maskormenacelogs | STRANGE, WHERE WERE YOU WHEN WE STARTED THIS GIG?

WHO: All diplomatic imPorts that have signed up HERE.
WHERE: The capitals of Mexico, South Korea, and France. UN-attending imPorts will be placed in Davos, Switzerland.
WHEN: January 26th.
WHAT: Democracy in motion as imPorts attempt to use their skills of persuasion to convince each government or organization to lend the imPorts - and America - their help. Players may also use this log to play out the long flight over, planning, and other associated activities.
WARNINGS: None anticipated; let us know if we should change this!

Depending on their assignment, all imPort diplomats will find themselves either in Seoul, South Korea; Mexico City, Mexico; Paris, France; or for UN attending imPorts, Davos in the Swiss Alps. They will be housed in the American Embassies and regardless of their Registration status, will be treated as American citizens. UN-attending imPorts will be housed in a hotel close by. Their accommodations will be that of an extremely luxurious hotel, and they will be provided with anything that they should require, be it books on the art of rhetoric, access to state of the art computers and laptops, food or drink. They will also be provided with boardrooms in which the teams may convene to assemble a strategy. Don't be distracted by the free drinks; this is a task that will require clear minds!

After one night of preparation, on January 26th, each team of imPorts will meet with either the government of their assigned nation or the UN. They will be placed at a podium in front of a room full of politicians and diplomats, and will be expected to state their argument. They will be allowed to have an opening speech before each assembly asks each group three questions.

When either the opening speech has been concluded OR the question has been answered to each player's satisfaction, please put QUESTION NEEDED in the subject title of your comment, and we will deliver the next question.

Just remember: an invasion is coming! Even if acquiring the alliance of these governments and organizations do not help with the imPorts' immediate predicament, it will impact the future of the game at large!

Get ready, our silver-tongued imPorts, and good luck!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

I'm a little distressed to learn that I'm that easy, I think. I like to think of myself as impossible to read.

[ Gregor snorts. ] I wouldn't call you easy to read, but no one's impossible. Though I try at times.

To be impossible to read? You're quite easy, you know.

[ He shakes his head. ]

I never tried to be impossible with you. But now I'm not sure I want to know what you got out of me.

Oh, really?

[ It's a bit of revenge for him playing her. Even if he did so kindly, she still lifts an eyebrow at him and says, speculatively: ]

That sounds like you think my assessment was bad...

[ He's internally squirming, though maybe not for the reasons she'd think. ]

No, I just don't like hearing assessments of me. Good or bad.

[ Oh? ]

Why not? I mean - if you even know yourself.

[ Blandly, ] Overexposure.

[ And now he is hard to read. ]

What does that mean?

You don't think one learns politics by being flung into the fray and being told to learn from your mistakes, do you?

Well -

[ She gives a self-conscious smile and indicates the room around them. ]

Yeah, sort of.

Political mistakes can cause people to die. Or suffer all kinds of injustices, as you've pointed out.

When you grow up knowing you'll have to go into it... There's plenty of time to learn more safely.

And be periodically surgically operated on to excise all unwanted traits? From the sound of it.

[ He laughs once, startled into it, because Gregor loves bitter comments on his constrained upbringing. Usually he's the one making them. ]

I wish. You can be anesthetized for surgery. I had to fake the anesthesia.

[ This somehow sounds airy and sarcastic instead of bitter. ]

[ A little carefully flippant: ]

Sounds like a recipe for trauma.

Oh, it wasn't that bad. Don't let me whinge at you. Everyone was very careful with me. [ Which was really more the problem. ]

It was just... stifling.

You had your weaknesses laid out for you. And no one let you have them. That sounds painful.

[ Gregor is not going to be deterred from diverting this attempt at psyche-diving. Not in this circumstance, prepping himself for diplomacy, forcibly separated from Miles physically and mentally. ]

Well, they were right, [ he says practically. ] I resented it at the time but I really couldn't afford them in the political sphere. Barrayaran politics are brutal and often bloody.

[ She gives a little grunt of acknowledgment. And apparently obligatory. Is this really what they do for third sons? I wonder... ]

It still sounds perfectly wretched. And, frankly, unwise. Sometimes what older generations call mistakes are actually innovations, aren't they.

[ He's never said he's a third son. Gregor can't imagine trying to be anything but an only child under his cover-- making up sibs would be wrenching for him. But it's true that he's never really specified so far, either.

It would be too much, too personal, to point out how many members of his immediate family had died in politics. Though he is thinking it. ]

Better than living with myself for preventable mistakes.

Mm. But that's what drove you away in the end, I assume.

... Feeling like I couldn't breathe for someone watching me? Yes.

[ Definitely that and nothing about Serg being the final straw. ]

So then it was their mistake. Losing a good man to too much harshness.

[ Gregor cannot contest this without getting much more personal than he wants, though it grates on him a bit to hear his teenage seethings repeated back to him in adulthood. How mistaken he'd been... ]

You could think of it that way. Of course, here it's not relevant at all. The UN isn't about to care whether I'm technically titled or not.

[ She allows this with a bit of a nod. ]

True. Just - it matters back home, doesn't it.

(no subject)

vorbarra - 2016-02-03 15:45 (UTC) - Expand

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