Malaclypse covered his mouth and feigned a throaty cough; but he was actually concealing a wide grin at Eddie's antics.
"Well.. another TAZ heard from. That would be two of my Discordian brethren who believe I'm micturating upwind here." Mal almost broke into another smile.
"I shall, however, continue to abstain on the present Motion to continue or disband this Council. I respect the views of all of you; and I will try to temper my ire by keeping that thought foremost in my mind.
"Madam Jinx, you appear to want your cake and eat it too. To my knowledge, you and Tannik Seldon are the only two individuals who have experienced this "communication" with these aberrant nomads. Now, I can take truck with your experiences; or I can rely on my own. In my experience ever since I have been old enough to fly through Sirius, when I have encountered a nomad, it has attempted to kill me. That to me is pretty conclusive evidence.
"Now, if you'll excuse me for a few moments, I believe I'll go and pour some strong coffee into Eddie." This time, Malaclypse could not supress a grin as he rose and strolled out of the Council Chamber.
Bah... sense and reason have left you all.
To Jinx and those trying to communicate and deliberate with Nomads, or any kind of peace negotiations with any other tribe or council... need I remind you of our past? Need I tell you of our struggles to gain the position we currently find ourselves?
I'm not one to speak boldly or firmly on many matters, as I've grown accustomed to long periods of silence in the deepest parts of Sirius, but I'm certain of one thing: Here today, gone tomorrow.
If we persist down this road I fear we will, as a folk, lose our identity. We've been fortunate and careful to establish a middle road, a common ground, and have finally reached a point where we are of some value to all those whom we serve. Zoners have no enemies, only those who would attack us individually.
Like our founders so long ago, we need to shake off this notion that we OWN anything. The heart of the matter is the search, discovery, and exploitation of resource for the benefit of the mighty pocketbook. If we but pursued our passions as a people, this trivial matter of Omicron Delta would soon pass.
It's the push, the perceived need to do something in the face of trial that has gotten us here. Look at you! Look at you all! Trying so desperately to hold on to something that isn't yours! Let go, I beg you. If it mean losing Freeport 11, then so be it. As Zoners we will do what we normally do... gain ground, find a spot to park our ships, and colonize as we see fit. We've been here before! Don't turn away from our history.
*Meiun... obviously exasperated and emotional, picks up his jacket and heads toward the door. As he is about to exit, he turns for one last word.*
I'm taking my ship, and I'm flying to Freeport 9. My charge is to defend at all costs, and I tell you that that is precisely what I'm going to do. Zoner life; our mission, vision, and values, will be defended... at all costs.
Take care folks. My vote is given. I'll be out there!
*Meiun points out the port hole to the brilliant red sun, and then turns and leaves the room.*
Leroy Fenning said "I abstain. Perhaps reform is in order, or perhaps the council should be disbanded entirely. I'm not sure. If it stays, though, it would be wise to more clearly define its scope and jurisdiction.
"As to the issue with the Nomads... we've never had too much trouble keeping ordinary Nomads from coming too close to Freeport 11 or any of our other bases. Only these "new" Nomads, which are somehow different, have suddenly become a serious threat. I see nothing wrong with attempting to communicate with them. What harm can it do? Even if we cannot reach anything peaceful, we will at least gain information."
The Holoviewer chimed as the Fnordette Scribe updated the Council's vote:
*On the Motion:
"Should the Council of Zoners continue as an Advisory and Oversight Body for the Zoners of Sirius?"
[TAZ]: Yea
[AW]:
[\JG/]: Yea
Elizabeth "Jinx" Tate: Yea
Isaac Drake:
Octavius:
Smiley: Yea
Leroy_Fenning: Abstains
Vendhyan:
Grayson Burrows:
Tommy: Yea
Patric: Abstains
Meiun: Nay
Ikash: (Pending confirmation of full Zoner status.)
A fairly tall man with a long handlebar moustache, long red coat, fedora - and a small black cat perched atop his shoulder - stepped away from the wall, against which he'd been leaning. "Now, I don't know too much 'bout them Nomad folks, or 'bout this Council, bein' new to the Zoners...but it seems t'me that talkin's nice an' all, but it doesn't do ya much good 'less ya got some action t'go along with it. An' that's got two meanin's: one, if this council's gonna stay around, it oughtta DO somethin', y'know? An' two, if these Nomad's've got some peaceful action to go with them words, then maybe we oughtta listen a bit more...but if they keep spacin' our folks, then maybe we turn 'em into blue applesauce, eh?"
Rak stood up.....
[\JUPITER GUILD/] will say the following on the two separate issues; one namely of Nomads and other of Zoner Authority.
1. Nomads: Be very cautious. These bastards were bred to protect the Dom Kavash and erase everything else out of existance including puny humans. Some people even speculate that these things were responsible for the disappearance for the Dom Kavash themselves. You want to trust that scum..... weight your options like every Zoner does. what are you gaining out of it, where can we make moeny. DO we have any long term benefits. If they are small enough can we eliminate them. We have seen how they infiltrated and almost destroyed the Rhinelanders from the inside. I personally will trust them as close as 1600m as that is the range of my Novas. Any closer and I will be having some Nomad stew for dinner. JG personally thinks it is too early to pass judgement so we will take the wait and see approach.
[Nomad issue: Abstain with prejudice]
2.Zoner Role:
Zoners have done a good job as overseers (officially). What we are unofficially is well know to every true zoner. Why even do this silly little poll. Zoners know who controls Sirius. We play their silly little games, and in return they dance to our tune. Lets keep it that way. [Zoner Stance: Overseer (officially)]-
Malaclypse thought about the Jupiter Guild delegate's response for a few moments.
"Pipsqueak, that was a very thoughtful statement, if somewhat convoluted. For the purposes of the present vote, may we assume that you are voting "Yea" for the Council to continue? For the purposes of moving on to other matters, I would ask the Chairman to consider it so.
"Brother Isaac, I would ask the Chair to call the vote on this matter. It appears none of the other members will be available to cast a ballot; and we do have other pressing issues to discuss. What is your own feeling on the matter, Sir? Will you be voting yea or nay for this body?
"The TAZ, will, with the undestanding that reform and tighter control of issues would be in order, change its abstention to "Yea" on the motion.
"One last matter: I have it on authority that the person known as "Ikash" has been seen with a Corsair IFF.. hardly qualifies for a seat on this Council now, does it? I suggest his name be removed from the Rolls until such time as his status can be verified.
"Thank you."
Transmission from the Persephone II:
"allright, lets put it that way - whatever way we want to move when it comes to the nomads. we shall all pull on the very same string. so if we fight them and cease any communication with them, we shall do it all and there shall be no one asking for a truce unless that truce comes by the annihilation of the nomads as a whole.
on the other hand, if we want to parley with them to work out a truce, to go the diplomatic way, we should all work for that one, too - as one. personally, i will be fine with any of those options, but i am very much after unifying in that important decission.
maybe the option to fight them back into their far away systems or even carry the war into their home to force them to defend rather than to attack might be a better way, if we are unsure how far we can trust them anyway. so i ll leave it to the council to discuss that matter - and i hope we will come to a decission that we can all live with, literally.
if we decide to fight them, we must somewhat extend our influence in delta, kappa and iota. we ll have to coordinate that with the corsairs and other neighbours. but that can be done when we made the decission.
Jinx out"
End of the transmission
edit: //ooc sorry for the unnecessary space in the post, somehow the college computer messes up with the font size and all...
Rak stood up again....
...I guess I would like to open a part of my hand at this point at let the others know a little about Jupiter Guild's plans and how it benefits all the zoners.
The AW/TBH peace needs to be instated by a treaty ASAP. I need help from the rest of the Zoners. There is now a cease fire and I would like this to be put in a treaty. (ooc: before 4.84)
WHY ???!!!! Because things will get bad before they get better and we need as many allies on the Nomad front as possible.
I would like to request a permission to invite the leadership from both factions and solidify this peace we have achieved. LET'S GET THIS DONE GENTLEMEN.
In the future, after the treaty; JG, Corsairs and AW will start getting some "business" from the Zoner faction amd will get joint custody as the guardians of Omicrons. JG will continue dropping food on crete till the cretean economy is able to stand on its own.
(ooc: P.S: By the way m8. look at my last post. In brackets after each paragraph is JG's vote on the matter.)
PEACE
Patric replays to Rak:
The AW/TBH diplomatics shloud be discussed somwhere else.(Open a new channel for this thing)Corsairs can not be pronunced Guardian of Omicrons because there are other factions,also in Omicrons as strong as Corsairs(wloudnt be fair to outcasts),and at the end of the ends they remain all Pirates(Unlawfuls).We do no need to discuss Corsairs as the
protectors of Zoner Bases from Nomads,For general Defense against Nomads we shloud Contact our allies The Order.
**Patric sat down**