INTERVIEW WITH AN OVERLORD:
JACKY: "So, today, in our cultural podcast, 'At work with Protoss and Zerg', we'll be interviewing an overlord. Yes, that's right, we have a Zerg overlord with us in the studio today. How are you doing up there?"
OVERLORD: "WRHRHRAUUAUGRHRHHSSHHFBTPF"
JACKY: "Right, that reminds me, I should start out by introducing our interpreter today, Courtney. Courtney, you've spent five years on Char studying overlord language. Is that correct?"
COURTNEY: "It is."
JACKY: "So, could you tell me why you chose to learn overlord?"
COURTNEY: "You know, I've always been fascinated by Zerg culture, you know, the way it's all so... violent, in a way, at the first glance, but then as you get to know them better, I mean, they're a lot like us really. They also use just minerals and vespene gas to build everything, for example..."
JACKY: "Fascinating. But why overlord? Why not hydralisk language, for example?"
COURTNEY: "Oh I learned overlord because overlords don't have an attack command. You know, as a civilian, I only have 40 hit points, so I have to be careful. Hydralisk language? Oh my god. Too dangerous.
Actually... I wasn't going to talk about this, but my friend Fred, he... he travelled with me when I went to Char. He was going to learn queen language. You know, those weird, whistly noises. Oh my god... the first week or two went really well but then they got angry at him. At first, they just ensnared him a few times, to punish him, but then one of the queens got really mad and... well, first she waited for a really long time until she had enough energy, and then.... she spawned broodlings of him! *sobs* He was only 24 years old..."
JACKY: "Courtney, I'm really sorry to hear that. If you need to take a..."
COURTNEY: "No, it's okay. I brought it up myself. Shouldn't have. Let's get on with the interview."
JACKY: "Alright. So, let me just introduce the overlord we're going to be talking to today. His name is.... I'm not sure I'm pronouncing this right..... YEEARHHGHGHHWRAUHAHURGWHZSHBT?"
COURTNEY: "Close. Actually it's YEEARHHGHGHHWRAÜAHURGWHZSHBTF."
JACKY: "Okay. So, YEEARHHGHGHHWRAÜAHURGWHZSHBTF, tell me, what's a normal working day like for you as a Zerg overlord?"
OVERLORD: "Well, you see, what we overlords do is we keep all the underlings in control so that the brood functions nicely and everyone does what the cerebrate needs them to do. I guess you can say we're the administrators of the brood, keeping everything under control."
JACKY: "And how do you do that?"
OVERLORD: "Well, what we do is actually we work a lot with the larvae."
JACKY: "How do you mean, work with the larvae?"
OVERLORD: "We teach them not to morph into anything if there aren't enough of us overlords around, even if the cerebrate tells them to. The cerebrate will often vigorously command the larvae to morph again and again, even though there isn't enough control. But we've taught them well, so they always blankly refuse."
JACKY: "Okay. But what happens if there isn't enough control in the brood? Say, if a lot of overlords get killed all of a sudden?"
OVERLORD: "Uhmm, well, yeah, that's the thing. Nothing much seems to happen, really. When that happens, it's really the kind of experience that just makes you wanna quit overlording and become a neutral unit on a UMS map or something. When 10 of your colleauges get killed by corsairs (damn corsairs!) and then everything just seems to be carrying on as normal, even though we're at like 124 of 53 supply. It makes you think: Are we even needed here? Is it all some kind of scam? Is the Overmind playing a trick on us? We all just try to forget about that afterwards."
JACKY: "What would you say is the most rewarding thing about your job?"
OVERLORD: "I'd say the most rewarding moment is probably when I manage to detect a Protoss dark templar and then some of my underlings take it out before it kills any of our drones. That's always a great feeling."
JACKY: "And the worst thing?"
OVERLORD: "Corsairs. Fricking corsairs. What are we supposed to do when our cerebrates send us out in the middle of the map, going at reaver speed because they don't feel like they can afford to upgrade us, and with no protection? You can see the corsairs from miles away and you're just like "oh shit"... cause it's not as if there's anything you can do about it. They just don't care about our safety.
You know, if I was a cerebrate, I would have a group of hydralisks with every overlord. Preferably some mutalisks too. Devourers, actually. Every overlord would travel with a control group of devourers."
JACKY: "That does sound annoying. Sorry to hear about that.
Another thing I'd like to know about: What's it like to transport other units around inside you? Do you enjoy that, or is it really demanding?"
OVERLORD: "I'd say it depends. I mean, when you're carrying two ultralisks, I have to say that's pretty heavy. The ultras get really cramped in there too, so they're just bumping around all the time, in a foul mood, making grumpy noises.
Also, one time, I transported eight drones at once. That was a such a mess. The drones were just shuffling around on top of each other and spinning around in circles all the way to the island expansion. Ticklish as hell! I also transported Courtney once..."
JACKY: "Really? Courtney, could you tell us what it's like to be transported around inside a Zerg overlord?"
COURTNEY: "Yeah, so, at first, I was really afraid to go inside an overlord, so I had chartered this dropship and I was just flying around next to the overlords, shouting to them."
OVERLORD: "Yeah. That was such a funny sight..."
COURTNEY: "But then I thought: 'Do I want a hands-on experience of Zerg culture or not?' And I got into an overlord."
JACKY: "So, how was it?"
COURTNEY: "At first I just thought 'eww, this is so slimy...', but then I found out it's actually also really comfy in there. But this one time, though, I travelled with an ultralisk that had an appointment to have its Chitinous Plating looked at in the main base. That was scary as hell. It was just me and the ultralisk. Luckily, it was very cramped in there, so it couldn't get its claws at me. It just kept wriggling and groaning."
JACKY: "Wow. I'm glad you're safe. Now, I have one last question for you, YEEARHHGHGHHWRAUHAHURGWHZSHBT. And thank you so much for coming. Now, this is something that's really been on my mind a lot. I hope you don't mind me asking..."
OVERLORD: "No, please, go ahead."
JACKY: "Okay, so: How do you stay in the air? I mean, mutalisks are always flapping their wings to stay up, but you seem to be just, kind of... hanging there?"
OVERLORD: "What do you mean 'why do we....' I mean, of course we do, we're overlords... but then again, come to think of it, that is a bit weird about the mutas, actually I've never thought of it like....aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!"
*THHWHURTHBTFBRSH*