A Bridge Zhou Far - Three Stars Rising [Concluded]

[Subotan]

The terrain PEXDET was marching through was flat and wide; the North China plains topography allowed huge storms of dust to blow in from the Gobi, and the dust-storms in turn reduced plant life to bare bushes and scraggly shrubs. It was in this climate that Renata was waiting, a few metres from his tent, for his killers to arrive.

As she had predicted, they came from the south, and the tall man leading the group raised a hand to halt the little platoon when Renata entered his sight. Renata remained upright, as straight as an arrow, as the tall man raised a hand to keep the dust out of his eyes.

"Renata! We have proof as to your identity. I have it all written down, right here. For the very survival of the People's Extraordinary Detachment, The Party has decided that you must be liquidated."

With that, he gave a nod to his followers. They fumbled in the jackets and produced various firearms, and short clicks could just about be heard above the howling wind. They armed them and pointed them at the alleged reactionary, waiting only for the Chairman's order to open fire. But suddenly, Renata swung his right arm out so it was perfectly horizontal; he gave his attackers pause for he was holding a long, sharp sword. Brandishing his steel in an iron grip, he called out to the tall man in a withering, mocking tone.

"The Party has decided? What, all three of you?"

The tall man looked over his shoulder in horror, to see that there were indeed only two loyalists standing with him; the screaming dust had allowed the others to slip away. Turning back to his victim, he was caught completely off-guard by Renata flying towards him, sword in hand. Renata's blade whirled like an propeller, an infernal engine, and it smacked the tall man right on the cheek, and knocked him back onto the floor. His two comrades scattered and ran, and the tall man was left to rely on his wit and his gun, which was lying several metres away. Renata raised her blade, and prepared to bring it down for a deep plunge into the tall man's stomach. But luckily, the tall man managed to kick Renata in the knee, and she toppled onto the floor, allowing the tall man to escape with just his a nick in his face and a burning sense of shame.


***

autolycus had watched the whole debacle from behind Renata's tent, and tutted with disdain when the tall man was sent running for his life. Renata appeared cheerful and confident, but autolycus giggled when he thought of how comfortable Renata would be after a visit from autolycus, and his bludgeoning ways. autolycus readied his big stick in anticipation, as Renata approached, blissfully unaware of the danger that lay just behind his tent.

"Aha! Got you!"

autolycus' collar was yanked back with tremendous force, and he coughed and gagged as he was choked by the tough linen fabric. autolycus could only squeak as three burly men with swords as big as his legs dragged him back into the darkness, allowing Renata's blissful obliviousness to be happily justified. They pulled him along for about fifty yards, before they found a sufficiently secluded area behind a large boulder, where they dropped him, freeing his wind-pipe.

"You blundering idiots!" spluttered autolycus, inbetween the sobs for oxygen "I'm a bloody Officer, and I was dealing with a bona fide Counter-Revolutionary!"

The three men looked at each other, before the burliest said in a scarily patronising tone:

"We know. That's why we stopped you, and it's also why we're going to kill you right now."

autolycus went white, as the burly men raised their large swords and menacingly approached. Thankfully for the other members of PEXDET, the sandstorm's screams muffled and blended with autolycus' own.

***

A loyal Communist returned to his tent without incident. He picked up a kettle which he had left bubbling on his camp fire, and crawled inside to pour it on some delicious noodles which he had swiped from the Officer's Quarters. Only, there was already somebody inside his tent, munching on his noodles.

"That dirty bastard..." growled the Communist under his breath. "I'm going to show him a thing or two when I-"

Throwing open the tent flap and jumping inside, he was confronted not just by a man and his noodles, but the hard, callous stare of a Japanese Kempeitai Officer

"Oh crap..."whimpered the Communist "Listen, you can keep the noodles, just let me get out of..." His pathetic attempt to escape his own tent was prevented by a Japanese soldier appearing from nowhere and blocking his exit. Putting a hand to his mouth, he whimpered.

The Kempeitai Officer sighed and finished slurping his delicious noodles. "We're not here to kill you, ******. We're just hear to present you with a ...proposition."

"Yes, a proposition" nodded the Grunt.

"Because we know all about you. We know about your home back in Darien, your love of sushi, and your general appreciation of Japanese war goals." continued the Officer, with a sinister smile

The Communist dropped his now cold kettle, and held his head in his hands

"So what do you say? You can either join us, in our fight for Greater-East Asian Prosperity and the Construction of a Pan-Asian Union, or, we can shoot you in the head." said the Officer, with a sparkle in his eye

The now ex-Communist glumly nodded, as he agreed to betray his Comrades, ideology and nation.

***

The Chairman assembled the Communists, again, with a disappointed and glum look on his face.


"...I guess we better keep on marching. We're nearly at Yan'an, Comrades, but they still walk amongst us. It is a shame we don't have more people like miotas with us, loyal Communists, who, although with a bit of a too-fond taste for sushi, or M3YUZ with their appreciation of Twelve-Pointed Suns were otherwise trusted and true Marxists."

Alive: 13/40

ACIN
ATPG
Captain Blackadder
Cute Wolf
Death is yonder
Double A
GeneralHankerchief
Jolt
Nictel
Renata
Seamus Fermanagh
Sigurd
Split


Lynched players 12/40

Azathoth
Beefy187
shlin28
Niklas
Pinman
TheFlax
YLC
miotas
M3YUZ
Romanic
Joooray
landlubber

Killed Players 12/40

Winston Hughes
Sasaki Kojiro
taka
Beskar
Chaotix
Psychonaut
johnhughthom
Secura
CDF
aThis
Yaesikhaan
wideyedwanderer
autolycus

Devoured by Rats/Consumed by Flames - 3

Thermal Mercury
Wishazu
AVSM

Deadline is is 22 hours, at 22:00 GMT+1. The update will most likely be late, as I'm going to somebody's 18th, again. However, I think this one will be excusable, since it will be my own

[Jolt]

Vote: Renata

Bye Renata.

[Splitpersonality]

Comrades,

Have we not suffered enough? Have not enough of us died or been conscripted into the hands of the filthy Japanese, as to raise even a few questions.

Apparently there are those of us in this unit who would forsake our political ideologies, our vision of a free and equal society for all, simply to hold the glory and power for themselves. How can we, communists for chrissakes, sit around and let ourselves be ruled by an oligarchy?

I am not saying our leader is necessarily corrupt himself, I am saying he employs agents of corruption, and that by his actions he is sentencing our own troops to die.


For power? For his Japanese allies? For his own amusement?


I can only speculate the reasons for his actions, but one thing is clear to me right now.


Vote: Revolt


He cannot be allowed to keep his position any longer.

[Double A]

I don't care if he IS a townie, even though I've been working for him since night freaking one, his leadership is ineffective. We've caught too few KMT scum, and hardly any Nippos. This is just plain ridiculous.

Vote: Revolt

[Jolt]

We got 3 Japanese identified so far.

[Double A]

Huh, I thought it was one.

Regardless, they're still alive.

[Askthepizzaguy]

We got 3 Japanese identified so far.

Who are the others?

[autolycus]

My guess would be that the boss thinks he knows who flaked out on killing Renata.

[Splitpersonality]

Then why isn't this info being released to the public?

[Double A]

There's that amazing leadership I was talking about.

[Splitpersonality]

And no offense, but if Jolt knows, why don't you?

Aren't you an officer?

Or are you not trusted?

[autolycus]

I'm dead, spl1t, I can no longer look at or comment on anything not in the public thread.

[Splitpersonality]

Derp, I totally forgot about that, that one is my bad.

[Double A]

GH's administration is less transparent than Stalin's :\

[GeneralHankerchief]

I'll tell you who flaked out: Nictel.

He was spotted visiting autolycus's tent by the tracker. Oh, look who happened to die? autolycus. Kill him now, we'll deal with Renata later.

[Captain Blackadder]

Sounds good enough to me

vote nictel

Abounding your post to be seen entering the tent of someone who ended up dead that very night seems clear to me you are a traitor to our cause of communism.

[Jolt]

That makes 4 known Japanese.

Unvote; Vote: Nictel

[Askthepizzaguy]

That makes 4 known Japanese.

Unvote; Vote: Nictel

Who are the others?

[Splitpersonality]

That makes 4 known Japanese.

Unvote; Vote: Nictel

God , if they're ing know why the don't I know them?

Why doesn't the town know them?


If we know who they are, we can stop them. Keeping the town in the dark doesn't help a thing!

Vote: Jolt, I don't care who you are.

[Askthepizzaguy]

I'll tell you who flaked out: Nictel.

He was spotted visiting autolycus's tent by the tracker. Oh, look who happened to die? autolycus. Kill him now, we'll deal with Renata later.

Ok let's try someone else.

GH, would you be willing to just state for the record who all the Japanese are?

[Jolt]

Who are the others?

Renata has been confirmed in investigation and and this night in the write-up.
Nictel has just been confirmed by the spotter.
Split and Double A have conviniently decided to try to create a revolt bandwagon early on, in the one turn where the Japanese are on the verge of surpassing us. So much that if they succeed in the revolt, then the Japanese will have equal numbers with the rest of the players, winning them the game.

I have been investigated as fully loyal and GH immediatly promoted me to the officer corps. If he isn't town, that is a pretty stupid move to do. As such, I have complete trust that GH is town, and it is obvious that anyone joining the revolt bandwagon means that it is a Japanese.

BTW Split, you also conviniently forgot to unvote.

[Pinman]

You can both vote and vote for a revolt. Its legal.

[Jolt]

Ah, missed that part. Nevermind then.

[Double A]

I am most assuredly NOT a Nippo. I don't care what you think. Tokyo can go to Hiroshima for all I care.

[Jolt]

I am most assuredly NOT a Nippo.

Oh. Ok.

[Double A]

You don't think I'd have been investigated by now if I was, and if I was vulnerable to sushi, I'd have been stuck in an officer position so I couldn't be converted?

GH may be ineffective, but he's not stupid.

[GeneralHankerchief]

We don't know all of them. The three we have positively identified are as follows:

Sigurd
Renata

Yes, I know Sigurd. I'll explain later on.

Nictel is, while not explicitly confirmed as one, is 99% Japanese. Reason being is he flaked out on Renata's vig group and was seen at autolycus's tent last night. That's about as confirming evidence as you can get without a positive identification.

Then we have split and double a, who came out of nowhere with this revolt. Split especially, who's been mostly inactive the entire game and suddenly the first post of any substance he makes is all coming out and trying to string me up. If I had to guess, I'd say that Split's been Japanese the whole time and Double A was recruited last night. But they can wait, and I'm less certain about them than the first three.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Now, for Sigurd. Yes, he was Japanese the whole time. ACIN, with my approval, tried to go undercover and flush the rest of them out, pretending that he was a player aligned only to chaos. I think Sigurd suspected something though. We sacrificed Joooray for the sake of trying to take town three or four Japanese, but that time has passed. I'll provide you some of ACIN's and Sigurd's exchanges later, but from what we got out of it Sigurd had at least two comrades at the time, at least one of them being on the North Bank.

I had 7 people on Renata last night, including myself. Sigurd was one of them, I did this to keep cover. I knew he wouldn't show up. But that means three other people skimped out on orders as well. Obviously, Nictel was one of them. As for the other two, I'd bet Split and one of either ATPG, DiY, or Double A.

It is clear to me that the enemies of PEXDET are making an all-or-nothing play this turn to remove me from power. Fine, bring it on. But if you fail, then you're marked.

By the way, for any of you who are on the fence, look at who's tried to revolt against me in the past. YLC. Jap. Romanic. Unknown, but suspected KMT. Renata and Flax both had their reservations. Jap and recruited KMT. Sigurd. Jap. The list goes on and on...

[Splitpersonality]

I have been investigated as fully loyal and GH immediatly promoted me to the officer corps. If he isn't town, that is a pretty stupid move to do. As such, I have complete trust that GH is town, and it is obvious that anyone joining the revolt bandwagon means that it is a Japanese.

BTW Split, you also conviniently forgot to unvote.

I can't speak for Double A, but I'm not Japanese.

The fact that you think/know that the Japanese are even remotely close to town numbers (if there's any more than 3 of them, I don't even know (that's assuming Renata and Nictel are japanese))


If the revolt succeeds, there are 12 people alive.

You are suggesting that there are 6 japanese in that case, because revolting should only kill GH.


If you're concerned about you seat of power, fascist, I can assure you at least one of you will retain their position when the revolution comes.

[GeneralHankerchief]

Split, if you are truly concerned for the welfare of PEXDET, then stop attempting to revolt. I will give you autolycus's position and let you in on everything.

-edit- This goes for any others who are truly concerned as well. My current officers will understand if they have to be replaced.

[Double A]

Wait, you haven't even confirmed my susceptibility to conversions, yet I've been working with you the entire game? I potentially could have backed out of a completely vital protection at anytime. You're worse than I thought!

And you didn't do ANYTHING about Sigurd. That's great. We've known about a jap for a really long time and you don't even mention him till now. I feel real safe, GH.