Chapter IV
Something New
Samus, after three seconds of thinking, turned to her black-clad guide. "Is anyone here expendable?"
The man chuckled briefly, then sighed. "I like what you're thinking, but no. Cloning is expensive, and our other methods of increasing our numbers are time-consuming and tedious. You're still one of our newest recruits. As such, you don't have the authority to command people to march to their graves. Think of something else."
Samus sighed in disappointment, then activated her Power Suit and browsed through the HUD. Upon checking her Shield Energy, she was greeted with a pleasant surprise. She had four whole energy tanks worth of power, and another tank was partially full. Upon waiting for a couple of seconds, she saw the total energy count climb up by one unit. Apparently, her energy had slowly been refilling ever since her scuffle with Psych. She decided that she could sacrifice one tank.
Selecting one energy tank with her mind, she imagined it in her hand. Holding her left hand out, she watched as a glowing substance poured from her palm and into the shape of a cylinder. After seven seconds, the energy stopped leaving her, and the cylinder took the more definite shape of the energy tanks that she was so familiar with, complete with a glowing meter indicating its fullness.
As the tank dropped into her hand, she applied a firm grip to it and asked to be allowed access into an empty, sealed room. A lab-coat clad human skeptically accepted her request, and a nearby wall panel, about seven feet tall and four feet wide, sunk into the wall and slid to its left. Immediately to the new doorway's right was a ceiling-height window, which Samus assumed was made of a secure material. She quickly walked into the chamber, gently laid the tank onto the ground, and rushed out of the room. After she did so, she asked for the room to be closed to the outside. The wall panel slid shut. Finally, she asked that one larval Metroid be released into the room with the tank.
Her escort looked at her quizzically. She sighed and said "The ones with the four nuclei and large membrane are the larvae."
Her companion nodded in understanding and pointed to the smallest larva that was available. Its tank, with the Metroid still in it, was sucked into the floor. Five seconds later, a circular opening appeared in the floor of the sealed room, and the tube resurfaced. The metal top of the tank slid open with a hiss.
The Metroid, hesitant, slowly floated out of its tank. At first, it moved about aimlessly, as if to test its freedom. Over time, its bobbing movements came closer and closer to the energy tank, to the point where it seemed to fly above it like a vulture, making barely audible gurgles all the while. Samus counted the seconds. When they reached forty-seven, the Metroid let out a small screech and dove for the container, grasping it in its mandibles. It proceeded to try to pull the tank deeper into itself with the larger set of mandibles, while the smaller set attempted to crush the cylinder, to no avail. After fourteen seconds, it dropped the tank, whose capacity-meter had lost its glow entirely. The Metroid then screeched louder than before, and repeatedly rammed itself against the window. It continued this for half a minute, until it eventually gave up, releasing sounds that most sentient beings would consider unpronounceable.
Samus turned to her escort. "A human would have died in half the time it took to drain that energy tank."
Said escort raised both eyebrows. "…I am at a loss for words. If that's a larva, what can the later stages do? I would call it terrifying, but I am afraid that I have seen much worse. But we need to keep these things contained!"
Samus fist-pumped the air in victory (after deactivating her Power Suit). "FINALLY someone gets it!" She whipped around and moved toward the window with the other Metroids behind it. "Eat it, freaks!" The Smug Zeta, as Samus subconsciously nicknamed it, shook its head and looked toward the lab coat-clad female, who rolled her eyes, oblivious to the aforementioned Metroid's gaze. As the Metroid in the Sealed Room was moved back into its tank… somehow… Samus turned toward her confused companion. "You are the FIRST person to EVER get that right!"
"What happened to the others?" He inquired, though he looked as if he already knew.
"They were destroyed by either released Metroids, or by Space Pirates." Samus half expected the male to ask what the former were, but he answered the question before he would have asked it.
"Criminals wandering the galaxy, huh? Should've seen THAT one coming. I mean, who WOULDN'T want to use these as bioweapons? Of course, aside from people who know what's good for them."
"… or me." Samus finished.
"… Space Pirates, right?" They started walking back the way they came.
She nodded.
"I see. Well, let's change the subject. We've noticed that you care little for your dorm-mate, so we've rearranged the list of who lives with whom. You should be glad to know that you have a different roommate from your former one. Your current roommate is a robot who identified himself as 'Coffee,' for reasons only he knows. He hails from the planetary outpost Lun Infinus, and he takes everything VERY seriously. I think you two will get along just fine."
It was at this moment that they left the Teleporter Room. It was also at that moment that Samus inquired about her ship.
"Oh, your gunship! Don't worry, we have it here, and you have full control over it… until the higher-ups decide otherwise, of course. You will be allowed, if not required, to take it on missions. Now, considering that you are a rookie, any external missions involving you won't be very complex yet, and you won't be doing much time travel, so-"
"TIME TRAVEL?! When I thought that Psych was a future version of me, I was being sarcastic. I didn't think time travel actually EXISTS!" Samus was flustered, her entire understanding of how time works being slowly torn down by the man to her right.
"I'll let Perpetuos fill you in on that topic. And, speak of the Devil-" The guide was interrupted by a human-looking male, clearly adult, who had just appeared one second ago and was obviously angry.
"Please describe why, exactly, you have summoned me. My patience is thin, currently, and I want to know the purpose of this particular meeting." The aforementioned male was simply clad, with a light blue t-shirt with an hourglass-shaped orange insignia, with orange pants and grey shoes. "I traveled THREE DAYS to get here."
The darkly clad guide was unfazed. "I didn't exactly ask you to come here; I simply suggested that this young recruit confront you as to the specifics of time travel and our usage of it. I apologize if I have inconvenienced you in any way, but your presence is not exactly… required… here at this moment in time. So would you please… not… vent in front of the rookie? I don't want to have to clean up after you divide by zero… again."
Perpetuos shoved his hands in his pockets and quickly muttered "I'm going to outlive both of you by far, so shut up and let me fume before existence itself becomes boring," before storming off in some direction.
The guide sighed. "I'm sorry. He's not always like this, but long walks tend to make him irritable. I do hope you don't mind."
"I've seen worse," Samus answered. Quite honestly, she didn't care much about the exchange that had just transpired. Literally nothing of importance, or even relevance, was explained, and she had been given enough time to adjust to the fact that yes, time travel was a thing. At this point, she just wanted to get through the day and meet her new nuisance/roommate. She had yet to lose patience, but sympathy was another story. In other words, she was back to her usual self.
"Now, let's see… your scheduled Basic Conditioning is done, so that's out of the way… unscheduled trip to the bestiary is over… 'First Experience with Time Travel' just happened… iiiiit seems that the rest of your day is open! I am no longer obligated to escort you, so we can take our separate paths and probably never see each other again! Go ahead, feel free to explore and – oh! I just forgot! Here, take this." And with that he handed her a small, sky-blue envelope. Samus looked at it quizzically, but before she could say anything, her guide leaned over and whispered into her ear: "Open it in a secure location. Alone. Mission details will be explained within the enclosed document. Am I understood?" Samus quickly whispered an affirmative. "Good. Oh, and one more thing? Prepare for anything and everything. Case closed." After the brief exchange of hushed words, the black-clad pale man drew himself up to full height, secured his headwear, turned on his heel, and walked away, hands in his coat pockets, an unreadable expression on his visage.
Samus applied a firm grip to her recently obtained mission reading. It appeared that Operation: Be Productive was back in action. She smiled, just barely enough to be noticeable. It felt good to have something to do again.
The plot thickens! What awaits the rookie now? Find out next time in Dragon Ball Z!
But seriously, Samus is going to see some action rather soon. If you're wondering, Coffee is the protagonist of The Desolate Room and an important side character The Desolate Hope, both of which I suggest you check out.
