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Post by The Union of Tinis on Jan 1, 2008 20:02:43 GMT -5
"...In other news the Chamber of Speakers has passed an agreement to allow Cal to drop Union debt in exchange for Tinis investing heavily in CAT train systems with the eventual goal of the CAT lines replacing the G-2 lines entirely as well as the Arx ring rail system. The agreement will not however become active until its also endorsed by the Cali parliament and signed by the First Speaker and Prime Minister Salato. In other news..."
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Post by Kingdoms of Cal on Jan 5, 2008 18:29:52 GMT -5
Salato stood in the calie parliament thinking 'Gods when will those out side here learn how this works, hell I'm in a minority government ' and says"No, no deal has been signed, I can not do that! But we will never get our money back and well bankrupting an allie, is that such a good plan?
The thing is we have got back the money we lent, so any more is immoral. Ixiz's government is trying to fix the nation but while we take and take we can not trade.
If they choose to use our tech than all it good, ixiz is a wise wee...dragon thing." she was met with laughter as expected. "But he is wise and seem to know a way for wards for the place. In all honesty considering the amount of international debt we now own here. It is not a big thing. I know the Tellen banks have given loans to many northern nations when no one else would give them money.
Having one that might pay them off might be a good thing" There was laughter from the socialists. "Good" though salato. "So to vote?"
----- Uniformly socialists Yes Libertarians :50% 40% Liberals: 95% 2% Freedom party: 90% 3% greens: 100% Conservative*: 20% 2% others: 80% 15%
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Upper chamber
65% 10%
---- It just waited for the nod from the lucan council.....that knew the other side of the deal.
---- *A lot of the conservative party were not attending due to having backed the wrong side in the civil war and not wanting to be voted out via a bi election. (You have to be in the chamber to be drop kicked out).
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Post by Kingdoms of Cal on Feb 9, 2008 20:26:32 GMT -5
Ilinie was looking out over the site, the Tinisens seemed to have an enterprising streak in them. The number of coffee stalls and places where you could get breakfast were growing. Though officially still under Tinisen control the site was effectively running under Calie rule. The Calie weren't even bothering to enforce their own tax rules up here, as it kept the workers happy. Some found the use of cash odd, but the consortium had allowed for it with large organized accommodation and places to eat with a card similar to what they were used to.
Some Tinisens had broken with that and lived in little villages of workers. Workers from further afield had joined them. Where most counties would view refugees as an issue the Calie here had simply employed them. It was a very confusing situation for the Tinisen, but there was no way they could provide the labour required, Tinisen unemployment in the north was at an all time low and the city was sucking up skilled trades furs from all of Tinis With the addition of furs from the naval base, there was approaching 300,000 furs working here now.
The shiverers (as the northern furs called them) where the engineers from the south. The Calie had pulled in all the engineers and architects from the south. The major problem was resources.
Ilinie sent a message to Erenmoric
“Greetings grand overseer
We are in need of large quantities of stone, as one of the few peoples that can expand there cities via quarrying we request quantities of stone. We will pay well, of course depending on quality and pre-cut stone will be worth more.
I believe the Calie government has made the trade routes safe.
Is it possible that some of your construction golums can be made available?
Yours Ilinie (Free Port Consortium)”
She thought for a second and sent a public message.
“Greetings
To all northern nations.
The new city needs you! We need stone, skilled workers, constitution and engineers. We wish to build this city in a matter of months not years, so massive mobilization might be required . We will provide the ships needed and, with luck, trains to the south once tinis upgrades their lines.
Yours Ilinie (Free Port Consortium)”
She turned around and asked “How long till we get the MAT and CAT line builders?” “They are at the port, it will take them a day to get to the boarder. Then they can run.” “Well the tinisen's have yet to tell us where they want the first CAT line, MAT lines we don't know either.” “So they know CAT and MAT line builders don't work in cities too well?” “Yeah they figured that, heck the things are just to disruptive for use in urban areas ....but a Line from here or Semita is likely to be the first CAT line and one from their capital to a neighboring capitals is likely.” “sixty to thirty miles a day....they can do that?” “Oh yeah, we have three tbms on route, with two CAT5s and a MAT-E” “You know if they have sense they will start building them them selves.” “Well we are kinda planning on it.” “CAT4s?” “Well it would not be out of character.” “Line builders?” “Way to expensive, they are a billion a pop. They could but I can't see a reason why they would. I mean the things are massively expensive so leasing them makes far more sense, their economy can pay for only so much.” “So a CAT6 capable line would be good for them?” “A CAT6 link to one of there neighbors to the south would make them look so good. It would cut transit to them to three, perhaps two hours. Even using CAT5s.”
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Post by Kingdoms of Cal on Mar 6, 2008 19:14:27 GMT -5
The Tinisen general was on route to the Calie new base in Tinis. As he travailed along the motorway along the outside of the base he noticed a thing or two. For one the motorway as two meters above the ground and could easily be blown. That and he noted the drainage ditch in front of the short outer wall of the base looked very much like a tank trap.
The general,General Lakul Roil, was the only senior member of the tinisen army here, the air marshal and admiral were interested in other things. He observed the outer part of the Calie defences as they zipped up the motorway, the calie were no experts at roads, but even they could build one. The fact the supporting structure of the road was made of pillars only one meter apart and far stronger than was required made him see a tank defence.
As they turned into the complex, he noted the single entry point, between the city and the base there was a killing field. As he entered the base his heart dropped, it was clear that the Calie did not intend the base to fall. He wanted this base as it was very well thought out, between the outer wall and the first inner wall was a forest, one the Calie were willing to allow local school kids to use. The politicians would see a welcome educational resource, he saw a serious problem for armour.
The second wall didn't help, it was overhanging and massively banked on the back side of it, it was a tank wall. Cleverly designed, any tank coming over would have to expose it's belly.
The gap between the second and third wall was, apparently a golf course. Though he noted that all the bunkers were utterly exposed to the last inner wall. The Calie had produced a nightmare of a defence system that only a general would see...then he saw the last part.
As they entered the base it self, his heart fell further. It was clear the road he was on would be blown the outer parts of the base where designed to force urban warfare, no roads were straight. Not something any government wanted to be involved in.
The general sighed any attack on the Calie base was a non-starter. He knew that the body count would be far too large if he even tried to take the base. Then again a war between tinis and Cal was not within the bounds of possibilities, and he felt reassured that the calie had taken the defence of there base seriously, even the road they were now on, the only straight one was several meters above the ground, as was the rail line.
He and the other general would have to war game these defences, though he suspected a small defending force could hold the base indefinitely unless supplies could be cut off. Considering the size of the Calie navy, that was very unlikely.
The civilian politicians didn't notice the defences, to them the raised motorway and drainage ditch just looked like the Calie were overly concerned about flooding, the forest was a little bit of environmental offsetting by the base designers. The golf course was a little odd, but most of them put it down to the Calie being big on golf, though it did seem like a waste of space. Then again the new city next to the base, despite being designed to be very high density did have good size parks, so most supposed that rather than giving area over to private green space the Calie instead gave over the space to public areas.
As they left the housing for the troops, sailors, air furs, etc. into the base proper the tenements that made up the accommodation petered out, there were a few smaller houses in their own gardens before the wide inner, very wide, ring road.
The general once again saw a defence, anything crossing it would be a sitting duck from both sides. The other military types were getting interested now. The air marshal had his the sun roof open in his car, he knew the flight path of the air base passed over the road here. He was looking up intently as he hoped to see an angle, he had only seen them on satellite imagery, as they engaged there stealth tech very shortly after take off. His ears prick up, there was an aircraft coming, so he stood up and stuck his head out of the sun roof. He looked up and saw a very odd shaped aircraft, it's wings swooped forwards and it was very rounded. It wasn't and angle....it was an angle 2, he knew the intel guys had been talking about them but they didn't have any photographs of them. The Calie were adept at moving there move classified air craft when the spy satellites were out of range, or the cloud cover/snow was too much. He went for his small hidden camera, then stopped for two reasons, one taking the photo was likely to cause an incident and two his camera wasn't working. The general also noted that the small press team that was attached to the group to cover the hand over had there heads stuck out of their car, but most of them were hitting the side of there cameras as it appeared something was interfering with their function. He smiled, of course the Calie wouldn't tell them what not to photograph as that would be like a red rag to a bull, they just made it impossible. He smiled as he saw one photographer snapping away with an old mechanical camera, he knew that the calie would have thought of that, as they seemed to have thought of everything. He wondered where the low powered X-ray source was that would wreck the exposures.
As they entered the centre of the base is became clear that this was a serious naval base. The air marshal had not noted any serious air defence, but correctly surmised that, that was likely to be on board one the the bulk carriers that were travailing with the Calie fleet. What the tinisens had picked up from photo surveillance was inconclusive as the air base defences were covered and they only carried out exercise when they couldn't be seen. It was a shame as he had hoped to seen what defences the Calie had in mind for up here. He had how ever noted a various points along the way where an air defence system would be very well placed.
The admiral was only now paying attention, though the Calie had not brought there fleet in yet, like all bits of there more classified tech they were waiting for the formal hand over to come in. He could how ever get a feel for the scale of the operation. It was big, there was a good chance Cal would have a bigger fleet based here than tinis had, but from what he had seen from intel, the fleet was not of a disposition that could carry out major amphibious operations. From that and the fact that Cal maintained a small army, though large, the fleet was of no real threat to Tinis, and he had said so.
The General was looking at the base from a tactical point of view, it seemed to have no offensive capability on the land. The defences were strong but would be of an equal risk to a force trying to break out into tinis. His suspicions were confirmed the night before when his intel report stated that Cal was only sending one regiment to defend the base and no real amount of armour. That was a shame as he wanted to see what they had.
As the group left their cars they saw the Tinisen flag still flying over the squat square HQ of the base, as after all the base was still under there command, well in theory anyway. Control was to be officially passed today, the tinisens had given the Calie a fairly free hand as they wanted to know how things would be when the Calie took over. The tax money from the workers here would be missed, the Calie had paid the tinisen workforce very well, well south eastern rates of pay. Oddly neither Cal or Tinis were too keen on passing the city, Cal didn't want to start the clock yet and tinis....well even though Tax evasion was a way of life in the construction site, Tinis was pulling in vast quantities of tax.
In the distance a Calie cruiser entered the harbour, the tinisens had hoped for a mega carrier, but they knew to the Calie the battle ship was the honourable ship. The Sea Lord of the base would be on board as would be his sky knight and knight. Most of the tinisens found the dramatic names the Calie used as funny, the thing was behind the pomp and ceremony Tinis was handing over a base to a very capable military. None of the military invited were under any allusions otherwise. Yes they knew Cal had a small army, but it was very well trained, willing to take looses and if allowed could take K-IX by force quickly. Holding it would be another question.
The General couldn't help but envy Inca (the Calie chief war lord), his arm refused people if they were not up to standard and they had very high standards. They had no interest in conscription or anything that would reduce the quality of there furs. He also feared that even though the Calie only had one regiment at the base, in war games his troops might not be so good. Rather than Furs the Calie invested in training, then equipment, then did numbers, he was very worried that an elite formation of the tinisian army might not do so well against a normal calie formation.
The hand over was quietly passed to the politicians , the sea lord, taackia, had left his ship, with him was a group of sea knights, one of which held the Calie ensign. Folded in a discreet manor.
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Post by The Union of Tinis on Mar 22, 2008 2:14:40 GMT -5
Speaker Mogtue, presently acting party leader of the Nationalists (the regular leader had come down ill recently), had been asked by the First Speaker to be the official to hand off the base and the city. It was a dubious honor as it tied the Nationalists to the city which had only barely passed in Tinis, but at the same time gave Mogtue and her party the 'gravitas' of being capable of handling international affairs, which was good for this years election as Commander Yerzok, their candidate for First Speaker, was using that as her main campaign theme.
Mogtue was a little surprised to actually know all the military furs in their group. So it likely meant Yerzok wasn't keeping track of him or anyone else on this trip using a fake general. And the other politicians were also well known to her.
The interior of the headquarters was as tight as Mogtue had imagined it to be. Still plenty of unpacked boxes. Thankfully the official ceremony was taking place on the roof.
Both delegations made their way there after the official greatings. Both sides formed up on either side of the flag pole. The small press team set up their tripods and non-functional cameras at the far end of the roof. One of the Cali protocall officers quickly spoke with them, then said something that sounded like jibberish to Mogtue into a comm. The press proceeded to take a bunch of photos of the assembled group. After a full two minutes of this they stopped with a word from the officer.
I guess they're kind of paranoid about photos here, Mogtue realized. I guess that explains the jammed cameras at least.
The small podium next to the flag pole was quickly checked by the protocall officer and the press were shortly after allowed to hook their recorders into the output of the microphone there. The video cameras were placed and adjusted as well. After a brief check over by the watchful eye of the protocall officer, the press took steps away from their cameras and took seats to watch, all their material now set to provide a semi-live feed to their news networks or services.
Gosh, I guess they had to sign something probably to get to be here.
With a nod from serveral different furs to signal readyness, Mogtue nodded to the sea lord and then took the podium.
"Friends, fellow citizens, and allies. Not many of you know me, but I am acting Nationalist leader in the Chamber, and have been asked here to represent Tinis to Cal and the world.
"As in necessary and proper as it was stipulated in the agreement between the nations of Cal and the Union of Tinis, I have been asked here to offer up a tract of land on this northern coast of the Union to the nations of Cal. The land shall be of two parts, a military base fully under control by Cal and its military, and a free city, that shall be officially under Cali jurisdiction, but which was agreed to be a free port of call for trade and movements of people to the northern part of the continent. Today we are to hand over the first of these tracts of land.
"Before I officially lower the flag of the Union and hand over the charter of the first of the plots of land, I would like to announce several things. The first is that the Union shall begin in the coming months the long awaited transportation grand project. For to long the Union has relied upon a perpetually slowly upgraded system. Like with the other grand projects of our nation we've manage to take giant leaps forward, passing many nations in our ability to succeed. We shall do such again. The bill was pass overwhelmingly last night and shall go into effect immediatly. The plans call for a massive upgrade of the rails and raods of Tinis, as well as an expansion of the Arx maglev network, a subway system for the city of Matabia, along with new technologies, some purchased from our Cali friends, some from elsewhere, to enchance the speed of our networks, as well as to increase the enviromental harmony of the entire system. Included of course will be several new lines of zero emmission vehicles, including a renewal of the off roading favorite, the Sig. [the Sig is one of the few civilian owned gasoline cars in Tinis, and the zero emmissions is brought by CO2 scrubbers that need to be replaced every few hundred miles] The official plans for the high speed lines should now be available to the Cali planners, including the rail lines between this city and its neighbors, as well as the main link to Arx.
"The second announcement is that with the return of the Nationa Construction Council and its equipment from Pargalo, they'll be splitting their time between working on the transportation project, and helping with construction here. As part of that assistance, they'll bring in an estimated 100,000 tons of high quality granite for processing and construction, along with preparing the needed steel and other building materials that they can provide.
"Finally, I'd like to announce that the Retrieval Program will now officially apply to the Free City and these land holdings. So if any Tinisian citizen wishes to spend time in this city to work, and they return home, any excess income they have upon re-entering Tinisazil will provide them the appropriate standard of living upgrades, with a guarantee to match or exceed what you had in the free city up to the maximum. So work here will not be without gain if anyone wishes to return to the Union."
Mogtue was actually not to happy about the last part, but he had to announce it as it was something some of the other party leaders wanted pointed out.
"And thus, without much further delay, I shall lower the flag of the Union, and offer the territory of this military base to the representative of the nations of Cal, Sea Lord, Taackia."
With that, Mogtue turned to the flag poll, unhooked the rope, and began to lower the Union flag. The Tinisian general stepped up and assisted with the lowering and subsequent folding of the flag. Mogtue then offered it to the general with a short bow. She then turned to the sea lord and gave a similar bow while offering a folded paper in her paw. The paper bit was not part of the official agreement, but it was a tradition of sorts in Tinis, a hold over of the house days.
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Post by The Union of Tinis on Apr 2, 2008 21:43:14 GMT -5
"So what's this all about?" asked Iwing as he followed the foreman further into the tunnel.
"Well sir, I called you down here 'cause we found something a little unusual. Before I went up and called whom I'm technically supposed to, I thought I'd give you a quick heads up."
The dragon's tail waved quickly behind him as he walked. This and the boots were not helping his posture.
"We were digging tunnel nine nine seven this morning. Its cutting along just above the bed rock. Soundings picked up an object ahead so we stopped the bore machines and went to work by hand for a few hours."
The dragon and mouse turned a corner. "And," continued the foreman. "We found this."
Iwing half expected it to be a water leak or gas pocket, or possibly a giant boulder. But upon seeing the three foot high stone wall jutting across the excavated area, with clearly defined brick pattern, he realized why he'd been called down here.
"Well, I guess we lucked out that this is under the tower park," said the dragon. "I won't have to bend tails to work around it."
-----
A few weeks later the new addition to 'towers park' was nearly fully cordoned off. Of what they had unearthed so far gave little clue as to the origins of the ruined structures, nor why they were buried under the north coast of Tinis. The archeologists had helped the workers dig around the ruins and had worked with Iwing and the other architects to ensure that the site wouldn't be disturbed by construction efforts. Only a hundred feet from one side of the site the foundations and thirty floors of one of the towers were already framed and being filled out.
The site was being incorporated into the green space around the towers. The top would eventually be covered by a reinforced plexiglas roof to allow park visitors to look into the ruins from above and to keep the ruins safe from the weather.
Still until more than a few outlying walls was uncovered, they'd likely not figure out who built this place or why.
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Post by Erenmor on Apr 11, 2008 15:41:24 GMT -5
The Erenmor reply to Ilinie arrived eventually. It took so long mainly because the admins had to decide who would actually be responsible for trading the excavated stone.
Eventually the thankless task was shifted to Conrad.
"I do apologise for taking time with the reply, but as this is a first for our government, competencies had to be sorted out.
"On to business - while we can provide certain amounts of stone, you'll find they're a bit different from what you'd get elsewhere, if only because of the excavation method. Because of the above, I would believe that Golems would be necessary if adjustments to the stone itself had to be made on site as well. But, the bottom line is, we can provide both - for a suitable price.
"We would prefer resources rather than money in return - exotic minerals, radioactive substances, the kind of stuff you don't just find lying around.
"Respectfully, Conrad, Administrator, New Baikonur"
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Post by Kingdoms of Cal on Apr 12, 2008 9:22:37 GMT -5
Ilinie was sat in bed in a hotel room in Arx, having taken a little time off as she had managed to persuade her mate to come up north. He was a hydro engineer involved in the grand damns project. The pair were self confessed workaholics so the original plan that both of them left their work alone had not worked. He had been on the com many times to check up that the tests of the system were going well, she did not feel guilty checking her messages on her laptop.
The pair were sat in bed, having decided to have a lie in today and breakfast in bed, well more like lunch. He was reading a news paper she was on her laptop, both were leffens and both were naked.
Ilinie was reading the message from Conrad.
She said, to no one in particular "Exotic minerals, radioactive substances where the hell am I going to find those?" Her mate raised an eyebrow and put down his news paper and stoked her long hair. She purred. "Well don't the old nuclear plants have a pile of crap that fits that description? You know the crap they have no idea what to do with. I reckon the military also have a fair amount." She looked at him, and smiled "I knew there was a reason that I joined with you." "Yeah I am good for one thing." "I can think of another thing your good for" she said putting her laptop to one side. --- A hour and a half later while her mate was in the shower Ilinie was on the com. "Ilinie here" "Who?" "New city?" "Ah gotcha, what can I do for you?" "Well you have a large amount of radio active stuff?" "Oh yeah the waste, but I'm not about to let you dump it up there. Though I do admit it would have a plus side." "No, no I am not suggesting that and the nuclear waste people would be less than pleased.
It will be dealt with correctly." "Well I'm not willing to go over one hundred million." Ilinie looked confused for a moment, until she clicked that to the ones that had the legacy of the various calie nations nuclear programs the stuff was a liability. "OK talk to the other people with the stuff and get back to me with a price, I'm willing to take the lot off your hands. If you pay for transportation and the required escorts excreta." "OK, I'll get you a price." She hung up. She was back on the com. "Hello is that the defence ministry?" "Yes, how did you get this number?" "I am Ilinie...new city?" "And?" "Well I am looking for exotic minerals, radioactive substances and I reckon you guys have stuff that fits the bill." "Look we are not about to give you a nuke war head if that's what you think." "Why on earth would I want on of those? any way you will have by now no doubt have confirmed who I am." "......Yes, but I am not authorised to talk about such things. I'll put you through to the quartermasters office." The line went dead for a little. "Quartermasters office." "Yes I am looking at acquiring all the exotic minerals, radioactive substances you have going." "erm....you mean our nuclear waste and our decommissioned war heads?" "Well yeah" "Erm...what are you going to do with the stuff?" "The Erenmoric gov seems to want the stuff in exchange for building material" "I don't know. I mean the war heads are really nasty shit, they probably broke every law when it came to weapons. They were designed to not just destroy cities but also make the area uninhabitable for eons." "OK so you really don't want them to know what they were?" "Well yes." "Put them amongst the civilian waste and make them not look like war heads?" "That could work." "How much waste do you guys have?" "Well two hundred tuns and growing...well glowing in some cases." "So it comes down to cost." "three hundred million, no more." "Done"
Ilinie smiled as she hung up, the consortium were going to be up on the deal.
---
An hour later she got a call from the civilian energy producers, they were not willing to offer more that three quarters of a billion to get rid of their waste. She had manage to get them up to that as she had played hard ball, well her last energy bill had been a little high so she was willing to rip them off.
--- "FAO Conrad.
I have secured a large quantity of both exotic and radioactive materials, approximately one thousand tons. They are the products of over a centenary of calie nuclear science and weapons development
In exchange for the stone required we will send it north to you, how ever it will have to be escorted by the calie navy until you take ownership. The material will be transported by sea as transporting it by air is simply too dangerous.
In the longer term we have a number uranium mines and are not strangers to exotic minerals. Perhaps your government might wish to open up trade with our corps and mutuals?
If this is sufficient we would like to bring in some construction Golems to accelerate the construction of the port.
Yours
Ilinie"
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Post by Kingdoms of Cal on May 4, 2008 14:25:34 GMT -5
Claie archaeologist joined the tinisen crew at the dig, the Calie tended to have one on hand due to the fact that due to Cals extreme age when building they usually found something. Usually nothing of any note so having someone on hand to check that it wasn't important meant that they could get on with construction quicker.
“Hmmm, any idea what we got here?” said the teerie under her several layers of clothing. “Dunno yet.” came the reply from her tinisen counter part. “Any finds?” “A few weird looking coins....Actually what do you make of these?” he said handing her some odd hexagonal coins. Pa looked at them, she recognized them, but what the hell were they doing up here. “They are Madicon from the three kingdoms era, what in my ancestors name are they doing up here?” she exclaimed. “We knew the Madicon were sea furores but I have no record of them travailing this far north.” She continued. “It looks like they weren't the only ones, we found this.” the tinisen said handing her another coin. She looked at it, pulled back her hood to get a better look, almost like she couldn't believe what she was looking at. “Its a Do, from Queen Ac's reign, just before the great disruption. Where did you find this?” “Oh over there, there was a cash of currency, but the most interesting thing about this place is the means of it's destruction.” “What do you mean?” “It was burnt to the ground and buried.” “Why?” “Well we are trying to figure that out.”
“I got a skull” came a shout. The pair raced over to the raccoon that had found it and was busily brushing the earth off it. Pa stopped dead when she saw it. “Put the skull down” she said in a very paced manner, like she was talking to someone with a bomb. “It's just a skull.” the raccoon replied. “No it is a red death victim's skull. I didn't know it came up here, but I think I know why this place was destroyed.” “How do you know it was red death?” “In the terminal phase of the red death the blood clots at random and the bones start to deform, you see that growth on the mussel, that is classic red death.” “But this has to be over a thousand years old.” “Look red death almost wiped out Cal, we check that we are not dealing with a extremely resilient strain, if there was a stain up here, it is unknown.” “Oh” the raccoon replied putting the skull down very gently. “Don't worry, the odds of it still being active are disappearingly remote and there hasn't been a case in living memory, but it is always prudent to take precautions. Especially as it is unlikely anyone up here has inherited any of the immunity that we developed in the south. I also doubt you will have been vaccinated either, I'll get onto the com and get some vaccine up here ASAP.”
-- Meanwhile on another part of the site Tomintec, a leefen geologist was watching the construction, well they were still clearing this part of the site and were digging down to find the bed rock. The JCB stopped and Tomintec wandered over to investigate what was going on. “Here I thought you said bed rock was further down” the fore fur shouted. “It is” Tomintec replied before peering into the hole “One minute” he continued before jumping into the hole. “This what in the goddesses name, it should not be here.” he said as he shifted some of the earth. “I know it's going to be a pain to shift, I wonder how big it is. Might be a blasting job.” “No, no, I mean the rocks round here are sedimentary, also it is flat. I do not think this came to be here by any natural process.” as he cleared some earth from the rock he noticed a marking, his initial thought was that the digger had caused it. But on further investigation he came to the conclusion that it was intentional. “We are going to have to get the archaeologists up here.” “Well shit, we are already behind schedule and this is going to delay things even more.” the fore fur said to an listening Tomintec who was brushing earth off the rock with his paw. “By the goddesses” he said to himself quietly “this can not be.” “What?” the fore fur asked his curiosity piqued he jumped into the hole. “It's leefen. And it's been here for a quite some time, what in the goddesses name is it doing up here. Get a priestess.” “I think it a little late for the last rites” the fore fur said sarcastically. “No, no there is more writing. I can't understand it, I think it's in tarin. I don't speak the language. The only people who might know it are the sisterhood.”
By the time the archaeologists got to the site tomintec and the workers who had picked up on the leefens excitement had managed to clear all the slab. It was about two and a half meters long, one wide and twenty cementers thick. They were in the process of raising the monolith vertical so that they could see both sides. There was far more writing on the other side.
The archaeologists looked at it non-plused as they didn't know the language, very few people outside the sisterhood spoke the dead language. A few minutes and a little discussion and a heated argument over tomintec being an a geologist having taken on an archaeological dig (toes had been trended on and boundaries crossed) a priestess arrived.
She took one look at the monolith and said “Oh in the name of the goddesses” and barged past the arguing furs and started running her paw down the stone. When she reached the bottom on one of the columns of symbols she returned to the top of the next it was clear she was reading it. Then she stopped halfway though and dusted off as symbol. Then looked at it again. “Tolic, TOLIC!!! sulant, mew” she bowed her head and then she looked at tomintec and said “Do not let ANYONE touch this! ANYONE!” “Yes your blessedness, she touched this?” he asked. The priestess nodded and was on her com and shouting down it. The leefens reaction suggested that this was a find of some importance to them. One of the tinisen archaeologists approached the monolith, a lupine. Tomintec put his hand out and said “Don't come any closer or I will strike you down.” The archaeologist looked shocked it was quite clear the tomintec was serious, the archaeologist backed away. “Ere what's so important? It's just a rock with a bunch of writing on it's no like it worth getting in a fight over who touches it” the fore fur said. “She touched it, tolic, sulant mew” tomintec bowed his head before continuing “touched this very stone.” “Who was this tolic person any how” one of the workers, a lupine, asked. Tomintec looked at the worker “You know there was a far less enlighten time when your kind would be killed for even uttering that name.” The worker looked shocked “Why?” “Tolic, sulant mew” tomintec once again bowed his head before continuing “Lead us from race of lupines that tried to enslave us, even though the other feline tribes surrendered to them she gave us the strength to resit. But we had little chance of victory as the others sold us out and we had to flee. They pursued us for many years. We fought them every inch of the way, we killed ten of them for everyone of us they killed, we never surrendered, preferring to die rather than be enslaved.
The stories of this time are told to every kitten at there mothers knee.
We fled far before we landed on inleef, this might tell us to where we came from. The fact she touched this makes it one of the most holy relics. Possibly the most holy, I don't even know if I am worthy enough to look upon it, but I'm blessed as the goddesses have let me find it.” The tinisens were looking at each other, this was a side of the Calie they had not seen as they always seemed so relaxed about there faith. Then again the leefen seemed to be the ones that took there faith the most seriously of the Calie. This was really important to them as every leefen on the site was downing tools and crowing round the hole. It seemed like, to them, it was like finding the arc ocovenantovenat.
“Tolic, sulant mew” tomintec bowed his head again “Never saw inleef, we were ambushed as we took to the sea and she and a few others fought as our rear guard. She stayed behind so that our ancestors could escape. If she survived to write this, we might have a link back to where we are from. It could be her scroll as she never wrote anything down but knew the goddesses, part prophet part warrior queen. She was our last queen as no leefen will take the title as she is our queen and will be until we die as a people.”
“So tolic sulant mew is kinda the mother of your nation.” one of the workers as sultant mew just means 'blessed be you' it is not her name.” one of the leefen workers corrected. “Oh right.” “Yeah I do not know if you have an equivalent but...you can't imagine just how important this is to us”.
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Post by The Union of Tinis on May 5, 2008 21:03:06 GMT -5
One of the Tinisian archeologists whom had popped over nodded. "I guess the closest thing we have that's semi unique to Tinis would if we didn't know where Glorvan's tomb was and then found it randomly." A few nods from some of the other Tinisians followed this. "Now that Pargalo isn't so screwed up pilgrimages there have become common."
"I don't know much of your Glorvan," replied Tomintec. "But I know he too traveled far, though for different reasons. It would be as if you discovered one of his way points in his most early and obscure travels. And maybe perhaps where he began his teachings... not really sure how to bring home the weight of this find."
The archeologist whom spoke up. "No need. We fully intend to give full respects. Should we erect a tent over the site to shield if from the winds of the north seas?"
"Yes... that would be very good... Just be careful. It can't be touched."
The Tinisian gave some commands to her subordinates. Most rushed off to get supplies to cordon off the area, foreman be damned. The archeologist came back to near the priestess.
"I'm afraid I need a refresher on Cali history. When was this journey of the blessed one?"
----
"First Speaker?"
"What? I'm busy trying to prevent world war sixty four."
"The New City... some of the speakers are in a panic about the archeological finds. Rumors that it was a plague city..."
The dragon gave the aid a weird look. "I heard. Vaccines are being produced or imported. And precautions are being made. No one's gone in or out by land since first hint of that's happened until the medical group knows for certain that there's no possibility of it popping up. Which is remote in the first place. Now go back down stairs and tell those nationalist weenies that the office of the First Speakership is following procedures for possible plague occurrences and unless they want to pass some new laws real quick that they'll have more immediate problems with me if they keep bothering me!"
"What about the sea or air?"
"If there's been any movement there, blame the Cali."
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Post by Erenmor on May 9, 2008 20:12:23 GMT -5
Eventually the stone from Erenmor arrived, by ship. A number of superfreighters requested to dock at the port-in-progress, others waited for their turn at a respectful distance. The ships were an odd sight - small spherical bumps lined the hulls on both sides just below the deckline. Each one also had a crew of Sentinel marines in addition to the organic crew. Apparently Erenmor took the safety of their cargo on the seas very seriously.
A smaller cargo ship brought a sizeable construction crew of Golem droids... along with another Sentinel contingent to ensure their safety - and potentially to keep sensitive technology out of unintended hands. And with the lot came the crew's administrator, a bright-furred feline with a few slightly noticeable cybernetic modifications in the form of small electronic pads in the sides of his ears and another in the back of his neck, and yet another over the front of his throat.
"My name is Isaac Guthrie," the feline introduced himself, to whatever official arrived to receive the delivery. "I've been asked to oversee the construction effort here."
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Post by The Union of Tinis on May 12, 2008 22:59:25 GMT -5
Izixs was peering through a telescope out the window of his personal apartment in the Arx spire. "So what's the latest?"
"Well, no sign of infections. No unexplained deaths. The health ministry agrees with the rest that lifting the quarantine was a good idea as well. Though they took five times longer than the rest they didn't find any signs of the plague there in the ruins. There is the local control zone for the ruins though still, but city operations are back and running. They're even getting the train lines hooked up with our new lines in the next day or so."
"Thank you. Did you know in the right weather I can see that blasted city?"
"Um no sir I did not."
"Well, I got this baby pinned on it now. I see a new splotch in the ocean. Probably that Erenmor ship that was supposed to arrive today."
The aid waited for more.
"Yeah... um," said Izixs. "You should send out invites again for foreign diplomats and dignitaries to see Arx soon. Not yet. But maybe next week or something. Maybe we'll get all the folks from down south to stop going insane and pay us a calm visit. Hell, write up a personal letter to Meriko or something of Shikieshuu. I'm sure she'd love to see Arx in person."
"And what of your own travel plans?"
"Oh, well, perhaps I should look into another visit down south as well. But first, I gotta harass Iwing a little more. The spires of his works up at the city are not going up symmetrically. He should fix that."
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Post by Kingdoms of Cal on May 17, 2008 12:07:15 GMT -5
Ilinie greeted Isaac Guthrie saying "Welcome to the new city your presence here is more than welcome. I am head of procurement, legal and corporate affairs. This is Pa, head of local and labor relations for the consortium." Isaac looked at the two curiously, both were wearing many lairs of clothing, it was clear that they were not used to the temperatures up north. Ilinie smiled at him, she like all leefens was a black puma, and put out her hand. As they shock hands isaac's gaze fell upon Pa, it was the first time he had ever seen a teerie in the flesh, Pa was taller than isaac had though the teerie to be and her fur, well what little of it was visible, was of a far lighter green than he had imagined.
Pa noticed Isaac looking at her and said "Wotcha" tapping her forehead with her fore and index fingers in an almost mock salute.
"Sorry I am not accustomed to your....hue." Isaac said a little embarrassed.
"Don't worry I get that allot up here, well us green furs are kinda unique to the commonwealth.
Anyway I doubt you have any labor problems." she replied in almost a mocking tone.
"No we don't, the golums will have good accommodation?"
"Oh aye, they will be billeted with the engineers and architects and the other professional workers....well as good as we can. Oh yeah, put these on." She replied handing isaac a bright orange cloak, a helmet and some heavy boots.
Isaac looked at them curiously and started "My jump suit will..." before being cut off. "This is a work site so the rules are clear, no vest, no helmet, no boots, no job. It applies to everyone no matter who they are or where they are from.
Sorry.
Oh yeah the cloak counts as a vest." Pa said.
Isaac reluctantly put on the garments, once he had finished, noting that they had got his shoe size and hat size right, he asked "Are you in charge here?"
"Us...well we keep the place ticking over but the architects are in charge, we will take you to meet them while we get your ships unloaded." Ilinie said smiling.
The docks were still incomplete and construction had paused as the workers were mostly queuing up to be vaccinated against the strains of red death the calie had a vaccine for.
Pa walked up to one of the sentinels and handed it a small vile of clear liquid. It looked at it trying to figure out why it had been handed it. From a preliminary scan it seemed to be organic and harmless.
Isaac noticed this and looked at Ilinie quizzically.
"Ah yes. Erm....well we kind of unearthed an archaeological find and, well, discovered red death had got up here. The risk of an outbreak is massively remote but not zero. So I would advise you to have your workers and crews vaccinated. Well and your self." she said handing isaac an epie pen.
"Am I or my workers at risk?"
"Well as much as anyone, there hasnay been an out brake in five hundred years. But when it comes to red death you never take a risk. It almost wiped us out once." Pa interjected.
"Feel free to check out the vaccine, the red serpent will provide you with as much as you want. Though the red death appears to be have been eradicated. The last thing we want is for a new strain to appear in the non-vaccinated population.
Provided you use that in the next twelve hours you will be at the same risk as me" Ilinie said in a kindly tone.
"And her?" isaac asked indicating Pa.
"Nae man, being a green fur doesn't just give you good looks" Pa smiled before continuing "it means I'm naturally immune, unlike the leefen." Pa said.
"Any way shall we will go meet the head honchos, unless you have any more questions?" Ilinie said indicating a small electric golf cart type vehicle.
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Post by Kingdoms of Cal on May 17, 2008 12:56:49 GMT -5
Off the coast of Erenmor a calie fleet was closing on their national waters. It was quite a unique fleet as it had avoided the main shipping lanes. An escort carrier group, a squadron of destroyers and two cruisers were escorting nine cargo ships.
The cargo ships were odd in design as the Calie navy had pulled the hulls of them from the scrap yards as they were old battle ships. Their hulls were five inches of armer plating and had next to no superstructure. The Calie navy had simply taken back the hulls and welled them shut with heavy plating and put a very small bridge on them.
Each of the cargo ships was carrying hundreds of tonnes of nuclear material each. The Sea lord of the fleet broadcast a message: "To Erenmor fleet
We are now approaching your waters and wish instructions as to our next action. We are not an attack fleet. replete we are not an aggressive force. "
The sea lord waited nervously, he didn't want to stop the fleet as then they would be a sitting duck. The war ships could hide and run but the cargo ships could not. It was a one way trip for them as after this they would be too radioactive to be of use, there lead lined holds were already hot and the water in them highly active.
If the Erenmoric wanted radio active stuff they had more than enough, goddess knew what they were going to do with stuff. The Calie were just happy it was no longer their problem. When the last two civilian reactors were fully decommission they would only have a few tonnes of waste and the naval reactors were small. With luck the Erenmoric would take the waste from them too.
---
Supreme Sea Lord Za had been thinking and sent a message to the Erenmoric government:
"Greeting grand overseer
Due to the nature of our power plants in many of our ships and submarines we produce an amount of materials that you may be interested in. I believe a deal could be made so that such materials will be passed to your hands.
If such a deal is possible I would also take the remainder of the civil material. Also bare in mind that cal has significant uranium reserves that you may wish to utilise. Your government is not popular with our people but that is no reason that a deal can not be struck.
Supreme Sea Lord Za"
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Post by Kingdoms of Cal on May 17, 2008 14:33:16 GMT -5
Wentanie and Iwing were sat in a little coffee shop in the first part of the city to be completed. Iwing had been astounded by the place, it was still cold out side but you would never know it in here.
Wentanie smiled "It's going to get colder" "Why?" "Well the plan takes into account the heat given out by furs and such, the heat in hear is due to the run off of the power plant." "The power plant?" "Ah...yeah the sewage works. Well the first digester is on-line now and producing methane so the first of the generators is on-line." "A gas powered power plant in tinis...there is no way our government would allow that!" "Well would you rather we released methane into the atmosphere?" Iwing knew that methane was a far worse green house gas than Carbon dioxide. "You can be green, when you guys look for money can't you? How much are you guys charging for waste?" "Charging? good quality organic material the power company is paying us. A fifty year deal for all the waste, hell when the digesters are done with it they sell the dry waste to fertilizer companies." Iwing was coming to the conclusion the calie could make money from anything...even shit. "Is there anything you guys can't make money out of." Iwing said to him self "Dunno, The power plant is talking with our neighbor here to get more in, to keep them ticking over." "You make money from shit? How?" "Not something I know much about, but if you have the right bacteria it is apparently very easy." Iwing looked about the place, the crystalline 'roof' between the buildings let the sun through but made the clouds look out of focus. It almost felt like he was in a shopping mall but not quite. He was also feeling a little off colour due to the vaccination he had, had earlier, his immune system was dealing with a lot of things.
It was an odd place as the coffee stalls were empty and at ground level there was little in the way of utilities. The calie view of zoneing was interesting, they didn't have one. Each of the spires had accommodation at the top, offices lower down and at this level shops. The refugees from up north had utilised this level and there were pubs, restaurants and shops, even now. This place would be a bustling street soon.
He jumped as a tram shot past, he had supposed that the trams would be street cars, they were not. Calie trams were multi carriage light trains. The first tram line to form a loop was here in the north east of the site. They were checking the network now.
Iwing had thought that the tinisians could not live here but at street level there was a lack of conformity. A tinisian population might be happy here, what with the green spaces, the lack of a need to commute and the public transit. It was odd that a nation...well nations that Cal was had made a place, he had though from the design to be utter incompatible with tinisian society, very friendly to them.
All they needed now was a fusball stadium.
Wentanie smiled "Right to the stadia, right two team sports and one athletics is the plan...well and a race course. that sound OK?
Oh yeah we need a terminal, or terminals for the air port. Design build there I think?"
---
The red serpent had started flying in red death vaccine, being Calie based they took even the smallest risk seriously.
Dr To the head of the red serpent sent a message to the tinisian government:
"There is a risk that you population has been exposed to the red death.
We will provide vaccination as a non-vaccinated population may provide a breeding ground for a new strain. We will provide you with all the vaccine needed and laissez with your medical profession.
The vaccine must be given free and we understand that you do not charge for medication. I believe the best course of action is a mass vaccination effort. I would also ask you to urge your neighbors to do likewise.
Dr To"
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