07-06-2021, 04:30 PM
(Joint Post With Xiomera)
EICA Headquarters, Geminus
Tuesday, June 6th, 7:16 AM
Two women and a man stood around a small command desk, watching row after row of people type quickly on advanced computers. Some were in uniform, their clean purple suits adorned with a silver plate denoting their rank and Lunar Guard Membership. The rest were in regular formal clothes, looking slightly unnerved by the presence of their Guard Colleagues.
Minister David Park, Director of the EICA, looked down at his control computer with concentration, trying to focus on anything other than the two Guard Generals next to him. One was older, in her sixties, with a large scar across her face. The other was younger, maybe mid thirties, with golden hair tied back in a ponytail.
"They're making great progress." He said, gesturing at his console. "The Xiomeran power grid is an incredibly hard thing to get into. At least we aren't trying to hack their military software, that'd be a major pain in the ass, no pun intended." He rambled on a bit, drumming his fingers on his chair.
Artemis, the older General, chuckled silently. "If all goes to plan, we'll hit Tlālacuetztla's rush hour when everything goes down. The chaos should disrupt a good portion of the capital city, and send the Empress a powerful message." She turned to Hestia, the younger Guard General. "The message is ready, correct?"
She nodded. "Filmed, edited, and encrypted multiple times. There's a good chance they'll know it was us anyway, but it's better to be safe than sorry. As soon as we can get through, the message will be primed and ready to send."
"Brilliant." Artemis nodded at the Minister. The pair had worked together for years before, so they had more of an understanding. "You may fire when ready, so to speak."
---
The capital of Xiomera was the beating heart of the Empire, but never more so than during the morning rush hour. People were heading to work, or already working, in the classic Xiomeran workaholic fashion trying to impress their bosses or get a jump on their competitors.
The highways and streets of the Aztahuan and Inchahuan sections of the Imperial capital were bustling with cars and pedestrians. The train and bus stations were also packed with commuters trying to get to work, and students trying to get to class.
In the nearby Montelin section, the most affluent residents of the capital were likewise beginning their day, either heading off to work or merely to enjoy the luxurious amusements that the Imperial elite favored in the nation's richest neighborhood.
The first sign of trouble was noticed at the central operations facility of the Tlālacuetztla Municipal Utility Service. Engineers noticed unexplained fluctuations in the power grid, and began trying to find the source. As they tried to do so, the TMUS computer network began to experience problems as well. Frustrated engineers and computer operators found themselves in the rare and unexpected position of having to battle their own systems and equipment.
The problems, oddly enough, were solely happening in the central section of the capital's power grid. As the disruptions grew worse, frantic engineers and techies contacted their superiors to warn that the power grid was about to shut down.
They were ordered to bring backups on line, and did so. As soon as they did, however, the backup systems also began to malfunction. This was unprecedented. Xiomeran love for redundancy, and instutitional paranoia, usually made sure that even if one system failed, there was always a backup or a failsafe. But now, all the systems were failing.
Despite the best efforts of the utility workers, every single backup system collapsed, one after the other. All they could do was send a desperate warning to Imperial officials telling them what was about to happen.
It began first in Aztahuan, the heart of the financial district and the place where Xiomera's business elites worked and played. One by one, blocks of the neighborhood lost power, until all of Aztahuan was without power. The power outage then spread to nearby Inchahuan, the home of the capital's intellectuals and most elite educational institutions.
Traffic ground to a halt, caused by the failure of the traffic control grid when it lost power. Trains shut down, leaving commuters stuck. In offices, classrooms and homes, the power flickered before finally going down, leaving people unable to work or do anything else.
And then, the outage spread to Montelin, the home of the Xiomeran super-rich. In the shadow of the Palace of Flowers itself, Xiomera's most powerful people found themselves abruptly, if briefly, thrust back into the stone age. No power, no water, nothing.
Watching from the Palace, with its secure power supply unaffected, Calhualyana was not in the dark - not literally, at least. But she was in the dark about what was happening to her capital, and this was not acceptable. "Get the CEO of TMUS on the line now," she demanded of Xiuhcatli, her steward.
The utility company CEO, Amoxtli, came on the line, clearly nervous. "We've been hit by some kind of coordinated disruption," she said. "Something, or someone, from the outside is disrupting our computer network and our control systems, taking the power grid offline. We are trying to restore it now, but we are encountering opposition. We don't know from who," the CEO said apologetically. Calhualyana sighed. "Get ISA, Cala and ISTC to send teams over to the central ops facility for TMUS now," she snapped at Xiuhcatli. "We need the power grid back online now."
---
"The Atzahuan, Inchahuan, and Montelin grids are shut down. The Palace of Flowers still has power, it must be coming from a more secure grid, unfortunately we can't reach it. But everything should be ready for the message." Minister Park stood, gesturing to the chair.
General Hestia quickly replaced him, fishing out a flashdrive and inserting it into the console. "The Palace of Flower's systems are much too secure to hack into quickly. But, since the power is down, they may be sending out a bunch of phone calls, but other means of communication are mostly silent. If we flood the Government's older forms of communication, say, email, with the message enough times, we should get noticed by the security services. We're sure to get noticed by Calhualyana." She typed a bit, standing as she finished. "Messages sent. The Palace should be informed soon of a sudden influx of messages being sent to dozens of Email addresses belonging to Palace and Governmental staff. She'll be watching it in ten minutes, max."
---
When the emails began flooding the inboxes of various officials and staff, it didn't take long for them to gain the attention of IIA. From there, they were quickly forwarded to IIA Director Tepochtli. He watched the video message silently. Then he contacted the Empress.
In her office at the Palace, Calhualyana was still busy coordinating the response between TMUS, ISA, Cala Computer and ISTC to the power outage when Tepochtli forwarded the message to her secure email. She paused to read his email, then clicked to watch the attachment.
A silhouette of an unknown figure greeted her, a grey background behind them. When they spoke, their voice was heavily modulated, leaving little trace of accent or tone.
"This is a warning to Empress Calhualyana of the Xiomeran Empire. Any further attacks on democratic nations will be met with swift and strong retaliation. The Xiomeran Empire will not be permitted to attack and bully democratic nations while claiming to abide by the Jinyu Agreement."
"Any further action of attack or retribution is foolish, and will be quickly met with equal action. The power grid will be restored within an hour of this message being received. Have a good day, Empress."
Calhualyana watched the video twice more. Her expression did not change. When she was done, she called Tepochtli. “Find out who is behind this, and provide me a list of possible responses.” She then called the team that was working on the power outage. “The people who did this just informed me they plan to restore power in an hour. You have thirty minutes. Don’t make me wait for these terrorists to turn the power back on for us,” she said in a voice as dark as the lights in the center of her capital.
EICA Headquarters, Geminus
Tuesday, June 6th, 7:16 AM
Two women and a man stood around a small command desk, watching row after row of people type quickly on advanced computers. Some were in uniform, their clean purple suits adorned with a silver plate denoting their rank and Lunar Guard Membership. The rest were in regular formal clothes, looking slightly unnerved by the presence of their Guard Colleagues.
Minister David Park, Director of the EICA, looked down at his control computer with concentration, trying to focus on anything other than the two Guard Generals next to him. One was older, in her sixties, with a large scar across her face. The other was younger, maybe mid thirties, with golden hair tied back in a ponytail.
"They're making great progress." He said, gesturing at his console. "The Xiomeran power grid is an incredibly hard thing to get into. At least we aren't trying to hack their military software, that'd be a major pain in the ass, no pun intended." He rambled on a bit, drumming his fingers on his chair.
Artemis, the older General, chuckled silently. "If all goes to plan, we'll hit Tlālacuetztla's rush hour when everything goes down. The chaos should disrupt a good portion of the capital city, and send the Empress a powerful message." She turned to Hestia, the younger Guard General. "The message is ready, correct?"
She nodded. "Filmed, edited, and encrypted multiple times. There's a good chance they'll know it was us anyway, but it's better to be safe than sorry. As soon as we can get through, the message will be primed and ready to send."
"Brilliant." Artemis nodded at the Minister. The pair had worked together for years before, so they had more of an understanding. "You may fire when ready, so to speak."
---
The capital of Xiomera was the beating heart of the Empire, but never more so than during the morning rush hour. People were heading to work, or already working, in the classic Xiomeran workaholic fashion trying to impress their bosses or get a jump on their competitors.
The highways and streets of the Aztahuan and Inchahuan sections of the Imperial capital were bustling with cars and pedestrians. The train and bus stations were also packed with commuters trying to get to work, and students trying to get to class.
In the nearby Montelin section, the most affluent residents of the capital were likewise beginning their day, either heading off to work or merely to enjoy the luxurious amusements that the Imperial elite favored in the nation's richest neighborhood.
The first sign of trouble was noticed at the central operations facility of the Tlālacuetztla Municipal Utility Service. Engineers noticed unexplained fluctuations in the power grid, and began trying to find the source. As they tried to do so, the TMUS computer network began to experience problems as well. Frustrated engineers and computer operators found themselves in the rare and unexpected position of having to battle their own systems and equipment.
The problems, oddly enough, were solely happening in the central section of the capital's power grid. As the disruptions grew worse, frantic engineers and techies contacted their superiors to warn that the power grid was about to shut down.
They were ordered to bring backups on line, and did so. As soon as they did, however, the backup systems also began to malfunction. This was unprecedented. Xiomeran love for redundancy, and instutitional paranoia, usually made sure that even if one system failed, there was always a backup or a failsafe. But now, all the systems were failing.
Despite the best efforts of the utility workers, every single backup system collapsed, one after the other. All they could do was send a desperate warning to Imperial officials telling them what was about to happen.
It began first in Aztahuan, the heart of the financial district and the place where Xiomera's business elites worked and played. One by one, blocks of the neighborhood lost power, until all of Aztahuan was without power. The power outage then spread to nearby Inchahuan, the home of the capital's intellectuals and most elite educational institutions.
Traffic ground to a halt, caused by the failure of the traffic control grid when it lost power. Trains shut down, leaving commuters stuck. In offices, classrooms and homes, the power flickered before finally going down, leaving people unable to work or do anything else.
And then, the outage spread to Montelin, the home of the Xiomeran super-rich. In the shadow of the Palace of Flowers itself, Xiomera's most powerful people found themselves abruptly, if briefly, thrust back into the stone age. No power, no water, nothing.
Watching from the Palace, with its secure power supply unaffected, Calhualyana was not in the dark - not literally, at least. But she was in the dark about what was happening to her capital, and this was not acceptable. "Get the CEO of TMUS on the line now," she demanded of Xiuhcatli, her steward.
The utility company CEO, Amoxtli, came on the line, clearly nervous. "We've been hit by some kind of coordinated disruption," she said. "Something, or someone, from the outside is disrupting our computer network and our control systems, taking the power grid offline. We are trying to restore it now, but we are encountering opposition. We don't know from who," the CEO said apologetically. Calhualyana sighed. "Get ISA, Cala and ISTC to send teams over to the central ops facility for TMUS now," she snapped at Xiuhcatli. "We need the power grid back online now."
---
"The Atzahuan, Inchahuan, and Montelin grids are shut down. The Palace of Flowers still has power, it must be coming from a more secure grid, unfortunately we can't reach it. But everything should be ready for the message." Minister Park stood, gesturing to the chair.
General Hestia quickly replaced him, fishing out a flashdrive and inserting it into the console. "The Palace of Flower's systems are much too secure to hack into quickly. But, since the power is down, they may be sending out a bunch of phone calls, but other means of communication are mostly silent. If we flood the Government's older forms of communication, say, email, with the message enough times, we should get noticed by the security services. We're sure to get noticed by Calhualyana." She typed a bit, standing as she finished. "Messages sent. The Palace should be informed soon of a sudden influx of messages being sent to dozens of Email addresses belonging to Palace and Governmental staff. She'll be watching it in ten minutes, max."
---
When the emails began flooding the inboxes of various officials and staff, it didn't take long for them to gain the attention of IIA. From there, they were quickly forwarded to IIA Director Tepochtli. He watched the video message silently. Then he contacted the Empress.
In her office at the Palace, Calhualyana was still busy coordinating the response between TMUS, ISA, Cala Computer and ISTC to the power outage when Tepochtli forwarded the message to her secure email. She paused to read his email, then clicked to watch the attachment.
A silhouette of an unknown figure greeted her, a grey background behind them. When they spoke, their voice was heavily modulated, leaving little trace of accent or tone.
"This is a warning to Empress Calhualyana of the Xiomeran Empire. Any further attacks on democratic nations will be met with swift and strong retaliation. The Xiomeran Empire will not be permitted to attack and bully democratic nations while claiming to abide by the Jinyu Agreement."
"Any further action of attack or retribution is foolish, and will be quickly met with equal action. The power grid will be restored within an hour of this message being received. Have a good day, Empress."
Calhualyana watched the video twice more. Her expression did not change. When she was done, she called Tepochtli. “Find out who is behind this, and provide me a list of possible responses.” She then called the team that was working on the power outage. “The people who did this just informed me they plan to restore power in an hour. You have thirty minutes. Don’t make me wait for these terrorists to turn the power back on for us,” she said in a voice as dark as the lights in the center of her capital.
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