Konbanwa, Ikeda-san,

First and foremost, let me thank you for reaching out. It is always a pleasure to meet new people and spark new friendships.

My name is Harold Kane. I was the first Minister of Relations of Natio Octavarium, and since my retirement from politics, I am a foreign affairs advisor to the Cabinet and to the Fleet. But even prior to that, I was a Taskmaster of the Vagrant Raiders, the predecessor organization to the Natio and a longstanding affiliate of Malta and her allies.

Our organization is a micronation of sorts, committed to creating new, free lives for those rejected by or disillusioned with the Houses. Our people live in freestanding, self-sufficient colony stations, built without dependence on planets for maximum sustainability at minimal environmental impact. Our civilian population only numbers around one hundred thousand, but they are all free people from many nations and many castes who now live without fear of persecution and without restriction imposed by social hierarchy. Many nations claim that all within their borders are equal regardless of race, creed, origins, gender, and affiliiation, but only say that. We live it.

Cardamine. The Natio has a number of citizens and residents both from Malta and from organizations with such ties that would lead to addiction to the substance. As a result, it is legal within our borders and provided to citizens as a component of healthcare. While getting a shipment is easy, it's expensive to make sure it's the good stuff, and not just your average street dust. The founder of the Vagrant Raiders, may he rest in peace, was a man of the Orange Dream whose family owned a plantation of Malta. When he passed with no living next of kin, his land became ours, and upon our establishment in the Taus, we nationalized the farm to supply our own people with high-quality, slavery-free cardamine for medical purposes. Of course, a caramine plantation maintained with agricultural technology centuries beyond a slave's sickle and watering jug tends to grow a bit more... enthusiastically than is the norm.

At current stocks we're producing and refining roughly forty thousand users' worth of excess high-grade cardamine. If you're against intermediaries, we are more than willing to sell direct from our facilities on Malta; I'm sure the Maltese government is okay with your freighters landing out in the countryside. Our dockmaster will handle the transaction the same as any other would, you'll just get a bit more "bang for your buck", so to speak. Of course, we can also bulk transport it to you, putting the risk of interdiction and the insurance of the product in our camp instead of yours.

In addition to our production of medical-grade cardamine, we have relatively easy access to lawful ports around Sirius and the Octavarium Mercantile Guild can procure and ship resources and materiel that may be difficult for organizations such as your own to obtain. Guild pilots own their own ships and staff their own crews, and operate between organizational borders as standard contractors under the banner of Natio Octavarium. And, of course, at your request, some of the Guild's captains would be more than willing to procure less-than-strictly-above-board cargo and deliver it discreetly.

If nothing else, it's good to meet some friendly faces in and around Kusari. Every time we poke our heads in we either get accosted by the corporate goons from the Hogosha, some random group claiming to be a Shogunate that'll disappear by the next time we say "hi", or Imperial military intelligence with trigger fingers itchier than the bugs under a psychotic man's skin. The Sisterhood reaching out to us is a welcome sight, to say the least.

We look forward to doing what we can to support the Sisterhood and to support the Matriarch, from now until the time her word is not just that of the Gen'an, but the word of the nation of Kusari.

Best regards,
Adjutant Harold Kane
Natio Octavarium

Your direct relation with the Maltese cartels is completely understandable, ma'am. Best to go right to the source you know and trust. We would do the same if we didn't have our own soil on Malta with which to grow our own crop.

That figure of forty-thousand is without our own users and the others that we do some supply work for. Though we definitely can't supply the whole of Kusari, if you need a time-sensitive job done without directly having the Chrysanthemums involved, well, we can help out with that. We export some fine THC and alcoholic products of various types as well, both of our own development and sourced from the Houses. I assure you, they actually have flavour, and aren't just rocket fuel cut with sugar water.

This is starting to sound like a sales pitch. Apologies.

Yes, we have been accosted by those two organizations. The Kempeitai were very unpleasant to us and suspicious that we may have been Blood Dragon plants or some other nonsense like that. They once dropped a destroyer on top of one of our bulk transports and accused us of smuggling narcotics; I'm not sure how you would ingest cryogenics equipment, but I imagine the result would have been... unpleasant.

The Hogosha, we've had a few run-ins with. They know we distribute Maltese product, so they're none-too-pleased when they see us, that's for sure. But they're jackbooted corporate thugs, and not a government agency, so if we have to expose a few of their pilots to vacuum to protect our own, so be it.

Anyways, in lieu of cardamine or flowers, I'll send some samplers of our fine beverages over your way. Or perhaps you could come visit and bring them back yourself? I would be delighted to show you around our little home in the Taus.

Adjutant Harold Kane
Natio Octavarium

Hey, it's not illegal here. And we understand the being-marked-as-terrorists thing; remind me some time to tell you about the BDM, the attack at Zwickau Base, and the time we sold cardamine to--

*cough*

Actually, let's stow that one for now.

The Independent Miners Guild is a problem. Reports have come in that they continue to do business with the Enclave despite having accepted an invitation to a formal peace conference with the participants of the Gallic War, which I personally consider to be antithetical to accepting such an invitation in the first place. The Enclave, similarly, refuses to admit wrongdoing in the war, whereas the new provisional governments of Gallia are seeking a long-lasting peace. Each of these traitorous organizations on their own would be a problem, but together, they are a potentially existential one.

I look forward to a bright and productive future between our two peoples.

Adjutant Harold Kane
Natio Octavarium

Itsu? That's a familiar callsign. I distinctly recall a vessel using another number with that callsign shooting down two of my pilots and two Blood Dragon vessels around a year ago. It flew with the number 5 and the pilot claimed to be Kusari naval intelligence, but what we saw was a lot more... Omicron-y, if you catch my drift. Depending on the situation I may be able to get the Octavarium Intelligence Commission to authorize a release of declassified materials relating to that incident to your organization under the auspices of public health and safety.

All the same, we'll keep an eye out for Overwatch vessels in the region. There were other Order groups that we had some limited contact with but we haven't heard from them in the better part of a year. And we'll keep that little bit of information about the Enclave you've provided nice and securely locked up in our "blackmail folder", so to speak. Not to say that we blackmail people, but you know how it goes.

Be careful out there, sister.

Adjutant Harold Kane
Natio Octavarium