Tales of an IOT Nation
Chapter I: Breaking in the Office (and Sonereal's Door)
Mechaerik held the IOT Book of Etiquette uncomfortably in his hands. The black judge robes of the Polish Supreme Court weighed heavily and it felt rather chilly this strange January morning. On the stage, sitting the chair closest to the (supposedly) bulletproof podium was the Imperial Party's own point-man. Imperialists running Poland seemed strange enough but....
Ponies! In the government! Mechaerik mentally bit his lip, carefully putting on a poker face to hide his rather public displeasure of Bronyism. True, the Iron Chancellor isn't a Brony himself, thank Ravus, but members of his cabinet were. The one good thing about that is that the head of the Polish Intelligence Agency was a staunch anti-pony.
Lost in his thoughts, he didn't notice the new Chancellor move until the man stood in front of him, ready to take the Oath. Wordlessly, placed his right hand on the black book.
"I, August Sonereal, hereby swear to try my best not to insult my fellow politicians and troll the senate too often. I promise I shall keep debate as on-topic as one can in a quasi-democratic country. I promise to try to use the senate room as a chat room while the senate is in session. I promise not to try to one-up our neighboring nations throwing billions away on impossible super-infrastructure or military projects. So help me RNGod."
And with that, Sonereal became Poland's first Iron Chancellor. The date is January 30th, 1815.
****
Hoplitejoe, for all intents and purposes, hated being the Economic Advisor to a guy running a country with six neighbors and no ports. Macroeconomics? Err, sure! So far, all his staff has been telling him to "build more factories!" Building factories is really difficult when a country, again, has six neighbors.
And boy did Hoplitejoe hate those West and East Prussians. Not that that will have any bearing on his recommendations on port deal offers from Livonia and East Prussia, of course. The man from Madagascar knows how to separate business with seething hatred toward Prussians of all cardinal directions.
Navigating the Warsaw Palace (the capital building) wasn't fun the first few days. For some reason, Poland had a "navy" and an "admiralty" and by that, a few government merchant ships under the command of Admiral Tyo. Behind close doors, it is rumored that Tyo would be a bigger danger to an enemy navy if it was under his command instead. He and his underlings lingered around before disappearing to some other governmental building but that didn't mean the Warsaw Palace was any less busy.
From far it.
He entered the Octagon Office. Sonereal and another man were just finishing up a meeting. The man nodded towards HopliteJoe and exited.
"That was Mosher, our new ambassador to Angola. What can I do for you HJ?" Sonereal smiled, ignoring the small pile of paperwork on his desk.
"We need more factories."
"I am keenly aware of that."
"We have to build more factories."
"That sounds pretty mid-19th century. What's up?"
"Well, for some reason, no one will build a factory. Factories are the sole determinant of economic output and us only having," HJ counted on one hand, "five factories across all of Poland is hurting us."
"But everyone else has five factories too."
"Well, yeah. However, we're having problems with stability or something. Ask RedSpy about it but the point is, only four factories are working."
"Wait, what's going on at the fifth factory?"
"They're not working?"
Sonereal scratched his head in a comical fashion which was a cover for his true confusion. "Wait, are they...striking? Because it is a bit too early to be doing that."
"No, they're just not working."
"So hire more people."
"We did. They also won't work."
Sonereal sighed. "They teach you all this fancy economic theory and military stuff in the private universities but it really doesn't seem to apply much in the real world. Well, can't we expand our agriculture economy and-"
"Our farms do not factor into GDP."
"Now you're messing with me."
HopliteJoe shrugged. "Listen, it is confusing but we need more factories and we're the only guys who can build them which also means we control the goods produced at those factories. Government-ran industry and all that jazz."
"Well HJ, you're doing a good job so-" Sonereal was interrupted by someone suddenly barging into the room. The Science Advisor to Sonereal, Kinich, was not in a good mood. "What the hell is it?"
"Science. I need more government subsidies or our people won't INVENT ANYTHING."
"I understand your concern but we're sorta full of other stuff to do and I...don't think....science is that important right away an-"
Kinich's fist one minute was clenched next to him and the next, it was through the thick wooden door of the Octagonal Office. "SCIENCE." Kinich stormed out the room amid interns frozen in terror around the door.
HopliteJoe and Sonereal's eyes met, they both nodded, and HJ left the room, stepping over long splinters of wood. Sonereal sighed, "I hate this job."
Only the Irish and the Belgians like us 
