jeriendhal | Terinu AU, The Vulpine Imperium, Part Two

The Imperium Today

Culture: The Vulpine race divides itself into roughly three castes.

The Industrial Lords are the rulers of Imperium, the only ones allowed to own land, industrial or commercial facilities. Infighting among the lesser Lords is common, as each attempts to gain the most profit at the expense of their rivals. This is mitigated somewhat by the stabilizing force of the Countesses, who have a formalized system of power division that they rarely deviate from, lest the be ganged up upon by their rivals seeking to hold to the status quo.

The Military Caste serves as the backbone of the Vulpine forces. The serve as the main defense against the Hive, and to a lesser extent as internal sercurity against the occasional uprising among the lesser races. They do not intermarry with the Industrial Lords, though if an officer shows considerable accomplishment he might be co-opted and made a Lord before he can gather too great a power base in the military to cause trouble.

The Serf Caste, once the backbone of the Imperium, is a rapidly shrinking segment of the population. With plenty of strong Creo backs around to serve in industry, and the Galen and other races as a mid-level administrative force, there is little need for lowest of the Vulpine race in ordinary tasks, except in areas of personal interaction where a Lord would find it distasteful to deal directly with aliens. Occasionally there's talk of eliminating their ability to reproduce entirely, and just cloning them as needed, but Vulpine scientists caution against this due to the dangers of genetic stagnation (lordly by-blows still occuring occasionally).

About the politest thing one can say about this setup is that the Vulpine are serious about merit based promotion. Each Military general gained his position after starting as a lowly private. Each minor Lord or Countess' offspring has to prove they're worthy to lead, through sherparding segments of their domain's responsibilities. Those who fail at their tasks are demoted. Those who cause the Imperioum serious harm are eliminated, whether they be a lowly Serf or a Countess' heir.

Relations With Other Races

For the most part, the Imperium's relations with their subject races aren't much different from the Varn Dominion's old ways. The only difference is that no one is expected to worship their new Wise Lords, just obey. Those who serve well are rewarded with relative luxury. Those who try to rebel find their worlds or asteriod olonie rapidly Hell Bombed.

Some notable exceptions are:

The Manzi were eliminated early after the War For Freedom. Noting that these scientist-centaurs were obsessive about research, the decision was made to exterminate them rather run the risk of their skills being used by potential future rebels. This has slowed down the Imperium's rate of scientific reseach, but given the closed minded nature of the Ardactavian Hive toward science, this has not proved any great difficulty.

The Maud are only used in basic accounting tasks these days, their great wealth being co-opted by the Vulpine for themselves to pay for their new industrial facilities.

The Ferin faired worst of all. Disgusted by the Varn's pets' tendency towards laziness and frivolity when not put to work in the power cells, the Imperium rapidly disassembled their habitat domes and placed them in far more efficient (and smaller) kennel facilities, where they are kept until needed for power service.

As for humanity, the Vulpine encountered them some eight hundred years after the War For Freedom. Noting their tendency towrds violence and development of nuclear weapons, Earth was hell bombed into glass without direct contact ever being attempted.