Curiosity killed the cat, then assimilated its genetic code, and now I have a cool tail.

Daxxarri

Cats vs. Dogs

"Bhekar Ro...it feels like a lifetime since I was last here."

"Actually, you never were here. Only the Kukulkan Brood was."

Looking out across the barren world from the leviathan, Kerrigan supposed she should take Izsha at her word. The...thing kept all her memories of being the Queen of Blades, and while they weren't pleasant memories to access, the terran (or zerg? What am I?) had accepted it as a necessary evil. So if that meant following her advice to come to this dead world, if that meant having her mind filled with images of the battle that had taken place here six years previous, so be it.

I'm still the queen...something...of the...something...Kerrigan reflected miserably, knowing that "something" was merely substituting for something else, but unable to remember what. Yet I'm still a slave...

A slave to her memories, that was for certain. But she couldn't help but feel like a slave in other ways as well. It was hard to tell with the zerg really, as to determining where control began or ended. Once, if Izsha recounted correctly, they'd effectively been homogenous-fulfilling the whims of the Overmind, with a chain of command that couldn't be broken. Now however, with one zerg civil war out of the way and another raging right now for all intents and purposes, Kerrigan was actually having to carry out judgement on brood mothers and the like. Were they to be held accountable for their actions? Or should she do what the inhabitants of the Koprulu Sector wouldn't...or couldn't...and forgive and forget?

Using the Koprulu Sector as a basis...well, neither would happen, based on the terrans and protoss she'd sparred with so far. And going by what memories Izsha had bestowed upon her, Kerrigan couldn't blame them.

Well, at least no-one is here to pass judgement...

It was bittersweet news, all things considered. The former Ghost knew that she'd send a brood to this world six years ago, with its sole settlement suffering greatly from the invasion, yet enduring just the same. Now however, it was a ruined husk, the bodies of its inhabitants picked dry by glider hawks. What had happened, or why, was a mystery, but either way, Bhekar Ro was a world that had briefly returned to life, only to be put down before it could do so. Why, how, and when was in question, but there was at least the partially comforting knowledge that she wasn't responsible for this massacre.

Which was about as comforting as removing one drop of blood from a sea of it.

"Mistress, you should keep moving..." Izsha said, her telepathy breaking into her "queen's" thoughts. "The xel'naga temple...you should see it before it gets dark."

"Dark?" Kerrigan shot back, a small smile coming to her lips. "Is this where you say, 'they come at night...mostly?'"

"No, mistress, this is where I say that the reason I recommended coming here is because this world is the site of a device built by our progenitors. And if you are to ever fully understand the zerg again, you must understand our creators as well."

More visions assailed the former Queen of Blades, mostly centring on the structure Izsha had described. Still, other things filtered through, mainly the battle that had taken place around it, and what had emerged from the structure as a result. Things that included what looked like...like...

"Roverlisks..." Izsha declared, as if reading Kerrigan's mind (and probably was). "A failed experiment by the Kukulkan Brood. Abathur has made that quite clear."

The images faded, much to Kerrigan's relief. Alien structures, energy creatures, infested dogs...for better or worse, it was the last aspect that got to her the most. A vestige from her human self-alien species inflicting mass murder on zerg and protoss unlucky enough to get in the way? Fine. Infesting a single mutt? A travesty. Humans liked thinking in small terms. And apparently it was a trait that the zerg queen still possessed.

And she wasn't even sure whether that was a good thing or not.

"Regardless, we aren't here for anything the Kukulkan Brood might have left behind," Izsha continued. "We are only here for what the xel'naga have left, even if the temple is nothing but a ruin now. Fortunately, you won't be alone."

"Really?"

"Oh yes, my queen. Abathur's newest creation should be on its way."

A new creation...well, that was always interesting to see. Or, at least interesting to Kerrigan's zerg side. Her human side felt ill every time one of the abomination's creations spilled out from the evolution chamber. But looking at these creatures...she felt ill. Plain ill.

"Behold, mistress," Abathur declared. "The successor to roverlisks. A lesson taken from the battle fought on this world, and improved upon."

"Yes, I...see..." Kerrigan said, looking down at the little monstrosities. "How...creative of you."

"Thank you, my queen."

Abathur may have been a genius, but he clearly didn't understand sarcasm.

Nor did he understand that Kerrigan had no desire to use infested cats called "kitlings" in her Swarm.

A/N

The idea for this, somewhat obviously, is based on material from Shadow of the Xel'naga. That being said, I'm not all that against roverlisks, all things considered-especially not when the ideas of "kitlings" and infested cats were thrown around in Blizzard polls. All in all, the idea of cats and dogs being used by the Swarm boiled down to this.

And cats win BTW. XD