Reform

[Myroria]

A man ran past Georgian houses on the northern hill of Novrith. He dropped the cloth sack he was carrying on the ground as prefects, with pistols drawn, followed him. Kolonialreich marks and pfennigs spilled everywhere. The man was about to jump over a fence when one of the prefects shot the man in the back of the knee. His body slumped over the top of the fence to the other side, and there was screaming after a thump. The prefects ran to the other side of the fence, to bone fragments on the ground and a puddle of blood. Typical attempted escape. The prefects frog marched the bleeding man back to a cruiser, and threw him in the back. The prisoner died in prison three days later of infection.

[Myroria]

"Lit'en to this,

'Burglar dies of infection - A man who stole thousands of marks worth of goods died of an infection in prison yesterday, after being shot in the knee by a prefect.' Yada yada yada."

"And, Fredrika?"

"What 'e need is improvement. There's shoplifters dying of the flu in jail. The flu, Peté, the flu!"

"The flu?"

"The flu."

"Mmm. Yes. Perhaps you are right.

"God knows I'm right. Maybe we should make a statement. And by 'we', I mean 'you', as I sit next to you and wave."




It was a bright, crisp day in early March. Peté and Fredrika had called a press conference in a room in Quarrovth Plantation. Fredrika and Peté were sitting on the couch on the left and the press consisted of two people, because news stations had no problem just sticking another station's video in it's broadcast. Peté picked up a paper from the end table and held it in front of the camera.

"'Burglar dies of infection in prison'. Does that sound appropriate to anyone? I didn't believe so. What this prefecture - and, in fact, this country in general - needs is reform. There's petty criminals dying of wounds, outlanders being thrown into ditches as fraternity rites of passage, and communists protesting every day. Do we want a revolution? Do we want anarchy? Of course not! We want order. Stability. Therefore, I am going to issue decrees to work toward the equality of this nation. Now, I'm no idiot - I know outlanders will never be equal, nor will the death penalty ever fade. But, my citizens, we can improve Myroria! Step back and take a look - how many nations actually are not annoyed at us right now? One, maybe two? We're going to make this country better - and we're starting now."