Brotherhood Bar-Talks

[Laowai]

The crowd had begun to grow slightly and the barman walked the room, stacking empty glasses in a precarious pile which he balanced expertly. As he made his way to the darker badly lit corner of the room he found a familar figure seated at the table.

"Laowai!" the barman said surprised, "haven't seen you in for a while"

Ben nodded, "Yes, i have been off the radar so to speak". The barman scooped up another glass and added it to his pile, "I heard you got shot up pretty bad out in Delta?" The old Corsair chuckled slightly, "Yes, you could say that, still can't lay on my right side at night, but what would life be like without a little pain eh?"

The barman chuckled in return "Baijiu?" he asked
"Of course" Ben replied.

As the barman made his way back across the room to the bar, Ben unclipped his holster belt and placed it on the table. From one of the pouches he withdrew a large data pad. Its screen suddenly glowing blue as he activated it, bathing him in an eerie light. He moved aside several tabs of information, Outcast intelligence reports, AW and zoner transmission logs, Hessian transmission logs. All of these gleaned through various technical boffinry. Some of it was still encoded, and even with his technical aids and stolen technology it was proving a tough nut to crack. His latest Lane Hacker "aquisition" was a considerable upgrade on the last one, so much so that the coding on that too was proving difficult to break.
But, he had gleaned enough, and the transmission source location logs, codes of which were much simpler to break, all pointed to a common theme.

And he was worried.

He changed screens and began to draft a message.

To the Elder council of Crete.

Copy to: Zavier Benitez, Juan Lucendez and Gentle.


My Brothers.

Recently as you know i was not available for duty owing to injury. But i have since returned to the skies above Crete and while i was away i have kept close eyes on the developments within Corsair space. These developments my friends, do not paint a good picture.

It seems as i write this that we are surrounded on all sides by hostile forces who have almost by accident opened the possibility of a united front against us. That this not happened yet is probably due to the fact that either our enemies are completly strategically inept or we are just plain lucky. Either way, we cannot rely on ineptitude or luck indefinitely.
We face our traditional enemies, the Outcasts, who have openly cooperated with our new enemies, the AW, who have also called in the aid of bounty hunter vessels. The bounty Hunters themselves have become increasingly bold within Gamma itself and added to this we have seen increased Nomad activity as well.
The Hessians, allied now with the NovaPG of the blood dragons have effectively strengthened themselves so as to be able to counter our activities in the omegas, and their alliance also pits an organised enemy against our economic interests in Sigma 13.
The AW's position has allowed The outcasts a fortified position a mere one jump hole from Omicron Gamma and worse, intelligence reports, both our own and reports obtained from other sources have noted that during engagements with us the AW have been able to call upon regular Zoner and TAZ flagged zoner ships to aid them. While these regular Zoner vessels may not openly attack us, the fact that they are actively defending our enemies in engagements makes them effectively hostile should we decide to conduct offensives.
My friends, these developments put us in a grave tactical situation.
Our home forces are indeed strong. Our combined fleets, boast an impressive array of family and independent capital class vessels, and our fighter and bomber wings are second to none. No one can dispute the superior fighting qualities of our people nor their sense of honour. That being said, our strategic position here is not strong and i believe it is time for the council to begin to think outside the box. We need allies my friends - not just allies, but effective allies that will allow us to divide our enemies and keep them divided. A united front by our many enemies would be a disaster for the Corsair people.
I urge the council to discuss these matters at its soonest possible convenience.

Sincerely

Captain Ben Laowai.



He finished the message and waited for his drink. Usually things were a lot busier in the bar at this time, but the increased combat patrols that were being required were taxing people's time, and thus, local business. Though with all the vessels coming home with holes in them, or not coming home at all, the shipmakers on Crete and tripoli were making a killing...

Looking down at the pad again he hit "Send".

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