-=Neos Constantinople, Republic of Thracia, Union of Hellenic Socialist Republics
Old, ancient Constantinople, Konstantiniyye, Istanbul, Constantinople again, was a city that had suffered in the decline of the world. The sea had encroached, and most of the city had simply had to pack up and move before wholesale replicating a new version of the old, only to find the sea followed them. What had remained of the old city and that of the new had become New Constantinople. One of the greatest civil works of the era had finally shored up its defences, preserving the few crumbling ancient ruins from Empires barely forgotten and protecting the new gleaming beating heart of a Union finding its place in the world.
In a city where all eyes had once looked upon the Hagia Sophia, it now turned to a different dome - that which made up the seat of the government of the Union, where the delegates and representatives of all its republics met under a new architectural marvel of ancient marble and newwrought steel, a fusion of the old and new. The pride of Justinian, barely standing, looked on in envy.
It was here too that the Archon was found, at the heart of a sprawling new Urban centre only contained by the primordial forces of water. It shared its environs with places for the government both federal, local, and of the syndicate, but its focus was and always had been on the idea of a Union that the revolution had come to see made reality.
The Archon, an older man, once of the factories, then of the syndicates, then of the politics, was not one of the Hellenic elite, distinguished by now only by a few minor traits and a legacy of wealth and opulence that somehow managed to persist in as classless a society as the Union could bring to bear. He had once been blonde, but time had worn it dull, and the habits of a clean shaven man had given over to the wisdom of a seemingly ever growing beard. He was alone, looking at reports, at information, at maps, at bills. It was the affairs of any head of state that made up the role of the Archon, the first among equals, or so the ideologues would say, but every society needed a hierarchy to function, and so here he was.
The Franco-Iberian Egyptian matters were somewhat of a concern. They were not enemies, far from it, but the Union, long quiet, had begun to flex its international clout, but there was realpolitik at play. Athanasios was not Archon by chance, of course, so he took a moment to think. The Union's control of one bank of the Stait was tolerable, as long as the disorganized Egyptian state controlled the other, the latter could be, to a certain extent, controlled. Geopolitically, having it fall to the Franco-Iberian's was.. problematic. It was somewhat infantile, he mused, that if they wanted it then they needed it. Of course, there was no guarantee that the Franco-Iberian's wanted such a thing, not all campaigns ended well, after all.
He decided against offering the Egyptians any outright aid, they were not sufficiently prepared to embrace the revolution, and one brought by the sword was always problematic, as the Union's own attempts in the east had come to show, let alone the matter of the early Union's stability. He would not be known as one who brought the workers a struggle beyond their own eternal burden. No, there was a simple enough first step.
He penned a small note, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs would see to that. He then penned another, the Citizen's Marine would do the rest.
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