Chapter two! Maybe the whole arrival into the cloud thingy wasn't worded or expressed the way I wanted it, but hopefully it's not too bad for you.
Samus banked left as hard as she could. A flurry of Space Pirate missiles shot past her as she did. An entire fleet, damaged as it may be, still somehow found the strength to turn and shoot at her.
The Gunship jerked abruptly as a Pirate fighter managed to shoot the right wing several times. She banked left, preventing further damage. Smoke began to emit from the damaged wing, and a further alarm warned Samus that the destruction was dangerously close to the missiles she carried. If those weapons were triggered while they were still in the ship, Samus would be gone.
She could either abandon ship or come up with an alternate solution, probably much riskier and endangered her life a lot more…
Eh, why not.
She double-checked the danger she was in. Her gunship showed her specific details on how bad the right wing had been shot. Temperatures inside the metal were rising and the weapons were only a few minutes from detonating…
She performed a corkscrew. Her ship flipped upwards and spiraled back towards the flurry of Battleships. Samus just then realized just how many ships she was facing. She didn't even have time to count the small fighters, but she saw at least sixteen battleships. Those were the only ones that had survived so far, but they were plenty a threat.
At least, fifteen of them were. Samus adjusted her course to fly directly towards the nearest battleship. Normally it would have opened fire, but most of its weapons were no longer powered due to the Phazon loss and those that were operational hadn't been manned yet, as most of the pirates were still trying to recover from their magical power source disappearance. And even worse, many of the pirates had been enhanced with Phazon, and the sudden drain would be a bit hard to readjust to. Many died instantly because of the sudden loss. That was probably why the Parasite Queens on the first battleship Aran had landed on were so traumatized.
It didn't matter. Samus was clear of most of the enemy fire and flew right above the battleship's bow. She launched all the missiles she had, stopping as soon as the right wing's batteries were vacant. A pair of missiles remained in her left wing. The missiles she fired were each sent to a different point on the ship, based on the logs she had downloaded from the other battleship before he destroyed it. If ever a Space Pirate ship had collapsed on itself, now was the time. Each missile landed on pinpoint locations and caused maximum damage.
Samus pulled up and looped again in time to avoid the explosion. No Pirates on the ship had been able to evacuate, though. The pirate ship collapsed and pirates were either crushed, sucked into cold space, or engulfed in the flames that followed. Three small pirate fighters had been a little too close and were showered in the debris. None survived.
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The cloud of phazon particles that were in the empty space that was once called Phaaze sensed lifeforms nearby. By nature, they took a deeper look at these newcomers. Some had been previously touched by phazon. In fact, they all had. But the source of Phazon had been destroyed, and the third party hosts had already lost the substance completely. Only this planet-sized cloud of phazon atoms remained. But, like phazon itself, these remains could "feel" and "think". Not in the same way Samus or Pirates or even Chozo could understand exactly, but it was living all the same.
These newcomers drew closer to the cloud. Before, Phazon had mutated, controlled, grown, and even created a clone of a planet, even if it was in a different dimension. Now, this cloud of phazon would continue with the "different dimension" path used previously by another leviathan, but this time, it would be different…
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Samus's Gunship beeped red suddenly. Her ship had an air leak and she was losing oxygen fast. Outside, a single pirate fighter had managed to breach Aran's ship. Fifteen Pirate Battleships and hundreds of small fighters chased after her.
Samus wasn't aware that the cloud of Phazon was still dangerous, nor did any of the pirates see how the cloud seemed to be flowing towards them and many particles of the dying Phazon were simply circling each other.
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Phantom-like tendrils of phazon wrapped around each ship, not solid enough to be detected even by Chozo technology. Then, each ship entered the cloud. Samus locked her suit to save her from the loss of air. Outside, she could see nothing but light blue. Then, everything went black.
From an outsider's point of view, they would have seen several ships flying through a cloud of phazon, until the cloud was too thick to see through and the ships were gone. But they didn't come out the other side.
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The cockpit of Samus's ship cleared and she saw a sky. A clean blue sky with clouds and a bright sun. Then she saw rock. A planet was beneath her, a familiar one, and she was a bit too distracted trying to understand why she could see Tallon IV beneath her as her gunship's right wing collided with one of the mountains.
Her ship spun out of control, headed straight for the surface. She gripped the controls but it was already too late. The last thing she did was press a button and a protective wall of metal closed around the cockpit. Then, impact.
One of the Space Pirate Battleships appeared above Tallon IV's area known as the Tallon Overworld. The captain began yelling orders to those pirates still alive and operating their terminals. The Battleship was in a collision course for a mountain, and there was no avoiding it. The pirate captain(a commando, to be exact), jumped and strapped himself in for the impact he knew would come.
The mountain crumbled as the metal ship crashed, the latter ripping in half and falling towards the lush green ground below. The landing echoed across all of Tallon… Or was it even Tallon IV at all? They had last been near Phaaze's coordinates, how had they moved? 5.1 trillion teratrons(exact calculations based off GF technology) of a planet didn't just migrate.
Right now, the pirates didn't matter. The crash had ended. The pirate commando wasn't moving. He wouldn't ever again. A branch from a tree the ship had landed on had torn through the command bridge and stabbed into the pirate's chest.
Other pirates suffered similar fates. One in the cargo bay had survived and found himself half buried in loose debris, but foolishly began removing it. It apparently wasn't as loose as he'd believed, and a broken maintenance crane came loose from its new position to crush the pirate. Other fatalities were all over the ship. Only a hundred or so had survived.
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Samus Aran woke up. The first thing she saw was her seat. Logic quickly came back to her. She was lying down on her back, on the ceiling of the ship. The gunship had been flipped during the crash. Slowly, memories of the crash, Phaaze, Dark Samus, and the cloud came back to her.
The hunter got to her feet slowly, painfully, dizzy and shaken up, but had no serious damage. Her suit malfunction had been minimal, only the PED suit had been broken, but since Phazon was gone, it didn't really matter.
She rebooted her ship, slowly, and searched through the accessible functions. Her first question was why was she on Tallon IV? If the ship couldn't access its logs, than she'd have to go out and find the answer herself.
Turns out she'd have to do just that. What a surprise. The ship was barely able to function, and it would be a while before the auto-repair program would activate, but even then, the ship didn't have enough power to work on its own and the right wing was severely damaged.
Outside the wrecked gunship, Samus witnessed Tallon IV's lush swamp again, not exactly happy but not the worst memory she ever had. The rain had already set in and she could hear native beasts all around her. But there was some other sound in the air…
She looked up to see what looked like an asteroid coming down towards the planet. Her mind went from asteroid to Leviathan instantly, the Phazon meteors that spread Phazon across the galaxy. But it wasn't a leviathan, it was made of metal.
It was Frigate Orpheon.
Samus pulled up her scanning visor. The results were unexpected.
Identified as Frigate Orpheon, one of the many Pirate Stations used as genetic experimentation sites. Database files indicate this particular station had been destroyed and crashed into Tallon IV.
That wasn't right.
Subject appears to be a compilation of Space Pirate technology, deceased organisms and Phazon particles. It is possible this is not the original station.
That made more sense. This was not the original. She had been on the original, and she'd watched it blow up! She was there to see the remains!
The Frigate disappeared behind the mountains, and the crash vibrated across the entire section of the planet. Samus no longer cared, she knew what happened to it. All she cared about now was learning about where she was.
She scanned a nearby bush, already knowing it would yield unusual results.
Target is composed of plant and phazon cells. Target is drifting from this dimension, suggesting phazon involvement beyond simple structure.
That was scary. What was worse than reading that?
Samus thought too soon. She heard a shriek and whirled around towards the sound, arm cannon at the ready. What climbed over the cliff and into her line of sight was a creature she'd never expected to see again.
Ing!!! Samus almost panicked. The warrior ing shrieked again and charged towards her, but she fired back. One of the beast's legs fell off, but it continued its attack. Samus jumped out of the way and switched to her morph ball. She returned to her original form and shot the beast from behind with a missile. The Warrior ing slowed, ice forming around its joints. But one of its legs swung at Samus's feet, knocking her into the mud. She rolled over and pointed her cannon straight into the beast's red eye. Her Nova Beam punctured straight through and pierced the monster's deranged brain. Needless to say, it was dead.
The hunter jumped to her feet and observed the dead creature. She scanned the monster.
Deceased Warrior Ing. Native to Dark Aether, this species of Ing, along with all others, is extinct. Unusual phazon cells are within the interior, suggesting they are the only reason this creature is present.
So… Phazon made this Ing?
Samus was lost, needless to say, but there would be time to study once her ship was back in order. Right now, she needed an energy cell…
She turned around, glancing in the direction of where the Frigate Orpheon had crashed. She began the trek there, expecting Pirates, if they had survived the crash.
Long delay, but this chapter should be posted. Not sure if I captured everything the way I wanted to, but let me know what you think. I appreciate all opinions.