NationStates Jolt Archive


Hate, murder and illusions of grandeur [OPEN]

Holy panooly
09-08-2005, 10:21
OOC: Factbook (http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?t=436448) and Diplomacy thread (http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?t=436295)

IC:
Near the Greater Kaf Mountain Range

Frank Patch, a notorious hunter walked back to the old colonial manor, probably built by Spanish land owners, slave drivers of the many old plantations in central Holy Panooly. As every night in this godforsaken country, it was hot, damp and unfit for men. His house was built with stone, chisel hard granite from the local quarry. It stood like a rock in a sea of hostilities, unbroken and untouched. It was a rarity, but the clouds were gone and the stars were clearly visible from the open spot in the dense forest, and around the house the small cornfields and vegetable beds laid quiet and peaceful in the night’s sky. As Patch entered his house through the massive wooden doors, beautifully carved by the best workers a terrific smell of food penetrated his hairy nostrils and began to mix with his permanent smell of fresh sweat, sticking all his clothes to his dirty, unwashed body. His leather buckskin boots were covered with mud, without wiping his feet he walked to the dining room.
In there his friends were already waiting for him, welcoming him into their midst and without hesitation or saying a word, Patch took the best seat and installed himself. Snapping his fingers the cook, a tall but chubby man around the age of fifty entered the room with a cooking pot full of some sort of soup or stu? Knowing precisely what it is impossible since you can eat it with both a fork and a spoon. The cook also sat down and all of them were eating their meals, rich in fat but not fat enough to make them all plump and awkward human beings.
After fifteen minutes, a lot of beer later the plates with chicken was presented by a servant, and all of the men were eating like wild beasts. Bones were thrown on the ground for the hunting dogs, or the Lady’s cats and without fighting the animals ate their own meals. It seemed none of the men could eat without producing all sorts of bodily sounds, burping, coughing, or just being plain uncivilised. Picking their nose, and without washing hands just eating. Beer was spilt on the ground by just about every participant of the eating gang; nobody even bothered to clean the stains on the wooden table. Nor did anyone notice the messenger. He rushed in without knocking, and an angry look on the men’s faces thundered at the messenger.
“Mr Patch, mister I have great news for you!”
“No news is that great to disturb my supper.” He replied swiftly and violently.
“But Mr Patch, this is something you must see! It’s truly unbelievable!” This time Patch looked up, cleaned his hands with an already smudged napkin. He did not stood up; he just leaned back in his chair and looked at the young messenger.
“What’s so un-be-lieve-able my good friend?” The words could only be understood as sarcasm, disbelief and mocking the seriousness of the messenger. The others laughed, but this was not the meaning of what Patch said.
“Well, we found an oilwell…” This time everybody laughed, even from the women in the other room laughing was heard. It was a laugh that could be explained as insulting, bullying the poor man.
“… It’s not a normal oilwell” he continued desperately. “It’s the biggest I’ve ever seen, it’s an underground sea…” This time Patch stopped laughing, and a more intrigued look on his face appeared. He was listening carefully, took a sip of beer and politely asked the messenger to continue his story.
“Well Mr Patch me and a friend were…” Shut up about your friend the cook interrupted, just tell how big it is, where it is and… how big it is…”
“Well Mr whatever, it’s so huge it is an underground sea. We couldn’t measure the bottom, and oil drips from the ceiling into the sea. I believe the process of oil, the creation of the stuff is still happening below the rootwater.”
“My God” was the common reaction of everyone; even the Lady and her servants joined in, looking at the messenger in disbelief, but this time because of the sheer surprise of his message.
“I must go and see this with my very own eyes” Patch decided, he grabbed his rifle and ordered his men to abandon their supper. All of them put their hats on, and followed the messenger to the caves. The hike through the jungle would only take a few hours, but that’s not the worst part. Going into the extensive cave networks is the toughest part.

After a decent of a few hours the men saw the greatest cave of all. Watching in awe with open mouth, eyes were spilling small tears of joy, but the silence was perfect. The lanterns illuminated the hole in the earth brightly, and a glimmering black sea was exposed. For the first time in million years the underground sea of oil was discovered. The ceiling of the cave was low, but not low enough for a small boat to be used to explore the vast sea of oil. But unfortunately, news like this cannot be kept secret. Only a mere day after the discovery, Baron Templeton heard of it. He couldn’t confiscate Patch’ land, but he could exploit it. And that’s what was going to happen.

The International Telegraph

240 Guinea 35 Cents ~ The 9th of August the year of our Lord 2005 ~ Your daily source of the world's economy

Today, one of our reporters - The largest oil finding in recorded history has been found only two days ago in war torn Holy Panooly by a man known as Frank Patch. This amazing discovery did not made the oil price fall back to a more reasonable price because of recent destabalizing factors in the world, but it was a welcome news item for many stock exchanges around the world. More good news came in yesterday when the unofficial leader of Holy Panooly, Baron Dominic Templeton announced the price per barrel from this extraordinary finding to be sold at $58,- per barrel, in defiance of the $64,14 of today. Oil producing companies around the world hear these reports with growing interest, insiders say. Exploitation has not yet started, but the current (semi) official estimates of the "underground Black Sea" about the amount of oil numbers float between the total amount - in barrels - of oil found in the rest of Holy Panooly (139 trillion barrels) and even more. This underground sea has yet to be mapped, but many people think it goes underneath the whole Greater Kaf Mountain Range, an area the size of the Alps in Switzerland.
Doomingsland
09-08-2005, 15:48
Doomingsland Imperial Intellegence HQ

Brutus sipped his coffee as he read the morning paper with interest. This thing about the Panoolian oil was most interesting, indeed. Doomingsland, while being a major oil producer, always loved to capitalize on other peoples' finds on such a product. Monopoly was the name of the game.

Of course, there was always the problem of exploitation, as in this case. Local oil companies had no experience whatsoever in drilling in a jungle. Then again, there were certain to be local warlords or something along those lines with the capability to exploit said oil. Brutus knew Holy Panooly was a poor country, and his could easily lift the weight of economic strain off of her shoulders.

Perfect.

Upon reaching this conclusion, he immediatly began to compose a telegram to the Emperor's office, requesting permission to exploit local resources using government money. He would, of course, recieve a favorable response. Holy Panooly had fought enemies of the Empire before its economy went down the shitter.

There was always the chance they'd wish to seek vengeance. By helping the Panoolian economy, Brutus would, in sense, create an ally from scratch. Hopefully. There were other perks to working with Imperial Intellegence in such matters for the locals, such as being granted large shipments of advanced weaponry. This would allow for any would-be ruler to effectively impose himself on major population centers and maintain control over the nation as a whole.

Well, most of it, at least.
Holy panooly
10-08-2005, 09:48
Near the Lesser Kaf Mountain Range

"Please mister don't... We have taken care of this farm since the early 1900's. You cannot take it away from me, from my family." The farmer stood there, weakened and frail with sadness all over his body. He may have owned this piece of land since 1902, but apparantly it has lost much of its former glory, if not all. Too much cheap booze did the job of ripping him from a once thriving enterprise pretty well. Look at this place! The paint's chipping off all the buildings, the pavement has turned into a mudpool. There's no difference between the pigs and children.
"Mr Gezler, I'm sorry about your farm and everything that comes with it, but I have orders from..."
"Please! Listen to me! You cannot take it away from me. I have seven thousand guinea's in gold, please take it and make up some excuse..."
"A nice amount. But I'm not sure if I can do this. It smells like a bribe of some sort." The man began to lose his patience with this farmer. It's stupid, but hell 7000 guinea's is a damn nice amount of money. One does wonder where he got it from...
"Well Mr Gezler, just give me the money and I'll call this case closed." Gezler left for the farmhouse and returned a few minutes later with a small bag of papermoney and gold. He handed over the bag to the man, shook hands and each went their own way.

*****

The oil companies had to wait for a while, the underground sea beneath the Greater Kaf has enough for ages to come, but when they smell the stench of progress, and eternity beneath the Lesser Kaf, I'm sure they will start digging here as well. But goddamn, there's a whole lot of that black stuff beneath those mountains and canyons. Some experts believe Holy Panooly is the only place on earth where the process of the creation of oil still cointinues to this day, unaffected by the ice ages, climate drops and all the other weather crap. It's seeping through the roots, beneath the rootwater and the corpses that lay to rot there. It streams into the sea, and endless black sea. Trillions of dollars have streamed down, and are still seeping into the big black pool.

I cannot wait until the first pumping devices arrive.