Lyra found Alarak exploring the ship to pass the time while the others made sure that their Hierarch was alright. The First Ascendant sensed her presence and turned to acknowledge her. “Ah, Lyra, seems that you needed me to bail you out since your friend, the Matriarch, needed me to point it out to her that you needed assistance.”
Lyra struggled to avoid glaring at Alarak.
“It’s time we made our move against Ma’lash.”
“That’s on the list of things we need to get done quickly but we also need to bring the Purifiers into the fold.”
“You would rather bring aboard machines of questionable loyalty over the most powerful members of the Protoss race?”
“The decision is up to the Hierarch to decide, though your little stunt at the Glacius facility may be a factor in Tassadar’s decision.”
If Alarak was upset about the possibility of the Purifiers being recruited first, he didn’t show it. Instead he silently headed back to the bridge to meet the Hierarch.
Tassadar entered the bridge to find Alarak, Lyra, Zeratul and the Purifier with Fenix’s personality imprint, who had decided to go by the name of Talandar after his chat with Fenix, awaiting him.
Alarak was first to speak, “Tassadar...Hierarch of the Twilight Council. Warlord of the Templar...I had expected so much more.”
Talandar snapped at Alarak, “Arrogance! Watch your words, or my blade will watch them for you.”
Lyra sighed, “Can we please deal with Amon first before Alarak wedges this tentative alliance apart?” Alarak responded with an amused chuckle.
Tassadar decided to get to the point. “You care little for my survival, Alarak. Lyra mentions that you are the key to getting the Tal’darim to defect to us. Is this true?”
“Well, I wouldn’t say ‘defect,’ more like we share a common goal and I need my people to be deprived of Ma’lash’s leadership. Once I am Highlord, I may or may not be willing to win this war for you.” Lyra rolled her eyes at Alarak’s roundabout way of saying ‘yes.’
“Lyra and I encountered Ma’lash on a dying world communing with Amon. We barely escaped with our lives when he began summoning shadows from the Void to stall us.” Zeratul said.
“Hmmph...I take it that he’s still cross with Lyra over her killing his favorite servant?” Alarak asked with a nod from Lyra in response. “Pitiful, holding such a petty grudge over the death of one Protoss. He has no right to lead the Tal’darim.”
“I will make my decision once I have consulted my advisors.” Tassadar said before he ended the meeting.
A short time later, Tassadar met with everyone who could provide some advice to the matter of dealing with Amon. Lyra had already pointed out the main objectives that needed to be done. Vorazun had already sent her elite trackers to locate the headquarters of Moebius Corps while Tassadar had to decide if he wanted to activate the Purifiers first or bring the Tal’darim Death Fleet into the fold. Karax was tasked with continuing his research on the Keystone. Zeratul joined the trackers to search for Moebius Corps.
Artanis told Tassadar that he had faith that the Purifiers could be convinced to join them since they were able to befriend Talandar.
After considering all options, Tassadar decided that the Purifiers would be good to have on their side should matters on Slayn go awry.
Much to Alarak’s chagrin, the Spear of Adun set course for Endion.
Tassadar informed his advisors about the original Purifiers sealed away on a warship called Cybros which was orbiting a forest world called Endion. Rohana and Aldaris were against releasing machines that could not be controlled. Their advice was noted. Talandar noted that the Purifiers have their own personalities and did not need to be controlled as they should behave as if they were still Protoss.
Rohana stated that the Purifiers rebelled against their masters which Talandar countered that anyone in their right mind would rebel against a slave master.
Lyra mentioned that Sweetie had told her that the Protoss once rebelled against Amon eons ago when their race was still young because they suspected Amon of trying to control them. The Protoss asked Lyra how Sweetie knew to which she responded, “The Overmind had a lot of ancient knowledge and that knowledge had been passed on to Bon Bon.” Tassadar considered bringing in a team of scholars at some point to learn about the history of the Protoss from the Overmind’s point of view.
Once the Spear of Adun arrived, Karax picked up Zerg signatures on Endion and concluded that Amon’s Brood would be their next opponent. The stasis field holding Cybros in place was still intact. He also noted that they needed to use a device called the Megalith to disable the stasis lock.
Since they were facing Zerg, Lyra made some adjustments to the troop composition in the war council chamber. She used a setup that specializes in dealing with clusters of enemies due to the usual nature of the Zerg. She went for Zealots, Stalkers, Vanguards, Dark Templars, Energizers, Corsairs and Dark Archons.
Karax accessed Endion’s records and found that the stasis grid was maintained by five locks that the Megalith needed to destabilize to remove the stasis field around Cybros. Providing assistance in the task were a few Colossi that were kept in their own stasis.
The Colossi engaged the minor infestation around the Megalith, using the high ground to their advantage.
Once the Zerg in the area were cleared out, Artanis warped in a Nexus from orbit with Lyra accompanying it. Tassadar ordered Karax to activate the Megalith.
Lyra wasn’t sure what to expect from the Megalith but suspected that they were going to be forced to follow it around and protect it.
In the meantime, Artanis worked fast in getting the Nexus Point set up and providing the necessary support the device needed.
It wasn’t long before the Megalith was fully booted up and emerged from its storage. Once the device was ready to travel, it started heading southwest.
Lyra took whatever forces were available while Artanis warped in an Energizer to accompany Lyra as she escorted the wandering device.
The Zerg resistance was minor and easily incinerated by the Colossi.
Once the Megalith arrived at the first lock, it interacted with it and was safely lowered into the lock. For some reason, Lyra thought, the Zerg didn’t seem to want to attack the Megalith while it was submerged. She decided not to question it and took the time to prepare for when it moved again.
The Energizer transformed to create a power field to allow Artanis to warp in some Stalkers and Zealots.
When the Megalith was ready to move again, Lyra’s forces moved in to deal with some Zerg near the second lock. She cut down a fair number of Zerglings before the Colossi arrived and burned through the rest while Lyra impaled a Spine Crawler with its own tentacle.
The Megalith arrived to interact with the second lock. The Energizer moved to Lyra’s position again and transformed again to create a power field, allowing Artanis to send her some Dark Archons and Dark Templar. When a group of Zerglings approached, Lyra tried out a new technique that caused the Zerglings to attack each other. Lyra finished off the victor.
The Megalith finished with the lock and began moving again, and so did Lyra. The army moved through a canyon that hosted a variety of Zerg minions including a few Ultralisk. Lyra used her Mind Control ability to take command of the Ultralisks. She also teleported to higher ground to deal with some Spine Crawlers.
The Zerg-bolstered escort managed to clear the canyon and led the Megalith to the third lock.
By this point, the Nexus Point was fully established and was able to warp in Vanguard and Colossi to Lyra’s location.
Since the Megalith would be safe while destabilizing locks, Lyra moved ahead to clear the way. Karax notified her that the Zerg were emerging from caves. To seal them, Lyra blasted the rocks with her horn and caused the caverns to collapse.
A small hive cluster ahead proved no problem for the Pony Templar once she sealed the caves around it and sliced up the hive structure. The Colossi cleaned up the minions.
The Megalith safely arrived at the fourth lock and began disabling it. While her forces continued to grow in number, Lyra went ahead to take on more of Amon’s Zerg.
A well established hive cluster awaited her. When Artanis noticed this, he began warping in Corsairs to manipulate the battlefield before they went in.
Once Disruption Webs were in place, Lyra and her forces moved in to take out the hive cluster before the Megalith arrived. She placed the Spore Crawlers and Overseers into Void Stasis to prevent the Zerg from finding her before turning groups of Zerg against each other and controlling the Ultralisks to tear their own hive cluster apart.
Meanwhile the Colossi were burning a path through the area with the Vanguard in front bombarding the area in front of them.
With the hive cluster cleared, the Megalith had a clear path to the last lock that would remove the stasis field.
Lyra and the Protoss knew that the Zerg would focus their attention to Cybros now and the possibility of Hybrid among the invaders was very high.