# T20 Traveller - The Kursis Charter (complete Aug 8th 2005)



## Morte

This story is based on the adventure of the same name included in the Linkworlds Cluster mini-sourcebook published by QLI. So it includes *HUGE SPOILERS FOR THAT ADVENTURE*.

Traveller for D&D Types

Traveller is a hard science fiction RPG which has been kicking around in various rule sets for years. It recently got a D20 version courtesy of QuikLink Interactive. I’m started out using the Lite version of their rules plus the pre-release Gateway Domain Sourcebook and some sample PDFs all stuck together with guesswork – much as I wanted to buy the full rulebook, it was sold out. I eventually got hold of it round about the time the party reached Miip.

A few things you might need to know about the setting:

In Traveller, a hyperspace jump always takes a week and the better your engine the farther you go in that week – it ranges from 1 to 6 parsecs. There’s no FTL communication other than putting a message aboard a ship. 
The predominantly human empire we play in comprises 11000 worlds and it takes about a year to cross. Authority is delegated through layers of nobility, until you get down to planetary level. Planets can run themselves pretty much how they like (barring outrages), the empire starts at the starport.
The adventure takes place in an unremarkable cluster of stars known as the Linkworlds, in the Ley sector of the Gateway domain in the year 993. Gateway domain is a border area onto other large polities, but the Linkworlds are well inside the border.
The domain is at peace, although it has been supplying military units for a border war elsewhere in the empire. 993 is a pretty good year, the height of empire.
And the system:

You generally don’t start adventuring at level 1. Characters go through a semi-random prior career process, giving them a few levels in various classes at the start. A character might perhaps typically be level 4 to 8 when they start “travelling”.
No magic. Some minor psionics, which I’m not using.
For combat purposes, HP = CON irrespective of level. A shotgun blast in the chest is liable to kill you at level 4 or 20. Combat is best avoided if possible. A strong, well-chosen skill list is the key mechanic. That and good decision making will get you through.
There is much less increase in character “power” as you level than you’d find in D&D.


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## Morte

*The Starting Characters*

Sir David Shetland

Class: Noble 1/Scout 8
XP: 36,000
Race: Mixed Humaniti
Age: 46
Sex: Male
Height: 1.75 m
Weight: 70 kg
Description: Average build, short cropped blonde hair, green eyes, clean shaven.
Homeworld: Ipsham (0533) Satyressia/Ley A594342-C
Languages: Galanglic, Oynprith [Droyne]

*Abilities:*
STR 13, DEX 12, CON 10, INT 14, EDU 14, WIS 14, CHA 12, SOC 16

*Key Skills: *
Driving-6, Gather Information-13, Gunnery-10, Knowledge(Droyne)-5, Liaison-15, Pilot-7, P/Admin-7, P/Survey-12, Sense Motive-7, T/Astrogation-6, T/Communications-5, T/Computer-4, T/Mechanical-5, T/Medical-5, T/Sensors-15
_{Includes attribute bonuses but not skill-enhancing feats listed below (since they don't always apply).}_

*Feats:*
Armor Prof (Light, Vac Suit)
Vessel (Grav, Ground, Starship)
Weapon Prof (Marksman, Ship's Weapons, Swordsman)
Carousing - +2 to Gather Information in social situations
Contact Specialist - +4 to all Liason or reaction checks when dealing with someone for the first time
Jack of all Trades - use skills which require training as if character has rank 0
Martial Training - +1 to BAB every 4 levels, currently +2
Negotiator - +2 to all Liason and P/Administration Checks
Noble Presence - use SOC bonus instead of CHA bonus for Leader and Liason checks
Trustworthy - +2 to Liason and Gather Information when interacting with others

*Combat:*
Lifeblood: 10
Stamina: 34
Saves: Fort +2, Ref + 5, Will +8
Attacks: BAB +6/+1, +1 DEX, +2 Martial Training
No armour: AC 11, AR 0, Skill Check -0, Speed 9m
TL-12 Hostile Environement Suit: AC 16, AR 5, Skill Check -3, Speed 3m (heavy load)

*Equipment / Possessions*:
Usual gizmos, assorted scruffy clothes, one smart noble outfit.
Later gained a TL-12 Hostile Environement suit.

*Backstory*
Born into a noble family on a world with a dense, tainted atmosphere and 1000 inhabitants, most of whom are in the chemicals trade.

Universtity application was such a spectacular failure (rolled a 1, presumably flashed the Dean or something) that he ran off and joined the scouts.

Spent a few years doing assorted scut work, training, and eventually concentrated on planetary surveying and contact (both remote and in person).

Took a period of detached service to fulfil some family duties (welcoming a Droyne enclave to his homeworld and liasing with them). Hence the noble level.

Went back to the scouts, did a bit of quiet sniffing around the Sollies when the war started, and eventually got mustered out at 46.

Won a merchie ship in a card game during his last week, and went off to find it. [I.e. swapped heavily mortgaged A2 Far Trader for all accumulated mustering out bennies.]

Silea Crossflow

Class: Merchant 7
XP: 21,000
Race: Luriani
Age: 30
Sex: Female
Height: 1.65 m
Weight: 62 kg
Description: Volupturous, short black hair, blue eyes, second eyelid, exotic tattoos, webbed hands and feet.
Homeworld: Daramm (0812) Spearhead/Ley A76AA76-E
Languages: Galanglic, Standard Luriani, Old High Vilani

*Abilities:*
STR 12, DEX 10, CON 12, INT 16, EDU 17, WIS 10, CHA 14, SOC 8

*Key Skills: *
Driving-7, Entertain(Flute)-12, Intuit Direction-5, K/Interstellar Law-13, Liaison-12, Navigation-5, Pilot-15, P/Admin-5, Swim-10, T/Astrogation-13, T/Communications-8, T/Computer-13, T/Sensors-11
_{Includes attribute bonuses but not skill-enhancing feats listed below (since they don't always apply). Silea effectively has Pilot-19 when flying the Avarice Rewarded.}_

*Feats:*
Armor Prof (Light, Vac Suit)
Vessel (Grav, Ship's Boat, Starship, Watercraft)
Weapon Prof (Marksman)
Barter - +2 on Trader and Broker checks
Hobby (Entertain (Flute)) - makes it a class skill
Luriani racial abilities - dive long and deep, resist cold, skill bonuses etc
Narrow Escape - instinctively avoid dodgy encounters in space
Vessel Spec (A2 Far Trader) - +2 to Pilot checks in an A2 Far Trader
Ship Tactics - add INT bonus to all ship attack and defense rolls
Skill Focus (Pilot) - +2 to pilot checks

*Combat:*
Lifeblood: 12
Stamina: 34
Saves: Fort +5, Ref + 2, Will +4
Attacks: BAB +1
No armour: AC 10, AR 0, Skill Check -0, Speed 9m
TL-12 Vac Suit: AC 13, AR 3, Skill Check -3, Speed 6m

*Equipment / Possessions*:
Usual gizmos, funky clothes, TL-14 vac suit, snub pistol, Cr3,000.

*Backstory*
Luriani are a human-related race who were geneered hundreds of thousands of years ago to be amphibious. They have an extra eyelid, webbed hands and feat, additional subcutaneous fat, they can collapse their lungs and seal off their eardrums to dive deep. They cannot normally interbreed with humans.

Silea comes from their main world, from a poor background which was not quite poor enough to keep her away from the datanets. University was out of the question with family to support, so she signed up on a merchant ship.

She has been working in space ever since for various small merchant outfits, turning into a real hotshot pilot. She is always looking to learn and to improve her skills.

She seems very calm and measured, but it is whispered that she has been known to really lose it once in a while.

Iain "Fish" Anderson

Class: Merchant 6
XP: 16,000
Race: Mixed Humaniti (Luriani Verasti Dtareen culture)
Age: 26
Sex: Male
Height: 1.70 m
Weight: 69 kg
Description: Stocky, short brown hair, blue eyes, clean shaven.
Homeworld: Luur (0811) Spearhead/Ley A56A770-C
Languages: Galanglic, Standard Luriani, Old High Vilani

*Abilities:*
STR 13, DEX 11, CON 13, INT 10, EDU 18, WIS 12, CHA 12, SOC 6

*Key Skills: *
Gambling-6, Liaison-6, P/Admin-6, Sense Motive-11, T/Computer-14, T/Electronics-14, T/Engineering-14, T/Gravitics-14, T/Mechanical-14, Trader-5
_{Includes attribute bonuses but not skill-enhancing feats listed below (since they don't always apply).}_

*Feats:*
Armor Prof (Light, Vac Suit)
Vessel (Grav, Watercraft)
Weapon Prof (Marksman) - merchant class
Barter - +2 to Trader and Broker checks
First Aid - can use med kits untrained, acts as T/Medical-0
Hobby (Sense Motive) - makes it a class skill
Gearhead - +2 to T/Engineering and T/Mechanical when trying to break, fix or pervert a piece of equipment
Jury Rig - fixes stardrives with chewing gum
Miracle Worker - fixes stardrives with flavorless chewing gum
Zero/low G adaptaion - reduces penalties for zero/low gravity

*Combat:*
Lifeblood: 13
Stamina: 35
Saves: Fort +5, Ref + 2, Will +5
Attacks: BAB +1
No armour: AC 10, AR 0, Skill Check -0, Speed 9m
TL-12 Vac Suit: AC 13, AR 3, Skill Check -3, Speed 6m

*Equipment / Possessions*:
Usual gizmos, greasy clothes, TL-14 vac suit, shotgun, about Cr65,000 banked.

*Backstory*
The Versati Dtareen are a genetically standard human group living as part of the Luriani culture. They have the mentality but not the amphibious adaptations. Iain was dubbed "Fish" as a child when he tried to swim like the Luriani kids, and failed.

He's an irreverent, awkward sod. He knows everything about machines (self-taught) and will tell you if you don't escape fast enough.

He got a job on a freighter to get off his planet before somebody broke his legs and he's been hiding in engine rooms ever since.

What Silea sees in him I don't know.

Luan Derhayenne (NPC)
Female Human (Imperial), age 34
Medical doctor, financial investor
Class(es) and skills are whatever I find to be convenient at the time.


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## Morte

*So, uh, where are we?*

Map of the Linkworlds Cluster attached...


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## Morte

*Act I: Avarice Rewarded - Sir David*

_[Background: The Imperial Interstellar Scout Service (“the scouts”) are a government service who explore and survey the galaxy, meet new people, and run the X-Boat network of data couriers across the empire. Scouts don’t retire, they go on “detached duty” and can be called up at need. The service occasionally lends detached scouts a small ship that would otherwise be in mothballs. They are very popular as a prior career for PCs.]_

Date: 128-993 Imperial.
Location: Daggar’s Edge system (1425), aboard outgoing X-Boat bound for Shanape (1023).

Karsis turned down the cabin music as she caught Cerenkov blue in the corner of her eye. A ship was coming out of jump, roughly where the incoming X-Boat was due to emerge. The vagaries of hyperspace had held it for two hours over median jump time, which was nothing unusual. She was already reaching for the radio enable when the tender opened her channel. It looked like time to get busy. She confirmed bearings to the tender and locked her data array on the incoming boat, starting the five minute meson laser transfer, then shook hands with the planetary data dripfeed to tell it the scouts were spacing out. Time to warn the other warm body…

She hit the com to talk to the hitchhiker in the starboard berth. “Hello David. Our incoming boat has just come out of jump and I’m taking the feed. Please come up and strap in.”

“Roger bridge, on my way” came back over the intercom. Half a minute later a small man in a not entirely scruffy IISS jumpsuit and an entirely scruffy brown leather jacket hopped through the bridge airlock and dogged it behind him. His eyes swept the controls as he slid into the astrogator’s chair and strapped down. He looked around the bridge, smiled, and let out a happy sigh.

“Last trip on active duty, maybe?” Karsis asked him. He looked about fifty, a little grey at the temples. A real veteran, who’d made a name for himself of sorts in the service and finally gone on detached duty a month ago. Karsis was flying the last leg of his cadged ride to Shanape.

“Could be that way” he replied. “I doubt they’re going to reactivate me at my age. Still, I have my A2 rust bucket to look forward to.”

Karsis shot him a surprised look, taking her eye off the data monitor for a moment. “You’re going detached in a Far Trader?” Anybody with thirty years in the service, two decorations, and a “Sir” he didn’t bother with on the front of his name could probably arrange detached duty in some relatively funky hardware. How on earth did he end up with an A2?

“It’s not assigned. It’s, um, _my_ ship. Since I’ve got it, I thought I should travel in it.”

“Oh” said Karsis. He was talking about seventy-odd megacredits’ worth of rust bucket, there. She made Cr 5825 a month. The “Sir” probably came into this… There was an awkward pause, which she filled by giving the jump plot a final sanity check against a paper star chart taped to the bulkhead. The computer pinged, her data was aboard. She swapped jargon with the tender and prepared to jump.

As Karsis drew a key to unlock the covers for the jump controls, Sir David Shetland spoke once more.

“I, ah, won the ship in a card game.”


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## Morte

*Act I: Avarice Rewarded - Silea and the Fish*

Date: 132-993 Imperial.
Location: Shanape system (1023), Shanape highport, spacers’ bar.

“You think he’s coming back?” Silea ran one finger round the rim of her short glass as she finally asked the question.

Fish looked deep into the 2D video wall, which passed for a window in this bar, and watched the 400 km/h stratospheric winds rip the top of a storm system over downport. “They should be able to fly through that no problems. This place is, what, tech thirteen?”

“No, I mean, d’you think he’s got himself arrested or something? They’re a bit draconian down there.”

“What, our illustrious captain? Surely he wouldn’t do anything to offend the local law.” His voice was closer to irony than sarcasm, but not by much. “Now, if you were suggesting that the bank caught up with him…”

Silea absently unhooked her finger from his on the counter. “Better go and see if anyone repossessed the ship then. He’s thirty-two hours late. I suppose it’s time we looked into it.”


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## Morte

*Act I: Avarice Rewarded - Master and Commander*

Date: 134-993 Imperial.
Location: Shanape system (1023), Shanape highport, aboard the free trader “Avarice Rewarded”.

Two days did not find Gani Hayeck, the absent master and commander. His personal communicator was out of service. The downport hotel he’d given as a contact knew nothing about him. His name didn’t show in any local news searches. When he’d been gone 48 hours, Silea reported him missing to the highport authorities. They echoed the report to downport, who passed it to local law, and it sat in the databases for a few hours before a downport security employee looked into it.

Four hours later a highport security officer came to see them. It seemed that Hayeck had transferred to downport via grav shuttle on 130-993 as they expected. He did not check into a hotel at the downport or in the local area. He rode another grav shuttle back up to the highport and left the system in a low berth five hours later, aboard a jump 3 passenger ship bound spinward-rimward via the Harukaze system.

There was no evidence of foul play, he had committed no crime, and neither the imperial nor the planetary authorities had any official reason to take an interest in him. But it rather looked as if…

“He’s done a bleedin’ runner!” said Fish.

“Do you have any reason to think… ?” the security officer raised an eyebrow and invited the other two to pour their hearts out.

Silea glanced at Fish to quiet him and replied. “There’s nothing… _sinister_ as such. But times haven’t been great aboard this ship. And I had a feeling that Hayeck might be quitting soon, with the new owner and all. I didn’t expect anything like this, though.”

“New owner?” asked the security officer, and they explained some more.

The Avarice Rewarded was owned, with five or six other vessels, by a private trading company based in the Delta quadrant. The company had bought it from a retiring owner-captain, and they’d acquired Silea and the Fish with the ship. The company put Hayeck in command, he’d talked his way into a speculative trading role rather than running a charter, and it had taken him about 18 months to make a thorough hash of it. The ship made no money and its maintenance was less than perfect. The captain had annoyed the laid-back Luriani and driven two less tolerant crewmembers (a gunner/deckhand/steward and a medic) to quit.

It had come as no particular surprise when the ship was transferred to a new private owner “in settlement of a debt”, and the remaining skeleton crew ordered to Shanape for handover.

“And now your captain has… departed suddenly” said the security man. “Do you think you could have a look at the command data and see if there’s anything important?”

He’d need a warrant to insist on that, but Silea was just as interested he was and she had no real objections anyway. “I think that’s within my purview, as second officer with the captain missing” she said. She swivelled her chair and started tapping access codes.

“Air-bleeding bastard. He’s raided the till.”

The Avarice Rewarded had no money, no captain, no cargo, no business, no plan, six months to the next refit, half a crew, and a new owner due aboard any time now.


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## Bergoren

I've been waiting for a Traveller story hour... I have not seen to many around and I like this one so far...  Are you writing a up the games as you play them or are you writing up a game thats been in progress for a while? I'm really just wondering how often we can expect updates. =)

Sorry for spelling errors. I don't have Javascript on so I can't use spellchecker.


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## Morte

Bergoren said:
			
		

> *I've been waiting for a Traveller story hour... I have not seen to many around and I like this one so far... *




So far so good then...



> *Are you writing a up the games as you play them or are you writing up a game thats been in progress for a while? I'm really just wondering how often we can expect updates. =)*




It's just started. I hope to post something about once a week to keep up. The other half of session 1 should be along "soon" (in the next day or so).


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## Morte

*Act I: Avarice Rewarded - Owner Aboard*

Date: 135-993 Imperial.
Location: Shanape system (1023), Shanape highport, aboard the free trader “Avarice Rewarded”.

The new owner took it pretty well. He came aboard, said hello, told them he was David and not Sir David, listened to the bad news, and finally responded with “Anything else?”

“Do you need any more?” asked the Fish, grinning a bit.

“That seems like enough trouble to be going on with…” he rubbed his chin.

“What do you want to do?” asked Silea, biting off the “sir”. 

“Well, we’d better find some business hadn’t we. Better business than our friend Hayeck managed… Did he really try to make a living as a free trader this far from the frontier?”

The two existing crew nodded glumly.

“Well, perhaps we can sort something out. I know a few people here, between the scout base and the navy base.” He stopped rubbing his chin and started stroking his upper lip. “Maybe it’s time to buy a few drinks for my old pals… see if they can put me onto something. With all the reserves called up for the Solomani war there must be some holes they need to fill.” He came out of reverie. “Would you two be up for that?”

The Luriani looked at each other, and looked back at him. “Why not” said Silea. Fish nodded assent.

“Alright, I’ll get onto it when I’m stowed. And we’ll need the four sacred cows aboard. Which are you two, pilot and engineer?”

“Right,” said Fish, “and Hayeck was supposedly the astrogator when he wasn’t losing money, but Silea did the real work. The medic quit, she couldn’t stand him. We had a gopher too, he looked after the passengers if we had any. He liked to think he was a gunner.”

“Well, I don’t know if we’re going anywhere that needs a gunner, but I did get basic training once upon a time. About 20 years ago… And I can get wavered as a qualified astrogator. I don’t think anyone will quibble with 12 years doing exploratory surveys…”

“We’ll need a qualified medic, if we’re to do any general merchant trade with passengers.” Silea knew her interstellar law, at least where it pertained to merchant starships.

“I’d like a medic aboard anyway, just on principal. We’ll have to recruit one. It’s a big starport, it ought to be possible.”

“Alright…” said Silea, slowly “but we haven’t got the credits for fuel since Hayeck ran, never mind speculative cargo or wages.” Her voice rose a little on the last word, as she realised how long in was since payday and how soon the next one was due.

“I expect I can sort something out” said the new owner. “Let me get my stuff stowed and I’ll get on it.” He reached for the one modest bag he’d brought aboard and looked at the hatch leading back into the body of the ship. “Which cabins are you two using?”

Fish looked at Silea, who looked at Sir David and spoke. “Cabin. We’re a couple. We’re through the hatch on the port side. First to starboard was Hayek’s, it’s got a command terminal.”

“Oh right,” he said, “I’ll take that one then.” He grinned as he headed for the hatch, bag in hand.

“Hey, who’s cooking if we get passengers? We need another trainee” called Fish.

“I’ll do it. Scout’s cooking won’t kill anyone. Too often.”


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## Morte

Type A2 Far Trader Avarice Rewarded. 200 tons displacement.

Fuel requirements: 44 tons
Jump Capability: One Jump-2
Manoeuvre Drive: 2 constant
Cargo Capacity: 66 tons
Passenger Capacity: 4 low berths, 10 staterooms (including crew)
Crew: 4 standard ( Pilot, Astrogator, Engineer, Steward/Medic)
Aramament: 2 hardpoints for standard turrets, one dual beam laser fitted, one hardpoint empty
Ship’s Vehicles: none
Ships Locker: emergency vacc suits, various survival gear, small arms, assorted junk


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## Morte

*Act 1: Avarice Rewarded - Kursis Mail LIC*

Date: 135-993 to 136-993 Imperial.
Location: Shanape system (1023), various port areas.

Calls were made, acquaintances renewed, brains picked. [And the first skill checks of the game were rolled, for Gather Information.] Not much came of it until a former navy type working in the port authority said “Well, Kursis have a job touring the boonies but it needs maybe five tons of cargo space. I suppose you’re in a type S, that won’t be quite enough.”

“Nope, I’m on a rickety A2. That leaves me 61 tons to make a loss on.”

“Hey, what are you doing on a merchie?”

“Long story. Want to hear it over lunch?”

“Sure, but get hold of Fridrick Hilmersson at Kursis Mail LIC planetside first and make an appointment to discuss the Linkworlds charter before someone else does.”

Lunch was eaten, the appointment kept, formal and informal references given. Avarice Rewarded and her crew didn’t have much of a background, but local corporation Kursis Mail LIC didn’t have much of a mail fleet since all their ships were requisitioned by the navy as auxiliaries. It was time for the quadrennial collection of starport management logs, bonded hardcopies of the electronic reports kept for anti-fraud reasons. Kursis normally shipped them to Sentry (0921) in its regular mail fleet for forwarding in the high jump mail system, but just now they were stretched too thin.

Sir David got a pretty good deal, what with his charming manner and his old friends telling him exactly how bad the corporation needed outside help. Kursis would pay their normal overheads and fuel throughout the job, and pay for a full maintenance overhaul at 069-526 once the job was done. They were free to trade as they went along.

It wasn’t the most exciting job in the world, but a charter on these terms was perfect for a trader with next to no capital and a major spaceworthiness inspection a few months down the line. Sir David hired a lawyer, and set contracts in motion.

“Looks like a nice easy job” said the Fish when he heard about it.


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## Morte

*Act I: Avarice Rewarded - Ms. Luan Derhayenne*

Date: 135-993 to 136-993 Imperial.
Location: Shanape system (1023), Shanape highport, aboard the free trader “Avarice Rewarded”.

Meanwhile, back on ship, the Fish glided around poking at the hardware and making lists while Silea ordered supplies and looked for unemployed space medics to interview. The supplies were a problem until Sir David came up with the money from his own pocket. The medics were a problem, period, because their was a war on.

In the end they interviewed two. The first was a port employee, he had a bit of medic skill from his army days and some experience working in planet side hotels and a bit of this and a bit of that and… and he looked OK, if uninspiring. He was on a month’s notice at the port authority, and might have a problem shipping out earlier than that. They said “we’ll let you know”.

The second was a bit odd. She was a full-blown medical doctor, with sixteen years in medical education and acute hospitals behind her, and she should presumably be coming into the prime of her medical career. She’d come up the hard way, indentured to a corporation in return for her training. But she’d somehow bought them out a decade earlier than usual, which meant she was free to quit her job and leave the planet.

And quit she did, and leave she did, on the first grav shuttle to highport where no job awaited her.

They asked why she’d burned her bridges so thoroughly. She said something to the effect that she found life in Shanape “a bit stifling”. “The Avaricious”, as the owner and crew were beginning to call themselves, took this as a reference to Shanape’s level D law. The previous charismatic leader had pulled the planet up by two tech levels in fifty years, but his successor couldn’t let go of control when the time came. Now everything that wasn’t compulsory was illegal. Law enforcement was draconian and intrusive.

They asked how she’d found the money, if she didn’t mind telling them. “I invested” she said. “I speculated on the stock market and eventually made enough to buy out my indenture. I did quite well on pharmaceutical stocks.”

She asked questions too. What medical facilities were aboard? Would they be getting supplies before departure? Did they intend to carry passengers in low berths? And what would be the terms of her contract? 

They said they’d let her know as well, and two hours later they did. That solved the “who buys the speculative cargo” question.

They had a crew, they had a job, and it all got very busy.


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## SpaceBaby Industries

Ah, Traveller.  I've been a fan of the game, especially the setting that drove it, all the way back to when I bought those three little books in the box.  I don't want to date myself even more by saying how long it's been since I've actually _played_ a Traveller game - managing to get together for D&D is tough enough to schedule as it is.

In any case, it's good to experience the Traveller universe again, albeit vicariously.  



> Type A2 Far Trader Avarice Rewarded. 200 tons displacement.
> 
> Fuel requirements:   44 tons
> Jump Capability:     One Jump-2
> Manoeuvre Drive:     2 constant
> Cargo Capacity:      66 tons
> Passenger Capacity:  4 low berths, 10 staterooms (including crew)
> Crew:                4 standard ( Pilot, Astrogator, Engineer, Steward/Medic)
> Aramament:           2 hardpoints for standard turrets, one dual beam laser fitted, one hardpoint empty
> Ship’s Vehicles:     none
> Ships Locker:        emergency vacc suits, various survival gear, small arms, assorted junk




Question: Do you know if the other tried and true Traveller ships got revised, was the A2 an anomaly as a class, or is this one special?  I remember the original A2 had J2, but only 1G.  Cargo was 61 tons, and there was a handy Air/Raft.  There was also that extra fancy oversized stateroom for the owner aboard and/or captain with a big window and such.

Yes yes, I own Supplement 7: Traders and Gunboats.  More frighteningly, I remember these things.  

The assorted junk part in the ship's locker...that sounds like some things never change regardless of the rules set in use.


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## Broccli_Head

Hey Morte, 

I'm all over this. Good to see someone playin' T20 like me, though many sectors to trailing and over 100 years earlier. 

Space Baby Ind--Yes, several of the classic ships have been revised.


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## Morte

SpaceBaby Industries said:
			
		

> *Question: Do you know if the other tried and true Traveller ships got revised, was the A2 an anomaly as a class, or is this one special?  I remember the original A2 had J2, but only 1G.  Cargo was 61 tons, and there was a handy Air/Raft.*




I don't really know the ship rules (awaitng reprint of the proper rulebook), I just used the design provided with the adventure. Maybe it's a revision or maybe they were just built at different tech levels by different shipyards. E.g. your A2 might have been TL 11 while this one is TL 12/13.

An air/raft weighs five tons, which may explain why I've got one less air/raft and five tons more cargo capacity. The lack is deliberate. When they visit a world in the steam era, they'll have to ride steam trains to get around (unless they improve their finances).

With a bit of prior history handwaving I swapped the scout ship Sir David was entitled to for a larger trader + extreme cash shortage, so that they could do a bit of trading and I could put "interesting" passengers aboard.



> *There was also that extra fancy oversized stateroom for the owner aboard and/or captain with a big window and such.*



Yep, Silea and the Fish have somehow blagged that on the Avarice Rewarded.



> *Yes yes, I own Supplement 7: Traders and Gunboats.  More frighteningly, I remember these things.*



It's scary, isn't it?


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## omnimpotent

This is excellent!  I've heard about Traveller for decades now, and even got around to getting a copy of T20. (second hand, at a bargain, and still in good shape - maybe in better shape than your old A2!)

It sure is nice to hear a few of someone else's runs before I jump in myself.

As a bonus, it seems like you have woken the sleeping Broccli Head, my other T20 educational series.  Huzzah!


----------



## Morte

*Act I: Avarice Rewarded - Hortalez et Cie*

Date: 136-993 Imperial.
Location: Shanape system (1023), Shanape downport, Hortalez et Cie offices.

“So the loan is to provide an operating fund, Sir David?”


----------



## Morte

*Act I: Avarice Rewarde - All Systems Go*

Date: 137-993 Imperial.
Location: Shanape system (1023), aboard the free trader “Avarice Rewarded”.

“Roger highport, we have telemetry for your traffic pattern. Detaching.”

…

“Avarice Rewarded, you are clear for 2G burn to 120 diameters per agreed telemetry.”

…

“Avarice Rewarded jumping for Liar’s Oath in three minutes, highport.”

“Roger Avarice Rewarded, bon voyage.”

Silea ran jump plot checks, instrumentation checks, navigation checks, and made a point of calmly sitting back to watch the status displays for another minute.

Back in engineering, the Fish studied a few panels then leaned against a bulkhead feeling the vibration though his shoulder blades to make sure everything was alright.

Luan ran over procedures for jump sickness and cold sleep berths in her head. She had four crew plus passengers hot and cold to look after. Space medicine was new to her, but she had studied with fierce intensity since coming aboard.

Sir David sat in his co-pilot’s chair and did nothing.

…

Silea flipped the lid and hit the switch. Cerenkov blue played around the ship for a moment, and then it was gone. She turned to the owner aboard. “Right then, you’d better go and see if you can poison the passengers”.


----------



## Morte

*Act II: Liar's Oath - Jump*

Date: 137-993 through 144-993 Imperial.
Location: jump space, aboard the free trader “Avarice Rewarded”.

Jump was an anticlimax after the rush to get going. Fish spent most of the time playing video games -- Liar’s Oath was a lower tech world and Luan had bought consoles as speculative cargo. Silea did her homework on the next system and played the flute. Many Luriani were musical, and she found plenty of time aboard ship. In the “evenings” she used radical measures to tear Fish away from his video games. Fish thought it was a pretty good trip.

Sir David learned, much to his shock, that there was more to cookery than noodles.

Luan studied. At first she studied space medicine, xeno medicine, allergic and respiratory conditions, and anything else that could go wrong on a planet hopping trip. Eventually she unwound, and began to read more about worlds and people as it sank in that she had a new life to come.

They had passengers. There were two students returning from university in cold sleep low berths; and in middle passage they had a couple of construction engineers who were going to supervise expansion work on the starport. They worked for the same company that was paying haulage on the sealants in the cargo bay. And there was a military man, an army captain returning home after a “consulting” stint on another world.

According to library data Liar’s Oath (1021) UWP C4247A7-8 was a 0.5g moon orbiting the system’s smaller gas giant. It had a thin/tainted atmosphere and about 40% surface water. The military dictatorship enjoyed the broad confidence of the 60 million inhabitants. Law levels were about average, e.g. wandering around with firearms was not allowed. Intrinsic technology was level 8, the beginnings of the space age, with higher tech imports.

The captain gave them a bit more spin on the place. The current boss was one major Alice Lakaii, whose government was more progressive and less corrupt than the military junta they’d ousted twelve years earlier. They were trying to boost the economy, starting by improving the starport, and they earned a bit of imperial currency to pay for this by hiring out soldiers trained to fight in hostile atmospheres like their own. The captain was one such starmerc.


----------



## Morte

*Act II: Liar's Oath - Arrival*

Date: 144-993 Imperial.
Location: Liar’s Oath system (1021), free space, aboard the free trader “Avarice Rewarded”.

The Avarice Rewarded came out of jump about half an hour early and found the stars and planets in their expected places. Silea locked on the geosynchronous beacon over the starport and received permission to land. She plotted a course, agreed it with Sir David and started the 2g burn. There was a tiny shiver as the ship’s artificial gravity shifted to counter the acceleration.

Meanwhile, Luan did her rounds to see if anyone was jumpsick and the Fish communed with the engines. All was well, so everybody settled down for system transit.

They were 174 minutes in-system when an amber light began to flash on the comms console. Silea’s eyes snapped to the traffic summary. Sir David, manning the comms console, verified the signal and hit the intercom switch for crew areas. “Bridge to crew, we have a signal GK ship in distress and we are investigating. Standby for manoeuvres.”

“Got a bearing?” Silea asked.

“It’s coming from the direction of the gas giant. It’s faint, something’s interfering.” He punched his comms bearing into the ship’s TMA system and continued working. “It’s data, not voice. A looping signal. Short. I’m working on it, computer’s trying to pull an average out of the noise. I’m pinging on radar. Can you roll up 30 clockwise 118 to give me a good aperture?”

“Roger. Programming… manoeuvring.” Again, the tiny shivers as ship’s gravity compensated for the bursts of thrust. Silea looked at her TMA tracks. “Well, we’re the only ship on anything like an intercept. We might get to it. Depends how fast it’s going.”

“Computer’s cracked it. Oh… no wonder it’s faint. They’re _inside_ the gas giant’s atmosphere.”

“What in the name of seaweed are they doing in there?”.

“They don’t say. Here’s what I’ve got… It’s the ship’s computer talking, emergency programme. Vessel identifies as the scout/courier _Malfeasant_. Malfeasant is on a ballistic trajectory, no engines, blasting out from deeper. Malfeasant has expended all fuel already and… cannot reach orbit. Crew not responding. The broadcast has looped for 84 minutes. Looks like it was blocked by atmosphere while they were deeper.”

“They used all their fuel” said Silea. “Whatever happened, they rigged a blast trajectory and the recorded message. They must have hoped someone would come and get them.”

“That implies there’s somebody alive to go and get. But they aren’t talking… The ship’s broadcasting telemetry with the message. Here, put these in TMA.” He fed her a string of numbers.

Silea studied her trackers again and started working plots on the nav software. “We could intercept, barely. But we’d be inside the atmosphere. Pressure at that depth is… significant… but within our tolerances. We might have fifteen to thirty minutes alongside as their trajectory tops out.” She paused, and kept her eyes on the console as she asked “Are we going for it?”

“Of course we’re…” Sir David came to a halt as his face turned sour. He’d been flying tiny scout ships all his life. “Passengers. We’ve got five passengers. That’s probably more than the crew of Malfeasant. If they’re alive at all… Can we risk our passengers on a rescue?” He went quiet for a few seconds, and slowly turned to look at Silea.

“Go on,” she said, “I know it’s coming.” [1]

“Sorry. Do you think we can do it, without ‘unreasonable risk’?”

Silea tapped buttons and made a verbal log entry. “For the record, pilot estimates that we can attempt an intercept on the distressed vessel Malfeasant within the atmosphere of Honora without undue risk to passengers and crew. We must evaluate the chances of a boarding and rescue as we close. Mission should abort if the risks become too great.”

Sir David gave her a grateful look.

“Go on, start getting ready” she told him as she punched go on the intercept plot.

_[1] Interstellar law requires that assistance must be rendered to any distressed vessel, unless this would unduly endanger the rescuing ship. It also says that a ship with passengers shouldn’t play dice with them. The Avaricious are under no obligation to assist Malfeasant, and are possibly sailing a bit close to the wind by doing so. Silea, who has studied for her merchant officer’s exams, knows all this and Sir David is an old enough hand to know it too._


----------



## Broccli_Head

Yummy! 

I love a good Traveller Story and having the Linkworld's Cluster I remember this little Segment.  I can't wait to see how your crew handles it!


----------



## Morte

For no particular reason other than that this was the first A2 deckplan I found, I've decided that the _Avarice Rewarded_ looks like this.


----------



## Padril

Hello Morte

How have you been? Nice story, it makes a change from all the D&D stories on here.

A couple of questions

1) Is this a game being played or is it just fiction based on the ruleset?

2) Without being familiar with Traveller I'm guessing from your story that focuses on roleplaying not on killing things?

Padrill


----------



## Morte

*spies his former NWN co-DM coming over the horizon*



			
				Padril said:
			
		

> Hello Morte
> 
> How have you been?




Hiya Padril, not too bad.



> 1) Is this a game being played or is it just fiction based on the ruleset?




It's a loose interpretation of a game being played. I have plenty of authorial license.



> 2) Without being familiar with Traveller I'm guessing from your story that focuses on roleplaying not on killing things?




I guess Traveller aimed at the "what would it be like to exist in this world?" style of play, rather than the "how do we vanquish our enemies?" default for D&D, or the "let's make the coolest possible story" systems like Sorcerer and Dust Devils. But it's a big ruleset, people can and do bend it every which way. Some people play Traveller games where the PCs are Imperial Marine commando units on mission.

But on the whole there's less combat than D&D in most Traveller games. It's too dangerous to make a habit of it -- one bullet will kill you, guards are ex-soldiers rather than mooks, and there's no Raise Dead. There's plenty of _conflict_, but _combat_ is not the stock way to resolve it.


----------



## ForceUser

Interesting characters, well-realized setting, solid writing. I've never been a Traveler fan, but this has piqued my interest. Keep it up!


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## Morte

*Act II: Liar's Oath - GK Intercept*

Date: 144-993 Imperial.
Location: Liar’s Oath system (1021), approaching Honora, aboard the free trader “Avarice Rewarded”.

Sir David tore open the door to the ship’s locker. He grabbed a duffel bag containing a soft emergency vacc suit, cursing the fact that he hadn’t bought a fitted suit of his own after leaving the scouts.

He headed aft, running through the options in his head. The doctor couldn’t use a suit, and she might be needed for treatment. Silea had to fly the ship. That left him and the Fish. If Silea flew the ship within normal parameters, Fish could leave his station unattended. If he was willing, of course.

Sir David ran through the cargo bays and into engineering. “Fish, will you…”

“Way ahead of you” said the Fish, who was half way into his vacc suit. He sighted the duffel bag and made a face that could only be described as a sympathetic scowl. Sir David shrugged in a “What can you do?” sort of way and continued.

“You pick out emergency gear from the locker, then meet me on the bridge. I’ll talk to Luan then suit up.”

Fish nodded and continued with his suit. Sir David headed for Luan’s cabin, where he found her selecting medical supplies from a locker. “We’re trying a rescue?” she asked, turning away from the locker to talk. He nodded.  “Any idea what medical conditions I can expect?”

He briefed Luan, and spoke to the passengers, then suited up and went to the bridge.

Fish was most of the way through assembling a wheeled stretcher. He paused to give Sir David a toolbelt. Then he stood up and looked at his boss. “Silea has a spectrograph on the atmosphere”, he said, “and it’ll go through that soft suit in five or ten minutes. Hydrogen, ammonia, gas narcosis ahoy. I’m going to have to search the ship on my own and call you in if there’s anything that needs two people.”

“Alright.”

“Alright then.”

They nodded to each other. Fish turned to Silea. “How’s the flying?”

“We’re getting buffeted by the upper atmosphere. Internal grav is compensating. This will get worse. We’ll make intercept in a wind around nine thousand clicks/hour. That’s thin gas, though. If the gusts catch both ships the same then they won’t affect docking. Depends how Malfeasant’s streamlining compares to ours.”

“Type S. It should be more slippery than us.” Sir David pulled a face as he spoke.

“Unless there are holes in it.”

“Yes.”

“Five minutes. Check suit comms then you two get to the airlock.”

They did. On their way they felt the first jolts big enough to come through the ship’s contragravity. Two minutes later they were sat on the floor by the airlock, feet spread and backs against the wall. The passengers had been instructed to lie on their beds. “No danger unless you fall over”, Luan told them in her best confidence-inducing manner.

The ride eased off a little as they got inside the atmosphere and the pressure evened out. With about two minutes to go, Silea spoke over the suit voice network “I have response to aerodynamic surfaces, controlling a glide. Retro burn for velocity match 25 seconds.”

Fish swallowed inside his suit, and felt his digestive system lose its sense of timing. They didn’t feel the final retro burn kick in though contragravity, perhaps because it was only 0.1g or perhaps because they were desensitised by the thumping from the atmosphere. Time went very slowly for the boarding party.

Alone on the bridge, Silea wanted to scream through her forced calm as she juggled tasks and seconds. The Avarice Rewarded hove up 525 meters behind Malfeasant, 17 meters below track, 85 meters left, and closing at 22 meters per second. About 10% off the numbers she wanted. Fine. Now for the hard part.

“Final manoeuvre. Closing by phased array radar. I have radar visibility through the gas. Malfeasant is not tumbling. She has extensive hull modifications… some sort of stabilising fins. There is either extensive modification or severe damage to the engine area. Closing… Closing… Coming side on… Waist airlock looks normal. Trying for dock.”

She handed over to the software. She’d given it every advantage, now it was over to tolerances and luck. Wire frame projections sprang to life on the screen before her. She clenched everything she had as they wobbled and resumed their glide to alignment.

An impressive “thunk” played through the ship.


----------



## linnorm

Very nice.  It's good to see some sci-fi in here too.  Keep up the good work!


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## Broccli_Head

Nice description of the descent into the gas giant. 

It's just like a movie.


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## Morte

*Act II: Liar's Oath - Malfeasant*

Date: 144-993 Imperial.
Location: Liar’s Oath system (1021), Honora high atmosphere, aboard the free trader “Avarice Rewarded” and the modified scout/courier “Malfeasant”.

There was silence, for three or four seconds, before Silea’s voice came over the intercom. “Docking appears successful. The airlock strain gauges are out of the red zone. Over to you, guys. I’ll keep it as steady as I can.”

Fish opened the airlock inner door and closed it behind him. He clamped a cable from his suit harness onto a bracket, in case the hypersonic winds were blowing through the other ship or the gravity was at ninety degrees to normal, and opened the outer door. Soon he entered the world of red emergency lighting and yellow tinged air that was Malfeasant. The white floodlights on his helmet lit a sideways figure of eight before him.

Gravity ramped up from zero to something like standard in the first few meters leading from the airlock, as it should with the ship in space. He spoke into his radio. “The gravity seems OK in here. I can’t see any holes in the hull. There’s a yellow tinge to the air, some of the atmosphere has got in. There aren’t any people in this bit.” He looked around again. “Right, I’m going for the bridge.”

It was only a few paces but it took two minutes minute to get there, switching grapples around in case of surprises. The bridge door was held open by a huge body lying on the floor in a heavy duty vacc suit. Fish spoke into the suit radio again.

“I’m on the bridge, the way’s clear. There are three people here, they’re all dead or unconscious. I’m checking. One’s… one of them’s an Ursa, I think.” There were two seats on the tiny bridge, both by flight consoles, and there was a vacc suited human slumped in each. Their suit telltales showed no respiration or pulse. The Ursa, on the other hand, had a pulse according to his suit. Fish relayed the information. Sir David quickly appeared with the stretcher.

_[Background: Ursa are genetically uplifted bears, experimentally created by the  Solomani corporation GenAssist for high gravity colonisation. Mostly lab samples were terminated when the project closed down, but a few escaped and some of their descendants now live in the Gateway domain.]_

A minute of strenuous exertion later, they were still on the bridge. The Ursa must have weighed five hundred pounds in his heavy suit, and Sir David had to be very careful not to tear his own soft suit while lifting. But if he couldn’t lift, he eventually got around to thinking. With about 16 years in assorted Type S Scout/Couriers, Sir David could operate them in his sleep with his toes. He dialled the gravity down to 0.1g from a control console and they got their load strapped onto the trolley.

Back on the Avarice Rewarded, they rolled him into Luan’s makeshift HQ. Silea repeated the gravity trick by radioed request to get the Ursa off again. “You’ve got about nine minutes maximum” she told them as Luan went to work.

“Let’s get the other two aboard in case they’re alive, then I’ll hook on and check for more” said Fish.  They did, dumping them just inside the airlock. Two more minutes gone. Sir David stayed on Avarice Rewarded to drag them to Luan and wait for a call. Fish went exploring on Malfeasant.

There was nobody in the four staterooms, but the second -- obviously a captain’s cabin and obviously built for somebody very big -- had a portacomp sat on the desk. Fish grabbed it and put it in a belt pouch. Next he climbed to the scout’s small upper deck, figuring the sensor positions might be manned. It was chock full of stores -- food, spares, and lots of air scrubbers -- but there were no people. He went back down through the main deck and kept going to reach the cargo hold.

“Woah. This is… different. It’s been converted into a salvage platform or something. Two big winches, a plasma cutting lance, loads of vacc suits on the walls. Heavy duty EVA suits. There’s a gun rack by the door too, with weird gear in it. There’s a…”

“Are there any _people_ Iain?” Silea cut in over the radio.

“Uh, no. I’ll check the drive room and so on.” He scuttled back up the ladder and headed aft. The open areas were devoid of people, so he hooked on and approached the last two doors. The air/raft bay was stacked with stores again. When he entered the drive room, all the fuss with the grapples paid off as his helmet floods cut a white pattern in Honora’s solid yellow atmosphere. The room was open to space, the back wall and half the floor missing. The drive was _gone_, and the room was wrecked by heat and blast damage.

Fish had been looking for an engineer since he came aboard. The three on the bridge just didn’t look the part. Now he knew why he hadn’t found one.

He closed the drive room door and returned to the Avarice Rewarded, his job done.


----------



## (contact)

I wonder what they were trying to salvage down there?  (shudders) It's even creepier than going swimming after watching Jaws.


----------



## Morte

*Act II: Liar's Oath - Heroes*

Date: 144-993 Imperial.
Location: Liar’s Oath system (1021), aboard the free trader “Avarice Rewarded”.

Silea had the nose up and the thrusters firing thirty seconds after Fish came back aboard. The Malfeasant sank below them.

The Ursa was breathing but in a state similar to coma. Luan rigged oxygen and a drip. The two human women taken off the bridge were indeed dead, and probably beyond revival even if Avarice Rewarded had carried the appropriate gear. Sir David got them out of their suits and into the two unoccupied low berths for preservation.

“We’re heroes”, said Silea with a glum voice once the Avaricious were gathered on the bridge. She waived vaguely at the comms station, adding “Every ship in the system keeps telling us so”.

“How’s the Ursa then?” asked Fish.

“If he was human or Vargyr, I’d say he was in an unrecoverable coma” said Luan. “But my medical database says that Ursa go into a hibernation-like condition under extreme systemic shock, and they can come out of it in time. So who knows…”

There was a long, long silence as everybody chewed on private thoughts. Finally Sir David broke it. “Well, hopefully somebody dirtside can study a database and treat him. Speaking of which, do you want me to agree your approach plots Silea?”

They went back to work. Soon the Avarice Rewarded flew over star town. From the air they could see that Liar’s Oath used sealed arcologies to keep the tainted atmosphere out. There were no domed cities, at least not on their flight path. Walkway tubes and electric trains criss-crossed between the buildings and sealed grav vehicles zipped about them. “Well they can afford to import air/rafts,” said Sir David, “so hopefully there’s a market for video games.”


----------



## Morte

*Act II: Liar's Oath - Taking Care of Business*

Date: 144-993 to 146-993 Imperial.
Location: Liar’s Oath system (1021), aboard the free trader “Avarice Rewarded”.

They landed, the third ship in port, and took care of business: waking the students from cold sleep, unloading baggage for the passengers and cargo for its owners, customs, and a brief meeting about the Malfeasant with a starport security officer (who was also an army captain and wore service uniform). They told him the story and he said the authorities would look into it, with a view to informing the owners and relatives of the deceased. Malfeasant was not a local vessel, and there was no evidence of a crime.

The Ursa went to a local hospital, still in his “not exactly a coma”.

The local bureaucrats were alarmingly efficient at the things they did do. The Avaricious barely had time to display ID and authorisation from Kursis Mail LIC before a shipping crate with three tons of hardcopy starport records came aboard. An engineer (who was also an army corporal and wore service uniform) had had a look at their recently stressed airlock and pronounced it healthy. They could leave within hours of arrival.

“Sod that,” said the Fish, “I’m going for a drink”.

…

Liar’s Oath was dull. Everything was clean and tidy. Half the functionaries were in army uniform. Swimming was considered entertainment rather than exercise (Silea partook, and wowed the locals). It was all so mundane that the video games fetched a healthy profit.

The place even looked miserable, with its dim blue sky lit by a weak red star. Not that anyone wanted to see the sky – the mainworld orbited the gas giant they had so recently departed, and its slightly poisonous atmosphere held the same chemicals in smaller doses. When Fish entered a mall and saw a sign offering “twelve hour shopping and sparkling entertainment”, he changed his mind about hanging around. “Where next?” he asked.

…

“Sentry” said Sir David. “Aleif’s a red zone, so the contract excludes it for pickup. Everything else is more than one jump so we have to stage. I don’t want to stage at Aleif space station, there’ll be no cargo and the navy might shoot us. Which is the only excitement Fish will find there…”

“I’ll talk to the brokers,” said Luan, “but I don’t know if there’ll be much to buy here. We might end up sticking to fee-paying cargo and passengers for this leg.”

They set to work.


----------



## Broccli_Head

Alright! Further exploits from the crew of the _Avarice Rewarded_!


----------



## Morte

(contact) said:
			
		

> I wonder what they were trying to salvage down there?  (shudders) It's even creepier than going swimming after watching Jaws.




All will be revealed. Well, some of it will be revealed, and it depends what the Avaricious do after that.

Thanks for the kinds words, all. Traveller story hours are hard work -- they've only needed about 10 dice rolls up to the point you've read, so the game flows at an alarming rate. I'm slipping behind...


----------



## Padril

Morte said:
			
		

> When he entered the drive room, all the fuss with the grapples paid off as his helmet floods cut a white pattern in Honora’s solid yellow atmosphere. The room was open to space, the back wall and half the floor missing. The drive was _gone_, and the room was wrecked by heat and blast damage.
> 
> Fish had been looking for an engineer since he came aboard. The three on the bridge just didn’t look the part. Now he knew why he hadn’t found one.




I can picture the look of horror on his face as he stared out at the planet. Keep it up I'm hooked already.



> *spies his former NWN co-DM coming over the horizon*




Ah yes I've been meaning to talk to you about this, I'll send you an email soon.

Padril


----------



## Broccli_Head

Morte said:
			
		

> Traveller story hours are hard work -- they've only needed about 10 dice rolls up to the point you've read, so the game flows at an alarming rate. I'm slipping behind...




So true...so much is going on. I guess that's why I opted for the log format. I can relate the tale as the crew sees things, not in an omniscient way.


----------



## Morte

*Act II: Liar's Oath - Bear Necessities*

Date: 149-993 Imperial.
Location: jump space, aboard the free trader “Avarice Rewarded”.

Two days into jump, Silea had given up on teaching Luan to use one of the hostile environment suits they’d taken off the Malfeasant’s crew. 40kg was just too much for her, she was better off with the emergency soft suits. Sir David adopted the other environment suit for the time being, finding it pretty heavy going himself. He extended the shopping list he was building between cooking and cleaning for six passengers.

Fish missed the video games. With not much else to do, he eventually got around to looking at the portacomp he’d taken from the captain’s cabin on Malfeasant. It had sat in his suit in the drive room ever since. He hadn’t bothered mentioning it. It turned out that it was some sort of video diary rather than a personal organiser. Fish looked through it a couple of times then showed it to the rest of the crew.

It was entirely recorded in the Ursa’s tongue, which was beyond any of them. But some things were obvious. He and his crew had modified and equipped their ship specifically for a salvage operation deep in the atmosphere of a gas giant, and a particularly corrosive atmosphere at that. There were a few hints that Honora was some sort of trial run, not the main target. The final entry showed the captain stood outside the ship’s drive room, not in his environment suit, but talking rapidly and subconsciously gesturing at the engineering section behind him. He was already moving forwards, towards his cabin or the bridge, as he clicked the diary off – the first time in forty minutes of video that he hadn’t held still as he cut the recording.

The diary ended. Luan, who didn’t normally have much to say about spacefaring matters, spoke first. “So they had some problem with their drives… and they couldn’t fly out normally… and they went for that blast upward in the hope that somebody would rescue them at the top of their arc?” The others nodded. “But it didn’t quite work out.”

“I wonder what they were out to salvage,” said Fish after a pause, “it must've been pretty special for a job like that…”

“I’ll see if the computer can translate” said Sir David. But the Ursa language of grunts, whistles, whines and facial twitches was too much for their software. “Anyone met any other Ursa lately?” he joked.

Silea, as usual, had done her homework. “There are about ten thousand on Miip. It’s an Imperial Ursa World. Some of them must speak Galanglic.”

Sir David picked the portacomp up and smiled at it quizzically. “Looks like that’s where we make the next collection for Kursis, then.”


----------



## Broccli_Head

Morte said:
			
		

> Date: 149-993 Imperial.
> Location: jump space, aboard the free trader “Avarice Rewarded”.
> 
> Silea, as usual, had done her homework. “There are about ten thousand on Miip. It’s an Imperial Ursa World. Some of them must speak Galanglic.”
> 
> Sir David picked the portacomp up and smiled at it quizzically. “Looks like that’s where we make the next collection for Kursis, then.”




Nice detective work on the part of Silea!


----------



## Morte

*Act II: Liar's Oath - Filthy Lucre*

Date: 154-993 Imperial.
Location: jump space, aboard the free trader “Avarice Rewarded”.

With one day of jump remaining, Sir David looked at costs and revenues in his cabin.

First, the costs:

The loans he’d acquired with Avarice Rewarded and extended to operate it added up to Cr 48000000. At 1% per annum, that cost Cr 40000 per month to service.

Avarice Rewarded normally consumed about 42 tons of refined fuel on a 2 parsec hop at Cr 500/ton, i.e. Cr 21000. Kursis Mail LIC would pay that for the next few jumps.

A skilled pilot like Silea drew Cr 6000/month, Fish the engineer made Cr 4000, Luan was earning Cr 3000 as a medic/broker and he paid himself Cr 3000 as an astrogator/steward.

Warm bodies – crew and middle passengers – cost about Cr 750 per week-long jump in food and life support. Low passengers in cold sleep cost a mere Cr 50 but the ship had to employ a suitably qualified medic to carry them.

Other costs like starport fees were relatively minor. In total the ship cost about Cr 59000/month on crew plus finance charges; and there would normally be Cr 21000/jump to pay for fuel. Plus one-off maintenance, which could cost half a million if things went wrong…


Then there was revenue:

Passengers paid Cr 8000 per jump for middle passage or Cr 1000 for low passage. Profits would be Cr 7250 and Cr 950 respectively per jump. Cargo haulage paid Cr 1000/ton, if there was cargo to be hauled. Speculative cargo was speculative.

They’d sold nine high and six low passages on their two jumps to date, clearing Cr 70950. They’d also hauled 17 tons of cargo to Liar’s Oath and their full 62 tons (after records) on the current hop to Sentry, making Cr 79000. There’d be little in the way of cargo or passengers to or from the class E port at Miip.

Luan’s video games had made a Cr 40000 profit. She hadn’t found anything worth a gamble at Liar’s Oath.


Putting it all together he reckoned that over their first six weeks and four jumps they’d earn about Cr 190000. Costs would be Cr 88500, to which they would normally add Cr 84000 for fuel.

In the long run, that wouldn’t pay for maintenance and lay ups. In the long run, they could avoid places like Miip. Sticking to class B starports or larger would fill the ship most of the time, and the right route(s) would aid speculative trade. He could cover the interest, and the body of the loan might be paid by the time the youngest crewmember retired.

It was no wonder that small traders took themselves off to the fringes of the imperium, where the risks and fees were higher. No wonder they went on salvage missions in the depths of gas giants…

He’d buy a proper vacc suit for Luan at Sentry, but the environment suit would do him for now.

_[Background: A2 Far Traders cost about 67 million new. Avarice rewarded is worth more like 60 million, with a 48 million loan. Yes, any sane person would sell the ship and enjoy their 1% a year on 12 million. But…]_


----------



## Broccli_Head

Oh the joys of Speculative Trading!


----------



## Morte

*Library Data*



			
				Broccli_Head said:
			
		

> Nice detective work on the part of Silea!




Not really detective work as such, she's just read and remembered the library data for each system on their mail schedule. INT 16 EDU 16, our Silea. Here's what the ship's computer turned up on Miip:

*Miip 0819 E999546-3 Ni 300 IU F1 V*

_Decoding the system database line:_

Miip orbits a yellow-white main sequence star. The system has no belts and no gas giants. The starport is class E. The large, 1.125g mainworld is 90% covered in water and has a dense, tainted atmosphere. Population is about 30,000. The representative democratic government imposes a moderate law level of 6. Tech level is 3 (gunpowder and wagons). Miip is non-industrialised and it is designated an Imperial Ursa World.

_For flavour text, the ship’s library data on Miip comes up with the following:_

Miip is an entry point into the Linkworlds cluster from the Reaching Arm, but most traffic goes to Kerin’s Tyr instead since there is little reason to visit Miip.

Miip Downport is essentially a marked landing area. The adjacent village is populated by humans who will occasionally trade for a few minor luxuries but have little interest in offworlders. They will provide meals and lodging for a modest price, however.

Although Miip is 90% covered with water it is a very large world, so the other 10% provides plenty of land for the small population. The air is dense but breathable. It does, however, carry a taint in the form of radioactive dust particles which mandate simple filter masks as protection.

The weather is incredibly violent, especially in coastal areas. Travellers should beware of severe rainstorms, leading to flooded streams and mudslides in uneven areas. The rain is complemented by frequent lightning, since strong solar radiation ionises the atmosphere. The rainstorms can last for up to a week but this is rare. Strong winds also play across the planet’s large and fairly flat surface. Many dwellings are built partly underground in consequence.

The planet’s entire population of 30,000 live on one large island, part of a northern chain where the weather is less violent than the rest of the planet. Two thirds are human and one third Ursa. The humans are mostly lowland farmers and craftsmen with a pre-industrial society. The Ursa mostly live in the uplands, where they herd a hardy domestic quadruped and hunt game with rifled muskets.

Government is a system of village and town representatives who occasionally meet to settle larger issues. Law enforcement is informal. The Ursa and the humans get along, trading at times. The Ursa do not generally care to receive visitors in their upland homes, but some humans have befriended them at times and there are a few mixed villages.

The remainder of Miip is mostly unexplored. There are the usual rumours of ruins on distant islands, and a variety of hardy wildlife awaits the bold traveller. The reason for the radioactive taint is unknown – a nuclear bombardment in the distant past has been suggested.


----------



## Stockdale

This is a great story and needs a bump!


----------



## Renfield

This is a great story, and I haven't seen a post in weeks, I'm going through withdrawls!!! I'd check out Sonellion but there's just too much for me to read, here I'm caught up, and this guys writing skills are damn good, so hear me whine for this story to continue: WAAAAAAAAAAH WAAAAAH


----------



## Morte

Look at me ma, I'm getting bumps. 

OK, I'm working on an update and there's a new PC to come soon. Meanwhile, how much XP do you folks figure they earned for the stuff that's written so far? Half a level (average) sound reasonable?


----------



## Morte

*Act III: Miip - They Sent a Whole Freighter?*

Date: 163-993 to 164-993 Imperial.
Location: Miip system (0819), aboard the free trader “Avarice Rewarded”.

Sentry had been lively but uneventful. They unloaded their cargo, delivered the first set of starport records, and did a bit of shopping on the bustling, high-tech commercial hub. The ship now owned a very swish tech level 14 vacc suit, and the crew had been taking turns to show Luan how to use it. They’d also beefed up the collection of weatherproof gear in the ship’s locker.

And here they were, a week later, just out of jump at the Miip system and trying to get the starport on radio. The ship had no passengers, and there was nothing in the hold apart from forty tons of fuel in blisters to replenish that used on the jump in. It looked like there’d be no fuel for sale on Miip.

“They may not keep a continuous comm watch” said Sir David in the astrogator’s position.

“I… suppose not” said Silea. “I haven’t been to a port like this for a while.” She consulted the computer. “It should be early morning down there. We’ll land in the evening, if we just punch in a 2g transit. We can hail them every hour.”

…

Starships obviously didn’t visit Miip very often. The first sign of recognition they got was when workers in the fields south of the starport looked up to wave as they coasted in at a polite 200km/h, checking out the scenery. They flew up a valley and found a village at the top of a saddleback ridge. The low buildings were wood and stone, with turf and log roofs. Everything was obviously built to last, and the village was surrounded by an earth embankment.

The landing area was a couple of hundred meters away. It featured the only expanse of concrete in sight, sat in a sunken pit, and surrounded by another twenty foot earth embankment.

“The weather must really be something here” said Silea. It was clear for the moment.

She put the ship down in the landing pit, and they started to disembark.

…

The four of them headed down a vestigial track to the village, leaning into the wind. By the time they got to the embankment a reception committee of eight or so locals was waiting. They were all in natural fibre clothing, with bright cloths over their faces to filter the tainted air and weather-beaten skin around their eyes. As the Avaricious approached they saw muskets and a couple of modern carbines, but they were all resting easy on shoulders. The villagers’ body language seemed friendly enough, they were clearly just being careful of strange spacers. As they arrived one man, who stood at the front, moved forward a little and spoke.

“Hello folks. I’m Andrew Karrilane, the elected Elder here in Arodu village. Glad to see you’ve got your masks on already. Welcome to the village, what brings you here?”

“Rampant bureaucracy” Sir David grinned around the edges of his facemask. “We’re here instead of the mail ship to collect your quadrennial starport records”.

“They sent a whole freighter?” there was general amusement and bemusement. “Did you bring any mail? Was there any?”

“Oh no,” said Sir David, “it takes a five ton safe welded to the ship to carry mail. You can’t just put it in the hold.”

Karrilane shook his head ruefully and turned to one of the other villagers, a man in his fifties or sixties who was wearing a Marine NCO’s ceremonial cutlass on a gleaming belt. “Do we keep such a thing as quadrennial starport records, Garren?”

Garren seemed to grow 5cm as he replied. “Of course we do, this is a proper starport. I’ve submitted four sets of records before and they were all fine. I’ll check them over tonight and you can have them in the morning.” 

Karrilane turned back to the Avaricious and, with one eyebrow bent knowingly, asked “So, do you want to sample the local cuisine then?”

…

The local cuisine was pleasant enough, and the villagers friendly. The crew stayed the night in a couple of village houses. They enquired after Ursa, but none lived in Arodu since they liked to stick together and their herd animals ate the vegetation at higher altitudes. There was an Ursa village about 4km away, uphill, so they decided to pay it a visit next day if the weather was amenable.

Karrilane advised them against taking the ship up to the higher ground – there was always the risk of a mudslide taking away whatever area they decided to land upon. He also warned them that the Ursa of this village liked to keep to themselves, and they were liable to just ignore humans who hadn’t earned their trust over time. Sir David tried to find out what the Ursa wanted or needed, i.e. anything he could offer in payment for translation services. Karrilane couldn’t think of much, and nothing that the humans of Miip didn’t trade to them already. He didn’t actually say that he didn’t want the Avaricious cutting in on his trade, but…

…

In the morning the weather was clear but windy. They collected the starport records – fourteen handwritten sheets of paper – and “stowed” them aboard ship. An hour later, clad in heavy weather gear, they stood and looked at the hill leading up to the Ursa village.

“If we’re going to make a habit of this”, said the Fish, “we should buy a ship’s jeep.”


----------



## SpaceBaby Industries

Morte said:
			
		

> “If we’re going to make a habit of this”, said the Fish, “we should buy a ship’s jeep.”




Jeep?  Oh come now, this is Traveller!  Surely you mean a fine ATV!  Who wouldn't want one of those big, blocky, go anywhere monsters.  Granted, the last time I checked they did take up 10 tons in cargo, which might be a bit distressing for a merchant crew, but how could you pass up driving around in a big tired beast that looks like it came out of the B-movie _Damnation Alley_*?

Sure, you could have a tracked one, but go with the classic Wheeled ATV.

Great to see the Traveller story continuing.



*Excepting that strange three tires on each side of the axle bit, which somehow improved handling and provided propulsion in the water.  I daresay the vehicles in that movie made a huge impression on my young mind at the time.


----------



## Broccli_Head

SpaceBaby Industries said:
			
		

> Sure, you could have a tracked one, but go with the classic Wheeled ATV.




Or an air-raft!


----------



## SpaceBaby Industries

Broccli_Head said:
			
		

> Or an air-raft!




True, but Morte already mentioned in a previous discussion about the various incarnations of the A2 that he was making a special effort for our heroes to _not_ have an Air/Raft.  While an ATV provides you with many benefits, it still cannot fly, which means you're still stuck with lots of interesting challenges on low tech worlds.  Be it terrain or otherwise - you simply can't fly over or around the obstacle as the case may be.

Not to spoil anything, but the weather on Mip is going to be pretty important very shortly, and an Air/Raft would either short circuit everything or be utterly useless, depending on a Referee's decision.

Go lower tech.  Go ATV!


----------



## Morte

Damnation Alley!!! Ye gods, I've seen that film and read that book and I never connected one to the other until you mentioned it just now. What a travesty the film was.

Yep, I started them with no vehicle in the hope that it would cause a bit of fun. There is also the small matter of money. Using the samples in the T20-Lite booklet, a jeep is Cr2580, a wheeled ATV Cr52880, and an air/raft Cr273200. Sir David just bought one Cr8000 vacc suit instead of two, and made do with a 45kg environment suit retrieved from a corpse...

I'm hoping that lacking little luxuries like jeeps and vacc suits will encourage them to entertain any opportunities to make a buck which come their way. Why railroad 'em when you can starve 'em into submission?


----------



## Morte

*Act III: Miip - The Lab Sample's Affection for the Geneticist*

Date: 164-993 Imperial.
Location: Miip system (0819), mainworld, uplands.

“So, you don’t do much walking up hills in the merchant game then?” Sir David grinned at the Fish, who was obviously suffering.

“Don’t these people have grav taxis at the starport?” he shot back.

Silea smiled. She was quite fit, in a gym/pool sort of way. Luan said nothing, preferring to suffer in silence. Sir David finished the conversation with his other spare breath. “It’s getting flatter. We must be near the plateau, the village can’t be far.”

…

A few minutes later, two Ursa emerged from the scrub beside the trail. They made to turn uphill, then changed their minds and ambled down to meet the Avaricious. They carried long, heavy muskets and the older looking one had a bag tied to his back with game-like bulges showing.

“Greetings, sophonts” called Sir David. “We’d like to visit the village.” The Ursa exchanged unreadable looks. He went through introductions, and explained that they were looking for help with a translation.

The Ursa were Termeigh, an adult male, and his nearly adult daughter Yvonne. They spoke Galanglic well enough, and gave simple answers to direct questions, but they just didn’t seem interested in getting into a conversation. Sir David ran out of steam after a couple of minutes. “Can you… Do you have any idea who might help in your village?” he finished a bit lamely.

“We will take you if you want. But everybody will be busy” said Termeigh.

“Busy?”

“Busy.”

…

“This is the village. We will return to hunting now.” And with that Termeigh and Yvonne were heading back down the hill, as Silea called “Thank you” after them. The Avaricious were left standing in the middle of the village, with a few villagers ignoring them and going about their business.

It was not so different from the human village of Arodu, except the doors were wider and the hunting-to-agriculture ratio was obviously higher. There were a few places of business like a carpenter and a smithy. Sir David shrugged and started to ask around, beginning with the more commercial villagers.

He got nowhere fast. Everybody was busy, nobody was interested in doing a little work for hire. The few human villagers spoke and acted just like the Ursa, except they were perhaps a fraction more forceful in their rejection. When he offered one of them some tech level 12 cordage from the ship’s stores – 3mm diameter, with a breaking strain of two tons, the best trade goods they could think of – he could tell that they wanted it but were rebuffing him anyway. He motioned the rest of the group aside.

“They’re stonewalling us. They’re not just busy, they’re discouraging outsiders. It’s some sort of policy thing.”

“Maybe if we stand here like lemons for long enough they’ll help us to get rid of us” said Fish.

“Or take pity on us…” Luan made one of her rare interjections.

“Well, I’m eating lunch. Something’s bound to happen if we start eating.” The Fish was a firm believer in something he called “Sod’s Law”, he’d brought loads of wet weather gear to ensure good weather for the trip. He dug into his backpack for trail rations. Since he obviously wasn’t going anywhere, the others started eating too.

Whoever Sod was, he appeared to originate from Miip. Within a few bites, the wind had dropped to nothing then started blowing harder from another direction. The temperature fell noticeably in a matter of minutes. All around them, urgency kicked in – shutters slammed home, breakables were carried indoors, and villagers scurried to and fro.

“I don’t like the look of this” said Silea, reaching for her pack.

An older-looking Ursa female came up the steps out of out of a large building with a cleared area out front, which looked like some sort of village hall. She strode up to them purposefully. “You’d better come inside” she said, in the thickest accent they’d heard so far.

…

They’d just about had time to move into a corner – “Wait there” they were told – when a huge, but low, rumble of thunder shook the shutters. And then the rain came, hammering what little of the building stood above ground. The thunder got closer and higher in pitch as they took in the scene. The hall was about ten meters by five, sunk into a stone-lined pit three meters deep, with only the shallow roof above the ground. The floor was suspended, and Fish made out stonework for drainage channels in the corners.

The villagers had let them in, but they were still not interested in talking. When the storm hit they had been working to get the hall ready for some sort of festival. They carried on in a subdued fashion, making stools and building a small stage at one end of the hall. They did answer a few direct questions: sudden storms were not unusual but this one was especially bad, there would be a heavy toll of damage.

The rain got harder and the wind louder. After forty minutes the door flew open and a fountain of wind and water flew down the steps into the hall, propelling a human couple and their pitifully howling baby. It took two big Ursa to get the door closed behind them. From what was said, the wind had lifted the roof off their house. They weren’t the last; an hour and a half later an enormous Ursa came in low to the ground, with two human children about ten years old crawling behind on short ropes.

Time wore on. Work stopped on the festival. The hall became a grim place, with children blubbering and adults snapping as the rain found its way through the turf roof. They’d already heard about two other houses failing in the storm when the second roof beam from the door started to creak every time there was a gust. It dropped a spray of water into the room every time it settled. The human children would stop grizzling and stare at it in silent fear.

After a few hours Fish poked a length of cane he’d found through the cracks in the floor. He spoke quietly to the others. “If it comes to it, there’s room for the children in the crawlspace down there. It’s very well drained, and this floor will be the last thing to go.”

They were still mulling over that when the door opened once more, and the same huge Ursa who’d towed the human children in earlier staggered in with another Ursa male on his back. The passenger was Turmeigh, the hunter they’d met earlier. He sank in a heap, smearing blood and mud on the floor. Everyone moved towards him. Most of the blood was coming from his paws, and they could see that all his claws had been snapped off or wrenched out. He gasped out his tale, speaking Galanglic as he hazily made out the humans (villagers and travellers) before him.

He and his daughter were caught on a steep hillside when the storm hit. They tried to find shelter, but Yvonne lost her footing and slipped down into a river where she was swept downstream a short way. She got swept against a boulder along with a floating log, which jammed her in place. Termeigh tried to free her, but he lacked the strength and he knew that he could easily get swept away himself which would be no use to Yvonne. So he came back to the village to look for help, and the big Ursa who was patrolling the village in the storm brought him in.

…

Every villager in the room swept forward to mount a rescue, all clamouring at once. The big Ursa held up one paw to stop them, and they immediately fell silent and waited for him to speak.

“Family people stay” he said. “I’ll need a rope and tools…” He walked over and grabbed a coil of rope which had been meant for the decorations, and a bag of carpenter’s tools. By the time he got back to the door, three Ursa were waiting. As were the Avaricious, who hadn’t said a word.

“This is not your affair” he rumbled.

Silea held up her webbed hand. “If she’s in the water, I can help.”

“I’m with her” said the Fish.

Sir David said “I was trained as a rescue worker in the Scouts, maybe I can help. Do you have a block and tackle, here, and a heavy pegs with a mallet?”

Luan, who looked like she would blow away in a stiff breeze, said nothing. But she didn’t move away.

The big Ursa measured them for a moment. “I am Thomas Arheim. We are glad of your help.” He reached for the door.

“Before we go, tell the village your names.”


----------



## Broccli_Head

Morte said:
			
		

> Date: 164-993 Imperial.
> Location: Miip system (0819), mainworld, uplands.
> 
> 
> “Before we go, tell the village your names.”




That's a bit ominous...

So, how much prodding did it take to ge the PCs to go and do something?


----------



## Morte

Broccli_Head said:
			
		

> That's a bit ominous...
> 
> So, how much prodding did it take to ge the PCs to go and do something?




Very little. I worry for them.


----------



## Renfield

Very little? *sigh* what I'd give if my players were that Selfless... Then again I run D&D games which are substancially different than Traveller I imagine. *shudders* oh the Neutrality I have to deal with now.


----------



## peteyfrogboy

Renfield said:
			
		

> Very little? *sigh* what I'd give if my players were that Selfless... Then again I run D&D games which are substancially different than Traveller I imagine. *shudders* oh the Neutrality I have to deal with now.




I've found that requiring some living family members makes for a good way to motivate even the most staunchly neutral adventurer. "Sure, you don't care about the villagers, but what about your baby sister?" Muahaha!


----------



## Morte

Now that I finally got hold of a proper rulebook to go with the "Lite" rules, I've edited the second post of this thread to include proper details for the three starting characters. There's also a smidgeon of background.

I suppose I'd better get to writing the story then...


----------



## Renfield

Write damn you! WRITE!!! You should be glad... no grateful! that I'm commanding you to write... more than I get on my storyhour. I've only had two people save myself post there and one is one of my players. So write and be thankful to the powers that be that people are posting here!!!!


By the way, great story so far   
(Couldn't help myself... blame it on the caffein)


----------



## Padril

Morte said:
			
		

> I suppose I'd better get to writing the story then...




Mutters to himself "About bloody time"

I was starting to think you had given up on this. 
Are you much further ahead in the game? I hope so, we can look forward to lots of updates then.

Padril


----------



## Morte

*Act III: Miip - Down by the River*

Date: 164-993 Imperial.
Location: Miip system (0819), mainworld, uplands.

It was, for practical purposes, a hurricane. The dense atmosphere, laden with water, hit them in the face at 100 km/h. It was slippery, exhausting, dispiriting work that drained them all. Their weather gear helped, keeping half the trouble out, but the other half was plenty to be going on with.

The wind shifted every so often, making anyone who’d leaned into it stumble. Everybody fell, even Thomas who was moving on all fours, and some of them collected bruised ribs or muscle wrenches on trees and rocks they never saw. Fish had a makeshift bandage over a gash within fifteen minutes. Sometimes Luan had to hang onto the Ursa’s backpack harness to stay on the ground. After half an hour she started checking the others for hypothermia. Only Silea could ignore the cold.

It took almost an hour to reach the river. “Halt” bellowed Thomas, just before Sir David went over the edge. “We must head downstream to the Kumminisquat tree, then find Yvonne. She should be within fifty meters of that.”

They found the tree, and were supremely glad of the two fuel-celled flashlights they’d brought from the ship. Yvonne was close by, on the outside of a bend in the river where the water was mercifully slower. She was half-sitting, half lying on her back, with a hefty log across her hips jamming her against a boulder. The water flowed around her shoulders, sometimes splashing her snout. She was about four meters from the shore.

Her eyes rolled slowly towards the torch light, but she didn’t move her head or respond to shouts.

Thomas and Sir David moved together to the top of the river bank and took in the scene. The river had cut itself steep banks, which would be tricky even in good conditions. Now it was rain-slicked and muddy. Then there were the five meters of swift, freezing water. On the up side, there were a couple of moderately sturdy trees along the bank which could be used to anchor ropes. But there was nothing overhanging, they could use ropes to pull but not to lift.

Thomas shouted over the storm. “I hope I can lift the log. But I cannot move Yvonne as well. Somehow you four must pull her out with ropes when I lift.”

Fish dragged himself forward and half-mumbled, half-shouted. He was clearly suffering, but still thinking like an engineer. “Bind her with the local rope, it’s thicker and won’t cut. Then use our three mil cordage to haul. We can tie it onto the pickaxe blade and use that as a handle. We need a tree to tie the pulley…” He scanned the bank and pointed downstream. “That one. We pull downstream, use the current instead of fighting it.” After a moment he added “The rope needs to attach low to her hips, to turn her under the log when it lifts. Loop it under her if you can.”

Silea joined the huddle. “Join the ropes. I’ll go in the river with Thomas. He can lift while I make a rope cradle. You sort the pulley out.” She stepped back and started peeling off her outer clothes.

Fish created a deeply unscientific and thoroughly non-reversible knot joining the 3mm and 15mm ropes, then moved downriver. Luan went with him to help, and Sir David stood by to keep the ropes running free.

Thomas went over the lip onto the river bank, slid down the mud on all fours, and hit the river like, well, like an out-of-control five hundred pound Ursa hitting a river at speed. He recovered and started wading, angled upstream against the current. Silea took five huge breaths then slid down the bank after him, carrying the bundle of rope around her neck and shoulder. She seemed to glide into the water like it wasn’t there. A couple of meters from shore she started swimming, six powerful strokes taking her outward while the current carried her downriver towards Yvonne.

Sir David watched for a few minutes as the pulley was constructed, and the ropes set out taut. He didn’t see much of her, just her feet bracing against the log as she dived to build the rope harness, and her head when she came up breath. After a while she waved him to go and pull on the rope.

So he missed seeing her hands triumphantly thrust out of the river, pushing under under Yvonne’s shoulders, making the Ursa’s body rotate so her hind legs would slide under the log as Thomas lifted it. Three times he’d lifted the log, and after two failures Silea got the right footing, balance and timing to free Yvonne.

On the shore, the hauling team felt the rope slacken and began to heave. Thomas let go of the log and half-scrambled, half drifted after Yvonne to keep her head out of the water while Silea stroked hard to stay close in case of need.

A minute later they were all out of the water and on a relatively flat patch of river bank. There was no way they were getting Yvonne up the bank and past the overhang, and they hadn’t thought to bring a shovel to dig it away. Besides, Thomas wasn’t going to be lifting anything more until he’d rested.

So Luan came down on a rope, and wrapped self heating emergency survival blankets they’d bought on Sentry around both Usra. They only covered about three quarters of the torso, but she hoped they would be enough to get Yvonne’s core body temperature up and maintain Thomas’s.

The Avaricious and the Ursa huddled as best they could and hoped the storm would end.


----------



## Morte

Padril said:
			
		

> Are you much further ahead in the game?l




Oh yes.



> I hope so, we can look forward to lots of updates then.




Hah!

BTW, Fish went up a level after his moment of glory with ropes and pulleys. He put another point on most skills and took the "Naval Architect" feat. It seems all that time with his nose buried in technical manuals during jump has led to something...


----------



## Morte

*Act II: Miip - Say What?*

Date: 165-993 to 166-993 Imperial.
Location: Miip system (0819), mainworld, uplands.

Eventually, the storm eased off. A search party of Ursa from the village found them and dug away the river bank to get them out. They all made it back to the village alive. Pretty ragged, but alive. Fish looked like he belonged on a slab, but alive. Yvonne was incoherent, but alive.

Luan declared that nobody was going anywhere until they had some strength back. The Ursa put them back in the village hall, which was quiet since the festival preparations had been put off.

The villagers’ attitude had changed, and whilst they weren’t quite natives they certainly weren’t outsiders to be stonewalled anymore. Although the repairs meant the villagers were genuinely busy now, they had no trouble finding time to help the travellers. Half a dozen of them, some human and some Ursa, took turns to translate the video journal. There was a bit of trouble with the technical terms but they managed to get it worked out between them.

Some years previously a transport vessel called _Vraidercalt_ had been hit by pirates in the vicinity of Aspiration (3232), an independent system between the Khuur League and the Galian Federation. Seventy diameters from a gas giant, with half the engine room shot to pieces and communications a mass of smouldering metal, Vraidercalt jumped out on a rush plot.

The ship misjumped – no surprise there – and ended up in the essentially deserted space around Kleister Beta, second star of the 069-526 system. The crew got their drives, hull and flight systems together but communications at anything more than close range were beyond them. There was nothing around Kleister Beta to talk to anyway. So they set to skimming fuel from the star’s only gas giant, Railarii. Something went wrong with that – they weren’t as repaired as they’d thought they were – and they found themselves stuck in the gas giant’s atmosphere with no way to get the Vraidercalt out.

So they put the ship in a stable orbit, programming the computer to use occasional contragravity bursts to compensate for atmospheric drag. The crew put Vraidercalt’s emergency low berths on a launch and abandoned ship. They went into cryonic suspension and hoped the automatics would get them to Kleister Alpha. The journey wasn’t measured in parsecs, but it was far enough to mean a short burn followed by whole years of coasting. They died on the way.

The launch had made it into Kleister Alpha’s space about a year before Avarice Rewarded came in-cluster. It was intercepted by a private vessel – the _Malfeasant_, whose captain’s diary the Avaricious were translating. From the launch’s records, Malfeasant’s Ursa captain (one Vilis Kline) figured there was a highly valuable cargo on Vraidercalt. He excised relevant data from the launch’s computer before handing it over to the authorities. He had a plan, and it involved salvage.

The villagers who were translating were not too impressed when they got to this part. Vilis Kilne would not have been an especially welcome member of their community. Fish pondered for a moment, then wondered aloud “Is that actually illegal, if they were all dead?”

Silea, their space lawyer, ran her mind over it. “It’s failure to report an accident… But if there’s an actual ship’s log which says everyone from Vraidercalt got on the launch, and they’re all dead, and he can argue that he’s protecting his legitimate salvage rights…”

“Depends on the judge” said Sir David.

Silea nodded. [1]

“But their families…” said Luan, pained, and the villagers nodded. They went back to translating, and deduced what they could from the rest of the diary.

Firstly, the Vraidercalt was probably still there. It was deeper in the atmosphere than fuel skimmers normally went, but there was no reason it shouldn’t survive for years on the occasional contragravity burst.

Secondly, Vraidercalt was legitimate salvage. And nobody knew she was there, excepting themselves and Captain Kline (whom they’d left in a coma after rescuing him from Malfeasant). 

Thirdly, Avarice Rewarded could operate at that depth with some specialist gear. Malfeasant had been on a trial run when her drive failed and Avarice Rewarded came to the rescue. Apart from the drive problems, she’d been over-prepared. Kline noted the waste of money in his diary.

Finally, the 069-526 system (containing Kleister Alpha and Beta) was two parsecs away and another stop on their charter route.

“I was actually thinking of going there next” said Sir David. He drew a breath, and continued. “It’s our refit yard, Kursis are paying our bill there when we finish the charter. I wanted an advance visit, to see if I could book a fuel purifier installation. Once the charter ends, and Kursis stop paying for all this expensive refined fuel we’re buying, that’ll save us sixteen thousand a jump.”

“We should sort something out while we’re there” said Fish.

The Avaricious all nodded. An astute observer might have discerned that they had different ideas about what “sort something out” meant.

The diary played on, and they made some more notes. It reached the final scene with the Ursa captain standing in front of the engine room door and gesturing behind him in alarm. Their translators explained that he was trying to “blast out” despite the engine problems because he “didn’t want to end up like the Vraidercalt but with no launch”.

_[1] As somebody put it, the Imperium is “a government of men, not of laws”. It really does depend on what the judge thinks is right, as much as what the law book says._


----------



## Shadowdancer

Great story hour. Very exciting, and compelling. I eagerly await the next post.


----------



## Padril

This needs bumping


----------



## Morte

*Act III: Miip - Maelcum*

Date: 166-993 to 169-993 Imperial.
Location: Miip system (0819), mainworld.

They slept in the village hall the next night, on straw mattresses with homespun wool bedding. Fish made some quip about bearskins, but he made it quietly. The next morning they said their goodbyes and headed off. Three Ursa waited at the edge of the village to see them off – Thomas, Turmeigh and Yvonne. Yvonne hugged all of them, bending their ribcages to show how grateful she was.

The walk back to the “starport” village of Arodu was muddy but pleasant enough, and mostly downhill. They dropped in at the village to say goodbye, and Garren the “starport manager” told them there was “some ground-pounder” waiting at their ship, hoping to work or buy passage off world.

“You mean surface army?” asked Sir David, eyeing the marine scabbard and cutlass hanging from Garren’s belt.

“That’s right”.

“You’re an ex-marine then?” he gestured to the cutlass.

“Me? I never served. No, it’s my daughters. Her enlisted marine’s cutlass. She was commissioned last year, so she sent it to me. She has an _Officer’s Cutlass_ now.” He seemed to swell with pride as he said the word “officer”. 

“Congratulations” said Sir David. “Well, I suppose we’d better have a look at this fellow then. Thanks for your help, and your efficiency with the records sir.” He gave a formal nod and turned away.

Garren beamed.

…

The ground pounder was waiting by Avarice Rewarded’s port airlock, alongside a small kitbag and a gun case. He was doing push-ups and clapping. Lots of them, in 1.125g. When he heard the scrape of walking boot on gravel, he threw himself up to the vertical and began to walk forward.

“Good morning. I’m Maelcum Rivers, lately Major Rivers of the planetary army on Liar’s Oath. I was hoping you might give me a ride off Miip.” He smiled, and started to offer a hand.

The man looked about thirty, dark-skinned, about average height and build, with yellow eyes and short frizzy black hair. He looked very fit. He was wearing sensible outdoor clothes.

Sir David leaned forward and shook hands. “David Shetland, lately of the scouts. I’m the owner, cook and bottle washer of the Avarice Rewarded. This is Silea Crossflow, our pilot, and Doctor Luan Derhayenne who’s the medico and broker. That’s ‘the Fish’, we found him in engineering. He seems to like it there.” Fish nodded. “So, what brought you here? And where do you want to go?”

“Well, to cut a long story short a woman brought me here. Then she told me where to go, which was ‘anywhere else’. I suppose I’d like to get to Sentry eventually and look for work, if I don’t find something along the way. But I’ll go wherever you’re going rather than wait a few months for the next ship.”

“We just came from Sentry, I’m afraid. We won’t be back there for another four or five jumps. But if Fonnein Orbital at 069-526 is any good to you, we can sell you passage. Lots of small ships pass through there for refit, you’ll be able to pick up a ship bound for Sentry soon enough. What sort of ride did you want?”

“Well, I’d like low passage if you have the facilities?” Sir David nodded, and Maelcum continued “But I was… sort of hoping you might want someone to work passage, perhaps for a while.”

“Oh, what do you do?”

“Well I don’t suppose you need anyone to command a company of hostile environment troops on counter-insurgency operations? Or a sniper? Or a consultant on working in dangerous atmospheric conditions?” He grinned a bit. “OK, I lift things and clean things. And I cook as only the army knows how.”

“Actually…” said Sir David, “It just so happens I could do with picking somebody’s brains about working in dangerous gases. Come aboard. You’ve got yourself a ride at room temperature.”

“Is army cooking better than scout cooking?” asked the Fish.

Maelcum picked up his kit bag and gun case, and they filed aboard the ship. Silea paused by the hatch and turned to Luan. “We have to get the long version of the story about the woman.”

…

Soon they were aloft and heading out to the jump point. Maelcum’s gun case – holding a downright gorgeous sporting rifle with hand-crafted woodwork and a high tech HUD-linked sight – went in the locker. His other gear went in cabin 4, while he went into the hold to help Fish pump their spare fuel from the blisters to the jump tanks.

…

A few hours later they were in jump space. With no passengers, they settled down to an easy routine. A couple of days into jump, Sir David gathered the regular crew and broached the subject they’d all been thinking about.

He asked them if they’d be interested in mounting a salvage operation on the abandoned Vraidercalt once their charter was over, assuming they could perform it in Avarice Rewarded. He proposed that fifty percent of the profit (or all of the loss) went to the ship’s accounts, with the other fifty split evenly between the people involved. If the salvage was beyond them, they’d try to sell their information for a finder’s fee instead.

Fish jumped at it, mumbling something about “saving up”. Silea and Luan said they were in if the risks looked reasonable.

…

Maelcum worked over the hostile environment suits they’d taken off Malfeasant, and taught the Avaricious a thing or two about working in poisonous gas. His cooking was… different from scout cooking. They liked him.

Sir David thought for a bit, and offered him working passage as ship’s security officer until they reached Sentry or he got a better offer. He was also invited to join in a salvage operation in a hostile atmosphere after that. Maelcum accepted both offers. He expected to end up in a mercenary outfit eventually, but he was quite happy to have a break from the military life.


----------



## Morte

Here's Maelcum's character sheet

*Maelcum Rivers*
Class: Rogue 3/Army 4
XP: 25,000
Race: Mixed Humaniti
Age: 30
Sex: Male
Height: 1.7 m
Weight: 70 kg
Description: Slightly slim, dark-skinned with short frizzy black hair, yellow eyes, clean shaven.
Homeworld: Kerin's Tyr 0620 Ley B575775-6
Languages: Galanglic, Irilitok

*Abilities:*
STR 13, DEX 17, CON 15, INT 14, EDU 9, WIS 10, CHA 10, SOC 8

*Key Skills: *
Bluff-6, Hide-9, Intimidate-6, Leader-12, Liaison-4, Listen-6, Move Silently-9, Search-8, Spot-10, Survival-10, 
_{Includes attribute bonuses but not skill-enhancing feats listed below (since they don't always apply).}_

*Feats:*
Armor Prof (Light, Medium, Vac Suit)
Vessel (Ground)
Weapon Prof (Combat Rifleman, Lasers, Marksman, Swordsman)
Martial Training - +1 to BAB every 4 levels, currently +1
Stealthy - +2 to Hide and Move Silently
Smuggling - +2 to Hide stuff from officials
Spot Trouble - roll to foresee, avoid or reverse ambushes
Alertness - +2 to Listen and Spot checks
Command Presence - +2 to Leader checks

*Combat:*
Lifeblood: 15
Stamina: 35
Saves: Fort +4, Ref +10, Will +2
Attacks: BAB +5, +3 DEX, +1 Martial Training
No armour: AC 13, AR 0, Skill Check -0, Speed 9m
Flak vest: AC 17, AR 4, Skill Check -0, Speed 9m
Combat Environment Suit: AC 18, AR 6, Skill Check -3, Speed 6m

*Equipment / Possessions*:
Usual gizmos, practical clothes (some military surplus), Combat Environment Suit, chameleon smock, fine sporting Rifle with Advanced HUD, Autopistol, assorted ammo. Luggage comes to about 9.999kg.

*Backstory*
Born and raised on Keryn's Tyr, a mid-tech taint world based on arcologies.

At 18, Maelcum fell in with a bad lot and made his initial living as a smuggler. He earned a reputation for being slippery as lubricating gel and seeing trouble before it arrived. This may explain why he quit the business just before they were busted and joined the planetary army (induction on another continent).

The army realised just how sneaky and co-ordinated he was and initially trained him as a sniper. But eight years in the army awakened something in Maelcum -- leadership qualities. He was decorated, commissioned, and promoted to the rank of major.

He saw service on his home world and in mercenary units they hired out to other planets, in a mixture of counter-terrorism and "police actions". Like all soldiers from his homeworld, he was trained to operate in hostile atmospheric conditions.

After seven years and ten months in the military, meeting a certain woman aboard a homebound ship awakened something else in Maelcum. He mustered out two months later and set off after her. She went to Miip and he followed.


----------



## Morte

The game is now over, while the story hour is about 30-40% complete. I guess I'd better get on with it then...


----------



## Morte

*Act IV: 069-526 - Library Data*

*069-526 0721 BAAA630-7 Ni Wa 103 Im M4 V K8 D*

Class B starport, 1.25g, exotic atmosphere, ~100% surface water, one million inhabitants, government by self-perpetuating oligarchy, no laws, mass tech level is 7 (e.g. hovercraft, solar power, assault rifles, composite fibre materials).

The planet known to astrographers as 069-526 is the main world of the binary Kleister system. Kleister Alpha is a dim red main sequence star and the distant white dwarf Kleister Beta. The Beta system is uninhabited and consists of a gas giant, an iceball planet and miscellaneous rocks. The Alpha system has three gas giants and several rockball planets to keep its main world 069-526 company.

069-526 is known unofficially as “Fonnein” to its million inhabitants. It’s a large, cold world which is almost entirely covered with water, much of it frozen. The land area is negligible, and the atmosphere is deadly to humans anyway. The world was colonised in 922 to exploit the rich sea life and minerals, using outside technology and resources. Fonnein does not have the manufacturing technology base to sustain itself without trade.

About two thirds of the inhabitants have live in underwater cities, with the remainder in smaller outlying installations. Each city has a spaceport on a tower poking above the waves (which can be closed by bad weather), as well as extensive submarine docks and cargo handling. These spaceports transfer to the orbital starport for off-world traffic.

Fonnein is administered by a hereditary leadership caste, descended from the colonists’ original elected leaders, who live amongst the normal citizens and get on just fine with them. The extremely dangerous underwater environment seems to instil a tendency to rational co-operation amongst the populace, and they live without any laws or much in the way of politics. Visitors who witness Fonnein society have been known to joke about mind-affecting drugs in the air-reprocessing system.

There are some archaeological mysteries on Fonnein – what appear to be dolphin skeletons have been found in sediments around one hundred thousand years old. Dolphins only left Terra 3-4000 years ago, and they could not breathe Fonnein’s surface atmosphere.

Fonnein orbital is one of the uglier starports in charted space. It was made by welding two defunct freighter hulls to a gantry structure and adding assorted docks, gantries, boatyards and accommodation at convenient points. It’s a bit of a warren, but runs a successful business. The orbital’s yards have a good reputation for quick and cheap refits to small merchant ships. 

Elsewhere in the Kleister Alpha system, the Imperial megacorporation Sternmetal Horizons LIC maintains a mining operation on Estorr, a moon of the gas giant Praimen. Around twenty thousand employees mine radiocatives, with some petrochemical skimming operations just getting underway. Non-company ships are not normally permitted to approach.


----------



## Broccli_Head

What's this ?  A post?


----------



## Morte

*Act IV: 069-526 - Fonnein*

Date: 174-993 Imperial.
Location: 069-526 system (0721), approaching Fonnein Orbital.

“Well, it’s not Gateway” said Sir David as the telescope picked out the orbital’s silhouette against the planet’s day side.

“It’s about as un-Gateway as you can get” agreed Silea.

“Oh, have you been to Gateway?” Luan was suddenly enthusiastic.

“Not me, I’ve just seen pictures” said Silea.

“I went there once, years ago, in the scouts” Sir David reminisced. “We were giving some diplomat type a lift, the navy being indisposed, and we let him talk us into timing our arrival so we could watch dawn sweep across the face of the planetoid. Every second or so it caught another window, on one of those dwellings carved into the surface. It was as if the whole station was sparkling in the sun. Inside it’s just another hollow asteroid with a park in the middle, only bigger than usual. But the view from space is really something if you catch it right.”

“So do you think this place would look any better if the sun was shining from this side?”

“Nope. I think the less we see of it, the better. It’s a good job we can dock with our eyes closed.” He tapped the edge of the flight controls console.

“I’d love to visit Gateway” Luan said, half to herself.

Silea started to spin wire-frame holograms of her docking path. “It’s only forty parsecs, or forty-five around the rift” she quipped.

“I guess I’ll never make it” Luan sounded resigned.

“You probably _could_ work your way out there, if you don’t mind taking a year or two to do it, you know. But it’s a long way to go for a view…”

A burst of comms chatter cut the daydreaming short. Sir David exchanged reassuring noises with flight control to assure them that the free trader approaching at several thousand kilometres per second had every intention of stopping before it rammed them. The Avaricious got down to business.

…

Eventually, they were down to creep speed for docking and the orbital spaceport filled thirty degrees of their forward arc. It looked like two bugs with large carapaces had hit almost exactly the same part of a windshield. At least the planet looked good behind it – blue water and white ice, seen through swirling grey clouds.

Silea initiated a sequence of attitude burns to swing them around the side and find their assigned docking gantry.

“What’s _that_?” asked Sir David, as they flew over a heavily modified 400 dton Type R Subsidised Merchant, that had apparently been turned into a giant hologrammatic hoarding.

“Oh that’s Honest Ab” said Silea, grinning a bit. “Everybody’s favourite local arms dealer. He’s famous in this corner of space. He sells all sorts of weaponry from that ship, merc gear and ship’s weapons – you name it. They say he can get grav tanks, if you don’t mind a wait. And all of it is actually, genuinely, legal. Proper paperwork and everything. Not forged.”

“But why the lightshow?”

“Maybe he wants to remind everyone he’s the only non-shady retail military weapons dealer in twenty parsecs. It might save him a few customs inspections, remind the powers that be that they’ve searched him fifty times and he was always clean.”

Luan nodded quietly in the background. “Is this a big place for weapons dealing then?”.

“Well…” said Silea “It’s a small port. But I have heard that this is the place to get your refit done if you want it to include a few military surplus bits and pieces. Things you couldn’t normally get fitted at a merchant yard. Perhaps he’s selling to that crowd, the ships or the yards.”

“Well, I wasn’t planning on getting in any starship combat in the near future,” said Sir David, “but I suppose I really ought to buy some ammunition for the carbines in the locker. Maybe I’ll go see Honest Ab.” He turned to Luan and asked “Do you think we could pick up any good cargos here for Kerin’s Tyr?”

“Kerin’s Tyr is quite a bit lower tech than this place, it might be hard to pick up manufactures they can use and maintain there. But I did wonder about water purification equipment or something like that. Unless they mine the icebergs, they must purify their water. Come to think of it, with this atmosphere code the icebergs might need purifying too. I’ll have a look at the local net once we’ve docked.”

“Which will be in about thirty seconds…” said Silea.


----------



## Morte

Broccli_Head said:
			
		

> What's this ?  A post?




Your turn now.


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## Watus

Hooray!

I'm glad to see this SH back in action.  It's a keeper.


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## DrZombie

Nice SH, keep it going


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## Morte

*Act IV: 069-526 - Nice Little Runner, Needs Work*

Date: 174-993 to 174-993 Imperial.
Location: 069-526 system (0721), Fonnein Orbital.

Fish was busy.

First he and Maelcum went to see honest Ab. Maelcum had forgotten more about weaponry than the Avaricious would ever know, and Fish went into terminal geek mode at the first mention of equipment shopping. They oohed and ahhed at the fancy lasers and vehicle mount gauss weapons, then bought Cr20 worth of carbine ammunition for the ship’s locker.

Then he went with Sir David to visit a couple of the local repair yards. With Kursis paying, they picked the best. Their overhaul was scheduled six weeks hence, and they also contracted for certain sensor modifications which would be useful in a gas giant’s atmosphere. Sir David reached a tacit understanding that as much as possible of the costs would end up on the “refit” bill. Then they went for lunch with the yard owner and he finessed an agreement that the yard would have a TL11 fuel purifier ready to fit if they wanted it. There would be no need for a deposit, and no cancellation fee if they changed their minds.[1]

Next Fish and Silea settled down for a thorough computer search on the local net. They looked for anything they could find on the scout Malfeasant they’d intercepted in the gas giant back at Liar’s Oath, or the freighter Vraidercalt which was presumed in to be abandoned in the Kleister Beta system, or any of the sophonts involved to date. They found records of the Malfeasant retrieving a drifting launch, with dead sophonts aboard, its origins unknown. Vraidercalt was in the database of ships registered lost. It was the property of Ling Standard Products[2], who offered salvage on ship and cargo. Putting an offer for salvage on cargo on public record was unusual, so far as Silea could tell, and it suggested that the Ursa captain was right about there being something valuable aboard.

Finally Luan borrowed the Fish to look at some water purification gear she’d found on the local net. “Do you think they could use this on a world with steam power?” she asked. He studied schematics for a bit, then accidentally delighted her by suggesting that they should get a shuttle down to the planet to check the gear out properly.

Her eyes grew wide as the grav shuttle shot through the clouds towards the blue and white planet, then decelerated and levelled out over pack ice and sundry bergs. It hurtled towards the landing tower poking up through the waves at exhilarating speed then braked to a halt at 5g (internally compensated) just when she started to worry. Three hundred meters down the elevator shaft, they arrived in a submarine habitation. It seemed, well, just like the orbital spaceport. The gear checked out, so Luan placed an order.

They caught the shuttle back up. It was local evening, and the pilot flew a few unscheduled circles to give the passengers a view of sunset on the ice field. This was more like it. “It’s a pity the surface atmosphere’s not breathable,” said Fish, “the missus would love to go for a swim”.

The starport delivered two dtons of hardcopy records that evening, ship’s time. They loaded freight and booked in a group of five passengers for Kerin’s Tyr, respectable businessvargr every one of them. Sir David made sure they knew their weapons would be going in the ship’s locker, and assured them that Major Rivers the ship’s security controller would take good care of them. The team from the medical charity who were going in low berths presented less of a worry.

Bright and early the next morning, just as everybody was about to start in on whatever they’d planned for the two free days before jump, the comm rang. A lieutenant Jamish Kharassiss, Imp Nav (retd), now of the starport authority, had an offer of work for them. It should only take about 36 hours for a 2g vessel. Fish blanked the comm and made rude gestures at the screen as he routed the squid through to Sir David.

_[1]Sir David’s Liason skill is godly, especially when his feats kick in to help.
[2]A humungous imperial megacorportaion, imagine a cross between General Electric and Ford that spreads over 11,000 worlds._


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## Broccli_Head

Yeah! Another Traveller Post. That's two today


----------



## Morte

*Act IV: 069-526 - Go Fish*

Date: 175-993 to 176-993 Imperial.
Location: 069-526 system (0721), aboard the free trader Avarice Rewarded.

“Lieutenant… Kharassiss is it? Hello, I’m David Shetland the owner aboard. How can we help you, lieutenant?” Sir David sat at his desk in his cabin. He’d been checking out restaurants when the call came in.

“Yes, good morning Sir David.” The young navy man knew his title, so he’d done some sort of basic background check. “I’m one third of the Imperial Navy in these parts, I’m here as an advisor and to carry out the occasional inspection at the shipyard. We don’t have any vessels in system, but we’ve a small recovery job in the outer system that needs doing and we’d prefer not to use a local. It seems you have a bit of a reputation for boarding on intercepts.”

“Oh really?” Sir David immediately wondered if he was talking about the Vraidercalt, and tried to look more interested than alarmed. “Would this be a confidential mission, by any chance?”

“Just so,” Kharassiss nodded, “but nothing of a military nature. To cut a long story short, there’s the wreck of a pirate vessel drifting in the Kuiper belt. We got a lucky intercept when they’d just hijacked her, while they were heading for the border. Our frigate had to move on immediately after the battle, so we never searched the wreck. And now we’ve, well, discovered a few things around here and we’d like to recover the data cores from that ship’s computer to have a look at them.”

“I should think our engineer and security officer could handle the boarding. How far out is the ship? What sort of vessel is it?”

“It’s above the plane, spiralling slowly in towards the sun. Call it thirteen hours each way at 2g, plus the boarding. The ship’s a thousand dee-ton freighter.”

Sir David raised his eyebrows. “Pretty big. Nobody’s tried to salvage it?”

“We pulled rank on the locals. And the rumour that it was irradiated after the particle beam hits probably helped. Not that it’s true, but we sort of forgot to scotch it.” He shrugged and grinned.

“Well, I could be interested. Even if this is meant to be our day off, and we’re committed to jump in 48 hours. What sort of fee are we talking about here?”

Kharassiss offered Cr500 a head and Cr5000 for successful recovery. Sir David countered that it was a decent offer for hire of the crew, but owning the ship cost him about Cr3000 a day in interest, maintenance and salaries. They settled on Cr6000 for the job plus the Cr5000 bonus.

Later, in the galley, Sir David explained that he wouldn’t have normally cancelled the day off for a job like this. But a bit of practice boarding and searching a large vessel could be handy if they were going to do a tricky salvage later. And a friend in the local navy might be a good thing, too.

Silea talked to traffic control, and they were under way within an hour of the call ending.

…

“These are pretty hefty. Have you tried moving in them? I bet they’d be no fun in high gee.” Maelcum waved at the two environment suits they’d taken off Malfeasant and looked at Sir David.

“They weren’t much fun in one gee ship’s gravity. I was out of breath in fifteen minutes. Hopefully they’ll be less work in the wreck at zero gee. And the alternative is emergency soft suits, if we’re to suit everybody.”

“Alright, well I’ll look them over on the way. Come and suit up before boarding, and I’ll adjust yours. You get the hang of it after a few thousand hours walking around in methane or whatever.”

“See you in nine hours, then.”

…

“No nuclear radiation worth talking about. The sun has made it a bit warmer than background, but there’s nothing generating heat anywhere near the surface. No radio emissions. No response to a transponder request.” The former survey/contact specialist sat in his co-pilot’s chair, putting the ship’s sensors through procedures nobody had used in years. They weren’t ideal for the job.

The Avaricious were gathered on the bridge, looking at the freighter on the docking telescope.

“And there’s a really big hole in it.” Fish said, in case anyone had somehow missed the really big hole in the freighter’s side.

“Some little holes too,” said Silea, “maybe they fired missiles to occupy those turret lasers while they hit it with the big beam. Then the missiles hit the hull later.”

“At least it wasn’t a Meson gun” said Maelcum.

“What do you mean?” asked Luan.

“The hole in the side. A meson gun fires a stream of particles that pass through normal matter, then decay to normal high-energy particles inside the target. It’s not actually mesons, there’s some historical reason for the name. But it wouldn’t leave a hole like that, exploding inside. The thing is, they do massive radiation damage. That would have been a problem when we go aboard.”

“I see” said Luan. “Do you think there was anyone aboard when the navy destroyed it? Not pirates, I mean?”

Sir David puffed out one cheek. “That Lieutenant didn’t say. I was thinking that if we find any obvious prisoners, we should collect ID and maybe bring the bodies back.”

“It’s funny that they haven’t been to look at it before now” said Silea. “Even with the war on, they usually want to check a wreck like that.”

“Yes, it is a bit odd.”


----------



## Broccli_Head

Hey Morte! 

Glad to see another post.


----------



## Kesh

Rule of Adventuring Survival #1: Never take jobs from the military.


----------



## Morte

*Act IV: 069-526 - Death Ship*

Date: 176-993 Imperial.
Location: 069-526 system (0721), high above orbital plane.

“No lighting. No atmosphere. No AG from the deck plates. And finally no spin. Thanks, missus.”

Fish, Maelcum and Sir David were through the aft dorsal airlock which Silea had selected for docking. It gave her the right leverage to cancel the freighter’s tumble, using 0.02g attitude thrusts to keep the stress on the coupling within limits. Docking had been “complex” – Luan went green watching the screen as Silea flew a path like a demented ball of string to align the airlocks. They’d sent her off to “get the sickbay ready”.

The away team set out to explore the ship, led by Fish who was the best in zero gravity. The entry point was a long way from the bridge, where one would normally expect to find the computer they were after. Silea had offered to shift to another airlock now that the nameless freighter was stable, but the guys seemed to like the idea of an expedition through the hull.

They worked their way in towards the central spine of the ship, expecting to find a corridor running along its length. This upper deck was an accommodation area for crew and perhaps passengers – most freighters took the odd passenger, just as most liners would carry some freight – and it seemed eerily mundane in their helmet lamps. The walls were cream, the carpets pale grey, and the pictures were apparently fixed to the walls because none of them were drifting around. The cabin doors were closed and un-powered, so they ignored them for the time being.

Apart from a couple of frozen/desiccated pot plants, they didn’t see any deceased life forms for about nine minutes. The first dead sophont was a little girl, in pyjamas decorated with a cartoon Ursa (or perhaps a bear) playing grav-ball. She was drifting up near the ceiling, with a deflated survival ball[1] dangling off her like a translucent silvered shroud.

Maelcum eyed the body neutrally. Fish, who was seeing his first dead child, grabbed a handhold and gasped “sh-t” over the voice net. Sir David bounced off a couple of walls and came to a rest next to the corpse.

After a long look, he opened a channel to Silea. “Note for the log. We have encountered the body of a human female child, estimated age ten, floating in an emergency life support bag. No signs of rapid decompression or rupture to the bag, it appears the child died of suffocation before the air drained out. Two fingers have snapped off since the body froze. That may have happened when we docked. She doesn’t look to be carrying identification. Coordinates from airlock are…” he read off the figures from the inertial locator on his suit cuff.

“I think you might have to open all the doors after all, Fish. But let’s go to the bridge, first. We’ll see if we can find anything useful there.”

They moved on, the Fish not looking quite so graceful now. After a couple of minutes they found the first open cabin door. Inside was a dead woman, again in a deflated survival ball, again the apparent victim of suffocation after her air ran out. There were clothes and toys suitable for a ten year old girl, several with an Ursa motif.

“She doesn’t exactly look like a pirate.” Sir David sent back another log entry.

“The air in the ball would last longer for a child, right?” asked Maelcum. The others confirmed. So, thought the retired counter-insurgency officer, she stayed here like she was told but when she saw her mother suffocating she opened the door and fled outside. Just like hiding from guerrillas in a burning building. He didn’t say anything to the others.

“Alright, let’s get to the bridge. Then we’ll take stock.” Sir David waved them back out of the cabin.

_[1] Ships carry at least one survival ball per passenger in each cabin. They’re like big plastic bags. Passengers can step into them and inflate them with the incorporated air cylinder, which lasts about four hours for an adult. They’re usually transparent, with a vapour-deposited metallic pattern added to reflect light and radar. Even if they are undamaged, the air will eventually leak out of them by osmosis._


----------



## Kesh

Damn. Not a pleasant way to go. And adds some very interesting wrinkles to the situation. See my rule #1 above. 

Keep it up, Morte! Excellent stuff.


----------



## Morte

*Act IV: 069-526 - Administrative Error*

Date: 176-993 Imperial.
Location: 069-526 system (0721), high above orbital plane.

They passed more doors on the way forward, but most were closed and unpowered. The only exception was the galley, where they found a tattooed man in an apron drifting amidst strands of frozen stew.

“Aren’t those like Silea’s tattoos?” said Maelcum.

“Almost,” said Fish, “he’s one of the Mmarislusant. They’re Vilani people who live with the Luriani, kind of like me except I’m descended from the old Solomani garrison.” He paused. “I can’t imagine one of that lot as a pirate.”

“He doesn’t look it”.

…

The bridge door was powered down. Fish popped an access panel and started poking around with a probe from his portacomp. Soon a power cell came out of his pack and found itself wired into the door. He hit the “open” button. Nothing happened. He sighed.

“Oh terrific, anti-hijack mode. Give me a minute…”

Out came a bizarre vacuum-friendly fibre crimping tool. Fish snipped away at the optical links inside the panel and spliced one into a trailing lead back to his portacomp. Soon he was running an anti-security programme of questionable legality (as used by all sensible spacers) while Sir David studied the ceiling. The door dilated. He checked his power pack. “That’ll hold it open for months. In we go.”

There was no light on the bridge save starlight through the windows. They played their headlamps around and clamped a couple of floods to the ceiling.

This time the bodies were vacc-suited. Two of them had apparently chosen to asphyxiate in the privacy of their helmets, strapped into seats. A third had taken his helmet off to allow pistol access; his brains were all over the wall beside him. There was a data crystal, the sort that holds personal or media files and plugs into a portacomp, taped to the middle of the console in front of him.

“I’ll have a look at it” said Fish.

…

My name is Eneri Louie-Tiemme. I’m the second officer of this vessel, the _Cochrane’s Burden_. The hijackers killed the captain and the first officer when they wouldn’t tell the console codes. They cut their throats, they did, and made me watch so I’d sing. Which I did, to be sure. Then they locked us in the belly bay, as hostages or slaves or some such. Which O’Gandy and I escaped from five days into jump, with the aid of Louisa distracting the guard. There was only four of them, so we took the ship back just fine when it was us with the surprise. We gave them the pleasure of our former accommodations, with Louisa doing the guarding.

We came out of jump with our boots laced and our flies buttoned, ready to hail, and found the scum had scragged the transponder and the voice twig. Which was a bit of a shame on account of the navy corvette which had come out of jump before us. The Emperor’s fine lads and lasses sat there for ten minutes, watching us do nothing. I was thinking they’d send a boat over. No such luck. There was a big explosion aboard and every alarm in creation sang before the power went down, including the backup.

Now we’re here on the bridge, with the door shut and no juice, and there’s maybe eight hours of air. And I’m f-cked if I know what to do.​


----------



## Morte

Kesh said:
			
		

> Rule of Adventuring Survival #1: Never take jobs from the military.




Even when you're tyring to win friends an influence people amongst the navy. Or with the sort of publicity this could bring, _especially_ when you're trying to win friends and influence people amongst the navy.


----------



## MJD

*An interesting aside...*

Heh... I'd forgotten all about the small side adventures in the book. 

I'm interested to see how this bunch handles the Vraiderkalt boarding....


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## Skylinkdave

Beautiful story. I plan on running "The Kursis Charter" for my group of Travellers, and this gives me tonz of ideas on how to flesh it out, and what I might expect from the players. Can't wait to see how this group finishes up...

Dave


----------



## William Cameron

Mr. Benford,

I am very glad that you are once more sharing this story with us.

One small suggestion if I may.  Have you considered saving the story as a single document?  Both QLI and Freelance Traveller would jump at hosting such material.  Not only is the story very good, but the insights it provides into running a campaign  would help many GMs.

Again, thank you for sharing with us.


Sincerely,
Bill


----------



## Morte

*waves to MJD (author of the adventure)*

Skylinkdave: Thanks. It's a good adventure, with a bit of everything, and easy to run. Don't make the mistake I made and switch the Malfeasant signal GK to before planetfall (I wanted some action after hours of chargen). That could have scuppered me if they'd just handed the diary in to the authorities on Liar's Oath, but I got lucky (they forgot they had it). And if you keep real accounts, start them with Cr50-100k in the bank -- otherwise some bad spec trade rolls and that non-paying trip to Miip could actually break them before they get up to speed.

Missah Whipsnade Sah: Thanks too. Yep, there's a word doc. When I get finished, and it fades down the list at ENworld as story hours do, I'll submit it to Freelance Traveller for their archive. I must be about half way by now...


----------



## Morte

*Act IV: 069-526 - Well, Somebody Has To*

Date: 176-993 to 177-993 Imperial.
Location: 069-526 system (0721), high above orbital plane.

“F-ck” said Fish.

“You could put it that way” said Sir David, something like bitterness or disgust creeping into his voice.

“Wow” said Maelcum, “they blew it”.

There was a long pause, then Sir David spoke again. “Can you relay that back to Silea for the log, please, Fish.” Fish spoke to Silea and made the data transfer.

“Thirteen, I think” said Sir David.

“Yes, so far. Plus someone in engineering, I’d imagine. And maybe the other cabins.” Maelcum had also been counting bodies seen or implied. “How will we store them for the trip back?”

“We can put them in the main hold and evacuate it. That’ll do. Alright, let’s get this computer core out then start a proper search.”

…

Fish dismantled the computer to get at its optical core, while the others herded the casework he detached into a corner. It was out in 15 minutes, and into a shock-absorbing bag. Then they towed the three bodies from the bridge back to Avarice Rewarded and put them in the hold. The woman, child, and cook went back in a second run, and they set to searching the ship properly.

Luan examined the frozen corpses as they came in and made medical notes for the ship’s log. She didn’t seem bothered by them. Back on Cochrane’s Burden, Fish got through the other passenger area doors quickly since none of them were in anti-hijack mode. They found four more bodies, apparently passengers, who didn’t seem to belong on their list of thirteen.

Back in engineering they found two more, looking like crew. They were perforated by flying metal shards from the hole in the wall.

“Beam came through” said Maelcum.

Fish spoke emptily. “It hit the power plant from the back. Spalls from that hit the backup.” He pointed at the wreckage of the main fusion plant, and the big holes that flying debris had punched through the backup store. “All power gone. That’s what stopped the doors. I wonder how the girl got her door open.” He attached a tow line to one of the engineers.

“Below decks next. You two had better lead off, there’ll be sharp edges down there from the weapon damage. Your suits are better for that.”

…

The fifth visit was the worst. They found Louisa, or at least a woman in overalls labelled “Lousia”, drifting in a corridor, near a chair facing a door. She showed signs of rapid decompression, plus impact trauma to the head. There was blood and broken skin on the wall.

A short way along, five feet of wall were missing from either side of the corridor. The edges of the holes were torn and blistered. Maelcum checked for radiation since they were close to the impact site, then headed through the hole on the side opposite the chair. He was quiet for a moment, then spoke over the comm link. “This is the brig, where they held the hijackers. There are bodies.”

The other two followed him in.

It was a charnel house.

The room was open to space, but most of the recognisable body parts had stayed inside the hull. A head floated free, and two arms tied together at the thumbs. A pair of legs were taped to a bench against the outer hull. Of the torso, no sign. But the really gruesome sight was across the room, where the plasma and shrapnel had had a chance to spread and cover the other three prisoners. The freezing vacuum had preserved the result for all to see.

Fish began to flail, and make gagging sounds. There was the sound of heaving on the comm link. As Maelcum and Sir David turned to face him, his faceplate splashed green and yellow from the inside. He sucked in another breath for the next heave, and drew the last lot of vomit straight back into his lungs. Maelcum grabbed a bracing point and prepared to push off towards Fish, as they heard him start to drown over the comm.

But Sir David snapped a quick warning: “Leave him. Spacer suit.”

Maelcum relaxed. Moments later water jets blasted Fish’s faceplate clear from above, as unseen suction pumps gathered the fluid under his chin. As the visor cleared, the apparently soft fabric below his ribs constricted and gave him a Heimlich manoeuvre. A fresh water jet swept the vomit away as it hit his faceplate. The fabric shifted again, taking a grip on his lungs and regulating his breathing. In ten seconds he was back under control. His eyes refocused, before he saw the carnage in his headlamps and closed them with a shudder.

“Looks like you got the night off” said Sir David.


----------



## Morte

Fish has a TL14 tailored vacc suit, the best money can buy in the 56th century. It's a spacer's suit, different from the ground pounder hostile atmosphere suits that Maelcum's used to.

Well, that's my story now. During the game Laurent (Fish's player) was acting sickly, so when we go to this bit I raised a D20 and said "Will save", grinning. A few seconds later I had absolutely no idea what happens when somebody vomits in a vac suit, either currently or at TL14. I had to fall back on "roll to know what to do" and "roll to do it", which was pretty disappointing. Not my finest hour as a GM.

Before I wrote this up, I asked for ideas about the spacesuit on the JTAS forums. I did a bit of retconning for the story hour.


----------



## Broccli_Head

Ok...so what exactly did they see?


----------



## Morte

Broccli_Head said:
			
		

> Ok...so what exactly did they see?




I had this idea that I'd leave it unsaid and let your imagination invent the really gruesome stuff for itself. Oh well. I'll get this writing thing worked out one day...

I'll have a ponder, maybe revise it, maybe fill it in with later dialogue.


----------



## William Cameron

Broccli_Head said:
			
		

> Ok...so what exactly did they see?




Mr. Head,

Do we really need to know?  I find the suggestion far more frightening than a graphic depiction.

Whatever it was, it made Fish physically ill.  He'd been herding dead bodies for a few hours and it could have been something relatively minor that set him off.

If you still require precise details, may I remind you of the amount of viscera the human torso holds?  If a few of the hijackers' bodies ruptured under decompression, there may be a 'delicate' web made up of tens of meters of mixed-up intestines, colons, livers, kidneys, hearts, lungs, and many, many other bits gently hanging in free-fall at the other side of the compartment.

Now, be honest, did you really need to know that?


Sincerely,
Bill


----------



## Morte

I made a slight update to the previous post, to fix an error with the dates and clarify something near the end. And now...


----------



## Morte

*Act IV: 069-526 - After the Party, a Little Nervous Laughter*

Date: 177-993 to 178-993 Imperial.
Location: 069-526 system (0721), various locations.

Luan cleaned Fish up. Sir David and Maelcum finished up on Cochrane’s Burden, grabbing a few photos for the log. They set gravity in the hold to zero with a mild centring component and evacuated the atmosphere, leaving the bodies to float in a central clump.

Silea cast off, and put Avarice Rewarded on course to match Fonnein Orbital. Sir David slouched onto the bridge a few minutes later, looking tired. He crumpled into the co-pilot seat. “Do you want to go and see Iain? I’ll take the bridge until oh-six-hundred.” She gave him a grateful nod and headed aft. Sir David familiarised himself with the flight plan then started putting reports together.

One went to Fonnein Orbital Starport Authority and Lieutenant Kharassiss of the Imperial Navy, advising that they were inbound with 19 casualties from the freighter Cochrane’s Ghost, destroyed in an anti-piracy action. It appeared that four were hijackers and the remainder passengers and crew. Doctor Derhayenne’s notes were attached. Did they have facilities for the bodies on the orbital, or would they prefer them take to a planetside spaceport?

He sent a separate note to Kharassiss, stating that they had recovered the computer core as contracted.

Well, that should raise hell.

…

Silea found Fish in the sickbay, towelling off the residue from Luan’s water/alcohol wipes. He was staring at the bed, in no hurry to meet her eye. He looked miserable. Something clicked in Silea, and suddenly she knew the answer to a question she’d been asking herself for the last year.

She came to a halt with a slight stamp to get his attention, put her hands on her hips and gave him a pouty smile. “Oh, my poor boy. Come on, you.” Holding out a hand, she switched to Luriani “Ehlahté, o erastairs mou. Thar’soh eh-ahn eiste pragmat’amu.”

Fish sat bolt upright, eyes wide open, jaw dropped.[1]

Silea gave him a wicked smile, grabbed his wrist, and yanked him off the bed. The towel hit the floor, leaving him naked. She dragged him out of sickbay and towards their cabin, past a grinning Maelcum.

…

Maelcum wandered onto the bridge to find Sir David. “Um, just to let you know, we probably shouldn’t disturb Silea and Fish for a bit.”

“Is he OK?”

“Oh, I think he’ll be _fine_.”

…

It was five-thirty in the morning, ship’s time, when Silea stepped out of the shower. She leaned over her sleeping lover for a while, listening to him breath, then kissed him on the temple and turned to take a slim box from the desk behind her. Kneeling beside the bed, she took her flute from its box and played silently for a few minutes, working the keys without blowing and listening to the music in her head. She looked at Fish all the while.

Then she dried her hair, towelled off the remaining water from the shower and put some clothes on. Leaving the cabin, she turned away from the bridge and headed towards the cargo hold. She dimmed the lights along the way, leaving a few emergency signs to cast shadows as she passed. After a look through the glass panel at the bodies, she sat with her back against the door to the hold. This time she played the flute audibly but very quietly, whispering out a long sad song.

At a few minutes before six she turned the lights back up and went to relieve Sir David on the bridge.

…

The Starport authority didn’t have storage for the bodies on Fonnein Orbital, so they were directed to one of the spaceports down on the planet to hand them over to morgue vehicles. Lieutenant Kharassiss informed them that he’d visit their ship to collect the computer core when they made it back to the starport.

“How long do we have before we’re back on the orbital?” asked Fish.

“Two or three hours, depending on traffic control and the unload time. Something on your mind?” Sir David raised an eyebrow.

“I thought I might get a look in that computer core before we hand it over. What do you think?

Sir David chewed his lower lip for a second and replied “Alright, I’d be interested to know.”

“I’ll be in engineering” said Fish.

Twenty minutes later he was back. “There’s no specific entries by sophs, but the diagnostic log agrees with what the second officer said in his message. They jumped, command entries from the Captain and First Officer stopped, four new users gained command access and the crew lost it. Then after another day the crew got command access back and overrode security on a few doors around the brig. Days later, they come out of jump and there’s ten minutes of sitting still and trying to route around a radio fault before the massive damage reports flood in. And then the power went out.”

“They made no effort to manoeuvre, fire or evade?”

“They were about finished putting the jump drive to sleep when the beam hit the engine room. Turrets were powered but they didn’t use active sensor fire control or anything.”

“It’s…”

“Yes” said Luan, angrier than they’d ever heard her.

…

The reporters were a shock.

After Silea flew the ship through a thunderstorm at 1200 kilometres per hour and landed it on the spaceport gantry in howling winds laden with spray, it didn’t seem like there would be people about. But when the spaceport extended a tube to their airlock for the morgue crew, it plugged them into the phone system.

Within minutes two reporters had put in calls to the ship, asking to come aboard, asking for interviews, asking the crew to come out to the camera and light setup, asking what had happened on Cochrane’s Burden.

Sir David told them that he didn’t have time for an interview because they had a schedule to keep, and he didn’t want to discuss events on the destroyed ship in case there were local passengers aboard whose families should hear the story first. He was apologetic but insistent.

Meanwhile, Luan followed the departing morgue crew out and made a concise statement to a camera team across a boundary rope. She told them that the ship had been hijacked, the hijackers had destroyed its communications, and the crew had then retaken the ship. When they came out of jump the Imperial Navy had fired on the stationary, silent ship killing all aboard. She said that three-quarters of the dead appeared to be crew and passengers. And she turned on her heel and walked back onto the ship, as the reporter shouted questions behind her.

Sir David got the call asking for his comment on her statement just as she walked onto the bridge and said “I told them”.

He cut the comm and swivelled to face her. She was shaking. “Well”, he said “good for you”. He eyed her with considerable respect. “Alright, let’s get out of here. Whenever you like, Silea.”

Luan shuffled up to Sir David, seeming to shrink as everyone looked at her. “What are we going to… I mean we have to… About the navy.”

“Kharassiss is the navy around here. He can do what he likes around here, but he can only escalate this to command at Sentry. We’ll be at Sentry in a few weeks. That’ll give him plenty of time to do the right thing and the navy time to do something about it. If they don’t, I know lots of people on Sentry and it’s a planet with free press. It’s not like Shanape.”

Luan gave a halting nod and shuffled off the bridge. Sir David half rose to go after her, but decided to leave it a while.

They don’t mind sonic booms on planets where everyone lives in ocean floor arcologies. They were happy to give Avarice Rewarded a priority transit to the orbital starport on request, since she had a scheduled jump to make later in the day. Silea put the pedal to the metal, and tore the clouds apart.

…

Lieutenant Kharassiss looked shell-shocked. As Sir David dismantled him with a stare, he took the data core and paid their fee. On his way out, he said “Sir David, I want you to know that I _will_ do the right thing about this. It’s… terrible.”

…

That evening, Sir David took Luan to dinner in a restaurant ship floating between icebergs, with a big dome over the dining area, and floodlights to create a little extra sunset. Silea, Fish and Maelcum took care of fuel, cargo and passengers.

When the diners came back, Maelcum went out to hit the late bars. He came back early next morning with a spring in his step and a big grin on his face. Luan eyed the bite marks on his neck and asked him, mock-stern, “Now are you just going to show those off Major Rivers, or do you want an anti-inflammatory?”

They cleared dock, and headed out to jump for Kerin’s Tyr.

________
_[1] Silea used a ritual snippet of erotic poetry from traditional Luriani courtships which might be politely translated as “OK, sure, I’ve thought about it and yes I’ll marry you. So let’s get started on the kids right now.”

The Luriani are a fiery race, on the whole.

Of course, amphibious Luriani like Silea cannot normally have children with the genetically-standard humans integrated into their society. Not without complex and expensive gene therapy. So the phrase has a double meaning between these two._


----------



## Broccli_Head

Hooray, an update!


----------



## Morte

*Act V: Kerin's Tyr - Library Data*

*Kerin’s Tyr 0620 B575775-6 Ag 320 I F8 V *

*Geography*

Kerin’s Tyr is a small to mid-sized world of thirty million sophonts, primarily agricultural, with government split into several states. Local technology peaks at level 6 (early jet aircraft, primitive computers, antibiotics, radio). Law levels are moderate, ranging up to level 5 (no concealed firearms) in the richer states and down to “not much law” in the badlands.

Gravity is around 0.6g. The planet’s surface is about 50% water. The planet has three main inhabited landmasses and a fourth “Great Arctic  Wilderness” of ice and largely-uninhabited tundra stretching down from the north pole. Even on the inhabited continents, there is still a lot of wilderness remaining unexplored.

The air is a standard oxygen-nitrogen mix of readily breathable pressure, but the local flora does produce a pollen which is injurious to those not acclimated. The locals can ignore it, and resistance develops in a few months of gradual exposure. But new visitors will need to wear filter masks or risk periods of breathing difficulty which incapacitate them for a day or two at a time. There are drugs which help, but they may have side effects as bad as the pollen itself.

*Governments*

There are four main nations on Kerin's Tyr: The Kingdom of Harven, The Confederation of City-States, the Grand Theocratic Republic and the Liberty Alliance.

The smallest of the main continents is governed by the Kingdom of Harven (Hereditary Oligarchy, Law level 5, Tech level 6). This is the most populous state on Kerin’s Tyr by a good margin. The Kingdom is reasonably well-ordered and organized, and welcomes offworlders. It maintains a large spaceport at the capital (Tersberg), which sees considerable traffic coming down from orbit. It exports a great deal of foodstuffs and natural products; mainly grain, vegetables, fish from the coastal fishing towns, and hardwood from the abundant forests.

The Confederation of City-States (Balkanized, Law Level 2, Tech Level 5) is a loose conglomeration of independent cities scattered across the eastern side of the largest continent (the western side is frontier). City governments vary hugely – elected councils, hereditary nobles, military groups etc. A steam-powered railroad system links the cities, most of which operate small spaceports (Type D). The Confederation has no central government or capital, but each city-state sends representatives to squabble aboard a "parliament train" that travels between the cities. Little is ever settled, and politics in the Confederation is a constantly-shifting web of alliances, embargoes, sanctions and even outright conflict.

The cities nominally maintain a joint armed force and a small 'wet' navy to counter the Kingdom of Harven. These forces are little more than political footballs and they do not interoperate very well. Most cities have militias with TL 5 small arms.

The third continent is shared by the Grand Theocratic Republic and the Liberty Alliance.

The Republic is actually quite democratic (Representative Democracy, Law level 5, Tech Level 6). Only initiates of the ruling Church of Stellar Divinity (whose faithful venerate stars as gods) are allowed to stand for election, but that’s pretty much everyone. Diplomatically, the Republic is rather stiff-necked and insular.

The sole spaceport is located at an isolated "Star City". Star City is considered holy, but ships' crews are not permitted to leave the “Offworld Enclave” (not holy). Only those of sufficient "purity" - i.e. those who the theocrats don't think will cause trouble - are allowed into Star City proper where the pilgrims will come into contact with them (and gawk).

The Liberty Alliance (Tribal Government, Law Level 2, Tech level 3) is a collection of nomadic groups, small settlements and two city-states. It is home to most of the world's Vargr population. These groups have absolutely nothing in common except a desire to ensure that the Grand Theocratic Republic does not expand into their territory. Armed clashes have occurred, and for a long time guerrilla warfare was common as the Republic attempted to expand its territory. An uneasy truce now exists.

*Warne Highport*

The port is a private venture, owned and operated by Venture Ports LIC, with Imperial subsidy. A class B orbital starport is quite grand for a planet of thirty million that would have a hard time putting an explosive rocket in orbit. But most Jump-2 traffic passing through the Shanape Linkworlds cluster arrives or departs via Kerin's Tyr. And since the system has no gas giants and there’s no water on the other planets, visiting interstellar ships must either come to the main world for hydrogen fuel or waste time finding ice asteroids. So the starport sees a fair amount of trade passing through.

There’s probably a story as to how a classy orbital housing sixty-thousand got built around a planet like this, and somebody probably didn’t want it told. But that was over a century ago, and Warne Highport has seen better days. It is now rather seedy and run-down, with the air of a lively if rather disreputable market. The port is considered neutral ground, so merchants from the various nations of Kerin's Tyr often come to the Highport to conduct their business. Goods are usually shipped direct on-planet.

Traffic through the port is a mixture of tramp traders and regular services plying the cluster, Jump-2 vessels crossing the rift from the Reaching Arm, and Tukera Lines vessels heading in to Sentry for refit (or back out again).

Laws are liberal (level 2) and rather informally applied. Order is kept by Portside Security, a private security force that seems to believe that court cases are a needless waste of everyone's time. Minor infractions usually result in a "spot fine" payable in cash or personal possessions, or in on-the-spot justice administered with shock batons. Crime rates are fairly low.

A platoon of Imperial Marines is stationed at the Highport, protecting the Imperial trade mission and the residence of Baron Marie Iskuulii, the Imperial noble assigned to the world. The Baron makes regular visits to the nations of Kerin's Tyr, and meets with ambassadors on a regular basis. She has no desire to live on the planet.

For port security and traffic control, Warne Highport operates a force of 10-ton light fighters to back up its inspection cutters. The latter are unarmed, and crewed by professional if unenthusiastic personnel drawn from the Portside Security force.

Six 200-ton System Defence Boats are also deployed to provide immediate defence of the port. Their mercenary crews are long-service professionals. They are reliable and skilled, and so far have rebuffed all efforts by various on-planet groups to bribe them.


----------



## Morte

*Act V: Kerin's Tyr - Another Day, Another Space Station*

Date: 186-993 Imperial.
Location: Kerin’s Tyr system (0620), Warne Highport and approaches.

Sir David and Luan spent a lot of time talking about the worlds of the Ley Sector, late into the evenings, sat over drinks in the galley. Silea and the Fish wandered around the ship with big, dreamy smiles.

Fish spent time in his cabin doing sums, and started talking to Luan about how to best liquidate a small interstellar investment portfolio. His head was in a whirl.

He also borrowed the video journal they’d taken from the doomed ship Malfeasant, and the translation the Ursa of Miip had made, and watched it a few more times. He showed it to Maelcum, and gave him the story of the lost ship Vraidercalt and their tentative salvage plan. On his second view, Maelcum asked “why have they got so many of those?” and pointed to long, slender objects by the Malfeasant’s salvage bay airlock.

“What are they?” asked Fish.

“They’re shock rods, on extension poles. They’ve got a set, in the weapon rack, with their laser carbines. They’re right next to the airlock, just where you’d want one of those strain gauges they’re so fond of. Like they think they really need them.”

“Why would they?”

“Good question, let’s have another look”

…

They came out of jump without ado, and hailed the starport.

“Avarice Rewarded, welcome to Kerin’s Tyr. Please proceed to Warne Highport for customs inspection, vector follows.”

“Roger, control, wilco”. Silea reeled in the vectors, plugged them into nav and gave them a reality check before executing. Another planet, another set of entry procedures.

They said goodbye to the Vargr passengers over lunch on the run in. They’d been fun, joking and gambling with Maelcum (who lost) and Fish (who won). The Avaricious learned all sorts of K’Kree barbecue jokes, and made mental notes never to tell them in front of K’Kree.[1]

Then they were docked, and the customs inspector came aboard. He cleared them without problems, but said “I’m afraid you drew the short straw on random safety checks. The port engineer will be in touch about the time.”

They offloaded their cargo, which was all for delivery to the highport rather than the planet, and defrosted the low berth passengers. Luan started looking for sales opportunities. Fish got ready for the inspection. Sir David and Maelcum went off to see the starport authority about the hardcopy records for their charter. And then everything went wrong.

…

“They’re on the planet, Sir. Apart from the through-system transit records we keep here, which I can have sent to your ship. But I’m afraid you’ll find the nations on Kerin’s Tyr are very… _proud_ of having their own starports, and they like to keep their own records. It’s a sovereignty issue, you see.”

“Just how many starports are we talking about?” Sir David asked the highport official.

“Well, four starports. Unless one lot are on the, um, train.”

_“Train?”_

“The Confederation of City States keeps the high profile parts of their government on a steam train that shuttles between the cities. Since the starport is a point of pride, I wouldn’t be surprised if they keep the records on it. I could ask them, informally, if you like.”

“Asking formally would be a problem?”

“Well, ah, maybe. You never know.”

“I don’t suppose we can get them to just forward the records to the highport?”

The bureaucrat, who’d been quite decent and helpful as un-bribed bureaucrats at a rather seedy orbital starport go, shrank within himself a little. Sir David recognised the look. “So we’ll have to visit them then.”

“I’m afraid it will probably come to that sir, yes.”

“Oh well. We’re probably taking the ship down  to sell cargo, anyway.”

…

“It’s a stitch up!” ranted Fish. “There’s nothing wrong with the port aft fuel transfer pipe. Cracks on the x-ray, my arse! And twelve and a half thousand credits is a rip-off!”

It seemed they had a fault. Or at least the inspection said they did, and they weren’t cleared for space until it was fixed. It was a pack of lies of course, the yard was generating a bit of business in a slow patch and the inspector was earning a nice backhander. At least, it looked that way.

Sir David went to work on the officials, and Maelcum went to work on the bars. They came up with the same story, phrased in different terms: the shipyards were run by the local mob. So were the safety inspectors. So was the highport, barring selected parts of the Baron’s residence and marine barracks. And every so often, a ship failed its inspection, and a local yard which happened to have capacity would do a Cr7500 repair job for Cr12500 on a “rush basis”.

As somebody in a bar parked in an odd curved corned of the station told Maelcum: “Think of it as an extra starport tax, it’s just your turn to pay. It’s nothing personal. But it’s probably best to pay it, rather than argue with them behind it.”

They paid, and got a timetable for the passenger/cargo shuttles down to the surface. 

_[1] Vargr are genetically uplifted wolves, with a residual pack carnivore mentality and a chaotic society. K’Kree are genocidal militant herbivores with a rigid herd culture who would exterminate all meat eaters, sentient or otherwise. They are two of the major races on or beyond the Imperium’s borders. They mix poorly._


----------



## Broccli_Head

Great to see you post! You post about as much as I do!


----------



## Psion

Nice job. Did you get the Gateway book yet? Has it changed your view of the region?


----------



## Morte

Psion said:
			
		

> Nice job. Did you get the Gateway book yet? Has it changed your view of the region?




My review of the Gateway book is here. 

I've had it for about a year, as the pre-release PDF and now the final PDF, and I've been using it steadily. It's good stuff.


----------



## Pyske

Shadowdancer's story got me started on a sci-fi kick, so I just polished off yours as well.  Nice job; you obviously put a lot of effort into the write-ups.


----------



## Morte

Pyske said:
			
		

> Shadowdancer's story got me started on a sci-fi kick, so I just polished off yours as well.  Nice job; you obviously put a lot of effort into the write-ups.




Thank you. I stare at the screen until blood drips from my eyes and hits the keys.  I do envy those professional writers who can write better than me and turn out thousands of words per day.

As it happens, I recently took over playing Vasilii in the PBEM feeding Shadowdancer's story hour. Though it will be a while before the SH gets to that point.


----------



## Morte

*Act V: Kerin's Tyr - Tersberg*

Date: 187-993 Imperial.
Location: Kerin’s Tyr (0620), main world, Tersberg spaceport.

Tersberg Spaceport in the Kingdom of Harven was straightforward. They picked up the records without any great trouble, and sold half Luan’s water purification gear to an importer/distributor who had ideas about starting a new business line with it. Unfortunately he only wanted half to test the market, and if things worked out he’d be bringing any further machinery in as freight rather than buying it from traders. Still, they had plenty of time to sell the remainder on the other three quarters of the planet. The deal worked out about Cr22000 better than using that space for freight, so they were pleased.

Their next destination system, the cold and lightly populated but mildly wealthy world Adukgin, was a freight clearing house on the edge of the cluster. It had a reputation as a good place to find small freight looking for onward shipment, but it wasn’t a major destination in itself. So they spent a fair while poking around, talking to brokers, checking out the market for anything they might get to haul to Adukgin or perhaps buy as speculative cargo.

“Premium meat and fancy veneers” said Luan, “they’ll sell on a watery world like Sentry if the market’s just too small at Adukgin.”

The real travellers aboard – Sir David, Silea and the Fish – took  Tersberg in their stride. Seeing a canal barge moored alongside a 50dton grav shuttle, loading crates of salted meat for transhipment to the orbital, had stopped seeming incongruous years ago. The great big diesel trucks hauling giant tree trunks gave Luan a fright by rattling past her and blotting out the sky (“and they’ve got no computer guidance at all!”); but they looked like ants crawling up to the 4000dton Tukera freighter across the field.

Maelcum looked around with interest, especially at the jet interceptors patrolling out of the Kingdom’s nearby airbase. It seemed like most of the planets he’d served on as a starmerc, except they weren’t having a civil war right now. So this was how it worked when it wasn’t going wrong.

…

After a long day, they decided to hit the spaceport bar and grille before catching the shuttle back up to the highport. They went in, and stood at the “please wait to be seated” sign (ubiquitous on eleven thousand worlds). There was a bit of a ruckus coming from the other side of the bar. After a moment, Silea went running towards it. “Bill!” she yelled, as she pulled a 4g turn round a startled waitress.

A grizzled old man stopped pontificating to the assembled spacers at the bar and turned smartly at the sound of a young female voice, just in time for Silea to go flying into his arms and plant a kiss on his lips. He squeezed her tight, lifted her off her feet, and spun her around as his drinking buddies dodged back.

“Hey cool, it’s the cat man” said Fish.

“Looks like he got da cream” said Maelcum, as Silea wrapped  her legs around the old guy’s hips and made squealing noises.

“Mister Anderson, you will explain” said Luan to Fish.

“Yes, explaining would appropriate at this juncture” agreed Sir David.

“That’s Bill” said Fish, as if it were all they needed to know.

“So we heard” said Maelcum, arching an eyebrow.

“And Bill is…?” Sir David added.

“He’s… well he’s _Bill_. From Bill’s ship.”

Fish looked at three “I’m about to start tapping my foot” expressions and got it together. “He’s _Sir_ Bill, or Sir William something-or-other, since the emperor had him knighted for flying right through the middle of a space battle picking up survivors. Everybody knows him. He’s got this Suleiman[1] that’s about a million years old and somehow still flies, and he tramps around the Linkworlds with about fifty cats and the occasional cargo. Or maybe the cats run the ship and they hired him to fetch cat food. Nobody knows, he’s been here forever. Silea’s aunt worked for him as an engineer, and cat-wrangler. She likes him.”

“So I see” said Maelcum. Silea was leading Bill across the floor by one hand.

Bill arrived. He seized Fish by both shoulders, held him at arm’s length, and eyed him up and down. “So you finally got lucky, young fellah, and pulled the wool over her eyes. Permanent trouble-and-strife.” Silea punched him on the shoulder, not very hard.

“Yep, she was putty in my hands. As soon as I drugged her and hired that hypnotist you told me about, the ring was good as on her finger.” Fish got his kneecap out of the way double quick, before Silea’s kick could connect with it.

“Come and have a drink young lad, come and have a drink.”

And there was much drinking, and good times were had, and tales were told, and Silea came away with plenty of ammunition to poke fun at her older relatives.

_[1] A Suleiman class basic 100dton scout/courier starship, as built for the Imperial Interstellar Scout Service and sold on to just about everybody. It’s about half the size of Avarice Rewarded and a third the capacity. Suleimans have been modified for pretty much everything. Probably 50% of adventurers get around in a Suleiman of some ilk. It’s like the VW Kombi camper van of space._


----------



## honorwolf

Morte said:
			
		

> Date: 187-993 Imperial.
> Location: Kerin’s Tyr (0620), main world, Tersberg spaceport.
> 
> 
> “Hey cool, it’s the cat man” said Fish.
> 
> “Looks like he got da cream” said Maelcum, as Silea wrapped  her legs around the old guy’s hips and made squealing noises.
> 
> “Yep, she was putty in my hands. As soon as I drugged her and hired that hypnotist you told me about, the ring was good as on her finger.” Fish got his kneecap out of the way double quick, before Silea’s kick could connect with it.




Great lines, Morte!

So is Sir Bill a creation of your own or found in the LW Cluster? I have the pdf, but my campaign is set many sectors to Spinward-Coreward in the 'Marches. As a result, I haven't read through it all yet.


----------



## Morte

honorwolf said:
			
		

> Great lines, Morte!
> 
> So is Sir Bill a creation of your own or found in the LW Cluster? I have the pdf, but my campaign is set many sectors to Spinward-Coreward in the 'Marches. As a result, I haven't read through it all yet.




Thanks. He's in the Linkworlds booklet, as one of the optional/random encounters to put in if and when you like. So was that salvage job at 069-526, where they found all the dead civilians. And Honest Ab, the interstellar arms dealer. You could actually use them in almost any area/era, if you wanted.

Come to think of it, there's a bunch or rumours and news items at the end of the adventure that I used in the game but haven't reproduced in the story hour.

With Bill, I saw his entry in the PDF and pasted/emailed it to Monique and Laurent (Silea and Fish) before the game, saying he was going to show up in the next session and since their characters were local they would know him. It worked out rather well, since it completely surprised the other two players...

This, incidentally, is one reason I like PDFs -- I probably wouldn't have set something like that up with a paper book (no copy and paste).


----------



## Morte

*Act V: Kerin's Tyr - The Grand Theocratic Republic*

Date: 188-993 Imperial.
Location: Kerin’s Tyr (0620), main world, Star City.

Getting spaceport records from Star City was easy, the faithful of the Church of Stellar Divinity practically tripped over themselves helping the “noble starfarers”. The paperwork – about two cubic meters of laser-etched silicate wafer – was despatched back to Avarice Rewarded courtesy of the local postal system. The locals seemed quite happy to hand it over and forget it, provided it was them doing the handing over and not some central planetary authority.

Luan had arranged to demonstrate water purification gear to two local businesses. Leaving the off-world enclave was not quite so simple as getting the starport records, but they finessed it. The local businessmen found the equipment most efficient and possibly slightly holy.

The profit was better this time, they came out Cr 33000 ahead of using the cargo space to haul freight. This was turning into a pretty good trip, which pleased Luan no end because as she said “I don’t know if we’ll get off Adukgin with a full hold”.

Star City was disconcertingly clean and wholesome. Everybody had neat, sober clothes and hair. Nobody showed much skin. There was a definite surplus of politeness and deference in town. By the time they caught the shuttle back to Warne Highport, Silea and Fish were itching to escape. As soon as they got back they told Maelcum to take them to “one of his seedy dives” for the evening, leaving Luan and Sir David to mind the ship.


----------



## Psion

Morte said:
			
		

> This, incidentally, is one reason I like PDFs -- I probably wouldn't have set something like that up with a paper book (no copy and paste).




Too bad it's not available as a PDF anymore. (I actually got mine though, before they stopped offering it. Missed out on GtD PDF tho.    )

Nice to see a Church of Stellar Divinity appearance. I am planning on running a game in the Free and Holy Federation of Amil, so I'll be fleshing the faith out a bit.

Which reminds me... we actually used to have an advanced generation sequence for priests back in the MT days.


----------



## Morte

Psion said:
			
		

> Nice to see a Church of Stellar Divinity appearance. I am planning on running a game in the Free and Holy Federation of Amil, so I'll be fleshing the faith out a bit.




Amil. Wow. Well, that certainly gets points for originality. 

Something tells me you have a nifty adventure hook up your sleeve.


----------



## Morte

*Act V: Kerin's Tyr - The Wild Frontier*

Date: 189-993 Imperial.
Location: Kerin’s Tyr (0620), main world, the Liberty Alliance.

“We should go down to Neigsten spaceport in the, um, Liberty Alliance. They only have a shuttle from orbit every three days and it goes in forty minutes.”

“That’s the frontier place with the two spaceports, right?” Fish tore himself away from breakfast long enough to answer Luan, who was checking the highport net on her portacomp.

“Yes. There are flights between there and, uh, Comore spaceport on some sort of… winged aircraft. Two each way per day.”

“What else does it say?”

“Low tech. Poni and cart transport. Lot’s of farming, and nomad herders. Quite a few Vargr. Um… There used to be a guerrilla war with the star-worshippers, but they’ve stopped. There’s a truce, now. Weapons are advised if you travel out of town, on account of wildlife.”

“Wildlife you say?” Maelcum suddenly paid attention. “And we’re there for three days. Can you find the hunting laws on that thing?”

“Hold on… They don’t seem to have much law at all. People just walk around with _guns_.” Luan sounded amazed. “Not just hunters, everybody I mean.”

Sir David lowered his mug to the table with a certain finality. “Thirty-five minutes to the shuttle… Can you all pack for three days in twenty minutes?”

…

The Avaricious stood, bags on shoulders, at the shuttle terminus exit, staring at the grass, and the gravel path, and the sign saying “Starport Offices”, and the rain. Especially the rain.

“Is that a taxi rank?” Sir David peered along the suspiciously road-shaped stretch of broken tarmac at the poni poking around the far corner of the building. “Have we come out of the wrong door?”

Fish put his fingers to his lips and let out a piercing whistle. A snout poked around the corner, followed by a Vargr in some sort of livery. The taxi was soon summoned and the driver, whose livery proved to be a tasteful combination of garish orange and even more garish orange, held an umbrella while the men got into the cab. Then he trotted off to the driver’s seat leaving the women to clamber in through the rain.

…

They found a hotel, an odd mix of high and low tech. Sir David used the lobby telephone – a voice-only device – to call the Spaceport Authority about the records. He soon had an early appointment with one Khoeghz Ngegzang, the spaceport manager, who was a Vargr judging by the name. Given that just about every Vargr they’d seen so far was in uniform or at least flashy clothes, he decided to wear his one obviously noble outfit for the meeting.

It paid off. The Vargr was looking to show his importance, and make the off-worlders wait days for the paperwork. Sir David put on an air of quiet confidence and effortless authority, and within half an hour the Neigsten records were being packed. Ngegzang decided to show off his influence and reach in the Liberty Alliance by arranging for the records from Comore, the other spaceport, to be flown in. Unfortunately they would not arrive until the next morning, after the shuttle had returned to Warne Highport. Sir David thanked him nonetheless.

Back at the hotel, he found that Maelcum had also acquired the knack of dealing with status-conscious Vargr – they were all calling him “Major Rivers”. The rain had eased off, so they all went for a walk around the town. It was a small working port, built of brick and wood, with plenty of warehouses and haulage outfits. There was nothing very “startown” about it, no glass-and-ceramcoral megacorporation offices or spacer bars or grav vehicles overhead. It was all a bit dull, and they went back to the hotel wondering what to do for the next three days. A well-dressed Vargr gent in reception solved the problem by offering them a job.

His name was Jorjiak Miilaki, and he was a landowner with several tenant farms in the area within 50 kilometres of the town. He had a problem which required a little military expertise. Since he’d heard there was a Major Rivers who’d arrived in town with a group of off-worlders… They told him to give them the story, and he explained over sherry in the lounge.

A cluster of his tenants about 20km out of town had got caught in the middle of a dispute between two of the nomad groups who ranged the frontier. One tribe, the Artath clan, had always gotten along fine with the farmers. The other lot, the Carval, were newcomers. They’d fought a long guerrilla war against the Grand Theocratic Republic’s border creep, and moved on after the ceasefire. They’d become used to getting things done with guns; and since they had no herds and no traditional lands in this area, some of them were trying take over from the Artath. Jorjiak’s farmers had been caught in the middle, raiding was becoming common, and a lot of them were about ready to give up and move out.

It was time he did something to stiffen their defences. To that end, he’d obtained several cases of TL 8 bullpup carbines, 60 weapons in all, plus ancillaries and several thousand rounds. He needed them delivered – easy enough – but more to the point he needed someone to get the wavering farmers ready to use them. He really needed a starmerc unit, but he couldn’t afford that and he’d never find one in time anyhow. So he was pleased to see a group of self-reliant spacer types, with a major and a noble who’d managed to overawe the local tin pot bureaucrat. Especially since they’d have nothing to do for the three days before the next shuttle run.

He made them an offer. For Cr1000 each, they were asked to deliver the weaponry to a farmstead, teach the farmers and their neighbours to use them, show them how to organise their defences, deliver 20 carbines to the Artath clan, and most importantly to convince the farmers that they did stand a chance. He’d be along in a couple of days to check progress, and would pay a Cr 10000 bonus to the group if he felt they’d turned the situation around.

They took the job, with various motives. Luan wanted to help the farmers. Maelcum figured he was liable to end up in this sort of business when he finished working passage on Avarice Rewarded, so he might as well try it out now. Sir David was a scout, and scouts help people. Fish was bored. Silea didn’t really like the idea much, but she went along with the others.

They agreed to head out the next morning.


----------



## Padril

Great story so far Morte   

Keep up the writing just remember to wipe the blood off the keyboard or the keys start to stick.

One quick question. Were you watching the Royal Family when you wrote this:



			
				Morte said:
			
		

> Cracks on the x-ray, my arse!




Padril


----------



## Shadowdancer

Your party is only two short of "The Magnificent Seven." Or "The Seven Samurai," if you prefer.  

Nice to see another update. I'm very interested in seeing how the upcoming events play out for your players.


----------



## Broccli_Head

Morte said:
			
		

> Date: 189-993 Imperial.
> Location: Kerin’s Tyr (0620), main world, the Liberty Alliance.
> 
> . Silea didn’t really like the idea much, but she went along with the others.
> 
> They agreed to head out the next morning.




Poor Silea. I wonder what she'll be saying when things turn sour.


----------



## Skylinkdave

Morte said:
			
		

> They agreed to head out the next morning.




Ooooohhh... Here we go...   

Dave


----------



## Morte

Padril said:
			
		

> One quick question. Were you watching the Royal Family when you wrote this:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Morte said:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Cracks on the x-ray, my arse!
Click to expand...




Actually, I was thinking of London Underground accident reports...




			
				Shadowdancer said:
			
		

> Your party is only two short of "The Magnificent Seven." Or "The Seven Samurai," if you prefer.



Funnily enough, when I went through this as a player recently the GM said something about the Magnificent Seven. He changed it a lot more than me, though.




			
				Broccli_Head said:
			
		

> Poor Silea. I wonder what she'll be saying when things turn sour.



It'll be in Luriani (or Corsican French, in the case of Monique who played her), so good luck...




			
				Skylinkdave said:
			
		

> Ooooohhh... Here we go...



Soon, grasshopper.


----------



## Morte

*Act V: Kerin's Tyr - Bandit Country*

Date: 190-993 Imperial.
Location: Kerin’s Tyr (0620), main world, the Liberty Alliance.

About a click outside of town and around the first bend, Maelcum pointed at the poni and said “OK, make that thing stop”.

Sir David did things with the reins and the beast’s six legs stopped plodding forwards. “Break out the carbines?”

“Yeah. Friend Jorjiak mentioned raiders, and nomads, enough times to treat this as bandit country. We should be ready for someone to try and take the cart off us. So let’s get you all a weapon each, and I’ll change into fancy dress.” He grinned as he pulled his duffel off the cart.

A few minutes later they were moving again, rolling along the track over the grassland. Maelcum sat prominent in his combat environment suit with his hunting rifle held high, chameleon smock deactivated. The others hunkered down in the cart, Silea and Luan looking at their carbines with some alarm while Fish admired his like a new toy.

…

The cart rolled through flat, open grasslands for most of the day, occasionally passing a clump of trees where the land lay lower and there was more water. After noon the contours changed to low hills and they forded a couple of streams. They made their destination, the Sarragh family stead, in late afternoon. A wary Vargr with a double-barrelled shotgun met them, eyes flicking to one side. He confirmed that they were the group from Jorjiak, and called his pack-mate with the lever rifle out from behind the well. Old man Sarragh came out from the farmhouse and invited them in to talk over _zhou kholat_. They sat around a table.

“I put the word out yesterday you were coming. Should be some folks ride over tomorrow mornin’, come ‘n pick up the guns. Hope it does some good, somewhere.” He sounded resigned, demoralised.

“Well, I think we can help with that, once the major gets to work.” Sir David sounded quietly confident.

“Oh yes, there’s plenty we can do here.” The easygoing, laidback Maelcum had somehow vanished; and suddenly there was an efficient professional at the table. “Mr Sarragh, I’d like to have a look at your local situation while it’s light. Then we can discuss the other homesteads after dark, and work on defensive principles and a training plan. I’m sure all you folks could punch ten times your current weight, if we go about it the right way.”

Sarragh’s ear’s twitched off his head for just a fraction of a second, then drooped flat again. He obviously wasn’t convinced. “Just what do you have in mind?”

“Well, we’ll start by picking a perimeter and the firing points that cover it. I’m sure your Mr Miiliaki can arrange some barbed wire. Add tripwires for warning, some little traps for anyone who crosses the wire, and a proper drill for gates. Then we build some redoubts with interlocking fields of fire, to give you safe firing points that can cover each other. Meanwhile, we teach you to make the best use of a self-loading rifle.”

“How’d you expect us farmers to do things like that?” Sarragh looked incredulous, but also a bit hopeful. His ears poked halfway up and stayed there, waiting for the answer.

“You can dig holes, plant posts, and bank up earth can’t you?”

“Yes, but…”

“The rest is mostly knowing where to do it.”

…

Maelcum made his inspection. He found fenced off areas for animals and vegetables, pigs, assorted small outbuildings that provided cover for anyone  approaching the farm, things called Arked that looked like furry pigs, a big barn, chickens, and a well that was inconveniently exposed and vital to survival.

“Have you ever dug deep ditches here?” he asked Sarragh.

“Can’t say we have. There’s a good slope, we don’t get enough standing water to need drainage.”

“Then if you dug a meter deep crawl trench from the farmhouse to the barn, and off to a bunker just past the well, it would hold together?” Maelcum pointed out the line he wanted.

The Vargr thought for a bit. “Should do, so long as we put a drain far end.”

“Then I think we have our interlocking fields of fire. I’d like bunkers by the farm and the barn, but they can wait. Let’s go and talk plans, before your flocks and neighbours come in.”

…

Maelcum – Major Rivers – started handing out a few preliminary orders and everybody jumped. Fish was sent to look at lumber for bunkers, and cordage for traps, and small holes in thick walls for shooting. Luan went off to set up a first aid station in the cellar, and Silea commandeered a small troupe of children to clear it out. Sir David set up a small training range out back. He put it out of sight of the fresh grave.

All the Avaricious got the same picture: these people lived under siege. Nobody went out of doors alone, everybody went armed. There were “plenty of bunks tonight” because a third of the thirty hands had quit, or in two cases been shot. They seemed pretty glad of the attention, and grateful for the new guns, but nobody seemed ready to think they’d solve the problem.

The flocks came in, escorted by paired farmhands with flintlocks and the occasional single-cartridge rifle. Sometimes their eyes widened when they saw the Vargr by the gate toting the two bullpup carbines Sir David had broken out early. He was quietly pleased at that. Dinner came. The Avaricious and the farmhands, who were about two-thirds Vargr, sat down to eat. They made their plans for the next day, when the local farmers and friendly Artath nomads would come in for weapons and training.


----------



## Morte

Next update: actual combat?


----------



## Morte

Morte said:
			
		

> Next update: actual combat?




Yay, three thousand views. That's ten times what my last SH got. Can I stop now?


----------



## omnimpotent

Don't you DARE stop now.


----------



## Pyske

I'd forgive you, but I'd rather you didn't.

 . . . . . . . -- Eric


----------



## Shadowdancer

Morte said:
			
		

> Can I stop now?



Sounds like my ex-girlfriend on my birthday.


----------



## Padril

Congratulations Morte on reaching the 3000 mark. Looks like fireworks in the next instalment so you better not stop now otherwise I'll have to submit your email address to every spammer on the net  



			
				Shadowdancer said:
			
		

> Sounds like my ex-girlfriend on my birthday.




Now that conjures up a very disturbing image  

Padril


----------



## brennanhawkwood

Morte said:
			
		

> Next update: actual combat?



 One month and no actual combat...bummer!

Here's hoping we'll get to read more about the Avaricious...I know I am looking forward to seeing how they handle what's to come.

--- Blair


----------



## Morte

brennanhawkwood said:
			
		

> One month and no actual combat...bummer!
> 
> He're hoping we'll get to read more about the Avaricious...I know I am looking forward to seeing how they handle what's to come.




Ack. Sorry.

Between getting heavily involved in a playtest and running a new Traveller campaign with two 4-5 hour sessions a week, I'm kind of buried. But you're right, I've been remiss. I'll see what I can do after the game tomorrow.


----------



## Morte

*Act V: Kerin's Tyr - Dust and Bullets*

Date: 191-993 Imperial.
Location: Kerin’s Tyr (0620), the Liberty Alliance, Sarragh’s Stead.

“The Carval? They are many. Many guns and horses. They fight Theocratic Republic, take their guns, control other tribes. Because they stop the Theocratic people, they say they are lords of these lands, between the towns and the mountains. They come to the farms, the camps, and call for  ‘tribute’. People they take, and animals and weapons and food. Now other tribes are Carval. You no pay tribute, they start raiding. Kill people, take herd. Many plains people move away and leave land to them, or they join and become Carval. Farm people go too. We think maybe we move, find new pastures, hard journey but no Carval. But we try new guns first. You teach.”

Sir David listened to Goniss, the leader of the six Artath, and then took them out to the firing range for a little demonstration. The Artath put four rounds a minute into a target at one hundred meters, standing in his stirrups, the horse ignoring the shots. He reloaded his cap and ball carbine with great flair, whipping the ramrod around in a blur. Sir David fired twenty-four rounds in the same time with a self-loading carbine. A wave of low murmurs and excited talk came from the nomads. They compared groups, and found that Goniss had done almost as well with a smoothbore carbine as Sir David using a modern rifle with an optical sight.

“You’re a good shot,” said Sir David, “you’ll be better than me. Can you all shoot like that?”

“The Artath can shoot” replied Goniss, levelly.

…

The day wore on. The Artath trained and rode out with three carbines each. The first few farmhands went through the range drill as well. Pegs sprouted from the ground around the farmstead, found each other with string, and then started turning into foxholes and slit trenches. Fish wandered around cutting holes in perfectly good buildings. Silea redeployed her troupe of kids to making sandbags. And the watchman on the barn roof reported a dust column coming in, a lone rider by the look of it.

It was Goniss, returning with bad news. A Carval war party was closing in on the northeast herd. Two shepherds were driving the herd in as fast as they could while the rest of the Artath party screened them.

“What will the Carval be after, right now?” asked Maelcum.

“They want shoot herders and take some Arked. Make easier to get tribute next time.”

“How long before they reach the herd?”

“They riding easy, three hours. We go back quick, we get there sooner.”

“Alright. Three minutes.”

Maelcum fired a string of instructions to the other Avaricious, the farmhands, the children, and anyone else who came near enough. Precisely three minutes later Goniss, Maelcum, Sir David and four of the more adventurous farmhands rode out, heads spinning. Behind them, the last of the children vanished indoors and the remainder of the carbine-savvy farmhands went into the foxhole by the well.

“So”, said Maelcum to Goniss once he was sure the horse wasn’t going to offload him just yet, “can we find any sort of cover to fire from?”

“Grass, small slopes, dust from herd. Few bushes. Nothing to stop bullets.”

“We’ll use the dust.” He thought for a few seconds. “Tell me, what would the Carval normally do if…”

…

Sir David, Maelcum, and two farmhands dismounted just before the group emerged on the far side of the herd and took prone firing positions as the last few furry pigs trotted past. The horse nomads took their mounts by the reins, and edged off with the herd, lying flat in their saddles and trying not to eat too much dust.

A few minutes later the raiding party of twenty or so Carval ran into a slow patter of aimed 7mm high velocity fire, Maelcum keeping the rate down so as to avoid giving the impression of larger numbers. It had three of them out of their saddles before they’d spread and hit a gallop. The one in the fancy hat with the lever rifle was first to go, hit by Maelcum’s hunting rifle. The Carval spread to both wings, planning to circle their enemies and charge them from all directions.

Their left wing ran into a skirmish line of Artath, peeling off the herd and waiting to gun them down. That side turned into a frantic, wheeling and very deadly firefight in the dust, using tactics developed for cavalry with slow-loading muskets and revolvers. The Carval had fifty percent greater numbers, but the Artath had initial surprise and twenty rounds per minute.

The group on the ground weren’t so used to dealing with horsemen who wheeled in and out of the dust at breakneck speed, darting in from all directions to fire and darting away. Two of them got shot in the back – one a farmhand who died coughing blood, and the other Sir David whose flak vest saved him. But their opponents weren’t used to off-worlders who would shoot a precious and extremely valuable horse out from under its rider, then snipe the rider as he tried to get up. The two farmhands found it pretty shocking too, they almost stopped firing a couple of times.

…

And then it was over, four or five Carval galloping away low in their saddles.

Goniss rode up, looking quite pleased about the fresh bullet strip across his forearm, with the surviving half of the Artath. He looked at the dead horses in confusion. Sir David shrugged. “The Carval will have to prove a point, now?”

“Two days. Or three, if there is luck.”

“We should get back and prepare for the real trouble” said Maelcum.


----------



## Bluebear

I'm enjoying this story (as well as that about the Bray Kaeven).  Are there any other Traveller stories on Story Hour?  If so, which are they?

Secondly, how do you like the T20 rules compared to other Traveller rules . . . and why did you decide to use T20?  Finally, if you had to do it again, would you use the T20 rules or revert to another older set (and if so, why)?


----------



## Morte

Bluebear said:
			
		

> I'm enjoying this story (as well as that about the Bray Kaeven).  Are there any other Traveller stories on Story Hour?  If so, which are they?




Not really -- Broccoli_Head's SH seems to have faded away (and mine, um, ah...). You could check out Raconteur's Rest



> Secondly, how do you like the T20 rules compared to other Traveller rules . . .




They're about the same.

The main reason to play T20 is it's D20 -- if you already know/have D20, or the people you inted to play with do, then you need a pretty good reason to go elsewhere. Also, it's the most complete line from the view of a player/GM -- they have a setting book which is actually in print, and some adventures, and some vehicle books and so on.

GURPS is a bigger-yet-cleaner ruleset, but GURPS is an old Texan dialect word for "you need twice as many books as you thought you did and at least one is out of print". Also GURPS trade is realistic, i.e. it forces ships to move on as fast as they can and keep the cargo turning over or go broke, whereas T20 and CT have completely arbitrary and unrealistic "it takes a week on planet to find cargo" rules that work better in actual play. There are some lovely books for GURPS but they seem to be meant more for collectors (who are the majority of the Trav market) than gamers.

I wouldn't touch pure CT -- "roll over 8 and consult a two page list of modifiers" etc -- and I don't know anyone who does. They plug in the DGP task system, and use some house rule from a 1981 magazine to get around book 4 producing characters twice as powerful as book 2, and so on and so forth. It's OK if you've been playing 20+ years and finalised your last house rule in 1988, or you can get someone like that to sort it out for you. But I wouldn't try to play using the CT reprints currently available.

Megatraveller is not bad at all, it's pretty much a tidied up CT. When I started my T20 game it was only available on eBay and rather rare/expensive so I ruled it out, but there are PDFs from DTRPG now. If you're OK with PDFs it's a good option.



> and why did you decide to use T20?




They had free PDF "lite rules" and a free PDF adventure (the one you're reading, but it's no longer free). Nobody else did. Also I prefer PDFs to paper, and T20 is the most PDF-oriented line.



> Finally, if you had to do it again, would you use the T20 rules or revert to another older set (and if so, why)?




I'd play whichever I could get other people to play, frankly. I've GMd and played all of the rules above, I think they're about the same, i.e. all are usable and none are great. Pick what your group likes, or your game store stocks, or whatever you can get a discount on.


----------



## doghead

I am here.



			
				Morte said:
			
		

> Now we’re here on the bridge, with the door shut and no juice, and there’s maybe eight hours of air. And I’m f-cked if I know what to do.​




And this is begining to look like the diabolical mess that Maerdywn has cooked up for us in his pbp game here at ENWorld.

Got another 3 pages to go. Going to save it for tomorrow night.


----------



## doghead

And then there were none.



			
				Morte said:
			
		

> <snip>
> 
> I'd play whichever I could get other people to play, frankly. I've GMd and played all of the rules above, I think they're about the same, i.e. all are usable and none are great. Pick what your group likes, or your game store stocks, or whatever you can get a discount on.




I've played both CT and T20 and would agree. His description of CT is spot on (although they remain my favourite rules for sentimental reasons). The T20 generation system was a little confusing, but the game seems to play quite nicely.

Morte, does T20 have the ship, vehicle and robot creation rules of CT. I spent hours building things with these. Especially low tech robots.

And thanks for the SH.


the head of the dog.


----------



## Morte

doghead said:
			
		

> Morte, does T20 have the ship, vehicle and robot creation rules of CT. I spent hours building things with these. Especially low tech robots.




Yeah, they're all there. My idea of ship design is "Google for somebody else's if you can", but I've done some T20 ships and there are design systems for vehicles and robots and computers too. It's all pretty similar to CT in use, except the numbers come out a few percent different.


----------



## Broccli_Head

Yah, we haven't played in a very, very long time and I was caught up with the posts.


----------



## TDRandall

*poke poke*  Morte?

Was looking through the story hours in my special "I like to read these" folder, and noticed yours had dropped to the bottom.

I'd really like to hear how things developed further in this game!

You still with us?


----------



## Morte

TDRandall said:
			
		

> *poke poke*




*ow ow*

Er, um, yeah. Still here. Stuff happened. Next update half-written (and has been for months). Well I suppose I should get something together then. Be back in a day or two.


----------



## Morte

*Act V: Kerin's Tyr - The Battle of Sarragh's Stead (I)*

Date: 193-993 Imperial.
Location: Kerin’s Tyr (0620), the Liberty Alliance, Sarragh’s Stead.

It turned out that they had two days.

Maelcum got his trenches, dugouts and firing points but not his barbed wire – the messenger went off to town, and nothing came back. On the morning of the second day after the fight with the rustlers, the sound of sporadic shots drifted over the hill. In the next few minutes two scouts came galloping back into camp (they never saw the third). Three hundred Carval followed them in a contemptuous rush, ignoring the shots and sweeping into the compound to use their revolvers and sabres. 

It didn’t quite work out like that.

They got inside the farmstead sure enough, with no palisade or wire to form a physical perimeter, but they rode straight into Maelcum’s “kill zone”. The farmhouse, the barn, and the redoubt built around the well had interlocking fire over the whole area. There was nowhere that wasn’t in sight of at least two of them. Although Maelcum quietly wished for a couple of medium machine guns – it’s hard to hit a moving horseman with a rifle, and the locals still couldn’t grasp shooting horses – the hail of fire from the carbines was telling. The Carval who swept out of the compound left forty bodies on the ground. The defenders took a couple of wounds to flying splinters.

“Next time they’ll do it properly” said Maelcum. “Right, we’ll get everyone in place during the lull”.

…

The Carval withdrew to about a kilometre, behind cover, leaving snipers in the scrub to harry the defenders. The defenders harried them back, getting the better of the exchange from behind sandbags and stout wood.

The Carval had worked out that they weren’t going to just ride in and shoot everybody. Their next attack was about capturing firing positions inside the perimeter, to get an easier approach to the farmhouse and cut down on the crossfire. It came under cover of smoke, with feints on the far side of the camp, and it achieved some success. A rush of attackers swept over two of the bunkers between the farmhouse and the river. They took heavy losses, but enough remained to drop into the bunkers with sword and pistol. Soon any defender who fired from that side of the farmhouse had to get their shot off quickly and duck sharpish, if they didn’t want an attacker trying to put a bullet back through their loophole.

…

With a toehold on the grounds, i.e. a bargaining position, the Carval offered a parlay. Sarragh and Sir David went out to talk, while Maelcum watched through his rifle scope.

The Carval spoke much better Galanglic than the Artath. Perhaps it was due to their time battling the Theocratic Republic. Their leader, or spokesman, sat straight in his saddle and delivered a monologue rather as if he’d memorised it. Sir David wondered if he was just a messenger for the real leader.

“You fight well. Not like farmers. Really I should kill you all, to make an example, and burn all the farms within a morning’s ride. But I like you. You can go, if you wish, all of you. Take a horse and a meat animal each, and what you can drag behind. Go more than two days’ ride and we of the Carval will give you our mercy. Or join the tribe and have our protection. You have three hours to decide. Then we burn the farm.”

The spokesman or leader, whatever he was, turned in the saddle and waved forward another nomad. This one was on foot, leading a six-legged poni (the nomads rode horses) which dragged an over-sized stretcher affair. On it lay four bodies.

“Here, we brought your dead. You can bury them while you decide.”

It was the farmhands who’d occupied the two bunkers. They were cut about. Sir David looked at a Vargr’s upper jaw, hanging on by a flap of skin, and figured this for psychological warfare. Bringing the bodies in and burying them was bound to put the wind up the defenders.

He returned the compliment by inviting the Carval to collect their own dead, sending one or two unarmed me with stretchers at a time. “Three hours should be enough for you to retrieve all these bodies” he said. “Probably”.

In a dim room on the top floor, Maelcum knelt on a table well back from the window in his chameleon smock. He watched the conversation through the sight on his rifle, getting used to faces, checking for body armour. He had a look on infra red, adjusting the controls to make it look like night.

…

The time passed, and the Carval spokesman came back for his answer. Sir David told him that if the Carval left now he would not pursue them in his spaceship with laser turrets after they retreated from the farmstead. With the ritual exchange of sneers completed, the two parties went back to their troops. The firing started up again a few minutes later.

The Carval who’d taken the bunkers near the farm sat tight, as more pushed up under cover of smoke and musketry to join them. Maelcum and Fish watched closely, waiting for the opportunity the major had predicted, their moment for the telling counterstroke. It took about five minutes, then Maelcum picked out the Carval leaders moving in to direct an assault spearheaded from the bunkers. He called Fish and gave the order.

Downstairs the defenders unleashed a hail of fire. Seven buckets flew out of assorted farmhouse windows and sailed towards the occupied bunkers, dropping two into the nearer bunker but missing the other altogether. The massed nomads in the unlucky dugout enjoyed a brief glimpse of Anderson’s Patented Fertiliser And Nail Bombs, before their hole went off the “taken” list and onto “no man’s land”. Meanwhile Maelcum shot the most senior-looking Carval leader through the left lung at three hundred meters, then lined up the tricky headshot on the one who seemed to do the most thinking, talking and gesturing at defensive weak spots. That one popped up to shout orders, so he took a round in the belly. The next shot went through his lowered head as he bent forward to clutch at the wound.

The organised assault turned into a wild, screaming charge. It was much like the first attack except that the nomads were coming for vengeance instead of entertainment. It did slightly better – the defenders were deprived of two bunkers that provided part of their crossfire. One of the Carval came flying off his horse, jammed a cap and ball revolver into a firing port, and ventilated the Vargr on the inside. He put another two rounds into Sir David, who was really glad he’d brought that flak vest because he got off with a couple of bruises.

In the farmyard, a grizzled rider waved a dirty yellow fur cap in a circle over his head and brought it down as if to spear the farmhouse door. Riders converged on the door and started trying to pry it open, to get inside the defences and into sword range. It was a two part door; as they got the top part open Fish sailed another nail bomb out into the yard. Yellow cap caught it, and aimed it straight into the farmhouse, over his fellows, with an exultant snarl.

It bounced once on the floor inside and skipped down the stairs into the infirmary. The explosion came a couple of seconds later.


----------



## TDRandall

Morte said:
			
		

> Yellow cap caught it, and aimed it straight into the farmhouse, over his fellows, with an exultant snarl.
> 
> It bounced once on the floor inside and skipped down the stairs into the infirmary. The explosion came a couple of seconds later.




OUCH what a twist!  I had pretty much written off the attackers as a lost cause when the bucket headed out, but now it seems back to hopeless for our fearless protagonists!  (If I'm picturing it all right)


----------



## Morte

... continued ...

The explosion was at floor height, in a corner, not quite under one of the infirmary cots, at the end of the row. It lifted the nearest patient half a meter, spraying blood and fur around the room, and dumped him on the floor. Splinters from the disintegrating cot joined the wave of concussion and improvised shrapnel as it spread. The second patient took shrapnel and splinter wounds that bled him to the point of heart failure in thirty seconds. The third was lucky, he only got a few minor cuts to add to his existing bullet wound. The fourth was not so lucky, a broken gear wheel hit his neck edge on. Luan, standing by the fifth cot, took wounds to her calves and feet. Her left Achilles tendon was neatly severed, but no major blood vessels went with it. She crumpled, wounded and stunned, and folded up on the dirt floor. By the time Sir David reached the cellar, leaping the last few steps and sprinting through the cloud of fine mud, she was bleeding from both ears.

…

Upstairs Fish heard the explosion from the cellar and swallowed hard. Great. Way to go. Just what they needed, a friendly fire incident with bombs. He picked up his next shrapnel canister and took a long look at the fuse; then he lit it and held on, biting his lip, before a final compulsive throw.

He got a textbook airburst over the farmyard, about 4 meters off the ground. The carnage was terrible. The yard went quiet for a moment, before the survivors gave a few faltering shouts and started to drift away.

…

In the cellar Sir David slowed to a halt, jaw hanging, eyes wild, and stared around. He began to sink to his knees, then staggered forward as he saw Luan. The world narrowed to a tunnel, darkening at the edges and muted as if underwater, as he lifted Luan’s head and stared at her unblinking eyes. Then he grabbed at her wrist to feel for a pulse. He found one, and the world started to come back together.

He set to work, with a high-tech medkit that he’d kept out of the hospital supplies.

…

Things went mostly quiet for a few hours, with some sniping back and forth. Luan was concussed, lame, deaf in both ears, and mostly unconscious. Silea and Fish had small wounds from splinters. Sir David owed his flak vest at least one life. A third of the defenders were dead along with a phenomenal number of the raiders.

Maelcum counted over a hundred Carval dead, and wondered if they would fade away or get it together for a last assault. If they did what they should have done in the first place – set fire to the farm buildings after dark – he didn’t see a way out of that. Best to forestall it then. He went to see Fish about an improvised flash hider for his rifle.

…

The last parley was about an hour before sunset. It was a different nomad who came, a woman and older, and Sir David thought this one might be a figure of authority. She wanted to talk to “the outdider” alone. Sarragh left them to it, with a scowl.

“You,” she snapped, “you do the impossible. With all this… this _fortification_ the mud-crawlers fight like a hundred riders. But we know how this will end, both of us. We will burn the farm, you will all die in the flames or be cut down outside, but it will cost us many riders to do this because you are here. You will have some plan, I know it. So go. Take the other outsiders, if yet they live, put them in a cart, get out of here. Leave the mud-crawlers to us. You do not need to burn with them. Well?” 

Sir David gave her a level stare, leaned forward to spit on the ground, and spun on his heel. The woman shrieked and rode off.

…

A few minutes after sunset Maelcum switched on his chameleon smock and oozed out of the farmhouse. The defenders lost sight of him before he cleared the perimeter. The besieging Carval never saw him at all, they just saw burning tents and panicked horses as he went to work on their encampments. He shot a couple of obvious leaders first, then wounded some horses to set them screaming and panic the rest. Twice wily veterans got a few men together and came looking for the sound of his rifle, which the confusion and the pre-arranged decoy fire from the farmstead could not entirely hide. Twice he shot those hunters as they peered through the fading light. The Carval were seasoned fighters but they knew nothing of adaptive chameleon smocks or II/IR optical gunsights, and serial headshots coming form nowhere disturbed them profoundly. Maelcum shot nine men with thirteen rounds, working to build a panic since that was the only way he might conceivably attack two hundred troops without calling in artillery. A trickle of nomads did begin to ride off into the night, but most still worked to bring the camp back under control.

They didn’t finally break until he took a chance and crept into a gap in the crowd to blow their powder store.

…

In the morning a grav APC completed de-orbit from Warne highport to disgorge a squad of mercs in combat armour. They fanned out, gauss rifles ready, deploying for a sweep-and-clear on the farmstead. A quick exchange of shouts persuaded them that it hadn’t fallen after all, and they didn’t need to retake it from the Carval. Jorjiak Miilaki, the Vargr landowner who’d hired the Avaricious in the first place, disembarked soon after. Even the humans present could read his horrified wonder.

…

Back on the highport that evening, the Avaricious took stock. Luan was in an autodoc at the residence of residence of Baron Marie Iskuulii having her eardrums and tendon regenerated under the supervision of a Marine medic; Sir David had pulled rank (noble and paramilitary) to get her in. They were all invited to dine with the Baron on the following evening cycle.

Jorjiak paid their fee and bonus. He wanted to give more, but all his liquid cash (some from freshly liquidated assets) had gone to paying the mercenary unit to moonlight from their day jobs on the orbital. So he gave them a validated letter that entitled them to guarantee loans of up to Cr300,000 against his lands. Then he went off to procure barbed wire.

The Carval were gone, headed into the wilderness.

The farmers were still there.


----------



## Morte

Man, writing is easy. You just stare at the screen until blood drips from your eyes. That big battle scene just didn't want to come. Maybe I'll speed up a bit, now it's done.

Maelcum levelled to 8 after that and somehow gained +3 to hit -- 1 for DEX going 17 to 18, 1 for BAB, and 1 for his Martial Training feat (+1 to hit every 4 levels) ticking up a notch. Freaky.

Next up, playing with trains.


----------



## Hawkshere

Thanks for working on this storyhour again!


----------



## TDRandall

Great stuff as always, Morte.  The side quest to the wild west was fun, but I'm looking forward to some spacey stuff again.

Wow, I gotta get me some of that chameleon stuff - what kind of hide benefits are on that thing?  Or is that Maelcum was already a ninja-in-training and just has the high enough technology to make it look like magic?


----------



## Burocrate

Thanks for the Story Hour "fix", I have been really feeling the craving since your last update.  Skills in Hide/Move Silently, Dex bonus and Chameleon bonus stacked against Vargr racial spot bonus, no Wis bonus (I would guess) and Spot ranks....and we see who ownes the night.


----------



## Morte

TDRandall said:
			
		

> Great stuff as always, Morte.  The side quest to the wild west was fun, but I'm looking forward to some spacey stuff again.




That should be along in due course.

One of my very favourite things about Traveller is the way you can go straight from TL0 planets where they think you're a god because you've got an electric torch to TL15 contragrav-cities floating in the sky, and all things in between. And there are always new challenges and new stories. It's a wonderful setting for campaign gaming.



> Wow, I gotta get me some of that chameleon stuff - what kind of hide benefits are on that thing?  Or is that Maelcum was already a ninja-in-training and just has the high enough technology to make it look like magic?




"This technology can be applied to any vac suit, combat environment suit, Combat Armor, or Battle Dress. It is designed to mimic the color, temperature, and shading of the wearer’s current physical environment, helping to render them difficult to track by both the naked eye and IR systems. First available at TL12, a more advanced version becomes available at TL14."

I saw no particular reason not to allow a chameleon smock -- Maelcum could have had it on his armour anyway. The book only gives it an AC bonus of +2 at Tl12 (cost Cr1000) and +4 at TL14 (Cr5000), but I figured it surely had to have a Hide bonus so I set it to +5 and +10 respectively.

[In my current T20 house rules armour gives damage reduction but no AC vs firearms, except Chameleon which gives AC but no damage reduction. I also raised base AC from 10 to 14, because otherwise there's not enough advantage in being a good shot.]

Maelcum was reasonably stealthy with Hide and Move Silently at 9, and he had the smock for Hide +5, and it was getting dark, and he'd arranged a noisy decoy. The Carval were all human, so Vargr ears and noses were all inside the farmstead siding with the PCs. So long as he kept his distance and moved cautiously (take 10) he wa almost invisible, and only had to get behind cover to lose anyone who spotted him. It was only when he fired, or steeled himself to move in and blow the powder store, that it got risky.

I cut the PCs a few favours on that battle, and had the Carval miss a couple of tricks, basically because I changed the script on the fly. In the published adventure the star mercs turn up earlier and rescue everybody (combat armour and Gauss rifles are all-powerful). But the party did so well preparing with their trenches and interlocking fields of fire and nail bombs etc that I thought they deserved to win on their own without being upstaged. I'd have liked to just drop the numbers on each side, but unfortunately I didn't decide this until after I'd said "several hundred nomads" out loud.


----------



## RainOfSteel

Morte,

I've been reading this SH, on and off, since I saw you mention it over on CotI about a year ago.

Tonight, I decided to finally read on and get through to the end.

The end.

What end?

Help!  There's no ending!

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhh!


----------



## Morte

*Act V: Kerin's Tyr - Railroad*

Date: 196-993 Imperial.
Location: Kerin’s Tyr (0620), Confederation of City-States, Unity Downport.

“You need the civil records office, sir. They’re responsible for archiving government information.”

…

“No, that’s not us I’m afraid. The starport keeps that. I think it’s the Office of the Starport Manager.”

…

“Oh yes, we collate those but we pass them on to the Bureau of External affairs with one of their tag numbers. You’d have to ask them what they do with them.”

…

“I’m afraid that information is confidential, sir. If we told people how we route incoming parcels, they could use it to send letter bombs. I’m sure you understand.”

_Sir David: Liaison-15 + 4 (Contact Specialist) + 2 (Negotiator) + 2 (Trustworthy) + 9 (roll) = 32_

“Well, I suppose it’s alright in this case. They’re kept on the parliament train sir, with all the other state documents and regalia and so on. It’s on its way to Katter at the moment, to mediate on a land dispute. You can get hold of them there, if you want to go after them.”

Fish was the first to say “Train?”

…

No air/rafts for hire. No aircraft going to Katter. No roads worthy of the name. “Well,” said Silea, “I wonder what the freshers are like on these trains.”

…

The train was rather splendid. It thundered mightily along the rails, until you got used to it and ignored the noise and shaking. Everything in first class was polished brass or waxed wood, set off by crystal glasses and starched linen. The freshers were tolerable. The Avaricious had a pretty good time, all told. There was good food, and lots of alcohol, and the entertainment could not be faulted.

The fun started when Sir David and Luan turned up to breakfast together, grinning and laughing and leaning on each other’s shoulder. Silea raised an eyebrow at Maelcum, and nodded across the table. He pursed his lips. Fish did a double take. Sir David and Luan managed to avoid kissing each other for all of fifteen seconds, then did so and turned great big grins on the rest of the crew.

“Here we go” said Maelcum.

“About time” said Silea.

“So are you two shagging?” asked Fish, putting on his best bewildered voice.

The table collapsed into laughter. Laughter is pretty incapacitating when you’re wearing a filter mask to keep the local pollens out.

…

On the second morning the train hauled itself through a mountain pass and headed down through forests along the rails that would eventually reach Katter. Everybody except Sir David and Luan noticed a certain sobriety in the air. A few of the other passengers in the first class breakfast car had decided to wear guns today. The waiters bustled a bit more and smiled a bit less.

Fish spoke to a mining engineer they’d befriended the previous evening. “Is there trouble in this part of the world? Everybody seems nervous.”

“Yep. The farmers are jumpy over a mining proposal. We want to build an open cast mine, and they seem to think we’re going to dig up the whole region instead of a square kilometre of it. Three or four farmers will get paid way over the odds for their land, a few hundred others will get free roads and so on, and they’re treating us like an invading army. Yokels. I think there’ve been demonstrations, with rocks thrown and so on.”

…


They reached Katter and walked over to the parliament train without trouble. After a few blank looks, the records pickup was smooth.

On the way back, an angry looking crowd of farmers with shotguns and (Fish later swore) pitchforks spotted their government cases and decided that they were Obviously The Wrong Sort. Various Yelling and Shaking of Fists ensued, followed by Ominous Advancing, but Maelcum hustled the Avaricious down an alley and dropped a smoke grenade in their wake. That was the end of it.

Soon they were back on a passenger train, with another two day ride ahead of them. Maelcum found it a bit dull, sitting in the club car on his own all day.


----------



## Morte

Sorry this has taken so long after I promised to speed up. I had a chest infection, then a campaign restart after a TPK, then another campaign restart with a different system after a semi-TPK, then a two week toothache. I'm now looking forward to root canal surgery on Monday.

It's all go, this SH writing...


----------



## Morte

*Act VI: Adukgin - Library Data*

*Adukgin 0722 B434431-A Ni 704 I A1 V*

Adukgin orbits a very hot, white, main sequence star along with four gas giants and several other rockballs. It’s not a particularly attractive world – it’s dry, with desert covering most of the surface and air that’s too thin to breathe without a compressor mask. Temperatures swing between tolerable at the poles and “way too hot” everywhere else. Most inhabitants live somewhere near the south pole, which is surrounded by an ocean belt containing most of Adukgin’s water.

The Adukgin system is the cluster’s connection point for J2 traffic to spinward, so the starport sees a fair volume of traffic. It has a minor orbital component, mostly for shuttle transfers, but most of the action is at the downport near the south pole. The downport startown of 40,000 is also world capital, and home to more than half the 70,000 population. The remainder mostly live in communities of a few hundred spread around the south. The only other major population centre is Grand Mine, a highly automated mineral extraction facility with 3,000 residents.

Politically, the world is run by a committee of managers from various institutions who co-opt new members of their own choosing. Whilst there is a certain bias to family and friends, appointments are mostly meritocratic and so government has been efficient. The inhabitants lead a fairly pleasant TL10 lifestyle.

The world did merit a small naval presence thanks to its strategic location, but this has been dispatched elsewhere since the Solomani Rim War began. There are no armed forces as such, but the customs authority runs a few cutters.

From a spacefarer’s point of view, Adukgin’s star wildlife is a small, scaly, burrowing creature known as the Graddin. These like to burrow their way into settlements or sneak aboard starships before chewing cables (a Graddin delicacy) and laying eggs in awkward places. The Graddin's bite is toxic to humans.


----------



## Morte

*Act VI Adukgin: Wham, Bam, Thank You Ma'am*

Date: 208-993 Imperial.
Location: Adukgin (0722).

“Right”, said Fish, “we want barbed wire and minefields all round the cargo hatch to keep the little buggers out. Shotguns all round. I don’t want those blasted things in my cables.”

“Perhaps I could arrange a few claymore mines…” Maelcum drawled. He steepled his fingers, innocently.

Silea rolled her eyes and put in “If you’re that worried, we can park the ship at the highport and take the shuttle down.”

The Avaricious had considered not trading at Adukgin at all, since there just weren’t many people to do business with. In a place like this, there was a good chance that a regular free trader would make less in a week than they’d pay on the mortgage. But Sir David’s part ownership and special finance cut their overheads, so they went for it.

Besides, them starport records could be slippery varmints and you never knew how long you’d be on planet hunting them down. Might as well use that time to hunt cargo.

…

It took about 10 minutes of comm calls from orbit to locate the starport records and get them shipped up to Avarice Rewarded. They were waiting on the highport when the ship docked.

It took 2 hours to unload 45 dtons of bulk freight from Kerin’s Tyr, most of it food.

It took about 3 days to sell the fancy hand-carved wooden furniture Luan had bought in the Confederation of City States on Kerin’s Tyr. All that time on the train had brought the local woodwork to her attention. It fetched a good price on this fairly rich, semi-desert world; but she was glad they hadn’t brought a hold full of the stuff because it would probably have taken weeks to sell.

Luan kept an eye on the starport commodity trading board to see if anything local was offered for sale. In the week they spent in system, the only offers were 80 dtons of old rope and 150 dtons of bulk plastic. Neither looked more profitable than freight, and neither lot would fit in the hold anyhow.

But they did pick up a pretty full hold of freight bound for Sentry, most of it split off from larger ships headed elsewhere. And they got some passengers, two for the low berths and two fresh victims for Sir David’s cooking.

…

Fish sat in the engine room on the run out to jump, throwing darts at a picture of a Graddin and looking smug.


----------



## TDRandall

I keep trying to think of something witty (or at least obnoxious) about "80 dtons of old rope and 150 dtons of bulk plastic".  There's got to be something good that you could do with that much twine and plastic but I guess I'm just tapped out.

Thanks for an update, Morte.  Gotta keep the universe spinning!


----------



## Shadowdancer

Yeah! A "Kursis Charter" update! We are living in Blessed Times.


----------



## RainOfSteel

Ooo!  As always, thank you, Morte, for your hard work.


----------



## Arrgh! Mark!

Morte, I hate you.

You made me go out and buy the Traveller book. 

You and your annoyingly good story. If only I could describe hard sci-fi.


----------



## Morte

*Act VII: The Pay Off - Sentry*

*Sentry 0921 B5A8ACB-D 410 I M4 V*

With 40 billion sophonts, Sentry is the economic and administrative heart of the Shanape Linkworlds Cluster. Marquis Hallentein, the local arbiter of interstellar affairs, dwells in a subterranean city on the small moon Luramii. The Marquis owns the moon outright and uses it as an administrative centre as well as a base for his small trading fleet.

Sentry has a powerful military presence, with both Imperial and planetary forces.

Sentry’s starport is huge, with a vast amount of traffic passing through. The orbital component also acts as a home to the Scout Service station maintaining the X-boat link. The downport sits on an island just off the main landmass, surrounded by a startown of five million sophonts. The starport proper has the customary low level of 3, whilst the surrounding island startown operates as a level 9 “interface zone” to the planet’s strict level 11 regulation.

Tukera Lines also have their own highport 180 degrees around the planet, which acts as their regional headquarters and a private shipping/repair hub.

Sentry is a small, cold world that’s 90% covered in water. The high level of nitrogen in the atmosphere has stopped much life evolving. The available land is largely covered by high-tech sealed cities that collectively house around four billion people. The other 90% of the population live in huge ocean floor arcologies, each home to a billion or more sophonts. Most citizens have no great need to leave their home arcology. When they do, they usually travel by submersible.

Strict laws govern Sentry’s highly ordered society. A system of guilds and professional bodies represent the populace’s interests to a World Senate, which answers to hereditary “Adjudicators”. The government has worked quite well, on the whole.

Although it’s not particularly focussed on production industries, Sentry’s sheer size and its technology level make it an industrial powerhouse exporting over several sectors. The university is a major research and teaching centre, particularly for aquatic engineering.

The rest of the solar system is heavily developed, with a naval base on one of Sentry’s moons and an industrial complex dominating another. Private outfits exploit the belt.


----------



## TDRandall

>>The Marquis owns the moon outright 

I want my own moon!  Now THERE is power and wealth!

This looks to be an excellent site if you want a Seaquest-like campaign.  Hmmmm - not much life has evolved -- but mayhaps those that did are all supersized kraken and narwhales to face-off against your "average" Nautilus submersible (besides all the situation headaches that 40 billion different opinions can generate)?

With 40 billion people, even if only a small percentage actually go anywhere I'd think there'd still be plenty of reasons to build a platform (perhaps several) for landing air/space/starships floating above each arcology, with umbilical-like elevator tubes to get people and cargo up and down.  I guess the thought of easy access by rowdy extraterrestrials to their pristine bubble cities is just not acceptable for them.  The snobs!


----------



## Morte

*Act VII: The Pay Off - Charter Complete*

Date: 217-993 to 219-993 Imperial.
Location: Sentry System (0921).

“Welcome to Sentry, Avarice Rewarded. Please proceed on transit vector sent via channel 237.”

“Roger Sentry, channel 237” Silea sent back.

“Look at all the blips. There are hundreds of them.” Luan gestured at the ship’s main situation map.

“We’re zoomed out, most of those are non-local. Sentry’s fancy, they’re relaying their overall traffic plot via the outer system buoys. Normally we’d be on our own sensors and we’d only see a fraction of that. Still, it’s a lot more ships than we’ve seen lately.”

Five minutes later, a great big pulsating blue blip appeared near the middle of the screen, pulsing with highlights, as event flags fired on a couple of other console displays. “That’s not small,” said Sir David, reaching for the telescope controls, “and it’s not far either.”

“One of the Marquis’s freightliners” Silea read from the transponder details. “Watch them rearrange the traffic for it. It’ll go in to his moon at one gee and everybody will divert around it. We’ll probably be running in front of it for a while, like a little fish fleeing an Orca.”

“Would you look at that. Ten thousand dee-tons. You could fit us in the cargo hold about thirty times over. You can actually see it.” Sir David got a lit pixel on the video feed from the 60cm telescope.

…

Avarice Rewarded proceeded towards orbital insertion at 2g, leaving the great freighter behind. They made turnover, listening to occasional comm chatter as ships within their sensor range groused about traffic control being all over the place today. After about twelve hours and a couple of watch changes, they got close enough to see shipping around Sentry on their own sensors as well as system traffic control relay.

Traffic control sent a matching orbit to bring the ship onto downport approach as their landing slot cleared, and they made de-orbit after a three-quarter circle of the planet.

Soon, they were sat on the plascrete waiting for customs. As the passengers disembarked up a docking tube, they were treated to a flyby from four SDBs on their way back from a long tour in the belt. They flew over the port slow and low, letting the watchers pick out hull details, then stood on their tails and headed for the navy base on the moon Yrech at 6g.

…

News of Cochrane’s Burden had preceded them. The unresisting ship’s destruction at the hands of the navy, with around fifteen civilian casualties, had been quite a story a month before and Luan’s impromptu news interview was well known.

The naval vessel responsible was long gone, off to the Solomani Rim at J4 to serve in the war. An official investigation order was headed after it. Sir David made some discrete enquiries, and got the word that the navy was taking it seriously. Luan decided she didn’t want to talk to the many reporters who obviously wanted to talk to her and stayed abroad. Sir David gave a brief interview, saying that he was sure the navy would investigate properly and do the right thing.

…

The ship got one last free refuelling courtesy of Kursis Mail LIC of Shanape, their employers on the charter mission to collect starport records from around the cluster.

The last of the records went into the high jump mail system, and Sir David took the receipts to the Hortalez et Cie office complex. Hortalez were local acting factors for Kursis. They were to make the final payoff for the starport records job, in the shape of a voucher paying for Avarice Rewarded’s refit at Fonneien Orbital. They were also, as it happened, the Shetland family’s bankers.

Sir David got his refit voucher without trouble. Then he went over the road for his second appointment, with the merchant bank.

…

“You’ve traded profitably on the slim pickings in the Linkworlds since our last loan, Sir David. What makes you want a second against this Jorjiak Miilaki’s lands?” The banker looked up from Avarice Rewarded’s accounts, which looked pretty good alongside the business plan from some months before.

“Two things. First I want to fit a fuel purifier, which will greatly  improve our profitability. So far we’ve had free fuel courtesy of Kursis, but from now on buying unrefined will save us about sixteen thousands credits per jump. Secondly, I want to stake a speculative mission in the cluster. If it succeeds, it should be quite lucrative. If it fails… Well, you’ve seen that I have the profitability to pay off the second loan.”

“And this speculative mission is…”

“Confidential” Sir David confirmed.

“Well, confidential usually costs about four percent extra. Since we know you, and since it’s secured, we might shave a little. The next loans committee meeting is this afternoon, we should have an offer for you by sixteen hundred. I take it you want an early repayment option?”

“Yes, indeed.”

Sir David headed back to the ship. On his way back he stopped at the Spacers’ Guild office, then at a milliner’s shop.

…

In the end they got their loan at four percent, three over base and two over commercial, a little cheaper than a standard ship mortgage. 

“So it’s on, then?” said Fish as they heard the news over dinner.

“Yes, we’re going for it. Time to go flying around in gas giants again. Oh, and speaking of flying around…” Sir David reached under his seat and brought out a flat square box, wrapped in deep blue silk. He handed it across the table to a surprised looking Silea. Fish deftly lifted her bowl away so she could set it down and open it, then mimed eating the (non-existent) remains of her dessert once she was so engaged. Off came the silk, then the lid, then the tissue, and out came… a hat, blue and white, with a peak and a certain amount of gold braid.

“Congratulations, First Officer Crossflow” said Sir David in a “public occasion” sort of voice. “I sorted you out with the Spacers’ Guild this morning. There’s a fancy certificate too.”

“Make sure he gives you a pay rise” said Fish, gesturing with his spoon for emphasis.

…

The next morning, they jumped for 069-526 to refit at Fonnein Orbital.


----------



## Morte

*Act VII: The Pay Off - Fitting Out*

Date: 227-993 to 258-993 Imperial.
Location: 069-526 System (0721).

They reached the shipyard at Fonnein Orbital about eleven days late, mostly thanks to the runaround and delays at Kerin’s Tyr, and missed their booking. “I guess we shouldn’t have traded at Adukgin after all”, Luan shrugged.

But the yard cleared a slot after a few days, and work got started. The ship sat in the berth for an overhaul and systems check on Kursis’s ticket. Sir David paid for a small (2 dton) fuel purifier that could turn assorted gloop into a full load of liquid hydrogen in about sixteen hours. And the phased array radar under the bow got a second set of transducers and a processor upgrade, for better discrimination in visible-opaque gas.

The Avaricious bought drinks for a few miners from the Sternmetal operation at the rockball world Estoril, learning the best places to shop for environment suits. They bought one more used suit to add to the two they’d taken off Malfeasant’s dead crew, and had all of them adjusted and checked over.

They also picked up a couple of shock rods, like the ones Malfeasant had had ready. Nobody was quite sure what they were for, but they were cheap and Malfeasant had obviously thought they were important.

On the morning of 258-993 Avarice Rewarded came back from her test cruise around local space, and berthed in the yard for final checks. The SPA inspector gave her a clean bill of health. Stores and unrefined fuel came aboard. The fuel purifier ran a top up, and Sir David declared the ship ready for space in the log. First Officer Silea Crossflow concurred.

“Right, let’s do it”.

They headed out for jump to Kleister Beta, the far system’s binary companion, and their planned rendezvous with the abandoned ship Vraidercalt.


----------



## Morte

OK, we're in the final session, I can see the light at the end of the tunnel...


----------



## Morte

*Act VII: The Pay Off - Kleister Beta*

Date: 266-993 to 269-993 Imperial.
Location: Kleister Beta (uninhabited far binary companion white dwarf), 069-526 System (0721).

“Right, we’re into polar mapping orbit. Scans ready?” Silea shot a glance at Sir David.

“They’re working away. The system should squawk when it finds something. I’ll watch it for a while, make sure it’s tuned right.”

“OK, I’m going for a kip. I think Maelcum’s next on comm watch.”

…

Maelcum looked out at the lonely gas giant, known as Lisiik Gara, and compared it to the one that hung over Liar’s Oath. “It’s pretty calm compared to home. Most of the storms are just big enough to lose a planet in. You couldn’t get the moons in with them.”

“If you want storms, the sensor log’s got some real biggies” replied Sir David.

…

“We got a ping. There’s something dense on radar down there.”

It was two and a half days into the search, two thirds of the way around the planet, and Fish was doing a turn on the bridge when the sensors triggered their alert. The rest of the Avaricious joined him quickly, Sir David taking the sensor console.

“That pings like superdense. It’s a ship hull.”

“How big is it?” Fish asked.

“Pretty big. Bigger than us. Hard to say without characterising the gas for radar absorption. But it’s of the right order for Vraidercalt, certainly.

“And how deep?”

“Deeper than we’d skim, but we can operate down there if we fly slowly.”

“We’ll have to treat it as atmospheric flight rather than vacuum ballistics” mused Silea. “It’s on the equator, so it’s probably on an equatorial flight path. So we’re crossing that path at right angles. If we can plot its vector on this pass, I’ll set up an approach for the next time around.” Silea was already playing with wire frame orbital projections on the astrogation suite.

…

Four hours later they were ready to dive into the gas.

“There’s some mucky weather coming” said Sir David, looking at his plots. “But it should pass us by unless it veers.”

“Alright, lets go have a look. You folks prepare for boarding.” Silea hit “go” on her de-orbit program and the Avarice Rewarded, which was flying upside down for better sensor visibility, arced in towards the dim blue gas giant.

They picked up a transponder signal halfway in. “It’s definitely Vraidercalt”, Silea sent over the ship’s comm, “and it’s got enough power for a transponder.”

…

Avarice Rewarded closed within a kilometre of the abandoned ship. Fish and Maelcum got ready at the airlock in their heavy environment suits and other boarding gear. Sir David clomped back to the bridge to finesse the sensors. Luan put her normal suit on, minus helmet and gloves, and set up med lab. Silea made minute corrections in the shifting winds.

“Let’s see if this thing works.” Sir David fired up their upgraded phased array radar and got a picture of the Vraidercalt, which was still invisible to the eye. He spoke a running commentary to the rest of the crew.

“Affirmative, picture is clean and clear, unlike the Malfeasant… I can see combat damage on the hull. Must be from the pirate attack before they misjumped. I’ve also got a wobble, looks like their contragrav is not too stable. OK, Silea, let’s do that ring around it…”

“Loading bay on this side looks undamaged, but we’ll have to go EVA for that. Over the top we go… There’s a dorsal airlock. Geometry is OK, we could dock to that. The bay for the launch is empty; there’s probably an intact airlock in there but it’s another EVA job. Other side now… Oh, that looks nasty. Big hole in the lower port side. I’ve no idea what made that. Underneath… Well. Now that’s downright weird. You got any ideas on that Silea?”

“No. It’s like something dissolved the bottom of the ship.”

“I hope that’s not where the loot was” Fish muttered to Maelcum.

“Let’s come back around to the top and dock” Sir David decided. “Are you OK with that, Silea?”

Silea eyed the 1000 dtons of wobbly freighter, and said “let’s do this nice and slow.”

…

* CLUNK *

“We’re docked. Attitude thrusters are moving us in time with Vraidercalt. Hang onto your lunch when you get through that airlock, guys, the deckplates may not be working on the other side.”

Sir David made his way back to the airlock. The expedition team checked all their suit seals and cracked the hatch.


----------



## linnorm

Yay!


----------



## TDRandall

More great updates, Morte.  You sure have picked up the pacing quite a bit.  Which is fine, but I did chuckle when you went to warp speed (er, stutterwarp?) with this bit:



Silea eyed the 1000 dtons of wobbly freighter, and said “let’s do this nice and slow.”

* CLUNK *

“We’re docked."


----------



## Morte

*Act VII: The Pay Off - Vraidercalt*

Date: 269-993 Imperial.
Location: abandoned freighter Vraidercalt, Kleister Beta (uninhabited far binary companion white dwarf), 069-526 System (0721).

“For a place with artificial ‘gravity’, it sure is hard to stay on the ground.” Maelcum enjoyed a rare opportunity to bitch instead of acting unperturbed in front of the troops.

Vraidercalt’s contragravity system, which was meant to null the 4.7g external pull of the gas giant below, was fluctuating between 4.4 and 4.7g every 20 seconds. Meanwhile the ship’s deckplate box, which should set 1g internally and compensate for pull from manoeuvres, was dead altogether. So the Avaricious were moving around in the fluctuating 0-0.3g from the planet that made it through contragrav. And the whole ship was bumping around in time with the turbulent atmosphere, with no deckplates to cancel the motion.

“I never liked gravity” said Fish. “I usually wish somebody would uninvent it. But an extra half gee would be quite handy right now.”

“I shouldn’t have made chilli” said Sir David.

…

They were on the upper deck of three, which appeared to hold crew quarters and ship systems plus a galley and canteen. Junk lay around like a hurricane had recently been through, though there was thankfully no hurricane – not on this deck, at least. The red emergency lighting was still working, augmented by their torches and helmet beams which jolted around in time with the motion. The lights mixed eerily in the blue gas.

The plan was to take a look round the ship, identify priority salvage, and then return to Avarice Rewarded for trolleys etc. They’d also evaluate the possibility of salvaging the whole ship at a later date.

“First, the bridge” Sir David declared. “Let’s see if we can get a log, or a cargo manifest, or a deck plan.” He pointed to his left “It should be that way.”

They passed the canteen. “Oh man, that’s weird” said Maelcum, as a fore-aft lurch synched with a contragrav peak and a set of loose knives and forks flew past his faceplate.

The team moved on, and didn’t see the cutlery fly back the other way a minute later.

…

“OK, you’re the spacers. So tell me why there’s a big hole with wavy edges in that door.” Maelcum spoke first as the trio faced the armoured, anti-hijack door to Vraidercalt’s bridge.

“And why does it show smooth edges, no impact deformation, and no surrounding paint bubbles from conducted heat?” Fish got down on his knees to peer at it.

“Any claw or teeth marks?” asked Sir David.

“No, of course there aren’t any claw or…”

“Well, it’s not giant space hamsters then. Can you squeeze through it and get the door opened from the other side, instead of spending twenty minutes overriding security?”

…

Fish opened the bridge door from inside and waved the others in. “Now this place is really creepy” he said.

Vraidercalt’s bridge was capacious, with six consoles plus a conference table, fresher and drinks machine. The fittings looked soft, almost ghostly in the red lighting and blue mist. They jumped out hard and sharp as the team played their white lights around.

It only took a few seconds to find the first body parts. A minute later, they’d spotted quite a few, mostly wedged in corners or under chairs. They added up to about one person, but they came from three or four original owners. Fish did a lot of hard swallowing and said “This is not good.”

Maelcum looked things over. The remains were down to bones and scraps of flesh, ligament or clothing. “I think they died before they were cut up. Their hearts must have stopped, there’s not much blood around. Or maybe it evaporated at this pressure…”

“Am I imagining it, or is that hand holding an electric carving knife?” Sir David put in.

“Yes,” said Maelcum, and the blade has sort of melted. Look at this, Fish.”

Fish gave Maelcum an evil look and came over to get a better look at the severed arm. “That’s an acid or solvent splash. Something sprayed a powerful solvent around here.” He stood up, and turned to face the other two.

“We’ve got critters here, haven’t we.”

There was a general readying of weapons.

…

Fish had a go at the computer and control systems, and found insufficient power to do anything. Sir David went looking for visible clues and found a set of neatly framed deckplans for Vraidercalt decorating one wall. Maelcum watched the hole in the door.

Sir David studied his deckplan. “There’s a secure area off the main cargo hold on the lower deck, at the aft end, beside the engineering space. I think that’s us.”

Fish came and looked. “Yeah. The cargo bay could be jammed with cargo, and it might have shifted. Also there was that big hole we saw from outside. Why don’t we drop a level and walk aft along the passenger deck, so we’ll get a look at that, then drop again and we should be at the rear end of the hold.”

“Let’s do it.”

…

Another deck, another corridor. This one was a relatively empty, long corridor between long rows of passenger staterooms. They winched a few doors open and found the staterooms empty, with no signs of passengers. Apparently Vraidercalt had not found many passengers on its last voyage. At the aft end they found opposing large doors with signs reading “Low Passage” and “Gymnasium”.

There was nothing of note in the gym.

“I suppose we ought to check.” Fish hooked a thumb at the low passage area and they went in. It was filled with rows of low berths, the vertically oriented type. Most of them were empty but there was a cluster of six that contained humans… …or parts of them. Four looked like they’d been eaten away, eroded, or as Fish put it “as if they were made of chocolate and somebody poured a vat of boiling water on them.” It was pretty much like the damage on the bridge.

The other two looked intact, and their indicators said they were functional and contained live sophonts.

“Uh oh,” said Maelcum, “I thought that log said they got everybody who was alive into the launch. Looks like somebody lied.”

Sir David asked “Fish, can we power those back on the ship?” 

Fish played his torch over a few power connectors, throwing bizarre shadows. “Yeah, no problem. I can get the tools to uncouple them when we go back for the cargo sled.”

“I’ll warn Luan they’re coming then. We’ll take them back later.”

…

They came to the bulkhead door that isolated the stairs and lift shaft. Fish eyed it carefully. “It looks sealed. With the breach on the lower hull, we might start a gale when I open this. I’m going to pop the needle valve first.” He opened a small valve by the door, which was there to check for smoke or unequal pressure on the other side. He shone his torch across the valve, looking for turbulence. “No gas flow. Opening her up.” The door dilated. 

“Right, let’s have a look at that secure cargo store”. Sir David rubbed his hands together and stepped through the hatch onto a steel mesh spiral staircase, where a cross between a giant jellyfish and a cloud darted down from above and tried to swallow his head. It whipped tendrils down to lash at him, incidentally clipping the doorframe and leaving a smoking gouge about 1cm deep. Fortunately, his Cr 140,000 hostile environment suit was made of sterner stuff. The tendrils only left surface abrasions.

Maelcum was first to react, raising his shotgun and pumping a couple of rounds over Sir David’s head. He calmly reported the contact back to Avarice Rewarded between shots.

Sir David started to move, then saw Fish pointing a gun over his head and stood very still. Fish got one useful shot off. Like Maelcum’s, it punched a tight hole through the cloud creature and tore the covering off the wall behind it. The effect on their new enemy was about the same – not much. Diaphanous flesh (for want of a better term) closed over the holes in its midriff, while the creature’s business end finished swallowing Sir David’s head. A ring of very scary green liquid slid down his neck towards the seal, raising a wall of steam as it tried to cut through the suit.

A stray tendril whipped out and took the tip off Fish’s shotgun barrel. Maelcum took two paces backwards. “Everybody stand still” he said over comm, in a voice that brooked no argument.

There were three darker green nodes in the mass of cloud over Sir David. Each was about the size of a fist. None were stationary. Maelcum took slow aimed shots, leaning into his shotgun as the gravity waned on its 20 second cycle. The first and fourth hit nodes, and when the second node went the cloud suddenly decided it wanted to be somewhere else. Maelcum barked “David, step out. Fish, close the bulkhead and then reload.” He reloaded his own shotgun.

By the time Sir David was through the door Maelcum had a suit diagnostic and repair kit out. “Let’s have a look at you” he said, plugging in a probe.

“Well, that’ll be what the shock prods were for then” said Fish.

“Oh, _that’s_ it” groaned Sir David.

“We’ll go back and get them once I’m sure you’re not going to leak” said Maelcum. “Then we can finish this.”


----------



## Morte

*Act VII: The Pay Off - All Over Bar The Looting*

Date: 269-993 Imperial.
Location: abandoned freighter Vraidercalt, Kleister Beta (uninhabited far binary companion white dwarf), 069-526 System (0721).

The clouds didn’t like electric shocks one bit. They didn’t like being sprayed with a paint gun loaded with bleach from the cupboard under the sink in the galley, either. The alkali pretty much exploded on contact.

The avaricious met three more of the creatures, driving two away and dropping a third to the deck. As they examined the body, it seemed to regenerate. Maelcum fairly shredded it to make it stay dead.

And then they were through the last door into the cargo bay, on the bottom deck. It still seemed in fairly good order – the cargo was all in standard 4 dton shipping containers, and they were properly bolted down. There was some wind gusting around, presumably from the hull breach which was out of sight behind containers, but not the hurricane they’d feared.

Everybody clipped on a safety line (and hoped the clouds didn’t eat it) as they made the short transit to the secure hold. Fish opened it with thermite bricks and extreme prejudice.

“Property of Ling Standard Products. Machine tools. Precision equipment. Handle with care.” Sir David read the stencils off the stack of completely non-standard boxes that filled most of the room.

“Is that valuable?” asked Maelcum.

Fish walked up for a closer look. “It is when it’s assembly and test rigs for their current model anti-gravity nodules. They’d be worth a fair bit to Ling.”

“And a lot more to their competitors” added Sir David.

They loaded the first few boxes on a trolley and headed back.

…

It took four trips and about forty minutes to get the boxes out of the hold, up the stairs, and onto Avarice Rewarded. Two clouds hit them on the stairs on the third trip, a near-perfect ambush while they had their hands full, and they lost one box. Everybody thought the ambush was a bit clever for gas-dwelling jellyfish, but nobody wanted to say the word “intelligent” aloud.

Then they back went to the bridge and blew the safe in the captain’s office, recovering the holocrystal which held the captain’s log. The eighty thousand credits in cash and assorted passenger jewellery were, of course, incidental.

Sir David recapped the remainder of the plan. “Alright, next we get those low berths off. Then we can go and start stripping fittings. We’ll do the computer and the turrets first, then survey the power plant and drives in case it’s worth bringing a proper salvage vessel back for something. I don’t think this hull is going to be worth the cost of recovering it.”

…

Fish was hanging upside down from the strut work around the low berths, while the others kept guard. He yanked on a wrench and complained “These bolts go on forever. Anybody would think they’re supposed to hold the thing in place.”

“Could you use another thermite brick?” asked Maelcum.

“I’m not sure how well it will mix with a freezer system. Besides, I’ve only got four left and we might find another safe that needs…”

“Bridge to away team, we have a contact. Do you copy?” Silea’s voice broke through on comm.

“Go ahead” replied Sir David.

“It’s just broken out of that storm that was passing and it’s coming right at us. It’s big but faint. The other sensors don’t work in the gas.”

“How big is ‘big’?”

“Ten to fifteen kilometres across. It dopplers, like it’s not quite making a constant speed.”

“That’s the big granddaddy cloud,” Maelcum cut in.

“How long do we have, Silea?” asked Sir David.

“About twenty minutes.”

Fish pushed himself away from the back of the low berths, looked at the other two, and said “so it’s thermite time after all?”

He got very busy.

…

“Lock sealed” yelled Sir David as he pushed the second low berth into the corridor and went slamming into the far wall with it.

“Undocking.” Silea’s voice came back, followed by a minute lurch. “Mains in five, four, three, two, one, we’re go. Pulling away, two gee. OK, you’ve got ninety seconds to come to the bridge and watch that thing swallow Vraidercalt. Or chase us.”

“Record it for me” panted Fish, who was lying flat on his back in the corridor with his suit oxygen turned up, “I’ll get my breath back first.”

…

Silea put them into a fast orbit. The next time they came around, Vraidercalt was gone.


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## Morte

*Act VII: The Pay Off - Onward Bound*

Date: 283-993 Imperial.
Location: a nice restaurant, Sentry System (0921).

Six days on Sentry, back from the salvage, and it was time to touch base with each other. The swapped stories and laughter over dinner, and then it was time for business. Luan reeled off the figures.

“We sold the machine tools back to Ling in the end. They offered 15,000 a box and a 20,000 exclusivity fee, if we swore an affidavit saying that last box was destroyed during the salvage. We got them up to 17,000 for the boxes. So that’s 411,000 for the boxes, plus 91,000 in cash and sundries. Take off 8,000 for suit repairs, 18,000 lost reselling the two suits we bought for the salvage, and 1,000 in legal costs. The gross was 485,000.”

“We agreed on 50% to the ship and split the rest between us, so we’re all 48,500 richer.”

“And the ship’s part pays for the fuel purifier…” put in Sir David.

“… leaving a decent trading fund in place for continued business” finished Luan.

Everybody nodded and smiled. It was a fraction better than they’d reckoned on the way home.

…

“So, are you two going to spend it how you thought?” Sir David looked at Silea and the Fish.

“Yes,” said Silea. “It’s Daramm for us. We’ll get the gene splicing and I’ll put a few ova in the freezer. Then off to my family – who’re down to twenty-five or so at the moment – and I’ll bear the first child, or maybe two.”

“Sorry to leave you without the crew…” started Fish.

“No worries,” said Sir David. “I can fly Avarice Rewarded if I stick to easy stuff, and Sentry’s so busy I’m sure we can hire an engineer. I met this Ursa from Rising who might be interested…”

…

“And what about you two?” Silea looked back at Luan and Sir David.

“Well,” said Sir David as he took hold of Luan’s hand on the table and shot her a smile, “Luan did say she wanted to see sunrise on Gateway Station. It seems like as good a direction to trade in as any. We can get there in a year, near enough.”

“We’ll need good security, of course, out there in the wilds beyond the empire.” Luan gestured at Maelcum with her other hand. “I wonder if a certain Major Maelcum Rivers is available?”

Maelcum took a sip from his drink. “I think the Star-Merc business can wait a couple of years, Miss Derhayenne.”

“I was hoping you’d say that. Well, I think that’s in the bag.” Sir David stood, and raised his glass.

“To Avarice, which has Rewarded us with love and children and more stars to wander.”



THE END​


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## Mishihari Lord

I've enjoyed your story hour.  Thanks for the ride.

Any chance you'll do another T20?


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## linnorm

I'm sad to see it go, but it was a fun ride.

Thanks for the story,


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## Burocrate

*The End*

Wonderful ride indeed!  Was there talk of a .pdf complete story version?  Thanks for sharing either way.


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## Shadowdancer

Nice one. Thanks for the tale.


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