Star Wars: Evolution of the Rogue Zerg


Chapter 4: Part 2


Time period: 8 1/2 hours after RC Kriss’s reconnaissance mission.



Abdule Rithcus entered the outpost’s frosty hangar with his arms crossed in their opposite sleeves and his stride as sturdy as any Jedi on a mission. Instantly he had to keep himself disciplined and calm as he saw the strange aliens. His combat expertise made him (within 5 seconds of strides in the hangar) see and memorize his troops’ positions in the hangar, the positions of the four different types of aliens, his current path and all positions in relation to the hangars’ exits.

Of the four different types of aliens, three types were bigger than he was. Of the one type that was his size and smaller, there were 11 that were quadrupeds and approximately as long as Abdule was tall… all except one, which was obviously smaller then the rest of its kin, at about 3 ½ feet long. Three of the normal sized quadrupeds had insectoid-like wings as well. Each of the quadrupeds had four limbs: two front limbs along with two back legs with hinged middle joints that were in a reversed direction in relation to a human knee; such a design would suggest that they move in a hopping sort of running motion and is also the reason for why they can stand extraordinarily hunched down on just their back legs. Most of the quadrupeds’ front limbs were single, sickle shaped claws, but a few others had two clawed digits. Abdule made the observation that the smallest quadruped along with one other had two clawed digits and a clawed thumb. The bodies of the quadrupeds were solid, armored carapaces with a few fleshy, unarmored parts. Within their heads was a mouthful of razor sharp teeth, though not particularly of threatening size, and protruding from their head was a large armored crest that almost spanned their entire body length. Behind their legs, a thick, bony protrusion, probably a tail, stuck out and solidly balanced the creature as it stood hunched over and crouched over its legs.

Of the other three kinds of creatures that were before him and bigger than him, the smallest of them were at least two and a half feet taller than Abdule. There were four of them and they had similar, proportionate head crests to the smaller quadrupeds. They had no legs at all, but in fact a thickened, armored, short serpentine tail to slither upon. Along with arms that were similar to the quadrupeds front limbs, the only other notable features were that they had two bottom jaws, the lowermost of the two being separate from the rest of the head except at the original point of hinged connection to the rest of the mouth. The lowermost jaw also was separated at the middle, and at the ends of each location of separation of the lowermost jaw was an organ that was obviously used for spitting poison or some other kind of fluid.

The last two kinds of alien were simply huge. They were far too big for instant and accurate measurement of size, but small enough to be easily mistaken for small starships. There were three of one kind and only one of the other. The first three were the biggest kind of alien, they were also the most simple, for they had bloated fly-like bodies with little armor. They hovered at the middle altitude of the hangar with insectoid wings that were beating faster then the eye could track and ear could hear. Their most notable features were their six, segmented and seemingly useless legs along with their two, enormous front pincher claws… though they just dangled there, making it look like the creature was too physically weak to use them as formidable weapons. And the last notable feature was their head. Their heads were simple with large, bald foreheads. But their mouths were horrendous, hanging proboscises that weren’t long, but very wide and coming to a small closing point at the end.

The last creature was obviously the most dangerous. It hung from the hangar ceiling like a minnok, but it shared no other characteristics with a minnok. It was instead a huge, lean, segmented worm with a mouth at one end of it and eyes at the other. It’s only noticeable teeth looked quite deadly, because they were incisors that were as long as half of Abdule’s height and as thick as Abdule’s thigh at their thickest. He didn’t see any other dangerous characteristics of it besides its teeth and size, but he felt quite weary as he walked up the group of aliens with it watching his every move.

He was able to make all of those observations right before he stopped a meter away from the large group of quadrupeds. He saw all of the clones, which were in front of the groups as well, stand in attention and set an organized path for Abdule to walk through down to the group of quadrupeds as he made his last observations of the aliens without moving his eyes.

RC Captain Kriss stepped out of formation at the end of the clone trooper formation while removing his helm as to address Abdule clearly, though Abdule spoke before the Captain did.

“Captain, tell me now how you are able to communicate with these aliens.”

Kriss looked a little surprised by Abdule’s sudden order, but began to answer anyway, “Well Sir, um…” Kriss was a little hesitant.

Abdule cut in, “Captain, I did not come here expecting it to be long before I can speak with them. Tell me now.”

“Well Sir, don’t ask me how it happened, but when I encountered them on the field, they implanted an organic translation device within my-” Kriss looked surprised as he cut off and turned to the group of quadrupeds. It took Abdule a few seconds to realize that the smallest of the quadruped aliens was talking to Kriss. Their language was literally composed of almost nothing but clicks, whistles, chirps, and hisses, while having very few easily memorable syllables. Abdule was immediately interested in learning it, though time was of the essence.

Kriss turned back to Abdule after the alien finished talking, “Forgive me for the interruption sir, when I’m addressed, I not only hear it, but I also… um… feel it. But anyway sir, they implanted an organic device in my ear so I can understand them… though the implant is probably within my skull by now.”

“Well, Captain, how do they understand you?” Abdule wanted to hurry up this conversation, but his natural curiosity usually takes hold easily.

The Captain looked truly puzzled by the question, “I… I really don’t know sir.”

Suddenly, a sharp whistle filled the room. Abdule looked down to see that it had come from the smallest alien quadruped, which was now at Abdule’s feet, obviously to get his attention. Abdule lifted an eyebrow as it reached behind itself to one of its back legs, and took out of a small pouch a small grub of sorts and reached its three-digit hand out to him in a giving gesture. Abdule took the small worm from it and then watched as the alien pointed to the side of its head, obviously an instruction though body language meaning for Abdule to put the grub in his ear. He did as was “told”, and squinted in discomfort as the worm burrowed painfully into his ear canal.

“Do you understand now?” Abdule didn’t need to look down again to know that the small, feminine voice was emanating from the alien at his feet.

“Yes, I do. Not to be too unwelcoming, but who are you and your… companions?”

“Well, my name is Karsona, Ambassador of the Rogue Zerg. And well, these ones behind me are my escort is all… I hope their presence does not upset you.”

About thirty seven questions ran through Abdule’s head, but he refrained himself from asking, since he was just now coming to the conclusion that his next few words would most likely be mentioned in historic text generations from now… he had to choose them carefully.

“And I am Jedi Master Abdule Rithcus of the Galactic Republic. Neither I nor my troops are offended. This must be your first encounter with anyone who speaks for the Republic, so I can only assume that you had to take extra precautions in case of hostility. Consider me for the next few hours as an emissary for two of the largest powers within the galaxy,” Abdule realized that he was missing tact from his tone of voice, so he immediately added it, “Please, come inside, I’m sure it must be uncomfortable in here… though I don’t know if all of you can fit deeper inside this… outpost.”

Rather then hearing an audible voice from the giant boated fly like creatures, he felt a deep telepathic voice from one of them, “Do not worry yourself about us larger zerg, we are only here as advisors to the ambassador, and do not to need to accompany her to be able to communicate. And Commander Tiborsis does not need to accompany her either to be able to protect her.” Abdule winced at the realization that this “Commander” was probably the enormous winged worm that was hanging from the hangar’s ceiling.

“Well then if all you....” Abdule was overwhelmingly lost for words at that point, so he gestured with his hands at the groups of aliens that would fit within the base, “may come with me and we shall converse in a more comfortable environment.”

As Abdule turned around and as he led 16 aliens and a squad of clones into the base, he grieved within his head at the fact that he had almost no experience with situations of this kind. Not only was the fate of future relations with these creatures put into his hands, there was an immense uneasy feeling Abdule was getting from them. It was also a familiar feeling, he just couldn’t put his finger on what it really was.

As they entered the large hallway, Abdule wondered how these aliens commonly relaxed. For most normal humanoids, sitting in a comfy chair before conversing could easily suffice in this situation… but not one of these beings were even remotely humanoid, and the lobby of which they were headed was almost completely dull except for the fourteen moderately good chairs that encompassed the large meeting table. Perhaps he could ask? After all, he was an adult and Jedi, why let cultural differences embarrass him?

Tilting his head to look at the ambassador while thinking on his toes, he remembered a tactful comment he had heard many times before, “So, can I get you anything that will make your stay more comfortable?”

“Um…” the little alien ambassador hesitated. Abdule was partly relieved as he felt a kindred spirit of recognizable emotions coming from it, “No thank you.”

One of the large, serpent-like zerg bent down as it slithered and whispered something to the ambassador that Abdule could not hear. He felt a bit suspicious as the ambassador then nodded in response, but said nothing.

As they entered the lobby, Abdule gave the clone RCs hand signals of where they should stand guard. He then proceeded, feeling a little odd, to pull out a chair on the side of the table facing the door they entered and gesture to the ambassador that it was welcome to sit in it. As it puzzlingly walked over and hopped into the chair, he walked around and sat at the chair directly across from the ambassador. The other quadruped with three digit hands then made a few of it’s own hand signals to the alien escort, which then proceeded to form its own formations that Abdule carefully analyzed.

Abdule then successfully tried with all his might to remember the ambassador’s name, “So Karsona, what brings you here on this chilly day.”

Karsona looked a bit surprised and panicked as it obviously looked for words, “Um, well… Master…” Abdule was slightly amused that she had forgot his name just like he had hers, “Rithcus, I am a part of a swa… um, race of beings that call themselves the Rogue Zerg. We come in peace, for this is our race’s first contact with other sentient life.”

As Abdule listened carefully, he then finally finished formulating the perfect plan of communication, “Please forgive my bluntness, but this Republic outpost was designed for purely military operations, so if you would be so obligated to allow me to talk to you in a way more familiar to my experiences, I’d greatly appreciate it.”

Abdule finished memorize the zerg facial expressions as Karsona’s bright red eyes widened, “Well… I myself am not that experienced with negotiations such as this, so if at least one of us is comfortable, I’m sure we could get somewhere much faster.”

Abdule smiled, “Well then, seeing as how you are completely unknown to the rest of the Republic, protocol leads me to treat your presence as a violation of Republic military space. So if you would please answer my following questions, I will most likely be able to eventually consider you not a threat and not in violation of Republic military space.”

Karsona looked a bit taken aback and nervous, but it then looked back at its escort. Two of them gave a hiss and Karsona turned back around, “I would be happy to follow your protocol and answer some questions.”

Abdule knew exactly what he was going to ask from this point on, “You say you are of the Rogue Zerg. Where does your home reside?”

“On the other side of this planet,” it replied.

Abdule razed an eyebrow, “Hmm… how long has your race been on this planet?” He didn’t understand how this alien race could have possibly evaded the Republic if they had been here for a long time.

“About 3 of this planet’s years,” Abdule wasn’t surprised. It only made sense that they only got here relatively recently.

“So you arrived here. How did that come about?”

Karsona paused a bit before replying, “I don’t know all of the specifics, but our race was traveling the stars previous to our arrival on this planet. I do not know exactly how long we were traveling or where exactly we came from originally though.”

Abdule was getting more interested, “And what are your race’s intentions on this planet?”

The ambassador took a very long pause this time, which flat out said to Abdule that it was hiding something. He also felt the telepathic presence of the large bloated creatures that were still in the hangar, which probably meant that the ambassador was being carefully fed information from them. If the ambassador did lie, he will allow it, since he wouldl just use the Force later to extract the necessary information, “To live and let live,” it finally said, “That is all.”

“I see… so what government operates your society?” Abdule was pessimistically suspecting that it was based on a chain of slavery laws since there were so many different aliens.

Karsona looked about a bit in thought, “I… don’t understand the question that well. But I think the best answer I can give is that we… we are a swarm. A, uh, brood. A hive.”

Abdule after that point was completely fascinated. He continued his chain of questions about the ambassador’s race, religion, and variation. The ambassador wasn’t very specific about everything, but specific enough for Abdule to be interested. He took great interest in finding out the genomes of her escort and that Karsona itself was of a specific genome called zerglings. Though Karsona couldn’t tell him why there were so many kind of zerg, he couldn’t help but imagine what amazing thing bonded the various zerg genomes together.

Then he had an epiphany. What if it was the Force that bonded them together? He hadn’t tried to sense the Force around these creatures yet. If they were literally a race of variation that was bonded together by the Force, then they just might be one of most powerful Force sensitive races in existence! The Force bonds everything together slightly, but for it to bond different creatures together into a single race!? The Jedi Council would be amazed if such was the case.

But Abdule wasn’t going to get his hopes up before he actually tested such a theory. After Karsona finished answering all of the questions that he needed to judge them as not a threat, he decided to ask a few extra questions without telling it.

“So how did your leader know of the presence of this outpost?”

“The Hive Mind sensed you a long time ago – perhaps when we first arrived here - though he didn’t know what to make of you. After rigorous study, he finally came to the conclusion that you are strong in energies that govern the universe, and not only that, but energies that are similar to what our own race generate within us.”

It made sense. The Force flows through everything. Even though he and his troops arrived here only 3 of this planet’s months ago, Abdule wondered why their Hive Mind – a being described to have immense power – would take so long to analyze the Force that flows through Abdule and the clones. He then asked exactly that.

Karsona looked puzzled by the question at first but then replied strongly, “Why, please do not get confused Master Rithcus. The ‘you’ I was referring to was not everyone in this base, but was referring directly to you,” Abdule’s jaw practically dropped open.

If their Hive Mind had spent such a long time analyzing specifically Abdule, then were these energies that the ambassador was referring to really the Force?! Maybe the Mind was not actually powerful enough to sense the Force in normal living beings like the clone then… wait, no, that couldn’t be it. According to Karsona, the Mind could sense these specific energies within his own children, and sensing the Force was not limited by distance.

Abdule gasped quietly out loud. What if what the Mind was sensing was not the Force, but something more specific? What if…

Abdule then asked the ambassador if it would give him a few moments of thought. After Karsona agreed to let him, he then let his mind open and expand. He opened his senses to the Force, and expanded his sight beyond just light. But almost immediately after doing so he lost all coherent thought to panic.

He was instantly overwhelmed with the immense presence of the dark side of the Force.

He began to turn his head frantically, trying to find a direction it wasn’t coming from. He quickly found out that it was plowing at his mind from every angle but behind, only because there was not a single zerg standing right behind him. With all of his willpower, he struggled to withdraw his senses from the Force and not make any bigger of a scene… though his incoherent, frantic, jabbering pleas and quick sitting motions had probably made the biggest possible scene already.

With one large final shunt, he pulled himself from the brink of nearly complete darkness. He opened his eyes wide to see if anything had transpired while he had been engulfed in the maw of madness. With his hands flat against the table and as sweat seemingly poured from his skin, he watched as everyone in the room stood still. Ambassador Karsona must have gotten out of its chair while he was escaping insanity, for it was huddled behind a hydralisk bodyguard. Abdule wasn’t quite as frantic as moments ago when he was praying for a quick death, but he was certainly frantic in a… slightly lesser sense.

He shot up out of his chair and spoke as he sporadically walked around the table, towards the exit that lead to his room, and gave hand signal commands to the clones that told them to follow him, “Um… well… I-I hate to end this meeting so soon but it seems that I, well… best be… attending to another matter at hand. I’ll… ah… leave all of you guests here for a few minutes while I… attend to a short matter…”

His thoughts were ricocheting like crazy as he and the troops went down the small hallway and trying to avoid eye contact with the zerg altogether. The energy they sensed had been the dark side of the Force?! Those shadowy abominations dared lump him into such a group of monsters like themselves?! It wasn’t possible. It couldn’t be. They were practically overflowing with evil. And he wasn’t using the dark side that much. He had control over it. CONTROL, DAMMIT! Why did they come here? They must have come to take control of the Republic during it’s time of weakness during the Clone War. Yes, that was it. What other reason could such maddening creatures have for landing in a life abundant galaxy after traveling so far?! None other! Abdule was sure. Oh, but he wasn’t worried… oh no he wasn’t. He was going to quell their contact. He was going to make sure that at least all of the abominations in this base weren’t going to leave it alive.

Abdule exited to into the base’s main hallway with the troopers right behind him. As the clone’s followed him down the main hallway, Captain Kriss walked out ahead and beside Abdule.

In a quick and slightly puzzled tone he asked, “Sir, what is going on?”

“Seal up the base and gain yourselves the most powerful combat advantage possible from in between wherever you are and the hangar. Captain, for the time being, I put all combat specifics and command into your hands to carry out that order, I have to attend to a slight matter at hand before I meet you in the hangar.”

Kriss startlingly asked, “Sir! What in the bloody hell is this all about?!”

Abdule then lost all patience in his troops; he didn’t want to give them any more orders after this. He stopped himself and his clones dead in their tracks, turned around and then in a scowling, fury filled voice said “We’re going to kill them all. And then get as far away from the frozen rock as possible.”

Abdule’s last thought before storming off toward his room was of how ludicrous it was for these creatures – these Rogue Zerg – to think of him as being as disgusting and abominable as they. They were forces of darkness! And from this day, he will be remembered as a champion of the Jedi!