“Well?” Norman asked as he sat down with the Admiral after the meeting.
The man let out a slight sigh as he leaned back in the chair. “Their demands are completely unreasonable. Not that I expected them to be anything different. They are surprisingly less onerous than I predicted.”
Norman was slightly surprised by the Admiral’s statement. “You can’t seriously be considering any of them, can you?”
“While I appreciate your concern. Any deal between the Commonwealth and the Council was always going to contain a lot of give and take, Lord Norman. I’m certainly not going to give up any of our people, enhanced or not. And asking us to cut ties with all of the zones around us would just leave us at their mercy. But scuttling our pre-collapse military assets is a possibility. To be honest, they wouldn’t last much longer anyway. We simply don’t have the manufacturing base required to maintain our jets and helicopters for much longer. And the only thing the Aircraft carrier has been good for is being a mobile airport. It was never designed to strike deep inland. And providing sufficient fuel to run all of these systems is posing a significant challenge.”
“Didn’t you tell me that those were the only things keeping the Council from pushing you back?”
“I did. And I suspect that if we just agreed to drop them wholesale after a ceasefire was signed. They would renege on the deal and shove us aside without issue. No, to ensure a lasting peace, it would need to be a gradual demilitarization of those assets.”
“And that would also give you time to find replacements for those.”
The admiral smiled slightly at Norman’s statement. “It would.”
The next day came without any fanfare, and thankfully without any violence. It seemed Donovan’s current scheme didn’t involve allowing his council members to run amok this time around.
The first meeting Norman attended was with the younger jorik, Valadin. Honestly, the man had little to offer that Norman didn’t already have access to. His main selling point was offering enchanted items. That would be great if Norman didn’t have access to a jorik enchanter, a gron enchanter, and a human enchanter.
But he didn’t turn the man’s offer down. The main reason was to strengthen his ties with Custodian Marlinik. He already knew that that jorik enclave was rather insular. Even though there were millions of joriks in that zone. How the Admiral had managed to coax one of them out to attend this meeting was a mystery, but he was glad the man had. And not just for the trade opportunity, but also to see the happy expression on his Administrator’s face.
That didn’t mean he was going to let an opportunity like the aged Custodian slip through his fingers. He had faith that Nolia realized this as well since she was spending time with her Gigi and life partner. There was always the possibility that the couple would ask to be restored to life and leave with the older jorik, but Norman doubted that.
They seemed to like their positions within Normenia, and if he understood the conversation from yesterday properly, it didn’t appear that Nolia’s mother approved of her shacking up with Saliu.
The next meeting he left up to Eugene to handle. He was pretty sure he understood the Matron’s wants there, considering she wanted to meet at her temporary residence and had invited Eugene. And he did not want to get caught in the middle of that.
He had offered Eugene the option to go back to his living form for the encounter, but the man declined. He called their upcoming meeting a sample, and if she wanted more, she would come back with a better offer.
It took him a while to get that image out of his head.
That left the final meeting of the day and the one he really didn’t want to attend. But he would attend if only to moderate the discussion.
Norman made his way to the meeting room and opened the door. Donovan was standing on one side of the room with the Admiral on the other.
When the Council leader spotted Norman, he spoke. “Now that our chaperone has deemed to grace us with his presence, I believe we can begin.”
Seeing the two here before him did surprise him a bit, but he managed to hide it well as he made his way to the smaller meeting table. “Are the rest of the Councilors running late?”
“They will not be attending as they have already headed back to California. We discussed our options last night, in order to save time here today.” The man’s ever-present smirk was gone, replaced by the no-nonsense businessman that the Admiral had warned him about.
“Very, well,” Norman spoke as he sat at the head of the table. “It seems you are prepared to present your offer, so you may begin.”
“The Wizard Council stands with the demands it made yesterday. Demilitarization, closing off borders, and turning over any potential threats to our sovereignty.”
The Admiral scoffed. “You can’t be serious. Did you just come here to waste both of our time with these ridiculous demands?”
“I’m going to have to agree with the Admiral here. A deal like that sounds very one-sided in your favor.”
“Fine,” the man spoke, leaning back in his chair and motioning at the Admiral. “Make me a counteroffer.”
The two went back and forth for a bit, arguing over the finer points of a specific option before coming to a tentative agreement.
“We will agree to a ten-year plan to demilitarize our old US military assets, with any potential nuclear assets disposed of within the next year.”
The fact that the Admiral had access to nuclear weapons had come as a shock. At least to Norman. It seemed that Donovan had been aware the man had them from the beginning. It would explain his slow approach to wearing them down, instead of just striking with all of his power.
“We agree to limit access to human breakthroughs in magical knowledge to former U.S territories. And we also agree not to station enhanced personnel along our shared border, so long as you agree to do the same.”
“Acceptable,” the man replied in an almost bored tone. “The Wizard Council agrees to remove the mindless undead from our shared border as well as any of our Controllers. Our… underprivileged populace will be ensured basic human rights as detailed in the International Human Rights Law.”
That was about all the Admiral could get out of Donovan as far as compromises went. It seemed neither man was all that happy about the deal, which probably meant it was about the best they could expect.
Norman had the pair finalize the agreement on paper in the first-ever Ashvale Accords. And even though these two had come to an agreement, he knew it didn’t mean the cessation of hostilities between the two countries. Just an end to the war and open fighting.
The Admiral offered his hand to Donovan, but the man declined to shake it. Barnes seemed unfazed by this and dropped his hand. “Thank you for facilitating this agreement, Lord Norman. As well as offering the hospitality of your city and its people. Now, if you will excuse me, I must return home.” The man gave Norman a slight nod, which he returned before the man turned and left the room.
“Well… just you and me now, isn’t it?”
Norman turned toward the Council Leader, done with his bullshit. “I don’t know what your game is, Donovan. You are an insufferable prick, and I don’t much like you.”
The older man chuckled at Norman’s blunt statement. “And I think you are a naïve, self-centered man-child trading away humanity's future for personal fulfillment.”
Norman narrowed his eyes at the insult. “I could kill you here and now and I doubt anyone on the Council, including your son would shed a tear,” he responded coldly.
Donovan shrugged at that. “You could, but you couldn’t trap me here like you did with Gail and J-son. I made sure your little soul trap wouldn’t work on me. Besides, what would killing me get you?” the man asked, relaxing in his chair. His face had reverted from ruthless businessman back to smirking bastard in an instant.
“It would rid me of you.”
“For a bit, perhaps. But we both know I wouldn’t stay dead. And then you would have made me your enemy. Besides, who do you think keeps the Council in line? If it wasn’t for me, they would already be down your throat. And let's face it, your little spells wouldn’t save you from all the hell they could bring to bear. Not for long anyway. You may be powerful, Norman, but you are only one man. You and your little nation are insignificant in the grand scheme of things. So no matter how much you claim to dislike it, this is the game we play.”
“I don’t think you understand just what I’m capable of,” Norman growled.
The man laughed. “You mean your defeat of the Empire's army. I’ll give you credit, it was impressive. But hardly a drop in the bucket against even their main forces if they chose to attack. There are scarier things out there than me, Norman. And I don’t mean the Empire. But I think you already know that. If humanity wishes to survive in this new existence, we must be unified. Not that you seem to care about that as you have already made your choices.”
“And yours are so much better? I guess all of humanity is only the former United States?”
“I wouldn’t expect one such as you to understand my goals.”
This time Norman snorted. “Leave me out of your power plays, unless you want to end up like Gail, or worse.”
The man finally stood and adjusted his suit and tie. “Life is a game, Norman. As long as you live, or I should say exist, you will have to play it. It may not be against me, but someone or something will come along and force your hand. Think twice about making me an enemy.”
As if the man’s words were prophetic, the whole room began to shake.
“What did you do!” Norman demanded as he grabbed the edge of the table to steady himself.
The Council Leader seemed just as surprised though. “I appreciate that you think I can shake this entire building, but no, this is not me.”
Grobert teleported into the room a moment later and whispered into Norman’s ear.
Norman turned to his advisor in surprise. “Another collapse? You’re sure?”
The man nodded.
When he turned back toward where Donovan had been standing, the man was gone. He had vanished in the short time Norman had looked away. And he wasn’t invisible, his amulet would have broken through any attempt at hiding.
“What the fuck! Where did Donovan go?”
“He didn’t teleport,” Grobert confirmed, “I would have felt it if he did. I don’t think he used a portal either, I can sort of feel those portals.”
“We can figure out how he left later. I thought you said collapses only happen like once a decade. Are we safe?”
“I said they usually happen once a decade. But they can happen as little as five years apart. The longest between collapses was sixty years, but that was a long time ago.” The room shook again.
“Ok, what do we do?”
“We wait and see. The Ministry is strong enough that it will survive as are most of the houses in the city. Then we fix any damage and go on with our lives.”
Norman couldn’t help feeling anxious as the room continued to shake and he wasn’t quite sure why.
MJMarkgraf And we have reached the end of book 3. Comment below on what you thought.
“Well?” Norman asked as he sat down with the Admiral after the meeting.
The man let out a slight sigh as he leaned back in the chair. “Their demands are completely unreasonable. Not that I expected them to be anything different. They are surprisingly less onerous than I predicted.”
Norman was slightly surprised by the Admiral’s statement. “You can’t seriously be considering any of them, can you?”
“While I appreciate your concern. Any deal between the Commonwealth and the Council was always going to contain a lot of give and take, Lord Norman. I’m certainly not going to give up any of our people, enhanced or not. And asking us to cut ties with all of the zones around us would just leave us at their mercy. But scuttling our pre-collapse military assets is a possibility. To be honest, they wouldn’t last much longer anyway. We simply don’t have the manufacturing base required to maintain our jets and helicopters for much longer. And the only thing the Aircraft carrier has been good for is being a mobile airport. It was never designed to strike deep inland. And providing sufficient fuel to run all of these systems is posing a significant challenge.”
“Didn’t you tell me that those were the only things keeping the Council from pushing you back?”
“I did. And I suspect that if we just agreed to drop them wholesale after a ceasefire was signed. They would renege on the deal and shove us aside without issue. No, to ensure a lasting peace, it would need to be a gradual demilitarization of those assets.”
“And that would also give you time to find replacements for those.”
The admiral smiled slightly at Norman’s statement. “It would.”
The next day came without any fanfare, and thankfully without any violence. It seemed Donovan’s current scheme didn’t involve allowing his council members to run amok this time around.
The first meeting Norman attended was with the younger jorik, Valadin. Honestly, the man had little to offer that Norman didn’t already have access to. His main selling point was offering enchanted items. That would be great if Norman didn’t have access to a jorik enchanter, a gron enchanter, and a human enchanter.
But he didn’t turn the man’s offer down. The main reason was to strengthen his ties with Custodian Marlinik. He already knew that that jorik enclave was rather insular. Even though there were millions of joriks in that zone. How the Admiral had managed to coax one of them out to attend this meeting was a mystery, but he was glad the man had. And not just for the trade opportunity, but also to see the happy expression on his Administrator’s face.
That didn’t mean he was going to let an opportunity like the aged Custodian slip through his fingers. He had faith that Nolia realized this as well since she was spending time with her Gigi and life partner. There was always the possibility that the couple would ask to be restored to life and leave with the older jorik, but Norman doubted that.
They seemed to like their positions within Normenia, and if he understood the conversation from yesterday properly, it didn’t appear that Nolia’s mother approved of her shacking up with Saliu.
The next meeting he left up to Eugene to handle. He was pretty sure he understood the Matron’s wants there, considering she wanted to meet at her temporary residence and had invited Eugene. And he did not want to get caught in the middle of that.
He had offered Eugene the option to go back to his living form for the encounter, but the man declined. He called their upcoming meeting a sample, and if she wanted more, she would come back with a better offer.
It took him a while to get that image out of his head.
That left the final meeting of the day and the one he really didn’t want to attend. But he would attend if only to moderate the discussion.
Norman made his way to the meeting room and opened the door. Donovan was standing on one side of the room with the Admiral on the other.
When the Council leader spotted Norman, he spoke. “Now that our chaperone has deemed to grace us with his presence, I believe we can begin.”
Seeing the two here before him did surprise him a bit, but he managed to hide it well as he made his way to the smaller meeting table. “Are the rest of the Councilors running late?”
“They will not be attending as they have already headed back to California. We discussed our options last night, in order to save time here today.” The man’s ever-present smirk was gone, replaced by the no-nonsense businessman that the Admiral had warned him about.
“Very, well,” Norman spoke as he sat at the head of the table. “It seems you are prepared to present your offer, so you may begin.”
“The Wizard Council stands with the demands it made yesterday. Demilitarization, closing off borders, and turning over any potential threats to our sovereignty.”
The Admiral scoffed. “You can’t be serious. Did you just come here to waste both of our time with these ridiculous demands?”
“I’m going to have to agree with the Admiral here. A deal like that sounds very one-sided in your favor.”
“Fine,” the man spoke, leaning back in his chair and motioning at the Admiral. “Make me a counteroffer.”
The two went back and forth for a bit, arguing over the finer points of a specific option before coming to a tentative agreement.
“We will agree to a ten-year plan to demilitarize our old US military assets, with any potential nuclear assets disposed of within the next year.”
The fact that the Admiral had access to nuclear weapons had come as a shock. At least to Norman. It seemed that Donovan had been aware the man had them from the beginning. It would explain his slow approach to wearing them down, instead of just striking with all of his power.
“We agree to limit access to human breakthroughs in magical knowledge to former U.S territories. And we also agree not to station enhanced personnel along our shared border, so long as you agree to do the same.”
“Acceptable,” the man replied in an almost bored tone. “The Wizard Council agrees to remove the mindless undead from our shared border as well as any of our Controllers. Our… underprivileged populace will be ensured basic human rights as detailed in the International Human Rights Law.”
That was about all the Admiral could get out of Donovan as far as compromises went. It seemed neither man was all that happy about the deal, which probably meant it was about the best they could expect.
Norman had the pair finalize the agreement on paper in the first-ever Ashvale Accords. And even though these two had come to an agreement, he knew it didn’t mean the cessation of hostilities between the two countries. Just an end to the war and open fighting.
The Admiral offered his hand to Donovan, but the man declined to shake it. Barnes seemed unfazed by this and dropped his hand. “Thank you for facilitating this agreement, Lord Norman. As well as offering the hospitality of your city and its people. Now, if you will excuse me, I must return home.” The man gave Norman a slight nod, which he returned before the man turned and left the room.
“Well… just you and me now, isn’t it?”
Norman turned toward the Council Leader, done with his bullshit. “I don’t know what your game is, Donovan. You are an insufferable prick, and I don’t much like you.”
The older man chuckled at Norman’s blunt statement. “And I think you are a naïve, self-centered man-child trading away humanity's future for personal fulfillment.”
Norman narrowed his eyes at the insult. “I could kill you here and now and I doubt anyone on the Council, including your son would shed a tear,” he responded coldly.
Donovan shrugged at that. “You could, but you couldn’t trap me here like you did with Gail and J-son. I made sure your little soul trap wouldn’t work on me. Besides, what would killing me get you?” the man asked, relaxing in his chair. His face had reverted from ruthless businessman back to smirking bastard in an instant.
“It would rid me of you.”
“For a bit, perhaps. But we both know I wouldn’t stay dead. And then you would have made me your enemy. Besides, who do you think keeps the Council in line? If it wasn’t for me, they would already be down your throat. And let's face it, your little spells wouldn’t save you from all the hell they could bring to bear. Not for long anyway. You may be powerful, Norman, but you are only one man. You and your little nation are insignificant in the grand scheme of things. So no matter how much you claim to dislike it, this is the game we play.”
“I don’t think you understand just what I’m capable of,” Norman growled.
The man laughed. “You mean your defeat of the Empire's army. I’ll give you credit, it was impressive. But hardly a drop in the bucket against even their main forces if they chose to attack. There are scarier things out there than me, Norman. And I don’t mean the Empire. But I think you already know that. If humanity wishes to survive in this new existence, we must be unified. Not that you seem to care about that as you have already made your choices.”
“And yours are so much better? I guess all of humanity is only the former United States?”
“I wouldn’t expect one such as you to understand my goals.”
This time Norman snorted. “Leave me out of your power plays, unless you want to end up like Gail, or worse.”
The man finally stood and adjusted his suit and tie. “Life is a game, Norman. As long as you live, or I should say exist, you will have to play it. It may not be against me, but someone or something will come along and force your hand. Think twice about making me an enemy.”
As if the man’s words were prophetic, the whole room began to shake.
“What did you do!” Norman demanded as he grabbed the edge of the table to steady himself.
The Council Leader seemed just as surprised though. “I appreciate that you think I can shake this entire building, but no, this is not me.”
Grobert teleported into the room a moment later and whispered into Norman’s ear.
Norman turned to his advisor in surprise. “Another collapse? You’re sure?”
The man nodded.
When he turned back toward where Donovan had been standing, the man was gone. He had vanished in the short time Norman had looked away. And he wasn’t invisible, his amulet would have broken through any attempt at hiding.
“What the fuck! Where did Donovan go?”
“He didn’t teleport,” Grobert confirmed, “I would have felt it if he did. I don’t think he used a portal either, I can sort of feel those portals.”
“We can figure out how he left later. I thought you said collapses only happen like once a decade. Are we safe?”
“I said they usually happen once a decade. But they can happen as little as five years apart. The longest between collapses was sixty years, but that was a long time ago.” The room shook again.
“Ok, what do we do?”
“We wait and see. The Ministry is strong enough that it will survive as are most of the houses in the city. Then we fix any damage and go on with our lives.”
Norman couldn’t help feeling anxious as the room continued to shake and he wasn’t quite sure why.
MJMarkgraf And we have reached the end of book 3. Comment below on what you thought.
