Part 32: Centaurian Dusk

Broadcast Archives: Gaian Empire

Citizens of Gaia:

No doubt you have been alarmed at the things that have happened, that are happening, and most especially those that will happen. I have come on your vidscreens in recent days often enough to reassure you. The time for reassurance is over. There is no room for such childishness in the new order. Now is the time for truth.

It has been so long since I stepped foot off the Unity landing pod onto the damp Chiron soil. What stroke of luck put me here in Gaia, instead of under the jackboots of the Hive? We each swore to uphold the charter and the mission that is our last link to dead Earth. We went forth with our innocent naivety, following the principles our fathers and commanders have laid down for us.

My naivety did not survive the Hive.

I had a brother, who was not so fortunate as I. In the military tactics grading exams, he scored higher than me by 1%. This one percent, it turned out, was enough to make sure that his cryocell was the one picked by Yang's selection algorithms. This one percent made him part of the Hive.

He did well, of course. The Hive is nothing if not meritocratic. In the years following Planetfall, he cultivated friends among the Hive's elite, made a name for himself, and rose to prominence as the Hive's head of the army. And then, he was betrayed. Strokes of luck by the Believers, conspiring allies that hid research findings from him, and a stubborn refusal to lower himself to atrocities ended his career. And then, it ended his life, in the acid baths and cutters of the Hive's recycling tanks/extermination facilities.

How do we explain the Hive? How do we explain all the other excesses of the other factions on Planet, and of parts of our own? The crew of the Unity were chosen from the best of humanity, but the best is not enough. No, the truth is, humanity tends towards decay, and the environment for decay is decadence. Freed from the pressure to survive of the end days of Earth, we fracture and fight and commit great crimes. The only true union, the only real lasting utopia, is that forced on us by necessity.

For a while, I toyed with the armchair militarists, who think themselves my followers. I entertained their archaic notions, played with their dreams of power. But they do not understand. My praise for Deirdre and her understanding of the problem was genuine. But her solution, the enslavement of mankind as toys, zoo animals of the Planetmind is abhorrent. We cannot trust our legacy to a power that has killed so many of us!

When I saw that she had started, but thankfully not finished the final step of her plan, I knew what had to be done. How our true mission of the planet was not research, or colonisation, but to end the cycle of destruction and hate that has plagued humanity since the first hunter gatherers.

First, humanity must be purged. The elements of mankind that are wrong or evil must be destroyed. Destroyed, utterly. Not the pathetic surrender and rebuild plans we presented to the Spartans. Not the idealistic and short sighted mercy that is the fault of Gaia. Not even the occupation, annexation and conversion that would let their taint persist and resurge. No, only the best, only the good will live.

Next, humanity must unite. No more of these silly factions. Rather, all must unite under a single banner. I have no illusions that this would be under me. In fact, I intend otherwise. When the expeditionary forces return, the civil war will end swiftly in their favour, and will neatly remove the negative elements within Gaia itself that I have gathered around me. The fire I will unleash shall forge us into one nation, one weapon.

And then, at last, we will face the Planet, for in the aftermath, there will be only one option remaining. We will fight this 'growthdream', on our own terms, with weapons of steel and physics and thought. And we will win, or it would be the deserving end of humanity, the deserving result of our failure. In our struggle shall be our finest hour.

I have done wrong. I am not too proud to admit that. But my crimes are to prevent all crimes, my wars to end all wars. I do not ask for understanding, or forgiveness. I ask only for the dawn of the New Terran Order. I ask only that the 'angels' which now carry out my mission, who by now nothing can turn back, do their task successfully, bravely and without regret.

May the righteous survive the fires to come.

-General Joacquim


It's so beautiful.

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(DailyMotion link)

EDIT: A translation of the lyrics of the song can be found at: http://www.apocalyptica.com/phorum-...9,336761,336837