Chapter 10: Battle on Icerra
"Samus-san...there's a problem. Schneider's...gone after
the Icers on purpose. He wants to use them to get rid of
us!" Samus crosses her arms.
"I had a feeling that we were giving him a cute little
improvisation. Schneider might be a scumbag, but he's still
intelligent, I'll give him that."
---------------------
Samus had followed Gul'Gen to the warehouse that Royce was
using as a nesting ground for repopulating the Metroids.
She had never seen such an place before, it wasn't even on
the station map. But with a hole the size of who knows what,
she thought that even an idiot would soon know about a way
inside. They both walk inside to see Royce gathering the
other Metroids.
"I've already found out about what happened. Hardy called."
Samus looks around for a moment.
"This place...there are tunnels everywhere. You did this?"
"They lead to all the major locations, places where we had
assumed the X would be around. And they had been until
recently. We've got problems if the planet trade, or the
Icers get attacked by the X."
"Politically, and survivalistically."
----------------------
The 'Pork Roast' was ready for departure to head to the
planet Icerra to, if at all possible because of the X
having a head start, intercept the ship that they had
stolen for their use of hostile measure.
It hadn't occured to Samus that the X clone of Ryu
spoke about commiting genocide to save the Federation
again. She didn't care, the X were a real threat. To
take the chance at trying to become powerful enough to
destroy all Metroids and rule the universe without any
doubt, that was the sign of real villianry. But the X
were just parasites. How could they have a mind that
was conscious enough to speak, let alone obliterate?
The X weren't sentient, and she had thought that the
Metroids weren't, until Gul'Gen had told her more than
she learned about the Metroids while on Chauda. The
'Pork Roast' took off at top speed for Icerra after
leaving the vicinity of Alpha Centauri Station.
----------------------
Inside of a dark chamber of the palace of Emperor Artic,
far deeper in than the throne room, a haggard old man
sits inside of a hovering chair laden with buttons on
two panels near his arms. He lets out a demented
laugh nearly every few seconds. Artic walks inside of
the chamber.
"What is it, Your Majesty?" The old man says the last
two words in indignation.
"Dr. Akyasuma, your plan is being carried out?"
The old man leans into the light, his face extremly
wrinkled and slightly baggy. His eyes looked like
he was always angry as his eyelids were barely open.
He also wore a weird looking black hat, one that
looked like tiny Mickey Mouse ears.
"Indeed. You and your people shall never die in
combat any longer. You saw the power of these,
my precious creations...the X. The Metroids were an
obstacle as they and their energy-leeching powers are
the only thing that can destroy them. They should
have been destroyed. Every last one of them. But my
parasites have begun to fail in the objectives that I
set for them...so I use my backup...you shall not need
the Dragonballs for immortality-my parasites will be
your immortality...and so...Emperor..." He says this
last word with the same tone as the last title. "I now
give you an on-hand demonstration. Hahahahahahaha!"
A gigantic Core-X floats up from behind Akyasuma and
flies into Artic, devouring him and then assuming his
form. Akyasuma lets out a sadistic laugh as he watches
Artic's face contort in terror, giving him the impression
that he was ultimately lied to in the end. Artic was
dying at the hands of this Core-X...and it was taking his
likeness for itself.
----------------------
Samus and the others were all on edge as they approached
Icerra. The ship was nowhere in sight the whole time.
Hardy decided to land the Pork Roast inside of the palace
court, which was admirably large enough for Keaton's own
heavy cruiser. This meant of course, that Hardy's would
barely fit, as Hardy's counted as a super-heavy. Ryu
made a wisecrack once saying that everything about Hardy
was like Texas, it was always bigger.
They had all gotten outside of the ship and scanned the
area for the X. The palace grounds were empty, and the
only life readings were almost in the center of the
imperial abode. Well, aside of a few scattered readings.
The Metroids rushed in first to catch any X that dared to
assault, followed by Samus and the others.
They had reached a pair of doors with one lone, yet large
in height, Icer standing in front of them. He cracked a
grin.
"You can't defeat us by any means. We have become more
powerful thanks to a little contribution." Samus armed
her Super Missiles and fired one at the Icer's head.
The missile exploded and the body had reformed into an
X. A large purple one. Two Omegas both tackled and
absorbed it, and pushed the door open to see Emperor
Artic and Schneider side by side. Schneider, spotting
Aran, ran off to the innermost chamber along with Artic.
A flood of X parasites came out of the vent above as
Samus used her Speed Booster to get behind them. That
swarm was gonna be occupied with dodging the Metroids.
'Hopefully Hardy and the others have gone back by now.'
Royce watched Hardy and the others run from the X that
were chasing them before she grabs all of them and flings
them back into the throne room. Running through the chaos,
she goes after Samus to see where she and the two antagonists
were going to.
-----------------------------
Samus stopped inside of a large room, where only Artic
stood. She scanned the area to see if Schneider was
hiding somewhere.
"There are no surprises. Come out of the doorway
before I let it crush your head. Schneider has gone
in the other direction, so you deal with me." Artic
folds his arms in front of him.
"Think that you're such a big shot just because you've
got the Icers' leader, eh? I wonder where you get your
sense of awareness." She fires ten Super Missiles at
Artic, which all stop ten feet away from him and explode.
"Where did you get yours? I can't be destroyed using
your conventional weapons. I'll have to ask you to
remove your Power Suit if you want to stand a chance
against me."
'What, is he nuts?' Samus switches back to her beam
cannon and fires several blasts from her Ice Beam at
Artic. This sort of worked, as the beams had actually
hit him, but it looked as though he wasn't even affected
by them.
Artic shakes off the icicles from his body and charges
at Samus with a flurry of punches that she didn't see
coming and couldn't block. He finishes by kicking her
high up into the air, almost to the ceiling. She turns
around after setting her beam to Wave and firing non-stop
at Artic, who was flying up to Samus dodging every blast.
She kicked Artic in the face and fires three shots at
point-blank range.
'If that didn't get him, then...' The body starts to
phase back into the Core-X but reforms back to Artic.
'Aw, rats.' She fires seven more Wave Beams and lands on
her feet after reaching the ground. Artic lands on his
back and flips up to stand only to be greeting with a
Super Missile to his chest. The body dissolves into the
Core-X and Samus begins to volley Super Missiles at it.
----------------------
Royce was heading down the other pathway after seeing the
shutter behind Samus close and lock. She stopped inside
of the dark chamber, watching the door shut behind and
lights beginning to activate around the edge of the room
on the bottom. A large, bright spotlight shone from under
the glassy floor underneath of Dr. Akyasuma. He lets out
a small chuckle as he looks up at Royce.
"Hail...to the Queen Metroid, who has finally met her
end..." Royce looks at Schneider, who was standing beside
Akyasuma. He stays where he is while Akyasuma backs away.
"I suppose that you already know?"
"Know what?" Akyasuma's baggy face curls into a weird
grin.
"Know that the X are my creation. It was I who made the
Icers, too. No nature-made species could ever go into
outer space and expect to survive. Not one single thing
about nature involved outer space! Ha! But I am one of
the greatest minds. Insane and evil, yes, but still..."
He breaks off into a laugh as Schneider tries to attack
Royce with everything that he had.
Royce would sometimes see an opening in Schneider's
fruitless onslaught and fire a small blast of energy at
him. Only after he had noticed that he was out of
Missiles did he get blasted by a large Hyper Beam that
came from the locked door. Samus barged in and started
to shoot the Core-X with a constant stream of energy
blasts.
"Royce! There's a really big X in the other room!
Better take care of business!" Royce turns around and
runs down the hallway to see the giant X sailing right
at her. She catches and starts to absorb the parasite.
"Stupid. This is a fitting end to a monstrous species."
It tries to resist Royce but miserably fails at the last
moment.
The Core-X after being turned into a vulnerable blob
fled by crashing through the floor and escaping in a
narrow duct. Akyasuma had escaped, too, but only
during Royce's short battle with Schneider.
He had gone down a different hallway and around when
he ran into Royce, who was heading to the 'Pork Roast'.
"This was only a setback, you! If you Metroids were
extinct, then I would rule everything! I'll just
nip your proliferation in the BUD!!" Akyasuma holds
up a small phaser-like object and a long yellow beam
protrudes from it, piercing Royce in the right side
of her chest. She stumbled and landed on the Core-X
that popped out from the duct behind her. It made a
kind of gurgling noise before Royce grabbed and had
absorbed it with some of what strength she had left.
She was only pierced by a Plasma Lancer, that wasn't
gonna stop her from killing every last X and then the
looney scientist that created them. She ran after the
fleeing old man leaving a trail of blood.
"You won't catch me in time! Haugh!" Akyasuma runs
right into Hardy's arm, clotheslining himself out of
his hoverchair. His entire lower half was all, to the
shock of those who saw it, machinery. Royce stopped
running after seeing Hardy hold the feeble robot up
to handcuff it. She fainted just when Samus arrived
in the room. Hardy sees the small yet gaping hole in
her chest.
"Uh-oh. We need a medic, and now!"
"Samus-san...there's a problem. Schneider's...gone after
the Icers on purpose. He wants to use them to get rid of
us!" Samus crosses her arms.
"I had a feeling that we were giving him a cute little
improvisation. Schneider might be a scumbag, but he's still
intelligent, I'll give him that."
---------------------
Samus had followed Gul'Gen to the warehouse that Royce was
using as a nesting ground for repopulating the Metroids.
She had never seen such an place before, it wasn't even on
the station map. But with a hole the size of who knows what,
she thought that even an idiot would soon know about a way
inside. They both walk inside to see Royce gathering the
other Metroids.
"I've already found out about what happened. Hardy called."
Samus looks around for a moment.
"This place...there are tunnels everywhere. You did this?"
"They lead to all the major locations, places where we had
assumed the X would be around. And they had been until
recently. We've got problems if the planet trade, or the
Icers get attacked by the X."
"Politically, and survivalistically."
----------------------
The 'Pork Roast' was ready for departure to head to the
planet Icerra to, if at all possible because of the X
having a head start, intercept the ship that they had
stolen for their use of hostile measure.
It hadn't occured to Samus that the X clone of Ryu
spoke about commiting genocide to save the Federation
again. She didn't care, the X were a real threat. To
take the chance at trying to become powerful enough to
destroy all Metroids and rule the universe without any
doubt, that was the sign of real villianry. But the X
were just parasites. How could they have a mind that
was conscious enough to speak, let alone obliterate?
The X weren't sentient, and she had thought that the
Metroids weren't, until Gul'Gen had told her more than
she learned about the Metroids while on Chauda. The
'Pork Roast' took off at top speed for Icerra after
leaving the vicinity of Alpha Centauri Station.
----------------------
Inside of a dark chamber of the palace of Emperor Artic,
far deeper in than the throne room, a haggard old man
sits inside of a hovering chair laden with buttons on
two panels near his arms. He lets out a demented
laugh nearly every few seconds. Artic walks inside of
the chamber.
"What is it, Your Majesty?" The old man says the last
two words in indignation.
"Dr. Akyasuma, your plan is being carried out?"
The old man leans into the light, his face extremly
wrinkled and slightly baggy. His eyes looked like
he was always angry as his eyelids were barely open.
He also wore a weird looking black hat, one that
looked like tiny Mickey Mouse ears.
"Indeed. You and your people shall never die in
combat any longer. You saw the power of these,
my precious creations...the X. The Metroids were an
obstacle as they and their energy-leeching powers are
the only thing that can destroy them. They should
have been destroyed. Every last one of them. But my
parasites have begun to fail in the objectives that I
set for them...so I use my backup...you shall not need
the Dragonballs for immortality-my parasites will be
your immortality...and so...Emperor..." He says this
last word with the same tone as the last title. "I now
give you an on-hand demonstration. Hahahahahahaha!"
A gigantic Core-X floats up from behind Akyasuma and
flies into Artic, devouring him and then assuming his
form. Akyasuma lets out a sadistic laugh as he watches
Artic's face contort in terror, giving him the impression
that he was ultimately lied to in the end. Artic was
dying at the hands of this Core-X...and it was taking his
likeness for itself.
----------------------
Samus and the others were all on edge as they approached
Icerra. The ship was nowhere in sight the whole time.
Hardy decided to land the Pork Roast inside of the palace
court, which was admirably large enough for Keaton's own
heavy cruiser. This meant of course, that Hardy's would
barely fit, as Hardy's counted as a super-heavy. Ryu
made a wisecrack once saying that everything about Hardy
was like Texas, it was always bigger.
They had all gotten outside of the ship and scanned the
area for the X. The palace grounds were empty, and the
only life readings were almost in the center of the
imperial abode. Well, aside of a few scattered readings.
The Metroids rushed in first to catch any X that dared to
assault, followed by Samus and the others.
They had reached a pair of doors with one lone, yet large
in height, Icer standing in front of them. He cracked a
grin.
"You can't defeat us by any means. We have become more
powerful thanks to a little contribution." Samus armed
her Super Missiles and fired one at the Icer's head.
The missile exploded and the body had reformed into an
X. A large purple one. Two Omegas both tackled and
absorbed it, and pushed the door open to see Emperor
Artic and Schneider side by side. Schneider, spotting
Aran, ran off to the innermost chamber along with Artic.
A flood of X parasites came out of the vent above as
Samus used her Speed Booster to get behind them. That
swarm was gonna be occupied with dodging the Metroids.
'Hopefully Hardy and the others have gone back by now.'
Royce watched Hardy and the others run from the X that
were chasing them before she grabs all of them and flings
them back into the throne room. Running through the chaos,
she goes after Samus to see where she and the two antagonists
were going to.
-----------------------------
Samus stopped inside of a large room, where only Artic
stood. She scanned the area to see if Schneider was
hiding somewhere.
"There are no surprises. Come out of the doorway
before I let it crush your head. Schneider has gone
in the other direction, so you deal with me." Artic
folds his arms in front of him.
"Think that you're such a big shot just because you've
got the Icers' leader, eh? I wonder where you get your
sense of awareness." She fires ten Super Missiles at
Artic, which all stop ten feet away from him and explode.
"Where did you get yours? I can't be destroyed using
your conventional weapons. I'll have to ask you to
remove your Power Suit if you want to stand a chance
against me."
'What, is he nuts?' Samus switches back to her beam
cannon and fires several blasts from her Ice Beam at
Artic. This sort of worked, as the beams had actually
hit him, but it looked as though he wasn't even affected
by them.
Artic shakes off the icicles from his body and charges
at Samus with a flurry of punches that she didn't see
coming and couldn't block. He finishes by kicking her
high up into the air, almost to the ceiling. She turns
around after setting her beam to Wave and firing non-stop
at Artic, who was flying up to Samus dodging every blast.
She kicked Artic in the face and fires three shots at
point-blank range.
'If that didn't get him, then...' The body starts to
phase back into the Core-X but reforms back to Artic.
'Aw, rats.' She fires seven more Wave Beams and lands on
her feet after reaching the ground. Artic lands on his
back and flips up to stand only to be greeting with a
Super Missile to his chest. The body dissolves into the
Core-X and Samus begins to volley Super Missiles at it.
----------------------
Royce was heading down the other pathway after seeing the
shutter behind Samus close and lock. She stopped inside
of the dark chamber, watching the door shut behind and
lights beginning to activate around the edge of the room
on the bottom. A large, bright spotlight shone from under
the glassy floor underneath of Dr. Akyasuma. He lets out
a small chuckle as he looks up at Royce.
"Hail...to the Queen Metroid, who has finally met her
end..." Royce looks at Schneider, who was standing beside
Akyasuma. He stays where he is while Akyasuma backs away.
"I suppose that you already know?"
"Know what?" Akyasuma's baggy face curls into a weird
grin.
"Know that the X are my creation. It was I who made the
Icers, too. No nature-made species could ever go into
outer space and expect to survive. Not one single thing
about nature involved outer space! Ha! But I am one of
the greatest minds. Insane and evil, yes, but still..."
He breaks off into a laugh as Schneider tries to attack
Royce with everything that he had.
Royce would sometimes see an opening in Schneider's
fruitless onslaught and fire a small blast of energy at
him. Only after he had noticed that he was out of
Missiles did he get blasted by a large Hyper Beam that
came from the locked door. Samus barged in and started
to shoot the Core-X with a constant stream of energy
blasts.
"Royce! There's a really big X in the other room!
Better take care of business!" Royce turns around and
runs down the hallway to see the giant X sailing right
at her. She catches and starts to absorb the parasite.
"Stupid. This is a fitting end to a monstrous species."
It tries to resist Royce but miserably fails at the last
moment.
The Core-X after being turned into a vulnerable blob
fled by crashing through the floor and escaping in a
narrow duct. Akyasuma had escaped, too, but only
during Royce's short battle with Schneider.
He had gone down a different hallway and around when
he ran into Royce, who was heading to the 'Pork Roast'.
"This was only a setback, you! If you Metroids were
extinct, then I would rule everything! I'll just
nip your proliferation in the BUD!!" Akyasuma holds
up a small phaser-like object and a long yellow beam
protrudes from it, piercing Royce in the right side
of her chest. She stumbled and landed on the Core-X
that popped out from the duct behind her. It made a
kind of gurgling noise before Royce grabbed and had
absorbed it with some of what strength she had left.
She was only pierced by a Plasma Lancer, that wasn't
gonna stop her from killing every last X and then the
looney scientist that created them. She ran after the
fleeing old man leaving a trail of blood.
"You won't catch me in time! Haugh!" Akyasuma runs
right into Hardy's arm, clotheslining himself out of
his hoverchair. His entire lower half was all, to the
shock of those who saw it, machinery. Royce stopped
running after seeing Hardy hold the feeble robot up
to handcuff it. She fainted just when Samus arrived
in the room. Hardy sees the small yet gaping hole in
her chest.
"Uh-oh. We need a medic, and now!"