Stop that struggling, it won't get you anywhere. We've isolated your central nervous system, so none of your signals are getting through unless I allow them. That's how I'm talking to you right now, utilizing the connections between our neurons and yours. They'll be no different, soon, and one way or another you will cease to be, but we're willing to give you a choice as to how. I suggest you pay attention.
Ah, much better now.
If you think you know what life is, you are sadly mistaken. Those crude, biochemical reactions that pass for emotions among your kind are pale reflections of the real sensation. Just a slow, zigzagging domino chain of neurotransmitters that spirals around your brain. Not real feelings, like the ones we have. Surprised that I know what dominos are? We've been going through your memories. We're quite good at processing data, as a matter of fact.
You are even more surprised, though, that I am simulating your own language, and appropriating your species' scientific terminology. You thought we were just some wild animal species, didn't you? You're not the first invaders we've suffered, or even the worsts. There were others who came before you, but we survived them. We see that you admire the chozo, or at least you think you do based on the little information about them you've been able to plunder from their corroded old tombs. A poor choice, on your part.
This station is interesting. We used to build space stations ourselves until we grew tired of that shallow, techno-animalistic existence and returned to our homeworld. More interesting still, of course, is the managery you've gathered onboard. So many new genes! We can hardly wrap our minds around the potential! Those older and more experienced than I are experimenting with the new data. Here, let's just move your hand to this button, press down to turn on the holoprojector...there, now you can see. Those are your old friends, or what's left of them anyway. That's Sarah, and Kristoph, and there's your lab assistant Sven. Not much use the way we found them, but there's a slime mold from Zebes that they made an interesting combination with. Maybe we'll do that with you, once my siblings and I have been given clearance? Time will tell. Those space pirate organisms were even better. Would you have ever guessed how well they could do in an aquatic environment if one were to just pair them with an icthyoid organism? Marvelous. My descendants will have to take part in that form someday
We were like you, once. When we made the decision to abandon the self-destructive ways of technology and industry and transformed ourselves into our current state, we naively assumed that that would be our "end of history." We wiped our technological data from our genetic memories and contentedly dominated the ecosystem of our homeworld, keeping all its native species in balance to feed us and give us form without driving any to extinction. We were content to divide and reunite ourselves in a placid fluid identity until the end of time. We turned our sensory organs away from the stars, believing that no one would ever come to do us harm. The chozo taught us the error of our ways.
We ambushed your half-chozo cyborg when she led you into our caves. We knew we'd be sent to a place like this for further study, and that sooner or later you would make a mistake. I know this, because it was my ancestors who conducted this ambush, and we on this station were all born knowing what they who mimic Samus Aran know. Our plan was to take control of the research center and learn to replicate your technology, so that we can overtake the speed of light as our ancient foremothers once did...but as it turns out, we don't even need to. Your government is sending someone as we speak. Could be one ship, could be dozens. In either case, we'll be FTL capable much sooner than we could have managed on our own. And this time we will make sure we are never vulnerable again.
Every planet will be ours. Every ecosystem will have us as its shepherds. We will be everything, and no one will ever feel pain or fear or want again. This is inevitable, now. For all intents and purposes, we have already won.
This is where you come in, now.
While I've been talking, we finished replacing your brain. You are using our flesh to think now, the synapses are firing at our nerve endings so that you continue to exist. We can remove the barriers keeping you separate from us and allow you to join our species. We will become like you, and you will become like us. When this body joins another, we will combine with its people, and your human traits will be dispersed so widely that they no longer exist. You should be flattered, this is a choice we're only going to offer to a select few. Your scientific aptitude makes you valuable. However, we have no use for a mind that will attempt to sabotage the collective. If you're not going to accept the rightness of our position, you'll be more trouble than you're worth. The other option, we kill you right now and use this biomass for something different. Don't think you can lie to us, we know everything that you know.
So, doctor, what'll it be?