[Lauchenoiria]

Jointly written with Xiomera

Election Day, Huenya

“They still haven’t found the terrorists,” Alana Gutierez read from her phone to Paul Ramirez, her fellow election observer. The Lauchenoirian pair were among many sent to witness the Huenyan elections and ensure that they were run in a fair and free manner. The Huenyans had been very inviting, but the more sceptical among the Lauchenoirians thought it was because they were just terrified of Xiomeran interference and hoped to chase their neighbours away. The news from elsewhere in Huenya seemed to point to that theory.

Alana and Paul were stood outside a polling station in the town of Canchaura and were very nervous after the terrorist attack during early voting. They’d been told that Lauchenoiria had assessed the threat and thought it unlikely that the terrorists would target foreign election observers. That didn’t make them any less nervous; Lauchenoiria had wrongly assessed many threats in the last few years. The town they were in was fairly small, with most residents being from the Itotemoc or Necatli tribes, with only a handful of Xiomerans and even fewer expats from other places.

So far, things were going smoothly enough, and the mood in the queue was hopeful from what Paul could tell; Alana spoke basic Huenyan but Paul didn’t know any. They’d taken turns watching the people in the queue, the ballot boxes to ensure no tampering, and the horizon for the threat of vans full of terrorists. It was hot in Canchaura, much warmer in this equatorial region than in the winter of Lauchenoiria, and both of them were wearing their summer clothes.

“I bet a Shuellian would pass out in this heat,” joked Paul, fanning himself with a leaflet some priests had insisted on handing him earlier that he couldn’t read.

“Ha, no they wouldn’t,” Alana shook her head. “They’d spontaneously combust.”

The pair both chuckled to each other, earning some curious looks from the Huenyans standing in the queue. A pair of Necatli, obviously a couple, were holding their baby and were playing with the child as they waited. Behind them, a young Itotemoc man only just old enough to vote was dancing from foot to foot in excitement, clutching a book about international politics written in English. Paul recognised the cover, he’d read it a few years back and thought it basic but good as an introduction to the subject.

Everything was going well, and the pair were beginning to relax, when things took a turn for the worse.

The “worse” began with the sound of heavy trucks and vans rumbling towards the polling station. The Golden Blade had targeted Canchuara because of its status as a city with a mixed population, and also because it was far outside the regions of Huenya that had strong support for the terrorist group. They wanted to show that they could strike anywhere in Huenya, even outside their normal range. The group also had another reason for coming to Canchuara. They had heard that there would be foreign voting observers present in the town. That made Alana and Paul prime targets.

But the people of Canchuara were more prepared this time around. They had learned from the example of Oxtlacoal.

As the Golden Blade fighters ran from their vehicles towards the polling station, alarm bells began to ring around the town square. A mixed group of defenders rushed to their positions - local police, Civil Guard, Huenyan soldiers, two armed prosecutors from the SIPS, a FIS agent, even some local civilians who had rifles and were perfectly willing to use them on some terrorists. The sounds of gunfire and shouting quickly rose to a deafening level; two of the local Civil Guardsmen quickly ushered the voters, poll workers and observers who were outside towards the polling station.

Alana and Paul were not happy with this turn of events. Though most Lauchenoirians were somewhat used to the sound of gunfire following their civil war, it was still an unpleasant thing to experience. The pair stayed close together as the Civil Guardsmen ushered them towards the door, wishing they could move faster and afraid of what might happen next.

As the fighting raged around the polling station, the Golden Blade terrorists seemed surprised at the unexpectedly strong resistance they were facing from the Canchuara defenders. Their initial goal of overrunning the polling station and repeating their previous act at Oxtlacoal was clearly not going to happen. Reinforcements from the Huenyan military and police would arrive before they could defeat the Canchuara defenders. So the leader of the strike group decided to do the next best thing. He pulled out a whistle, giving a series of sharp blasts in a repetitive tone.

At the signal, one of the Civil Guardsmen escorting people inside the building suddenly turned, shooting the other. The other one fell to the ground; the turncoat then pointed his rifle at Paul. As a van screeched to an abrupt halt nearby, the turncoat pushed Paul into the open doorway of the van, then jumped in after him. The van then drove off, gunfire from the security forces futilely peppering the ground around it. The rest of the Golden Blade terrorists began to retreat, laying a covering fire down to prevent pursuit.

“Paul!” screamed Alana, trying to run out behind the van. The young man who’d been so eager to vote earlier held her back away from the gunfire as she continued to scream his name in shock and horror as the terrorists retreated.

As the van sped away, and the sounds of gunfire retreated in the distance, a bag was roughly forced over Paul’s head and his hands bound behind him. A voice in roughly accented Spanish told him not to move or resist, or he would regret it. He was on his way to join the other poll worker who was in the terrorists’ custody.

Back in Canchuara, any idea of celebrating the town’s staunch defense of its right to vote was muted by the realization that there were turncoats in their midst - and that yet another worker was now taken.