Robotic Voice: "Metroid"

Thinking: "Metroid"

Comms: [Metroid]

Texting: "Metroid"

Alien language: {Metroid}

Whispering: *Metroid*

Talking: "Metroid"

WARNING: Volume 9 lore spoilers

Chapter 14: The Labyrinth

Summer descended with the statue deeper and deeper into the earth. It was strange, to say the least, as she knew that her own daughter had gone into countless other such structures during her time in space. Summer sighed at this thought. She was alive, but had no way of knowing where Ruby would be. She knew that Yang and Tai were probably at Patch or going to Beacon, but she was afraid of what they would think of her now. At least Ruby, after getting over the initial misunderstanding in regards to the phazon, would be accepting… hopefully.

About half way during the descent, Summer, from within the Morph Ball, saw the walls light up with blue runes. The sight was actually beautiful, making the tunnel walls look like they were carved with glowing jewels. She was busy admiring the sight when a voice resonated throughout the tunnel.

{So the mother of The Chosen, reborn as her corrupted doppelganger finally arrives. Travers this test and perhaps you will prove yourself worthy of taking flight}

The foreboding message was very clear to Summer, not only in understanding it thanks to Dark Rose's memories. The Chozo clearly did not like her, they even knew that she would turn up. How they knew was a mystery, one likely to go unanswered for the rest of time.

The descent lasted for a few more minutes. Finally the statue elevator reached the bottom. Summer disengaged the Morph Ball and floated to the doorway she saw. Passing through she heard a rumble from behind. She turned around to see the entrance cave in, blocking the path to the surface and destroying the statue.

"They even destroyed that beautiful crystal art," Summer thought in dismay.

She walked forward, arm cannon raised and ready to fire. The cave was dark, only slightly illuminated by the faintly pulsing phazon highlights on Summer's armor, the radioactive bio-material the only source of light in any direction. Thankfully, Summer's visor came equipped with a night vision spectrum and was able to use the slight glow to show her the surrounding environment. It was not really anything special, just a seemingly normal cave.

The cave was about 2 meters tall and one meter wide. Not much room to maneuver and combined with the darkness, provided terrible visibility. She was almost caught off guard by the first enemy she encountered. Key word: 'almost'. Spinning around, Summer saw the creature. It was a purple Geemer, a type of alien wildlife species with a spiked carapace that was commonly impassive until it spotted an enemy, no matter how threatening that enemy was. Now it seems that this one saw her as an enemy.

The Geemer charged at Summer in an attempt to ram her with its spiked body… it did not even get within 2 meters of her before it was vaporized.

"Well that was disappointing," Remarked Summer as she continued to walk. Summer continued to traverse the tunnels, only encountering the occasional Geemer or Ripper, a heavily armored, but small, floating pill-shaped insectoid alien. Luckley, as time passed she regained a little bit more phazon and got the Plasma Beam, now being at 60% restored.

Summer eventually found a larger cavern. And by large, it meant that it was large enough to fight what looked like an ever-shifting labyrinth. "Oh, wow," Summer breathed as she took in the sight. At the center of the maze she could see something emitting a blue glow. The walls of the labyrinth were constantly shifting around making it so that anyone inside would never follow the same path twice.

"Well, I obviously need to head to the center, unfortunately it seems I won't be able to cheat and go over the top," Summer remarked as she noticed a sort of energy net over the top of the labyrinth. "Time to see what is in store for me now."

Summer jumped off of the ledge that she was standing on and landed near the entrance of the maze. She still thought that it was amazing that with the suit, she did not need to even worry about a landing strategy.

Approaching the entrance, Summer could only marble at the sheer size of the place. The walls alone were 30 meters tall and 10 meters thick and the thinnest point. The entire structure was multiple kilometers wide.

"This is going to take a while," thought Summer as she stepped through the entrance, the moment she did though, Giant doors slammed shut behind her causing her to jump. "Yep, they definitely want me to be stuck here."

Summer continued on, she encountered different cannon fodder type enemies that Ruby had faced in the past, even if Summer did not know it. Thanks to the abilities she had now, Summer did not have any problems, only needing to shoot them once or twice before they were killed. She spent an hour wandering the maze, blasting a Geemer here, incinerating a worm like Zero there. Finally she came across something more interesting.

Summer was now in a more open area of the labyrinth, being about a 10 by 10 meter square. In the center of the area was a pedestal, a glowing blue canister floating above it. The hallway that led her here was now sealed off by a door. Between Summer and the pedestal was a towering, bipedal, robotic bird with golden plating. It was the Golden Torizo from Ruby's second trip to Zebes.

{Your first challenge awaits. Prove yourself in combat!} Came a voice speaking in ancient Chozo. As those words are spoken the eyes of the Torizo light up green.

(Play: 'Big Boss Confrontation BGM (Ridley, Draygon)')

The moment the Torizo locked onto Summer it fired a laser from its eyes, blasting her away before she had a chance to dodge. Tucking into her Morph Ball to recover, Summer rolls out of the way as the robot bird charges forward with a swipe from a tallen.

Going back to normal, Summer spins around and fires a missile, unfortunately the robot sidesteps the explosive before spewing bombs out of its mouth.

Firing her beam cannon, Summer shot the bombs out of the air, however she was caught off guard when the Torizo began launching energy slashes at her. Summer was able to narrowly dodge the arcs of energy, but she was too late to follow up as the Torizo fired yet another lazer from its eyes, sending her into a wall.

Summer struggled to her feet as she looked at the Torizo. This was not going well, she had barely done any damage to the mechanical bird and her shields were already at 50%. Summer swiftly charged her arm cannon and began firing burrage after burrage at the robot, each beam hitting the Torizo as it made no move to dodge the energy blasts.

Summer rolled out of the way as the Torizo launched another cluster of bombs, coming up to fire a Super Missile, causing the Torizo to stumble back. At this point, the robot bird was finally looking damaged, having smoke coming off of it.

Summer fires another Super Missile at the Torizo as it recovered, but at the last moment it grabbed the high yield explosive. "Oh Shi-" Was all Summer got out before the Torizo threw the Super Missile back at her. She was able to dodge and not get hit directly, but the force of the blast was another story.

A/N: To fully understand, a normal Missile is comparable to a common, modern day RPG. These explosives have a similar yield to 0.001 Ton of TNT or roughly 907 Grams. These are already used to destroy heavily armored tanks. A Super Missile is 6 times stronger (Based on Metroid Prime statistics) resulting in 0.006 tons of TNT or roughly 5.44 kg and can cause the immediate area to shake violently. Both are about the same size and based on visuals could roughly be about 1 foot long and half a foot wide. If you want to look further for more comparisons go right ahead. Simply put, a Super Missile is called 'Super' for a damn good reason.

When the Super Missile hit the ground behind Summer, subsequently detonating, the shockwave sent her flying once again, it turned out that the Anti Friendly Fire system does not include attacks redirected right back at you. Fed up with being thrown around like a ragdoll, Summer charged right at the Torizo, avoiding eye lasers, and slid between the robot's legs. While doing this, she charges a stacked beam of Plasma and Wave.

Quickly turning around, Summer jumps onto the Torizo's back and places her cannon directly on its head. "Time for you to go back to the scrap heap." Growled Summer. She fired her cannon, the Plasma and Wave Beam combo wreaking havoc with the mechanical beast, shredding through metal plating, leaving only melted slag and short circuiting any electronics otherwise left untouched.

At last the Golden Torizo was defeated. Summer stood in place for a moment to catch her breath as she watched the Torizo fall over before she walked to the glowing blue capsule on the pedestal.

{Well done Corrupted One, but your test is not yet complete. Continue forth and prove your redemption.} There was the voice of Chozo again. Summer seriously wondered how they were still able to talk like this even though they are dead.

Summer reached out to the blue capsule and the moment she touched it, the container shattered and the phazonic energy trapped inside was absorbed into her body. Now she was at 70% restored and had gained the Power Bomb, and Grapple Beam, though with her ability to hover up to 8 feet above the ground, the Grapple Beam would only be useful in a few situations. She also noticed that at this point, she had both effects of the Varia and Gravity suit modules but the suit she had was classified as the Phazon Suit, the original foundation of Dark Rose's body.

Now fully recharged, Summer turns and sees that a new passageway has opened up. "No other way to go," Summer mutters as she walks through. It did not take long to come across enemies this time. Instead of the crawler type aliens, Summer now faced what seemed to be a full fledged Space Pirate, specifically a Gray Zebesian, the weakest of the crustacean-like pirates that took over Zebes. It looked different though as the eyes were not the normal yellow, but rather a dull gray.

The Gray Pirate turned and noticed Summer. Immediately it jumped back and fired a beam at her. Summer found this to be a simple matter of dodging and followed up with a normal shot, immediately killing the pirate. After a moment, Summer saw that the corpse disintegrated into gray dust, similar to how Creatures of Grimm fade away, but there was no trace of Grimm anti-life matter.

Summer shrugged this off as how the labyrinth worked. The crawlers that she had killed earlier had simply been vaporized by her beam so she supposed that she missed it with them. Now alert for greater danger with intelligent enemies around, Summer stalked forward. Over the course of the next hour, Summer fought through groups of Zebesians of varying colors. She found that the gray ones were the weakest, followed by green and pink, with yellow and silver being the strongest and most durable, the latter being able to not only melee attack, but also reflect her attacks.

The silver ones being the strongest actually struck Summer as funny. "I guess the color silver is universal for indicating strong warriors" she thought while remembering her own eye color and what they could do. She took note that she should try using her Silver Eyes at some point to see if they still worked and what it would do with the suit.

Summer soon came across a larger group of Zebesians, 5 of each color, totaling in 25 enemies at once. "You boys don't happen to know where the exit is, do you?" Summer inquired. Instead of answering, the silver ones charged at her to perform their usual melee tactics as the others started spraying beam fire. "I guess not."

The first Silver Pirate reached Summer and went to kick her, but just as it got close, Summer countered with her arm cannon and proceeded to blast it to oblivion with a Super Missile while it was vulnerable. She then dropped into the Morph ball to avoid the initial barrage of beam fire as well as kicks from two more Silver Pirates. Placing a bomb, she used the Morph Ball's innate dash ability to slam into another Silver Pirate.

The bomb she left behind exploded, damaging the 2 Pirates near it, but not killing them. At the same time, Summer had knocked over the Silver Pirate she had dashed into and proceeded to unload a fully charged Plasma Beam right to its head point blank, killing it instantly.

Summer had to dodge out of the way as the remaining Silver Pirate that had not taken damage yet decided to throw its claws at her. Summer had been baffled by this action during previous encounters as the pirates seemed to never run out of claws.

Now Summer was surrounded by the three Silver Pirates as the other pirates continued to circle and fire beams. One of the remaining Silver Pirates charged at Summer, seeming to not have learned from its two brethren. Summer corrected that with a Super Missile to its head, leaving it a smoking husk.

Now two Silvers and 20 of the other pirates remained. This was a perfect opportunity to test the new weapon she got. Just as the Zebesians either fired their beams or threw their claws, Summer dropped into the Morph Ball, charged a Power Bomb, and unleashed the deadly payload.

The thermonuclear energy washes over the Zebesians. The non-silver Pirates, having no shielding against this, are all incinerated immediately. The silver ones hold out for longer, but unfortunately for them, the shielding they had was damaged by Summer already so instead of outright turning to dust, they were cooked within their armor, falling to the ground and disappearing shortly after.

Summer got up and observed her handiwork. She could now appreciate the sheer destructive force that the power bomb held. All that remained of the Zebesians were dark smears on the ground and the husks of the Silver Pirates.

"Yah… not going to be using that in populated areas…" Summer muttered as she walked away from the fight. She did not encounter any more enemies as she continued. She did notice a few more dark smears near where she let off the Power Bomb, but no other trace of life could be seen.

Soon Summer came across another large chamber. This one was more rectangular and on the far end was another Phazon capsule, this time protected by some sort of shield. On the walls were large tiles, each with a different symbol.

{You have arrived at your next challenge. Meny stand to protect this world, but only one can lead you forward, while all others will push you back. To whom you seek to return, you must remember. Only then will you continue, Lighting overhead, while red petals scatter.}

"That is not confusing at all…" Summer thought dryly. "Yah, there are many huntsmen and huntresses that fight the Grimm, but what do they have anything to do with this?"

Looking at the stones, she noticed that they were not writing as she had first assumed they would be. Instead, they were emblems, the crests that a hunter would take as a sort of calling card. "Well that answers that question" Summer mumbles

She recognised her the emblem of her old partner, Raven, a black, left pointed wing with a clock in the center. Thinking back she remembered how Raven had actually helped Summer get to the Grimmlands without alerting her family or Ozpin. The next emblem was that of a dark yellow decorative heart of fire, Tai's emblem. Summer also recognised Qrow's crest, the red wing opposite of Raven's crest, this time with a set of gears on the inside.

Seeing her old team's emblems filled Summer with regret. She had left them behind, saying that it was only a routine mission, when in truth she was doing something similar to Raven. She had run away from home because of Salem, but instead of being consumed by some sick ideal due to being in denial like Raven did, she went head first into the beast's lair.

She turned from her team's emblems and took note of all the other colored crests on the walls. She recognised most of them, Ozpin's dark green gear inside a gear, Glynda's violet crown. She Also saw the Axe and Wolf head of Peter Port and the strange pot-like emblem of Bartholomew Oobleck.

Turning back to her team's emblem, she thought about what the riddle was. "To whom you seek to return… Could it be Tai?" She wondered out loud. It did make sense in a way, she wanted to return to her family after all. Lifting her hand, she reached out and placed her hand on Tai's crest. A moment passed and the crest started to glow… before releasing a great flash of light that threw Summer backward. When she opened her eyes, she saw that she was no longer in the puzzle room, but rather the room she fought the Golden Torizo in, even the destroyed robot was still there.

"... … … So that is what it means by 'All others will push you back.' … This is going to be annoying." Summer sighed as she got up and began walking through the labyrinth.

Summer had finally made it back to the puzzle room and was glaring at the crests. "Ok, if it is not Tai, who is it?! Though I often see her as a sister, it's definitely not Raven, and Qrow…" Summer was not happy with how this puzzle worked. This was her second time being teleported. After she had tried Tai's crest and got sent back, she tried Qrow's to a similar result.

"Ok, I am obviously missing something. What else did the voice say? 'Only then will you continue, Lighting overhead, while red petals scatter.'" Summer mumbled. "Is that a clue to what the crest looks like?" Summer tried to remember all of the crests that she has seen in her life as a huntress but came up empty. She had never seen any crest with the combination of lightning and flowers.

An hour passed and Summer was currently rolling back and forth in her Morph Ball, every other rock being into the wall. She simply could not figure out the riddle. "Ugh, how did Ruby get past all of the puzzles that these bird brains left for her." Summer thought about her daughter and how, from the little she knew, Ruby had gotten past numerous other puzzles such as this one.

Summer suddenly stopped rolling. Ruby… of everyone who she wanted to see again, Ruby was the one she wanted to see the most. She thought back to the riddle, 'red petals', why did she not think about it before! Ruby did have a crest, it was a red version of Summers own crest, the Scatter Rose with a lightning bolt over top of it!

Summer shot out of the Morph Ball and looked around, searching for the crest of her daughter. There it was, right next to the Phazon Capsule. Summer looked at it for a moment before facepalming at the sheer stupidity of it all. Walking to Ruby's emblem, she placed her hand on it. This time, instead of blowing her back with a flash of light, the emblem glowed and caused the room Summer was in to become smaller and the other crests to disappear along with the shield around the Phazon Capsule.

"To think the correct option was that obvious and I did not even realise it…" Summer mumbled in dismay. She walked over to the Phazon Capsule and absorbed it. Now she was at 80% restoration and the only upgrades that she did not have (barring those from Dread) was the Screw Attack and Space Jump. She had everything else. (Upgrades from Super Metroid, all of the other games have almost all of those upgrades in addition some of the upgrades unique to that game)

Once the energy from the phazon subsided, Summer turned to the new passage that had opened in the place where Ruby's crest was and continued with her expedition. Nothing was going to stop her from seeing her family again.

"Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit!" cursed Summer as she ran away from a tall white, heavily armoured, four limbed and extremely flexible and mobile robot with a glowing red eye.

Shortly after Summer had left the puzzle room she had come across a strange door with blocky, pixelated effect. Not seeing any other way to go, she stepped through. She had only been walking through the new area for a short time when she heard a creepy beeping/chirping sound. She quickly learned that she was not alone in the area as she soon encountered the robot previously described, emblazoned on its chest was E.M.M.I.-02SM.

Summer had tried to destroy it with varying combinations of her weapon systems but everything bounced off. Left with running being the only option, Summer activated her Speed Booster and immediately ran off as fast as she could.

That brings us to where we are now, with Summer running for dear life from the dreaded E.M.M.I. Unfortunately though, using solely the Speed Booster became a non-viable solution as the terrain became filled with obstacles. Summer ran, jumping over, sliding under or rolling through the obstacles as fast as she could to get away from the indestructible robot.

Summer's luck soon turned for the better as she was able to find a hiding place in a dark hole that she tucked herself into using the Morph Ball. Summer watched as the robot arrived near her hiding place, scanning for where she was. Thankfully, the hole she was in was deep enough to hide her. A minute passed and Summer let out a sigh of relief when the E.M.M.I. finally walked away back where it came from.

"What in the world was that!" Summer said as she rolled out of her hiding place once she felt that the robot was far enough away. She continued on, more carefully now than before as she knew she would not be able to take a robot like that down, hiding whenever she heard the beeps of the robot approaching. Finally she reached another pixelated door and walked through before the robot saw her again.

Summer looked around the room she was now in. In the center was a raised platform with a pedestal, on the pedestal sat an item orb. The rest of the room was much like the one she fought the Golden Torizo in.

{Your final test. Retrieve the weapon and strike down your other self.}

It sounded simple enough, get the item and fight whatever enemy showed up, at least that was what Summer was thinking. She would soon find out that she was dead wrong.

On the raised platform, a dark blue mass started to coalesce. It formed a humanoid shape with black armor, glowing blue accents, a blue visor, and an arm cannon. It was the original Dark Rose. Things would have been fine if it was just that, but something else started to appear. Pixel-like particles started to form two more beings. One had crimson hair, the other golden yellow. Summer's eyes widened in shock, it was a 5 year old Ruby and a 7 year old Yang.

That shock turned to horror when she saw Dark Rose charge its arm cannon and aim at the two kids. Acting on instinct, Summer quickly turned into the Morph Ball and boosted to the kids before shifting back and tackling them out of the way of the blast of phazon from Dark Rose.

Summer was not prepared for this. She had been expecting to need to fight to protect herself, instead she was fighting to protect the two individuals she called her daughters. Holding the two kids by her side, Summer lifted her own cannon and fired at Dark Rose who in turn moved out of the way while floating.

The fight continued like this for 5 minutes, Summer constantly moving around, protecting 'Ruby' and 'Yang' while Dark Rose attacked with the power it had while on Dark Aether. Thankfully, Summer was able to control the radiation from the Phazon within herself and her counterpart did not seem to radiate any, despite having Phazon, so the kids were safe from that.

Unfortunately, Summer could not outlast Dark Rose and eventually took a direct hit in defence of the kids. Summer was thrown onto the raised platform, leaving the kids behind. Summer struggled to stand as she looked to see Dark Rose walking slowly toward the two sisters, arm cannon charging up.

Summer did not know what to do. She would not be able to make it in time and the weapons she had would not stun Dark Rose long enough for her to reach the kids. Something caught her eye then. It was the Item Orb. The one she was told to pick up.

Wasting no more time, Summer snatched up the Orb, crushing it and letting the energies within absorb into her body. The power from the Orb created a shockwave that pushed Dark Rose away from the children and focused its attention on Summer. Summer's arm cannon began to morph. The suit itself being more biological than mechanical made it seem as if it was growing at a rapid pace.

The lower part became longer and wider, tapering into an axe blade, the upper part gained a protruding pick. (Think of an organic version of Summer's axe as seen in volume 9 and smaller to fit on her arm like Optimus Prime has his axe) A notification showed up on Summer's HUD

Weapon Acquired: Phazon Axe

A powerful weapon with the ability to channel phazon, plasma, and Dust.

A grin grew on Summer's face as she turned to face Dark Rose. She channeled phazon into the blade of her new axe, the blade emitting a sickly blue glow. In a flash, Summer used her semblance, the hereditary power of the Rose family, Petal Transmutation, and surged toward Dark Rose.

Reverting back to solid form, Summer swung downward, aiming for the head of Dark Rose. The darker twin lifted its arm cannon to block, but as the blade hit the cannon, it cut right through and into the evil beings head. Summer did not stop though and proceeded to cut all the way through until the head of the axe was planted in the ground, the two halves of Dark Rose falling to each side, before dissolving and being absorbed into Summer and bringing her restoration to 100% and giving her the Space Jump and Screw Attack.

Standing up, Summer deactivated the axe, reverting it back into a cannon, and looked towards the two girls. They were smiling, but before Summer could say anything, they waved goodbye and dissolved into pixels.

{Well done, corrupted one. You have passed the tests and have shown us that you can be trusted. Take this, a final gift to aid you on your journey. May the winds be ever in your favor.}

The pedestal in the center of the room began to glow as a new item sphere manifested. Summer walked up and took it, absorbing the contents. In her field of view, notifications of new abilities and upgrades popped up, ranging from Spider Magnet, to Phantom Cloak, to Flash Shift. But of all the upgrades she gained, two caught her attention: Phazon Overload (Hyper Mode) and Chozoien Tracer. The former a Super State requiring 100% phazon capacity, which she now had, the other being able to trace and identify Chozo technology. In other words, Summer could track down Ruby using this ability.

The first thing Summer saw when she activated the Tracer to look for Ruby had her tearing up. Ruby was on Remnant, Beacon Academy no less. However, the joy did not last long as she heard a warning siren go off and the cave begin to shake.

(Play: Super Metroid - Escape)

[Warning… Warning… structural collapse imminent… T - 00:06:00 and counting]

Summer blinked. "Oh great…" she sighed as she dashed off to the opening that was revealed. Summer ran down the corridor as chunks of rock fell down from the ceiling forcing her to dodge from side to side. Rounding the corner she was able to see that the corridor led to a cave and made a sprint for it using the Speed Booster. She was about 100 meters away when the wall to her right collapsed and a robotic figure stepped out.

"Oh not you again!" complained Summer as she saw the E.M.M.I. blocking her path, standing right at the entrance of the cave. She knew that missiles, bombs, and beams did not work on this thing, but she decided to try something else.

She shifted her arm cannon into the Phazon Axe and empowered it with phazon. Summer then felt the energy from the phazon flood her systems as she activated Phazon Overload, her strength and speed increasing. When she was about 50 meters from the robot, she jumped and activated Shine Spark, surging forward at sonic speeds. Tucking into a mid-air roll, she also activated Screw Attack, the Phazon Axe spinning around like a saw blade. Summer made contact with the robot and to her relief, the combination of powerful attacks tore right through the thing like a spinning blue wrecking ball.

Returning to running, Summer took note that she still had all of her upgrades and powers, but her phazon levels were now at 50%. "Seems like I use up phazon when using Overload." Focusing on where she was going, she ran through the cave, zigzagging, jumping, and wall jumping through numerous obstacles. Eventually she saw daylight up ahead and increased her speed.

[T - 00:00:30]

Parts of the cave continued to collapse around Summer, forcing her to slow down so that she could dodge.

[T - 00:00:15]

She was 20 meters away and time was almost up. She pushed herself faster to keep ahead of the falling rock as she strained to reach the exit.

[T - 00:00:00]

The cave fully collapses, kicking up a dust cloud and destroying everything inside. For a brief moment, the world is still as nothing moves. Then from the cloud of dust, a streak of white and blue burst forth. Summer had made it out.

Skidding to a stop, Summer looked back at the cave. She gave a silent prayer to the Chozo that had raised her daughter and thanked them for giving her a chance to see her. She then looked out over the expanse of deserted land.

She wanted to see her daughter, but if the Space Pirates had joined forces with Salem, Summer needed to get more information. She also knew that even with all of this power, Summer would not be able to stand against Salem. It would take both Ruby and Summer to take her down once and for all. There was no redeeming the witch lake Summer had hoped she could, but perhaps she could do something different.

"Perhaps it is time to join the bad guys for a bit." Summer thought as she walked off toward Salem's castle.

A/N: Hello everyone! I am sorry for the long wait. I was busy IRL and I got stuck writing this. Writer's Block is my nemesis.

I hope you enjoyed this chapter. There are a few spoilers for RWBY Volume 9 that I used to flush out some details. I hope you do not mind. I will start working on a detailed list of what Summer can do at a later date.

Till next time.