JEDI HoloNet

En route home from Lianna, where the Thanium diplomatic campus has been in session for the last cycle, Emperor Hautrn died of natural causes. Before his passing, he made this speech to the assembled worlds of Thanium,

My time in this galaxy is quickly coming to a close. Throughout my life, I’ve lived in the shadow of a painful legacy that looms over the histories of both our sectors. To many outside of Spadja and Thanium, they ask why blood feuds from four centuries ago should still run so deep? They tell us to move past our differences, to let go of that past. Those people outside of our worlds mean well when they say so, but they do not understand the depths of tradition, of pride, of pain, and of legacy that our shared past of conqueror and conquered brings to our now.
For my part, I recognize the terrors of genocide that my immediate ancestors imparted upon yours. There is no excuse, no words that can be said to soothe the still open wounds or speed the healing of many peoples. Nonetheless, I’m here to offer what words that I can in pursuit of that goal, despite the perceived futility. On behalf of my people…

I am sorry. We were wrong. We are wrong.

As I speak, a conservative movement on my world has been gathering power and support among many of my people and within my government. When I am gone, which will be in the near future, they will have the means and ability to act on their doctrine of returning the Stenax people to the forefront of power in our galactic neighborhood.
They plan to do so at the expense of your worlds, as my ancestors did centuries ago. They plan to do so with the help of foreign powers and criminals who have been illegally supplying them with ships, weapons, ammunition, and supplies. They plan to do so to reclaim a glory that never was, in a way that will never bear the fruit they seek. Their plan will only further tarnish the future of our species and our world.

You, together, assembled as one, have the capacity to hold off this oncoming storm. To defend yourselves versus those of my people who have been so indoctrinated, misled, and taken in by this extremist ideology. Alone, each of you will fall to the superior numbers, technology, and training of the Stenax naval and army forces. I beseech you all. Whatever it takes to unify, whatever you must give up… Do so. Do so to insure the continued freedom that your forebears understood the sweetness of once released from the yolk of my violent ancestors. Do so, so that your children will grow up so accustomed to that flavor of freedom that they know no other feeling.

Come together to stand free, or fall under oppression alone. Only you may decide.

Even as the Emperor spoke, the Hobors of Tahlboor and the Alzarian Monarchy have opened embassies on Feena, the capital planet of the Third Estate, in order to establish closer ties to the autocratic government who has promised any Thanium planet protection in exchange for annexation. While neither group has formally agreed to join EckCzar Vahn Goreing’s regime, they have begun to engage in negotiations with interest to do so.

In response, Sooman Queen Cainen Qeel has mobilized the Royal Navy of Sooma to increase patrols along the borders of their vassal Alzar. This has already resulted in a dramatic increase of skirmishes between the two species as the Alzarians continue a Quasi-War of independence to break their status as vassal under the Sooman regime. Meanwhile, reports of increased raids from Hobor clans against the Troobs on Tahlboor have been building a sense of inevitability of a civil war on their planet.

As invasion from the Spadja sector already has begun as advanced Stenax forces have moved in to occupy the unpopulated Rhen Var system to set up planetary and orbital supply lines for further incursions into Thanium. Every major planetary system in the Thanium Sector has begun to reassess their options. Perceived apathy on the part of the Republic Ambassador leaves their choices between attempting to unify the disparate and culturally divided worlds within the sector, or to reluctantly take the extended hand of the Autocratic EckCzar Goreing and surrender their independence voluntarily rather than through a violent subjugation.

Reporting from Lianna, this is Andee Navaro.