The largest moon of the planet Hyperion was known by official Federation records simply as "TTRS-4A," but the local colonists preferred the name "Moon of a Thousand Songs." They thought the catchy name might distract them from how dreadfully boring everything there was.
Adam's lens clicked as the gunship left the planet's penumbra, switching to a different mode to account for the change in brightness. "We will be landing shortly," he declared.
Samus was already checking her equipment. "No need to remind me, Adam," she said, materializing her cannon. She could hear the soft buzzing noise as the millions of tiny machines around her body constructed it into being. "It's not like we get many good jobs these days anyway."
"Still, it doesn't hurt to be cautious."
The rest of her suit materialized around her, leaving only her head exposed. She swore she could feel her skin tingle every time her power suit drew energy from her, but her doctor had assured her that sensation was most likely psychosomatic. She grabbed a hair tie. "I still don't understand why they need us, though. So they discovered an unidentifiable substance leaking into a mine shaft somewhere. You'd think that would happen more often."
"It's the substance itself that's the issue. They're afraid it may be another instance of the X parasite. After the incident at BSL, that possibility is fairly high on the Federation's list of precautions. As the only person known to be immune to the parasite, it's understandable that they would notify you specifically."
She finished tying her hair. "So we're the hazard crew then. Good to know."
"Still, you're going to be careful out there, right Lady?"
"Oh come on, Adam." She materialized her helmet, which flickered, performing a quick systems check. "You already know how I'm going to answer that."
The elevator lowered her from the gunship with a hiss. The sunlight off the bare sandstone nearly blinded Samus, forcing her to shield her eyes before her visor could adjust. The planet Hyperion loomed above, nearly black with shadow. It seemed a bit ominous having such a massive body hanging there in the sky, almost unnatural. It pricked something in her basic human mind, the little switch that says 'look out for falling rocks.' If there's one thing that Samus learned from a lifetime of exploring the galaxy, it's that animal instinct is simply not equipped to deal with life among the stars.
The crimson sun was high in the sky, almost behind the planet. The sun's name was Tartarus, after its designation, 'TTRS.' What an uninviting name for a star; Samus honestly had no idea why it stuck. In a few minutes, Tartarus would disappear behind the planet, and the moon would be shrouded in an eclipse, like a second nighttime. Due to the moon's tidal lock with its planet, this must happen quite often. Once every "day," probably.
"You must be Samus Aran." The voice pulled Samus back to reality. It belonged to a Federation soldier clad in full-body armor. She frowned. The soldier's armor wasn't the sturdiest model out there, but it was obvious that the Federation was expecting some degree of danger.
"That's right," Samus replied. She glanced down at the soldier's nameplate. "Gregson, is it?"
Gregson nodded. "Follow me, ma'am. The mines are right this way."
The path to the mines was long and narrow. While Samus lamented that Adam couldn't have found a closer landing spot, she could see why he chose to land so far. The terrain was jagged and torn, almost chaotic. Large, sharp rocks and angular cliff faces and massive crystalline spires dominated the landscape. Some of the crystals glowed with an uncanny white light that sent shivers down Samus' spine and left her with an empty feeling in her head. She tried not to stare at those.
As they approached the mine, Samus saw that something else prevented a clear landing spot: a sea of people, right in front of the mine entrance. There was quite a variety of different species in the crowd, too: Humans, Vanitax, Shenti, Zalfor, even a family of Garinians. Samus hadn't seen a crowd this diverse in quite a while. All of them were wearing warm, layered clothing. This moon was on the edge of the habitable zone, and was fairly frigid. The only reason this moon in particular was habitable in the first place was because the tidal forces from its host planet squashes and squeezes the moon and heats it up from the inside out. The intense geologic activity was also responsible for the abundance of rich mineral deposits, as well as the frequent quakes.
The mine itself was carved into the side of a mountain. Two Federation marines stood guard at the entrance to the mine, fending off a flood of locals. Signs bobbed up and down within the crowd, bearing slogans and insignia that Samus didn't recognize. Chants filled the air, saturating it with discontent. Obviously, this was some kind of protest.
Gregson stopped on the hill. "I trust you can find your way from here. Good luck."
What? Why? "Is the crowd down there dangerous?"
Gregson shrugged. "We don't want to provoke them. They think we shut down the mines because we want to seize control of their Floralite or something. Typical conspiracy trash, you know how it is. Just don't do anything to get them riled up. You're a hero, these types look up to people like you."
So that's the real reason they called her in. Well, partly. They needed more than some faceless marines to get the locals to safety if need arises, and who better to use as a figurehead than Samus Aran?
Sure enough, it was true. The crowd's uproar dulled to a murmur as she approached. "It's Samus, Samus Aran is here," they whispered.
"Yes, yes, it's me," muttered the bounty hunter. "Had a good look yet?"
A high pitched voice shouted over the crowd. "LOOK OUT!"
Instinctively, Samus activated her suit shields, but it was too late. She was promptly tackled by a large, furry blur. Said blur then began to furiously lick her visor and bark, blocking out her view with a thick layer of saliva. After a moment of surprise, she managed to push the furry thing off of her and get back to her feet. Her suit's environment system quickly vaporized the dog spittle covering her visor. The dog itself happily bounced in front of her, its rear bits shaking vigorously.
A young girl trotted up. "Sammy! Here girl!" she said, patting her legs. The dog barked and bounded over to its owner.
"Is this your dog?"
"Yep! We named her after you! Isn't she great?"
"BARK!" said Sammy.
Samus chuckled. "She sure is. Try to keep better track of her, okay? It sounds like she has a tendency to wander off." Not unlike her namesake, she thought to herself.
The girl nodded. "Will do! Come on, Sammy!"
"BARK!"
The two of them melded back into the crowd. Once they were safely away, Samus turned to the mine, and nodded to the guard to let her in. As she entered the mines, Samus realized that she had an uncharacteristic smile on her face.
The mines were long and twisted, as mines tend to be. As it usually is with minerals, especially minerals like Floralite, the veins don't often follow a straight or predictable path. As such, the mine itself was like a damn labyrinth. If it wasn't for the map Adam uploaded to her visor, Samus could easily have imagined getting lost down there. Plus, it was cramped as hell. After a while, Samus got tired of ducking under the arches and, of course, just curled up into a ball and rolled the rest of the way. Damn, that function was useful sometimes.
The path was long and wound back and forth several times, but when she finally reached the chamber with the alleged X-parasite, she was dumbfounded. The chamber was massive, probably a magma chamber from an ancient volcano that had vented long ago. There was a thin land bridge arcing across, and stalactites hung from the ceiling like innumerable war wasp hives. But the most shocking thing about the room was the sickly yellow light that danced across the ceiling, and the churning, bubbling, roiling sea of amber-colored fluid that emanated it.
If all this was X-parasite, everyone on this moon was already dead. Everyone in this system was already dead.
Samus scanned it just to make sure. Sure enough, it was as she feared. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, counting to three before exhaling.
"Adam," she said into her comm, "We may have a little bit of a problem."
"I'm seeing the images from your visor," he replied. "You're sure all of that is X?"
"Unless my suit is giving me a false positive, which it never does."
Adam was silent for a second, no doubt processing this information and devising a plan to deal with it. "All right, I'll call for an evacuation and reinforcements. You should head up and try your hand at convincing the locals, since they don't seem to harbor any particular fondness for the Federation."
"All right, will do."
"BARK!"
Oh, no.
Samus ended her call just in time to hear a "Sammy!" followed by a "HEY KID! STOP! YOU CAN'T GO DOWN THERE!"
Change of priority, Samus thought. There was a lot of X here, but it looked like it was dormant for now. As long as nothing touched it, it would be fine. In contrast, a young child in a mine shaft was a more immediate threat. She took off running in search of the girl with the dog.
The mines were almost a labyrinth, but luckily the girl kept calling her dog, allowing Samus to hear roughly where she was at all times. Unfortunately, both the girl and the dog were quick on their feet, and for a while Samus only caught glimpses of the girl's ponytail whipping around a corner, and stretched shadows of the dog on the wall. As she gave chase, she began to recognize the caverns. She felt a pit growing in her stomach. If they found the X-chamber…
Samus' thoughts were cut short as she rounded the corner.
The girl and the dog were indeed in the X-filled chamber. Worse, the dog was on the opposite side of the land bridge. Even worse, the X seemed to be reacting to the extra consumable biomass (in other words, the girl and the dog) that had suddenly entered its domain. It had now risen so that it lapped at the sides of the bridge.
The girl was clapping her hands and shouting. "Come on, Sammy!"
Samus inhaled and counted to three. Time to address the situation. Somehow, the girl knew instinctively that the X parasite was dangerous, and wasn't rushing in herself. That was good. The dog, too, seemed to know there was some sort of danger, but didn't seem to know what the danger was. And the X was bubbling very close now. If the dog was startled in any way, one misstep would spell doom for it, and probably for everything else on the moon. There was only one course of action.
Samus leaned forward and joined the little girl, patting her legs and calling out to the dog. "Here, Sammy! Come on, you can do it! Come on, girl!"
Sammy growled at something unseen, and reached out a paw.
"That's it! Atta girl!"
Another step.
"rrr-BARK!"
A hesitation.
"Shh-shh-ssh! It's gonna be okay, girl. Just come on."
The X burbled and bubbled in anticipation.
"Come on, girl. You can do it, come on."
Another step.
"That's it! Come on!"
Another step. And another.
"She's gonna make it!"
"BARK! BARK! rrrrrrrrrrrr…."
A hesitation, and….
"No, Sammy! Keep going! You can—!"
A step backwards.
A yelp as yellow spikes jammed their way through soft paw-flesh. Amber tendrils wrapped their way up the leg, stabbing and stitching through it like needles through tapestry. Yellow color seeped through the animal, infecting it and transforming it into more of itself. The whole chamber seemed to shake.
"SAMMYYYYYY!"
The tendrils thickened and bundled, wrapping around the dog's leg like ropes before snapping taut, dragging the creature off-balance and pulling it beneath the surface of the roiling yellow.
For a moment, all was still. Even the ripples of the dog disappearing beneath the yellow cauldron eventually dissipated.
Then, the pool exploded.
Samus scooped the child up with a single motion, kicking off as fast as she could. Her suit responded to the situation, injecting 10CCs of adrenaline directly into her thigh. She could feel her pupils dilate and her heart rate speed up twofold. The ground beneath her feet quaked, but she didn't notice. Drops of yellow liquid splashed around her and began forming into shapes, but she tried not to think about it. She tried not to think about the rushing wave of deadly amber fluid directly behind her.
She opened up her comm. "ADAM! EVAC! NOW!" She hung up, and hoped that would be enough to get him to do what she wanted.
She blurred past the guard on the way out, who was no doubt checking to see if the girl and her dog were okay. She didn't have time for him. Before he could speak, he was swallowed by the wave.
Samus reached the entrance of the mine and immediately turned around, firing three missiles at the arch of the door, collapsing it into a pile of rubble that blocked the entrance. The crowd scattered, shouting in surprise.
"What is she doing?!"
"A marine is still in there!"
"Who cares, leave him to rot!"
"Those are OUR mines!"
"What is she thinking?!"
"Wait, is she carrying—?"
Samus set the girl down, who immediately ran to who Samus presumed to be her father, or at least some sort of caretaker or paternal figure. "Thank the stars you're all right!" He looked up at Samus with pleading eyes. "The dog… where's Sammy?"
Samus shook her head. "Everyone, listen up!" she shouted. "All of you need to get off this moon, right now! Grab your families, grab your dearest possessions, get one the nearest shuttle and get the hell off this rock! There's something in that mine that can and will send everyone here to a fate worse than death if you stay, so get out while you can!"
She turned to that marine (Gregson, was it?) who had run up when he heard the missile blasts. "Get your ships in the air, as soon as possible. Get all the civilians into shuttles, and get them the hell away from this moon and this planet. Don't ask why, just do it. If they complain, shoot them with stun bolts and drag them off. Then once everyone's gone, call your superiors and have them drop rocks from orbit, slag this place down to the core. You can't leave anything left, do you hear me? Everything has to be molten by the time you're done with it. Everything."
She turned to the crowd and realized none of them had left yet. "What are you still doing here?!" She fired into the air, and the crowd flinched. "Get out while you still can, blast it!"
Someone stepped forward. "This place is the only home we've known! That mine is our lifeblood!"
Someone else. "Yeah! We can't just let you Federation types stomp all over us and take what's ours!"
"Yeah, this is our home!"
Are these people dense? Samus thought.
"Listen, I—!"
Her words were cut off by the sound of molten destruction finally eating its way through the wall of rubble. The ground trembled, and a wave of yellow burst forth from the once-sealed tunnel. The protestors finally decided to flee, but not before a few of them got snagged up by the many arms of the massive liquid beast.
Samus turned to face the monstrosity. It was growing more solid now, but it looked like it was still deciding on a form. Teeth and claws and half-finished faces slashed and squished and screamed brief elegies before returning to the formless soup of destruction. It looked like the X was playing with the genetic material at hand, trying out different patterns and combinations, seeing what sort of shapes it could tease out from the infinitudes of combinations of genes both active and long-defunct. Wings and fins and nautilus shells and eyeballs of every shape and color sprouted from the amorphous mass. And more, too. Ribs, intestines, beating hearts, and other organs usually found on the inside of creatures lined the thing like a pulsating organic garland. Samus couldn't help but feel sick to her stomach.
"Adam, where the hell are you," Samus said to no one in particular.
Gregson and the remaining Federation troopers fired on the beast. Round after glowing energy round slammed into the abomination, sending it reeling backwards. It formed a massive pair of jaws just to shout in annoyance.
Then, as it was still being pummeled by a barrage of energy fire, it stopped. All the extra appendages and organs retreated into the shape, and its surface became smooth as glass. Thinking they'd won, the Federation soldiers advanced on the abomination, still firing.
A massive clawed arm sprouted from the yellow sphere, hanging in the air for a moment before slamming with all its might down on poor Gregson. He was flattened instantly. Then another claw formed, swiping away the remaining soldiers, leaving Samus the only one left. Then a hind leg formed, then another, then a long, dripping tail ending in a barbed point. The last thing to form was the head, a head with pointed ears and a grizzled snarl and yellow saliva webbed between its conical teeth. A dog's head. Its eyes were black as coal, and glowed with a red light; smoke trailed from them like signal flares.
The abomination reared to its full height—easily ten meters or more—and screamed skyward as several long, yellow tendrils sprouted from its back like the wings of a spider-web demon. The ground shook. The mountain moved. The scream sounded uncannily like a human.
There was a flash of light, and the abomination reeled backwards, shielding its face. Another explosion hit it squarely in the chest, and then another, and another. Samus barely had time to wonder where they were coming from when the shadow of her gunship flew overhead.
"Sorry I'm late, Lady."
"Took you long enough," Samus muttered under her breath.
The abomination roared as Adam unleashed another barrage of missiles.
"It seems as though this mission has not gone entirely to plan," Adam quipped, his voice the usual deadpan.
"YOU COULD SAY THAT, YEAH," Samus shouted half-sarcastically. She intended to respond normally, but it came out as a shout. It was probably the adrenaline in her system. She began charging a super missile.
"Once it is over, perhaps we should take a brief detour to somewhere nice. Somewhere with food, preferably."
Samus released the missile, which blew off a large chunk of the beast's shoulder. The shoulder simply re-formed.
Was he really planning on discussing dinner dates while confronting a massive monster that could easily destroy all life in this star system? "Slow down, tin can. Can you even eat food? Last I checked you don't even have a physical body. Besides the gunship, I mean."
"I have my ways."
How long was it since he had been her CO? And how long since he died? And yet here he was, still annoying the crap out of her from beyond the grave. Samus shook her head. "So where did you have in mind?"
"You know, I was thinking maybe-"
The creature roared, and barbed tendrils stabbed through the gunship's starboard engine. Startled, Adam tried to fly away, flaring his remaining engines, but the tendrils snapped taut, pulling him closer to the monster. The yellow seeped into the engine, devouring it. A small alarm sounded and the entire starboard engine decoupled from the rest of the craft, causing the whole machine to jerk forward from the sudden loss of inertia. The engine itself was pulled into the side of the abomination, which relinquished its shape for a brief moment to swallow the mechanical device, amoeba-like.
Without one of its main engines, the gunship spiraled away, its auxiliary engines flickering uselessly as Adam tried to adjust to the loss of such a critical component. The abomination regained its shape, with a couple cylindrical new additions on its back slowly forming from the many wrapping tendrils that sprang forth from its hide. Once its head was fully recognizable again, it turned to face Samus directly. For a moment, Samus was frozen in fear.
The beast roared as the ground shook once again and Samus turned to flee, curling into a ball. The mountain finally gave in to the pressure of the quake. The whole face of it collapsed, and boulders the size of houses tumbled down its side. The beast's new additions, a pair of oversized rocket engines copied from the piece it snagged from the gunship, flared, sending the creature into the sky just in time for it to avoid the first volley of falling rocks. Samus wasn't so lucky.
Rolling down the hill from momentum alone, Samus herself became part of the avalanche of rock. Pebbles bounced against the armored shell of her morph ball. Inside, Samus clenched her teeth. She prayed that none of the larger boulders would hit her. Then she noticed an even bigger problem.
The quake had opened up a massive chasm right in front of her, too big for her to leap across. She uncurled as quickly as she could, wheeling herself backwards and almost falling over in the process. Boulders bounced past her and into the massive pit. At the bottom, she could see crystal spikes, the same kind whose uncanny glow gave her a headache. She turned around.
The beast had somewhat adapted to its makeshift rocket pack, and was still bounding half-uncontrolled down the side of the mountain, heading straight for Samus. A metal shape soared past it, stopping right above Samus' head.
"Adam!"
"Hang on, this is going to be tricky," said Adam. The lower hatch of the gunship slid open, and the tractor beam activated. Before it grabbed Samus, however, the auxiliary thrusters flickered, causing the ship to careen to the side, ending up directly over the chasm. "I can't hold still, you're going to have to jump."
The beast was catching up. Samus nodded. She backed up, and took a running start. The ground shook one last time. She could feel the beast land directly behind her, its fetid breath saturating the air. She reached the edge of the chasm. She leapt.
Her arc took her up into the air. Her arms flailed, reaching out for a hold that wasn't there. She could see the tractor beam directly in front of her. She had judged the jump correctly. For a moment, she almost thought she was going to make it.
Then Samus heard the roar of twin rocket engines. A gigantic yellow blur hit the gunship, tearing it in two as it shrieked another of its uncannily humanoid screams. The tractor beam flickered and died, with Samus inside.
She fell.
Flaming debris rained down around her.
She didn't even feel it when the glowing white crystal impaled her through the chest.
High upon the clifftop, the beast with the flaming eyes stared silently as the hunter drew her last breath. Then, it howled at the planet above.
The red sun slid behind the black disc, eclipsing the land in shadow.
Darkness had fallen.
...Nng…
…Kksss…
…Pressure…stabilize…
In the beginning, there was a little girl. The girl cried out to her mommy, but her mommy wasn't there. She cried out to her daddy, but her daddy wasn't there. Feathers drifted around her as beaked faces looked concerned upon her.
The dragon with hate-filled emerald eyes cackled as the raging flames cast it in silhouette.
When were the tests, again?
"From thirteen hundred to fourteen hundred, power suit training. From fourteen thirty to sixteen hundred, lunch. From sixteen hundred to sixteen thirty, lunch clean-up. From seventeen hundred to nineteen hundred, afternoon training. From twenty hundred to twenty-one thirty…"
Mother… Mother Brain…
"That never would have happened if I had been there…"
Baby… Gave your life…
"SAMMYYYYYY!"
Samus' eyes snapped open. Her hand bolted forward, and hit curved glass. She heard someone's muffled voice, which she thought she recognized. "You gave her too much! She's already awake!" There was some sort of fluid draining out of her tank. Her feet were wet.
"Wh-where…?" she said. A face pressed up against the glass, but Samus was having trouble focusing on it.
"Samus, can you hear me? I want you to nod if you can hear me."
Samus didn't nod. She looked around the inside of whatever she was in, her hands scrambling for some sort of way to open it.
"Samus, nod if you can hear me."
Get out get out get out get out get out…
"It's not working. Someone sedate her. Wipe her and try again. I don't know if enough of her made it through."
No no no no no…
"She's broken the tubing with all that thrashing, I'm going to have to inject her manually."
"Okay, but be careful."
A gloved hand opened the tank. This was Samus' chance. She kicked the door with all her might, sending it straight into the person's face. She stumbled to her feet. She was wearing a hospital gown. She felt strangely weak.
"Grab her! Grab her before she runs off!"
Samus ran. She ran as fast as she could. The walls were metal and the floor was cold and she was still dripping wet with some sort of clear viscous fluid.
She turned the corner and almost ran into a door. The door must have been transparent, because she could see a young woman on the other side. She had short blond hair and couldn't have been older that twenty, and she looked scared. Samus didn't have time for someone like her.
"Open the door," said Samus. The girl mouthed something too, but Samus couldn't hear it. The door must be sound-proof, she thought. She tried to mouth the words, enunciating them clearly for the girl to read her lips. "Open the-…"
The girl on the other side was mouthing the exact same way.
Samus froze, and so did the girl. Samus placed her hand on the door, and so did the girl. The girl began to cry. Samus' vision blurred with tears, as well.
"This can't be happening to me…" said the girl.
She slid to her knees. The clanking boots of armored Federation troopers came up behind her. She could see them in the reflection. They grabbed her by the shoulders and dragged her off.
They were taller than she remembered.