the strength to stand, merely watch as the craft carefully descended, the three thrusters rotating on limbs to form legs as the ship came to a rest a few yards from where she sat. There was silence for a few moments before a panel opened beneath the craft and a lift descended from within, upon which stood a single figure, tall and imposing, armoured in an orange armour suit. The girl couldn't see properly, but she could tell they weren't human, she'd never met an alien before…she'd only ever heard stories, but now one was coming to rescue her.
As the figure left the field generated by the craft, a similar one immediately sprang up around their own form in a sphere, creating a bubble that engulfed the girl as just a pace away, they stopped and looked down. Looking up pleadingly at the figure, she opened her mouth, to try and ask for help.
"Please…"
Her voice betrayed more of her condition than anything one might imagine from looking at her, it sounded barely human, the result of a vocal system already decaying and the entirety of her internal organs being damaged by the very air she was breathing. The figure noticed this immediately and knelt down, laying a hand so gently on her shoulder that the contact was almost non-existent.
"Shhh…be still little one, now is not the time for your strength, nor the place for your words, sleep now, and wake renewed."
The figure's words were spoken perfectly into the mind of the girl, layered with a gentle prompting to let go. In her condition she had no power to resist the psychic power behind the telepathy, her eyes closing and her body falling limp into the arms of the alien, who smiled sorrowfully beneath its helmet. Picking up the girl, it returned to the craft which would soon return to the sky and disappear into the black void of space, the alien speaking only a single line before entering the ship.
"You sleep a victim, little one, but you will wake a saviour."
Author's note: Well, I've been absent from actually writing for some time now, and I feel it's about time to get back into it, I'm not going to try and push myself as hard as I did the last couple of times, which I believe resulted in me burning myself out far too quickly, so updates might not be as common as I would normally like them to be, but better to get a story that's finished slowly than the first few chapters in a week of a story that will never be finished. On this story itself, I plan it as some additional exposition for a Metroid idea I've had in my mind for years, it will be updated alongside the main story as so it doesn't spoil the main plot, but will focus on developing one of the main characters in that story. Chapter 1 of that story is my current project, so I hope to have it out within a fortnight provided I can keep my levels of procrastination to a minimum, feel free to PM me if you think I'm being too slow. To finish I'll simply say that my interpretation of the Metroid universe is incomplete, while I have played most games through to completion (though I have read up on the stories of each), I have not done so with all of them, and my knowledge of the manga, while not nil, is limited, and I write with this in mind, but I will continue with what I am aware of regarding the universe, any inconsistencies are likely due to me not knowing beforehand and I will continue to write the story in my mind rather than alter it to be something more correct. I do not own Metroid, nor claim to have any connections to the people who do and write this solely because I love the setting of the franchise and want to demonstrate my enthusiasm through creative writing. If you have any specific questions regarding what the canon of this story will be you can feel free to ask me in a PM or when you leave a review and I will do my best to respond.