Emergency planning (Benjamin/Alexander/Kyros)

[Benjamin Kírix-Unda]

The Marines pulled them into a room and slammed the door shut behind them, "We don't know, King Frexton. Last I saw they're getting arrows fired at them too."

"Our Marines are moving them into safe rooms much like this," another Marine said while pulling the curtains to the windows shut, "We don't know if more are getting shot at."

If Alexander looked around him he'd notice that the Marines were just as scared as everyone else. At least one was against the wall, crying.

Thankfully, down below the special operation Marines moved in, they quickly seized peace in the courtyard before moving into the building. They came to the door where the Kings were and knocked, after being let in they approached the two and saluted.

"I apologize but there seems to be a leadership issue." the man spoke with calm, "I've endowing leadership onto you for now, we need help calming this situation right away..."

"...So if you may, stand in President-Alexander Frexton. Orders?"

[alexanderthegreat]

Alexander did happen to look around the room and noticed the great display of cowardice to be had from the Marines. In one way it angered him, the people who were trained and expected to die for their country, for their president, were here flailing about! How pathetic! At the same time he couldn't blame them for being scared, he was, too. It was okay to be scared, but when it came to your job...

It was a moment like that that Alexander was smacked in the head with a ton of bricks. Now he understood what Holmes meant. Duty before yourself.

Being suddenly promoted to the 'stand-in president' was something that surprised Alexander. On one hand he was worried because dammit, that meant he was suddenly thrown in charge of cleaning up in a country he knew very little about, aside from what Benjamin told him about earlier. Seriously, wasn't this the job of the senators? Wherever they were? Oh what a mess...

"First order of business, gentlemen," Alexander spoke with a raised eyebrow and hoped to the heavens he wasn't going to screw it all up, "this is your land being invaded and taken over! Do you want to be remembered as the military force that allowed a hostile takeover to happen on your watch? Or do you want to be the heroes, the legends that boldly faced Duo's arbitrary despotism?!

Secondly! I need to speak with The Senate immediately, so find them--preferably alive!"

He felt he was doing good for a start, but what else now?

"And where are your generals?! They need to get on pinpointing the enemy location and fight back," ...or something. He wasn't really a battle strategist, "the rest of you need to be out there guarding this castle and everything it stands for, including the people! The people are who we need to worry about!

Kyros! What can you do?! I can protect the city, I have abilities to manipulate barriers of varying stats. Your predecessor was magical, are you?"

[Benjamin Kírix-Unda]

"Yes, sir," the special forces Marine nodded, "Our entire special forces are tracking down the shooters and keeping the peace. We'll handle things on the military spectrum, we just need someone we can trust on top until we can get a clear line of succession."

Indeed, as they spoke the armored Marines broke down nearby doors and stormed the buildings. It was quick and aggressive and the Marines moved to put down any violent riots that might have a chance to spawn.

"Soldier 3440." The Commander said while turning to one of his soldier, "Gather all Senators in the council room, position only special forces around the area. If ANYONE comes close to it you put an arrow between their eyes, no question, just fire."

"Yes sir!" He yelled before exiting the room, soon the entire building was filled with these special armored soldier. They just about dragged every Senator to the council room and put about a dozen troops in it.

The Commander approached Alexander and nodded to him, "They're all in accounted for. Ready for whatever you plan on doing, Mr. President."

[alexanderthegreat]

Alexander was surprised at how fast everyone moved. It was awesome He gave a quick, grateful nod to the commander before he turned his attention to the senators.

"Everyone, we have problem," he cut directly to the point, "this lovely meeting's gone sour quickly and Benjamin is dead. My first question is was there seriously not enough security to keep these people safe? And secondly, on the same topic, one of you spoke with him only moments before we were all attacked. If I didn't know any better, I'd say he knew something was wrong, which makes me start to think one of you knew there was something wrong as well..."

He glanced around hurriedly at each person, not really wanting to waste time pointing fingers or playing some wild goose chase for an irrelevant reason.

"This is something I need to know before I get on to discussing a plan for now and a plan for Unda," he threw in quickly, as if it should have been obvious.

[Benjamin Kírix-Unda]

Perhaps Alexander was hoping for the person to stand up and spill everything, but what he got was eight Senators standing up and yelling at him.

"This is a outrage!" One of them called out, "Not one minute after our President is killed you do some sort of power-grab!"

"You're not our President, Alexander Frexton, King of Santo-Luce!" Another one called, the floor was getting tense and three soldiers put themselves between Alexander and the Senators. The Commander stepped beside Alexander and slammed his fist against the desk, grabbing everyone's attention.

"If you recall Martial Law was voted in, meaning, the military is in command. We see fit to place Alexander as a step in President until we have a CLEAR line of succession."

The commander didn't answer Alexander's question about enough troops to protect them, because the sad fact was they DID have enough troops. This killing was done by their own men. Benjamin's fear were rightly so, there was some that wanted the old empire back.

"As long as he stands before you he will be addressed as 'Mr. President', not King and certainly not 'Alexander'. Understood?" The Commander commanded, the Senator sat down but no one spoke at all.

Clearly this wasn't going to be easy.

[alexanderthegreat]

'What just happened!?'

He hadn't thought his questions were harmful enough to spur on such a strong reaction from the senators, even during such a sensitive time, but perhaps his foreign approach was too strong.
Or maybe it was just what was needed to shed light on some things he thought were amiss. Was everyone just this prone to acting this emotionally that all rationality was carelessly tossed out the window? Or were these odd observations he'd made in the last several minutes really building up to something?

'I struck a nerve. What do I do? I think I have what I need, something in this very room is wrong. If it is, how should I push it? If it isn't...well if it isn't I still can't see why all the aggression is necessary...'

"Benjamin will not have died in vain. I'll be sure of that, my words were not hollow when I promised Santo-Luce's helping hand. However, in order to continue we need to get some information settled first because I can't back your country successfully if someone's pulling strings or withholding something vital..."

He took a long moment to stare at each of the senators, fully aware of the awkward tension in the room. As odd as it was, it was a familiar feeling. He spent days in his own castle that was pressurized with so much tension and questions like these he had that he was worried when the fuse would finally blow the whole place into chaos. Foxy formed beside him, on guard immediately as her reaction to Alexander's careful gaze around the room. His eyes settled particularly on the person he swear he saw near Benjamin last and continued his thoughts.

"...so I'll say it again and slowly so. Everyone is in cheer when one of you approaches the president, and whatever you said to him shook him right before he was shot down. Are you to tell me I'm not allowed to find this suspicious? Why is it when I press the issue of something being 'off' about all of it, you all rise as you do against me?

How am I to help if I don't know who's lying to me in this room right now?"

[Benjamin Kírix-Unda]

Each of the Senators turned to look at the one Alexander was staring at. The man fixed his jacket and raised his chin, as if disgusted by them King/President's words.

Senators were the weird group in the family of Unda's government, they dealt only with domestic affairs while the President did foreign affairs. They were the ones that outlawed royalty and put warrants to all those directly linked to the old ruler. Most of them hated royals of all types for most of them were elected because they faced persecution by the previous monarchy.

Out of them all who had faced the worse attacks was the man everyone was looking at, Thymos. He hated all those connected to the queen. Benjamin was one of them, having distant links to the royal family he was excluded from the warrants but not from Thymos's anger.

"I congratulated him on his speech, and that was all, Mr. President," he said in a more or less sarcastic tone, "Do you honestly think that we would have our own leader killed in a time where the only lifeline for the Republic is the President himself?"

[alexanderthegreat]

Alexander honestly had no clue who this Thymos guy was, he only knew what he saw and was going to rip at every thread in the string if he had to to find out what happened. That meant he had to do what he did best...annoy him to death with questions!

He grinned.

"I don't believe I said anything about you having him killed. I do recall implying that you knew something that appeared to mortify the man in his last living moments," Alexander spoke slowly, folding his hands behind his back as he continued staring down at the other man, "but now that you've brought it up, why would you bring up murdering your own leader? I'm sure we're all in agreement here that he was a hard working, inspiring man. It seems so odd that someone should arbitrarily attack him like this, in a time where we all clearly supported him, doesn't it? We were all there, we all hold his ideals, right? Why should anyone in this room have any reason to kill a man like that? Can you think of a reason? I ask because you're the one who brought it up. Be a sport and give some reasons."

Alexander shook for a moment as he watched the other man. He'd keep biting at him if he had to.

[Benjamin Kírix-Unda]

"Blasted!" The man stomped, "If ANYONE has a reason it's you. With him gone you're hoping Unda falls into chaos so you can take over and enforce your damned rules on us!" This claim was joined by a couple 'Yeah!' from the other Senators, other simply frowned and shook their heads.

Finally the eldest of the men, a Senator from Wild Unda (the easiest way to tell was accent along with his appearance, Wild Unda was mostly populated by an entirely other race than what the majority of Unda was.) looked over and spoke to the man Alexander was accusing, "Thymos," the older man said, it caught the other attention, this man seemed to garner a great deal of respect, "Do not play with the President. Was it not you who cursed Benjamin to the graves in the debates of signing a treaty with Santo-Luce?"

Thymos shook his head angrily, "Shut up you old turtle, this is no time for your injection into the conversation!"

Well, everyone seemed to respect him but Thymos.

[alexanderthegreat]

Alexander's stomach flipped a little with the wild accusations coming in his direction, he'd never really been involved with something as heated as this before--well, he had, but not on this side of the fence. His arms came back to the front and crossed over his chest as he raised an eyebrow at the man, Thymos.

"You're all free to accuse me of whatever you wish so as long as you have the evidence to back it up," he shrugged, "but until you can find it, I'd like to hear this 'old turtle', he seems to have something interesting to share with the class that you're eager to keep quiet. Why is that? Also, is what he says true?"

[Benjamin Kírix-Unda]

The older man shifted in his chair, his old, wrinkled face stared at the President for a moment before he managed to speak, "My name is Kame, Mr. President." He didn't seem to enjoy the 'class comment' but he answered the question anyway, "Thymos suffered torture at the hands of the past monarchy, his rage for anything with a royal bloodline is well known-"

"Don't you speak of it as if it was exclusively me, you lost ten years of your life to them!" Thymos roared before a Marine pushed him back in his chair.

Kame shifted in his chair uncomfortably, "But I never wished Benjamin's blood for his relations with that monarchy. You were elected on the idea of sending him out of office. Mr. President, I somehow doubt that anything he had to say to him was good. I apologize for saying so but I can not let go of this feeling."

The Marines eyed Thymos further, their fingers rested on the trigger should he try something. The air grew tense.

[Kyros Forthe]

"Whoa, people lets calm down." Kyros said, after he had calmed down, "Look, I think we can agree that fighting among ourselves isn't helping anyone." He looked at Alexander, and then he stood in front of him, "We need solutions, not more bloodshed. So let's work together."

[alexanderthegreat]

"Kyros," Alexander kept shifting his gaze from Kame to Thymos as he spoke from behind the prince, "I assure you we're getting solutions. The only way to get solutions however, is to get answers to questions, such as..."

He provided a semi-sheepish grin to Kame as he said, "Kame, thank you."

This was a lot of information dumped on him, and a lot of empty holes filled up. He worried about Kyros, he was so naive and reminded him of himself so much it was almost scary to a point. He couldn't imagine doing something like this back then.

He put a firm hand to the prince's side and stepped past him, focus fully on Thymos as he approached the growling senator.

"Though he makes a fair point. If I'm to believe you've done nothing, why do you sit here throwing your anger out around the room? Your wild assumptions that I'm accusing you of something I hadn't even gotten around to fully investigating, your frantically trying to cover up any information about yourself and your attitudes towards royalty and anyone connected to it--like Benjamin--which seems to conveniently bring me straight back to someone withholding information. Someone knows what went on out there and I bet they, Thymos, knew before this meeting with you all this afternoon. They knew President Benjamin was going to be attacked, and they waited, watched, and were caught, weren't they?! What do you say, Thymos?"

Actually, he still wasn't fully sure if Thymos was the one who arranged any of it but it seemed like a nice dramatic jab to take. It was all connected somehow, Alexander was sure. All that mattered to him was raising the heat a little to see how much angrier this guy would get.

[Benjamin Kírix-Unda]

Thyros tapped his foot on the ground in annoyance, his eyes darting between everyone in the room before he stood up. Raising his fist and pointing at Alexander.

"You can't POSSIBLY understand!" He roared, "I did what was best for MY nation. I saw it moving back towards what it was and I took ACTION."

"Unda will flourish once it's back under the control of the Empire! AND ONCE OUR FLAG FLIES OVER YOUR LANDS YOU WILL REGRET THIS DAY, KING OF SANTO-LUCE! YOU WILL REGRET THE DAY YOU EVER TOOK A STEP ONTO MY COUNTRY! YOU CAUSED THIS TO HAPPEN, YOU AND THAT FOOLISH MAN!"

The Marines moved quickly, grabbing him by his arms and holding him still with a blade pressed against his throat.

[alexanderthegreat]

Alexander was hoping for angry, he was expecting angry. But when he was given angry, he actually jumped a little.

No, really, Benjamin clearly wasn't kidding when he said the Undian people were extremely patriotic...though on one side or the other. Here he was looking at the other. Err...the bad one.
He took a hurried breath as he himself tried to show full composure and he looked from the Marines keeping hold of Thymos to the other senators in the room.

Zeke said something once about these moments in his 'movies'. Something about the detective that uncovers the secrets and then 'says something awesome' afterwards. It was a fitting time to have one of his own despite the threats from Thymos.

"So that's a confession. Anyone else want to join in? I think I'm going to be here for a little bit yet."

Hmm. Somehow that didn't seem right.