Imperium by Forever Jake

Chapter Three

--

"You have the Umojan Hegemon ready on telescreen, Highness," said the girl with the headset. Mengsk nodded in brief acknowledgement and sat in front of the screen.

"Go," he said. The screen blinked on.

They were in the Command Room, as the old Magistrate referred to it – a broad, circular chamber in the heart of the palace filled with every kind of computer and video monitor imaginable. Though he hadn't yet ask the aides to demonstrate, he was half convinced he could run his entire Dominion from this room. True or not, the thought gave him great pleasure.

The screen directly in front of his chair was now filled with the overlarge features of the premier of the Umojan Protectorate, a man Mengsk knew as Donovan Korovsky. The two politicians went back as far as the early days of the original Korhal rebellion, when he had been forced into hiding from Confederate enforcers. Then it had been Korovsky, at the time a lowly Umojan councilor, who had urged his government to offer asylum to his friend. Now it would be Mengsk extending his own protective hand.

"Arcturus, old friend," the face in the telescreen warmly intoned. The years have not been kind to him, Mengsk thought. His hair is almost completely white. One advantage to being bald, I suppose. "It is good to see you alive and well. The rumors are true, then? The Confederacy's fall had to do with you?"

"I am far from responsible for the toppling of the Confederacy, Donovan," he assured his friend. "You can thank the Zerg for that – not that it matters. What matters now is unifying all of our varying Terran factions before the alien threat destroys us as well."

"You are right, of course, my friend," the image of Korovsky said. "But my government is wary of overextending itself. We fear that if we ally ourselves with Korhal, we will make ourselves a more obvious target for the Zerg and Protoss."

"You are Terran, Donovan, the same as I am. That in itself is enough to make you a target. If Umoja stands alone, she will fight valiantly – and perish valiantly. Together, we stand a chance against the Swarms and the Protoss fleets. An allied Terran armada would be a powerful force, capable of holding the aliens at bay."

There was a pause. Korovsky was skeptical, of course, but if he could be hooked...

"Have you already spoken with Moria?"

"The Combine's board of directors are actually waiting right on the other channel. As soon as you and I are through–"

"We are through, Emperor Mengsk." Korovsky stiffened visibly. "The Umojan Protectorate cannot promise the support of its troops and starships unless those of the Kel-Morian Combine will also agree. Speak with their directors and call on me again. I shall wait for you."

"Thank you, old friend." Korovsky's face vanished as the screen went blank. Mengsk sighed and stood up. "Any response from Moria yet?" he asked the girl with the headset. She shook her head.

"Not yet. Wait... Just got 'em. Combine board of directors, channel six."

"Put 'em on."

He sat back down in his chair. The picture on the screen returned abruptly. There were eight figures this time, clustered around an impressive wood table in some sort of meeting room. One of them cleared his throat.

"Good evening, gentlemen," Mengsk began.

"Good evening, Emperor Mengsk," replied the man who had made the noise. "I'm Jarren Herk. I'm the senior chairman for this board, and I'll be speaking for us all today."

"I'm pleased to make your acquaintance, Mister Herk. As you all know, the shadows cast by the oppressive Confederacy are no more. We are at a crossroads; the doorway of a new age of freedom and unity is upon us, and–"

"Sorry to interrupt, your Majesty, but I'd prefer if we cut all the doorway-of-a-new-age bullshit and got down to business."

Mengsk swallowed. "That's fine."

"As you have said, the Confederacy is gone. Unfortunately, Emperor Mengsk, some of our stockholders are expressing some concern that your new 'Dominion' might prove just as oppressive as the Confederacy you're replacing."

"I thought they might. Tell your stockholders they have nothing to fear from me, and that they are welcome to take their concerns up with me one-on-one. As for the Confederacy, their absence in this sector means we're all going to have to start cracking down somewhat if we plan to stay alive."

"That's right. While the end of the Confederacy means lighter restrictions for those of us that operate outside the Confederates' idea of the law, it also means the loss of a considerable amount of protection. Let's face it, the Confederacy was very much the military power in the sector."

"Sadly true. Which is why I am prepared to offer full protection–"

"With what, Emperor? I'm sorry to be so blunt, but your forces you seem so eager to offer us can't possibly match the defenses of the Confederacy's that the Zerg have already destroyed. If the full might of the Confederate fleets couldn't stop the aliens, what the hell do you think you'll be able to do?"

The Emperor smiled then. For a moment he had thought they'd have gotten away, but now he had them.

"Gentlemen," Mengsk began, "allow me to show you something." He turned to the girl with the headset. "Queue up the schematics," he said. She complied; a second later, the screen behind him blinked on. "Can you all make that out?" he asked the Morians.

"It looks like some kind of blueprint," said Herk. "What is it?"

"My agents discovered these schematics just before the evacuation of Mar Sara. The device, we came to realize, was something long rumored to have existed, but never found – a psi emitter."

"Oh, for God's sake!" exclaimed the chairman skeptically. "The psi emitter? Everybody knows that thing isn't real!"

"On the contrary, Mister Herk. It is very real. I've built them; used them, even." He paused. I used them to lure the Zerg to Antiga and Tarsonis, he thought. He felt no guilt – the emitters, like anything else, had been the means to a worthwhile end. Morality was for philosophers, and Mengsk was not a philosopher. All the same, he decided, it probably wasn't the best idea to go around implicating himself in the Confederacy's fall just yet.

"What do they do?" asked a man on the other end who had not yet spoken.

"Why don't you answer that one, Mister Herk? Imagine for a moment that one really could build and use a psi emitter. What might happen?"

There was another long pause. Herk seemed uncertain; intimidated, almost. He swallowed and stammered out a brief response.

"W-well, the rumors about the psi emitter always said that it broadcast psionic signals, like the kind our g-ghost agents use."

"Right. And what might a truly massive signal be able to cause?"

"A m-massive signal? Well, I guess ghosts could use it for whatever training they go through–"

"You're not think about this the right way, Mister Herk. Anyone else have any idea?" He paused, his eyes scanning the assembled men. No one said a word. "I suppose I'll have to explain, then," he said, smiling.

"Zerg broods, we've discovered, use psionic emanations to communicate with one another, the same sorts of emanations that grant ghosts their abilities."

"Yea? So?"

"So, if this massive psionic signal were to go off... it would get their attention. The emitters we built are capable of a psionic broadcast strong enough to destroy a ghost's mind, if it were focused right on them. Unfocused, the device beams the signal out into space, where it's heard by pretty much every Zerg on this side of the galaxy."

"How do they respond?" asked the man who had spoken out before.

"Like sharks to blood in the water. Swarms of Zerg descend on the emitter within days." He stopped for a moment to let the image sink in, and then went on. "Suppose we activate an emitter near the Protoss fleets. Bingo, the Zerg are attacking the Protoss! We can force our enemies to pit themselves against one another, over and over, until nothing survives."

"It's not possible," someone whispered.

"Oh, but it is. I've tested it. The signal runs on a timer, too; expires after a few days' time. No worries about agitating the Swarm once it's arrived. Lure it to the Protoss, and back off – wait for the sparks to fly. All too easy."

There was silence, then. Mengsk let it go on. They were digesting what he had told them, processing it. One by one they began to nod to themselves, so subtly they probably didn't even realize they were doing so.

But he noticed. He noticed, and he smiled.

--

All too easy. Those were the words he had used. Too easy to throw all the aliens together into massive conflict, too easy to sit and wait and build up strength while they annihilate one another – and too easy to dupe Kel-Morian investors into signing away their ships and soldiers and money to one Emperor's dreams of Dominion and conquest.

Mengsk walked along the winding balcony as it bent along the irregular surfaces of the palace. A thin, nearly-invisible layer of transpara-steel girded the outside of the balcony, protecting him from the heat of the night and the vengeful fire of would-be assassins alike.

He had been here, once, years ago. His father had been the Magistrate, then, at a time when such positions had actually meant something. Arcturus had gone to visit the man who ruled Korhal with benevolent vision, the man who preached to the populace about the injustices of the Confederacy's policies and rallied for peaceful secession.

Arcturus had gone to talk his father out of his mad plans, to convince him to just play along and let the Confederacy make the rules. The two had come here, to the highest balcony, and looked out over the darkened city while the argued politics and morality. The next day, the son had left the planet bitter and frustrated, unable to win his father over.

It was the last time the two would ever speak.

Three days later, Magistrate Augustus Mengsk, his wife and his two daughters were dead, assassinated by Confederate 'peacekeepers'. The corpses were suspended from the balcony for a week while birds and insects came to assault and desecrate the bodies. A warning had been given – the Confederacy would not tolerate the kinds of things Arcturus' father had been so keen on saying.

The warning didn't stick. Talk of secession continued, even spread. This time, there were no more words of peaceful independence. The plan had become open, bloody rebellion. Korhal's sons would fight for the freedom of their planet, and if necessary, die for that freedom. It all sounded brave and inspiring in the planning.

It was not to be. There would be no fighting for Korhal – only dying.

One thousand tactical nuclear warheads struck the surface of Korhal, decimating the cities and turning the lush landscape into a broken desert. Months later, as the radiation levels normalized, people would begin to return and re-colonize – but the deed had been done.

The Confederacy was a corrupt, oppressive government that utilized secret armies of shock troops and potent space and planetary weapons to keep their terrified citizens in check. Arcturus and his supporters were bringing about a new age of human freedom and unity to replace the decades of strife and dissention that had so long gripped the sector. They were fulfilling prophecy, doing good work… weren't they?

"Some of our stockholders are expressing some concern that your new 'Dominion' might prove just as oppressive as the Confederacy you're replacing." That was what the chairman fellow had said. Concern that he would become the monster he had vanquished? He, Arcturus Mengsk, great protector of humanity… couldn't possibly be…

He paused where he had been walking, idly scratching the back of his head with a weary hand. His cool, dark eyes flickered around, focusing on nothing.

He blinked.

He had been on the tip of something, there – some great epiphany of the sort one comes to while walking alone in the middle of the night. It was no use, though. It was gone now, just as all such things disappear if not nailed down immediately. He shrugged. It didn't matter.

There was a door on the side of the building, a few feet up the catwalk. He decided it was time he went to bed. He yawned and began to shuffle slowly towards the entrance.

He paused. He had seen something, there…

He turned around sharply, his eyes at once alert and predatorial. What was it? Something out there, in the city perhaps, had snagged his attention, some element of the night striking wrong his seasoned observational sense. He looked and looked, his breath hesitating in his throat as he scanned the nightscape.

There!

Up, up, up above the horizon of streetlit buildings, there had been a tiny flash of light. He waited, staring at the section of sky, the whole of his being focused on the spot where he had seen the flash.

Then there was another. And another.

Down below, though he could not see them, people on the street were stopping, pointing. Falling stars? A meteor shower? Some sort of fireworks display? Up on the balcony, all alone, Arcturus Mengsk knew better.

Korhal was under attack.

--

End of Chapter Three

--