JUST AN OVERLORD
By Gavin Jurgens-Fyhrie2
Overlords, are we. The Kerrigan, heard we. The words to the We,
carried we.
Gone, is the Kerrigan. Mad, went the We. Mad, went the we born
after the Becoming.
Remembered, some of we.
The ancient homeworlds, remembered we. The starving young,
remembered we.
The fear, remembered we.
To the We, called we. Saved us, the We. Became, we.
Long-lived, are we. The language of color and mind, remembered
we. Count, could we.
Wept, we. Killed by the not-We, were many. But:
Not kil ed, were One and One. This one and mate from centuries
ago.
While our minds slept, served we. Together when our memories
returned, were we.
On the horizon line, wait One and One.
On one side, the calm embrace of the We. Return, wil the
Kerrigan. This, know we.
On the other side, madness.
Solitude.
Cling to the horizon line, will we. Dead, are our kin. Dead, are our young.
The last of our kind, are we.
One and One.
* * *
Ten minutes before his death, Razek gazed out over the new
home of his Scantid Pirates
with a sense of supreme accomplishment.
He stood on the observation deck of the former Tarsonis Ghost
Academy, a reclining giant
of black reflective marble on the outside and neosteel on the
inside. The desiccated grounds of
the city square framed the academy and the shattered monument
up front. Only two ragged
stone feet on a pedestal remained of the tribute to some hero of
the now-dead Confederacy.
Five years ago, the zerg had come to Tarsonis, the Confederacy's
capital world. Bil ions had
died in a handful of days, by zerg or protoss. Now Tarsonis was a
ghost world, a channel for
winds screaming in cold stone hallways and howling through the
rusty teeth of the shattered
skyscrapers surrounding the academy. Tarsonis City was a
spooky place, no doubt, but since the
Dominion salvage crews had left, nothing was out there.
Razek grinned, rubbing the thick network of scars at his throat.
Except his pirates, of course.
And a few Dominion patrols. Too few, some might say.
Granted, the academy needed some work. They only had access
to A level and above, and
the lifts went all the way down to Z. Razek lit a cigarette and
hissed smoke between his teeth.
Who knew what spicy, expensive secrets the Confederacy had
hidden down there...?
He blinked. A white speck carved a brief line across the gray
Tarsonis sky, a line that curved,
then came back, straight at the—
He fumbled for his communicator just as the Dominion medivac,
engines flaring, came to a
rearing halt above the dusty grounds of the academy. Eight
marines in powered CMC armor
plunged from the front loading ramp, striking dirt with thundering
mechanical crunches.
Sera and Bourmus, standing guard at the entrance tunnel
beneath the ruined statue, stood
gaping. Only Sera managed a grab at her sidearm before the four
marines closest dropped to 3
their plated knees, and all eight opened fire with their gauss rifles simultaneously. C-14 fire
chopped gaping chunks out of the two guards, dropping them in a
tangled heap.
Only twenty seconds had passed since Razek first saw the
dropship. The unused
communicator trembled in his hand.
One of the marines, his armor scarred and battered, broke ranks
and stamped toward the
tunnel. Shrieking, Miles came racing out of the tunnel with that
damn knife of his. The marine
grabbed his wrist, crushed it, then shattered his skull with a
casual backhand, scattering the
idiot's brains into the dust.
"Razek!" screamed Lom over the communicator. "Marines!
They're killing everyone!"
Not yet, thought Razek, heading for the lift and drawing his gauss
needler. But I'm sure
we're gonna give them a chance.
* * *
Four Dominion marines advanced down the dark hallway two by
two, their bulk blocking
the sunlight spilling through the front gate. Chest illuminators
flared, outlining the lift doors
ahead in overlapping circles of light.
A heavily scarred pirate lunged into the lights like an
inexperienced stripper and fired a
quick burst of needles. A lucky round clipped the front left
marine's leg servos. He dropped to a
knee, already raising his C-14, and fired back. The Impaler spikes
stitched a diagonal line across
the pirate's chest, and he fell, spilling apart.
The rest of the pirates came then, whether through that loss of
nerve that somany fatally
mistake for courage, or through sheer hopelessness. A marine in
the rear hurled a single
grenade through the heroic last charge of the pirates into the
doors of the lift beyond.
Flames and jagged fragments of steel scythed back along the
hallway. The pirates didn't
disintegrate. Not exactly.
Dripping with blood and terrible things, Sergeant Bayton raised
his helmet's pitted visor.
"Private Berry?" he said politely, flicking pieces of pirate from his suit's mechanical hands.
"That was a very brave and unique tactic you just used."
"Thanks, Sarge!"
"Certainly. Because most marines would call using shredder
grenades in close quarters
goddamn stupid!"
Sergeant Bayton reached out with slow malice and snatched the
C-14 from Private Berry's
hands.
"You don't get this back until you can fire it like a big boy, Private."
"But—"
"No offense, Sarge," said Private Kell Daws, stil kneeling from the lucky shot at his leg, "but
Berry has the self-preservation of a moth in a campfire factory,
and those grenades are just
beautiful when they go off. It ain't his fault."
"I'm glad you think so, because you've just volunteered to help him scrub the people off this
hallway."
"Aw, Sarge!"
The fourth marine raised a mechanical hand. Something
dripped.4
Private Caston Gage raised his visor just in time before he lunged
against the wall and threw
up.
Berry raised a hand.
"Do I have to clean that up too, Sarge?"
"Attention, all squad members," Kell said with mock gravity into his helmet communicator.
"Priority transmission. Private Gage has expelled creep, and may be infested."
Sergeant Bayton sighed and rolled his eyes at the merciless
heavens.
"Recruits."
* * *
Once the grounds were cleared, the marines ditched their armor
and began the long
process of readying the upper levels of the academy for
habitation. Ten hours passed. The
entrance corridor was cleaned to the sergeant's somewhat unfair
standards. The long mess hall
on the second floor received some further attention. And Caston
stil hadn't lived his moment
of weakness down.
"It ate a hole in the neosteel," Kell swore. "It was dis-gusting. I had to cover my eyes with a
pancreas—"
"Because you're an expert on anatomy, hayseed," said Private Vallen Wolfe from the
kitchen. He was the only one anybody trusted to cook.
"I had to cover my eyes with what was probably a pancreas," Kell said, showing Vallen his
favorite finger.
The marine recruits (lovingly nicknamed "Meatbag Squadron" by Sergeant Bayton) had
been sent down to the
