Dominion
The space station was your average stop along the way. Too many people,
too few air and water filters. It had that stale air, stale water, stale atmosphere
feeling to it, even where it was clean and brightly lit. You made your
way along the hallways of the outer ring, where a variety of shops, taverns and
lodgings exist. This was the transient sector where people only lingered
while their ships were having cargo transferred. You could not really say
that this was all that different than your days in the service, as there were
plenty of both active duty and ex-service members around. The shops had
most of the normal goods that you would be interested in and you knew there was
also a back store counter where you might get those harder to get items.
The liquor in the bar wasn’t that watered down and the women seemed reasonably
decent. All in all, not a bad place to stop – for a short while.
It had been many years since any disturbances had happened in the Spinward
Marches subsector. While piracy would always exist and some of the
governments actually licensed it, it was still a fairly safe and decent area to
travel within. Like many in this region, you didn’t have much of a beef
with the core government, the Imperium, as they tended to leave the outer
sectors alone. A single Imperial fleet roamed this sector and even it was
actually run by the local governments. Rebels consisted more of people
that just like to complain, but few ever took any real action. One could
almost say that this region of space was suburban.
It felt as though you had been discharged from service just the other day, but
it had already been several weeks since you arrived here. The itch to get
out and do something was starting to well up in your bones. Station life
was fine, but the job boards around here were simply full of white bread
transport jobs. You looked out the window at Regina, which the station
presently orbited. The elevators connecting the station to life on the
planet.
The station seemed much smaller than it
was in reality. Of course, much of that was due to the sidearm that you
presently carried. Security on the station did not allow any weapons at
all beyond the security gates, which limited you to the much smaller outer
ring. Even here, security carefully monitored everyone in the area,
watching for anyone that seemed to be getting even the slightest bit out of line.
In your entire time here, you had only heard of one confrontation, and it was
quickly and quietly taken care of.
All throughout the zone, you would see
the motto of the security forces, “Peace, Order, Compliance and Control”.
Not the friendliest group of people, but seemingly effective. To your
experienced eyes, it was clear that they had a lot more that they could bring
to the table than they showed. They were clearly confident in their
abilities and several people you had met while staying here had said that this
was also their experience. Basically, this was not a place to make
trouble.
As you moved about the zone, you did
notice how attentive to maintaining the station the maintenance crew was.
They seemed to appear out of nowhere, worked on some minor item and then left
as quickly. Thinking it over, you do not even remember seeing a single
light not working. Clearly, being a station orbiting the capital had its
perks. You wondered how nice it was on the other side of security.
Almost daily, a new ship would arrive as
a dock would be freed up by one departing. Several docks seemed to be
assigned to specific transport lines that always seemed to be either quickly
loading or unloading cargo. A good amount of this cargo didn’t even seem
to be bound for the planet below, but was simply transferred to another ship,
which would quickly depart. Very orderly and efficient.
You smiled as you confirmed that your
decision to muster out here had been a good one. While this station
certainly lacked much of the excitement and adventure that you sought, this
place clearly was the center of activity in the general region and you knew
that this would be a great place to launch your “new career”. Of course,
figuring out what that was would be the more difficult part, but you had your
own ideas.
You were fairly confident that you knew
at least one other person that had mustered out at this station, but your
attempts to find them in the zone were in vain. Clearly they had either
moved on or were beyond security. Either way, that was not going to lead
too much. Coming to think of it, you had not really heard much from them
in over a year or so. What is ironic is that the others that you had met
had all come here for almost identical reasons.
At some point, you encounter a woman
named Ryoko Kami. She is in her thirties, decent looking and in good
shape. More importantly, she was easy to talk to, was interested in
hearing about your past career and paid for the drinks. Over time, you
learn that she is part of a crew on a ship that sometimes plies these space
ways and that they are always looking for talented crew members to join their
team. While not disclosing anything you might consider sensitive, the
free drinks and good company did allow her to apparently learn enough of you to
have her say that you might be someone the Captain might want to meet.
However, it would seem that no matter
how good you thought your interrogation abilities were, you never got any more
information out of her than she seemed willing to give. But it seemed
that it might be a good idea to keep this opportunity in the back of your
pocket. She did at least indicate that their ship might be in the area
soon, which surprised you that it wasn’t here if she was part of the crew.
While it seemed like something was a bit off, what out in space wasn’t?
In addition, all of the Imperial ships
that were docked had departed the other day. But it seemed like their
destination was kept confidential, as usual. Suddenly, the zone seemed so
much bigger with the large crews of several ships no longer hustling along the
passageways. Dinner was going to be much quieter tonight.
As you sit in the local pub, listening
to some quiet music in the background, a Sargent in the local defense force
comes in and gathers up all of his men and they make their way out to the
docks. Curious, you check out what is going on and see that all of the
local defense ships have crewed up and are making for a quick departure.
Moments later, they are all but gone at what would seem like an almost unsafe
speed to leave a large orbital station. As the docks now appear mostly
empty and most crew members are long gone, you notice the maintenance staff
suddenly appear and begin to work over pieces of equipment that were in constant
use until a moment ago. They scurry around and tinker with this and that.
You head back to the now very quiet
pub. Only a few patrons remain at this establishment, one of which is
Ryoko Kami, who is sitting at a large table off to the side of the dining
area. Out of the main path, but clearly not trying to remain unnoticed,
as she is wearing an outfit designed to do the exact opposite. A waitress
is finishing the delivery of a large collection of food and drinks, which
include several of your favorites available here, for what appears to be a
decent sized group. As she notices you, she invites you to sit down and
join her.
Ryoko is a woman in her thirties, decent
looking and in good shape. She acts as a liaison for Captain Darrow
Hargrove. She can often be found onboard
the orbital station at Regina. She is
well spoken and seems to always know more than she lets on.
Captain
of the Morning Star, a merchant freighter, and leader of a group of merchants
that ply the space lanes in the Spinward Marches. Difficult to meet or locate, as he always
tends to be on a mission, he can usually be contacted thru Ryoko Kami.
A subsector capital with a high law
level. Entry to the planet is strictly
controlled and all commerce is thru the orbital station. A highly militarized and xenophobic people
that are generally distrustful of others and fearful of off-world persons. A general police state where the government
monitors everyone and the police motto is: Peace, Order, Compliance and Control. Persons that follow the rules are generally
shunned but are treated fairly. Piracy
in the system is very low and military defenses are unusually high, even for a
sub-sector capital.
Consider all attempts at circumventing
the law as two levels more difficult than normal.