Chapter 4

The Size Up

The building burned brightly in the dark corner of the city, smoke billowed heavily out of the busted out windows. The abandoned structure moaned as the fire licked away at the frame holding it up, its weight becoming more and more unbearable, screaming to collapse on itself at any moment.

"Samus, take the bottom three floors and Priss can take the top three", Sylia commanded through the suits intercom system. Both Priss and Samus separated from the RV that rolled up to the building, Priss jumping high into the air, somersaulting and nimbly landing on a neighboring roof to access a safe entry point. Samus ran full speed around the backside of the building, her scan visor picked up every detail that jumped out at her. She carefully pushed a door open; the fragile piece of wood fell off of its hinges kicking up dust and ash as it landed. Samus entered what looked to once be a kitchen, the sink a sickening gray mass of charred porcelain.

……

On the roof of the burning building, Priss found the stairwell to take down to start her search. She felt none of the heat from the flames that licked the walls as she made her way down, taking each step cautiously. The concrete was a tricky business because it could stand up to a lot of heat, but in a fire the chemical structure could be compromised, turning the once solid staircase into a dry sand staircase. Priss began her search on the top floor, checking each blistering room for any sign of the boomer, the wallpaper that hadn't caught fire yet was peeling itself off the walls, curling down to the floor in defeated heaps. A cracking sound behind caused Priss to jump around, she aimed the newly installed arm cannon in the direction of the sound and opened fire, the beam of freezing ice flew from the cannon and hit the opposing wall, creating an icy coat on the wall that immediately began to melt away. Priss continued through the floor, finding nothing but the orange flames eating away at the buildings insides; it wouldn't be long now till the building collapsed.

From out of nowhere, the floor opened up and an arm grabbed Priss' leg, pulling her down into the floor beneath her. She fell and landed with a thud, the floorboards creaking under the extra weight. Priss shook her head, unsure as to why she had fallen through the floor. She took a quick look around from her position on the floor, the flames were more intense on this level; the walls had been completely destroyed with the exception of the framework. The flames raged on all sides around her, but she noticed one thing; coming towards her was a wavy shadow, the shadow of a person. "Samus? Is that you Samus?" Priss asked into her COM, her arm up, ready to fire if she needed to.

……

Samus listened as the transmission came in but the heat from the building only brought in the static; she replied back but received only crackled broken up language. The two of them were dead to the world, their transceivers wouldn't break the heat the building was throwing at them, distorting the signal past recognition. Samus had since turned on her X-Ray visor to examine the area around her. The framework, or lack thereof, of the building was strewn about her view, the fire was no longer visible in this mode but Samus wasn't worried, the flames would cause no damage to her suit. She placed careful steps, taking note of where the weaknesses in the floor lied. Every now and then a piece of the ceiling would come down and crash around her and she would have to find a different way around; she had seen no sign of the boomer. More crackling came over the COM, but she could again no longer distinguish the static from the voice on the other end. "This is great! I feel like I'm playing the firefighter who gets to try and find the missing person in the burning building", Samus thought to herself, heading through another door. A rumble from overhead prompted Samus to step back just in time to see an inflamed couch crash through the ceiling; she could just make out a robotic body jumping across the hole a few floors up. "Gotcha."

……

Priss dodged the attacks the boomer threw at her and tried returning some of her own but found it was a fruitless attempt inside the burning inferno. The boomer blasted Priss with a charged particle beam and sent her flying through a wall of fire and landing in a puddle of boiling plastic, its previous form unknown. The boomer approached quickly; raising a large water pipe above its head, ready to bring it down on the helpless Knight Saber. Priss covered her face with her arms in defense; the next she knew she was being drug backwards, the sound of the pipe hitting the floor thudded ahead of her. She found herself wrapped in an electrical rope and turned to see Samus pulling her back with her grapple beam and then she fired her ice beam; the beam passed overhead, dropping melting water particles from its tail. The beam hit the boomer in the chest and immediately began freezing it over until the entire robot was encased in ice. Samus released Priss and they both began to advance on the boomer; the melting ice weakened the barrier and before the two could strike it broke free and sent them both flying back toward the wall.

Samus picked herself up and motioned toward Priss that they needed to get the creature out of the heat packed building; Priss gave the thumbs up. Samus noted a hole in the ceiling as they ran toward the boomer, Samus leapt up and into the next floor; Priss stopped a few inches from the creature and began distracting him with a few kicks. Samus crashed through the ceiling overhead and fell behind the boomer, rolling one of her legs around and sweeping the boomers feet out from under him. As the creature fell forward, Priss grabbed it by the shoulders, planted her feet in the boomers chest, and rolled onto her back, sending the robot creature flying through the nearby brick wall. Priss wasted no time following the creature out of the gaping hole and as she dropped down, she fired a few of her new needles at the creature; they sunk deep into both arms and instantly froze over, the rush of wind from beneath ripped the frozen arms from their shoulders and the creature landed hard in the pavement, sending chunks of asphalt into the air.

Samus followed Priss out of the building and landed behind her; the boomer was just beginning to rise to its feet and Priss had readied a knuckle bomb to smash the boomer's head in. The robots chest plate opened to reveal missiles and they began firing as Priss charged the boomer but before she could even get off a shot, an electrical wave beam blew past her and hit the boomer; electrocuting it until it lay on the pavement, smoke venting off of the heated metal.

"WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING? THAT WAS MY KILL!" Priss yelled, the COM system working clearly outside the raging fire; she stomped over toward Samus.

"You are playing around. You should have just taken care of the thing while you had the chance. If you were fast enough, you could have destroyed it before that chest plate even opened", Samus replied calmly, trying not to let the overheated Priss get the better of her.

At her response, Priss blew a gasket, the visor on her helmet came up to reveal her face, red with anger; she began attempting to chew out Samus who argued back claiming that Priss didn't need to show off to her. Samus was silently enjoying the argument, but neither of them was paying attention to the boomer rising to its feet behind them. It's mouth opening up to reveal another particle beam cannon charging to blast the two before they would be able to realize it. Samus' suit picked up the energy spike as it began to gather, and Priss caught site of the light reflecting in her helmet. Priss and Samus both jumped back in opposite directions and fired their weapons; Priss' needles caught the creature in the leg, ice streaming up one side of its body, while Samus' ice beam caught the creature at mid abdomen. As the boomer's beam reached capacity, the frozen wires in the boomer could no longer hold the voltage and the energy imploded on its self. The boomer exploded, leaving nothing but metallic pieces scattered around its body, covered in green Metroid slime.

Priss and Samus peered at each other from their spots, "Nice shot", Priss commented.

Samus shrugged, "Coulda been better", she said, smirking behind her green visor as Priss turned and made her way back to the other awaiting Knight Sabers.

……

"Sir? Are we ready for the test run?" A grey Space Pirate turned and asked a much larger Elite Pirate in their native tongue.

The Elite Pirate responded, "The reactors have been purged. Proceed with test run 001."

"Aye Sir", the pirate responded, typing a few commands into the hovering touch screen before turning his gaze out into a cavern where three enormous reactors began humming to life. Green lights began flashing on and off along a conference table size console indicating that internal temperatures were good; slowly the hum from the reactors grew louder, causing the very walls of the tower size cavern to slightly shake and disturb small rocks from there homes; they fell to the ground harmlessly. "Sir…at this rate, the energy will be more then enough to create the dimensional rip on a universal level."

"Excellent", the elite replied, "The test is complete, power down and check for any possible irregularities. Report to me once you are done."

"Aye sir", the pirate said.

The elite pirate left the room and entered his office chamber; various diagrams of the huge skyscraper size machine were scattered on his desk. The pirate pulled a switch on the cavern wall and a screen rose from the floor and flickered to life; the image of a short cut red head appeared, her skin a pale paper white with long eyebrows shooting from her brow. A red gem transfused in her forehead glimmered and the female opened her eyes. "Mother Brain, we have succeeded. We can pull enough energy from the reactors to rip the dimension open."

A frown appeared on Mother Brain's face, "Elite 1983? How many times have I asked you to refer to me as Sharon Apple? I tire of your in competency in remembering a simple name", she reprimanded, the elite began stuttering an apology, "That nickname should have been stricken from the records long ago. That hideous thing your pirates built for me should have been destroyed in its plans for creation long before it was built. If you plan on living past another day, I suggest you try harder to remember who I am, and not what you all wanted to make me."

"Yes Ma'am", Elite 1983 said, bowing apologetically.

"See to it that the Metroid boomers are ready for the invasion and report to me when we are ready to begin."

"Yes Ma'am", the pirate repeated; the monitor went blank and the pirate grumbled to himself as he flipped the switch again, descending the monitor back into its compartment.

A/N: For those of you who read my "The Plight Of Samus Aran", this is the sequel to that. In that story, Mother Brain is found out to actually be Sharon Apple, an A.I. chip created by the Macross Consortium, first as a venue of entertainment, and later as a weapon. The A.I. became self aware and began living for its own purpose, which to begin with was giving people what they wanted and failed. (The whole Macross and Sharon Apple thing can be seen in the anime Macross Plus) After her failure, she realized she could not make individuals happy and in order for her to be happy she wanted power, and that power led to corruption which in turn, made her seek out the Space Pirates who built her her first form, Mother Brain. Mother Brain was a failure and in "The Plight Of Samus Aran", this enlighting story comes to present. Now Mother Brain, AKA Sharon Apple, is still seeking that power but in a different form. Just read the prequel to this :-P and it all will make sense XD

Don't forget to read and review and if you have questions…just ask.