The sector struggles to recover from the last major battles, the people try to rebuild from the devastation, living in the shadow of the mighty forces that lick their wounds and prepare to clash again. Kerrigan’s Broods, the renegade Cerebrates, the Terran Dominion, the UED, and the Protoss fleets all lay poised for a second war that could begin at any moment, wiping out the last vestiges of civilization in this small sector. In this time while they war amongst themselves, a larger threat looms in the distance. The Ancient Ones, the Xel’Naga, are returning, and with their coming, they bring the doom of the entire sector. In this dark time, the imminent clash between the greater forces blinds them to the threat sweeping towards them and the dark corruption that swells within their own sector. Hope for all of Humanity, Protoss, and even the Zerg, lives within the most unusual of places. Hidden away from everyone the last relic of the tattered Confederacy, an abandoned Zerg world, and a splintered Protoss colony, that has been lost since before the Dark Templar were cast from Aiur contain the only chance for surviving the fury of the Ancient Ones’ return. As billions prepare for the war before them, and the dark tide sweeps inexorably closer, it’s a time for heroic and desperate measures. Now in the last hours the hopes of three races lies in the hands of the abandoned, and the way of survival is known only to the lost. It’s a time when the future of the many can only be saved by The Forgotten Ones…
[Author’s Note: The storyline occurs mostly after Broodwar; however the first few chapters occur at or right after key points in the first three campaigns in StarCraft.]
Prologue [part 1] Several millennia before StarCraft begins…
As the shuttle pushed through the atmosphere towards the planet below, Ash’korellia tensely waited for the all to familiar lurch in her stomach as the ship’s thrusters fired to slow the descent. Beside her the accompanying scientist continued his description of what awaited them with excitement and passion. “As you are no doubt aware, Korellia, our’s was the last ground based scientist team to remain on the planet. Seeing as the Zerg have finally reached phase three, meaning that they’ve reached the point of unaided expansion, and…-”
Korellia cut the scientist off in an irritated manner, “I’m quite aware of what phase the project is in, and why we are in that phase. You are supposed to be explaining WHY your team has failed to pull out with the rest of them.”
“I’m very sorry Psion Master, I was merely trying to be thorough.”
“Well quit being thorough and get to the point! Might I remind you that your team is jeopardizing the timeline of the Legacy Project with this delay! After the failure of the Protoss, I don’t even want the smallest problem to upset our operation, to much has been invested at this point.”
“Yes, I know we would have pulled away sooner, but we found something astounding on the surface. The Zerg, they’ve evolved a new creature, without our aid…”
Again the scientist was cut off, this time by the roar of the engines, as the shuttle landing boosters activated, and they touched down softly. Not waiting for the talkative scientist, Korellia stepped outside into the stiflingly hot air. Quickly, she pulled her enveloping robes tighter to her, and in their darkness was sheltered from the all too bright sunlight, an anathema to all her kind. Inside her robes, the special machines sewn into the fabric maintained a constant cool atmosphere that fought back the sweltering heat of the planet’s surface. Using psychic probes she found her way almost blindly across the landscape to the Xel’Naga research sight. With the slightest mental touch, she activated the doors, which silently slid open in response. Only inside did she pull her cowl back enough to see, though her face was still deeply hidden within the cowl. Inside the building she felt far more comfortable as the doors closed behind the last member of her party, and the harsh light outside was replaced by the soft blue fluorescence of the facility. Quickly she turned to her scientist guide, and said, “Where is everyone?”
“Probably studying the creature, everything was packed up already when we found the creature. We have everyone studying it quickly, so we could leave as close as possible to when we were scheduled to.”
Stifling a sharp reply, Korellia angrily stalked off towards the surgical observation room, with her guide and her shuttle pilot following in tow. She wrenched the doors into the surgical room open with her mind, barely pausing for them to open wide enough for her to squeeze through. The sight that greeted her was an ice-cold splash of water to her heated anger. The entire room was in disarray. Delicate machines, and Xel’Naga robes lay scattered around the walls, while most of the metal in the room was blackened. Altogether the room looked as if a bomb had gone off. There was no sign of the creature. The robes, and a slightly silver pool of liquid was all that remained of the scientist.
For some reason Korellia’s mind brought back flashbacks of when the First born had rebelled. Of the scientist cut down, by their own creations, their silvery skin losing cohesion, as they collapsed into puddles like the ones that greeted her. Behind her she heard the retching sound of the scientist as the contents of his stomach surged up at the carnage that greeted his eyes. Turning she saw that even her more battle-hardened pilot, was taken aback at the scene.
Realizing that this scene could very well represent the failure of yet another attempt by the Legacy Project, she prepared herself to establish mental contact with the Fleet captain Khyl’zarbec. She had just entered the trance to send her message, when another mind ominously rose up in her thoughts. A giant presence that seethed with power, loomed in her mind dwarfing her own impressive skills.
The dark voice ominously called to her, “Fear not my parent, it is naught but what you wished. You desired to create the ultimate child and I shall finish your work. Fight me not, instead prepare yourself for the inevitable assimilation into the perfection of my being.”
Consumed with terror, Korellia quickly turned to flee for the shuttle, calling out to the other two. “We must get to the shuttle immediately. The Zerg have turned against us, as the first born did!” The meaning of her words cut through their dazed shock, and both of the scientists took off after her. Running as fast as they could, they reached the exit door and stumbled through. In their haste they didn’t even pull their cloaks up to block out the sunlight, and the intense light blinded them. Rushing as quickly as they could with their minds clouded by the pain, they hurried towards the shuttle. Once inside the pilot quickly started up the engines and with unseemly haste the shuttle took off into the sky. Still reaching out with her mind Korellia frantically attempted to contact anyone in the fleet, but the ominous presence that had spoken to her, blocked her projected screams for help.
Behind her fleeing shuttle a small swarm of flying creatures rose from behind the base where they had been roosting. As one the creatures turned to follow the shuttle, unerringly aiming for the vessel. The scientist cut in at the sight of them saying, “Korellia, those are the creatures we found. The Zerg evolved them without our aid, and as we suspected it’s capable of flight!”
Korellia turned at this and saw thirty tiny beige pods with wings aiming for the vessel. At the sight she turned and shouted urgings at the pilot to increase their escape velocity.
“Quickly we must escape to the safety of space so I can inform Khyl’zarbec and the other Psion Masters of this!”
Needing no further urging, the pilot accelerated the craft through the atmosphere, as the vessel began to overheat at the friction of its passage. At last they cut through the outer edge of the atmosphere and entered space. Without asking the pilot headed towards the closest vessel to the planet’s surface, which fortunately for Korellia happened to house the other Psion masters. In moments the combined might of several Psion Masters burst through the blanket that had been thrown upon her thoughts querying, “Korellia, why the tight shielding of your thoughts?”
“It is not my doing my fellow Masters, the Zerg, they rebel as the firstborn did. We must prepare ourselves for flight quickly.”
The shock her news brought to the other Psion Masters briefly destabilized the mental link. In that moment the scientist intruded, from his position watching their rear saying, “Korellia we have another problem. The creatures… they are apparently compatible with travel through space!.”
Not fully believing the news, she verified for herself that the swarm continued to follow behind her vessel, which thankfully had not lost too much of its lead on them. The shuttle entered the larger Xel’Naga vessel’s docking bay at almost full speed barely shutting off its engines at the last moment. Quickly, Korellia raced out of the shuttle towards the bridge where the other Psion Masters would no doubt be headed.
Korellia entered just in time to see one of the creatures carelessly crash into the shield raised around the ship. To her horror, the bright flare of an explosion accompanied its collision. The shields became briefly visible as they energetically attempted to absorb the shock. Beside her a technician called out in a quavering voice, “Shields reduced to 70%, sirs. A few more blows like that and well be completely defenseless.”
As three more creatures collided with the shield perimeter, the screaming of the ship’s emergency sirens shattered the spell of dread that descended over the bridge at that announcement. From the bridge they saw the faint flickers of the shield briefly flare and then fade away to nothing.
The viewport from the bridge revealed the normal blackness of space alive with even more of the explosive beasts. A wave of the creatures flew towards her vessel, which lay naked to their assault. Three beasts veered off from the flight and flew into the engine exhaust tube of the vessel smashing into the interior. As the volatile chemicals within the beasts combined releasing energetic explosions, cracks began to appear in the thrust tube walls. The ship was forced to cut its engines or risk tearing itself apart.
As her ship’s engine cut they were left defenseless, but the remaining attackers surged around the vessel ignoring it, and flew on into the rest of the fleet. By the time the engineer had reactivated a portion of the bridge screen the creatures had already reached the next two ships. Sickly green chemical explosions and fading blue glows, marked the collapse of the shielding on both ships. Korellia witnessed escape pods by the hundreds flying swiftly away from one of the critically damaged vessels, towards those ships still undamaged by the Zerg onslaught. Closing her eyes to the sight, Korellia, contacted the fleet commander, Khyl’zarbec. “Beloved,” Korellia mentally whispered to him, “what is the status of the fleet?”
“By Xella’s you still live my love. For a moment I had feared the worst”
“Yes, beloved I still live, for the moment they spare our ship any further assault. Tell me though, how does the fleet fare?”
“See through my eyes, Korellia, it is too horrible for words.” Sharing eyes a moment; she witnessed the computer overview of the battle before him. The systems screen depicted a lone blue island, her ship, surrounded by a sea of red Zerg. On the bridge’s viewscreen she saw four more vessels bleeding light and exhaust from their damaged engine drives, two of the damaged ships were no longer even moving. From them, a swarm of lifeboats surged forward, just ahead, of a living wave of several hundred Zerg. The void was filled with the fleeing Xel’Naga’s terror, and underneath that terror an even more insidious psychic emanation could be felt, no doubt the same thing that had contacted her on the planet’s surface.
“Korellia, beloved, can you and the other Psion Masters stop the onslaught on your ship?”
"No, Zarbec. These beasts don’t mindlessly attack they are driven by something more powerful than we are. Still for the moment they seem content that our ship is defenseless and pursue the other vessels.”
A massive explosion on the left side of the battlefield interrupted their conversation. One of the stalled ships, emptied of its crew save for a stalwart few, had breached its own generator. In seconds the, walls of the ship had blown outwards, the generator’s explosion, propelling a wave of expelled shrapnel and ionized gas into the swarming Zerg. For a moment, Korellia and Zarbec carried hope that the explosion had been enough to stop the assault, but seconds after the fiery wave, had passed from the region, the speedily flying forms of another swarm, surged through the debris field, rushing onward.
“Zarbec, you must leave now, you must take the vessels that still work and enter the Warp Conduit, if you don’t all of us will be lost to that swarm.”
“But, beloved, can your own ship enter the Warp Conduit with us?”
“No, our Warp Key has already been damaged there is no escape for us.”
“Then I cannot order the evacuation of the solar system. I cannot just abandon you, the other Psion Masters, or the crew of your ship."
“You must, Zarbec. You cannot let everyone die, needlessly. We are beyond hope, the swarm already surrounds us, and no lifeboat would be able to make it to one of the functional vessels in time. You must save them first. Besides all the Psion Masters from the Legacy Project save you are on this ship, we may yet find a way to save the situation for our ship, but you must save the rest of them, or risk losing everything.”
Korellia’s message was punctuated by the fiery glow of a second exploding ship.
Zarbec bowed his head to the inevitable, “You are right beloved. We shall retreat into the Warp Conduit.”
Turning Zarbec roughly called to his navigator, “Activate the Warp Key, we retreat to the Xel’Naga homeworld. Pass the order to all remaining vessels that retain warp functionality, we can stall our retreat no longer.” The deck of the bridge vibrated as the massive generators powered up. The front of the ship, cracked open, its pointed end spreading into four projections. From the exposed interior a powerful ray of brilliant white light shot forth. A few hundred feet off the bow the beam suddenly struck an invisible wall, and the powerful rays began to ripple outward in a circle from the point of collision. Abruptly the beam cut off, however the rippling circular waves in space continued to undulate from the point where the beams had struck, they’re motions becoming more violent with each wave. All along the line of vessels four more rippling waves appeared in space.
Then the four reaching arms from the front of his vessel each unleashed a steady lance or ultramarine light into the rippling field. The lances punched through space itself, and abruptly the rippling motion became more intense as four holes of blue and green light formed within the rippling space. Behind his vessel the furious cries of the Zerg, resounded through space, and across the psychic plain. Frantically Zarbec counted the seconds as the green and blue regions of light expanded, taking over the entirety of the Warp gate. Now, rigid circles of blue and green light projected outward from the ripple towards the Xel’Naga vessel. Each one pulled closer and closer to his Vessel, and at last he felt the familiar surge through the vessel as the first circle of light passed over the front of the ship. The aquamarine ring proceeded over the ship, as behind it more rings followed, closer to each other until they became a solid encircling cylinder around the vessel. Once the tube had solidly surrounded the entire ship, the engineer cut off the four stabilizing lasers that were being projected into the Warp Gate origin. Suddenly the rings stopped their slow advance and paused a moment, a glowing tube of light in space. Then without warning, cylindrical tube of light pulled back on itself, collapsing into the flat circle it had originated from, and in a bright flash of light no sign of the Warp Gate or the tubes of light remained. The ship had also disappeared, pulled in by the retreating light as it collapsed.
***
Korellia watched each bright flash, till the afterimages of the fifth and final gates collapse at last faded from her vision. Believing herself to be alone at last let, Korellia release her grip on her emotions, and let her tears of fear and failure fall.
“Do not cry my Korellia, I will be with you until the last,” the mental voice of Zarbec whispered, as he offered what feelings of comfort he could project across the void.
“Zarbec? You maintain the link still? Its too dangerous for you to hold on while you’re in the Warp Conduit!”
“I don’t care what dangers there are, I will not have you spend your last moments alone, you have filled my life with comfort and driven out my loneliness, I will not let your end yours in solitude.”
Any further words were forestalled as another Psion Master on the bridge spoke shakily, “We have a chance my brothers and sisters, but only one. If we try together we might just be able to open the Warp Conduit ourselves even with our ship’s Warp Key damaged.
The sheer audacity of the idea deprived the Masters of their own voices, and no one offered ascent to the reckless thought. The ship then shook as a third and fourth explosion rocked the void, as the two other damaged Xel’Naga ships released their explosive payloads, into the onrushing Swarm. The finality of the explosions at last loosened the tongues of the Masters and one by one they shakily offered their consent to the plan.
Through Korellia’s eyes, Zarbec witnessed the last desperate act of the other Masters, as they attempted to use their combined psionic power to force their way into the Warp Conduit.
Brilliant beam of light smashed into the invisible wall, and space began to ripple. Then four selected Masters sent psychic lances into the ripples puncturing the layer of normal space to the Warp Conduit beneath. Soon the familiar aquamarine glow began to spread outward.
At this moment, the menacing voice of the creature that had spoken to Korellia swelled in their thoughts. “I come for you my parent’s. You have stalled long enough, it is time you made the final sacrifice in adding to my perfection.”
Fear the clenched the Masters on the bridge, tense with terror, they began to count off the seconds for the Conduit to enter its third phase. As the blue and green light spread outward; however, a shift came over the colors, they began to waver, and darken, changing into violet and crimson tones. The normally calm pool of space that was the Gateway began to undulate even more violently like a storm tossed pool of water. Violent tendrils of purple and red light lashed outward from the pool hungrily searching for the source of power that had opened the Gate. One of the searching tentacles of light encountered the ship, and with rapidity more arms lashed out, and latched onto the vessel. In horror the Masters, at last reacted, cutting their link, and the power feeding the Gate. Just as before, with the cutting of power to the Gateway, the projections slowed their advance, and suddenly pulled backwards collapsing into space. With them the tendrils pulled the hapless vessel into the twisting chaos, and in a bright flash, ship and portal disappeared.
As they were pulled into the rift, Korellia clung to his own presence in reflexive fear. In that instant as her body left the spatial plane, Zarbec felt her mind tear free of her own corporal body. Clinging to her shattered mind, Zarbec desperately tried to hold her thoughts together. Yet her essence slipped through his mental hands like water. Desperately fighting the inevitable Zarbec wept knowing that now she was lost for all time, no matter what fate befell the crew of her ship. Now it was Korellia who stalled Zarbec’s tears. Calling out with a fading mental voice she spoke to him, “Cry not beloved, you have filled my life as much as I have filled yours, and it is through your strength that I am able to go in peace to my final resting, in spite of this violent end. Thank you my love. Until we are reunited in the Afterlife, farewell.” With that Korellia’s spirit passed for all time beyond Zarbec’s reach.
