Author Topic: King of Chistopol meets the Head of the Sisterhood  (Read 2010 times)

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Offline Chistopol

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King of Chistopol meets the Head of the Sisterhood
« on: August 05, 2020, 11:03:25 PM »

If Tartu was the gem of the Kingdom is was one that had been chipped and lost its shine long ago. What had once been a thriving city through the 19th and early 20th Centuries had been the scene of vicious fighting in the 1960's and even after had struggled to regain its lustre. The city was made up of row upon row of concrete housing blocks, the ground floors of which were turned over to commerce while the residents of the city lived above them. Thankfully the one positive of the rebuilding of the city was the fact that there had been plenty of oppurtunities to put green spaces in so that those consigned to living in the small flats that most Tartuites called home had places to stroll and relax on the frequent sunny days.

Today one such of these green spaces was off limits to the general public as it was effectively surrounded by a ring of steel with large temporary metallic panels put around the Royal Park. The perimeter of the park was being patrolled by khaki clad soldiers who appeared pretty casual about the days proceedings. At Tartu International Airport there would be a small welcoming party but the aim was to keep the arrival of the Bene Gesserit Reverend Mother rather low key. In the view of the First Minister, Darijus Laine it was important to find out about this "Sisterhood" as it appeared the Kingdom may have a significant number of them and added to that they had the place the Bene Gesserit considered the Holy Land on the doorstep the downside however was several influential nations called them terrorists and until The First Minister could work out which nations they saw as the most significant to befriend they didn't want to upset them. A convoy of black armoured cars made their way up to the entrance to the park and it was here the First Minister and King Kārlis IV would meet their guest.

"Reverend Mother, welcome to the Kingdom of Chistopol" The First Minister was the first to greet her extending a hand in welcome. It had been determined that he should be the first to welcome the guest as it would show that while on paper Chistopol was a Kingdom it was the people who had the real influence. Darijus though was a man who respected the King and believed that he was the personification of what was good about the nation. "It's my pleasure to introduce His Majesty King Kārlis."

"Dear Lady" the King stepped forward his left hand gripping the top of a black wooden cane topped with a silver decretive panther's head. The King figured that for this short meet and greet followed by the walk into the park itself he didn't really need the cane but he had good days where he could walk for hours but then other days his legs would suddenly feel like heavy weights and occasionally had failed him. He did not want that to be his first impression. "Its good to meet you. I hope you've had a safe journey. Where have you come from as I heard you'd been busy on business around Mundus." The two Chistopolians and the Bene Gesserit delegation entered through the metal protective screen. The park featured a network of white gravel paths that were flanked by avenues of trees under which every ten meters or so nicely carved benches sat with most having brass plaques pinned to them dedicated to some family that had died during the fighting for independence. As they reached a small lake that swans elegantly glided on a small bridge jutted out into the lake to a small island on which sat a kind of cross between a bandstand and a gazebo. At the centre of this was a table set up with various seats surrounding it. "Please take a seat" the King said as he carefully lowered himself into his own seat. "I am eager to learn about this faith of yours. I am also eager to see if we can in someway show support to the faith." The King began before the First Minister interrupted him.

"We however will support the faithful, maybe not the Sisterhood." Darijus explained, "My concern is this Chistopol is a nation that probably recognises your problems more than most, but I was elected to complete the rebuilding of Chistopol and not lead us into another war. My concern is also that we may be at a point where we are forced to choose a friendship with the Sisterhood and your Theocracy or friendships with nations across Mundus. While my heart wishes to support the Theocracy at this point my head is telling me that would be a mistake for my people. I hope this is understandable and I apologise if it isn't what you wanted to hear. I am though keen to hear what your faith is about and how you think we can support the near million or so members of it here in the Kingdom."

Offline Libby

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Re: King of Chistopol meets the Head of the Sisterhood
« Reply #1 on: August 09, 2020, 10:51:44 PM »
Erin was rather nervous about this meeting Chistopol were a useful nation for the Bene Gesserit. Their history with the Soviets and their geographic location meant they could be significant in the Sisterhood's efforts to regain the Holy Land.  Naturally she would have preferred the meeting to have been given the status of some kind of official state visit with all the pomp and ceremony that would come with it and that made her nervous. Was it the fact that the Chistopol government wanted to be able to downplay the meeting or did they have no real serious intention of pursuing things with the Sisterhood. On the other hand though there was the fact that Chistopol had a small but not insignificant Bene Gesserit diaspora. Erin had brought with her Melissa Debdale a woman who on paper was the Foreign Minister of the Theocracy however with Chistopol not likely recognising that entitity she was just going to be introduced as Erin's adviser. As a former Truthsayer and member of the Corrino household she had a wealth of experience of other nations compared to Erin. The pair did the best to hide the disappointment of not meeting the Royals at the airport but the drive to the Park was interesting with the difference between the seemingly random green spaces and the different coloured buildings.

Again they were surprised that it was the First Minister who greeted them and not the King but perhaps this was just a custom here and so they went along with it. "First Minister thank you for the hospitality" Erin said as she pushed her black hood back away from her head revealing a perfectly bald head. As she was introduced to the King she bowed before speaking. "Your Majesty thank you for extending an invitation to come and meet with you. It means a lot." She then turned, "This is my diplomatic adviser Melissa." The tall blonde woman bowed as her name was mentioned.

"An honour Your Majesty" Melissa said as they made their way into the park.

Erin fell into step alongside the King, her robes dragging slightly behind her as they walked recieving a dusty hem. "I flew in with Melissa from Aosta. One of our faith's schools held a lecture series there and we were attending. Such things are important to the Bene Gesserit you see while many faiths believe in rituals and prayers our faith believes in the importance of gaining knowledge of all kinds. So in one respect you could argue that I've just come from a prayer service as such. You see we believe the Universe goes through cycles, at the end of each cycle humanity faces a great disaster and is all but destroyed and loses so much knowledge that it makes any knowledge of God or Gods impossible. The Sisterhood work to ensure that some element of humanity survives. Eventually one of these cycles will come to an end and the Sisterhood will have worked out a way to harness the power of a special human called the Kwizach Hadrach, a kind of Messiah figure, once the Kwizach Hadrach exists we'll be able to ensure humanity survives the disaster in tact and thus can ensure we learn the truth of God or Gods. Humanity has failed several times and sadly we don't know if the next disaster is coming next week or in a million years time, but its coming." Erin sounded confident in what she had explained. To many there was clear evidence of this, be it ice ages, plagues, some even argued the meteor that likely killed the dinosaurs was one such disaster. Many of the Sisterhood believed the next disaster couldn't be that far off, global warming, pandemics, pollution and the planets overpopulation all were leading up to matters. Erin therefore needed to ensure the Sisterhood went from strength to strength. "As for what you can do to support the faith I have many ideas I hope we can discuss." she added as they took a rather pleasant seat in the parks lake gazebo.

Erin's heart slumped when the First Minister began to speak as it sounded like he was saying there was no way they would support the Bene Gesserit in Kaitaine. That wasn't surprising but it was unfortunate. "First Minister if I may clear something up. The Sisterhood is a term that is used in many many different ways. The first is that it is similar to the Christian use of the Priesthood. The Sisterhood is the group of people who complete the day to day business of the faithful in terms of carrying out our duties. If you are in the Sisterhood its essentially like being a member of the clergy. The Sisterhood is also used in a similar way as sometimes Christians use the word "Church" to mean the family of those who follow the faith, even though for example one of our leading figures, Niklaus Corrino, is male we would still refer to him as being a follower of the Sisterhood or a member of it in many ways. The Sisterhood though is an entity that should we gain full control over the Theocracy would be running the nation on a day to day basis, in a slightly similar way as the Odinists in Nya Aland. I think we can find a way where your understandable lack of support for our armed conflict in Kaitaine and the desire to support members of our faith in Chistopol can be accomodated."

Melissa took over for a moment. "One of the biggest things any Bene Gesserit would desire is to contribute to the expansion of knowledge of the Sisterhood and the discovery of the Kwizach Hadrach. In order to do that we'd like someway, naturally within your nations laws, to give people access to it. In places like Ui Cenneslaig for example we have a special school. Our faith believes in a form of genetic screening to find people with potential links to God/Gods and have them produce children to further the chances of finding the Kwizach Hadrach. This often sees a form of matchmaking for marriages so would we be permitted to do likewise here? I think its hard for us to immediately begin this discussion as we are unfamiliar with your own nations laws and possibly more importantly religion."


Offline Chistopol

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Re: King of Chistopol meets the Head of the Sisterhood
« Reply #2 on: August 16, 2020, 09:05:56 PM »
What First Minister Darijus Laine wanted to say was "preposterous" what he actually said in response to the explanation of the Bene Gesserit faith was simply "interesting." He didn't buy into a lot of what they had said but it seemed harmless as far as religions go. "In terms of you asking about the marriages and what sounds like arranged ones then that's none of our business. Our laws state that marriage is between one man and one woman and can take place from the age of 18. Now if at 18 years and 1 day of age a girl agrees to marry someone she has never meet because of her religious belief then good luck to her. You won't find us standing in your way if you wanted to set up some kind of Bene Gesserit dating agency." He said rather more sarcastically then he had intended.

King Kārlis IV knew he had very little sway in the outcome of the meeting but he was here and so was not going to keep himself silent. "I think though there must be more than marriages that can be accomodated. Our capital Tartu is home to three different native faith's shrines and Temples. About 10million people in the Kingdom are followers of different faiths, Christian, Jews, Muslim, Manist, you name it we have it I suspect. While it may not be common you do see spires, minerets and domes dotted through our capital. We have though no places for the Bene Gesserit, why is that?" The King asked.

Darijus was a little annoyed he had nothing against the Bene Gesserit but they were a very small faith group compared to some of the others dotted around Mundus and he didn't want to be seen favouring a group he was yet to make his mind up about if it stopped him for example not being able to do business with groups like TUNA, MICA or CNN. "We have heard of the issues with nations like East Moreland and Rokkenjima, before I support any building in the capital or anywhere else for that matter tell me some more about nuclear waste and claims of Truthtalkers....Truthsayers......stealing it?"

Offline Libby

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Re: King of Chistopol meets the Head of the Sisterhood
« Reply #3 on: August 29, 2020, 02:35:41 PM »
Erin turned her attention first to the King's question. "Those places you have spoken of as places of worship are equally important to the Bene Gesserit. You see we believe that when things went bad for humanity in the last great disaster that befell us we lost so much knowledge of our world and so much understanding of the universe. We also lost our connection to the world of the divine, its why many of us use the phrase God/Gods when we speak. A Bene Gesserit will take the parts of each philosophy that they identify as being correct, some may believe in the reincarnation element of Buddhism, some may then take the elements of the five pillars of Islam and add them in. Each faith was established by someone who had gained some insight into the divine the problem is we believe that at the moment no faith has 100% the correct knowledge, not even 20% I would say. Every time a new place of worship opens on Mundus the Bene Gesserit will have someone who is happy. To us our places of worship are libraries, they are schools, they are any place that knowledge is gained and shared. If what you are implying is that you'd like to see a Bene Gesserit place of worship then I would happily explore the idea of opening a library here in your country."

When the First Minister asked questions it seemed he clearly had a mistrust of the Bene Gesserit and the Revrened Mother would need to try and sooth those. "Our Truthsayers." she corrected him on the name of the group. "They had nothing to do with that issue in East Moreland. However some Truthsayers did. When people say we are responsible it would be like saying that anytime a veteran of the Chistopol military commits a crime the whole nation is at fault. Those responsible for that are as hated by the Sisterhood as much as by the Morelanders. When we find those responsible rest assured we will make sure they face justice. Nuclear weapons damage the world and that is not what we do."

Offline Chistopol

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Re: King of Chistopol meets the Head of the Sisterhood
« Reply #4 on: September 02, 2020, 08:51:24 PM »
Chistopol's capital of Tartu was pretty neglected over the years, many of the nations buildings were hastily thrown up concrete nightmares of a variety of colours which was a token gesture at trying to soften the cities aesthetics. "The idea of a new library would fit in well with our plans to regenerate Tartu." The First Minister explained. "The city as you saw is largely a bit of an eye sore. Once the Communists left they destroyed large swathes of the city and in an attempt to quickly rehouse people the city didn't prioritise archetectual design as a significant factor, nor did they give too much concern to leisure facilities except for some green space. The addition of a new library would be nice. Should you build it would the locals be able to access it?" He asked.

 

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Re: King of Chistopol meets the Head of the Sisterhood
« Reply #5 on: September 14, 2020, 09:15:51 PM »
Erin thought this move to discussing the library seemed to be going in her favour. There was the clear hatred of the Communists here but also a chance to do something meaninful for the city of Tartu. "Well the various libraries that we have built across Mundus so far have been in keeping with the local traditions and existing buildings. We don't have a style as such of Bene Gesserit construction, we are a group of people who try and combine our thoughts with local ones and so we see archetecture as a local concern. In terms of if we were granted a chance to have one in Tartu I think we have two options. The first would be to take an existing building and allow us to renovate it. The second would be to allow us to build from scrath. Personally for speed I'd like to take an existing building but I understand from what you called them you'd like to maybe see newer things." Erin explained her view. "Either way we'd love to invite the local people in. The one in Tamora allows people of any faith or none to visit and withdraw books. We also would be happy to do things to help the local community such as running classes, homework clubs, various activities to promote literature or education."

Offline Chistopol

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Re: King of Chistopol meets the Head of the Sisterhood
« Reply #6 on: September 28, 2020, 09:51:13 PM »
First Minister Darijus Laine was pleased that at least this seemed that the people of the capital were going to be given a valuable resource for their cultural enrichment. It also presented a chance to wipe some of the hideous remnants of the Communist occupation. "I would be happy then to see this library established. We have at present a list of buildings in and around the capital that are frankly in need of either a bulldozer, a bomb or some fantastic TLC. Off the top of my head the old Workers Drill Hall would be towards the top of that list, its close to the city centre and has plenty of space. If memory serves me correctly the building is currently home to lots of dusty boxes full of unimportant things such as the trappings of the old regime. They can be destroyed for all I care. If you're willing to spruce the place up then I can see no reason why it wouldn't be suitable for you." The First Minister thought for a second or two. "We however would need you to ensure that it is presented in such a way that is draws a very clear image that this is the Sisterhood and not the Theocracy who are running it. As I have said we wish to foster strong relationships with many nations and at present I am not confident enough that we could be seen in any way as suspporting that entity. In time we shall see." The First Minister finished.

"Is there any other matters we may discuss with you."  King Kārlis asked.

Offline Libby

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Re: King of Chistopol meets the Head of the Sisterhood
« Reply #7 on: October 08, 2020, 08:30:50 PM »
Erin didn't want to push her luck. There was a whole of host of different things she wanted to try and ask for, access to cross the boarder into the Theocracy, support with communications in their efforts for independence and even to just blurt out that Chistopol should invade but all of that was impossible. For now all she could hope for was having measures to promote and protect the faithful in Chistopol and she had achieved that. "I have nothing else to ask of you." She was pleased that she'd managed to get the school. "I suppose the only question is would I and my Sisterhood's administration be free to come and visit the library here as and when we wish? It would be greatly appreciated if we could as it would allow me and my friends to oversee the place much more efficiently. Other than that I suspect all that remains is anything you wish to discuss."