Note that this fan fiction is set upon to separate but closely linked alternative realities. The first ‘Now’ is set in the supposed future, while ‘Then’ is set just after the events of Starcraft, and prior to those of Brood War. Neither reality is designed to closely match Brood War story line. The dependency of one reality to the other will grow more apparent with each chapter.
THEN. 10. OEDIPUS AND THE SPHINX
‘Oh. Ohohohohoh. Oooh. Oooh baby.’
The rasping groaning pursued Conor, female scion and last surviving bearer of the name and Ghost status, in her sickened rush from Arcturus’s master bedroom to its adjoining bathroom. Each room was lined with mirrored tiles, which reflected everything within to a multiplicity of infinities. In theory of construction no doubt, it was meant to provide no place in which an assassin could hide. Currently though, it served what had no doubt been its more intended purpose. Currently it reflected Arcturus’s disgusting body throughout both rooms. Reflected every inch of Conor’s slender nudity.
She spun both taps loud enough to disguise what she was doing in there.
‘Man, that was fantastic,’ grated the desert-dry tones of the naked, lolling, power-mad dictator from the other room. ‘You’re better than the painted courtesans of any spaceport, and you’ve definitely got a tighter body. You know stuff I’d never even dreamed existed.’
‘I had a good teacher,’ she called out, though her every fiber screamed with revulsion and horror at what she’d just done. A Ghost to the last though, despite what her mind and voice were thinking and saying her body was carrying out its duty. Still naked and unwashed, she was rifling through a casually dumped makeup bag. A surprisingly large makeup bag. One shielded against the most potent detection technology the Confederacy – and thence the Ghosts – had had.
‘Yeah, it was definitely a good idea taking your brother’s offer,’ called Arcturus. His voice took on a sour note. ‘Despite the failed attack.’
‘I’m sorry,’ called back the Ghost, though she was anything but. She’d been well aware of the failed attack during the night’s work. It had led to their coupling being much more… savage… than it perhaps might have been. She shuddered at the memory, but was careful to keep her long, smooth thighs pressed together.
What she’d been forced to do – and with a smile – last night had turned her stomach worse than any of the multitudes of murders she’d carried out as a Ghost; and to a girl who’d been sleeping with her brother since puberty, this was no mean feat. And Arcturus had been careful not to let her know anything of how, exactly, the attack had failed. His violence had been enough for a mere concubine as evidence.
Still, through other means she knew about it. She knew due to the telepathic linkup the Cabal of Ghosts – supposedly disbanded – had maintained. She knew from those strategically placed near positions of command how, before any serious losses had been inflicted on the Former Colonial Militia, a surprise nuclear attack (believed to be impossible, since the Cabal of Ghosts were all under constant guard during the battle) had weakened the Dominion attack, and then a huge force of Protoss had appeared and spirited Raynor and his forces away.
‘Come back to bed now, sweetmeat. I’m ready again.’
She could see this perfectly well through the reflections, but what she was doing was blocked by her body. She had gathered from the bag a spatula and a vacuum-walled bottle. It was the work of a moment to pass the spatula between her legs, smear the mess into the bottle, and secrete both away again. And with that action, she and the full massed psionic might of the Cabal of Ghosts who danced telepathic attendance on her actions knew that the fulfilment of their plan was at hand.
She turned from the bathroom and stood naked in the doorframe, arms outstretched, legs and body open. Arcturus reclined, leering, on the bed.
‘I’m ready too,’ she said, and walked towards him. Now at last, she could bear the perversions and the pain she would have to endure. She had set in motion the mechanism of the Ghosts’ final ascension, and at last she was free to pursue her own goal of revenge.
THEN. 11. ANCHISES IN THE UNDERWORLD
Shakuras, the Dark Templar homeworld, was a chill place of perpetual twilight and blue, wind-swept basilica. True daylight and dawn never came here, and the place seemed eternally deserted… save for eerie sounds as though of movement, and whispers to those sensitive enough to hear. It was enough to un-nerve the most sceptical of men, and Space Militia, whose lives rested on any number of totally uncontrollable factors, were never anything except superstitious.
To Raynor’s men, life on Shakuras hit them every day as cold, alien, and remorseless. The rocky ground was paved over with flagstones of blue metal, save where it broke over twilight lakes and impassable gorges. Blue lamps of alien operation and power source rose from the ground and the metal, organic-seeming walls, serving frequently as the brightest source of illumination. None had yet discovered whether agriculture was possible here, but of a certainty, the planet’s custodians did not practice it. The custodians who were never seen, who existed as whispers… as footfalls… as ghosts.
On some level, varying with the intelligence and the credulity of the individual, each knew that this was because the custodians were the Dark Templar, Protoss masters of entropy, who went invisible at all times save for necessity, due to their unrelenting persecution at the hands of their own people. Each knew, too, that but for the intervention of the Dark Templar upon Tarsonis they would not now be alive, or instead of cold blue basilica they would be facing the torture chambers of Arcturus.
Yet, as humans tend to do, all this was ignored in favor of the perceived discomfort that was here and now.
One night (day? Twilight hour?) Tom Kazansky and Magellan stood at a rendezvous some way out past the boundaries of where Raynor’s men had placed their buildings and their spacecraft. They stood atop a large artificial plateau of basilica raised a story from the floor by the ubiquitous curved walls, accessible only by smooth and treacherous blue-metal stairs clearly designed only for a Protoss physiology. Like so much upon this planet, the structure was a miracle of alien, beautiful civil engineering, but of unknown purpose. Whether meeting-ground, market place, dwelling or law court, it was deserted. Kazansky and Magellan were the only sentients for miles around…
… for all they knew.
‘The moon is down.’ muttered Kazansky morosely. For him, this was the height of purple prose.
Magellan was silent, staring off into the horizon, making the occasional android twitching movement.
‘Anyone around?’ growled the pilot. He seemed discomfited, which for him, was the height of agony.
‘Their cloaking system is utterly, utterly fascinating,’ said the construct raptly, by way of a reply. ‘Far superior to the telepathic cloaking field of the Ghosts, or the skin-effect of the Wraiths. They actually use entropy to manipulate the laws of chance and probability, making light bend around them.’
‘Wonderful. Wonderful,’ rasped the pilot. ‘It would be much more useful to know if there were any of them arou-‘
Adun Toridas, breathed coldly into their minds from out of the ether.
‘Aaaaaah!’ gasped Magellan, his black-ribbed metal trousers projecting him six feet into the air. He wheeled and came down with a vast array of horrendous-looking blades extended from his metal arm. Holding them protectively out in front, he scanned the darkness keenly.
Kazansky’s eyes went wide; he pulled out a pistol and dropped into a two-handed stance, back to back with Magellan.
‘Jesus! It’s only me,’ said Jim Raynor… this time verbally. To the side of them, out of the way of the pistols and blades, he materialized out of the chill twilight.
‘Ay-yi-yi!’ gasped Magellan. He turned to face him, and the blades snapped as one back into his limb.
Kazansky holstered his pistol… reluctantly, it seemed. ‘Was there any reason to sneak up on us like this?’ he demanded. ‘This meeting was pre-arranged.’
‘I’m sorry,’ said Raynor, his voice muffled through the cloth wound around his lower face. ‘Force of habit, I guess.’
‘Yeah,’ muttered Kazansky, looking him up and down.
Raynor was clad in the flowing cloak and robes of the Dark Templar. A hood was over his head, and similar cloth masked his mouth and nose. The hilt of a devastating Warp Blade hung at his belt. Beneath the robes, unlike the Protoss, he continued to wear human clothes; but otherwise, only his eyes identified him as human.
And they seemed to glow.
‘So why did you ask me here?’ whispered Raynor, taking a few steps back. Kazansky and Magellan stood together, facing him coldly. He could sense their hostility. He wondered why. ‘I cannot lose any time from my training and meditation.’
‘Maybe not,’ said Kazansky, ‘but your men are restless.’
‘They don’t like it here,’ Magellan added unnecessarily.
‘Why?’ queried Raynor in genuine wonder. ‘They’re safe from everyone here. Most people don’t even know this planet exists.’
‘Including the ones who supposedly live here,’ Kazansky pointed out. ‘The men are spooked. They’re also running out of food… again.’
‘What? Magellan, aren’t you supposed to be studying the soil for agricultural prospects?’
‘I have a full report on my findings, stating what foods will and won’t grow, and what we should do about it,’ said the construct primly. ‘Unfortunately, nobody in charge has looked at it yet.’
The accusation was obvious. Raynor frowned.
‘The people don’t like it here at all, Raynor,’ said Kazansky. ‘They don’t think it’s their world, and they’re scared shitless of the ghosts who live here. And they don’t think they can achieve anything by being here.’
‘Don’t they know I’m learning the skills of the Dark Templar in order to assassinate Kerrigan? Fools.’
Kazansky and Magellan looked at Jim, then exchanged glances.
Raynor realized immediately he’d probably overstepped some bounds. ‘Look, maybe it’s not obvious to them what I’ve been doing. But I’ve learned so so much! There’s so much to the universe I never dreamed existed. So many secrets…’
***
When Zeratul and his Arbiter and Corsair fleets had Recalled themselves and Raynor to the surface of Shakuras, Zeratul, with the minimum of preliminaries and assigning a suitable place for Raynor’s men, had taken Raynor alone in a robotic transport ship to an island remote from any signs of habitation. It was clear his training as a Dark Templar was to begin sooner rather than later.
There were two things about the rescue that Raynor wondered about forever after. The first was that for him to awaken to the entropy of the universe, he would always have had to be responsible for slaughtering hundreds of sentient beings in a nuclear explosion. The second was that without that awakening, Zeratul would never have considered him – or his men – worth rescuing.
Neither of these things were ever discussed or brought up between Raynor and Zeratul. They were ignored.
You have succeeded in opening your mind to part of the universe’s true nature, human, Zeratul began with little preamble, and as such you are to be commended. Few there are who could have done this, even many of the Protoss. However, awareness is one thing. True manipulation of the universe’s energies takes time, alas, and is another thing altogether.
Raynor looked at him, squarely and unafraid. ‘I’m prepared.’
Is your purpose to destroy Kerrigan all unwavered?
‘Oh yes,’ breathed Raynor. ‘You can say that again.’
But is it correct, human, that that is truly why you wish to do this? You wish to do it for the good and the survival and the aggrandisement of your race, and not for the power it gives you, incomprehensible to any human? Is that why you chose the path of agony in order to gain for yourself the powers of a Ghost?
Raynor frowned. ‘Yes. Why else would I do it?’ And yet, of course, he doubted himself…
Zeratul looked at him keenly. Your motivations are clouded and more murky than you care to admit, he said presently. You conceal the true reason for your actions even to yourself. And yet for that, I cannot condemn you. If the Protoss were pure of motivation and goals, I would not now be here upon this twilight world. And so, I will train you. Your reasons are irrelevant.
‘What ever,’ said Raynor testily.
Zeratul ignored him. The first thing you must realize, human, he telepathised, Is that the greatest power is not that of the mind. By itself, the mind is comparatively weak. The electrically-firing neurons of your mind can influence those of other minds, leading to that form of communication you call telepathy, but that is about the limit of their power. Do you think that the mind by itself is powerful enough to generate the fearsome energies of the Psionic Storm of the High Templar?
‘Um. Yes. I suppose,’ said Raynor in confusion, who subscribed to the pragmatic philosophy that if he saw something, it must be true.
Zeratul lowered his head to his hand, seeming to touch his elongated, mouthless face. A logical assumption I suppose, but it is not the case. Were those energies to flow through the Templar’s own brain, naturally it would be left no better than that of its victims. In reality the electrostatic stimuli of the brains of the Protoss and Terran and Zerg are necessarily not much different in potential one from the other.
‘So how is it done?’
The psionic energy is not used itself; instead it is used to manipulate the flow of other energies. In the case of the High Templar, it is the light blue; in the case of ourselves and – we surmise – the Zerg Cerebrates, it is the dark blue. Entropy.
‘So this is what Tassadar used to destroy the Overmind?’
Yes, and indeed this is the only way it could have been done. Each branch of my people has grown accustomed to manipulating the flow of one energy or the other, though usually without any more than the most basic understanding. Perhaps we will never understand their true natures. Few indeed have ever been able to command both. Tassadar was one such, but otherwise the unreasoning hatred the rest of my race have for our people and our philosophies prevent a hybrid of such study. It is therefore unlikely indeed that we shall ever advance beyond the rudiments.
‘So I have to use my own psionic powers to manipulate entropy,’ Raynor said dubiously. It sounded an unlikely prospect.
Zeratul gave the ghostly, telepathic equivalent of a laugh. It is not as difficult as it sounds, human. Most of us do not understand what we do, we understand only that it works. I think this will be the best first step for you.
Zeratul reached into his robes with his long-fingered, many-jointed hand and pulled out a cylinder. He handed it to Raynor, who examined it curiously.
It was a cylinder of dark blue crystal, surrounded by an elaborate arrangement of yellow Protoss metal.
This is the focussing device of the standard Dark Templar weaponry, Zeratul thought. The Warp Blade.
‘What am I supposed to do with it?’ Raynor said incredulously. It looked like no kind of weapon to him.
Hold it as you would a sword. I sense that you have had training in that regard.
Raynor automatically dropped into a Japanese sword stance, gripping the cylinder two-handed. It handled surprisingly well; the grips seemed to have been made to fit him personally.
However, Zeratul was looking at him with something very akin to contempt. No Protoss warrior alive ever held his blade two handed, he grumbled. Still, I suppose, you’re only human.
‘Thank you,’ muttered Raynor sarcastically. He began to feel foolish standing with a sword stance and no sword. ‘What am I supposed to do with it now?’
Now. Remember the feeling you had when you opened up to the entropy. Try to feel it again. Concentrate on the hilt of the blade. Try to feel that entropy flowing from the hilt.
Raynor frowned, and tried to find the entropy. It had been in the back of his mind ever since the battle on Tarsonis, a thin, half-remembered undercurrent of awareness. But to do anything with it…
See, said Zeratul eventually after a while. This is what I myself wield. He reached into his robes and pulled out a similar cylinder. As he held it out ahead of him, a three-foot long blade – familiar to Raynor from the few times he’d seen Dark Templar in action – shimmered into being. It was composed of dark blue light, transparent, and seemed to ripple like a ribbon in the wind. From a three-inch base it seemed to taper to a point. It seemed insubstantial, but despite its ephemeral nature it was always ramrod straight and followed Zeratul’s every slightest movement.
This blade is composed of pure entropy, drawn by my psionic energy and focussed through the hilt, Zeratul informed him. He gestured almost casually with the blade, and gouged a three-foot rent in the rocky floor. Raynor’s eyes opened wide. It is more destructive by far than the Psi-blades of the Zealots from which it derives. Their energy is not carrying out its true purpose, whereas ours is… Come, look into my mind and see how I focus the forces of entropy all around me.
Raynor concentrated, attuned himself to the workings of Zeratul’s thoughts – by now an easy task – and studied the weird, alien processes therein. The whole feeling of it felt wrong to his mind somehow, but he tried to replicate them.
As he did so, for just a few seconds a thin ribbon of blue energy sprung from the hilt of his blade.
Zeratul nodded approval. Excellent. I knew that with the strength of your mind, you would find the river easily.
In the weeks that followed, Raynor learnt to sense the patterns and processes of entropy around him, and how to influence its movements. He learnt how to use it to manipulate light rays around him, producing a cloaking effect vastly easier – and more efficient, he now realised – than the telepathic obfuscation of the Ghosts. He learnt to generate a plasma field around himself, which would entropise the energy of any attack used against him. He learnt that Zeratul was indeed correct – the use of raw psychic power was as nothing compared to the ability to manipulate the vastly greater energies around him, present in all things and movements, unobserved.
You are perhaps the first non-Protoss to realise this, Templar, thought Zeratul later in their training, when they were practising sword techniques with the ubiquitous Warp Blades. The Protoss was the stronger by far, but Raynor’s training in martial arts developed to use the opponents’ momentum stood him in good stead.
Surely the Zerg and Kerrigan can manipulate these same energies? thought Raynor back, this mode of communication second nature to him now, not missing a beat as their blades clashed violently together.
They can, but I think they know not what they do, Their powers are something genetic, innate, something implanted in them by the Xel’Naga, or stolen from one of the many races they absorbed. I do not think even Kerrigan will come to this realisation. Her poor and impoverished spirit seems bent only on conquest.
‘Not for very much longer!’ gasped Raynor, with a final burst of energy, forcing Zeratul to yield.
Excellent, responded Zeratul, holding Raynor’s blade an inch from his head. There’s nothing more that I can teach you.
***
‘And so, my friends,’ said Raynor to Kazansky and Magellan, ‘that’s what I have been doing. I’ve learned things you can’t even begin to imagine! Soon, I will be powerful enough to murder Kerrigan-‘
‘I don’t think it’s going to be soon enough, Raynor,’ interrupted Kazansky gratingly. ‘There’s something we think you’d better see.’
‘What? What’s happened?’ said Raynor with instant suspicion.
‘I think, sir, that you’d better see for yourself.’ said Magellan quietly.
Raynor raised his hand to his head in frustration. It was the same gesture Zeratul was fond of doing. ‘Very well. Take me to whatever it is.’
Kazansky and Magellan turned and made their way across the basilica in silence. Swathed in his Dark Templar garments, putting a hand on the hilt of his Warp Blade for protection, their leader followed.
