To: The Gaian Guard [The War Within]

[Durandal]

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Evening, Gaians. Ya'll don't know me, but I know you. Hell, do I know you. Name's Leo Harrington. I was a Fleet Captain in the Hellfire Legion for twenty years. I was there when Drake Thastus ordered us out into the independent worlds, I was there during the schism.. I've seen it all. Now most of these kids have forgotten about me, but I still carry a little bit of weight and I just might happen to know a thing or two about winning a fight. That's what I've been doing for twenty years and I'm still here, so I strongly suggest you hear me out.

The Legion ain't what it used to be. This.. this 'Commonwealth', these outsiders they're letting in.. this ain't what Thastus intended. So I retired. I've sat back, I watched and took it all in stride.. but now the mountainside view from my cabin is a strip mine. Now I'm talking to you, because I think you're the only people who have an idea of what that's like.

Now.. I know a place, an abandoned facility at the edge of Vespucci in the Veracruz field. Atacama, they called it. It's old, its rusty, but for the past month we've been piecing it back together. And now, we've found somethin'. A jump hole, leading to the Inverness system.

We're a hundred and fifty men strong. Two gunboats and a full wing of Prosecutors. We're willing to throw in with you entirely. Now I suggest you think strongly about what I'm offerin' here. This is a beachhead in Commonwealth space. This is how you hit them back for every mining op and tourist attraction they bring to Vespucci.

And one last thing.. this so called Lord Commander Locklear the Commonwealth voted in.. man's a puppet, plenty of Legionnaires wouldn't be sad to see him go, but I can do one better. He's out on a hunting trip right now on Guadalajara, on his side of the mountain, where there aren't any minin' operations... Man doesn't even know he's the one bein' hunted. Now I'm willin' to hand him over to you alive.. so long as you're willin' to let me do the honors.

So tell me.. do we have a deal?

Leo Harrington, Fleet Captain, Hellfire Legion.