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SUBJECT: L. E. Werhausen Personal Log
DATE: 1/7/824
The LWB regulars here on Darmstadt are congratulating me on my first circulation through Vierlande Prison. First circulation? I don’t know how they can take the idea of being sent there more than once in such stride. The conditions in there were awful, prison commons were full to bursting, with inmates in such close quarters that you just couldn’t avoid breathing on the stranger next to you. Not a nice environment for making friends.
There weren’t many Bundschuh captives there. I saw a scant few of my crewmembers from the Marzforderungen, including my second officer, a few hardcore LWB pilots, but it was mostly Hessians and Unioners, a volatile combination in a space like this. Several fights occurred per hour. Some of the inmates might’ve ended up dead from their injuries. I tried my best not to pay too much attention to it, and for the most part I was left alone to rot for the length of my sentence. A grueling week passed.
Lucky me, one of the Hessians in my block, a cell across from mine, actually tried to talk with me. Color me surprised. He was an alright sort. He used to be a Daumann miner operating out of Munich, but he was planetside on Nuremburg when the crisis hit. They diagnosed him with some pretty nasty cancers, and he got laid off when he started barking a bit too loud at his manager for better workman's comp. He got scooped up by a Hessian cell pretty quickly once he was out. I don't blame them, he's a pretty easy mark. Another Rheinlander used up, dispossessed and looking to even the score.
I told him about how we got caught. Liberty Navy delivering us right into the hands of a waiting polizei, and we didn’t even put up a fight. The pilot even said that Bundschuh-affiliated ships weren’t allowed in Liberty space period, and here I thought the Libs actually supported our cause.
My prison-mate was more disappointed by us going so quietly than he was of my crew profiting off of the nominally Hessian blood diamond trade. “A fully-loaded Uruz and you let a Behemoth and a Liberty fighter boss you around? Are you crazy?” I don’t think he had the wrong idea, either. We could have opened up at any time and probably have smeared the polizei transport in no time flat. I told him that I didn’t want it to come to more Rheinlanders killing Rheinlanders. I was hoping that we could come to an understanding, or that I could talk my way out of it, or that they’d show sympathy. “So you’d rather that your crew suffer, you lose your ship, and be thrown in jail than dare to actually fight an enemy acting contrary to your goals?” he says.
I… didn’t really have an answer to that one. I know that revolutions are dirty work, you have to prioritize practicality over sentiment some days. But, does it really have to come to gunning down perfectly moral men and women, the countrymen I came back to Rheinland to help liberate, just because they stood up on the wrong side of the line? I got a sense that the officer who made the arrest, he was a good man. He might’ve even had sympathy for the Bundschuh cause, if I had him pegged right.
The fact remains that I wagered my crew’s safety on him being willing to let us go, and I lost that wager.
I have to live with condemning my crew to prison without fighting on their behalf.
Some captain, huh? It’s crushing for morale. Mine especially. I can't give up without a fight next time, whatever the odds. Letting other people suffer for my mistakes isn't a track record I'm used to, and it's not one I intend to start up. I need to get past this, prove that I'm better to the men and women I serve with. But... am I?
I guess being one of the few Bundschuh on-board Vierlande at that time had its benefits drawing that Hessian’s attention, because once he was done picking me apart for getting caught, he hinted me in on an escape routine – yes, a routine, repeatedly successful escape attempts made from a deep space super-max prison, I was surprised too – that they use to sneak out their best pilots when they get nabbed from time to time. For their sake, I'll keep the procedure unmentioned in this log, in case some determined, stone-faced MND agent digs this up some day. Better luck next time, eh?
I have to say, I was impressed by the professionalism, and the willingness to let me in on their escape. Compared to the confusing command situation going on with the Bundschuh right now, it’s becoming almost understandable why mother preferred the Hessians if they always run a ship this tight. That doesn’t make her right, though. The Hessians are still pirates and terrorists both, and I can’t put the news reports about the people they've killed out of mind so easily, however willing they are to pitch in for me. Still, I’ve had more than one preconception challenged since I’ve joined the Party... regardless, I had them drop me off on Darmstadt, since I had a fighter in reserve here.
The Marzforderungen is still impounded at Brandenburg, and I’ll have to figure out how to spring it. Upsetting as it is, the crew I lost can be replaced with a few more restless tertiary squadron members, but an Uruz transport is an invaluable asset I don’t want to be responsible for losing. I’ll come up with something to get it back.
I guess I’m already taking the lesson to heart. Practicality over sentiment.
SUBJECT: L. E. Werhausen Personal Log #2
DATE: 9/7/824
Right... personal logs... I almost forgot I'd started this with how busy I've been keeping. That's a good sign, I think, since it means I'm doing my job and not jamming my insecurities into a diary wie das schulmädchen.
Except for my initial entry, I suppose. I'll chalk up the whining to the nerves of getting out of prison and my first grand screw-up. Anyway, since I've already begun this journal, and because I can't fall asleep with Schultz and his damned punkmusik on full volume next door, I might as well put in the effort. If I'm lucky, I'll bore myself to sleep before I work up the stomach to go stuff him in the airlock.
Speaking of my previous failure, we managed to steal our transport out of impoundment at Brandenburg with surprising ease, and the majority of my crew sent to planet-side prisons managed to spring with help from sympathetic guards and local cells. Not so doom and gloom after all. We've put the Uruz to better use than mooching off the blood diamond trade in the meantime, ferrying munitions and subsistence supplies from Akabat into Bruchsal, purchased using the quite substantial donations I've been collecting from local miners and commerce in the last month.
That's been the state of affairs for about as long as I've been with the Bundschuhpartei. Seems like everything I've been doing has just been to help keep us afloat, whether it's distributing informational flyers or looking for handouts.
I know it can't be helped... the apparant lack of visionary leadership is keeping us from organizing towards real, tangible objectives, and I'm not about to step up and try to take the reins. Nein... definitely not after that display with die Polizei... the tertiary squadron pilots would laugh me out of the bar the second I bring it up.
Well, der himmlische Gott must have heard me feeling sorry for our poor party, and gave me an opportunity in the form of that Republican Shipping kapitän I seem to keep running into. He and his crew are a jovial bunch, he's offered to run supplies for us off-the-record more than once, he always contributes generous amounts of credits once he's off his run, seems to share our ideals in spades. And, by some miracle of the Lord, I managed to get him to agree to risk his employment, maybe his citizenship, to help me move a few thousand lower-class unfortunates out of Nuremberg and into the temporary care of the Zoners on Bethlehem.
Being perfectly candid here, I hardly thought he had the guts to risk that, but all the while, he just told me he was doing what anyone in his position would do for their countrymen. I'm envious of this guy, not a hint of cynicism in him, age be damned. I honestly couldn't think of a better moral candidate for the Bundschuh than this man, and he's even got Rheinwehr experience under his belt as a chief engineer. He'd have my recommendation in a heartbeat.
But, he mentioned during our flight that he owes it to his infant child and his beloved to not get himself killed in some fool's errand. A more wise vater has never lived, and devil take me if I ever try to persuade him to give up that conviction. We managed to sneak in and out of Liberty smooth as silk, too, and about three-thousand Rheinlanders are better off for it. I couldn't have done it without him. Seeing the relief on the faces of the refugees really lit me up. It's that kind of work I signed on for. A shame it isn't all we have to do to set Rheinland right.
... merciful Gott, he's finally turned it off. If divine providence keeps it up, maybe we'll have tight leadership when I wake up and we can save lives large-scale?
