Penal Planet G228
Penal Planet G228 is a unassuming dead world used only for mining and punishment. Truly there was nothing about the planet to make anyone care too much about it unless they were being sent there for their crimes against the Imperium. Scammers, thieves, and black market dealers made up the population of the planet and were forced into shells that would only obey the commands of their taskmasters and left to their own thoughts as they could do nothing but watch their body moved to the whims of the supervisors. The thousands of Penal drones marched across the planet perfectly synchronized splitting into seperate groups at designated dig sites collecting all the mineral wealth they could in repayment to the Imperium. One such Penal drone was Eze, a Seendi found trading in the black market. She had been there for 3 years and at this point she was prepared to never even think about crime if it meant she never had to look at another inch of G228 again but on the bright side she only had another two years in this hellhole and then finally she could do something somewhat mentally stimulating or at least she hoped that she would, sentence extensions weren't completely unheard of in the Penal planets. "Penal Drones numbers 1,500 through 3,775 make your way to dig site 448." The voice of their Mechanator taskmaster boomed inside the minds of every penal shell he mentioned, including Eze's; after marching another few thousand miles she finally reached her dig site with thousands of others who all had nothing more to do but watch as their mining laser's began digging into the ground below...
Many boring hours of collecting minerals later Eze's body's scanners would detect something that couldn't be made into an attack drone. Her shell crouched to the ground and focused it's laser on the point where the foreign material was detected carefully drilling a hole around the area and delicately grabbing it from the earth below. It looked like some sort of relic, something that was long past it's time in this universe and yet at the same time exuded some type of majesty that Eze couldn't quite explain. It was decorated with a number of intricate engravings depicting some sort of battle between two grand armies as they clashed though years of dirt and grime prevented Eze from seeing the specifics of the battle. After a few scans of the object the databases of the Imperium could determine nothing about the object as it became one of the first interesting things Eze had seen on this planet since she was sent here 3 years ago. Her shell's legs did the work for her as it began the trek to give the object to a superior for further analysis. Maybe this would take those two years off her sentence? Eze doubted it, but optimism had never hurt a Seendi.
Mechanator T'sahh was scrolling through the internal cameras of the Penal drones when a motion scanner indicated that one of them was waiting outside his door holding some sort of artifact. Curious he opened the door and looked at the object the penal drone held in it's hands and grabbed it quite aggressively. Using his scanners he went over the relic and found...nothing. Absolutely no data could be collected from this item, "Hmm, Interesting..." Looking at the Penal drone, T'sahh pettioned to subtract a year from it's sentence from his internal U.I. Whatever it was this drone had brought to him it surely had to be investigated with some more suitable equipment and it wasn't as if the drone didn't deserve something for it's effort despite how involuntary it was. Though T'sahh would have loved to use it as a mantle piece from his outpost he knew it would have to be sent to the core worlds as all relics were.
Octavious Research Labs
The AI were out of options. They had done everything they could to the ancient piece of junk and yet not a single concrete result came back. Radiocarbon dating, scanning, attempts at dissection (which ended in a planet-wide blackout), and even plain brute force was employed against this thing to try and figure out what it was made out of and why. At the point they were at the AI was ready to throw this thing into the sun to see if they could get it back after it went into a supernova. However, there was something odd in the handling of this artifact; why were the AI so focused on finding out the material of this random piece of metal from the middle of nowhere? Because The Paramount had taken interest in it and that meant that until this thing was figured out there would be no stop to the prodding and poking of the thing until it have an answer. As for The Paramount he didn't know why he wanted to know about the relic so badly, it just seemed like the right course if action. Of course he probably had a few larger priorities, but this artifact intrigued him. Perhaps it was it was the fact it was impenetrable or maybe it was that it could cause blackouts in his capital. Regardless there was something strange about it and whatever it was he wanted to know what it was. As he sat overlooking the Ecumeopolis that was his capital H'Krell walked into his room and preformed the standard salute, turning his hand 360° degrees, a move which the mechanators were sure not too many organics would be able to do. The Paramount did not turn around from his viewpoint and H'Krell's voice pierced the silence of the room. "My liege, our AI have found a use for the relic, I think that you'll want to see it."
The Paramount turned his head to his subordinate at this, "And what is it that they've found?"
"You'll need to see it I'm afraid..." H'Krell had his reservations about refusing his liege even as the Grand Mechanator, but what the AI had found...well it had to be seen to be believed.
The Tactical Codex's chambers
The first thing The Paramount noticed was the usually boring, wire infested walls of the Codex's chambers were now glowing a bright yellow nearly overwhelming the visual capacities of his own visual sensors. And while that was strange, the next thing he saw surprised him most. The Tactical Codex was operating at 200% efficiency; higher than it's average efficiency rating in the 80s. "It seems you were right, H'Krell. Now leave us." H'Krell did as asked leaving the room as The Paramount looked at the exposed relic located inside the Codex and moved his hand to grab it
"Don't." The Codex spoke as if it had authority over The Paramount causing a good bit of surprise in The Paramount
"Excuse us?"
"You should not grab the module because I need it to help you. Allow me to explain" The Codex pulled the Octavian expansion plan from her files and began to remove the potential issues with it with each potential issue being wiped away as the Codex slowly showed the borders of the Imperium across the galactic map "After I collect all the power I can from the module I will give it to you so you can deal with those who would want to see you dead..." pictures of various leaders began appearing on screen as the Codex finished her sentence. The Paramount surprised at the convincing argument and... personality the Codex had. "Do you accept my offer?" The Paramount looked at the AI in charge of his military surprised that this module had apparently have it a personality. As it was it seemed like he only had one choice.
Across the Imperium
Hundreds upon hundreds of ships moved across the void moving into the unoccupied space of the frontier full of ripe, unexploited primitive planets ready for seizure. Dozens of civilizations would be told to bend the knee or die while the Octavian fleet claimed system after system for the Imperium. A few planets tried to give resistance only to find their cities turned to ash from orbital bombardment while a unfortunate few, who had the technology to at least delay their Octavian invaders would soon find their atmosphere's poisoned with nerve gas signaling the end of their species and all others on the planet. Those that would care to watch the Imperial movements would be relieved that, at least for now, only primitive worlds found themselves under attack. A few planets however had some special interest from the Imperium put into it. Though similar these planets held things that were best not instantly immolated, one declaring itself the Mighty Yamato Empire, another (somewhat oddly) calling itself the Rational Empire of Hobbes Dystopia, and a third who was quite oddly a gang, but the power this criminal enterprise held piked the interest of the Octavian state. Each would have an emissary sent to their territory and each would offer a place among the Octavian "alliance" as it could be called though in all honesty it could more accurately be described as a series of protectrates. Each nation would be told they would be given technology, protection, and their own space state in exchange for loyalty to the Octavian Imperium along with allowing Octavian miners to take some of the resources of their system for themselves and aiding the Imperium in any wars that may take place. The gang would get a different offer, they were told that Passione's trade would be extended across the stars as long as their services were provided to The Paramount.
These deals would be highly publicized to make the expansion look less agressive while the more ethically dubious actions during the expansion would be covered up including the billions of deaths across planets who tried to resist and the billions more assimlated against their will and indoctrinated into loving it. In other words, a normal day in the Imperium
Octavious
Paramount square
Paramount square
A crowd of billions had assembled on the streets of Octavious after the news of The Paramount's speech to the people and trillions more were tuning in via the Aether (mostly because the speech would be broadcast on every legal Aether channel). The Paramount had often made appearances out of his towering palace, but rarely did he speak to the public. As The Paramount, The Paragon, Grand Mechanator H'Krell, and the Arms of the Mechanators Tal'Talen walked out to meet the people the crowds erupted into thunderous cheering and applause (the noise of applause being synthetically recreated to be precise) and with the single movement of The Paramount's hand they all fell silent. "My people! Today is a fantastic day for the Imperium! Our Imperium has entered a new era of expansion refusing to stop for the organic empires around us!" The crowds burst into another round of cheers before again being silenced by The movement of The Paramount's hand "The organic nations fear us, they fear the notion of something being superior to them and yet refuse to accept our gift of assimlaton! But why you ask? Why do they hate us for being better than them and yet refuse the tools we want to give them to improve their poor organic lives? It is because they do not know better our children! They do not know what benefits it will reap them and they refuse to believe us for they see us as the enemy! We are not their enemies! They are their own! This is why us Octavians who have seen the light must civilize the galaxy! We must civilize the galaxy for their sake! We must civilize the galaxy for our own sake! And so let it be said that today, Ocranious 30th, 2420 that your liege has declared the Imperium's mission for the upcoming years is to civilize the poor, organic, masses! All hail to this glorious Imperium that we have nourished! All hail to you, our people, who have heeded my every command and request! And all hail to the many Mechanators who have kept order in our borders!"
To his right, his son The Paragon raised his hand and rotated it 360 degrees "All hail!"
To his left the Grand Mechanator H'Krell did the same salute "All hail!"
And finally standing to the left of the Grand Mechanator, Tal'Talen would do the same salute with her sharpened fingertips "All hail!"
Soon the entire crowd would be changing all hail, fanatically calling out to their leader hoping that he would spread Imperial influence to the stars. Soon enough, The Paramount and his cabinet walked back inside and the crowd slowly dispersed and the feed cut. Any watching the speech from outside the Imperium may have reason to be concerned. If only they knew what was to come...
