Gatherer, Builder and Avenger
AN: This story takes place three months after the Zerg attacked and consumed Backwater Station.
"Revenge, at first though sweet, bitter, ere long, back on itself recoils" - John Milton
"Jim, are you really sure we should move in?" The burly marine breathed out a cloud of smoke out. He stared at his superior's face. Tychus bit down on his cigar, tasting the nicotine and tar in the corner of his mouth. He was actually being serious? Raynor continued on with his plan, pointing to the hologram of a planet.
"Karkii is a very important to Mengsk's troops. If we can capture the planet, the Dominion will be knocked on its ass and we will have fifty thousand warehouses full of minerals, more than enough to repair the Hyperion and our ships."
Tychus whistled a low tune at his comrade's comment.
"Damnit Raynor, and I thought you were the most sane of all of us. First we fight those Protoss Carriers, and now this? I like a good fight, but this is just getting risky."
"Since when we haven't we took a risky opinion before, Findlay? There are no other planets around this quadrant of space. If we abandon this opportunity, we may become essentially sitting ducks if we run out of Vespene to use,"
"Alright, I get the point Raynor. But I don't know if the morale of some of the Raiders will snap once I announce the news. We have been successful on crippling the Dominion, leg by leg, but some of them are still shaky, like those surviving colonists. Hell, they could turn tail and run off on us like sheep if they saw a bit of blood spraying."
"They already made the choice Findlay. There is no turning back on, not after what we fought through."
"Looks like I'll trust you again on this one."
The marine breathed in his cigar deeply, and released afterwards. He was ready to leave the conference room when suddenly…
The door opened up, revealing a marine standing at the door, wielding a sniper rifle. The marine was in a rusty suit, with several welding repairs decorating the armour.
Tychus glanced over on the pauldrons of the marine. The symbols on the pieces of armour were two M's and a knife.
"Wait, you're Mad Marco? What the hell, weren't you killed in Backwater?" In response, Marco roughly shoved Tychus aside and Marco aimed his rifle at Raynor's head.
Raynor ducked just as the bullet blasted out of the modified firearm's barrel.
Before the rogue marine could fire again, Tychus tackled him. Raynor kicked the gun out of Marco's reach. Marco was forced to stand, restrained by Findlay.
"If this is some elaborate attempt to assassinate me from Mengsk, he did a shitty job getting a gunman. Who the hell are you and how did you get on my ship?" Macro's opaque glass dome opened up, surprising both Raynor and Tychus. The mysterious marine was a teenager! He wore a wrinkled cap atop his head and he looked quite pale. It was obvious that the kid had no sleep in days and looked quite skeletal looking, with his eyes sunken in.
The teen spat out at Jim's bearded face, barely making a noise over a whisper.
"Raynor, you chickenshit. I finally get the pleasure of meeting you… in person."
Jim was puzzled at the enigmatic person.
"Who are you?"
"My name is… Leland, Carl Leland. But you know me better as one of your former faceless SCV operators. You left us to die in that Zerg infested hell hole, and I was to return the favour to avenge them all. All those innocent people, you left to rot to the mercy of those damn zerglings ripped them limb, by limb…" Leland broke down into tears, sobbing in emotional pain.
"Tychus, take him to the brig immediately. We'll have to question him later."
The bald man nodded, and dragged the treacherous Terran out of the room. Raynor followed afterwards, to speak to Captain Horner of creating defensive measures on covert boarding.