/||\        -----------------------------------------
       / || \            Starfleet Command, Second Fleet
      /  ||  \             U.S.S. Coronado,  NCC-63100
   .-/   ||   \-.     Fleet Captain Brian Aldur, Commanding
   ./    ||    \.   -----------------------------------------
   .-_-. || .-_-.              Simulation Teaser
   .-_  \||/  _-.

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/ Simulation Teaser                                                             |
/ŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻ

 Irony.

 Brian Aldur sat in the Observation Dome, watching Camelyn turn below him and
 considering the irony.  It was now ten days since Task Force 2.7's arrival in
 orbit, and nine days since civil war had erupted across the face of the
 planet.

 The planet continued turning far into the night, and crew members that came
 into the Dome soon left the Captain to his lonely vigil.  Below, the Island
 of Y'nallis came into view, home of the late Duke Erresea of Y'nallis.  The
 Duke was dead, killed by the Crown Prince, Lan DuLac, if rumors were
 accurate.

 There was no way to know for sure -- much of the island was burning, and at
 least one nuclear weapon had been used there sometime in the previous week.
 Neither side could say for sure which side had used the weapon or why.
 However, both sides were in almost constant contact with the Federation
 ships and if you stripped what they told you from the pretty phrases they
 used to tell it to you in, Aldur could well believe that either side could
 have done it, based on how they felt about each other.

 Irony.

 The task force had been sent into Dominion space to stop the Camelyns from
 killing the Gorn, and to bring the King home.  Unknowingly, a mission of
 peace.  Unknowingly, the trigger for a war apparently long in coming.

 Doubly ironic that the two sides were nearly evenly matched.  King Reginald
 had one-third of the ruling Dukes and Barons on his side, and so was
 outnumbered, but his troops and fighters were of higher quality, Aldur
 judged.  He also had excellent tacticians on his side, and even in a losing
 defense, as had happened the previous day in Ildor, his Knights were
 valiant and fought to the last, going down in last stands that Camelynian
 poets found so honorable and romantic.

 Prince Arachon of Dargoneth, also styled King by his men, had the larger
 number of troops and lands, but much of his supporters came from the
 southern continents, an area of the planet still not fully recovered from
 Gorn raiding parties of a century ago.  They fought with a savage fury few
 on Reginald's side could match.

 They were so evenly matched, in fact, that the whole bloody mess could
 conceivably come down to the last two Knights on the planet trying to kill
 each other to settle the matter, a victory that would certainly be hollow,
 considering the victor wouldn't have much of a planet to lay claim to.
 Aldur laughed sourly.  Such an ending would no doubt appeal to segments of
 the population on Camelyn, including the poets -- it would be sad, and
 honorable, and tragic -- the kind of ending that made for a good song down
 there.  Too bad that there might be very few left alive to appreciate it.

 Irony.

 Triply ironic, because word had come up from the planet that Reginald and
 Arachon were related in some unfathomably complex Camelynian way that gave
 a fair amount of weight to Arachon's claims of Kingship.  Lan could have
 explained it to him, Aldur thought, except Lan was somewhere below feeding
 the fires of hate and passion, instead of seeing to his duty on Coro...

 So far, both sides had left the ships of the task force alone, the forces of
 Reginald shielding them from the forces of Arachon when they got too close.
 Reginald's forces had stopped short of asking for Federation assistance, but
 that too was a point of contention.  Reginald's side wanted Federation
 membership, and might even be willing to give up the local clashes with the
 Gorn in order to get it.  Arachon's side wanted to remain outside the
 Federation -- the devastation of the planet a century before by the Gorn
 couldn't be fresher in their mind if it had happened yesterday, and they
 spoke of it in just those terms.  Both sides had very strong cases for their
 arguments, and both sides would die to defend them.

 Irony.

 Both sides would soon meet again on the parley field on neutral ground in the
 Evelor.  Aldur had managed three days ago to get them to do this daily in the
 hopes of finding some peaceful solution to the fighting.  Knights from both
 sides gathered in the parley field, visibly unarmed, theoretically willing to
 talk.  Armed Starfleet Security kept the peace -- Aldur believed in a
 completely unarmed Knight as much as he believed in Santa Claus -- and on the
 surface, the discussions Aldur moderated were peaceful enough...

 Aldur was shaken from his reverie by a low chiming filling the Observation
 Dome.  He had apparently spent all night in contemplation of the destruction
 below.  In an hour, it would be time to go again to the parley field, and
 try to find a way to end the slaughter.

\_______________________________________________________________________________
\ End Simulation Teaser                                                         |
 ŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻ

----------
Ross Glenn aka Jester
Fleet Captain Brian Aldur, U.S.S. Coronado, NCC-63100
http://www.ussrenegade.com/coro2400/