Starcraft 2 Story: What We Know So Far

For those of you who don't know, Jimmy Raynor actually had a criminal background before the events of SC and BW along with a man named Tychus Findlay. This is them meeting each other once again.

The man that Tychus is refering to that is interested in the alien (Xel'Naga) artifacts is actually Valerian Mengsk, of the Möebius Foundation and son of Emperor Mengsk, lord and master of the Terran Dominion.

If you just watch from 1:00 through to 1:50, you will see the closing scene in the mission directly after the cinematic above. This shows Matt Horner flying the Hyperion in to rescue Raynor and Findlay from the encroaching Zerg swarm.

This is the scene directly after Raynor and Findlay make it back on the Hyperion. They are shocked to learn that Sarah Kerrigan, The Queen of Blades, has returned after the swarm's 4 year period of inactivity.

At an undisclosed time before the above scenes on the Hyperion, Zeratul finds a Xel'Naga temple of some great significance and is confronted by Kerrigan.

In an extension of this scene, in a video with such awful sound quality it's just not worth posting, Kerrigan also says to Zeratul: "Do you hear them Zeratul? Whispering from the stars? The galaxy will burn with their coming," alluding to the Xel'Naga's imminent return.

Back on the Hyperion, on his way back from the cantina to recover from the shocking new information that the Zerg have returned, Raynor, is met by Zeratul, who imparts the new information he has learned: "The Xel'Naga return, the cycle nears its end, the artifacts are the key."

Just to be clear, all of the following is just my personal speculation:

So what the heck does all of this mean? For my explanation I'm going to assume that you already know all of the events that transpired over the corse of SC and BW. If you don't, I HIGHLY recommend you read This and This. The ending of BW left us with the UED being destroyed completely, Mengsk in charge of the Terran Dominion, the Protoss in shambles trying to merge the Dark and High templar societies together, and Kerrigan and her Zerg minions dominating the whole Koprulu Sector. SC2 begins four years later.

During this time between games the Zerg and Kerrigan completely vanish. Zeratul also vanishes, never to be seen. Raynor is posted as the number one criminal in the Terran Dominion, as Mengsk tries to hunt him down. Not much has been shown to us regarding progress in Protoss cultural integration, but I speculate that nothing particularly interesting is happening from their point of view; they're busy trying to rebuild themselves after their homeworld (Aiur) was purged by the Zerg.

Zeratul has been doing some interesting work during his 'disappearance', however. The text in the following spoiler is a transcript of his conversation with Duran at the end of the BW secret mission, Dark Origin. The context is Zeratul discovering a Zerg/Protoss hybrid in perfect cryo sleep in a stasis cell, and he is horrified at the potential power of such a beast.

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After this strange encounter, Zeratul leaves on a four year mission to learn more information about the Xel'Naga, in a desperate attempt to try to stop their return. If you don't know anything about the nature of the "Cycle" and the Xel'Naga, the I recommend you read this article. If you don't want to read that whole thing, then all you really need to understand is this:

The Xel'Naga are an incredibly powerful race that can live easily for millions of years. Unfortunately, they are not capable of reproduction in the way that we think of it. A generation of Xel'Naga is created from merging two races, one that represents a purity of form (like the Protoss), and one that represents a purity of essence (like the Zerg). The Xel'Naga travel across the stars in massive "Worldships" genetically altering various races that they encounter, trying to create the purity of form and essence that they need. Upon doing so, they will merge the two races together (we don't really know how), and then the hybrids will be the next generation of Xel'Naga. Both of the races are destroyed in the process of giving birth to the Xel'Naga. This form of indirect reproduction of the Xel'Nagas' is referred to as "The Cycle". If a generation of Xel'Naga is unable to engineer and merge the perfect races, then the Xel'Naga will go extinct forever.

So the current generation of Xel'Naga in the SC continuum is nearing their deaths now that they have lived for who knows how long, possibly billions of years, and they haven't been able to make any races that they believe are more pure in form or essence than the Protoss and Zerg (and yes, the Xel'Naga did create both of those races). The Xel'Naga are now returning to merge the Protoss and Zerg by whatever force is necessary to keep their species alive. This is most likely going to be the major crisis in SC2, as if the Xel'Naga succeed, the Zerg and Protoss will be utterly destroyed.

The Xel'Naga artifacts that have begun popping up around the sector are sought after by many factions. Zeratul seeks them to try to find some way to stop the Xel'Naga. Kerrigan desires them as well, but her motives are still unknown to us (it is implied so far that Kerrigan knows much more about the Xel'Naga than anyone else). Jimmy Raynor and Tychus Findlay are looking for them now to sell them off to Valerian Mengsk, who is also implied to be rather knowledgeable about the Xel'Naga, but it isn't completely clear why he is after the artifacts. The Dominion also is trying to gather the artifacts, and has started regulating trade among the Dominion controlled worlds in hopes of seizing them, but again, Emperor Mengsk's motives are unknown.

Discussing Samir Duran just makes my head hurt, so I won't say much about him. Some people say he's an infested terran, some people say he's a Xel'Naga, some people say he's a Zerg/Protoss hybrid, some people say he's actually a sentient Khaydarin Crystal fragment, like the Uraj or Khalis. Whatever he is, it seems to me like he is against Terran, Zerg, and Protoss alike, and that his actions make him seem like he's an ally of the Xel'Naga, even if he ins't of of them himself. His experiments in hybridizing the Protoss and Zerg make it seem like he could've been sent by the Xel'Naga to try to find a way to merge the species together by the time the Xel'Naga arrive in the Koprulu sector, making their job easier when they get there. It's also possible that he's just a very wealthy Terran doing exparaments to make the perfect pet. We won't know for a long while–probably until the final expansion of SC2.