By Stephen Johnson (sjwriter@netcom.com)
Coordinator Shing looked up from the console abruptly, at the PDC Marine who had just entered the data analysis room of the Deep Universal Explorer Isaac Newton. "Yes? Ah, those are the catastrophic monitoring tapes?"
"No Sir, both units have been destroyed. These are more log tapes from the ruins of the personnel quarters Sir!"
"Relax Marine, whatever hit this Outpost is long gone by now."
"SIR!"
With a sigh Coordinator Shing silently dismissed the Marine, muttering after she had left.
"Espri deCorps is all fine and well, but thinking is what keeps you alive out here."
"It didn't keep the Co-op of this Outpost alive." Investigator Levi said as she closed the door behind her. "Of course overwhelming firepower is a little hard to sidestep."
Coordinator Shing shrugged. "They were slaughtered and the Outpost looted, we knew that much coming in. It fits the pattern."
"Eight Outposts in fifty years, same pattern, no clues. The official explanation isn't cutting it any more."
"Shhh! The Hall Monitors back dirtside might hear you." Coordinator Shing said, rolling his eyes.
"This is not the work of a Marauder!"
"Or the Traditions or the Nephandi, agreed. Nor any of the other Outsiders we've encountered thusfar out here. Too methodical, to focused and too bloody interested in our Technologies."
"It would have been nice to get a tissue sample for our Progenitor friends, how is the Syndicate-"
"To replace this Outpost I'm going to have to talk to the Ivory Tower types and make the threat real to them. Then maybe the next time we can have a fortified Outpost waiting and get some information out of that next raid."
It's the Deep Universe/Umbra, resources are tight and stretched thin. If there was a real threat the fund would be made available, but the T'kra are nothing if not cunning. There is no evidence, just all the mystery of missing people and equipment. So the Void Engineers suspect something, but in the absence of facts can do little more. The T'Kra have good reason to insure the Void Engineers have no facts... yet.
The T'kra are the Wanderers of the Deep Umbra, and rightly feared by all who have encountered them and survived. In a now decayed, desiccated and dead Tellurian they were born millions of years ago. Like Humanity some amongst them Awoke and began to shape the reality around them with the sheer force of their will. Like Humanity they discovered the dichotomy of internal/external foci and fought a War over it.
The T'kra had always been warriors from their point of view, conquering and enslaving their lessers to provide those things Warfare can not. Like Humanity they turned their external foci, their tools, to killing but even the most savage killers in Human history would be amateurs compared to the average T'kra. In time the T'kra attained their vision Ascension, to become the perfect warrior society. Unfortunately the cost of their Ascension was the draining dry of their Tellurian's supplies of Quintessence and other resources as well.
With their tools, Their Technology, they pushed out into the Deep Umbra and found a new Tellurian, rich with resources and Quintessence as well as a primitive people ripe and ready for enslavement and use. The T'Kra reached out and conquered this new Tellurian, it was not an easy task and the very process of abandoning their own Tellurian changed them. They became more corrupt, ruthless, cruel and vicious; even the Nephandi will find them to be a bit... extreme.
Time passed and their rapacious use of their new Tellurian rapidly drained it of Quintessence and other resources as well. Once again the Deep Umbra beckoned and once again they sought out another Tellurian to rape, use and discard. Thus they have been for time out of mind, growing and spreading as they go. Leaving a trail of decayed, desiccated and dead Tellurians in their wake.
At some point early on they encountered a Tellurian with beings following a course of tool use evolving into a unique technology. The conquest of the Ja!Ku'pok almost broke the T'Kra and forced them to split into several... well Tribes or Clans are words that will serve as well as any, though truly they do not fit well at all. Each Tribe/Clan owns a Tellurian they are in the process of using to pursue their vision of Ascension, the perfect warrior society. In fact the T'Kra have become so corrupt honor means nothing to them, victory is their only measure of worth and it has been very long indeed since they last faced an equal opponent. The T'Kra still fear the Ja!Ku'pok in fact though they believe them destroyed.
Few Tellurians have been spared by the T'Kra, only those of such utterly alien a nature to be unnoticeable to them as a rule. They are powerful enough to enforce their paradigm on the Tellurian they are invading and make it change to suit them. Still that can take time with the more alien of paradigms so the closer or more primitive a paradigm is, the more the T'Kra prize it and rush to take the Tellurian and make it their own.
They also prefer those Tellurians with someone to... resist them and to provide them with a crushing victory. Nomadic tribes are good, stone age savages are better. Civilization is bad, civilizations with Awakened individuals are very bad, Technological Civilizations are worse, Technological Civilizations with Awakened individuals are the stuff of T'Kra nightmares. In short the T'Kra have descended away from their ideal of Ascension to become secret Cowards. Still they pursue the ideal of Ascension, if not the actual thing any more.
The first T'Kra scout found the Gaian Tellurian around 1100 CE, noticed that there were inhabitants and moved on. It was only an initial survey after all and the majority of the Tribe/Clan had just settled down in freshly conquered Tellurian and were still busy finding out just how satisfying a splat the local inhabitants could make when dropped from some height. The T'kra finished their leisurely survey around 1270 CE and settled down to serious decadence and barbarism for the next few hundred years. The local inhabitance not only splatted in such a satisfying manner, the sounds they made as they were consumed alive were entertaining too!
About 1435 CE another scout passed by the Gaian Tellurian and noticed a particular upswing in Quintessence flow in the Tellurian. Before they could investigate further however they were attacked and destroyed a band of Fuoji (see below) who promptly backtracked the scout's path through the Deep Umbra and found the main body of the Tribe/clan. They sent out messengers to other Fuoji and then attacked the T'kra with everything they had. Which wasn't much really but they managed to get in amongst the local inhabitants and Awaken a few of them. This plus a continuing stream of fanatic hate filled Fuoji finding them and then, of course, promptly attacking. Kept the T'kra well occupied for the next five hundred years or so.
By the early 1900's the T'Kra Tribe/Clan was beginning to see the signs that it was time to move on to another Tellurian. Fewer and fewer resources to find, Quintessence flows slowing to a trickle, no more locals to amuse themselves with, an unbreathable atmosphere, water so polluted it was poison, a dead ecology. Little clues like that told them it was time to move on. So they dusted off the old scouting reports and picked the Gaian Tellurian as a prime candidate for conquest. They sent out scouts and were horrified to discover a technologically advanced civilization in the Gaian Tellurian, worse it contained Awakened individuals.
The T'Kra took an early Void Engineer Outpost intact, stripping it bare before retreating back into the anonymous depth of the Deep Umbra. The technology was primitive by their standards, but it was better then even the dreaded Ja!Ku'pok had possessed. The T'Kra next attacked a mixed Tradition Horizon Realm, they were a War Chantry in the midst of Summer, the T'Kra almost lost, it was a very, very close run thing. It scared the T'Kra, scared them enough for the Tribe/Clan to send out messengers of warning to the other Tribes/Clans scattered throughout the Depths of the Umbra.
Each Tribe/Clan contacted has responded, capturing a Void Engineer Outpost and discovering the terrific pace of technological advance the Technocracy is pursuing. The truth is that if just one Tribe/Clan of T'Kra had attacked the Gaian Tellurian would have fallen. By now however the Technocracy is getting suspicious and the Void Engineers are in controlled panic, they Know something is out there. The Fuoji have noticed the sudden concentration of Tribes/Clans and have begun to attack as well. Even worse for the T'Kra they have begun to infiltrate the Gaian Tellurian, delighting in the discovery of such an Awakened community. Some of them have even managed to begin associating with some of these Awaken inhabitants on a regular basis and have a small but growing influence on them.
But the nightmare for the indecisive T'Kra are rumors that the Ja!Ku'pok may not be dead, or even worse the Gaian Tellurian may contain the survivors of the Ja!Ku'pok. With Fuoji bands gathering strength and internal politics to distract them the T'Kra have yet to move on the Gaian Tellurian. However the Nephandi have yet to discover and contact the T'Kra, though some are actively pursuing rumors. All in all interesting times lay ahead...
The Fuoji are surviving mages and acolytes of Tellurians the T'Kra have conquered and destroyed. They take their name, which is only how Humans would pronounce it by the way, from the mages of the first Tellurian to fight back against the T'Kra and survive to help other Tellurians. Many of the Fuoji are so insane they would make a Marauder nervous, they are one and all however dedicated to the extinction of the T'Kra. Most of them have stolen T'Kra ships or created vessels of their own to move within the Deep Umbra in some safety, comfort and swiftness.
When they find a T'Kra Tribe/Clan they send out messengers to other Fuoji bands of their discovery and immediately attack. Usually they are so vengeance driven they can't even wait to plan and just fling themselves headlong into the slaughter. Some rare ones however can hold back and make plans and coordinate to do more damage. There are legends amongst the Fuoji of three Tribes/Clans that they have managed to destroy to the last T'Kra, when such leaders emerge. Such Fuoji are usually major spirits (Incarna, Lord or better) or Oracle level mages.
A great many Fouji have a terrifically difficult time "tuning-in" to the T'Kra reality to do any serious damage. Think in terms of an octopi type being who, when stiffening it's limbs causes horrific social, psychological and even physical damage in it's own reality and culture, standing up in the midst of a firefight and stiffening it's limbs. Or a being that screams deadly curses that actually translate as rather funny jokes. The disconnect between the realities can be that great.
Yet, experience teaches the Fuoji what works and experienced Fuoji can teach less experienced Fuoji the fundamentals. This is one of the Fuoji's greatest strengths, their very diversity allows them to find "someone" who can slip into a conquered Tellurian and Awaken the inhabitants and begin a resistance to the T'Kra. They are also, quite simply, the finest intelligence network in the Deep Umbra. They have to be to find the T'Kra in the limitless depths between the Tellurians.
The T'Kra are a tough opponent to anyone they run into. They breed easily and quickly, the smaller Tribes/Clans number in the low billions while the largest number in the tens of trillions of individual T'Kra. Add to this that about one in a million of them is Awakened, and the rest have access to a Technology able to move their entire population across the Deep Umbra and conquer Tellurians at will. Also by sheer numbers they are able to shift the paradigm of any Tellurian they enter.
Still they have their weaknesses. The T'Kra worship victory and this has led them to avoid any difficult or costly fights if they can, it's also led to vicious internal infighting. Also their entire existence is based on stripping an entire Tellurian of it's resources and available Quintessence and then moving on, thus they are vulnerable whenever it comes time for them to move on. Their ruthless cruelty and arrogance is legendary, it makes them enemies where ever they go and enemies can pile up. Witness the Fuoji. Their technology is another, abet subtle, weakness even though it is also their strength. They have never faced an enemy with a comparable technological expertise. For example somewhere out in the sea of unformatted sectors of the Digital Web are connections to the T'Kra computer systems and the T'Kra don't even have a clue to the existence of the Digital Web... yet.