Chapter Twelve
Somewhere deep in the Greek mountains a secret meeting has been called. In attendance are Gilgamesh, Cleo, Alex, Caesar and The Aztec dude who name loosely translates as Hard to Type.
Alex: Thank you all for coming. I believe you all know why we are here, and you have read the briefing books. Caesar that does not look like a briefing book in your hands, what is it?
Caesar: Ugh
nothing. Never mind.
Alex: No, tell us.
Caesar: Well
its the latest copy of Byzantine Illustrated.
Gil: 
The swimsuit Issue!?!?!? Let me see, let me see!
Alex: Gil, you of all people! Theodora has razed two of your cities and marches on your capital and all you care about is the swimsuit issue. Get a grip on yourself man!
Cleo: Looks like he already has a grip on himself Alex. Here Gil, let me help you with that. My what a nice pike you have.
Gil: I bet you say that to all the boys.
Cleo: Yeah, pretty much.
Alex: STOP IT! We are in mortal danger and all you people care about is
well
stuff that doesnt matter.
Aztec Dude: Hey Cleo, care to help me out?
Cleo: Forget it spear boy, you are as ugly as I heard. Even I have standards. You're so ugly, when your mama dropped you off at school, she got a ticket for littering. And take that stupid sock out of your trousers for crying out loud.
Alex: Please people, we are at war!
Caesar: I choose to think of it more as a little lovers spat.
Gil: Easy for you so say, Theodora loves you. Well not exactly love, more like an obsessive controlling dysfunctional lust, but we should all be so lucky. What a set of wits she has. By the way, whats with the dress Caesar? You can get your butt kicked by a redneck in Sumeria for wearing a matching dress and sandals like that.
Caesar: Alex also has a dress on.
Gil: Yeah, but we expect that kind of thing from him.
Alex: Sigh. Please people listen up. Ive have brought in the worlds best strategic military planner to tell us how to win this war. Here he is now. Im sure you all recognize General Insight.
General Insight: Good afternoon everyone.
Cleo: Arent you the guy Joan was using.
General Insight: No, she was using General Disaster.
Cleo: Oh. Are you busy later? Wanna see my tatoo?
General Insight: Err... ugh...I have studied the situation and rest assured you can rid yourselves of Theodora in 20 turns or less.
Gil: How so?
General Insight: Gil, you must build Frigates and Galleons and push your way through to Theodoras homelands. Only warriors guard the homelands and your knights and rifles can easily destroy her once you reach her shores.
Alex: What about the dromons? They are everywhere.
General Insight: Fear not. Your Caravels can easily clear a path to Theodoras shores. And your build rate is so advantageous, you can afford to lose many boats to the dromons and still penetrate the defenses. You have all the advantage you need.
Cleo: Penetrate, I love that word!

Say it again and I'll give you a backrub General.
Alex: Geez Cleo, cant you see hes busy?
Aztec Dude: Im not busy.
Gil: Shut up spear boy. It is an interesting theory General, but arent you a little outside the box with this plan? We would have to disband units to do this, and my instincts tell me to build land units where I have the edge, not sea units where I am weak. After all, the best defense is a good defense.
General Insight: But your land units are always leaving cities to chase down a single Byzantine unit and leaving your cities exposed. You must protect your cities.
Caesar: But we have great odds against the lone Byzantine Maiden, and they are so hot. We must attack in size!
Cleo: You have great odds if you attack me with size Caesar.
General Insight: But 400 units to capture a lone Byzantine babe? Isnt that excessive? Why not send 4 knights and maintain a garrison in your cities? Size is great, but this is overkill.
Caesar: Have you seen the wits on those maidens General?
Gil: Hes got a point general.
Cleo: I can actually
see his point from over here.
Gil: Also keep in mind General, that maidens always say that size matters.
Cleo: Hes right about the size thing you know.
General Insight: 
You people are doomed.
Meanwhile, back at Byzantine headquarters:
Theodora: Do you have the plans for the Sumerian invasion ready General Mayhem?
General Mayhem: Yes worthy Queen.
Theodora: Show me. Hey! Dont show me
that General, show me the map of the invasion plans.
General Mayhem: Oops sorry! Yes of course, show you wanted to see the battle plans. Slide one please Major Woody.
General Mayhem: As you can see we plan to split the armies up into a red and blue force. Attack force
Alpha is in blue, and
Beta is Red. We should have ample trebs to move on two attack paths. Our trebs are as ample as your wits. We expect Gil to resettle lands, so we may have to make two laps around Sumeria. Once we raze all of the large cities,
Alpha will sail to Greece while
Beta mops up the small resettled areas. Should be tedious work, but we expect it to go smoothly despite the size of Gils power graph and the fact we are weak compared to him.
Theodora: Gils power graph makes me a little weak. Show me the current military inventory.
Major Woody: Here is the unit inventory. 104 trebs should be enough.
Theodora: Oooooh, 104 trebs! Thats a lot of rocks. Please tell me that the armies still have only 2 units loaded so caravels can transport them.
Major Woody: Yes, we only placed an extra musket in one army, just to be safe. We were a little confused by the math involved in calculating when an army will be attacked. Math is hard. The 2 unit LB and Knight armies work just fine after we launch a few rocks and sheep over the Sumerian walls.
Theodora: Yes, math is indeed hard. But from the looks of it, its not the only thing thats hard Major Woody.
Major Woody:
And with that Theodora exited her throne room to check out the newest shoe styles using the recently acquired French dyes and ivory.