A small pack of Worgen have been on a journey across Azeroth for quite some time.

Long enough for them to think they are some of the most powerful beings in the land. For the most part this was no joke. Fully clad in armor and robeing of noble elites, there was no fear in this group about crossing paths with anything out there. They were indeed quite fearsome to deal with.


Their sense of smell and direction allowed them to always know the way home. Yet where they went, they did not know. You could say because of this flaw, they ended up at the outskirts of lost isles.

As it approached nighttime, the faint smell of wood and ocean brought hunger among the tired traveling pack of Worgens. It was time to setup camp.

                    ---

He came running out of the bushes so fast he almost knocked over his two friends. “COME. NOW!” he snickered, trying harder than usual just to speak clearly. With that he ran back away, knowing curiosity would kill the cat with them.

It always does with Goblins.

They found him hiding behind bushes up on a small hill “Will you two SHUT UP!???” he hissed at them as they clunked their way through the shrubbery towards their friend up above.
They popped their heads out from under the same dark green bush as their own skin, and saw a sight that seemed to trigger more laughter from the first Goblin.

Wiping tears from his eyes he exclaimed “Ok ok…. So these Worgens…. Im guessing they are trying to prepare Westfall stew... Problem is they have been attacking this little Murloc for what seems like an hour now. They snagged a few before…but this little guy…” and with that he choked into more muffled laughter.

“I mean… LOOK at them… Elites… and they cant take down this one little Murlock… They are too stubborn to leave him alone and go after other prey.”

His two friends focused in more intently after hearing the last bit of information, and it was true. Try as they might, the little Murloc parried each one of their attacks. Obviously the damage he was causing to them was all for null, but the fact of the matter remained.

They could not take down this unusually small Murloc.

The first goblin smacked one of his friends so hard his eyes could have popped out of his head. “HEY! Remember Joe talking about that one Murloc he spent A WEEK trying to take down? I THINK THIS IS HIM! Hehehe, LETS GO!!!”

And with that the first Goblin took off running into the field. He was always doing stupid things but he knew his friends were always by his side, and regretfully, they just got pulled into another one of his mis-adventures.

                    ---

They were beginning to tire. Try as they might this little Murloc would not succumb to their attacks, and with rage and stubbornness setting in, they continued their assault, unknowing of the three elite armored Goblins running at them.
The mage of the group perked and without hesitation informed his other two friends of his new findings from across the field.

 “Im out of mana and a pack of elite Goblins is coming at us. We need to retreat. NOW.” And with that the three wolves ran off into the night, upset.
On all their minds, tonight they would have to settle for leftover spider legs.


The Goblins pulled up on the little Murloc, he was jittery as a squirrel that got into some Dwarven moonshine ale.

“HAHAHAHA, did you see that? They ran! HEY LITTLE GUY, don’t your mama tell you not to talk to strangers? HAHAHA”
Little Grunty turned around to face three Goblins, expecting another attack he gurgled out incoherent babble and begin to swipe at the loudmouth who was stepping closer.
“HAHAhoo, stop that now, come with us, I have something I want to give you” And with that he handed the little Murloc a handful of beans. “Come on!” he beckoned at little Grunty and took off again, back towards The Lost Isles, with the two other Goblins following close behind. They were getting a little tired of their friend’s random shenanigans.

                    ---

Little Grunty sat in the corner, the two Goblin friends watching him suspiciously as he twitched and garbled in the corner, shifty eyes darting everywhere, gnawing on a old fish head that was given to him.

“What in the hell are you doing Paul? Why did you want to bring this little rat back here?” Sneered the tallest of the three, irritated as his friend sat behind a pile of ratchets, gears, and other metal junk the professional engineer had been hording like the Goblin he was.

“This little guy deserves something. Did you see the way he took on those Worgens? HAHAHA, Ive been saving this broken metal for a while now. Most of it is too damaged to make into a full set of armor… But enough of it is intact to make something for this little guy, HAHAHAAA” Paul was transforming into one of those maniacal weird gnomes again…

“HERE!” and with that he stepped from behind the rubble, holding almost a round ball of blue unidentified metal, along with some sort of peewee gun.

Goblin and Murloc alike stepped back in agreed confusion. This Goblin was nuts with a capital N.
Surprisingly the little Murloc allowed Paul to outfit him with this strange suit, technology grafted into it that was obviously not of this planet.

The Suit hummed with an internal power of its own. “Now little guy, See this red button? Yea…. I don’t know what it does.”

What should we learn from this story? Never tell a Murloc what NOT to do.

Within that instant, little Grunty mashed his webbed paw over the small glowing dot and begin to fade away. The last thing he remembered hearing was: “Good going Paul. Next time teach him how to walk right into Ironforge…”

                    ---

“CAPTIAN RAYNOR! We just had a teleport at base!”
“And?”
“…And its not human… But it has our armor, modified.”
“Im on my way”

Shortly after Jim Raynor walked outside onto the dock, marines standing all over crowed around a small creature decked out in Terran armor, twitching and glancing all over.

“What is it?”
“We don’t know sir, but he seems friendly.”

Just then, sensing the rip in space, a lone Zerg came out from behind a large group of rocks, hell-bent on blood.

Grunty Tweaked and twitched, babbling and bouncing all around, empting his entire clip into the hydralisk until it was no more than a mutilated carcass, Grunty babbling away, clicking on an empty trigger.

“Hey little guy, you fight well, I don’t know where you come from, but your more than welcome to join our cause.”
Grunty just gave him a blank stare and pushed the now empty gun in Raynors face.

“I don’t know who makes ammo that small, so here.” And with that, Raynor grabbed the little gun and handed him a standard issue assault rifle.

“First post, take the new recruit with you out into the field, see how he does.”

“Yes sir!”





To be honest, Grunty was a little too dumb to ever really figure out what just happened. Growing up in a marsh with other Murlocs, his constant questing finally got the best of him.
Back on Azeroth Goblin and Worgens alike talked of the elusive Murloc that would just not give up. Newspapers articles began to be written about him, yet no one ever saw of him again. On this world, it was just another story lost in the wind.

Grunty made a good addition to the Terrans though, and continued his twitchy life on this new planet, completely content with blowing up anything that looked at him the wrong way.

By: Apollo1579

Contest entry

Grunty the murloc

The story of Grunty starts out at a small murloc village off the coast of the Anaheim woodlands. The family just got started and they had found a little murloc boy and named him Grunty. This was a fitting name for this murloc because of its small size and embarrassing features. This family of murlocs was blessed by the gods of Azeroth for this gift of a murloc child falling from the sky. They were unable to have kids themselves so this was the perfect opportunity for the parents. Years go by and Grunty thinks that he is a normal murloc. This all change when the murloc started to socialize with the other murlocs around him. He was not accepted by the others and quickly hated among all the murloc clans in Anaheim woodlands. After his peaceful years in his parent’s murloc hut he finally got a taste of real murloc life.

A few years after the hatred started, for the small murloc, he was chased out of the city. In the process of this his parents were slaughtered in front of him and hung out in front of all the huts. This mad Grunty run for his life and as soon as he found a safe place in a rock beside a camp and traveling merchants he cried. The next morning Grunty awoke to the smell of salted venison on the fire of the merchant’s camp. He longed for the venison but knew if he showed himself he would be killed instantly. Grunty stayed there until the merchants left. As they packed up a merchant selling small scale guns and armor that work drop and full set of training armor. Grunty saw this as a stroke of luck that the world’s smallest armor and weapon merchant would be so close to the smallest murloc.

He tried the armor on and instantly he was flooded with memories from his past. He could see fighting, endless war and destruction from his past. Grunty shook off the memories and began to train to get revenge on the murlocs that killed his family. Every night Grunty would make small ammo for his gun and shoot at targets in the forest were no one could see him. After a few months of intense training Grunty had another glimpse of his past. This memories he could see his old family and friends. He could see has old armor and semi auto machine gun. This brought hope to him for getting revenge on the murlocs that killed his parents. The night after this memory Grunty snuck back into his old hut that he lived in for his recent years. He searched all the contents of the hut for information about the day he was found in the Anaheim woodlands. He found pictures of a crashed pod in the forest. This intrigued him to go find the contents of the pod that he came here in.

 So the next day he awoke with a smile on his face. He set out for the woods the look for his crashed pod. Where ever it is he needs to find it to ever get back to his home. He spent the day looking in caves and under rocks but he had no luck until; he stumbled on a goblin encampment. Within the camp he saw his old pod. This is bad. Grunty waited the day to figure out how to get his stuff back. While trying to figure it out a goblin spotted him and grabbed him before he could escape. After explaining himself the goblins he was allowed a meal. The goblins felt sympathy for this tiny murloc and they want to help him with is revenge on the others. That night the goblins attacked the murloc village. This battle was over before it started. The goblins came in and left nothing alive inside the village. After the battle Grunty was invited to follow the goblins on their journeys around the new world. Grunty agreed later that day he examined the pod. He told the goblins it was his and they believed him.

They left his home away from home and set off on an adventure through Kalimador. While on the ship he tried to get the pod open and it was stuck. Years past traveling with the goblins. Grunty is exalted With Orgimmar, Thunder Bluff, and Undercity. He spent days helping these factions because of the items he needs to fix his pod. Thunder bluff had a module that is used to power the engines on his pod. Under city had the nuclear fuel used to power the module. Orgimmar had a certain type of ore that can withstand space travel. This was an epic adventure for Grunty and he was trained by the goblins in engineering. With all his training in Azeroth he is on his way back to the lost isles. Once he got there he assembled a team to help him fix the pod. This project took 6 days. Once it was complete he could finally open the pod. He found his armor and his machine gun in the pod. He put it on and was respected amoung the goblins for his heroic deeds to Azeroth.

They fixed his pod and Grunty was ready to take off once again back to his home. The goblins through him a going away party and tears were shed for the leaving of Grunty. After the party he took of only to see that the Worgen were attacking goblins. By this time Grunty was already gone. He swore to himself that he would come back and help the goblins.

10 years later Grunty was back at home and he was the finest murloc Marine the fleet has ever seen. He assembled an elite squad of marines called Orbital Drop-shock Murlocs (ODSM). Grunty was going to full fill his promise and come help the goblins for all that they did to help him get back home. Also coming with is a portal murloc to set up communications between the two worlds. The set off for the lost isles and got there quickly. Upon their arrival they saw that the Worgen enslaved the goblins. They landed and were immediately confronted by the Worgen. They explained themselves and war broke out. 21 ODSM against hundreds of Worgen. The battle raged and Murlocs owned all the Worgen. Pushing the Worgen back into the castle Grunty unlocked the goblins' chains. Now the ODSM and Goblins assaulted the Worgen slaughtering all that stand. It seemed all was going well until the Worgen king came out of the throne room. Grunty charged and jump in the air. The king threw and spear and it pierced Grunty through the chest. At the same time Grunty shot the king in the head and the battle was over. Grunty was killed in the name of ODSM and the goblins.

The rest of the ODSM and the goblins held a ceremony to honor Grunty in his epic heroism coming back the save the goblins. After the war the 20 ODSM left stayed to protect the goblins in to honor Grunty. These 20 ODSM are still in Azeroth.

GO fk ya self i just want "grunty" xD

Hi my name is Grunty, and I'm an alcoholic.... (crowd yells "HI GRUNTY")

I grew up as a child of two alcoholic murlochs... My parents with drink Grog and then my mother used to beat my father.  It wasn't easy.... Then at the age of 5 (we murlocks don't live THAT long) I joined the marines... the horors I saw... no wonder I drink!!

While in the service of the Horde, i came a cross a small troll town, where I met a man making tiny ammo...  so like any good drunk murlock, I killed him, took the molds and all his supplies, and now manufacture my own ammo!.

I don't really want to be here tonight. unfortunately I was court ordered.... seems there was an unfortunate episode involving me and an Org (don't really remember it, but we both were woken up naked by the cops...)  Any way... that's all i have to share..

(Crowd yells, "Thanks for sharing, Keep coming back)

Who makes ammo that small?

We set out to find out as much as we could about the origin of everyone's favorite pet. While researching Grunty, in the oldest of archives here at the Curse HQ, we came across a newspaper clipping from the Azeroth newspaper about a mysterious little fella found in the woods by a group of Worgen and Goblins who were heading home from Blizzcon 2009! Unfortunately the article comes to an abrupt end without telling us what happened to him after the Worgen and Goblins found him, take a look:

Date: 2505. Location: Onboard the Starship cruiser Murky.

As Sgt Grunty walked from his quarters to the command deck he thought about his mission. How was he supposed to accomplish this?

A seasoned fighter in dozens of battles, earned the medal of Lurky for his heroism in the battle of Eren'Ta, the Murloc still couldn't believe what he was asked to do.

As he entered the command deck, General H.D. Rurky approached him. "Glad you came, Grunty" He said with an almost unnoticeable smile. "I know you have some doubts about this mission, but it's the only way, and you are the only one who can do it.

Grunty looked over to his side and armed his weapon "What is he doing here!" He yelled as he was barely holding himself from blasting away.

"At ease Soldier!" Commanded General Rurky . "Murkimus is your partner on this mission."

"I don't need a partner, Sir." Voiced Grunty while staring at Murkimus.

"Just relax Grunts, this isn't what I'd call a top 5 dream team either." Smirked a laughing Murkimus.

"Don't call me Grunts. Answered Grunty and turned towards the General.

"We're losing this war." General Rurky started his pre-written speech. "The Zerg are gaining more territory as we speak. The Protoss are destroying worlds just to stop them and the Humans...Well the Humans can't handle this. We've stood in the shadows until now hoping for this war to bypass us and end quickly. We were wrong. We should have acted earlier...quicker...But The Elders...The Elders thought it was not the right time. Right time...heh..Like THIS is the right time!"

"But sir, I don't understand what we are doing here. Earth is nowhere near the combat zone." A confused Grunty asked while still holding his blaster close.

"What you are going to hear now is one of our stories that passed from generation to generation and as the years went by History became legend, Legend became Myth and eventually all knowledge about our past was about lost."

"The Elders know of a story, one of our earliest stories that dates to the time of The Great Cataclysm!" The two young Murlocs gasped as the General uttered those words.

"Before we left for the stars, before we had to find a new home for our race, we used to be a young race on this planet, on Earth Prime. The Legend goes that an old race of Humanoid creatures called 'Orcs' created a magical portal from their home world, whose name is long forgotten, to Earth in order to invade it. Even though its creator was very powerful, he didn't realize the portal's full potential and powers. The portal caused his home world to break apart and many died."

"What's that got to do with our mission, sir?" Asked Murkimus, while juggling his spear.

"Everything." General Rurky said while turning to stare at the glowing image of Earth which was viewable outside the deck.

"Those portals were not only a gateway between two points in space, but also between two points in time!" He said while turning back to face the two uneasy Murlocs. "Although the powerful Orc didn't know it at the time, the magical portals can be used to travel in time, to a time before The Great Cataclysm!"

"Your mission is to land on Earth and find the last remaining portal, activate it and go back in time to help us win this war!"

"But how will we do that, sir?" Asked a worried Grunty

"You'll have to activate the portal together. One of you will need to send power to the portal itself while another will have to use the Book of Medivh to create the rift in time."

"Sounds easy Grtuns." Laughed Mukimus, who was always eager to jump into unknown situations. "Don't call me 'Grunts' Murkimus."  Replied Grunty.

"While in the past you will need to find the ancient race of the Goblins and Worgens and prevent them from creating the future...This future from ever happening. You two are our strongest soldiers and each of you is essential for this mission."

"And once we're done with the mission how are.." Started asking Grunty but was stopped by Murkimus "This is a one-way ride Grunts.

There won't be a way for us to return home after we pass through."

"He is right." Said General Rurky  "I'm sorry Grunty and Murkimus. There isn't another way, it has to be done like this, and it has to be you. If you're still up for this mission, meet me at the Bay in 1 hour." Said General Rurky as he left the deck.

"Are you coming Grunty?" Asked Murkimus "I...I don't think we really have a choice. I'll meet you there." Said Grunty as he stared at Earth from the deck.

"This is the last time I'll be seeing you from here." Grunty thought to himself "The next time I'll view you, I will be standing on the ground."

1 hour later and onboard one of the stealth fighters that will take them to a distant island in the South Seas, Grunty and Murkimus both looked at each other as they were strapped in their chairs. General Rurky's voice was heard over the com system. "Good luck Murlocs. You've made the hardest sacrifice possible. It was an honor serving with you both."

"Thank you, Sir!" Both Murloc answered.

The landing was easy enough; Earth's stealth seeking technology wasn't good enough to detect them. They landed a few miles from their target, blew up their ship and started walking to the portal.

Inside a small jungle in the South Seas they found a huge stone structure. A structure you wouldn't guess might be a Time and Space gateway if you didn't already know that yourself.

Murkimus and Grunty started working fast, clearing the overgrown weeds and trees that were all over. Once they were done it resembled what General Rurky told them they'd find.

Murkimus, being the brute of the two, decided he'll be in charge of powering up the gateway with Grunty's blaster. A move Grunty would shot him in other day for, but only accepted because he knew there wasn’t any other way.

Grunty moved in to the circle they drew on the ground and started carving out on the ground the symbols required for the spell. When he was done he looked back at Murkimus and with a knowing look asked him if he was ready, Murkimus just smiled back and nodded.

It was now or never for the two young Murlocs. Grunty started the chant and the symbols started to glow. As he uttered the last words the portal energized itself with the power of Grunty's blaster and a Dark and alarming watery substance appeared to cover the gateway.

"It really worked Grunts" Said Murkimus.

Just as Grunty was about to answer his usual response about not calling him Grunty, they heard fighter jet engines and seconds later they felt the ground shake with laser blasts raining down on them. Apparently the opening of the gate caused Earth sensors to go off all over and they were discovered.

"Murkimus!" yelled Grunty "We got to get to the portal before they hit it! We have to pass through now!"

Grunty and Murkimus ran towards the portal the laser blasts were hitting closer and closer. Just as they were about to enter, one laser blast hit very close sending Murkimus and Grunty flying into the portal.

A few hours later in an unknown time or place, Grunty woke up. He slowly opened his eyes and saw only trees. Huge trees which were blocking the sun. After a few moments of trying to remember where he is, he remembered the mission. He remembered he was at the portal, about to enter and that the Humans discovered him and started to blast him…and Murkimus! He remembered he was with him also!

"Murkimus!" yelled Grunty "Murkimus, where are you?"

Grunty started searching for Murkimus. Yelling his name and looking all over the forest he was in.

Grunty searched all over the woods, turned every rock, even climbed a few of the bigger trees to see if he can spot Murkimus from the top. Nothing. No sign of Murkimus. Grunty started to doubt he even made it with him through the portal. Did the Humans capture him? Or worse…was he dead?

Grunty quickly dismissed those thoughts. His mission was the only thing keeping him sane. He believed it was his destiny to complete it. 'Destiney' he laughed to himself. What a strange twist. Just 10 years earlier at the battle of Eren'Ta, Murkimus told him it was his destiny to stop the war. He charged a Zerg command center with his entire platoon against Grunty's better judgment. He and Grunty were the only survivors that day.  It was the last time they both met until today.

As the hours passed, Grunty started losing hope. He hadn't seen anyone yet, nor has he found any trace of Murkimus.

He walked out of the trees and surprised the pack of Worgens. As expected of Worgen, they did not trust the Murloc, for they have met Murlocs in their past, and it was always trouble when you saw one around. However this Murloc was different. He could speak in Common.

Grunty told them that he was lost and couldn't remember where he was or who he is, except his name, Grunty, and asked if he could join them. The Worgen leader being a Shaman decided to trust the young Murloc and take him back to their village and try helping him gain his memories back.

On their way back to their village, the Worgen leader, Fenrod, told Grunty all about his home land, Gilneas, which was their destination. Grunty was curious to know where they were now and Fenrod, smiling, told him that they are in the Anaheim woodlands and they just left the Blizzcon event. They were sent their on behalf of the Alliance to make sure the Goblins, now proud members of the Horde, won't cause any trouble.

As the hours passed, Fenrod tried getting information from Grunty, why he was there, where he was from, what was that weird looking blaster he had, but Grunty, loyal to his mission, kept his mouth quite and told Fenrod that he doesn't remember.

Meanwhile…

Inside an Ancient arena, Murkimus found himself with his spear and a gladiator helm and shield. Just as the announcer announced him as the next challenger….

Lol :)

No birds chirped, no leaves brushed together, no wind passed over them as they walked. It was eerily quiet on that particular morning. A small pack of Worgen was making their way from Anaheim back to Gilneas. They smelled a stench all too familiar. The smell of war. In the distance, the patriarch of the pack heard a distinct noise that sent a chill up his spine. The worgen were walking along in their human state. Unfortunately, for them, that would pass quickly as the sound grew closer. A group of Lost Isle Goblins made themselves visible through the clearing as a rather oafish goblin hollered "...and that's when I told this little fella... I GOT WHAT YOU NEED! Look at him, he thinks he's so tough... I must've killed 5 or 6 HUNDRED Murlocs in the last 6 levels alone! Who does this guy think he is!?"

The worgen patriarch stepped up to the front of his pack. The goblins halted. There was a moment of uneasy tension that hung in the air like an orc fart. No one moved, they simply eyed one another. One of the goblins yelled "Random Dimension Portal Modifier! I choose you!" and hurled a chunk of metal into the space between them. A blue light shot straight into the air, and a swirling white gas pulled the air around the light downward into the Portal Modifier. From behind the front line of goblins came a small blue creature that appeared to be armored to the teeth... the worgen had no clue what was happening, and as such were torn from their flesh as they each transformed into their beastly natured worgen forms. The patriarch had seen enough, and leaped forward on all fours, attempting to grab the creature before the now swirling vortex consumed it. He failed, and there was a *Bloop!* as the blue creature disappeared... and then the patriarch. A goblin in the middle of the huddle bellowed, "Glad I could help! HA!"

The worgen pack all at once howled, and sprang forth in dark flight toward the goblins, and let loose an assault no one could have imagined. The gnashing of teeth, and tearing of flesh was more than the goblins n the back of the group could handle, and they began rummaging quickly through their packs for toys. A goblin screamed "Yes! Here it is! It's super effective!" and threw a similar device down on the ground below them. A red light swallowed them, more quickly than the blue light from the other device, and they were gone in the matter of just a few seconds. One of them, however, was spit back out and not even looking... well... quite like himself.

"Evil Twin Malfunction... lovely..." he muttered as the worgen examined their battlefield, noticing he was the only standing goblin remaining. Two worgen from the pack lunged toward him, and the goblin jumped in the air, using rocket boosters to propel him toward the skies... or so the worgen thought. A short worgen standing near a minuscule demon quietly announced "Fear" in the direction of the goblin, and his trajectory was thrown askew and he jettisoned toward the Blue light, fireballs trailing behind him. The small demon ran toward him to get another fireball off and turned to his master, yelling "This was NOT in my contract!" and threw one last fireball as the goblin disappeared in the same *bloop!* the two previous travelers had. The worgen assembled and howled in grief of their lost patriarch.


On the other side of the blue light the worgen patriarch awaited the damnation that he was sure to endure. The small blue creature was violently launching rockets, machine gun rounds, and hurdling obstacles as waves of little aliens came running toward them. "MurlgrulugURLGLRULGURARGLA!" was all that was heard aside from the sound of artillery and squishing alien slaughter. The worgen attempted to help as best he knew how. The few aliens getting through had only left a few marks on the little murloc soldier. He screamed and winced at every blow that hit him. The worgen could no longer stand by and let this small warrior fight this battle alone. He screamed "Shield!" and the murloc felt his soul lighten as energy surrounded him to protect him. The worgen priest said a quiet prayer, and the murloc heard a loud bell as holy light shot from the worgen toward him. A soothing wave fell over the priest came closer and said "May you be Renewed, my friend." The murloc felt his wounds healing as he continued to battle the zerg from all around him. He looked to the worgen and said "These baddies called Zerg. They not good. Bad to Terrans. Terrans good. Kill Zerg, Help Terrans!"

The Priest nodded and assumed his shadow form, calling upon the essence of darkness to surround him. He spotted two of the larger zerg creatures and whispered "Pain..." toward them. He then called forth a devouring plague upon them both, and focused his thoughts on the larger of the two. He focused on it's mind, what little bit there was of one, and Blasted it with an intense shock. There was a scream on the battlefield. He began to sear it's mind, and the enemies around began to fall.The murloc threw a grenade, and continued to fire upon the zerg waves approaching them. The battle raged.

There was a small *Bloop!* from behind them that neither noticed. The priest stopped in battle, and focused his mind on the presence of a new begin on the field with them, and attempted to view into it with his own eyes. With his mind vision, he could see his own back. He turned on heel, and Screamed into the consciousness of the goblin, causing him to run away. He tripped, and fell, his bag spewing goodies all over their nook. The murloc turned and fired two rockets, and streamed rounds toward the goblin. Without much need for explanation, the goblin did not get up. The priest gathered the bag's contents and recognized a Goblin Land Mine, and a few sticks of EZ Throw. He set the mines on the entry to their battle nook, as the murloc continued to cover him.

Upon finishing the setup of a portal device found in the bag, the priest called out "Come, my small friend! We must move quickly!" The murloc threw the last stick of EZ Throw and reared back to the portal, grabbing onto the priest as they both disappeared. Their defense line had broken, but the Goblin Land Mines did away with at least 35 zerglings that attempted to penetrate their nook. They were gone.

*Bloop!* and they were back in the forest clearing. The howling of the priest's pack was so loud the murloc peeled off his helmet to cover his head with his arms. The patriarch cried "Fortitude!" and the air was filled with Green Crosses that lit the sky. The pack stopped immediately, and turned to their patriarch. In dark flight they joined his side. "Brethren, this murloc assisted me in returning, and I him. We fought side by side on the fields of battle against an army I've not seen the likes of in Gilneas, much less the entirity of Azeroth or the Outlands. He fights with valor, brave and wise. Stature aside, I would do battle with this fellow any day, and yet still I know not his name. Speak, friend, and enlighten us to your insight.

The murloc stepped forth and opened his mouth with great care to speak in common. "My name Grunty. I work for Terran. I come from Azeroth, but go through blue portal in Gadgetzan many year back. Greenies pull me to big place from Zerg fight. Man sing with round glasses. Say 'Prince of Darkness'. They keep me in box. They mean. Murloc grows slow, I learn fast. Terran use me for... in... full... trate. Grunty good, Terran Good, Protoss Bad, Zerg Bad." The priest moved forward.

"The worgen of Gilneas owe you a debt of gratitude for your prowess on the battlefields with the Zerg. You are welcome to join us on our journey... to our home." The worgen shed the fur, their limbs snapping back into their human forms and their clothing changing shape as they went.

"Grunty like worgen. Worgen look like Terran sometimes. Terran Good. Worgen Good."

And so, the murloc stayed with the worgen patriarch. Many epic battle, pieces of loot, and Guilds later they can still be found fighting side by side in the Valley of Alterac... the Basin of the Arathi Kingdom, The Warsong Clan's Gulch, within the Eye of the Storm, along the beaches of the Strand of the Ancients, on the Isle of Conquest, and in any dungeon that dare tempt the likes of the worgen...

Without going into to much tremendous detail, Grunty had been taken in by the Goblins, where he learned to craft, steal or otherwise obtain his diminutive ammo. Laccking the skills to reapair or creat transportation of his own, he resigned himself to a life away from home, untill an extreem and exceptionally unlikely even happened. As it happens, a couple years ago, a blue clad Guard stationed in the Black Mesa Research facility fell in the lline of duty. Upon his death, he expected to be transported to the next realm within the Sierra domain, but, instead, he found his essence fragmented and distributed among the inhabitants of a foreign realm.

The same dimentional tears that destroyed Black Mesa, stole Barneys' essence and led to the creation of unlikely heros like Barneynomore, Blindbarney and Iambarneytoo in Nordrassil, now flashed down onto an unsuspecting Grunty, during breakfast, drawning him though Xen, the ruins of the reseach facility and along the residual trail of the noble Guards stolen essence. the last nonsensical thought that passed through his little mind was : " Who is Gordon and why does he owe me a beer??"

Grunty. Years have passed since this loyal Terran made the ultimate sacrafice to the ongoing war with the Zerg. This is his story.

  He was once a normal man, with a wife and kid. That is until the Zerg invaded Chau Sara. He lost his family that day and vowed to do whatever it took to exterminate the vile creatures who took his life from him. He join the Terran Army and enlisted as a Grunt, what better way was there to get up close and personal with the monsters he thought. He fought battle after battle, taking as many Zerg down as he could. After a year of fighting, Grunty was a highly decorated soldier and had the respect of seniors and subordinates alike both for his ruthlessness and his strategic mind.

  One day, while Grunty was resting in his barracks room, he heard a knock at the door. Immediatly he grabbed his Gauss rifle, ammo, and stim packs and headed to open it. "Another battle, just what I was itching for. I hate when the higher ups make me take time off." As he opened the door, instead of seeing his squad leader, he saw two scientists. 

"I am Michael Taylor and this is my associate, James Green. We are with the Biological, Chemical, Nuclear, and Weapons Research Department. May we take a moment of your time? We have an offer you might be interested in." 

"Make it quick, I'm expecting to leave for Mar Sara sometime today to help clean out the remaining zerg."

"Right the point with it then? I knew there was a reason we picked you. In our department we specialize in new and more efficent ways of eradicating the Zerg. On top of that, we also experiment with different chemicals and drugs to help make the soldiers stronger, faster, and have a higher life expectancy. We have just developed a serum that will do all of that and more. Your senses will be hightened, your reflexes more honed, and you can shoot and run all day without feeling any kind of fatigue. Now, we come to you with this proposal because over the past month we have been watching you in combat. You outperform, and quite frankly outlive almost every other Terran on the field. This serum has not been tested on Humans yet, so we would like to offer it to you first. I know what you're thinking, that you are just another test rat. This is not the case, if it was we would find a more.....how should I say, expendable person. We have another serum that will reverse the effects if something should go wrong. If you say yes, we will begin immediatly. If you say no, you will never see us again and the offer will not be brought back to you. We will come back in one hour to hear your answer. Good day, Marine."

  As the two scientists left, Grunty sat down hard on his rack. He didn't know what to think, let alone say, about an offer such as that. Be stronger, faster, healthier....a supersoldier. Time seemed to stand still in that hour that Grunty had to contemplate. This was a life changing decision, one that he could not take back if he said yes. Or one he would be offered again if he said no.

  An hour passed and the scientists were at his door.

"Have you made a decision?"

"I have. When do we start"

"Right now. If you will just follow us."

"One sec  Doc, let me put my gear on. Just in case I have to leave in a hurry."

  Grunty followed the two. They led him through the building and outside. From there they boarded a shuttle which took them to the other side of the continent. Exiting the shuttle he was led into a building that reminded him of a Command Center, but he knew it was something far more important. Into the building and down a hallway they came to an elevator which took them to the top floor. Upon entering the new room, Grunty knew that more than just weapons were made here. Large cylinders were placed around the room with, what looked like, different animals floating in some kind of green fluid. Tables and computers were lined with men and women wearing white jackets, poking and prodding or typing furiously. No one in the room looked at the bewildered Marine as the two scientists he followed led him past and into a smaller, but no less imposing, room with a door at the other end with a window next to it. In this next room he saw shelves upon shelves lined with vials, pills, syringes, and stuff that looked like you could eat it. There was a small chair in the middle of the room. Normal looking, except that it was bolted to the floor and had ankle and wrist restraints on it.

"Well, here we are. We will begin in a few moments. I just have to get a few things in order. Please, have a seat and relax."

"N...No thanks, I'd rather stand if you don't mind."

  After a few minutes of standing in awe at where he was, the scientist Michael Taylor turned to him, with a vial of blue colored liquid that seemed to move on its own.

"We are ready. When you are ready, all you need to do is drink this. The effects, although you won't feel them, should take effect within a few minutes. After drinking we do request that you do sit. If something should go wrong it would be in everyone's safety if you were not standing."

 He handed the vial to Grunty with a shaky hand and a nervous look.

"Ok Doc, you're the boss."

 Grunty paused a moment, looked at the vial, and took a deep breath. He raised the vial to his mouth.

"Cheers!"

The liquid was drained in a matter of seconds, after which Grunty calmy sat in the chair. Minutes passed and Grunty felt nothing.

"Let's give it a few more minutes, shall we? Then we will begin some simple tests to measure your strength, endurance, and stamina."

"Well lets hurry this along as fast as we can. I'm still expecting to catch a Cruiser for Mar Sara today."

A few more minutes passed and Grunty started feeling an odd tingling sensation all over his body. He stood up and started to walk around the room in small circles.

"Hey Doc, is my body supposed to tingle like this? It feels as like my body is......AAAAAGGGGHHHH!!!"

 Grunty toppled over a nearby desk, sending the documents, vials, and other items crashing to the ground. His body started convulsing as his eyes rolled into the back of his head. Foam and mucus started to flow out his mouth and nose. The scientists in the room tried to restrain him, but the convulsing was too much to control. They fled the room into the one with the window looking in where they watched the scene unfolding.

  The convulsing and fluid excretion stopped, but what was happening was far from over. Grunty felt his spine start to shrink and it began to arch in the middle, although he felt not pain. His legs and arms were shortening as well. As his body started to grow smaller and smaller, he noticed he could see more of the room than before. Reaching his hand to his face he tried to scream as he realized his eyes had moved towards the side of his head. In fact his whole face had changed, resembling that of a fish. His teeth had become razor sharp daggers in his ever widening mouth. The room began to spin and Grunty fainted.

 Grunty's vision and hearing slowly started to come back as he started to wake. He was on a gurney, being rolled down a dimly lit hallway. He heard people around him talking and recognized Michael Taylor's voice. He tried to talk, but no sound would come. He felt as if he would faint again.

"Let's get rid of the body, no will ever know what happened here. We will use the wormhole generator and send him anywhere but here. We can work on the cover story later. I don't think I have to remind anyone what the repurcussions will be if anyone ever knows the truth."

"Yes, Sir. My lips are sealed and I think I have the perfect place to send him."

 "Well, here we are. Let's get this over with. We have to perfect that serum. Minsk wants it in working condition by the end of the week."

 So he was just a test subject after all, he thought to himself. It all made sense. Minsk ordered the serum to be made, as to give his soldiers the advantage while fighting the Zerg and the renegade's loyal to Raynor. He knew he should have listened and went with the others who rebelled against Minsk. None of this would have happened. Now I have three more targets on my list, these two scientist and Minsk. As soon as I figure out how to get out of this mess, they're mine. He said in is head.

  The gurney stopped, and Grunty was lifted off. He was being carried to a big circular device.

"Power it up already. We have little time to waste. I want to be rid of this failure as soon as possible."

"Yes, Sir. The machine is powering up now. I programmed the coordinates for a place well out of our galaxy, maybe even our time."

"Don't tell me, it's better that only one of us knows. You know, I do feel bad about what happened to him. Grunty was a great soldier. Maybe we could send him with something to protect himself, at the least. Ahhh, I got it. The new Gauss rifle we have been developing. It's just the right size for him. We'll give him enough ammuntion to last a lifetime, considering he doesn't just shoot at everything that moves."

 "Sir, it's powered up and ready. Just lay him on the pad here and in a few seconds none of this will have happened."

  Grunty was layed on a square pad with a rifle and bag full of ammunition. What did they mean "just the right size for him?" The rifle was tiny, like a child's toy gun. He had little time to contemplate this as the pad he was lieing on lifted in the air and hurled towards the giant circle. Everything went black and Grunty knew no more.

  Days, months, years seemed to pass. Grunty finally awoke, dazed and confused. As his vision slowly came to him, he noticed he was in a forest and could see glimpses of the baby blue sky above him. He could see bushes and trees all around him. He was on an open patch of ground, in the shape of a circle.The faint sound of birds came to his ears. He lay still for many minutes, trying to keep himself concious. Suddenly he heard two voices coming from the left of him and getting closer. The first sounded high pitched and squeaky. The second voice sounded low and gurgled, like whomever was talking was growling.

"Boy am I glad to be out of there Lucas. That was too crowded, and people kept stepping on me!"

"Aye, I bid Blizzcon 2009 a happy farewell. Can you believe some guy tried to skin me? And then some hunter kept following me around mumbling about a Worgen Pet. I think he was trying to tame me! Let's get back to Azeroth, Blippy. Can you make us a portal?"

"Sure thing, friend. But it will cost ya! 5 gold and we have a deal."

"I gave you 5 gold to get HERE. That should cover all the expenses. Runes of Portal do not cost that much."

"Profit, my furry friend. It's all about profit. Now do you want to get home or not?"

"Fine, take the gold. But you will not get a copper more from me."

"Nice doin business with ya! Let's just get to the clearing and I shall start the spell."

  Grunty didn't know what to do. From what he gathered the one called Lucas was something called a Worgen, whatever that may be. The one called Blippy sounded like a small child with some sort of power. Maybe he could use the small child's power to get back to where he came from, and exact his revenge. Grunty tried to move, but his body still seemed sluggish and not willing to respond. He tried to set himself up, only to fall back to the ground. He grabbed his rifle and held it close as the duo he heard talking walked into the clearing.

"Alright Lucas, stand back while I.....wait a minute. Is that a Murloc? Wearing some kind of armor? Is that....is that a gun? Wait a minute, why would a Murloc be in Anaheim? They weren't invited to Blizzon 2009. Hey, you, Murloc. What are you doing here?"

  Grunty did not make sense of anything that was just said. Murloc, Anaheim, Blizzcon 2009. What were these things?

"It's okay little guy. Blippy and I won't hurt you. Are you lost? Where is your family? It's okay, you can talk to us."

  Grunty cleared his throat and tried to speak.

"My....my name is Grunty. I am not a...a Murloc or what ever it is you speak of. I am a Terran, of Chau Sara."

  He told the two the story of what had transpired. The Goblin and Worgen looked at him with a sceptical look. But after a few minutes they conversed in private, out of earshot of Grunty.

"Well, what do you think Blippy? I think he is tellin the truth. Sounds crazy, but after being at the Blizzcon I am ready to believe anything."

"I believe him too Lucas, he talks so proper unlike the normal Murlocs. He must have fallen into a cross-dimentional whatshoozit."

"Speak in Common, Blippy. Your big words hurt my head."

"Ok furball. He got portal from one world to another, just like we did. But it wasn't on his own will, so he does not have the means to get back unless we help him."

"Ahhh, thank you. Much better. So do ya want to help him? And don't say if he pays well enough. Look at him, he don't have anything."

"Well, working for free goes against everything I believe in but I think just this once I can do it."

  Blippy and Lucas told Grunty they would help him get home. They told him all about Blizzcon, Anaheim and Murlocs.

"You two aren't from here?"

"No, we are from a place called Azeroth. Blippy made a portal, much like what you went through, to get us here."

"Well can you make me a portal to Chau Sara?"

"Well, Grunty, it won't be easy but I'm sure I could. I just need to do some research. So for now, would you like to acompany us to Azeroth? From there we can work to get you home."

"If it gets me home. What can you tell me about Azeroth?"

  Blippy and Lucas told Grunty everything they knew. Azeroth, the Lich King, the Scourge, the Burning Legion. The Alliance and The Horde and their ongoing war with each other and the other forces.

"This Scourge sounds a lot like the monsters called Zerg where I am from. You say the Burning Legion created the Scourge? The Lich King controls them, but doesn't work for the Burning Legion? Sounds like you could use some help. Maybe I will stick around for awhile and explore Azeroth. I got an itching to wipe out some mindless drones and the Scourge sounds like a good target. Thank you for helping me, if I can ever do anything to repay you let me know."

"Don't worry, Blippy will. Greedy little goblins. Hahahaha. I think this is the start of a beautiful friendship and a unique voyage. What do you think Blippy?"

"I agree, but call me little again and I will leave you here."

 Blippy made the portal to transport the three to Azeroth. Once in Azeroth, the trio explored the world fighting Scourge, Demons, and for some reason turkeys. Grunty never did make it back to his world. He stayed in Azeroth, the place where he finally found happiness. He organized the Murloc Marines, an elite army of murlocs. They train nonstop until the fateful day comes and they storm Ice Crown Citadel to take the battle to the Lich King along with Blippy and Lucas and the rest of the Horde and Alliance.

The Murloc Space Marine

Part 1

My name is Grunty and  I am a space marine in the army of the Terran Dominion. That was pretty much all I knew until recently. Neural Resocialization they call it, but brainwashing is a better word I think. It serves no other purpose then turning marines into obeying puppets so some general in his battlecruiser can send them onto the battlefield and to their deaths. The treatment, as I know now, is standard issue for marines. Your memory is wiped as much as possible and replaced by preprogrammed thoughts that make you susceptible to following orders and make sure you stay dumb enough not to rebel. So my past was a mystery to me. There were fragments ofcourse, but I didn’t know what was real or what was programmed. Sometimes I would try to focus,  try to understand who I really was and how I got here. But then the neural reprogramming would kick in and pull a veil over any scraps of memory I had left, leaving me with a blank mind and a headache. One thing I knew though: I was different from the rest of my fellow marines.

For a start: Im not human. I don’t even remotely look like one. I'm much smaller, my skin is pale and shiny, my eyes are huge and my throat doesn’t seem to be made to speak the human language. Not that I have to, because all I normally do is follow orders.
Right after resoc I was send off to a training facility on Tarsonis where I stayed in the company of numerous other creatures, ranging from neural enhanced dogs to toddlers with genetically aged minds. I was the only one of my kind though, which was starting to make me ever more curious. The only thing we all had in common was that we were small. The others spoke to me, but I had difficulty talking to them and couldn’t produce anything but some throat noise, so they simply called me Grunty.
The training facility was full of "freakshows" as our trainers would call us, and they treated us as such. The only person that ever acted nice to me in there was this human female. She was only there for a very short time, but I still remember her well. She had bright red hair and was a telepath. Sarah she was called I believe. I haven’t seen her since. I hope she is ok.

Me and the rest of the trainees received the standard issue CMC-400 powered combat suits and gauss rifle, but in a miniature version. Our training was fully focused on infiltrating areas where space was limited, such as air vents and Zerg hives. Basically go there where human marines with their bulky combat suits cannot. I became part of the famous Alpha Squadron and saw my first real combat soon after training when we were sent to Mar Sara to evacuate the local population and hold off the Zerg. My reprogramming and training made me a natural born killer. The initial laughs about me being small and different soon ceased as I found I could move as swiftly as the zerg and kill with ruthless efficiency. I killed many of them. I hate them, and with each planet they infest I despise them more.

It was during the battle of Bhekar Ro that things changed dramatically for me. Until then my life had seemed nothing but one big blur of fighting. The Terran Dominion had been formed and our unit was send to the bleak colony world of Bhekar Ro to answer a distress call send by the local colonists. Some of them had found an alien artifact inside a mountain and accidentally seemed to have activated it, drawing not only the Terran Dominion to it, but also the Zerg and Protoss. So we were send there to investigate and to rescue the colonists if needed. As we arrived we found the Zerg and Protoss already locked in battle. Alpha Squadron jumped right in, guns blazing. It was a fatal decision as we were wiped out. I was cut off from what remained of my unit when we got the call to retreat. So I did what I do best and used my speed to run between surprised Zerg and Protoss troops, trying to find my way back to my unit. Things did not go as planned though, as a wall of Zerg forced me to turn back. Ultimately I found myself near an entryway into the alien artifact, on the opposite side of the battlefield where I wanted to be. With the battle still raging on I had no other choice but to head deeper inside it.
The interior of the artifact looked weird. Alive somehow. I was deep inside the artifact when the whole mountain suddenly started to shake. The sound was deafening and the walls started glowing with bright light. I turned and ran back the way I came as fast as possible. I could already see the sky outside when the sound and light engulfed me. It all went dark after that.

I regained consciousness again in a forest. I was lying on my back in a small clearing surrounded by massive trees. Every fiber in my body hurt. I glanced around. Gone was the artifact, gone was the mud and dirt of Bhekar Ro. Gone were also all the Protoss, Zerg and Humans. It was replaced by trees, a clear blue sky, warming sunlight and a gentle breeze. But where was I? Had I died and gone to heaven? I had certainly never seen a world like this during my time with the space marines, but it all still seemed oddly familiar somehow. I tried to understand the feeling of familiarity, thinking if this world could somehow be connected to my past. The resocialization kicked in again, its effect hammering in my head. I tried not to think about it again but instead focused on the heads up display of my combat suit.  The screen was showing all sorts of warning messages about possible joint damage and overstressed servos. I tried to get up but I couldn’t. The suit refused. As I tried again I suddenly heard people talking behind me.

I felt the ground around me for my gauss rifle, but it was nowhere to be found. Finally the strangers I had heard approaching loomed over me. I was glad to see that two of them were humans, both male. One of them had a beard and black and gray hair with the look of a seasoned warrior. The other human seemed a lot younger with bright blue eyes. The two weird looking creatures that accompanied them were clearly a male and female. They were not that much bigger then me but had wrinkly green skin and long pointy ears adorned with earrings. The bearded man asked where I came from and what I was doing here. I tried to explain to them that I was a space marine, who had been fighting the Zerg and Protoss just minutes before that, but to no avail. All I produced was some very poorly pronounced words that didn’t actually sound like anything.
The one thing I noticed about the humans and smaller creatures is that they did no show the usual surprise when people saw me for the first time. It was almost as if they had seen someone of my kind before. My combat suit did grab the attention of the small green ones though. They were poking and prodding it and discussing it with lots of excitement. The bearded human finally picked me up and put me on my feet. He showed surprising strength for his lean build and as he did something snapped back into place in the back of my suit. All the warnings on my display disappeared and I was once again able to move. I quickly scanned the clearing for my gauss rifle and saw it lying in the underbrush at the far side of the clearing. Too far away to get to it quickly. So far there had been no sign of hostility, but I did not feel comfortable without my rifle.
The bearded human that had picked me up now kneeled before me, introduced himself as Seridas and his human companion as Esamir. The two green skinned creatures called themselves Frazzle and Jubkin. My head was still pounding from the transition to this world so I barely managed to say my name. Seridas now looked at his companion and they discussed where to take me. They seemed to think I was an infant that was lost. Frazzle now  talked to the humans about something called Murlocs and a village that was nearby. He gestured me to follow him.
I was about to point out that I still wanted to grab my gauss rifle when suddenly Seridas turned and stared into the woods. He smelled the air and as I looked closely his face had now something distinctly wolf like. Frazzle and Jubkin had stopped their heated discussion about my combat suit and looked in the same direction, fear clearly visible in their eyes. The thick smell of sulphur filled the air.

Continued below in part 2

The Murloc Space Marine

Part 2

The demon strolled into the clearing almost casually, its eyes of green flame firmly fixed on Seridas. Large horns sat on top of its head and it had wings folded behind its back. In one hand it held a whip. Accompanying the demon was something that I could only describe as a large sort of Zergling with leathery skin and two tentacles sprouting out from its back. It growled and showed a mouth with rows upon rows of razorsharp teeth. There was no mistaking. These two were not here to have a chat. Seridas yelled something to Esamir that sounded like “Felbeast”. Much to my amazement the two humans transformed into wolflike creatures in the blink of an eye. With inhuman agility Seridas jumped on the felbeast while Esamir launched himself towards the larger demon.
At that point my training kicked in. I felt the rush of adrenaline like a switch that was thrown in my head as I was no longer thinking but acted on instinct. I lowered my visor and raced to the gauss rifle at top speed, the leg servos whining as they protested against the strain. Upon picking up the rifle I was happy to see it was undamaged. I turned around and kneeled, aiming for the felbeast. It was already bleeding from several claw marks on its body, but it had managed to attach one of its tentacles to the chest of Seridas. It almost seemed to suck the very life out of him. I could see the wolf man going limp so I fired a short burst at the tentacle, severing it. The beast roared and let go. Seridas rolled away, clutching his chest in pain. The other human did not fare much better. The demons whip was around his neck and he was in dire need of help. Frazzle and Jubkin came to his aid, but they were apparently unarmed except for some small knives.
The felbeast now focused its attention on me and with a roar it charged in my direction. I unloaded three short bursts into its front legs, the metallic spikes ripping away both flesh and bone. The felbeast dropped to the ground in front of me and howled in pain. I took a few steps back and took aim for the kill shot. Frothing at the mouth and driven mad by rage the felbeast managed to get up again and started crawling towards me on its hind legs and the remains of its front legs. Seridas had in the meantime recovered enough and jumped on the felbeast again. He ripped away the remaining tentacle and sank his claws deep into the beasts flesh, severing the spine. He tightened his grip until the struggles of the felbeast became lessened. With one final guttural noise it died. Seridas stood next to the beast now, covered in blood, ichor and breathing heavily from exhaustion.
At that moment a scream sounded and I saw how the remaining demon had now taken to the air, dragging Esamir and the two greenskins up with him. They were already several meters up in the air. I shouldered my weapon, aimed carefully at the muscles of the wings and unloaded the rest of my clip into it. The demon roared and let go of his opponents. Esamir landed heavily on all fours but was unharmed. The greenskins pulled parachutes from somewhere and safely drifted to the grounds. I quickly reloaded my rifle and took aim again but the demon was gone already.
 
With the threat of the demons gone we headed for the road and rested there for a moment. My head was spinning. It was difficult to try and grasp all the things that had happened today.  First the battle of Bhekar Ro, then the teleportation to another planet. After that wolf-men, small green skinned creatures and demons. Who wouldn’t be confused?
The two wolf men had changed back to their human. Their wounds seemed to heal as I looked at them. Seridas caught my gaze and explained that he had once been a human being, but that his home town of Gilneas was infected by a curse that had turned them into Worgen: wolf-men. The fast healing of wounds had been one of the positive side effects of the curse. The two green skinned creatures introduced themselves as Goblins that made a living by trading and making the best deals anywhere. The four of them had visited a big festival called Blizzcon in the nearby town of Anaheim. They had stayed around for a bit after the meeting to avoid the huge crowd and were now returning home. A flash of  bright light in the woods just to the side of the road had grabbed their attention and they had gone there to investigate, where they had found me.
After we rested for a while Seridas told me that they would bring me to the closest Murloc village. I didn’t know what a Murloc was, but I decided it was time to find out.
 
We travelled next to a stream for most of the time and I could not help being mesmerized by the beauty of the landscape around me. I was so caught up by it that I was shocked when my eyes finally fell on the familiar huts of the Murloc village. And yes, familiar it was. My mind raced. Images of a village like this showed up briefly, but they were all vague and tainted by the resocialization. Despite my mind going blank again I was sure now. I had lived in a village like this. I did not know if it was this exact village, but there was no doubt about it. This was my world. These were my kind. I was a  Murloc.
 
The village elder came out to greet us, but he stayed cautious. I don’t blame him, because we must have looked like an odd bunch, His eyes went wide when he saw me. Seridas asked him if I belonged to this village but he ignored the Worgen completely and walked over to me. In a crystal clear voice he asked me my name and where I came from. I tried to speak and much to my own surprise I found I could speak the same language as the elder. This language felt much more natural to me then the human language I had tried to speak so far. I didn’t know that I could speak this language, but the village elder speaking had apparently made that part of my past unlock in my head. At first it was difficult to speak but soon I was speaking as good as the elder was. Meanwhile the rest of the villagers had come out and were now standing in a circle around us, listening to me. I told all that I knew and the elder proved my suspicions were right. This was not the correct village. Nobody had gone missing from the village and neither had anyone ever heard of me. He also informed me that there were dozens of Murloc villages all over Azeroth. It would take a while to find the correct one.

The next day we were all up early to continue our journey. We said our goodbyes to the Murlocs and I thanked them for their hospitality. I had been overjoyed having been able to speak to my own kind, but the time had come to find my family. Both Seridas and Frazzle offered me their help in finding my family, but they had to go their separate ways now.
I had expected this and had been thinking about it that night. Frazzle had told me a lot about the Lost Isles, and it seemed like an appealing place. A warm climate, lots of water and Goblins that were always glad to help. But at the same time I saw this weird look in his eyes, as if he was not being completely honest about it. So I decided it was probably best to go with the Worgen. Even though my gut instinct told me it was the best choice I still remained uncertain. Seridas had not told a lot about the Worgen of  Gilneas except that they were negotiating to join the Alliance. So I chose to travel with the Worgen, something that Frazzle was very much disappointed about.
Not long after we had split up Seridas turned to me and said I had made a smart choice. Goblins were traders alright, but they trade anything and everything and may have tried to capture me to make money off of me. He laughed as he said that Goblins would probably sell their own family if it gave them a decent profit.

The road to Gilneas became darker and  more nightmarish with every step we took. Unseen things crept in the shadows and more then once we heard some animal scream in the woods. It did not seem to bother the Worgen but it caused me to jump several times, drawing my gauss rifle and aiming it at possible threats, but nothing happened.
Still I was glad when we passed through the gates in the Greymane Wall and I could see Gilneas in the distance. Dozens of buildings with light pouring out the windows welcomed us. But as soon as we entered through the main gate a patrol of city guard stopped us and ordered me to follow them to the city hall. Seridas and Esamir had to stay behind.
The city hall was an impressive building, and it was heavily guarded as if something or somebody important was inside. As I entered a large meeting room I saw three people sitting at the table that were in a heated discussion about something. They welcomed me but I could not help and notice their curious looks as they looked at me. The person on the left, a woman with blonde hair, got up and introduced herself as Jaina Proudmoore. The man to her left had fiery red hair and was called Rhonin. Next to Rhonin there was another person called Krasus. He resembled a tall human, but with pointy ears and an oddly pale skin. Jaina Proudmoore then explained that several strange things had happened throughout Azeroth the last few days which all seemed centered around my arrival. I needed to tell everything I knew.
 
I explained as best as I could what had happened to me. During my tale I could see the amazement on the faces of Jaina and Rhonin. I realised that in this world of magic, werewolves and demons my story would seem to be bordering on the impossible, but they believed every word I said. The expression on the face of Krasus however grew more concerned as I continued my story.
As I was speaking I ran into the blockade in my mind again. Krasus frowned as he saw me struggle. When I mentioned the resocialization process and the blocking of old memories he offered to remove whatever it was. I gladly accepted. He wasted no time, seemed impatient even. His eyes locked onto mine and his gaze seemed to look right into my soul. A chill ran down my spine. As I relaxed a bit I suddenly felt his presence in my mind. I was surprised to learn that the person Krasus as he was sitting at the table was not his true self but a mere illusion that he chose to use when he was among humans. In reality he was more then that, and far older then I could have possibly imagined.
Like a spider in a web Krasus tiptoed through my mind, looking for the key to unlock my memories. He made slow progress at first, but I did sense him steadily working his way to the core of the blockade. From time to time he managed to untie a memory pattern, which send ripples through my mind and causing fragments to emerge. I saw a Murloc village on the shore of a lake. It was different then the one I had visited. There was a cave. And a room with humans in white suits looking at me. It didn’t fit together yet somehow it had to be. Krasus finally found what he was looking for and he started working feverishly to solve it. As he succeeded I felt the veil in my head being lifted and my brain was being filled by a waterfall of returning memories. Everything finally fell into place.
 
I was born on the shores of Lake Everstill in Redridge. Like any young Murloc I had been adventurous and curious about the world outside the village. One day I had ventured far from the village as I fell through a crack in the rock wall that I tried to climb. I landed in a pool of water far below ground which saved my life. When I climbed out of the pool I marvelled at what I had discovered. There, between two crude pillars, was a swirling blue portal. Ofcourse back then I didn’t know what a portal was, so I strolled towards it. As I touched the portal I felt as if I stretched to infinite length. Time seemed to stand still for a moment before a blinding flash nearly knocked me unconscious. The first thing I saw again was a room full of humans in white coats who looked at me in shock. They had apparently been working on teleportation technology on Tarsonis but had somehow accidentally connected to the portal beneath Redridge on Azeroth. Since I had nowhere to run the humans managed to capture me quickly. They ran dozens of experiments on me and brainwashed me after they were done. The marines wanted me for their special projects as well so thats how I ended up becoming a space marine.
Now, several days after my memory has returned, I am about to go back to Lake Everstill to visit my family and village. They have already received word that I am alive and well and are waiting for me. The underground  portal in Redridge was destroyed to make sure nobody could ever come back through it. It would also mean that I could never go back to the Terran Dominion, but Krasus assured me that if I ever did want to go back that he could create a one-way portal to send me there.
 
My name is Grunty. I am a Murloc space marine. I will return to Alpha Squadron when duty calls, but for now I will make it my mission to protect the inhabitants of Azeroth, Horde or Alliance, from any Zerg that dare show up.

---- Transmission Ends ----

my version of Grunty

Running as swiftly as her short squat legs would let her, Gavnor darted into the cover of the trees. Pressing her hand to her aching side, she surveyed the damage to her side and lower leg, she knew she was slowly dyeing, but wondered just how long could she hold on, she was pregnant, close to giving birth, which was why she was in the predicament she was in, she knew full well that she never should have gotten pregnant, yet here she was, and to top it off, she had been feeling the contractions for hours now, racking through her body. cursing softly, as darkness slowly surrounded her. she lay down, hoping against hope that they had lost her trail, for she knew if they did find her, it would be her death, for committing the heinous crime of getting pregnant.

Hours later. she bit her lip hard as another fierce contraction ripped through her body, and felt the young fry convulse and birth from her body, into this strange land that she now found herself in.
looking down, she looked through the litter of fry that she had just given birth to, realizing that none had survived, at least that was a blessing,  looking again, she realized her mistake as a lone one, began to wiggle and squirm among the dead fry, she quickly scooped it up and tried to raise up, grunting painfully, as the wound in her side made itself known again,  as quickly as she could, she moved away from the dead fry, hearing as she did, the forest noises around her, she knew she needed to seek some safety for the new young one she held in her arms, never would she surrender to anything or anyone on this strange planet, a merloc she was, and a proud one to, but in exile now for getting pregnant, but if she survived, she would deal with that later, after all, she was of the upper echelon of the murloc society and a proud marine warrior to boot.

Dais sat back, how could this happen to him, of all the things to happen, did someone hate him?, had his family disgraced him without his knowledge?
After all hadn't he shown them all how glorious his wagering and bargaining  was,  to be given this assignment, the disgrace was just to much to bear, he had been told he had to meet secretly with a Worgen for whatever reason, oh, how he hated the idea, a dumb worgen, why they were with the alliance, of all things, and how he hated the alliance, true they were in a kind of forced truce, but still, maybe he'd kill the cursed worgen after he received the dumb papers he was suppose to get, well, off to the meeting place, this blizzcon 2009 thing, no he didn't want to do that either, he just wanted to,, what?, to go and kill the bloody alliance and....

Kiera had no idea why she had been picked to meet with the Goblin, but she would do what she had to do, then go and return to her homeland, she sorely missed her beloved pets already, and wondered how long this would take, the blizzcon thing had just confused and scared her, but she had her work to do, she had found the little green goblin Dais, and now they were leaving Blizzcon and heading back, surprisingly she did find Dais good company, maybe this forced truce was a good idea, well, she and others would find out, but it would take years before anyone really knew, how well it had worked.,

Breathing heavily, Gavnor, surveyed the vast area she now found herself in, she knew that her body couldn't hold out much longer, how long had she been carrying her precious little fry, she didn't know, hours?, days she thought?. She had sensed and now  knew she was being stalked by some creature, knowing it was the blood from her wounds that had attracted it, she moved through the underbrush, feeling lost and alone on this hostile  strange planet. she knew the animal was behind her, whatever it was and that she was it's chosen meal for the night, could she out run it, no, most likely not, but maybe she could outsmart it, if she was quick and smart enough.

Wondering down the path, Kiera and Dais bantered back and forth, commenting and discussing several topics, both enjoying this strange encounter that in a thousand years Kiera knew she would have never figured she would be in, how fascinating this was. ,strange, that one could feel so alive, so close to nature. Keira, laughed at her wayward thoughts for whatever reason, she was enjoying herself more than she had in years.
The scream of a shadow panther abruptly brought Kiera back to reality, as she realized how close it was, most likely on its nightly prowl for food,  Kiera, smiled ,knowing the ways of the wild , again dreaming of her homeland, and being home again, 
Startled again by the sudden thrashing of the brush next to them,. both Kiera and Dais  jumped back as
 A blood soaked merloc came crashing out of the underbrush and ran straight into Dais, knocking him down, quickly followed by a flying jet black panther, which realizing that its dinner was now compromised, put up a feeble fight and ran back into the underbrush,
Kiera had no like for merlocs, nasty little creatures, that they were, but this one looked strange, wearing of all things, a shimmering blue body shaped peace of clothing, she looked down at the sprawled unconscious form, seeing the small fry in its arms, wondering how strange, a merloc wearing clothing and looking for all the world like it was trying to protect its young??
merlocs usually didn't take care of their young, they had no intelligence at all, and were usually at war with anything not part of their small villages, usually warring with anything and everyone.

Dais watched the Worgen bend closer to the foul smelling bloody merloc and wondered at the craziness of this night. But hunched his skinny shoulders in a shrug. accepting the strange chance encounter, along with all the strange things he was having to deal with this night,  Becoming friends with a Worgen had been a rather uncharacteristic reaction, but Kiera was like no one he had ever met, and she had such a warm personality. and now this merloc, it was just another part of the unnaturalness of the evening,

Kiera looked down at the unconscious unusual merloc, examining the small baby fry and tried to make sense of it all, coming to no conclusions, while quickly realizing that the merloc was injured, her healers side took over and she began to examine it in Ernest, looking over the baby also.  Soon realizing that the "mother?" was mortally injured and half starved, it/she had given birth maybe 2 to 3 days ago,  she tried to comfort the mother as best she could, suddenly realizing that she was staring into a pair of intelligent soft brown eyes, she backed away, in confusion and awe.

Gavnor looked up into a warm pair of caring green eyes, wondering who and what it was, she grunted in pain ,asking  the creature who it was, for she had never seen its like before, but could tell that it was intelligent, by the way it had been handling itself, as if that were not enough to already deal with, she then saw another creature, that resembled a katow, it was a small creature, greenish in color, small and squat, with squat features. she shook her head to clear away the dream she must be having,  only to open her eyes on the same picture as before. realizing she had little time left before her body gave out, she tried to lift her fry and talk, hoping that they would know her language, if either of them knew any language at all.

Kiera watched as the gravely wounded merloc tried to lift her baby and grunted, in a strange gurgling language, trying to impart something of great importance to her, but what she couldn't understand. slowly Kiera touched the baby, watching the mother, wondering if she was trying to tell her the name of the "child"?   trying to make sense of the words, she asked if the baby's name was Gunt, Gant, Grint, Grunt? Grunt, is your child's named Grunty? sensing that the mother was at the limit of her endurance and  wishing she could understand the mother, she took the child and layed it down beside it's mother while she tried to take care of the wounds covering her body, taking stalk of the wounds on her head, lower back, side and  upper leg, she wondered how she had lasted this long.  Kiera knew that the mother couldn't be moved without serious problems, and decided to make camp at the side of the road, and began building a fire, asking Dais if he would help, and either find or make something for them to eat,  Grumbling, Dais agreed, quickly moving off into the forest and soon returned after dispatching a small rabbit, and began preparing it for the fire

Gavnor knew she wouldn't last the night, silently crying for what she was losing, she knew that they did not understand her language, but hoped that they would take care of her little one, what had they called him,,  Grunty?  a strange name to be sure, but he was in a strange land, and would be living a strange life, far stranger than any she could comprehend

she could feel her life slowly leaving her body, knew she was now in fact truly dying, she wanted to leave  her child something to remember her by, but what does a marine leave a child, marines didn't have children, marines were not suppose to have any family, accept their parents and brothers and sisters,  no marine had ever had any fry that she knew of,  an emptiness enveloped her as she realized how much marines gave up, to become the fighters that they were,  an unknown anger began to brew up in her, an anger of how she had been deceived by her elders, slowly the life ebbed from her body, she turned to the tall slender creature who called itself  Kiera and again tried to talk to her, shrugging out of her uniform, trying to take it off, thinking of giving it to her only child, something that she knew would protect him always and  could  help him to remember her by, for her uniform was no usual uniform, but it was a marines uniform, it could do almost anything, become almost anything that a marine could want or use, hoping against all odds that the  Kiera one would understand her actions, Gavnor continued to slowly painfully try to remove the clothing.

Kiera looked down on the mother who was trying so hard to make her understand what she wanted, as the mother began to pull at her own clothing  trying to remove them, in stunned silence, Kiera began to comprehend the actions of the merloc. disbelieving that the mother  wanted her child to have her clothing, so she won't be without something from her, how odd, I never knew of a merloc to do something like this,  I guess this is no ordinary merloc, not ordinary at all. helping the mother out of her clothing, she began to undress her and rewrap her in a warm blanket, taking the wondrous blue fabric and soon swathed the child in it shimmering body shaped peace of clothe that its mother had worn, watching with awe and shock as the clothing began to rearrange itself as if by magic, to slowly reform around the child to fit it in size, as if it was made for the child,  she now knew that this merloc was not from around here, but from somewhere else, but where, she knew not.

That night Kiera dreamed and wondered about the small little baby and its mother that had been thrust upon her and her new friend Dais, of the unusual circumstances, and fate that had brought them all together, Slowly waking up to a mewling crying sounds, Kiera woke to find that the child was cuddled against her, and sadly that its mother had passed away in the night, curled up against both Kiera and its child. Crying softly for what she knew that both she and the child had lost, for the first time in her young life, Kiera found herself standing with an enemy Goblin, burying a very strange merloc and feeling desolate.

Dais asked Kiera what she was going to do with the child, because in no way could he take care of such a little thing, it would most likely die anyway, and he really had to be on his way. he was so sorry but he really had to go, but he would be in touch with her again, and gave her one of his precious talking stones, the other he would keep  so that if she needed him, she could get in touch with him, using the precious stone which , a mage, years ago, had given him, telling him of their special innate power, and to never lose them, for they would come in use years later, little did that old tauren mage know.

Kiera fingered the strange fabric that Grunty had been swathed in, when she had found him years ago, how long had it really been, 2 or 3 years?., and Grunty had surprised her, day by day, growing up with an unbelievable intelligence and curiosity that was unparalleled from anything she had ever known, he was far advanced than any of the other Worgen children twice his age, secretly she had taught him all she knew, and she knew vast amounts of knowledge, from reading every book in the  Stormwind library that she could lay her hands on. And his greed for more knowledge kept growing, he had began to play with some of her alchemy sets and then began working with Abel's engineering sets, when Abel had found out, he had been furious at first, but had softened toward the little scamp, for Grunty had grown on the old timer when he had met him that fateful first week when she brought him back home. 
Abel had been one of the first that was affected when the curse came to Gilneas, he had been a boy then, and years later, had traveled and had seen a lot of  Azeroth, he had been to both Kalimdor and the Eastern Kingdoms and had been to the Outlands and to Northend, he had seen a lot, but refused to talk much about his experiences, except only to Grunty, for some reason, everyone found a soft spot for the little merloc, and Grunty was able to peer deep into the depths of any that he came into contact with.

the strange fabric that Grunty always wore, seemed to always fit him, and at times it seemed to meld to his individual thoughts and molded itself to his whims and fancy, he would wear other things, but always had on, as he called it, mommy's shimmer cloths, for Kiera had told him all about his mother, drawing pictures of her and telling him stories of what she remembered of that fateful night. Grunty had wanted to hear the stories almost every night and still craved anything he could find out about his mother, which unfortunately was very little.

His 7th year now passed, lazely, Grunty sat in the Big arm chair, again reading his favorite books about the land that he now called his own, going over everything he could find about the wars of Azeroth, and the inhabitants living within her sphere. He wanted to learn all he could and meet every one of its people, tho he called himself a Worgen, he wanted desperately  to meet and see all of the inhabitants ,the humans, dwarfs, night elves, gnomes and the Draenei, those from another planet, they were all his people, he had books that he had either found, or begged Abel to get for him, about them all, and Abel's stories, were the best, the ones he cherished more than anything, when Abel could be talked into telling him of his adventures, we became enraptured, listening to every word, living every sentence  told to him, so incredible was Abel's life, that , he wanted to hear and, experience all he could.  Grunty had decided long ago that he to would explore as Abel had, as much of Azeroth as he could, even wanting to experience and adventure to the horde cities and lands as well as the alliance, for the horde also exited him, he so wanted to meet a tauen, an undead, or even a troll, how exiting it would be to possibly meet a orc or a blood elf, he had met a Goblin, Dais, but didn't remember much from the encounter, because he had been a small fry at the time, but had talked to him using the talking stone that Kiera had, oh how he wanted to go exploring, thinking of these things, he fingered his treasured shimmy fabric, that was his mothers, feeling it move beneath his fingers, as it always did, and remolding to what his mind seem to want. looking down, he smiled at the shimmy blue then the neon green colors floating upon and in the fabric its self, he wondered at this marvelous fabric, for no other fabric could do what shimmy fabric did, someday he might test it, but not now, he was to attached to it to even think of destroying it accidentally while examining it, he knew the fabric gave him protection, for there were times that it had saved him from severe scratches and cuts from his explorations around Gilneas, and into silverpine forest. someday he would test it out, to see what it was made of, for now, it reminded him of his mother, making him wish he knew more about her, shifting his hand into a newly formed pocket, he fingered the feel of new paper under his touch, and realized that he was holding onto a peace of paper that hadn't been there a minute ago. pulling the paper out, he unfolded it and looked at the strange writing on it,  he ran to Kiera, his nana, and showed her the new paper, and how he had found it, Kiera looked the paper over, often wondering, how the fabric had the ability to contrive and manufacture all the pictures and pages that Grunty had found concealed in it over the years, all the pictures were of his mother, or strange places, most likely where his mother was from, and the pages with strange writing, she figured that that was the written language of this mothers to, maybe someday, Grunty would be able to read those letters and pages, and learn more about his mother.

His 12th year now behind him, Grunty listens to the noises of battle, forging on around him,  looking down at his shimmy armor, for that is what it really is, an armor suit, given to him by his mother, so long ago, all to soon, his world had come crashing down around him, by what others were calling the great cataclysm, true he had seen wonders, traveling to and seeing so many cities, and marveling at so many things, meeting hundreds if  not thousands of people,, he had been to Ironforge and to Stormwind, and was impressed with what he saw, he had met those in Exodar and learned so many things,  in those 5 years, his journey into horde lands had been a complete surprise to him, and he had met some memorable people there to, the Tauren, the orcs, both races overwhelming to say the least,  the ones he had learned the most from had been the Blood elf, a proud fierce people, but now so much had been lost, so many lives thrown in chaos, and his own people, again the curse was causing so many problems,  he had gone berserk when Kiera had been killed, had gone in a red rage, his suit undergoing a transformation that had scared many, and where the gun had come from, he had no idea. he had become almost mindless with rage and had gone on a killing spree that still scared him, how had he known how to handle the gun,  it had almost been a natural thing, all he knew was the gun was there, materializing out of the fabric of his suit, and his suit, shifting, layering and organizing over his body, becoming something he had never imagined. a protecting armor like no other he had ever seen

Kiera was dead, as was Abel, he swore he would avenge his nana and Abel, and the others that had befriended him, and he would help to get back the ones that had been taken prisoner,
this he swore to all, he would avenge the wrongful death of Kiera

This is an adventure that was told to me months later of the happenings for one of its witnesses, as I asked her of waht happened these nights, being I myself witness of the uncommon reunions they made at the Inn. I have already writed it down in my own language but wanted to write it in the Common Language because I suspect it will be important some day. Besides, as a Ironforge Dwarf, registering my personal history is registering History itself, we never knows when History is being made until its too late to have a real story and compile and confront many versions is the only way to know what happened.

I hope my squalid knowledge of Common will be enough to make this inteligible and ask for the reader to forgive me of any misspelling or grammar slip. Here is what happened then.

Early night at the Tavern of Duskwood, Darkshire.

Six Goblins and 2 Worgens sit around the same table, calling attention of all around.

They discuss how the worgens would pay a loan they had with Mittrix, the leader of the Goblings.

One of the Worgens was saying he got a job from the Duskwood Mayor and it would be enough for him to pay the debt with the Gobling and save some for him to get home before his military leave expired.

Gruuwolf, the Worg who was talking, then explained the mission, he was to go to the place where Duskwood road forks with the road that leads to Strangleton and deliver a message to the patrol camped threre. They then would give him a document as proof of his devlivery. On getting back to Duskwood Mayor he would pay him golds enough to make everybody happy. "Easy task, easy gold", he told them as a mean to finish the argument.

Mittrix, the aparent leader of the Goblings, wasn't that so sure about and looked at his own fingers for a long time, taking no attention at all to his mates, who talked together and loud enough to no one to understand what where they talking about.

He finally looked at Gruuwolf whith his smart gaze and a half smile and said that he wasnt going to stay put while Gruuwolf was out in the enemy infested woods, risking to die over an unpayed debt while completing his task, to the surprise and unhappyness of all other goblings on the party, who where planning to get some rest in this so agreable place.

Moody, a female young Gobling, told them she was then going to sleep, to get up early for the quest. Gruuwolf explained her and all others that, unfortunately, the orders where to go during this very night and he was already late for the job.

Half an our later the whole bunch was strolling past the pumpkin farm and the cemetery in silence. At this point lanterns where unlit, it was easyer to see at moonlight, even with the mists falling, and more dificult to be spotted for any unwanted company.

Gruuwolf and his friend where all ears and noose, and the goblings, usualy talkative, where surprinsingly quiet, weapons unsheated.

The road wasnt any problem and they reached the camp little past midnight. Gruuwolf produced a sealed scroll to the woman who was in charge. Then things started to complicate. The officer explained them she should wax seal the document Gruuwolf was supposed to bring back to Mayor, problem was that some field worgs atacked them at the dusk and, even whith no grave harm to no one, managed to stole a chest where the seal was.

After a coffe around the bonfire Mittrix asked more about the wood worgen in question. Eeryn, the officer in charge, told them they used to stay in small camps in the northern side of the hill in the other side of the road. She would be glad if she could lead a party on them, but she was ordered never to leave the camp and so she would do. Mattrix then asked his own group if they where willing to get to these worgen, excep for the worgen present, who would not want to fight their own race.

Gurtrag, the other worg, told them it wasn't any problem to him to fight these rebels and Gruuwolf agreed. He then wanted to make things clear, arguing he wanted an equal part of any loot that could result of this raid.

They all agreed, after some hesitation from the Goblings, of course, over minor details that could never happen.

Eeryn explained the worgen camps would be easyer to reach circling the hill to the west, but part of the way should be done by the road, because of wolves that lived in this region.

All agreed, they departed at one in the morning, lanterns unlit as before.

The tracker eye of Gruuwolf was set to the ground of the road side, looking for signs of the rebels leaving the road. Finally he spotted some signs and told his friends it was time to get to the woods. When they where about to leave the road they where attacked by a strange creature, enormous and white, using as weapon a kind of iron chain whipe with a spiked iron ball at the end. They could get to a safe place because they where warned on time. The crature maked such a noise while walking, stomping the ground loudly, that they realised danger and the way to flee on time. Moody noticed the thing has a third arm on its back.

Now they where on a open grassy wood and could hardly see where the hill was. They had to open their way through some spiders to get to a camp whoose bonfire they spotted. There where about five worgen, two sleeping, the others around the fire. Gruuwolf was suspicious about it looks so easy and asked the rest of the group to stay put while he left. Gurtrag asked everyone to be prepared to an atack and they got ready. Ten minutes later Gruuwolf was back with some coins on his hand and a ferocious smile over his face.

He told them the worgs in there where probably the same guys who atacked the Aliance camp, its tracks comming from that direction still fresh. They where seven in the raid he said. "Now I'm sure they're only five" he said smiling. They moved on after discussing who would do what and got to positions. The two worgen atacked first, as planned, getting all the atention of the enemy on them. The Goblings came later, swiftly taking most of them by surprise. The rebel worgen where fierce but surprise and number easily overpowered them and in some minutes of rough fight they where laiyng on the floor.

Exausted, all party but Gurtrag sat down to have a little rest. Some minutes later Moody started collecting the loot, while Gruuwolf looked around for the chest or any sign of it. He found it behind a tree, at the same time he heard a noise he never heard before, a kind of goorgling that he identified as some sort of crying or a help cry.

After signaling Gurtrag and handing him the chest, he got cautiously to the direction of the strange sound, following the base of the hill. His acurate powers of scout naturaly got startled by signs of fight on the floor, it looked like someone was chased in this place. Strange tracks, as if two giant frogs where being chased by at least four worgs from the camp they atacked. The goorgling sond had stopped for a while and he decided to follow the tracks to see what would them tell him.

After some minutes of comming and going around the track he got to the bodies of two yellow creatures, kind of a merging of a fish with a frog.

Signs around their bodies showed him there was a rather rough fight in the place. The creatures wore marks of rope around necks and wrist, one of them had a piece of rope around his neck. He wondered how such small beings could stand a so savage fight against worgen. Should be a realy savage and skilled kind.

He tough they deserved a proper buryal and came back to his friends to talk about it. They presented them warrior honor and buried them, rolling and placing a large stone boulder over the graves to mark the place.

After a little rest where Gruuwolf told them the tracking story Mittrix suggested it was time to go back. Gruuwolf wanted to stay a little bit more, cause he believed the sound he heard wasn't emitted from the dead guys, as they where dead for a while for the signs. After a little argument with Mittrix tey settled that twenty minutes would be enough, would Gruuwolf find the noises origin or not.

They came back to the worgen camp in silence until he, as well as most of the party, heard the strange noise again. Cautiously he tried to identify the direction of the sound and got to a bush, a little far from the base of the hill, surroundong a very old tree. There was a bundle, som sort of gray woolen cloth, hidden under the branches. As his hand got to it the thing made some movement, and the strange goorgling sound again. It was faint, as of some week creature where producing it. He reached to the bundle carefully and opened the wool tissue to reveal a tiny versio of the guys they had buried earlier. The poor thing had its enourmous eyes half open, was trembling and breathed with dificulty.

"Its a baby!" sayd Moody, as she got it to her lap. The others wondered if the buried guys would be this baby parents or guardians. Mittrix told them one of them was a female, he knew this creatures from some adventures in Barrens long ago. Most probably they had hide the baby and runned the other way so to get the worgen atention on them, hoping to save his life.

Back to the Darkshire guards camp they handed them the seal, that was found in the chest. At Duskwood Gruuwolf was paid for his job afte a long speech about bravery and commitment  by the Mayor, and things where settled between him and Mittrix.

Before going to beds they stayed by the fire talking about the adventure they had. Examining the woolen cloth Gurtrag could see strange marks on it. Again, Mittrix could identify these them as being identical as some marks he has seeing at The Exodar.

After Moody and the Innkeeper tryed diferent kinds of food the baby finally accepted some raw fish and pure water, and got to sleep. "Are you sure it will survive?" asked Moody to the Innkeeper, but she wasnt that hopefull. "I have seeing so many to die... Lets hope this baby will survive", she said in a sad way.

In the morning Gurtrag said farewell to the party and thanked all for the adventure whish he enjoyed. After breakfast he left Duskwood while his friends decided what to do with the little fishy thing they found. Mittrix was inclined to leave it to the Innkeeper, but she told them she was very busy and, even if she was willing to keep it, she couldn. Gruuwolf argued he was going to be in Darnassus as part of his errands and a ship to The Exodar wouldn't be any trouble. As Mittrix recognised the inscription on the cloth as being Draeney, they probably would know what to do with the baby.

After lots of raw fish and water the baby was now looking more healthy, Moody taking care of it as no Gobling present would dream she was capable of. It goorgled to her and looked to her when she talked something, forming in the little face something that resembled a smile. The Innkeeper and the maids deserved the same treatment from it, and would be around it as well, and during the nights there was allways one of them wake and at the baby's side.

As Gruuwolf was asked some more missons from the mayor and Mittrix was doing more business than he expectedwith the citizens and the army they stayed there for some more days.

Finally Gruuwolf had to go, if he wanted the time he still had to be enough for his last mission of delivering the little fishy friend to the Draeney. Mittrix and Moody announced they would go with him, to his surprise, while the other Goblins would saty to finish some of the bussiness they started there. The Innkeeper and the maids all said long weteyed goodbyes to the small creature they started calling Grunty, and nobody knew how this name came to be used.

Taking profit of Stormwind troops movements they left Duskwood with this unexpected but welcomed (and free of charge, as Mittrix noted) protection.

Walking in his proud manner through The Exodar Chaplain Maisyr went to his commander's bureau quickly, even if still thinking about the infected creatures problems and how to solve it. As he entered the chamber he was surprised to see there a Worg and two Goblings talking to his boss. The older Gobling was finishing a report over the reason they where at The Exodar and then asked for permit to make business there during some days.

Eysin'Otar introduced Maisyr to the guests and then stoped for some moments, holding his breadth and looking fiercly to his folded hands over the top of the table. "The inscription on the blanket says this creature was kept in one of our facilities for observation. It probably was born there, at least his mother has become pregnant inside this facility. We will make contact to know what exactly happened. They probably fled from there. Murlocs are prety smart creatures and its dificult to keep an eye on them all the time. The studies running there where about the possibilitie of making friendship with Murlocks and other species, to help us on the war struggle, once it is of their interest too. So the baby is to be delivered to the scientists to take care of it. There is probably some female murlock willing to take care of it."

Mittrix then made the question that was in his mind for days. "Is threre som kind o reward for us, for the trouble of bringing it bak to you?"

Eysin'Otar gave Maysir a suggestive glance while avoiding a smile.

"Yes, there is. Thats why Maisyr is here. We have not much gold, then i wanted to know if some goods would do."

After thinking for a while Mittrix glanced at his friends. Finally he spoke. "I want to thank you Druid Eysin for being so compreensive with us. Im not sure about Gruuwolf here, hes a warrios, not a merchant. So i propose him to pay in gold for his share and keep the goods. If its all setled i would be gald with some food and rest."

After the visitors left Maisyr looked at his boss with the astonished eyes he saved for the ocasion. The old Druid started laughing at him in a good humored way.

"Maisyr, I know you'll be fine on handling them. Just say the goods will have to be won from our enemies in a easy raid. You should make it as easy for them as possible under the circumstances, would you? As for the baby, nobody but you must know, at least for now, of our joint effort with the Terrans to find the right species that could produce good warriors that wold be help for them as well as for us. I dont know if you was aware of this, so keep it to yourself. As far as I know they where in an advanced stage of contact, even if some murlocks disagreed with any alliance. They got as far as to produce some armor and weapons that suited murlock body requirements." Maisyr got pleased to be worth to know such secrets and kept silent and attentive to his boss. As a sign of the end of the conversation the Druid talked again, but already looking for the many papers on the table. "We will handle him back to them in a quiet way as soon as possible."

Outside the door Moody started walking slowly in the direction of the nursery. She decided to saty with Grunty as much as possible, before it wasn't possible to stay. She was now glad to know he wasn't an experiment subject to be killed, and that was what she feared the most. She would keep it a secret while necessary, she knew Mittrix shouldn't know about it. He would start devising a way to take some profit on the situation and end up putting Grunty in danger. Ok, she wasn't Grunty's mother, but was the only one who could take care of his safety by now. After all, he was soooo cute, was't him?

Winksy12 , dedicated WoW player, is proud to present the red-hot action-drama-sci-fi-WoW based-Murloc Comedy that is:

GRUNTY THE MURLOC MARINE: The legend.

Prologue: Abandoned by his mother, alone in the woods, the homeless, hapless murloc Grunty was... crying like there was no tomorrow. As we all know, the legendary screams of the Blue Coastal Murloc can break the sound barrier (assuming the murloc is not suffering from a hoarse throat, or if so, is not using Strepsils), and soon the screams attracted the attention of the rather coincidentally nearby Blizzcon '09 Paparazzi. While the people were amazed at this creature, straight out of WoW myth, Grunty was terrified, and after the 126th photo had been taken, Grunty snapped. He cried and cursed and screamed and slashed at all who came near. Then he bolted for the doors. The paparazzi set forth in desperate pursuit, only to be cut off by a Zhevra, who happened to be suffering from stroke. The Zhevra was promptly sued for all it owned by Blizzcon Authorities.

Part 2: For the Murloc!

After leaving Blizzcon, Grunty was soon overrun and surrounded by a huge group Worgens and Goblins. Both fascinated by this amazing coastal creature that lived in neither of their homelands, both demanded that Grunty be theirs to keep. Grunty, terrifed by this display, didn't put in a word until the two races were at each other's throats. They hurtled into battle, clawing and biting, shooting and swearing. Poor Grunty, who had fallen for the friendly ruse the Goblins had been putting on, was bound in electric chains. Eventually, though, it became obvious that the Goblins would take the prize home. Using their high tech rockets and silver cattle prods, they fought off the Worgen long enough to hurl the frazzled Grunty into their Flying machine. The Worgen howled as an innocent creature was taken from them, lost in the dark world of Goblin engineering.

Part 3: Apocalypse and Midgets

Upon arrival at the famous Area 52, top secret science facility in the Netherstorm, the unconscious Grunty was scanned, tested, and promptly sent to the dreaded Room 9. Room 9 was at the very bottom of the facility, half a kilometre underground, and it was were the Goblins were even know working on their greatest experiment, the creation and flight of the Netherstorm X-1 Rocket... Using their most powerful fusion technology, they bonded Grunty's flesh with their most powerful suit of armour. With it, they gave him the gift of a 21. Stock Ammo Sub-machine Gun (SASG). Then they woke up Grunty, strapped him into the X-1 as their prototype astronaut, and sealed the hatches. Soon, the world would be at the mercy of their spaceship and their army of Murloc Marines!

Part 4: Grunty's disgruntled thoughts...

Grunty, the poor stupid Murloc, was, at that very moment, screaming his head off once more. He was trapped inside a huge metal fire-tube, and he was surrounded by flashing lights and numbers AND he was covered in alien-armour! These were all bad things, because in the deep, sophisticated part of the brain locked away in Grunty's head, the facts were:

1. He hated big metal-fire tubes, because all he'd seen happen to those made by the little green idiots, was fly up into the air and explode.
2. Ever since he was an egg, Grunty had suffered from EME, Extreme Murloc Epilepsy, and the lights were NOT helping.
3. And finally... he had a reeeaaaally bad itch on his stomach, and he couldn't scratch through the stupid missle-proof armour (though it was a close thing).

Finally, as the flight took off, the safety straps were robotically loosened. Taking his chances with EME, Grunty proceeded to press, pull, or smash every flashing or lit-up thing within the vicinity of his hands. ( The cabin boy was aghast to find that his treasured bright-red cockroach, whom he had found in a broken engine and petted for many a happy hour, had been mercilessly crushed by Grunty. He sued Blizzard for implementing Murlocs into Azeroth, only to have it clash with the already white-hot case with the afore-mentioned Zhevra, instantly be dismissed, and come back into his mailbox along with a 500 gold fine for wasting court time).

Part 5: Epic FAIL!

T-minus 3, 2, 1....Blast off! The Goblins, oblivious to the commotion inside the cockpit, wasted no time in launching the X-1. With a roar it took off. It soared 10 metres into the air, over the walls of Area 52....and then crashed as Grunty promptly cut the engine.

Grunty, surprised to find that the fire-tube had stopped, was ecstatic at his newfound freedom, and leapt out of the shattered wreck of the X-1. The Goblins, furious to see their test-dummy escaping, ran through the gates of Area 52 after him...only to have their memories of Grunty erased by the Memory Wiper the cleaners fixed moments ago. Grunty gunned the surprised Goblins down with his....err, gun, and using the powerful batteries still intact within the rocket, he combined the power with his suit and teleported to Azeroth.

Warning: The following chapter does not contain the drama and comedy of the previous and later chapters. Read it only if you prefer more actiony, serious, marine-type stuff, as it may sorta ruin it for you if you don't. So, I guess we could call it, a Bonus Chapter.

Bonus Chapter: Grand Theft Grunty

With a flash of light and a soft burst of mist, Grunty the Murloc appeared. He gagged as the stench of his blackened armour washed over him. He was temporarily immobilised by the effects of porting, but within a few seconds he recovered. Suddenly he whirled around, acting on a unkown instinct. His visor flashed with information, GPS, and possible hiding places, while his brain major uncoded and rapidly absorbed the data in front of him. But in a corner of his brain, a wisp of doubt flickered unwaveringly. 'What is going on?' These instincts were strange, these strategist thoughts, unheard of, and as for the lightning-quick relfexes...WHAM! He unwillingly sidestepped just in time for a huge Ice Chimera to jump from the bushes. Fear and horror overrode Grunty's newfound militaristic intelligence, and he cowered as the Chimera turned around...

Grunty desperately tried to think of something, he lifted his little metal stick, and waved it around, he pretended to throw it away. He lifted it again and BANG! A tiny thorium bullet shot from the stick and gunned down the Chimera. 'It had cut open an artery, allowing blood to clog and spill undeterr-'. He shook his head. How did he know this? It was then that it struck him. The suit had granted him this information, these instincts. He rose to his feet, clutching his SASG tightly, he surveyed his surroundings. He knew that from now until he could figure out how to teleport again, until he could fix his suit, that he was alone. In the wild. But he was not afraid. He was fine. He would survive. Because he was, and forever would be, Grunty the Murloc Marine.

Epilogue

The Goblins and Worgen desperately searched for their lost Murloc, but to no avail. Grunty, desperate to live a normal life, had ported to Dalaran. For a time he worked as a Warden and Soldier for the defense of the Violet Hold against the problem of the Azure Dragonflight, which had, quite literally, sprung up overnight. He did his job well, but was terrified after a close call with an Outalnd-bound Goblin search party. He had been forced to miss his shift at the Hold, and the complaints were coming in.

Eventually, it became clear the Goblins were slowly but surely tracking him down. Regretfully, Grunty left his job behind, and with over 2 months wages in his pockets, he hired a portal to Ironforge. Disguising himself so as to not be compared with the Wanted Posters all round the city, he took the tram to Stormwind. He rushed to the High Throne, and throwing off his disguise he pleades with Jaina Proudmoore and the King to help him. He wished to open a portal to the future of StarCraft, where he could live properly and be recognised for who he was. King Varian thought it was a load of Murloc crud and prepared to kill him, but Jaina saw into the little beast's soul and was sorry for him. Together they worked in secret at a research facility at Dustwallow. Finally they perfected their teleporter. Grunty said farewell to the World of Warcraft, stepped inside the portal and...disappeared, just like that (Narrator snaps fingers dramatically)

Epiphany

Some say that Grunty was a monster, an insane, uncontrollable creature that should never have been released from Room 9. Others say that he was, just another Murloc, alebit equipped with marine-class weaponry. But a handful of people, those good hearted kind of people who DO leave the last slice of pizza for their buddy running late, who DO donate just for the heck of it, who want to make the world a better place, know the truth. They know that ever since Grunty was found in Anaheim, was captured by the Goblins and experimented on, achieved (and quickly lost) the position of Warden, and indirectly became the cause of one of the most scandalous lawsuits of all time, he has looked evil in the eyes, and wanted to stop it. Greenpeace praises him, Blizzard sings of his glory, and hyped up fans compare him to the legendary likes of Bigfoot. He is a hero of both man, and beast.

Grunty now lives a life of mystery in a galaxy not that far if you take a left, on a a planet that's actually not that big, fighting too secure peace for all of the universe.

The End

WARNING: Be warned, mortals. The Goblins did not strap  Grunty into a dangerous rocket without a failsafe. Eventually the mind-wiped goblins discovered that they had secreted away Grunty's DNA samples in their labds in Room 9. Already have they created the clones, it is too late to stop them. All we can do is pray, and hope that the codes to unleash these Murloc marines fall into the hands of those who would use them for good...we can only pray....

Good luck to you all. May this archive of information help you if the Murloc marines are ever set loose upon Azeroth...

By Winksy12

Disclaimer: The red-hot action-drama-sci-fi-WoW based-Murloc Comedy which is written above has been written for the sole purpose of casual entertainment. Any references, humorous or seemingly serious related to any gaming or real-life organisations/groups  are not meant to be offensive or taken literally in any way. Please take this into consideration when reading this player-made story. It was made for the purposes of entertaining readers and (hopefully) earning a name as one of the Murloc marine contest winners. Thank you for understanding.

Grunty, the best scout in the space marines, looked around to see no one. His squad all gone, his weaponry missing, even his armor was gone. He noticed a strange green creature appear out of the woods. He dodged their first glances by hiding within a bush. A wolf-like creature then appeared behind him. Startled he grabbed the nearest object, a rock, and hit it upside the head. The wolf-like creature stumbled backwards at the astonishment of Grunty's strength. The green creatures ran up to Grunty to calm him down. They introduced themselves as Goblins. Grunty barely understood them but luckily his translator was still intact, though damaged. The Goblins explained to him that they we're friends, not foes, and would help him get back to where he was from. The wolf-like creature, still in a daze, stumbled towards little Grunty. He tried to explain to him that he was a Worgen, not some beast. Grunty, a bit unbelieving, decided it was better to stay close to the Worgen rather than insult him and more than likely be killed by him. Grunty needed help, they all could see it, so the Goblins and the Worgen decided to help him out. They started off to Booty Bay for the Goblins had a little workshop there that they could use to make little Grunty some temporary gear until he could replace what he had. The Worgen thought it a waste of time to do such a thing. He said it would be better to try and send him back to where he came from asap the best they could. The Goblins threatened to use their knowledge of goblin engineering to blow him back to where HE came from. Grunty, obviously intrigued by the thought of explosives, wanted to hear more of the engineering. The Worgen felt insulted and left, deciding it was worthless and beneath him to try and reason with them. With the Worgen gone Grunty felt more at ease. Grunty and the Goblins found their way to the little workshop within Booty Bay and the Goblins went to work on gear for Grunty. Grunty decided to scout out the new area he was in. While walking towards a location with a giant fish of some sort hanging above it a tall tusked humanoid walked up to him muttering to himself. The humanoid tripped over little Grunty as he walked over him and became enraged. He screamed something about loot and Murloc boots. When the humanoid struck at him Grunty dodged and fought back with lightning speed. The humanoid fell into the water with a great splash screaming "ROGUE!" as he fell. Grunty decided to go back to the workshop. When he reached the shop he found the door broken open and no one inside. He found the gear the Goblins were making for him on a table along with a few mines, bombs, and a wind-up bomb that Grunty had never seen before but decided to take. The gear itself consisted of some metallic armor decorated with the Horde symbol and a nice gun with acceptable accuracy. He searched the shop for any clues that could lead him to the whereabouts of his new green friends. He sees claw marks and obvious signs of struggle along with blood stains everywhere. He finds a note with symbols on it he couldn't understand but noticed a crudely drawn map on the back. Grunty knew maps, he read and made them all the time. He followed the map to a cave off in the center of Stranglethorn Vale. Grunty went into the cave cautiously in case there were traps. He found more blood stains on the ground and claw marks, along with strange symbols on the walls. He was walking for about 20 minutes until he came to a corner with a purple glow coming around it. He heard growling and light mumbling that was to light to be understood. Grunty broke a piece of reflective metal off his armor to look around the corner. Just as he could see something a bolt of energy hit the metal and bounced off hitting Grunty in the mouth taking 3 teeth with it. Not letting himself show weakness Grunty jumped up, grabbed hold of his new gun, and ran around the corner ready to shoot anything that lived. He was shocked when he saw a glowing portal floating within a circle of more strange markings. He looked through and saw his home, just waiting for him to come to it. He then noticed the Worgen he previously got rid of standing there, a dead goblin in one hand and a thick glowing dagger in the other. Grunty felt anger rising inside his chest. He then heard whimpers from the corner and saw the other Goblin, the male, injured, barely alive. Grunty was infuriated by this. The Worgen saw little Grunty in all his rage and laughed. He said that Grunty should have watched the little green ones he traveled with. He then began to explain that he was going to end both the Goblin's lives but Grunty could go home through the portal. Grunty was shocked by this, why was this creature HELPING him? He looked more closely at the portal and his home disappeared and he only saw death. He saw that the portal wouldn't take him home, but to Icecrown Citadel and straight to the Lich King. Grunty knew that if he went through he would surely die also. He aimed his gun at the Worgen. The Worgen just laughed and threw the dead Goblin at him. He dodged the corpse but the Worgen held him in his grasp. The Worgen was deviously pleased but Grunty had something up his sleeve. He pulled the pin on a bomb he had with him. The Worgen was astonished at this view of courage. The bomb went off in a furious explosion but only dazed the Worgen. Grunty smiled as he opened his eyes and pick his gun back up. Just as the Worgen could see again Grunty fired. The furry corpse fell to the ground with a great thud. Grunty took the keys from the table next to the cage and opened it. The Goblin stumbled out and almost fell but Grunty caught him and lied him down. He then began to bandage the Goblin so he wouldn't die. The Goblin crawled over to his companion's corpse and weeped. Grunty felt sorry for the poor strange creature but needed to get home. He searched the Worgen's corpse and found a purple crystal. He held it up to the light and squeezed it. The portal suddenly became clear with Grunty's home. He looked at the weeping Goblin. The Goblin looked up and saw the portal. He said that Grunty should go through and quickly, before it closed. Grunty held his hand to take the Goblin with him, to help him, but he refused. The Goblin said that his place was on Azeroth and Grunty's was through the portal. Grunty felt sad but knew if he went through the portal he could build his full strength up and possibly come back to help his friend in the future. As Grunty stepped through the portal he said something in Orcish that the Goblin didn't quite catch. Then the portal closed. As the Goblin finished sobbing he noticed what Grunty had said, he had said the word "Friend" just before leaving. The goblin was filled with joy then.

Grunty The Space Marine

In the days following the death of Jim Raynor, the Zerg had decided something special was in order. Spending months on end perfecting the right genetic process, the Zerg had turned what was left of Raynor's memory into an abomination. The specifics lay beyond Terran understanding, but it appears the Zerg had taken Jim's genetic code, and merged it with a Zergling. Leaving a being hunched, and amphibious. With the mental capacity for rational thought, and speech, but vocal chords only capable of the sounds "whir" and "lirl".

Upon waking to a world of slime, and throbbing purple creatures, this fresh marine knew immediately that this was not his world. He rebelled. He attempted to flee, but was quickly put down. With no weapons to speak of, and with what appears to be a bad leg, or perhaps just a permanent hobble, the marine was at a severe disadvantage. He was detained, and was kept in the very same room they stored our lost Hero. On inspection of the corpse, he found that Raynor's armor was made to fit him, and Jimmy's rifle simply felt at home in the young man's hands. Luckily, the green marine (not a testament to the marine's color, but instead to his experience) found the most important feature in the armor James left behind. The Sack of Unending Ammo. With his new found toys, motivation for freedom, and complete lack of knowledge about his surroundings, the marine gave a hearty grunt, and steeled himself for battle.

He charges the dirty, purple door, to find it gives way at he approaches, but not to him, the door had given way to a woman of exceptional beauty, for a Zerg. Without further consideration on the matter, and with a healthy grunt with each round fired of his weapon, our marine begins to systematically neutralize his foes. Starting with the woman, he fires with impeccable accuracy and doesn't wait to see if the round landed. Before he can blink, and with one final grunt, the marine discovers he'd downed a dozen of the purple bastards.

He feels a welling of energy in his head, and it's leading him to the north. Without realizing he's doing so, he follows the voice without words, destroying all he comes across along his way. He passes through a door larger than the rest, to find a massive gateway. He is drawn to the controls, where a vision appears to him, perhaps a ghost. It's a man, slightly larger than he, equipped with technology far surpassing his own, or that he's wearing. It's clear this man is from the race who build this gateway, and it's clear the man wants to help him.

"I am Zeratul, and I've seen you before. I know you wish to go home, but this place does not exist. I've drawn you here, though, not to portray bad news, but to instill hope. There is a place to which this world is linked. A place you resemble in appearance, but not in mind. I offer you this choice: You may stay in the world that will not accept you, or travel to the one which will accept you as something less. Your mind is too great for the body you inhabit, and you will never find home. But you may find comfort and care in another place. The choice is entirely yours."

The marine grunts, in his deep thoughts. The life of a pet, being undersold at every corner, and never being suspected of higher intelligence, or a life to use my brain, always on the run, always within moments of death.

He grunts again, and expresses a garbled affirmative.

Zeratul responds"I Obey. I pray you find a new home."

The vision of Zeratul turns back to the controls and decidedly inputs a few commands. The portal slowly turns from a light blue, to a dark purple, and the vision faces the Marine again.

"It is ready for you. May your grunts ring through history."

Zeratul attempts a very human gesture. He stands tall, and renders salute.

The Marine looks himself over once more. Decides he truly is an abomination, and takes his first step toward the portal, and the first step toward his new life.

"Before you go, Grunty, I need to express the possibility of side effects. The portal sometimes gets the reconstitution of atoms wrong. I fear you might find yourself changed on the other side."

Upon landing, forcefully, the young man takes a look to his surroundings. Finding this a world of giants, trees as high as his strained eyes can see, he hides. He chances on a cavern, and, racing against the sunset, he makes camp.

The new sounds, smells, and sights kept the marine awake the entire night, and it wasn't until the saftey the morning sun brought, that he was able to drift to sleep.

Brought awake by the sounds of a heated conversation, one he's quite surprised to understand, he works his way out of the makeshift home, to be stared down by an odd pair. The first seemed to be a beast, thrice his size, covered in dark fur and a bit of a temper. It's clear this creature is a beast built for combat. One of power, one who respects ability. The other is of a size comparable to his own, and clearly respects only money and status. The creatures continue their argument without hiccup.

The large one exclaims:

"You see?! It's creatures like this little thing that should be put on a pedastal! Standing tall from his own, to show his abilities outmatch those around him. This guy knows combat, and isn't afraid to show the fact!"

To which the green skinned retorts: "But where will that get him in life? Saving the weak, protecting the young, is that what you think the world is about? In the end, friends will bring him no comfort! Only money will bring the things that sooth the body. Only money can save him from starvation, can save him from living in a damn cave!"

"Would you listen to yourself? What will it get him in life? What could money ever do for a man without hope? When you find yourself on your deathbed, without a friend, what will money then do for you? And years after, will money bring you the honor of memory? The honor of fame? I would live in a hut with friends and family before I live in a mansion alone."

The goblin gives a short laugh. "Then your quality of death is higher than your quality of life? You life in a preposterous dream! I'll leave you to care for your newfound bretheren, your weak and your young, I have ventures to unfold, and schemes to see through."

The large beast finishes the conversation with:

"Be gone, and know I will live through my family for years past my leave. Know that my happiness is great, though my fortunes are small, and know that never will I know lonliness. In your darkest times, still, I will help you see the light of friendship. Until that day, though, I wish not to see your face."

The little marine listened to this conversation through ears that heard vulgarities and mispronuciations. His brain, far sophisticated beyond these two, translated for him into a conversation he could enjoy. Despite his needing to paraphrase, even for himself, he agreed whole-heartedly with the large one.

With a speech the big guy obviously fails to understand, he explains that he wishes to meet these friends and family. He wishes to know the happiness of which he speaks, and trots off to explore a new land, with a new family, and in a new home.

Some say he is the creation of evil scientists while others think he is the offspring of a Murloc father and a Gnome mother.  
 
 He was found in the woods by a group of Worgen and Goblins. Curious as to why the little Murloc was sitting alone in the woods the group asked him who he was and why he was there.  In response to those questions he just sat there and grunted earning him the name Grunty.   The travelers who happened upon little Grunty decided they could not just leave him alone in the woods they decided to care for the young Murloc but they could not decide who would take Grunty.  With both groups feeling they could better care for Grunty then the other they reached a compromise and decide it would be best to raise him together.  

 As time passes under the care of the Worgen and Goblins Grunty shows little interest in anything but the Goblin inventions and the Worgen ways of tracking and stalking.  Little by little Grunty becomes more comfortable in his new surroundings, and the elders of the clans become more weary of him.  Slowly Grunty begins to open up asking the Goblins if he can help with their inventions with his focus mainly on the weapons and explosives.  Showing a real knack for weapons Grunty quickly adapts and starts making modifications improving them.  

 As for his time with the Worgen Grunty spends most of his time playing hide and seek with the pups always wanting to be it to improve his tracking.  

 The clans gradually start asking Grunty questions about his past but quickly realize he remembers nothing before the day they found him. Not his name not where he is from. Nothing but the fact he wants to be a space Marine.  Upon hearing the news the elders now realize why they fear the young Murloc named Grunty.  Among the elders of both clans it is believed that you have to kill your family to become a space Marine.  As word gets around the clans, fear spreads with most trying to distance themselves from Grunty.  The pups no longer want to play with him and Goblin engineers no longer allow him in their labs.  Confused as to why everyone if afraid of him all of a sudden.  Grunty knows he needs to find answers.  To find these answers Grunty asks one of the few Worgen who will still talk to him, one of the Worgen that found him in the woods.  

 After listening to the words of the Worgen that he sees as his father Grunty assures him he would never hurt him but says he will leave for the sake of the clan.  Fearing the worst for young Grunty the Worgen pleaded with Grunty no to go.  With his mind already made up and no hope changing it he would leave for the good of the clans.  The Worgen, realizing this decided if he could not stop him the least he could do was to send him out prepared.  So he took Grunty to the best Goblin engineer around. At first he was reluctant to help but then the Goblin said OK.  They worked for hours modifying the best weapons for Grunty to use.  For extra protection the engineer also gave Grunty a newly designed suit of armor.  Fashioned in his new armor and weapons in hand Grunty said his good byes and made his way off.  Alone and no idea where to go Grunty heads off into the setting sun.  

 As the days turned into weeks Grunty continued to hone his tracking skills and practiced his marksmanship with an unyielding vigor that few could handle.  While out tracking an elusive and deadly creature known as hogger, Grunty came across a group of the ugliest most foul smelling creatures he ever saw.  These creatures, he found out by overhearing the locals were called orcs. After some time stalking these disgusting creatures they began to attack the locals, Grunty watching the slaughter could not stand it any longer and decided to take matters into his own hands. Using his stealth and cunning he learned from the goblins and worgen Grunty quickly devises a plan and begins to systematically destroy the vile orcs.  After he finished off the last orc the surviving locals came out and cheered calling Grunty the Savior of Goldshier.  

 Word Quickly spreads of Grunty's heroics and he is soon granted an audience with the king of Stormwind.  The king offers to make Grunty a knight of the Alliance but he declines telling the king he wants to be a space Marine.  The king smiled at Grunty and wished him the best and told him he would always be welcomed by the Alliance.  Grunty tired from his travels and decimation of the group of orcs decides to hold up in Stormwind for a while.  After a rest and a bite to eat Grunty decides to explore this strange new place.  He walks around enjoying the sights and sounds, finding himself in the auction house.  Grunty checks the weapons for sale hoping to upgrade but finding nothing useful at a reasonable price he leave to continue his sight seeing.  Grunty soon comes across of group of Gnomish engineers he went to see what they had for sale and quickly realized that the Gnomes unlike the Goblins where not masters of weapons and explosives. The Gnome however had some useful gadgets of their own. Quickly seeing the potential of the knowledge he learned in his time with the goblins, Grunty made a deal with the Gnomes to teach them to harness the powers of explosives and make new cutting edge weapons in exchange for use of their facilities and materials.  

 Over the following weeks Grunty developed amazing new weapons and the Gnomish engineering business roared to heights previously never thought attainable.  After arming himself with his new weapons Grunty again sets off to become a Space Marine.  

 Months after his journey to Stormwind and non stop training Grunty sees what he believes to be the first person he has come across in ages, but in the blink of an eye the shadowy figure disappears.  Deciding to put his skills to the test Grunty goes after the mysterious man in blue.  Weeks go by as Grunty relentlessly searched for the person in blue.  Nearly ready to give up his search Grunty sees out of the corner of his eye what he was searching for.  That blue figure from before sitting next to a tree.  Grunty sneaks up and playfully says "tag you're it".  Startled the stranger reaches for his weapon only to notice it's gone, he looks around to see Grunty carefully examining it.  Grunty looks at the stranger and says your hard to catch.  Handing the weapon to the stranger he says "hi my name is grunty".  Taking hold of his weapon the mysterious man in blue says "I am space Marine Major Dorko".  Unable to maintain his composure Grunty excitedly yells "I want to be a space Marine too".  The two talked for hours Grunty telling of how he was found by the Worgen and Goblins, and sharing his exploits of his travels And his meeting with the king of Stormwind.  Major Dorko Told Grunty how he was stationed on the planet to preform recon.  He also shared tales of his time as a space Marine. The duo fast becoming friends decide to travel together.  

 For months the friends travel teaching each other skills and tactics always training and pushing to become better.  During this time they come across many strange creatures and people with many encounters ending with the two having to kill to defend themselves.  At first it was hard for Grunty to kill but with time it became easier.  Not just easier to kill but to deal with having to take lives.  

 After a little more than a year of traveling and fighting most of the time the pair cross a river into an area Grunty vaguely remembers.  Not sure why he remembers this area he shrugs it off and continues to move forward.  The two come across a small crude encampment, while searching the camp for clues to who or what was here Grunty sees a familiar track and remembers where he is.  Just as he turns to Major Dorko to warn him from out of nowhere come dozens of attackers.  The ensuing battle is fast but fierce.  Grunty quickly readies his weapon and begins to shoot the assailants.  With his excellent marksmanship and the crude weapons of the mangy beast men Grunty easily finishes with the group attacking him.  Grunty looks in the direction of Major Dorko to see him finish the last of the attackers.  Major Dorko looks to Grunty smiling and says "you're getting pretty good, you'll make a fine space Marine" then walks to the corpse of one of the attackers to get a closer look.  

 Examining a corpse of his own Grunty gets a bad feeling in the pit of his stomach, at the same time he hears a yelp. Turning and raising his weapon he sees a beast leap out and attack Major Dorko. Grunty unloads his weapon into the monster seemingly unfazed it turns and heads for grunty.  He reloads as fast as possible then fires again, again emptying his weapon.  This time the monster falls to the ground reloading one last time Grunty walks to the beast and puts two rounds into its head to be sure it stays down.  Starring down he realizes the beast is the deadly Hogger.  He sprints to Major Dorko to see the extent of his wounds, immediately he knows his friend won't make it.  Major dorko barely conscious knows it too.  With his lasts breaths he tells Grunty not to mourn him, but instead be strong and fight on to become the great space Marine he is destined to be.  Overwhelmed with grief and anger Grunty sits down to gather his composer.  After a minute he decides he has to go on, but first he must do something.  He removes the armor and weapons from major Dorko and buries him.

 Gathering the gear to head off he feels something is wrong, looking around he notices the body of Hogger is gone.  Low on ammo Grunty decides it's best to hurry up and leave.  Needing rest and supplies he makes his way to Stormwind.  

 Over the next few weeks Grunty works diligently with the Gnomes updating his arsenal and modifying major dorko's armor to fit him.  With his work done Grunty suits up and heads out to reach his goal of becoming a space Marine.

  Quote:

Originally Posted by Maziel

  Quote:

Originally Posted by DarkJedi66

What's happening here? Your articles are too long ^^

 

LOL

 

It said lots of detail. =D

 

Besides, some of us aren't from the US and couldn't get to Blizzcon for a Grunty Murloc. I'd love one, but I ain't flying to the US to attend Blizzcon for it. =D

Very good quality in your stories....Id pay for that hehe...... And also i'm not from US and Couldn't afford to get their, So This is a pretty nice thing that curse is doing...Allowing Lots of people too express their creativity and also win a little friend :) 

 (finishing sentance of article)

after leaving Blizzcon in search of solitude from the long hours and flashy cameras, they stumbled upon the young murloc and...

remembering how fragile the creature, despite how dangerous it could become, they let it follow them. despite being attacked by a large number of demons like imps, voidwalkers, and Succubus' they went on into the capital city of Gilneas.

There Grunty was placed in a family that would care for him untill he was independant, their relationship growing stronger and stronger. However while Grunty and his newly formed family where hunting they were attacked by a group of undead forsaken that killed his family.

Grunty survived by hiding behind a large grouping of shrubs. He wept as blood seaped from his mothers wounds, at just five years old he had witnessed the murder of his new family... He left then and there to find a new family among the many that roamed Azeroth...

Grunty left to the city of Ironforge seeking a new future, leaving behind his friends at gilneas he journeyed onwards...

There grunty found a crazy gnome that had the idea of an invention known as a "shrink ray".

He gave the gnome five gold to build the invention, afterwards buying ammo and a gun, using the "shrink ray" he quickly created a rapid fire Rifle that suited the size of its user...

1

The Worgens was very intrested in the little Murloc in a space suit. But so was the Goblins. The goblins was interrested in the little murlocs intresting suit, for new weapons and protection. But as both of the races knew, there was only one space marine and therefore only one of them could take him home. They stod a long time stearing at each other, waiting for someone to make their first step. "Wrrr! We'll take the little space Murloc home!" sayd one of the Worgens. "How nice.. You realy think you'll be the one taking him home? Cuas thats never gonna happent!". The worgens were cold as ice, they didnt move a mussle. Until.. "What the? What was that!?!" One of the goblins sayd. All of suddent a man in a murloc costume wearing a blizz flag in he's right hand, had ran in and picked up the little Murloc Marine, and then ran away. "Wrr! This is irritating me!".

"Hey, little fellow, your aint that heavy of a space marine" the mystic murloc costume man sayd. "Brhua lhruaa brarh brarh vruaah" the little murloc sayd. "Yeah i feel the same way little fellow" the man answered.

The goblins and worgens has think'd a way they both could use him, the goblins were only instrested ind he's armor, and the worgens where only intrested in learning the murloc to know, so they would have a chance of getting peace with the murlocs. "We have a idear of how we can get that murloc back" one of the murlocs sayd. "How" the worgens repeated each other. "Well if we just.. What the, get that junalist away from here!"

After a couple of days, i mad some research again, i found out that the goblins and worgens never found the little fellow. And ended up beating each other.
I suppose the little murloc and lives happy, and hopefully, he's a place where he belongs now. I've heard a bird sing that he's take away, in the blizzcon 2009, but who knows.

By: Kundry
Class/Race: Drainei Shaman
Server: Steamwheedle Cartel (EU)

Grunty Cox Part 1

The dark, silent sky over Elwyn Forest was violently shattered for a few seconds by a flash of light and a loud boom.  Just as suddenly the light subsided into a miniscule dot that seemed no bigger than a star.  As the dot grew, it also dimmed and took on the shape of a large Terran Marine troop carrier.  Soon the ship darkened the whole sky above a small murlock village that was nestled by the shore of one of Elwyn's lakes.   The silent hum of engines and whine of stabilizing servos of the ship at first frightened the murlocks to take refuge in the deepest parts of the lake, but as the gigantic Terran marine ship landed a few yards off, the inquisitve nature of the murlocks got the better of them, and they emerged.

A spotlight came on by the bay door of the gigantic carrier ship.  It scanned the area nearby their landing site.  Although the murlock village was detected, the defense sensors of the ship deemed it no threat.  A loud  hiss fractured the renewed silence of the night.  The bay door opened like a gigantic draw bridge, revealing a blinding light coming from the bowels of the ship.  The door, now ramp, landed on the muddy earth with rumbling force that again sent the murlocs scrambling to the safety of their little lake.  When their bright eyes broke surface again and looked upon the bright rectangle of a door, they saw a brigade of marines marching off the ship.

The marines formed organized fighting ranks in the ancient Roman phalanx style.  They stood at attention with rigid compliance and waited for their sergeant to issue orders.  Marine Sergeant Roland Cox walked off the ship onto the muddy earth making loud sucking sounds as his heavy armor made him sink ankle deep into the soft soil.  After making some adjustment to his jetpack controls located on his forearm, he was then able to walk about without sinking.  His armor was exactly the same as that of his grunts, the only difference were the sergeant chevrons painted on his shoulder.  He scanned the area around him with a portable handset, and after a green light and encouraging beep were emanated, he pressed the release hatch on his faceplate, which whined slightly and opened up.

“Alright you worms, the air in this stinkhole is breathable, so let me see yer ugly mugs,” said sergeant Cox while removing a stogy from a pouch at his side and lighting it with the ignition flame on his firebat-issued flame thrower that was mounted on the left arm of his armor.

The unit complied at once and all pressed their own faceplate releases.  The faces on all the marines were hidden by the shadows of the night, however, it was very obvious that they all felt a measure of concern.

The sergeant took a deep drag off his stogie and went on. “Seems HQ gave our pilot some wacky information, and he’s come across what he believes is an uncharted wormhole.  So now we get the pleasure of being the first to explore this mudball to see if it can be settled by the federation.”

The marines looked at one another. They were soldiers trained to shoot first, shoot second, and shoot third... no questions.  Exploring was not in their programming.  They were concerned also as no records indicated that ships lost to uncharted wormholes ever returned.  The marines, however, had little chance to dwell on their worries as a group of engineers emerged from the ship and retrofitted a series of sensors onto their armor-plated shoulder slots that would normally house heavy artillery.  They all seemed to be carrying an array of small satellite dishes over their left shoulder.

“Your orders are,” said sergeant Cox while chewing on his stogie. “Fan out to a 20 kilometer radius at a steady trot of 10 kilometers per hour to let those sensors send back information to our computers.”  His look hardened. “Bring nothing back, engage no enemy, we do not know what this planet is or who lives here, so we don’t want to start another war when we already got one on our asses.  MARINES MOVE OUT!”

The marines immediately and instinctively followed the sergeant’s orders; to do otherwise would be considered mutiny and punishable by death.  As the marines moved out into the shadows of the forest, the air around the gigantic ship became still again.  Sergeant Cox sat by his carrier and watched the engineers work on the engines, ceramic tiles, and other vital parts of the ship that needed constant vigilance to maintain in working condition.  He started to relax, rested his back against the hull of the ship, closed his eyes, and breathed deep the mossy scent of the forest.

Instinct, more than anything else, suddenly warned him to open his eyes.  A spear flew towards him, and with the genetically enhanced reflexes that federation genosurgeons had implanted in him, he dodged without even unfolding his arms.  The spear, bone tipped from the looks of it, clanged against the reinforced hull of the ship and bounced off it likes a toothpick bouncing off tile. Sergeant Cox hit the faceplate control, which snapped closed immediately, and threw up his night vision pane.  On it he saw the most peculiar thing he had ever seen in his entire life.

“Fish people?” Mouth agape, Sergeant Cox zoomed in on one of the funny looking creatures.  They were indeed humanoid fish people. They seemed to breathe through gills, and appeared to be hyperventilating as they stood in dry land.  The sergeant saw that they were all wielding primitive-looking spears, hide shields, and other random weapons that would be extremely ineffective at penetrating his armor, but if they hit flesh they would rip and rend, leaving wicked wounds that may only heal in protein regeneration baths.  With a chuckle he decided to play the ‘fire god’ routine and allowed a stream of ignited plasma to emanate from his arm mounted flamethrower while at the same time cutting on his voice augmenting speakers and making loud ominous sounds.

As he expected, the fish people were all terrified, and scampered off towards their little lake.  What he didn’t expect was that after the adults cleared out and went back to take shelter, a single baby murlock remained behind with bright stars in his eyes looking up at the sergeant.  Baffled, Sergeant Cox again opened his face plate and stared at the little creature with curiosity.  Again he spurted a small amount of ignited plasma into the air, and with some amusement saw that the little Murlock seemed thrilled with the display as he performed a funny little dance.

Sergeant Cox had always been a hard man, with little regard for living things other than his marines, but to his surprise he became immediately endeared to this little creature.  He offered his outstretched and armored hand to the little fish-child, who was no bigger than a puppy, and it climbed on.  Looking both ways to make sure that none of the engineers had seen him, he put the Murlock into his empty provisions pack, and walked back into the ship.

A few hours later the contingent of marines returned. The information gathered by the ship’s computer showed that this world seemed to be inhabited by warlike and primitive creatures who wielded powerful magics.  As per the rules of the federation for colonizing planets, those with sentient beings were to be protected from the skies from the influence of other space-faring cultures, but left alone to follow their own evolutionary paths that would inevitably one day lead them to explore space, at which point they could be invited to join the federation.  Therefore the marines were loaded back into the ship, and left the soils of the Eastern Kingdoms with the assurance that none of them would see this primitive planet again for as long as they lived.  Most of them didn’t, but one of them was destined to return.

*******

Grunty Cox Part 2

Grunty Cox stepped into the armoring room, was donned his full marine armor, and issued his gauss rifle and ammo.  It was not unusual for the Terran federation to accept loyal warriors from other races throughout the galaxy who were friendly to the Terran initiative to eradicate the devouring Zerg horde.  What was unusual is that Grunty was a recruit like no other.  His physiology was completely unknown to any of the engineers in his unit, and so they had to develop custom biological controls for his armor.  This they had done with little complaint as he was the adopted son of one of the federation’s most celebrated soldiers, the now deceased Colonel Cox.  Grunty, as his friends called him for his unerring devotion to join the ranks of his father’s beloved marines, was small in comparison to the rest of his unit.  Those who chose to underestimate him because of his size often paid with broken limbs, and even their lives, when they came to face him in the many training exercises, hand to hand combat, and in the field of battle.  He wielded his gauss rifle with surgical precision, cutting down enemies like wheat at harvest time, with a glee that bordered in the psychotic.  He enjoyed the berserker instinct that led him to be one of his units most effective soldiers, and so he looked forward to any assignments that included land deployment, search and destroy, or even infiltration missions.  This time it was no different.  Along with a small troop of four other marines and a Ghost, Grunty was to be deployed in a faster-than-light pod to a small moon that was suspected of being infested with Zerg.  The mission was simple, protect the Ghost until they reached the Zerg control center and then call down a nuclear strike to wipe out the colony.  Grunty polished his gauss rifle, smiled, and made a gentle gurgling sound in the back of his throat, a sure sign that he expected to have some fun.

The pod flew through hyperspace for uncounted hours.  Grunty and the others were safely nestled in their cyogenic sleep chambers while they were carried to their destination.  The computers aboard the pod registered a nearby star going supernova, and were unable to correct their trajectory enough to completely avoid the shockwaves from the blast.  The pod was sent whirling head over tail, as an errant football, through space.  Its route completelly lost, the computers struggled to regain control and would have been successful had the explosion not caused a rift in the fabric of hyperspace, through which the pod was hurled.

Grunty Cox Part 3

Grunty awoke.  Punch-drunk and confused by the bright sparks of electrical wires ripped from their housing, he shook his head and looked around for his companions.  The cryogenic pods were the other marines and the Ghost had been sleeping were shattered.  His survived miraculously as it was sent careening behind a bulkhead that protected it from the majority of the impact as the pod crash-landed in a wooded area.  Survival instincts kicked in and Grunty put on his helm, adjusted his armor, checked his ammo, and went to look through the pod for any surviving communication equipment that he could use to send a message to home base.  Unfortunately for him, all the electronics in the ship had been fried by the electromagnetic burst generated when the ship had pierced through the fabric of hyperspace.  The ship was scrap, his comrades were dead, and he had no way of sending a signal back to the federation.  For the second time in his life, Grunty found himself completely alone in a world to which he was completely alien, or so he thought.

He walked through the woods, guided by his own biological senses as the augmented electronic senses of his armor were currently unusable.  He walked with a great deal of effort through the forest, hoping to encounter some sign that would tell him where in the universe he was located and, with luck, find a federation outpost.  He came to a clearing in the forest, and sat down to rest a bit.  He was eating some of his army issued rations when out of the woods came a very unlikely group of creatures.  On the right there was a large, shaggy humanoid that looked to be a wolf walking on his hind legs. On the left was a couple of, what he could only refer to as, frog people.  One of them seemed to be a female, the other must have been male. They froze staring at each other, Grunty’s gauss rifle rested against the log where he sat.  The Worgen’s hands twitched at his side and hovered over a pair of wicked looking daggers.  The goblins smiled at each other and nodded.  They stood to the side and reclined their backs on a tree.

The Worgen drew his daggers and at the same time seemed to vanish in a flash of light.  Grunty jumped to his feet, picked up his rifle, and hit the control to close his faceplate.  He stood on top of the log looking around.  The goblins continued to stand by the tree nonplused at the events unfolding.  From his left Grunty felt, more than saw, the Worgen emerge from the shadows and bear down upon him, daggers poised to strike.  Grunty sidestepped off the log and let the weight of the armor take him down.  The daggers hit wood and embedded themselves in it deeply with all the weight of their Worgen master pushed behind their hilts.  Grunty rolled and stood, he loosened a single round off his gauss rifle and struck the Worgen rogue square in the left buttcheek.  He collapsed to the ground as his entire leg became useless and howled in pain while holding his rear with both hands.  At this display, the goblins howled with laughter, slapping their knees, tears running down their cheeks.

“Whorrrl arrrghl you?” demanded Grunty as he pointed his rifle at the Goblins.  Still smiling, but with their glee under control, the goblins put up their hands in a pacifying manner and introduced themselves.

“I am Trademistress Grimtooth,” said the woman. “And my companions here are Gadriel and Swiftpaw.  Two rogues that I hired to accompany me as body guards to attend the most important trade show in the land, Blizzcon.”

Grunty put his gauss rifle down and looked over at the Worgen who had brought himself under control and was now applying a red liquid over his butt wound, which proceeded to heal itself with an unpleasant odor and organic sound.  The Swiftpaw looked at Grunty with murder in his eyes, ready to try for round two.

“That’s enough, Swiftpaw!” said Grimtooth.  “You should know when you’re bested, and now you can stop this foolish boasting of being able to best any opponent, anytime, anywhere.  This Murlock has shown you that what you need is more training, less pride, and definitely less mead.”

The goblins laughed again, the Worgen looked chastised, and Grunty looked confused.

“Whatrrrl is a Murrrrlok?” he asked.

The goblins stopped laughing, the Worgen turned to look at him with puzzled.

“You’re a Murlock” said Gadriel.

“I’m a Terrrran Marrrinegrrrl”

“That may be,” responded Swiftpaw as he dug his daggers out of the stump “but you’re still one of those pesky, fishy, murlocks.”

For a second they stood looking at eachother, then Grimtooth said “You’re not from this world, are you?”

Grunty shook his head.

Grimtooth smiled, “Very well, how about we do this. You come with me and escort me back to my island, and on the way I will tell you all about Murlocks, this world, and other information that you will need to survive here.

Grunty looked at Grimtooth for a few seconds, then made up his mind.  He picked up his rifle, shouldered it, and begun to follow the goblin and her companions into the dark recesses of the forest.

THE END for now.

Part 1 of 2

The air crackled as the atmosphere wretched creating a transportation portal. The night was dark and the energy shot all around the opening like lightning and it illuminated the entire alley way. Young Soarjin was mesmerized by its beauty and awed at the power.  Angry shouts, the wailing of victims, gunfire and explosions could be heard all around them. Enemy hovergunships could be heard circling overhead trying to find their location.

“Told you this was a bad idea!” Shouted the Sergeant. “That damn portal is like a beacon for every one of those bastards hunting us down.” He said while shooting an angry glance at the Technomarine who kept insisting it was the only course of action. The Sarg had seen many battles, lost many friends, even sacrificed his personal life for the well being of the Kingdom and now he felt belittled being a caretaker for the some high born Lady. He thought “this is how dedication is rewarded” and he shook his helmeted head.

Bombs hit close to their location but this patrol knew the battle torn streets of San’Kas City to well to be caught at a disadvantage. The portable cloaking devices where helping them greatly but it was obvious the enemy was overwhelming and tearing the city apart in sections looking for them.

Two Demomarines caught up to the patrol surprised that no one had used the portal. “Sarg!” Yelled the lead Demo. “The explosive charges are in place. We’ll have a building or two dropped on their heads when they get too close.” He said with a glint of glee in his eyes.

“Hoorahhh.” Shouted the other Demomarine as he shot off a flare and fired several gun bursts into the sky. “What...” he shrugged “…like they can’t see that freakin solar event” as he pointed to the snapping and crackling portal.

Lady D’trace held the young child Soarjin close. “It’s alright. We’ll be leaving soon.” She tried to convince herself that these words were for the good of Soarjin and not just to help calm her own nerves. Regardless she connected her suit to Soarjin’s by means of a datalink. “Soarjin, I want you to listen closely.” She started the data transfer. “I’m sharing with you the great knowledge of our race. Your suits computer will easily store what I have.” She glanced around then back to Soarjin “In case this doesn’t go as planned you must protect this information. If need be, use it to survive.” She forced a smile.

“Techno!” Yelled the Sergeant. “Is that thing stable yet or do I have to shove you through it to test it?” He said as he approached the jittery Techno.

Glancing at the Sergeant the Techno started explaining. “It must be the gas they dumped on the city or the old metals that were used to make these buildings maybe both I don’t know . The readings are erratic and a portal has never had this type of effect.” He looked at the readings and at the portal as it shot off a huge energy surge. “I can’t get a lock on our destination. It’s, it’s like picking up a whole different set of codes that I have never seen.” Flustered he continued “This technology is still new and only worked best under ideal situ…”

“I DON’T CARE!” Yelled the Sarg. “Get this piece of junk to work!” and with that he kicked the portal console. A large electrical bolt snapped and sizzled the paint on a near by wall. It seemed to be the Portals response.

A muffled explosion was heard close by and a Demo cursed. “Well that’s one less sniffer they can use to disarm the bombs, hope they didn’t bring five more.” Then another muffled explosion. “Make that four more.”Grinned the other Demo.

Soarjin looked up and over Lady D’trace hoping to see more of what was happening down the alley way but to no avail as a strong hand pushed down. “Stay low little one. Keep checking your gauges on that suit to ensure this gas doesn’t get inside.” Spoke the calm Proctor. He had trained this little one for several years. Very quick to pick up new things, which is good. However, always curious, and that can be a problem.

A hovergunship passed several stories overhead. Its engines could be head changing direction. “It’s coming back!” Yelled the Sarg. “No doubt they are now fixed on our location – Let’s move it Marines.

Gun fire erupted around them from the hovergunship and the ground erupted around them. Bullets rained down and one pierced the top of the Proctors helmet and Soarjin saw the Proctors head explode inside his helmet. Soarjin screamed, “NOOOOO!”

Both Demo’s launched backpack fel-rockets and the hovergunships with flawless accuracy. The craft took heavy damage and secondary explosion could be seen and felt.

The portal fluxed, waned and the light dimmed. The Sarg looked back to see why the erratic nature had subsided only to notice the Techno was dead and laying at the portals rim, a tendril of electricity was connected from the portal to the Techno, it’s body was being used like a grounding wire for the excess energy. The body was beginning to cook and expand in the suit. The Sarg knew that time was short and timing was important.  His attention was drawn back to the sky as the Hovergunship crashed onto the rooftops of the 14 story buildings that surrounded them in this alleyway. Walls buckled and metal, burning fuel, concrete and glass fell like a hellish firestorm.

On the run, Sarg grabbed Soarjin and headed toward the portal. Lady D’trace yelled “Stop” but it was too late, the datalink line was snapped. She got up and started to run towards them and the portal cursing that only 72 percent was downloaded.

“Only one way to test this….” And with that Sarg tossed Soarjin into the portal as the Techno’s body exploded.   The force knocked Sarg and Lady D’trace backward and the portal became even more unstable. Almost like an angry dragon finally released from its grounded imprisonment.

Soarjin screamed as energy ripped through the suits shielding. The comlink was silent but through the portal the Sarg, Lady D’trace and the Demo’s could be seen. Spasms of agony shot through every muscle. Glancing around the helmets HUD that displayed vital information on the inside of the face shield Soarjin got only brief relief knowing the system was holding up…mostly. Looking down at the datalink broken end it could be seen that the portal had attached itself to the severed end. With a great act of concentration Soarjin reached down and unfastened the worthless cable.  The pain subsided. Floating just feet inside the portal Soarjin looked back out the portal and watched the gauges on the HUD begin to report error message. “Hurry Lady D’trace” Soarjin yelled.

Dodging and weaving the two Demo’s made their way towards the portal. One stopped to help the Sarg get up only to be rebuffed by the war hardened warrior. Just as soon as the Sarg was standing a huge chunk of debris decimated both he and the Demo.  The other Demo stopped to help up Lady D’trace to her feet as another large piece of debris smashed the portals controls. Freed from the restraints the portal pulsed, exploded and vanished. The walls of the building around them were weakened by the blast. Several of the charges left by the Demo’s went off. The Hovergunship screeched and pivoted and started sliding down the walls.

“Death comes for us Lady D’trace.” Said the Demo as they dodged falling chaos and ran through a hole blasted in the wall by the portals explosion. Enemy troops were waiting and grabbed them just as the building began to implode.

“Where is Soarjin?” Demanded the enemy leader.

“We are all dead.” Said Lady D’Trace as the walls moaned from the building that was collapsing overhead. “I’m sure your King is listening so let me be clear, you will never get your filthy hands on the Princess.”  With that she kicked the leader between the legs. As he fell to his knees they entire group was bathed in light as the building utterly collapsed.

Part 2 of 2

Soarjin awoke in pain laying face down on what she believed is called grass. Her head felt like it was about to explode. Her stomach ached, convulsed and she threw up inside her helmet. “This is not good” she mumbled and spat. Tilting her head side to side in an attempt to avoid moving her helmet and the remnants of her last meal, she could see odd shapes. “Those are trees from the historical archives. Well Soarjin, we aren’t in Sankas anymore.” She said with a smirk remembering a story she was once told. Wondering for a moment how long she had been out since it was mid-day. Focusing she could see small flying creatures and little critters moving along the ground. “If the air is ok for them it must be good for me. She tried to read the atmospheric data gauges but through the goo all she could read was insufficient data. With that she got to her hands and knees then opened the visor and let the vomit drain onto the ground. The air seemed ok, though wet and had an odd smell, although better that was she was just smelling. She removed the helmet and looked about for Lady D’trace and then remembered seeing the Proctor die and the Sarg and Demo get buried under tons of wreckage and then the portal closed and she blacked out. There were no footprints so is it possible that they didn’t make it? Was she the only one to make it to the rendezvous point? And where is this place? She had never seen this part of her world. Questions are for later, there is work to be done.

Removing a decontamination packet form her backpack she cleaned out the helmet and while doing so had her suit perform a self diagnostic. Wondering when a Royal search party would lock in on her biochip or did she need to start walking and find help.

 What sounded like voices could be heard approaching. Were they friend or enemy?  She wanted to run to the sound but the voice of her mentor the Proctor came to her. “Always be on guard, there are many who say they are friends that would want to see you harmed.” With helmet in hand she made her way to some cover “I think these are called bushes.”

The voices drew closer but she didn’t recognize the dialect or language. To be safe she should get some scans and with that she put on her helmet. External audio had a hard time translating the language at first. Then small bits till finally she understood the conversation and that they saw the portal. One of them spoke in a high toned voice, very fast “Boy have I got a deal for you if we can find out what made that light.” A gruff almost menacing voice replied “We are close, I’m picking up heat fluctuations on the trees. Definitely not normal. It was bright AND hot.”

“Computer, run scans on the two biopeds.” Soarjin said. She watched as the two made their way to the grassy area.

Looking at a wet puddle of something and some sort of opened container and wet crumpled parchment the shorter one said “I don’t know what that is but I’m certain I can’t sell it. Any idea what it is Athiam?” The taller one replied “Tinker, I’ve smelled that before we got to the clearing and believe me, no one wants it, not even whatever coughed it up.” The short one realizing what the tall one was referring to stood up and took a step back. “Eeewww.” The smaller one said and made a face. “Don’t worry Tinker, I’m willing to bet you I can find where that came from and that might get us information on that light.”

Now Soarjin knew their names but had no idea where they came from. Where they travelers from a different system? The computer was scanning and processing and all it could do is state that they were humanoid.  Regardless she knew that these two might start looking for her and she needed to move out, quickly and quietly.

With a grin Tinker looked at Athiam. “Got yer senses on high do ya?”

“Always” was the deep reply. Athiam looked at the ground and followed the mashed grass footprints all the way to the bushes and inside he could pick see heat, body heat. “Whoever you are you need not be worried we are travelers heading home after a having a great time at a convention.” He said trying to look his most sincere.

“I told you not to grin – too many teeth.” Chastised Tinker. “Listen, my friend is correct, we mean you no harm. From what was left over here do you need some help? I have a friend that’s a priest he could heal you, I could take you to ‘em - for a small fee.” Athiam shot a glance at Tinker “umm – forget that last part.”

Again the words of the Proctor “Learning new things are good. However curiosity can be a problem.” Well my old mentor this is a time for both and with that Soarjin took out the pulse rifle from her backpack, altered her voice emitter to sound rough like the Sarg and stepped out of the bushes. “Stay back, I’m a Space Marine and I will not be captured. Who and what are you?”

“Whoa there lil fella” said Tinker as he backed up a step.  “We were serious. We mean you no harm so ease up on the drawn weapons?” He said with a look of disgust. “My name is Tinker Sprocketsocket and I’m a Goblin from a far away Island.” Gesturing to the taller one “and this is my friend Athiam, he’s a Worgen and easy to anger so could you put away the weapon?”

With that she did what the Demo grunt had done, fired off a flare and shot a few rounds into the sky. Unfortunately it knocked her down but she recovered quickly.  “I will not be captured” she said again in a low husky voice.

“Listen” said Athiam in a not amused voice “I don’t know who you are, for that matter what you are, but if you want to join us as we travel to our home cities you are more than welcome to. Just lighten up on the firepower.” He said with his eyes narrowing to slits.

“I’m outahere” said Tinker.” Probably just a rotten flare that he shot off that got our attention to start with.” They both turned to leave out the way they came in.

“Wait.” Said Soarjin. “I will follow you. Maybe I will find the answers I seek along the way.”

Tinker looked over his shoulder “Fine with me but you fire that thing at me and I might have to break out my rocket launcher and show you what fire power really is.”

As the two weary conventioneers got to the road, closely followed by their new companion. Athiam leaned toward Tinker and said “Great, it’s following us like some gun toting pet.”

A couple days later they arrived at a crossroads where the two travelers took separate paths to their homelands. Tinker said “If you want to follow me to my city you are more than welcome to travel with me. We have lots of engineers and armor specialist that would love to get a look at yer gear. Hee Hee. I bet you could charge a few gold coins for that and I’d be glad to set up a few meetings once we get there – for a small fee of course.”

“If you’d like you can follow me to my city. We have the same stuff Tinker is talking about, you would just have to be careful not to get stepped on – it’s not like we can walk through others and their mounts and such.” Athiam said.

With that Soarjin said “I thank you for your hospitality Athiam but I will follow Tinker. This island sounds great since where I am from there is very little water so to be surrounded by it must be fascinating.” She looked at Tinker “I’m ready when you are and please stop calling me “it”, my name is…” She thought fast, giving her real name could be dangerous. If she is to take on and maintain the illusion that she is a Space Marine then she must take on the rank as her new name. She is too young to be anything but a grunt. So that is what her name must be “…Grunty. “

As she followed Tinker towards his homeland the words of Lady D’trace came back to her “use the information to survive” how she missed her and Proctor. Soarjin thoughts solidified “I will do as you said Lady D’trace and use what I have to survive. Now begins my life as Grunty the Space Marine.”

Modern day Azeroth. The war against the Lich King rages on. The Alliance and Horde have temporarily put aside their differences to finish him. Not all is well. Tension is growing in the North as supplies start running low. Assassins are sent in. Mercenaries are hired. Another war between the Horde and Alliance might happen soon. One thing is left to win this war - Technology.

The Goblins have finally joined the Horde. A trade is what some would call it. In exchange for the Goblins' skill in trade, and the Horde's warpower, sanctuary, resources, and more. Things are seeming dark for the Alliance, but one thing happens.

The Greymane Wall falls in. The Worgen prevail. Gilneas would fall, but there is one thing nobody saw coming. The Alliance come to the rescue. They came in from the seas. They marched through mountains, shattered fortresses - nothing could stop them. Right when all seemed lost, the Stormwind forces came through to defend Gilneas. They stopped the Worgen. There was a condition - Gilneas joined the Alliance. 

Things started to balance out. Tension continued to grow. People deserted Alterac, Warsong, and Arathi. More clashes come in. Supplies run incredibly low. It's a last stand. Everybody thinks they will lose. The secret agencies are forced to come out of hiding. Meanwhile, GW-0 (Gnomish Warfare Zero) comes out of its lair under Stormwind. They finally try their hardest experiment yet that could end the world. They take a Transponder through a Transponder stream, they DIVIDE BY ZERO! They go to an unknown world - The world of Starcraft. Three special forces Gnomes all armed with Death Rays vs. a Space Marine. The marine punts one of the Gnomes away, and that leads to Space Gnomes - The Government Coverups, a book. Gnome number two threw his death ray at the marine, and he laughed. He wanted a closer look, so he took his helmet off. He leans down. Gnome number three takes his death ray and kills the marine. He hears footsteps. He takes out his shrink ray and sets it to his size, but accidentally pushes it too far. It shrinks too small. He can't pilot it, he has to push it through the portal and take what he has - Only a murloc-sized marine suit.

Meanwhile, back in Azeroth, people are studying the most dangerous beings. Murlocs have been frequently raiding Goldshire. They manage to elude capture. But there's one special murloc. EVERYONE knows him as Grunty since everybody seems to think of him as a leader. This last raid, he picked up a gun and shot some people. He runs faster, and thinks faster. This last time, an army of GW-0 troops were stationed by the lake. They captured Grunty! This was a miracle - The marine suit AND a pilot. He was put through intense training. All the best bioengineers worked on him. Engineers toned up his suit.

The Goblins were working on some technology of their own, now. It could end the world due to its velocity - A cloning device.

This marine was no ordinary murloc. He could slay Onyxia on his own, then swim to Northrend and defeat Sartharon. People would face armies to ally him. You get the point.

Years, decades, centuries go by with Goblins working on technology - Before they finally invented a cloning device. Meanwhile, up in Northrend, the wars had temporarily stopped. The Gnomes sent Grunty into Northrend, going after Thrall to finish him once and for all. Unfortunately, the Goblins were planning for this. They captured him. It took hours, but they managed. They cloned him, but there was one thing they didn't count on - The fact that he still had his battlesuit on. He became a robot. He couldn't think. The robots went berzerk and there was only one way to stop him - To get rid of the original Grunty. So, the Gnomes divided by Zero twice this time and threw him into a strange, corrupted world called "Reality". All the other Grunties followed, but their minds were cleansed. And to this day, the legend of Grunty lives on...

>>End of story<<

Yeah, I know. It's pretty bad. I just thought I'd see if I could win anything, not to mention contribute to the Curse community. Thanks for even reading this. :)

PART 1 OF 3

The date of the story I'm about to tell is unknown. Some names have been changed in the interest of privacy and will never be revealed under any circumstances. However this story cannot go unspoken. It has been a long time coming and if it weren't for the heroic acts of one undersized space marine, I may not be sitting here writing this today. He was called too small by everyone who knew him. He was told his whole life he would never grow up to be a full size marine and serve in the fleet. But he would not take no for an answer, and when Azeroth called for help and it fell on def ears he knew what he needed to do. He needed to be shinning beacon in an ever darkening world.  This story is about a good friend of mine and the savior of perhaps an entire world, Grunty the marine.

      Grunty was born to a middle class family on his planet of Namfel. Even from his Sigla day (Day of Birth) he was considered to be undersized and unfit for the life of a marine. You see on the planet of Namfel all children are tasked to a job immediately on their Sigla day. Most male Pon's (Short for people of Namfel) become marines due to the hostile environment in their solar system. If you are not selected to become a marine you were considered a simbet. Simbet is a term used for someone not strong enough to be a working member of society. If you were deemed a simbet you were essentially set up for a life of hatred and agony. When grunty's father found out of his denial to enter the Marine academy he was heart broken. The first night after he was born there were a few issues with his breathing. It was uncertain he would even survive to see his first full day. The doctors had to perform three air probes to inject his lungs with air. Finally after several failed attempts the doctors were able to stabilize him however he would be permanently marred to wear a breathing apparatus.

      The first couple of days were the hardest. His father, Lou who was a marine LOFT (Lightning Ops Force Trooper.) was criticized because of his son's physical appearance. It was a dishonor to not only himself but his family that Grunty was passed over for marine duties. People ignored him in the streets. When he tried to go purchase goods he was shown the door out of the shop. No one wanted to be seen with the father of a simbet. His mother Merla, was not treated any differently either. She worked in an ammunition factory. The first day after Grunty's Sigla when she returned to work she was fired. She tried to fight it but it was no use. In the PON culture it is the highest disgrace to be deemed a simbet so anyone she went to was no less cruel than the next. The events of the first days were so stressful on the family. Grunty's mother and father fought constantly until eventually Lou came to the decision it was time to leave their colony and perhaps Namfel all together.

      Grunty was only ten days old when his father came home from work for the last time. "Pack your bags, we need to leave immediately!" Lou screamed at his wife. Before Merla could even get a word out Lou was already in their room packing his things. 20 minutes went by before the two spoke again. "Where are we going? Said Merla. "Somewhere we can hide until I can get us a shuttle off of Namfel" replied Lou.  "Off Namfel? Are you crazy? We can't leave here this is our ho....." Suddenly there was an explosion greater than anything Lou had heard before. He immediately ran to try to find Grunty. Fortunately Grunty was still in his bed unharmed. He scooped him up in a heartbeat raced for the only exit in the house. "Were trapped, we can't get by the damage from the explosion" screamed Lou to his wife. "I need you to take Grunty and get on the first shuttle out of Namfel... Promise me you will do this!"  "No we can get out of here together! You can get through this its just fire." Merla replied. Just then the roof started to collapse like a fiery water fall. Lou reacting on instinct was able to throw Grunty across the debris to his mother only seconds before being engulfed in flames. That was the last time Merla would ever see Lou. Merla was sad for she knew the fate of her husband however there was no time to site around and wait for more to happen. She grabbed her things and ran for the door. Out on the streets she saw the city on fire. The colony was under attack. But from who? The vessels she saw were foreign. None she had ever seen before. She was no stranger to war, nor was anyone else on Namfel but this was different. These ships were more advanced. More round and sleek, almost artistic. If she had seen it anywhere else under other circumstances she might enjoy the site. But that simply wasn't the case. The ships fired canons of what seemed like green goo that exploded into a fiery green flame on impact. She wanted to stare in amazement at the shear beauty of the thing but time was not on her side. She needed to run, and keep running until she could run no further, and then run some more. That's exactly what she did. Assuming that the entire colony was destroyed she vowed never to return there. She spent several months on the run from what she did not know. All the while keeping the promise she made to her late husband in the back of her mind. Some days she and Grunty would go without eating entirely. Merla decided this was no way for her to live raising her son, even if he was a simbet. She decided to go into the next town they past disguised as an inter-planetary trader and try to hitch a ride out of there. On the 12th full moon of Grunty's life Merla finally found a taker. They would leave the planet exactly the way Lou had wanted it to be. They were set to start a new life somewhere else. She hoped for a more peaceful place where she and her son weren't considered outcasts but accepted as good decent people. Just before takeoff Grunty had an issue with his breathing apparatus. All the time on the run he was growing but his apparatus wasn't. It was made for a baby, and he was twice that size now. They needed to find someone to repair it or make a new one. If they couldn't get it done then it was a large possibility that Grunty wouldn't make it through the flight. "Are there any Mechs in town?" Merla asked the port master. "You may be able to find one in the bazaar, but I am not waiting for you to take off. I need to go now" he replied in a stern voice. Merla knew how long it took to find this shuttle and that they may not be able to get another for several moons. She had a decision to make. Risk Grunty's life trying to get to the next port and find someone there or miss the shuttle and get help immediately. She made the hardest decision of her life.

      Off flew the shuttle with Merla and Grunty onboard. Merla had always been afraid of flying, but somehow that fear got lost in the sheer terror of the decision she just made and the consequences it may reap. Several hours went by and Grunty's condition stayed the same. Merla looked for hope anywhere she could. The fact that Grunty's condition didn't improve wasn't necessarily a bad thing because it didn't get any worse either. He was just stable. Merla had just fallen asleep and was dreaming of happier times when she was suddenly awoken by the captain's voice. "Hang on folks we have a blockade of ships ahead, it may get a little crazy" Merlas heart raced. "Could these ships be part of the same fleet that attacked their colony?" She thought. She wondered "Are they after me? What do they want?" After much debate in her head she decided that it wasn't worth worrying about. She was just a woman who worked in an ammo shop and had a husband who was a LOFT. While being a LOFT was a high ranking job it was in now way one that would make Lou or his family a target. Little did she know that the fleet that was stopping them was indeed looking for her. Not because of her or her husbands status, or because they were trying to flee Namfel, but because of a prophecy that was made ten years prior about a simbet who would save the world of Azeroth.

 PART 2 OF 3

The old Junk shuttle pulled up to the blockade when a voice came across the radio "Calling the merchant shuttle approaching the blockade, please proceed to enter our ships shuttle bay for further instruction." The captain, angry with the delay and the money it would cost him decided he had other plans. He turned to the people in the back seats and told them to hold on tight.  "I am sorry sir you must have the wrong ship, I am just on a quick run to the outer planets. I have nothing on board but traders and gear." said the captain across the radio. All the while readying to jump to hyper speed. "Please proceed to enter our ships shuttle bay for further instructions." Came the voice through the radio again. "Enough of this ****" said the captain to his co-pilot "Lets get the hell out of here." He fired up the rear turbines and pressed the the red button on the console marked "IN CASE OF EMERGENCY" This was a scary sight for Merla. Why was this an emergency? Why didn't the captain just do as he was told? Whatever it was they were along for the ride now. The shuttle bumped and lurched as it picked up speed. Faster and faster they went. Merla wondered when they would finally reach max speed. It seemed like forever before they weren't moving any faster than the second before. She looked out the window behind her only to see the star ships pursuing. She wasn't nervous however. Her husband had always told her that the ships would never fire on an unarmed vessel. Just as that thought crossed her mind she saw a familiar green ball of goo and light heading towards then from the ships. Remembering what the goo did to her village she turned around immediately and alerted the captain of the situation. But the captain had more important things to deal with. Driving the shuttle at speeds like he was going was like driving a brick through a winter storm. He struggled at every moment to keep control of the ship. If he lost control the green goo would be the least of their worries. All of a sudden the ship shook uncontrollably. She suddenly saw herself in a dream, sleeping on the side of her husband, Grunty in his crib. She was at peace. And then there was nothing.

      Grunty's eyes opened. They were only a sliver but it was enough to let the light through and hurt his eyes. He was so young, only a baby by our standards but he was very aware of what was going on. He knew why the ships were chasing them, and what had happened after his mom blacked out. He had a very advanced mind for one of his age and it saw things that other could not see. "Could the prophecy have been right?" he thought to himself.  You see all along while he was a baby he would have terrible nightmares. With every passing week his mind would become more and more advanced and as with such so did the nightmares. They first started out basic. He would be all alone in front of a giant armada of ships and droids seeming to be barring down on him. As the dreams got more and more advanced he started to see a pattern. While the fact that he was physically alone was true, he felt as if he was very much supported and surrounded by friends. Slowly the nightmares got less and less terrifying and he was able to cope. It wasn't until the night before him and his mother left Namfel he heard the prophecy spoken in his dreams. "Under great dourest and extreme courage, a small being will rise from his inadequacies and shortcomings and save the lives of millions of creatures far and wide." There was no reason for him to believe it! Why? It made absolutely no sense. But something about all that had happened so far seemed very real. From the first explosions in their colony to the demise of the shuttle he was only moments before on board. The dreams and visions he had had so far had been right.

Grunty's eyes were still adjusting to the sudden brightness around him, when he started to smell something he had never smelled before. It wasn't a bad smell by any means but it was so foreign to him. When his eyes finally came to, he noticed he was surrounded by trees. These trees were different in fact to any trees he had encountered on Namfel in his short few months alive. The scent he smelled was that of pine and flowers. Namfel being a very desolate planet he had never seen or smelled such beauty. He sat upright and looked around for several minutes just taking in the sights of the scenery. He was suddenly brought back to reality when he heard the sound of muffled words and footsteps in the distance. His first instinct was to go and find where it was coming from. He immediately changed that thought at the prospect of them being unfriendly. He had no idea what planet he was on, nor did he know what he would even say or do if he did find them. He jumped to his feet and ran for the bushes. He managed to hide just in the nick of time. As he turned around to the clearing he was just lying in, he saw two strange creatures walking side by side. One was very tall and strong looking; He had fur all over his body and had the face of what appeared to be a wolf. His armor was very ornate and old looking. But he had the presence of a champion. The second of the two was a small little creature closer to his size. He was Green and very lanky. His arms hung low to the ground as if they were used to get around into places others couldn't. His ears were pointed to the sky and his eyes were keen like knives. The two were hauling back some kind of creature that looked to have been dead for maybe only a few minutes. And they were talking in a language that he was unable to understand. Just as they started to get out of view and Grunty thought he was safe, his breathing apparatus started to act up. It gave off a loud hissing sound that could only be rivaled by a trains whistle. The two creatures were immediately alerted to the sound. Grunty knew he had been made. He was to small to outrun the wolf he knew that and he knew with the eyes of the smaller creature that if he tried to sneak away he would be caught. All he could do was sit and wait and hope that they would be friendly. The two approached the bush they thought they had heard the noise com from. The wolf man started to speak in an unintelligible voice. His voice got louder with each word spoken. "Genre ve toul?  GENRE VE TOUL?" Grunty didn't respond. The green man started to say something to his much larger friend. The wolf man started again to speak but this time in a voice that was much more understandable. "Who is there?" When Grunty heard the familiar sounds it was almost as if a huge weight was lifted from his shoulders. It gave him hope. They were speaking the common language. He hoped that this meant the planet he was on in fact was one of the settled outer planets. He stood up slowly as not to startle the two. The two creatures jumped back. could it be they were afraid of a little grunt like him? He waved his hand in a friendly gesture. "Who dat is?" said the small green man to his friend. "I do not know. It is nothing I have ever seen before." Grunty had never spoken before he could only mimic what he heard. "Who dat is?"  Grunty said. He stared at the two creatures with a quizzical look on his face. "He be funmaking me?" The green man said with anger in his voice. The wolf man raised his hand meaning to stifle any fight that might begin "Calm down my small friend... I do not believe he means us harm." He said. He looked towards Grunty with a warm face "Hello little one! My name is Felix of the Worgen clan and this is my friend Zi." "Excuse me!" The green man interrupted. "But I think I can introduce myself!" He then turned to Grunty. "Mines names is Ziplock of the Goblin clan."  Grunty stood in amazement. He had never seen such creatures before. A Worgen and a Goblin. What were they? Where were they from? Before these thoughts could finish crossing Gruntys mind there was a sudden boom in the air. In shock all three creatures in unison turned to see the red billowing smoke blowing seemingly from space. "What this is?" said Ziplock "We must return to the clans. They will know what this is about." said Felix.

The three Returned to the tribes for a much needed council. Although the Worgen and goblins were sworn enemies they were united under one purpose for a week straight every year. That purpose was blizzcon. But now with things looking bleak they found a new purpose to unite. Their world was being threatened by what? They did not know. "We must act and find out what this disturbance is!" One Worgen chief said. "No we must runsis and hidessis" Said a lesser goblin. Over the past few hours while the council was being held a space ship had appeared through the bright red curtain and was only moments from landing 20 miles away. While Ziplock and Felix were in the heated debate supporting their respective sides Grunty managed to sneak off.

Grunty roamed the Anaheim woods not knowing where he was or where he was going but he knew he was looking for something. He went from stream to stream and field to field. He was on a mission. A mission only the feeling in his body knew. After two hours of walking in what seemed circles, something was starting to happen. Grunty walked up upon a giant tree standing seemingly alone in the woods. It was taller and wider than any tree Grunty had ever seen, and it gave of a very faint blue glow. The tree had mysticism to it. Not only because the age of the tree was most likely beyond measure, but because the tree almost seemed to talk to the small little murloc. Whisper to him in fact. Grunty slowly approached the tree; weary of the magic it may posses. He could hear a voice in the air whispering to him in a very feminine and warming voice.  "Under great dourest and extreme courage, a small being will rise from his inadequacies and shortcomings and save the lives of millions of creatures far and wide."   Grunty had heard this voice before. Not in a conversation or from any one physical being, but in his dreams.

The ground began to shake. Grunty was afraid. He didn't know what to do. He could run away but that seemed the wrong thing to do. For the first time since being with his mother he felt safe. The voices, the ground, the tree, and even the ship. They all seemed to be exactly where he expected them to be. He knew everything was coming and yet nothing at all. He had never felt these emotions before. It felt good. Grunty's feet started to quiver. A blue mist surrounded him in an amazing whirlwind of light and magic. It lifted him swiftly into the air. He started to gain altitude. Higher and higher he floated. He felt strong. Stronger than he had ever felt before. Just before reaching the mid line of the tree he was showered in a bath of silver and gold light. "You were meant for great things little murloc! Your time has come. The drums of war sound and without your help this planet will no longer exist in peace but in pieces." Grunty didn't know what to do. He couldn't speak. He didn't know how. All he could do was mimic what he heard. All the intelligence locked in his brain unable to break the chains that bound it. "But how?" Grunty said in a horse voice. It was so unbelievable he wasn't sure if it was something he had just imagined. He spoke! He had no idea where it came from but it was his thoughts through his own mouth. "You will know when the time has come... But for now it is time to release your inner strength." came the warm voice. Grunty saw beautiful blades of gold and alabaster floating around him. He felt good. He saw what appeared to be perfectly sized armor zooming towards him. Before he knew it he was completely outfitted in chain link plate armor. His weapon was his only thing absent. Before he could even think about it, it appeared. It was a brilliant weapon shining in the light. Perfectly sized and balanced. A rifle. "It is quite an amazing weapon to be sure, but how could a gun like this ever stand up to a whole army? Grunty murmured. "Oh my murloc friend... this is no ordinary gun. It is imbued with the strength of the dwarves, the cunning of the night elves, the mechanics of the gnomes and the life of the Draini. With this weapon any shot fired will expand twenty times and spread across the plain firing several bullets at once. You can never miss."  Said the voice. "There is one last thing before you go little one. Take this orb. It is filled with more power than any one person should ever have. It is your blessing but be warned it is also your curse! Just as the voice said its last word Grunty began to fall. Faster and faster he plummeted. Certain death was just around the corner. Grunty closed his eyes. He saw his life, how short it was an everyone in it. He felt his mom with him smiling comforting him into the after life. His fathers strong embrace protecting him from the pain of the entrance into the deluge. "Could this be it? After all of that? Its over just like this?" Just as he was about to collide with the ground and his ultimate end, the ground opened into a swirling vortex and swallowed him whole.

PART 3 OF 3

"We must go fight! We cannot stand idly by while these beings invade our planet." said Felix. "Our Elders have known of this war for ages and it is now here. We cannot run. We cannot hide! To arms my brothers! To arms!" Felix had just gotten done speaking when there was a sudden explosion nearby. All the worgens jumped for cover while the goblins fled in fear. Felix didn't know what the source of the explosion was but he knew it might have been what they needed to top off his speech and rally the troops. Once the all clear was given the worgens sprang into action. One by one they filled into their makeshift armory, arming themselves in preparation for battle. "We march to war!" Said one worgen. "The glory of battle!" said another. The clan of worgen left the camp in single file marching on the direction of the explosion.

"Theysis dumb dumbs" said the goblin chief. The goblins were in disarray. In the time it took the worgens to arm for battle and march towards the disturbance, the goblins hadn't even regrouped from their earlier cowardice. The goblins were a very proud race when it came to their inventions and trinkets. However when it came to battle, they were more adept to surrender and be enslaved then risk the agony of death. The only reason the goblins allied with the Horde in the first place was for protection. "We should help them!" shouted Ziplock "They are our sworn enemies!" came another voice. "Then we banish them to their doom and perhaps our own!"

Grunty awoke to the sound of birds chirping and a faint echo of machinery in the distance. The ground he laid on was scorched in a perfect circle still glowing slightly with embers. Grunty sat up And looked around. He had seen this field that lay ahead of him before. He knew exactly where he was and where the sounds of machines were coming from. He stood up just in time to see what he had feared most coming over the far hill. His dream had come true. His nightmare was real and the droids and ships were barreling over the ground. He wasn't scarred. Just like in his dream he felt safe like someone was there with him. The feeling he had of his parents being with him was still with there and he knew now that his mother didn't survive the crash. It was a sobering revelation but he couldn't mourn, there were more pertinent things at hand. Grunty reach over his back and pulled out the rifle that was given to him. As it came over his shoulder its brilliant silver and inlaid gold shone in the sunlight. He aimed down range. His whole life had led up to this. Right now was the time and the moment that he would decide the fate of perhaps several races. He brought the scope up to his eye. His finger quivering as it slid down across the trigger guard and onto the trigger. He had never fired a gun before. "What is it going to be like?" He wondered. The sweat dripped down across his scaly forehead. A million and one thoughts zooming through his mind at once. He squeezed the trigger. There was a loud boom. If it weren't for his focus and his fear it might have otherwise made him jump. He saw a brilliant white light shine out of the muzzle followed by a rapidly expanding single bullet. It flew so fast as it screamed out in anger. Just as the bullet was a hundred yards off its intended single target it exploded into several different bullets. All of a sudden six droids fell and one speed ship crashed as its driver was hit in the chest. Grunty wanted to bask in awe at the pure power if the weapon he held. He aimed down range again. Over and over droids and ships alike fell in the field. Grunty thought he was doing well but whenever one droid fell it seemed two would come over the hill an replace it. The armadas of alien forces were gaining ground on him. He could feel the heat of the machines on him as they were only a hundred yards away. Over and over he fired his weapon. He didn't know what to do.   In mere minutes he would be overrun by the masses. There was only a shallow section of forest behind him, to which his weapon would have a hard time picking targets out of. It wasn't an option to retreat. He had to fight to the very last moment. Just as things were starting to get out of hand a series of howls were heard off to his right and left. He looked to see the worgen charging out of the forest that surrounded the field. They had fire in their eyes like he had never seen before. They ran full speed head long into the crowd of droids, Felix leading the way on the left. They crashed together like two waves fighting for their own direction. Swords against steel. The fight was fierce. The alien droids had more advance weapons and their speed ships were faster than anything they had to catch up. The diversion had created more room for Grunty however. He was more focused now that everything wasn't on him. He fired round after round hoping they wouldn't mistake the worgens for enemies. The fight continued on for hours. The Worgen seemed to be getting the upper hand until it happened. A giant beetle like machine came from the horizon. Taller than anything anyone had ever seen it must have been a 100 feet high and 200 feet wide across at its body. From its body extended six mechanical legs, Cumbersome yet powerful. It was being controlled by the aliens from the center of the bug, Deep behind several layer of armor and steel. It startled everyone on the battle field. The ground shook and everyone stumbled. Just then several balls of fire were shot out of what seemed to be the eyes. They flew through the air very much like a mortar. One by one the bombs fell and exploded and one by one aliens and worgen alike were slain. It seemed like a never ending barrage of bombs that there was no end to.

All seemed to be lost! Over the trees they could see what looked like balloons holding machines on strings. Grunty looked up in dismay. As if the beetle wasn't enough, they had air troops coming as well. The balloons slowly got closer and closer while the battle progressed. All Grunty could do was to keep shooting. He noticed every so often that his weapon would not shoot out bullets but a straight beam of energy directed at whatever he pointed. He thought maybe, just maybe if he could time it right he could use the beam to take out the balloons and destroy the machines on them. There was a pattern to how often the stream of energy was coming and he had just about had it down to plus or minus one or two shots. He steadied up on the balloons just as they were starting to come over the beetle like machine. Grunty slowly started to pull the trigger being very still. He controlled his breath and was ready for the blast to come out. Just as his finger pulled the trigger to the full action he saw bombs falling from the machines on the balloons. It was too late though he had fired the shot. It hit right on target. Only instead of hitting the balloon directly it was deflected out and away. Grunty didn't know what this was or who it was, all he knew was they must be on their side.

The balloons all gathered around the beetle "Fire all weapons!" shouted Ziplock. On the goblins command all the balloons proceeded to rain their arsenal down upon it. The beetle adjusted and started to fire on them but it was no use. On all four of the outer ships their were warlocks and mages concentrating their barrier spells on the zeppelins. Just like grunty's energy beam had deflected off the zeps so too did the bombs intended to destroy them. One by one the bombs fell and hit their mark. The beetle seemed to be holding up well at first but it was no match for the amount of explosives being dropped directly on it. The giant machine started to waver. Its legs slowly gave out underneath it. There was an explosion from inside the ship. The outer shell blew off the front of the beetle and exposed its inner core and its reactor. It was open now to the onslaught of the goblins. It crashed into the ground with such a force it knocked everyone on the ground to their knees. The time had come to finish it off.

Grunty looked up as the beast fell. It was no more than scrap metal now, but it was still producing bombs out from its hull. Grunty knew it had to end now. He could see the power reactor inside. It glowed bright blue and he knew if he could hit that with a direct beam of energy it would end the fight for good. He once again steadied in the old familiar stance except this time he knew it was his enemy he intended to destroy. He pulled the trigger and a straight burst of energy hit its mark. There was a giant explosion from the inside of the beetle. Grunty's eyes darkened and he passed out.

Grunty awoke to a camp bustling with activity. There were many worgen laying on the ground in a row. He knew this to be the line of the dead for there were flower places in all their hands. In a tent on the far end of the camp he heard howls of pain and triumph. He didn't know what was going on. Had they won? What was to become of this planet? Before he could get up and ask he was greeted by Ziplock and Felix. "Your awake my good friend! Your awake! Thank the gods of outland!" Said Felix. "yes, Wes haves you to thanksis for our lives little friend!" Replied Ziplock. "What happened?" asked Grunty. "When you fired that final fateful shot you sealed your place in the annals of time. You destroyed the alien forces completely. When the explosion went off your respirator was fried and you passed out. We had to have our surgeons make you a new and improved one." Said Felix thankfully "You are ok now and all we can do is mourn and celebrate for you Grunty Shortblast are the savior of our planet. So I ask you is there anything we can do to return the favor?" "I just want a place to call home." Said Grunty. "So it shall be." Came a loud stern voice. It was the worgen chief Banestar. "You will forever have a place to call home amongst my people, and you will forever be a friend of the goblins as well. I cannot speak for all races but I promise I shall spread the word across Azeroth of what you have done here today. Your story will be sung by bards and heralds for years to come" For the first time in a while Grunty felt happy. He was at peace. He was home.

Thank you very much! Its amazing how much fun it was to write this! I hope everyone enjoys it! Cheers!

For my entry, I chose to enter as a comic rather than just a written story :)

In case it is too hard to read any of the text:

Grunty

Origin of Cuteness

1.) One night in Gadgetzan...

2.) BOOM!

3.) "Oh praise the light! A son to call my own!"   "MRRL!"

4.) "Well you're going to need armor to survive this world kiddo!"   "MRRL!"

5.) "Hey! Stop that! That's not food!"

6.) "Hey! No!" *Bang!* "Ahh!"   "MRRL!"

7.) "You can try on your armor tomorrow it's bedtime now!"

8.) *Dreaming of fighting a Zergling*

9.) "I think I'll name him Merlin... hmm... No... Grunty!"   "MRRL..."

The End! =^w^=

Part One

   Charged with cleaning out the chamber of a missing anchorite, you discover a worn out journal that looks as if it the previous owner had attempted to hide it. Intrigued you begin reading.

    It started shortly after the crash on what would be known Azuremyst Isle. Our supplies were short so we approached the native races seeking aid, but soon realized that the beasts of this island were hostile to anyone not of their own race or far too primitive to communicate with properly.

    Although our situation was dire and supplies were low, it was decided that that we could not allow the “lesser species” to be as they were. I was approached by a curious draenei I’d never met before, she called herself Sironas,  and brought with her some documents from the elders. It was decided that simply eliminating all other species would be too violent, so an alternative plan was to be attempted. The goal was to produce a small sample of one of the native races.

    This sample would serve one of two purposes; best case scenario the sample could serve as diplomats for us when they came of age, worst case scenario they became the last of their species on the island. Such a mission might seem a tad bit controversial to the majority of the population so the project was to remain a secret. It would seem suspicious if I were to visit the elders on a frequent basis so Sironas, claiming to be an official messenger, would serve as a liaison for me and provide the elders with details on the project.

    It soon became apparent that such a process was highly unnecessary as the islands yielded many more resources than initial anticipated as we slowly discovered it’s secrets. Still Sironas insisted that this was necessary and was now merely a mission of diplomacy rather than survival. When the time came to expand we would need again to deal with the races and planning for the future was essential.

    Since I had dealt with more foreign species than any of the other anchorites, it became my duty to select a species and start the madness. I quickly narrowed the choices down to naga, murloc, owlbear and furbolg. Naga were immediately removed from the choices, after having noticed their violent tendencies, it became obvious that even if I could produce one that was friendly towards us it would never find a place among its own. After that I observed the other races more closely. Owlbears were the next to be eliminated, despite being the most passive of the remaining races, I doubted highly that they had the intelligence to be raised as the cultured beings we sought.

    That left be with choice between furbolgs and murlocs. The furbolgs were my first choice as they seemed to be more civilized than the murlocs. I began to make plans to try and capture several of their young but I quickly abandoned my plans after learning of a second tribe on the island. It turned out that there was a less violent group attempting to make peace with us, which if true would mean potential war if I tried to take their young.

    With the discovery of the furbolgs I pleaded with Sironas that capturing another species was no longer necessary as there was already a race that we could live with. She assured me that one race was not enough to guarantee our survival and that it would be everyone’s benefit if we could be at peace with the murlocs and made it very clear that any attempt to stop the project was a waste of my time. Still unsure, I sought the advice of O’ros, the naaru whom was aboard the Exodar with us. I asked if it was right to do that to the murlocs. The answer came in melodic tones, he told me that he was unsure if this was right or wrong but that the light was with me as long as I treated the creatures as if they had been one of our own.

    It took about two weeks to get everything set up and to secure the eggs. As fate would have it, the eggs that I plundered came from a village that had been ransacked by naga merely hours earlier. It gave me some comfort knowing that had I not been doing this the eggs would have died and it helped to convince me that what I was doing was right. In total I had secured nine eggs although it appeared as if some had already died. After having made sure the incubators were working I went off to learn as much as I could from the murlocs by looking into their minds. It wouldn’t be the most accurate way to learn of their customs but it was the best I could do. If nothing else the murlocs would at least know their native language.

    Two weeks later the first of the eggs hatched and I found myself face to face with a purple baby murloc. Over the next few days three more of the eggs hatched, giving a total of three males and one female. When it became obvious that the others had died as I feared, I disposed of them, saddened that less than half had survived. Although by now familiar with the murloc language, which they called Nerglish, and some of their naming concepts, it didn’t feel right to give them murloc names. It also didn’t feel right to give them a draenei name so I opted to leave it for now and would let them choose a name for themselves as they aged.

    A month went by and they steadily grew, I was happy they were healthy. It quickly became obvious that murlocs aged fairly quickly in comparison to other races I’d encounter and soon they were mature enough to begin teaching. Having never had children and thinking back to O’ros words, I treated them as if they were my own children and asked them to call me mother. I had thought that it was going exceptionally well, Sironas disagreed slightly on my teaching methods.

    After the eggs had hatched she demanded a report on the status every week. Once I had told her that they had become old enough to begin speaking, she came by unexpectedly to observe the lessons. I asked all the children to politely greet her and the first did as “Mommy Sironas”. Upon hearing this she stood up and violently struck the child and asked him if liked the feeling of pain. He shyly shook his head and she then told him that draenei should be referred to as master if he didn’t want to feel the pain again. In turn the other three murlocs finished addressing her, making certain they said master fearing her retribution.

    From that point on she made sure to appear at least once a week, always uninvited. Whenever she saw something that she didn’t agree with, she would strike one of the children. I would always plead with her that they were simply children and that she shouldn’t strike them for such absurd reasons, but she simply responded that children needed discipline and that she would give it as I obviously wouldn’t. Whenever she left I tried my best to comfort them and told them that whenever she wasn’t around I’d still prefer them to call me mother.

    As the time pased and the murlocs kept learning, I told them that it was time for them to choose a name for themselves. I warned them that it would be with them for as long as they lived so they should take great care in their choosing but whatever they chose I would be happy. The only female was the first to choose her name, it was Gurky. The youngest of the bunch heard this and liked the name and wanted it for his own. I told him that although they could both have the same name that it would be better to have one of his own. Hearing this he thought for a minute before deciding that since he was a murloc, Murky would be better than Gurky.

    The next to choose his name was the second oldest. He was always excited with any stories of combat, especially of the gladiator battles in the arenas so he decided he wanted a name like the great combatants. A little unoriginal but he decided his name would be Murkimus. That left just the oldest murloc to decide his name, he seemed to be the only one that took my words of caution with any second thought. He asked if he needed to pick a name right now and I told him he could take as long as was needed.

    About two months after the eggs had hatched, we made contact with other intelligent races on this planet. At first it was one small ship with only a few representatives, sent here to investigate the crash of a mysterious foreign object, the Exodar. Despite initial reluctances to co-operate based on the fact that we resembled the man’ari eredar, our relations steadily grew. Despite raising the murlocs, I was put in charge of the diplomatic measures with “the Alliance” consisting of the dwarves, gnomes, humans and night elves. I didn’t quite understand how the elders could entrust me with two such important tasks at once, but I was delighted to learn of the new races and I knew that the murlocs would understand my other responsibilities.

    I studied the books and languages of the other races and after several months I was versed enough that I could start passing the knowledge onto the murlocs. Sironas interrupted as usual but today she had a slightly different tone. She seemed somewhat overjoyed and with her evil smile told me that with the recent discovery of our new allies, it seemed pointless to continue the project.  She claimed that due to the secrecy of the project it was vital that the murlocs be removed immediately, and that special transportation had been arranged. She commanded the murlocs to follow her and scared as they were of her, followed without hesitation. The murlocs, my children began walking when suddenly she stopped and turned around. I thought that there were four murlocs she asked. The eldest had died earlier this week I lied, knowing full well that he hadn’t woken up yet and was safely in the other room. It seemed to slightly please her that one of them had died and I watched as she took the rest of the murlocs, my children, away.

    I quickly went to the only one left, the one still unnamed. He told me he had heard everything that the evil woman had said and the sounds of his siblings as they were forced to leave with her. To him, their whimpers had sounded like a grunting and so he finally decided upon his name, Grunty, so that he would never forget his siblings.

    Knowing Sironas all too well by now, I knew it was unsafe to keep Grunty in my personal chambers. I decided to move him to a place where he could somewhat blend in to his surroundings, the stasis chambers. It was a hall where we stored specimens from the different worlds, some who were too dangerous to be allowed to roam free, and others suffering from injuries or diseases we couldn’t currently treat with our technology. Even if someone were to stumble in as long as he kept still he could seem as if any other foreign entity.

    I found a large empty chamber and set it up as a room as best as I could. It wasn’t nearly as luxurious as my private chambers but Grunty understood as well as I that it was necessary to keep it simple. I explained that because he had to remain a secret, I couldn’t visit as often as I would like, but it was important that he keep learning. I taught him how to use the most basic of priestly knowledge, how to look into another creatures mind, the same technique I had used months ago to learn Nerglish. I told him that although the specimens here were frozen in time, they were all still very much alive and could still share their knowledge.

    As the time passed by my visits became less and less frequent as my diplomatic duties got in the way, but every time I visited he had new stories to share with me about the creatures in containment. Back when all four of the murlocs were still here he was always the most eager to learn and still possessed his thirst of knowledge. He would to pose questions on the various species he inspected and I tried my best to answer but for the most part we had only the most basic of interactions with these races. One specimen in particular intrigued Grunty the most.

    It was similar to the humans we met here, but from another planet, one much more advanced than even our current technology. During our travels we came across him a pod floating through the twisting nether. It appeared as if he was suffering from some sort of parasitic infection that we had no idea how to cure so we kept him in stasis until such a time that we might be able to help him. Of course like most of the subjects we intended to help, he required very specific analysis for his treatment and since we could in theory attend to him at any point in the future, he would probably spend at the least another century in stasis.

    Having never had the time to gaze into this particular subjects mind myself I listened to Grunty’s story. He told me of an alien race known as the Zerg and how the infection he suffered was from combat with them. The man was a soldier that was fighting them, in the dimension they came from they threatened to conquer the universe. Something about this idea mesmerized Grunty, he told me that if any zerg found their way into our universe he would protect me from them. A simply smiled and thanked him.

    I had originally wished to shelter him until he was a bit older from such stories of wars but seeing as he had already learned of this zerg and been fine, I thought it appropriate to tell him about other dangers that one day may come to pass again. I told him of the Burning Legion and what they had done to my race and what I had learned of them from the humans and night elves of this world. I told him about our encounters with the orcs on Draenor and as best I could about the humans war against the orcs and made sure that he knew that it was mostly do to demonic influence.

    Talking about the other wars and disasters simply made him look into the humans mind more and more. I asked him what he was doing and he told me that he was learning of his technology. He told me that although our weapons were strong, this mans seemed much more effective and that even if he couldn’t make these weapons now, he could learn how to he would be able to one day to protect me.

    The days went by and he kept learning. I taught him as much as I could about the histories of all the races on Azeroth and of their languages. Soon he was fluent with all the alliance races, his own tongue and even some of the horde races. It all seemed to be going perfect until I learned that there would be a cleaning of the stasis chambers, organized by Sironas herself. Never had such a thing happened before but it appeared that she had gained some sway over the elders and could do whatever she pleased for whatever reason she decided to make up. At this point I doubted strongly that the elders had ever asked me to start this experiment and that it had been merely a source of amusement to harass the baby murlocs.

    Whether it was her intention to discover Grunty or not, it was no longer safe to keep him where he was. It probably wasn’t safe to keep him on the Exodar period, if she could arbitrarily inspect this section of the ship, who’s to say that next week she may not probe another section. It was essential for Grunty to leave this place.

    I told him this and he reluctantly agreed, not wanting to share the same fate as his siblings. Together we decided that the best bet was to use the ship itself to open a dimensional portal to somewhere else on azeroth, anywhere else. I was confident that with his understanding of languages wherever he ended up he would be fine. I gather as much gold as I could and the next night we planned for his departure.

    With no complications we cleaned up the stasis chamber to make it appear as if it had always been empty. I asked Grunty if there was anything he would need and he told me that everything he needed was in his head. We made for the control room and as usual it was empty, since the crash their hadn’t been much use for it. Having never actually used it myself, it took me a while to figured out how to get it working and to make a small portal. I told Grunty that although the portal was stable, I wasn’t sure if I had configured everything properly. It was entirely possible he could end up on a different planet or perhaps another universe all together. I handed him the sac of gold and told him that if he wanted to stay we could try and hide but he knew that the portal wherever it may lead was his best chance.

    After he left I felt slightly empty inside. Even though I didn’t get to see him as often as when he was had just hatched, it was the highlight of my day whenever we met. I cursed Sironas for her cruelty and wondered what had happened to Murky, Murkimus and Lurky. Three days after Grunty had left Sironas was exposed as a man’ari eredar and slain by several young heros wishing to prove themselves. She had been masquerading as a draenei aboard the exodar tricking many other anchorites for her own amusement, with the ultimate attempt to convert others to man’ari eredar like herself. I felt like such a fool having been manipulated by her but I felt worse for Grunty. Had we only waited a few more days she would have been gone, and there would have been no more threat for him. Without the fear of angering the elders he could have even come out of hiding and been accepted by the draenei as a whole. I regret greatly my impatience, but one can not dwell on the past forever, I must simply hope that he is safe, wherever he is.

Part Two

    The journal ends here. You go to return it when a fairly large stack of paper falls out. You pick up the pile of paper and realize that it is actually a very long letter. Curious as to what connection this letter may have with the book, you begin reading.

Dear Mom,

    I hope this letter finds you safely. I’m all right here and would have come to visit you in person but I know that it is unsafe as long as that woman is there. You always told me the greatest stories as I grew up and I wanted to repay you with my own story.

    After I went through the portal I ended up in the goblin controlled town of Gadgetzan. Their guards immediately surrounded me and aimed their guns my way but stopped quickly when I piped up as best I could in goblin, “I’ve got money”. At that point I wasn’t really good at haggling so I got screwed a bit and ended up paying far too much for board at the inn. Once they discovered my multitudes of languages, a trader approached me and asked me if I would serve as a translator for him in his business ventures. Having spent most of the money you gave me I couldn’t really refuse.

    Again I got screwed into a less than optimal wage but didn’t know better. Working with him however did help to increase my reputation with the other goblins and once they learned of my eagerness to work, started to give me better rates and let me in on some tips to help haggle my way to better prices. A year quickly went by, and after that much time I knew all the trade secrets and was employed by many goblins and other merchants that came through. I quickly learned that information was money and that by using the skill you taught me I could easily become rich, but knew that that was not why you had taught me such a skill.

    As the time passed by, I grew tired of the daily routine and decided it was time to work on those blueprints I had learned of so many years ago from the strange human. I asked around the goblins who was the most skilled engineer among them. They told me that the two most skilled engineers they knew of were the famous Gazlowe in Ratchet or a slightly eccentric gnome in Booty Bay. If I wanted shoddy work they told me I could just stay here and have Nixx Sproketspring do the job, but they assured me he was crazy. To have a goblin call one of their own crazy you can be certain that he would be more than just a tad bit eccentric. Having dealt with goblins for so long I opted for the goblin engineer as I could probably haggle better and headed out to Steamwheedle Port within the week and found my way aboard the next cargo ship heading to Ratchet.

    All was going smoothly at first but eventually pirates boarded us. Our crew consisted mostly of labourers and although the pirates weren’t the most skilled of fighters, we were clearly outmatched. Most of our crew died, but being as I was still so small it was easy for me to hide myself. I learned that they were a group known as the Bloodsail Buccaneers and that they would be taking us to the shores of Stranglethorn Vale to meet up with the rest of their fleet. Although I would have preferred dealing with the goblin in Rachet, an engineer is an engineer. If fate would have be go to Stranglethorn, I’d just have to make the best of the situation.

    Ideally I would have liked to have kept myself hidden and then quietly snuck off the boat without anyone noticing, but unfortunately that was not to be the case. Two guards cleaning the deck found me one day sleeping behind a barrel and drew their weapons to attack. I woke to the noise and pleaded for my life. I guess the thought of a talking murloc amused them greatly because they burst out laughing and then they put away their weapons roughly pulled me up. I asked where they were taking me and they told me that the captain would get a great laugh out of me. Sure enough they were right.

    The captain was a tall scruffy human male who went by Fleet Master Firallon. He was greatly amused by me and asked how I came to learn common. At this time I wasn’t quite aware how rare mind reading was so I told him the gist of the truth, excluding mainly the human in stasis. I thought if I told him enough he wouldn’t probe my thoughts and I could keep a few things secret. Perhaps feeling sorry for me, he agreed that I could travel as part of the crew until we reached Stranglethorn and even longer if I so chose. I thanked him greatly and was very glad he didn’t ask why I was looking for such a skilled engineer.

    Weeks went by on the ship and I worked as hard as I could. I wasn’t the most useful member on the crew but I think boosted the morale of the ship. There were always laughs left and right as I struggled to do a task that the other crew members did with ease. Eventually we reached the shores of Stranglethorn. I was aware by this point that the Bloodsails didn’t get along with the members of the Cartel so they couldn’t escort me directly to the city.

    Before I left them they gave me back my sac of gold, perhaps a bit heavier than it had been when they had taken it, and told me that I was always welcome aboard their ships. As I made my way up along the beach following their directions I found the tunnel leading into the city. The guards waiting outside pulled out their guns and took aim yelling “Murloc!”. This seemed all too familiar so I tried what had worked so long ago, “I’ve got money”. They were a little more hesitant than the goblins of Gadgetzan but after dropping a few select names they relaxed a bit.

    My first objective was to find the engineer, which wasn’t exactly a hard task. His name was Oglethorpe Obnoticus and his house was fairly easy to spot, it was the one on fire. I quickly ran to go help put out the fire but soon realized that it wasn’t required. There was a mechanism set up directly above his house to pump water up and douse the flames, apparently it was a fairly common occurrence. I approach him cautiously, wondering what exactly I had got myself into.

    When I saw him I tried to talk but he told me to stop and then put on some weird helmet. He told me that using it he would read my mind and find out what I needed. I sat there patiently for half an hour as he stared and me, stopping every few minutes to adjust a knob on his helmet. He eventually gave up and tossed the helmet aside saying that it wasn’t properly calibrated to a murlocs brain and that the test had been successful, proving that gnomes and murlocs cloak their minds differently.

    I explained that I had a design for a special type of weapon and could only trust the most skilled of engineers to attempt to craft it. After I mentioned the word weapon it seemed that everything after that didn’t matter. Either gnomes are easier to negotiate with then goblins or this one was particularly crazy but I got a decent deal. He agreed to craft the weapon in exchange for material costs and promising that I would show nobody else the schematics. He told me that it would take between 2 and 20 months to craft the device. Given the initial impression and him giving me such a wide range in time, I wasn’t exactly impressed but I had nothing to lose.

    I finished up the hard copy of the schematics and allowed him to take some measurements and then headed towards the inn. I got a decent rate and started looking for work. Being directly at the port provided a lot more work that Gadgetzan had and word quickly spread of my linguistic skills. I had more work then I knew what to do with but it provided a nice distraction.

    Either Oglethorpe had no concept of time or possessed a time machine that arbitrarily triggered itself. I visited almost every day to enquire to the progress of my weapon and to provide money for the materials. Every time I was there different pieces would be finished and the next time I visited they’d be completely disassembled. When I enquired as to why he’d tell me that he’d never built that part but it would most likely be his next step.

    One day one of the men I was doing business for, a human named “Sea Wolf“ MacKinley, thought I might be a little overworked and asked if I wanted to accompany him to watch some matches at the arena and to meet his friend, Short John Mithril. We arrived and the two exchanged pleasantries and took me to one of the best seats for viewing. Short John told me that he’d heard of me and thought that I’d probably appreciate the first match.

    It was mostly for laughs to get the crowd warmed up, they were going to pit a murloc about my age up against some animals they’d captured from the jungle. It was extremely popular and the murloc always won. Short John excused himself for a minute to announce the match for all the spectators. It was to my great surprise that when he yelled out the name of the murloc combatant, Murkimus the Gladiator. It was my younger brother facing off against a panther nearly twice his size, armed with a small wooden spear.

    I watched in horror and prayed for his success, to my surprise the match was over within a minute with the panther gutted and my brother unharmed. I asked to see Murkimus once the battle was ended and they assured me it was best for him to rest for a bit and they would take me there after the last match. It seemed like forever until the fights were finally over and I got to see my brother.

    Short John and MacKinley lead me down to find him. I expected to find him in shackles in a cell but instead found him in a small, decently furnished room. He didn’t recognize me at first and since I hadn’t picked my name when he took me away, it took me a while to convince him that I was his older brother. I learned that after they were taken away, he was sold off to be a slave in the arenas but had won his freedom long ago and that he now chose to participate. As for Gurky and Murky, they were sold off as pets to a gnome mage by the name of Breanni. From what he understood she was heading to the city of Dalaran to establish some form of shop and that if nothing else, they would at least be cared for.

    I explained what had happened after they had been taken away and what I was now doing in Booty Bay. I asked if he’d come with me after my weapon was finished being made. He asked me where I was headed and then stopped and said it didn’t matter. His place was in the arenas and soon he would make his way to Outland to participate in even greater bouts. He wished me well and told me that it would be nice to keep visiting as long as I was in the jungle. I didn’t understand why he’d want to keep fighting but it was his choice and I would be happy if that’s what he wanted.

    Over the next few months I continued my work with the goblins and my visiting my brother. And then I thought back to his words, where was I headed? I decided that no matter what, I should find my other brother and sister first to make sure that they were alright. If my luck turned out right I’d be in Dalaran a city full of mages who could assist me in my travels from there.

    After a while I gave up counting the time that passed, that damn engineer never seemed to make any progress, but I’d waited this long I could wait a little longer. One day I went in expecting the usual stories about how some parts seemed to disassemble themselves or how goblins had tampered with his mind slowing down his production or even expecting to find his bi-weekly fire, but was surprised to see that it was done. Although it was done, he said it now needed a name. I told him that the gun was called a C-14 Impaler Gauss Riffle and with the armoured suit it was standard Terran heavy armour. I tried on the suit and it fit perfectly. He began to rattle on about things that didn’t make sense like the suit growing as I grew and it producing it’s own ammunition by extracting small amounts of metal from the air as long as I wasn’t firing.

    I went to visit my brother at the arena one last time and told him that I probably wouldn’t ever see him again. We said our final good byes and I planned for my voyage. During my time in Booty Bay I had made friends with a goblin named Scooty who operated the teleporter there. For a fee he could send me north, like all goblin technology he couldn’t guarantee me safety or that I’d arrive where I wanted to go. I had trusted the faith on a portal once before and all had worked out, a teleporter was basically just a very unstable portal.

    I hopped on and it began malfunctioning immediately. Sparks were flying left and right off my armour and all of a sudden I was gone. It wasn’t an instantaneous transport like from the Exodar to Gadgetzan but instead I travelled through multiple dimensions and saw what was happening. None stood out exceptionally except for one I was already familiar with, the one the other human had come from. I saw the Zerg attacking as they had in the mans visions. It was very brief but I knew they were in trouble. When I finally stopped moving I was in a forest surrounded by many strange humans dressed as all sorts of races from Azeroth. They were all headed towards some building and I didn’t quite understand the ritual. I was completely lost and people started staring at me. I heard some yelling “Did someone lose a kid in a murloc costume?”.

    I started to panic and almost fired off a few shots from my riffle but stood my ground. All of a sudden a pair of goblins and a strange creature called worgen approached me and calmed the crowd somehow. They took me aside and said they knew that I was from their world not this one. I asked them if they knew how to get back home and they told me that they had planned on staying a bit longer but couldn’t ignore a lost murloc. The female goblin seemed extremely offended that they had to leave and I still feel bad for ruining their expedition into the strange dimension. The other two eventually calmed her down enough that she agreed that this world was no place for a young murloc.

    The goblin pulled out a device from his pocket and placed it on the ground. There was a large flash and all of a sudden we were in different set of woods, but I knew I was back in Azeroth. The goblins offered to take me back with them but I asked the worgen if I could go with him instead. He seemed a bit surprised but said it shouldn’t be a problem and let out a strange laugh. I kindly explained to the goblins that I appreciated their offer but like my mother I think it would be more interesting to spend time with a new race.

    As of writing this message I’ve been with the worgen in Gilneas for a month. Many of them are still feral and working to gain control of their minds but have treated me with nothing but kindness. We’ve been exchanging stories and I’m excited to have begun learning their language. While I stay here I’ve been  making plans to travel to Dalaran to try and find clues to Gurky and Murky. Once I can be certain that they are happy, I plan to find a way to travel to the world of the Zerg and to help defeat them.

    After that if I ever make it back to this world, I’ll be strong enough to stand up to Sironas and will come see you and tell you more stories. I also find a cure in the other world so I can save that man in the stasis chamber when I return. I wish you the best of luck in the future mom, I’ll try to message you again before I head to the other world but if I can’t I don’t want you to worry. You taught me well and I’ll do you proud, wherever I may be.

                            Grunty, Murloc Marine of the Exodar

    You return the oversized pile of paper to it’s place in the journal and wonder if such a tale of other dimensions could be possible. You also think the strange creature you acquired recently from a cloaked man in Dalaran. He called it a zergling and you wonder if it has anything to do with the zerg described in the letter.

@KillerCatie

Awesome! I think you'll even get one for creativeness o.O

Grunty was running while shooting all the creatures who were following him. His battleship was infected at first with some kind of alien spores and after that the attack began.
The pandazerg were evil creatures half insect half pandaren. Sharp claws and maws fell under his comrades in a bloody battle he was lucky to escape alive.
His armor was covered both with the blood of his fellas and enemies. And his gun was nearly out of ammo. Only one grenade left and half of the clip for so many aliens chasing him.
When he finally reached the emergency capsule room he was nearly surrounded and without time. That horrible creatures were everywhere ready to jump and finish with his life with their claws more similar to huge scythes.
Then a huge explosion overcame the aliens throwing them away burned in fire.

- JIMMY!! – Grunty said when he saw one of his injured partners appear near the corner. He heavily walked to the marine and sit down near him. Grunty was still shocked because of that amazing entrance of his friend but still manage to open the door of the closest escape capsule. He tried to take Jimmy with him but he refused.

- I wont make it, you are our only hope Grunty. Ive activated the selfdestruction sequence in the battleship console. Now, you have your last mission. Live!
And with this words Jimmy made his last effort pushing Grunty inside the capsule and closing the door after that.
Grunty jumped to the crystal glass window of the capsule before it was launched just to find the quiet body of his smiling friend going far away along with the battleship. - JIIIIMMYY!!-. And some seconds after that a huge explosion crushed the spaceship in two pieces covered in fire.

Suddenly two days later Grunty awake. He was weak and tired but he took a look around like a marine should do. He was in a beach, half covered with salt and sand, he could hear the sound of the sea waves near there. But more important than all that, someone was carrying him along. His body was bouncing and four green hand were holding him by hands and feet. – What the hell!! Who are you? Where I am?

-Yaw! Look Kebok! Is alive!! –say one little voice.

- Damn it!! Im sure alchemist Fizzleburg wanted to made the autopsy. Well at least we could take a look a this strange technology he have. Check this cool shotgun… were the last words he heard before losing his cosciusness.

When he recovered he found himself inside a wood cage with a piece of mois bread next to him. He ate it in seconds and after that he look at the place where he was. It was a small village near the coast, full of strange mechanic artifacs and dangerous machines. The villagers seems to be small green skinned creatures with small evil eyes and big ears and nose. Next to his cage was another one and inside it there was a big strange creature. He looked humanoid and beast at the same time, maybe something between them. Wild and bestial look but his eyes and face expression revealed feelings and human personality. Suddenly he began to cough like if breathing caused him a lot of pain.

- Are you alright?. asked Grunty willing to know his health state.

- Yeah... it has stopped now. This is not my favorite inn... *cough *cough You are the first talking murloc ive ever seen. Whats your name little one?
Grunty wasnt expecting an answer since he didnt know if that race was able to speak but the surprise of a chating in that circunstances make him a bit happier.

- My name is Grunty and im... from far far away from here. To be honest you are the first talking whatever you are ive ever met too. hehe
That phrase made the wolfman laugh a bit before he started telling him his history. - Im Fenrir a worgen, thats how we want to be called. In the past we were humans but a dark magic disease spreaded in my country turning us into this. It tooked us some time to control ourselves and set us free from Arugals control, but we finally managed it and recover our country. How i end inside a cage may be your next question, isnt it Grunty? .Grunty smiled.

- Well i was travelling from my homeland, Gilneas, to Stormwind to visit their trade market and buy some stuff when our ship was attacked by the Defias, a thief organization. We fighted but we were outnumbered by them and in the end we have to escape in a small boat. After two days of painful disasters we arrived in the coast of this weird island. Weak and hungry we tried to obtain some help from the local population but they were highly hostile as you have seen, and captured us as slaves. Normally goblins are a neutral race but these ones seem different, independent from the other cartels. These "others" wont let us go freely. We have to escape from these bear cages.

- Yeah, and if i can recover my armor and bolter we will get a chance. You dont seem to be very healthy. - said Grunty worried.

- I will be fine buddy. I just need a bit of fresh air out of this cage and they will taste the fear of my claws and fangs. They hide your things whatever they are in that small armory over there. But we have to get out of here first.- pointed the worgen.

- Thats not a problem, you are talking to Sargent Grunty of the Marine Special Forces, if i can defeat insectoids armies i can certainly open this lock. These green scavengers dont know when you are awake or not.- said Grunty.

The little murloc show then a small key from one of his pockets. While he was feigning to be unconscious he manage to pick it from one of the goblins who were carrying him without them knowing. But the trick wasnt going to succeed for much longer so he had to be quick. He used and the lock opened in a few seconds, after that he opened Fenrirs. Both walked silently behind boxes and big metal machines avoiding being found for any of the guards. Grunty smaller than his new friend decided to go alone and recover his future stuff. That "other" goblin werent ready to learn about his technology. Who knows what could have done with his personal fragmentation grenades, there were a present from his girlfriend Gurky.
A not small metal tube was used to silent the roomguard before he could even know Grunty was there. He knew a thousand ways to kill a men, a bit less with goblins but enough. That little greeny was going to sleep for a long time.
Once he had his armor on and his weapon loaded he returned where Fenrir was hiding.

- We need to get to the hangar, its our only escape route. You said you knew how to pilot right?- asked the worgen.

The murloc nod with his head and said. - I only hope this crappy green skin know how to build one able to fly.

The hangar was a huge platform full of strange vehicles and machines. One of them painted in red had two metal wings and big machine gun back so they headed in that direction when....

- ALARM!! ALARM!! Intruder alert! Intruder alert!

- Damn it, they realized we escaped. Now our escape time had reduced drastically. We must reach that flying machine before they find us.

- Too late...

Two goblins appeared right in front of them and a lot of more could be heard coming from behind. They had not seen the cameras surrounding the area. Once they knew they have escaped not long time passed until they found their location.
Fenrir using his last energies dashed to the goblins while avoiding their rifle shots. His claws fell from the sky just to slice his enemies bodies who fell under his feet. Nearly exhausted for all the jumping, running and fight, he took a look behind to see Grunty and all the goblins when... BOOM!! A huge explosion suddenly explode in the middle of the goblin squad, making them flew away covered in napalm fire. - Say hello to my BIG friend!- shouted Grunty.

- Prisoners found at the Hangar!! Prisoners found at the Hangar!! Sealing all the exits!! Sealing all the exists!!

- !... Run! Grunty run!

Both, marine and worgen run with all they got to the plane. The big metal door were closing by the sides slowly but they were running out of time. They had wasted a lot of time fighting the "others".
The plane wasnt very big, it had a big motor engine in the front with a defensive machine gun on the back seat. Grunty took the controls and Fenrir the weapon. When the murloc started the engine, the computer of the plane said: -Enter Starting Code- 6 Number Sequency-

- I will need some seconds to find the code, can you buy us some time?

- Take them out! Dont let any of the prisoners escape!! Fire!! - were yelling the goblins. And their bullets flied all over the hangar. Some even hit the platform so Fenrir took the machine gun, loaded it and aimed them.

- Sure, i will keep the last goblins away but do it before that doors close or we will be tauren food.- and he began to shoot to everyone in sight. Grunty was trying to concentrate while entering the numbers but was hard with the sound of the machine gun hitting his ears. Wait! Murlocs have ears? Well doesnt matter.

- Grunty, we are nearly out of time!!

- I nearly have it... 5... 9... 16... 17... 24... 43. GOT IT!! Lets go out of here!! - yelled as the plane began to move straight forward. The air machine faster every second suddenly separated from the ground.

- We are flying Grunty!! Woohooo!! We are free!! - said happily Fenrir with tears on his eyes. - Take that stupid goblins! Now... to Gilneas!!

- Im the one piloting here you know? - Fenrir looked scared for one moment.- Dont worry hehe we will go to your country, i feel curious about a wolfman city. And i think this is the beggining of a beautiful friendship...

Grunty was a survivor of a human attack where almost all of his family was wiped, he was sent off into the unknown space by a group of goblins who were studying the outer space looking for any strange planets or portals, after a few hours of searching Grunty found a strange portal that led him into the universe of starcraft , a terrans ship picked him on the radar and captured him thinking that he is an enemy , after seeing how harmless he was and that he wasn't with the enemy they decided to train him and  hire him to work with the terrans , a few days later a large amount of zergs attacked their ship, Grunty , while brave still couldn't take all of the zergs on and was forced to take an emergency pod escape. sent into an unknown space through a strange portal, Grunty had little knowledge of what was waiting for him ahead and whether this portal would really lead him into planet Azeroth or into another universe, upon waking up in Anaheim woods with his pod nowhere to be found , a group of worgens and goblins approached him , he was taken to the lost isles where felt it was more like home to him with the engineer specialist goblins. after finally arriving at the lost isles he asked one of the goblins who live there if they had seen his pod around , the goblin noded yes and that he did in fact see a pod in Anaheim woodlands being dragged by a nasty zergling, Grunty asked the goblin a favor , to make a weapon for him, after a few hours the goblin handed over Grunty a shining gauss rifle with tiny cute bullets that would make a murloc mother proud , Grunty headed back to Anaheim woodlands for one final time to retrieve his pod (which had a lot of plans and gear that would help him get back to his fellow Terrans.) heading into the same forest he crashed in he noticed a zergling going into a nearby cave , Grunty rushes into the cave and kills the zergling before he had the chance to turn around , after going deeper into the cave he found his pod badly smashed with half of his items lost , still he had enough ship plans and items to build a terran ship to get back to the starcraft universe he had grown to love, after heading back to the lost isles he gave his goblin friends the ship plans and started building his Future ship  , a few weeks later he had a fully working ship that was ready to take him back home , after leaving planet azeroth he noticed a strange dot on his radar , after a few hours of flying around in space he found a portal that led him into his home world in starcraft where he was reunited with his terran friends heading yet to another strange adventure.

  1 of 4

Time, Dragons, and Space:  A story of connecting worlds and a war through time.

"You know, I have heard about enough of your bull#*%@ about dragons and magical time portals," Commander Rinka said. "I want the truth, I want real answers, and I want them now!" He slammed his fist down on the table in mock rage. The human female that sat across the table from him looked unimpressed.

"Sir, I told you you wouldn't believe me when you asked me that question the first time," she said. She looked down at the manacles binding her wrists, focusing on the blinking lights. "Even your interrogation drugs, while amusing, can't waver my faith in the Light."

The Commanders face scrunched up, he opened his mouth to yell, but was cut off as the door to the small metal cell burst open. "Sir!" a terrified looking uniformed man shouted.

"What!!" the Commander shouted back. The man in the doorway visibly swallowed with a gulp, "Sir, he is here, Admiral DuGalle, is here."

"What? Why is he here?" the Commander shouted as he stormed out of the room. The uniformed man closed the door and followed closely behind. "I doctored the reports myself, he can't be here for the prisoner. Where is he now Lieutenant?"

"Sir, he asked for the keycode to your personal office as soon as he got here," the Lieutenant said, fumbling with a folded piece of paper, holding it out to the Commander.

Rinka snatched the paper from him, turning to a complete stop and spinning around, the Lieutenant bounced off the Commanders imposing frame and found himself sprawled out in the floor. "You didn't give it to him? Did you?!" he exclaimed, opening the paper.

The Lieutenant stood, dusting himself off. "I am sorry sir, but he does outrank you." The Commanders face slowly grows pale as he reads the letter. "Lieutenant, I am being relieved of command." He scowled, then crushed the paper in his fist as he barred his teeth. "I am not going to take this! Not from him, not from anyone! Lieutenant, take the prisoner, and her beast, to my shuttle, I will finish this my self. I don't need the UED to support me, if I can find out what her secrets..." the click of a gun silenced him.

The Lieutenant looked down the barrel of his pistol at the Commander, "The Admiral also gave strict orders that if you refused to comply, you should be executed immediately." The single shot blew out the back of Commander Rinkas skull. His face frozen in shock as his lifeless body fell back into the deck of the hallway. The noise brought other soldiers and officers into the hallway. "Stop gawking, get a cleaning crew up here, I don't want any blood left on the bulkhead when the Admiral gets here."

"Excellent work Lieutenant," Admiral DuGalle said, "I knew you would be loyal to the UED, you have not lost sight of what we are here to accomplish, like your late commander." DuGalle closed the folder and sat it back down onto the commanders desk. "Thats why I am promoting you to Commander, this station is yours now. I trust you will no disappoint me."

"Sir! I will do my utmost to assist you in accomplishing Earths directives here," the lieutenant said, swelling with pride, a smile leaking onto his face as he saluted the admiral.

"Good, you were right in transmitting the unaltered reports to me," DuGalle stood and began to pace around the side of the desk, "If this female you captured is indeed in possession of healing powers, it could be a great asset in our fight against the zerg. Have her, and her little pet, taken aboard my Science Vessel. I will interview her there."

"Yes sir, Admiral DuGalle sir!" the new commander of research station 14 exclaimed.

Raylea looked out the window at the star field, filled with nostalgia of her childhood. She had been moved from the small metal room a few days ago, once free of the station, she was surprised that her restraints were released. She had been given a much larger room, with a comfortable bed. They had returned her friend, Grunty to her. Back on Azeroth, she had found a clutch of murloc eggs, all but one smashed open by the scavengers on the beach. With no other murlocs in sight to take care of it, her compassion as a paladin got the better of her. She took the egg, hatched it, and was raising the little murloc herself. She looked down at the little murloc in her hand, scratching him under his chin. "Well, perhaps we can finish our mission here, these people do seem much more hospitable." Grunty's response was a what sounded like a cat purring underwater. Her thoughts were interrupted as the door to her room opened.

"Good morning madam," a tall, older man said, stepping into the room carrying a metal tube about a foot long. She could see the five armored escorts through the door. "My name is Gerard DuGalle, Admiral and commander of the United Earth Directorate fleet in this sector" he said, "How may I address you?"

"I am Raylea," she said, "Champion of the Argent Crusade." She stepped away from the window and took a step towards the admiral. "Are you going to berate me and my mission as well?" she asked.

"Well, that depends. I have read all the reports, but that brute Rinka was too heavy handed. "I want to hear your story myself, then I want to see if we can help each other." He unscrewed the top of the tube as he pulled out a chair and sat down. He motioned for her to sit and turned two of the mugs sitting on the table over.

Raylea sat down across from him, watching him pour a hot, black liquid into the two cups. She accepted one from him and watched carefully as he placed it to his lips and sipped before she tasted it. She blinked, "Coffee? I am surprised to find something familiar here." She took another sip and sat the mug down, "Alright, I will start with the relevant information..."

  2 of 4

Subject: Unknown non-colonial female subject interrogation by Adm. DuGalle

Receptiants: *retracted by fleet command*

Report from recorded conversation between unknown human subject "Raylea" and Admiral DuGalle.

Raylea: I come from a world you people would regard as fantasy, giant winged lizards fly through the sky, beasts of all kinds roam the lands, and a great evil raises the dead heroes of the world to do battle against the righteous. One of these groups of "lizards", we call them dragons, command the very flow of time. This Bronze Dragonflight has taken it upon themselves to protect the time line, sending heroes back to points in time where their nemesis, the Infinite Dragonflight are trying to meddle with events pivotal to the history of our world. In a area known as Dragonsblight, all the different dragonflights have their own shrines, focus points for their powers. The Bronze shrine is under constant siege by the Infinite Dragons, a battle almost unseen as it rages through the very fabric of time. On one visit to the temple where emissaries of the dragonflights meet, the Bronze dragon, Chromie, who I have worked with several times before, asked me for my help. The warriors of the Infinite Dragonflight have started to win, using weapons advanced beyond anything seen on our world. Weapons I have seen here in your ships.

DuGalle: So these Infinite Dragons are using Terran weapons against the Bronze Dragons. And the timeline of your worlds history is in danger because of this?

Raylea: Correct, Chromie gave me a device that she got from a captured Infinite. When I activated it, a familiar looking portal opened, and I stepped through. When I landed, I was in the middle of a battle between your forces and the creatures I now know you call the Zerg. At first, I thought they were some sort of Silithid, but I digress. I joined in the battle, felling a number of foes, but eventually overwhelmed. When I awoke, I was chained by your Comander Rinka, being taken to his research station.

DuGalle: So, what do you wish to accomplish here?

Raylea: I need to find out how the Infinites are getting weapons from here, and stop them. Its of the utmost important....

Recording terminated, all power converted to bridge for defensive purposes. Assault by unknown alien beings, organic, coherent energy projectiles produced from their bodies. Defensive matrix uneffective.