Message to: Natalie Callahan
Comm ID: Gunther Hoerst
Location: Ronneburg, Omega-5
Guten tag, Frau Callahan.
You ought to remember me, since I personally wrote off a few Thors from my books about a year ago so that you could squirrel them away to Liberty for mischievous purposes. It was an interesting transaction, although the Bounty Hunters are utterly useless opponents. Lets say I knew about your group before you contacted me, and you continue to serve our common interests through your actions.
Now, the reason why I am contacting you now is... complicated. You see, I wouldn't be speaking to you right now had I not taken the effort to break into Viva's PDA so that I could find out more details on where exactly is she right now. A PDA that she clearly forgot to take with her, by the way. Probably an indication of being in a hurry.
This is troubling because I specifically told the people I hired that there is to be no shooting involved. They are adamant they did not find the ship nor Viva in Liberty at all. So the question remains: what the hell is going on? Where is she? And what happened to my ship?
If you've heard from her, tell her to call me back. You can tell her I'm worried or something, but I need some explanations before I have to deal with yet another missing equipment inquiry. There's some unfinished business that we need to sort out, I'm sure she'll tell you all about it.
[font=Microsoft Sans Serif] Gunther! My darling-dear! My precious Major!
[color=#99BBCC]Why I'm so glad to hear from you too sweetheart, I've been wondering if the kind Major would ever direct a word to poor old me again.
Oh the wait and the heartache I had to endure! The painful and nigh-endless hours I've spent longing for just a smile and some kind and lovely notion from you.
But alas, alas, it was not to be until now.
And even if it took you well over a year, I won't hold it against your darling, because I know that PDA or not you didn't forget about me, much as I didn't forget about you and our past dealings.
However I know, I know, you want me to get straight to our slippery, oh so slippery, and sooo shady business.
And I admit that truly I am sorry for having kept you waiting a little, finding myself battleships and running a whole corporation have been such time-consuming tasks you know, but it's okay.
Firstly, yes m'dear, Viva and I are in quite the relationship, even if it may be oh so loose, but y'know, y'know, I didn't know you and her were too? I mean, I'm actually wondering if it will be you or her proposing first... such lovely two individuals you are, you'd make quite the couple. I hope you're not against a more loose marriage akin to my relationship with her though? Because that really would break my heart darling, it really would. Not to mention Viva's... oh dear, let's not think of that any further.
I suppose I can shed light on the matter of her not returning your calls though. She's kind of dragged herself into having some fun-time for, well, old times' sakes. You know, extortion, explosions, and excessive violence. The usual affair.
But she'll be fine, even if I'm playing some hide-and-seek game with her now... it's pretty funny though as long as both parties enjoy it... and don't worry, her security has been arranged and nothing bad will happen to her, and much less will anyone but me lay hand on her.
Judging by what you're saying however she was being quite a bad girl though... stealing one of your precious, precious... Heimdalls? Well at least that's what it looks and seems to work like.
In other words, the ship is currently aboard one of my liners and being... closely looked at. I don't really fancy the design that much when I think of it, much less the lack of "convincing arguments" and the associated lack of "walls of text" behind them if you will, but it's still a very interesting specimen and actually, I'd like to inquire about per-chance being able to have the option to acquire myself three or four or five or just half a dozen in the future. I'm sure that would certainly be interesting a way to enhance the corporate fleet.
But let's disregard this for a second as that's more of a future thing anyway, and we do live in the present. I will arrange for your gunship to be returned to Freeport... I think One was it, the one in Omega-3. I don't think anyone will mind or notice it much in the first place.
I'm afraid however that both Viva and my men took the liberty of... modifying it. A little. I suppose that would explain why you lost its signal in the first place. I'm sure you're aware that in our shady area of work secrets are things which demand extensive protection so they can stay secrets, so alas, I had a major amount of the internal devices removed and replaced with more suitable components. That and the seats in that thing along with the air-conditioning and the whole controls were such a royal mess. Effective, but uncomfortable. I suppose Viva doesn't have a problem with that however, but you know, I prefer to add my own touch in general and ensure that entertainment is a comfortable thing to do for the entertainer.
But in short, you will find your gunship where I said within a twenty-four hour period, and your dear Oberleutnant Glockner won't have to worry one little bit about his prize-Funship having gone missing, nor will you. Consider the new internal arrangements a nice little bonus for our war hero. I mean who doesn't like integrated ashtrays, espresso makers, holo-players, and seats with a massage function aboard one's ship? But I digress.
As part of this game Viva and I are playing I've had little contact with her, and while I can assure you that your beloved is perfectly fine and safe as I mentioned before, I'm afraid that she hasn't had the chance to inform me of any business which you are referring to. She did mention something about me helping her pick out a couple vases and paintings and holo-art once we went on vacation on Los Angeles however, but I somewhat doubt that to be what you're on about.
Sooo... yeah, tell me what that is about and we can discuss matters as we did previously when you gave me some nice tools to conduct my destructive entertainment with.
Oh and can I have one of those fancy hats, one like you're wearing? I still have that sexy uniform from back then, but I'm afraid I couldn't get my hands on one of those new hats you're sporting. I really like that hammer and pick-axe, makes you look all revolutionary, even if I myself don't fancy the old gray. I'm more for red and black, and of course blue.
Message to: Natalie Callahan
Comm ID: Gunther Hoerst
Location: Ronneburg, Omega-5
Whoever will be returning the RHGB-Hummel to Freeport 1, tell him/her to look for Gluckner in the docking bay. He'll be surrounded by big guys who answer only to me. This way your envoy can meet the "hero" himself.
As to the unfinished business, I expect some compensation for the trouble that you two have put me through. A simple favour will suffice, and since thievery seems to run through your organisation like live blood through veins, you should find this easy. Though ideally it won't involve much of a theft.
Let me put some background into it:
For the past six months my organisation (and myself in particular) have been trying to obtain something very specific from Liberty. Not really something we can just ask for either, nein, we specifically need the technology behind the Liberty cruiser forward gun. We've lost a lot of good men trying to get that damn thing from the greedy Liberty Navy, though we've managed to get just about everything we needed from the many scans and pieces of debris that we've successfully brought home. Unfortunately, our attempts to replicate the technology are still not quite up to scratch, we're missing just one piece.
That last vital piece was set to be delivered by the Lane Hackers during a diversionary joint strike on California, which the Navy was supposed to not expect. Of course as luck would may have had it, some of the corrupt pirates that we were forced to deal with while planning the op ratted us out, and so the strike failed, I lost one of my best men and the transport got intercepted.
Let me get to the point. I need schematics for that gun. I know of your connections to the Hellfire Legion, and I know they have at one point gotten away with a nice little portion of the California defence fleet, including a few cruisers. How do I know this? That PDA has a lot of data on it. I also know from experience that you're not quite as unreliable as my usual contacts in Liberty tend to be. Have your courier deliver my men a copy of those schematics and I'll consider the gunship matter closed. Maybe I'll even owe you a small favour back.
And in case the Legion wants to know what is in it for them, I know well enough that they are slowly moving into Rheinland, interested in hitting their other enemy from behind. I know their representative went to the Revolutionary Congress on Vogtland a few weeks ago. I know they're interested in relations, one could tell just by looking at his face. What better way to deliver an opening statement, than to give the Rheinland rebellion a Wunderwaffe with which they will make the headlines on New Berlin and exterminate a good portion of the Omega Corsair camp?
[font=Microsoft Sans Serif] Oh dear. It's actually flattering to hear that I'm "not as unreliable", but oh dear. Oh dear!
[color=#99BBCC]You sure must be wanting those schematics bad if you're trying to make me giving you what you wish for look like some absurd kind of compensation.
Darling, you know I drive a hard bargain, but I deliver as necessary, much as your gunship by now has been long-since delivered to the Freeport. While we're at that, I trust that Glockner appreciated the modifications we undertook to his prize-Funship? I hope he didn't freak out over the paint-job though, I figured all that green wouldn't much such a highly-decorated hero and all, some nice black mixed with plenty of red just looked nicer, but that was a last-moment decision anyhow.
Still, since you still dislike skimming around the edges, I'm going to be frank, which is no doubt much more to your preference.
I understand that you want me to help you, but unlike our last ordeal I don't think that much as you wished to hire me, I can hire you, and much less do I think you'd cheerfully oblige. But as I'm sure you'd like our partnership to stay on a business-level, I think you may or may not be able to put a particular one of your logistics experts on... a special assignment. For a little while.
Now you may have gathered this or that out of the PDA you mentioned, and maybe you are relatively correct regarding some of the Legion's wishes, however those may be less of a military nature for the time being, and while my relationship to the Legion and may position may grant me a considerable amount of liberty when it comes to exchanging one thing for another or picking wedding gifts, I am certain that you understand that the Legion may wish to attain something in return for a gift this size and value.
As I said, the Legion's interests in Rheinland are, aside from taking advantage of the war, less of a military nature for the time being. Some... support of one another or our mutual allies may be something the Legion is actually interested in, when you think of it. Said support would obviously encompass long-range inter-system exchanges of goods and otherwise, something the Legion lacks particular finesse and raw data for.
Granted, I myself have the necessary men working for me who could more or less fill that role, but they're not much for the military life and all that strictness and such as a Red Hessian Army liaison officer might be, as you surely can understand.
So I do suppose that if a particular gentleman of your merry lot were to suddenly find himself eager to volunteer for shady and slippery work outside of Rheinland's reaches and maybe willing to see the beauty of Vespucci first-hand, I may be inclined to part with the schematics you long for so dearly.
However I'll do so as a, how should I say, wedding gift, Major Gunther Velasquez.
But, as I'm sure you'll find those terms for now to be more than satisfactory, I'd like to continue to more interesting and slippery matters between you and I, slippery matters which may or may not encompass the future option for having some customized Heimdall-class Gunships constructed to expand my corporate fleet in case of necessity, something which would be realized by you agreeing for now to said option being a distant possibility if conditions which we were to establish in the future were met.
Oh and before I forget it, while the Legion may part with the schematics in question in exchange for what I mentioned, consider it a personal bonus for me when I request to see the results of said schematics ending up in your hands myself, first-hand. Nothing the Legion would have to know of for the time being.
That said, I like the approach you proposed else, of the oh-so-glorious bastards of the Legion handing your adorable revolution a Wunderwaffle or however you pronounce that. It would be quite a PR boost as long as you ensure to make it fancy enough, and I'll take your word for making it fancy.
Message to: Natalie Callahan
Comm ID: Gunther Hoerst
Location: Ronneburg, Omega-5
You're asking a lot, though a lot of it is simple insurance for the future I see. Well, I doubt anybody will be asking questions if I squirrel away a couple people to support the Legion's newest enterprises, after the schematics have been delivered. I don't suppose you've already picked the victim, have you?
Regardless, the Legion can expect a lot of pomp over their "gift" should they wish to make it more... formal. It will likely help convince the Revolutionary Council that a fair relationship can be formed. If you invite yourself and Viva onto their delegation, I'll give you a room, a formal invitation to the launch... and one of my hats if it is absolutely necessary.
As to future equipment trades... we'll see. Might be easier to part with a ship or two if they are supposed to be "sent to the Legion as relief" or something similar.
[font=Microsoft Sans Serif] Well isn't that just shiny!
[color=#99BBCC]Oh darling, doing business with you turns out to be just a pleasure again, how wonderful!
Having said that, oh yes I did have someone in mind, a particular Oberleutnant Karl van der Riess, an, as I've heard, expert in the particular field of work.
I suppose while the Legion usually isn't much for pomp actually, they may or may not be able to stage a particular exception here, but I don't see myself being part of the delegation. It's much more convenient for now to stay in the shade, something a man of your caliber no doubt will understand. I appreciate your invitation regardless.
And I'll obviously take the hat.
We can let our future dealings stay our future dealings for now and see about those later, but it's nice to know you still have a soft spot in your heart for oh-so-poor old me.
No really, it almost brings a tear to my eye. Almost.
Regarding making it formal, I suppose I could direct you to my artificial sister? She'd no doubt handle this matter from a more... Legion-influenced perspective. More official, more mighty and all military-like.
But only if you wish so, else I'll do some more magic and the like.
Still however one question remains, considering I'll still be seeing this as a wedding gift to you more than anything...
Message to: Natalie Callahan
Comm ID: Gunther Hoerst
Location: Ronneburg, Omega-5
Good choice, Van der Riess is an exemplary commodity dealer. It's going to be hard finding a replacement for him for the few weeks that he's gone I suppose... then again I can give the job to Gluckner as a "promotion". He's been on freight duty during his off time for the past week anyway. My way of making him work to repay the damages to the gunship.
Have your contact send us the blueprints. I'll take care of the rest.
And I honestly have no idea what you mean about that wedding. I rather hope this is yet another one of Viva's practical jokes.
Plus you know, you were so worried about her earlier, it's actually not looking to be that far-fetched to assume that there might be a little more, si?
But having said that I'm sure it would be more of a joke at your both's expense, and I think it would be... entertaining to watch.
And without a wedding, there could be no wedding gift, no?
But moving on, to the more technical matters.
I'll have my dear sister contact you once the Legion's figured out its plans for the particular delegation to arrive, though I suppose they won't be staying longer than a day, just to attend a ceremony or the like.
So I'm guessing we'll be leaving it to you to make it classy and fancy as a result. You'll soon probably see for yourself that they're not that much revolutionaries really, and not big talkers either unlike you and I.