The Queen

A party of over a dozen made its way down the jungle path. Athena walked in the middle while a ring of zerglings fanned out around her as scouts. The drone that saved her life moved on her left while the three-meter-tall queen marched on her right.

As they moved, Athena took the opportunity to chat with the queen.

"So…" Athena paused as she tried to organize her thoughts. "What do you know about this…" She paused again, not knowing how to refer to the game. "What do you know about where you came from?"

Much to Athena's disappointment, the queen hardly knew anything more about the game than Athena did. The queen was aware of what happened in the game when Athena controlled it to transfuse a drone. She was also aware that Athena created her. At the same time, the Zerg knew nothing about the source of this system or why it was under Athena's authority. Despite the queen's tactical intelligence, it seemed like she was as much of a puppet as the drone and the zerglings. After a few minutes of questioning that yielded next to no results, Athena gestured at the drone and changed the topic.

This time, she told the queen about the unexpected actions of the drone, and this time the queen was able to give her a satisfactory answer.

"The longer we Zerg are in this realm, the more experienced and intelligent we get." The Zerg explained slowly. "When we are first created, we are the products of the same template. We are given certain skills and memories by default, but there are things that can only be gained in this realm. The longer we remain and the more things we experience in this realm, the more we learn and grow. The more we become…different. Unique. Dangerous."

"And is that the same for the Protoss and the Terran?"

"My apologies, my Queen, but I don't have any information on the Protoss or the Terran."

"Fair enough. What would that look like?" Athena asked. "How would a zergling who, say, has been in this world for a year be different from a zergling who was just produced?"

"A zergling who has resided in this world for a year will likely be much more intelligent than a newly produced zergling by virtual of being in this world for so long. It will have a much greater capacity for devising tactical and combat decisions. This allows the zergling to learn from its past experiences. As an example, if this zergling has had a history of fighting Protoss warriors, it will be able to analyze the battle on its own and perform better when facing Protoss warriors in the future."

Athena nodded to herself as she glanced at the drone beside her. The drone hasn't been in this world for too long, but then again what it did wasn't really rocket science. It noticed she was under threat, and it shielded her. A little smarter than the zerglings, but nothing more. This matched what the queen told her.

By all accounts, her units should remain loyal to her regardless of their intelligence or sapience. From the information she gathered, the loyalty of these units didn't seem to depend on their intelligence or the lack of it. Even after being deployed into this world, they were still units that she produced, and in the same way that a Terran marine or Protoss zealot wouldn't just suddenly betray her in a ladder game, they could likely never turn against her. The queen was sapient and self-aware, but she still fought for her.

It was a somewhat comforting thought, and Athena truly hoped she was right. She couldn't even imagine what would happen if the Zerg or the Protoss suddenly turned rogue and were set loose in this galaxy.

"And the link we are using right now to communicate. Is that exclusive to the Zerg?" She continued.

"I don't believe so, my Queen, but I cannot confirm it."

"I see. Are there limitations to this link? Distance? Or maybe the number of connections there can be?"

"I am not aware of such limitations, my Queen."

Once again Athena nodded. She didn't learn anything about where this game came from or what it wanted, but at least she got more information about the Starcraft units. If the Terran were sapient and intelligent, which they likely were, then perhaps they could be more than just brutes and enforcers. If she decided to use them as governors, commanders, and officials, then she would have potentially hundreds or thousands of human beings in high positions of power who were unquestionably loyal to her. People who would never take bribes or commit treacheries. People who she could communicate with wherever and whenever she wished.

Truly, the potential there would be endless.

Of course, all that potential would only be realized if she could survive and escape from this world.

As they continued heading down that path and a few zerglings mauled two more animals to death not far away, Athena consulted the queen once again. This time, she wanted the queen's advice on what she should do in her current situation.

"It would be risky if I stay here, even if I want to," Athena explained. "If I stay in this outpost, I will no doubt be sent on further missions out here. If I run into danger with my squad present, do I use the Zerg to defend myself? If I do, I risk my secret getting out. Even if I am willing and able to eliminate all witnesses, someone will notice my secret sooner or later."

It might make sense if she was the lone survivor in her entire expedition for once. Perhaps she was just lucky. But twice? Three times? That would be questioning the intelligence of the Imperials, and Athena never considered anyone in the outpost stupid.

Athena was aware that Zerg queens weren't really the best advisers for a situation like this. The Zerg were known to be effective, but their effectiveness mainly resided in producing enough units to overwhelm the enemies in the quickest manner possible. Her situation required a level of subtly the Zerg rarely inhibited. Plus, queens were not commanders or strategists. They were more akin to low-level commanders, but Athena didn't have access to broodmothers that would typically be the brain of the Swarm and she had to make do with what she had.

In a sense, she just wanted to bounce ideas off of someone else while walking, and the queen served this task much better than the drone or the zerglings.

"I do not have any information regarding the human civilizations of this galaxy yet. I may need your input on some topics, my Queen." The queen replied.

"Go ahead."

"This Outpost Delta…it is the only Imperial base on this planet?"

"Yes."

"Is there any Imperial presence in close proximity to this planet? What is their response time?"

"I don't know." Athena shook her head. There was no way for a simple private like her to get this type of highly classified information. "Morgo IV is a remote planet, but it is in a star system entirely controlled by the Venya Imperium. There should be a handful of other planets in the system garrisoned by the Imperials, but I don't know what their force sizes or response times are."

"I see." The queen's armored skull moved in a nod. "Are there vessels capable of interplanetary travel in Outpost Delta?"

"There are. The outpost's hangar holds 10 Gazelle-class shuttles." Athena explained patiently as she went through her memories. "The Gazelles usually have Callisto Engines, this galaxy's FTL engine, and enough fuel for a decent jump. There's just one problem…even if I can fight my way to one of them, I don't know how to pilot a shuttle."

The old Athena never had the chance to go to a good school when she was young. Her only experience with aircraft was sitting in combat dropships or shuttles as her squad was deployed to war zones. The same could be said for most of the infantry troops on the planet. There was a contingent of 30 pilots on the planet who knew how to pilot the shuttles, but it would be almost impossible for her to enlist their help.

After all, pilots were much better compensated than infantry troopers like her. Even if she could force a few of them to help her, did she really want to hop on a shuttle piloted by two people who meant her ill? With the lack of aircraft knowledge on her part, they could be piloting the shuttle into an Imperial space fortress and she would be none the wiser until it was too late.

"Then we must force the local garrison to evacuate from this outpost." The queen said. "My Queen. If we can use the Swarm to launch an overwhelming assault on the post, how likely will it be for the Imperials to abandon the base and evacuate to another planet? Perhaps it will be safer for you on another planet."

"It's possible. Captain Hanson, the commander of the unit, is a veteran who started off from the bottom. He will likely order a retreat in the event of overwhelming force and certain defeat. Once the important people are gone, of course." Athena frowned as she did her best to tap her chin while in the armor. "The problem is we don't have overwhelming force. Even if I make roaches…roaches are tough, but each roach costs 100 resources and I have a little over 300 after building the roach warren. Three roaches can't beat an entire infantry company. Nor can 30 zerglings."

There was a moment of silence before the queen clicked her talons again. It was a sound that brought Athena a strange amount of comfort.

"My Queen, you said you are unable to request a transfer off this world. It is odd. Human beings tend to require breaks to function at an acceptable level. The Terrans often allow their soldiers to rotate from postings after a period of time. What is preventing this…Imperium from doing so?"

"The FTL travel in this galaxy functions differently from that in the Korpulu Sector." Athena slowly explained, once again drawing from the memories she inherited not too long ago. "In this galaxy, the Callisto FTL Engines are modified versions of the FTL engines from Legacy Xeno Race Omega, one of the highly advanced alien races that had long died out when humanity first reached the stars. Callisto Engines run on a type of fuel now named Compound Omega. Compound Omega is extremely expensive and dangerous to both refine and store."

"In other words, traveling between different planets or systems is expensive, and the cost grows disproportionately with the distance. The longer you have to travel, the more fuel you need, and the bigger your ship needs to be. The bigger your ship is, the heavier it will weigh, and the more fuel you will need."

"Making things worse, this galaxy is also constantly at war, so almost every faction in the galaxy is saving Compound Omega wherever they can." Athena shrugged. "For the higher-ups, rotating infantry units like mine to civilized worlds for breaks is a waste of fuel. Simple as that. Only when our unit is too depleted to carry out its objectives will we be swapped with a fresh unit, but I can't risk waiting until then. It's too much of a gamble."

"This presents a significant advantage for us in the future, my Queen." The queen immediately noted. She wasn't a good strategist, but she still noticed a huge opportunity. "The Swarm doesn't rely on this Compound Omega for FTL travels. Nor do the Terran and the Protoss. Our FTL travels are much cheaper and much more effective than that of the locals in this galaxy."

"Maybe. There's more." Athena explained as they continued moving. A few screeches came from the back as zerglings continued to hunt. "The communication technology in this galaxy is even more limited. Most inter-system communication has to be done by sending ships to carry the messages to the destinations. It is often very expensive to send a message over such a distance, and there will always be delays or even accidents. I heard sometimes messages can be weeks, even months, late. That is if they arrive at all."

Even as Athena was saying this, she had trouble containing the excitement in her voice. In the Korpulu Sector, anyone can reach anyone with the press of a button. In the Wings of Liberty campaign, Valerian Mengsk casually called his father in Korhal with a single click while he was in orbit above Char. Considering Korhal was the capital of the Terran Dominion and Char was the capital of the Zerg Swarm, this call likely went across half the Korpulu Sector. Yet that significant distance didn't stop the two from seeing each other and talking in real time.

When Athena first saw the cinematic, she didn't think much of it, but only now did she realize how impressive that was. Was real-time communication over such a distance even physically possible? How fast did the signal have to be traveling to make that happen? And how was the signal not distorted in the slightest?

"Hmmm…this would indeed open up opportunities." The queen hissed quietly, reaching the same realization Athena did. Whether Athena wanted to go to war against the Imperium or simply hide from it, this would make things a lot easier.

The two continued for another minute before Athena finally reached her destination.

There, sitting on an open field, were the three Blackbuck MSVs Athena had been dreaming about.