(Just to clear the air, I am continuing this story. The message saying I was ending it was a joke. This story is going all the way to the glorious end)

(I realize the two week wait between chapters may have contributed to this, but I assure you that's just coincidence)

Disclaimer: Despite the extensive use of improvised lab rats, this story, is in fact, not science. Science has so far failed to provide us with giant monsters that kill things. Ones that aren't human, at least. Also, don't own it.

A guest reviewer has asked if there will be a sequel or another story involving Abathur in another universe. First off, even if I wrote a story like that, that wouldn't happen for a long time, not until Catalyst is complete, which will take, at the very least, another few months. A shorter sequel is a possibility. I'm kicking around an idea for it, although feauxen isn't exactly sold on it. A story with the same premise with another universe or another character is never going to happen. I am not going to write a story that's copied and pasted from another one. Yes, there are stories by other authors with a similar start. But this one is mine, and I'd like to say I've done a good job making it unique. I don't want to spoil that with another story with an identical premise. Another universe and another character is a possibility, but I don't have any plans for that. That said, the next fic I plan to work on has already been decided, but it will wait until after Catalyst is finished, and I actually have an idea what Dehaka I'm doing. With that lengthy rant out of the way, here's a transition joke.

(You may be in remission from pretending renditions of inferior transitions gave you anything like my delicious compositions)

Yeah, because your compositions always leave me...craving for more...sorry, I can't say that with a straight face.

(Also, major thanks to feauxen for writing most of the first scene. There is something about Luna that I find very difficult to channel.)

I may write Luna better, but Abathur is still beyond my reach. Without him helping write that scene...well, I would have been completely unable to finish it.

Also, I feel obligated to apologize for dragging the chapter release out so far. Without the drama I added to it, you probably would have gotten this a few days ago. Many apologies for that.

(Sweet Overmind there are a lot of ANs here now)

Catalyst

Luna was cold.

This made sense, of course, because it was December, she wasn't wearing warm clothing, and stone castles are quite drafty. Luna rather wished she were wearing warm clothing at the moment, but some gurdies had run off with all of hers. Or that was what her roommates had said. They often made up ridiculous creatures to blame on their own mischief. Still, she would need at least a warm robe and slippers in the morning. Fortunately, this wasn't the first time Luna's possessions had gone missing in such a fashion, so she hunting them down had become something of a second nature to her.

Shivering a bit, Luna walked purposefully into the uppermost level of the dungeons. This was where she usually found the barest essentials. Tonight, she really wished this wasn't the case, because the dungeons were even colder than the rest of the castle. As her breath began to fog the air, she noticed something out of the corner of her eye. It was a robe, perhaps even one of hers. She was reaching out to take it when, to her great surprise, it spoke!

"Cease contact," it said.

"Oh!" Luna squeaked as she hastily withdrew her arm. Then, with a start, she recognized the voice. "Abathur! How lovely to meet you here. Are you also looking for something?"

Abathur stepped into the light, looking slightly reluctant. "Wandering. No purpose."

Luna shivered again. "Just wandering? I don't suppose you saw any clothing as you wandered, did you?"

"Have not."

"Oh." Disappointment filled Luna, and she shivered again. "Do you think you could help me look?"

Abathur peered at her in his unique way. "Have extra. Can provide, if you lack."

Luna felt an unfamiliar warmth spread through her chest. "Really?"

"Yes," Abathur said, "Remain here." Then, he walked away.

Watching him leave, Luna was startled. Was he really going to help her? He'd sounded quite blunt, but he always sounded like that. As the minutes slowly, frigidly passed her by, something kept Luna clinging to the hope that Abathur wasn't like the others. That maybe he really would come back around that corner and-

Luna heard footsteps. He was back! As Abathur rounded the corner, a spare robe in hand, she couldn't help but run to him and throw her arms around him in an overwhelming hug. She saw him flinch defensively, nearly avoiding the contact like he always did, but for some reason, this time, he actually let her fully embrace him.

For about three seconds.

"Cease contact."

Luna obligingly let go, and eyed him critically. His heart had been beating quite quickly during her hug, and he looked to be breathing faster than normal. "Did you run all the way here, Abathur?"

"Were losing heat," he replied in his usual monotone, "Slower path, necessary?" As he said this, he held out the robe he'd fetched for emphasis.

Luna too the robe and wrapped it around herself. "No, I don't think so."

"Lacking insulation. Inefficient. Reason?" Abathur asked.

"I was…" Luna's mind raced. She fidgeted a bit, wavering between telling the truth and some of her usual fiction, when confronted like this. As indecisiveness took over her mind, her mouth began to describe the situation as she saw it, like it always did.

"My roommates stole all of my warm clothing and hid it. I'm going to need something to wear tomorrow, so I had to find it. When nothing was hidden in the common room...I kept looking." Luna's eyes widened. Even she was shocked at her openness.

Abathur peered closely at her again. "Temperature, potentially fatal. Motivation, unclear."

Luna admired the brickwork in the wall to their left. "I needed to find my clothing, or else someone might have noticed the situation, and I don't want people to think that I'm having trouble getting along with my roommates. I…" Luna wasn't really sure herself why she'd thought that going to such extremes was a good idea.

"Roommates, disagreeable. Why hide from instructors?"

"Because…because I don't know what will happen if the teachers do find out," Luna realized, "and I don't think I'd enjoy finding out."

Abathur stopped peering, and his face hardened. "Punishment, probable?"

Luna finished admiring the left wall's brickwork, and decided to compare it to the right wall's brickwork as she considered Abathur's question. After a lot of reflection, she came to two distinct conclusions; punishment was indeed possible, and the bricks were the same on either side.

"I...I don't know," Luna said, finally looking up at Abathur, "They may decide that I'm the problem, and there's no telling what would happen then. I've heard that muggles lock people like me up, and that wizards can't be all that different."

"Your imprisonment, illogical. Reasoning?" Abathur asked, a hint of worry present in his tone.

"Believing in nargles and crumple-horned snorkacks makes me crazy, you see," Luna explained. "And since being crazy makes me unfit to live in muggle society, it's not hard to wonder why wizards might be quite similar. If…if you hadn't started listening to my stories about them, I don't know what I would have done." And she really didn't. Abathur was the first person she had ever sought out at Hogwarts, and if he'd ignored her…

"Creatures, inspiring. Wish stories to continue." Abathur tone began to waver, and his expression became pained. "Potential imprisonment...upsetting."

"You know, that's possibly the nicest thing I've heard since arriving at Hogwarts," Luna said, "And if it isn't, you definitely said whatever it was that was nicer. You are an excellent friend, Abathur."

"Trying," Abathur replied humbly.

Luna cocked her head as she took that in. Her newest and best friend was certainly odd sometimes. "I'm glad you try, Abathur. I don't know that anyone else does."

"Others, try to stifle you. Unproductive. Bad decision. Wish to see full potential. Yours, better than most."

Luna carefully wrote her about that declaration confusion into her expression, and Abathur seemed to understand that she was asking him to elaborate.

"Your potential, limitless. Ideas, invaluable. Would hate to waste."

Luna felt a warmth rise up in her chest, and this warmth had little to do with the robe Abathur had given her. "Thank you. Although...in the interest of preserving all that potential, I think I should head to bed. Sleep is an essential part of life, after all."

Abathur jerked a hand toward her as if to physically restrain her, before he stopped and asked, "Returning to dorm? With terr- humans responsible for situation?"

"I won't be with all of the people currently responsible for my situation, Abathur. Not unless you feel like intruding?" Luna smiled saucily.

Abathur's hand dropped to his side and he stared at her, clearly confused, for several seconds. "Unclear. Are...joking?" he asked hesitantly.

Luna giggled. "Of course I'm joking, silly. You don't need to be so worried. When they see that I've brought back an unfamiliar cloak, my roommates will probably be scared out of their wits. I'll have my possessions back by morning, and it'll be a full week before they try anything else."

Abathur peered deep into her eyes and...was that approval on his face?

"Acceptable," he said.

That was approval on his face! Luna was so caught up in joy upon that realization that she hastily said goodbye and rushed off before tears of joy could show themselves. As she skipped merrily back to class, she couldn't get Abathur's look of acceptance and approval out of her head. No one had looked at her like that before, and it made her stomach squirm with warm little wiggleys that made her nervous and excited all at once. Luna had a friend, and he approved of her habits and quirks.

Oh, the things they would do together.

(Transition)

"Albus, there are days when I truly wonder whether you've gone senile. I should probably thank you for settling that question. Jaren is odd, yes, but possessed? Driven mad by an alien? I've heard more plausible theories in those 'books' written about Potter."

Dumbledore's eyes twinkled. "Pray tell, Severus, how do you know what is written in those books?"

"That is not remotely the point, Albus. You cannot ask me to use Legilimency on a student for such an absurd reason. For any reason at all, really."

"Severus, you are the only one I can trust with this task. You are the child's head of house, and it is your duty to ensure his safety. You yourself have admitted there is something odd about him."

The potions professor affected a superior air, turning up his nose and looking down it at the barmy old man. "There is a difference between ensuring someone's safety and outright assault. This most definitely crosses the line. I will not invade the still developing mind of a child, especially not on such flimsy justification as above average potion skills."

Dumbledore sighed. "Do you remember the rumors from last year about someone eating a Boggart?"

"Yes. I thoroughly checked the Slytherin dorms for illegal potions the day afterwards. There was a startling lack of hallucinogens."

"I'm not surprised. You see, that wasn't a rumor, Severus. Thenabar turned a boggart into a worm and then swallowed it whole," Dumbledore said. "It was only luck and the distraction provided by Sirius's break-in that prevented rumors from spreading more widely."

As the headmaster told Severus the results of his investigation, the Potions master's shock grew greater and greater. Albus told him about Adeviar, about the boggart, the troll, ripped apart, and how all the signs pointed to Thenebar being possessed.

When Dumbledore had finished talking, Severus couldn't say anything. He opened his mouth several times, trying to speak, but nothing came out. After several minutes of this, he finally found his voice. "You understand, the tournament is disrupting the normal class schedule. I will not have Jaren in my class until after the First Task. I will not be able to get to him before then."

"That is a risk we can afford to take. After all, a few more days won't make a difference."

(Transition)

An arrow flew through the still forest air and struck a tree vibrating from the impact, The tree was marked with eight painted eyes, and the arrow had pierced one of these eyes perfectly. Similarly painted trees surrounded the archery range, all riddled with arrows. Few arrows would not have been a fatal shot, were these stationary enemies real. The centaur that had fired the shot stood nearly surrounded by the faces of his enemy, his quiver now empty.

"Very impressive," Bane said. He was standing back, watching the archer practice with a solemn determination

"Impressive or not, it won't be enough. If it took only a single arrow to end an acromantula, we would not be trapped here," Thane shot back.

"Of course not. It is good to see that some of us are aware of how much of a threat they pose," Bane agreed.

Thane snorted, and retrieved his arrows before beginning to fire them at the faces of his enemy once more. Another few arrows pounded into the bark as Thane watched from behind the range. After another few minutes of watching the impalement of acromantula eyes, he spoke up again.

"You know that the acromantulas hunt us, in our minds as well as the woods. Milano's suicide, tragic though it was, proves that. We will need to go after them," Bane continued.

"And doing so without consulting the stars would be a very efficient way to commit suicide," Thane remarked. He hadn't stopped firing arrows at the trees. "Brash you may be, but I doubt you're so eager to die. At least, not yet. Given time, we'll see just how desperate you become."

"Why do you think I have approached you, stargazer?" Bane asked.

"Ah. So you're too lazy to look up and see them for yourself. No wonder you're so desperate to prove yourself."

Bane ignored the insult and continued. "It is not that. I have seen the stars, but their message is... unclear. If we do not act, only hard times await us. But the other path, that is hidden to my eyes," Bane explained.

"Was it really hidden? Or did you just refuse to see it?" Thane mused. "Either way, it is your own failing, and I see no reason to correct it for you."

"Would you rather we march to war without your guidance? If you know the outcome, do not hide it from me," Bane demanded

Thane ignored the demand, tilting his head to face Bane. "What do you hope to accomplish with this, Bane? Do you think a few warriors will kill the entire colony in their own territory? Do you have some elaborate plan that will inevitably fail? Whatever it is, knowing your failure ahead of time will not prevent it. No matter how much you plead Bane, I will not help you to commit suicide. I still have enough hope, and see enough in the stars to avoid that."

"It is not just I that will fight. Not all of the others agree with Firenze. They and I are ready to sacrifice ourselves to end this scourge, if necessary," Bane said.

"And if that only makes matters worse?" Thane turned then, and locked Bane in place with a penetrating stare.

Bane stilled. Thane had finally turned away from the archery range, and was observing him with a cold dispassion.

"So often, we discount the celestial spheres, especially those closest to us, but even they each have their place in the sky. You cannot read the stars without taking them into account, and they scream of your folly. Our situation will grow incalculably dire if you go through with your attack."

Bane scoffed. "I did not think you were so eager to eat from Firenze's palm, star-gazer. If this is all the aid you will give us, then we will move without it."

"Oh? I remember you singing a very different tune just a few minutes ago," Thane said mockingly.

Bane raised his head and straightened his back. He turned away from Thane, looking as if he was preparing to leave. "We will end the acromantulas, with your aid or not. Your help is welcome, but far from necessary."

"I'll not join your fool's errand, it will bring doom to us all." Thane stated, firmly refusing Bane.

Bane reached back for his bow, face contorted with anger. Thane watched him with one eyebrow raised. He made no motion to reach for his own weapon. After a tense moment, Bane's hand fell back to his side. "We will march with or without your aid, Thane."

"Of course you will," Thane let out a heavy sigh. "I hope you find your glory before you condemn us all to death."

(Transition)

A few days ago, if someone had told Abathur that giant reptiles flew using nothing but muscle and tissue, he would have dissected their brain to see if that idiocy could be weaponized. Now, having witnessed a dragon chase his former camouflage through the air, Abathur was very glad to have access to the immensely powerful essence possessed by these dragons. And he would have had it sooner, had he done been more proactive about Norbert, but those wings should have been vestigial!

Regardless, watching the dragons attempt to scorch the humans had been immensely amusing, even if none of the terran whelps or the hybrid had been torn apart, and none of the dragons had been killed. A corpse that nobody paid attention to, or something he could harvest unseen would have been excellent. Unfortunately, these were humans. They were good at killing everything except what he wanted them to.

Abathur soon made his way into the Forbidden Forest, stopping directly outside the terran dragon enclosure. It was almost comically easy to infiltrate their camp. They weren't even bothering to hide them, unless a few wards that likely blocked the humans' pitiful visual spectrum, and some sound muffling counted as concealment. Abathur, however, was not bound by such limitations. They might as well have put up an invitational sign. Oh well. The humans' folly was to his benefit this time and he wasn't going to complain about it.

Abathur pinpointed every human mind within the warded enclosure, and ordered his forces to quietly surround them. The ground beneath his feet seemed to writhe, before flowing forward to do his bidding. The sleeping humans were targeted first, swarmed by ants bearing a sedative. Abathur would have preferred a toxin, but he didn't have anything appropriate, and he was already pressed for time. A few dozen pincers injected sedative into their veins, ensuring they would not interrupt his work.

That only left the terrans keeping watch. Abathur covered them in ants, giving them the same treatment. They collapsed one by one, clearing the path between him and the dragons. Their screams were quiet enough to be irrelevant, even without the wards. With a couple teralings, smallest of the acromantulas, escorting him, Abathur walked towards the chained reptiles. They were peering curiously at him, clearly not seeing him as a threat. That would probably change soon.

Abathur's spiders had located the wardstone. Abathur, in his almost true form, moved over to it, inspecting the runes inscribed in the rock. He set the spiders to weaving their webs, overlaying the current scheme with his own, more extensive version. He would tolerate no interruptions. The limbs on his back twitched in anticipation.

With all the security taken care of, Abathur turned his attention to the dragons. They were isolated, chained down and separated. Good. That would make this much easier. He walked into the first pen, containing the Swedish Short-snout. It reared up, preparing to exhale fire on Abathur, to turn him into a pile of ashes. It had decent survival instincts. He would still have to improve them though. If the beast's instincts were ideal, it would have tried to escape the second it saw him.

Abathur only had to think, and the dragon's jaws snapped shut, its body stilled, and its head hurtled toward the ground, but to his great surprise, the beast was quite capable of resisting him. With an extreme force of will, Abathur pushed the dragon's head lower, close enough to the ground for the teralings to strike with the long, biting fangs he'd added. They scurried forward, pinning the dragon's head beneath their bulk. Then they bit deep into the pinned head, their fangs penetrating both scale and bone, but it was slow going. Almost too slow. The dragon was more powerful that Abathur had expected, or perhaps more resistant to psionics. The gigantic reptile was struggling against his grasp, and, to his surprise, it might have been able to break his grasp, given time. Fortunately, the terralings exposed the beast's brain before that could happen.

Stepping up to the dying dragon, Abathur drove one of his scythe-like limbs directly into the exposed gray matter. It stopped struggling almost instantly, freeing Abathur to concentrate on other things. The sac on the limb buried in the dragon's brain contracted. Millions upon millions of copies of the hyper-evolutionary virus flooded from the tip of the limb, infecting every corner of the dragons brain. Abathur directed it to the dragons prefrontal cortex, binding the dragon to the hivemind. With a burst of power, the rest of the brain was healed.

The dragon rose unsteadily. It shook its head before looking straight at the dragon next to it. With a predatory gait, the new convert approached its former relative. Abathur slammed the next dragon to the ground, and had his dragon took advantage. A single claw, driven by several tons of muscles, dug straight into the skull. Abathur inserted his tendril into the brain, giving the corpse the same treatment as the last one.

After another half hour, every dragon had been given the same treatment, and were following closely behind Abathur. Cloaks of spider web, woven into intricate patterns, hid them from casual observers. Abathur collapsed the wardstone before withdrawing the Hive and teralings.

Abathur was immensely pleased. He now had forces to provide an aerial view of the battlefield and harass enemies with. He could extract the essence from one of the dragons, and convert the rest to biomass. Abathur's tendrils shivered yet again. What secrets of psionics were contained within these strands? Even after he used what he needed for the infestation, there would be quite a bit of these creatures left over. Well, he had time. And biomass was one of those resources that was never lacking in uses.

(In another life, this was a neat, horizontal line, a smooth Transition)

Sarah Kerrigan: Sarah Kerrigan is a terran born in the Koprulu sector who had immense physic powers and was recruited and trained by the terran confederacy. Her powers first manifested at age 8 in an incident that killed her mother and left her father with brain damage. It was this incident that garnered her the attention of the Terran confederacy. She was kidnapped and conscripted into their ghost program, where she was systematically broken down and reconstructed as a new person. She became an assassin to the core, heartless and efficient, and robbed of all memories aside from those deemed necessary. Eventually, she was rescued by Arcturus Mengsk, the revolutionary son of one of her previous targets. Kerrigan came to be loyal to Mengsk, working on his behalf to collapse the Confederacy that had hurt her so much. Unfortunately, once Kerrigan began to question Mengsk's methods and motives, he abandoned her on the zerg-infested planet of Tarsonis, where she was quickly overwhelmed by the Swarm. The terran ghost was never heard from again, and is presumed to be dead.