Niadra

"A newly created Zerg Queen. Highly intelligent, inexperienced, and eager to please Kerrigan by following her every command to the letter. Has a motherly demeanour to her brood."

- Character description

Niadra is a zerg broodmother.

Heart of the Swarm
"Listen carefully. This ship contains many dangers. Follow my commands and hide in the shadows. You will consume and grow. Infest this ship and kill every last protoss onboard."

- Kerrigan to Niadra

Niadra was created by Sarah Kerrigan when she battled the protoss on Kaldir. Although she succeeded in preventing them from contacting the Golden Armada, one of the protoss ships attempted to flee from the planet and travel to Shakuras. To prevent them from surviving, Kerrigan placed a parasitic larva within the captured protoss colonist Lasarra and dropped the psionic veil that prevented her from being warped back to her people.

After being teleported to the ship, Lasarra attempted to warn the Templar but died as the parasitic larva spawned from her body. Shortly afterwards, it began infesting the local animals kept onboard by the protoss and hid within the ventilation shafts where it found a safe location to mature into a. Kerrigan gave her the name Niadra and tasked her with eliminating all the protoss onboard the ship. Niadra and her growing brood moved through the ship destroying the protoss, Niadra herself continuing to evolve and grow her powers by consuming the specimens in the ship.

After reaching the bridge and destroying the last protoss on the ship, Niadra and her brood became the only occupants of the craft. She attempted to contact Kerrigan to inform her of this, but her communications were not responded to. With few other options, Niadra decided to continue the Queen of Blades' last directives: to survive, grow her brood, and destroy the protoss, until the day came when her queen needed her again.

Shadow Wars
"I remember you well, o' Queen of Blades. I remember the purpose you gave me. I took a protoss ship in your name. I slew everyone onboard. And I never heard your voice again. But your purpose remains, o' queen. As long as any protoss remain, I will hunt them."

- Niadra

Niadra never heard Kerrigan's voice again, but the directives she gave her remained, so she vowed that as long as any protoss live, she would hunt them. Eventually, she took her brood to an abandoned terran base on the planet Adena, hoping to lure terrans there to expand her brood to fight the protoss. A renegade Terran Dominion group landed on the planet, and Niadra sprung her trap, attacking their marines and placing a larva in their commander, hoping to infest their battlecruiser. The larva was successful in getting in their dropship, but the transport was shot down by Admiral Urun of the Daelaam in orbit. Niadra instead turned her attention to a psionic terran in the squad named Elms, who she saw as a powerful tool for her brood. Niadra sent her broods to retrieve her.

Game Unit
A Niadra portrait will be available in StarCraft II for those who purchase a Season 1 War Chest.

Larval Form
Niadra's larval form is used briefly. She has no form of offense in this form and must hide to avoid conflict until she can grow to her broodmother form.

Unlike a typical larva, this one has controllable movement and can survive without the creep.

Broodmother Forms
As a broodmother, Niadra is a ranged support attacker. She is unsuited to fight enemies alone, and must rely on other units to fight. Niadra is able to quickly breed zerg units to fight for her, and has a regeneration aura that rapidly heals nearby allies. As she continues to consume biomass and evolve, the control she provides and thus the army she can command increases, as does her HP.

Quotations

 * See StarCraft II Niadra Quotations

Personality and Traits
Niadra is extremely loyal to Kerrigan, even without the Queen of Blades giving her direct orders. To this end, she is fixated on wiping out the protoss, as it was the last directive that Kerrigan gave her. She has a motherly demeanor to her brood. She regards terrans as being a species driven by greed.