Samus Aran, The Savior of the Universe and greatest bounty hunter ever, had just taken her most mundane job ever. Bodyguard for a bunch of snooty British sounding museum curators and history buffs on a trip to one of the moons of Zebes that survived the blast.

The uncreatively named Zebes Moon 02, or ZM02 for short, is a small, inhabitable and highly hostile moon with a similar gravity to earth, and the entire surface covered in one big desert. With a temperature range of 120 Fahrenheit in the day and -20 at night and absolutely no water whatsoever, it was no wonder that nobody even bothered to set foot on the moon. Planetary scans showed no valuable resources and a slightly acidic yet still breathable atmosphere if you didn't mind neverending coughing and sore throats. ZM02 was literally a useless ball of sand that even the craziest of people would refuse to visit. Upon its discovery, it was slapped with a basic label and was promptly ignored by virtually everyone.

So when ZM02 been scanned by the Hubble Telescope Mk. XVI and a crater formed from debris from Zebes coincidentally unearthed some hidden ruins on the arid desert moon, scientists and historians alike were immensely fascinated. Naturally, this led to the curators of the Historical Society of Ancient and Lost Civilizations to plan an expedition to the dangerous moon. Faced with multiple unknowns, the museum's board of directors decided to hire some extra protection. And when dealing with the Zebes system, there was no better guard to hire than Samus Aran.

After years of fighting space pirates and saving the universe many times over, she had officially hit rock bottom.

At least that's what she told herself. In reality, she was getting a lot of money for it, but she wanted the thrill of action more than money. For all intents and purposes, she was loaded. After rooting out the corruption in the inner circle of the Federation, she had been rewarded handsomely by Fleet Admiral Dane, but with the lack of evil scheming, most of the violence in the universe seemed to have stopped. Go figure.

But in doing so, she broke A LOT of laws. And the extent of her criminal activities could not be ignored by the Galactic Council. In order to secure her pardon, she had to agree to go into retirement unless the Federation needed her, and as much as she HATED taking orders, she hated the idea of spending the rest of her life in prison due to HUNDREDS of charges of espionage, smuggling, arson (which if asked, she will swear to the day she dies was an accident), trespassing, impersonating a public official, and high treason.

Nowadays she had reluctantly enjoyed a forced semi-retirement, doing the occasional bodyguard job for some high ranking officials, or occasionally running a training drill or two for the Federation's Soldiers. But not once had she taken a job that basically boiled down to shooting any hostile wildlife at a dig site.

The greatest Bounty Hunter in the universe was now a glorified critter cop.

So why this particular job? Samus had asked herself the same question multiple times, and every time she came up with the same conclusion. She was not sure. Part of her thought it was because of the Baby Metroid, and her regret from not being able to save the creature. Part of it may have been because she missed her adopted homeworld, and the trip to one of its moons would be a good escape for a bit.

More than likely, it was because she hoped SOMETHING would happen on the trip.

When that thought happened to cross her mind, she immediately pushed it out of her head. After all, why would anyone ever wish for something bad to happen on a mission?

So, here she was. In the cargo bay of the space freighter, fiddling with her zero suits armor digitizer. Ever since the events on the BSL and the X parasites invading her armor, she had been trying to undo the drastic changes to her power suit. Sure, the ability to absorb the X was amazing, but considering the X exploded on BSL, it was kind of moot point. Plus... she missed her old suit. After all, it was the only thing she had left of her home. For as tough as her childhood was, she missed Old Bird. Try as she might, she couldn't find a trace of him after her return to Zebes as a Federation Police Officer.

Regardless of her other reasoning, she still knew one thing was for sure. There were unsolved questions she needed answers to, and she hoped that a good old fashioned Metroid related mission would help solve the question that plagued her mind.

Looking away from the emblem on the back of her hand, she tossed the small fusion cutter she held back into a nearby toolbox and walked away with a sigh. As it looked now, she would need an expert surgeon, an electrician, and a quantum physicist to repair the damage on the hand emblem, not to mention the extensive modifications she had observed the chest and back of the suit. She had done all she could, and ZM02 was hours away at this point. Walking to a nearby cot, she decided it was time for a nap. From a nearby chair, she grabbed her old brown leather jacket from her days as a federation police officer and threw it over herself like a blanket as she laid down, closing her eyes as sleep slowly claimed her.

Expect infrequent updates. I am taking liberties with what is and isn't canon. Parts of Other M may be, but some aren't. For the most part, the manga, Zero Mission, Samus Returns, Super, and Fusion are canon. Other M and Prime are selective. Mainly because I haven't played Prime, and Other M is the Alien 3 of the series. For example, Samus's Jacket in the Other M flashbacks. And if I add tools from other franchise, like the Fusion Cutter, it will not be important down the line and just a one-off thing. Yeet.