Eyes of a Tragedy

After that morning's meeting, Kerrigan was ... pensive.

She knew the rites of Parents' Weekend well enough to know she should be in her office for most of the weekend, and it was as good a place as any to be. Especially if she wanted to place a call to River later, and ensure that all the Protoss sacred sites they'd been in the process of... acquiring had enough brood to stop Zeratul if, for some reason, he found his way back to Koprulu.

Still, her human form felt like it fit her badly right now. She itched to send the extra human emotions back to the hell they'd come from. Itched for a fight.

But. Office hours.

The only way anyone could possibly tell what was on her mind was the incessant ticking of her pen against her desk.

[[ open! ]]

Oh, Kerrigan had felt that annoying Protoss presence slipping onto the island that morning. No, it wasn't that she wasn't aware.

It was that she didn't care. Not yet. Not unless the Dark Templar was planning to show up and ruin her office hours, when she ran the risk of dealing with some very interesting guests. It'd be typical, mind, but she was in no mood to tolerate self-righteous blathering and waving around of psi-blades.

Her office was spartan. Her bearing was calm. The Queen of Blades was ready to face any horrors Parents' Weekend would try to throw at her -- and their little warrior, too.

[[ open! ]]

It was a whole big, beautiful new semester, wasn't it?

The intel she was gathering here was already proving to be very interesting indeed; but today, Kerrigan was busy with other things. Drafting up class plans with her hands, her mind was high up and away, poking through her own troop movements.

She was certain the entire galaxy was wondering what the hell had happened to the Zerg, pulling away at the moment they could have claimed total victory. They didn't fully comprehend what was going on, which was fine with her... For now.

[[ open! ]]

Dude. Dude. So last week, the first installment of StarCraft II came out after twelve freaking years, and obviously we own it now. And dude. Duuude. There is so much awesome in my new canon. SO MUCH. (Dude: Flimic rendition of the Battle of New Gettysburg at last. This could've been useful back when I played it out)

But but but how it ends, dude.

( Dude. There are spoilers under here. DUDE. )

... composing myself now, back to your regularily scheduled programming, etc.

Examining the bigger picture again hadn't seemed to stop whatever human part of Sarah Kerrigan's mind was still questing. It had been nearly a week since the last time she gave in, and now she was sitting there again, staring at a website on her screen.

Years ago, she and Harriet had gone down to London to find a solution to the angels problem. They'd spoken to a lot of government officials at the time, and... Well.

She closed her eyes, brushed her fingertips over her eyelids, and gave in to human weakness. Touched the numbers of the first familiar name she found into the phone, and called.

( The voice that answered was crisp, professional, and possessed of a strong Welsh accent. )

Something tiny and human curled up in Sarah Kerrigan's body, then dissolved. She sighed, tension seeping out of her body, and shut her eyes. She slumped back.

It only lasted a minute.

Then her body language straightened itself out, and she sat up. Right. That-- issue was out of the way.

[[ co-written with the awesome notquitewright, details of phone call NFB, and open ]]

It'd been a desperately long time since the last time Kerrigan found herself in an office such as this. Her expression twitched slightly with the memory of her twisted mess of human feelings the last time she was there. Then she opened the door in full, and observed the desolate room in front of her.

A desk, a chair, and a bookcase.

And a computer that seemed more ancient than the last time she was here. She decided to chalk that up to faulty human memory. She took a seat, and stretched. It wasn't time yet to take the computer apart - she could always adjust the settings... later.

She made a quick mental note to take up communications with River soon, then stretched leisurely in her chair. Mhm.

[[ open hours! ]]

It had been a scant few hours since Kerrigan's victory on that platform above Char. A fleet of Mutalisks and Scourges broke loose from it, and soared off into space, chasing the retreating UED fleet.

( Scattered across worlds, the Zerg pricked up their ears. )

[[ nfb, nfi, ooc-okay; taken from the amazing epilogue to StarCraft: Brood War, which I could literally quote by heart at age 15. Aaanyway. ]]

( She who is Old yet New Again: Sarah Kerrigan, Queen of Blades. ) (Please check under the cut for details on Kerrigan's telepathy, whee)

( The rest, in bullet points: John Mitchell and Cable. )

"You have corrupted her! Somehow you have poisoned her thoughts. Restore her to her rightful self, or you will pay dearly for this offense, Kerrigan!"

Zeratul's indignance, his anguish had been delicious, once he'd found what Kerrigan had done to his Matriarch. Had done a long time ago.

"With her as my puppet I was able to eradicate the Renegades on Shakuras, and use you to kill the Overmind. And as you can see, your leader belongs to me now. Not bad, huh?"

So maybe gloating had been a little... much. If she hadn't, then she might not have had to chase Zeratul's hide across Char all these weeks. You could say what you wanted about the Protoss, but they certainly knew how to make things difficult.

Like stealing the Matriarch from Kerrigan even after it had become pathetically obvious that she was beyond redeeming. Honestly, the one thing Kerrigan disliked about being here rather than in a Terran colony or on Fandom was the lack of a decent brand of aspirin.

Anyway, weeks of searching, and that brought Kerrigan to this point: with River at her side, amidst the ruins of a Protoss base, facing Zeratul as he clutched on to the stasis cell that held his wounded Matriarch.

"Damn you, Kerrigan, for what I must do!" the Dark Templar's psionic voice spat.

Great. Theatrics. The Protoss did always know how to make a scene.

Advil, anyone?

[[ for the girl ]]

She had been tempted to finally follow up on one of those Fandom invitation beacons. But no. Not today. Today, Kerrigan had... more important plans. She'd shelve this one for next time.

"I have some unfinished business with the Dark Templar Matriarch, Raszagal," she mused, glancing down at the planet below through the thick surface of the viewscreen. Her heel tapped against the floor. "I'll need to steal her from her tribe before we can finally assault the Overmind on Char. However, her defenders will not simply allow us to take her away."

She glanced over her shoulder at Duran.

"The pylon clusters are generating some sort of electromagnetic field that is preventing our flyers from maneuvering," he supplied, frowning. "We won't have any air support at all."

That... wasn't good. She would've sent mutalisks and overlords if she'd had the chance.

"Then we'll need some new strategy."

Thankfully, Duran stepped up. "Perhaps it would be best if we staged some kind of diversion, my Queen, and claimed the Matriarch during the confusion."

Kerrigan nodded. "What did you have in mind?" she drawled, turning.

"The Protoss outpost of Talematros is built upon a large mesa and is essentially impregnable to ground attacks." Duran traced the lines of the city on the map before him with one finger. "However, Talematros is fueled and supported by a number of adjacent pylon clusters." He stabbed at the area in question. "I believe that if we can cause a surge within those pylon clusters, we can cause Talematros' power grids to overload. The resulting explosion will be the perfect cover for retrieving the Matriarch."

This... was not as wasted an opportunity as she had feared it would be. A smile spread across Kerrigan's features. She paced towards the map.

"Clean, simple, devious," she mused. "I like it." Her eyes snapped up to Duran. "Call in River. Get her out there."

Duran blanched. "My Queen, I think it would be best if I--"

"Bullshit," she said, "We obviously need your tactical brain up here."

With a frown, Duran bowed. "My Queen. I will alert River immediately."

"Good," she said, and flicked her eyes sideways, towards another screen. "Cerebrate. You'll be offering support while River does her thing. Get to it."

[[ for her who is here. also, kerrigan: now has her own metal song ]]