Ashes of Sol

[thevorpalbunny]

Trojan Confederacy
Dzada Cupczyn heaved a sigh. "That...could have gone worse."
His secretary Mona Canavan looked at him and said, "Indisputable, sir."
"I'm trying to look on the bright side. Not surprised the Mendozas refused to show me the courtesy of telling me they'd be seceding; they made no secret of their contempt for me. Other than that, though, we kept half the ringleaders. Zach Harrison left, but we kept the Italians, Barteaux, and Dobos. And even with the Mendozas, Selänne, and Björklund leaving we kept a fair number of their groups. Did you get that regional breakdown of the seceders?"
"Yes sir. We kept all the colonies in the Jupiter orbit, but most of the turnwise Neptune belt left and a significant number in the clockwise belt. The entirety of Kuiper province left."
"Mentioning Liandri hit home around Jupiter, clearly. My backyard hung around, and the Mendoza's went with them. Could be worse. Just have to keep saying that. What's next?"
"I believe you were going to the comm room to handle the two groups we sent out and the new messages."
"Thank you for reminding me, Mona."
"Just be glad I'm here to remember things for you. You'll forget your head if you ever lose me."
"I'm going to ignore that now."

Interplanetary Communications
"I'm back, Arthur. Any responses off our communications?"
"Nothing from Europa, but the Greater Lunar Union has apparently picked up the pieces on Luna and is interested in trade. Here's the transcript:"

...

"Hmmm. They're certainly a market, but I'm leery about trading through Liandri space, and Mars might present a problem. I'd rather stay on this side of the belt. I'll draft a message for you to send back to them."
"Will do. We have a couple new messages: Callisto -- that's Jupiter system -- has a severe water shortage. Rhea's food shortages are getting worse. A group of miners is sending out maydays near the asteroid belt. And two big ones: Pluto's maydays ended and were replaced by claims that it was just a test; we believe they were taken over by pirates. And a group of ships has entered the system; it's a group of German Ark ships that failed a mission to Alpha Centauri. They say they need minerals. Here's the full transcript:"

"Good day, this is the UIGS, and we have returned from what was to be an interstellar journey in order to comply with the messages received from Earth some years ago. We are no longer in the pristine Arks that some of you may remember. We are now a nation unto ourselves, and our ships have gone through many modifications to insure that our sovereignty is assured. We, however, are in need at this time. In need of massive amounts of mineral, and construction wealth. For soon, our already strict regimen of life shall become greater as our Arks fill, or become any more unliveable than they currently are. For this, we are willing to come to... arrangements. This is Kommandant Siegner Burken, Messe gut."

"That is very excellent news. Get a German speaker to translate this and reply:

Greetings, Commandant. I am Dzada Cupczyn, Prime Minister of the Trojan Confederacy. We received you message and are very willing to trade; we have abundant supplies of mineral resources, in fact. Our capital is in the turnwise Trojan belt of Neptune, but if you reach either of the Neptune Trojan clusters we'll send someone to meet you. Also, watch out for pirates; we've been receiving maydays from rocks around the outer system.

You think you can get that off quickly?"
"Certainly, I'll get Monika Maier to translate right away."
"Oh, then send off a quick message to the Pluto fleet to expect hostiles on the dwarf in case they didn't catch the original signal."
"Certainly, sir."

<Carrier Signal test pattern: 1,1,2,3,5,8,13,21>
Greetings, Commandant. I am Dzada Cupczyn, Prime Minister of the Trojan Confederacy. We received you message and are very willing to trade; we have abundant supplies of mineral resources, in fact. Our capital is in the turnwise Trojan belt of Neptune, but if you reach either of the Neptune Trojan clusters we'll send someone to meet you. Also, watch out for pirates; we've been receiving maydays from rocks around the outer system.
<Carrier Signal test pattern: 21,13,8,5,3,2,1,1>