Chapter 4:
As Samus charged her Wave Beam, Phantoon released a volley of Phantom Eyes towards Samus. The eyes were launched from the ghost's large, yellow eye, which was open at the moment. In addition, several Rage Hands were also summoned to the battle and made their way towards Samus.
The bounty hunter dove out of the way of the spectral hands, but she happened to dive right into a volley of Phantom Eyes, which took out the remaining half of her Energy Tank. Samus did not mind, though. She still had nineteen more tanks. She then rushed towards the ghost as he was unleashing more Phantom Eyes and fired her Wavebuster at its eye. The stream of electricity reached out and struck the eye, causing the ghost to roar and convulse in pain. Samus withstood another volley of Phantom Eyes, which took off another Energy Tank, but she kept up the attack against Phantoon. The ghost writhed in agony and cried, attempting to attack, and when unable to due to the pain, tried to phase, but was unable to do so due to the paralyzing effect of the Wavebuster. As Samus kept up the pressure, she watched as her missile supply dwindled. She had already used up fifty missiles and was using five missiles per for each second she kept the Wavebuster active. But the damage the Wavebuster and its paralyzing effects were well worth the cost in missiles.
The bounty hunter kept up the pressure and lightning began to arc across not only the ghost's eye, but across its entire body. Eventually, the ghost had taken all that it could. Phantoon gave a cry and its eye exploded into globs of yellowish liquid. The body of Phantoon then rose into the air and began to crack. Light then emerged from the cracks and the ghost exploded in a magnificent display of light. Samus then checked her missile inventory and saw that she only had a hundred missiles left. That was not a problem, though, for her sensors detected no further Space Pirate presence in the vicinity.
After defeating Phantoon, the bounty hunter scanned the command center for any sign of the prisoners. She went over to one of the consoles, which was still functioning, and scanned it. The writing on the console was written in the Space Pirates' native language, but her suit's translation software was able to translate the writing. It indicated that the prisoners were being held within several cages in secret rooms that surrounded the command center. She activated her Scan Visor and began to hack the computer so she could free the prisoners. As she did so, lights flickered on the console, as well as on several other consoles as well. After a few seconds, the lights stopped flashing and several metallic walls disappeared, revealing translucent blue fields of energy that confined the captured crewmembers and passengers of the Adventure in the Stars. Glancing at the faces of the prisoners, she could see the terror, dread, and uncertainty that they undoubtedly felt. The instructions appeared on the HUD as she scanned the console for the controls for the force field. She found them in the right corner of the console and she pushed a red button, which deactivated the force field that confined the prisoners. The force fields disappeared and the prisoners were free to move.
Samus walked towards one of the groups of prisoners and as she approached them, she saw their terrified faces and stopped, holding out her left hand in a non-hostile gesture, and said in a calm voice, "Don't worry. I'm not with the Space Pirates. My name is Samus Aran. I am an independent bounty hunter currently allied with the Galactic Federation in Exile."
Her admission that she was siding with the Galactic Federation in Exile seemed to calm some of the freed captives, but others merely scowled at her. "An ally of the Magic Lords, then," one of the men seethed, which brought a scowl of disapproval from some of the other prisoners.
"I am an enemy of the Magic Lords and fought two of them for the survival of Earth," she said forcefully in answer to the accusation. "Anyway, we can't let any of our political differences or allegiances keep us from getting out of here. We have to get out of this base now, before the Pirates abandon it and tell their frigate in orbit to scuttle the base."
Some of the prisoners still scowled and seemed to refuse to move, but others pushed their way towards the bounty hunter and stood with her. Turning back to the others, one of them, a woman of Middle Eastern descent rebuked those who appeared to be siding with the Galactic Federation proper, saying, "You fools! Are you really so hateful towards those who are still willing to fight for the lives of six billion people that you would rather stay here and die than put aside your differences with our rescuer and get out of here? What does it matter which side of the conflict Samus is on? She saved us! If we stay here, we're going to die! I don't know about you, but when I get a chance to escape certain meaningless death, I take it! If you want to stay behind and abandon your families, then fine, do it. I'm going!"
That speech was more than enough for many of the prisoners to shove their way past those who were still considering their course of action and stood by Samus, who was already beginning to direct them to stay behind her while she led the way out of the base. Eventually, the rest of the prisoners saw the folly of remaining inside a doomed base that had been in the clutches of one of the greatest enemies of the Galactic Federation and they proceeded to follow the others who were following Samus.
Before leaving the base, Samus looked back and took a quick headcount. She was relieved to find that all one hundred freed captives were following her. She told them, "I'll lead the way just in case the Space Pirates left some stragglers behind to slow us down."
The others had no problems with Samus's plan, so they all formed up in a double file line behind her so the line would not get too long and they could watch their backs, just in case a Pirate attacked from behind. Before leaving, though, Samus looked around the command center to see if there were any discarded weapons that could be used by any of the survivors for rearguard duty. Much to her surprise, and relief, there was an energy pistol that looked to have been left in the command center inadvertently. It was different from any other Space Pirate energy pistol that she had ever seen, though. In fact, it looked like it had been designed for use by a human, rather than by any of the species affiliated with the Space Pirates. However, knowing that the Space Pirates could have left it as a trap, she decided to scan the pistol before handing it to any of the captives. Her scans indicated that there was no tampering with the pistol, but that its energy charge was pretty low and only had enough energy for about sixteen shots at best. One thing that stood out to her was the power level of the shots inside the pistol. The shots seemed to be as powerful as her standard uncharged Power Beam shots, which themselves were twice as strong as her previous Power Beam shots. Grabbing the pistol, Samus went to the back of the line and handed the pistol to a Caucasian male in his early forties. As she handed it to him, she told him, "Watch our backs. I'll handle all threats up front. But be careful, my scans indicate that that pistol's load is only sixteen shots, so don't waste them."
"Got it," the man said as he took his position as Samus went to lead the others out of the base.
The bounty hunter approached the door that led to the exit at the rear of the command center. She fired a single blast of energy from her Power Beam and collapsed the blue shield over the door. Once the door opened, she ushered the rest of the prisoners through. One by one, the prisoners made their way through, with Samus having gone through first in order to take care of any Space Pirates that may have stayed behind to try to either slow her down or deny her a complete victory by killing some of the freed captives. So far, though, there were no Space Pirate stragglers for her to deal with, merely seeing a long tunnel out in front of her, so she merely waited for the others to get through the door before continuing on her way. Once the others had made it through the door, she led the way down the dark tunnel.
As she made her way down the tunnel, she switched to her Light Beam and charged it, not only in order to prepare herself should a powerful enemy come out and attack, but also in order to illuminate the surrounding area, which the Light Beam did a very good job of. To the prisoners, it was as if the tunnel were now fully lit, for they could see all the way down the corridor. Samus knew that this would attract any enemies that might have been hiding in ambush, but it would also reveal them to her and the others. As they continued down the tunnel, there was still no sign of any Space Pirates whatsoever. It was not long before the group came to an incline in the corridor. Though the incline was relatively steep, it did not affect Samus at all. The other captives, however, did not have Samus's genetic enhancements or training, though, and they were much slower in climbing the hill. The hunter slowed her pace, allowing the others to keep up. She continued to scan just ahead of her, just incase any Pirates were lying in wait.
As the group neared the top of the incline, Samus went on ahead to clear the path. As she reached the crest of the incline, she found four Space Pirate Troopers standing close to a large cargo turbolift. Having already charged her Light Beam, she decided that now was the time to let loose with a Light Missile. She fired the missile and a golden missile of light was unleashed upon the Space Pirates from her arm cannon. The Pirates were blinded by the light of the missile as it rocketed towards them at hypersonic speeds. The missile scored a direct hit on the lead Pirate and detonated into a massive explosion of light. The light washed over the Pirates and caused them incredible pain as they writhed in the bath of pure, golden light. The light soon congealed into a series of golden orbs and zeroed in on each of the individual Pirates and struck them, exploding upon impact. The Pirates were bathed in a flood of golden light once more and were instantly annihilated, armor and all, by the Light Missile. Samus checked her missile gauge and saw that despite the damage done to the Space Pirate squadron, the Light Missile had only consumed five missiles. She grinned. It seemed as if the Light Missile had proven its worth. And if the Light Beam, and by extension, the Light Missile, was truly designed to destroy evil enemies, then she had a perfect weapon for fighting the Magic Lords and other enemies that might have strong resistance to conventional weaponry.
The captives soon crested the hill and approached the bounty hunter, who had charged her Light Beam once more in order to illuminate the area. The group looked ahead and saw a large turbolift that looked to be able to hold many of them at any given time. Samus went over to the turbolift to see if it was still functional. Scanning the elevator car, she found that it was fully functional and that it could hold around thirty of the captives, along with Samus, herself, safely. Samus and the first thirty captives then went to board the elevator. The doors slid open and the group then filed onto the lift. The doors closed and the lift proceeded to rise.
The ride lasted for almost thirty seconds, during which time, the group encountered no difficulties at all. The ride was quite smooth, much more so than either Samus, or any of the other prisoners, would have expected. After thirty seconds, the lift opened and revealed a large cavern that Samus's map indicated was on the first floor, and that led to the exit of the base. Stepping out, she directed the others to remain onboard the lift for a bit until it was clear. She charged her Light Beam, just in case there were more Space Pirates coming. Sure enough, two Space Pirate Troopers jumped out and fired a series of blue energy pulses towards the bounty hunter. Normally, Samus would have dodged the aim of the Troopers and allowed the blasts to sail past her, but with a group of civilians to protect, that was not an option. Instead, she allowed the blasts to strike her shields and she suffered only one point of damage per hit. She retaliated with a blast from her Light Beam. A large ball of light struck the Space Pirate Trooper on the right and exploded upon making contact with the Trooper. The explosion of light washed over both Space Pirates, with the excess light congealing into small orbs of light and swirling back towards the Space Pirate Troopers. The light orbs struck the troopers and annihilated all of the organic tissue, leaving nothing behind except for the armor of the troopers, which promptly collapsed into a pile of metal. Samus then activated her Scan Visor and took scans of the area in order to make sure that there were no other enemy soldiers in the area. Her scans quickly came back negative and she viewed it as safe to allow the rest of the civilians to come up. It took three subsequent trips to bring up the rest of the civilians from the lower levels of the base, but eventually, each group made it up to the first level of the base and once they were all assembled once more, Samus led the others through the cave and towards the exit.
Meanwhile, during Samus's escape of the base, the Space Pirate leaders were riding a large loading skiff towards a grounded heavy freighter that was patiently awaiting their arrival. Kraid and Mother Brain were lying on the skiff while Ridley and his Techno Lords were flying above, providing cover for the Space Pirate forces. They doubted that they would face any resistance, for Samus was undoubtedly busy freeing the rest of the captives, assuming that she had not been killed by Phantoon. The two Space Pirate Troopers that were piloting the skiff also had life force sensors that allowed them to monitor the life force of all of the Space Pirate generals. There were images of Mother Brain, Ridley, Kraid, and Phantoon, with Crocomire and Draygon's signatures having gone dark. Phantoon's signature soon joined Crocomire and Draygon's signals in going dark. The copilot turned back to Mother Brain and informed her, "Mother, I regret to inform you that Phantoon has been slain in combat, almost certainly by the Hunter."
Mother Brain was silent for a few moments, prompting the copilot to cock his head inquisitively. Eventually, Mother Brain sighed, "A pity." She said nothing more, but the tone of her voice indicated that the loss of Phantoon was not significant in her mind. The copilot then returned his focus on assisting in the piloting of the skiff, which was fast approaching the large freighter in the distance. Ridley, however, was less than pleased. While he did not have any particular attachment to Phantoon, he did not like the nonchalant attitude that Mother Brain had towards the loss of Crocomire, Draygon, and now Phantoon. Still, he did not start an argument with her yet. He would save that for when they got onboard the freighter.
After a couple minutes, the skiff arrived at the freighter, which was a large flat vessel about two hundred meters long that had two dozen large, bulky cargo containers attached to the sides of the vessel. The ship, itself, was not all that tall, only about two levels, but the cargo containers were quite tall, at least five or so stories. They were more than capable of holding all of the materiel and equipment for constructing a new base for the Space Pirates. The freighter was also able to hold all of the remaining Space Pirates, but since their numbers were so low, it merely held about two hundred Space Pirate Troopers along with the leaders and a few Kihunters for the crew. The rest of the remaining Space Pirates were stationed onboard the Siriacus. As the skiff approached, it slowed down until one of the cargo containers opened and allowed the skiff to enter. A ramp extended from the cargo container, allowing the skiff to board the ship. The skiff then proceeded to carefully board the freighter, followed closely by Ridley and the two Techno Lords.
As soon as the Pirate leaders had boarded the freighter, the boarding ramp retracted. As the ramp retracted, the Techno Lords powered down to their normal human forms and went to board the ship, proper, in order to assist in its takeoff. Several Space Pirates of High Command then came into the cargo container and said, "Lord Ridley, Mother Brain your presence is required on the bridge of the ship."
"Understood," Ridley answered for the two of them. The Pirate Commanders then turned and went through the small hatch towards the ship, proper. They were quickly followed by Ridley, along with Mother Brain, whose stasis tank was being pushed by two Space Pirate Troopers. As they were walking, Ridley told the Commanders, "Tell the bridge that as soon as we lift off, tell the Siriacus to destroy the base and then target the civilian ship, the Adventure in the Stars. The captives will have almost certainly taken the ship by now, and I want to make sure that it is destroyed before we leave. I don't want any human survivors from this."
"Understood, Lord Ridley," the Commanders said, and they proceeded to contact the bridge so that it could relay Ridley's orders to the frigate.
Samus and the others rushed through the rocky corridor, making their way forward as they rushed to exit the base. On and on the group went, Samus having to restrain herself so that the others would not fall behind. It was more difficult than it appeared, for she was accustomed to moving through Space Pirate bases as quickly as possible as she evacuated said base. It helped, though, that there was no time bomb at this base, so there was no real pressure that she was aware of. However, she was keenly aware of the Space Pirate frigate in orbit of the planet and that a single blast from its weapons could annihilate this entire base, as well as the surrounding area. As they continued, the group eventually came to a wall that looked to be a dead end. They did not come this far just to be stopped now, though. Samus had the perfect way for her to get through this barrier. She had the others stand back as she somersaulted towards the rocky barrier and plowed through it with her Screw Attack. After plowing through the barrier, she came across another door with a blue blast shield. Firing a single blast from her Wave Beam, she collapsed the shield and the door opened as she walked into the doorway. She then stood in the door in order to keep it open as the captives proceeded to file after her. Once they arrived, she proceeded on through and waited as they filed through the door one by one. Once the captives were all through, the group continued on its way.
On the other side of the door, the others recognized that they were now once more in the initial entry hall of the base. The mouth of the cave was close. Samus ran to the mouth of the cave and activated her Speed Booster, plowing through the final barrier and opening a path to the final door. Finally, Samus was outside the base, and back on the surface of the planet. She was quickly followed by the captives, who quickly filed out of the base, one by one. As each of the captives passed, she quickly checked them in order to make sure that they were all in good condition. So far, all of the captives that she had freed were still in good condition. Good, she thought. They were okay. She then looked over at the Adventure in the Stars, which was only a couple hundred meters away. Past the ruins of the mountain, she saw a large freighter beginning to lift off. Samus knew that the freighter likely contained the Space Pirate leaders, Mother Brain, Ridley, and Kraid. With the ship taking off, she knew that they did not have a lot of time to board the Adventure and get it off the ground before the frigate would scuttle the base, and them as well. With that thought, Samus and the others made their way towards the captured star cruise liner. They did not have a lot of time before the frigate would likely be given the order to scuttle the base.
Samus ran to the open boarding ramp of the star liner and ushered everyone onboard. As each of the crewmembers and passengers passed, she quickly checked to make sure that they were okay. She also activated her X-Ray Visor to make sure that there were no cloaked Space Pirates that were waiting for the perfect chance to board the ship and recapture it. Fortunately, there were none. In addition, her suit's early warning sensors indicated that there were no Space Pirates in the vicinity, either. Once everyone was onboard the ship, the boarding ramp began to close. As the ramp closed, she heard a quiet hum that stared to get louder and rise in pitch. The ship was powering up. She quickly used her Command Visor to decloak her starship and rushed towards it. The canopy opened and the bounty hunter quickly jumped into the ship's cockpit. Once she was inside, she closed the canopy, raised her ship's shields and powered its weapons. Checking her loadout, she found that she still had four cluster seeker missiles, along with two anti-starship missiles and two matter-antimatter Nova Missiles. The Nova Missiles were heavy missiles designed specifically for destroying capital starships. They were the strongest anti-capital starship weapon that could be fielded by starfighters, and only a few starfighters were designed to be able to wield such weapons. As such, they were extremely valuable, for a volley of such missiles would be sufficient to take down the shields of a cruiser. And if they managed to hit in the right place, two such missiles could strip the shields off of a frigate if they managed to strike near a weak point in the shields and possibly even inflict severe damage to the ship itself. After her checks were completed, Samus proceeded to takeoff. Her ship rose from the ground and once she was a few dozen feet into the air, it turned on its axis and, pointing straight up into space, she gunned the engines and the ship shot towards the Space Pirate frigate as if it had been shot from a cannon.
Meanwhile, onboard the heavy freighter, Ridley watched from his chair the bridge as Samus was ushering the freed captives towards the Adventure in the Stars. He grimaced. Now was the time that he wished that the freighter had been outfitted with weapons more than ever. All he could do was watch as Samus led the freed captives onto the captured star liner. One of the officers, a Space Pirate Trooper manning the navigation station behind the dragon and a little above him called over to him and said, "Sir, we have lifted off from the ground and are underway. We should breach the atmosphere in a few minutes."
Ridley gave a small grumble. He then turned to the communications officer to his left and commanded, "Open a channel to the Siriacus and tell them to scuttle the base and the captured star liner. Once that's finished, tell them to regroup with us and follow us to Earth."
"At once, Lord Ridley," the officer responded. As the officer went to relay the Space Pirate commander's order, Ridley gave a smirk. At least he would be able to see the civilian star liner be destroyed, and possibly witness Samus's reaction to a failure. He then gave a soft chuckle as the freighter rose higher into the atmosphere.
Onboard the frigate, Siriacus, the message came in over the comm channels. "It's a go, Commander P'Vash," the voice of a Space Pirate Commander echoed over the bridge. "Scuttle the base and the civilian star liner we captured."
"Understood, my lord," the Space Pirate Commander said in reply, bowing before the image on the forward viewscreen. Turning to the weapons officer behind him, he said, "Lieutenant A'Dak, we're clear. Target the captured star liner and our base and destroy the both of them."
"Understood, Commander," the weapons officer, an unarmored Urtragian Space Pirate Trooper answered in reply.
The Pirate set the ship's weapons to full power and proceeded to begin targeting the massive star liner. The sensors showed the star liner beginning its ascent. The ship's thrusters fired and sent up clouds of dust and threw rocks out from underneath the ship. Crosshairs soon appeared on the forward viewscreen a little to the right of the star liner. They began to move as the weapons officer adjusted the angle of the cannons and they began to center in on the cruise ship. As they did so, a chime began to sound and the crosshairs turned yellow. After a few seconds, the crosshairs lined up with the center of the Adventure in the Stars and they began to turn blue. As they turned blue, the chime began to become more steady until it was solid tone. As soon as the tone was solid, P'Vash cried, "Now, fire!"
The forward cannons of the Siriacus unleashed a torrent of energy towards the Adventure. Several of the blasts managed to sail past the cruise ship and struck the ground. Those that struck the ground then exploded as the confinement streams that contained the energy breached. The blasts were visible from the bridge of the Space Pirate frigate. P'Vash and the rest of the bridge crew marveled at the sight as a massive ball of fire expanded from the epicenter of those blasts and continued to expand even after the Space Pirate base was nothing but lava and vapor. The eyes of the bridge crew went wide as the fireball continued to expand, but soon, something happened that forced them to take their eyes off the viewscreen. The sensor officer took a casual glance down at his console and saw a small that the Adventure in the Stars was still intact. He called out to the Space Pirate Commander, yelling, "Commander P'Vash, sir, I'm still picking up the Adventure in the Stars on my sensors. Sensors indicate that its shields are up and are still at sixty percent."
"Damn it!" P'Vash swore. "On screen!"
The image switched from the still expanding fireball, which had reached over three hundred kilometers in radius, to the star liner. The ship was rising above the firestorm that had been produced by the explosion of the energy bolts that had struck the surface of the planet. As P'Vash looked closely at the star liner, he thought he saw another shape flying with the large civilian cruise ship in the corner of the screen. He thought nothing of it as he looked back to the weapons officer and commanded, "Target that star liner and destroy it!"
"Yes, sir," the weapons officer answered with a note of sadistic pleasure in his voice. However, before he could fire, the ship shuddered. The bridge crew struggled to maintain their footing as the ship shook from what appeared to be a weapons impact. The weapons officer then pushed the fire button to unleash the next volley of energy fire that would hopefully destroy the civilian starship. Nothing happened. The officer pushed the button again, but none of the main cannons fired.
"What's going on, Lieutenant A'Dak?" P'Vash roared. "Why haven't you destroyed that ship?"
The officer glanced down at the weapons console and saw that the forward cannons had suffered damage and that there was damage in the firing control systems. "Sir, we've suffered damage to our main cannons!" A'Dak cried in response. "They aren't moving and I can no longer fire them!"
"How?" P'Vash screamed. "That star liner doesn't have any weapons!"
"No sir, but the Hunter's starfighter does," came the response from one of the other members of the bridge crew. The crew turned to the Pirate Trooper, who pointed at the corner of the viewscreen. The ship shook again as a small dot began to grow. Indeed, it was Samus's gunship. The ship fired a series of energy pulses from its forward cannons and the ship shook again.
P'Vash cursed at the sight of the ship. "Damage!" he roared.
"Superficial," came the response from the sensor officer. "So far, we haven't suffered any further damage."
P'Vash breathed a sigh of relief at the report. Turning once again to the tactical officer, he called out in a much calmer voice, "Raise shields immediately! Then target the Hunter's ship and blow it out of the stars!"
"Yes sir," A'Dak responded. He then went to set up the shields. A bar on the console that represented the shield level began to rise, but as soon as it reached about sixty to sixty-three percent, it stopped and began to fluctuate. "Sir," A'Dak called to the Commander, "the shields are only getting up to sixty percent or so! They must have suffered damage in the initial attack."
P'Vash swore again. "Then focus our shields onto the forward arc. The Hunter's gunship is armed with heavy weapons. We can't afford to underestimate it." He then turned to his communications officer and commanded, "Comm, call in the support squadron. Get our ATCs and starfighter support over here now!"
"Yes, sir," the communications officer responded.
As the officer went to call in reinforcements, P'Vash told A'Dak, "Ready all point defense weapons, target that ship. I want it destroyed!"
A'Dak tried to get a weapons lock onto the ship, but he could not see it on sensors, despite the fact that it was strafing the frigate with energy fire. "Sir, the ship must have stealth capability; the sensors can't get a lock."
"Then switch to manual then! I want that ship destroyed!"
"Yes, sir," A'Dak replied. He then switched the point defense cannons to manual and sent the signal to the gunners that it was their show. All the while, P'Vash looked out at the viewscreen and grinned. Samus Aran was picking a fight with the Siriacus. Despite the fact that it was a research frigate, rather than a combat frigate like the Chimera had been, this was a big target for what amounted to a modified starfighter to take down. He did not doubt for a second that the only reason that Samus was attacking the Siriacus was so that she could cover the escape of the civilian star liner. That prompted him to grin. He knew that she would remain to battle the frigate until either the civilian ship was safely away. And he knew that it would take the destruction of the Siriacus to keep the frigate away from the civilian ship. All he could do now was watch the battle unfold, and wait for the gunners to get a lucky hit in on Samus's ship, or the reinforcements to arrive and finish her off, or drive her away so he could destroy the Adventure.
Outside the frigate, Samus's starship maneuvered out of the line of fire of a point defense cannon. The cannon sprayed a volley of sapphire energy bolts towards her ship, but she managed to keep ahead of the cannon's sweep. She soon returned fire with her forward energy cannons and sprayed scarlet bolts of energy against the frigate's shields. As expected, her energy bolts inflicted no damage to the shields, however, as she performed her run, several of her energy beams managed to score hits on the hull on the aft part of the ship. A few of the point defense cannons in the aft half of the ship were hit and a few exploded, inflicting more hull damage to the ship. After the first few bolts hit, the shields were raised over the aft half of the ship and the rest of her energy bolts inflicted no damage. However, the attack told Samus all that she needed to know, and her scans of the ship also bore out her thoughts. Her initial attack run on the ship had inflicted damage not only to the main cannons of the frigate, but also to its shields. She scanned the ship again and saw that the shields of the frigate were only up to fifty-five percent. She gave a satisfied smile. The damage had been done, and there was a hole in the defensive screen of the frigate. With the shields of the frigate at only a little over half strength, her two Nova Missiles could not only take down the remaining shields of the frigate, but also inflict severe damage to the ship, itself. However, before she could focus on taking down the frigate's shields, and possibly the frigate itself, several more blips appeared on her sensors. Looking out the back of her cockpit, she could see small shiny dots off in the distance. She grimaced as she saw the Space Pirate starfighters and ATCs approaching her position fast.
Wasting no time, Samus turned to face down the approaching starfighters and deal with their threat before they managed to get within firing range, knowing that she could not afford to waste any time in dealing with them since even without its primary energy cannons, the frigate was still a threat to the Adventure. As the fighters and ATCs approached, Samus tallied twelve starfighters and two ATCs. She was thankful, now more than ever, that she still had her four cluster seeker missiles. Immediately releasing the safeties for the missiles, she targeted all fourteen enemy spacecraft. In less than a second, her ship's targeting computer had managed to get a lock on all fourteen enemy fighters and ATCs. Once her computer had gotten a lock on the enemy craft, she fired her four cluster seeker missiles. Her starship's weapons bay opened and immediately unleashed the four missiles. The missiles rocketed towards the enemy squadron, zeroing in on certain points of the squadron. Once they were within a few kilometers, the missiles split apart and each warhead searched for its own specific target. Only one warhead sought each of the starfighters, leaving the other warheads to deal with the Space Pirate ATCs. The Space Pirate fighters and transports began evasive maneuvers the moment they realized that they had been locked onto by Samus, but there was little that they could do to evade her missiles. Unlike some bounty hunters who may have skimped on the missile armaments for their ships, viewing missiles as only being useful against capital ships, Samus prepared for all potential contingencies on a mission, especially if she felt that she may be dealing with Space Pirates. As it was, the countermeasures employed by the Space Pirate craft were woefully insufficient to confuse the targeting systems of the warheads. The guided warheads zeroed in on the fighters and the ATCs and detonated upon impact. Samus looked off into the distance and saw fourteen bright flashes of light. With each flash of light, a red blip disappeared from her sensor screen. After a few seconds, only one red blip remained in the vicinity, the Space Pirate Frigate Siriacus.
Turning her ship back towards the Siriacus Samus glanced at her tactical screen. The ship's shields had recovered to sixty percent their full strength; still no match for two Nova Missiles. Samus then switched to her Nova Missiles and flicked a few switches to release the safety levers of the missiles. She then proceeded to arm the warheads and locked onto the port aft quadrant of the frigate, since the frigate was missing several of its point defense guns in that area. Once the tone began solid, Samus pushed the firing button on her control stick twice. Two missiles erupted from her ship's weapons bay and streaked towards the frigate. The missiles were noticeably larger than the cluster missiles that she had used against the Space Pirate starfighters. The frigate sprayed energy fire at both the missiles and the modified starfighter that had launched them. As soon as she had fired the missiles, Samus peeled her ship away from the frigate and weaved her way through the massive gauntlet of energy fire, managing to avoid most of the fire. The only energy blast that managed to score a hit on her ship scored a glancing hit at best and only brought her shields down to seventy percent. Her ship lurched with the hit, though, but suffered no further damage. She felt that it was fortunate that the blast had managed to clip her ship, rather than score a hit on one of her Nova Missiles.
Meanwhile, the Novas continued to streak towards the frigate. In merely a few seconds, the missiles managed to get through the screen of energy fire and scored two direct hits on the Space Pirate frigate. The ship's shields flared a bright yellow with the first hit. The glow spread out from the epicenter of the explosion and as the missile detonated. A tremendously bright flash was seen as space was illuminated for a fraction of a second. After that second, the flash disappeared. The first missile took the shields of the frigate down to ten percent. The frigate tried to divert power from the forward shield to the rear shields, but were unable to do so before the second missile struck and took down the remaining shields of the frigate in addition to inflicting severe hull damage to the ship. The missile blew a massive hole into the side of the frigate. Equipment and crewmembers were blown into space through the massive hole. The ship began to list to its left as P'Vash undoubtedly did not want Samus to fire into the damaged hole.
Unfortunately for P'Vash, Samus was already approaching and matching his ship's maneuvers. She lined her ship up with the large hole and armed her two remaining missiles, which were anti-starship missiles that were generally designed for use against transports and freighters, though given the damage that the Siriacus had sustained, if she managed to hit close enough a critical system, the ship could suffer catastrophic damage and even be destroyed. Once she had targeted the hole in the frigate, she fired her two remaining missiles towards the hole. The few remaining point defense cannons tried in vain to shoot down the missiles, ignoring Samus's gunship to focus on the missiles. The missiles easily managed to make their way past the energy fire and flew straight into the hole. In less than a second, two more explosions rocked the frigate. Chunks of metal were blown from the center of the ship, forcing the frigate downward. The engines went dark and the lights on the ship suddenly winked out of existence. The frigate then began to move down towards the planet, being pulled down into the gravity well of the planet. Without its sublight engines or thrusters being operational, there was nothing that the frigate could do. If anyone was left alive onboard the ship, which was debatable given the damage that the ship had suffered, they would not likely survive the crash. As the frigate entered the atmosphere of Shanera, the hull of the frigate began to ignite and was set ablaze. As it continued to fall, the fire spread to the rest of the ship and eventually, the Siriacus was reduced to a fireball. After a while, the frigate split into two pieces and they both crashed into the planet, with the front half of the ship crumpling into an unrecognizable mass of metal and exploding, while the rear part of the ship fell and crashed into an ocean.
Meanwhile, just as the ship began its death dive, the Adventure in the Stars had managed to breach the atmosphere. Once it had, Samus opened a channel to the ship and told the captain, "The frigate has been dealt with. You're clear to go, Adventure."
"Thanks for the help, Samus," the captain of the star liner responded. "We owe you, big time."
Samus smiled. "Don't worry about it. Crippling the Space Pirates again is more than payment enough."
The captain and the bridge crew of the star liner chuckled at Samus's statement. The channel was then closed and Samus then brought her ship alongside the star liner. Off in the distance, her sensors detected a second starship, a heavy freighter that she was almost certain was of Space Pirate in origin. She would have been tempted to go after the ship if she had not expended all of her missiles on this mission. However, as it was, she had no missiles left, and while her energy cannons were powerful, they would not take down the freighter's shields before it managed to escape. However, since her sensors did not detect any weapons onboard the freighter, she decided that it was best to let the ship go and focus on escorting the Adventure in the Stars to its destination. With that, Samus waited for the Adventure to get a heading. The Adventure soon transmitted its course heading to Samus's ship. Once she received the coordinates of the ship's intended jump, she waited for the large cruise ship to jump to warp. The engines of the large star liner glowed for a second before it proceeded to jump to warp. One second after the Adventure had jumped, Samus's gunship went to warp to escort it to its desired destination.
Meanwhile, during the battle between Samus's starship and the Siriacus, the heavy freighter that held Kraid, Ridley, and Mother Brain achieved orbit over Shanera. Ridley stood on the bridge with the others as they watched the final moments of the battle. Ridley scowled as he saw that Samus was handing the frigate and its fighter and ATC support their rears as one by one, the fighters and ATCs were annihilated. He then saw Samus head towards the frigate and noticed that she was beginning an attack run on the ship. At first, he did not know why she would risk making an attack run on the ship. He then had a sinking feeling as he saw two missiles launch from the Hunter's gunship and the gunship begin to peel away from the frigate as the frigate sprayed energy fire at both the gunship and the approaching missiles. He then told the sensor officer, "Ensign, scan those missiles. I want to know if those are matter-antimatter Nova Missiles."
The sensor officer quickly glanced down at his console and after a second, he said, "Confirmed, Lord Ridley. The missiles are using a matter-antimatter warhead. They seem to be the heavy variant, for they have minimal guidance systems, likely to store more matter and antimatter."
Ridley could only look on in horror as the two missiles struck the frigate in the side and managed to blow a massive hole into the ship. His glued his eyes to the screen as Samus unleashed two more missiles, not as large as the Novas, but undoubtedly deadly nonetheless. He watched as the two missiles flew into the massive hole that had been formed by the initial strike and exploded, gouging two more massive holes into the ship. He saw the ship's lights wink out and the engines go dark. Looking over at the sensor officer, he said, "What is the status of the Siriacus?"
The sensor officer looked at his console and his face went white. He looked over at Ridley and said in a detached voice, "Shields are down, main power is offline, auxiliary power is offline, and its weapons are gone. Engines are also non-functional and thrusters are out. My lord, the ship is being pulled into Shanera's gravity well. I am detecting no escape pods, either. There is nothing we can do for it."
Ridley seethed. "Then we will have to accept the loss of the Siriacus." It was the most difficult thing for Ridley to have to say. Samus had won, again. Even though he had not faced her directly in battle, she had still beaten him. Now, all that was left was this cargo vessel and maybe a few transports that were currently in pieces in the cargo containers. Now, there were only a couple hundred Space Pirates left, not counting the leaders. While they could clone more Zebesians, and possibly the Urtragians as well, it would be difficult to recover from this loss since they had lost their last warship. Ridley then turned to the helmsman and said with a note of anger in his voice, "Set a course for Earth and get us out of here. There's nothing more we can do here."
"Aye, sir," the helmsman responded.
As the ship jumped to warp, Ridley said in a low, ominous voice, "You better not refuse us, Cyrus. It would not be good for you if I divulged your willingness to work with us."