Jake Ramsey

Jacob Jefferson "Jake" Ramsey is a talented and extremely curious "maverick" archaeologist. He is over six feet tall ("his only distinguishing feature") and is extremely good at playing poker (counting cards comes naturally to him).

He became a preserver after Zamara forcibly entered his mind. As a result, his memories will become available to future generations of preservers.

Early Studies
Ramsey was born on Tarsonis, growing up with his parents and sister, Kirsten. He retained fond memories of his life there in adulthood. He became an archeologist and explored a number of worlds with strange alien ruins. One such world was Van Osten's "Moon", actually a planet. He was forced to break off his research due to a lack of funding. During the Great War, he lost many friends upon the fall of Chau Sara and Mar Sara.

Maverick
Although a talented archeologist, Ramsey found that his career was stagnating after the Brood War partly due to his "maverick" theories. He believed that the artifact discovered on Bhekar Ro was created by an intelligent alien species unknown to the terrans which may have been the ancestor of the protoss and zerg. He was nominated for the Flinders Petrie Award for Archaeological Distinction for his excavations on Pegasus, but didn't actually win the award which was a source of bitterness for him.

Ramsey and his small team worked on the inhospitable world of Gelgaris for two years before he received a message from the Terran Dominion. The spokesman identified himself as Valerian Mengsk, son of Dominion Emperor Arcturus Mengsk (much to Ramsey's surprise) and a budding archaeologist. Mengsk told him about the find on Bhekar Rho, along with other such artifacts, created by a third alien race, which he and his father noted were appearing on other worlds. He invited Ramsey to help him uncover the secrets.

Ramsey and the younger Mengsk had a meeting. Valerian Mengsk invited Ramsey to visit him and offered him full funding but insisted that Ramsey work with several people unfamiliar with him, not tell them who Valerian was and keep some classified information to himself. Ramsey was hired to unearth an artifact discovered on Nemaka that was related to the one on Bhekar Rho. Valerian and Ramsey toasted to "the discovery of wonders".

Ramsey traveled to Nemaka on the Gray Tiger. Speaking to its captain, he discovered that he wasn't leading the first expedition to Nemaka; the Gray Tiger had delivered three previous expeditions there. He was introduced to R. M. Dahl, the beautiful pint-sized leader of a team of private sector mercenary marines; this came as a surprise to him. He also made friends with Marcus Wright, a huge marine in excess of six feet in height who was neurally resocialized due to his "past life" as a cannibal (he had tortured, murdered, dismembered and eaten seven people).

The Discovery of Wonders
"Jake...you know you weren't the first. You were kind of the bottom of the barrel as far as Valerian was concerned. He'd tried all the top people first. You were a desperate, against-all-odds, last-ditch effort. He'd tried everything reasonable, so he brought in someone who wasn't."

- Rosemary Dahl

As Ramsey explored the artifact, he found a rope laid down by a previous expedition. The rope had become undone, and he attempted to fix it, but suddenly fell through the floor. Then the next floor opened up under him as well. The dual falls twisted Ramsey's ankle. Dahl quickly found him, telling that the ceiling above him had closed up after Ramsey fell through it.

Dahl went to fetch a stretcher, while Ramsey hobbled deeper into the temple. He was surprised to find alien glyphs on a wall, so he took a sample. He then stumbled upon the opposite wall, touching it with his bare hand. This caused a glowing rectangle to appear on the wall.

As Ramsey recovered, he was given the lab results on the glyphs; it was blood, less than a decade old, and probably protoss.

Ramsey couldn't figure a way to activate the door (other than make it glow). Valerian Mengsk was growing impatient and told him to try thinking like a protoss (something Ramsey was already trying). One night, Ramsey approached the temple by himself. Ignoring the blue crystals scattered around the temple, he noted a plant fossil, and was struck by an idea. The Golden Mean was a formula found in nature, even on alien planets. It was universal. It corresponded with the plant and the rectangle. Whichever creature had sealed the temple door was using the universal code. Ramsey used the code to draw a Golden Spiral, a combination of the Golden Mean and the Fibonacci sequence (another natural code); the door opened and Dahl surprised Ramsey. (She said she knew he'd try to sneak out sometime, so she stealthily followed him inside.)

The interior chamber had scattered "blue singing stones" and spots of dried protoss blood. Inside was a small vessel, obviously attacked in space, which had crashed within the temple. Nearby they found the crumpled body of a protoss, whose white and lavender robes were soaked with fresh blood. Ramsey approached to investigate and noticed something unusual - blood was dripping off the protoss's body, but the drop hung in place, almost as if the body was stuck in a time bubble. The bubble popped. The protoss awoke, used telekinesis to attack Dahl and used a strange telepathic ability on Ramsey, who was overwhelmed by a flood of memories and passed out.

As Ramsey recovered, one of the doctors performed an analysis on him. Ramsey was not subject to an attack; instead, his mind was transforming extremely quickly. The emotion and memory centers of his brain had been altered, along with certain "unused" portions of his brain.

Dahl pretended to be concerned about Ramsey, long enough to get a few minutes alone with him, which she used to steal the medical data. She made sure someone else send a report to Valerian Mengsk (she used that time to send her own private report).

Betrayal and Alliance
"It's so not fair. Jake's been busting his butt for years on these backwater planets while other archeologists have been getting the cream of the crop in projects. He's always been willing to do the hard stuff. And now when it looks as though he's made it, that someone out there has finally realized what he's done, this has to happen."

- Teresa Baldovino after the attack on Ramsey.

Ramsey awoke to overhear his doctor talking ... but shortly thereafter realized that he had become a telepath (the doctor was not talking). When Dahl came to see him, he read her mind; she was going to receive a monetary bonus for "selling" Ramsey to Valerian Mengsk, perhaps big enough to retire on. She alerted the other mercenaries that their cover was blown, so they rounded up the civilians. Meanwhile she told Ramsey point blank what would happen to him - he would be subject to a form of "mental rape" in which every memory of his would be extracted by telepaths, then he and the other civilians would be killed.

When Ramsey was momentarily left alone, a voice spoke in his head. Ramsey thought he was going crazy at first. The voice identified herself as Zamara, the protoss who had died. She offered him assistance against Dahl's team, and would also teach him how to filter incoming thoughts so he wouldn't be overwhelmed. She had to alter his brain so it be efficient at telepathy. Ramsey asked her where those visions were coming from; they were memories, but they didn't belong to Zamara. As a preserver, she had the ability to hold the memories of other protoss, and those memories came with her when she took residence in Ramsey's head. Zamara had some important secret she wanted to share with Ramsey and with others, and would allow nothing, not even Ramsey himself, to interfere with this transmission.

Dahl took Ramsey to the Gray Tiger, which had arrived to pick up the prisoners... only to be surprised when the marines it was carrying took her and her team prisoner, too.

Ramsey was imprisoned by himself, with his old friend Marcus Wright standing guard (as a resocialized marine, his allegiance could be shifted, and it was). Zamara had a plan to rescue Ramsey; she would neutralize Wright's resocialization, causing him to run amok. Ramsey wanted no part of the plan, even though Zamara told him that failure to cooperate could harm his brain. He tried to resist, but Zamara was able to use his brain to alter Wright's. Wright underwent a temporary nervous breakdown, then freed Ramsey and went on a rampage. Ramsey encountered Dahl, and the two fled the Gray Tiger in an escape pod, covering their tracks as best as they could. Ramsey fell unconscious however, and he experienced protoss memories from long ago.

Dead Man's Refuge
Ramsey spent much time unconscious as "memories were uploaded into his head". The memories centered around a protoss warrior, Temlaa, a member of the Shelak Tribe during the Aeon of Strife, and his mentor, Savassan. The Shelak Tribe was at war with the other protoss, trying to guard Ihan-rii artifacts from them.

Dahl began to worry; she wanted to keep Ramsey alive because his brain was valuable, and also as a form of revenge against Valerian Mengsk. She also wanted the answers to questions including what had happened to Marcus Wright.

Ramsey spent more time unconscious, dreaming of Temlaa and Savassan's journey to discover new Ihan-rii relics. The two protoss rediscovered the protoss psionic link, which would later be known as the Khala. The Khala was almost like merging, and frightened Ramsey. When he awoke, he discovered that he had developed eidetic (photographic) memory, which was painful as it made the deaths of his friends seem even more real.

Dahl took the pair to Dead Man's Rock, a world far from Terran Dominion interference. She planned to meet the only person she could trust, her former lover, crime lord and ex-mercenary Ethan Stewart. Stewart tried to prepare a reception for her, but it was blown by one of his former employees and multiple gun-toting enemies. Ramsey's mind-reading abilities proved extremely valuable, as he was able to see through the ambush.

Stewart was anxious to meet Ramsey, once he had regained consciousness (he still had memories to process). He had a few unpleasant run-ins with Stewart's servant, Phillip Randall, who kept entering his room unannounced. At an exquisite dinner, Ramsey scanned his mind and found nothing untoward there (for a crime boss); Stewart wanted to use Ramsey's modified brain for his own purposes (such as a "loyalty detector"). However, Ramsey drank too much alcohol and nearly told the whole story of what had happened to him. Zamara told him not to tell Stewart about the contents of the memories, and used a strange ability on Ramsey clearing the alcohol from his system.

As Ramsey delved further into the memories, he recalled Savassan about to form a deep telepathic bond with his student, Temlaa. Ramsey recoiled from the memory, much to Zamara's disappointment. She told him that she might have chosen the wrong host; the secret she held was contained in the memories of the restoral of the Khala and Ramsey needed to experience them. Ramsey relented and allowed himself to experience the memory. A side-effect of the memory was a strange psychic connection with all the terrans in Stewart's headquarters. One of them was thinking of how much money they would make betraying Ramsey to Valerian Mengsk.

Minds in Conflict
Ramsey was able to experience a meeting between Ethan Stewart and his employee, Dr. Reginald Morris, a "mad scientist" and expert on telepathy. Morris was going to scan Ramsey secretly before Stewart shipped Ramsey to Valerian Mengsk. Stewart was able to hide his thoughts from Ramsey by using a psi-screen. The technology was used to protect the wearer from a telepath's abilities, but this one had been modified to allow certain surface thoughts through, such as the "cold-hearted logical" thoughts Stewart had allowed Ramsey to read. Stewart was also planning to betray Rosemary Dahl. Ramsey was only able to read Stewart's thoughts now because of his pseudo-Khala connection.

Ramsey tried to bring the evidence to Dahl's attention, but she had known Stewart for nine years and refused to believe him. However, Ramsey did convince her to hack into Stewart's communication network; if there was nothing suspicious there, Ramsey would look like a fool (which Dahl would enjoy). The hack proved that Valerian Mengsk had been in contact with Stewart since at least the day Ramsey and Dahl had escaped from the Gray Tiger (before arriving to Dead Man's Rock). Dahl felt betrayed and turned against Stewart. Together (and with help from Zamara) they plotted an escape.

Dahl took down selected security cameras and took Stewart hostage. They needed his DNA, voice and retinal scan to enter the hangar so they could steal a spaceship. Stewart tried to convince Dahl that they could run away together, but Ramsey realized that Stewart had no choice in the matter; if Stewart disobeyed Valerian Mengsk, Valerian would hunt him down and kill him. He told Dahl this (she claimed not to be falling for Stewart's tricks anyway); Stewart was surprised that Ramsey could read his mind and allowed him to read something obscene. They reached the hangar before things began going wrong for them.

Stewart had hired an assassin to safeguard him, and equipped him with his own psi-screen. The assassin tried to poison Rosemary Dahl with darts, but Zamara noticed his presence at the last minute and made Ramsey jump in the way, then cleared the drug from his system (to some extent). Zamara used her martial arts skills to fight the assassin, who was himself extremely well versed in methods of killing opponents without using weapons. Zamara, unused to fighting in the body of a terran, was losing the match. She had to use a powerful psychokinetic technique, which could damage Ramsey's incompletely-altered brain, in order to kill the assassin. Meanwhile, Dahl had defeated Stewart, then shot him.

Stealing a system runner, Ramsey and Dahl began their escape, only to be intercepted by Terran Dominion Wraiths and a Valkyrie, which had been sent to Dead Man's Rock by Valerian Mengsk. Engaging the system runner's warp drive took more time than Dahl had; she was preparing to jump blind, an extremely dangerous maneuver. Ramsey tried a novel use of his psychic powers; he created a Khala-like psychic link with all the nearby terrans, including Dahl and the ones in the small fleet. The cascade of mental connection was intensely distracting, preventing the fleet from fighting back. However, it also caused Dahl to collapse. Ramsey quickly read from her mind how to activate the jump into Warp Space and pressed the button.

Desperate Mission
Ramsey's psychic outburst drew the attention of Devon Starke (a ghost in the employ of Valerian Mengsk), Infested Kerrigan, and the powerful dark archon Ulrezaj. The latter two were really more interested in the preserver in his head than in Ramsey himself.

Zamara directed Ramsey and Dahl to Aiur, where she needed to acquire a piece of valuable technology, and on the journey began relaying to Ramsey the memories of Vetraas, a contemporary of Adun's. The party were all surprised by the presence of the zerg on Aiur, which damaged their system runner beyond repair, stranding them on that world.

A band of protoss called the Shel'na Kryhas rescued them. The Shel'na Kryhas were protoss who had been stranded on Aiur years ago when the warp gate was disabled. They pledged their assistance to the party, but were dismayed to hear Zamara's request to enter a massive cavern system beneath Aiur to retrieve the valuable technology. The caverns were inhabited and defended by the Tal'darim, another group of stranded protoss, who had mentally regressed to the state the protoss inhabited during the Aeon of Strife. The caverns had been forbidden to the protoss by the Conclave, and the Tal'darim were believed to outnumber the Shel'na Kryhas. Instead, Romemary Dahl was sent to scout the caverns.

Dahl was captured by a Tal'darim named Alzadar and subjected to the addictive drug, Sundrop. She was ordered to lure Ramsey (and therefore Zamara) into the caverns since their Benefactor, the Xava'tor, desired preservers. Dahl succumbed to the addiction for a time, but eventually let Ramsey know what had happened. Ramsey comforted her in this hard time, helping her through the hallucinatory withdrawal symptoms.

Zamara was able to identify the Benefactor from Dahl's memories -- the Dark Archon, Ulrezaj. Zamara also revealed that Ulrezaj had sent a minion to try to kill her, and that he had been destroying the preservers.

Zamara needed to acquire the pure Khaydarin crystal from the room Savassan and Temlaa had visited before, but the Xava'tor had declared this room off-limits to even the Tal'darim. Zamara finally told Ramsey the reason she desired the crystal; to store herself so her presence would no longer contribute to Ramsey's brain tumor. She needed to reactivate the warp gate and travel to Shakuras, where the Dark Templar could transfer her mind into the crystal. Ramsey hadn't known about the tumor, and he and Dahl were upset at this. Making matters worse, giving Ramsey more memories of the past would simply cause the tumor to grow.

The terrans, Alzadar and a force of Shel'na Kryhas sneaked into the caverns and reached the chamber Zamara sought, where they obtained a shard of the giant crystal. However, the chamber housed other secrets; strange liquid-filled vats housing unseen creatures which emitted a form of psionic horror, and on the way out the party found drained protoss corpses of Tal'darim betrayed by Ulrezaj. The party was ambushed by the Tal'darim, but Alzadar was able to hold them off by revealing the truths he had recently discovered. He and half the party remained behind while Ladranix, the two terrans and the rest sneaked out, only to be ambushed by zerg forces led by an infested Ethan Stewart.

They were "rescued" by a Terran Dominion force sent by Valerian Mengsk and led by Devon Starke. The ghost telepathically communicated with Ramsey, telling him that Valerian had no intention of harming him. However, Ramsey didn't know if he could believe Starke, and furthermore he wanted to be cured of his tumor. He agreed to be picked up by a Dropship, but since he and Dahl still feared Valerian Mengsk, Dahl hijacked the ship and brought it to the warp gate.

Zamara and Dahl fixed the gate, a time-consuming venture, but they were attacked by the zerg. After Alzadar and his Tal'darim arrived to save them, a vengeful Ulrezaj appeared on the scene. The Dominion forces also appeared. The zerg, protoss and Dominion all worked against Ulrezaj, who still appeared to have the upper hand.

Ramsey agreed to relive another memory of Adun's time, in which Adun used a combination of Templar and Dark Templar energies as a defense form, but burned out as a result. Ramsey quickly taught the protoss the new technique... the Tal'darim, having been mentally transformed into Dark Templar, could create uncontrolled psionic storms, while the Shel'na Kryhas would control and direct the storms. Most of the protoss survivors sacrificed themselves to power the storms and stopped Ulrezaj, enabling Ramsey, Dahl and the protoss, with great loss, to escape through the warp gate to Shakuras.

Twilight
When Rosemary Dahl and the rebelling Tal'darim survivors made it to Shakuras, the gate guards feared a zerg invasion and sealed their end of the gate, redirecting Jake Ramsey and Zamara to an ice world. Ramsey, wearing clothing suitable for a jungle, was also suffering from seizures as the now-multiple brain tumors were killing him. Zamara believed the Dark Templar warrior Zeratul could help, and use the ice world's gate to travel to Zeratul's pink-skied sanctuary world.

Upon meeting Zeratul, Ramsey quickly realized he was soul sick. Zeratul ordered them away and refused to speak to them at first, but Zamara took advantage of his curiosity about how a preserver ended up inside a terran. Eventually they traded stories, with Ramsey relating the "boring" tale of how he was taken from obscurity by the heir of Arcturus Mengsk. When discussing how the protoss would treat Rosemary Dahl (probably badly, as protoss experiences with terran females involved only Sarah Kerrigan) Ramsey mentioned Raszagal, which only angered Zeratul further. He admitted to killing her and explained his reasons, and said he wished to live alone with his pain and dishonor. Ramsey told him that killing Raszagal at her request to break Kerrigan's control over her was honorable, but not following her instructions to lead the Nerazim was not. Zeratul, losing control, strangled Ramsey, but let him leave alive.

Zeratul later returned, saying he learned never to give up from terrans. He told them of the various secrets that weighed on him, and asked Zamara for her own secret. Zamara revealed the life cycle of the xel'naga to them, pointing out that the hybrids (and possibly Ulrezaj's mysterious creatures) were not a natural part of the cycle.

Zeratul went with them to Ehlna, a Dark Templar sanctuary world where Zamara could be removed from Ramsey. Briefly reuniting with Rosemary Dahl there, he underwent the "operation" to remove Zamara and, while this was underway, the site was attacked by the zerg led by Ethan Stewart, Ulrezaj and finally Terran Dominion forces led by Valerian Mengsk. While unconscious Ramsey was almost killed by a hydralisk dispatched by Stewart, and had to be rescued by Dahl. Meanwhile Zamara was successfully removed, and she used the moon's unique energies to trap Ulrezaj in her crystal with her.

The Dominion won the resulting battle with the zerg, and Ramsey, now bereft of psionic power, surrendered to Valerian's forces. Ramsey still had brain tumors, and Arcturus Mengsk still wanted to drain his knowledge (which would mentally cripple him) despite Ramsey's honest desire to hand over the information. Valerian pretended to acquiesce, but it was simply an act to delay his father until Ramsey's tumors could be removed. Devon Starke didn't believe the plan would work, however. He used his powers to steal some of Ramsey's memories and offered himself up as a sacrifice to Arcturus Mengsk, a delaying tactic which would give Valerian time to arrange Ramsey's escape. Ramsey and Valerian finally had the long talk Valerian was waiting for before Ramsey and Dahl could leave.

Author
Ramsey later chronicled his experiences with the protoss in a digi-tome titled Alien Enigmas. In anticipation of publication, Ramsey released an audio fragment from his personal collection.

In an interview before the release of Alien Enigmas, Ramsey theorized that the protoss now living on Shakuras were embracing change to avoid suffering Aiur's fate.

Project Blackstone
"Back in the loving arms of the Dominion."

- Ramsey after his arrival at the Blackstone facility

After what he described as years of running from them, Ramsey was involuntarily returned to the service of the Dominion. He was sedated during his trip to the site of Project Blackstone. He joined the project and was assigned beta-level security clearance. He would communicate with Dr. Leah Martine about the protoss. He very quickly discovered that live protoss were being experimented on. He revealed to another researcher that he could hear their screams.

Flashpoint
At some point prior to the Second Great War, Ramsey informed Valerian of the existence of a xel'naga device that could hypothetically be used to de-infest the Queen of Blades. It was a theory that turned out to be correct, and Valerian's forces were successful at Char.

Team
Ramsey's archaeological team, as of their arrival on Gelgaris, consisted of himself, 31 other archaeologists and "one originally perky and now sullen intern." They were later joined by other scientific individuals selected by Valerian Mengsk. After being taken prisoner on Nemaka alongside Ramsey, they were placed in cells aboard the Gray Tiger and ultimately killed when Marcus Wright disabled the ship's life support systems. Known teammates included:


 * Teresa Baldovino
 * Antonia Bryce
 * Leslie Crane
 * Darius Grayson
 * Kendra Massa
 * Chandra Patel
 * Yuri Petrov
 * Eddie Rainsinger
 * Owen Teague

Trivia
Jake Ramsey was nominated for the Flinders Petrie Award. This may be connected to Christie Golden spending time writing at Flinders Island, Tasmania.