Samus turned off the lights. She adjusted her ship's controls so that none of the computer terminals were glowing and even the emergency lights were devoid of illumination. It was as dark as death. She couldn't even see her own hands, although they made silhouettes as she held them up against the stars. She turned off the ship's engines. It was travelling fast enough on frictionless momentum. The silence was all-consuming.
The huntress pressed her face up against the ship's main window. Without sound, without light, she might as well be drifting, lost and alone in the freezing vacuume of space. Just the thought was terrifying, but the bounty hunter took a rare thrill in that flavor of terror. This was as close as she could get to such an experience; any closer and she'd wind up dead within minutes. She closed her eyes and sighed against the glass. She'd missed this in all the months she spent on the Chozo planet. The isolation of space, the indifference of the void suited her.
"Squee." The metroid scratched the window with a fang and squished against it, trying to see what its mother was seeing. Its own illumination was dim and subdued, keeping with the theme of darkness. It was only the source of light and sound on the ship.
Samus absently stroked the larvae's rubbery flesh. "Look there, Warrior." She pointed to a red smear of a star. "That's Ostelic Major, one of the only suns that's cool enough to support life. And over there, beside the small nebula: that's Mirage 14. You can hardly see the Mirage planets since they revolve around a tiny blue star that doesn't produce much light. Between those two, although it's hardly visible now, is Siran Rhese, the sun of the SR planets. There are hundreds of SR planets. One of them is your home."
Warrior probably didn't understand, but it kept still as if it was listening. It was growing big, much bigger than Hatchling was at around the same age. Samus supposed this was because she fed Warrior live food rather than energy from her ship and suit. She kept several of those vertebrae caterpillars in her hydroponics tank as a replenishable food source, for both her metroid and herself. She could retrieve some fresh protein from the animals once Warrior was finished with them. Their meat was delicious, fat, and boneless save for its single spine. She still felt the urge to suck their energy, but the urges were suppressable now. Her child needed the nourishment more than she did.
Warrior could already wrap its mandibles around a human head, but its prefered perch was to cling, leech-like, against its mother's belly. It had long outgrown its favorite spot on the huntress's neck. For some reason, it liked to hang vertically rather than resting horizontally. It loved the feel of warm human skin, all soft and yielding although it was not transparent like its own body. When it touched Samus, it was sensitive to her every movement, from her heartbeat to her breathing to the humming vibrations she made when she spoke.
It nudged against her stomach now, hopeful. It had learned that Samus did not always allow such behavior, but she was more likely to give in if it was polite in asking. She looked down at it with a sleepy look of annoyance, then sighed in defeat. She dropped her arms to her sides and Warrior quickly occupied the vacated space, chirping.
Samus didn't mind the parasite being attached to her; the extra weight was barely noticeable with her Chozo strength. It helped illuminate the area before her as she groped in the dark for the light switch. And as she worked on the computer interface, her elbows rested comfortably on the protruding dome of the metroid.
After some time, Warrior began mewling in its singsong voice, although it had the decency to sound almost apologetic for the interruption. The bounty hunter paused for a moment, then decided to listen to her child's suggestion to take a break. She pried the metroid off her and it hovered around her head, as eager as a child anticipating candy.
"Warrior." Samus said in a commanding voice as she sat in front of the hydroponics tank. The metroid floated steadily before her. "Down. And stay." It plopped obediently onto the floor with its fangs splayed out. "Good. Now stay. Stay." Samus put a hand on it to make sure it wouldn't move. With the remaining hand, she removed a caterpillar and put it on top of her child, then slowly backed away.
"Squeeeeww." Warrior whimpered pitifully, its mandibles twitching in complaint.
"Seru." The woman ordered. Her child fell silent. "I told you to stay." She rose to her feet and left the room for a moment, returning with a ration bar and a heat plate. She was pleased to find that the metroid had not budged from its position, only a shaky glow giving away its impatience. The caterpillar moved lethargically on protoplasmic flesh, trying to find a good foothold with its suction feet.
Samus made herself comfortable on the floor and finally whistled a short tune, after which Warrior immediately flipped onto its back and caught the startled worm in its fangs. She took a bite out of her ration bar and watched her child feed, her expression wistful. Its method of eating didn't disgust her, but induced quite a contrary feeling, considering how she once fed like that as well. For now, she was merely pleased that her training of Warrior in a language consisting of Universal, Chozo, and music was working to some extent. When the meal was finished, Samus whistled another tune and the metroid dropped the leftovers onto her lap.
"That's a good baby." She cooed, gently rubbing the base of a metroid fang. It made the happiest purring sounds and draped itself over a human lap. Warrior never needed much incentive to learn, remember and obey Samus's commands. It seemed perfectly content with being the willing and eager pupil/servant, as long as it had the acceptance of its mother. Perhaps its behavior had to do with the metroids's hive-like society, in which all junior members followed the Queen's bidding faithfully. Samus could already command Warrior with a 50 word/song vocabulary, but there were limits to what the baby metroid could learn. It could not comprehend sentences and most of the words it knew had some physical action attached to it. The most abstract words in its working lexicon were 'good' and 'bad', both of which were used with enough frequency that they were understood and remembered. Perhaps it would learn more once it evolved.
Samus turned her attention to the caterpillar which she placed on the heat plate. The plate's temperature was set on low so she could turn the animal with her fingers without too much injury, yet high enough so that the fluids would congeal tenderly inside the exoskeleton.
Warrior was bumping itself against the hydroponics tank in an attempt to find a weakness in the glass and slip through. It was unsuccessful at this attempt, as it was in every previous one, and decided to engross itself in whatever its mother was doing. It watched her flip the frying insect, then tried doing so itself.
"Hey!..." Samus cried, then stopped. She saw that the heat plate didn't cause Warrior any discomfort, and in fact it was squeaking in a questioning tone, wondering if it had done something wrong. The bounty hunter suddenly wondered if the metroid had a higher heat tolerance to compensate for its vulnerablility to cold. It made sense, especially when she distastefully recalled SR388's abundance of acid lava. As an experiment, she turned up the temperature and flipped the caterpillar again, indicating that Warrior should do the same. It did, eagerly, interested in this new game. She further increased the temperature a bit, then a bit more, but she never did discover Warrior's threshold for heat, not when the metroid's childish nature made it overly enthusiastic. It flipped the sizzling caterpillar, then flipped it again without waiting for its mother, then it decided that she shouldn't have possession of its new toy at all and dashed off with it. When Samus demanded that the food be returned, the child tossed it in her general direction, resulting in situation similar to a chucked water balloon filled with searing-hot entrails.
Samus opted to take a shower as soon as the fusion suit finished healing the heat damage to her skin. Warrior trailed after her, chirping mournfully, finally realizing that it did indeed do something wrong. It hovered at ankle height, slow and forlorn like a dog with his tail between his legs, moving quickly only to dodge articles of clothing falling to the floor.
"You've caused enough trouble today. Bad." Samus dismissed Warrior with those words and shut the shower door on it. The metroid infant whined as the glass misted up, slowly deleting the image of its mother.
A sudden klaxon diverted Warrior's attention and it immediately rushed to the cockpit to see what was going on. It didn't do anything once there, of course; the only buttons its mother lets it press were the light switches and the Autopilot trigger. There was the sound of wet feet slapping as the aforementioned mother ran to the helm, disregarding shower, towel, and clothes in her haste. She stared at the computer for a second before realizing what the cause of the disturbance was.
"Warrior. Down. Freeze." Samus sat on the pilot's seat and pushed the metroid to the ground. At the 'freeze' command, Warrior preformed what she thought was its neatest trick, which was to completely immobilize itself. Its fangs would stiffen, its glow would turn off and it would hang itself motionless in midair. It couldn't keep the act up for long, however. Samus hoped this would be a short communication, but kept a foot on the metroid just in case. She took a moment to flip wet hair over her shoulders before answering the transmission.
The holographic face of an officer appeared before Samus. "Attention, unidentified hunter-class gunship," The huntress managed to scowl at the image; it was just her luck that it had to be a human male on the other end. "This is communications officer Seth Gallis of research station Rebenada. You are entering restricted Galactic Federation territory." The man hesitated briefly. Although he couldn't see below Samus's shoulders, it wasn't every day that a wet, naked woman answered a routine transmission. But he recovered quickly, either too professional to let something like this faze him, or unnerved by the bounty hunter's glare of bladed ice. In any case, he tried to avoid her eyes. "Identify yourself and your business immediately."
"I am Samus Aran, freelance bounty hunter." She replied, sounding almost bored. Now the man did gape, and quite openly. A universally renowned mercenary, even one who has had a falling out with the Federation, was not meant to be seen in such an exposed state. That in turn threw him off balance, made him feel as if he was the vulnerable one. "Are you quite done staring?" She said, annoyance coloring her voice. "I'm a busy woman. Make this quick."
It wasn't long ago that the universe believed Samus Aran was a cyborg. She did nothing to dissuade the notion back then, but now, if the visuals didn't confirm her womanhood, then her own confession did. Gallis swallowed and tried to regain his composure. "You are not authorized to be here, Ms. Aran. I repeat, please state your business."
"I am on a mission which requires me to enter this system."
"I have not received any word of..."
"Of course you haven't. Let me talk to your superior."
Gallis bristled at the interruption and abrupt dismissal. Regardless of her past notoriety, Aran was still a civilian and had no right to talk to him like that. He was about to bark back a retort when he noticed the blinking radar screen beside him. It clearly displayed Samus's ship, but it was moving at a speed impossible for even fighters and breakercrafts, let alone gunships.
"You should hurry." Aran said casually, as if reading the officer's thoughts. "I will be within spitting distance of the Rebenada in less than five minutes."
It wasn't long before another face replaced the hologram of the officer, a face which was drawn and chiseled to read 'astute' and 'commanding', with a hint of aloofness and irritation. The irritation grew as Samus ignored the man at first. She was faced the floor and whistled a strange tune before turning to the new speaker.
"I am the Commander and Manager of Rebenada research station, Kaleb Ark Ferdinaz. Samus Aran, you realize that this is restricted territory and yet you still insist on entering. Explain yourself."
Ignoring his perpetual frown, Samus had to at least admire the man for getting quickly to the point. He didn't seem very affected by her nudity. "I used to travel freely in this area and until given incentive to do otherwise, I still intend to do so." She thought she vaguely recognized Ferdinaz. He was some big-name military hotshot, back when she was but a fledgling hunter.
"Would arrest and confiscation of your ship be enough incentive for you?" Ferdinaz said with a smile. His expression dissolved as quickly as it appeared. "You're not stupid, Ms. Aran. So why are you acting like you are? I know you haven't forgotten the significance of the Siran Rhese system."
"And what if I did forget?"
"Then I would be a gentleman and remind you before escorting you away. But like I said, you haven't forgotten. So stop your vehicle immediately before I am forced to open fire on you." Ferdinaz glanced at the radar screen and noted with satisfaction the gunship's abrupt halt. He turned back to Samus's hologram. "Now cut the crap. What are you doing here?"
"To my knowledge, Rebenada is a sister station to B.S.L." Samus said blandly. "And since it shares the same orbit as its predecessor, I would assume that it also boasts similar functions."
Ferdinaz's lips drew themselves thinner. She left unsaid that B.S.L. was an undeclared metroid breeding facility, and then a deathtrap full of X, all of which she sent crashing into their homeworld. She had something against the study of the X, despite all the potentials of such research.
"Yes," The man said gruffly. "Research station Rebenada, like B.S.L., is devoted to the study of the indigenous lifeforms and the enviroment of SR388 for the benefit of civilization."
Samus smiled, sweetly and coldly. He left unsaid that the study of indigenous lifeforms included the metroids and the X, both of which would incite riots on every major planet if the civilian population ever knew about them. And the 'benefit of civilization' basically meant that they were working on the development of better weapons.
"Of course it is, Commander." She agreed with genuine-sounding honesty. Then the bounty hunter paused, seeming to hesitate. "You see, I am in need of the facilities on the Rebenada. You must know that my power suit was drastically altered during my last venture to B.S.L. And, considering your rank and the amount of information that passes by you, you might also know that I have been experiencing problems with the new fusion suit and have even visited a Federation doctor about it."
Aran switched the visuals from holographic 3D to 2D, allowing the man to see everything behind her. Ferdinaz's eyebrows shot up with interest when he saw the fusion suit in the background. At a glance, it looked quite a bit like her original power suit without the varia or gravity upgrades. But instead of a singular plate covering each shoulder, three curved plates overlapped each other at an increasingly upwards slant. The mandibles found on her previous fusion suit seemed crueler now, more mobile and sensitive. She retained the blades on her left arm, and the blades on her knees, once mostly decorative, were now probably functional as actual weapons. Yet, the interlocking plates or scales of her new suit resembled neither the organic nor mechanical appearance of her previous suits. Instead, it was something in between, perhaps comparable to a mechanical insect of sorts.
"There has been some recent complications with my armor." The bounty hunter said dryly, indicating to her suit's new developments. "And I was unsatisfied with my last visit to the Federation doctor. I figured that since Rebenada had close ties with B.S.L., I might be able to get more answers about the condition of my power suit if I inquired some of your researchers. I am willing to part with it for some time if doing so would yield the results I am looking for." She glanced hopefully at the Commander. "So how about it? I'm sure we can come to some sort or agreement."
Ferdinaz considered the pros and cons of allowing Samus Aran onto the Rebenada. She was not permitted near the station nor the planet it revolved around, but that was mostly because of the fear that she would destroy one or both. The likelyhood of her doing something drastic would increase if she discovered that Rebenada housed a fair number of X for study. Yet, without her suit, what threat did she pose? She would be as dangerous as any other human female. But if she sincerely needed help with her suit and had no intention of blowing anything up, then she might not be a threat at all. And if the researchers were to discover something new about her suit, or the Chozo, or the metroid vaccine, then it would be to his advantage. He simply needed to ensure that she stayed away from the X experiments. She had enough blackmail material against the Federation already.
"Alright, Ms. Aran." Ferdinaz answered reluctantly. "But I'm afraid our docking bay is somewhat overburdened right now, so you will have to leave your gunship in orbit. We will send a shuttle for you and your power suit. We'll be there in twenty minutes."
The bounty hunter's left eye twitched, but then she nodded. "Alright. I'll be waiting."
The moment the transmission was terminated, Samus slammed a fist onto the armrest. "Shit!" She hissed vehemently. Everything had been going according to plan until the moment Ferdinaz said he would send a shuttle. How was she supposed to smuggle Warrior onboard a shuttle?
She rose from her seat and paced while thinking, her child a close shadow behind her head. She had no doubts about the true purpose of Rebenada. Like B.S.L.; it was a military development facility, not only of metroids and X, but of other questionable things as well. Actually, it probably didn't contain metroids since the Chozo had been pretty specific that Warrior was the last of its kind. But the X were a definite possibility.
Samus could battle the X without her suit, but she would be at a huge disadvantage when it comes to fighting opponents with long-range weapons. She had planned to rely on Warrior for defense, especially if the Federation personnel onboard turned against her. Now she had walked into the jaws of her own trap.
At least she was allowed onto the station. The bait of relinquishing her suit for science was too much for the researchers to resist.
The huntress stopped before the cockpit window, staring out at the Rebenada. Unlike B.S.L., it was thin, long, and flat, like an oversized, mechanical piece of spaghetti. No, it's more like linguini. She allowed herself a crooked grin. She would like some pasta right now. The surface of SR388 could be a giant meatball dwarfing the research station in orbit.
Samus stared at the wet footprints on the ground. Oh yeah, her shower. She had left the water running; her reservoir of hot water was probably depleted by now. She stared again at the space station. Warrior nudged against her belly and attached itself there when it met no resistance. Samus stared down at her baby.
And then, she was hit with a moment of sudden inspiration.
She laughed, loudly and brashly. She tossed her head back and filled her ship with the sound. Warrior squealed its own version of laughter, feeling both its mother's glee and the vibrations running down her body. "Oh my God." She said, wiping the corners of her eyes. Oh, she's figured out a way to smuggle Warrior aboard, all right. It was probably the most absurd, inane, spur-of-the-moment plan she's ever conceived of. But it just might work. She just had to make sure she didn't die of laughter or embarrassment first.
Warrior chirped a question at its mother. Samus curled down and gave it an awkward hug. "Can you sense it, Warrior? The excitement, the rush of adrenalin before a mission. I feel it all the time." She smiled into the metroid's rubbery flesh. "We're going in, baby. I'm counting on you."