Tales of Tingst

[Tingst]

So I’m going to be posting a few stories here, all of the planned ones based in my nation - The Republic og Tingst. My inital plan, conceived in 2008 or 2009, was to not write any “factbook” or wiki about Tingst anywhere, but rather let the nation and society develop through the stories; WA-category “Anarchy”, so I was thinking you’d have great freedom in modeling it and still make it somewhat “believeable”. I’m not a 100 % sure about that anymore, I find the idea of trying to put down in words what I think of Tingst appealing. So, I might do that, time permitting. But first of it’s just gonna be the stories, where you get to know the nation through bits of information in the storytelling, supplemented by short sections of descriptive facts.

I’m not very well experinced in role-playing, that is developing a story underways with others. I’d like to try that though, but you’ll have to give me some time to get into it, read a few of your threads (please give me tips on good ones!), get the hang of it, etc. The intial stories I’ll post here will basically be novels divived into parts with a planned narrative, begining, middle and end.

You are all very welcome to comment on the stories, in fact, I’d like that. The pace of the stories will probably vary a lot, all depending on what my daily life throws at me, but it’ll get there eventually.

Ok, so enjoy the first part of the second entry (the first was the story I started back in the days, that I’ll be bringing back to life when I find all the pieces scattered on my old computer) in "Tales of Tingst.

[Tingst]

1. The mean-spirited Vasco Petronas.
   Millerwick, Eastside, Tingst City Proper.

• Ah, nothing like beating up a juvenile delinquent to get your juices flowing in the morning, Senior Investigate Officer Vasco Petronas thought to himself while carefully removing his riot gear. The IO’s were encouraged to take part in routine patrolling, coordinated Street Safety Tasks and Urban Delinquency Reduction Procedures, but few of them actually did. They saw it as beneath them. SIO Petronas was old-school, however, having himself been a Street Safety Operator for several years, before being promoted to IO and gaining seniority. He knew a case could often fly or die based on intel gathered first-hand. Merely leafing through SSO-reports would only get you so far, and, besides, it was fun.

• I’m gonna go ahead and get the BLT today, Henry he said while entering the 10 th. floor cafeteria of the Safety First Inc. building on Fordham Avenue in the eastern parts of Tingst City Proper. Today’s UDRP had been standard, and not connected to any ongoing case. Vasco liked to tag along once a month, to stay in touch with the streets, if for nothing else. He sat down at a table overlooking the cityscape to the west and cautiously removed the lettuce from his BLT-sandwich before devouring all of it in two quick sessions.

He yearned for a case worthwhile, a real murder mystery of old. He was bored with gangland rape and domestic murder/suicide, and he frowned upon the recent development where several more demanding investigations had been outsourced to smaller enforcement consultant groups. The latest restructuring had severely downsized his department, and seemingly consolidated the hitherto unofficial business strategy plan of focusing resources on regular patrolling and incident reduction in his sector, limiting investigative measures to high-profile incidents. Safety First Inc. was under pressure from the competition, and it seemed more and more obvious that the contract in Sector 5 was not one of the highest priorities. White collar crime was being boosted, and Sector 5, despite being the city proper, was low on the bigger institutions; apart from a financial institution and a medium-sized oil company, it was mainly a small business and residential area. - Shitty boutiques and even shittier kids no one gives a shit about, as Petronas so eloquently used to describe his sector.

Little did he know, as he was sitting there, feeling sorry for himself, that one of those kids was being dismembered in a basement on the corner of Jones and Penton. That should constitute high profile, you’d wager.

[Tingst]

2. The seemingly friendly Joyce Dell
   Thirwell, Eastside, Tingst City Proper

Executive Detective Joyce Dell was sitting in one of the many interview rooms on the sub-levels of the First House Security Group’s east side operative building, just at the corner of Penton and Maersh. At the opposite end of the table she had a girl of barely 15 years, another junkie who had attempted to steal snacks from a Burrard Oil mixer. They were fairly common, the mixers, and they were always held at the garden terrace, located just above street level. And every time the most daring, or desperate, got in and tried to help themselves to either food or anything worthwhile they might be able to get a few Pris from on the street.

The terrace was a joke, security wise. A laughable fence and then a wall that a geriatric on a mixture of Cat and smack could scale in under a minute. And that’s not even a clever remark, Joyce had seen it herself. - We could fix that, Joyce had told the Burrard liason at numerous times. - But it’ll cost you extra. The contract on sector security in Sector 6, as was standard city-wide, dealt with exterior security and investigation, internal security handled basic building security. Poorly, one might add. And of course they weren’t willing to pay more. The events had even built up a sort of perverse notoriety among the clientele, - You never know what might happen at Burrard, the saying went.

Sometimes they came in big groups, and just stormed the place. Other times it was scattered groups of individuals that tried a more covert approach. Shirley, that was the girls name, had been one of the latter ones. She’d even dressed up in what ED Dell assumed was her finest dress. A summery thing, no shoulders and with blue and pink flowers dotted across it. Of course it didn’t fool anyone; a soiled dress, however pretty to begin with, could never mask what an extended period on Aurora Grade C Smack did to your appearance and posture. And the hollow eyes, they were always a give away.

• I wonder if it’ll make any difference, Joyce Dell thought to herself with regards to the highly controversial act on setting an age limit on the use, production and distribution of grade B, C and D narcotics that had just been passed. - Will I see less of Shirleys? The debate had been long and loud, touching at the very heart of Tingst, all sparked by the unfortunate death from an overdose of a 10-year old boy from one of the gated communities. Not that children as young as that, or younger, hadn’t been dying earlier from the exact same cause, but they were usaully from less resoucefull segments of Tingst society. The incident had rallied powerful people to the cause, people who normally considered themselves guardians of the “Tingst way of life”. - Nothing like the death of your neighbours child to make you appriciate the commonly despised art of regulation, Joyce thought to herself.

She wraped up the interview and sent Shirley on her way with one of the uniforms. It was late, and she hadn’t eaten. - Dumplings, perhaps, or maybe Hue, that’d be nice. And I should be able to catch News at 11. Joyce entered one of the elevators and headed to the 15th floor and her office. Before she had time to sit down, the phone rang. The call was a murder, apperently a brutal one, at the corner of Jones and Penton, right at the southern edge of Sector 6.