Aquilan Society

The society has been working for decades to reconstruct a ‘true’ history of the system, they believe that the current situation (a mixed society of aliens and humans living equally in a democracy) is new, and before the war against the Raiders things were very different. This ‘truth’ has been suppressed and erased from all public databases.   Historically, Aquilan Society members have found themselves unwelcome at Tantalus, and so most members kept it a secret and were very careful who they trusted. Until recently, even members of the Society only knew the identities of one or two others.   Each member gets anonymous access to the Aquilan database, an online store of all the collected history gathered by the Society over the past 70-100 years. It is very fragmented and incomplete. The basics of what they have reconstructed are listed below.   Since the arrival of the Star Charter, things have rapidly accelerated. A mysterious shadowy group that opposed the Aquilans, and apparently also the elected government of Tantalus, has emerged and proven that they can manipulate Ithacan Society on a massive scale. The Aquilans - who already had a secret network - have been alarmed at how powerful this shadowy group has been. This group seems to strongly oppose the Imperium, and when the Star Charter arrives, this shadowy group becomes very active in trying to kill or sideline the Imperials. The Aquilan Society actively started countering the shadowy group, which resulted in many members becoming dangerously exposed.   The most famous of these is former Admiral Athena Graves, who was removed from her position and went underground - there she presented evidence that this ‘Shadow Council' as she calls it, has endangered the lives of everyone in the Ithacan Star League, by concealing information about the true threat posed by the Raiders (which she also revealed are known to the Imperials as Orks).  

Society Mission:

The society has been working for decades to reconstruct a ‘true’ history of the system, they know:

Ancient History:

• Alien Overlords kept the humans for slave workers for thousands of years in Raakata.
• Imaru Baraqu came from the Imperium approximately 2000-3000 years ago with an extremely strong military force and liberated all the slaves.
• Any aliens that weren’t directly involved in the Slavery and swore fealty to the Imperium were allowed to live and worked as indentured citizens to help restore what their kind had destroyed.
• The Raakata System entered an age of rebuilding and redevelopment that saw humanity rise again to be a powerful civilisation that even spread to other worlds through the Erebus Gate.

 

The Greenskin War

• Orks (raiders) arrived some time between 200 and 500 years ago and engulfed the system in war.
• A war leader called Imaru Baraqu (presumably a hereditary title, likely the descendant of the Imaru that came from the Imperium) led all the people of the system in war against the Orks.
• The Imperium under Imaru and the Orks fought until both were almost entirely destroyed and society changed hugely during/after the war (about 100-200 years ago).

 

Post-War Ithacan League

• The survivors here on the edge of the system grouped together and formed the Ithacan League, they were a mixed group of humans and aliens, and for some reason (deliberately or accidentally) treated each other equally, humans were no-longer the superior race.
• A small battle force came about 20 years ago to help clear out the Graveyard of Raiders.
• This battle group called itself the Imperium and used the Aquila symbol, along with ships and personnel that matched the scraps of records from the recovered history, however …
• The Assembly Council asked/demanded that the Imperial forces leave immediately after they helped out, and there was tension at the higher levels.
• The Assembly Council adopted a defensive stance, to persuade the Imperium’s forces that trying to outsay a welcome would be unwise.
• There has been no communication from the Core (Imperial worlds) for the past 15-20 years, except occasional news from other colonies and trade ships that the Core was rebuilding from the destruction, like everyone else, and didn’t have resources to spare.

Arrival of the Star Charter:

  The Star Charter’s arrival sent shockwaves through the Aquilan Society. Advocate Collins, a member of the Society, managed to be the first person to officially greet the “Imperials”. Initially everyone thought they’d come from the Core, but these newcomers claimed to be from outside the system entirely.   For the Aquilans these people represented an amazing opportunity to learn about the Imperium first-hand - and they proved that the Imperium existed outside the Raakata system, however forces at work in the Assembly Council were already working to try to sideline and maybe kill these unwelcome Imperial visitors.   Admiral Athena Graves and Advocate Collins and many other Society members burned favours, threatened and even lied to arrange it so that the Star Charter was folded into ongoing plants to take the fight to the Raiders. This made it so that the Imperials became too high-profile to “disappear”.   Admiral Graves then hired the Imperial Crew as Privateers, which meant she could keep them close to her and try to watch out for them without revealing herself to be an Aquilan.   Unfortunately she was outmaneuvered by the Shadow Council who inserted an agent onto the ship (Consular Nonaks) who sabotaged the mission, resulting in an overall failure, and in protecting the Imperial crew from official sanctions she exposed herself as an Aquilan.  

Finding the Sterope

Before the Shadow Council could force her out of office Admiral Graves assigned the Lost Star to find the Sterope - a legitimate mission, but one that would take the Imperial crew out of the reach of the Shadow Council for a while.   Graves was forced to retire from the Admiralty, which would mean she lost the protection of being a high-profile Navy officer and also meant she could no-longer protect the Imperial crew. She fled to the Imperial Quarter, where she could be amongst people she knew for a fact weren’t in league with the Shadow Council, and she could finally reveal her allegiance to the Aquilan Society and immerse herself in the culture of people from the Imperium.  

Releasing the Sterope Data:

At Tantalus the data regarding the Ork fleet and the Assembly Councils rebuttal both cause ripples through the giant station. Independent analysts verify the data released by the players is genuinely from Navy sensors, and have proven that the data released by the Assembly was faked to reduce the threat.   This caused a massive public panic and uprising against the Assembly Council known as the Truth March.   The Aquillan Society joined with others that wanted to see the current Assembly taken down. They fermented riots and unrest as cover, and used their insider-knowledge to stage a coup.   From there, the rebels triggered martial law, giving emergency powers to the Ithacan Navy who was commanded by an Aquilan ally of Admiral Graves. Graves was reinstated as Supreme Admiral, giving her command of the overall defence of Tantalus.   Graves then legitimised the Imperial colony, folding them into Tantalus officially. She started conscription and began the process of restructuring Tantalus on a war footing.    WA few days after the release of the Sterope data Graves and the other military leaders (with support from the community and Aquillan agitators) used executive powers to collapse the Assembly Council - they claimed it had failed to protect people - and reformed it as Imperial Ithaca.   

Imperial Ithaca

Naturally these sweeping authoritarian changes were not well received by everyone, but Graves and her allies began pumping out sweeping propaganda campaigns and plenty of rousing speeches to galvanise the majority of the population around the idea that if they didn’t act now, they would be dead in a few weeks. They highlighted that there was nowhere to run, nowhere to hide, etc, and that once the crisis is over, the government will be restructured.   Days after the release of the Sterope Data there is still massive unrest at Tantalus, but the coup is over and the majority of Tantalus’ citizens were working hard to bolster the defences of Tantalus and be ready for the Orks.   The Aquilan Society members no-longer have to hide, and the entire Aquillan Databse was made public on the Datanet for a few hours before the vast majority was removed. Aquillan members and interested civilians began visting the Imperial Quarter to learn about the Imperium.   Supreme Admiral Graves assembled a small team to go on a ship to the Graveyard to reconnect with the Profectus and inform them of the latest developments. She gave them a special sealed information packet to a trusted member of the Aquilan Society with instructions that it be delivered directly into the hands of Captain Nahara.  

Economic Collapse and Revolutionary Uprising

The unity and purpose that the Truth March brought to the population of Tantlaus was extremely short lived. Less than a couple of weeks after the declaration of Martial Law and the triumphant speeches made by Admiral Graves about returning Tantalus to the Imperium, the realities of live under Martial Law were biting. Shortages across all sectors impacted everyone as the military sucked up resources for the 'Fortress Programme'. Conscription stalled as people protested and simply refused to show up. Public opinion rapidly turned against Admiral Graves and most of her Aquillan allies distanced themselves from her. Officially the Aquillans played down the connections between the current Martial government and the Imperium.  

Imperial Centre Established

Shortly after the Truth March the Aquilan Database was made public and then removed from the datanet with a few hours. Presumably an internal debate took place on what to do with the collected knowledge that the Aquillans had worked for so long on.   Due to the fact that there were a great many influential Aquillans, funding was not lacking, and so the Aquillan Society was registered as a Corporate entity and purchased a building in Hollard. This building was refurbished and opened as an Imperial Embassy. Staffed by Aquillans and employees drawn from the Imperial Quarter it was part library for the Aquillan Databse, part academy to educate people about the Imperial and part propaganda centre.  

Reconnection with the Sleastatt Noble Houses

After Admiral Graves' team successfully brought the Sleastatt Alliance to the defence of Tantalus many fast couriers started arriving at Tantalus from the Sleastatt Houses carrying diplomats and military advisors. The Aquillans and the Sleastatt Houses immediately connected and are often indistinguishable. Many Sleastatt visitors to Tantalus loge at Imperial Centre and there has been increasing connections between the Sleastatt Alliance and the Aquillans over the weeks.