October 10th, 2506:
The Spear of Adun was....huge. I'm talking 'that's no moon' huge, here. It made Sarah's leviathan look like a toy, and that was already the biggest thing I'd ever seen in space. You could fit an entire city or three inside it, and apparently the Protoss who had built it a zillion years ago did basically that. They had planned for anything with forges and factories, a whole army sealed away in stasis pods, and even an apartment building's worth of assorted rooms for alien guests. Protoss had really strict rules on interacting with other species, but like I said, planned for anything. It meant I had a bed and a bathroom, at least.
The evil Protoss ships stopped chasing us after we warped out of the Aiur system, ending up in the middle of deep space. When I finally fell asleep though, I had a new dream; running across a desert of blue and purple sand at night, with a huge shining city of dark stone and glowing green crystals on the mountain ahead. Behind me was a tidal wave of teeth and chitin, thousands of hungry Zerg with hybrids leading the charge. But the Zerg were closer than the city, and winning the race; I couldn't reach it in time, but the others ahead of me might. I stopped, turning around and igniting my warp blades then woke up, drenched in sweat as usual. Dreams about being chased by Zerg were nothing new, of course, and of course I'd have one after the day I'd been through, but I'd never dreamed I was a Protoss. Then again, I'd never spent any time around Protoss before either. It'd be hours before I could sleep again, though, so I got dressed and went for a walk. It was night, and the Spear was huge, so I never expected to see anyone else. I definitely didn't expect to run into Heirarch Artanis, and he seemed equally surprised.
My apologies for disturbing you, Witness. I have difficult decisions to make, and a walking meditation has often helped settle my mind. I did not realize I had entered this part of the ship.
It's okay. I was doing the same thing actually settling my mind. Had a bad dream. Besides, it's your ship anyways.
Tell me, what do Terrans dream of? We Protoss also have dreams, though they are were - influenced by the currents of the Khala.
Eh, mostly silly stuff. Being late to work, or making a speech in your underwear. I get weird dreams sometimes though, like just now. I was a Protoss, I think, running across a blue desert with purple clouds overhead, and a whole bunch of Zerg -
All of a sudden, Artanis was not politely standing back where I could look at him without craning my neck. He was right up close, crouching to stare me in the face.
Please. Begin again from the start, Witness. Describe this dream to me, in every detail you can.
So I did, despite having no idea what was going on. Artanis was completely silent until the end, then he stood up.
Thank you, Witness. You have been most helpful this night.
He turned and disappeared, leaving me still wide awake and now completely confused.
October 14th. 2506 (maybe? Protoss warp speed is different)
We came out of warp around another planet. It was blue and purple, covered in clouds like the desert I dreamed of, but even from here we could see flashes of light and explosions on the surface, and massive flocks of Zerg diving in and out of the atmosphere. The communicator screens flickered on to show a Dark Templar woman, who was clearly relieved to see Artanis. The next few minutes were very educational, in a 'we're all going to die' sort of way.
This was Shakuras, the Dark Templar homeworld, and it was basically overrun. A warp gate that linked it to Aiur had burst open and started flooding the planet with Zerg and hybrids, killing tons of people and forcing the rest back into a siege of their capital city.
The city's warp conduit was sending refugee ships into orbit past the flying Zerg, but the shuttle launch bays were being sealed by creep and slowing the evacuation. They needed reinforcements to break the shuttles free of their prisons.
Artanis promptly deployed to the surface, meeting up with the remainder of Matriarch Vorazun the Nerazim lady 's Dark Templar soldiers.
He'd barely begun to set up his nexus, though, when an earthquake shook the city. Some sort of portal opened up, and a huge monster made of scythes and tentacles popped out. It started bombarding the warp conduit, with a whole mess of Zerg gathered around to guard it.
They had a giant thrasher-monster. But we had a Spear of Adun, and apparently it had orbital bombardment cannons. They made a right mess of the defending Zerg, and the Dark Templar were able to charge in and carve it to pieces afterwards.
With the immediate threat gone, Artanis sent some dark templar up to scout a path towards one of the shuttle bays while he built defenses. Along the way, they found one of the city's remaining fuel depots. Seeing as how the city didn't need fuel anymore on account of being smoking ruins, Artanis happily liberated the remaining supplies.
Being invisible was a huge help in avoiding all the Zerg, but there were Overseers in the sky who could detect them anyways. It took some careful zig-zagging to slip through the patrols.
The launch bay itself was entirely unguarded, at least by anything that could see the dark templar. A whole bunch of frenzied hacking later and it was free to start launching shuttles into orbit.
Another void thrasher popped up, and this time the Zerg had wised up. They'd brought a spore crawler in to guard it, which could sense invisible enemies but unfortunately the dark templar knew that too, and killed it before it could properly root and expose them.
With the thrasher now defenseless it could only blindly spit lightning at the ground that they dodged another one bit the dust, and the shuttle bay it had been close to was promptly liberated.
More dark templar had worked their way in to join the fight, with the raiders easily pouncing on any spore crawlers that showed themselves while shredding their way through the helpless and blind Zerg afterwards.
The third shuttle bay was up on a plateau with Zerg entrenched to protect it, but the Spear's cannons were ready to fire again. They blasted the heck out of the defenses, and in the confusion a small group of dark templar slipped past the survivors and out of range of the spore crawlers.
Again, nothing could stop the stealthy Protoss from cutting all the creep away from the launch bay.
A third thrasher joined the fight in response, though. If the Zerg couldn't keep the launch bays shut, they could try and demolish the void conduit first.
Already knowing the patrol paths of the overseers nearby, the dark templar headed that way en masse. It was a trickier fight this time, launching hit-and-run attacks against the void thrasher whenever it was left exposed without an Overseer, but this was clearly a strategy the dark templar knew well.
The next thrasher didn't fare any better. The dark templar just waited until the local Overseer had moved away, then charged in to carve up the monster before it could deal any serious damage.
Artanis's own army had built up a bit by now, and they came in to help with the cleanup as well as shoot down those pesky Overseers to make scouting easier.
Another fuel depot was tucked away nearby, and promptly cleaned out.
That only left one shuttle bay, but now a void thrasher had appeared nearby. Between the bay's own defenders and the Zerg emerging to guard the thrasher, it was almost a solid wall of Zerg.
This was all or nothing, and the Protoss attacked accordingly. Stalkers blasted away at the swarming Zerg while Dark Templar carved them into ribbons.
When Nydus worms started popping out and spewing reinforcements, the Stalkers only moved in closer. It was suicidal for the lightly-armored machines, and I'm sure they knew it I watched a pair of Ultralisks tear one apart like a chew toy. Blinking around to make the Zerg chase them only delayed the inevitable, and pretty soon they were all destroyed.
Of course, that had been the plan all along. While the Stalkers drew attention, the Dark Templar had stopped fighting and skulked past the guards invisibly, to where the shuttle bay was momentarily unguarded. A frenzied assault broke it clean before the Zerg could react.
More thrashers started spawning, but it was too late the last of the evacuation shuttles was launching to safety through the conduit, while Artanis started recalling his forces. The Zerg could have the city, or what was left of it.
Re: My Life For Aiur? I Barely Know 'Er! - Lets Play+Read Starcraft 2: Legacy of the
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