Shadow Hunters

by Christie Golden

  “I would have you accompany me, Vetraas,” Adun continued. “They have asked to speak with me alone, but I would prefer to have my most trusted adviser with me at such a meeting. There was something … well. Will you come?”

  “Of course,” Jake responded.

  The Conclave, led by the elder Kortanul, was none too pleased that the executor had disobeyed their instructions and not come alone. Adun calmly and respectfully asked that Jake be included, and after some private discussion the Conclave agreed. While the thoughts they directed toward Jake were definitely not conciliatory, he was only amused and curious as to the need for such secrecy.

  “Before we begin,” said Kortanul, “it is imperative that you both swear that word of what transpires here goes no further.”

  Jake and Adun nodded. Kortanul stepped forward to Jake, holding up his hand, palm facing out. Jake mirrored him. A gentle glow began to pulse between them and easily, naturally, their minds merged. So linked, Kortanul asked for Jake’s solemn promise. So linked, in a deep place within the Khala where he could not lie, where violation of this oath would result in swift punishment, Jake made the oath.

  He watched, filled with apprehension, as Adun did likewise. Never before, in the centuries in which he had served, had anything like this been asked of him. He wondered what was so dire that the Conclave felt they had to resort to such measures to ensure loyalty from two whose loyalty had never once been questioned.

  The members of the Conclave nodded, satisfied, and Jake and Adun were permitted to sit in the beautifully carved chairs that were usually reserved only for the Conclave. Jake noted that while they were lavish and opulent, set with crystals, inlaid with precious metals, and of a form pleasing to the eye, they were not very comfortable.

  “We can either show you this information in a link or tell you,” Kortanul continued. “It is your choice, Adun. Though I will advise you that if this is merely told, you may find it hard to believe.”

  “Speak,” Adun said. “If this is as portentous as you say, I would hear reasoned thoughts about it, not the emotions you feel toward it.”

  Kortanul inclined his head. “As you wish, Executor.” Despite his words, he seemed deeply reluctant to speak. Adun and Jake waited patiently.

  “Impossible as it may seem, there are those among us who would destroy everything we have sought to build over the last millennium. They—”

  “We’re finally here,” Rosemary said, shaking Jake awake. “But boy, Professor, I’d talk to your travel agent of a protoss. This place doesn’t look at all like you described it to me.”

  Jake woke up with a start. He’d slept wrong and had a terrible headache. He went to rub his temples and winced; he’d forgotten about the bump on the head he’d taken not that long ago. It took a second for Rosemary’s words to register. He threw off the blanket and got to his feet, sitting down heavily and looking through the screen as Rosemary guided the ship into orbit around the homeworld of the protoss.

  “Oh my God,” he breathed.

  He had come expecting the verdant lands of Temlaa and Savassan, a world of lush rain forests and oceans, of gleaming cities and mysterious temples. But the planet that filled the screen had been horribly brutalized. With a sickening feeling, Jake beheld mammoth patches of blackened, charred earth. Here and there were what struck him as being pathetically small patches of green rain forest, although his rational mind realized they must stretch for hundreds of kilometers. What lakes there were looked brown and unhealthy. The oceans alone seemed to have escaped….

  Jake’s mind flashed back to the dinner conversation he had had with Rosemary and the late Ethan Stewart. Ethan had said something about Aiur—but Jake had been more than a little the worse (or better) for the alcohol and focused on the sorbet.

  The sorbet is indeed made from the juice of the sammuro fruit of Aiur, Ethan had said. Damned hard to find, even on the black market. This may be the only taste any terran may ever have of it.

  “So that’s what Ethan meant,” he said, grief closing his throat. It was not Temlaa’s grief or Zamara’s he felt now, but his own—a nauseous sensation of loss and anger and disappointment.

  Zamara—what happened?

  The zerg found our homeland. You can see the remains of their infestation from here.

  So that was what that somewhat shiny, crusty gray material that covered huge clumps of what had once been a fertile planet was. Zerg “creep,” humans called it. Jake thought he might throw up.

  Why did you not tell me?

  It was not necessary. Zamara seemed genuinely puzzled at his anger. We were not coming here to behold my world’s beauty. We came here because we need to enter the underground chambers to recover the lost technology.

  But I didn’t understand this had happened…. I wasn’t prepared to see this!

  He realized that she would never understand why humans needed to be braced for something like this. It was yet another thing that reminded him just how alien Zamara was, even though they had grown to be fairly close. She was much more rational and logical than he, and doled out information on a “need to know” basis.

  I share your pain, she said unexpectedly. I was witness to much of this unfolding. That … I hope I do not have to share with you, but it might be necessary.

  Rosemary was looking at him with a hint of sympathy on her face. “Why didn’t she tell you?”

  “She didn’t think I needed to know,” he said, embarrassed at how bitter and angry he sounded.

  Rosemary shrugged. “Whatever. I don’t much like the idea of landing down there. I’ve heard a little bit about what happened, but not a lot. So are the zerg and the protoss all gone or what?”

  My people were evacuated through a warp gate to a safe place.

  Relieved, Jake sagged a little in his chair. And the zerg?

  They obey their controller. They would have been recalled once their mission was accomplished. Aiur was attacked four years ago, there would be no reason for them to linger.

  “She says there are no zerg left, and the protoss all made it to safety,” Jake said to Rosemary.

  “Good. Sounds like we go in, find what you need, and get out. I like that. Then what?”

  Then what?

  We take the technology to other protoss.

  Where? And what is this crystal for, anyway? Why are you being so mysterious about this?

  You do not need to concern yourself with that right now.

  Zamara … this is really starting to get irritating. You know I trust you—and not just because I have no choice in the matter.

  Her mental voice softened, became kinder. This I know, Jacob. All will be revealed as needed.

  Jake sighed. “We go find other protoss and they help her out. And that’s all she’s telling me now.”

  “Doesn’t tell you a lot, does she?”

  “Well, you don’t either.” He regretted snapping at her but damn it, his head hurt.

  Unexpectedly, Rosemary grinned. “Touché,” she said. They spent several minutes in silence looking out at the shattered world of Aiur as Rosemary brought the ship into the atmosphere and began to scout for a good place to set down. “So no zerg, no protoss. Anything else we need to worry about?” She pointed at another screen readout that listed the chemical composition of the planet’s atmosphere. “Can we breathe that stuff, Prof? Looks like there’s still a lot of crap in the air from the fighting.”

  There is nothing in the air that would be harmful to you with short-term exposure. However, there could be residual radiation from the conflict. She should check for that. Any formerly inhabited area—

  “—could be dangerous,” Jake relayed as Zamara thought the information. “Unstable buildings and so on. We should be able to breathe just fine; we’re not going to be here long. Looks like the atmosphere is slightly heavier than on most terran settlements, but we should be okay. Oh, and she says there’s wildlife.”

  “Nothing a rifle won’t blast to smithereens, I hope?”
>
  Jake thought of the omhara, the giant predatory beast worshipped as a god by the early protoss. Huge, with three eyes and hooves and extremely sharp teeth. He thought of other creatures he had seen, from the small primate known as Little Hands to enormous, placid, burrowing creatures known as lombads, to the small and incredibly swift kal-taar, all glimpsed through the eyes of Temlaa, who was regarded as primitive but who had as bright a soul as anyone he’d ever met. R. M. regarded the animals of this place as an obstacle, and he supposed if they attacked, they would be.

  It wasn’t worth picking a fight over. “No,” he said with a sigh. “Just animals.”

  He felt suddenly weary. The nap hadn’t rested him much. And the headache was coming back, as it had during the last three days of traveling. He supposed it was to be expected. He wasn’t cut out for this sort of thing. He missed the feeling of good ol’ dirt between his fingers, of the thrill of the hard-won archeological discovery … the familiarity of friends and a job he knew and was good at. Jake supposed anyone would get a headache under the current circumstances.

  He also was keenly interested in this mystery the Conclave was about to reveal and annoyed to have been awakened right when they were getting to the good part.

  I select each memory I share with you for a purpose, Jacob. Much deliberation goes into what you see. They are all, as you put it, “good parts.”

  He chuckled softly at that, then continued briefing

  R. M. He gave her the coordinates for the underground chambers. She entered them and started their final descent.

  Jake heard a sound he’d heard before, in the shipyard—a proximity alarm. Rosemary glanced at the console. “What the hell—”

  No!

  Zamara’s mental cry was not so much a word as a gut-punch of a negative, an urgent sensation of not-wanting, and Jake doubled over. His head felt like it had had an ice pick driven through it and for a second everything went gray. He was glad he hadn’t eaten because he was sure he’d vomit his guts out. Stop! Don’t land!

  “Don’t land!” he said in a raspy voice.

  R. M. turned, confused, but she’d halted their descent above the ground. “What’s wrong?” A dark shape suddenly appeared in front of the screen. “What the—” Rosemary shouted.

  The ship suddenly rocked. Something yellow-white and gooey spattered over the shield, which immediately went opaque. Sparks chased each other along the console and smoke billowed out in black waves. Other alarm systems added their voices to the din. A sharp burning smell made them cough and Jake again came close to being sick as the reek of something acidic burned his nostrils. Jake and Rosemary unbuckled themselves and scrambled back. The ship rocked again, as if something enormous and hard had either struck it or landed on it.

  “Hang on!” Rosemary shouted. Jake dropped to the floor, but there was nothing to hang on to. The ship, which had been hovering about ten meters over the ground, began to fall and crashed hard. Jake had the wind knocked out of him and couldn’t breathe. What the hell was going on?

  Zamara shouldered him aside in his own body. She forced his lungs to work, got him to his feet, had him fling open the weapons locker and grab a rifle.

  I was in error. There are indeed still zerg on Aiur after all.

  CHAPTER SIX

  “WE RETURN, O QUEEN.” THE VOICE IN HER MIND was harsh and rasping. Kerrigan turned her attention upon the overlord whose mission it had been to retrieve this latest prize.

  “Show me what you have brought me.”

  The things chittered, mandibles and antennae and pincers moving. Four hydralisks came forward, the linked scythelike arms cradling a precious burden instead of ripping something to bloody bits. They slithered in front of their queen, and moving as one lowered the chrysalis to rest at her feet.

  Kerrigan felt a wave of emotions wash through her, all powerful and some long-forgotten. She realized she felt … tenderness and affection toward the being encased in the sticky cocoon. Protective. There was a kinship between herself, the mighty Queen of Blades, and this nascent new life that even now writhed in torment inside the sludgy fluids of the cocoon. Surrendering to the emotions of the moment, feeling no shame or weakness at them, she knelt beside the softly glowing chrysalis.

  “I know it hurts right now,” she said to the being’s mind. “Your body is being stretched, pulled, remade. You are being reborn. Your very cell structure is not what it was.” She laid a long, clawed hand on the pulsing cocoon, wishing that she could offer the comfort of touch. Inside, what had once been a human man named Ethan Stewart kicked as best he could and sent forth a silent scream.

  “But you will be glorious when it is all done,” she murmured. “Glorious as your queen is. You will know power such as you have never tasted.” She began to explore the mind that was being re-formed the same way his body was being re-formed. She was surprised to discover that Ethan had no latent psychic abilities. Still, his was a highly intelligent mind. Highly disciplined. But damaged. It would need to be repaired as much as possible, but some of the damage could be of use to her. She had seen through the eyes and mind of the zergling that had gazed first at the surgeon, then at the patient on the bed, then at the familiar, delicate filigree of wires that constituted a psi-screen. She had jumped to the conclusion that Ethan was, like herself, a ghost. She had thought that he was the originator of the strange ripples she had sensed so far away. Clearly, he wasn’t capable of such things. But as she insinuated herself into his mind, she realized that while he himself was not responsible for the ripple, he knew … something. Something about protoss and terrans. Right now, the rage and paranoia rampaging through his brain was preventing her from accessing that information clearly. But the organic chemicals that were modifying his brain would help settle some of that.

  Not all, but some. She was familiar with what overusage of a psi-screen did to a person. She’d been given a graphic demonstration during her training. She’d seen the loss of control, the rage, the cunning, the paranoia. Had quailed as her instructors had let the poor shattered ghost hurl herself against padded walls and scream epithets. Because he was not a psi, Ethan would have suffered less injury. But he’d still be damaged. Maybe even a bit insane.

  She could work with that.

  She had created him, in a sense; right now he was helpless, in agony, entirely dependent on her for his survival. She had put others through this process before, a matter of trial and error, learning more with each failure or mild success. Ethan would, she hoped, be the culmination of all she had learned through those experiments. If all went as she anticipated, he would be magnificent, though of course not as perfect as she herself. She had no intention of creating a rival. She hoped to create an ally, a general, a warrior.

  She hoped to create a consort.

  There was no time to suit up. There was no time to do anything but hit the switch, watch the door iris open, and fire point blank at the two four-legged monstrosities who charged at them. Bits of shattered chitin, blood, and flesh sprayed all over the cargo bay door, sprayed all over Rosemary and Jake.

  “Hold them off!” Rosemary shouted to Jake. He obeyed, his will and Zamara’s completely one and the same. He was almost numb with horror but kept the rifle leveled, squeezing it so hard his hand cramped. Another, smaller zerg came at him, mandibles snapping, chittering madly, its eyes black and shiny and focused on him. It crawled without hesitating over the still-twitching bodies of the fallen. Jake trained the rifle on it and blasted it to a pulp, hyperaware that more would be out there. He tried frantically to remember what he knew about zerg. It wasn’t much that was helpful.

  Rosemary dove for the lockers and emerged with a handful of small round things. “Get down!” she cried as she lobbed one toward the door.

  Jake dropped, lying on his side, still somehow gripping the rifle, still firing. The third thing was dead. There was quite the nasty, foul-smelling pile accumulating. The puddle of sludgy blood was oozing toward him.

  “Cover your head
!”

  He did so, and heard a terrible boom. Bits of dead zerg spattered his body with soft plopping sounds. The stench was appalling as the liquids started to seep into his shirt.

  Inside him, Zamara sent calm to his brain and nervous system. It helped, a little. For about a second the door was clear of zerg—living ones, anyway. But he could hear their awful sounds, and knew they were there. He propped himself on his elbows and prepared to resume firing. Sure enough, four zerglings began swarming in. They died like the rest of them had. Jake began to hope they might make it.

  “How many are there?” he yelled to Rosemary over the din.

  “No clue!” she shot back. Then she did something that appeared to be totally insane. She gathered up an armload of grenades and raced for the open door, leaping out gracefully.

  “Rosemary!”

  She’d never looked more beautiful to him than now, when he was suddenly convinced he was about to lose her. She stood with her feet planted firmly on Aiur soil, tendrils of short black hair clinging to her sweaty face, one arm cradling death conveniently packaged in handy fist-sized grenades, lobbing them one after another at something he could not see.

  Explosions, four of them, hard on the heels of one another, shook the earth. He tried to get to his feet but slipped in the disgusting stew of zerg body parts. By the time he made it outside, ready to help, it was over. Rosemary shot him a triumphant grin.

  “You did good, Professor.”

  He gave her a feeble smile. “I’m afraid you did most of it.”

  “Nah, you did fine.”

  “We get them all?”

  “For the moment. But from what I remember about zerg, they don’t act alone. Reinforcements’ll be in any minute. Take what we can carry and let’s—”