{"id":78,"date":"2021-11-30T04:29:36","date_gmt":"2021-11-30T04:29:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/fringewar.com\/?p=78"},"modified":"2021-11-30T04:29:36","modified_gmt":"2021-11-30T04:29:36","slug":"the-poor-frog","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/fringewar.com\/?p=78","title":{"rendered":"The Poor Frog"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Zelski II, February 2875, Taurian Concordat Briefing Room, Location Undisclosed<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t worry, Envoy Grevin, they&#8217;re only going in to determine resistance level and soften up any defenses,&#8221; Ivan droned, &#8220;Follow up in a couple of months and you can bring sufficient forces to bear to take the prize.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>He looked up at the hairy ambassador with watery eyes before slowly continuing.  &#8220;Besides, they&#8217;re mercenaries, an expendable resource&#8230;&#8221; <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The ambassador growled low in his throat.  &#8220;What, exactly, do you get out of all of this?  The fact that we&#8217;re meeting here suggests Comstar general command either doesn&#8217;t know, or is content to have you run this off-book.  Either way, that&#8217;s a big bet for a mid-level drudge.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Ivan&#8217;s affront almost appeared genuine.  &#8220;Why, the greater good, of course!  A strong periphery would make a competent ally for a change.&#8221;  <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The ambassador nodded, unconvinced, &#8220;Of course.  All the same, I still want at least one pair of eyes onboard that dropship.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s already done, ambassador.&#8221; Ivan&#8217;s smile left Grevin cold, dark thoughts clouding his mind.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>They should put a bullet in the back of his head before he ever reaches that planet.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Zelski II, February 2875, Taurian Concordat Briefing Room, Location Undisclosed &#8220;Don&#8217;t worry, Envoy Grevin, they&#8217;re only going in to determine resistance level and soften up any defenses,&#8221; Ivan droned, &#8220;Follow up in a couple of months and you can bring sufficient forces to bear to take the prize.&#8221; He looked up at the hairy ambassador [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/fringewar.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/fringewar.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/fringewar.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fringewar.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fringewar.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=78"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/fringewar.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":80,"href":"http:\/\/fringewar.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78\/revisions\/80"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/fringewar.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=78"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fringewar.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=78"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fringewar.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=78"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}