"D-matrixed Ultralisks, D-matrixed Battle Cruiser, D-matrixed DTs, see a pattern here?"
-Rychean
|
| Crisis on Arridas - 02 (Shadows by Quartets) | | | Author: | | | IP: | 98.baltiXXXX | | Date: | 07/21/00 07:07 | | Game Type: | Other | | Labels: | none | | Report Rating: , # of Ratings: 1, Max: 7, Min: 7
Lifetime Rating for Moogle: 7.2500 |  | Posted in Other since it's fic and not battle report, just so you know. :P I have 5 parts written so far and I'm going to post them as I get around to it. Just so you know.
============
Crisis on Arridas
A StarCraft/Brood War Continuation (sort of) fic
02 – Shadows by Quartets
By: Moogle (tealkeeper@yahoo.com)
============
Disclaimer: StarCraft, Brood War, and all related characters, concepts, and locations are originally created and copyrighted to Blizzard Entertainment. Any new characters, concepts, and plot are that of the author, Moogle.
Author’s Notes: If you haven’t read the first part, I strongly suggest you do so as the characters who are the ‘major’ players are introduced. As with last chapter, existing SC/BW characters will get not much more than a mention.
* * *
Colonel Erai Nalkri, commanding officer of the Aquaritia Battalion on Arridas, sighed heavily from his office in the Command Center. It had been a good half of a day since the last raid on the mineral fields. Presently the Battalion’s few surviving Goliaths were out and about eliminating the last remnants of that force. Marine Gauss Rifles were essentially worthless against the tough carapace possessed by the Zerg’s lethal air units, so the only effective anti-air defense without actually using air was the Goliath’s Hellfire Missile packs. Even those weren’t much use without the more powerful Charon Boosters, which gave them extra range, but fortunately Sergeant Major Mack Kilimaro’s visit to the motor pool had had some positive effects. Within an hour all remaining Goliaths were fitted with the upgrade. A few shiny new vehicles also rolled off of the lines. Erai silently thanked the two of his subordinates for that as he watched the last stubborn Mutalisk explode into little giblets.
As it was, they’d barely been able to salvage what they had of their mining operation. The mining centers, while all had remained standing, were all severely damaged and would likely collapse in a couple of hours if not fixed. The remaining SCVs had to instead repair those buildings instead of gather minerals, leaving a gaping hole in their production facilities. All were hesitant to order anything built if it meant exhausting their entire reserves with no way to replenish them. As an aside, all ships were grounded and new ones were not being built. It was known that where there were Zerg, there was Scourge. This was learned the hard way by the higher-ups of the Battalion. Himself a Wraith pilot, and also having seen the Zerg many, many times in battle, he knew the danger the little suicide aliens possessed.
At the time, it had been only two days since they had been on Arridas when the unfortunate had happened. The flagship of the Battalion, the Battlecruiser Grendal, was holding a meeting of the command staff at the time. Erai and a scant few others with intelligence had made up an excuse to get out of attending, knowing well the dangers of having a huge, inviting target in the middle of a base. Especially when said base was recently established, had yet to even unload all of it’s troops and vehicles, and had exactly ZERO pieces of static defense in place. A pretty sight it certainly wasn’t when four dozen of the bastard Scourge announced their arrival in the only way they could – by blowing up. The damage inflicted had been so bad that not only were all hands killed, but not even shrapnel fell to the ground. The Grendal simply ceased existing. Admiral Zaarin and all of his Generals and Colonels, except for Erai, gone in a flash, the Battalion’s symbol, wiped out, a lot of troops and unloaded vehicles also taken out in the surrounding explosion.
A minor miracle that another week had gone by without any kinds of attacks from the Zerg. The Zerg had, after all, been on the planet for over a year. Fighting them first had been Colonel Jackson Hauler’s Nova Squadron (late of the Confederacy), but those turned tail and ran to join the Dominion at the first promise of being saved from certain doom. Next, in a foolhardy move, Emperor Arcturus Mengsk I had sent crack troops from his Alpha Squadron under Captain Mike Roberts to try to eliminate the Zerg. This was long before anyone knew the true power that could be possessed by the swarms. Not a single man was heard from again, though the possibility that there were a few pockets of survivors existed. After that came Epsilon Squadron of the United Earth Directorate, General Thierry LaCroix commanding. Unfortunately much like the rest of the UED forces which tried to conquer the Koprulu Sector, they were wiped out when the Zerg they had been controlling went back to Kerrigan. It was again likely that the Zerg ignored some pockets of survivors, but Erai neither knew nor cared to spend efforts he could be using to kill Zerg to find them.
That was when the Aquaritia Battalion had come, using a few of the ancient existing Alpha Squadron buildings at first. They built their base up quickly, knowing if they didn’t they would die. There was one motivating factor that Erai knew could never fail – life.
He sighed once more and hoped his friend and most trusted subordinate was getting things done on the other flank of the base. And where were those damn reinforcements?
Out of his office he walked, to the communications tent. He needed to know, and soon.
* * *
For Mack Kilimaro, some days were better than others were. Much to the dismay of both he and his subordinates, this was one of the others.
“Damn it, Hawkins! Why hasn’t that fire trench been reset yet? The bastards could show up at any second, QUIT DICKING AROUND!” he screamed at some hapless sap who was unlucky enough to be in his way. A few other men snickered. “And you, what are you waiting for? Get into your suits and get your asses in gear! NOW, DAMN IT, NOW!”
The shouts could be heard from quite some distance, and anyone hearing them immediately stopped what they were doing to do as Mack had assigned them. Usually he was quite the amiable leader, but when it was crunch time, they knew not to mess with him. Especially not when he was in his modified firebat suit – complete with upgraded Perdition Flame-thrower. The polar opposite to Erai’s favorite motivating factor, Mack simply used fear of turning people into a crisp to get the job done sometimes. Rather than hate him for it, his men respected him all the more. After all, though they may not show it on the outside, they all knew if not for that crazy firebat, they’d have been dead countless times over.
A female voice sounded behind him. “Think you could yell any louder than you just did, Mack?”
He frowned as he heard the voice. *No, no, it can’t be…* Turning around, he saw standing there the one person he didn’t want to see.
“You’re going to kill yourself from all of this stress one of these days.” Jaclyn Krah, medic and constant annoyance to the firebat, said with a giggle.
Mack’s face flushed red instantly as he saw her. Despite how much he may have been annoyed with the woman, what he had just done was impolite as a gentleman. “My apologies. I would not have been so vulgar had I known a lady was present.” He bowed slightly.
“A soldier and a gentleman. How utterly cute.” She laughed at the sight, but then wiped the smile off of her space as she got to why she was really there. “We need to talk.”
Mack straightened under her intense stare. It made him uncomfortable, even if he outranked the medic. “Let’s go to your office at the hospital then. It should be quiet there.”
Typically, temporary posts wouldn’t have a designated hospital building, but when it was known that the battle would wane on for a long time, usually the medics prevailed on the commanders to have one built. So Jaclyn had done with Erai. It wasn’t as it had been too difficult. As one who still fought on occasion, in the thick of things, Erai appreciated the need for medical facilities.
“No, Mack.” She began with a frown. “The hospital is the problem.”
Mack drew a blank altogether when trying to think of a response. All he could manage was, “Pardon?” As soon as he closed his mouth, he looked at the woman again. She was obviously distraught, shaken, confused, from something Mack didn’t know. He assumed he was about to find out.
“The hospital was totally destroyed a few hours ago.” She started sobbing as she said it, wishing Mack wasn’t in his armor so she could have something to hold onto. “I…I was in my sleeping quarters in the barracks…and when I woke up it was just…I…”
As she burst into tears, Mack genuinely felt sorry for her. As much as he didn’t like her at times, there was absolutely no way that as a human being he couldn’t not feel bad for her then. “What? How…how could that happen?”
“They came in by air…lots of those big floating things…”
“The Overlords.”
Jaclyn sniffed again as she nodded. “And then they just unloaded a bunch of those little ones…the Zerglings…the building’s structure just plain collapsed. It crushed the bastards that did it…” She stopped as she cried some more. Mack wasn’t about to push her, he knew she had to be really angry or depressed to be driven to curse. “Dammit, Mack! Almost everyone’s dead except for a few lucky people! Or maybe they aren’t so lucky…”
“Don’t you go saying shit like that, Jaclyn…” Her having cursed, he didn’t want to make her feel any different, so he figured he would curse as well. “At least alive there’s a chance of something good coming out of it.” He paused again; knowing the next area would be difficult to tread but it needed done. “How could they get in without us finding out until now?”
She blinked, tears flowing down her cheeks again. “You know how the hospital was in the middle of nowhere, even inside of the base. They broke some static perimeter defenses, and comms were disabled, so I was the only messenger…all of the others are tending to the survivors…”
Mack looked around to the various men who were staring. He nodded silently to each of them, letting them know to keep up the work while he departed. “Come on. We need to go let Erai know about this…”
As the men on the main flank made further preparations for their defense lines, the firebat and the medic walked off side-by-side to the nearest communications tent, knowing that to alert the Colonel was the only thing to do.
* * *
“Command… Yeah… Yea—dammit… Yeah… All right, get on it… Out…” It wasn’t a pleasant thing for Erai to get news such as what he just received, but having gotten it, he knew there was only one way to turn things around to something that might almost be good.
He slapped the button down to send another message. “Command to Lansing.”
“Yeah, what the hell do you want now?” Came back the gruff reply almost instantaneously.
“You need some new samples, Doctor?” Erai asked.
“That would be good. Where?”
“The hospital.”
“Wait, why would they be there?” Stephen started to get the picture, but still wouldn’t have figured it out were it not for Erai.
“It’s gone, the bastards took it out and it fell on them.”
“Shit! Hold on…” The line went silent for a bit, all that could be heard was a little static and two voices in the background. Erai assumed it was Stephen conferring with Jennifer Solaris, his assistant. “Alright. We’ll get over there right now. No escort needed. Out.”
Before the line clicked dead, Erai heard them loading firearms. He sighed again; hoping the scientist knew what in all creation he was doing.
Nobody else did. And quite unfortunately, in his anger, Erai never checked up on the status of the reinforcements.
* * *
In his office on the base’s science facility, Dimitri Pyakov balled up a fist and punched it through a wall, hard. It was about an hour after the rest of the base knew about what had transpired with the hospital. Ordinarily it wouldn’t have shaken Dimitri too much, except for the fact that at the time of the attack, five of his eleven remaining Ghosts were in the hospital receiving ocular implants to see more clearly and further than they could have been.
One survived, and his surgery was interrupted, so he didn’t even have the enhancements the other six had. He frowned as what little effectiveness the Ghosts might have had as a group would have had just vanished almost in front of his eyes. Even firing more powerful shells out of their standard issue C-10 canister rifles (which, surprisingly enough to Dimitri, had been designed and produced by George Halsey and his machinists,) there was only so much that seven of them could do.
As much as the deaths of four of his remaining men ate away at him, that wasn’t even the chief cause of his worry and anger. More than anything, the fact that it was a targeted attack on the hospital got under his skin. The Zerg went in, knowing what they were hitting. It was almost like they knew what was in there, which they were killing, who it would piss off.
A little known fact, but Dimitri was a known sufferer of paranoia. This was indicated in his personnel file, in the computer databases, which were used in the base’s command center. The only person privy to such information was the Colonel. However, himself a soldier, he never took men off of active duty because, in his own words, “Some bastard shrink couldn’t get enough pussy and got pissed off, so he just went and made up shit that wasn’t there.” Odd logic, but it wasn’t as if Erai was about to let anyone tell him what he was to do with those under his command. Most other commanding officers would want total control of their men, or at the very least obedience from the majority as a result of fear. Instead Erai preferred to be seen as just another soldier, except he gave the orders by default. This was the actual case, since Erai had assumed command as a result of terrible planning, but the men who served under him didn’t harbor any hard feelings towards him. Dimitri had nothing but the utmost respect for his comrade and commander as a result.
Perhaps some of the feelings the Ghost had about Zerg sentience, or Mengsk’s traitorous nature, were sound and justifiable. Perhaps they could be entirely attributed to his mental instabilities. Or maybe it was some of both. The only certain thing was that time would be the only thing that could tell.
After a couple of minutes, he removed his fist from the wall and shook it a bit. He silently rebuked himself for allowing his emotions to get so out of control, but mostly for being stupid enough to punch through glass. He searched around the room for something to bandage up the flowing blood other than his clothing, but didn’t see anything. Cursing himself more, he walked out of the building to a local triage station, which was fortunately equipped for such stupid things as bandaging a hand.
As the medic on duty set to stopping the blood and healing the wound, Dimitri looked off to the horizon. It was calm and tranquil, but the way the clouds were in the sky, it cast a large shadow, slowly inching towards and eventually over the base.
The incoming sight made Dimitri glad he was going inside. He did not want to have to ponder what the clouds beginning to gather could symbolize.
* * *
Stephen and his assistant Jennifer had noticed the quickly advancing shadow as they worked through the rubble of the hospital, looking for new subjects to examine. The significance of darkness wasn’t lost on the two of them, but they were too busy to give it any further thought while they searched. In particular, they were interested in the corpses of the Zerglings, but more specifically what would loosely be called the brain. The Zerg had almost no individual thoughts and thus no use for a brain, but the organ which held the psychic connection to the cerebrate, and thus Kerrigan, was found in the area which would be a stomach on humans. It had taken quite a bit of research to discern what organ was what. Said research had seemed quite useless at the time, but Stephen and his team persisted and their findings seemed useful at that particular time. But once they found what was undoubtedly the source of the psionic link to the local cerebrate, it could be used to analyze the data as the project was supposed to. Stephen had only since they come to that planet identified what he thought was that particular organ, but needed more specimen to determine that.
Hence why the death of at least a hundred men and women of the battalion was actually a good thing for science of the times. With Zerglings crushed under the rubble, dead as a result of their own handiwork, Stephen could search without worry of getting himself killed as countless scientists had done before him. It was a daunting task for just two people, so for moving the heavier pieces they had some of Halsey’s workers help. Bulky men, regardless of what shape they might have been in, were always good in that capacity.
With a grunt and a heave, a particularly heavy piece of rubble was lifted to reveal five of the dog-like corpses of Zerglings. At least, Stephen assumed it was five, it may have been pieces of more than that but he didn’t care to speculate.
“That’ll do it fellas, thanks much.” Jennifer said, loud enough to make sure the men heard her, but not enough to disturb the quiet reverie which Stephen had slipped into.
The men shouted their assents and turned to leave, again leaving Stephen and Jennifer alone to their specimen gathering.
She shook her head a bit, her medium-length auburn hair flipping behind her off of her shoulder. Silence washed over the area for a minute or so while Stephen checked the remains of the crushed abominations. Finally she’d had enough of if and broke it. “I know you’re not really uncaring about all of these deaths, Stephen. What do you really think?”
No response. It was as if he didn’t even hear her speaking. “You can hear me, I know it. Don’t ignore me just because it deals with emotions, dammit.”
“Huh? Pardon?” The scientist poked his head up from where it was, covered by protective masks and such. His eyeballs, blue upon close inspection, were all that could be seen of his entire body.
*Well, maybe he really didn’t hear me…* she thought curiously. *That man can get so wrapped up in his work… * She sighed, looking at him again. It was a rather amusing picture, holding a couple of Zerg organs in his hand, trying to drop them into a specimen container while his gloves were slippery from all of the blood. She tried her best not to laugh, but failed utterly.
He looked at her strangely. “What are you laughing at?”
As suddenly as she began laughing, she stopped. “It’s nothing. Come on, let me give you a hand.” Gloves, a mask, and a labcoat were the only articles of protective clothing she was wearing, but it didn’t bug her in the slightest as she aided the scientist in perhaps the most critical part of his research.
“Shit! Look out!” He suddenly screamed at her. Before she knew what was happening, he’d thrown her behind him a yard or so and dropped one of the organs he’d been fumbling with. Time seemed to slow as it dropped to the ground, impacting on a rock. A sidearm was procured from his labcoat, by the same hand that dropped the organ. It finally occurred to Jennifer to look to the left, to where her back had been facing before.
She nearly passed out as she saw what was happening. Still seemingly in slow motion, a Zergling was running towards them. It suddenly processed that was what she had been thrown away from. Stephen, who had for once been thinking about someone other than himself, had just saved her life.
The sight continued to transpire in front of her very eyes, as Stephen leveled the pistol off at the still-charging beast, then began firing shots into it.
BANG! … BANG! … BANG! A short pause. Then, once more, BANG! … BANG! … BANG!
As the Zergling was struck five times and fell lifeless to the rubble which it had dug itself out from, time returned to normal for Jennifer. She wanted to reach over and put her hand over a scrape, which had started hurting, but as she moved it her eyes rolled back and she simply fainted from the shock of it all.
Stephen laughed inwardly at the scene as he picked up his specimen container with one hand. He took another look at his partner, laughed some more, then bent down and slung her over one of his shoulders. His walking pace was quite slow as he headed off to the northwest back towards his laboratory, but it didn’t take him more than ten minutes.
He looked up to the sky as he walked, noticing the clouds seemed to have passed. The setting sun looked rather beautiful as he observed it.
* * *
Chief Engineer George Halsey let out a snicker as he mounted his modified Vulture for his traditional evening ride through the base. The Vulture – complete with headlights and a horn to beep at people he felt like annoying – came gliding out of the doors of his shop, facing south. Not far off he could see the Turret station between his position and Pyakov’s Science Facility. He motored along south, floating a few feet above the ground on his bike as he went. Crossing a few of the Goliath patrols, he continued until he reached the secondary defense trenches. He honked at a few of the Siege Tank drivers, just to make sure they were awake. He supposed it was lucky they didn’t haul off and shoot him with their Arclite cannons, but he knew they weren’t facing his direction.
Turning his vehicle to face east, he again took off, passing a communications tent on his right, the Science Facility on his left. About a half of a minute later he made his way into their local hills, which made convenient defensive fortifications. The base, which was only assailable by land via the northern and the southern points, was surrounded by water and plateaus on the other two flanks. Only air assaults could penetrate on the east and west, and the Turret network always had plenty of notice as a result of their elevated position. Along his way up and down the hills he passed another couple communications tents, though he wasn’t really sure why they were there considering each Turret had it’s own communications gear. He shrugged as he rode, the air whipping along his clothing. It was a sensation he couldn’t live without. More than any other reason, it was that particular sensation which was the reason he rode around in the evenings. The 27 hour day which Arridas possessed gave an extra hour of dark time, which he used for his own amusement rather than sleep.
A minute or so passed and he found himself at the edge of the plateau, so he rotated another ninety degrees and, facing due west, headed off again. On either side of him, more Turrets were staggered to protect the flank from the air. He could also see some more Goliath patrols, though he didn’t stop to harass any of them. Further ahead, he could see the mineral patches and vespene geysers, still being worked on long into the night. It seemed most of the buildings had been repaired, at the expense of many, many manhours. There was a heavy defense line on the northern perimeter, as it was accessible by land but only after going up a long, gradual hill. It was so littered with Zerg bodies that one couldn’t even see the level ground at the bottom any longer. Without stopping for so much as a wave, he also passed the fortified hill which contained the base’s only remaining Command Center. Turrets and bunkers heavily guarded the ways up the hill, as well as the top of it. If there were to be a last stand, it would be on that hill. Some of the troops tended to call it Nalkri Hill, even though it had never been a site of a battle. Yet, that is.
Yet another communications tent came up on his right as on the left he passed the laboratories headed up by Stephen Lansing. He made one more turn, rotating another ninety degrees so he faced due south. More Turrets whizzed by along his right side, then he noticed the offices coming up on the left. He smiled widely as he pictured his quarry, asleep happily. Where the offices were on the left there were the quarters on the right. He let out a loud belly laugh as he went by, laying down on his horn so it blared obnoxiously while he passed the quarters. Executing a perfect kick turn, he began moving due east once more in order to escape the curses, which were being thrown his way.
There were several more Goliaths on patrol as he passed the Barracks, which were closed for the evening. He considered waking up the poor civilians in training, but decided against it. After all, it was a bad thing to have people not liking you, especially when they were soon going to be wielding guns.
He laughed one final time, then turned due north right into the hangar. As usual, his ride took exactly eleven minutes.
Before he went off to sleep, he looked off at the sky one final time. More clouds appeared on the horizon, slowly creeping towards the base.
|
|
|
|
Home
Forum
Starcraft Tournaments
