Story

Yep, the KMs were why Walden Briggs found himself on this barren moon-mining colony high above Roxara's orbit and seemingly light years away from Korhal IV or anything close to what he considered civilization. Or at least that's what he was thinking as he marched, left foot, then right, with four other marines from Zeta Squad, decked out in heavy CMC-300 power armor toward the mineral-filled caverns some eight miles ahead.

Roxara's moon was the least scenic place in the galaxy, nothing but dust and rock beneath an endless canvas of winking stars. Well, nothing but dust, rock, stars, and a mother lode of coveted resources.

"Hey, Jenkins," Hendrix said, his voice hollow through the comm in his helmet. "I got one for ya."

"Oh, here we go again," Wynne interrupted, his usual dim chuckle quick to follow.

"This one best actually be funny," Jenkins said as he scanned the vast plain in front of him. In the distance he could see refining plants and other structures in various stages of construction. It looked like a city of skeletons, unfinished scaffolding: the bare bones of what could be.

"Cut the chatter, kids. This one's a yellow. May actually be something this time." Walden knew the reaction he was going to get before he even said it. Nothing about this mission seemed to make sense to any of them, and he knew it.

"Oh, no, Sarge says this one might just be a yeller. Whatever are we to do?" Hendrix laid the sarcasm on thick.

"Shut it, Hendrix," Walden snapped.

Roxara's moon was the least scenic place in the galaxy, nothing but dust and rock beneath an endless canvas of winking stars. Well, nothing but dust, rock, stars, and a mother lode of coveted resources.

"Come on, ease off, Sarge. Ain't been a zerg attack in four fekkin' years; ain't no one seen them protoss neither; and the Kel-Morian bastards ain't really much of a threat to us after we been through all of that. I mean, otherwise they'd have sent more than Zeta Squad and the outdated Confederate junk we call weapons and armor here," Hendrix continued.

"'Outdated junk.' There's an understatement. That's a compliment to the garbage we got. That means one time our stuff was actually usable," Jenkins added, flashing that prize-winning smile of his.

"What's an understatement mean again?" Wynne asked, chuckling.

"I don't know how they let you in the damned military in the first place," Brody, the enforcer of the group, chimed in. "Now, listen to the sarge and shut your yaps before I shut 'em for ya." Brody was the most intimidating man in any group he ever found himself a part of, and he knew it.

"It wasn't that good of a joke anyway," Hendrix said meekly.

Walden liked having Brody around.

"Those Kel-Morian dirt bags may not be much compared to the zerg, but it doesn't mean their agents can't sabotage our mining here," Walden said. "'Sides, we have our orders, and we're going to follow them like good little marines; you scan me?"

The mission was a simple one. Five members of Zeta Squad were to head to the mining cavern at Binion's Point to make sure there weren't any Kel-Morian agents wiring nuclear devices to the processors inside. Easy enough, if not an odd use of military personnel.

"Aye aye, sir," Jenkins responded, a flash of sarcasm flaring in his dark eyes.

The mission was a simple one. Five members of Zeta Squad were to head to the mining cavern at Binion's Point to make sure there weren't any Kel-Morian agents wiring nuclear devices to the processors inside. Easy enough, if not an odd use of military personnel. By the time Zeta reached the entrance to the cavern, the last hints of daylight were seeping away. The marines' long shadows stretched into giants, desperately clinging to the last moments of sunlight before fading into the all-consuming dark.

"Don't we have scanners for this, boss? I mean, it still don't make a heck of a lotta sense that we was called all the way out here to do some cave exploration." Hendrix peered into the cavern below.

"Look, if any of those KM ops are down there, we're sending a message back to Moria that we ain't playin'. Sure, it ain't normal, but I can see the logic," Brody said sternly.

"I don't know. Hendrix is right, Brod: this is strange," Jenkins added.

Walden knew that Hendrix and Jenkins had a point. This was an unusual assignment for a squad of marines pulled out of service from a planet a warp-jump away. But despite that, one thing Walden did have faith in was the Dominion. It was the one thing he stood for, the one thing he knew he could trust. Sure, he knew all about the rabble-rousers who saw Emperor Arcturus Mengsk as some sort of tyrant. He knew all about terrorist scum like Jim Raynor and his "Raiders." But none of it ever made a lick of sense to him. These were dark times, scary times, times more frightening than any "civil liberty" violation could ever be. These were times that required a tough leader like Mengsk.

These were dark times, scary times, times more frightening than any "civil liberty" violation could ever be. These were times that required a tough leader like Mengsk.

When Walden had first heard about Chau Sara all those years ago, his heart felt as if it had fallen into his stomach. He was on Tarsonis. The sky was azure. Perfect. He was in Bennet Park, sitting on a bench and reading an article on his fone. It was a fluff piece about a DJ who had pulled herself from the Gutter of southwest Tarsonis City to become one of the hottest club draws on the planet. He could even remember her name, DJ Atmosphere, and her photo staring up at him, a dark-haired beauty behind overwhelming blue mascara. Then a flashing red scroll snaked across her face: "Chau Sara incinerated by an as-yet-unknown alien race." He remembered how surreal it had been even as he read the words. "Alien race"? Incinerations?

And then, the gravity of it all had hit him: it felt literal. His knees gave out, and he sank off the park bench onto the cool wet grass. He knew someone who had moved to Chau Sara recently, Rudy Russell, a buddy from his childhood who'd become a satellite mechanic—his buddy who was incinerated.

It hadn't taken long for the fear to seep in—the anxiety that anywhere could be next and no one was safe. That fear had turned into anger filling his body as if someone had poured a pot of coffee into his veins. Years later he wondered if that headline grabber Jim Raynor ever felt that anger. Dissent from your government was a luxury that could come when people no longer feared the words "zerg" and "protoss."

So, no matter how unusual this mission seemed, Walden wasn't going to question its rationale.

"Jenkins, you don't get paid to question. You get paid to kill. You got that? Now let's go," Walden said, moving forward.

"Shoot, Sarge, I didn't even know that the piss-poor amount of credits I get was even considered gettin' paid." Jenkins smiled, turning on the lamps affixed to his armor. Brody shoved Jenkins from behind. Jenkins knew better than to retaliate.

They had split up into parties of two, with one marine, Hendrix, a recon specialist, going at it alone. The cave was damp, and even in their pressurized CMCs the air was thick with the smell of kladdical moss, a pungent plant that grew on the moon and choked its caverns' walls.

They'd been searching for what seemed like an hour, each carefully following the digital map that guided him through his assigned quadrant. All were about to come to the conclusion that the cave was empty.

He'd heard that Kel-Morian spies often armed themselves with nuclear detonators and were known to blow themselves up upon capture, taking everyone with them. Savages.

"Bandai-Seven to the Rooster… all clear down here, Sarge," Wynne said as his lights cut into the dark ahead to reveal little more than an unused SCV. "Except for that smell. Remind me to never go into a cave full of this junk again."

"I'll be sure to do that, cupcake," Brody said, smacking Wynne's shoulder. "But I just assumed it was you…. Now come on. We're clear."

"Roger that," Hendrix said over the comm. "All clear here too."

Walden and Jenkins pressed forward on a different side of the cave. Walden always had a pretty great poker face, one that Jenkins knew better than to throw in against, but at that moment Jenkins could see right through it. Walden's thick black eyebrows were scrunched up as if they were trying to grab hold of each other. Confusion! Yeah, that's what that look was, thought Jenkins. Sarge is just as confused as the rest of us about why we're out here.

Walden clenched his jaw, noticing that Jenkins was trying to read him. "Don't give me that look. Just be happy you got yourself an all-expenses-paid vacation to the moon of—" But he was interrupted suddenly by the sound of rocks sliding down the dirt. "Hold it, boys. We might have a live one here."

"Heat signature!" Jenkins shouted as he aimed his gauss rifle in the direction of the noise. "Twelve o'clock, down that hole. Maybe we do have ourselves a KM after all. Come on out, boy, because trust me, you don't want me coming in after ya."

Whatever was scattering the rocks ahead was moving quickly. The two marines stalked forward. "Zeta, rendezvous to this location on my mark."

"Yes, sir," Brody said, his breath heavy over the comm.

Walden's heart rate was through the roof. He'd heard that Kel-Morian spies often armed themselves with nuclear detonators and were known to blow themselves up upon capture, taking everyone with them. Savages.

Rats was the affectionate slang for rations, the pre-packaged meals anyone in the Marine Corps was forced to accept as "food."

The marines were silent with anticipation: just the sound of their hearts throbbed in their ears. Walden took a deep breath and stepped forward.

And there it was: a shadow curved over the dirt. Without warning Jenkins fired a barrage of hypersonic spikes. "Die, you mother of…." The rest was drowned in the heavy chugging sound of gunfire.

"Hold fire.... Hold fire!" Walden interrupted. Jenkins released the trigger.

"Cancel alarm." Walden shined his light on what Jenkins was shooting at: a zick slug, big, slimy, and indigenous to the caves of Roxara's moons. It was nothing but shredded meat now.

"Nice shooting, Jenkins," Walden said. Then to his comm he said, "Nothing but one of them z-slugs. Thought they cleared out all the life-forms before they started mining.... Nothing to worry about."

"Hell. Poor thing crossed the wrong marines," Jenkins said, trying to cover his embarrassment.

"Idiot," Wynne snickered over the comm.

"All right, men, regroup at Alpha Nine-Tango. Looks like we get to go home early and dine on some fine Dominion rats. Binion's officially clean." Rats was the affectionate slang for rations, the pre-packaged meals anyone in the Marine Corps was forced to accept as "food."

"Why don't we fry up some of that z-slug instead… damn thing's got to taste better," Wynne added. His chuckle, this time, was infectious.

Hendrix was already waiting for them outside, his hulking shadow twisted in the eerie glow of Roxara's planetary light.

"Well, this is a rare sight if I do say so myself," Brody said gruffly. "I ain't never seen you not be the last out, dragging that lazy ass of yours."

Hendrix just looked at him. Wynne cackled from behind Brody. "Hell, he ain't never been on time a day in his life."

The marines formed a single-file line, with Walden leading the way like the head of a blue neosteel caterpillar crawling into the desolate moon night.

Finally Hendrix smiled and said, "Jokes," cryptically before pushing down his visor and covering his face.

"Maybe you can teach an old specialist new tricks…. Alright, we're done here. Jenkins, you got the data report?" Walden asked.

"That is correct, sir."

"Move out. We got ourselves a nice hike under the stars." Walden began to march back.

The marines formed a single-file line, with Walden leading the way like the head of a blue neosteel caterpillar crawling into the desolate moon night.

"Hey, Hendrix, you got a joke for us?" Wynne asked, laughing like a naughty schoolboy just waiting to get scolded.

"Fekking Wynne," Brody said.

"Well, excuse me for asking."

The command center loomed in the distance, and after an eight-mile hike, Walden thought it might just be one of the more beautiful sights he had ever seen. Once inside, Zeta Squad went through the usual routine: security checks, armor removal, and relief.

The command center loomed in the distance, and after an eight-mile hike, Walden thought it might just be one of the more beautiful sights he had ever seen. Once inside, Zeta Squad went through the usual routine: security checks, armor removal, and relief.

"Alright, ladies. Get some rest. We leave at 2700. I'll uplink the data to Command." They all made cracks as usual before heading off their separate ways. They were a family, a dysfunctional one, but a family nonetheless.

"Think this command center got poker?" Wynne asked.

"I bet it does. If you're playing, so am I… I could use a raise this week," Jenkins replied.

Everyone was jovial despite the strange mission. Wait, that wasn't right; actually, Hendrix hadn't said much of anything. Now that he was gone, he began to weigh heavy on Walden's thoughts as he walked down the metallic corridors. It's not like him to be so quiet. Why didn't I think of that earlier? I should talk to him in the morning. Maybe the mission spooked him. A good sarge needs to be in tune with his men and willing to show a softer side from time to time.

But this line of thought quickly slipped away as he opened the door to his cabin. He liked the fact that there were bunks inside the command center for a change. There was nothing quite like the feeling of the hour or so after having been in a CMC-300 suit all day. It was like being reborn.

Walden was down to his boxers and t-shirt, sprawled out on what passed for a bed and watching UNN, the Dominion-run news network, on a holo. It still felt good to be able to stretch out his legs without the cling of neosteel, but he wasn't calm by any means. UNN reporter Kate Lockwell was doing a story about Jim Raynor's most recent terrorist act on Halcyon. The bastard had blown up a school, all in the name of defying what he called a "corrupt imperial government that exploits its own citizens." How could a man live with himself after doing something like that? I'll take an imperial regime over a terrorist any day of the week.... And to think, some people call him a hero. Raynor's face was emblazoned across the screen. He looked different from the man who was on Dominion-issue targets at the firing range. He'd grown out his hair, and his face looked as if the wear and tear of years on the run had taken their toll: he looked older, maybe sadder.

Raynor's face was emblazoned across the screen. He looked different from the man who was on Dominion-issue targets at the firing range. He'd grown out his hair, and his face looked as if the wear and tear of years on the run had taken their toll: he looked older, maybe sadder.

A loud scream forced Walden to sit upright. He hadn't heard a cry like that since the last days of the Brood War. Days he'd prefer to forget. He leaped up from his bed just in time to answer the thumping on his door.

Brody fell on top of him in a heap of red. His stomach was ripped open, and blood was pouring out, blood and literal guts. His face was a pale white, and he clutched desperately at Walden's shirt until it ripped.

"Oh, fekk, fekk, fekk, fekk. Hang on, Brody! Hang on!" Walden knelt down, cradling the shivering corporal.

"Hendrix," Brody managed to get out, "Hendrix isn't Hendrix. He's… he's...."

"He's what, Brody? What?"

"Zerg," he said in a whisper, eyes staring up, unmoving. "Zerg." The whisper grew softer, and his terse breathing stopped.

Zerg? Hendrix is a zerg? That didn't make sense. But then Wynne and Jenkins ran down the hall.

"Sarge… reactor core. That thing is in the reactor core. Come on." They both had needle-guns and were hell-bent on chasing their prey. Without thinking, Walden ran out, leaving his gun.

"We need to get Brody to the infirmary stat!" Walden ordered.

"It's too late, Sarge: he ain't gonna make it," Jenkins said. "We gotta make sure no one else ends up like that."

"What the fekk are we chasing?" Walden asked, panting, heart rate accelerating.

"Hendrix ain't Hendrix. We just finished poker when we caught him down there in the operations room, scanning for security codes." Jenkins was rambling as he ran at a track star's pace. "When I asked him what the fekk he was doing, he just turned and smiled and walked away. I grabbed his arm, and he punched me... harder than I ever been hit." He wasn't lying about that. Jenkins' face had a swollen knob over his eye.

"He ran. Brody… Brody, he tackled him," Wynne spat out. "Then he… oh, fekk... he... Hendrix changed. He was nothing but ooze and guts, like some sort of inside-out person. He… it… its hand turned into a bone… like a blade… and… he stabbed Brody in the gut with it."

They were following a blood trail scattered across the floor, but that blood sure wasn't terran, no way. It congealed in thick gobs of purple protoplasmic mess that were sickening to the senses.

"Brody was able to get a shot off, though, and hit it. Hurt it before it ran," Jenkins added.

"Where the fekk's security?" Walden managed to get out.

"Suiting up, Sarge. They hear zerg and it's all CMCs and gauss after that," Wynne responded. There wasn't the slightest hint of a chuckle in his voice this time.

Walden's head was reeling. How could Hendrix be a zerg? What was he going to tell Brody's wife? What the fekk were they talking about?

They were following a blood trail scattered across the floor, but that blood sure wasn't terran, no way. It congealed in thick gobs of purple protoplasmic mess that were sickening to the senses.

"We gotta get this thing before it escapes," Jenkins said as they rounded a corner, following bio-matter down the metallic hallway toward a blast door.

Wynne hastily opened the door. Inside, lying on the ground in a heap of gore was the fresh corpse of an SCV pilot. His lifeless eyes glared at them. His beard was soaked in his own blood, and his expression was full of shock and regret.

"It went down there," Wynne said, following the trail of matter toward a hatch.

"Sarge, you stay here and get them SEC down there as soon as they arrive. We'll go after it," Jenkins insisted.

"Sorry, marine. Not gonna happen," Walden commanded, even though every fiber of his being wanted nothing more than just to agree. "Jenkins, this is my responsibility. You fall back and make sure the SEC knows that Wynne and I gave chase into the processing tunnels. Give me your needler."

"Yes, sir," Jenkins replied, handing over the weapon.

Walden led the way and began his crawl down the ladder into the dark steamy depths of the reactor core.

The screeching from below was almost unbearable. "SKREEEEE, SKREEEEE, SKREEEEE!" It was the sound of a wounded animal desperately looking for some way, any way, out. "SKREEEE!" That was a zerg, alright; Walden had spent enough time in the trenches, fighting those monstrosities, to know.

His bare feet touched the warm metal floor. His toes sizzled as if he were walking on burning coals. Damn fusion processing. He coughed, choking back the steam.

A loud scream forced Walden to sit upright. He hadn't heard a cry like that since the last days of the Brood War. Days he'd prefer to forget.

"Zerg ain't dormant like they say, Sarge. Looks like they walking amongst us now." Wynne moved forward, needler held up and waiting to blast away at the first chance he got. But his words lingered. Looks like they're walking amongst us. For some reason it just didn't seem possible to Walden.

"SKREEEEE!" Was it coming from the left? No, right. Wait! IN FRONT! Charging full bore at Wynne was the creature. It was humanoid in shape, still bearing many of Hendrix's features, but even through the steam it was clear to see that its body was morphing, changing, part human, part zerg: it looked like a person who had been pushed through a meat grinder and come out partially insectoid. Wynne fired only to be knocked on his back by the creature before it drove its bone blade into his guts with a loud animalistic yell. It stabbed repeatedly, twisting the bone blade over and over.

"Sarge! Oh, fekk, it hurts. Shoot it! Shoot it! Get off me…. Sarge!" Wynne shrieked, the pain unbearable.

Walden was frozen, paralyzed by what he was seeing. This can't be happening. This can't be fekking happening! I ordered him here. I could have had him stay behind.

"Ahhhhhhhhhh!" shrieked Wynne.

Then a jolt of rationality hit Walden, and he squeezed the trigger. But he didn't shoot the zerg. Instead, he put a needle right in Wynne's head, ending his suffering. He couldn't allow Wynne to die like that. He pointed the needler at the zerg, which was now slipping away, melding into the steam.

The zerg's face peered back at him. But it wasn't Hendrix's torn face anymore… it was Wynne's. Wynne's face glared right at him, eyes burning into Walden's soul, staring in accusation. Walden couldn't pull the trigger and kill Wynne twice. No way. All he could hear was Wynne's god-awful chuckle rattling around his warping mind. And then the creature was gone, vanished in the mist.

It was moving fast toward him, as if it knew just as well as he did that they were both trapped and only one of them was going to get out alive. He steeled himself as it came. This was what he had joined the Marine Corps for in the first place: to face up to that which scared him.

His heart felt as if it were trying to kick out his ribs. Shhh, he thought, doing his best to suppress the rapid pants jetting from his now-dry mouth. Shhh. Gotta stay calm. In control. Walden had tucked himself into a ball, holding onto the needler like a safety blanket, as if his life depended on it. And maybe it did. He could feel the large pool of Wynne's blood, warm and damp, trickling toward him.

It was above him. He knew it. It was sliding on the grates and slithering his way. Where was the security team? The zerg was coming back for him. Bang. Clang. BANG! He could see the jagged light through the grate disappear, then reappear as it moved forward. It was moving fast toward him, as if it knew just as well as he did that they were both trapped and only one of them was going to get out alive. He steeled himself as it came. This was what he had joined the Marine Corps for in the first place: to face up to that which scared him.

He used all of his energy to stand up, spin around, and fire a barrage with the needler into the grates just as they gave way and the zerg, half in Wynne's form, smashed down on top of him.

Blood was everywhere. Wynne's face stared right at him before morphing into fleshy protoplasmic matter. Walden pushed it off of him, standing up. Then...

"Sergeant Briggs, you down there?" a voice asked from above.

"That is correct… and I'm the only thing left alive down here."

By the time Walden had crawled back up the ladder to the main bay of the reactor core, he was exhausted, emotionally and physically. He wasn't exactly prepared to deal with what he saw. A team of Dominion scientists stood, arms folded, ready to greet him as if they had been waiting there the entire time. Next to the scientists was a full squad of marines decked out in powered combat armor and large gauss rifles. On the ground in an ocean of blood lay Jenkins, dead.

You have just done a great service to the Dominion. What you've encountered is what we call a zerg 'changeling.' The Queen of Blades has been busy fine-tuning the capabilities of her disgusting kind."

"What the hell's going on here?" Walden said, trying to assess the situation. "Where'd this squad come from? They ain't SEC: they're Corps!"

"Take a deep breath, Sergeant Briggs. You have just done a great service to the Dominion. What you've encountered is what we call a zerg 'changeling.' The Queen of Blades has been busy fine-tuning the capabilities of her disgusting kind."

"You… you know about these things? What the fekk happened to Jenkins?" Walden had experienced too much in the last few hours to deal out proper decorum to the scientist whose uniform clearly marked him as an officer, a captain.

"Watch your tone, Sarge," said one of the marines. He had the blissful look of one of the resocialized criminals who had been redeemed for use in military service. Walden had always believed in the resocialization program. The Dominion said it was taking criminals and giving them the gift of hope, a new beginning. But the marines here didn't look much different from the criminals he'd encountered in the seedy Gutter of Tarsonis before the zerg overran the planet, certainly not now that they were aiming their rifles at him, a marine sergeant who had just been through hell.

"Hand over your pistol, Sergeant; we just want to ask you some questions about your experience," the scientist said, putting out his hand. "We need to know all we can about these changelings. They can take on the appearance of our soldiers and infiltrate our institutions. They even send out psionic impressions leading our troops to believe that everything is up to snuff. This is a very dangerous enemy, don't you think? One we need to know all about in order to ensure the Dominion's safety. Your records indicate extreme loyalty…. It was one of the reasons why you—Zeta Squad—were chosen. Now please, the gun."

"What happened to Jenkins?" Walden asked again, backing up into the cool metal wall behind him. His sanity was slowly slipping away.

"Corporal Jenkins had to be neutralized. He was resisting a commanding officer. I'm going to ask you one more time, Sergeant: hand over the needler." The captain extended his hand forcefully.

"No… oh, no." It was all coming together: the mission that had seemed completely erroneous, Hendrix, the mining cave not being in service during peak time, all of it. "This whole thing… this was some experiment. So you could see how these things work?"

"Well, we couldn't use the resocs, could we? We needed to see just how adaptable the changelings are. Sergeant, the Dominion needs to make tough choices to protect its people. These are dark times, and extreme measures need to be taken." His words stung Walden. "Now hand over—"

It was only now, when the whole universe was going dark, that Walden realized things aren't always what they seem. The universe had zerg that looked like men and men who were far worse than zerg.

BAM!

It only took one shot to shut him up. One shot to stop the words that sounded like karmic laughter. His whole life, Walden had always seen the universe in blacks and whites; it was much easier that way. The changeling looked just like Hendrix. Like it was one of us. This thought made him smile as his body was pumped with 8mm spikes.

His body was being torn apart as the marines fired, but for some reason the only thing he could think about was the UNN report about Jim Raynor, who'd been crying out against the atrocities of the Dominion all this time. It was only now, when the whole universe was going dark, that Walden realized things aren't always what they seem. The universe had zerg that looked like men and men who were far worse than zerg.

"The bastard killed the cap!" one of the marines said.

"Hell, that's a damn shame," said one of the scientists, ignoring the soldier. "We really could have used some more data out of that one."

"We're fine," said another scientist, wiping the blood spatter from his lab coat. "We've got two more changelings in stasis. Tau Squadron's within travel distance."

"Make it happen," said the first scientist, turning to leave. "And clean this mess up."