Raul stood up, preparing his ideas: "Well, I believe the best thing we can do now is to stop the growing number of independents. I will ask the engineers at Tripoli Shipyard to stop ship construction at once and move the unsold battleships, cruisers and gunboats into Omicron-91 and Omicron-94. Our bases there will be completed soon, so I think we should put the biggest weapons of the Corsairs into the hands of Benitez and TBH. This will take a while, I think, since our bases in our systems haven't been completed yet. But we can right now broadcast a message to all Corsairs that the growing number of battleships, cruisers and gunboats will not be tolerated anymore and can result in destruction of the respective vessels if refused. It is a harsh decision but we need to deal with this situation harsh even if they are our own brothers. Battleships, cruisers and gunboats should only be used by experienced people. We can put up an own license for Corsair capital ships which is needed to own a capital ship. That must even apply to our own brothers in TBH and Benitez."
"I completely agree Raul. Although, I believe this is more a result from our recent surge in finances. Independent brothers who once secured our borders are growing fat on the hog while others around them starve. We must do something to curb this inequality, and I believe taking away their ships is the first step, through arms or talk."
Juan broke out into a hacking cough, gulping down water afterwards. He looked at his watch and realized it was time for his medication. He unscrewed his pill bottle and downed a couple, taking another big gulp.
"I feel we shouldn't tolerate Independent captains flying around causing havoc for us to clean up. I also think we shouldn't allow upstart factions like the TT, who don't even bother to read the news every morning, to fly around Gamma like it's their playground. But what should we do about this? A purge puts a bad taste in my mouth, killing our own brothers to get at a few doesn't seem like a strategy we should be looking into."
"The thirteen saloons that had lined the one street of Seney had not left a trace. The foundations of the Mansion House hotel stuck up above the ground. The stone was chipped and split by the fire. It was all that was left of the town of Seney. Even the surface had been burned off the ground.
Nick looked at the burned-over stretch of hillside, where he had expected to find the scattered houses of the town and then walked down the railroad track to the bridge over the river. The river was there."
It was a pleasent feeling, to, for once, be in agreement with other Elders of the Council rather than arguing against them.
"I think we are all in agreement that action of some kind needs to be taken. Yanez has made some good suggestions, which we may help towards finding a solution.
Whilst support by the indipendants can be beneficial, past events have put me in a position in which nothing would please me more than to taste their blood. I am in support of both peaceful, and forceful measures that will help deal with the problem at hand, whichever this council chooses.
As a side-issue, I would like to ask the council's permission to welcome Praetor Zavier Benitez, and Consul Ximen Benitez into the chamber to voice their individual concerns and ideas about the matter at hand. "
"Please, call me Raul. I would be pleased to hear the ideas of Preator Zavier and Consul Ximen. We are currently three people here from TBH, so why not invite the two most trusted Benitez aside you?"
"Aye, where has that son of a Hessian been hiding these days? Zavier I mean. I haven't seen him in a week at least! I think that may have been because I insisted he get that head of his polished. Ah well, they're both wise in their own right, bring them in."
"The thirteen saloons that had lined the one street of Seney had not left a trace. The foundations of the Mansion House hotel stuck up above the ground. The stone was chipped and split by the fire. It was all that was left of the town of Seney. Even the surface had been burned off the ground.
Nick looked at the burned-over stretch of hillside, where he had expected to find the scattered houses of the town and then walked down the railroad track to the bridge over the river. The river was there."
"Carlos has informed me of the issues we are discussing. First off, the independents. I agree with what most of you are saying. The independants are a big part of what people see of us. If other nations see a bunch of cap-ship independents flying around, they think "Those bloody cap-ship corsairs." Personaly, I think people see a lot more independants then they do clan/family members. They only truly notice the clans/families when they are out in numbers. I must say I think this means they rub off a lot of our image on others, if you get what I mean. Just today I heard a comment somewhat along the lines of, "If we get seen out here (gamma) we'll have at least three battleships on us in less then a minute."
I think the best idea so far is the one put up by Elder Raul. We need to restrict independent usage of capital ships. How we enforce that though, is the hard part. Of course we could just tell them not to buy capital ships unless they are "worthy" or something along those lines. But that can't stop somebody from buying a cruiser on a whim.
Firing upon them should not be an option. These ships take LOTS of resources to build. Resources that we must gather or trade.
I think a license would be our best bet. Tell independents if they are going to buy a capship, they must buy a license. Although this may not be enough. Any rich person could buy a license and still be a total idiot with a capital ship. We may have to put them through a series of tests. Perhaps of knowledge of our past ((roleplay and rules knowledge)), and or a test of fighting skill.
However, again, the question comes up: How to enforce a license?
This must be put to an end, our nation cannot stand to have an image of a bunch of crazy capships flying around. We also can not have ship after ship after ship be built just be blown up by the next wing of bombers that flies past."
Ximen paused for a moment.
"Another thing. The TT. Who knows where they came from, one day they never existed, the next they are all in battleships blockading OUR artifact trade. We can't allow that. I think in order to have a new Corsair clan or family, they must work it with and through us first. I assume this will happen VERY rarely, and I will say myself I don't want to see fifteen million corsair clans out there.
We need to warn the TT. We need to tell them to sell their capships. We can let them keep one, maybe two for homeworld defence, but we definately don't need all they have. They need to get fighters. And if they don't agree with that? I guess we'll see.
That's about all I have to say for the time being."
Ximen looked at the others to see what they had to say.
Zavier entered shortly after Ximen, hearing the tail-end of his speech. his bald head shiny with sweat from his Titan's flight helmet.
"So thats what this is all about, eh? All those battleships that we DON'T need floating about on their merry way, hurting us more than the enemy via attrition, or the loss of our H-Fuel/MOX?"
The Praetor of the Benitez takes a seat next to his Commandante and Imperator, Carlos.
"I say that the independants should have a series of one on one combat trials against the Artemis, Memoria, Prometheus and Talos ((Alphabetical order, don't hurt meee! D:))... If they can beat all four battleships in a row, then they get to keep the battleship that did the task. It will also be a test for our own battleship captains... If they manage to beat all of our battleships with all of theirs, then a license should go into effect..Although that seems petty, it WILL stop the majority of the battleships....Noone likes swarms of battleships....on either side."
Zavier finishes talking and leans back slightly.
We've been slaves to this war
Ever since we were born
And we keep begging for more
of this destruction.
OOC: Sorry for the shortish post..I'm not to terribly good at Forum RP...I'm far better at making it up as I go along ingame..
"Freelancer Alpha dash niner, this is Freeport 7 control, You are cleared for departure. Good luck out there."
Soldato Zavier Benitez, Benitez flight instructor.
The pirate clumped down the hall his cybernetic feet echoing. news had reached him that the doors to the council chamber had been breached. 'About time someone gave us an open door policy muagh hahaha' Gentle grinned. Carlos the Don of the Benitez family had a unique manner. Similar in many ways to himself thought gentle. As Gentle approached the smashed doors he took a firm hold of the one hanging limply from its hinges and pput his strength to it. The door ripped from its housing and gentle carried it above his head into tho council chamber. Maybe the doors should be kept open now. this was a good thing no.... Corsairs should talk more and openly. Maybe Carlos had inadvertently started something good. gentle was always happy to talk to his hermanos and a locked door prevented this.
"Hola Mi hermanos, sorry I am late I just heard the news that the doors had fallen off the council chambers. Amigos I have brough the Don a souvenir of his institution of our chambers new open door policy."
Gentle set the ancient door down next to Carlos and grinned from ear to ear.
"maybe you can make a table with this Carlos hermano, muagh hahaha"
"So we have finally come to sort out the mess that gathers outside of Crete every day. Good news indeed this is amigos."
"Please allow me to give you an account of events that happened to me in person only 2 or 3 days ago. I undocked from Crete noticing a large volume of independants in space. I brought out the [OPG]bancoGrande so that I could furnish some of the greenstick corsair boys with something other that pea shooters and spud guns. Whilst performing a transaction with a TT named firestorm I was hailed by an Indy named Paul. This idiot asked If he could take out my shields. naturally I was resistant to this and said 'no this ship has too many valuable items' he replied with 'well I could just shoot you and take them all' naturally I immediately docked and switched to my bomber. After undocking I gave out some well deserved verbal retribution to the miscreant Paul. he was wholly unappologetic and continued to call me crazy man. At this point a TT whos name I did not get opened fire on Paul without warning stripping his Gunboat of its shields. Paul assumed it was I that had opened fire and attacked me. I attempted a fast evasive manouver and whilst trying to type a message for ceasefire I inadvertently released a torp which took out my bomber. Now this in itself may appear as a comedy of errors however if we look at the facts. I should not have to be defending a bank from my hermanos. TT should not be attacking other corsairs when there is a situation being handled by an elder.
Since then I have attempted to help the TT in training. A group of TT and some other indies were outside Crete using bombers to take down an osiris. I assisted in this training. At the end of which a titan under TT colours of the TT attacked my bomber stripping its shields this fool then said I was not welcome to train with the TT. Naturally I returned fire and stuck a nova into the idiot. The TT corsair was destroyed before he even made his first pass. Now had I been that corsair Id have been clearly asking for help of someone who can destroy a titan in one pass, I ceratinly wouldnt be trying to threaten him.
These idiots have annoyed me, attacked me, harassed other corsairs, incited violence, made up their own rules, disrespected corsair elders and generally made us look like a bunch of capital ship wimps who need to hide behind a million tonnes of metal.
hermanos I am nearing breaking point. What can we do to educate these idiots in our politics, structure and beleifs. I am certain there is good in them. They are without direction and seem incapable of communicating effetively with us...... bah not so long ago I would have just killed the lot of them. Ahhh it greives me so much as there are some fantastic Corsair pilots who do not fly as part of a faction who show respect and goodwill to the Corsair people in general. We need to take a moderate approach is my gut instinct hermanos. We should not shun these people but certainly they need a voice and need to be heard so that we can include them in our ideas and plans. If we separate ourselves from them now we will never get them where they need to be. The TT seem to have some kind of organisation can we not invite them here and ask them to be part of our community so that we can culture them and raise their faction to be something great. There are many independents around crete who rely on us to use common sense and not rely on our hearts which tell us to act with emotion and not cold hard sense. I regret now that I have shot at one of the TT but as you all know I am often one of the first to go for the guns. Not this time amigos we need to consider this matter more carefully. We cannot always place demands upon our hermanos who are born with the right of free will and speech. Let us instead harness this and guide them and encourage them in our ways. This is what I came here to say today. What are your thoughts Amigos?"
Gentle flipped open his cybernetic leg and pulled out a bottle of sirius60 and a dozen collapsible glasses. Puring himself a drink he pushed forward the whisky and motioned for all to help themselves.
Juan Lucendez raised his index finger to speak, but before he could say anything, his mouth opened widely. Closing it several times, Juan finally thought he was O.K. when he let out a very loud sneeze.
"AHHH CHOOOO"
"Excuse me hermanos." Said Juan, putting away his handkerchief and preparing to speak. Taking some whiskey to clear his sinuses, he gulped greedily, thanking Gentle for the drink.
"Now, Gentle. Good to see your still alive and kicking...." Silence came as the unintentional pun floated across the room.
"Oh, errrr, I mean. Good to see you."
"Right."
"About the TT. We have intelligence that they have been blockading Artifact trade whenever they can. Now, how do you think they can afford those ships of their's? Girlscout cookies? They are incredibly deep into the smuggling trade and do it almost as often as the Brotherhood. The point here is that they've started to realize the TT can make more money if it has exclusive rights to the trade."
"Now, I don't mind the average Corsair getting a ship of his own and making a living for himself. That's just natural. But actually blocking the trade from others brings us one step closer to the corrupt House corporations that corner the market to line their own wallets. But, instead of destroying these brothers, I agree. We need to help them come into the fold."
"Also, about the true Independents. These are the brothers that stay on top of the daily news and try with all their strength to bring glory to the Corsair people, and glory to themselves. Most regular Independents wouldn't bother with any of our factions in the slightest, mostly because we don't have any kind of punishment for not joining. Which is fine, but if they don't know our allegiances, nor do they have the courtesy to follow orders in a heated fight. I don't see why we should tolerate their presence one second longer than we have to."
"Therefore, I call the only one who actually bothered to try and listen in on this conversation, and give his opinion before this Council." Juan yelled his last sentence, startling the others and making them look around themselves in confusion.
"I picked up some sort of attempt to access the Council logs and retrieve our records of this session. The Hacker tool, that whoever this person is, used is somewhat old roughly by 12 or 13 years. Our potential hacker is much older than this, but I believe he has earned his right to speak before the Council, any disagree?"
"The thirteen saloons that had lined the one street of Seney had not left a trace. The foundations of the Mansion House hotel stuck up above the ground. The stone was chipped and split by the fire. It was all that was left of the town of Seney. Even the surface had been burned off the ground.
Nick looked at the burned-over stretch of hillside, where he had expected to find the scattered houses of the town and then walked down the railroad track to the bridge over the river. The river was there."
"That poor, poor door... I see your gate-crashing skills haven't changed hermano Gentle, not at all..."
"But Elder Lucendez, I am sure your 'friend' would give us his views on the situation at hand whether we agreed to it or not, and if he gained access to this room, then he must be good enough. Of course he can give us his opinion, but this person shouldn't expect it to be listened to by us, as anyone who intrudes to the council chambers without prior permission should be shot. Of course, that doesn't usually happen, and of course it cant happen here, but I am sure he understands."
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