POV: Simon
It has been two days since I arrived in this world and I haven't been able to make any progress in growing my brood. This is because of the journey to the southern mountains that I originally though would have taken two hours.

Instead, the trip has taken much longer than I could’ve anticipated, preventing me from establishing a proper headquarters and amassing my army.

The upside to this delay is that it has allowed me to encounter multiple native species and harvest both their essence and DNA, though almost all of them were unusable or their impressive traits were already assimilated into the Swarm prior to our encounter.

The only notable exceptions were the Manticore I encountered on my first day here and a Cockatrice that I managed to ambush and defeat before it could harm me or my drones.

As we traveled, I pondered on the possibility of creating a Manticore-based soldier that somehow incorporated the Cockatrice's petrifying stare, the regenerative abilities of a Roach, and the near-impenetrable armor of the Ultralisk once my base was properly established.

"My lord, we have reached the edge of the forest." Drone four reported as it returned from a scouting mission. “We shall soon reach the mountain range, my lord.”

"Good, mountainous terrain provides us a higher chance of locating the amount of Minerals and Vespene Gas required to properly grow our forces." I said before I gave mental orders for drones one, two, and three to search for a suitable place to construct my first Hatchery.

"It shall be done." The three drones replied in unison before moving to complete their assigned tasks.

"I hope we'll have enough time to build our defenses before the inevitable counterattack." I thought to myself, fearing the potential damage the Princesses of Equestria can deal to my brood at its current strength.

POV: Princess Celestia
Meanwhile...
"You highness, I must protest!" Second Lieutenant Sol Scorcher exclaimed after I informed her of my intentions. "One company of troops is more than enough to deal with this minor threat."

"If what Twilight said was true, this minor threat is much greater than what an entire Division of Equestria's best soldiers can handle." I said as I donned my unique combination of ancient plate mail and modern combat armor before preparing my weapons, the legendary Longsword Dawnblade and the recently developed Mk. 16 assault rifle. "If it makes you feel better, I will only provide support should your troops need it."

Two days ago, a routine patrol discovered my former student unconscious at the edge of Ponyville, when I received the news I put the town put on high alert before I personally arrived with an entire brigade of EUP personnel in order to reinforce the town's defensive garrison.

Yesterday, she recovered from the incident enough to provide information on what happened to her. She told us of a strange creature that commanded a small group of monstrous beings attacking her using some form of magic.

Even though she had only just ascended, Twilight has already proven herself to be an exceptional mage and her Alicorn body is more resilient than that of even the toughest of Earth Ponies, to be incapacitated without having the chance to react meant whatever the creature she encountered was, it was extremely powerful.

But instead of taking her hostage or, Goddess forbid, killing her; the creature seems to have also protected Twilight from a squad of Gryphon infiltrators and appears to have made sure that she was safe after it had knocked her out.

This complicated things, on one hand, this means it is possible to reason with this creature and potentially ally with it; on the other hand, the creature and its motives are complete mysteries and could be nefarious in nature.

As I continued to wonder who this new potential ally/enemy was, lieutenant Scorcher informed me that the expeditionary force was ready to depart.

“Alright then, let’s go.” I said before we began the journey into the Everfree forest to learn the truth of this new unaligned force.

POV: Simon
Five days later...
I was amazed by how quickly my brood has grown, mostly because the games had never properly portrayed the speed a Zerg swarm can develop.

What started out as four drones with just enough essence to create a single hatchery has become a hatchery (which is currently upgrading into a Lair), two Extractors, a Spawning Pool, two Evolution Chambers, one hundred Zerglings, thirty drones, and twenty Overlords in the span of five days.

While I would normally prioritize defenses early on instead of amassing a large amount of units, I knew that both the Equestrians and the Gryphons were searching for us and thus I needed a way to both defend the hive and repel any attackers.

"My lord, overlords have detected a large amount of units approaching the hive cluster from the north." Drone four reported as it approached me. "They seem to be Equestrian in nature.

"Have the overlords been detected?" I asked my impromptu advisor and unofficial second-in-command.

I had used one of my Evolution chambers to reengineer drone four, giving it increased intelligence and independence as well as the ability to speak vocally, though it still prefers to communicate with me via hivemind.

This so that I can use my drone as an ambassador should someone outside the swarm seek to communicate while I was preoccupied.

"Negative, my lord." The Drone replied before another report came in from my overlords located to the hive's northwest flank. "A small Equestrian scout force has discovered the hive cluster. Shall I have the Zerglings engage them?"

"No, let them report their findings to the main force." I said while psionically recalling all my Zerglings and ordering them to burrow by every possible entrance the Equestrians might choose to take. "We'll lure them in before encircling and destroying their group with one decisive strike."

"It shall be-" The drone was then interrupted by the sound of gunfire. "THE HIVE CLUSTER IS UNDER ATTACK!"

POV: Sol Scorcher
Me and my squad watched from our concealed position as approximately twenty-five Gryphon soldiers attacked the strange collection of organic structures in the valley below.

“How are they this deep in our territory?” I thought to myself before I spotted the target we were sent here to find. “And what is that thing doing here?”

Before I could give out orders for my squad to withdraw, I noticed that multiple creatures the size of a large dog seemed to have burst from the ground around the living buildings and begin charging the Gryphon attackers.

The creatures seemed to be allies of our target as they fought the Gryphons with reckless abandon but ignored our target, literally fighting tooth and nail to repel their enemy as the figure began firing the strange assault rifle Princess Twilight mentioned at the attacking Gryphons.

“Lieutenant, what are we going to do?” Private Dome Defender asked me as the Gryphons were slowly overwhelmed by what appeared to be dozens, if not hundreds, of those dog-sized creatures.

“Let’s head back, we need to inform the Princess about this.“ I said to my squad before we began heading back to the primary expeditionary force.

POV: Drone Four
As the scouts moved to reunite with their comrades, I was somewhat glad that they didn’t see me but also frustrated at the same time.

As the group moved, they were so preoccupied with staying undetected that they were oblivious to the fact that I was following them.

While I hadn’t received any orders from my lord to do what I was about to do, I knew that with the amount of Equestrian soldiers at our doorstep, the hive cluster would be heavily damaged should they attack.

So I made the independent decision to attempt... negotiations, as my lord would put it, with the Equestrians to prevent them from harming the rest of the brood.

As the scouts arrived at the Equestrian camp, I decided to finally put those evolutions the lord gave me to good use.

“Hello?” I said as I cautiously revealed myself, only to be greeted with multiple guns pointed in my direction. “I wish to speak with your leader.”

“Holy shit, it talks!” One of the soldiers shouted as majority of the Equestrians lowered their guard.

“What’s going on?” I heard coming from the largest tent before a creature that my lord calls an ‘Alicorn’ emerged from within.

“Your highness, one of those... creatures Princess Twilight encountered wishes to speak with you.” The soldier that shouted earlier said to the Alicorn as it pointed to me.

“I see, let it through.” The Alicorn said, much to the surprise of the soldiers present.

“Your highness?” The soldier asked the Alicorn for clarification.

“I said to let it through, Sergeant.” The Alicorn ordered before the last of the soldiers lowered their weapons and made a path for me. “I wish to speak with it as well.”

POV: Princess Celestia
While I had not expected that one of the creatures Twilight encountered would actively seek to communicate with us, it was not entirely unwelcomed.

“Greetings, I am Princess Celestia.” I introduced myself to what Twilight said was a ‘Drone’ as I used my magic to pour tea some into a teacup. “Would you like some tea?”

“No thank you.” It politely declined as I sat down. “A Drone such as myself does not... drink tea.”

“I see, so what do you drink?” I asked the large alien-looking creature before me.

“Us drones only need to consume when we morph into a structure, thus we have evolved to not require much in the way of nourishment.” It answered, though the answer only raised more questions.

“What do you mean ‘morph into a structure’?” I asked the Drone after having a sip of my tea. “Do you mean to tell me that-“

“All the buildings currently making up the hive cluster were build using drones?” It interrupted me. “Yes, they are.”

“Why must your kind sacrifice their lives to create those buildings?!” I asked the drone, shocked that the creature would sacrifice its allies to accomplish something as simple as constructing buildings! “Why do you follow someone who does that to your species?!”

“Because we live for the swarm and we would gladly die for it.” The drone answered calmly as it began to explain everything I needed to know about the Zerg swarm.

POV: Simon
Four hours later...
It had been four hours since Drone four disappeared and I was currently cursing myself for giving it the ability to act independently.

To make matters worse, it had somehow developed a way to prevent me from psionically sensing it or seeing through its eyes, making the task of locating it much more difficult.

After I learned that drone four had vanished from one of my overlords, I had nearly all of the Zerglings that survived the battle with Gryphons unharmed (which were exactly ninety-four out of the one hundred total) begin searching the hive and its immediate surroundings.

Just as I began to fear the worst, Drone four reappeared in the hivemind, though it still prevented me from determining its location or looking though it.

“Drone four, where are you?!” I angrily asked the intelligent worker via aforementioned hivemind. “I don’t remember giving you orders to disappear!”

“Please forgive me, but I believe you wouldn’t have approved of my mission.” The drone answered before revealing it location, which was right in the center of the Equestrian camp. “What I have done is the best course of action we could have taken.”

“If I hadn’t spent an expensive amount of resources on you, I would end you here and now!” I said, despite having no plans to do so even if I didn’t reengineer the drone since it was the only other sentient being in the brood at the moment. “Bring Celestia to the hive cluster immediately, I want to speak with her.”

“By your command.” The drone replied as it attempted to carry out my orders, only to suddenly stop. “My lord?”

“What is it?” I asked drone four.

“Celestia wishes to bring a contingent of her soldiers with her.” It answered. “She says she will refuse to comply unless her demands are met.”

“Fine...” I said before ordering twenty-five Zerglings to escort the Princess and her soldiers to me. “Tell her I have dispatched troops as well to make sure she gets here safely.”

This entire thing was NOT going according to my original plan...

But as a Zerg, I must survive, adapt, and overcome...

Author's Note

Gryphon and Equestrian weapons are basically just renamed real-world firearms.

Examples: Mk. 16 (M16), AP5 (MP5), and Block 17 (Glock 17)