"It's time," Dark Samus said simply, crushing the molten skull of a felled Revenant underneath her heel. No amount of rigorous training or mental preparation was going to make Phaaze or its disgusting Leviathans disappear. Every time she closed her eyes she saw that blister upon Hell's skyline, and the seed it had dared crash before them as if to taunt her.
The Defector's axe grew in size as it cleaved through another Cacodemon, yet another beast looking for its meal in the wrong quarter. "I had begun to fear you'd been preparing to face the wrong enemy."
"You can't prepare to face the past," Dark Samus said. "You can only close your eyes to it until it consumes you. Frankly, I'm tired of opening my eyes to that eyesore. We'll start with the Leviathan."
. . .
The seeds this incarnation of Phaaze produced were larger too, and spread twice as quickly. A small region of Hell had now become a sickly blue landscape of alien flesh.
The duo had returned to the site of the impact crater in the Titan's Realm - what had once been an ancient city Hell had long conquered now twisted into a melting, irradiated jungle. The town had been decorated in Hellgrowth - twisted echoes of what was once bountiful vegetation. Said Hellgrowth was now tainted blue as Phazon corruption coursed throughout the city's flesh. Bioluminescent hairs hung from ceilings in the ruined rock, and tendrils grew like vines around the buildings and bore abominable fruit - glands to pump more of the sickly blue substance into every inch of the city and the ground it was built upon.
Location: Meltstone Blight
The two of them walked in relative silence - the constant low hiss of the irradiated land beneath them, and the skittering of unseen parasites in dark corners keeping them company.
"You're going to want to make good use of that shield," Dark Samus warned. "If Phazon doesn't burn you alive, it will burrow its way into your brain, and you'll be no better than the other vermin it uses as sentries."
"Argent energy has existed for eons, Hell energy for longer. How is it that Phazon can corrupt an already tainted land, and bend the will of demons?"
"Phaaze certainly wasn't new to the universe when it arrived in our world," Dark Samus mused. She hated going back to that place. But she didn't come out here to shy away from it.
"Through the hunger, I only had the slightest idea of Phaaze's intentions…felt only the fringes of its consciousness."
"Phaaze is alive?"
"Just as alive as Hell itself. However, it has a more…directed focus. When I had combined with what I thought was the origin of all Phazon, it greeted me with laughter. It sensed my desperation and fear, and found the triviality of the matter humorous."
"I suppose we now know why. Such indifference is typical of cosmic intelligence."
"This Phaaze is magnitudes larger than the one I knew. Even from here, I can feel its hunger…as if it's fed on entire galaxies and remains insatiable."
Further investigation had brought to light another disturbing truth. This particular seed behaved differently. Typically, a Leviathan would burrow beneath the crust of a targeted planet, and infect the very roots of the world from within. This one…it seemed to have functioned more like a bomb. Remnants of the Leviathan's flesh were spread for miles in every direction from the point of impact, and enough Phazon was deployed in the explosion to infect the entire region in a matter of hours. As they ventured further into the city, the very atmosphere became volatile.
The Dark Hunter projected a shield of Argent energy around their bodies - enough to protect them from potential corruption via the vapor present in Hell's supernatural atmosphere.
"There is a concerning lack of resistance in the area," the Defector mentioned, cutting through a sickly tentacle blocking his path with the axe. "Perhaps the impact wiped any demons out?"
"I doubt it. You saw the Pain Elemental earlier - the Leviathan would have turned any and every demon it could get its tendrils around."
The defector growled. "The only other reason they would clear an area like this would be in the presence of a super-predator."
Dark Samus paused. "Leviathans typically anointed an apex creature to defend them, forcing them to act as guardian for the seed." She turned toward her partner. "What are the odds of some super-demon having been roaming the wastes where the Leviathan struck?"
The bioluminescent light throughout Meltstone flicked, casting the pair in silent darkness…before coming to life again alongside a howl from something big on the city's outskirts.
"I would say…rather high," the Defector warned, readying his shield and shotgun. Dark Samus prepared her cannon, and the two stuck close together as they moved in the direction of the howling. Above and behind them, a small, tendriled creature soared through the air. It bore many eyes along its body, some filled with the same radioactive liquid that poisoned everything in this area. Its head had a shell-like covering - Phazite plating. From a hole in the shell, a beam of light shone down like a searchlight upon the two warriors.
The Defector raised his gauntlet and fired his grappling hook to board the creature. Between him and it, however, the thin cloud of Phazon particles began to rapidly condense. A beast was formed from the congregation, gargantuan in size. A pitch-black void filled the eye socket on its horned head, and a maw overfilling with teeth roared in recognition of an intruder. In place of its hands were mace-like boulders, volatile spikes adorning them as one of many mutations the Leviathan had granted it. It brought its hammers down upon the Defector, whose Argent shield narrowly prevented him from being clobbered into mist. It did not, however, solve the issue of his rapid collision course with the ground, nor the threat of a several hundred-ton demon dinosaur directly above him.
Dark Samus sprung into action, catching the Defector before he hit the ground and just barely avoiding getting crushed by the behemoth on his trail. The impact from the beast's landing sent the both of them careening into the air, and even as they recovered, they were caught in the light, and the beast reappeared before them. It caught them both in its maw and let them out in a Phazon-fueled laser that shot them halfway across the city.
The warriors hit the ground rolling. Dark Samus was able to recover into a stable float, the Defector got caught up in irradiated tendrils and vegetation he wasted no time in cutting from his body.
"Any intel on what this Leviathan chose as its guardian?"
"A…Guardian," the Defector said, ushering Dark Samus underneath a drooping balcony to avoid another searchlight creature up above.
"Well, obviously, we already established-"
"A 'Guardian'," the Defector repeated, emphasizing the capital letter as much as he vocally could. "The Guardians are a rare species. They are usually created to guard some of Hell's most coveted artifacts. It makes sense your Leviathan would have sought one out."
"What about the searchlights?"
"Seekers - a symbiotic creature with the Guardian. The beast lacks eyes with which to seek out trespassers and meals, so the Seekers guide it with their light. Any creature caught in the light, the Guardian becomes aware and moves to deal with it swiftly. In exchange, the Guardian kills whatever preyed upon the otherwise defenseless seekers."
"Why not just give the Guardian eyes?"
"Hell has its way of doing things. It seems Phazon does as well - they aren't normally able to teleport."
"Great, teleporting dinosaurs from Hell. Day keeps getting better and better. Here's the plan. I'll distract the Guardian - you grapple up and take care of the Seekers when it comes after me."
"Sound plan. Try not to get crushed."
Dark Samus rolled out from the cover they'd ducked behind and locked gazes with the Seeker that'd been tracking them. She bathed in the creature's unholy light and jumped backward as the Guardian formed from the Phazon particles in the beam. As she landed, she recalled an ability of hers, to split into three Dark Echoes. Each spread in different directions, leading the ravenous Guardian who took rapid pursuit.
Dark Echo - Dark Samus creates two weaker clones of herself. She can control them as easily as her own body. By absorbing them, she obtains a temporary shield that makes her invulnerable to attack.
The Defector grappled onto the Seeker once the Guardian had some distance from it, and smashed his axe into the creature's plated skull. It cried out, prompting the Guardian to turn its head towards it.
"Wrong target!" Dark Samus growled. She launched one of her echoes up to the Guardian's head, and roundhouse kicked it back in the right direction. The Guardian roared ferociously and snapped its head - and jaw - back to destroy the Echo in one bite. It pounded the ground before it, and Phazon-infused mortars erupted from its back like a volcano. They homed in on Dark Samus and her remaining Echo. The Dark Hunter succeeded in dodging around and destroying several of the projectiles, but soon, her Echo was overwhelmed and destroyed. She planted her feet and charged her beam in anticipation.
Duels with the Hunter in times long past on Aether came back to her. The Hunter would absorb Phazon temporarily through her weapon, and dish it back out as part of her payload. Dark Samus held her breath and gathered two of the mortars into her cannon. Her arm shook, whether it was with power or fear she hadn't the time or focus to determine. The Guardian opened its mouth to charge another beam to fire upon her, and Dark Samus used the opening to blast the beast with a taste of volatile Phazon. A fantastic explosion knocked the creature onto its back and sent it sliding.
The Defector's shotgun planted firmly into the Seeker's soft flesh underneath its armor, and one trigger pull blasted it out of commission. Another Seeker hovered up behind him, and though the beast was off its feet, by the power of the searchlight it was brought up above the Defector, this time without Dark Samus present to boost him out of the way. His shotgun returned to flames, and from the fire came one of several treasures from his travels through the slipgates.
Last Ritual - A triple-barreled laser cannon scavenged from a faraway realm. Fires laser beams in a fully automatic fashion. By charging the weapon, the barrels can split apart and fire a devastating Siege Beam.
It took about two seconds for the heavy weapon to transform, but the crackling red plasma coursing across it was enough to tell him it was time to pull the trigger. A mighty THOOM followed the concentrated blast. There was enough kick to rocket the Defector out of the way, and he landed on his shield to smoothen out his landing.
"Care to trade?" he asked, sliding next to the Dark Hunter. She nodded, and slammed her fist into the ground, riding a group of ethereal tendrils that threw her into the air. She split into three Echoes again and spread out - when the Seeker caught one in its searchlight, it left the other two plenty of time to reach it. Dark Samus' Scattershot beam tore into the Seeker's head, shredding its plating and then the rest of it.
Last Ritual's onslaught of projectiles kept the Guardian trained on the Defector, who swiftly raised his shield to defend from the beast's seeking mortars and Phazon breath. He noticed the violet buildup on his shield again, and while he didn't have the time to purge the Phazon, it did grant him another idea.
"Dark One!" he called out, Dark Samus already jetting to the final Seeker. "Guide the beast to you, then back to me!"
"Hope you've got a plan," she thought, pulling herself around the creature's neck, and grappling it mid-air from behind. She jerked its head back up to her, which teleported the Guardian directly up above her. With haste, she pointed it back at the Defector, just before the Guardian's flaming flail fists flattened her.
The Defector jumped up to meet the beast, holding his shield above him. He brought the Argent Axe behind it, sparking it against the Phazon-coated shield and causing a reaction. Violet spikes of Argent-Phazon burst forth from the shield and speared straight through the Guardian's stomach. With no Seekers remaining, it had nowhere to escape to. The Defector fired Last Ritual's Siege Beam and shot out from underneath the wounded beast. Dark Samus caught up to it mid-air and activated her Sparkrush. She became coated in volatile energies, and propelled like a rocket into the Guardian's back, spiking it into the ground and causing the Guardian itself to combust. In its final dying roars, it went nova, exploding into dissipating Argent and Phazon in all directions.
Dark Samus landed using her Phase Shield and protected herself from waves of caustic substances. They spread throughout Meltstone Blight, eroding the poison that had seeped into the land and rapidly claimed it. The city had been thoroughly purged of Phazon and the Hellgrowth that remained died without its influence, waiting to be regrown with the spilling of fresh blood.
. . .
"It seems to have cleared out of my shield as well," the Defector noted, the pair of warriors passing through the dead city, now clear of at least one kind of corruption.
"Killing the guardian purged the seed, and everything it had affected."
Dark Samus gazed up at the blue monstrosity, still and yet full of life. It pulsed slightly and let out a groan heard across all of Hell. Even still, it pumped out another seed over the horizon. It crashed into a mountain an incredible distance away.
"We're not going to be able to bust every Leviathan across an infinite dimension," Dark Samus said, somewhat frustrated.
"No…but that certainly seemed to have an effect up there. Perhaps we could weaken it…and then find a way to take our assault to Phaaze itself. I'm certain we aren't the only ones on cleanup duty."
"I'm sure it won't be long before our enemies catch wind of Phaaze's return, either."
Both of them stood in silence.
"Samus Aran nearly perished in her conquest against the Phaaze of our world. This Phaaze…it would destroy her effortlessly."
"And yet, here you stand after an encounter with its seed."
"That's because I wasn't al…"
She paused.
"Go on."
Dark Samus looked over at the Defector. He looked at her, earnestly. Reassuring, and at her side even in the face of a cosmic abomination.
She couldn't help but laugh.
A real, genuine laugh, not used to taunt, or celebrate superiority.
"Let's go, Defector. We have a blight to destroy."