Harmony of Heroes: Ultimate Multiverse Explorers

by Lucar

Chapter 163: Friendly Critters, Hostile Ghosts

Author's Note:

Chapter made by me and Cyrus Colter.

Before you start, for the ones who haven't read the recent blog, I started rewriting A Sweetie Dream Land. And with this, I have some precision to give about some characters' sizes.

As of the starts of A Sweetie Dream Land, Kirby was 20cm tall. A Waddle Dee is about 30cm, Dedede, about one meter, Meta Knight, over 30cm (maybe 35cm, not sure yet), and Sweetie Void, about 50cm.
By the time of The Forgotten Land, Kirby is 30cm tall, and Sweetie is about 60cm.

With Crocy safe in her universe, Sweetie Void moved with Samus toward the part of the room that Crocy discovered by destroying the spiked wall, after retrieving for Samus an Energy Tank at the other end of the room, beyond a large gap with grapple points. They jumped on some pillars in the middle of the acid below to reach a blue door at the end.

“I still can’t believe what happened,” Samus said, making Sweetie giggle.

“Honestly, me too. But I won’t complain. It’s nice to not fight for once.”

Entering the next room, they found themselves on a ledge overlooking a lower level and facing another ledge with a red door. Moving back and forth under the ceiling was a yellow Ripper. Under their ledge was one of these weird green platforms, and they could also see a pipe as well as a blue door in the floor.

Having no way to reach the opposite ledge, they jumped down, eliminated the Gamets coming out of the pipe, and spotted another blue door just under the ledge they came from. This door led to a recharge station which wasn’t really needed for now. So they passed the blue door in the floor and entered a shaft, landing on a ledge with a blue door right away. Passing it, however, led to a metal gate that blocked the path, so they returned in the shaft and jumped down from the ledge.

After a long drop, they found a red door that they passed, entering a room with acid rising and lowering regularly. To advance, they had to wait for the acid to go all the way down before they could follow the tunnel. At the end were pillars, some of which had spikes. Instead of jumping on them, Sweetie flew to the other side and retrieved the Missile Expansion there.

Back in the shaft, they moved down, dealing with Violas and Primids until reaching a blue door in the floor that led to a cavern above more acid. The cavern was long enough that Samus could run with the Speed Booster, but large stones here and there prevented that. And yet, Samus saw that she had to run in order to do a big jump above the acid and reach the other end of the cavern. Thankfully, a Power Bomb was enough to destroy all the obstacles, including a group of Mellas (bugs that looked like Mellows with fire on them), allowing her to run. With a big jump, she reached the ledge at the end where there was a blue door. Here, she and Sweetie saw many yellow Rippers flying back and forth between their position and another ledge at the other side of the cavern where there was a Missile Expansion. Sweetie flew to it to retrieve it.

Passing the blue door, they entered a shaft with a Chozo statue holding an orb. Like always, Samus fired at the orb, revealing an upgrade that made her grin: the Grappling Beam.

“Now that I have the grapple, I can explore almost everywhere as long as it’s not underwater,” Samus said.

“About time we found it. It didn’t take that long to find it the previous time I was with you. It was even one of the first upgrades.”

Samus shrugged. “The order changes from one adventure to another.”

They spotted grapple points in the ceiling of the shaft, however, they were too far for Samus to reach from where she was. Thankfully, there were small ledges leading to them with some careful jumps. Once at the top, she was able to use the grapple on the grapple points to reach the blue door.

The next few rooms were more tests for Samus to master the Grappling Beam. The first room was full of water, with a gap between the two ends of the room. Because of the water, Samus couldn't hope to reach the other end of the room even by jumping from the bottom of the gap, so she had to use the grapple.

Then came a shaft with Funes that Sweetie eliminated along with Primids and Cymuls. Once all enemies were gone, Samus had to jump to reach the grapple points in the ceiling with her grapple.

Finally, there was another room filled with water, large with two gaps bigger than previously. Again, Samus had to use the grapple to traverse the gaps. The second gap was too large to traverse in one swing, so she had to grapple a first point, swing, then grapple a second point to reach the other side and the metal gate there, which was the same metal gate that had blocked their path previously. A Super Missile to the green light above it opened it and they were back in the first shaft after Crocy’s room.

A jump through the door in the ceiling and they were back in the room with the green platform which they used to reach the ledge to Crocy’s room. But before passing the door, Samus pointed her cannon toward the yellow Ripper and used the Grappling Beam on it. The grapple successfully latched on the Ripper, allowing Samus to reach the opposite ledge with the red door. Passing it, they entered a room with a Power Bomb Expansion.

After that, they returned to Crocy's room and jumped through the door in the ceiling, the one from which they fell into the room. Back in the shaft before Crocy’s room, they had to fight some Primids and Floows.

“The Grappling Beam opened many paths for us. I think that it is time for us to explore a bit before we continue to the next step of our adventure. Let’s start with Norfair since we are here already,” Samus said.

“Alright. You definitely need Super Missile Expansions. We haven’t found a single one since you got them.”

“Exactly. Let’s start by seeing if we can open a shortcut to the elevator shaft.”

“Right. The door at the top of the shaft leads back to it, but I remember that there is a metal gate that we couldn’t open from the elevator shaft side.”

So they climbed the shaft and opened the blue door at the top. Finding themselves in a large cavern with lava, they eliminated a Dragon before they climbed a series of ledges and killed a Geruta at the top. Here, Samus used the grapple on a long series of grapple points doing like back in the water-filled room, reaching the ledge with the metal gate where a Missile Expansion awaited her. She opened the gate by firing a Super Missile at the green light above it.

“We should now open the other metal gates. We can reach two of them from the blue door at the bottom of the previous shaft. This way, we won’t have to do detours when we explore Norfair,” Samus said.

Sweetie nodded, and they returned to the shaft above Crocy’s room. After the blue door at the bottom, they traversed a cavern with lava where they had to fight red Subspace soldiers and wheels spitting fire. At the end of the cavern were two blue doors, one in the wall and one in the ceiling. They took the one in the wall first, entering a room with a Power Bomb Recharge Unit. They took the door on the other side and entered another cavern with lava. This one had to be traversed with the grapple. The blue door at the end led to the first metal gate.

Back in the cavern where they fought the Fire Primids and Glires, they took this time the door in the ceiling and climbed the shaft to the two levels lava cavern with the metal gate which they opened.

“And now, I know where to go. Follow me,” Samus said.

They climbed to the upper level and returned to the purple room under the large bubble room. From here, they had to redo all the detour back to the large cavern with the green platforms where they had opened a metal gate and gotten a Missile Expansion the first time. On the way, in the shaft with the passage to the metal gate they opened earlier, they opened a yellow door, entering a purple cavern filled with lava where they could do nothing (there was a passage for the Morph Ball, but it led to a dead end). Once in the cavern with the green platforms, Samus, this time, was able to use the grapple to reach the red door at the end of the room, at the other side of a gap with spikes at the bottom. The door led to a room with a Chozo statue giving the Wave Beam upgrade.

“This beam will allow me to hit targets behind obstacles. Nothing is safe from me now,” Samus explained.

“Sweet!”

From here, they returned to the large bubble room and climbed to the top where Samus used the grapple to reach the green door and enter a lava bubble room with a Missile Expansion. It wasn’t over with the room however as Samus spotted with the scanner a bubble that could be destroyed with a bomb, so she used a Power Bomb to destroy it. The Power Bomb also caused a metal pole to rise from the lava, allowing Samus to reach the hole she created with her Morph Ball. The hole led to a lava purple room filled with Dragons and Sovas. Instead of crossing it with risky jumps above the lava, Sweetie flew to retrieve another Missile Expansion as well as an orb that contained what revealed to be a Reserve Tank.

“This tank contains spare energy that will fill my own if I drop to zero, saving my life if the worst case scenario happens,” Samus explained.

“I doubt it will happen, but it’s always good to have.”

“And with that, I think that we are done with Norfair. Let’s return to Brinstar.”

It didn’t take long for them to return to the elevator shaft, having to fight some Subspace enemies (Primids, Floows, and Cymuls) on the way. They took the elevator back to Brinstar and Samus told Sweetie to follow her before they traversed the glass tube. They returned to the first red shaft and climbed back to what had been the yellow door to the room with all the spikes. When they entered the room, this time, Samus was able to use the grapple to traverse it, avoiding to kill the Firefleas to keep some light in the room. Once at the end of the room, they opened the red door.

In the next room, Samus spotted a metal pole that could be moved up with a bomb. She used it to reach a passage for the Morph Ball leading to a Chozo statue giving the X-Ray Scope upgrade.

“Aah. This will be very useful. With it, I will be able to see through the walls to find secret passages. It will also show me weak points in our enemies. From now on, each shot will be lethal.”

Right away, she used it to find a secret passage behind the wall going under the floor and leading back to the beginning of the room. To enter it, she had to bomb an elevated part of the wall with her Morph Ball.

Before long, they were back in the red shaft and they climbed it until reaching and passing the door back to the jungle section of Brinstar. They traversed the first room, running on the floor that crumbled under them. They entered the second room and found themselves blocked by a metal gate.

A metal gate that was supposed to be open.

“Are you telling me that these gates close back after a moment? Does this mean that we opened all these gates in Norfair for nothing?” a very annoyed Sweetie Void said.

Samus sighed. “Seems like it. Thankfully, with the Wave Beam, I will be able to open them even if we are on the wrong side. Well, the ones with the blue lights. The ones with the green lights can only be opened with Super Missiles so I can’t open them with the Wave Beam.”

She was able to open this gate, allowing them to continue. They crossed the room and jumped to the yellow door that they hadn’t been able to reach the first time. Samus’ map said that they entered the same cavern as the one where they found the Morph Ball upgrade, but they were in a different part. After eliminating some Sidehoppers, they found a secret passage leading to a Power Bomb Expansion. Samus then used a Power Bomb to destroy the wall separating this part of the cavern to the part with the Morph Ball upgrade, thus getting a shortcut to Crateria.

They moved to the other side of the elevator to Crateria and returned to the room where they got an Energy Tank. Here, Samus used a Power Bomb to clear the way and discover a small shaft. However, she had no way to reach the top of the shaft, so they left and returned to the elevator room.

However, instead of taking the elevator, they returned to the jungle and took the blue door at the end of the room. In the cavern behind it, Samus led Sweetie back to the room with the Charge Beam upgrade and used a Power Bomb to destroy a section under the statue and reveal a secret passage. They moved down the cavern behind it and entered a room with water. In this room, Samus had to use the Speed Booster, but because of the water, she couldn’t reach her max speed. Thus, it was a dead end.

Back in the previous cavern, they climbed until reaching a yellow door that Samus opened with a Power Bomb. They entered a room where a Sidehopper and two Small Sidehoppers welcomed them. Once the creatures were dead, Samus used the Grappling Beam on a grapple point and swung until she could jump to fire at a metal gate at the top, reaching the gate’s blue light at the other side and opening it. Samus then had to grapple and jump in the same way to pass the gate and reach the other side of the room where a gate leading to an Energy Tank awaited them.

Back in the previous cavern again, they climbed a bit more until reaching grapple points leading to a Missile Expansion. Here, Samus found a wall that could be destroyed with a Power Bomb, leading to a secret door to a room filled with Sidehoppers with some spikes to make it a bit harder. Sweetie Void decided to cut all of the Sidehoppers to pieces with her swords, allowing Samus to find and destroy a piece of the floor with a Super Missile. They dropped to the room under, where a Power Bomb Expansion awaited Samus. She had to fire at a gate to reveal the entrance to a secret passage to the room’s exit, having to bomb a pole to make it rise on the way.

Back in the large cavern again, they climbed and took the blue door just above where they found the previous Missile Expansion which had been the cavern’s entrance the first time they arrived here. Back in the tunnel linking the cavern to the main shaft of Brinstar’s jungle. Here, Samus identified that part of the ground could be destroyed by the Speed Booster, so she did so, making the both of them drop down a shaft to a different tunnel where they found some kind of wingless green bird the size of Samus, like an ostrich. Not far from it was a nest with an egg.

“Well, Fluttershy would love this discovery, but now how are we supposed to get out of here,” the filly wondered. The ostrich creature let out a cry and seemed to gesture for them to clear the path between it and the shaft,

“Looks like this one wants to show us something,” Samus observed, as they moved to the sides, only for the land avian to cry out again, look at the hunter and gesture its head next to it, maintaining eye contact.

…

…

…

“Do…. you want me to... follow your lead?” Samus asked the bird, hesitantly. The bird nodded while giving another cry. “O…K.”

After stepping in line next to the creature, both Samus and Sweetie were startled when the creature suddenly just ran off, following its cue, despite their confusion, only for it to turn to wonder as both Samus and the creature started glowing as both entered the Speed Booster state.

The creature suddenly crouched as it entered the shaft, retaining the Speed Boost state, then jumped, rocketing back up towards the top of the shaft.

Having stopped due to her shock of the bird having a Speed Booster state of its own, Samus doubled back to the end of the tunnel with the egg, then got a running start, following the actions of the bird, crouching as she stopped dead with the shaft above her. Pushing off the ground, she found herself rocketing back up to the top of the shaft, just like the creature had.

The bird seemed to cheer at Samus’s success as she slammed into the cavern ceiling, Sweetie Void following quickly behind.

After landing beside the bird, Samus gave it a Chozo salute, bowing her head with her hand on her heart. “Thank you, Dachora, for your teaching.”

The Dachora cried, then jumped back into the shaft. Samus decided to jump back in it to pass the blue door at the end of the tunnel only to discover that it led just in a room with a Power Bomb Recharge Unit. Still useful. So they returned in the tunnel, bid the Dachora farewell, and Samus used what she called the Shinespark to leave while Sweetie followed her by flying. Samus will have to be careful as she used the Shinespark however, it drained her energy. They then moved down the tunnel back to the jungle’s main shaft.

Here, Samus used a Power Bomb to reveal a secret area of the shaft leading further down. As the filly and the bounty hunter jumped down, they passed a metal door. At the bottom, Samus’ X-Ray Scope found a secret passage that was, however, blocked from this side, so they took the blue door instead. They entered a small room where they killed some Beetoms before they passed another blue door to a metallic room.

They immediately spotted an Energy Tank at the other side of the room before a green door. However, before it was a hole so Samus had to jump to reach the tank. They then opened the green door and entered a room with, finally, a Super Missile Expansion.

“Finally!” Samus exclaimed. “It was really annoying to just have five Super Missiles. Always having to be careful. Not being able to use them when I want.”

“It’s still just ten Super Missiles. I wouldn’t be against finding one or two more expansions.”

Returning to the previous room, they jumped down the hole, went through a floor that crumbled under them, and landed back in the jungle before a blue door to a recharge station. To continue, Samus had to curl into her Morph Ball to roll under thorns, reaching a part of the room that was filled with more thorns both on the floor and on the ceiling. There were also Beetoms and pipes out of which came Zebbos. So Sweetie used a shield to make the two of them cross the room while they eliminated all the enemies attacking them. Once at the end of the room, they passed the blue door.

Now, they were at the bottom of a shaft and found themselves before three little monkey-like creatures with blue fur and two antennas.

Samus looked up at the shaft. “Mmh… I won’t be able to use the Shinespark here.”

“Then how will we get up there?” Sweetie wondered.

Chirping gained the two’s attention, and they looked at the little monkeys who looked back at Samus before they turned to face the shaft’s wall. While facing the wall, one of them looked back at Samus and gestured at the wall. Samus nodded, indicating that she followed. Then, one by one, the monkeys jumped toward the wall, then pressed themselves against it, then jumped from it toward the opposite wall above Samus and Sweetie Void. The monkey repeated the operation, jumping from wall to wall and climbing the shaft.

After observing the monkeys a bit, Samus nodded and jumped toward the wall, repeating the monkeys’ movements. She pressed against the wall, then jumped, and jumped, and jumped, successfully climbing the shaft. Sweetie Void flew to follow her. Once at the top of the shaft, Samus landed on a ledge beside the monkeys who waited patiently for her. She then bowed her head at them, hand on her heart.

“Thank you, Etecoons, for your teaching.”

The Etecoons chirped, then jumped back into the shaft.

Seeing the passage for the Morph Ball in the opposite wall, Samus jumped toward it and turned into her Morph Ball midair, entering the passage leading to a small room with a Power Bomb Expansion.

They passed the blue door back to the jungle’s main shaft (the metal door they passed previously). Then, Samus made them climb the shaft all the way to the top most pair of doors, one of which led to the Brinstar map room. The other led to the room with the crumbing floor where they got a Missile Expansion. This time, Samus used the Speed Booster to run, outrunning the crumbling floor and passing under the closing gates, reaching the other end of the room where there was a red door.

They opened the red door and entered a room with a Chozo statue holding an orb containing a Reserve Tank. Under the statue was a tube leading to another room with a Missile Expansion. Another Missile Expansion was behind the wall. A Power Bomb was enough to destroy the wall so they could reach it. Back in the room with the crumbling floor, Samus fired at a part of the ceiling, destroying it and revealing a secret upper level with a Super Missile Expansion.

“I think that we are done with Brinstar. Now, Crateria. I think that this is where we will find the next step of our adventure. But before that, there are a couple of places to explore,” Samus said.

So they returned to the jungle shaft and took the elevator to Crateria. They then backtracked until they returned to the shaft above the old Tourian escape shaft. Here, they passed the blue door under the one to the recharge station and entered the room with the passage blocked by stone. Samus bombed them and they reached a blue door to a Missile Expansion.

Back in the shaft, they then went to the old Tourian escape shaft and went almost all the way down, fighting some of these two-headed things which revealed to be called Shaydas, until reaching the secret passage to a yellow door. The room behind was a long corridor with acid leading to a shaft. Careful of the acid, Samus ran to use the Shinespark to reach the top of the shaft where she got a Super Missile Expansion. Then, moving through a Morph Ball passage, they entered a spiked room where Samus had to use the grapple to traverse and reach the blue door at the end. From it, they returned to the escape shaft through the secret passage at the top.

They then returned to Mother Brain’s room where, after dealing with some pirates and Primids, Samus used a Power Bomb to destroy the floor under Mother Brain’s broken glass capsule, finding a small secret room with a Missile Expansion.

“That’s everything I can think of to explore. But you remember that small shaft we found back in Brinstar which I couldn’t reach the top? I think that I can now thanks to the Shinespark.”

“Let’s return to Brinstar again, then. Lucky us, the elevator leading to there is not far.”

So they left Mother Brain’s room and took the elevator back to the caverns of Brinstar where they returned to the room where they found an Energy Tank. Samus placed herself against the wall and ran, then used the Shinespark to jump up the small shaft. At the top was a blue door to a watery room with spikes with no visible way to reach the other side. Thankfully, the X-Ray Scope found an invisible platform. However, it was too high to reach with a jump from the water. Samus needed the Gravity Suit.

“I guess that’s it. Let’s return to Crateria and continue our adventure,” Samus said.

So they returned all the way to the ships, fighting more Subspace beings, mainly Primids. Samus used the occasion to replenish her ammunition before they moved to what had previously been a green door and traversed the tube behind it.

They traversed the cavern, eliminating Keyhunters, and passed what had been a yellow door to return to the watery room with the grapple points. They remarked, however, that some of the points were cracked.

“I will have to be quick,” Samus said before she used the grapple. As she said, she had to hurry up when she reached the cracked points so they didn’t break. She successfully reached the other side where they passed a blue door.

Back outside, they found themselves before a large lake, before what revealed to be a large spaceship that was in a very bad state, partially sunk.

“That…. was there before I was brought here… they never let me explore it.” Samus said.

“I would say, understandably, just looking at it,” the filly replied.

“This is actually the ship from which the Chozos arrived on Zebes. It crashed a long time ago for mysterious reasons. Apparently, the ship’s energy was just… sucked away. Many died in the crash, and because of that, it was a place of respect for the Chozos, and few entered it. The more spiritual ones could feel that the souls of the dead remained behind for some reason.”

“Ooh. A haunted ship. What are the chances we will encounter hostile ghosts?”

“I don’t see why the ghosts of Chozos would attack us. There is no Phazon to corrupt them. I think that we will just find it overrun with critters. And maybe security bots.”

“Yeeeeah… I won’t bet on that. Haunted place: hostile ghosts. It always worked like that for me.”

“We will see soon enough if you are right. Let’s go.”

Many scaffoldings were between the girls and the ship. Samus had to use the grapple to go from one to another, either with grapple points or with a yellow Ripper. Before long, they reached the ship’s entrance: a green door. One Super Missile later and they entered a long corridor with conveyors on the floor and ceiling and many cylinder-shaped canisters containing ore in the walls with Sbugs (small insects) scurrying away.

The corridor was entirely plunged in darkness, so Samus and Sweetie both used lights to light the way. Samus identified the cylinders as Zebetites, powerful energy sources of Chozo origin, but they were currently turned off, like the conveyors.

“Zebetites were Mother Brain’s power source,” Samus explained. “I had to destroy them to weaken her. They are hard as heck to destroy. The glass regenerates if you don’t quickly destroy the ore inside.”

Sweetie raised an eyebrow. “How does this work?”

Samus shrugged. “No idea.”

They advanced in the corridor and reached the end where they passed a blue door. They entered what revealed to be a stairwell, and right before them upon entering was another blue door to a recharge station. However, like everything in the ship, it was turned off. As they returned in the stairwell and headed down, they were surprised to see an entity appear behind them, where they had been a moment ago.

Whatever that thing was, it looked like ethereal skulls glued together floating in the air. One scan identified it as a Covern, a cluster of corrupted souls that died in the ship, Chozos, but also other creatures. The Covern disappeared not long after Samus finished scanning it.

Samus sighed. “You were right…”

Sweetie giggled. “Told you. Whenever I enter a haunted place, there are always hostile ghosts.”

They quickly moved away as another Covern, or the same one, appeared where they had been. This time, the girls attacked it, successfully sending it to the afterlife. As the two descended the stairwell, another appeared behind them, eliminated the same way. At least, they gave Samus new missiles upon elimination.

“Seems like we should avoid idling as long as these things are around,” Samus commented.

“Yeah.”

As they descended again, they arrived at a metal door that remained closed because it wasn’t powered.

“So we will have to find whatever is draining the ship’s energy if we want to fully explore it,” Sweetie Void guessed.

“Seems like it. And with our luck, this will be some bigass ghost.”

Sweetie and Samus moved aside to deal with a Covern appearing.

“Oh I’m scared. So scared that I will giggle at it like Pinkie Pie would say,” the filly said.

Further down, Samus found a part of a wall that could be destroyed with a bomb. This led to a secret room with conveyors and spikes and a Missile Expansion at the end. Since the conveyors were turned off, getting the expansion was as easy as taking a lollipop from a baby.

In the stairwell, they descended to the bottom where there was another metal door and a secret passage that led, however, to a dead end for now. Part of the stairwell’s floor could be destroyed, so Samus used a Power Bomb, finding a secret section with a green door in the floor.

Going through the door, they landed in a big room with a blue door at the end, beyond an inactivated Work Robot (a cylindrical robot). Taking it, the girls found the ship’s map room, but it was also turned off. Back in the previous room, beyond a second inactivated Work Robot, Sweetie found a passage on ground level leading to a smaller room with a one-eyed monster door, like the one leading to Kraid’s room.

“Oh! So will we find one of our four targets behind this door?” Sweetie questioned with a grin. Finally some real action!

The door fired a plasma ball at Samus who easily avoided it before answering with a missile in the eye. The door closed its eye in pain and Samus waited for it to open again to fire a second missile, then a third one, destroying whatever that creature was as it left behind a simple blue door.

They passed it and entered an empty room, nothing present in it. Sweetie and Samus remained on guard however as they looked around.

Then, blue flames began to appear in the air above them, forming a circle, before they rotated around and closed in on each other. Once they reached the center of the circle, they faded away, and in their place materialized… a giant head which seemed to have a single eye which was currently closed. The head was transparent, and looked like a cephalopode, having two tentacles. Then, it opened its eyes, which revealed to be inside its mouth. As soon as the eye opened, the creature turned tangible. Some appendage holding the eye came out of the mouth, making the eye come close to the girls, before it roared. The eye then returned inside the mouth which closed, and immediately the creature turned intangible again before it disappeared.

Samus still had enough time to scan it.

“Phantoon. A spectral entity living in another dimension. What we are seeing is just its head, and the eye is what serves as the connection to the corporeal world, so it is its weakness. It’s an energivore and gains power the more it absorbs. It seems to be the reason why all these souls are stuck here and corrupted.”

“A real piece of work,” Sweetie said as blue fireballs began to appear and drop out of thin air.

“As long as its eye is closed, it’s intangible, meaning we can’t damage it. But in return, it can’t attack us directly.”

“Only with fireballs, uh? Should be easy. But you are wrong about one thing,” Sweetie said as she eyes Phantoon, the specter appearing before her but remaining intangible. She then flew toward it, wrapped energy around her hoof, and punched Phantoon hard, sending it flying through a wall while it screeched. “I can hurt it even with its eye closed, as long as it’s even partially in our dimension.”

Samus clapped. “Nice.”

Phantoon returned and opened its eye, screeching, before it tried to slap Sweetie with one of its tentacles. Sweetie caught it and pulled, bringing Phantoon to her before she punched it in the eye, making it crash on the wall before it fell on the floor where Samus fired a Super Missile at its eye. She only had enough time to fire one before Phantoon closed its eye and turned invisible for a couple seconds.

It turned visible near the ceiling of the room and sent spheres of blue fireballs interspaced by fireballs that homed in toward the girls. The fireballs in sphere formations were fast, so it wasn’t easy to avoid them, and the homing fireballs didn’t help even if they were slower. At least, the girls discovered that the homing fireballs could be destroyed.

After avoiding two spheres of fireballs, Sweetie Void fired from her horn a large beam that hit Phantom right in its closed mouth/eye, making it screech and stop attacking. Phantom disappeared and reappeared a few seconds later beside Samus who jumped away, avoiding some fireballs. Phantoon then opened its eye, becoming tangible, and swung a tentacle at Samus who jumped above it before she fired a Super Missile at the eye at the same time that Sweetie fired another large beam at it.

Phantoon immediately closed its eye and moved around while dropping homing fireballs in great quantity. Sweetie flew right through them, destroying them, and punched Phantoon several times before she turned one of her hooves into a blade and pierced the specter with it right in the mouth.

Phantoon screeched even louder than before and stopped moving. It then faded in and out repeatedly before it finally dissipated. The ship’s lights turned on right away, indicating that Phantoon was gone.

“I’m not sure that it’s dead,” Sweetie said.

“Maybe not, but it’s certainly not likely to return,” Samus replied, making Sweetie roll her eyes. “Come on, let’s get whatever we can from here and move on. No telling when the Pirates or Subspace Soldiers could come poking around.”