While many of the ex-Ammatar elite who returned to the Republic following the Elder War have found the transition difficult, there are a good many who have retained the optimism that led them to defecting in the first place.

Omad Durgen was a Vice-Admiral in the Ammatar Fleet before the Elder Invasion. He and a group of loyal officers commandeered a ship and defected to the Republic, even aiding the Elders for a brief time before the ship sustained too much damage to continue. “It was glorious,” Durgen said. “We all thought we’d come to the Republic as heroes. The wayward sons, returning with the heads of our enemies held high. It wasn’t to be so.”

Durgen, like many others, found that the long-held beliefs and hatreds that had developed in the Republic were difficult to overcome. “It didn’t matter that I had defected. All that mattered was that, at one time, I had fought the Minmatar on the side of the Empire. I was a murderer, a butcher, a race-traitor,” he said. “I hoped to enlist in the Republic Fleet, but they would not have me. I was a security risk, they said. A potential spy for the Empire. ”

Durgen has been able to find work, as a low-grade security operative for the Minmatar Mining Corporation. “It’s respectable,” he said. “It doesn’t pay well and I’m constantly being watched by my superiors. Many of my co-workers hate me for the crimes they believe I committed against the Republic, but I will win them over eventually. It will take hard work. I never expected this to be easy.”