NationStates Jolt Archive

The weather was rainy and gray outside of the Oceanic Star hotel, which made it hard to appreciate the view over Sike kali. Not that there was much to see: The former rejistanian capital was struggling against an economy, which could only be lower if you add a hyperinflation like in Abysmalistan.

Inside of the room, a group of rejistanian jasika'he'ny were assembled. They were invited by Kijat Lariha, the owner of Severina, the phone company, which brought broadband to various rejistanian nations. He did not only invite well-known people from other industries, but also his business rivals if they were sufficiently close in their political viewpoints. All of them were rejistanian nationalists, maybe just because it would make business far easier, maybe because they were annoyed by the demise of the great nation, some even believed in Rejistanian cultural superiority.

Lariha'he just finished explaining why he considered national unity most important. It was a quick summary of the arguments and the main purpose was not to inform them but to create a certain agreement between them so that they would not call him crazy and probably even agree with him, even though his plan to save the association. He explained it like this: "Maybe we should not look at the causes for diversity, maybe we should look at the causes of unity. Rejistania wasn't united for a surprisingly long time in history. You all know why the country united, don't you? right, nothing managed to unite this country than the Jusa'he'ny*. We really should thank them for the invasion."

Some people laugh.

"Well, I think the best way to create a unified country is not via political campaigning or such. The best way to achieve unity is giving people a reason to unite against. Now, here comes the part, which is sufficiently crazy to work. If you somehow value your sanity, you might want to leave the room now. I think we should cause enough perceived threat from outside to the association so that the Rejistanis overcome their internal animosities and to unite. Of course, it would need to make sure that the population isn't harmed and that there never will be a real threat. Before you ask, yes, this is manipulation of the masses, but whom of you isn't guilty of that as well." He smiles a bit more. "The best kind of threat I could think of was a foreign nation. You all know the state of the rejistanian militaries or rather: lack of state. In case of an invasion, no Rejistanian nation would have a chance, but they all might."

Some people nodded.

A few weeks later, a series of letters was sent by Kijat Lariha and the newly-founded asene rejis to several national leaders, hinting in vague words to the fact that they can be able to make a change on the rejistanian island, which would be remarkably and that 'unity would be profitable'. It was intentionally vague so that if intercepted or published no suspicion of the true plan would arouse.

The Allaneans were curious.

They were not truly afraid of the Rejistani in any way, of course – in the past, a signle battalion of the Allanean army had proven capable seizing power in the nation overnight. However, there were certain concerns that the chi-virus could mutate and spread to Allanea.

Thus, medical retrovirus stockpiles remaining since the first Rejistani War were reactivated and fueled into a fleet of ten DREAD cropduster aircraft. Only after that the response was sent to the Rejistanis, encoded.

We wish to inquire as to the nature of our operation. Are you requesting our support in some form of coup? Or is this a more complex operation? Please communicate more detailed intent via secure comms.

Public keys were exchanged, fingerprints compared, the typical crypto-boogie was danced. After that song ended, a new one was danced, to the tune of 'NDA', that is 'non-disclosure agreement'. Even though, it was Kijat Lariha's public key, it was not one of the organizations, whom you would identify the charismatic CEO with. not even the most careful websearch would give any information about the organization. Eventually, the message was transmitted:


ISOR,

national unity is a precious good, You would not like Allanea splitting up into tiny fragmental and legally incompatible units and we do not like this about Rejistania. We are an association of concerned citizens of different races who are willing to influence society towards unity, but we do realize that a threat of Jusanan proportions would be required to unite the country. The Allanean people are in the tradition of Jusa (or united States of America), this of course means that the tradition of enterpreneurism is shared. This is one of the reasons, why we approach the government of this great country with a modest proposal: We want to propose a business relation with the aim of unifying Rejistania. We would offer you a payment in XiKiNa* if you adopted a stance in your foreign policies, which would make the Rejistanian nations reunite. Due to legal concerns, we insist that the paperwork would be done via a legal entity in a neutral country. Please excuse the inconvenience but we think this does ensure unbroken contracts.

If you consider the sheer idea of this outrageous, please excuse the waste of your precious time, we however are aware that desperate situations often call for unconventional solutions.

In hope of agreement,
Kijat Lariha, representing the asene rejis


*many non-fiat currencies in rejistania are based on a set of ressources, which is called XiKiNa (ximasamu kihatuela nahit = stable exchange norm).

Dear Rejistani friends!

You must understand that it is quite impossible for our government to be paid of this assignment, not only because the Allanean government does not provide paid services – which, however, are available from a variety of military contractors in Allanea – but also that you are quite likely unable to pay for any such 'services'.

However, it is likely that it is possible for us to have an exchange, of sorts. As you understand, while the United States of Allanea does not allow for diplomatic relations with Rejistania as long as people in your country remain infected with the chi-virus, should we be allowed to try to reverse its effects through the dispersal of medical agents, we will happily proceed through this operation.

Further, we in the United States desire to reduce the unnecessary loss of life, and as such, we will operate less-than lethal weaponry throughout this operation. Apart from the already mentioned medical agents, we will also utilize a quantity of nonlethal weapons such as Mix-44, both for testing purposes and for the stated purpose of intimidating the various Rejistani 'nations' into uniting.

[Mix-44 is a sticky, rapidly-drying paint produced in Zeppelin Manufacturers, which is extremely difficult to remove and also electromagnetically-reflective. Its effect to render ineffective any military electronics, exposed weaponry, hatches, etc. while increasing the effective RADAR signature of ships, aircraft, tanks, and whatever other equipment may be stuck under it. However, the equipment will usually remain operational after the paint is removed. The version of Mix-44 utilized by the Allaneans is bright pink.]

From a sheer technical standpoint, a single aircraft battlegroup should be more than capable of carrying out this operation (as a matter of fact, a single aircraft battlegroup should even be capable of conquering Rejistania, so the threat posed by it to the Rejistanians will be more than believable to those who are not informed of our plan.

Another option, once operations within the Rejistani aquatory begin, is to spread rumors, in different parts of the country, that Allanean troops have already landed in area X or Y, and so forth – with the help of friendly operatives within the nation, of course. We will assist this by landing ultra-heavy armored units (such as the 3500-ton Imperator tanks, and having them 'accidentally' spotted by populace. As it is not possible for any of the current Rejistani military units to actually damage a tank of this category (nor, in fact, did a ground weapon of such firepower ever exist in the Rejistani arsenal, we can safely make this foray without harming anybody.

In nations where no military exists, we will employ additional operations with similar tactic, specifically overflight with Allanean strategic strike aircraft, ultra-heavy cargo aircraft (the Ouroboros cargo plane's 1.1 kilometer wingspan will surely be impressive), or landings of troops in Water Buffalo nuclear-powered hovercraft.

Yours,
Colonel Thomas Morrison,
Army Special Operations Branch.

ISOR,

We know that the alhantes virus is a factor towards rekijonalism, but we are not sure whether it would be advantageous to use a method without testing for the medical, psychological and spiritual effects. There are people who suggest that the virus is not a new occurance but one, which comes from an indefinite past. According to mythologists, general traditions of Rejistani mythology share characteristics, which can be easiest explained by the so-called 'chi virus'. Losing the factor is probably like losing your sight or your hearing and an entire nation going blind or deaf will have severe consequences. Yousee, since we can not switch it off, it is still not clear how much information is gathered by this. If you are aware of the effects it might be advantageous to explain them to us to prepare.

Yours,
Kijat Lariha

Dear Friends!

Should you be affected by the medical agent, you will feel as if suffering from a light cold over several days, after which time you will operate like a regular non-chi-afflicted human being. The agent's effects will spread from person to person like a regular cold, taking the country some time to prepare until it is all completely cured.

After this you will operate much like the inhabitants of all the other nations.

Yours in Liberty,
Colonel Thomas Morrison,
Army Special Operations Branch.

ISOR,

We inquired more about the effects on a psychological and spiritual level. What will people feel if they are deprived of this sense? What will a "saint of recession" say if the messages, he heard suddenly disappear, will the Capgras-Syndrome spread epidemically if people are robbed of their emotional input from people. I do not know and I hope, there is empirical data on this.

Yours,
Kijat Lariha

This data does not exist, as we only tested the agent in simulation. We will send you some of it if you wish to conduct testing.


Yours in Liberty,
Colonel Thomas Morrison,
Army Special Operations Branch.

The message lead to a lot of 'hy ely' (angry discussion) as the kireshi immigrants would call it. None of the people in the group actually was kireshi though so they used different terms. Eletema Jasti of Konihekta nanti kansu said unquotable things with the intention that the Allaneans should be poisened, burned, hung, quartered and then really hurt for proposing this. Kiuri~l Tanhil of Tanhiltek said it was a bitter pill, that has to be swallowed for the good of the nation(s). The discussion became very agitated, in the bad way: pets were threatened, names were called, gods were called to smite people, curses were uttered. the fact that there people are on one of the highest social stratas in the rejistanian society does not mean that they are any better than the Lumpenproletariat in solving their problems when very agitated. Hakita Tama of one of the most important agricultural jasikas had an idea to settle this dispute: Xedsi, that is a traditional majuvedian fighting technique. Others complained about this being too majuveda specific. Eventually, Kijat calmed the discussion down and asked first those who are for the plan and then those who are against the plan to raise their hands. A close majority (the rejistanian expression for such a close majority can be translated as 'parliamentary majority' due to the many factors leading to the disvoting) was for accepting the Allanean proposal.

Discussion about the logistics started. Among the group were influential people at a pharmaceutical company. Ja~nhae Kalatasire decides that she will take care of the tests, which was accepted. Kamusera Ethana JSK simply works in a country, where the government is more 'efficient' in the rejistani sense of the word (ie: more corrupt than usual in the rejistani nations) so it would be easier for her to get human volunteers.

This message was sent:

May Kalet be with you,

We need a series of information on how this factor functions, spreads and can be defeated in case an unexpected situation (the proverbial collision of fecal matter and electric ventilators) occurs.

Yours,
Ja~nhae Kalatasire

Dear Ja~nhae!

Simply quarantine those affected until the cold symptoms pass (no more than 3 days), then 2 days more to be certain. The factor will not spread after that.

Jaaesiua kali was never a wealthy place, in fact, the capital of Iusaeu tani was more like a sprawling village with a government. The economy of Iusaeu also never was exactly strong. If subsidence farming is an important factor, you immediately know that a place is dirt poor. The fact that Kamusera Ethana JSK has a plant in this city is an important factor. Every morning, a group of unemployed Jesets, Revjans and Hitos waits in front of the plant in case they need workers for a day, for a few hours, anything to get some xeke~l. Normally, an employee would read a few open positions and then some form of chaos would ensue or he would say: "No open positions today!" and disappoint the waiting people. On that day, the announcement of the employee caused a large riot: "E Siganivi! He jiru! Kesera! Listen! This company searches volunteers for a medical study. It requires complete isolation for at least 2 weeks! High risk! The pay is 5000 xeke~l in total!" At this moment, the proverbial hell broke loose.

----

"About the results..." an employee stuttered.

"Su?" asked Ja~nhae Kalatasire

"Jie... hesera... mi'ala---"

"Speak Rejistanian! My Revjan is latunuek! And don't fear that I bite! If I do, I am quick enough so you won't even realize it!"

"Yeeeees, Many things were found in the study! Ungood results over a certain spectrum. I compiled a list for you."

"Excellent. What is your impression?"

"I think some are faking to get a higher payment. This is, I mean... I do not want to insult, but... 3rd world."

"Immoral behavior exists in all places, but I agree that many volunteers had a monetary interest in faking syndromes. What makes you think that they did fake?"

"The inconclusiveness of this. There seems to be a very specific pattern for the symptoms which are described. And experience with this area..." his mimic moves in the same way as it would if he had to carry someone else's vomit in his bare hands.

"Okay. Tell the people that if their symptoms remain constant further isolation is required. This should be a good non-monetary factor to entice more honesty."

"Or to cook the books in another direction."

"Yes, but since the monetary factor remains, a better balance is reached. Send the preliminary results to the Allaneans, maybe they see something it is, we don't."

"Yes!"

Dear Friends!

Our people in DREAD are concerned of the issue of results being faked. But there is an interesting question we would like to ask: Do you track those who have left your experiment? Have they adopted to social life post-chi factor? If yes, then we can begin our project.

Yours in Liberty,
Colonel Thomas Morrison,
Army Special Operations Branch.

ISOR,

Of course, you are aware that the results are preliminary and that the study is not yet finished. Probably these facts were lost in translation into English though.

Yours,
Kiilea Jamu~n,
Department of Research and development, Kamusera Ethana JSK

----

"Jamu~n'he? Do you have a minute?" asked Ja~nhae Kalatasire one of her research experts, who designed the study.

"Ve, tahoj!"

"Well... I think the Allaneans tried to be subtle."

"I am not sure what you mean?"

"I think they subtly wanted to criticize the design of the study."

"Ha... They know where the study is taking place? mer'Iusaeu mer'tani! Tani hanilenly selme*!"

"May I remind you that you are a citizen**?"

"I can't help that, but as soon as I get the chance of another citizenship, I'd gladly accept!"

"Anyways, what does this have to do with the design?"

"The Iusaeuns try valiantly to get advantages. This is of course, why we misdirected them. they think the test is about physical issues, this of course means they present their mental side unguarded."

"Good point, I will hint at that."

------

"Okay, Rila, you know what to do?"

"Yeah, don't treat me like a retard just because I am female!"

"I treat you like a retard because you're a foreigner."

"You are superioristic?"

"No, I just think anyone who gives up a job in Hetkali to work here must get his head checked!"

"Haha! That's the center speaking!"

"Rehearse it for me, please."

"I stand behind the one-way transparent mirror and check for any signs of abnormal behavior when the patients see their visitors. I list the strange forms of behavior here and in case of a threat of violence, I will not intervene but call security!"

"Okay!"

----

Rila and a group of other experts were in the observation room. There were experts in the different involved cultures, stenographers, a priest, other psychologists. The patients were somewhat disoriented in the room, they did not like being confined. However, they did not seem to suspect anything unusual of the mirrors. The families were in serious civilization shock. Of course, Rila heard the bullshit about the 'second age of prosperity' which remains in the far future, but in this moment, she understood a bit about this. These people lived in shacks, tandesi'ny or tiny houses, which had seen better days, but probably everyone of them has a TV set. They probably all knew the soap operas about the rich and beautiful, who do not live in Iusaeu, but in places with well-sounding names like Kalisimu, Jinhes, Najajara or even Sike. The were very cauious in approaching their families. They were unsure about their family members. They seemed to be aware of a certain change. Rila got immersed into checking the reactions of the patients, she was able to ignore the sounds of the others in her room. After about 3 hours, the time for visits passed and she could evaluate her notes.

----

"This is definitely interesting!" Linguist Alekim Jhari exclaimed why studying her notes

"What is?" Asked psychologist Rila Sanaku.

"This!" She points to a strange diagram on the screen of her Kanaxivari-computer.

"I do not understand this!"

"It is a distributrional chart! It shows the amount of nouns, verbs, adjectives, pronouns, articles and xanjied forms of them."

"oh?"

"The rejistani languages have very transparent borders between the word classes, you know that?"

"You mean like in Hetkali tani, the term tani is not a noun but an adjective?"

"It is a qualificational adjective or a xanjied noun, but yeah!"

"A noun?"

"Yeah, but this has more to do with comparisons between different languages."

"So what is the point of this diagram?"

"A distribution chart is unique for every language. It has a certain amount of variation, of course. A lawyer speaks differently than a butcher. Let me show you a norm.chart for Revjan."

Another colorful chart appeared after a few keystrokes.

The lajikan linguist explained. "This is the standard chart for Revjan. We call a standard chart also an Etval chart. Now I'll add RMS."

Upper and lower bounds appeared.

"And now let me integrate the first chart, I showed you, okay?"

"Veka!"

New lines appeared somewhat oblivious to the upper and lower bounds.

"You see the different pattern? there is often more deviation, than we can expect!"

"Yes... Can it be a local accent?"

"No, friends and families of the patients use a more standard compliant pattern. I show you!"

Another series of lines appeared, this time within the bounds of the root mean square deviation.

Rila asked: "How does this manifest? I can not see anything in this."

A few keypresses showed text in all sorts of colors, often the letters of a word were in 3 or 4 colors. Rila understood that this was a syntax highlighting for a text in a natural language.

"You see this, su?" Alekim pointed to a sentence, more exactly: to one word of it.

"My Revjan is not very good."

"It doesn't matter: 'Jionhir itabla'! This is constructed without qualification, any teacher would correct a student who does not have a very good reason for it to 'Jionhir tabla'. This is like saying... City of Sike instead of Sike City***!"

"Okay, so we found the first minor difference?"

"Minor? You have no idea what minor means! remember that all laws and regulations are codified in a very specific language. Remember that words and grammar can often be used to carry very subtle meanings! Slani, remember that all culture is based on that! There were wars about certain ways to understand language! And you have the nerve to call it minor."

"Well, I guess even now, they would be able to understand from a legal text that stealing is bad. Or get the basic meaning from the fable of Ala. Most people wouldn't realize it."

"Well, if you assume most people are uncultured persons."

"I will not get into that with you! I did see that a certain confusion stemming from this, but it was minor, they got over it very quickly."

"Lanjamesit****... It worries me definitely!"

----

The final report which was sent to the Allaneans and to Kijat Lariha's group had other than this linguistic deviation very few effects which manifested over the language borders. Certain patterns in communication changed, the psychological basis of this seemed to be confusion about the intention of the other person. it was mild but statistically significant.


* OOC: No translation here, there are children on this board :)

** OOC: she refers to the taboo in many places to insult the country in front of foreigners

*** OOC: In the untranslated text this would be 'kali'het Sike' vs 'Sike'ha kali'

**** OOC: lanjamesit is similar to the term maybe but has a connotation of 'not likely'.

From the depths of the Department for Special Operations, the response came:

Dear friends!

The language anomalities are within the norm, considering the transformations in the recipients' perception. The language is a reflection of one's perception and thought. We believe that this is within te range of healthy responses, and as long as no psychoses manifest themselves, we would like to begin with Phase One of the operation, specifically, moving a single carrier battlegroup into range of your country.

Please respond if you wish to authorize these proceedings.

Yours in Liberty,
Colonel Thomas Morrison,
Army Special Operations Branch.

OOC: I'll post tomorrow! I haven't forgotten about this thread!

The discussion raged for quite a time. The meeting took place in Jaaesiua kali and many people felt that the location was somewhat below the comfort, they deserved. One of the people said he deducted everything there is to know about this place when he saw a young girl on the street, who offered intercessory prayers for a small donation.

They did not meet in a hotel but in a conference room of Kamusera Ethana JSK. The local newspaper ran a small article about the fact that Kiuri~l Tanhil was seen in the city and started rumors about a hostile takeover of Kamusera Ethana by Tanhiltek JSK.

The discussion was heated, one of the volunteers spoke to the group and even those, who understood his Hito had issues understanding him. This could be only partially be explained by the strange 'semi-central' accent, which is rather common in nations in central Rejistania but far away from Sike kali. Others also spoke semi-central hito and were understood better. Elin J'akiri argued laconically that it makes no sense to give up Rejistania to unite it. Inxa Senijxava replied that language evolves and then said in very antiquated Majuvedian that it is the point of languages to accommodate for changes.

A few hours later, when the discussion was postponed, the person, who commented about the young esina badly went to her. "Young one, are you inikresaist?"

"Yes, tahoj! I adhere to the teachings of the Xarix and of the Hanta denomination."

"Can you pray to the god of wisdom to help me with one hard decision?"

"To Alikimnerajausikansa?"

"That is the name, which this area uses, yes. I have to make an important decision and I need wisdom to decide correctly. I can no longer make the complex movements in my age, you know?"

"You do not need to justify to me! and I am sure the Gods see your real intention!"

He handed her a banknote in translocal currency. While the nation was not Kurumaleha-ed, it was in a smaller local association, as such they did not have one currency but accepted the currencies of neighboring countries. Thus Iusaeu tani preferred the jaku over the local xeke~l.

Maybe it was coincidental that he later changed his mind to support the allanean solution, maybe it wasn't.

The majority, which eventually supported it was anything but big. A message was sent that a parliamentary majority supported advancing.

Far west from the Rejistani shore, 02:00 shipboard time

The carrier seemed to stand still, its shipboard light at full blaze as the deck elevators hummed steady, bringing two aircraft onto the front deck. They were not coated in the grey colors of the Allanean Air Force – rather, a black and yellow paint scheme, the kind denoting civilian cropdusting aircraft. For that, in fact, was what they were – AGN-77 Cropfighters.

The world's only supersonic, stealthy cropdusting aircraft took off towards the Rejistani coast. The engines roared in an even roar, without clatter or wheezing – typical, really, for equipment on which every nook and cranny was stamped Made in Haven.

Mother, this is Health Services, I am now turning to target. Proceeding at four thousand furlongs per hour, over.

Health Services, this is Mother. Drop altitude to five furlongs, you are going in too high, I repeat, too high, over.

The Cropfighters began to drop. The night was moonless, and they had to rely purely on instrumental navigation. Upon their screens, the approaching shore blinked green.

Bughunter, this is Health Services, do you see my exhaust? Over.

Health Services, I see you clear. Forming on your tail now. Over.

The cropdusters changed direction slightly and continued their descent as the Rejistani shore continued to roll closer and closer. Aboard the first aircraft, the pilot put his hand on the dashboard and flipped a switch.

Mother, this is Health Services. Delivery system open. Over.

Health Services, this is Bughunter. Flipping delviery system open even now, over.

The air around the aircraft screamed as the spray nozzles unfolded, cutting into the wind like a shark fin cutting through water.

Bughunter, we have targets!

There was a red blip on the first cropduster's target control screen. It was a Rejistani 'naval dock' belonging to one of the smaller Rejistani nations. It housed two elderly patrol boats, and nothing else of significance.

The pilot nodded, and said, simply. “Computer, resolve approach pattern.”

The ASDL/A33 Common Mission Processor, manufactured at the Praetonian Royal Air Company, accepted the voice command.It was capable of resolving an approach vector wards an enemy air defense destroyer in the high seas of the Strobovian straight – passing over some glorified fishing boats was far easier. Then, the comms system transmitted the data to the second aircraft, and it followed suit as 'Health Services' approached the naval docks.

Minutes later, the naval personnel would be woken up by the roar of four enormous engines, each capable of over 150 kilonewtons of thrust. Over the noise, the splattering sound of the Mix-44 would not be audible. By the time the roar reached its peak and the aircraft began to rise over the harbor – dipping to only a quarter of a furlong at their lowest point of descent – the Rejistani naval craft would be covered, prow to stern, in brilliant pink paint.

Several minutes later it would be dry, gluing every single hatch and window on the craft shut, and making any radio or electronic equipment it coated unusable. It would require many hours of work to scrape it off.

Location: Asauxu harbor, near Nteh~sa kali.
Time: 23:30 (Jinhes Standard Time)

Jelsa Amituvela skated to the harbor. Her t-shirt with the logo of a local pizza delivery service was wet of sweat and rain. The harbor was not exactly near the city, but they were the best customers of this service, so no one would dare to complain. She heard a strange sound approaching the harbor, she did not see much but what obscurred the stars was enough to make her gasp. "keva'm- xilat'sen*!" she cursed, proving that the biggest loss which would happen if religion disappeared from the face of the planet would be the loss of most of the curses. She still started approaching the harbor assuming that the military was doing some form of practice. It became however too loud. She stopped, hid and waited until the noise passed. "Selme kovomin**!" she cursed quite secularly. "These slaniards want me to bring pizza during a training! Not with me!" She did not hear her own voice, she remembered opening her mouth to prevent the loss of hearing.

Inside the Kansu Jui, seamen were playing Kalui or Poker for lilek'ny. The noise made the Asukheri nervous and Lhinki Ntea made the mistake of looking at what caused the noise. The Lajiki first could not see anything at all. It was too dark to make out anything. Also, the noise seemed to be from a bad angle and starting to get louder. he rushed inside. "Hanh-hi-le... What's this happening? Han!" No one had any clue, Hisikanvali Kaluru radio-ed Nteh~sa, who had no idea as well. Another series of curses crossed the ether. Suddenly the connection failed. And then the curses were only audible locally.

Jelsa Amituvela's boss was not pleased with her, despite her dramatic description of what happened, he did not care. They ordered, they should get it! After a series of again religiously inspired curses (albeit this time from another religion), Jelsa again skated into the same direction. As only means to her safety, she carried a flashlight. Soon, she was on the road again, disregarding traffic lights, the right of way, one-way streets, 90% of the rest of the road traffic regulations and the rules of inter-tanic relations because delays over a certain amount are deducted from her already inflation-diminished wage. She knew that the price of food was on the rise, and the price of weed even more. She knew the harbor fortunately. Thus she used her flashlight only to fend off vegetation on the last meters. Some branches were always in her way on the somewhat sloping street to the place listed and she preferred them not to strike her. She shifted her body-weight to take the last curve at full speed. She could only in fractions of seconds realize something was wrong, then the usual, flat and smooth surface made her loose control and fall into the water! "Jesus, Marija ve Josevu!" she cursed.


"the only thing, which will remain in the end is the call for those responsible" ~Laxtu Takil

The First Lentine of Asukheru was not a happy person upon hearing about this incident. Yes, Asukheru tani was still independent except for the membership of the Association of Rejistani nations and she defended this neutrality and independence. In his opinion, the classical three aims from the rejistani motto (tolerance, peace and prosperity) did not anyhow correlate with some form of tanic agenda. Now, the nation was attacked by an opponent, he had no idea of. Probably some kind of ressource heavy terrorism. Remembering an old classic, he demanded: "Round up the usual suspects!"


*OOC: Translation: "My father in the sky"
**OOC: Translation: "debt of the government"

Off the shore of Asukheru

“Entering flight corridor now, active defenses are on.” - the flight captain said loudly as he flipped multiple switches on his control dashboard. In the soundproofed cockpit of the Ouroboros, the nuclear-driven engines of the giant aircraft were only a powerful hum - but not the raging horror that they would be had the soundproofing not existed.

The switches that the captain just flipped turned on an array of CIWS and other anti-missile countermeasures. There was now a very good chance that if an S-300 or similar missile were fired at the cargo plane, it would be shot down. But, of course, the people in Asukheru did not maintain such weaponry.

Happily, the crew was not instructed to attack them in any noticeable way. Rather, the idea was for the giant aircraft to be seen by the Rejistani fishermen, merchant mariners, or whoever else might notice the 1100-meter wingspan aircraft as it passed over the territorial waters of the small nation.

And for those who missed out on the obvious, it was painted with white stars almost fifty meters tall and the letters USAF in the same glorious white.

"Captain! Is there what?" The young rejistani, a mainlander and vedan (though it never was sure to which veda people he belonged), was very excited. Excited enough to mangle his grammar more than usual.

"Kiuu, young'un! Don't get excited that much over what is little!" The older person said and probably thought something about the youth of today.

"Not little, airplane, in-approach! Kimede'ny! Huge!"

"mi'halen su? We're no smugglers, we're fishermen and licenced correctly, if this is some effort of the Kjurumaleha, it it's no relevance for us! We're Asukheri in asukheri waters, neutral."

"Yes, captain!"

However, soon, the airplane approached even though they even earlier thought it could not get any nearer. The rejistani fishermen in Asukheri and Jasnian waters were worried. Many worried messages in local languages were radioed but no one had any news. The local authorities in Asukheru had no information about any JaTaMeTa*-adhering flight in this area.

Of course, when people saw that the airplane was not only a foreign airplane but a foreign military airplane, the tension rose. Only the most stoic captains did not return their harbours. The central military base attempted contacting the airplane stating that: "An obvious navigational error has been made. You entered the area of the soveign and neutral nation of Asukheru! Please stop your approach or identify according to common procedures! A complaint will be filed to your government!"

In other nations on the Rejistanian island, the situation was seen with worry, occasional Schadenfreude (after all, it happened there and not in one of the nations, where running water was standard**) and the Sikenian Daily even assumed that the pilots would be sent to court due to criminal incompetence (as someone read this exists in the allanean legal system). Generally, however worry was prevailing


*JaTaMeTa is an agreement of trans-national flights getween rejistani nations.
** that is what radio moderators said, it is not the truth about Asukheru, which invests in its infrastructure to make it possible even in the remote areas to have clean water.

Aboard the Ouroboros-D

"Captain Green, we have a message from the locals. They say that they'll file a complaint to the Allanean government if we do not immediately leave the waters of the Asukheri nation."

"They'll do – what?" - Green raised his eyebrows.

"File a complaint, Sir." – the Radio Intercept Officer was finding it extremely difficult to keep a straight face.

"Give me the that mike, Ashton. Let's give them something to complain about."

The Allanean commander grabbed the microphone. The United States had ranked in the top 400 rudest nations in the world, and Captain Horatio Green was about to demonstrate just why.

Hey you! Asu-something! Listen up! This here is an aircraft of the United States airforce, an Ache-Tee-Ess-Oh-Two-Dee Ouroboros. It cost north of forty billion bucks, and it weighs 200,000 tons! That means that this here baby has more tonnage than your pathetic nation's entire NAVY, combined!

Not only this, but it actually outguns your parody of a navy – it has more cannon, more missiles, and better RADAR. And it's not even a combat aircraft! It's a cargo aircraft! It is one thousand, one hundred and nine meters wide at the wing, and it can carry a fucking division of troops into battle!

Oh, you're probably wondering how it flies. It flies with eighty-eight separate nuclear reactors, so if I were you, I wouldn't want it to get shot up.

Now you're wondering, why am I here? I am here to reconnoiter the borders of your little pissant nation of a future Allanean invasion! So very soon, there's going to be a whole shitload of planes just like this one, and we are going to run you over like an eighteen-wheeler running over an armadillo, and then we're going to invade your country, pave over your forests, build Cute Bunny branches everywhere, kill your troops, seduce your women, and then teach the resulting tots to play football!

That's real football, for real men, not that cheapass Rejistani thing. You play it with an oblong ball and armor.

Now if you want to file a complaint to my superiors, go right ahead. I'm sure they will probably reward me for pissing off a bunch of commie foreigners, too.

But let me tell you this, pissant: This is the US-of-fucking-A, and we cannot be stopped. We have the Navy, the Marines, the Army, and most important of all, we have the Air Force. Enemy sailors ditch their ships and run away when they see our navies upon the oceans. Entire civilizations commit mass-suicide in fear when our armies approach.

So if I were you, I'd think long and hard about that complaint.

Oh, and may God continue to Bless Allanea.

After about an hour of passes near the Asukheran shore, the Ouroboros flew away.

OOC: no time for a long reply atm, but well, SCNR :wink: (It's all Starblaydia's fault!) BTW: it's "Asukheri".

IC:
Of all events which followed, one stood out in particular: The Public Prosecutor's Department of Nteh~sa kali sent an inquiry to the Allanean airforce regarding the identity of the pilots in order to sue them for the use of 'inappropriate language on the public airwaves'. It was never revealed who filed that lawsuit.

Of course, the inhabitants of the small haditera of neutrality and prosperity (according to government doctrine) were scared upon receiving the news. Whoever had dual or foreign citizenship left on short notice, others thought this all would clear up as a silly prank and blamed liberal allanean drug laws. Some stoically decided to stay, others stayed fearfully without a place to go. Some people made good business from this, especially everyone offering transportation, some people filed insolvency.

Training Area 56, Cloyster Coast Military Camp

Upon a forested area, secluded from civilian observation – in fact, the nearest Allanean civilian was the Allanean consul in Northford, 500 kilometers away – a mock-up of a Rejistani village has been built to full scale, and 15 'Target Tanks' were added to it - in effect, Kasahela Mark I battle tanks, converted by Allanean Arms into remote-controlled target vehicles.

Today, the DREAD decision to make moving targets from Kasahela'ny would prove useful. Painted in nondescript camouflage colors, the tanks looked real to anybody who wasn't a huge military buff – and even he would probably be distracted by the much greater shiny in the field – the Samsons.

Indeed, even as Allanean cameras were trained on the village, a pair of TR-29 Samson tanks started steaming towards it at full speed.

There was a small creek between them and the village, and of course it had a bridge – right until one of the Samson tried to pass over it. Naturally, the small bridge cracked like a match, and the tank fell into the water, which reached as high as the turret ring – but then, seconds later, it emerged, roaring like an angry elepant, the main cannon raised like a trunk as he swiveled it towards one of the Kasahela'ny.

Behind it, the other tank crossed the creek without even bothering to look for a bridge.

And then there was fire.

Within ten seconds on the clock, the two tanks fired 20 monstrous shells, even as the tiny Rejistani tankettes fired back ineffectually. The camera showed the puny 20mm shells exploding ineffectually against the armor of the 150-ton monsters, and then it showed the robotic target-tanks being torn completely apart by the far more powerful armament of the Allaneans.

The five extra shells went towards the worthy goal of razing buildings in the village.

After that, the tank drivers entertained themselves by tearing the village down with main cannon and mounted grenade launchers, and sometimes simply driving through houses and letting the weight and speed of the tank do the work.

The resulting video was then uploaded to Youtube under the title 'Allanean War Crimes in Rejistania'.

Then, the Allaneans waited.

Territorial Rejistania might lack political unity, it might lack cultural unity apart from certain obvious uniters like the rejistani language, the national team, the Song Contest and reja music in general, a small part of inikresaism which did not change, loan words in the different rejistani languages coming from rejistanian, and so on, but a certain pan-rejistanism surely exists. Thus, when the Allaneans threatened the nation Asukheru, many Rejistanis felt solidarity and followed the news with interest. It's maybe for the same reason, which makes inner-KaMaRian derbies often lead to fan violence, but as soon as one of the teams plays against one from Hetkali, all KaMaRians support it.

The video thus was first discovered nowhere near Asukheru but in Kalisimu (despite the privatization of Konihekta, many rejistani nations do still not allow DSL or other "non-cooperative" forms of internet-access, thus video-sites are much less popular than what could be expected). The person, who discovered it was exkola side student Tanma Ki, who had much time to wait for videos to load since she used her parents ISDN while they assumed her at school. She was really shocked and immediately forwarded the video to the local TV station Televisije KaSi, where her father worked. The result of this: she was grounded for 1 week for skipping school.

Oh, and that the TV station spread the news and caused a frenzy. We must not forget that.

The different nations were very eager to condemn the Allanean actions in Asukheru (and the Asukheri minister of the interior was portrayed as a filthy liar in-process because he claimed that 'the territorial integrity of Asukheru is intact'). Scouts were sent into Asukheru to gather information about the situation, Allanean web-sites were defaced when an exploit for a popular web-server became known, weapon-sales peaked, as did the sales of ammunition (more often than not, was existing law conveniently ignored by the dealers and the police, because territorial integrity seemed to be at stake even in other rejistani nations). Stocks in Asukheri companies fell sharply (and then rose because people realized how cheaply they could get shares of thriving companies, who might or might not suffer from the invasion), Allanean goods were boycotted, people GTFOed out of territorial Rejistania when possible.

Everywhere through Rejistania, preparations were being made as the people awaited the Allanean attack. And indeed, the Allanean attack did not fail to come.

At midnight precisely, the citizens of Asukheru were woken up by a terrible roar. As they peeked out of their windows to investigate, they would be surprised by seeing that outside, it was bright as day.

Overhead, giant bombers (http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?t=530912) with wingspans of almost one hundred meters flew, dispensing multiple flares – from the ground, they seemed like terrible balls of light, floating in the sky for no reason – for the Rejistani could not see the parachutes that held the flares aloft.

The bombers circled, and suddenly the sky was filled with even more lights – bright, colorful, and almost loud enough to drown out the majestic noise of B-22 Zeus engines.

The light was, of course, not great enough to blind anybody, but it would be sometimes painful to look at. For Rejistanis without any military literacy, the display was probably quite discomforting.

And really, it should have been.

For the Allaneans have been known throughout the lands for their power of subtlety, and the subtlety of the Allaneans is unlike any subtlety anywhere in the world.

For even as the firework display went on, the Allanean bombers also dispensed a large quantity of the chi-antivirus, hatched in Reijiro Techno's underground laboratories. It would have an incubation period of about a two weeks – enough for refugees from Asukheru to spread throughout the land by train, by car, and by air.

Of course, with the flashes, and noise, and the altitude of the giant planes, this would be different for the locals to notice.

Which was precisely the nature of Allanean subtlety.

A large amount of people fled to more secure places, they mostly found themselves in refugee camps, strange kente'ny or in schools. Classes in many parts of Rejistania could not be held normally because asylum seekers from the region of Asukheru arrived. Sometimes, they were nicknamed "invia'ny" by the residents because of their strange language. The Asene (ie: the Association of free nations of Rejistania) immediately got together. it seemed clear that the defense clause had to used immediately. However, Tanhike Jerem, the first lentine of Jinhes made it clear that a military victory seemed out of question, victory would maybe however achieved by destabelizing Allanea. The declaration of war thus was delayed three days (officially, the negotiations still took place) and various activities took place, more or less outside of the public view: Notorious and infamous crackers were pardoned by various nations, the first lentine of KaMaRi kali called people in the financial sector, who owed her favors.

The technique was simple: if the daytraders get fed wrong information, hy ely will ensue. If the public gets fed wrong information, hy ely will ensue as well. One of the most simple tricks didn't even involve high technology: various calls were received (if anyone would attempt to follow them, only a set of proxies in the HURD, Vephrall, and other countries would be found) by the Cute Bunny Burger headquarters asking for details on the balance fraud (of course in the hope that CBBC would officially deny the accusations). The callers claimed to be calling for various newspapers of international fame. The traffic control system in some parts of Liberty city had completely ridiculous warning like 'BEWARE: Amestrian invasion! Avoid the area of Liberty City!', 'TROUT MIGRATION ZONE!' or 'BEWARE: Car firmware hackers ahead!' Others just stated that the amount of available parking spaces was -128 or pi or 1 + 29i or other impossible numbers. The hope was not that people would take them serious, but that people would be distracted and lose control over the car.

”Greetings, this is the ANN Traffic helicopter, flying over Liberty-City. There's a six-mile – I fucking kid you not, bitches, six-mile traffic jam on Aaron Burr Avenue, heading towards Palin Drive. Apparently some dude hacked several electronic road signs, and this is the result. I bet there's going to be a ton of lawsuits against the contractor – by the way, the name of the contractor in this area is Lawn Dart, Limited, if you want to file a class action.”

“What? You must have this wrong, John – who the hell names a road contractor “Lawn Dart”?

“Well, these guys did. By the way, the ANN-LC Traffic heli is sponsored by Moses Rosenberg Legal Services – call them if you want to be a party to the class-action.”

* * *

Greetings, Comrades. This is the Communist News Network.

The markets had taken a hit today, with the LCSX Top 30 rating dropping by ten thousand points to a terrible 430,000. This is another sample of what economic experts from both sides of the political spectrum – Karl Marx on the left and Keynes on the hard right – term the 'instability inherent in capitalist economics.' Most specifically, stock of the Mulligan Bank and Hammond Motors have taken a hit.

The Senate and Congress leadership has reacted in their typical, antisocial heartless fashion. Senator Harriet Jones (D-Montana) has provided us with the following response when asked whether the Senate will vote to bail out failing banks: “A bailout? What the fuck is this, Amestria? This is Allanea, we don't just fork money over to companies who made a retarded financial decision, and even if we were so inclined, the Constitution does not provide for any power for us to do so.”

When asked as to her party's attitude towards the suffering this would cause among the poor and middle-class American, Senator Jones had replied, quote, “Fuck off, communist”, unquote. We of the Communist News Network condemn this sort of treatment, and remind our listeners, viewers, and readers that this is remininscent of the McCarthy era in Old America. In other news...

* * *

In the meanwhile, the Allaneans continued their operations against the Rejistani.

On the very day on which the Rejistani had started hacking Allanean networks – or rather, on the night of that day – the Allanean aircraft carrier disgorged five Havenfighters, painted jet-black and nearly invisible as they took off, precisely at 23:00.

Their weapons were an array of tiny guided missiles, each weighing not more than 45 kilograms. As the Havenfighters approached the long-suffering Rejistani coast, they unleashed the tiny rockets.

From the point of view of Rejistani observers, nothing happened – unless they were watching by RADAR. Then, the rockets' pre-programmed fake RADAR signatures would take front and center stage.

On RADAR, it seemed as though hundreds of strategic bombers entered Rejistania airspace at incredible speeds, and then went out to sea again, and then disappeared. That their disappearance was not due to high technology, but due to the tiny missiles disintegrating as they fell into the sea, was none of the Rejistanis' concern, now was it?

* * *

On various online boards, posters that claimed to be from various remote coastal villages, posted descriptions – and sometimes photographs – of Allanean aircraft flying over their homes, and even sometimes dropping weapons (again, pictures were often provided of burned-out barns or village huts). The rascally Allaneans were, it seemed, wreaking havoc all across the coast.

In a Na~ovikian military base:

"Tahoj La~esam, this device seems to be malfunctioning!"

"Jaimil, it just needs percussive maintenance!" La~esam Mikil slaps the device, upon which it displays nothing at all. "Oops! Can we agree that nothing happened!?"

"Nothing did happen!"

In other locations, solar flares were blamed, or bugs in computers. It seemed to be too exaggerated even for Allaneans.

Online, a various fora were swarmed by reports about allanean overflights. For some odd reasons, the people claiming it were all new to the forums, spoke a rather kalisimuan rejistanian (the choice of terms as well as certain grammatical structures were more similar to the polysynthetic languages of that area than of the inflecting languages of the regions, they claimed to hail from, if they stated it at all). It probably would be considered spam if... well, if not the KaMaRi Update and the Na~ovi National picked it up. Now the large majority of territorial Rejistania heard the news, not just the few people who frequent jatmi.kmr.rj, kalirete.nvi.rj, han-iltakil.ask.rj or temky.lsi.rj. Now one could say that hell broke loose.

Certain things happen far more slowly and nearly unseen than a nearly-clash with Allaneans. Among these things was that several radio stations started broadcasting in 'patriotic rejistanian', rejistanian flags were seen in more and more businesses (despite the panic, many big enterprises stayed open and tried to continue business as usual). The acts of the unificators was subtle and mostly behind the scenes. The discussion of the central asene* were largely influenced by the conspirators. Of course, they made sure to be tactful and careful of getting caught. Much of the asenical constitution was already in their sense anyways: in case of trans-national emergency, the asene has the power to act as 'coordinating entity within specified limits, which means that it can workaround national sovereignty to quite an amount. Also Jahane San was first lentine of the association of free rejistanian nations, who was not only a unification-friendly person, but also personal friend of Kijat Lariha. Thus when the association decided almost unanimously to declare national emergency, the switches were set for unity... or weren't they?

*ie: association of free rejistanian nations.

As the union of the Rejistanian nation drew near, the Allaneans commenced a new stage of the operation. A pair of Arbiter bombers were sent to Rejistania on return from their missions on the Blackhelmian Front. They would fly at the 25-kilometer range, far outside the ability of any Rejistani aircraft or weapon to reach, or the ability of Rejistani RADAR to spot – but, mysteriously, the Allanean military 'accidentally' plotted a course for them over the biggest observatories in Rejistania.

If someone was watching, they would see horrendous, 200-meter-wide 'flying wing' bombers (http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a229/MalikCarr/61ff3dbd.jpg) crossing over Rejistania's most famous observatories.

Measurements would prove the bombers were flying slightly over the twenty-five kilometer range. A consultation with an aircraft identification guide would prove them to be the infamous Brettonian superbombers.

But what was not obvious at this altitude was that the bombers were spraying the Allanean bioagent as they went. Within several hours, wind currents would begin to carry it all over Rejistania.

Jahane San looked a bit like an animation character in these days, she was almost constantly busy trying to get various institutions in the national militaries to accept the cooperative leadership in these days. The term unification was not used, but the lentine used other terms referring to the same thing without the odious smells, that the term unification would invoke. The rejistanian language fortunately has no dearth of ways to formulate things. The hideous classification system* did its part of confuscating** matters.

The fear, the Allaneans created broke a lot of people's egos, but not their simu and distrust. This was where the rather untypical lentine came in. She lacked the 'Grandmother of the nation' image many more or less long-serving first lentines had, instead, she often was clear, harsh, frank and rather young. But she did get people to hear and to listen. While the Sikenian Daily more or less hopefully called the way she handled national leaders and the asenic parliament a 'coup', others called the half-kireshi a lentine of hope and change.

Soon, the harmonized militaries of territorial Rejistania patrolled the sea and at least attempted to check the sky. Especially in the AJIJOJ (ameri'tan janek, Indusije'het janek, odisasu'ta'het'ny janek) areas military presence was increased.

Less obvious was a number of subcommittees which worked on better cooperation, coordination and harmonization in other areas. From fishing licenses to the health care system and many things inbetween (it does not really work with the latin alphabet, but these 2 issues are as far away from each other in the rejistanian translation and their alphabet as it can be). It would reduce, if implemented, the sovereign rejistani nations to nothing but states in a territorial Rejistanian super-nation. The subcommittees were not officially part of the Asene, but were created by the group of conspirators, who however hoped that as soon as the time had come, it would be implemented.

*OOC: notice why it is hideous? :)
**confuscating: confusing and obfuscating

In the meanwhile, the Allanean carrier crew was keeping itself entertained. Sometimes, a decoy missile was fired over the Rejistani border, to appear on RADAR like a strategic bomber. Another time, an empty Allanean diver's rebreather would be found on the shore of some remote village. Yet on some other occasion, Havenfighters would go supersonic over a small town, waking everybody up with their terrible sonic booms.

And ten days later a piece of news leaked to the Internet – a copy of OPLAN Righteous Glory, the 'Allanean Plan for the Occupation of Rejistania'. It was a massive, 500-page document revolving around a strategy to use the 'lack of unity of the Rejistanis against them' and to execute surgical air strikes against key assets, followed by a massive ground invasion. The writers hoped that no more than 5,000-10,000 locals would be killed before total control would be established.

Of course, the plan was a not-very-elaborate fake, but how the hell could the Asene know that?

Tisani'ny flew through the night to the determined targets which were approaching in associated waters of Ejisna tani. The quaint democratesque nation earlier had nothing really capable of defending itself and so foreign troops were sent into the nation. Halite Esevan Hisriu commanded the team of KaMaRians in the north-East of the country. The foreigners in the various nations were often from related places, but many still had a culture shock. Even though the Vedan and the Seleken or Lajik regions were bordering, there is a bigger difference between the mostly Vedan Jinhes kali and the mostly Lajik Sekevu kali than between Jinhes kali and Hetkali, despite the latter being far more distant from Jinhes than the first.

While many newspapers were supporting the 'decider' Jahane San, the mensekfa Sunteca was not too happy with her politics and published this cartoon on their front page:
http://666kb.com/i/b30jjbvvjyah04x4r.png

Jahane San was unimpressed by these cartoons. She violated all conventions on what can or can't be said by replying in an interview to the questions on what her stance on the cartoons was: "I do care not one in 1000 about the vicious slani which the lajikin regionalists and fragmentalists are thinking as long as what I say is implemented!"

Due to the undoubtly temporarily extended nature of the crisis, the defense case was extended indefinitely. the majority

On the same time, the breath of Jaortirkansa was perceived in the entire country. The non-religious term would be that the season of cold nights and thus of colds happened earlier and far more severe than normally. It added to the gloom and doom, the rejistanis felt. The theists of course had the advantage of being able to go to the temple and to sacrifice. It at least gave these people the feeling of being in charge of their fate to a certain extend. The Christians and Excelites at least had the possibility to pray really hard. Atheists and agnostics however were left no other resorts than to stock up on rice, dried vegetables and bottled water - well and to make a gun license and get armed (not that religious people did not do that, just to a lesser extent).

Besides a fearful preparation, the rejistani cracker scene were active very much. Allanean websites were systematically scanned for vulnerabilities and when found, flaming protests against the Rejistania-politics in Allanea inserted. Seleken crackers even appealed to racial preferences by referring to seleki-hashi brotherhood.

Home In Allanea

At home, the reaction to Rejistani hacking was multifaceted. Liberty Times published a column titled “Rejistania: A Battle For Freedom or Meaningless Interventionism?”, the Allanean Conservative complained about the 'excesses of the Kazanskyite neo-conservative Reich', and Antiwar.all condemned the invasion as 'yet another crime of the military-industrial complex and the statist Illuminati in charge of this nation'.

Other media had a different opinion. The Allanean News Network condemned 'the attacks on private property and civilian individual possessions by Rejistani hackers', and inquired why the military wasn't adequately funde. Fox News appealed to listeners from its New York office, asking them 'to support the troops and the President in this difficult time, when the nation is already fighting a war on three other fronts'. They forgot to clarify, of course, that Allanea was always fighting a war on at least two or three fronts.

01:35 shipboard time, aboard the aircraft carrier Cecil Rhodes

The Tisani'ny were detected on takeoff, of course. The exact nature of the missiles was not immediately identified – their spectrograph signature had not been present in the Allanean computer database. As such, a set of 'all encompassing' (and therefore somewhat frantic) measures was taken by the Allanean sailors and commanders.

Those who stood on the open deck of the Cecil Rhodes would see the night light up. First, on the very horizon, then, aboard their very own ship, dozens of rocket tubes would fire at once. These were only the decoy launchers – within seconds, Rejistani anti-ship RADAR would begin detecting not only a dozen or two Allanean ships, but literally hundreds, as if the battlegroup had magically multiplied itself within seconds – and of course, the onboard RADAR of the Tisani'ny would perceive the same change.

And then, far, far ahead of the Cecil Rhodes there was yet another magnificient flash – dozens of magnificent flashes, in fact, as long-range air-defense missiles were launched. Their targets – the Tisani'ny, approaching from over a range of a hundred miles. From here, it would be impossible to hear or see the large, supersonic Questarian missiles acquire their slower, more primitive targets, and envelop them in showers of shrapnel, nor to see the wreckage of the Tisani'ny plummet into the cold sea.

Yet the flashes continued, as the air defense cruisers launches smaller, shorter-range missiles, and the enemy rockets continued their approach. By the time they reached the Allanean fleet, only a small pack of missiles was left still in the air.

The automated CIWS turrets on the aircraft carrier swung suddenly to one side and fired short bursts – wasting no more than a hundred shells each, not actually aiming at anything quite yet. These were preliminary bursts, designed for the targeting computer to diagnose the system for inaccuracies and failures.

Around the carrier, flares rose towards the night sky, to provide any infra-red sensing missiles additional targets. Now, not only on RADAR, but also on infra-red systems the Allanean fleet would grow insanely huge – and yet more missiles strayed off course to destroy the new 'Allanean battleships'.

The CIWS cannon now let forth a continuous, high-pitch howl as they fired hundreds of shells with every second, exterminating the remaining missiles. On the decks of Allanean warships, thousand of spent shells rolled underfoot as the Allaneans engaged in the biggest live-fire exercise ever to be held in Rejistani waters.

Technically speaking, the Allaneans did not retaliate against this measure – as Rejistani civilisation continued to exist the same morning. And yet, the same night, a pair of Cropfighters took off towards the Rejistani shore. They were protected not merely by their stealth equipment (by itself, good enough to hide from any mere Rejistani RADAR), but also by several dozen decoys that had far bigger RADAR signatures, launched specifically to cause false alarms all over the Rejistani air defense network.

And the Cropfighters? Why, they simply flew over a Rejistani RADAR station and sprayed it with Mix-44. By morning, the operators would find their RADAR dish not only useless, but gloriously pink.

OOC: in case anyone but Allanea reads this. This thread was on mutually-agreed-on NaNoWriMo-related hiatus.

More than one curse was heard on the aftermath of this night. Among the things, which were painted pink as collateral damage was the car of one of the most staunch homophobes in the rejistani media. Haditekam Isviakali was very unamused seeing his car in pink and the doors unable to move. Others cursed for other reason, maybe because they saw the mess the Allaneans made, heard the noise when trying to sleep, or only heard the news and worried.

Jahane San was really unamused about the situation. In an address to the press she called the current Allanean strategy as destined to fail. Her usual tone was replaced by anger and confidence: "We will not negotiate! Not surrender! They are using our fragmentation and riva'tan against us, but this is no way, they permanently will win. This, our, territory and country will victoriously prevail if the people here unify behind it! A famous rejistanian minister once said that Rejistanians do not exist, we, today and tomorrow, need to prove him wrong! We need to become Rejistanians first to be rekijonal patriots second. We need to step together, to cooperate intra-rejistani* for acceptance, for peace and for prosperity! This is why I ask you, citizens of the national subdivisions* of the Rejistanian islands to contact your representation and to tell them to cooperate fully with the Association of Free Nations! Tell them, this is not the time for needless struggles for power!"

* this does not sound as horrible in the rejistanian original.

"Sik~hane'he su?"

"Is me." said the Kireshi, dressed in a bathrobe to the deliveryperson on the other side of his door. He was suspicious about the person. Normally these kind of people deliver legal papers and other highly unpleasant things. The only kind of thing Jandal Sik~hane liked to have delivered to his house was pizza -- and occasionally also Na~ovi-style duck.

"Veris Jasika! I have a letter for Janda~l Sik~hane."

She flinched. Could it be that the Mejinsiti government was no longer strong enough to uphold its guarantee of legal protection against the various sidhines, who wanted her in jail, far away from a computer. "Not here!"

"Too late, I heard you!"

"Am Jandal, no Janda~l" She opened the door, accepted the letter and signed in latin letters, drawing the tilde as a small curve under the k and h.

The letter was from someone who called himself I Hiki'he and who posted from Sike. What it said was simple: "Someone called Syku I Anik (SaLiTo'ra), better known as Salan in your circles was not able to finish a project. The exact reasons must remain a secret for now, but we do hope, that you can continue his work. Yours, I Hiki" Aside from the letter, there also was a disk in the envelope.

She was devastated. It apparently meant that one of her online contacts was no longer among the living. SaLiTo'ra referred very clearly to this, it was one of the phrases the superstitious mainlanders use to avoid even mentioning the end of a life. It is a common prejudice that calling death by its name attracts it. A few queries later found the reason: apparently one of the best crackers of Xentira was unable to go down stairs to get caffeine while lacking it in his bloodstream. If she would not have known that he was the most clumsy person on this side of the Tan-Ju River, she would have assumed a conspiracy.

Jandal went to the temple of Jaortirkansa and made a haditesemelika for the soul of Salan. Then she returned to her computer and browsed the contents of the disk. She felt as if she was obliged to continue the legacy of Salan -- even though she could not know who actually sent it to her.

The files were notes of a chaotic cracker, there was no doubt about it. They showed the security system of a bank -- one of those institutions who have more money than common sense. The systems seemed to be good, but not really something, which was well planned. It even lacked the typical feeling of a temporary solution which grew over the decades. All of the systems were too recent for that. The Jaynesville Banking Corporation seemed to lack the kind of people in the IT department, who got their technical knowledge from more than a bunch of shiny four-color glossies. `How would you hack a system designed by and for Sidhines?' she wondered. Then she got an idea. She went to the nearest Midjit Kanisama and bought a box of her favorite energy drink (a strange liquid called `Xju!' which had the highest amount of caffeine per lil'kansu ines). This night was going to be long.

A few hours later, the system seemed still to stand like a rock. Jandal cursed in a matter, her mother would surely not approve. They at least did not make the usual mistakes. This of course leaves various other ones to make. Those, which might not be covered in a quick course to system administration. 15 minutes later, she was in the internal network. `Does no one check whether the memory management of a programming language actually works as advertized?' she thought. She felt both happy but also mildly annoyed that it was one of these errors, which can not be fixed by the programmer and stem from nothing more than the laziness and lacking discipline to manage the memory oneself.

The letter did not tell what she was supposed to do inside of the system, so she relied on her own instincts here. She was not out there for the money, she was normally inspired by the challenge just to get into a system. This however was not her usual run. This was an Allanean and thus an enemy system. She had to do some kind of trouble. She had no idea how exactly this system worked (even though they did seem to use the same system as Ivanika Hetkali), so she simply created a trigger which would cause random failures to commit transactions and delete random records in these cases. This was a rather easy work in the dialect of PL/SQL which the database used. Yet, it would be effective and soon cause a lot of trouble, hoefully breaking the trust in the entire banking system.

http://www.geckoandfly.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/05/china_shanghai_stock_market_crash_recession.jpg
JAYNESVILLE BANK STOCKS DIP ON HACKING SCANDAL
Liberty Times

Only several days after it was discovered that the Jaynesville Bank's computers have been hacked by malicious Rejistani crackers, the price of JBC's stock has already dropped by an astounding total of 37%. It is not clear who has lost how much much money in the aftermath of this hacking attack, but one thing is clear: the Jaynesville Bank is going to be hit by this, and hit extremely hard.

While the details are so far unclear, it is already known that the Jaynesville Charter School Association will be filing a lawsuit against the Bank for failing to secure the accounts of the Association and losing the local school network over 1,500,000 Praetonian dollars. Local residents are also filing a separate class action suit, reaching a grand total of fifty billion Menelmacari credits. Other lawsuits seem to be imminent.

The legal experts of the Liberty Times believe that not all of these claims will be awarded by courts, but these are not the bank's only costs. As it is currently forced to shut down its computers until the nature and date of the leak is evaluated, we believe the bank will lose money through not being able to provide service in the meanwhile, not to mention the loss of consumer trust.

That said, we believe that the Jaynesville Bank will soon return to a semblance of normal operation – a few billion dollars short, of course.

* * *

Yet the Jaynesville Banking Corporation, though not a major institution in Allanea, was not yet dead. Though they did not want to exact violent vengeance, they would still make their new (and unknown) enemy pay for costing them billions of dollars, invading their privacy and the privacy of their customers. Yes, indeed... the Rejistani would soon pay. Sooner than they thought.

(I translated only the kireshi part of this chat, the rejistanian is left untranslated)

-!- Navades has joined #1000letik
<LiLou> Hi Nava! Il su?
* Navades nods "mesit, mesit! Il?"
<KyXiKeMji> Nava! Great to see you in here! What's new in your little edge of the known world?
<LiLou> it's okay! You were offline for quite a while... kovomin su?
<Navades> 1024, no idea where to start... a project kept me offline.
<KyXiKeMji> oooh, a project! Fun or profit? :)
<TARENkansa> let her off the hook, she couldn't even get to the bar yet.
* KyXiKeMji takes a can of Merkado from the fridge and throws it to Navades
* Navades catches it in midair, thanks 1024 and drinks happily.
<InivilaSija> Morning, #1000letik!
<LiLou> Hi Inivila! *gives cup of steaming hot coffee*
<InivilaSija> Hi Li! Thanks!
<Navades> I only do projects for fun and you damn well know it. I don't even want to be accused of profiteering.
<InivilaSija> heee, moral by now?
<Navades> Not really, but I want to keep it fun, il'ki su?
<KyXiKeMji> What exactly did you... project then?
<TARENkansa> Stupid resolution, my dear N!
<Navades> Nothing national.
<KyXiKeMji> Where then? Sike? KaMaRi? Heta*?
<Navades> Nothing national, I said!
<TARENkansa> Kansa'ny! You are a territorialist now?
<Navades> Me? Kinda. Now that Mejinsiti became nothing but a region to the asene.
<TARENkansa> Way to go! Nilhe'veka alnany!
<Navades> All hail Mejinsiti then?
<TARENkansa> That would at least be worth some patriotism!
<Navades> Mejinsiti can not defend itself against the attacking roadsloths! The Asene, Rejistania, has something related to a chance.
<TARENkansa> Ever heard of roaring mice?
<Navades> no. Should I have?
<TARENkansa> Obscure film reference, sorry!
<LiLou> Nava, na~o! Tell us at least where...
<Navades> Land of the roadsloths!
<TARENkansa> Really?
<Navades> Yes.
<TARENkansa> No chance in 10 Gogoolplex!
<KyXiKeMji> Please tell me that you are not behind this: http://sikeniandaily.jsk.si.rj/s14178de5a/jaynesville-bank-in-deep-chaos
<Navades> High chance!
* Navades does not want to be accused of bragging
<KyKiKeMji> Dude? You're fucked!

*slang for Hetkali

“This is the USS Mighty and Glorious, approaching target. Torpedo rooms one and two report manned and ready, over.”

“This is the Rhodes. You are clear to fire. Let's get it done, over.”

Deep under the blue waves of the ocean, Mark 48 heavy torpedos were released from the submarine. They sped towards their targets – not enemy ships or submarines, but actually Rejistani Internet backbone cables, strung out on the bottom of the sea.

“Rhodes, this is Glorious, we have impacts at point Alpha and Beta, over.”

Upon the screens of the Allanean carrier's bridge, FireTux displayed flashes where the torpedos had impacted their targets. And again. And again

Of course, Allanea had only two submarines deployed – they could not, by themselves, cut off every single cable. Therefore, other means were also used.

Havenfighters, taking off the Rhodes worked in several shifts, dropping one-ton depth charge around the locations where cable was laid, in an effort to rip it all up in several places. Within the first day of operation, 250 tons of munitions were used up in this manner.

Yet the anger of the Allaneans was not limited to such pathetic weaponry. A certain spot, over ten miles off the Rejistani shore, was chosen for a unique demonstration. For safety's sake, a day was chosen in which the wind blew away from the mainland – and then, a single Allanean aircraft passed over the location – a place where, coincidentally, the last remaining cable passed.

The packages detached from the Havenfighter – slim, graceful, gleaming in the sun. The packages were not painted – instead, their hulls were virginal silver, polished before the flight by the loving hands of Naval sailors.

The Admiral commanding the Allanean task force put his hand on his control dashboard, squinting at the screens.

Three... two... one...

He pushed a control button. All across the Allanean battle group, a variety of directional satellite jammers turned themselves on. Their mission – to disrupt and shut down the various Rejistani satellites. There would be no satellite Internet for the locals, and there would be no contact with the outside world. Except for that last cable, that is.

The Havenfighter passed over its target. The packages detached from the aircraft and fell into the sea with heavy splashes. By the time B-57 nuclear bombs (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B57_nuclear_bomb) touched the sea floor near the cable, the stealth fighter had been long gone.

And then, there was fire.

OOC: Do you mean by mentioning 'mainland' that Sumumusumu (which is an island in the West) might/will be affected?

Konihekta Mesit was a ground zero. Not that there was physical damage a uninformed person could see, but it was a center, that could not do what it was supposed to do: relay data from one network to the others. Nationally, a group of technicians attempted to regulate routing so at least national addresses would be reachable. Routing tables had to be adjusted and different networks that shouldn't had to interconnect. Fir example, the ISP U jsk used a foreign carrier to connect to the web which means that data took a quite long trip before reaching a local address. Now the networks had to interconnect in order to allow the users of U at least to reach national addresses and for the users of other ISPs to get to the servers, U hosts. If not many webhosting companies preferred U, there wouldn't be as much hurry and haste.

"Slani!" the loud shout was clearly audible in Jandal's little lair. For some odd reason, connections seemed to time out whenever she wanted to reach certain servers. And even worse: her download of Evankelije ines'tan - idjenus stalled. she decided to first go to bed and then LART her ISP about that.

There was a joke about various areas of Rejistania - always about the Acceptable Target of regional rivalry that if you wanted to bomb it back to stone age, you'd be finished as soon as you got the order. As could it be perceived, that turned out to be definitely wrong: Slekim, Ly'he'ny, Revuki, Ssei, Xanhatdi and Vtukuveda~n all noticed the effects of the allanean attacks. And maybe even more than the populated areas. While in KaMaRi certain companies just called it a day and people enjoyed a day without work, Despite the unclear situation, the KaMaRites, Na~ovikians Jinhesis and other urbanites did not lose their cool as much as a typical person from a hole in a state you have never heard of who is now without his Kekeken and Nininin. Add to this the fact that the H1SR matches would be coming up in a short time did not help. To quote the Kaiser Chiefs: I predict a riot.

The office of Jahane San never so much established a routine that was different from chaos, so saying it was in complete and utter chaos is rather redundant. It was however even more chaotic than normally, even though a casual visitor wouldn't have noticed. A strange combination of Rejistanian and various regional languages was used to relay the bad news. And bad news they were indeed: The Rejistanian islands were systematically cut off from the internet. The various high bandwidth connections were cut off one after the other. The military hastily prepared for an intervention but they had no chance in 100, they lacked a strategy except for vague interpolation, they lacked the technology and the preparation to be anything but too late. also they did expect the Allaneans to operate much nearer to Rejistania than they actually did.

The fact that INTERLINQ remained up the longest will probably for years spawn jokes about the questionable hygiene of the Radjavedans or the Kireshi. Rather kind people will say that it was due to 'very cost effective' sewage processing. It is just the way rejistani mentality works: always trying to find something funny no matter how horrible the situation is. Like Mercedes Lackley they see the best way to cross thin ice is doing it in a dance. Why this long and convoluted paragraph about this? Because the things, which can not be joked about often get publically denied to avoid discussion. This does not mean that someone honestly thinks they never did, just that they are out of the field of discussion.

TBC

Two messages were sent, one via radio to the Allaneans, one via satellite phone. The first one was in rejistanian, albeit it maybe sounded different than usual, for some reason, the sender seemed not to remember that aspects are a slekim (ie: seleken) or vedan, not a rejistanian concept. Also strange, seemingly irregular adjectives were used for the country. The second one was in English and addressed to Thomas Morrison. It simply said: "Are you insane?! Have you lost your mind in a poker game?!"

The response came rapidly. It was a set of formal surrender terms:

1.The United States accepts the Association of Free Nations of Rejistania as a sovereign protectorate and accepts all responsibility for its defense.
2.The AFNR will fund its own defense to the tune of 2.5 trillion dollars per year, as a payment assistance for the US military, and maintain a local defense force with a maximum budget of 0.5 trillion dollars per year.
3.Free trade and peace will hereby be established between the two nations, and a United States military facility will be established in Rejistania for the defense thereof.
4.Should Rejistanis wish, they will be free to volunteer for service in the United States Armed Forces.

Signed,

Maverick Monningham, United States Secretary of State

A message was sent only a while later, despite heated arguments in the Asene. Eventually, the acceptance of these terms was sent. Conveniently signed by Jahane San's vice Jeatil Jhara~o. Either this was because Jahane San really felt unable to formulate clearly, as he stated or because he did not want to fall into so much disgrace as Jisna Vari, who negotiated the first alliance with Allanea

Jahane San was in a bad mood. Unfortunately, this was nothing new to her recently. The First Lentine* spent much of her time doing things which, if he Na~ovi National knew about could end her political career swiftly: She searched refuge in both Asura Hanta and Jasira. The first was a meditation technique from Hanta-Inikresaism, the second was a local brand of hooch. However, she did not plan to end her political career before it paid of enough to retire in luxury and allow her hypothetical children a good life as well. To reach this goal, she knew that she had to remain in office for quite a while and longer than what was deemed possible in the current political situation. She had this one chance and as sure as kaskada'ny land on flowers, she was going to take it.

``Citizens, Rejistanis**! This is a time, where this nation, our nation must, definitely, remain united. The attacks on our country were only caused by the fact that we could not find together sufficiently fast. That we were divided and divisive*** when the direction should have been away from it. It has priority to overcome our regional, ethnical, prosperity and states related-related differences and to defend this nation as one, to create a Rejistania which does not discard its cultural traditions for the culture of the attackers. If we remain in unity via federalism, we will prevail -- in tolerance, peace and prosperity!'' Most of this speech of Jahane San to local and foreign media had the only purpose of creating a sense of patriotism, as artificial as the flowers in her office, by trying to link it to the more glorious times of Rejistanian history. ``I am currently conducting talks with the various soccer associations of this, one country and, believe it or not, the re-creation of the Heven... mje'het... sekhika... rejistaniha is only a question of time.'' The rejistanis almost went berserk upon this announcement. The Na~ovi National (which had little interest in changing his name now that Na~ovi was no longer a nation) used in the international edition the headline: "One people, One nation, One league!" While the article itself was critical of Jahane's chances of success, its headline went further than even most pro-rejistanis in speaking of one rejistanian people.

On the other hand, not all was well for the first lentine. One of the things she found out was that most of the military budget was, well, diverted. It would be rather difficult to make sure that the military budget was cut especially since some of the areas it was diverted to were unpleasant to deal with. To reduce the amount of lil'kansu'ny spent there would be a chore. It would be far more easy to remove real military spending, but they'd have the devil to pay if they even thought about that. Despite that, Jahane San knew that she needed to resolve the situation as soon as she could because she would not want the dirt-chewing Allaneans to get really angry.

In the meanwhile the re-establishment of more or less stable internet connections made the 'tani again a place in the world -- as much as it ever was.

* which is by the way a strange combination of English and Rejistanian terms. It is like calling a Prime Minister a Minister Mje'he.

** In the original rejistanian, this could be also understood as Rejistanian citizens.

*** literally: in division and towards division

The Allaneans had their own plans for Jahane San. Very soon, she would be contacted by the proverbial “Men in Black”. It turned out – to the lady's surprise no doubt – that she was the happy owner of a Mulligan Bank account to the sum of 25 million dollars – a small sum for the Allanean Central Intelligence organization, a great sum for a Rejistani public servant.

In addition, the Allanean government had implemented a project that would help their agenda in many ways. Specifically, they began transferring money to Rejistani papers that were favorable to Rejistani nationalism – of course, under the premise of classified ads being published for various contracts and government auctions. Secretly, the Allaneans were overpaying the nationalist papers at 500%.

Simultaneously, the Allanean military suggested to their Rejistani counterparts that they would begin patrolling the Rejistani seas for smugglers – now that the two nations had free trade, any smuggler was also a competitor for Allanean business.

There exists a theory that a specific series of linguistic symbols can crash the brain of those, who can understand them. While this theory was known in the various areas of the countries, it was not invoked intentional. Instead, the allaneans not even bothering to ask in the language in which the newspapers were issues however bad formulated was insulting to many rejistanis and asking someone with the least grip on the English language to formulate the reply a subtle retort. Not that they were against the money, but chalkpeople need to get a bit of a sense what is appropriate, su?

Jahane San should have been happy, but, spirits of the sky, she was not. "You are aware that as soon as this would come to light, my family would no longer be welcome in any place of the country? There are already stories which say that I was bribed by Allaneans, National 'reported' it, you see? Thus it would be... advantageous for the security of me and my extended family if this was not... actually true."

Elsewhere, people would be glad if they were offered this amount of money. Due to the war and the post-war slashing of funds to pay reparations, the support of the development of the OS Nariv/TAREN (a distribution of a distributed open source operating system called TAREN) was stalled. This meant that many developpers of it had to search employment in the free market. Their mascot, a kitten named Jhevaki~l looked very sad on the homepage where it asked for donations for the project. While other projects suffered as well, Nariv was most affected since it was developped in close cooperation with the government of Kalisimu for their computing needs and to secure the position of the country as haditera of technical progress and programming.


In the meanwhile, in the cellars of the rejistanian government a sinister plan was worked on: to break allegiance to the rekijo'ny, the rekijo'ny were split up into kalesa'ny and these united to 12 nanti'ny under the pretense that the kalesicism, which existed earlier was not workable. This conveniently both allowed setiling and to make the direct representation of rejistanis in the to-be-created directly representational convention independent of the rekijonal borders. The rekijonal convention would be the upper chamber in the new democratic system.

Some people in Allanea were not quite happy with their plan failing, but they sucked it up and lived with it. However, one man had seen an opportunity in the ensuing chaos. It was Alexander Kirillovich Kazansky, a man whose salary from just one source was over ten billion dollars, and whose total income ran in trillions every year. He offered the Rejistani half a billion dollars for Jhevaki~ l himself, to become a mascot of a new and secret project that Kazansky Heavy Industries was developing – a new operating system of a highly Allanean nature.

The team in Kalisimu gasped when hearing this and replied by the question whether that was a practical joke of some sort. It seemed to be very strange to pay more for the logo than the rejistani government (not the rejistanian though, it is referring to the government in a part of Rejistania, namely in Kalisimu) in their existance of the project. While Jhevaki~l was cute and maybe a good brand logo it not only seemed excessive, it seemed altenany* excessive, which unfortunately is hard to translate into English.

*a rough translation: the most excessive when the next-to-most excessive thing is far less

Aboard the SS Alex Comfort

Alexander Kazansky purred with pleasure as he emerged on the deck. He looked out onto the beautiful blue sea spreading out before him as he wiped wiping his pale, adolescent-like body down with a luxurious silk towel, his initials – AK – embossed in gold in one of the corners.

“Miranda!” - he clicked his fingers together. Immediately, a young lady appeared, holding a silver tray. On the tray rested a gold-plated cup made out of a human skull and a champagne bottle in an icebucket. She was dressed in a modified sailor outfit that exposed almost the entirety of her long, beautiful legs and underlined the size of her breasts that seemed about to spring free at any moment.

“Here, Mr. President. This is your drink.”

“Oh, Miranda. Thank you so much!” - said the Boy-President, dropping the towel to the deck - “Come, let me take it. Let us go to the prow.”

The prow of the former Doujin class super-dreadnought offered a majestic view as the vessel, nearly one thousand meters long prow to stern, plowed through the ocean at full speed, towards the territorial waters of Rejistania. There, upon the prow, a set of lounge chairs has been put up for the President and his staff. On the right and left of the Presidential seat – more of a luxurious, leather-bound armchair than a true lounge chair – small tables have been put up to house additional wine, cigarettes, or glasses for Kazansky and those whom he invited along on his trips.

“Beautiful, isn't it?” - the President said, pointing to the horizon, where the rising sun had painted the ocean in glittering gold. He stretched out on his lounge chair, pretending to ignore the longing glances his servant was directing at his exposed youthful body.

“Oh, yes, Mr. President-”

“Please, call me Sasha.” - Kazansky smiled, pouring champagne into what used to be the skull of the Emperor of Antanjyl.

“Um. Yes, Sasha...but...” - the girl blushed, staring as if hypnotized as the President of the United States poured champagne into her glass

“Oh please, Miranda.” - the man who was once Emperor of Greater Prussia smiled cheerfully. - “I did, you know, look at your file when you were hired.”

“You... did?”

“Yeah. So I know you were a member of the Oakland High-School Kazansky Fan since you were 12. When you graduated high-school – at seventeen, which is very commendable – you applied immediately for a job on this boat... very commendable. Come on. I know you want to call me Sasha. That's why you came here.”

She gulped down her champagne in a single, fluid motion.

“Yes, Mr. President... I mean... Sasha.” - she could not withdraw her eyes from Kazansky's body. It was rather obvious that something was about to happen.

“Mmm...” - Kazansky stretched on his lounge chair, sipping on his champagne. - “Mmm. So... I think I am going to find a different seat. The view here is great, but it can be improved upon.”

She gulped. Here it goes...

The President put down the empty cup, and, with a single, gentle motion moved across the gap between their chairs. He kissed her before she could say a word, his flesh rubbing against the coarse uniform blouse, his tongue penetrating into her mouth. Then he descended, his face now resting on her white-and-blue clad chest. “Yes,” - said Alexander. “I like the view here much better.”

“But! Mr. - SASHA! We are on the DECK OF A BATTLESHIP! PEOPLE WILL SEE US!”

“I hope they enjoy the view as much as I will. Besides, it's not a battleship. It's a yacht.” - replied Kazansky, his palms traveling slowly under the back of Miranda's shirt. She let out a suppressed moan of pleasure...

Later

“Oh. My. God. Oh. God.” - Miranda breathed out. Her body returned to sanity slowly, as she felt the sea breeze cool her skin where her partner had ripped the blouse open in the front. She hugged the Boy-President gently, to feel closer to the warmth of his body as he lifted himself from her and smiled, kissing her lightly on her forehead and the tip of her nose.

“This seems like the beginning of a beautiful day,” - smiled Kazansky, reaching for a an Emercion (http://z4.invisionfree.com/NSDraftroom/index.php?showtopic=4972) cigar as he sat on the side of the armchair. As he opened the cigar's individual silver casing, he smiled benevolently at the fan. “Do you smoke, dear?”

“Oh, no, Sasha.”

“Not even weed?” - the President lifted an eyebrow - “You know, it's far less awful than tobacco.”

“No... I get my THC from brownies.”

“Ah, a girl after my own favor. We'll get you some of my stock.... you know, I get hand-made hash ice-cream. Like the Arabs had. Except, of course, mine is grown in a lab in Rothbardia. The seeds are actually from Mazara Palani... Oh, by the way. I forgot. Did you check my business inbox for me like I asked?”

“Of course I did, Sasha. There was nothing there but a letter from the Rejistani... they seem to think there was an error with your request. They seem to think it is excessive or something, to pay this much for a mascot....”

“Well. Considering we're having this conversation aboard of my personal yacht built out of a super-dreadnought, crewed by my loyal fangirls, drinking champagne from Napoleon's private reserve from gold-plated cups and smoking cigars that cost more than some people's monthly salaries... I'd say you should write back to the Rejistani and tell them that they're free to ask for less money if they want to – but I'm fully serious about getting that copyright. But first... let me carry you to the pool.”

The office looked almost like a place, where normal government employees earn their lil'kansu'ny, an illiterate foreigner would not understand that many texts pinned to the walls were of purely humoristic quality. Instead, they appeared to be created by a formerly cheap and now expensive in its rarity typewriter and it made the text appear rather official and also positively old. The truth was however, that one of the maintainers created this monospace font and it spewed out of the printer in Kimsi Hae's buereau. Kimsi got the printer from some place, which decided to phase out needle printers.

Currently, he and the rest of the core team chatted with non-local and/or non-core team members about the Allanean offer. As typical for the team, they chatted on a publically reachable server, so interest, a SILC client and knowledge of the rejistanian language provided and any foreigner could listen to them and speak in the public channel (as long as he was authenticated by the cryptographic system). The status of the channels could be very easily described: pure shock. Kama had to add to the Narev FAQ that the Allanean offer was not a hoax and that the final decision was pending until the votes were in. (The Narev team was not a real democracy, but it often played one). Later, H~sik~hi Mahere, the project's lawyer, had to correctall the misconceptions, the Rejistanis had about the sale of an icon, especially one with the legal status of 'implementation via conventional usage'. He stated that he never saw so much misinformation on a single topic ever before. Despite having taught in an elementary school.

The local newspaper Kalisimu Kalesa'ha (Kalisimu District) found this on their website and turned the word-of-mouse (or mouth) rumour into actual news. Suddenly public interest in the project reached a new high, the servers were slashdotted and the actual Jhevaki~l was not allowed outside.

Eventually, Rae'he could only write that the project decided to accept and invited Alexander Kazansky to their offices in Kalisimu for the signing of the contract and the official transfer.

Naturally speaking, the Allaneans suspected they would not be able to arrive at Kalisimu by ordinary roads. Therefore, a flight of six large, black cargo helicopters took off towards the Rejistani city. In actuality, the Doomani Bellicus cargo/attack model was chosen. The helicopters bristled with anti-tank missiles and sensors. If an attack occurred, they could fight it of. The flight captain was virtually certain they could engage and destroy the entire Rejistani ground forces without returning to the Alex Comfort. But just to make sure, a new weapon was attached to the helicopters – a pair of large, black, 250-kilogram assault loudspeakers per chopper.

Even as they flew over the Kalisimu skyline they played music – at a volume that the pilots considered 'reasonable'. The Rejistani would probably disagree.

Of course, the military and the police read the newspapers where the story about Jhevaki~l made the headlines on more than one day. However both the the taste in music and the volume of it did not please the rejistanis. This was why the police already waited for the helicopters to land near Yjik Hank~hila Sede.

Even though (or because) the street was one of the main streets in the city, it was more often than not full of slowly moving traffic, not enough to really call it a traffic jam, but enough to make the speed limit of 50 km/h an unattainable illusion. The usual euphemism which was used in Rejistania for this state is called 'reduced average speed'. This was the reason why the Kalisimuan police arrived on motorcycles. As they guessed, the helicopters landed on the parking lot of a nearby Hakeme Mijit (a local supermarket) and in more distant places like down in Kanata SyLy. It is not exactly easy to land if supersticious rejistanis erect small places of worship on rooftops (which is done because religion on the workplace is often not allowed, but religion above it not mentioned).

A fearless policeman approached the helicopter which landed nearest to the Yjik Hank~hila Sede. When the Allaneans left the helicopter he came near and used American Sign Language (it actually was Rejistanian Sign Language, but these were very similar and exxcept for the strange word order, which he used (which was not actually RSL but ramakijavedan), it could be understood) to convey the following message: "K-e-t-l-a-n (he then made a sign to mean blossom, which was the meaning of the name), police department of city-honour, are you aware that noise pollution is an offense in this city? And, who of you is the handicapped person?" He turned his head towards the 'handicapped parking' sign.

Similar things happened to the other helicopters as well. The policemen were not necessarily deaf, some of them saved their hearing by noise protection like used by construction workers.

“Go, go, go!”

Black-clad guards hopped off onto the ground, their bayonets glinting menacingly as they established a defensive perimeter around the choppers. Obviously, Allanea's President didn't really need the protection. The goal of having an entire platoon of troops form a menacing circle around Kazansky, festooned with gleaming bayonets and clanking with grenade pouches, was merely that of impressing the locals.

And then Kazansky and his entourage began to appear – the man himself, of course, dressed in his habitual military uniform, covered in medals, but also his Rejistani translator – a young woman in a wheelchair with her hair died orange – Marshal Watanabe, a pale young-looking man in a black uniform – and a few other people whose sanity was... dubious at best. Of note was Miranda (whom we have described before) and Empress Isabella, dressed in minimal leather clothing and a spiked collar, as befitting the President's... intern.

The young woman in the wheelchair rolled out in front of the Rejistani police officers, and started gesticulating at a frenzied pace.

“Well, I am missing my feet – so until my replacement surgery comes up, I think I count as disabled – or handicapped, if you like that better. Marshal Watanabe there is legally insane in most jurisdictions, and he has a diagnosis to show for it. Now, I suggest you let us pass. WE'll be leaving a detachment here to guards the helicopters, so I suggest you avoid trying to tow them away.”

"May the gods help you!" he signed sincerely. "There still remains the issue of your... deliberate noise. Can you tell me who ordered this noise and to which name these... " he paused a bit as if unsure what the right term was* " vehicles are registered on?"

* but an omniscient narrator of course can tell that he was unsure whether the term or helicopter was an ASL term or a modern rejistani addition. It was the latter.

"These are government property. The United States Military, of course."

"And who of this group ordered the noise? And why in-the-sign-of-the-first-creation did he do that?" asked Ketlan'he.

"The noise? Pardon me, but I do not quite understand. There was no noise. Unless you mean the motors... well, and the music, but it was at quite a moderate volume."

"It was not within the laws of the city and" he nearly signed 'nation' but realizes his mistake and signs 'region' instead "of Kalisimu. People want to work, concentrate. learn or sleep. This is why I request you to behave inside the legal framework. Due to the intensity and duration, I can not just warn you and a fine is inevitable." He hands Alexander Kazansky a sheet of paper. A letter in (surprisingly good) English indicating that the city of Kalisimu had to fine him for 'excessive breach of the peace'. The fine was specified as 3 times the averaged daily income.

"Very interesting," - says the President, folds the paper and inserts it into a rear pants pocket - "It is to be said, of course, that this is a fine of 83 billion dollars... you do not, I hope, expect me to deliver it immediately, do you?"

"You might not worry. We give a one month interval. I am aware that you probably plan to wait out inflation. The Abysmalistan national team did so as well for a higher amount in national currency."

"Very well. Now pardon me, officer - I have work to attend to." - with that, President Kazansky and his staff start making way towards their destination.

"Please respect the noise regulations on your next travels. And good bye [literally: do well]!" he signed.

The office building of the Narev'he'ny was bursting with activity. Variou things which would appear too quaint like the early-generation SI were already removed. Except for one of course, which was put into a huge package. A sleeping, completely white cat with orange-yellow eyes and the name Jhevaki~l was currently in a transport cage, but now someone carefully put her into the package with many air-holes. Narev'he'ny were happy to hear the helicopters, making it far less likely that it all was a strange joke.

The Allaneans started slowly piling into the building - guards, then Kazansky and his entourage, and then more guards. Two guards remained outside, rifles at the ready, in the case that some bizarre local fanatic attempted to assault the building. Naturally, it was done more to encourage the security of those who might become 'collateral damage' in such an attack rather than that of Kazansky himself.

Kimsi Hae was excited. He and many other Narev'he'ny were present and were all dressed up in their best clothes, be it suits (mostly beige), long, yellow skirts which left almost nothing of the body uncovered or just jeans and the least filthy (and least offensive) t-shirt.

"Hello, Mister Kazansky" said the lead developer with a bow of her head. Her English pronnciation was not as bad as it could have been but that is about the best thing that can be said about it. She used the typical pronunciation which can be expected by someone who learned English from a kireshi and the s sounded more like the z in zone than like what was intended.

“Greetings,” - said the President - “I believe I am here to pick up my logo.”

With a swift motion, he produced a small card from a breast-pocket. “Here. This is a limited debit card charged to one billion dollars. Now, where is my cat?”

"Maybe it is possible that you come to the room of reaching agreement." said Hae'he (using indicative as form of politeness) she made a gesture towards the conference room. If she was taken back by the directness of the Allanean head of state, she was sure not to show it.

"Sure," - said the President, repocketing his debit card, and proceeded into the room, followed by advisors and bodyguards.

The conference room, because that is what the 'room of reaching agreement' meant in the rejistanian language, was rather small, but like custon in Rejistania, the walls were covered with a very squishy material which formed pyramid-shaped bulges to remove echos. The walls were in a light turquoise-green and the round, wooden table in the middle had chairs for about a dozen people. in front of every chair, a cup with a text in a rejistanian language was waiting.

The Rejistanis decided to go ahead with the transaction as quick as the foreigner wanted. "We have already prepared the official documents for the transfer of the rights of the logo." explained Kimsi Hae'he and pointed to a single sheet of paper in front of one of the seats. "If you notice something not as it should be, you maybe tell it, please!"

The Allanean perused the document for two minutes, signed it, and laid it back on the table, and then plopped the debit card on top of the paper.

"Well, gentlemen. I suppose this does it for the business part?"

Kimsi Hae and Syku Elan, the creator of the Jhevaki~l also signed it.

Jikilen Akiru disagreed: "Not quite. Even though this is not part of the contract, we do feel as if a real exchange should exist. This is why we prepared something to indicate the transaction which happened. And as a gift of gratitude for saving this operating system from... going away." (His English was not as good as the English of Kimsi Hae, he had a clear Jinhesian accent and more often than not the sentence melody seemed to be more Ehila~o than English).

He stood up, went to a corner of the room and brought a box with airholes, which had typical patterns associated with Narev's GUI on all 6 sides.

The President looked in surprise. "Well, you have a billion dollars. You could probably take a very long vacation now. Or buy a set of very good servers."

Jikilen Akiru explained: "This project was created by people with a dream of a easy, shared operating system and surely we will keep the dream working. We have a saying in this nation: The Green River does not only flow though Temekaryn. I think you might understand."

"Ah, indeed, I do understand. " - the President nodded - "By the way... this operating system of yours. Do you think the disributed-computing technologies from it could be incorporated into a... different operating system?"

Kimsi made a vague gesture: "It is not that we use technology, that is unique in this system, but we did design system here to use it in the way most efficient. I surely think existing Operating System cannot be changed easily towards this. There will be ... " she made a different gesture: moving one hand above the other and then, while keeping that hand in this position, moving the other hand above this, "... code far away from ymeti... from efficient."

"Oh, not efficient... wait a second. What is in that box?"

"The material inspiration for the logo... You know, when it was created, Elan'he, Syku, used a material inspiration. He did draw, he could see it during that time." Syku Elan turned his head to Kimsi when his name was mentioned, she made a gesture to him, which seemed to say: it's all good.

"Oh Gods everlasting - you have an actual cat in there?" - now Kazansky was becoming strangely amused.

"Yes, Jhevaki~l, the cat, and a ... Sistenhaines'ha of version early." explained Syku Elan in something only vaguely resembling English pronunciation. Kimsi 'translated' it and corrected the grammar.

"Oh, but this is precious!" - the President reached out for the box - "Why, thank you so much! I have a cat at home that will so appreciate the company!"