Before I begin I suppose I should note that I'm not speaking for all of the Corsairs here. My name is Icarus Augustopolos and I represent a minority group of Corsairs known as the Custodi. I was also the person that greeted you in the Sigmas.
I was originally slightly reluctant to contact the Liberty armed forces about anything considering the rather uncomfortable status our people enjoy within the Republic, however since it's still light years away, in the good way, from other Houses then I suppose there is no reason not to. That has, of course, a bit to do with this new little anomaly that opened a couple of hours ago in our back yard.
I guess we are not the only people who this consider this jump hole to be slightly inconvenient. It attracts some of the element that we'd rather distance ourselves from - such as Outcasts and their orange poison - and I suppose you feel the same way.
So to break the ice I would like to propose a little agreement. The status of the Corsairs within Liberty is not very clear and while by my perception we are not considered outright hostile, some police officers have been slightly trigger happy towards my persona when I was passing through several days ago. As such, we can dispatch a couple of squadrons of fighters and bombers that can assist you in guarding the jump hole if you can guarantee that they will not be shot by Liberty forces in Colorado. You know - a non-aggression pact for the greater good, "enemy of my enemy", et cetera.
Yours faithfully,
Ίκαρος Αυγουστόπουλος
Icarus Augustopolos - Custodi General
I'm fairly surprised to see the Corsairs being the first to reach out in regards to offering a non-aggression pact. While I cannot say that I'm against it, to openly operate with people we do not fully trust yet wouldn't be very wise.
As such, I only see my agency being potentially interested in working with you under very limited capacities, this over-all agreement on the N.A.P will require approval by all the parties you've mentioned however, given the urgency of the matter at hand.
What particularly interests me is your 'end-game' here, we all have motives and things that makes us tick, what does it for you in this situation Mister Augustopolos? What do you see as being the end reason for wanting to cooperate with Liberty all of a sudden, after many years of our people ignoring each other in justified passive aggressiveness.
Though for the sake of simplifying this process and waiting for the responses of the others, I will set up terms that I feel are needed. If this pact is to go through, your side must fulfill the following:
There shall be no smuggling of artifacts through your people or otherwise in or around Liberty space, or any form of smuggling thereof, utilizing of third parties or otherwise.
No obstructions to the armed forces shall be committed in any way shape or form if they are acting within the norms of their duties.
You will not obstruct commercial, civilian or military traffic within Liberty space by utilizing the anomaly or otherwise.
If in case either side must pursue a fleeing criminal through the anomaly, due courtesy and information must be passed and permission to eliminate the target in the other's space granted, this should not just be done without an announcement of some form.
None of your warships will be allowed to hunker down within Liberty space, should you have any.
To clarify, Mister Augustopolos, I'm not agreeing with or denying your proposition, I'm merely getting the ball rolling for the others to pitch in. Let's see what the others have to say. I'm also interested in your list of restrictions regarding the pact.
I am happy to see that you are at the very least open to some negotiations. As such, let me answer some of your concerns.
As I said before, we do not represent all of the Corsairs. Most of the ones you probably met for the last couple hundred years were the ones we call Dorians - those eager to quickly venture out into space and profiteering on various unimportant commodities. This, unfortunately, left our nation heading to a slow but sure destruction. A significant portion of their own people live in poverty and thousands of them die of starvation every day.
The Custodi are the ones who provide a significant portion of essential supplies to the rest of our people - grain, wood, fruit and water - and we realised we simply cannot function anymore without some kind of external support. As such we ventured out into space to at the very least attempt to fix the reputation the Dorians have so thoroughly broken. We are not all savages, Mr Reeves.
Now as for your terms. While I do not entirely understand the almost Sirius-wide bans placed on Artifacts, if that is your wish we will honor it. Also we do not have any warships larger than gunboats in our ranks, so I don't think this will be an issue.
When it comes to our requirements. Your laws specify that Corsair ships and equipment are banned in Liberty, regardless of who is flying them. We would like this ban lifted for ships under the Custodi tag (C::).
As a semi-related matter, we also have one incident that happened yesterday in the Colorado system and involved the Gas Miners Guild ships. One of your pilots, Guard, was present at the scene.
[15.10.2016 19:27:05] GMG|Tal,Ravis: Right.
[15.10.2016 19:27:08] GMG|Tal,Ravis: Tracking target.
[15.10.2016 19:27:15] GMG|Keiji''Namura: Guild ships, on me.
[15.10.2016 19:27:20] GMG|Tal,Ravis: Got visual on that Corsair fighter.
[15.10.2016 19:27:22] [GMG]Captain.Ginyu: Roger that ! *strikes a pose*
[15.10.2016 19:27:27] GMG|Keiji''Namura: Target is on scanners.
[15.10.2016 19:27:31] GMG|Tal,Ravis: Copy that.
[15.10.2016 19:27:34] [GMG]Captain.Ginyu: I am ready too shoot when you are ! *strikes another pose*
[15.10.2016 19:27:42] GMG|Keiji''Namura: Guild ships, charge weapons.
[15.10.2016 19:27:43] GMG|Tal,Ravis: Got positive ID.
[15.10.2016 19:27:47] GMG|Tal,Ravis: That's the bastard we're looking for.
[15.10.2016 19:27:50] GMG|Keiji''Namura: You know your target, engage.
[15.10.2016 19:27:53] [LN]-ESRD|Guard: GMG vessels, you are in violation of Liberty space.
[15.10.2016 19:27:53] [GMG]Captain.Ginyu: Target in sight ! Engaging !
[15.10.2016 19:27:53] GMG|Keiji''Namura: Discharging weapons.
[15.10.2016 19:27:55] GMG|Tal,Ravis: Acknowledged, moving to intercept.
[15.10.2016 19:28:02] [LN]-ESRD|Guard: Do not open fire.
[15.10.2016 19:28:32] GMG|Keiji''Namura: Liberty ships, cease fire immediatelyt.
[15.10.2016 19:28:44] [LN]-ESRD|Guard: This is your last warning. Hold fire.
[15.10.2016 19:28:53] GMG|Keiji''Namura: This is a Guild operation. Keep your distance.
[15.10.2016 19:29:04] [LN]-ESRD|Guard: I'm affraid this is Liberty space.
[15.10.2016 19:29:10] [LN]-ESRD|Guard: You mmight as well break off.
[15.10.2016 19:30:46] GMG|Tal,Ravis: Keep on him.
As you can hopefully understand, if such vigilante groups of people would be allowed to operate in Liberty and hunt my people this agreement is not possible to come to fruition.
Yours sincerely,
Ίκαρος Αυγουστόπουλος
Icarus Augustopolos - Custodi General
You make a compelling argument, one I'm willing to partially accept for the time-being. The ultimate decision of certain changes in regards to diplomacy between the Republic and the Custodi will be subject to the Government's ultimate decision. All I can do on your behalf, should you begin proving your differences from your own brethren, is lobby in support of you.
While you seem like a perfectly intelligent man, I'm not sure whether by fatigue or general over-sight you ended up averting a rather important question I needed answered, 'what your ultimate desire out of this potential cooperation was'?
Though I'm willing to brush that aside since you did me the kindness of sharing information you'd collected, both visual and audio-wise. I see potential, but that's all I currently see. I'll pay one good turn with another and consider you largely different from these 'Dorians'.
On the basis of your very own words regarding external support, I'm willing to bet, even though I'm not a gambling man, that you do seek for Liberty to help supply your people with the bare necessities required for life. I'll be frank with you here Mister Augustopolos, that's a big ask given the long line of negligent history your Dorians have left behind. Stay your current path, play us no underhand tricks and this could go further than I'm sure most people expect.
I'm nonetheless forced to wait and also observe the points that the other departments you've looped into this transmission will bring to the table. For the time being, I can guarantee that 404's assets will not fire on you should you fulfill the above terms. This isn't an official pact, just us reaching an understanding and checking if your statements about your nature and differences hold water.
The Guild entering Liberty space like that without proper procedure is alarming. But that's a matter that's largely out of my hands to decide upon, all I can do is express my distaste for their lack of manners. Matters of border integrity fall under the Navy's belt and experience, along with the L.P.I. I'll leave the handling of that specific incident to them.
My apologies for not being too specific. Of course, our 'ultimate desire', as you called it, is the survival of our own people. I am not only talking here about provisions though.
I am not blind and I saw the Libertonian planets. Most of those have little to no grain fields or other traditional means of providing food to your population. By contrast, the fields of Attica on Crete are easily visible from space. I suppose you have developed some kind of technology that lets you feed your population a lot more efficiently than we can do with ours. Understanding and employing such technology on Crete would undoubtedly prove to be very helpful in that regard.
Additionally, I hope you can understand that we have lived for a long time without support from the outside while our enemies started making friends with the Houses. Not that long ago our pilots noticed the Outcasts getting on very friendly terms with the Bretonians. It would be foolish to think that we can only rely on ourselves if that is the case.
Nonetheless, I'm glad to hear you are supportive of our idea and I hope we can get input from the other addressees of this communication.
Yours sincerely,
Ίκαρος Αυγουστόπουλος
Icarus Augustopolos - Custodi General
COMM ID:Captain DEGRANGE, Elisabeth TARGET ID:Custodi General Icarus Augustopolos SUBJECT: ------ ENCRYPTION:High PRIORITY:Medium
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Greetings Mr.Augustopolos,
It's not often you get to hear from a Corsair, not in Liberty at least. Thank our geographic positions for that. The last time we had contact with one was some years ago. Anyways, that's quite some interesting information you've got there. Can't really call it new, but good enough to make a point. It's just a cheeky battle of pinches and bureaucracy, for now.
From what I see, you have some requests, support of some kind and technology. Well, in the end it's still negotiations. You as well need to be offering something. So, Mr. Augustopolos, what exactly are you bringing to the table? What kind of capabilities do you and/or your group have? Combat capabilities, your influence within the corsairs and your ability to bring us valuable commodities or materials from beyond our influence and "reach". Upon hearing that, I might consider giving you an offer or having you do some more specific tasks for us.
But before that, to prove better than and different from your "Dorian" fellows, there's some conditions you need to know and consider.
- In Bretonia, the Liberty Navy Expeditionary Fleet has had several hostile encounters with corsair entities. ESRD operatives in the Omegas or Omicrons have reported such as well. We wish to see none of that from you or your group. If possible you are to also utilize any influence you may have, to make sure such is avoided.
- Liberty Commerce is often assaulted by Corsairs as well. We wish to see none of such from you and your group, and if possible to ensure them safe flow.
- Now last but not least, working with organizations considered hostile, dangerous and/or perceived as a threat for the maintaining of law and order by the Republic of Liberty, is a no go. We require that you at least remain indifferent and not supportive of such and possibly assist against them.
So, Mr. Augustopolos, what are you bringing to the table?
As far as that guild incident, it happened during a temporary anomaly, and yet still indeed concerning. However now that he anomaly is over, we won't be hearing much from them, except for the usual business and commerce they have long done. In any case we'll see that they do at least receive a deserved warning and possibly a sanction for their actions.
And for Artifacts? Let me put it like this. It's a mystery box. It may either do nothing, make a great ornament, open up the possibilities to discover the secrets to the next era of technology, or simply bring in doom's day. After all they're still alien things.
Waiting for your reply.
Captain Elisabeth DeGrange, out.
Important:This communication remains the property of the Liberty Defence Forces and is subject to the jurisdiction of the Neural Net Communications Act 807A.S, Section 30. If you have received this message in error, you are requested to contact the sender and delete the communication.
I'm glad to hear back from the Liberty Navy and to see that you too are not dismissive of our intents at first glance.
Now regarding your points. We cannot promise anything in Bretonia. The Kingdom of Bretonia is in a state of outright war with Corsairs and empirical evidence shows there will be conflicts of interests. Similarly I cannot guarantee safe passage for Liberty transports coming in or out of Bretonia. However what I can say is that we will attempt to support the Liberty Expeditionary Fleet forces in the Omegas and Omicrons to the best of our ability.
Regarding your final point I can only say we will do our best to avoid conflicts of interest. Custodi aren't tied to any organisations Liberty would consider hostile so I hope it is not difficult. We will remain indifferent in case of a combat as our ships are instructed to act only in self-defence in such cases.
Now. As you are definitely aware, our homeland of Crete lies very close to the Nomad worlds and we have had some encounters with the aliens even in our home system. While I'm sure the Navy maintains contact with other organisations on the frontier, we have access to one kind of alien materials which I don't think can be acquired elsewhere.
While we have doubts as to whether they come from Nomads, the Xeno Relics as they are called, definitely show some interesting properties. Some of the research conducted on those by the Dorians show that they might inhibit scanner waves which, if confirmed, can prove to be very helpful in certain situations.
Unfortunately the research facilities on Crete aren't advanced enough to even consider researching properties of those relics. They are definitely different than Artifacts in that they are found in space and mostly homogeneous in appearance. Should the Navy be interested in those, we would be more than happy to supply you with them.
Additionally as I explained to one of the ESRD agents during our conversation at Bethlehem, the Corsairs have ties to many organisations around Sirius and there are many things we are able to acquire in small quantities that would be otherwise inaccessible to Liberty.
Let me know if those terms satisfy you.
Yours sincerely,
Ίκαρος Αυγουστόπουλος
Icarus Augustopolos - Custodi General