Rush Into Dawn

Chapter 9

In the days following the fall of the Syber, the Nomari resistance reluctantly organized around Gellen as their new leader. Most knew him as a traitor to the Nomari cause and had trouble accepting his rapid transformation into the savior his supporters claimed he was. If he was so loyal to his Nomari brothers and sisters, couldn't he have figured out a plan that didn't include so many of their deaths? He was supposedly some kind of genius after all, wasn't he? Due to their long-term oppression by the Syber however, very few Nomari had the temperament and experience needed for a leadership position. The Rija who might have been able to play a role in the rebuilding effort mostly remained silent, their teachings leading them to believe that regular Nomari needed to step forward. Gellen and his supporters quickly moved in to fill the gap.

Though many Nomari were deeply concerned about his tactics, no one could argue with the truly stunning defeat that Gellen had inflicted on the Syber and his power grew by the day. He became a symbol of what the Nomari might be able to reclaim of themselves and their culture. A group of Nomari led by friends and relatives of the victims of Gellen's murderous efforts on behalf of the Syber did attempt to organize opposition but were largely unsuccessful. They had no one to put forward that could offer the resilience and strength the Nomari now needed to see in their leaders and find in themselves. After the opposition effort failed politically and the movement fractured, multiple desperate assassination attempts were made on Gellen's life but he escaped them all and punished the perpetrators severely, most with death.

For the first few years, the Nomari government remained on the Syber home world but a groundswell of support grew for the notion that all Nomari should return home to try and repair their broken culture on the ground it grew from. Gellen opposed this effort, not wanting to give up the weapons he now controlled and the unquestioned power that went with it. He needed more time to try and develop the advanced weaponry that could survive the electric storms of the home world. Although his motivation was mostly related to maintaining the status quo, he also knew the weapons were truly needed to protect a people that had become almost childlike and unable to protect themselves. He pushed this viewpoint aggressively and his message made many resistant to leaving.

When Rija leaders countered by encouraging a voluntary return compromise, Gellen, feeling threatened, had them jailed, tried for treason on trumped up charges and eventually executed. Concern predictably continued to grow regarding Gellen's behavior and he responded with ever increasing paranoia and violence, lashing out at even members of his inner circle. He could not understand the general passivity of his people and could not muster sympathy for their plight. He had freed them after generations of abuse and servitude, paying a heavy personal price in doing so. How could they not loyally follow him now and how could they threaten their freedom and very survival by returning to a planet they were not ready to defend?

Gellen continued the abuse and persecution of all who had even the appearance of opposing him until even the loyalty of his staunchest supporters eroded. In a final deal brokered by the Rija, it was decided Gellen would be forcefully removed from power but there would be no single replacement. Instead, power would be permanently divided up among seven Nomari leaders so that it would never again be concentrated in the hands of a single individual the way it had with Gellen. The seven leaders and their followers were the first incarnation of the kilns that would come to define Nomari society. Legend held that each of the original seven leaders represented people from different occupations and that began the tradition of kilns being divided along vocational lines, ensuring an extended family and voice for all Nomari. Although no one official leader was ever selected again or any kiln more powerful than the others, the Rija were implicitly given deferential control over the shape and direction of the new government structure. Being the only Nomari cultural organization that had survived the occupation, they had long served as moral advisors and spiritual supporters, even when doing so meant a painful and violent death for some of them.