HAZY MORN

The darkness eveloped me for a long time... I was still too young to understand the concept of death, but I could feel myself on the edge of something. I dreamed... I relieved what had happened... Being alone, being rescued, being hurt...

After what seemed like ages, I finally found myself in a different room than the one from my memories. It was the room that I would spend the rest of my youth in...

Dimly lit, there was only one door, a large mirror on one wall, and a bed that I was lying on on the other. The only other item of note was a small cabinet opposite the door that would suddenly have food when it was time to eat. Though they would become some of my happiest years of my life, I was unaware that it was just like a prison cell...

A gentle, melodic voice finally spoke to me.

Her name was Joy, and she was to be my foster parent. Ironic, that she would be the only joy in my life...

Her waist-long blonde hair framed a compassionate yet sorrowful face. Despite my years of living with her, only her eyes truly remain vivid in my mind. An unusual shade of violet, and the irises were horizontal slits rather than the circles mine were.

I sat up and winced. A large metal panel stretched across the back of my waist, limiting my movement. Over the years I frequently asked Joy why I had to wear the thing, and her reply was always the same. That I had bad kidneys, and that the machine was what did that function for me. She also told me I had needed a large donation of blood, which she had happily given, glad to make a small sacrifice to save my life.

I always trusted Joy... So I did not question this answer, and thought it nothing more than coincidence that the plate was right where the light had burned me before.

It was actually Joy who gave me my name. She had always called me Samus Aran. She said it fit me, it was from an old, long lost language that meant "surviving hope".

I spent many happy years with Joy, blissfully ignorant of the galaxy beyond our room, and perfectly content with what I had. Occassionally, I would awaken to find items had been placed in our room. Treadmills, weights, and other pysical training equipment. Joy would say that it was important that I use these items to become strong...

And it was Joy, I had no reason to doubt her...

As most children do, I would occasionally grow curious of the outside world. I'd ask where the door would lead, even though it was always locked, where our food in the cabinet came from, and where we had come from.

Joy would smile sadly and pat me on the head and say "You'll know soon enough," and that would be the end of the discussion.

There was only one point of discord between us. Around my sixth birthday, I recounted my recurring dream of my earliest memory, that fateful day when the gentle monsters found me in the dark, and took me out into the light. Joy looked about nervously, sighed and sat me down on the bed. "Samus," she said after a long pause. "Those monsters were Space Pirates. They weren't trying to save you, they wanted to take you away, to hurt you..."

"No!" I interrupted. "They were scary-looking, but they were good monsters, they found me when I was lost alone for a long, long time."

"Samus, please..." Joy said as she folded her hands and rested her forhead on them. "They were bad, evil monsters. They wanted to hurt you..."

"No, that's not true," I insisted. "If they wanted to eat mme or something, why didn't they when they found me? Why would they carry me so carefully? Why..."

But I stopped. Joy's shoulders were shuddering with short gasps. She was crying. I had never seen her cry before or since, so the shock of it doomed me to silence. Before I knew it, I was crying too.

"Joy, I'm sorry," I sobbed. "Please, please stop crying. I won't talk about the bad monsters again..."

And I didn't... Joy was the kindest person I had ever know, or ever would know. It pained me to no end to see her suffer, especially if it was my fault. So I kept my dreams to myself, and never mentioned it again.

But somewhere deep inside, I knew that what she had insisted wasn't true...

Despite this one incident, my childhood was a quiet and happy one. Joy took care of all my schooling, and with no other real recreation, I exercised in my free time. The result was that I was quick-witted and strong when I hit 16. It would be the last day I would truly be happy...

Joy had always been kind and loving to me, yet something about her, her very aura, seemed to emanate a terrible sense of sadness.

But that day, my sixteenth birthday, she was sadder than usual. Though she smiled and spoke no differently, I could feel it. I could sense her feelings of upcoming sorrow and regret.

But the last thing I wanted was to make her more sad, to make her cry again. So I grinned and hid the sadness she had unexpectedly infected me with.

It was around midday, that is it was about between when I would awake and when I would sleep, whenever that was. A sudden hiss sounded, and made me jump. Joy looked at the room's door. "Samus..." she spoke in barely a whisper. "Remember that, no matter what, I love you. I always have, and always will..."

My emotional dam burst at the fear in her voice, and tears were suddenly filling my eyes. "Joy? Why do you say that? Are you going away?"

Behind me the door's hissing stopped and the portal made a series of clicks.

"No," a voice I had never heard said behind me.

I turned and immediately shielded my eyes from the hall's relatively brilliance compared to the dim room I had spent most of my life in.

"But you are." the stranger continued.

My eyes began to adjust, and the man's features slowly came into focus. He was tall by human standards. His black hair was combed and greased back, matching a well-trimmed moustache. His eyes were as gray and cold as steel, his features cracked and wrinkled with age and worry.

But his anxiety and tension were different from the kind Joy often displayed, more a sense of fear and anger, than sadness and despair...

The truth? The truth is that I never knew my real parents, but Joy was more of a parent than any child could ask for. She loved me like I was her own. I loved her back, and I still do to this day. I just wish she had been honest with me, that she had been the one to tell me the truth, rather than having to find out for myself...