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+--- Thread: Perpetual Commotion | The Santini Family (/showthread.php?tid=104553)
Perpetual Commotion | The Santini Family - Thexare - 09-08-2013
As usual, the Santini holdings had been spared the brunt of the fighting between the Lance and the Ghosts. As usual, Emilio had been offered the appearance of power, in a position where he could actually use little of it.
But this time was different in one way. Though the Santini family always came out of past difficulties stronger for the challenge and, through Emilio's maneuvering, better off politically as well, he saw no happy ending this time. He sat in his office checking over all his resources, shaking slightly from the stress. Everything was coming apart. Suddenly, his daughter - the one that remained among the Outcasts - entered the room, with two words.
"Cape Wrath."
"I'm sorry?"
"Father, you're looking for a way out of Omicron Alpha. We can't go to the Gate, because of the Colonials. We can't go to Beta, because of the Gas Miners. And we can't go to Liberty because some drunk Rogue might get himself killed. By me."
"And the business?"
"Santiago. He can protect himself - a lot better than you can, incidentally - and he knows how we run the plantations."
Emilio sighed. He knew she was right, but why did his children keep getting thrown into the line of fire like this?
"And what about you, Tiana? Why do you want to go with us? We've all got more than enough money to just stay out of this, maybe I should've never been pulled into the Council all those years ago..."
"I have... plans. They involve Cape Wrath. If I tell you more, you'll try to stop me. Just get mother ready."
RE: Perpetual Commotion | The Santini Family - Thexare - 09-10-2013
"Command code accepted. Aurora Sector unlocked. Welcome back, agent."
Aurora Sector, Cape Wrath Base. A long-isolated section of the base, formerly used by the 8th Fighter Wing, the Southern Lights, and its component squadrons, the 39th Tactical Fighter Squadron 'Libeccio', 49th Tactical Fighter Squadrion 'Scirocco', 72nd Interdiction Unit 'Notus', and of course the 313th Special Operations Squadron, 'Mirage'.
A series of small cleaning robots rolled along the floor, letting out a series of beeps acknowledging Tiana's presence as she slowly paced through the halls. Little dust had settled, no garbage cluttered the halls. And according to the records, no one had entered - as it was supposed to be. The deployable turrets were the only things that gathered any dust at all, a reassuring sign that truly no one had gotten in.
And the Aurora Sector expansions were completed on schedule, as well - multiple additional hangars, complete with an exclusive launching corridor, an expanded private armory, and more; essentially, Aurora Sector was like another complete base.
But this was set into motion years ago, well before the recent troubles. Now, though... now there was need for Aurora Sector.
Tiana opened a nearby comms console and made a call to Malta, an isolated hangar out in the wilderness. OF2-39. Over the course of his four years among the Outcasts, Captain Ayumu Ishida had turned this abandoned hangar into a heavily-defended outpost suitable for his operations.
"Ayumu."
"It's done. The data has been backed up, the defense network is online and engaged. Santiago has everything under control for our planetside operations. Mia's security has been accounted for. Getting ready to launch; anything else?"
"No, that's everything."
"Time to reclaim my home, then. Inform the crew - I'm taking over."
RE: Perpetual Commotion | The Santini Family - Thexare - 09-11-2013
Ayumu stood in front of a sizable audience in one of Cape Wrath's assembly halls. The long green coat he always wore bore the pale blue emblem of Mirage on its shoulder, but other than that nothing visibly tied him to any combat force.
The Outcasts before him were a disorganized lot, as they so frequently were. He recognized a handful from the Southern Lights, but the majority were largely unknown. When it became clear that all who would attend were present, Ayumu flicked a switch under his podium and began.
"Many of you recently moved here to get away from the civil war." His voice rang out over the loudspeaker, ensuring everyone on the base would hear. "The Ghosts are a shadow of their old glory, and the Contari Lance will stop at nothing to realize their ambitions. Neither group is concerned with Malta; the Contari only want power, and the Ghosts? They're not what they once were. A shadow of their old selves." Murmurs amongst the audience indicated a general agreement with his words, and he continued, "But there is another player on the board. Don Emilio Santini, you know him well. He has always been fair and measured in his dealings, and always had an eye on the future of Malta. And he has decided to step into this conflict." The tone of the audience changed, to surprise and some dismay. "He does not take the side of either the Lance or the Ghosts - he intends to put an end to the war; whatever it takes, we will end it! We cannot and we will not show weakness to the vultures of the Republic, to the cowards that hid behind their minefield for centuries, or to the barbarians of Crete! We are the people of Malta, we will unite, and we will prevail!"
Cheers broke out among the audience, and many of them lined up to speak to one of Ishida's lieutenants about signing up.
"Impressive speech, dear." Tiana Santini-Ishida had been semi-hidden in the back of the room during the speech, only approaching after the crowd dispersed. "So who wrote it for you?"
"You wouldn't believe me."
"Try me."
"Mia."
"Hey, you're right, I don't."
RE: Perpetual Commotion | The Santini Family - Thexare - 09-12-2013
"This isn't- how many?"
"... Twenty-four."
"Not even a tenth of what we need." She sighed. "So this is how it ends. The Mal- the Outcasts want their life of senseless violence. They want their petty power struggles and pointless wars."
"How what ends?"
"Ayumu, there's nothing left for us here. Mia was right... there's nothing father can do. You can't help people that don't want to be helped." Tiana was shaking, though it was barely visible. "Everything I've done was to help him, to try to bring some stability to this godforsaken sh!thole. And it was for nothing. They WANT this!"
"Then where do you want to go?"
"I... I don't know. But... away. Not an Outcast base. I can't keep doing this, it's just so... pointless."
RE: Perpetual Commotion | The Santini Family - Thexare - 09-13-2013
A pair of old variant Scimitars, a Switchblade, a Sabre, a prototype Gladius, and an X-Shuttle set down at a private spaceport on Planet Cambridge. The hangars were situated behind a rather large residence, and already held a Roc and a heavily remodelled Manaslu.
The pilot of the Switchblade was the first one to disembark, and before she could react she was nearly tackled by the owner of the house - her sister, Mia. Physically they were very different; Mia quite curvaceous and perpetually smiling, and Tiana more slender, with a body more akin to that of a gymnast, and of course far less cheerful - now more than ever, though she forced a smile for Mia.
"Ease up a bit, sis, pretty sure she needs to breathe," the pilot of the Sabre commented as he walked toward the X-Shuttle. Their adopted brother, Santiago Mirez was a reasonably well-built man, and probably would've ended up as an enforcer if his skill at sniping wasn't more useful. His dark brown hair was, as always, uncombed and sticking out everywhere, and his brown coat barely concealed a large handgun holstered at his left hip.
The two Shamshir pilots were even more different than the sisters - one was, of course, Ayumu Ishida, a quiet Kusari man wearing a long green coat, with a concealed shortsword inside. The other, a beautiful bespectacled woman with tan skin and golden-brown hair who didn't look nearly her age - she was the girls' mother, Serena Santini.
Before he could move toward the X-Shuttle, Ayumu found himself as Mia's next target, so Santiago, Serena, and Emilio started unloading the X-Shuttle - it was nowhere near full, of course, but it was easier to pack everything and keep each person's belongings seperated this way.
The Gladius pilot, a largely unremarkable Kusari woman named Aina Kouryo, approached Ayumu and waited for Mia to calm down for a moment before speaking. "Ayumu, the Gladius is almost ready for combat. I'm going to return to Malta for more testing. I'll be in touch with Mia so you can keep up uwith what's going on."
"Thank you, Aina. And... be careful."
"I will, Ayumu." She returned to her ship and launched without another word.
While Emilio, Serena, and Santiago were going through their belongings, Mia pulled her sister and brother-in-law up to the house. As soon as Tiana opened the door, however, a gigantic green spider easily a foot in diameter swung across the doorway. She stumbled back, and Mia started laughing uncontrollably. Tiana quickly realized it was just a stuffed animal hanging on a string and really felt quite stupid about the whole thing.
"Aww, don't be like that, sis. I made him, you know. Wanted to show you, and, well... there he is!"
"Wait, you made this?" Ayumu repeated, looking more closely at the oversized spider's stitching.
"Mhm! There's quite a few more inside, different animals. Made 'em as references for The Adventures of Spinny, needed to get the proportions and positions right," she explained as she led them to the sun room just off the side of the entry.
"I'm not sure why," Tiana commented as they sat down. "Plenty of comic artists over the years have ignored physics and anatomy."
"Yeah, but the art is the entire point. I want to get kids interested in seeing other worlds. There's so much in Sirius we don't know. I'm sure there's no friendly talking spiders out there, but it's a lot easier to make a stuffed spider to draw than it is to find a guy willing to pose for me."
"I don't think you'd have any trouble with that, Mia," Tiana said, glancing at Ayumu. Just then, Santiago and Emilio walked in with boxes.
"Oh, hey, dad! Could you put on a pot of tea? Kitchen's down the hall, to the right."
"Of course, Mia. You have this under control?" he asked Santiago.
"Yeah, just set it down here, I'll get it in a bit."
"Right, then. I got your message, sounds like it's gotten pretty bad up there," Mia continued after the two walked away. "What'll you do now?"
"Honestly, Mia, I don't know. I just... I need to find something worth doing."
Mia smiled, hoping to reassure her little sister that everything would be fine. "I already figured that, so I did a little digging. Based on your work with Mirage, I'm seeing two possibilities... one is, of course, Bretonian Intelligence. You'd have to ease up on the knifework... probably... but other than that it seems like a good fit for both of you."
"What's the other?" Ayumu asked, not particularly thrilled about the idea. He'd helped the Bretonians a few times, but never really liked the idea of answering to any House authority.
"Have you heard of Natio Octavarium?" From their reactions, it was obvious that neither had. "I'm headed out to the city they've settled in a few days to do some research for the next book, Why not come with me and see if they might need anything?"
Meanwhile, Serena had let herself in and slipped past them unnoticed. She walked into the kitchen and found Emilio standing over a kettle of water and asked, "Dear... what are you doing?"
"I'm making a pot of tea for Mia."
"And... why are you doing that?"
"... why am I doing that?"
RE: Perpetual Commotion | The Santini Family - Thexare - 09-20-2013
Mia, Ayumu, and Tiana left the private hangar on Cambridge after their trip.
"I don't think that's the place either," Ayumu said, shaking his head. "They don't need spies, and those Merak pilots seem... competent enough for recon."
Mia threw her arm around Aymu and smiled. "Well, there's always Lib- oh right. Or you could go to Kus- No, wait, that won't do either. What about Rhein-"
"I- I get the idea, Mia."
"Course you do, Yumi. Look, really, Liberty doesn't have much on you - under your real name. Same for sis. But you shouldn't take any chances there, I don't want you getting hurt."
"Fine. What do you think we should do?"
"Eh, I dunno. Go freelance? Private investigations, freelance scouting, seems like a good line of work for you two."
RE: Perpetual Commotion | The Santini Family - Thexare - 10-13-2013
"Don Emilio, I- wait, where is everyone?"
Emilio's mansion on Malta was kept surprisingly clean by a small reserve staff of guards and maintenance staff, but other than them, everyone was gone. The fields were tended only to prevent overgrowth, as even the servants had gone. Released, with enough money to get to anywhere they wanted to go.
"Captain Conti? Haven't seen you around here in quite a while," one of the guards said. "They're gone. Went to Cambridge."
"Wh- how do they keep doing that?!"
"A couple fighters and a freighter quietly getting past traffic control when we're worried more about keeping the Lance from destroying everything? Hmm, I wonder how they weren't noticed."
RE: Perpetual Commotion | The Santini Family - Thexare - 10-13-2013
"Dear, wait." They had stopped just at the entrance to Mia's property - w hich surprised Emilio every time he saw it. He had never expected anyone in his family to own land outside of Malta, or that he'd be happy for it.
"What is it, Serena?"
"It's about that message earlier." Emilio twitched slightly, a tic he was picking up in recent months whenever a subject he didn't like came up.
"Serena. Malta is beyond help at this point."
"So you say, as you try to convince yourself."
"We don't have any reason to go back. You were a Hacker, Serena, you don't have any family there. And most of my family is dead."
"And your mother?"
"Three years ago, she broke the right arm of a would-be robber and then shot him with his own gun. I'm reasonably sure she can handle herself." Emilio's voice was getting somewhat shaky, however; Serena was right, he didn't entirely believe it.
"The Ghosts are waning. And the Lance needs to be broken."
"And then what? Will the Maltese ever put their petty revenge fantasies behind them? Will they unite instead of always falling intio these petty power struggles?" He sighed, and looked back at the distant city. "Can they ever become a true House?"
"Well, Dad, that depends on who's leading them," Mia said, now hanging upside-down by her legs from a nearby tree, somehow not surprising either of her parents.
"No leader among the Maltese shares my vision. And I am not a leader."
Mia flipped down from the tree, and looked Emilio in the eyes. "So you're giving up?" Though she didn't look angry - she never looked angry - there was a challenging tone in her voice that, however briefly, stunned her father.
"Mia... you've been listening the whole time. You know how I feel."
"But... I mean, weren't you the one talking about doing the right thing for Malta?"
"My father was killed by one of his rivals. Thousands have died in these pointless civil wars. Millions of lives have been ruined by the slave trade. You speak of doing the right thing, Mia - why should we continue to support this?"
"I... I don't know..."
"Of course you do, Mia. You know that we can't. That's why you left. You did the right thing, and it took the rest of us a bit longer than it should've to come around."
RE: Perpetual Commotion | The Santini Family - Thexare - 10-29-2013
Activity at P. Pokey's returned. Getting ideas beyond his station again, I think. Tenerife resurfaced. Pass it on.
- Yukionna
An old ship of yours has been located, along with a former coworker. They're at Malta. O's land.
- Ringwraith
Message noted. Keep tracking them. Will respond if they become relevant.
- Escher
"... that's not quite the response I expected..." the older man noted quietly, somewhat concerned and typing up another message.
Matters re: Kansas, Alpha may become complicated. Agents monitoring situation.
- Ringwraith
Noted. Your assistance is appreciated.
- Mystic
"Dear? Oh, come now. We have a dinner to get to, and you're-"
"Dealing with business at the-"
"It can wait, come on."