CHAPTER 2: ARCTURUS MENSK
"I am free. I need not your services," sneered Kerrigan.
"Yes, but do you want them?"
"Do you think me afraid to shoot? Be warned, I would take great pleasure from your death."
"That's because they pump you so full of chemicals you'd kill your own grandmother and like it. I'm offering you yourself back. Your sanity. Your soul."
Since when do I care about my soul? She asked herself. Since now.
"Do you really think like is like this? You think all across the galaxy people live to kill each other? There's beauty out there. Do you want to see it?"
Kerrigan made up her mind. She cloaked and hopped over the fence. Seeing the confused look on Arcturus's face, she leaned down to his ear and whispered "yes."
Arcturus's ship was huge and filled with Sons of Korhal. He made her give him the gun to be sure she wouldn't shoot. He led her to a small room with only a sort of raised cushion in it. He sat on it and patted next to him. She stood.
"Now tell me, what is your name"
"Sarah Kerrigan"
"Sarah. Take off your helmet and stay a while."
"Are you trying to trick me! I'll die if I take it off!!"
"Nonsense, Sarah. If it makes you feel any better, I'll take you down to sick bay and hook you up to life-support."
"No, I'll do it." She wasn't afraid of death. She really wasn't. She removed her helmet. She frowned.
"I don't feel any different. Are you sire the chemicals are pumped in through the helmet?"
"Positive. Well, I'll have dinner sent up in an hour. Goodnight, Sarah."
With that he was gone. Too late Kerrigan realized he had positioned himself so he could slip out and lock her in. She scowled and felt herself succumb to the raging storm inside her.
Dinner arrived through a subwarp field in a cavity in the wall she tried to escape and found it worked only in one direction. She was so frustrated she tried to rip her makeshift bed on the cushion from the floor. It was bolted down.
The technicians monitoring the hidden security camera in her room noticed she grew more violent with every escape attempt. They worried about possible suicide.
After 2 weeks she became sullen, defeated. She began acting like a hopeless prisoner. Once, they heard a strange sound coming from her room. It took them a full 2 minutes to realize she was crying. It took them 20 minutes to believe it. But she was. Sobbing, uncontrollably, thinking herself alone.
Arcturus came to dinner with her that night. He had a special dinner prepared on a catering tray. He knocked before entering. He asked her to join him. He treated her like a woman, not an animal. And so she trusted him. She opened up to him. She bared her newly-discovered soul to him.
After dinner e left to deposit the cart in the galley. He returned to find her lost in thought, crying silently, her back to him. A bit awkwardly, he placed his hand on her shoulder. She whipped around, flashing a knife, and before he knew it she had her knife against his throat. When she realized it was him she turned away, ashamed. She tried to stutter out an explanation. "Don't. Please. Never… just… I… Reflexes… training… It's just that… "
"Hush. It's alright now. I'm not hurt. It's gonna be ok. That's all behind you now. You're gonna be alright."
She hoped to god he was right.