The Pylon glowed through the night, casting soft azure light over the surrounding dunes. The Jawas had set up camp nearby, their sandcrawler parked at a respectful distance. They chattered constantly, fascinated by the strange structures the tall, silver-haired being had summoned from nothing.
But DRN-5571 was troubled.
The Gateway stood dormant.
Attempts to create units failed. The interface responded, but only with a silent error: "INSUFFICIENT RESOURCES."
She frowned. The familiar logic trees unfolded in her mind.
In her old existence, minerals and vespene had been supplied by drones — mining, refining, channeling.
Here... there were no mineral fields. No vespene geysers. Only sand, scrap, and the whispers of the Force she didn't yet understand.
She examined the Jawas' piles of scavenged tech — metal plating, circuits, power cells, chunks of droids.
Potential: Medium-grade resource conversion. Energy yield: 12.4% baseline.
That would have to do.
She approached the Jawa who had seemed most receptive — a smaller one with a necklace of droid fingers and unusually clean robes. She pointed to the tech pile, then to her own structures, then mimed "transfer."
The Jawa tilted its head.
Then it nodded.
A trade was made — a small stash of copper wiring and a broken blaster for a sphere of glowing energy she conjured from the Pylon's field. The Jawa squealed in delight and ran back to show the others.
The next morning, they returned with more scrap.
She knelt beside the Gateway and began feeding the materials into a converter node she constructed — a basic Assimilator, reconfigured.
A soft chime.
+50 resources. Construction possible.
She smiled — or the closest thing her new form could manage.
She extended her hand.
And from the Gateway's warp field came her first unit — a Protoss Observer, its shimmering form cloaking the moment it emerged. The Jawas shrieked in delight and chased it playfully.
Things were progressing.
But peace never lasts.
---
The attack came at dusk.
A shrill cry tore through the air as crude bullets peppered the side of the Gateway. DRN-5571 turned sharply.
Figures in rough, tan wrappings crested the dune — Tusken Raiders. Wielding gaderffii sticks and outdated slugthrowers, they charged the camp with brutal purpose.
The Jawas scattered, diving for the sandcrawler, screaming in panic.
One fell — a gaderffii smashing down on its shoulder.
DRN-5571 stood still for a moment, frozen. This was not protocol. This was chaos.
But her core logic remained intact.
Protect. Build. Survive.
She extended her hand, and the build lattice ignited.
A Photon Cannon burst from the ground, locking on to the nearest Tusken.
Blue energy flared — and the first attacker disintegrated in a pulse of psionic fire.
The rest hesitated.
She summoned another.
And another.
Then a Shield Battery, pulsing with radiant energy. The Observer hovered above, marking targets.
The Jawas peeked out, watching in awe.
The battle was short.
And brutal.
Smoke and scorched cloth littered the sands.
When silence returned, DRN-5571 stood amid the glowing remnants of her defenses, her new body heaving slightly from exertion.
The Jawas emerged cautiously. One approached and offered her a piece of metal — a gesture of reverence.
She looked at it.
It wasn't much.
But it was something.
She nodded slowly.
Then turned back to the horizon.
This world was hostile.
But she could adapt.
And she would build something no storm could break.