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Krane

Day 115, Year 1

He appeared from the shadows without any of them noticing until he cleared his throat.

Scott immediately leapt from his lax position and, while back flipping in the air, sent a wave of spines in the sudden creature's appearance. However, they were obviously meant to intimidate rather than to kill as all the knives missed and instead embedded themselves into the mud and trees right next to the lanky creature. There was no doubt; those were his real targets, barely a hair's length separating the sharp organic weapons from cutting flesh and vessels.

Alexis, for her part, began to levitate, her eyes flashing neon green as her pent up psionic powers were tapped into. Sparks began to fly from her fingertips as they bristled with power, small arcs of white light lightning leaping from one digit to another. Her odd dual colored hair began to rise with the sudden drop in air pressure, accompanied by the peculiar smell of ozone.

For his part, the newcomer didn't even flinch or shy away from the display of raw power that the two siblings. Instead, the Zerg creature simply drew himself up even higher so as to present a proper greeting posture to the Overminds. Perhaps now a description of him would be apt to aid in his manner of introduction.

While not a giant Zerg creature much like Sylvanas, he easily towered over Arthogious' height but was a much stockier build, with actual muscles coating his arms. His head resembled that of a Zergling with an elongated jaw, and the creature had two pairs of eyes dotting his head, a total of four eyes with a glowing orange color. His body was, again, very muscular and strength resonated from them as he flexed his four arms. Yes, this Zerg boss had four arms, two on either side. A stocky and thick tail stretched out from behind his bipedal stance, slightly moving back and forth as he stood there.

"Who are you?" Scott growled, flipping a knife threatening in the air and catching it to show how sharp it was as the sun glinted off the weapon's edge. "And what are you looking for from us? If it's a fight, we'll give you one!"

"Peace," The creature rasped, his voice hoarse and gravel. "I seek peace and servitude."

"Servitude?" With a casual flick of his hand, yet another spine embedded itself at the feet of this newcomer as Scott slowly approached. "You wish to serve us?"

"That is correct. I wish to bring my brood into the brood of the true leaders of the Swarm."

"That's awfully nice of you." Even Alexis' tone had an edge of distrust to it, and she was normally the most accepting one. Arthogious was special, she herself felt that his string of fate was destined to intertwine with the Swarm's future. But now?

She felt merely void and nothingness emanating from this creature's aura. He had to have put up very strong psionic walls that warded her out of his mind and gave the young Overmind the tour of the place. For perhaps the first time ever since becoming an Overmind, Alexis couldn't read a Zerg creature's mind. It troubled her.

However, Scott appeared to not have any such qualms. While still remaining cautious with his weapons out, the male Overmind reexamined this new Zerg applicant with curiosity and judgement. He apparently saw potential in this one… "What's your name?"

"I am Krane," The creature declared, gesturing to himself with one arm. "I am a Zerg capable of independent and complex thinking. My brood contains much needed upgrades that you will want for your units. And I wish to serve the Overminds with the hope of reuniting the Swarm back into its former glory of being the galaxy eater."

O O O

Day 117, Year 1

"I'm not happy, but I really don't see a choice," Kiara bluntly told her siblings. The three were having a war council, with Arthogious slithering close to the eldest sister, but Krane was told to wait outside as they decided his fate. Scott had been for assimilating him, pointing out that he would accelerate the Swarm's growth significantly by providing a variety of unit upgrades as well as another independent mind that could aid in strategy, logistics, etc.

Alexis was flat out in disagreement and cautioned against Krane. It was a shock to see the normally chirpy and energetic young girl act so solemn and cold. The fact that his mental walls were impenetrable with her current powers made Alexis uneasy, as there was no way that she could discover his true intentions without getting stronger first. And by then, it could very well be too late.

Thus, if fell to Kiara as to the final vote cast. Both siblings had already informed her that her decision wouldn't offend either one; however, one could tell that they would probably let out these conflicting feelings out in a spar later. It wouldn't do to let these things fall to the wayside and let them simmer and grow. A good old sibling brawl ensured that all hard feelings were forgotten amidst smiles and jokes when they were busy healing up from rough play.

"Krane is offering us a lot and is asking pretty much nothing but the offer of servitude in return. It seems like a deal way too good to be true." The purple haired woman sighed, resting her head on her hands as she thought it over. "I really don't trust him either, and yet, we need him and cannot risk him becoming openly hostile at this point of Swarm evolution."

Scott and Alexis had the grace to remain silent as their elder sibling pondered the unique and conflicting situation. There were definitely a lot of factors to take into account, and a lot of consequences in the future if the wrong choice was made today. If Krane was true to his word and they accepted him, then they could gain a powerful ally that would hasten the development of the Swarm. On the other hand, if they denied him and he felt bitter, a war on two fronts could develop: one with Krane, one with Zestra. Even Kiara who didn't bother much with campaign strategy knew enough about old Earth history to know it never turns out well.

That reminded her of something that could potentially give some more time to this momentous decision. "Scott. What have the Overlords reported about Zestra's movements or plans?"

At this sudden change of topic, the male Overmind was caught off guard and hesitated. "Oh, um…" He quickly scrambled to get his thoughts in order before continuing with a sure tone. "Right now, it appears that Zestra is retreating somewhere along the coast. We suspect that she is making a move to flee the continent and retreat to somewhere isolated, where she can cultivate and grow her brood."

"Continent?" Alexis asked incredulously. "There's more than one piece of land on this world?"

"Well, according to Arthogious, from the brief glimpse he had while flying down here, there are indeed a few continents on this planet. Don't expect them to be all different though, they all seem to be just more jungles."

"Aw." The girl pouted and her shoulders slumped. "I guess this really is Zerus in a way."

"Zerus…" Kiara muttered. "You know, that actually isn't a half bad name to give this planet."

"But that's stealing Big Sis!"

"Fine. We'll just change it to…Zarx. Sounds good?"

"Still sounds like copyright material, but let's go with that."

"Agreed. I think it's a decent name to be honest," Scott chimed in and the three finally agreed on something this war council: this planet was to be named Zarx. However, it would seem that the tactician Overmind still had more to report regarding Zestra. "Reports from the Overlords show a small contingent of units being led by the Broodmother herself heading over to that crater where you said you found Avial. I wonder what's she doing over there? You can't really set up a good base there due to how easy it would be to siege it…"

"Attempt to steal research material," Arthogious rasped, understanding his former colleague's intentions. "Avial corpse still in process of decomposition. Retrieval incapable, autopsy to be performed on site. Zestra possibility to maim or steal body before analysis."

"Well, we really can't have that, can we?" Alexis grimly smiled, finally seeing an excuse to be away from Krane. "You two shore up things here, I'll go deal with Zestra and the body. If you don't mind, I'm taking Arthoigous with me. I'll do my best to keep him in line."

"Oh, he will behave. Unless he wants another ass kicking when he comes back."

"Aw, can't you be a bit more lax?" The young girl finished with the conversation and moved, getting on her feet and stretching. "C'mon Arthogious! We've got an oversized Queen to deal with!"

"Term interesting. Origin?"

"I picked apart Sylvanas' mind and found that name in her memories. Seems like nobody really does like Zestra. I doubt we'd recruit her anyway, willingly or unwillingly."

"Predicament precarious. Caution advised, lethal force necessary."

"Exactly my thoughts. Exterminate! Exterminate! Exterminate!"

Kiara swore that Scott's eyebrow was about to fall off from how much it was twitching as the parodied cry faded into the distance. But thankfully now, it was just the elder two siblings left in this council, and no stubborn little sister to obstruct the final vote of Krane's assimilation. Of course though, Kiara must have the same mindset of Scott about the benefits of having another Zerg leader under their command.

She didn't exactly agree with everything that Scott had pointed out as a pro of assimilation, and agreed on a lot of cons that Alexis had added in as the dangers of letting somebody who just seemingly popped out of thin air into their Swarm. And yet, there were also the facts to consider regarding how Krane might react if accepted or rejected. But in the end… "I'm going to cast my vote for assimilation Scott. Not though, because of Krane's positives. He's going to be your little pet project, much like how Arthogious is mine. I want to see you develop yourself more with Krane."

"But Alexis technically recruited him."

"But Alexis technically has no use for him really," Kiara retorted. "The fact that I'm the one who's usually seeing him on a near daily basis has to indicate something, no? But I'm not taking care of Krane; you want him in the Swarm? You take care of him."

"I…understand."

"Do you now? Scott, this is a pretty big responsibility. You are responsible for every action he commits in the Swarm's name, any phrase he utters, any killings he performs. The minute he starts showing any rebellious or mutinous behavior…" In a rather crude imitation, the purple haired woman flicked her hand the same way Scott does when he pulls out a spine knife from his body and mimed a slashing motion at the throat.

While a poor copy of what he would actually do, Scott's throat tightened as he realized what his sister meant: in case Arthogious got out of hand, the male Overmind would be the one responsible for taking care of the issue. There had to be no sympathy or mercy shown; a swift kill was the most he could grant to a possible traitor. It made sense once he thought about it though, especially as Kiara was granting him a huge favor. In a way, this is her test to see if he was really mature enough to be a leader of the Zerg Swarm in his own right if anything were to happen to the eldest sister.

A/N: Woohoo! 100+ reviews for the Zerg Rebirth, giving a total of 300+ reviews for the entire Rebirth series! Thank you all for being so supportive, and be sure to look forward to even more from me as we continue our saga!

On the other hand, I've been thinking, and I believe that the Rebirth community is ready for something than small time RP or discussions. They'll still be the main part of the forum of course, but I want to add something else in now: competitions. Something like writing competitions that will have prize pools of me writing something for the winner or declaring the winner's story official canon or something along those lines. How does that sound?