Another chapter is out and ready for your enjoyment peeps, sorry it took me awhile but my work loves to give me long hours as of late and my procrastination monkey took over a lot so I was rather preoccupied. Also just so you all know I've finalized the timeline for this portion of the story codenamed "Wings of Liberty" so I have a clear game plan as to what I'm going to write for the time being.

In other news I have a pet rock slug that my friend brought back from one of his trips, and to be frank it's surprisingly cute. It only bit me once but he assured me that they are not venomous, he even talked to the biologist of that world. I just need to make sure it doesn't escape the enclosure and make it underground or else it will cause some major property damage. Good thing I have experience this sort of thing before on our adventures together.

Now on to the story, I can hear the thing squeaking widely, must be hungry.

Chapter 27: Memories 2

It's been nine hours since the Zerg invaded and the evacuation of Agria's colonists is still underway, a good amount of colonists have been sent away but many more are still left on the defenseless planet, Isabel's family included. As of now they reside in a large modified storage room where they are sharing with a couple dozen other people who are all scared and anxious, and she can feel all of it. The emotions from her fellow colonists had started to slowly dig into her like a dagger as the hours dragged on preventing her from falling asleep despite her clear and strong feeling of exhaustion.

This was all added on top of her already existing anxiety that had dug its roots deep into her mind and corroded her already scared emotions. Though some of it has been caused by her separation from Ares, the vast majority of it is from the fact that they are going through all of this again, but this time on just a small farming world. If it weren't for the fact that her father and May were sitting right next to her and the four metal spheres she's currently spinning in her hand, she'd be sure that she would have a mental breakdown from the stress.

Why must the zerg torture her like this? Wasn't it enough that they took away her mother and drive her out of the only other home she knew, now they want to take away the little freedom she has left? She just wants them to leave her alone, but the truth is that they will never do so, and she is completely helpless to stop it.

She just wants to stop thinking about this, she just wants to go to sleep again and wake up from this nightmare, she just wants to go back home.

Home, that is the only thing that goes through her mind, her home in that little room where she felt safe and that everything else outside never mattered. The memory of that safe haven begins to put her in a trance, her eyelids began to fall, and soon she retreats into her mind where nothing outside matters anymore.

10 years ago

Within a small room that looks like it could comfortably accommodate for two people lies a nine year old Isabel playing with her toys on the ground next to her blue bed with a small scale model of a goliath in one hand and a cartoonish looking green monster in the other. Around her messily lay various other toys ranging from dolls to various action figures she seen on tv. She's smashing the two figures together and making a series of noises to crudely simulate a fight between the two.

"I shall defeat you Galbador and free these people from your rule!" She voices while shaking the goliath toy. "Never pilot Davis! You will be beaten like everyone else!" She voices the monster toy in a slightly lower voice while shaking it. She continues smashing them together making grunting sounds as they "hurt" each other. Upon the apparent climax of the fight she gives out a dramatic yell as the goliath hero was seemingly defeated. "Muahahaha! I have defeated the hero!" She keeps the goliath down while the monster is shaking in victory. But the girl simply smiles before her hand raises the goliath back up. "Not today! Ratatatata! Grahhh!" She vibrates the figure to simulate it shooting before she leans its opponent to the ground in defeat. She then grabs a nearby doll in a blue dress and brings it near. "Thank you pilot Davis, you save us all again." Her voice becomes more feminine to fit the role. "All in the days work miss, but I must go for there are many more people that need my help." The girl then moves the bipedal mech figure away which concludes her story.

She sets the toy down and lays on the sand-colored carpet floor to look up at the greyish-blue ceiling. This is the fifth time she completed the story today and she's starting to get board doing it, she doesn't know what to do now as nothing is really coming to her mind at the moment. Mabey some time sitting at her desk can give her some ideas, it usually does. The young blonde gets back up and heads towards her desk on her left making sure not to step on any of her many toys that lay scattered on the ground. After puling out the seat and sitting in it she leans over her desk and rests her elbows on its surface to look down on a blank sketchbook with a pencil at its side. But to her annoyance nothing came up in her mind after five minutes of just staring at the book, this causes her to sigh heavily and shuffle back her shoulder length hair, she hates it when this happens especially when she's board and since she's not allowed to come out of her room unless it's dinner time she doesn't have any real reason to go.

She then looks up ahead of the sketchbook to look at a small spherical device that she tried working on earlier this week, but since she doesn't have a lot of parts at the moment it was never finished and so it's left incomplete with various parts scattered around near it. There's also the fact that playing with her toys was a lot more fun than working on the machine.

She suddenly hears a familiar series of knocks on the door which causes her head to perk up before turning around in her seat in excitement. She immediately runs towards the door almost stepping on some of her toys in the process and nearly slamming against the door. Her hand raises up to it and responds with two consecutive knocks.

The handle started to turn and the door opens to reveal a blonde woman who is a foot taller than her with matching red eyes and blonde hair that is tied up and longer than hers.

"Mommy!" She immediately leaps towards the woman who returns the embrace.

"Hey my little firestar." The woman joyfully responds while picking her up. The girl feels the dirt and grime on her mother's skin but she doesn't mind since that means that she's working really hard. She was set down but she still looks up to her mother with eyes shing as bright as the sun. "How was your day today sweetie?"

"Dad taught me my lessons then I finished playing, aka boring." Isabel responds rather dramatically. She suddenly notices someone standing right behind her, she has shorter red hair and wearing the same sort of attire as her mother. The woman also seems to be a little more reclusive than her mother as evidenced by her arms being crossed in a defensive posture and her eyes nervously looking around.

"Isabel, this is May, a longtime friend of mine who works with me. Say hello."

"Uh, hello." She herself isn't used to meeting people outside her family, but the redhead seems nice enough for her.

"Greetings, as your mother has said I am May, nice to meet you." The woman introduces herself though there is a tinge of uncertainty in her voice as she talked.

"She can be a bit shy with new people but I'm sure you two can get along." The blonde woman looks up and starts surveying the child's room. "We should really clean your room missy." This really embarrassed the girl once she realizes just how messy her room is. "Sorry about this May, maybe you can wait in the living room while I help her out."

"It's fine Maria, I heard that activities like these can help get to know someone better. Besides, haven't we've all been as messy at one point in our lives."

"I guess so. Isabel, may you allow May to come into you humble domain." Her mother bows and asks jokingly which the girl immediately gets.

"Yes she may." She answers in similar fashion while bowing as well causing the redhead to giggle a bit before entering.

"So, where do we start?"

Present Day

Isaac looks down at his now sleeping daughter resting her head on his shoulder, her chest now slowly rising up and down consistently showing that she's in her own little world which puts the father at ease. He's honestly glad that she's asleep at a time like this since the worry about her stressing out over this is gone for the time being. It reminds him of all those years ago where she was young and she would rest herself on his lap after tiring herself out from playing so much. He loops his arm around hers and puts his hand on top of hers despite it being the one still holding the now unmoving spheres.

He then sees that May is also getting some rest by leaning against Isabel making him the sole one of the group awake, he can almost forget that there's an invasion going on outside with such a peaceful sight. He just hopes that this peace can last as long as it can before things get hectic again.

3 Hours Later

Ariel leans over her messy desk with a stressed out expression as she stares at the message on the screen, the entirety of group 12 hasn't made it to the main starport, this is the third group that had been slaughter by the Zerg. All those people, the people that she grew up with, are gone. She doesn't know how long she can hold on.

No, she can't give in, these people need her to save them from this nightmare and she isn't going to let them all die here, not while she's in charge. She looks over to the adjacent screen and sees a multitude of red dots surrounding their location. Just an hour ago there was only half the amount of dots on the screen and it's only getting worse.

"Adjutant what's the estimated time before they overwhelm us." Ariel speaks over to a small comns unit to her right.

"Based off of the current growth rate of the zerg forces, it is estimated that they will overrun this position in one hour." The message from the mechanical voice brings dread to the doctor. The remaining defenders on this planet are not enough to escort let alone defend the colony from such massive numbers, she needs to do something and fast.

She begins to type on her computer and opens a communications channel to as many frequencies as possible, she doesn't care as to who will hear the message she just needs the help to get her people off this planet.

Raynor's Raiders flagship Hyperion

Location: Unknown

Shipboard time: 13:00 Hours

Within the bridge of the Hyperion various crewmembers work on their stations in order to keep their ship running. Within the center of the room stands both Jim Raynor and his second in command Matt Horner who are both leaning over the holotable.

"Alright Matt, what'u got for me?" Jim asks.

"Sir, we've received a distress beacon from the colony world called Agria, I'm putting it up now." Matt answers before he puts up a screen in front of the two of them that lists only one planet since they already finished their job at Monlyth.

"Any ship receiving this transmission…the zerg are invading Agria…The Dominion abandoned us here…We're just a small farming colony." The message is heavily riddled with static but it's still audible enough to understand. "We've got to evacuate before we're overrun…if you can hear this message, please help us!"

"What will you have us do commander?" Raynor took a minute to think about what actions they should take before coming to a conclusion.

"We're going to Agria, we're going to save what we can."

"Yes sir, all hands brace for jump. Head to these coordinates." He enters the designated series of coordinates provided by the message and readies himself for the jump along with Raynor. The ship begins to lightly hum as its warp drives begin to rev up until they reach their peak power.

Soon reality stretches out and the entirety of the ship and its crew instantly disappear into the blackness of space to their next destination.

Didn't we all wish that we lived in our childhood again? It was so much simpler back then when we hadn't have to deal with so much responsibility. There were times where I would yearn for a chance to relive my childhood, but alas reality doesn't work that way.

Okay let's get out of this negative zone and head towards the trivia of the day:

"Many of our dreams are strange because the part of the brain responsible for making sense of things shuts down during dreaming." (Santos-Longhurt, 2019)

That actually explains a lot, I remember a time where I dreamed about running away from semi-sentient zombies controlled by worms growing out of their skin in a mall. (No joke it was a strange dream that I still remember to this day.)

With that out of the way I hope that you all have a great day or night wherever you may reside and thank you for reading my content. Stay strong in these troubling times just as Isabel and her family do.