As I whirled around locking on to the 7 ft. green armored personnel, my Varia suit appeared instantly around my clothing. Not seconds before I let fly a volley of beams the being dodged off to the left taking cover behind a control module. I could hear the loading of its weapon and just as it stood to fire I let loose a charge beam that was so powerful it blew a hole in the hallway on both sides. As I stood holding my cannon at ready I locked on to the green figure walking out of the rubble. He was 7 feet tall and I was estimating when I guessed he was around 990 to 1,000 pounds with the suit and I couldn't see a face or any other attributes.

"Identify yourself," I called to the figure. As soon as the words left my lips a huge hunk of wall came flying at me. I boosted out of its path but it took out the wall behind me.

"You identify yourself first," replied the emotionless male voice. His voice suggested calm preparedness.

"Samus Aran, ex member of the Galactic Federation now renowned bounty hunter," I said pulling my cannon back representing peace, but keeping a missile in the chamber, there was no way this stranger was getting the drop on me. He lowered his assault rifle and walked out of the dust and rubble.

"Master Chief, Active member of the SCCSR. Renowned member for heroic condition choice award," he replied. His voice seemed to be eternally monotone. I knew him. I knew of his tale, which got around pretty fast. All his history, stories, heroics, and his power were only a small amount of what seemed to drift around the universe. He was renowned, but I knew him in a totally different way. All that training seemed to rush back to me with a passion of a thousand hungry Metroid's. I stared for only a moment, but in that short moment I relived years of training, pain, and hardship in the span of a second. I remembered fighting him. The way he seemed to jump back and forth dodging even my largest attacks. I remembered the force e would charge at me with. I fazed out of the Varia suit and walked right by him.

"Good to see you again... John," I say laughingly as I walk past him coldly.

.o~.o.~.o.~.o.~

All the air caught in my lungs as I watched her walk past. And way too suddenly all the memories of those years of training and competition between myself and Samus hit me hard enough to make my words jam in my throat as she kept walking. The memory of seeing her working harder than the others to prove herself, stung like a hundred bees in one spot. She was enhanced like me and all the other students but I was the only one she couldn't wipe off the boards in seconds. And I couldn't win against her either. Her advantage was the flexibility of her suit and her speed. Mine was my tactical use and my power. But for some reason I was unable to beat the power of her cannon, always changing between different beams, missiles, and other devices. I was easily obliterated but she, for some reason, always got too close to finalize me and I would get a good hit in knocking her back. As the memories hit me I realized she had walked off with the memory chip with the information I needed. I knew it was unintentional because she is probably here for a different reason than I, plus how could she know why I was here? So I just turned around and walked to the lady at the front desk and explained what happened. They said that she had paid half of the damage repair on the way out.

"she still obviously hates debt," I whispered to myself as I paid my half and walked back to my landing pad. The "Hunter" was still there so obviously she was spending the night. With that consolation I boarded my craft and sat down as it took off, thinking about the next time I would see her, and maybe… possibly… Bring her back.

.o~.o.~.o.~.o.~

As I woke the music the person above me had become obnoxiously loud, I looked over at the clock and moaned. It was 5:25 in the morning. A knocking came at the door. My charge cord popped back into my wrist as I stood and turned. I grabbed my room key and walked out the door. A small boy around the age of 12 to 15 was standing there.

"Um, are you Mr. Guy-Manuel De Homem-Christo?" he asked shakily.

"Yes," I replied.

"Do you want the scores for the meeting last night?" he asked shyly. I was going to say no but he looked so innocent and cute so I caved in.

"Sure, why not?" I replied smiling. The boy breathed deeply and handed me the score sheet. I paid the lad 2.50 for it. It was free but I felt he deserved the money. Once the boy was gone I turned to go upstairs and confront my "neighbor," All my gears, bolts, and even my new memory chip, were glitching out because the new charge was a dry one. I had the electricity in me but most of it was ineffective and had to be discharged. I turned over to the elevator door, and even this far away I could hear the music like it was right next to me. I know that it's not so loud to the humans so they don't notice, but I have very good hearing so it was causing my cords to tweak about. Once the elevator door was open and I was out on the next floor up, the music seemed to get louder and louder. I walked right up to the door and pounded on it as loud as I could. No response.

"Wow this guy is retarded," I growled to myself as I marched back to my room. A cruel black cloud seemed to hang about the morning.

.o~.o.~.o.~.o.~

I woke to the sound of a punk rock song blaring at its highest sound frequency possible and a pounding on my door. As soon as my eyes popped open I realized I had fallen asleep on the remote and the audio had been bumped up to its' loudest. I hurriedly turned it down and ran to the door. I threw the door open but all I saw was a gold streak fading from view around a corner. Suddenly the dreams came back to me forcing me forward to see who it was.

When I rounded the corner the elevator was closed and none were in the hallway. Obviously I had missed the stranger. I hurriedly pushed the down button and once the doors were open I locked the elevator in its place and shut down the security cameras. I quickly plugged into the system and pulled out the system camera records. I downloaded all the memory and then plugged it all back in and left minutes before anyone could have noticed or showed up to see why it wasn't working. I walked back to my room and immediately plugged myself in to the television. The systems morning records showed a few meaningless people then nothing. The screen went blank, then more meaningless people then another blank, then me. Obviously whoever was pounding on my door didn't want to be seen, which meant he had something to hide.

If he/she was an Cyborg I would know why. We were supposed to be extinct, because supposedly one of us hacked into the current government and got us all killed for our potential as terrorists. I deleted the video from my memory core and went back to ponder what I had seen. It wasn't possible. I wanted to believe I had seen the gold from my dreams but couldn't bring myself to it. I had gone too many years without belief for it to just happen now. But what if it was true? What if I was being foolish to not hack the safety system and search all the cameras?

My new train of thought was blown out of the waters as I heard a loud explosion outside not seconds before the building collapsed under my feet.