Walk Without Rhythm: Part 4
A StarCraft: Elizabeth Story
By Violetlight
Disclaimer:Once again, StarCraft belongs to Blizzard. This is the conclusion to "Walk Without Rhythm" so I would like to thank everyone for reading my story! By the way, I handed this in for an English project and got 92! StarCraft rules!
Part 4: Consequences
Before I was separated from my brood, I happened to receive a few…evolutions that aren't available to most Zerg. My brood developed these biological upgrades after an encounter with Fenris Brood, who's Cerebrate is Nargil, that genetic genius I told you about earlier, and also the Cerebrate who raised Queen Elizabeth. Being made a functional, although still sterile, female was one of those upgrades, but another is much more useful right now. All Zerg ground forces, except for the giant Ultralisks, have the ability to Burrow in the ground to avoid detection from our enemies. The Drones and Zerglings in Phoenix and Fenris Broods take that ability a step further. Not only can we Burrow under the ground, but we can also Tunnel through it, and that's what I'm doing now – Tunnelling towards the Terran base so I can drop off the Thumpers as close to it as possible, without getting shot at by those Siege Tanks I saw up on the top of the hill on the way there.
The Terrans weren't overly stupid for once. They did build some bunkers and things on the sand before, but I'm guessing they had some encounters of the big, nasty worm kind, so they've build the majority of their base up on a low, but rocky, hill. They did, however, build a good chunk of their buildings right near the edges of that hill, so the Sandworms should have no problems reaching them. My problem is that the Thumpers have to be put on the ground, not under it, so that the vibrations will carry. That means I'll have to unburrow, and even though I have my Protoss armour on with its shields, as well as my own ultra-dense carapace and healing ability, I won't stand a chance with four or five Siege Tanks firing at me at once. It's time for me to live up to my ancestors' name and see just how fast I can run across the dunes. I pass the foundations of a ruined bunker. Good, I'm getting close. Just a few more clawfuls of sand and clink, I hit rock. By the Swarm, I hope this works…
I burst out of the sand and immediately, I feel bullets from a hilltop bunker bouncing against my shields. I quickly place the first Thumper and run! Boom! A Siege Tank bolt hits me, but it's okay, my shields are holding. I place the second thumper. Boom! Another hit! My shields are gone; I've got to get out of here!
I race away from the base as fast as I can, not caring if I run without rhythm or not. With the Thumpers calling "come and get it!" I don't think the Sandworms would bother with a little thing like me. Boom! Boom! Ow! That hurt! My armour's cracked and I feel blood dripping down my side. It hurts like hell, but I have to keep running or it will hurt a lot more. As I run, though, I feel my carapace start to knit itself back together. Thank the Swarm for Zerg healing!
I'm far enough away now, the Siege Tanks can't reach me, so I shed my armour. It's too cracked to do me any good now anyway. Suddenly, I feel bullets pinging off my carapace, and a few going through. Hey! That part of me just healed you morons! I scream a Zergling battle cry at the Marines chasing me and run back towards the rock outcropping. Normally, I would take them out myself, but I'm already injured. I need backup.
"Heh heh, let's frag that critter!" I hear one the three idiots laugh, as I back up against the rocky wall. I snarl at them as they cock their guns…then, slishck slishck, the Terrans find that they don't have guns anymore, or arms, or heads.
"You were saying?" Wenessal eye-smirks, pulling her Psi Blade out of a Marine's neck.
"Thanks for the save," I smile at my Protoss friend.
"Deekah, you're hurt." Wenessal notices the blood still dripping from the Siege Tank shot, and from the new bullet wounds as well.
"Don't worry, I'll live," I assure her. My carapace is once again fixing itself. Wenessal, however, is not all right. She keeps looking at her Psi Blades, and at the three slain Marines. "What's wrong?" I ask.
"Nothing…it's just…I've never actually killed before."
"Wenessal, I know it's not easy, but we have to do our jobs. I'll talk to you about it after the battle, if you like."
"I…I would like that. Thank you Deekah."
"Hey, what are friends for?" I look back towards the Terran base. "I wonder what's taking those Sandworms so long?"
My question is answered. As the Zealots and I watch, we see not one, but three Sandworms burst from the sand at the bottom of the hill! One bunker is smashed just by the flying sand, and the screams of panicked Terrans fill the air as the creatures, looking for prey, smash buildings, toss around Siege Tanks and Goliaths like they were toys. One swallows a tank; another crushes a group of Marines, while the third obliterates SCV's. Strangely, the one thing the Terrans have that could have saved them from the worm's assault, the Battlecrusier, is just floating there, not even firing a shot. A few Dropships and Wraiths join it and it starts to ascend. I can't believe it; they're just leaving their own people here to die! These "UED" Terrans are truly disgusting.
As the Sandworms continue their search for prey, and their Battlecruiser takes off, Terrans start pouring out of their ruined base. The Marines and Firebats are running incredibly fast; they must be so full of stimpaks that they can't even think, just react. It's clear that they're reacting to their abandonment the only way they know how – they want to take us down with them. There is no reasoning with these Terrans; all we can do is give them an honourable death in battle.
The first wave of Marines start running past the rock outcropping, but stop when they see the bodies of their three dead comrades. Enraged, they start shooting their Gauss Rifles wildly, looking for anything to kill. They won't find anything but their own deaths here, as the Zealots quickly surround them and tear them apart. More Terrans keep coming, and soon, the battle is a whirlwind of flying bullets, flashing blades, and searing flames. I act on instinct, slicing, tearing, mercilessly attacking white and grey and white and red blurs. I feel rather than see my Zealot comrades, my own claws joining their electric-blue Psi Blades, slashing the enemy to bloody pieces. The Protoss continuously running back to nearby Shield Batteries and my own healing processes turn the tide against the Terrans, as we targeted and killed the few Medics early in the battle. It could have been a few minutes or a few hours, I can't say for sure, but all the Terrans meet their end.
The battle's not over yet, though! Laser bursts start shooting from nowhere, it must be some cloaked Wraiths, and our Photon Cannons were destroyed sometime during the battles with the ground forces. The Zealots scatter; even if they could see the Wraiths, they wouldn't be able to attack them. Suddenly, blue psychic lightening fills the air above us as Atdaias and Rangal's Psionic Storms destroy two of the Wraiths, but at least one remains, and it will take the High Templar some time to ready themselves again, time that we don't have! The Shield Batteries were exhausted in the last battle; the Zealots are helpless! I hear Arvix scream as the Wraith blasts a hole through his shoulder, his shields must be gone!
Quickly, I run to Arvix and stand over him, taking the Wraith's blasts myself. With my healing, I can stand the injuries, more so than a shieldless injured Protoss could. That's a pretty big hole; I may have no danger of bleeding to death, but he does. "Hang in there," I tell him, but another blast hits and I scream as burns a hole right through my foreleg.
"Deekah…don't do this for me," he sighes weakly.
"Shut up Arvix. Ahhh!" another bolt slams into me, cracking my carapace. I don't think I can take another hit…
All of a sudden, I hear a mental shout behind us, and the crackle of more psychic lightening. "LEAVE THEM ALONE!" There's an explosion and that Wraith is no more.
"Thank you, High Templar." I pant. It didn't take them as long as I thought it would for them to recharge.
"By Adun!" I hear a Protoss gasp.
"Huh?" I try to turn my head. There's no High Templar there, only a very surprised-looking Nageer.
"I did it. I actually did it, and I did not incinerate myself!" Nageer proclaims, still in disbelief.
"Thank you, and congratulations, High Templar Nageer." I manage to smile before dizziness overtakes me. I guess blood loss affects Zerglings more than I thought it did. I think I heard someone call out my name before everything went black.
"To the Terrans who call themselves the "UED". I am Drixis of the Dark Templar. Let it be known that through the principles of the Dae'Uhl, the Great Stewardship, the desert world of Zz'gash and all the life forms that inhabit it are under the protection of the Protoss Empire, and that all who threaten them will be destroyed. You are not welcome here. Return and you will suffer the wrath of the First Born!"
"Nice speech."
"I'm glad you think so."
It's been three days now since the Battle for Zz'gash, as the Protoss are calling it, but unfortunately, we've been ordered back to Shakuras. Apparently, a few rogue Zerg broods have followed some Protoss through a Warp Gate from Aiur, so all the Templar forces have been recalled. It's bad enough that the Zerg are still running rampant on Aiur; the Protoss really don't need them on Shakuras as well. I wish we could have spent more time on Zz'gash, though. The last three days have been amazing!
I slept through the rest of the day of the battle, and I felt a lot better when I woke up; my body had had the chance to heal completely. Arvix was doing a lot better too. Protoss medical science (like the rest of their technology) is very advanced, but apparently the doctors believe that if Arvix had taken one more shot, he likely would have ended up in a Dragoon. I really did save his life. By the third day, he was walking around again, and I heard that he should regain the use of his arm in a few weeks.
One of the first things I did notice when I woke up was that Dune Runners were all over the base. I asked Drixis why they were there, and he told me, we weren't the only ones doing some observations. The Dune Runners are very intelligent, with their own language (which sounds like a speeded-up version of Zergling speech), culture, and a pack-based society. Drixis actually compared them to what the Protoss were like before the Xel'Naga sped up their evolution, a early society of tribal hunters. The Zerg might have evolved Dune Runners physically when the first Zerglings were created, but we were de-evolved mentally, made vastly stupider so that we were easier to control. This gives me another reason to value my sentience; it actually makes me closer to my ancestors, not further away.
The Dune Runners had been watching us since we arrived, hiding in the sand dunes near our base. It's strange, isn't it, how they were right under our noses (or, in the Protoss' case, the area of their face where their nose would be, if they had one) the whole time and we, with all our fancy Observers and stuff, didn't even know it. The Dune Runners quickly determined that we meant them no harm, and were flattered when they found out that we had travelled across space, or the "Black Vastness", as they put it, just to study them. When the UED Terrans arrived, the Dune Runners thought that more friendly aliens had come to say hello. They were wrong.
Drixis later told me of how during the battle, the Dark Templar had rushed to save the trapped Dune Runners while the Terran base was still under attack from the Sandworms. I can imagine the Dune Runners' reactions when the locks on the cages appeared to slice off by themselves, before the Dark Templar had decloaked, showing the Dune Runners that they were on their side. The Dark Templar had just finished freeing the last of them when the sandworms, satisfied with however many Terrans they had eaten, retreated back to the desert. As soon as they left, fifty or so Dune Runners had appeared from apparently nowhere, and destroyed what was left of the Terran base. They made it quite clear that they didn't want the any Terrans on their planet either.
We're just spending a few last hours with the Dune Runners before we have to return to Shakuras. Right now, one of the little ones has taken quite an interest in my tail, so I'm letting her play with it, swishing it back and forth as she tries to pounce on it. The Dune Runners know that I'm not really one of them, but most of the ones here have come to talk to me at one point or another. When they ask me which part of the Black Vastness I'm from, told them Shakuras, the same place as the Protoss. I think they know that this isn't true, but they don't seem to really mind, they know that I'm a friend, and that's all that really matters to them. The little one suddenly makes an excited little squeak, and runs off to play with her brothers, who, as I can see, are trying to drag one of the Probes behind them.
"Can we keep it?" I hear them ask their mother.
"What did I tell you before?" she sighs. "The Protoss are our friends, they're not pets."
"Not even the robots?"
"No."
"But motherrrrrrr!" they whine. Children seem to get in a lot of trouble, but still, the Dune Runners are lucky to have them.
"Hey Deekah."
"Oh, hi Arvix. How are you feeling?" Arvix's arm is in a sling, but besides that, he seems all right.
"By Adun, will you stop worrying about me already? You're almost as bad as Wenessal, who, by the way, finally agreed to go out with me!"
"Really? Okay, how many months are you going to take rock line duty for her now?"
"None. She actually wants to go out with me, believe it or not."
"I'm choosing 'not'," I tease him. "By the way, how long until you have to stop the 'poor me' act?"
"Very funny Deekah. I'll be as good as new in about 10 days, which is a lot better than being stuck in a Dragoon for the rest of my life. Thanks again, Dee."
"Just doing my job, don't get all mushy on me now."
"I wouldn't torture you like that," Arvix eye-smiles. "By the way, I was talking to Drixis earlier and I managed to swipe a little something when he wasn't looking."
"Drixis' comm. computer! Arvix, I didn't expect you to get this for me."
"Why not? You were right about the Sandworms."
"Well, yeah…but still. You didn't have to."
"Deekah?"
"Yeah?"
"Shut up and take the damn computer."
"Thanks Arvix."
"Don't mention it. I mean, really, don't mention it. By the way, I said I would get you the computer, I didn't say anything about taking it back."
"What?! Arvix!"
"Sorry Deekah, I've got to go. I think I hear Wenessal calling me…"
"Hey, get back here you…" ah forget it. I look at the computer lying between my front claws. Can it…? "Computer," I order. "Can you show me the records of any Terran Ghost agents that have been encountered by the Protoss?"
"Affirmative," the little machine beaps. Pictures and Protoss writing start to fly across its screen.
"Computer, narrow your search to Terran Ghosts in the Liberty's Flame militia." I command it. Five Ghosts' records show up, although there are a lot more in Elizabeth's Terran ally's army. I just hope he's in here. Let's see, Ghost agent 76-0938, 94-0001, 88-, wait, that's it! I pull up the record, and in an instant, those soft brown eyes I remember so well are starring back at me. "Eighty-Eight…"
Eighty-Eight, the one Terran I could ever really bring myself to trust. He was my mate…my love, and it was because I defended him that I had to leave my brood. Elizabeth was very kind to all of us, but the one most important rule that she and General Drais made regarding the Zerg/Terran alliance was that we could not kill each other. No Zerg could spill an allied Terran's blood, and no Terran could harm us. Anyone who violated this rule would be handed over to the other side to be…dealt with. Everyone thought this was a good rule, and I guess it was. The trouble was, after Eighty-Eight and I had been seeing each other for about a month, one of the Terran Medics got it into her stupid little head that she liked Eighty-Eight, and she just wouldn't stop bothering him, no matter how many times he told her to get lost. Then, disaster struck when she caught Eighty-Eight and I together one night on the Creep, when we were coming out of a Burrow, him with most of his clothing off. We had been trying to keep our relationship a secret; after all, we were a Zerg and a Terran, but Medics are notorious gossips, and she threatened to tell the entire base about us, if Eighty-Eight didn't agree to sleep with her once. When she started going on and on about how disgusting, how wrong she thought it was for us to be together, I just couldn't take it anymore. I snapped. I jumped on that Medic and stabbed her twice in the chest, puncturing her lungs, and I watched as she drowned in her own blood.
I had to run. I had killed a Terran, a Medic at that, and the other Terrans wanted my blood. If I hadn't been picked up by the Protoss, I would still be on that dump of a planet, hunting the local wildlife, living like an animal just to survive. My life would have no meaning.
I look at the picture on the screen and remember the good times, how Eighty-Eight used to scratch me behind my ears or under my head shield. He always knew where I liked it best. I remember how he used to tell me he loved me, despite my race; how much I loved him. But he is in my past now. There's no going back. Even if I did see my old brood again, I would never be able to rejoin the Zerg. When I joined the Templar, the Council made me get my head shield cut off, the telepathic receptors in it joining me to the Zerg severed forever. It was the only way they could be assured of my loyalty to them. A metal shield replaces it now, so I won't loose my balance when fighting, but it's just a hollow shell. To the Zerg, I no longer exist.
Eighty-Eight, if I ever did see you again, would you leave behind the Terrans, everything you knew, so we could be together again? I don't know if you could, and I can't ask you to make that sort of sacrifice, I love you too much.
As I look at this picture, I now realise that as much as I miss Eighty-Eight and my brood, they are a part of my past now, and while I will always remember my past, I shouldn't dwell on it. The Protoss took me in, accepted me, and gave me a future. I have made friends here, Arvix, Wenessel, even Drixis, and have found a new purpose for my life. They are my brood now, and I will fight to the end for them! You never know, maybe one day, all Zerg can be rejoined with our sibling race, the Protoss, again. Maybe I'm the beginning of that future.
I shut down the comm. Computer. I should go give this back to Drixis now. Speaking of Drixis…ah hell, he is kind of cute, for a Protoss, and everyone could use a good laugh before we go. If you'll excuse me, I have a Dark Templar to lick!
The End, for now.