"Adams!" the woman called out as she ran out of the small, wooden house. "The Zerg are comin'!"

Orville "Sam" Adams looked up from his charts, annoyed. "Whadya mean, Bacardi? I ain't got no time for this, I'm plannin' out Corona Town's seed grain for next spring! I ain't got no time for nonsense."

The town's Chief knew that far too often Melissa Bacardi's imagination, or fear, rather, ran away from her. She was always afraid that plagues would come in or blights would destroy their crops or the Zerg would run them over and destroy them. But in all Orville's years of Chiefhood, indeed his entire lifetime, no Zerg had ever bothered about the planet Budwise II. It was just a small fringe planet many distant miles from most of the Terran worlds in the K-Sector. The only reason it had been populated at all was due to the rumor that it was rich in resources, enough to compete with the Kel-Morian Combine's vast mines. That rumor proved false, and soon the Confederacy lost interest in it. About that time, the Protoss decimated Chau Sara, and the few colonists on Budwise II were abandoned.

Frightened and alone, the Budwisers (as they came to be called) set up their own way of life, not entirely appalled with the happenings that left them there. They refused to aknowledge the Confederacy anymore, and revelled in their new freedom despite the hardships of farming life. The Confederacy, even if it wasn't distracted, didn't care about them enough to quell their rebellion. In fact, they would have been left entirely without news of the outside world if it weren't for their own scouts, who were likely the best in stealth strategy of all humanity.

As it turned out, the Zerg didn't care about them either. Perhaps they were two small in number to be worth infesting or conquering. In any case, the people Corona Town, Miller City, and Porterisville lived quiet, rural lives in the middle of nowhere. The only reason Bacardi howled and whined about the Zerg was that some idiot working for Mengsk wanted them to send their young men out against the broods and to "extend the protection of the Dominion over the noble Budwisers". Needless to say, they had refused the offer. Apparently Mengsk didn't care enough to push the matter any further.

"Scout were just sendin' in their reports," Melissa continued, out of breath. "And the Zerg're coming from all directions! Oh, and Chad Guiness from Porterisville is callin' you! Waitin' on the line inside, he is."

Adams narrowed his eyes in thought. If Chad was on the line, then there might be something to this. He handed the seed charts to the young men assisting him then huffed his way inside the little cabin. This cabin, small as it was, was the most important one in all of Corona Town, because it held most of the technology that the Confederacy had sent along with them for their expedition. It was the only means, excepting a five mile hike to Porterisville, and eight more to Miller City, to communicate with them. On the large monitor ahead of him, Adams could see the grim faces of Chief Guiness and his deputy, Mike O'Doule.

"What's going on?" Orville feared the answer he might recieve.

"You've probably scanned already, and you notice that there's a bunch of us from Porteris headed your way." Guiness said gravely. "Those're the civillians, and it'd be nice if ya could shelter 'em in your caves. The soldiers will be headed down there shortly to set up some defenses, cause Corona Town's more defensible. Be there in like less than three hours, cause the Zerg'll be comin' before tomorrow."

That bit of news, the soldiers and not the attack, pleased Adams. Chad's army, known as the Stouts, were dangerous men, because they were most often sent out on scouting and space hunting missions. Many an unawares space pirate found his booty, including slaves, put to more peaceable use upon Budwise II rather than be consumed or sold for themselves. None of the pirates ventured near the planet, because there was no one to steal from (that they knew of), but every so often one of their number would disappear, only to return as debris. Sam was glad to have these soldiers protect Corona Town. While his men were no less brave, they were farmers rather than fighters.

Something bothered the Chief. "Guiness...what about Miller city? Will'ya also send some Stouts to them?"

"Haven't you heard? They were already overrun by the Zerg, and nobody made it out alive."

---

Zzzzzzzzzzzt. Zzzzzzzzzt. Snap, snap, crack...

Those were all the sounds that Parker heard as she mined the blue crystal. She used to wonder how miners could work underground with all the dirt and grime, not to mention dynamite. This kind of mining, however, felt safe to the point where it was boring. All you had to do was zap the minerals in the weaker spots until a chunk of the crystal came off, then grab the chunk with the SCV's mechanical claws, and haul it out to the command center. As long as you didn't hit yourself with the laser, then you wouldn't blow up.

It was tedious, and at first Angela wished she hadn't taken the job for herself. It was the kind of work where you wanted to get lost in your thoughts, but the base's time was running short so she had to pay attention and hurry. That meant staring at a vast blueness for almost a minute. Yet she knew that she would have to do something noncombatative like this, because Jenkins was far too old-fashioned to let her get close to the fight. She wouldn't fight him on that point. Parker's plan involved it, so she would just have to be patient.

However, her opinion soon changed on the mining. The battle started.

It was horrifying, from what she could hear. Alternately screams and snarls, guns and shots of acid, sounded across the plains, like percussions in a bad techno mix. Angela couldn't tell if there were more deaths on her side or the swarm's, because she wouldn't let her ears aknowledge the death-cries of her fellow cadets and they reproduced the sounds of shrieking, dying zerglings. Fairly shortly she couldn't tell the difference between the two.

Every so often she would catch the eyes of the other SCV pilots. Some of them looked scared, and one particularly young boy was fighting back tears; he had seen his best friend get hit by a guardian. Some were mumbling quickly to themselves for the distraction, trying hard not to believe they were witnessing a battle. Even Angela found herself quietly singing "Blind Willie McTell". Only one cadet seemed to have control of himself: Cadet Killian. He was one of fifteen survivors of last year's failing cadet squadron, and apparently this battle was going better than last time's, because his face was as calm and furious as crumbled stone. He even seemed to laugh a bit at the frightened others.

But before she realized it, everything was over. The last of the hydralisks were being finished off by the tanks, and there were no more zerglings to help them. The only guardians, as far as Angela could see, were two that had crashed in the ruin of two destroyed supply depots. Whatever overlords there had been were already dead or run off back to their own. The boys were either carrying off the casualties (a fortunately small number) or celebrating the victory with self-proclamations of human might against their enemies.

Even Jenkins was cheerful. "Alright! It's an easy road from here on out. Let's get back up our defenses and get ready to sit this out. Gregory and Oscar, get on repairing our missle turrets! Killian, get up another bunker. Parker, you build us up some more supply depots, and Killian, you help her when you're done on the bunker. We got another 45 hours to go, so let's move out!"

"42 hours?" Angela thought. "It feels like only minutes ago we passed the sixty hour mark."

Time was running out. If she was going to initiate her plan, it would have to be soon. And wasting resources on building more supply depots, when they had more than enough, was certainly not going to work towards her goal.

"Hey Jenkins!"

"What is it, Parker? Didn't I give you somethin' to do already?"

"Yeah, but I got a question. You said that if we survived the first attack, the Zerg wouldn't be strong enough to get up the force to attack us again, right?"

"Yeah, that's right. Get to work."

"No, hold on. Now if the Zerg are so weak, what's to stop us right now from going and destroying the base they got us from? We've got more resources than they do."

The others around looked at Jenkins, thinking that it was a reasonable question.

"Because..." began the cautious boy. "They might get resources quick and stomp us back down. Then we wouldn't make it at all and-"

"Wait, wait, wait. You just said that they wouldn't be strong enough. If they can get reinforcements, then they can take us down, even if we just sit on our butts and wait for it to happen. I say that we should go in and make a name for ourselves, to really stand out, you know? Why not?" Angela turned back to Jenkins. "Is it or is it not possible?"

He scoffed. "It ain't worth it. People died today, Parker, and more will if we go on. We're safer here and that's the end o' that."

This reaction wasn't unexpected, and in fact she had planned for it. But it was the hardest part, and she had to make certain to appeal to Jenkins' natural pride.

"No it's not. Don't you see that this is just the beginning of us fighting the Zerg? It's not just a matter of survival out there, it's a matter of winning! Victory is survival, not just sitting around because the Zerg don't have enough to get us at the moment. Can't you tell that this is the real thing? We should strike while we have a chance!"

She failed. Jenkins wasn't swayed, and the others, loyal to him despite her logic, weren't swayed either, though some of them did have doubts about staying and waiting for the hours to run up when they could do something important for the Dominion. All of them knew that the instructor above was watching them from above, and that anything they could to to impress him would be important. But no, they still refused to listen.

"Look," she tried again. "I'll take a science vessel and go scout out as close as I can get to the Zerg base. I'll report back what I see and maybe we can take it out. What's wrong with trying?"

But few were listening. Jenkins was already barking out orders, orders that were reluctantly followed. Everyone was returning to whatever various duties they doing before, wondering if Angela would say anything else, but realizing she probably wouldn't. Jenkins didn't even bother to tell her to get back to work or anything, he just walked away.

"Hey, Parker is it?"

Angela turned around to find a curious Killian behind her.

"Yeah."

"It's cool what you said, and you're right. Jenks was all sayin' that people shouldn't die, but what's the point of sittin' here if we aren't gonna avenge 'em? I've seen to much to just let the Zerg get off like that."

"That's what I was trying to say!"

"I know. Hey, I got clearance for a science vessel. Why don't we go scout? It's a good enough idea."

"Thanks, dude. Let's go."

---

The review who can name all of the alcoholic drinks I used in this chapter gets a cookie. :)