Episode 27- The short awaited return.
.
"All hail the Mighty Smothership!" A casual onlooker would only see him shouting to the almighty nothingness filled with stars around him. But it has a purpose. A screen immediately materialized, showing a face filled with neural duty and somewhat damaged by strenuous years.
"Hail received and acknowledged. Good to see you back, little band leader."
"The pleasure is all mine, Helmmaster Helga. It seems stress left you with deeper furrows compared to the last time I saw you."
"And you seem to be more purple and glowing overall. Go on, your Mother can't wait to receive all this treasure you bring with yourself."
"Aye aye, captain!" He replied with a half hearted salute, and continued to his destination. The giant battle vessel passed him by, patrolling the extremely green planet. Its many different cannons, turrets, a few ballistas and even giant slings adored almost every inch of the ship, making it look ridiculously overpowered.
The pleasant feeling of home began to engulf him, first the familiar magic and then, the pleasant smells on the surface.
"Today, you are free to do as you please." Those were the words said by Stetmann to her, just before he hurried off. Before starting wondering what to do, breakfast first.
That got her thinking, even if the whole building was destined for children, there were still a few adults around. Well, more of a barely adults, with everyone, not excluding her, below the age of twenty-five. Mina herself was twenty-three, making her the oldest in the whole orphanage, excluding the staff.
Any help she tried to offer was met with, 'Later'. Mina didn't know when the later would come, but she did get a kind of foreboding feeling. Shaking those thoughts off, she entered the cafeteria, which was almost empty. All the children ate already, and her 'peers', for lack of better word, always were present at a later time of the day.
The breakfast today was good and healthy, like always. Wholemeal bread, butter, tomatoes, cucumber, some cheese, and boiled egg. Surprisingly, any kind of meat was offered only at dinnertime, but always came in a myriad of choices.
"Hey Darius'z, is something important happening today?"
The man in question raised his head from eating and reading at the same time. After swallowing, he replied "I don't think so, why do you ask?"
"Stetmann was almost rushing somewhere, he seemed to be both very excited and in a hurry."
"It could be just his inspiration striking him again, or some new tech to look over. It happens from time to time." He continued to eat, when not speaking at last.
"Hmm…" Mina, on the other hand, concretated on eating, mulling over both thoughts and food. Even if the meals there didn't seem to be anything special, they were actually something every simple citizen would envy. On the Core Worlds, all the products were oftentimes packed with some unknown substances and fillers, leaving a lot to be desired. The healthy options are so expensive, only the rich could afford it without batting an eye. Only farming communities on far planets, like this one, could freely and cheaply have great quality food, again, as this one.
"So… is there anything interesting to do in the city?"
"Erm… I don't really know. I mostly follow the projects handed over by Stetmann, and I don't really go out that much… Ask someone else."
"Hmmm…" After finishing eating and saying a goodbyes to the acquaintance, she started thinking it over. The Orphanage's Director lady was out, too enthusiastic and too little time to tell about the right place for her. Stetmann was absent, and with the people she knew, that would be it. Mina obviously wouldn't ask the Mayor himself, or the Magistrate she obviously lost contact with.
'Think outside the box, outside the box.' She thought to herself. A wealth of information, with time and patience to steer in the right path… "It's obvious, really" she said, hitting the palm of her hand with fist, she made a decision.
"A prodigious son returns! What treasures did you bringed in this time?" The speaker himself was holding his hands up in a winning gesture, with hands and palms outstretched.
"The highest grade of junk, of course!" Dobromir replied, with head held high and eyes closed.
"You really know how to please your mother, and bring your father more headaches to deal with!"
"Everything for my dear, loving mom and dad!" With that, he looked straight into his speaker's eyes. He was replied with the same, the two keeping the stare for some time. Dobromir hopped down from his boat, and walked closer, still keeping eye contact.
"Father" "Son".
Suddenly, a thunderous boom echoed, with enough force to blow away any possible onlooker. The earth itself shaked a little, and the clouds gathering in the sky seemed to be blown away.
"Ehh…" Their epic handshake ending, the Mayor sighed. "Another failed experiment, even more explosive than the last."
"Are they testing a new energy source, again?" Dobromir had experience, observing from afar of course. He was far from any kind of scientist.
A negative shake of head. "No, no, the new energy generator was put on halt after ending in an even bigger explosion than this, two weeks ago."
"So… A weapon?"
"No, no, they mostly didn't work, and just outright melted into a pile of slag." It was accompanied with a dismissive wave of a hand.
"Okay, I have no idea." Dobromir said, shrugging his arms.
"If I remember correctly…" The Mayor replied, stroking his chin "It was supposed to be a portable source of heat."
"Wait, so how did they make it explode?!"
"Protoss tech, of course." A light drop of head, dealing with all of it, day in and day out, was highly annoying and time consuming.
"Aaaa, it explains a lot." He nodded his head in affirmation.
"Really? Then shine light on this matter, because I don't get it." He folded his arms on his chest.
"Protoss technology revolves all around psionics and… you know what? I will explain it to everyone, at the same time." He looked back at his boat, and some junk just raised into small towers. "I will need our industrial haulers for all this crap, or rather, research material."
Target spotted. Surprisingly, it was the same granny from some days ago. Now, old people don't necessarily know about all the places the young people like to spend time in, but Mina was counting on that.
"Hello, granny." She said softly, with a small wave of a hand.
Turning in her direction, her reply was "Oh! Hello deary. What brings you this fine day?"
"You see, I have a free day, and zero idea what to do with it."
"Oho ho ho, you came to the right person. Do you want some wild party? Or maybe play some games?" She said the last part with a glean in the eye.
"No, no, I feel like relaxing and calming today."
"Hmmm… low effort?" a nod of affirmation, "Less people?" another nod. I'm guessing general silence would be appreciated too, hmm…" She started stroking her chin, looking into the distance. "Oh, I know! Here." She again took out her device, and showed the path to the destination. "It's just what you need."
'Staaaareeeee'
'Gaaaaazeeee'
Those two words were almost heard, between the two. The air around felt somewhat unpleasant, and the world seemed to fade into black & red. All the sound around faded, into almost perfect silence. Glowing orange eyes were met with glowing yellow, and the tension could be cut with a knife.
Kerrigan voiced a cool sounding "Hmph", while closing her eyes and folding hands over her chest. She was honestly impressed. After no bothersome infested following her around, she went over to check if he was with his pack. To her surprise, she found a worthy leader waiting before her.
The Zergling in question never even stood up and was looking at her with only one eye. The oppressive atmosphere full of sulfur was ignored, it was a zerg after all. The lack of sun and lava everywhere made a nice contrast, but was ignored by both parties. The sound returned a moment later with a distant explosion, seems some Terrans still remained and even used nukes from time to time.
Looking closer at the pack leader, Kerrigan saw the marks, rather simple really and… this zergling was already growing bigger than the rest. Still, it also looked somewhat less… jagged? Less rough around the edges? More round in certain places? "Hmm… the only softer looking zerg are… queens? Not really, but compared to the whole rest…, there is still room for improvement. Oh, I know! Turn over, I have a little gift for you."
The zergling looked at her this time with both eyes opened, before going legs up. Seems it wasn't this opposed to the idea. Kerrigan sat on the ground close by, then added a little of her own blood for canvas.
"Everyone can see clearly? Okay, let's start with this." Dobromir bringed over his giant tower shield, and turned its handle point towards his small audience. Its back was overgrown with veins of blue crystal, with a bigger mass in the middle, and a frame around the shield's edges.
"I extracted a little from my armor some time ago, put it on the shield and left it alone. Before the battle on Tarsonis, the mass in the middle was still the size of a pine cone , and the veins were very short. The next time I saw it, it had grown three times bigger, and when I deflected a dragoon's plasma ball, it became like this. Now, for the main event…"
Dobromir started taking his armor off. First was the unfastening of buckles, then taking it off part by part. Gauntlets, graves, pauldrons and finally, the breastplate. His naked chest was all purple, just not as intense as typical zerg's. Surprisingly, he wasn't especially muscular, the sixpack barely showed, and the belly was of standard beer enjoyer. Dobromir turned all the pieces inners towards his audience.
"As you can see, it's all totally overgrown now but it started as a small crystal taped to the insides. My conclusion? It's a passive helping agent, not a core. Also, the Protoss are all about psionics, and you know how it is."
"Uhmm, uhmm".
"Aia, it all makes sense now."
"I think it is good to know, just not for me."
"So that's why everything was exploding lately."
His four spectators were composed of, in order, The head of Research of this colony, just under her orders the leaders of Mechanical and Biological divisions, and the one who has to coordinate all those scientists who sometimes just shut themselves off for days on end, The Mayor.