The Galactic Empire and its Discontents

‪‎Trigger Warnings‬: Bureaucracy, Movie References, Fake Trigger Warnings

Second Officer Dandar Acrecar slammed his datapad down on the desk, disgusted by the video he had just watched. Rebel forces had made a mockery of a tragedy and then faked a ridiculous reward ceremony.

The economic prosperity of an interconnected galaxy is an attractive offer. The Empire was growing, and the 1,246 senators could no longer all participate in sessions at the old capital.

So the Emperor had called for the construction of the Guiding Star: a mobile space station the size of a small moon. No longer tied to the Galactic capital with its history of elitism and corruption, the Guiding Star promised to be a new symbol and center for the growing Empire.

But this aspirational, administrative goal ended in disaster when an overheating accident caused the station to spontaneously immolate.

The propaganda piece Dandar had watched twisted the Galactic Empire into an evil force. The Guiding Star had been renamed the Death Star. Rather than housing bureaucrats, it had been described as an instrument of war. The communications dish on its side was recast as a planet-destroying weapon. The accident which had taken the lives of all of those senators had been transformed into an act of self-defense by plucky rebels.

Dandar hoped the manufactured narrative wasn’t believable. Beyond the doubtful mysticism, the actions of the Empire made no sense. No one would destroy a planet to the core when they could just burn the surface into glass. Everyone knows that prisoners can’t keep secrets through chemical interrogation, and, even if they escaped, the prison-keepers wouldn’t limit their pursuit to only four fighters.

Plus, the editing looked fake. The Guiding Star and one of the Imperial fighters had exploded in an identical puff of debris.

But the old capital alone housed uncountable trillions of lives. There are over 400 billion stars in the galaxy containing over 3.2 billion habitable worlds. Official statistics estimated that the known galaxy contained over 100 quadrillion sentient beings, although this number was heavily dependent on what aliens could be considered sentient and could easily quadruple if the entire galaxy were explored.

If 1% of 1% of 100 quadrillion sentients believed in a conspiracy theory, then 10 trillion beings would become radicalized by the misinformation Dandar had just watched. The video would have to be suppressed.

A sinking feeling grew in Dandar’s stomach. Although the video was clearly false, what if there was some truth to it?

Dandar allowed himself a second to think through the implications.

There was an easy test. The propaganda had claimed that the “Death Star” had destroyed a planet named Alderaan — a world allegedly important enough to have a senator of its own.

Dandar brought up the list of representatives and was soon scrolling through a spreadsheet of all 1,245 members. Sure enough, there was no planet named Alderaan on the list. A tiny part of Dandar’s mind felt confused, but Dandar failed to notice.

Dandar breathed a sigh of relief, feeling silly for even entertaining the thought.

He had wasted over two hours on this topic. He would need to mention it in his daily summary of the news for Moff Reavell just so that he would have something to show her. After typing up a synopsis, Dandar started summarizing the financial news.