Cratak put down the statuary and tapped her communicator. “Cratak here. Ready to beam the team back. There’s nobody left… just the animals. All the people are gone from this settlement.”
STO Member since February 2009. I Was A Trekkie Before It Was Cool ... Sept. 8th, 1966 ... Not To Mention Before Most Folks Around Here Were Born! Forever a STO Veteran-Minion
This sounds more like something the Elachi would do... Why would the Heralds want to abduct people? They usually just shoot first, shoot second, shoot some more, then when everybody's dead, pack up and go home.
Iconians were supposed to wipe people out after M'tara's moderation was gone. This is like T'Ket and all who agreed with her disappeared too and someone who likes to study puny humanoids prevailed.
TOIVA, Toi Vaxx, Toia Vix, Toveg, T'vritha, To Vrax: Bring in the Allegiance class. Toi'Va, Ti'vath, Toivia, Ty'Vris, Tia Vex, Toi'Virth: Add Tier 6 KDF Carrier and Raider. Tae'Va, T'Vaya, To'Var, Tevra, T'Vira, To'Vrak: Give us Asylums for Romulans.
I agree, this is starting to sound just a little like the Elachi..I'm going to go out on a limb here and suggest that the Elachi or Solanae are doing this as an attempt to please their Iconian masters, especially in light of M'Tara's death.
Alternatively, they're trying to find a weakness in Romulan physiology that they can exploit.
I'm curious, and I don't recall, was there ever any direct observation of the Heralds abducting anyone? Or were there just many reports like these of people missing from locations attacked by Heralds? What I'm suggesting is that perhaps it's not actually the Heralds doing the "abducting" at all. Perhaps a friendly influence, perhaps even through temporal manipulation, is arriving to spirit away would-be victims just as the Heralds attack. We're going to find a massive refugee camp somewhere filled with evacuated survivors.
Now that's a plot twist if I ever saw one. Yeah I have to agree it's more in line with Elachi tactics but...
"The whole house was hollow now, empty – like the whole galaxy was in danger of becoming."
That suggests to me that the "issue" is not restricted to New Romulus.
I wonder if there's a "Mine Trap"-ish PVE queue coming where we have to do what the tactical team was doing:
sweeping settlements and stop Herald Thralls from taking people.
What do they want with them anyway? I could understand the Elachi but... The Heralds? We've taken down M'Tara and I expected them to go all-out and steamroll us and... this?
Maybe when we took M'Tara down the Iconians as a faction became fractured? Different Icos with different tactics and agendas?
Don't get me wrong, it's very interesting.
NEXT CHAPTER! ^^
edit:
It is sad to see the trees of the Isha Forest burn. :S
"Ad astra audacter eamus in alis fidelium."
-
"To boldly go to the stars on the wings of the faithful."
"But enemies who appeared in the middle of the night, whisked away your family and your children, and vanished to some place millions of light years away – it had an uncomfortable similarity to the tactics of the Tal Shiar...." No one else found this comment entertaining, considering we've been told that the Tal Shiar now answer to the Iconians ?
I'm thinking L'Miren and T'Ket are on the war path. Maybe L'Miren wants people to experiment on?
Maybe bio-weapon development? Create a substance that they can introduce via gateway to a planet and wipe out the entire population.... kinda like fumigating to kill bugs.
The more of these I read, the more I thing the robotic Herald troops are captured civilians that were removed from their bodies and put in the herald automatons.
I'm thinking L'Miren and T'Ket are on the war path. Maybe L'Miren wants people to experiment on?
Maybe bio-weapon development? Create a substance that they can introduce via gateway to a planet and wipe out the entire population.... kinda like fumigating to kill bugs.
Maybe they need new Heralds... They have lost a few during the war.
Maybe they have some way of turning others, into the lesser races that serve them.
I'm thinking L'Miren and T'Ket are on the war path. Maybe L'Miren wants people to experiment on?
Maybe bio-weapon development? Create a substance that they can introduce via gateway to a planet and wipe out the entire population.... kinda like fumigating to kill bugs.
Maybe they need new Heralds... They may have lost a few during the war.
Maybe they have some way of turning others into their lesser races that sever them.
That or M'Tara's lot commited scuicide with the loss of their god.
The more of these I read, the more I thing the robotic Herald troops are captured civilians that were removed from their bodies and put in the herald automatons.
That reminds me of the Prometheans from Halo. O.O
*le wild Halo theme kicks in*
^^
"Ad astra audacter eamus in alis fidelium."
-
"To boldly go to the stars on the wings of the faithful."
And another interesting read Love these more and more and I hope you will continue giving us such short stories even when in the new Season!
Yeeees that would be awesome
To see what the other characters of the story are up to, while we're busy "exploring" and sending our inactive ships to heavens know where.
"Ad astra audacter eamus in alis fidelium."
-
"To boldly go to the stars on the wings of the faithful."
I'm thinking L'Miren and T'Ket are on the war path. Maybe L'Miren wants people to experiment on?
Maybe bio-weapon development? Create a substance that they can introduce via gateway to a planet and wipe out the entire population.... kinda like fumigating to kill bugs.
Maybe they need new Heralds... They may have lost a few during the war.
Maybe they have some way of turning others into their lesser races that sever them.
That or M'Tara's lot commited scuicide with the loss of their god.
I just had a scary thought.... What is L'miren's idea of war?
When I last fought them before being sent back to Kobali. They was not taking people, they was killing them. Since the war has calmed down. And no additional reports of war other than Vaadwuar still fighting. I find these reports misleading.
Now back to killing Vaadwuar to help out on the Iconian Resistance. For we know the Vaadwuar is a bigger threat and the Iconians is a minor issue.
USS Casinghead NCC 92047 launched 2350
Fleet Admiral Stowe - Dominion War Vet.
I agree with the other posters. Abduction is not an Iconian tactic. Such tasks are always delegated to the lesser races, the heralds and servitors. This stinks of the Tal Shiar. If you wish to hold out a beacon of hope, Sela is the only other person fighting T'Mara's coven behind the scenes with an interest specific to the Romulans, and Sela is not above using Tal Shiar tactics, not to mention that she is far too familiar with Iconian physiology and technology not to use that to her advantage.
There is one other thing that is never hinted at in the stories; Not every Iconian agreed with T'Mara and followed her after the sundering of Iconia. Not every Iconian abandoned the light. Iconian tech is not exclusive to her and her followers. Lets wait and see if this technical nightmare Nog is feverishly working on plays a useful role.
We've seen the Heralds kidnap people before. At the end of "Cutting the Cord" we see a Herald ship capture the Leahval and tow her through a Gateway. We know that the crew of this ship ended up with the Elachi and Solanae, so we can argue that they're not the only Iconian forces who kidnap people.
Why do I get the bad feeling that Heralds were being used to abduct people simply because the writers forgot that the Elachi exist?
"There will never be enough blood to wash away my need for vengeance! A single world...I could destroy a million worlds and it would not be enough! Your existence is an insult to the memory of my people! I will continue my fight, even if I must fight alone!"
Why do I get the bad feeling that Heralds were being used to abduct people simply because the writers forgot that the Elachi exist?
Lol good point. I hope not
I wonder if they are thinking the bio-weapon idea...but more along the lines of using the lower lifeforms (us) instead of just wiping us out. Conversion idea that has been suggested sounds plausible. But I am thinking conversion not simply into Iconian slaves/soldiers...more along the lines of converting us into pure energy which they consume for food and doing it on a mass/instant scale with some big bad galactic scale final weapon...absorb us all (yikes!).
I can see the gruesome cut scene now- of T'Ket sucking the life out of someone al-la the 'Brain Bug' in Starship troopers during a lab test on some of the individual abducted Romulans...and then somehow motivating the Solonae to develop it into a way of eating everyone in the galaxy at once. We don't know what they or the Elachi have been up to taking people and changing their bodies, with liquid polymers and other ghastly things.
Comments
I Was A Trekkie Before It Was Cool ... Sept. 8th, 1966 ... Not To Mention Before Most Folks Around Here Were Born!
Forever a STO Veteran-Minion
This is getting kinda odd...
Iconians were supposed to wipe people out after M'tara's moderation was gone. This is like T'Ket and all who agreed with her disappeared too and someone who likes to study puny humanoids prevailed.
Toi'Va, Ti'vath, Toivia, Ty'Vris, Tia Vex, Toi'Virth: Add Tier 6 KDF Carrier and Raider.
Tae'Va, T'Vaya, To'Var, Tevra, T'Vira, To'Vrak: Give us Asylums for Romulans.
Don't make ARC mandatory! Keep it optional only!
Hmmm...
CM
Alternatively, they're trying to find a weakness in Romulan physiology that they can exploit.
"The whole house was hollow now, empty – like the whole galaxy was in danger of becoming."
That suggests to me that the "issue" is not restricted to New Romulus.
I wonder if there's a "Mine Trap"-ish PVE queue coming where we have to do what the tactical team was doing:
sweeping settlements and stop Herald Thralls from taking people.
What do they want with them anyway? I could understand the Elachi but... The Heralds? We've taken down M'Tara and I expected them to go all-out and steamroll us and... this?
Maybe when we took M'Tara down the Iconians as a faction became fractured? Different Icos with different tactics and agendas?
Don't get me wrong, it's very interesting.
NEXT CHAPTER! ^^
edit:
It is sad to see the trees of the Isha Forest burn. :S
-
"To boldly go to the stars on the wings of the faithful."
I'm thinking L'Miren and T'Ket are on the war path. Maybe L'Miren wants people to experiment on?
Cheers... RRF Admiral Cybyl
My character Tsin'xing
Maybe they need new Heralds... They have lost a few during the war.
Maybe they have some way of turning others, into the lesser races that serve them.
That or M'Tara's lot commited scuicide with the loss of their god.
That reminds me of the Prometheans from Halo. O.O
*le wild Halo theme kicks in*
^^
-
"To boldly go to the stars on the wings of the faithful."
Yeeees that would be awesome
To see what the other characters of the story are up to, while we're busy "exploring" and sending our inactive ships to heavens know where.
-
"To boldly go to the stars on the wings of the faithful."
Tal'Shiar/Reman Resistance/Romulan Nemesis uniform, pls.
https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7403/13262502435_5604548f2c_o.png
My character Tsin'xing
Now back to killing Vaadwuar to help out on the Iconian Resistance. For we know the Vaadwuar is a bigger threat and the Iconians is a minor issue.
USS Casinghead NCC 92047 launched 2350
Fleet Admiral Stowe - Dominion War Vet.
There is one other thing that is never hinted at in the stories; Not every Iconian agreed with T'Mara and followed her after the sundering of Iconia. Not every Iconian abandoned the light. Iconian tech is not exclusive to her and her followers. Lets wait and see if this technical nightmare Nog is feverishly working on plays a useful role.
Lol good point. I hope not
I wonder if they are thinking the bio-weapon idea...but more along the lines of using the lower lifeforms (us) instead of just wiping us out. Conversion idea that has been suggested sounds plausible. But I am thinking conversion not simply into Iconian slaves/soldiers...more along the lines of converting us into pure energy which they consume for food and doing it on a mass/instant scale with some big bad galactic scale final weapon...absorb us all (yikes!).
I can see the gruesome cut scene now- of T'Ket sucking the life out of someone al-la the 'Brain Bug' in Starship troopers during a lab test on some of the individual abducted Romulans...and then somehow motivating the Solonae to develop it into a way of eating everyone in the galaxy at once. We don't know what they or the Elachi have been up to taking people and changing their bodies, with liquid polymers and other ghastly things.