“unexpected outcome, will make difficult obtaining biomass, temporary setback, can adapt, will adapt” oh god, you even sounded and spoke like the original Abathur! ‘must not squeee, Must. Not. Squeee.’ Shaking your head, you turned to the egg, instinct demanded that not a drop of biomass be wasted, and you were not about to disagree.

Hesitantly at first, you began consuming the shell that had protected you during your evolution, the taste was… strange, like a mixture of fries and chocolate that didn’t completely agree with whatever passed for a palate in your new body, but you kept going until every bit of biomass had been consumed, once done, instinct guided you once more, turning your focus inwards.

It was a strange, ‘seeing’ Essence for the first time, to you, it ‘looked’ like a shapeless cloud of multicolored, faintly glowing motes interconnected with thin green lines, instinctually, you knew this was the Essence provided by the egg’s shell ‘simple, crude, effective, sufficient’ and just ‘beside’ it, was your own Essence, the motes glowed much more strongly, and the lines where thicker, it looked like a spiral galaxy that glinted and sparkled like the jewels of a crown ‘elegant, sophisticated, complex, good’

Carefully, you began experimenting, focusing on the egg’s Essence-you were more than a little hesitant to mess with, studying it, spinning it around delicately, you began understanding it the more you saw of it, you could see what gave it’s shape, it’s color, what made the shell as hard and sturdy as it was, and what allowed it to extract nourishment from the soil beneath it and provide it to you to fuel your evolution ‘useful traits, insufficient still, creation of creep tumor not yet possible, need more Essence’ with that in mind, you stopped ‘looking inwards’ and skittered/slithered out of the chamber.

The first thing that drew your attention once you were in the tunnels was the faint glow of the worms in the ceiling “hmm…. Bioluminescence, useful for places light doesn’t reach, or luring prey closer” you shook your head, now was not the time for distraction, you needed to get Essence to complete the creep tumor ‘blueprint’ you had floating around your head.

Once outside, the first thing you did was pick up a few leaves and eat them, the biomass they gave was barely worth mentioning, but the Essence they provided was all kinds of useful, with that done, you ventured a bit further outside the cave, the next thing you spotted was a snake, a green tree python to be precise, placidly resting on a branch just outside your reach, in the end it didn’t matter much, turns out your ‘scythes’ are sharper and sturdier than they look, a few chops later and you both had a branch and a snake to snack on, and with that, you had all the necessary Essence to cobble together a creep tumor.

With that in mind, you wasted no time in scurrying back into the cave to begin working on it.

It was a busy day in Canterlot, ponies going about their business, politics and shady deals occurring in the background, guards patrolling, and tourists bumbling about, nothing out of the ordinary, at least, until an anomaly in the fabric of reality ripped a tear in the veil between dimensions and spewed forth several black creatures of considerable size before closing again.

The creatures tumbled and rolled through the air, falling for a few seconds before regaining their bearing and leveling out, most of them flew away, always going in pairs, but a couple of them remained flying in circles over Canterlot, a series of constant high pitched ‘pings’, the city’s population, having witnessed the event, watched in bewildered silence as the creatures seemingly danced around each other in the air.

Bewilderment turned to terror when the creatures turned on a dime, nosediving towards the population below, civilians screamed, running every which way as the guards took aim with crossbows and magic “open fire!” cried one of the guards, bolts and blasts sailed through the air, but did little to deter the creatures, bouncing or splashing off of their thick rubbery hide “shields!” barked the same guard, immediately several unicorns’ horns glowed, pouring their magic into a solid barrier placed directly in the path of the creatures.

The first one veered sharply, rapidly gaining height, seemingly startled by the sudden appearance of the barrier, but the second one crashed into, and through the shield, the backlash of the shield shattering sending the unicorns reeling and leaving them vulnerable.

One unfortunate unicorn, directly in the path of the creature, still stunned because of the backlash, was skewered, his enchanted armor not even slowing the hard-as-titanium lance, the unfortunate unicorn was carried screaming to the skies “shining!” came the horrified scream of one of the earth ponies.

Some of the pegasi that had been chasing down the first creature broke off from their group, diving towards the second in an effort to aid their comrade, whose limp body hanged skewered on the creature’s lethal grasp.

It had taken you a while, spinning a strain from parts of different organisms was a slow, meticulous process, specially without vespene gas to help the process along, it had taken you the better part of four hours, but now that you had the creep tumor strain, you will be able to produce it from any source of biomass.

Now here you were, in a corner of the chamber, opposite from the entrance “process, messy, unrefined, must make better, later” it was terribly embarrassing, as you were more or less giving fuckingBIRTH! To whatever organism you made “hatchery needed as soon as possible” you grumbled, before grunting, and pushing, there was a disgusting bursting and splatting sound, and when you turned around, there it was.

A mound of tissue with bulging see-through sacs filled with pseudo organs suspended in green amniotic liquid of about twice the size of a zergling, it pulsed like a heartbeat, once, twice, three times, before burying itself into the soil, and seconds after, the deep purple ooze-like super-organism known as creep began spreading from the hole, for now it was a paper-thin layer, but as it acquired nutrients it would spread further and thicken, you knew it could become so thick, that a roach could bury itself in it without reaching the ground, but such stage was still a ways away.

With the foundations of your base well on it’s way, you were faced with a new conundrum, what to do next?

[] Continue making creep tumors, until having covered all of the cave

[] Make a couple drones, they’ll make things easier

[] Make a pack of zerglings and send them on a recognizance/hunting run

[] Write-in

Author's Note

winning vote:

[X] A… chibi abathur? (minimal combat capabilities, frail body, sophisticated essence weaving, can produce and modify any strain as long as there are enough resources, cocoon can be consumed for biomass)

hi! sorry for the delay, had to take care of other quests, anyways, hope you enjoy the chapter