NationStates Jolt Archive

OOC: This is an introduction RP for four FT nations: Hannait, Enkavia, Alderania, and Doom (FT); being large and such, it is also the start of a new canon. It is early FT, and wormhole drives are probably the most advanced things we have. Weaponry is basically entirely projectile (as far as is important to know right now), we’re not using shields, teleporters, or a lot of really shiny stuff like what you find in Star Trek/Wars. Also note that we are using non-naval classifications for our ships and such, and changing some other terminology, and hopefully context clues will make it obvious what is what, and if not, OOC will. Those things will be made clearer when they're actually relevant.

We reserve the right to boot anyone from this. If you want to get involved, please ask questions via TG if you’re unsure about anything. Please, no invasions. For the record, this takes place hundreds of years before Anagonia’s “The Politics of Relations,” so Alderania has not yet split way.

I probably forgot to say some things. I’m sure my fellow RPers can correct me if I did. Credit to LS for much of this post.

-----

Lux Aeterna

Hannait
Coalition Representative Council Chambers

The Coalition’s governing chambers on Hannait were filled to bursting with representatives, media personalities, lobbyists, and those who had paid great sums to be witness to the historic moment, one of the few times when the entire Coalition representative body met to enact alliance-wide change.

Vladimir Delacrois, one such representative, was quite pleased with himself. He sat, contented, as a colleague from one of the old colonies reread the contents bill on which they were about to vote: “And henceforth there shall be established a five-point-three percent tax upon all imports and exports of the collected colonies of the Coalition, as well as a ten percent tax upon the governmental budgets of said colonies, to be used to pay the debt owed by the various colonies established at the cost of the Coalition, both prior to and following the advancement of wormhole technology. To enforce these new taxes there shall be created a Coalition Revenue Police….”

The representative droned on, his dull monotone making a bill even as controversial as this one seem boring and mundane. Delacrois might have nodded off had he not been its co-author. He took out a small bottle of wine and took a swig from it, smiling at the assembled legislature before him. With this, my re-election is guaranteed. Delacrois had grown quite fond of life as a Coalition representative, mostly of the luxury and prestige that such entailed, and had no intention of giving it up. This desire to continue was part of what drove him to help draft the bill that was currently being so unexcitingly presented for a vote. It was the first tax ever levied in Coalition history, and it essentially saddled the enormous debt of the old colonies, one of which he represented, upon the new colonists, almost all of whom owed far less to the Coalition. It was sure to win massive support among his constituents, and what did the frontier colonists matter anyway? Few of them had representatives in Parliament, and it was only by the grace of the Coalition that they were able to survive at all. Admittedly the support of these colonies was mostly handled these days by Enkavia Industries, a mega-corporation named after the commerce-loving old colony that it originated from, and not the government itself, but such was a detail of little consequence, at least to Delacrois. Besides, Enkavia itself owed its entire being to the Coalition and Hannait.

Next to him, Nadia Satyamurthy, a junior representative from the same old-colony voting bloc that had dominated the Council of Representatives for decades, shifted uneasily in her seat before leaning towards Delacrois and speaking in a low voice: “Are you sure about this Vladimir? The neo-cols won’t like this at all, and neither will the Enkavians. Do we really want to alienate them?”

Delacrois chuckled. “Don’t worry, Nadia, the post-wormhole colonists know that they owe their prosperity and safety to us, they will accept these like all other worlds will. As for the Enkavians, they are but one world, and for all their economic power have only so many representatives. You trouble yourself far too much. Even if these neo-cols don’t like the taxes, what can they do? They don’t have the voting power to change it. Hell, most aren’t big enough o have any representatives at all. The old-colony bloc is in no danger of falling from power any time soon, and think of what the people of your own world will think of this bill. They'll love you for it, Nadia. This could mean a long career for you, you know.”

Nadia pondered this for a moment, seeming reassured. “Well, that’s just one thing. I’m more concerned about the protests around Alderania. There’s a lot of Heliists there angry about the new law allowing women to be priests.”

Delacrois nodded. He was a liberal Heliist himself, though not devout by any standard, and knew all too well of the uproar. “That’s a little troubling, yeah. However, the ultra-conservatives have always thrown their fits as society evolves. Given time, they’ll come to accept and embrace it, as they always have done.”

Nadia frowned. “I’m not so sure about that, looks like the situation could get volatile from the videos I’ve seen.”

“Well of course the media will play these things up.” Vladimir chucked. “It’s how they make their money. You are far too concerned of every little problem you see, Nadia. For hundreds of years the Coalition has ruled, and never in all that time has anyone thought to openly defy our will. Why would they start now?”

It was, perhaps, in poor taste given the circumstances with Alderania, that the priest blessing the vote was a woman. She rose from her seat beside the silent Coalition Marshal, the man who oversaw all organization for official Coalition business, and took a hold of ceremonial roll of paper on which the motion was written. Holding it aloft, toward the sun that hung above the chamber’s glass dome, she blessed the coming decision of the council, praying for the just and rational choice to be made, whatever that may have been.

With a landslide victory to pass the measure, the hall erupted into a chaos of shouts, applause, and speech that could hardly be heard. None among those gathered could have foreseen the consequences of the bill -- except, perhaps, one. The Enkavian delegation had made for a vehement opposition party, their statements filled with vitriol, perhaps a part of the reason why even some of their voting-allies had not taken their arguments seriously enough.

Luther Havazy, the senior representative from Enkavia and CEO of Enkavia Industries, shook his head as around him the Council erupted in celebration. He stood up, the rest of the Enkavian delegation following his lead, and quietly walked out of the building. Politicians, he thought, hiding his anger behind an emotionless face. Damned fools, the lot of them.


The Atlas, Enkavia:

The massive behemoth of a craft that was the Atlas sat dormant in a slow, wide orbit around Enkavia. On board, the Enkvaia Industries board of Directors was meeting, and the discussion was not a happy one.

"How dare they!?" One of the younger members nearly shouted, throwing the bill, which he had been reading, into the center of the table around which the board was gathered. "Greedy, pompous...”

"We realize that you are outraged, John." Luther said from his chair at the table's head, cutting the man off. "As are we all. It was difficult enough to turn a profit while providing the colonists with what they need before now, and this tax will make such provisions a cost that we cannot afford."

"The neo-cols won't pay it." Another board member said, leaning forward. "Most feel that they don't owe the government anything. After all, it has been us, not the Coalition that has been supplying them in recent years. From what I've seen of frontiersmen, they will have no qualms about openly defying this new tax, and neither will their local governments."

"It would seem that such was anticipated," Luther replied, nodding. "Hence the creation of this Revenue Police."

The man he was addressing nodded in return. "Tyranny’s what that is. Forcing honest, self-reliant men and women to give up what's rightfully theirs. It won't be stood for."

Luther Havazy leaned back, his eyes closed as he pondered the situation. "Perhaps it is time we began moving our assets out of the old colonies."

John Bishop, the young man who had spoken earlier, eyed him warily. "Why, what are you intending?"

Havazy smiled. "If the neo-cols will wish to oppose this tax, then they will need someone to champion their cause, an entity with economic clout.” He steepled his fingers, regarding the men before him. "An entity such as Enkavia Industries."

Bishop paled. "Are you proposing that we defy the Coalition? That we rebel?"

"My, John, who ever said anything about rebellion? I merely propose that we refuse to pay the debts of others, and that we protect the property rights of the new colonists," He grinned. "against any who would violate them. As for rebellion, perhaps such shall occur at some point" Luther chuckled, seeming quite happy at the prospect of ignoring the Coalition's newest law, "if such is for the good of the colonies." After a moment his smile faded. "So, who present is in favor of such actions?" For several seconds there was silence, before a chorus of 'aye' sounded from around the table. "Excellent."

Niari:

George Smith frowned as he read the Enkavia Industries newspaper that had come with that day's shipment of replacement parts for one of his mining team's excavators. He was a foreman in the small mining settlement of Shamal, and the team had just begun its lunch break. The front page of the paper was taken up entirely by a story about the new taxes that the Council of Representatives had passed, calling them 'an outrageous breach of our property rights' and 'a disgrace to capitalism and the individualist ideal'. George didn’t know much about the finer points of capitalism, but he knew that the money he earned from selling the ore that he and his team collected was theirs and theirs alone. He remembered an incident a few years back, when a passing pirate gang had begun raiding the town’s trade wagons. Several weeks after the first raid, they were ambushed and destroyed by the miners, who killed every one of them. That's what a man must do out here when someone tries to steal what belongs to him. George thought, putting the paper aside and biting into his sandwich. A pirate is a pirate, whether he's got a Coalition badge or not.

Hochmeister of the Order of Aldera, Holy Protector of the Sword of the Stars. All this has been granted to me, and for what? Why have the Holy Stars chosen me as the deliverer from the unclean ones? Oh Stars, give me the strength to finish the task You have set for me. Give me the strength to do Your will. Amen.

Tran Koreth knelt in the confessional, silently muttering his prayer to the Holy Stars, the Givers of Life and Divine Light. The corrupt priests and charlatans of the Temple would not bother him, and they would not bother the Holy Stars either, if he could help it. Reduce the requirements for penance. Ha! Tell the people they can live the sinful life of homosexuality and still enter into the eternal union with the Stars? Lies! No man of any authority in the Temple could make such outrageous claims without being of the black holes, the evil beings that suck the light from the universe.

Could that be true? Could they be of the Evil Ones? Oh Stars, answer me! Give me the answer I seek! There was silence in the confessional, but then an answer. Tran saw a small spiderweb hanging underneath the windowsill of the room's solitary window. In the web, he saw a tiny gnat being wound up by the spider. That was his answer; he was the spider, the Temple was the gnat. The Stars had chosen him for sure.

Tran got up from his knees and sat in the chair reserved for the priests to hear the confessions of sins. He needed to rest his weary knees, for in his older years Hochmeister Koreth had developed a bit of arthritis. His knees ached. He tried rubbing his knees with his knotted hands, but the pain did not stop. I need to get this done quickly. With some small effort, Tran got up and walked into the rest of the spartan temple.

The Order of Aldera did not believe in majestic temples to honor the Stars; instead, the preferred ones made of simple materials, such as wood, with geometric rows of pews. Only the holy altar would be made of precious metals, for only that location was believed to be where the Holy Stars kept their divine powers. This temple, the Temple of St. Aldera, was no different.

The Hochmeister genuflected before the altar as he passed it, and entered a door that lead to the priests' quarters. A new priest, and unpopular one with the Hochmeister, had shown up. The problem was not the priest's devotion to the Stars, but the sex of the priest; the priest was a woman. The priest had been sent by the main Temple, and with the Hochmeister's belief he was chosen to act against them, something had to be done to her.

He drew a knife from beneath his robes, approaching the woman from behind. When he drew close enough, he let lose a terrible cry and grabbed the woman's hair, slashing it. He cut at her robes, leaving her exposed and vulnerable. He picked up the lock of hair, and delivered his message. “As I cut your hair from your body, so too shall the Order cut away the cancer of the unholy Temple. Go now from this place, and deliver this message to whomever you please in the Temple. For it is written, 'only a man may give the knowledge of the Divine Stars to the people, for he is the leader of the family.'”

The female priest looked at him for a moment, dagger and hair in his hands and danger gleaming in his eyes. She was angry and being so violated, and her anger had gotten the best of her. She overlooked the danger in the old man's eyes. “Father, is it not written that in the ends of days a new freedom shall sweep the land? Is it not written--” The dagger plunged deep into her chest, tearing through her heart and ending her life. It was not the time to spread false doctrine with the leader of the Order. Tran turned to his fellow, loyal priests. “Clean this up. I have work to do. Soon we shall be enemies of the Temple, but fear not, for the Divine Stars have chosen us for this task. We will bring the true religion to a great many people, and our Order will receive much honor and glory from the Heavenly Lights.”
The priests nodded grimly, for they knew a fight had been brewing ever since the new religious reforms had taken place. It was just too much now. They dutifully cleaned up the mess the Hochmeister had made, as the Hochmeister strolled off into his back office, considering carefully his next move. He had to act with less brash emotion, this time.

OOC: Approved by Lord Sumguy (this is Leistung)

Planet Sveniia
Coalition space, Sventoji region

A freezing wind gusted over the balcony of the skyscraper, causing Herkus to shift uncomfortably and tighten the scarf wrapped around his neck. The parka was constricting, but then there were no real alternatives to it other than freezing while stepping out for a breath of fresh air. His eyes wandered over the frozen crags of the landscape, noting the absolute lack of civilization besides the several hundred story building he had the pleasure of living in.

To an outsider, the building would have seemed incredibly out of place – a massive structure which appeared to almost be leaning to its side, a grey spire of humanity towering above the mountains and fissures devoid of life. To the denizens of Sveniia, however, it was a fact of life, a constant reminder that only by the good graces of their rulers were they able to survive. Few had ever spoken of venturing out of their mining towers, and even fewer were able to remember a time when they had seen the outside world – only those on the upper levels of the spires were permitted to come and go as they pleased, and those select few never, never brought passengers along.

Herkus allowed the frigid air to fill his lungs and then exhaled, his breath turning to a fine mist and finally dissipating. One was never able to escape the sounds of the drills, even a hundred stories above the ground, and the trains which transported the apsium to refineries and spaceports in Strylinka made no attempt to drown out the grinding as they glided effortlessly along a magnetic rail. The Coalition’s new tax would hit the mining planet particularly hard, and Sveniia’s planetary government predicted a profit loss of thirty percent by the end of the year – profits which were vital in purchasing necessities for both the miners on-planet and other nearby planets under the control of the Sventoji regional government. Without them, men would starve, and relief ships would only prolong the problem. It was the duty of the governing council for the Sventoji-aligned planets to provide for their own people, and past attempts by the Coalition to interfere met with extreme hostility; perhaps that thought had crossed the representatives’ minds as they signed the bill into law.

“Tarvydas!” A harsh voice broke Herkus’ concentration, and he turned to face the man. A sleek black shuttle in the shape of what appeared to be a grass seed with thrusters cast a shadow over his figure, but Herkus made out the facial features – a tapered, slightly down-turned nose which ran smoothly and without interruption to his forehead, and two piercing grey eyes which sized him up before he had even reached the Councilor. “It is time to go,” he snapped, obviously less interested by the mountains than Herkus was. “By Aukštėjas, sometimes I feel as though the Heliists have more intelligence than you ice-dwellers.”

Herkus snorted at the joke and stepped with the man into the shuttle, which lifted gracefully off the spire and shot forward in less than a second, the aerodynamic shape cutting easily through the pristine air, unspoiled by the rape of the planet’s crust which occurred under the tower’s massive hulk. The two men reached Strylinka a few minutes later, the seed-shaped craft dodging hundreds of similar ships and slipping effortlessly into a shaped hole which funneled into the starport’s main terminal.

“An interesting situation on Hannait, wouldn’t you say, Mykolas?” Herkus asked the man as they stepped off the shuttle, the black shape ejecting from its berth with a hiss of compressed gas and shooting back off into the sky. “The Heliists are already on edge, and now the Enkavians will be baying for Coalition blood – and you and I both know that no one in the alliance has the stomach to bring either back into line.”

“The Heliists…” Mykolas paused to spit on the white tiled floor and continued. “The Heliists will no doubt do something drastic, kill a number of people and throw themselves into the sun or some such nonsense.” Herkus chuckled, and Mykolas smirked for the first time that day at his own joke. “The representatives will languish in the company of bureaucrats and prostitutes (and not necessarily in that order either) and propose to formally decry some action or another, but no, they will not bring either faction into line with any great haste.”

“And ourselves?” Herkus ventured, continuing to walk along the tiled pathways. “Do we plan to remain on the sidelines for the time being, or solidify the Coalition and bring the soon-to-be dissident factions back into line?”

“I fear that the Coalition has lost its solidarity already, Herkus,” Mykolas replied wearily. “Further attempts to commit to a comradeship will be met only with more bureaucratic nonsense, more infighting.” He ran a hand through his auburn hair and sighed. “Once our supplies of apsium run dry, we will be a shell of a civilization – the Coalition can do nothing to prevent this, so long as they insist on pacifism in our solar system. If we see the opportunity to sever ourselves the corpse which has been tied to us since the beginning of our history, we will take it. If not, then we bide our time. It is been the way of Sventoji for a dozen generations to wait for the proper moment—” He paused as a mosquito landed on his hand, and he lifted a palm to prepare to end its life. “—and then strike.”

(OOC: Year? I can't be sure how to base it without the year! Mewsland spans from 2099-2991 in the Milky Way)

(OOC: 2450? Okay. And, in that case, let me know when to chime in here via a visitor or private message)

OOC: Mews, will do. Leis, we need to go over some stuff to make sure everything syncs up with what I have in mind. I will get something posted in regard to Alderania and Sventoji later.

Damazin

A poor planet somewhat close to Enkavia, Damazin was one of the new colonies, founded after the discovery and perfection of the wormhole drive, and owed the first twenty years of its existence to Enkavia Industries. As a planet, Damazin was harsh -- it had been a daring terraforming experiment of a planet that, under other circumstances would have unlikely to be even put forth as a potential site of a colony. But with advancing technology, some wanted field tests and a now-defunct corporation had made the attempt. The planet hadn’t been terraformed well, but that was true of the majority of them, anyway. The problem with Damazin was that it was habitable only around the equator, in a narrow belt that made it hard for settlements to feed themselves. Most of the resources, as well, were to be found well outside of the safe zone.

The colonel in charge of local Coalition forces, Kazuo Ramirez, had a special attachment to the place despite it otherwise being barely above “hell hole.” What he enjoyed was outside of the window on the small orbital command station in orbit around the planet: massive grids of scaffolding-like structures which kept all the little pieces of future craft in one place and lent a much-needed sense of organization. It was a symbol of power, truly. Ramirez oversaw the production of a dozen uhlan craft per year, and they might have had a greater output of them had they not been awarded with a greater responsibility: every two years, his facilities put a new barge -- fully operational and outfitted with new skirmishers -- to replace the two-decades-old versions that dominated Coalition presence in Enkavian-regional space.

There was, of course, the nagging issue in his mind of what would happen when the tensions he could already see boiling in Enkavia and beyond reached Damazin. Sure, he had a couple of barges and a handful of dragoons at his disposal -- yes, there was a wing of cataphracts stationed in Lisala that was ostensibly under his command -- but the issue at hand was if he could actually bring himself to use them at all.

He didn’t think so. Coalition Revenue Police had better be able to handle it, he thought. The uhlans his manufactory center were putting out were all being assigned to the CRP and he was proud of his spacefaring children -- he didn’t want to receive reports of their loss.

Pushing away from the window, he floated across the room. The zero-g environment was getting to him. The command center had long since stopped its rotation and the engineers still had not looked into the problem. It was obvious, really -- some of the thrusters had short-circuited and pushed against the spin, slowing it to crawl that barely counted as motion. Why that had happened … well, he didn’t care to think about it. The last thing you wanted to think about in space was how shoddy some of the workmanship on the only thing keeping you from hard vacuum.

He drifted through a hatch and stepped lightly on the wall, pushing ever so slightly forward. There were some things he was expecting to have happen, things that would require a fully operational barge, and he was not about to be caught with his pants around his ankles.

Iasos
Coalition dragoon in Enkavian space

Major Susan Yilmaz received some unpleasant news. She and her wing were being assigned to the new CRP and she did not like it one bit. Not that she didn’t agree with the tax; on the contrary, her colony owed quite a bit of money to the Coalition and she was happy to see the debt was finally going to be forgiven, even if it did take a few decades (from a Hannaitian perspective).

As the technical superior officer in the CRP in this region, it was supposedly her duty to be a desk jockey, and yet she wasn’t being replaced and the Iasos was still hers. That meant she still had to accompany the wing into a potentially-hostile environment. And what was she expected to do the entire time? Work on spreadsheets. Oh no, not even digital spreadsheets, she had to keep a literal book. For security’s sake.

Stars forbid the Coalition just pay for new electronic security measures if they were so paranoid.

***POSTING AS OMICRON ZETA UNION CUZ JOLT </3 ME***

Arkau House, Arkau, Federal District, Omicron

"This is an outrage!"

The Premier slammed his fist on the table, causing coffee cups to slosh their contents about. "We cannot stand idly by while capitalists attempt to suck every centavo away for their dastardly plans!"

"Spoken like a true Guide of the Revolution, Andrej," the Commissar for Defence said.

"It is true though! We cannot stand for this!" the Premier continued. "I will not have..." he paused, putting an emphasis of absolute disgust on the next word, "capitalists extorting our People's money for their own profit!"

"What would you have us do?" the Commissar for Internal Security asked.

"Tell the Commissar for the Education of the People - why isn't he here today? - tell him to begin work on new advertisements denouncing the taxes with extreme ferocity."

"But Andrej, that won't affect the actual tax." the Commissar for Defence pointed out.

"Fine. I move that the Central Committee adopt a Resolution that shall issue letters of marque to all People's Space Defense Force and, er, private vessels for the destruction of any craft relating to the so-called 'Coalition Revenue Police'. Furthermore, the 'Coalition Revenue Police' shall be classified as a terrorist, subversive, and counterrevolutionary group and will be banned completely. All in favor?"

Almost all of the twenty Commissars at the table spoke in support.

"Very well. All opposed?"

The Commissar for External Affairs raised his hand and spoke softly. "I am afraid, Comrade Andrej, that this could have serious repercussions. I could easily see the old-col bloc attempting to create an invasion force in the hopes of changing our regime."

"Comrade Petr, you are a defeatist!" the Premier screamed. "You are hereby dismissed from the position of Commissar of External Affairs! Take him out of my sight!"

Several large, burly men from the Internal Security Bureau grabbed the unfortunate ex-Commissar and dragged him out of the room. They threw him into a black van and drove him to the Federal Penitentiary for Counter-Revolutionaries, better known colloquially as the Traitor's Gate. Once there, they dragged the Commissar into a small room, interrogated him, tortured him, and then shot him once at the base of the skull.

Dissent to the People's will as interpreted by Premier Andrej Kalinoviĉ was simply not tolerated. Within hours, a replacement for the deceased ex-Commissar had been found and officially appointed. State media would report that Comrade Commissar Petr Petrov had been arrested and executed for spying on behalf of the Enkavians.

OOC: So, yeah, someone should try to blackmail the Omicrons into paying the tax by revoking some kind of aid or something from the Coalition. Just do whatever and I'll run with it. I also what de Ajkon to get up in front of everyone and basically be like Khrushchev and say something like "Our time will come!" and scare the crap out of the old-cols.