Disclaimer: In college now. Writing is probably going to slow. Or speed up. Idfk. Looks like slow down. So much learning, none of it for this, no scientific accuracy. Also, don't own it.
Catalyst
Slash, spit, crush, tear. Let the brutalisk charge forward, let them rip apart the feeble terran flesh, let their ears soak in the screams, the cries, let the pained wails guide them to their prey. Abathur enjoyed the pattern, enjoyed it's familiarity, enjoyed observing the results, enjoyed the secondhand rush of adrenaline and the slight spike of resistance when his children's claws passed through a hunk of metal or a human's spine. He enjoyed how it was so easy for him to charge through the muted thuds of tank shells and bullets.
In the distant corners of his mind, Abathur was aware of the other parts of his hive cluster, crawling and repairing and healing. He would leave it to its own devices. The more intelligent strains could manage that, they knew how to recover their grip. He wanted all of his focus right here, in the frenzy.
Let the Swarm tend to itself, let Daggoth finish his long journey, he was going to tear apart the last shreds of human resistance.
(Transition)
Dumbledore had contemplated his death often enough. He was reaching the age where it was a regular concern, rather than some faint, distant possibility. Even then, it was not something he wished to dwell on. These days, it was the deaths of others that occupied his mind. The death of those on the battlefield and increasingly often the deaths of those behind it. It was these deaths that he was thinking of now.
Not all of that was morbid, traumatised reflection. This ritual, entrenched as it was in the act of finding a solution to violent problems, had a tendency to drag out those thoughts. Dumbledore could feel it siphon away his magic, dragging it out in drops and pulses, shaping it to fill the carvings, flowing like water into every gap they could. Adeviar and he had gone over it to the point of exhaustion, ensuring thoroughly that this time, nothing could or would go wrong.
It was finally time, and all Dumbledore could think about was the people on the battlefield, dying right now while he completed this task. The ritual demanded it, demanded that focus on death and those about to die. Adeviar, standing stoically on the opposite side of the room, must have been thinking the same thing, even if he didn't show it. No doubt he had many things to dwell on.
Dumbledore's attention returned to the circle, swirling and rising, a vague aperture opening in the middle, tinted a bright blue. He had no idea what would come through. All he could do was have faith.
(Transition)
Tassadar's mind had never been as clear as it was now. He was standing on the deck of Gantrithor as it fell apart around him, channelling power that he would once have considered heretical beyond belief, and aiming his prow into the leader of a race dangerous beyond reason, a creature the size of a mountain, and his mind was tranquil like the bright and constant golden structures of his youth, not half a hemisphere away.
A portal yawned into place over the Overmind. It seemed the dark creature intended to flee. Tassadar, in his focused state, knew it was pointless. He was too close, the power of the dark templar too strong and too eager for the foul mind's death. This was its end. This would be his death too, but that didn't seem quite as important. Right now, he was Akhundelar, the tip of the spear. It was the fate of all templar to draw blood and seep it.
His life for Aiur. Somehow, he had always thought he would die this way. He had trained. He had fought. He had learned. And now, it would all be worth it.
The ship was breaking apart beneath Tassadar's feet. He was close, mere moments from the impact, when something pulled on the edges of his mind, a gap of awareness, a void of thought, inviting, pleading for his presence.
(Transition)
Thenabar stood abruptly. Dumbledore's pet traitor had finally gotten desperate enough to try the ritual. Such a silly man, thinking that hiding from their control would hide him from the sight of the Overmind. A delightful lie, so ripe now, what fear would he feel when Thenabar plucked it away?
The cocoon sitting in front of him was ripped open, a ring of remarkably human looking hands piercing the wet skin and pulling it away. He would have thought they'd have been warped more, but whatever. The hands were far from the most important part of the Psionic master. It didn't really matter what the candelabra of bodies looked like, except perhaps to add that special layer of flavoring to the initial burst of shock when Dumbledore finally saw it. If he'd bothered to mimic salivary glands, Thenabar would have been drooling. But no, that was later. The present came first.
"I assume you know what we're doing?" Thenabar asked the newborn master. It really was odd how little had changed with the base material.
"YesOfcourseAbsolutelyIndeed we do," came the reply from half a dozen lips in a similar number of pitches, a rather eerie effect which would no doubt work wonderfully disturbing effects when echoing in human ears.
"Good. Let's hop to it then," Thenabar said, gesturing impatiently at the amalgamation. Really, if it knew what it was meant to be doing then why wasn't it-
Suddenly they stood in the middle of a Hogwarts corridor, the twisting nausea of teleportation and the buzzing whispers of shattering wards ringing through Thenabar's mind. Ah. It wanted to be thorough. Fair enough. He set off walking, ignoring the distant screams of panicked children, all that wasted food. It was a shame, but he had to save himself for now, couldn't risk filling up just yet.
The Psionics master had landed him close to his objective, that massive stockpile of human waste that the Evolution master had found all those years ago and never found an occasion to use. How long had it been processed at this point, four years, five? Five years of accumulating and processing a school's worth of wasted biomass. There was really only one thing that he could make with all of that.
Thenabar produced a larva from within his cloak as he walked calmly towards the reservoir. With a wave of one of the Psionic master's many hands, the door opened. Thenabar, ignoring the stench, haphazardly tossed the minute creature into the biomass, grinning. This was going to be fun. The second the larva touched the putrid mass, it burrowed under, devouring it. Thenabar caught a few golden gleams shimmering off the carapace as it went down. His smile grew wider. It was probably manic at this point, come to think of it.
He had no way of tracking how long it would take for the larva to feed and complete its metamorphosis. Then, quite suddenly, the brutalisk burst out of the pile, tearing apart the bricks that contained it, eliciting screams and delicious spikes of fear and pain. A few of the students had probably been crushed in the growth, the poor dears. Oh well, they had probably bothered him in the hallways a few times. He wasn't feeling very sorry. Besides, they were just appetizers. There was still quite the commute to get to the main course.
Thenabar didn't see what happened when the Psionic master warped the three of them out of Hogwarts' ruins, but he hoped it involved a lot of falling bricks and more falling hopes.
(Transition)
One of Daggoth's maws enveloped the incoming spore, consuming it, tasting it. The Evolution Master had sent him essence, an odd flavor, tinged with patterns and a scale much larger than usual for his creations. It was tainted with the chemicals of fear and pain. Abathur was in trouble. Very well, Daggoth would grow this spore, he would take his flesh and mold it to the Evolution Master's plan. There was little time left before he reached his destination, but he had enough flesh and enough focus to finish the process.
Within his bellies, his flesh cast itself into the pits of acid, reducing themselves to biomass, fed to the spore. A shape was emerging, a vague spheroid, dominated by a single massive eye.
While it grew, Daggoth examined the essence, how the strands twisted and turned within the growing creature, weaving their delicate pattern. It took a long time, nearly up until they had reached their destination's remarkably large moon. The Evolution Master had outdone himself. Daggoth would quite enjoy unleashing it on this defenseless blue marble.
(Transition)
The first hints of a silhouette had just formed in the center of the runic ring when a thunderous crash erupted from outside the thick walls of the ritual room. Dumbledore and Adeviar both jerked their heads, looking for the source of the sound. They didn't have to look hard; a massive claw, hooked and barbed, tore through the western wall, followed by a head, little more than two thick jaws holding up a large horn. A brutalisk, right in front of them. Dumbledore hadn't realized just how large they were. The creature stood through multiple floors, open hallways broken apart and feeding into the new cavern
The beast released a deep grunt that rattled their bones, cracking the wall open wider, opening a gap. Behind it, Dumbledore could see aurors running towards the creature, running to the edge of the newly made balconies.
"Ignore," Adeviar said to Dumbledore, if not calmly then determinedly. "Ritual important. Others can kill." His body remained turned towards the bright blue aperture, even as his yellow eyes darted over the brutalisk. "Have to finish. Have to."
"Why Adeviar, that's such a harsh tone to take. If you're not careful, one would almost think that you don't want to attend this little reunion," A small figure in a dark cloak walked through the yawning crack, stepping confidently through the dust. "Do at least show some appreciation for all the effort we've put in. Honestly, we've spent months setting up the guest list alone." Dumbledore could see the slim curve of a smirk underneath the hood, parting slightly to let the light, mocking words out.
"Thenabar," Dumbledore stated. He drew out his wand, ignoring the slight tugs of the ritual and Adeviar's warning growl in favor of the comforting feel of elder wood in his hand.
"Yes, well, obviously. You didn't think I wouldn't come, not when our little duel is still unfinished?" Thenabar rolled his shoulders back, letting the oddly familiar hood fall off his face, revealing wide eyes and a widening grin, both as manic as any expression he had ever seen Tom wear. "I've been waiting for this for so long, Albus, and I won't let anything stop us this time."
The aurors launched their spells, bright red and green jets spilling towards the brutalisk. Then a sudden pulse of magic came from its feet, swelling over the spells and rupturing them. Coiled wisps of magic escaped into the air, an unstoppable volley of spells dismissed almost casually.
Thenabar sighed dramatically. "If you wouldn't mind, this is a private event. Please, I'd rather you didn't interfere." The brutalisk turned its attention away from the ritual room, its spiked feet digging deep into the stone, forcing it to turn. "For Merlin's sake man, some of them haven't seen dear old Albus in years." The brutalisk took several ponderous steps to the right, turning to the aurors, revealing a second figure.
Dumbledore didn't wait any longer. With a flick of his wand, a whip of fire washed across the room, a striking viper of a flame bearing its fangs towards Thenabar. The light was washing over his robes, casting shadows across the alien's face, when the whip stopped in midair, mere inches from his face.
"Unacceptable, DumbledoreAlbusProfessor. You will not harmstopkill him. You will stop your ritualsummoningresistence immediately," said a number of voices, each with the same pitch and tone. A hand reached over Thenabar's head, grasping the whip without any sign of pain. The body it was attached to was human as far as he could tell. All of them, Madame Horchaver, Gellert, Tom, each of the half dozen wizards that the Swarm must have acquired all looked human enough on their own. But not taken together, not with veins and skin leading into the center of that fleshy mass, not with the tendrils holding them in place like a macabre chandelier. A collection of the most powerful wizards and witches on the planet, hung around and fused to the zerg in an utterly disgusting way. If Dumbledore had ever required more proof of the zerg's evil, utterly aberrant nature, this would have
"Are there truly no boundaries you won't break, Thenabar?" Dumbledore asked, letting a note of fury fly out under his words while his wand began to move.
"Dumbledore, Dumbledore, please try to be more understanding," Thenabar said, head tilted, holding his hands wide in a peaceful gesture. "The whole reason we're interested in you at all is because of your ability to use magic. You didn't expect us to leave here empty handed, did you?"
The hand, Gellert's hand, twisted its wrist, dissipating the flame whip. Several of the other hands began to rise, moving in the air as if conducting a phantom orchestra. Dumbledore finished his spell, forming a ring of brilliant red reductor curses around the monstrosity and Thenabar, letting them fly in. Thenabar managed to slip under them, practically flowing under the curses with inhuman flexibility, before dashing towards Adeviar. Tom raised a hand, and the curses heading towards him and the others simply vanished. The conducting whipped into a frenzy, sending plates of earth rocketing towards Dumbledore, damaging some of the outer edge of the circle. Dumbledore muttered an incantation, pulling up a shield seconds before the rock stuck him. There was a moment's pause, a single second of peace in the now flickering blue light of the ritual, before Adeviar cast a sickly green-yellow beam towards Thenabar and the fight began in earnest.
(Transition)
The world outside his ship seemed to slow down as the call came to Tassadar's mind. The Gantrithor's hull pushed slowly, painfully into the Overmind's flesh as the dark templar's energy moved into the vast creature in slow spiraling arcs. He had time to think, time to respond.
The call was tempting. It promised escape, it promised a chance to fight for his people and for the universe for yet longer, to see the proud and just world, free of the zerg and their ruinous path to oblivion, free of the shackling traditions of the Conclave. It promised him a chance to fight and to help, and there was that tinge of desperation and pleading that he had felt above Mar Sara, with all those terrans minds begging, hoping, running to whatever safety they could find. Even the terrans, with their young minds, and even with the expanse of space between them, he had heard that cry and could not bring himself to silence it.
But the Overmind's vast bulk remained before him, on the verge of escape, and before any other duty he could possibly take on he had to finish this one, for the sake of everything else. He couldn't leave this unfinished. It was simply inconceivable. He could not disrespect the sacrifices of all those brave templar and courageous terrans who had given their lives to save countless more. All he had to do was stay here, and it would all be done.
He could see the energies of the dark templar ravaging the Overmind, tearing it asunder, wrapping around its vast spines and carving into its flesh. The vast beacon, the vast mind was disappearing. Could he hope, perhaps that this was enough? That this would kill the monster, that it would save his people.
It would have to be. Tassadar could not ignore the screaming voices behind the anomaly, their shouts and cries for help. The anomaly itself was fluctuated, spasming in reaction to whatever disruption was on the other side. With the brilliant destruction of the Overmind before him, with his ship collapsing around him, Tassadar let the pull of the anomaly take him.
He was immediately hit with the sensation of falling sideways, whipped around an axis like the spoke of a wheel. Faster and faster he rotated, feeling almost as if he would be flung off at any moment. He couldn't see, couldn't sense any mind aside from his own. There was no Khala here, nothing to provide reference except the spinning.
Suddenly the spinning began to slow. Tassadar's sense of direction managed to return, enough to realize that he was tipping upwards, the final rotation slowly levering him upright. Tick by tick the wheel turned, moving him higher and higher until finally he was fully upright. A world erupted into being around him.
He was at the center of a circle. A titanic zerg form was screeching, tearing its way through the building and the terrans within it. Two human psionics, one infested, were fighting what would seem to be a terran child, if not for the warping flesh and voracious thoughts, and another new abomination, several terrans fused into a floating orb of discoloured flesh. Tassadar had no idea what was going on and he had no time to. All he could do was fight.
The lone protoss templar marshalled his power, that of the khalai and the dark templar alike and unleashed it.
(Transition)
It took Luna nearly a minute of desperate flailing to realize Abathur wasn't paying any attention to his body. No matter how much she begged or pleaded or yelled or hit him he wasn't going to respond. He had left her completely alone, aside from the mindless people and the handful of zerg that remained after the blast. For some reason, Luna felt they had to be discounted. They couldn't talk, they couldn't do anything on their own, and...they couldn't think. Merlin, what had she been doing? She'd been giving people to Abathur to make into fancy puppets, had convinced them that it would be great if...had she really convinced them? If she'd shown them the hivemind, and the hivemind and Abathur made them into that, then-
Luna collapsed. She couldn't muster the strength to keep standing.
She tried to count in her head, how many people she had recruited. After forty, she had to give up. There were too many and she was too overwhelmed and it was-was it getting dark above her? Luna looked overhead, craning her neck. Four massive zerg were flying over head. Three were tapered at one end and bulbous at the other, the leviathans that Abathur had mentioned, the ones that carried the cerebrate. She was supposed to leave on them, wasn't she? To leave the planet and the humans to...whatever it was Abathur had in store for them.
The fourth creature, she didn't remember. It was more ovaloid, like a flying carapaced egg, a massive slit dominating its thicker bottom half. It seemed to be going a different direction than the others, flying more towards the west. Was it new? Had the cerebrate made it? The slit opened partially, revealing a bright yellow eye, slitted like a snake, malicious and deadly.
Just an eye? Why would it just be an eye? And then, quite suddenly, it hit her. Luna could only think of one beast whose eye was dangerous enough for Abathur to use like this. She'd heard rumors of a basilisk in the castle toward the end of her first year, and apparently they'd all been true.
So that's what had happened to it. Abathur had torn it apart and put it back together in that thing. He wasn't content with just slashing the humans apart, melting them in acid, crushing them in jaws, or whatever other horrid means of killing them he'd found while she'd been brainwashing people, Merlin, she'd been brainwashing people while Abathur made killing machines. And now he was using them.
Why? Why did he insist on killing all of them? Had they been some sort of threat? But Luna hadn't seen any hint that they had been fighting or against each other at all until Abathur had said so, when he said that humans wouldn't trust them, would kill them. But hadn't Thenabar been fine? Were they at war? It seemed like they had only started their war when Abathur had said so. But...he had attacked first, sent the nydus worms underground and the zerg with them to fight.
The basilisk eye had floated out of view, while the leviathans were approaching, getting lower to the ground. The wind displaced by their sheer bulk whipped around Luna, lifting up her limp hair and tentacles as if they were as light as dust. The eye was probably going off to kill more, turn them to stone, imprisoned in time until they finally shattered. All because Abathur decided that humans had to die or become mindless slaves, and Luna couldn't do anything to stop it.
Could she?
Luna stood up. Her tentacles snapped to attention, cracking into place like spiked flails whipping into place. Her face felt slack, dead of any expression. She didn't want to have to do this, not really. But she couldn't stand aside, couldn't ignore what was going on right in front of her.
The stone pavement was uneven, but he'd made sure her sense of balance was better. It was rough, as well, but her armored feet had no trouble on any terrain, not anymore. He'd done so much for her, she couldn't even keep track of it all. And yet...she continued her slow march toward him, the horrible necessity of what she was about to do nearly crushing her.
The leviathans kept floating lower. The wind had picked up. She probably couldn't do this once the cerebrate fully arrived, if it managed to pick up where Abathur left off. It had to be now. Quite suddenly, she was standing directly behind Abathur, the evolution master, one of her best friends for years.
She would never forget the sickening noise his body made as she tore it apart.
(Transition)
Abathur: Slug boy who's real big and good at the genetics. Also his mouth is sideways. ~f
Abathur: Focused. Calculating. Intelligent. Cold. Very few words can be used to describe the Evolution Master, for there are very few things to compare him to. In a Swarm where most creatures are grown by the billions, Abathur stands out for being a unique creation, the only being of his like in the entire galaxy. Instead of relying on numbers, Abathur relies on his ability to shape essence to constantly evolve the Swarm, working from the backlines to invent and implement increasingly deadly weapons and strains. In the span of a few years, Abathur is capable of utterly reshaping the Swarm, creating dozens of new strains each more lethal than the least, creations capable of killing in new and more brutal ways. This is the sole purpose of the Evolution Master: improving the Swarm, through essence, through stressors, through planning, through pain, he will never stop his endless march for perfection, no matter what gets in his way.