Disclaimer: This fanfic takes place in an alternate universe and adopts the basic features of the StarCraft setting to tell a brand new story.
Somewhere on Chau Sara, fourth quarter of 2499 A.D.
My mind burned with questions. Why the Overmind created us, our purpose for being here, what I should expect in the future… My brother felt my thoughts and soothed my curiosity.
"An exceedingly powerful race lives near the galaxy's fringe, on a distant and isolated planet called Aiur," explained Jormungand. "We know them only as the Protoss, the First Born."
First Born? Born of who?
"You seek too far ahead, Jormungand. You have not explained how things came to be," came the voice of Garm.
"Must you always question our methods?"
"Indeed I must. Is that not why I was born? Without knowing your flaws, how am I to serve alongside you most efficiently?"
Jormungand paused for a moment. "Speak… truth."
So Garm began his tale.
"Long before the legacy of the Zerg, even before the creation of the Overmind, there existed the Xel'naga: beings possessing powers so immeasurable, they were able to create entire races—such as our own. The Protoss too were created by the Xel'naga. They were the first creation, gifted with a purity of form. And we were the second creation, blessed with a purity of essence. Indeed, our two species are but opposite facets of a greater whole."
At this Jormungand interjected, "Did I not bid you speak truth and only truth?"
"I do! Tis all true," whined Garm.
"Literally, perhaps. Yet the Protoss sullied their purity of form with individual egos, warring against their gods and provoking the Xel'naga into fleeing into the void of space. They do not now possess that purity, if ever they did. Nor did the Xel'naga create races: they steered the evolution of that which already existed. On the ashen wastelands of Zerus, they uplifted an insignificant burrowing parasite into the doom of worlds. So humble was the beginning of ones such as we."
Garm scoffed and continued. "As you wish, I shall bore our little brother with the details. Our makers gazed upon our glory and declared us the perfect lifeform. We exceeded their expectations, we consumed them, and ultimately we surpassed them."
"Such memories!" cried Jormungand, his voice burning with desire and nostalgia. "We consumed Zerus and the whales from beyond the stars! When the Overmind turned its gaze upon the world ships in orbit, twas we sent against that awful might. The first of the brotherhood that now spans the stars! Under Tiamat's wisdom we led our billions upon billions against those mighty hulls. Beaten and battered, we never shied away! He found their weaknesses and we tore through their sorceries like meat and sinew. We partook the fruit of wisdom, knowledge and eternal life. We feasted upon the souls of gods and became as they."
I could scarcely imagine it even with the memories streaming before me. Great windowless vessels of basalt hanging in the skies, glowing with the bluish light of arcane runes. Billions of my brethren carried by leg and wing, streaming forth as a great horde only to burn under the light of a thousand suns! What a cruel universe, I proclaimed, that I could never partake of these events myself. I wondered what glory was denied me then and wept.
"Twas only the beginning," said Garm, assuaging my sorrow. "For millennia we refined their knowledge and sought to complete the Grand Experiment they had abandoned. We will assimilate the Protoss, cleanse their impurity, and evolve beyond our makers' wildest dreams. We will remake the universe in our image."
In proximity of planet ΡΓ-21578 IV, several millennia previous
The purpose of the Witness, the greatest work of zerg bio-engineering at that point in time, was to determine the locations of habitable worlds. In a galaxy of over four hundred billion estimated stars, the zerg worked tireless to perform this task. Even now, the Overmind still had yet to fully decipher the detailed genetic histories pilfered from the minds of the Xel'naga. As natives of a radioactive crematorium, it came as a shock to the zerg that such vastly different worlds than Zerus were remotely habitable. But then, life always found a way.
Nothing was certain beyond death and the harvest. The Overmind sent deep space probes to ascertain whether such alien worlds indeed harbored life. Any species discovered would be observed for a time to see if they offered anything of value to the zerg. If the swarms' interest was piqued by these surveys, a brood would be sent to perform a more detailed and rigorous analysis.
Ultimately, the probes could only learn so much.
The Fenris brood gazed upon the verdant world with a thousand eyes. It was the fourth planet of the 21,578th red giant identified by the all-seeing, never-sleeping eyes of the Witness. Their deep space probes had identified several species of note, but the one that caught his interest was the slothien. The species was a soft-ribbed gastropod that fed primarily on vegetation and tree bark scrapped with its thick mandibles and claws. It was covered in oily fur, but despite its docile appearance these hairs could be thrown at predators, causing irritation and mild paralysis. Though a harmless herbivore at present, Fenris thought, with the proper guidance these adaptations could be turned to quite lethal purposes.
"Abathur," he called telepathically.
Elsewhere within the miles of arteries that coursed through the behemoth, the bosom of a great, slug-like creature heaved and groaned. At one end of its body numerous tentacles writhed, tasting the sensations in the humid air. At the other, a bulbous knot of pulsating, glowing tumors pulsed and breathed almost with a mind of their own. Within this hideous bio-structure, the "evolution chamber" (cousin to the cerebrate or "brain bug" breed), a cage of ribs guarded the quiescent form of a maggot-like thing.
At the call, the maggot-thing opened its half-dozen eyes and rose on several sets of spindly legs. A mass of tumorous pustules across its back pulsed and glowed in unison with the evolution chamber that housed it. Abathur was awake and eager to feast.
"Organism Abathur will serve cerebrate," it responded robotically.
"Analyze the slothien's combat potential."
"Insufficient data."
Fenris paused for a moment, confused. "Insufficient data? Attempt an educated guess," he ordered.
Abathur's pustules dilated as it pondered this. "Attempting analysis... Organism: slothien. Observations: Arboreal lifestyle. Minimal aggression. Infantile morphology. Conclusion: Worthless strands. Advise immediate departure."
The evolution master's voice was devoid of malice or prejudice. As far as it knew, it was simply stating the facts. Garbage in, garbage out.
Fenris called to the behemoth and gave his first order. It descended upon the world below and the brood followed with it. A group of bulbous sacs, trailing waving tentacles, fell through the clouds and the tallest trees of the forests. The force of the blows opened many craters, creating a large clearing. Upon impact with the black, fertile soil, they split open like overripe fruit, spilling their contents. Grey mats of creep rapidly spread outward. A fleshy flower bud, the size of a hill quickly rose from one of the craters. A living wave of chittering things swarmed from the craters, literally overshadowed by the rise of massive shrimp-like blimps.
Insectoid creatures with many eyes glided forward on diaphanous fins, pincers clicking with excitement as they immediately headed towards the trees. As ones the drones carved through the wood, the timber falling within minutes of their ministrations.
Once the spawning pools were in place, the hunter swarm wasted no time in spawning swarm queens to aid in the task of spawning more hunters. Creep tumors were planted to expand the growth of the creep, for the photosynthetic lichen was ultimately the food source of all zerg. Hatcheries were inseminated with a cocktail of bio-toxins that maximized the replication of larvae. Masses of the wriggling creatures poured from the birth canals in torrents. Ever more drones were sent to gather lumber and other biomass to feed the creep and the growth of the brood. Long lines of drones stretched for miles from the primary colony, carrying endless bundles of sticks and small animals to be digested by the corrosive enzymes of the spawning pools. Broodlings and feederlings multiplied almost without end, consuming and digesting the increasing amounts of refuse produced by the growing tide of zerg.
Fenris dispatched flights of overlords and marches of drones to survey the rest of the planet for deposits of minerals and fossil fuels. Meanwhile, queens were dispatched to oversee the construction of nydus tunnels to more efficiently distribute resources between future colonies. Without nydus worms the process would require additional drones to dig the tunnels.
As the overlords searched the skies, they saw that the slothien were far from the only species of interest. The fourth planet played host to multiple biomes. In the tundras south of the temperate forests, the descendants of the Gargantis proximae observed the movement of vast herds of strange, armored hulks that scurried on many rows of hooves. If the Xel'naga records were to be believed, these were the docile, herbivorous brontolith.
Fenris looked upon this new species and his thousand maws drooled. He saw no spines, nor horns, nor claws, but he was impressed by the sheer size of the beasts. After analyzing hundreds of hours of collective observations by the overlords, he found no other species on the planet that could really match them so far. None of the predators, save for some of the pack hunters, posed much of a threat to the brontolith.
He knew this by the ragged, gaping wounds that adorned the creatures like religious trappings. The wandering herds were constantly followed by hordes of opportunistic ectoparasites. Flocks of winged things flapped rhymically in circles high above them while swarms of tiny jumping things nipped at their heels. The wounds were small, yes, but a thousand cuts kill as easily as one great gash. The armor, though thick, was not truly impervious. The buck beaks and incisors of the parasitic vermin could gnaw through it eventually.
Yet what stood out was a complete lack of any visible infection. The wounds always healed eventually. He saw no puffiness, no angry swellings, no weeping sores, no quivering pustules, no fungal growths, no worm-like endoparasites writhing beneath the skin. How could this be? He needed to know more!
A great saurian beast with a goatish beard stomped toward the center of the primary colony, pulling itself forward along massive, gorilla-like arms in an almost comical hopping gait. With several sets of eyes it regarded its surroundings and the progress of the new colony. It would probably be the better part of a month before the hive was mature.
Packs of wiry, lithe beasts with scaly manes stalked through the clearing on all fours. Two of them detached and loped to the side of the first beast, rubbing affectionately against its thighs. The ravasaur clicked its mandibles but remained aloof. Several nearby larvae mimicked its movements. Suddenly the beast chortled at this, making a horrible sound like cracking ice. They were the hunting swarm, that which dwelt in the fen. All were one within the zerg, the many that were it.
"Go forth," one of the overlords called to it. "The queens will nurse our young."
The saurian tensed and then burst into activity. Faster than the eyes could blink it had darted off through the foliage of this alien world. Shrubs and grasses crushed underneath its hooves and the calls of alien birds echoed in its ears. The wind roared across its skin and the sun beamed on its scales.
The trip across the stars had been too long. Fenris had not realized how much he missed this until he felt it once again. He wanted to hunt, to feast. He wanted to feel the warmth of blood in his mouth and the spray on his claws. He wanted to find new hosts for the microscopic zerg larvae coursing through his veins. He went forth as a conqueror bent on conquest, and hell followed with him.
A/N: Zerg broods have multiple names. Their autonym is their name for themselves, such as Daggoth, Nargil, Zasz, Araq and Auza; these are typically styled after Sumerian or Hungarian names. Their xenonym is the name applied to them by terrans, such as Tiamat, Fenris, Garm, Jormungand and Incubus; these are typically taken from monsters in terran mythology. In the story I will be translating their names as the latter because those are readily recognizable and convey cultural impression.