Five minutes later, I arrived at the Leviathan's head dressed in my marine power suit.

"Since the Zerg assimilated all life on Zerus before leaving, this planet should be barren," I said as I walked in. "We might have to scour it for months before we find any remaining traces of Zerg-."

I stopped myself when I saw the planet through the window afforded by the Leviathan's eyes. It was green. But this was a rocky planet, not a gas giant. So either it was made mostly out of some unusual green mineral like malachite, or I was looking at a planet-spanning jungle.

Kerrigan gasped beside me. "So much life," she whispered.

I blinked. "Okay, so, that was wrong. Life on Zerus must be incredibly hardy. Iszha, send some overlords down to scout for us.

"It is already done," answered the tentacle-woman. "Initial reports suggest the jungle planet is home to many creatures, including some that bear telling similarities to us zerg."

"Can it really be that easy?" I whispered, mostly to myself. I continued more loudly, "So we just grab one of these animals and get Abathur to sequence its genome, and we're good, right?"

"Negative," the nearby Abathur answered. "Creature will have evolved different from Swarm. Incompatible sequences. Cannot assimilate. Must find sequences that predate Swarm's departure from planet. Common ancestor."

I groaned. "You have got to be kidding. This whole time, I assumed descendants of survivors would do. Now you're telling me we need to find DNA thousands of years old that has somehow been miraculously preserved, just as it was, without evolving along the way?"

"Affirmative," Abathur answered.

I sighed and rested my face in my hands. "Of course," I whispered to myself. "How will we ever find something like that in a planet-spanning jungle?"

Kerrigan stirred beside me. "I sense something," she spoke softly, staring at the planet. "A consciousness so ancient it predates even the overmind. It has power… but it's sleeping." She turned to me. "We must wake it up," she declared loudly. "If anything knows where to find Zerg DNA we need, this ancient thing will. It may even possess the right DNA itself."

I blinked a few times. "That's extremely convenient," I said finally. I focused on Kerrigan and furrowed my eyebrows. "Since when can you sense how old a mind is?"

"Since forever," Kerrigan replied matter-of-factly. "It's just never been relevant before. It's not that strange. You can sense roughly how old food is by tasting it."

I frowned. "To some extent, I suppose. Mostly I can just sense whether it's ripe or spoiled."

"Well, it's not like I could tell you precisely how old a Terran is," Kerrigan replied. "But when you sense a mind as old as the Overmind, or this thing… you can tell."

I hesitated, then shrugged. "Alright then. Izsha, take us down towards this… ancient sleeper."

"Right away," Izsha answered, after looking to Kerrigan for confirmation.

…

A few hours later, we had morphed a bustling hive cluster on top of a plateau surrounded by dense jungle. Nestled into the base of the plateau lay an enormous mouth. Just the mouth, gaping open, displaying rows upon rows of teeth. The rest of its body had to be underground.

"This is the ancient thing you sensed?" I asked Kerrigan as we looked down at it from the plateau.

"Yes," she replied. "I'm reaching out to its mind, but it's not responding."

"Does it possess the DNA we need, Abathur?" I asked hopefully.

The Abathur who had accompanied us to the planet's surface slithered up to the mouth, carefully touched part of its gums, then brought his hand to his own tiny mouth. He chewed a little, swallowed, then returned to us. "Negative," he reported. "Creature evolves as individual, not as generation. Self-regulates genetic code. Old as Queen declared; however, changed too much since then."

I paused. "It can control its own DNA? That's handy."

"We can worry about its evolution after we wake it up," Kerrigan said impatiently. "It slept through Abathur removing a small part of it. Don't know that attacking it myself will fare any better, and if I succeeded it might be too angry to talk to us. Any other ideas?"

I scratched my chin. "If that's the size of its mouth, the whole creature must be ridiculously huge. Leviathan-sized. Without creep, it must take a lot of biomass to feed something that big. So I'd wager it's hibernating to conserve energy. If we feed it, it'll probably awaken."

Kerrigan nodded. "As good a plan as any. I'll hunt around the jungle for biomass to throw into that mouth."

When we oversaw the morphing of our base on this plateau, I thought I could make out large shadowy figures in the jungle around us. Watching us. I caught a glance of a particularly tall one now, darting behind a tree at the edge of our base. "What do you sense out there?" I asked Kerrigan, a little nervous.

She glanced at the jungle. "Hunger," she answered, a determined expression on her face.

Before I could say anything more, a voice entered my consciousness. It felt like hivemind communication, but… wilder.

"Brakk speaks now!" declared the voice. "You intrude on my territory, corrupt zerg! We will devour your flesh!"

Kerrigan looked at me, smiling patronizingly. "Sounds like some jungle animal doesn't know what he's in for."

I looked back where I'd seen the shadowy figure, and made out a group of flying creatures emerging from the distant jungle and soaring towards us. "Let's not celebrate just yet. Our mutalisks are reconstituted, right? We should deploy them."

Kerrigan nodded, and soon a squad of mutas met the flying creatures in aerial combat. The wild fliers looked suspiciously like guardians, just smaller and greener. Also like guardians, they apparently possessed no anti-air attacks, and were swiftly torn apart by our mutalisks.

"More of these… primal zerg are massing nearby," Kerrigan commented. "I'll stop them while I get the biomass. You hold down the fort." Kerrigan launched herself into the air and disappeared in the jungle, followed shortly after by a group of zerglings and the mutalisks, and then, almost as an afterthought, by a few drones.

I didn't want to underestimate an unknown enemy, but I did find it hard to believe that any number of primal critters could be as dangerous as a trained military. Every so often Kerrigan would come back escorting a drone carrying some meat from slain jungle creatures, and order the drone to drop the meat into the monstrous mouth. Though many of her minions never made it back, she herself remained unscratched and just kept replacing the lost minions.

As for me, I watched for counterattacks from this 'Brakk' and other primal zerg who apparently followed his orders. I had to fend off incursions a couple of times, but our spore and spine crawlers, spare zerglings, and my own sword swiftly cut through the attacking creatures. I couldn't help but notice, though, that they generally attacked us with what seemed to be smaller and more colorful versions of our own zerg units.

I wandered over to an Abathur who had begun work in the base's evolution pit, and asked him about it.

"Abathur, didn't the Swarm evolve most of its strains after leaving Zerus? How did these primal zerg evolve very similar strains completely independently?"

"Designs stolen! Swarm on planet for hours, already being replicated! Sole possibility!" Abathur declared. His alien many-eyed face was as unreadable as ever, but his voice was extremely angry. Angrier than I'd ever heard it before. "Unacceptable! Must be wiped clean. No trace left. Destroy primal zerg!"

Woah. Not the reaction I was expecting. "You're upset?" I asked, confused. "I didn't think you could be upset."

"Unacceptable!" Abathur repeated. "Swarm's power: the ability to assimilate strengths of other species. Primal zerg must not take from us!"

"But how could they have?" I asked, confused. "We don't even have any guardians with the Leviathan. But the very first thing we were attacked with, within hours of disembarking, were primal guardians. How could they have possibly had time to steal a design from us that we don't even have with us?"

Abathur paused, his many eyes blinking one after another. Then he put an arm down and grabbed a fern off the ground, sticking it in his mouth. He chewed softly, swallowed, and finally spoke. "Have learned Zerus flora and fauna feed directly on essence. Assimilate strands and sequences through digestion. Guardian sequences remain in larvae. Sole conclusion: hatchery infiltrated. Larvae eaten, sequences shared with pack. Designs will spread when pack members digested by other primals. Unacceptable! Centuries carefully evolving designs. Whole species assimilated! Stolen in moments! Must be destroyed! Enemies must not possess Zerg essence!"

I held my hands up placatingly. "Alright, alright, Abathur. I take your point. We'll destroy the primals who've fed on our... essence. I'd much rather they stay jungle animals than risk a possible second swarm. One brood war was enough."

Abathur nodded, seemingly satisfied.

I wandered around the base a bit more, content to let the stronger Kerrigan see the bulk of the action, until finally, when she returned with biomass for the seventh time, Brakk's mental voice leapt into my consciousness again. "This ends now, corrupt zerg! I will kill you myself!"

A mass of creatures poured out of the jungle and rushed at our base, led by an enormous blue ultralisk-like creature.

Kerrigan and her army joined me and my defenders in repelling the assault. Fighters of both groups attacked, bled, and died, and all the while the leading blue monster cried out silly taunts, like "Your empty minions are no match for the might of the primal zerg!" and "I will feast upon your flesh!"

"Kerrigan, shut him up. Please," I asked once I got to close to her on the battlefield.

"Gladly," she answered. She turned and leapt upon the creative's back, her hands grabbing onto its tough hide. It roared and bucked, attempting to throw her off. Psionic energy crackled around her, then traveled through her arms directly into the creature. It screamed, thrashed, and finally collapsed. Kerrigan jumped off it, landing lightly on her feet, raised her gun, and sniped the last two jungle attackers.

I laughed out loud and whistled appreciatively. "Impressive work, Kerr," I commented.

She didn't look at me, but when she walked past me I saw that she was smiling.

Suddenly, I heard the creature with the enormous mouth stirring behind us. Kerrigan and I both rushed over to it, just in time to see a whole head erupt out of the ground.

"I return," the creature announced in a wizened telepathic voice.

"Ancient One!" Kerrigan called up to him in a demanding tone of voice. "We are here for the power of the ancient Zerg. You will help us."

The 'Ancient One' peered down at us. "Call me Zurvan," he rumbled slowly. He glanced at the battlefield, at the fallen zerg carcasses. He inhaled deeply. Finally, he spoke again. "Your Swarm smells of Amon, the fallen xel'naga who came to Zerus long ago. He forged the zerg into a weapon, and took them away. Yet some of us were hidden, overlooked. We multiplied. We remain pure. If you seek our power, you must become primal zerg. You must become pure."

"Yes, we are trying to become pure zerg, untainted by Amon," I spoke up. "To do so we need Zerg DNA that has remained unchanged ever since the Xel'Naga's intervention. Do you know where some might be found?"

Zurvan rumbled thoughtfully. "Travel to the birthplace of the zerg," he answered. "There you will be tested. You may be torn apart. If you are strong enough, the power of the ancient Zerg will be yours."

I nodded. "Makes sense. The birthplace of the Zerg would have ancient DNA. But where is it?"

Zurvan… smiled? Or maybe he just opened his mouth wider and showed off his teeth. Hard to tell. "You must feel the power. It calls to you. Go to it."

I blinked. "I don't…" I stopped myself when I glanced at Kerrigan. Her eyes were closed. She was focused on something. Suddenly, her eyes snapped open. "I know where we need to go," she declared. "Come, Magis." She walked off towards our base.

I hesitated, looking back at Zurvan.

"You have questions?" Zurvan addressed me.

I turned to him. "It's just… What did Amon do to the Zerg, exactly, to interfere in their evolution? The primal zerg, like yourself, don't seem that different from us."

Zurvan smiled, or whatever it was, again. "He desired our strength, the ability to steal essence. But we were independent... we would not follow. And so he bound the zerg to a single overriding will. They lost their identity, and became his slaves."

I frowned. "The hive mind. That was the Xel'Naga intervention? Just the creation of the hivemind?"

Zurvan nodded his enormous head. "Yes. A terrible fate for a strong primal zerg."

I scoffed. "So much the worse for the primal zerg. The hivemind has to be among the best evolutions of any species. Your individuality causes you all to consume yourselves, while, once we infest everyone, we shall be forever at peace."

Zurvan said nothing, but continued smiling.

"Still," I continued, "If Amon invented the hivemind, that explains why he would be able to control us through it. Thank you."

Zurvan watched me with amusement in his eyes as I ran after Kerrigan.