CHAPTER 13: DRIFTERS
Hunter
Log 3849
I have a feeling this isn't all of
the Chozo. The girl said they were in a prison structure. I think
this was just a place for marking the Chozo ready for sacrifice.
While the Chozo had just decimated that single pirate, they are not a warrior race. They are peaceful and desire knowledge and wisdom, not power.
They could help me in battle, but in the long run, they'd just get in the way and get killed. One of my goals is to prevent that.
They seem to be showing me a way out, so I guess it's time to continue.
Samus out...
The sea of Chozo parted to reveal a door at the back of the chamber.
Samus made her way down the path created by the giant birds and reached the door, which one had already opened.
As Samus proceeded through, she could hear the creatures filing in behind her. This could be dangerous if Samus was fired upon inside the tunnel.
She turned and gestured to the lead Chozo to stay back a bit to give her some room, then continued on.
The tunnel finally led to a massive cylindrical room with a completely flat metal floor. To the far left stood a control panel.
Samus entered the room and the Chozo followed.
After all of the creatures had made it inside, Samus pressed the console. The floor shifted, which caught many Chozo off-guard as they braced themselves against their comrades. They began moving upward.
Samus contemplated their destination. This could possibly be a bad thing. What if the elevator's destination was the prison? What would she do with all of the branded prisoners?
The elevator finally reached its destination: a large, well-lit room with four pirates.
Samus fired a plasma shot at the first, severing its torso into two pieces. The Chozo handled the other three, smashing them against the walls.
The result surprised Samus. The force used on the pirates left dents in the metal walls that were easily several inches thick.
She proceeded toward the door and opened it.
Outside lava canals snaked through the terrain and plumes of sulfurous gas escaped from crevasses. The smell of rotten eggs permeated even Samus' breathing system. She cringed in response.
There was nowhere to go in front of the building, so Samus proceeded to the right and looked behind the structure.
There stood a massive black wall that looked to be made from cooled lava. Across the top was a small lava canal.
"So much for barbed wire," thought Samus.
On the corners of the wall were what appeared to be guard towers with gun turrets.
This was definitely the place where the rest of the Chozo were being held.
Samus couldn't put the other Chozo in jeopardy by bringing them with her. She had to go this one alone...as usual.
She peeked around the side of the building to get a glimpse of the far guard tower. Inside was a pirate, seemingly sleeping at his post. The other guard tower seemed vacant, so Samus approached the massive obsidian wall.
She knocked on the structure. Solid. She definitely couldn't dig her fingers into that stuff, especially after what had happened underground.
Samus continued around the wall, as close to it as she could get. When she rounded a corner, she saw her way in.
Running under the wall was a lava flow. The opening was nearly two feet tall and three feet wide...just large enough to crawl under.
She made her way to the lava canal and knew that she had to work quickly. She began blasting ice beam shots at the molten rock, solidifying it. After a few moments, she had cooled enough to slip into the opening.
After crawling through, she emerged in an empty courtyard. At the back of the courtyard stood a large black structure. It looked similar to a geodesic dome, except for being flat around its base. It connected to the wall to create a single large mass of solid obsidian.
In the middle of the courtyard, standing near the lava flow, stood a control panel. Pressing her hand on it, Samus awaited the results. The large dome began to shake and rise as the ground crumbled away to reveal more lava. The structure continued upward as the lava began to bulge toward the center of the newly formed lava pond.
Emerging from the pool was a familiar face...a gigantic bust of Ridley's head, mouth open and teeth beared.
After the bust had completely surfaced, the lava pool immediately cooled, making it identical to the ground it had already replaced.
Inside the mouth were pods, each roughly Samus' size. Samus began to approach the pods, but they began to undulate before she had taken more than a few steps.
All six of the pods suddenly burst and out sprung six creatures.
"What the...heck is going on..." asked Samus, "little Crocomires?"
Each of the lifeforms were nearly identical to the former beast. During her last trip to Zebes, he was essentially Ridley's watchdog. She had easily eliminated him by casting him into acid...but she seemed to be a little short on that at the current time.
The creatures rushed at Samus. She began blasting her beams at them, plasma, energy, ice, none of them did anything but slightly move the monsters.
She launched a missile at one. It was knocked to the side for a moment, but quickly righted itself and continued at Samus.
She tried a super missile on another one. The creature sailed though the air and bounced off of the wall, onto its feet. It continued on as well.
Samus ran back and readied herself against the farthest wall.
The Crocomires, knowing they had their prey pinned down, lined up next to each other and opened their mouths. Yellow energy gathered quickly and launched in a massive beam toward Samus. She leapt upward and somersaulted over it, landing beside the sextuplets.
She diverted her power systems and switched to the Chozo beam. She fired a single shot down the line. The shock from the blast threw Samus backward as the beam ripped through the small beasts.
Samus finally reached the ground and skidded, tumbling for several feet until she came to a stop on her stomach. She turned to face her targets...and couldn't find them. What she did find however, was a massive hole burned into the obsidian wall, still dripping with molten rock that hadn't been vaporized in the blast.
"What a shot..." Samus remarked.
Maybe this beam was a little more than she could handle...
If she had not cut off the stream, it would have thrown her though the rock wall and maybe even into a lava pit. She had to learn how to master this weapon, this destructive force.
Suddenly, a shot zoomed past Samus. She looked toward its origin...the guard tower. All of the fighting had awoken the pirate at the turret.
Shot after shot rained down. The blue-hot plasma streaked past Samus, burning impressions in the air along the way. She dodged and jumped, running toward the tower.
"This is a good enough time as any to learn how to use this thing," Samus said as she stopped and braced her feet and legs.
She held up her arm cannon and pointed it at the turret.
The pirate fired a shot directly at Samus. It streaked toward its target.
Samus unleashed a burst of the Chozo beam. The blast pushed her feet down into the crumbling surface beneath her as she tried to withstand the force.
The shot engulfed the plasma shot by the turret and continued on. Samus could hear the pirate screech as the Chozo beam contacted the tower. The pure energy seemed to rip the structure apart atom by atom.
Before long, the noise ceased, and there were no remnants of a guard tower to be seen.
Samus calmly walked back toward the building at the back of the courtyard. She had to find a way inside.
She knew ONE way of making one, but if the Chozo were inside, there wouldn't be much of a point in getting in that way.
Walking into the mouth of Ridley's bust, she knocked on the back...hollow. This would have to work for now.
Samus stepped back and fired a super missile into the mouth. The wall blew open, revealing a passageway into a long hall.
She continued inside and proceeded to the end of the tunnel, which opened up into a large room, tiered downward. At the bottom of the tiers were hundreds of sleeping Chozo.
Samus leapt down to the creatures and stirred them. Before long, all had awoken and were prepared to leave.
Aware that the Chozo would be unable to climb the tiers, Samus gestured for them to stand back. She crouched and braced herself, firing the Chozo beam upward at an angle. The beam cut a trench into the tiers that led all the way to the exit corridor.
Samus hurriedly herded the Chozo up the trench. She waited on all of them to exit before she started up the trench. Then she heard a rumbling sound...
The sound got louder by the second...and sounded like it was behind her... She turned to face the back wall just in time for it to explode into flying stone chunks.
Samus shielded herself with her arm as the debris flew around her. When the rocks finally stopped falling, she let her arm rest and awaited what would emerge from the enormous cloud of dust.
Suddenly, a claw shot out and grabbed Samus before she could move. The grip was familiar, nearly crushing.
Her attacker stepped through the dust...an Ultimate.
It roared and pitched Samus. She hit the flat part of one of the tiers, skipping off of it and landing against the back wall.
She could hardly stand after the impact. Crumbles from her collision point with the wall fell and bounced like hailstones on the ground.
The Ultimate began stepping up the tiers to reach Samus again.
She righted herself and beheld her assailant. This was her chance. She pressed her back against the wall in a seated position and aimed her arm cannon.
The large claw once again reached for Samus...closer...closer...closer...until the shadow engulfed Samus...
Then she released the blast from the Chozo beam...
The Ultimate felt the force of the blast and attempted to hold it at bay with its palm.
Samus continued to fire at the hulk...
The arm began to shudder as the stream of superheated energy began to slip around the Ultimate's claw and overpower it.
Samus felt the wall cracking behind her and the pressure on her back and shoulders, but for her life, she continued to fire the Chozo beam...
Finally, the powerful shot threw the Ultimate's arm upward and allowed the beam to connect with its chest. The beast immediately flew backward against the back wall. It roared and screeched in pain as the energy slowly tore it apart, particle by particle. A purple aura started to outline the Ultimate until it fell silent.
The aura lit the room in a white-purple hue as the remains of the Ultimate dissipated into nothingness.
Samus cut off the beam as she sat in slightly lingering consciousness. Her vision began to fade.
She heard a noise to her left, she leaned to look and
turned her head, but soon fell victim to fatigue and passed out.
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A few Chozo entered the room, returning because of the commotion. They approached Samus' limp body and lifted her up. They carried her down the hallway and back into the courtyard, where all of the other Chozo had gathered.
The Chozo had been liberated...
