Nebula-class Star Destroyer Trojan, in orbit around Ter Abbes

The dagger-shaped warship hovered over Ter Abbes; hovering over the sphere like an angel of death. Heavy turbolaser batteries and ion cannons bristled across its pristine hull. A squadron of Deathsabers soared with the cruiser, maintaining a loose escort formation around the Confederation star destroyer. Several Juaire-class Corvettes maintained a triangular formation around the heavy cruiser. It was enough strength to constitute as a standard Confederation heavy patrol line. There are some who say this is too much firepower for a diplomatic mission. There are some who say that it is provocative. But the Rear-Admiral doesn’t want to take any chances. And though he won’t admit it, I wouldn’t doubt it that there are other Confederation ships nearby. Valeska snorted. Kashan redundancy. Her eyes picked out several warships up ahead bearing the emblem of Ter Abbes’ Security Forces. It’s not exactly as if they don’t have a defence force of their own to fight off any intrusion.
“Captain?”

Valeska spun about on her heels to face the officer. “Yes?”

“Ma’am, we have received clearance from Ter Abbes Traffic Control for our diplomatic envoy. The Pro-Consul wishes to be away almost immediately.”

Valeska glanced at the planet briefly and smirked. “I can’t see why. But nothing’s stopping her; after all, she is the mission leader. The escort fighters are ready?”

The man nodded. “Greywind Squadron is ready to lift whenever.”

Greywind. The most elite starfighter squadron within the Confederation. I suppose I should be lucky that I have them for once; they’re usually off with Lucerne’s commands. I guess their presence here means the mission is of some importance to the Confederation.

T4a Lambda-class Shuttle Contegorian Courage, Ter Abbes

“We’ll be moving into the atmosphere shortly,” announced the shuttle pilot, “Make sure you are firmly strapped in.”

The Pro-Consul stared out of the shuttle’s viewport motionlessly. She had already strapped in before the shuttle had even left the Trojan’s hangar bay. Her eyes gazing at Ter Abbes, the Kashan woman let a yawn escape her lips. It’s so dreary out there; a forsaken planet. Thorn frowned. In more ways than one. By the maker, I pity the Confederation service members who will get stationed here. Though I suppose it’s pretty surprising it hasn’t petitioned to join the Confederation now. Ter Abbes was located just off the Perlemian trade out between the Roche Asteroid Belt and Anzat; right within the Contegorian Confederation influence of space. Confederation merchant vessels frequented the planet; exchanging their cargo and credits for the planet’s exports, typically industrial goods. As the Confederation had expanded, soon Ter Abbes was surrounded by Confederation planets with Soroya coreward and Audacia several light years away. But given how their government has operated in the past; I guess it’s not too much a surprise. Ter Abbes had a democratically elected government headed by a Prime Minister; a political system found throughout the galaxy. What wasn’t found throughout the galaxy was the political instabilities within that sort of system. When the Mandalorian mercenary Goran Bevjin assassinated a politician on the planet, a brief civil war began; only stopped by the invasion of the Vong, which had reunited the planet. An odd coalition of archenemies headed the interim government up for several years without election. A recent grassroots movement across the planet had called for new elections and a reshaping of the government in order to prevent further such occurrences from happening. And for that, the Confederation had been invited by the people through a referendum to help with the reconstruction of the government. Rumours abounded throughout the streets of the industrial planet that it would be joining the Confederation as well. An unsubstantiated fact. Who knows; maybe the leaders elect will be the ones to make that decision.

A voice softly echoed throughout the shuttle’s cabin. “We’ll be landing shortly. Estimated at five standard minutes.”

In Orbit around Ter Abbes
Nebula-Class Star Destroyer Aequus

The dim lights in the captains quarters had been turned down a little bit in preparation for sleep but like many other times sleep did not come easily to Awdin, so he had finally gotten himself out of bed and walked over to his desk, having more pressing things to do besides making futile attempts to sleep. Slowly he pulled a robe on just incase some one happened to walk in, which would not be good with him only in his underwear.

Bending over slightly he initiated the holo system in his desk, sitting as the desk came to life with various screens, readouts, and systems. Awdin could here the slight hum of the systems that the desk contained working, processing, and booting up. Eventually the systems finally all were ready and he began to once again peruse through his assignment on Ter Abbes. He looked through the holo documents sighing to himself as he read through the briefing which he had been given by command before coming here.

He could already see that most of his time would be spent on training the Ter Abbes security forces which were at the moment a shabby bunch of local militia. He was already going through the exercises and such that he would be using to get them into fighting shape.

Along with that he was also supposed to oversee the development, production, and testing of a couple of new ships that were being produced by their defense forces. He had the rough schematics for them somewhere but didn’t feel like taking the time at the moment to go through all the files searching for them. Lastly was the duty of keeping order during the elections and making sure that nothing went wrong “Purposefully”, or accidentally. In preparation he had already sent troops down when they had arrived, nothing much just something to show them that they were concerned about the election and the general safety of this process and the people involved. At the moment he still had not received any objections or thank you from the government, and no trace of the people being annoyed or mad about this. So for the moment they would stay there and help keep order especially since the normal security forces would be absent for training in the next few weeks.

At the bottom was a small note that besides his forces Pro-Counsel Thorn and Captain Valeska would also be here mostly on diplomatic missions though, at least for Thorn. The captain frowned slightly the facial expression casting long shadows over his face in the dim light. Personally he hated political side of most things, and only got involved in that kind of thing when absolutely necessary. It wasn’t that he was bad at politics or didn’t understand them it was more of a fact that things usually went slow when politics were involved, and not all that interesting at least to him.

At the thought of politics he remembered a phrase from the academy. Something about that war is only a continuation of politics and a different means of the same thing . He shook his head slightly because mostly that was true.

He dropped his head into his hands as he thought that he would probably play a key part in the entrance of Ter Abbes into the Confederation at least on the military side of things.

There was a slight click as he turned on another projector that brought up a holo image of the planet. It by no means was a “pretty’ planet, by no means at all. He looked it over seeing markers where he had placed troops and where there were points of interest. Such as the capital, speeches for election candidates, and other things like this. For a moment he laid his head into his hands. He felt like a kid going through his homework in a way. Slowly he raised himself, turning off the equipment and such and pushing in the chair when he was finally standing, and suddenly he felt tired like he could go to sleep. He walked over to his bed plans for everything racing through his head as he got into bed again after shedding the robe.

Chamberlin Hall, Vorsprung, Ter Abbes

Faint light barely penetrated through the dark windows of the municipal building. Chamberlin Hall was host to several of Vorsprung’s public works. Including the TAUWM: a multi-faceted agency that not only dealt with elections, but somehow with the distribution of vaccines. It seemed like an odd arrangement to the Kashan woman. Clumsy and awkward. Just like this room.

“This is a mess.”

Her brown eyes scanned the room, resting her left hand on her hip. Holo-projectors, desks, and comlink stations were haphazardly scattered across the tiled floor. Cables snaked around the floor, making walking through the room a tedious process. The Pro-Consul’s eyes squinted. How they managed to get this far is beyond me with this organization. The janitors or cleaning droids must go nuts whenever elections are going on. The Maker help us if every election site is like this. She closed eyes and let out an exasperated sigh.

“Ambassador Thorn.”

She spun about her heels to face the man. Christina eyed him over. Dowdy. The man is positively dowdy. But something is different about him. She looked at him closer. It’s confidence with which he speaks and walks. He could have passed as the tech support guy except for that. And he looks familiar…

“Ma’am?”

She slightly shook her head and began to preen. “Hello sir. Is there anything I can do for you?”

He flashed a smile. “No, I think there’s something I could, uh, maybe do for you. Do you see that projector over there? I received a complaint about a malfunction with it. It says here that you filed the claim. Perhaps you can show me what’s wrong…”

I didn’t file anything…

The man leaned closer and whispered in her ear. “Work with me here.”

She nodded. As the supposed tech man walked over to the dysfunctional console, she quietly grasped her holdout blaster concealed in the folds of her gown. She looked from side to side across the room as she approached the man. He kneeled at the base of the projector.

“So in your report you say it won’t power up…”

The Kashan woman nodded.

“…take a look down here.”

The Confederation politician kneeled down beside the man; concealing the pair from any observation by outsiders, whether they were in the hallway or the room. He looked at her eyes and offered her a hand.

“I am Special Agent Kel Mills of CSIS. The Rear-Admiral has assigned me to keep an eye on you.”

She rolled her eyes and pressed her holdout against the man’s ribs. “I can take care of myself thank you very much.”

He looked down at the blaster and snorted. “I might be impressed by that remark if there was a powerpack loaded with it. It’s rather useless without ammo, you know.”

She glanced down. So that’s what I forgot. Wonderful. I probably look like a real ditz right now. Thorn blushed and concealed weapon back into her gown. She grasped his hand to return the handshake.

“I think I should be fine. But I’ll be sure to get you if I need any help. How can I contact you?”

“With this,” replied the Kel, handing over a small, miniaturized comlink, “it only has one frequency. So you don’t have to worry about remembering anything, and it’s encrypted. I’ll also be shadowing you. But we will look rather suspicious if we keep talking all the time. I’d rather not have my cover be blown.”

She nodded. “I understand.”

He looked up quickly and then back down. “So what you forgot to do was to plug in the projector.”

“Mister Praxon, try and not be so blunt to our esteemed guest in the future,” sneered a man edging towards the Confederation personnel.

The mayor. The woman nodded. “It’s understandable. I imagine that with all of the glitches going around, it’s been a long day for you, Mister Praxon.”

Kel bowed as much as his crouching position would allow. “Thank you for your understanding, miss.”

Warehouse BA-5, Ter Abbes

It was a stark, industrial building with stenciled letters claiming it was Warehouse BA-5 owned by a subsidiary of a now defunct Republic Engineering Corporation. Durasteel girders and frames with duracrete walls formed a multi-level rectangular warehouse. Windows and other creature comforts were at a minimum. There were hundreds of similar buildings across the planet. Many stored goods from the various corporations and factories that had made Ter Abbes their home. There were even some offworld interests which maintained them for holding excess imports. But this one was unique on Ter Abbes. A security officer with the REC trade logo emblazoned his sleeve leaned against the warehouse’s wall.

“Tex, that you there?”

A man spun around with his blaster in hand. He let out an exasperated sigh.

“Blast you. Don’t sneek up on me like that. I could have shot you thunking you were an intruder. What do you want? You’re not scheduled to relieve me for another fifteen minutes…”

The shorter man nodded. “I know. But the boss is coming with the Top-Scale crew.”

The other man’s jaw dropped. “The Top-scale crew? Now? What’s gotten into his mind? It’s a little dangerous. I mean, there’s still sunlight.”

“I know Tex. I don’t like it either. Best get ready though. I see dust coming up the road.”

Tex silently cursed and holstered his pistol. The two security guards briskly jogged to the guard house, more of a booth, set at the perimeter of the property. Pulling up the security controls on the built-in computer terminal, Tex tapped a few buttons as they could see the first silhouette of the lead landspeeder: a Mobquet Corona Limited luxury groundspeeder. The energy fences surrounding the facility briefly dropped to allow the landspeeders access.

Tex whistled. “Has to be them All right. Who else could afford those?”

The other guard nodded and re-activated the fences. “I’ll take care of everything from here. Have a nice night Tex.”

“You too.”



Chamberlin Hall, Vorsprung, Ter Abbes

Pro-Consul Thorn strode through the hallways of the diplidated building. Several days ago, she would have heard her footsteps echoing as she went from floor to floor. But in the last few hours, throngs of people had crowded into the building. The lower floors were filled with a variety of voters. Some of the campaigns had even brought in the homeless to vote. Yet a booth away, a rather successful businessman cast his own ballot. Thorn found the disparity in the classes intriguing. Ter Abbes had largely a pre-dominant middle class whose loyalty was split into a multitude of parties and platforms. On the other hand, the lowest and richest of people were very well organized into lines. Thus, the major deciders of the election were oddly enough, the minorities. Usually, it was a very close race between the candidates because the two extremes nearly cancelled each other out. Where the poor held the basic numerical advantage, the rich wielded more influence, which indirectly swayed more voters to whatever side though chose to support. Thus, the balance of power stood on a teeter-totter for decades until the civil war, and continued to do so during the provisional government. Based on history, the election would seem to be like every one before it.

Christina looked down at the floor. But that might not be the case. Rumours about the elections were nothing new. They happened nearly every election. Some candidate had an affair. Some candidate was corrupt. Some candidate has a dead skeleton in his closet. Some of them were true, but most were just pure mudslinging. But what was rare was the persistence of new rumours’ contents: the election was being rigged. Thorn had heard it from both members of multiple parties. And each one had their own slight twist to the story. She would have normally shrugged that off as typical Ter Abbes Mudslinging. But there was one mystery. All members of the same party told their story exactly the same way, with the same words in the same general order, and in the same tone. Rumours aren’t that strictly uniform in anything. Thorn finally ended her walk in her temporary office within the building. She set her datapad on the desk and reclined her chair.

“Ma’am?”

She looked up to see a familiar face within the doorway.

“Ah, Mister Praxon, do come in,” invited the Kashan woman, “please shut the door behind you.”

The undercover agent nodded and shut the door behind him. Holding up a hand, Mills pulled out a device out of hi coat and pointed it in all manners of directions. He’s doing a sweep of the room for bugs. Right.

“No bugs?”

Mills frowned and silently shook his head. He leaned in over the desk to whisper in her ear.

“Not that I can detect, but that doesn’t mean much. There could be a lot of passive systems that this thing wouldn’t detect.”

The Pro-Consul sighed and mutely nodded.



Warehouse BA-5, Ter Abbes

“…as you can see, its messed everything up.”

“Yes, I know. In fact, I bet we all could have guessed that. What I don’t get is the need for a meeting in person. Doesn’t this make us more suspicious to the feds? A holo-chat would have been a bit more secretive and private,” stated the dark-skinned man.

Aurelius Leed, the supposed manager of the warehouse, nodded in understanding. They were in the basement of the warehouse standing and sitting among durasteel crates. A motley group of people surrounded him. They seemed to have little in common whether it be their looks, gender, age, ethnicity, or clothing. In fact, they all could have seemed to be an average person one could meet on the street or in the office except for one thing: their extremish clothing. Some of which was very traditional and classy, some of which was risqué, some of which had gone long out of style, and some which revealed their cultural origins. Leed’s face briefly twitched into a frown as he paced around. They can be so difficult at times.

“Yes, yes your right. I could have used a holo-chat. Do you know what the potential problem with that is?”

He looked around the people. A couple of them nodded in recognization. Most simply stayed still; their faces impassive with apathy. A couple of them uneasily shifted their feet or gazed down. Leed tightened his jaw and continued to the circle around the group like a wary predator.

“We could have used holo-chat. Doing so would expose us to the possibility of not only being detected, but completely discovered and revealed. What do you think would happen if someone, the Confederates or our own government came across our channel? Yes, it is encrypted, but couldn’t that only make them more curious? And none of you would think that they couldn’t crack it, would you?” stated the man, “at least this way we prevent us being exposed by any electronic means. Enough with this nonsense, let’s talk business…”



Nebula-class Star Destroyer Trojan, in orbit via Ter Abbes

“They’re not bad,” stated Lieutenant Avris.

Valeska scowled. “Not bad, but not good either. Their force composition is interesting, using the Defenders as swarm starfighters. While it certainly utilizes their strength of industry, what about their pilots? They don’t seem to have a lot of skilled pilots. Probably because they don’t last that long in Defenders. Which we could attribuate to battlefield attrition if they were in continual war.”

“It’s not like Republic Engineering Corporation made shoddy projects. Or is the Trojan a shoddy product?”

The black-haired woman glared at the flight coordinator. “The Trojan is actually an Abhean product, even REC designed it.”

“That’s what I’m getting.”

“I don’t equate the two to be the same thing. There’s a hell of a lot replacements in their starfighter corps. All because of a lot minor accidents; repulsors failing and what not.”

“Bad maintenance?”

“That’s what the official reports state, but not everything fits. How would the nav computers be bad by maintenance? Those things shouldn’t have been modified by the techs at all.”

Avris nodded. “So what does that leave us?”

“Bad construction. The thing is that all of them passed their safety tests according to the official inspections. Heck, they didn’t even half to pay for the replacement ships. The subsidiary that REC left continues to not only build them, but has found wealthy sponsors to help provide some of the fighters free to the government. A campaign of some sort.”

Avris. “Corporations having their hands in politics isn’t new.”

Valeska leaned over the console.

“But corporations sponsoring specific pilots into the armed forces without any base to choose them on is.”

“Sponsoring random pilots?”

“Yes, it doesn’t make any sense. There are some better pilots they didn’t sponsor at all. What’s the link? Get me a background check on them. I’m going to get a surface party ready.”

“Yes ma’am.”

Chamberlin Hall, Vorsprung, Ter Abbes

“So what do you want me to do about? Run in there with my hold-out and tell them they’re all under arrest?” questioned the Pro-Consul.

Kels scowled. “No, but as one of the officials overlooking the election, I think you should send an investigative party.”

She rolled her eyes and sighed. “It’s a bit more complicated than that. You’re basing a move on pure rumour.”

“It’s more than a simple rumour. You said it yourself,” stated the Confederation Intelligence Officer, “and it seems to fit.”

“A lot of things could fit,” replied the Kashan woman, “I’ve had people tell me I look like a fashion model. That doesn’t make me a fashion model. Just because it looks like a political conspiracy doesn’t mean that maybe they’re having a perfectly legal political gathering. We certainly can’t make the move without the authority and permission of the Ter Abbes government.”

Kels sighed. “That’s asking for failure. If they’re that well off politically and materialistically, they’re going to have eyes and ears in the government. They’ll be tipped off ahead of time and we’ll start looking like fools. That’ll be a great impression.”

“That’s one trouble democracy presents us with,” mused Christina, “in order to protect the freedoms of others, we trade secrecy and efficiency sometimes. But we gain better satisfaction from our people. We can’t have everything Kels, and this looks like something we won’t be able to catch. Tell me, do you put a possibly guilty man in prison, or let him go free? Do you believe in guilty to proven?”

The agent muttered. “I’d rather put him in jail until proven innocent.”

“You know that’d never work in politics.”

Kels barked a laugh, “That’s why I just spy on people instead. I have some work to do. Pleasure seeing you ma’am.”

As the man walked out of the door, Thorn leaned back in her chair. Cocking her head to the side, she swiped a comlink off the top of her desk. Hitting the calling stub, Christina put it up to her mouth.



Warehouse BA-5, Ter Abbes

The movers and shakers of Ter Abbes society, whether they were entertainers or labour union leaders, continued to listen to the warehouse foreman. An image of their world hang above Leeds as he continued his briefing. He tapped a button on the holo-projector’s remote control, and the projection vanished in mid air. Small, box shaped droids scurried around the floor, handing out bell-shaped wine glasses to everyone within the room. Leeds himself grabbed one from a crate behind him.

“…Everything is almost set,” stated Leeds, “our people are ready in position. This Confederation involvement with practicing with our military could be a potential problem, but I’ve arranged for our group to give the escort. It took a couple of bribes and blackmailings to do. But it is ours for the taking. Gentlemen and ladies, to success and the Ter Abbes Oligarchy. May its reign ever last.”

“Wait a minute, let’s trade glasses,” stated one of the occupants, hurrying over to Leeds.

“As you wish,” replied Leeds, exchanging glasses with the man, “if you’re worried about me poisioning you all with this, I could drink any one of your glasses first. Let me assure you, they’re quite safe.”

Before the others could drink, he quaffed the contents of his new glass down and smiled. The others followed suit, drinking down their glasses. They smiled and started talking among themselves. Some about their plans, some about the exquisite flavour of the wines, and some about the terribly amused smile plastered on the foreman’s face. A woman stood up among the crowd and faced Leeds.

“I feel-”

She collapsed to the ground. Others collapsed, others rose before also falling onto the ground or slumping across the various crates that littered the room’s floor. Leeds merely shook his head.

“Ah, the most difficult part about this whole mess is over Tex,” stated the man to the approaching security guard, “it’s a pity they didn’t think to build up a resistance to Gringor venom. They might have actually survived. Get rid of their bodies. I don’t care how or where, as long as they can’t be found within thirty-six hours...”



Across the starlit sky, a trio of craft quietly glided across the industrial landscape of Ter Abbes, occasionally eclipsing stars until they neared warehouse BA-5. A pair of Deathsabers silently hovered over the circular enclosure like angels of death. Underneath them, the Ter Abbes Navy shuttle descended onto the duracrete landing pad. Its landing ramps lowered which a mass of shadowy men clammered down, led by Agent Kels and Captain Valeska. Kels looked at their motley force, composed of Ter Abbes police and Confederate volunteers, and smiled. Most of them drew and checked their service sidearms. The agent turned to Valeska and hesitated.

“Now what?”

“You don't have a plan?! You don't have a plan. No one ever has a plan,” muttered Valeska, “Why does no one ever have a plan?”

“I guess will do this by the seat of our pants.”

“Wonderful,” muttered the former instructor to the agent, motioning over her naval volunteers, “this is what we’re going to do. We’re going to secure the perimeter. Kels, take your people up the left. I’ll take mine up the right.”

Kels nodded and motioned his contingent over to the side of the building. The policemen hugged the sides of the wall for better cover. They moved slowly, with each advance being covered by several weapons. On the other side, Valeska’s marines and sailors slowly around in a pack, not even remotely trying to conceal themselves. The captain walked over to the guard box and found it empty. She grabbed her comlink.

“Nothing.”

Kel’s voice came back calm and cool. “Nothing here either. Something’s not right here. They have to be all inside. But why? It doesn’t make any sense from a security standpoint unless it’s a trap.”

“So what do we do?”

“Spring the trap,” stated the agent, “there’s no entrance here. We’ll come around and meet you at the guard station.”



Office, Warehouse BA-5

Leeds hunched forward over his office computer terminal, hurriedly typing a message. Various datacards were haphazardly scattered across his desk. The door swung open and Tex walked in. Leeds glanced up from his office computer terminal in annoyance.

“Boss, we have a situation.”

Leeds leaned back. “Define situation.”

“We’ve been surrounded by the police and Confederate troops.”

He frowned. “Have they done anything yet?”

“They just walked around the building, but now they’re heading for the main entrance.”

Aurelius cursed under his breath. “Have you got rid of the bodies yet?”

“No need to,” stated a new voice.

Tex slightly wobbled and toppled onto the ground. The barrel of a blaster slid into view from the doorway. Agent Kels walked in and spared a brief glance at Tex.

“Don’t worry,” stated the Confederate, “he’s just stunned. I suppose the same can’t be said for your guests on the main floor.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I think you do, otherwise you wouldn’t have asked your guard abou”t the bodies. And besides killing several dozen influential citizens, you’ve managed to bribe officials, put the lives of Ter Abbes servicemen at risk, and conspired to topple the government. I’m not terribly familiar with your planet’s laws, Mister Leeds, but I imagine if you’re not executed, you’ll be spending a fair amount of time in prison. I do give you credit though, it was a masterful plot, if not greedy.”

The man from Ter Abbes stared at him silently. Kels shrugged.

“You managed to convince a vast majority of influential leaders from a variety of backgrounds to help take part in treason via a coup. You played on their greed, their lust for more power. I think their greed was probably only overshadowed by your own. You wanted it all, but you couldn’t do it without their help. You needed money and allies within the government and political parties for your coup plan to work. If you mass-controlled many of the parties, you’d win; at least for a while. The problem remained that they would eventually disagree with you or each other and it would all fall apart. But that’s what you persuaded them what the plan was. Part of that plan involved infiltrating Ter Abbes forces with your followers. They did this for you as part thinking that those forces would loyally protect them if things went wrong. They probably would have, in fact, but you had other plans. Namely to use those forces to eliminate the leaders and infrastructure of the Ter Abbes government. And you would certainly win the ensuing civil war because you would not only control most of the remaining military, but would also be able to produce a fair amount of war material. How far off am I?”

Leeds glared at the Confederate with rage.



Aftermath…

Vorsprung

The red-and-blue banners of Ter Abbes hung from nearly every window across the city. It was inaugural day. At Vorsprung, Christina Thorn, acting as an event hostess, stood on a massive stage erected in one of the city’s square with the newly elected officials. Throngs of citizens had amassed around them, hearing several speeches promising change and commitments to their constituents. The Kashan woman began her last introduction of the day.

“…and so, it is my pleasure to introduce to you your new President, Fionn Codi,” stated Pro-Consul Thorn.

She started to clap, which the crowd quickly joined in on, occasionally interjected by yells from supporters or detractors of Codi. The President-elect nervously arose from his central seat. Codi smiled as he neared the podium.

“Thank you, thank you my fellow citizens…”

The clapping ceased.

“…much has been promised to you today. Better schools, a better economy, a more fair justice system, and free pet caf from Senator Orgas…”

The crowd lightly chuckled at the last item.

“…These are all wonderful and fine things. I hope they do live up to their promises and commitments, not only because it is the right thing to do, but you deserve it. There are many things I believe our great people deserve that have not met over these last years. I have seen a great many proposals to solve these ills, these diseases. Some of them are truly mad, and some would solve some of our problems. In fact, there is no one solution, only components that form this solution. And I firmly believe, that membership into the Contegorian Confederation is one of them. Because of this and from what many people have told me, I am authorizing…”