"You say that's the only odd point," Luna asked carefully as Samus and Spike paused in the retelling to take a drink. "Does that mean it was a straight trip back aside from that?"
"Definitely not," Samus murmured. "There's a reason we didn't get a chance to investigate it. See, as we were making our way back to the main path, we found one of the doors had been completely slagged. As best I could tell, someone had taken a high-heat beam to it and melted it until it was unusable. It looked like the damage Spike's hottest flame breath would have made..."
"Or the plasma torch modification I gave you for your Arm Cannon?" Ghor asked hesitantly.
"Precisely," Samus admitted. "We found a way around it by bombing our way through some cracked flooring...but..."
As Samus and Spike dropped into the ventilation pathways of the room below, they froze. Down below, they could hear the sound of footsteps. Gazing through tiny holes in the grating below them, Samus could see...herself, her old Power Suit carefully walking towards the door out of the chamber, gaze sweeping back and forth in search. Feeling her breath catch in her throat, she saw the figure starting to look up. With a mental command, she shut her entire suit down to turn off every light and reduce the reflective glare of her faceplate, so the SA-X's searchlight wouldn't catch on her. She felt the cessation of the hum of Spike's armor, a sign that he'd deactivated it completely as well, though whether to avoid detection or in case of direct confrontation, Samus couldn't be sure.
The SA-X started to turn away, but stopped. It then swept its searchlight back, and Samus froze as she saw it glinting off Spike's gauntlet. Spike held perfectly still, but ready to act. Samus could see the energy gathering around his muzzle as he prepared to open a wormhole. She herself began to reactivate her own suit, in case the SA-X began an assault.
The SA-X continued to stare...and then, to Samus' and Spike's surprise, lifted its gauntleted hand to its helmet. A signal on their communication frequency was picked up, but was nothing but garbled noises and static. The same set of garbled noise and static repeated, this time seeming more insistent. In the end, the signal cut out and the SA-X continued out of the chamber.
It was a full minute before either Spike or Samus dared to breathe again. "What was that about?" Spike whispered as he reactivated his armor.
"Don't know, don't care," Samus whispered back. "Let's get to a Navigation Room, pronto!"
"What was that about?" Twilight asked curiously, once she got her nerves under control.
"No idea," Samus replied. "It was...strange, with the SA-X. Sometimes when we encountered it, it would attack us mindlessly, trying to kill us. Other times, it would only attack me...and every so often, we'd get that signal again, and each time it was more and more intense." She shook her head. "We couldn't make sense of it."
The various figures around the table thought it over for a time, trying to apply their own logic...only for it to be cut off by the sound of a balloon deflating. Pinkie Pie lay slumped against the table, her eyes wide and staring, tears at the corners. "Pinkie, darling," Rarity began, "is anything the matter?"
"I...I think I understand..." Pinkie began.
"Really?" Twilight asked eagerly. "Then tell us!"
"Don't wanna..." Pinkie whimpered. "I wanna be wrong..."
Those who knew Pinkie well stared at her, their expressions a mix of concern and terror. Spike made his way over to her and scooped her into his claws. Sitting back, he held her close and started stroking her mane. "Feeling better?" he asked as she started to relax again.
After a time, Pinkie's mane and tail floofed up again. "Meow!" she let out happily, startling quite a few laughs all around.
Once the tense atmosphere faded, Samus continued the tale. "We made it back to the Navigation Room after that without incident...but..."
"Adam, do you read?" Samus called out as she activated the Navigation Room computers. "We had a close encounter with the SA-X. We're unharmed, but the behavior it exhibited-"
"Download your system's logs for us to go over later," Adam cut in curtly. "We have other problems. Releasing the Security Lock may have been a mistake. The SA-X has invaded the water environment in Sector 4 (AQA) with several thousand X."
"That thing sure moves fast," Spike muttered worriedly. "We just saw it here, not ten or so minutes ago."
Pinkie let out a startled whimper, but quickly motioned for Samus to go on when concerned expressions were turned her way.
"It slipped in easily with the blue hatches active," Adam explained. "The creatures and systems in Sector 4 are already showing multiple irregularities. Melissa is monitoring them, and should have more information for you when you get to Sector 4's Navigation Room."
"And there's another concern," Ghor spoke up. "I've picked up several automated signals emanating from the station that I can't intercept. I believe the members of the Federation directly in charge of this station may be getting regular updates from all its systems...so we can expect Federation forces to arrive before too long. We need to have this situation handled before they get here, or we risk the X getting into their ships."
"Understood," Samus replied wearily. "We're on our way."
"At that point, any chance of taking things slow and taking breaks when we could went out the window," Samus concluded. "Even the thought of stopping for any length of time was anathema, no matter how appealing it sounded...not with a clock over our heads, endlessly ticking away..."
"Making this simultaneously our most terrifying and exhausting mission ever," Spike added, sinking back into his seat, even the memory of it exhausting him.