Rosemary Dahl

Rosemary Dahl (often known only as R. M. Dahl), a major character in the Dark Templar Saga, is a cold-hearted mercenary who works for Valerian Mengsk. She was about twenty-five years old in 2505 and is very beautiful, with blue eyes and short blue-black hair. She is also very small but hard-muscled; her appearance has fooled several opponents into a sense of complacency about her abilities.

Dahl is also extremely intelligent, and is a "jack of all trades". She has demonstrated competence in pistols, shotguns, gauss rifles, unarmed combat, computers, communications and sensor technology, piloting, deception, medicine, command, security, tactics, card games and even warp-jump navigation. Her favorite weapon is an AGR-14 assault rifle.

Biography
Dahl used to be a marine and mercenary; during her tours of duty she became addicted to stimulants, turk, bog and fireweed.

Circa 2496, on the world of Dead Man's Rock, Dahl met another mercenary, Ethan Stewart, who helped her break her addiction to stims (but was unable to wean her off of cigarettes). Stewart employed her for a time, and eventually they became partners and lovers. Dahl trusted Stewart implicitly and believed he is the only one she could trust.

A Dead World
Dahl and a small team of private-sector mercenary marines - Aiden, Kate, Sebastien, Tom and Marcus Wright (many, such as Wright, had undergone neural resocialization) were attached to an archaeological expedition to the airless world of Nemaka financed by Dominion Heir Apparent Valerian Mengsk and led by Jake Ramsey. The expedition's purpose was to explore the artifact discovered on that world. She and Ramsey took an instant dislike to each other; indeed, she didn't seem to get along with anyone except the marines. Dahl insisted on taking charge of emergency matters and had her mercenaries accompany Ramsey's team whenever they entered the artifact, despite Ramsey's objections.

Dahl accompanied Ramsey on his trips into the artifact (even when he tried to do so secretly) and dragged him to safety when a strange event shocked his mind (after being thrown telekinetically by a dying protoss). Ramsey had to be put under medical care.

Dahl secretly copied the medical doctor's report (stealing it from the computer to do so) and sent her own report to her employer, Valerian Mengsk, dodging any attempt to detect the outgoing transmission. Her report stated that Ramsey's brain, especially the centers involving emotions and memories, had been altered.

She intended to turn Ramsey and the other archaeologists to the marines to be psychically "debriefed" in return for a large sum of money. Ramsey's psychic shock, in which his brain was invaded by Zamara, the deceased protoss, transformed him into a mind-reader, letting him know about this. After his mind was probed by psychics, he and the rest of his team would be killed. Dahl didn't care about their fate. She did care about her own fate, which didn't look good when she was betrayed by the marines sent to pick the expedition up. Dahl was thrown into a brig aboard the battlecruiser the Gray Tiger.

First Escape
Ramsey and his new "spirit advisor" used his new-found abilities to create a distraction, enabling him and Dahl to escape. He fell unconscious, forcing Dahl to hide him when she had to gun down opposing marines. She also had to sneak past a raging marine, who was ripping a former friend apart. Dahl stole an escape pod after she damaged the Gray Tiger's computers in order to prevent anyone from tracking their flight path. She headed straight to Dead Man's Rock in order to meet up with Ethan Stewart. She met him at the settlement of "Paradise" and, after displaying her skills in a firefight or two, brought Ramsey safely to Stewart's headquarters.

Dahl was enjoying her time with Stewart, and so was very upset when Ramsey told her that Stewart had betrayed them to Valerian Mengsk. She refused to believe him until Ramsey talked her into hacking into Stewart's communication system and found the evidence of the betrayal. Stewart and the young Mengsk agreed that Dahl would be interrogated and neurally resocialized (which would wipe her memories of the interrogation) and then returned to Stewart reasonably intact.

Second Escape
Dahl immediately sought revenge. She hacked Stewart's security system in order to attack Stewart without drawing his guards upon her. Stewart was unable to calm her down and she shot him in the arm. She brought him to a system runner vessel in his hangar when she was attacked by Phillip Randall, Stewart's valet. Ramsey fought Randall while Dahl and Stewart dueled. In the end, Randall was killed and Dahl shot Stewart down. Dahl took the ship away from the launching cave only to be met by Wraiths and a Valkyrie that had been sent by Valerian Mengsk. In order to escape, she had to execute a blind warp-jump. Ramsey used a psychic ability to stun the attackers but it also stunned Dahl, so he was forced to read how to execute the jump from her mind and do it himself.

Secret Mission
During their journey, Dahl discovered the system runner's navigation system had a built-in remote tracking system, enabling Ethan Starke (and his followers) to track them. The only way to remove the tracking system was to replace the entire navigation system. Dahl piloted the system runner to the Brontes system, which now acted as a shipyard for the Terran Dominion, in order to steal a new navigation system. She misdirected the minimal Dominion presence long enough to install the new system and escape.

Zamara guided Dahl to Aiur, but the fugitives were surprised by the zerg presence. Their ship was demolished. A band of protoss stranded on Aiur after the warp gate was disabled, the Shel'na Kryhas, saved the fugitives. Dahl, uncomfortable with the situation, demanded that the protoss and Ramsey not read her mind; they agreed.

Zamara needed to acquire a piece of technology from the cavern system beneath Aiur which had been visited by Khas, but these caverns were inhabited and guarded by another band of protoss... the Tal'darim or "the Forged". These protoss had mentally regressed to a state similar to those of the protoss who lived during the Aeon of Strife.

Dahl reluctantly agreed to a scout a way to the destination, a chamber containing a huge extremely pure khaydarin crystal. Zamara placed a "mental screen" on Dahl, enabling her to hide her thoughts from the Tal'darim. However, a band of the cavern's inhabitants, led by Alzadar, ambushed her using cloaking powers and a mental assault.

Dahl awoke to find herself tied up and surrounded by Tal'darim. Felanis, their leader, asked her to lure Jake Ramsey to him, but Dahl refused, so Alzadar tried another technique; he placed a sample of the addictive drug Sundrop upon her skin. Alzadar believed her previous history as a drug addict would render her vulnerable to its effects. Dahl resisted for two days, but eventually succumbed. Alzadar ordered her to lure Ramsey to him, a task made easier by her skill at deception and her insistence on not having her mind read. The Tal'darim were really interested in Zamara, as their "Benefactor" desired preservers.

Dahl couldn't go through with it, however. She eventually admitted to Ramsey what had happened, and he and Zamara helped her overcome the addiction. With his information, the party discovered the truth behind the Tal'darim; their Benefactor was the powerful dark archon, Ulrezaj. Dahl then took part in a ploy to capture and detoxify Alzadar, who rejoined the Khala once he learned the truth about his Benefactor.

Another Escape
Zamara led a force of Shel'na Kryhas and the two terrans through a secret way to the crystal's chamber and acquired the technology, but spooked by horrors encountered during their escape, they drew the attention of the Tal'darim. Distracting the Tal'darim, the party fled from the caverns, only to run into a zerg ambush led by their old enemy Ethan Stewart.

The ambush was spoiled by the arrival of a small Dominion force, dispatched by Valerian Mengsk. Accepting their assistance, the party allowed itself to be picked up by a dropship... but Dahl hijacked it, ramming Wraiths in order to make it to her true destination, the warp gate.

Zamara was unable to repair the Gate by herself, since it had been sabotaged by rifle fire, so she asked Dahl for help during the operation... meanwhile a massive battle erupted with the Dominion and Shel'na Kryhas on one side, and the zerg on the other. Alliances shifted again with the arrival of Ulrezaj himself; all forces attacked him and were losing. Ramsey taught the protoss a new technique to fend off Ulrezaj long enough for Dahl and Zamara to finish fixing the gate. With that task completed, Dahl, Ramsey and the few protoss survivors fled through the gate, which had been directed to Shakuras.