"Now if you will excuse me I am going to have sex with a corgy"
-Fox^1
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| Tales of the Flesh: Part I | | | Author: | | | IP: | fjwilsonXXXX | | Date: | 01/31/00 07:01 | | Game Type: | Starcraft | | Labels: | none | | Report Rating: , # of Ratings: 1, Max: 7, Min: 7
Lifetime Rating for .Praetor: 8.2987 |  | It is the first time I have thought of perfect memory as a curse. Outside the hacking continues. To have been at such a height, and to have fallen so far. They are quite efficient, these ones, diligent in their duty. As was I. I had been quite diligent in my duties, but I had failed. I had failed my queen, and she did worse than punish me. She left me to die.
My last hope of salvation began the ascent to orbit, and then to leave this system, carrying what I had managed to save. Which wasn't much. My Queen! She's gone. Gone.. gone.. gone.. gone... Never have I lived without her presence.
The world is smaller, colder, and darker. But sharper. I can feel the cold blades peeling back my flesh. Not actually my flesh, but Cereberates can feel their brood around them. Mine is dying, slice by slice.
My Queen is still gone... still gone. I had been born before she was, but not before she was formed. Hers was the first soul I touched, aside from the Overmind. Kerrigan... Sarah. I was the only one to know you by that name. Gushing, a major vessel has been cut. No matter, I shall likely be dead before I notice the loss of blood.
I had raised you, Sarah. Took you from what you had been, to what you were. I protected you, placed my self before all harm to you. I gave you your first minions. Do you still remember Raag? The Zergling through whom you learnt your control. You were still in the cocoon then. You have left me.. left me. Even when the Overmind left, it had not been this way. I still had you, then.
They're inside the outer chambers. I can feel the pressure on my skin as it is on the floor. They must not be content to simply collapse my Hive, crushing me. They wish to do the deed themselves. kerrigan... nothing.
SARAH! I reach with all my energy. Nothing. I am alone. All alone. My child, my queen, my mother, my... they are here. A thin slice of pain runs down my side, and I can sense them, inside the inner chamber. Four of them walk in, all clad simply with tattered cloaks. The battle had not been easy on them, either. So few of their brethren left.
Smaller than anticipated.
A boon, Executor.
I am no longer an Executor, Dannath.
You are the Executor of our people. The two dark templar are looking at me.
It hears us.
Yes. You hear me don't you, Cereberate. The leader of the Dark Templar addresses me, his statement not a question. I shiver in response, expelling gas I had held too long. The two Dark Templar ran their blades over my skin, chilling me. The leader cut, and a part of my uniform flesh was split to the cartilege. Do you know who I am, Cereberate? I hiss a response, and the Protoss understand it. Doom Dragon, nearing eight hundred years old. This world is no longer fit for my people, Cereberate. I knew this. The battle had raged for months, decimating all our fleets in the beginning. Now, the fields bloomed, enriched through debris and blood, so much blood. Doom Dragon stood victorious over a strategic wasteland.
Cereberate? I do not know how he did it, this Protoss before me. Nameless, known to most only through legend, he let a sect of the Dark Templar, dedicated to preserving a sancutary, somewhere, unknown known to all but themselves. That sancutary had been destoryed, and now they looked for a new one. The Dark Templar asks for my submission, making his intent known through means I do not understand.
Yes. I do not know anything else to say.
This Cereberate is mine. I don't know what I shall do with it yet. Load this messy bulk onto a shuttle. The other Dark Templar hesitated, but obey. They all seem old, perhaps a trusted few companions from times beyond memory.
I slide myself out of the hatchery, pushed by the Dark Templar, but propelled more by the muscles of my hive. Seven probes pass me, glinting in the bright sun. Had I autonomous optics, they would have been harmed from the long period in the dark Hive.
Where? This gruff voice from one of the Dark Templar.
What? I ask, uncertain as to his question.
For your drone, beast. The Dark Templar does not like me. I can understand this, I do not like him.
The many hidden eyes on my Hive spy the probes, each carrying a small chunk of mineral. That fold.. there. I daren't touch the Dark Templar's mind too much, and merely open the recieving fold of flesh in my Hive, waiting for the probes. The small mechanical marves beep a few times, and deposit the minerals efficiently.
***
A few short hours later, I rest, if one can call it that, one the cold hard floor of a shuttle. My drone accompanies me, the last remnant of my brood. It is skittish, hovering frantically back and forth in the small room it has besides my bulk. Finally, I bother to send it a command to avoid contact with the walls, not wishing to discover the integrity of the computer piloting the shuttle.
A brief wave of intense fear washes over me, devasating in the depths it reaches, but short in duration. How one can trust life to a few sparks running across conductive metals is beyond me. The drone is whirling around in place, still frantic about its surroundings. I consider calming it, but refrain. It will become the walls of a hatchery soon enough, I hope, and then its skittishness will not matter. Besides, dealing with drones is the work of an Overlord. It is quite a bother to direct the small creature directly.
The flight is long. I do not know how long. Disconnected from all that I have known, nothing is sure.
***
I know Gilk, my drone, well know. I have calmed it, and explained it worked with the Toothless Ones. It took some effort to remove the resistance Gilk had to this idea. Perhaps an Overlord could have done it better, but I worried, would all my future minions be so recalitrant?
Open your mind. The simple command came from Doom Dragon, the Protoss with no name. I comply as quickly as I can, falling behind his direction easily. Have this. I panic, stunned for a minute. Information floods into my essence without my control. When I can think again, I see how Doom Dragon is what he is, not he is called. Most Protoss, most Zerg, even UED psychics offer, Doom Dragon gives. The difference is paramount. He uses your brain, you do not collect from his.
I calm Glik, who is distracted by my sudden lack of attention. The drone settles to the floor, and I review the gift from Doom Dragon, which is ongoing. We float above a small planet, or a large moon. The body is icy, but holds life. Curiously, it is heated by both a close green sun, and the interal pulls and stresses from the gas giant it orbits. But the strangest feature of the moon is the electric current running between it and the gas giant. A massive arc of electricity flows between the two bodies, funneled by wisps of ionized gas between them, and powered by the magnetic core of the moon. On the other side of the moon, two patches remain from a time when the planet faced another direction entirely.
These patches had abundant minerals on their surface, and a reserve below, which could be mined with difficulty. This, Cereberate, shall my my people's new home. The shuttles began their descent down to the planet. On the Southern Hemisphere, landed two mighty Archons, one a dark red. I am pleased to note they have both lost the radiation signatures they had from the previous battle. They are joined by four probes and two zealots. One of the probes begins a warp rift, starting a Nexus.
My shuttle ceases moving, and the door opens. Groaning, I roll my bulk with the help of Glik, and drop painfully into the snow. No longer worrying about the loss of Glik, I sieze the drone, and plunge it into the ground, ordering it to disperse its organs and grow from the minerals placed there by another shuttle, to create a home for me. Two Zealots land on the ground, as well, taking a stance on either side of me. They keep their psi-blades ready, worrying me, but look for threats from afar, not at myself. Unsure of myself, without even Glik to control, I cry out to Doom Dragon What do I do?
Let any Protoss know your breadth, this I expect, of course they will know what I do, and grow. I have taken what is left of my troops to the other Hemisphere. Expand, but leave the islands in the center of the formation you find free of your presence. I reply with a hearty assent. Reaching out, I take comfort in the presence of the two archons north of me, throbbing with their power. That is, until the shuttles connecting the strength on their island to mine disappear, rising into the atmosphere. Before I can ask my question, Doom Dragon answers, all eight shuttles go to carry the people. We shall have to send more.
The chill of the snow below my bulk affects me even more, and I urge the biological colony that was once Glik to grow ever faster.
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I'm not promising to be quick with this story =). It's based on Winter Conquest (and another ice map in the other Hemisphere). The Cereberate is starting bottom middle, his Protoss ally on the southern island.
The idea of a Cereberate co-operating with the Protoss IS a bit shaky, but I'm getting over the hurdle by postulating that each Cereberate is created somewhat unique (Dagooth as a master of armies, Zasz as micromanaging elite troops). This Cereberate, the one you play in the StarCraft single-player, was created to look after and nurture Kerrigan, thus making it more susceptible to other psionic beings, and used to 'nurturing' at least a little, as opposed to mass destruction. It is also shocked by the loss of its brood and the support that brings. You'll see the main character mature as the Zerg forces grow =). |
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