A Brotherhood of Crows.
Chapter 16

“...The Manhattan Project can be seen as the pivotal moment of recent human history. Oppenheimer and his team set out to create an ultimate weapon, a tool for ending the stalemate of the Second World War, which by then had dragged on for almost a decade, and caused the deaths of millions on both the Allied and Axis sides. Instead, Oppenheimer and his team discovered thauma particles - the atomic basis for current anti-gravity technology used in airships. While this technology is now commonplace, it’s creation must be seen as part of the context of a devastating war. The United States army utilised the first thauma drive for the USS Enola Gay, the first “true” airship. A simple gunnery platform, the Enola Gay attacked the Japanese Empire from heights of 80,000 feet, altitudes too great for the Japanese air force to reach, and well out of the range of its flak cannons. For days, from its permanent floating position, Enola Gay dropped thousands of tons of explosives onto the Japanese mainland. It is ironic, perhaps, to the pacifist mind, that the death of millions of Japanese citizens is what ultimately caused the end of the war.”

~A History of the Commonwealth, Hardt, Y & Einhander, B, Oxford University Press.

Wife of government minister found murdered

LONDON - The Metropolitan Police have announced today that a forty year old woman murdered in Pimlico last night is Elisa Manning, the wife of Jacob Manning, Minister for Public Decency. Officers were summoned to family residence after the neighbours reported noise disturbance. Mrs Manning was declared dead at the scene. Mr Manning, forty one, MP for Ilford West, was at a ministerial event at the time of the murder. Police have appealed for witnesses.

~ From Reuters News Agency.

“The student is a contradiction in terms. For a boy of his age, he demonstrate frightening intellect, an uncanny creative mind and a voracious appetite for reading. However, his behaviour is simply unacceptable. He is disruptive, anarchic, and possess a sense of humour better suited to a thirteen year old, rather than a boy of sixteen. We also have reason to believe he has homosexual tendencies, and this is irreconcilable with the ethos of the school. We move, therefore, for his expulsion.”

~Memo from the Board of Governors, Our Lady of Perpetual Exfoliation Catholic School, Manchester