Truppen
“I am Brigadier General Thorson Albrecht... And this war is not concluded.”
2678, Baedecker 6 Orbit
Empire's Rift, Chpt. 4
by Steve Rzasa
T.Mk.V (Mark 5)
Designed 2660
Fully Cybernetic. Solid State Brain. Only the subject’s consciousness remains. Multiple Variants.
Production Dates 2661-2672
First Things First
The Truppen were the unintended consequence of an Aparatic program to improve human physiology through genetic manipulation, physical grafts, nanites, physiological conditioning, cybernetic grafting, and cyber implants.
Physical Manifestation
In 2595, a group of Aparatic Monks formed a sect that created a doctrine that because all life is sacred, the enhancement of life forms is a godly work. It was called the Doctrine of Physical Manifestation. It held that God will manifest his kingdom in the physical universe at a future point in time and that the kingdom of God can only be manifested in the physical world by perfecting the bodies that human souls inhabit. This belief was not part of mainstream Aparatic doctrine and was considered heretical.
The Makers
A splinter group of the sect formed a secret society that declared that the physical manifestation of the kingdom of God could be more speedily accomplished by cybernetic experimentation and enhancement. They were nicknamed ‘The Makers.’ They believed that those who chose to be subjects of enhancement were suffering to bring the kingdom of God into the physical universe. In Ammanian theology, this was dubbed the Enhancement Doctrine and was declared an abomination. The practice was banned and Maker monks, when discovered, were excommunicated.
The Project
Like all attempts to suppress adherents to the faith, the measures that were taken against the Makers only served to strengthen their resolve and drive them underground. An organized faction of the sect established a secret facility to conduct their work. The facility was set up outside of the jurisdiction of Terra and its colonial empires. It took nearly sixteen years to build the facility deep below the surface of a hostile moon in an isolated starsystem.
Ammanians and the Aparatics faithful to the Maker sect were collected, vetted, and encouraged to volunteer for the enhancement experiments. A surprising number did. Once in the program, there was no way back. Secrecy was paramount, and the monks held absolute sway at the facility. For the sake of security and in keeping with the clinical nature of the experiments, the participants were stripped of their identities and assigned numbers. The horrors that were inflicted on the subjects killed many and drove others mad, but there were successes. Nanite repair, grafting of alloys to skeletal frames and subdermal applications were promising. Work proceeded for nearly two decades until the day someone found them.
