Chapter 46: - The Kneebenders
The Kneebenders.
Despite his beliefs, despite all of the hatred and pain Gus had suffered at the hands of the Evoloved, despite everything that had only ever pushed him towards a life of compassion, he despised the Kneebenders.
Officially, they were not known as the Kneebenders. Officially, their name was 'The Unified Way.' They were humans, but only in the loosest definition possible, at least from a moral, philosophical standpoint.
While humans were fighting on the fringes of human controlled space against the seemingly endless might of the Covenant of the Bloody Dawn, there was a certain group of people that believed that the future of humanity was within the structure of the Bloody Dawn.
At first, people tolerated the existence of the Unified Way, figuring them to be made up of pacifists and people who had lost too much to the war. While most people did not agree with them on their outlook on the war, they at least saw them as a necessary, if unwanted, consequence of the war. Pacifists had existed as long as war, as had grieving parents who lost children to the war. But public opinion of the faction quickly dissolved, especially on the frontier of human space.
The first generation of Kneebenders were the main reason for all of the general hatred of Kneebenders in the modern day. Twelve years ago, a lot of people in a number of battles in the frontier during the years of first combat against the Bloody Dawn abandoned the fight. Not only did they abandon their allies to die on the battlefield, setting back the expansion efforts of decades, but they actually joined the Bloody Dawn as an auxillary force of humans. Why this happened remained a mystery to humans, even today. However, it was dangerous for a number of reasons.
Firstly, was the hole the defection left in the military power of humanity in the region where it happened. Where humanity had been making small amounts of progress along the frontier, slowly expanding their borders with each fraction of an astronomical unit they took in space, or each metre they took on a planet, their forward movement now ground to a halt.
Naturally, it was not just the fact that the defectors left to join the Bloody Dawn that caused the progress to slow down and eventually stop. Another huge contributing factor to the stagnation of expansion was the depth of information that the defectors took with them to the Bloody Dawn. As Abbadeus Shaw, a general in the era of humanity's colonisation of the solar system, was credited with saying, skill wins duels; tactics win battles; but it is the ever turning cog of intelligence that wins wars.
Forward operating bases, set up to give the advancing human forces a home on new planets that they were in the process of taking over, were all wiped out in what felt like an instant. Millions died in a matter of days, and thousands more were taken captive, as information given to the Bloody Dawn by the defectors was acted on in one swift offensive. This event, which became known by the humans simply as the Backstab, was also the birth of one of the most infamous names that would ever cross the mouths of many humans: Barthor Greelos, Captain of the Bloody Dawn ship the Honoured's Blade.
In modern times, the term Kneebender is used as a slur directed at those who would have humanity bend the knee to the Bloody Dawn, but back then it was used as a synonym for traitor. Eventually, as more people in the core systems became desensitised with the notion of war against the alien covenant, the term grew away from its origins.
There are many different ways of thinking that people would consider Kneebender thinking. The most obvious was that humanity should stop fighting and join the Bloody Dawn. Even amongst other people that would be considered Kneebenders, this type of thinking was explicitly despised. People felt like those who wanted this simply wanted humanity to be enslaved under an oppressive ruler.
Another popular school of thought was that of the Moral Unifiers. The Moral Unifiers were a sub section of the Kneebenders that think that it is morally unacceptable for humanity to resist subjugation from the Covenant of the Bloody Dawn, considering that humanity has in essence subjugated the Trellior.
While their views were seen as more reasonable by most of humanity, they were still condemned as being wrong in their views. This is because the Trellior chose to join themselves with humanity, and have benefitted greatly from their arrangement, expanding from one planet to the entirety of the Trell system. They have not lost their freedom, and operate as more of an ally of humanity than a vassal.
In contrast, the Bloody Dawn were not interested in protecting humans and their territory. In truth, it seemed like all they wanted were more bodies to throw into their problems, and they were willing to throw however many bodies they had to to achieve it. They were barbaric, uncivilised, and inhuman.
Other people that populated the Unified Way were people who had lost almost everything in the fight against the Bloody Dawn. While he could not agree with them, Gus could at least sympathise with their perspectives.
He sat up in bed, and prepared himself for the day ahead. Despite himself and his squad being chosen for a mission that he did not agree with, he had to complete it.
Later that day, there was to be a political rally taking place in one of the regions of Africa on Earth. The rally was pro Bloody Dawn, and pro unification. While he hated having to defend that type of person, the type that would advocate for unification, it was a necessary evil if he wanted to obtain his goals through means at the academy. And besides, it would probably be free experience for his system.
***
"So, someone tells me that the Braye boy and his squad have an important mission. Well, he's defied me twice, so I'll be damned before I sit idly by and let him succeed without any interference."
Gifts
-- Gift
received Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone