S1-169
A world overgrown with plant life

1:17 PM
05/19/3273

Yionus's moon, Zuter - IMC testing site Echo-918
Chamber 137

Music
Metroid Prime 3: Corruption - Briefing Room & Ambience Theme

Michael had decided to pay the World Gate another visit, opting to show Ada-1 his invention, but for whatever reason, Hayden-10 wanted to come along.

It was quite the coincidence, since a Taken Dreg just dropped off a brand new Dimension Key before vanishing back into the Ascendant Realm. "Looks like we've got a new Dimension Key."

"I've never seen one before."

"Trust me, Ada. When a new Key is made, we are shown the door to a whole new world, and all we have to do is unlock the way."

She picked up the Key, taking a look at its appearance, only to see a darkened treetop above the image of a forested expanse.

Michael took the Key and tossed into the arch, opening the rift for them to step through as Rocco picked up a Chrono-Extractor.

Dimension 14 - UNKNOWN
UNKNOWN

Music
Metroid: Other M - Sector 1 Main Theme

The area could only be described as 'Mother Nature really let herself go'. Everywhere they looked, plant growth was overly abundant.

"{I'm getting a signal. Line up the locator arch and follow me.}" Once it was transmatted in, Michael pushed the arch to the portal, used the Chrono-Extractor to remove the Dimension Key, and followed his Ghost.

Once the trio caught up with Rocco, they saw... nothing. "{I... I don't get it. The signal's emanating from this location, but there's nothing here.}"

"There must be local interference. Fan out!" Michael ordered.

Hayden-10 simply got down on one knee at where Rocco was picking up the signal. "Looks can be deceiving. The signal origin is here, it's just not on our scale."

"You mean to say that Michael's Ghost is picking up a signal from something extremely small?"

"In our time, nothing is impossible. Behold." Everyone looked very closely at the ground, discovering what looked like a very disturbing, vaguely onion-like object that had a flower on top of it, and it was using three sickly yellow hairs to stand, and it appeared to be swirling between different colors at random.

"What the heck is that?"

"I..." Hayden-10 abruptly stopped himself upon uttering that one letter, drawing the attention of those around him. "...have no idea."

"Hayden, the suspenseful silence was a nice touch, but it was unnecessary. Don't get me wrong, it was very well-timed. We just... didn't need it." Hayden-10 simply turned his head a full 90° clockwise to face Ada-1, wearing the Exo equivalent of an unamused expression, disturbing the Black Armory curator. "Please don't look at me like that. It's creepy."

"Go down into the pit in Earth's moon and you pick up a thing or two from the Hive."

"That must've been some time before we tracked down Skolas, the deceased Kell of the House of Wolves."

"Or as he called himself, the 'Kell of Kells'." Hayden-10 added.

Ada-1 then noticed something approaching her right foot, and it looked like a tiny rock with eyes, arms, legs, and a leaf. "Well, what do we have here?" She gently picked it up, showing it to Michael, Rocco, Hayden-10, and Cyleena.

The blue-shelled Ghost scanned it. "{It's some kind of... organic life form that possesses an external shell that's hard as a rock, and the shell's naturally grown. It... THIS PLACE MAKES NO SENSE!}"

"Calm down, Rocco. We've seen weirder. Remember the Hive on Mars?"

"{The Hive sect known as the Grasp of Nokris? Yeah, frozen Hive are pretty high on the list of strange things I've seen, just above whatever the heck this thing is.}"

Ada-1 then gently put it back on the ground, being careful not to step on the onion-like object as she went elsewhere to look for additional information. "These other dimensions your Keys open up... Are they altered versions of our own?" Ada-1 asked.

"Not really. Some of them are under completely different laws of reality, and in all but one so far, the Traveler never existed. Why do you ask?"

"Take a look." Michael and Hayden-10 looked at what Ada-1 was gesturing to, seeing what looked like a moss-covered car battery.

"That makes no sense. No sign of human activity in this area, then a car battery covered in moss all of a sudden? This place is weirder than normal."

"Gonna have to agree with you on that one, Michael. Ada, you've got a good eye, but there doesn't seem to be much around here for it to point out." Hayden-10 finished, heading back to the portal arch. Michael and Ada-1 followed him, seeing as the IMC ace was the one with the Key.

So you know, we just entered the world of Pikmin.

I'll see you next time, and hopefully we recover the Black Armory Obsidian Accelerator.