Heaven's Fall

Act 8: A New Planet to Feed On

"To all of my fellow mighty Signis, we have successfully tailed the escaping enemy ship. And with this they brought us to their home planet. We have already won the previous encounter but, victory will only be achieved if we gain total control. We will wait for a few hours before we engage the spiteful enemy. My people, our loved ones who we left behind will honor us if we bring them joy, treasure and loot."

I then raised both of my arms in front of the fist-sized mic.

"For the colonials!"
The whole ship resounded with the following words:
"For the colonials! For Honor! For Duty!"

I, Tar Irium Bis, a Signis Komandant. After all of the species we have encountered, only the beings who call themselves humans managed to stand on toe to toe with the Empire.

However an unexpected development took place in the middle of the space war. One of the enemy motherships sneaked into our territory and surrendered. As suspicious as it seems, they didn't demand anything other than the safety of the ship and its crew. This didn't make sense, if they had the technology to sneak into a heavily defended planet and into the capital, why did they surrender?

Even the Elder Council was confused. It's hard to admit but if they used that stealth function to attack us, the capital might as well be an empty barren land with craters here and there. But it was a surrender.

"There's no use in thinking about it. They surrendered, that's all there's to it."

Those are the words of my uncle in the Elder Council.

The humans didn't leave their ship though. All of them stayed put.

Well we can't do anything about it. We'll be breaking the Oath of The Founder if we touch those fragile humans. It's rather a troublesome thing.

The Oath of The Founder, a solemn promise and a law that dictates whoever surrenders will not be harmed unless they show a hostile action. It's a very strict rule. Whoever breaks it will be sent to a harsh prison in the end of the galaxy.

The Founder?

He is a conqueror, a being with extreme power. He lived for eons. Or so that's what the books says.

When we were assimilated into the empire, the Founder didn't leave his chamber for a decade and no one saw him since then. Until now which was around 500 years after we joined the empire, only a few are allowed inside the Founder's Chamber. These few individuals were the Kings and Queens of the each specie of the Empire.

Except for our Signis King, the others won't allow him to enter the Chamber. However the rest of them would just hand him over orders calling it as the will of The Founder. In these wills, we were ordered to spread throughout the universe and report our findings.

All of these "wills" were sometimes absurd. Especially when we reported the existence of the humans, they ordered us to annihilate them or we will be annihilated instead. Our people called it politics, but deep inside we all knew it's obvious they hated the humans.

But why?

We can't question the higher ups, since the responsibility of the subordinates will fall upon the leader. And no one wants to be "mysteriously found dead" or "a signis committed suicide with 2 plasma bolt holes in the head." So our leaders either punished or banished the ones who question.

Is it fear? Or did The Founder speak of something about these humans? Jealousy?

Well if it's fear then I can understand them. The humans opposed our Signis technology which was a combined product of our understanding and the strength of the Empire. This doesn't mean we have the entire arsenal of the Empire's technology tree though. However these humans stood their ground with their own human-made technology. But it's not that surprising.