Salvage Union: Aspirate Part Three

Salvage Union: Aspirate Part Three

"My family were farmers. We used to raise, uh, staple crops overseas in the Whitespring Republic. My grandfather, before he passed, used to talk about how it was a hard life, but a good life. How they used to take care of their workers and pay fair wages for the crops they harvested. My grandmother was a different story and much less nostalgic. And she outlived him, heh. So. She got the last word, I guess. We only survived because we held a knife to our own throats, looked the government in the eyes and dared them to blink. That's not just my family. That was all of the farmers. We had an arrangement to protect ourselves, our workers, from overreach and exploitations. They knew they had to play ball with us, so they did. Then, uh, the Boren Confederacy blew up the Beanstalk. And the Republicans came for us in. Force. No more fun and games. Almost a decade of winter *and* war on the horizon. They needed us under their thumb, to control the food, demand compliance from their civilians. Seize the assets, force the survivors to serve. My parents were teens when they boarded the smuggler's boat. I don't remember what they used to call this place. But they were here when they started building A-SPR. When they started the agri-clans, my mother traded family tradition for a seat at the table. As an. Advisor, mind. The target on her head as a clan head was too much for the family to bear. But it was a good trade. We've been doing business with them since. The Monroe Clan has been good benefactors, even if they have...everything, at this point. Delilah Monroe herself shook my hand when I graduated from accounting school and, well. She's been a good boss since. I can't really complain. I wish it went differently. But I don't think I'd be any happier as a farmer." https://thecoffin.club

Salvage Union: Aspirate Part Two

"Yeah man, everyone knows aliens did it. Everyone knows aliens blew up the Beanstalk. Check it: we got the Meld, right? Where the fuck did that come from? Wasn't here when we had like, governments and shit. Nah man like. They saw the Beanstalk and realized we were a threat, right? The little monkeys deciding to poke at the stars with their fighting machines and shit. Maybe we'd climb up there and start colonizing the stars. I don't even know why we had that thing. I wasn't born yet. And it's not like we make shit or harvest shit. This planet fucking sucks. So like. Our reach outstripped our grasp or some shit. And the aliens saw us do that. And maybe they were like...alien gods. Punish the wicked trespassers. Anyway yeah aliens did it and they sent the Meld for good measure to finish the job. Like who else could make it, right? If it was the corporations, they'd, like, include an off-switch or some secret shit to protect themselves. But that crap eats everything and everyone. Doesn't make any sense and they're not, like, dumb enough to make alien goo machines and just let them loose, right? They're, like, evil and shit, but not that sort of stupid evil, probably. You gotta worry about the arcologies and resources, y'know? Nah man I'm not saying the aliens are gods. They could be as powerful as them, but like. No such things as alien gods. Just a bunch of spiteful assholes who dropped a robot bomb on us 'cuz they were scared of us. And like. Maybe we were scary? I dunno. I've seen old pictures of what this shit looked like. It wasn't great. But fuck you, dude. Assholes." https://thecoffin.club [https://thecoffin.club]

Salvage Union: Aspirate Part One

"What's most important to understand about the war is that there was an intentional omission and destruction of context. We know the war started. We don't exactly know why or who threw the first punch. We do know what the opening salvo was: cutting down the Beanstalk. Given...recent intelligence, I'm unsure the intent of the Beanstalk was to send things off-world back to somewhere else. But that's baseless, fruitless speculation. The Beanstalk would've been a boon for us one way or another, even if we weren't a client state for a distant parent nation. I apologize for the digressions. There's only so much I can say on the matter. The simple facts are this: we used to be a planet of nations. Four major continents, each with its own master. There was a balance, and it was tense; I don't think the arrangement was a good thing. The idea is that they would motivate each other to do better. Steel sharpening steel. And what they had to offer was...a nationalist industrial powerhouse, a confederacy of energy oligarchs, research-obsessed propertarianists and a liberal republic dabbling in empire and mass culture. The question on everyone's lips was "who will throw the first punch?" I don't think anyone did, is the thing. The circumstances don't quite add up. People talk about how the Beanstalk fell at the ground level, yes, how it tipped over, struck the earth. Earthquakes. The shit it kicked up into the air that resulted in five years of winter. The ensuring war. But then why did the top 20 floors explode in low-orbit? Why is the sky full of shrapnel that stole away our satellites and cut us off? In my humble opinion, it wasn't a single punch. It was a targeted strike from multiple conspirators out to take this planet for themselves. And when the dust settled on their broken toy, they did what they did best: turn on each other and rewrite the history books as fast as they could." https://thecoffin.club

Salvage Union: Floodplain Part Seven

"Did she ever call her goddess again?" Sister Zlata hugged her knees close as she sat on the stool. The rest of the novice sisters had left the lecture and gone to do chores. Zlata had remained behind to ask questions. Sister Charity didn't much mind; it was a sign of a healthy mind and good faith. "Nope. From what the texts tell us, she survived the war and settled down to rebuild the Temple with a new congregation. She lived late into her elder years and was survived by a couple dozen brothers and sisters." Zlata's face fell. "Oh." "You have to understand: we have been told these truths from the Goddess herself. They happened long ago and far from here. But she remembers those who call her and tells their story so we understand." "...yeah, but. They both killed all of those people. It sounds like they made the war *worse.*" Sister Charity nodded. "...and she dies in her bed in a new Temple?" "Mmhmm." "...I don't think I get it, Sister." Sister Charity exhaled. "Well. What is there to get? It's a recounting of a history. I never said it was a metaphor, or a parable. It's a fact of our faith. Some sisters...they take faith in knowing that it was one of us who got the "happy ending", mm? That it's not an exec or some corpo or warlord dying peacefully." She sighed. "I worry about those ones. I'm glad it makes you uncomfortable, little sister." She frowned, wrinkled her nose. "What am I supposed to do with any of this?" The older sister shrugged. "Whatever you want. The past is what it is. Our goddess kept going, and so did Nia. One of those stories...these *histories* had an end, and the other didn't. Interpret these truths as you see fit." She closed her copy of the Book of the Earth and Moon with a smile. "And you're not going to get out of all of your chores by asking me questions." The younger sister rolled her eyes as she rose. "...would you have called her?" The older sister paused. "I will only know if I am ever in her shoes. I hope I never am." https://thecoffin.club

Salvage Union: Floodplain Part Six

The history books talk clearly about what happened next after the Scourging of Roden. The Emperor was survived by his mother, Lady Belhaine, his bastard teen son, Volkan of Wrought, and his adopted cousin Firhardt of Tessalan. The members of the Inner Council had their own surviving heirs as well who laid claim to their seats (or, if they were bold enough, laid claim to the destroyed throne). Thus began the Succession Wars, where Belhaine and Firhardt tried to control Volkan for his strongest claim while also putting down the uprisings fomented by the Council's heirs. Abroad, the war to occupy Djartola ground to a standstill. Cut off from commands and logistics, the field commanders had to make their own calls. The smart ones held to the mission with aplomb or went rogue and were not punished for it. The majority of them reveled in loot and slaughter, sweeping across the roads of Djartola to feed the beast as Djartolan resistance bled them for every inch traveled. The Succession Wars had a third player as well. There were rumors that at night, across the countryside, a woman and young girl could be found stealing into the strongholds of successors and would-be heirs alike, leaving no survivors. They would flicker in and out, ghostlike, without distinct reason beyond taking one more piece off the table. In time, Roden began to fear the Daughter of Moonlight and her merciless hand. And in time, Paraleux and Svatkopt saw the weakness of Roden and Djartola alike. This was how the whole of the continent came to war and the real slaughter began. Twenty years of marching boots, barked commands, scrabbling in the mud over long-ruined farmlands, the "Continental Look" of haunted eyes and sunken cheeks, families stitched together from scraps and clutched close. Her goddess left two years into the conflict. Officially, her husband needed her elsewhere. Unofficially, she had run out of ideas for how to stop the war without killing even more. https://thecoffin.club