"From the sound of things," Ember spoke up softly, "I'd say at that point you could handle literally anything you'd ever faced before, solo. What sort of challenges could have been left for you?"
Samus smiled mirthlessly. "That's not what this was about in the first place. While that's true, each trial was about facing a part of myself I'd had trouble accepting in the past, which was the source of the problems I'd dealt with. I'd embraced my Chozo side from the beginning, so I never experienced problems there...but I'd been isolated from humanity for so long by the time I returned, I felt like an outsider. I couldn't really see myself as human anymore. That's what the first trial was about, when I fought to save my parents...accepting my humanity."
She leaned back, letting her thoughts drift as she spoke. "Facing myself through the eyes of the SA-X, and seeing myself become Metroid Prime...it forced me to accept the entirety of my Metroid aspect, and not fear what could happen as that side of myself matured, knowing that even as it happened I would always be myself. The final trial..."
"Coming to terms with your dragon side," Rarity deduced pointedly. "And from the sound of things, it was the hardest such trial?"
"Very much so," Samus confirmed. "It started simply enough, but..."
Samus found herself walking through a dark void, at the shores of a deep, crystal clear lake. Gazing into it, she knew she should be able to see straight to the bottom, but all she saw was darkness. Beyond that, the water was far from still, constantly shifting in turbulent waves as though something deep inside were thrashing. "What is this?" she spoke up softly.
This is your inner dragon, Old Bird explained softly. The beast inside, seeking to break free. The instincts you haven't been able to embrace and understand. It fights you even now. If you cannot come to terms with it, it will eventually devour you. Are you prepared to face it?
Samus thought silently to herself for a time, then braced her weapons and nodded firmly.
Instantly, the lake erupted, and a massive form leapt free from it. She readily recognized the draconic shape similar to Spike's, but it was massive, nearly the size of a Federation Dreadnought. It had golden scales over its underbelly, and orange scales covering its upper body, limbs, and tail. Its long neck was covered in silvery-black scales, while its head was covered in dark purple. Rather than eyes, it had a green visor, and the roar it let out was half-shriek, half-scream. Massive wings spread from its back as it dove down towards her. Lunging to the side, Samus quickly scanned it, hoping even in her mind this would work.
Recording to Logbook
Hunter Dragon
This metaphysical manifestation of your inner dragon possesses all of your technological abilities as biological functions. However, its combat techniques are based entirely in draconic instinct, relying more on brute force tactics than anything else. It is far from stupid, though, and capable of converting its body into the half-energy state of the Screw Attack without somersaulting. It is recommended you do not engage in physical contact for long periods of time.
Useful knowledge, Samus thought to herself as she once more dove out of the way. She opened fire with her normal arsenal as she raced around, trying to inflict an appreciable amount of damage, but found that the armor of the creature was even more durable than her own. The only places she'd managed to get any reaction from with her beams was when she struck the visor or inside the mouth. Even that only made it rear back, and she knew it didn't inflict enough damage. She continued to race away as her surroundings became more rocky, taking the shape of a massive cavern surrounding the pool.
Samus continued to dodge the strikes as best she could, but a Speed Boosted clenched fist slammed into her mid-leap, sending her flying across the chamber to slam into the opposite wall. She winced as she saw just how much damage that did. As she got to her feet, she saw that the Hunter Dragon was once more taking to the air. Noticing how part of the rocky ground had buckled upward into almost a ramp, a desperate strategy came to mind. As the Hunter Dragon circled towards her, she took to her heels, racing around the room.
As expected, the Hunter Dragon pursued her with the single-minded precision of a hungry predator, actively seeking to devour her as it blasted her with its breath. She dodged each amplified form of her beams as she kept her Speed Booster primed, not quite activated until she got into the right position. As she approached the ramp again, she triggered it, building up into the Boosted state. As soon as the Dragon triggered its own to keep up, she stored the energy for a Shinespark before racing back to the ramp. As she'd expected, the Dragon came to a halt with its tail nearly in line with the ramp. Leaping into the air, she unleashed her Shinespark, hitting the ramp and getting her feet under her to race up it before leaping off.
With the dragon nearly horizontal, she was able to land on its tail at a downward slope and race down, conserving momentum so she almost immediately triggered Speed Booster again, entering the state just before the Dragon triggered its Screw Attack state. As Spike had discovered back on BSL, two beings in half-energy state could interact with each other as though physical, and her Speed Boosted state protected her from the energies of the Dragon's non-spinning Screw Attack.
Reaching the Dragon's head, she caught hold of the tip of one horn and flipped, aiming her arm cannon straight at the visor before sending a mental command. Missile Discharge.
She probably couldn't have done this with her real arm cannon, but she was in her mind, where physical limitations were what she believed them to be. As such, all of her Super Missiles discharged at once, slamming into the visor for a time before shattering it and slamming into the pulsing flesh beneath. The Hunter Dragon shrieked in pain as it tossed its head, forcing her to flip away as the acidic blood splashed her. However, she was fine with this. She'd made an opening.
As the Hunter Dragon continued to roar in pain, Samus raced up the side of the chamber, running along the wall in Speed Booster before she reached the ceiling. Once there, she raced along before leaping off, aiming straight towards the Hunter Dragon's head. Injecting an Energy Tank, she unleashed a volley of Hyper Beam shots from her arm cannon while firing off magical blasts of all elements from her left hand, focusing both streams to cross as they shot through the broken visor.
The explosion rocked the entire chamber, once more leaving it in total darkness as Samus was sent flying back again. She skidded to a halt at the edge of the lake, nearly falling in. Once she gathered herself, she turned towards where the Hunter Dragon had been...and stared at herself.
It wasn't quite herself, now that she looked again. It was definitely her shape, but the armor of the suit was very different. It was pitch black, and somewhere between chitinous and scaly, less power armor and more exoskeleton. Spikes jutted out along the back and out of each elbow. The visor glowed gold as it stared her down, hunched slightly over. Quickly, she activated her Scan Visor again.
Recording to Logbook
Dark Hunter Core
This is the core of your essence made metaphysically manifest, drawing on the darker side of your very soul. The instincts and training of all sides of your being, fused into a single entity. Human, Chozo, Metroid, and Dragon in balance, the instincts and civilized tactics molded into one.
You cannot defeat this opponent.
Samus stared at those last five words in the logbook entry. Never in her entire life had she ever seen something so bleak. But here, in the core of her mind, she stared at what sounded like an absolute death sentence.
You cannot defeat this opponent.
She knew, somehow, that it was no lie, or deception. It was simple statement of fact. If she fought this part of herself, she could not win. But she'd never before faced a battle where she was required to lose. It went against everything she'd ever learned in her Chozo training.
You cannot defeat this opponent.
Spike... she thought silently. It looks like...I'm not going to make it back... She wondered what would happen, if she fell here...to her own darkness...
A thought struck her. A memory of a game Spike had played, and an argument over how to handle one particular segment...
Standing upright, Samus took the biggest gamble of her hunting career.
She deactivated her Power Suit completely. As it faded into light, she focused her mental discipline, and caused the mental manifestation of her Zero Suit to fade as well. She then stood before her innermost darkness, naked as the day she was born, and opened her arms to it.
The Dark Hunter Core rushed forward. But as it approached, it seemed to lose cohesion. As it impacted her...
...she accepted it.
The darkness infused her, finding balance inside her against the light, and the lake behind her turned still.
Turning, she stared into the lake. There, she saw four faces reflected back. A human, a Chozo Warrior, an Omega Metroid, and a powerful dragon. As she stared, she realized that in truth, they were all her own face.
As she came to terms with this, the reflection vanished, and she unfolded from her Morph Ball in Old Bird's stone grip. Her suit gave her the new alerts.
New systems activated in suit. Loading...
Grapple Beam has been modified to control mystic energy generated within the body.
Hyper Beam function available. Inject one Energy Tank to activate.
Weapon Overlaunch available. Missiles can now be fired to depletion without damaging arm cannon.
Unknown Item acquired. Analyzing...
The display changed, black text against a golden background as a new meter appeared on her HUD beneath that which measured her suit's energy.
Omega Systems Online.
"Omega Systems?" Rainbow gasped out eagerly. "What is that?"
Samus chuckled, noticing how interested everyone was. "Well-"
At that moment, the doors of the chamber burst open, and a familiar red dragon rushed in, wearing a very unfamiliar expression of abject terror. "Dragonlord!" he shouted out despairingly, seeming to shrink in on himself even as he reached the table. He then began to babble, his voice racing too fast in terror for anyone to make sense of what he was saying.
"Garble, calm down!" Ember yelled out. "I can't understand what you're saying!" Despite her shout, he didn't respond, starting to sob in hysterics.
Without knowing why, Spike drew himself upright and glared down at Garble. "Speak sense!" he barked out. To Ember's stunned amazement, the Bloodstone Scepter flared in response to the command.
Something seemed to grip Garble, and he calmed enough to speak rationally. "We were out in the badlands, my underlings and I. We were grousing over an earlier bad defeat, and we came across what looked like half a dragon corpse. It...it ate them! Just grabbed hold of them and stripped the flesh from their bones to repair itself! Dark Magic, Dark Magic..." He began to sob hysterically. "I couldn't get away fast enough...that name will haunt my nightmares..."
"What name?" Spike snapped out, leaning over him fiercely to make him speak.
Garble stared up, an expression of absolute terror on his face. "...Ridley..."
As he spoke, a chill ran through the room...and shadows blanketed the sky.