Into the Black

Once we were back on the ship Kiki settled right into one of the guest cabins, and, after checking out the fabber we had on board, made suggestions for things we would need in order to set up a decent shop for her. Since I still needed to upgrade the medical and training facilities on board as well, that meant we needed to get back to work making money.

So we left Kiki on the ship to start getting her bunk the way she liked it (Raven was keeping an eye on her, and had locked down all systems) and headed down to the shuttle. There was a large mountain range that acted like a wall around the ‘civilized’ areas of kisArra, at the poles, and smugglers and ne’er do wells had a couple meeting spots to recruit workers, trade goods, or set up jobs. Of course, their main base wasn’t anywhere so close to the authorities. They went and put THAT at the other end of the planet, down in the Southern polar region.

But for the moment, we were still in the Northern area, because that’s where most of the people (and therefore jobs) were. Walking into the trading post that, most disappointingly, didn’t have a bar or other place for people to sit and relax (that’s why we were in town instead of coming here directly, after all), I removed my mask so I could speak with one of the clerks, and turn in the quests we’d completed, hunting down a couple groups of Freemen bandits that had been attacking one particular smuggler’s operations relentlessly. That netted us a decent 40k credits. Not enough to write home about, but it was good for rep building with the smugglers, which opened up better-paying jobs.

Possible Distress

SND-C4AWL3R Mobile Harvester TX-1138 has lost communication. Go to the Harvester’s last known location to determine the cause of the failure, and resolve the issue.

Rank

C

Success

Find the Mobile Harvester.

Restore Communications.

Failure

Do not find the Harvester.

Payment

50000 Credits

Teach Sana Olona a Lesson

Sana Olona is the leader of a group of raiders that has been plaguing the smuggler harvesters for months now. She’s also been plaguing the ‘official’ harvesters, so they have a substantial bounty out on her, in addition to our payment.

Bonus: If you wish, a slave collar will be provided which you can use to capture Sana instead of kill her. If she is captured and enslaved, the Smuggler’s Alliance will be glad to discuss extra dispensation for the purchase or lease of the slave.

Rank

B

Success

Kill or Capture Sana Olona.

Failure

Do not kill or capture Sana Olona.

Payment

200000 Credits + Bounty

Bonus: Negotiate with Alliance if Sana Olona is enslaved.

‘Contract’ Worker Delivery

A fresh set of workers under strict contract to the Smuggler’s Alliance (the kind that comes with Defiance collars), is set to deploy to Mobile Harvester SG-1983. These workers are joined by an overseer who is replacing his predecessor, who is to be forcibly retired after failing to meet quotas.

Rank

D

Success

Deliver the workers and overseer to the Harvester.

Failure

Fail to deliver the workers and overseer to the Harvester.

Payment

25000 Credits

Hidden

Spice Run to Jagloth

Ten crates of angeMel spice (valued at 6.8 million credits) needs to get to the planet Jagloth, currently under blockade by Confederate forces due to a local matter. Run the blockade, and get the Spice to Katar Greynore at the Spriteshack Industries headquarters in Jagloth City.

Rank

A

Success

Deliver the Spice.

Failure

Fail to deliver the Spice. (Will result default payment of 50% of the value of the Spice. If done willfully, will also result in a bounty equal to the value of the shipment placed on your head, and all criminal organizations in Confederation space will see you as unreliable, and refuse to work with you without holding one of your slaves as collateral.)

Payment

5 million credits

Increased Reputation with criminals in Confederate space

20% lifetime discount from Spriteshack Industries for goods and services.

The ‘contract’ worker job was small time, as far as the pay, but it was on the way to the Harvester he was supposed to locate, so this wasn’t a bad deal. Plus, the ‘Hidden’ reward was intriguing. Naturally, the big kicker was the smuggling run to Jagloth. It was a system located between here and the core worlds of the Confederation, so he was happy to be leaning in that direction.

angeMel Spice was perhaps the most precious commodity in the universe, according to those who used it. It was pretty damn useful, if you could arrange for a constant supply of the stuff. A dose of the stuff would temporarily boost intellect and reduce the cost of psy powers. Used regularly, you could improve overall health and greatly expand your natural lifespan. Things got freaky when you were addicted to it, however.

Addicts of any substance were unpredictable, at best. angeMel addicts were worse. Their behavior wasn’t that hard to predict, but their abilities were. Some would get prophetic visions (don’t ask me how that worked in a game). Others would have their mental abilities (both intellect and psy powers) permanently expanded. That often came with physical mutations. So they were super-powered freaks that lived practically forever unless killed.

But addicts were all the same in that they needed to keep taking the source of their addiction in order to keep the benefits. Low-level addicts could get by with Spice-laced drinks at regular intervals (usually once a day, plus whenever they needed a ‘boost’) that would stain their lips as a mark of their addiction. The really high level addicts had to breathe the Spice constantly, and were kept in tanks filled with Spice-laced air that would probably kill anyone else who breathed it, if they didn’t change first.

The Spice was only found here on kisArra, and no one knew where the hell it came from. Of course, most people didn’t really care enough to find out, and the ones that did were more concerned with finding a way to synthesize it. See, the further you got from kisArra, the more expensive the Spice became, so that by the time you got to the halls of power, like the Imperial Palace on Earth or the Confederation Senate on Diymia, the stuff cost so much that only the truly wealthy could afford more than the slightest doses used to extend life. And even they could not afford the true levels of addiction. Well, other than the ones who were subsidized by the state, of course. The ‘increased mental powers’ thing was really quite sought after by those who valued strategy and manipulating their opponents, or those who valued keeping their opponents from doing the same to them.

Anyways, we picked up our overseer and his slaves contract workers, and loaded them into the shuttle. Slavery was legal in Confederation space, but the slave trade was illegal, unless you were going through a properly licensed Slaver’s Guild representative. 99.9% of all ‘legally’ enslaved people in the Confederation were criminals enslaved for their crimes, or people who were forced into slavery due to debts or breach of contract. That last 0.1% were voluntary enslavements, and usually knew their new Master beforehand. Of course, where there was regulation, there were criminals looking to skirt it for profit. Calling the slaves ‘contract workers’ was a polite fiction.

Nothing I could do about that, though. There were some things that were bigger than what any one man and his band of beauties could handle. All I could do was protect me and mine, and make sure that, at the end of the day, we came out on top. Which meant I didn’t have much say in what happened to the poor saps that got shanghaied into working on the Harvester.

We headed off to make the delivery first. I didn’t want dead weight when I was busy trying to find out what the hell happened to a missing Harvester.

A Harvester is basically a two-part thing. You have a massive aircraft that carries the part that does the actual harvesting around, and basically circles around when that’s not happening. Then you have the harvester itself, a big, dome shaped structure that crawls its way across the sand, scooping up the desert, filtering out the Spice, and throwing the sand out. Usually has a crew of six and one overseer, with another two stationed on the flyer.

We landed the shuttle about fifteen meters from the harvester’s main hatch. I needed to see the workers through the door to receive payment, so I left the shuttle with the overseer and his replacements (five men). The hatch opened for us, letting out that lovely smell of air that’s been through filters too many times, and the filters aren’t catching everything anymore.

Nyna Thelynn

Knelfi Female

Level 20

Titles: Mechanic, Pilot, Overseer

The Knelfi woman in charge looked up at us as we walked into the room, her eyes brightening as she saw the new workers. “Oh thank the gods! We’ve been short-staffed since that damn Freemen raid last month! We lost five workers before we beat the bastards back, but that left us with only two to run the harvester and two for the flyer, while running triple shifts! We’ve been dead on our feet, and all anyone’s said is to meet the damn quotas, even if they won’t give me what I need to make it happen!”

Her tirade continued on for a while, until the new overseer eventually got tired of it all, and said, “Well, Nyna, you’re in luck. The ‘front office’ has heard your repeated complaints about the situation, and they sent me here to take care of the situation. As you can see, I brought replacements to bring this harvester back to a full crew, and we’ll be meeting the quotas again very soon.”

“Unfortunately, your incompetence at allowing the raiders to damage ‘company’ property and your failure to meet your quotas has earned you a black mark in your file. Sad to say, but you’re no longer the Overseer for Harvester SG-1983. Instead, you’ve been reassigned, as per the clause in your contract about failing to live up to your responsibilities as Overseer.”

The knelfi woman looked at the overseer in dismay, then in fear. She started to scream as two of the new workers grabbed her arms, and held her still so that the Overseer could slap a slave collar on her neck. Those screams were choked off when the Overseer hit a control on his bracer, and suddenly the woman… not relaxed, but went perfectly still, looking forward glassy eyed for a moment, before shifting into a more sensual pose. With a sultry voice, she asked, “What can this slave do for you, Master?”

The Overseer grinned, and then turned to me, offering his hand. “Thanks for the lift. We needed this done quick to keep production up. Too much demand, and the raids have been getting worse. Fortunately, this new batch actually knows how to use a weapon. Anyways, here’s your credits, and I’ve been authorized to give you a bonus, since you did quick work, and are going to keep your mouth shut about the whole thing.”

When I shook his hand, I saw that ownership of the new slave had been passed to me.

‘Contract’ Worker Delivery

A fresh set of workers under strict contract to the Smuggler’s Alliance (the kind that comes with Defiance collars), is set to deploy to Mobile Harvester SG-1983. These workers are joined by an overseer who is replacing his predecessor, who is to be forcibly retired after failing to meet quotas.

You delivered the workers and the overseer to the Harvester, and you were rewarded not only with the promised credits, but with ownership of the former Overseer of the Harvester who was ‘retired’ and enslaved in front of you.

Rank

D

Success

Deliver the workers and overseer to the Harvester.

Failure

Fail to deliver the workers and overseer to the Harvester.

Payment

25000 Credits

Nyna Thelynn

Nyna Thelynn

Knelfi Female

Level 20

Titles: Mechanic, Pilot, Slave, Stepford

I shook my head at the former overseer become slave. "Always read the fine print."