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Alster Unioners

Frei was barely repressing himself. Oh, this was going to be interesting. Irrespective as to if anything benign came of it. The pieces were steadily slotting together, as though fate was a blown-out hotrod of a shuttle being made whole again by a wiley technician with a junkyard of new-build components. Now that Corin had enough of an insight to substantiate rumour with fact - it was time to tip the scales.


Frei's Bretonian English was close to immaculate - it had to be - trade between the Syndicates was a bilingual job. But he had a belief that someone in GCHQ would translate Tomrum directly to Carinea's own BBC inflections, and like any good Unioner, Frei had an obligation to parody government institutions even when he was arm in arm with them. He switched into a florid mix of asteroid slang, Rheinland underworld creole, and Hamburg Rheinish German and badly mauled Danish lonewords that would irritate any Lane Hacker decryptors who might be punching a dataspike into the commnet.

It has been some time since we last dialogued. The news is good - the foundations are set, bera asilik have planned for - if you follow.


Rheinland is entering a period fo' reshufflin' the books, but the auld dynamics remain in play, wit o nawit da same bodies filling the pressure vessels. We have kept a light touch - the opportunists in the edgeworlds have done much of the unifying response for us. Risk of any self-titled patriot setting us back a few years has diminished. Now that is a cause for celebration on both sides of the Walker Nebula, ja?

We have the numbers, and the support - in the blue-collar and in the populi, to push for restitution. Which is to say, the politicians are seriously considering reinstating the Compacts of Unionisation. Restoring the old ways - the old dignities, is no longer a dirty phrase left for radicals, If a royal kaiser is the end result remains to be seen, mi sneakfreund. We are all honest brokers now. Leverage; we have it on the Republicans, and in the industry, too. We've cut a deal with the Robusters - the Exec' board of DHC themselves, on that account. Oder and Alster behover till Arbeiterstreiks - their production rests upon us. Radical legitimacy, min cabalers. It gets the pundits talking. Only the 'Schuh and their
FaulHesse handlers name our mang terrorists now. Terror's a dated taktik for deadmen when your enemies choose to play with red, veinpaint.


It's how you know you're entering the final days. Near two hundred years of human suffering about to hit a reckoning, long, long overdue on its debts.

I can't share op's details. The cells havn't cleared me to give you the full picture yet. Suffice to say, the FaulHesse are going to be tied in knots in the eastern front soon enough, which might ease pressure on the left. I've heard that the Coalition are taking exception to the moves you've made in rebuilding your homeland. I've heard all the main actors have been traded around like pieces on the board, and all the Coalition's subgroups are operatin' under redetached chain of command nowadays. Y'kan only build such wa groß hull wit so much steel before the air starts seeping out.

What air has seeped out, Bretonia? Your war in the Omegas has stress-tested that boat. I've been in the room with Mr Selim more than enough to get wa taste fo da man - I know he ain't the man to wrap himself in the flag and walk out of the airlock gates. Keller, too. That man thinks himself a fulcrum - big on symbiology, flags, impressions. He poisoned a director for no benefit to himself. A world-changing mind, you might say. Hm. What's the state in the west? Who are the players now? Who can we rally? We took Ernst Klugmann and made him a symbol of the third way. If the Coalition's hit upon the realisation that there's another, better path than reliving the old lie, we can cut a new path to bringing a just peace to the streets, fields, and hopes of South Sirius.


We've made it our cause's work to bring back the thirty seven thousand Unioner Lifers off Vierlande who are turnin' over radioactive topsoil on Jianxi for the rest of their days, taken in the Wedel release. That's an army of men, and ah' I believe that they're the catalyst to bring the Coalition down. That all the gears to grind the so-called Volksrevolt into the violent memory it should be, exist now. Today. Now, We can't reach them - not yet. The Sirene's jump drives arn't enough to secure a supply line, and our technicians are still a month away from gettin' the BIFROST functional enough to break Volvograd's atmosphere. But with a new player in the area... we can roll for the eight.

It's up to you to put the pieces together. We're ready; we're strong enough to break the chains. Provide armaments and ships that you cannot politically afford yourselves.

Tell us where to use our strength. Our industry. Patch us through.

Alster Unioners

Frei turns towards the terminal. There's a glint of passion dancing in the wily pirate's eyes.

I wouldn't have believed them as it's so close to what would have wished would have occurred, it borders on poetic ire. It's the Unioner cycle of history, played out all over again. The masters become the criminals, the criminals, the masters. Like an old song that can't stop being rediscovered by new players. My point is that the Crimeans probably are... hm. What is that brisk Cockney expression, mi venner? Skint. They are a fledgeling movement - low on manpower, guns, ammo; which means they are low on men to crew said guns and ammo. I imagine they have no wish to become fully of Bretonia in their populations and beliefs, given those that I have heard are heading the pack.

I can imagine you're not giving them the full range of your military equipment - stores here and there - whilst you're still rebuilding your nation, 'eh? Well, we have been looking for a customer in the Omega systems. One who could do some good with our ships. Who could use our hardware to strike where we, as yet, cannot. We have a long, troubled history with the Coalition. I have lost friends and proteges to their ways. I would rather a coalition that stuck to its margins of belief - that opposed the fascism of the Volksrevolut - for that is what militarising the angry inexorably leads to; fascism - that has twisted the Coalition and the Hessians away from any semblance of labourist beliefs.

We do not believe the enemy of an enemy is a friend. But when one who understands a nation intimately decides to enforce their patriotism through armed resistance to its agents - like the Unioners did, near two centuries ago - the weaknesses that you once laboured to cover up, to improve - become prominent targets. I wager that the Crimeans will come to know better than anyone - perhaps better than us Unioners, that the Coalition does not truly stand for its people. It uses forced labour camps and gulags for physical toil. It imprisons men, women, and children, for political belief. The watchful eye is half-blind and lacks the depth perception to tell the innocent from the guilty. The Unioners free slaves - into our movement, yes - but the coalition makes slaves of the free. It is the enemy of labourism, as severe as any monopoly, and it cannot be bargained with for it views itself as morally infallible from the strength of its fascistic doctrines that send boys out to die in the depths of space.


I ask that you enable negotiations between the Crimeans and the Unionists. They likely still despise us - a holdover from when they killed us on Hessian prerogative. Well, they do not need to like us - but I hope they will understand us. Our goals are very similar now, without the veneer of a flag standing in the way. We can provide ships and weapons on a scale that Bretonia itself cannot politically afford - deniable technologies and unconventional weapons, well suited to the omegas. Cruisers, fighters, weapons, food and medical supplies, nanites, unregistered nuclear devices - whatever they require, they shall have.

In return, there are thirty-seven thousand Unioners who could find a new purpose with the Crimean Privateers. These Unioners were freed from prison only to be betrayed by the symbol of the coalition - to be loaded into a new, worse prison, on a vessel named after the Coalition's most notorious premier. These men and women are itching for a chance to avenge each other. They would be perfect to bolster the Crimean ranks.

What do the Unioners get out all of this? Understanding. Another link in the chain of pro-labourist groups that are not under the thumb of the Volksrevolt. Sirius is better off if the Crimeans survive. As are the Unioners - the Crimeans are the butterfly effect that will prevent the SCRA from joining Heinrich's hell-march, when Rheinland inevitably splits apart. That will save Rheinlandic lives, without any Crimean crossing the Rheinland border. I believe it will aid Bretonian interests as well - a staunch opposition in the Omegas means that when the Federal Republic of Rheinland finally expires, the trade avenues between Bretonia and Rheinland will remain intact, thanks to a strong, capable paramilitary.