Vignette:Competition
Competition
- Ebershall, Königstadt, Goetic Empire
August 14th, 1910
he trip home was uneventful, if not fraught with bouts of seasickness and the occasional vomiting. His entrance, on the other hand, was anything but. Cars now lined the streets where horses once stood. Telephone lines had created a gigantic web above his head, encompassing all of the city. Was this even his hometown now? Perhaps he’d spent too much time pushing paper in Alvastadt.
The yellow misery of Alvastadt and the Protectorates, for him a constant source of worry, seemed to fly away with each gust of the August wind welcoming him home. For the first time in a long while, he admired the vibrant greenery surrounding the manor. Red viburnum, lilies, roses, amaranths, and so much more dotted the gardens; this was massive compared to the small garden he’d cultivated back at his post. His colleagues from New Leithe, Sungkow, and Singaradscha seemed utterly oblivious to the beauty of the gardens, preferring to study the myriad of paintings inside the manor.
Yet, the meeting he’d just attended not an hour ago continued to nag at his mind. The new worries had supplanted his distaste for the dry heat of Alvastadt, and he’d only begun to make sense of what was to come.
“Have you heard the news?” An old voice called out from behind.
“Sungkow’s getting Baron von Hardenberger as their new governor,” he replied.
The old man chuckled. “Given your position, I can only assume you know what’s on the way.”
“We’ve got competition again.” He rubbed his forehead. “Ever since Kleinheisterkamp in 1900, we’ve been the empire’s golden boy. I can see why the Kaiser chose Hardenberger; he’s been in his camarilla since God knows when.”
“He’s not going to let you rest, you know. Not you, your boss, not your underlings.”
“Thank you for pointing that out, opa. I’ll make note of that.”
His grandfather rubbed his forehead, sighing. “Have a walk in the gardens; you need time to collect your thoughts.” He patted him on the back. “I’ll be with your father inside.”
“Thanks, opa.”
Watching his grandfather stroll off into the confines of the manor, he began to think. With a ruthless, ambitious man like Hardenberger in power, his connections could net him powers his predecessor couldn’t even think to use. With his ego, he’d have no problem exercising those powers. With no limitations, no shackles to chain Sungkow’s growth down, the Avalonian colony might as well speed past Alvastadt like a bullet to a speck of dust. By dumb luck, he’d picked the short straw.
But maybe he could pull something off. After all, Sungkow was still reeling from the hurricane of 1901. Alvastadt had a head start. Hardenberger still needed to divert resources to cleanup and reconstruction. He had friends in El Haud and Avarino that were willing to pull some strings while he worked on more official forms of communication; that was standard procedure in these lands. And to top that, the copy of the Alvastadter Allgemeine Zeitung he just so happened to pick up before boarding the ship to Goetia mentioned new oil discoveries in Upper Alva on page 3. This was it; the ace up his sleeve.
For the first time, he wanted to go back to Alvastadt.
