Published December 20, 2010
Corruption
To this day, Ridley was unsure of what had happened. They were investigating the giant crater and then the missing ship came from the sky. The next minute Dark Samus was there making everyone a slave to its will.
Ridley had used Draygon as a meat shield to avoid the initial blast of Phazon. "Kraid, punch it!" he roared, flying into the air as everyone began to swear allegiance to Dark Samus.
"But she's ma friend!" Kraid grabbed Dark Samus in a tight hug, crushing it. Dark Samus began to have flashbacks to its escape from the Phazon Mines.
Ridley shrugged. "All right, then keep hugging it. Whatever works."
"Kraid, release the great one at once!" Draygon hissed. He had been corrupted extremely quickly. Ridley credited it to being a simple organism.
The crayfish was blasted onto the ground by Ridley's kinetic breath. "No, keep hugging it!"
A searing pain to the back caused Ridley's suit to lock up, sending him crashing to the ground. He turned, growling at the group of his soldiers who had shot him down. "Why are you resisting?" one asked him. "Dark Samus has taken away what made us as pathetic as you are now. Come, join us."
Ridley climbed to his feet. "First of all: don't talk like that. It's creepy. Second: I've been possessed once already and that was enough."
"Technically, only your armour was possessed," Crocomire pointed out. Ridley blasted him, not caring if he was corrupted or not.
He noticed that Kraid's hug was beginning to loosen. "Kraid, keep hugging it!"
"Okai!"
"Let me go," Dark Samus' distorted voice wheezed.
"Okai!"
"Dammit! You're like a goldfish!" Ridley dodged a corrupting shot from Dark Samus. "And since when could you do that?"
Dark Samus didn't respond. Instead, it floated into the air, Phazon gathering around it. The Phazon exploded outwards, creating a rapidly expanding sphere that was sure to corrupt everything in range.
"Oh shit."
-Two days later-
Ridley stalked down the hallway, his neck sparking violently. If he ran into one more group of pirates chanting "one of us" then he'd kill everything in sight.
Things had changed since Dark Samus took over the space pirate confederation. Dark Samus was now the absolute authority. High Command was second to Dark Samus. All missions involved Phazon in some way and were set by Dark Samus. Dark Samus, Dark Samus, Dark Samus.
He remained uncorrupted, resisting the Phazon inside of his body. However, even with the whole armada under new leadership, his loyalty lay to the space pirates. He would stay and try to think of a way out of this.
"RIDLEY!"
On the other hand, Kraid's status was unknown. Ridley couldn't figure out if the Herculean idiot was corrupted or if he was even smart enough to be corrupted in the first place.
"What? What could you possibly want?" he hissed.
A huge smile covered Kraid's face. "I found a football."
"RAAAAAAAAAAAH! I DON'T CARE ABOUT YOUR FOOTBALL! This whole operation has gone to hell and your presence is not helping me in the slightest in fixing this mess! Why can't you just drop dead?"
"Hay, that wasn't called for."
Ridley took a deep breath. Screaming wouldn't help, Kraid wouldn't understand anything he said while shouting. "Kraid, I am under an enormous amount of stress. Have you noticed that we now have a new leader?"
He nodded sloppily. "Yeah, the pretty lady's our lead person now."
"Yes. I am positive that whatever 'the pretty lady' is planning is not in our best interests."
"Having doubts?" Ridley jerked to the right, glaring at Draygon as he floated toward them. "Disciples shouldn't question their leader."
"Yeah Ridley," Kraid said, obviously having no idea what Draygon was talking about and just trying to sound like he knew what was going on. "That."
Both of the rivals ignored him. "You should feel lucky that you're my friend," Draygon continued, hissing the word. "Otherwise I'd have you reported for insubordination and you'd probably die."
"Charming," Ridley grunted. "Does that mean your retard offspring are full today?"
"Quiet! I've come to get you. We're being summoned."
"Summoned, eh? That's a new one."
Dark Samus had set up a kind of throne room inside the seed. When they arrived its back was to them, its attention focused on a one eyed monstrosity that looked like it was part of the seed. Also in there were many of the other high ranked pirates. Among them was one with a large red helmet, one who looked extremely familiar.
"When the hell did you get promoted?" Ridley snapped, breaking the silence.
"Just now actually," Swatllum happily answered. "I'm a commander now!"
"I noticed. Isn't such a high rank to tasking for someone like you?"
Swatllum shrugged. "Well, I'd like to just lie around and eat Hot Bloggs all day but the salary increase is a plus."
"The fuck is a 'Hot Blogg'?"
Dark Samus faced them, silencing all conversation. "It is time to tell you all of my mission."
It went into an explanation of how it corrupted the Aether cleanup team, found Phaaze, destroyed a Galactic Federation battleship, took an Aurora Unit, could control Phaaze and wanted to corrupt the GF too. Ridley didn't listen intently but got the gist of it.
He raised his hand. "Question: do you have any plans? Because we've been trying to take these guys out for a long time and they're pretty strong."
"Do not question the great one!" a High Commander shouted, glaring intensely at Ridley.
"Am I going to have to deal with millions of suck-ups now? If I am I think I'll just kill myself now."
"Then do it," Draygon hissed. "You're always talking about how you should kill yourself. Do us all a favour and let me tear you into pieces!"
"Trying to take the cheap way out? That's a good idea seeing as you can barely scratch me otherwise."
Dark Samus interrupted their argument, ending it. "You are here to assist me with that. I plan to attack vital federation planets with Phazon Seeds but am unsure of which ones to aim at."
"Elysia must be one of them!" the pirate who had argued earlier declared. "Their spy base has caused my operations nothing but failure!"
"Norion must fall," another pirate announced. "It holds one of their most powerful fleets and must be taken out of the way as soon as possible."
Kraid began to jump up and down. "I know I know! Let's go to my place!"
"He means Bryyo," Ridley translated. "It's his home planet and is now a vital fuelling station. The mines there are well protected but a seed will easily crush them. And Norion? Really? You want to go all out against a fleet that's made to go all out?"
"This is our best chance to crush that base."
"No it is not. It is our best chance to get our asses kicked if we spread our forces and attack it. You are stupid."
"You are too hesitant," the pirate argued, sneering at the space dragon. "We must be swift and decisive, not questioning of our own power!"
Ridley sighed. "Fine, go get yourself killed. I'll be laughing at you through a telescope."
The pirate frowned again, the room going silent. "If Norion is as formidable as you say," Dark Samus began, "I want our best fighters leading the assault. Ridley, you and I shall lead the battle on Norion."
"Wha- I was completely against it in the first place!"
"My decision is final," Dark Samus growled, staring down the giant dragon. He became aware that the other pirates looked ready to attack him if he continued to argue... aside from Kraid.
"Can I come tooooo?" Kraid asked loudly, his eyes brightening at the prospect of killing people with his friend.
Dark Samus hesitated, glancing nervously at him. Ridley decided to file away this piece of information for later. "You... will be more useful on Bryyo. Your knowledge-"
"Okai!"
"...Yes."
The next few weeks were not good for Ridley's stress. About a week after the corruption of the entire armada several pirates took it upon themselves to create some Dark Samus themed motivational posters. One of the most popular ones displayed the dark one pointing at the viewer with the caption "YOU ARE MINE" in bold letters beneath it.
"MION NO WAG," Mother Brain said sympathetically.
"If only it were so simple," Ridley grunted as he raked his claws against a metal wall. "We get to attack Norion on Thursday. Hurray."
"ZOOMBO WOOMBO..."
"Of course I'm not excited by this. If we caught them off guard and used absolutely everyone we could take Norion but this plan won't work. I get the feeling that things won't work out very well."
"KI-"
The door to the room exploded open. Jikarvl slid to a stop in front of them, screaming, "Kraid knows you're here!"
"Is there any way today could become worse?"
"He's bringing his pet."
They didn't react in time. Kraid entered the secondary control room through the doors that were custom made for him, Chykka trailing behind him. "HAI GUYS! I haven't seen you in years mom. How's your back? It was really really bad last week."
Ridley spent a few seconds trying to comprehend his words. "There are so many things that are wrong with what you just said. I would normally try to correct you but at this point I've learned that trying to change you into a contributing member of society is a hopeless cause. Just know that you are stupid."
Kraid stared at him blankly, his acidic drool slipping down and almost hitting Mother Brain's computer. "GALVE MA JIKIKI! VULOA!"
"Look at what Phillip can do!"
-The next Thursday-
It was finally time. They would attack three major federation planets, the assault on Norion being led by Ridley and Dark Samus. This meant that neither Kraid nor Draygon would be on the ship with him. This also meant that he would spend extended amounts of time with the dark one.
They two sat on the bridge in silence, waiting for the wormhole to be ready for travel. Ridley was clicking his claws on his perch, his thoughts elsewhere.
"Would you cease to do that?" Dark Samus growled.
Ridley paused his tapping before resuming doing so, slower and louder. "It makes me happy."
"It is irritating. Stop it at once."
Ridley lazily shrugged, doing as told. "If you say so. Did you know that Kraid is looking for people to practice his hugging on?"
Dark Samus said nothing, even when Ridley began to tap his fingers again. He smiled contently.
After an hour the wormhole appeared before their fleet. "All ships forward!" Ridley roared. "Hopefully no one will die."
-On the GFS Olympus-
"That's the situation," Admiral Caster Dane said to the bounty hunters assembled before him.
Immediately after finishing his statement an alarm went off and emergency lights started to flash. "Space pirates have appeared through a wormhole," Aurora Unit 242 announced. "They are splitting into two sections: one to attack our fleet and another toward Norion."
"Damn, they must be targeting the planet's defence system!"
Samus pulled up her arm cannon, arming it. "Well let's go show them some hospitality."
-On Ridley's ship-
A glow of Phazon appeared around Dark Samus. "I must summon the seeds. Remember the plan Commander Ridley."
He waved off the comment. "I know what I'm doing." The being nodded before it vanished from sight, turning into particles of Phazon. "But you don't. No one else does. Everyone except me is fucking dense."