• Published 4th Apr 2013
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Metroid Equis - Flammenwerfer



A meteor impacts the nation of Equestria, Planet Equis. Tranquility is quickly snuffed out when a poison begins to spread violently. The Princesses cannot combat this unknown threat, as no knowledge of it exists. Help comes from an unexpected source.

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23. Cannon and Horn

Metroid Equis

Chapter 23

Cannon and Horn


[Crashed Frigate]


Armored soldier gazed at armored soldier within this grand arena-like room. However, the room changed a bit when Samus noticed circular containment fields come to life, effectively sealing off any of the exits to her. Since her experience with magic did not allow her to teleport, her only option was to fight. But really... like she was gonna do anything else? She looked around without altering her passive stance, just to get a glimpse of her surroundings and what she had to work with: there was effectively no cover. Nothing she could kneel behind to apply suppressing fire. Her magic potential against the potential of one (even corrupted) of the likes of the Magickakorps would be laughable at best. That left Samus with really only one thing in her skill-set that she could rely upon to avoid getting potentially massacred: her unmatched dexterity and finesse.

Not making any sudden movements to provoke the corrupted unicorn soldier, Samus slowly inched her hand up to her visor, her adversary not making any indication that it was doing anything but existing. Scan data would be absolutely vital in the coming events. She was thankful that her systems provided a wealth of information:

[Recorded to Logbook]

[Morphology: Corrupted Magickakorps Trooper]

[Phazon corrupted elite unicorn soldier. The phazon has completely infused with one of Princess Luna's best, leaving nothing but a war machine in its wake. The extensive magical training undergone by any member of the Magickakorps has guaranteed an almost complete remnant control of magical casting abilities. Scans indicate that the phazon has not inhibited any form of cognitive control over movement abilities as well as aforementioned magical weaponization, suggesting the presence of several beneficial mutations. Enchanted armor, however compromised, may still offer resistance to your weapon-fire. The usual weak points of a unicorn apply, however, target's inherent training and retention of full body function may make targeting the horn nearly impossible. Thermal and X-Ray scans show phazon tumors still present from the first infusion near several vital body parts and organs. Consider targeting and eliminating armor pieces, and then the underlying tumors to inflict potentially catastrophic wounds. WARNING: Your defensive shielding will not stand against constant magical bombardment of that caliber. Evasive maneuvers highly suggested as a defense mechanism rather than shield strength and magical ability.]

Samus engaged her combat visor once more and achieved a lock on the elite unicorn two-thirds her size. Her cannon was aimed and her Night Beam was charged, waiting for the slightest provocation once more. The corrupted unicorn trooper did not move a muscle at Samus's battle ready status. All that was readily apparent was that the entity was breathing... otherwise Samus would have suspected that it died standing up. But still... she expected this adversary to at least make a few other movements. With the calm before the storm, Samus made one adjustment to her suit properties for the purposes of the amount of jumping and moving she'd have to do:

[Weapons Systems]
>[Screw Attack]
>>[x]Always Active [ ] Manual-Activation [ ] Auto-Activation

Now when she'd somersault in the air, the damaging screw attack would take effect immediately. Samus reasoned that it could prove to be a powerful weapon in such circumstances. Still, this unicorn was bothering her.

Standing too still...

Her thought process was completely altered when her instincts suddenly screamed for her to evade left. She complied without hesitation and rolled on the ground to the left, nearly missed getting torn into by a large magical beam that pierced the "Magickakorps Trooper" she was initially facing... only to have the now discernable magical echo fade out of existence, the real adversary coming back into the light from its positioning behind Samus, horn still charged to full power.

And the first shots had been fired.

Samus came out of her evasion in a kneeling position and aimed her cannon behind her, unleashing the charged Night round before following up with a torrent of standard shots. The unicorn completely manipulated the path of the charged shot in a different direction while calling upon a shield to absorb the standard shots, which rippled in the magical bubble like drops of water in a lake. Before the trooper could strike back, Samus unleashed a single missile as a probing strike. The unicorn's horn lit up brightly and a single, thin beam of magic made contact with the projectile in the air and altered its trajectory, sending it straight back to Samus. She bounded off her feet and into another aerial somersault, the screw attack ever present in her jumps breaking apart the missile in her path.

Samus erected a magical barrier in front of her like a portable shield as she fired another volley from her cannon. The unicorn merely rolled horizontally to the right and returned fire. The finesse and agility that the unicorn trooper showed was remarkable. Samus bounded off her feet again and into a cartwheel, keeping up her weapons fire the entire way. Her enemy continued to return fire, rolling and bounding side to side like a trained soldier, and occasionally using teleports to disorient Samus's targeting but it did not deter the Hunter from unleashing all she was capable of, never standing on her feet for more than a couple of seconds at a time.

There was a problem. Samus was currently stuck in the middle with a magical shield and cannon while the magical soldier continued to teleport all around her. As much as she could dodge and evade, her weapons had little effect on her adversary's shield, or got redirected back to her. Her systems could detect no discernable pattern between the teleports so she was perpetually on the defensive. Nevertheless, her suit still had something to say:

[Aura Visor can detect movements in the Magical Field.]

Right!

Samus immediately switched visors, the entire room dimming out completely save for structural outlines. The unicorn trooper was a bright, pulsing, golden light silhouette, like she expected. However, while still on the move, Samus noticed that about two seconds before a teleportation occurred, a bright light was detected on her visor, and the unicorn would teleport there. It made sense in her mind, as time (however small) was necessary to determine the pathway of the teleportation spell. With this revelation, Samus formed a battle plan.

Samus cartwheeled to the side once more and unleased a heavy volley of Night Beam fire, ceasing fire to arm her power beam and charge it... waiting. In all honesty though, the "waiting" was about sixty percent waiting, but another forty percent hoping... hoping that her plan would afford her enough time for her strike to land before the Magickakorps trooper could put a shield up or redirect her projectile back at her. The latter thought was a bit unnerving. If a super missile was sent back her way, it would do enormous damage to her suit as it stood.

This better work...

Samus was so concentrated waiting for the moment to strike, she let her guard down just enough. A beam round from the unicorn soldier found its mark in Samus's upper chest, making her lose her evasive footing and stumble in slight disorientation. Her enemy sprung into action. The loss of her coordination allowed the elite unicorn to grasp her form in a holding spell. She resisted and applied her magic all she could, but said resistance paled with the enemy soldier's magical might. It tossed her straight into the containment field, her upper back and neck taking most of the impact before she crumpled to the floor. Samus, even more disoriented and gaining her bearings back as fast as she could, felt the same magical force turn her over and fling her yet again across the "battlefield." This time she bounced on the floor and skid, her armor creating a few sparks. Samus lifted her left hand just in time to cast a shield that fended off potentially lethal rounds of Night shot.

However... no attack came.

Samus flipped up to her feet immediately and scanned around her. Nothing was to be seen, and the moment she switched to her Aura Visor, she felt four legs clamp onto the back of her torso and attempt a grip on her neck... a killing strike. Samus did a half-backflip and landed on her upper back, her attacker taking the entire brunt of the counter-measure and easing its grip. She immediately rolled away and charged her beam, but as she released the shot, the writhing trooper vanished in a teleportation spell. Quickly springing into action (barely two seconds worth of time), Samus, viewing through her currently equipped Aura Visor, detected immediate fluctuations in the magical field right behind her. With quick precision, she swung her cannon overhead and aimed at the exact, vacant location and fired a single missile. Like she hoped, the missile made perfect contact with the Magickakorps soldier as it came out of its teleport, the projectile striking its leg armor and the concussive blast throwing the trooper backwards, sending armor-pieces everywhere.

The trooper shakily got to its feet, its left leg armor obliterated and displaying a throbbing phazon tumor. Once it got its bearings, the only sight it took in was the one with Samus charging straight at it and getting back-handed by her arm cannon. The clanging of two armor pieces meeting in brute force sounded throughout the room and reverberated off the walls, only overtaken by the sound of the Magickakorps soldier tumbling on the ground after flying through the air. Samus decided not to be overzealous and waited for her enemy to shakily get to their feet... her cannon aimed and ready with a charged Night round. Stepping forward cautiously and ascertaining her enemy's location, she released the shot as it got to its feet, the magical properties of Samus's beam wiping out any magical ability for a few seconds. The revelation of no magic visibly shook her adversary, and in the end, a few seconds was all Samus needed to fire three precise power-beam rounds into the tumor on the unicorn's leg.

The tumor exploded grotesquely, sending blood and phazon in every direction. The popping of the bulbous appendage took many vital muscles and tendons with it, leaving the leg limp and useless while forcing involuntary (corrupted and distorted) cries of excruciating agony. Still the corrupted unicorn soldier was undeterred, and opened magical fire on Samus in a similar fashion as before. Samus resumed her pattern-less attack/evasion strategy with an internal grin of her plan of attack having had some effect. Said effect was immediately apparent, as her adversary would stumble with the loss of function of one of its legs.

This round of attack was simple for Samus to evade her enemy's magic fire, but as well, the trooper was able to evade her own cannon fire just as well. Like last time, Samus knew that either one of them would have to slip up again, or one of them would have to break the stalemate.

However, the unicorn moved first. It bounded forward and planted itself directly in the center of the battleground. Samus ceased her attack once she saw her enemy generate a large bubble shield around itself. Keeping her cannon ever aimed and locked on, the unicorn raised its head up and charged its horn to almost blinding luminosity. As the horn got brighter and brighter, Samus was not noticing anything about to happen... until her visor's threat alert level was slowly rising to 'warning' levels. Only then did she notice that the unicorn's shield was starting to fracture in several locations. Those fractures extended all around the magical bubble shield until it completely lost form, leaving large, sharp shards of hard magic floating in the air. With another bright flash of her adversary's horn, one by one the shards flew at her at frightening velocity.

Samus's eyes widened, recalling the destruction this particular magical spell caused back in the Pirate Everfree installation. Samus cartwheeled to the right to avoid direct piercing strikes, the magic shards shattering on the containment fields. Having to gain her footing again, she wasted no time in somersaulting forward, her screw attack obliterating even more of the extremely sharp pieces. She repeated the same process to the left and charged her Night Beam passively. Her plan of attack was to eliminate the threat of getting impaled by magic before attacking with a point-blank charge shot.

Almost... NOW!

Samus somersaulted forward once more, destroying the last spear-like shard of magic, came out of the move in mid-air, and released the shot. The charged beam round of "anti-magic" made perfect contact with the Magickakorps trooper, forcing it back and into a retreat for the few seconds it had without magic potential. Pressing her advantage, Samus called upon her sticky-grapple, firing her grapple beam and having it attach to the trooper's oblique plating. With all the strength she could muster, she yanked her attached beam back, violently removing the armor from her adversary's side and exposing another large, bulbous phazon tumor. The unicorn stumbled backward as its armor gave away to Samus's grapple beam.

Not a second later, the trooper's horn was back in commission and charged fully without hesitation. Samus moved to strike quickly before an anticipated defensive spell could be cast but her world was rocked when the unicorn roared out with a magically amplified voice, almost identical to the Royal Voice but once the magically charged sonic waves hit Samus, she felt like her eardrums were going to explode. Screaming in pain, her body seized up, her hand and cannon went to the sides of her helmet in a futile attempt to cover her ears from the blood-curdling and crippling sonic attack. She fell to her knees, her body almost convulsing, as her visor displayed warning after warning of sonic and neural overload, dampeners failing to minimize the attack. The unicorn ceased its nonlethal but certainly immobilizing attack in order to rear back and stomp down on its good leg , sending a powerful, blue-hued shockwave in every direction. The waves overcame Samus's form and threw her back against the containment field, her defensive shielding having taken all of the blow, and a heavy one at that.

It took almost a full two seconds for the Hunter to recover her bearings and get back to her feet swiftly. Her defensive shielding had been depleted a level of fifty-four percent integrity, a new record low for her, at least on Equis. Setting her mind straight once more, she had gained ground: the phazon tumor was exposed and ripe for attacking. The unicorn's horn had ceased its blinding charge, undoubtedly in an effort to recharge some magic potential or conserve it, moreso. Samus ran over another plan of attack in her head. Judging by the size of the exposed tumor, destroying it would cause severe damage to many vital organs. It most likely would not be enough to take it down, in which case, scans indicated the presence of such a tumor which would do the job: under the helmet.

Samus decided to go on the offensive and take advantage of her enemy's cool-down period, however small it would be. Aiming her cannon, she primed her missile launcher and fired two missiles one right after the other while run-strafing. Like she expected, the trooper attached a magical beam to the first missile and redirected it into the second missile, the two destroying each other, no harm done. While it was distracted, Samus had already been running in a circle and decided to charge straight at her enemy. Her plan was to hopefully have enough energy to activate her speed booster.

It worked, just in time. Two feet in front of her enemy, the unicorn attempted to cut her down with a magical beam but Samus's speed booster kicked in right then. However, neither the Magickakorps soldier, nor Samus knew of her recently acquired ability: The Rainspark. Samus bounded off the floor at a point blank distance, her shinespark taking effect as she collided into her enemy, taking it with her as they sped across the battleground with a rainbow trail. Not even three seconds later, Samus crushed the unicorn, tumor-first, into the containment field. What she did not expect was a miniature Sonic Rainboom to erupt from her point of impact. The magical blast coursed through her adversary, not only temporarily knocking out its magical ability, but the overload of hostile magic coursing through its body exploded the already agitated tumor since it was crushed against the field. Blood, phazon, and some guts sprayed onto said containment field before either being incinerated or sliding down it.

What the....?!

Samus, having no time to ponder her bewilderment on the revelation, bounded backwards off the impact zone, back-flipping and aiming her cannon. Had the rest of the armor been removed from her enemy, that move would have ended the fight right there.

Remarkably, her enemy got right back to its three feet, albeit mortally wounded. Samus waited this time to see what her still-dangerous enemy would do instead of rushing right in like last time. She was right to do so, as it charged its horn brightly once more. This time, her systems warned her of sonic fluctuations, and as a test, Samus cast a magical shield in front of her and crouched behind it, waiting for the magically amplified sonic strike. When the unicorn screamed out, the nonlethal sonic waves did not penetrate Samus's shield, but diffused off of it, like sound being absorbed and negligibly reverberating off a sound-proof wall. With her enemy's retaliation attack done, she needed to find a way to remove the trooper's helmet. She felt that a similar strategy of magical disruption with the Night Beam and prying the helmet off with her grapple beam worked nigh flawlessly, and opted to repeat the strategy. Taking one last glance at her enemy, the unicorn was faltering. The loss of its limb and enough blood and phazon was starting to weigh in.

Samus fired missile after missile after missile at the Magickakorps trooper while strafing once more, depleting her ammunition levels below thirty percent. This did not give the trooper time to merely redirect the paths of the projectiles, which it did for the first four new missiles that Samus fired, but instead opted to erect another bubble shield around itself. The concussive blasts of the missile barrage bombarded the unicorn's shield incessantly, and Samus refused to let up, regardless of low ammunition warnings. Unlike her beam weapons, the concussive blasts would eventually shatter her enemy's shield and she was waiting for that exact moment to strike with a charged Night round. She watched as her enemy's shield glowed more luminous and consequently more unstable with each explosion of the next missile. She judged accurately and ceased fire, closing her cannon's barrel and allowing it to quickly charge her Night Beam. The charge completed exactly when the last missile impacted the shield, one that should have shattered the shield and left the trooper defenseless. It's defenses seemed more desperate rather than calculated as they were earlier in the fight.

It did not go as anticipated. At all.

The unicorn's shield did shatter... but not as intended or expected. Instead of the shield collapsing on itself and fading out of existence, the shield exploded outwards, sending large, shear-like shards of hard magic in every direction like a giant, pony-sized fragmentation grenade. Her enemy had put whatever reserves of high-intensity magic into a spell which absorbed the exothermic energy of her exploding missiles into the shield, and when it could hold the charge no more, a "distorted" explosion, sounding like an artillery cannon, sounded throughout the room. Samus had no time to react.

"AAAAAAHHH!!!"

The explosive power was so violent that it propelled the magical shards at hyper-bullet velocity, it was more than enough to negate her shielding (and counting almost as a melee strike) and pierce the flattest side of Samus's right-thigh armor as she tried to shield herself at that instant, the shard embedding itself through the metal and deep into the side of her quadricep. A second magical shard embedded itself deep in her suit's pauldron, but it was high enough above her shoulder that no harm was done. Nevertheless, even after the fractured magic disappeared back into the magical field, it left an open, two-and-a-third-inch, profusely bleeding gash. She instinctually collapsed to her right knee. Blood was already starting to trickle out of the gash and down her armored leg as well as between the armor and her Zero Suit, but with her adversary not dead yet, she could not administer medical attention to her leg. With a wound that large, she would not necessarily bleed out in a short time, but the blood loss would compound on her fighting abilities until she would be overtaken, and extreme amounts of movement would only exacerbate a wound on such a critical muscle needed for her finesse.

She needed to end this fight, and end it now.

Time seemed to slow down for her as she looked to her adversary, who was charging its horn yet again. What she did pick up, however, were little flickers, lasting fractions of a second, in the magical charging process. Her enemy was slowly being overtaken by magical exhaustion, and one final push was needed.

Samus raised her cannon, fighting through the stabbing pain in her leg, charged her Power Beam and fired a Super Missile. Right after the large projectile left her barrel, she sprinted out of her kneeling stance straight toward the unicorn. Despite her leg feeling like it wanted to die right then and there, she pressed onward. The unicorn fired a locking beam onto the missile and attempted it to redirect it back at Samus, but her positioning so close and the extra power of the Super Missile ensured that it could not do so. With the Magickakorps trooper's horn concentrated on diverting the Super Missile, Samus charged her Night Beam and plowed right into her adversary, tackling it to the ground as the redirected Super Missile impacted the ceiling.

Her enemy would have none of it, and quickly charged its horn to force her off. However, Samus released the charged round directly into the unicorn's abdominal plating, ceasing any magical casting ability. Samus rolled with the now desperately writing corrupted unicorn soldier until she locked it in a sitting position. Its magic was about to come back online and right then, she wrapped her hand around its horn and bent the appendage sideways with all her might, completely shattering it and nearly tearing it off. It cried out in a deathly-painful scream as its horn was rendered inoperable, and Samus went for the kill. She used her left hand to grasp the underside of the helmet and rip it off with all her strength, exposing a giant tumor taking up most of the left side of the infected pony's face. Without the armor, her adversary was now virtually indistinguishable from the other corrupted unicorns she fought. It still desperately struggled in her grasp and she ended up pushing forward, pinning her adversary to the ground under her weight. She raised her cannon to the tumor on its head.

Rest... in... PEACE.

She fired a single missile which exploded the tumor, phazon particulates and blood spraying over Samus's front and visor. The wound took half of the unicorn's head with it, and the struggling ended immediately.

Samus's heart was racing as she looked down upon her lifeless adversary. Nothing else moved or sounded around her save for her own breathing and heart-beat. She let out one last sigh as she collapsed on her heels and then onto her back for a few moments to revel in what she considered one of the hardest battles she ever fought. Only when her leg reminded her that she had a wound that was still bleeding out did she get up from laying down. She stood up, limped to the opposite side of the room where the containment fields had now gone offline, and took out some medical supplies that she stored in one of the small (and only) compartments in her suit. She would have to seek more proper medical attention when she was out of this place but this "patch" would hold her until she did so.

She then unequipped her Astral Suit and sat down, right hip up, and went to work on cleaning and treating her wound. She winced and grunted at her work of sanitizing the gash as best as she could before injecting some painkillers and wrapping it up in gauze. Her attention was so focused on herself (and rightfully so) that she did not notice magic form off the lifeless unicorn soldier and coalesce into what looked like an odd rendition of the morph ball. Once Samus was done, she looked up and indeed found the object floating and rotating in the air. Wordlessly, she stood up with some residual pain, and equipped her suit once more. Gently walking over to her prize, she grasped it and felt the magic course through her body and form up in her abdominal area. Out of instinct, she morphed down into her morph ball and laid a bomb. Instead of exploding normally like the concussive, static charge it was, the blue bomb grew larger and brighter. When it exploded, it exploded out by violently fracturing itself and propelling hard magic shrapnel in every direction, piercing any object in its path before the magic disappeared.

Samus phased back to her standing form.

[Fragmentation Bomb Acquired!]

[Your bomb arsenal has been expanded with the Fragmentation Bomb. These bombs form from your magic casting abilities into a bubble-like shield only to explode violently, sending shrapnel in every direction. Deadly against large groups of soft targets and has the ability to break through enchanted metals.]

Samus dismissed the notification, proud of her earnings, and moved onward, past this god-forsaken room. Her original mission still stood: destroy the ship, evacuate Luna's troops.

Author's Note:

Alriiiiiight! An intense and brutal battle, and our Samus is victorious. As well, I made a few edits:

Chapter 2: Ponies: I edited Samus's encounter with the wildlife to make it a tad more believable. As well, I edited Samus's initial introduction with Fluttershy, to, again, make things more believable.

Chapter 6: Encounter: Quite a few complained about this and I understand perfectly. I had Celestia cast a 'weightlessness' spell on Samus's disassembled Varia Suit to allow her to maneuver as well as normal in the forest. This should clear up some shitty writing, hopefully. I'll make more edits by the time the story is done.

Let me know what you thought of this chapter! I'll be lurking, as always.

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