Chapter 4: Depths and Surfaces, Killers and Ghosts
"KRAID IS DEAD!!!" Ridley shrieked at the top of his lungs as he burst into the meeting chamber. Draygon and Phantoon, who were already positioned around the table, jerked around to look at him in surprise.
"Kraid has fallen?" Mother Brain demanded. "Samus Aran has killed him once more? Even with his Sys-Gro enhanced body?" Ridley nodded silently. "Damn that bounty hunter to a million hells! Will nothing ever stop her?! She continues to ruin our plans even now!"
"So, Kraid has failed again..." Draygon said. He shook his head with a sorrowful expression on his face, trying his utmost to disguise the evil joy that was running through him. "Poor, poor Kraid... Aran is truly a nightmare. We join you in grieving for the loss of our dear brother, Ridley, and we eagerly await the day he shall be reborn anew with his own technology. Let us all vow here and now that Aran will pay tenfold for his death!" Ridley glared at him, not convinced in the least but not wanting to do anything under Mother Brain's gaze. Phantoon spoke as well.
"It is truly a shame that Kraid has died, Ridley. But take heart; he shall not remain dead forever. It is as Draygon said; Kraid's own technology will serve to return him to life, even as it did to you both before. Do not be so shocked; we all knew Kraid's combat skills were not his strongest point. He was a scientest at heart, not a fighter, so it can hardly be considered surprising that he fell to Aran, now can it?"
"Watch your mouth, you insolent little squid..." Ridley hissed, eyes beginning to glow red. Phantoon continued, his glee at his most hated rival's death overrunning his good sense.
"No, Kraid's true achievements were in his works of science, feats which we shall forever remember him by... the cloning procedure, which creates brainless and pathetic copies of lifeforms... the revival chambers, which consume so many resources to activate that they can only be used for us alone... and the Sys-Gro supersteroid, which he himself took into his final battle with Aran. Truly a shame that that failed him as well, resulting in his death... perhaps Sys-Gro isn't as grand an achievement as he had us believing it was after all..."
"Phantoon..." Draygon warned. Even he saw the danger the Elocto was placing himself in. But his partner continued on heedless, unaware of the threat.
"Poor Kraid... even his scientific achievements were not enough to save him. They were failures as well... and by association, perhaps Kraid was as well. Unskilled enough in fighting to be killed by Aran... unable to create inventions that would do the job... what did Kraid have that was a success? I can't think of a thing... so it appears that brother Kraid was truly a fail-AIIIEEE!!!" Phantoon had gone too far. Ridley's tolerance had finally snapped. The Drakar had lunged forward and slammed Phantoon against the wall, pinning him there as his claws dug cruelly into the helpless Elocto's flesh. All traces of humor and manners were gone from Ridley now. In their place was an enraged, vicious and VERY dangerous killer, who glared at the now-terrified Phantoon with eyes that shone red with fury.
"Don't you EVER talk like that about Kraid again, you gutless, sniveling little worm. Or I swear, I will rip you into a thousand chunky bits of gore and feed them to the KiHunters." Phantoon nodded, unable to speak as the cascades of sweat running down him mixed with the blood from the wounds. Then Draygon leaped onto Ridley's back, attempting to restrain him.
"That's enough, Ridley!"
"Ridley, ENOUGH!" Mother Brain yelled in agreement, exasperated. Ridley shrugged and threw the Evir off, then released Phantoon and turned to him, his personality returning.
"Brother Draygon... for the sake of all of us, the Space Pirates as a whole, and especially for his own personal safety.. can you PLEASE keep your squid leashed?" Draygon didn't respond; he helped Phantoon back up, and the two of them departed, Draygon whispering reassurances to the still-shaking Elocto. After they were gone, Mother Brain spoke to Ridley again.
"That was a foolish thing to do, Ridley. You know how they are allied against you; without Kraid, you stand alone against the both of them. This foolish quarreling among the four of you aggravates me to no end." Ridley smirked.
"I'm not afraid of Phantoon and Draygon, milady. Those two are no threat to me whatsoever, believe me. But anyways... now that they're gone, there is something else I wish to discuss with you."
"Yes?" She asked. "What is the problem?"
"It's that new agent... Crocomire, from the Far Side. Quite frankly, milady, I think we might have made a mistake taking him in. I can't give him orders; I don't think he even speaks Galactic, and if he did, I'm pretty sure he wouldn't listen anyways. Just a short while ago he tried to take a bite out of me! Granted, I was attempting to communicate in Mydiene and accidentally said something rather unpleasant to him, but still. If any Zebesian, KiHunter or Evir attacked one of us, they'd be dead instantly no matter what the cause was. He's completely uncontrollable by anybody except yourself, milady."
"Crocomire is no problem." She assured him. "I have complete control of him; he follows all of my orders without fail. What else is needed in a servant, after all, my faithful Drakar? Do not concern yourself with Crocomire any more; I will handle him myself. You may go now, Ridley."
"As you wish, milady." The Drakar bowed and departed, taking the elevator back up to Crateria. As he journeyed through the caverns, a pair of metallic Zebesians fell into step with him out of the shadows. Ridley showed no reaction to this aside from a smile, but he began speaking.
"So, boys. How are my compatriats doing?"
"Phantoon's shaking like a leaf." Ezer reported. "You must have done something to really scare him, boss. Draygon looked really angry, though. You might want to watch your back around him for a while, boss. He might try something, especially if Aran offs Phantoon."
"I've been watching my back around Draygon ever since he joined up." Ridley shrugged. "Speaking of Samus, what is our little bounty hunter doing now, hmm?" Garan frowned.
"She's gone into Norfair, boss. She got the Varia Suit off of Kraid, so the heat don't bother her anymore."
"Wish I had some heat right about now." Ridley shivered as the three Pirates emerged into the open and rain began hitting them. "Still raining. Why am I not surprised by this. I hate this place. I absolutely hate it. Well, let Samus nose around in Norfair. She won't be able to get to my lair yet, so it's no problem to me. I'm not territorial like Draygon. Come on now, less talk and more walk. I want to get back down there and feel the warmth again ASAP."
***
"YAH! Get off me, you parasites!" Samus fired a Super Missile and destroyed the five bloodsucking insects. Shaking her head, she pried an Energy Tank out of the ceiling and left. :"I hate leeches." She went all the way back out of Kraid's Lair and jumped down to the elevator to Norfair. The bounty hunter cautiously stepped into a lava-filled room, waited a moment, and smiled. Her Varia Suit offered enough heat protection; it was still hot, but she wasn't being cooked in her suit any more. Samus set off across the lava river, careful not to fall in; her Varia suit was good, but not THAT good. It was good enough for her to grab a sunken Missile Tank out of the lava before it was destroyed, though. Before long, she came to a room built of green bubbles. However, all the doors were too high up for her to reach. Samus picked a Missile Tank, then looked around.
"I didn't come all this way just to turn back..." After careful examination, she found a secret tunnel in the floor, which led to a pair of doors, one in the wall and one in the floor. She chose the latter first, climbing down another vertical shaft and crossing another river of lava. Lava-dwelling dragons spat it at her, and she avoided them. As she crossed a break in the river, the bounty hunter saw a hole in the ground that led down to a yellow door. "Yellow? What security level is THAT? Whatever it is, I won't be able to open it... guess I'll have to come back later." She moved back onto the river, then stopped as she heard a rumbling. Her fears were confirmed when she looked over the edge. The lava was rising.
"DAMMIT!" Running to the end of the cave, Samus launched herself up a shaft. Before long, she had left the lava far behind, and settled back down, destroying more of those annoying dragons as she climbed. A door led into a ledge high above a chamber; she could see a gate on the other side, but the only way across were a series of yellow mechanical lifts. The bounty hunter carefully hopped across and picked up a Missile Tank, then frowned. There was another, similar cavern in front of her, but there were two problems. First, there were no platforms; only a series of what Samus recognized as Grapple Points in the ceiling. Second, the floor was covered in deadly spikes. "Too bad I don't have my Grapple Beam... I'll have to come back here, I guess..." Going back out to the vertical shaft, she reached the top and exited back into the green bubble room, on a much higher level, and entered another high door. It led to a long hall, gradually sloping downward.
"Hmmm... this smells like a trap." The bounty hunter examined the floor a bit, and nodded. "Breakaway... probably all the way down." She got back up, stopped for a moment, then took off, running down as fast as she could. Underneath her feet, she could hear various sounds; surprised creatures, the burbling of lava, and more, but kept going regardless. So much, in fact, that she smashed right into the door at the end. As it turned out, this was a good thing; the impact shook loose a Missile Tank that had been embedded in the ceiling. Shaking her head to clear out the stars, Samus took it and went in. A Chozo Statue was waiting for her.
"Hmm... I wonder what's gonna be in here. Another Beam upgrade, maybe? The Wave Beam? Or the Ice Beam? Please let it be the Ice Beam in here..." She opened it and stared. It wasn't anything she had seen before. "...What is this crap?" She picked it up and her suit absorbed it. "Speed Booster? Huh..." Suddenly, she heard a familiar shaking, and looked down with a feeling of dread. Lava was seeping through the bricks. "Oh, HELL." She turned and ran, racing back up the tunnel, knowing in her heart that she wasn't fast enough, that she wasn't going to make it... and then, there was a prismatic flash, and she was at the door. Into the door, actually. "OOF! What the-?" Samus darted out into safety, then stopped and collected her breath.
"...Whoa. So THAT's what the Speed Booster does..." Shaking her head, Samus dropped back down to the bottom of the green bubble room; the last high door was on the other side of the chamber, unreachable. She entered the secret way in the floor again, this time taking the door in the wall, and into a long hall that she blasted through with her Speed Booster, obliterating blocks, creatures and anything else in her path. She emerged back in the vertical elevator shaft at the start of Norfair. Climbing to near the top, the bounty hunter entered a room that had confounded her earlier, with metal blockers that had dropped down as soon as she approached. The Speed Booster, however, was too much for it. As she blasted through, she suddenly tripped over something, and went flying. "YOW!" She got back up and looked back. It had been a dip in the floor. And at the bottom of it was a strange metal that she recognized all too well. "Bendezium." One of the strongest metals in the galaxy, Bendezium was incredibly tough. The only thing that could break it was a Power Bomb, and she didn't have any. "Something else to come back to." Moving on, Samus came to a mechanical maze. She passed it, though, and found another Chozo Statue.
"Come on, Ice Beam... come on, Ice Beam... YES!" It was the Ice Beam, a beam upgrade that would give her blasts the power to freeze most creatures solid. "Yeah! Too bad I'll have to unequip the Spazer... huh?" She blinked. She had turned the Ice Beam on, but the Spazer hadn't deactivated. "I can have them... both equipped at once? That's never happened before..." Her Chozo Power Suit had changed itself again, it seemed. "Well, I ain't complaining. Now that I've got this, there's a lead I want to check out..." She went back out and took the elevator back up. In Brinstar, Samus went back to a vertical shaft where there were no platforms uo, but Rippers (creatures which could best be described as hovering turtles) flew back and forth. Samus shot one, and it froze in midair. She nodded.
"This works." Hopping onto it, she shot another and froze it, then continued on up. At the top, she carefully made her across a dangerous chamber full of hostile flora and fauna. On the other side was something she hadn't expected. Another elevator shaft, that went up. "Hmm... that has to go to Crateria. But I'm not ready to head back up there yet..." Instead, the bounty hunter went into a door and found a Chozo Statue, holding... a Power Bomb Tank. "Whoa..." Power Bombs were the most destructive weapon currently known that could be personally used; they unleashed a huge wave of destructive energy in all directions. Somehow, Samus' Chozo Suit was immune to its effects, which was good. "Bingo." She took it and installed it, then turned to leave... and accidentally dropped one. "Whoops!" The Power Bomb exploded, and to her surprise, the wall behind the statue disappeared, revealed as false. It hid a Missile Tank, which she took, then returned to Norfair and opened up the Bendezium in the floor she had tripped over earlier. The bounty hunter dropped down a few levels, picking up a Missile Tank as she did, and saw another long hall sloping down, which she blasted through with the Speed Booster. At the end were several doors; she took the one in the floor, dropping into a narrow hall. "Dammit..." Right in front of her was a spiked wall that completely blocked the way.
"Yt etzsabos? Pykap Ysyt?" A voice behind her screeched in surprise. Samus turned to see a heavy, thick-skinned reptile with four legs and two spindly arms. What was unusual, though, was the creature's long snout with eight smooth, grey eyes all down its length. Samus frowned.
"An Allgor from the far side..." She blinked as realization came to her. "You're the serial killer, Crocomire!"
"Pi, uia ntif fvi E yk..." Crocomire hissed. "Fojj zvot, uia ntif fvi pvyjj nejj uia!" He began moving forward. Samus frowned.
"You only speak Mydiene? Well, I don't need to understand your talk to know what you want... heads up!" She blasted him with her beam... and it did nothing. Neither did Missiles. Crocomire laughed.
"Giijepv xiatzu vatzos! Ku vebo ep ekqotozsyxjo!" Samus looked into the beast's open maw, and remembered an idea.
"It worked on Kraid..." She jumped up and launched a Super Missile into his mouth. The killer gagged and backed away, but seemed to suffer no damage. Samus groaned. However, he immediately ran forward again, and she blinked. "Huh... something back there you don't like?" She grinned. "Well then, let's get you back there!" Crocomire glared at her hatefully.
"Uia pvyjj todos-YRN!" Another Super Missile made him stumble back again. It seemed it was an involuntary reaction that he couldn't stop. The battle continued on; Crocomire showed an ability to spit clods of acid, but Samus kept up the attack, forcing him further and further back with each hit. Finally, they reached the back of the tunnel, and Samus saw what frightened the killer. The ground ended, at the shore of a lava river.
"So, your skin's not tough enough to stand that, eh?" Grinning, she blasted his maw once more. Crocomire's legs pedaled, and he walked back, onto the very edge. The Allgor stood there on the edge for several seconds, arms wheeling as he tried to stop himself from tipping over. Then Samus gave him a tiny push, and with a wail, he fell in. Screaming, Crocomire tried to jump out, but he was too heavy; he couldn't get back up. Desperately, he stretched out a claw towards Samus, even as the lava began to take its deadly effect.
"Xiatzu vatzos! Vojq ko!" Though she didn't speak Mydiene, Samus knew what he was saying. He was pleading for mercy. The bounty hunter looked down at him coldly with no pity in her eyes.
"No... I don't think so. I've seen the news... seen what the corpses of your victims look like. As far as I'm concerned, you're getting exactly what you deserve. Enjoy your swim." And then she turned her back on him, even as the flesh began to slowly, agonizingly melt off of his bones...
"Well, back up, I guess." Samus sighed. As she was about to exit the room, however, the spiked wall exploded, and through it lurched... SOMETHING. Crocomire's skeleton, devoid of anything but bone, lurched at her in one final attack... and then, with a sigh, collapsed into a pile of loose bones. Samus felt the sweat run down her brow.
"Ugh... Well, THAT was unexpected..."
***
"Easy, Phantoon... easy..." Draygon told his friend as the two of them entered the Wrecked Ship of Crateria, Phantoon's Lair. "How are you doing?"
"I'm fine, Draygon." Phantoon assured him. "Don't worry. Ridley's not nearly as tough as he thinks he is. They're just flesh wounds; look, I'm not even bleeding any more." Draygon smiled; he knew the Elocto was only putting on a brave face to hide how shaken he had been, but he approved.
"Good. The last thing we want is for you to have to go up against Aran while hurt. I wish she would take out Ridley again; then we'd be free of both him and Kraid." He sighed. "Unfortunately, it probably ain't happening. She won't be able to make it to Ridley's Lair with just the Varia Suit. She'll be coming back up and going for one of us."
"Well, then, that'll be the end of the line for miss Aran." Phantoon grinned evilly. "You got Maridia ready for her?"
"My clan's on full alert, and I've got a squad of G-Level Zebesians ready to kill." He told his partner. "What about you?"
"Oh, don't worry about me." Phantoon's grin grew even wider. "I've got plenty of friends just waiting to tear her apart."
"The ghosts, you mean?" Draygon shuddered. "How can you stand this place? It disturbs me, and trust me, that's hard to do."
"It suits me." The Elocto shrugged. "Anyways, all I have to do is get rid of the power in here, and the ghosts'll be here." Draygon blinked.
"And how, exactly, do you plan to do that?"
"Simple." Phantoon raised a tentacle. "You forget, Draygon, that my species have the ability to drain electrical power with our tentacles. Most of us have to have the tips removed before we can leave the planet; it's galactic law. But I managed to sneak off without having that operation. I just drain the power, and poof, Koben ghosts everywhere. They hate and are jealous of anything living. Aran won't stand a chance." The Evir thought for a moment, then frowned.
"I think I've found a flaw in your plan, Phantoon. If the ghosts will attack anything living, what's to keep them from going after you?"
"You forget my species' other unique ability, Draygon." Phantoon closed his eye, shimmered and vanished, but his voice continued speaking. "The power to 'phase out' onto the ethereal plane, which the ghosts are part of. They think of me as one of them, as a strange sort of ghost. I'll be fine."
"You think of everything, don't you?" Draygon asked. Phantoon phased back in and shrugged.
"I try."
"Well, you are the most cunning of us..." The Evir complimented his friend. "Ridley likes to think he is, but he's really just a fighter at heart. Kraid's brains were all in his laboratory."
"And you?" Phantoon asked, amused. Draygon shook his head.
"Me? Naaah. Never claimed to be. I'm just a simple torturer, Phantoon. I know where to hurt people to make them scream the most. I always leave the planning and such to you. Always did, even in the old days."
"The old days..." Phantoon murmured, reminiscing. "Back before we joined the Pirates... back when we were just Phantoon the Thief and Dray the Torturer. Those were the days... we weren't top-of-the-line wanted by any means, but we did well enough. I pulled off some really good heists, and you..."
"I was the bane of corrupt politicians everywhere." Draygon chuckled. "That is to say, all politicians. We had lots of fun... but then my dad died, and my brother was killed in a clan war, and suddenly I, the runt, was the chief of my clan. That's when everything changed... Evir law said all the clanmembers have to follow the same profession as their chief. They did all right as lawyers under my dad, but when they came to us, there was a bit of a problem. An entire clan full of torturers?" He shuddered. "Not good. Not good at all. We were at our wits' end."
"Then mom came..." Phantoon picked up the memory. "She nabbed us like Skultera in a barrel, you know. We had to provide some means of career for your clan, and couldn't find a way that would work. Then she found us. We had made enough of a name for ourselves that other crooks were telling tales about us, and when she heard about our clan troubles... well. Didn't take a brain the size of a ship to tell that here was a golden opportunity. And she took it."
"It was a good deal, though." Draygon admited. "We got postions at the top of the Space Pirate hierarchy, with Kraid and Ridley, second only to mom herself, as well as jobs for all of my clan. She got a full aquatic force, plus the best thief and the best torturer in the galaxy. The only downside was having to work with that pair of reptiles... that, and Aran..." His face became grim. "Phantoon... we can't lose to her, you know."
"Huh?" Phantoon looked confused. "What are you talking about, Draygon? I thought that was obvious. For one, I'd imagine dying hurts like hell. For another, have you SEEN the bounties they've got on us? It would kill me twice over to contribute to her payroll that much."
"I mean we REALLY can't lose to her. Think about it." Draygon explained. "Both Ridley and Kraid have been killed by Aran twice now. Neither of us have even once. Ever since the first time she assaulted Zebes, that's been our primary advantage over them. If she kills us, even once, we'll lose that. That would be completely intolerable. We HAVE to beat her."
"You make a very good point." Phantoon conceded. "Very well then, we agree. Whichever one of us Aran goes after, we will make sure that she does not survive to leave again." Draygon nodded.
"I'm afraid chances are she'll be going after you first, my friend. After all, this ship is blocking off the only way into Maridia. In order to get through to me, she'll have to go through you."
"You're right, I guess." Phantoon sighed. "Well then, I'd better start draining the power out of here. You should probably leave now... the Koben ghosts won't harm me, but they would have no such compunctions about bringing you over to their side." Draygon groaned.
"That's a ghastly thought. Me as a ghost. I wonder if I'd still have to be stuck with the job of Clan Chief. I wouldn't put it past them. It's a shame the position is carried over until death with no exceptions; otherwise I'd abdicate." He shrugged. "Well, no sense wasting time whining over what I can't change. I'll see you later then, Phantoon." The Evir crawled away, and Phantoon turned to the main generator, plunging his tentacles into the machine.
"Might as well get started..."
***
"Wait for it... wait for it..." Samus whispered to herself as she watched the pit of lava slowly lower. The moment it exposed some small rocky islands, she dashed across and grabbed the Missile Tank on the opposite side, then darted back before it rose again. "Simple, but effective." She returned to the previous room and climbed down into a long hall. Strewn around the floor were several lumps of Bendezium. "Let's get this junk cleared out to start..." The bounty hunter Power Bombed the mess, then looked around. One end of the hall led to a dead-end; the other opened into a huge, spacious chamber over a lava lake. Way over on the far side of it, a door was on a ledge high up on the wall. A fallen marble pillar created a ramp towards the lava. Samus thought for a moment, then smiled, realizing the possibilities of her new Speed Booster. Moving to the dead-end of the hall, she turned and ran towards the ramp at full speed. The prismatic effect kicked in, and when she hit the ramp, she blasted through the air and smashed through the door at approximately 100 MPH. After she was done picking herself back up, the bounty hunter found a Chozo Statue.
"Let's see... whoa." Samus blinked. "The Grapple Beam..." One of the newest Federation inventions was an energy-based grappling hook, that allowed users to hook onto special points and swing across. However new it was, she had discovered on Tallon IV that the Chozo had created it earlier. "This should come in handy..." Climbing to the top of the room, the bounty hunterused the Grappling Beam to cross a pool of water and froze a few wall-dwelling Funes before pulling herself up a floor, again with the Grappling Beam. She then grappled across a couple more pools and blew open a one-way gate to emerge near Crocomire's chamber. Grabbing another Power Bomb Tank on the way with the help of a Ripper, Samus reentered the room and walked past Crocomire's bleached bones. As she was about to climb back up, though, she glanced over to the lava shore that had spelled the serial killer's doom, and realized something. The ceiling was covered in grappling points.
"I wonder what's over there..." Crossing, Samus was delighted to find a fourth Energy Tank. She took it, then returned and headed back up, continuing upwards. "I've had just about enough of Norfair for a while... don't want to run into Ridley without being ready for him." Grappling across a huge lava pit, she grabbed a Missile Tank in front of a one-way gate, which she opened to emerge back inside the main elevator shaft upward. As she was about to depart back to Brinstar, the bounty hunter paused. "Wait... one more thing I gotta check out first." Taking the path she had embarked upon at the start of her journey into Norfair, Samus soon came to the area of the green bubbles, and from there the large, spacious cavern where she had seen grapple points before in the ceiling. Now that she had the Grapple Beam, Samus easily swung across. A Chozo Statue awaited her.
"Hmmm... another Beam upgrade, perhaps?" Samus mused as she opened it. She was dead on the money; the statue held the Wave Beam, an electricity-based beam that could actually shoot through walls to hit things on the other side. "Looks like those one-way gates won't be so one-way anymore..." She absorbed the upgrade, then closed her eyes and gritted her teeth as she activated it without switching any of the others off. Nothing happened. She fired, and the blast flew with the crackle of electricity added to the effects of the other Beams. Samus smiled. "Looks like there's no problem with adding the Wave Beam to the mix... I like the way the suit's handling beams this time around." Returning to the green bubble room, Samus was about to depart, when she noticed something. Tiny, gliding creatures called Wavers flew around the room, and with the Ice Beam, she could freeze them in midair to create a platform to access a previously unreachable door. The bounty hunter thought about it for a moment only, then sighed and hopped on up. Inside, a large, predatory Garuta insect guarded a Missile Tank over a lava pool. Samus blasted the bug, took the tank, and turned to leave... then stopped.
"Something doesn't smell right about this room..." She muttered, looking around it. "Well, when in doubt, blow shit up!" With those words of wisdom, she set a Power Bomb. The explosion revealed a secret passage in the far wall, which she entered. The bounty hunter was faced with a lava lake, with only small stepping stones, and hostile dragonlike creatures waiting in the molten goo. On the other side, though, was one of the artifact orbs normally held by Chozo Statues. Making her way across, Samus was pleased to discover that the dragons were vulnerable to the Ice Beam, and once frozen, could be used as stepping stones themselves. On the other side, she opened the orb and found... something completely unknown to her. "Huh?" The item looked kind of like an Energy Tank, but not exactly. Her suit absorbed it. "Hmm... Reserve Tank? Wonder what that is? I'll have the ship check on it once I get back there..." Turning to leave, Samus jumped onto the first stepping-stone, and tripped, nearly plunging headlong into the lava. "What the-?" Checking, she discovered that it actually contained a Missile Tank, which she took. With that taken care of, the bounty hunter quickly made her way back to the main elevator shaft, leading back up to the jungles of Brinstar. She opened a side room with a Power Bomb, grabbed the map from the Station, then jumped onto the elevator.
"Well, so long for now, Norfair." Samus said as she rode the platform up. "Don't worry; I'll be back before you know it. Especially for you, Ridley." The elevator hummed upward regardless and soon came to a halt, right outside of Kraid's Lair. "I could just take the long way back up..." She mused. "But I think I know a faster way." She set off on the same path she had taken to find her first Power Bombs. As she climbed up the shaft of Rippers, though, the bounty hunter saw a yellow door she had missed before. "Yellow? Haven't seen THAT security level before... does that mean..." She tried a Power Bomb, and the door opened right up. Samus walked in... and immediately wished she hadn't. The long cavern was very dark; the only soure of illumination were glowing Fire Fleas. The floor was covered in spikes with only small metal blocks being safe to stand on for about fifty feet, then it ended in inky blackness.
"This looks very dangerous... but the map says there's something important on the other side. Tallyho, then..." Before that, though, a problem presented itself. The Fire Fleas would attack her if she went near them, but if she killed them, there would be no light at all in the dangerous cavern. That would be suicide. Then the solution came to her. She shot each Fire Flea once with her beam, and the Ice Beam froze them in the air, immobilizing them without stopping their precious light. Samus moved past to the edge of the floor. Even this close, she could not see the bottom of the pit. However, she could see the series of grappling points along the ceiling. She could also see the many threats in the way; flying creatures, spikes and snakelike Yapping Maws living in them. "Hmm... I think the best chance of getting through there is... BANZAI!" Blasting forward, she started swinging across as fast as possible, blasting past anything in her way. Flying critters dived, and Yapping Maws snapped, but she was gone before they hit, landing on the other side. "So... what's in here..." A Chozo Statue. And it held... a visor. "Whoa..." Samus muttered, picking it up. She hadn't acquired any variable visors since she had been forced to hand over the ones she had aquired on Tallon IV. Scan Visors were incredibly expensive, and Thermal Visors were only used by the Pirates. Trying it on, however, she discovered that it was the third type, the X-Ray Visor, which none save the Chozo had created.
"Looks like this cave was inaccessible even to the Pirates... good thing. The LAST thing we need is them getting a hold of this..." Another frantic grappling trip back across, and she climbed all the way up the shaft and took the elevator, grabbing another Power Bomb Tank on the way. Samus emerged in a dank cavern with a yellow door in the ceiling, which she opened with a Power Bomb. Up above, she found more of the giant, mantis-like insectoids from Brinstar.
"It is Aran! Kill her!" One of them shrieked, diving downwards. Her first shot blew its wings off, her second shot froze it solid, and her third shot killed it. The others weren't much better. After clearing them out, she looked around. She was in a straight tunnel.
"Let's see... according to the map, my ship is that way..." The bounty hunter wandered down the tunnel, and soon emerged into open space, on a familiar-looking desolate, rocky plain. It was still raining; it didn't look like it would ever stop. "Here we go... and it's about time. I really need a nap..." As she walked towards the place she had left her ship, something... instinct?... compelled Samus to turn. She stared. About a mile away in the direction she had just came from was a huge, looming hulk of a wrecked ship. The derelict looked to be decades old. Its make seemed to be Koben. Now that she actually saw it, she remembered seeing something like this on her map of Crateria.
"Whoa... I've got to check that out. AFTER sleep." Yawning, she located her invisible ship. "Disengage cloaking device." The air shimmered, and the yellow gunship was there. Climbing in, Samus reset the cloaking device, then checked her messages. "Huh... Horzat? What's he want... to talk?" She shrugged and sent off a reply message, then collapsed onto a bunk. Within moments, she was fast asleep.
***
"Whaddaya mean there's no lohacla left in the store..." Horzat muttered in his sleep. He rolled over as his alarm clock hummed a few low, slow notes followed by the sound of wind blowing, then suddenly blasted into a battle cacophony. The former Space Pirate yelled and fell out of his bed. Cursing like an Egenoid Star Marine, he rose and slammed the thing off. "I can't believe it's noon already... I gotta start going to bed earlier or something." Muttering to himself, he attached his fake leg, grabbed his cane and put on his eyepatch, then exited his living quarters and walked down the stairs to the bar. Entering, he frowned as he heard loud snoring. "What the-?" Following the sound, he soon located its source; a large, heavy Iz trucker under a table, surrounded by empty bottles. He was one of the regulars, and while he was a good pal for the most part, he would never pass up an opportunity for free drinks. "Dammit... missed one. Looks like Hrug here's been helping himself to a lot..." Sighing, Horzat took the drunkard's wallet and dumped him out on the street, then mopped up the spilled drinks.
"Three hours until opening time... should be enough to get this dump ready." The barkeep began taking stock, checking which drinks he needed to bring out more of. Once he was done, Horzat went out to the stairwell and walked down to a huge, thickly-reinforced, quintuple-locked door. He took two keys out of hidden compartments in his cane, two more out of his leg, and the last from behind the Power Bomb in his eye socket. Inside was an alcoholic's idea of paradise; halls of cases of shelves of barrels of every conceivable alcoholic drink, cascading on seemingly endlessly. Horzat was on a very handsome stipend from the Federation's shadier departments in return for the information on the Metroid plans he had given them when he left the Pirates, a stipend that not even Samus knew about, and he had used it to make sure he would never, ever run out of drinks. That was one of the things that made Horzat's Bar so popular among the transients of Magani; they knew he'd always have what they wanted, even if they didn't know how.
"They don't come here for my personality, after all..." The Ex-Space Pirate chuckled as he refilled the bottles that needed it. Putting them in their proper places behind the counter, he looked around to make sure everything was clean and all the chairs and tables were in their proper positions, then started up his computer. "Let's see what e-mail I've got... spam... spam... hmm, something from Tazrat..." Tazrat, Horzat's brother, was one of the Grondheim Monks. "I'll look at it later... more spam... and something from Samus... huh?" He blinked and double-clicked on the last e-mail.
From: Schozo5 To: GrumpyOldZebesian
Hey, Horzat. Got your message, and to tell you the truth, I was surprised. If I didn't kow better, I would think you almost slightly cared about me. Don't worry about a jamming; the Pirates don't have decent interference up. As a matter of fact, we could probably make a direct connection. I'll be in my ship asleep for the next few hours, so gimme a buzz.
"Hmm..." Horzat looked at the sign next to his front door that stated he opened at 3, and changed it to 4 before sending a signal to Samus' ship. He was answered by the ship's computer.
"Samus Aran is asleep at the moment. You have clearance to speak over all ship's speakers. Do you wish to do so?" He thought for a moment, then grinned.
"Yes. HEY, SAMUS, RIDLEY SAYS YOUR NEXT FIFTY DRINKS ARE ON HIM!" Horzat heard a loud crash followed by some confused cursing, and he laughed. A few minutes later, Samus appeared onscreen.
"Horzat, I should kill you for that."
"Hey, you've done worse to me." The Ex-Space Pirate countered. "Remember the time you switched the labels on all my drinks?"
"Well... yes." Samus conceded grudgingly.
"And the time you told the Yakuza Amabassadorial Cluster that I was offering free all-you-can-drinks to arachnids?"
"Yeah, I suppose so..." She groaned.
"And the time you-"
"OKAY!" Samus yelled. "Okay, you owe me a few."
"More than just a few..." Horzat grumbled. "But anyways. How are you doing, Samus? Scoring loads of bounties?"
"Oh, yes." The female bounty hunter grinned. "Loads of Zebesians, plus that serial killer Crocomire. And somebody else who's gonna make you real happy... Kraid."
"You killed him again?" Horzat asked, eye lighting up.
"Yuuuup. Got a really nice picture of him afterwards for the bounty, too. When I get back, you can get it enlarged and framed."
"YAHOO! Samus, you just made my day!" Horzat actually danced a little jig. "Falcon's gonna be pissed when he hears that you got Kraid before he did... he went to Zebes too, you know. Have you run into him?"
"..." Samus bowed her head, and Horzat knew something was wrong.
"What is it, Samus?"
"Horzat... I'm afraid that... Falcon did get to Kraid before I did..." She whispered. Horzat's eye dimmed.
"Are you saying that..."
"I'm afraid so, Horzat..." She nodded somberly. "Falcon is dead... Kraid murdered him."
"Damn... damn that lizard..." Horzat hissed. "Was it painful?" Samus shook her head.
"Fortunately, it didn't look like it... he was impaled on a spike. It seemed pretty instantaneous."
"That's good..." Horzat's eye was steely. "But I wasn't asking about Falcon's death, Samus. Did Kraid die easy?"
"Not even close." Her own eyes were just as hard. "Trust me... he died VERY painfully. I literally blew him apart from the inside. If they want to revive him again, they're going to have a hell of a time patching his guts back together." The barkeeper sighed.
"Good. Now, on to less morbid subjects." He intentionally steered her away from Falcon's death. "Where's your next target?"
"Well, I saw an old, wrecked Koben ship nearby." Samus told him. "My map doesn't show what's inside, but it lists it as Phantoon's lair."
"Phantoon?" Horzat thought for a moment. "The Elocto? Up on Ridley and Kraid's level?"
"Correct." She agreed. "Anyways, I'm going in there. If Phantoon IS in that wrecked ship, I'll send him to join Kraid; a meeting with him and Draygon, the fourth Pirate Lord, is way overdue for me. I'd better get going."
"Well, gimme a call later." Horzat said by way of goodbye. "If ya need somebody to talk to, or just want to hear about what's going on in the galaxy. The Feds are going bonkers."
"Really?" Samus' face had a wolfish grin on it. "You'll have to tell me more later... this I gotta hear. See ya later, Horzat." The screen blinked out, and the bartender sighed.
"That girl's going to be either a zillionaire or dead before she hits thirty..."
***
"The Wrecked Ship..." Samus muttered as she grabbed a Missile Tank which some stupid Pirate had left lying on the shoreline. In front of her, lying partially beached in the shallow water like a dead whale washed up, the ancient Koben ship loomed. A massize relic from a bygone era, the ship looked as if it dated back to before the unified Galactic Federation. "No weapons on the outside, so it's not a war vessel... and it's too big to be a personal craft. Probably a freighter..." Whatever the ship's purpose had been before, it was finished now, along with the lives of all the crew onboard. Now, it was just an empty shell of its former self, devoid of all life. "Well, almost all... according to my map, Phantoon's in there." With more than a slight feeling of apprehension, Samus jumped over the waves and onto the ship's dock, grappling over the Skultera-infested waters below. Unfortunately, the rain made the dock wet; on one landing, the bounty hunter slipped and fell into the drink. "DAMMIT!" Icing the carnivorous Skultera fish, Samus made for the shore. Then tripped. "What the-?" Digging through the sand, she came up with a Missile Tank. "Who's in charge of hiding these things, anyways?" Returning to shore, Samus set off across the dock again, this time making it to the airlock safely, and cautiously entering.
"...Geez, this is creepy..." Samus whispered after several moments. The hall was walled, ceilinged and floored with complex machinery that looked completely undamaged by the crash. By all rights, it should have been alive and moving, lighting the way. Instead, everything was dull and lifeless, the hall pitch-black. As she entered the main stairwell that connected the parts of the ship, something suddenly appeared in front of the bounty hunter, causing her to jerk back with a startled oath. It was grotesque; a cluster of decaying heads fused together, floating in the air and glowing.
"Leave this place..." The heads moaned. "This is not a place for the living... this is our ship... the ship of the dead... leave, or join us..."
"A dead Koben...?" Samus wondered. "A... ghost? What am I saying, ghosts aren't real..." Then she remembered the Chozo Ghosts of Tallon IV. THOSE has been real, all right; real enough to nearly kill her in their berserk frenzies. "But wait... hold on a second... if you guys are ghosts, why do you let Phantoon stay here?"
"We know no Phantoon..." The Koben spirit growled resolutely. "This ship is only for the dead... leave now, or become one of us... no more warnings..." It disappeared. Samus shivered.
"Man... I hate ghosts. But I've got no choice; no matter what they think, Phantoon's here, and he needs to be taken down." Resolute, she continued down the stairs.There was a whistling noise, and then, a horrendous shriek.
"YOU WERE WARNED!" A Koben spirit was somehow occupying the same space as Samus, her body going through it like it wasn't there, and everywhere they touched, she felt the life slowly being sucked from her bones. Screaming, she jumped away, turned and fired her blaster, which like her body, simply passed through the Koben. It vanished, and a moment later, reappeared on her again with the whistling noise. The bounty hunter jerked loose and tried a Missile, but it didn't do anything, and the spirit disappeared once more. The third time, though, Samus was ready; as soon as the whistling noise was heard, She dived forward, avoiding the ghost entirely.
"Ha! Now I know how to avoid you!" She continued down the stairs, passing dull, lifeless doors without power and taking a Missile Tank that was lying in the corner. At the bottom, it seemed like a dead end. "Hmm..." The bounty hunter switched to the X-Ray Visor and smiled at what she saw; two secret passageways, one in the floor, one in the wall. She chose the latter first and crawled through in Morph Ball mode, still avoiding the Koben. It turned out to be a dead-end. She saw another secret passage at the end, but it was blocked by a deactivated worker robot. "Dammit." Returning to the stairwell, Samus went further downward. Now she was at the very bottom of the ship; the walls were coated in green mold, the only thing that could survive in here. Exploration turned up a Map Station, but like the rest of the ship, it was powerless. On the other side of the moldy area, however, was something familiar. A grey, fleshy lump in the wall that opened into a golden eye the size of a door. She Missiled it thrice, and it died, revealing said door. Above it, an ancient sign read "Power Room."
"The same kind of security Kraid had... Phantoon's gotta be in here." She grimly stepped inside. At first, the power room looked empty and desolate; there didn't seem to be any inhabitants at all. Then, with a hissing noise, floating blue fireballs began to appear, forming a circle in the air. Startled, Samus shot at them, but like with the Koben, her blasts did nothing. And then, with a wavy distortion, an Elocto appeared in the center of the ring. He opened his eye and looked down at Samus.
"Samus Aran, I presume?"
"That's me." The bounty hunter nodded. "And you would be Phantoon."
"My reputation precedes me, it seems." Phantoon smiled. "Your reputation, on the other hand, appears to be entirely deserved. I really must congratulate you on making it past the Koben... you're the only visitor to this ship to survive with the power off."
"'With the power off?'" Samus repeated. "You mean it's supposed to be on?"
"Bingo. I've been draining the power from this room for quite some time now. I've stopped, though; bit hard to fight and do that at the same time. The ship should turn back on in abut ten minutes. After I've dealt with you."
"I think it's more likely that it'll be the other way around, mollusk." Samus threatened. The Elocto shrugged.
"And I tend to doubt it. It's nothing personal; I actually want to thank you for offing Kraid. I hated him. But business is business, and enemies are enemies. Goodbye, Samus Aran." Phantoon closed his eye, shimmered and disappeared, phasing out into the ethereal plane. This posed quite a problem; not only could Samus not attack him, she couldn't even see him! Unfortunately, the opposite did not seem true, as blue fireballs dropped out of the air and began moving towards the bounty hunter. Samus blasted them while frantically looking around for something, anything that would give her opponent's postion away. Then she had an idea, suddenly remembering how she had dealt with the Chozo Ghosts of Tallon IV. Switching on the X-Ray Visor, Samus grinned; now she could see Phantoon, dancing around and dropping the blue fire. Then he stopped, and as his eye opened, he shimmered slighty. It took Samus a moment to figure out what hapened. Then she realized it. Phantoon had returned to the normal plane. Before he could attack, Samus blasted a Super Missile right into the vulnerable eye. As it hit, two things happened. First, Phantoon took a great deal of very painful damage.Second, all hell broke loose.
"EEEYARGH!" Phantoon screamed, slamming his eye shut and going ethereal again before flying to the top of the room. "You want to play hardball, bounty hunter?! FINE!" Suppressing involuntary tears, he gestured with his tentacles in sweeping motions, and huge waves of blue flame came roaring down upon Samus. They were undodgable; Samus was bathed in the unnatural fires multiple times, losing an entire Energy Tank. Finally, the Elocto's rage subsided, and he began drifting around again. Before long, he opened his eye and phased in again to take another look. And naturally, Samus Super Missiled him in the eye once more, enraging Phantoon anew. "You just don't get it, do you?!" Now leaking blood along with the water from his eye, he repeated the waves of blistering blue heat, draining another of Samus' Energy Tanks.
This is just turning out to be a slugfest, Samus thought. And I've only got one tank of energy, and one Super Missile, left. He looks almost dead himself, though... come on... The moment Phantoon's eye opened, Samus' last Super Missile went into it. Now blood was flowing freely from the orb. For a moment, it seemd the fight was over, as Phantoon wavered in the air, seemingly about to fall... and then, in a howl of rage, he created the unavoidable waves of flaming death. Samus felt the last of her Varia Suit's energy being melted away, and she new that she had failed, that she was going to die now. And then, from seemingly nowhere, an Energy Tank was refilled.
"Huh?!" Samus wondered. Then she decided that she could figure it out later; right now, Phantoon was drifting around once more, and she was out of Super Missiles.
"What's wrong, Samus? Out of heavy artillery?" Phantoon laughed, opening his eye. Then something hit him. Something smaller, faster, and still painful. Ordinary Missiles. They flew fast and furious, slamming into Phantoon's eye by the dozen, and he screeched in horrible pain, trying to force the optic closed. It was then that the Pirate Lord realized for the first time what he had overlooked before, something that gripped his heart in a cold steel clamp. He could die here, and that realization brought Phantoon's cowardly heart to the surface of his being. "No! NO, I don't want to die! I don't want to DIE!" Finally, he managed to get his eye closed, and he became ethereal once more. He rose, ready to unleash the final, terrible storm of his fear...
"You do not want to die?" A slow, angry voice spoke. Samus tracked it to see a single Koben ghost... or was it? She looked again with her X-Ray Visor and gasped; there were hundreds, all swarming around Phantoon. "You do not wish to die?! You are alive! You have tricked us! You are not one of us! You shall pay!" The Koben charged forward, their ethereal forms merging with Phantoon's. Wailing like a siren, he stretched, expanded, and wavered.
"No! I don't want to die, I don't want to die, I don't want to-NOOOO!!!!" With one final wail, Phantoon the Elocto's spirit exploded into nothingness, taking all the Koben with him. His hollow, lifeless body flopped down to the floor of the chamber, smoking from the eye socket. Samus shook her head.
"He brought that upon himself... playing such a dangerous game can only lead to woe." Suddenly, the room brightened up, and there was a whirring noise as the lights in the came on. She heard mechanical humming spreading to the other rooms. "Well, he spoke the truth there... the power's back on." Exploring the ship, Samus found there was no trace of Koben remaining. She ran a self-diagnostic and discovered that that "Reserve Tank" was empty.
"So that's what they're for..." She murmured. "They're emergency backup... well, I'm certainly thankful for them." Taking a scan and a picture for the bounty, Samus left the room. The ship was a different place now that the power was back on. Strange lifeforms had been released from storage, somehow surviving this long, and work robots slowly paced around. Her first stop was the Map Station, where she discovered a section up above that she had completely missed. "I've gotta check that out..." Proceeding up, she discovered something sorely needed in a side chamber; a pair of Super Missile Tanks and one Missile Tank. "All RIGHT!" Happily pocketing them, she proceeded further up the ship's length and emerged into a hall. And found herself completely surrounded by the mantislike humanoid insects, these ones with a thicker grey exoskeleton.
"She's killed Lord Phantoon! Destroy her!" One of them shrieked. Samus just laughed and eradicated them with her Super Missiles. Beyond them was a Chozo Statue with nothing in its hands. She had only seen this once before, on Tallon IV.
"Let's see if the same thing works..." Leaping into its hands, Samus curled into her Morph Ball mode. With a groan, it came to life and began walking foward, carrying her into a secret passage in the floor. After a time, it stopped and released her, once more returning to its eternal slumber. Samus uncurled and laid a hand on it for a moment, then turned and walked through the door waiting for her. Inside was another statue, this one holding... the Gravity Suit. She silently absorbed it, and smiled as she saw her suit change to a dark purple color, and felt the increased protection. She couldn't feel it, but she knew that another effect was that water would no longer drag her down.
"This is an excellent bonus indeed. I think now's a good time to go back to Brinstar and Norfair to see what I can nab with all my shiny new things..." Samus smiled even wider. "I'm going on the mother of all scrounging runs. And when I'm done with that... there's just one guy left for me to meet. Hope you're ready for company... Draygon."