Lore of Metroid Part Four: The Poison War

The Hunters

Samus considered the Tallon IV incident to be resolved, and returned to her duties.

She was contacted by The Federation for a very unusual commission: Bounty Hunters throughout the galaxy were turning their attention to the supposedly dead Alimbic Cluster, home of the expired Alimbic civilisation. A telepathic message had been sent through space, promising untold power to whoever reached its source. Samus investigated, and discovered that the hunters were being guided to assemble ancient Alimbic relics into a great key, and were fighting each other for the components.

Samus succeeded in acquiring the relics herself, and the key was activated.

They key brought the hunters to the void outside the universe, to the prison of the murderous Gorea. In its exile, the creature had spent incalculable generations trying to reach the living universe through telepathy, and had succeeded in manipulating the bounty hunters into assembling the keys to its prison and releasing it. Gorea absorbed the technologies of the bounty hunters and dispatched them with ease.

Samus Aran scoured the prison ship for something that could save her, and discovered a great weapon. Over the millennia, the prison ship had studied every atom that formed Gorea, and had constructed a single weapon capable of disrupting its molecules and killing it. Samus armed herself with this Omega Cannon and finally killed the diabolic creature.

During her escape from Gorea’s exploding prison, Alimbic spirits appeared to Samus. They silently thanked her for avenging the death of their race, and guided her back to the living universe.

The Galactic Federation paid Samus generously for investigating and pacifying the Gorea threat. They also offered her a new mission: an investigation into the disappearance of Federation Squad Bravo, last seen near the ancient planet Aether.

The Two Worlds

Squad Bravo was a Galactic Federation task force that had pursued a Space Pirate faction to the surface of Aether, with contact lost immediately after. Samus headed to the distant world to look for survivors and as her gunship entered orbit, she witnessed the surface of the planet in flux. One moment it would shine gentle blue, only to then alternate to a dark purple haze. Samus attempted a landing, but a powerful lightning strike forced a chaotic descent.

Samus was nearly killed after only a short time on the surface. Two worlds fought each other for dominance, and the bounty hunter was thrown chaotically between the dimensions. First attacked by a force of reanimated corpses, Samus overcame their assault to face an onslaught by a living mass of demonic Ing. The horde stripped her of her abilities and left her for dead.

Severely depowered, Samus tried to progress in her mission and found a sanctuary. Within a secure temple, she discovered the one creature on the planet that didn’t want her dead.

U-Mos, the last guardian of the Luminoth, told Samus of their history. She learned of the Phazon comet that came from the stars, and how its impact tore Aether into two warring worlds. She is told of the Luminoth survivors, and their centuries of sleep in a state of prolonged suspended animation. Samus developed a respect for the lonely U-Mos, who had acted as the Luminoth's protector as his race sought to wait out eternity in their sleep.

The bounty hunter was taught of the monstrous creatures of Dark Aether, all ruled by their fearsome Ing Emperor. A plan was formulated; if Samus could brave the constant burn of the dark world and acquire the stolen Light of Aether, the energies of the planet could be reconciled. Dark Aether would collapse, and Aether would regain its stability.

Samus ventured between the two parallel planets and fought her way through the formidable Ing armies. She discovered the remains of the dead Squad Bravo, and slaughtered a terrified group of Space Pirates whose attempt to mine Phazon on the planet had met disaster. Samus began to acquire the energies of the Light of Aether.

It was then, during her mission to destroy the dark form of Aether, when Samus Aran first met the dark form of herself.

Dark Samus had been on Aether for some time, absorbing the Phazon beneath its surface and gathering strength for its planned war. The creature had intentionally stayed in the shadows, but as Samus had become stronger, it chose to strike. It repeatedly engaged Samus in battles across the planet, and was repeatedly destroyed only to resurrect itself after a time and come back stronger.

Eluding the pursuit of Dark Samus, the bounty hunter eventually reached the hive of the Emperor Ing. This creature had created its lair within the biggest Phazon vein on Dark Aether, and had been strongly changed by the mutagen. It transformed itself throughout its battle with Samus, growing and twisting in failed attempts to adapt and overcome her. Samus ended its reign, and drained the final energies of the Light of Aether from the dark world. The dark planet began to collapse.

As Dark Aether shook violently, Dark Samus appeared once again to interrupt Samus’ evacuation. The creature’s repeated defeats and resurrections had rendered it invulnerable to the bounty hunter’s weaponry. The two battled as the planet slowly destroyed itself around them. Samus was able to channel Dark Samus’ energies against itself, absorbing the Phazon shards that erupted from its body and launching them back to create an overload of energy. Dark Samus was once again torn apart, and collapsed into Phazon particles. Samus evacuated to Aether, and Dark Aether and its cursed inhabitants were cast into oblivion.

U-Mos released the Luminoth from their millennia of stasis, and the species returned to the waking world. As Samus Aran left for the stars, the species began to plan the restoration of their devastated planet.

The Corruption of the Space Pirates

In Aether's orbit, Dark Samus recreated itself once more. The creature had come to this planet to consume its Phazon, and had absorbed enough to give it incredible power. During its time on Dark Aether, it had watched as the Emperor Ing controlled its chaotic brood through intense mental domination. Dark Samus taught itself this ability.

A small Space Pirate vessel entered orbit; an opportunistic mission to scavenge any excess Phazon ejected from the destruction of the dark planet. Dark Samus stowed away on this ship, and remained hidden until the craft returned to the nearest Space Pirate Homeworld. [MP3]

On arrival, Dark Samus made its presence known. The Pirates sent entire armies destroy it, but the creature continued to recreate itself in stronger forms and slaughtered its way to the Space Pirate High Command. Dark Samus interfaced with their command networks and communications systems, and applied the mental domination it had learned from the Emperor Ing. Within moments, the collective races that made up the Space Pirates entered a state of religious fervour. They looked upon Dark Samus, and saw God. [MP3 / MP3 SP]

Now the new leader of the Space Pirates, it ordered an attack on a powerful Galactic Federation battleship, the GFS Valhalla. With the Space Pirates completely dominated by its will, Dark Samus enabled them to commence the assault in perfect harmony with each other’s actions. The highly coordinated force dominated the Federation ship and stole its Aurora Unit, a large organic computer system somewhat resembling a colossal brain in a containment tank.

Dark Samus had grown strong enough to sense the location of the living planet Phaaze, the source of all Phazon and the cause of Metroid Prime’s tormented existence. The creature led a Space Pirate armada to the distant blue planet, and the creature once known as Metroid Prime finally had its revenge.

Phaaze had condemned a lone Metroid to millennia of pain and torment, as it launched it across the stars in its Phazon prison to Tallon IV. That small Metroid had survived, grown strong and intelligent, and had never forgotten its suffering. It took sadistic pleasure as it violated the living planet by painfully implanting the Aurora Unit into its crust. Dark Samus dominated Phaaze’s will with the organic computer’s reprogrammed artificial intelligence.

Dark Samus forced Phaaze into an agonising accelerated reproductive cycle, and launched Phaazon Seeds to a multitude of planets across the universe. These seeds were ejected with tortuous force, and reached their targets in weeks instead of eons. One such seed crashed straight into the Space Pirate Homeworld, where the survivors of its impact worshipped it as a gift from God.

The Space Pirate civilisation changed under the rule of Dark Samus. The seed, now embedded in their Homeworld, gave them access to colossal quantities of Phazon, and the substance was imbued into their bodies and technologies.

Dark Samus ordered her worshippers to distribute cloned Metroid creatures to all the worlds which Phaaze’s seeds had impacted. Having earned its revenge against Phaaze, it now intended to carry out its final plan. It would spread Phazon and Metroid creatures throughout the universe, and the Metroids would eventually mutate and evolve into self-aware creatures like Metroid Prime.

Dark Samus watched the first mutations. If all went well, it would no longer be alone in the universe.

The Corruption of the Galactic Federation

As Phazon appeared across the universe, the Galactic Federation was able to study its monumental properties. When intelligence informed Federation leaders of the advances of the Space Pirates, a consensus was formed: War was inevitable. Unless the Federation quickly weaponised the substance, they would be completely dominated by their Phazon-enhanced enemies.

Phazon retrieval operations were established on Tallon IV and other worlds, and the ore was extracted in great amounts. Federation vessels convoyed huge amounts back to the core systems, where the material was infused into all military technologies: weapons, armour, power generation, computational capabilities, propulsion and shields.

It took barely a few months for the Galactic Federation to corrupt itself with the poison. Soldiers guarded the border systems with suits powered by veins of liquid Phazon, while freight vessels shipped more and more ore with increasing frequency. Civilian industries planned Phazon farms to integrate the substance into the technologies of the general populace. The glowing blue aura of Phazon had reached the human imagination, and nothing was off limits.

With Phazon demand accelerating exponentially, the Federation and the Space Pirates battled over infested border planets. When the war started, it wasn’t merely a conflict powered by Phazon; it was a crusade for Phazon.

As small skirmishes erupted across distant planets, the Space Pirates became a society of total war. Their embrace of their Phazon gift from Dark Samus was a spectacle: tendrils of living mutagen grew out of their world and reached into the acidic clouds above. The races that formed the Empire lined up to be injected with Phaaze-minerals, and endured the eruption of Phazon crystals from their flesh. They channelled their agony into battle fury.

There was a stalemate: Both the Space Pirates and the Galactic Federation were enhanced with Phazon. While the Pirates had more numerous, ferocious ground forces, the Federation were supported by their infamous alliance of Bounty Hunters – independent commandos of unparalleled skills, who could land on a world and bring its mining operations to the point of utter devastation.

Samus Aran was perhaps the most infamous, but others, such as the changeling Gandrayda, the cyborg Ghor, and the cryokinetic Rundas were causing havoc across the universe, disrupting the Space Pirate war machine wherever they were sent.

Dark Samus needed these agents to tip the balance, and a plan was put into action. Pirate agents led by General Ridley and Dark Samus discretely landed on the Federation border world of Norion. This force infected the planet’s Aurora Unit with a virus derived from Dark Samus’ studies of the Valhalla’s stolen system. Planetary defences fell as a precision-timed Phazon Seed entered the Norion system on a collision course for the planet.

The Galactic Federation desperately needed to save the lives of Norion’s colonists, and commissioned their Bounty Hunters to crush the Pirate forces and reactivate the planet’s defences. The best hunters landed and apparently succeeded in reactivating the planet’s defence cannons with seconds to spare. Norion was saved as the Phazon Leviathan was blasted out of the sky.

With the mission apparently accomplished, the Bounty Hunters were immediately taken by surprise. Dark Samus made its presence known and attacked them in a furious onslaught. She launched a Phazon seed into each of the hunters; a microscopic Phazon Leviathan that would parasitise on their flesh as the bigger variants parasitised on whole planets. The Space Pirate invasion of Norion, the infection of the planet’s Aurora Unit, the Phazon Leviathan entering the system; all were bait to lure the Bounty Hunters into this trap.

Dark Samus left them to their horrible fates: the Phazon infection would slowly consume their bodies and souls. Soon the hunters would devolve into corrupted shells of their former selves, and would take their place by Dark Samus’ side. They would be the agents of its will, the generals of its armies, and would lead the Space Pirates to total victory. Federation medics arrived on the scene, and did everything they could to save them.

The Corruption of the Bounty Hunters

The four bounty hunters were comatose for a month as the Phazon infection spread through their bodies, rewriting their DNA and slowly metamorphosing their bones to blue crystal. The Federation medics were dealing with enormously challenging circumstances: they needed to reduce the spread of the aggressive mutagen as it transformed already-exotic physiologies into living minerals. The Phazon defied medical science, and increased in virulence with every drug and radiation therapy they exposed it to.

The Phazon could not be removed, and the medics repurposed themselves. They sought to prolong the lives of their patients, to give the hunters some control of the incurable infection. Using a new Galactic Federation technology known as the Phazon Enhancement Device, the medics rebuilt the hunters’ armour to monitor infection levels, and to channel excess Phazon into a potent fuel for their weapons and equipment. The Bounty Hunters were brought back from the brink of death, and made aware of their dire circumstances. They had weeks to live.

The Bounty Hunters were updated regarding the war: Phazon seeds had impacted multiple worlds accessible to the Space Pirates, and could provide them with the fuel they need to win the conflict. The Federation had spent the last month studying the remains of the Norion-bound Leviathan, and informed Samus that each seed was regulated by a Phazon core, a vital organ that, on destruction, immediately halted the spread of Phazon. The cores could be collapsed with a Phazon overload, a discharge of energy that the Bounty Hunters’ infections and PED suits would uniquely allow them to deliver. Dark Samus’ tactic to corrupt its enemies with Phazon has given the Federation the living weapons they need to fight the great planetary poison.

Each of the Bounty Hunters set course for a Phazon-infested world to find and destroy the Phazon cores. Samus was soon informed that the Galactic Federation had lost all contact with her fellow hunters. They had already succumbed to the Phazon infesting their bodies, and were slowly becoming living avatars to the will of Dark Samus. Samus set out to the planets impacted by Phazon Leviathans, to try and complete the corrupted hunters’ missions herself, before she too was consumed by the Phazon madness growing within.

Finding Phaaze

Samus Aran ventured across multiple planets and euthanised her fellow Bounty Hunters from their Phazon madness. She killed the deranged creatures within the Phazon Leviathans and collapsed the toxic cores at the heart of each seed. Her infection increased in severity, leaving her increasingly vulnerable to the tormenting projections of Dark Samus. At times her flesh glowed with a poisonous aura so intense that blue light shone out of the cracks in her armour. Samus Aran was a creature of walking poison, and death was near.

Samus performed great heroics in her dying state, and these seemingly discordant endeavours led to the salvation of the universe. Samus discovered an erratic Federation Aurora Unit on the ancient Chozo colony of Elysia, and cured its infection. The Aurora Unit was able to reconcile current universal events with Skytown’s ancient data regarding the living world Phaaze, and retrieve the triangulated region of space where the poisonous planet was hidden. Samus then discovered the wreckage of the Galactic Federation vessel Valhalla, and learned from its logs that the Space Pirates stole an Aurora Unit to be implanted into Phaaze. Samus landed on the ancient planet Bryyo, and overcame its devolved creatures to restore the Federation access to the fuel gel mines needed for the war effort.

Samus invaded the Space Pirate Homeworld. As acid rained down from its red skies, she battled elite Phazon Commandos that were being mass grown to invade the universe. Forcing her way into their command centre, the bounty hunter learned that the Pirates had created a prototype Phazon Leviathan warship; a wormhole-powered spacecraft made by implanting their space faring technologies into a living Phazon seed.

Samus slaughtered her way through the Phazon-fuelled pirates and stole their fleet command codes. As a Galactic Federation fleet arrived to reinforce her efforts and pacify the Pirate threat, Samus relayed her discoveries and delivered to the Federation the means by which they could access the distant Phaaze. The fleet used the stolen codes to remotely activate the Leviathan wormhole drive, and entered the resulting space portal.

The Federation fleet emerged to find themselves in orbit of Phaaze, and immediately under attack from the large Pirate fleet guarding the living planet. As the two sides battled, Samus used the distraction to land on the glowing blue world.

Samus explored the most poisonous planet in the universe. Juxtaposed with the chaos of the space battle above, other than a few hostile Metroids released by Dark Samus, the world was a strangely tranquil place. Samus expected terrors and superpredators, wholly unaware of the Chozo's history behind their extinction. The hunter came upon discarded shards of ancient armour, identical in material composition to the exoskeleton that Metroid Prime had clad itself in centuries before.

Samus was minutes away from death; her corrupted body generated Phazon at a faster rate than her suit could process it. She was more alien than human, a condition paradoxically both killing her, and keeping her alive. Without this unique, unstable physiology, Samus would have burnt alive the moment she set foot on Phaaze.

Samus followed the planet’s mineral nerves and witnessed the Leviathan maturation chambers. Beyond these, she finally arrived at the continental fault within which Dark Samus, the reincarnation of Metroid Prime, had violated the planet. It was here that the stolen Aurora Unit had been implanted into this world, to dominate its will and force it into an agonising, accelerated reproductive cycle. It was here that Metroid Prime tortured Phaaze for its imprisonment millennia ago.

The two battled for Phaaze, with Dark Samus moving faster and attacking stronger than ever before. Samus weakened the creature, and it deviated from previous behaviour: During all of their past battles, Dark Samus was defeated and lost cohesion, fading into disparate Phazon particles and recreating itself later, stronger and more resistant. The creature would not face such a defeat again, and in its vulnerable state, it summoned the mad Aurora Unit 313 back to the surface. The organic computer burst out of Phaaze, and Dark Samus merged itself into it, stabilising and allowing the battle to continue.

Samus Aran, dying and alone on a planet of poison, crushed them.

The End of the War

Samus blew apart the Aurora Unit, and the defeated Dark Samus once again lost cohesion and collapsed into atoms. The planet began to violently shake, and Samus evacuated to her ship.

Phaaze had developed a symbiotic bond with the destroyed Aurora Unit, and the severed connection was the death blow for the planet. Already weak from the torturous forced reproductive cycle it had been made to endure by Dark Samus, Phaaze could suffer no more. As Samus ran to escape the upheaval, the ancient living world died beneath her feet. The Phazon energies within its belly lost their careful containment, and began a meltdown that would tear the entire local region of space apart. All local Phazon activity appeared to be disrupted; the Space Pirate fleet in orbit found that their Phazon fuel had ceased to burn, rendering their ships immobile. Meanwhile, Samus Aran’s Phazon infection suddenly faded into nothingness.
The Galactic Federation fleet detected the imminent planetary collapse and hastily programmed the Leviathan ship to open an escape wormhole. The fleet fled into it, leaving the paralysed Space Pirate armada to their fate. Samus’ gunship entered the wormhole at the last second, and Phaaze’s corpse exploded with brilliant blue energies, burning the region and leaving no evidence that the living planet had ever existed.

Phaaze and Phazon had defied known sciences. The older races, the Chozo and Luminoth, had been mystified by their existence and saw them as dangerous poisons. Millennia later, the younger races, the Galactic Federation and the Space Pirate Empire, had been equally unable to understand what they were dealing with. These younger races had unwisely taken this alien material beyond their comprehension, and injected it into their societies. They would very soon deeply regret this.

Phazon was anchored into this universe by its connection to the unique living planet Phaaze. With Phaaze now dead, all forms of Phazon across the universe immediately collapsed into their component energies, and vanished.

Throughout the Galactic Federation, Phazon-powered vessels and orbital stations immediately lost their fuel, leaving countless stranded. Phazon-powered troops found themselves trapped in their powerless armoured suits, and Phazon-based weapons went silent, never to work again. The Federation retreated all of its forces and consolidated all of their manpower to recuing powerless ships and resolving the crisis. They directed their industries to replace their now-useless Phazon technologies. The war was over.

The End of the Space Pirate Empire

The Space Pirates had embraced Phazon. They had welcomed a Leviathan as it crashed into their world, and made passage for its gargantuan Phazon tendrils to grow beneath the crust. They had converted all of their technologies to Phazon-powered, and had injected Phazon crystals into their own bodies. They had cloned an army of Metroids, and were a universal power to be respected and feared.

When Phazon vanished, their Empire violently imploded. The crust of the Space Pirate Homeworld shattered as the Leviathan and its tendrils disintegrated, sinking billions into an ocean of magma. Phazon technologies across the entire empire lost containment, and devastating explosions ripped through almost all infrastructures. Trapped on dark powerless ships, the Space Pirates felt the Phazon crystals within them begin to vanish. These crystals had long-since replaced the pirates’ bones, and they suffered agonising death as their bodies became puddles of boneless flesh.

All creatures created, enhanced or cloned using Phazon melted, as an essential component in their biology simply disappeared from the universe. The Space Pirates had been using Phazon in all of their cloning processes since its discovery, and as a consequence, every cloned Metroid they had scattered around the universe simultaneously died.

The Empire was gone. The Metroids were gone. Everything they had was gone.

The few survivors gathered, and fled to the abandoned facility beneath the planet Zebes. As a stronghold not used at all during the Phazon war, Zebes’ infrastructure had avoided the devastation. The Space Pirates landed, rebuilt, and started the delicate recreation of their greatest generals. It was the darkest hour of the Space Pirates, and they needed to be led.

The End of Metroid Prime

There was no creature like Metroid Prime anywhere in the universe. A genetically engineered animal from a forgotten era, it had outlived the race that engineered it. It had endured eons of agonising mutation in a prison-comet launched from a living planet. In the guise of Dark Samus, it had matured into an undying genius and brought two empires to their knees. It had crossed the cosmos to get its revenge on Phaaze, and had been worshipped as a God. It had survived.

Its most exotic evolution was immortality. Every single time Metroid Prime had died, the creature faded into Phazon particles. Its consciousness would briefly exist in an immaterial state, guiding the Phazon particles to form a new body, and imbuing its mind into them. It assumed this cycle would go on forever, body after body after body.

The mind of the ancient creature could not perceive any Phazon particles, anywhere. As its intellect and memories diluted across the enormity of space, it knew it would never again possess physical form. It existed in complete torment, a formless consciousness trapped in deep space, going mad and fearing eternity.

DISCLAIMER: I DO NOT OWN THIS!
ORIGINAL SOURCE: http://kotaku.com/the-spectacular-story-of-metroid-part-2-1284621108

PART ONE: http://imgur.com/a/sjYw0
PART TWO: http://imgur.com/a/MvK9h
PART THREE: http://imgur.com/a/CLbFj
PART FIVE: http://imgur.com/a/JPQS0