5

"Gotta hurry!" Eli muttered as he ran with Samus over his shoulder. he knew his gunship was somewhere nearby so he randomly began yelling "PAYDAY!" at every big rock he saw. one of them began to flicker as he yelled at it, "thank God."

Eli hit the button to drop his workbench as he entered his ship, he pulled out the medical scanner he'd use when fusing his own broken bones. Eli found the airlock switch on Samus's helmet and flipped it, removing the piece of armor. hair like golden wheat spilled from the back of the helmet, and Samus's sapphire blue eyes fluttered as she tried to fight the effects of the intruder in her body.

"Samus!"

She didn't respond.

Eli slapped her, "SAMUS!"

"Uhn?"

"how do you open your armor?"

"No..." she said woozily, "I don't like you like that..."

"SAMUS!"

She seemed to recover slightly, she whispered, "inside... neck."

Eli snaked his fingers into the collar of the power suit, and began feeling around for anything that seemed like a release. he found a small button beneath Samus's throat and pressed it. all of the seems in Samus's armor hissed as they released their airtight seals.

"She wasn't kidding," Eli said as he began taking apart the pieces of Samus's armor, "her suit doesn't pop." Pop was a generic term used for an emergency releas that disconnected all of the major seams of someone's armor, allowing for emergency treatment. "This tech could cost her her life!"

Samus's hand was shaking when she grabbed Eli's arm, although whether from fear, pain, physical weakness, or something else, he couldn't tell. He finally got her suit off enough that he was confident his scanner could find the tentacle. he started at the wound on Samus's left hip and slowly followed a trail of internal bleeding up to her heart, "oh my God!"

The tenticle was wrapped around her heart, with small cilia that seemed to be injecting something connecting it. "I'm not qualified for this... I don't think anyone in the SYSTEM is..."

"Eli... help... it hurts...so bad..."

He'd never once imagined Samus Aran as one to beg for help, especially from him. He looked at the vitals readout on the scanner, he may not be qualified, but he was her only hope. He reached into the MedKit on the wall and pulled out a syringe and a seditive. he pulled a particularly strong dose from the container and tapped the syringe to make sure there were no air bubbles. First, he injected most of the chemical into Samus's jugular, then he stabbed the needle through her sternum and used the medical scanner to hit the tentacle and inject the rest into it.

Samus feel asleep quickly and Eli began sterilizing some of the tools he normally used for repairing his armor and ship. "God, if you exist... I need a miracle... big time..."

He began by sitting Samus up so he could unzip the form-fitting blue suit she wore. "excuse me," he apologized to her unconcious form as he unveiled her from the waist up. Under normal circumstances, he would be blushing profusely; but then again, if the circumstances were normal, he wouldn't have just undressed an unconcious woman. He used the scanner to find the top and bottom of Samus's heart, marking them with a grease pen. He pulled out a sterile-wrapped scalpel from his MedKit and placed it an inch above the top grease mark. He took a deep breath and prayed once more before pressing it against her sternum.

The new alloy was designed to cut bone as easily as flesh, so it glided through the breastplate easily. Part of Eli felt sorry to mar such beauty as Samus's flawless skin, but he knew it was nessecary, so he shook the feeling. he turned the knife and made a small box area. Setting down the scalpel, he picked up his precision spacer and placed the tip in the incision. slowly he turned the crank, the sound of cracking bones made him feel sick.

Once the separation was large enough, he hooked a pair of hex keys into the hole. Mentally bracing himself, Eli pulled up on the keys. this time, the cracking feeling traveled up the hex keys, coupled with the sound of flesh seperating. Eli had to turn away for a moment to avoid vomiting, he'd never had a strong stomach for this stuff. After settling his stomach with a quick drink of water, Eli felt that he was ready for the difficult part.

Turning back, Eli peered into the hole in Samus's chest. her lungs had been pushed aside by the tentacle which was appearently affected by the seditive, since it was loosely attatched to her heart at this point. Eli Prayed that it didn't have some sort of toxin release as a natural defense as he grabbed the short end with a pair of needle-nose pliers. He released a heavy sigh when there was no reaction from the creature. Lifting ever so gently, Eli pulled the black thing far enough from Samus's heart that he could comfortably fit the blade between the muscle and the foreign object.

Eli's normally steady hand was quivering slightly, "one wrong move and i kill her..." the blade moved effortlessly through the cilia, separating the tentacle from Samus. He lifted the creature which seemed to be recovering from the effects of the seditive. He placed it in an air-tight specimen pod, suspecting that not only might it help the doctors in treating Samus, he could probably demand a higher reward with a specimen in-hand. He used the scanner to make sure he got all of the tentacle and check for others.

Once he was sure she was clean, he quickly closed Samus's chest, very well aware that his ship was far from an aseptic environment. "Computer! Set a course for the nearest class-2 or better medical facility! Emergency Speed! Open a channel to them as soon as we make way!"

"right away, Eli. Good to hear from you again."

"Every nanosecond may count!" Eli began taking of his armor, amazed at how little damage it had taken. "don't waste processing speed with idol chatter!"

The ship lurched as it lifted off. "Eli, you are connected."

"This is Eli Trace, I have Samas Aran on board and in serious condition!" He began explaining the situation, "We engaged a mutated form of Ridley and during the battle, some parasite-like wormy-tentacle thing entered her body. After the battle, it moved upwards from the wound and latched onto her heart, looking on the damage, it ate or dissolved everything in its way. It seemed to be injecting something before i was able to preform an emergency surgery before it killed her. I currently have the creature in a specimen pod, but if it escapes, i will be forced to destroy it. Copy?"

"Did he say he preformed a surgery?" A doctor in the background asked whoever was taking the call. "Let me talk to him! Dr. Hornst here, what's her current condition?"

"She's sedated at the moment..." Eli looked at the scanner, "heartbeat is weak and slow, but constant. Breathing looks ok." He raised it to her head, "woah."

"What?"

"her neurokenetics are beyond my scanner's capabilities to read... what the hell does that mean?"

"No idea, I'd have to look at the data myself. give her a full scan then upload the info."

Eli did as he was told.

"What in God's name..."

"What's wrong?"

"I don't rightly know... all i can say is keep her asleep, we have no idea what all this means."

"I have their entire network in my ships files," Eli said hopefully, "my computer should be decrypting it as we speak, maybe the answer is in there."

"i hope so," Dr Hornst said heavily, "but either way... Keep Samus out cold."