Interview with Samus Aran

Froglight

Funny thing about the Kerian Rebellion; not one single Kerian fought or died during it, the greatest war the galaxy has ever seen. Mostly because when it began there were no Kerians, because there was no Kerry.

"The Kerian Rebellion, what a fucking clown show." General Tarmun gave the impression that he wanted to scoff, or even smirk, but simply didn't have the energy. "Only this generation would willfully continue a pointless galactic rebellion for a planet that was destroyed forty years ago."

If Jon Tapin had been a bit more sure of himself as a reporter, and a bit less starstruck by the military giant that sat across from him, he may have spoken with the good General about how the number of dead Kerians still absolutely dwarfed the casualty figures of both sides combined after 40 years of constant warfare.

Instead, he hesitated awkwardly and asked the question that everyone at home was more interested in hearing: "Did you ever work with Samus, for or against?"
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Sixteen years before Samus was born, the Galactic Confederacy took its economical ruthlessness to a new level when it decided to gut a planet whose core was worth more than its civilization. Kerian civilization was about ten years past networking computers. Kerry was on the cusp on achieving complete global communications. Kerry was an arguably more fashionable 1980s Earth.

Initially when the confederacy discovered Kerry, the humans felt like they had discovered a long-lost sibling. The history of Kerry was so similar to the history of Earth that the humans were already jockeying for Galactic Council rights for the Kerians who didn't even know there was alien life, let alone a Galactic Council.

The humans voted for immediate contact and uprise of the Kerian civilizations, and the rest of the galaxy seemed to have no objection until a surveying drone returned from a trip to the planet's core.

Kerry was 1980 Earth, this was known. Kerry had a core that contained enough fuel to last the Confederacy three generations alone. This was learned.

Upon learning of the value of Kerry's core, the humans sent immediate "Cease Research" and "Protect Life" requests to the Confederacy. It is widely accepted that the Confederacy pretended to not receive the requests. Twenty days after the estimated delivery date of the request, Kerry was stripped of indigenous life and was converted into a mining colony.

The summarized execution of an entire civilized planet for monetary gain reflected very poorly on the already unpopular Confederacy. It was a stark and shocking sign that the powers-that-be had truly deluded themselves into thinking they could do anything they wanted. It was the hardest anyone had ever stepped over any line, and, as many Confederate sworn military officers would later lament, the worst tactical blunder any government had ever made.

The tired and until now fringe anti-confederate groups ran a very successful 'We are all Kerians' publicity campaign that took less than a month to lead to widespread violent insurgence.

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"Hang on, hang on." Jon let out a nervous laugh. "This is getting away from me. I had a few more questions about your childhood."

"Alright. Sorry about that."

"No no, don't be. It's fine. I'm staying with you for a while and hopefully we'll be having hours of conversation like this. I have to edit it all afterwards later.

I think it's important to note that you were in fact a war orphan, and you were being raised by religious sisters of an alien race. Did your father fight in the war? Or were you part of a civilian family, and if so what side can be blamed for their deaths?"

"The Sisters wouldn't tell any of us girls anything about that, whether or not they even knew."

"Why was that?"

Samus laughed. "Little girls have a hard enough time getting along without bloody family war grudges. We were taught not to dwell on those things. Those other girls were the only family I ever really had anyway."

"That makes a lot of sense, actually. What about your name? It's not a human name is it?"

"Samus is not. That's the name the Larean Sisters gave me. She was one of their old gods. She was the god of music, hunting and..." Samus leaned back her in her chair tapping the side of her cheek and looking up in thought. "and...I always forget this one. Tablesetting! That's right! I don't know how I always forget it when it's so weird. It's not weird to Lareans though, they take that shit seriously."

Jon looked down at his blank pad with a tight-lipped smile. "And Aran?"

"We all got to choose our second names when we turned 16, and when we were like 10 one of my friends had the idea that when the time came we should all use an alternative spelling of our father's first names, because that was the one thing that the Sisters did tell us about our past. They thought it was important to give us something, even if it was a pointless token, of our past and where we came from."

"So your father was-?"

"Aaron."

"Well that was actually pretty interesting. I'm glad I asked. I should also note that right now we are aboard your very own ship, at your dining room table actually. Tell us about your ship."

"Well it's a human ship, which is strange considering I haven't even met many other humans, but good because the doorways and beds are all the right size. It's a freighter with crew quarters for twelve plus a captain, and it's retrofitted with- Did you want me to go into detail about the guns?"

"No that's okay, we can do that later. There will be graphics and intense music for the audience for that part."

Samus let out a small laugh, "Sounds good."

"How did you come by your ship?"

"An old man gave it to me."

"An Old Man?."

"An old man."

"Alright then, we'll come back to that later. One last note because it's almost been twenty minutes and my host told me we could talk for fifteen before she had to check the ships navigation, and I don't want to hold her up and cause us to crash into a star or something. Samus has graciously agreed to let me stay aboard her ship and follow her for two months as she does what she does. As far as I know this has never happened before. I told my producer it would be useless to even try to contact you, and a week after she ignored me here I am, with all my bags in one of your crew quarters, sitting at your dinner table. Why did you accept?"

"I'm not sure. I guess I thought it might be fun. That and you were the only person to ever ask anything like that. I really do need to check on the ship, though. Why don't you go get set up in your room? I'll get on the intercom if I need to let you know anything. We have twenty hours of flying before we hit the next fuel station."

"I think I'll get situated, maybe do a little editing and get some sleep then. I've been up for 28 hours so far, hustling to meet to you by the time you left Polis Station."

A few hours later Jon was startled awake by the sound of Samus's voice blaring through a speaker in his celing.

"Hey, are you up?"

Jon threw his covers off and reached for his glasses on the gray featureless nightstand.

"Wha-? Yeah, I mean, no, but now yeah."

"Oh, sorry. I know this thing is loud, I don't think I can turn it down. I was just wondering if you wanted to see the suit."