HEATH ROW NEWS
The Skarkon War Continues
6.29.122
Bosena Accords Strike Against Angels Cartel
In response to the masse evacuation of Angel Cartel forces on the planet, Bosena Accords executive Galm Eskola-Fae opted to break the non-aggression pact with the Angels Cartel on Skarkon and turn against remaining groups of pocketed Cartel influence in Gulormola and Kor’ali.
“Our non-aggression pact with the Angels Cartel has always been conditional,” he stated to Heath Row News reporters, “Our mutual cooperation existed to ensure a smooth transition of troops planetside, and to combat Krullefor influence here. This was done at the behest of allies within the Republic who assured us that the growing threat of Seykal and Krullefor subversion was higher than the relatively stable and contained threat of the Cartel. The devil you know and all that. Lately however our ongoing agreement with the Cartel has proven unfruitful and a liability. Not only have they utterly failed to raise an effective resistance to Krullefor, RSS, and CBD encroachment on Skarkon now they have abandoned the region to the tune of thunderous orbital bombardment.”
“Our forces had already had small skirmishes in the past, with Cartel affiliated slavers or particularly hostile and militant Angels groups conflicting with our forces, spreading further chaos, and adding further legitimacy to Kril Efrit’s façade of ‘uprooting slavers’ has his pretext for conducting political purges here. Each isolated incident was handled carefully and dealt with accordingly. This parting shot, however, is a bridge too far. The banning of orbital bombardment tactics has been a sticking point for the Accords since our founding due to the collateral damage it causes both on the local populous and on the planetary ecosystem. There’s no negotiating their way out of this. There is no more non-aggression pact. The remaining Angels will get everything we have been sparing them from on Skarkon, and then some. No slaves on Skarkon, neither to Krullefor nor the Cartel.”
Despite his strong words the response to Cartel in the region has been relatively limited, with a majority of the Angels Cartel forces already having evacuated the planet in short order following their parting shot to Krullefor facilities. What the Angels have left behind however has been quickly plundered by the Bosena Accords, with the independent warclone organization claiming Cartel weapons, dropsuits, vehicles, logistical supplies, outposts, even biomass containers to fuel the Accord’s ongoing guerilla war. What little resistance the Cartel could muster was restricted to small pockets of cut-off gangs and slavers that had long since been cordoned off by the Accords in an effort to box them in and prevent them from being able to spread their influence without breaking the non-aggression pact. Unable to put up any significant fight against even a single squad of warclones, the Bosena Accords pushed into these small pockets of remain Cartel territory to carry out public arrests before handing the Cartel members over to allied rebel militia groups.
Skarkon Freedom Corps Formed
With the release of a document outlining the alleged conspiracy committed by the RSS to consolidate control within Molden Heath and the Republic at large, many local clans have taken to joining the Gulormola Autonomous Region and the Sahaal Elevator Autonomous Zone to cooperate with the Bosena Accords in their underground war against the RSS. Most notably among those allied are local clans who number among the Vele’kor and Jar’ikosh substribes of the Sebiestor.
Previously the most vocal supporters for widespread reform in Molden Heath towards social justice, separate local clans within each substribe have convened in Sa’kak to form a united front in the region to continue the war for regional autonomy. Radicalized by the actions of the RSS now brought to light and empowered by casting off the yoke of the Angels Cartel, the newly formed “Skarkon Freedom Corps” aims to unite the countless militia groups into a rainbow coalition of Sebiestor nationalists, labour-populists hoping to return to the democratic glory days of the Midular regime, left wing anarchists, and warclone advisors into a formidable fighting force that can keep Kril Efrit’s Republic Security Service at bay.
Also present as founding members of the Skarkon Freedom corps were representatives from the Ishohoulvi Freedom Corps, Sebiestor Society for Economic Justice, Skarkon-Ennur Miner’s Circle, Molden Heath Subcircle of the Kalamtokek Warrior’s Circle, the Sahaal Stevedore’s Union, and the Skardisaad Republican Army.
Ishuhuolvi Offensive Launched
Bolstered by supplies scavenged from the retreating Angels Cartel and with CBD’s logistical routes fully committed to the defense of Nalvula, the remaining forces of the Bosena Accords have staged a massive land invasion of the Ishohuolvi province in southern Skarkon. With the airspace hotly contested by CBD missile defenses, rather than risk a costly naval or orbital invasion of the Ishohuolvi Peninsula the Accords have instead concentrated the bulk of their forces on border outposts previously established by the United Neopian Federation’s ArSec. Sitting at the foot of the Ternate mountain range that separates Gulormola from the CBD territory of Ishohuolvi, for warclone forces to cross the mountains they will first have to summit Skarkon’s ancient and formidable Sahendaruman Fortress.
Originally a series of brick-and-mortar territorial strongholds for mining corporations in the region during the early days of Matari settlement, the fortress has been modernized and heavily fortified over the last two decades to act as a bulwark between the previously Angels Cartel dominated eastern provinces and the Caldari-administered south. Together with two other equally formidable land forts and interspersed observation platforms it forms the Huomaeli Belt, a supposedly impenetrable border built by the CBD megacorporation that runs between Gulormola and Ishohuolvi. Despite heavy losses, the Bosena Accords 1st Hellawes Squadron has already succeed in knocking out enough of the fortress’s missile batteries to soften it up for their main invasion force; a massive spearhead supported by five of the Bosena Accord’s seven remaining Mobile Command Centers operational on Skarkon.
The fort won’t fall easily however. Even with CBD’s focus being turned away from Skarkon at the moment, the fortress still plays host to a number of Spaceline Patrols elite artic warfare units. These Caldari commandos will also be supported by Tronhada Free Guard mercenaries equally adapted to cold weather warfare, and warclone veterans of the Onikanabo Bridade. The Bosena Accords would be remissed as well to fully discount the massive artillery guns that brim Sahendaruman Fortress capable of firing down into the canyons and valleys below.
Regardless of who is victorious one thing is clear; neither side is willing to leave without a fight.
(((Artist Credit)))
