Mirkai
22-06-2005, 02:40
1 / Beneath Central Mirkai
Erlin put a taloned hand to her cheek and rubbed it in thought as she walked. It was another bad day for the dig. Just like every day.
She crouched through the small passage, the ceiling being only 6 feet high and the tunnel itself about that wide. Even though she was ducking as she moved, the feathers covering her head still brushed against the sturdy light-brown rock above them. At least, she thought, it was strong enough that this tunnel didn't need buttresses. She'd bumped her head on them before, and this rock probably saved her a few small headaches.
But at the same time, it was causing one big one. The same strong compound that supported the tunnel had also rendered Mirkanian power tools nearly ineffective, slowing the digging to a crawl. Aside from this, the plate of rock was found to be much deeper than it was thick, relative to the direction they were tunneling from. So she'd had to order the tunnel to move horizontally until they found softer ground.
A yell echoed through the passage from up ahead. She couldn't see its source; though a string of lights ran along the wall to her right, she was approaching the dig site, and the stretch of tunnel ahead was filled with a thick haze of dust. It obscured her vision, but she was grateful nonetheless. The empty rock behind her was silent, well away from the busy workers, and she disliked the feeling of desolate solitude.
But up here, close to the men, things were alive. It was chaotic, but there was a sense of.. community. Though Erlin still couldn't see the miners through the dust, she could hear them quite well. They shouted to one another over the whine of their tools, most of the voices accented with the frustrated urgency so prevalent in the behind-schedule dig, but the light tone of a joke occasionally carried through the dirty air.
Finally, the site came into view. The dust was pierced by heavy spotlights, resting on the ground. With a little difficulty, Erlin weaved around them through her crouch, stopping just beyond. A few meters ahead of her, she could see the familiar shapes of the Mirkanian workers. Here they were just widening the tunnel and heightening the ceiling; the actual forward digging was up ahead.
This was far enough, though. Erlin didn't fancy crouching down even further; her back was sore as it was. Aside, she didn't need to go any deeper. She could see that the men were working well from here and, more than that, could feel a part of that work as well. As foreman, she was expected to do little more than keep track of complaints and schedules, and relay any major changes in the project to the Warchief.
That wasn't why she took on this project, though. She liked feeling immersed. The sense of togetherness that formed when so many were working towards the same goal, in the same space. When she applied with the Mirkanian Defense Authority and Broadstar, this is exactly what she wanted.
"Rinsa, Krirt, report!" Well, she did still have a job to do. She wasn't sure if she could be heard above the machinery that blared just feet away, but it was worth a try.
She was heard well enough. "Rin's d'n fur'er!" That would be Krirt. A.. burrowing owl, if she remembered right. He was short enough that he didn't have to crouch, and could get around the tunnel easily. One of the lucky ones, he was.
Erlin shrieked, drawing Krirt's attention. She was the only falcon on the project, and her voice was recognized immediately. She pulled one her fingers across her throat, signaling to the owl to turn off the grinder he was widening the walls with. He did, and once the noise died down it was much easier to speak.
"I'm not chasing Rinsa through that mouse hole. You're short, go get her."
Krirt shook his head, entirely unlike him. He didn't typically contradict his foreman, or any of his superiors. He must've been very tired, or thought the order was particularly useless. He spoke.
"Don' need to run down 'ere. We 'en getting slowed again from the rock, e'en thicker.. Rin's said 'nother.. ten hours an w're through."
A nod from Erlin. That was about all she needed to know. She had hoped they'd broken through the rock sheet already, but that may've been a bit too much.
"Good. Keep at i-" A scream from down the tunnel cut her off. She had about enough time to think 'What now?' before a black streak of feathers rushed out of the narrow passage before her.
She extended her left arm across the tunnel and braced it on the wall, intent on halting the panicked crow. She wanted to know what was wrong, yes, but she also wanted to stop him from running. No matter what problem you have in the tunnel, bumping someone and getting a rock grinder to the beak was only going to make it worse.
As she expected, the runner didn't slow down a bit. He -and it was a he, there were only two crows on the project, both male- hit her arm full force. Were she not gripping the surface of the rock, she'd likely have been thrown backwards. As it was, though, she managed to disperse most of the momentum by bending her arm, and then turned to pin the creature against the wall. Her success in restraining him was mostly luck, given the cramped quarters of the passage.
"Don't EVER run, you never run in here!" As always, her concern came through as anger.
"S-ssorry.." he hissed. There was a great deal of pain in his voice, and for a moment Erlin wondered if she didn't push him against the wall a little too hard.
"What's wrong?"
"My arm.." She stepped back from the wall, just enough to let him move again, not that she could go much further anyway.
The crow.. What was his name? Dlin.. Clin.. Something like that.. lifted his right arm, displaying a large patch of scraggly and singed feathers, the burnt skin visible beneath it. She wished she didn't already know what had happened.
"Sparks?" she said, her tone one of obvious exasperation.
"Yea." There was noticeably less pain in his voice. She had probably been pressing against his arm as she held him against the wall. She looked closely at the burn.. It was a good deal more severe than some of the others she'd seen. She mentally cursed at the rock. The grinders were the only tools they had that were tunneling through it at a decent clip, but the sparks they threw off were a hazard to the feathered Mirkanians.
"Hang on." she said.
She looked him over for other burns. The four scaled toes that made up each of his feet, the digits each ending with a blunt talon, all black.. No worries there. The plumage of his legs, body, and arms were all fine, save for the one initial burn on his right forearm. His tail feathers were good, as were the large wings that clung tightly to his back, connected at the shoulder blades. Finally, his head, for all purposes a crow's head, was unharmed.
"It's only your arm. Can you keep working?" Of course he could keep working. But she was required to ask.
"Well.." If he said no, she was going to pluck him for it. She was already short on workers. The natural claustrophobia of most Mirkanians had made the project undesirable despite its high pay, and she couldn't lose another.
He must've seen her fists clenching. "I.. think I can manage."
"Get to it." She gave him a pat on the shoulder. He inched by her and continued down the tunnel, soon disappearing from view into the haze.
She turned her back to the workers. That was it. The space center, the hidden factories, they were going to have to be dug out by someone or something else. Mirkanians weren't made for this, and there were too many problems. She began walking.
Walking through the thick rock tunnel, until it faded into softer shale, up past the now-dormant hovering carts that are used to ship rock back to the surface, and up to where the passage broke off into another small tunnel, leading into her foreman's office. Office might've been a bit of an embellishment; it was little more than a square chamber cut into the earth with a small mobile computer stand, a chair with a generous portion of the back removed to accommodate tail feathers, and a "Twelve Ways to Motivate Your Employees" calendar (April: Whips and chains make a good punishment and a good reward).
She sat on the chair, placed her hands on the blank black pad of the computer terminal, and began sliding her talons across it. As they etched out invisible lines and curves, the familiar jagged scrawl of Mirkanian letters began appearing on the screen.
2 / Pride, Capitol of Mirkai
..And those same letters now rested on a screen before Warchief Trieound Rodurn, accompanied by a smooth female voice which echoed out of an unseen speaker within in the monitor. They filled the small room, an office just as unassuming as the one that had been dug out beneath the rock. It was a uniform white, every surface within perfectly smooth. The floor and walls were bare, save for a large, rectangular window looking out on the Mirkanian night, and a small doorway to Rodurn's back.
The complaint was written in the foreman's typical blunt manner, short on formality. It was little more than a list of problems, and the complacent tone of the text/voice interpreter lent itself poorly to the gruff style.
"Unexpected rock face. Flammable feathers, sparks. Short on workers. Tools ineffective...."
It continued on like this, for the most part little more than a long list of problems. Some of them Warchief was familiar with, while others he'd had been unaware of until now. He suspected they were considered insignificant before, but were creating much larger difficulties when taken together.
About halfway through, Rodurn stopped listening. He was no miner, and many of the issues seemed foreign to him, and even the ones that he could understand seemed far to numerous to solve individually; if he wanted the facility to be finished within a decade, or even within his lifetime, he was going to have to consider something more drastic.
The lack of tools, manpower, and information regarding the build site could all be traced back to Mirkai's relative inexperience with large-scale digging. The fact that they were working in a geologically unstable area didn't help matters any. By the time the robotic voice reached the document's closing statement, the Warchief had made up his mind. There was only one course of action he could take, and it would be one he'd long considered.
The last few lines from the computer mimicked his thoughts.
"Can't keep working like this. Suggest outside help. Tell Draies to tie his beak. Erlin Slairinsa, Foreman."
As he reached forward to the terminal's touch pad, intent on closing the mail window, the Warchief began shuffling names through his head. People, countries, corporations, all shared only one thing; they were contractors, willing to work discreetly and without questions. Most of them looked more or less the same, with only moderate variations in price. All told, hiring one of them would be vastly simpler than trying to have Mirkai dig out and build the MDA facility on its own. There was a problem, though. As always.
Truth be told, Rodurn had requested extra national help with the construction for quite some time, long before the situation had become so desperate. While he didn't predict just how complicated things would become, he saw numerous advantages in hiring a more experienced workforce. He searched through many digital catalogues, narrowing down the choices by price and.. legitimacy.
Eventually, he'd whittled it down to about 20 or so different contractors, some privately funded, others government sponsored, and yet others governments themselves. He presented this list, along with his proposal, to the High Watcher himself, Serian Draies. Draies shot it down after only minutes, citing the risk it posed. "If we were to petition outside help, it would attract far too much attention. It would put the people's safety at risk." Never mind that this was to be Mirkai's first major military production facility, as well as their ride into space.
Given their past relationship, Rodurn held a lot of sway with Draies, but it didn't help. No matter how much he pressed the issue, the High Watcher wasn't listening. Things may be different now, though. Lately, there had been conflict amongst Mirkai's neighbors and, though it never touched her borders, Serian was worried they'd be dragged into a war they wanted no part of. While it never came to that, he's since been far more concerned about military strength and readiness, and with these problems posing a significant delay to the facility..
"Hey, I know that look." The distinct, solid, human-like voice of Draies came from behind Rodurn, where the doorway was. He was one of the few Mirkanians that didn't posses an 'accent'; he'd undergone a great deal of speech therapy, no doubt to relate better with humans. "You want to ask me something, right? I bet I know what it is, too!" The hawk leaned on the doorway. He couldn't smirk, no Mirkanian could, but he really didn't need to.
The Warchief turned, facing the voice. Though his old eyes could see occasional blurry shadows, he'd long since learned to rely on sound as his primary sense. He didn't need to affirm the other bird's assumption, either, they both knew he was dead on. "There are too many problems. With the build and with our workers. We can't do this alone."
"Of course, of course we can't!" Draies exclaimed, using the boisterous tone he was so fond of when contradicting Rodurn. Though he knew Rodurn would see little of it, he moved himself from the doorway and began making exaggerated, theatrical gestures with his arms. "We'll just get on the newswire, won't we? And will we ever look good, with our shiny new factory, surrounded by tanks and craters and corpses!"
The old crow stared at the shadowy wisp of Draies waving his arms in his typical far-too-dramatic manner. He hated it when the damn hawk did this, and they both knew it. Of course, it was also a good way for Serian to avoid discussing the point seriously, but that was secondary to irritating Rodurn. He quickly recalled the foreman's suggestions. "Should I tie your beak shut?"
"Business first, old boy!" he cried. He laughed, a thin little chortling sound that didn't go with his human accent at all. When it faded, it'd taken his exaggerated tone away as well. "But no. You've asked me this.. how many times? What makes you think my answer will be any different now? Things haven't changed that much, you know, not enough for me to change my mind." This was, of course, a lie. Draies was putting on another show, though it was far more low-key than his last little display.
"Where are your speeches?" A hint of cleverness had snuck into Rodurn's voice; the High Watcher wasn't putting up near as big a fight as usual. Maybe he wanted to lose? "Just a no? You've changed your mind."
The hawk opened his beak and stammered for a minute. Enough with his pride. Would it be so bad to admit he was wrong earlier? Well, yes. Still, it was necessary for Mirkai's safety. "Ok, all right, yes, fine. I want you to finish this.. thing as quickly as you can. It's taking far too long to build, we need it for our carriers, and it's draining our resources. Do what you have to do, hire who you have to hire. There, happy?"
He nodded. "You'd like a say in who's chosen?"
"No, not at all, I'm done with this. You wanted responsibility for it, you take care of it."
"It will be done."
"Yes, now, do it. I have more work myself, thanks to you." This wasn't far from the truth. He had to inform the people at Broadstar that their funding was going to be funneled from payrolls and equipment to some other company's bank account. He had to contact those responsible for evacuating the dig site, call up his spin doctors to explain why unknown men and supplies were being shipped to the middle of the country, and find some way to not let it slip that their innocent little space center was hiding a critical piece of Mirkai's budding military infrastructure. He'd wanted to go hunting tomorrow, too.
Rodurn turned his back to Draies once more and hunched over the input pad on his terminal. The sound of swishing feathers came from behind him as Serian shrugged his wings, followed by the distinct click of a hawk's talons as he walked out of the room.
A few taps on the terminal pad, and the list of names that had been scrolling through the Warchief's head earlier was now presented on the screen, though he couldn't see it. He scrawled in each name on the input pad, listening to his voice interpreter spit out long paragraphs of information about prices and previous jobs. Most of them sounded about the same. Shortly after the list had passed the middle entry, Rodurn stopped it with a long swipe of his talon down the pad. It didn't really matter, all of them matched the criteria, he might as well just pick the one he stopped on.
"Zeppelin Manufacturers.." He typed up a short memo. "I'm not much for mail. Perhaps we should talk real-time." and sent it away to the dubiously named company. Or country. Whatever it was.
He certainly hoped they could build better than they could spell.
((OOC: Well, I finally decided to get off my lazy butt and post. It's not much, but any feedback is appreciated. I know it doesn't say much about my nation, but I'm saving that for a more appropriate place a post or two down the road.
If you'd like to contact me for any reason (criticism, RP setup, berating me..), I can be reached in #nationstates_general on Espernet on IRC, as well as on AIM under the name LandHawk Jr.))
Erlin put a taloned hand to her cheek and rubbed it in thought as she walked. It was another bad day for the dig. Just like every day.
She crouched through the small passage, the ceiling being only 6 feet high and the tunnel itself about that wide. Even though she was ducking as she moved, the feathers covering her head still brushed against the sturdy light-brown rock above them. At least, she thought, it was strong enough that this tunnel didn't need buttresses. She'd bumped her head on them before, and this rock probably saved her a few small headaches.
But at the same time, it was causing one big one. The same strong compound that supported the tunnel had also rendered Mirkanian power tools nearly ineffective, slowing the digging to a crawl. Aside from this, the plate of rock was found to be much deeper than it was thick, relative to the direction they were tunneling from. So she'd had to order the tunnel to move horizontally until they found softer ground.
A yell echoed through the passage from up ahead. She couldn't see its source; though a string of lights ran along the wall to her right, she was approaching the dig site, and the stretch of tunnel ahead was filled with a thick haze of dust. It obscured her vision, but she was grateful nonetheless. The empty rock behind her was silent, well away from the busy workers, and she disliked the feeling of desolate solitude.
But up here, close to the men, things were alive. It was chaotic, but there was a sense of.. community. Though Erlin still couldn't see the miners through the dust, she could hear them quite well. They shouted to one another over the whine of their tools, most of the voices accented with the frustrated urgency so prevalent in the behind-schedule dig, but the light tone of a joke occasionally carried through the dirty air.
Finally, the site came into view. The dust was pierced by heavy spotlights, resting on the ground. With a little difficulty, Erlin weaved around them through her crouch, stopping just beyond. A few meters ahead of her, she could see the familiar shapes of the Mirkanian workers. Here they were just widening the tunnel and heightening the ceiling; the actual forward digging was up ahead.
This was far enough, though. Erlin didn't fancy crouching down even further; her back was sore as it was. Aside, she didn't need to go any deeper. She could see that the men were working well from here and, more than that, could feel a part of that work as well. As foreman, she was expected to do little more than keep track of complaints and schedules, and relay any major changes in the project to the Warchief.
That wasn't why she took on this project, though. She liked feeling immersed. The sense of togetherness that formed when so many were working towards the same goal, in the same space. When she applied with the Mirkanian Defense Authority and Broadstar, this is exactly what she wanted.
"Rinsa, Krirt, report!" Well, she did still have a job to do. She wasn't sure if she could be heard above the machinery that blared just feet away, but it was worth a try.
She was heard well enough. "Rin's d'n fur'er!" That would be Krirt. A.. burrowing owl, if she remembered right. He was short enough that he didn't have to crouch, and could get around the tunnel easily. One of the lucky ones, he was.
Erlin shrieked, drawing Krirt's attention. She was the only falcon on the project, and her voice was recognized immediately. She pulled one her fingers across her throat, signaling to the owl to turn off the grinder he was widening the walls with. He did, and once the noise died down it was much easier to speak.
"I'm not chasing Rinsa through that mouse hole. You're short, go get her."
Krirt shook his head, entirely unlike him. He didn't typically contradict his foreman, or any of his superiors. He must've been very tired, or thought the order was particularly useless. He spoke.
"Don' need to run down 'ere. We 'en getting slowed again from the rock, e'en thicker.. Rin's said 'nother.. ten hours an w're through."
A nod from Erlin. That was about all she needed to know. She had hoped they'd broken through the rock sheet already, but that may've been a bit too much.
"Good. Keep at i-" A scream from down the tunnel cut her off. She had about enough time to think 'What now?' before a black streak of feathers rushed out of the narrow passage before her.
She extended her left arm across the tunnel and braced it on the wall, intent on halting the panicked crow. She wanted to know what was wrong, yes, but she also wanted to stop him from running. No matter what problem you have in the tunnel, bumping someone and getting a rock grinder to the beak was only going to make it worse.
As she expected, the runner didn't slow down a bit. He -and it was a he, there were only two crows on the project, both male- hit her arm full force. Were she not gripping the surface of the rock, she'd likely have been thrown backwards. As it was, though, she managed to disperse most of the momentum by bending her arm, and then turned to pin the creature against the wall. Her success in restraining him was mostly luck, given the cramped quarters of the passage.
"Don't EVER run, you never run in here!" As always, her concern came through as anger.
"S-ssorry.." he hissed. There was a great deal of pain in his voice, and for a moment Erlin wondered if she didn't push him against the wall a little too hard.
"What's wrong?"
"My arm.." She stepped back from the wall, just enough to let him move again, not that she could go much further anyway.
The crow.. What was his name? Dlin.. Clin.. Something like that.. lifted his right arm, displaying a large patch of scraggly and singed feathers, the burnt skin visible beneath it. She wished she didn't already know what had happened.
"Sparks?" she said, her tone one of obvious exasperation.
"Yea." There was noticeably less pain in his voice. She had probably been pressing against his arm as she held him against the wall. She looked closely at the burn.. It was a good deal more severe than some of the others she'd seen. She mentally cursed at the rock. The grinders were the only tools they had that were tunneling through it at a decent clip, but the sparks they threw off were a hazard to the feathered Mirkanians.
"Hang on." she said.
She looked him over for other burns. The four scaled toes that made up each of his feet, the digits each ending with a blunt talon, all black.. No worries there. The plumage of his legs, body, and arms were all fine, save for the one initial burn on his right forearm. His tail feathers were good, as were the large wings that clung tightly to his back, connected at the shoulder blades. Finally, his head, for all purposes a crow's head, was unharmed.
"It's only your arm. Can you keep working?" Of course he could keep working. But she was required to ask.
"Well.." If he said no, she was going to pluck him for it. She was already short on workers. The natural claustrophobia of most Mirkanians had made the project undesirable despite its high pay, and she couldn't lose another.
He must've seen her fists clenching. "I.. think I can manage."
"Get to it." She gave him a pat on the shoulder. He inched by her and continued down the tunnel, soon disappearing from view into the haze.
She turned her back to the workers. That was it. The space center, the hidden factories, they were going to have to be dug out by someone or something else. Mirkanians weren't made for this, and there were too many problems. She began walking.
Walking through the thick rock tunnel, until it faded into softer shale, up past the now-dormant hovering carts that are used to ship rock back to the surface, and up to where the passage broke off into another small tunnel, leading into her foreman's office. Office might've been a bit of an embellishment; it was little more than a square chamber cut into the earth with a small mobile computer stand, a chair with a generous portion of the back removed to accommodate tail feathers, and a "Twelve Ways to Motivate Your Employees" calendar (April: Whips and chains make a good punishment and a good reward).
She sat on the chair, placed her hands on the blank black pad of the computer terminal, and began sliding her talons across it. As they etched out invisible lines and curves, the familiar jagged scrawl of Mirkanian letters began appearing on the screen.
2 / Pride, Capitol of Mirkai
..And those same letters now rested on a screen before Warchief Trieound Rodurn, accompanied by a smooth female voice which echoed out of an unseen speaker within in the monitor. They filled the small room, an office just as unassuming as the one that had been dug out beneath the rock. It was a uniform white, every surface within perfectly smooth. The floor and walls were bare, save for a large, rectangular window looking out on the Mirkanian night, and a small doorway to Rodurn's back.
The complaint was written in the foreman's typical blunt manner, short on formality. It was little more than a list of problems, and the complacent tone of the text/voice interpreter lent itself poorly to the gruff style.
"Unexpected rock face. Flammable feathers, sparks. Short on workers. Tools ineffective...."
It continued on like this, for the most part little more than a long list of problems. Some of them Warchief was familiar with, while others he'd had been unaware of until now. He suspected they were considered insignificant before, but were creating much larger difficulties when taken together.
About halfway through, Rodurn stopped listening. He was no miner, and many of the issues seemed foreign to him, and even the ones that he could understand seemed far to numerous to solve individually; if he wanted the facility to be finished within a decade, or even within his lifetime, he was going to have to consider something more drastic.
The lack of tools, manpower, and information regarding the build site could all be traced back to Mirkai's relative inexperience with large-scale digging. The fact that they were working in a geologically unstable area didn't help matters any. By the time the robotic voice reached the document's closing statement, the Warchief had made up his mind. There was only one course of action he could take, and it would be one he'd long considered.
The last few lines from the computer mimicked his thoughts.
"Can't keep working like this. Suggest outside help. Tell Draies to tie his beak. Erlin Slairinsa, Foreman."
As he reached forward to the terminal's touch pad, intent on closing the mail window, the Warchief began shuffling names through his head. People, countries, corporations, all shared only one thing; they were contractors, willing to work discreetly and without questions. Most of them looked more or less the same, with only moderate variations in price. All told, hiring one of them would be vastly simpler than trying to have Mirkai dig out and build the MDA facility on its own. There was a problem, though. As always.
Truth be told, Rodurn had requested extra national help with the construction for quite some time, long before the situation had become so desperate. While he didn't predict just how complicated things would become, he saw numerous advantages in hiring a more experienced workforce. He searched through many digital catalogues, narrowing down the choices by price and.. legitimacy.
Eventually, he'd whittled it down to about 20 or so different contractors, some privately funded, others government sponsored, and yet others governments themselves. He presented this list, along with his proposal, to the High Watcher himself, Serian Draies. Draies shot it down after only minutes, citing the risk it posed. "If we were to petition outside help, it would attract far too much attention. It would put the people's safety at risk." Never mind that this was to be Mirkai's first major military production facility, as well as their ride into space.
Given their past relationship, Rodurn held a lot of sway with Draies, but it didn't help. No matter how much he pressed the issue, the High Watcher wasn't listening. Things may be different now, though. Lately, there had been conflict amongst Mirkai's neighbors and, though it never touched her borders, Serian was worried they'd be dragged into a war they wanted no part of. While it never came to that, he's since been far more concerned about military strength and readiness, and with these problems posing a significant delay to the facility..
"Hey, I know that look." The distinct, solid, human-like voice of Draies came from behind Rodurn, where the doorway was. He was one of the few Mirkanians that didn't posses an 'accent'; he'd undergone a great deal of speech therapy, no doubt to relate better with humans. "You want to ask me something, right? I bet I know what it is, too!" The hawk leaned on the doorway. He couldn't smirk, no Mirkanian could, but he really didn't need to.
The Warchief turned, facing the voice. Though his old eyes could see occasional blurry shadows, he'd long since learned to rely on sound as his primary sense. He didn't need to affirm the other bird's assumption, either, they both knew he was dead on. "There are too many problems. With the build and with our workers. We can't do this alone."
"Of course, of course we can't!" Draies exclaimed, using the boisterous tone he was so fond of when contradicting Rodurn. Though he knew Rodurn would see little of it, he moved himself from the doorway and began making exaggerated, theatrical gestures with his arms. "We'll just get on the newswire, won't we? And will we ever look good, with our shiny new factory, surrounded by tanks and craters and corpses!"
The old crow stared at the shadowy wisp of Draies waving his arms in his typical far-too-dramatic manner. He hated it when the damn hawk did this, and they both knew it. Of course, it was also a good way for Serian to avoid discussing the point seriously, but that was secondary to irritating Rodurn. He quickly recalled the foreman's suggestions. "Should I tie your beak shut?"
"Business first, old boy!" he cried. He laughed, a thin little chortling sound that didn't go with his human accent at all. When it faded, it'd taken his exaggerated tone away as well. "But no. You've asked me this.. how many times? What makes you think my answer will be any different now? Things haven't changed that much, you know, not enough for me to change my mind." This was, of course, a lie. Draies was putting on another show, though it was far more low-key than his last little display.
"Where are your speeches?" A hint of cleverness had snuck into Rodurn's voice; the High Watcher wasn't putting up near as big a fight as usual. Maybe he wanted to lose? "Just a no? You've changed your mind."
The hawk opened his beak and stammered for a minute. Enough with his pride. Would it be so bad to admit he was wrong earlier? Well, yes. Still, it was necessary for Mirkai's safety. "Ok, all right, yes, fine. I want you to finish this.. thing as quickly as you can. It's taking far too long to build, we need it for our carriers, and it's draining our resources. Do what you have to do, hire who you have to hire. There, happy?"
He nodded. "You'd like a say in who's chosen?"
"No, not at all, I'm done with this. You wanted responsibility for it, you take care of it."
"It will be done."
"Yes, now, do it. I have more work myself, thanks to you." This wasn't far from the truth. He had to inform the people at Broadstar that their funding was going to be funneled from payrolls and equipment to some other company's bank account. He had to contact those responsible for evacuating the dig site, call up his spin doctors to explain why unknown men and supplies were being shipped to the middle of the country, and find some way to not let it slip that their innocent little space center was hiding a critical piece of Mirkai's budding military infrastructure. He'd wanted to go hunting tomorrow, too.
Rodurn turned his back to Draies once more and hunched over the input pad on his terminal. The sound of swishing feathers came from behind him as Serian shrugged his wings, followed by the distinct click of a hawk's talons as he walked out of the room.
A few taps on the terminal pad, and the list of names that had been scrolling through the Warchief's head earlier was now presented on the screen, though he couldn't see it. He scrawled in each name on the input pad, listening to his voice interpreter spit out long paragraphs of information about prices and previous jobs. Most of them sounded about the same. Shortly after the list had passed the middle entry, Rodurn stopped it with a long swipe of his talon down the pad. It didn't really matter, all of them matched the criteria, he might as well just pick the one he stopped on.
"Zeppelin Manufacturers.." He typed up a short memo. "I'm not much for mail. Perhaps we should talk real-time." and sent it away to the dubiously named company. Or country. Whatever it was.
He certainly hoped they could build better than they could spell.
((OOC: Well, I finally decided to get off my lazy butt and post. It's not much, but any feedback is appreciated. I know it doesn't say much about my nation, but I'm saving that for a more appropriate place a post or two down the road.
If you'd like to contact me for any reason (criticism, RP setup, berating me..), I can be reached in #nationstates_general on Espernet on IRC, as well as on AIM under the name LandHawk Jr.))