[Color=red]Prime Minister H. H. Asquith read the morning paper with a steely gaze, one gloved hand allowing him to sip his tea, only in order to spit it out again once he saw that the Tsar of Russia had died in mysterious circumstances - his position taken over by a 'Regent', a man that he and the Crown did not know. There had been revolutionary mumblings within the Russian territories, this he knew to be fact, and in his keen mind he wondered which side this Dmitri Pavlovich, a Grand Duke apparently, was on? Who knows, Pavlovich might even have had his own monarch's cousin assassinated! Heaven forbid, but in these times of uncertainty one never quite knew what to expect, and the case was apparently still being investigated.

With another sip of tea to replace the one he had just wasted, and one should never waste tea, he returned swiftly to the business of running an empire and the Commonwealth within it; it was nice to have an empire, he had always thought, a British Empire at that, and it continued to amaze him how so few regular military forces could keep it all under control. He was of the liberal party himself, a man of and for the people so he liked to think, but one had to admire the way in which the dominions had been held down and linked to the motherland over so many years.

"Sir?"

Oh yes, he had entirely forgotten the man standing silently before him. Oddly enough, this man - though he could never remember his name, so had taken to calling him 'John' - had come to make sure that all the treaties between Russia and Britain were still in place.

"Yes, yes, tell this Grand Duke that all will remain as it is between our two nations."

"I hear word that President Poincaré himself shall be attending the funeral of the King's departed relative, sir."

"Will he now?! Can never underestimate the French, John, never. They have never liked us, nor we them, you just remember that."

"I shall sir, I shall, but how are we to respond to this? We cannot have Great Britain absent from proceedings, it would cast us in a most unflattering light."

"You do have a point, John," admitted the Prime Minister, "you will leave for Russia immediately therefore, taking with you a letter which I shall write, and joining the mourning. Agreed?"

Reginald Smithe internally flinched at how he was treated by this man, a man he saw as inferior to himself in every way, but readily agreed to leading a diplomatic expedition to the other side of the world. Anything to get away from Asquith!

Meanwhile the wheels of empire kept turning, people rose and slept, business went on as usual, most nations now looked to Russia to see what would happen next; Britain herself was not overtly worried, and would retain all current treaties, for now.[/color]