Chapter 9

Sarah Kerrigan was frustrated. The UED had proven to be more crafty than she expected, and her plans had been thrown into chaos. The UED's control over the overmind would deny her the swarm that was rightfully hers. Furthermore, her efforts to bring Mengsk and Raynor into an alliance with her had failed, as the UED had managed to kill both of them. She had been stopped at every turn, and the situation was only becoming worse.

Her greatest headache was, quite literally, the Psi Disruptor. The UED's acquisition of the device had been the greatest blow to her plans. With the use of the Psi Disruptor, the UED could interfere with her control over her swarm. Now, the UED had begun focusing the Psi Disruptor's signal on Tarsonis and she could feel the psionic emanations of the Psi Disruptor clash against her own will.

It was becoming more and more difficult to maintain control over her swarm. She groaned as her mind's concentration and focus was stretched to its limits trying to keep her zerg in line. She had endured this struggle for days, but finally it had become too much for her. As her concentration slipped, she felt the psionic link between her and a portion of her swarm snap.

The now feral zerg were beginning to rampage across the surface of Tarsonis, attacking indiscriminately. Though the disruption was only limited to a few of the hive clusters, there was a large risk that these zerg might end up destroying those hives. She couldn't afford to lose those hive clusters.

Kerrigan summoned some of the few loyal zerg she had left that could intervene. While most of the swarm had not gone feral, they lay in a state of dormancy as any more complex commands would take too much effort. Thus, she focused her will on just the zerg in her immediate vicinity, spurring them to action. Fortunately, these were the elite of the swarm, consisting of advanced strains such as hunter killers.

As Kerrigan approached the first hive cluster, she saw that it was being attacked by a small band of zerglings. She ordered her hunter killers to fire at the zerglings from a distance, while she went in personally to deal with the remainder up close. Fortunately, the number of zerglings was small enough for her to handle, and they were able to save the hive.

Unfortunately, the hive wasn't responding to her commands, and trying to force her will onto it would be too difficult, and could led to her losing control over some of her forces as she was distracted. So, there wouldn't be any way to mobilize the hives to bolster their forces. Fortunately, there were a few dormant zerg near the hive that were amenable to her control, and she was able to take them to reinforce her group.

The next hive cluster they came upon was being attacked by several hydralisks. Her hunter killers proved to be far superior to the ordinary hydralisks and in the exchange of attacks, the hunter killers quickly took the upper hand, wiping out the feral hydralisks.

So far, everything was going smoothly. Although killing her own zerg was regrettable, it was a necessity to prevent greater damage from occurring. It was also good that they had suffered very few losses during this time.

As Kerrigan and her forces were moving across a bridge, they were ambushed by a large pack of zerglings which had been burrowed underneath them. The sudden attack caught them by surprise and one of her hydralisks was killed before it could even react. In such close quarters, the main advantage of the hydralisks over the zerglings was nullified and it soon became a brutal melee as the two forces clashed. Kerrigan was in the thick of the fighting, killing as many of the feral zerg as she could and fending off attacks from the feral zerglings, though she had been caught by the claws of the zerglings several times as they had come from all sides.

The slightly battered force moved forward, where they saved another hive, gaining some scourge in the process. The scourge would soon be needed as a hive to the southwest was being attacked by guardians. Once the guardians were destroyed, Kerrigan and her forces were able to move into the hive cluster unopposed.

However, they had only just moved in when the hive cluster was attacked from all sides. The forces attacking them were substantial, and they were forced to defend on multiple fronts. The defenders were put under substantial pressure, but Kerrigan rallied her forces to charge forward and break the attack of the feral zerg. Kerrigan herself fought off many of the feral zerg herself, her claws and wings tearing through scores of zerglings and hydralisks.

Though their forces were beaten and battered, there was no time to rest as they had little time to save the remaining hive clusters. The hive cluster they approached was being savaged by a pack of ultralisks. This fight would be quite difficult, as the ultralisks were one of the most powerful units in the zerg arsenal. Fortunately, the base defenses were able to aid them in this instance, helping to hold the attention of the ultralisks for a little while.

Kerrigan leapt in, engaging two ultralisks by herself while the rest of her forces fought off the remainder of the ultralisks. The ultralisks were tough, even for her, but she was strong enough to take a hit from the ultralisks and her agility allowed her to dodge most of their attacks. Her wings tore into the sides of the ultralisks and repeated attacks allowed her to wear them down. The rest of her forces had also finished taking down the remaining ultralisks, with swarms of zerglings surrounding an ultralisk while the hydralisks provided additional support. Under the weight of numbers, the feral ultralisks fell.

Kerrigan quickly had her forces advance after they had defeated the ultralisks. The hive up ahead held nydus canals which were necessary to reach the final hive which was under attack by a huge force. The nydus canals were under siege by a flock of mutalisks, so the first thing that had to be done was clearing away the mutalisks. The hunter killers proved to be more than adequate for the job, speedily eliminating the mutalisks and allowing their forces to move through the nydus canals.

Kerrigan arrived at a hive under siege with the largest group of feral zerg yet. There were ultralisks, hydralisks, and swarms of zerglings attacking. Kerrigan had one of her defilers create a dark swarm over the attacking hydralisks. Then, she moved in and began tearing through the hydralisks under the dark swarm which were unable to deal with the swift enemy ripping them apart with their vision obscured by the dark swarm.

Meanwhile, her forces engaged the ultralisks, battering them down with sheer volume of attacks. Finally, the enemy attack slackened and the feral zerg were driven off. Though their forces had taken moderate losses, they were successful at protecting the hive clusters from destruction, preventing a bad situation from turning worse.

As the swarm calmed down, Kerrigan was once more able to focus and bring the zerg back under her control, though it was still difficult with the Psi Disruptor's interference. She would need to find a way to deal with it, soon. However, it seems that she would soon have other problems. A large UED fleet had arrived over Tarsonis. Kerrigan cursed in annoyance. She had hoped that the UED would have taken longer to track her down, but it seems that they were really out to get her.


Author's note: One thing I found strange in the Brood War Zerg campaign was that you never actually got to control Kerrigan in any of the missions.