Hybrid (starcraft) Read online

  The worker had stopped in the doorway, tentaclelike appendages clutching at either side of its cranium. As she continued to watch, captivated, the worker crumpled to the floor, its head expanding.

  Unwelcome memories rushed back to the Queen in a flood: the image of her mother clutching at her temples and screaming; her father observing with eyes full of horrific revulsion at first, the only blankness; the sound of her mother’s skull splitting open….

  The Queen shut her blazing eyes tight, reopened them, fixated once again on the current crisis.

  The young woman inside the cell was gone. The worker was now lying still, its lifeblood oozing from a rupture in its skull and spreading across the metallic tiles.

  The Queen took the catwalk in the opposite direction of the monitors, toward the cargo ay access lift. Once there, she stepped in and pressed the button marked HANGARS 1-12.

  How could this have happened? She asked herself, even as she answered the question.

  She had simply underestimated the girl, had lumped her in with all the rest of her kind—human beings made inferior by fear and emotional dependence. But, as the Queen had suspected once before, this one was different. The Queen could not help but feel a kind of…respect.

  Telepathically summoning one of the warriors to follow, the Queen stepped out of the elevator and into the hangar level. Now that her instincts had been reawakened, the Queen was fairly certain that the female was intelligent enough o hope that some of her race’s craft had been left in the hangar. Of course, all such nonessentials had been jettisoned long ago, but the subject did not know that.

  And so the Queen proceeded to the only lift connecting the cell-block level with the hangar level. She stood in front of the doors, waiting. She heard an engine winding down, gears grinding, a gush of hydraulic steam…then the doors before her opened, and she looked into the eyes of Amanda Haley.

  AMANDA FELT her heart sink. The creature standing before her must surely be the leader of the monstrosities. The characteristics that marked her as alien—from her luminescent yellow eyes and olive skin to the spindly blades protruding from her back and shoulders—also served to mask something beneath: features that suggested that this creature had not only been human at one time, but had been attractive as well.

  Glancing briefly over the creature’s shoulder, Amanda could see that the hangar was empty. Any hope of escaping this place was instantly dashed. Don’t give up. Not yet, she told herself, forcing her eyes to meet those of the alien being before her.

  “I applaud your effort, though it was in vain,” said the Queen. “I am Kerrigan, matriarch of the Zerg. I would know your name.”

  “Just go ahead and get it over with,” retorted Amanda.

  “Oh, we shall.” The Queen smiled. The girl remained defiant even in the fact of unquestionable defeat. The Queen was reminded so much of herself that for a moment she felt—

  There has been a setback, Queen? Interrupted the Cerebrate.

  Not at all, she responded. Merely an intriguing turn of events.

  I trust the operation will continue to run smoothly, answered the Cerebrate.

  Put your trust where you will, returned the Queen. The schedule I adhere to is mine alone.

  Just then the warrior arrived. The Queen sent a message. The creature obeyed, wrapping a snakelike cord around Amanda’s throat with one appendage and restraining her arms with the other.

  Amanda closed her eyes, hoping that whatever the creature did, it would be quick.

  A diminutive, spiked tentacle wriggled out from under the creature’s skin. Amanda felt a prick as the spike-needle pierced one of the tiny veins at her wrist.

  The warrior stood still for a moment, then turned its head in the direction of the Queen.

  Genetic strain incompatible, it relayed telepathically.

  The Queen nodded.

  Then the formula will likely be ineffective, offered the Cerebrate.

  The Queen knew. Most likely the process would result in failure, stripping the woman of any shred of humanity, rendering her a base, servile mutation for the rest of her days. The brave girl would become a thoughtless, debilitated drone.

  You wish to proceed, Queen? asked the Cerebrate.

  The Queen hesitated.

  Queen…?

  THIS ROOM was new. Sarah had not been taken to this place before. She sat abound to a chair with reinforced restraints, facing Lieutenant Rumm, who paced back and forth before a blank wall.

  The lieutenant stopped pacing and lowered his somber gaze to the little girl. “I want you to know that you forced me to do this. It was not my intention to take this course of action.”

  Sarah stared back, impassive.

  With an electric hissing sound, the solid wall behind the lieutenant phased into transparency, affording a view of an adjacent room, not unlike the one Sarah was in. Bound in a chair similar to Sarah’s, and facing her, was the emaciated form of Patrick Kerrigan, her father.

  She had been able to visit him only once since “the incident.” He had appeared then much as he did now—staring forward, not looking at Sarah but through her, with wide, unseeing eyes.

  Sarah felt her throat swell. Her eyes grew bleary.

  Standing next to Patrick was a tech holding a pressurized syringe in his right hand. The sleeve on Patrick’s right arm had been rolled up; veins stood out like ropes along his scrawny forearm.

  “The serum in the syringe is the same that was injected into our little friend the kitten,” the lieutenant said in a matter-of-fact tone. “If you do not agree to cooperate with us fully from now on, your father will be injected.”

  Sarah’s brow creased, her lips becoming a thin line.

  “You do remember what happened to the kitten,” said the lieutenant, drawing nearer. “Death will not come quickly, child—no, not at all. It will be a marathon of suffering, even to such a dull-witted specimen as he.”

  The lieutenant was leaning over Sarah’s chair now, both hands plant firmly on the armrests, waiting for a response. Looking in the girl’s eyes, he saw fear, pity, and agony…but not compliance.

  “So be it,” he said. Setting his jaw, the lieutenant turned to the window and nodded his head.

  Inside the adjacent room, the tech placed the syringe to Patrick’s arm.

  “No! If you do this, I’ll use my power to kill him and me!”

  Sarah’s wide, furious eyes turned to the lieutenant. “I’ll do it—I swear I will! I’ll kill both of us!”

  Suddenly Sarah felt a prick in her wrist. A needle in the arm of the chair had punctured her skin, delivering a powerful sedative into her bloodstream. Sarah felt fire flow in her veins, and the room began to go dark. The last thing she saw was her father’s haggard, uncomprehending face and those wide, oblivious eyes.

  The lieutenant breathed a sigh of relief as Sarah’s chin slumped to her chest. He turned and made a brief vertical motion with his hand. The tech nodded and removed the syringe. The wall shimmered and became opaque once more.

  The lieutenant stood looking at the little girl, his emotions conflicting. He did not relish the decision that he must now make, but he was an animal of the Confederacy, and ever since he was a child he had always bowed to the wishes of superiors, be they right or wrong. A neuro-adjuster would be employed. He would recommend it. The little girl would never be the same again.

  THE QUEEN stood once more overlooking the massive, gloomy chamber, waiting for the cocoon to open. The decision to continue had not been an easy one. But then again, why should she care for the welfare of some human subject, brave or not? Because of the potential, she told herself. There’s still a possibility…

  Metamorphosis complete, interjected the Cerebrate.

  The Queen watched as the bottom of the sac opened up, spilling its contents onto the floor below. There, huddling and shivering in a fetal position, was what remained of Amanda Haley: a slobbering, malformed, half-Zerg, half-human genetic defect.

  The Queen sighed, sendi
ng a telepathic message for the creature to stand, which it is immediately obeyed, struggling to an upright position, on shaky, alien limbs.

  Another drone, thought the Queen. Her mind belongs to the swarm now. The potential is wasted.

  As suspected, the formula was incompatible, offered the Cerebrate.

  The Queen nodded. The Cerebrate had a way of stating the obvious. Looking down at her arm, the woman who had once been known as Sarah Kerrigan could see the faintest traces of an old mark—a scar, really, —that still glistened despite the molecular changes her body had undergone. It read “24.”

  “So be it,” whispered Kerrigan as she spun on her heel and stepped once more into the long, desolate corridor.

  FB2 document info

  Document ID: 318d8b06-7ad8-4266-b23e-520638b122bb

  Document version: 1

  Document creation date: 21 November 2009

  Created using: FB Editor v2.0 software

  Document authors :

  ukrainian.citizen

  Source URLs :

  http://sclegacy.com/feature/8-scencyclopedia/356-hybrid

  Document history:

  1.0 - создание файла

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