Samus had now been on Zebes for almost three years. She was currently training with Taklon. After an exhausting ten minutes Taklon had Samus in a headlock and she agreed to forfeit. Even though the Chozo blood within her had increased her strength, agility, and senses and she had come far in her training she rarely beat Taklon. His fighting skills had improved as well. Other than him she could beat all the other Chozo her age. They both bowed to the other like Hawkoruu taught them and then they took a break. Nikora was there as well. She wasn't big on training and things of that sort so she just watched. Samus had a worried look on her face.
"Don't worry. I'm sure Hawkoruu will be fine.", comforted Taklon.
"I know I shouldn't worry so much but isn't he kind of old to be going of to war?"
Nikora took a break from eating her shogor leaves and said, "I've seen him in those tournaments. He can handle himself."
Taklon stepped back in and said, "Yeah, he is old but you have to remember, he's been fighting wars for 60 years, that's a lot of experience."
Meanwhile on Hamar 5, Hawkoruu was instructing some human and Troglodan soldiers on how to use some laser cannons. Troglodans are basically humanoid but are shorter than humans, are purple and have four arms each. Hawkoruu had joined a volunteer Chozo army. The Chozo council would not officially go to war with the space pirates. The council did, however pass a decree that any Chozo who wished to do so had the right to make war on the pirates. Hawkoruu was one of those. He had always been disgusted that the Chozo council did almost nothing against the pirates.
He as one of 50 Chozo warriors stationed on Hamar 5. One of the volunteer army's spies had given him information that space pirates were going to attack the planet in three days. Him and the others had been sent to this planet to warn the inhabitants and aid them in defending themselves against the pirates. He had alread taught the soldiers how to use their borrowed Chozo weapons but decided to go over it with them again before the battle.
"And remember to aim for the front parts of their ships. They're less armored there.", said Hawkoruu, instructing some pilots.
"Got it!", said one while the other two nodded their heads.
"Good." He had a gift for commanding respect among these people. He supposed it was because most of them had never seen a chozo, much less one who was 11 feet tall.
He looked at his watch and saw that the space pirates were due to arrive soon. He walked to the docking bay of the fortress and got into the cockpit of a Chozo mark 9 Avenger. This was an advanced Chozo ship more than capable of stealth and combat. He would be leading the rest of the fleet in this. The plan was to fly the fleet into orbit and keep it hidden behind the planet's moon. When the pirate ships approached they would come out of hiding and launch a surprise attack before the pirates reached the planet. It was soon time to beging the plan. Some soldiers saluted him as he and the rest of the fleet took off with brilliant, blue flames propelling them upward.
Hawkoruu had been sitting in the cramped cockpit of his ship for half an hour. It was pretty boring, sitting there.
He wondered, "Was Sobimoruu right? Is Samus really to me so important to the fate of the Chozo people and the galaxy? He remembered when he went with Sobimoruu to K-2L and rescued Samus from the wreckage. Sobimoruu had been right. There was a little girl on the planet. How she survived,he did not know, unless it really was some kind of destiny. He remembered when he began training Samus. Sobimoruu told him to train Samus well and to make sure she received the same training a Chozo warrior would. He used to be skeptical when it came her ability to keep up with the training but to his surprise Samus was flying through the warrior training faster than most Chozo. She would be a great warrior some day. Hawkoruu's thoughts were suddenly interrupted by a siren coming from the control panel. The space pirates were approaching!
Hawkoruu and about 200 others started up their ships and emerged from behind the small moon. Before the pirates had time to react they were already losing ships. The small pirate fighter ships flew out of the frigates and engaged Hawkoruu's fleet in battle. The pirates would lose this battle. That much was sure. The hard part was left to Hawkoruu and ten GF soldiers. It was their job to infiltrate one of the pirate frigates and capture some data. Unfortunately, this data was held by a pirate general. Hawkoruu flew his ship past the pirate fighters and up to the frigate. The hangar was still open since the fighters had just flown out so Hawkoruu was able to fly inside. A large silver colored ship landed, and screeched to a halt behind him. A few seconds later, the hangar gate closed behind them and air was pumped back into the room.
Hawkoruu stepped out of his ship and looked around the hangar. He saw a pirate engineer running for a door on the other side of the room. He aimed carefully and fired a plasma beam. The pirate burst into flames and soon all that was left was a black stain on the floor. Hawkoruu smiled and looked back at the silver ship. Nine Galactic Federation soldiers had stepped out. A tenth soldier was staying in the silver ship. He waved at them and walked over.
"You've already been informed of the plan, let's do this." He interrupted one soldier telling a dirty joke.
"Pay attention, you're more likely to live that way."
The soldier nodded and said the stereotypical "Yes sir!" The soldiers followed him to the far door of the hangar and stopped when Hawkoruu gave them a hand signal.
Hawkoruu shot at the door and it opened. Why, Hawkoruu didn't know but for some reason space pirates almost always designed their doors so that they opened when shot at. He looked inside and saw no pirates.
"It's clear." They all stepped into what appeared to be a laboratory. Hawkoruu was disgusted at the sight. Various creatures were floating in tanks filled with strange liquids. Others were frozen. Sitting on desk was a human skull. Most of the soldiers looked away and one barfed in his helmet.
"Jake, you going to be o.k?", asked one soldier.
"I'll be fine, I just wasn't prepared for anything like this. It's just wrong.", he answered, taking off his helmet.
Hawkoruu said, "Sorry, you humans ready? We have to get going."
"Yeah, answered Jake.
"Good."
Hawkoruu opened another door, "It's clear, oh, no it isn't." He closed the door and backed off. They could hear bullets knocking against the steel door a second after it closed. Hawkoruu shot the pirate stepping through, threw a grenade-like device into the other room and re-closed the door. The GF soldiers were startled by the sound of the explosion in the other room. They could hear pirates screaming for a few seconds before they died. Hawkoruu opened the door and stepped through. Dead pirates and blue colored dust littered the floor. One of the pirates had pulled the alarm switch. An annoying siren was going off and lights all over the ceiling were flashing red. Hawkoruu didn't like it. The lights were hurting his eyes so as they passed through the room he shot at the ceiling to stop the lights.
There were two doors to go through and both of them were locked by huge metal plates covering them.
"Ugh, which way do we go?", asked one soldier with a dumb look on his face. Hawkoruu told him to wait a second and pulled out a small box with a dish and two antennas sticking out of the top. He set this on the floor and it made a humming noise.
"What are you doing?", asked the same soldier.
"Just mapping the ship", answered Hawkoruu, "This wont take long at all." He picked up the device and stared at a map which appeared on it's glowing surface. Beyond this room the frigate became maze-like.
"We will take the door on the left, you two come with me, the rest of you stay here just in case the general tries escaping through here. Stay alert."
"You sure you wont need any more help?", asked one soldier.
"I know what I'm doing."
"Fine then, sir."
"Why must you humans insist on calling me sir?"
"Tradition, sir.", answered another soldier. Hawkoruu laughed to himself.
"Well, let's go." Hawkoruu shot a few missiles and destroyed the door on the left. The two soldiers stepped though with him. They ran down a long, twisting hallway and shot a few pirates who got in their way. Pretty soon, they were at another door. Hawkoruu knocked it off it's hinges with a few missiles. He stepped through and to his anger and surprise the general wsn't there. All the room had was a large chair, several computers, a small pile of gold, and ten very ugly space pirates. The pirates immediately shot him. He was knocked over but he would live because of his Chozo armor. The two soldiers came in behind him and shot down five of the pirates before they died from machine gun fire themselves. Hawkoruu leapt back up and sprayed the room with his flame thrower. Hawkoruu laughed as the pirates ran around the room, engulfed in flames. He stopped himself.
"No, disgusting, I shouldn't laugh. These are intelligent beings. If I let malice into my heart I will become like them.", he shot each of the pirates so their deaths wouldn't be unnecessarily protracted.
The general had to be headed toward the ship so he could escape. This would also lead him through the room where Hawkoruu left the troops. Hawkoruu ran down some more turning hallways. On the way he called his troops. There was no answer. He sighed into the radio and continued running. He shot at pirates as they popped out of adjacent rooms. He soon made it to the room with the soldiers. Hawkoruu was too late. Their bodies were horribly muilated. He couldn't stop to mourn. He had to catch the general before he got off the ship. Hawkoruu looked at a device on his arm. It was blinking red, which meant his armor's power was low. He took off for the hangar.
On the way there Hawkoruu got a call from the soldier watching the silver ship, "The pirates are in the hangar, please send help. I can't hold them off forever!"
"Hang tight, I'll be there soon. In less than a minute, he was running through the hangar. He could see the silver ship. Unfortunately, space pirates had surrounded it. Other pirates were looking for the soldier. The soldier was hiding behind other ships, and occasionally took shots at the pirates. Hawkoruu pulled out a golden colored rifle, looked through the scope and shot laser beams through three pirates. The other pirates around the silver ship scattered and hid behind whatever they could find. One pirate peeked from behind a vessel and pointed at Hawkoruu. Hawkoruu shot a laser through its head. He then realized just in time that the pirates probably knew where he was by now.
He ducked behind a small ship and saw machine gun fire and lasers tear through the floor in the are where he had just been standing. The pirates opened fire on the ship he was standing behind. The ship began looking like swiss cheese and Hawkoruu wondered how long the ship could protect him. The pirates stopped firing because the soldier fired a rocket and obliterated several of them. He tried hiding behind a pillar but before he could move he was torn apart by laser blasts and his ashes were sent flying by the force. Before they could focus on Hawkoruu again he pulled out a blue orb and threw it. The pirates saw it coming but couldn't move fast enough to avoid it. The orb exploded and sent metal shards ripping through their bodies at 500 miles an hour. Hawkoruu saw that not all the pirates were caught in the blast. He quickly charged over and shot two of them. He saw a door closing on one ship. He fired a missile, shattering the door. A very scared pirate general hopped out and tried running. The general turned and shot Hawkoruu. His armor didn't have enough power left to fully protect him and he felt the laser burn into his leg.
He stopped himself from falling and returned fire, hitting the general in his left leg. The general went down. He still tried shooting back but Hawkoruu shot his hand and he dropped the gun. Hawkoruu limped over painfully and stood over the general.
"Wha-what do you want?", stammered the pirate general.
"Oh, nothing more than to ruin your world, the disc, I'll be wanting that too."
"What disc?", said the general faking ignorance. Hawkoruu didn't have time for this. There were still other pirates on the ship and they'd arrive soon.
"You know what I'm talking about.", replied Hawkoruu, pressing his gun against thegeneral's head. The general pulled the disc out of a pocket in his armor.
"Uh, here." Hawkoruu knew it was fake. He could tell in the general's voice and he'd dealt with pirates before.
"The real one!", shouted Hawkoruu, snapping the disc.
"What?, that is real.", lied the general. Hawkoruu punched him in the face, knocking him out. He checked the general's pockets and found a knife, some unidentifiable device, and, aha!, the real disc.
He began limping toward his ship when he got hit by a laser in his side. Space pirates were rapidly filling the hangar! He had to do something quick. He threw down a smoke bomb which would block him from sight for a good 20 seconds. He got back up and entered a pirate fighter ship. It took him a few seconds to figure out how to turn the ship on. He felt the fighter shake as several lasers on it. There was one option left for him. He fired the fighters cannon at the hangar gate. The gate exploded outward and everything in the hangar, all the ships, and all the pirates were sucked out into space. Hawkoruu got to see a hundred pirates flailing their arms madly in the void as if that would help them breathe before he lost consciousness.
Samus and Taklon stood outside the landing area. The landing area was a cement circle on the ground about a quarter of a mile across just outside Chozodia. Samus was looking at the sky, shielding her eyes from the sun, using her left hand.
"There he is!", she pointed and jumped with glee.
"Where, I don't see... oh I see it.", replied Taklon. A red colored ship the size of a house was descending from the sky. They patiently waited as it landed. They ran over to the ship as its door opened. Several chozo stepped through and waved as they passed.
"Where's Hawkoruu?", asked Samus, worried.
"He's in there.", assured Taklon. Hawkoruu stepped through walking with a cane. Samus ran over and hugged him.
"I'm so glad you're back. I was worried.", greeted Samus.
She saw his cane and asked, "What happened?"
"Oh, a pirate got a lucky shot, I'll be fine though."
"How long are you staying?"
"Well, it looks like I'm staying for good. I got discharged. They gave me this though." He held out a gold medal with a tree engraved on one side.
"Oh, that's cool.", said Samus, looking at it.
"Hey, Samus, move your fat head.", said Taklon.
"Oh, sorry." Samus moved allowing Taklon to see the medal.
"Hey that is cool.", said Taklon.
"Yes, it is, well it looks like you two wont be needing a new trainer since I'm back. How about you two show me a good sparring match."
"O.k.", said Taklon.
"I'll beat you this time.", bragged Samus.
"Nuh-uh." Hawkoruu laughed at both of them as they headed toward the training grounds.