A History of the United Worlds of Rigel
-Part 2
Imperium
Rigel's era as a directly controlled imperial province, is considered by some groups to have been it's golden age. During the approximately two hundred and fifty years following the Second Rebellion, and before the start of the Colony Wars Rigel prospered, and much of the groundwork was laid for the later mercantile powerhouse it would become.
The first few decades however were wrought with hardship, as the crippling damage the four years of the rebellion had inflicted upon the system was slowly repaired. This endeavour required a great influx of capital, which was a significant drain on the Empire's finances. Despite this bureaucratic will to accomplish the restoration of Rigel was strong. The Imperial institutions were eager to find sources of revenue that left them less dependant on the support of the hypercorporations. If Rigel could be made as productive as it had once been under the Consortium, their investment would be well worth it.
The first Imperial Viceroy Teras Mirranir, instituted sweeping changes to the Rigel system and it's surrounding region. Firstly the administrative capital was moved from Hayar's Landing on Kolar to a new purpose built city on Chelar. The new capital of the Rigel province was called Sanadar, and the planet itself renamed to Rigel Prime. The exterior inhabited worlds of the Rigel sector, which the Consortium had ruled via violence and fear, were now brought properly into the framework of the province's government. To control and regulate this territory and the multitudes who inhabited it the previous corporate structures where replaced completely by the importation for Imperial bureaucrats from the core worlds.
Rigel however was along way from the Orion home space, and though postings there were considered a god way for ambitious young Orions to gain experience in the bureaucracy it became difficult to retain them as they sought bigger and brighter opportunities back home to further their careers.
Though many stayed either due to eccentricities of character or a genuine love of Rigel, the shortfall in personnel was made up by heavily recruiting from the Free Rigellian population. This was a marked divergence from policy within the Empire's core where non-Orions were usually shut out from governmental posts, but it significantly boosted the political power of Free Rigellian society.
The population of Free Rigellians was significantly swelled during this period by the generous bond purchasing regulations set out by the Provincial government as more and more slaves bought their freedom. Another source was immigration from other worlds in the Rigel sector. Though these newcomers often had no history of slavery themselves, they integrated into the existing culture. This influx greatly strengthened the sector's culture and society, in which Free Rigellians had embraced the Orion commercial drive with enthusiasm. Many Free Rigellians rose to become wealthy and influential business owners. By 780AD there were more Free Rigellians than there were Orions. By 850AS the Free Rigellians were beginning to rival the slaves in number. An economically savvy and well motivated middle class with links to government power had been created.
These economic and cultural developments had lead to Rigel becoming a jewel of the Empire, its multi-ethnic cosmopolitan population and Imperial backed security making it the ideal hub for trade just not within the Empire but for much of local space. However the policy of Orion supremacy still held, and the very highest positions were denied to anyone but them. For Nobles of the Empire Rigel and its environs became a travel destination, and many came to holiday on vast luxurious estates or wilderness hunting lodges, and sample the exotic markets of Ategn and Sanadar.
The golden age however bright could not last. The self indulgent hedonism and laissez faire attitude of the Imperial state towards the Orion colonies during this period fostered a growing resentment across the Empire. Tax and jurisdiction disputes flared up on many colonies, both large and small, with increasing frequency by 920 AD.
Isolation
In 934AD the Imperial government's relationship with several major colonies across it's periphery had totally deteriorated. When pro-imperial legislators pushed through new laws regulating the hypercorporations, it was the last straw. Several major worlds including Alukk, Celos and Duaba all broke ties with the Imperial government, ejecting imperial tax collectors at the behest of their corporate backers.
The initial Imperial response was sluggish, as if not quite understanding the gravity of the situation. Token forces were sent to enforce compliance on the wayward colonies, but in almost all cases they were chased off by newly raised Colonial Naval units, mostly corporate security ships under contract.
Very quickly there was an incident, with great loss of life there cam outrage, and all thoughts of compromise and reconciliation were thrown aside. The conflict that would rage across the borders of the Orion Empire would become known as the Colony Wars.
The Imperial military lurched haltering in to action, like a great mailed fist it smashed aside resistance in one system only for it to reform again elsewhere.
As the conflict raged an ever increasing amount of material and capital was required to keep the war machine running. The wealth of Rigel flowed into this abyss seemingly without end.
As the war raged Rigel became increasingly isolated from the rest of the Empire, the garrisons were drawn down, the news came less frequently, and the noble dilettante tourists were increasingly replaced by permanent refugees.
By the 955AD the Empire was exhausted, and under duress from the gathered military of the Allied Orion Colonies signed an armistice and recognition of independence that basically amounted to surrender. The once mighty Orion Empire was reduced to Orion, a few minor colony worlds, and the resource drained Rigel sector. A far flung outpost that now seemed so far away. The hypercorps had proved their supremacy.
The rump Empire soldiered on for a decade more in this shrunken state before a lingering succession crisis within the Imperial family led to a series of short, but brutal, civil wars, with both sides often backed by rival hypercorp factions. When the Syndicate backed claimant finally prevailed and was subsequently installed upon the throne, the then current Viceroy of Rigel, Duchess Parvenna Yatah, took matters into her own hands. As a member of a cadet line of the previous royal house, she had a proper heritage, and more importantly a solid backing among the Rigellian bureaucracy and local Imperial Navy squadron. With this support she declared herself the true and rightful Empress of the Orion Empire, and severed ties with the hypercorp's puppet regime on Orion in 971AD. This act set Rigel on a course that would forever split it from the rest of Orion space.
Independence
The break with the rest of Orion civilization was not total nor immediate, and for the next hundred years the Corewards and Rimwards Orion Empires alternated between periods of uneasy peace and sporadic conflict as one tried to conquer the other. In between they both found time to come to blows with the frequently shifting states that made up the fractured Orion colony worlds.
This constant level of warfare served to further confirm the downward spiral of Orion civilization following the heights of the Empire. Even before the Colony Wars the social fabric of Orion culture had been wearing at the edges as politics became heavily influenced by violence and corruption. During the last fifty years technological developed had stalled, and in some key areas even noticeably regressed.
Now important repositories of knowledge and irreplaceable infrastructure were routinely being wrecked for short term astro-politcal gain. In Rigel this was as keenly felt as elsewhere, it had always lacked the great research and development labs of the coreworlds, and though the least touched by war due to it's isolation, the dwindling resources meant that few efforts could be made to improve matters.
A significant area of shortfall was the inability to construct the complex warp drive systems to power new ships, the great Consortium shipyards had never been rebuilt, and Rigel was dependant on imports from hypercorporation manufactories to support its small remaining shipbuilding industry.
The hypercorps presided over this decay like carrion birds, picking at the pieces of most worth, and leaving the rest of Orion civilization to wither. Even distant Rigel was not immune to their depredations, and it paid a heavy price to get the scraps it needed to maintain its own faltering infrastructure. A burden that meant it could never find the resources to try and properly rebuild.
Eventually it seemed as though the wars would stop from sheer exhaustion, and perhaps in the future once there was nothing of worth left to fight over, something new could be built from the ashes.
Any chance for the Orions to pull themselves out of this endless spiral of decline and infighting was robbed when the Hur'q arrived.
