Origin[]
Founded in 2713, the syndicate is an organisation that has endured through the centuries. It was born out of a dark and painful history. To understand the origins, we must first trace the birth of Kaal Leon in 2648. A 64-year-old father, he had become a UEE soldier to follow in the footsteps of his paternal grandfather, who fought as a Navy lieutenant at the start of the Second Tevarin War in 2603. The tensions between humans and alien races such as the Tevarin and the Xi'ans also led Kaal to join the military at the age of 19. At the age of 24, he was sent by Illyana Messer with a small commando to assassinate the emperor Corsen Messer. For fear of being blamed for his actions, he left Jalan (formerly Elysium IV), and went into exile on Orion III in 2672. He remained there until 16 February 2712, when the Orion system was taken over by a new threat: the Vanduuls. The Battle of Orion, as it is liked to be called, saw an astronomical amount of casualties after the raid orchestrated by the Vanduul race. Many historians claim that no one survived, but in fact some groups, including Kaal, managed to escape. In this Vanduul offensive, Kaal lost all his remaining family. After proudly following the Messer regime, he lost all confidence when he noticed that the active emperor, Samuel Messer (son of Illyana), did not intervene and let the population be decimated slowly. He managed to escape in a cargo ship, to settle clandestinely on Gonn, the main planet of the Oberon system. There, after mourning the loss of his loved ones, he vowed to change things because he felt that the political regime was incompetent and disordered. He formed the beginnings of the syndicate he called "Resurrection" with the help of his companions whom he had met in the aphorite mines of Gonn. The aim of the organisation was to thwart Vanduul supplies by stopping the main trade flows with the Banu. As the years went by, Kaal contracted an incurable disease that led inexorably to his death. At the same time, and in view of his deteriorating health, he wrote an essay "The Science of Races" in which he shared all of his xenophobic ideology and the decadence of the Messer system, before succumbing in 2721, at the age of 73. A considerable influence of these writings can still be seen today with the emergence of the group XenoThreat.
28th century[]
After Kaal Leon's death in 2721, the syndicate was taken over and led by one of his fellow miners, Ether Arnold. Ether Arnold completely overhauled the organisation, establishing its own hierarchy and defining a concrete programme with missions to ensure the function and continuity of the syndicate. Various missions consisted of the resale of rare minerals to finance the organisation's major political projects. What was originally a syndicate gradually turned into a real company, which was not seen favourably by some of its supporters, who adhered more to Leon's initial ideology. In 2728, after a dispute broke out between Ether and other members, he withdrew from the union, taking the majority of the accumulated funds and settling on Nova Kiev, Terra, with his two sons. He is incidentally the grandfather of J. Harris Arnold, founder of Anvil Aerospace.
The rebellious supporters took up the torch and continued to undertake more and more ambitious projects, following Leon's work. As the responsibility of the syndicate could only be based on one individual, a council was established to avoid repeating the mistakes of the past. The head office, now Gonn, was decided by the board members. But one problem remained: the syndicate was a small group of individuals who could hardly be counted on the fingers of one hand. So they embarked on a major campaign to expand their horizons and recruit more and more people. Ten years later, in 2738, the syndicate had over 2500 members across 15 star systems claimed by the UEE. The Leonnist model began to gain momentum and insurgent movements emerged to bring about the downfall of the Messer empire, such as on 12 April 2792, when the group called 'Tide' warned of Linton Messer's malicious terraforming policies. It was mainly in 2789 that the syndicate carried out one of its most important missions to hasten Linton's removal. A group from the Resurrection escorted Senator Terrence Akari to meet with a Xi'an delegation on Tohil III to end the cold war between the two races. The new peace treaty served to undermine the Messer's reign and bring it to an end.
29th century[]
The 29th century began with the rise to power of Erin Toi and Marshall Leon. Although these two emperors brought about a radical change in comparison to the Messer line, the syndicate was not satisfied with the policies and strongly opposed this new model. Diplomatic policies to improve relations between Humans and other species were no longer compatible with the Leonnist philosophy. However, the council was divided. Many members were lenient towards Marshall Leon's system and welcomed it, while another, much more extreme, section wished to 'maintain order and security by having only ourselves'. An intra-organisational rivalry developed and the syndicate split in two. As a result, the extremist part of the syndicate broke away and founded "Propriotarism", a syndicate according to which everything that man has created belongs to him and him alone. This movement was also intended to oppose the Ark initiative, where all inter-species knowledge was to be shared. On the other hand, the members who had agreed to a more peaceful vision, created "New Beliefs", a syndicate conforming to Leonism, but offering a more anti-militaristic alternative.
In 2851, there were rumours that Propriotarism, led by Kurt Liroï, was developing a plan to burn Ark Station to the ground. The UEE had not taken seriously the many threats it was receiving from the terrorist organisation. This ignorance led to the 'Battle of the Ark' in October 2852. Caught off guard, the UEE fleets were almost all destroyed, and the government had to call on external allies. To do this, the Empire contacted the Beliefists, who already had a history of involvement with the Propriotarist syndicate. The Propriotarist forces, based on Baker III, an ice planet, attacked the Beliefists' ships, which concentrated to form a strategic blockade for two long months. On 14 December 2852, having weakened the enemy fleets, the Beliefists gained the upper hand and drove the extremist threat back to their military headquarters. One issue remained. It turned out that the Propriotarists had a contingency plan, but luckily a crucial message was intercepted by a Beliefist officer between leader Kurt Liroï and his admiral Jeen Peck. The message contained instructions to send an infiltration ship to attempt to travel to the Ark to hack into and destroy the entire contents of the Tayac I orbital station. What was intended to be a symbolic anti-UEE assault turned into a delicate infiltration mission. When the owners realised that their backup plan had been discovered, they withdrew to Baker III.
With the hacking key posing an inordinate danger to the Empire, the Beliefists were sent to neutralize the Propriotarist syndicate protecting their asset in their headquarters once and for all. Accompanied by Squadron 45, Operation Ice Dune in January 2853 was a disaster for both sides. While the death toll was in the thousands, the trenches were not sufficient to keep the Beliefists' troops warm. As the armies were not well equipped, the frost made itself felt. Many regiments were forced to end their days because of the serious physical and psychological suffering. This drama finally subsided after two years of intensive fighting, and in 2855, the UEE took the lead and destroyed all that remained of the Propriotarists.
The files remain classified by the UEE to this day, which does not want to aggravate public opinion, despite the Historical Truth Act, passed in 2941 by Kelos Costigan. The Ark is currently experiencing endless debate and scepticism, and it is very likely that the truth will be hidden from public view for a long time to come.
What evidence remains is a CVR black box, which was recovered from the remains of a belief ship, which hackers have partially decrypted. The voice dialogue is as follows:
- "Idris, this is T█n█a, I have a visual on the ene██. He is about to f█re on the Ark station. Permission to ret██n fire..."
- "Tanga, this is Idris, clearance granted. What ██ the model of the enemy ████?"
- "Idris, this is █anga, the enemy is in po██ession of a Cutlass Bl█ck, equipped with █ CF-3█7 turrets"
- " [INCOMPLETE DATA] "
- "W█it... he's ███ alone... there's a whole fle█t of C8 Pi███s and a Carr██k!"
- "[INCOMPLETE DATA]"
[END OF TRANSMISSION]
Although denied by the UEE, many experts affirm the authenticity of this dialogue, and many complaints arise every day to force the government to reveal the veracity of this exchange.