Slavhacs – Axiom Subroutine
“If I should ever be captured, I want no negotiation. I expect no negotiations. If I ask for mercy or freedom after I have been captured, you may consider it a sign that I am already destroyed. End me then, before they use me further.”
Asher McVay days before being sent to the Ministry of Truth.
Slavhacs are condemned souls. They are base tools and pets of the Axiomite ruling classes. The brutal genius of Axiom system has always been to exhaust the enemy assets, squeeze them for every ounce of knowledge they posses, and then turn the remainder back upon the enemy itself. In this way, even depleted prisoners that have been exhausted past any reasonable capacity remain useful to the Axiom machine. No resource is ever wasted entirely.
As such, Slavehacs are a cruel and terrible joke. They are minds that have survived the capture
and interrogation process in the vast empty cells beneath the Ministry of Truth. Few who are taken down to the cells ever come out. Few can speak of the interrogation process, and few would risk doing so if able. The Ministry is feared beyond any in the Axiom world, both in the material and Aetherial manifestation. Those who do emerge, shattered and broken, rarely last longer than a handful of cycles. Alternatively, the individuals that return in the form of the Slavhac are minds to useful, too resilient, or too talented to execute outright. They are too dangerous to release back into the Aetherium, and too wretched to be of any other use.
Instead, prisoners fated to become Slavhac are mind-hacked and rebooted to deadly effect. Their consciousness is bound to a controlling Avatar, who dominates the Slavhac completely. Slavehacs, then, are feared and hated in equal measure – considered abominations by more than just Axiom enemies. They are deadly, powerful, and terrible in equal measure. Once completely within the Avatar’s control, the Slavhac is a sacrifice at the altar of power and Axiom control. It is an intimate link that speaks only to the cruelty and ruthlessness of the Avatar and the cause.
Of Course, there is another option: the cold cut. If captured, many resistance users and Axiom antagonists have developed a system so that, if captured, the operative can be severed completely from the material world. The meat is severed from the soul, as they say. It is a truly desperate and deadly act. The physical and psychic trauma is almost always fatal to the living body, while the stranded consciousness lingers then slowly disintegrates in a flat line form. It is a horrific testament to the feat the Slavhacs inspire that any would consider the option as an alternative.
.exe
Slaves to Power: if the operation being played uses normal deployment rules, then every model in this program must deploy at the same Pylon as the Collective’s Avatar. At the beginning of this model’s activation, if this model is not within 3 square of this Collective’s Avatar it must materialize to any unoccupied square within 3 squares of this Collective’s Avatar. If this is not possible, this model is immediately deleted.
Sacrificial Overload: Use one of the following .exes. After resolving the chosen .exe, delete this model.
4 cs: Choose an enemy model within 3 squares. During its next activation, the chosen model suffers from stun, lag, and interference.
3 cs: Choose an enemy model within 3 squares and LoS. That model takes an amount of damage equal to the amount of Stability Grid this model has remaining.
2 cs: Immediately shift the Schema that this model is on a number of squares equal to the amount of stability Grid it has remaining.
1 cs: Choose an adjacent enemy model with Los. Shift that model 3 squares in any direction.
Safeguard: Instead of applying damage to this model, you may apply all the damage suffered to the Collective’s Avatar, regardless of where it is on the server. This model still suffers all other effects.