Chapter 1

Jimmy!

"Aaahh!"

"… but of course Mengsk—pardon me, Emperor Arcturus the First—claims this was all necessary. According to his spokesperson, the new Terran Dominion is doing everything necessary to remove the alien threat and make the colonies safe once more. It has been almost two months, however. In this reporter's opinion…"

Jim Raynor lay back down, eyes staring up at the steel-gray ceiling. He ran one hand over the sweat-drenched stubble atop his head and felt himself smile despite the adrenaline still coursing through him. A quick glance showed a hologram playing on his console, the tall, slender man captured within conveying his report with style despite or perhaps because of the battered leather trench coat and slouch hat he wore.

Mike Liberty. One of the few people left Jim called friend. Still reporting on Mengsk, even now. Still trying to get the truth to people who didn't want to hear it.

"… still reeling from the loss of the Dylarian shipyards," Mike was saying now, and Raynor cocked his head to listen.

"Arrest warrants have been issued for James Raynor," his friend was reporting, "though it is still unclear what happened. Why would the hero of Antiga Prime suddenly turn rogue? And why, after so many months saving lives, would he unleash such destruction on the Dylarian shipyards? According to the Dominion Raynor's attack could have crippled the fleet, putting everyone at risk in the case of another alien attack." He could hear Mike's voice dropping and knew what he would see if he glanced up—his friend was leaning forward slightly, a faint smile on his face, suddenly a friend confiding instead of a journalist reporting. "Perhaps Emperor Arcturus is simply enraged at the thought that anyone could walk away from his new rule, particularly one of his most prized associates. And perhaps these charges have been manufactured as an excuse to pursue Raynor, rather than letting the public realize that perhaps the Emperor's mandate is not as universal as he might claim."

"Heh!" He couldn't help laughing at that one. Go get 'em, Mike! But the hero of Antiga Prime? Where did he come up with this stuff? The accolade was as phony as most of Mengsk's charges against him.

Of course, the charges were true this time. He had struck the shipyards. He'd had to. When he'd belted Duke, Mengsk's favorite lackey, and stormed off the ship after Tarsonis, Raynor had expected to be on his own again or perhaps down to a handful of his troopers. He'd been unprepared for the wave of support he'd received from his men. All but a handful had walked with him, and he'd found himself the head of a small army. But they were an army without transport, and he knew that Mengsk would never let them leave so easily. So they'd needed ships, and quickly. It had seemed safer to go after the shipyards and the vessels housed there than to try stealing active ships from those still loyal to Mengsk.

It hadn't been that simple, of course. Mengsk had guessed his move—whatever else he could say about the man, the self-styled emperor was an excellent strategist—and had dispatched Duke in his own flagship, the Hyperion, to head them off. That had been a mistake.

Knowing he wouldn't get any more sleep now, Raynor sat up and rubbed at his jaw under his short beard, grinning at the memory. Duke was a capable ship commander, perhaps, and a good general for all his faults. But he was used to fighting on level ground, going up against fleets and scoutships. He hadn't been prepared to wage a battle through the shipyards, where his own men couldn't shoot for fear of hitting each other or a ship. Raynor had had no such compunctions. If a ship was holed they moved on to stealing the next one. He'd lured Duke in close, then used the shipyard's own machines to grapple the Hyperion and lock her in place. Then he and his boys had overrun it.

Still laughing, Raynor stood up and crossed the room, heading for the handsomely appointed bathroom. Duke's short fuse had cost him the Hyperion, and Mengsk had received the first public defeat of his new Terran Dominion before he'd even declared its formation. Raynor had left with the Hyperion and a dozen other ships, his own private fleet, leaving Duke bound and gagged behind him.

Of course, it had gone downhill from there.

His smile dropping away, Raynor wrenched open the polished wooden door and glared at the room beyond. Marble sinktops, porcelain tiles, handsome faucets and fixtures—this place looked more like a fancy hotel than a ship captain's quarters. But they had been Mengsk's, and the big man did like his comforts. Raynor had been tempted to rip them all out, but it would have taken too long. He'd considered taking a simpler room for himself, but his crew had insisted. He was the captain now and these were his quarters. So he put up with the luxury and did his best to concentrate on other things.

Unfortunately, there wasn't much else to concentrate on. Since taking the ships Raynor had become Public Enemy Number One. Every soldier in the Dominion was hunting for him, and his face was plastered on every colony. Not that it bothered him—he knew better than most what Mengsk was capable of and what he did to those loyal to him, and had no desire to go back. Being the law didn't change anything. You stood by your people or you weren't worth standing by. Raynor honestly believed that, and Mengsk's betrayal had made his own desertion easy.

The question, however, was what to do after he deserted. He hadn't thought much about it at the time, since he'd planned to go off alone. But having others with him changed that. They looked up to him, depended upon him, sat patiently waiting for his orders. And he didn't have any. Oh, they'd stolen the ships, of course. And they'd hit a few outposts, singed a few patrols. But he didn't know what to do next. He didn't know where he was going. It had been six weeks and he still had no idea.

All those years as a marshal, Raynor had told himself he was independent, self-sufficient. It had been true, at least in part. He'd survived on his own resources, acted on his own judgment. His mandate had been loose enough and broad enough to give him a lot of freedom. But there had been a mandate: to protect the people of Mar Sara. After he'd joined Mengsk he'd gotten a new mandate: to protect the people from the Confederacy and from the aliens. What was his mandate now?

He'd quit out of rage, he knew. Rage at Mengsk for what he'd done. For whom he'd betrayed.

Rage over Kerrigan.

He could still taste the fury he'd unleashed at Mengsk for deserting her like that, leaving her to the zerg and whatever else was crawling across the planet's remains. Hell, he could still feel the tender new skin across his knuckles where he'd punched Duke after the iron-haired general had ordered him to stand down. He was still angry.

But being angry wasn't getting him anywhere. And after that initial fury had faded he found he didn't know how to lead the way his people expected. They'd become rebels, but what were they really rebelling against? And how?

Mike was a more effective rebel, in his own way, sending out these rogue broadcasts from hidden stations. Reporting on what Mengsk was really doing to consolidate his power and telling people what had really happened with the zerg and the protoss and the Psi-Emitters.

Copyright © 2006 by Blizzard Entertainment, Inc.