here's a theory: if dark samus is in every way opposite of samus, wouldn't dark samus be male?

Yeah I'd have to agree with the previous review. And I know you're trying to get to the main story by passing the first few years, but it feels like you're rushing it too much. I am, however, looking forward to Gandrayda. She doesn't have enough fics.

So, this is a very different sort of K-2L fic, and I like that. It's showing a lot more of Samus' childhood, that she had friends, etc. I like all of that and think it should be done more often.

But, and I scrunch my nose here, I don't like much else about this fic. And let's start with the obvious things:

The second and third chapters are just way too short. Don't get me wrong, for literary effect that's entirely appropriate but it comes across as just laziness and chapter-padding when you skip through the years so quickly.

I would also say that the amount of author's notes is generally inversely related to the quality of the story you're writing. Writing is telepathy already. You don't need to tell us you're moving to age nine; that's the chapter title and you could tell us in the story anyway. I can see for myself that it's longer. Don't tell people not to flame, and don't explain what a chapter is really about or will be used for. The writing should speak for itself without you having need to re-frame it in or after every chapter.

I'm not a fan of Ropster, which I may be entirely wrong but seems a very obvious author surrogate, and not an especially compelling one. She's really, really freaking cool and capable and a ninja, and you promise this will all make sense later down the road, but it just doesn't work for me now.

Now, I do really like the idea of Samus being an entirely different person before the raid, Chozo training, bounty hunting. And if she's the foil to Ropster who is cocky and outgoing, that's great. But you don't need to load up cool attributes like it's points for skills categories.

The actual writing is serviceable, although you do a disservice to your readers by transitioning from place to place using "With Samus" or "With Ropster." Almost always there's a better way to do that.

But to go back to what I said at the beginning, this is a very different sort of K-2L fic, and I don't know I've ever seen anyone spend even a whole chapter on pre-raid idyllic life there. I'm hesitant about the Dark Prime and possible back from the dead stuff, but you might be able to do something really neat with that.

However, your single biggest problem is the most common: OC outshining the canon characters. I think if it seemed like less of an author surrogate, this could be a really good story, though.