Hello dear people. 2021 is here, I think we all hope only one thing: That it won't be like 2020. So, wherever you are, wherever you are from, stay safe and healthy.
Chapter 27
Every party needs a Mage!
''Sooo..." Evalonis mused as he and Paula were walking down a corridor within the Hyperion. ''...how exactly did that even make any sense? I mean, what you told me seems physically impossible. Also, the same person can't be in two places at the same time." He then stopped and squinted his eyes. "Can they?" When Paula heard that, she too stopped and pulled her shoulders up.
"Apparently Mum can." she replied. "Don't ask me how she did that. Or how I did that. Oh damn, just thinking about it makes my head hurt..."
"It sure sounds...what's the word you usually use to describe these things?"
"Trippy."
"Yes." Evalonis confirmed. "Trippy. So, you gained a helping hand from your mother. And then what?"
"I ran. As fast as I could. Hurried back on the bridge, activated the hyperdrive, and off I went."
"And what about the others? Your mother? Your father? And the other people you said were on board?" All Paula did was to shrug her shoulders once more.
"Beats me. Once the ship exited hyperspace and crash-landed, they were no longer on board. So I suppose Mum took them with her. I guess." Yep, that certainly sounded like Paula alright.
"Well, if you say so. It is just good that...wait, crash-landed?!" Evalonis suddenly asked and looked down at his girlfriend. Paula stared up and blinked a few times before a goofy smile appeared on her face.
"Oh, yes! I forgot! Story ain't over yet! So, as I said, when the ship exited, I kinda misjudged the distance to a planet. But I totally winged it like a pro!" she boasted. Somehow Evalonis had his doubts about this statement.
And he was damn right about that...
Shortly before the Hyperion left Flemmington...
"Too close! TOO CLOSE!" Paula yelled the moment the Hyperion came out of hyperspace, only to stare at something that looked like an ocean from high above, which made sense because it was actually an ocean. One that she knew well.
Sternenheim.
Paula's home, the place where she had been born, and that had been the place where her family had settled down. A place that deserved the description paradise, and was hidden from pretty much everyone else. A world that carried its own strange secrets, a place where even someone as imbalanced as the young Kerrigan felt calm and serene.
"REVERSE THRUSTERS! WHERE ARE THE REVERSE THRUSTERS?!"
Well, most of the time.
Her mother had once tried to teach her that while it was possible to break the rules of space and time, the consequences usually far outweighed the gains. And Paula knew exactly what her mother had been trying to tell her. Everything happened for a reason after all. Still, right now she wished she had at least tried to figure out how to bend space and time. Because if she had, then she wouldn't stand on the bridge of a vessel that was about to slam into a goddamn planet.
"Aw...crap." Paula managed to whimper as the Hyperion, caught by the gravity of her homeworld, dived deep into the atmosphere. "This is gonna hurt, isn't it?"
Yes. Yes, it was.
Sternenheim was a strange world. Nothing really seemed to make any sense. Like for example that the oceans were made out of water that you could actually drink. Or rather "the ocean". Since there was only one. It covered more than 98 percent of the surface of the planet, and only here and there you could find small islands and archipelagos. Another fascinating aspect was that you wouldn't find any dangerous critter inside the never-ending ocean. Sure, there was some weird stuff swimming around in those waters. Like squid fishes, the most invasive species inside the entire galaxy (and according to Sarah Kerrigan the most delicious one). And while you could always take a swim in these waters, the life on those few islands was a bit more...ferocious.
The truly unique thing about the locals was that it wasn't the animals that could ruin your day. Since there weren't any. At least any indigenous. The plant-life, however?
Well, the story of Jim Raynor getting beaten up by a palm-tree was probably one of Paula's favorite childhood stories. Usually, the locals were a friendly bunch of sentient plants. Unless you tried to pluck a fruit from their branches without asking nicely. And even then, chances were high that they would give you a royal beating, just because they felt like it. Still, as long as you knew how to behave, the locals weren't that bad. There was only one golden rule you should never forget:
Never use palms for your hammock on this world.
Never.
Another quaint fact about this world was that it resided inside a stellar nebula, something that should be impossible. The radiation inside those were usually enough to turn any living being into mush within fractions of a second. Even a Zerg leviathan wouldn't dare to venture into a nebula just like that. Yet for some odd reason there was a planet, brimming with life, hidden inside a beautiful (and deadly) nebula.
Sounds fishy?
Everyone was aware that there had to be more to Sternenheim than meets the eye. There were signs that it wasn't a natural planet, that it had been created by someone...or something. The Xel'Naga? Or maybe even someone else?
No one knew.
Karax had postulated a few ideas over the centuries, but so far, he had decided to focus his attention on other problems and projects. And no one else really cared about who might have created this world. As for Paula's mother, well, she had simply declared that whoever had created this world, they should have left a "This is mine. Be back soon."-somewhere. As far as Sarah Kerrigan was concerned, this place belonged to her and her family now. As for Paula: This place was her home. There was no other place in the galaxy that made her feel more at peace.
There were more things unique to this world. Since Sternenheim didn't orbit a star and was surrounded by all sides by the bright colors of a stellar nebula, there was no day-and-night-cycle. There was just day. And something that you could call "twilight hour". When Paula had first left Sternenheim and visited another world, night had been so dark that she had thought she had turned blind. Her parents had told her that in the beginning living in a place with no night had been hard. But she hadn't known anything but eternal day for the first few decades of her life. Which had come with certain benefits. Like the fact that she hadn't been able to be afraid of the dark as a small child.
All of that sounded like a true paradise, right? Well, there was at least one thing about this world that was less endearing. And that were the storms.
Or rather: The storm.
There was one massive band of clouds moving over the smooth surface of the planet. And just like the eternal day, this storm was something that was a part of this world. It moved across the planet at a steady pace, and you could set your watch after it. Every 10 months the storm would hit the chain of islands that had become the home to a certain someone. And during that time, you didn't want to go outside. Like, seriously.
Just don't.
Aside from what the world had to offer, Paula's family had added their own twist to the mix. What can one do if aging is no longer an issue? Well, every member of her family had found their own answer to that. Needlessly to say it was Paula's Uncle Joe that had outdone himself by taking up the hobby of gardening, creating a garden of the size and beauty that was unheard of. It was a place of tranquility, of beauty, of true wonders.
And it was the place where Paula's father had created something beautiful as well. Ever since he had taken up doing art, Jim Raynor had become one hell of an artist. And the proof of that was the stone garden, a place where countless statues stood, each one representing a person that Jim was dear of. So naturally there were beautifully crafted statues of people that he had fought alongside during the great war, but also others.
There was a statue of Trace Raynor, Jim's dad. And his mother Karol. Of Valerian Mengsk, the founder of the Empire, and of course Matt Horner, his best friend from before the age of a.J. And yes, a.J. stood for "after Joe". The statues of Fenix and Tassadar were among Paula's favorites. They looked so mighty, so imposing. Like legends of old, which they basically were. Her mother was never too tired to tell Jim to sink them in a nearby lake, but so far, he had resisted her calls for that. She probably tolerated it because he had outdone himself when he had made a statue of Izsha and Zagara.
And the Queen of Blades.
The nice one.
And then there were the statues that were at the center of the garden. The ones that meant the most to Jim. They had earned themselves a special place, just like they had inside Paula's father's heart. The first two statues belonged to a woman and a young boy, and they were the reason why Sarah usually stayed away from the garden. Not because she was scornful about Jim for adding these to the collection, but of respect. Those two statues represented his first family, his dead wife Liddy and Paula's half-brother Johnny. It was one of Paula's favorite places. The statues of Johnny and Liddy, and of Sarah and Paula herself stood a bit removed from the other ones, beneath a huge tree, surrounded by a beautiful lake.
Each and every single one of these statues was true masterpieces. And while they were made out of stone, they just looked so very much alive.
Yes, this place was special.
Too bad that it was about to get wrecked.
"She's late." Marianna growled.
"I know that." Sarah replied, doing her best to ignore the nagging frustration inside the back of her mind, coming from her sisters.
"She ran into problems, I'm sure of it." Claire mumbled.
"That is a possibility." the oldest sister confirmed.
"Bet she fell down a hole and broke her neck. Serves her right." Madeleine sighed. "One of us should have accompanied her."
"They would have noticed, you know that." Sarah told her sisters.
"Fine, but we could have at least put a brain-parasite in her head." another sister said. Sarah did her best to ignore the growing frustration that was currently harassing their shared consciousness. Even though they were all linked, they still possessed more than enough individuality to be their own persons.
Time passed and all Sarah did was to wait. She knew that this was the most annoying part of the plan. It meant that they were doomed to hope that Paula had pulled it off. That was like hoping if a Zergling inside a meat-plant could keep its urges in check and not go all crazy. So yeah, Sarah was pretty certain that Paula had managed to blow it. And the possibility that she had broken her neck in the process was at the very least endearing.
"We should come up with a new plan." Louise whispered as she leaned over to Sarah, making sure that the others couldn't hear them. As the second-born, she too knew how to maintain a certain distance to their shared consciousness.
"We should wait some more." Sarah refused. "She still might have done it."
"No one is here. They all left. We got the place to ourselves." Louise ignored Sarah's reply. "I'd say this is a golden opportunity."
"To do what?" Sarah asked with a mocking tone and raised an eyebrow as she looked at her younger sister. "Block the toilets and flush them? Paint some naughty words on walls? Put together a nuclear explosion device and create a mushroom-like cloud in the upper atmosphere?"
"Where did you get your hands on fissure material?" Louise whispered in awe, which earned her a hard look from her older sister.
"None of your business."
Better not give them any weird ideas. Well, any weirder than they already were. And so they were forced to wait. The moment of truth had already come...and passed without so much as a whisper. The only sign that something had happened was the fact that their father Joseph had suddenly been whisked away. It meant that Paula undoubtedly had achieved something. The only problem with that was that the psionics that had grabbed their father had a distinctive scent to them, one that didn't belong to Paula...
...but Sarah Kerrigan, Paula's mother.
"If Paula blew our cover, then we're done for." one of Sarah's many sisters mumbled, echoing her own thoughts.
"We don't know that." Sarah tried to calm the others. "All we know is that Paula's mother wanted father somewhere, that's all. Don't come to conclusions until you know more." Her words were meant to ease her sisters' nervousness, yet she knew that they had already made up their mind that Paula had blown it. And they were already thinking about a way to come up with some "plausible deniability". But so far all they had come up with was "Paula's to blame!"
Then again, so far that had always worked.
If it's broken and works in your favor, don't fix it.
"Mother will be furious if she finds out." Louise whispered.
"If she finds out." Sarah corrected her.
"Come on, you know that that's not gonna happen. She will smell out any lie that we present to her. Or worse, she will take it out on Dad." Sarah didn't reply anything to that. As the firstborn, her duty was to calm her sisters down and to keep them focused. But it didn't change the fact that Louise had a point. Still, Sarah decided to stay quiet instead of speaking out loud.
"We wait." she simply said with a flat voice. "Should Paula truly have ruined our plans, then we will deal with that problem once it presents itself to us." Thankfully their time of waiting was about to come to an end. A faint noise caught their attention, and all of them looked up into the sky.
"Was that an explosion?" one of the sisters asked, and Sarah could feel her fear. She sent out calming signals through their shared consciousness, doing her best to ease her sisters' minds. As they scanned the sky, one of them finally spotted...something.
"There! Up there!" All of them looked in the same direction at the same time, spotting a dark...thing high up in the sky. It was growing in size. Fast! And once you could make out some details.
"Is that...?" Louise gasped.
"Seems Paula made it after all." Sarah growled.
"Uh huh...then why is she trailing smoke?" To that Sarah had no answer. They watched in horror how the vessel approaching them grew and grew in size until you could make out some details. It was an ancient battlecruiser. An ancient battlecruiser that was trailing ungodly amounts of smoke while debris was falling off its ragged hull. The vessel was clearly out of control. Which was bad. But what made it even worse...
"Uhm...is it just me or is this thing coming right at us?!" Louise whined. Sarah squinted her eyes to take a better look. All she could see was a big brick, the front of the battlecruiser, growing in size with each passing second.
"I think you're right." Sarah muttered. But since she didn't want to scare her sisters... "She's probably going to pull up anytime soon." There was an awkward moment of silence. "Anytime now."
"Should happen right about now."
"Just give it another second or two."
It was her sister Maive who spoke out what everyone was thinking.
"She isn't pulling up! She's heading right for us!"
Sarah could feel her frustration spike and one of her eyelids began to twitch. Of course, things had gone south. She raised herself to full height so that all of her sisters could see her. She took a deep breath, even though she could have told them psionically the same thing, and then-
"TO COVER!" she yelled before she watched as her sisters threw themselves to the ground, only to vanish deep inside the earth as they used their ability to burrow themselves. Sarah was the last one to head for cover underground, but only after raising her hand, pointing it at the incoming battlecruiser, and flipping the bird at it.
"Up yours, Paula. Up yours!"
Seconds later the Hyperion smashed into the surface of Sternenheim.
For over one thousand years Jim Raynor had worked in his stone garden, with some help of Joseph Brent. It was a place of contemplation, of quiet, of beauty. Surrounded by lush trees and some crystal-blue rivers, it was truly beautiful.
Until a goddamn battlecruiser decided to plow through it.
The Hyperion didn't exactly land. A more fitting description would be "falling from the sky like a brick". But it didn't even do that. Having gained far too much momentum, the ship arrived far too fast and at a shallow angle. So when it made contact, the ancient warship was basically turned into the world's biggest plow.
There were two different kinds of plants on Sternenheim. The locals, and the newcomers. The locals were the ones that had a mind of their own and could end up beating you up if you looked at them the wrong way. The other kind was the one Joseph brought along. You know, the normal kind of plants. The one that doesn't beat you up. The latter didn't have much of a choice and were simply smashed to pieces by the massive warship. The locals, however, seemed to notice the danger, and reacted in a rather unique way, by de-rooting themselves...
...and running like crazy on their short, stubby, root-liked legs away from the carnage.
It was actually quite a hilarious sight.
Sarah Kerrigan had taught her daughter once that destruction was a part of life and usually gave way to creation, she had meant that in a grander scale of the cosmos. But that was probably not about people steering battlecruisers into planets. No one would be that dumb.
No one except for Paula Kerrigan.
Trees and statues, hundreds of years old, were mowed down and turned into rubble. The statue of Fenix and Tassadar? Gone. Valerian Mengsk? Turned to dust. Even Matt Horner wasn't spared that fate. The giant ship left a trail of destruction, something that you couldn't fix with just a bucket and some grease. While the Hyperion was stupidly fast when it landed, the sudden contact with the ground slowed it down considerably. Gravity did the rest, and so the insane attempt at landing eventually came to a halt...
...a couple of meters from the statues of Liddy, Johnny, Sarah and Paula.
The deafening sound ceased, and an eerie silence replaced it. The destruction caused was local, but everything that had been so unlucky to be in the path of the Hyperion had been completely squashed. The silence went on for quite some time, until a hatch on the side of the front of the vessel popped open and a certain brown-haired menace emerged.
"Ugh..." Paula Kerrigan heaved as she simply fell forward and landed on the soft ground. She landed on her back and held her head. "Can someone make the world stop spinning, please? Oh, I think I'm gonna churn..." It took her a while to regain her senses. Paula rolled on all fours, yet the world still continued to spin around her head. Good thing that no one had witnessed her piss-poor attempt at a landing. Well, except for a bunch of sentient plants, but one of the earliest lessons her father had taught her was to never listen to them anyway.
"Well...good thing...that no one...witnessed that..." Paula panted, not realizing how the ground behind her began to shift as if something beneath it was moving. She didn't pay any attention to it, though. Too busy trying to keep her stomach in check, Paula didn't notice how something dark and big emerged from the soil, followed by more of its kind. All of them had a vaguely human-shaped, if you crossed a human with a snake and threw plenty of Zerg into the mix as well. And when Paula heard the strained voice of a certain someone, an icy chill traveled down her spine.
"What is this, Paula?" a cold voice snarled. For a second she mistook the voice for that of Izsha. But a quick glance of her shoulder caused her to sigh in relief. That one right behind her looked like Izsha, but a bit smaller, and with certain differences that only the watchful eye could catch. Nope, that wasn't Izsha. Whew.
"H-hey...Sarah...look what I... found...urrrrk..."
Sarah, Izsha's and Uncle Joe's firstborn, looked down at Paula, then up at the wreck of the Hyperion (which was still smoking in places), and then back at Paula again. Behind her more of her sisters unearthed themselves. Sometimes it pays to have a Zerg in your ancestry. Sarah opened her mouth, only to close it again. Paula noticed the utter disbelief in Sarah's line of thought. And that brought a smile to the young Kerrigan's face. Sarah was known for her cool demeanor and the fact that she had herself under control at all times. In a sense she was the absolute opposite of Paula. It was probably the reason why they got along so well. If only inside Paula's head. The young Kerrigan took a few deep breaths, trying to calm her stomach. Until...
"You're late." Sarah declared matter-of-factually.
"Uh..."
"And you promised that everything would go smoothly."
"Hnng..."
"You also promised us a battlecruiser."
"Ehh..."
"This is a goddamn wreckage."
"Uhhhgh..."
"And your flying sucks."
"Ehhhiii..."
"Perhaps this is the moment where you tell us what else went wrong." Sarah continued. Paula looked over her shoulder again, a stupefied look on her face.
"Got...got help...from a certain...someone." she managed to say. Sarah immediately knew who she was referring to and her eyes widened in anger.
"Say WHAT?!" she yelled.
"Had help from my mo-mo-MOAAAAA!" And that's when Paula finally lost control over her stomach. Behind Sarah some of her sisters slithered up to her and looked down at the young Kerrigan.
"This is disgusting!" Mona whispered.
"I think it's amazing that such a small body can contain so many fluids!" Louise marveled. "There's no end to it!"
"If that means that she's about to start a breeding-cycle and is about to lay some eggs, then I'm so out of this!" another sister growled. Paula was in no condition to talk back. Not until her belly was finally empty. She took a few deep breaths and managed to sit down on her butt.
"Just so you know..." she moaned. "...I don't lay eggs."
"Oh, that's a relief." Louise whispered. "One less thing we have in common then."
"Be quiet, all of you!" Sarah barked, calling her sisters to order. She looked up at the giant vessel and frowned. "We already lost a lot of time. So we have to hurry. Get in there and see what needs to be fixed. We have to leave as soon as possible." With her authority as firstborn, she decided to put her foot, err, tail on it, and thankfully her sisters decided to do as they were told. Countless more emerged from the ground, and soon hundreds of them were climbing all over the vessel, looking for hatches and entry-points to get inside and start working on the Hyperion. Or what was left of her. And when Sarah knew that they were busy, she looked down at Paula once more and frowned.
"So, what was it you said about a certain someone helping?"
"Ehehehe...funny story, really." Paula chuckled, but she couldn't hide the desperation in her own voice. "I tell you if you promise to not beat me up."
"That depends on what you're about to tell me."
"Aw, crap."
The Hyperion had stopped smoking, which was a good sign. Probably. The reactor hadn't gone nuclear so far, so that had to count for something, right?
"So let me get this straight..." Sarah growled, her arms crossed in front of her chest, as she looked down at Paula who was sitting on what once had been a healthy apple-tree. "...you recruited a bunch of people you had never even met before, dragged them into a derelict vessel without any form of preparation, encountered a century-old infested Terran, panicked like a pro, summoned your father by accident, SUMMONED YOUR MOTHER BY DOING THAT, needed her help to fix this mess, and now everyone knows about our plan. Did I get this right?"
"I only told Mom about it."
"Oh, that makes things so much better." Sarah griped. "Because your mother so won't tell the others."
"She promised she wouldn't."
"Oh, that makes it so much better." Sarah sighed and rubbed her temples. "I knew that things would not go according to plan, and I knew that I should have come along. But noooooo, I allowed you to talk me out of it."
"Gehehe, doesn't that mean that I'm not to blame and you are?" Paula chuckled, only to earn herself a withering glare from Sarah. "I'll be quiet for now..."
"Need to think, so shut up and stop being yourself for a moment." Sarah explained. That's when one of her sisters approached them.
"Oh, hey Jean." Paula greeted the other sister, who threw her an annoyed glance.
"I'm Rebecca, you dimwit." And then Rebecca turned her attention towards her older sister.
"How bad is it?" Sarah wanted to know.
"Pretty bad. Structural parts are all okay, which is the best thing I can tell you. The reactor is basically on its last legs, and the electric systems are so ancient that we can't make head or tail of them." The moment Rebecca said that, Paula snickered. Both sisters threw her an annoyed glance.
"What?" they asked at the same time.
"You said head or tail, which is funny because you all have heads and tails and..." When Paula realized that the sisters were in no mood for whatever she had to say, she just bit on her lip and looked down.
"How serious is the damage? Can you fix it in time?" Sarah wanted to know.
"Doubtful." Rebecca replied. "The structural damage, that we can fix. But these systems are ancient. There are still computers inside with hard-drives. Hard-drives! Do you know how to fix a hard-drive? I sure don't."
"I see. Damage control it is, I guess." Sarah sighed. "See if you can make the ship fly worthy so we can take it away from here. Doesn't need to be far, just so we won't be here when she arrives." Paula noticed how Rebecca tensed up when she heard about her.
"Don't worry, Mom promised me to keep this to herself, so she won't be getting here anytime soon and-" That's when Sarah gestured Paula to shut up.
"Zip it!"
"But-"
"Shut your piehole."
"I just wanted-"
"Close the hatch!"
"All I did was to-"
"One more word and I'm going to tell your mother about your boyfriend!" Sarah declared, ushering the ultimate threat which actually caused Paula to go ghostly-pale. And then she was actually quiet.
"Rebecca?" Sarah then asked and looked at her younger sister.
"Dunno." the other small version of Izsha mused. "I guess we could squeeze out some more lightyears, but not much. So, if there would be a better option, no matter what, I'd take it."
"Hmmm..." Sarah hummed, deeply lost in thought. That's when suddenly Paula jumped to her feet.
"I got it!" she suddenly exclaimed.
"You figured out why you're so annoying?" Sarah whispered, which earned her an amused look from her sister.
"We just have to ask the one guy for help who knows more about ancient technology than anyone else! Uncle Karax!" Paula declared with a proud look on her face. All she earned, however, were irritated looks from both Sarah and Rebecca.
"Brilliant plan, Paula!" Sarah praised her with a mocking tone in her voice. "That's so clever, especially since he isn't interested in anything but his work. Don't you think we checked that before?" But the smile Paula flashed them in return was downright annoying.
"It just didn't work because you didn't have the right thing to win him over! Here, let me handle that. Just you wait and see!" she declared, turned around and simply ran off into the distance. After she was almost gone from their sight, Sarah took a deep breath.
"HE'S THE OTHER WAY, YOU DIMWIT!" Sarah yelled.
"KNEW THAT, I WAS JUST TESTING YOU!" Paula yelled back, turned in the other direction, and ran straight towards the horizon. And when she was finally gone from their sights, Sarah sighed.
"Aren't you going to stop her?" Rebecca wanted to know.
"No." Sarah replied. "Whatever keeps her busy is what keeps her out of our hair."
"We don't have hair."
"Don't, Sister. Just...don't."
Sternenheim wasn't just a unique world that seemed to defy logic, it was also the resting place of one of the biggest secrets the universe had to offer. Or at least the galaxy they called their home. Ulnar, or what was left of it, was also part of this world. The former "homeworld" of the Xel'Naga had found its final resting place here after a certain madman had decided that he didn't need no stinkin' auto-pilot to steer this thing home.
Now Ulnar had become the biggest puzzle in the history of, well, pretty much all and everyone.
No one really cared about the wreckage that once had held the fate of the entire universe inside of it. Especially not Sarah Kerrigan, who still loathed the very thought of being near any piece of this dreaded thing. That's why the "killing field", how Paula's mother liked to call it, had been the perfect hiding spot for young Paula every time she had done something naughty.
And she had done naughty things many times.
What had once been a gigantic "space station", had been reduced to countless pieces of rubble, all filling the surrounding area. Karax had explained that over 70 percent of Ulnar had landed inside the water, and even for the crafty phase smith it was hard to get to that pieces, especially since Paula's mother felt no need to help him with that.
Ulnar wasn't simply a space station. Of course, you could call it like that, but it was so much more. Human logic was not enough to fully understand what it was.
Well, now it was one big puzzle.
And there was only one person on this world who actually wanted to put those pieces back together.
"Hmmmm..." Karax hummed as he held a piece of dark stone in his hand. A probe came over and started to scan the piece as it analyzed it, looking for matches. "...this does look familiar." He recognized the shape of one side and the signs on it. It seemed to match another piece that he had looked at just a few hours ago. It made sense that the two parts that belonged together were in the same area. At the same time Karax was aware that this wasn't for certain. That's why he had to catalog every piece of debris he came across, regardless of how insignificant or small it was. It was a tedious task, but every glimpse of knowledge unlocked was one step closer to unlocking the secret that was Ulnar. And Karax was nothing if not committed to this task. The probe next to him chirped something. It looked nothing like the probes his kind had used during the Great War. It didn't hover in the air. Instead, it used four spider-like mechanical legs to move around. This probe, alongside the thousands of others that helped him in his task, was of his own design. A long time ago he had studied the technique the Zerg use to burrow through the ground and figured that it would make a fine addition for a probe. That way it could search for things that lay deep beneath the ground. Even in all those centuries, he hadn't really changed the design of those legs. Karax was too modest to claim that it was his design, though. No, the true genius had been the one who had created those nifty spider mines the Terran had utilized. Sometimes copying was the highest form of flattery, and Karax recognized brilliant work when he saw it.
Even with the help of his probes, the work was more than a person could do in one lifetime. Good thing that he had all the time in the world. While Sarah Kerrigan wasn't really willing to help him, she at least left him to his own devices.
The probe looked at him and chirped.
"Yes, please check if this piece is a match to the one we found earlier." Karax replied and handed it over to his mechanical helper, who grabbed the piece with its internal tractor-beam and skittered away. Karax then looked around to figure out where to go next. It was hard to tell since he was in the middle of a thick jungle. Perhaps he should skip this area and look somewhere different. There was a sandbank nearby that emerged always shortly before the great storm would hit the chain of islands. Perhaps...
"...leee KaaaaaaraaaaaaAAAAAAAAAX" he heard a familiar voice until suddenly something small and light jumped him from behind and held on to him like an octopus. Karax looked over her shoulder and blinked a few times.
"Paula. How nice to see you. How have you been?" the phase smith asked with a cheerful tone in his voice.
"So so." Paula replied. "But now I got my favorite uncle back, everything's peachy."
"Is that comment not hurtful towards Joseph and Tesson?" Karax wondered.
"Naaaa, it's not. I keep telling them the same thing." Paula told him as she kept piggy-hugging the huge Protoss. "The only difference is that when I tell you that you're my favorite uncle, I actually mean it."
"Hmm... something is troubling about that statement, but thanks anyway." Karax mused. "So, what brings you here? Do you wish to help me cataloging pieces of Ulnar?"
"Uhm...no."
"Oh. Too bad. Then what brings you here?"
"Need your help, Uncle Karax."
"My help?" the phasesmith wondered. "Why, what is this about? Mind you that I cannot help you with questions regarding the sexual reproduction of Terrans, no matter what Joseph told you."
"Not gonna need the talk from you." Paula muttered. "I need a phase smith. The best phase smith, actually!"
"I don't know where to find the best phase smith, dear Paula, but I happen to be a phase smith, if that is enough for what you need."
"I was referring to you when I said "best phase smith". It was supposed to be a compliment."
"Oh!" Karax chirped. "In that case: Thank you!"
"You're welcome." Paula chirped back. "So, how about it?"
"How about what?" the huge Protoss asked, a confused look on his face.
"How about helping me?"
"Helping you? With what?"
"An adventure!" Paula told him. "A quest! For glory, and honor, gold, and there will even be a dragon to slay! But don't worry, we will bring a knight along as well."
"What's a dragon?" Karax asked, not familiar with that word. "Is that some sort of dragoon?"
"Eh...not really." the young Kerrigan mused. "Think of a winged Zergling that breathes fire. And is 20 meters long."
"Sounds fascinating, but I highly doubt such a creature exists. Lady Izsha would have told us about it. Many times, actually."
"It's figurative speech. Just roll with it." his niece mumbled. "Aaaaanyway, I need your help. Like, right now. Need you to fix something for me." She then climbed down from her uncle and looked up at him with big sparkly eyes. "Can you do that?"
"I suppose." Karax replied. "Give it to me and I can take a look." He then opened his huge hand.
"It's not here, it's near the stone-garden. It's too big to carry it all the way." she told him.
"Oh. I see. Well, would it be much of an issue to ask your mother to bring it here? I wanted to go on cataloging more remnants."
"Ehhhh...Mom is kinda not available at this moment. Gotta ask you to tag along. But don't worry, because you're totally going to enjoy the ride!"
"Ride?" Karax wondered. "What does that mean?"
"It means that I need you to fix up a ship and then come with us. You know, in case it falls apart in the middle of space." Paula could see the doubts all over Karax' face, something you could only see of you had grown up among Protoss.
"A journey? To where?" the phasesmith wanted to know.
"To a magical place! A place full of wonders and fantastical things!" Paula said, keeping it as vague as humanly possible. She could see the frown on Karax' face.
"Paula..." he muttered. "...is this like back when you told me that you had found a secret Xel'Naga-library, only to bring me to a human amusement park?"
"Nooooooo?" Paula replied. "Also, that park was totally awesome. Remember the "Ultralisk", that giant roller-coaster? They don't build those anymore, I tell you that!"
"I do remember. I also remember that I was too tall to ride it. Also, I believe the image they used for an ultralisk at the entrance was incorrect. I do not remember them walking upright, having human hands, eyes and lips. And I am also certain that they cannot do a "thumbs-up". Though I could be wrong about that."
"It's not an amusement park, don't worry." Paula told him. "And this time there is actually a good chance that it will be Xel'Naga-related!" She could see the doubts all over Karax's face. "Perhaps."
"As much as I enjoy helping you, Paula..." Karax sighed. "...I think I will pass on that offer. There is still so much work to do, you see."
"You always work on this, Uncle Karax. And at this rate you will need probably a couple of million years until you're done." Paula whined. "Come on, I want to take you on a trip! It will be good for you! Fresh air, new faces, even a familiar face, and plenty of old things you can tinker on!"
"I appreciate your concern for me, Paula." Karax told her and placed his huge hand on her shoulder. "And you are right; this will take many more years. But I enjoy my work here, and I do not feel the urge to, what does your father always say? "Skip town for a few days." I think that is what he says."
"Yeah, but this ain't about Dad. It's about you and me, going on an epic road trip!"
"The two of us?" Karax asked.
"Well, and a couple of others. Point is: I need your help. You see, I have acquired this ship, and it's kind of a mess right now..." Paula mumbled. That's when Karax's eyes widened in surprise.
"Wait...are you talking about the battlecruiser that fell out of the sky a short while ago?" the phasesmith wondered.
"Oh, so you saw me landing!" Paula beamed.
"Landing? I thought it was a crash. No vessel should ever perform an atmospheric re-entry that fast and at such an angle. It is suicidal..."
"Yes..." the young Kerrigan whispered.
"...dangerous to everyone on the ground..."
"I know..."
"...reckless beyond anything that is reasonable..."
"Uh huh..."
"...and if performed on purpose, utterly irresponsible." Karax concluded.
"Good thing that I didn't do it on purpose then!" Paula shot back. "Come on, you're gonna love it! An ancient battlecruiser, just for you. You can fix it to your heart's content! How does that sound?" She then grabbed Karax's huge hand and wanted to drag him along, yet the huge phase smith didn't even move a single millimeter. Paula looked up and frowned. "What'cha waiting for?"
"I am truly sorry, but I cannot leave. My work takes precedence. I am certain that whatever you have planned, Tesson will make for a better, uhm, travel companion." Karax explained.
"Yeah, but I need a mage in my party, not a rogue!"
"What?" Karax asked, not understanding a word.
"Nothin'." the young Kerrigan sighed. "Oh, come on! I really need your help. We need your help. And this time I'm actually certain that we might find something that could be interesting for you. Perhaps."
"As I said: I am sorry. I still have a lot of work ahead of me and... Paula?" Karax suddenly asked as something happened with her face. He squinted his eyes and tried to figure out what was wrong. "Are you...in pain?"
"I'm pouting." Paula replied. "I'm trying to look sad so your heart will melt and you will agree to help me because you don't want your niece to be sad and cry."
"You are not crying." he told her.
"I know, I can't cry on purpose." And then she pouted even harder. "Will you now come along?"
"No."
"And now?"
"No, Paula."
"Aaaahnnnnd...nnnoooooowwww?!" she pressed out.
"No. And please, Paula, stop. I am pretty certain that the color of your skin is unhealthy." the phasesmith. "What are you doing now?"
"I'm...holding...my breath..." Paula gagged.
"Why?"
"So you...come with me...and I don't lose...anymore brain-cells..." the young Kerrigan muttered. Karax sighed and shook his head.
"Paula, be reasonable. This childlike behavior is not helping your cause." the phase smith tried to reason with her. He succeeded, but not because Paula was finally seeing reason but because she was running out of oxygen.
"GHAAAAAAAAAA!" she gasped and sucked in fresh air before coughing out her own lungs. And when she had finally calmed down somewhat, she nodded.
"Okay...okay, I get it." she told him.
"Thank you. I knew that you can be reasoned with. Joseph likes to call you a menace, but I knew he was just trying to make fun of me and-" Karax didn't get much further though. Suddenly Paula put her hand into her pocket and pulled something out.
"I had hoped not to do this, but you leave me with no other choice." she mumbled. "Here, I got something for you." She then grabbed Karax' huge hand and placed something small in it. She made him close his hand and made a step backward.
"What is this? Paula?" Karax asked, feeling a bit dumbfounded by all of this.
"A present. For you. And a request. An honest one. Please...we really need your help." Paula said with a surprisingly gentle tone in her voice. Karax frowned and looked at his own hand. And as he opened it and looked at the object Paula had gifted to him, his expression turned soft. The object was small. But he recognized it immediately. He put it between his fingers and studied the gift.
It was a light-switch.
An ordinary, if very worn-out light-switch.
The kind of switch that you don't find often these days anymore because it was made out of plastic, poor-quality steel, and wires made out of copper. It was, by all means, obsolete. Karax said nothing for a long time. Instead, he looked at this gift, and after a while his features visibly softened, something that you could only tell if you grew up with Protoss at your side. And then he said the one thing that Paula had wanted to hear all along.
"Very well. I suppose I could use some time off. Then let us go, shall we?" And he was rewarded with the biggest smile from Paula you could imagine.
And perhaps that was the best present she could have given to him.