“Raynor!!” Kerrigan’s eyes turned yellow as deadly psionic energy rampaged around the bridge. There was no debris to be seen. The tentacles and spores were powerful, but there was no way they could destroy every sign of the experience of a ship as large as the Hyperion. There could only be one explanation, and Kerrigan didn’t like that possibility.

Every zerg growled as they felt their lives under threat. Kerrigan was arrogant, but she had the right to be so. If she wanted to, she could kill all several hundred elite zerg units in the bridge in just seconds. But just before the zerg units were terminated by the anger of their queen, Kerrigan regained control of her power.

Yet it wasn’t over. Every single unit in Kerrigan’s personal brood felt the wrath of their leader, and every single one of them went into a frenzy.

Those on the ground were especially so. Zerglings emptied every fraction of energy stored in their body just to get some additional speed. Hydralisks fired while walking forward. No longer trying to be efficient and minimize the losses, they unloaded spine after spine while moving forward themselves to engage the enemies in melee combat. Roaches no longer relied on their salivas to do damage. Instead, they used their size and strength to literally push their way into the Tal’darim line. They were taken down quickly and joined their fallen comrades on the ground, but their sacrifice was worth it.

The Tal’darim defenses were already half gone, and the frenzy was the last straw. Reinforcements were depleted, and broken holes in the defensive line could no longer be fixed. Eventually, the Tal’darim were cut into smaller groups and taken out one by one.

But Kerrigan wasn’t satisfied by what was happening.

“Wipe the Tal’darim out! I want to see their corpses laid out in front of me!” That was an impossible, or at least insanely difficult, problem because protoss don’t have bodies, but the pissed queen had no intention of minding that.

She had the artifact in her grip, and she allowed it to slip out of her fingers. The sudden difference between victory and defeat made her want to kill something. For normal people that was just a literary device, but not for Kerrigan.

Raynor was lucky and got away, but the Tal’darim didn’t share the same luck. Kerrigan swore to herself that one day she would find her former lover and make him pay for what he did, but as for now only the Tal’darim could relieve her anger with their lives.

Immediately, five of the leviathans that were in the orbit of the planet started descending. Spore crawlers and spore cannons, usually meant as anti air weapons, uprooted and crawled to the lower side of the ship and planted themselves so they were pointing at the ground. The leviathans lowered to a distance so the Tal’darim base was put in the firing range of the spores.

Usually this was a dangerous thing. In a normal battle, even if the fleet of one side was down, the opposing fleet couldn’t descend into the atmosphere and fire freely upon the ground sources. Orbital defenses could rip through any ship in the air. Weapons like Drakken Pulse cannons of the terran, spore cannons of the zerg, and Khaydarin monoliths of the protoss, could break through the shields and the armors of the capital ships with relative ease.

This was not the case here. The most the Tal’darim had were photon cannons. That was it.

When the capital ships were in place, unchallenged, the spores opened fire. Large and small projectiles alike smashed into the protoss camp below.

With the help of overseers that entered surveillance mode, the spores were as precise as possible. Static defenses like photon cannons were the first to perish. When they were gone, the spots where the Tal’darim were the most concentrated came under fire.

With every shot, at least half a dozen zealots or slayers were caught in the blast. If it was a weaker spore crawler then the units might be able to survive, but if it was a spore cannon, the Tal’darim were for sure dead. Even phasing armors of slayers couldn’t protect them against something as large and powerful as spore cannons. After all, spore cannons were used as anti-capital ship weapons. They had no problem killing a single ground unit.

The most painful hits came when three large spores landed in the mixture of protoss and zerg in the second line of defense. Most of the Tal’darim forces still alive were holding back the swarm in the front. The best of the best, including ascendant Dyges, were engaged in hand to hand battle. In order to back their brothers up, these warriors were in a tight position. This was good against zerglings, roaches, and hydralisks, but it was hardly helpful when something as explosive as spore cannons came into action.

The acid melted zerg and protoss alike. The only difference was the zerg were expendable and the protoss weren’t. Some of the more formidable units, like slayers and roaches, stayed alive after the first round, but then came the second, and then the third. The leviathans didn’t stop until everything in the front that could move was obliterated. They had no intention of distinguishing between friend or foe.

A few Tal’darim tried to retreat or spread out to minimize the losses, but the zerg, even though they were bombarded by their own ships, moved forward and entangled the protoss, holding them in place. As long as the Tal’darim were delayed, even if it was just a few seconds, the following spores would melt everyone.

The bombardment continued for three minutes. When the leviathans stopped, the once heavily fortified Tal’darim base was completely different. Almost all of the defenders were dead, and even their armors and wreckages were nowhere to be seen.

But that wasn’t over.

Hundreds of openings appeared in the lower deck of the leviathans. They were tiny compared to the leviathan themselves, but actually, they were large enough to fit an Ultralisk. Suddenly, a zerg drop pod was thrown out of each of the holes. Carrying countless units, these drop pods landed on Monlyth.

When the zerg were done, there was no survivor.

Kerrigan’s anger died down slightly when she sensed the only living things on the planet below were zerg, but she didn’t forget the protoss weren’t the only one that made her look like a fool.

She would go after the Raiders herself. They were hiding in Dominion airspace, but the swarm could wipe out the Dominion with acceptable losses. In the four years, the Terran Dominion turned from a group of defeated rebels to an empire, but the swarm wasn’t sitting back either.

But she had something else in mind. As clever and lucky Raynor was, he had one ship. That was it. The real problem was the xel’naga.

Amon wanted to destroy all life in the sector, and he planted some seeds in both the protoss and the zerg to get ready for that. He implanted the backdoor in the khala to control the protoss. For the zerg, he relied on the Overmind and his psionic network. However, things changed slightly when the Overmind fell at the hand of Tassadar. After that, Amon was forced to work with the Queen of Blades.

After winning the Brood War, Kerrigan returned to Char. It appeared like she was sitting back and enjoying her victory. In fact, even Kerrigan herself thought that was the case, but it wasn’t.

The swarm was preparing for war. Amon never had any direct control over Kerrigan, but he could effectively influence her decision and make her act in the general direction of his will. For example, Kerrigan was almost naturally building up her swarm. She thought that was just a subconscious decision, that was because she wanted to, but in reality, Amon wanted an army he could command when he returned to the material world.

Unfortunately for Amon, Kerrigan wasn’t an easily deceived person. The Queen of Blades sensed the presence of the xel’naga and felt his intention. Despite subconsciously believing the future was sealed and the resurrected fallen xel’naga would kill everyone, Kerrigan wanted to die in a blaze of glory. The swarm would never fall without a fight.

That was why she was going after xel’naga artifacts. Kerrigan didn’t know how to effectively fight Amon, but she thought only xel’naga weapons or tools could hurt or even defeat a xel’naga. The Keystone fragments could be potentially helpful.

Then came Monlyth, and she suffered a defeat at the hands of an enemy ten times weaker than her.

Despite wanting to find Raynor herself and snap his neck for tricking her, Kerrigan herself was occupied with the other artifact fragments. The safety of a potential table changing weapon was more important than a pissed ex.

Of course, not being able to deliver the kill herself didn’t mean letting Raynor go free.

“Zagara.” She made contact with one of her most loyal broodmothers as her own brood prepared for a jump.

“My queen.” The broodmother immediately psionically showed her obedience.

“Bring your brood to the Dominion. Locate and destroy a rebel group known as Raynor’s Raiders, but bring their leader, Jim Raynor, to me. I want to see him suffer myself.” Zagara’s brood was one of the most powerful broods the swarm had. Even alone they weren’t afraid of the Dominion Fleet.

“Yes, my queen.”

Kerrigan sat back as all twenty one leviathans warped away. When the smoke cleared, the only sign of the fight that happened here and the thousands that died was the sound of drones hatching and mining.

In a piece of neutral space, a slightly wounded battlecruiser exited warp space.

The entire bridge went dead silent as everyone took a few deep breath and tried to come back from the shock they just sensed.

That was close. Very close. If the warp drive was activated a few seconds later, the Hyperion would’ve taken the full brunt of the leviathan tentacles. Once it was hit, the Hyperion would be damaged. If that happened, there was no promise the ship could make it out in one piece.

Jean wasn’t shocked, but she was indeed thinking.

Everything she did so far, whether it was saving the Raiders, buying the mercenaries, or buying new gadgets, was useless against what she just saw today.

Now, that wasn’t saying nothing changed. That was saying if Jean today was compared to her a few days ago and they were in a fight to the death against Amon himself, the Jean today could survive a few more seconds and do a few more scratches before being crushed.

From the scanners, Jean saw most of the things that happened on the planet.

First, how good were the Tal’darim? The Tal’darim were one of the best warrior factions in the sector. The several thousand guardians and, judging from common sense a fleet, could take on the entirety of the Dominion. Even if they couldn’t defeat the entire Dominion Fleet, they could inflict massive damage on the terran ships and still get out in one piece thanks to the advantage in technology. In general, the Tal’darim were better than the Terran Dominion who was better than Raynor’s Raiders.

Yet, the Tal’darim were almost defenseless against the swarm. Granted, they were outnumbered, outgunned, and overwhelmed, but no fight was ever fair. It’s not like Jean could go to Amon and tell him to send out his weakest troops to make the battle as fair as square as possible.

If the factions in the sector was a food chain and Amon was the lion on the top, then Jean was not even the sheep that the lion hunted down and ate as food. She was the grass that the sheep feasted on.

Someone normal would’ve given up already, but Jean wasn’t normal. All the desperate knowledge did was make her think even faster.

Unfortunately, Jean was the only special one in the bridge. The others weren’t exactly satisfied with how things turned out.

Raynor finally spoke after a few more seconds of awkward quietness.

“Swann, examine the damage of the ship and make repairs. Tychus, contact the Moebius Foundation and set up a time to exchange the artifact with the credits they promised. Horner, help Swann.” Raynor’s tone was oddly deep as he turned to the only person he didn’t mention.

“Jean, come with me.”

The man turned and walked out of the bridge without another word.

Jean quietly followed him, leaving everyone else in the bridge confused.