Editing Samus (section)

==Allies, Enemies and Misc==
===Allies===
'''Galactic Federation''': Basically the UN in SPESS, (most of) the Federation is a relatively benevolent government that governs over its subject worlds in a relatively fair and just manner. However, it is noted to be extremely sectionalized, with different groups having different approaches to governance and military tactics. Samus often works for or with groups of Federation forces in dealing with Space Pirate incursions and other potential threats to galactic peace (including the very rare inter-service conflict). In more recent times however, a darker side seems to be more and more prevalent, with not just one, but two attempts to breed and weaponize Metroids (after they ordered them to be wiped out, mind you) as well as the intention to do the same with the X Parasites. This last endeavor was thwarted by Samus. This has made her an enemy of one particular subsection of the Federation (which is officially unnamed, but has been given the nickname. see below)

*'''The "Ringleaders"''': A collection of military and ex-military bureaucrats, amoral scientists, and war profiteers. this particular group of war hawks are the ones trying to clone Metroids and later X Parasites for use as bioweapons. Due to a botched translation job, the English version of Other M doesn't make it clear they are a distinct political party in the Federation, and the English version of Fusion leaves them out entirely. In the Japanese Other M they are politically defeated, turning the Federation as a whole back into Samus's allies and employers once more. Though apparently, some still remain, time will tell if they become antagonists in the future game.(Metroid gear solid.)

*'''Adam (Ship AI)''': The first NPC introduced in a Metroid game, heck the first interactable character other than Samus at all at the time, the AI came with the ship the Federation gave Samus after she survived getting space AIDS as part of the deal. Acts like every other stereotypical AI command center in gaming with a go here, kill this, fix that type deal it till Samus decides to go suicide run the BSL station when she finds out about the hidden program they had running there. After calling out her stupidity and hearing her rant about Adam it apparently uploaded his memories and personality then proposes a better solution and repeats his catchphrase to convince Samus it was him. Whether he was uploaded when she got the ship or the AI uploaded the personality on the fly is unknown. As of Metroid Dread, he is still serves as Samus' mission advisor.

*'''Adam Malkovich (Human)''': Currently the only relevant GF character, Adam Malkovich served as a commander for GF forces and often as Samus' commanding officer during joint missions together. His relationship with Samus was [[skub | intended to be like that of a surrogate father-figure, though the main source material he's involved tends to cause a lot of debate regarding how well that was portrayed]]. He's also an alleged military genius, though between forcing Samus to shut down most of her gear, splitting up his team (who all together couldn't handle the threats they were fighting initially, much less divided) and [[wat | freezing Samus with an ice beam right in front of a live Metroid]] [[Derp | despite admitting that he didn't know if cold weapons even worked on them]], this also is a hotly debated claim. He later sacrificed himself to blow up said Metroids, though a copy of his personality was uploaded as an AI that acted as a liaison between Samus and the Federation while she was aboard the BSL. (a running theory is that he faked his own death, and that he is in fact sylux)

'''Chozo''': Samus' foster parents aren't really around anymore, but they were [[Tau | originally a militant warrior people who prided in scientific progression and enlightening the lesser races]]. However, as they mellowed out in their old age, many of them sought to explore their more spiritual aspects, with many [[Exodite | forsaking their technology to live in harmony with the natural world]]. The Thoha, one of the major Chozo tribes, were such a group. Between dying out from old age, getting slaughtered by Space Pirates/Ridley, getting nuked by Meteors filled with Phazon and generally fucking off to parts unknown, their ruins and technology are currently the only known remnants of their civilization. A far more militant group are known as the mawkin Who decided to stick with the militant warrior traditions, and were led by a psychotic tyrant with galactic domination ambitions. (as usual Samus ended him)
*'''Grey Voice''': One of the only two named Chozo, Grey Voice was a curmudgeon who initially objected to adopting Samus before relenting with the knowledge that she literally had nowhere and no one else to go to. To help her adapt to Zebes, it was Grey Voice's DNA that was used to genetically enhance Samus into what she is today. While he feigned servitude to Ridley and Mother Brain to avoid getting his people wiped out, he eventually dusted off his old power armor and tried to kill the two of them despite having been genetically engineered to be incapable of violent acts. Ultimately Ridley slaughtered him and most of the remaining Chozo in response. Is highly likely to be a thoha.
*'''Old Bird''': The other named Chozo, Old Bird was friendlier than Grey Voice and actually played with toddler Samus a little bit before the Space Pirates raided her colony. He also tried to teach her the lesson that just because someone looks different, you can always find good in them and become friends in the end. [[not as planned | Suffice to say, this advice backfired spectacularly when 3-year old Samus told Ridley this and he responded by incinerating her mother]]. When they returned to investigate the carnage, Old Bird was the one who found her amidst the ruins and basically strong armed Grey Voice into adopting her. After the events on Zebes that decimated the Chozo population and killed Grey Voice, Old Bird led the precious few Chozo who survived into hiding, leaving their ultimate fate unknown.
*'''Quiet Robe''': The first living, breathing, unmasked Chozo to ever be portrayed in the flesh in a Metroid game. Quiet Robe rescued Samus from the clutches of an E.M.M.I. during her mission on ZDR and informed her as to the identity of her true enemy on the planet, Raven Beak. Leader of the mawkin. Quiet Robe revealed to Samus that the Thoha Tribe, to which he was the sole survivor of, were the Chozo who were responsible for the creation of the Metroids and the only ones with the genetic code capable of controlling them. After informing Samus of what the E.M.M.I were programmed to steal, Quiet Robe was assassinated by a robotic Chozo Warrior. Later, his body was infected and controlled by an X-Parasite who used his knowledge to re-activate all the remaining E.M.M.I and send them after Samus.


'''Luminoth''': Giant bipedal moth people, the Luminoth are an elder race much like their Chozo buddies. Unlike the Chozo, the Luminoth are still around and kicking (if only barely. With only a few dozen of them left, they are all but extinct thanks to their war with the Ing, though the war has ended, and they are now recovering). They are known to have met and collaborated with the Chozo on a few projects, as well as assisting the Galactic Federation with cleaning up residual Phazon on their planet, but they have not done much since.
*'''U-Mos''': The last sentinel of the Luminoth, U-Mos was charged with watching over the remainder of his race (who were in stasis at this point) and defending the final remnants of planetary energy remaining on the original Aether. While initially wary of Samus (and despite her initial distrust of him), his heartfelt pleas for her to save his people and planet, as well as the threat the Ing would possess should they escape to the galaxy at large/the universe as a whole (Metroid is inconsistent on whether it's intergalactic or not) gained Samus' cooperation. To aid in her one-woman war, he eventually gifted her the slick-as-hell Light Suit. Notably considered to be a pretty young man; especially for someone entrusted with the duties of chief guardian and head of state; by the standards of his species at 250 years of age though he mostly got the job because nearly everyone with more experience was dead by the time he was elected. Kind of like a twenty five year old ending up as head of the administratum or Captain General of the Custodes.

'''Alimbics''': Yet another elder race, the Alimbics were insectoid-like beings who, like the other elder races, had a thing for science and technologies of borderline magic. Originally from another galaxy altogether, the Alimbics engaged in some minor trading of tech with a variety of races such as the Chozo, Vhozon, Kriken, etc. Ultimately, a love-craftian horror named Gorea came to their civilization and began assimilating their race to grow stronger. The leaders of their race sacrificed themselves in a process to seal Gorea away in an alternate dimension. The fate of any remaining Alimbics (who weren't assimilated) isn't entirely clear, but they're presumed to be either extinct or in the same plane of existence their leaders went into upon sealing Gorea.

'''Baby Metroid''': The last "natural" Metroid in existence, this infant Metroid hatched right in front of Samus just after she had slain the last Queen Metroid. It immediately imprinted on Samus, who couldn't bring herself to kill a defenseless baby. She quickly took it to a Galactic Federation research lab for safe keeping, only for Ridley to show up, kill everybody on the station and steal the metroid. Samus eventually found the Metroid on Zebes, who had grown to massive proportions of its original size and nearly killed her before recognizing her as her "mother". It slinked off in shame before intervening in Samus' fight against Mother Brain, draining the later's energy and feeding it to Samus. Turns out MB didn't really appreciate this, and so she killed the Metroid before it could attack again. (which caused it‘s surrogate mother to go on one hell of a rampage) This would have been the end of the story if not for the fact that the Federation would later use what genetic samples they had of this metroid to later save it's mother's life from that X infection.

===Enemies===
'''Ridley''': Sometimes heralded as the leader of the Space Pirates, other times just a high-ranking warlord or an enforcer, Ridley is one of the most evil fucks in the galaxy/universe. Despite being a fully sentient and highly intelligent being, he takes extreme pleasure in the bestial brutality of indiscriminate slaughter of anyone or anything unfortunate enough to be on the same planet as him. [[Grimdark | His sadism even goes so far as to gloat to Samus who was at the time, only a teenager and was caught in her first ever PTSD episode about eating her freshly murdered parents (while mimicking their voices) before promptly killing her adopted chozo-dad]]. What's worse, is that in most cases he kills people just for the shits and giggles (which, by Nintendo's standards, is pretty damn dark) rather than to fulfill some ulterior motive or power play. He joined the space pirates as an enforcer of its mysterious High Command not for any higher goal or even for his own gain, he's only in it because he likes to hurt and kill people and the space pirates were the army that would let him do that the most. As mentioned above, he currently holds the Nintendo record of fastest respawn times (Even Ganon from LoZ usually takes at least a lifetime or longer to reincarnate, Ridley just pops back a week later like it's just another damn day at the office). While most Nintendo villains are evil in a grand, cosmic way; Ridley is mean and cruel in a very personal and ugly way and his opposition to Samus is born entirely out of personal rather than destiny related reasons and ideology is only in play to the extent that "I deserve to have fun by killing and torturing people" versus "That's really fucked up" is an ideological conflict. As of Metroid Dread, he has yet to reemerge in some shape or form, so for now it is modestly safe to assume he has perished permanently. Until some Space Pirates eventually pull back the curtain on a secret clone army of the dragon, at least.
*The only major Metroid games Ridley is absent for are Metroid Prime 2, Metroid Prime Hunters and Metroid Dread. He was formerly absent from Metroid II: Samus Returns, but a cybernetic iteration of him randomly popped in to fill the role of final boss in the remake of it.
*While the Metroid Prime, Mother Brain, and High Command are all more influential or powerful than he is and he's always operating as someone else's soldier, he's Samus' arch-enemy, not them. As mentioned before, Samus' conflict with him is almost entirely driven by personal reasons and at the same token, he's the only reoccurring villain who definitely opposes her for reasons beyond being an obstacle in his plans. The others are her enemies or villains; only he can genuinely claim to be her nemesis.

'''Kraid''': A massive, morbidly obese Godzilla that serves as another high-ranking Space Pirate commander. Despite having a position similar to Ridley's, he's not remotely as revered or competent as his draconic counterpart; a detail likely noticed by most of the Space Pirates in charge of rebuilding Ridley every time Samus kicks his ass. To that extent, Kraid has only ever stood in Samus' way twice, both times on the planet Zebes (it's entirely probable that his size prevents most conventional ships from moving him anywhere else anyways). Even though he was planned to show up in Metroid Prime in a deeper section of the Phazon Mines, it wasn't until Metroid Dread where he makes a re-appearance chained up in a facility with no explanation or fan-fare as a boss fight. Samus was resolutely unimpressed with his reappearance and dispatched him rather effortlessly.

'''Mother Brain''': A giant, literal brain that functioned as something of an overseer for the Chozo society. Over time, she grew rather sick of cleaning up after Space Pirate raids and the Chozo's new pacifistic outlook on life and began wishing to instill her concept of "order" unto the galaxy/universe. To this end, she conscripted Ridley and the Space Pirates to act as her personal army in a bid to take control of the Galactic Federation to achieve this goal. She also seemed to think that the Metroids are the perfect life form, and sought to evolve them into a fully intelligent race. Suffice to say, between her second death and the extinction of Metroids, the odds of her goal being realized are real fucking slim.

'''Space Pirates''': These awesome fuckers have been the biggest thorn in the Federation's side since god knows when. The exact nuances of their government and society at large aren't really clear (different games show them as Arthropods or Reptoids, not helped by the official stance they are an amalgam of many species) but they are an extremely militaristic race that tends to have a [[ork | "might is right"]] mentality. Despite this, they are still a fairly advanced race in their own right and are capable of creating (crude) technology that allows them to rival the Galactic Federation. Unlike the Federation, the Pirates are much less concerned with the safe applications of said technology, so much of their newer or experimental technology tends to be considerably less refined than their GF counterparts. Their tech also tends to suffer from particularly fatal flaws (such as notable vulnerabilities to specific beam weapons, or high equipment temperatures making them liable to explode). The R&D aspect of their technology also tends to have a staggering mortality rate on the personnel testing it, a hilarious example being when they tried (and failed) to copy Samus' Morph Ball. After ''Prime 3'' and ''Super Metroid'' they have been almost completely defeated, having lost both their homeworld and their backup bases on Talon IV and Zebes, though as with any video game antagonist it wouldn't be hard to bring them back if Nintendo really wanted.
*'''Disciples''': A sect of Space Pirates who worship Phazon as a holy substance, and Dark Samus as their new goddess. During ''Prime 3'' they held most of the political power in the Space Pirate hierarchy, though the destruction of Phaaze means any survivors probably aren't high on the totem pole any longer.

'''Ing''': When Aether was hit by a Phazon-infused meteor, the impact in tandem with the Phazon reacting with the natural energies of the planet split Aeither between two dimensions of reality. Most of the Phazon and half of this planetary energy shifted over to the half that became known as 'Dark Aether'. This realm became populated by the Ing, literal daemons of darkness who possessed and killed things in the original Aether (not necessarily in that order either, their possession abilities aren't even limited to organics which the Luminoth found when the Ing turned their war machines against them) in order to slaughter the Luminoth and steal the remaining energy to stabilize their dimension and erase the original planet. Once Samus drained every bit of planetary energy and murdered their Emperor, the entirety of Dark Aether imploded upon itself, taking the rest of the Ing with it ([[Grimdark|many of whom were so desperate to escape their apocalypse they tried to force themselves through an unstable portal to a realm that's atmosphere would've very likely killed them anyways]]). This is kind of noteworthy, as this is the first instance of complete and utter genocide Samus has committed against a fully sentient (if strictly hierarchical and extremely hostile) race to the point of extinction.
*Metroid Prime 3 gives a hint to their origins with a minor enemy known as the Phaaz-Ing which looks and acts an awful lot like a recoloured version of an Inglet. It's likely that the Ing Horde was birthed from a collection of Phaaz-Ing that hitched a ride on the leviathan heading towards aether and were mutated by the dark dimension when Aether's bizarre energies sent the meteor into another dimension.

'''Dark Samus''': The first of Samus' doppelgangers, Dark Samus is an ''extremely'' mutated Metroid first appeared as titular final boss in Metroid Prime. After it was defeated by Samus it survived by stealing the Phazon Suit to effectively turn into a deranged murder-clone of her. While she was relatively directionless on Aether, she eventually became obsessed with spreading Phazon corruption to every known planet of importance. Due to being almost pure Phazon, Dark Samus' personality is twisted and manic. The Space Pirates corrupted by her came to see her as something of a prophet or harbinger, with many all but worshiping her. Her final death came with the destruction of the planet Phaaze, which effectively cause all Phazon to become inert and fade away.

'''SA-X''': The Samus Aran X-Parasite was created shortly after a Federation sponsored visit to the recently de-Metroided SR-388 when one of the little STD blobs crawled into Samus' suit. After promptly infecting and copying her at the height of her power, it began wreaking havoc on the Space Station it was contained in. By the time Samus was strong enough to face off against it, it had asexually reproduced into no less than 10 copies of a fully powered Samus. All these copies are presumed to be destroyed along with the entirety of SR-388 and the Space Station they were held on. Unlike Dark Samus, this thing might have copied some of the original's personality, though mostly it seemed to imitate just the part that was obsessed with murdering metroids. Given that the X-Parasite mimicking Quiet Robe willfully sacrificed itself to bring Samus' metroid form under her control so that she could escape the about-to-explode planet ZDR, it may be more towards the former.

'''E.M.M.I.''': Extraplanetary Multiform Mobile Identifier, E.M.M.I.s are cybernetic probes created by the Galactic Federation for the express purpose of tracking down and identifying potential X-Parasites on a recently identified planet known as ZDR. To do this, they made these things out of "the toughest stuff" in the galaxy, to wit, none of Samus' conventional weaponry can damage an E.M.M.I. under any circumstances. Of course, all the E.M.M.I. sent to ZDR went rogue and now want to take a sample from Samus... by impaling her with a massive proboscis-like needle. Upon encountering Quiet Robe, he reveals that Raven Beak has re-appropriated the E.M.M.I., equipped them with some of Samus' stolen gear and has tasked them with extracting the Metroid DNA from within her so that he can create an army for galactic conquest. As their acronym suggests, E.M.M.I. adapt their forms to better track their prey. As far as Samus is concerned, she has to spend a majority of her time fleeing from these robots, as the most she can do is ''potentially'' escape their grasp if they manage to pin her. Why the Federation thought designing a droid this difficult for their top bounty hunter to deal with when she's still working for them is an enigma at best. Fortunately, by the time Samus encounters the last E.M.M.I, she's able to dispatch of them by using her Metroid abilities to simply drain them of their energy.

'''Raven Beak''': An evil Chozo who leads the warlike Mawkin Tribe. The Thoha Tribe contracted him to stop the Metroids after they ran out of control on SR388. He obliged in their request, but upon the the Thoha requesting that they destroy SR388 to ensure the Metroids and X-Parasites couldn't pose a threat, Raven Beak betrayed and slaughtered them. Raven Beak instead decided to hop on the bio-weapon bandwagon and use the Metroids as weapons for galactic conquest, only sparing Quiet Robe from the Thoha genocide as a means to control them. However, his plans were delayed slightly after it was revealed that an X-Parasite managed to infect one of his soldiers and was wreaking havoc upon ZDR, the Mawkin base of operations. By the time Raven Beak managed to contain the X-Parasites, all of his soldiers had succumb to the parasite, leaving him as the sole survivor. Undeterred, Raven Beak set out to resume his plans for the Metroids, only to discover that while he was preoccupied with the X, Samus had wiped out all the Metroids on SR388. Again undeterred, once he discovered that Samus had been inoculated with Metroid DNA, he shifted his plans to capturing Samus to harvest her DNA. To this end, he leaked footage of an X-Parasite to the federation and captured all the E.M.M.I. units dispatched to investigate by the time Samus got to the planet. Though he was originally planning on simply killing Samus during their initial encounter, his plans shifted once he noticed Samus' latent Metroid DNA was beginning to awaken. Thus, he knocked her out, stole most of her powersuit's equipment and disseminated them to the E.M.M.I under his control and engineered a majority of the trials Samus had to endure with the intention of fully awakening her powers for his personal use.
*Raven Beak thus far is the most powerful opponent Samus has ever faced (you don't survive an outbreak of X-Parasites by being easy to kill); even at full power, he is able to best Samus in combat in both of their encounters, Raven Beak emerged victorious. Only upon Samus' metroid powers fully awakening did he lose against her.
**Raven Beak is the source for the other half of Samus' Chozo DNA infusion, providing the martial prowess the Mawkin (and by extension, the former Chozo people) were known for. In a sense, this effectively turns him into Samus' bird Darth Vader-dad. This relation does little to prevent Metroid-Samus from going full [[Doom|Doomslayer]] on him.

===Bounty Hunters===
While all of them were or are enemies of Samus, a few of them were allies for a short time, or would otherwise be likely to ally with her in normal circumstances. Their motivations also continue to prove that Nintendo still only has a tenuous understanding of what a bounty hunter actually is.

'''Sylux''': A "Bounty Hunter" who apparently has a hate-boner for the Federation. All that's really known about him is that he's native to the planet of Cylosis, he stole his power suit and the Shock Coil weapon from the Federation and when he's not spending his time killing their outlying forces, he's stalking Samus across the Galaxy/Universe. Unlike the other hunters introduced in his debut game, it seems that Nintendo has actual plans for him. Plans big enough to build an entire trilogy around him as either an antagonist or Deuteragonist. (Hunters, likely Prime 4 as well)

'''Rundas''': An alien bounty hunter with cryokinetic powers, Rundas was initially employed alongside several other hunters to work with Samus on Norion. He had your typical cool-guy type attitude with an arrogant flair, but was at least competent enough at his job to justify ''part'' of it. Among other things he saves Samus from falling to her death. Following his corruption and deployment to a planet called Bryyo, he lost his mind and was enthralled to Dark Samus. After being defeated by Samus, he regained his sanity, though either upon realizing what he'd done or possibly Dark Samus' overriding his will, he killed himself with his own ice powers before having his essence absorbed by Dark Samus. Visually, he kinda looks like a Wraithlord from 40k. (Prime 3)

'''Ghor''': A cyborg bounty hunter who [[This guy | would often donate his rewards to the victims of his marks]], Ghor utilized his space ship as a mech suit to murder the hell out of any Space Pirates in his way. He has a weird sort of split personality thing where out of his mech suit he's like a kindly robo-grandpa, but when he's in the suit he becomes EXTREMELY ANGRY AT EVERYTHING ALL THE TIME. He's also something of a tech expert (being a cyborg, this is unsurprising), and is able to remotely access computers and networks with a flick of a hand. Despite falling to corruption much like his bounty hunter colleagues, Ghor regained enough mental clarity to tell Samus how to repair the damage he inflicted on an orbital station and its resident AI overseer before retreating to attack her ship. Much like Rundas, he too was consumed by Dark Samus upon his defeat at Samus' hands. (Prime 3)

'''Gandrayda''': A Shape-Shifter who can copy the appearance and some abilities of other people/races, Gandrayda was an arrogant show-off bitch who was skilled at infiltration (a shape-shifter who specializes in infiltration, shocking, I know) and liked to toy with her targets before killing them, usually as one of their supposed "allies". Unlike the other two bounty hunters who were corrupted, Gandrayda actually seemed to embrace her new powers and role under Dark Samus and above her Space Pirate legions. Just like the two hunters before her, however, she was defeated and ultimately slain by Samus and Dark Samus, respectively. (Prime 3)

'''Weavel''': The only other named Space Pirate. During one of her raids, Samus wasn't as thorough as she thought she was and didn't quite kill Weavel, just horribly maim him. Thankfully, some of his chaps had enough tech that all they really needed was his brain and spinal column and shoved that into a robotic shell that could split in half and turn its legs into a battle turret. Since then, he's been a bounty hunter for the space pirates, causing chaos wherever he can. An interesting note is that his anatomy is practically human in design when most Space Pirates are digitgrade insectoids with crab-claw hands. Possibly was an attempt to replicate Samus' power suit, since it'd hardly be the first time they've tried. (Hunters)

'''Kanden''': An individual from a race called "Enoema" who was used as an experiment to create an ideal super-soldier. The process worked, physically speaking, though Kanden's mind couldn't handle whatever the hell they did to him and caused him to go insane. Evidently, he now has the single-minded goal to become the single greatest bounty hunter in existence, and is willing to kill anyone or anything to prove it. He uses his Volt Driver and the electromagnetic field he emits to disrupt enemy suit systems. (Hunters)

'''Trace''': A member of the insect like Kriken, Trace is currently undergoing the rite of passage for his people: to find a suitable planet to conquer or to claim powerful technologies to help the Kriken Empire become stronger than the Galactic Federation or any force of Space Pirates. He happened to decide that the Super Weapon all the other hunters were also seeking happened to be the perfect prize, and so joins the rat race for it. He fights primarily by sniping at long range, or by cloaking himself and ambushing his prey. (Hunters)

'''Noxus''': One of the few bounty hunters on this list that actually has some sense of morality, Noxus is a Vhozon who uses his position as a "bounty hunter" to basically be Batman without the whole "no guns" policy. His conflicts with Samus were primarily because he believed she was just as unworthy as all the other hunters who were looking for the super weapon mcguffin featured in Hunters, or simply because he only trusted himself to keep it out of the wrong hands. Any other day of the week, it's likely that he and Samus would probably get along just fine. Has a notably goofy alt-mode in that he literally just hugs his legs to his chest and spins around on his tip toes like a top and attacks by sticking his arm out to hit things. (Hunters)

'''Spire''': A morally neutral dude who's the last surviving member of the Diamont race, all he wants to do is find out what the hell happened to his people (who mysteriously vanished without a trace). Evidently his job as a "bounty hunter" helps him get around or access any information he seems to deem important for that cause. Likely the only reason he had any beef with Samus is because he thought that the Super Weapon everyone and their dog was looking for could give him answers to what happened to the Diamonts and he didn't want to risk losing the opportunity to someone else. (Hunters).

===Misc===
'''Phazon''': An organic, highly radioactive substance that can be utilized as an extremely high-yield energy source, but is likewise extremely toxic to almost all organic life exposed to it. This semi-sentient substance, when left to its own devices, perpetuates itself by corrupting any nearby matter (organic or no) and converting it into yet more Phazon. Unrefined, Phazon often takes shape as lightning blue and black tendrils or actual physical crystals. Refined or pure Phazon takes the form of a gel-like fluid, and as can be expected, is considerably more potent in both energy yield and in its mutagenic effects on lifeforms. Exposure to Phazon, even briefly, can have severe detrimental effects on the physical and mental well-being of anything that comes into contact with it. In the "best" case scenario, individuals corrupted by this substance gain powerful new abilities and become stronger and more resilient, but they often become psychotic, erratic and extraordinarily hostile towards anything and anyone else. In most cases, creatures or individuals will die horrible, painful deaths caused by unstable, uncontrollable mutations. Select few creatures can ever find a "happy medium", but the few who survive are often still very unhinged and often have dramatically reduced life spans from the prolonged exposure. The substance itself originates from a planet called Phaaze, which was effectively a single massive super-organism. Phaaze "reproduces" by gestating massive Phazon meteors named Leviathans within it's womb (yes, the planet actually has functioning genitalia) then hurling them into space with the hope that they impact a planet. Upon impact, the Leviathan selects and heavily modifies a powerful creature to act as a guardian for the Leviathan itself (the namesake Metroid Prime and Emperor Ing were two such guardians) while it begins to spread Phazon throughout the planet. Had Samus not destroyed all these Leviathans, they would have eventually transformed their host worlds into more Phaaze planets. Dark Samus, once she got her shit together, implanted a sophisticated Galactic Federation AI into Phaaze and used it to forcibly launch Leviathans at specific worlds in an effort to subdue/destroy all other life in the galaxy/universe and turn everything into Phazon. Ultimately, Samus managed to destroy all of Dark Samus' leviathans and, true to her reputation, permanently ended the Phazon threat by blowing up Phaaze (which somehow rendered ''all'' Phazon completely inert, which begs the question of how sustainable Phaaze's reproductive system would actually be - maybe the Phazon only becomes independent when it fully creates another Phaaze?). Was ripped off in the expanse by the proto-molecule.

'''Metroid''': The eponymous creature for which the franchise is named, Metroids are artificial creatures created by the Chozo specifically to combat the X-Parasite they discovered on SR-388. The initial form resembles a floating jellyfish with two sets of fangs instead of tentacles, however many different evolutions and sub-breeds spawned depending on what forms of energy they have consumed or been exposed to, though the "traditional" life stages involve Metroids metamorphizing from floating jellyfish into [[Tyranid|massive insect/dinosaur hybrids]]. On this note, Metroids derive sustenance entirely from energy; primarily by rapidly draining the life force out of any living creature (and any powered armors they also may be wearing) until it turns into a withered husk and crumbles to dust. This, combined with their surprising resilience to most conventional weaponry makes them extremely dangerous and apparently prime candidates for weaponization through both the Space Pirates and Galactic Federation. That said, they do have a notable vulnerability to extreme cold and ''can'' still be killed by sustained, concentrated fire. Eventually, the Galactic Federation officially recognized the danger they possessed to the galaxy/universe at large (while being completely unaware of the X-Parasite that was being kept in check by them), and ordered Samus to commit full-scale genocide on them.

'''X-Parasite''': The "original" life consuming entity on SR-388 (seriously, that place could put many-a death world to shame with the kind of fauna regularly growing there), X-Parasites are roughly basketball sized yellow blobs that infect organic creatures, consume them from the inside while propagating rapidly, then ultimately kill their original host and shape-shift into near perfect copies of them. If their mimic-body is killed, they can even just make a new, identical body a few seconds afterwards if their true forms aren't killed in time. They also assimilate the host's memories in order to properly mimic the creature, and can utilize that knowledge for their own gain. Once they realized the threat Samus possessed to their species they attempted to scuttle the station with her on it. In the form of a BSL scientist they utilized the host's knowledge to destabilize the main reactor's cooling system to cause a meltdown and cause a destructive chain reaction. Later on, upon learning Samus's weakness to cold, they bred a cold sub-breed solely designed to chase down and kamikaze into her to freeze her to death by absorption. But after she acquires a way to mitigate this weakness and went through a room full of the new breed absorbing them all without harm they then flee just like the rest of their brethren. They're immune to almost all known weaponry and are able to infect people or creatures even through vacuum-sealed power armor, which arguably makes them more dangerous than the Metroids created specifically to kill them. This is especially true for creatures with cybernetic or robotic implants/cybernetics/equipment, as not only can they be infected by the X-Parasites, but their technological components can also be fully replicated. This includes but isn't limited to Samus' power suit, missile launchers, beam cannons and even [[what|gravity generators]]. Despite the Galactic Federation's intentions to the contrary, Samus has likely ensured their total extinction when she blew up the lab they were contained in alongside SR-388. Until it was revealed some had made it off-world to ZDR, which also got blown up, so they might be extinct now but since they've now gotten off-world before who's to say they didn't do the same elsewhere?

TLDR: An even worse version of what the monster from the 1982 movie 'The Thing' would have become if it landed on a zoo space station and not an area of barren tundra.