Land uninhabitable for years, scientists say; hundreds dead, Vohemaro ship 4423 "likely suspect"by Reever FolliesDoma, The Badlands - The
Old Reliable, venerable trader based in Kropmork, pulled into the small Badlands town of Doma, expecting to pick up its quarterly shipment of steel, swords, and fine silk from the town's renowned weaponsmiths and silk groves. What they found, instead, was a horror unlike anything Reial has seen since the Vohemar Revolution: the entire population of the town--human, demihuman, plant, and animal--dead, some literally in their tracks. Panicked, the crew sent out an urgent request for authorities to investigate.
Their distress call brought the Vohemaro
Pride's Folly, in the area thanks to a recent resupply stop at Claiborne, and Ivonia's
Soyokaze, who, according to its famed Captain Tylor, "just happened to be on patrol nearby." Investigations from the medical staffs on both ships soon revealed the cause of the tragedy.
"We analyzed substances found in the bloodstreams of the Doma victims," Nurse Harumi of the
Soyokaze explained to
Badlands Bulletin reporters, "and determined that the cause of their deaths was from the action of two different poisons - a powerful neurotoxin and a joint-affecting necrotoxin. I've not heard of the combination of these two toxins from sources other than certain highly venomous animals. The poisons were apparently introduced to the town's water supply, which was used by both the population of the town and its crops and livestock. This would explain the deaths of both the silkworm groves, the silkworms themselves, and the crops and cattle kept by the town. Moreover...preliminary tests done at various sites throughout the town suggest that the poisoned water has seeped into the water table of the region. I'm not familiar enough with the poison to say precisely how long it will take before it is uncontaminated, but it will probably be at least ten years before the Doma region is habitable again."
Sources close to the
Badlands Bulletin have revealed that Nurse Harumi's analysis was--possibly intentionally--incorrect. The true nature of the poison used to murder the population of Doma is a substance known as N-Action Tetrodotoxin, code named 'Black NAT.' This poison, refined from the poison of the Two-tailed Giant Reaper Scorpion found in Badlands deserts, was created by the Ivonian government's Draklor Research Facility for possible military applications. After an initial period spreading through the body, it concentrates at the joints and along the spine, causing extreme pain from the poison eating at the tissues at those sites, and increased stiffness and unresponsiveness from the paralytic effects of the toxin. Within an hour, the victim is completely paralyzed; with the pain from the flesh-eating effects of the poison building to unbearable levels, they suffer in immobile, silent torment until their brain shuts down approximately an hour later. Plants simply rot from the inside out when water laced with the poison is absorbed. The poison is incredibly powerful--little more than two liters of the undiluted poison would be sufficient to cause devastation such as this.
Incriminating as an Ivonian weapon of mass murder, combined with a possible coverup over the true source of the carnage, might be, signs point to another party as the culprit. Records show that, less than a day before the estimated deaths of the populace of Doma, the Vohemaro ship captained by Isako Amasawa, the
4423, left the town after a short stay. While the stated intent of the
4423 was to pick up a package to be delivered, one can hardly forget that this same ship was responsible for an attack on Ivonian shipping last year, as well as being one of the two ships whose crews were present at the treaty signing in Kropmork that ended in the assassinations of the dignitaries present. Captain Hakkar of the
Pride's Folly refuses to comment on whether or not the
4423 is the perpetrator of this horrific crime, but has stated that the Vohemaro government has demanded that the
4423 to return to Berum for questioning. Opinions elsewhere are less neutral.
"This is treachery and skulduggery of the highest order," said Senator Gestahl of Melior. "A Vohemaro ship of war has clearly decimated a...not just neutral, an innocent...town! Their use of Black NAT not only suggests that they seek to incriminate Ivonia of perpetrating this crime, it bald-facedly proves that the country as a whole - for surely a single ship could not plunder the fruits of a classified military project--favors the use of espionage, rather than peaceful tactics, to resolve its conflicts, and supports, if not outright commands, even the most despicable of actions by its troops. I am drafting a bill to demand immediate censure of both the
4423 and the Vohemaro government, and request that the
4423 surrender itself to Ivonian authorities for an unbiased investigation of the incident."
Investigations by both governments are still ongoing, but tensions continue to mount between the two countries, both engaging in a war of intimation that the other is behind this terrible tragedy. Even at the ruins of Doma, tensions boil; there has been one clash--small, and soon broken up by officers from both ships--between marines from the
Soyokaze and
Pride's Folly. As the incident highlights the bad blood between the nations, many Badlands residents wonder--is this the beginning of war? More importantly--how long before the bickering between these two giants erases the memory of this small town, and the treachery that killed it, and how likely are the rest of the Badlands to suffer the same fate?
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