NationStates Jolt Archive

OOC: This is a brief intro to the RP. Basically what's going on, is Rouge Jiggady, Dyelli Beybi's Eastern neighbour has collapsed (ie deleted), Dyelli Beybi is supposedly evacuating their civilians, but in reality looks more like it's trying to occupy the territory.
It is also secretly setting up some more illegal activities in Jiggadian territory, so it can't get the blame for what it's up to, but please, read on...
Apologies to any Klatchians who can actually read the map, I may have got the city name wrong.

Now I said the RP is open. That is not to say that I'm looking for a massive war, so please don't come on and post enormous troop deployments.
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The world was a funny place, and Rogue Jiggady was one of the funnier parts. The Rogue Jiggadians had always had a luke warm relationship with the Dyelli Beybians at best. A Dyelli Beybian diplomat had been assassinated in the chaos that had spawned that Nation. Dyelli Beybi didn't like it when it's diplomats got killed.

Now though, the Rogue Jiggady Government had collapsed, taken by the jungle which had taken so many of Dyelli Beybi's Eastern neighbours. Dyelli Beybi, being the 'grand humanitarian state' it was, decided to help out in evacuating large chunks of the population back to Dyelli Beybi... focussing of course on the Coastal cities where the Navy could land.

They landed at Hammer Bay (OOC: First Port on the South Coast, East of Dyelli Beybi).

The landings were led by Commisaars... never a good sign. Out to Sea, the monstrous Dyellian well ships lurked, ferrying fresh troops onto the beaches. As the morning wore on, it became increasingly clear this was no small landing, this was much, much more. There were tanks, trucks, mobile AA pieces, artillery, and the light 'Sahariana' recconaisance vehicles that transported the Dyellian scout teams around.

At the so called front line, a Section of 'Fusiliers' were cautiously moving in to clear a street. The overturned, burned out shell of a car marked where a riot had passed, "OK, Lewis, see anything in any of the windows?"

"No Sergente. Not a soul." Lewis had a trench telescope, quite handy for looking around corners without chancing someone taking a pot shot at your head, "Looks like the Jiggadians are lying low."

"Know what's good for 'em, they don't have an army to look after them any more, it's only a matter of time before the forrest dwellers assemble in enough numbers to wipe this city off the map.... anyway, fold up the telescope, lets move boys, we're supposed to have the airport secured by noon."

The Section's radioman, chattered away for a moment, and their was a rumble of engines from a couple of streets back. A few moments later, an IFV drew up, hatch open, the man in the turret waved to the Fusiliers as the vehicle drew up, "All clear?"

"Yep." the Sergente replied, "Almost pointless isn't it, nobody's shooting back... to be honest, I think some of the locals were actually relieved to see some propper armed forces, especially considering whats been happening in the outlying towns."

"Yeah well, orders are orders, just don't get slack, or you'll be pulling a partisans bullet out of your helmet."

"Right you are Tenente..."

Similar scenes were being repeated across the city. The 'sand rats' had arrived, and arrived in force.

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Some miles East, the locals were also being disturbed by sand rats. This time from out of a submarine, "What do you be thinking the landlubbers are up to?" one remarked to amother as they watched all kinds of boxes appearing on the wharf of their little fishing village.

"Can't say Joe, but I'd be thinking it can't be anything good. You can't trust a sand rat. So what d'you suppose they be hiding in those crates?"

"Yargh well we won't be waiting long, looks like they're showing young Bill something..."

"Avast! Guns!"

The Dyellians were arming the locals. In fact they were coming to a very nice deal with the locals. Within the month, Piracy would plague Southern Klatch again, except this time it was going to be much harder to identify the perpetrators...

Communication relay from the Kraven High Command...

"Greetings... The Empire of the Kraven Corporation is currently facing many troubled protests in our own lands... however we are willing to dispatch 150 of our Capitol police force to aid in the evacuation of Rouge Jiggady... we hope that we can assist where ever possible and 6 of our VTOL transport/gunships are prep'd and awaiting the orders to launch... we await your response..."

The High Command

The Cheka hadn't been expecting any offers of aid in the Jiggady affair, they didn't need it and hadn't asked for it. It was all very puzzling. A few Senior Commisaars had met to discuss the problem.

"So what do you reckon they want. We've dumped A whole Division into Jiggady, an extra 150 police officers won't be much of a drop in the plan. They'd be outnumbered by the Political Officers. We've got well over 500 in there."

"That's true." a second Commisaar nodded, "I think this may be a plan to spy on us, politely turn them down."

"Actually." the third agent in the room chimed in, "Better the devil we know than the devil we don't I'd say."

"What are you proposing?" the second asked, all heads in the room were now turned to watch the third agent.

"Simple really, we let them in, if they really want to help evacuate they can, we could do with the extra transports, even if their police won't make an enormous impact. If they're spies, well at least we'll be able to watch them. If they're planning to spy on us, we'll at least be able to keep this lot away from the more ahh... politically sensitive zones."

"Sounds good to me." the first was nodding, "All in favour?"

Every Cheka Officer in the room raised a hand.

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From: Third Republican Army HQ, Saint Guineford's
To: Kraven High Command
Subject: Rogue Jiggady Evacuation plans

We are very grateful for the support offered, and readily and graciously accept. However, before we can honestly drop your Officers into Rogue Jiggady, it would be best if they were given some idea as to what is going on there. What we propose is that your Officers first fly the Theta Base, Headquarters of the First Division for a briefing, before moving to Hammer Bay to link up with the Second Division for the actual evacuation.
At this stage matters are fairly restrained, however as we progress into the heavier jungles, fighting is inevitable.
Regards,

Commisaar Smith.
Offices of Genorale Soult.

From: Kraven High Command
To: Third Republican Army HQ, Saint Guineford's
Subject: Rogue Jiggady Evacuation plans

"Thank you for your Instructions, The VTOL's are en route... we expect them to be entering your airspace in about 6 hours... if their is any further assistance you require please dont hesitate to ask"

The High Command
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One of the Many Airfields of the Kraven Corporation

6 black VTOLS sat awaiting to launch... their ram jet engines humming gently as Capitol officers marched up the ramp... their tactical combat armour shined in the afternoon sun as officers ran too and fro checking that all was in place for the long flight...

"This is Command squad 138... all squads are locked and we are ready to commence flight... copy on that Air Command?"

"This is Air Command... you are cleared for launch... alpha 55673"

"Understood Air Command... All systems are green light... engines are hot... we are cleared to go.."

the lead VTOL's engines slowly tilted into the launch position... as the ram jet engines powered up into an accelerated whine... the large black craft slowly began to lift off the ground... a few moments later the rest of the wing followed suit and the detachment was air borne... the engines all tilted into flight mode... and within a few minutes of being air borne the ram jet engines were hammering the craft through the sky... leaving 6 twin contrails across the bright afternoon sky...

Corporation High Command 1 hour after VTOLS launched

"Hmmm... Commander... why are we sending in our Capitol polce to aid this nation?"

"Public relations Grand Admiral..."

"Care to Explain?"

"If the Riots in Region 17 get out of hand... we will have a freindly nation to call on to assist in the total subjugation and pacification of Region 17"

"What if they take pity on the protestors?"

"Then we will know exactly how their military force works"

"But surley they will know our strengths and weakness's of the Capitol Police?"

"Yes... the Capitol Police they will... Our Imperial Guard... they will not.."

"Im still unsure wether this is a good plan or not... Commander... Keep me informed... if this does not go in our favour... Then On your Head it will be.."

"I understand.. Grand Admiral..."

(OOC - Im away from thursday till monday, so ill get my troops landed and then you can deal with the breifing and you can use them as you see fit during the RP until i get back and catch up with whats going on... so far im interested to see what you have in store... :))

The 6 vtols roared through the sky... bright contrails chased after them like dragons of old...

"This is Command squad 138... we are entering Dyelli Beybi's Airspace.... ETA 6 minutes"

"Understood 138... Continue as orderd"

"acknowleged Air Command"

the 6 vtols began to decend from the clouds... the ram jets tilting into a landing position the undercarraige... 4 metal feet lowered from the vtols fuslage... they approached the ground at high speed... the ram jets screaming in protest as they slowed the craft down to a steady speed enough for them to land safely...

with a heavy thump the first vtol touched down... on a grassy area with in the limits of the Nation... but not in the limits of the military base... despite the Nations leaders knowing of our arrival...they didnt want one of the vtols to be accidently shot down... it would have caused a lot of embarresment for both sides...

moments later and the 5 other vtols touched down... several metres apart.. the ram jets of each vtol cooling down... with a steady whine... making the air around buzz with heat and static...

"This is Command squad 138... we have touched down... awaiting first contact with Nation"

"138 we have acknowleged your arrival.. disembark and form up the tactical squads"

"Understood Air Command..."

"Command squad to all units... prepare to disembark..."

with a click and several hisses the boarding ramps of each vtol lowered.. the interior was dark... apart from red lights that rotated on the inside warning passengers that the boarding ramp was being lowered... with a gentle crunch the ramp was in place...

followed was something that if anyone had witnessed at the time would have had them stood in awe... each unit marched out of the vtols in perfect unision... each arm swang in time... each leg stepped in perfect rythm... it was the apex of the Corporations goals... Order... Power...Peace... they were the guardians of the Corporations rule.. and were the amplifier of its voice...

the units marched out in front of the vtols... and lined up side by side... forming a perfect parade ground formation...

from one of the vtols stepped out an officer... he wore a long black trench coat and a black officers cap... on the top of the hat was a silver skull backed by two crossed hammers... and on his lapels were 6 skulls... 3 on each side...

he marched down the line of capitol police... inspecting them... making sure they would put across the best view of the corporation...

the capitol police were tall.. each at 6foot 2inches.. genetic conditioning at birth.. and advanced cloning techniques assured that only the best of the best of the Nations gene pool would enter the capitol police...each trooper was armed with a gpmg, general purpose machine gun... each had the gun held out by the pistol grip and an attachment on the barrel that allowed the gun to be fired in a stable position while moving... and negating the need for a tripod fire base..... each trooper had a full helmet and gas mask with various optical mags, including Heat vision, Night Vision and Flare Comp...

Each trooper had full tactical combat armour that can withstand a high velocity weapons and is also stab proof.... the ultimate policing force...

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v399/HorusGodEmperor/jinrock2.jpg

(OOC A picture of them above :))

(OOC: I'm guessing some of the rest of Klatch will show up here. Dyelli Beybi is a very suspicious State)

Grassy was probably the wrong word for Dyelli Beybi. Baking hot worked. It simmered at 113 degrees Farenheit or 45 degrees Celcius as the locals preferred. The area near Theta base seemed like it had been jungle at one point, but was now, most definitely not. It looked like someone, for one reason or another, had deliberately poisoned the ground. Probably the locals...

And it didn't take long for them to arrive. When they arrived, it was in the form of a pair of open topped 4 x 4s, both of which were fitted with what looked like the chaingun from an A-10, along with all kinds of electronic aiming and tracking equipment. By contrast the Dyellians were something of a scruffy lot, while they were issued with body armour, they'd ditched it back at base, most of them had brought along their helmets, although one, a woman, wasn't wearing anything on her head at all, while another was wearing a navy blue beret. They seemed to be uniformly short, slim and with dark hair. The men sported a variety of beards and moustaches, some of which were probably due to them being too lazy to shave.

If the Kraven police had looked up any details on the Dyellian military they'd probably have read that the blue beret denoted 'Voltigeurs', who were supposedly some of the best troops in the army, (acting as scouts, snipers and commandos), although they certainly didn't look it.

One man, in the lead vehicle, stood up as it pulled to a halt, his moustache was a least well trimmed, "Tenente Mathias at your service." he announced, his accent could easily be mistaken for an Irish one, "You guys are lucky, you landed in a good spot, quite a lot of the area around here is heavily mined, last thing we'd want is our visitors from the esteemed Kraven Corporation blown into small pieces!"

He seemed to find his joke quite funny and looked a little disapointed when none of his troops laughed, "Anyway, we're sending out some trucks to pick you lot up and take you to Theta, and we can arrange some flatbeds to move your VTOLs to the landing strip."

(OOC: Will post more later.)

Regional Command Center
Anchorage, Northern Territory, Kingdom of New Shiron

Admiral Bill Sims of the Royal Navy read over the latest intelligence reports from Klatch. With the complete collapse of the Rouge Jiggedy government not long ago, the Dyelli Byebians were finally moving in to restore order.

"Yeah right, restore order my ass. This is a pretty blatant land grab I am sure of it. Although why the hell anybody would want the place is beyond me." He mumbled aloud, startling a young RAF Lieutenant who had the misfortune of being the messenger. "Lieutenant" he snapped, "Get me the RAF on the line, and Northern Fleet command. I want some drones sent up. I want to see what they are up to in that hellhole."

within hours the massive 30,000 ton submarine the King Charles V was heading northwest toward southeast Klatch. Shortly after, a surface task force, TF 34, with the 28,000 ton cruiser Monarch and two 9,000 ton destroyers (Battleaxe, Broadsword), plus a fast replenishment ship and Assault Ship McClusky (Essex class LPH, improved World War II type carrier refitted as an assault ship) were steaming north. Aboard the Essex, a steady stream of Darkstar drones were landing so that they could be checked out and refueled.

Meanwhile, high overhead, several satelittes were retasked to cover the area in a steady stream to provide real time data.

Meanwhile information was released to the press indicating the Royal Forces were observing the Dyelli Byedi relief expedition in Rouge Jiggedy and providing distant support to its Ally.

OOC
New Shiron is being nosy, but has no plans to place anybody on the ground on that godawful hellhole

The Dyelli Beybian Navy, formerly known as the Kreigsmarine, had deployed in force off the Coast of Rogue Jiggady. They had their largest Carrier, the DBPS General von Paulus in the area, along with the brand new Battleship, DBPS Alexigrad, add to that 7 Battlecruisers of varying sizes, 2 Pocket Battleships, 4 Armoured Cruisers, 4 Protected Cruisers and a destroyer Escort, and a fair few number of submarines, it was fairly obvious the Dyelli Beybians were up to something fishy... and that wasn't even counting the six well ships, 10 military tankers and 5 ammunition tenders.

The appearance of New Shiron forces brought a flurry of activity. Four ships, the 31,000 Tonne Battlecruiser Archer, 10,000 Tonne Pocket Battleship Calcutta, 7,700 Tonne Armoured Cruiser Jesuitlem and 4,400 Tonne Protected Cruiser Collins were detached from the fleet to make sure the New Shiron forces didn't get too close.

(OOC: DB uses a very old system of ship classification, for instance a modern destroyer would usually come out as a '1st Class Light Cruiser').

Tollan, Ilek-Vaad, The Tollan Massif

Supreme Republican Commander Ring had been watching the various military buildups and also watching the rather noticeable Dyellian buildup along the Jiggafian Coast. He had also been watching , with much greater discomfort, his Red Jaguar Command . The Command Generals had been grumbling. He had activated no forces and projected no power to discourage the Free Republic's Klatchain neighbors from whatever 'plans' they had for their increasing mobilizations.

He could feel Command General Itzcoatl's eyes boring into the back of his head. Itzcoatl, the most senior Command General, was rarely in Tollan, but the other Command Generals had called them and here he was. Commander Ring punched up the Jiggadia Coast on the main screen, quietly counting ships.

"That is a lot of firepower, especially for a humanitarian mission." Itzcoatl growled through his ritually scarred face, his black eyes like those of a feeding shark.

Commander Ring leaned back "Those jungles are dangerous. It is a long way from our borders, there is no need to get involved."

Itzcoatl growled "They need to know they are being watched. That WE are watching."

Fire Control was quiet as the two men quietly regarded each other.

Command General Itzcoatl unfolded his arms and turned and left through the blast doors, his boots pounding the cement floor as he left, the Fire Control leftenants watching silently. They all turned and looked at Commander Ring.

Commander Ring stood and turned to the Naval Guard Duty Leftenant. " Activate Tactical Groups Emperor Ehecatl, Sir William Issem and Namroth Vedic. Dispatch them to the international waters off the Jiggadian Coast, for maneuvers. Put Command Admiral Ilek in charge of the force."

The Leftenant nodded tapping the icons for those groups on his plasma screen. Within seconds the ships were preparing to get underway, from their respective ports.

Commander Ring sat again and turned to his right "Seargent Emael, contact the Minister of Defence, apprise him of the entire situation and let him know that we are watching the situation."

Seargent Emael nodded "Yes Commander."

With that things were put into motion, whose outcome was uncertain.

OOC:

Three Tactical Groups comprise of:

6 Revenge Class Battleships
6 Tollan Class Carriers
66 Jaguar Arsenal Cruisers
36 Trident Submarines
36 Wolfhound submarines

A typical Naval Guard deployment, for 'minor' issues

ooc
wow! all that for my tiny little task force... chuckle

IC
Admiral Sims looked at the various displays in the command center as satellites showed the rather large buildup of Ilik Vaad forces in the area. "They aren't actually part of the FKC yet are they?" he asked his deputy, General Alfred Bester, RAF.

"No sir, I don't believe they are."

"Well, if the DBs get too worried I am sure they will sound off somehow. Just keep an eye on things. Better alert Space Command though, it might be time to make sure the ships we have up hurry their ass home from the asteriod belt. Just in case."

Aboard the McClusky, busy deck crews refueled the 20 foot flying winged shaped drones as they came aboard. Techs checked their electronics and active stealth systems even as other techs ensured the paint and finish remained ready to go. One by one the drones returned to the skies on their long mission to Rouge Jiggedy. Other drones remained high above the task force, while closer to the deck gunships fluttered about at high speed, their MAD and infrared surviellence systems keeping a sharp lookout.

The task force reached a point 500 miles south southeast of Rouge Jiggedy and began slowly cruising back and forth, careful to remain in international waters. There the little fleet remained under radio and active sensor silence, relying on its smaller escorts to keep watch.

Under the waves, the King Charles V launched 4 of its smaller submarines, which quickly took up positions all around the task force to keep a sharp ear and eye out for any intruders.

Press Release
"Our Navy continues to provide support to our friends in Dyelli Byebi as that nation provides support and relief to the desperate peoples of Rouge Jiggedy."

Official Message

To: Dyelli Beybi High Command
From: Reichskanzler Helmut Kahn
Subject: Rogue Jiggady

"We have observed to a small degree your activity in the jungles with our satellites. I have no objections; just stay in the burning hot South, and we'll stay in the freezing cold North.

It seems neither of us would perform well in one another's territory. However, if you need help, it may be arranged, depending on the political climate of the Klatch, and the stance of my closest ally and neighbor, Vrak.

-- Kahn"

"Greetings... Commander? Is it?... my appologies... I am unfamiliar with your Military insignias? Regardless... We are awaiting your orders and are ready to dispatch at a moments notice... The flat beds won't be needed... the vtols are capable of rapid movment so using a truck to move them would be handling them twice?" The officer was a tall muscular man... he was in his early fourties and his face looked like it had seem some action... but somthing about him made him look uncomfortable in the climate.."I have to say this is the hottest climate ive been in yet..." the officer began to unbutten his trench coat slightly...

"Please? care for an inspection?" the officer smiled as though he was eager and proud of the detachment he was in command of...

(OOC- my apologies... i should have done some homework on this lol)

(OOC: No it's cool Kraven, I didn't really supply any info. You made some pretty reasonable assumptions all things considered.)

The officer shook his head, "Just Tenente, it's what you'd call a First Lieutenant, the top brass are all waiting for you at Base, they don't like coming out too much though." he laughed, "The countryside in this area isn't safe, but I mustn't say too much, they have a full presentation for you at Theta, seems like they've gone the whole hog, brought out some local weapons to look at and all sorts."

"An inspection." Mathias grinned, he seemed to do that a lot, "I might have to let you inspect my troops when we get back to Theta."

He allowed the officer to show him the detachment, "Marvellous." he exclaimed, "The discipline, superb, it would put the Bersaglieri to shame. You guys certainly look every inch the perfect soldiers, or police officers."

The Bersaglieri were the Elites of the Dyellian Army, they weren't Special Forces, but were trained a fair bit better than the Fucillieri who were the run of the mill infantry.

"Climate isn't too nice is it." he remarked sympathetically, "... but it only gets worse in Jiggady. It's just as hot and a lot more humid, you really feel it. Even we get hot in there." he indicated the rest of his troops, "And we're sand rats, we're supposed to be used to the heat."

The trucks had begun to arrive, while he was speaking. The drivers wore the same jungle pattern uniforms as the troops who'd already arrived, but had field grey berets, "Grey Berets are for Logistics and Engineering." the Tenente explained, "We try to be polite to them or they might forget to bring us our supplies... anyway, if you guys want to load up, we can set off to meet the General and get your briefing underway."

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In Hammer Bay, the evacuation had begun, while the 2nd Division began to push out towards the outlying towns and villages. It was here that things were going to get hairy...

At Sea, the enormous Vaadian fleet had resulted in a lot of very unhappy Commisaars in the Dyellian one, "We can't let the locals do what they're good at." one complained, "There's too many bleeding ships and sattelites and spy drones all over the damned show. They'd pick us up."

"Just have patience." the Senior Commisaar in the ground replied. They were onboard the Alexigrad. He was leaning on the railing, staring out to sea.

"What about the North Germanian letter?"

"We'll reply as soon as I can think of something to say that won't upset them." the Senior Commisaar chuckled, "It seems like there's a lot of interested parties dabling in this whole Jiggady affair."

"Excellent Tenete?..." the Officer spoke it as though tasting a new fine wine... then chuckled slightly to him self... "Despite my adversion to the heat... the Capitol police shouldnt have too much of a problem... the armour has environmental controls so should keep their temperature at a resonable level... Ill have the Units load up at once..."

the officer glanced over at the units then back at the Tenente... he saluted before moving off towards the capitol police lines...

"All Units... Prepare to Embark... on Transport Vehicles provided"

"Command squad 138 Reporting.... Understood"

Again... in perfect unision each unit executed a perfect right turn... and began marching in perfect time towards the transport lorries.. each holstered the Gpgm's into the side holster on the troopers back packs... and back to mount up... each grabbed the same rail... in the same position.. and used the exact same number of moves to enter the back of the trucks...

the officer beamed with pride...

"Tenente? May I ride in your Vehicle... I would love to learn more..."

as the units were loading up... the vtols began to engage the ram jets... vast clouds of dust began to sweep from under the massive ram jet engines as each vtol slowly began to lift off the ground and take once again to the sky...

Corporation High Command

"Grand Admiral... Lead Vtol states that First contact has been made... and Units are moving out for breifing..."

"Good... Commander.... Keep me informed when anything new comes about.."

"As you wish Grand Admiral..."

(OOC- might be able to get one more post in this afternoon or tonight, depending on when you post.. other than that like i said ill be away for 5 days but please feel free to utilize the capitol police while im going... just pm my nation with what youve done and ill catch up with everything monday evening thanks :))

OOC: Actually my forces haven't 'massed yet, they'll be coming from three seperate ports, it will take them some time to assemble and actually get in place.

IC:

Command Admiral Ilek walked out onto the concourse balcony on the conning tower and donned his admiral's helmet, the captain of the 'Sir William Issem' at his side with his comm ready.

"Who else do we have Captain? " queried the Admiral

"Emperor Ehecatl and Namroth Vedic, sir." the Captain replied.

Admiral Ilek paused "Namroth Vedic is based in Tyre, down the coast from Jiggady? Have them get into position and hold a spot for us. Get us under way and let Emperor Ehecatl know that we will rendezvous with them tomorrow, south of Costa Tula."

The Captain nodded "Sir." and relayed the commands into the comm.

Summer had come in Coventry and the winds were fair as the 'Sir William Issem' and it's Tactical Group slipped quickly from the confines of Coventry Cove. Admiral Ilek was looking forward to the trip, it was his second trip to the Klatch already, he hoped to maybe see some action this time round.

200,000 feet over Rougue Jiggedy several Darkstar drones flew racetrack patterns overhead. Essentially invisible to the naked eye, and with the radar cross section of a small insect, they would be very hard to spot unless you knew exactly where to look and spent a lot of effort doing so.

Real time video was sent back to Anchorage for analysis.

Admiral Sims watched as DB forces spread out from Hammer Bay. "Looks like its fairly routine for them so far. Not much harder than a glorified exercise."

"Yes Sir, I am glad our boys aren't there though." replied a thin athletic looking blonde woman wearing the uniform of the Royal Marine Regiment. "That jungle looks like its a bitch and the climate looks like its a sauna."

"Well Colonel, maybe next time." the Admiral chuckled. "Lets look at the feed from the approaches. I want to see what the IV forces are up to. Have they even reached the area yet?"

ooc
I reported the spammer above by the way

Admiral Vaca Aramayo took his seat at the command console of the Revenge Battleship 'Namroth Vedic'. The Namroth Vedic being stationed at the port city of Tyre in the Republic of Zorbus was only a couple days away from the Jiggadian Coast. The Admiral sat and reviewed his orders from Command Admiral Ilek. He turned to the helm "Right, ensign get us underway, half ahead."

The battleship cout out it's harbour with it's Tactical Group following closely behind, moving striking straight south until they were some several hundred miles from the coast and began their leisurely jaunt in a SouthEasterly fashion towards the Jaggady Coast.

*****

Elsewhere the Tactical Group Emperor Ehecatl moved South out of Costa-Tula, to two hundred miles off shore to await the arrival of Tactical Group Sir William Issem, from there it would take them four to five days to reach Tyre and another couple of days to join the Namroth Vedic on 'maneuvers'.

OOC: someone had too.........

"Absolutely!" the Tenente seemed a jolly sort, "Jake, hop in the back, I'm driving."

The 4x4 was a fairly comfortable vehicle to journey in, it had good suspension and the seats were well cushioned. The breeze had a cooling effect as well, The Tenente's 4 x 4 took up position at the front of the column, while the other took up at the rear. The vehicle only had 3 propper seats, although in the back there was room for two another couple of passengers in cramped spaces between ammunition lockers and the back of the vehicle. 'Jake' had moved to one of these, freeing up a seat in the front for the Kraven Officer.

"We call these Sahariana, they're a light recconaisance and AA vehicle." the Tenente explained, then tapped a complicated display on the dashboard, "It has an air search radar, and IFF unit inbuilt, we can put the chaingun at the back on autoaim, or manually aim it like we are now."

Someone was standing up in the back, manning the gun, "They're quite nice vehicles, although a bit lacking on the armour side." he laughed again, "We tend to ditch them before going into a pitched battle, but they're good for keeping helicopters and infantry away from a convoy."

"Anyway..." he turned sharply, suddenly, putting them onto a rough gravel road, "This area is a warzone, has been for a good thousand years from what I've heard, unfortunately the Jiggadians have got mixed up in the whole business, they built their cities in the jungle, and the jungle is going to claim them again unless they're very lucky."

The road crested a rise, and it became clear why this area was so burned, off in the distance, there was jungle, dense and inpenetrable. The Dyellians had cleared this area to make it easier to defend. And to the North, was Theta. It was a massive base, a small town would probably be a better description, with a runway that would probably take a 747, and enough barrach facilities for thousands of soldiers. There were tanks, IFVs, and trucks, hundreds and hundreds of trucks.

The perimeter defences looked in the middle of an upgrade. At some points there was a simple barbed wire fence with occasional watch towers, however in others there was a concrete wall, fronted by a fairly impressive earth glacis, foot trenches, tank traps and revertments, engineers were extending the whole affair, presumably sooner or later the old fence would be entirely gone, "All the different forces in the army have a different beret colour, the Tenente explained, Voltigeurs have blue, tank crews wear black, Special Forces have beige, Fusiliers wear green, Artillery have bright red, and Bersaglieri have dark red, I think that about covers it..."

As the column pulled up at a Gate, it was temporarily halted by someone wearing a green Beret. The Tenente flashed some papers at him, at which point he saluted and raised the barrier.

The inside of the camp was organised chaos, there seemed to be large numbers of men and women lounging around, smoking, playing cards or drinking. There were also a fair number of fully kitted out soldiers guarding one building or another, or just generally patrolling the precinct. They always seemed to work in pairs. Every now and then, someone in field grey would crop up, "Dress uniform." the Tenente explained, "Except for in that one's case."

He nooded towards a man in a field grey uniform with blue trimming, "Commisaar, one of the not-so-secret police. They make sure we're not plotting any kind of rebellion against the Government."

The vehicle pulled up in front of a building that stood out. Unlike the rest of the facility which was either concrete or wood panelled, this building was plastered in white with a red tile roof. It was single storey, and big. It probably had an atrium in the centre. A guard from the front sauntered over, "Would you tell the Genorale that the men from the Kraven Corporation are here."

"Of course Tenente." he saluted and wandered into the interior,

"You might want to get your men out?" the Tenente suggested, "I imagine we have a few minutes until the Genorale comes out." he checked his watch and grinned, "I imagine he's probably taking a siesta... ah the advantages of high rank!"

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

(OOC: Oops, sorry IV. Well we'll just assume the Dyellians aren't alarmed yet :P, they'll do that when they realise you lot are coming to keep an eye on them.)

To: Reichskanzler Helmut Kahn
From: Provincial Ministry of Defence, Cyro
Subject: Rogue Jiggady

We have no intentions of causing any form of disruption to other Klatchian States, one should not be concerned by the goings on in Jiggady. We hope no misunderstandings will arrise from this incident. If North Germania or Vrak has any concerns with the goings on in Jiggady, please feel free to contact us, and we will do our best to resolve them in a manner acceptable to all.

Regards,
Commisaar Reilly,
Secretary to the Minister of Defence

Exactly what kind of doctor that Dr. Wilbert Katz was, hardly anyone knew. He liked to think of himself as an adventurer rather than a scientist, even though he often used science as an excuse for his adventures. Currently he was leading a small party on a beach in the northern coast of the Gonad Peninsula. They dragged their rubber boats out of the salty surfs and collected the cases and packages from the boats. Within a few minutes they had deflated the boats and buried them among the palmtrees near the beach. Guns were loaded and backpacks strapped on. A couple of men and a woman were setting up a small camo tent nearby.

“OK Johnson, what’s the status? Any animals nearby?” Dr. Katz was a tall man, reddish-blonde and athletic. His voice was more used to issue commands than lectures.

“All clear. No sensors are picking up any large organisms, Doc.” Johnson was a woman, approximately 25-30 years old, with dark hair and light skin.

“All right team, let’s get moving! Wester, get that communications post goingright now!” One of the men by the tent waved in response.

Dr. Katz was a constant cause for headache back at the University of Katla where the rector had given up trying to stop his often pointless excursions. When Katz had announced his plans to explore the wildlife and cultures of the isolated parts of the Gonads, the authorities had fallen over eachother in trying to stop him, but he always financed his own adventures himself and cared little for threats. Katz had become quite a wealthy man, selling books, treasures and artefacts from his journeys. Some even said he dealt with contraband, but that might just have been futile attempts at discrediting him. Nevertheless, he didn’t care what anyone said, unles they wanted to help him. Now he sat on a distant shore, armed with cameras, lots of hi-tech equipment and enough weapons to stir-fry a small army. At forty-something, Wilbert Katz was the oldest member of the expedition, many were no older than 25. They had no plan, no guide, no really good maps (just an exact satellite positioning system) too little food and very vague ideas about what the peninsula had to offer, both in terms of obstacles and advantages.

“Doc, we’ve got an incoming message from Katla” a short man skipped over to him holding a small phone.

“They just don’t give up do they... Yeah, this is Katz. ... Just landed sir. ... No. ... Yes, we understand that you can’t be held responsible if we get into trouble. ... Yes, the elves sir. Thank you but no, Mr. Secretary. Yes. ... Over and out.” He threw the phone back to the short man and wiped his forehead with the sleeve of his khaki shirt. “Gods, it’s hot here!”

“We should get moving up in the hills and establish a camp before this afternoon, sir. We have probably already caught the attention of the natives and should remain on alert.” Ethel Johnson was the closest the team came to a guide, she was Karmanyaka’s foremost expert on the Gonads. Then again, no-one knew whether she had actually been here before.

A couple of hours later they had reached the top of the first tall hill. This gave them a stunning view of both the jungle and the ocean. Their ship had anchored in a secluded, natural haven cut into the rocky shore of a narrow gulf, beyond that it was all open sea.

“Doc, there’s a big ship on the eastward horizon.” a blonde girl with binoculars called out.

“Well, it’s probably a freighter or something.” said Katz and continued putting up his tent.

“Um... no, this one looks a bit like a warship, sir. All guns and stuff.”

“Let me see.” Dr. Katz tried to zoom in further with the digital zoom. “Yes it looks Dyellian. But this is only a smaller warship, the bigger ones are more than twice as big. Probably nothing to worry about.” He handed the bioculars back to the girl.

“Doc, actually I think I saw that ship in the same place an hour ago. It must’ve anchored there.” This was a man, thirty-something, who had tied a handkerchief on his head.

Johnson stepped up on a stone and tried to see too. Her amazing eyesight had already astounded several of the expedition members.

“They are unloading something in smaller boats onto the shore. But this is no concern of ours right now. Our number one priority is to set up camp and establish a perimeter defence around the hilltop.”

“You heard her! Get moving, team!” Katz shouted. He exchanged a questioning glance with Johnson before he got back to his tent pegs.

OOC: Just a little note. Dyellian warships are very distinctive. They have pagoda masts which look like monstrous, bulky extensions of the suprestructure...only the really tiny ships don't have one of these. Generally a single pagoda houses the antenae for all the radars and most of the targeters onboard.

OOC: Oh and I just assumed there would be at least a couple of Dyellian ships on the northern coasts of Jiggady. Is that all right? At least there should be no doubt whether the ship is Dyellian or not.

On a side note: Karmanyakan ships are totally free from anything resembling Buddhist shrines... ;)

Admiral Aramayo relaxed as the Tactical Group Namroth Vedic arrived about four hundred miles south of Thunder Bay and began to spread out in a defensive formation.

"Call General Quaters, put all stations on alert , have the Tollan Carriers put up an umbrella of at least fifty Orions at a time, and what the heck, let the Artemis pilots test their new toys, have two launch from each Revenge and give each pilot an hour or two to open things up."

The Jaguar Arsenal Cruisers slowly sunk into the waves as they slowed and stopped hydroplaning, the waves washing over their decks, they looked like surfaced submarines with lower , slanting conning towers. About one hundred miles behind them the Revenge Battleships Namroth Vedic and Sir Themirin Ilek-Vaad were a flurry of activity as the sirens sounded and the battleships 'sunk' as they took on stabilizing ballast, in case it was required that they fire their 28" Ship Destroyer guns.

A further hundred and fifty miles behind them, buried deep in the cruiser/submarine screen were the sitting duck Tollan Carriers, they did nothing special, just sluggishly moved into place and began disgorging Orion fighters five at time, until , within minutes, an umbrella of fifty was achieved.

Admiral Aramayo watched the screen as the deployment completed and leaned forward and turning to the comm officer.

"Ensign,hail the DBPS Alexigrad and tell them the following ' This is Naval Guard Tactical Group Namroth Vedic, we are in international waters south of former Jiggadian territories conducting standard shake down and testing maneuvers. We are not enforcing any exclusion zone and have chosen a spot that is well out of any shipping lanes, and hopefully will not hinder your operations. If you have any issues please feel free to contact Command Admiral Ilek, who is in charge of these maneuvers. I thank you, Admiral Aramayo out.' "

He relaxed in his chair again "Is the coffee ready yet?"

OOC: you can become alarmed.......right about.....................NOW!

There was no obvious indication the Dyellians were concerned by the Vaadian approach. They didn't mobilise any new ships, they just sent a polite reply to the hail,

"Message understood. Thank you for contacting us. We will notify if we move into the area you're in."

It was becoming clear though, aside from the main fleet, there were a lot of little Destroyers (Dyellian destroyers were what anyone else would call Frigates) and Destroyer Escorts, scuttling around the Jiggadian Coast, as well as at least one E-Boat, a rather large submarine, that had been built to go to extraordinary depths, and was shaped something like an elongated pancake. There wasn't any obvious reason for these ships to be there.

Four people crawled over the border of Jiggady, each identically clad and armed. They each had one Concremian Multi-Taser handgun, one .45ACP silenced handgun, one FN P90 and a VSK silenced sniper rifle.

They wore urban-pattern camoflauge, with beige patches and a light grey kevlar vest. Each had a PCDU (Personal Combat Display Unit), which consisted of a gasmask and black visor that was capable of a variety of tasks.

A strange symbol (http://www.freewebs.com/concremo/symbol.htm) was visible on their back, left thigh and right shoulder. It was embroided into the uniform in white stitching.

One looked up, seeing a blue reticle moving across the sky. That meant non-combat unit, with green for friendly and red for hostile. It must be a passenger jet or a drone of some sort, he thought, and payed no furter attention to it.

They quickly and quietly made their way across a small minefield, cut a hole in two barbed wire fences and found an abandoned bunker once used for the border guards. The nation was in chaos, and they would have to accomplish their mission in the midst of it all.

... and Rogue Jiggady wasn't the kind of nation you just wandered into. Most of it was untamed jungle. There were snakes that could swallow a man whole, the swamps held crocodiles larger than a bus, big predatory cats, trees which could ensnare unwary humans and slowly digest them (Klatchian Oaks and Strangler Teaks) all manner of poinsonous snakes and insects, and of course the locals, the original inhabitants.

Long before the Diocletian Empire, long before Christofi, long before Rogue Jiggady or any of the other States that had nominally ruled the peninsula they'd been there. Some people called them 'elves'. This was slightly misleading. To most people an elf was a nice, refined creature with no place in the modern classroom, to the Dyelli Beybians and anybody else familiar with the inhabitants of former Rogue Jiggady, otherwise known as the Gonad, they were cunning, murderous, Satan worshiping monstrosities. Creatures which took a strange sadistic delight in cannibalism and human sacrifice, particularly of the strange flat eared creatures which wandered into their domain from time to time.

About the only ones who didn't end up on the altars or on the menu were the Dyellians, who they killed on sight. Nobody (except the Cheka, who weren't talking) knew why that was. It didn't make a great deal of difference in the end though. If you entered that peninsula you usually ended up dead. If you survived you became a 'Voltigeur' (if you were a Dyellian, or in any way affiliated with that state).

In New Shiron a decision was made to forward information to Dyelli Byebi. Although it might disclose some capabilities, the large IV fleet was troubling as it was not part of the FKC yet. Besides, that might not be such a bad thing for the DBs to know that New Shiron could watch very closely.

the Honorable Lord Harrington, Key of the FKC, arranged to pass a note to the more sober of the Keys from Dyelli Byebi.

My dear colleague,
I have been directed to forward some information to your government from my government that you might find of interest. Perhaps we should have lunch?

(OOC - Hey im back, will post later tonight... :))

The Grand Admiral stood over a read out map of the area... his deployed troops... and the strange fleets that had begun appearing off the shore of Rogue Jiggady... the Admiral sighed and ran his knarled fingers over his worn features... the moved his hand up his head and removed his officers hat.... he flattened down his hair and replaced the cap.... before returning his quizical gaze back to the maps....

Dr. Wilbert Katz woke up and thought for a horrible moment that he was in his bed at home, and then he calmed down as he realized that he was in a sleeping bag beneath a reinforced, electrified steel mosquito net. Around the net lay dead insects that weren't classified as birds simply because this was the Klatch. Some had mandibles the size of garden scissors. Katz got up, shaved and went to fetch some coffee.

In the middle of the camp, which was surrounded by heat cameras and motion detectors, was a raised platform where the group had mounted a machinegun. The machinegun nest had been manned all night and someone had just turned off the lights, which had washed the camp hill in bright, white light the whole night.

"Everyone alright, Johnson?" said Katz, while sipping the bitter, black goo that passed for coffee on the Katz expeditions.

"Yes, Doc. And that worries me as much as it relieves me..." Johnson answered, her eyes scanning the foliage surrounding the hill.

"You think someone is watching us?" he asked, a hint of excitement in his voice.

"More like they are studying us, watching for weaknesses to use against us, and I imagine they have already found some." said Johnson in a matter-of-fact voice.

"We'd better be extra careful then."

As they started preparing to explore the surroundings, someone noticed that one man was missing. Phil had gone to empty his bladder behind a tree and hadn't returned. Johnson could see that it wasn't the tree – there were no man-eating trees in this area – which was one important reason why they'd chosen it. It was probably not an animal either, Phil would’ve screamed (at least briefly) if a jaguar rat had bitten him.

"It's them. They've started it now." Johnson picked up her semi-automatic bolt gun and fastened it to her belt. "We can't stay here Doc, it's not safe… We should never have come here."

After a short debate Katz folded and agreed to pack up and use the boat for quick daytime raids along the coast. They couldn't protect themselves in a camp like this. They packed up as much of the camp as they could carry, now that Phil was missing. When they climbed down the hill, Katz noticed that they had lost another expedition member. Rosie was gone.

Down by the beach they faced the next, much worse problem. The boat had been sunk. All that could be seen was the bow sticking up out of the water. A thin patch of oil washed ashore and the crew were nowhere to be seen.

The younger team members started panicking and everyone huddled together with their guns ready to fire.

"They're elves, right?" Katz almost sounded worried, which was unusual.

Johnson nodded in response. "And they've had us under observation since we landed yesterday. That Dyellian ship is still there, we should try to get there as soon as possible."

"Right, let's move along the shore towards the ship." Dr. Katz had regained his calm. "Keep your eyes open. And you there, get that camera going, we don't want to miss any valuable research material." Slowly, they started making their way eastwards towards the Dyellian ship.

The small 'infailtration craft', having apparently been in more battles than there were Goblins in Blood Moon, sculled quietly into an isolated Jiggidean bay. At least, it would have if the engine hadnt suddenly parted company with the host of Goblin-made repairs and 'improvements' attached to it, sending a bright red flare a hundred feet into the sky.
The positive effect of this was that the craft was sent flying into the jungle at roughly two hundred miles an hour, smashing everything in its way including a rather large alligator. This was alright though because the alligator in question as about to eat a puppy.
The craft eventualy came to rest when two large rocks inexplicably rose out of the jungle to block its path, shredding the boat beyond any repair.
The team of goblins quickly extricated themselves from the boat, free of any casualties except the single Goblin now dangling above an enraged aligator.

The general consensus back in Blood Moon was that they should get involved in Jiggady, but there were at least thirteen differnt opinions on the twelve person High Council as to who exactly they should support.
Thus the team had been dispatched with orders to 'Find out who the good guys are, then support them."
This had caused some confusion and a debate about the nature of 'goodness', but in the end it was agreed that it was the best phrasing that could be understood by the Goblin typing the orders.

Thirty bruised and battered Goblins organized themselves into three squads and attempted to figure out where they were supposed to be. The first team would head off to the site of the Dyellian army to check things out there, the second was to find a mountain of some sort and set up a base of operations, radio and all that, the third was going to 'generaly scout around', as ordered by the govornment.
There was much rejoicing when the equipment crates were opened though, the govornment had the sense to pack AK-series weapons, the last mission had nearly been ruined when they sent a group of Goblins into a jungle with MP5 SMG's.
At the bottom of the cases lay a nice assortment of pre-prepared explosives, mostly C4, but there were other Goblin-made explosives that managed to explode with extreme alacrity in the face of any conditions. Most often they were the result of alchemists mixing up anything that went 'Fzzt' with some paste, so they werent really stable, but they did the job.
Aside from this, the Goblins had their standard weapons that almost every Goblin owns, that is, a sword or axe or some kind of blackpowder weapon, and an array of small knives, daggers and bladed objects that seems to accumulate over the years.
The standard goblin armour (Leather, chainmail and occasionaly a bit of plate) had been painted over with a jungle camo-pattern, the reasoning behind this was that bright red-plated Goblins running about in the jungle would be noticed. For now it was almost impossible to see them, since they were green.
The three squads set off to their destinations, lugging whatever equipment they couldnt jam into their belts.
Soon enough a few giant snakes, alligators and assorted wildlife learned to leave little green men alone, mostly because they were covered in bladed objects, but also because they didnt wash.

About two hundred miles south of the port city of Costa-Tula, in the Free Republic, the Tactical Groups Sir William Issem and Emperor Ehecatl met and began arraying themselves into a single united fleet. Command Admiral Ilek relaxed in his quarters as the fleet carried on usual operations to get underway.

Admiral Ilek clicked open his comm as the Captain hailed him "Admiral Ilek, Admiral Ayamar has reported that the Namroth Vedic is in place and that he has made contact with the Dyellians. Nothing is going on so far, just usual small scale military and evacuation type stuff."

"Very good capatin. Have all ships get underway as soon as is possible." he sighed as he relaxed.

*****

South of the Gonad

Colonel Weatherston quite liked the new Avery Frost Artemis and he was putting the jet through it's paces, despite orders he had skimmed well out of sight of Tactical Group and was rapidly approaching the shore of the wild Gonad. He was eager to see how the computer adjusted it's 'skimming' mode from water, to solid terrain. While skiming, the Artemis was just seventy five feet from the waters surface, he was travelling at just under mach-1. Laser range finders on several points of the jet automatically adjusted his altitued to avoid objects and the ground, he had already buzzed past several ships, to which he was just a blur thanks to the active camoflage skin, and now he made the transition from water to land, the sensors pulled the jet up automatically about one thousand feet before he got to the trees and then kept him at a constant seventy five feet above the trees.

The Colonel chuckled , when he was contacted by the Namaan Ilek-Vaad II, his battleship. "NIV-22, where exactly are you?"

Colonel Weatherstone replied "Just testing out my controls,I have just transitioned from sea skimming to land skimming , over."

There was a pause "WHAT land Colonel?"

Colonel Weatherstone executed a deft turn and began following the coast in a westerly path "The Gonad, I think Fire Control."

There was another longer pause "That is outside of operations parameters Colonel, return to ship at once." the Fire Control operator sounded a bit annoyed.

The Colonel smiled "Roger that, on my way back now." He lied as he contiued skimming along the coast.He increased speed to mach one, giving a nice sonic boom to the jungles inhabitants as he did.

The Dyelli Beybians had a lot of 'goals' to achieve in the Gonad. More than most people would necessarily guess. The boat the Karmanyakans had spotted was a 'Protected Cruiser' the DBPS General Nairn, which was currently acting as a radar picket, searching for planes and ships that shouldn't be there. The crew weren't watching the shore though. It would take quite a bit to get their attention.

The Katz Expedition had been moving along the shore for almost a day now. At one time just after noon, Johnson's extraordinary eyesight had spotted a crouching person far behind them on a rock on the beach. When she told Katz, he had immediately ordered her to photograph anything suspicious she spotted, a request she certainly wasn't going to obey. Now it had just turned dark and the small field generator had been started to power the big lights. It didn't matter if they were visible for miles, as long as anything attacking them could be spotted and thoroughly gunned down. Katz had tried to make contact with the university but without the antennas on the boat they had no chance of relaying the signal from their com-units.

They were cooking some sort of Komodo dragon they'd just shot and almost half the team were on guard to protect the vulnerable camp. Johnson was getting edgy and it was already clear to most expedition members that she was more in charge than Katz was. He was sitting to the side trying to write down a description of the expedition's doings so far. Suddenly there came a shout from one of the guards.

"Hey! Who the hell are you?! Doc! There's a man here, who's…" he hesitated. "Where'd he go?"

Johnson looked around and turned to the guard. "What did he look like?"

"He was here, I'm not joking. He was tall, thin and pale. Looked every bit like an elf, pointy ears and all."

"I know. Looks like they are playing with us." said Johnson as Dr. Katz jumped out of the shadows, his camera held high.

"Did you get a picture of him?" he panted.

"No, I… he just disappeared!" the man sounded confused and frightened at the same time.

"OK, good work Paul, just tell me if you see anything suspicious, ok?" Katz slapped the man's shoulder and motioned to Johnson to follow him.

"I know about the Gonad Elves." said Katz in a low voice. "Do we have any chance of survival?"

Ethel Johnson looked with her steel grey eyes into his and responded in a grave voice:
"We've got a small chance if we do everything right and stay alert."

--

Nothing more happened that night, except for the regular, nocturnal attacks of the giant mosquitos. One girl made a necklace out of the shiny wings retrieved from around the mosquito nets.

After two hours of walking in the humid heat suddenly a group of elves stepped out in front of them. The members of the expedition raised their weapons in defence. Katz held up his hand and addressed the elves.

"I'm Doctor Wilbert Katz of the university of Katla, Karmanyaka. We're here on a scientific research expedition." He didn't get further before the laughter of the elves interrupted him. The one who looked like their leader said something and they all laughed again. He had what looked like a freshly cut-off human ear on a string around his neck.

Johnson pointed her gun towards the leader and said something in the language of the elves. This not only surprised the elves but Katz almost dropped his rifle and looked at her with wide-open eyes. "You speak elvish?"

The leader elf looked at Johnson and said something that sounded a lot like a threat, then they all disappeared into the thick jungle again.

"I should probably have told you earlier, but I'm part elf." she said to her astonished colleagues. "My grandmother was en elf. Anyway, I told them to leave us alone and then they called me… well it's untranslatable, but it means something like 'unclean half-blood'. They told me they were coming back when they had decided how to kill us all."

"OK, er… if we keep a good pace we can reach the beach where the Dyellian ship lies by noon tomorrow." said Katz in an attempt to boost the morale of the group. "Come on, team!"

Team two, under the leadership of a Goblin named Gurf, slipped through the jungle making rouhgly as much noise as an elephant on hard drugs. This was not really any fault of their own, but the effect of the nature in the area.
First they had to deal with the alligator that had tracked them down and tried to eat them, then the noise had attracted some kind of snakish thingy, which had in turn been followed by a bunch of mosquitos the size of large cats.
To avoid these, the Goblins had tried taking to the trees, only to find that there were worse things up there. They had run into a giant sloth-thing with twenty inch claws that could apparently move fairly fast when it wanted to.
They staggered along through the jungle, then stopped.
Gurf sniffed the air reflectivly. That was a smell everybody knew, at least in the Goblin circles.
Bloody Elves.
Suddenly the squad was very, very quiet.
With a few gestures the determined to spread out around the area where the Elves and...some kind of human or ape or something, were standing.
Assorted weapons were readied in whatever manner suited, while the squad quickly and quietly moved through the underbrush.
After waiting until the forms of the people were clearly visible, the Goblins sprang.
Two jumped out of the brush ahead of the Katz expidition, leveling assault rifles, then looking puzzled at a distinct lack of Elf in the clearing.
A further four, who had seen too many movies, tried to swing out on vines, hoping to decapitate somebody. The only casualty this produces was an impact by a balistic Goblin who had been slightly confused by the lack of gunfire and confusion on the part of their 'victims'.
The rest of the Goblins had appeared in the Bushes to the side and the rear, brandishing some sort of weapon.
A thrown axe was wobbeling in a tree nearby.
Gurf stared, then straighened up...
"Err...where are da elves?" He quickly looked over his shoulder, then back at the Katz people.

The Officer looked around at the assorted troops.... different uniforms all over...
he did look however positivly over dressed in his supremley pressed uniform... he quickly strode over to the trucks lined up... his Capitol police were sat moitionless in the back of the trucks... the only thing that gave away that anyone was there were the red glows from the eye peices of their gas masks and helmets...

"Squads.... Dismount" came the order... barked from the officer as though he'd done it a thousand times before in his sleep...

but again... like so many times before... each Capitol police trooper stood up.. in perfect unison... the took a left or right turn and began to dismount from each truck in perfect rythmical precision... marched out onto the parade ground and began to form up in a perfect military parade...

the officer marched to the head of the formation and awaited the General to arrive...

OOC: D.B is always in that damn jungle...Oh and if the elves see humans...And some of the elves have heavy weapons people.

The Alconians had just woken up to the fact that the Deyllians were operating in Rouge Jiggady. Actually they had known since the inital landings since there was a Joint Defense Force base located on the same bay. With an Alconian Marine Battallion stationed there, supposedly under the auspices of the JDF control.

Presently Company A and B of the 16th Marine Battallion were 'upcountry' actually on the outer perimiter of the Captial of Rouge Jiggady. (Who's name I can not recall) But they were not alone.

"Tidewater, this is monk fish...over..."

Monk fish, this is Tidewater...report...

"Sir, the situation is not quite as it appears. We seem to have enemy armored vehicles moving through the city." The Captain stated dryly as he looked though his bonoculars on the scene below. The streets were empty, cars lay burned out. Buildings stood smoldering, and the former Cristofian Palace that had served as the Rouge Jiggady government building looked like it had been heavily shelled.

Bodies lay strewn down the various roads. His eyes noticed the wheeled Striker hiding behind a pile of debries at the intersection before the palace. He could make out the figures standing about, smallish, wearing dark green uniforms. Neither the insignia on the uniforms, nor the small flag waving near the old palace made any sense to him.


"Based on size they look sorta Deyllian...I mean they are on the small side compared to most of the human population but...nothing indicates...wait...my god...they have calvery?"


eight horses and riders, in full armor trotted out of a side road and into view. Four abrest the riders, in armor that was dull and rusty trotted down the road. Behind them came a four by four of early Deyllian manufacture.

The Captain pulled himself back behind the old tomb in the cemetary and looked at his senior sargent. "Who the bloodly hell are those people?"

He realized he was still holding the handset of the crypto set..."Ah sorry sir..."

Report when you have more info...Tidewater out

"Alright, well tonight isn't a full moon. So let's see if we can pentrate and find out who these bastards are..."

"Yes sir..."

It would always be unwise for various parties to think that the Vrakians were not monitoring the situation. Either through the JDF, of which the president did have final control or through the resources of their own military and intelligence assets, the Vrakians kept a close eye on the Klatch. And tended to get ansy when foreign powers decided to meddle, no matter how close the relationship.

Still, operations in Rouge Jiggady were not as high on the priority list compared to, as, an all out attack such as what Neo Tyr attempted. No, the jungles of the Gonnad tended to make short work of any interlopers. As well, previous incursions did indicate that outsiders were long on bravado but short on research and wits when it came to those dangerous parts of the Klatch. Heck, most parts of the Klatch were dangerous. It was a matter of minimizing it and carving out a civilization on your spot of land. And the Gonnad was perhaps one of the worst.

Besides, it would be interesting to see how well the new invasive species introduced by the Vrakians would fair in their new ecosystem. What place, exactly, would they take on the food chain? According to an obscure VIS report, roughly 50 mating pairs were released in the area. At least a couple biologists would be occupied with that experiment.

With most of the concerned parties that were identified, the VIS was busily doing background checks on the new nations encountered. The Vaadians would prove to be the most difficult diplomatically. One one hand, Vrak enjoyed good relations with them and closed several significant business deals. On the other, the Vrakians tired of their preaching about “power for the people” and all that other ridiculous nonsense.

A polite diplomatic note was sent from the Vrakian ambassador in Ilek-Vaad to his counterpart with the urgency to speed it up to the First Speaker. It said, in effect, that operations within Rouge Jiggady are an internal affair and that while the friendship of the Vaadians has always been appreciated, a clarification as to the exact purpose their forces from the area would indicate that the Vaadians regarded their friendship with Vrak to be on an equal level. Of course, the Vrakian ambassador would be at your disposal to answer any questions.

As well, the note from Lord Harrington was acknowledged. He was directed to have a meeting with the lead Vrakian key at his convenience.

The perpetual war between the Dyellians and the elves had suddenly turned hot. Usually there were the odd skirmishes back and forth in the jungle and the odd raid into the burned out border area, but nothing too serious. For the firsttime in around 200 years there was actually a pitched battle.

And the Dyellians had taken the usual Dyellian approach, surround, entrench and shell into submission. Trucks rolled up and down the East road from Hammer bay, which was now the main artery for the army. Luckily the jungle didn't grow right to the Coast, so it meant ambushes were unlikely. Just in case, the odd Company of Fucillieri had dug in along the route.

(OOC: I'm working off FBs old map with the terrain marked on it)

At the head though the column had ground to a halt. Genorale-Maggiore Grey had driven to the front, "What the blazes is going on here?" he yelled from out of the window of his staff car. He had to yell, the artillery were firing practically non-stop.

"Elves Sir." one Tenente who seemed to be in charge in the immediate vicinity explained.

"Well damn it man, roll a tank over them."

"We tried that. They blew it's tracks off. We had to go and rescue the crew. We've got seven dead and twelve wounded. They've got some genuine weapons in there, it isn't just the jolly old elves with bows business."

Grey was no fool, he knew this was unusual, "You going in again soon?"

"We're sending in a Voltigeur Platoon in 5 minutes Sir."

The Senior officer nodded, "Good good, this is Tenente Colonello Barker's opperation is it?"

"Yes Sir." the Tenente nodded.

"Tell him he needs to be clearer in his Communications to HQ."

--------------------

(OOC: More to come later)

In the halls of the FKC government, Lady Victoria Martinez-Smythe, former head of the New Shiron Red Cross and now representing New Shiron as a Key, brought forward a proposal.

"The tragic collapse of the Rouge Jiggedy government should not mean the doom of the people of that nation. I propose, in the name of New Shiron, that the FKC step in to bring permanent and stable government to that blighted area, and that since Dyelli Byebi has already seen fit to begin rescue operations, for which we of New Shiron applaud it for, than why not regularize the situation?

I propose that Dyelli Byebi be handed a permanent trusteeship of the former nation of Rouge Jiggedy until such time as it is once again stable enough to be independent."

ooc
the government of New Shiron loves the idea of DB getting stuck in a quagmire.. chuckle.

The Alconian Marines were moving through the dimly lit city. Along a small stream that was surrounded by debries on both sides. The small group was waiting as a scout appeared down from a bridge embankment
"Ah, sir..."

"What is it Peterson?"

"Sir, I just got a look at those sentries..."

"Yeah, and..."

"Well three of them appear to have pointy ears..."

"elves? Elves with heavy armor?"

"Yup...and that cannon, it isn't a cannon...it is a plasma grenade launcher..."

"A LOW plasma grenade launcher...f***"

"Oh there were two humans with them sir...but something odd about them..."

"Kid, humans hanging out with elves in the Gonad isn't odd, it is damn near life altering. Whoever these elves are, they apparently have taken out the Rouge Jiggidy government, have heavy, even super-heavy weapons, and work with humans. I'm not sure HQ is going to beleive me, or think we're all smoking pot out here..."

"Yes sir..."

"Let's get back to the ralley point, I really don't want to start a fire fight with a damn LOW plasma cannon."

The patrol began to make it's way back west, to the comfort of the cemetary.

****
The middle Alconian Key stood. "Although I don't have any real problem with the plan. It has been noted that the local aboriginal population has a strong dislike of the Dellyians. Are we sure we won't be just exaserbating the situation and making the restoration of goverment to the Gonad take even longer?"

OOC: Heading north or east there D.B?

The Vrakian key grunted.

“If there is to be any trusteeship, then it ought to fall under the purview of the constitution in this matter. And it’s quite clear that the Gonad is unclaimed territory. Which means it falls within the jurisdiction of Parliament.”

He swept a flipper to punctuate this point.

“But seeing how that the Gonnad continues to make trouble for the Dyellians along their eastern border, I can only see these options.

1) Secure the entire border of the Gonnad from encroachment from any other state or from the inhabitants themselves. This would mean that a part of the JDF would be tasked in this undertaking. This also means that it will remain unclaimed forever.

2) invite another state into that territory

3) Find out if there are any kind of inhabitants or civilization there and set them up as a new territory, with them pledging allegiance to the Klatch.


We are basically against any one state expanding its borders, to be perfectly honest."

My dear colleague,
I have been directed to forward some information to your government from my government that you might find of interest. Perhaps we should have lunch?

The Key read the note, thought it was a little odd considering he hadn't actually shown up to Parliament recently, then sent a note back;

It would of course be a great honour. Is the Key's club an acceptable venue? Only I have been warned that the town itself is considered highly unsafe.

The Dyellians weren't opening their mouths on the trusteeship of Rogue Jiggady business. It was expansion, which they were in favour of, but it was also a bloody awful place, not exactly where they'd been planning to expand into.

(OOC: DB's army is pushing East from the near the border towards the main population centres)

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Generale Soult, when he emerged, was an large bearded man... well he wasn't very tall, but he spread outwards, he'd probably been muscular when he was younger, but it had since gone to fat. His black hair was slicked back. The beard was unkempt, and much like many of his men, it was unclear if it was there because he wanted it to be, or if he'd forgotten to shave.

"Ahh, my friends from the Kraven Corporation. What marvelous discipline." that seemed to be the first thing the Dyellians noted when looking at the Kraven forces, "If only we could keep you around here to show some of my people how to behave themselves."

He hadn't bothered to introduce himself, and if it hadn't been for the Tenente mouthing, 'The Genorale' to the Officer from Kraven Corporation... and the large amount of gold braid on the man's field grey uniform, there was nothing that identified him as Generole Soult, "Do you and your men want something to eat before we get down to business? We have very good chefs at Theta, I don't think you'll find the food wanting. Otherwise the Colonello over there."

He indicated a man in desert pattern camouflage with a green beret who was following the Genorale around, "He is ready to give you your briefing as soon as you are ready."

General Craig, the middle Key from New Shiron asked to be recognized and replied.

"Our suggestion that Dyelli Byebi be given trusteeship was made for reasons of simple expediency. After all, they have forces there already, in very large numbers according to our sources, and can more readily take control of the situation than anyone else can. The honorable Keys from Alcona and Vrak do raise valid points though. Points that should be considered carefully.

But people, innocent civilians, are almost certainly going to die in even greater numbers than have already unless we act quickly on this. More to the point, opportunists from elsewhere may also act. Do we have a large and available FKC force in place to move in to replace Dyelli Byebi forces that are there now? Just as importantly, wouldn't it be prudent to keep our FKC forces available for critical contigencies if Dyelli Byebi is able to handle the mission there? After all, the FKC is still deeply involved in Neo Tyr and we may need troops for other issues as well at some point."

The General nodded kindly and took a sip of water.

"From the point of view of New Shiron we are gravely concerned about chaos in that region. After all, it is on the direct and primary air traffic route from New Shiron to the rest of the Klatch. Any hostile state or pseudostate that arises in Rouge Jiggedy would be a serious strategic concern for us."

The Key read the note, thought it was a little odd considering he hadn't actually shown up to Parliament recently, then sent a note back;

It would of course be a great honour. Is the Key's club an acceptable venue? Only I have been warned that the town itself is considered highly unsafe.

The Dyellians weren't opening their mouths on the trusteeship of Rogue Jiggady business. It was expansion, which they were in favour of, but it was also a bloody awful place, not exactly where they'd been planning to expand into.

(OOC: DB's army is pushing East from the near the border towards the main population centres) "

Shortly after receiving the reply, Lord Harrington walked briskly out of the Chamber were debate was continuing and went to the Key's club. An aid hurried along with him, carrying both her laptop and his briefcase. Lord Harrington was in a good mood. This might even be fun.

General Craig, the middle Key from New Shiron asked to be recognized and replied.

"Our suggestion that Dyelli Byebi be given trusteeship was made for reasons of simple expediency. After all, they have forces there already, in very large numbers according to our sources, and can more readily take control of the situation than anyone else can. The honorable Keys from Alcona and Vrak do raise valid points though. Points that should be considered carefully.

But people, innocent civilians, are almost certainly going to die in even greater numbers than have already unless we act quickly on this. More to the point, opportunists from elsewhere may also act. Do we have a large and available FKC force in place to move in to replace Dyelli Byebi forces that are there now? Just as importantly, wouldn't it be prudent to keep our FKC forces available for critical contigencies if Dyelli Byebi is able to handle the mission there? After all, the FKC is still deeply involved in Neo Tyr and we may need troops for other issues as well at some point."

The General nodded kindly and took a sip of water.

"From the point of view of New Shiron we are gravely concerned about chaos in that region. After all, it is on the direct and primary air traffic route from New Shiron to the rest of the Klatch. Any hostile state or pseudostate that arises in Rouge Jiggedy would be a serious strategic concern for us."

The Vrakian replied.

"Remember that the southern most tip of Vrak borders northern Dyelli Beybi. This means that the southern HORDE group can either cross into Dyelli Beybi or through the old Monte Ozarka territories. Interestingly enough, I should point out that Monte Ozarka is also "unclaimed territory" at the moment."

A grin.

"Southern Vrakian troop movements tend to make the Dyellians...worried."

"General... Our soldiers Don't need to eat.. they are completly self sufficient any proteins and other nutrients are fed directly to them via the back pack... however I would love to sample some of your culinary delights... as for the breifing General... I can start whenever....how about over dinner?"

Corporation High Command

"Grand Admiral... We have No Further Information as of yet... the Imperial Officer is being breifed.."

"Very well Commander... Keep me Informed"

"As you wish Grand Admiral"

The Junior Alconian Key stood up, "I would like to point out that Joint Defense Forces are in the area. If I am not mistaken, some were deployed inland to the Captial of Rouge Jiggady to try and save as many lives as possible. Nor is Vrak the only nation available to help in establishing a new state in the Gonad. There are JDF forces in the AMW canal zone who could prove useful in this matter."

******
It was a small creek that ran down into a namless estuary, as it had done for the past ten thousand years. As such it had cut a steep trench through the dense soil and then proceeded to fill in the estuary, turning it into marshlands. Now the creek emerged from the edge of the jungle, twisted its way through feilds of knee high rye and corn then passed under modern concrete highway bridge before dropping down across some rocks to mix with the salt water of the sea, visible across the wide expanse of marshland edged by a pair of low hillocks at the edge of the sea. These were covered in brush and large piles of shells, the larger one actually had a small abandoned cabin built upon it. If there had been a path across the mashlands to the cabin, it had vanished over time.

Humans, maybe even elves, had come along at some time and built a wooden bridge here but only the stone enbankments survived. Now the costal highway crossed using a modern concrete span built by the Cristofi government using slave elf labor.

That evening, the former slaves demonstrated that they had mastered the use of dynamite. The quiet roar of the sea upon the sand bars, and the chriping of some local birds was drowned out by the sudden thumps that caused 120 tons of reinforced concrete to crash into the creek bed below. The creek, stopped from it's never ending journey to sea began to build up behind the new dam. It was surprising how fast it filled up it's deep trench and began to flood the feilds behind the road.

Espcially to the Fucillieri entrenched on a nearby hill that could easily protect the bridge against a sudden, open attack. The elves of the Gonad were not known for acts of tatical demolition. More like sudden, savage raids from the jungle. The elves hadn't even tried to hit a convoy...just blew the bridge while the nearby road was empty.

A small creek, not even visible on most maps, had just gone from being another scene on the Deyllian supply line to the brownish gash that cut it in two.

*****
On a distant hill in the jungle, an elf watched the small plume of pulverized concrete rise into the air over three miles away though a pair of bonoculars. He smiled as he watched the local garrison scramble about. Part of him wanted to order an attack and slaugher the mongrels where they stood. But his mind returned to his orders, and his eyes went down the back slope of the hill behind him.

The Djel had learned to use the modern tools of war. The people of the Dark One were going to show them that his Oracle had taught them the same lessons.

The expedition was taking a break in the small clearing where the elves had recently left them. They drank some water from canteens that were rapidly becoming empty. Suddenly the clearing filled with green creatures, screaming and throwing things around. Most team members were already terrified that the elves would come back and massacre them so they had their weapons ready. When the dust settled they were standing with their guns pointing at what seemed like some sort of green pixies or miniature orcs, both of which sometimes showed up in the Karmanyakan mountains.

"Holy Gods! What the hell is this!" screamed Katz amidst shrieks and exclaims from the other people and grunts from the goblins. "Who are you?! No, I don't know where the elves went!"

The Karmanyakans were surrounded by the goblins and the situation was tense, to say the least. Johnson leaned over to Katz:

"Doc, I think they're goblins. I doubt that they are hostile to humans. Can I handle it?"

"Wha…? Oh yeah, go ahead." he sighed.

Dr. Katz now seemed completely at a loss. The man who had wrestled with hungry crocodiles, blood crazed wolves and greedy publishers seemed to have no clue what to do, and his team looked more to Johnson for leadership.

"We are scientists from Karmanyaka." she began. "We have been attacked by elves and fear that the may come back to finish us off. I am Ethel Johnson, assistant to our leader Doctor Wilbert Katz." she indicated the bewildered doctor. "We mean no harm, so if we can all lay down our weapons, perhaps our expedition can continue our journey to safety?"

"First elves and then goblins?!" gasped Katz and fanned himself with his big hat. "What is this – 'Middle Earth'?"

The elves could be back any time and they would probably grow tired of playing with their new toys quite soon. If the expedition couldn't reach the Dyellians soon, they would be in serious trouble.

The lead Goblin signaled to the others, who lowered their weapons, or retrieved them with uncessicary forces from whatever they were buried in.

"Er, al'ight den. We are da 1st Goblin Ex-pah-dishun-ary Force outta Blood Moon, dats a bit norf of 'ere. Person'ly, I 'ave no idea why were 'ere. So far we been attack'd by everyfing 'cept Elves. We was told ta 'look 'round over dere and tell us anyfing interestin'. So far we got giant alligators, skeeters, slofs n' Elves." At this point one of the vine-swingers, who had been carefully lowering himself out of the tree, lost his grip and fell the remaining ten feet with a loud yell and a stream of Goblin curses, "But dats da general drift 'o fings. So tell joo what, you seem ta be goin' somewhere, how 'bout we jus' go wit joo till you get dere, or don' need us no more. Free guard service for joo, an' we get some people ta tell us wha's interestin' round here."
The Goblin sighed and threw a rock at he fallen Goblin, who was buried up to his knees in mud and being attacked by a mid-sized mosquito, as well as some sort of spider, although it was unclear who was fighitng who it was apparent that the Goblin was losing. A few leeches had attempted to attach themselves to the Goblins lower extremities, and now floated on the surface of the mudpond, twitching occasionaly and leaking green Goblin blood into the muddy water.

The problem for Katz, and now the Goblins it appeared, was that they were less than a mile from the mouth of a small river. A river that the Oracle and her army had been using to ferry supplies in and drugs out. Which ment that the band of mercs who had informed Jhonston of what they were going to do to her (even if she were full elf they would have made her a slave) were going to be out of luck soon.

-May the Dark One protect us...those two groups near the outer perimeter just joined up and are coming this way.

-Why? I mean are they looking for this base?

-No sir, the ship at this location here...I think they are trying to get in a postion to be picked up by it.

-Fools, don't they realize that inland over there is mostly swamp?

-Obviously not sir...they have been sticking fairly close to the beach.

-Fine, send a few mounted troops with AK-47's to round them up. I am curious to find out who these odd little creatures are...

-Yes sir.

OOC:

Feel free to check out the FKC website for ecological information.

http://www.freewebs.com/klatchia/ecology.htm


As well, a while back Vrak also introduced a new species into the Gonnad as part of a field testing experiment, specifically the usefulness of biological monsters and their role in the military.

The bughog is one such creature. It is significantly bigger than the African warthog and even the River hog, standing 100 to 110 cm at the shoulder and measuring over 2 meters in length for an adult male, not including the tail. Females are slightly smaller and both have a bristly mane and fleshy pads beneath the eyes. They are brownish red in colour and would appear to be a big warthog, even having four tusks. However, the similarities end there. A bughog has a thin, scorpion-like tail which is quite long. It can use it to attack prey in front of it, since the hard tail is barbed at the end and can strike rapidly to great effect When not in use, the tail curls up behind the bughog. The skin itself is quite thick and tough and offers some degree of protection from bullets. As well, there is a bony ridge that extends from the top of the head down to the snout.

Females can have up to 20 piglets, although this is rare. In the wild the litters are smaller. The bughogs are fairly intelligent as far as animals go, and are quite cunning. They are quite aggressive and won’t back down even from a much larger animal unless significant injuries are inflicted in the beginning. They communicate with eachother with a series of grunts, snorts, and squeaks. They can also be tamed to a certain degree for tracking, since they have a keen sense of smell, which makes up for their poor vision. They can grub around for roots and whatnot but seem to have a hankering for flesh.

The exact history behind them is murky, although they are believed to be a genetically engineered creature designed for unknown purposes.

"General... Our soldiers Don't need to eat.. they are completly self sufficient any proteins and other nutrients are fed directly to them via the back pack... however I would love to sample some of your culinary delights... as for the breifing General... I can start whenever....how about over dinner?"

Corporation High Command

"Grand Admiral... We have No Further Information as of yet... the Imperial Officer is being breifed.."

"Very well Commander... Keep me Informed"

"As you wish Grand Admiral"

Soult seemed to find this quite suspicious, "They don't eat? They miss out so much on the pleasures of life! Ah the gastronomic delights of fine cuisine...ah where was I?"

Here was a man who loved food, "Yes, we had planned to put you in a briefing room and have the Colonello lecture at your men and show them some of the more interesting weapons they may come up against, we can still do that, but maybe we can, as officers, as you suggested, have a fine lunch, I will invite Tenente Colonello Morris, who is probably the army's resident expert on Rogue Jiggady, he isn't much of a speech maker, but he knows his stuff."

"Tough bugger that one." the Voltigeur Tenente remarked quietly.

"Anyway, if you do not mind being separated from your men, the Colonello will take them to the lecture theatre."

"General... It would an honour to discuss these matters with you over dinner... ill let you choose me a meal accoustomed to your area... and maybe one day Ill repay the favour at our capital... I dont mind the Troopers being breifed about the different weapons they will encounter... they wont cause any trouble... they'll just sit and listen..."

"Ill instruct the capitol Police with their orders"

"All Squads are Ordered to Comply with the Colonel... follow his orders to the letter and ensure that you uphold the virtues of the Corporation... Understood?"

"Acknowleged" Came the monotone mechanical reply of each trooper.. there voice altered by the amplifers in the breath masks...

the Officer turned around and headed back to the General...

"Excellent." the General seemed like a similarly happy sort, "Tenente, see you if you can find Morris will you?"

"Right you are Sir." the Voltigeur Tenente gave a quick snap of a salute.

"It was an honour." he spoke to the Kraven Office, then yelled to his Sahariana crew, "Get the can rolling, we're looking for Morris."

After he had left, the General led the way into his headquarters which seemed to double up as a house, field grey clad officers (one's who actually seemed to take some pride in their appearance) came and went, often carrying stacks of paper, "This is the Headquarters for the Division, we're on border watch, so we've always got plenty of reports to deal with."

The coriddor into the buidling led straight into a large central atrium, with a well planned and tended garden and ornamental fish pond in the centre. A pillared colonade led around the outside, and it was around this that the General took the officer, stopping to let a guard, also in field grey, open a door on his right, "This is the small dining room." the General explained, "The larger one holds many more."

It was true this one could only hold some six. The inside was well lit by several high windows facing onto the outside of the building. The walls themselves were oak panneled to about waist height and painted a cream colour above. A large painting of a Napoleonic era battle hung on one wall, "Please, my friend, take the Seat on my right."

The General had sat down at the head of the table, "Do you know anything about the former Rogue Jiggady yet or not?"

A knock sounded on the door, "Enter."

The man who entered took scruffiness to a new level. He wore a dark green jungle patterned camouflage uniform, dried mud still caked his trousers, while his shirt looked like it was missing a button or two. For a Dyellian he was enormous, hitting 6 feet, with blue eyes and slicked back blonde hair. In most armies he'd be told to get a haircut, "You asked to see me General, I was just heading over here myself."

"May I present Tenente Colonello Morris, Fucillieri, but still likes to run with the Voltigeurs. Would you like to join us Richard?"

"For lunch?" he abruptly seemed to notice just what a mess he was in.

"Yes, don't bother changing, I know you're fresh from the field."

"Right yeah, I'll be right back Sir, need to wash my hands."

The General chuckled as his subordinate left, "He'll change, he'll want to look presentable. Feel free to quiz him on anything you like when he returns."

As the General predicted he returned in a field grey uniform which looked a lot more presentable, he seated himself without asking, on the General's left, moments before the first course arrived, some kind of white meat served on kebab skewers along with red and orange capsicum. Morris hadn't spoken to the Kraven Officer or been introduced, but had immediately picked him as a foreigner, "That's crocodile." he said helpfully, "Very popular meat in these parts, although we have a bugger of a job trying to export the stuff. I'm guessing I'm here to talk about something? Tell me what you want to know and I'll tell you if I know it."

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Meanwhile the recruits from the troops from the Kraven Corporation had been led into a large, steeply sloping lecture theatre, while the Colonello had positioned himself up front, in front of a large white screen "Welcome to the Gonad Peninsula." he began, "Arsehole of the Earth."

"Now you probably know the place as Rogue Jiggady, we've known it as Christofi and the Diocletion Empire. None of these nations have lasted, and thats because of the locals." he paused

"We're right at the Western tip of the peninsula at Theta, a few miles from here the jungle starts, now I'll begin by telling you guys about some of the flora and fauna to look out for."

He moved over to stand behind a computer terminal, "This is the Giant River Crocodile."

The screen changed to a picture of a crocodile which was probably the length of a bus, "These bastards are huge, they originally came from Dyelli Beybi but have spread to some of the nearby rivers. We shoot them when they get too big in the Djel, but in the Gonad there is no systematic cull, so we can only take a guess as to how large they are in there, they are quite regularly over 10 metres long. Do not try to shoot it with your regular weapons, it will only make it angry. They are generally quite placid as long as you don't go into the water near where they are. If you really need to kill one, try using something like a Barrett Light 50, and aim for the heart, the skull is too damned thick. We use a 40mm squeezbore cannon, these are available if you request them from Divisional HQ."

The next picture was of what looked to be a giant python, "Pretty similar deal to the crocs, keep an eye out for these. Called a Porterhouse snake. They tend to lurk on the larger branches of trees where they will strike downwards at their prey, dragging it back up to where they can devour it at their leisure. A bit softer than the crocs, but still a bugger to kill."

A third picture showed a very slightly enlarged black panther, "Night cat, sits in trees, drops on it's victims, much like a leopard. You're generally safe from these if you're in a group, they only hunt at night. Unlike the last two specimens these things die quite easily."

The next slide showed a picture of two fairly innocuous trees, one of which was deciduous and something which looked like a giant venus fly trap, "The thing that looks like a venus fly trap is a triffid, never ever set up camp near one, they move, very slowly, but they do move. The other two are the Klatchian Oak and Strangler Teak, they will both strangle you if you get too close."

The final slide in the series showed a monkey with enormous fangs and something which looked like a giant 16 legged cockroach with three chicken heads and feathers on it's carapace, "The revolting looking thing is a chickaroach, we don't know if there are any in the Gonad. They are predatory, but don't usually attack humans. The other things are what are commonly referred to as 'Homosexual Monkeys', don't ask me why, it was the good people of EvilPsychoticGuy which gave these buggers their name, in any case, they behave like a bull rhinocerous who's come back from a hard day at the swamp and found you wearing his pyjammas, smoking his cigars and in bed with his wife. They attack people quite regularly, and always in a large troop. They will fade away and strike again later if they don't kill everyone in the first go. They don't give up until you either wipe out the troop which is hard, or leave their territory. Again, we don't know if there are any in Former Rogue Jiggady, but it seems very likely."

"You may be wondering why I'm giving you information on jungle animals, when this is an evacuation of civilians. There are quite a large number of villages and small towns which exist within cleared areas in the jungle. It may not be safe for us to use helicopters to access all of these areas, the jungle inhabitants do have surface to air missiles. Does anyone have any questions?"

(OOC: Can anyone spot the Blackadder quote?)

Johnson looked at Dr. Katz and then back to the Goblins as her boss only gave her a blank stare.

"All right, lets team up against the elves until we get to the Dyellians, but I have no idea how the Dyellians will react to a group of Goblins."

"Oh great." muttered Katz.

"But we really have to get going if we are to reach safety before nightfall. And meanwhile I'll brief you quickly on the area. Still, I wonder what Dyelli Beybi are doing here… something is going on."

They started moving through the thick bushes. The Karmanyakans were confused to say the least, most members of the expedition had never seen intelligent non-human species before and now they had encountered both elves and goblins on the same day. A young man asked the goblins to pose for the camera to document the occasion.

---

A Karmanyakan key had something he wanted to share with the other FKC keys. He almost knocked out his glass of Karmanyakan spring water as he stood up.

"There have been rumours about some 'Kraven Corporation' being involved in the Gonad. These rumours have been confirmed by intelligence sources. Firstly Karmanyaka would like to know how extensive their interference in this matter is. Secondly we wonder how Dyelli Beybi views the doings of the Kraven Corporation in the inter-regional war in 'Region 17'. Apparently the Corporation is engaged in a bloody war where civilians are quite ruthlessly murdered by regular troops. The government of Karmanyaka finds it rather distressing that an FKC state gets involved with this type of nations."

He sat down, took out his handkerchief and tried to save some of his wet papers.

As it happened one Dyellian Key was out with the Key from New Shiron, or more waiting at for them at the Key's club, (OOC: Sorry I think I forgot to reply to that part of the thread, I was so rushed for a few days) and one hadn't been seen in Parliament for Several months, but had been seen at the local Casinos. The third was there but was too innebriated to make any form of coherent response, "That'll show them, here here." he chimed.

in the Key's private club, Lord Harrington enjoyed his meal and after that, asked for some brandy.

"Well, I suppose its time to get to why I asked you here." he motioned his aide over from the other table, and had her set up the laptop and insert a DVD. Moments later, video footage of ships, troops and aircraft, all clearly in Rougue Jiggedy because of the terrain, began to play. Although there was no sound, the imagery was very sharp and at times you could even see the expressions on soldiers and sailors faces as they carried out there activities.

Ships that were clearly of IV origin also displayed, as well as various unknown ships that seemed to have blundered about.

"My government is prepared to send your government real time footage from our surviellance platforms, to assist you in pacifying and defending this area. The Queen feels that even though we may have some disagreements at times about economic policy, we prefer that your people bring order here rather than some outsider, or perhaps as badly, some of our more heavy handed fellow FKC members. Rogue Jiggedy is an area of significant concern to us, as it is on the direct air and sea route between New Shiron and the rest of the Klatch. We want it to be secure."

He leaned back in his chair and waited for a response.

A Capitol Police officer Raised his hand...

"Yes?" the Colonel asked

"How would Corporation Pulse 7.62mm High Velocity GPMG's do against such creatures?... how about Massed fire or Controlled Bursts" the troopers voice was mechanical and cold... made audiable by the amplifer speaker built into the armour

______________________________

The Officer tucked into the meal... he looked at it cautiously.. savouring every bite and occasionaly looking to the ceiling in deep thought....

"This is quite Good..." he spoke...

he fininished his mouthfull before continuing...

"So what kind of Operations will the Capitol Police be carrying out?... if their are any kind of underhand operations that need to be done we can carry them out swiftly and without a hitch... The High Command radioed the VTOL flight crew earlier warning them of a build up of ships around the coastal area... we don't know if this is a problem... but we can if needed storm their vessels as a premtive strike..." The officer continued to eat the meal before him...

The Alconian Key raised an eyebrow at the intelligence from Kamayanka. Hmm, seems we may have to keep a much closer eye on things

Admiral Ilek stood at the rail on the observation balcony of the Sir William Issem when his captain approached.

"Sir, we will be off of Tyre in the morning. Tactical Group Namroth Vedic reports minor activity in the (Vaadians can't help but laugh when they say it), the Gonad sir."

Admiral Ilek nodded "Well, when we get to Tyre we'll have the Emperor Ehecatl stay off our waters there and we'll join the Namroth Vedic in international waters."

The captain nodded "Aye sir."

Admiral Ilek turned before he headed off "Oh, and have all the RASTER feeds that Tollan has marked as interesting, we'll have a look at them tomorrow too."

"Aye sir." The captain then headed off to relay the commands.

The Colonello considered the question for a moment, "Hrrm, I'm not too familiar with your weapons, I would not try them on a big bull croc, the gun we use is a 40mm squeezebore cannon that compresses down to 30mm. The main problem with the snakes is there's just so much muscle mass on them they can soak up quite a bit of damage. The monkeys you can drop with an air gun, but they're fast and there's a lot of them."

Morris nodded, then shook his head, "The ships are Vaadians, they're technically our allies. They like to show off their military though. They're like a peacock in the mating season, strutting up and down and flashing their tail feathers."

Morris generally didn't think much of his fellow Klatchians or nearly-Klatchians, it wasn't an unusual sentiment in Dyelli Beybi, "What we're actually doing is more or less what we're claiming to be doing. More or less, because we're also taking the opportunity to run a crackdown on the jungle dwellers."

He paused, while the General called for wine to be brought to the table. It appeared a few moments later. A red, what most people would call Spanish style, and undoubtedly very pricey, "There will be a bit of supervising loading of civilians onto planes boats and so forth, as well as a fair amount of deep oppperation jungle work. The jungle dwellers, you probably would call them elves, are not the pleasant sort from fairy tales. They eat humans, or slaughter them depending upon their mood, which will make things difficult for the evacuation... it's the reason there is an evacuation in the first place."

He nodded in thanks to the waiter as he moved around filling everyone's glass, "Anyway, there will probably be a bit of hunting around in the jungle for 'where that SAM missile' came from and so forth. They don't have the same kinds of numbers or quite the level of machinery we do, but they know the jungle, which is why we formed the Voltigeurs."

Meanwhile the main course arrived, "Coq au vin." the General happily declared.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Meanwhile in the Key's Club, the Dyellian Key, a small dark haired man named Lee Ehrlich nodded along with Lord Harrington, although he did raise an eyebrow during the playing of the footage, it looked like Dyelli Beybi needed a new wave of EW devices, "It is of course a very generous offer." the Key began diplomatically, "What I would like to know though, before relaying this onto High Command is what New Shiron would like in return?"

Meanwhile in the Key's Club, the Dyellian Key, a small dark haired man named Lee Ehrlich nodded along with Lord Harrington, although he did raise an eyebrow during the playing of the footage, it looked like Dyelli Beybi needed a new wave of EW devices, "It is of course a very generous offer." the Key began diplomatically, "What I would like to know though, before relaying this onto High Command is what New Shiron would like in return?"

Lord Harrington replied evenly. "Just as I said. Stability in that area, and my nation feels your nation will bring it about. Of course it would also help to reduce any lingering bad feelings your nation may have concerning our previous interference in your nations internal affairs." He sipped his drink, and the with a wry smile added. "At least that's the hope."

Ehrlich nodded taking a swig of something that smelled like mineral turpentine, "I'll relay it onto High Command, although I can make no promises we can actually pacify the Gonad, that would be reliant on us more or less exterminating the elven population, which would be damned hard in a jungle."

He shrugged apologetically, "I know it sounds evil, but we don't really have much option, we need to clear them out and either kill or reeducate them. If we don't this situation will just keep getting worse and worse until they're invading us, and then we will be the ones getting exterminated..."

He smiled, dropping the topic of elves, "In any case, I am sure High Command will be most grateful. I hear they are quite unhappy about Ilek Vaad trying to fill the Ocean with ships, we're supposed to have good ties with them, they're behaving like this is the Cuban Missile Crisis."

Harrington decided to ignore the Elf reference. After all, once upon a time Orcs had lived in New Shiron, and they had long since been killed to the last monster. Having read the reports about Gonad Elves, he saw no difference between the two races.

As far as the Ilek Vaad fleet went though...

"I would imagine not. Their massive sortie worries us too. We keep a relatively small navy, but the RAF and Royal Space Force has been working on some plans to deal with big fleets like them. They are the main reason my Queen decided to furnish you this information. Its important to know what they are up to."

At the University of Katla, people were starting to get really worried about Doctor Wilbert Katz and his expedition. The plan had been that Katz would report every day from the ship. The last thing that had been heard two days ago was something that sounded like a cut-off distress call. The University Council had a meeting in their oak-panelled hall.

"I say, this is absurd!" exclaimed the Dean. "We explicitly told Katz that we wouldn't take any responsibility whatsoever for his expedition in the Gonad. And yet now we're here!"

"Come now, James." said a professor in calm tones. "We still have a responsibility towards the students who accompany Katz on this trip."

"Trip?! Why on earth would he have to go to the Gonad peninsula? It's utter madness!" The Dean was getting red in the face.

The Rector banged the table with a large inkwell and raised his voice. "Gentlemen, I you please! Thank you. We have a problem with Dr. Katz. He and his expedition seems to be missing in the Gonad. We will contact the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and have them look into it all." he caught the stare from the Dean and sighed. "Yes, I know we said that we wouldn’t help him but Professor Birton is right, we must think of the students and miss Johnson."

---

Meanwhile, the expedition was getting closer to the mouth of the river, they could actually already hear the rush of water as the stream poured out into the ocean. Not far beyond that river mouth the Dyellian ship lay anchored. There still wasn't any sign of the elves that had threatened Johnson and killed some of the students. They wouldn't be far behind, but always out of sight of the expedition and their Goblin companions.

---

OOC: Alcona - I don't know much about the Oracle and her people. They're not elves, right? What is it Katz and the expedition can expect? Would appreciate a small briefing on this! : )

OOC: Those are IC secrets (D.B. knows but OCCly ) The Oracle's people are the major problem. She has gotten the elves well armed, and built basicly an empire based on exporting drugs, dimonds, and gold out of the Gonad for weapons. The 'humans' with her are a major backfire of D.B.'s using anti-matter bombs on the place.

IC: Katz expidition was stopped short as it turned the edge of a small point. There were three horses standing along the shore. On the back of each was a figure, hard to tell if they were human or elf due to the helmets on their head, but they were elves. Two of the elves carried AK-47's, the third appeared to be carrying a heavier weapon. One could make out the tubes of RPG's slung across their backs.

Seeing the odd little troop, one of the elves blew on some sort of horn. The sound ecoed across the water. A moment later a group of riders appeared from behind. Rather than just standing on the shore, they were comming from behind a dune at full tilt.

******
Behind the screen of dunes and brush waited the third group of horsemen, or horseelves in this case. Their leader quietly listened, waiting for this odd assembelage to run over the dune and into the trees. Where they would then be captured as they ran into her center line.

"Oracle bless this morning, for today we capture thine enemies and shall give them to you."

Notice to Mariners and Pilots

The New Shiron Royal Navy and Royal Air Force will be conducting a major exercise 1,000 miles south southeast of the Greenbeard, nearly 1200 miles south of Midlonia. Be advised that approaching within 200 miles of the exercise area (coordinates enclosed) will be hazardous as the exercise will include live fire activities.

----------------

Secret messages to JDF and Dyelli Byebi military headquarters
New Shiron forces are conducting a major exercise within easy support range of Dyelli Byebi forces and will be in the area for 2 weeks. Should they be needed, the commander, Admiral Tovey, has orders to coordinate his activities and movements with the senior DB commander on the scene.

ooc
6 cruisers, 12 destroyers, 3 carrier submarines, several support ships, plus 6 landbased fighter wings will also be involved

doesnt include the 1 cruiser, 2 destroyers, and 1 submarine carrier already operating 310 miles south of Greenbeard

information on New Shiron ships and aircraft can be found here

http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?t=424788

"Well General... I pressume we can begin the operations? do you have any maps of the area that I may use to better co-ordinate the efforts?... and where abouts will you want us deployed?" the officer sipped at his wine... relaxing and sitting back in his chair... the jet black uniform of the Kraven officer was a stark contrast between the field grey uniforms of the others present...

The General hadn't really been paying a great deal of attention, "Mmph? Oh opperations? Yes, there is a town just East of the border, it's one of only two towns on the Peninsula which isn't Coastal, sorry I can't remember the name offhand, it's something piraty anyway."

He shook his head, clearing his thoughs, giving an apologetic smile, "We were hoping to send your men in alongside a Regiment from the 1st Division. The road passes through jungle, which is not safe, so progress will be fairly slow. We don't want any of the supply convoys getting ambushed if we forge on too quickly. I'll see what I can do about getting you a map."

-----------

Meanwhile the Dyellian advance had ground to a halt once again. They'd come to the intersection of the the Coastal Highway, and the Highway North that bisected the Peninsula. Here the Division set up perimeter and began to stockpile supplies for the push into the more populated Eastern reaches of Rogue Jiggady. Patrols had suggested the area was heavily defended than what they'd moved through so far. Fucillieri Companies had now been assigned to all bridges, while the numerous small supply depots were collecting portable pontoon bridges that could be erected in a couple of hours (depending upon the size of the river). The loss of one or two bridges could be dealt with. The D.B.A.T. did have a small number of amphibious trucks, but widescale demolition would cause a logistical nightmare.

The Naval Guard finally had it's assets assigned to 'Watch the Gonad' in place and observing everything and generally being on alert in case something happened. It was assumed that things in the Gonad (at least historically speaking) could go from bad, to pear shaped, to worse in minutes rather than hours.

Admiral Lassander Ilek checked his charts against satellite positions to make sure everyone was in place , and they were.

Naval Guard Deployment (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v606/jaguar1024/Deployment.jpg)

Admiral Ilek turned to the duty officer "Make sure that the marines are on alert, if anything does go down let's have some quick responders ready. I don't know what Tollan Command has specifically in mind for us, but let's be ready for anything. Make sure we continue drilling and training."

one of the VTOL pilots ran into the room panting heavily

"Reichmarshal!... Reichmarshal!... we must leave at once.... somethings happened in Kravonika... Air Command are instructing us to leave immeadiatly..."

"What?.. Why whats going on?"

"The Imperial Guard Sir... They've taken Arms against us!"

the reichmarshall was silent... he thought for a moment then spoke to the general...

"My deepest apologies... but I am afraid we are going to have to pull out of your Operations... I wish you the best of luck and may Father watch upon you" the officer saluted... the quickly left as fast as he could possibly walk....

the Capitol Police were already mounting up into the vtols... and the Officer and Pilot were heading for the air strip as fast as possible...

something big had kicked off at the Corporation to make them pull out this fast....

The General followed, waving cheerfully to the Kraven VTOLs as they left, Morris had followed, watching with a deep frown on his face, "Very eratic." he commented.

Soult slapped him on the shoulder happily, "Never worry my boy, the Cheka will be feeling a lot more relaxed without having to keep our eyes on them, and when the Cheka are relaxed things are easy for us eh?"

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

(OOC: Deep apologies New Shiron for repeatedly forgetting to reply to the Key's club subsection)

Klatch still had Orcs, Dyelli Beybi had become very cosy with them, in truth the Dyellians and the Orcs were a match made in heaven, the Dyellians were (usually) the brain, while the Orcs provided the muscle. It had helped to pacify the Dyellian Artctic territories very quickly, very few people wanted to mess with Commisaars and Orcs at the same time. It was a relationship that many Klatchian countries were quite rightly suspicious of.

"Agreed then." Ehrlich nodded amicably, "We'll scratch your back if you scratch ours and we'll make sure the Vaadians don't get up to anything funny."

It was a modified Hind, this time. Modified was possibly the wrong word, it was filled with liquid storage tanks, while more tanks filled up all the hardpoints, leaving only the main gun as a weapon along with the usual chaff and expanded Dyellian electronic suite.

It wasn't far over the Eastern border when it began to disgourge the content of the tanks as a fine mist. After circling around the jungle for just over an hour it returned to base. It wasn't immediately clear what was going on, although in a few days it would become clear that the helicopters that were doing this (and there were quite a number) were spreading defoliant.

Further east a Eurofighter shrieked at low altitude over the jungle, dumping what looked like a fairly similar liquid fuel tank into a River as it passed. What it had in fact done was dump a rather unpleasant poison into the water supply which destroyed DNA. It acted by destroying DNA, causing cell death, and tended to concentrate in the liver. In high enough doses it was lethal, but when dumped in a river was only likely to make the drinkers very ill. Some though had been put into a bacteria or virus to wipe the elves out, but their immune system was too strong (and anything that worked on elves had a worrying tendency to infect Dyellians as well), so instead they were resorting to a much more inefficient method of trying to poison them.

Further east sill, a Flight of Anatovs merrily carpet bombed an area of jungle with suspected elven settlements from high altitude while a squadron of Mirage kept an eye out for anyone thinking of interfering.

It had all changed in a matter of hours. Dyelli Beybi was no longer acting under the guise of evacuating the Jiggadians, (although that was still going on, where exactly they were going was anyone's guess) now they were quite openly trying to exterminate the elven population while they were at it. They'd waited a long time for this, and nothing was going to stop them. Up in the Arctic Territories the military was gearing up to send two whole Armies South to join in the opperation. One was the newly put together 'Orc Army' which was sure to cause a few raised eyebrows in the rest of Klatch.

And then the Rain Came...

It was an open broadcast, in the clear, and it was the most horrific scene. The Alconian Marines didn't stand a chance against the massive carpet bombing of their postion. The screen showed men trying to hunker down between the massive trees of the jungle. The screams of men who had been blown apart but not killed filled the air. A blast threw half a human torso still alive into view. The Marine wailed in sudden anquish of the blast. Somehow he had kept his gun, and proceeded to blow his brains out right infront of the camera.

A voice, filled with pain and hate but not panic called out to the world over the noise of the carpet bombing
[i]This is Company Bravo of the 16th...Royal Marines opperating under...Whop boom Joint Defensive Command...We are under attack...we repeat we are Whop Boom...We have civilians under our protection...we repeat...Whop Boom

That would be the last anyone heard of Company Bravo of the 16th...or the 128 Jiggdian Civilians they had been escorting to saftey.

******
In a bar in Torrhall a man stood, he had once fought the 16th on the the shore of one of the Outer Islands. Tears filled his eyes as he watched the scene played on KCN
"Well if Tzar Felix wants a f***king war we shall give it to him." He screamed.

"Bugger." one Commisaar commented.

"'Bugger' is an understatement." Felix Dzerzhinsky was holding an emergency meeting with Senior Commisaars and military officials, "I think we can safely say that if anyone overreacts, and this is the Klatch, someone always overreacts, we're going to be in a bit of trouble. However in order to minimise the impact of this event I reccomend that 1st Group Bomber Command stands down whichever Squadron was involved and prepares an immediate court of inquiry."

"It's not the pilot's fault." the Group Commander put in, "They had no idea there were f***ing Alconians on the ground, we were bombing deep jungle, they never informed us they were going to be there."

"Even so." Air Marshall Christopher France put in, "We need to look like we're taking this seriously. A tribunal is necessary, if it finds the incident was due to a Communications breakdown, then so be it and that's good for the pilots."

"Well." Felix continued, "I think that about sums things up, anyone else have anything to add."

Nobody did and the meeting broke up. As they were leaving, Felix caught the arm of one particularly shady Commisaar, "What have you learned on the internal matter?"

"It stinks." the Commisaar replied, "It's a set up, looks like we may need to give Six a shake up, they've gone funny since the Port Olympus murders."

Felix shrugged, "They know the risks and the rules, if something like that happens, it's regretable, but we're not supposed to be starting a war, we just have to reorganise and go in again, learn from our past mistakes and become invisible. Look into it, Seven has my permission to take whatever steps necessery, although be careful about the stitch up, we may, regretably, need to leave it to take it's course, we can't have the media deciding we think we're above the law."

The other Commisaar nodded, "Got it."

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Official Statement from the Dyelli Beybian Provincial Airforce to the Klatchian Press

This morning at 18:00 hours, bombers from 3rd Squadron, 1st Group, in an attempt to eliminate hostile ground units in the Gonad peninsula, also managed to hit elements of the 16th Alconian Royal Marines. This sad and unfortunate accident is being looked into by an Official board of Inquiry. The Sqadron has been temporarily stood down while this is Inquiry takes it's course.
The Provincial Airforce wishes to extend it's condolences to the families and friends of those killed in the accident, and to assure them that no such accidents will happen again.

-Air Marshall Christopher France


From: Dyelli Beybian Provincial Airforce
To: Alcona and Hubris, Ministry of Foreign Affairs
Subject: Friendly fire incident

We once again wish to apologise for the incident this morning, and to repeat our condolences to all those affected. Dyelli Beybi perhaps has a reputation for killing it's own side, however this is a reputation we wish to shake.
We wish to invite a representative from Alcona and Hubris to be present at the INternal Hearing that will decide whether a Court Mashall hearing is necessary, so that no ill-informed allegations of corruption can be made.

-Air Marshall Christopher France


From: Dyelli Beybian Provincial Airforce
To: 16th Royal Marines, HQ
Subject: Friendly fire incident

We once again wish to apologise for the incident this morning, and to repeat our condolences to all those affected. At this stage we are suspending our bombing opperations over the Gonad at this time as a mark of respect, although we also wish to point out that we have poisoned the drinking water in several areas of the peninsula.
The bombing campaign will resume in seven days. We request that all units of the Royal Marines give us their coordinates in order that similar accidents do not occur.
Please find attached a map of the Peninsula marking those waterways affected by chemical drops. Please advise any units within this area of the danger, also advise us and we will be able to airlift in purification equipment within 24 hours.

-Air Marshall Christopher France

Office of The Fuehrer of The Holy Empire of Christopher Thompson
2:30 P.M. Local Time

The Feuhrer of the Holy Empire, known simply as Alucard, was sitting calmly at his desk this afternoon. After personally mediating the military stand-down of the Van Deamanian and Jummanistran forces only a few weeks earlier, he was sleeping much better now. No Holy Empiric lives were lost, and the diplomatic mission was considered in large a whole sucess, save the fact that the entire navy had to be mobilized in order to do it. Diplomacy is after all,the Fuehrer thought, All about applying the correct pressure.And he was, for the most part, correct. Diplomacy was rarely a meeting of the righteous to calmy discuss what to do, as many civilians percieved it was. However, movie-makers always did what they wanted to...
He rolled his eyes at this thought as he picked up his coffe in his white-gloved hand and turned the page of his midday brief. He passed by the domestic pages, as usual, partly because he knew that they would report only sucess in economy and the usual, and partly because he knew he would be re-told all of it at next week's advisory meeting. While he leafed through it, a single word caught his eye: Klatch.
He stopped. He went back, and looked for it again. Klatch. There it was again, he thought. He knew he'd heard of all the international incidents somewhere in the southern klatch...but where. He decided to do a bit of research. He pressed one of the buttons near the front of his desk as he absently set down his coffee, forgetting it existed. An aide rushed in immediately.

"Yes sir?" The aide said, erect and saluting.

"Get me everything we know on the Southern Klatch," he replied nonchalantly as he perred down at the document again. The aide hurried out to retrieve the documents.

Fifteen minutes later, the aide came in with two men he recognized, and a rather small file. The file was startlingly small infact, comprised an eighth of the report he read just a quarter of an hour ago he would realize later. The two men were well known to the Feuhrer. They were High Admiral Alexander Anderson, and Marine Corps High General Gerin Sokolov. 'The odd couple,' as they were known by the military, as Anderson was a staggering 6'6", and Sokolov a puny 5'11". But nobody let him hear those words. They took the folder, and the aide scampered off, intuitively knowing that he would best serve his and the nations intrests away from this room. "Shit," the Fuehrer said under his breath. "Now I remember the Southern Klatch."

The Southern Klatch, or the 'Heathen Hole,' as it was known to the citizens of The Holy Empire, was a place that both the military and Senate had pushed to 'purify' half a decade ago. The Fuehrer had bravely stood before the entire Senate and High Military Council and defiantly pushed the issue out of their minds, as he knew it would yield little good and only cost lives and money. But his efforts had only stalled the process down into oblivion until Parliament and the military finally gave up. Even the people wanted the place rid of the 'elves' that inhabited the area. For various reasons, lobbyists, and humanitarian aid, they had all rallied under the cause. But he had pushed it all away, and now, just as it had begun to sink into history, this came up. After all, it was unprecidented, a Feuhrer refusing to grant humanitarian aid. His ratings had gone down significantly because of it, and nothing yet had presented its self to boost his ratings up, short of the small miracle he had just performed near the Van Demanian Straits. And now this would come up again. And he would have to yield, he knew it, and realized it right then. His power base had crumpled under that strain, and he was only now reagaining it. He had no choice. Even before the two men said anything, before they sat down, he said three sentenses: "I authorize full humanitarian aid, with limits only on mass destruction. Go, deal swift justice and purge the lands, save lives and exterminate all unclean in the name of Christopher Thompson. In the name of The Holy Empire."

The two men looked at eachother first with open mouths. Had he just..? Yes, he had. After a few seconds, their gapes turned into smiles. Finally, a true holy order. An order to exterminate an enemy race.

OOC: Basically, I'll be filling the void of religeous zealot bastards. Their aim will be initially, to establish a center of operations near the coast, then to do what the marine corps (which is actually a deadly effecient just barely post-modern blitzkreig army) does best: blitzkreig. They'll storm the jungle, and extract all non-hoistiles as quickly as possible with all means, and then make their way to a purging of the elven population here. This may or MAY NOT be sucessful, depending on if you want the elves to live. I want to work with this rp, so if I'm in too late or something in the plan doesn't work right, I can yank my forces, or have them get bogged down or something. BTW, this is still an open rp, right?

BIG OOC POST

Yeah it's open, your post looked pretty well written too I might add. To make things easier for you I've written out some background info on Klatch.

http://www.eng.auburn.edu/users/donatgw/superklatchdeluxe.jpg

The link there takes you to the most up to date Klatchian map.

Klatch and it's many States
Klatch is theoretically one Nation bound by a constitution, it is looked a little freyed at the moment. Dyelli Beybi is centrally located on the Southern Klatchian Coast. To it's East is the Gonad Peninsula, where the fighting is.

The main players here are Dyelli Beybi, who is possibly trying to evacuate civilians, possibly trying to exterminate the elves, possibly trying to extend their borders. Dyelli Beybi is an excedingly left-wing democracy, with a very well developed Intelligence service. Dyelli Beybi has a reputation for pursuing it's own goals to the detriment of the Federation as a whole.

New Shiron is a fair distance from the main Klatchian continent, they are concerned about the peninsula falling into anarchy and endangering New Shiron air traffic. At the moment they are cooperating with Dyelli Beybi.

Alcona and Hubris, Vrak and Ilek Vaad are all also involved along with the JDF (National Army, as opposed to the provincial troops levied by the individual States). These factions are suspicious of Dyelli Beybi to varying degrees. Vrak is known to be excedingly belligerent towards outsiders interfering in Klatchian affairs.


History of the Elves and other non-humans in Klatch
The Gonad peninsula is mostly jungle. The Diocletion Empire existed in the area first, and more or less left the elves alone. Next came Christofi, a theocracy which mercilessly persecuted the elves, airing brutal executions on television, shows which were outlawed in most countries but which recieved high ratings in Dyelli Beybi. Abuse of the elven population led to them becoming somewhat twisted. Finally Rogue Jiggady colonised the area, following their Government's collapse Dyelli Beybi moved in. There is rumour the collapse pf Rogue Jiggady may in fact have been due to the 'Oracle', a creature which has succeeded in uniting the Elven tribes into a unified force.

Dyelli Beybi has been fighting the elves on and off for as long as anyone can remember. The elves call the Dyellians 'Djels' and regard them as unclean and distinct from humans. The Dyellians are allied with the Orcs, and several other human cultures all of which together form 'Dyelli Beybi'.

It has been hypothesised that the Dyellian race has more than a little elven blood in it, facial bone structures are nearly identical and they're generally of a similar build (although the Dyellians are quite a bit shorter), the Dyellians deny all this vehemently.

The other two non human races likely to be floating about the Gonad are the Vrakian sentient walruses, the current President of the Federation is one of these, and the Var, dragon like creatures inhabiting Lords of War, with links to Alcona and Hubris. The Var hunt Orcs, the Orcs don't tend to like this too much. The Var are in possession of technology far in advance of that possessed by most of Klatch.


Technology
All Klatchian States are post-modern, although in varying aspects. For instance, Dyelli Beybi has highly advanced AA and electronic equipment. Alcona and Hubris and New Shiron both employ UAVs. Vrak uses robots to a limited extent, Ilek Vaad uses 'active camouflage' and multi-task combat vehicles, while Midlonia has some really big ships.
Some States, Lords of War in particular, also have Space Fleets.

OOC: We hvae teh spcfleets t00!!11!!!!! ;)

IC:

Admiral Ilek was standing overlooking the rear deck of the Revenge Battleship 'Sir William Issem' as an ensign rushed up to him.

"Admiral, " he began with a salute "The Deyellian airforce has bombed Alconian Marines!"

Admiral Ilek stood quietly for a minute "You know, that is entirely unexpected news, but I'm somehow not suprised."

"There was a distress call from the Alconian Marines, but it was cut off sir."

Admiral Ilek went immediately to fire control, where satellites were already locked on the 16th's position, the Captain stood by.

"This is the bombing area sir, the distress call came from here, the jungle cover is still too great to discern any survivors in the area by satellite."

Admiral Ilek noded as he sat "Send out the Artemis fighters and have them skim the jungles for survivors, put Marine Units A-D on alert and have their Marathons ready to launch for a rescue operation. If any Artemis spots anyone, send in a Marathon to pick them up.

Why is it that we always have to clean up these messes? Oh and put up the Orion fighter umbrella at full strength and instruct the pilots to down any incoming bombers or such that do not have my personal clearance.

Now then, open a JDF, Dyellian and Alconian channel for me to broadcast."

After a few minutes the following message was sent and repeated on JDF, Dyellian Military and Alconian Military Channels

"This is Command Admiral Ilek of the Naval Guard.

Naval Guard aircraft and marines will be conducting ongoing search and rescue operations in the last known position of the 16th Alconian Marines. A no fly, no go zone will be enforced within five hundred miles of the search zone. Forces wishing to assist, or enter this zone must clear such entry with Me, or the Admirals of Tactical Groups Emperor Ehecatl and Namroth Vedic.

This zone will be enforced strictly. That is all. Admiral Ilek out."

The transmission included co-ordinates for the search area and positions of the three Naval Guard Tactical Groups.

Admiral Ilek then contacted Tollan Fire Control to advise them of the situation.

If there could be an instance of burning cold rage, it was the persona of Alexander Crawford, Grand Duke of the United Duchies.

"Those bastards...Dzerzhinsky is going to pay for this...even if it takes my family a century to enact our revenge Beta Company will be honored."

His eyes had gone to deep, deep blue, almost black as he spoke. "I want all southern theater war plans updated and ready to implement on five hours notice. I want all divisions along the Eastern Marches to be ready to move in less than one hours notice. Naval Marshal?"

"Yes your Grace..."

"Inform Lieutenant General Babcock that I want the Third Expedition Battallion ready to move..."

*****
To: Ilek-Vaad, Admiral Ilek of the Naval Guard
CC: Republican Council of Ilek-Vaad
From: Alexander III, Grand Duke of the United Duchies

First, I wish to thank you on behalf of myself and the Naval Marshall at your present attempts to rescue survivors of the 16th Marines, Beta Company. As such you have our full support to assist the 122nd Rotary Air Wing that will be also conducting SAR. I will leave it to our mutual commanders in the feild to work out the details.

******
To: Naval Guard Detatchment off Coast of FKC
From: Lt. General Myers, Commander 16th Marines
Subject: SAR operations

I will be sending rotodyenes into the last reported area of Beta Company. They will have equipment aboard capable of locating any activated SAR beacons that survived the bombardment. Both Beta Company and Alpha Company were returning from a deep pentration rescue mission to the captial and went radio silent due to enemy activity.

We should warn you that the enemy appears to have a mixture of weapons types including some very high-end anti-aircraft units. We advise caution as the enemy may be preparing a counter-strike at overflying aircraft.

******
There was no response to the Deyllians formally. Just the cool silence of a State that was so angered by the actions of the Deyllians and their arrogance that rather than say anything, they said nothing.

Well in Parliament they had something to say...

The middle Alconian Key rose and looked at his fellows in the grand space. "My fellow Keys, the United Duchies has suffered greviously today. Not less than four hours ago Alconian Marines, operating under Federal Control, were slaughtered in a massive carpet bombing by the State forces of Dyelli Beybi. And with those Marines over one hundread Jiggdian civilians were also lost. Whatever motivates the Dyellian war machine to drop mass loads of chemicals and bombs on the Gonad is irrelavant now. They are obviously operating outside the legal parameters. The Joint Defense Force is the group that should be rescuing Klatchians from their failed state. And those forces doing that have now been horrifically slaughtered."

He paused, letting his eyes cast around his audiance. "It is obvious to my government that the United Duchies must ask where General O'Booze is in all of this. Forces under his control and responsiblity have been slaughtered by state forces acting outside of the law. I demand that General O'Booze present himself to this body and explain his lack of action. And futhermore I demand that either the Deyllian Forces in the Gonad operate under Federal control, or that they withdraw immediatly."

******
To: Naval Guard Detatchment off Coast of FKC
From: Lt. General Myers, Commander 16th Marines
Subject: SAR operations

I will be sending rotodyenes into the last reported area of Beta Company. They will have equipment aboard capable of locating any activated SAR beacons that survived the bombardment. Both Beta Company and Alpha Company were returning from a deep pentration rescue mission to the captial and went radio silent due to enemy activity.

We should warn you that the enemy appears to have a mixture of weapons types including some very high-end anti-aircraft units. We advise caution as the enemy may be preparing a counter-strike at overflying aircraft.

******


Admiral Ilek looked over the communiques and responded as necessary.

To:Lt. General Myers
From: Admiral Ilek, Naval Guard

Subject: SAR operations

I am currently launching twenty five Artemis Ground Attack Fighters. They are designed for low altitude operations. Their sensory equipment will not only be able to detect any distress signals but also pick out individuals that are still alive, but may not be near or had a chance to activate their SAR equipment.

I have standing by four Naval Guard Marine units (four hundred men) and four Marathon-B transports (carrying capacity two hundred and fifty) to immediately move in and rescue any surviors detected. Please make sure that your Rotodyne pilots keep in contact with Fire Control aboard the Sir William Issem to make certain that we co-ordinate rescue activities and that there are no mishaps.

*****

In the bowels of the Revenge Battleship, four Marathon-B Transports were reay and loaded with Marines, each transport had one hundrd marines and room an additional one hundred and fifty passengers. Each unit comprises of ninety 'Tacticals' armed as regular Retaliatory Guard, but with the smaller carbine Minimi, five trauma surgeons and five Naval Guard snipers, in their jungle gear.

Colonel Lolkema was in charge, he looked over his men "Alright then lads, this is search and rescue, we don't go in until the Artemis' find someone to rescue. This is hostile territory. All units are to follow hostile territory target acquisition procedure. Remember, always better safe than sorry. So then sit tight, and let's wait and see."

*****

The supersonic group of Artemis fighters skimmed the water until they reached the jungle, where they slowed and transitioned their 'Locus' computers to skim the tree tops. They were seventy five feet from the very tops of the trees, too low for most ground based radar and at six hundred miles an hour, too fast for someone with a stinger or equivelant.

Their active camoflage skin appeared green and mottled from above, blurring them into the trees and from below they appeared sky blue and white, almost invisible against the sky, only the disturbed tops of the trees let anyone know they were there.

They were soo over the bomb sites and the trees gave way to craters and areas of flattened debris. The Artemis' wee going too fast to spot anything themselves, but Fire Control was poring over the data that was coming back from the Artemis' camera and thermographic sensors, within minutes they could cover huge areas and let Fire Control pick up and direct them back to points of interest.

****

While all this was going on, Tactical Group Sir Willaim Issem Moved closer to the Gonad, to give the planes a shorter journey.

In Regina, the capital of New Shiron, the Defense Minister Matthew Ridgewy was asked about the blue on blue incident in Jiggedy during a press conference on the newest defense budget.

"In any military operation accidents occur. Its part of the price of doing business. Indeed the destruction of the Alconan company is a terrible tragedy, and we extend our sympathies to the families of those killed and wounded. Hopefully such accidents will not occur in the future. At first glance, it appears to have been a simple case of miscommunication, always a risk in a combat zone."

later on in private, Ridgeway and his Generals and Admirals looked over the latest intelligence information:

"Apparently the Alconans are pretty pissed off sir." General Stark, director of military intelligence reported. "They have sent out some warning orders and are going on a high state of alert."

"Any chance this wasn't an accident?" Ridgeway asked sharply.

"Its possible the Dyellis blew away that company on purpose, but pretty unlikely sir. It looks like a big intelligence screw up to me. Uncharacteristic of them, but they are stronger on political intelligence than operational intelligence based on our past observation of them. It happens sir."

Ridgeway nodded, "Well this isn't going to help matters at all. We have the IV moving a mucking great big fleet around, the DBs have a big fleet in the area, and we have our fleet there too. DB has a lot of troops on the ground, there are problems in Port Olympus, we had another blue on blue incident with DB and the JDF not too long ago. Christ, are they incompetent or just accident prone?"

No one wanted to answer that question..........

The supersonic group of Artemis fighters skimmed the water until they reached the jungle, where they slowed and transitioned their 'Locus' computers to skim the tree tops. They were seventy five feet from the very tops of the trees, too low for most ground based radar and at six hundred miles an hour, too fast for someone with a stinger or equivelant.

Their active camoflage skin appeared green and mottled from above, blurring them into the trees and from below they appeared sky blue and white, almost invisible against the sky, only the disturbed tops of the trees let anyone know they were there.

They were soo over the bomb sites and the trees gave way to craters and areas of flattened debris. The Artemis' wee going too fast to spot anything themselves, but Fire Control was poring over the data that was coming back from the Artemis' camera and thermographic sensors, within minutes they could cover huge areas and let Fire Control pick up and direct them back to points of interest.

****

While all this was going on, Tactical Group Sir Willaim Issem Moved closer to the Gonad, to give the planes a shorter journey.

High overhead, UAVs from New Shiron were already watching the area, doing their own looking. The Vaadian aircraft were observed carefully as they moved into the area. Although very difficult to track, the Infra Red trace and more importantly, the hypersonic shock wave and its effects were observable until they went feet dry, and then the movement of the air and its faint but observable traces were monitored as they moved. Only the best software and computer imaging systems back in New Shiron made this possible, along with the very high speed communications links between the drones, the satellites above and the ground station in New Shiron.

Aboard the New Shiron 3rd Fleet, Admiral Tovey was quickly alerted about both incidents.

"Any indication that the Vaadians have indicated their intent?" He asked his G2.

"We haven't picked up any traffic between them and the Dyellians Admiral. Their profile indicates an armed recce, but we don't know their intentions. It might be a mercy flight, or it might be something else."

Tovey nodded, "Ok ladies and gentlemen, until we know what the hell they are up too, we better put the fleet on alert. Order all ships to suspend further exercises and go to condition 2. Put in a call to the RAF, I want a standing patrol over the fleet from now on, at least a squadron at all times."

Aboard HES Angelus (freewebs.com/supercav)
25 miles off of southern Dyelli Beybian Coast, Moving NE 9:50 PM local time

"All systems nominal sir, the bubble is intact and we're still maintaining cruise speed of eight-hundred-fifty knots," the sailor reported.

"Excellent," replied Captain Laetase. "Keep us steady super-cavitating on this course until we're within fifteen nautical miles of the ingress zone."

"Yes sir," the man replied.

The Angelus, a brand new type of ship that is the pinnacle of Holy Empiric naval technology, was guarding fifteen newly made Typhoon 1A1 heavy transports. (http://www.deepangel.com/html/deep_image_gallery_30.html) Then, it happened. Contacts blinked to life on the sonar screen, which had to contantly refresh due to the high speed of the ship under super-cavitation.

"Sir, we're picking up contacts port of our current position," the sonar officer beamed.

"Yes, I know," he replied. "They're the Namroth Vedic tactical group from Ilek-Vaad. They shouldn't pose a threat, they can't hit us from all indications that we know, and they're not here for war even if they could. Although sixteen super-cavitating ships will most certainly wake-up their sonar officers," he chuckled at the thought. After all, that was the dis-advantage to super-cavitation. It was noisier than a Metallica concert to the tenth power to a sonar operator. Not that is mattered; they were here to kill elves, not Ilek-Vaadians. "Maintain course."

"Yes sir," a much more elite, proficient voice said. It was their navigation officer. A bloody brilliant one at that, but he was also a bit stuck-up, which clashed with Laetase's urban upbringing oh-so-much, he thought quietly to himself.

The captain pushed one of the nuemerous buttons on his comm seat, and the speaker to his ears lit up with an ever willing "Yes sir?"

"Yes, this is Laetase. Scare me up four S-16 Vipers for guard detail, and another four S/A-18 Hurricanes and tell them to get their asses into the air." He paused. "Guard detail as well."

"Yes sir, right away!" And with that, the comm died immediately. Down into the bowels of the HES Angelus, the four dedicated sling shots preped as eight sub fighters made their way to them. They went slowly to the slingshots, and one by one all four of the catapults registered to the pilot's comms as 'prep'd and ready.' The blast doors opened, much like gigantic torpedo tubes, and they slipped in silently. Three seconds passed. Nothing happened. Six. Nothing. Eight. Nothing. Nine, the massive blast doors on the otherside opened, and revieled an amazing view. The bubble on which the Angelus was riding was just a few feet away, and the sea behind it passed by at over 800 knots! Ten. The pilots shuddered as they were propelled out of the ship at just over two-hundred-fifty knots, and their own engines engaged, pushing them at five-hundred, six, seven, eight, nine...there. They did have to catch up with Angelus after all, now that she was a few miles ahead of them. The next set of four launched, and careened off, but rather than going down, they went up. These were the new S/A planes, capable of doing both air and sea battle. The piled into the air, their engines pouring away at the atmosphere as they caught up with the Angelus who was just two-hundred feet below the water, and they just five-hundred feet above it. They came in a standard delta formation, a sign that no war was meant, and moved on as if this was everyday. Besides, in a few hours they would reach the shore, and then the real fun would begin.

OOC: I've spent quite a LARGE ammount of time justifying and making this navy, and I'd REALLY appreciate it if it wasn't trampled all over. They don't plan on involving themselves much in this operation, so if you leave them alone they won't anniahlate you. Also, my navy is the most advanced (by FAR) thing I have, and my Marine Corps will be much more conventional. After all, they still use Oil for Cripe's sake. The Marine Corps is located in my sig where it says here.

65 Nautical miles south southeast of Rouge Jiggady
aboard the Monarch class SSNC, the Queen Amanda, the CIC watch officer and Sonar watch chief both hit the battle stations alarm at the same time from their seperate stations.

Captain Harry Stanton walked briskly to the bridge moments later and asked for a report.

"Captain, we have a large very high speed transist that puts in on a heading for both the IV and DB fleets." Lieutenant Meredith Wigham swallowed hard for a moment when she saw the display verifying the speed of the transist. "Umm, sir we have confirmed that target speed is 800 knots"

Stanton stared at the pretty young lieutanent for a moment, keeping his face impassive. "Who has something like that?"

"Not many sir, only thing that the computer can reference is a source reported something like this from the Holy Empire."

The Captain thought about it. It was a good 20 times faster than his own ship, but his torpedoes could catch it if needed. The Mk 99 could reach 1,000 knots, although at that speed it had a short range and no loiter capability. Luckily though, it was very unlikely that the target could hear him, and even less likely that it would hear the little Sealions. Although they could only make 60 knots. He didn't even want to think about the damage that thing was doing to the local sea life.

"Damn, there are whales in the Great Southern Ocean listening to that thing barrel across the ocean." he muttered. "Take us to transmission depth. We are going to need some orders, and we need to let the rest of the fleet know what is going on. Although I am sure everybody knows its here now. Flush the Sealions too, and tell them to set up a picket line between us and that thing. Make damn sure they remember the rules of engagement."

Meanwhile, aboard the flagship, Admiral Tovey blinked a couple of times when the new contact and likely suspect was reported. "Sound general quarters, and let the Dyellians know what the hell is coming. Send a flash message home too."

ooc
New Shiron armed forces information can be found here
http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?t=424788&highlight=shiron

I can live with the submarine, although the usefulness of the speed is a doctrine quibble, but then my forces rely on stealth and defense firepower more than speed and armor. Although damn your sub would be killing a lot of marine life at that speed (shock waves would be a serious side effect).

OOC: You just violated Klatchian Territorial waters in about 0.9 minutes and proceeded to run into the Great Dyellian Mine feild (which is between thirty and fourty miles out) I suppose your supercavitation 'saved' your ships but as hostile acts go you make Neo Tyr's blundering about look rather pathetic. And we invaded him for that little act of interference.

IC: The Octogon
The Joint Defense Force's alarms went off like crazy. An unknown force had proceeded to just show up off the Klatchian Coast, violate the Federation's territorial limits and airspace with impunity.

"Someone get O'Booze on the line, we have an apparent invasion force now in Defense Sector Five. Type unknown, Nation Unknown, and they don't seem to care too much about any of the other navies operating in the area."

******
There were a good number of signs of life in the area of jungle not bombed out of existance. It appeared to be Primates mainly who were now moving into the bombed out areas to scavange.

Five miles north of the incident site appeared to be two groups opposing each other across a small valley. Thermal indications would show that both forces were engaged in an intense firefight. Who was who was a bit difficult to make out as neither were apparently broadcasting any normal signals. But one of the groups was apparently firing into jungle which registared movement but no heat signitures. The second group was pounding the first group with heavy fire.

At the bombsite there did appear to be a small group of surviors hidden in a small deflection at the edge of the bombing site. Three individuals apparently, none moving....but then they were surrounded by the heat signitures of a few hundread small creatures.

Aboard HES Angelus (freewebs.com/supercav)
27 miles off of southern Dyelli Beybian Coast, Moving NE 11:52 PM local time

"Sir," the sonar operator spouted, "We're tracking active motion in large numbers south of the ship."

The piqued the captain's attention, as he suspected the fleets by him would do nothing. "What is it son?"

"Well," the sonar officer began, "It seems like someone's setting up a defensive perimeter around us, but it seems to be very deliberate and preperatory."

"Preperatory?" he said immidiately.

"Yes sir. It seems as if they're getting ready for something."

"Hmmm. Alright, it's something we'll have to deal with keep me informed. And I hope that they all know that there's four pilots they can talk to up above us..." (hint hint)

"Your orders sir?" The officer said questioningly as he patiently waited for his commanding officer's response.

"Maintain course and speed."

"Yes sir."

Captain Laetase moved back to his command seat and again hailed the hangar.

"Yes sir? What is it?" The hangar operation manager inquired.

"The situation's changed. Bring the rest of the Viper's to-" BAAM. A large shudder issued throughout the ship, and the battle alert sirens and lights became active at once. "What the hell was that?" The Captain shouted. "And what the hell did it do?"

"Sir, Incoming minefield detected!"

"No Shit!" Laetase screamed back. "Dive to ten-thousand feet! Make your new heading degree one-nine-two. Let's get under and out of this damn minefield! And recall all the Vipers and give the Hurricanes our new heading immediately!"

The proper men shouted their yes sirs and got to work. The only thing that the Captain could think of was what in the flying fuck a minefield was doing in International Waters.

The ship turned and made it's new heading, and the confused transports responded in like terms, changing their heading as well. "Damage report!" the captain screamed. The report came back almost instantly: "All signs green sir, no damage, but we were shaken up pretty bad."

The Captain audably sighed, "Alright son, good work." He clicked the com off, and then adressed his navigation and sonar operators. "First off, Sonar, how much minefield is there?"

"Well," he started in response, "I can't tell exactly at this speed, but I'd say that if you ride this out in this direction for...five minutes or so, we'd be fine."

Laetase nodded and turned to his navigation officer. "You heard the man. After five minutes, surface, and comms?"

"Yes sir?" The comms officer stood up and saluted impatiently.

"Yes, get me a link with the Dyelli Beybian government. I want to know what nasty little suprises that have around here."

The ship surfaced after leaving the minefield and began hailing the Dyelli Beybian government's known open com channels.

OOC: I'll make the landing at approx. 1:00 AM local time, so as soon as some more postage happens or later this afternoon. Also, if you wanna save the whales :p I suggest you hail the four fighter pilots above, although it's not like it'll matter soon. I'll be slowing down and making my landing next post or so anywho. Also, I'd like to note that a nation's water's are considered within 12 miles of its boarders, and that the only way that this could have happened and not been in international waters would be if you had somehow nationalized these waters, but under what premise that would be allowed I don't know. Anyway, I'll deal with it. If there are anymore secrets like this, please let me know.

ooc
hmm, well minefields would have to be on the continental shelf so the ocean depth is probably only a few hundred feet at your location.... however radical turn south would allow you to go to deeper waters and then dive down to the abyssel plain level (about 10,000 feet or deeper). In any case, more detonations will follow although they probably won't do any damage because the shock wave of your movement will detonate the mines a safe distance away.

However, a turn south is going to scare the hell out of the thoroughly concerned New Shiron fleet that is south of you.

IC
"We have detonations in the water sir" the Sonar officer said quickly.

Captain Stanton just shook his head. The minefields, always tricky to deal with, would have been hard to spot moving at the speed the target was making. "We get orders yet?" he asked the communications officer.

"No sir, Fleet command is waiting on a political decision. The usual rules of engagement are in effect."

"Very well. Send a message via long wave to the Commander Farraday. Tell him his boats are to go active and he can flood his tubes. If the target closes on us for some reason he is to defend the fleet."

moments later 15 Sealions all turned on their active sonar and began pinging away, flooding an area 15 miles wide and nearly 100 miles across with sonar signals. Their targeting sonar remained off for now, but like beaters trying to flush a tiger, they made their presence known.

Behind them the Queen Amanda remained quiet, but used the information gathered by its mini sub squadron to develop its own picture of the situation. It was the hunter, the min subs were bait.

Only one Sealion remained in its hanger, and a frustrated Petty Officer 2nd Class Wilma Deering paced as techs hurried to finish putting back its sonar array that only a few hours ago they had been doing maintenaince.

"Its ago Ms Deering, the Chief will have us going in no time." Petty officer 3rd class Amanda Detmer soothed. "Its ok to be fashionably late to a party you know."

Wilma wasn't impressed and snarled a curt "Shut up" to her somewhat amused subordinate.

ooc
New Shiron uses ultra low frequency long wave radio to communicate with its submarines and the Monarch class carries that aboard. The signal range is relatively short (a few miles) and the Sealions can't reply, but it does give the Queen Amanda the ability to vector its brood like fighter interceptors onto a target bomber.

The Queen Amanda is roughly 200 miles south of the Rogue Jiggedy coast at this point, having replaced its sister ship a day earlier and moved in closer to monitor events. This puts it within active and passive sensor range of the coast, especially considered what a noisy place it is now.

HES Angelus
The submarine had surfaced, it's antenna stretching into the sky, keeping a link open with a communications sattelite orbitting the planet. On it's short-range communications, however, the captain broadcasted to all near fleets.
"Hello, this is Captain Laetase of The Holy Empiric Ship Angelus. We have run into an unknown minefield and request from any nuetral or friendly force near by to update our mapping of this area, as it is obviously highly inaccurate. Our intent is to secure a base of operations within the Gonad and extract civilians and exterminate all hostiles in the area. This is a humanitarian expeditionary force, repeat this is a humanitarian expoditionary force. We request that someone update our map as to what the hell is really going on here, and possibly guide us around the minefield if at all possible. I repeat..."

IC:

Admiral Aramayo walked over to the Ensign.

"Several large submarines detected sir, heading straight for us, at high speed. They will be over the Wolfhound emplacements in about fifteen minutes and will hit the Trident screen shortly after that."

Admiral Aramayo nodded "Contact Tollan. Do we know who they are? Have their been any attempts at contact?"

The ensign sjook his head "No sir."

Admiral Aramayo looked over as Tollan responded "Admiral, we are tracking wahat appear to be advanced supercavitating submarines, rather large, by satellite. They are of unknown origin. Supreme Republican Commander Ring is giving you liberty to deal with them."

Admiral Aramayo nodded "Very well. If these ships reach the Wolfhounds, have them open up, alert the Wolfhounds and have them use the satellite link to calculate Icarus trajectory needed to intercept the ships. Put all Tridents on alert and have them swarm whatever is left of those sixteen ships.

Scramble Artemis fighters and Orions, put the Tactical Group on Alert."

*****

Quickly efficently and quietly the Tactical Groups readied to attack, outwardly things looked no different, other than the air filling with fighter jets that quickly scrambled and spread out to see where they could best be used. The Jaguar Arsenal Cruisers readied their Icarus torpedo launchers.

On the sea floor the Wolfhound subs that had been laying flat on the bottom for weeks prepped their nearly vertical torpedo tubes, as the Trident submarines made a net beyond them.

Even with the speed of the transports the advanced targetting systems of the Wolfhounds, Jaguar Arsenal Cruisers and the other ships had already calculated the angle and trajectory needed for the Icarus torpedos to intercept, head on. The speed of the submerged transports would only bring them to the powerful torpedos quicker. The super cavitating Icarus torpedoscould reach one hundred and twenty eight knots, they couldn't catch these enemies, but they could use angles to intercept.

*****

Admiral Aramayo returned to his seat and watched the giant plasma screens, on them were red x's indicting that when the enemy reached here, the torpedo barrage should fire.

"Captain, order all ships to fire at mark. If no one tells us who these ships belong to, we'll Give them to Captain Jones."

OOC: I think that eight-hundred-fifty knots is a stretch for any ship, super cavitating or not. But if my Kltachian neighbors don't object........

The Retaliatory Guard (http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?t=347434&page=1)

Vaadian deployments are always ready for war, that is why they are always so massive, even for such a small task as to watch the Gonad ;)

OOC: If there are no mines, we could assume they attempted to pass over Ilek-Vaad's Wolfhounds?

The Octogon
"They requested what?" The JDF Admrial looked up from his charts

"Er....details of the Dyellian Mine Feilds sir..."
"Who..."
Hello, this is Captain Laetase of The Holy Empiric Ship Angelus. We have run into an unknown minefield and request from any nuetral or friendly force near by to update our mapping of this area, as it is obviously highly inaccurate. Our intent is to secure a base of operations within the Gonad...

"Who...The Holy Empire...the pope?"
"Nope not the Pope some two bit one and half billion pop nation...apparently they woke up to the fact that they were hurtling through a minefeild."

"I am a little curious about 'setting up a base of operations within the Gonad buisness." The Admiral added quietly.

"Quite sir..."

extract civilians and exterminate all hostiles in the area.
"That sounds like a good old fasioned purification to me. Remove civilians and kill all hostiles...hostile to who?"

"Er...I would say to them removing civilians...or in general..."

"Quite...which says that they are...."

"Invading...I mean no State has notified us a treaty with this Holy Empire."

"Er...most don't tell us about any alliance their in..."

"I am an Admiral of the JDF, if Parliament hasn't been informed then it doesn't exist in my book."

"Sir, I still haven't been able to raise General O'Booze"

"Fine then, I will interpet the wishes of the President, I think we are fairly clear on this"


Broadcast in the Clear
This is the Joint Defense Force of the Federated Klatchian Coast. You are entering restricted waters off our coast and have stated an intent to land personel upon Territory of the Federation. Be advised that we have no known agreement or treaty allowing you such access to Federal Territory. Any violation of the soverign territory of the Federation will be considered an aggressive act. Any aggressive act can and will be met with force by either Federal, State, or Allied Forces.
Consider this your first and last warning.
Admiral Pellew, Defensive District V Commander



Encryption JDF Code Z876-8200
Attention all Klatchian Forces, the Holy Empire has stated intentions to land troops within Klatchian Territory without permission. As I have had no countervailing orders to standard Klatchian Protocols, I am forced to authorize use of force to stop this apparent attempt an the invasion and conquest of Klatchian Territory.

Futher All JDF Naval Forces off the Coast of Neo Tyr are hearby recalled to protect the southern coast.

Please notify us here at the Octogon of any and all actions and communications dealing with the Holy Empire

Good Luck and God Speed
Admiral Pellew

HES Angelus
The submarine had surfaced, it's antenna stretching into the sky, keeping a link open with a communications sattelite orbitting the planet. On it's short-range communications, however, the captain broadcasted to all near fleets.
"Hello, this is Captain Laetase of The Holy Empiric Ship Angelus. We have run into an unknown minefield and request from any nuetral or friendly force near by to update our mapping of this area, as it is obviously highly inaccurate. Our intent is to secure a base of operations within the Gonad and extract civilians and exterminate all hostiles in the area. This is a humanitarian expeditionary force, repeat this is a humanitarian expoditionary force. We request that someone update our map as to what the hell is really going on here, and possibly guide us around the minefield if at all possible. I repeat..."

Admiral Tovey looked at the message printout with raised eyebrows. "Do we have instructions yet?"

"Yes Admiral, JDF command has authorized use of force to evict them if they approach the coast of Klatch or initiate hostilities with any JDF or other Klatchian forces." Captain Eddington replied. "Looks like we might just end up with an honest to god navy shooting war for a change sir."

"Well, before we start a war, lets get some support. Contact Fleet Command and tell them the situation, and request implementation of Operation Kincaid" Tovey ordered. Sipping his coffee, "lets give this guy a chance to talk. Send this message as well". Tovey quickly jotted down a few lines and handed it to his Flag Captain.

Meanwhile in New Shiron, Defense Minister Ridgeway was not a happy man. Yet another crisis was evolving in the Klatch, as if the latest Alconan/DB problem and the Port Olympus crisis weren't enough. At least this one was fairly clear cut. Involvment in this would also allow New Shiron to avoid having to make a quick decision on the others as well. Always a plus.

A string of orders were quickly sent to the RAF and RSF.

Within 20 minutes, the wing of F22D fighter bombers outfitted with anti shipping missiles was being prepped, along with its tankers and AWACs aircraft. At another base, a squadron SF3 orbital fighters was already racing into space to take up high guard positions.

Meanwhile the RSF was busy as well, and a 3 corvettes and the frigate Pegasus either shifted orbits to cover the area or lifted off into orbit to do so.

As all of this was going on, Tovey's message was sent to Captain Laetase of The Holy Empiric Ship Angelus.

"This is Admiral Tovey, commander 3rd Fleet, Royal Navy of New Shiron. As a member state of the Klatchian Federation, we have received orders to initiate hostilities with you should you approach the coast of Klatch, or an air or water craft from your vessel does so. I strongly recommend that your vessel pull back outside of the economic zone of the FKC, which would be a minimum distance of 200 miles, and have your government contact the Federal Klatchian Government before your vessel proceeds further."

Meanwhile, the 3rd Fleet began steaming north as 30 knots, which meant that it would reach the area in 30 hours and missile range in 18 hours.

Closer in, TF 34 and its ships also began moving north, but at a slower 14 knots. Only 300 miles from the coast, they were rapidly approaching engagement range as well.

The Queen Amanda moved as well, and its Sealions continued to activily ping away on their sonars.

[ Encryption JDF Code Z876-8200
Attention all Klatchian Forces, the Holy Empire has stated intentions to land troops within Klatchian Territory without permission. As I have had no countervailing orders to standard Klatchian Protocols, I am forced to authorize use of force to stop this apparent attempt an the invasion and conquest of Klatchian Territory.

Futher All JDF Naval Forces off the Coast of Neo Tyr are hearby recalled to protect the southern coast.

Please notify us here at the Octogon of any and all actions and communications dealing with the Holy Empire

Good Luck and God Speed
Admiral Pellew

A message was also fired off to Admiral Pellew.

From Admiral Tovey, commander New Shiron 3rd Fleet

"We are shifting positions to cover the intruder. Message sent (see attached) and intruding vessel ordered to retire to waters at least 200 miles from FKC coast. Intend to engage if vessel does not comply within 12 hours, makes a move that would be considered a hostile act, fails to reply within that time frame or otherwise infringes sovereignity of FKC."

ooc
see previous post as to message and movements

(OOC: 850 knotts? Thats quite fast. That could circumnavigate the earth in less than a day. I won't complain, I can live with it. Im not certain the shockwave would necessarily have set off the mines, they're mostly magnetically activated captive torpedo mines.)

The Dyelli Beybian fleetwas already well aware of the incoming threat, and had called on a coupole of Scout Cruiser Squadrons to join the fleet. That way they could 'Starfish' the subs if they started to look hostile, although anyone worried about marine life would probably be even more worried if they knew that the Dyellians were considering using that particular ASW weapon.

On land, the Dyellians had a rather large flight of helicopters heading straight for the bombing zone. They were at high altitude, well above the range of most SAM. It was difficult to work out exactly how many were up there, but it was quite a lot. It wasn't helped by the fact that there was something else up there carrying EW equipment. It could well be a Dyellian SAR attempt, but it was just as likely to be another random ground attack.

The infantry were doing more or less nothing, just sitting in their fortified coastal positions waiting for reinforcements to arrive.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

In Port Olympus, O'Booze was informed of the Alconian Key's demands, "He can go to hell." O'Booze told the aide who had carried him the message, he was too tired to bother with some stuck up Alconian.

Anyway, there might be an invasion coming, "Mobilise JDF Naval assetts to the area, but I don't want anyone shooting unless they shoot first. We don't want a second Neo Tyr situation."

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Nearby in Parliament, the one Dyellian Key who had actually shown up had sobered up enough to understand what the Alconian had said, but not enough to sound even slightly diplomatic, "Dyelli Beybi does not answer to the likes of the Alconian Key. If the Alconian Key believes that the Dyellian Provincial Air Force deliberately bombed JDF forces, then the Alconian Key is in need of a brain transplant.

"Dyelli Beybi does not deliberately bomb it's Allies, what happened was regretable, but also the result of gross incompetence on the part of the JDF which has singly failed to evacuate the human population from the Gonad. Had the JDF done a better job at controlling the elven insurgency, we would not need to bomb the place.

"We will not place our forces under control of the JDF. The Provincial Army does not do the bidding of any foreign power, be it Alcona and Hubris or Menelmacar. Dyelli Beybians shall never be slaves to Alconian Imperialism!" apparently in his less than sober state, the Key had forgotten that it was Lunchtime O'Booze, a Dyellian, who now commanded the JDF.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Felix Dzerzhinsky had the odd idea he was getting blamed for the Air Force's mistake. It was odd. How could people link the Head of Intelligence to the a Military blunder. It wasn't good news anyway, it had already been suggested in Dyelli Beybi that Felix was reaching retirement age, that the 'old rat' should be pensioned off, and a newer, fresher Commisaar take over the role.

It wasn't the time though, the Cheka wasn't ready. For the first time in many years, Felix Dzerzhinsky prayed. He prayed to keep his job, to keep the Commisaars who would drag Dyelli Beybi into war with Klatch at bay, Lord forgive them, for they know not what they do.

There was a knock on the door, snapping the head of the Cheka out of his personal reverie, "Enter."

A junior Commisaar entered, "We've got an unidentified craft hailing us, I might add half of Klatch is ready to launch attacks on them, and the Navy has called for Starfish support."

Felix massaged his scalp, he was getting quite a headache, "Patch them through to the office."

The radio link opened a few moments later, "This is Chief Constable Felix Dzerzhinsky, Cheka HQ, Cyro, may I inquire as to your intentions in Dyelli Beybian waters?"

Dyelli Beybi illegally laid claim to a lot more water than it really had any right to, but nobody argued with them, even if Dyelli Beybi's Navy didn't frighten them off, the rest of Klatch's navy generally did. It really wasn't worth arguing with them.

Meanwhile, in Port Olympus, Elizabeth Lackey, an attorney from the New Shiron Diplomatic mission and Bill Nye, an attorney from Greenpeace walked into the courthouse housing court facilities dealing with civil issues and filed a lawsuit.

"The Government of New Shiron and the Greenpeace Foundation do hereby file a cease and desist order against the Holy Empire of Christopher Thompson as operations by its navy are causing severe and irrevocable damage to marine wildlife in the maritime economic zone of the Federated Klatchian States.

As a secondary motion, the two parties also charge the Holy Empire of Christopher Thompson with inflicting serious economic damage and hereby ask for real damages of $10 Billion and punative damages of $1 Trillion dollars.

The Court is requested to serve that government with a papers to resolve this matter and also take it to the World Court should the Holy Empire fail to respond."

The middle Alconian Key turned to the drunk Dyellian. "The truth of the matter is that you have been illegally operating in the Gonad for years now. The elven insurgency was created by you, induced by you, and is now your excuse for what is obviously an additional territorial land grab."

He paused looking around at the other Keys. "I ask you this, why is it that Dyelli Beybi calls us allies one minute and then accuses us of Imperialism the next?"
He paused again, "I only ask you all this, who controls the JDF at the moment? Who has continually sent men and material into the Jungles of the Gonad even when it was the territory of another state? And who's former monarch has claimed the title Tzar of the Klatch? It was the United Duchies, No...it was the long suffering Dyellians." The sarcasm in his voice was bitting.

A note was passed to the Key as he stood there. He opened it and read it. "And here is General O'Booze's response to Parliament. Go to Hell. Well that shows me doesn't it. It shows us all that we are here to rubber stamp what is need to be rubber stamped and ignored when we demand explinations of their activity. For his Royal Highness has other matters to attend to, like sucking the c*** of his Imperial Majesty Tzar Felix...."

"No don't boo me...look at the drunken fop the sent to this body. Do they respect the Federal Parliament, do they respect their fellow States? No, we are allies when needed and annoying foreigners when we protest their actions" The Key was looking strait at the Dyellian Key.

"I ask you this, what State here treats the Klatch as nothing more than its own personal list of client States, to fight their wars for them...to die for their wants...but where are they when any of us are in trouble? Where were they when Dozle invaded our lands? Were they dying on the front lines, no they were hidding behind their borders, letting Vrakians, and Var do the dying. When New Shiron was attacked, where were they? Allowing the Vrakians and Var to do the dying, when they kill Federal Forces, they blame those very same Federal Forces for the mistake. I ask you this my fellow Keys, who is acting with imperial arrogance here?"

It was a further example of incompetence in the beaurocracy. O'Booze hadn't actually wanted the note to Parliament to read 'go to hell', he'd wanted a diplomatically phrased note with a similar underlying message. He was a Dyellian which meant that as soon as the news got back to him, he had the aide sacked and began to draft up his resignation...

"Tzarist Dyelli Beybi and the United Republics bear nothing in common." the Key retorted, "The only thing that remains are the people and the land. The whole system of Tzarist Government is gone. Furthermore the so called Tzar of Klatch is dead, as are all his close relatives are dead, the current Dyelli Beybian Government has made no such claims."

"Furthermore, Felix Dzerzhinsky is a Senior public servant. He does not rule Dyelli Beybi. Parliament reserves the right to terminate his employment when and where it sees fit." he was yelling now, "Furthermore, unlike the Landgravine, Lunchtime O'Booze does not abuse his position in the Privy Council to further his own Imperialistic ambitions."

"What is more." he was really letting rip, "Unlike Alcona and Hubris, all land aquisitions by the State of Dyelli Beybi have been legally aquired via the Federal system, we are not going to throw the whole fabric of Klatchian society into jeapardy to gain a few measely acres of jungle, unlike Alcona and Hubris who seem ready to tear the Federation apart because their Marines are too lazy to inform the Dyelli Beybian Provincial Airforce as to their whereabouts."

Meanwhile, in Port Olympus, Elizabeth Lackey, an attorney from the New Shiron Diplomatic mission and Bill Nye, an attorney from Greenpeace walked into the courthouse housing court facilities dealing with civil issues and filed a lawsuit.

"The Government of New Shiron and the Greenpeace Foundation do hereby file a cease and desist order against the Holy Empire of Christopher Thompson as operations by its navy are causing severe and irrevocable damage to marine wildlife in the maritime economic zone of the Federated Klatchian States.

As a secondary motion, the two parties also charge the Holy Empire of Christopher Thompson with inflicting serious economic damage and hereby ask for real damages of $10 Billion and punative damages of $1 Trillion dollars.

The Court is requested to serve that government with a papers to resolve this matter and also take it to the World Court should the Holy Empire fail to respond."

The clerk looked at them both with a funny grin on his face. "Er, you can't sue a government without them giving you permission to sue them. And what World Court, there hasn't been a recognized World Court since the collapse of the NSNW World Court years ago..."

OOC:Great, great...but most nations apply to the concept of Sovereign Immunity...and I don't think there is a world court anymore... :eek:

The Alconain Key looked at him,

"What Imperial Ambitions do you suppose the Landgravine has? Hmm? And perhaps the matter of you not knowing where the hell JDF forces are is because your trips into the jungle have never, ever been coordiniated with JDF command in the fist place. Nor can I see what your bombing the middle of the Jungle, and attempting to dump poisons on Klatchian Territory will be tatically benifical to a force that is crawling along the shoreline."

He paused again, "While you were buislly spending resourced bombing the hell out of the Jungle, Alconian Marines were ordered to secure as many surviors of the interior cities as possible. Might I remind you that your little incident also caused the deaths of 128 civilians who you were supposedly trying to save."

"Maybe if the JDF units had bothered to inform us in the first place this wouldn't have happened?" the Key was getting sarcastic.

"Or is it that you view the Dyellian race as so sub-human that we're not worth informing until after we've accidentally bombed an Alconian position? Dyelli Beybi has admitted it shares some of the blame for this incident, however it is arrogence in the extreme to assume that Dyellian pilots should just know where every company of Alconian Marines happens to be, or that we should ask anyone's permission before cleaning up the problems that exist on our doorstep.

"Need I remind the Keys of the Federation, that it is Dyelli Beybi that will be affected if the elves become coordinated. It is Dyelli Beybians that will die, not Alconians, not Vrakians, not Midlonians, Dyellians. So pardon our offense if we see it as our duty and our right to restore order in the Gonad Peninsula when nobody else seems to be making any effort to do so.

"You have accused us of not being present in the Dozle War. It is true we were not, but need I remind the Alconian Key that we were safeguarding the Southern Coast from potential attack from the sea, and that over 600 Dyellian Soldiers died when that attack finally came. It is also true we did not involve ourselves in New Shiron. Need I remind the Alconian Key that at the time, Dyelli Beybi had the heaviest deployment of any State to Neo Tyr, with a standing garrison of 10,000, which remains in that country still, and the Entire High Seas fleet being present in that conflict. Dyelli Beybi has done it's bit for Klatch."

The Dyelli Beybian fleetwas already well aware of the incoming threat, and had called on a coupole of Scout Cruiser Squadrons to join the fleet. That way they could 'Starfish' the subs if they started to look hostile, although anyone worried about marine life would probably be even more worried if they knew that the Dyellians were considering using that particular ASW weapon.

On land, the Dyellians had a rather large flight of helicopters heading straight for the bombing zone. They were at high altitude, well above the range of most SAM. It was difficult to work out exactly how many were up there, but it was quite a lot. It wasn't helped by the fact that there was something else up there carrying EW equipment. It could well be a Dyellian SAR attempt, but it was just as likely to be another random ground attack.

The infantry were doing more or less nothing, just sitting in their fortified coastal positions waiting for reinforcements to arrive.


Admiral Ilek stepped up behind the ensign "Dyellian choppers sir, Shironian UAV's sir."

Admiral Ilek sighed "Doesen't anyone pay attention to the JDF channels? Or their own for this matter? Let the Orion's know, I'm sending ONE last missive, tell them ten minutes after I send it to down anything in the air over the bomb area, excluding what the Alconians have cleared."

Again Admiral Ilek sent a mesage on all JDF channels, Dyellian channels and Shironian channels.

"Be advised, Vaadian and Alconian forces are in the process of rescue and recovery of the 16th Alconian Marines. The area of the recent saturation bombing is under a temporary exclusion zone. Forces entering this zone are requested to co-ordinate directly with me.

Forces entering this zone without clearance will be assumed to be unfriendly.

That is all."

As he finished he pointed to the duty Leftenant and one hundred Orion Stealth Fighters were dispatched to cover the ground search.


OOC:
I'll leave it up to Alcona if the rescue jets spot anybody.

HES Angelus
"What should we do sir?" The comms officer asked. They all knew what was happening. The Angelus was being surrounded as the minutes passed, and their fate was soon to be sealed unless their captin pulled something out of his ass. Aparently, The Holy Empire's reputation had not spread to the Klatch despite all the attention the Klatch had recieved in The Holy Empire.
The Captain picked up the microphone and blasted out on all channels his best.
"Again, I repeat that we are on a mission to save the distressed people of the Gonad. We are simply there to aid in the safe extraction of all civilians and the extermination of the elves so that once again peace may reclaim the Gonad area. We are on a mission of humanitarian aid. We will comply with any and all legitimate requests of all governments in the area immediately. Our information on this area is very poor aparently, as the nation we pass by now seems to have claimed quite a bit more sea for himself than any nation should have. However, we will respect his territorial sea zone and egress from it immediately along the surface at a speed of fifty knots, course one-eight-zero unless told otherwise. Aparently there has been a gross misunderstanding. Our mission, as we were told, was to ingress to south eastern Gonad via international waters, which are assumed outside twelve miles of a nation, and make a landing and set up a temporary base of operations on the boarder of Dyelli Beybi. Once we had done so, we were to contact the Dyelli Beybian government and ask for orders as to how we can assist in the evacuation of civilians and extermination of the elves. Many nations, the world over, have respected and even welcomed our open-ended, no bells attatched humanitarian and military aid. However, it is becoming exceedingly obvious that you here would not appreciate it. We offer all nations of the Klatch an efficient force that will help in their endevors in the Gonad, but we need you to stand down, update our maps as to who's territorial waters are whose, and what we are and are not allowed to do.
"To Dyelli Beybi: we had no clue we were barging in your national waters. As I earlier stated, our maps were incorrect, and we wish to wire money to replace the thirteen mines that were detonated by our tresspassing. Our deepest apologies.
"To New Shiron: We ask that you stand down; we are here to help. As you may already know, we are not launching all of our forces out of this ship, and are currently re-calling them inside. Once the Hurricanes land and are back in the ship, we will have no combat assets to harm you with out. This ship, nor any of the fifteen transports that are with us, posess any type of offensive firepower, it is only the fighters and sub fighters inside that can, and none are out now, even as you tighten the noose on us. That should speak volumes enough about our mission here.
"Again, we hope that this can quickly and quietly be resolved as the sole purpose of our entry here was for humanitarian reasons. We have cast aside our swords, and ask that you do as well. We would even go to the lengths to have our ships inspected to ensure that we contain no weapons of mass destruction, chemical biological, or otherwise that can seariously affect the global envirnoment, as The Holy Empire posesses no such weapons, and even led under guard by any number of ships to the Gonad to ensure we are in fact here on a humanitarian mission."
The Captain put down the mic and waited for a response as the HES Angelus and the fifteen transports made themselves pathetically visible on radar and sonar screens everywhere by surfacing and slowly moving south to exit Dyelli Beybian waters, just as they said they would.

OOC thread is here.

http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?p=9197849#post9197849

ooc
You wouldn't know about the attempted lawsuit yet Christopher Thompson, it hasn't even made it past the court clerk yet.

New Shiron current forces and deployments
http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showpost.php?p=9197963&postcount=2

IC
"The Holy Imperials aren't moving fast enough damn it." Tovey muttered. He had hoped to avoid a fight if possible. He had hoped that the simple positioning of his fleet, along with everything else around would make it clear that staying or continuing was a bad tactical idea.

"Forward his message to the Octagon and to our Defense Ministry Captain." Tovey lit up another cigeratte and crumpled the now empty pack. "And Paul, tell the fleet to arm weapons. It looks like we may have to do this after all."

-----

Aboard cruisers and destroyers, crews frantically finished last minute checks on their Sea Dragonflys, and missiles and torpedoes were loaded. Mini sub crews aboard the carrier subs and destroyers did the same. The exercise was over. Time for the real thing.

-------------

In space, the crews of the space fleet began their own final checks. Orbital bombardment ordinance was checked to ensure software and hardware were ready, and simulations were made of probable attack runs.

------------
Another message was sent to the HES Angelus
"Captain Laetese, although your movement is a good start, regretably your sudden approach without previous clearance into waters dangerously close to FKC territory has been determined to be a threat by the Command Authority of this Alliance. Although it would be a tragedy were hostilities to begin, nevertheless, any unknown warship that makes such a provacative approach as yours did, especially without at least a courtesy notification of intent to transit would be considered highly suspect in the best of situations. In this particular situation, your ship has expressed an intent to conduct military operations on the soveriegn territory of a member of the Federated Klatchian Coast. Although no government is currently in power in that area, nevertheless, the remainder of the FKC is currently debating the status of that territory as we speak, and FKC Defense forces are conducting humanitarian operations in that area, as well as attempting to restore order.

Military activity, regardless of motive, conducted by your ship in our territory is nothing less than an act of war and invasion, as your assistance was neither requested or invited.

Once again the FKC therefore must insist that your ship immediately move to a position at least 201 miles from the FKC coast. Until that is accomplished, military forces must continue to approach your position to ensure the safety and security of the FKC.

Sincerely,
Fleet Admiral Anthryax Vercingtorix, Commander, Royal New Shiron Navy

this message is sent in the clear

The clerk looked at them both with a funny grin on his face. "Er, you can't sue a government without them giving you permission to sue them. And what World Court, there hasn't been a recognized World Court since the collapse of the NSNW World Court years ago..."

OOC:Great, great...but most nations apply to the concept of Sovereign Immunity...and I don't think there is a world court anymore... :eek:

Mr Nye had a reply quickly available and he did so with a grin. "Well it is true that we can't sue the FKC government, nor can we sue our government. But that is because we have laws on the books that say that. Do we know if the Holy Empire has such laws on ITS books? Its certainly worth finding out don't you think? Besides, consider the embarrassment it will cause them."

"Be advised, Vaadian and Alconian forces are in the process of rescue and recovery of the 16th Alconian Marines. The area of the recent saturation bombing is under a temporary exclusion zone. Forces entering this zone are requested to co-ordinate directly with me."


The Dyellians were being their usual selves, not particularly prepared to back down, but not trying to be offensive either, sending back a return hail, Colonello Jameson, 1st Battalion, Air Cavalry. We, or more apropriately the Airforce, caused the problem, we're ready and willing to help fix it. Remember that this is the Gonad peninsula, we have considerable support in the area and are quite happy to put this Flight temporarily under your command. Firing on Dyelli Beybian aircraft could only be regarded as a declaration of war, sadly firing on New Shiron intelligence gathering vehicles is likely to provoke a similar unfriendly response from that State. We strongly advise against attacking other Klatchians deliberately and without reason.


The Dyellians seemed to be the friendliest of the locals, hailing the HES Angelus, We are willing to support your Opperations in the Gonad, please communicate troops numbers and we will send you coordinates for a relatively safe passage through the minefield. If it is acceptable, you will rendezvous with the D.B.P.S. Desagradavel off the South Coast of Dyelli Beybi. We believe a coordinated effort would be more efficient.

HES Angelus
"Sir, message for you," the comms officer said with a wide smile on his face.
"What is it son?" The weary Captain Naetase asked.
"Here," he put the headphones on. The Captain listened to the message, straightened up, and smiled, laughing a sigh of relief. He ordered the message be put on loudspeaker, and the ship rejoiced in relief.
So there is someone sane here, Naetase thought to himself. He picked up the mic, in a much cherrier mood now, and said:
"Thank God you're here. This is the HES Angelus. We are responding to a request from the Dyellians to rendevous with the D.B.P.S. Desagradavel off the Southern coast of Dyelli Beybi. They wish for a coordinated effort from our forces. We shall respond immediately.
"This is the HES Angelus again. We posess with us a single CVSX Angelus class submarine, and fifteen 1A1 Heavy Transports. The total number of troops we can field with these ships are six-thousand foot soldiers, two-hundred D-64 light dropships, one-hundred small, light combat vehicles, fifty small transport vehicles, and fifty tanks. However, I would like to make it known that we do not field any artillery, and our ground and air transports are incredibly small.
"In any case, thank you again. You've just saved us from a war we didn't want. We shall hold position here, now that we have been granted permission from the Dyellians to enter their air and sea space, and demand an immediate stand down of arms against this ship. Again, we have been granted permission to penetrate Dyellian air and sea space, and ask for the impending attack on our forces to be nullified immediately. We're not asking you to leave your own sea and airspace, but we are asking that you sheath your swords. And save that for the elves in the Gonad."
The entire crew lit up in applause as the captain unclicked the mic, spun around neatly, and walked back to his seat. It felt like the weight of the world had been suddenly lifted off his shoulders as he ordered the ship to halt and wait for orders from the Dyellians. He made a small prayer to God at that moment, thanking him for his intervention amidst this madness.

Admiral Ilek replied to the Dyellian Colonello.

"Colonello Jameson, I understand your position completely. I would appreciate it if your helicopters stand down. I do not think that the Alconians will want to rescued by Dyellians at this particular moment, not that I can blame them. If you could hold off and I will contact you when survivors have been located and direct you to their positions if we need additional support.

Before warning me against attacking Klatchian states deliberately without cause, perhaps you should brief your airmen on that concept first.

Admiral Ilek, out."

Admiral Ilek simply couldn't understand the Klatchians and the way they all killed each other, routinely, but became incensed when someone tried to intervene. He shrugged.

"If the Dyellians get fiesty, just break off the mission, this really isn't worth it I don't think." He said to his Captain as he stood, like most Vaadians he was gung ho in the heat of the moment, but then realized that his men may be dying to save foreigners, and that was never worth it.

*****

Admiral Aramayo on the other hand stood ready to attack the Angelus. Tactical Group Namroth Vedic closed in as the sub surfaced and prepared to sink it.

His captain looked over his shoulder " Sir, they are radioing something about being here to pacify the Gonad and aid the Dyellians apparently, we're also getting communications from New Shiron's forces to stand down."

Admiral Aramayo shrugged "Move in. Hold off on attacking, I don't see New Shiron standing down over the Gonad, so we aren't standing down here. If this sub attempts to dive, destroy it."

The Com Officer contacted the Angelus.

"Holy Empiric Ship Angelus, Remain surfaced. Do not at this time move from your current position. Your presence here is unrequested and unwarranted. We will consider any further action you take as hostile until we have confirmed the humanitarian nature of your mission and determine why exactly you are here. That is all."

The Vaadians, typically, saw chaos erupting all around them and decided that by default, they were now in charge. They were not likely to heed any 'advice' from the Dyellians and New Shiron, especially since they saw the Dyellians as primarily responsible for this new round of instability, and the Vaadians hated chaos and instability.

OOC: Note I have indicated groups of 'surviors' in the area. Or as much data as I think you would be able to gather in this post Ilek-Vaad http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showpost.php?p=9194919&postcount=85

*****
In the western Jungles of the Kandi 18 C-I30J's were taking off from a small airbase near the Terran Sphere Border, They turned slightly north to cross the Deyllian Corridor and fly through Vrakian Airspace.

Behind these came three massive airships. A recent development of the Alconian Naval Air Wing they pushed themsevles up into the high atmosphere. They too turned to follow the C-130's flight path at only 425 knots.

****
Off the Coast of Neo Tyr, a squadron that had been flying the JDF standard over their Alconian penants turned north. Two Myth Class Aircraft carriers supported by an additional escort type carrier and their battlegroups.

Offical Announcement
It has become obvious that we need to futher strengthen our forces within the area of the Gonad to protect and recover troops already stationed their under JDF control. As such we will be moving forces into the area to support these endevors.

*****
In a quite room a Naval pilot sat in the darkness. The uncomfortable plastic chair was pushed up in a corner between a bed and a standard gray-green metal nightstand. There was the lumpy shape of someone in the bed, the pilot hand was lightly clutching the sleeping shapes.

The television was on across the room suspended from the cealing, a stream of various news reports scrolled across the bottom of the screen.

"Idiots..." was quietly croaked in the darkness.

Admiral Vercingtorix just shook his head in annoyance when the Intelligence passed on the message Dyelli Byebi sent to the Holy Imperials.

"Ok, looks like we don't have to shoot at least. Order the 3rd Fleet to move back to its original positions. But I want standing patrols over the fleet to remain in effect and keep the RSF squadron on high guard position."

---------------

A few minutes later the Sealions from the Queen Amanda turned off their active sonars and began to return to their mother ship. Soon after that, the 3rd Fleet turned around and headed south.

-------

Message to HES Angelus
"Your situation has been clarified. New Shiron naval forces are moving back to their original positions."

There were a good number of signs of life in the area of jungle not bombed out of existance. It appeared to be Primates mainly who were now moving into the bombed out areas to scavange.

Five miles north of the incident site appeared to be two groups opposing each other across a small valley. Thermal indications would show that both forces were engaged in an intense firefight. Who was who was a bit difficult to make out as neither were apparently broadcasting any normal signals. But one of the groups was apparently firing into jungle which registared movement but no heat signitures. The second group was pounding the first group with heavy fire.

At the bombsite there did appear to be a small group of surviors hidden in a small deflection at the edge of the bombing site. Three individuals apparently, none moving....but then they were surrounded by the heat signitures of a few hundread small creatures.

The Artemis Fighters circled the area trying to see who was who in order to support the Alconians. They did however open up with their 30mm cannons on the groups of small creatures approaching the non-moving individuals, they were obviously not human and aparently up to no good.

*****


Aboard the Sir William Issem, Admiral Ilek watched the information pouring in.

"There , that firefight, there has to be some Alconian Marines there. Get Colonel Lolkema and A and B units in the air and on the ground."

*****

Two Marathon-B Transports lifted off vertically from the Sir William Issem and hit mach 1 soon after takeoff headed directly to where the Artemis' had spotted the survivors, who were apparently fighting for their lives. They would soon have some hlp, if they could hold out.

OOC: I can't believe I missed that post. My bad.

HES Angelus
"Roger that New Shiron, good to soo you are indeed on our side. We will, however, maintain this position until we are raidioed from Dyelli Beybi with a route through the minefield. Over and out." Te Captain cherrily hanged up the mic and furthur relaxed in his chair. This is how things are supposed to happen, he thought to himself. "Alright, people, good work. But this hasn't even started yet. Comms?"

"Yes sir?" the wqually happy man inquired.

"Yes, fire off a message back home, tell them to ready the group of reenforcements for tommarow morning."

"Yes sir!"

The ship sat silently in the ocean, waves lapping it as their navigational officer slowly updated the map with a now known minefield and now known territorial waters. Heads would roll back home when the Holy Empire was made knowledgeable about this, but the Holy Empire was also not well known for a goodintellegence agency. Most of their intellegence was in field via soldier and purely political; their covert operatives were a joke compared to the rest of the world. Secrecy and subtleness was never really in The Holy Empire's agenda, and it was always obvious to the world when they were coming. But they liked it that way. The fifteen nervous transport captains had since been relieved of the weight of the world via the message as well, and the troops inside them were all doing various things: most had finished their prayers, and some were having as much of a party as you could manage in the large, packed transports, but with no booze, they were partying like Kennedy's. But that was okay, this was the Marine Corps. A party on a Wednesday was unprecedented.

The small creatures were the dreaded Homosexual Monkey's. For some reason they had started to dine on the dead bodies but had been staying away from the small pit that the few surviving humans were in. It appeared that they didn't feel like running across the scorched ground with someone shooting at them.

The 30mm fire caused many to explode into a further mess of gooy monkey mess, most ran off for cover in the surviving jungle.

*****
The firefight was obviously still going on, the two sides hidden from the air by the dense jungle canopy and the rising wisps of smoke. However the group to the north east appeared to have a good number of non-combatants sheltering within a horseshoe protective line.

"This is quite bloody maddness..." The surviving Captian asked as he waited for an oportune moment and threw another grenade at a group of figures climing up the steep wall of the canyon.

"How sir, I mean this is the Klatch sir..."

"Yes, but I joined the Marines because I wanted to see the world, not spend my days getting attacked by flesh eating monsters in some nobbly bit off the end of Dyelli Beybi that they don't even want."

"Well it is the Gonad sir..."

"Yes Percy, the Gonad...the enlarge festering wart of insanity, elves, and pirates attached to the maddest State in the Federation and suffering from its own personal delusions of you in a bikini...."

"I thought I looked quite fetching in a bikini...."

"You mean that contraption of duck tape and used dental floss you had on last week?"

"Yes, I found it when you sent me to look through Lt. Commander Edwards things..."

"Only a mindless dolt like you would attempt to wear it..."

"I thought those things were mindless..."

"Percy, there are these things that are attacking us..." boom "a rotton turnuip laying in sheep dip, and then you..."

"What's that..."

"Things I would rather never ever see..."

"Oh, should I be shooting..."

"yes you pathetic dolt..."

Teeny OOC note: I lol'd

The Artemis Fighters came back after what would be known throughout the annals of the Naval Guard Air Corps as the 'Monkey Run' and lower still to the ground, using the break in cover from the canyon and craters to ascertain who was who and what was what.

Wing Leftenant Myers had led the 'Monkey Run' was leading in his lads again "Look there, civilians, Issem Fire Control I have confirmation of non-coms, probably civilians."

Fire Control responded "We see them, satellite magnification appears to show Alconian Marines.............we're not one hundred percent...............hold on."

Myers sounded incredulous "Hold on? They're being swarmed? Hell." He clicked off his active camoflage and waggled his wings before diving at the people who he hoped were the deadly viscious elves and not Alconians.

Myers came in low and peppered the elves climbing up the canyon wall with his Cerebus air to ground missles, they exploded in the air behind the cliff line, spraying the elves(?) with shrapnel filled bomblets. Myers was obviously an expert, he had fired low enough to where the canyon and crater wall sheltered the Alconians and their protective horseshoe formation, they could see and hear the explosions, but were only sprayed by rock and dirt themselves.

Myers pulled up and reactivated his camo, the rest of the pilots got the message loud and clear and followed suit imitating Myers run, albeit with camoflage activated, the air was filled with explosions and the searing whine of the 30mm shells.

Issem Fire Control then re-contacted Myers "Orders are to protect the horseshoe formation, marines ae on the way, give them room until the marines arrive to evac."

Myers nodded with smile "I'll get right on that!" Myers liked to gamble and was reasonably good at it, he was very pleased with himself until he saw the red light blinking "Out of fuel?"

Myers uncamoflage run had come at cost ,his fuel tank was now riddled with shrapnel and bullet holes, too many for the self sealing membrane to really help. "This is Myer's I'm down, my tank is dry I must have sustained hits. This bird is solid, I didn't feel anything!"

He steered for one last pass this time directly over the Alconians, as the plane sailed over them he ejected, hopefully to land near them and not the unfriendlies, or any monkeys, his plane continued for about a mile and a half and hit with a defeaning boom, the remaining Cerebus warheads making for a rather impressive display.

Myers looked down and saw jungle rushing up at him " I have a feeling this can only get worse in the short term. How the devil do homosexual monkeys reprod..................." he philosophised as he slammed into the tree tops.

OOC: The Beta and Alpha company sites are about five miles apart...

The cover here hadn't been that broken up. Mainly because this company wasn't standing where a twenty year old survey thought there was a village. It was less a canyon and more of a steep sided ravine with the occasional rock outcropping.

Myers of course had a good view of the Alconian postion. He was stuck in a tree at the edge of the Alconian line, but with the massive forest giant protecting him from incoming fire. It was a nice place to get a view of the Marines hiding behind boulders and attempting to shoot downwards while the Jiggdian civilians were laying flat amongst the trees. Bodies lay everywhere, and a motar shell slammed into a small group of civilians as he hung there for a moment. The horseshoe wasn't backed up to anything but a dense patch of trees that seemed oddly dissimilar to those nearby. Everyone was keeping as far as possible away from them.

"Look Sir, it's an Angel sent to take us all to Heven."

"Yes, an Angel, except for the fact that he is suck up in a tree in a paracute, wearing a flight suit, and has what looks like the Vaadian Flag on his heart."

"Maybe he's a refugee Angel Sir?"

"From Heven, more like Haven...damn't it Percy I'm trying to use this squad gun...go get him down from there..."

"Yes Captain Duyneidr..."

"Not with your shot gun you twit!"

The solid shot of the trench gun slammed into the branch holding Myers in place. The branch gave way dropping Myers to the ground. He felt a pair of hand grab at thim and then two AK-47s opened fire above his head. Two hand grabbed him up in his chute and dragged him behind the lines.

The first two of the Alconian Rotodyenes were approaching the small group of survivors from the other company now. Three of the other Rotodyenes formed a hovering arrowhead pointed at the approaching helios. The sixth heavy rotodyene was circling towards the fire fight.

The Vrakian key listened silently to the bickering and the increasing hostility between the Alconians and Dyellians. Finally, after finding a pause in the conversation, he began.

"Honourable keys, it is time that we all decide the fate of the Gonad. And I fear that if we do not come up with a solution soon, then the FKC president will exercise his perogative to do so which does supercede us all. He is quite...displeased that any one state chooses to exercise any type of control over the Gonad in an attempt to find a solution. I daresay he is quite upset at watching all these foreigners come in under the guise of assisting the FKC, and particularly Dyelli Beybi. The FKC does not need any outside help to deal with an internal matter.

"We propose that the Gonad forever remain an unclaimed territory never to be settled by any invited state. We also propose that the borders of the Gonad remain secure from any outside incursions..." at this a very hard glare at the Dyellians, "and from forces from within. In other words, the Dyellian border security threat is real and we believe that their borders should be strengthened.

"As for any outside forces, we believe that they should be immediately turned away else face the wrath of the Klatch. If the president finds out that there are foreign troops landing in the Gonad, well, I'm afraid that Neo Tyr will look like a walk in the park in comparison."

In the great throne room the King of Vrak, who was also known as the FKC president, brooded. He casually picked up a SOAT-bot skull, a war trophy from the Dozle invasion and began to laugh. Behind him, another walrus slithered in.

-My liege, it is good to hear you laugh.
-Uhh? Who’s there?
-Why, your humble servant.
-Come in, High Monk. Come in. So, shall I release our forces upon the Klatch? I tire of their disrespect and them not consulting me!
-No, my liege. But this is the price we pay for leading a loose confederation. And we cannot hope to defeat all of them ourselves.
-Hmmmm, you are correct. But, they must show me allegiance! I AM THEIR LEIGE!

At this, a quick flipper swipe to the robot skull sent it crashing onto the stone floor. The hollow clattering echoed through the entirety of the great sepulchral hall.

-Control yourself, my liege. All is going according to plan.
-How can you say that? The war in Clairmont is far from over. We are duty-bound to provide more troops. And those Tyrinians just bother me. If I had my way, I would roast them in nuclear fire and be done with it.
-Well, we can’t do that. Mighty we are, but that would attract much unwanted attention.
-Hmmmmm, I suppose. Argh! But I want to do it now! We….

The High Monk breathed deeply and a single whisker twitched. It was always difficult to manage the King when he was in a mood. This King was needed, but in time a new, more…pliable king would be thrust upon the throne and would lead Vrak into a new and truly glorious epoch. It would be the envy of the world and…

Control. Breathe.

At least he could take satisfaction in the quiet build up of the Vrakian military. For all its size and resources, it hasn’t been running around getting into wars at the drop of a hat. Which can both be good and bad. Good in nurturing its strength but bad in that soldiers tend to get restless and need an outlet. Hence, why he saw the wisdom of letting this Neo Tyr episode snowball into the first every FKC invasion of another country. And why he supports the added might to aid Clairmont. And the New Shiron war was conveniently timed as well, with technological payoff. Which was good.

His quiet reforms have been slowly implemented throughout the command structure and efforts. While the Order is outwardly against technology it also is quite pragmatic in adopting it. A whole monestary was devoted to reconcile the Ancient Beliefs of Bok to the every changing realities of the present so as to keep the faithful spiritually full and yet still provide answers for the skeptics. At least the Great Blood Wars provided some help for wasn’t it true that at least one legend had the Bok monks learn the Ursa shaman shapeshifting tricks and used it successfully against them? Ah, he would have to contact Brother Iroj about that.

And he also learned that the SOAT-bot production was in full gear and that finally the R&D centres were yielding fruit, despite the tightlipped generals. They would have to learn the Path but he was glad to see that War Drums were being used once again.

He looked back at the King who was now mumbling and salivating to no one in particular. He decided to leave and to make sure that the King was not let out in the public. That last televised declaration nearly ruined his carefully laid plans. It was all he could do sometimes to keep the King…in control.

He shook his head and mentally thought to himself. Clairmont...Santa Barbara...Ilek-Vaad...Dyelli Beybi...Midlonia...

The Vrakian key listened silently to the bickering and the increasing hostility between the Alconians and Dyellians. Finally, after finding a pause in the conversation, he began.

"Honourable keys, it is time that we all decide the fate of the Gonad. And I fear that if we do not come up with a solution soon, then the FKC president will exercise his perogative to do so which does supercede us all. He is quite...displeased that any one state chooses to exercise any type of control over the Gonad in an attempt to find a solution. I daresay he is quite upset at watching all these foreigners come in under the guise of assisting the FKC, and particularly Dyelli Beybi. The FKC does not need any outside help to deal with an internal matter.

"We propose that the Gonad forever remain an unclaimed territory never to be settled by any invited state. We also propose that the borders of the Gonad remain secure from any outside incursions..." at this a very hard glare at the Dyellians, "and from forces from within. In other words, the Dyellian border security threat is real and we believe that their borders should be strengthened.

"As for any outside forces, we believe that they should be immediately turned away else face the wrath of the Klatch. If the president finds out that there are foreign troops landing in the Gonad, well, I'm afraid that Neo Tyr will look like a walk in the park in comparison."

The Speaker, who had been waiting for some sense out of someone. ( Although he had been constantly looking for the New Shrion delegation actually) banged his gavel. "I second the motion as the senior Key of the United Duchies that debate should begin upon the Fate of the Gonad. I also call on a voice vote of closure of the Gonad to all foreign forces."

******
Not far away, in the Shades a man was standing over a massive three dimensional model of the Gonad. His eyes were studing the various small shapes indicating units, not just of the Dyellian and JDF forces, but also the locations of major elven forces.

"Sir, the Vrakians just stated that they want the Gonad to be permanetly off the books of any state in Parliament."

The dark eyes looked up at the young man. "How nice...someone get me an interview with the Vrakian Ambassador...Now!"

Mickleover, Midlonian Port.

“Load the guns!” screamed a voice through the tannons, “We put to sea now not today or tomorrow but now, all guns are to be prepped during the voyage, damn morons will taste Midlonian and Klatchian steel for polluting out seas!” there was a small cheer as the tannoy ended, the captain struck the orderly round the back of the head and wrestled the speaker horn from him.

‘Have that fool thrown in the brig,’ he clicked the button. ‘Now hear this! There is a large fleet of unknown origin polluting the Klatchian waters, insofar they are held up by the minefield, we’re going to rush at them and send them to Davy before they even realize what the hell hit them, with our group we will be joined by the King’s might who’s primary weapon should really put the jump on them.’ There was a huge cheer at the name of the ship mentioned, perhaps the deadliest Midlonian Battleship in existence.

Several hours later, some forty ships, approximately two carrier groups slid gently out of Mickleover, the entire fleet stationed at that city was put to see, as they left another, larger ship joined them, a single massive gun glistened on the fore deck of the ship, her name shone in the sun King’s Might

OOC: We didn't mean to pollute the waters, but our privies were full up...............

IC:

Wing Leftenant Myers thanked his luck to have landed so close to intended spot, he paused to shake out the cobwebs and realse his parachute in a controlled manner, thusly placing him gently on the ground, he was looking forward to it after the harsh landing. All of the sudden, there was a boom and the branch his parachute was hung up on disappeared in a hail of splinters.

He hit the ground and was dazed again, he went limps as he was grabbed and pulled away, waiting until they set him down to release his chute and check for broken bones. He looked around, pushing up his blast visor " Well, good to see I was right. Did my missles give any of those Keebler Elves a headache? Do we know where they are coming from, I can call in some missle strikes?"

*****

About three miles behind Beta and Alpha company a Marathon Transport hovered above the jungle, anyone within sight would have trouble picking them out with their reactive camo, but the noise and the swirling tree tops were a dead give away.

The Artemis Fighters intensified their ground attack with confirmation of the position Alconian Marines.

Panels opened under the Marathons and twenty five at a time the Naval Guard Marine Units rappelled down , their reactive long-coats blurring them into the jungle as they went down. With their long-coats closed no flesh was visible on them, and only the lower legs and hands weren't camoflaged, but non relective charcoal grey, their Minimi Carbines wrapped in jungle camo mesh. They hit the ground without a word or a sound and began to creep up on the Alconian positions.

*****

Out at sea, Tactical Group William Issem charged ahead, moving to within one hundred miles of the Gonad Coastline, shortening the flights for the increasing number of aircraft issueing from the battleships and carriers.

New Shiron, which at this time was already sending Dyelli Byebi satellite and UAV data, also sent the DB fleet a message.

"Be advised, a large Ilik Vaad task force is moving in close to the Gonad area. New Shiron 3rd Fleet remains in position to provide support to you if requested or needed. Signed, Admiral Tovey, commander 3rd Fleet."

on the bridge of the flagship, Admiral Tovey double checked with his staff again. "You are sure IV didn't contact Dyelli Byebi about their movement? Its pretty damned provacative."

"No sir, we have not intercepted any message to that effect, and JDF command confirms that they haven't received one either." Eddington replied.

Tovey just shook has head. "Cancel the move south. We are heading back up north. Order TF 34 to stay where it is, and we will join up with them. Order the fleet to 40 knots, and tell the replenishment ships to stay here. Detach TF 37 to cover them. Better let JDF command and the DB fleet know we are moving up into closer support range."

OOC
TF 34 is now 180 miles south of the Gonad, and the rest of the 3rd Fleet is now 600 miles south of TF 34. Detached is TF 37, 1 cruiser, 2 destroyers, 6 replenishment ships, which remains at 700 miles south of TF 34. The 3rd Fleet will link up with TF 34 in about 20 hours.

The Dyellians did as they were asked, although the parting comment from the Admiral reinforced the Dyellian idea that he had a sock for a brain. Luckily the radioman did not air what the Colonello had to day back, it was the kind of rhetoric that would cause Hell's Angels to blanche.

The whole mass of helicopters and whatever else was up there floated off some distance to the West where they proceeded to mindlessly spend large amounts of the Government's money blowing up sections of uninhabited jungle.

Meanwhile the Dyellian Navy had rather kindly got around to giving the Christopher Thompson troops a route around the rather large minefield. It had a gap far to the West, but once around it, one could easily move to the rendezvous point, a Squadron of Four Scout Cruisers (which really didn't deserve the title cruiser) showed up to provide escort (and also to make sure no trigger happy Klatchians decided to try to take a pot shot at the transports). The D.B.P.S. Desagradavel it turned out was a moderately large Battleship with a tremendous amount of weapons for it's size.

It was also the ship of Vice Admiral Collins, who respectfully sent a request for the Commander of the Christopher Thompson forces to meet her, and it was a she, on her Flagship. For anyone with a slight background knowledge of Dyelli Beybi, they would know Adelle Collins was coincidentally the wife of the High Chancellor of the United Republics, with quite a reputation for suplementing her income by 'taxing' passing merchantment for the pleasure of using Dyellian sea routes (although she hadn't done it for a while).

'We have ident Captain on the ships, message from MIRA. Somebody tooting around calling themselves "The Holy Empire."' the Aide read the sheet of paper and then threw it aside into a bin.
The Captain snorted. 'Holy Empire... pfft, hoping God will protect them? God and science are on our side, and whatever the hell deity they worship, ours is the stronger, how long till they are within Hellbore range?'

'Lead elements? a day, maybe two.' mumbled the aide.
'Good!' the captain rapped the wood finish on the helm and then wandered off.

HES Angelus

"Sir," the comms officer stated, "The Ilek-Vaadians are hailing us. They're telling us to hold position and await until the 'nature' of our mission has been identified."

"What?" The Captain sounded more confused than worried. "What in the bloody hell are they rambling about? Our situation has already been clarified by the Dyelli Beybians, hasn't it?"

"That's what I thought sir, but--"

"Fine, put me on a line with them, we'll work this out."

"Yes sir." The comms officer sat back down and opened up a channel with the Ilek-Vaadian forces. The Captain's voice was calm and reassuring as he spoke.

"To the Ilek-Vaadian naval forces ordering our halt: We shall comply, but we shall inquire as to why exactly you wish for us to halt and investigate the nature of our mission. We were under the impression that this situation had been rectified and we have been granted permission by the Dyelli Beybians to move toward Dyelli Beybian forces stationed along the southern coast of Dyelli Beybi. Both Dyelli Beybi and New Shiron accept our mission here, and you should have recieved reports ordering your hostile actions against us to cease from at least one of these sources. If you have not, please contact them immedietly, I'm sure you know how to. Aside from that, is there any other reason that we have been ordered to halt under threat of force by your naval assets in the area?"

'We have ident Captain on the ships, message from MIRA. Somebody tooting around calling themselves "The Holy Empire."' the Aide read the sheet of paper and then threw it aside into a bin.
The Captain snorted. 'Holy Empire... pfft, hoping God will protect them? God and science are on our side, and whatever the hell deity they worship, ours is the stronger, how long till they are within Hellbore range?'

'Lead elements? a day, maybe two.' mumbled the aide.
'Good!' the captain rapped the wood finish on the helm and then wandered off.

secret IC
In New Shiron, the Central Military Command Center at Citadel hummed with activity as staffers monitored updated computer screens with the latest feeds from signit and space sources.

The Midlonian sortie was quickly analyzed, and a message was sent.

From New Shiron High Command
To Midlonian High Command

Subject: Joint JDF naval operations near Gonad
As a partner in the JDF and defender of Klatch the Kingdom of New Shiron hereby requests that close cooperation be carried out between your fleet and ours. We request that you take up station 300 miles east of the Gonad zone and ensure that no more foreign warships come in from that quarter without specific permission from JDF command. We also request that if you begin hostilities with any foreign forces, you inform us so that we can provide support. The New Shiron 3rd Fleet has orders to ensure that no foreign warships approach the area from the south and will follow the same rules of engagement. Geography and Greenbeard prevent foreign intervention from the north and east.

Sincerly,
Fleet Admiral Anthryax Vercingtorix
Commander New Shiron Naval forces

**********
Encryption: MAx; JDF protocols 8970987126; route: General O'Booze; route...complete
**********

To: General Lunchtime O'Booze
From: Office of the FKC President
Subject: Southern Klatchian area events

Since you are the highest ranking JDF official who is in charge of JDF forces we would like you to clarify as to exactly what measures you will be taking in order to ensure the safety of the Klatch.

====

The VIS now learned of the identity of the latest intruder and promptly sent a message to their government. The others had not been identified but that would change with time. Some officials were keen to point out that the early ones already landed in the Gonad, to which the reply was "Let the jungles take care of them."

To: Christopher Thompson diplomats
From: Office of the FKC president
Subject: your incursion

You have intruded upon the waters of the Klatch. We would like you to explain your actions. Please note that the FKC president's authority supercedes all authority of any state, including Dyelli Beybi.

Message sent to JDF command

To CINC JDF Forces
From CINC New Shiron Forces

A serious chain of command issue is developing in the Southern Klatchian Sea and the Bay of Lunacy. A large fleet of warships from Iliik Vaad are operating in the area and are claiming to be friendly. In addition, Dyelli Byebi forces are working with force from the Holy Empire of Christopher Thompson. Neither the CT or IV forces as far as we know are part of the JDF chain of command. Should such forces be considered friendly allied, friendly non allied, hostile, enemies or simply considered pests.

Attached is an operations plans which I suggest be implemented to prevent further intrusions into the southern zone of operations.

http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showpost.php?p=9218189&postcount=35

I strongly recommend that additional JDF naval forces move into position to seal off the Bay of Lunacy from incursions by any other navies at this point. In addition, if Greenbeard can provide bases, New Shiron can strongly reinforce the area with interceptors and maritime strike aircraft. At this point New Shiron aircraft are operating at the edge of their endurance, although space craft can immediately respond to any problems in the area.

http://www.freewebs.com/klatchia/atlas.htm

"To the Ilek-Vaadian naval forces ordering our halt: We shall comply, but we shall inquire as to why exactly you wish for us to halt and investigate the nature of our mission. We were under the impression that this situation had been rectified and we have been granted permission by the Dyelli Beybians to move toward Dyelli Beybian forces stationed along the southern coast of Dyelli Beybi. Both Dyelli Beybi and New Shiron accept our mission here, and you should have recieved reports ordering your hostile actions against us to cease from at least one of these sources. If you have not, please contact them immedietly, I'm sure you know how to. Aside from that, is there any other reason that we have been ordered to halt under threat of force by your naval assets in the area?"


Admiral Aramayo looked partially perplexed and then responded.

"The Gonad Peninsula and it's waters are NOT part of Dyellian territory. We have not been advised of any special authority that they have in this area. WE have not heard from any Federation Authority that your presence in Klatchain Territorial waters is expected or accepted.

My initial request stands. Stop where you are or I will be forced to open fire."

Admiral Aramayo shook his head "Has Admiral Ilek had any reply to his hails on the JDF channels? The Dyellians are bombing the Alconians, and New Shiron and Midlonia are making these waters awfuly crowded."

The comm officer grimaced "He has been in touch with the Dyellians and the Alconians, I'll get with William Issem Fire Control and try and contact the Dyellians."

Admiral Aramayo took his seat " I think that Admiral Ilek needs to take charge here, no one in the JDF or Federation is."

*****

Over the Jungle the pair of Marathons that had dropped off the marines headed back to the William Issem as another pair headed out to hopefully make a pickup. The pilot of one of the Marathon's apprised Fire Control of the situation "Fire Control , the only open place for a pickup is under heavy fire. It might be a good idea to open up a part of the jungle."

Fire Control responded "Roger that, we'll look at it."

*****

On the ground Colonel Lolkema was advised that a Artemis Pilot was down and apparently with the Alconian Marines, Colonel Lolkema was quick to attempt to make contact with Flight Leftenant Myers.

At the Citadel, a transcript of the latest message from the IV fleet to the Holy Imperials was quickly read by Fleet Admiral Vercingtorix.

"Well, well. So what do we do if they start shooting at each other? Neither are allied to us, and they aren't JDF either." He sipped his coffee and thought about it for a moment. "Duty officer, get me the Queen. We are going to need a political decision."

----------

The Queen was enjoying a rare day to herself, reading a pleasantly diverting murder mystery involving a train, a nasty old man who gets murdered by practically everyone, and a brilliant detective. If only life were that simple.

The Red Phone was not what she had in mind. She answered it anyway though.

Admiral Vercingtorix explained the situation to her, and she plugged in her laptop to the secure line and looked over the briefing as he talked. "Ok Admiral, for now keep the standard rules of engagement and tell Tovey to continue to close. I will get the Vrak King on the line, he is President of the Federation and he will have to make a decision it looks like. But if anybody shoots at us, or the Dyelli Byellis, blow the bastards out of the water."

She motioned an aide over. "Get me my husband on the phone. We may both need to talk to the King of Vrak about this. Get Harrington on the line too, I want him in on this, and its time to put some pressure on the Keys. We need to resolve this before someone starts shooting."

Vercingtorix listened carefully. Someone was going to be sorry they interrupted her vacation day, that was for sure.

"Admiral, I will get back to you about the rules of engagement as quick as I can."

Midlonian task group 32, Klatchian ocean.

'Sah!' yelled a bridge crewman 'Ships on horizon, MIRA eyes confirm it as the vessels.'
The captain, still in pijamas yawned and rubbed his eyes, he was handed a cup of piping hot tea, which he blew on then took a sip.
'Hellbore loaded?' he said, again yawning.
'Aye sir, King's Might reports she will be ready to fire in around five minutes.'
'Start sending a message on a continuous loop for them to take their ships and go away, or we'll make them go away, make sure you put in all of the "in the name of the federation" and all that rubbish.'
'Aye sir'

##Message to vessels of the Holy Empire##

You are violating Klatchian waters, we request that you alter course and leave our area of juristiction, if this request is not met within the hour we will be forced to remove you from our waters, thank you.

OOC: Yes, yes I DO have a Hellbore from the Keith Laumer Bolo books mounted on that single ship...

(OOC: I'm assuming the Christopher Thompson forced are in Dyellian waters by now)

From: Dyelli Beybian Provincial Navy Admiralty
To: All concerned Klatchians
Subject: Foreign Naval Forces

The Foreign Naval Forces currently in Dyellian waters are cooperating with Dyelli Beybi. We ask that all involved Klatchian States desist from their Campaign of harrassment. It is not in the interests of the Federation or Dyelli Beybi or the States involved.
While many States may believe that Klatch can exist on it's own, Dyelli Beybi believes it is better to make friends where we can. We also feel it is our duty to inform the rest of Klatch that constitutionally we are acting within our rights, any hostilities towards Foreign vessels in our waters can only be interpreted as an outright flouting of the Constitution of Klatch.

- Admiral von Scheer.

The Octogon
The JDF command was being no help. Actually the problem was a decidely divided command structure that was in someways completely leaderless. The red line to O'Booze hadn't been aswered in forever. "Great, the one time the bastard isn't in his office is when I need his authorization." Pellew screamed.

"Sir, the Dyellians are claiming..."

"I can read the teletype as well as you can...damn it...the President (who was acting chairman as per the constitution) wants these Holy Rollers (the new nickname of the Christofian forces) out. The Bloody Djels want them in.

"They appear to be in Dyeblli Beybi waters sir..."

"Great...great...what the hell...inform everyone on our side that they can not shoot until shot at."


Encryption 457-J9045
To All Klatchian and Allied Forces:
The Inner Consul has given orders that no forces should fire until fired upon. Advise that all ships remain on high alert as it is expected President will authorize use of force soon.

Admiral Pellew...


**********
The Alconian Naval taskforce was quietly and quickly approaching the Gonad also. They were south east and behind the Mildonian task force.

*****
OOC: I'm not sure where you but down but the two sites are five miles appart Ilek-Vaad
Alpha Company
Someone groaned at Myers poor joke. A Jiggdian who was fighting in the line with the Marines pointed towards a large rock. "Arg...der Cap' be next to yonder rock...go ask hem'...Arg"

The fighters on the other hand had not been 'detected'. But in some pointy haired brain noticed that to get a good bombing run on the forces in the valley they would have to sweep low and line up either upstream or down stream.

So Mr. pointy ears opened fire with his thrity 30mm hellflower chain gun platform. It wasn't the most advanced version of the Hellflower, it still used chemical based projectiles rather than gravemetric, but the thing still filled the air surrounding the battle with 30 mm slugs of hot lead. Six chainguns in unison opened up, firing round at 400 per second.

Beta Company
The Ilek-Vaad Marines didn't have much problem approaching this group. As the monkey's had demonstrated a decidedly unhappyness about being killed by flying death from above. Of course they might just be waiting in the tree tops for the planes to vanish before attacking again.

*****
The Arx, Port Olympus
A small armored car left the underground warrens of the fortress and headed southeast to the base of the Green Fleet as some called it. Twety minutes later the car stopped on a military dock.

Tied up along side was the KJN Tochter a coastal battleship that had been built in part response to the powerful Dyellian monitors. She was the flagship of taskforce five that usually sailed the inland freshwater seas. But taskforce five had just been informed by some faceless beuracrat that they would be detached from JDF command.

The Commadore of Taskforce Five was not a happy camper five minutes later when he arrived. He was even less happy when he was informed that his cabin had been 'requisitioned' by a 'passenger'. "It better well be bloody God because any mortal is going to find me giving them a tounge lashing...."

Twenty minutes after barging into his former quarters the Commadore appeared on the bridge. "Inform the Taskforce that we are to immediatly set sail..."

"Er...where to Commadore?"

"Christchurch, via the Dyelli...." We have a stop to make at Cyro...

The small armored scout car was being raised up onto the deck of the Tochter for her journey south.

In fact the reason O'Booze hadn't replied was because he'd taken that moment to resign, making a public public Statement that the JDF seemed "completely unprepared to cooperate" siting widescale racism against Dyellians. He went on to say that his resignation came in the wake of, "scandalous comments attributed to myself in the houses of Parliament", which he also put down to racism, finishing that he felt, that his resgination "will have little or no effect on the efficacy of the JDF."

Before he left though he did send out one last message to JDF forces.

From: Lunchtime O'Booze
To: All JDF Forces
Subject: Foreign Forces

It seems of little concern to the JDF what Foreign Naval Forces may be doing in Dyelli Beybian waters. The pre-issued orders to not fire unless fired upon stand. The JDF should have no place for the kinds of trigger-happy lunatics who seem to be persistently demanding the right to attack foreign Naval vessels, which from a Neutral standpoint are in no way endangering Klatch.

The purpose of the JDF is to protect Klatch, not to drag Klatch into another war just because the Officers involved feel peeved that they did not get a posting to Neo Tyr. Klatch is ill-prepared to fight another war, unless they propose abandoning the garrison in Neo Tyr while the situation remains as volatile as it is. JDF Commanders should be aware of this before making the kind of reckless decisions they are demanding to make.

At this Stage the forces of Christopher Thompson are of negligeable threat to the Federation, and in fact appear to be engaged in peaceful negotiations with Dyelli Beybi. JDF Commanders should stop wasting everybody's time in demanding war. I am resigning my Office, but unless I am replaced by some form of Imperialist warmonger, JDF Commanders will get the same response.

Stop wasting my time and go back to looking for real threats.

It was always a tricky tightrope for the FKC president and, by extension, the rest of the diplomatic staff to walk and the VIS to understand. Given the advanced age of the walrus and, more troubling, his increasing paranoia, it always made it difficult for him to understand exactly why each state was able to do this and that under the constitution. He personally would like to trample on the entire document itself and bring the Klatch much closer in purpose and unity like a sharpened spear.

In truth, this whole “loose confederation” structure was alien to the walrus psychology. Their entire history had been of leading and being led by a strong-flippered leader. This is why the Polaris and Orca were able to manipulate them for quite some time until those chains were cast aside. It also explained why the walruses were paranoid and, underneath their veneer, only trusted their own. They have been through a lot and it was still a difficult road for them to trust outsiders.

Still, O’Booze’s resignation was unexpected and left them scrambling. They could understand the Dyellian frustration of seemingly having to ask everyone in the Klatch to conduct their own affairs. Yet, as many walruses would point out, they all shared the Klatch and were all a part of it. Why not explain what you are up to? State sovereignty and national unity caused quite a bit of apprehension in the autocratic kingdom of Vrak.

It made for quite a bit of confusion and, truth be told, vast quantities of alcohol were consumed on this paradox. At least it kept the distillers happy.

Now that the FKC government lost two of its most prominent figures, the VIS began to feel out likely candidates.

The 3rd Fleet was now spreading out, its 6 task groups spread out covering a stretch of ocean 300 miles across, with a group every 50 miles. This allowed them very thorough sensor coverage of an area nearly 500 miles across.

Now only 180 miles south of the southern coast of the Gonad, they slowly patrolled the area, with small squadrons of mini subs operating all around, and constant flights of Sea Dragonfly's overhead, while further out UAVs flew overhead.

Slipping through that net would be a formidable task for any would be adventurers.

---------
Queen Gabrielle sighed as she hung up the phone. The chain of command was now almost nonexistant at the FKC. At least orders had gone out ordering Midlonia not to fire. Hopefully the IV would listen too.

"All of this for a worthless piece of jungle inhabited by psychotic Elves?" she muttered to herself.

----------
The New Shiron Keys returned to their places at the seat of authority. With the peaceful suppression of the protest recently, there was no longer a danger that New Shiron would be linked to a massacre. At least not this time. Now maybe some other issues could be settled.

meanwhile, in Regina....

The Queen walked purposefully toward the loading ramp of the SST-3 Interface shuttle "Osprey". Trailing behind her, in some cases hurrying to keep up, were her aides and a squad of Royal Marines.

Among them was her privy counselor, Lady Katherine Hepburn. "Your majesty, are you sure dropping in unannounced to visit Port Olympus is a good idea? There was a recent demonstration after all?"

"They aren't pissed at us, and we need to resolve the mess that is the FKC government. Besides, it will shake things up. Something that needs to be done."

------------

The shuttle lifted into the sky and then accelerated into low orbit at 2 gravities, quickly reaching Mach 10, where it moved like a streak of light across the sky.

Within a short time the pilot was requesting clearance to enter Dyelli Byebi air space, with another clearance sent to alert Vrak and Port Olympus that it was on its way.

(ooc I assume commercial and civilian traffic between New Shiron and the rest of the Klatch is reasonably routine)

Soon after that, the Shuttle slowed and dipped back into the atmosphere again, slowing for its final approach to Port Olympus.

"Port Olympus control, this is the New Shiron space plane "Osprey" on final approach with diplomatic status. Request clearance to land."

At the same time, Major Winters nearly choked on his coffee when a message came through to the Residency. "Holy shit! The Queen is coming. Alert the Keys, and for gods sake, get the security detail and everything we have moving to the airport."

Patty Maguire, his secretary, also a bit disconcerted added in a moment later. "Should we tell anybody else?"

"Not just yet, lets find out who she wants to talk to first." Winters added as he dashed out the door.

*****
OOC: I'm not sure where you but down but the two sites are five miles appart Ilek-Vaad
Alpha Company
Someone groaned at Myers poor joke. A Jiggdian who was fighting in the line with the Marines pointed towards a large rock. "Arg...der Cap' be next to yonder rock...go ask hem'...Arg"

The fighters on the other hand had not been 'detected'. But in some pointy haired brain noticed that to get a good bombing run on the forces in the valley they would have to sweep low and line up either upstream or down stream.

So Mr. pointy ears opened fire with his thrity 30mm hellflower chain gun platform. It wasn't the most advanced version of the Hellflower, it still used chemical based projectiles rather than gravemetric, but the thing still filled the air surrounding the battle with 30 mm slugs of hot lead. Six chainguns in unison opened up, firing round at 400 per second.

Beta Company
The Ilek-Vaad Marines didn't have much problem approaching this group. As the monkey's had demonstrated a decidedly unhappyness about being killed by flying death from above. Of course they might just be waiting in the tree tops for the planes to vanish before attacking again.

*****


OOC: Yes, That why A and B units were dropped, one to head for each respectively, at a point roughly three miles behind each.

IC:

Leftenant Myers paused "Hold on a tick......." He said placing his hand over the left side of his helmet and pulling the boom back down in front.

"Right Sir, excellent, I'll let them know. They have their backs to some trees here but they're keeping a distance from them, maybe strangler teaks of Triffids, so watch out. I'll let their C.O. know Colonel."

With that Myers crawled over on his belly to the Captain "Flight Leftenant Myers Sir, Naval Guard Air Corps. " He said with a brisk salute "I've just heard from Colonel Lolkema of our Marines, they are headed over to secure us and evacuate us, he wants your men to be ready to pull back when his lads come over the ridge."

He motioned to the ridge where the elves were trying to come over.

"He'll signal me and I'll signal you when it's his lads coming over and not the Gonadiers."

It sounded crazy.

Fortunately for the Artemis pilots, their ceramite composite armour was extremely thick on the underside, precisely to defeat ship based 30mm CIWS systems, the Hellflower startled the hell out of them and forced them to pull up, but the pilots soon realized that despite the loud thudding at their ships, they were relatively unhurt.

They then took a higher altitude and chased down the Hellflower , it had presented itself as an attractive target.

On the downside, where the shells had impacted there were now dark blotches in the camoflage of the Artemis' where the colour cells had been destroyed.

*****
Colonel Lolkema and Unit A were coming up to the Captain and Alpha company, but not from behind. They were currently looping round and preparing to head up the ravine, flanking and flushing the elves at the same time, driving them either into the Alconian guns, the Artemis' guns or back into the jungle, they were proceeding carefully and quietly, it was a classic 'Loop and withdraw' Retaliatory Guard attack.

After flushing the elves they would withdraw, as they covered the Alconians, buying time for a pickup.

*****

Major Ncube approached Beta Company with B Unit , carefully, well aware of the monkeys, whose corpses abounded. They began instantly securing the area, the five snipers staying in cover and hiding them and their 12.6mm anti-material rifles to take out anyone that approcahed , while the medics rushed to see who was alive and who could be saved.

Major Ncube contacted Fire Control "No fire here as of yet, just dead monkeys, This area may be perfect for a pickup, I will assess and be in touch, Ncube out."

*****

Onboard the Sir William Issem's sistership, the Namaan Ilek-Vaad II, the ordinance officers were busy tackling the whole jungle issue. They soon had a plan. They busily set about arming four Apollo Cruise Missles with cluster bomb warheads, but armed them to explode not several hundred feet above the target, but only one hundred to fifty feet, down amongst the foliage , mowing down trees and undergrowth , with relatively little crater.

Four of them would clear out a very nice pickup point.

Queen Gabrielle looked out the window as the armored limousine drove through the back streets of Port Olympus from the airport to the Residency. The landing had been uneventful and routine, especially since she hadn't informed local authorities of her plans.

Sometimes suprise is better security after all.

The city reminded her in some ways of what Varangia had looked like before it had been essentially destroyed during the New Cynthian invasion. Full of rivers, canals and bridges and only semi kept up.

A little while after landing she was at the Residency and taking the opportunity to freshen up, while the harried local security commander, Major Winters consulted with the head of her security detail about plans to visit Parliament.

Gabrielle grinned a bit a she listened to a report on how the demonstration had been ended. Whoever had thought it out had impressed her with the restraint and the effectiveness of flooding the area with dirty smell water. It was much better than tanks or riot police and the extremely convienent timing of the media disruption had been impressive too. Thankfully it had ended that way too. A massacre would have been a political problem at home. The Opposistion parties would have crucified the Conservatives and Tories who currently barely held her own Parliament and probably forced a change in New Shiron policy concerning the Klatch.

Which would have been tricky in its consequences.

OOC: Did that post belong in this thread New Shiron?

The fact that the Hellflower hadn't destroyed the enemy aircraft but only apparently dented them made the pointy ears decide to retreat. But not without a few parting shots.

As an air-to-ground missle vanished into where the Hellflower had opened fire from causing a massive explosion, an anti-air missle exploded from a small opening in the canopy of the jungle. The missle actually used SLIDE target imagry to keep a lock on the target. In this case the odd small flecked shapes now across the figher's bottom surface.

Captain Duyneider turned to look at the man saluting him.
"Well Myers I have two questions, which way are they coming from? And when in the hell are they going to get here..."

The shapes of the figures that had been attempting to move up the slope now started to vanish back into the undergrowth of the jungle and the ravine.

"Sir..the enemy appears to be pulling back..." The incomming fire stopped.

"Er...Lieutenant Myers, Corporal Percy of the 128th Benjian Trench Rifles. Also the only living member of the Trench Rifles..."

The sound of something coming down through the jungle canopy and into the ground behind cut the Captian off. A large amount of swearing...

"Percy go find out what that was...Myers call your people and update them that the enemy appears to be regrouping..."

As Percy vanished behind a boulder he said, "Maybe we scared them off..."

"Yes...these mindless brutes that take an entire clip of fire got scared off by us and our depleted ammo..."

"Sir, it's a large bowling ball with white lights...one just went out...and it has something in that funny lanquage..."

"English Percy?"

"No...the Dragon's writting..."

"Var Percy?" The Captain looked at Myers with concern in his eyes.

"Yeah, and another light just went out..."

Duyneider stood and shouted, "Alright people this is an order to evacuate...evacuate this postion now...go...go...go..." He turned and started to run down the hill into the ravine jumping bodies as he went. The surviors started to run after him, with Percy sort of stumbling about lookign confused. "There are only three lights left sir...?" He shouted down to the vanishing figure of the Captain.

*********
It was just a mass of craters and burned, mutilated flesh. The stench of burned human flesh hung in the air and mixed with the chemical smoke residue of the bombing. In one crater were two surviving Jiggdians and a female Marine Officer who was just still alive. She had some massive shrapnal wounds.

HES Angelus
Shortly after exiting the minefield

The Angelus' captain had seen more then enough mines during combat, but never were they arranged in such a pattern or intricite design. He marveled at how, even the course west of the mine fields was so complicated in order to not be struck. Had they not had the constant and direct assistance of the Dyelli Beybians, he was most certain that their odds for survival would have been from around zil to nothing.
Captain Laetase, fresh from rest, came into the command room of the Angelus, and took his usual seat as he passed by the usual saluting faces. He sat down, having been awoken as they left the minefield as he asked, and ordered his comms officer that the link with the D.B.P.S. Desagradavel be reopened, to which his comms officer provided an ever willing 'yessir.'
Captain Laetase sat up in his chair, firmly took the mic, and clicked the button.
"This is Captain Laetase of the HES Angelus. We have navigated through the minefield and are approaching you as we speak. Sonar tells me that you should have a visual on us by now, as we're currently breaking waves at the surface. We shall continue to do so at eighty knots until we meet you, which is expected to be in about an hour or so. Until then, could I perhaps know the name of whoever's lovely voice has saved my ship and my life?" the captain asked rather forwardly. "And I want to thank you again, whoever you are, for doing so, as you probably prevented a rather bloody war. In any case, we shall link up with you soon, and the formalities shall proceed," he said with bore. The captain hated the formalities of the navy; it went against his laid-back take-life-as-it-comes-style. But he also knew that it would come with rank, so he had learned to accepted them with a grain of salt each time, knowing that his ass-kissery combined with his great skill would one day grant him admiralty -- or at least he hoped it would.
The Angelus didn't complain, however, as it and the fifteen transports pushed on toward their requested position to link-up with the Dyelli Beybian ships.

ooc
building up to something Alcona

IC
Soon the Queen was being driven up to the Parliement building, escorted by several SUVs and a decoy limousine as well.

With her was Lord Harrington, who had rushed over to meet her once he got the word. "What are you up to your Majesty?"

"I want the FKC government to get its act together. How can we have the a huge naval display going on off the coast of the Gonad without a Supreme Commander of the JDF for God's sake! Things are just itching to get out of hand. We have blue on blue incidents between Dyelli Byebi and Alcona, some stranger wandering in at incredible speed and nearly causing us and the Midlonians and the Vaadians for gods sake to upon fire, and now those very same Dyelli Bebyian (sic?) who laid an illiegal minefield in international waters are letting the Holy Imperials join in this mess. I have a lot to say damn it. I want some action and right the hell now!" She said heatedly.

"Well your majesty, it should be interesting to see how they all react."

"I would like to speak to my wife please..."

"I am sorry sir, Queen Gabrielle is not here..."

"Then where is she?"

"I can not inform you of that information your Grace..."

"Should I send one of my guards to help you realize that as her husband, and an Allied head of State that maybe I should know where the hell she is..."

Before the woman on the other end of the line answered, The Overlord saw a car pass between the gates of Parliament Hill, and proceede to get stuck behind a Vrakian Tank plying up the slope.

"She is in Port Olympus damn it. Why doesn't she keep me in the loop about these things. Tell our senior key to get her a connection with me."

Myer's pointed down along the left ridgeline "That way sir, give them about ten minutes." He paused and listened intently for a second "Fire Control also says to brace for a blast, they are going to clear out a pickup site about five miles to our back."

He looked around at the explosion.

"That couldn't have been them.........." he said as the Captain gave his orde and started down the ravine, Myers thought it was best to follow him.

At about that same time Colonel Lolkema and his men started up the ravine, he saw the Gonadites were apparently retreating, and let them go "Easy now lads, let them back off if they like, seal off the ravine, no point in chasing them through their jungles lads, easy now." He whispered into his comm as they rushed up the ravine , only picking off the stragglers............the Naval Guard Marines were heading headlong into the now 'retreating' Alconian Marines.

One of Lolkema's men men whispered into his comm "there, someone is coming over the ridge!"

Lolkema grunted philosophically "The best laid plans lads, the best laid plans."

His marines braced themselves and hoped it was Alconians diving over the ridge.

In the air a second Artemis was hit, but this one by it's an enemy missles and not it's own. The pilot pulled up as the missle hit, exploding under a wing and raking out one of the intakes. The other Artemis' intensified their fire again on where the missle's contrail led to the launch area, the pilots using their infrared viewers to target the elves moving through the undergrowth.

The damagrd plane turned and attempted to limp back out to sea.................like the A-10, the Artemis was a robust plane. As it headed back, a second wave of Artemis fighters were arriving to replace the current ones before they were too low on fuel and ammo.

*****

Major Ncube sighed as the five medics did what they could to stabilize the three survivors.

"Fire Control, this is Ncube. Only three survivors. Send in extraction."

Within minutes one of the pickup Marathons would be there, Ncube and his men warily watched the jingle until then.

The last white light went out on the ball. A moment later the small outcrop became the center of a star for thirty seconds. The sudden change in pressure created a tornado effect that sent winds whirling about at about 70 miles per hour. The air filled with boulders and small rocks rising up and streaking through the atmosphere.

The Captain threw himself into the creek bed. Most of the Jiggdians and Marines did likewise to avoid the sudden blast of wind and falling rock. A plume of plasma ran down the slope and turned several people and tree's into vapor instantly.

A moment later the blast was over, some trees were broken like toothpicks. others stood with their canopy's engulfed in flame. Duyneider looked up from the mud and mumbled, "I have Var tech..."

*****
JDF 16th Alconian Marine Command
-What the Hell was That!

At Citadel and at the Center for Esoteric Skills both intel teams watched as a UAV high over the Gonad reported the bright flash of an extremely hot explosion.

Immediately video feed was sent up the chain of command.

Admiral Vercingtorix reviewed the tape minutes later. "Oh shit, was that a nuke or another antimatter blast?"

"Unknown sir, but we are checking. It was way to hot to be a conventional detonation."

"What the hell are the Elves doing with that kind of firepower? I thought they were supposed to be primitives!"

-----------------
Meanwhile Gabrielle realized that she still hadn't heard from her husband yet, and she had sent word for him to call a while back. She tried again, this time trying his private line. She had a few minutes, as it appears the Vrak were moving slow in getting their tanks out of the way.

With her in the back seat, her speechwriter hurriedly finished up corrections to copy for the Queen's intended speech.

To: Christopher Thompson diplomats
From: Office of the FKC president
Subject: your incursion

You have intruded upon the waters of the Klatch. We would like you to explain your actions. Please note that the FKC president's authority supercedes all authority of any state, including Dyelli Beybi.


The Intelligence Director looked at the previous note and wondered why the nation of Christopher Thompson didn't reply. It seemed quite obvious to him that the note was written clearly and plainly. A whisker twitched as he mulled over the possibilities. Either they didn't get the message the first time or they chose to ignore it.

He dictated another note, but this time much more strongly worded.

====

To: Christopher Thompson diplomats
From: Office of the FKC president
Subject: your incursion

You have intruded upon the Klatch. The Gonad does not belong to any one state which means it is unclaimed territory. This means it falls within the authority of the FKC president himself. Which means any agreement that you have with any FKC state is rendered null and void if the president himself declares it so.

You are asked one final time. Clarify your intentions to this office immediately and stand down any and all of your military assets else we decide harsher measures be enacted.

You have six hours to comply.

====

**********
Encryption - MAX; JDF protocols 97987912684; route JDF Inner Counsel; route...complete
**********

The nation of Christopher Thompson has been given six hours as of this moment to clarify their intentions to the Office of the President and to stand down any and all of their military assets. If they refuse to answer us or if their answer is not satisfactory, then use any and all means to capture and destroy their vessels. We will keep you informed as to the nature of their answer and if it meets our expectations.

The last white light went out on the ball. A moment later the small outcrop became the center of a star for thirty seconds. The sudden change in pressure created a tornado effect that sent winds whirling about at about 70 miles per hour. The air filled with boulders and small rocks rising up and streaking through the atmosphere.

The Captain threw himself into the creek bed. Most of the Jiggdians and Marines did likewise to avoid the sudden blast of wind and falling rock. A plume of plasma ran down the slope and turned several people and tree's into vapor instantly.

A moment later the blast was over, some trees were broken like toothpicks. others stood with their canopy's engulfed in flame. Duyneider looked up from the mud and mumbled, "I have Var tech..."



Colonel Lolkema motioned for his men to get down as the Captain and his men dove for cover. Myers did likewise.

Myers looked up after the blast and pointed in the general direction of the Vaadian Marines who also began to stand and see who was missing, Myers cleared his throat "Colonel Lolkema, over here. I'm going to contact Fire Control and let them know we don't need a pickup point cleared."

Colonel Lolkema got his men up with guns ready as fast as he could and staying low went over to Captain Duyneider and Leftenant Myers "What in the hell was that!?"

Above the Artemis Fighters began to climb when the 'device' impacted, with the exception of the damaged Artemis, it turned into a fireball in the initial explosion as it struggled to get higher, the other pilots could only watch as their comrade was vaporized.

*****

Aboard the Sir William Issem Fire Control went crazy with alarms as the satellites caught the explosion. Admiral Ilek jumped up and watched the aftermath of the explosion of the main screen.

"What in the hell was that?"

Even as Gabrielle was trying to get her husband on the line her aides hurriedly showed her two new pieces of information.

"Jesus, I can't even go to Parliament without another problem developing!" Gabrielle swore testily. "We have a small nuclear type explosion and the President is threatening to blow the hell out of the Holy Imperials. At the same friggin time!" She asked Lady Katherine.

"Yes your majesty."

Gabrielle sighed heavily. "Ok, find out where the President is and request a meeting." Meanwhile the commicator to her husband finally got a response.

"Hello dear, I decided to drop into Port Olympus to see what was going on. Can you meet me at Parliament?" She asked sweetly, although the video easily showed that the anger in her eyes and the tense expression on her face.

The Intelligence Director looked at the previous note and wondered why the nation of Christopher Thompson didn't reply. It seemed quite obvious to him that the note was written clearly and plainly. A whisker twitched as he mulled over the possibilities. Either they didn't get the message the first time or they chose to ignore it.

He dictated another note, but this time much more strongly worded.

====

To: Christopher Thompson diplomats
From: Office of the FKC president
Subject: your incursion

You have intruded upon the Klatch. The Gonad does not belong to any one state which means it is unclaimed territory. This means it falls within the authority of the FKC president himself. Which means any agreement that you have with any FKC state is rendered null and void if the president himself declares it so.

You are asked one final time. Clarify your intentions to this office immediately and stand down any and all of your military assets else we decide harsher measures be enacted.

You have six hours to comply.

====
To: The Office of the FKC president
From: The Office of The Fuehrer of The Holy Empire of Christopher Thompson
Subject: Our Humanitarian Aid

The Holy Empire has sent a humanitarian relief force to the Gonad in order to extract the local civilians, and exterminate the hostile elven forces inside the Gonad. We wish to coordinate our efforts with any Klatchian forces in the area in order to furthur our efforts in the area. We shall deliver the rescued civilians to whatever place that the FKC President so wishes, and will yield to all mandates of the local forces, as this is a humanitarian mission in nature. We are here to restore peace and order, to save the damned and slay the wretched. These are our intentions.
We have ordered our forces to not fire on any Klatchian forces save in risk of extermination by these said forces. If they have done so, please inform us immediately. Recent reports from the ship known as the HES Angelus indicate that they are working with the Dyellian forces. They have navigated through the mine fields and are meeting up with the Dyellian navy. They have done this under Dyellian orders. The said movement furthur into Klatchian waters was done under those said orders. We are attempting to comply with Klatchian demands, but too many are coming from too many sources, all demanding opposing orders. We need a single, concrete unified order, and until the Klatch can arrive upon such an order, we shall follow the Dyellians, as they seem to be the most rational people we have met, and we shall be working most cloesly with them, as our main base that is planned there is on their border. Also, they probably have the greatest intel and forces inside the Gonad as well, so these factors are of great consideration when considering who to listen to. Unless you can make a decision by, of and for the Klatch, we shall follow Dyellian forces.
Greatest Hopes and Warmest Regards,
Alucard
Fuehrer of The Holy Empire

To: The Office of The Fuehrer of The Holy Empire of Christopher Thompson
From: The Office of the FKC president
Subject: incursion

Your humantarian efforts are not needed. The status of the Gonad is an internal FKC matter. Your military assets are ordered to stand down and surrender themselves to the nearest JDF force or FKC state force. You are not to step onto Klatchian soil nor fly any vehicle in our airspace. You will comply with these demands or risk war with the Klatch.

I am the President of the FKC and there is no one higher than me.

====

**********
Encryption - MAX; JDF protocols 97987912684; route: all FKC state forces, all JDF forces; route...complete
**********

Christopher Thpmpson military assets within the Klatch have been ordered to stand down and to surrender themselves to the nearest FKC state or JDF forces. If they surrender to the nearest State force, they are ordered to remain within their vessel until the JDF arrive on scene.

JDF forces, with assistance from FKC forces will then conduct interrogation of the crew while the vessel(s) is searched. Once the inspection is complete, the crew of the vessel(s) will be allowed to return and then escorted out of Klatchian waters. The foreigners are not allowed to set foot on Klatchian soil nor to fly in Klatchian airspace.

If refusal or avoidance of these demands is encountered, deadly force to exterminate the crew and vessel(s) is authorized.

Aboard his flagship, Admiral Tovey looked at the printout of the message glumly. "Do we have a firing solution on that ship?"

"Yes sir, as long as it remains surfaced."

"Ok, order the subs to get their Sealions in the water and they are to move to a position to form a picket line in front of us. If he heads south we will have to sink him." Tovey commanded. "Get some Sea Dragonflys up too. Send a message home to make sure we are supposed to do this."

The Dyellian Officer sounded on the other end of the line to the Angelus laughed huskily, "Vice-Admiral Collins." it seemed she had taken a very personal interest in the Angelus.

"Read the latest comunique from el Presidente?" her tone was casual, and not really in keeping with the fourth highest ranking Officer in the Navy, "The mad old Walrus wants you to surrender, he's put in plenty of clauses to stop us doing anything funny as well. It's so sad that the Vrakians don't trust their Southern neighbours."

Her accent was quite distinct, lilting and to a Klatchian quite obviously Dyellian (although very easily mistaken for Irish), "We've been told if you surrender to us we're supposed to keep you shut on your boat until the JDF arrive, probably in case we try to employ you to conquer the rest of the Federation or some other equally inprobable reason that just happened to be passing through his alcohol soaked, raisin of a brain at the time."

Secret Comunique - Encryption Level: Overkill

From: Dyelli Beybi, Ministry of Foreign Affairs
To: New Shiron, Ministry of Foreign Affairs
Subject: Rational Behaviour in the Federation

In recent weeks it has become apparent that many Klatchian States are more than willing to provoke open hostilities with any State that so happens to cross their path. Obviously this will not be beneficial for the overall health of Klatch.

Other supposed Klatchians seem to be taking a great deal of joy in impeding Dyellian attempts to subdue the Gonad, speculating that this is a 'colonial land grab' rather than the security opperation that any sane person can see it is.

The latest move by the President has not served to further Dyelli Beybi's faith in the Federation, neither has the unprecedented hostility by the Alconians following what was quite obviously an unfortunate accident. While we can understand some element of anger over the event, their refusal to accept any Official apologies from the State of Dyelli Beybi or to attempt to rectify the communication problem, despite all our best efforts, underlines a thread of irational paranoia that seems to be creeping into Klatchian politics.

As such, Dyelli Beybi wishes to send a representative from the Ministry to meet and discuss the problems facing the Federation with New Shiron, as New Shiron appears to be the only State exhibiting any form of rational thought at the moment.

Your Respectfully,
The Hon. Dr Jack Ledoux

The Karmanyakans of the small expedition had all probably been killed. Either by rogue elves or by the oracle's forces. A corvette from the Karmanyakan Coast Guard had been sent to the last known position of the Katz Expedition and found the wrecked ship. The sad news hit Karmanyaka with the evening news. People had loved the crazy adventurer and outside the gates of Katla University flowers and candles were placed to honor the great explorer and media profile.

--

Meanwhile in the Palace in Katla the Lord Tengil shook his head.

"What is this charade? he asked his aide. "No one in charge, and everyone running around, guns blazing and dead whales floating around in the bay of Lunacy. Has everyone gone mad?"

"Possibly, my Lord." said the aide.

"And those... 'Holy Rollers' as the Alconians say, why won't they just return to whatever crusader kingdom they came from?" the Lord Tengil sighed. "Give this message to the ambassador of Ilek-Vaad: 'The Dominion of Karmanyaka would like to send the frigate Preponderant, under the command of captain Massimo Giulii, over to assist the Vaadian fleet and act as an observer. The Preponderant is currently sailing in the bay of Lunacy north of Tactical Group Emperor Ehecatl. If granted, she will rendezvous with Emperor Ehecatl in two hours approximately.' It's already quite crowded over there, but one more ship won't do much difference. I just want to be sure they don't blow up anything that's ours."

--

The senior Karmanyakan key rose:
"The Dominion of Karmanyaka second the proposal laid forward by the Vrakians and we would also like to suggest the establishment of a security zone in the waters and airspace around the Gonad, to be patroled and maintained by JDF forces."

The Dyellian Officer sounded on the other end of the line to the Angelus laughed huskily, "Vice-Admiral Collins." it seemed she had taken a very personal interest in the Angelus.

"Read the latest comunique from el Presidente?" her tone was casual, and not really in keeping with the fourth highest ranking Officer in the Navy, "The mad old Walrus wants you to surrender, he's put in plenty of clauses to stop us doing anything funny as well. It's so sad that the Vrakians don't trust their Southern neighbours."

Her accent was quite distinct, lilting and to a Klatchian quite obviously Dyellian (although very easily mistaken for Irish), "We've been told if you surrender to us we're supposed to keep you shut on your boat until the JDF arrive, probably in case we try to employ you to conquer the rest of the Federation or some other equally inprobable reason that just happened to be passing through his alcohol soaked, raisin of a brain at the time."

HES Angelus
The comms officer patched her voice in to Laetase.
He grunted at the thought off the old drunken walrus. How in the devil was he running the Klatch again? He's probably never know. He grunted at the thought and gave an equally harty laugh back over hte comm line. "Alright, as much as I'd like to stay here and bash the insanity that all these others have shown us, and believe me, I would, we have a holy order to fulfill. We are to have you escort us to our intended landing zone and eventual base of operations, correct?" He sent over the data corresponding about their intended base that was to be made boardering the southern ocean and Dyelli Beybi as the Angelus and the 1A1 Heavy Transports moved to within hundreds of meters of the Dyellian escort group.
"Alright," the Captain explained, "this is the plan. Our transports will get in a five by three column behind your flagship and submerge to thirty feet, just below the water. Your five cruisers would be best suited to making a circle around them please. The Angelus, the flagship of our group, will dive to the same depth and bring-up the rear. But first, we'll launch out an Eagleye. The Eagleye is the best-known AWACS within the Holy Empire, especially for its size. And we'll launch five Mustang 2s for air support. After submerging, we'll scare-up our S-16 fleet here to form a second circle around the entire fleet. Don't worry about them, they'll stay under just a few feet of water, so you'll be able to see them gliding through the sea from your decks, and they're also one of the most manouverable things in the sea, so don't worry about hitting them.
"Is all this okay with you?" The Captain asked back, much more careful to inquire within of his new allies now that he finally had some.

To: The Office of The Fuehrer of The Holy Empire of Christopher Thompson
From: The Office of the FKC president
Subject: incursion

Your humantarian efforts are not needed. The status of the Gonad is an internal FKC matter. Your military assets are ordered to stand down and surrender themselves to the nearest JDF force or FKC state force. You are not to step onto Klatchian soil nor fly any vehicle in our airspace. You will comply with these demands or risk war with the Klatch.I am the President of the FKC and there is no one higher than me.

====

====

To: The Office of the FKC president
From: The Office of The Fuehrer of The Holy Empire of Christopher Thompson
Subject: Your Demands

Your Outrageous Demands shall be answered as soon as we can establish contact with the Angelus. She is currently submerged at the moment, stripping us of our abylity to communicate with her. We shall allow the search of all ships stationed within Klatchian waters and the questioning on the ships of all crew, but shall bar arrest, siezure, or removal of anything belonging to The Holy empiric Navy from any Holy Empiric Ship of any nature. After being serched, they shall return home the same way they came.

====

The Fuehrer looked at the message he was about to send. Well, fuck, he thought, there goes peacable relations. He ordered an aide in, and asked that the nation come to high alert in accordance with class one, situation C standards, and that the other eleven CVSXs be sent near the Klatch.
His orders, of course, were immedietly carried out, and the Holy Empire's war effort secretly became off awake; all off-duty soldiers were taken back, the Citadel Fortresses along the major coastlines were silently manned, the sub-fighter and fighter patrols of Holy Empirirc waters became much more robust in nature, and extended past the normal routes all the way to three-hundred miles out, more than double the norm as the more and more passengers of planes and ships noted that they were being stopped through customs to have their baggage checked and more guards within the Holy empire were put on duty to guard specific governmental buildings. Secretly and silently, The Holy Empire was hoping for the best, and preparing for the worst.
The eleven CVSXs were moved out of the massive, beautiful docks of The Holy Empire, and met up in International waters. They then began to Super-cavitate on their long journey to within two-hundred nm of Klatchian waters, where the real journey would begin to silently run all the way to the boarder of Klatchian waters and wait for orders. They would be back-up for the Angelus in case all hell broke loose.

Even as Gabrielle was trying to get her husband on the line her aides hurriedly showed her two new pieces of information.

"Jesus, I can't even go to Parliament without another problem developing!" Gabrielle swore testily. "We have a small nuclear type explosion and the President is threatening to blow the hell out of the Holy Imperials. At the same friggin time!" She asked Lady Katherine.

"Yes your majesty."

Gabrielle sighed heavily. "Ok, find out where the President is and request a meeting." Meanwhile the commicator to her husband finally got a response.

"Hello dear, I decided to drop into Port Olympus to see what was going on. Can you meet me at Parliament?" She asked sweetly, although the video easily showed that the anger in her eyes and the tense expression on her face.

"Yes, I and everyone else watching KCN knows where you are." There seemed to be a bit of humor on his face. "I assume that you've lost your patience with our fellow Klatchian States?"

His blue eyes turned slightly for a moment. "You realize that someone just detonated a plasma bomb in the Gonad?"

Admiral Aramayo was standing on the bridge as the main screen went momentarily blank and was replaced by a Tollan Fire Control Officer.

"Admiral Aramayo, the Retaliatory Guard is recalling forces. You are to rendezvous with the Emperor Ehecatl at their current position. On the way keep in contact with the William Issem, if you can help them wrap up their operations quicker then do it. As soon as the Alconians are on board and safe they are to be recalled as well."

Admiral Aramayo looked a bit suprised , but not much, the Klatch was a mess and with war all but declared he knew that Retaliatory Guard Command would want to pool it's forces for a typical 'Buick swatting fly' attack.

He saluted "At once. We will leave immediately."

With that, Tactical Groups Namroth Vedic began to abandon it's position.

"Yes, I and everyone else watching KCN knows where you are." There seemed to be a bit of humor on his face. "I assume that you've lost your patience with our fellow Klatchian States?"

His blue eyes turned slightly for a moment. "You realize that someone just detonated a plasma bomb in the Gonad?"

"Yes, I have indeed lost patience with our fellow states." she glowered. "A plasma bomb? My people did pick up something, but we hadn't identified it yet other than it certainly shouldn't be something showing up in that part of the world. Do your people know who did it? Or why?"

She forced herself back into control. "Well, I intend to go to Parliament and see what is happening for myself. The FKC is adrift and a storm is coming up. Its time for things to get back under control. At least to the extent that they can."

Colonel Lolkema motioned for his men to get down as the Captain and his men dove for cover. Myers did likewise.

Myers looked up after the blast and pointed in the general direction of the Vaadian Marines who also began to stand and see who was missing, Myers cleared his throat "Colonel Lolkema, over here. I'm going to contact Fire Control and let them know we don't need a pickup point cleared."

Colonel Lolkema got his men up with guns ready as fast as he could and staying low went over to Captain Duyneider and Leftenant Myers "What in the hell was that!?"

Above the Artemis Fighters began to climb when the 'device' impacted, with the exception of the damaged Artemis, it turned into a fireball in the initial explosion as it struggled to get higher, the other pilots could only watch as their comrade was vaporized.

*****

Aboard the Sir William Issem Fire Control went crazy with alarms as the satellites caught the explosion. Admiral Ilek jumped up and watched the aftermath of the explosion of the main screen.

"What in the hell was that?"

It was quiet after the blast, Duyneider stood up covered in a greenish mud. "That was Var technology, and that is just icing on the cake. These bloody elves appear to have gotten their hands on some even worse weapons." He stood up and watched as his Marines began to orginize the civilians into a line with the Marines flanking them.

"I think we should get moving out of here before someone decides to throw another one of those blasted ball bombs on us. We would be in serious trouble in the bottom of the ravine here don't you?"

******

JDF Encryption AT785J90 -
All Forces in Gonad Sector
Regarding the President's Orders All ships are to take immediate steps to comply with orders. Operate on the assumption that non-allied forces may attempt to destroy your ships. Maintain ready watches at all times.

I will be taking direct command of all military actions within the Southern Klatchian Sea.
Admiral Pellew


[color=red]
JDF Encryption AD445E67 -
New Shiron Naval Forces, Admiral Tovey
I will be flying into the area to supervise the interrogation and search. At present your flagship is seen as the most sutiable Klatchian vessel available for this. As such I will be transfering my flag to your flagship along with some of my staff until JDF reinforcements from Neo Tyr arrive.

Admiral Pellew

*****
The JDF costal defense taskforce was passing another fortress on the river. The three coastal battleships flew the Federation Flag off their sterns while the smaller gunboats glided along side like terriers protecting a prize bull. At the rear was a large bulky helicopter tender. Far above the small group flew a helio keeping tabs on both sides of the river.

The taskforce began to take another bend in the river, soon they would be entering Bath.

Colonel Lolkema looked over the situation and turned to Captain Duyneider "How many men and civilians do you have? I can have two transports in here in short order."

He paused and motioned to his men who spread out at the bottom of the ravine, the Colonel turned back to the Captain "Get everyone back up there, that bomb should have cleared things out, we'll hold off any counter attack down here."

Myers was still crouching and listening intently to his comm "Sir, The second wave of Artemis' should be coming overhead in a minute or two. Unit B has only recovered three surviors and will have room on their transport for at least a hundred."

The Colonel nodded "Let's get everyone up there and see how much room we have."

*****

Major Ncube looked up as the shadow of the Martahon-B covered him and his men. The bottom panels opened and dropped their rappel lines, they quickly transferred the wounded and the medics up first as the Martahon hung in the air above them, kicking up dust , his remained alert for any threats.

The Marathon's co-pilot manned the single 30mm cannon on it's rotating turret, his infrared viewer engaged as he scanned the jungle perimeter for any movement.

The Martahon was also escorted by five Artemis fighters, that circled it, about a thousand feet out watching for anything that may target the transport.

====

To: The Office of the FKC president
From: The Office of The Fuehrer of The Holy Empire of Christopher Thompson
Subject: Your Demands

Your Outrageous Demands shall be answered as soon as we can establish contact with the Angelus. She is currently submerged at the moment, stripping us of our abylity to communicate with her. We shall allow the search of all ships stationed within Klatchian waters and the questioning on the ships of all crew, but shall bar arrest, siezure, or removal of anything belonging to The Holy empiric Navy from any Holy Empiric Ship of any nature. After being serched, they shall return home the same way they came.


To: The Office of The Fuehrer of The Holy Empire of Christopher Thompson
From: The Office of the FKC President
Subject: Our requests

You crossed into Klatchian waters without authorization. We suggest that you make every effort to contact the Angelus for their own safety. And the orders to carry out interrogation stands along with the searching of the Angelus and any other vessels that may be accompanying it.

Again, the status of the Gonad is an internal matter. We do not require humanitarian assistance from any outside power. We have every sovereign right to keep our borders safe from intruders such as yourself. Perhaps in the future you would do well to remember this in your dealings with us and other nations. The FKC does not intrude upon the sovereignty of any nation until it has been wronged first.

Duyneider just blinked at the Vaadian Colonel. "Beylay that order! Listen, I don't know what physics you learned in school, but that bomb site is the last place I am allowing these civilians or my men...Sound off and give me a surviving civilian count now!" He yelled out, then returned his gaze to the Vaadian.

"That is the kind of order I was expecting from Percy here, who god gave a dead hamster in a wheel to power the few mechanical gears that represent his brain..."

"I resemble that remark..."

"God help me..." He was interupted by a man in sargents stripes. "Sir, I have 48 civilians and 34 Marines..."
"My God I've lost two thirds of the civilians...which is why I am not about to allow them up that hill." He turned to Meyers. "Ask your fellow flyers if there happens to be an alternative clearning nearby."

I bet you just squeeked through physics and physical chemistry didn't you. Typical put a man who just scapped through college likely on this mission. Duyneider thought as he watched Meyers for a moment.

Of course Duyneider didn't think about the fact that he had no idea what education Vaadian Marine Officers received, or that Lolkema had any clue the ground of the bomb crater was likely still at 500 celcius or hotter. The fact that physics and physical chemistry were required for him just translated in it being required for everyone.

Secret Comunique - Encryption Level: Overkill

From: Dyelli Beybi, Ministry of Foreign Affairs
To: New Shiron, Ministry of Foreign Affairs
Subject: Rational Behaviour in the Federation

In recent weeks it has become apparent that many Klatchian States are more than willing to provoke open hostilities with any State that so happens to cross their path. Obviously this will not be beneficial for the overall health of Klatch.

Other supposed Klatchians seem to be taking a great deal of joy in impeding Dyellian attempts to subdue the Gonad, speculating that this is a 'colonial land grab' rather than the security opperation that any sane person can see it is.

The latest move by the President has not served to further Dyelli Beybi's faith in the Federation, neither has the unprecedented hostility by the Alconians following what was quite obviously an unfortunate accident. While we can understand some element of anger over the event, their refusal to accept any Official apologies from the State of Dyelli Beybi or to attempt to rectify the communication problem, despite all our best efforts, underlines a thread of irational paranoia that seems to be creeping into Klatchian politics.

As such, Dyelli Beybi wishes to send a representative from the Ministry to meet and discuss the problems facing the Federation with New Shiron, as New Shiron appears to be the only State exhibiting any form of rational thought at the moment.

Your Respectfully,
The Hon. Dr Jack Ledoux

In Regina Prince Alex, who was filling in for his big sister while she visited Port Olympus, looked over the message and sighed heavily. "Send them a reply and invite them to visit. Emphasize that the visit should be low key."

JDF Encryption AT785J90 - All Forces in Gonad Sector Regarding the President's Orders All ships are to take immediate steps to comply with orders. Operate on the assumption that non-allied forces may attempt to destroy your ships. Maintain ready watches at all times.

I will be taking direct command of all military actions within the Southern Klatchian Sea.
Admiral Pellew

JDF Encryption AD445E67 -
New Shiron Naval Forces, Admiral Tovey
I will be flying into the area to supervise the interrogation and search. At present your flagship is seen as the most sutiable Klatchian vessel available for this. As such I will be transfering my flag to your flagship along with some of my staff until JDF reinforcements from Neo Tyr arrive.

Admiral Pellew .

Admiral Tovey sighed in relief. The Alconans were generally rational, so he looked forward to meeting with Admiral Pellew. "Signal an acknowledgement" he ordered. "Signal Admiral Hawkins to take command of the fleet if necessary, and I want this task group to detach from the fleet and close to 100 miles of the Holy Imperials. Send the subs out in front as well. The rest of the fleet is to remain on station for the present."

With that, Task Force 38 was formed, with the cruiser Glorious, destroyers Rapier, Cutlass, Submarines Princess Grace, King John V, King Robert the Great, Queen Charlotte II, Queen Elizabeth, Princess Carolyn, and Queen Amanda, and their 116 Sealions and 10 Sea Dragonflys.

It moves north at 20 knots so that the submarines can remain quiet and to listen better.

please! i need reinforcements in border dispute! mikus lamarus has unjustly invaded my country! i require immediate assitance!

His orders, of course, were immedietly carried out, and the Holy Empire's war effort secretly became off awake; all off-duty soldiers were taken back, the Citadel Fortresses along the major coastlines were silently manned, the sub-fighter and fighter patrols of Holy Empirirc waters became much more robust in nature, and extended past the normal routes all the way to three-hundred miles out, more than double the norm as the more and more passengers of planes and ships noted that they were being stopped through customs to have their baggage checked and more guards within the Holy empire were put on duty to guard specific governmental buildings. Secretly and silently, The Holy Empire was hoping for the best, and preparing for the worst.
The eleven CVSXs were moved out of the massive, beautiful docks of The Holy Empire, and met up in International waters. They then began to Super-cavitate on their long journey to within two-hundred nm of Klatchian waters, where the real journey would begin to silently run all the way to the boarder of Klatchian waters and wait for orders. They would be back-up for the Angelus in case all hell broke loose.

high above in space, ships, drones and satellites of the Royal Space Force of New Shiron monitored the sudden burst of signals and activity from the Holy Empire. Noted with particular interest was the sortie of the 11 Holy Empire submarines.

This information was quickly passed to the Lords of War, Alcona, Vrak, and Dybelli Byebi. Not to mention its own forces. Regretably there was not a working relationship with the other FKC member nations on military matters, so the information was not passed on to Midlonia, Greenbeard or anyone else.

"Yes, I have indeed lost patience with our fellow states." she glowered. "A plasma bomb? My people did pick up something, but we hadn't identified it yet other than it certainly shouldn't be something showing up in that part of the world. Do your people know who did it? Or why?"

She forced herself back into control. "Well, I intend to go to Parliament and see what is happening for myself. The FKC is adrift and a storm is coming up. Its time for things to get back under control. At least to the extent that they can."

"Well things have decidely gotten worse not better. When the Great House here someone used a plasma bomb in the Gonad they are going to want to find them and make them extinct." He let out a deep breath.

"I think it is time for an emercency family meeting...Grandpa is up to something...I am not sure what."

"Well things have decidely gotten worse not better. When the Great House here someone used a plasma bomb in the Gonad they are going to want to find them and make them extinct." He let out a deep breath.

"I think it is time for an emercency family meeting...Grandpa is up to something...I am not sure what."

"I agree, give me some directions to get where you are, or where we need to go." She said in a matter of fact voice.

At that moment another message came in on her comm, and she sighed as she looked over an email from her brother, and then another from Defense Minister Ridgeway.

She just shook her head and forwarded them to her husband.

ooc
information on the DB diplomatic approach and the Holy Empire military activity

To: The Office of The Fuehrer of The Holy Empire of Christopher Thompson
From: The Office of the FKC President
Subject: Our requests

You crossed into Klatchian waters without authorization. We suggest that you make every effort to contact the Angelus for their own safety. And the orders to carry out interrogation stands along with the searching of the Angelus and any other vessels that may be accompanying it. Again, the status of the Gonad is an internal matter. We do not require humanitarian assistance from any outside power. We have every sovereign right to keep our borders safe from intruders such as yourself. Perhaps in the future you would do well to remember this in your dealings with us and other nations. The FKC does not intrude upon the sovereignty of any nation until it has been wronged first.

To: The Office of the FKC President
From: The Office of The Fuehrer of The Holy Empire of Christopher Thompson
Subject: Our requests

What, exactly is your definition of interrogation? We will be willing to allow a questioning of all our soldiers and sailors, for what information you might want to know I know not, but many countries have turned the word interrogation into a mild or worse form of torture, which I will not allow to happen. Also, we require that any interrogation be done aboard the Angelus or the ship that the said soldier or sailor hails from unless you can provide a complelling reason otherwise, as these ships will work just fine for interrogation as we see it. What we see right now is a leader taking a humanitarian force, torturing all the forces, not returning them, stealing the ships and then using them as a chip for some other effort. Please prove me wrong, and I may allow them to leave the ship.
Also, it appears that your 'internal' affair is failing. Recent sattelite passes track a rather large explosion, most likley a plasma detonation or small anti-matter detonation in nature, has happened, and more and civilians are being killed, and Klatchian forces are begining what looks like a retreat from the area. This implies one of two things:
That your forces are full of cowards, which is the less likely scenario, or that you lack the sufficiant military to handle the situation on your own at the moment, which is much more likely due to the Neo-Tyr situation. We are willing to cooperate with the local military authority to the fullest extent in calming the Gonad and making it once again a peacable land. We are here to strengthen relations and have sent this envoy of hope as a sign of good-will, but you see it as an invasionary force. We ask that you reconsider your position and allow us to help you. That is all we ask.
Alucard
Fuehrer of The Holy Empire

please! i need reinforcements in border dispute! mikus lamarus has unjustly invaded my country! i require immediate assitance!

OOC: Piss off. Stay out of our threads you dumbass.

To: The Office of the FKC President
From: The Office of The Fuehrer of The Holy Empire of Christopher Thompson
Subject: Our requests

What, exactly is your definition of interrogation? We will be willing to allow a questioning of all our soldiers and sailors, for what information you might want to know I know not, but many countries have turned the word interrogation into a mild or worse form of torture, which I will not allow to happen. Also, we require that any interrogation be done aboard the Angelus or the ship that the said soldier or sailor hails from unless you can provide a complelling reason otherwise, as these ships will work just fine for interrogation as we see it. What we see right now is a leader taking a humanitarian force, torturing all the forces, not returning them, stealing the ships and then using them as a chip for some other effort. Please prove me wrong, and I may allow them to leave the ship.
Also, it appears that your 'internal' affair is failing. Recent sattelite passes track a rather large explosion, most likley a plasma detonation or small anti-matter detonation in nature, has happened, and more and civilians are being killed, and Klatchian forces are begining what looks like a retreat from the area. This implies one of two things:
That your forces are full of cowards, which is the less likely scenario, or that you lack the sufficiant military to handle the situation on your own at the moment, which is much more likely due to the Neo-Tyr situation. We are willing to cooperate with the local military authority to the fullest extent in calming the Gonad and making it once again a peacable land. We are here to strengthen relations and have sent this envoy of hope as a sign of good-will, but you see it as an invasionary force. We ask that you reconsider your position and allow us to help you. That is all we ask.
Alucard
Fuehrer of The Holy Empire

To: The Office of The Fuehrer of The Holy Empire of Christopher Thompson
From: The Office of the FKC President
Subject: Our requests

We do not need to explain our rational nor procedures to you. You intruded upon our lands and yet you are flabbergasted at our reaction. Do peaceful envoys intrude upon a sovereign nation's waters without any form of communication? The fact is, your intelligence failed on the exact political composition of the Klatch. It is not our fault that you failed to communicate to the proper authorities regarding the Gonad territory. Accept that you made a mistake and humble youself and this situation may yet be salvaged. The Gonad situation is an internal matter. Your humanitarian efforts are not needed. I grow tired of repeating myself to you.

You will stand down your forces. The Angelus and any other vessels will be searched and your crew will be interrogated. Refusal to comply with these requests will result in harsher action. Calling us cowards is a poor choice of words if your intentions were truly peaceful. We strongly urge you to cooperate fully with our requests, meditate upon the error of your ways, and then demonstrate wisdom in your future dealings with the Klatch.

[Great Seal of the FKC president]
[Great Seal of the FKC]

====

The southern HORDE group went to level two. Military planners were beginning to draft up proposals on how to counteract this new threat called Christopher Thompson while the VIS was tasked in finding out as much as possible the military strength of that nation and its allies. The spin doctors were confident that they could make Christopher Thompson appear to be a belligerent power since they seem to be cut from the same rock as those thick-headed Tyrinians.

Nearby Guardian fleet groups were suddenly on high alert and began to prowl the South Klatchian ocean. The Gonad was far and so the helicopters that carried anti-sub torpedoes would have to refuel in Dyelli Beybi or Monte Ozarka.

As well, despite a fierce war being waged in a far off continent, another far more secretive and much more advanced power was called upon. They did have counters to this threat but it was uncertain as to whether they could spare the equipment.

To: The Office of The Fuehrer of The Holy Empire of Christopher Thompson
From: The Office of the FKC President
Subject: Our requests

We do not need to explain our rational nor procedures to you. You intruded upon our lands and yet you are flabbergasted at our reaction. Do peaceful envoys intrude upon a sovereign nation's waters without any form of communication? The fact is, your intelligence failed on the exact political composition of the Klatch. It is not our fault that you failed to communicate to the proper authorities regarding the Gonad territory. Accept that you made a mistake and humble youself and this situation may yet be salvaged. The Gonad situation is an internal matter. Your humanitarian efforts are not needed. I grow tired of repeating myself to you.

You will stand down your forces. The Angelus and any other vessels will be searched and your crew will be interrogated. Refusal to comply with these requests will result in harsher action. Calling us cowards is a poor choice of words if your intentions were truly peaceful. We strongly urge you to cooperate fully with our requests, medidate upon the error of your ways, and then demonstrate wisdom in your future dealings with the Klatch.

[Great Seal of the FKC president]
[Great Seal of the FKC]


To: The Office of the FKC President
From: The Office of The Fuehrer
Subject: Compliance

We did not call you cowards, we called you oversretched in your military endeavors. However, we will comply. We have managed to get a line with the Angelus, and have ordered the group to come to a full stop and await furthur instruction from your officials. May we ask in what time-frame they and the ships may be returned to us?

Alucard
Fuehrer of The Most Serene Holy Empire of Christopher Thompson
[The most Sacred and Holy Seal of The Fuehrer]
[The most Serence Sacred Holy Seal of The Holy Empire]

__________________

The Angelus taskforce surfaced and came to a halt. They prepared for a boarding -- a peaceable one. They all got in their formal military attire, save the mrine corps, and took a parade ground stance inside all the ships. They awaited the arrival of whoever the FKC President was going to send, and would greet him or her with honor. The main hatch of all sixteen ships was opened, and all aircraft had been recalled, they were ready.

__________________

In secret, a short message was sent to Vice-Admiral Collins pleading for her help by any means that she could in the matter.

We are to be stopped and interrogated for what we know not. Likely to start a war back home. Please help us, we beg of you.
Captain Laetase

Pellew was now somewhere about 10,000 feet over over the Gonad and heading for the old JDF base in Greenbeard.


Holy Emperial Forces

Agents from the Klatchian Marshall's Office as well as IIS and VIS will be conducting the interrogations. We will only resort to psycological tactics if your crew proves to be uncooperative in this matter. I hope that we can avoid any futher unpleasentness by your crew's truthful and forthcomming answers.

Attepts by senior members of the crew to interfere, derail, or coach the interviews of junior members will be considered grounds for the removal of all questioning to Klatchian Ships.

Admiral Pellew

Commanding Admiral JDF Forces


"Sir we are approaching Geenbeard airspace...twenty minutes until we can put you on a long range hop to the New Shiron Task Force."

Duyneider just blinked at the Vaadian Colonel. "Beylay that order! Listen, I don't know what physics you learned in school, but that bomb site is the last place I am allowing these civilians or my men...Sound off and give me a surviving civilian count now!" He yelled out, then returned his gaze to the Vaadian.

"That is the kind of order I was expecting from Percy here, who god gave a dead hamster in a wheel to power the few mechanical gears that represent his brain..."

"I resemble that remark..."

"God help me..." He was interupted by a man in sargents stripes. "Sir, I have 48 civilians and 34 Marines..."
"My God I've lost two thirds of the civilians...which is why I am not about to allow them up that hill." He turned to Meyers. "Ask your fellow flyers if there happens to be an alternative clearning nearby."

I bet you just squeeked through physics and physical chemistry didn't you. Typical put a man who just scapped through college likely on this mission. Duyneider thought as he watched Meyers for a moment.

Of course Duyneider didn't think about the fact that he had no idea what education Vaadian Marine Officers received, or that Lolkema had any clue the ground of the bomb crater was likely still at 500 celcius or hotter. The fact that physics and physical chemistry were required for him just translated in it being required for everyone.


Colonel Lolkema hadn't even considered the heat of a plasma explosion, very few Marines, Vaadian or not, would have the kind of knowledge, the physics of plasma weapons and such was beyond the pale of all but the higher physics courses. While he didn't mind being corrected the Colonel was 'upset' by the yelling. He replied quietly and calmly.

"No need to yell now." He could see the Capatin losing his cool. "Follow these lads here and they will loop us back around to where we came from and I will have Myers contact Fire Control clear us a pick up point." He didn't argue with anything the Captain said, or try to dissuade him.

He motioned and his point men headed out "Keep close to them, they are hard to spot in the jungle." he motioned to Myers and Myers got back on with Fire Control.

Myers turned back to them "Fire control will give us a pickup point five miles due east of here, they said to look for the plume of smoke." He paused looking around "Another waves of Artemis fighters should be over us in a minute or two to give us aerial cover."

Colonel Lolkema nodded "Right then, civilains first after my lads here, Captain you and your men after them, more of my lads on the flanks and I will take the rear with the rest of my lads...........medics check on everyone as we go, let's move."

He spoke softly and quietly, because of course everything he said was picked up on his comm and was sent encrypted to all his men, they took the lead and relayed the marching order to civilians and Alconian Marines that were out of ear shot.

Colonel Lolkema put his hand on Captian Duyneider's shoulder "We have plenty of room to get every one in one pickup, no need toget excited, let's just take it nice and easy."

The Marines then just did that their pace was quick as they fell impeccably into order, moving quickly, but not allowing any stragglers, walking with their guns leveled and in a crouch, swinging their FN-Minimi's back and forth as they went, sweeping the areas around them with their tactical computerst. The Retaliatory Guard were quite contrary to the average argumentative and belligerent Vaadians. They all had literally years of training at patience and avoiding panic, or even to even become excited during these situations, they seemed to be doing everything as a matter of course, despite the chaos of the situation.

*****

Aboard the Namaan Ilek-Vaad II Captain Volks nodded to the Fire Commander "Give them a clearing." He paused and stood "Fire at will."

The Apollo Missles leapt from their ports on a cloud of compressed air and fired their rockets, flying into the Gonad at nearly mach four. They hit the jungle in a lateral staggered formation, clearing out a wide long gap, perfect for a hovering Marathon.

The Explosion shook the ground and the plume of thick white smoke was easily visible to the Marines.

Pellew was now somewhere about 10,000 feet over over the Gonad and heading for the old JDF base in Greenbeard.


Holy Emperial Forces

Agents from the Klatchian Marshall's Office as well as IIS and VIS will be conducting the interrogations. We will only resort to psycological tactics if your crew proves to be uncooperative in this matter. I hope that we can avoid any futher unpleasentness by your crew's truthful and forthcomming answers.

Attepts by senior members of the crew to interfere, derail, or coach the interviews of junior members will be considered grounds for the removal of all questioning to Klatchian Ships.

Admiral Pellew

Commanding Admiral JDF Forces



A Message was sent back to the helicopter:

Understood. We recognize that you cannot torture us, and that is a better answer than we got from the president. We now know what your methods are, and will not resist in any fashion. We shall cooperate. Is there anything we can do to be of assistance before the questioning begins?
________________________

HES Savior Task Group, just inside international waters
The group moved silently, staying at their depth of twelve-thousand feet, camoflouged in the icy blackness of the depths. They all formed a line, side by side, and began to silently launch all their sub-fighters. They were, like the rest of The Holy empire, preparing for the worst.

In Regina Prince Alex, who was filling in for his big sister while she visited Port Olympus, looked over the message and sighed heavily. "Send them a reply and invite them to visit. Emphasize that the visit should be low key."

The Dyellians were good at low key. It meant they sent a Commisaar over via a comercial jet. The one they sent this time was a Commisaar V Dzerzhinsky, (not to be confused with F Dzerzhinsky).

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Meanwhile at Sea the Dyellians were more or less on top of the Christopher Thompson forces. It took Collins a while to reply, but when she did it seemed like she'd thought the matter through, "Say, now if you guys take a look at the Dyellian ships, aside from the pagoda masts, what do you see?"

The Dyellian ships had very odd, bulky masts which looked more like an extension of the superstructure, or a pile of mishapen boxes piled onto the top of the ship. There was something else though that was noticeable, one hell of a lot of electronic warfar devices, Dyellian naval doctrine was simple. The fleet would enter an area, and discharge too much static over radar frequencies for anyone to effectively target them (conveniently missing out the narrow frequency they opperated under). Everyone knew they were there, but there wasn't too much you could do about them, aside from sail to within visual range and open fire with the cannons. A few advanced missiles could get through the ECM cover, but those had to weather the storm of CIWS (the 50 mm variety) and the enormous amount of chaff the fleet could put up. A submarine Captain might also notice there was a lot of towed Sonar, and rather large extensions over the propellars to help muffle the sound of the fleet to passive sonar.

"I'm thinking, that if I accidentally flicked a button round here we might cause a lot of chaos in our friendly Klatchian radars, giving you the opportunity to slip away. It's not a plan I'd generally advise, but if you really feel strongly about the matter of not getting fondled in the interogation room by some Alconian pervert, it's probably your best bet."

She considered what she'd just said for a moment, "Unfortunately thats about all we can do, if we do anything warlike, Klatch will come down on us like a tonne of bricks, and Dyelli Beybi would end up sliced up into nice little pieces and divided up between the Walrus folk, the Alconians, and hey the Vaadians might be in for a slice of the pie as well!"

Dyelli Beybi had enormous oil, iron, tungsten, manganese and titanium reserves. It was why it had always survived as a wealthy country despite a series of insane or incompetent rulers (prior to the last Revolution).

Glorious this is JDF Air patrol 4-90 requesting permission to land
Was declared to the New Shiron cruiser...
**********

There was no response from the helio over the 'foreign' Holy Imperial Fleet at the moment. It was an attack helicopter from shore just making a spotting of all of the ship in the immediate vicinity.

420 miles south, south east
The Myth Class Carrier began to scramble F-22D off into the air to begin air coverage over the area. An Arx and two Lynx class battlecruisers appeared to pull to the front of the fleet. The two ships looked identical except for the main guns. The Lynx had one less gun per turret, and those guns appeared far more ungainly and fat that the sleek modern guns of their close cousin.

aboard the Glorious, the landing platform was prepared to land the Alconan helicopter and an honor guard of marines and welcoming committee of officers waited for the approaching Alconan admiral.

----------
Meanwhile, 6 of the 7 submarines had split off from TF 38 and accelerated to their maximum speed of 50 knots. All of their Sealions had been recovered and techs checked all of the smaller craft for problems and hurriedly recharged their fuels cells and checked their weapons loads. This force, under the command of Admiral Beach, was headed into position to reinforce the Alconan and Midlonian fleets. The strong possibility that a large force of Holy Imperial submarines was on its way called for quick action.

"No need to yell now." He could see the Capatin losing his cool. "Follow these lads here and they will loop us back around to where we came from and I will have Myers contact Fire Control clear us a pick up point." He didn't argue with anything the Captain said, or try to dissuade him.

He motioned and his point men headed out "Keep close to them, they are hard to spot in the jungle." he motioned to Myers and Myers got back on with Fire Control.

Myers turned back to them "Fire control will give us a pickup point five miles due east of here, they said to look for the plume of smoke." He paused looking around "Another waves of Artemis fighters should be over us in a minute or two to give us aerial cover."

Colonel Lolkema nodded "Right then, civilains first after my lads here, Captain you and your men after them, more of my lads on the flanks and I will take the rear with the rest of my lads...........medics check on everyone as we go, let's move."

He spoke softly and quietly, because of course everything he said was picked up on his comm and was sent encrypted to all his men, they took the lead and relayed the marching order to civilians and Alconian Marines that were out of ear shot.

Colonel Lolkema put his hand on Captian Duyneider's shoulder "We have plenty of room to get every one in one pickup, no need toget excited, let's just take it nice and easy."

The Marines then just did that their pace was quick as they fell impeccably into order, moving quickly, but not allowing any stragglers, walking with their guns leveled and in a crouch, swinging their FN-Minimi's back and forth as they went, sweeping the areas around them with their tactical computerst. The Retaliatory Guard were quite contrary to the average argumentative and belligerent Vaadians. They all had literally years of training at patience and avoiding panic, or even to even become excited during these situations, they seemed to be doing everything as a matter of course, despite the chaos of the situation.

*****



Duyneider paused for a second, "If I'm shouting then likely my ears are still hurting from using these blasted AK's we captured from a pointy ear patrol." He stood there silently letting the Vaadian Officer give orders for a moment.

"Sargent detail a pair of Marines to each squad of civilians and put...damn we lost Mchenry...ah two men on point with the Vaadians." He wasn't shouting but you could tell he was having trouble hearing his own oders.

He turned to the Colonel, "Better to have someone on point who knows the flora and fauna around here"

What ever Duyneider's problems were, he wasn't letting lose on the Vaadian anymore.

The Alconian Marines noted the sargent's signals. Small groups of two formed up within the civilian ranks and the rest formed up behind Percy and the Captain. Two Marines, Perry and Meijers went to point.

The Alconian Marines were not apparently all that flustered either. They carried their weapons at the ready, pointed downwards with eyes scanning the jungle.

Percy trugged along with his massive trench gun slung over his shoulder.

As the group approached the bast sight, one of the lead Marines went down on his knee and signalled a stop with a rolled fist. His eyes scanned the Jungle and he attempted to get the attention of the Vaadian point.

The Marine hadn't seen or heard anything, but he wasn't hearing something. The high pitched chirp of the Betham bug. Which said something that ate Bethem bugs was up ahead, like a troop of rabid monkeys.

And for those of you with IR goggles that were not damaged, there were lots of little hot warm spots about in the tree canopy. Of course there had been lots of warm spots in the canopy, various small animals and large birds that had returned to this part of the jungle after the fighting was over.

At a drab military airbase, a sleek hypersonic transport roared into the sky. Within it were a squad of VIS agents, a retinue of marines and some other surprises.

It veered over Dyelli Beybi while sending out friendly IFF codes. It made a beeline to the nearest airbase nearest the spot where the Thompsonians (OOC: Hmmmm. What is the adjective for your people?) were anchored.

The lead interrogator, a walrus in a plain uniform mulled over his notes and orders. Hrmmph. Those f#%^@#%* foreigners.

"I'm thinking, that if I accidentally flicked a button round here we might cause a lot of chaos in our friendly Klatchian radars, giving you the opportunity to slip away. It's not a plan I'd generally advise, but if you really feel strongly about the matter of not getting fondled in the interogation room by some Alconian pervert, it's probably your best bet."

She considered what she'd just said for a moment, "Unfortunately thats about all we can do, if we do anything warlike, Klatch will come down on us like a tonne of bricks, and Dyelli Beybi would end up sliced up into nice little pieces and divided up between the Walrus folk, the Alconians, and hey the Vaadians might be in for a slice of the pie as well!"

Angelus Taskforce

"Well," Captain Laetase said with a wide grin on his face, "it appears we have better allies here than I thought. Now, I wasn't asking for that much, but thank you. That is an option that up until a few hours ago I would have taken, but the Fuehrer has given the order that we stay here. What we want to know is if you can prevent our torture, the removal of our ships and any tribunals against us, and possibly come to bat for us to help you in the Gonad. You know the forces in the Gonad are failing miserably, we all know it. And besides, we don't dare run away now; it would risk the Fuehrer's anger when we returned. But we do sincerely thank you for your willingness to make such eforts for us. Such willingness shall not be forgotten."

Savior Taskforce

The silent taskforce glided to a stop in full parade formation as all of their sub-fighters were deployed. It was an awesome sight to see:
Hundreds of sub-fighter aircraft ready to zoom in at hundreds of knots to vaporize the enemy in the name of great justice and his most holy Fuehrer. The Klatchian states had failed to make any major deployments so far, and had grossly underestimated the power that these eleven submarines carried.
And if the Fuehrer heard word of any inhumane treatment from the Angelus task force, it would take him but seconds to reach this force that was nearly twelve-thousand feet in the deep.

<snip>(OOC: Hmmmm. What is the adjective for your people?)<snip>
OOC: Many use '(Holy) Empirics' or the slang 'Thompsonians'
Parenthesis is optional.

Duyneider paused for a second, "If I'm shouting then likely my ears are still hurting from using these blasted AK's we captured from a pointy ear patrol." He stood there silently letting the Vaadian Officer give orders for a moment.

"Sargent detail a pair of Marines to each squad of civilians and put...damn we lost Mchenry...ah two men on point with the Vaadians." He wasn't shouting but you could tell he was having trouble hearing his own oders.

He turned to the Colonel, "Better to have someone on point who knows the flora and fauna around here"

What ever Duyneider's problems were, he wasn't letting lose on the Vaadian anymore.

The Alconian Marines noted the sargent's signals. Small groups of two formed up within the civilian ranks and the rest formed up behind Percy and the Captain. Two Marines, Perry and Meijers went to point.

The Alconian Marines were not apparently all that flustered either. They carried their weapons at the ready, pointed downwards with eyes scanning the jungle.

Percy trugged along with his massive trench gun slung over his shoulder.

As the group approached the bast sight, one of the lead Marines went down on his knee and signalled a stop with a rolled fist. His eyes scanned the Jungle and he attempted to get the attention of the Vaadian point.

The Marine hadn't seen or heard anything, but he wasn't hearing something. The high pitched chirp of the Betham bug. Which said something that ate Bethem bugs was up ahead, like a troop of rabid monkeys.

And for those of you with IR goggles that were not damaged, there were lots of little hot warm spots about in the tree canopy. Of course there had been lots of warm spots in the canopy, various small animals and large birds that had returned to this part of the jungle after the fighting was over.

The Marine pointmen paused when their Alconian counterpart motioned for them to do so. Their tactical computer fed a heads up display directly inside of their visor, which was covered by a bullet proof blast shield, very little would damage their sensory capabilities.

As they had moved the sounds of jet aircraft above was unmistakeable. The Artemis fighters gave them a fairly wide berth, instead flying wide circles to spot any possible ambush, or approaching enemy.

The Corporal at the lead manipulated the track point on his rifles hand grip and looked over to the Alconian Marine and and held out his rifle with the palm pilot sized view screen visible. It showed an above image of the area with a red blinking dot rapidly approaching labeled 'A-EVAC'.

He then waited to see what the Alconians would decide to do. While the Vaadians were extensively trained in the Tolteca jungles, which are arguebly nearly as dangerous, it was still an alien enviroment.

*****

Some miles away Major Ncube and his men were all loaded and had their three survivors, the pilot pointed the Martahon up and out to sea again, not sparing any throttle to get the critically injured survivors out as fast as they can.

The Alconian Marine on starboard point sat quietly for a moment, annoyed at the jet noise. But then he heard it, the nasty hyenea like call of a homo monkey.

The Marine pulled a small communications unit off his belt. He hit a button three times and waited for a response. Two clicks came back. "Sarge...we got humpers ahead, moving slowly I'd say they smell all that cooked flesh and are searching for it, over." He wispered quietly.

"Understood, hold for instructions." came quietly back.

There was a quick confrence between the sargent and Duyneider. They both looked at a map for a second and then nodded. The Sargent trotted back up the line to the Vaadian commander and saluted.

"Colonel, we appear to have a troop of humpers...Homosexual Monkeys moving this way, appears they might have smelled the carnal house back there...the Captain and I believe the safest move is to swing around them up this small counter ravine and across this low spot in the ridge to the LZ."

Colonel Lolkema nodded "We can do that. Would a series of loud explosions scare them off? We could use our grenade lauchers to fire flares into and around the clearing, if you think that would scare them off?"

He whispered into the comm "Get ready to move, follow the Alconain Marines."

His men got ready to move as indicated.

The Sargent shook his head, "They are between us and that clearing you made. They won't move into the clearing if we fire grenades at them, likely they'll wind up over running us. Not too much of a problem, except for the civies will get chewed up. And the elves may think we're dead...I think the Cap' prefer to stay off their radar with the firepower they seem to have recently acquired."

'Perry, turn south, south west, follow the dell for about 600 meters and then turn back over the ridge to get us to the LZ, over"

The Marine on point stood and motioned the others to follow him. They pulled back about twenty yards and then began to follow the smaller, narrow valley that intersected. The line swung to follow the point up and out of the way of the approaching troop of monkeys.

Colonel Lolkema nodded and the Vaadians followed the Alconians along the ravine, keeping alert and their rifles at the ready. The ones on the flanks keeping an especially close eye on the civilians.

The group followed the ravine to loops around and at about the same time there was a louder sound of jet engines, apparently the Marathion had arrived, it hadn't moved into the clearing yet but was apparently circling, inside the circle created by the Artemis fighters, waiting for the group to come into the clearing.

Hopefully the Marathon hadn't made enough noise to panic the monkeys into scattering, or if it did startle them they would at least stampede away from the group and towards their intended meal.

Secret IC
In New Shiron, the analysis of the Holy Empire sortie resulted in several quiet activities. The Royal Space Force, Royal Air Force and Royal Navy began quietly recalling everyone on leave or on detached duty and reservists got warning orders to prepare for service on short notice.

All ships at sea, all spacecraft and all aircraft were recalled to bases and complete maintenance checks began. Only those ships and spacecraft involved in the Gonad Crisis continued their missions. Several very large ocean ferrys held in the reserve fleet were quietly manned and they one by one slipped out of their moorings and then moved alongside Coast Guard bases throughout the country.

New Shiron's premier shipyard, Newcastle yards, the primary builder of the Sealion I and II, suddenly got a huge order and even a higher priority for materials, and a deal was quietly made to increase the number of subcontractors it had.

Space shuttles carried liaison officers to Greenbeard to initiate discussions regarding ramp space for aircraft and harbor space for watercraft.

Eventually the press picked up some of this, but the Military was still held in high regard by the Press after the New Cynthian invasion and most stories were either suppressed or written in the most innocious way.

New Shiron was quietly preparing for war.

Colonel Lolkema nodded and the Vaadians followed the Alconians along the ravine, keeping alert and their rifles at the ready. The ones on the flanks keeping an especially close eye on the civilians.

The group followed the ravine to loops around and at about the same time there was a louder sound of jet engines, apparently the Marathion had arrived, it hadn't moved into the clearing yet but was apparently circling, inside the circle created by the Artemis fighters, waiting for the group to come into the clearing.

Hopefully the Marathon hadn't made enough noise to panic the monkeys into scattering, or if it did startle them they would at least stampede away from the group and towards their intended meal.

If the monkey's were running, they didn't appear in the dense undergrowth of the Jungle. As the group moved up the valley one of the points again stopped and looked at the dense thicket of tree's across the top of the ridge.

He clicked on the communicator again. "Sarge, another problem, that ridge appears to have a growth of Enchanted Oaks..."

"Damn, Colonel keep your flankers from getting too far up that ridge. Those are E Oaks up there...nasty buggers. Point see if there is a break in the thicket ahead...Captain, E Oaks..."

"Damn it...alright I assume you sent the point on to see if there is a break in the grove.." The Sargent nodded.

"Alright, send a few of the boys up on the other side to watch out for any elves. Either we will wait out the troop to pass us here or find a path through the E grove....give the civilians a moment. Unless you happen to have some eletric static discharge devices on you Colonel"

"Aye, Aye sir..." the Sargent added.

A few Alconian Marines moved to the top of the opposite ridge..."Only a panther sir...looks like he's after a monkey" was the report in.

Colonel Lolkema didn't rightly know what an Enchanted Oak was, it didn't sound dangerous but Captain Duyneider seemed to imply it was so he passed along the warning to his men on the flanks to not get too high up on the ridge.

He shook his head "No, no ESD grenades, I didn't think we'd need them in a jungle." he paused and looked around "There has to be someway to get the monkeys moving , out of our way. Maybe get my snipers up in a tree or two and them start picking them off, at least put it in their heads that this isn't a safe place, or get the Artemis fighters to rip through the canopy with their cannons.

We can't wait forever that Marathon was coming from around five hundred miles out to sea, he'll have to head back to refuel and we'll have to wait for his replacement, and I don't want to wait around with what those elves were throwing at you."

He was sounding frustrated , he shook his head again "Or I can get some of my lads and engage the monkeys, even if they attack me and my men you can get the civilians to the pickup zone and we'll follow once you're set."

"What did you want to hit with the ESD's? I can contact Fire Control and get a cruise missle or two set up with ESD warheads."

Angelus Taskforce

"Well," Captain Laetase said with a wide grin on his face, "it appears we have better allies here than I thought. Now, I wasn't asking for that much, but thank you. That is an option that up until a few hours ago I would have taken, but the Fuehrer has given the order that we stay here. What we want to know is if you can prevent our torture, the removal of our ships and any tribunals against us, and possibly come to bat for us to help you in the Gonad. You know the forces in the Gonad are failing miserably, we all know it. And besides, we don't dare run away now; it would risk the Fuehrer's anger when we returned. But we do sincerely thank you for your willingness to make such eforts for us. Such willingness shall not be forgotten."


"Yeah we can do that." Collins sounded quite sure of being able to offier protection, "Under Dyellian law we cannot hand over a prisoner if it seems likely they'll end up getting tortured or facing the death penalty, and I'm sure we can refuse to hand over ships."

"You see." she continued, "From our point of view your willingness to participate in the Gonad conflict was quite welcome. The participation of the other Klatchians has only caused problems. We have a whole Division in there, doing nothing because the other Klatchians are suspicious of our motives and likely to attack us if we try anything."

"If you can pull up alongside the Desagradavel you can come onboard, I'm not going to ask for a surrender at this point, but at we can have a propper face to face chat about what options we've got, and the crews can swap cigarettes or whatever it is you guys do."

Duyneider nodded as he listened to the sugestions. "ESD cruise missle might work, but that might only stun the upper branches and not the root system. He pointed up the side of the valley towards the ridge and the dense line of oaks that stood silently, deadly above them.

"Damn, as for trying to snipe the troop, might get them moving...might also stall them as they try to figure out who is killing them off. And an air attack might just flush them this way."

He paused in thought..."If you attacked them and then drew back up the first ravine might do the trick and draw them off. But I'd have to assign some of my remaining Marines to act as guides." Duyneider stated with a dry tone, whatever he thought of the Vaadian Marines, they lacked a good sense of this jungle and sending them out by themselves seemed like a recipe for casualties.

"And we are all a bit low on ammo, hell we're not even using our standard equipment right now, used up the last our discharge rods trying to escape a mounted elven patrol. The other company had reems extra ammo but that's been Dyellified..."

The Captain stood quietly for a second, "If you can get ammo or fresh guns for four of my men to act as guides, I think that last idea would work. Once we get the civilians out we could come in behind and blast out what remained of the troop from behind. If they hadn't decided to retreat back towards us by then." He studied the plan in his head again.
"The key is not to be too powerful...an occassional single kill and a orginized retreat should lull the buggers to follow you...once we're past you could open fully up and wipe out the troop."
******
The rotors of the JDF-Helio touched down on the crusier's deck and Admiral Pellew jumped out. He was wearing a light gray jumpsuit with the patch of the FKC over the right pocket. The group of agents he had brought filled out after him. A tall man with craggy features, Pellew returned the salutes in a ship-shape manner. His blue eyes quickly ran over the crew.

"Sorry to be dropping in on you like this, but I found out that the Djel have sent out the Sea Bitch herself to meet with these Holy Rollers. Which means we are just going to complicate things."

The rotors of the JDF-Helio touched down on the crusier's deck and Admiral Pellew jumped out. He was wearing a light gray jumpsuit with the patch of the FKC over the right pocket. The group of agents he had brought filled out after him. A tall man with craggy features, Pellew returned the salutes in a ship-shape manner. His blue eyes quickly ran over the crew.

"Sorry to be dropping in on you like this, but I found out that the Djel have sent out the Sea Bitch herself to meet with these Holy Rollers. Which means we are just going to complicate things."

"Welcome aboard Admiral" Tovey replied, and introduced himself and his immediate aides. "If you will follow me sir to the CIC?" Your aides may come as well of course, or Lieutenant Phipps here" he pointed to a short but very attractive young brunette Lieutenant J.G. "can take them to the wardroom for some food and coffee."

Tovey led Pellew quickly to the CIC. It was a bit of a walk as the hanger and landing deck were well aft of the CIC and Bridge decks, and it was after all a 900 foot ship. As they walked, Tovey filled Pellew in on his deployments and his orders from home. "We are to give them every reasonable opportunity to comply Admiral, but Fleet command at Anchorage and the Joint Chiefs at Citadel are concerned about the Holy Imperials sortie."

ooc
Pellew would be able to immediately notice a couple of things about Tovey's deployments. They were cautious and obviously calculated to give the Holy Imperials time to leave if they took the opportunity. But if they stuck around, then the intruding ship was going to be boxed in very tightly.

Duyneider nodded as he listened to the sugestions. "ESD cruise missle might work, but that might only stun the upper branches and not the root system. He pointed up the side of the valley towards the ridge and the dense line of oaks that stood silently, deadly above them.

"Damn, as for trying to snipe the troop, might get them moving...might also stall them as they try to figure out who is killing them off. And an air attack might just flush them this way."

He paused in thought..."If you attacked them and then drew back up the first ravine might do the trick and draw them off. But I'd have to assign some of my remaining Marines to act as guides." Duyneider stated with a dry tone, whatever he thought of the Vaadian Marines, they lacked a good sense of this jungle and sending them out by themselves seemed like a recipe for casualties.

"And we are all a bit low on ammo, hell we're not even using our standard equipment right now, used up the last our discharge rods trying to escape a mounted elven patrol. The other company had reems extra ammo but that's been Dyellified..."

The Captain stood quietly for a second, "If you can get ammo or fresh guns for four of my men to act as guides, I think that last idea would work. Once we get the civilians out we could come in behind and blast out what remained of the troop from behind. If they hadn't decided to retreat back towards us by then." He studied the plan in his head again.
"The key is not to be too powerful...an occassional single kill and a orginized retreat should lull the buggers to follow you...once we're past you could open fully up and wipe out the troop."


Colonel Lolkema nodded and whispered into his comm, four of his men stepped forward and uplugged their FN-Minimi's from their huds and layed them down, they then quickly undid their ammo belts which had an extra four clips of ammo each along with an extra clip of grenades for the under the barrel grenade launcher.

A further twenty men came silently out of the jungle and settled around the Colonel "Alright then, let's get everyone out of here." The Colonel said with a nod.

The Marine sargent recalled everyone, a simple 'tap' pause, 'tap''tap' pause 'tap'. He assigned himself and thee other men to go with the Vaadian group. Rather than pick up the Vaadian weapon, he nodded to a fourth man who was carrying a second gun on his back. He handed over to the Sargent along with a few clips.

"Sarge, you were holding out on me?" The Captain asked quietly.

"You didn't think I would have Thomas hauling around a squad support gun without enough ammo to do some damage...." Was the reply

"Quite..." The Captain turned to the Vaadian troops, "I'll let you decide who gets their gear back." The Alconian Marines who had been assigned to Monkey Group, as someone had dubbed it, handed the Vaadians their assortment of rifles, two AK-47's with a few rounds between them, and a G7 6.25 mm with one full clip in and a second partial clip. The Alconian's felt a bit chigrined at having to disarm the Vaadians so badly. You could see the embarasment on their faces.

Duyneider turned and looked at the two groups of troops. "Alright, Perry, Burns, Heller, and my Sargent will be helping you on this op. Now a troop of Homosexual Monkeys are fairly nasty. They will keep on attacking until you kill them off or they can't get to you any longer. They will use their claws and teeth to try and bite you. But remember they are quite devious and if you have an unprotected weakness that they can get at, they will go for it. And just because they have stopped attacking for a moment, don't think your done with them. They have a nasty tendency to pull back and re-group."
He turned and saluted the Colonel, "Sir, on behalf of The Federation and His Grace I would like to offer our thanks on your help in this."

The Alconians and civilians were gathered into a tight group now. The Sargent had attached his eight inch long sword bayonet onto the end of the squad support gun.

In most armies the 5.56 x 45mm Fn-Minimi was a squad automatic, of course FN-Ilek had modified it with caseless ammunition, a 250 round box instead of a belt and of course carbon fiber and titanium construction, it kept it's power but was light, fairly. Colonel Lolkema noded and one Marine collected the extra rifle and ammo, the other three pushed their helmets back and removed earplugs and handed them to the Alconians with the Minimi's.

"Those ear plugs cut out at a certain decibel level, you thought the AK's were loud, wait til you fire the Minimi. The ammunition is caseless so don't worry about hiting your mates with the cases, this trigger is for the rifle, this one is for the grenade launcher. Right now it had 20mm offensive grenades."

The marines listened to Captain Duyneider and zipped back up, no flesh was visible now, they gave no obvious targets for the monkeys, Colonel Lolkema added something "Now then lads at range lets use the grenades, that will get their attention and clear out any packed groups they may be in, when they see us and head for us lay in on them."

He pauses and turns to his other men "Get everyone loaded as fast as you can , if yo do come under any fire get up and out, get the civilians to safety. Snipers, take positions around the clearing and nail anyone isn't us that follows you into the clearing."

The men with the 16.2mm Anti-material rifles nodded.

Colonel Lolkema nodded "No need to thank us, let's go get some."

"I agree, give me some directions to get where you are, or where we need to go." She said in a matter of fact voice.
"


"Go give your speech to Parliament. Maybe if someone other than the Keys vents at them they might actually do something for once. I will pick you up aftewords off Government Dock...Five it looks like. Then we will head south to Herzog Island and get His Grace to tell us what the hell is going on. I think they are trying to sneek Vic out under the radar right now and get her home actually."

The Overlord shook his head as he skimmed the data file. "Remind Alex that Karlord Nar'puth is staying in the Embassy wing and might back down this fellow from the Checka if they get a bit too pushy. Oh, and Pellew has...well tell your Admiral to watch it...that female Admiral Collins is a know Pirate and you know how Alconians tend to react to pirates...especially those hidding behind a uniform."

The Vrakian ambassador in Port Olympus was suddenly woken up by one of his aides that told him the Queen of New Shiron was present. He roared and tossed a massive tankard at the aide narrowly missing him. He roared that he would see the Queen personally and to convey his apologies for not seeing her earlier but due to to stupid aides like himself the ambassador wondered why he didn't skewer that weakling with his tusks then and there. The aide cringed and ran off down the corridor back to the Queen's last known arrival point and, breathlessly, conveyed that the ambassador would be down momentarily and extends his profound apologies.

IC
Gabrielle finished talking to her husband and then got a few more updates about the situation at sea and in the Gonad as her convoy moved along. The message from the rather nervous looking Vrakian came moments later.

At this point, Gabrielle simply gave the poor Vrakian diplomat a smile. "Please inform the Ambassador that I am on my way to Parliament to give a speech, but that I would very much like to meet him now if he can spare the time."

Minutes later she reached the building were the Vrakian Ambassador was located.

ooc
Although I have no idea exactly at this point where that is, but its bound to be fairly near Parliament I would expect.

The calamity of the deep sea broke as several massive objects plunged thru the dark waters at velocities no submariner of the old school could have deemed possible underwater. But possible it was, as the flotilla of subs was taking full advantage of the reality of supercavitation.

In the middle of the formation of supercav bubbles was a single enormous black mountain of alloys and battlesteel. To an outside viewer, thru the supercav bubble it was merely a massive black blob. This vessel carried the name HMS Nightingale and it was the ship around which the 2nd Carrier Battlegroup was clustered.


The cavernous bridge of the Nightingale was a hive of activity as dozens of personnel went about their tasks. In their faces, Captain Julia Diamato saw disappointment, anger and frustration. She understood her crews feelings. The order from High Command that had instructed the 2nd CVBG to assist the FKC in dealing with any possible outside intrusions to the Gonad situation. Diamato had first had trouble understanding why was the 2nd CVBG required before she was informed of the presence of the Holy Empire's subforce.

Even though she understood why, she had a hard time accepting it. Her nation was fighting for its very survival against the Fourth Imperium at the soil of Clairmont and yet High Command saw it wise to actually send forces away from the Homefront. Rear Admiral Daniels had rationalized the reason for her. Quite simply, the 2nd CVBG's presence was not required back home. The Imperials hadnt exactly brought any wet navy ships with them from space, and the air wing and missiles carried by the battlegroup would do little good in the end. However, it was absolutely critical to maintain good relations with the Vrakians and possibly do some PR work to the rest of FKC in the process.

Her thoughts hit a brick wall as the calm voice of Rear Admiral Daniels presented a query from behind her command chair.

"You dont even need to say how pissed off you are about this Captain, its so blatantly obvious. But you know the Vrakians are dying for us back home, we owe it to them to help with this one especially when we could detach our battlegroup from the Homefront without it affecting the war effort."

It was the third time that the Rear Admiral explained it to her, it did nothing to lessen her agitation for leaving her comrades while the 2nd CVBG went for a PR mission. As it was, she didnt begin to debate the issue with Daniels.

"Yes Admiral. We will be arriving to the area of operations in another three hours."

Daniels quickly glanced at the three massive screens that dominated the forward bulkheads of the bridge. One of them displaying sensor feed, one the status of the Nightingale and the third a map with the course of the 2nd CVBG painted to it.



Three hours later as the battlegroup shut down its supercav, the multitude of sensors it carried began drawing up contacts. Recon drones and sub-fighters began discorging from the belly of HMS Nightingale. While the twenty four other ships of the 2nd Carrier Battlegroup took up formation around the Battlecarrier in their midst.

A communications relay buoy broke the surface ten thousand feet above the battlegroup, and transmitted the notification of the arrival of the battlegroup to Vrakian Command.

In most armies the 5.56 x 45mm Fn-Minimi was a squad automatic, of course FN-Ilek had modified it with caseless ammunition, a 250 round box instead of a belt and of course carbon fiber and titanium construction, it kept it's power but was light, fairly. Colonel Lolkema noded and one Marine collected the extra rifle and ammo, the other three pushed their helmets back and removed earplugs and handed them to the Alconians with the Minimi's.

"Those ear plugs cut out at a certain decibel level, you thought the AK's were loud, wait til you fire the Minimi. The ammunition is caseless so don't worry about hiting your mates with the cases, this trigger is for the rifle, this one is for the grenade launcher. Right now it had 20mm offensive grenades."

The marines listened to Captain Duyneider and zipped back up, no flesh was visible now, they gave no obvious targets for the monkeys, Colonel Lolkema added something "Now then lads at range lets use the grenades, that will get their attention and clear out any packed groups they may be in, when they see us and head for us lay in on them."

He pauses and turns to his other men "Get everyone loaded as fast as you can , if yo do come under any fire get up and out, get the civilians to safety. Snipers, take positions around the clearing and nail anyone isn't us that follows you into the clearing."

The men with the 16.2mm Anti-material rifles nodded.

Colonel Lolkema nodded "No need to thank us, let's go get some."

The Sargent nodded and turned to head up the slope and back over into the main ravine behind the monkey troop. He crossed the steep slope quickly and almost silently as he navigated between the foliage. A moment later he was going down again towards the bottom of the ravine and the narrow path they had been on earlier.

He stopped on a large rock at the edge of the creek and waited for the Vaadians and the three scouts to deploy into postion. He pulled the heavy squad support gun up to his shoulder and peered down the scope, obviously picking a target as he did so. "Sir, upon your mark..." He said quietly to the Vaadian Commander.

The Vaadian Marines followed and assembled in an oblique staggered line as the captain stopped and took up his position. Colonel Lolkema nodded to Capatin Duyneider "Let them have it!"

The Vaadian Marines opened up with their grenade launchers, setting the range with their tactical computers so that the grenades exploded over the monkeys, showering them with shrapnel and even getting ones that may be concealed. For the Alconians who didn't the training to use the computers the grenades automatically switched to dumb fire if no range was selected. The computers also prevented the Vaadians from picking the same targets, giving then the best economy of fire power possible. The grenade lauchers were semi automatic and the Vaadians quickly emptied the five round clips and then switched to using their Minimis with the three round burst setting.

They fired in a staggered pattern, so that only half would have to reload at the same time as the others could continue to fire. They forward to press the monkeys, corralling them with their lines of fire away from the pickup point.

The Minimi's were loud, the earplugs were a good thing to have.

The screech of infuriated monkeys filled the air as the troop charged out of the canopy and towards the Vaadian line. The Grenades proved only somwhat successful, too many fragments vanished into the strong limbs of the trees here, but a good number of monkey carcasses hit the ground.

They were swift, hopping from one tree to the next, some were using the tree's as cover against the incomming fire, but only somewhat effectively.

The Sargent was using the squad support gun, firing long range tree round burts into tufts of foliage...ususally to flush out a group of monkeys. Then the remaining wave seemed to appear out of the trees and dropped on a few of the Vaadians. They bit and tore at the suits, and then began to attempt to undo any buttons or zippers when their teeth and claws didn't get purchase.

One monkey went for the sargent, rather than waste ammo, he swatted at it with the gun, slicing the monkey open and throwing the dying creature back into the jungle.

****
Back in the side Ravine, the Captain listened to the sounds of the battle, and the screetching monkeys. "Alright people let's go..." He said in a firm, quiet voice.

The Marines began to heard the civilians out of the small dale and towards the sudden clearing up ahead. They attempted to stay as silent as the grave, keeping an eye out on the tree's for a straggler who might sound the alarm.

A moment later the first of the civlians stumbbled into the smoke filled area the Vaadians had cleared.

The Vaadians calmly tracked the monkeys through the trees and picked them off, the movement coupled with their body heat was more than enough for the tactical computers to track them and target them. As The inevotable monkey actually made it to them and began attacking the Vaadians had a peculiar way of dealing with it. They did not appear to have any edged or close combat weapons. As soon as a monkey made it them the Vaadians obligingly offered their forearm to the monkey's gaping maw (they have reinforced ceramite bracers) and immediately collapsed backward, simultaneously yelling "Here!" and another marine nearby picked off the monkey with shots to the body.

The technique was developed for use against attack dogs, but worked well against the monkeys, so long as they only hit a marine one at a time. However as the monkey's charged they invariably swarmed and brought down a marine or two, who then used their guns as clubs as their comrades rushed forward closer to get a bette angle on shooting them off.

At the clearing Leftenant Myers rushed ahead into the clearing and got ahead of the refugees "Alright, line up beind me!"

As he yelled the sleek Marathon appeared and as he yelled into his headset, the noise from downward facing jet exhaust kicked up dust and debris to both sides of it where they were angled. At the front and back it was relatively calm, like the eye of storm, and Myers had positioned himself at the tail.

The clearing was wide enough so that the Marathon actually touched down as the Marines made a perimeter around it. The rear ramp deployed and Myers began herding the refugees in "Alright get in there, all the way up to the front , let's go! We're almost out of here!"

Under the Martahon's belly the sleek gun pod opened, exposing the 30mm Chaingun that began rotating as the co-pilot searched for any attackers.
The pilot stepped out of the cockpit and into the empty cabin, there no seats, just loops on the ground and floor, allowing for one man to stand and one to crouch, optimizing the space to pack it with up to two hundred and fifty men. The pilot played stewardess and got the refugess into position and to make sure they were holding on.

Meanwhile above the jungle the Artemis fighters kept up their vigil for any incoming groups of elves or other unfriendly denizens.

A communications relay buoy broke the surface ten thousand feet above the battlegroup, and transmitted the notification of the arrival of the battlegroup to Vrakian Command.

The signal was quickly picked up by the destroyer Battleaxe from TF 35, which was maintaining station near the boundry of the continental shelf and deep ocean. A Sea Dragonfly was quickly dispatched to check out the source, and it rapidly reported the discovery of the buoy.

Shortly after, a signal was sent to JDF command informing them that something new and unidentified had been found.

"Yeah we can do that." Collins sounded quite sure of being able to offier protection, "Under Dyellian law we cannot hand over a prisoner if it seems likely they'll end up getting tortured or facing the death penalty, and I'm sure we can refuse to hand over ships."

"You see." she continued, "From our point of view your willingness to participate in the Gonad conflict was quite welcome. The participation of the other Klatchians has only caused problems. We have a whole Division in there, doing nothing because the other Klatchians are suspicious of our motives and likely to attack us if we try anything."

"If you can pull up alongside the Desagradavel you can come onboard, I'm not going to ask for a surrender at this point, but at we can have a propper face to face chat about what options we've got, and the crews can swap cigarettes or whatever it is you guys do."

"Right then, we'll move right away." The Captain ordered the ship to move ahead at five knots and to make anchor along side the Dyellian flagship. He looked at his faithful men as they sat looking at their hopeful captain. He hoped that faith and hope would be enough here.

Waves lapped the Angelus silently and almost shyly now as the Angelus, now within fifty meters of the Desedgravel, slowed its engines as the ship prepared to move next to it and extend planking onto the Desedgravel.

OOC: You REALLY want me to run, don't you New Shiron?

"Welcome aboard Admiral" Tovey replied, and introduced himself and his immediate aides. "If you will follow me sir to the CIC?" Your aides may come as well of course, or Lieutenant Phipps here" he pointed to a short but very attractive young brunette Lieutenant J.G. "can take them to the wardroom for some food and coffee."

Tovey led Pellew quickly to the CIC. It was a bit of a walk as the hanger and landing deck were well aft of the CIC and Bridge decks, and it was after all a 900 foot ship. As they walked, Tovey filled Pellew in on his deployments and his orders from home. "We are to give them every reasonable opportunity to comply Admiral, but Fleet command at Anchorage and the Joint Chiefs at Citadel are concerned about the Holy Imperials sortie."

ooc
Pellew would be able to immediately notice a couple of things about Tovey's deployments. They were cautious and obviously calculated to give the Holy Imperials time to leave if they took the opportunity. But if they stuck around, then the intruding ship was going to be boxed in very tightly.

"Those are not aides so much as the collective investigate body of the Federation back there. I'll be needing you to send them over to the enemy ships stat to begin the process of interviewing and inspecting the Holy Rollers. Sorry to do this to you but I need you to scrape up some marines to back up the IIS and Marshals over there. I don't want to suddenly pull the last remaining company of Marines out of the Gonad right this second."

He followed Admiral Tovey towards the CIC listening intently. "I can safely say that the....Council agrees with your Fleet Command on how to handle this matter" He smiled wryly, "But likely not for the same reasons. The Council is very concerned about this sortie, for a number of potential reasons. One of which is that the Federation and the Holy Empire both have intrests in Santa Barbera. They may be attempting to con their way into the Gonad and use it as an advanced base. Or they could just be elf haters, and for the one State with a civilized elf population in the Federation being Rouge Jiggady, well we can have them killing off Klatchian Citizens as well as the native brutes."

As they entered the CIC, Pellew noticed the alert on the communications bouy. "Anyone identify that signal yet?" He asked, "And if you don't mind I need to send a message out to the Holy Empire Fleet."


Holy Empire Forces
We will begin transfering marines and investigative personel to your ship momentarily. Hopefully this will be a quick and painless process for all concerned.

I should warn you that I can not guarantee your saftey with any personel not acting under JDF authority at this time. Nor upon their actions now or in the future.
-Admiral Pellew

Holy Empire Forces
We will begin transfering marines and investigative personel to your ship momentarily. Hopefully this will be a quick and painless process for all concerned.

I should warn you that I can not guarantee your saftey with any personel not acting under JDF authority at this time. Nor upon their actions now or in the future.
-Admiral Pellew


"Shit," the Captain said as he listened into the comm lines. "Well," he said out loud, "they really don't want us to leave the ship, do they? Quick and painless process, eh? Well, let's hope so. Comms."

The waiting officer turned around immediately, ready to send a message back. "Yes sir?" he answered in reply.

"Send a message back to the Alconians. Tell them we'll be good boys and sit inside our fort until they arrive. And tell the Dyellians that we're going to have to discuss any options we have here and now over secure comm lines. Give them the message that was sent to us by the Alconians as well."

"Yes sir, right away."

Message to Alconian Vessels:
The Angelus and its task force shall remain in this position until directed otherwise by JDF forces cooperating in the questioning about to commence. All personel shall stay aboard their respective ships until otherwise is requested of them by the said forces.

Message to Dyellian forces:
They've got us holed up here, we can't move without pissing them off furthur. Sorry, but our options are going to have to be discussed now. However, if you believe that no harm shall come to us through these interrogations, we ask that you wait peacably until after they are finished, then we may resume our mission with you.

Tovey thought about what Pellew said for a moment. "Alright, we can help with that. We don't carry marines aboard but we do have SEAL team, and they can easily carry out the simple tasks marines carry out. We do have a COD V22 Osprey coming in shortly that we can use as a utility aircraft, and I can send a couple of gunships as well. How close do you want to be? At our current speed (which is 20 knots), it will be a few hours. If we need to, we can speed up to 50 knots, although we sacrifce some detection ability and stealth doing so." (ooc which puts it on the scene in about 3 hours)

Offering Pellew a cup of coffee he added. "Or we can fly you over in about an hour. As far as communications facilities, my communications officer is at your disposal."

Eddington motioned to his Admiral at this point. "Sir we have a tentative ID on the signal. The Battleaxe reports that thermal and motion sensors have detected 25 large and a number of smaller contacts at 12,000 feet under that buoy. Based on size and signature, they look like oceancraft from Clairmont. Which I guess since they are working with the Vrak in their homeland, they are kind of friendly."

OOC: Pellew is acting JDF commander on a New Shiron vessel. Of course considering that the Queen of New Shiron is the Grandaughter-in-Law of the Grand Duke of the United Duchies (A+H) well things just get intresting.

The nearest Alconian vessel forwarded the Holy Empire's response to Pellew who was far closer in at this time.

"I want to make inital transfers of personel by air. I will stay here and keep in the loop of what is going on. I am going to let a Marshall do the questioning of some of their senior staff. I guess the Seal team could work, and we do have that JDF helio I came in on...needs a refuling but the JDF base in the Gonad can do that..."

He considered how to approach, "So approach at best reccommended speed but let's get those Seals and men transfered over to this mighty mystery. And I won't mind if a few of your officers want to go get some intel over there either Admiral." He added with a wry grin.

"As for the allies of the Walrus King showing up, I'm not surprised. Oh well, I expect we will be in the dark for hours about them. Until the Vrakians remember we're out here."

Tovey considered for a moment. "Admiral, we can refuel your aircraft easily enough, in fact that should be underway now." He looked over at one of his officers, "Lieutenant Commander Tanaka, why don't you go with them and be sure and take Lieutenent Maguire as well. Better take Mr. Tibbs too, he will be annoyed if we leave him behind."

ooc
catching a lift are
Lieutenant Commander Toshiro Tanaka, Submarine branch,
Lieutenant Maggie Maguire, Aviation branch
Chief Warrant Officer Buck Tibbs, Technical services branch
Lieutenant Skip Hartley, co / Seal Detachment 3-1
7 other SEALs including a medic

Officers and SEALs are in combat environment suits, carry ACR-10s and Snub pistols, personal computers (the size of a discman but the capability of a Pentium 4 with built in radio commo and sat phone)

Snub pistols are low velocity weapons adequate to injure or kill anyone not in armor but not high enough penetration to go through bulkheads and the like. ACRs are Bullpup type weapons similar to what was used in the move Aliens. Combat Environment suits are a cross between a vacc suit, ballistic cloth armor and also have some protection from lasers and flash burns. The attached officers will be in those as well. The suits are also chameleon capable but are set to a black and silver at the moment (black with silver piping and insignia)

IC
"We will send two Sea Dragonflys to escort the mission." Tovey added. He glanced over to the Eddington.

"Set ship to condition 2, maintain course and speed helm." Eddington ordered. "Flight, launch aircraft when ready."

ooc
Task Force 38 continues at 20 knots toward the Holy Imperial ship, the aircraft will be there a lot quicker though.

catching a lift are
Lieutenant Commander Toshiro Tanaka, Submarine branch,
Lieutenant Maggie Maguire, Aviation branch
Chief Warrant Officer Buck Tibbs, Technical services branch
Lieutenant Skip Hartley, co / Seal Detachment 3-1
7 other SEALs including a medic


The four IIS agents all hopped aboard, they were all dressed in standard flight suits over their civilian gear. Each had a 38 automatic strapped to their waist. The two junior Marshalls, still in grey suits and carrying black duffle bags seemed a bit confused about what was going on.

A woman in a gray cloak with the badge of the Klatchian Marshalls over her breast stepped towards the helio. The man behind her stepped up to help her graciously back up into the plane. Unlike the others he wore a dark fadora with a green band that matched both the dark grey suit he was wearing as well as the color of his eyes. The only thing he carried was a brass tipped cane in one hand.

The final passenger looked like the child of a brick wall. The 6'8" Vrakian was big enough to actually carry a LOW flechette gun and pack along with two square black duffels.

As the helicopter began to take off, the man in the gray suit turned in his seat. "Welcome ladies and gentlemen, I am Marshall De'Brauer at your service and I will be incharge of this operation on the scene as you will. I report to Admiral Parks, Parks reports to the President, and the President reports to a turtle named Frank who lives in coconut under the Sea." It was a tired old joke, "I expect you chaps from New Shiron will be a great help in this. My perusal of things so far is that they are worried about their boys and girls being tortured. If someone asks you are to say nothing, the fact is the assumed threat of torture is the most condusive to truthful responses. Understood?"

"Will you please send word to the Holy Imperials that the initial survey team is on route and that they are led by Marshall De'Brauer? Thank You."

OOC: The cane is actually a refined version of a cattle prod using a dense battery and capacitor to fit inside the black non-conductive metal tube.

A LOW flechette gun is bascily a tribarreled weapon that fires six sided ceramic 'arrows'. Each barrel is actually a rail gun, the ceramic arrows don't have enough umph to push through bulkheads but do break appart into fragments if they hit something hard. Thug is carrying a mini actually.

A communications relay buoy broke the surface ten thousand feet above the battlegroup, and transmitted the notification of the arrival of the battlegroup to Vrakian Command.

Somewhere in Vrak...

Translated from Vrakian.

-They came through.
-Of course. They are an honourable people. Not like these pakrah Thompsonians or whatever those idiots call themselves.
-There is a price...
-Don't be a pakrah yourself! We are committed to providing aide to Clairmont no matter the cost. The Imperials are a far greater threat to Clairmont and thereby us instead of these pakrahs. They remind me of those blokk pakrah Drakonians and Tyrinians. Sometimes I swear they all come from the same whore of a mother.

[The walrus spat as the words "Drakonians" and "Tyrinians" were mentioned. He particularily hated nations that had some so-called sense of honour yet saw fit to violate their national sovereignty.]

-Acknowledge the message from our allies. Tell them that half our fleet in Neo Tyr is already on the way to their homeland. How are the preparations going here?
-The super-cargo haulers are on a fast track maintenance schedule and we should be able to lift the first batallion in six hours once we find a clear drop zone there.
-Good. Did Team 99 make contact yet?
-Not yet. They are availing transportation in Dyelli Beybi to meet with Pellew.

[At this the Intelligence Director groaned. He doubted how cooperative the Dyellians would be in this matter.]

====

**********
Encryption - MAX; L3 Gamma 88 Orange - 2nd CVBG
**********

We thank you for your support. We have previously diverted half our fleet in Neo Tyr to render assistance in your homeland. More aid will come soon.

Please find attached IFF codes for the Klatchian states involved. Known Ilek-Vaad IFF signals are also attached. However, due to the delicate nature of this situation, we ask that you keep your fleet 500 km from the FKC mainland proper but hopefully within range of the Thompsian fleet.

We are attempting a diplomatic solution to this problem and hope to resolve it soon.

Again, thank you and we shall never forget.

====

OOC: I can edit this DB if you wish.

IC:

"Team 99", or otherwise known as a grumpy bunch of VIS agents descended from their hypersonic jet at Saint Guineford's airbase. The lead walrus was decidedly unhappy about being in such a hot part of the Klatch as sweat rolled off his brow.

With a quick waddle, he made his way to a special wing of the air conditioned terminal along with his retinue. The oddest thing that anyone would see were the 4 SOAT-bots that walked along on all fours.

====

Elsewhere thoughout Vrak, troops were being funnelled to Jump City on the Ithica class transport ships. Vaguely resembling giant outrigger canoes, infantry, tanks, and artillery along with helicopters were slowly rolling up large ramps. Even one was being loaded purely with SOAT-bots. Apparently, the military machine was busy.

**********
Encryption - MAX; JDF protocols 897284; route: Pellew; route:...complete
**********

Please be advised that the our Clairmontian allies have arrived but will remain 500 kilometers from the mainland Klatch. Here are the attached IFF codes.

====

**********
Encryption - MAX; VMHC protocols 72487; route: all Ilek-Vaad tactical groups; route:...complete
**********

Please be advised that the our Clairmontian allies have arrived but will remain 500 kilometers from the mainland Klatch. Here are the attached IFF codes.

In New Shiron, several Royal Guard bases in the northern part of the country suspended all training and thousands of vehicles went into the shop for maintanence checks. Rail traffic to those bases also suddenly increased greatly and several defense plants and arsenals began hiring and went to 24 hour operations.

A huge order was also placed with the company that made New Shiron's version of MREs, while other plants that made first aid supplies, batteries, and electronics spares got similar orders.

The first real inkling of what was going on finally leaked to the press, and stories began running about the crisis off the coast of Gonad. The announcement that the Military and Security forces of New Shiron were going to Defcon 3 and a general callup of reservists was not a surprise when it occured soon after. The callup of the National Reserve Sealift Fleet and the National Reserve Airlift Fleet was similarly expected when it occured at the same time.

Within hours, trains began leaving Royal Guard bases toward sea, space and airports.

As the helicopter began to take off, the man in the gray suit turned in his seat. "Welcome ladies and gentlemen, I am Marshall De'Brauer at your service and I will be incharge of this operation on the scene as you will. I report to Admiral Parks, Parks reports to the President, and the President reports to a turtle named Frank who lives in coconut under the Sea." It was a tired old joke, "I expect you chaps from New Shiron will be a great help in this. My perusal of things so far is that they are worried about their boys and girls being tortured. If someone asks you are to say nothing, the fact is the assumed threat of torture is the most condusive to truthful responses. Understood?"

"Will you please send word to the Holy Imperials that the initial survey team is on route and that they are led by Marshall De'Brauer? Thank You."

Tanaka waited until she finished before replying. "Of course ma'm, we are here to observe and record after all. Its not our business to interfer. My officers and I will simply follow your lead for the most part. Although we will certainly take the opportunity to conduct a Environmental Impact Inspection. After all, we want to make sure that ship isn't going to harm our environment. Any bonus information we pickup would be completely accidental of course."

The SEALs and Mr. Tibbs smiled behind their closed faceplates which hid their expressions. Tibbs also suppressed a chuckle, as his minicomp had some special goodies aboard.

The Communications Officer handed Captain Diamato the message that the commo console had just recently spat out. Diamato read the few lines of text carefully before handing the transcript to Rear Admiral Daniels. The Admiral's eyes scanned the message once before he spoke.

"Allright, we will remain at five hundred klicks from the Klatchian mainland, however the battlegroup shall be ready to supercavitate in a moments notice in case we need to move in closer."

Diamato acknowledged while she was inspecting the myriad of different icons on the large map of the area of operations where the Battlegroup had been assigned to.


In the cavernous hangar bay of the battlecarrier, cranes were lifting sub-fighters from their storage bays and to the moon pools from the bottom of which massive hangar doors allowed them to enter the dark sea. Personnel ran about the hall doing their tasks, loading up sub-fighters with munitions and fuel cells.

A trio of VK-26 Chimaera subfighters burst out of the hangar bay and to the ocean, taking off in their assigned patrol route around the battlegroup. They joined two dozen other subfighters that had already departed from their ships and were making sure that the perimeter of the 2nd Carrier Battlegroup was secure.

A single rope ladder descended from the Desagradavel, "Quick!" a sailor yelled from the deck, "Send the Captain up here, now."

The Marathon Transport landed gracefully on the multi-purpose deck of the Emperor Ehecatl. A grizzled bearded man stepped down from the transports ramp, the Captain of the Emperor Ehecatl rushed to meet him and saluted him with a raised fist.

"Supreme Naval Commander Itxaad, how was your vactaion sir?" the Captain inquired politely.

"Boring, Captain , boring. Where are we right now?" Itxaad growled

"The Namroth Vedic will be in position with us by tomorrow, the Sir William Issem is still conducting rescue operation in the Gonad. The second large group of non Klatchians have been identified as allies of the Glorious Kingdom."

Itxaad nodded and set off at a brisk pace "Good, Good. The enitirety of the Naval Guard has been activated and a further five tactical groups will be joining us here. The Etaliatory Guard have begun massing their armies. Whereever these Holy Imperial fascists land, we'll be prepared to wipe them out."

The Captain nodded "If it comes to that."

Itxaad stepped into the lift that would take him down to Fire Control "I hope it comes to that. I love a really bloody naval engagement!"

As Gabrielle was finishing her meeting with the Vrak Ambassador and was about to go to Parliament, back in New Shiron, a flurry of activity began.

Dozens of shuttle craft lifted off from based, heavily escorted by orbital fighters. The craft accelerated into orbit and then made a quick transit north.

Meanwhile, long lines of troops were boarding aircraft and ships in northern Shiron. Even as troops were boarding, vehicles were driving aboard the large RO/RO fast transports, while still others were continuing to arrive by train at Anchorage. Elsewhere, other large ships were loading dozens of Sealion subfighters, plus the support equipment and small craft needed to establish forward bases.

The 3rd Fleet suddenly abandoned its picket line, and turned south, steaming at 50 knots on a course that would clearly enable them to pick up any convoys steaming north later on.

---------------

Aboard the lead shuttle, Brigadier General Harly Ellison, commander of the 3rd Ranger Regiment, looked through the viewport as the shuttle began to reenter.

"Sir" the pilot reported "our transponders are active on the JDF frequency. We shouldn't have any trouble from anyone if they pay attention."

"Inform General Wayne and Admirals Pellew and Tovey that we are on schedule."

A few minutes later, the sky high above the Southern Klatchian Sea shook from dozens of sonic booms as the 48 shuttles carrying the 3rd Ranger Brigade and forward brigades of the 3rd and 5th Airborne divisions came in high over the ocean on a course that would take them straight to Gordan Bay in the former nation of Rogue Jiggedy.

Operation New Hope I was underway.

ooc
All New Shiron aircraft and ships are flying JDF colors or using JDF transponder codes. As are military vehicles.

link to the intervention force is here
http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showpost.php?p=9257099&postcount=17

a map can be found here
http:\\www.eng.auburn.edu\users\donatgw\maps\elfmap.jpg

information on New Shiron military is here
http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?t=424788

this is a rather huge committment for New Shiron, involving its entire JDF component and a good chunk of the Air and Space Force and a lot of the Navy and Coast Guard

Minister of Defence, William Issem thought it best to pen a quick note to the Vrakian authorities.

To:Minister of Defence, the Glorious Kingdom of Vrak
From: Minister of Defence, Ilek-Vaad

I wished to advise the Glorious Kingdom that the forces of the Retaliatory Guard have been activated at the request of the First Republican. The Retaliatory Guard will be prepared to assist our friends in the Klatch should hostlities arise from any quarter. We are sending a further five Tactical groups westward to meet with Flag Tactical Group Emperor Ehecatl to assist in the naval defence of any area that may be the landing point for Holy Empire forces, or indeed the forces of any foe. If there is anything that we can specifically aid you with, feel free to contact Supreme Naval Commander Itxaad aboard the Emperor Ehecatl, for the time being he has operational control of the theatre.

William 'One Hundredman' Issem
Minister of Defence, Ilek-Vaad

The Vaadians calmly tracked the monkeys through the trees and picked them off, the movement coupled with their body heat was more than enough for the tactical computers to track them and target them. As The inevotable monkey actually made it to them and began attacking the Vaadians had a peculiar way of dealing with it. They did not appear to have any edged or close combat weapons. As soon as a monkey made it them the Vaadians obligingly offered their forearm to the monkey's gaping maw (they have reinforced ceramite bracers) and immediately collapsed backward, simultaneously yelling "Here!" and another marine nearby picked off the monkey with shots to the body.

The technique was developed for use against attack dogs, but worked well against the monkeys, so long as they only hit a marine one at a time. However as the monkey's charged they invariably swarmed and brought down a marine or two, who then used their guns as clubs as their comrades rushed forward closer to get a bette angle on shooting them off.

At the clearing Leftenant Myers rushed ahead into the clearing and got ahead of the refugees "Alright, line up beind me!"

As he yelled the sleek Marathon appeared and as he yelled into his headset, the noise from downward facing jet exhaust kicked up dust and debris to both sides of it where they were angled. At the front and back it was relatively calm, like the eye of storm, and Myers had positioned himself at the tail.

The clearing was wide enough so that the Marathon actually touched down as the Marines made a perimeter around it. The rear ramp deployed and Myers began herding the refugees in "Alright get in there, all the way up to the front , let's go! We're almost out of here!"

Under the Martahon's belly the sleek gun pod opened, exposing the 30mm Chaingun that began rotating as the co-pilot searched for any attackers.
The pilot stepped out of the cockpit and into the empty cabin, there no seats, just loops on the ground and floor, allowing for one man to stand and one to crouch, optimizing the space to pack it with up to two hundred and fifty men. The pilot played stewardess and got the refugess into position and to make sure they were holding on.

Meanwhile above the jungle the Artemis fighters kept up their vigil for any incoming groups of elves or other unfriendly denizens.

The Alconian Marines lined up on both sides of the civilians, helping some cross the broken tree limbs and debries that filled the area. As the last civilian was pushed on board, the Marines gathered back at the edge of the clearing. They formed a jagged line of two man teams and then charged into the brush screaming "For the Duke and Athena!" at the top of their lungs.

*****
As one Vaadian Marine went down when four monkeys charged him, the sargent stopped shooting and stabbed into the back of on of the creatures, the sudden sharp pain caused in to scream out in pain, and the sargent flicked the monkey off his blade and the Marine in one quick motion. A moment later another two were likewise dispactched. The fourth monkey attempted to attack the sargent, and he gave it a swift kick. Before the creature could regain its balance, a Vaadian Marine blew it apart.

A moment later the battlecry of the charging Alconians caught the attention of the monkey's and the sargent. The rabid mammals turned and charged back towards the Alconian line. As they did so they seemed to loose any sense of the fact that they were turning their backs and exposing themselves to an enemy from two sides.

The sargent opened up on full auto, helping to shread the surviving monkeys before they even neared the approaching marines.

*****
At an (mostly) abandoned airfeild in Monte Orzka the C-120's and the two vast blimps took off into the air again after refueling. They turned to cross the Bay of Lunacy and fly over the Gonad.

****
In the South Klatchian Ocean, the two Myth Class Carriers ARN Manticore and ARN Jackalope slowed to ninteen knots and turned north. A protective screen of Fast Cruisers and destroyers turned north with them.

"Inform Taskforce 22 that they are to proceede on their present course and hook up with the Shiron group Hammer." Vice Admiral Billings stated as he stood on the bridge of the Nanticore and watch his three battlecruisers and an escort carrier continue towards the Holy Imperial landing group.

Billings looked down at the flash order message again. "Alright, inform the Captains that we are to maintain JDF proceedures and IFF until futher notice. As of this moment forward we will are offically Taskforce New Hope II."

He returned his gaze out the windows for a moment at the horizon of the Southern Klatchian Sea. "I don't know what your upto Pellew but damn it if you don't have brass balls...."

"Sir?" A midshipman on her first tour of duty looked up from her bridge station at the Vice Admiral.

"Nothing, just talking outloud..."

"Ah, yes sir."

*****
Pellew read the reports that the New Shiron communications officer had handed him. "Well things are going along great so far. If you would radio Fifth Fleet United Duchies about them shaking loose a flying boat to pick up the VIS cooling their heels in Saint Guinford please? And have them see if they can get some additional Black Tabs out this way also..."

He looked up at Admrial Tovey, "Well sir it seems everything is going swimingly at the moment, which means the fecal matter is going to be hitting the fan soon. I think I'll pop in to the ward room now before the real crises start."

*****

Holy Imperial Vessel
This is Klatchian Defense airship Z-109B informing you that we will be landing the inital inspection team in T minus twenty minutes. Please have your landing platform cleared and ready. Repeat, This is Klatchian Defense airship...

At Parliament, the Queen took her place with the New Shiron delegation and waited as Lord Harrington requested permission to speak. When given it, he then asked that the Chair allow Her Majesty, the Queen of New Shiron, Gabrielle O'Connor be allowed to address the body. Dressed in a formal business suit, her red pinned up, and her vivid green eyes serious, the Queen stood up and began to speak:

Ladies and Gentlemen,
New Shiron is gravely concerned about the situation in and around the Gonad. Particularly since the Federation and Federal military forces are acting in an uncoordinated fashion. We have intruding warships of advanced design from the Holy Empire of Christopher Thompson blithely entering an area where our fleets are operating. That same empire is reporting it intends to conduct military operations in territory that is part of the FKC. We have Ilik Vaad sending out not one but several fleets and conducting military operations in Gonad.

We have the head of the JDF resigning and no replacement has been appointed. The Privy Council at this point consists of the President, and an injured Outer Counsel.

We have a serious friendly fire incident involving Dyelli Byebi destroying 2 companies of Alconan marines who were operating under JDF authority.

We have the forces of Ilek Vaad moving into the area massively and they aren't even part of the JDF, nor subject to its chain of command.

Ladies and Gentlemen, it is time for this Parliament to act. I ask that you Keys immediately appoint replacements to the Privy Council. Appoint enough members to fill not only the senior but also the junior slots.

I call for the President of the FKC, His majesty the King of Vrak, to immediately appoint a supreme commander of the JDF, and also to appoint theater commanders for Gonad region, as well as the waters south of it, and the waters north of it. I strongly recommend that Admiral Pellew, the district commander be given command of the entire operation. I also call for Dyelli Byebi forces in the Gonad area to be placed under JDF command at once, to avoid in future blue on blue tragedies.

I call for Parliament to demand that Ilik Vaad either pull out of the area, or place its forces in the area under JDF command. I call for the Holy Empire to immediately withdraw its ship, and send no more.

I have also been informed that a detonation that could very well be either a small nuclear device or an antimatter weapon has been used in the Gonad, and the culprits appear to be the Elves. Now we all know that it is impossible for the Elvish primitives to have developed such a weapon. So I call on the JDF to immediately determine who is using those kind of weapons.

Because of this most recent threat, New Shiron has determined that it must act and is deploying as I speak the 8th Army to Gordan Bay in the Gonad to restore order, and ensure that no outside forces move into that portion of the Gonad. This action is being coordinated with the local JDF district commander Admiral Pellew. I want a formal naming of a supreme commander to formalize this arrangement for the reasons I have indicated already.

We in the Klatch must act together people. Or the situation will get further out of control to great cost to all of us. Thank you for your time.


after speaking, she leaves, and Lord Harrington stands up to introduce a motion calling for action on her points and an immediate vote.

High above the city of Gordan Bay, assault capsules where ejected from the shuttles as they flew over at mach 3 at over 50,000 feet. The capsules plummeted toward the earth, guided by GPS coordinates supplied by satellites above, and at 30,000 feet they fell apart, creating a cloud of chaff that fell at the same rate as the armed trooper who was inside.

Clouds of chaff filled the sky over the bay itself, and it continued to fall for several more minutes until at 1,000 feet, the assault troops opened their chutes. While the chaff plummeted harmlessly into the water, the rangers and paratroopers now steered their parawings toward their drop zones.

Ranger platoons soon began landing at the principal power stations, the water treatment plant, the television and telephone facilities and city hall, while the airborne troops dropped in company sized units around the principal airport, the two secondary airports, and the principal container and RO/RO facilities at the seaport.

As the parachutists were landing, several squadrons of fighters swept over head, must under Mach 1. Heavily armed, they were available to provide air support. At the same time, 9 Corvettes, bigger than a World War II destroyer, swept out of orbit and also began circling overhead.

The second phase was under way.

*****

Holy Imperial Vessel
This is Klatchian Defense airship Z-109B informing you that we will be landing the inital inspection team in T minus twenty minutes. Please have your landing platform cleared and ready. Repeat, This is Klatchian Defense airship...

OOC: New Shiron, your map link doesn't seem to work...

IC: Alconian Airship
Roger. Please give us the schematics of the ship you wish to land, the Angelus cannot handle something too terribly large. We would have to clear off space in our helicopter bay for you to land or open up the tarmac on top of the carrier, meaning that we would have to launch either one or both of our helicopters based on the size of the craft you wish to land, unless you want to drop the interrogator(s) off on a line, that is, or use the Mustang tarmac. We can accomodate you on the fighter runways provided the airship isn't too terribly large. Also, we would like to give you a personal tour of the ship to ensure that the ship lacks weaponry of mass destruction in accordance with Holy Empiric and International law.
Any other requests may be filed with the leader of the Angelus Humanitarian Task Force Leader, Captain Laetase, as he has specific orders from the Fuehrer. When we recieve how you wish to board the ship, we shall accomodate it immediately. However, we reccomend that you instill a bit of trust in us and let us pick up the group you wish to send in on our CH-91 Black Mambas, as this will save us both time and stress. You may send as many in as you wish, up to ten men per chopper, and only the pilot will be aboard each CH-91. However the decision remains firmly in your grasp. Please radio soon. We are opening the helicopter bay of the Angelus now.
__________________
The Angelus' chopper bay in the back opened rather quickly, as it was meant to, and the CH-91s began to spin up to speed. They took their time even though the choppers were meant to be able to do so in seconds, as they required reply from the Alconians. Also, the large strips of runway on the Angelus moved up as their covering counterparts moved out and back, and in a few moments the entirety of the Angelus' covered deck would be revealed, a glourious four and a half acres, all ready and willing to land the airship if possible.

On the ground, the paratroopers of the 3rd and 5th Airborne moved to secure the seaport and both airports even as the 12 companies of rangers secured the critical functions of the city. Engineers also landed, and they began rounding up equipment to ensure that the runways were open.

Over the Southern Klatchian Sea, a massive airbridge was underway as 2 lines of transports, spaced 20 minutes apart, were on their way carrying the remainder of the 2 airborne divisions and 3 engineer brigades.

Meanwhile, General Strasser, commander of the X Corps, and a hero of the New Cynthian invasion, was summoning local civilian leaders to the now secured city hall.

At sea, the fleet began steaming out of harbors on its long journey to Gordan Bay. The fleet was in two groups, a fast group moving at 50 knots, and a slower group moving at 30 knots. Meanwhile, shuttles were already returning to base to pick up new loads of equipment, men, vehicles and material.

In the New Shiron parliament, an emergency appropriation of nearly $100 Billion in Kronors was passed to pay for the unusual military activity and a portion (several billion) was set aside for recovery spending for the local population of Gordan Bay. The sooner that area had a functioning economy, government and local defense force, the sooner New Shiron troops could go home.

Holy Imperial Vessel
This is Klatchian Defense airship Z-109B, we are a S-92 Cyclone type helio. We will land where convienient but attempts to thrwart the Investigation will result in active measures being taken against your vessel.

The S-92 Cyclone showed up on the horizon. And quickly ate up the distance between itself and the massive submarine. It began to hover off the ship waiting for landing instructions.

Aboard the aircraft the Senior Marshall just shook his head as he listened to various odd requests of his prey.

*************
Fort Bradelton*
(Large Island between Greenbeardian Island and the Gonad)

The grasses had become quite tall between the vast slabs of concrete that formed the former runway. Trees and bushes grew up to the very edge overruning the former military installation. Only the brick and concrete seemed to have survived the past years here. Nearby a mass of blackened concrete, a former gun battery, rose out of the trees. It was quiet here, still, like it had been for years. The Jiggdians had rebuilt some of the naval facilities on the protected east side of the island. But this runway had not scene much activity since the collapse of Christofi.

The roar of two F-22D's flying over wide open area scared the array of birds living here. They rose swaking and crying as the two jets made a second pass over the place seemed to make them want to go hide in the high trees of the jungle.

Manticore this is Jackrabbit Black five...target area appears clear. Repeat target area is clear...

Jackrabbit Black Five...this is Manticore you are ordered to return to station point beta...Black Bird one this is Manticore, you are cleared...Good Luck and Godspeed.

A few minutes later one could hear the roar of the C-130's as the flew overhead. As they crossed over the abandoned airfeild, small objects began to appear and fall towards the ground. Then almost clear parachutes began to appear. Slowing the fall of the troops as they decended to the ground.

The first trooper hit and rolled as the light breeze from the south tried to push him into the trees. It was a short person, about four foot tall or so in dark green fatigues and a black submachine gun strapped across his chest.

A moment later his fellows also began to land on the concrete. Like him they all appeared short, but in the crowd there appeared several standard sized humans rushing towards the tree line.

******
The former naval faclities of the Rouge Jiggadian Navy were not so abandoned. Paval Doggtrotter sat in the shade of a large tree overlooking his 'empire'. Paval was a second rate chemist who was making a fortune in the illicit drug trade. With no local forces to interfere in his plan, he had been buying weapons cheap, trading them to the elves in the Gonad for his raw materials and then turning them in profitable cocaine and other illicit drugs in his informal labs here. Times were good. Times were about to go bad...

There was a call on the radio...Aye...Doggtrotter ye be there? Paval took the cuban from his mouth and motion for the attractive young female waif to hand him the radio. "Yes, Barth I am here..."

Ar...Well we be getting company soon, der be a destroyer commin' up der channel mit a cruiser right behind it...and I don't dink dey be commin' fur to buy no white powder...

"What...Who" Doggtrotter pushed forward in his seat. Ar...Tis the dasterdly Alconian Navy it be...flying the Klatchian colors ov' der own, mean' dey be here in name a da Sea Pig 'imself..."

"S***" Doggtrotter started to think when a rusted jeep approached. "Senior...there are pluens over de old airfeild..."
"pluens?" The small boy mimicked a plane flying overhead.

"Barth, try to stall those boats comming up the channel." He dropped the radio and ran into the former commandant's house. As he did so an F22D passed overhead.

Maticore...This is Manticore Red Three...Target B appears to be occupied...repeat Target B appears occupied...

King's Might

'Ship within range sir!' screamed an asupex operator with a yorkshire accent.
'Ship within range, aye.' the captain confirmed.
'Hellbore is locked, loaded and ready to fire.' stated the weapons auspex operator.
'What range are we at?'
'Errr, around 2000 nautical miles.' replied the auspex operator.
'In range of their radar, but any further away and we'd miss due to the curvature of the bloody earth.' mumbled the captain, his anger barely contained. 'Target that big bloody ship and get rid of it if you could gentlemen.'

The hellbore turned slowly in its giant turret, with a gigantic roar the gun fired, a bolt of plasma capable of going 45,000km.

The greatest weapon in the entire Midlonian arsenal.

The ship had been thrown backwards by the shot, the engines having been shut down to reduce the guns recoil by as much as possible.

The Angelus had been targetted.

King's Might

'Ship within range sir!' screamed an asupex operator with a yorkshire accent.
'Ship within range, aye.' the captain confirmed.
'Hellbore is locked, loaded and ready to fire.' stated the weapons auspex operator.
'What range are we at?'
'Errr, around 2000 nautical miles.' replied the auspex operator.
'In range of their radar, but any further away and we'd miss due to the curvature of the bloody earth.' mumbled the captain, his anger barely contained. 'Target that big bloody ship and get rid of it if you could gentlemen.'

The hellbore turned slowly in its giant turret, with a gigantic roar the gun fired, a bolt of plasma capable of going 45,000km.

The greatest weapon in the entire Midlonian arsenal.

The ship had been thrown backwards by the shot, the engines having been shut down to reduce the guns recoil by as much as possible.

The Angelus had been targetted.

OOC: Alright Midlonia, that's it. I asked you to explain yourself and rp this a bit better in the OOC forum a few pages back and at least a week ago. You haven't even told me what the hell this gun really is until now, and you've also somehow managed to move your ship into range, prep the firing of, and fire this whatever the hell it is without going through any channels with any other nation, and have done it quite poorly. Until you justify yourself in the OOC forum like I asked quite a while ago, my ignore shields are at full power.
I have waited and waited for your justification, and it has not come. Furthur more, I believe this is the longest post you have made. Your act of war against me is...a measly 60 IC words of dialogue. No. I haven't seen your leaders active in this, why you feel the need to anniahlate me which would be against orders of the entire Klatchian command, and many other things that I am too frustrated to say here right now. For a nation of over one-thousand posts, you can do much better. If you want to wank it out (which it appears you do), go to another thread. I've never ignored a post in my life, but I guess there's a first time for everything.

IC:

Holy Imperial Vessel
This is Klatchian Defense airship Z-109B, we are a S-92 Cyclone type helio. We will land where convienient but attempts to thrwart the Investigation will result in active measures being taken against your vessel.

"Roger, we believe your airship to be small enough to land on the deck of the Angelus. The deck shall be ready in a few seconds, please make your landing now."

The deck of the Angelus had been summoned up, and the pieces of the hull that covered it moved to the side, split away, or moved down and under the flat pieces of runway that moved up and locked together in place. The Angelus, with her deck readied, looked remarkably like a shorter, longer CVN, save the hydro-dynamics. On it was the flight deck crew, pouring out on their positions, readying for the landing of the airship. A beacon was blasted on all frequencies in the center of the massive deck for the airship to land, and a hail was sent up for the Alconians to do so. The Captain of the carrier, Laetase, strolled out on the deck, lacking of his normal guard that would accompany him on a greeting of foreign nationals. He awaited the arrival of the interrogators and their personel. He was also waiting to give the tour himself.

King's Might

'Ship within range sir!' screamed an asupex operator with a yorkshire accent.
'Ship within range, aye.' the captain confirmed.
'Hellbore is locked, loaded and ready to fire.' stated the weapons auspex operator.
'What range are we at?'
'Errr, around 2000 nautical miles.' replied the auspex operator.
'In range of their radar, but any further away and we'd miss due to the curvature of the bloody earth.' mumbled the captain, his anger barely contained. 'Target that big bloody ship and get rid of it if you could gentlemen.'

The hellbore turned slowly in its giant turret, with a gigantic roar the gun fired, a bolt of plasma capable of going 45,000km.

The greatest weapon in the entire Midlonian arsenal.

The ship had been thrown backwards by the shot, the engines having been shut down to reduce the guns recoil by as much as possible.

The Angelus had been targetted.


OOC: You do understand that unless your ship is insanely high, then you cant possibly hit the Angelus from 2000 NM away due to the slight issue of line-of-sight. As a Helbore (if it is a similar Hellbore to those in Boloverse) is a line-of-sight weapon, you would need to approach within Anti-Ship Missile range of an enemy to actually hit it due to line-of-sight.

OoC: I tend to take the micheal an awful lot in the II forum, I loathe posting here and my posts are rubbish to match, so sod it, I'll leave this the hell alone untill some other twit comes knocking at the FKC's door, preferably in the Nationstates Forum.

Also, I didn't see your posts and since when did I have to actually listen to Federation orders? Seems you need to do a bit more digging for information.

OOC Thread is here. Use it please. Thank you (http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?t=430205)

Synopsis of the Reconstruction Plan for Gordan Bay

1. New Shiron military forces under the auspices of the JDF to institute general security and stability to allow the reconstruction of local and area civil authority.

2. Using local personnel, a defense force created to provide for the long term defense of the area.

3. Civil elections and the creation of a local and area government under the authority of the FKC.

4. Economic aid to allow the rebuilding of the local and area economy to ensure long term stability.

5. Area becomes a territory under the FKC.

6. New Shiron JDF forces return home.

This document (the actual report is much longer) is handed out to the local leaders and broadcast generally on radio, televison and on the internet, and leaflets are handed out widely and dropped as well.

<I desire and explination you roundheaded fool, I feel the Dementor Creator has given you a potted plant for a brain!>

The elf was starting to quake in the cool dampness of the giant cavern. The lights were still somewhat dim and he could barely make out anything in the pool, but his ears could make out the movement of the Oracle in the water before him. <Oh Great One, I can only relay that which Vice-Captian Tuthra told me, that he was attempting to kill off the last of the Jiggidaian government before...>

<By using a plasma mine! He is a fool, I want this Tuthra stripped of his rank and put to work in the mines...>

<What about the....>

<Yes, I know...there is great worry about the chemicals the Djel have dropped upon us, and the poisons in the water...So we shall send the young ones and many of those in training to the New Place...>

<Er...> The elf wasn't sure about this magical new device the Oracle had built. And his hesitation was apparent.

<You need not go, Terran...you shall fight in the Great Battle that is comming, yes it is time we shall cover our withdrawl from this land and let the Djel beleive they have won. Then, when the time is right, we will strike them...we shall return to these lands and kill all who would worship Death and the Creator.>

The Alconian Marines lined up on both sides of the civilians, helping some cross the broken tree limbs and debries that filled the area. As the last civilian was pushed on board, the Marines gathered back at the edge of the clearing. They formed a jagged line of two man teams and then charged into the brush screaming "For the Duke and Athena!" at the top of their lungs.

*****
As one Vaadian Marine went down when four monkeys charged him, the sargent stopped shooting and stabbed into the back of on of the creatures, the sudden sharp pain caused in to scream out in pain, and the sargent flicked the monkey off his blade and the Marine in one quick motion. A moment later another two were likewise dispactched. The fourth monkey attempted to attack the sargent, and he gave it a swift kick. Before the creature could regain its balance, a Vaadian Marine blew it apart.

A moment later the battlecry of the charging Alconians caught the attention of the monkey's and the sargent. The rabid mammals turned and charged back towards the Alconian line. As they did so they seemed to loose any sense of the fact that they were turning their backs and exposing themselves to an enemy from two sides.

The sargent opened up on full auto, helping to shread the surviving monkeys before they even neared the approaching marines.

*****


The Naval Guard Marines did not follow the Alconians but simply looked at each other in amazement and then quietly and quickly spread out on the flanks of the Charging Alconian's. The tactically challenged monkeys were no doubt caught totally suprised by the enfilading fire.

Colonel Lolkema and his men opened up on the monkeys full bore with FN-Minimis filling the air with nearly a solid curtain of lead as they did their best to sweep the monkeys awy, advancing back towards the clearing as they did. Colonel Lolkema looped behind Captain Duyneider.

"Let's get out of here, the civs are loaded, the longer that Marathion stays on the ground the better someone has a chance to target it!"

With that his Marines began withdrawing, leap frogging each others position in a covered retreat back to the clearing.

At Gordan Bay, the paratroopers had secured both airports. Occasionally a particularly stupid armed looter attempted to fire upon the Guardsmen, but such acts were quickly ended when the looter was blasted to shreds by small arms fire. At the seaport, things went more slowly, as each warehouse and wharf had to be checked and cleared out, and a number of civilians were efficiently although as politely as circumstances allowed, escorted out of the area. Civilians who worked there suddenly found themselves presented with contracts to sign from the New Shiron government, which guaranteed them pay and protection upon signing.

Many leapt to the opportunity.

A few pirate small boats were seized, and a number of others that were armed and that attempted to flee were blasted to oblivion by hypersonic missiles from the fighters overhead. New Shiron didn't like pirates much.

As the bridgeheads were being secured, the first wave of transport aircraft began landing at the airports, carrying engineering, airfield control specialists, and communications teams. Meanwhile, the shuttles used in the first wave were already home, being loaded with vehicles and more troops.

As sea, the fleet was steaming north at 30 knots, crammed to capacity with equipment, vehicles, supplies, small craft and other needed items.

In the warehouse district, the first serious firefight broke out. A band of pirates, looters, and gang bangers found themselves surrounded by the rather scary looking soldiers. They made a worse mistake when they panicked and started shooting.

Lieutenant Shawna Welles, commander of 1st Platoon/A Company/8th Rangers, was immensely annoyed. "Those dumb bastards. Ok first platoon, teach them error of their ways."

A barrage of small arms fire and RAM grenades followed her command and within a couple of minutes the wood and sheet rock was splintered apart, leaving only the metal framework remaining. The hoodlums fired back, briefly, before they were literally blasted to shreds.

At the cost of one wounded, a unlucky Ranger who took a round in the chest that failed to penetrate (but left a very nasty bruise), 57 criminals were no longer going to plague the locals.

The platoon moved on, leaving the wreckage and the shredded bodies behind as a warning to others.

------
Another incident occured near the primary airport, located a few miles outside the city. A patrol of paratroopers from the 7th battalion / Royal Parachute Regiment, ran into a band of Elves. The 12 members of the patrol spotted them through their thermal imagers before the Elves managed to spot them, and immediately opened up with their small arms and grenades, killing most of the Elves immediately. A couple managed to survive long enough to run, but they didn't get far. A Dragonfly gunship, one of the first unloaded from the transports, was called in, and it quickly spotted both of the creatures. A couple of laser shots from the 80 megajoule laser hit the creatures, the super high temperatures literally causing their fluids to explode them from the inside out, and only a faint mist of blood and charred bone remained.

A hunting party of a dozen Elves would trouble no one anymore.

Soon after the warehouse district incident, a series of warning was issued by radio, on television, and by leaflet.

"Any person found to be carrying firearms or military weapons outside of their homes after dawn tomorrow with be assumed to be hostile and will be shot on sight. Weapons are to be kept in your homes from now on. Security patrols will begin tomorrow morning at first light, but any shooting incident that occurs from this moment on will also be considered as a threat to JDF forces and will result in the culprits being shot unless they immediately surrender when ordered to do so."

Fort Bradelton
In the early morning light the Kobi III rolled off the Sea Witch 130B and onto the concrete of the abandoned runway. As the light tank turned a Paratrooper Colonel and her aide watched.

"How much longer till we get this Big Bertha to unload?"
"Well all two hundread and fifty troops aboard and their gear is off, we just have to get the supply trucks off and they'll be ready to head back, and we can get the next Bertha in here and unloaded.

"Quite, don't like having that gear floating around in the sky. Anyway we need to get started on getting this site up and running soon."

"Yes, Mam, the twenty third engineering group is on route as we speak...."

"How is B site doing..."

"They had a bit of a fire fight before they got the 102nd in but they now have control of the site, and apparently a huge weapons cache.

"Hmmm..."

**********
The small C4 explosion could be heard in the living quarters. Acting Commadore Wilson looked up from the papers spread about him and looked up at the clock. "Damn it Bosun, we were supposed to go back to the Atheon four hours ago." The Bosun looked up from the couch he was sleeping on. "Sir, aircover suggests there isn't anything but some Dyellian frigates north of here..."

The Commadore stood up as a Marine entered the room. "Well?"
"Sir we found five hundread thousand krondor in bearer bonds, a...well you should see the dimond, and several photocopies of various documents.

"Send it all off to Nav Int on board the Manticore

"Yes sir..."

The Deep Gonad
Duyneider just nodded as his marines pulled back after killing off the last of the monkey troop. Really the Alconian Marines were tired and a little on edge about having to go to a Vaadian ship.


they had gained the name Big Bertha's in the Marines. The massive airship which looked like a traditional blimp expanded horizontally could carry up to 250 personel and several hundread tons of equipment.

The Naval Guard Marines helped the Alconian Marines get aboard and the jet lifted off the ground at an angle catapulting itself onto the air and quickly accelerating to mach speed and back out to sea with it's escort of Artemis fighters. The medics tended to the wounded and Colonel Lolkema and his men sat quietly holding onto the loops that passed for 'seats', the stripped down Marathon had a large carrying capacity but was extremely uncomfortable.

The Marathon touched down on the 'multi-purpose' deck of the Sir William Issem. It was greeted by more medics and the ships doctors who helped civilians first and then everyone else. This was all overseen by Admiral Ilek who made his way over to the Colonel and Captain Duyneider.

Colonel Lolkema saluted him with a raised fist "Command Admiral Ilek, this is Captain Duyneider of the Royal Alconian Marines. We rescued everyone that was alive and recovered the downed Artemis pilot. We have ten men wounded, three marines dead and one Artemis pilot dead, from the plasma explosion."

Admiral Ilek nodded but kept his eyes locked on Duyneider "Very good Colonel. You and your men report to debriefing. Captain Duyneider, we only recovered three survivors from your other comapny, two civilians and one Marine. They are all in very bad shape. The rest were killed instantly by the Deyllian bombs.

I want to apologize for our not reacting sooner, but we were at sea conducting excercises and did not anticipate taking any action, much less a rescue under fire. I will take responsibility for any casualties that our slow reaction may have contributed to.

I want you and your men to go to sick bay and get thouroughly checked out, even if you feel fine. Better safe than sorry. The medics will let you use the comm units there so that you can inform your command of your whereabouts and current condition. I will arrange for transport to an Alconian base or ship as soon as possible. Until then, get some rest."

An ensign then stepped in to lead Captain Duyneider to sick bay, as Admiral Ilek stalked off.

'Ship within range sir!' screamed an asupex operator with a yorkshire accent.
'Ship within range, aye.' the captain confirmed.
'Hellbore is locked, loaded and ready to fire.' stated the weapons auspex operator.
'What range are we at?'
'Errr, around 2000 nautical miles.' replied the auspex operator.
'In range of their radar, but any further away and we'd miss due to the curvature of the bloody earth.' mumbled the captain, his anger barely contained. 'Target that big bloody ship and get rid of it if you could gentlemen.'

The hellbore turned slowly in its giant turret, with a gigantic roar the gun fired, a bolt of plasma capable of going 45,000km.

The greatest weapon in the entire Midlonian arsenal.

The ship had been thrown backwards by the shot, the engines having been shut down to reduce the guns recoil by as much as possible.

The Angelus had been targetted.

450 Km North, North West, eight thousand feet above sea level

The Sea Witch had just reached altitude when it discovered it had moved directly into the path of the plasma bolt. The crew didn't even know what killed them, one moment they were focused on the report of the radar. The Sea Witch 10 was basicly a massive AWAC desined to keep track of every small radar signiture on the sea below. Alconian Airship V-1010 had been deployed to guard against a sea skimmer attack. Unfortunatly, the Mildonians hadn't seen the small radar signiture and had plotted their firing course right though her flight path.

The 24 sailors aboard Airship V-1010 and their brand new Sea Witch vanished in the blink of an eye. Of course the plasma bolt desintegrated, its momentum vanishing as it ate the huge amount of gas and fabric, turning the carbon back into oxide to settle on the sea below.

*******
Pellew of course didn't know what had happened, he was currently in the Wardroom of the New Shiron Cruiser. But somewhere else someone with blue-greenish eyes noted the destruction of another group of Alconians by 'allied' fire.


JDF ALEART
This is an immediate notification that any vessel that attempts to fire upon the Holy Imperial Ships off our coast, without JDF approval, or being in eminent danger, shall be considered Rouge.

All Rouge units and nations will have to deal with the 2nd and 3rd LOW Gravfleets as well as JDF units and will be immediatly presented to Parliament for Attaintment. THERE WILL BE NO FURTHER WARNINGS.

******
The JDF helicopter sat down on the deck, her passengers unaware how only fate had prevented them from being killed.

****
Duyneider gave a short head bow to the Admiral. "No appologies needed sir, I'm just sorry your boys and girls got killed in that mess, I will order all my men to report to the sick bay at once sir."

The three survivors of the bombing were in actually differing shape. The two civilians were relatively unharmed although one had been talking gibberish the entire flight, the second was almost catatonic. The female Marine Officer was in bad shape with a back full of shrapnel, and a good deal of blood loss. The surviving Marines from the second company were suffering from exauhstion, several odd rashes, a lot of minor bullet wounds, and severe heat exposure. The civilians were suffering likewise, although most were also suffering malnutrition, dehydration. A few of the young surviving females had obviously been raped and torchered, they tended to cling to a female Marine Corporal named Yosef or a massive wall of a civilian with bright red hair named 'Ol Tom.

Duyneider made sure that everyone else was being taken care of before he dropped into an unoccupied chair in sick bay. He leaned back and closed his eyes waiting for a medic to get to him.

High above the Southern Klatchian Sea, other eyes were watching too.

Captian Connie Rains was enjoying her tea when the alarm buzzer went off aboard the Space Frigate Pegasus. She immediately raced to the bridge, a few steps away from the wardroom.

"Whats the situation Charlie?" she asked as she settled down in her command chair.

"Somebody, its looks like a Midlonian surface ship, fired a plasma weapon. It looks like it was aimed at that intruding submarine down there. It must have hit something though. Something caused it to use up its energy. We are playing back the tape to see what it was."

"Send a message home. Tell them what happened. Make sure its a Flash Operational Immediate. Send a copy to Admiral Tovey, and informational copies to the JDF command as well."

"Ma'm" called out another bridge officer, a young man wearing the uniform of a Ensign, "We just got a message from the Lords of War. Looks like they saw it too, and they are not happy about it."

Port Olympus
The Heavy Gravcruiser did not seem to care. It regarded the various Terran air-breathing fighters as little more than potential nuciences. Which is how the Var regarded most activity within the Federation, the noisy squabling of small, spoiled Terran children.

The Gravship turned for the landing area in the Black Pool. Here the ship would land and then sail over to the government docks. On the masthead of the Nar'pateh flew the battle standard of House Crawfnord. For those who understood the Var, and very few outside of LOW did, this ment that the Lord of House Crawfnord was aboard. For the Nar'Pateh was here to pick up Queen Gabrielle, Kathlord of House Crawfnord to take her and her staff in relative saftey south. Few in the Klatch wanted to start a war with the Var and their Overlord.

Shooting at his wife aboard a Var Gravship really didn't seem like a prudent manuver.

To:
William 'One Hundredman' Issem
Minister of Defence, Ilek-Vaad
From: Vrak Military High Command

We thank you for your information. However, this is a delicate situation and since you still have the status of foreigners in regards to the Klatch as a whole, we ask that you remain at least 300 kilometers from the Gonad and Klatch proper.

We hope that the situation can be diffused. There is a remote possibility that certain elements might use your presence to advance their own agendas.

At Parliament, the Queen took her place with the New Shiron delegation and waited as Lord Harrington requested permission to speak. When given it, he then asked that the Chair allow Her Majesty, the Queen of New Shiron, Gabrielle O'Connor be allowed to address the body. Dressed in a formal business suit, her red pinned up, and her vivid green eyes serious, the Queen stood up and began to speak:

Ladies and Gentlemen,
New Shiron is gravely concerned about the situation in and around the Gonad. Particularly since the Federation and Federal military forces are acting in an uncoordinated fashion. We have intruding warships of advanced design from the Holy Empire of Christopher Thompson blithely entering an area where our fleets are operating. That same empire is reporting it intends to conduct military operations in territory that is part of the FKC. We have Ilik Vaad sending out not one but several fleets and conducting military operations in Gonad.

We have the head of the JDF resigning and no replacement has been appointed. The Privy Council at this point consists of the President, and an injured Outer Counsel.

We have a serious friendly fire incident involving Dyelli Byebi destroying 2 companies of Alconan marines who were operating under JDF authority.

We have the forces of Ilek Vaad moving into the area massively and they aren't even part of the JDF, nor subject to its chain of command.

Ladies and Gentlemen, it is time for this Parliament to act. I ask that you Keys immediately appoint replacements to the Privy Council. Appoint enough members to fill not only the senior but also the junior slots.

I call for the President of the FKC, His majesty the King of Vrak, to immediately appoint a supreme commander of the JDF, and also to appoint theater commanders for Gonad region, as well as the waters south of it, and the waters north of it. I strongly recommend that Admiral Pellew, the district commander be given command of the entire operation. I also call for Dyelli Byebi forces in the Gonad area to be placed under JDF command at once, to avoid in future blue on blue tragedies.

I call for Parliament to demand that Ilik Vaad either pull out of the area, or place its forces in the area under JDF command. I call for the Holy Empire to immediately withdraw its ship, and send no more.

I have also been informed that a detonation that could very well be either a small nuclear device or an antimatter weapon has been used in the Gonad, and the culprits appear to be the Elves. Now we all know that it is impossible for the Elvish primitives to have developed such a weapon. So I call on the JDF to immediately determine who is using those kind of weapons.

Because of this most recent threat, New Shiron has determined that it must act and is deploying as I speak the 8th Army to Gordan Bay in the Gonad to restore order, and ensure that no outside forces move into that portion of the Gonad. This action is being coordinated with the local JDF district commander Admiral Pellew. I want a formal naming of a supreme commander to formalize this arrangement for the reasons I have indicated already.

We in the Klatch must act together people. Or the situation will get further out of control to great cost to all of us. Thank you for your time.


after speaking, she leaves, and Lord Harrington stands up to introduce a motion calling for action on her points and an immediate vote.

The lead Vrakian buried his head in his flippers. After composing himself, he addressed the assembly.

"Honoured keys. It is with humility that I speak after hearing the words of Her Majesty. However, I feel compelled to address some key points before we vote.

Firstly, the King of Vrak has already appointed Admiral Pellew as supreme commander of this particular operation. I was not informed of it myself until five minutes ago.

Secondly, the replacements for the Privy Council must be done, but we suffer from a dearth of candidates. The candidates so far are as follows:"

A brief shuffling of papers and then he clears his throat.

"Vlademir Dzerzhinsky from Dyelli Beybi for the Intelligence Cabinet post. Landgrave Wittlebach from Alcona & Hubris for the State Cabinet post, although I daresay that with the recent assassination attempt, we should elect a temporary person in that capacity or perhaps remove the Landgrave from the running. Anyway..."

This time, a quick drinkie from a scotch bottle.

"Defense Minister Matt Ridgeway of New Shiron for the Defence post and Vice Rector of the University of Katla, Daniel Mbissim from Karmanyaka for the Research and Development post. Only North Germania holds the Industry and Trade post. So, as you see, we would like to see more candidates."

"Uhhh...the status of Ilek-Vaad is still under discussion as to whether they will join the Klatch. I don't think they would want to be placed under JDF command but they could be asked to maintain a far distance from the Gonad. We understand that they are helping conduct a rescue operation for the aforementioned Alconian marines? With regards to Dyelli Beybi, I am given to understand that...er...their ships are not under JDF command and can't really be forced to. I mean, none of ours can. That is,...er..without getting into the technicalities, a state's military comes under the command of the JDF with respect to attainment. I don't think that step is needed now. And, well, yes, the nation of Christopher Thompson should go away and publically apologize.

"Regarding the friendly fire incident, it is most tragic and a proper investigation should be launched. About the explosion, well, yes, that is truly surprising to everyone here I'm sure. The Klatchian Marshals should look into that matter. Yes.

And for Gordon Bay being occupied, well,we have no objections as long as it is being done temporarily. This whole Gonad business must be discussed and a resolution ought to be found."

'Sir, we, ummm.' beads of sweat trickled down the forehead of the junior on the darkened bridge, lights continued to blink as it flashed "error".

'What? What is it?' the captain himself was beginning to look worried.
'Well, umm, do you want the Good news? or the Bad news?' the aide's face was green from the auspex reading. He was still staring intently at the screen as it flashed red and green.
'Good news obviously.' muttered the captain, he began to look releived.
'Well, we destroyed a target....' the aide began.
'Well, that's excellent, break out the cham-' he stopped. 'wait, what do you mean by "a" target?'
'That's the bad news, it was a JDF seawitch.'
'Oh shit...' the captain slumped into his chair and then threw up.

It was rare for a Midlonian captain to make such a mistake.

Admiral Ilek returned to Fire Control and had a seat "Captain, pull us out of here , rendezvous with the rest of our Tactical Groups."

"Aye, aye sir." the Captain said with a quick salute.

With that Tactical Group Sir William Issem began to move away from the Gonad's coastline and back out to sea. They would soon be a few hundred miles from the cpast and comfortably in neutral waters again.

*****

In sick bay Lefttenant Myers plopped down next to Captain Duyneider "Well, that wasn't half bad."

A nurse walked by "Myers, is something wrong?"

Myers nodded "A bit of a broken leg I think." he tapped the hard side of his knee high flight boots "Hurts like all hell."

She nodded "If that's the worst thing you get from shooting yourself down you'll be pretty lucky."

"Damn! How does anyone know that?" he exclaimed

"There are two Avery Frost engineers on board, monitoring the Artemis' performance." She said as she hurried off.

Myers laughed "I don't suppose it will count as a kill."

The Chief Medical Officer came in shortly and looked over everyone as his doctors were tending to them he also paused in the missle of the ER to make a short statement that he was obviously reading from a piece of paper.

"I am required by law to inform you that all civilian non combabtants that have been removed from or escaped from a war zone are legally allowed to request asylum in the Free Republic. If you wish to request asylum simply state that to a Nurse, or Doctor. "

He then carried on.

*****

Back in Fire Control Admiral Ilek made a brief communication to the Alconian Command:

We have completed rescue operations in the Gonad and have rescued a number of civilian and Alconian Royal Marine survivors. We are currently heading to join Tactical Group Emperor Ehecatl and will hold position there until we are able to arrange for returning Alconian Marines and Gonadite civilians to an appropriate Alconian vessel or craft.

Then one to Dyelli Beybi:

We have concluded rescue operations in the Gonad. I thank you for standing by and report that we do not appear to require any further assistance. Thank you for your co-operation.

*****

The Minister of Defence penned a reply to Vrak Military Command:

To:Vrak Military High Command
From: Minister of Defence, Ilek-Vaad

Our forces have concluded rescuing survivors from the Gonad and will now take up a position that will be at five hundred miles from any Klatchian States territorial waters. If Vrak Military Command requires our assistance, we will be prepared rendered assistance in any way that we can.

The junior Alconian Key stood up, "I wish to understand why Landgrave Wittelbach would not be considered for the post of Minister of State?..Or perhaps I am a bit confused by the comments of the Vrakian Key"