Muskegonia wrote:Previous attacks had been limited, at least where white Zeonese had been concerned. Women had not been physically harmed, though they certainly did not leave their encounters with the Cougars mentally or emotionally unscathed. But now the Zeons had shown their hidden barbarity, and all restrictions were off. The Cougars sent more raiding parties over the porous border, and now they were out for the blood of any Zeons who they could find.
Labrador Valley
When the Whitetail Cougars had first begun their campaign of intimidation and terror against the Zeonese in the Labrador Valley, it had been like firing bullets into a sponge. The material recoiled and was damaged, but other than that it did not respond. The determined defense mounted by the Brookman and Armstrong men was an outlier, and most farmers who had been targeted chose to exercise the better part of valor and depart for safer pastures farther north. This was beginning to change. The John Brown Society raids provided an example of an alternative: the Zeonese could fight back and inflict suffering on their tormentors. The sponge began to harden, and its edge began to become sharp.
Allanea wrote:This was the rule everywhere. The Allaneans had come from a country where the rifle was the traditional badge of the citizen (indeed, Allanean law did not use the term ‘citizen’ - Allaneans were arrogant enough to just call themselves Freemen – and so it was common even for entirely innocent Allaneans to be well-aware of all sorts of nasty tricks that in most countries were the domain of only the truly paranoid.
And they were happy to share this knowledge. They did not – as of yet – hold any classes or training sessions, but if one asked, they were totally ready to share.
For all of its talk about “real men,” Mount Zeon did not have a strong military culture. The rifle might be the badge of the Allanean Freeman, but in Mount Zeon a man was measured by his ability to produce and his firm control over the household. The nation was far more comfortable with husbands spanking their wives than with men signing up to wield weapons of war against other men. The gun culture was miniscule – weapons were a tool for hunting for food, or defending a flock and farm against predator animals. When the Allaneans spoke, with the calm confidence of men who were far more acquainted with this sort of violence than the Zeonese, their neighbors and friends listened. Some Zeonese found it easy to transfer the skills of hunting for food or for the protection of herd animals to the stalking of other men. They were eager to learn whatever the John Brown Society was willing to teach them.
While the Association traded tit-for-tat violence across the border with the Whitetail Cougars, the unit of Fencibles – the national militia which had been deployed in Greenfield and New Hannover – had been acclimating to their new area of operations. Many of the men who arrived lacked any familiarly with the terrain or the geography. In the forests and fields of the Valley these troops, while more heavily armed and better trained than the Associators, would be totally ineffective at catching or stopping the small bands of Whitetail Cougar militiamen who slipped across the porous border. So, the Fencibles remained mostly near the large population centers like Greenfield and its surroundings, while the Association took responsibility for patrolling and responding to sightings or calls for help.
The Cumberly Farm
OOC: written after consultation with Muskegonia
Lyman Cumberly was not the sort of person who an observer would peg as an Associator. He was older than the average Zeonese homesteader, and his personality could be generously described as “prickly.” He was not the sort of person to saddle up a horse and ride a patrol route with a rifle slung over his back. But he provided the Association with support – his farm was one of the southernmost farms still occupied. He had not originally been on the frontlines, but the Whitetail Cougars had slowly pushed the border north until it ran across the Cumberly property. Patrols of Associators knew they could rely on “Ol’ Lyman” for food and water, both for themselves and their mounts. He didn’t ask questions whenever a group of Associators might bed down in his barn, waiting for sunset to cross the border and torch a Muskegonian barn or tractor.
The Whitetail Cougars didn’t know this. All they knew was that Lyman Cumberly was sitting on land that should belong to a Muskegonian. Two pickup trucks loaded with Cougar militiamen roared down the dirt road that led to the Cumberly farm. However, the Association spotted them as they moved. Allanean-provided radios spread the word from the spotter, camouflaged in a blind overlooking a well-worn path, to a nearby patrol who made haste to Lyman’s farm.
The first indication that the Whitetail Cougars got that they would not have an easy time of it was when the two left tires of the lead pickup blew out in spectacular fashion just beyond the fence that surrounded the Cumberly plot. The sudden shift in momentum nearly toppled the vehicle on its side. When the militiamen checked the tires and the road, they found improvised caltrops scattered along the path. The Muskegonians allowed themselves a chuckle at the cowardice of the Zeons, and then proceeded on foot. They imagined that the Zeon who lived here had shot his bolt, clearly expecting the Cougars to give up when they faced any difficulty at all. They vowed they pay the man back for ruining two perfectly good tires.
On a small rise in the ground, a Zeonese man wrapped the sling of his rifle around his hand just like the Allanean had showed him. He tried to control his breathing, which was slow but ragged. The crosshairs of the scope settled on the lead Cougar, assault rifle in hand, walking down the path towards the farmhouse that sat a little distance behind the would-be sniper. The convergence of the two lines settled on the man’s head, then drifted down to his center-of-mass, and then drifted down further to his waist. The raiders were saying something that they found funny, and the man’s mouth was wide open in laughter when the Zeonese pulled the trigger and felt the rifle buck against his shoulder. The raider went down, clutching at his lower stomach. The round had gone a little high. The shooter imagined it would still hurt quite a bit.
More shots echoed over the field. Not every one hit, but enough of them did. The Whitetail Cougars tried to figure out where to aim their fire, but it seemed like it was coming from all sides. The last two men standing broke into a run towards where the undamaged pickup truck was sitting. One of them went down pitching forward, dark red staining the back of his shirt. The other one skidded to a halt when two rifle barrels, and the men holding them, rose up from their concealed positions in the ready-to-harvest crops and blocked his path.
“Drop it,” one of them said, gesturing at the assault rifle. The weapon thumped against the soil.
“Take a look back at your friends,” the other Zeonese man said. “Go back and tell the rest of them that we’re not taking it no more. They come back here, they’ll end up the same.”
The Muskegonian replied with words designed to get a rise out of the second man, whose black skin stood out against the amber field behind him. His bravado earned him a rifle butt to the stomach, that dropped him to his knees.
“Go on,” the first man said. “Get.”
When the sound of the pickup’s engine had faded into the distance, Lyman Cumberly stalked out to the edge of the property where the Associators were gathered.
“They’ll be back,” he spat.
New Argyle
General Randall Flynn struck many of his fellow, superior, and subordinate officers as being cold-blooded. He had pale skin, which seemed to neither tan nor burn in the sun, and he seemed to never blink. His green eyes bored into whoever they were focused on, not as a form of intimidation although he was quite capable of intimidating those who he felt required further motivation. But even with men to whom he answered, it seemed as though his casual gaze was still intent on seeing through you. He spoke in a calm voice that could harden into black ice when he was displeased. He was very displeased right now.
“I was under the assumption, Chief Engineer Daniels,” he was saying to the civilian in front of him. “That the railroad would be capable of transporting my men on a much more…accelerated timeline than the one you have just given me.”
“There have been delays, General Flynn,” the man stammered back. “The, er, transition in labor disrupted our timetables. And the topography south of New Argyle was not properly mapped by the first teams…”
“And it only just now occurred to you,” Randall Flynn interrupted, “to inform me of the effect these delays will have? I do not need to remind you, Chief Engineer, that there are men dying in the Labrador Valley.”
“We are working as quickly as possible,” the Chief Engineer promised. “I assure you, the new timetable is accurate.”
“And leaves the Labrador Valley defenseless against a major enemy incursion until new spring!” The sudden rise in volume might have knocked the Chief Engineer flat on his back, but those eyes kept him rooted to the place where he stood. Like a rain shower on a clear day, the moment was over as soon as it began. The General remained seated, making a microscopic adjustment to the neat arrangement of papers on his desk.
“That will be all, Chief Engineer,” he said after an infinite moment of silence. “I expect regular updates on your progress. And seeing as my troops will have little to do until after the winter, I will ensure that they are made available to assist you men in their labors.”
“That is greatly appreciated, General.” The Chief Engineer scampered away at General Flynn’s dismissal. The General looked over the report on the top of the nearest stack. Colonel Merit’s brigade was at Providence, preparing for the move to New Hannover and the Valley. They might be sufficient to hold the Muskegonians at bay for the remainder of the campaign season. Winter would blanket the Valley in snow and render any large-scale movement virtually impossible. Randall Flynn had his orders, direct from Father John himself. As soon as his troops were in position, Mount Zeon would respond to Muskegonia’s many insults. If they would not share the Valley peacefully, then they would be ejected and denied any piece of the land.