Zerg – The Simplified Histories

November 21st, 2008

The Xel’Naga were sentient beings who sought to create the perfect race with their proto-genetic sciences. Having already declared the Protoss a failed project, they moved on to a planet called Zerus that was mostly ash and had frequent fire storms.

There, they took the lowliest swarming insectoids known as Zerg and began to experiment with them, determined to evolve them into a sentient race of their own. Arguably their biggest mistake was that they concentrated on their purity of essence instead of their physical attributes, as this was the area they had failed in with the Protoss.

Because of these genetic alterations the Zerg flourished, developing the ability to burrow into flesh and feed off the spinal fluid of its prey. The little Zerg then learned how to assimilate their body with the body of their host, thereby controlling them in an all consuming, parasitic way. The Zerg’s new talents enabled them to affect the things around them, in a way that they had never had been able to do before.

Slowly, as the little Zerg stole over their planet assimilating various creatures into their swarm they began to absorb the genetic traits and talents of their host bodies. Mutation occurred and so every Zerg appeared different depending on what creature they had assimilated.

Inherently selective about which race they would assimilate, they only did so if they could become better and reach the top of the planetary hierarchy. The races who were not assimilated where destroyed.

The Xel’ Naga soon discovered that the races who were assimilated into the swarm could not be recognized after a few generations. The evolutionary process had sped up and they had all developed similar characteristics, hard carapaced skin, knife like limbs and spines. This united the Zerg as they now looked as if they came from one species not several. The ever increasing hunger of the swarm was a growing problem.

The ignorant Xel’Naga did not want differing of opinion to separate the Zerg and so bestowed upon them a collected conscious, the Overmind. The Overmind represented the drive, needs and wants of the swarm as a whole, each Zerg felt it and could not disobey it.

Eventually the Overmind became like a collective personality and adopted different traits as it saw fit. The Overmind had secondary agents, a solid and unshakable hierarchy of Cerebrates. These Cerebrates were made to be the enforcers of the Overmind’s plans.

Giant compared to their original form, they saw to it that every command was carried out for the good of the hive. Over time, their various commands became their personalities. Warrior Cerebrates would be killers, Scouts, constantly looking for other races to assimilate, each order designated by the Overmind became their only concern in life for the betterment of the hive.

Then the Cerebrates had secondary agents as the chain of command extended and other nests were built. The Queens and Overlords where created who watched over the drones who watched over the collective hive. It was a flawless system, where each was genetically unable to disobey orders, and so the Zerg grew.

The Overmind knew the planet was empty now and called to life forms in space that came and were immediately assimilated into the hive. Space ready, now the Overmind was set to take its swarm to the next world. The Zerg had survived and more, had fiercely possessed that purified essence the Xel’Naga had given them.

They destroyed the poor Xel’Naga soon after that, assimilating them just as they were made to do by their creators. With the knowledge of thousands of sentient species now in its conscious, the Overmind became unstoppable, powerful beyond anything it could have realized.

It knew of all the races who the Xel’Naga manipulated with their sciences, the most important, the closest being the Protoss. The Overmind hungered for the limitless power of the changing Protoss and set out to assimilate it.

The Zerg left Zerus, expanding their army as they devoured worlds along the path to the Protoss. But even with all its power, the Overmind knew it could not defeat the Protoss, not with their psionic ability, not when reality itself could be changed at there pleasure. While every race the swarm consumed held no answers as to how to defeat them, the Overmind grew more and more anxious.

Then they discovered humanity and its up and coming psionic abilities. The Overmind knew the human race was still vulnerable, weak, and that they were the answer to defeating Protoss. They just needed that psionic ability. It took them 60 years to get to the human worlds, and once there, they seeded a colonized planet to grow their nests and begin their attack.

While the hives were being built the Overmind quietly sent his minions to other worlds in secret, infecting them as the population of humans remained ignorant to it all. Protoss warships arrived and destroyed the first infected colony completely, they knew of the spores the Zerg had sent down to the planet. The Overmind withdrew, and watched the Protoss eager to learn anything it could about its most dangerous enemy and greatest prize.