.

At the Estra Harbormaster’s Office

The Harbormaster was an overweight human in mis-matched Chinese style silks. He attempted to extort an exhorbitant fee for landing.  Bletherin negotiated a more reasonable rate with “genuine Chinese cheese.” He then asked what the Bad Wolf was looking to purchase.  Bletherin replied that being their first trip to Estra, they were looking to see what was available, but were interested in more exotic cargo.  The Harbormaster provided a map of the public areas of the station, and recommended The Exchange, which was a bar.  He also provided a schedule of shuttles to the planet. Bletherin, Grendel and Alex went to The Exchange.  Grrr and Kovak went to a strip club.

At the Exchange

The bar was full of questionable characters who were clearly the traders of one sort or another.  The hostess was unsure what kind of menu to give to Grendel.  They took seats at the bar.  There was a cat-like being sitting at one end sipping tea. She looked at them and looked away.  An overweight Antari, quite unusual, sat at the barstool next to Bletherin.  He ordered an Antari cocktail and engaged Bletherin in conversation.

The Antari was looking for news about the “trouble” on Echrar. Alex searched the database and fed Bletherin all the details.  It was an Antari colony that had a bloody coup and was now being supressed by the Antari government.  Bletherin told him that the coup was likely to fail, but if the cargo could get there quick enough, there might be a credit to be made.  He told the Antari they were looking for special cargo.  

“The kind that talks or the kind that make people talk funny.”  

Bletherin said he would be interested in the most profitable kind.

The Antari told him that there was a House Horusca representative on the station an they there were looking for a newcomer to collect a special cargo for them.  After a drink he left.  The cat-being advised them to be careful and bargain from a strong position or their profits would be negotiated away.  The current representative was a cold human female who drove a hard bargain and had a number of human muscle with her.

In exchange, Bletherin shared stories he had heard during his career, presenting them as if they had happened to him.

At the Club

The club was a dive.  A male human stripper was dancing. Kovak admired the dancer. It appeared to be the start of a shift. Grrr noted a pair of Harth having an animated conversation and approached.  The female was complaining about a Garlan who called her a fuzzball and was insulting her customers.  At that moment, the subject of the conversation entered.  It was a tough looking, scarred Garlan.

The female went to leave, and the Garlan grabbed her.  Grrr slapped his hand away.  The Garlan threw a punch and missed.  Grrr punched back.   The Garlan fell back into a table.  The two Antari there joined the fight.  Blows flew.  Another Garlan joined the fight. The female Harth hid under a table fliddling with something.  The barkeep drew a shotgun from under the counter. The Harth captain joined the second Garlan against the Antari.

Kovak struck up a conversation with an attractive alien med tech.

More blows were exchanged.  Then a stream of smoke emerged from beneath a table and started filling the room.  The barkeep summoned someone.  Grrr grabbed the female’s hand and pulled her out into the corridor as boots approached. Kovak and the two Harth ran off in the opposite direction, which was toward the Exchange.

At the Exchange

Kovak asked the Harth if she was alright.  She said that she should not have used the smoke bomb, but that that fight looked like it would last a while.  She said that she did not understand why the Captain kept him around when he scared off the customers.  She asked if the Bad Wolf needed an engineer.  Bletherin said the crew was full.  

Grendel asked if she could give them any advice as she was familiar with the station.  Her name was Hrrr.  She suggested a potential contact for the cheese.  Grendel asked about incoming ships.  Hrrr said that ther were G’Frar ships from time to time, but the G’Frar didn’t let station crews on their ships.  

Grrr ordered food for Hrrr.  She mentioned that the House Horusca was looking for someone to do an illicit cargo run.  She was not too concerned about finding another job as it was a high traffic station.  Her specialty was hyperspace drives, so she would be in demand.

Hrrr said she was especially interested in G’Frar technology, but not Grrr.  She was friendly enough, but was on heat suppressors.

Hrr recommended posting their wares on the station community board.  Bletherin posted the cheese and booze.  There was another ship recently docked by an antiques dealer that looked promising.  They requested that cargo as there might be personal effects from the missing people among the wares.

Grendel searched for parts from the ships that had gone missing.  There were parts from a wide variety of ships, many of them older than the crew.  Alex ran an algorithm overnight.  He found that there was a necklace that might have been taken from one of the missing people, and a vase that was missing from 50 years from an Antari museum.

In the Morning

Kovak explored the station.  Grendel sought out collectable cards to trade or sell for his collection, as well as ship parts to support the cover story, and also weapons.  Grrr and Hrrr spent the night talking in the Exchange.  She was intrigued by Grrr and gave him her contact information.  Kovak ran into another pilot who told her where the pilots hang out.  She went there and found that the human old was of better quality, and there were many more humans there.  Bletherin sold their cargo for a good price, except for some of the alcohol.

When Bletherin returned to the ship, there was an Aryan-looking human waiting to speak with him.  They went to the Exchange to talk in private.  He told the Captain that he wanted them to go to Canan, to collect “frozen horse embryos.” They would be given “medical supplies” to sell on Canan.  He also mentioned that the local authorities would not want to cargo leaving the planet.  They were medical drugs not approved for use within the Collctive yet.

The payment had grown to a reasonable amount.  Kovak wanted to know why someone else had not taken the job yet.  The client refused to specify what the cargo actually was.  Bletherin pushed for more details. The Aryan told him in Garlan that the cargo was an effort to improve the human race, and that regulations tended to get in the way of such efforts  (e.g., illicit human genetic engineering to create a race of humans capable of living on a certain planet).

In the meantime, Grrr, who had been having breakfast at the Exchange.  He spotted the Aryan’s body guards and joined them for a drink. They said that there were things that one did not want to do in their own back yard. Grrr asked them why the job had not been taken.  They said that no one wanted to go to that planet because there were no orbital facilities and the locals were not very friendly.  They said that the cargo probably had something to do with Aria’s project.

Bletherin and the Aryan negotiated a good price and prepped for departure in three days. 

Covert Investigation

Alex scanned the local net, then he hacked into the shipping records and downloaded information about various smugglers, routes, and cargoes that could be used for future interdiction within the Collective.  There was additional security around the House Horusca and several other organizations’ data, but he recognized the security code from Merrick. He dug deeper and realized that it had been created by an AI. 

Eventually he uncovered that the ships that they had gotten into combat with had been on Merrick recently, but not at the same time. He noted other ships that appeared to be related to those. It appeared that they were delivering goods, but the manifests were encoded.  All small quantities, and resembled the number of passengers on missing vessels.  Scanning the data, he found what had been other previously unrelated abductions.

The crew sought out other legitimate cargo to bring to Canan. They went to two other stations. Most of the legitimate exports were plant based. Canan was a dry planet, so alcohol might fetch a good price. There were artists on Estra whose works might be well received off world.

There were worlds on the route to Canan, but they needed to stop on New Florida to send a report to the CEP.  That is also where they could acquire tracking devices to plant on the illicit cargo for others to collect later on.  Once they knew what the cargo was they would decided what to do.  They wold also arrange on New Florida to be boarded on their return and either “talk their way out of it” or “get arrested.”

First came Loranis, which was a new colony, so therefore it needed just about anything.  They checked the databases to see what would be most profitable.

Chain of Command

  • Bletherin – Garlan (scaled hexapeds, with the front set of limbs equating to arms with four fingers, and
    the second and third having cloven hooves) Captain of the CEP Alex Murphy
  • Grrr (aka Snarl) – atypical Harth (furred mammals that resemble semi-anthropomorphic dogs) Head of Security on the CEP Alex Murphy  
  • Alex – the CEP Alex Murphy AI
  • Grendel – Heffulump (alien with multiple tactile appendages) Engineer of the CEP Alex Murphy
  • Kovak – Human Pilot of the CEP Alex Murphy