Tales of a troubled place

[Kingdoms of Cal]

UBC 11:00
-----
A young looking vulpine sits behind a desk and speaks.
"In foreign news the island of emass has started to fall into violence, we have reports of riots in the capital of taotal. The calie government has remained silent."

"We take you to our reporter on the scene try amun an"

The screen cuts to a vulpine, though he is not of normal fox colouring, he is green where there should be red. He speaks "The city is eerily quiet after last nights riots. The raptorians had taken to the streets not just here but over the nation."

"We have reports from last night from all but a few of the towns and cities here that have rioted"

A film of absolute anarchy is shown, a group of raptorians attack a group of vulpines who fight back with force, the raptorians fight back with larger force attacking with lunging attacks and claws cutting the vulpines from head to toe. The vulpines retaliate with greater numbers using bottles, rocks and improvised weapons. The camera pans down on an obviously dead vulpine, guts strewn out over the pavement, then pans to over to a raptorian who's skull was so obviously smashed that it's brains lay on the pavement.

"These scenes from last night seriously call in to question the possibility of this nation joining the commonwealth. How ever over fifty percent of the electorate have voted to cede to the commonwealth. The only thing that will stop this nation ceding is the ackl, the council that governs this place....if govern is the word."

[Kingdoms of Cal]

----
11:10 Cal

The emergency cabinet meeting sat in the cabinet room, it's round glass wall looking out from the executive tower some mile up. It was a large room, the only room higher up was the prime ministers office that Salato refused to use as she viewed the pyramid of power being the wrong way up.

Salato sat impassively at the large round table, she looks at the foreign minister. "What is going on?" she asks

A diminutive teerie replies "Almost our worst fears, they are not at civil war, but close."

"Details." salato says in a resigned manner.

"The history of emass has been one continued confusion. It was once a Teerie colony but they lived with a large scaly population. They broke off from teer about five hundred years back and we still make up over thirty percent of the populas. The rest of the populas are ethnic Teuie , well about twenty percent who have emigrated there over the years and ten percent hybrid, f^$% weirdos" Al (the foreign minister is stunned by a withering glare from Salato) this stops him.

"Who fled persecution" salato says "continue."
Al seemed to have shrunk, salato could do that Al was almost five foot three, but felt like he was two foot tall as he continued.
"Ten percent are native dragons, they are not the problem. Twenty percent are raptorian, dinosaurian, many of whom have families that have emigrated to miokalia, over the years. They are the problem and the problem is likely to get worse"

"How so?" asks Anderamia the treasure.
"Well they will block any move to cession made by the furry types." Salato sighs.
"This is a problem why?"
"Because it is becoming increasingly clear that the furry populas is losing patience. They're is a chance they will ignore the inevitable raptoian veto at their ackl, their council." Al answer.
"What is the structure of this ackl?" Alexander John interjects (Home minister).
"It represents all the races in their nation, a bit like our lucan council just that any member can veto any motion."
"And it's consistence?"
"Four Teerie, two Teuie, two dragons, one hyde, hybrid, and three raptorian. Until union here the rest would have a majority over the teerie...But since union and the referendum the Teerie, Teuie and Hydes have agreed to the commonwealth and the dragons really do not seem too concerned, they they will vote against it, but not veto." Al replies.
"Is partition an option?" Alexander asks.
"Non starter the raptiorian leader Cih Homolka, has suggested this just that he only talks about ground area ignoring the teerie." Al replies.
"Surely that makes sense?"
"Cih Homolka when he talks about ground area he means only what is on the ground. His proposed territory would cover over a third of the island and include three major teerie cities." Al replies
"How?" Alexander enquirers.
"Because he conveniently ignores the teerie, the major force on the island, as they live over the raptorian territory. So unless you want to figure out how to patrol a three dimensional border, partition is a non starter." Al replies exasperated, did anyone ever read his reports?

Salato scratches her forehead with her fore finger.
"OK Lets see if we can get aristos in on this, Lo should be able to cool the teerie off, if she hasn't already and Queen....what's her name, you know the snotty one, well she is the queen of teu so she should be able to cool them off." Salato says.
Salato thinks for a second "Alexander your good with the arisos get them on board. Al I need all the info you can get, see if you can get word to Guth Gehrke."
"The dragon leader?" Al replies shocked.
"They have been notable by their absence and the raptors might speak with them, they sure aren't likely to speak to us. Also they seem to be a moderating force."
"I'll try." Al replies.
"Right I'm going to get our assessment of the situation to the miokalian with luck they might have some ideas and might be able to calm down the raptors. That and I have my own contacts" Salato says.
"Al another thing see if you can get the miokalian ambassador for lunch, there's a good leefen restaurant on the 82th floor, you'll be safe there. I'll be order a commonwealth guard force be placed outside the miokalian embassy. Better our people fighting our people than them doing it." Salato thinks for a second.
"Alexander see if you can get police leave canceled on inleef, there's a substantial scaly populas there. I can't see the leefens doing anything but others might." Salato finishes.
"Agreed?" Al says.
"OK, the rest of you get as many MPs into the chamber the day as poss as we're likely to take a kicking." and with that salato leaves.

----
In her office salato makes a call.
"I wish to speak to Eye Faln en" she says.
"Look tell it's.....sally."
"Thanks"
Salato drums her fingers on the table.
"Fally, long time no see"
"Yeah we know, what's the hampden?"
"That bad?"
"Look can you keep a lid on this?"
"Oh....right. It's that bad?"
"Well keep your head down for the time being."
"No I don't think that would be a good idea I don't think they are ready for that."
"No I am not lieing to myself or them, hell it's only a trim and dye!"
"To you too"
"Love you to,you streek of p*ss."
Salato hangs up.

[miokalia]

Andertol holds a cup of tea, shaking it around somewhat.
The recently appointed secretary of foreign affairs sat nervously on the other side of the table, and president Phong didn't seem to show anything at all.

About 3/4 of the tea splashed out in Andertol's nervous shaking.

He threw the cup across the room with his diminished little arms and it shattered against the far wall, causing Phong to move slightly and Secretary Narte to leap from his seat and squawk.

"Phong solve this damn problem!", he yelled.

"If we had a solution, then we would be executing it already.", said Phong calmly.

"You're calm because it isn't your species.", said Andertol.

"They're close enough. You must understand that at a time like this, I have blocked emotional response in order to remain rational. I would be as frustrated as you.", said Phong,
"The first thing we do is make sure the violence doesn't spread. We have a lot of us on Inleef, and we're must do everything possible to keep them safe for now".

"I have to say, I'm honestly very concerned about the protests", said Narte finally.


----


The death toll was being closely monitored. Although the problem here was that on the Miokalian side, there were cultural details which made a massacre of their own people something they collectively had no way of dealing with.

President Phong issued a demand to the Ackl council. A stern and serious ultimatim.

Phong declared an absolute cease-fire and moratorium on all demostrations.
Regardless of international law or airspace sovereignty, Malych RM10 aerial units were circling above the island, and the carrier, MZS Celeste was called to sit on standby near the capital of Taotal.

Andertol was to personally go to the island along with Blinn to facilitate a negotiation in the Ackl. Andertol thought that is simple diplomacy weren't going to bring the upheaval to a halt, he was going to have to 'raise the stakes'.

The delegation was down there in a meeting in a matter of hours after the military made their presense known.

[The Union of Tinis]

Statement from Secretary of State Waldo:

"The Union of Tinis was encouraged by the democratic vote on the island of Emass but sorely dissapointed in the aftermath. We endorse the calls for a peaceful solution put forth by other nations. However, we are dismayed by the presence of military forces near the island at this time as we believe their presences may be seen as an act of agression by the various parties who rule Emass which may push them to make irrational actions to either suppress the violence or to encourage it. The Union has no interest in the island but do not wish to see a massacure. We call upon the parties and nations with an interest in the island and its people to meet at the table of diplomacy and leave their weapons at home."

[miokalia]

DCN News:

A typical dark brown dragon starts at the news desk,
"Tonight we have with us Chory Dakturo a prolific author and news blogger. Chory I have to ask what is your opinion on, well first off, the government delaying the sending of a 40% Dinosaurian peace-keeping force (if you could call it that) until today. Additionally, about the militarization of this diplomatic procedure on Emass?"

"Well I'd be lying to you if I said I support the escalation or potential escalation that this may result in, but I'd also be lying to you if I said we should just rely on typical civilized diplomacy.", began Chory.
"If civilized diplomacy were working, there wouldn't be fighting. Clearly, there is. I hope that one of Andertol's 'stakes' doesn't involve exchanging a massacre of raptorans for a massacre of ethnic Teerie, because that would be a form of escalation simply unacceptable to the international community. Although I trust that Phong would never approve of such a tactic. I'm sure he will approve of trying to instill the fear of mutually assured destruction into both sides.
And last, I can assure you that if Cih Homolka continues to agitate things, then we may see his security compromized.
The MRZF will not try to fight a war on difficult terrain if the possibility of casualty is too high... but they will indeed forcibly alter the terrain to make it advantageous to them. Regardless of if we agree to it or not, it is possible that we could see them try to enforce an absolute partition by tossing Teerie on one side, and raptorans on the other."

"I suppose it wasn't a very pleasent Dinosaur Christmas for anyone then was it?", said the dragon.

"Do keep in mind, the raptorans on Emass are not ethnic Dincotians. They are native and thus have different language and traditions and culture than us. They do not have any holidays on the 20th as we do.
The other thing to keep in mind is that they do not have the history that we had. They also live in a different environment.", said Chory.

"What do you suggest the raptorans on Emass do?", said the dragon

"If they value their lives at all, they will find any way they can to make their way over here. To stand and fight puts us in an awkward position, and will only propogate further tragedy.", said Chory.

[Kingdoms of Cal]

In,the largely burning city of, taotal the miokalia delegation entered the Ackl council chamber, they found it odd. For one the chairs seem bunched together away from one side of the table. They supposed this must be for some sort of ritualistic reason.

As they wait Andertol says "It is big?"
"Yes, have you ever seen a emassen dragon?" blinn replies.
"No, you?"
"No. But I have a feeling that is why this place is so large."
They fall in to silence.
"The Calie are an odd nation." Andertol says, just to brake the uneasy silence.
"Yes, and thinking about it I doubt they react well to force" blinn replies.
"Why?"
"Well they have spent so long trying to wipe one another out, but..."
"They never managed it?" Andertol ends the sentence for blinn.
"There are not Calie here though." blinn says
"Yes.....but teerie, they are unknown else where."
"They have not got involved yet, I'm a little scared of them."
"Why?"
"Because they could poison a city and even we wouldn't know about it for months.....they are too subtle, you have read intelligence reports of them?"
"Yes, it would be best to keep them out. I know the teerie here are just ethnic teerie.....But I have read calie history and this island is mostly jungle."
"They don't have jungle a fortress the jungle is their fortress?"
"They don't give up either......"
The pair fall into silence.

A few minutes pass before they become aware of pandemonium breaking out outside. They rush to one of the windows, both happy to break the silence.

The Malych outside where confused, on the short strip of tarmac outside sat an air craft. It was not of a familiar design, but it quickly lowered it's large unloading ramp.

The large black aircraft was not what seemed to be the major concern to the Malych anymore. They kept looking at the sky and then the ground, like they were reseting there sensors. On the ground there were patches of dust blowing around like a VTOL aircraft was there, was no evidence of one in the sky.

"Those must be the Pict air craft we have herd of" blinn says
"Where?" Andertol replies.
"The calie stealth tech. I have herd was good...but not that good."
"What do you mean?"
"The Malych's can not see them either, and probably did not see that" blinn indicating the large craft.

Then they drop into silence as they saw her for the first time, what they realized was emassen dragon, well most of her. The creature was ten meters long at least, well what they could see of it was.

They watched in amazement as it seemed to get longer and longer, by the time the tip of it's tail left the craft it couldn't have been less than twenty meters in length. It's large wings made it quiet clear that it was capable of flight.

It approached the chamber, talking with her was an odd looking creature. It was tall and appeared vulpine but had the tail and coloring of a teerie skunk.

"I believe that is Guth Gehrke and the hybrid leader, they are late."
blinn observes.

"The hybrid leader looks oddly familiar?" Andertol says.
"I know, but I can't place where from."

A few minutes pass before Guth Gehrke and the hybrid leader enter the chamber.

"Gre..."
"You are the miokalia delegation correct?" the hybrid asks.
"Yes!" Andertol replies forcefully.
"I, Eye Faln en the leader of the hybes, have a message from the leaders of the teuie and teerie." Faln answers.
"Well where are they!?!?" Andertol replies.
"That is what the message pertains to."
"What is it then!!"
"It reads 'We the undersigned refuse to negotiate while a nation holds a gun to our peoples head. Any attempt at landing troupes on our lands will be viewed as an attempt at invasion in support of the rapotian cause.'"
"But we.."
"It is signed by all the teuie and teer councilors, now give me a reason not to sign it. You have an air force in action over us. You have a 'peace' keeping force aimed at us. We voted democratically to cede, why the f#$# did you have to stick your nose in? Did you check the numbers in the massacres? It was only 23 s$#ing raptorians."
"Well..."
"We will probably have more than a thousand times that by the time this is over now yo..."
"Sorry she gets emotional." Guth Gehrke intervenes "But perhaps your presence as a military is not helpful? Well and I would like to here your answer to her question, if nothing else but out of curiosity . As for the plane please leave it alone, I can see some of your peo..well what every they are getting curious about it,sally...sorry the calie government thought it was important I got here in one piece. I said I would look after it, they seemed quiet keen that nobody other than myself or Faln looked too closely at it....it looks very dull to me but is surprisingly convertible.".

"There is a chance to cool this down, furries have agreed to talks under a joint hybe and dragconian chair. If you can persuade the raptorians in on this please do. He is using you" Guth Gehrke continues.

"What do you mean" blinn asks.
"You will see, I and Faln must take our leave. Oh you are welcome to observe the talks and aid in a diplomatic manner. But please no guns the situation is going to get worse before it gets better."



---
UBC news.
"With the miokalia intervention the situation in Emass has further deteriorated. With the raptorian leader claiming miokalia support the raptorian radicals have now started to systematically force ethnic teuie from what they claim to raptorian territory.

There has yet to be a response for the calie government, Salato has remained silent as the bulk of the emassen cities burn. The Malych despite being a formidable fighting force do not have the tactics to deal with an ethnic conflict. Most don't."

With the collapse of most of the civil institutions the emassen populas is taking up arms either to aid the miokalian forces or to fight them.

Prime minister salato is coming under massive pressure to intervene from within her own party.

----
Message from Prime minister Salato to miokalia government.

"We have a major issue on our hands and there is a risk of it spreading to Inleef. I would be personally thankful if you could ask the Malych to leave inleef, for the time being. We have reinforced the police with units for the northern baronies and northern Sae neither of which areas are concerned with the issue off the south cost. Your people will be kept safe, but with rising tensions on inleef we would much rather remove the possible flash point.

The people are a little nervous about the Malych's presence with what is going on. I know personally that it is not your intension to cause instability, quiet the opposite, but people are getting scared."

[miokalia]

"Clearly the mistake we are making here is that we have chosen to speak with the wrong people.", said Andertol,
"If those mammals think we're here to support the minority, then they are quite mistaken. This display of not bothering to hear our demands and requests in this diplomatic setting have made it clear that they have no interest in growing the hell up and solving this problem. I am primarily disappointed by the lack of Dl. Homolka here today. In case you're wondering, are primary interest here is seeing that Homolka gets some damn sense. He is a troublemaker and he has shown a distinct lack of interest in making this easy for his people and everyone else."



----


To the suggestion of Cal the RM10s were very quickly cleared out of the sky. It was decided that Inleef was worth more than Emass.

At the same time, a small group of Yamato units were left near the island on the Celeste.

[miokalia]

DCN News:

Amongst various clips of footage related to the Emass events, and anchor says:

"Andertol was quoted as calling Dl. Homolka "a troublemaker". Although his rapid deployment of military force to the island has been encouraged by the population and thus much of the protest is less focussed on Andertol's willingness to back off a bit militarily and more on the mere fact that a similar species is in trouble."



"34000 dinosaurians took to the street in Holyoke demanding Miokalian military involvement to protect and partition the island of Emass. However, it seems the popular demand is that the raptorans be given a small soverign piece on the eastern end of the island. Quite very different than the heavily contested borders that Cih Homolka requested not so long ago."

"It seems there is a lot of red in the protest. For those who may not know, red is usually associated with species-related things. Whereas green is related to nationalism or political matters."

"I beleive it is safe to say that Homolka is actually not a particularly popular figure with the protestors. As they are protesting the fact that the real looser in this conflict is the common raptorans. Banners are declaring that it is the government's responsibility to protect the Emassi raptoran"

[miokalia]

-Immigration Processing: Linguistics Class for Dinosaurian Immigrants-

Inside a typical institutional classroom in Hokyldaryon, A Miokalian instructor is running a class of 28 Emassi Raptorans who had fled to Miokalia's shores in the last few weeks.
They were taken care-of, and they were greatful, however the government forced them to go through citizenship and linguistics classes before they would be granted full citizenship.
They really didn't mind though. They at least knew here, they were safe.

"Su, Sao, Sosch.", said the instructor tapping at the condensed characters representing the sounds.

A distorted repeating of the same came from the class.

"Oh come on now. The goal here is to associate these symbols with those sounds. You either do it this way or you do it the hard way.", said the instructor.

"Why can't we do it the hard way?", asked one student.

"Because that would be hard", said the instructor.

"AGAIN.
A, ai, ae, ao.... AO...."
The class got confused over the ao pronounciation.

"it is AHO not AEIGH-O", said the instructor.

"Do natives have to go through this or is it just us immigrants?", asked one of the students.

The instructor seemed to get a bit more stern and said, "Worse, our kids must go through 15 years of compulsory public education. Dropping-out is not an option. The education is free and supplies are provided, this is so the students can focus on academic, athletic or intellectual pursuits without having to concern themselves with economics. And they do. They must.
Be glad we don't force you to be overachievers just to get citizenship!"

"Is this going to be on a test?", asked another student.

"Not exactly. You will have to identify and understand signs and written words. You will not have to memorize all of the combinations of characters, but it sure would help if you did.", said the instructor.

A class bell rings and the instructor packs up and erases her name 'miss Dal Chomoy Havaroa' from the board and then says,
"Tomorrow we start into Connotatives and Symbolic Connotation."

The next instructor comes in and as Havaroa leaves.

"I want everyone on top of the tables now", he said very quickly.

Many of the students looked at eachother and then began to sit on the desks.

"You've been conditioned for a long time to avoid heights even though instinctually you prefer a minimum level of verticality to your personal spaces.", said the instructor.

"No... Noragen Hok... omroyta?", said one of the students in broken Kohtohkhan.

"Like I said, you don't realize it, but it's there. This is why it is a freakish accident that you all ended up occupying the same space as Teerie, who have a similar instinct.", said the instructor.

"F*ck the tree skunks! They invaded our land and drop their trash on us!", said one student.

"The skunks pushed us out of our own land. God damn those skunks!", said another student in better Kohtohkhan worth translating.

The instructor took the metre stick from the top of the board and smacked it against the table in front of him with a loud *CRACK* and let out a multipitched roar which silenced the class.

"If you're god even existed then I'm sure it wouldn't have allowed you two to coexist in the same place to begin with! This country has zero tolerance for those who bring their ethnic grudges with them here! If you think I'm talking about idealism than you are mistaken!", yelled the Allosaurus.

"It's not your d*mn species, that's how you can say that", yelled another student.

The allosaur hissed and knocked over a chair and then yelled, "We're DONE with these kinds of troubles. We won our wars already. You have not! SHAME! Do you want to be a disgrace to all scaled creatures!"

The allosaur got closer to the student, the size difference of the snouts became apparent here and thus the teacher was quite intimidating.

"Now if you don't mind, I would like continue this class on Sociology.", said the instructor.

There was no contesting this.

The sociology instructor had the fun job of informing the Raptorans that if they didn't drop their ethnic resentments then they would not fit into the sociology of Miokalia.

Most raptorans would be willing to do this, since it came down to a matter of survival where they had to.
Many of them didn't quite expect that Miokalia had this shame-based component to it when they came there though.

[Kingdoms of Cal]

UBC news (world service)
------
A shot of some very bedraggled looking vulpines walking down a gang plank.
"In excess of twenty thousand Ethnic Teuie refugees arrive at ports along the teu coast. The flood is expected to continue with reports of raptorians raising their homes to the ground and destroying their farms. Also some reports of refugee transports coming under fire."
Cut to a shot of a fleet leaving harbor.
"The royal Cal navy mobilizing to escort refugee convoys"
A shot of smoke rising from the canopy of a jungle.
"At least one ethnic Teerie city ablaze, ethnic Teerie are reported to be abandoning their cities."
Cut to a shot of empty walkways and streets up in the canopy of a jungle.
Cut to a large demonstration.
"All major cities in southern Cal reporting major demonstrations calling for Calie intervention, some with in excess of 200,000 protesters, though the government is still maintaining it's non-interventionist stance."
Cut to a short of the Calie parliament complex.
"Salato to face a vote of confidence in her leadership, many in her own and her coalition partners party plan to rebel."

----

Salato sat at the cabinet table, head in her hands, she was meeting with the emergency cabinet and some others.
"It's bad, very bad, any ideas?" salato asks without looking up.
"The vote?" Alexander asks.
"That, what with libertarians, conservative and socialist support, I'll win it. Unless things get much worse, though there is going to be a large numbers of rebels. I can't blame them."
"Oh"
"We have the deployment of western defense fleet to defend the refugee convoys should cool things down a little."
"The problem is that some of the ports are beginning to come with in range of the raptorian radicals."Za interjects, he had been invited to the meeting as this matter was becoming increasing military.
"I don't want to have to deploy ground troupes" says Alan Douglas (defense minister)
"I know this has quagmire written all over it" Inca replies, having been hastily called back to the capital.
"A little saber rattling might be in order?" Za says.
"OK what do you have in mind?" salato asks.
"We could pull units from the eastern fleet."
"No leave them, the leefen are already nervous enough, I would ask you to put them on alert if it wouldn't cause problems with the miokalian, but it probably would. But leave one of the cruisers in the eastern sea, you never know what might happen and well it'll reassure the leefen." Salato replies.
"I'll send the Jackdaw, Raven, Jay and Magpie, they can sit off the major ports." Za replies.
"Why?" Alexander asks.
"They are big, modern and have fairly large guns, also putting a fleet out there would require more ships than we can really spare. The cruisers are meant for this kind of job, though I never thought I would have to deploy them quiet so close to home." Za says.
"Za was a good choice and sending a fleet could be seen as an invasion, but a single ship couldn't be. It was just the right amount of force, and well they could pummel the crap out of anything that got near them." Salato thinks.
"You have full support, your rules of engagement are to fire upon any force trying to take the port. Your crews also have permission to use any and all means to protect themselves should they come under fire." Salato says.
"Does that include silver weaponry?" Za enquirers.
"The way things are going you might need silver, those guns are too small for silver rain, aren't they?" salato replies.
"Yes, but there are other silver weapons."
"Oh well yes. But only if they are fire upon or if a civilian transport is under fired and no other weapon type will do" salato replies.
The most of the people in the room realize what salato was talking about.
"Right Alexander what's the hampden with the refugee situation?" Salator asks changing the subject.
"We have the reception centers up and running, we can handle it for the time being. But If this lasts for weeks we could have a problem. But we have plenty of empty barracks to put them in, thanks to Inca" Alexander replies.
"Any ethnic teerie refugees yet?" Za asks.
"Yes they are beginning to arrive"
"What is their make up?"
"Oh it's a little odd, only the very old and very young."
"S%$$" salato says.
"That is bad?" Alexander replies a little confused.
"It means that the ethnic teerie are preparing to fight, that and their empty cities confirm this." Inca says.
"OK what's the body count?" Salato asks.
"'bout one thousand raptorians, ten thousand ethnic teuie and five hundred of the rest." Za replies.
"Dear goddess." Salato says.
"We also have a problem in Taotal, the embassy complex is being over run by refugees." Alexander says.
"OK Ja can you organize an air lift to get them out?" salato asks.
"Ready to launch now."
"Well go, get them out of there Taotal is a flash point, lets get any civilian we can out of there!" salato says.
"Lets hope Al, the dragonians and Hybes can stop this." she continues.

[Kingdoms of Cal]

On Emass Al (the calie foreign minister) sits with a group of his officials, sat uncomfortably at a large table. They like the Miokalian had been invited observe the talks in Era, a dragonian city. Al was a short Teerie but he had never felt so small. He had reports that the emassen dragons were known to be in excess of twenty meters in length, but just how big they were had never been known. The viking(PT) STOL air craft that had brought him here was dwarfed by some of the dragons. Some he observed were in excess of one hundred meters in length.

He sat with more than a little concerned, he knew that there was no record of a dragon eating a teerie, but they almost certainly could. He was not alone in the chamber, over the other side of the large round table sat Andertol and blinn who seemed to be having an even worse time dealing with the situation. It was clear that neither of them were used to being small, Al took solace from this.

He was sat reading reports to take his mind off the situation, and the vast hall. He had noted that the dragonians where not technically advanced and probably incapable of fighting against a first world military. They like the the Hydes would not be capable of withstanding the raptorian advance. He had been warned that the ethnic teerie were preparing for such an advance and the lack of media here worried him.

His thoughts are interrupted by the arrival of Guth Gehrke with her was another larger dragon, he couldn't have been less than fifty meters long.

"Only an idiot would challenge that" Al thinks to himself.
Behind them was the hyde leader, there was something very familiar about her.

Behind her walked the other furry members of the council, the two vulpines looked broken and walked with their head down, the teerie walked with their heads and tails up. This worried Al, that was a sign that they were ready for battle.

As they sat down one of the vulpines turned to Al and started to talk.

"We can not defend out selves, have the Teerie deserted us?" he asked.
Al was dumb struck.
"We have lost most of our land we are losing, even the teerie here will not fight."
Al turns to the vulpine "You have never fought the teerie have you?"
"No"
"Well they have left their cities and are sending those that can not fight to safe places....the teerie plan to fight. My people fight in depth, but do not fight unless attracted."
"They have been. But no response, they are cowards."
"They are not, just we prefer to fight on out terms."
"Where is Cal?"
"We are there, but we can not become openly involved in this conflict without reason. It could cause war with the miokalian, one that would cost too much"
"So you will just let us die?"
"If we where going to do that would we be here?"
"So a few ships won't stop them, troupes!"
"We have no covenant with you or your people"
"So we do not matter?"
"Look this could turn into a war between us and the miokalian, the body count in that would probably be more that this nation could ever produce. In the goddesses name we have to stop this mess!"
Silence falls on the chamber as Cih Homolka enters the chamber followed by three other raptorians who take there seats near the miokalian.

Guth Gehrke speaks "The council is now all present. I call this session to order."
Cih Homolka stands and throws out some folders "These are our demands"
Guth Gehrke opens her and draws her head back in surprise. The ethnic teuie look at the contents of their folder with little surprise. The Teeries tails that wwere laid on the floor shoot up behind them "Half the f%$%ing island!?!?!" one shouts.
"It is our territory" Cih Homolka says in a metered manner.
Guth Gehrke raises a finger and says "This includes dragonian and hybe territory?"
"Yes they are historically our land." Cih Homolka says coldly.
"How? We and the teerie have been here as long if not longer than you?" Guth replies.
"Well when the bodies start coming in the miokalian will demand intervention. When you start killing raptorians they will go mad and force their government to act. As for Cal they will rattle their sabers but they won't fight."
A teerie and a Teu stand up and pull out two sacks.
They spill weapons over the table and the teuie says "Theses are miokalian weapons! They are already involved, we found them in the possession of raptorian personel. I would say the miokalian are already involved here. Some of the fighters don't speak raptorian, just miokalian tongues." he shouts.
Blinn and Andertol look dumb struck.
"Then we have no choice" Eye Faln en says "I say we invoke the covenant of eckla" looking at the dragons, both of whom nod.
"Yes, I see no other option." Guth replies looking at Al.
Al now realized that the covenant had something to do with cal, but no one knew all the covenants made by the various parts of cal over the eons, he certainly didn't.
Al stands and says "May we have an adjournment for a few minutes while I speak to my government"
Faln nods "I understand you will need to find your governments position on the covenant "

---
Back in cal salato receives a comm call "You've invokes the covenant of what?"
"I have no idea what that is."
"Oh look I'm not saying your lieing but let me check this"
"No need to say that cuz, but I do have to check these things"
"OK I'll make sure Al gets a response ASAP."
Salato looks at her com accusingly, then is immediately back on it.
"Lyie on a com link to the cabinet room, tell her the covenant of eckla"
"Yeah I know, but she will probably knows what it is"
She disconnects.
Then is back on "Emergency cabinet get them now"
"I don't care get them"
"The vote, tell them their is a major issue, and if they don't like that reason they can have my f%$%ing job!"

A few minutes pass and salato arrives in the cabinet room, it was in a concerned silence.

"You got Lyie!?!?!?" salato shouts.
"Yes miss" a civil servant answers "It took some doing but she is keen to talk with you."
"What ever get he on now!"
"Yes miss"
"Lyie what the f%$$ is the covenant of eckla"
"Ah that, well it was a covenant signed by all of the kingdoms to guarantee that neither sanctuary or drago every fell to an invading force. It was meant to prevent any one of the kingdoms from doing so." Lyie says over the link.
"But" salato says now sat down with her head in her hands.
"Well it never specified who the invader would be, so sanctuary and drago are now that they have invoked it are effectively protectorates. We do have wiggle room, the wording is a little odd and it is over five hundred years old. Well that and not all of Cal have signed it" Lyie says.
Salato sighs "OK, thanks lyie, but I don't want the first major act of this government in foreign affairs being us weaseling out of a covenant. Inca, Ja, Za , secure the territories."
"Give me Al and tell the rebels if they want intervention, they bloody well have it!" salato continues.

---
The council had reformed in emass.

Al stands up and says "The Royal Commonwealth Of Kingdoms, Principalities And Baronies Of Cal And Sae, here by honor our covenant with the hybes and dragonians and have now ordered forces to deploy. Any assault upon these territories will be dealt with by out forces."

Cih Homolka smiles as he wonders how the miokalian public will take raptorians being shot by a calie force.

[miokalia]

"You seem to be forgetting something.", says Blinn to Homolka,
"You seem to be forgetting that we have an economic interest in not having hostilities with Cal. And that while the public may react... It is us that controls the media. We are not a democracy, Cih... You probably have about three seconds before Andertol has an outburst on you too..."

Homolka looked confuse for a moment and then Andertol stood up

Time was up

Andertol simply decked Homolka across the nose. The room fell silent.
This kind of physical outburst was not expected here, although perhaps it should have been.

"Give me a reason that I shouldn't kill you where you stand! This is your fault. Your unrealistic ambitions are going to doom your people!

What do you expect us to do?", he yelled at him.

Homolka barely had a chance to speak before Andertol knocked him onto the floor with a swipe.

"Purchasing those weapons from the NCR before integration? Are you stupid?!", he yelled again.

Then hit him with a swift kick and said,

"My government needs to confer about this. Since it seems everyone wants to hold it accountable for the actions of this despot you see bleeding here on the floor... Blinn?"

Blinn sat for a moment. He then made a proposition.

"I have a proposition for at least a temporary peace arrangement:
Allow the Raptorans to have the Eastern tip of the island. Only 1/6th of the entire island. An area that is rural anyway.
Remember, this is temporary. At least until we are able to come to a resolution with Cal.
You have all created a terrible situation by not dealing with Homolka in time. And we're not going to fight Cal."

As Blinn was saying this, a fleet of larger EM-901 aircraft begin landing near the Raptoran settlements. Unloading several armoured units.

There wasn't much time. The Calie military was just one step behind them and they could not rely on the speed of diplomacy to prevent the impending disaster.

Their instructions were simple: Remove civilian raptorans from the island as fast as possible. These orders came from Blinn himself.

There was no time to argue anything, Andertol was finished beating up Homolka and finally said, "The machines fear for your people's safety, since as I understand it, this unrecognized territory has just called in an airstrike against them by activating a covenant which violates the Connel Treaty."

"Obviously violence has worked this far at fixing stuff, maybe a war will work even better.", Blinn said with some sarcasm and then continued without it, "I hate to disappoint you all, but we're only interested in protecting civilians here... and right now, that's what our military is doing...",

Andertol, already insensed and offended by the entire process began to show his punkish attitude when he mockingly said to the Teerie delegate across the room, "UH OH! That's means we're in your jungle, evacuating raptoran settlements! You better go rally the troops! Obviously this defensive effort is an invasion!
...
If being near your land, aggressively, defensively or for any other reason is a declaration of war in your culture, then I have something to tell you: a written refusal to negotiate directly after being confronted by military is extremely rude in our culture".

Blinn then said, "Andertol, that's quite enough. There is no more business that we have here. The delegates at this meeting have made themselves very clear."

Homolka's body guards were now nervously pulling Homolka out of the room.

Blinn then stood up and said,
"You have all made it very clear that you have no commitment to negotiating with the raptorans even through proxy. This was made apparent by the expedited activation of the 'covenant' as well as your totally idiotic accusation that we are supporting Homolka's regime. Of course they speak a strange dialect of our langauge... Just because they like us doesn't mean that we support Homolka's aggression.
And the fact that they bought guns from the NCR prior to integration means nothing. Everyone bought guns from the NCR back before they were integrated with us. Pargalo, Shimandu, Lemuryl, Baradun. You even might have!
If you were seeking to draw us into your conflict as aggressors then I am afraid you will find yourselves dissappointed.
Our only interest here is to get the refugees off the island.
I sure hope Cal has the sense to do the same.

Finally I have one other thing to mention.

I've been to Cal and as a Malych I respect them as they are a society advanced enough to grant rights to inorganic sentients... What makes you think an advanced society like that is going to want to readily integrate a society apparently incapable of even empathizing with it's enemy's people or willing to sacrifice it's own?
The whole reason why you didn't get rid of Homolka earlier is probably because you knew having an aggressor like him would increase the popularity of your integration over in Cal. Because over here it was pretty popular.
Because without a cause, you're just a weird island with serious ethnic troubles... Something Cal really doesn't need.

Despots like Homolka don't show up unnoticed you know. You all... especially the Teerie definately had the capability to asasinate him before things escalated... and you all seemed very quick to escalate this matter... for an island with minimal and sparse access to media.

I know how politics work, I know that politics are what politicians do best. And what that was, was politics, pure and simple.

And I think it's kinda really f*cked up too.


Andertol, we're leaving."


With that the two promptly exited the hall and got into their aircraft. They wasted no time in getting out of there.


----


A message from Blinn to Prime Minister Salato:

Regarding the activation of the Coventant of Eckla:

Please allow our evacuation peronell to be able to finish their mission. To put it bluntly: it is a mission to remove a large number of willing raptoran civilians from the island.
We will be utilizing the MZS Celeste as a defense outpost to protect refugee boats, since we are aware of factions attacking civilian targets such as refugees.
We are doing this because the factions of Emass have shown no intent to come to a peaceful solution. They simply want to pull us into their conflict and provoke aggression from us towards them which is something we refuse to do.

[The Union of Tinis]

"But sir, we desperatly need a statement of position on Emass before you go," stated the aid.

Waldo sighed and turned to her. "We already stated that we would like to see a diplomatic solution and condem escalation of violence or the use of threats."

"That's not what I mean," replied Audry. "Do we recognize the Emass vote or not?"

Waldo's ear language showed his anger. "Inform all parties that we still have no interest in the island except that we don't want to see a massacur, but otherwise that in conjunction with.... that one law."

"Dipomatic code five, section two sir."

"That in conjunction with Tinisian Diplomatic Code Five, Section Two, that without overwhelming evidence depicting excessive outside compulsion nor wide spread voter fraud, that the Union of Tinis recognizes the vote on the question of Emass joing Cal as being valid. And as such recognize Emass as being under the jurisdiction of Cal. We also see the need for a transition local government and recognize their... one council... and recognize the Ackle as the presiding government and that it is subsidiary to the government of Cal."

Audry finished writing it down. "Do you think we should address the violence directly there at all? Like condeming the actions of the groups directly?"

"No."

The aid looked up. "But that's one of the reasons we really need this statement. And what about Miokalia?"

"Audry, please," said Waldo, his ears still twitchy and low. "If Cal is in control as the people there seem to want, they'll be able to act best to end the violence. Andertol might have good reason to want to save his biological peers but he should be giving deference to the Kingdom. Its not part of his country. And unless its the Cali who are sending in their military to destroy one group or another, what ever he does or suggests his government to do should respect Cal authority. Else its just begging for someone foolish to try to play the governments off one another. Audry, this is why figuring out soverighty early is very important and why I'm glad that vote has already happened, even if it did help spark all this."

The aid nodded. "Alright sir."

"Oh, and make sure you don't send out the statement until after my plane's taken off. Sometimes silence and inaccessibility can be a great way for people to take to heart what you say."

[Kingdoms of Cal]

Things in the far south east of the island of emass were going well for the miokalia forces, but not else where. The arrival of their forces caused the raptorians to flee to the jungle, into which they simply disappeared. It was becoming apparent not all the raptorians were happy with the idea of going to miokalia.

What was odder was that in the cities many of the miokalian forces were met by numbers of ethnic teerie and even ethnic teuie in the streets. When they asked for the raptorians they were told by the raptorians in question that they did not want to go, then told by the furries that they would have to go through them to take their friends from them.

It was becoming clear that not all of the raptorians wanted miokalian rule. The miokalian forces had even received fire from the raptorians when coming to aid....something was not right.

In a few cases they had been amazed by the presences of emassen dragons who were certainly not on their side. It appeared that the emassen were uniting against them.

This left them more than a little confused.

[Kingdoms of Cal]

Message form member of the council for sanctuary to miokalia leadership

I am sorry for the behavior of the other races, the teuie especially, but I have raise protest about the behavior of the representatives sent. The Teerie , hybe and dragonian people have not raised a hand against the raptorians despite massive provocation. Though I will admit threats were made, but making demands of a nation under threat is perhaps not the best course of action.

The teerie and teuie races have their pride, so requests might have been better?

How ever your representatives characterization of both mine and the dragonian representatives invoking a treaty of aid as aggressive was neither accurate or helpful. We had and still have a superior military force at our door, we had little chance of survival without such aid. Both of our peoples have been faced with such a threat before, the dragonians still have places to go but my people do not.

As for the teerie, they were preparing to defend them self and the teuie....just read the body count. They were both simply scared. I believe my people with the aid of my cousin the calie and the dragonians may be able to fix this. How ever your aid would be helpful, I have always believed that the worst curse is "May all your wishes come true". Many people don't understand why this is a curse, with luck Homolka will. Well with your aid.

Yours
Eye Faln en