Chapter 1: The Fallout

Samus reached into her jacket pocket and felt around for her paralyzer gun. She rested her fingers on it as her feet hammered against the metallic floor and her eyes darted back and forth, watching for anyone to appear at the curve ahead in the winding hallway. Just the odd passerby, which would look at her for a moment and move on. Outside of her power suit, the most attention she got was a "watch where you're goin', bud" when she sprinted past and nearly bowled someone over. No obvious threats there.

Energy surged under her skin all the same.

She had an acute awareness of everything around her: the shadows the moving figures cast against the harsh incandescent lights above, the beads of sweat rolling down her back and matting her hair, the floor panels reverberating under the drill of her footsteps, the stench of cleaning solution resting heavy at the back of her throat. Her grasp on the paralyzer tightened, pressing the shape of its handle into her palm. Every few seconds she tensed up, half-expecting a slimy, infected abomination to emerge from the doors. As far as her body was concerned, she never actually finished her last mission.

I should have been giving a routine report to the Council right now, she thought. But that was before she destroyed a research station – and an entire planet – in direct violation of Federation orders. And if her past few experiences with them served any indication, this wasn't the same Galactic Federation that she fought to defend as a teenager. Corruption loomed overhead, and it didn't forgive any breach of protocol, let alone one as heinous as vaporizing a planet.

There was a part of her that just wanted to leave this galaxy behind, but she knew she couldn't. Not as long as there were innocents that needed her, and especially not as long as she had living allies whose safety had been compromised by her act of defiance.

That's what brought her to this station. Janus Space Colony, a relatively small boarding-house orbiting a gas giant in the outer reaches of a sparsely populated solar system. It was where she and two other witnesses to one of the worst examples of Federation corruption chose to stay. Janus was only a little less cramped than the average satellite colony, but Samus had spent her whole life in tighter spaces, and the others reasoned it was a small price to pay to keep a safe distance from the leaders they'd testified against.

After what Samus did, even this isolated space wouldn't be safe anymore.

They were a lost cause the moment they met me.

Intrusive thoughts pooled at the back of her mind, weathering her focus like droplets of acid. She bit the bottom of her lip, remembering all of Adam's reassurances on the way to the colony. As if that matters? He believed the Federation was just and he died for it, and so will they, soon. Just like Mom and Dad, and Grandpa Bird, and– She squeezed her eyes shut and gave a light smack to her head with her free hand, as if the miasma of thoughts could be knocked away like water out of her ear.

She opened her eyes again and saw the room number she'd been looking for, flickering neon blue over an automatic door. While nothing about it had ever signaled home for her, she felt her body ease at the sight of it. She let go of the paralyzer and knocked twice on the door. "Hello? Open up. It's Samus."

The door slid open to reveal a man in a sweaty tank top and gym shorts, his muscular figure barely fitting the doorframe. He popped off his headphones and gave an impossibly wide smile. "Princess! You're back already!" His expression dropped as soon as he got a look at Samus's face. "What happened? You tired? Mission not go too well?"

Samus pushed past him without a word and shut the door behind her. "There, now we can talk." She paused to scan the tight room. Nothing but two bunk beds, one with a rising and falling figure bundled up in the comforter, and a sofa stiff from disuse. Yet she swore she felt invisible eyes passing judgment from every crack in the wall panels. She took a deep breath. "Anthony… we all need to leave. Now."

"What?!" He chuckled nervously. "I guess it really didn't go well, then!"

"It's a long story," said Samus, reaching into a nearby closet, "but that corrupt branch of the Federation we witnessed on our Bottle Ship mission runs deeper than we thought. More importantly, they'll likely do anything to silence us now." She grabbed a bag from the closet and started shoving fistfuls of clothes and small rectangular ration packets inside. "I'm not sure where else we can go, but we're not going to be safe here anymore."

Anthony crossed his arms. "But we can't let 'em keep you quiet! Once you tell everyone the truth, their days have gotta be numbered! Besides, I've seen you fight! You could take down anyone they send after you, easy!"

"Maybe I could, even if I am still getting used to some adjustments to my power suit… It's you two I'm worried about," said Samus. She stopped packing and took a moment to breathe in again, glancing to the mound of blankets and the tuft of red hair poking out of them, then back to Anthony. When she looked at him, she couldn't help but see that horrified expression on his face as he plummeted toward a sea of magma. It was an afterimage burned into her mind's eye that even his safe return couldn't wipe away. "If we stay here, your lives will be in constant danger. You almost died when I backed down before. I won't let it happen again."

His voice lowered. "What you did in the power plant wasn't backing down, Samus. You didn't expect to ever see Ridley again and your brain overwhelmed itself, there was nothing you could have done about that."

"What, have you been listening to my psychiatrist?" Samus smirked and gave his shoulder a light shove. "The point stands. I can't risk your safety."

Anthony nodded. "This is all pretty sudden. I'll miss little old Janus, but you haven't been wrong about danger before. I'll go wake up Madeline and tell her-"

"You should go. Without me."

Samus and Anthony froze. They turned around to see a redheaded woman standing by one of the bunk beds, her feet shaking under her weight and her grip on the support beams so tight that her knuckles were bright white. "Doc! I didn't know you were up," said Anthony.

Madeline stepped forward and looked up at them from behind a set of tangled bangs so overgrown that they almost masked her stare. "I've been awake for a while." From the dark circles the size of energy capsules under her drooping eyes, which were fighting back tears with little success, Samus had no reason to doubt her claim. Or that this was her first time standing up in a while, for that matter. "You're so strong, you can survive no matter what happens. I can't. Let them come for me and- and punish me for what I've done and maybe then they'll finally be satisfied and leave you alone!"

The room fell silent save for a faint hum from the vents.

Time crawled to a standstill as Samus met Madeline's gaze. This was someone who'd once been the epitome of Federation corruption, an entire rogue facility under her command. Every once in a while, especially in the time between her crawling into bed and falling unconscious, Samus caught her mind drifting back to what happened in that station, how she watched Adam die and almost lost Anthony.

Thinking about it now, the dull pain of an old wound welled up in Samus's chest. She blamed herself for it… but she couldn't bring herself to blame Madeline for it, too. "That won't be enough after my actions this past week. And we won't leave you behind." She placed her hand on Madeline's shoulder, the outline of a weak smile visible in the corners of her eyes. "I won't leave you behind."

Madeline wiped the droplets from the rims of her eyelids. "I- I don't know what to say… Thank you, Samus. I'll try not to put you in harm's way. It's the least I can do after… after everything you've done for me."

"Trust me, Doc," said Anthony with a wink, "this is Samus Aran. It's nothing she hasn't done before."

Three bags slung over one of her arms barely slowed Samus's pace back down the hall. "I've thought about our plan of action on the way here. We need a place to hide while we figure out our next move, and I have two of my past mission locations in mind."

"Here, let me-" Anthony tried to reach for one of the bags, but Samus pulled her arm away. It was her fault that they had to leave in the first place, so she wanted to at least carry the luggage, much to his dismay. "Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't everywhere you go explode? You kind of have a reputation for that."

"Not everywhere." She rolled her eyes. It was easy to forget she was a living legend when she spent so little time around other people. "Take Tallon, the first planet I cleansed during the Phazon Crisis. It's uninhabited, but it has an oxygen-rich atmosphere and is now free of any hazardous materials. Or Aether. The denizens there consider me a hero, so they should grant us asylum without question, though I would prefer not to bring them into our personal problems unless we have no other choice."

Anthony thought for a moment. "I don't know, Samus. Everyone who knows anything about phazon knows about your role in clearing out those planets. They seem like the first place anyone would look for you."

"Damn it, you're right." Samus clenched her fist around one of the bag's handles. Calm down, she thought, getting frustrated will just make it worse.

She turned around and saw him without his usual grin and Madeline, who hadn't said a word since they left the room, staring blankly at the metal panels below. A glint in her hair caught Samus's eye – she was wearing a pink hairclip that wouldn't look out of place on a child, and it had noticeable cracks running across its smooth surface. That's odd. Why is she…? Then she remembered. "Melissa's clip."

"Yes?" Madeline's hand went to the clip. Her fingertips barely brushed it, as though it would crumble away at the slightest touch.

Samus was startled to get a response. She'd said that out loud? "It looks good. On you," she said, smiling awkwardly.

To Samus's relief, Madeline raised her head and cracked a faint smile, probably for the first time in days. "Thank you." She looked back down.

"Hey, we can make it to the docking bay faster if we take this shortcut!" Anthony gestured to a nearby door, opening it to reveal a massive room. It was full of half-awake humanoids slouching over sofas, cleaning off exercise equipment, and packing their belongings away for the night.

"A recreational facility?" Samus looked over to him.

Anthony smiled. "You mean the rec center? Now come on, I've gotten to know this place pretty well."

Samus kept watching the corners as she and the others slowly made their way to the other side of the room. Nobody there seemed to give them much thought except for a pair of guards leaning against the wall next to the way out. One of them pulled out a tablet and pointed first to the screen, then to Samus. She forced herself not to visibly shudder. She never liked escorting such vulnerable targets through danger like this. Something about her attracted pain and death.

Meanwhile, Anthony waved to some of the humanoids by the exercise machines, and they waved back. "Hey, Higgs," one of them with a towel resting on their shoulders said, "where ya goin' this late?"

"Just got something to take care of!"

It amazed Samus how easily he brushed that question off without technically lying. She followed his lead to the door across the room, with Madeline walking so close in between them that it could almost be considered huddling. They were only one hallway away from her gunship, but Samus couldn't help but reach back into her coat pocket and ready her weapon again.

"Hey, Princess. Feeling a little on edge?"

Her hold on the paralyzer relaxed. "You could say that."

Anthony patted her on the back. "So am I, being perfectly honest here. But you always find a way out of everything, and besides, we're almost out."

Before Samus's brain registered what happened next, she felt a jolt at the back of her neck. She lunged forward and pushed Anthony and Madeline to the ground with each of her palms. Two energy shots grazed her shoulder, leaving trails of vermilion light that dissipated when they hit the wall with a harsh crackle. She looked back up and saw one of the two guards aiming a paralyzer at her.

"Samus Aran, we've just received a warrant for your arrest. Says you used a Federation-owned station to destroy planet SR388."

She staggered to her feet, rubbing the numb spot on her shoulder where the blasts made contact. The crowd preparing to leave the rec room, who'd gone dead quiet when the shots were fired, broke out into a low murmur. There was no way any of them didn't know who the Samus Aran was.

"Stand down and don't move. We'll be taking you to the Supreme Council for your trial. And your accomplices, too." They looked her over and tilted their head. "Huh. So this is what you look like outside that power suit. Y'know, my associate here used to think you were the suit." The other guard elbowed them.

Samus dropped her bags and kicked them towards Anthony and Madeline. She turned to them and whispered, "run."

She materialized sheets of orange metal and yellow padding that wound around her limbs and torso to form her suit that deflected the incoming paralyzer shots. Neon green hexagonal panes expanded around her field of vision, creating a visor that immediately honed in on the guards.

"Stop–" The guard couldn't finish before nearly getting knocked off their feet by a burst from Samus's newly-manifested arm cannon. It could've done a lot more if she charged it longer, but she wasn't shooting to kill.

Samus maneuvered around the second guard, who was too terrified to try and stop her, and bolted through the crowd of onlookers to the door. She stepped out into the hallway, swerving to evade a flurry of incoming fire. Left, right, further right, left. The spikes on her suit's forearms burrowed into the wall when she veered too far, creating a shower of bright sparks. The walls whirled past so quickly that it seemed to melt into a tunnel of silver streaks illuminated red and white.

A shrill alarm echoed through the hall, building the cacophony of guards hollering and energy blasts hitting steel. When she took a quick look back, she saw that there were at least half a dozen officers giving chase, but by now their constant gunfire had deteriorated and their focus was on keeping pace with her. She moved so quickly that she caught up with her fellow escapees within seconds, and the entrance to the docking bay was in sight.

Anthony took out his freeze gun from one of the bags and aimed toward more guards that were emerging, shielding Madeline with his other arm. "What are we gonna do now?!"

Samus opened a communication line back to the gunship. "Adam, start the ship's engines! We're making an immediate takeoff!"

"You named your ship's computer after Commander Malkovich? Aww, Princess, that's so thoughtful!" Anthony swung the bags and knocked over an officer without looking away from her.

"He is Commander Malkovich," said Samus.

Anthony blinked. "…I'm sorry, wha-"

"I said it's a long story!"

The ship's hatch shifted and lowered to the floor as they entered the dock. Samus jumped inside, with Anthony and Madeline following close behind, and entered the ship amidst the chaos of the guards taking one final chance to seize them. The ship was just like she'd left it, with seats at the ready and the dachoras and etecoons from her past missions curled up on the floor. She catapulted herself past the creatures on board into the pilot's seat.

A circular purple light mounted on the screen at the center of the dashboard came on, flickering in response to their entry. "Samus. Where do you wish to go?" It spoke in a tinny, synthetic voice, but with a quick yet deliberate cadence that reminded Samus of her time spent in the Federation Army. Adam.

"Away from here!" She powered on the thrusters without setting target coordinates, throwing the still-entering passengers off their feet and hurtling the gunship through the gaps between other parked ships. The few plasma shots that made contact with it did nothing to slow its departure from the docking bay.

Samus calmed her breathing to slow her pulse as the towering metal structures gave way to the endless, murky vistas of outer space. The pinpricks of starlight in the distance became lines drawn across the depths of the void, the gunship now moving at hyperspeed.

"Whoa boy," said Anthony as he grabbed onto an armrest and staggered into the seat, "talk about a rough takeoff! You okay, Doc?"

Madeline hyperventilated and clung to one of the passenger seats for dear life, with a nearby etecoon sniffing her and tugging at her shirt. She looked at Anthony and gave a shaky nod, her smile looking more like the bared teeth of a frightened animal.

"Hello, Anthony." Adam's artificial voice came from a set of speakers. "Samus told me about you."

Anthony stood up and slowly walked toward the dashboard. He tapped the light that watched him like an inquisitive eye. "So this is the commander?" His voice wavered. "You don't… you don't remember me?"

"It's complicated." Samus kept her hand on the gunship's steering globe and her eyes on the stars ahead. "He's a copy of Adam's brain patterns, collected sometime between our time together in the army and his final mission. His memories were compromised, but I've always heard bits of him through the canned orders, and he's coming to terms with that, too."

Adam's light flashed again. "I'm still learning about who I… or, rather, who I was based on… was. But it's truly an honor to meet you."

"Great to see you again too, Commander Malkovich. Or hear you?"

Samus silently sighed. There was a part of her that wanted this computer to be flesh and blood, to have the real Adam's voice, to be the real Adam. But this was just a copy, and she couldn't deny it. "You should sit back down, Anthony. I don't want you to get hurt if we have to make a sudden stop."

Anthony nodded and slipped back into his chair. Next to him, the curious etecoon had crawled into Madeline's lap. She prodded at its back, smoothing over the fur and earning a contented squeak that she couldn't help but smile at.

Samus closed her eyes for a moment and all the doubts clawing at her mind faded a little. Surely there would be ships in pursuit before too long, and she still had to find a place to hide, but the gunship was well beyond Janus Space Colony.

She was, dare she even think it, safe. The etecoons and dachoras were safe. Anthony and Madeline were safe. Adam – if only a simulation of him – was safe.

Maybe, just this once, she wouldn't lose them.

Then all the streaks surrounding the ship collapsed back into points. Everything on board heaved forward, the seatbelts digging into Samus's shoulders as she almost crashed into the control panel.

Her pupils narrowed. Did the ship just stop? Why? She pulled up everything she could on the dashboard and checked the various meters and gauges. "That can't be right," she said. "Plenty of fuel, no breaches to the hull, nothing overheating… Why is the engine stalling?"

The panel housing Adam played a light ping. "Diagnostics complete. It appears that outside interference is preventing the ship from operating properly. I have no protocol on record for resolving this issue."

Samus shifted her focus to the small screen in front of her and pulled up their current location. There was nothing within a lightyear radius of the ship. She adjusted the rear cameras projected on the windshield, and that's when she saw a gargantuan space station looming behind them, composed of intricate, weathered metallic structures that crumbled apart into bits of shrapnel hanging motionless in the vacuum of space. Looking back down, she saw that there was still no indication of the presence of a station on the map. "That has to be what's causing our engine problem."

Anthony looked over the towering station, mouth agape, while Madeline shivered and clung nervously to the etecoon. He stood back up. "This gunship of yours got any actual guns on it?"

"It used to. This standard-issue rush job they gave me doesn't." She opened a compartment next to the screen that revealed a set of switches. "If these emergency thrusters even work, they still won't be enough to take us anywhere. We could carry the ship into the station, but this is the most obvious trap I've seen in a long time. It isn't even shown on my radar."

"Unless we want to wait for the Feds to come pick us up or die here before they find us, we don't really have a choice," said Anthony.

Samus pulled the levers and felt the low hum of the backup thrusters reverberating through the ship. There was a small entrance carved into the side of the decaying station, with no light visible inside. It could bring shelter from the outside world or death from within.

So be it.