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Toasty
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Xerxes took in a long, soothing drag from his cigar. The man was thoroughly addicted to it; no doubt from his stressful position as President of Persia. He had developed a flare for them from the first day the ships arrived from the Aztec lands, part of his exotic tastes for the land of Magnus; his continent, Minor, had grown bland and boring over the years. He hated it, a tiny little piddling island of two civilizations (though it had earlier been four, long gone were the Babylonians and Arabs). To his North ruled Sultan Osman of the Ottomans, and to his Northeast on the Island of Pax Romanus, the Romans. Why the Romans so indulged in self-glorification, he would never know. They named their capital, country, and subcontinent all the same thing.
Persepolis was by all means a bustling city. As Persia entered the industrial age--years before any other nation even came close, no less--this become more appearant every day. Xerxes palace, strewn with golden trinkets, ivory sculptures and heavy with the smell of Persian bourgoise incense, represented the Persian population entirely in that it was entirely Persian. Not a single foreigner inhabited a single Persian city; however, several Persians inhabited several Ottoman cities.
Xerxes looked out his window as the sun set on the city. The imperial palace made an imposing view on the skyline of Persepolis, standing high above any of the skyscrapers in the metropolis of 750,000 souls. The glimmer of the gold and the analogous burnt orange, black and golden yellow shown in through deep auburn curtains.
Xerxes continued to puff lightly on his cigar. He grew more distasteful of this pitiless land every day. By no means loyal to Persia, he saw in the setting sun the setting of his glory days. Osman had become his greatest foe of all time. The Ottoman forces consisted of no less than 52 Sipahi regiments, 23 cannon regiments, and 38 riflemen regiments. After their latest victory in the Fourth Turko-Persian war, Xerxes was trapped in a gigantic city not a day's reach from the Sipahi regiments stationed at Susa.
Xerxes stood up from his seat in a fine wood-carved, satin-padded chair. He approached the window, as his pitch black, muscular silhouette cut through the sunlight that beamed through the window, filtered out by venetian blinds of wood which stood open and made but a dent in the light's radiance.
All the humility suffered in the Sixth war would be forgotten, he thought as a determined smirk grew across his face. My regiments march towards Susa. In a matter of days, we will gain back the lands of North Persia and Babylon. He drew in an even longer drag from his Aztec cigar. Revenge is, as always, a dish best served cold.
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Toasty
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Pasha Omar Mehmed was a cavalry officer; had been since the Fifth Turko-Persian war. He had led the 32nd Sipahi regiment to victory in Susa. His country heard great fame of him, the man to take the first Persian city in Ottoman history.
Turkey was a satellite that revolved around Persia. Though it had gained all of the Arabian lands, and most of the Babylonian lands, Persia had been a great nation since its creation: while the Persian city of Persepolis was run through by two rivers on fertile grassland, Istanbul was a lonely city near an elephant heard in the middle of the Great Turkish plains. The only nation who seemed to start off worse than Turkey was the late Carthaginians, though even they managed to make Carthage the greatest port city in the world until its capture in 612 A.D. by the Romans.
Susa was a city that never should have been, in an ill-designed area surrounded by mountains and hills. While easily defensible, it's pitiful maximum population of about 20,000 made it entirely useless by an economic standpoint.
Mehmed had been promoted to the rank of Commadore of Cavalry Force XI. Composed of the forty-first through fifty-second Sipahi regiments, it was by far the largest by comparison to any of the other Ottoman cavalry forces.
Mehmed had gone to sleep at the Ottoman Military HQ A General's quarters. In the event of a fifth war with Persia, fully expected by the high command and most likely doomed to seal Turkey's fate, HQ A would be the front line based on all intelligence records avaliable to the Ottoman military staff.
Unfortunately for Mehmed, he was a deep sleeper. He would have never awoken to the noise made by the rumbling hooves of the Persian cavalry as they approached Susa.
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Osman had grown old in his reign over Turkey. His eyes had bags under them from his age and looking at him you would think every crevice or line in his face would have a story to tell from crises during his administration.
Lately he had taken to wearing a suit and a red fez, a symbol of the ruling class in his developing nation. Turkey seemed to continually find herself just a few steps behind in whatever case, the Sixth Turko-Persian war being the first and only successful Ottoman military engagement with a competent foe: to say that the wars against Babylon and Arabia had been overglorified by the press was an understatement. Turkey found itself more and more often grasping at straws to point out its achievements, and their citizens were feeling the effect. Edrine had become a haven for corruption and organization against the fragile Republic, and as more defeats at the hands of the Persians were taken, the more likely the populace was to take a swing at the porcelain government.
Not only that, but Turkey found itself increasingly at odds with its foreign nations as well. While they had maintained good relations with the Romans since their meeting in 1550 B.C., and never been at war, it would be impossible to recruit their military support, them losing the cities of Vispalis and Ravenna to Persian forces, as Xerxes maintained but a toehold on Pax Romanus. Caesar had become all too cautious in his old age, as compared to Osman, who likened himself to American cider, as the older he got, the more of a bite was attributed to his flavor. And while the nations of the Magnus continent seemed to feel the need to perpetually harass Ottoman shipping lanes, they took no notice of how Xerxes had repeatedly broken alliances against Turkey in order to make peace with them. Ottoman reputation was entirely white, Persian entirely black, yet Persia seemed the favored child.
Osman, far off in Istanbul, mulled over bills and papers due to be delivered to parliament at the end of the month, as it became later into the night to about 2300 hours. As he drifted into sleep, resting his head on his cotton shirt and his reading glasses coming slightly off-center, he had the image of Istanbul burning in his mind.
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Toasty
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The shrill guns of war screamed with the firing of Persian cannon. As dawn arose in Susa, and the sun peeked out behind the angled crests of the mountain range, so did the explosion that sent 4 artillery divisions' cannonballs hurtling towards the barracks of Susa.
The 21st riflemen division, caught by surprise as a cannonball crashed through their wall, ran out in their undergarments with rifles in hand after suffering two casualties. Racing across the dew-soaked hills came the finest of Persian cavalry units; against the ruddy orange, black, and purple of the April June dawn, another flash of light and cloud of smoke arose from the hills.
Mehmed, similar to the men of the 21st division, ran out in his undergarments to see a war developing in front of his eyes. In the tanned glory of the rippling Persian mass, he rubbed his brown eyes. The wave, following behind the great cavalry units as they raced on a nearing hill, consumed the entire horizon from side to side. The sun was, in fact, blotted out by the mass of Persian infantrymen running to reclaim their long-lost city.
A stray cannonball soon decapitated Mehmed.
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A young man of the 21st Ottoman Rifleman Division was seen running from the battle. Imagined a coward, he was, infact, running to the border town of Edrine and it's un-seiged communications room. There he would find a Sipahi regiment assigned to mail carriage which would run to Istanbul to notify the Sultan.
However, as he soon came running from the battlefield and the sounds of the Persian cannon faded, he would soon be terrified to see ahead of him the blocking of the roads out of Susa; their stood, in all their militaristic greatness, the Elite Persian Cavalry regiments. They had come ahead to cut off all the roads out of Susa.
He realized, as a bullet sped through his heart, that Susa would fall, and many more Ottoman cities would, before their could be a surmountable defence against the Persian marauders.
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vovan
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I agree with DC in that the chapters are a bit on the short side. But since I myself prefer to write short chapters, I'd say that overall a nice story.
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08-12-2002 10:17
Funny thing is I just entered a war against the Persians in my game as the Ottomans too, they're the first to be on the recieving end of my Siphais.
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