Samus maneuvered the gunship around the Valley of Bowser and locked into place behind the gargantuan rock sculptures head. The nuclear golem tried to turn around to face them again, but its considerable bulk made it incredibly slow. This made it easy for Samus to simply keep the ship out of danger. The only problem was that they were now at a stalemate. The Valley of Bowser couldn't hit them because it was too slow but they still didn't know how to attack it without setting off an apocalyptic explosion that could potentially wipe out all life on the planet. Obviously, this was not an ideal situation.
"Well, at least it's not firing lasers at us anymore." Joey commented in partial relief.
"Those weren't lasers." Samus corrected him. "They were thermonuclear energy blasts."
"Lasers is easier to say." The boy muttered under his breath.
"This does give us more time to think, though." Ridley eyed the view screen closely as if staring at it would be enough to figure out how to stop it. "Anyone have any ideas?"
"Maybe we could try tripping it?" Roshi suggested, looking down at his larger-than-average belly with a twinge of sadness. "I know that always works on me."
"That could work." Samus considered the option for a moment. "We could use the ship's grapple beam as a tripwire to knock it over."
"There is a flaw in that plan." ADAM interjected. "The resulting tidal wave caused by something that big crashing into the water like that could potentially flood the surrounding continent."
"Then how else are we supposed to submerge this thing?" Samus yelled in frustration, which was not a smart thing to do in a confined space crammed with people.
"I am afraid that I don't know the answer to that question." ADAM admitted. "I can not calculate any scenario in which we are able to successfully defeat this thing without massive ecological damage as a result."
Samus punched the ship's windshield out of frustration. Fortunately, it wasn't with enough force to damage it.
"That's certainly not the reaction that I would have expected from you." Ridley snickered. "How many planets have you blown up at this point?"
"Can it, lizard!" Samus tried to point her arm cannon at the space dragon, though there wasn't enough room in the cramped cockpit for her to do so and she just ended up smacking Diesel in the face. The small, furry mechanic swore loudly, prompting Armstrong to cover Joey's ears. "Now's not the time!"
"Right, sorry." Ridley apologized, which was not something he was used to doing or that he particularly liked. "Still new at this whole, 'being the good guy' thing. It's going to take some getting used to."
"I-a have an idea!" Luigi spoke up. "Can-a we use the-a thing that-a pulled us in her to-a lift that-a thing up out of-a the water and fly it into-a space?"
"Nice thought." Samus replied. "But the tractor beam isn't nearly strong enough to lift that thing up."
"If only we knew what was actually powering that thing." Armstrong mused. "It would be much easier if we could just turn it off."
Before anyone could react to that comment, the giant rocks that made up the Valley of Bowser began to shift and move around each other. Samus barely had time to send the ship hurtling out of the way before the titanic stone recreation of the Koopa King was suddenly facing them and fired off another beam of radioactive blue flames.
"Well, apparently it can do that now." Samus said, mildly stunned by the unexpected turn of events. "So much for hiding in its blind spot."
"Am I crazy or did I just see a castle inside that thing's head?" Ridley asked, not really expecting an answer.
"Why not both?" Yoshi replied sarcastically.
"I-a didn't see it, but-a there was a castle in-a the Valley of Bowser when-a Mario and I were-a here last time." Luigi stated. "I-a don't know-a how that works now that-a the Valley is-a like this-a now."
Ridley pondered silently for a moment as they dodged another radioactive blast before speaking up again. "I'm going in there."
"You're what?" Just about everyone asked at more-or-less the same time.
"I'm going in there." The ex-space pirate repeated. "There might be something inside that we can use to stop it safely."
"But you'll die!" Joey pointed out.
"Oh, please. Do you really think a lit something like nuclear radiation is going to bother me? I'm mother-eating Ridley!"
"I don't think that's how that saying goes." Armstrong muttered.
"Accurate, though. He ate my mother, after all." Samus said semi-sarcastically as she grabbed Diesel out of the air and pulled him to the ship's controls. "Take over for me, I'm going too."
"Wait, what?" Diesel quickly grabbed hold of the controls with the long, slender tentacle-like appendages emerging from his sides to steer the ship out of the way of a radioactive blast.
"You can't be serious!" Armstrong grabbed her arm to keep her from going. "It's too dangerous."
"What, do ya think I'm goin' ta let my archnemesis upstage me?" Samus laughed. "Besides, my suit should protect me."
"Just barely." ADAM said. "Your Fusion Suit won't be able to shield you from that much radiation for more than about an hour."
"Then we just won't take that long." Samus shrugged as she shook loose from Armstrong's grip. "And I'm surprised that you aren't just sending me in there without any proper protection. That's what the original you would have done."
"That was one time!" ADAM snapped.
Samus managed to work her way to the back of the overly crowded cockpit where Ridley was waiting and pressed a button to open the entrance. Then she turned around to face everyone, gave an enthusiastic thumbs-down and fell backward out of the ship.
"Did… did Samus just forget to wait until we were actually above the enemy?" Armstrong questioned.
Ridley sighed and facepalmed before jumping out of the ship after her. He dove down beside the bounty hunter and reached out to grab her, but he was too slow as Samus suddenly went into a summersault and was surrounded by an aura of crackling energy.
"Oh, right." Ridley said as he watched the sizzling ball of orange energy bounced through air towards the Valley of Bowser. "Space Jump… and Screw Attack. You'd think that I'd have the Hunter's normal powerset memorized by now."
Ridley glided along behind Samus, making sure to keep his distance. He had been hit by her Screw Attack enough to know to stay clear of her when she was using it. He had no idea how it actually worked but he did now that it was enough to hurt him even in his regular form. He didn't even want to know how much it could hurt him in his current state.
Samus landed on one of the rocks that made of the Valley of Bowser's nose and looked up as Ridley flew past. He perched atop the Valley's head and climbed down to where the Hunter was waiting.
"Well, that was fun. Now let's… um…" Samus stared up at Ridley.
"What?" The space dragon asked defensively.
"How does that thing stay on." She pointed up to his head, prompting Ridley to glance up at Mario's cap, which was somehow able to stay on his head without being blown off by the wind.
"I… don't know."
"Whatever, let's just get going."
With that, Samus jumped into the blue flames emerging from the Valley of Bowser's eye and Ridley crawled in after her. It was hard to see anything through the magically radioactive blue fire that filled the massive stone structure, but they could both just barely make out a large castle in the distance. Unfortunately, it was still quite a ways away from them with no pathways leading to it. Ridley unfurled his wings and was immediately sent hurtling upwards, crashing into the ceiling at terminal velocity before falling back down decide Samus in a contorted heap.
"I can't believe I'm asking you this, but are y'all OK?" Samus prodded Ridley in the rib with one of her metal boots.
"Never better." Ridley growled as he straightened himself out and stood up again, most of his joints noisily cracking into place as he did so. "You've beaten me worse than that countless times."
"That I have." Samus nodded.
"I feel like my flesh is about ready to melt off my bones, though, so I think we should hurry up."
"I know what ya mean. Even with mah suit's heat shielding I still feel like I'm inside an oven." Samus agreed. "But now I'm not sure how we're supposed to get over there. If I were to use mah Screw Attack or Grapple Beam in here, it'd probably set the whole thing off. Not that I even have my Grapple Beam anymore, anyway."
"Considering we came here specifically to prevent that from happening, it's definitely a good idea that we don't do that." Ridley scratched his chin for a moment. "I have an idea. I hate it, but it's an idea. I'm going to have to grab you, so try not to instinctively try to kill me or anything."
"What are you…"
Ridley wrapped his long, spindly arms around Samus' waist in a surprisingly strong grip and opened up his wings again. The dragon and bounty hunter were both sent flying up but with the extra weight, their ascent wasn't quite as fast as it had been when Ridley was on his own. This gave Ridley the time he needed to control their trajectory just enough so that when Ridley crashed into the cave ceiling again, they were just above the castle. Unfortunately, Ridley wasn't able to control his fall any better than before and the two crashed right through the castle's roof.
"Never. Do. That. AGAIN!" Samus yelled furiously at her former archnemesis as she managed to pull herself out of his grip and looked around. "Well, that's odd."
Ridley managed to slowly clamber up onto all fours and quickly noticed the same thing that Samus had. They were no longer engulfed in magic blue flames. He looked up at the hole where they had just made through the castle's roof, as well as a few windows scattered around the large room they were now in. The fires still burned brightly just outside but seemed to stop at every available entrance into the castle.
"Wait… but it's… the fire… but it should… how?" Samus babbled incoherently.
"I've learned that its best not to question the laws of physics on this planet. They don't seem to apply." Ridley said sagely as he placed an assuring hand on Samus' armored shoulder, prompting the space hunter to slam him face-first into the hard-stone floor. "Ow."
"Okay, my suit's detecting a life signature somewhere nearby." Samus suddenly acted as if everything was normal again. "I say we check it out."
"Yes, I can smell it." Ridley sniffed the air. "It smells familiar, but I can't quite place it. I think it might be… wait, why do you smell like a Metroid?"
Samus tensed up noticeably. "Let's just get going. These readings indicate that it's the same alien that we saw earlier."
"Yes, that's what I was just about to say." Ridley wanted an answer, but his sense of self-preservation told him that he shouldn't press her further right now. He didn't want to get on her bad side, after all. Well, further on her bad side, anyway. He was always on her bad side. "I think its name was Kazzak, or Kalek, or something like that. Works for Bowser."
"What's the deal with this Bowser guy, anyway?" Samus asked as they started walking towards where they both detected the Magikoopa to be.
"I don't know?" Ridley shrugged. "My crew and I fled to this star system to get away from a Federation warship that had been tracking us down when we picked up a transmission from this planet. When we answered, we found that it was from some sort of local king or warlord or something, asking for help kidnapping the princess of a rival kingdom. Normally I don't do abductions, but it sounded like a bit of fun and I had nothing better to do while we were lying low, so I took the job. He had me stationed in a small castle with orders to kill a human guy in a red cap, the one I'm wearing right now. I carried out the job while I had my crew take the princess from Bowser's castle and send her back to her own people. For a sizable reward, of course. It sounds like he seems to try abducting the princess a lot but was always defeated by 'the Mario', which is why he hired me to kill the guy. In fact, he took the princess just a day after my crew 'rescued' her, which is why the green one and I are going to fight him."
"I was asking if ya knew anything about him, not for your whole life story." Samus pointed out. "Although that is interesting."
"That wasn't my life story. My life story is far more interesting than that." Ridley muttered. "But what is it that you found interesting?"
"Because your side of the story if very different than what I was told. When Bowser called me to hire me for this job, he claimed to be the ruler of this planet and that you were attacking his people for no reason. I'm guessing he just made that story up to get me to kill you before you could kill him."
"Truly a monster of my own heart." There was no sarcasm in Ridley's voice as he said that. "But that does make me wonder how he even knew that it was me that was going after him when just about everyone else that I've run into since then has thought that I was the Mario."
Samus blasted a door open with her Ice Beam, freezing it over, then shattered it with an Ice Missile which froze the surrounding section of wall around the now empty doorway.
"You seem to be using a lot of ice-based weaponry these days." Ridley observed.
"Unfortunately, it's all I've got right now." Samus shook her head, which looked odd when she was in her armor. "I lost most of my suit's weapons and powerups when it was stripped down and turned into this Fusion Suit and only managed to get a handful of abilities during my final mission working for the Federation. I want to be able to fill out my arsenal again, but Zebes and SR388 are both gone, I can't get anywhere near Talon IV or Elysia without being caught by the Federation and arrested for treason, and I haven't been able to find any other Chozo settlements where I can find upgrades for my suit. I can't even go to Aether and see if the Luminoth can help me out."
"Interesting." Ridley scratched his chin. "I have a lot of questions about what you've done since we last fought, but I suppose those will have to wait. We've already spent too much time just standing here and talking."
"I agree." Samus finally stepped through the icy archway leading into the next room, with Ridley keeping close behind her.
Kamek was floating in the air at the far end of the room. He didn't notice the two intruders' approach as his attention was focused solely on a large crystal ball in front of him which showed the battle outside. He appeared to be using it to control the Valley of Bowser.
"Now let's see you dodge this one!" Kamek yelled angrily and raised his glowing wand for a moment. "Oh, the dodged that one, too. Well, how about this! Oh."
"Yeah, unless you change up your tactics, there's no way you're going to be able to get them." Samus said mockingly as she aimed her arm cannon at the Magikoopa. "You're just too slow."
"Gaah!" Kamek screamed at fell off his broom, landing on the red carpeted floor with a loud thump. "H-how… when did you get in here?"
"I don't know, maybe a few minutes ago." Ridley shrugged. "Or do you mean in this room, specifically. Because we just got here. Did you really not notice the Hunter here blow up the door. It wasn't exactly quiet."
"You know what, it doesn't matter." Kamek said dramatically as he floated up off the ground and landed gently on his feet. "This just means that I can have the privilege of taking both of you out myself. Take this!"
Kamek swung his wand, releasing a blast of magical energy flying towards Samus. The ball of sparkling energy glowed red, blue and yellow as it made its way across the room. Samus sidestepped out of the way, causing the magic to keep going until it hit the wall and turned one of the bricks into a Koopa.
"As I said, you're too slow." Samus reiterated. "I feel like a turtle could have dodged that."
"Why you…" Kamek seemed to seethe with anger, to the point where a dark red aura seemed to radiate out from his body. "That's it! I'll show you my ultimate attack!"
Kamek rose off the ground as he began to dance around wildly, shouting some sort of magical incantation in a language that neither Samus nor Ridley could identify. Samus aimed her arm cannon at the dancing Magikoopa, prepared to fire an Ice Missile at him. She didn't get the chance to, however, as Ridley acted first. The purple space dragon picked up the green-shelled Koopa that Kamek's spell had created, which retreated into its shell upon seeing him approach it. He then chucked the green shell at Kamek like a football, putting as much strength into the throw as he could. The makeshift projectile hurtled through the air like a rocket before bouncing off of Kamek's skull at what Samus estimated to be well over a hundred miles per hour. The blue-robed magician dropped to the floor like a ragdoll, with the Koopa landing on its back next to him.
"Well, that's… one way to do it." Samus lowered her canon as it was clear that their opponent was out cold and would not be waking up anytime soon.
"Okay, now let's get out of here before…"
Ridley didn't get a chance to finish his sentence before the castle began shaking violently around them. The floor began cracking apart as chunks of stone fell from the walls and ceiling.
"Why does this always happen!" Samus shouted in frustration. "Every! Single! Time!"
"Look's like we're going to have to find a way to get out of here before the whole thing explodes." Riley sighed. "Hopefully it doesn't take the whole planet with it."
The hunter and ex-pirate ran back out the way they had come. As they ran through the hallway back to the room that they had crashed into, Samus began to glow as her speed suddenly more than doubled. It became nearly impossible for Ridley to keep up with her, even running on all fours. She suddenly stopped and crouched down just below the hole in the ceiling that they had come in from, continuing to glow as Ridley caught up to her.
"Frak." Samus muttered under her breath. "I was going to shinespark my way out of here, but the flames outside haven't fully died off yet."
Samus' glowing armor steadily dimmed and returned to normal as Ridley looked around outside. The blue fire did appear to be subsiding, but they were still there for now, meaning that they still had to be careful about setting off an explosion. He could also see that the rocks making up the outer shell of the Valley of Bowser were breaking apart just like the castle, which at least gave them more options for where to find a way out. In fact, they could probably just stay there until the radioactive fire was completely gone if it weren't for the fact that they would likely end up crushed to death under an almost literal mountain of stone first.
"How're we supposed to get out of here?" Samus wondered aloud.
"You're the expert when it comes to these situations." Ridley pointed out. "Although, I think I may have an idea."
"Spill it."
"First, I'm going to need to do that thing where you somehow contort yourself into a sphere. I'm still not sure how you do that."
"Well, that's easy. You see, the Morph Ball works by-"
"I didn't ask for an explanation, I just need you to do it if you want out of here safely."
Samus shot Ridley a deathly glare, not that it was visible through the green-tinted visor of her helmet, before doing something that she never thought she would do by following Ridley's orders. Once she had activated her suit's Morph Ball functionality, Ridley picked her up and tucked her under his elbow before spreading his wings and kicking up off the ground. He was able to fly up to the roof without any issues and climbed out into the burning blue fire outside. The magical flames weren't burning nearly as hot as they had been before, which signified to Ridley that he wouldn't have as much of an issue with the updraft, which was nice. He spread out his wings again and was sent flying straight up again, though at a much slower speed than earlier. It didn't take long before he was able to maneuver his way to an opening leading outside and he was able to glide out.
Ridley took a deep breath of fresh air before flying up and circling the collapsing Valley of Bowser like a vulture above a dying animal. He spotted the orange gunship flying around nearby and glided down to it. He perched atop the ship before climbing around to its undercarriage and in through the entrance hatch that opened for him as he approached it. Once Ridley was safely inside, he finally dropped Samus onto the floor.
"Well, that was certainly different." Samus said, slightly relieved, as she stood back up again. "ADAM, status report!"
"Radiation levels are steadily dropping." The ship's A.I. confirmed. "At the current rate, it will reach safe levels in 45 seconds. 44, 43…"
"We don't need the countdown." Samus said as she climbed around the ship's other occupants to get back to the pilot's seat. "Is there any chance that it could still go critical?"
"Yes." ADAM replied. "Though the odds are only about 1.98% and dropping."
"So that's a no, then." Samus pulled Diesel out her chair and sat down, to the small engineer's annoyance.
"I was actually getting kind of worried there." Armstrong sighed. "For a moment I wasn't sure that you'd be able to do it."
"Oh, come on, you know me." Samus said playfully. "I always manage to save the day."
"Well, that really depends on your point of view." Ridley muttered.
"What are we going to do now?" Joey asked Samus.
"Well, I don't know about y'all, but I really don't like it when people try to kill me."
"She really doesn't." Ridley confirmed.
"So, I think I'm going to go pay this Bowser fellah a visit and give him a piece of my mind." Samus continued. "Who's with me?"
"Yeah!" Joey cheered excitedly. "Let's show that nerf-herding jerk what's coming to him!"
"Watch your language." Armstrong said, concerned. "Though of course, I agree with your sentiment. Of course I'm in."
"Sure, whatever." Diesel shrugged.
"We-a still need to-a save the Princess." Luigi pointed out. "So, if you could-a give us a ride, that would-a be great."
"Would sure beat walking." Ridley added.
"Why not." Samus nodded.
"I want to help out, too." Roshi spoke up. "I may not be all that useful, but I still want to do what I can."
"That's-a the spirit!" Luigi said encouragingly.
"So, it looks like we're all in agreement, then." Samus turned back to the controls. "Then it looks like we're off to… actually, someone's going to need to tell me where we're going."
"Hold up! I didn't agree to any of this!" Yoshi's sudden outburst drew everyone's attention to him. "I'm not going anywhere other than back home."
"What?" Luigi asked. "Why?"
"Yeah, you always help out Mario." Roshi added.
"That's just it." Yoshi shook his head. "I help Mario. I don't know this… Ridley, was it? And this is all way out of my comfort zone. I mean seriously, WE'RE IN A SPACESHIP! Most of the people here are aliens! We just fought a mountain! What's even going on at this point?"
"If you don't want to come, you don't have to." Samus said. "I'm not going to force anyone."
"Thank you." Yoshi calmed down. "Now just drop me off on my island and go."
