The last five decades for the Kil'drabi had been a journey of routine turned horrific struggle for survival, struggle turned to surprising encounters, and encounters that turned to humbling reminders of the paths they yet needed to travel within the endless voids.
When their fleet had taken anchorage within this system and had initiated communications with the local population of Those Who War Eternal, their Elders had been ignored, and their hails left unanswered, slotting the local Those Who War Eternal splinters here into the second category the Kil'drabi had encountered within their travels. The first were those who hunted and killed them, either hurt in the past too much by other alien peoples, or able to kill them thanks to superior technology and numbers or skill of voidcraft, urged onward with hatred's flames fanned by word and religion. The second were those who could not or would not, talk and converse with We Who Yet Wander but refrain from attacking them even if they held superiority in any or all matters of the void.
The path for those in the second category was clear, with ancient examples and old encounters recorded within history and stories guiding their steps and actions. A message was sent to explain their reason for staying within their home. Assurances were made to not leave the assigned places where the ships and the resources direly needed would be created and mined, alongside the oath to repay the locals with the refined bounty of their home at the end of a pre-determined period of time as payment for letting them stay there.
It had been assumed that Those Who War Eternal accepted their words, or at the very least had not chosen to refute them, as their fleet had stayed its hand while protecting their homes and watched closely for any trickery by We Who Yet Wander.
Only too late did they realize that they had been the subject of great deception years in the making, a fleet coming to aid the locals with fire and hatred. Yet, the Kil'drabi had given as hard as they had gotten, wrecks burning within the void as the greed of the local rulers had caused them to send a message in arrogance, claiming all the materials and all the ships of the fleet for "breaching the sanctity of a system owing fealty to the Lord Of Eternal Tides who resides on Holy Terra."
Though the only survivors were not those who would ever know of the message, their ship was too busy crashing onto an alien moon frozen over and sparse in a reprieve for the few that dragged corpse after corpse from the wreckage and ruin when the ship had given its last. What followed was death and murder, for the survivors of Those Who War Eternal that had crashed in their own vessel not far from them were intent on bringing no shame to their name, choosing fire and death for each.
And yet, the winds of war were not in their favor; the Kil'drabi could manufacture quicker and better weapons, tools, and equipment than Those Who War Eternal could, pushing back with overwhelming firepower what grit and skill could not hold back forever. The last months of the conflict had been rough on We Who Yet Wander, as it was known that Those Who War Eternal had given birth to children, and their kind was not known to leave children alive if it meant suffering in their future, but war did not leave choices when it was fought to the last.
And then craft descended from the sky and the war was over, leaving naught but a people now alone and thinking the last two decades of fighting would end with quick obliteration from ortillery or swift and brutal massacres by hordes of soldiers descending upon their new-found homes.
But struggle turned to encounter, and another category of Those Who War Eternal was found to reside within the system, one who talked and was willing to listen, to learn from those all others of their kind despised and feared. Much was shared on that fateful day, yet little was demanded from those high in the void and mighty in their armaments until an offer was made, given from the Elders of one station that had ripped itself free of the shackles crafted by Those Who Create Eternal In The Name Of Ruin Incarnate. Aid would be given, and protection from all others promised, in return for metals and loyalty that cost them little to swear and less to create.
Though it angered many that the aid would be in tools and machines of "technology low enough for you to use," it shamed far more when those were still almost too advanced to be of use to We Who Yet Wander.
And it shamed all when an idle discussion and hopeful request to recover some of those lineages lost in the battle returned with compassion and fervor beyond what could have ever been demanded. A captain, one Herkata-55/C, was named Mak'hati when she returned, again and again, with lost lineages and gene-stores thought to be forever out of their reach until the trickle turned flood. Each ship of their fleet was searched and had its most vital memories returned to them, alongside the names of all 197 Humans that had lost their lives retrieving them.
After their death, all those lost, the gene-lines of the Kil'drabi and those Humans now called Mak'hati, were carved into a monument within their settlement underneath the soil and flesh of stone of the Frozen Moon. A reminder of what had been taken and a reminder of what had been given. A call from this generation to those who would come to never let grief and anger delude them into thinking that one group spoke for all of their people, and that aid deserved aid.
So when Those Who War Eternal asked to be given the fruits and seeds of the Frozen moon, to have their holds filled with plants and animals they could eat, the Elders decreed that they would do so, but they would not lower their tribute in metals in return. Good deserved Good, and those who had given unto them hope beyond hope deserved to eat more than the corpses of their fallen and a singular plant that brought no joy to taste.
But in those days before the ships destined to carry this bounty of seeds and animals would arrive, something else happened, something that would have, once, given no pause to the families beyond mourning for an unborn soul taken by Ruin Incarnate.
We Who Yet Wander had no psykers, for all their kin that could harness the powers within that otherworldy and hostile realm hatched with skin tinged red, blue, green, and purple, and all would spell doom and fates beyond death if left alive. So they all were killed, none spared for the safety of all, yet their names recorded as if they had died newly hatched, for it was the least that could be given unto those who had everything taken before they had anything.
But the parents of the hatchling were those who had turned to pray to the Star Child of the humans alongside the 14 Trodden Ways, old talks having turned to conversion in half as they had taken a liking to the aspects preached by the book given to them.
And now it seemed that Faith answered Faith, as the hatchling wore a skin not of gun-metal grey or dusted black but of silver-gold.
This...had never happened.
[] No matter. No exceptions.
Hesitation or hope for the skin-changed had doomed many. We shall not join their numbers.
(The Silver-Gold Child is executed and mourned.)
[] Give the Silver-Gold Child to the Humans.
They have people who can harness the Warp safely; they may know what this is and warn them if something is wrong. If nothing else, a stay of execution is no exemption from the very same.
(Reveal Kil'drabi Psykana: Paths, The Void, Struggle, Community, and Family.)
