Ravens of Eternity

156 The Flow of Power, Pt A Drogar family on Taloren was just sitting down to eat their nightly meal when the program they were watching on the screen next to them switched to an emergency newscast.

On the screen, a Drogar with buffed scales and a clean, formal robe smiled at the camera kindly. It felt as though he was in the room with the family themselves. And when he spoke, his voice was firm and authoritative, but also warm and welcoming.

“Apologies for breaking your normal evening ‘Cast,” he said. “But we here at Taloren Tonight have breaking news regarding the terrorist attack from a few cycles ago. And I must warn you – we are about to show graphic and disturbing content that may not be suitable for some to watch.”

As the family doled out their food among each other, the reporter on the screen walked over to a large display that stretched the floor of his newsroom. At the moment, it held the logo of the show – Taloren Tonight, but it quickly changed to drone footage of the Chosen’s attack on the Federation prisoners.

On it, hundreds of red-armored Drogar pushed their way through broken gates and into the prison courtyard, where a massive gunfight was underway. Guards and their human shields fought stoically against the mass of terrorists.

Streams of fire from both sides claimed many lives.

The family was disturbed to see such a gruesome amount of deaths, but they kept watching – honestly, they couldn’t stop. Concern was etched on their faces, and their disapproval of the entire situation was practically on all their minds.

It switched to another area of the fighting, over by the barricade. There, hundreds of the terrorists fired at the Security Forces and Justicar hiding behind their mobile fortifications and armored gondola.

One of the Chosen fighting stood up suddenly, and fired a number of shots right into the SecForce’s formations. Of course, he hit nothing but armor, but his rage was clear as day.

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“Many of you have been asking, demanding to know who these people are, and why they’re doing this,” said the reporter. “Which is why we’re issuing this emergency broadcast all across the Empire. Everyone needs to understand who these people are.”

The drone zoomed in on the terrorist’s body and revealed the fury on his face as he squeezed off round after round. Just as he seemed the angriest, the reporter froze the screen.

He turned back to the audience with a worried look on his face.

“This vicious attack,” he continued, “was perpetrated by an extremist organization who call themselves ‘Taloren’s Chosen’. They believe that any actions we take to join the greater galaxy and all its peoples is a false step that weakens the Empire itself.

“They also believe that it is possible to return our home planet of Taloren back into a lush jungle. Which is, as we all know, is scientifically impossible for a number of reasons – the first being that our technology isn’t robust enough to handle a task of that magnitude. Not yet.”

The reporter walked to the other end of his long rectangular display, and as he did so, the image changed again. This time, it was footage of a few hundred red-robed Drogar protesting just outside of a Red Zone. Though there wasn’t any audio coming from the display, it was clear that they were all chanting the same thing, over and over again.

“These extremists have been responsible for multiple disruptions all over every major metropolitan planet in the Empire. But they have been most active on Taloren Prime itself.”

On the screen, the Chosen were confronted by heavily armed and armored Red Zone security, and blasted with highly disruptive sonic cannons. They were rendered completely confused and disconcerted, which allowed the Security Forces to charge into them and beat them with solid metal batons.

“Their behavior is typified by outlandish, reactionary theatre designed to foment friction and violence against the Empire while claiming to love the Empire. A clear contradiction in their own rhetoric.”

The screen flicked to another set of footage where a group of Chosen broke into a well-regarded museum. They dashed through the large, desolate space and quickly killed the few guards stationed there.

As they moved through with speed, they trashed as many of the pieces of art as they could see. Many multi-phasic sculptures and three-dimensional paintings were permanently marred in the attack. Just as important were the lives they took along the way.

Security Forces led by a Silver Justicar ran in after them, cornered them, and gunned them down unceremoniously. The Justicar herself cut down as many as she could by herself.

The rage in her eyes were as clear as day.

“These people attacked the Great Lacroseth Repository of Future Visions of all places! Their statement regarding this attack was simply that the Future was an affront to the glory of the Imperium’s past.”

The reporter shook his head at the absurdity of it all.

“But that’s not the most absurd attack they’ve committed – they’ve gone after research facilities, datacenters, and manufacuries to name a few. All with the expressed opinion that a return to the ‘Old Taloren’ was best for everyone.”

Behind him, the screen showed various security footage of a dozen Chosen throwing homemade explosives at a small family clinic at night. The explosives stuck onto the coral-like walls, and blasted huge chunks out of them.

Along with those chunks were shattered cases of medicine, broken devices, and scrapped medical beds. Their attack utterly destroyed everything inside the clinic.

But they didn’t get to celebrate their win for long.

Two Justicars, one Silver and the other Bronze, swept in at the group from both sides, and cut them down one by one with their blades. Though they initially tried to fight back, they were practically useless against the two.

Half of them fled, or tried to anyway. But none made it out alive.

“Their attacks grow bolder with every attack, and become louder every cycle. And the grand spectacle of it all only attracts more into their ranks. More than enough to attack a fortified compound and kill hundreds of political prisoners.”

The screen went back to the barricade, and the angry Chosen who was firing into the Justicars and Security Forces. He unpaused the footage and let the chaos continue once again.

And as the drone zoomed back out to get a bigger picture of the fight, a gondola crashed right into the barricade at great speed. Then two figures swept through the gondola floating above, killed their occupants, and sent them crashing to the ground.

The family was overawed at the sight of a human and a Drogar Justicar fighting against the terrorists.

“Can I be a Justicar, Fah?” asked one of the children.

But his father shook his head emphatically.

“Sadly, only your sister can,” he replied. “If she could pass their trials, at least.”

“According to reports, ” said the reporter, “the extremists massed a little over two thousand to stage this attack. Their target was the more than ten thousand unarmed Federation prisoners located on the compound itself.”

On the screen, SecForce and Justicars rushed down the street, through the wrecked heavy gate, and into the compound’s main courtyard. All of the fighting had descended to an all-out brawl, and blood almost literally coated the grass.

“Who knows how the Federation would have reacted, if these terrorists achieved their goals.”

The sheer numbers of the Chosen overwhelmed the few hundred defenders, and many on both sides were utterly slaughtered. Not only were there people cutting each other to ribbons, but Scythe Drones and hidden autoturrets were added into the mix.

“Thankfully, the stoic vigilance of their guards, the temerity of the SecForces, the speed of as well as the sacrifice of some of their own, most of the prisoners were spared. But most critically, the one who saved them all was Swarmfather Retholis, who negotiated their surrender to begin with.”

Soon, Retholis’ gondolas came in to save the day, and they made quick work of whatever was left of the terrorists. His troops swept through their enemies with clinical precision and with an outright show of power.

The father leaned down to his boy and put his hand on his shoulder. He squeezed it pridefully.

“Although you can’t be a Justicar,” he said, “you can, with an equal amount of hard work and dedication, be just like the Swarmfather there.”

“Our drones caught the aftermath of the entire attack,” said the reporter. “You may wish to look away, if your constitution isn’t strong.”

The screen switched to drone footage much closer up, perhaps only a half dozen meters in the air above the compound. It easily captured the dead that were scattered all over the ground. The devastation was much easier to see, not just on the bodies, but on the land, vegetation, and structures that were around.

Almost everything was blood-soaked and torn to shreds.

“Absolutely horrifying,” said the reporter. “The death toll, even more so. A few hundred guards and prisoners died defending themselves. And the terrorists themselves? Three times as much. As reprehensible their behavior was, they were still citizens of the Empire.”

The screen then showed the faces of multiple dead Chosen one after another. Each of their faces was plastered with horror, pain, anger, disbelief, fear, regret, or any mix thereof.

Each of them screamed of a promise that was left unfulfilled.

“From seeing all this death and mayhem, a question nags at us. To what end do any of these attacks accomplish? Today, we can show you the footage we recorded when we went to ask that very question after the attack.”

The reporter stepped to the side, the lights lowered, and the screen switched to an interviewer just outside the mangled gates. The interviewer looked young, energetic. She wore a more athletic set of robes, though it still looked clean enough to seem formal.

She looked at her EyeCast and talked directly to it.

“Here we are on the grounds of the attack,” she said. “Everyone’s cleaning up, and all of the surviving terrorists have been sent off for mandatory interrogation. We’ve got the green light, so let’s see if someone will talk to us inside.”

She stepped through the gates, and was immediately greeted by a massive amount of bullet-ridden Chosen corpses all over the courtyard. Each of the bodies were being combed through by the Security Forces and a few of the guards. They stripped them all down and separated their bodies from their gear.

Another team then piled up the corpses on a number of parked gondola.

The interviewer spotted Swarmfather Retholis and ran towards him as quickly as she could.

“Swarmfather! This is an incredible attack. Do you have any knowledge as to why they did it?”

“No,” he replied stoically. “I apologize, I can’t talk right now as I have to clean this all up. But I’m sure you can find someone who will.”

He then pointed her deeper into the compound, past the courtyard and into the trees byond. Then he turned around and began issuing orders to his people.

The interviewer shrugged, then headed in where he pointed.

“He doesn’t appear to be talkative right now,” she said. “Or happy.”

As she walked, she came upon a wounded Severas whose armor was covered in cuts and blood. She was coordinating cleanup as well.

“Silver Justicar,” said the interviewer, “would you have a few moments to talk?”

Severas turned towards the interviewer, and eyed her wearily, but nodded in concession.

“Thank you. First question I have – what happened here?”

Severas sighed as she used a MedNject on her thigh and relieved the pain she was feeling on it.

“Terrorists intruded into a Yellow Zone, murdered prisoners and guards,” she said. “They broke the law, and we executed them for doing so.”

“I see,” said the interviewer. “I saw raw drone footage of the attack – I noticed that a human prisoner was fighting alongside you. Isn’t that a violation of the law as well?”

“I deputized her to assist me with said executions. Without her, we might not have broken through in time.”

“Of course, that makes sense. One last question if I may – do you know why they attacked? What reasons did they have to make it?”

Severas rubbed at her chin as she thought of the question. She had never honestly given it that much thought. All she really cared about was that they were murderers and lawbreakers.

“I think, judging from previous behavior,” she replied, “that it doesn’t matter what they think, or what reasons they might have. All that matters is that they’re angry, whipped up to be angry, and lash out from that anger. ‘Why’ has no bearing at all.”

“Being angry isn’t against the law though,” said the interviewer.

“Of course not. But causing death and destruction from that anger, or any reason, is unlawful.”

“Thank you, Justicar.”

The lights came back on, and the reporter stepped back in front of the screen. His face looked somber, but with hints of determination in it.

“Our Justicars truly are heaven-sent,” he said. “They have such tremendous willpower and drive. But we’re still left with too many questions.”

Still images of the Chosen splashed up on the screen, one after another, second after second. In one they were chanting or cursing, another they were throwing rocks. In yet another they were firing weapons. Destroying. Cheering. Killing. Bleeding. Dying.

“Just who is behind these extremists? Who’s funding them? Who’s profiting from them? For now, all we know is that Taloren’s Chosen are little more than a cancer on the Imperium. If you see anyone wearing these blood-red robes or blood-red armor, report them to the nearest security personnel or Justicar immediately!”

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