Fusion Depths

Recently, I had moved into a new house. It was a pretty small house with little more than a single bedroom, bathroom, and a kitchen. When I finished unpacking all  the boxes I went into my room and fell back on my bed. I was completely and totally exhausted... I had nothing to do and I grew bored quickly...

  Then I remembered that right before I had left I had installed a GBA emulator onto my computer, and had never really got to play around with it. I stood up and as I stood, I gazed around my room. I let out a small sigh and sat down in front of my small computer. It was the latest model, and had been modified in almost every way possible. I opened up my browser, and thought of what game I could possibly search for. I had recently heard that creepypastas occasionally had games that were tied to them.

  Usually creepypasta just bored me and didn't interest me whatsoever, but I had nothing else to do other than listen to the air conditioner whir constantly. As I browsed Google for creepypasta games, most of which said I would have a spooky time or a horrifying experience, my eyes caught a link that I nearly passed up.

"Failure"

  I raised an eyebrow, what could this possibly be? Curiosity quickly overcame me and I clicked it eager to see what it was. It was a downloadable hack for Metroid Fusion. I was a little skeptical at first, I'd never seen any sort of hack for Metroid Fusion. I had seen many hacks for Super Metroid that were completely changed in all ways possible. Eventually I decided that it would at least entertain me for a few minutes, and clicked the download link. The download went extremely smoothly with no trouble at all, and after a little bit of tinkering I had it ready for play in no time at all. Though, I couldn't play right away I had to take a small vacation that would take around a week. I felt it was necessary to get away for a bit to cool off and left the house to my brother.

  When I returned I quickly unpacked and went into my room to find that my computer had a text document in it labeled.       

"Hey!"

  I had left my house to my brother, so I wasn't that surprised. He often left messages on my computer to tell me how it had gone since I was away. I quickly opened, and read the message...

'''"Hey bro! I kept your computer updated, and I moved your emulators to a file named emulators. I also played that ROM hack you had in your folder for Metroid Fusion! It was a total rush!" '''

  I closed the document and true to the message there was a file named Emulators. I opened the file and found the emulator the hacked Metroid Fusion and another text document that I could tell wasn't added by my brother. I looked at the name of the file and grew a little uneasy.

"Find me in the water..."

  Was this referring to Sector 4? It said in the water and that was the aquatic sector. I opened the file Metroid Fusion, and it started with no difficulty at all. The intro was the exact same as before.

  Samus was infected by an X parasite on SR-388 and tried to return to the B.S.L flagship. As she got there the X infected her centrel nervous system, and caused her to pass out. Her ship drifted into an asteroid belt, but by a stroke of luck the ship ejected her out of the ship in an escape pod which the B.S.L flagship recovered. Then she was transported to the Galactic Headquarters for medical help. Over the trip the X grew in numbers and became deeply imbedded in her. She was given a minimal chance of survival. Then the scientists dicovered a cure. Because the Metroids were the main predators of the X parasites, they proposed using a cell culture from the last infant Metroid. After use the X parasites were totally and completely eradicated, and Samus survived reborn. She learns that while she had been passed out most of her suit had become so integrated with her that most of it had to be removed surgically. The infected pieces of her suit were sent to the B.S.L research station, and that shortly after arrival an explosion rocked the station. Now she is being sent there to investigate.

  Anyway, after she docked at the station I took control eager to play. The game, despite being hacked, had little to no changes in it at all. I just BARELY noticed a very small sound in the background that sounded like the cry of a creature I had never heard from any of the monsters in the game. It came at random spots in the game, and seemed to happen most often before I received a key power-up such as the morph ball or the bombs.

  After playing the game for around an hour I was headed to Sector 4 to get the speed booster from Serris. I was excited and had completely forgotten about the message that had been within the file. I went through a series of doors to the elevator leading to the Sector. When I entered I quickly started down the elevator eager to pump Serris full of missiles. As the elevator descended... It stopped and seemed to power down, as if the station's power had gone out.... I remembered this was what happened later in the game when the CO told you to return to your ship, and as you rode the elevator up to get to the main deck the power would go out on the elevator.

  Why was it here though? I'd played this game countless times before, and this had NEVER happened in any instance of the game before. I briefly considered just stopping and playing something else, but I decided I wanted to see what would happen so I bombed around. I eventually found a small hole in the left wall, and proceeded through the hole with morph ball. I came out above the room that would normally lead to the recharge room, save room, and navigation room. The door was locked however, and despite a few minor attempts it wouldn't open and I moved on.

  The sector was dark like in Sector 6 where you had to get the Varia Suit. The only door that was open was the room to the diffusion missiles. After a bit of exploration in the main room, I proceeded to enter the room. It was dark just like the main room. The little things that inflated and prevented you from obtaining the diffusion missiles were still there. So I went through the small opening in the bottom and noticed the enemies that normally prevented you from going down were no longer there. I debated if I should go down into the water, I didn't have the gravity suit so getting back out would be next to impossible. I decided that it would be fine since I had saved pretty close to where I was. I rolled into morph ball and slipped into the passage. I got down there and everything was fine, but the enemies were still there so I had a difficult time exploring the underwater maze. Most of the enemies that typically blocked you were gone. It was still dark and the water looked incredibly murky.

  After a ton of exploration I found that the deeper I went the darker It got. Even to where all that was visible was the circle around Samus that represented a light of some sort. I tried to avoid the deeper areas as much as I possibly could. This seemed to be where the hack really shined. The passages were changed into a labyrinth of complex twists and curls. The background was a dark ocean that lead off into an all consuming darkness. That made a few chills run up my spine. I found a save room, and I saved my progress.

  It was late and I desperately needed some sleep. So I slipped into my bed and sleep quickly overcame me in little time at all. I woke up the next morning I got up and decided I would play a bit before I went searching for a new job. I opened the file and found the text file from before had been erased. I couldn't find it anywhere, I searched in the recycle bin thinking since I was tired the day before I might have put it in there, but I found absolutely no trace of the text document. This creeped me out greatly and I decided I would just go job hunting and play the game a little later.

  After an uneventful day of job searching I came home, and loaded my computer to it's desktop. After I browsed YouTube for any new videos my subs might have uploaded that day. There wasn't any so I slowly decided that I might as well play some more Metroid Fusion. I started the emulator and started file 1 I was right back in Sector 4 where I had left off. I continued to roam around the underwater maze looking for some kind of exit, but after wandering I realized something... The maze had... Changed while I away. The way back up was seemingly completely gone as if it had never even been there in the first place, and I looked frantically for the way back out. After I looked ALL over the maze, I quickly knew that I could only go down. All the other paths lead to dead ends.

What's more is that the circle of light surrounding Samus was now barely in sight. I crept down and as I did I noticed the background was changing. As I went deeper a small head in the background peeped it's head out. It looked like Serris, but it was much to large to be Serris. As I went deeper it would get close and closer. The water in Metroid games always made me feel a bit uneasy. This however was almost completely terrifying to me. Water was my number one fear, and after the creature in the background got closer, I was able to see it much more clearly. It was a large fish that I had never seen in game before. It had decaying flesh on it's body, and it's mouth was opened into a position that seemed to swallow the darkness. Eventually it got too close and I grew frantic and turned the emulator off. I shivered and quickly went over what had happened in my head. I never wanted to play that EVER again.

However after around a month past I almost, but forgot that experience. I brought the chair up to my computer and wondered what to do. I looked at the Metroid Fusion file, and thought why's this here? I loaded it up on the emulator, and it said I was in Sector 4. I just let out a small shrug, but I felt like I knew this from somewhere. I selected file one and a small cut scene like picture appeared of a pixelated Samus appeared. She was clearly underwater, and was lying on the sea bed, against a large rock. I then noticed something that made me jump... She had an opening in her visor. It looked like something had broken it with something. She had struggled, but... it seemed that it had been no use in the end. The darkness seemed to close in around her as I stared at the picture in pure astonishment.

In the bottom left corner there was a small text phrase.

"We found you..."

I quickly remembered all that had happened to me when I had previously played the game. Ever since then I continue to play Metroid Fusion and other games based off the Metroid series. I've gotten over the hack that I had found, and even though I have never played the hack since, whenever I see water in Metroid I shiver a bit.