Pulse of the Imperium

Kiran had invited Efren aside somewhere a little more sheltered after the debrief, settling down somewhere reasonably comfortable. "... That hit har... what we found earlier, I mean."

"It was... quite a lot..." He said with a nod.

"It's my first time out here since I was a small kid... I couldn't help but see myself in that man's face."

They nodded. "There was a resemblance. These are your people, after all. Mine, too, less directly. I didn't see myself, but I saw what happened to him. Using one of the community's sources of unity to destroy its members. "

"Why would anyone just... let someone do that to them...?" He asked in confusion.

"Is it the drug? Does it make someone... lose themselves?"

"Normally it's not powerful or particularly addictive. It's a mild high with some hallucinogenic properties. I've used it many times for ceremonies," they explained. "It was nothing like... that." They waved their hand vaguely.

"You ever heard the phrase, 'the dose makes the poison'? The cartel refined it so much it's barely recognizable as the same thing."

“There were no signs of resistance…” he said aloud, not really making any specific point.

“How does one just let that be their end?”

"We also don't know how long they had him," they noted. "It could have been the drugs rendering him barely functional, or it just could have been the effects of being tortured like that. Everyone has their breaking point."

“It’s just so… wrong. To treat humans like that. Rip them of their will.” He said with obvious consternation.

“I don’t assume to know anything… But how does someone do that to people?”

Kiran folded up their legs, wrapping their arms out and stared ahead at nothing in particular as they remembered the state of the body. "I don't know. I used to think I'd do anything to protect my people, but... This was so wrong. A failure of humanity."

“What are they like?” He asked with a soft voice.

“I was born among them… tried to read up on them… keep some of the language.”

He paused, “But I was raised in a different world. One of the muadh and not.”

He lifted his chin up slightly, “What should I expect when I find them?”