A New Day (New Hebrides)

[Diamond]

Thread for the New Hebrides

New Dover, capital of the New Hebrides, September 2, 2004

Miranda Mulawi leaned her elbows on her desk and rubbed her tired eyes, trying to massage out four solid weeks of madness. She was a tall woman in her late forties, with luxurious black hair and striking, elegant features. Her nails, once pristine and painted red, were now ragged nubs. It had been the strangest, most terrifying, and chaotic month of her life. Of course, the same could probably be said for the other ninety million citizens of the newly-minted Republic of the New Hebrides.

By now everyone was aware of the situation: a chunk of Imperial Japan had somehow found itself transported to a new world, a bizarre ‘Mosaic Earth’, where no less than fifty other states faced an identical situation. Completely cut off from the worlds of their origin, lifted out like puzzle pieces and slapped down willy-nilly, the diversity of the cultures and peoples represented was nothing short of staggering.

Mulawi tried to focus on the intelligence report before her, a satellite [1] analysis of the New Hebrides’ strange neighbors. To the south, the island continent of Drakesland still existed. But now it was split into three distinct nations, all of which claimed some variation of the Latin-derived name ‘Australia’. A fourth area, sitting like a tumor in the continent’s heart, appeared to have suffered a devastating nuclear conflict at some point. To the east, where there should have been nothing but sparsely-inhabited archipelagoes and atolls, lay something called the Confederation of South Sea Islands. The rest of the region was even stranger. Large chunks of territory appeared to contain no human life at all, only virgin wilderness.

And then there was Japan… a different problem altogether. Oh, they’d proven themselves friendly enough; Mulawi had lately concluded a preliminary treaty stabilizing their currencies and establishing limited territorial rights, but these alternate Home Islanders were a different breed from anything in Mulawi’s native world. Their almost embarrassing adoration of the Emperor struck her as something from out of the Middle Ages.

There was a soft knock on her office door. “Come in,” she said, and leaned back, pushing the satellite report aside.

Her old friend Admiral Nathan Takeshi strode into the room, a frown on his face and a sheaf of papers under one arm. Mulawi eyed the papers warily. “Now what? More pirate attacks?”

Takeshi slumped into the plush chair across from Mulawi. “I wish I had better news for you, Miranda.”

“How bad is it this time?”

Takeshi hesitated. “It’s… bad. 800 dead in the latest attack. They sank a pair of coastal patrol boats off Palawan. Then they blew a civilian merchant vessel out of the water.”

Mulawi gritted her teeth. “God damn Eric Soames. What does he think this’ll accomplish? He’s winning no friends among the population at large, that’s for certain. It’s one thing to oppose us; it’s quite another to slaughter helpless civilians.”

Eric Soames had been, a month previous, the Deputy Minister of Defense of the Empire of Japan. He’d been visiting the New Hebrides to observe the maiden flight of a new aircraft being tried out by the fleet under Takeshi’s command. Never the most stable of men, the absolute shock of finding himself lost forever from the world he’d known had apparently been to much for his sanity to take. When word had reached New Dover that the Duke of Okinawa, a nephew of the Emperor, was on the island of Kalimantan, Soames had launched a half-assed plan to overthrow Mulawi’s transitional government and install the Duke as a new Emperor, with Soames himself holding all the real power.

It would have been laughable if so many regular military and Provincial Defense units hadn’t defected to his cause. Soames was thought to have close to 10,000 men at his command, hardly a force to scoff at. Especially with all the weaponry he’d pirated over the last two weeks.

Takeshi reached across the desk and patted Mulawi’s hand. The gesture, from any other man, would have offended her, but the Admiral and she went way back. They shared the same political and personal goals, and years ago had even shared a bed.

“We’ll get him, Miranda,” Takeshi said. “It’s only a matter of time.”

Mulawi sighed. “That’s what I’m worried about: time, and the lack of it. I’ve got the Imperial News Network breathing down my neck to let one of their crews visit Japan. I’ve got citizen groups baying for blood if they’re not allowed to leave the islands. As if the world they knew was still there! Idiots! I’ve got representatives from no less than eight alien governments trying to nail down our position regarding everything from trade to human rights violations by some nightmare regime on the Caspian Sea. And to top it all off, I’ve got Soames and his band of fucking ingrates out there playing havoc in the shipping lanes!”

She pounded one dainty fist on the desk. “What’ll happen if they sink a warship, or, God forbid, a civilian craft, belonging to one of these foreign powers? My Christ, we could have a war of catastrophic proportions on our hands…”

“We’ve done everything we can in that regard,” Takeshi said. “All governments have been warned to stay well clear of our waters until we can nail Soames. As pitiful a thing as it is to say, we’ll just have to pray that nothing serious occurs before then. What really worries me is this nation on the Malay peninsula – Sinhapur, I believe its called. They’re our closest neighbor and the most likely to be targeted by Soames, but we know nothing – as yet – about them.”

Mulawi shook her head despairingly. “Maybe… maybe I ought to resign. If someone else was in charge, Soames might at least cease hostilities.”

Takeshi snorted. “And who else should we have running things? Not me; Soames hates me worse than he does you, if such a thing is possible. Stay the course, Miranda. We’ll come through.” He squeezed her hand.

Suddenly the door flew open and Mulawi’s secretary, a nervous young lieutenant named Hiro, bustled in. “Madame Representative! Priority Red message from south Kalimantan!” Sweating, he abruptly thrust a printout at Mulawi and bowing nervously, backed away to stand by the door like a nervous mouse.

Mulawi scanned the report. Takeshi watched her face grow paler by the second. “What is it, Miranda?”

She pinched the bridge of her nose and wordlessly slid the report across to the Admiral.

He read through it, then cursed softly. “Sky pirates? Allied to Soames? Good God, what’s next?”

[G.Bone]

OOC: Would your nation like help from the D. of Australia?

[Landshark]

Landshark wanders by whistling innocently

[Diamond]

Originally Posted by G.Bone

OOC: Would your nation like help from the D. of Australia?

Yep; gonna post in the Diplomacy thread right now.

[Diamond]

Tokyo, Imperial Japan, September 4, 2004

Keiko Masoda did a last-minute inspection of herself in her bathroom mirror before grabbing her purse and camkit (1) and heading off to the elevator. Sam Giones, her cameraman, met her halfway down the hall.

"Nice place, eh?" he said, glancing around at the plush maroon carpet, gold-inlaid mirrors, and rich tapestries gilding the hall.

"I see your talent for understatement is alive and well," Keiko said.

Sam chuckled. The Asakusa View was nice, that was for sure. The whole building was a work of art. Where did all the native architecture of our Japan go? Keiko thought. Too much British influence, I guess...

They rode down to the lobby in silence, each lost in their own thoughts. When First Representative Mulawi had finally relented the day before and allowed Keiko and Sam to travel to Tokyo, Keiko had wasted no time arranging transport on a military jet travelling to Japan, bearing government bean-counters intent on ironing out the last few details of the Japanese-New Hebrides Mutual Assistance Treaty.

The Japanese Emperor's government had been all too eager to accomodate them. Not really surprising that they'd want to give the best imression they could, being next door to a coupled of large and potentially unfriendly neighbors. It was still strange though, to think of an Emperor that wasn't a descendant of Tokugawa. And the attitude of these alien Japanese towards their Emperor... they treated him almost as a god. Strange, very strange.

The viewers back in the New Hebrides would love it. Keiko grinned.

(1) A camkit is a compact camcorder, palm computer, and editing suite.

[Diamond]

OOC: I'm going to post the battles against the rebels in Borneo in sections; I'll probably jump around quite a bit, so don't be confused if the dates are not sequential.

From the journal of Captain Jeffrey Lea
(CO, Company D "Firemakers", 2nd Division, New Hebrides Army)

September 27

I haven't seen rain like this in years. This isn't one of the gentle rains or quick storms we get back on the Home Islands; no, this is a constant tropical deluge that gets into every stitch of clothing and every piece of equipment. Now I know how my grandfather and all those other poor fools who fought in the Indochine War felt. Must remember to have Doc Hiwuri emphasize proper foot care - all kinds of nasty diseases floating around this godforsaken island.

Oh, the southern part of Kalimantan is pleasant enough; Weatherall, the capital, is a proper city. Good surfing down there. But up here, in the central mountains and jungles, it's like a different world. There are canyons so narrow and deep, so overgrown with heavy, thorn-covered vines, that they never see the sun. Treacherous twisting paths used by generations of hunters climb up the sides of sheer cliffs; two of my men have fallen from them. Itarosi was lucky; he only broke his leg in nine places. Nealson caught his neck on a tree limb and died instantly.

My only solace this past week has been that, as miserable as we are, Eric Soames and his rebel forces are faring even worse. Every couple of hours we come across another huddled knot of men, deserters from his army. They tell us several of his officers have left, siphoning off men and equipment to their own personal causes. It's encouraging, but disheartening at the same time. With all these factions on the loose now, it could be years before we've seen the last of them. If we ever do.

Ah well. All we can do is our best, for the Empire. (Insert ironic chuckle here.) I guess I should say now instead, 'for the Republic'. That's never going to have the same ring to it...