Horned Devil
Location: Odessa, Sirius Square
Tags: Auteme | Kirie | Titus of Epoch | Marlon Sularen
Kralmus watched as the rebel mob flowed into the square, their politician-Jedi at their head, and beheld his grim work. The young woman in the lead spun the whole thing well, he had to admit, doing her best to turn fear and uncertainty into righteous outrage. But that was her job as one of civilization's talking heads - to twist the emotions of the livestock and keep them doing what she wanted. She'd keep filling their heads with high and mighty principles right up until they ran smack dab into the Final Dawn firing lines, and then her loyal followers would become "brave martyrs to liberty" as they were mowed down. That played better on the holonet than "band of convenient meatshields".
The Mandalorian hadn't expected to break their resolve in any case, only to rattle them. The purpose of each hanging corpse was to remind each individual member of the mob that he or she had children and parents and lovers and friends, people who would mourn them if they suffered the Final Dawn's harsh justice... and people who could suffer it in turn if they, too, were found to be disloyal. So too were the bodies intended to remind them that, no matter what a righteous cause they believed they were fighting for, they weren't invulnerable. This wasn't a holovid in which they were the main characters. They could suffer and die, en masse, at random, for being out on these streets.
In any revolution, the gutters and graveyards would end up full of brave young people with high-minded ideals.
It was certainly irritating when the Jedi woman waved her hands about and untied the bodies, lowering them gently to the ground. It'd taken him a solid fifteen minutes to position them properly, and that had been impressively fast, but she'd undone it all in seconds. And they called the Brotherhood the destructive ones! Kralmus clucked, shaking his head; someone just had no appreciation for art. No matter; it all would've been cleaned up sooner or later anyway, and the slow descent of the corpses gave the mob time to get a good look at the ragged, brutal wounds through their throats. Let the citizens of Epoch consider that up close before they ran around fomenting insurrection.
The group of rebels didn't linger for long beneath the sneering statue. Kralmus's nasty little display might not have spooked the Jedi, but it certainly seemed to have unnerved her camera-woman, though she'd managed to capture the footage despite her disquiet. Good. Broadcast what the Maw could do to people who stood up to them. Let the galaxy see the brutality they could unleash. For every self-righteous hero that footage created, encouraging someone to join up with the GADF, another five Alliance citizens would cower in fear when they saw it, terrified by the clear price of resisting the barbarian hordes. Such wretches would make compliant slaves when their planets fell to the Maw.
Crouched on a nearby rooftop, Kralmus watched the progress of the group below as they left the square. He trailed them from above, shadowing their movements through the city, closing in on the palace. Thus far they'd faced little opposition except their own fears and doubts, which Auteme had been excellent at keeping in check. But soon they would run across the entrenched positions of Sularen's Final Dawn troops, and they would find that a wall of blaster bolts was a harder obstacle to overcome. Kralmus grinned at the thought. He couldn't face this whole mob alone, but soon he wouldn't be. Soon he could crash into their flank while the Final Dawn shot their front ranks.
Soon the killing would start, and that was when he would really start having fun.
Tags: Auteme | Kirie | Titus of Epoch | Marlon Sularen
- Kralmus trails the rebels from above
The Mandalorian hadn't expected to break their resolve in any case, only to rattle them. The purpose of each hanging corpse was to remind each individual member of the mob that he or she had children and parents and lovers and friends, people who would mourn them if they suffered the Final Dawn's harsh justice... and people who could suffer it in turn if they, too, were found to be disloyal. So too were the bodies intended to remind them that, no matter what a righteous cause they believed they were fighting for, they weren't invulnerable. This wasn't a holovid in which they were the main characters. They could suffer and die, en masse, at random, for being out on these streets.
In any revolution, the gutters and graveyards would end up full of brave young people with high-minded ideals.
It was certainly irritating when the Jedi woman waved her hands about and untied the bodies, lowering them gently to the ground. It'd taken him a solid fifteen minutes to position them properly, and that had been impressively fast, but she'd undone it all in seconds. And they called the Brotherhood the destructive ones! Kralmus clucked, shaking his head; someone just had no appreciation for art. No matter; it all would've been cleaned up sooner or later anyway, and the slow descent of the corpses gave the mob time to get a good look at the ragged, brutal wounds through their throats. Let the citizens of Epoch consider that up close before they ran around fomenting insurrection.
The group of rebels didn't linger for long beneath the sneering statue. Kralmus's nasty little display might not have spooked the Jedi, but it certainly seemed to have unnerved her camera-woman, though she'd managed to capture the footage despite her disquiet. Good. Broadcast what the Maw could do to people who stood up to them. Let the galaxy see the brutality they could unleash. For every self-righteous hero that footage created, encouraging someone to join up with the GADF, another five Alliance citizens would cower in fear when they saw it, terrified by the clear price of resisting the barbarian hordes. Such wretches would make compliant slaves when their planets fell to the Maw.
Crouched on a nearby rooftop, Kralmus watched the progress of the group below as they left the square. He trailed them from above, shadowing their movements through the city, closing in on the palace. Thus far they'd faced little opposition except their own fears and doubts, which Auteme had been excellent at keeping in check. But soon they would run across the entrenched positions of Sularen's Final Dawn troops, and they would find that a wall of blaster bolts was a harder obstacle to overcome. Kralmus grinned at the thought. He couldn't face this whole mob alone, but soon he wouldn't be. Soon he could crash into their flank while the Final Dawn shot their front ranks.
Soon the killing would start, and that was when he would really start having fun.