Petra Episode 7 Creedor Kratz

Petra Episode 7 Creedor Kratz

Creedore Kratz was a principled man. Never mind that he was one of the most feared men in the Empire and with good cause. Never mind that he left a trail of death and destruction in his path which he never apologized for. Never mind that anyone who stood in his way soon came to regret it. Creed was a principled man.

He was the son of a Simian Female and a Golden Male. The union was taboo and his father suffered death on account of it. His mother fled with him as a child or he would have suffered the same. Even though the Goldens were a captive people they maintained the purity of their blood line and while they allowed the breeding of Simians, none of the offspring was allowed to back breed into their bloodline. Creedor was the only living example.

His mother became concubine to a high official of the Empire and rose to become his consort. Her master saw the boy's potential, insured his education and sponsored him to becoming a citizen and later a knight of the Empire. The boy was brilliant and his psychic gift was unprecedented. Little wonder that he succeeded in everything he did and moved along a fast track, accepting and performing in tasks of ever increasing responsibility. At the age of twenty-eight he was in Command of Psychic Operations for the Republic and moved his headquarters to the Compound forty miles south west of Corinth.

He was an idealist and a faithful servant of the Empire. He fancied himself a true Knight and when he took his oath he meant it. He swore to observe the Order’s spirit and not the sad state to which it had deteriorated. This was the standard he set for himself, and encouraged his subordinates to follow. He was determined to be a good role model and through personal example, have an effect on those around him.

The problem with the Order of the Knights of the Empire was that it no longer lived up to the standards of it’s founding fathers. It was said that the principle founder was none other that God himself and he established the Order to serve the good of the people. The knights were appointed to insure this happened and had a Code of Honor with many laudable tenants, and character traits, such as protecting the weak from oppression and virtues such as truth, decency, justice, humility, and selflessness. What a laugh! They were expected to seek out the corrupt from within, calling to task those who abused their powers for personal rather than corporate good. Yes, the Order had started out with lofty principles but they eroded over time until what had once been intended for the public good became corrupted into the worst sort of evil. Ironically they became the antithesis of what they should have been. Knights took the power of the gods onto themselves, not to promote the common good but rather to promote their personal well being, not to elevate the people, but to beat them down and enslave them.

To be sure there were laws, and good ones, that had been written in days of old when the Knighthood deserved to be above the law. That was when they lived by the Code. Those were the days when mortals walked the earth, aspiring to be more, living up to lofty standards in a sublime world an honor. Such men had no need for the low standards of the law, a code for common men, below which decency condemned the behavior of scoundrels.

Eventually these so called Knights routinely began operating below the legal limits and the crime was not so doing or even getting caught. The crime was having their nefarious behavior exposed and then being called to account. This was not a serious deterrent because the very instrument that was supposed to prevent this was the very instrument that made it possible. Since the Knights were the ones supposed to be doing the enforcing and maintaining the standards, there was no detering their outrageous behavior.

As a consequence, the Empire had been on a down hill slide for centuries and was coming to the end of its tether. The bindings of their power were beginning to unravel and they were on the verge of a freefall into the abyss and suffering that hard landing which follows. The only thing that could delay the inevitable was a man of the stature of Creedor Kratz, who through a sheer strength of will might reverse the momentum and get things back on the right track. He was determined to become exactly this instrument and resolved to change the Order's image from despised agents of corruption to a force for the common good.

Creedore was a student and historian and resolved to keep himself untainted but was very careful not to appear “Holier than Thou.” His supervisors saw him as incorruptible, loyal and utterly dependable This accounted for his rapid rise in the bureaucracy as well as his political connections that derived through his mother.

Creed, thus considered himself a Knight of the old school and demanded that those who worked for him live up to the standards of the law. If anyone violated the “Regulations“ he dealt with them firmly. His telepathic powers gave him a unique capability for discovering those who did not comply. His minions were paid for their services and expected to live within their means and not supplement their life style by dipping into the corporate lauder. He dealt with those who suffered a mental lapse, in a harsh and unforgiving manner. To his subordinates he was respected, not loved. This was all he asked because he believed that men loved as they chose and feared as they must.

When Creedor returned from his unsuccessful attempt catch up with Cpt Standaloft’s patrol he was not in a good mood. It was bad enough that the Confederation was onto his scheme for locating patrols, bad enough that they had identified him as the person behind it, but that damned patrol leader had the nerve to flip him the high sign. I knocked him on his ass, he thought, but that SOB escaped with a wealth of valuable knowledge that is now being evaluated in the high councils of the Elves. I wonder what his mission was? Perhaps he was probing our defenses for the sole purpose of learning our tactics and techniques. Perhaps he was gathering information from spies and informants....Perhaps it was something more. Something about this latest patrol didn't resonate and he was determined to get to the bottom of it. "Damn!" he muttered shaking his head... Whatever they were up to they accomplished it and we failed to stop them.

It was his practice to walk about the Compound when he returned and listen in at a few key places in order to bring himself up to date on the pulse of his command. One of these spots was the Guard’s Mess. There was an old shed on the back side of the building and he slipped inside. It was supper time and he let his mind flit from table to table to see if there were any interesting conversations taking place. He stopped abruptly…

“I swear to you what I’m saying is the truth. I was right there in the Observation Booth. Alfred was hanging in the straps and Hilda was painting on lipstick and applying make-up. Then she put a wig on him and Jody stepped up and nailed him in the ass.”

“What brought that on?”

“Apparently the two had an argument in town and Alfred started knocking him about...Wow! did Jody ever get even in a hurry.”

When he heard this Creedor was not happy. The whole notion of his subordinates using his office and personal facilities when he was away was not acceptable. It wasn’t that he minded what Jody had done…that was one of the ways things got settled in the culture of the Compound, but not in his office, not in his confinement cage; not in front of his prize Simian…no absolutely not! Jody had to be taught to use better judgment and find somewhere other than the Commander’s personal space to settle his scores.

Despite this infraction he liked Jody…personally and professionally. He saw great potential in the lad and saw in his personal focus, ambition, ruthlessness and violence a tool that could be valuable if focused in the right direction. Jody was a shrewd, mean spirited homo who operated at an emotional level. Everything to him was personal. Creedor was also queer but he was more calculating and reasoning. He had this well integrated philosophy that guided every action, and unless he flew off the handle, which he only did on rare occasions, he seldom let his humanity got the better of his intellect.

As mentioned earlier, Creed saw himself as a Knight of the Old Order. The basic premise of the code was to make the world a better place. "Better," was the operative word. It was a variation on the word "Good" and he had a definition. He saw nature as God’s creation, a mechanism designed to provide the default in the world should man choose not to intervene. He also believed that God was not always around and that when he was absent, nature made a lot of decisions, unless of course man decided to intervene.

So if neither God or man chose act on the environment, nature would provide an outcome and that outcome was the natural default. Now, if Man chose an action that would improve on his situation, over doing nothing at all, this was "Good." If man considered two actions either of which was an improvement than one was usually "Better" than the other. And if man had a choice of three or more courses than the one that was the optimal choice, he termed "Best." So the Order theoretically defined "...Making of the world a better place as the optimization of good." Thus, when defining a problem, Creedor went through a process of definition, facts, possibilities, analysis and choice. This analytical approach was vastly superior to the emotional mode which often resulted in decisions that were less that optimal. In the world of reality the difference between success and failure often hung on the barest of threads and the quality of a decision, where other factors begin to cancel out, could be the difference between winning and losing.

While Creedor was gay, he didn’t look it. He had none of the mannerisms one might associate with a homosexual. His orientation was not flexible as with some who can sit on the fence and graze in either pasture. He was hard wired gay and the very thought of intercourse with a woman sent a twinge of nausea through his body. His orientation was deeply personal and he went to considerable lengths to cover it up; not because he cared at a gut level but because experience had taught him that being gay was perceived as a sign of male weakness. He knew that the perception of weakness was as dangerous as the weakness itself and this was why he kept his orientation under careful wraps.

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After listening at the guards Mess hall he walked over to the Cafeteria where the Keepers ate. In this case there was a latrine against the outer wall, well suited for psychic listening. It wasn’t long before he heard Jody bragging.

“If you don’t believe me just ask Hilda. She tricked Alfred into getting strapped into the restraints and them I stepped in and taught that dumb ass a lesson.”

"I don’t believe you did that," said a friend, “now we'll all have to be on our toes...what if the Guards decide to get even?”

“I wouldn't be too worried about that," said Jody. "After what happened to Alfred they'll think twice about tangling with us. I'll be surprised if there's any fallout at all.”

Creedor chuckled to himself…he had reached, through other means, exactly the same conclusion as Jody. His was based on the facts and Jody’s on an intuitive and emotional grasp of basic human nature. Yes, Jody had definite possibilities but first he had to be tamed, honed if you will, into a reliable instrument of the Empire’s will. He returned to his office. Looking over at the flagpoles he checked to make sure his colors were flying. Then he went inside the main administration building. The guard at the reception desk was named Big Mordichi, and his size certainly gave him claim to the moniker. Creed scanned his mind and at first glance did not expect to see much. To his surprise he saw feelings of affection for none other than Hilda the milk maid. The young woman was not pretty, however, there was a clean freshness to her mind that never ceased to amaze the Commander. Hmm he though, finally someone with a little empathy has seen beneath the surface of that girl. She would make him a good wife.

As he stepped into his office Hilda was just leaving.