Brisbane Awakening Assembly History
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Official History
The Foundations of Freedom: 1965 – 1982
The first Free Councillors to arrive in Brisbane arrived in the early 1960s with their sights set on the establishment of the Queensland Institute of Technology. Though not driving the project, the predecessors of the current Praelectors and Salient Gears cabals were deeply invested in the project and had no scruples about using their gifts to help it succeed. When it finally did in 1965, they were overjoyed with their success and made no secret of it. Not much came of that, however, as the new Institute was still quite small and the Diamond Orders maintained significant control over Brisbane.
Those early years were characterised by tension, with the Free Council being a new arrival to a city with a long Diamond tradition and arriving in the wake of more severe conflicts that had arisen on the global stage. However the local Orders had only heard stories previously, with no more than the occasional libertine passing through or leaving the city for the Order elsewhere, and so the tension never broke into violence. With generally positive relations, aided by those early libertines’ keeping their activities subtle and focused on QIT, they came to be accepted. From the mid-1970s it was common for an official Emissary to attend Consilium meetings along with the occasional curious student, though they typically kept to themselves and only sought to ensure that local politics were not moving to disenfranchise them.
Due to this distance, the Free Council of Brisbane fared quite well during the battle in 1982. Their excellent organization, due largely to the coordination efforts of a young warlock known as Wavelength, ensured that all of their members were inside the heavily fortified V Block lorehouse and the Seers largely bypassed their territory without incident. The records kept in V Block do not shed any further light upon the incident, only that when the smoke had cleared the Diamond had nearly been destroyed completely. Only a handful of their most talented masters had survived, and there was not nearly enough left to maintain the Consilium. The Free Council offered their assistance, but received a terse reception and withdrew without incident.
Pre-War Years: 1983 – 1991
In the years immediately following the collapse of the First Consilium, the Free Council flourished. Though the Lighthouse maintained their hold over Gaslight Mansion, and in the mid-1980s a cabal of mystagogues called the Stonemasons moved in to St Lucia and began tying themselves to the University of Queensland, the Free Councillors were able to extend their formal influence to cover all of Gardens Point as well as Kelvin Grove. In the absence of a more restrictive authority like a traditional Consilium, they were able to engage in more radical experiments and began to engage in more political activism. In the late 1980s a new cabal, calling itself Neogaea, joined the current generations of Praelectors and Salient Gears to expand the areas of influence they held. With many of them now in the city, they began establishing more formal connections. When the Second Consilium was declared in late 1990, the Gardens Point Assembly was almost a reality. The aforementioned declaration, perceived immediately as a threat to their well-developed independent system, lead to the official declaration of the Gardens Point Assembly and the beginning of the conflict.
Cold War of Independence: 1991 – 1994
The conflict in the early 1990s is sometimes dramatized as a war of independence, but in truth it was really more of a cold war fought through politics and espionage. Citizen Agents of the Gardens Point Assembly attempted to spread propaganda to the fledgling Consilium whilst also keeping tabs on their movements, whilst Guardian agents working for the new Consilium Council engaged in counter-espionage and attempts to undermine the Assembly’s support base. The small numbers on both sides ensured the conflict never progressed much further than political meetings, but after a few years it became clear to the leadership of both sides that continued antagonism was detrimental to everyone. Harp, Hierarch of the Second Consilium, met with Wavelength, Strategos of War for the Gardens Point Assembly, in Customs House. In a week of discussions they established an agreement that would put an end to the conflict, ensuring the Free Council that their Assembly and right to self-determination would be respected whilst guaranteeing that they would not attempt to infiltrate and undermine the Consilium maintained by the Diamond. They further assured each other that every mage, regardless of Order, would be free to choose their patron government whilst being allowed to associate with members of the other. Numerous witnesses from both sides watched the Pax Brisbanensis signed, and it was later accepted by both governments with the understanding that any further ideological conflict would be strictly peaceful.
Assembly for the 21st Century: 1995 – Present
Relations between the Assembly and the Consilium have remained stable ever since. Even though individual members of either group may hold antagonistic opinions, the official positions of each have remained positive. The years have, hitherto, been quite peaceful and no major events have occurred to the Assembly.