Layla/Asteroid 7

Cavern
The enemies will change up once again in the cavern. This time, you will be forced to deal with sideways flying creatures that move in a wave and pass right through the walls and blocks of the stage. They do a hefty amount of damage if you touch them. Another enemy runs back and forth lobbing small energy orbs at you which you must avoid. Grenades can be very helpful against both enemies. Many time it may appear like you have to make some impossible jump to navigate the stage, when in fact, all you have to do is shoot out some of the blocks closer to the floor. When in doubt, shoot a brick. Always try to safely trigger spike falls before you actually have to pass beneath them. Early on, there is a section with three paths. Take the top one and when you reach the dead end, push down to warp to the floor. Although some crates look difficult to reach or destroy, there is a solution to hitting everyone. However, in some cases, they are not worth the effort or danger that you put yourself into in order to collect them, so use your best judgment. The entrance to the secret room is particularly difficult to reach. You will come to a chamber with three spikes suspended in mid-air. The third one is the one you need to jump on, so trigger the first two to fall. Then jump on the small ledge to the left, and jump off of it to right. You want to land on the left side of the spike without passing all the way over the center of it. If you manage this correctly, you should be able to press up and evoke an elevator without causing the spike to drop to the floor. Inside, you will find a large cache of crates, including many pistol upgrades.

Fortress
This fortress is large, but still not as complex as the one you visited on the fifth asteroid. Because of it's layout, you'll have to pass through a good portion of it to reach the end. The good news is that it's virtually impossible to miss the password disk before you reach the boss because they are found through the same elevator at the end (down for the disk, up for the boss).

There are a couple of oddities to this fortress. First is the gaps in the floor at the end of certain hallways (indicated by the black columns). These gaps take you to another level, and you also suffer the usual consequences. These are not good ways to travel around and should be avoided at all costs. The second is that a number of the elevators take you to the yellow "!" on the map in the fourth basement. If you see a down arrow with no lines on either side, that indicates that you will end up on the fourth basement. The only escape is through an elevator that takes you to the fourth floor (even though you go down).

You can use this fact to shortcut the stage just slightly. From the start, run to the first elevator on the first floor. Take it up to the second floor and run to the end of the hallway. Take the elevator down and you will find yourself in this section of the fourth basement. Run to the next elevator and take the elevator down, and you will end up on the 4th floor. Run to the end of the hallway and take the elevator down to the first floor. From here, you can finish the level out. Make sure you grab the disk first before taking on the boss, or you will not be able to collect it without revisiting the asteroid.

Boss
The boss of the seventh fortress looks a lot tougher than he actually is. Compared to the boss in the sixth fortress, he is actually much easier. This boss stays on the ground and doesn't move substantially fast. This makes him extremely easy to jump over when he gets too close so you can cross over to the other side of the room. He bullets at you which fly above your head. You don't even need to duck below them. The bullets he shoot travel at three speed; fast, medium, and slow. The slow bullets move at the same speed as him, and as he draws closer to you, it's not uncommon for all of his bullets to be traveling with him, so when you jump over him, you also jump over the slow shots. All you have to do is find a weapon that works and fire away.