Tamsen Cauley is a Terran Dominion official and important character of the StarCraft comic. He was both the employer and an opponent of the War Pigs.
Biography[]
Terran Confederacy[]
- Cole Hickson worries about Cauley(src)
Tamsen Cauley was a Terran Confederacy official, working out of the Center for State Security, based on Tarsonis. His responsibilities included controlling the War Pigs, a group of outlaws turned into expendable soldiers who could be used in situations requiring maximum deniability.[1]
They were not neurally resocialized so they could maintain their unique talents.[4]
Cauley developed a reputation as a "political survivor" and people who crossed him tended to vanish.[1]
In March 2499 he was contacted by a superior about a crisis—the Hephaestus, a battlecruiser, had picked up a zerg organism at LV-555. The organism had gotten out, forcing the crew to release an SOS. Cauley ordered the War Pigs to meet him at the Center for State Security, except for Nuura Joss, who was taking care of the General Lee ship (Cauley wished to give the War Pigs mobility, but they were given an old ship due to their low status). At the briefing, Romy Pyrius asked him why they should conduct such missions. Cauley reminded him that he would otherwise end up in prison or under neural resocialization. The War Pigs conducted the mission successfully, at the cost of one of their number.[1]
By February 2500, Cauley believed the Sons of Korhal leader Arcturus Mengsk would defeat the Confederacy. He dispatched the War Pigs to Atticus Minor, where they attempted to assassinate Mengsk. They failed. Confederate forces tried to prevent the War Pigs from leaving, but the outlaws escaped and went into hiding.[5]
Cauley now believed that a Mengsk victory was inevitable, and he planned to switch sides. However, he wanted to hide all involvement in his attempt to kill Mengsk, which meant eliminating the War Pigs. When War Pig soldier Brock Valevoss confronted him about his betrayal, Cauley revealed his control over the "new, upgraded" Cerberus Program, which were neurally resocialized, less innovative but "obedient". Cauley offered Valevoss freedom from his criminal record if he lured the other War Pigs into an ambush.
Valevoss lured the War Pigs to Tyrador VIII where they were ambushed by a team of Cerberus Program troopers and goliaths. However, the War Pigs had become suspicious of him and made contingency plans; Valevoss was killed by a goliath firing indiscriminately and the War Pigs killed all their attackers. They scattered, each going into hiding.[4]
Terran Dominion[]
- Nuura Joss gives her opinion of Tamsen Cauley(src)
Tamsen Cauley, unlike many other Confederate bureaucrats, became a part of the Terran Dominion, due to his ability to "read between the lines".[4]
However, he was watched by agents such as Cally Muller.[6]
In 2502 Cauley, now the chief of Dominion Internal Security, met Arcturus Mengsk in his personal apartments. Mengsk held a political discourse in which he claimed the Dominion was better than the Confederacy, but there were still problems to be dealt with; loose ends.
Cauley worried about the War Pigs — a loose end — and concocted a plan to eliminate them again. First, he went to New Folsom Prison, where former War Pig member Cole Hickson resided after having been captured. Cauley offered him a deal; reunite the War Pigs for a task — the assassination of Jim Raynor — and they would have their criminal records expunged.[4]
In order to ensure Hickson would follow orders, Cauley subjected him to an experimental form of neural resocialization, which would only surface when prompted.[6]
While Hickson went to recruit the other War Pigs, Cauley scanned the profiles of Jim Raynor and Tychus Findlay at the Dominion Internal Security Division. Then he revealed his full plan; the Cerberus Program still existed and was pointedly not under Mengsk's control. They would eliminate the War Pigs once they killed Raynor, sparking the ascent of Tamsen Cauley.[4]
Cerberus was tasked with secretly following the War Pigs. Team leader Lars Trakken, whom Cauley allowed to serve in the unit despite not being neurally resocialized, made comments about Cole Hickson which Cauley found suspicious and ordered Monica to begin investigating connections between the two.[3]
Cauley was informed by a mysterious figure that a male prisoner had woken up. Cauley worried that Cerberus might not be able to eliminate the War Pigs, but the figure said they could use a higher-tech strategy.
A female ghost received a communication following her massacre at Bhekar Ro.[7]
This ghost attacked Hudderstown Colony, Agria, hometown of Turfa Dei. He and the War Pigs killed her, and Leonid Celsus, the Dominion official who dispatched her, foresaw the War Pigs being useful in the future.[8]
When Cauley learned of Trakken's connection to Hickson, he warned him not to let his mission become personal. However, Trakken disobeyed his orders[6], leading a team in boarding the General Lee but failing to find or kill any of Trakken's targets. A protoss fleet then arrived and began an orbital bombardment of the planet. When Trakken informed Cauley of this fact, Cauley told him to just wait and let the protoss eliminate all his targets.[9]
Cauley watched over the battle. However, it ended badly for him. Raynor and the War Pigs escaped, Trakken was killed, and the protoss cut short their purification attack. The War Pigs resolved on a "suicidal" revenge attack against Cauley.[10]
References[]
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