353 km northwest of DSA, Early Autumncool wind from northeast, calm waters...Captain Miga was writing in the ship log, when the voice of her subordinates caught her attention. The door to her cabin slowly opens, and her lieutenant walks in.
"Mam..." the Lieutenant salutes her. "The rest of the convoy has caught up, we're ready to land."
Captain Mira shuts the log book. "Tell Commander Shia to get his shore party ready to leave."
The Lieutenant nods, and backs back into the hall. His footsteps fade away as he exits out to deck.
Captain Mira herself proceeds to the bridge to take command. Her crew salutes her as she walks in. Through the windows, she can see a scenic profile of the land, a shore of white sand and palm trees. The water of the ocean was a clear opal blue, which shimmer in the strong light of the sun. It was an untouched paradise...
"Mam, the Shore Party A and B from the
White Tail are in the water right now. Commander Shia asks if you wish to join them..."
"Tell him that I humbly decline his offer. I'll be staying onboard the
Soulful for the remainder of this mission."
"Yes Mam..."
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Shia and his Marines helped the surveyors' with unloading their equipment off the motor launch. Cameras, ropes, optical instruments, GPS...all the equipment needed to map out the coast. Shore party A and B had already set up operations further down the beach.
"Heaven this is a beautiful place...ever seen anything like this Commander?" said Bian, a Marine Drillmaster.
"Once...in Chi'an. I was with my girlfriend...." the Commander replies.
While the surveyors were off doing measurements and data collecting, Shia and his squad took a more freelance surveying of their own. With their MD-2 rifles sling on their backs, they creep into the jungle.
"We're gonna have a lot of cutting to do...so much trees..ow!"
"Watch out for those branches Private. And yes, there's gonna be a lot of chopping to be done."
"We can always napalm the place..."
The squad stumbles upon a clearing, where clutters of strange crimson red flowers were growing. They stop to admire the scene, laying down and taking a sniff of the exotic beauties. Shia picks up some and puts it into his satchel. Drillmaster Bie catches him doing this and loudly comments. "Commander, if you want to bring them back, you better pot them." Several privates gave out a light chuckle.
Shia ignores the suggestion and stands up. "Breaks over, back to the beach."
For the next two weeks, the surveyors mapped up the coast, taking soil samples and measurements of elevation and depth. The data was inputted into a mapping program at the end of each day. At the end of it, 521 km of shoreline was mapped.
The head of the surveying teams, Docter Hita Chen, reviews the data before it is sent off.
"Mr. Cho, you can send the data back to headquarters now. Tell them we have a pretty good spot for settling, on quadrant Z12-15. We'll need them to send in Phase 2 if we want construction to start."
Quadrant Z12-15 was a small inlet that feature a relatively flat shore with minimal forage. It was perfect location for the Loyalist's first settlement.
After the mapping data was received, urban planners in the Department of Population Control began plotting out the blueprints for the new settlement. It will be name
Songhai, or "new sea".
In the harbour of Na Sui, government ships were being loaded with supplies and engineers. Due to conflict in the Americas, the convoy will be undefended as it journeys to its destination. Hopefully, this will avoid any problems with the DSA and SD.
The convoy set sails with three tankers, thirty transport ships, seventeen large cargo ships, twenty multi-purpose vessels, a crane ship, and a LN landing craft carrying 5000 LA personnel that will make up the Loyalist Territorial Army.
After a few close brushes with American warships, the convoy arrived at LZ12-15 five weeks later. Engineers came on shore and began construction on a makeshift pontoon pier to unload the larger vessels. It took around one week to complete and securely anchor the pier to the sea floor. The cargo and transport ships began unloading the supplies onto shore while engineers started on a second pier.
On shore, a temporary camp was set up and bulldozers began clearing and leveling the area define by the blueprints. Surveyors mark off the roads and zones of the future settlement. Supplies and men continue to be ferry in from home, and construction of the city Admin began.
By mid-winter, a total workforce of 30 000 was present at LZ12-15, working around the clock to complete Songhai. An additional 20 000 LA personnel are ship to the area to further reinforce the Loyalist position in case of "foreign opposition".
Back in the capital, the Loyalist government drafted out the political details of their territorial claim.
As of Today,
The free lands outlined is hereby claim as a territorial jurisdiction by the People's Republic of Loyalist. This claim is further reinforce by our active development and military presence in the said areas. We humbly ask that nations of the international community recognize and respect our territorial claim, as a extension of our sovereignty.
