Eyes of a Tragedy

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"This is Kerrigan." Beep.

There were no children here.

There was the Queen of Blades, tending to her new crop of zerglings. A new strain of their DNA, new potentialities. New mutations. It was a good day.

More and more, the hunger called to her, the Swarm's voice joining it. Gonowgonowinfestinfectfeed. In the end, she was a slave to it, she knew this. But she was Kerrigan, and she would not go down so easily; she would not move until she said it was time.

Until then, she would keep saying: stop. Wait.

Even to River's voice whenever she cried out for more dances, whenever she threatened to start tearing into flesh just to sate the hunger.

There were no children here, but here, on this platform, Kerrigan was coaxing to life a new brood, a more patient one, a more destructive one.

Maybe these were her children.

[[ open! ]]

Chau Sara would be one part of their staging ground.

The days were ticking away, getting them closer to readiness-- Mar Sara, with its xel'naga artifacts, would be one of their first targets to hit. But Mar Sara's tinier brother Chau Sara was easier: terrans had never quite resettled there, and Kerrigan had had groups of Pillagers on the planet's surface for some time.

They had encountered terrans here before, and fought them; sometimes with losses, sometimes not. Now, though, the Kel-Morian Combine had done up some insane notion that they could come back and strip-mine the Sara system without interference.

Kerrigan intended to increase her presence on Chau Sara before they even got near it.

"It won't be long now," she said. "They are starting to get arrogant again."

[[ for River! ]]

For Fandom, it had been a week.

For Sarah Kerrigan, Queen of Blades, it had been but a few seconds. The Xel'Naga artifact had taken her and her charge by the metaphorical balls and flung them across time and space bare minutes before something had wiped it from the skein of the universe.

And now it was spitting them out in a flash of blue between the trees.

The loss of her Swarm hit Kerrigan at once, sending her staggering to her knees on her way out of the tear. Her hands flew to her head and she let out a high-pitched whine as her senses compensated for the fact that her massive army had suddenly been reduced to one.

She'd be grateful that she made it to Fandom later. Right now, she'd need a minute.

[[ for one, and nfb. ]]

Her universe was coming apart.

For weeks now, Kerrigan had heard - felt her creatures as they were ripped from this universe. She had had to step in to keep troop movements from falling apart as they suddenly had to work around absences the other zerg could neither register nor comprehend.

But it was moving too fast.

Weeks, she had dodged and weaved and worked her little ploys to ensure the survival of the swarm-- and now Tarsonis was gone. In and of itself, it meant nothing to her: it was a terran planet, and not a zerg one.

But it meant that now they were in danger. And so as she watched the oddity crawl into being in the distance, all impenetrable clouds and utter nothingness, she took a step back. Towards the Xel'naga artifact. The same one that had gotten her to Fandom in the first place so many years ago.

She was the Swarm. As long as she lived, it survived.

"River."

Kerrigan crushed the hand of some hapless dead Protoss under her sharp heel without even looking twice. The field was full of bodies, and for once, their deaths weren't even on her - mostly non-existent - conscience. No, two groups of Protoss had fought here recently.

She wasn't entirely sure why, but she had a hunch it had something to do with the artifacts this planet was rumored to hold. Ah, those trusty Xel'Naga - you could always count on them to cause a good fight.

"What we were looking for here," she had to conclude, eventually, "Has already been taken."

The Hydralisk at her side turned its mindless eyes on her, goo dripping down onto her foot and sinking into the nurturing Creep below. It wouldn't be long, or much of the battlefield would be covered in it, and Kerrigan would be able to set up another base - another zerg stronghold too far out of the center of Koprulu to catch anyone's attention.

"Pity," she murmured.

[[ open for river, or for anyone who has her number, god forbid. ]]

Kerrigan was packing.

Oh, she didn't need to, but she had a feeling the squirrels - those little rodents - would be spying on her. She could have sent them skittering away, of course, but right now it was an opportunity to prove to Anakin that she really was doing as she had said. As a human.

Just because she didn't plan to return to the island right now didn't mean she might not want to in the future.

So: she was packing a completely unnecessary duffle bag. In about fifteen minutes' time, she'd be out of here, down the causeway, finally shaking this restrictive human guise and returning to her plans back in Koprulu. They had been developing new species of zerg for long enough. Time to start putting the next steps into motion...

[[ first piece of ocd open to all, and second to one... ]]

Fandom still held some surprises after all, as it turned out.

A certain young blonde telepath had shown up on Kerrigan's doorstep last night. That... had been a surprise. On the other hand, she had mused, it was almost as if the island were actively trying to cast its more talented inhabitants into her lap. Far be it from her to look a gift horse in the mouth.

So to speak.

Kerrigan had kept her curiosity in check the previous night, but Emma's mental state had been a little-- hm. Useful? She supposed she could find out how useful now, in the morning. And so by time dawn broke, Kerrigan was heading back into the room where she had left Emma a mattress, two cups of coffee in her hands.

[[ for one, nfb, and warning for potential consent issues later on in the thread. ]]

It was getting harder and harder to keep her focus on Fandom at all, but this week-- this week she finally found the impulse to come down to her office and at least pretend to be working. Said pretending came down to running more simulations of protoss brain functions on the ludicrously outdated computer Kerrigan had sitting on her desk.

It was something, but she doubted it would allow for much in terms of insights. Oh well.

If only she'd gotten Zeratul's brains...

[[ open! ]]