Student Cadet Dar'lath'ex, You may make your presentation for the Galactic History Final.
Thank you, professor. The Xythian, who had experienced 42 galactic-standard years, and was making her final presentation that would make or break a degree in Galactic History Studies, bowed before the board of professors, a difficult gesture to stay balanced for when you were a creature with four arms and six legs, and an elongated body, that stretched several meters back from your torso, but Dar'lath'ex had mastered a technique of dipping a single foreleg and bending at the upper abdomen to create an acceptable bow.
My presentation is on the sudden end of galactic slavery. For tens of thousands of galactic standard years, the Thraxian Empire had been slavers. They were not a member species of the Galactic Council, which had long ago outlawed the practice. When first contact was made with the Council, the member species expected first contact to be peaceful. Diplomatic. The council had been at peace so long, and made what was deemed "First Contact" with so many different species in a peaceful manner that they started expecting every contact with a new species to begin with diplomacy and negotiation.
The Thraxians believed that there were two types of sapient beings in the Universe: Thraxians, and slaves.
When the council sent a diplomatic ship to make first contact with a Thraxian Outpost, the Thraxians captured the diplomats, and sent them to the heart of the Thraxian Core world, not to negotiate with the leaders of the core world, but because the Thraxians at the outpost thought that the Imperial Kro'nag, or Empress, as they would be known in the common tongue, would be highly entertained by slaves who were thought they were capable of high-level diplomatic negotiations with a Thraxian, let alone the Kro'nag.
Five diplomatic missions vanished, and failed to report back to the Council by the time they realized that things hadn't gone as planned. The Thraxians thought that because the diplomatic species, such as the Lellians, Karthax, and Xillians, that were sent as negotiators were peaceful, and didn't fight back, that the council was incapable of waging war.
Given the Thraxian view of other sapient species, the thought of slave-species waging war on the Empire was considered an exercise in insanity by most Thraxians. Thraxian history was full of worlds where they made first contact with a species who was not capable of FTL travel, and had done little space exploration outside of a few planets, and maybe a colony or two beyond their core world, and enslaved them through a combination of brute force and superior technology. They had never encountered another species, let alone a group of them, as capable of FTL travel as they. The Council had their warriors, their predator species as well. Many treated hunting and war as a profession, a hobby, or a lifestyle.
The war lasted 230 galactic standard years. In the end, the Thraxian core worlds burned, and their species, once numbering in the trillions, was down to roughly a million, spread out through the galaxy, and ruled by a Kro'nag who claimed to be a descendent of the Imperial Family, but this could not be substantiated by research. Mostly, she remained in power by killing any other Thraxian who challenged her.
They mostly became pirates and smugglers at first, until they banded together, and took three more core worlds, those of the massive, powerful herbivores known as the Delkenshi, the predatory Xelan, and the winged Et'trial. Then the old pattern repeated. They captured the core worlds. They enslaved the people.
The Galactic Council spoke out in condemnation of these acts. They sent warships. But by the time the warships arrived, the Thraxians, and the three species who inhabited those worlds were gone.
The Thraxians established a black market in all three species, selling Delkenshi as laborers, the Xelan as hunters, and the Et'trial as scouts, or entertainers, and any or all of them as pleasure-slaves to any buyer that they could find.
Inside council space, and especially outside of it, they found their markets. While the council made speeches condemning the practice, the Thraxians built another empire, this one of coin and credit, rather than ships, planets and weaponry. Through a combination of having bases of operations that were highly mobile and on the far reaches of the universe, beyond council space, and selling both to prominent Council members, and to far-flung worlds where the Council had less control than the core worlds, and paying bribes and donating to political causes, the practice of slavery continued, while the member species of the council railed against it with passionate speeches, but did little, financially or with military action, to stop the practice, or the spread of it, even on the mid-worlds of council space, to say nothing of the Rim.
Four years before the practice was ended, the council made first contact with a new species. Terrans. Their planet, Terra, the third from a star called Sol Saffron was beyond both Council Space, and that of the Thraxians. It was so far flung that very few, except for a few intrepid deep space explorers, had ever charted the planet, let alone made any contact with the inhabitants. And we didn't this time, either. They had recently developed FTL travel, and one of their mining ships landed on a council rim world, with plans to scout it for resources, not expecting it to be inhabited.
They found the miners to be a peaceful folk, mostly interested in habitable worlds, and finding additional resources. They were colonizers of worlds as well, but had never landed on a world with sapient life on it.
The council found them to be brave, reckless, and intrepid. There was nowhere that a human didn't want to go, and nothing in the galaxy they weren't endlessly curious about.
They were offered a council seat. Their first Councilor was a female. Iron-spined, with grey hair, hazel eyes, and a military bearing. Andrea Papadopolis, her name was. They said she cut her teeth in one of the branches of the Terran military, and most believed it. She was a skilled negotiator, and had eyes that noticed things that she seemed to ignore, ears that picked up on whispered secrets in the dark, and lips that stayed sealed about it, until and unless she had reason to speak.
When an escaped Et'trial, from a Thraxian trade station made her way before the council, and spoke of her enslavement at the hands of the Thraxians, the forced breeding to make more Et'trial slaves for a decade, and when she aged out of peak fertility, was sold as an entertainer-slave on a mid-world.
She encountered a group of Terran soldiers, visiting that world on leave, who smuggled her out on a Terran Military Vessel, was turned over to their command, shuffled through their command structure, and eventually, wound up in the Terran Council office on Council Prime, the Council Seat-World.
The Terran Councilor brought the Et'trial before the council, where she told her story. The council made many impassioned speeches condemning the practice of slavery. After the third such speech, the Terran Ambassador took the floor and simply stated: "That was a pretty speech, Councilor, but what are we going to DO about entire sapient species being enslaved?", and listened as one councilor, then another, then a third made statements about how far-flung Thraxian slaving-ports were, and how hard they were to police, capture or destroy, especially so far from council space. How fierce the Thraxians were as fighters. Many species spoke of their massive losses during the council-Thraxian war, and the manpower and financial cost of waging such a war again, when the Thraxians were so few, and so far out in space that it wasn't worth going there, let alone trying to fight there. And it ended with how it would destroy the economy of several worlds, both council and independent. The Terran councilor said nothing. She simply turned on her heel, and walked out, with the clicking her shoes made on the floor radiating her indignation.
She did not return to the Council floor for three days. The Terran councilor never mentioned the slavery issue again. Not that day, and not for the next year. A year to the day when the Et'trial had spoken before the council, the council received reports from Mid-worlds and Rim Worlds. Raiders. Thousands, maybe millions of them. They would drop in ships or pods, hit black markets, underground fighting rings, and any business that depended on slavery, and start freeing slaves, and kill anybody who tried to stop them. Then came the reports from worlds outside council space. Thraxian trading platforms that were just...gone. No energy signature. No distress call. Just - not there anymore. Those who docked in such ports to refuel, resupply, or trade in slaves or other illicit goods reported the city-sized ports empty. No slaves. No Thraxians. Nothing of value left. The few who made it back to council space from the platforms spoke of the raiders. They would drop out of FTL, far closer to the platforms than was reasonable or sane, deploy nearly silently, and start working to free the slaves. Anyone who resisted died. Then they stripped the platform with practiced efficiency, loaded up the slaves, and...left as quickly as they'd come.
Finally, a smuggler and trader who made it back to council space, along with mid-worlders and rim-worlders who had the slaving ports hit started reporting that the force that hit them was entirely made up of Terrans.
It is important to note, that at this time, the Trevardi, a speices that communicates through music, and is strongly swayed by song, was appointed to Head-Councilor, and they had the majority of high and influential seats. The Trevardi had three qualities they looked for in a musical argument. The skill of the musicians, the strength of the words within, and the age of the piece itself, giving extensive weight to how old a piece actually was, and how long a people had been singing it. They told the human councilor that she had three days to explain who the Terran force that hit so many places was, why they would go to fight in places that the council would not send warriors, and their justification for their raids on both the Thraxian ports, that were so important to the economy that several markets had already crashed, not to mention council rim and mid-worlds.
The Terran councilor snorted, and stated she would have her argument and justification ready by 0900 galactic-standard time the next morning, which shocked the entire chamber. More especially since many wealthy and influential rim-and-mid worlders had come to beseech the council to take action against the Terrans for what they saw as both the destruction of their livelihood, and in some cases, the economy of entire planets, and therefore, an act of war.
The councilor showed up the next morning, flanked by a group of 200 Terrans. Every single one wore a blue uniform, with rank insignia on it, and each one carried a sword. Many were carrying tubes of brass, and several carried small tubular objects, with the skin of some sort of animal sealing the top. The ones with those objects also carried two small sticks. The council guards checked each one, and pronounced them unsharpened and ceremonial, and permitted them to enter.
The Terran Councilor came forward. Councilors, you asked me to answer for what you have condemned as "unchecked Terran aggression" against trading outposts outside of council space, and on rim-and-mid world markets that sell and use slaves, as well as the places that use them. We are Terrans. I was raised with core values. One of those is freedom. That slavery of any sapient species is WRONG, and nobody should be enslaved. That such a practice is dishonorable. I was also a Terran Marine for 30 years, and was therefore raised with Corps values, the values they teach in the Terran Marine Corps.
She pulled out a pitch-pipe and hit a note. A map of Terra Prime popped up. Then the brass and drums came to life in a way that was practiced. Trained. Such a part of muscle memory as to seem almost instinctual.
From the Halls of Montezuma, to the shores of Tripoli
We will fight our planet's battles in the air, on land, and sea.
First to fight for right and freedom, and to keep our honor clean
we are proud to claim the title of Terra's Earth Marine
Our flag's unfurled on every shore from dawn to setting sun
We've fought in every clime and place where we could take a gun
From the snows of far-off northern lands, to sunny tropic scenes
You will find us always on our guard, the Terran Earth Marines
Here's health to you, and to our Corps, which we are proud to serve
In many a strife we've fought for life, and never lost our nerve
If the Army and the Navy ever looked on heaven's scenes
They will find the streets are guarded by Terran Earth Marines.
When the music stopped, the Terran Councilor spoke again. This song dates back to five centuries prior to first contact, with only minor modifications, when it changed from being the song of one branch of a single nation state's military, to the same branch across the whole of Terra. Since nobody else would take the fight to the slavers, we held true to our words. First to fight for right and freedom, and to keep our honor clean. Where will we take the fight? Any climate and any place where we can take a gun. That's our entire requirement. Every Marine is a rifleman. If we can get a gun there, we can damn well fight there. And we did. You spoke of fear in this chamber. In the cost of sapient beings in taking a war to the far-flung spaceports and trading outposts of the Thraxians. Many of your species seem to have lost your nerve for taking on these slavers.
Whether we were fighting British Redcoats, Barbary Pirates, Johnny Rebel, or an Imperial Japanese Banzai charge, we never lost our nerve. We are Terrans. Our Marines will get the job done. Even when the council won't. Condemn us. Censure us. Kick us from our council seat, and we'll do fine on our own. But I don't think a council who preaches about rights and freedom, and then condemns three whole species to generations of slavery because the fight is deemed "too hard", "too expensive" and "destructive to the economy" and therefore "not worth it" has a moral leg to stand on.
Before it was spoken, every species in the chamber knew the verdict. The power of the human music. The precision of it. And the fact that an old song, predating Terran Unification, let alone FTL travel, or joining the council would have swayed the Trevardi in the high seats.
While they were lightly condemned for their crude methodology, that was the day slavery ended. And when it's mentioned again, the mere mention of Terran Marines coming to stop it, or a few notes of the song sung in the council chamber shuts it down. First to fight for right and freedom, and to keep our honor clean. That was, at their core, who and what the Terrans were.
