Star Craft: Contingency

By: The 483

Disclaimer: I do not own the rights to Star Craft

Spoiler Alert: Some spoilers, Light to moderate, are contained herein.

Chapter 10: Slightly Left of Center

The sound of chattering hordes and crunching bone. The feel of buckling steel and the rumble of distant explosions. The smell of blood and fear. The feeling of... home. She could feel the gibbering madness around her. The disoriented blurs of the criminally insane. The foggy murk of the failed resoc's. The clarity of the truly evil souls. It wafted around her like the vile steam of a sulfurous pond. And she could feel each one of them blink out, like the snapping of a taut wire as their life was ended by one of her extensions. No pain, no suffering, just a quick, merciful cleave of a scythe, or snap of jaws.

Once, she had been a puppet conductor, performing a symphony she didn't know, dancing upon strings she couldn't see. But when the strings were cut, she survived the fall that shattered her body, and through will and spite and anger, she rose, and she rebuilt her fractured self. Now, it was her show, and she was an orchestrator the likes of which creation had never before seen. The galaxy itself trembled at her coming, fearing the arrangements she could direct, but knowing, in their violence, there would be an unparalleled beauty to the composition, newer and better than any that had come before.

Once, she had been a tool. A sharpened stick used to gouge and stab at the enemies of her wielders. Then, she had been broken, and reformed into a hammer to strike back at those that had abused her. And when there were no more nails to pound, she had been tossed away, to be forgotten with the things that lived at the bottom of the garbage heap. Oh, but the things in the trash had different plans. The things in the garbage sheared away her corners, her doubt, her fear, her... self, until all that was left was and edge, sharp and brutal. As a axe she was used to carve large, bloody swaths through anything in reach, and predictably, with an over extended swing, she fell back, biting into the thing that swung her. And there she lay, to rust and decay. But, another old tool was not contented with that, even though it too had felt her bite. This tool picked her up, scraped away the rust, and hung her back in the shed, ready to be used again. And this time, it was she herself that would lift her off the hooks, and shape her in her own image.

Once, she had been a blunt instrument or pointless destruction. Now, she was a scalpel, a surgical tool of unmatched precision, able to excise a single problem with ease. Now she was cataclysm on a galactic scale, and extinction event that walked on two legs, and numbered in the numberless.

She was Sarah Louise Kerrigan. She was the Swarm. She was life, and she was death.

And... she was nervous.

(...)

Steel deck plates buckled and cracked under her feet. She could feel the rumble as her Zerg poured through the crippled ship, slaughtering convicts wherever they could be found, and the deeper reverberations as the explosives tore the ship apart around her. Oh, she could feel it in her feet, and through her leviathan, which was all that was truly holding the ship together anymore. It was odd, the deep new connection she shared with her swarm. She was more an individual then she had been in her previous incarnation, but she was also more her Swarm them ever before. She was herself, a discreet individual, but at the same time, she had dozens of other voices, sparked with solvency of their own, but still a part of her. She was akin to a galaxy, billions of individual bodies, but all held together by the gravity of her will, her overriding personality.

She could see, hear, and feel from each and every one of her extensions spread among the stars, all at once, or individually with the faintest whim, so easy as to be beneath conscious thought. But her thoughts now were all her own. A Marine charged her from a broken corridor, and without distracting her from her own thoughts, she raised a hand, halting him. There was a brief flash, and then all that remained was a shadow of ash on the bulkhead in the vague shape of a human. Ahead of her, a wave of Zerg crashed through the ship, her Zerglings and Hydralisks slicing through resistance, and the possessed prisoners soaking up grouped fire. She continued through at a steady pace, her wings darting out of their own accord to eliminate any creature not yet dead as she passed. Finally, she approached a sealed, heavy bulkhead marked with the maximum security. She pulsed the area, gauging the resistance on the other side, the dominions final stand on this ship. There was a concentration, dozens of marines and firebats, a handful of reapers and ghosts, and no less than 6 siege tanks.

Such resistance would have at one time stirred her to some feeling, but now, all that it presented was a slight impediment in time of her reaching her goal. Ionized air crackled and sparked around her hands as she drew upon her psionics to flood her arms with energy. She pressed her palms to the door, and the door was no longer there, but careened across the room, slamming into the lead dominion element, crushing a marine before it bounced clear. A flood of her Zerg rushed in, clogging the room with clawing bodies. When the tide of Zerg washed back out of the room, there was nothing but broken bodies, stains, and clumps of twisted metal. She pinged her surroundings, found him, and moved to the door. She reached for the lock... and hesitated.

This was the moment she had waited for weeks for. Her only thoughts since Arcturus had made the mistake of taunting her with him had been of retrieving him. But now, upon the threshold, suddenly she knew.

She was scared. She, The Queen of Blades, the center of the swarm, was afraid for the first time since she was abandoned to the very same creatures by those she trusted. She would have laughed at the absurdity, indeed, her corupted half was laughing at it, the fact that she was afraid of a single human above all else. Why? Because he was the only one that had believed in her, and she had, no matter how necessary it was, had betrayed him. True, she know believed in herself, a startling revelation in and of itself, but it all came back to him. She owed him so much, and had nothing to show for it.

She steadied herself as best she could, checked to make sure that no living Zerg were nearby, closed her out going links to her semi-sentient followers, gritted her teeth, and disengaged the locks. She knew that what happened next would be more terrible then anything she had dealt with since regaining her control, but it needed to be done. Even though her Zerg in the ship were little more then animate machinery, she still did not want them to see her as she faced this, and did not want to see herself through their eyes.

The door unsealed with a hiss like a startled gasp, and the slid slowly into the wall. She tensed, and entered the dim boxy room.

"Sarah?" The emotions hit her like the glare of a searchlight as he saw her, and with a rapidity as fast as thought itself, fell over her like a layer for freezing water as she came into focus. "What have you done." The blast was like a hammer to her heart; so violent she almost gasped with physical pain. Mixing with her own feelings, it grew, until she had to shutter herself from his mind, blocking the swelling anger, sadness, disappointment, and hopelessness he shot like arrows.

"What I... Had to." Her voice sounded weak, pitiful, but she didn't care. It burned her throat, but felt clean; the first sincere thing she had said in far too long. She could not meet his eyes. Even shielded, his rage, his... disappointment was palpable.

"Tell that to Fenix! Tell that to the millions you butchered!" He spat. Kerrigan flinched as if she had been struck, but there was no going back now. She had to do this.

"You swore, that you would kill the Queen of Blades." She closed her eyes, and stepped forward, grabbing his manacled hands. She pressed his special revolver, which she had carried with her since her first departure in his shuttle, back in Umojan space, into his hand. "You were the only one who ever believed in me." Her voice quavered with the depth of her sadness, and she lifted the barrel and placed it against her forehead. "Do you...still believe in me?" It came out almost as a whisper. And then, she waited.

He fired. Six shots, and then more, the hammer striking empty chambers, bullets impacting the metal wall behind her. She slowly opened her eyes, and looked up into his. She still did not read his mind. She could see all she needed in his eyes. "I...love you, Jim. Never forget it."

"We're done." He barked, and brushed past her, standing tall, his back to her. He turned his back full to her, and left the cell. Her Zerg in the corridor parted as he approached, not slowing, not afraid... or maybe not caring anymore. When he was gone, she heaved a watery breath, steadied herself, and pushed the raw pain to the back of her mind. There would be time to greave later. Now, it was time for blood.

(...)

Even with the emotion suppressed, she still shook until she was back in her Leviathan, surrounded by a cocoon of flesh. She felt better being clear of his presence, and the little dead spot in the ruins of her should was easier to ignore. She projected herself onto the bridge screen of the Hyperion. Valerian looked displeased.

"I have completed all of my obligations now, Valerian. I am moving on Korhal." He stared, calculating his words carefully.

"I would like to ask you to stall briefly, Kerrigan." Her eyes narrowed, and he rushed to continue before she got too mad. "I know my father must be stopped. I do not contest this. But my duty is to my people, and I would like a chance to try and get as many innocents out of Augustgrad as I can before the carnage starts." Kerrigan felt her fury build like stromclouds behind the front of a hurricane.

"Arcturus knows that I am coming. Every day I delay gives him a chance to better his defenses. Are you asking me to make the most difficult battle of my life even more so." She spoke through gritted teeth, her eyes dancing with malevolence. Valerian met her eyes, his features serious, and voice grave.

"Yes, I am." Behind the man, she saw Jim, sitting, legs drawn up, looking at her. Her anger faltered, and dissipated. She met Valerian's eyes, and gave a surprised and amused cluck.

"Hmm, maybe you are different from your father." He inclined is head a fraction of an inch in deference.

"Thank you, Kerrigan. Then I have time?" She made no outward sign o the annoyance she felt. Truthfully, her swarm was underpowered, and the recess would give her time to strengthen her ranks. Even with Dehaka and Stukov's broods integrated with her own, she worried she wouldn't have the numbers necessary to breach the strongest bastion in Terren space, and knew Arcturus had spent the 4 years before she was dethroned preparing for her to come.

"You will have until I can muster my Swarm. Perhaps a week at most." She was going to break the connection when he spoke again.

"Kerrigan, are you sure you are prepared for this? Is your Swarm strong enough?" She was going to snap, but he held his hands up, palms out. "I do not question you, but I have seen reports from the late General Warfields command, and even this ships scan of your current forces show your numbers are less then I would think is ideal." He gave a winning smile, the one he would call upon many times in the coming years, as he rallied the broken shell of the Dominion into something proud. "During our escape from the Umojan facility after we last parted, we encountered a Zerg controlled planet outside the rim of Dominion space." Matt, waiting for the cue, attached a set of coordinates to the channel, and Kerrigan scanned the quizzically. She extended her senses, and felt the space around the listed location.

"I have no Zerg in that space." His face showed that he had expected this response.

"I assure you, Kerrigan, that, based on our experience, there is Zerg there. Zerg derived from your Swarm. Millions, we believe, but, more likely tens or hundreds of Millions. A jump to that system would not interrupt your preparations to heavily, and would give us both a little extra time to strengthen out positions. And, if you can reclaim these Zerg, it will make you that much more able to stop my Father."

It was a persuasive argument, and somewhere in the back of her mind, the coordinates tickled her memory in a maddening fashion.

"Very well, Valerian. I shall reconnoiter this area. But be prepared for me to start the assault when I return." She closed the channel before he had a chance to reply.

(...)

Kestrel awoke slowly from a peaceful sleep, her nerve cords laying about her face in no discernable order, and would have looked out of place on the backdrop of the white pillow had anyone outside the room been able to see.. She opened her eyes, to find Willow sleeping in her arms. Kestrel smiled, and gently kissed her on the forehead before carefully untangling herself and rising, tucking the sheet back around her lover before leaving the pulsing room. She always enjoyed waking up with Willow. It was impossible to feel like a monster in these instances. She walked down the living hallways, trying to figure out what had woken her. She moved out of her personal quarters, located behind the center hub of her main Hive. The flooring changed from soft and fleshy to hard steel as she moved into the core of her Hive. Something was bothering her, lost amongst the billions of tiny points of data that comprised her swarm, but like a single dead pixel in a computer screen composed of billions of pixels, the error was hard to pinpoint. He chitin plated boots clopped on the steel floor.

The center of her main Hive had been lifted out of a Terran Command center, the hive itself grown into an around the massive steel cavity, and allowed her personal staff to coordinate with her swarm. She had grown Isis an extensional doppelganger in this hive, so that combined with the light gold and blue crystalline thing she had floating in a stasis field, all three prongs of her empire were united an she could quickly contact Human or Protoss through Isis.

A scant double dozen of people were seated at consoles or performing other odd tasks, the privilaged few who were not only unafraid to consort with her, but with whom she deigned to speak to. Early on, it had been only Willow, but as her human branch had grown as more nativees of her 3 planets had been assimilated, and her war forces reached a respectible number, she found it necessary to relay some communications herself, though Willow still handled aa majority of her personal needs, when it was busy, she needed multiple people to relay messages out across her people. One of these people who had not only speaking privliges with her, but could almost be considered a friend, rose from a chair and swaggered over.

"Boss, we may have a situation brewing." Kestrel turned to face the woman, her green eyes glowing softly in the dim, mostly terminal lit space.

Victoria Caverns was an Ghost who had managed to escape the Purge of the Ghost Program by having caught a blast of Terrizine gas on some backwoods planet, that wiped her conditioning Resoc and returned her faculties to her a mere week before the Purge happened. Her Operator, whom had placed her there, had been executed, but Victoria had never been recovered, and had been working for a small farming community out past the rim when Kestrels toothy blanket had swept over it. Now she was a trusted Lieutenant rated up there with Willow and General Williams. Her long, shiny hair was tied in a simple knot, her dark brown eyes looked merrily out of a pretty, angular face, and her build was trim, but slightly bulkier then Kestrels own. She still wore the old, faded and patched Ghost Bodysuit, but the white and grey armor plating and reactive camouflage cells were brand new, as was the Canister Rifle clipped to her back anchor mounts. The oddity was, that her suit was not covering her right arm, the suit and armor cropped from the shoulder cusp down to the edge of the black, marksman style glove she wore on her hand. Her arm flesh was a full sleeve tattoo of a jumble of green, thorny vines, with Rose flowers of Purple, White, and Red sitting on the shoulder, upper surface of the elbow, and wrist in that order.

"What is it?" She asked.

"Got a hit at grid 130x578. Unknown entities, one registering a 8 on the PI scale, another giving off dead wave readings but some other odd readings we can only catch sporadically, and one so far off the scale our computers can't even use the Archons as a referent." A chip of ice fell into the pit of her Stomach. There were rumors of a being that was like a super concentrated Archon floating out among the Protoss on her planets, but Kestrel could not have imagined something like that coming to her worlds. She minimized her foot print to avoid being found. Did the scattering of Protoss she had released to return to their home worlds tell about her, and this was the response? No... she did not think that was it. Even in there weak state, there would have been far more that the three odd readings that were reported. Fleets, legions of robots, and scores of infantry and combat walkers would have been deployed if that was the case.

"What does this look like to you?" Kestrel said, almost under her breath.

"Scouting action." The former Ghost said without hesitation. "Either that, or a would be invader with one hell of a set of balls on him." Kestrel felt another dot in her mind go dead, not like a unit being lost, but losing her connection with it nevertheless. Victoria suddenly looked thoughtful, listening to the feed through her suits comm set.

"Boss, a squad of marines has a visual on the party, but no hostile action has yet been launched. Orders." Kestrel heaved a heavy, weary sigh.

"Tell them to hold. If the party makes contact, have them alerted that an emissary is on the way. I think I need to go and see who has come to pay me a visit." He voice was level and bored, but inside, she felt a gnawing apprehension, and had a feeling things were rapidly going to change for her.

End 10.