Mataarian hospital ship SS Western Star
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By the time the Mataar-Oltrin War broke out, the Western Star had already been all but ancient. Laid down at the turn of the 20th century and launched two years later, she was, at the time, the fastest, largest and most luxurious liner of the nation. In the years before and during her construction, the nation slowly began to open up to foreign tourists, something that had previously been reserved mostly for businessmen and politicians. In a great gamble, the owner and founder of the Great Western Line (of which Western Star would become the flagship) had anticipated this development and gambled large parts of his company's budget on her construction - rightfully so as it turned out.
While she would be the only ship of her class, and not many indigenous steamship operators would join the Great Western Line on the routes leading westward and southward, the ship would nevertheless see frequent and good service from 1904 all the way to 1920, when the rapidly degrading economical and inner-political situation made operating the aging ship impossible. As the Great Western went under, she was sold to a cruise liner operator, who ran her twice on the North-South route - a horrible idea given the current political climate.
When the Northern Secession occurred in 1922, she was present near the "front lines" in Chernyagan harbour, and was promptly acquired on charter by the Army as a hospital ship, operating a year in this role even after hostilities died down as the local power supply was intermittent enough to be worrisome to hospital operations ashore.
Once that role became superfluous, she served as a barracks ship for a while longer before being returned to her owners - who didn't know what to do anymore with the at this point ancient and poorly maintained vessel. Restoring her would have been massively expensive, but with investors seeking to purchase the ship for various uses - a floating hotel and a museum amongst the proposals - she was left in limbo while workers from the various investors came to try and preserve the slowly decaying hulk to their best ability, though with limited success.
By 1934, her powerplant was basically a lost cause (even though she had received oil firing in 1919), and her underwater ship was described by divers as "a lovely underwater forest that could give biologists a good time". Minor leaks were occurring with steadily increasing frequency, and the once lavish wooden interior had been neglected. Even the effort needed to turn her into a stationary attraction quickly became too expensive, and Western Star was sold to a breakers' yard in '35.
She was mere days from being towed off when, in 1937, war broke out. The ship was one of the largest available vessels at the time in spite of her age and at cheap cost, so Western Star was chartered by the government for use as a hospital ship, hastily repainted, and sent to the fortress port of Angelos - steaming mostly on thoughts and prayers - where she was presumed safe from hostile threats.
Mere weeks later, the city came under siege, which would not be lifted for another six desperate months. The ship's staff and crew had their work cut out for them in this time, trying to shore up leaks and maintain decades old and poorly looked after machinery to keep the lights on in the operations rooms upstairs. Without spare parts, her engineers soon took to dismantling her dubious main engines to fashion replacement parts for her auxiliary generators. This meant that, when the city fell, she was finally and permanently stuck in place and was surrendered to Oltrin control.
Her brief moment of historic fame came when Western Star, now renamed Progress, was given as a present to the Oltrin puppet state, the Socialist Republic of Mataar, as the first official action of the Oltrin Sovets towards their nascent allies. It was spun as an act of generousity, an attempt to help rebuild and repay the damage done during the siege, however Oltrin really had no use for the derelict ship at this point and were content to push responsibility off onto someone else.
In this capacity, Progress operated until 1940, when a rumor made the rounds amongst the underground resistance that prisoners were occasionally taken aboard her and ruthlessly interrogated. Although this rumour was never confirmed and Oltrin deny any such allegations vehemently, on March 21st, a pair of amateur divers placed makeshift explosive charges on her port side hull. An hour later, explosions shook the vessel, and she quickly began to list and settled on the harbour floor, her ancient systems and makeshift crew defenceless against the raging floods.
The socialist propaganda machine ran haywire with the story claiming as many as 500 souls killed in the attack (in reality, it were closer to 50, the ship had been seeing much reduced use now that fighting had moved on elsewhere), and headlines about the incident and the ensuing investigation, show trial and ultimate execution of a suspected saboteur ran in the newspapers for months afterwards.
However, after the liberation of Mataar, a pair of men came forth, claiming responsibility while presenting convincing proof of their statements. In spite of having essentially pleaded guilty to a crime of war, no prosecution was ever launched, showing the hardened militaristic stance of Mataar in the 1950s and the increasing enstrangement with her erstwhile allies.
-o-
Author's Note:
My first post on here. I hope I don't embarass myself too much. This was written at 11PM so if my writing leaves to be desired, this is why.
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