Summoning Italy

The Southern Crisis

Palazzo Quirinale, 8:32 AM, 28th of September, 1639

Prime minister Giovanni Canessa walked down the halls of the palace in a hurry. His heart was beating quickly due to troubling news that came in.

At 6:52 AM, an Italian Navy destroyer engaged in a skirmish with an unknown warship down south and rescued refugees from yet another unknown nation. And as social media footage of refugee boats landing on Sicily and southern Italy came in, the government realised there must be some kind of war going on down south.

How do you give asylum to refugees of an unknown nation? How do you deal with a skirmish against an unknown nation? That was all what Giovanni could think of and right now the government was in a crisis on what to do.

Soon Giovanni reached the meeting room. Inside President Roberto Sotto paced around the room nervously while his aides tried to get more information. Giovanni sighed as he approached. "Roberto, good to see you."

"And am I glad to see you," Roberto said with a nervous smile as he shook the man's hand before they both sat down. "Where are the other ministers?"

"They're on their way," Giovanni said as soon he sat down. "Just when you think things are calming down something had to happen, huh?"

"Well we're not exactly out of the fog yet. Guess things south went to us first before we went to them," Roberto sighed while he sat down with Giovanni. "I'm very split on the news. It's both stupid and righteous of the navy to engage. But god dammit... if news reached back to whatever country the ship we attacked came from, we might get into an unprovoked war."

"Exactly," Giovanni said. "Moretti has... fairly strong opinions on what happened."

"He's an honourable man," Roberto said. "I can expect him defending his men. Which isn't wrong but..."

Soon the doors opened again. Minister Matteo Bernardi, the Minister of the Interior stepped in. He had a brown combed hairstyle and a moustache as he wore a suit. And like them he was worried.

Another minister was with him. Minister Bianca Lorenzo, a brown haired, fair skinned woman entered with Matteo.

Soon Giovanni stood up. "Ah, mister Bernardi, misses Lorenzo it is so good to see you," he said exasperated.

"It's crazy out there," Matteo said as he ran his hand through his hair, "refugee camps have been set up in south Italy. We're doing the best we can so far but right now we need official orders."

As Matteo sat down, so did Bianca. "And my ministry's in a panic. So far they're interviewing the refugees on where they came from. We're expecting the first reports to come in soon."

The aides of the ministers sat to the sides. Meanwhile Giovanni spoke, "alright. We're just now waiting for minister Moretti and Romano. Seems like we're in the middle of a new refugee crisis."

"I suppose some things never change," Matteo sighed, "so far we're giving temporary asylum to the refugees. We don't even have their nationalities yet so we can't officially process them."

Bianca leaned against the table. "I also heard that there are more ships to arrive. At least that's what the refugees said."

Roberto was about to speak before the doors opened again. Silvio Moretti, Minister of Defence was of Italian-Libyan descent with a fair mix of African and Mediterranean genes as his hair was in a buzz cut. And soon a blonde, middle aged woman entered with Moretti. Minister of Transport and Infrastructure Sarah Romano fixed her blazer as she spoke. "Good morning to you all. Sorry for the delay-" she said as she took her seat and so did Moretti.