Making Mundus Blind

[KrisNord]

The landscape of northern Nya Åland was a mixture of thick forest and valleys full of snow. It was a place where if you really wanted isolation it was easy to find and it was a place where reindeer herders would go weeks without seeing outsiders. It was here among the forest that a small two log cabin complex was situated, here the residents lived off the land, the forest provided the fuel for heating and cooking, it provided the game for meat, the roots and vegetables helped suppliment their small homestead farm and the river close by meant fish was never often off the menu. The only needs they had from the outside came every two weeks flown in by small plane that landed on the nearby lake and was meet with sledge dogs. The early morning barking indicated that it was feeding time for the huskies that worked for the residents as transport. The only other early morning sound was the gentle buzz of the diesel generator that provided them with the small home comforts. This morning though it was a little different a group of five men sat around a series of homemade devices consisting of a home made antena, a long mass of copper wire and even a few PVC pipes. The sound of a cordless drill mingled with the dogs and generator as the group put their finishing touches to things. A series of numbers were read out and the homemade device attached to the telescope mounting swung into the correct position. "That's the spot. Power on." A man instructed and a switch was flicked. "We now just wait." It would be several hours before they knew one way or another whether it would work.


At the command and control centre of Nya Åland#s military they were getting various communications from embassies around the world. There was a ritual that happened every 12 hours that the embassies across Mundus would use the nations satellite communication systems to relay reports. Often they were just updates as to big news going on in the nation, political rumours or just health updates of the staff. It was getting close to the time and the bank of the various operators ready to note down what was going on. They hit the window for communication and then the first voice came in. "Hi, Krokom, this is Jan in Claith" the familiar voice began.

"Hi Jan" the operators on either end tended to recognise each others voices after so many days. "Ready for your report."

"Excellent......" there was nothing.

"Hello Jan."........"Jan are you reading me."........"Claith come in" There was nothing, not even static. As the operator looked down the line of operatives he saw several puzzled faces and removed one headphone from his ear. Similar conversations were being asked and then one at a time they pressed the button to alert the watch supervisor. As the suited man appeared from his office his eyes widened as he saw this wasn't just one operative reporting that the ambassador of somewhere like Zimalia was worried about the latest disease outbreak this was across the board. He headed into his office and picked up the phone and got in touch with his technical teams, they had already picked up on the problem as the Air Force who were on exercise in the Alucard had lost comms, additionally the Joint Nordic Space Programme had lost contact with one of their probes. Then an hour later just as suddenly as it had been lost everything returned to normal.


Out in the forest of the North a phone rang and Ragnar Odinsson, Head Gothi of the Gungnir picked up the phone. "Sir, it worked."

"Excellent. Thank you Anja" the man hung up having heard from Anja Odinsson, a member of the JNSP team and a devoted member of the Gungnir who had been instructed to be the eyes and ears for this particular effort.

Ragnar headed back into the log cabins communal area where men and women who had devoted themselves to returning the  Nya Åland nation back to the true ways of Odin. Weapons were being cleaned, on a table a woman was sewing damaged clothing while a younger girl, maybe 16 years of age, was chopping up meat to be used to bait traps to catch fish and game. It was all about being as self-sufficient as possible and the Gungnir were great at it. "Brothers and Sisters." Ragnar announced loudly. "We have been successful. We will soon be ensuring no foreign transmissions enter the sacred land of Odin. Soon we shall make them as blind as Höðr.


OOC- Written by Dave

"This morning's exercise is a simple one. You're going to take the RHIB, head out to the buoy in the middle of the bay. You'll find a waterproof bag padlocked to it. I want you to grab the bag and bring it back to shore." The sun was just raising over Red Base, the training area operated most of the year by East Moreland's elite Red Legion and designed to replicate an old fishing village, mainly due to the fact that at one time it was. Major Ryan Miller briefed the men, this case mainly probationers just recently out of selection.

"Simple" Sgt. Simon Grant exclaimed.

"Yeah....problem being everyone not in the RHIB is going to try and stop you bringing it to me in my office. They'll be locked in the barn until I give them permission to leave. I'll be watching from the lighthouse. Now everyone go and get your gear on." Miller finished briefing his team and made himself a cup of tea while the others set up their gear for the exercise. With the steaming brew made the Major picked up some cake and jam and plodded up to the top of the lighthouse where his giant spotting scope was waiting. "RHIB team you have a go."

Beneath him he saw the RHIB begin its mile long trip out into the bay and waited for it to reach the marker buoy. He picked up his radio and satellite radio set and told the team in the bar to go. The whole exercise was being monitored back home at Red HQ in Aldfield. He grinned to himself as he watched the men on the boat struggle with the bag, he'd given them the wrong padlock key on purpose. He took a swig of his brew and returned to the scope, he guessed by now the reception team would be taking up positions. He couldn't help but laugh as he saw Sgt. Grant stood bellowing at his probationers while extending his arm towards the lighthouse with his middle finger raised clearly now aware of the trick Miller had played, "improvise, adapt and overcome." Miller said to himself as he watched a probationer take out a knife and hack their way into the bag. Now the RHIB was back underway but rather than heading towards the base it was heading up the coast, clearly planning a flanking move. He stood and looked around and couldn't see any of the men below, that was promising as they'd clearly found a good ambush position. Thirty minutes later he could make out the first of Grant's men closing on the village complex and still nothing. Soon the team where within touching distance of the barn, not a shot fired. Something had clearly gone wrong.

Miller made his way down and entered the barn, the team where still in there going over weapons drills and checking gear. "What the hell you doing here." He was shocked they'd done nothing.

"You never called." an NCO informed him.

"I certainly did." The annoyed officer exclaimed. After a brief back and forth Miller unclipped his radio. "Red Home this is Nordic Red, did you get my call" nothing came back. "Red Home come in please" Once more nothing, not even static. "Get everyone geared up and in an all round defence." Miller ordered and instantly the men grabbed their gear and headed off into the complex in a well rehearsed pattern. Meanwhile Miller went and picked up a traditional land line and phoned his contacts at the Nya Åland Special Forces Mjölnir HQ. He was informed they'd no idea of anything going down in East Moreland but that they'd lost comms too. It seemed like something was going down but the idea of what was still a mystery.


OOC - Anyone else who is in Nya Åland and using satellite communications equipment can assume they lost contact for approx 4 hours.

[RobertAgira]

The Bakkermayan Merchant Ship (BMS) Zardoz was heading out towards the vessels taking part in the ongoing project to remove the plastic from the Alucard. It was a routine and simple task, meet up with the two boats towing the specially adapted device. From there they would hoover out the cargo holds of the ships transferring all the plastic to their own hold while simulatniously moving supplies of fresh food, fuel and various other needs over to the working ships. They did this every two weeks and it was a nice easy contract for the Zardoz. Today the Alucard was like a millpond, it was destined to be a nice easy transfer. They were nearing the area the ship was working in and used their comms link to get more accurate co-ordinates but nothing came back. They tried several more times and even tried contacting the operations HQ in Bakkermaya hoping that they might have had more accurate location, but again this was empty. With this in mind they figured that it was perhaps a problem at their end and so relied on their radar system to track down the operation. As they pulled alongside they used their hand light to communicate and it turned out that the ships working the Alucard had been trying to contact them too with similar results. The mystery continued for about half an hour until suddenly HQ turned up on the radio seeking the attention of the ships.

[Markus]

Tamoran Embassy, Krokom , Nya Aland

It was a regular day at the Tamoran embassy in Krokom. The facility was small and didn’t have a lot of staff as Nya Aland was not among the countries Tamora perceived as either friendly, important enough on the world stage or having a large Tamoran diaspora to warrant a large facility.

As was the case with most Tamoran embassies across Mundus, it was temporary closed in the evening to allow the staff to do their evening prayers.  That included the ambassador who was facing Djerb and had his TV turned on for the live prayer service which was held in the Great temple of Djerb. He was in the middle of the prayer when the live transmission stopped. He thought the connection would be immediately restored but since that didn’t happened he got up and checked the TV. He called for his personal assistant but he was informed that the same thing happened in the entire embassy.

The ambassador was very familiar with how the Alanders treated all other religions, how they jailed those of others faiths when they dared display their faith in public and the whole issues they had with the Kingdom of Tytor over that. He therefore was sure that these were Alanders shenanigans aimed at provoking them and cause an incident.

“So the Alanders want to play with us” he thought as he ordered his assistant to leave the room and he resumed his prayers.

[KrisNord]

The next morning Ragnar was rather pleased with how the initial test had gone. They hadn't had any major media coverage yet but that didn't matter, whispers and rumours online of a satellite communication shut down.  That was enough for now they'd proved what they had worked and that for now was an ace up the sleeves of the Gungnir. Soon they would swing everything into action in one all mighty offensive. He finished his coffee and headed across to the guest quarters, there Giuseppe Kessler was being forced to work on several different contraptions, a young man called Harald Odinsson was working alongside him soldering and inspecting circuit boards. Harald was a PhD graduate in engineering from Krokom University who had come to the group around 18 months ago and while he didn't fully understand the science behind what the group were doing he knew enough to check that it would do what was needed. They were supported by a group of four of five students who had been studying Masters degrees and knew enough to be able to confirm that the captive Kessler wasn't leading them down the garden path.

They were working on six more of the devices that had been used in their own woodlands and over the next few days they would be finished and sent out to operatives around Mundus. One of them was destined for Ui Cenneslaig, another for Lodja and one more for Paracambi. The others Ragnar had still to work out exactly what he planned to use them for but that would come in time. He looked at his watch, it was time and so he headed out as the team turned on the machine for the 2nd time effectively killing all transmissions to and from the satellites passing overhead.

[Achkaerin]

Victoria Conway was the Achkaerinese ambassador to Nya Aland, she was also the Prefect of Albion which made her the senior Achkaerinese ambassador on the continent it was a system designed to be a little more helpful for all concerned. She'd dismissed the previous days outage as an anomaly after all such things weren't completely unheard of, but this second one had her a little frustrated two outages in such a short space of time was concerning it suggested a discernible pattern than a random occurrence. She looked up as her office door opened and in walked her husband Harry.

"Internet's gone again." Harry said "I thought we had that checked yesterday."
"We did." Victoria said "Everyone's getting ready for Wing's Day and this happens." Wing's Day was an Achkaerinese festival in honour of the Goddess Kisara who ruled over the beasts of the skies.
"You're getting paranoid if you think the two are related." Harry said
"Did I say they were related?" Victoria asked
"You were thinking it." Harry said
"Let's call round the other embassies and local area see how widespread this is." Victoria said "And let's double check that our SCION uplink is secure." 

[KrisNord]

A great evil has descended upon Mundus. We see the way the media corrupt our youth against their traditions, expecting girls to dress like whores while men act like women. You need only turn on television and see women made famous simply by wearing short skirts, tight tops and filling their bodies with plastic. We see men wearing make up and caring more about their image than the contribution they make to society. You need only listen to modern music and you are drowned in lyrics promoting drug use, violence and promiscuity. Sport, a past-time which should promote the best qualities in humanity has even been turned into nothing more than a mouthpiece for uncontrolled gambling, sports man pumping their body full of chemicals to cheat and are paid an obscene amount. This evil can no longer be permitted.

Each day we see the world willing to go along with this evil and our people become weaker because of it. There was a time when the Nords were a proud race, we valued hard work, community and self-sufficiency, while now we have become lewd, lazy and self centred. Times must change. Over the last few days you will have experienced an inability to send messages by satellite between 10am and 11am through our nation. This is just the beginning. We have the capability of shutting down your satellites when we choose, where we choose. Should our new constitution not be accepted within the next 48 hours we shall begin wider disruptions. Blocking your access to satellites is just the beginning of our capabilities. Should our message go unheard we shall begin a rain of fire from the heavens which Mundus has never seen the like of.

Ragnar Odinsson
Head Gothi of the Warriors of Odin.

[KrisNord]

We have given the world enough time to consider our ultimatium. Foolishly the government of Nya Åland have denied our new constitution. As a result of this Mundus must be punished and that punishment shall be swift. This punishment shall continue until the behaviour of Mundus and the constitution of Nya Åland change. We have seen the true nature of several nations across trying to impose their will upon the Holy Land of Odin and as such this will not be tolerated. Nya Åland is a pure gem that will be protected for we are the Warriors of Odin.


Susanna and Tryggvi had arrived in Hunter's Bay on a student visa. They would be enrolled in a few days at the University there in the Commonwealth of the Unified Iwi through CETO to study History and the Maori language for beginners of course. They had no intention of learning the filthy Maori tongue but it gave them a good amount of cover to carry out their real task. It took them about a week to gather all the parts together or for the courier service to bring them via their homeland. As separate bits and pieces there was nothing that would raise any alarms and so as the statement of the failure of Nya Åland to comply being issued it was time for Susanna to flick the switch as Tryggvi adjusted the aerial. They had the satellite TV on in their small countryside farmhouse and having triple checked his settings the screen went blank, as did the satellite communications of all the ships in Hunter's Bay Port and those throughout the region trying to bounce their signals off the satellites used by the Maori[1]

1.	again feel free to have any ships passing through the Matilda's hit.

[Achkaerin]

What had initially been a nuisance was now a full on issue, the Round Table Council otherwise known as the RTC[1] had been called and assembled it comprised the senior members of the Royal Family, advisors, Government Ministers and staff, military leadership and members of the intelligence community. Chairing the meeting from his seat at the oaken round table was the Achkaerinese Emperor Peter Azurewind, on her feet at the opposite end of the room in front of a large wall computer touch screen that showed a map of Mundus was Lt Colonel Kara Thornton of Achkaerin's Military Defence Initiative.

"In the last few hours your majesty we've had three reports from Achkaerinese shipping vessels transiting the Matilda's and Ardian Gulf area." Kara said "Everything we know leads us to believe that this is the Gungnir showing they can make good on their threat."
"I see." Peter said "How are Nya Aland doing in hunting down the Gungnir?"
"I would assume they're doing the best they can." Adam Sheppard the Minister of Defence said "Fighting terrorists is never easy especially when you go hunting for them because you're on their turf and most of the time you don't have the full picture. I'd expect that if the Alander's weren't doing a good job then the Morelanders would be saying something, I mean they've got a base right there and they train the Alanders."
"Probable progression?" Peter asked
"Terrorists don't stop until they're stopped." Kara said "This doesn't end until either the Gungnir are neutralized or we find a way to block what they're doing."
"Do we think the Gungnir might escalate things?" Michael Williams, the Consul and head of the elected government asked
"It's something we have to consider." Cheryl Holmes, the Minister for the Diplomatic Office said "At the moment they're trying to pressure Mundus against Nya Aland..."
"And succeeding somewhat." Crown Princess Serenity said from where she sat next to her father.
"Thank you Serenity." Peter said "Cheryl please."
"The question is what happens if the Gungnir decide to change tactics." Cheryl said "We should take steps to make sure that the risk is minimal."
"We should also throw support behind the Alanders." Serenity said "When it comes to combatting terrorism, shoulder to shoulder is how it has to be."
"Agreed." Peter said "Admiral what ships have we got in the area?"

Fleet Admiral David Jackson turned to the Emperor.
"Your Majesty we have the INS Stardust and INS Normandy in the Karifan and the INS Groundon is in port in Vaguzia." David said
"Ok send new orders to the Groundon they're to proceed into the Alucard and standby to evacuate Achkaerinese diplomatic personnel if the situation escalates." Peter said "Task the other two vessels to assist and protect and put phase one of Sunstrike in effect."
"Yes your majesty." Cheryl said, Sunstrike was the procedure for evacuating an Achkaerinese embassy, there were stages to this and the first stage was basic preparation."

"If we go full on with that then the Groundon will be where we evacuate to. Diplomatic back channel in others in and let them know that we can assist them if they have to take similar decisions. Let's try and avoid having a naval car park sat off the Alander coast shall we?"

1.	OOC - think UK COBRA

[Aosta]

One of the great beauties of the Aosta Imperial system of government was speed or at least it usually was. The Emperor could simply state a course of action and things would be set in motion with his civil service staff running too and fro to do his bidding. The problem was though the Emperor of Aosta was a two year old boy with no ideas what space was yet alone what a satellite was. It was rather useful therefore that the Empire had a backup system for such scenaroios. Prince Lorenzo and his sister Princess Brigida were the stand ins for the infant Emperor and if both of them were being honest their knowledge of the way satellites worked was more or less on par with the Emperors. They sat and listened to an expert from the nations Air Force talk to them about different types of waves, beams and frequencies but all they really understood was that for a few minutes everyday they had some issues with their GPS and their communications. Was it even worth being concerned about? The Air Force man said "yes", it was something that they were probably on the edge of as it stood with reports of other Albion nations having problems and if the officer was correct some nation in Ardia now. If it was spreading then they had to be prepared.

"So what would you have us do" The Prince asked.

"I would, if I was you throw our lot in with the rest of the region regarding this. I've heard rumblings of some meeting between nations and even a nation from Alba Karinya being involved in a solution. We also have statements from Rokkinjema in Ardia against the nation where this is happening." The Officer suggested.

The Prince looked across at his sister. "Sounds like a sound idea."

Princess Brigida knew even less about such military science matters but if their Air Force adviser was suggesting this then they would take it onboard. "I think we wait for this regional body to make their announcement and then support it so long as its not something likely to harm our nation."

"Agreed" the Prince nodded. "Thank you for your time Squadron Leader" he rose shook the mans hand, "We'll be in touch when we hear from the neighbourhood to seek your advice on their approach."

The officer stepped back gave a swift bow followed by picking up his cap and saluting. "Thank you Your Highnesses" he said politely as he left the room.

[KrisNord]

"The Theia Space Telescope[1] is to go." Was all that Erik heard over the phone before the line went dead. He placed the phone he'd had the call on in his pocket and headed back towards his rented appartment. As he reached it there was the huge communal bin outside and he split the thing down into its battery, front and rear case before taking the sim card, snapping it in two and throwing those in ensuring all the parts where in different sections. He then gave the bin's contents a good swirl with a nearby broom to make sure the phone sank beneath the surface. Satisfied the burner phone was gone he headed up to the apartment which had no furniture except for a bed and and a desk upon which his laptop sat. That too like the phone was something not destined for long term use. It hadn't taken them that long to work this one out. The telescope was one of the most well known scientific tools around on Mundus and its computer was ancient, built in the tail end of the 1980's it was thought to only be 15Mhz. Meanwhile the laptop he had in front of him was running at around 1.8Ghz, it could dance around the telescopes computing with ease and knowing the right location to point a makeshift aerial and then just a few months of monitoring things from Achkaerin's space agency meant they had everything they needed. He went up to the roof and set up the laptop and the aerial, checked the settings and once happy the aerial was in the correct space began tapping away at the keyboard.

Soon Achkaerin would notice the telescope start to spin but with the frequency of the telescope now being changed between four different frequencies on a random allocation it would take them far too long to halt what was to happen. Soon the viewfinder was pointing directly towards the sun and everything was being powered up. At that point an e-mail dropped into the inboxes of several agencies and media outlets including Achkaerin's Space Agency. The e-mail contained a single video file

"The God Odin was someone who always sought to make himself greater. He was willing to make sacrifices to achieve his goals. He hung himself, used spears to wound himself and finally in order to gain all the knowledge of the universe he sacrificed an eye. We of the Gungnir seek also to make ourselves better, to rid ourselves of great evil, to rid ourselves of the pollution of these intruding foreign cultures. So we too shall sacrifice an eye. Let this demonstration be a warning as to what we are capable of."

Just two minutes after the e-mail was delivered a live feed of the telescope appeared to anyone who wished to access it across Mundus. The lense opened and a blinding light hit the sensor pad which converted light rays into images back on Mundus. So intense was the light that it essentially cooked the sensors rendering the device nothing more than floating metal. As soon as the job was done Erik packed up his gear into his car and headed away from the city of Valtheim. It was practically impossible they'd have his position, after all the whole process took less than five minutes and for anyone to have worked out where he was they'd need his frequency for at least ten. He'd now simply go check himself into a small guesthouse he'd found on the internet a few weeks ago, enjoy four or five days relaxing and then fly to Bakkermaya ready for the next stage.

1.	Achkaerin gave the OK. This is essentially Hubble