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Homeworld: Legacies is a Homeworld 2 fan fiction written by DeepChrome in 2005. The first installment (although not chronologically) of the popular Legacies series it introduced several new characters such as Noreena Somtaaw and Ashoran. Also, unlike most HW2 fanfics the story focused around the protagonists of Homeworld: Cataclysm, Kiith Somtaaw and shows the Vaygr warlord Makaan in a positive light.

Plot SummaryEdit

It is some time after the Vaygr War. The Kushans have driven the Vaygr Crusades out of Hiigaran space and reestablished peace and order in the galaxy. The only threats to their sprawling dominion are rogue pirates from time to time. Karan Sjet has become something of a ceremonial leader for her people and though she holds no official position she is a symbol of unity across Hiigara and its colonies. With this influence she has helped found schools across the galaxy where ambitious and intelligent students are trained to become unbounds, commonly known as wireheads.

Some kiithid however do not have the resources or numbers to train such unbounds and for the most part are left to coordinate their fleets the old-fashioned way - through a combination of manual controls and computers. This leads to several problems such as communication blackouts or cluttered hangars. One of the kiithid forced to deal with such problems is Kiith Somtaaw, who despite their victory over the Beast are still a minor mining clan relegated to the outer reaches of Hiigaran territory.

When one of their number, a female engineer named Noreena becomes fed up with the problems she radically decides, at the behest of her fellow engineer Saeri to hook herself into the Kuun-Lan's core without prior training. The ship's doctor initially refuses Noreen's suggestion, calling it crazy, but as Noreena lays out her reasoning the medic sighs and decides to go through with it. The decision is a disaster, until Saeri reveals herself to be a Sjet unbound sent to scope out the possibility of giving Kiith Somtaaw a wirehead. Realizing that Noreena will not training if she's to go through with her decision Saeri contacts the legendary Karan Sjet to come and train Noreena personally.

Upon Karan Sjet's arrival Kiith Somtaaw once again becomes a centre of attention. Iifrit Somtaaw-sa, the Kuun-Lan's commanding officer gives Karan a personal tour of the ship. Upon encountering Karan Noreena is surprised by the elder woman's friendly charm, as well as her youthful appearance (in spite of being well over one hundred). Noreena, like everyone else, is awed by Karan's presence although, as the same time, she feels sorry for the Sjet-sa, unable to pry her many admirers away from her. Noreena soon wonders how she'll interact with Karan on a personal level.

To Noreena's surprise Karan reveals an astonishingly casual nature. As her personal teacher in unbound training Karan guides Noreena through the training showing her how to put on the bodysuit, how to multitask a small fleet, and how to manage her increased sensory awareness. As she does so Noreena increases in reputation, once considered an undisciplined and troublesome Worker engineer Noreena is now the pride of the Somtaaw fleet and promoted to the rank of Lieutenant.

However, not all prove more reverant towards Noreena. Already having been a nuisance to her in the past Noreena's sometimes friend Reydavic Somtaaw decides to get revenge on Noreena for a prank she pulled on him shortly after her becoming an unbound where she pretended to be Karan. Returning to his usual means of mischief, Reydavic takes the opportunity of her tutorship under Karan to create an erotic, lesbian-themed pin-up of Noreena and Karan. Shortly thereafter Reydavic is condemned and neutered, as a hope of discouraging his inappropriate behavior.

As Noreena struggles with the burden of being Kiith Somtaaw's wirehead Karan interacts further with the crew, gradually becoming more casual with them. When she finds and examines a painting of the Kharakian Genocide by Talia Somtaaw, an amateur artist, Karan actually breaks down her usually strong composure and sheds tears, moving the crew. Afterwards Karan remarks that Talia's painting “is beautiful. It’s exactly how I felt when it happened. Exactly. I’ve been at a loss for words for so long, to explain this when people ask me.” In her nostalgia and sadness, Iifrit Somtaaw-sa, to many's surprise, becomes the one to comfort her.

Noreena's problems aren't over yet though when her mother and father Ilania and Tessar Somtaaw arrive. While Tessar eagerly congratulates his daughter Ilania is furious, Noreena's decision having come between Ilania's plans of marrying Noreena off. Fortunately Karan defuses the situation by relating her own experience with her father, Huur Sjet-sa, and how she regrets their break in relationship shortly before the Kharakian Genocide.

Yet even more problems arrive when engineering genius "Progie," a friend of Noreena's, reveals his newest inventions, miniature hyperspace cores he calls "mini-cores." Although a seemingly harmless invention they soon become a problem when Progie starts jumping them into awkward places, at one point almost jumping one into Noreena's own body by accident. Once again, Karan proves her worth by recognizing Progie's talents for what they are and at her suggestion Iifrit asks Progie to stop using his mini-cores in return for sponsorship in a project to successfully reverse-engineer a far jump core, something that's only once been accomplished previously.

Yet even as Noreena struggles with the responsibilities of a wirehead-in-training and the Somtaaw fleet reorganizes itself under the influence of Karan a new threat begins to emerge. On the rim of Hiigaran space the Hiigaran fleet and those of their allies mysteriously come under siege by organized gangs of pirates. In one single raid the Somtaaw suffer the worst defeat ever since the Vaygr War, losing an entire convoy. Each time these raids come without warning, striking seemingly random locations and with staggering coordination, indicating an unbound as their leader. As the Somtaaw scramble to fight this new threat Noreena's training is forced to accelerate nearly to the point of breaking.

As Kushan Fleet Intelligence struggles to identify the leader of these pirates Noreena is simultaneously given the task by Iifrit of tracking down the identity of Lena Somtaaw, a brunette he once met in the Collision who he became interested in but could find out nothing about. Noreena reluctantly takes on the task but soon discovers that Lena does not appear in any files at all throughout the entire Hiigaran database, leading Noreena to be curious about Lena for her own reasons.

In short time a Hiigaran spy, Nadia Somtaaw arrives from the Vaygr Reaches with a revelation. The pirates are united by an insane but brilliant cult leader named Ashoran only makes things worse. Believing himself to be the living incarnation of the Kushan god of the underworld Qwaar-Jet and once a major foe of Emperor Riesstiu Ashoran has amassed an enormous horde of Imperialists, Vaygr, and Turanic pirates as well as countless followers of his personal cult. Of an unknown age and species Ashoran is revealed to have been plugged in to a hyperspace core for well over a century, thereby granting him unknown but undoubtedly powerful abilities. He's soon deemed the most dangerous threat the Hiigarans have faced since Makaan.

As the Hiigarans prepare for the inevitable confrontation with Ashoran Nadia sinks comfortably into the Kuun-Lan's crew. Revered due to her experience as a spy deep in Vaygr territory during the war five years earlier Nadia reveals a wealth of war stories, including several holo-images of Makaan. However, the harmless fun soon turns serious when someone remarks that a holo-image of Makaan as a younger man looks suspiciously like Jerel, Noreena's best friend. Noreena watches helplessly as her peers drag out Jerel and reveal the Eternal Mark on his flesh, thereby proving he's a Vaygr and most likely, Makaan's son.

As Noreena watches Jerel is dragged off by ship security, immediately suspected of ties to Ashoran. However, some questioning and background checks reveal that Jerel is anything but, in fact a defector from the Vaygr who was given a false identity by Fleet Intelligence several years back. Although still the son of Hiigara's most dangerous enemy since the Taiidan Emperor Jerel is deemed trustworthy. Others are not so easily convinced and Jerel continues to be a subject of persecution, although the command staff of the Kuun-Lan work to keep things quiet, to prevent him from becoming a target of assassination by vengeful Hiigarans.

Afterwards Noreena, Karan, and Iifrit, now aware of Jerel's true identity, begin to wonder if there would be some way to bring Ashoran's numerous Vaygr allies to the side of the Hiigarans. However, as they begin to list ideas none of them become convincing and most of them end up jokes. Then, abruptly in the middle of the meeting Karan goes into a temporary psychic shock. Shortly thereafter Iifrit and Noreena recieve word that Ashoran has hijacked the Hiigaran flagship Sajuuk. Now with their ultimate weapon in the hands of the enemy, the situation begins to look more dire than ever before.

While they are at their weakest a renegade Vaygr Crusade jumps near the main Hiigaran fleet, opening gravwells. As the Hiigarans rush to their battlestations the Crusade's leader reveals himself, to everyone's great shock, to be none other than Makaan, who was long thought dead. Unbelieving at first the Hiigarans prepare to open fire even as he presents the Hiigarans with an offer: forget their old quarrels and join up with his Vaygr in an alliance against Ashoran, or perish alone at Ashoran's hands. Begrudgingly the Hiigaran command staff accepts Makaan's offer, realizing that he has a point, particularly after they reveal to him that they've lost the Sajuuk.

Makaan arrives on board to meet with the Hiigaran leaders and discuss their strategy, which he believes to be gravely inadequate, but soon discovers things are not to his liking. He expected to find Karan, his old nemesis in command, but instead finds the inexperienced Noreena as the fleet's local wirehead. Demonstrating considerable doubts in her ability Makaan decides to test her ability to withstand a psychic attack at the hands of Ashoran - by invading her mind himself. After Noreena manages to resist him Makaan leaves her be, convinced that she at least "stands a chance." Before matter can move ahead any further however Ashoran strikes.

The battle proves to be an enormous challenge for Noreena, who, although having multitasked fleets in simulation has never had to do it in a real battle. However, she manages surprisingly well and with the help of Makaan's rogue Vaygr and the main Hiigaran fleet under Karan the allied forces hold back Ashoran for some time. However, things soon began to go badly as Ashoran unleashes deadly "mindblasts," first ravaging Karan's mind and then Makaan's before moving on to the weakest of his unbound foes - Noreena. However, with some difficulty Noreena proves able to drive Ashoran out of her head, who is already taxing his telepathic abilities through his simultaneous mindblast of Karan and Makaan.

With Ashoran out of her mind Noreena turns to the battle at hand and recognizing an opening as the Sajuuk manuevers to get a lock on a less valuable target than the Kuun-Lan (which Ashoran intends to capture) she takes the mostly-charged siege cannon of the Somtaaw command ship and aims it straight at the Sajuuk's phased cannon array, firing as soon as it reaches full charge. As the phased cannon array, in mid-fire, tears itself apart the siege cannon blast the resulting explosion nearly destroys Sajuuk, which forces Ashoran into a retreat. In his rage, Ashoran throws one last attack at Noreena, flinging at her an apparently telekinetic attack, throwing her through her tanks and tearing her neural links from her.

Knocked unconscious from the attack Noreena is hospitalized in the Kuun-Lan's medical bay, spending the next week in recovery with a makeshift tank filled with Vaygr ventilation equipment, which makes it a living hell for Noreena to be in. To make things worse Noreena is revisited by nightmares of Ashoran's attack, although she finds help in the form of Karan, who through psychic therapy guides Noreena into recovery. In the process Noreena discovers that Karan is, in fact, Iifrit's girlfriend, Lena although Iifrit is unaware of this fact. When Karan explains she wants to keep her identity a secret for now Noreena agrees, respecting Karan's desire for privacy.

After Noreena makes a full physical and mental recovery she is greeted by a party organized by the Kuun-Lan's crew, celebrating her release from sickbay. Rejoicing in the victory they've won and the fact they've all survived Noreena allows herself to have some fun, although almost immediately she's faced with the realities of their desperate situation and the fact that, inevitably, she'll have to go back to the makeshift tank until they're able to acquire a new one - most likely in two months. However, in spite of this, Karan is able to give her good - and surprising - news, revealing her intention to give Noreena a far jumper and to train her as her successor. Awed by this proposal Noreena graciously accepts, humbled how far she's risen in under a year.

Dramatis PersonaeEdit

• Noreena Somtaaw, Worker engineer and main protagonist (female Kushan)
• Reydavic Somtaaw, Worker engineer and general troublemaker (male Kushan)
• Pyalun Somtaaw, head of Kuun-Lan Info Services (male Kushan)
• Saeri Somtaaw, Worker pilot who recently joined Kiith Somtaaw (female Kushan)
• Iifrit Somtaaw-sa, Somtaaw kiith-sa and commander-in-chief (male Kushan)
• Tydaar Somtaaw, Kuun-Lan chief of security (male Kushan)
• Karan Sjet-sa, Hiigaran Fleet Command and Sajuuk-khar (female Kushan)
• Talia Somtaaw, Moral Sector worker and amateur artist (female Kushan)
• Lena Somtaaw, civilian (female Kushan)
• Jerel Somtaaw, Info Services crewman and Noreena's best friend (male Kushan)
• Reyan "Progie" Somtaaw, scientist and engineer (male Kushan)
• Alisair Somtaaw, Kuun-Lan's captain (male Kushan)
• Nadia Somtaaw, Hiigaran spy (female Kushan)
• Ashoran, pirate warlord and cultist (male, species unknown)
• Makaan, Vaygr warlord (male Vaygr)

External LinksEdit

• Homeworld: Legacies on Relic Forums
• Homeworld: Legacies on PDF