Later that week, Karl lay on his zero-g bunk and watched the Kitty Kat accelerate on the wall screen. He'd extended the display so he could see it lying down and kept one eye on astronav while he watched the [[recast|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_recast"]] monitor with the other. There were no signals on [[recast|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_recast"]] yet but there would be soon. They were nearing the relay and, just to make things that little bit more exciting, Zone Control had hailed a few minutes ago to inquire about Karl's recent course change.\n\nHe had given the usual excuse: comet photography somewhere far away, in a system that Zone Control most definitely did not have up to date comet maps for. It was the perfect excuse for rash maneuvers as proper comet photography required highly eccentric orbits that often only became available as up-to-date comet maps were replicated across the galaxy. With these, and with a little finesse on astronav, it was possible to catch a comet at just the right relative velocity and from just the right angle to snapshot the entire ice-rock with it's glistening tail in one smooth fly-by.\n\nAdmittedly, comet photography was also the most common excuse for erratic course corrections but, considering the Kitty Kat was burning hard toward the Divide and the Zone Control ship that had inquired was registered to the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]], Karl figured they would not care much about the Kat and it's shenanegins. If anything weird happened, it would occur on the far side of the Divide and that was all Zone Control wanted to know: it was not their problem.\n\n"Karl," Olga said from the bunk below. "Karl?"\n\nHe looked up. "What?"\n\n"We're nearly there." Olga snapped a last fiber-cable into her display and looked to the kid, who sat on the floor of the crew compartment. "You good?"\n\n"Iced, yo. We heard the tracker yet?"\n\n"No idea. Karlie?"\n\nKarl glanced at the [[recast|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_recast"]] monitor, which had begun to display minor fluctuations in background noise. Too little to constitute a broadcast but enough to suggest they were in the [[recast|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_recast"]] cone of some faraway inter-stellar transmitter.\n\n"No tracker," he said. "Only background noise."\n\n"Keep watching that screen," Olga said.\n\n"I am. Nothing ye--"\n\nBefore Karl could finish, noise resonated all across the [[recast|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_recast"]] bands. One pulse. Had to be the tracker, the data-noise that went ahead of an actual [[recast|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_recast"]] to announce that a transmission was about to start.\n\n"Here we go," Karl said. "First ping."\n\nThe screen registerd another resonance. Two pulses. The transmission would start in less than a minute.\n\nOlga brushed her infusion-tubes over the back her skull and looked around. "We ready? Data's gonna start coming through any moment.".\n\nThe kid nodded. "Fazed as is, yo. I think."\n\n"You think? "Karl did not like the sound of that.\n\n"Ain't done this sort of jig before. And I means I never done nothing like it. Gonna get feisty."\n\n"Just make sure to capture the entire transmission," Olga said. "And do not hold onto anything that isn't flagged. Otherwise the Kat's recordbanks will overflow and that might crash the ship."\n\n"That shouldn't happen," Karl said. "The flight system is completely isolated."\n\n"So you keep insisting," Olga said. "Me, I'm not so sure here but if you're willing to bet my ship on that, I'll believe you."\n\nKarl breathed a laugh. "Your ship and our lives, Ollie. We'll be fine."\n\n"I don't know, Karl. I have a bad feeling--"\n\n"Yo, not to interrupt, but I's set here." The kid showed his pad to Ollie.\n\nShe nodded and turned to the screen beside her bunk. Dozens of fiber-optic cables ran from it down to the floor, where the kid had plugged them into all sorts of spare cyber-gear and data pads. Improvized cryptomancy at it's finest - they'd had to clear as much space on the ship's recordbases as possible to ensure there'd be enough room to cache the entire [[recast|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_recast"]] transmission and, as a result, all processing had to be offloaded to whatever was available.\n\n"Hope it works," Karl muttered, watching his screen.\n\nThe [[recast|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_recast"]] monitor registered a third and last pulse, then a sudden surge in echo-resonance.\n\n"Here it comes," Karl said.\n\n"Here comes something," Olga said. "No way to know if it's our data or not."\n\nEither way, the [[recast|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_recast"]] dish in the Kat's belly read resonance tremors at ninety-three trillion cube per nanosecond. Memory ran full on twenty recordbanks. The glow panels in the ceiling flickered. Karl eyed them, wondering why the ship's intelligence had decided to do that.\n\n"Still scanning," Olga said. "Haven't seen it--"\n\n"There!" The kid pointed to his pad.\n\nOlly glanced at it and blurted, "Capture, capture!"\n\n"I is, yo. Start block, base meta, encryption block, end. Verify the lot."\n\n"Verifying." Olga tapped her screen.\n\nThe glow panel overhead went out with a pop.\n\n"Ollie," Karl said. "I don't want to sound alarmist but the lights are going out."\n\n"Nothing I can do about that," she said.\n\n"Just hang on," the kid muttered. "Hang on. And yes! Kill it!"\n\nOlga tapped her screen and yanked cables out, one by one. The cyber-tech on the floor started flashing red lights. Overhead, the glow panels came back on. Karl drew slow, calming breaths.\n\nEverything was fine. No one had broken the multi-trillion credit hypership. The flickering had just been the ship's intelligence compensating for the sudden spike in power drain.\n\n"So--" Karl rubbed his hands. "We get it?"\n\n"We got something. Not sure what."\n\n"Something not good," the kid said. "No, no, no. This ain't good at all."\n\nOllie and Karl both spoke at once, "What's wrong?"\n\n"This!" The kid held up his pad, which displayed a solid wall of garbled text. "It's SendCode-3. Not two."\n\n"So run it through the intepreter," Ollie said.\n\n"How? I ain't got one, yo."\n\nKarl groaned. "You mean we have the data and can't read it?"\n\n"Not my fault, yo." The kid rubbed his face. "Fuck, I didn't think, that's what is. Didn't think at all cause back on the [[Slide|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_cons_slide"]], everything was always in Code-2. Never thought I'd need swipe Send-3."\n\nOlga laughed. "Oh, silly."\n\nKarl shot her a dark look. "It doesn't sound silly. It sound like a major oversight."\n\n"Aye," the kid said bitterly. "This stinks."\n\n"Except it is silly," Olga said, giggling. "Because I installed an interpreter on the ship's data-space months ago. Remote on port 44151. Password's password. All lower case. Run it through that."\n\nThe kid breathed a laugh. "Password's password? The bytes was you on? Flex?"\n\n"It's an interpreter," Ollie said. "Who's gonna nab it?"\n\n"Me." The kid tapped his pad, chewing his lip as he worked.\n\nKarl sat up. "So it worked? We have our data?"\n\n"We got a lot of flagged data," Ollie said. "That could be our data. Or a million other records that happen to resolve to the same unique identifier and, since we can't decrypt the data, we can't know which one is our data block. That's why I said this would never work."\n\n"Yeah, yeah," the kid said. "But it's coming out clean on Send-3." He showed them his data pad.\n\nKarl squinted at the glowing screen, which was cluttered with code and long strings of alpha-numerical characters that meant nothing to him. They must have meant something to the cryptos though because Ollie swiped a copy onto her screen and began dissecting it into little clumps of text.\n\n"There." She shared a thousand-character string to Karl's screen. "That's the identifier."\n\nKarl scowled at the data. It certainly looked like an identifier. A hundred-odd random characters that meant nothing to him.\n\nHis gaze wandered back to Olga. "You sure this is it?"\n\n"No," she said. "It might not even give us the information we want because we don't even know if the data we want was on this transmission. But it's the best we have. That one shot you wanted, remember?"\n\n"All right. Then let's see if this works." Karl brought up the far-comms interface and extended the [[farbound|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_farbound"]] boom. \n\nMachinery in the hull rumbled as the antennae extended. Karl waited until the system reported all green, then typed in the code for Mr. Dorrings' personal array and waited for the [[farbound|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_farbound"]] units to pair.\n\nWhile the far-comm worked, Karl composed a brief message:\n\n<i>To Corporate Law-Tech,\n\nNeed unique ID resol. Hedge transact-data. Payment as usual. Respond.</i>\n\nHe attached the identifier and sent the message. Rather than ripple out in echo-noise, it was cached to transmit later. Reasy: the array had not managed phase one synchronization because Mr. Dorrings' array was currently busy. The far-comms interface estimated an hour until it could begin pairing and a few hours more until the data could be transmitted. Until that happened, there was nothing to do except wait and hope Mr. Dorrings would come through for them.\n\nIf not, the plan was a bust because the [[Hegemony Hedgefond|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]] did not release any data except in response to official law-tech request and Karl did not know any other law-techs crooked enough to risk their careers messing with the largest credit institution in the galaxy. They did not tolerate information warfare unless it was conducted with the approval of the Chairmen and the Chairmen of the [[Hedgefond|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]] could not be bought off, bribed, or otherwise influenced, at least not by anyone who didn't own a pan-galactic and more credits than they knew what to do with.\n\nThe Hegemony Commission had seen to that in the regulatory overhaul of Fiscal Year 26500, an act of legislative desperation that had shored up the plummeting credit rates of the [[Hedgefond|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]] during the Bread Basket debacle with two quick fixes: one, neurologically enforced anti-tamper conditioning, to be scribed into every Chairman upon his - or her - acceptance of office, and two, conduct quarterly psych-evals to ensure market loyalty. Any breeches were cause for immediate termination and, given the dire situation the Chairmen had been in at the time, the 26500 act had passed without resistance, as Karl knew all too well.\n\nEarlier in life, he had worked as an ideologue of [[Division X08|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]] and had been tasked with investigating many suspected breeches of market loyalty, though one in particular stood out: the curious case of Chaiman Habin Grutter, a hyper-masculine busybody who had run afoul the Commission at the height of the Bread Basked debacle, accused of embezzling trillions from the War Fund in order to satiate the many desires of his thirteen mistresses. Under the new regulation, this was grounds for immediate termination and Karl had been tasked with conductiong an ideological assessment of the man's mental state - not that anyone cared; it was all for appearance's sake.\n\nThus, for six long weeks, Karl had gotten to know Chaiman Habin Grutter and, during those weeks, much of what Karl had believed to know about his old ideology had crumbled to dust. Grutter had been a bad apple by all accounts, a controversial womanizer at best, a downright crook at worst, and between his thirteen mistresses and their many expensive tastes, he genuinely struggled to make ends meet. But the real reason he was being investigated was not his degenerate lifestyle or taste in beautiful young women with hyper-enlarged breasts. It was his ties to [[Division X08|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]] and their black business ventures in the west, which Habin Grutter had accidentally let slip in the presence of a recorder, a faux-pas for which the corporate elite knew only one punishment: utter and complete financial ruin.\n\nNothing had changed since Harbin Grutter's dismissal, not in the corporate sector at least, and so the civilized galaxy limped on, shackled by corruption, hobbled by greed, and so it would continue to shamble onwards until the thin veneer of sophisticated society eventually broke down. Karl did not know when that would happen - assuming it ever happened - and he did not want to know either. Unlike some in the movement, he didn't wish for a collapse of the civilized galaxy, much a complete and catastrophic failure of modern society. There were already enough problems in the galaxy as it was. There was no need to add more just to make a political point.

The first few days on the job were a blur of documents and formwork. Joshin read one quick-start guide after another, familiarizing himself with the Digital Department's setup on [[New Arches|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_new_arches"]]. All documents were classified REG-6, which meant Joshin had to sign before and after reading, and the text had been redacted to the point that all he learned was what he already knew: the <i>Reuse and Recycle initiative</i>, a corporate and colonial co-operative launched to clean up in the aftermath of the Bread Basket War, had sent the [[Erkan-Corbei Minerals Group|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_corbei"]] down to the surface of the planet to recycle old fusion reactors.\n\nThe Digital Department was supposed to host data services for this operation. How those services were hosted and what data was being stored on the servers was either not documented or redacted, though Joshin did find a REG-6 file that detailed the supposed 'fusion reactor' they had found. There was even a video of the spherical device, a great collection of data drives and cables which had crashed down on the floor of some dusty old colonial laboratory.\n\nDefunct scientific equipment lined the walls and, down around the device, contractors milled about and worked measuring lasers. The man who'd lased the sphere showed the results to the camera: twenty meters in diameter. Then the camera zoomed in for a closer look at the data devices, most of which were broken or cracked. Only a handful glowed in the gloom of the laboratory, illuminating the salvage crew in frail white light.\n\n"Wow," Joshin muttered, watching the crew climb and crawl around the device. "It's enormous."\n\n"Sure is," Tip Toppin's cheery voice said.\n\nJoshin looked up to see the older colonial watching over his shoulder. There were dark bags under his eyes but the irises shone with excitement.\n\n"Just heard from the salvage teams," Tip said. "They've completed their assessment. You think you're ready to crack your skull against this, kid?"\n\n"No." Joshin quickly added, "Not yet. I've barely read the brief."\n\n"You'll learn on the job." Tip patted Joshin's shoulder. "C'mon. Table time."\n\n"Sure thing, Boss." Joshin set his workpad aside and followed Tip to the collab table.\n\nLorrise and Mr. Arbin were already there, scowling at a wireframe schematic of the laboratory Joshin had just seen on video. He recognized the layout and, of course, the giant squashed sphere in the center.\n\n"Has to be a transmitter somewhere," Lorrise said. "Maybe inside the mechanism? I mean, if Salvage did the assessment right, there's no array. No dish. Nothing."\n\nMr. Arbin scowled. "Quantum entanglemet, then?"\n\n"Probably." Tip leaned on the table and looked around. "Unless anyone has a better theory?"\n\n"I don't see how it could be anything else," Lorrise said. "[[Farbound length|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_farbound"]] transmissions need an array. [[REACH-RANGE|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_reach"]] pulses use a core. [[Recast|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_recast"]] relies on a dish. None of those are present, which leaves us with quantum state transmissions, and all those need are entangled particles in the right place, right?"\n\n"I think so," Tip said. "Anyone know for certain?"\n\nMr. Arbin shrugged. "I've barely even heard the theory."\n\n"Same," Josh said. "But I learned the basics and, if it is a quantum transmitter, shouldn't there be a limited supply of entangled particles?"\n\n"Yes," Lorrise said. "I think that's how it works. And the limited supply would explain why it sends so infrequently."\n\n"Not exactly," Tip said. "According to Salvage, it's been sending for well over a thousand years."\n\n"Exactly! And look at this." Josh swept a readout onto the holo-projection. "This says it's reading and writing enormous chunks of data. Billions of operations every time the machine bleeps. And it's been doing that for a thousand years, so even if they packed that entire sphere full of entangled particles, it'd have run out already."\n\nThe older men looked at one another.\n\nTip said, "Kid's got a point, Lorrise."\n\n"Unless it somehow creates more particles," Lorrise said. "Think about it. Every time the net failed, the machine did something. Some sort of exotic spike. Interference goes through the roof. What if--"\n\n"It's a perpetual motion machine?" Tip scoffed. "Those are impossible, even with exotic science."\n\n"Only practically," Josh said. "In theory, exotics lets you build a perpetual motion machine."\n\n"Except the Boss is right," Lorrise said. "Theory is one thing. Practice is another and perpetual motion don't work, does it? Cause if it did, we'd be floating in free energy and be able to travel back through time. But we can't. Because the laws of physics never break. They only bend under very specific conditions and then re-assert themselves. That's Exotics 101."\n\nMr. Arbin nodded. "Exotics 101. Exactly."\n\n"Except it wouldn't be perpetual motion," Josh said. "Not if it's hooked up to a power source. That would be a finite supply."\n\nLorrise groaned. "You can't just pump energy in and create entangled particles in two different locations. Yes, I know that's what I just suggested but it doesn't work like that. I was stupid for even saying it."\n\n"Then it isn't quantum entanglement," Mr. Arbin said. "Could it be standard shortwave sent through some sort of micro-wormhole?"\n\nJosh shot the man a funny look. "Have you ever seen a wormhole? A real one, I mean, not a simulation in a lab."\n\n"No," Mr. Arbin said. "But, until yesterday, you had not seen an AI either, Mr. Joshin."\n\nFair enough, Josh figured, though the wormhole theory was absurd. Those were no more possible than perpetual motion machines.\n\n"So to summarize," Tip said. "We have two whacky theories and no good explanations."\n\nEveryone nodded.\n\nTip breathed a laugh. "Damn. We need smarter people in this room."\n\n"Or we need a way to communicate with the machine," Lorrise said. "So far we've tried Oponor, Var, HiTec, CCCTC, Relic, Farthrash, and Jupe. It's all gibberish. So what encoding haven't we thought of?"\n\n"It's not encoding," Tip said. "It's AI language. Sentient data patterns. Or something. None of the parsers we have will work."\n\nJosh shook his head. "No. It isn't. It's gibberish."\n\nEveryone looked at him. Josh shrank a head.\n\nTip said, "What you on about, kid?"\n\n"It's just a theory," Josh blurted. "But let's make some assumptions. One: the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] really did build that device, which would mean it sends and recieves in Relic. Two: let's assume the work logs we got from Salvage are correct: no antennae, no external uplink. And three: if it were a known language or some derrivative, it would give us at least a partial header match, right?"\n\n"Yes," Lorrise said slowly. "All true so far."\n\n"Exactly," Josh said. "And that machine has been sitting on this planet how long?"\n\nTip shrugged. "Hundreds, maybe thousands of years?"\n\nJoshin nodded. "And it's sitting in the middle of a nuclear grave yard. Come on guys. You AI is broken. Assuming it is AI. Are we even sure of that?"\n\n"Yes," Tip said. "I'm convinced it's an AI."\n\n"As am I," Lorrise said. "And you're right, kid. We already thought of that. Chances are it is broken. But that doesn't help us cause we still can't turn it off. Or stop it from messing with our network. There has to be some interface. Something which bridges the AI to our systems."\n\nJosh said, "Something like what? You already said it's not connected to your systems."\n\n"I don't know," Lorrise snapped. "I'm not an exoticist but maybe a virtual particle bridge? Some sort of electromagnetic ghost? Or--"\n\n"Oh, please," Arbin groaned. "Can everyone stop with the random guesswork? We need to approach this problem logically. Scientifically!"\n\nLorrise opened his mouth but Tip cut him off, "He's right, Lorrise. Corporate isn't paying us to sit around and guess."\n\n"Yeah," Lorrise said quietly. "I just want answers."\n\n"We'll find them," Tip said. "Tomorrow. After we've all rested. Now, who's up for chow?"\n\n"A good idea," Arbin said.\n\n"For once I agree, Mr. CCCT." Lorrise waved his hand over the collab table.\n\nThe hologram went into locked mode. Everyone exchanged looks and, with a nod to one another, older men left for chow. Josh remained at the table, scowling at the <i>Swipe to Unlock</i> cube.\n\nSix million a week to sprout random theories about an old machine. Not bad for a first job, but also not the sort of work Joshin had been hired to do. He was supposed to be running servers and writing scripts, not fumbling around in pseudoscience using best guesses and shaky theories. Problem was, bad theories were all they had - and lots of them.\n\nJoshin even had already come up with his own: the AI wasn't a [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] machine. There was no evidence for that. More importantly, it had been found in a colonial bunker on [[New Arches|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_new_arches"]] and, as anyone who'd graduated Cultural Exchange knew, there'd been more than one black science pit on [[New Arches|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_new_arches"]] before the war. Put two and two together and the explanation was obvious: the AI was a secret colonial project built with the help of black scientists from the [[Dominion|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_dominion"]] - or was it?

In the three hundred short years since Yerris had sworn his oath of silence, he'd seen many aspects of the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]]. He'd marched in red with the militants, agitated for the commoner's cause, and been beaten bloody by corporate enforcers for it. His calling had taken him into the deepest vaults of the [[Machine-Cult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_msmith"]], where technologies that made [[Holy Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]] look like a child's toy were experimented on, and to the tallest business-spires of the [[Hegemony|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]], where a single slice of bread cost more credits than Yerris had ever owned.\n\nOn one memorable day, he'd held sermons before a congregation of five hundred thousand by morning, drunkenly sang Ode to the Empire with [[loyalists|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_loyalism"]] at midday, and analyzed classified [[farbound-length|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_farbound"]] intercepts by night. He had even seen a [[Paladin|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_paladin"]] with his very own eyes, something few in the galaxy could claim. The one thing Yerris had never seen however was the inside of an interrogation chamber on [[Xenve-6|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_xnv"]]. It was unlike anything he had expected.\n\nRather than a tiny cell full of recording devices and neural readers, the [[Knights of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_knight"]] marched him to the highest levels of the Eternal Temple and through a grimy hatch, into a crude granite cell with a hole in the ceiling. Through the hole, the sky was visible, overcast and inky black. The Trisolare had been swallowed up in murk by billowing storm clouds.\n\n"Oh, splendid," Yerris muttered as the [[Knights of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_knight"]] marched him to the edge of the barbaric contraption.\n\nThe staff-end of a [[plasma lance|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_plance"]] hit him in the back of the knees. Yerris fell hard on stone. His kneecaps ached.\n\n"Stay," a crackly voice aid. "Ser Duhan will conduct the inquisition. Pray to [[Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]] you are not found lacking."\n\nYerris scoffed. "You'd let the accuser interrogate a suspect?"\n\n"Heresy is in the sphere of Shield." The [[Knights of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_knight"]] stepped back.\n\nHeavy footfalls sounded. Yerris looked over his shoulder. The two [[Knights|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_knight"]] unbolted a thick steel hatch. Rusty hinges squeaked. The hatch clanged shut.\n\nYerris hung his head, muttering, "[[Loving Stars|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_lstars"]] who shine upon us. Forgive me, for I have failed in my task. [[Holy Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]], I pray you see my plight in your predictions. The eyes of the many are blinded by wickedness and hate. They would sooner burn and salt the earth than--" Yerris hesitated.\n\nThe hairs on the back of his neck stood upright. A blurred silhouette had appeared out of thin air.\n\nIt resolved into a prehistoric battlesuit with slender arms and an armored body. The unit's face mask was silver and, when the exonetics unit moved, the air around it stuttered as though the laws of physics held their breath. A [[machine-angel|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_paladin"]].\n\nYerris' eyes narrowed. "No. [[Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]] cannot have heard me."\n\n"A fallible assumption." The voice was mechanical, devoid of human inflection.\n\n"Wh--" Yerris's nose dripped. "How could you know so soon?"\n\n"This unit was always present. Errors needed to be corrected." The [[Paladin|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_paladin"]] crouched before Yerris.\n\nIt streched out a silverish hand with long fingers. Cold metal touched Yerris' cheek. The scalding light of a million stars seared his thoughts. Yerris screamed.\n\n"Your situation is--" The [[Paladin|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_paladin"]] tilted it's faceless head. "--unfortunate."\n\n"Stars," Yerris gasped.\n\nHe wiped his runny nose. Mucus continued to dribble.\n\nThe [[machine-angel|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_paladin"]] stood. "Samus Yerris: you stand at a crossroads. A crisis of faith. Your purpose is uncertan." It flickered. "Interrogators come. Confess."\n\nYerris laughed. "To what? I've done nothing!"\n\n"Your sin is ignorance." The slender silhouette vanished as suddenly as it had appeared.\n\nBehind Yerris, rusted door-bolts squeaked. Hinges creaked. Heavy footsteps thudded.\n\nBrother Duhan stepped into view. The biological part of his face was contorted in disgust. The cybernetic half remained cold and disaffected.\n\n"Tell me," Ser Duhan growled. "Will you confess and retain your dignity, Samus Yerris?"\n\nYerris scoffed. "To what? And I am Blessed Father yet, [[Knight|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_knight"]]!"\n\n"You are a liar and a heretic," Duhan snarled. "Do not deny it. My investigation has been conclusive and the evidence is plain. You conspired with ideological enemies of the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]]. You attempted to snare me in these machinations. The truth is evident."\n\n"Evident, is it?" Yerris shook his head. "You are nothing but an ignorant pawn."\n\n"Amusing." Duhan crouched, eyes level with Yerris. "You insist I am ignorant and misguided and yet I can still look you in the eye and tell you earnestly: you are the traitor. Your scheme has failed. I have proof."\n\nA data-pad was thrown before Yerris. The screen flickered, it's projectors damaged by the fall.\n\nDuhan said, "Records transmitted from the [[Cathedral|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_cathedral"]]. The messages you supposedly sent me before your arrival. Never transmitted. Your visit here? It was listed as a sabbatical. You lied to me, Yerris, and you played me for the fool you thought I was."\n\nYerris rolled his eyes. "If you knew, Duhan, you--"\n\n"Silence." Duhan slapped him.\n\nYerris felt his cheekbone crack. He groaned.\n\nThe [[Shield-Knight|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_knight"]] snarled, "I requested additional information from [[Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]]. You are known to conspire with [[imperial loyalists|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_loyalism"]]. You research the planet [[Terra|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_terra"]] on a private link and you take particular interest in the galactic north. What is more: one finds imperial writings in your private chambers."\n\n"Fool." Yerris winced; his cheek ached. "I researched. The [[Tyran Fleet|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyran"]]."\n\n"The Tyrant is dead," Duhan growled. "The old world has fallen. Excuses will not save you, Padre."\n\n"Those are not excuses!"\n\n"Ah. But you see: I took one look at your records and all was lain plain. You are insolant and indignant. Your faith is as weak as your commitment to the commoner's cause. It would not have taken a corporate agent much to entice you. You already sought an oppertunity to enrich yourself and erronously thought you could gain me as an unwitting accomplice."\n\nYerris rolled his eyes.\n\nDuhan scoffed. "I shed sweat and tears to safeguard this planet long before you were born, Yerris. Did you truly think I would not notice a foreign agent who attempted to buy corporate interests with [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] funds?"\n\n"That's precisely," Yerris said through gritted teeth. "What I did."\n\n"So you confess?"\n\nYerris forced a pained grin. "I confess to whatever you accuse me of, militant. You wouldn't even believe the truth if you heard it."\n\n"Indeed?" Duhan raised his chin. "Tell me."\n\n"The Tyrant's daughter lives. The old world endures. It has poisoned the corporate--"\n\n"Nonsense," Duhan growled. "Saint Arthuris may or may not have been a saint but the Tyrant is definitely dead and the imperial house is broken. That is beyond doubt. [[Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]] confirms it." \n\nYerris breathed a laugh. "Did you not say earlier one ought not trust a machine?"\n\n"For evidence," Duhan said. "There is ample evidence. Millions of accounts confirm the Tyrant died."\n\nYerris shook his head. What a sheltered imbecile.\n\n"Ah, bile." Duhan hung his head and, after a moment, looked up. "This charade is pointless. We know you are an agent of the [[Hegemony|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]]. The [[Cathedral|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_cathedral"]] will confirm my denunciation by the end of the week. The evicence is overwhelming."\n\nThat it was. The [[Brotherhood|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_brotherhood"]] would sooner see Yerris cleansed for heresy than allow his lips to slip. He had known it might one day come to this from the moment he had sworn the oath of silence.\n\nYerris stared at the acid-burnt floor. "Fine. Cleanse me and be done with it, Brother."\n\n"You are no brother of mine," Duhan snarled. "But it is not so simple. You will be judged. Tried. Look!" \n\nHe gripped Yerris by the chin and forced him to look up. The sky was inky black. \n\nDuhan's lips curled. "If only you could see them one last time, Padre. If only you could beg the [[Loving Stars|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_lstars"]] for mercy."\n\nYerris laughed. "Oh, you archaic--"\n\n"Silence! This is no laughing matter."\n\nIt was not. Yerris however could not resist a cackle. His lungs ached. \n\nYerris gasped for breath. "It is. Just so. Ironic."\n\nDuhan raised his hand but hesitated. "Inititally, you struck me a decent man. I shall treat you as though you were and give you one more cycle to contemplate your situation."\n\n"How noble of you, Lord Duhan."\n\n"I have done penance for my sins. Confess and you shall be shown the same mercy. Excommunication is an option."\n\nYerris shook his head. It was no option for him.\n\n"Or remain silent if you wish, but know that--" Duhan pointed to the hole in the roof. "--has loosened every tongue, if only one last time, since long before I was born."\n\n"Charming," Yerris muttered.\n\nHis jaw ached, not that it mattered. The [[Loving Stars|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_lstars"]] would not save him any more than [[Holy Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]] could. He would die a heretic while, in secret, he was yet another martyr of the silent cause.\n\nTragic, really, but Yerris had no alternatives. His hands were clamped and he'd been chained at the edge of the hole. If the acid rain didn't melt him to slush, the militants would turn their sacred implements on him soon enough.

The Cybercult was a loosely affiliated cyber-activist - or digital terrorist - syndicate which existed from the 26th to the 29th millennium in the Galactic Core. The cult was known for it's anarcho-technological ideology, vigilante justice actions, and resistance to both the corporate lifestyle and traditional [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] morals. Despite referring to itself as a cult, the Cybercult wasn't one and had no religious basis. It was an anti-religious, anti-establishment association that promoted transhumanism, protested social norms which restricted cyborgs and androids, and strongly encouraged free-love party culture - it's finances were driven primarily by skimming credits from intoxicated partygoers and stealing virtual identities. Due to the fact that the Cybercult was a virtual organization with only a few physical cells, but many on-net supporters, it had no coherent identity, only it's stated goals and self-professed ideology, which the cult called the cyberpunk revolution.<br><br>\n\n<div class='HUD_CodexImage_Left HUD_CodexTallImage'><<print "[img[" + $codex.imagePath + "codex_cybercult_hacker.png]]">></div>In order to better understand the Cybercult, one must comprehend the era in which it existed: the [[recast network|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_recast"]] had recently been pioneered. Data traveled the galaxy at speeds unlike ever before, especially in the Galactic Core. The average core-dweller cared little for these developments but the tech-literate middle-class citizen began to realize: the galaxy they read about in these data packets was a very different one from the quasi-happy corporate or religious life they were expected to be part of. For the vast majority of citizens this was not an issue. Life continued as normal even though times had begun to get harder, due to events which they heard little of - the Lost Crusade, the Bread Basket War, the Witch Hunts, etc. To those with access to technology, the poorly-secured channels of the [[recast network|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_recast"]] offered a glimpse into a galaxy beset by barely-contained chaos.<br><br>\n\nNews of warships lost in the dozens - later: tens of thousands - to advanced weapons that the civilized galaxy could not even imagine, stories of colonial resistance to a war which never should have happened, and rumors about what lay behind the age-old myth of pirates and [[corsairs|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_corsair"]] filtered back over the net. Clearly, the powers-that-were were hiding the truth. Falsehoods were being promoted. Criminals flourished as social tensions rose between the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] and the [[Hegemony|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]]. Theo-political tensions rose as the [[Temple of Purity|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_purifier"]] was brutally repressed. The [[Machine-Cult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_msmith"]] developed strange, unheard-of technologies, many of which were rumored to be weapons. Most importantly: a strange shadowy war was being fought for reasons no one quite understood - the Cybercult never revealed any significant information on [[Cabal|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cabal"]], most likely because it never uncovered enough to do so - and the average, defenseless citizen of the Galactic Core was unknowingly caught in the middle.<br><br>\n\n<div class=''><<print "[img[" + $codex.imagePath + "codex_cyberglam.png]]">></div>To the young, rebellious, tech-literate modernist of the late 26th and 27th millennia, invariably an intelligent person raised on the perpetual myth of the civilized galaxy, these deeper truths did not match. Consumerism spread. Taxes rose. Quality of life suffered. FVCK EDEN became the rallying cry of the alleged radical who the priest said was at the verge of becoming a [[theothobic mass-murder|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]]. War-scarred veterans returned amid floods of refugees and none recieved the help they needed, only prayers and a pat on the head. Chem use increases and prices dropped despite there being more [[Constables|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_constabulary"]] in the pressure corridors than ever, and gang warfare was a frequent occurence even on civilized stations. Where the gangs didn't fight, the young partied and raved, desperate to escape the depressing reality of the cyber-generations - life expectency had gone down despite the promise of [[Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]] being within reach, or so the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] said. The longer they watched, the longer they listened on the net, and the more like-minded individuals shared their thoughts across the gulf between what had once been isolated systems, the more lies became apparant - at times blatant, like the utter denial of the Lost Crusade by the clergy. Information had begun to outpace the censors and, as early as 26006, the first cybercult activist - at the time called the cyber-ring - was arrested for alleged heresy and practice of the [[abominable arts|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_abom"]]. In truth, all she had done was reveal a corporate data-sheet which hinted at border conflicts between the colonials and an unknown foe.<br><br>\n\nThe [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]], terrified knowledge of the [[Dominion|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_dominion"]] and borderspace incidents would become common knowledge, over-reacted. The Cybercult, a name which was given these alledged and at the time non-existant activists by Cardinal Lubenrieb, quickly formed and adopted it's alleged identity, resisting oppression and censorship of the data-net. The movement exploded during the mid-27th millennium, albeit only on the net, and remained active on most worlds and habitation platforms despite numerous arrests and infiltrations until the early 29th millennium, when the Great Schism drove the remnants of the cybercult underground or to seek refuge with the [[Temple of Purity|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_purifier"]], fearing reprisals from the [[Real Church of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]]. For the longest time however the Cybercult had no allegience and fought it's own vigilante-justice campaign in the civilized galaxy. It is in this form, and as Android Abe, the virtual 2-dimensional mascot which represented the vigilante-activists, that the Cybercult is most often remembered.<br><br>\n\n<div class='HUD_CodexImage_Left HUD_CodexTallImage'><<print "[img[" + $codex.imagePath + "codex_cyberteam.png]]">></div>Association with the cult was voluntary and members joined out of conviction, often young, highgly-educated individuals who had become disillusioned with life in the modern galaxy and were certain that the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] and the [[Hegemony|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]] lied constantly to the public. Under the mantra "Trust in the Truth", the Cult resisted the corporate shadow-war and disinformation by the clergy, often broadcasting classified information and attempting to educate citiezns though cyber-activist campaigns and, at times, digi-physical direct actions. At the height of it's activity, in the late 28th millennium, experienced cyber-teams were also funded and supported by the cult, each composed of self-styled vigilante cyber-samurais who struck back in retaliation for corporate black operations, overreach by [[Sainted Constabularies|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_constabulary"]], and criminals - both small local gangs and large enterprises like the [[Sons of Kobol|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_kobol"]] and [[High Court|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_highborn"]].<br><br>\n\nDue to the complex politics of the corporate shadow-war however, and for pragmatic reasons, the Cybercult often took sides with the "lesser evil" in an attempt to share as much of the truth as it possibly could with the overpopulated, under-educated averaze citizen of the Galactic Core. It's cyber-teams clashed frequently with security forces, corporate mercenaries, and criminal paramilitaries while cryptomancers and technomancers often battled, unseen and unheard by the average cizizens, with virtual security systems and the AI-watchdogs of [[Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]]. The Cybercult was known for it's extensive use of cybernetic augments and technology in it's self-styled war for the truth, in addition to almost universal cryptomancy and technomancy skills. If at all possible, the cult attempted to pursue it's goals without putting any physical or material assets in danger - it's philosophy was that of virtual vandalism and digital terrorism, used sparingly and only ever in pursuit of it's larger ideological strategy. This idealistic goal was never reached and the Cybercult was quickly classified a criminal organization on most worlds and habitation platforms. Cells were often violently stamped out, individuals arrested, and the cult's private data network, the Distributed DarkNet, was constantly besieged by corporate security agents and crypto-constables.<br><br>\n\nThough one can easily say the Cybercult never achieved it's goals and often resorted to extreme and violent measures when cornered, it had wide influence, inspired the Cyberglam and Party Rave social movements, convinced countless rebellious young men and women - and hybrids - to adopt the cyberpunk aesthetic, brought numerous social and political issues to light - although never as many as it had wanted - and was, in a classified [[Dominion|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_dominion"]] report, referred to as the only true neutral force in the Galactic Core at the time. Despite it's wide-reaching cultural influence, the Cybercult never truly achieved any political breakthrough and never managed to inspire change, mostly due to complete absence of a relatable political wing. The cult did not see it's actions as political activism but believed the civilized galaxy would do the right thing if only enough of the truth could be revealed to the general public. Either this supposition was wrong or not enough could ever be revealed, and as the New Era began with violent upheval all across the Galactic Core, quite literally demolishing what little remained of the myth of the civilized galaxy, the cybercult died out as a movement and crypto-activist network.

/* ########################################################################\n\t\t\t\t\tOrga Stuff \n########################################################################*/\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_intern",\n\tname: "Internship Program",\n\tinCategories: [],\n\tinSections: [],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_conglomerate"],\n\timg: "codex_plex_intern.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_directors",\n\tname: "Board of Directors",\n\tinCategories: [],\n\tinSections: [],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_conglomerate"],\n\timg: "codex_plex_board.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_finance",\n\tname: "FinSense Department",\n\tinCategories: [],\n\tinSections: [],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_conglomerate"],\n\timg: "codex_plex_finance.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_lad",\n\tname: "Legal Advice Department",\n\tinCategories: [],\n\tinSections: [],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_conglomerate"],\n\timg: "codex_plex_lad.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_execs",\n\tname: "Executive Department",\n\tinCategories: [],\n\tinSections: [],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_conglomerate"],\n\timg: "codex_plex_executive.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_security",\n\tname: "Defense and Security Department",\n\tinCategories: [],\n\tinSections: [],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_conglomerate"],\n\timg: "codex_plex_defense.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_mmngment",\n\tname: "Middle Management",\n\tinCategories: [],\n\tinSections: [],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_conglomerate"],\n\timg: "codex_plex_management.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_fabric",\n\tname: "Fabrication and Automation",\n\tinCategories: [],\n\tinSections: [],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_conglomerate"],\n\timg: "codex_plex_fabrication.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_maint",\n\tname: "Maintenance and Construction",\n\tinCategories: [],\n\tinSections: [],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_conglomerate"],\n\timg: "codex_plex_maintenance.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_litigation",\n\tname: "Litigation Department",\n\tinCategories: [],\n\tinSections: [],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_conglomerate"],\n\timg: "codex_plex_litigation.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_conglomerate",\n\tname: "Plex Conglomerate",\n\tinCategories: ["orga"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "fringe", "govt", "corpo"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_book", "plex_codex_directors", "plex_codex_execs", "plex_codex_litigation", "plex_codex_finance", "plex_codex_mmngment", "plex_codex_lad", "plex_codex_security", "plex_codex_fabric", "plex_codex_maint", "plex_codex_intern"],\n\timg: "codex_plex.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_cmall",\n\tname: "Commerz Cartel",\n\tinCategories: ["orga"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "fringe", "crime"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_conglomerate"],\n\timg: "codex_commerzcartel.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n\n/* ########################################################################\n\t\t\t\t\tBig Ships \n########################################################################*/\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_dship",\n\tname: "Plex DL-31-B1 System Defense Ship",\n\tinCategories: ["tech"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "cships", "conglom"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_conglomerate", "plex_codex_cdrone", "plex_codex_parray"],\n\timg: "codex_plex_dship.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_cruiser",\n\tname: "Plex CL-55-366-F Cruiser",\n\tinCategories: ["tech"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "scraft", "conglom"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_conglomerate", "plex_codex_skiff", "plex_codex_cdrone", "plex_codex_parray"],\n\timg: "codex_cruiser.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_freighter",\n\tname: "Plex NC-998-81 Modular Freighter",\n\tinCategories: ["tech"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "uships", "bhd", "cabal", "retrib", "cons", "conglom"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_conglomerate", "cabal_codex_myrroth"],\n\timg: "codex_mod_freighter.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n/* ########################################################################\n\t\t\t\t\tLil Ships \n########################################################################*/\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_cdrone",\n\tname: "Plex XC-5-33-B1 Combat Drone",\n\tinCategories: ["tech"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "scraft", "robo", "conglom"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_conglomerate", "plex_codex_cruiser"],\n\timg: "codex_cdrone.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_skiff",\n\tname: "Plex STS-1981-A Patrol Craft",\n\tinCategories: ["tech"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "exo", "scraft", "conglom"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_conglomerate", "plex_codex_cruiser"],\n\timg: "codex_skiff.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n/* ########################################################################\n\t\t\t\t\tBigguns\n########################################################################*/\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_parray",\n\tname: "Plex X-577-E Plasma Array",\n\tinCategories: ["tech"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "hweap", "conglom"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_conglomerate", "plex_codex_cruiser"],\n\timg: "codex_plex_array.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n/* ########################################################################\n\t\t\t\t\tExosuits & Infantry Guns\n########################################################################*/\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_exosuit",\n\tname: "Plex EL-421-C Exosuit",\n\tinCategories: ["tech"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "exo", "conglom"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_conglomerate"],\n\timg: "codex_exosuit.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_secbot",\n\tname: "Plex Mk-Ultra-X Bot-Drone Unit",\n\tinCategories: ["tech"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "robo", "exo", "conglom"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_conglomerate"],\n\timg: "codex_plex_secbot.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_pcannon",\n\tname: "Plex XN-5517-L Plasma Caster",\n\tinCategories: ["tech"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "weapons", "conglom"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_conglomerate"],\n\timg: "codex_plasma_gun.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n/* ########################################################################\n\t\t\t\t\tTech Stuff\n########################################################################*/\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_matrix",\n\tname: "Plex ITL-X1 Automated Assembly Matrix",\n\tinCategories: ["tech"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "autom", "conglom"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_conglomerate"],\n\timg: "codex_assemblymatrix_sketch.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_desk",\n\tname: "Plex ITL-5791 Desk Workspace",\n\tinCategories: ["tech"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "autom", "conglom"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_conglomerate"],\n\timg: "codex_plex_desk.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_alufoil",\n\tname: "Alu-Foil Printing",\n\tinCategories: ["tech"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "autom", "comm", "conglom"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_conglomerate"],\n\timg: "codex_alufoil.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n/* ########################################################################\n\t\t\t\t\tFood\n########################################################################*/\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_synthf",\n\tname: "Synth-Fruit",\n\tinCategories: ["bio"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "food", "conglom"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_conglomerate"],\n\timg: "codex_synthfruit.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n/* ########################################################################\n\t\t\t\t\tArtefacts\n########################################################################*/\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_book",\n\tname: "Book of Economics",\n\tinCategories: ["art"],\n\tinSections: ["script", "plex", "conglom"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_conglomerate"],\n\timg: "codex_book.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>

The Irrwish-class Blackship was an attempt by the [[Dominion|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_dominion"]] to design a New Era strategic weapons delivery platform as early as the 28th millennium. Actual design of the Irrwish had begun earlier in an attempt to slowly improve on the wildly successful and extremely long-serving [[Incubus-class battleship|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_incubus"]], though this goal was never achieved - only a few hundred Irrwishes were built by the time the [[Dominion Fleet|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_dominion"]] abandoned the program due to severe cost overruns. Part of the issue with the Irrwish was that, besides being an extremely expensive and radically new design, it had begun to incorporate unproven antimatter technology developed by the [[Irrtech Initiative|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "neo_codex_irr"]] and ended up creating more design problems than it solved.\n\n(( todo: finish this ))

The [[Potts drive|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_pots"]] purred, cycling cooling blocks as fast as the mechanism could insert them. Heat levels hovered just below critical, as was common with corporate drives - [[p-drives|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_pots"]] ran unusually hot compared to [[Luminev drives|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luminev"]] but achieved much better performance, albeit at a significantly worse fuel economy. To the average corporate shipowner, who traveled only short distances and rarely worrid about the price of Pale, this was a non-issue. To Karl, the fuel economy was everything. He only had a limited budget left for this fiscal year and the Kitty Kat was running up significant expenses.\n\nBeside Karl, footsteps pattered as Olga paced up and down in the cockpit pod, shaking her head. She did this for several long minutes before she finally stopped and looked to Karl.\n\n"If Mr. Dorrings is compromised--"\n\n"He is," Karl said, watching the fuel counter tick with mounting unease.\n\nOlga shot him a dark look. "Even so, you should have consulted me first."\n\n"Boob-blood's got a point," the kid called from down below. "You's rushing in. No foreplay. Bad op-sec."\n\n"I know it's a risk," Karl said. "But this is our chance. If we wait, Xarena--"\n\n"Oh, enough with Xarena," Olga snapped. "This isn't about her and you know it!"\n\n"Except it is, at least to me."\n\n"No. It's about your ex-girlfriend. The one you made that dumb promise to. What was her name? Allessa! You think you have to do this for her but you don't, Karlie. She's dead and has been for centuries!"\n\nKarl stared at his sister in stunned silence. Was that really what she thought this was about? A fling he'd had with Allessa Corbei?\n\nOlga banged her fist on the hull. "Damn it, Karl. You could have asked. You should have asked! We're on this ship too, you know. My ship, by the way. Mine. Not yours!"\n\n"I know." Karl rubbed his chin, thinking. "Look at is like a detour. We fly past and see whether this place exist and, if it does--"\n\n"No. I don't like that idea. I have a bad feeling--"\n\n"Olga, please. It's just a few more days and--"\n\n"Fine! I'm done with you constatly cutting me off. If you have to do this, do this, but do it without me!" Olga clattered down the latter to the crew compartment.\n\n"Olga!" Karl tried to stand but his harness held him down. "Shit!"\n\nHe fumbled the buckles apart and hurried to the ladder. Why the rush, Karl did not know, there was one. He'd pushed his sister too far and he wanted to apologize and, with that in mind, Karl vaulted down in one go.\n\nKarl landed with a thud and teetered unsteadily on his feet. "Olga, listen to me. I--"\n\n"I don't want to hear it!" She tore open the panel to the smuggling compartment and dove inside. \n\nThe cover smacked closed behind her. Locks clicked. A seal hissed. Clamped in place from the far side.\n\nKarl pulled a face. "Well, that could have gone better."\n\n"You think, ey?" The kid set his data pad aside, shaking his head. "You's iced it with boobs. First the shit with gramps. Now this."\n\n"I know," Karl said heavily. "It's just--"\n\n"Nah, blood. You--" The kid pointed his data pad at Karl. "You got a problem with acting too quick and not thinking. Saw it myself when you took this job, then again with resting bitchface, and now again. You never stops to think ahead. Mean, what's the plan here anyways? We zooms over to this station and, what, they rolls out the red carpet?"\n\nKarl shook his head. "We observe and assess. Scout the situation out."\n\n"With what? Eyeballs and eardrums?" The kid snorted. "Shizz, blood. You true ain't thought this through at all."\n\n"The Kat has telescopes and sensors," Karl said. "We map out the--"\n\n"Think, yo. Think." The kid tapped himself on the forehead. \n\nKarl had thought about it! He'd weighed the options and concluded that the risks of inaction were far greater than those of a rash decision. Just because no one wanted to hear that didn't make him wrong. Or did it?\n\nOn second thought, Karl had just put his sister's ship on a course to a complete unknown. He hadn't done legwork. He hadn't done research. He'd just input the course and sent them with a half-empty tank, in the hopes Station 418 actually existed. But did it? Come to think of it, did the shadow organization even exist?\n\nEver since Karl had made his case to Gal and Lag, everyone had just sort of assumed the shadow theory was true. But it wasn't like the [[Cybercult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cybercult"]] had gone out and conducted a peer reviewed study on the matter. They'd all just assumed that a pan-galactic cabal had compromised every major government institution in the civilized galaxy because that was what Gal and Lag had theorized and a whole bunch of circumstancial evidence corroberated the theory. But was it true?\n\nKarl didn't know. Gal and Lag didn't know. No one knew. They'd all just assumed that, with someone who referred to themselves as the Spymistress, there was some sort of organization in play. But what if there wasn't? What if that was just smoke and mirrors and the shadow organization was just the conspiracist's explanation for the age-old conflict between [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] and [[Hegemony|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]]. They'd only been at one another's throats since the end of the old world, after all, and while the Crusade of Eden had forced the conflict into the shadows, the ideological gulf between east and west remained as prominent as ever.\n\n"Shit." Karl rubbed his face, exasperated.\n\nAs he did so, he also noticed the infusion tubes in his chest had turned dark. Tainted blood. It was time to swap packs.\n\n"Oh, man." Karl trudged over to his locker and rummaged through it in search of a blood pack.\n\nThere were three on the top shelf, exactly where Karl had left them, but as he pulled one out, he couldn't help but wonder whether his brain was running on tainted blood. That would have been an easy excuse: he'd forgotten to swap his blood pack and oxygen deficiency had made him irrational.\n\n"But it isn't that, is it?" Karl shook his head and slotted the pack into the pump in his back.\n\nThe mechanism clicked. A soft beep sounded as Karl's circulator began pumping foul blood into the old pack. Long seconds passed as fluid gurgled in Karl's tubes. The kid watched on, his expression one of barely-concealed disgust.\n\nKarl knew that look, the one bio-normals got when they saw what they believed was [[abominated|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_abom"]] technology. No such thing existed - a technology was not an [[abominable art|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_abom"]] just because it offended the sensibilities of some and anyone who thought differently, at least in Karl's oppinion, was an idiot. Or so he'd thought until that moment.\n\nSeeing the kid eyeing him like he was watching a [[dazzler|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_impl_dazzlegun"]] stick their arm for the first time made Karl wonder. Because the kid wasn't unhinged or paranoid. He was as sane and rational as they came and what if, hypothetically, there was a good reason for his concern? What if Karl's bad blood really had made him stupid?\n\n"Aw, shit." Karl sat on the bunk with a sigh.\n\nThe kid shot him a sidelong glance. "You good, blood?"\n\n"No," Karl said. "You're right. I acted too rashly. Made a decision on impulse. I shouldn't have. So here's what's what: I'll get Ollie and, unless we're all agreed on what we do next, we just head straight for--" The panel to the smuggling compartment banged open.\n\nDampening mat flapped as Olga scrambled out, screaming. The kid stood with a yelp. Karl jumped to his feet, alarmed, confused, and unable to understand why everyone was yelling. \n\n"There!" Olga pointed at the smuggling compartment. "There was something inside there!"\n\nKarl's heart skipped a beat. "Something? What sort of something?"\n\n"Something!" Olga hid behind Karl, trembling from head to toe. Her voice had become a squeaky whisper, "It was there. I felt it. In there."\n\n"Okay, okay. Let's check it out." Karl inched toward the smuggling compartment.\n\nA curtain of dampening mat obscured the interior and, the closer Karl got, the less he wanted to know what lay beyond. He'd never been a brave man and he didn't want to be the one to push the dampening mat aside. But he couldn't fail Ollie again, not now, and so Karl carefully lifted the dampening mat with a finger.\n\nBeyond was the smuggling compartment, cramped and cozy as ever, and crouched right in front of Karl was a female silhouette with a pair of sickly yellow eyes. It's scarred skin oozed an oily substance that dripped down it's limbs like ink, staining the translucent lume tubes that decorated it's body: pink roses down one side and venom-green vines up the other. The thing, whatever it was - an [[abomination|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_abom"]], it was an [[abomination|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_abom"]]! - crawled out of the compartment like some grotesque human maintenance spider and rose to it's feet with a hiss.\n\n"Fuck!" Karl tripped backwards.\n\nThe kid threw his data pad at the monster, yelling. The device bounced harmlessly off it's shoulder. \n\nKarl and the kid looked at one another, eyes wide with alarm. Neither of them had time to react before the [[abomination|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_abom"]] grabbed Karl and shoved him to the deck. He landed hard, gasping for breath, and had just gotten his bearings when a skeletal cybernetic foot kicked him in the chest. Karl hit the deck again, this time with such force that all the oxygen evacuated his lungs. He wheezed and choked as stars swam before his eyes.\n\n"No!" Olga swung at the creature, screeching, "Don't hurt him!"\n\nThe [[abomination|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_abom"]] swatted Ollie's fist aside with such force the cyber-grafts snaped. Olga whimpered and shrank away, clutching her left arm. The kid, bless him, threw himself at the monster with a roar but he barely made it two steps before he caught an elbow in the face and collapsed with a thud.\n\nKarl saw all this through a blur of dark spots and remembered thinking he should have done something smarter, or at least acted sooner, as Lord Vindell Senior would have. Father had taught Karl that lesson many times: always liquidate the competition before they can muster a defence. It was a sound business strategy, no doubt about that, but Karl had no strengh to liquidate anyone or anything. He could barely breathe and just keeping his lungs heaving took every ounce of strength he had left.

Celestial Day dawned to a drowsy lot of drunks on the terrace. Everyone who hadn't headed home was asleep except Karl, who sat on a gilded stool and scowled at those his sister associated with. What he saw was less the individiuals splayed on the cushions and more the sickening stereotype: party privilege, a term which originated in the sex spheres of [[Cubix|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_cubix"]] to describe those who had purchased the privilege to indulge to their heart's content, buying sexual gratification and ample spirits to sate their so-called luxury needs. Until recently, the west had not known such a phenomenon.\n\nHistorically, only the wealthiest westerners had been able to host parties and, even then, they had been familiar affairs For anything more rowdy there were festivals and a bazillion holy days - communal affairs where the festivities had been organized by the local chapel, funded by the local council, and free for all to partake in. Otherwise there had only been commoner's holes, where locals off from shift droke their woes away, and - rarely - a back-passage feast hosted by some or another local sect. \n\nKarl still remembered the last time he had improvized a party the western way, a thousand years ago on [[Scaffold 35|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_sc35"]]. It had begun in the yard of the Corbei House and become a meandering crawl from one watering hole to the next, testing every secret concoction they sold under the table, and speaking to everyone and anyone about everything, until he'd ended in a dingy rent-a-room with the most beautiful woman Karl had ever met - aside from Olga, obviosuly. Every pub had been a communal unto itself, full of loud voices and leaf smoke, but for all the toasts to the saints and idiosyncratic drinking customs, the experience had at least been authentic. The Lakeview Lounge with it's ornate furniture and expensive glasses was not.\n\nIt was a caricature of a stereotype imported from the east: the guests had imbiled to excess, strewn their clothes all over, splattered all maner of liquids across the cushions, and then orgasmed loudly until they had all collapsed. Just being there made Karl uncomfortable, though he tried not to be disgusted by the people. It was their ways which bothered him, especially the way they tried to imitate the east. Except the east had no culture, no civilized norms, only what privilege and property the credit could buy and now the west followed suit, trampling it's customs for the newest and most exciting trends of the cyber-gene era.\n\n"And this is what the galaxy has come to?" Karl fingered his empty glass, shaking his head.\n\nA chair clattered loudly. One of the kitty-girls stumbled towards the toilet, a shower-and-piss box by the stairs, concealed behind a noise-curtain. When she pushed the dampening fabric aside, a muted voice spoke from the toilet, sounding sick. The kitty-girl stumbled in.\n\nKarl breathed a sigh and looked to Olga, who had collapsed on a cushion beside him. She felt around listlessly, saw Karl, and stopped to smile as genuinely as only a gene-sister could.\n\nHe smiled back. "Good morning, love."\n\n"Karlie," Olga mumbled. "What time is it?"\n\n"Just past cycle-dawn," he said.\n\n"Oh." Olga picked herself up with a groan.\n\nSomeone moaned irritably.\n\nOlga pulled a face and tiptoed over to Karl. "You're awake early."\n\n"It's Saint's Day," Karl said. "I've a present to give you."\n\nOlga nodded absently. "Did you sleep?"\n\n"No but, then again, I haven't spent the past week imbiling on a lounge-terrace."\n\n"We also talked, had fun, and--"\n\n"And?" Karl gestured to the messa on the terrace. "Law-tech rests it's case."\n\n"I know." Olga rubbed her face.\n\nShe looked utterly exhausted and, when she removed her fingers, black eye-ink clung to them. Olga groaned.\n\nKarl chuckled despite himself. "There'll be time to pretty up. Are you packed?"\n\nOlga nodded. "In the bag-room."\n\n"Good. Then get awake and say goodbye to everyone. We've to be at the docks in one hour."\n\n"One hour? Why so soon?"\n\n"We don't want to be here after that," Karl said. "Just in case."\n\n"In case? Karl, what did--"\n\n"The important part is I've a tube-day present to give you. The confirmation just came in. It'll be waiting at the docks."\n\nOlga's expression darkened. "You imported from the east, didn't you? Karl, I said--"\n\n"Don't worry, love." Karl set his glass aside and stood. "Now, time to get ready."\n\n"And Father?"\n\nKarl snorted. "He messaged. Told me to tell you all the best. The ususal."\n\n"So we won't be visiting him today, I suppose."\n\n"No."\n\nOlga nodded, her expression become downcast. Karl felt for her. All his sister had wanted was a perfect tube-day - eight hundred years of beautiful, wonderful Olga. Then her brother had almost missed it and, to add insult to injury, disapproved of her friends. Except as bad as Karl knew he had been, he was not as bad as Father. Old Otto Vindell hadn't even messaged his gene-daughter. He'd told Karl to tell her for him because the old fart had no spine.\n\n"Idiot man," Karl muttered.\n\nHe had nothing but contempt for his father but that was a problem for another time. The immediate was much more important: getting Olga to the E Sector docks in time for the meetup with Mr. Acrel - and to pick up her present, obviously, though Karl cared nothing for that. His concern was the Saint's Day job. They needed to be off [[Scaffold 22|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_scaffold22"]] before whatever Mr. Acrel had done at the black clinic came back to bite them because, if it had gone sideways, it would not be Mr. Acrel, the [[sanctioned hunter|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_abom"]] and darling of the clerics, whose neck was on the line.\n\nIt would be the neck of Karl Vindell, a filthy corporate capitalist and suspected member of the [[Cybercult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cybercult"]], believed to be responsible for techno-terrorism and digital vandalism on an unprecedented scale, who would be dragged before the Kangoroo Court of Eden and immediately found guilty on all accounts. Even if he wasn't literally hanged to the stars - that practice had been ruled uncivilized in the aftermath of the Witch Hunts - he would suffer the modern equivalent: locked up and carted off for re-socialization on a penal station and, while Karl was prepared to risk much for the cause, he did not need to give the faiths an excuse to arrest him, thank you very much.

Brother Duhan took Yerris to a solidary chapel, a little shielded room, deep in the bowels of the Eternal Temple. The walls were bare granite, the floor un-carpeted, and the chamer entirely devoid of technology. Not even furniture - no chair or table, only the circular icon of [[Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]] that hung on the wall. \n\nYerris had spent many cycles in such rooms during his youth. He'd not been a faithful [[acolyte|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_acolyte"]] by any account, even his own, and seeing those cold walls brought back memories.\n\nThe [[Cathedral|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_cathedral"]] during his first seasons. Time and again he'd snuck out of the dormus to explore the secret passages. Yerris had often encouraged Sister Tibeah to partake in his sinful adventures. Once, they'd touched and kissed behind the statues of a long departed cleric - Yerris had later been forced to memorize the unimpressive history of Padre Avantavi as punishment. He remembered nothing of the man's accomplishments. Only the unspoken lesson endured: there were hidden cameras everywhere.\n\nLater in his study, Yerris had discovered how to engage the forbidden doorways of the [[Cathedral|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_cathedral"]] and, instead of memorizing [[scriptures|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_scr"]] for Temple-Exam, he had explored the great vaults of [[Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]], fascinated by all the strange, xenological artefacts hidden in those old catacombs. He'd only later learned the vaults were located inside the nearby star and that, had he engaged the doorways improperly, he might have been trapped there forever.\n\nSuch foolishness had never bothered Yerris. He adored the insight and intriuge. One time, he'd even glimpsed the silverish silhouette of a [[Paladin|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_paladin"]] as it emerged from a hidden passage. The night after, Yerris shown Sister Tibeah. They'd spoken of nothing else for weeks, always in hushed tones, until quite suddenly Sister Tibeah had disappeared. Found guilty of heresy and cleansed at the stake.\n\nYerris shivered, unsettled by the memory. He could almost smell the odor of burnt flesh and see the pleading look in the young woman's eyes. Her only crime had been to be born a woman. Sometimes Yerris wondered whether the [[Solar Crusade|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_mlord"]] had ever tuly ended or whether it had simply changed it's visage and continued under a new name.\n\nThe sight of Ser Duhan and his old imperial plasma pistol, pacing up and down in the soldiary chapel, did not encourage Yerris.\n\n"So." Duhan's disapproving gaze fell on Pavel. "What you hear now, boy, never leaves this room. Is that absolutely clear?"\n\nThe [[squire|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_acolyte"]] bowed his head. "Yes, Sire."\n\n"Swear it by the stars," Duhan growled.\n\n"He said yes," Yerris said irritably. "Enough dramatics! We are safe. In a pit in the ground. What the Hades is in your circuits?"\n\nThe [[Shield-Knight|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_knight"]] shot Yerris a cold, mechanical stare. "Our confidence is compromised."\n\n"Well, obviously. There've been corporate agents in our ranks since forever, that's not--"\n\n"Not by the [[Hegemony|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]]," Duhan said. "The Magister was murdered on account of our negligence. My negligence. You remember the trace-ray I used in his office?"\n\n"Yes But I--"\n\nDuhan held up a hand. "It left the Magister's security apparatus weakened. It was rebuilt in great haste. I was in his office only briefly before security escorted me out but it was evident: whoever murdered the Magister knew. It could not have been the Magister's people. They were barred from entering his offce and, as I determined last week, it is an isolated system. The records prove: no corporate entered. The only ones who knew about this security flaw are us and the Magister."\n\nYerris, incredulous, "You're not suggesting--"\n\n"I suggest nothing." Duhan's gaze wandered from Yerris to Pavel and back. "You both knew of this. One of us let the infromation slip."\n\nPavel said, "Sire, I have not the slightest idea--"\n\n"Silence," Duhan snapped. "Our actions could be judged to be heretical by neglicence!"\n\n"But he's right," Yerris said. "Pavel was never there, Duhan."\n\n"You might have told him," the [[Shield-Knight|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_knight"]] said. "His lips might have slipped."\n\nYerris scowled. "No. No I never said a word. Not to Pavel. Nor to anyone."\n\n"Then the suspicion points to you, Padre." Duhan's biological eye searched Yerris' face. His cybernetic one remained perfectly still.\n\nYerris laughed. "Me? You cannot be serious!"\n\n"I follow evidence, Padre. It points to you."\n\n"But how? Why?" Yerris hands clasped. "Brother Duhan, enough with the paranoia, please. I arrived here alone, with no preparations or communications except to you and we both know who intercepted those. No, I've a simpler, more rational explanation for what transpired in the Maginster's--"\n\n"Do you have evidence, Padre?"\n\n"Possibly. If you'd just hear me out."\n\nSer Duhan folded his cybernetic arms. "Speak."\n\n"Well, the whole reason I wanted to speak to the Magister earlier is something Pavel and I had deduced. It was a lesson on bi-diffusal intersect analysis. Two primary spheres, two influences. And he--" Yerris gestured to the [[squire|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_acolyte"]]. "--mentioned there must be a third dimension, one we haven't considered. It tips the scales ever so slightly. Almost unnoticable. But it is clearly present."\n\nDuhan shot Pavel a suspicious look. "You did all that, did you, boy?"\n\nPavel bowed his head. "Yes, Sire."\n\n"Then you overheard well." Duhan looked to Yerris. "The boy's realization is one that has been evident to me for some time. [[Xenve-6|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_xnv"]] is a closed system, carefully controlled by both us and the corporates. Nothing can enter or leave unnoticed. Except something has, Padre: you. Your actions since your arrival have been highly unorthodox."\n\n"Not in a wider scope of galactic affairs," Yerris said. "My modus opperandi is one followed by most if not all of the clergy. It is the preferred--"\n\n"I do not need a lecture," Duhan growled. "Nor am I an expert in galactic affairs. My observation is limited to this planet and the spheres which influence it. Until your arrival, all was ordinary. Ever since, the extraudinary has become the norm. This cannot be a coincidence."\n\nYerris laughed, incredulous. "Are you accusing me, Brother Duhan?"\n\n"I am beginning to suspect. It is the way of [[Shield|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_knight"]]."\n\n"Then you suspect wrongly," Yerris said. "Do see sense: we've been looking in the wrong place all along. Yes, I'd not seen it before. I too thought this was only about [[Halder-Vue|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_halder"]] and that I'd come to solve a political dispute. It seemed simple: I was to avert crisis and prevent a spark that might ignite a holy war. But it's not, is it?"\n\nDuhan, dubious, "What is it then?"\n\n"Superficially? About just that. But see: what transpires here is but a single part of a much larger puzzle. I can prove it. If I may?"\n\nThe [[Shield-Knight|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_knight"]] nodded.\n\n"This transcript, ah--" Yerris felt his pockets, wondering where he'd put it.\n\n"Father?" Pavel held out the strip of parchment. "You dropped it earlier."\n\n"Ah. Thank you." Yerris showed the transcript to Duhan. "It's an invitation to a political event. Out of context, it's hardly significant. The [[Cathedral|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_cathedral"]] recieves and forwards thousands like it each season. But to route it to me here? On the eve of the Magister's murder? That reeks of conspiracy, both within our ranks and within theirs."\n\n"I see." Duhan handed the transcript back, shaking his head. "An invitation proves nothing."\n\n"Except it does. [[Halder-Vue|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_halder"]] was about to set a precedent. It was about to prove that a corporate subsidiary could cooperate with the [[Cathedral|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_cathedral"]] and that the noose of the credit-line is not absolute. I expected the [[Hegemony|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]] would contest this. Except this is not the work of the corprates alone. It cannot be. Only select individuals at the [[Cathedral|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_cathedral"]] knew where I journeyed and what I was to discuss here." Yerris rubbed his chin. "Stars, it's so obvious. Why didn't I notice this earlier?"\n\nDuhan shrugged. "It strikes me you jump to conclusions, Padre. Culprits under duress often do so."\n\n"I've pushed them into a corner," Yerris muttered. "Stars, we're provoking the very conflict I was trying to prevent. The [[Church Militant|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] is more deeply involved than I believed!"\n\n"Padre--" Duhan placed a heavy cybernetic hand on Yerris' shoulder. "That is an extremely serious allegation. One I hope you can support with evidence."\n\n"Yes, yes, of course, I--" Yerris waved the thought away.\n\nThere was no time to explain to the [[Shield-Knight|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_knight"]]. He didn't even believe in [[Holy Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]]. Yerris did. He had begun to believe the moment he'd seen a machine-prediction, documented in [[scripture|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_scr"]] a thousand years before, come true: the cleansing of Sister Tibeah.\n\nEver since, he'd served the cause of [[Holy Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]] without question and, unlike some in the [[Cathedral|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_cathedral"]], listened closely to what the distributed neural network professed. It had foreseen an issue on [[XNV-6|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_xnv"]].\n\nNot in detail. But the sequence of events had been approximated: the rise of the old world's [[loyalists|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_loyalism"]], a dagger which would stab [[Holy Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]] in the back.\n\nYerris had believed the prediction implied literal [[loyalists|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_loyalism"]]. But it hadn't! There was another explanation: the old loyalties of those who were obsessed with balls of glowing plasma - and burning women at the stake. Old ideas that endured in the [[Church Militant|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]].\n\n"Blasted." Yerris made for the door. "I must speak to the [[Cathedral|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_cathedral"]]."\n\nSer Duhan blocked his way. "Now, Padre?"\n\n"Yes. Immediately. Do you mean to impede me?"\n\nDuhan stepped aside. "I shall accompany you. For your security."\n\nYerris wanted to laugh. How similar to a corporate enforcer Ser Duhan sounded. Almost identical. Because they were identical.\n\nMen of the old world all thought alike. A favor for a favor. A deed for a deed. The [[Church Militant|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] was no different. But to send a killer and spark a holy war? What did they hope to gain?\n\nMore importantly: what had they promised the corporates? The secrets of [[REACH core|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_reach"]] activation? The sacred source code of [[Holy Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]]? Impossible to know but the militant fools had to be stopped!

The Djinn - also Species J1N - was a near-mythological being whose origins can be traced to early encounters with [[Lunar Corsairs|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_corsair"]]. These creatures were long held to be nothing more than a legend by all serious academics with most histories claiming their were complete fabrications, although the J1N species was believed by some to exist, perhaps the result of an late imperial genetics experiment. Later investigation by members of the [[New Era Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "neo_codex_nec"]] found that the Djinn, or a creature of a similar nature, might well have existed since as early as the 19th millennium, though all known such creatures had long died by the time this fact was established.<br><br>\n\nFor the duration of classic to modern galactic history, the Djinn was held to be a legend - alternatively an [[abomination|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_abom"]] - and few if any were thought to exist, through later records studied by the [[New Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "neo_codex_nec"]] would suggest there were many more Djinn than ever suspected, even by the most paranoid [[abomination hunters|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_abom"]]. The creature's shrouded origins have led to far more rumors and superstitions than solid scientific facts. It bears to examine these before delving into the scientifically probable truth about the Djinn.\n\n<h3>Traditional Conception</h3>\nIn traditional academic study in the home-galaxy, Djinn were mythological beings spawned from superstition and tales of the [[Lunar Corsairs|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_corsair"]], told and re-told by crewmen of the [[Solar Armada|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_mlord"]] who retuned to the Galactic Core after the Solar Crusade. The Djinn was said to have bright white eyes and skin as black as tar. It's lifespan was claimed to be eternity, and when it thought, it afflicted the minds of passers-by with illusions of terror and dread. Djinn were also claimed to be immaterial, able to walk through solid matter, and mythology suggested they were demonic agents sent to infiltrate, subvert, and destroy the civilized galaxy, though motives were never specified. They were said to be victims of the [[black plague|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_bblood"]] in some versions, in others said to be born from the husks of dying stars, and were occasionally believed to be created by the [[abominable arts|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_abom"]]. Many legends claimed the voice of a Djinn wound shatter reality and it's shrieks made the universe itself hold it's breath.<br><br>\n\nWhile traditional history recorded the [[Lunar Corsair|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_corsair"]] and [[black blood|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_bblood"]] in detail, the mythology of the Djinn was known to most modern researchers to be nothing more than the product of superstition and fear. Fanciful tales were though to be re-told of bygone eras and, while the modern galaxy feared pontential raids by [[Corsair fleets|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_corsair"]] from the Fringes, the Djinn was discarded and discredited as a complete myth. This notion was reinforced when it became known to some chronoligists that many Fringe raids had been encouraged by the [[Dominion|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_dominion"]], wchih had recruited pirates and corsairs through a clandestine methods to antagonize the galactic core. It was hoped that superstitous belief in the Djinn and the fabled threat of the [[Corsair fleets|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_corsair"]] would be eradicated by as early as the late 27th millennium. This never occurred.\n\n<h3>New Era Corrections</h3>\nWith many [[Dominion|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_dominion"]] records revealed when the [[Ecume Exclave|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "asc_codex_ecume"]] formed in the 30th millennium, traditional conception of the Djinn was challenged by the New Era revisionist. The [[New Era Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "neo_codex_nec"]] in particular, who had taken it upon themselves to investigate all of galactic history to create an archive that actually matched known historic fact, uncovered proof that [[Project CABAL|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cabal"]] had not only existed but that many [[Dominion|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_dominion"]] black operations in the galactic core had been run by [[black blood|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_bblood"]] afflictes with near supernatural powers, commonly referred to as Djinn.<br><br>\n\n<div class='HUD_CodexImage_Left HUD_CodexTallImage'><<print "[img[" + $codex.imagePath + "codex_blackblood_infectionmap_full.png]]">></div>Recordings and scientific notes confirmed that, in advanced stages of the [[Strain White|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_bblood"]] infection, certain subjects would undergo an exotic transformation that did not always lead to death. The outcome was dependant on a genetic marker that, if properly introduced, could allow the afflictee to slowly transform as the infection spread through the nervous system and into the subject's skin, slowly replacing organic cells and even synthetic augments with exotic structures of a non-entital sort. Throughout this process, the individual would retain their conscience and conception of self, though the individual would de-facto cease to exist as a biological being after the first decades of transformation as it's entire conscience would be copied into an artificial exotic wave, the non-entital control signal which allowed the individual to control their body as it was slowly transformed into the same substance.<br><br>\n\nIf not otherwise interrupted, for example by sub-atomic splitting or extreme kinetic forces, the artificial exotic creature would continue to exist for an unthinkably long period of time, sustained by the energy folded into it's pseudo-genetic makeup - in fact a warped fabric of space-time which would slowly unfold to release an astronomical ammount of energy in a small trickle. This creature, at this point a collection of exotic transcievers held together by the so-called control signal, would retain all functionality of it's organic original except that, in many cases, the reproductive system and pleasure centers of it's nervous system became irreversibly damaged. This was determined to be an unintended side effect cause by corruption of the [[Strain White|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_bblood"]] sequence, not a deliberate design decision.<br><br>\n\nThese combinations of psychological stressors would cause the entity to slowly succumb to painful delusions which would overwhelm the control signal, eventually causing the creature to cease functioning alltogether. Prior to this moment, and not unlike the Djinn of myth, these afflicted individuals could pass through solid matter up to a specific molecular density and thickness, cause others to forcibly mimic their actions by awakening dormant [[Strain White|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_bblood"]] entities via the control signal, conceal their precense from dormant carriers through similar mechanics, and in extreme cases even cause lethal sub-atomic vibrations in the blood vessels and bodies of dormant carriers. For understandable reasons, the [[Dominion|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_dominion"]] kept these records classified. Also kept from the public was all information regarding [[Project CABAL|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cabal"]] and the files eventually sgared with the [[New Era Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "neo_codex_nec"]] were heavily redacted, leading to many questions regarding the true origin of the Djinn.<br><br>\n\nThese revelations suggested that beliefs held by superstitious believers, paranoid [[abomination hunters|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_abom"]], and the [[cabalist cult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cabal"]] had not been mere fabrications but were based on embelished truth. The [[Dominion|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_dominion"]] had indeed used black operatives to destabilize the Galactic Core and had been doing so since as early as the 23rd millennium. It was also revealed that the Djinn, while more an unstable pseudo-genetic abberation than an exotic creation, had been originally devised in an attempt to create a post-human entity that mimicked organic life while not suffering from the many drawbacks of biological existence. It would seem this premise was used by the [[Dominion|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_dominion"]] for more sinister purposes and no known Djinn endured into the New Era, though some theories and conspiracists suspect that at least one Djinn may have survived.

The hatch led through a short connector to a forty-meter-long perishable goods container. There were no seal-boxes or freeze-racks inside. Instead, point-lights had been strung between handgrips on the walls, casting long shadows on forty troopers in big brown [[combat suits|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_csuit"]]. Most lay in zero-g hammocs, visors down and noise-cancelation on. Those who were awake serviced their stubby [[SNR-1 stingers|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_stinger"]], swiping drum-clamps and testing the inductive strength of the compat coil carbines.\n\nIn true Scout Operations tradition, the troopers had recently modified their shoulder-plates to show their personal convictions. Some had scratched out or disfigured the black half-diamond of the [[Independent Fleet|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyran"]]. Others had stenciled on symbols from their homeworlds, sprayed leering faces in bright green lumen-paint, or hung trinkets from the mount-brackets. Others yet had filled out the half-diamond so it formed the [[Tyranate|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyranate"]], a blatant display of [[loyalism|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_loyalism"]] for which the Chain of Command prescribed capital punishment.\n\nTeshandra had no mind to do as the Chain prescribed. Demotion to Scout Operations was punishment enough. Assignment to the Volunteer Battallion was much worse, if only because it was commanded by Sergeant Ruthran. The conscientious objector floated at the far end of the container, his bulked-up body wedged between two crates. Each contained a next-generation [[echo-drone|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_edrone"]]; top secret technology. The Sergeant had drilled his men on extensively and was, at that very moment, proofing the devices.\n\nHe'd run a plug-cable frin arm-computer of his [[combat suit|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_csuit"]] to the nearest crate. Both devices beeped quietly. Sergeant Ruthran studied the results on his computer.\n\n"Two?" Teshandra climbed towards him.\n\n"Eh? The Sergeant looked up. His visor was up and his rebreather mask off, revealing a thin face wedged in a flabby undersuit. "Oh, it's just you, Cadre."\n\n"Who did you expect? The Emperor reincarnate?"\n\n"Witty." He tapped the tab-buttons on his computer with his thick servo-assisted fingers. He shook his head, scowling at his computer.\n\n"Is something wrong?" \n\nThe Sergeant shook his head. He tabbed at his arm-computer. The high-res screen switched from the proof-readout to briefing documents.\n\nRosters, team assignments, equipment loadouts, and finally a wire-map of the [[Al Habe Sidir|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_alhabe"]] orbital rings; a six hundred year out of date schematic, that was. Nothing newer had been on file and Lilly's [[corsairs|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_corsair"]] had been unable to procure current data in time. The entire operation had been planned and put in motion in less than a decade. Far too little time for prepwork at inter-stellar scales.\n\n"So this." Ruthran gestured to the wire-maps. "This is what we got?"\n\nTeshandra nodded. "Thoughts?"\n\n"Only one: you've got damned weird ideas about what Scout Operations can and can't do, One. This?" He pointed to schematic. "Too big to secure. Or hold. Could blast it to bits with artillery though." He grinned.\n\nTesh's lips curled. "Do all former artillerist constantly want to blow everything up?"\n\nRuthran tipped a finger. "Boomtown."\n\n"Well, I have bad news for you, Two: no boomers and no artillery. What you see is what you get." In an undertone, she added, "Mostly."\n\nRuthran's brow rose. "Mostly?"\n\n"Need to know. Meaning: you need to know the [[Intelligence Corps|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_intelcorps"]] has though this through and is prepared. I know it isn't rock-scout in support of Operation Tyran and I know that means none of you will be reinstated. But--" Teshandra shrugged. "Like I said: need to know."\n\nRuthran eyed her suspiciously. "Meaning what, One?"\n\nTesh shot him a funny look. "You are bad at reading between the lines, aren't you?"\n\n"Could be, Cadre. Way I was briefed: we take the ring. Honor in death. For the [[Independent Fleet|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyran"]]. All there is to it."\n\n"Oh." Tesh pursed her lips. "And here I thought an objector would want to live."\n\n"Bite me." The sergeant showed his shoulder plate, which bore the objector's box in white - a mark of pride among those who'd been boxed by the Chain.\n\nTesh shot him a stern look. "A man of convictions. Pascifist convistions. Should I be impressed?"\n\n"What I meant is, Cadre, is I object to offensive operations. Not to duty in principle. And this?" He indicated his computer. "This is an offensive operation. Against a non-hostile system."\n\n"So is Operation Tyran," Tesh said. "Do you know where the 9th Fleet is headed?"\n\nRuthran shook his head. "Don't know. Don't care. Word was rock deployments. Observe and report to the Chain, not--" He gestured around. "--whatever the Hades this is. Which I don't even know, One, because the nixing op-brief only says what the [[Admiralty|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_admiral"]] needed to hear and we's been packed in one cryo-tube after another for, what, six years straight?" He breathed a laugh.\n\n"Amusing, yes." Tesh studied the man's scruffy face. \n\nThree-decade-old [[birth-body|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_bchamber"]]. Freshly cloned. Cybernetic jaw. Unusual for a [[Fleet|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyran"]] noncom. Then again, the Sergeant was an unusual man. He objected vehemently but had still made Sergeant as a Rock Corps artillerist before he'd been demoted for vocal opposition to Operation Tyran.\n\nTeshandra's lips curled. "You are an amusing man, Two. Do you know that?"\n\n"Sure, sure. Look, I don't want to be the one who complains. Those years we spent in transit were on ice and the Chain hasn't court-martialed us yet. Anyways: it's cozy in here. So all good. But here's the thing: Snitch Five is supposed to be a recon outfit. Not a black boarding team. We aren't trained for this sort of stunt, you know."\n\n"Yes," Teshandra said slowly. "All those training exersizes you conducted on individual initiative did not happen, did they?"\n\nHe looked away. "Like I said: don't want to be the one to complain."\n\n"But you are," Teshandra said. "Which is ironic, given this operation should be to your liking: we take the orbital ring with as few deaths as possible. No artillery. No grand offensive. One team slips in to secure Local Control and hijack the kill-sats. Once in control, we kindly request everyone stand down and pump Pale over when the [[fleet tanker|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tanker"]] arrives. If everything goes as intended, Snitch Five does not fire a single shot."\n\n"Likely," Ruthran growed. "Real likely."\n\n"It is possible. If the operation is executed properly and our assets come through. If so, we might even reach the main battlegroup in time for you to deploy on rock-scout like you wanted."\n\n"Assets," Ruthran growled. "You mean: [[corsairs|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_corsair"]]. Cutthroats."\n\nTesh shook her head. "Those familiar with black business prefer not to slit throats, Two. Leaves a body count. Encourages crews to resist. Makes--" She hesitated. "What matters here is: you get a bloodless operation, our allies get their payday, and the [[Fleet|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyran"]] gets it's fuel. Only the locals lose but that can be mitigated."\n\n"Yeah." Ruthran studied Tesh, expression sour. "What aren't you telling me, One?"\n\n"Nothing," Tesh said. "Your objective is to take Local Control like the op-brief states. Once you have, we hold the system until the Supply Tangent arrives. That is the entire operation."\n\nRuthran grunted. "Can do that for you, Cadre. On conditions."\n\n"Conditions?"\n\nRuthran nodded. "I want to know what's really going on. But you won't tell me that. So how about: you stay out of my hair and I get this done?"\n\n"No. I will come along. That is non-negotiable."\n\nHe scoffed. "To make sure I don't object, you mean."\n\n"No," Tesh said. "I trust Scout Operations to conduct operations without micro-managing oversight. my concern is: no one in Snitch Five has ever been to [[Al Habe|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_alhabe"]] before."\n\n"And you have?" Ruthran looked surprised.\n\nTesh nodded. "That was a long time ago but nothing changes in colonial systems. Still set in the old ways, resisting modernity whenever it rears it's head. Chances are those--" She pointed to the wire-map on Ruthran's computer. "--are ninety percent accurate."\n\n"Six hundred years is a long time," Ruthran said.\n\n"Would you preferr I stayed here while you bumbled around blind? With no way to interface with our assets?"\n\n"Dunno," he said. "You combat-qualified, Cadre? Cause it might get nasty out there. Bolts and blood. Might mess up your fine black uniform."\n\nTeshandra smirked. "Horrifying."\n\n"Yes," Ruthran said heavily. "Just covering the bases. So: are you combat-qualified?"\n\nTesh shook her head. "Says so in my record: never qualified with a [[stinger|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_stinger"]] and certainly not qualified to use a [[combat suit|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_csuit"]]."\n\nRuthran nodded. He did not speak.\n\n"Of course," Teshandra said. "That is mostly because, in my day, [[Lunans|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luna"]] were not eligable for service and our records were not kept. My combat qualifications include charging a [[Solar Knight|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_mlord"]] in a pressure suit and living to tell the tale. I can also add siezing two dozen old world warships in the name of Throne and Tyrant. Not alone, obviously, and not all at once. But my point here is: unlike you and your men, Two, I have actually conducted black boarding operations."\n\n"Fair enough," Ruthran said. "Old world experience works for me. Still, I suggest you stay back. Wouldn't want an officer to get injured, would we?"\n\n"But of course not. Oh, and we make dock in six days. I want this--" She waved around. "--rigged and prepped."\n\n"Rigged? To blow?"\n\nTesh nodded, an smirk on her lips. "You truly never have trained for a boarding action, have you?"\n\n"We trained," Ruthran said. "I don't see why we don't just use the airlock."\n\n"We will," Tesh said. "Only Boarding Spec will expect that. Coilers and [[chemical guns|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_zipgun"]]. Bots and bodies in overwatch all around the ship, not to mention the armed [[sub-frigate|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cfrigate"]] trailing us. They will expect us to use the airlock. But they will not shoot at their own station so, assuming it comes to that, and assuming are arrival is hot, we simply create our own exit."\n\nRuthran bit his lip. "So rig the pod. Sure. Then what? We don't have cutters and even if we did: it's take too long to cut into the orbital ring. They'd pick us off in the open."\n\n"True. But, you see, by sheer coincidence I happen to have assets inside the orbital ring. Assets who, as you pointed out earlier, just so happen to be cutthroats with a certain aptitude at boarding operations."\n\n"Mighty convienient, that." Ruthran nodded. "Okay, Cadre. We do this your way. But, inside, we do things my way. No blood unless necessary."\n\nTesh spread her hands. "As you wish, Sergeant. All I want is Local Control. Make it happen." She turned away.\n\nRuthran held her back. "Ah, Cadre-Officer?"\n\n"Digit discipline." Teshandra brushed his hand away. "But yes?"\n\n"Out of curiosity: is there anything else about this operation that wasn't in the op-brief? You know, ideas that were never fully fleshed out or that might be a bit too radical for the Chain of Command, maybe?"\n\n"Oh, most definitely. I know all about [[Al Habe Sidir|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_alhabe"]]." Tesh's lips curled. "I was born here."\n\nRuthran snorted. "Like I'll believe that."\n\n"It is so. You may take my word for it." Tesh winked and turned away.\n\n"Ruddy Cadre-Corps," Ruthran muttered as she climbed back the way she'd come.\n\nTeshandra smirked. In truth, she did recall a thing or two about the solar system but Scout Operations had no need to know. All they needed to do was execute the operation as planned. If the locals were sane and reasonable, which most colonials were, there would be no bloodbath. If not, well, then Supply Tangent Jupiter would arrive in the middle of a shooting war and all Hades would break loose when the Pirate Patrol caught up. Except that would not happen.\n\nFor one, the [[Intelligence Corps|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_intelcorps"]] had thought Operation Jupiter through, down to the last detail. For another, the pirate patrol did not know [[Al Habe Sidir|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_alhabe"]] was being targeted and would not be prepared. The gaggle of bitter old knights who'd rallied around their re-imagination of the [[Solar Crusade|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_mlord"]] were more self-professed altruists than military minds - they didn't even have a proper intelligence service.\n\nThe Great War had ended and the [[Red Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] was not the [[Solar Armada|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_mlord"]], no matter how much the cyber-knights from the Core wanted to believe they were. Still, at least one of their cybernetic-assisted minds knew: the largest supplies of Pale available anywhere in the galaxy were located in the Fringe and, if one wanted to move fleets across any meaningful distance, one had to control those fuel stocks - that or build big, ungainly wormhole gateways that blew up the moment anyone looked at them funny.\n\nIn other words: the [[Red Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] was coming to [[Al Habe Sidir|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_alhabe"]]. It didn't know that yet but it would do so in time. The question was not if but whether Operation Jupiter would be completed by the time their bloated old battlecruisers arrived.

The command capsule of the [[Plex hauler|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_freighter"]] was shrouded in shadow. Electronics hummed. Respirators hissed. The nav-computer beeped. From where Teshandra stood, leaning on the head rest of the pilot's couch, she could barely see the digital touch-displays. \n\nThe [[Cartel|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cmall"]] pilot's fingers were in the way; three taps to adjust onto approach vector. The digital displays updated course: long bend around the planet and into the orbital ring. The man didn't call the adjust. Too busy checking math to speak. Teshandra's gaze wandered to the nav-comm seat.\n\nA woman in a black skinsuit, identical to the one Teshandra wore, sat buckled in the harness. She'd tied her grimy white hair in a pony tail and had a neural-link plugged in her neck. It had made her hooded eyes glaze over; mind lost in the interface. Her cracked lips, inked princess-pink as Lillith vi Atada liked them, twitched in time to unspoken words.\n\nSuddenly she spoke aloud, "Transmission from Local Control. Got a [[sub-frigate|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cfrigate"]] shadowing us. Wants all trade codes re-synched or else."\n\n"Do they now?" Teshandra scowled. "Do they have guns on us?"\n\n"Chemical plinkers," Lilly said. "Tracking but belts unlinked. Wager they think the Market Gap is still crewed by [[Plexians|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]]."\n\n"More or less," Tesh muttered, gaze on Lilly vi Atada's princess-pink lips. "Any word from Local Control about the astrographic incident?"\n\nLilly shook her head. Her lips again moved wordlessly.\n\n"Nix." Tesh glanced to the pilot. "How long untill de-burn ends?"\n\n"Ten minutes," he rasped through his rebreather.\n\nTesh nodded, scowling. "Will we still be in effective range by then?"\n\n"Anywhere is in effective range," the [[Cartel|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cmall"]] man said. "The guns are probably on the sattelites. Not just the [[sub-frigate|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cfrigate"]]. And I wager there are surface-launched drone systems at the [[Plex|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] installation. This is why I told you your plan is terrible."\n\nTesh breathed a laugh. "Oh, ye of little faith."\n\nThe pilot snorted. "I have read the [[Good Book|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_book"]]. Faith is simply unimaginative fiction."\n\n"Faith in the old world, I meant," Tesh said. "Have some of that."\n\nThe pilot grunted.\n\nLilly vi Atada chuckled. "Look around, [[Cartel|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cmall"]]. The old world's all around you. Breathe it in, nice and deep: no need for faith when you got [[fission detonators|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_fdet"]]." Lilly glanced at Tesh. "You did save one of those for me, didn't you?"\n\n"The day I give you a handheld nuke is the day Hades freezes over. But yes. I have one. Here." Tesh tapped the [[fission detonator|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_fdet"]] strapped to her leg, just above her [[monomolecular blade|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cblade"]]. \n\n"Oh, good." Lilly flexed her shoulders with a sigh. "Well, didn't sound like Zone Control bought it. We're apparently on a suspicious in-vector. Popped in right after the malfunction. You--" She looked at Tesh with a pair of chem-stained eyes. "--really nixed up on that timing on this, One. Month or two before the event would've been less suspect."\n\nTesh shook her head. "Invadimia and Nubitari are at [[Station 16458|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_station_16458"]]."\n\n"What and what?" Lilly looked confused.\n\n"Pirate patrol," Tesh said.\n\n"Oh. Big guns?"\n\nTesh nodded.\n\n"I miss big guns." Lilly sat back against the neural-nubs. "Should have nabbed them, you know. Invadimia and Nubitari would've made for a cute little boomfleet."\n\nTesh rolled her eyes. Two old-world warships. Not even battleships. Old [[Mamut-class battlecruisers|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "general_codex_battlecruiser_evo"]]. Enough for pirate patrols. Not nearly advanced enough to be worth the effort.\n\n"Just saying," Lilly said. "Soon as they realize what's up, and who's here, we'll have to deal with them."\n\n"Only if pirate patrol arrives in time," Tesh said. "Doubt the old drives can make that multiple."\n\nLilly nodded. She looked unconvinced. \n\nNeither was Teshandra but she had done the math: news of the malfunction would spread via [[farbound-length|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_farbound"]] as soon as the gateway on the far side exploded and, if the two pirate patrol ships at [[Station 16458|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_station_16458"]] launched immediately, they would be at [[Al Habe Sidir|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_alhabe"]] within a year. Tight timetable. But doable.\n\n"It'll work," Tesh said, gaze on the Market Gap's digital displays.\n\nThe graphs and readouts described a slow deceleration burn, engine first, into the local system and to the orbital ring. The Zone Control [[frigate|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cfrigate"]] was following them in at a mismatched angle, bow angled towards the Market Gap.\n\nTesh tapped Lilly on the shoulder, "Any indication they'll try to board before we make cradle?"\n\n"No. Not as long as he--" She jabbed a finger at the pilot. "--keeps this bucket on vector."\n\n"I'm doing my best," the [[Cartel|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cmall"]] man rasped. "Local Control gave me a hard vector."\n\n"Hard?" Lilly laughed. "Slow burn is soft, [[Cartel|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cmall"]]. Soft as slipsilk."\n\nHe grunted. Silence fell in the command capsule. A loose cable creaked somewhere behind a panel; the one with the bullet holes in it. \n\nThere were more holes overhead and a big plasma-scorch beside the hatch to the capsule. An improvized light-cable had been strung past it and down the length of the ship. Lilly's work - [[corsair|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_corsair"]] tech-patch. One hard burn and the entire control system would have failed but there was no risk of that. The Market Gap lacked the fuel and performance for anything more than slow and steady.\n\n"De-burn terminates in five." The pilot tapped his controls. "Four. Three. Two. One--"\n\nThe main drive cut out. Tesh floated a hand's bredth off the deck. Her cybernetic toes, wrapped around the crunch-bolts in the pilot's couch, held her down. \n\nThe [[Cartel|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cmall"]] had complained about that, months back, when he'd first seen her do it. Teshandra had ignored his babble. She knew physics better than a sixty-year old sprout and physics painted a grisly truth: any force sufficient to crumple the couch onto her feet was enough to splat her against the hull. Belting in only mattered above one gravity. Old [[corsair|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_corsair"]] wisdom.\n\n"Old and wise. Long as it flies." Tesh smirked and tapped Lilly on the shoulder. "Three, read status on the [[frigate|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cfrigate"]]."\n\n"Still smack on our nose," Lilly said. "Really rubbing in the snivels."\n\n"Are they?"\n\nLilly nodded. Her eyeballs twitched beneath the lids; she'd switched to a different feed. Probably bow cameras.\n\n"Six barrels tracking," she said. "No belts loaded. Drone rack is closed but I figure two max. Lasers. Themal threat only. Too close for nukes. Debris scatter would slag the orbital ring."\n\nTesh nodded. "Anything else in effective range?"\n\nLilly shook her head ever so slightly. "Zone Patrol has five other [[frigate|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cfrigate"]], scattered all over, and there's that [[Plex|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] patrol we spotted out on the rim. But nothing close. Not unless you mean the kill-sats."\n\n"They won't fire," Tesh said. "Too far for a guaranteed drive-strike. Range to orbital?"\n\n"Six days drift. Looks about into the cradle. Minor adjusts because [[Cartel|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cmall"]] can't math it right."\n\nThe [[Cartel|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cmall"]] man snorted. "Idiot woman."\n\n"Least I am a woman," Lilly said. "And, One? Local Control isn't gonna buy my sob story, not if they has optics on us. Which they do. No way they haven't seen all the holes."\n\n"Says you," the [[Cartel|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cmall"]] man said. "I say: we glide in uninterrupted."\n\n"Into an ambush," Teshandra said. "Boarding Spec will be briefed. They know we're coming and they know something happend in the Crossway. Hope to Hades they don't know who we are or what cargo we're carrying."\n\nThe [[Cartel|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cmall"]] man laughed. "How? Even I don't know who you are, One."\n\n"Only so many possibilities," Tesh said. "They might guess."\n\n"Believe me," the pilot growled. "I have been trying. To no avail."\n\nLilly's princess-pink lips curled. "Old world's finest, [[Cartel|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cmall"]]. Old world's finest."\n\nTesh rolled her eyes. "Royal address, Three."\n\n"Bitch, bitch." Lilly sat up with a grunt; her neural interface sparked. "Ow! Nixing [[Plex|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] junk. The Hades they wire these with? Copper?"\n\n"Probably. Now we need to talk." Tesh pushed herself through the hatch to the spinal corridor.\n\nThe dimly lit tube ran the six hundred meter long spine of the [[Plex hauler|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_freighter"]], from the command capsule up front, past the data core, and all the way to the engineering deck and drive system at the far end. No crew quarters. No need for them aboard a sublight hauler. Standard complement: six in the command pod, which generously featured a vacuum-toilet in the corner, just in case the crew needed to relieve themselves on their prospective six to seven year journey.\n\n"[[Plex|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] efficienty," Tesh muttered as she float-crawled down the corrior.\n\nLilly followed, saying, "Strange breed them [[Plexians|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]]. Reminds me of--"\n\n"Op-sec," Tesh hissed.\n\nLilly laughed. "But they does. Reminds me of--"\n\n"Three, I swear by Hades." Tesh faced her unwanted friend, expression hard. "I did not bring you here because I missed your company."\n\nLilly shrugged. "Same difference though, right?"\n\n"Not entirely."\n\n"No, of course not. You--" Lilly leaned closer, eyes glittering. "You just need that precious fuel and [[Al Habe Sidir|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_alhabe"]] didn't pay the protection tax this century. Warm? Warmer? Scalding hot?" Lilly grinned. "Like you, One?"\n\nTesh rolled her eyes. Her latest [[birth-body|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_bchamber"]] had larger tits than the last. Lilly had noticed. \n\nShe eyed them hungrily, licking her lips with a chem-stained tongue. "Pretty." The [[corsair|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_corsair"]] ran her cyeberneic fingers over Tesh's breasts. "Mine."\n\n"For now," Teshandra said coldly. "Are you enjoying yourself?"\n\n"I always enjoy my precious little princess." Lilly's hand slid down the seal of Tesh's suit.\n\nTesh let it happen, if only for appearance's sake. The [[Cartel|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cmall"]] would think what they already suspected: a brigand band. Better it stayed that way. The [[Commerz Cartel|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cmall"]] were a twitchy lot.\n\nAlmost as twitchy as Tesh was. Lilly's touch was almost gentle and the smirk on her lips almost endearing. \n\nShe eyed Tesh hungrily. "This could be fun, One."\n\n"It could." Tesh kissed Lilly on the cheek and whispered, "We have a week before they make the [[Luminev limit|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luminev"]]."\n\n"Good." Lilly's eyes glittered. "Enough time to have fun."\n\nTesh shook her head. Lillith vi Atada, the Daughter of Hades, had her own definition of fun. One Teshandra did not plan to partake in.\n\nLilly's lips curled. "Oh, don't worry, princess. You'll have your precious fuel soon enough. Enough to make the entire [[Fleet|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyran"]] go puff-puff."\n\n"If we can ship it out in time," Tesh said.\n\nLilly's expression darkened. "What? Isn't the entire battlegroup on vector?"\n\n"No." Tesh leaned closer and whispered, "The Astrara argued I have no business dictating [[Fleet|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyran"]] operations and the [[Admiralty|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_admiral"]] agreed: operational planning is out of my domain. They decided the battlegroup should remain up north, out of the Mantle."\n\n"Whore-suckers," Lilly hissed. "The [[loyalists|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_loyalism"]] assured me--"\n\n"Your word against the Astrara," Tesh said heavily.\n\nLilly nodded, expression bitter. "No boomers then?"\n\n"None," Tesh said. "The Astrara insisted [[battleships|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_battleship"]] are too fuel hungry. Would slow the supply tangent down. Maybe make the Gauntlet run impossible. I argued strategic fuel reserves but [[Al Habe Sidir|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_alhabe"]] is too near the main hauler-route. Might draw the pirate patrol in."\n\n"Nixing old world hags," Lilly snarled. "But fine. What's coming in with the supply tangent?"\n\nTesh shrugged. "Wasn't told. But no boomers. The [[Astral Order|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_astral"]] wants the [[battleships|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_battleship"]] where they can see them. Which is absurd, logistically, but politically sound. They'll reach the Objective Tyran on empty tanks."\n\nLilly scoffed. "True hag logic."\n\n"From her perspective, yes. The 9th Fleet might mutiny. Too many die-hard [[loyalists|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_loyalism"]] in the ranks."\n\n"Certainly sounded that way," Lilly said.\n\nTesh shrugged. "They won't get far without fuel."\n\nLilly shot her a dark look. "We'll sort that. Just as soon as we--" She pointed down the corridor.\n\n"I could not care less about the [[loyalists|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_loyalism"]]," Teshandra whispered. "My interest is the North Front. Restore the borders to what they were before the Autumn Offensive, assuming the [[Astral Order|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_astral"]] lets me. They want to revise history. Reshape the [[Fleet|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyran"]] into a political tool and promise protection to the vassal states. Way the argument went was: the old world is gone and the new one requires a new perspective."\n\n"Bullshit," Lilly snarled. "They want the [[Fleet|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyran"]]. The Astrara--"\n\n"Is an idiot," Tesh said. "She truly believes they are an independant fleet now. That the past is lain to rest. That will not go over well on empty tanks."\n\nLilly's expression became darker. "You want to help that old world hag?"\n\n"I intend to make the best of my situation," Teshandra said. "Regardless what happens up north, fuel will buy loyalty and the Astrara was gracious enough to give me this suicide command. This--" She rapped a cybernetic knuckle on the corridor plates. "--is now my lifeline. Impossible odds. So low I doubt anyone expects me to succeed, which is fortunate. For us. If you have second thoughts, Three, now is the time to complain."\n\nLilly shook her head. "Mine are in position. Waiting for the signal. Like I promised."\n\n"Good." Tesh pushed off down the corridor, saying, "Send word as soon as we are close enough to transmit. I have to brief Two."\n\n"And I'll be with--" Lilly pointed back up to the command pod. "In case. You know." She winked.\n\nTesh flashed a smile and drifted down the spinal corridor. Here and there, patches had been pasted over bolt holes. Improvized light-cable hung along the lower crawl-bars. \n\nHalfway down, a ring of airlocks, each connected to a pressure-sealed cargo container. Perishable goods. Five of the six airlock indicators were red. The last glowed solid green. Teshandra hauled the hatch open and kicked herself in.

Teshandra hurried down the immobile moving stairs to the tramway station. Her boots thudded loudly. An emergency lockdown announcement sounded from concealed speakers, urging all personnel to make their way to the nearest escape pod immediately. Down on the platform, Snitch Five had taken charge. Two utility workers were on the deck, limbs bound and under guard. No injuries. No bloodshed.\n\nWhen Tesh reached the bottom of the stairs, Sergeant Ruthran stomped up. "Finally. What took you so long?"\n\n"Was on a sight seeing tour," Tesh said. "Stat?"\n\n"So far so good." Ruthran led the way across the platform, saying, "No resistance. Still no sign of drones. But there's that." He pointed to the station wall.\n\nVisible through the translucent structure, the planet below, icy and choked in clouds. Overhead, the massive orbital ring, an enormous construct which surrounded the colony like a banding chain. A true tribute to the old world; even inhospitable backwaters like [[Al Habe Sidir|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_alhabe"]] had been home to engineering on astronomical scales. \n\nTesh glanced from the view to Ruthran. "What about it?"\n\n"Skyhooks." He marked two points on tac-net.\n\nTeshandra zoomer her ocular units in. Visible on the horizon of the planet, glowing bright amid the clouds, two thruster plumes marked lift mechanisms boosting back up to orbit. Whatever payload they had slung up was too distant to resolve.\n\n"Must be headed to the other side," Tesh said. "Unlikely to be an issue. We're going there--" She pointed the other way. "Stationside 4."\n\nRuthran barked static. "Nixing long way around, One."\n\n"Thankfully we have transit." Tesh pursed her lips. "At least, I think we do." She activated the comm. "Three?"\n\nA distorted voice replied, "I'm busy."\n\n"We need transit," Tesh said. "Now. Or we go extral."\n\nRuthran blurted, "You're insane! No way we space walk over there. Thats, like, a million clicks. Exposed at that."\n\n"Transit will only be faster, not safer," Tesh said. "If we have transit. Three? Status on transit."\n\n"Probably," Lilly's distorted voice replied. "Local net is locked down. No wireless. No nixing clue what's going on. Can see a shuttle from here though. Gonna nab it and try to figure nix out. But, if everything went as planned, mine are inside the tramway system. Should be a car on the way over right about now."\n\n"Should be," Ruthran muttered.\n\nTesh shot him a hard look. "Ye of little faith."\n\n"Don't like it," he said. "Customs Guard might shut the ring down. Disable the tramway. Box us in here. And if--"\n\n"Two, do you second-guess absolutely everything?"\n\n"Comes with the conviction." He paced up and down before the viewport, his heavy [[combat suit|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_csuit"]] bouncing in low-gravity. "Listen, we're all thinking it, I'm just saying it: there is no way in Hades this mad insertion scheme works."\n\nTesh rolled her eyes. "You are an insufferable pessimist."\n\n"And you're a boundless optimist, One. Seriously! Math it out: we're over here and, over there--" He pointed to the far side of the orbital ring. "--is a billion light years away. There is no way they let us waltz over there. To be honest: I'm surprised they've let us get this far unopposed."\n\n"Typical [[Fleet|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyran"]]," Teshandra muttered. "Always thinking in clicks and combat models."\n\n"At least I am thinking," Ruthran growled. "Three? Where the Hades is that trans--" His voice trailed off. "Oh. Optics on object headed this way. Bet you nine out of ten it's Boarding Spec."\n\nTesh shook her head. "Ye of little faith."\n\n"Damn straight," Ruthran said. "Faith was disproven when the old world fell. In the new one, we's only got this--" He patted his [[stinger|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_stinger"]]. "--and that." He gestured to one of his men, who carried a collapsed [[long-nettle|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_lnettle"]] launcher on his back.\n\nTeshandra shot the Sergeant a dubious look. "What the Hades is that doing here?"\n\n"You said no shooting war," Ruthran said. "I want eyes on nuke-launchers. No discussion."\n\nTesh shook her head, gaze on the translucent station walls. Out there, visible amid the twinkling stars, a glimmering dot moved. Too far away to resolve. Too close for comfort: the [[sub-frigate|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cfrigate"]] which had shadowed the Market Gap in.\n\n"You see that, Two?" Tesh pointed to the dot.\n\n"Seen it," Ruthran said. "It's far out. Barely within the effective range of a [[long-nettle|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_lnettle"]]."\n\nTesh shot him an exasperated look. She knew the effective range of a nuke-launcher.\n\n"Point is: we can't hit it. But it can hit us."\n\n"No Zone Control ship will fire on their own ring," Teshandra said. "Move those launchers hullside and propagate: insurance policy. Pre-set targets on the ring and on Zone Control. We do not want a bloodbath but we need leverage over the locals. Did you not read the op-brief, Two?"\n\n"I did. I did. I--"\n\n"I am tired of your arguments," Teshandra growled.\n\n"Stat that." Roien boosted over to the nearest [[long-nettle|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_lnettle"]] equipped trooper. "Bodia, get your artillery hullside and--"\n\n"One?" It was Lilly's distorted voice. "Priority ping from tech team. Commsman says it sounds official. Commsman also says you're wasting time arguing with Two."\n\nTesh breathed a laugh. "That was quick. Link me in."\n\n"Linking y--" The comm squeaked.\n\nTeshandra lost synch with tac-net. A voice-only channel loaded with two other participants: the tech trooper and a lagged transmission stream from an unknown source.\n\nA male voice was saying, "I don't think you quite understand me: I am the Colonial Governor of [[Al Habe Sidir|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_alhabe"]] and I insist you connect me to whoever is in charge of this blithering nonsense. Immediately!"\n\nTesh smirked. Neither she nor the tech trooper spoke.\n\n"Do you hear me? Hello?" Static crackled. "Are you sure this is working? I can't hear anything." Noise scratched. "Yes, yes, I think it should be working. Is it working? Hello?"\n\nTeshandra breathed a faint sigh. "Good morning, Governor. Excuse the transmission lag."\n\nThe signal relayed. Audible in the background, a voice whispered, "On the orbital--" and "--could this happen? Please tell me--" and "--do you think it could be? I don't think--"\n\nFinally, the male voice piped up, "Ah! Yes, yes, you can hear me good. Good. Now I insist: I must speak to whoever is in charge. Immediately!" A fist banged.\n\n"Of course, Governor. But I thought you were in charge. Are you not the elected representative of this solar system?"\n\nAgain, a long pause. Tranmission lag.\n\nOut on the orbital ring, far in the distance, sunlight reflected off the approaching tramway car. The little bullet-shaped contraption zipped along at hypersonic speeds. Teshandra watched it draw nearer, waiting for the Governor to reply - he'd apparently figured out the mute function.\n\nSuddenly, his blustering voice barked, "Yes, yes, I am the Colonial Governor of [[Al Habe Sidir|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_alhabe"]]. That is me. I, ah, who am I speaking to?"\n\n"You are speaking to me," Teshandra said. "I am not in charge, which is quite all right, Governor Raic. I am here to negotiate a mutually beneficial outcome. Of course, this would be predicated on your assurances that both Customs Guard and Zone Control stand down. I must als insist we be permitted unrestricted access to the orbital ring. Do you think you could arrange such a thing, Governor?"\n\nThe transmission lagged.\n\nMeanwhile, the bullet-tram had grown large enough to see the red surface paint and the white-orange flame of [[Sacred Sol|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_sacred_sol"]], painted on as though the old world had never ended. Only it had. The bullet-train proved as much: it had been repainted so many times over the past millennia that the coat of red was a good shade darker than imperial standard.\n\n"Transit incoming." Ruthran stomped past, [[stinger|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_stinger"]] held ready. "Eyes up! Team One, support. Team Two, stand by to counter."\n\nBoots thudded as troopers hurried into position. Target-markers flitted as they took aim at the tramway-dock. Visible outside, the bullet tram slowed to a crawl as it glided up alongside the platform. Clamps locked in. The door-seal pressed against the translucent station wall. A single pane became solid, revealing the viewport to be ultra-qual digital screens.\n\n"So much for template standards," Teshandra muttered.\n\nIn her ear, the Governor's voice was saying, "You must see, good Sir, I could discuss this matter at lengh, of course, but--"\n\nThe tramway door hissed open. No one stepped out. Long seconds passed until two troopers approached it, coil-carbines aimed.\n\nThe governor was saying, "As you must understand, Sir, we are a colonial world, and so we cannot simply--"\n\n"Don't shoot," a male voice called from inside the bullet-tram. "We come from Sephinia Agrippa. We are not a threat. We are not a threat!"\n\nTeshandra's brow furrowed. Code-call? Or coincidence?\n\nShe glanced to Ruthran. "Two? Be humane."\n\nThe Sergeant tipped a finger. "Hold fire. You in there! Come out. With your hands raised."\n\nTense seconds passed. Troopers held their aim. Finally, a man in traditional red robes stepped out, hands raised. Behind him, a silhouette moved.\n\n"Nix." Tesh reached for her [[stinger|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_stinger"]], just in case.\n\nOn the channel, the Governor was saying, "Hello? Can you hear me?"\n\n"One moment, Governor." Teshandra glanced to Ruthran. "Two, sort this nix."\n\n"Stat that." He approached the man in red, [[stinger|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_stinger"]] aimed. "You. Who's in the tram?"\n\n"My wife," he said. "Please, do not--"\n\n"Out," Ruthran snarled. "Both of you!"\n\nThe man hastily ushered the woman out. She had inked eyes and wore a white dress which faded to red around her ankles. [[Solar priestess|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_deadgods"]]. Or an imitator who wore the colors of the old faith - in the new world, dressing as the [[Astral Order|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_astral"]] once had no longer constituted a sin against [[Sacred Sol|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_sacred_sol"]].\n\n"Over there." Ruthran pointed the two civilians towards the utility workers.\n\n"Yes, yes, of course. Please. Do not hurt us. We will cooperate. We--"\n\n"Enough blabbering." A trooper stomped up to take charge.\n\nRuthran and two others approached the tram. The tac-feed from their helmets showed leather seats with gilded harnesses. Sixteen rows before a great big transit board at the front. It displayed the next stop and a departure timer <i>-1mi hours</i>. Definitely under [[corsair|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_corsair"]] control.\n\n"Tramway secure," Ruthran's voice crackled.\n\n"Stat that," Teshandra said. "Verified friendly transit. Prepare to move the assault teams over." She unmuted the Governor's channel. "Excuse the delay, Governor Raic. Minor technical glitch. I--"\n\n"Hello? Yes, I am speaking to you and let me make quite clear--" The channel crackled. "I cannot be any clearer than this: whoever you are and whatever you want here, good Sir, you have made a seriously grave mistake! The [[Al Habe|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_alhabe"]] militia has been mustered. Armored shuttles are on their way to orbit and--"\n\n"Oh, Hades." Tesh rubbed her face. "Governor Raic, I admire your passion but let me be equally clear: I do not take kindly to bluster. Should your militias truly be on their way to orbit, I am afraid we will be compelled to fire on the craft using nuclear weapons. I suggest you not take that risk."\n\nWhile Tesh waited for the reply, Ruthran sheparded troopers into the tramway. Two teams. Twelve bodies total. Those selected were bulked up with extra ballistic pads. Their armored boots thudded with every augmented step they took. By the time they were all aboard, the Governor had still not responded.\n\n"Nix." Tesh keyed the channel. "Governor, I understand that--"\n\nStatic hissed in her cerebral. Signal strength had plummeted.\n\nThe tech-trooper's voice crackled, "Lost the net-link. Something on their end. Will try to get it back."\n\n"Stat that." Teshandra drew a deep breath.\n\n"One?" Ruthran stood in the doorway to the bullet-tram. "You coming?"\n\nShe nodded absently. "This could have gone better."\n\n"You said it. I was just thinking it." Ruthran ducked inside.\n\nTeshandra followed, into the ornately decorated car she'd seen earlier. Twelve [[combat suits|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_csuit"]] were inside, wedged between the seats in brace-positions, in case the tram lost the rail - or was shot at. The demo-man had wired a charge beside airlock and sat with detonator in hand.\n\nUp at the front of the tram, the board displayed the message: <i>howdy folks! where to?</i>\n\n"Cute," Ruthran growled. "Your assets do that, One?"\n\nTeshandra's lips curled. "Cutthroats are known for a sense of humor."\n\n"Right," Ruthran growled. "So I shouldn't ask questions, right?"\n\n"No. Tramway: to Stationside 4 via Sephinia Agrippa."\n\nThe text message changed to: <i>sweeto! blastoff in: three, two, one...</i>\n\nHydraulics heaved the door into place. Lock-bolts clicked into place. Electricity hummed as the tramway began to move. \n\nUp front, the screed displayed estimated time to the destination, calculated down to nanoseconds. The counter jumped constantly, the old digital display's framerate being too low to refresh in nanosecond intervals.\n\nTypical [[corsair|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_corsair"]] brag: some crypto had taken the time to none-too-subtly let everyone know how well he knew the system he'd compromised. Teshandra was not impressed. Jacking a bullet-tram on a backwater orbital ring was nothing compared to lightning raids on convoy turnover points or boarding of heavily armed warships in deep space. \n\nThe [[corsair|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_corsair"]] of yesteryear had been a different breed: desperate, destitute, and devoted. Mere mention of the name House vi Atada had evoked fear and awe, and not only among those who still blindly believed the Throne would one day rise again, summoned back from the broken husk of [[Tyra|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_terra"]] by the immortal will of House Lucinius. In the old days, a backwater like [[Al Habe Sidir|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_alhabe"]] would have surrendered at the mere rumor Lady vi Atada might be near. But that age had ended long ago.\n\nAll that remained of the old [[corsair|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_corsair"]] kingdoms were pirate nests and brigand bands. None of them had the technical skills or organizational capacity to raid a single hab-station, much less an entire convoy, let alone a battlefleet - and for the better. No one wanted to relive the horrors of the Great War, least of all Teshandra. The mere thought of what had once been, and what she had done in those dark days, made her shiver uncomfortably.

Six days later, Tesh floated by the hatch to the command capsule. Lilly sat in the comms-nav couch, tapping at her digital displays. Beside her, the corpse of the [[Cartel|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cmall"]] pilot. He had been bound, gagged, and stabbed in the chest with a tyro-spanner. The power-assisted tool had been left in his ribgace, sealing the blood in. All entirely necessary - the [[Cartel|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cmall"]] man had realized who he'd let aboard his ship as soon as Snitch Five had crawled out of the pressure contianer, banging around noisily in their bulky [[combat suits|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_csuit"]].\n\nThe troopers had since assumed position, half of them behind the command capsule and the other half down by the pressure containers. They'd all made themselves as small possible, pressed into crannies and jammed against the hull plates. Only the detonator-man was up front with Teshandra, remote-fuse in hand. \n\nThe visor of his [[combat suit|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_csuit"]] was lowered and, in the glare-mirrored plate, Teshandra saw a warped reflection of herself: a scrawny woman in a black pressure-suit. She'd clasped a respirator over her nose and hung the matching helmet on her thigh to conceal the knife and nuke-grenade there. Hopefully neither would be needed.\n\n"Three?" Tesh looked at Lilly.\n\nThe old [[corsair|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_corsair"]] shook her head. "Nothing on feeds. Not even space dust."\n\n"Keep looking," Teshandra said. "Boarding Spec must be on alert."\n\n"Sure don't look so. But what do I know?" Lilly tapped at her displays. "Final de-thrust."\n\nManeuvering jets fired. The [[Plex hauler|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_freighter"]] shook from capsule to engines. Somewhere in the ship, metal groaned painfully. The hull plates vibrated.\n\nTesh pulled a face. "Hope to Hades."\n\n"Hades and [[hellguns|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_hellgun"]]." The demo-man flipped the safety-cup on his remote on and off.\n\nTesh shot him a hard look. "Nervous?"\n\nHe stopped fiddling. "No, Cadre."\n\n"Good." Teshandra exhaled as quietly as possible.\n\nDemolition meant chemical explosives. Overpressure. Shrapnel. Clutter and debris. Not clean like a nuke.\n\nFrom the command capsule, Lilly called, "Cradle touch. Clamps in. We are secure. Repeat: secure and docked. Seal in progress."\n\n"Moment of truth." Tesh squeezed past the demo-man, headed for the bow airlock.\n\nIt was located in a widened area of the spinal corridor. The [[Plex|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] had kept three ready-suits there. Snitch Five had dumped them to make room for improvized armor plates. Two breeching charges had been rigged. One's indicator blinked green in rapid succession, then went dark.\n\n"Fuse primed," the demo-man's voice crackled.\n\nTesh glanced to the trooper, then the chemical bombs, and finally the circular airlock. The hatch was a centimeter smaller than imperial template-spec. Mismatched standards. The docking seal squeaked against the airlock, adjusting to the non-standard shape.\n\nLong seconds passed. Finally, Lilly's voice callsed, "Seal good."\n\nBeside the airlock, an indicator went green. The digital display beside it showed text in [[Plex|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] code-language. Pressure check. Seal arbitration. A second indicator blinked green. Bolts released with a clack. \n\nPressurized air hissed from a valve. The inner door fell slowly in low-g. Beyond the tubular airlock, a bright docking tube with hand holds cut in the white panels. The floor was grip-textured. Held to it with grip-tex shoes was a man in a grey pressure suit that bore the Customs Inspector patch. He approached the Market Gap, data-pad in hand and expression bureaucratically earnest.\n\n"Inadequate," he muttered as he drew near. "Utterly inadequate formwork." The inspector stopped six paces from the airlock. "You do realize that Local Control cannot authorize your dock if you submit incorrect data, don't you, [[Plex|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]]?"\n\n"Of course." Teshandra stepped out of the airlock. "What seems to be the issue, Sir?"\n\n"Your vessel is not a local register. These fields--" He indicated which ones on his pad. "--must be filled out, regardless of what your employer claims."\n\n"Oh. Okay." Tesh glanced to the airlock. "May I synch my data?"\n\n"Synch your data?"\n\nTesh nodded. "You are asking for cert-regs and template formwork. I can give you those in P-Type but that--" She gestured to his data-pad. "--is not how we do formwork. I need to synch via a converter."\n\n"Ah. Yes. But to be clear: no one disembarks until you clear spec. No unloading cargo either." His expression became graver. "Colonial law, [[Plex|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]]. You know the rules."\n\n"But of course, Sir." Tesh ducked back through the airlock.\n\nRight inside, barely out of sight, six troopers in [[combat suits|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_csuit"]] stood ready. Each held a stubby [[stinger|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_stinger"]] one-handed, drum locked in and safety off. All their visors were down. Teshandra still knew which one was Sergeant Ruthran: the one with the objector's box painted on his shoulder.\n\nTesh told him, "Go. Now."\n\n"Stat that." Sergeant Ruthran made a hand gesture.\n\nThe point man held up three fingers. Two. One. Micro-thrusters firde as six [[combat suits|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_csuit"]] zoomed past Teshandra. Outside, the inspector yelled. His voice was cut short by a nasty thud.\n\nThe trooper who'd decked him jammed the barrel of his [[stinger|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_stinger"]] in the inspector's back. "Don't move. Don't nixing dare."\n\nAnother trooper crackled, "CI secure."\n\n"Tube secure," someone called from farther up. "Tac link."\n\nIn Teshandra's mind, a notice popped. Her cerebral synched with the tactical network. Virtual indicators blinked to life, indicating the location and status of every trooper - and Lilly.\n\n"Tac-net up," Ruthran's voice crackled. "Cold ingress. Minimal resistance. Team Two, follow up."\n\n"Team Two moving," someone said as six more troopers hurried out of the Market Gap. \n\nFarther down the spinal corridor, the other teams were hastily disarming charges and moving towards the bow. No need to blow. Insertion had been clean and quiet. Not so much as a peep from Boarding Spec.\n\nJust to be safe, Teshandra ducked into the command capsule. "Three?"\n\n"Nothing." The [[corsair|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_corsair"]] slid a magazine into a ornamented [[zipgun|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_zipgun"]]. "And that's confirmed: Boarding Spec did not deploy." She racked the slide, smirking. "Bitchfood."\n\n"Play nice," Teshandra said, pulling her [[stinger|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_stinger"]] from beneath the comms-nav seat.\n\nIt was heavy for an ultra-light weapon. Intended for use with a [[suit|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_csuit"]] but managable without. Teshandra slapped the drum, just to be sure it sat, and clicked the power pack in. The holo-sight glowed to life. Teshandra waved her hand in front of it; the algorythm tinted it ruby-red. She activated on her cerebral-link. Her hand became lime-green.\n\nLilly watched, a dubious expression on her face. "You're really gonna lug that thing around, One?"\n\n"Yes." Teshandra slung the carbine and headed for the airlock.\n\nOn the comm-channel, a distorted voice crackled, "Dock room secure. Team Three, move up."\n\nFarther down the spinal corridor, troopers scrambled. Det-charges were still being sealed. Teshandra left them to it and headed through the airlock. Outside, the inspector was still on the floor, his hands now ziptied behind his back. He'd wet himself and trembled uncontrollably.\n\nTeshandra glanced at the trooper who stood guard over him. "Any resistance?"\n\n"Just wetleak," his distorted voice crackled.\n\n"Ah." Teshandra crouched beside the inspector. "Hello, Sir."\n\nThe man's eyes darted madly. His lips quivered.\n\n"Hey!" Tesh snapped her fingers beside his ear.\n\nThe man winced. "Don't hurt me! I just work--"\n\n"No one will hurt you," Tesh said evenly. "I need directions to Local Control. Is that still at Ringside 4? By the cargo bays?"\n\n"I don't know," the man squeaked. "Why would I know?"\n\n"Because that--" Tesh indicated his patch. "--says you work for Customs."\n\nThe man shook his head. "I'm just here because--"\n\n"Oh, Hades." Tesh stood and glanced to the trooper. "Nix this one."\n\n"Aye." The trooper leveled his [[stinger|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_stinger"]].\n\n"No," the man squealed. "And yes! I am with Customs Inspection. Please don't shoot me. Please!"\n\nTeshandra breathed a sigh. "Tell me what I want to know."\n\n"It's over by Ringside 4. Local Control, I mean. Exactly like you said." He stared with wild eyes. "Please don't kill me."\n\n"I did not intent do." Teshandra glanced to the trooper. "You?"\n\nHis audio unit snorted static. "Nix. I was getting ideas."\n\n"Leave that to your commanding officer," Teshandra said. "Secure the CI. Humanely." Tesh strode off, speaking on the tac-net, "Two? One on channel."\n\n"Stat that," a voice crackled. "Dock room secure. All teams moving up. Entering the ring. Get up here, One."\n\n"On my way." Tesh hastened pace, down the docking tube.\n\nIt led through a secure-door that had been jammed open with a blasting wedge. Beyond, a large room dominated by a waiting area. Digital screens on the walls welcomed visitors to [[Al Habe Sidir|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_alhabe"]].\n\nUp until a minute ago, two Customs Guard men in blue-grey had manned an arch-scanner at the far end of the room. They'd both been decked, bound, and put under guard. One of them bled freely from his nose. A trooper stood above him, [[stinger|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_stinger"]] aimed, just in case he got ideas. The rest of the assault team had already moved on, through the big double door behind the scanner and into the arrivals deck of the orbital ring. Virtual markers showed where they were on tac-net.\n\nRuthran's voice crackled, "One? You're still lagging."\n\n"I know," Teshandra growled as she hastened pace.\n\nThe arrivals deck was expansive, a hundred meter wide and half a kilometer long pedestrian area located somewhere in the great ring over [[Al Habe Sidir|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_alhabe"]]. Sell stands had been set up along it, though all were closed - the Market Gap was not an ice ship and no one had expected passengers of any sort. Behind the refreshments stands, giant screens offered a picturesque view of the ice-planet below. It resembled a beautiful white-grey marble, silhouetted against the infinite black of dead space.\n\n"One," Ruthran's voice crackled. "Where are you?"\n\n"Right behind you," Tesh snarled, hurrying along the arrival's deck.\n\nRuthran and his troopers were a hundred meters on, halfway to the tramway station at the end of the deck. No one around to resist and no stun-drones deployed. Textbook insertion: executed so quickly that Customs Guard had not even had time to seal the blast doors. A tactical victory that meant little in greater scope.\n\nBoarding Spec had been held back. The arrivals area was a wide and exposed. Too large to secure. Like the orbital ring: hundreds upon hundreds of kilometers of pressure-module, link-wire, tramway cable, docking berths, and thermal radiators. The Market Gap had docked at the eastern berth. Local Control was all the way on the other side and, unless Customs Guard was utterly incompetent, they'd committed to a calculated gamble: Boarding Spec could contain the intruders before they broke out of the arrivals deck. \n\nTesh doubted that. Orbital security based on containment no longer worked in the age of power-assisted [[combat suits|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_csuit"]] and handheld nuclear bombs. If even a single trooper slipped past the perimiter, they would force compromise - or outright surrender - through threat of collateral damage. So the theory. How it would play out in practice was anyone's guess.

The maintenance passage was so dark that gamma-correction failed to illuminate. Even light-amp was bad; blurry green-white on greyscale. Poor sense of depth. Teshandra moved by touch and feel, a skill learned long in the past. Ahead of her, the point team probed ahead with helmet mounted low-lights. \n\nTheir purplish cones cast eerie shadows in the long tunnel. An old imperial template: rated for maintenance robots. Smooth walls, grip-textured floor, and every hundred meters a great striped door to a sealed bot-hangar. There were no blast doors or security seals.\n\nAccess control followed the old imperial paradigm: track intrusion and auto-report to the authorities. The digital intelligence that managed the orbital ring knew they were there and had long informed Customs Guard. Only there were no seals to shut; such costly expenditure had not been wasted on colonial rings.\n\nOnce, such a security system might have worked. After all, in the old world, everyone had feared a marked record and backwater colonies had dilligently reported criminal offenses to the Imperial Census Bureau. In the new world, such measures were as meaningless as the fan-drone which darted in and out of view ahead, tracking Snitch Five as it advanced.\n\n"One?" It was the Sergeant's voice. "Optics on a drone."\n\nTeshandra said, "Ignore it."\n\n"Yeah. Right." Ruthran slowed.\n\nTeshandra passed him by. The Sergeant fell in step beside her, visor up and breather hissing.\n\nShe shot him a dubious look. "What?"\n\n"Dunno, One. You tell me."\n\nTesh shot him a confused look. "I have not the faintest idea what you might be implying."\n\n"Cute," Ruthran growled. "We should talk."\n\n"This is hardly the place," Tesh said. "Local Control is one klick ahead. You ought be consindering your tac-plan. The original one is well and nixed."\n\n"I have been," Ruthran said. "Here's what worries me: blast door. Big. Bulky. Sealed tight. Only the word of cutthroats that it's still open. Don't like that."\n\nTeshandra breathed a laugh. "You do not like anything, Two."\n\n"Yeah. Just saying. Could send up drones. Get a clearer picture."\n\nTesh rolled her eyes. Idiot idea.\n\n"Was just a suggestion," Ruthran said.\n\n"A poor one. An idea that will give away out intended entry point, proposed by a trooper who has been trained to exceptional standards. Some might even say the best military education in the galaxy." Tesh's lips curled. "I concur: you are excellent at blindly following orders passed down the Chain of Command. That is why you are here, after all. Or are you not, Sergeant?"\n\n"Dunno, One. Kinda makes you wonder, doesn't it? Given present company and all."\n\nTesh shot him a sidelong glance. "Oh, but what could you possibly mean by that?" \n\nRuthran snorted static. "You know what I mean, One."\n\n"No," Tesh said firmly. "I have absolutely no idea what you mean."\n\n"Right," he growled. "Then humor me a moment: say you heard a thing or two. A thing or two I'm sure others have heard about as well. And say that thing or two made you think. Maybe even--"\n\nTesh shot Ruthran a hard look. "You were trained to think, trooper?"\n\n"Self-taught, admittedly. Not unusual for Scout Operations. Snitches live longer with brains."\n\n"Most also die on one-way operations," Tesh said. "Deployments to rocks of minimal strategic value, all to provide beyond light lag targeting data via a device that borders on a military secret. I can count on my fingers the number of individuals who understand how the [[echo-drone|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_edrone"]] functions. You will be pleased to hear they are all right in front of you."\n\nRuthran breathed a laugh. "Nix me. You types have a sense of humor too. Who knew?"\n\n"Occasionally, though that is beside my point, which I assure you is not humorous at all: in their infinite wisdom, the Chain of Command has condemned it's most inventive and creative recruits to penal battallions. Innovation is not in the interest of the Chain. You are of course well aware of this absurdity and I suppose you find your current circumstances bitterly ironic."\n\n"To a point," he said. "Still, and I want a clear answer: what is your point?"\n\n"I do not believe in archaic tradition. This--" She gestured into the dark. "--is an example of such absurdity: an operation the Chain has condemned to failure before it was even attempted. They do not want me to tell you this, Sergeant, but you and I are alike in a way: those infinitely wise minds who command us believe we shall perish here, for it is statistically likely."\n\nRuthran grunted. "Good for morale, that."\n\n"Quite," Teshandra said with a sarcastic smirk. "Of course, one must remember: those who command us have unlearned the ability to think through rigorous training. Officially, we are not to say the word indoctrination, for that has a hated past in the ranks of the Tyrant, but we all know the unspoken truth, do we not?"\n\n"Truth about you? Or the Chain of Command?"\n\n"Both," Tesh said.\n\nFor a long moment, the Sergeant did not speak. Armored boots thudded in the gloom. Troopers moved in the purple glow of their low-lights.\n\nFinally, Ruthran said, "I dunno what worries me more: you, the Chain, or the fact this probably is a suicide operation."\n\n"Oh, do be reasonable, Sergeant. If anything you think to know of me is true, do you truly believe I would condemn myself to statistical damnation?"\n\n"Possibly," Ruthran said. "That's the tricky bit, ain't it? I don't really know who you are, now, do I?"\n\nTeshandra scowled. "Alas I cannot tell you, though I can tell you this: many do believe I would be insane enough to commit to a doomed operation. Or rather: they want this to be the case so strongly that they do not think farther than their own self-interest. Many of these individuals also believe a [[Lunan|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luna"]] cannot be trusted, no matter their past deeds. Prejudiced stereotypes from a bygone age. Ones which ought not apply anymore. Sadly, old views are so difficult to root out, are they not?"\n\n"Right," Ruthran growled. "I'm going to wipe the log on this conversation. Stat?"\n\nTesh breathed a laugh. "Openly an objector. Vocally an objector. Yet you worry what your comms-log might imply?"\n\n"Already been demoted once," he said. "Don't need that again."\n\n"You are missing the point."\n\n"And you aren't telling me what I want to know."\n\nTeshandra shrugged. "I cannot tell you what you want to know."\n\n"No? You can't tell me why you did that?" He pointed back the way they'd come. "Nuke trap. Smack in a civilian module. I thouht you agreed: no bloodshed. Oh, right, but don't bother. I just follow orders. That's my only purpose. Like you said."\n\n"Then you should have no problem executing your orders when we reach the target area. Is that correct?"\n\nRuthran grunted. "None at all."\n\n"Good." Tesh walked on, saying, "I am so glad you have unlearned the ability to think again. You are so much more agreeable when you are statistically already dead."\n\nRuthran stopped short.\n\nTesh glanced back. "Is there a problem, Sergeant?"\n\n"Just one question." He approached Teshandra, adjusting his breather mask. "It's about your accent. Fluent. No [[Lunan|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luna"]]. Not even a hint. I've ever met any survivor who spoke that way."\n\nTeshandra's lips curled behind her breather. "A Lady of the Court is to speak appropriately or she will find little acceptance among peers. This is an important lesson, Sergeant, for you may find that acceptance is a desire state to be in. In times of peace, one may pretend one has friends, and in times of persecution, well, I shudder to think what might occur when one has no friends in such dark times."\n\n"Persecution?" Ruthran snorted. "Right, One. Right."\n\n"Indeed. Persecution. Victimhood. To think: the Chain of Command claims we are an independent fleet, that we pursue of a future unbound by the past, yet still we perpetuate the old stereotype: recruit from our vassals and, when the recruit finds service does not agree with their personal goals in life, the recruit is punished. Disciplined. Sent to penal battallions. Yet never discharged."\n\nRuthran stepped closer. "Meaning what, One?"\n\n"Meaning: one hears of such recruitment methods and almost comes to believe it is impossible for some, for example those whose infinite wisdom we so readily trust, to shake off a mode of thought learned in an age we have all come to agree is long dead."\n\n"Yeah. Funny you mention that. Recruitment." Ruthran towered over Teshandra. "Interesting choise of words in this context."\n\nTeshandra tilted her head. "And what context precisely is that, Sergeant?"\n\n"This." He gestured from himself to Tesh. "Makes you think, doesn't it?"\n\nTeshandra stared into the Sergeant's polarized eye-slits. "Local Control must be taken. This system must be taken. Both with as little loss of life as possible. What comes after I cannot say as I cannot foretell the future. Even if I could, I do not trust you, Sergeant. Not yet. Perhaps, for the moment, we could agree on mutual acceptance?"\n\n"Maybe," Ruthran said. "Or maybe not. They say [[Lunans|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luna"]] can't be trusted."\n\n"Oh, then you need not be concerned. I was only born on [[Luna|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luna"]]. I was concieved in the Tyrant's shadow." Teshandra brushed past the Sergeant.\n\nHer rubberized toes squeaked on floor plate. Armored boots thudded behind her.\n\nRuthran fell in step. He said nothing and, concealed by his mask, his expression was inscrutiable. Still, Teshandra could feel him thinking. The Sergeant was a smart man. An objector. A man who saw the absurdity of the Chain for what it was. He'd put the pieces together soon enough.\n\nThe [[Admiralty|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_admiral"]] had not seen the virtue in such skills, only the visage of a deserter - a traitor - and worse: a man whose ambitions had barely sufficed for the Rock Corps, a historically matriarchial branch of the [[Fleet|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyran"]]. In their conception, the Segeant was a pawn to be thrown away on Operation Jupiter, a sideshow to weaken the local system's defenses before the Supply Tangent arrived. The Astrara had supported this absurd notion for her own reasons: anything to ensure House vi Therene was stationed far away from the 9th Fleet and the Astrara's precious [[Indominable-class battleships|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_battleship"]].\n\nTeshandra took no issue with that. She had no desire to be anywhere near the 9th Fleet and had absolutely no use for [[battleships|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_battleship"]]. [[Al Habe Sidir|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_alhabe"]] on the other hand was a pleasant enough place and Sergeant Ruthran made for intelligent - if annoying - company. All that remained to be done was convince the Governor to stand down. He did not yet see things as Teshandra did but, come the end of the orbital cycle, he would come around. All Snitch Five had to do was take Local Control and the rear entrance was just up ahead.

For three long hours, the bullet-tram zoomed around the orbital ring of [[Al Habe Sidir|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_alhabe"]]. Teshandra sat on one of the gilded seats, the stubby barrel of her [[stinger|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_stinger"]] jammed in the harness-release recess. Obstruction detection kept the device from closing on her. Acceleration well below one gravity. No need to buckle in. No response from the Governor either.\n\n"Damned." Teshandra linked into the tech-net. "Commsman? Status."\n\n"Minimal interference from tramway induction. Tact-net is stable. No signal from planetside. Not even a desynch tone."\n\n"Jamming?"\n\n"Negative. Local channels are locked down but there's no interference. If they wanted to speak to us, they would."\n\n"Nix." Tesh stared at the ceiling, thinking.\n\nBroadcast on open channel? Goad the Governor? Threten the entire planet?\n\n"Not yet." She linked into the command-net. "Three? Planetside line is nixed. No leverage. Ideas?"\n\nA long pause, then Lilly's distorted voice, "He wants to play bitchfuck, we be bitches."\n\n"I would prefer not," Teshandra said. "Humane touch. Remember?"\n\n"Nix that. I'm not asking mine to risk it for colonial leaf-rollers. Not what I pay them for. Not what they love me for either. Stat?"\n\nTesh breathed a laugh. "Arrogance, Three."\n\n"Arrogance is hot like Hades."\n\n"In your deluded dreams," Teshandra muttered.\n\nThe channel crackled. "Say again, One?"\n\n"Never mind. Any luck with that shuttle?"\n\n"My shuttle you mean? Eh. It's code-locked. But not for long. Figure I'd take the tug for a ride. Find a net-link to planetside that actually works. Maybe even beat you to the big antennae. Oh, and I caught a laser-light from your end: back door to Local Control is open. One hour. Maybe more."\n\n"One hour will suffice."\n\n"You say that but I hear rustle. The chicks are starting to squeak."\n\nTesh's brow furrowed. "Squeak what how, precisely?"\n\n"Indistinct comm chatter. All encrypted. Maybe a hundred active. Maybe a whole battallion. How should I know?"\n\n"Hades," Tesh muttered.\n\n"Was born there," Lilly said. "It spat me back out. Didn't have room. Y'know. Same old."\n\nTeshandra rolled her eyes. "Our primary concern is our dear friend Governor Raic. No cooperation means complications."\n\n"If the leaf-roller wants corpses, give them to him." There was a muffled screech. "Ah. Nix. My shuttle's up, One. Stat-check in thirty." Three's signal faded to static.\n\nOn the comm-net, the governor's line remained dead. Negotiation was off the table. Like Lilly had said: the leaf-roller had asked for corpses and he would recieve.\n\n"Oh well." Tesh sat back with a sigh.\n\nBeside her, a medic crouched beside her pack. The big smart-bag had been stuffed with spare [[combat suit|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_csuit"]] segments; three armored arms and two legs, all with replacement bio-bits in seal-gel inside. The medic held a third leg and was trying to fit it into the over-filled pack.\n\n"Nixing reg-spec," the medic mutterd.\n\n"No it ain't." Another trooper watched, visor pushed up.\n\nHer rebreather had been stenciled with little [[Tyranates|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyranate"]]. No black diamond on the shoulder plate. Instead, five [[fission detonators|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_fdet"]] had been clipped to the mount-brackets. Suicide squad.\n\n"Nah, nah," the trooper told the medic. "You're doing it wrong. Gotta fold 'em at the joints. Fit them in like squares."\n\nThe medic banged her visor up. "What the nix are you on, Jhavid?"\n\n"Troop manual," the trooper said. "Says so right in the book."\n\nThe medic snorted static. "You's half [[Plexian|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]]. Always talking about books. I swears."\n\n"Yeah. So my granma was [[Plex|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]]. And?"\n\n"So that's why you's in the snitch." The medic shook her head and clamped the spare limb to the side of his pack.\n\nJhavid groaned. "Just stick it in like the manual says."\n\n"Doesn't work. Can't be combat ready." The medic studied her pack. "Nix this junk. Ain't to spec."\n\n"Sure is," Jhavid said. "Pack it in exactly how the manual says. Then it'll fit."\n\nThe medic looked up. Exasperation positively radiated through her white breather-mask.\n\n"Okay. Okay." Jhavid stood with a hydraulic hiss. "Want me to show you how to do it right, hm?"\n\n"No," the medic said. "Don't need help from no [[Plexian|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]]."\n\n"Nitch, nitch. All complaint. No fix-it. That why you did med-tech, eh?"\n\n"Jhavid, I swear--" The medic stood.\n\nThe trooper shrugged. "Just saying. Manual says how to do it right."\n\n"Oh, nix you." The medic hefted her pack. She noticed Tesh watching her. "What you glaring about, ey?"\n\n"Me?" Teshandra blinked; she'd been glaring?\n\n"Saw it right," the medic growled. "Was glaring at me. Sympathizing with the [[Plexians|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]], ain't ya? Heard you intelligence types do that. Offers them deals and backdoor access. Mean, you guys realize we's at war with the [[Plexians|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]], don't you?"\n\nTeshandra stifled a laugh. "In whose dreams, trooper?"\n\n"Anywhere there's [[Plexians|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]], there's corpses. Like this cajit." The medic nudged Jhavid. "Oughta be executed straight off, you ask me. Told the Sergeant so too but--" The medic leaned closer to Tesh, audio lowered to a whisper, "Sergeant's an objector, ya know. Won't enforce the Chain. Won't do no executions. Just thought I'd report it, in case you need someone to drag off to one of your blacksites, eh?"\n\nTesh pursed her lips. The rank and file had ideas about the [[Intelligence Corps|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_intelcorps"]].\n\nThe medic snorted. "Yeah. That's the look I always gets. Like, you don't think we don't know what you's on about? Why we's really in this system?"\n\n"Let me guess," Teshàndra said heavily. "Your answer will be: old world loyalties. Not a sane strategic analysis. Not a rational examination of logistical reasons. You prefer the nutcase excuse: it's all a [[loyalist|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_loyalism"]] conspiracy."\n\n"Damn straight," the medic said. "Everyone's heard it. Everyone's saying it. Or you think we'd just not notice the old houses they've dragged out here?"\n\nTesh's brow furrowed. "Old houses?"\n\n"Vi Therene--" She gesture to Tesh. "And the spooky one. Vi Atada. Old blood. [[Baroness|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_tlord"]] blood. Mighty suspicious, don't ya think?"\n\n"No," Tesh said. "I do however find this suspicious: a medic breaks op-sec on an open tac-net channel."\n\nThe medic fiddled with her pack-straps. Pretending to adjust; she kept clicking the slider up and down.\n\nTesh shot her an amused look. "Who told? Lady vi Atada?"\n\nThe medic turned away, mumbling, "Didn't say nothing, Cadre. Swears."\n\n"Of course not." Tesh looked to the other trooper, Jhavid. "You?"\n\nShe shrugged as much as her [[combat suit|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_csuit"]] allowed. Also no response. Tac-net showed both their heartrates had spiked.\n\nTeshandra breathed a laugh. "She did you. Both of you." Her lips curled. "Did the Daughter of Hades convince you your bodies are worth so little?"\n\nThe medic jerked to Tesh. "Ain't none your business. With respect, Cadre."\n\n"No," Tesh said. "It is not. But rest assured: if you break op-sec again I will shoot you."\n\n"Right," the medic said. "Against the Chain of Command, that would be. Sergeant's our CO. Not--" She waved to Tesh. "--you."\n\n"Yes." Teshandra ran a finger along her stub-carbine, smirking. "I wonder, apocania: who will the Chain believe? Old world blood? Or an objector?"\n\nThe medic looked away. Her heartrate had spiked again.\n\nTesh's smirk became a scowl. "Do your duty. Do it well. The old world is watching." She winked.\n\n"Oh, come off it." The medic flipped up her visor; the face beneath was hidden behind a breather. "You hitting on me too? Serious?"\n\nJhavid barked a laugh. "The luck. Both the black bitches. Both of them!"\n\nTeshandra shrugged. She had no interest in sex. All the nerves down there were dead. The only person who knew was Teshandra's sweetheart.\n\nBut she was light years away, safe and sound with the 9th Fleet, and Teshandra had more important things to worry about. Like: the rank and file knew her name. Could cause complications, especially if the Sergeant knew and he would. Rumors spread fast in the ranks. On the upside: they probably thought she was her own great-granddaughter.\n\n"Well?" The medic stepped closer to Tesh. "What you think? Would you do me?"\n\n"I would sooner slit your throat," Teshandra said quietly.\n\nJhavid groaned. "I knew it! I told you: spooks don't never tell the truth."\n\n"Nah, nah. She--" The medic pointed to Tesh. "--is telling the truth. Guarantee it. Bet you a week's worth--"\n\n"Comm discipline," Ruthran's voice barked. "Optics on Stationside 4. Approaching latch point. Assault team to the airlock. Expect armed resistance."\n\n"Yes, Sir." The medic lingered, polarized gaze on Teshandra.\n\nTeshandra stared back, expression become hard. The medic might become a problem. She'd not stenciled the diamond on her shoulder plate but Teshandra knew: raised a true believer and since become disillusioned with the [[loyalist|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_loyalism"]] cause. The demotion document had insinuated as much.\n\n"Ey, come on." Jhavid pushed the medic towards the rest of the team.\n\nThey'd stacked three deep, [[stingers|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_stinger"]] loaded and [[suits|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_csuit"]] bulked up with ballistic pads.\n\n"Ready, Sir." Jhavid rasied a fist. On the sub-comm, she added, "And the spook's lying, Kit. Baroness vi Therene was [[Lunan|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luna"]]. No way in Hades a [[Lunan|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luna"]] swore the oath. Not the old one. Or the new."\n\n"Maybe, cajit. Maybe." The medic took position, a hand on the [[zipgun|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_zipgun"]] holstered at her hip. Her gaze wandered to Teshandra. "Maybe we should ask her."\n\nJhavid groaned. "You're thick as bug-beans, Kit. What sort of [[loyalist|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_loyalism"]] are you?"\n\n"One who's--"\n\n"Comm-dis!" Ruthran smacked the medic on the helmet. "Goes for all of you. The Tyrant won't rise from his grave exempt your dumb ass from the Chain of Command. Stat?"\n\n"Sir!" The medic tipped a finger.\n\nJhavid laughed. "Now that? That's real objection. No offense, Sarge."\n\n"Goes for you too, [[Plexian|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]]." Ruthran slapped Jhavid's visor down. "Brace it. Sixty seconds."\n\n"Hope to Hades." Tesh pulled her [[stinger|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_stinger"]] out of the release recess. \n\nThe harness tried to close on her. She pushed it off and joined the assault team, her cybernetic toes jammed in the hand-hold. No need for hands. Old world tech did the job better than modern [[suits|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_csuit"]].\n\nRuthran glanced to Teshandra. "You sure you want up front, Cadre? It's been three hours. Bet you Boarding Spec is set up right outside."\n\n"Bet you five sols I emerge unscathed," Teshandra said.\n\nRuthran grunted. "I don't take old world crypto. Will do you for rations though."\n\n"Fine. Five packs." \n\n"Deal." Ruthran slapped her shoulder and joined the assault team. "Brace in!"\n\nServos whirred as bodies tensed. Teshandra drew deep, calming breaths. Inertia dragged as the bullet-tram glided to a stop. Seal was made with a squeak. The indicator above the airlock blinked green.\n\nRuthran muttered, "Any moment, any--" The hatch hissed open. "Break!"\n\nAudio speakers roared. Armored boots pushed off. Micro-thrusters fired in clipped bursts as twelve [[combat suits|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_csuit"]] flew out the airlock. Teshandra scrambled after them, into deafening gunfire. \n\nBullets pinged off ceramic plates. [[Stingers|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_stinger"]] shrieked on full auto. Thermal spiked; ablative layers boiled off the trooper before Tesh. She huddled in his bulk as the assault team advanced. \n\nA trooper lay on the floor, visor holed at forehead-height. Beyond was a tramway station not unlike the one they'd departed, only the viewport-walls had failed, photo-units shattered by bolts and sparks flying from damaged circuits.\n\nScrunched behind the benches and blast-plates were Boarding Spec men in grey colonial pressure-suits. They had been issued imperial-red [[chemical rifles|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_zipgun"]], the only firearm the old world had entrusted to their colonial subjects. \n\nA lone burst from a [[stinger|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_stinger"]] downed a dozen. Spent cartridges clattered to the floor around the dead. Only one hostile remained: a tripod laser-bot clamped to the ceiling. It's lens housing swept back and forth.\n\n"Nix!" Tesh sighted her [[stinger|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_stinger"]]. \n\nTarget recognition locked the same microsecond she pressed the trigger. Noise cancelation reduced the carbine's roar to a muted rumble. A hundred odd smart-bolts smacked into the machine. Beneath it's armored shell, a capacitor detonated with a muffled bang. Bits and pieces of robot fell to the floor around the assault team.\n\nFor a brief moment, time seemed to slow. Heavily armored troopers executed injured Boarding Spec men point blank - only men; [[Al Habe Sidir|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_alhabe"]] truly was stuck in the past.\n\n"Spread and secure," Ruthran's voice crackled. "Team One, on the stair--"\n\nA dull thud sounded in the bullet-tram. Tesh glanced back. Smoke billowed out of the airlock. Chemical grenade. No one was inside to be hurt.\n\nUp ahead, the medic dragged the trooper with the holed visor into cover. Five [[fission detonators|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_fdet"]] dangled from the injured's shoulder-plate. Jhavid.\n\nRuthran stomped over. "Medic. How is she?"\n\n"Nixed." The medic peeled off the injure'd trooper's mask, saying, "Bolt in the skull. Fragments in the flesh. Will live but not walk."\n\nTeshandra grimaced. She'd expected worse. "Ah, well. Sergeant?" She waved to him. "Move your teams out. Immediately."\n\n"Move?" Ruthran turned. "One, the tac-plan is we hold and--"\n\n"The tac-plan is nixed along with the bullet-tram. Tech team will have to go the long way around. We go that way." Teshandra pointed to the side of the station, away from the moving stairs. "Through the utility passages. Either we get to Local Control before they lock us in or we blast our way out with [[fission detonators|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_fdet"]] but--" She shrugged. "Your decision, Two. Chain of Command."\n\n"Right, right." Ruthran looked about, shaking his head.\n\nTeshandra had sympathy for the Sergeant: more bodies than he'd wanted. She had no sympathy for the Governor who had gotten the men killed. Idiot Lillith vi Atada had been right: nix the leaf-rollers. The 9th Fleet needed fuel. [[Al Habe Sidir|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_alhabe"]] had it and, unless the Governor was taught a lesson, he would spill more blood for a lost cause.\n\n"Sergeant?" Teshandra snapped her fingers. "Assault team to Local Control. Now." She set off towards the maintenance passage.\n\nTwo troopers had already found the barely-concealed utility door. One stood aside. The other rigged a charge. Both turned their backs. The lock blew out with a hiss. The troopers ducked through.\n\n"Clear," a voice crackled. "Sarge? Maintenance passage is right where the wire-map said it'd be. No resistance."\n\n"Everyone inside," Teshandra said.\n\nTroopers hesitated. Several looked to Ruthran.\n\nThe Sergeant breathed an audible sigh. "Into the maintenance tunnels. Team Two: on point. Team One: cover ingress."\n\n"Sir." Troopers ducked through the door, one by one, and vanished into the gloom. \n\nWithin a matter of moments, only Ruthran and the rear guard remained outside.\n\nTeshandra shot the sergeant a hard look. "Inside." She grabbed the [[fission detonator|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_fdet"]] clipped to her thigh. "Trail-trap."\n\n"What?" Ruthran held her wrist. "One, you're not really--"\n\n"No arguments. And do not touch me again." Teshandra shook loose and primed the grenade; trip-chip out.\n\nShe wedged the bomb behind a bent hinge and set the chip beneath the door seal, sensor pointed up. The safety indicator blinked bright red. \n\nRuthran watched from behind his laser-scarred visor. The objector's disapproval could be felt through the polarized plate. He vehemently objected to nuke-grenades.\n\n"Live with it," Teshandra snarled. "Inside. All of you."\n\n"Chain of Command, eh, Cadre?" Ruthran drucked through. \n\nThe rear guard followed. Teshandra waited until they were well away from the trip-sensor, then backed away herself, and primed the fuse. The red light went blank. Tac-net shaded the area orange; extreme atomic hazard. More than enough to stop any pursuit.\n\nTeshandra had no sympathy. [[Lunans|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luna"]] were known to have an allergic reaction to being shot in the back and Teshandra was no exception. Or hadn't been, back when [[Luna|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luna"]] had still existed.\n\nThe astrography of the galaxy had changed plenty since the damned moon had been doomed to extinction. The old lessons however still contained wisdom: only expose your back with a bomb to greet the Tyrant's bastards. It was only good [[Lunan|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luna"]] etiquette.

"Okay, and there we go." Mechanical hands hauled Tesh into a sitting position. "Oh, Hades. That's really bad. Sarge?"\n\nTesh blinked. Her head ached. Her skin crawled. The world felt distant, as though Teshandra had frozen in a cryo-tank. \n\nOverhead, a shadow moved. It took Tesh a long time to realize there was a [[combat suit|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_csuit"]] hunched over her. Bulky fingers applied a smart-bandage to her face. \n\nThe medic; Tesh remembered her. Kit. Dissilusioned [[loyalist|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_loyalism"]]. Teshandra could have recited their entire conversation from memory. She recalled it all in vivid detail. \n\nThe present on the other hand made little sense. Tac-net had gone dead. Virtual overlay was blank. Only the comm unit still worked. Static rustled in her ear like space-mites. Tesh could have sworn she could feel the pests crawling around under her skin. \n\nPressue was applied uncomfortably to Tesh's face. She winced. Her cheek hurt straight down to the cyber-graft.\n\n"There, there," the medic's voice crackled. "Quit squirming. Just a flesh burn. Sarge? Sarge!"\n\n"Right here." The blurry bulk of a [[combat suit|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_csuit"]] loomed over Teshandra. "What is it, trooper?"\n\n"She's alive," the medic said. "Barely. Bio reads nixed-up. Bloodwork off the charts. Crazy-like." \n\n"Could be afterlife," Ruthran's voice crackled. \n\n"Nah," the medic said. "Her eyes were open. And she moved. Definitely alive. Infused her and patched it up good." The medic stood with a hydraulic hiss. "Best I can do, Sir."\n\nRuthran patted the woman's shoulder. "Good work. Go check on Jhavid."\n\n"Stat that." The medic stomped off.\n\nTeshandra watched her legs receed into the distance. Every heavy footstep shook the checkered blue carpet of a well-lit corridor. The walls were like like the dusts of [[Luna|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luna"]] once had been, before the Tyrant's impotent rage had scorched the damned moon black. \n\nThe mere thought of black dust made Tesh's heart ache worse than her face. She closed her eyes, willing herself to cry. Pain should have brought tears. All Teshandra felt was an irritable, buzzing mite-ache.\n\nOn the comm, Ruthran's voice said, "Can't say either way, Three. Looks lethal but the medic says she's got vitals. Don't make sense. She took white-hot smack in the face. Should be nixed by rights."\n\nStatic crackled on the comm. Another sort of noise buzzed under Teshandra's skin. She could feel the space mites crawling about.\n\nFinally, Lilly's distorted voice said, "One's tough, Two. Wait it out. Shuttle's online. We'll be over in an hour. Just gotta get the rest of your funnies aboard. Stat?"\n\n"Stat that." Ruthran exhald a deep sigh. "Nix, One. First you commit suicide by [[Plex|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] and now that psycho is coming over here. I swear to Hades. What is wrong with you spooks?"\n\nMore than Tesh wanted to admit. She would have explained but lacked the strength. Everything hurt and space-mites were everywhere. Imaginary space mites, that was. Such creatures did not exist and never had. Her brain simply had no other way to interpret the sensation and, long ago, in a different age, Teshandra had decided it had to be space mites. Space mites made sense. More sense than the truth did.\n\n"One?" A mechanical hand shook Tesh's shoulder.\n\nHer eyes opened a fraction. Ruthran's bulky [[suit|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_csuit"]] crouched before her, visor up and rebreather off. His thin face was drenched in sweat.\n\nHe wiped it away, shaking his head. "Damn it, One. This operation is so nixed. And you know what the irony is? I was warming up to you. That talk before. About acceptance. I kinda bought it." He breathed a laugh. "Serves me right for getting my hopes up, eh? Thought maybe you was our ticket out of the suicide battallion. And then--" He hesitated. "What the Hades were you thinking? You'd take on the whole damn [[Plex|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] alone?"\n\nTesh groaned inwardly. She'd thought Snitch Five would react faster.\n\n"Yeah," Ruthran said heavily. "That's what I was thinking too: you're a sack of shit spook. Made it all up, right? Planned it all out too: had that psycho let it slip on purpose, just in case I objected. Or got ideas. That's what you black ops types do, isn't it? Mind games and psy-ops. Rotten to the core. And that's kinda sad, y'know? Cause you're kinda hot, you know that?"\n\n"Two," Tesh said feebly. "I can hear you."\n\n"Nix!" Armor banged against the wall. Ruthran breathed rapidly. "Hades, One. You're alive?"\n\nTesh nodded ever so slightly.\n\n"Holy Hades," Ruthran muttered. After a long moment, he added, "How much of that did you hear?"\n\n"All of it." Tesh rubbed her face.\n\nThe left half felt fine; scars and swelling. The right throbbed around the bandage. Tesh felt the dressing. It squelched.\n\nRuthran said, "You shouldn't touch that, One. Only thing keeping your brain in."\n\n"I'm fine." Tesh managed a pained smile. "Flesh-burn, Two. Near miss."\n\nThe Sergeant nodded. His expression spoke for itself: <i>bullshit</i>\n\n"You eternal sceptic," Teshandra wheezed.\n\n"You look bad," he said.\n\nTeshandra shrugged a little. "Old world's finest, Two. Takes more than a glancing hit to kill the Tyrant's specimens."\n\n"That so, eh?" When Teshandra didn't react, Ruthran said, "So we took Local Control. You were right. The [[Plex|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] basically let us walk in. Team One is securing the command center now. Team Two's tryna secure the door. Get it closed before Customs Guard arrives. Also gotta figure out the controls. They're all in [[Plex|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] jibberish. Hopefully Three and the tech crew can make sense of it."\n\n"I heard," Tesh muttered.\n\nShe was still annoyed by the Sergeant. Half a second. Ooodles of time, especially for a cybernetic brain. He'd nixed up. Bad.\n\nTesh shot him a dark look. "Next time I tell you to act, trooper, I expect you to act immediately. Not ten seconds late."\n\n"Right," he said slowly. "Listen, I don't wanna--"\n\n"Then do not." Teshandra sat up with a grunt.\n\n"Wow, wow!" Ruthran grabbed her.\n\nHis mechanical fingers pinched. Tesh squirmed. Not in pain. At the memories; they'd surfaced along with the space-mites: glimpses of a time long ago, when another set of cybernetic fingers had gripped her. The mere thought of that had followed made Tesh seethe with shame and contempt.\n\n"Do not," she hissed through gritted teeth. "Touch me."\n\n"Okay." Ruthran stepped back, hands raised. "I'll accept that. I won't ask questions. But I am thinking, okay? I'm--"\n\nTesh shot him an exasperated look. "Can you please be quiet?"\n\n"Aye, Cadre." The Sergeant's gaze remained fixed on Teshandra.\n\nShe sat for a long moment. Finally, she said, "It is nothing personal. Mistakes happen. I have made mistakes too. Many. But never mind that. The present matters, and--" She glanced around.\n\nThey were in a [[Plex|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] corridor that ended at a secure door. Beyond was a command center: neural couches set in a circle around a soft-light tank. Two troopers in [[combat suits|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_csuit"]] paced around the room, coil-carbines in hand. In the corner, the body of a [[Plex|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] lay on the floor amid a pool of blood. The walls were riddled with bolt-holes.\n\nTesh shot Ruthran a dubious look. "Did you not say they let you walk in?"\n\n"Practically." He shrugged. "Had a tussle or two. All under control."\n\n"Good." Tesh picked herself up with a grunt.\n\nRuthran moved to help but hesitated. "One?"\n\n"I am fine." She shuffled towards the command center.\n\nThe stations were unmanned. Snacks and low-g cups had been left beside workstations. In the center, the big soft-light tank. It showed the local solar system in wirefram schematics. Clearly visible: the twelve kill-sats in orbit and thirty-odd sensors stations scattered about the system. Also tracked: debris from the gateway which had exploded, the six Zone Control [[sub-frigate|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cfrigate"]], and a handful of atmospheric shuttles. No meaningful traffic in or out of the system.\n\n"It's been quiet so far," Ruthran said. "Don't think they know what's up yet."\n\n"They will soon enough." Tesh gestured around. "And the [[Plex|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] who worked here?"\n\n"Down in the sublevel," Ruthran said. "Bound and secured. You know: just in case."\n\n"All of them?"\n\nRuthran nodded. "Checked it in on security board: all employee IDs are in the break room. Least, I think we got all of them. I don't read p-tech well."\n\nTesh nodded. Hostages were better than corpses.\n\n"Also, been trying to get in touch with the Governor," Ruthran said. "Couldn't make it work."\n\n"Time we changed that." Teshandra activated her comm. "Th--"\n\nHer audio popped painfully.\n\n"Ow!" Tesh felt her left ear.\n\nThe audio unit had shaken loose. She squished it back in. Noise rustled. Space-mites crawled. Tesh fiddled until the unit clicked into place.\n\nRuthran watched her, expression contorted. "Doesn't that hurt?"\n\n"Excruciatingly so." Tesh managed a little smirk; in truth, her head barely even ached.\n\nHer nerves had gone dead centuries ago, just like the ones between her legs. The going theory had been a brain transplant would keep her nervous system alive longer but the new [[birth-clone|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_bchamber"]] had changed nothing. Teshandra had expected as much.\n\nThe infection was deep in her brain. [[Black plague|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_bblood"]]. Spread down the spine and through the nerves. Another secret of the old world, one that ought have died with the Tyrant. The mere throught of that misbegotten man made Teshandra's blood run cold.\n\n"Bastard," she muttered, glowing at the light-tank.\n\nThe [[Plex|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] had painted their helix on the photo-glass but, underneath, the circuits reeked of the Tyrant's legacy. Imperial template. The [[Plex|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] were too stupid to design such a device from the ground up. They had simply copied the old and spliced in the new.\n\n"Oppertunists." Tesh shuffled up to the tank and folded her arms. "Two?"\n\nRuthran stepped up behind her. "Cadre?"\n\n"You mentioned our talk earlier."\n\n"I did."\n\n"You will be interested in this too." She pressed a hand against the soft-light tank.\n\nThe glass turned red where she'd touched it. [[Plex|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] code complained: invalid data. Unregistered imprint.\n\nRuthran breathed a laugh. "Fascinating, One."\n\n"It is. The [[Plex|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] scavenged a technology of the old world and redesigned it entirely. They created a new lock-system, one our augments cannot interface with. Only a data helix can match a valid pattern. To do that they tore the entire codebase apart, reverse engineered how every single module worked, and put it all back together." She glanced to Ruthran. "They are a thousand years ahead of us in digital technology."\n\n"Okay, that is kinda fascinating," Ruthran said. "In an uncomfortable way, since we're at war with them."\n\n"Or so the wise ones claim, Two. But I digress. Observe." Tesh removed her hand from the tank.\n\nThe red error message vanished. It was replaced by a pixelated Imperial Seal. Beneath, a blurry font read: <i>Privileged access granted by decree of the Terran Throne</i>.\n\nTesh shot Ruthran a sidelong glance. "Intrigued?"\n\nRuthran nodded, lips pursed.\n\n"As the [[Plex|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] discovered, reverse-engineering an entire codebase is rather difficult when one does not know what most of it does. They found it more economical to put the old systems back together with new modules spliced in. So, rather than to re-work the genetic lock system to work with their helix, they simply added it on top. Which is unfortunate for them and--" Teshandra tapped the tank. "--good for us."\n\nThe Local Control interface opened. She swiped a dozen [[Plex|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] dialogs aside, opened the administrative mode, and selected the kill-sats around [[Al Habe Sidir|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_alhabe"]], one at a time. \n\nEach time she did, the [[Plex|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] system instructed the underlying imperial chipsets to authorize against the satellite's sublight link, transmitting the genetic marker Teshandra had accessed the tank with in encrypted form. A [[Plex|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] dialog inside the holo-tank listed all sent transmissions, waiting for the return signal.\n\n"So," Ruthran said slowly. "What exactly am I looking at?"\n\n"The old world was paranoid," Teshandra said. "The Lords and Ladies of the Court were so terrified that colonial rebellions might lock them out of their systems that they pressured the Throne to take extra precautions in such designs; genetic overrides. Of a sort."\n\n"Way I heard it," Ruthran said. "They had good reason to think that way."\n\n"True. But nothing is ever so simple. You see, the Lords and Ladies were so often obligated to attend the Court of Sol that access had to be extended. Before long, many a trusted [[Trade Baron|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_tlord"]] had been authorized to act in their stead, granted access to devices such as this one, and so the seeds of dissent were sown by those not unlike me."\n\nRuthran clucked his tongue. "Nice try, One. But you're not from here. Op-brief said: House Vindell owns [[Al Habe Sidir|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_alhabe"]]. You're not a Vindell. The Lord is tube-born. No wife. Never banded."\n\n"Maybe I am an illegitimate heir." \n\nRuthran scowled. "Interesting theory. Are you?"\n\n"Yes." Teshandra winked and linked to tac-net. "Three? We have Local Control."\n\nThe comm crackled. "Oh, look who's back from the dead. How was Hades?"\n\n"Bland and full of space mites." Teshandra tapped at the tank's controls, saying, "Kill-sats are under our control. [[Farbound|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_farbound"]] echo still clear. No resonance from the supply tangent yet. I plan to speak to the Governor. See if common sense prevails this time. Just in case it does not, I need you and the tech team present as soon as possible. Stat."\n\n"Going as fast as this [[lugtug|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_lugtug"]] can puff, One. Zone Control's still shadowing. They're complaining about my flying."\n\n"Oh, indeed?" Teshandra scowled at the tank.\n\nThe little shuttle showed prominently: a red dot flagged with hundreds of vector violations. It spiraled around the orbital ring, keeping the structure between it and the [[sub-frigate|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cfrigate"]] trying to shadow.\n\nTeshandra's lips curled. "Do not antagonize them too much, Three."\n\n"Nitch, nitch, now go suck up to the good Governor already. I'm busy with this frigate. Three, terminate." Lilly linked out.\n\n"Always so polite, the Lady vi Atada." Tesh shook her head, flipping through the comm-stations Local Control had saved in the tank.\n\nThe [[Plex|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] had recorded hundreds of thousands of entries. Some on the orbital ring, others in the system, others yet the planet, and others yet in nearby star systems. One had been flagged as a priority channel: a [[farbound|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_farbound"]] line to the Governor's office. \n\nTesh tapped at it. The holo-tank blinked an error: invalid data. The underlying imperial code put the connection through anyways.\n\nA speaker beeped. "Colonial Office. [[Al Habe Sidir|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_alhabe"]]. Please state your name and--" The line clicked.\n\nThe Governor's voice blurted, "Please tell me that is you, Miss Lobre. Please tell me the situation is under control."\n\n"Good evening, Governor Raic," Teshandra said. "I assure you: the situation is under control. Under your control. Would you like to discuss precisely how you can exert this control, Governor?"\n\n"You," the Governor snarled. "Who the Hades do you think you are? This is a colonial system and, by Saint Fegg, I swear I will gut you myself if I so much as lay my eyes on you, terrorist!"\n\nTesh's lips curled. She felt no need to respond to such baseless threats. Long seconds dragged.\n\n"Hello? Hello?" Noise crackled. " Ah, blasted. Ruddy [[Plex|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] technology. Where's that Chief Executive when you need him?"\n\n"We had better leave him out of it," a hushed voice said. "And maybe we should try a different approach, Governor?"\n\n"Yes, yes. I--" The channel muted.\n\nTesh clucked her tongue. Lord Otto Vindell, the reclusive [[Baron|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_tlord"]] who had reigned over [[Al Habe Sidir|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_alhabe"]] ever since the local Lord had gone off fight the Great War. Teshandra had never met Otto but he sounded exactly like his father.\n\nThe channel beeped. "Ah, yes? Hello? Can you hear me? I have considered the conundrum we find ourselves in and I agree: we ought discuss the present situation in depth."\n\n"Indeed," Tesh said. "But, before we do, let me make my position abundantly clear: we have no desire to cause additional harm or put lives at risk but, should the need arise, we are in control of--" Tesh glanced at the kill-sat interface. "--eleven fully functional orbital kinetic stations with splendid firing arcs on [[Al Habe Sidir|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_alhabe"]]. Should the local millitia be mustered, should Zone Control attempt to engage in hostile action, should this command center come under siege, should communications be disrupted, or should terrestrial weapon launches be detected, we will fire on all major cities with all avaliable munitions. Am I understood?"\n\nThe Governor harrumphed. "That's preposterous. You can't be serious!"\n\n"I am." Tesh instructed the kill-sats to target the planet.\n\nA pre-set plan existed for precisely this scenario. The [[Plex|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] system categorically refused to transmit such asinine orders but the imperial chipsets obliged; the old world had been nothing if not paranoid of colonial uprisings.\n\nWhile the kill-sats adjusted, Tesh told the Governor, "Rest assured: we will not open fire unless given cause to do so. Indeed, I had rather hope to negotiate. As I understand, [[Al Habe Sidir|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_alhabe"]] is known for it's beautiful resorts and charming backwater hospitality. I would not wish to give you the feeling I am taking advantage of you, Governor, so perhaps we can reach an agreement?"\n\n"Ah, yes," the Governor said tersely. "Yes, I suppose that is in everyone's best interest, is it not?"\n\n"I should certainly think so." Teshandra drew a deep breath. "I propose a cease-fire under conditions: no military or para-military action is taken, as described earlier, and you send up one negotiator who represents the interests of [[Al Habe Sidir|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_alhabe"]]. Might I suggest Lord Vindell, if he is available?"\n\nThere was a long silence, then the Governor's voice, "Perhaps this can be arranged. Of course I agree to the cease-fire. But I cannot reach Lord Vindell at present. It might take a moment."\n\n"Of course," Tesh said. "In the interim, I suggest you announce that all colonial security forces are to stand down effective immediately. I suggest you explain to your people why this is of such imporance to the future wellbeing of [[Al Habe Sidir|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_alhabe"]]. In fact I suggest you do this now. I will remain on channel."\n\n"Ah, yes, yes, well you see that might be--"\n\n"Governor," Teshandra said firmly. "I have no wish to fire on innocent colonial citizens but I will provide a demonstration of intent, if that is what you wish. There are several step-cities along the equator, are there not? Perhaps a less important one could be sacrificed so that your hesitance will not be seen as political weakness?"\n\nThe Governor sighed audibly. "No, no, that is quite unnecessary. I assure you: the public will be informed immediately."\n\n"That would be advisable. Please announce the situation. I will wait." Tesh muted the transmission and glanced to Ruthran. "Two, instruct the tech team to deploy one [[echo-drone|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_edrone"]]."\n\nThe Sergeant nodded. "Will do. Any instruct?"\n\n"No. Simply listen. The supply tangent should be on approach and this monstrosity--" She gestured to the tank. "--will take months to configure for [[Fleet|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyran"]] cyphers."\n\n"Fair enough." Ruthran paced away, speaking on the team-net.\n\nOn the other line, the Governor was saying, "Yes, yes, but I cannot say that! Ah, babble, babble. Just put it through." The Governor cleared his throat. "Good evening, yes, yes, an urgent situation has developed. I must ask that a statement be issued immediately. Yes, an emergency broadcast. About the situation in orbit, yes. Do you think--"\n\n"One?" Ruthran rejoined Teshandra. "Drone's out."\n\n"Faster than expected." Teshandra scanned the tank.\n\nIt had detected the [[echo-drone|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_edrone"]] as an unidentified track launched from the Market Gap. LIDAR painted a silhouette which vaguely resembled a jellyfish with only one long tentacle, burning hard away from the orbital ring.\n\nWhat the tank did not detect: the tech trooper at the drone console, a bulky box which contained a plug-set and shortwave transmitter. Even one-way [[farbound|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_farbound"]] units needed a listener to adjust frequency and temporal synch.\n\nDigital systems had been experimented with and Tesh had drafted plans for an automated prototype but that was decades from a reliable field-certified unit. All very secret, to the point most people did not even believe [[farbound|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_farbound"]] channels could ever be synched automatically, though the [[Fleet|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyran"]] already employed such designs, installed in those precious [[battleships|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_battleship"]] the Astrara desperately wanted to an eye on.\n\nOn team-net, the the drone-tech's voice crackled, "One? Pingback."\n\n"On channel," Teshandra said. "What is it?"\n\n"Drone is picking up a [[Fleet|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyran"]] cypher. Synch is bad. But I am recieving."\n\nTesh had expected as much. "How far away are they?"\n\n"Hard to tell. Mostly white noise. Bits of op-code."\n\n"Keep listening. Tell me if the situation changes." Teshandra began to pace, lost in thought.\n\nThe Governor had come around, which was a start, though Tesh had never expected him to resist, not once the kill-sats were turned on [[Al Habe Sidir|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_alhabe"]]. Unfortunately, that had been the easy part. The larger strategic situation posed less easily solved issues. The North Front remained open, the future of the 9th Fleet was uncertain, and Teshandra was light-years away from anyone who could affect any meaningful change. \n\nBy design, admittedly, since only a fool would have remained with the 9th to witness the madness the Astrara had set in motion. But that did not mean Teshandra liked her situation. She had been shot in the face, for one, and for another she still did not know whether the [[Al Habe Sidir|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_alhabe"]] operation would pay off - in fuel and otherwise. Most of all, she feared her absence from the [[Fleet|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyran"]] would cost her something that could not be so easily replaced as Pale: her sweetheart. \n\nTeshandra had not seen the beautiful young woman she loved in over a decade. She did not even know if her love still loved her. Or whether any of their plans for a future still stood. All because of that miserable Astrara and her stupid obsession with a legacy that ought have been lain to rest well over a thousand years in the past.

(( explain how these work, frame swaps, related to Luminev and Farbound; basically time travel device - do trip and then jump back; virtual timeline - shrinkage of space-time in time jump ))\n\nThe REACH core and associated RANGE technology were a FTL travel mechanism developed by the [[Church of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] as an alternative to the notoriously unstable and relatively inflexible [[Luminev Drive|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luminev"]]. Before REACH and RANGE can be understood, it's basic mechanism must be explained: the sub-null principle. The principle builds on the earlier [[lum principle|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luminev"]] and associated research into null-mass [[gravity wells|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_gwell"]], stating that if a thing which is physically impossible could be created, then the impossible would - however briefly - be mathematically probable. Unlike the lum principle, sub-null did notseek to bend the laws of physics - it sought to temporarily recreate them. In practice, this was done through a device which created a teperature below absolute zero. In sustaining this impossibly low temperature, a perpetual-energy system could be generated, at least in theory. In practice, the device eventually overheated and unleasheed the accumulated energy as a static discharge.<br><br>\n\n<h3>Early Inceptions</h3>\nIn the 21st millennium, the REACH discharge mechanism was used as an alternative to conventional radiators, marketed as an advanced energy management system that radiated heat away from energy-intensive starships, particularly thermal-hot warships. The thermal-dissipation and associated static-discharge effect was implemented using a series of heat-transmitters which were set in lines around the vessel, projecting all thermal buildup as a static discharge away from the core and ship. The technology unfortunately had some limitations, most notably that charge would build up and be unleashed, often at inoppertune times. Experimentation in pursuit of avoiding this issue led to the discovery of the second REACH principle in the 22nd millennium and the associated RANGE ping several hundred years after. REACH, which can be imagined as space-folding or point-swapping, can be achieved by discharging the accumulated energy into motion, causing the molecular composition of an object to be moved by the ammount of accumulated energy, only at near-instantaneous speeds.<br><br>\n\n<div class='HUD_CodexImage_Left'><<print "[img[" + $codex.imagePath + "codex_seraph_reach.png]]">></div>To successfully REACH, a sufficiently large geometric space had to be delimited around the ship, enveloping it in an electrically charged volume. Existing heat transmission cells, often still built in strips despite impreovement of the technogy, became dual-purpose geometric points projectors which expanded the REACH field to cover the volume of the entire ship, not merely the REACH core. Were the core merely be allowed to expand spherically, it would create a regular shape and invariably tear any sufficiently large vessel apart. The visual REACH strip was a common sight on [[Church of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] starships, though the practice was not necessary and only continued to keep spare conductor cells readily availabe on the surface in case of damage - practically, and in nominal conditions, single-points around the ship would suffice to REACH. RANGE on the other hand worked by distriubting the movement of atoms in dead space, creating an mostly harmless outward wave which vibrated in the presence of similar REACH devices and would contract back to the point of origin, creating a closed sensory-loop.<br><br>\n\nREACH and RANGE in tandem were used to create a FTL jump and a method by which to identify other vessels operating on the same principle, as REACH cores would cause signal virbations when a RANGE wave passes their space-time nowpoint, which would then be carried back to the original core on the contraction-wave. Similar applications of sub-null technology were used to heat and cool objects, later also to astrographically displace them, though the REACH core was the best-known example. Very few smaller inceptions of the REACH-RANGE principle existed due to the sheer technological complexity, known the details of which were known only to the [[Machine-Cult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_msmith"]]. It is important to mention that, while REACH-RANGE theory was fairly well understood in principle during the modern era, virtually all functioning cores were built by the [[Church of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]]. Third-party manufacture, while not illegal or impossible at the time, was never practical. The technology underlying REACH manufacture was known only to the [[Machine-Cult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_msmith"]] and no third-party implementation was successfull.<br><br>\n\n<div class='HUD_CodexTallImage'><<print "[img[" + $codex.imagePath + "codex_reach_construct.png]]">></div>Over the course of the 24th to 26th millennium, improvements of the heat-transmission technology allowed armoring of the thermal strips installed on REACH-capable warships, though often only the bow was armored to allow spares to be moved around the hull more easily in case of battle damage. The general absence of internal utility paths larger than a centimeter-large maintenance spider made it more economic to fit spares on the surface of the vessel rather than locked away in storage systems which were not easily accessible. Many historic account of the [[Church of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] also suggest that the thermal strips were kept, in part, due to their recognition value, the bright blue stripe being an unmistakable sign that the ship belonged to the Holy Fleet even in absence of direct communication, e.g. due to battle damage or communications blackouts.\n\n<h3>Technological Comparison</h3>\nCompared to the only other contemporary superluminal transit technology, the [[Luminev Drive|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luminev"]], REACH was a far safer method of FTL as the core did not operate under full load and did not need to account for lumen fluctuations. It accumulated heat passively at a measurable rate, which had to be periodically discharged, but did not put extreme stress on the host-vessel's skeleton. The drawback of this principle was that the superluminal discharge proved short-lived. Sustained fuel flight fuel economy was not possible as the core required a known recharge period between jumps.<br><br>\n\n<div class='HUD_CodexImage_Left'><<print "[img[" + $codex.imagePath + "codex_reach_luminev.png]]">></div>In theory, the REACH core was stabler and more flexible FTL system, allowing for heat dissapation alongside FTL travel. However, the burst-transit nature of REACH mmade it ill suited for use outside the densely populated Galactic Core due to the cooldown. Another issue encountered with REACH / RANGE cores was that it released a wave of energy periodically which could be recorded and measured from any angle, even well beyond light lag, while a [[Luminev Drive|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luminev"]] only produced fluctuations in photo-activity directly ahead of the drive-vector, making REACH much louder than more traditional FTL methods. In case of core failure however, REACH had sufficient advantages. While a [[Luminev Drive|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luminev"]] would, in absence of costly failsaves, scatter it's accelerated atoms across disparate vectors, a REACH core would merely implode, which was disasterous for anything attached to the core, but relatively harmless to nearby objects. REACH-jumps were also more fuel-efficient on short-legged journeys as since the REACH core was in itself a near-perpetual energy device.<br><br>\n\nNone the less, the mechanism was not perfect. A REACH core required constant external energy imput and would continue to draw thermal or electric energy due to inefficiencies in the conversion mechanisms within the core. As a result, an external reactor was always required to operate REACH. Additionally, since heat was absorbed by the REACH core in standard operation, any additional systems attached to the same cirtuit would passive-charge the core over time. The resulting dynamic, known as the sub-null balance, was a fundamental principle of REACH core operation. Overcharging a core would lead to a hard reset of the device and forced static discharge along the radiator strips, possibly at an inoppertune moment. A related problem was discovred in that, when the core shut down, it's heat-dissapating effect could not be maintained, forcing virtually all REACH-capable ships to include small radiator strips behind the core to avoid overheating when the core was not active.<br><br>\n\n<h3>Related Designs & Evolution</h3>\nThe theories and principles of the REACH core were widely studied and experimented with during the modern era, though the only remotely similar successor technology would be the [[Cosmus Drives|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "asc_codex_cosmus"]], first produced by the [[Confederation of Frontier Domains|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "asc_codex_domains"]] in the 30th millennium. Although it built on mathematics which underlay the REACH principle, the theory behind [[Cosmus|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "asc_codex_cosmus"]] relied on null-mass rather than null-temperature calculations and as a result performed differently in practice than traditional REACH. Thus, despite some theoretical similarities, the technologies were not even remotely comparable in either practical operation or theoretical principle.

The witches covens were a loose association of radically matriarchal terrorist organizations that first arose in the 23rd millennium and persisted until the late 27th, when the covens as such were all but driven extinct by the [[Church of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]]. Virtually all covens were matriarchal, the only exception being the Black Circle, which was often not considered a true coven, and run by the Matriarch or - in rare exceptions - a Witch Queen. Some early covens were lated to the [[Astral Order|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_sacred_astral"]] of old and may have been formed by [[Astrals|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_sacred_astral"]] who had fled persecution - by the modern era, this connection had all but faded and no living descendants of the [[Astrals|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_sacred_astral"]] were identified as witches after the 26th millennium.<br><br>\n\nCovenite life was defined by secret loyalty to the sisterhood over all other institutions, reverence and ritual in the honor of the [[pantheon of witchcraft|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "rev_codex_pseudopantheon"]], and pursuit of the ideal state, deemed to be one in which a witch needed rely on no one, not even her sisters, and participated in the coven entirely out of selflessness. Outwardly, many covens rendered of lesser [[fleshmelding|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_fmeld"]] and cybernetic repair services as a form of communal relations, and occasionally engaged in pro-matriarchal activism. Mystic rituals, selective breeding and eugenics (later: artificial insemination), rote memorization of lost arts, and hobbyist use of cybernetics were the norm. Increasingly due to persecution by the patriarchal [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]], the covens turned toward fanatism and terrorism in an attempt to preserve their endangered way of life. <br><br>\n\nNotably, later covens frequently used silver - a pseudo-genetic manipulative derived from the [[black plague|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_bblood"]], creating short-lived kinetically resistant cellular structures all but impervious to harm - nano-disassembly bombs, neuro-toxins, [[shamblers|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_shambler"]], and similar bio-weapons in their unconventional war against the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]]. Until their eventual eradication, the covens were frequently preservers of seemingly arcane and lost arts, many witches being the distant descendants of [[Astral Archivars|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_sacred_astral"]] and therefore privy to large volumes of genetically ingrained knowledge, which could often only recalled by intuition, insight referred to most as witchcraft or black magic. The origins of the covens are complex however, as was their denunciation as practitioners of the [[abominable arts|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_abom"]] by the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]], and must be examined in detail to comprehend the history of the Witch and their covens.\n\n<h3>Key Concepts</h3>\nSinner & Saint, Ideal State, Tenants, [[pantheon|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "rev_codex_pseudopantheon"]], anti-patriarchial stance (etc)\n\n<h3>Origins and History</h3>\nThough traditional history records the Witches Covens to have been distant female descendants of the [[Astral Archivars|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_sacred_astral"]], specifically those who had followed Lady Celestina Namaz in rebellion against the [[Terran Empire|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_empire"]], the connection is in fact more insidious: the sons and daughters of Celestia had all but gone extinct by the 21st millennium, hunted down by [[Solar Knights|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_mlord"]] who feared astral knowledge might threaten their struggling kingdoms during the Decline. In fact, aside from the fact that the first self-proclaimed Witch Queen, Eleonora Mare, happened to be surviving [[Astral|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_sacred_astral"]] and incidentally the owner of [[Athena Medical INC|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_athena"]], there was no connection to the ancient order - Eleonora took on the surname Namaz to cement her authority in the 22nd millennium.<br><br>\n\n<div class='HUD_CodexTallImage HUD_CodexImage_Left'><<print "[img[" + $codex.imagePath + "codex_coven_eleonora.png]]">></div>Records de-classified in the New Era revealed that Namaz had become bored with corporate life and had sought to create a cult which worshiped her for purely egotistical reasons. None too subtly encouraged by a foreign agent, Namaz adopted a matriarchal structure and worship of the [[pantheon of witchcraft|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "rev_codex_pseudopantheon"]], in which Namaz would be seen as the sorceress and center of the cosmos. A [[memnetic demon|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_shadowperson"]] may have been used to coerce Namaz to cause the Cubix Crisis of the 24th millennium, an effort by [[Project CABAL|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cabal"]] to destabilize the Galactic Core and distract from the formation of the [[Dominion|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_dominion"]].<br><br>\n\nAmid this chaos, the first modern witches's circle had begun to form: Coven Namaz. It recruited dissatisfied women in the [[Corporate Hegemony|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]], particularly on [[Cubix|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_cubix"]], and concerned itself with worship of the [[pantheon|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "rev_codex_pseudopantheon"]]. Sisters of the circle were to worship the sorceress incarnate: Eleonora Namaz - in coven terminology a Witch Queen. Aside from regular orgies and ritualistic [[fleshmelding|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_fmeld"]], the coven did little to terrorize the known galaxy, though it was repeatedly assailed by witch hunters who executed extra-judicial warrants in corporate space. Eventual disagreements between Namaz and her lover Rea Eresi, who was descended from the legendary [[Astral|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_sacred_astral"]] Clelestia Namaz, led to a schism in the Coven and the near-complete extermination by the witch hunter Ahni Tomser.<br><br>\n\n<div class='HUD_CodexTallImage'><<print "[img[" + $codex.imagePath + "codex_witch_hunter.png]]">></div>The violent purge of Coven Namaz sparked controversy in the corporate sector as well as in believer space to the west, as the matter of witchcraft became a point of much contention between corporate east and believer west. Due to increased scrutiny, few witch hunters acted in the centuries to follow and a thousand years of relative peace followed until the Cubix Crisis was instigated by [[Project CABAL|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cabal"]], resulting in the death of Eleonora Namaz at the hands of a killing machine sent by the [[Paladin Order|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_paladin"]]. The disciples of Namaz remained on [[Cubix|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_cubix"]], worshiping one another in absence of a true Queen, while Coven Eresi splintered and dissolved into other witches covens. In the years leading up to the Crusade of Eden, witchcraft crept into many stations and [[Hegemony|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]] subsidiaries, often practiced by wealthy [[business-ladies|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_blord"]] who like Namaz had grown bored of corporate life and wanted pleasure, satisfaction, and most importantly: followers.<br><br>\n\nThe Cubix Crisis led to a proliferation of witchcraft-like cults across the [[Corporate Hegemony|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]] and stern allegations of [[abominable arts|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_abom"]] running amok in corporate structures, though few witches were found or persecuted at the time. The Crusade of Eden, though accelerated by the Cubix Crisis, was fought predominantly for territorial and political reasons. The Covens remained a distant afterthought, occasionally of interest due to their [[fleshmelding|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_fmeld"]] and knowledge of the [[abominable arts|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_abom"]], which were outlawed after the Crusade Accord, but otherwise deemed a negligent threat to society. Witchcraft persisted both within the [[Hegemony|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]] and beyond, often practiced in back rooms and delving into increasingly bizarre rituals and practices, though none generally harmful to outsiders - escaping covenites of the era had often suffered physical and emotional abuse. \n\n<h3>Queen Namaz and the Witch Hunts</h3>\nThis changed in the 27th millennium, when the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]], which was building up forces for the disastrous Lost Crusade, became the target of another [[Project CABAL|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cabal"]] plot to sow discord and instability. Covens across the galaxy, notably the genetic descendants of Namaz, were contacted and subtly encouraged to adopt a radically matriarchal world view which demonized all outsiders who were not subservient to the Matriarch, notably bisexuals, male homosexuals, and transsexuals. The already widespread suspicion of witches and witchcraft became overt hatred as Covens committed acts of vandalism and sabotage, convincing other covens that there was indeed a plot to purge them from galactic society after information leaked by the [[Cybercult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cybercult"]] revealed the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] had begun to classify witches covens as terrorist organizations.<br><br>\n\n<div class='HUD_CodexImage_Left'><<print "[img[" + $codex.imagePath + "codex_witchqueen.png]]">></div>Tensions flared across the galaxy but most notably on [[Scaffold 35|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_sc35"]], where the genetic descendant of Eleonora Namaz, the dreaded Witch Queen Isira Namaz, openly attacked the [[Church of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] with nano-bombs and the [[abominable arts|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_abom"]]. Many other covens took inspiration from Isira and joined in blatant terrorist attacks, both against presumed witch hunters and all others whom were viewed as threats. Although knowledge of the events on [[Scaffold 35|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_sc35"]] had been suppressed by the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]], information leaked out via the [[Cybercult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cybercult"]], and the Witch Hunts entered their most devastating last century. Billions were injured and displaced in addition to the trillions already affected by the Lost Crusade. Galactic civilization had been strained to the breaking point and Isira Namaz, the iconic Queen of Terror, had become the face of all that was wrong in the galaxy - an egocentric and violently psychopathic woman who saw hersellf as the sorceress of a divine [[pantheon|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "rev_codex_pseudopantheon"]], destined to rule the galaxy as Queen of the Covens.<br><br>\n\nIsira's aspirations led nowhere, and after the most violent century the Galactic Core had seen since the Decline, Coven Namaz was purged by the [[Temple of Purity|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_purifier"]], aided by the [[Paladin Order|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_paladin"]] at great cost to the locals. By the time the Witch Hunts had ended, the covens were all but broken. Out of the millions which had once existed, less than a hundred remained, hiding from zealous [[abomination|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_abom"]] hunters and the [[Paladin Order|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_paladin"]], which had committed to complete extermination of the Covens for fear of another crisis instigated by [[Project CABAL|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cabal"]].\n\n<h3>Queens of Apathy and Obscurity</h3>\nBy the 28th millennium, the Witches Covens had faded into obscurity. Most were left to their own devices, struggling against the tide of history that had washed their way of life away, frantically holding on to their self-ascribed genetic destiny and grappling with the injustice which had been inflicted on their kind for widely unknown reasons. A neural imprint of Isira Namaz survived, briefly causing the Corbei Crisis on [[Scaffold 22|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_scaffold22"]]. The incident went all but unnoticed in the galaxy at large as the Great Schism had begun and witches became a distant afterthought.<br><br>\n\nWithin the few remaining covens, extreme social tensions brought on by the Schism led to widespread despair among witches and numerous cases of ritual suicide pacts. What little remains of the covenite way of life was lost in the centuies to come and had disappeared all but entirely by the time the New Era dawned.

The Command Pod was a technology widely used in starship design after the 17th millennium GSY, seeing application throughout the late classic and modern era, and even into the New Era. The purpose of the command pod was to suspend the crew of a ship in semi-statis while retaining enough neural-functionality to allow the occupant to command the ship. It gained popularity after the first [[Luminev drive|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luminev"]] were invented and required crew to be awake more often than had been the case with conventional torth-propulsion. Where previously only periodic station-checks were required except in case of emergency, suddenly the crew had to be awake and attentive for extensive periods of time.<br><br>\n\nEarly command pods evolved out of existing classic-era neural couches, which required frequent crew rotations and could not be filled with suspension fluid. Such proto-pods were suspension tanks built around an existing neural couch; later designs became more elaborate and included ejection provisions. The occupant of a command pod would enter a state of semi-statis and be able to operate for several months before rest or rotation became biologically necessary. Later command pods switched to gas-based preservatives to make entering and exiting the pods easier and often extended the duty-rotation to over a year. Virtually all command pods operated on one of these principles, be they bulky early designs or the modern-era coffin pods.<br><br>\n\nIn most scenarios, the command pod contained little internal logic, merely a neuro-interface to the ship's digital command systems and numerous health-safety mechanisms. In rare cases, manual backups might be installed in the pod, though most designs did not implement such controls. Depending on purpose or use, the command pod would be designed to enhance crew survivability, or simply be a duty station which could not be removed from the vessel. Depending on construction, a command pod could also provide g-force dampening capacity, though many did not. Specifics of command pods were often tied to the ship they were designed to be installed in, and were not interchangable between designs, though some cross-vessel capable pods were manufactured to ease logistical requirements and construction. The limitation of such multipurpose devices was invariably that they could not be tailored to the specifics of a ship, which placed additional burndens on either the crew or the vessel's designer.

Fetish Hybrid\n\n(not imperial origin, though often thought to be; modern creation)

The bedroom told a situational story of it's own: a neatly tucked double bed with white sheets and, on the floor before it, two well used prayer mats. In the corner stood a dressing chair, adjacent, a big walk-in closet with mirrored doors. The other walls had been hung with silken drapes trimmed with looping script and, visible behind the drapes, were digital screens that pretended to look out at a rolling hillside that bloomed with blood-red grass.\n\nEverything in the room screamed strict belief in the traditional values of the [[Red Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] - everything except the box on the bed. That was half open and contained dozens of sex toys. Physical toys, that was, not virtual aids. Plugs and cups of every imaginable shape and size, stuffed beside tubes of lubricant and [[StimFuel|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_stimfuel"]] inhalers. \n\n"So, business." The WATCH YOVR STEP kid hopped on the bed.\n\nSprings creaked. The box of sex toys wobbled. A particularly spiky one toppled out.\n\nThe kid picked it up, scowling. "Say, where ya think you's supposed to stick that, ey?"\n\n"None of my business," Asmodeus said.\n\n"Yeah, sure, but you gotta wonder how--"\n\n"I don't need to wonder. What I need is a contract put out. Quietly."\n\nThe kid held up a hand. "Numbers, gramps. I knows what you shag."\n\n"You do?"\n\nThe kid laughed. "You came sniffing for me, gramps. You figure I just hops on anyone who drops by wearing a pretty shawl?"\n\n"No, I--" Asmodeus shook his head and sat on the dressing chair. After a long moment, he said, "So you know what I want?"\n\n"More or less," the kid said. "Less than more, honest, but I gotta know what you lights first."\n\n"Direct credit line. Guaranteed. Industrial grade. If you know who I am, you probably also know who I work for, so the financial angle is covered. The real question is: can you get me what I need?"\n\n"Depends." The kid tapped at his data-pad and looked up. "Local or remote?"\n\n"Loc--" Amodeus hesitated. "Actually, I don't know. I need to grab data from a corporate system. Not sure where it's hosted. Probably not local though."\n\n"Right, so shipwise. Bloat you an extra ten, that will."\n\n"Ten grand?" That was cheap.\n\nThe kid shook his head. "Big booties. Nine nulls. Fuel, commtech, passes, certs, you name it. Costs light, those do."\n\n"Oh." Asmodeus thought for a moment. "Ten billion seems a bit high. What's the going price?"\n\n"I'm cutting you ten loopies off for style, gramps, so don't argue, ey?"\n\n"Okay, okay," Asmodeus said.\n\n"So you want a shipwise data-grab, industrial grade backung. Who's gonna get unlucky?"\n\n"The [[Hegemony Hedgefond|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]]," Asmo said. "I need data on a transation. Shouldn't be too heavily secured, at least in theory."\n\nThe kid whistled. "You came to us for that? Sure your bozo can't light you that one out?"\n\n"Light out?" \n\n"Buy it, gramps. Damn, you's old."\n\n"Oh. No. We already tried that. Went nowhere."\n\n"So, they suspects you's after them?"\n\nAsmodeus shrugged. "If I knew what the corporates thought, I wouldn't be here, would I?"\n\n"Fair sniff. Right, so." The kid tossed his data pad to Asmodeus. "What you say?"\n\nThe screen displayed a math chart. Summarized in rows were assumed expenses, salaries, and whatnot. Total price: ninety seven billion credits.\n\nAsmodeus breathed a laugh. "And this is with the old guy discount figured in?"\n\n"All in an locked. One time fix, yo."\n\n"I'm tentatively interested." Asmodeus handed the pad back. "But I need to know what ninety seven big is buying me. I need to know specifics."\n\nThe kid shot him a funny look. "You's really asking that, yo?"\n\n"I need an idea or I walk, simple as that."\n\n"No, I mean you're going [[Hedgefond|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]] big. Ain't no cyber on the [[Slide|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_cons_slide"]] will fix that. You wants that kinda service, we has to find team players. Build a band of brothers, y'know? And you comes with the crew. As insurance. Might save ya a big one too. Depending on your skills."\n\nAsmodeus nodded. "Would have come along anyways."\n\n"Yeah," the kid said quietly. "You's run cyber before, ain't you, gramps?"\n\n"No," Asmodeus lied.\n\nThe kid shot him a funny look. "Crawler. Can see it. Way you walks. Too old to be gearhead. Too out-the-loop to be slinky. Not packing enough heat for heavy. Gotta be crawler." He shrugged. "Anyways, I know a crew skulking about for big buy-ins. I'll run it past their circuits. Get back to you in soon as I knows?"\n\n"Right," Asmodeus said. "Message me. You have my profile."\n\nThe kid nodded. "You gets a crypto token. You sees it, and it maths out, you legwork over here to finalize the float. Oh, and those lights? Gonna need half up front. If it floats. Tell your corpo bozo about that, just so she don't have no heart attack or nothing, yo."\n\nAsmo's brow furrowed. "This isn't a corporate job, you know. It's a private--"\n\n"Nah, nah. Deep down, this is cooked in crike, all the way through. You knows it. I knows it. No one's saying it." The kid grinned. "Business as usual, ey?"\n\n"Business as usual." Asmodeus stood.\n\nThe kid did too. "Nice chatting, gramps. And you sure ya don't dig a motor on the way out? Cause, if you don't, Stell be pissed. And my lights be pissed too."\n\nAsmodesus chuckled. "You're worse than a sell-shipper."\n\n"Aye, just saying. Motor does the nerves good."\n\nAsmo flashed a crooked smile. "My nerves are quite fine the way they are, thank you."\n\nTruth be told, his nerves were dead and had been for centuries but that was beside the point. The point was Asmodeus needed out of kiddie-land and back to Madame Corbei, who would almost certainly throw a hissy fit when she heard the price tag, but there was no alternative. No credible black-ops outfit would take a job on the [[Hedgefond|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]]. Going up against the central corporate bank was financial suicide, plain and simple, so there was only one option: the [[Cybercult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cybercult"]].\n\nAsmodeus did not like it. He did not want to work with them. But they were the only ones with the means and motive to crack the [[Hedgefond|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]] so it was them or give up and Asmodeus planned to keep going until he'd completed his life's work.

Later that afternoon, Karl stood at the railing of the terrace and watched the sun creep towards the edge of the great skylights overhead. Long shadows fell on the beaches below and, all along the shore, locals packed up their parasols and picknick baskets. Only at the Lakeside Lagoon, a sandy bay on the far shore, did little laterns flicker on. In their faint glow, androids set out tables and draped them in white cloths. Chairs were brought up and places set with riot-red napkins. Amid the fully automated prepwork, a luminous figurine that vaguely resembled a woman in a veil glowed bright in the mounting gloom.\n\nKarl breathed a laugh. "It isn't even Saint's Day, you fools."\n\n"Say what?" One of the [[gene-hybrids|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_impl_hybrid"]] with kitty ears sidled up.\n\n"The lagoon." Karl pointed. "Sainted decorations aren't supposed to go up until the cycle dawns but, then agian, since has the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] cared about it's traditions?"\n\nThe kitty-girl shrugged. "It just makes sense though, doesn't it?"\n\n"No," Karl said. "It makes no sense."\n\n"But it does. I mean, no one actually wants to eat out on Saint's Day. That's supposed to be about friends and family. So they sells tables for fast break one day before the celebration."\n\nKarl snorted. "That defeats the whole purpose of the Saint's Day fast."\n\n"I don't think so," the kitty said. "Anyways, only [[purists|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_purifier"]] care that much about exact dates. The cardinals said so themselves: it's the spirit of the celebration that matters, not archaic tradition."\n\n"Typical faith," Karl muttered.\n\nThe girl's wide eyes became big as plates. "That's a bad word, you know."\n\nKarl shot her an incredulous look. "Bad?"\n\n"It's derrogatory," she said. "And theophobic."\n\n"Good," Karl said. "No one wants a theocracy. No one sane, that is."\n\n"No but that doesn't mean you can just call people that," she said. "They're people too. They have feelings and thoughts and--"\n\n"Okay, okay," Karl said, regretting he'd even opened his mouth.\n\nThe kitty eyed him. "You aren't one of those idealogues, are you? You know, the ones who hate [[Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]] and think it's good that believers get beat up?"\n\n"No," Karl said. "Though I did work for the [[Division|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]] once, long ago."\n\n"Oh, well, that explains it." She patted him on the shoulder with a pawlike hand.\n\nKarl forced a smile. "I suppose it does, doesn't it?"\n\nThe kitty-girl nodded and, after a long moment, went back to her friends. Karl breathed a sigh of relief and sipped Liq from his plastic cup. \n\nSo the faiths had convinced the new generation that calling them what they were was a sin. Typical faith. Their first resort was always censorship. First the [[recast newtork|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_recast"]] and now socially accepted terms were being carefully curated. Not that the corporate sector was any better, mind you, but Karl resented the faith's aversion to the term faith because, all political stances aside, it was an honest description of those who followed the faith.\n\n"Karlie?" Olga sidled up, a tall [[Al Bashnari|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_albash"]] glass in hand. \n\nKarl smiled tersely. "Yes?"\n\n"Oh, nothing." Olga sipped bright green liquid and offered the glass to Karl.\n\nHe shook his head. "I'll stick with Liq. Someone has to remain sane around here."\n\n"And you think standing here alone is going to keep you sane?"\n\nKarl nodded earnestly. He did believe that.\n\nOlga giggled. "Oh, Karlie. Don't you want to join us?"\n\n"What, and argue about the ideal state of the galaxy?" Karl scoffed. "If I wanted to talk politics, I'd go on the net and start an argument with some idiot who might as well be any of them!" Karl waved to Olga's guests.\n\nShe shot Karl a dubious look. "What's wrong with my friends?"\n\n"They--" Karl swallowed his pride. "Nothing, Olga, but they insist on talking politics all the time."\n\n"And it's enlightening," Olga said. "Scarface was just saying how the Holy Fleet had the right idea: put it's warships in dock and send the crews home. Save costs and redirect funds to the people. You know, help the commoner like the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] promises to."\n\nKarl shot his sister an incredulous look. "You think that money is going into public works?"\n\n"I don't know," Olga said. "But that's what the cardinals promised, right?"\n\n"They lied," Karl said. "It's going into Project 28. Refits and overhauls for the entire Holy Fleet. Or did you actually think the faiths would stand down their war machine?"\n\nOlga shrugged. "It would be nice if they did."\n\n"But they won't," Karl said. "The Holy Fleet is the largest standing fleet in the galaxy and, as long as it exists to enforce [[Church Law|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]], it doesn't matter what happens on a local level. The People's Popes and the Local Councils can complain all they want. Hell, not even the corproates can break the Accords and the corporate sector is the largest economic bloc in the galaxy. The Galactic Core answers to the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] because they can make it answer, plain and simple."\n\n"Yes," Olga said quietly. "You've told me that many times and, every time you do, it sounds a little more like theophobia."\n\nKarl scoffed. "If telling the truth insults the theists, then good. I don't want anything to do with them. Or anyone who sympathiszes with them. At best, the Sestant will concede on theological principles like it did with [[gene-hybrids|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_impl_hybrid"]] and the consumer model. Politically, economically, and teritorally, the faiths will never back down. Ever."\n\n"Oh, Karlie." Olga stroked his arm, a sad look on her face. "Are you sure you don't want to join us for--"\n\n"I'm fine right where I am." Karl sipped Liq and stared out across the artificial lake.\n\nThe sun had vanished, replaced by absolute darkness except where the lanters of the Lakeside Lagoon glowed. In the shadows, robots moved about, clearing trash off the beaches to be recycled and re-used as [[Church Law|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] demanded. It was a good idea in principle but belied a dark truth: only those who could afford to spent a thousand credits on recycling fees could actually enjoy the lake because, like all things faith, equality existed only in the spirit of the law, not in practice.\n\nAnd the lake was only the tip of the iceberg. It was the same in education, space flight, and everything else, forget about a border pass to the east. Yes, the faiths banged on and on about how despicable the consumer capitalist system was and yet, for some reason, they'd implemented a watered down version of that exact system. At least the corporates admitted it up front: the [[Hegemony|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]] only cared about profit and even the Commission regulations existed more to protect profit than employees or employers, which was unfair but the corporates at least admitted it. The faiths flat out lied, insisting that all were equal under [[Church Law|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] and every individual had the same rights, which was simply untrue.\n\nThose with nothinig had nothing, no hope, no prospects, not even a proper education, while those who had the means to indulge did so to their heart's content. Olga's friends were the prime example: a gaggle of lucky louts who had never worried about making ends meet, only what outfit they would wear that day, or which body modification they would splurge on next. Another patch of kitten-like fur, perhaps? Or gem-nails that cost more the average employee earned in a fiscal year? Better yet: enlarged breasts, translucent skin, and a sexual appetite that rivaled that of the [[old gods|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_deadgods"]], which was no exaggeration. The plastic had gotten down and dirty with one of the kitty-girls.\n\nKarl eyed them with contempt, then turned back to the lake and his Liq. Drink and darkness swam in his mind and, for a brief moment, Karl almost wanted to throw himself into the lake. It would have been so simple: over the railing and down in free fall until he reached terminal velocity, just above the water. Except that would have been cowardly and Karl was no coward. He was part of the [[Cybercult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cybercult"]] and, while they'd not managed to achieve information freedom and free access to information for all quite yet, they were getting closer to that goal every day, quite unlike Olga's deluded friends, whose grandiose ideals and nonsensical political systems would never come to be, not even if they'd all become tyrants and tried to implement them by force.

<div class='HUD_CodexTallImage'><<print "[img[" + $codex.imagePath + "codex_galaxy_map.png]]">></div>\n\nThe Cyclus galaxy, also known as the milky way, was a barred spiral galaxy that was inhabited by the human species, which had slowly but steadily colonized their galaxy over some 100'000 galactic standard years. The history and astrography of the galaxy was influenced primarily by early human endeavors and remained significant into the New Era.\n\n<h3>Historic Overview</h3>\n\nThough irreversibly scarred by the brief but devastating inter-stellar wars which were fought in the modern era, the Cyclus galaxy a rich and complex history which began some 100'000 years before the human classic era. The rise of the [[Terran Empire|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_empire"]] as the first pan-galactic human civilization in the late 10th millennium BGS, marking the beginning of the Golden Age of Humanity, saw the Cyclus galaxy shaped by feudalistic system-kingdoms that spawned a legacy which would endure until well into the New Era. The first inhabited region in the Cyclus galaxy was the [[Sol|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_sacred_sol"]] system, the birthplace of the human species, though by the middle-eras of the Golden Age vast swaths of the Northern Mantle had been successfully colonized with the [[Empire|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_empire"]] expanding toward the galactic core. It was for this reason that the Galactic North - north in the home galaxy was defined as the vector between the [[Great Devourer|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "neo_codex_devourer"]] at the center of the Cyclus galaxy and the [[Sol|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_sacred_sol"]] system - was historically more densely settled than the galactic south.<br><br>\n\nThe eventual fall of the [[Terran Empire|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_empire"]] during the Decline in the 16th millennium GSY, which directly resulted in the Galactic Civil War and the Great War, saw the end of imperial civilization but did little to erase the [[Terran|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_empire"]] legacy, remnants of which could be found even into the New Era. The dissolution of the [[Empire|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_empire"]] saw the Cyclus galaxy split along ideological, religious, and traditional lines, with the human modern period becoming the most contested era in all of history, during which no less than seven major and many more minor conflicts were fought between spacefaring civilizations which hoped to gain dominance in their home galaxy.\n\n<h3>Astrographic Definition & Galactic Compass</h3>\n<div class='HUD_CodexTallImage HUD_CodexImage_Left'><<print "[img[" + $codex.imagePath + "codex_galaxy_map _regions.png]]">></div>\nFirst lain out by the [[Terran Empire|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_empire"]] and later universally employed by humanity, the Galactic Compass divided the Cyclus galaxy into six volumetric regions aligned relative to the Galactic North. In the center of the galaxy existed the Core region, centered around the [[Great Devourer|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "neo_codex_devourer"]]. Along the northern axis, between [[Sol|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_sacred_sol"]] and the Core, lay the Northern Mantle. Opposite lay the South Hole, rendered unstable by a FTL accident prior to the Decline and uninhabited ever since. To the East, the Eastern Expanse was historically sparsely settled and unexplored until the fall of the [[Empire|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_empire"]] drove settlers and miners into the unexplored regions. The Westen Wilds had been colonized earlier and remained a significant cultural and historic area throughout the Cyclus galaxy's history - the Wilds were also the site of many conflicts over the millennia. Lastly, these five regions were encompassed by the historically ill-defined the Galactic Fringe.<br><br>\n\nAlthough the precise borders of the galactic regions varied over history, the Cyclus galaxy remained defined by the Galactic Compass, a system which had been established in the classic era and was not changed since. The relatively flat disk of the galaxy made such a simplistic visualization aid practical, though it did not account for vertical alignment and sufficed only for passing familiarity with the galaxy's spatial layout. For more exact calculations, the Galactic Unit or U was used, defined as a variable-distance vector based on a point of origin. Due to it's variable length, all use of U-vectors required two reference vectors: the point of origin relative to the galactic compass and the vector-scale of the Galactic Unit.\n\n/* \n<div class='softtext'><h3>Significant Locations in the Cyclus galaxy:</h3>\n<ul>\n<<for $qq=0; $qq lt $codex.entries.length; $qq++>>\n\t<<if $codex.entries[$qq].inSections.contains("othergalaxy") eq false and $codex.entries[$qq].inCategories.contains("loc") eq true>>\n\t\t<li><<print "<<click '" + $codex.entries[$qq].name + "' 'UI_Codex_Entry'>>\n\t\t\t<<set $hud.currentCodexEntry = '"+ $codex.entries[$qq].id +"'>>\n\t\t\t<</click>>">>\n\t\t</li>\t\t\n\t<<endif>>\n<</for>>\n</ul></div> */

Had Natalia been a proper hostess, she would have offered her guest a glass of wine and ensure he sat comfortably but Natalia did none of this. She simply studied the cybernetic man, who sat opposite her and rubbed his hands like a schoolboy preparing for an indoc exam. Alas, Mr. Markuvius was no boy and his exam would not be of the educational sort. Natalia could tell. She had worked with the Intelligence Corps long enough to know he was cross-referencing data-points and agreeing on a procedure with a remote handler. They must have already agre on a plan because, after less than a second, Markuvius leaned forwards, his elbows rested on his knees, and studied Natalia with all six of his sensors.\n\n"Natalia," he said earnestly. "We have much to discuss and I realize there is not much time. So I must insist you come clean: what the Hades happened out there?"\n\nNatalia's cybernetic brow furrowed. "What happened where?"\n\n"In the Galactic Core," he said. "The Legion deployed with less than a million vessels in all, last I was informed, and now I head you command over a billion warships combined?"\n\nNatalia shifted uneasily.\n\nMarkuvius smiled politely. "Only a question, of course, and may I ask who you have left in interim command?"\n\n"You may," Natalia said and did not elaborate.\n\nThe Strategus scowled at her for a long moment. "Will you also tell me?"\n\n"I would prefer not to," Natalia said. "The walls have ears."\n\nMarkuvius glanced to the curtain, then to Natalia, and back. "You are concerned what Miss Therene might overhear, I presume?"\n\nNatalia nodded, though that was a lie. She was terrified of what Markuvius would say once he learned what had happened.\n\n"I see." Markuvius tapped his fingers on his thigh. "Yes, I suppose these are not the ideal circumstances, but then could you perhaps answer another question?"\n\n"Depends," Natalia said flatly. "What's the question?"\n\n"Oh, nothing drastic. Merely a point of administrative clarification: a volunteer operation was launched on Semini C. One squad, I believe, send to penetrate deep into the desert and then, well, then there seems to have been a synchronization error. The mission report was truncated prematurely."\n\nNatalia shrugged. "Semini C was deep in the occupied Colonial Belt, right?"\n\n"Correct," Markuvius said. "One of the first colonial worlds the Holy Fleet blockaded." His brow furrowed. "I thought you, as a colonial and the commander of the Legion, would know this."\n\n"Wish I did, Sir, but I was born on Al Habe. That's way up in the Mantle."\n\n"Ah, yes, but you are aware there were operations conducted on Semini C, were you not?"\n\nNatalia nodded. "I saw the formwork. Passed it all on as way."\n\n"So the mission report that was truncated, you are aware what it said?"\n\n"More or less," Natalia said.\n\nMarkuvius's expression brightened. "Then you can fill the data-gap, yes?"\n\n"Maybe. All I know is they went into the desert, met resistance, and exfiltrated once the mission was completed. I was told the mission was a resounding success."\n\n"Excellent. And what, precisely, was the mission?"\n\nNatalia bit her lip, uncomfortably aware of what the false icon had said: <i>I warned you about this, girl. I told you what men are like.</i> \n\nMarkuvius leaned closer. "You cannot say because you do not know? Or--"\n\n"No idea," Natalia said a little to fast. "I only saw the report."\n\n"Strange. I was led to believe you had briefed the mission team in person but, evidently, the record was mistaken. A copy and paste error, perhaps?"\n\nNatalia shrugged. "Happens from time to time, especially in the rush. Mean, the Legion doesn't have an entire corps of contractors to help us keep up with the formwork."\n\n"Obviously, yes, and yet--" Markuvius tapped his fingers on his thigh.\n\nNatalia looked away. If she did not see it, it was not there. Childish logic but that logic kept her sane. Barely.\n\nMarkuvius exhaled an artificial sigh. "Such a strenuous situation, is it not? First this unexpected outpouring of support in the west, then all these uncertainties about the future." He smiled sadly. "I do apologize for barging in like this, Natalia, but I am afraid the security state cannot afford to make mistakes. There is so much at stake, is there not?"\n\n"At stake?" Natalia did not like the sound of that.\n\n"In the galaxy," Markuvius said. "The peace process is underway, I hear, and the Volunteer Legion remains afar. Surely this is not a tenable position to maintain for any significant time, especially for the soldiers who are so far from home."\n\nNatalia nodded ever so slightly. She did not dare say or do more.\n\n"Terrible, truly terrible." Markuvius sat back, rubbing his hands. "So, let me be forthright, Natalia: I am concerned. The Council is concerned. We have agreed that we must understand the situation and, for that to be possible, I must know what you know."\n\n"What I know?" Natalia laughed. "But I've submitted everything I know--"\n\n"Please, please." Markuvius held up a hand. "Let me finish."\n\nNatalia swallowed. She had thought he was finished.\n\nMarkuvius leered a cybernetic grin. "As I was saying: I must know what you know. Naturally, this is not the place for such a discussion. A secure location has been selected and thus the question becomes in what manner you wish to be transported there. By which I mean: will you come willingly? Or must force be applied?"\n\n"Sir?" Natalia was genuinely surprised.\n\n"I do not know how I could be more clear," he said.\n\nNatalia grimaced. "I can't give you want you want, Sir."\n\n"Is that so?"\n\nNatalia nodded. She knew better than to trust the man who held the noose around her neck.\n\n"I see." Markuvius stood with a mechanical whirr. "Forgive me but, for your protection, I must insist you be moved to more secure quarters. I do apologize for the inconvenience but there is no alternative, I am afraid." He nodded curtly and stepped off the terrace.\n\nInside, in the dining room, stood two State Bureau men in brown uniforms and, towering behind them, was a Home Reserve trooper in a dated suit of EXA-27-I exonetics armor with bulky pauldrons and a riot gun gripped tight in mechanical fingers. The scene told Natalia everything she needed to know and, for a brief instant, she considered running. One quick leap and she'd be over the railing, skidding down into the fishbowl-shaped observation bulb, and then what? Where would she go? Where would she hide?\n\nA rethorical question - no one crossed the security state and walked away, not even Natalia Nyarre, the Lioness who had stood up when the Coward's State had stood back and stepped aside while the enemy invaded one sovreign state after another. Everyone lauded her deeds, of course, and no one more so than the ecumeni who lived in luxury, orbiting high above the beautiful gardens of Novo Terra. But they would not actually risk their necks if it meant defying Strategum Council, not even for a true hero.\n\n"Nix me." Natalia stood, resigned to her fate, and held out her wrists for the Bureau men.

Later that cycle, after FliCon Ludan had briefed everyone on the situation and informed Strike Wing Lazarus that they were on stand-by alert until further notice, Roien lay snuggled in his bunk-bag and read his favorite book: Dear Brother. He'd read it a hundred times in the past years and, sometimes, he read it to Limms so they could laugh about the absurdity.\n\nStringing up mono-fiber nets between asteroids to slice ships in two? Only a comedian could think of such a nonsense but, sometimes, quite often in fact, black comedy was exactly what Roien needed. The last months had been too serious - deadly serious at that. A little laughter never hurt.\n\nRoien flipped ahead to the good part. "Hey, Limms. Want a laugh?""\n\nFlight-Commander Limms grunted.\n\nRoien scowled. "That yes or no?"\n\nLimms grunted again.\n\n"Fair enough." Roien tucked the data-pad on into his gear. "Any word on the stand-by?"\n\n"Next cycle."\n\nRoien's brow furrowed. Limms had been in a foul mood for weeks. Ever since their last flight, in fact. Nothing important had happened, least not that Roien had noticed, but Limms had been bitter from the moment they'd returned to base.\n\nOn second thought, maybe that wasn't unusual. No one aboard the Immortal was happy, not after the last nine months. It had started to get to Roien too. So much loss. So much death, destruction, and the sudden silences as a stick took a fatal hit. \n\nSometimes it was a killer, sometimes a guider, and sometimes micro-debris the RADAR had missed. However it happened, death always came quick in dead space.\n\n"Y'know," Roien said. "The next one might be us. Smack into a killer."\n\nLimms snorted. "No. It can't."\n\n"Yes it can. I mean: it could be."\n\n"No."\n\n"Why not?"\n\n"War's over," Limms growled. "I'm depressed."\n\n"Cheer up. FliCon will sent us out at least once more before they make it official."\n\n"Yeah," the old pilot said. "And we're going out into enemy space."\n\n"What, we're invading?" Roien laughed. "Come on. The Long War strategum doesn't call for invasion. Can't be doen anyways. Can't sustain combat operations in the Core."\n\n"Says you," Limms said.\n\n"Says the Strategum Council and the War Academy," Roien said. "It's logistical fact. Not up for debate."\n\n"Yeah but think about it: we held the salient. This is our chance to show force. Poke and prod. Remind the core-dwellers who's boss."\n\n"Oh." Roien thought for a long moment. "You really think the Council would risk proviking another war?"\n\n"They would. Now go to sleep." Limms rolled over.\n\nRoien lay in his bag and stared at the ceiling. Sleep did not come. Too many thoughts clouded his mind, all of them dark, all of them about war. \n\nWar. It had become Roien's life, his reason to rise in the morning and tuck himself in at night, and now it was over. Just like that.\n\nNo more strikes. No more missions. None of that, at least not for a while. Wartime politics would give way to a new age of cease-fires and renewed border disputes. People would still die, obviously, but the big war? The one Roien had once dreamed of and now wished had never happened? That was over, especially for him.\n\nThe Corps would not let him serve another tour, not on this service cycle. He was six missions over allotment and Limms had a hundred over reg-max. As soon as the ceasefire was made official, they'd be sent to the rear to train new pilots - or to be discharged and sent home.\n\nHome. Roien didn't know where that was anymore, not since [[Tyra Station|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_terra"]] had been blasted apart by the believers and [[Sol|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_sacred_sol"]] had been declared a memorial star, if only because there was no way to rebuild the system with the enemy sitting on the doorstep, in the occupied Mantle.\n\nOr at least that was how things had been last Roien had checked. The galaxy had changed since. The enemy had retreated south and, according to some, only a lone cruiser squadron and a handful of automated sensors stations remained north of the Colonial Belt. But did that matter? Would [[Sol|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_sacred_sol"]] be reclaimed and rebuilt after what had happened there? And, even if it was, did Roien want to return there, to a system which had been shot up, blasted apart, and spat out dead?\n\nGo to sleep Limms had said. Roien figured he might as well try, if only because his waking thoughts brought no peace.

\t<<set $chapter = {\n\t\tname: "A Pale Shadow",\n\t\tscenes: 7,\n\t}>>\n\t<<set $story.chapters.push($chapter)>>\n\n\t<<set $chapter = {\n\t\tname: "Black Box",\n\t\tscenes: 8,\n\t}>>\n\t<<set $story.chapters.push($chapter)>>\n\n\t<<set $chapter = {\n\t\tname: "Wish upon a Star",\n\t\tscenes: 7,\n\t}>>\n\t<<set $story.chapters.push($chapter)>>\n\n\t<<set $chapter = {\n\t\tname: "Conflict of Interests",\n\t\tscenes: 8,\n\t}>>\n\t<<set $story.chapters.push($chapter)>>\n\n\t<<set $chapter = {\n\t\tname: "His Last Command",\n\t\tscenes: 7,\n\t\tedited: 7\n\t}>>\n\t<<set $story.chapters.push($chapter)>>\n\n\t<<set $chapter = {\n\t\tname: "A New Perspective",\n\t\tscenes: 7,\n\t}>>\n\t<<set $story.chapters.push($chapter)>>\n\n\t<<set $chapter = {\n\t\tname: "Hail Tyrannia",\n\t\tscenes: 7,\n\t\tedited: 7\n\t}>>\n\t<<set $story.chapters.push($chapter)>>\n\n\t<<set $chapter = {\n\t\tname: "Great Aspirations",\n\t\tscenes: 7,\n\t}>>\n\t<<set $story.chapters.push($chapter)>>\n\n\t<<set $chapter = {\n\t\tname: "A Parting Gift",\n\t\tscenes: 7,\n\t}>>\n\t<<set $story.chapters.push($chapter)>>

The Electro-type Sub-Frigate was a two hundred and fifty meter long sublight patrol and interdiction template developed by the [[Terran Empire|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_empire"]] for use by colonial worlds administered by [[Coloina Galactica|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_authority"]]. The original template was widely distributed across the galaxy in so many variants that to refer to the Electro-type as a class would be in error as well over ten thousand regional variants existed in the late classic and early modern era, before the design was finally standardized by the [[Colonial Corps|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_corps"]] almost twenty thousand years after the first Electro was launched. The Electro frame was built for the purposes of sublight Zone Control and in system vector policing via thermal threat. Secondarily, the vessel served as an interceptor and could be used for remote inspections, emergency salvage, and rescue operations. During the imperial era, the Electro type was the most common Zone Control craft in existence and original frames were used well into the modern era.\n\n<h3>Template Standard</h3>\nThe original Template type, replicated to all colonial worlds early in the Age of Standardization, described a high performance sublight frigate with exceptionally light armement, the fear at the time being that colonial insurgents might use the small craft as a weapon - this eventually occurred during the Galactic Civil War. The original Electro relied primarily on bomb-pumped lasers carried by smart drones - maximum complement: 8 - to create thermal threat and, secondarily, could use a small chemical turret to fire dumb projectiles on intercept courses. The Electro carried an extensive LIDAR and RADAR sensor suite alongside optical units and telescopes designed to track the many objects expected to maneuver in colonial vectorspace. To better intercept incoming craft well beyond danger rings, the Electro was powered by an Template I6-F engine capable of sustained burns for several years and sufficient supplies for an operational duration of one to three years, depending on crew complement - minimal was three crew members, though most Electros carried ten or more.<br><br>\n\nAlthough the original craft was highly automated, a large crew was preferred in case serach and rescue, salvage, or inspection duties had to be performed. Virtually all Electros carried additional salvage and utility equipment in their cargo bays and the vast majority of the vessel was dominated by a centerline fuel tank. The extreme thermal exhaust created by it's engine necessitated large radiators that could not be collapsed. The large profile and poor carrying capacity made the Electro ill suited for combat operations, an issue quickly realized during the Galactic Civil War, where rebellious colonies and systems often attempted to use Electro class vessels against the [[Grand Fleet of Humanity|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_impfleet"]]. In this role, the Electro fared abysmally and was soon outclassed by even the simplest purpose-built strike craft of the Great War.<br><br>\n\nIt's drone complement was best suited for use against radiators or thin hulls, using thermal threat to police vessels. In cases where thermal threat alone could not force the target to cease maneuvers, the poor armament of the vessel left the Electro all but unable to retaliate and it's relatively compact design made it less agile than purpose built ship destroyers. Almost a third of the vessel was comprised of the drive cone stabilization fins and the entire centerline skeleton was filled by the drive and fuel tanks. Having never been designed as a combat vessel, this was expected, Much of the Electro's available payload mass was dedicated to utility equipment, fuel, medical facilities, salvage robotics, sensors equipment and computer banks. By the Dark Ages, the Electro had been superceded in many systems by the [[Plex patrol frigate|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cruiser"]], a cheaper and more adaptible platform that performed better in the post-luminal age. None the less, the original Electro was used throughout the modern era, often by systems which simply had no other suitable Zone Patrol platform available.\n\n<h3>Colonial Corps Rebuild</h3>\n<div class=''><<print "[img[" + $codex.imagePath + "codex_colonial_frigate_new.png]]">></div>When the [[Colonial Corps|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_corps"]] was founded in the 26th millennium, the Electro type was radically re-designed and modernized to defend remaining colonial territories, all of which needed a cheap and performant defense frigate in addition to Zone Control craft. The original skeleton was stripped of paneling, reinforced to withstand higher acceleration, and re-equipped for more modern weapons systems. Notably the [[Colonial Corps|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_corps"]] Electro build moved away from bomb pumped lasers to police vessels and instead loaded the racks with smaller general purpose smart missiles. This increased missile payload was augmented with a [[farbound array|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_farbound"]] for superluminal target tracking and an electronic warfare suite that included a microwave beam that replaced the bomb pumped laser drones of earlier eras as the primary threat-weapon.<br><br>\n\nNot only was the Electro-C considerably more performant than the original frigate but it could, with creative use of it's missile armament and smaller but more performant main drive, function as a high velocity interceptor. The ship was also slimmed down slightly and the radiators moved to be less vulnerable. The chemical turret, while ill suited for fleet scale combat operations and wildly outperformed by even the simplest railgun, was retained to provide supportive and defensive fire. Perhaps most importantly: the Electro-C could be equipped with a [[Luminev drive|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luminev"]], making it a passable fleet defense frigate, though doing so required a larger engine module to be installed - one in four [[Colonial Corps|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_corps"]] Electros was superluminal capable and intended for fleet defense and inter-stellar patrols. Additional modernization was done to the command systems, more advanced robotics were installed, the payload bays were made external so larger containers could be carried, and the crew was reduced to three in all standard deployment scenarios.<br><br>\n\nIn [[Colonial Corps|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_corps"]] service, the Electro became an excellent cost-effective police and light military patrol vessel. Quite unlike earlier Electros of the [[Terran Empire|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_empire"]], the new colonial design was intended primarily for military use, with all vessels put directly under the command of the Orbital Defense Division. This change was a break from tradition, which had been to issue Electro's to civilian Local Control stations which sat ill with many colonials but was legally required as the updated Electro-C carried a suite of MilSpec weapons. The superluminal variant in particular proved an passable light weapons platform during the Bread Basket war, where shortages of [[Thermo-class assault ships|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_aship"]] saw Electro-C vessels pressed into front line combat duty in large numbers simply because no other vessels existed. It never excelled in combat, the core template being too old and insufficiently refined to compete with more modern, purpose-built ship destroyers. The value of the Electro was it's versatility, allowing a single platform to serve in multiple roles in accordance with the Orbital Defense Division's small-fleet doctrine.\n\n\n\n\n

The E5 Power Armor was a non-cybernetic powered exoskeleton developed for marines of the [[Colonial Corps|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_corps"]] Ground Operations Division in the late 26th millennium. Unlike most combat suits, the E5 had no neural or cybernetic interface - in fact the E5 performed worse when used with augmentative cybernetics - and relied on micro-hydraulo-sevros tied to a soft-brain scanner and pressure points which detected the wearer's motions and translated these into movement commands for the powered exoskeleton. Due to absence of a neural system, the E5 presented all data to the wearer on it's HUD or via the arm-computer, which could be detached for ease of use.<br><br>\n\nLimited mental patterns could be read by the helmet unit, allowing limited no-handed use and muscle-memory enhancement, but for all complex interactions the arm computer or backup interface in the face plate was used. Due to this design, the face plate did not contain any optics and was a thin ballistics plate which protected a seal-to-face digital unit and several display screens. IR and luminal optics were, unlike many other designs, attached to the top of the helmet and could look over the shoulder plate even when in profile. Absence of delicate optics allowed the face plate to be detached and clipped to the chest hook at a slanted angle, creating a heads-down display for when full enclosure was not desired or impractical. The face plate also contained a rebreather which linked to the back-mounted O2 tank, though it's lifetime was short - two weeks at most - and the recycler was used if at all possible.<br><br>\n\nAt this point it bears to briefly mention E5 mask art, a practice partially encouraged by the [[Colonial Corps|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_corps"]] to aid in identification of marines and encourage bonding. Marine regulations specified that mask art had to be in the shape of a face or head, and had to be stencil-sprayed in regulation-grey or off-white, yet the designs were freely chosen and company styles and regional difference quickly developed. The core colonial worlds were known for upbeat designs; [[Al Bashnar|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_albash"]] begame famous for tongues sticking out, for example, and Colonia Capitol often used symmetrical, beaming smiles. Farther west, toward the Wilds, fanged or demonic faces inspired by pirate-art were more common. Closer the Mantle and Eastern Expanse, historic attrition rates against the [[Dominion Fleet|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_dominion"]] led to morbid faces and skulls being the preferred art style. Farther south, in the Colonial Belt, marines often adopted hard edges and angular geometrics to set them apart from believers, who associated roundness with the sanctity of the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]]. Not all marines painted their masks, of course, but many did as an expression of individualism, often the only one allowed in the Ground Operations Division.<br><br> \n\nThe entire suit, which weighed almost one ton unloaded and far more when fully geared up, was powered by three rechargable batteries beneath the back plate and had a maximum endurance of six months without recharging. Spare battery cells were often carried on long operations. Although the E5 was dedigned for full-duty wear, only hooked up to charge while the marine slept in safe conditions, it had no provisions to inject food and water except a small feed-tube filled from a sealed bladder under the main-hand shoulder pad and could not recycle urine of refuse, though it was ejected. This made the E5 ill suited for long operations without support, though the [[Colonial Corps|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_corps"]] rarely deployed marines without intent to support within three weeks. The E5 was also low-to-no atmosphere rated. Back and leg-boosters could be installed for use in zero gravity, and for limited jump-jet functionality, but the sheer mass of the E5 made it ill suited for anything but short operations of such sorts.<br><br>\n\nThe large mass did however make the E5 an ideal firing platform for the [[Razorback Raptor|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_raptor"]], which all [[Colonial Corps|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_corps"]] marines were issued with. To aid in the rifle's use, the E5 was designed with a number of pre-programmed targeting and quick-action functions. Many marines coded additional functions such as the trench-reload (depicted), used whe the barrel of the [[Razorback Raptor|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_raptor"]] was pressed against the lip of a trench or firing slit to compensate for recoil, allowing a trained shooter to fire fifty aimed shots per minute. Other common pre-programmed grips and functions included zero-g motion assists, underhand and one-handed shooting for use in confined spaces, speed-reloads in standard and other rifle grip, and profile-maintaining limiters, a stance in which the off arm and shoulder plate were kept toward the enemy to provide additional armor for the chest and head.<br><br>\n\nIn addition to the standard-issue [[Razorback Raptor|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_raptor"]] and over-webbing with space for eight spare magazines, many marines also carried backup coilarms, spare munitions strapped to the leg plates, patching materials, multi-toolsets, chemical and physical trenching tools, ion cutters, chemical and electric grenades, mortar rounds and inductive mortars, and the Marine Backpack, which could be strapped to the backplate of the E5. The load-bearing capacity of the E5 exceeded that of most powered and semi-powered suits of the era, excepting exonetics. The E5 unit also allowed a networked or hard-link interface to the [[T9 Drone Tank|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_dronetank"]], allowing for marines to directly request localized fire support and advance in concert with the autonomous vehicle. Overall, the [[Colonial Corps|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_corps"]] marine tended to travel heavy, though the E5 was only ever considered medium armor due to it's limited ballistic blunting ability. The suit did offer full-spectrum radiological, biological, electronic, and ablative protection but it's ballistic qualities were poor to nonexistant, rated only to survive hits from coilarms at range and protect against shrapnel. Close-range hits, in particular direct hits or near misses from any railarm, were invariably fatal to the wearer and rendered the suit beyond recovery.<br><br>\n\nDespite these issues, the poor battery lifetime, and inability to recycle refuse and urine, the E5 Power Armor was well liked by marines of the Ground Operations Division and, far more than any other combat suit in the galaxy, became known for it's ability to operate almost indefinitely, in any condition. This was not primarily due to the suit's excellent design, though it was rugged and the mechanics were well above average, but the extensive training [[Colonial Corps|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_corps"]] marines recieved in operating, maintaining, and improvizing solutions to the E5 suit. A trained Ground Operations Division company could, even when cut off from anticipated support, continue to operate for several years, especially in colonial territories, which the Ground Operations Division trained and familiarized for extensivey. In particularly long engagements, notably during the Bread Basket War, marines were known to keep their E5s operational for almost half a century after support became impossible, using spare parts and jury-rigged solutions to patch up the suit and restore limited functionality.<br><br>\n

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<<nobr>>\n\tThe Lavandri Corporation was a pan-galactic and subsidiary of the [[Corporate Hegemony|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]] which hosted and [[recasted|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_recast"]] regular bloodsports deathmatches. It was best known for the Lavandri Cube Cup, played on [[Cubix|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_cubix"]], which became a galactic sensation and fan favorite as of the 28th millennium. On most [[recast networks|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_recast"]] across the galaxy, 8th cycle was reserved as lavandri hour and recent matches were streamed (albeit not live - transmission time depended on distance from where the match was played) all across the civilized galaxy and beyond. Despite it's prominence and market-dominance ain the modern era, Lavandri was not historically the premier bloodsports host, or even well known in the galaxy, before the 28th millennium. The company's history was one which demands to be examined in more detail, which this article will do.<br><br>\n\n\tFounded in 22051 by Linus Lavandri, the company was initially a dueling-sportsmanship center on [[Cubix|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_cubix"]], founded to train and entertain the recent influx of former [[Barons|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tlord"]] who had joined the [[Corporate Hegemony|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]]. Matches at the time were non-lethal, played for sport, and equipment prohibitively expensive for anyone beneath the upper business-class. The Lavandri Ring would retain this character throughout the 23th millennium, though the monthly matches gained some interest on [[Cubix|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_cubix"]] and Lavandri considered possibilities of gaining a broader audience, possibly the entire Galactic Core. Attempts and investments, often made with aid of the [[Barons|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tlord"]] and [[business-lords|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_blord"]], were made in the [[recast network|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_recast"]]. Nothing came of it. The technology was too slow and, at the time, Lavandry hard-copied some of it's fights to be sent to curious parties on other stations, albeit at prohibitive cost.<br><br>\n\n\tThe paradigm shift began in the mid-24th millennium, when during a Lavandri Duel, one combatant was accidentally killed. No fault was placed on anyone involved but the Lavandri Board of the day saw a market potential. The "death fight" had become their most profitable one yet and thousands of copies of the fight were made and sent to interested parties. In volume, Lavandri noticed, shipping copies of a fight around the galaxy wasn't nearly as expensive, and if volume could be achieved, they might achieve market saturation. An experiment named the Lavandri Cube Cup was launched, at the time subtitled Fight to the Death!, and six contestants - one of them sponsored by Lavandri - participated in a blood bath in the dueling arena. The fight achieved little publicity until, having heard of the event, the [[Church of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] boycotted the Lavandri Corporation. Affiliated dueling rings on the edge of [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] space, notably at [[Roke's Slide|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_cons_slide"]] were closed. Protest marches were held all across the Galactic Core. Viewership - when recordings of the fights finally arrived, which was many decades after the outrage had begun - skyrocketed to two percent of the Core population.<br><br>\n\n\tOver the course of the 24th and 25th millennium, the Lavandri Deathmatch began to evolve as an annual event, hosted on [[Cubix|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_cubix"]], following strict rules, tiers, and entry requirements. Viewership remained constant. Lavandri stayed above water, making a slight profit, but never achieving any breakout success. In the hopes of gaining more participants, in the mid 26th millennium, requirements and rules were loosened and, as coincidence would have it, corporate mercenaries returning from the Bread Basket War took interest. Before long, the Lavandri Cube Cup was booked. Lavandri still held barely any claim on income. The idea of betting on fights, which had evolved unofficially for centuries, was considered and the "vote-to-wash-out" system was introduced, in which viewers - initially only on [[Cubix|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_cubix"]] - could bet on the loser and, if they bet on all the losers of a given match-bracket, gained a payout based on what their teams had won. Simultaneously, votes began to count as points for the opposing team to earn if they massacred the higher voted party, or to be lost if their team wiped out, creating the arena dynamic Lavandri was known for. The system, as later admitted, was deliberately designed to be obtuse so that viewers would vote inconsistenly, a pattern that could be observed throughout the modern era. At the same time, Lavandri Arenas were being built on many stations and habitation platforms, and without fail the [[Church of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] protested, at times violently - just as many arenas were started as were shut down by fanatical protest.<br><br>\n\n\tBy the turn of the 27th millennium, [[recast|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_recast"]] technology had improved and Lavandri, having finally figured out how to "live" stream it's events - they were never live but viewers hardly cared - started streaming it's events all across the Galactic Core. The first broadcast Cube Cup instantly crashed the [[recast network|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_recast"]]. Citizens, employees, believers, and non-believers had tuned in at almost twenty percent viewership rate for the first "Live Galactic Deathmatch!", overloading the parallel-banding of the network. Every news station mentioned the event that had crashed the net. Corporations complained. The [[Church of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] protested. Viewership exploded and market shares skyrocketed. Lavandri hour was introduced to stop the network from crashing at peaks. Betting was introduced for distant worlds, though Lavandri accounts were required to prevent cheating, and elaborate safeguards were put in place to ensure Lavandri never lost credit rating. Hated and protested by the [[Church of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]], but loved by the galactic commoner who had never seen war, death of bloodshed, Lavandri Deathmatch had become a galactic sensation and Bloodsports Today was founded by Lavandri to commentate, discuss, and hype up the great media spectacle they had created, albeit more by luck than anything else.<br><br>\n\n\tThroughout the 27th millennium, and well beyond, Lavandri Deathmatch became ever more popular and, by the New Era, viewership rates reached almost thirty percent across the Galactic Core and beyond. Matches became tenser, faster, and the incubent system was introduced in which - for each bracket - one team had to submit a solo challenger to the last local, regional, or galactic champion who earned double points and wasn't matched at "random" like other teams were. Lesser leagues were established to compete for the major league, the Cube Cup being the goal, and the championship always held by a Lavandri contestant; the matches were statistically rigged. Bars for entry were lowered, Lavandri commitment to disfavored teams, and funds from viewer-bets were funneled into the winning contestants. Lavandri dynasties and fan-favorites began to coalesce within decades. Realizing their powerlessness to stop the Lavandri wave, the [[Church of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] finally eased it's regulations and permitted tournamets - albeit under stricter rules - in their territory. By the late 27th millennium, there wasn't a single habitation platform or world in the civilized galaxy which didn't watch Lavandri. Many worlds and hab-stations had even implemented their own local leagues for entry into the Cube Cup.<br><br>\n\n\t<div class='HUD_CodexTallImage'><<print "[img[" + $codex.imagePath + "codex_lith.png]]">></div>Despite it's success, Lavandri would be plagued by issues, notably those caused by upstart teams which gained ground faster than the host corporation hoped. The [[Cybercult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cybercult"]] sponsored a team that, in 27511 almost beat the tournament and had to be fouled out on a technicality. Several hundred years later, the [[Sons of Kobol|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_kobol"]] almost beat the Lavandri incumbent. Last but not least, the Blackthorn-sponsored team Project Incubus - known to have been co-opted by the [[Cabal|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cabal"]] - played Lith the Artist, by far the most (in)famous Lavandri contestant to ever have played. Famed for her blatantly sexual violence, disaffected and mocking personality, and sadistically cruel kill-streaks. The absolute top fan favorite of all time, Lith the Artist would score a gore-streaked winning spree that lasted the Cube Cup Final, in which only narrowly lost; recording analysis showed had she fired as little as a quarter second earlier, the Cube Cup would have gone to Project Incubus and Lanvandri would have gone bankrupt on the spot.<br><br>\n\nLavandri would weather these financial insecurities with increasing worry, it's management fearful that one day a contestant would indeed beat one of their incumbent cash-cow champions, and uncertain what would occcur when this did indeed occur. Finally in 28310 when a team of former [[Golden Legionnaires|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cons_codex_legion"]] joined the deathmatch and blasted a winning streak with such overwhelming skill and brutality that the Golden Club Cup was founded for contestants who sought a challenge not even the Lavandri Cube Cup could offer. Until the advent of the New War, when the Cup was dissolved, the regular and Golden Cup were played in tandem alongside the Cube Cup, with cross-bets allowed between both. Lavandri remained the premier bloodsports media spectable in the home galaxy until it's eventual dissolution. It's viewership rate as of the New Era had reached 37%, and it's services were expanded into [[Dominion|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_dominion"]] space, albeit with less success than in the Galactic Core. The corporation ultimately failed when the New War plunged the home galaxy into conflict with the extragalactic threat.\n\n<</nobr>>

Three days later, Asmodeus stared up at the little screen and pondered his life to come. The old days were over and, like Commodore Blaire, Asmodeus had begun to rot on the inside. Just not quite the same way that sick psychopomp had. Asmo had stayed off the stick and stuck himself in others instead. Sex-spheres and chem-girls had kept him company for countless centuries but, as the disease had spread, his skin had slowly begun to rot. The spot beside his balls itched more than usual.\n\nAsmodeus scratched, painfully aware that the [[black plague|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_bblood"]] had it's hooks in him now, and now, they was in, they would never come out. All Asmo had to look forward to was a slow and inevitable decline as his cells rotted away. One hundred percent fataility rate - on a long enough time scale. In the immediate, he'd simply have to contend himself with a sexless, joyless, pleasureless existence. \n\n"Mighty pity," he muttered.\n\nCaptain Lanae looked over from where she lay on the captain's couch. "What is?"\n\nAsmodeus's lips curled. "That you didn't want to take up on the cuddles. But never mind." He pointed to the screen. "Coming up."\n\nThe cutter was within meter-measure of Research Tube 981, inching towards toward the tubular structure one thrust-adjust at a time. The exterior hull looked undamanged. The radiators and the reactor shield intact. Same with the airlock: fully function. Four nav-lights blinked around the mating mechanism.\n\n"So not conventional warfare." Asmodeus grabbed his bag. \n\nInside, alongside a dozen normal implements and specialist tools, was a matte-black [[smart-zipper|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_zipgun"]]. The gun came in ten pieces which Asmodeus snapped together. Barrel seated tight. Slide locked in. Magazine in the slot. Asmodeus wrapped his fingers around the grip. The handgun's internal safety clicked off.\n\nCaptain Lanae eyed the gun. "Mighty big hand-popper, ey?"\n\n"Size matters in my line of work." Asmodeus tucked the gun in his belt and pushed out of the comm-bunk. \n\nHe bumped into the Cutter-Captain.\n\n"Don't mind me." She crawled into the navigation tube. "Just gonna do exactly what you said, Mr. mysterious corporate guy, Sir: take you in and back off. Wait for your signal."\n\n"Twenty standard hours, maximum," Asmodeus said. "If you don't hear from me, don't come looking for me. Head straight back to the smuggler route and report to Corporate. Tell them what happened. You'll find the second payment in this." He pushed his bag over to the Captain.\n\n"Aye." Lenae banged around in the nav-tube. "So you were kidding, ey? You does work for Corporate."\n\n"If you prefer that version."\n\n"Aww, just fess up, Mr. mysterious corporate guy, Sir. I ain't judging where the paychecks come from."\n\n"Maybe another time." Asmo flipped upside-down, aligned with the exit hatch.\n\nNot a full airlock, more a standard hatch at the end of a corridor directly beside the nav-tube. Manual operation. Levers and dials. Only baseline digital assists. \n\nThe manufacturer could easily have put down five more credits for a digital touch-panel in the airlock but the [[Corporate Hegemony|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]] worked in economises of scale and, when mass produced in the trillions, those five credits added up quick. Better for the economy to install a manual system and stick the hatch in a tube identical to the one which contained the navigation electronics, a design decision which forced the Captain to lay in the nav-tube with her ass sticking out.\n\nHer voice called, "Coming up on the lock-dock now. Final adjust."\n\nManeuvering jets fired. Asmo grabbed a hand-bar for support. Through the emergency viewport, he could see the Research Tube 981 drifting closer. The airlock was almost aligned. Around it, the nav-lights blinked nearer and nearer, until they disappeared from view.\n\nCrunch-cushions squeaked. The cutter groaned. Bolts slammed home with a clang.\n\n"Locked," Lanae said. "Remote seal is good. No security protols. Ready whenever you are, Mr. mysterious corporate guy, Sir."\n\nAsmo slapped the cutter-captain on the ass. "Hit it."\n\n"Nasty." A manual switch clicked.\n\nThe airlock squeaked. Oxygen hissed as pressure equalized. The cutter's skeleton groaned. Above the hatch, the indicator went green.\n\n"Think about me from time to time." Asmo pulled the manual hatch-release.\n\nThe pressure door swung inwards to reveal a dim zero-g tube lined by hand and foot-holds. The glow panels were off.\n\n"Curious." Asmo grabbed his hand-light and looked back. "Remeber: twenty standard hours."\n\n"I heard you, Mr. mysterious corporate guy, Sir. Now go off an do your thing then, ey?"\n\n"Aye." Asmo slipped into the tube and shut the hatch behind him.\n\nBolts locked in. The seal broke with a squeak. Visible through the emergency viewport, the civilan cutter drifted away from the station, firing maneuvering jets in short bursts. Tiny little ship. Just two tubes stuck on a propellant tank and engines. Too small to fit a [[light-drive|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luminev"]].\n\n"Good luck, girl." Asmodeus pushed his way down the g-tube, wondering what had happened at the R-Tube.\n\nOp-brief said investigate and interrogate. Instructions unclear. But the task had been given to Asmodeus, which probably meant Hades wanted someone dead. That or he had been the only agent on call in area, in which case Hades did not want anyone dead, just a reliable pair of eyes peek around inside the maw of the beast. Whatever the case, Asmodeus had reached the far shore of the river. It was time to get to work.

Asmodeus lay on his back on the comms-tech couch, staring up at the little digital display overhead. It showed a narrow view of space beyond the fast-cutter. The hull camera tracked a green course-line that curved into the distance and vanished in pixelation. Fuel at 51%. Velocity approaching point-one luminal.\n\nIn three days, the cutter would match vector and position with R-Tube 981, a [[Talithrax Genetics|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_talithrax"]] station beyond the limits of XNR-331, a twin-star system at the edge of the Eastern Expanse. Officially, [[Coloina|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_authority"]] borderspace. In practice: not so much.\n\n"Y'know," a drowsy female voice said below Asmodeus. "It don't go faster if you stare at the screen."\n\n"Don't go slower if I do neither." Asmo tabbed to the metrics page.\n\nGravity at point three and dropping fast. Acceleration flattening at the end of the curve. Five minutes until the main drive cut out and left them on a powered drift to the research tube.\n\nBehind Asmo, Captain Lanae thrashed out of her sleeping bag. Her head banged against the hull.\n\n"Fegg!" One of her cybernetic legs was still stuck inside her bag, causing her to pirhouette as felt gravity plummeted. \n\nAsmo reached back and shook the bag loose. Lanae's leg flew towards his head. Asmo deflected it with his elbow.\n\nLanae kicked the bulkhead. "Ow."\n\n"Limb discipline."\n\n"Aye, Sir, corporate contractor, Sir." Lanae cast around for a skinsuit. "Y'know, whoever builds these tubs really needs a knock on the head. Three by three and still you can't move nowhere without hitting--" She banged into the [[hydro|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_hydro"]] tank. "Ow! See what I means?"\n\n"No idea what you mean." Asmo turned his attention back to the little screen.\n\n"The space, grumpy."\n\n"I'm looking at it," Asmo said dryly. "Outer space is fascinating."\n\nLanae laughed. "You ain't been out often, has you?"\n\nAsmo rolled his eyes. "Do you ever zip up?"\n\n"My ship. My mouth. My rules. Anyways, what's a corporate like you doing all the way out here, ey?"\n\n"Business," Asmo said.\n\n"With dead space?" Lanae scoffed. "Credits and crike. You coreworlders think we's all thick or what?"\n\n"Yes," Asmo said.\n\n"All right. I's got the message, Sir, corporate contractor, Sir. Zippin it up--" She quick-zipped her skinsuit. "--Sir."\n\nAsmo shot the cutter-captain a pointed look. "And here I was getting used to the sight of your tits. They're an appealing sight. Suitably supple."\n\nLanae groaned. "You ever got anything else on yer mind, Mister corporate contractor, Sir?"\n\n"That." Asmo pointed to the screen.\n\nOne of the pixels had become a tiny white dot. Laser ranging failed to get a good read but Asmo knew what he was looking at: a tubular structure, ninety meters long, sixty wide, that zoomed along on a long orbit to the middle of nowhere. The cutter matched that orbit - plus relative ten - that moment. The main drive cut out. Low gravity became no gravity.\n\nCaptain Lanae stuck her head inside the comms-couch so she could see the screen. "So that's the big mystery, ey? The one Corporate couldn't tell me about?"\n\nAsmo nodded. "[[Talithrax Genetics|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_talithrax"]] Research Tube 981."\n\n"Dont't look like much. Mean, it's just a grav-rote tube, eh? What's it toing all the way out here?"\n\n"Not what it should be."\n\nLanae's brow furrowed. "Ey?"\n\nAsmodeus pushed the Captain off his cramped bunk. "Dead man's signal. Packet every standard days. A year ago, the signal stopped." \n\n"Aw, crike," Lanae said. "Bet you it was them pirates. Better yet: hostile takeover. Oh, wait, I's got it: tip-top classified research gone horribly wrong."\n\n"Gone horribly right," Asmo said.\n\n"What, you serious?"\n\nAsmodeus nodded.\n\nLanae's lips curled. "You's pullin me circuits. Corporate wouldn't let you tell me nothing, even if it was what I suspected."\n\n"True," Asmodeus said. "Corporate would not, Captain. Luckily for you, I don't answer to Corporate."\n\n"Ey? I saw that work order. From the top. Credit line and all."\n\nAsmo's lips curled. "Looks better to cutter-captains that way. Looks better to Corporate too. Lets them sleep safe and sound at night, pretending they're the ones in charge."\n\n"Ahhh." Lanae grinned. "You's one of them mysterious types then, ey? All right then, Mr. mysterious corporate guy, Sir: what's the real truth?"\n\nAsmodeus did not know and, even if he had known what happened at the R-Tube, he would not have told Cutter-Captain Lanae Hatichi-Sauha. He could have. The op-brief placed no restricted dissemination of information. But it was bad praxis to share non-critical information with the innocent and uninvolved.\n\nCutter-Captain Lanae was a good girl. She kept a neat slowboat and ran a decent little to-and-from business. Crike in return for a cutter, no questions asked, not even when the customers were the less savory sort who worked on spoofed corporate contracts. Smart girl like that deserved to stay alive.\n\n"What, no big reveal?" Captain Lanae looked disappointed. "Crikey. And here I was starting to warm up to you, Mr. mysterious corporate guy, Sir."\n\nAsmodeus rolled his eyes. "I thought you didn't want to get all warm and cuddly."\n\n"Oh, well, if that's all it takes to get an honest answer." She scrunched around and banged through the food-bin.\n\nAsmo eyed her ass. Sweet ass. For a sweet girl. But not for him and, more importantly, not the sort of girl one trusted.\n\nCutter-Captain Lanae Hatichi-Sauha had not been his first choice but, when the dead man's signal had gone out, the options had been limited. None of the pirates had wanted to go anywhere near R-Tube 981 and the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] patrols translating up and down borderspace. Had it in them the reds were out to get them. Chem-brain logic: like somehow the big [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] warships couldn't see every single smuggler in the east.\n\nAsmodeus had tried to explain that to the old Commodore but House Blaire wasn't the great name it had once been. Gone rotten from the inside out until all that remained of the legacy was a chem cartel at the edge of civilized space. Asmodeus had glad to be out of that madman's den and, from there, he'd made do, from contact to contact, until he'd found Lanae Hatichi-Sauha and worked out a deal. \n\nIt was a sweet deal. For the Cutter-Captain. For Asmodeus it was just another dead day, waiting for the raft to reach the far shore of the river. Soon. Only a few more days.

Hoping to find answers, Asmodeus crept towards the Reactor & Maintenance section. Halfway there, a window looked into the water reclamation and hydroponics area. The glass had shattered and thick vapor drifted around the grow-plant within. The scene reminded Asmodeus of a mountain meadow, just rolled up and stuck in a grow-tube.\n\n"Explains the fog, I guess." Asmodeus continued on, towards Reactor & Maintenance. \n\nThe first maintenance bay he passed was a big robot repair shop. A defuct maintenance drone lay on a workpench in pieces. Tools had been left out and a failing data-pad displayed a work order due three hundred days in the past.\n\nAsmo moved on, toward the reactor deck, where the passage ended at a thick lead-lined security doors. His geiger ticked slightly faster. Well below lethal levels.\n\n"Not rad sickness, then." Asmo turned into a cross-corridor that curved along with the tube.\n\nOn the far side of the station, the layout mirrored the one Asmodeus had just seen: another machine shop, this one stacked with several hundred maintenance drones, and three more shot-shells on the floor - not one bullet hole in the station.\n\n"Strange." Asmo passed a water tank located where the grow-tube had been on the other side.\n\nWater dripped from a leaky seal, into a bucket which sat on top of a rusted spot of deck. Where was barely time to register the bucket when, up ahead, shadows moved in the gloom.\n\nAsmodeus snapped his [[smart-zipper|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_zipgun"]] and shifted his grip so that he could hold his light in line with the barrel. Nothing moved up ahead, only shadows and a seal-safe door labeled <i>LAB-II</i>.\n\n"Strange." Asmodeus risked a step closer.\n\nOutside <i>LAB-II</i> was a corporate work-area. Desks and terminals, lockers and data-racks. A pressure helmet had been left on one of the desks. Nothing moved. Nothing made a sound. Behind Asmodeus, water dripped from the leaky seal.\n\nHe risked another step. "Hello? Is anyone there?"\n\nThere was no response but Asmodeus could hear someone - or something - breathing. A gene-creature, maybe? [[Talithrax Genetics|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_talithrax"]] had a history in genetic engineering projects gone wrong.\n\n"If there's anyone here," Asmodeus called. "Come out now. Otherwise I'll get jumpy and shoot you on purpose."\n\nShadows shifted behind one of the desks. A pair of eyes peered over the top. They belonged to a grizzled old man with a long, bushy beard.\n\nAsmo took aim, finger on the trigger. "Nice and easy. I'm not gonna shoot you unless you do something dumb."\n\nA raspy voice croaked, "Are you one of them?"\n\n"Depends who them is." Asmo kept his smart-sight smack on the man's head. "Is them the boarding party?"\n\nThe man shook his head. "Them. The ones who come. When the switch goes off."\n\n"Oh." Asmo relaxed - barely. "Yeah. I work for Corporate."\n\n"No. No, then you aren't them."\n\nAsmo's lips curled. "I lied. Sorry. Actually, I work for someone else."\n\nThe man snorted. "I do not believe you."\n\n"True story." Amos sized up the old man.\n\nHe looked positively ancient. Older than three centuries with an unkempt beard and a little tuft of hair on his balding head. The dirty lab-suit he wore bore the [[Talithrax Genetics|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_talithrax"]] logo. There was no name-tag on it.\n\n"Hey," Asmo called. "What's your name, hm?"\n\n"What is yours?"\n\n"Asmodeus."\n\n"Asmodeus?" The man breathed a laugh. "Funny, funny. Where are you from? Who sent you? Was it them? They were supposed to come."\n\n"Maybe." Asmo scowled. "Okay, just for kicks: Achillias and Arthinia had a fine, fine day. Really, that's all I got to say."\n\nThe man laughed. He stood up far too quickly.\n\n"Wow, wow!" Asmo aimed center mass. "Nice and easy. Nothing hasty. I'm twitchy on the trigger."\n\n"You are them!" Tears shimmered in the man's eyes. "Seven Saints of sin! You came. I knew you would come. I knew--" He wiped his face. "I am Station 981."\n\nAsmo's brow furrowed. "Say what?"\n\n"Doctor Naudrage. Station 981. Ahh, curses. What would they have put? Ah! Blacksite 9. Recognition code: omega nine five one six six."\n\n"Hades!" Asmodeus quickly lowered his [[smart-zipper|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_zipgun"]]. "I'm so sorry. I almost shot you."\n\nThe man grinned from ear to ear. "Yes? Yes! I knew it. You would come. You had to. You must see. Quick. Come--" He pointed toward <i>LAB-II</i>. "It is unprecedented!"\n\nAsmodeus held up a hand. "Just one question: the Hades happened here, Doc?"\n\n"Ah, yes, that." Doctor Naudrage's expression darkened. "A Commission inspection, you see, a five man team. They sent corporate codes and they cleared. But they were not from the Commission. Believers, I would say. Maybe [[Brotherhood of Silence|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_brotherhood"]]. Things became chaotic. I was lucky to hide."\n\n"And who moved the bodies?"\n\n"Me, alas. It said to do so in the procedure." The Doctor scowled. "All very tragic. I had colleagues here. Good colleagues."\n\n"Sorry for your loss," Asmo said. "How did the faiths find you?"\n\nThe old man shrugged. "We are not as subtle as we believed. I do not know, not does it matter. I have found something! Come. You must see!"\n\n"Sure, Doc." Asmodeus remained exactly where his was.\n\nThe op-brief had not mentioned that recognition code. It had not mentioned Blacksite 9. No one had told Asmodeus to expect anyone alive at R-Tube 981. \n\nHe did however recognize the code omega nine five one six six. It wasn't a recognition code. It was a kill-code. Eliminate all non-essential assets and abort operation. The only problem: Asmodeus did not know whether Dr. Naudrage was essential or not. He'd not been told. Because the op-brief system was about as transparent as the murky waters of sacred Styx.

The docking tube led to a cross-passage that forked left and right. The left side had been crudely welded shut. A zero-g toolbox floated in front of the door. Asmo headed the other way, shining his light ahead. It's narrow cone illuminated an open hatch and, beyond, the floor of the rotational ring. Yellow g-marks glided in and out of view at regular intervals.\n\nAsmodeus peered out of the door. The rotational room beyond was stacked with shipping crates. Recieve-dates stamped on the labels read over two years in the past. Consistent with what the brief had stated: no shipments in or out since the signal had gone dead. \n\n"So far so good." Asmo pushed himself down to the rotating floor.\n\nHe landed on all fours and snatched his [[smart-zipper|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_zipgun"]], scanning for threats. There were none. The rotational room curved up and over, into a separation wall. The doorway in it - labeled <i>HAB-II</i> - had been welded shut. An arc-spanner had been left on the deck beside it. The only other way on was a narrow corridor labeled <i>HAB-I</i> that ran the length of the rotational tube.\n\n"Lotas choices you're giving me here." Asmo crept along, drawing deep breaths.\n\nCyber-scrubbers in his lungs clicked on. Oxygen and micro-trace of c-dioxide. The air system must have topped up and gone into hybernate. \n\n"So not a lab-leak." Asmodeus peeked into the corridor to <i>HAB-I</i>.\n\nStandard corporate design: a long hallway with wilted orange ferns at the far end. Along either side of the corridor were doors locked with code-scanners. The third on the left was open. \n\nAsmo crept up and peered into a tiny room with a curved floor. The dimensions were so tight that the low-g bed barely fit beside a cabinet, the door of which had been left adjar. Inside were three white [[Talithrax Genetics|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_talithrax"]] labsuits with pressure seals and integrated biochem safeties. No civilian clothes. The employees at R-Tube 981 had lived under the tyranny of the thrust-mass equation\n\n"Must've paid well." Asmo headed on, down the corridor.\n\nAt the far end was a break room with a snacks dispenser that sold juice boxes for ten credits a pop. The corridor turned right, into an unmanned security station. The desk was deserted, the data-pads on it all long gone dead, and the gear cabinets were locked. Separating the habitation area from the rest of the station were three inches of airtight safety glass. When Asmo tried to shine his hand-light through, the glass mirrored.\n\n"Damn." He felt the glass.\n\nHair-thin cracks indicated a security door. No external release. Max-security workspace. Controls would be on the far side.\n\n"Paranoid," Asmo muttered as he drew his [[smart-zipper|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_zipgun"]].\n\nThe grip-safety clicked. He took aim but hesitated. A slug would blast the glass but it might also take out the hull too, depending on how poorly the corporates had build this place.\n\n"Okay, new plan." He lowered the hand-cannon and closed his eyes.\n\nDeep in his chest, a bio-converter engaged. Ancient cybernetics hummed to life. Capacitors charged. Asmo clenched a fist and punched the glass.\n\nThe impact rang. Safety glass cracked. A faint current held the shards in the frame. When Asmo pushed the glass out, electricity sparked around his finger tips. The glass fell to the deck with a crash.\n\n"Sheesh." Asmo shook his cybernetic hand into hibernate.\n\nBeyond where the glass had been, a blood-spattered carpet led into the distance. A body in a blue security suit lay ten paces from where Asmo stood. The man had several dozen gunshot wounds in his back and, directly behind him, was a body in a black skinsuit with a nasty gash in the skull.\n\n"Hades." Asmo stepped past the bodies. \n\nWater vapor drifted his way from farther up the passage. Several more bodies lay there. Boarding party. Had to have been. Only one part made no sense: why lock the door on the way out?\n\n"Gotta be an explanation." Asmodeus advanced, [[smart-zipper|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_zipgun"]] held ready, just in case.\n\nAhead, the corridor forked. Maintenance & Reactor were down the hall while, to the right, an open airlock led to <i>LAB-I</i>. The room beyond, a sterile white sphere filled with fancy lab gear, looked like it should have been seal-safe. Except the emergency release box had been bashed and the lever beside the airlock yanked.\n\n"Odd." Asmo stepped into the seal-safe room.\n\nHis foot bumped into something. Plastic rolled away. Shot-shell. Asmo crouched to examine it.\n\nUnmarked. Corporate gauge with a smart-targeting chip. Not so corporate. Even stranger: no damage anywhere in the room. Smart targeting systems were never that good. One or two pellets always missed.\n\n"Staged." Asmodeus retraced his route, wondering what the Hades was going on.\n\nInstinct said he'd walked into a trap but the trap was so poorly designed that even the dumbest crike-eater contractor would have seen through it. The spent shot-casing was nowhere near the guy who'd been shot. And there was only one spent casing. The body out in the corridor had dozens of gunshot wounds, some from pellets, others from EM-disabler slugs meant to take out robots.\n\n"The Hades?" Asmo looked around, more confused than he wanted to admit.\n\nHe'd been on all sorts of jobs over the millennia and seen his share of strange stuff. He'd never seen a staged scene quite as perplexing as R-Tube 981.

Half an hour later, Asmodeus floated in the airlock of the R-Tube, beside the Doctor's data drive, and watched the laser-blinker flash every six seconds. The little black device was stuck to the viewport of the outer door. So small and insignificant and yet, if Captain Lanae did not see the flashes or had to decided to bugger off with her partial payment, he would be stuck on that little station for a very long time.\n\nAn hour ago, that would have bothered Asmodeus but he'd come to see his situation in a new light: finally he held the cards. Lord-Astronomous Naudrage vi Atada was a valuable man, one who could be traded for favors, which in turn meant the nightmare on the dead river would soon be over. Asmodeus would turn his spectral raft in along with the man who had come up with that absurd metaphor. The bitter irony did not escape Asmodeus.\n\n"Dead or alive, Doc. Dead or alive." Asmodeus peeked out of the emergency viewport.\n\nIn the distance, a little drive plume flashed. The tubular hull of Captain Lanae's cutter accelerated towards the station.\n\nAsmodeus watched it approach, wondering how he planned to trade his way out of the blasted lands. The Daughter of Hades had insinuated she would reward for her father's finite demise but Asmodeus knew better than to trust that psychopath. He needed assurances from another, a different power bloc in the [[Project|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cabal"]]. One of the political men from the north, maybe, if Asmodeus could figure out who they were.\n\n"It will be tricky," Asmodeus muttered.\n\nHe would have to keep his cards close to his chest, play the power structures of the [[Project|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cabal"]] against one another, which in turn meant he would have to figure out what those were. The Daughter of Hades on one hand. Lord Otto Vindell on the other. The rest Asmodeus did not know, only that they lurked far in the galactic north, a region in space in which people like Asmodeus were unwelcome.\n\n"Should have paid more attention." He looked out the window.\n\nThe Captain's cutter slowly maneuvered into dock. The bow grew larger and larger until, finally, bump-pads squeaked. Bolts locked in with a clak. Machinery hummed. Visible through the far window, a slender silhouette drifted into view. It wasn't Captain Lanae.\n\nIt was the silver-plated battlesuit of a [[Traitor-Knight|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_mlord"]]. Slender fingers grasped the airlock release. The machine yanked with such force that the handle snapped off.\n\n"Oh no." Asmodeus pushed away from airlock, hand on his [[smart-zipper|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_zipgun"]].\n\nHe drew his gun the same moment the cutter-hatch banged open. Smart-targeting caught the silver silhouette only to fail with a flicker.\n\n"Fegg!" Asmodeus pulled the trigger as fast as he could. \n\nHis hand-cannon bucked and bounced, spitting smart-shells at the [[Traitor-Knight|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_mlord"]] until the slide locked back. The silver silhouette was unharmed by the barrage. Orange dust drifted lazily around it's slender shape. A friction-shield.\n\n"Damn it!" Asmodeus kicked himself towards the rotational ring.\n\nMicro-thrusters fored behind him. Asmo glanced over his shoulder to see the [[Traitor-Knight|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_mlord"]] snatch at his ankle. Slender fingers missed by an inch. The armored figure smacked into the wall with such force it buckled.\n\n"Shit, shit, shit." Asmodeus landed hard on the rotational ring and grabbed the [[mono-knife|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cblade"]] in his boot.\n\nAs he looked up, the silver suit of armor hurtled out of the shaft. Amodeus rolled aside, willing his cybernetics into battle mode. The bio-converter snapped on. Capacitors charged with a whine. Asmodeus came to his feet, breathing hard. The [[Traitor-Knight|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_mlord"]] stomped towards him, armored boots thudding on the deck.\n\n"Oh, no, no--" Asmodeus ran, thinking fast.\n\nA distraction. Or overwhelm the shield. Only so many nano-units in the hives. What he really needed was a plasma caster - or the torch by the door, up ahead! Asmodeus skidded to a stop and grabbed the cutting implement. Fuel cell at ten percent.\n\n"Oh, crap." Asmodeus looked back.\n\nThe killing machine strode down the the corridor, surrounded by a shimmering orange mist. Bright light glowed within it's palms. An intimidation tactic. The [[Traitor-Knight|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_mlord"]] wouldn't use SolTek plasma casters aboard a space station. Far too likely to blast through the cheap corporate hull and vent them both into space.\n\n"Fegg, fegg." Asmodeus unscrewed the fuel cell from the torch.\n\nThe [[Traitor-Knight|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_mlord"]] stopped the same moment Asmodeus got it loose.\n\n"Eat this!" He hurled the fuel cell.\n\nThe [[Traitor-Knight|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_mlord"]] ducked. The fuel cell bounced off it's shoulder plate and smacked into the wall with a deafening bang. Flames rushed out with a roar. Electricity arced around the [[Traitor-Knight|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_mlord"]] as it advanced, undeterred, trailing white-hot chemical vapor.\n\n"Shit, shit." Asmodeus backed away, [[mono-knife|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cblade"]] gripped tight and cyber-heart thudding.\n\nOne soft-skinned killer of Hades against the greatest war-machine of the old world. Talk about an unfair. The [[Traitor-Knight|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_mlord"]] were more mechanical marvel spawned in the hate-forges of House Montier than a martial man in a suit. No one had ever defated one in single combat, not even the Queen of Hades. The only option was to run. Only Asmodeus couldn't. \n\nThe [[Traitor-Knight|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_mlord"]] had broken the airlock. Asmodeus had nowhere to go.\n\n"Shit!" He backed against the nearest wall, scrambling for ideas.\n\nBefore he could come up with one, the killing machine lunged at him. Asmodeus stabbed it with his [[mono-knife|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cblade"]]. The machine dodged deftly and, before Asmodeus had even realized what had happened, yanked the knife from his grip.\n\n"Fegg!" Asmodeus punched the machine in the head.\n\nCybernetic knuckles met ceramic plate with a nasty crunch. Errors flashed in the corner of Asmodeus's vision. Three of his fingers had snapped clean off. Asmodeus stared at the damaged bone-grafts. Icky black blood trickled out.\n\nThe [[Traitor-Knight|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_mlord"]] tilted it's head. "That was incredibly idiotic."\n\nBefore Asmodeus could react, he was hit in the face with such force that the lights went out. Diagnostic reported both ocular units failed, severe concussion, and a cracked brain-case. Prognosis: bad.\n\nIn that last moment before the trauma override engaged, Asmodeus realized that punching a ceramo-synthetic plate designed to survive near misses from tactical nuclear warheads might indeed have been an incredibly stupid idea.

As it turned out, the far side of the Research Tube wasn't a carbon-copy of the side Asmodeus had entered on. Where there'd been a seal-safe room on the other side, this side contained an enormous recordbase system: hundreds upon hundreds of servers piled high to the ceiling. A narrow corridor led through the equipment to the soft-light projector in the center of the room. The projection displayed a dizzing number of color-coded charts and graphs, none of which meant anything to Asmodeus.\n\n"You see, yes?" Doctor Naudrage gestured to the multicolored graphs. "It is marvelous, don't you think?"\n\nAsmodeus breathed a laugh. "I see lotsa lines and charts, Doc. What am I supposed to be looking at?"\n\n"Extragalactic life!" Naudrage beamed.\n\n"The Hades?" Asmo peered at the projection. "In there?"\n\n"Well, I mean, ahh." Naudrage snapped his fingers. "Signals! Yes. In the signals. Of non-galactic origin. Probably extragalactic. Possibly extratemporal but I think that theory is rather less plausible the more I consider it. Fascinating, isn't it?"\n\n"Unbelievable, more like." Asmo paced around the projector. \n\nAll he saw was numbers and lines. \n\nHe shot the Doc a dubious look. "Extragalactic life, you say?"\n\nNaudrage grinned. "Precisely!"\n\n"And that's what I'm supposed to report? Not the kill team that breeched your security. Not you somehow surviving out here for a year. You want me to slow-boat it all the way back to report you've found proof of extragalactic life?"\n\n"Oh, it is so much more than that, young man. It is the thread which connects. Yes, yes, The missing link. Without it, the theory is not complete. I have worked on this for so long, you see. A side project, yes, but one of great value. You see, the pattern is cyclical in nature. An infinite spiral. It could not have a beginning, and so I wondered--"\n\nAsmo held up a hand. "I'm going to regret asking but what the Hades are you talking about, Doc?"\n\n"Why, the origin of all myth, of course: the [[cosmic cycle|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "rev_codex_pseudopantheon"]]." When Asmo did not reply, Naudrage said, "Do not tell me you have not heard of it, young man. It is only the most important work of my day!"\n\n"Might have heard of it," Asmo said. "Never heard nothing about aliens."\n\nDoctor Naudrage scoffed. "Not aliens, boy, extragalactic lifeforms! Existence beyond our conception. The convergence of spheres on an unprecdented scale. Cosmic forces at work. Fascinating, fascinating. I have all but discerned the point at which they intersect. It shall be here. Soon! Well, cosmologically speaking, of course."\n\n"Of course. I understand completely."\n\n"Yes, yes, it is unprecedented. You must, ahh, where did I put them?" Naudrage glanced about.\n\nAsmodeus shook his head. Crazy old man.\n\n"Ah! This." Naudrage grabbed a data-device and tried to lift it. It didn't budge. "Ah. Yes. I forgot. Quite heavy. But you must take it back. You must share what I have discovered. They must know. They must all know!"\n\n"Right," Asmo said slowly. "Before I do that: how the Hades did you survive out here?"\n\n"Why, on oxygen, bio-grow, and water, of course. Seven Sins. Are you daft?"\n\nAsmo rolled his eyes. "The boarding party, I meant. The one that came in shooting everyone?"\n\n"Ah, them, yes. Well, if you must know, they did not kill everyone. That was the Oger. Marvelous genetic constructs, I dare say. The pride of [[Talithrax Genetics|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_talithrax"]]. Perfected by a former colleague of mine. I insisted one be brought here as a precaution." He chuckled. "Yes, yes, I unleashed it once it had become clear we are compromised."\n\n"An Oger," Asmo said slowly.\n\n"A creature like you, young man. Think! You still do have a brain, do you not?"\n\n"Young?" Asmodeus snorted. "Sure. Whatever. An Oger."\n\n"But what am I to say? I wiped all data devices and unleashed the brute, as per protocol. It performed majestically. Far better than when the corporates employed it in the war." He grinned, eyes glinting. "A fascinating case study. Visceral. Ah, but I had to eject it along with the believers."\n\n"Eject it?"\n\nNaudrage nodded. "Out the airlock. Quite impossible to control, you see. Frighteningly dangerous. Do not worry. Out of stasis, the Oger becomes a ticking pseudo-genetic time bomb. It will decay within a matter of decades at most. Quite sad, actually. This particular one had such a charming personality."\n\nAmodas pulled a face. "Charming."\n\n"Yes, yes, a fine fellow. Also a scientist. Quite bright but, alas, ran afould the debt system. Ah, but I digress. Blacksite 9 was compromised but not breeched. I can attest to that."\n\n"Oh, good. Can I have that in writing?"\n\n"Seven Sins. How idle the youth of today has become!" Naudrage grabbed a data-pad and began to scribble. "I must say, in my age, this was not the case. We colonized the stars, we did! The entire galaxy! Surely you yould have recorded my words and regurgitated them with your own hands?"\n\n"Wait," Asmodeus said slowly. "You aren't just any old doctor, are you?"\n\nDoctor Naudrage cackled. "Me? My dear boy. But of course I am not! I am Doctor Naudrage. I am the one who, ah--" He tapped his forehead. "Yes, yes, the potency wears thin. Another copy or two and I shall forget entirely. But once, yes, once long ago I was Lord-Astronomous of the Court!"\n\n"The Court of Sol?" Asmo had a nasty sense the answer would be: yes.\n\n"It was a very important title, if you must know. I was sage among sages, and with a penis at that!" Naudrage raised his chin. "I was a significant character in my day. Much desired. Much beloved. I had the ear of the Throne, I did, but now that is long gone. The Great War, oh, how the celestials wept."\n\n"Hades," Asmodeus groaned. "Where do they find you maniacs?"\n\nThe good Doctor harrumphed. "I could say the same of you, boy. Undignified that they send such a witless buffoon to collect my life's work."\n\n"Don't worry," Asmodeus said. "I'll take your precious life's work back to whoever the Hades put you up to this, Doc."\n\n"Yes, yes that you shall, and ah, if it is not too much to ask, could you also report that you had eliminated me? I understand that it is not protocol, but you see, I must finish this--" He gestured to his graphs. "--and it is quite difficult to concentrate when there is a black operation being run out of the same station. I would make it worth your while of course."\n\n"You would, would you?" Admodas grinned. "Do you prefer top or bottom?"\n\nDoctor Naudrage's eyes widened. "Good gracious, boy! Nothing so mundane. No, what I can provide is far more spectacular than the slobbering saint. It is a secret so old it is akin to legend. But I must be assured you will not report what transpired here. They are not forgiving of disloyalty, especially not her. I require assurances."\n\n"Of course." Asmodeus drew his [[smart-zipper|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_zipgun"]], saying, "Tell you what: I take your data drive back. I wont't say anything. But only if you tell me your sweet little secret, right here and now. Otherwise--" He smirked at his handgun. "Well, you're a smart old man, aren't you, Lord vi Atada?"\n\nDoctor Naudrage went white. "No, no! Please. I must finish my work. The cosmological significance--"\n\n"Last chance." Asmo yanked slide back.\n\nAn unfired cartridge span out. He let the chamber slam closed.\n\nNaudrage flinched. "There is no need for that. Or to waste unspent shells. Truly, the youth of today."\n\n"Doc--" Asmodeus leveled the handgun.\n\n"Wait!" Naudrage raised his hands. "Please. I offer the first revelation. Ancient beyond imagine. A prediction calculated by the very first thinking machine, long before the Great War. So sublime, so majestic, a perfect foretelling, a revelation so clear and pure that dear Arthurius dared forsake the Sacred Throne in pursuit of all the riches and glory it foretoled. A divine script as only the old world could create, in which the true fate of the universe itself is transcribed. Ah, but it it sealed away, guarded jealously in the hallowed vaults of the [[Cathedral|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_cathedral"]]. Quite impossible to recover."\n\nAsmo snorted. "Fancy fariy tale, Doc. Not buying it."\n\n"Fairy tale? Hardly." Naudrage stepped closer, tone serious, "It is providence, boy, the key to insight into the divine!"\n\n"Whatever you say." Asmo grabbed the old man's data-device. "I've heard enough. As for you?"\n\nThe op-brief had been as murky as the dead river but Asmodeus could read between the lines: eliminate the man. \n\nHad Asmodeus been just any black asset of the [[Project|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cabal"]], he would have done exactly that without a second thought. Except Asmodeus Paratah was no fool. He had killed for Hades since the beginning and he knew better than anyone else: a memnetic copy of Lord-Astronomous Naudrage vi Atada was would be worth more to Hades alive than dead.\n\n"It's your lucky day, Doc." Asmodeus turned and, lugging the data-device with him, trecked back to the airlock.

The Sethenakmet-class Close Gunship, also known as the Wolf in the Lamb (Sethen e Akmet in clan dialect) in reference to the well known children's mare-tale, was a close range ambush warship developed by the [[Myrroth Clan Collective|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_myrroth"]] during the cartel wars of the modern era. Uniquely, no two Sethenakmet class vessels were quite the same, each being built to resemble a family of well known civilian vessels. The depicted close gunship is a Sethenakmet disguised as a Model T, a derrivative of the [[Plex NC-998-81 Modular Freighter|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_freighter"]] and one of the most common hauling vessels in the galaxy.\n\nThe Model T was obtained legimitately by the [[Myrroth Clan|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_myrroth"]] and reported as scrapped - technically and legally this was true, as most of the vessel's interior was indeed removed and peddled off to a junker clan. Only the drive block and outer hull were retained, as were several modular containers, which were then filled with sensors-spoofing foam layered around low-ob plating designed to make the vessel's [[farbound-length|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_farbound"]] echo almost identical to the exotic resonance of a [[modular freighter|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_freighter"]]. These modules and hull plates were then used to conceal the Sethenakmet within the shell of the freighter, with a disposable latticework of struts and mounting bars holding both together - the illusion invariably only held at range, where visual confirmation of signature abnormalities was not possible.\n\n<div class='HUD_CodexImage_Left'><<print "[img[" + $codex.imagePath + "sethenakmet_descr.png]]">></div>Most if not all Sethenakmets followed a pattern of unusually heavy direct firepower - usually [[railguns|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "general_codex_railgun_evo"]], sometimes cruder chemical cannons - with the depicted example carrying a total of fourteen guns in seven turrets, all packed on a seven hundred meter long chassis, allowing the close gunship to project an incredible ammount of firepower, albeit only at very short ranges. The depicted example has split these guns into three groups: a bow turret with quad ultra-light guns, eight more light guns on the upper axis, mounted as twins in four turrets, and two heavier guided guns on the opposite axis. With the outer shell attached, turret traversal and barrel elevation was severely limited, with one axis - usually the axis the light guns were aligned on - set up so that the weapons could be raised at an ideal angle, brining both the bow turret and the four top turrets into aximuth. On some vessels, one heavy gun could also be brought to bear on this axis, though this usually required discarding the outer hull.\n\nThough precise armament varied based from vessel to vessel, a firepower model can be computed for the depicted vessel, which carried fourteen [[Ilitivan|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_ilitivan"]] [[ultra-light railguns|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "general_codex_railgun_evo"]] (model GREP-A-S3) ninety-thousand rounds of ammunition for the bow and forward turret pair, another forty thousand for the rear turret pair, and two a single-barreled [[assisted railgun|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "general_codex_railgun_evo"]] (model GREP-B-S2) with two thousand rounds of ammunition per turret. The GREP-A-S3 fired 2mm rounds at a rate of thirty rounds per second and the GREP-B-S2 fired 250g guided rounds at a rate of five per second, for a total of 430 rounds per second if all guns could be brought to bear. Effective range when firing with such a setup was well below light lag, with practical engagement envelopes petering out around 5'000km for the ultra-light guns and 75'000km for the heavy guns. Depending on a variety of factors, fire could theoretically be sustained for around four to six minutes though this does not account for the fact that the GREP-A-S3 light guns were most likely tuned for a much higher rate of fire than listed by the manufacturer, maybe as much as forty rounds per second, and the heavy guns could be fast-cycled up to ten rounds per second, though neither gun system could sustain this for longer than a few seconds as the ready-packs of ammunition in the turrets would only suffice for one or two short bursts.\n\n<div class=''><<print "[img[" + $codex.imagePath + "sethenakmet_firing_arcs.png]]">></div>One of the most striking features the close gunship was it's unusual turret layout, which attempted to maximize firing arcs while maintaing a very slim silhouette, as all the ship's systems had to fit inside the proverbial sheep's skin. The gun mounts were offset to provide more overlapping fields of fire, with the light twin turrets having the largest field of fire at almost 260° - it should be noted however that, due to the arrangement of the turrets, some angles would be blocked by either the bow or aft superfiring pair. Best engagement envelopes were only achieved off the bow, where all guns could usually aquire the target, with two ideal angles off the upper hull, where one heavy gun and all four light guns could be brought to bear, in addition to the bow turret, which could not traverse more than ninety degrees to any side.\n\nOn some Sethenakmets, all gun systems were of the same caliber, on others gun layout varied (multiple heavy guns on one side were common, though this forced changes to the light gun setup). Almost all variants of the Sethenakmet had two fixed fire control systems in the hull, one each for the port and starboard hemispheres, and one fire control system each for the [[assisted railgun|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "general_codex_railgun_evo"]] turrets, the rounds of which required special guidance to use correctly - it should be noted that, because the heavy railgun turrets often fired guided rounds, additional firing arcs beyond the depicted 240° were possible. An additional pair of fire control systems was often installed in the bow turret to provide solutions in the frontal hemisphere. The vast majority of Sethenakmets did not feature beyond-light-lag targeting and did not feature [[farbound|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_farbound"]] based fire control. LIDAR was the most common system used, with one or two radar systems providing additional tracking for the batteries. On some designs, this was done via the crew capsule's radar, while others used systems installed in the gun module.\n\nThe use of [[guided missiles|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "general_codex_missile_evo"]] on Sethenakmet class vessels was exceedingly rare, the logic of the vessel being that it would maneuver close to it's target - often a space station or known hauler route - under the guise of being simply another freighter on the long-haul, and then execute it's intended mission at close range, in many cases within meter range (distances < 10km). Most often, this mission was to extort or intimidate the target, though during the cartel wars of the modern era Sethenakmets were often used by the [[Sons of Kobol|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_kobol"]] to spring ambushes, leading to similar tactics being adopted by the [[High Court|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_highborn"]]. Several Sethenakmets were also used as ambush and covert operations vessels by the [[Volunteer Legion|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cons_codex_legion"]]. All operators of the close gunship soon discovered that the vessel generally remained too close to the target to make guided weapons effective and, once the close gunship broke cover, it invariably did not have time to deploy [[guided missiles|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "general_codex_missile_evo"]] as it was already at point blank range and exceedingly vulnerable, having only it's discarded modules (assuming they were discarded) to use as concealment.\n\n<div class='HUD_CodexImage_Left'><<print "[img[" + $codex.imagePath + "sethenakmet_in_action.png]]">></div>This vulnerability was not helped by the need to use the original cargo vessel's drive in the close gunship to maintain an innocuous sensors signature, which coupled with the added mass of one or more layers of fake cargo - and occasionally real cargo layered on top to complete the concealment or to to carry more fuel - the Sethenakmet was exceptionally slow to accelerate at least until it's added mass could be discarded. For this reason, many close gunships were further built so that their aft section could pose as a legitimate freighter which had lost it's cargo, with the crew module designed in the same style as the drive block and the gun module built to be quickly discarded, should the gunship need to rapidly break contact. Tuning and [[Myrroth Clan|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_myrroth"]] tweaks to the drive system did however mean that most Sethenakmets could achieve decent burst acceleration and the variety of high-performance thrusters installed to stabilize the vessel while firing it's guns also afforded excellent off-axis maneuverability, which often proved useful at the ranges the close gunship operated at. Many Sethenakmet were also built with radiators and quick-eject crew pods, the former to prevent fatal overheating when sustaining fire from all guns for more than a few seconds, and the latter due to the extreme risk the crew of the gunships found themselves at, which often necessitated immediate evacuation - the tight design considerations of the close gunship offered little mass for armor, as this would have further ruined their already questionable acceleration characteristics. \n\nMost Sethenakmet-class vessels could be operated for years to decades at time and featured rather large crew quarters, often including provisions for scientific equipment, boarding gear, robotics bays, and at times even small grow gardens or other amnemities, both to help pass the vessel off as civilian and to sustain long endurance operations, the Sethenakmet being a generally slow vessel even when fitted with a [[Luminev drive|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luminev"]] - in many cases, the close gunships were carried to their launch point by larger vessels such as rockbreakers or tankers to preserve the Sethenakmet's fuel. Additionally, the relatively poor performance and poor sustained acceleration of the close gunship meant that, for most intents and purposes, it was a tactical vessel that, once positioned, was almost impossible to reposition and, for such a limited mission profile, the close gunship was an exceptionally costly asset. The average price of purchase for a new Sethenakmet close gunship was comparable to that of a MilSpec cruiser, with some custom builds exceeding the cost range of a battleship, depending on the cost of the materials required to obscure the vessel's true signature. Operational costs were equally high, if not higher, due to the specialized materials in use and the need to overhaul after any mission and it was this incredibly lopsided price-to-risk ratio that kept the close gunship concept from taking hold outside of it's niche role in piracy, covert operations, and the cartel wars.

The [[Helian Mythos|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_deadgods"]] by Naudrage vi Atada foretold that to tend the spectral raft was a ceacelss, thankless task. Day by day the Ferryman rowed back and forth across the dead river Styx, surrounded by darkness and shadow, guided only by the ghastly glare of the blasted lands on one shore and the lantern of the Lady on the other until, finally, come the end of ages, when the Cosmic Serpent rose up to devoir the Celestial Palace, the Ferryman at long last found solace in the Lady's embrace at long last.\n\nFor millennia, Asmodeus Paratah had wondered who his Lady of the River would be. He had longed to know love such as that the mythological Ferryman shared with Shavah: cold and loveless yet so heartfelt and genuine that even the other divines envied them. Alas, as Asmodeus had learned over the ages, the real Ferryman would never find his Lady of the River. He had lived loveless and joyless and, come the end of his days, would find himself trapped in a cold, dark cell, assuming that was what he was in. It was hard to tell.\n\nAsmodeus's fingers felt the walls of a cramped chamber but, absent a functional ocular implant, he could not make sense of his environment. Not even gravity made sense. It shifted and joslted constantly, throwing into one hard surface after another, until finally the deck became the deck again. Somehere in the distance, a [[light-drive|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luminev"]] hummed to a live.\n\nAsmodeus groaned. Captured. Taken prisoner. Betrayed to the Great Foe. It was all by design, Asmodeus was certain.\n\nHe'd not seen it earlier but it was so obvious: the dead man's signal. Commodore Blairich. Naudrage vi Atada. The Daughter of Hades. She must have realized that Lord Asmodeus Paratah no longer believed in the cause. He had become too independent, secretly sought a way out of his contract, and somehow that miserable bitch had found out. She had lured him into a trap and betrayed him to the Great Foe. That was how the Daughter of Hades did it: ruthless and without style.\n\nShe was a heartless bitch who whored herself out to the true masters of [[Project CABAL|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cabal"]]: the men of the north. Asmodeus had no idea what their names were but he knew they existed, which was already too much - and too little. He knew nothing of value, nothing he could trade in return for his life.\n\nThe [[Traitor-Knight|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_mlord"]] would, of course, not believe him. The fanatical men of the west would do their worst, knowing not to take pity on Lord Asmodeus Paratah, a man whose loyalty could be measured in credits and chem-girls.\n\n"Hades," Asmodeus muttered.\n\nFor so long, he had believe Hades to be the paradise he sought, a place where man could do as he pleased so long as he kissed the Queen's feet - and slit her foes from ear to ear. He had genuinely believed in the cause: for the free north and the free life of all good men. Except that had never been the plan. Asmodeus had no idea what the plan was, only that he no longer played a part in it.\n\n"I'd tell you everything," he muttered. "I would. If I knew."\n\nMetal banged loudly beside Asmodeus. A female voice yelled in his ear. Asmodeus cringed.\n\n"What did you say?" Metallic fingers grabbed Asmo's chin. "Tell me. What did you say?"\n\n"Nothing," Asmodeus whimpered.\n\n"Liar!" Force smacked Asmodeus in the jaw.\n\nTrauma-warnings flashed. Asmodeus whimpered.\n\nMetal banged on metal. "Tell me!"\n\nAsmodeus shook his head. It was the [[Traitor-Knight|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_mlord"]]. He would show no mercy to a killer of Hades.\n\n"You," the woman's voice snarled. "Instruct the filth."\n\nBoots thudded. Gear clinked. Something cold touched Asmodeus's forehead. Pain unlike any he'd ever percieved exploded.\n\nAsmodeus howled and thrashed. His audio units failed with a hiss. What happened after Asmodeus did not know but, when he awoke, his cybernetics reported critical failure in key systems. Touch, sight, and audio were all down. To Asmodeus it felt like he floated in the dead river, lost and alone, surrounded by the realm of shadow. Not even the Lady's lantern burned in the distance. There was only him and his spectral raft, buffeted this way and that by the waves of Sacred Styx.\n\n"Oh, Hades," Asmodeus muttered.\n\nAt least, that was what he thought he muttered. He could not hear his own voice, only see the blinking status indicator: bio-induction failing. Soon, his cybernetics would shut down, one by one, as Asmodeus Paratah waded into the dead river. He did not fear the end. In fact, it would be a relief. Six thousand years in the service of Hades had taught him the truth about the supposed paradise: it was nothing but broken promises and ash.\n\nThe sacred stick, which had once helped Asmodeus dream of the spectral realm, had become a pointless chemical trickle. Soon after, the chem-girls had lost their appeal and, try though Asmodeus had, he'd not found a Lady who filled his fickle concept of love. Even the great endeavor, whatever the Hades that was, had been hijacked by the mad schemes of northern men who did not care for people like Asmodeus. The Throne's finest had been used and abused until only the hollow shadow of a lost age had remained.\n\n"Bastards," Asmodeus snarled.\n\nDeafening noise rang beside him. Metal banged on metal bars. \n\nTo Asmodeus, it sounded like the rattle of a nightstick in the bars of the cells, exactly the same noise he had once heard in his youth, on the day he'd last seen his mountain meadows. Condemned to the slave-convoys of the south. Damned to toil away for the war effort. Had it not been for his name, Asmodeus Paratah might have died then and there, on the slaver's boat headed south.\n\nThe Queen of Hades had saved him. Or so Asmodeus had thought. The Daughter of Hades had proven herself no different than the slavers and, after her pirate princess had left to play politics in the north, the great cause had become ever more erratic, an orgy of bloodshed and greed which had suited Asmodeus at the time. Until he had found out he was afflicted by [[black plague|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_bblood"]] and, ever since, his life had gone from bad to worse.\n\nNothing brought joy. Nothing brought pleasure. Nothing was worth living for anymore. Not one thing in the galaxy. Not one.\n\nHad the Ferryman come to collect his eyes, Asmodeus would gladly have cut them out - metaphorically, that was. The man on the raft would never come, not for Asmodeus Paratah, nor for anyone else in the mortal realm. The [[Helian Mythos|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_deadgods"]] was a fairy tale and the man who had written it, the man Asmodeus had hoped might set him free, had in fact been a last snide insult placed in his path by the Daughter of Hades.\n\nShe knew Asmodeus likened himself to the Ferryman. She knew because Asmodeus had told her in that one beautiful night they had shared. Or had it been ten? Or a thousand?\n\nAsmodeus found it hard to remember. That had never been a problem in the past but, of late, lost in the shadow, adrift on the dead river, he found it difficult to tell one moment from another. He wasn't even certain where he was. Maybe it was as he imagined: he was the Ferryman on the raft. Or maybe he was already dead and the Ferryman had come for him. Maybe.\n\nOr maybe not.

For twenty long minutes, the riot line took verbal and physical abuse. Twice, the [[purists|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_purifier"]] charged the line and, each time, the [[Eighth|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]] held - on round two, they even nabbed one of the faiths. Team One got a few nasty kicks in before the faiths dragged the punk off. After that, none of them wanted to mess with the [[Eighth|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]], not even the most radicals of the radicals with their black masks with white looping script on it.\n\n"Cowards," Marisa muttered, listening to the noise.\n\nIt had changed from jeering and goading to chants and holiday songs. Oh ye commoner, oh ye cause. Marisa knew the words by heart and, for a moment, remembered singing along as a child, back when she'd walked in the parade with Momma and Papa. She'd been so afraid of the noises back then.\n\nIn the present, all Marisa felt was slight disappointment. The radicals had made way for the People's Pope and a crowd of thousands. Everyone was out - young, old, and agnostic alike. \n\nA drone-cam instantly found the Pope, dressed in white, at the head of the procession. Walking hand in hand behind him were twelve young women of the Chapel Choir and, behind them, four men who held a hastily painted banner: <i>Family, Faith, Future - For C and Council!</i> Way to turn a holy day into a political point.\n\n"Group," Team Three's Sergeant called. "Eyes on parade. Guns down. Gas out."\n\nShooters lowered their [[KRUGs|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_vindel"]] and unloaded their launchers. Canisters were snapped back into clamps. Not one had been fired, which was a good sign.\n\nTeam One's Sarge held up his hand, palm outstretched. "Shields to rest." \n\nThe riot line set their kinetic shields down, firm but non-confrontational. Would have made for bad optics otherwise, had the [[Eighth|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]] looked like they were about to charge the elderly, infirm, and underage. \n\nOn the comm, Kalvadek's voice said, "Be advised, CIVL is sending up negotiators. Contract condition's changed: stand by and support."\n\nMarisa keyed team-comm. "Kids, the faith-cops are taking over. Stand by for instructions."\n\n"Aw, man," Noshow drawled. "We eat costs and they mop up the elderly? Fucking faiths."\n\n"That's what the contract says. Stand down." Marisa waved her team to the side of the corridor.\n\nThe [[St. Michael's Constabulary|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_constabulary"]] had already begun to advance, a loose line of security robots and faith-cops with ineffective round shields. Designed to intimidate and de-escalate, not hold and secure. Faith ideals.\n\nCIVL had another set of ideals too: the six [[EXO heavies|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_exo"]] moving up behind the riot line. Each of the enormous powered suits towered above everyone, more machine than man, cased in MilSpec ablative layers and ceramic plates. All six had RIOT smart-disabler packs mounted on their shoulders and, clasped in their mechanical fingers, were huge riot kinetic shields that shimmered yellow-blue.\n\n"Crike," Marisa muttered as the heavies stomped past.\n\nRowdy breathed a laugh. "Shows how much the [[Cathedral|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_cathedral"]] cares for the sector. Or the Council."\n\n"Yeah," Marisa said.\n\nThe [[Cybercult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cybercult"]] would have a field day but she could not have cared less. The contract fulfilled over and, in the [[Eighth|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]], that was all that mattered: they all went home and got paid.\n\n"Contractor?" A [[constable|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_constabulary"]] approached Marisa, tapping his helmet. "Contractor!"\n\nMarisa engaged her speakers. "Evening, officer. How can I help you?"\n\n"All contractors are ordered to fall back five hundred meters," he said. "CIVL is taking over."\n\n"Sorry but I don't take orders from you, faith."\n\n"That's [[Chief Constable|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_constabulary"]] faith to you, contractor. Now get your ideological soldiers off my corridor!"\n\n"If you say so." Marisa keyed into the command net. "C2? Team Five. Have a Chief Constable here who just told me to clear out. That official?"\n\n"Affirmative," Kalvadek's voice crackled. "All teams to retreat five hundred mikes. Contract has changed to standby alert. Be sure to take your time, Five."\n\n"Understood." Marisa waved to the other Sergeants. "Oi! You heard C2: take five and stand down. In that order."\n\nThe [[Chief Constable|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_constabulary"]] shook his helmeted head. "I said: get off this corridor. This instant."\n\n"No can do," Marisa said.\n\n"That was not a request. It was an order!"\n\n"Listen, Mr. Constable, Sir, but--" Marisa placed a gloved hand on the [[Chief Constable's|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_constabulary"]] shoulder and drawled, "No can do that right now, Sir. We've been on the job an hour. On a holy day. Law says five minute break is mandatory for all employees and contractors, every hour, especially on holy days."\n\n"No. You--" The Chief jabbed a finger in Marisa's chest. "--will pull out. Right now. All of you!"\n\n"I am so sorry, Chief, but as you must know: the law's the law." Marisa strolled over to where Rowdy stood with his [[dazzle gun|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_impl_dazzlegun"]] and said, "Hey, contractor. You wanna show me how that thing works?"\n\n"What, this thing, here?" Rowdy hefted his weaponized holo-emitter.\n\nThe Chief grabbed Marisa. "Contractor! That is unacceptable!"\n\nMarisa laughed and patted Rowdy's shoulder. "Put it down. You're scaring the faiths."\n\n"Aye, Sarge." Rowdy did as instructed, his optics on the officer. "Man, them faith cops sure are a jumpy lot. You think that's why they waited in back so long?"\n\n"Could be," Marisa said.\n\nRowdy nodded. "Must've been afraid one of their sidearms would go off. Heard that happened a week back, y'know. Went off by accident seven times. Nasty business."\n\nMarisa breathed a laugh. "NegDis is a bitch."\n\n"Aye." Rowdy shrugged. "Guess we take five then, ey?"\n\n"Figure so." Marisa looked up the corridor, to where the People's Pope and his parade had stopped.\n\nA good forty meters separated the crowd from where the [[Division|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]] had broken rank in the middle of the corridor. Contractors stood about in groups of two and three, chatting, gesticulating, and pretending to not give a shit - ideological stand-down, the [[Division|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]] called it. A practiced political maneuver to drive home the point: FVCK EDEN.\n\nIn reality, the drones were still up and at least one contractor per group faced the risk area, exactly as trained: always alert and ready to move in the moment on the off chance something went wrong. So far it hadn't and Marisa doubted it would, not in the next fire minutes.\n\n"Hey, Sarge." Figtop strode up, gaze on his wrist-display. "Sarge? I think you'll wanna see this."\n\n"See what, contractor?"\n\n"Feed's gone weird. Look." He showed her.\n\nHis tac-interfacae had thrown a dozen errors. Net signal was zero even though he was literally standing right there.\n\n"Might be net noise," Marisa said. "You try to reboot?"\n\nFigtop nodded. "Ain't helped at all. It's almost like--"\n\nA micro-drone whizzed down the corridor, it's float-fan squealing, and slammed into the corridor wall with a crack. Contractors looked up with a start. A handful grabbed their shields.\n\n"Stand down," Marisa said, both on comm and in amplified audio. "Technical failure."\n\nAnother drone whizzed by overhead. It slammed into a riot trooper's helmet and shattered.\n\n"Shield line," someone called. "We're taking--"\n\n"Belay that!" Marisa looked to the tech-team. "Sergeant! Kill the drones. Now!"\n\n"I'm trying," he called. "System has siezed!"\n\n"Fuck," Marisa muttered as techs troopers fumbled with their devices.\n\nErrant drones buzzed about like a swarm of blobflies. Riot troopers hunkered behind their shields. Shooters scrambled for their weapons.\n\n"Hold fire!" Marisa switched to the command net. "C2, Team Five. We've got a massive tech malfunction here. Tac-net might be compromised."\n\nKalvadek's voice said, "We can see it from here, Five. Shut those damned things down before--"\n\n"Cyber!" Figtop grabbed his [[KRUG|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_vindel"]] and racked the bolt. "Line broken! Line--" The tip of a sword exploded through his chest.\n\nElectricity arced down his limbs and, for a brief moment, the only noise to be heard was the mournful whine of a capacitor. Then the sword was torn free and Figtop collapsed, a bloody hole in his chest. In his place stood a slender cyborg in a black bodysuit. What looked suspiciously like arc projectors protruded from it's shoulders.\n\n"Fuck," someone yelled. "Kill it! Kill--"\n\n"Hold your fire," Marisa barked. "Stunners and shields!"\n\nAs contractors scrambled to react, the cyber swung a fist. It hit Noshow in the breather with such force the hardened plastic crunched. On tac-net, Noshow's vitals went wild.\n\n"Shit!" Marisa grabbed her [[KRUG|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_vindel"]], shouting, "Block and deny! Shields! Shields!"\n\nBefore Marisa could take aim, the cyber sliced another contractor in the shoulder. Blood gushed from beneath the yellow under-foam.\n\n"Grab it," someone yelled as four shields moved in.\n\nThe cyborg took one look at the odds and ran. Arc-capacitors discharged with a vivious crackle. Marisa and everyone else recoiled as, barely visible through the electromagnetic stutter in their helmet displays, the cyborg darted for the nearest cross-corridor.\n\n"Fuck," Marisa gasped.\n\nRowdy's voice crackled, "I got it!"\n\n"Eyes!" Marisa shut off her helmet.\n\nEverything went dark. Marisa still saw the brilliant holo-flash. Optical noise seeped through the face plate, glowing bright pink and white. When Marisa's helmet came back on, the cyborg had collapsed, as blind and disoriented as everyone else. The sword lay on the ground beside it. Slowly, as though in a daze, the cyber groped for the hilt.\n\n"Don't!" Marisa aimed at the cyborg - a pointless act.\n\nShe still had the safety on and there was no round in the chamber. But the cyborg didn't know that. It froze, cybernetic lungs clicking madly. A split second later, two contractors jammed their stunners in it's augments. Electricity crackled. The cyber twitched violently.\n\n"Battery," one of the contractors yelled.\n\nThe other fumbled the cyber's battery packs out. Marisa watched, too shocked to speak, as the comm babbled in her ear. \n\nIn the background, smart-gas drifted lazily and CIVL was one the move, advancing with robots and riot shields behind three [[EXO heavies|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_exo"]]. Hydraulic-assisted feet shook the deck. Announcements boomed from high-intensity speakers. Dazzle-units glared and glimmered amid the crowd.\n\nOverwhelmed, Marisa keyed the comm. "C2, Team Five has a situation. Advise."\n\nVoices babbled and crackled. Kalvadek's voice was not among them.\n\nSuddenly, a blue glove grabbed Marisa's shoulder. She nearly elbowed the cop in the face. It was the [[Chief Constable|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_constabulary"]].\n\n"Fuck," Marisa gasped, shaking from head to toe.\n\n"Stand down," he said. "You hear me, contractor? Stand the Hades down now!"\n\n"Sir, I--" Marisa swallowed and, without thinking, lowered her [[KRUG|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_vindel"]].\n\nThere was no round in the chamber-clamp anyways. Even if Marisa had flipped the safety and pulled the trigger, the gun would simply have cycled the first round into the coils. She breathed a laugh and showed the Chief.\n\n"Stars, you've got balls, contractor." He eased her away from the cyber, saying, "Now stand down. CIVL in command now."\n\n"Yeah," Marisa muttered, too overwhelmed to think.\n\nLet the faith cops handle it. Sounded good to her cause fuck the faiths. And fuck the [[Cybercult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cybercult"]]. Or the cartels. Or whoever the hell had sent a cyber into their riot line. What was it doing there anyways? Trying to rile things up?\n\nOn the comm, Kalvadek was saying, "Team Five, do not lose that cyber. Whatever you do, do not lose--"\n\n"Too late," Marisa said. "CIVL is in control."\n\n"What? No. Sergeant, I just told--"\n\n"Shut up, Kalvin." Marisa waved to her confused contractors. "Team Five! Grab the wounded and fall back. Faith cops are in control."\n\nKalvadek complained but Marisa did not care. She had just seen three of theirs be injured, maybe fatally, and the faith cops had assumed control. There was quite literally nothing more the [[Eighth|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]] to do except stand down as the updated contract stipulated.

One hour later and twenty minutes late, Karl hurried into the departure terminal of the E Sector docks with his bag over his shoulder. Olga's boots thudded as she hurried to keep step with her pull-case in tow. The wheels clattered loudly enough that passengers turned to look. Everyone else, of course, had rented bag-bots. Only free thinking fools like the Vindell siblings walked their luggage into the terminal by hand, which was a bit how Karl felt: like a fool.\n\nHe had scheduled to meet Mr. Acrel in a busy departure terminal and only now, as he entered the great hall with it's many boarding booths, salespoints, and last-minute shops, did Karl realize he'd not specified where they should meet.\n\n"Damn it," Karl muttered, looking around.\n\nOlga stopped beside him. "We're not late, are we?"\n\n"No," Karl said. "But I've no idea where he is."\n\n"So message him?"\n\nKarl shot his sister a dark look. \n\nShe shrank a head. "Oh."\n\nKarl nodded, expression grim. His only address for Mr. Acrel was a DarkNet inbox and the sub-net of the [[Cybercult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cybercult"]] did not sent data the way public networks did. It piggy-backed onto legitimate accounts, pretended to be authorized data, and sent messages on an unspecified schedule - it could take weeks to a year for them to arrive and, in theory, a DarkNet message might never reach the intended recipient.\n\n"Not good," Karl muttered, pretending to look for his transit booth.\n\nThere were hundreds in the terminal, each painted in company colors and some manned by uniformed employees, though most were shuttered. The big inter-stellar companies like Star Line had dozens of booths while the smaller ones only ran two or three. Passengers in formal suits and tour groups loose streetwear came to check their bags and head down, past the Customs checkpoints, to the ice-rooms. Many of those who came wore red robes but none looked like Mr. Acrel.\n\nKarl cursed under his breath and set a slow, innocuous pace towards the door to the private peer. Two Customs robots with big red stripes across their chestplates stood beside it and, behind, an uniformed official waited beside a scan-arch. Almost no one was headed that way except Karl, Olga. A man in a black robe came the other way.\n\nHe bumped rudely into Karl, whispering, "Vindell."\n\nKarl stopped short and turned. All he could see of the man was a clean-shaven jaw but the voice matched. It was Mr. Acrel.\n\n"Fancy meeting you here." Karl smiled, more relieved than he wanted to admit.\n\n"Yeah, yeah." The [[sanctioned hunter|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_abom"]] stepped closer, growling, "Who's the bitch?"\n\n"My sister," Karl said coldly.\n\n"Sister?" Acrel scoffed. "Mighty fine boobwork for--"\n\n"Hey," Olga snapped. "I can hear you."\n\n"So you have ears, freak. Wonderful." Acrel eased Karl aside. "I thought you'd come alone."\n\n"She can be trusted," Karl said. "She's the one who found your man."\n\n"Oh. Well, in that case, good news: your man came through as much as possible, given short notice. Isn't enough to get the full picture. Gotta go in physical to get concrete proof. Have a cyber lined up for that already but we got fragments from the sniffers. You won't like what they said."\n\n"I don't like what I'm hearing either," Karl said. "This was supposed to be a data job, not physical."\n\n"Tell the saints, Vindell. And listen to this: the clinic was an [[Athena|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_athena"]] front. Definitely doing black work but there's more. They were also sanctioned to do limited studies on [[black plague|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_bblood"]]."\n\n"[[Black plague|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_bblood"]]?" Olga sounded alarmed.\n\n"[[Black plague|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_bblood"]]," Acrel growled. "But it's not what you think. The [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] didn't sanction them to do whatever the Hades they did to that poor kid. They sanctioned them to run genome work on the populace of this station."\n\nKarl's brow furrowed. "Population studies? Why?"\n\n"Dunno but, based on the results, I'll wager a guess: fear of another plague."\n\nOlga laughed. "That's absurd. There hasn't been an outbreak of [[black plague|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_bblood"]] since the end of the old world!"\n\n"True," Acrel said. "And false. [[Athena|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_athena"]] ran the bloodwork and I swear by the stars we are all infected. Everyone. Everyone. At this very moment, we are carrying the plague, albeit in very small quantities."\n\nKarl had no idea what to say to that. He glanced at Olga, who looked equally shocked, and back to Mr. Acrel, whose lips were drawn tight.\n\n"Okay," Karl said slowly. "So what's that mean?"\n\n"Dunno," Acrel said. "But they ran the numbers and, apparently, for the math to add up, everyone they tested would have to have been afflicted for thousands of years, which can't be. Theory seems to be the virus is somehow passing from generation to generation, mostly asymtomatic. Whatever it's doing to us, it's doing it at a very slow rate, one so slow it's barely measurable over the coruse of the average lifespan."\n\n"Meaning: three hundred years?"\n\nAcrel nodded. "Your kind might see more effects, blood. Hard to tell."\n\n"No effects on me. Or anyone like me I know." Karl thought for a long moment. "You must have read the data wrong. If we were all afflicted--"\n\n"I saw what I saw," Mr. Acrel said. "Your cyber-man was working on this for years, apparently. Made me pay top price for the data but I saw the seal-cyphers. It was authentic. Straight off the [[Athena|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_athena"]] net and the conclusions was confirmed by two separate sources. Unrelated experiments. It's authentic."\n\n"Crike," Karl muttered. "But what does that mean?"\n\n"No idea," Mr. Acrel said. "That's why I need to run another op. Get inside that place and find concrete proof. But it explains why [[Athena|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_athena"]] was doing their tests here and, if the Corbeis are involved--"\n\n"The Corbeis?" Olga sounded alarmed. "What did they do now?"\n\nKarl shrugged. "Fund some sort of black research."\n\n"Maybe more," Mr. Acrel said. "Maybe not. Way your man said it, I think they were trying to artificially breed a [[Djinn|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_djinn"]]."\n\nKarl laughed. "My man said that, did he?"\n\n"Not in those terms," Acrel said. "He didn't believe the [[abominable arts|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_abom"]] were involved, if he believes in them at all, but I'm fairly certain Doctor Briaback was trying to replicate the J1N species. Except the bloodwork was strange. Not like anything I've seen. Entirely [[abominated|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_abom"]] and that's only half of it. It seems they may have a working prototype. The child. If--"\n\n"The child?" Olga sounded alarmed.\n\n"Never mind," Karl hissed. "Can we prove the Corbeis were involved?"\n\nAcrel shook his head. "But it was the daughter, guaranteed."\n\nOlga and Karl both said, "Xarena?"\n\n"I suppose. That her name?" Acrel waved the thought away. "The pattern matches with the image I showed you. And get this: she recently left the station on some company excursion. Announcement didn't say to where but a friend in blue robes owed me a favor and that favor said she is headed to [[Roke's Slide|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_cons_slide"]]."\n\n"Damn it," Karl muttered. "I was hoping we could head east."\n\n"My heart bleeds," Acrel said. "And word of advice: get off this station as soon as you can."\n\nOlga said, "But if we're all infected--"\n\n"The entire galaxy might be infected," Acrel said. "That's not the point. The [[black plague|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_bblood"]] is harmless, at least according to the data I've seen, but the robes I associate with aren't and they will want to ask questions. Make sure they don't get the chance. If this gets covered up again--"\n\nKarl held up a hand. "I understand. We'll follow up on the lead and, if it's true, Android Abe will tell the truth."\n\n"Stars be with you, friend." Acrel rudely pushed past them and set a hasty strut towards the exit.\n\nKarl watched the black robes go, shaking his head. "What a strange man."\n\n"Yes," Olga said quietly. "Who is he?"\n\n"Not here. I've a present to give you. Then we talk." Karl set off towards the private dock.\n\nIt was time to disappear and, luckily for them, Karl had bought his sister a starship for her tube-day so they could leave on their own terms. After Karl had searched the ship for bugs and wiped the flight system, obviously. The [[Church of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] did not allow corporates to sell luxury yachts without injecting their own code into what should have been private computer systems but that was how things worked in the west: [[Church Law|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] made it legal and, if it wasn't, the law would be quickly rewritten so it was.\n\nAnything, everything, to stem the tide of so-called subversive elements who were alledgedly everywhere, in every social circle, preying on the civilized galaxy like vultures. Karl did not disbelieve that such threats existed. Quite the opposit, in fact: he knew they did. Except the faiths weren't targeting them. They were targeting people like Karl and Olga: educated individuals who wanted to spread the message of the [[Cybercult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cybercult"]] to all and usher in a new age of free information for all humankind.

<h3>General: </h3>\n-on l8r edit: check usage of "old gods" to be consistent w. religion vs science lore\n-later edit: more info on various ship / equipment info (i.e what it does, what weapons it carries, etc) scattered across scenes where appropriate; part of showing of worldbuilding work and tech advances as story moves alon\n-make sure gravity generators are explained somewhere\n-mention cruise versus mil power fuel loads\n-mention basic spaceship maneuvers (hook, turn tail, etc)\n\n-wide image style renders wrong on mobile resolutions (CSS issue)\n\n-arc concept: a galaxy traumatized by it's past endures "A galaxy torn apart and traumatized, it's people haunted by the specter of the bygone golden age."\n\n<h3>Wiki Articles: </h3>\n- redo last two cabalist images\n- list ship dimensions!!!\n-- starship class discussion - why done this way?\n- omnia 3: divide into mk1 mk2 mk3\n- emprania SAIC art -> clean up art to be less cluttered; figure out wot to do with interim fighters (separate article?); long rapir to rapir article!\n- bomb pumped xray laser article (and shaped nukes) in missile art!\n- strike craft art\n- Stations: rename!!\n\n-cabalist cult: 16 hands image\n-interceptor history\n-defensive model / interceptor tactics\n-thoughtless things re-lore entirely\n-fix warship designs: more info on failures\n-lore: periodic table organized by colors; lolly joke\n-shaitan: knowledge keeper (part of helians article)\n- ToP article is teeeerible!!! Clean up.\n- carnevorian movement\n- Deck plan: warship vs civilian\n- Holy & Dominion Fleet articles?\n- Shadow personality / Daemon article; lith\n- hip class articles\n- Algae Cube article\n- Flash article\n- Milk & Dairy\n- Grow-Plant article\n- security bot\n- re-add baroness as invasion carrier for the final dominion push? couple with the phantasm drone and a banshee control vehicle?\n- add dominion railguns to railgun article\n- redo: witches coven article\n\n- ngrep article\n- cyber / arc sword article\n-- prolly nano-assembly and shit\n- arc shields (part of shield article, or make new?) \n\n<h3>Other: </h3>\n- Light Theme

Grav-plates whined. The airframe wobbled. Visible on tactical wireframe, [[gravships|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_impl_buzzflies"]] descended onto the Level C15 landing pads in groups of three. A [[Constabulary|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_constabulary"]] [[grav-car|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_gravcar"]] circled the site, flashing a yellow triangle on the net. In reality, it transmitted auto-nav overrides and projected warning holograms, none of which Marisa saw.\n\nShe stood at the back of the cargo compartment, waiting impatiently for Team 5 to get it's slot. Voices squawked on the comm. Team leaders called status. Green dots blinked into existence on tac-net as riot sqads assumed blocking position around the landing pads. Only moments after the teams were clear, the first wave of [[gravships|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_impl_buzzflies"]] lifted off.\n\n"Ten seconds," the nav-gunner shouted from the cockpit.\n\nMarisa activated the team-comm. "Ten seconds. Stand ready."\n\nEngine whine pitched. The [[buzzfly|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_impl_buzzflies"]] decelerated hard, lowering the ramp as it came down. Air whistled through the cabin. Landing skids hit the pad with a bump. Everyone lurched about.\n\n"Ramp down," Rowdy's voice crackled.\n\nMarisa barked, "Egress! Egress!"\n\nRiot troopers stormed down the ramp and onto the pad. Marisa followed, counting heads. Eighteen were on the move. Two had paused at the bottom of the ramp: Rowdy, who struggled with his [[dazzle gun|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_impl_dazzlegun"]], and Tanbra who'd stopped to help him.\n\nMarisa slapped the girl on the helmet. "Shields in line! Move!"\n\n"Aye, Sarge." Tanbra grabbed her shield and hurried after the rest of the team.\n\nMarisa grabbed Rowdy's gun, saying, "Un-fuck that thing later. We're blocking the pad."\n\n"Sorry, Sarge. It's them damn straps. Got tangled in the cycler-cell."\n\n"Fix it after." Marisa jogged after the rest of her team.\n\nThey'd formed a ready-line behind the main force: three teams of twenty - ten shields, ten gas-gunners - who'd assumed loose a loose line along the edge of the landing pads. Beside Marisa, two more teams were moving to join the perimiter. Several meters behind, the Sergeants clustered together to compare holo-maps. Fingers pointed. Helmeted heads were shaken.\n\n"Oh, hell," Marisa muttered as she joined the knot of Sergeants.\n\nWhatever they were saying was drowned out by the pitched whine of twelve grav-booms. Three more [[buzzflies|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_impl_buzzflies"]] touched down to unload the blocking force and drone techs. Overhead, the [[Constabulary|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_constabulary"]] vehicle circled, flashing red and blue holograms in every imaginable direction.\n\nDown on ground level, the walkways were dark and quiet. No onlookers. No kids throwing cans. Chances were, they'd scurried the moment they'd spotted the [[Eighth|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]]. Felt good, Marisa thought, until she realized: the word was out on the net. In a matter of minutes, everyone in C Sector would know that riot shields had deployed, and suddenly Marisa didn't feel so good about the silence.\n\nOn the comm, Kalvadek's voice crackled, "Ladies and gentlemen, holos out. Preliminary tac-op."\n\nMarisa flicked out her wrist-projector. Data fed through her implant, into the suit, and out onto the fuzzy soft-light screen. It displayed a mesh-schematic of C Sector. The east corridor had been highlighted orange.\n\nKalvadek said, "Main knot is in the east and center corridors. West looks fairly calm. Blocking, you take that. Rest of you, into the junction here." He pinged a plaza where the east and center corridors merged. "Our main concern is a group that's formed ahead of the sanctioned parade. Word is the faith cops tired to talk it out. Didn't go well. They used gas and yearflares. Also, maybe desertion. Not sure how reliable that data-point is but they're faiths. Go figure."\n\nNot all of them. Rowdy's dad was a faith cop but he wasn't really a faith, not that the distinction mattered anymore.\n\nKalvadek was saying, "Group, deploy fast and hold the line. Do not advance beyond the junction unless the faiths move us up. That's what the contract's says. Any questions?"\n\n"Yeah," Team One's Sergeant said. "We get double pay for this?"\n\n"Faith law demands it," Kalvadek's voice crackled. "Now quit the crap. Any real questions?"\n\nTeam Four's Sarge asked, "Boss, just for clarity, we going mags in or out?"\n\n"Mags in, safety off. Standard procedure."\n\nMarisa checked her [[KRUG|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_vindel"]]. Magazine in, safety off, chamber empty. She left it that way.\n\n"Okay, group. You have your instruct. Stay loose and move out." Karvadek de-linked with a squeak.\n\nBeside Marisa, Team One's Sergeant shook his head. "No word from the [[Constabulary|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_constabulary"]]? Fuck me."\n\n"They're faiths," Team Two's Sarge said. "Go figure."\n\n"Yeah, yeah. Might be faiths. But still. They've got the real hardware." Team One's man strode off, waving to his men. "Group, advance to the junction. Thataways!" He pointed.\n\nThe line-teams began to move. Equipment jingled on it's straps. Boots thudded out of step. Riot shields wobbled in time with the pace.\n\n"Here goes nothing." Marisa drew a deep breath.\n\nHer respirator hissed. It was hot under the riot pads and it was about to get worse. \n\n"Team Five," she called. "Ready follow. Optics sharp. Let's move!"\n\nShields were lifted. Heavily armored contractors lurched into motion. Rowdy lingered, fumbling with the straps of his [[dazzle gun|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_impl_dazzlegun"]].\n\nMarisa paused beside him. "You good with that thing?"\n\n"Yeah." He clicked the straps back together and hefted the weaponized holo-projector. "All good, Sarge."\n\nMarisa patted him on the backplate and jogged after her team. "Left flank, match pace!"\n\nBulky armor creaked and groaned. Equipment jingled and thumped. To Marisa, they looked like the pride of the [[Hegemony|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]] - the finest, fiercest ideologues on [[Scaffold 22|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_scaffold22"]] marching in perfect ready-line. Only it felt wrong. They shouldn't have been there, not really.\n\nThe Fold was supposed to be a faith station. The [[St. Michael's Constabulary|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_constabulary"]] should have gone out to meet the locals but no. They'd called in the contractors, which could only mean one thing: the faith cops wanted to hold the heavy gear in reserve, just in case - in case the locals called for Red Mass, that was.\n\nThe mere thought made Marisa uneasy. Clerics draped in red, waving year-flares and riling up the masses to commit vandalism and violence. Hadn't happend for a long time, not since the Sestant had ruled it an uncivilized practice in the aftermath of the Gregorian Bloodbath, but everyone knew the [[purists|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_purifier"]] were keeping the tradition alive, complete with homemade firebombs and all. Except it wouldn't come to that. When the faiths saw the [[Eighth|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]] out in force, they'd all just turn around and go home.\n\n"Hopefully," Marisa muttered and checked her [[KRUG|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_vindel"]].\n\nMagazine in, safety off, and chamber empty, just like before. Marisa clicked the safety on. Regulation said that was improper trigger discipline but Marisa did not want to decide right from wrong in the heat of the moment. That was the path to Hades and, while the [[Eighth|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]] insisted one say hell, Marisa had a much bigger worry than ideal vocabulary: the very real chance one of hers might accidentally put live rounds down range without a sanction.

The walkways of Level C15 were eerily deserted. Saint's Day streamers swayed in the breeze of ventilation fans. Faded glow panels burned above locked doorways. Only a handful of locals had come outside to gawk with cheap ale-cans and data pads in hand but those few were enough. Within a matter of moments, the videos of the [[Eighth|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]] deploying would be shared to every channel and, within a matter of minutes, the media screech the inevitable:\n\n<i>Eighth versus Faith - Militarized Contractors Deployed Against Innocent Families!</i>\n\nWithin minutes, the [[Cybercult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cybercult"]] would have spun a sob story for the net and hammered the [[Division X08|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]] servers with bogus data. If they got lucky, they might even vandalize the company's virtual presence - the [[Cybercult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cybercult"]] was too chicken to do it in person. In fact, that was probably already happening, out there in the virtual world.\n\nIn the real world, cheap print-a-cups crunched underfoot as riot teams advanced towards Junction Plaza. Marisa caught a glimpse of silhouettes on the right, down a dark one-way passage. Digital enhancement revealed six kids in hoodies and baggy pants. One of the girls, who couldn't have been older than twelve, wore a FVCK EDEN shirt. She cheered half-heartedly at the sight of the [[Eighth|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]]. A boy in a red greasecoat clapped sarcastically. Everyone laughed as they handed around a bottle of neon-blue Flash.\n\n"Hey, Sarge," Figtop's voice crackled. "Optics on underage drinkers."\n\nMarisa breathed a laugh. "You gonna log it?"\n\n"Already done," Figtop said. "Civil law violation."\n\nMarisa scoffed. "You're logging boozers on a contract deployment, trooper?"\n\n"Gotta get satisfaction where you can, Sarge. Founders say so."\n\nMarisa shook her head, gaze on the junction ahead, where the east and center corridors merged into the wider passage Marisa advanced in. Tac-net marked the maximum zone line in red: the far end of Junction Plaza, a little square cluttered with communal benches and family businesses. \n\nThe riot line stopped a hundred meters short, well away from the open ground. Shields formed loose wall across the corridor with a handful of shooters in back. Marisa's team stopped even farther back, spaced out so there was room for the medics and tech crews. The former set down their backpacks. The latter crouched and prepped tubes of micro-drones.\n\n"Heads up," one of the techs called. "Swarm out!"\n\nTech troopers pointed their tubes down the corridor. Disk-shaped surveillance devices zipped out, buzzing loudly. On the tac-net, little green dots zoomed off into the distance.\n\nThe comm crackled; Kalvadek's voice, "Group, got a report from the faith cops. CIVL teams are pulling back to your position. Three minutes out."\n\n"Copy." Marisa switched to team-channel. "We've got faith cops coming in. ETA five minutes. Line must've broken."\n\n"Oh, nice," Noshow's drawling voice said. "Faiths kicking faiths. I live for this shit."\n\nFigtop snorted. "Fucking CIVL. Can't even handle what they's trained to."\n\nRowdy, who stood beside Marisa with his big [[dazzle gun|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_impl_dazzlegun"]], asked, "We gonna render aid, Sarge?"\n\n"Dunno." Marisa switched to the command net. "C2, Team Five. Troopers asking if we assist or stand aside."\n\n"Standard procedure, Sergeant. Render aid only in extreme emergencies. Leave the faiths to lick their own wounds."\n\n"Understood." Marisa looked to Rowdy. "Render aid in extreme cases only."\n\n"Copy that." He flexed his gloved fingers.\n\nGrip-tex creaked. Pads squeaked. Rowdy re-sealed his gloves with a sigh. \n\nWorried about his dad, Marisa figured. It was a reasonable worry but there was no time to dwell.\n\nWarnings flashed on tac-net: the drones had found a mass of bodies in the corridor and, trying to distance themselves from the crowd, was a CIVL team of fifty in blue uniforms under white armor. Three of the officers limped along with the help of their colleagues. The rest were shielding them with batons - no riot shields, not even the round ones that CIVL used. Less than a hundred radicals with chem-lights and a blood-red yearflare had the faith cops running scared.\n\n"Optics on mob," the Tech Sergeant said. "Running analysis."\n\nDrones darted in for facial scans with little success. Anyone who didn't have a mask on had either painted their face or put on a scarf. Looked like local kids, mostly. The People's Pope's procession was way behind them, singing faith songs and wandering with star-shaped lanterns in hand. Smart-analysis counted thousands of bodies, children and elderly among them. Everyone had come out to sing, smile, and be one with the community.\n\n"Shit," Marisa muttered, thinking of Momma, then keyed the command net. "C2, Team Five. About the Pope's procession. Advise."\n\n"Stand by," Kalvadek's voice crackled. "Be advised that CIVL is landing faith shields momentarily. [[EXO heavies|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_exo"]] are on stand-by."\n\n"Say again, C2? Was that [[EXO heavies|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_exo"]]?"\n\n"Stand by. Checking." There was a long pause, then Kalvadek's voice, "Confirm that, Five. Six units. RIOT equipped."\n\n"Crikey," Marisa muttered.\n\nIn the distance, a muffled thud sounded. The drone-feeds showed three CIVL officers stumble. Smoke trailed from a side corridor and, a moment later, a mob of red robes and black masks rushed the faith cops with homemade clubs. They even got a few hits in before CIVL popped smart-gas and everyone broke contact, choking and gasping.\n\nMarisa keyed her comm. "C2, CIVL just got walloped by a [[purist|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_purifier"]] mob."\n\n"Understood," Kalvadek said. "Group, advance fifty mikes. Shields and shot-line."\n\nMarisa switched channels. "Heads up, kids. One hundred mikes. Advance."\n\nTactical overlay flickered as, farther up the corridor, another bang echoed loudly. The feed showed the [[purists|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_purifier"]] charging after the fleeing faith cops, brandishing their crude clubs and hurling homemade crackers. In back, someone lit a year flare. The blood-red projectile ricocheted off the wall and whizzed down the corridor, straight past the cops and over [[Eighth|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]]. Marisa ducked instinctively.\n\n"Incoming indirect," Team One's Sergeant crackled. "C'mon, boys. Advance!"\n\nHis men took the lead. Team Two and Three followed and, once the main line had moved, Marisa waved her contractors forward. As they moved up, CIVL fell back in disarray. No riot line. No buddy teams. Just exhausted officers trudging past in twos and threes. More than one [[constable|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_constabulary"]] was bleeding.\n\nFigtop laughed. "The faith on faith violence. Talk about irony."\n\n"Cut the chatter," Marisa snapped.\n\nThe [[Eighth|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]] had closed ranks and, aside from Marisa's teams and the medics, everyone stood shoulder to shoulder. In back rank, shooters loaded smart-gas canisters into their launchers. Tech troopers stood by with gas-discs, just in case. With all the commotion, it was hard to see what was going on and, beyond the riot shields, all Marisa saw was a chaotic blur of smoke and light. To add insult to injury, the drone feeds jittered constantly as they dodged homemade lasers. The only thing which was cleary visible was the blood-red yearflare which burned bright on optical and infrared.\n\nTeam One's Sergeant said, "Group, massive movement up here. Stand ready. St--"\n\nA deafening bang shook the front rank. Contractors planted shields with a loud thud.\n\nSomeone yelled, "Kinetics on!"\n\n"Kinetics on," Marisa bellowed.\n\nYellowish light flashed in every shield as nano-swarms buzzed out and formed semi-liquid surfaces. In the distance, kids in black hoodies hurled cans. Dozens bounced harmlessly off the shields. One span over the riot line, spewing sparks and firecrackers. A shooter stomped it out, shaking her head.\n\n"Stand ready," Team One's Sergeant said. "Hold. Hold."\n\nBeyond the riot line, voices chanted, "Zanex, Zanex, worse than bad sex!"\n\nMarisa shook her head. Idiots kids the lot. But they had heart. Voices cheered and jeered like they really meant it.\n\nSomeone up front yelled, "Brace!"\n\nRiot troopers braced their shields as yearflares and crackers bounced off them. One of the blood-red survival sticks landed beside Marisa, burning red-hot. She crushed it with her heel.\n\nUp front, the faiths were yelling, "Fuck the [[Eighth|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]]! Get some faith!"\n\nAn augmented voice boomed, "Bootlickers, bootlickers, gonna shit your bloody knickers."\n\n"Funny," Rowdy's voice crackled.\n\nMarisa breathed a humorless laugh.\n\nBeside her, Figtop stood on tiptoes. "Sarge? What's going on up there?"\n\n"Nothing," Marisa said.\n\n"Nothing?" Figtop laughed nervously. "Yeah, sure, Boss. Nothing."\n\n"It's just crackers, Fig. Stand easy." Rowdy rested his enormous [[dazzle gun|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_impl_dazzlegun"]] between his armored knees.\n\nFigtop nodded, fingering his coilgun. "Just stand easy, ey? Just--"\n\n"Exactly," Marisa said. "Stand easy, Fig. Think about your girlfriend. What was her name? Browelax?"\n\nStifled laughter sounded on the team-comm. Figtop groaned but took it like a contractor was supposed to.\n\nUp front, noisemakers and firecrackers went off at irregular intervals. Smoke billowed from homemade bombs and, every so often, someone shone a glimmering holo-unit in their direction. Nothing the [[Eighth|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]] and their full-spectrum [[riot armor|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_carmor"]] couldn't hande.\n\nThe same couldn't be said for the CIVL team, which cluttered around the aid station. [[Division|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]] medics and apothecaries in green-white tended bruises and bloody ears. Even farther back, a second CIVL team had assembled with round shields and blue-white padding - not [[constables|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_constabulary"]] but real riot cops with breathing masks, icy blue cyber-eyes, and dual-barreled canister launchers. Not one of them would move up, not as long as the [[Eighth|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]] was there to take the brunt. \n\nThat was how the deputee racket worked: make it looke like it was corporates beating up faiths and only send in CIVL once the situation had calmed, which was exactly what all the cameras would record, and they were already recording, that very moment. From behind darkened windows and cracked doors, from the crowds and maybe even a drone the tech team had missed. Everyone wanted to cash in on the chaos and they would if the faith censors allowed it - and, even if the net was censored, the [[Cybercult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cybercult"]] would somehow get the news out.\n\nDamned faiths. Marisa didn't know which ones were worse: the ones hurling abuse at the riot line or the ones hanging back while contractors took that abuse. On second thought, it didn't matter. Faith was faith and, in the immortal words of the Founder, Low Yonserrins, the only good faith was a dead faith.

He had done it! Numar had tossed his helmet on, strapped himself in, yanked the crash harness into place, and called his status - and then realized he'd forgotten to get rid of his cloak but it was too late to do that. The lander had already released and, with all four engines at max burn, everything shook too much to risk releasing the harness. So Numar sat where he was, gripping the crash-bars and breathing like he had been taught: slowly and calmly, even if he did not need the oxygen. It kept the panic down and Numar needed that.\n\nVisible through the vis-check viewports by the storm ramp, the stars spun madly. Glipses of flashes and blurs of light streaked past and, with every gut-wrenching evasive burn, the lander lurched about and Numar was thrown into a different portion of the harness. He felt like a can rattling around in a case but, in truth, his body could not move more than a milimeter or two in any direction. All he could do was cling on and focus on the clicking of his snythetic lungs. In. Out. Click. Creak. In. Out.\n\n"One minute," someone called on the comm. "Hold tight!"\n\nNumar was. Everyone was. The lander intelligence flew like a maniac, spinning and twitching as it rocketed towards something. Numar could not see their destination, which was somewhere below them. All he saw were the spinning stars and streaks of light. It took him a long time to realize what those were: plasma trails.\n\n"Stars," he blurted. "They're shooting at us!"\n\nKnight-Commander Meredine barked a laugh. "Nice of you to notice, Padre."\n\nNumar could not believe it. They were being shot at and the rounds were close, so close they could see the plasma streaks. It was unbelievable! Unthinkable! Had Numar known this was what it would be like, he would never have volunteered.\n\n"Hades," he gasped. "This is insane."\n\n"Hold tight," someone called. "Dustdown in--" The entire lander lurched violently.\n\nDebris exploded up from the floor and blew out the top of the ship.\n\n"Hull strike," someone called. "Emergency. Emergency. Lander Seventeen has lost rotationa. We are going down!"\n\nAnother voice crackled a laugh. "We are, brother. We damn well are."\n\n"Hilarious," Knight-Commander Meredine's voice crackled. "Brace, brace, brace!"\n\nNumar did exactly that, gritting his teeth against the Gs as the lander wobbled it's way down to the drop zone, wherever that was. There probably would have been a map or a briefing or something but Numar had missed it. Or been asleep. He did not know. He had no idea what was going on but he wanted it to stop! Now!\n\n"Impact," Knight-Commander Meredine yelled.\n\nThe lander came down with a deafening tremor that shook the deck loose. Great cracks spread through the chassis while, over by the bow, the storm ramp lurched out of it's fastenings, one of which had been blown clean out of the lander. Numar watched in shock as the ramp floated off into dead space, spinning slowly away from the surface of a landing pad.\n\n"Dustdown," someone shouted. "Go, go, go!"\n\nNumar remembered the drill: release harness, yank strap release, check helmet - still on - and stand up. His cloak tore a second time but Numar had no time to figure it out. He was busy fumbling his gilded plasma pistol out of his holster and setting the selector to safe, just in case. By the time he was done, most of the Grey Knights were already down the storm ramp. Only two remained: the Knight-Commander and a tech-knight who was lugging a case of swarm drones down the ramp.\n\nKnight-Commander Meredine helped him, calling, "Padre! Move!"\n\n"Yes, yes." Numar scrambled across the deck, bouncing in low gravity.\n\nHe'd been told to expect that and forgotten. There was no actual gravity here, only spin simulation. Move too far off what felt like the ground and simulated gravity became a free float because, in truth, there was no ground, just the spinning surface of an old cylindrical space station. Numar saw it outside, looming overhead like the inner circuit of Scaffold 22 and, when Numar ducked out of the lander, he found himself on a landing pad beside the smouldering wreck of their lander. Most of the left drive nacelle was missing and there were bolt holes all over the outer surface.\n\n"Stars," Numar muttered, glancing around.\n\nThe Grey Knights had formed something like a perimiter and were gesturing about madly, yelling on the comm. Numar did not understand what was going on. Aside from the frantic voices it was eerily silent on the tube. Nothing seemed to be exploding or blowing up, which was a welcome change of pace, though Numar did not trust it.\n\nSomeone had been shooting at them before and, when Numar looked up, towards the spinning stars in the distance, he could see plasma streaks zipping into the distance. Hull guns somewhere on the station, no doubt, though they were all on the outside. The inside of the great cylinder looked almost serene, a clutter of old world habitats surrounding an enormous hollow space dominated by two maintenance docks. One of them contained the bone-white hull of an Exarch-class cruiser and the other an assortment of hull segments that might have once been a troopship. \n\n"So this is the Borderpost," Numar muttered.\n\nHe had expected something different. A heavily amored clamshell station with torpedo batteries mounted in the open, perhaps, not an old world cylinder rebuilt with a handful of modernized systems. That was the standard borderpost template and it should have been used everywhere. But the only clamshell stations Numar could see from where he stood were way out there in deep space and all five of them looked to be badly damaged. Had those been the torpedo batteries? If so, the Sagitarius Borderpost was much larger than Numar had expected.\n\n"Padre!" An armored hand gripped his shoulder.\n\nHe turned with a start to see Knight-Commander Meredine, her face hidden behind a faceless mask.\n\nShe called, "You're looking the wrong way."\n\n"I know, I know. I--" Numar shook his head, lost for words.\n\n"Drop zone is secure," Meredine called. "Do you know where that transit mechanism is you mentioned?"\n\n"Ahh." Numar glanced around.\n\nHe did not recognize any part of this station but, then again, it had been ten thousand years since he'd been to the Sagitarius Stratum. He might never have visited this particular arrivals station before or it might have been changed since he had last been there.\n\nKnight-Commander Meredine shook him. "Padre?"\n\n"Yes, yes. I am thinking." He had no idea where to start.\n\n"We'll figure it out later. Quick. Move!" Meredine pushed Numar off the landing pad.\n\nHe stumbled along, confused as to what the rush was. Then he saw an enormous gout of flames burst from the wrecked lander and understood: they were in danger. They had been in danger all along and he had not moved. Because he was an idiot and had forgotten the drop drill: clear the pad as quickly as possible. Knight-Commander Meredine had told him that many times.\n\n"Blasted," Numar muttered as they ducked through an open airlock.\n\nInside, two Grey Knights stood ready with their big autocannons while, on the far side, the rest of the knights moved into an expansive arrivals area. The walls were paneled in white and bore excerpts from the scriptures in looping script. Definitely not the original furnishings, which would have been gold and brown sprinkled with wrought iron details. The only original feature which had survived were the flecked marble floor tiles and even those were out of place, the entire layout of the arrivals hall having been changed.\n\nIn the old world, great statues would have dominated the arrivals area, looming over the waiting areas and shops which invited travelers to taste the specialities of the Stratum, the greatest inter-stellar city of the old world, which was a terrible misnomer in itself. No station of the Statum orbited a star, though the bright balls of plasma would occasionally whizz past as they orbited the Great Devourer, an event that had been known as starfall and been used as an excuse for everyone to feast and fornicate in the name of the stellar divines.\n\nNumar had never appreciated that culture, especially not back in the day, but now it was gone, he found the halls of the arrival area uncomfortably sterile. Gone were the statues and boutiques, the sellers and the opulent travelers. In their place had been built lifting cranes and automated cargo bays that were stacked with hundreds of red and white cargo pods that bore the winged rondella of the Holy Fleet. There were so many of them that they stretched over a kilometer into the distance, where the arrivals area and the station proper began.\n\n"Stars, that's a lot of them," Numar said.\n\n"Aye." Knight-Commander Meredine stood beside him, her oblong plasma caster rested on her shoulder, and looked around. "How many torpedoes did they think they'd need?"\n\n"A lot, evidently." Numar shook his head, lost for words.\n\nThe Red Cardinal had always complained that the Machine Cult built too many torpedoes and too few railgun rounds but Numar had never believed it. The Light Lance Mk2 nuclear torpedo was an incredibly complex piece of equipment, a three thousand year old design that still cost almost as much as an interceptor drone to manufacture. It seemed ridiculous to think that the Padre Mechani had built too many of those and too few railgun shells, of which thousands could be built for the same material and man hours required to build one torpedo. But maybe he had been mistaken. Maybe the Holy Fleet did have more torpedoes than they knew what to do with.\n\n"Unbelievable," Numar said, pacing along the arrivals area.\n\nThe Knight-Commander followed, saying, "So, I just heard from the corporate drop-commander. Seventeen teams made it down in the landers and there's a few hundred drop pod groups scattered about, though no one seems to know where anyone is. They're asking where to go."\n\n"Yes," Numar said slowly. "I believe we need to go that--"\n\n"Get down!" Knight-Commander Meredine shoved him aside.\n\nNumar hit the floor with a thud. The Knight-Commander had aimed her plasma caster at the boxes of torpedoes and, for a terrible moment, Numar thought she was going to fire. That would not have detonated the warheads but, if any of the fuel tanks were breeched, the Paleform within would have gone off with an allmighty bang. Clearly the Knight-Commander knew this too, as did the armored figure which stood before the big torpedo boxes, aiming a breech-loaded railgun at Meredine.\n\n"Knight-Commander," someone crackled on the comm. "What are we doing?"\n\n"Uncertain," Meredine said. "Are we surrounded?"\n\nNumar did not think so but, now he looked, there were corporate contractors all around them. They'd seemingly appeared out of mid air and there were at least twenty of them, all dressed in grey and black armor that seemed to blur around the edges. Corporate commandos. Numar had heard they used photon-bending technology but he had never seen it. Nor did he understand. Why were the corporates aiming guns at them? They were on the same side!\n\n"Ahh, Knight-Commander? I think we should maybe stand down."\n\n"Aye. Suggest we do exactly that." Meredine lowered her plasma caster.\n\nThe figure before her did the same with their railgun. Long seconds passed. Everyone stood about uneasily.\n\nFinally, a voice crackled on the comm, "Knight-Commander. Fancy running into you again."\n\n"Champion," Meredine's voice said.\n\nThe voice groaned. "Please stop calling me that. And what are you doing here? We can't get through to the Boss. Too much interference."\n\n"We are here to, ahh, one moment." Meredine tapped her helmet. "Sister Seventile? Please contact TacCon and tell them we have located their black team."\n\n"Contact TacCon and inform, aye." One of the knights moved towards the entry area, pulling of an enormous communicator's pack as they went.\n\nNumar had not noticed it before but it was one of his designs! The EternuLink Mark 5 automated long range infantry communication sets, though clearly this version was not the one Numar had proposed to the Machine Cult. The pack was much bulkier, almost as though they had simply taken a soldier's seal-pack and stuffed a communications unit inside without bothering to create a shell that fit the components. Or maybe he simply did not understand military equipment.\n\nWhatever the case, Meredine was saying, "We believe it is somewhere on this station. The Padre was to show us the way but, as it seems, we are lost."\n\n"I don't know anything about," the corporate voice crackled. "My orders were to sabotage the station and that's what we did. No magical space doors anywhere."\n\n"I see." Meredine tapped her helmet. "Sister? Comm status?"\n\n"Linking now, Sire." The line clicked. "TacCon, Grey Command. We are on the station and have located your executive team. Requesting instruct. Link, over."\n\nThe line crackled with static. There was no response.\n\n"No luck, Sire," the comms knight said.\n\nMeredine grunted. "We need a plan. Fast. It is only a matter of time until the enemy tries to push us off this station."\n\n"Wouldn't count on it," the corporate said. "Most of the garrison was called away weeks ago. Only a skeleton crew and the auto-guns stayed behind and I think we got most of the crew."\n\nMeredine laughed. "You must be joking, contractor."\n\n"That's where it's at," he said. "No idea what the hell they were thinking but, a few weeks ago, just after the defense fleet deployed, the troopships came in and loaded everyone up. Then they headed off. No idea to where. We were too busy trying to figure how to blow this place up."\n\n"Oh no," Numar muttered. "Please tell me you did not succeed."\n\n"Depends on how you define succeed," the contractor said. "Station's still intact, right?"\n\n"I suppose," Numar said.\n\nThe corporate nodded. "So, I guess you are the Padre?"\n\nNumar nodded. "And you?"\n\n"Mr. Sutskal. We met on the Slide."\n\n"We did?" Numar did not recall.\n\n"Yeah," he said. "Gelled back hair. Pretty face. You must remember me."\n\nNumar did not.\n\n"No? Ah, whatever." The corporate walked up, his railgun cradled in his arm. "So, what's this thing you're looking for exactly?"\n\nNumar looked to the Knight-Commander, confused. "Am I supposed to tell him?"\n\n"Yes," Meredine said. "He is the General's man. The one who found you on Roke's Slide. Do you not remember?"\n\n"Not exactly," Numar said. "That was a long time ago."\n\nThe contractor shrugged. "Just tell me what you are looking for. We've been here a while. Bet we can point you in the right direction."\n\n"We need the, ahh." Numar clucked his tongue. "How does one describe? It is an archway, about the size of a large door, and it is silver. It will likely be in the central ring, though I do not know where and it may be it did not survive the, ahh, actually, that does not matter. Do you know what I mean?"\n\nThe contractor shook his head. "No damn clue."\n\n"Blasted," Numar muttered. "Okay, then we must go look for it and, if there is no archway to the junction here, we must--"\n\n"Wait, wait," the corporate said. "Junction?"\n\nNumar nodded. "Cosmic Junction. Does that mean something to you?"\n\n"Yeah," he said. "Found an old map that pointed to that. Figured it might be a power lead or something but couldn't find the damn thing. Sorry, faith, but it looks like it's long gone."\n\n"Unlikely," Numar said. "Where was it?"\n\nThe contractor pointed down the hall. "In the central ring, about thirty degrees around the circle. Isn't anything there though, just an old room the faiths were using as storage."\n\n"Then that is where we must go." Numar looked to the Knight-Commander. "Sire, I suggest we hurry."\n\nShe grunted. "Evacuated by troopship you said, Champion?"\n\n"Stop calling me that," the corporate said. "And yes. Several weeks ago."\n\n"Then we best hurry," Meredine said.\n\nNumar grimaced in his helmet. "Do you expect them to return?"\n\n"No. I expect the last cruiser group, the one they did not commit, to be sent in any moment now. The assault fleet will be exposed and most of our troops are on this station. We are vulnerable and they have nothing to lose except for a mountain of torpedoes."\n\nThe contractor laughed. "Damn, Commander. I thought they'd just run off but what you said actually makes sense."\n\n"There is no time to lose." Meredine waved to her knights, calling, "Brothers! Rapid advance along the lenght of the station. Champion? Lead the way."\n\n"Right, right." The contractor set off, saying, "Stay alert. There might be remnants creeping around."\n\n"An excellent idea." Meredine looked to Numar. "Padre, keep that gun handy. Just in case."\n\nNumar nodded, gripping Father's gilded plasma pistol tighter than ever. He had never used it in anger, only on the training range, and Numar hoped things would stay that way. But he was not going to trust good fortune, not after what had happened at Roke's Slide, and although he now had an escort of Grey Knights and corporate contractors, Numar doubted they would be enough. \n\nThe Sestant had already tried to silence him once and they would try again. Only this time they would send an Arbitrational Unit and just one of those mechanical menaces would be enough to wipe out an entire division of conventional soldiers, which was more than corporates and the Grey Watch had at the Stratum. The landing force numbered barely more than a thousand fighters and robots combined and, while Numar did not know how strong that was in military terms, he knew they would not be enough to stop a Paladin battlesuit.

Ahni stepped out of the bullet train, onto the platform of Outer Blocks station and into a surge of commuters. Employees rushed by with business-bags in hand. Robots laden with delivery boxes rumbled about. Over the heads of the crowd, a stylized holo-advert depicted the enormous bearded face of Lowe Yonserrins. \n\nThe founding father of [[Division X08|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]] smiled down at commuters, his weary eyes concealed behind an ornate pair of spectacles. Attributed to the giant talking head was the slogan: <i>Freedom in Mind and Market is the unalienable right of every corporate employee</i>.\n\n"So you say, Lowe." Ahni shook his head as he swerved through the crowd.\n\nAt the end of the platform, where it merged into the Outer Blocks station, stood two Syndicate 4 contractors in grey protective harnesses. Nearby, three bipedal security robots paced through the crowd, their scanners sweeping back and forth as they checked train passes. The crowd flowed around the robots, indifferent to blaring announcements of expired transit passis. Cubix Geometric Transservice would fine them after the fact - nine out of ten would be unable to afford the fine and the cost would be passed to their employer.\n\nContrary to the idealistic vision of Lowe Yonserrins, freedom to suffer from ruined finances was not in fact the right of everey corporate employee. The Comission had debated the matter and concluded that, if a registered subsidiary of the [[Corporate Hegemony|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]] could not afford to subsidize it's employees passes, then it was not a competitive business as envisioned by the [[free-market ideal|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_freemarket"]] and ought be bankrupted by fines - an unusually reasonable position for the corporate sector.\n\nFar less reasonable: the cacaphony of holo-glare and advert-jingles outside the Outer Blocks station. The commotion originated from dozens of consumer terraces that stretched into the distance, each built to a unique angular shape and situated above those below so that the terraces seemed to collapse into a central waterfall. Holo-signs along the water gleamed in the late-cycle gloom, advertizing hundreds of boutiques, cafes, restaurants, and culture-clubs. Pedestrians and customers thronged the terraces; dark silhouettes caught in the holographic glare. CubeNav directed Ahni straight through the crowd - and past three perfume shops he habitually visited.\n\n"Not today." Ahni took the stairs down the back of the terraces. \n\nAside from two leaf-rolling interns behind Midibuda Fashion, the stairs were dark and deserted. Ahni hurried down, towards the glazed facade of Outer Blocks 1, a six story hab-complex which reflected the gleam of the terraces. On the ground floor, outside the entrance, stood a security bot stenciled in Habahai Hab Consortium colors. The machine scanned Ahni when he approached.\n\n"Svati Security Group." Ahni held up his wrist.\n\nThe bot's scanner flashed green.\n\n"Thank you." Ahni stepped into the lobby of Outer Blocks 1.\n\nThe walls and delivery boxes had been mirrored, like the hab-block above. Light and shadow reflected on all sides. Ahni paused by the resident's board and searched for Miss Giulia Dyani. She lived on the third floor: Rented Unit 45. The presence-indicator suggested she was out.\n\n"Or so you claim." Ahni headed for the elevators - mirrored, like the rest of the lobby.\n\nWhen Ahni approached, an indicator flashed red. The elevator doors remained shut.\n\n"Oh, please." Ahni pressed his wrist to the call-plate. \n\nThe device chimed. "Welcome to Outer Blocks 1. Please state your request--"\n\n"Security injuncture," Ahni said. "Svati Security Group. Certificate follows." Ahni sent the data.\n\n"Thank you for requesting a security injuncture. This controller intelligence is licensed by: Habahai Hab Consortium. What is the precise nature of your injucture?"\n\n"I must speak with a resident and require elevator access to do so."\n\nThe device blurped an error-tone. "Direct elevator access may only be granted to employees of the Habahai Hab Consortium. Do you wish to purchase a single-use security ticket? The pre-negotiated contract between your employer and the Habahai Hab Consortium allows purchase of a single-use ticket for a premium discount price of ten thousand credits."\n\nAhni rolled his eyes. "You have to be kidding me."\n\n"If you do not wish to purchase security access to--"\n\n"Belay that. I want to purchase access."\n\nThe device chimed. "You will be issued: one single-use security ticket to Outer Blocks 1. Your personal, non-transferrable access ticket is valid for twenty-four local hours. The bill will be directed to the Svati Security Group, Petty Credit Department. Is this information correct?"\n\n"Yes."\n\n"Thank you for doing business with the Habahai Hab Consortium. Please be mindful of our resident's rest schedules."\n\nIn the corner of Ahni's eyes, a new message icon blinked. That same moment, the elevator doors opened. \n\nAhni loaded the access ticket and stepped into the cabin. "Third floor."\n\nMirrored doors slid closed. Machinery creaked and groaned as the elevator rose. Ahni glanced around nervously. His reflection looked exceptionally sceptical, which Ahni was - Habahai Hab invested in flashy veneers and sourced machinery from the lowest bidder. The elevator squeaked all the way up the shaft, until finally the doors opened with a chime.\n\nAhni stepped out, into a dim corridor paneled with cheap plasti-wall that concealed the mounting brackets for flimsy habitation units. Habahai Model H-111-A. It said as much on the exposed bolt-lock covers.\n\n"Amazing any of it holds together." Ahni stopped outside Unit R-43.\n\nResident: Miss Giulia Dyani. The announcement panel on the door insisted she was not present. Ahni tapped the buzz-button anyways.\n\nRather than buzz, the door swung open with a click. \n\n"What the--" Ahni gripped the snubber in his back pocket. "Hello?"\n\nThere was no response.\n\n"Svati Security Group." Ahni risked a step over the threshhold. "Is anyone here?"\n\nAgain no response, only a meter-long hallway shrouded in gloom. Beyond a door to the left, dimmed holo-light gleamed. Opposite, two closed doors - bedroom and washroom if the hab followed standard Habahai Model H-111-A layout. Nearer the door, a fluffy pink coat hung on a hangar above a pair of heeled shoes. A used towel had been carelessly tossed on the floor beside them.\n\n"Miss Dyani?" Ahni stepped into the hab-unit. \n\nThe door shut behind him with a hiss. Aside from the click of Ahni's shoes, it was deadly silent.\n\n"Strange." He stopped at the end of the hall and peered into the holo-lit room.\n\nA tinted window looked out at the terraces, reducing the glare outside to dim hues that reflected on a couch set before a low glass table. On a shelf along the wall were hundreds of little figurines, each shaped to resemble NetShow characters - which show Ahni did not know but he recognized the stylism. Opposite the figurines hung a bio-luminescent painting. A Xani Duos. Or rather: a fake. No middle management maid could afford the artwork of such an esteemed western [[fleshmelder|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_fmeld"]].\n\n"Apperances over authenticity." Ahni shook his head and tried the door opposite the sitting room.\n\nIt swung inwards, into a low-income bathroom: stained white wash-tube set beside a grey toilet basin. Opposite, the sink had been overrun by cheap cosmetic tubes. No hair-dryer. No beatuy implements.\n\n"Suspicious." Ahni carefully closed the bathroom door and moved to the next.\n\nBeyond it lay a bedroom, if a tripple-size mattress lain on the floor could be considered a bed. Cheap linen-cloths lay crumpled on the floor beside a small pile of unwashed clothes. Even from afar Ahni could tell the collared blouses and tight black skirts were cheap <i>Dress to Impress</i> knock-offs.\n\n"Fashion." Ahni tutted and pulled a pair of no-trace gloves from his breast pocket. \n\nHe slipped the elastics on, wiggled his fingers, and examined the cabinets along the side of the room. Pleasure-products. Off-brank socks. Panties wrapped around smell-absorbers.\n\n"Damned." Ahni glanced around, annoyed. "Where did you hide them? Where did you--"\n\nOut in the hall, the door clicked. Ahni's heart skipped a beat. He barely had time to draw his snubber before the footsteps reached the door. \n\nAhni aimed, finger on the trigger, as a woman in a pink bathrobe shuffled into his aimpoint. She had gleaming ruby-red hair and eyes so ringed with fatigue that she didn't even see Ahni, simply wandered into the sitting room and collapsed with a sigh. The couch creaked audibly.\n\n"Shit," Ahni mouthed, wondering what to do.\n\nOver in the sitting room, a chime sounded. "You have reached Dr. Naudrage, [[Talithrax Genetics|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_talithrax"]]. I am unavailable. Leave a message."\n\n"Good evening, Doctor," the woman said. "I'm afraid I won't be able to come in tomorrow. Extenuating circumstances. I'm sure you'll understand. I--" There was a pause. "If you need help with the formwork, do send it to my private account. I will have it competed by night-cycle. Thank you again for being so understanding, Doctor." The woman breathed another deep sigh. "Stupid man. A doctor should know how to fill out transfer forms."\n\nAhni, blood pounding in his veins, had come up with a plan: sneak out and announce himself properly.\n\nWhile he carefully stepped out of his laquer shoes, the woman's voice said, "Yes? Oh, yes, hello dear. Yes? Oh, but that was splendid." She laughed. "The [[Tranq|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_tranq"]] is setting in. I'll pass out soon. I love you too, dear."\n\nShoes in one hand, snubber in the other, Ahni decided on a better plan: wait until [[Tranq|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_tranq"]] knocked the woman out cold. That would give him ample time to search the apartment for evidence of [[witchcraft|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_covens"]]. It would be there. Ahni was certain of it. The glimmering ruby-red hair and the artwork in the sitting room had been dead giveaways. \n\n"The only question," Ahni muttered, "is where?"\n\nThere was no response. Over in the sitting room, the woman had dozed off. Her bathrobe had fallen open to reveal a red Bylada bra and matching string-panty. Ahni crept over for a closer look, stubber aimed just in case.\n\nGiulia Dyani snored quietly to herself, chest rising and falling in time to her shallow breath. She did not see Ahni, who waved a hand before her face and leaned closer for a better look. The lingerie was authentic. Bylada. Hand-sewn specialities which sold for a billion credits a piece. Well above the means of a middle-manager at [[Talithrax Genetics|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_talithrax"]].\n\nAhni clucked his tongue. "Now isn't that a surprise?"\n\nGiulia's eyes flickered open. She looked up at Ahni with chem-clouded eyes.\n\nAhni breathed a disapointed sigh. "You absolutley had to look, didn't you?"\n\nGiulia Dyani mumbled incoherently.\n\n"Yes, yes, terribly tragic." Ahni thumbed his snubber to subsonic. "I was almost on my way out. Almost. But I am afraid there's no alternative now, is there?"\n\nGiulia shook her head ever so slightly. A drowsy smile curled her lips as she drifted into a chem-dream.\n\n"Hedonistic." Ahni scowled, disappointed in Miss Dyani. "You know, hedonism is an insult to the ideal state but what do you care about your own beliefs? All your kind cares for is sex, orgies, and the female orgasm." He smiled sadly and aimed at the witch's forehead. "Do excuse me, Miss Dyani, but I am afraid you must make the ultimate sacrifice for the greater good." Ahni squeezed the trigger.\n\nHis stubber thudded. Blood trickled out of a neat hole in Giulia's forehead, dribbling past her over-inked eyes like tears.\n\n"Such a waste," Ahni muttered.\n\nHis gaze remained on the Bylada lingerie. Limited edition. Sold out within minutes. Would be a shame to leave such fine threads on a corpse. Doubly so when other more deserving women broke their backs and bank accounts for such treasures - Bylada limiteds sold on the grey market for a thousand times the original price.\n\n"Truly a shame." Ahni tucked his stubber away. "A crying shame, really, but that's why I shot you in the head." \n\nHer blank, unseeing eyes stared past Ahni. \n\nHe carefully relieved the witch of her bra, saying, "You should have been more careful, Miss Dyani. More aware of your environment and your enemies, like your sisters always preach. Basic precautions, Miss Dyani, but then what does one expect from a witch?"\n\nThe bloody hole in her forehead underscored Ahni's point: witches were too stupid to think.\n\n"Ah, well." Ahni sat beside the corpse with a sigh. "Connect me with Miss Tyo. Priority call."\n\nIn his ear, the Svati Group dial-tune sounded. Long seconds passed until, finally, the line beeped.\n\n"Hello, Boss?"\n\n"Ah, Miss Tyo. Are you presentable?"\n\n"Almost done. I'll come collect you in ten minutes."\n\n"Good, good. Listen, I--" Ahni hesitated. "How do I say this politely? Maybe I can't. You see, there's been an unfortunate turn of events. That preliminary investigation I mentioned? My investigation has revealed it to be related to murder."\n\nMiss Tyo inhaled sharply. "Murder?"\n\n"Two victims, to be precise."\n\n"Two?" Miss Tyo's voice squeaked.\n\nAhni nodded, gaze on the dead witch. "Two corpses. Directly related. A spat in the believer-quadrant which got out of hand, as I understand it. I will have to make a full report."\n\n"Of course, Boss. I'll send for the investigators and collect you in half an hour. Or did you want to cancel the appointment with the Chairmen?"\n\n"No," Ahni said. "No, of course not. Send for the investigators. I'll wrap this up as quickly as possible."\n\n"Yes, Boss. Be by in half an hour." The line clicked.\n\nFor a long moment, Ahni sat beside the corpse and wondered. He'd expected to find evidence in plain sight. Every [[covenite|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_covens"]] kept trinkets - tarantula cards, black tomes, and the sorts - to be admired and adored on a ritualistic schedule; mementos of the orgasmic moments she had shared with her sisters.\n\n"But not you," Ahni muttered. "Or so you want me to think, to convince me you are innocent, so to say, when in fact you are not."\n\nHis gaze wandered around the room, from the bio-luminescent painting to the figurines on the wall, and settled on the holo-light outside. Shadowed silhouettes moved on the terraces. Employees and executives alike, out to enjoy the night-cycle. Light. Laughter. Lust. Precisely where a witch would live: close to the pulse, where her hedonistic lifestyle would blend in.\n\n"Yes." Ahni stood, a smirk on his lips. "You paint a vivid picture of yourself. You gleam your hair and wear lingerie that suggests intimacy with an executive. Except you are not favored by the C-suite, are you, Miss Dyani?"\n\nWhen the dead witch did not speak, Ahni sighed. "Even from beyond, you try so hard to convince me you are like any other corporate lass, Miss Dyani. But you are a recluse like all your sisters and, if there is one thing in this room which does not match your projected persona, it is those--" Ahni pointed to the figures on the shelf.\n\nAt first glance, they had looked like characters from a nondescript NetShow. On closer examination, each and every figurine had been altered. One gripped a black diamond. Another had an eagle perched on his shoulder. A third resembled a knight with crossed swords. Each and every one a re-imagination of a card from the tarantula deck. 43 in all - exactly 43 figurines; the sacred number of the [[pseudo-scientific pantheon|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "rev_codex_pseudopantheon"]].\n\nAhni smiled sadly at the corpse. "You thought yourself to be so smart, didn't you? So much more cunning than those who might pry into your past."\n\nMiss Giulia Dyani did not respond but Ahni knew that was what she had believed. Every practitioner of [[witchcraft|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_covens"]] thought herself to be smarter than the rest - more individual and unique than anyone else in the galaxy.\n\nIn truth, all [[covenites|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_covens"]] were alike: bored young females who had become dissatisfied with their place in life and been inspired by their idol, the White Witch, to demand more from the corporate system than they had earned. \n\nIn that light, Ahni figured, killing a witch was almost an act of mercy - better to die beautiful with a bolt in the brain than to one day face the rude reality: the average [[covenite|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_covens"]] was nothing but an asset of the White Witch, an industrial espionage agent at best, a plaything at worst, and neither would be tolerated once the [[covenite|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_covens"]] conspiracy was exposed, one dead witch at a time, until the Chairmen became sick of the insidious poison they had allowed to pool in the veins of corporate society.

StimFuel was an inhaler-based stimulant produced by [[Athena Medical Incorporated|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_athena"]], designed to keep the average employee of the [[Corporate Hegemony|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]] awake and on their feet. The substance was generally not controlled, though sales were most common in the corporate sector. A similar compound was used by the [[Dominion|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_dominion"]] as a a combat stimulant, though their stims were injected intraveinously while StimFuel was inhaled. Due to it's prevalence in the workplace, StimFuel earned a reputation as the office worker's drug. It had no notable psychological effects, though it could lead to irritability and excitability when used excessively.

<<nobr>>\n\tEden, the Garden of Plenty, was a mythological place, concept, and notion in [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] dogma. It was also the name given to the network meachine-learning, AI-driven Globes of Eden used by the [[Church of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]], which was both a relic evolved out of the [[Astral Archives|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_sacred_astral"]] of bygone eras. The Globes of Eden were, though based in technology developed during the Golden Age of Humanity, an entirely modern-era creation of the [[Machine-Cult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_msmith"]]. The origins of the term are unknown as Eden does not relate to the [[Astral Archives|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_sacred_astral"]] in any meaningful manner, though the term Eden was at times romantically associated with the lush jungle-planet planet [[Earth|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_terra"]], the historic homeworld of humanity. Theologically, Eden was the modern-era counterpart to reverance of the [[Loving Stars|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_lstars"]] and, as conceived by the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]], believers were to transition to belief in Eden once more archaic beliefs have slowly been rain to lest by machine-driven enlightenment.<br><br>\n\n\tIn strictly scientific and technical terms, Eden was a distributed AI-network capable of autonomous data aquisition, self-regulated monitoring of itself and other entities, advanced statistical analysis, and something which resembled primitive machine-based thought. These qualities were historically used to run predictions of a likely future - more commonly referred to as the [[Sacred Scriptures|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_scr"]]. The network was composed of several thousand recordbanks on Temple-Worlds and Halls of Eden across the galaxy, linked to one another by what was believed to be a distant cousin quantum-entanglement, though the system did not seem to require exchange of material data to function - or, if it did, the exchange is so well concealed by the [[Machine-Cult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_msmith"]] that was not been observed. Each Globe of Eden was composed of several thousand individual cells, which were observed to be able to function as memory, storage, and computational units at once. The system dynamically repurposed itself by need, though it was known to be fragile and required constant maintenance by the [[Machine-Cult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_msmith"]] to remain functional. \n\n\t<h3>Official Church Interpretation</h3>\n\t<div class='HUD_CodexImage_Left HUD_CodexTallImage'><<print "[img[" + $codex.imagePath + "codex_machinepriest.png]]">></div>In [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] dogma, Eden was not a place so much as a concept of future-prediction which was represented in numerous Globes of Eden, a network which transcended human knowledge and insight, from which would be born a new golden age for humanity, reminiscent of the commoner's mythological conception of life during the [[Terran Empire|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_empire"]]. This conception of Eden, of a digital garden of abundant knowledge where all things known to humankind were kept and tended, was the official dogmatic conception. Following this theory, Eden could be seen as a complex, semi-intelligent modern recordbank. While the clergy maintained this position was the only proper interpretation of Eden, it was not widely accepted by members of the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]], most likely because it was too mundane a notion for such a divine and oft-praised concept.<br><br>\n\n\tThe [[Machine-Cult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_msmith"]] of the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] held a differing view from the clergy, namely that Eden was a divine virtual conscience which underlay all existence the galaxy. This interpretation leaned heavily on the Globes of Eden, which were maintained by the [[Machine-Cult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_msmith"]] and were known to be unstable creations cobbled together from ancient data drives. Their contained data-patterns fluctuated and faulted frequently. The [[Machine-Cult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_msmith"]] claimed that these data-faults offered glimpses into the divine nature of the universe. The more rational explanation, and the one which most [[Machine-Priests|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_msmith"]] was assumed to hold in private, was that such complex recordbanks were difficult to maintain and thus fell into disrepair. It was known that sectors of Eden occasionally became corrupted by bad data-entry routines.\n\n\t<h3>Eden to the Believer</h3>\n\tIn practical belief and sermon, in the prayer halls of the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]], at temple, in chapel, or at shrine, Eden was a manyfold concept which symbolically referred to the many plenties that humanity lacked and desired to have in the modern era. The underlying notion of Eden was one of abundance, of all-encompassing everything, and of spiritual pureness. Usually this was interpreted to mean a post-scarcity society, or a mythological future in which humanity was left wanting for nothing. There was invariably no clear description for how Eden was to be reached, attained, or achieved, and most believers interpreted Eden to be a state of being which could be achieved only through deep and profound enlightenment or a life devoted to the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]].<br><br>\n\n\tControversially, some sub-sects of the [[Church of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] insisted Edenwasis a place to which humanity will one day be led by a prophet - occasionally a [[machine-angel|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_paladin"]] - where all that was wrong in the galaxy would be made right. Numerous expeditions were launched by professed prophets to find Eden, though unsurprisingly none ever located the fabled world. Strangely, few such cults associated Eden with [[Earth|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_terra"]], a notion which was held almost exclusively by scholars and historians, occasionally the less technical-minded astrographer. All such views were in stark contrast to the position of the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] took on Eden.\n\n\t<h3>On Belief in Eden</h3>\n\tWhichever interpretation of Eden one happened to subscribe to, if any, it was a concept, place, and notion which was central to the [[Church of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]]. There was rarely a prayer uttered or a sermon given which did not make reference to the mythological plenty and abundance of Eden. Many believers dreamed of or longed for Eden, a place which was very unlike their physical reality, or a state of mind where the shackles of human existence no longer restricted them. It was held to be unlikely many would achieve such a state of being, much less find Eden if they believed it existed, but not many believers cared for this fact. To them, Eden - whatever it truly was - was seen as an abstract concept with no known real-world equivalent, a notion so pure and divine that it had to be cherished and revered even if it was beyond the human ability to achieve, as this was the only way humanity might better itself: to believe so firmly in a brighter future in the Garden of Plenty that such plenty might indeed one day come about.\n\n<</nobr>>

Hours later, everyone sat on the deck, gear and riot shields piled in grab-positions, waiting for something to happen. Nothing had. Everyone was bored, especially Marisa. She absently toyed with the straps of her breather and watched her team bet on a six month old [[recast|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_recast"]] of Blue Babes. \n\nThe contestans were a sight to behold, a collection of [[hybrids|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_impl_hybrid"]] whose only goal was to get freaky with one another. Some were soft and sweet like puppies, others big and chunky like rhinodons, and others yet completely alien. Marisa didn't care for it. Some crazy freakshow that made the producers trillions in bets and ad revenue. Except it wasn't just about personal preference, not anymore. \n\nA year ago, the faiths had instituted a blackout. Months upon months of no-comms. Only data allowed in or out had to be brought in physically and checked at Customs. The faiths claimed it was a matter of galactic stability but no one in their right minds believed that. Censorship was what it was, plain and simple, and the goal was obvious: drive so-called subversive shows off the net by making it impossible to turn a profit in [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] space. Blue Babes was one [[recast|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_recast"]] channels the clerics abhorred more than any other.\n\nNow the only copies of the show available on [[Scaffold 22|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_scaffold22"]] were re-runs accessible on premium feeds like the one Noshow projected on the wall so everyone could see. Technically in breech of contract but the [[Division|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]] had a special policy for Blue Babes: to consume was a way to support the ideology. Even Rowdy had chipped in. Marisa had not.\n\n"Aw, come on, Boss," Noshow said. "Minimum entry. For her, ey?"\n\nMarisa shook her head. She did not have the credits to waste on ideology.\n\nFigtop laughed. "Told you, Show. Boss-lady don't like Sondamba."\n\n"Oh, come on," Noshow groaned. "Everyone wants Sondamba. Just imagine what those tentacles can do, slinking, slithering."\n\n"Nah, nah," Figtop said. "Browelax is where it's at. I swears by that--"\n\n"Oh, go suck a faith," Noshow spat. "It's Sondamba. All the way. I mean, come on! Tentacles! Look!" He pointed to the projection.\n\nMarisa looked and saw something more important than the squid-girl. Kalvadek. He hurried up the line, swiping data to the Sergeants as he passed. Hands were waved. Voices shouted. Contractors scrambled off the ground.\n\n"Shit." Marisa grabbed her [[KRUG|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_vindel"]] and helmet. "Boots up!"\n\n"Boots up!" Rowdy nudged Noshow. "Shut that shit off. In line! In--"\n\n"Sergeant!" Kalvadek skidded to a stop beside Marisa. "What in the name of Had--" He winced. "Fuck."\n\nMarisa grinned despite herself. "Projecting your insecurities again, Boss?"\n\n"Up yours, faith. Here." He shared a data-chunk with Marisa.\n\nShe took it on her wrist-aug, saying, "What's the sitrep?"\n\n"Priority deployment. All companies. C, D, and E Sectors. Faiths and freeloaders on the march in the hovels. Thousands of them. We deploy to C15. I want you--" He rapped his knuckes on Marisa's chest plate. "--on ready watch. Behind the line. Sharp as a stick. Think you can do that, faith?"\n\n"Boss." Marisa waved to her team, shouting, "You heard the man. Mout up!"\n\nContractors scrambled to collect loose gear. Shield-gas teams checked one another's equipment. In the background, [[buzzflies|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_impl_buzzflies"]] thrummed to life with dull warbles. Grav-booms flexed outwards like the wings of an insect.\n\nKalvadek grabbed Marisa's shoulder. "Remember: no one past the line. You break the vow, it's on you, faith."\n\n"Yes, Boss." Marisa slung her [[KRUG|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_vindel"]] and snapped her rebreather into position.\n\nIt reeked of plastic and scrubbed gas. Breath caused the seal to flap. Marisa adjusted the mask and, satisfied it sat, pulled her helmet on. Digital feeds flickered to life. Static resolved into a smart-screen. Marisa glanced left and right. Peripheral tracking worked perfectly.\n\n"Team Five," she called as she stomped toward their [[buzzfly|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_impl_buzzflies"]]. "Status."\n\nAt the top of the ramp, Rowdy gave the thumbs up. "Team embarked, Contract-Sergeant."\n\n"Good. Sound off!" Marisa stomped into the gunship. \n\nVoices crackled on the comm as twenty riot troopers called status and slot for the squad-intelligence. The computer figured out where they were and what role to assign them once they deployed. For the moment they were just twenty bulked up riot contractors, crammed in between the fire resistant padding and surveilance-proof grates. Everyone gave the thumbs up. Marisa's helmet overlay ticked them off - twenty contractors, all green. At the front of the cargo bay, visible through the cockpit hatch, the pilots brought flight systems online. \n\nMarisa pushed past her team and stuck her head in. "Hey. You get a tac-plan?"\n\n"C-15," the nav-gunner shouted as he flipped switches. "Grav tunnel over the tramway. C2 says a crowd's coming up from the hives. You know the layout, Sarge?"\n\n"Grew up there," Marisa said.\n\n"Good. We're up in--" He toggled a big orange switch. "Thirty seconds. Hold tight."\n\nGenerators whined to live. Grav-plates warbled in the booms.\n\nMarisa turned to her team. "Thirty seconds!"\n\n"[[Eighth|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]]," someone yelled.\n\nEveryone echoed the chant. Marisa laughed. She'd hoped it would ease the tension but, in reality, all her laugh had done was ring in her helmet. Hollow and empty, like Marisa felt. \n\nFull deployment into the warrens. That meant things had turned nasty. Or maybe not. Maybe the [[Cathedral|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_cathedral"]] wanted to lock the march down before it reached critical mass, like the crowds had during the Gregorian Riots.\n\nFrom the cockpit, the nav-gunner called, "Ten seconds!"\n\nMarisa grabbed a handrail. Long seconds passed as the grav-plates whined louder and louder until, with a lurch, the [[buzzfly|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_impl_buzzflies"]] lifted off. In back, hydraulics heaved the ramp into position. The last Marisa saw of the outside world was a glimpse of the K-shield coming down before the cabin pressurized with a hiss.\n\nEngine noise dropped to a muted rumble. Gear clinked, swaying on straps and clamps. The gunship wobbled. Everyone who'd grabbed a hand-hold swayed on their feet. Everyone else stumbled and about and quickly remembered to hold on.\n\n"Hope like hell," Marisa muttered, watching the tac-overlay.\n\nIt showed twenty crudely rendered [[buzzfly gravships|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_impl_buzzflies"]] lifting off and zooming down a wireframe of the [[Scaffold 22|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_scaffold22"]] grav-tunnel network. The render gave no sense of where they were or what was going on outside. Not enough data on the tac-net. That would come soon enough, once they put boots on the ground, and it would only be a matter of minutes until they did. C Sector was a small enough place when traveled by grav-floater, or so the data said. Standing in the back of that [[gravship|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_impl_buzzflies"]], watching the counter tick down on the tac-net, it felt like the longest Marisa had ever waited in her life.

Shavah followed Father down the steps of the clinic, towards a brightly lit boulevard. There was barely anyone about and, all along the boulevard, boutiques gleamed and glistened with holgoraphic adverts that no one saw - the M Sector Boulevard had closed ages ago. Only the St. Augustine's Clinic and a handful of eateries remained in business and even those were all but devoid of customers. In fact, the only people in sight was a cluster of believers who had lain out their prayer mats around the local Shrine of Eden and now knelt for morning prayer, connected to the data-pillar via public uplink cables. More than one pair of lips moved visibly as they recited the morning's rites.\n\nAs Shavah and her father neared the shrine, a loud chime sounded. "Valued citizens, please keep in mind that the People's Health and Safety Plan is in effect. Always-on contact tracing is mandatory for all citizens who travel beyond their registered communal circle. Unnesessary transit it strictly prohibited. Violations are punishable by fine and civil penalty. Please refrain from unnecessary travel and apply for cybergnosis at your earliest convenience. Cybergnosis - bringing Eden to you."\n\nShavah glanced at Father. "I thought you said the plague cannot be contained."\n\n"That is the most recent analysis," he said. "It was only verified last night: current quarantine measures are having no effect."\n\n"So the entire station is infected?"\n\nFather nodded. "Or close enough it does not matter."\n\n"Stars," Shavah muttered. "What will we do?"\n\nFather laughed. "I only I knew. If only."\n\nShavah grimaced, gaze drawn to the the entrance to the public transit system. All trains had been shut down for commuters - they were instructed to use pod-cars instead - but the line still ran cargo around the station and so the security checkpoint remained, manned by two spindly security robots. Diviners, Father called them. Apparently they were cheap and easily mass produced, and Shavah could believe it. The bots were everywhere, on every walkway, in every passage, constantly alert for civil disobedience.\n\nThere had been some in the beginning, when the People's Health and Safety Plan had been implemented. The purists in particular had made a stink. There'd been protests in the walkways, even a march on Cardinal Hall and, in the ensuing riot, two purists had been trampled to death by their own. The day after, civil liberties had been curtailed and, ever since, the diviners had been out and about. Apparently there had been complaints about that too but those had eventually died down as the reality had sunken in: the black plague was there to stay and it was getting worse.\n\nShavah had overheard Father the night before: cases of cybernetic rejection were on the rise, especially down in the low-habs, where the funds for medical treatment were scarce. Attempts to alleviate suffering had been made but the People's Clinics were under-staffed due to quarantine measures and, even if they had not been, there was little the apothecaries could do. Black plague was rarely fatal but brain rot and rejection syndrome could be and there were no cures, only hopes and prayers and, of course, the People's Gnosis Plan. It had been a complete success and yet, despite over two billion individuals qualifying and billions more funding their own pre-augmentation, the adoption rate was well below the expected two year target of twenty percent. \n\nThe culprit was the usual one, the same one which had forced the St. Michael's Constabulary to set up checkpoints on every level, the same one which had forced the diviners on everyone, and the same one that had made CIVL officers patrol in full exonetics armor, carrying military weaponry just in case. No one wanted any of that. No one had asked for it. But the purists had made it necessary when they'd made a stink and, to add insult to injury, they'd taken almost half the Local Councils in the last election.\n\nOn the upside: the reformists had lost handily to the Father's party and, with a red-blue coalition controlling fifty-nine percent of the councils, the People's Popes were predominantly sane and sensible men who had come around to the People's Health and Safety Plan. Only the rabble down in E and H sectors still resisted, categorically refusing to adopt any sanitary measures, which had led to the sections being cut off from the transit system, which served them right as far as Shavah was concerned. The purists were worse than the black plague and, to add insult to injury, they were the portion of the populace least likely to suffer due to the plage.\n\n"Bastards," Shavah muttered.\n\nFather glanced at her. "What, dear?"\n\n"Just the purist popes," Shavah said. "Bastards, the lot of them."\n\nFather nodded, expression grim. "But that does not need concern you, does it? Or did they mention you again?"\n\n"No," Shavah said heavily. "It's just so bitter: the black plague has fed their narrative and there is nothing we can do."\n\n"We can keep them contained," Father said. "I spoke to the Chief Constable last week. He agrees: we will not lift the measures unless proof of participation can be shown for over seventy percent of a local circle."\n\nShavah breathed a laugh. "The purists will never make that quota."\n\n"That is my hope." Father turned off, into the passage to the pod-car garrage.\n\nThe path was dominated by an enormous People's Health and Safety hologram which displayed the current quarantine measures and warned citizens that failure to produce proper documentation would lead to detainment. Two CIVL officers in bulky blue exonetics armor stood on the far side of the glowing screen.\n\nAs they approached the checkpoint, Father called, "Good day, officers. How goes the watch?"\n\n"Morning, Cardinal," one of them droned back. "Well enough. You?"\n\n"A splendid day. Splendid." Father smiled and strode out onto the parking lot.\n\nDozens of pod-cars stood in neat rows. A trio of diviners paced up and down between the cars, their sensors twitching back and forth while, over in the corner, a third CIVL officer stood with two men who had been cuffed to a park-bar. One of them had a bloody nose, the other a bruised eye, and both wore the black and yellow headband of the purist cult. The sight made Shavah wrinkle her nose in disgust. Lowlifes the lot, too poor to afford a transit permit but too good to comply with public health regulations.\n\n"Do what's right," Shavah muttered as she approached Father's pod-car.\n\nHe shot her a stern look as she got in. Shavah rolled her eyes and settled in the passenger's seat.\n\nFather got in and shut the door, gaze on Shavah. "What did you say before?"\n\n"Nothing," she said. "Just do what's right."\n\nHe breathed a humorless laugh. "Do you mean to antagonize me?"\n\n"No. I meant them." She nodded to the chained-up lowlifes.\n\nFather looked over his shoulder. "Oh. I see." There was a moment's pause. "Is that what you think of them?"\n\nShavah shot her Father a telling look. He knew exactly what she thought of luddites.\n\nHe pursed his lips. "As your father, I am of course concerned when such inflamatory statements pass my daughter's lips."\n\n"Oh, right. Because I'm the one you're worried about."\n\nFather shot her a stern look. "It is one thing to disparage the political failings of the purist. It is quite another to goad them."\n\n"Is it? I had not know."\n\n"Evidently not," Father said heavily. "Do you even know the origin of that phrase?"\n\n"Which phrase?"\n\n"The one you uttered."\n\nShavah's brow furrowed. "Had I said something? Oh, forgive me, Pater."\n\n"Daughter," Father said sternly.\n\nShavah rolled her eyes. "Fine, fine, and no. I don't know. Does it even matter?"\n\n"Origins always matter," Father said. "To know the origin of one's ideological opponents thoughts is to better understand them".\n\n"Why would I want to understand a luddite?"\n\n"Because they control the narrative and if the best we can do is mock their slogans, we will slowly but surely lose the councils to them. But, ah, one moment." Father tapped at the car's controls.\n\nWhen the interface came to life, he input the new destination: Magus Square. The vehicle hummed to life and trundled out of the parking lot. There were barely any other cars in the vehicle tube and, absent the glare of headlights and break lights, it was unusually dark out in the tunnel. Shavah stared out, watching the emergency signs zoom past.\n\nBeside her, Father said, "I do not need to tell you just how precarious the political situation is but consider this: your husband has not invited us to exchange pleasantries."\n\n"Oh, has he not?" Shavah blinked intently.\n\nFather's cybernetic eyes narrowed. "This is no time for your attitude."\n\n"Is it not?" Shavah shrugged and looked back out at the tunnel.\n\nFather breathed a faint sigh. "You are doing this to mock me."\n\n"Of course I am," Shavah said. "You have asked me not to mock purists and the irony is bitter, Cardinal. As bitter as your bedlife."\n\nFather drew a hissing breath.\n\nShavah shot him a pointed look.\n\nHe exhaled deeply. "So that is what this is about. I should have guessed."\n\n"Oh, please," Shavah said. "What ought I care what you do with Mother?"\n\n"I do not know, Shavah. That is what I am trying to ask."\n\nShe shot him a dark look. "And I am telling you: I do not care what you do with Mother. She will not speak to me anyways."\n\n"Ah. Yes. You see, she believes I have bribed my way into your good graces and this bothers her. She believes you ought see it as she does: I am a meddlesome man who has interfered with her life."\n\nShavah rolled her eyes. "What does it matter? Simply annul the banding and be rid of her."\n\n"I plan to," Father said. "Until then, I would appreciate if you could keep the peace, not quote inflamatory scripture at random luddites."\n\n"Scripture? That phrase is from the scripture?"\n\nFather nodded solemnly. "It is from the Gospel, in the Third Interpretation: see the light of the many and do what is right by the many. The purist cult believes this is a reference to the stellar cult and the commoner's cause. This is a misinterpretation. The light of the many potential destinies is what is implied."\n\n"Luddites misqoting our scripture," Shavah said. "Imagine that."\n\n"It is not a misquote. It is a political tool. To undermine the ideological enemy by using their terminology is a tried and true tactic. To illustrate, consider how the average easterner uses the worth faith."\n\n"Call the Eighth," Shavah said dryly.\n\nFather grunted. "Do you understand what I am saying?"\n\n"Yes, Father."\n\n"Excellent. Then explain to me why I disapprove of you using such inflamatory language."\n\n"Because I don't understand what it means," Shavah said. "I quoted our own scripture at them. I should have used one of theirs, which is all fine and well, except they have none."\n\n"Precisely," Father said.\n\nShavah shot him a confused look.\n\nHis lips curled. "The purist hides behind a cloak of faith that looks suspiciously similar to ours. Until recently, they did this quite literally when they wore the militant's red and this is how they market themselves to the masses: as one of us."\n\n"Oh, please. No one believes that."\n\n"Many do. More than you would imagine and that is why the purist has become such an insidious problem: we cannot use our own customs and traditions against them. The Sestant has dried and look what that has led to: the abolishment of time-honored tradition."\n\nShavah breathed a laugh. "Are you saying the Sestant is to blame for Mother's antics?"\n\n"I am saying that, had the Sestant not over-reacted so, there would have been no need to touch the time-honored triad of faith, fraternity and family."\n\n"Over-reacted? Papa, please. The purists openly assaulted the Cathedral."\n\nFather shot Shavah a stern look. "Are you willing to believe what the Cathedral claims?"\n\n"I do not need to," Shavah said. "Sevi told me. Armed luddites assaulted the Cathedral."\n\n"Or so they claim. Have you verified that claim?"\n\n"No," Shavah said slowly. "But I believe it. There was an armed uprising against the Sestant."\n\n"Was there?"\n\nShavah groaned. "Father, it happened. Everyone says so."\n\n"Yes, yes, I am not disputing that, but think about it: was it an armed uprising? Was that all that happened? Or was there more to it?"\n\nShavah thought about that for a moment and concluded, "I have no idea what you mean."\n\n"Then perhaps, after we have eaten midday meal, you should ask your husband about the situation on Scaffold 35. I would be curious to hear what he answeres."\n\n"I do not see why it matters," Shavah said.\n\nFather groaned. "Simply ask, dear."\n\n"Oh, Papa, but do see sense: as much as I love you, I do not believe that is reason enough to badger my dear banded man with your conspiratorial nonsense."\n\n"It is no conspiracy," Father said. "First the purists assault the Cathedral, then the Holy Fleet deploys to Roke's Slide, and now the Reformed Chapel attempts to break away. There is a pattern: the will and word of the Sestant so doubted that not one but two separatist cults attempt to split from the Cathedral."\n\n"The key word being attempt. Neither has succeeded."\n\n"Do we know that?" When Shavah did not respond, he added, "Should we believe the Sestant when it claims there is no reason for concern?"\n\nShavah bit her lip, determined not to reply. Father had made his point but she would never admit that aloud. To do so would have been akin to a confession and Shavah did not confess. She had no need to. The Sacred Machine already knew everything about her. That was the first step to salvation and cybergnosis was salvation. Without it, the human species would soon cease to exist, forced to regress into the state of biological primitivism the luddites so desperately wanted about and that was unacceptable, especially when Holy Eden offered a better option. And it did. The paradise of plenty was real. Shavah had witnessed it herself.

The Lux-class Escort Frigate was a small interdiction and escort frigate developed by the [[Church of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] during the Crusade of Eden. The vessel was designed in great haste to serve a dangerous gap in deep space combat operations: while the Holy Fleet had ample vessels to engage hard targets, it lacked a cheap patrol and escort vessel which could be risked in boarding operations, primarily to ensure that surrendered corporate vessels had in fact done so. The Lux was built on the [[Nebula-Galactic speedship|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_speedship"]] skeleton. The original cryogenics and recordbase compartments were removed and the outer skeleton expanded to make room for a crew pod, a boarding sub-craft, an advanced sensors suite, and a quad railgun system.\n\nThe choice of a pre-existing skeleton was made to speed construction, as all propulsion block units and the base skeleton could be bought as-was from Nebula-Galactic and the [[speedship|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_speedship"]] in particular was selected due to the vessel's exceptionally favorable acceleration, an unusual trait for a small vessel bult around a [[REACH|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_reach"]] core. Unlike the Nebula-Galactic vessel, the Lux was not an unmanned automated craft but instead was crewed by a complement of two sanctioned officers, making the Lux the vessel with the smallest complement of any [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] vessel. It could also carry up to six fully armed and equipped [[Knights of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_knight"]] in it's boarding deck though, when carrying a full passenger complement, the Lux could only operate for a few weeks.\n\nThe boarding deck was a standalone lander / boarding compartment which could be separated from the Lux if required and allowed landings (albeit not always a return launch) in conditions up to one gravity. The segment was self-contained and intended to be used in both boarding and light rockborn operations. Very often, the boarding deck was removed to make room for cargo or additional fuel or, rarely, a second sensors package for deep space patrols. Due to the vessel's small size and limited store capacity, it was not suited for patrols longer than a few months to a year but could be operated for much longer periods when properly supplied by the Holy Fleet. \n\nIn practical terms, and despite it's designation as a patrol and escort vessel, the Lux was an unusually large two man interceptor frigate which also happened to be able to perform inspection and boarding operations - the vessel was not in fact lain out for defensive operations as it carried no guided munitions and could not carry them on account of a sensors system which did not provide refresh rates that were high enough to guide a weapon into the target (in the 28th millennium, the Crysathia missile was experimented with and could theoretically be launched from the Lux as it was fully self-contained but, by the time the weapon was introduced, the Lux had left front line service). Instead, the sensors system of the Lux was optimized for [[farbound-length|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_farbound"]] detection at extreme ranges but only in a narrow cone ahead of the vessel - for any other orientation, the far less effective RADAR and LIDAR system had to be used, neither of which had been set up to provide high resolutions at anything beyond close ranges.\n\nWithin it's sensors cone, the Lux could achieve detection and threat identification at ranges which rivaled most conventional listening platforms and could do so from a mobile package, though for best detection and identification the [[REACH|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_reach"]] core had to be powered down. The [[REACH|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_reach"]] core could also be used in active ping mode as a detection method, though the Lux-class seldom made use of this feature. The core was intended primarily for short-range intercepts and interdictions, using short hops to achieve tactical mobility or close with disabled vessels that were already under the guns of larger combat vessels. The Lux was not intended for front line combat use and lacked the performance, firepower, and sensors suite to be considered a viable warship. \n\nNone the less, many Lux-class vessels did engage in combat over the course of the Crusades and proved one of the least impressive vessels of the Holy Fleet, often being out-performed by advanced strike craft like the [[Banshee-class fighter-bomber|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_fighter"]] of the [[Dominion|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_dominion"]] and - more embarrassingly during the Colonial Belt Conflict - the primitive [[Electro-type sub-frigate|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cfrigate"]] of the [[Colonial Corps|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_corps"]] which had originally been designed millennia before the Lux. The only benefit of the Lux was it's endurance and superluminal drive mechanism, which afforded better tactical mobility but came at the cost of all other performance characteristics.\n\nThese deficiencies could be traced primarily to the Lux's terrible armament and poor maneuverability at high G. While it accelerated hard, it had been built off a vessel designed for high speed transits, not high deflection gunnery and hard target intercepts, and the hastily repurposed skeleton of the [[Nebula-Galactic speedship|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_speedship"]] was not easily replaced with a MilSpec structure. The financial and doctrinal difficulties faced by the Holy Fleet during the 28th millennium would ultimately doom the Lux to remain a sub-par vessel that was increasingly put to use in an auxilary function and, far more frequently, sold off to Zone Control for use as a civilian patrol vessel. The design was never meaningfully upgraded, being deemed sufficient for it's intended role as a boarding and escort vessel even when, in pracice, the Lux often did not live up to expectation. Most use of the Lux would eventually be replaced by the autonomous [[Ophanim-class battle drone|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_impl_cdrone"]], a much more performant vessel in every regard, though the Lux would be retained for policing efforts until the onset of the New Era.

Today was the day of days, the one Shavah had dreamed of for years and had been looking forward to since the day she had been banded: it was the day she left her bloated biological body behind, once and for all. She had hoped that moment would come since onset of puberty and, for over a decade, Shavah had lain awake at night and fantasized about how one day, some day far in the future, she would finally leave behind the biological prison she had been born in. And she would. Today was that day!\n\nIt had only taken two years of preparatory surgeries and seventeen checkups by the family apothecary but Shavah had persevered. The Head Apothecary at the St. Augustine's Transcription Clinic had signed and stampted the formwork himself: certified for transcription at individual disgression. Shavah had of course booked the first available appointment and, now that moment had come, she could not quite believe it was real. But it was real. Shavah was really there, in the transcription chamber, a sterile white room that reminded her of the Leaves of Life, her favorite neuroden over in X Sector.\n\nShavah had not been back there since her banding and not because she'd wanted to stay away - she would have dearly liked to lounge in that place one last time before her biological self faded away. But there had been no time. Shavah's life had become so busy will all the medical procedures and mnemonic rites she'd had to complete to qualify for bio-simulation. After all, she was not merely to commune with Holy Eden like everyone did but to transcent biological existence completely, a complex and involved neurological process. Her mind had to be prepared as much as her body and Shavah had ensured she was as prepared as she could be, fully informed about the many risks and complications associated with bio-simulation. It was all very serious, most definitely, but all Shavah could think about was the outfit she had worn that day.\n\nThe long swishy skirt and blouse she'd worn to the clinic had never quite fit. The cuts were too loose around the waist, too tight around the thighs, and Shavah had hated how fat it made her look. But that would change. Soon. The machine priest had shown her only the day before and Shavah was certain: the outfit would fit her new bio-simulated chassis - it was not a body yet, not until Shavah inhabited it, which would occur within the hour. All the chips had been prepped and configured. The only thing left to do was pull the plug on her biological brain, move her cerebral cortex over, and that would be that. Her biological body would be euthanized and, as the technomagus had told her, it would be like drifting off to sleep and waking up in a body that actually belonged to her, not the flabby slab of flesh she had been born with. Only a few more minutes, until the sedatives set in.\n\nShavah tried to remain calm and stare at the symbols on the ceiling, like the apothecaries had suggested she do, but it was hard. She was so excited her heart pounded like a jackhammer and, for over a minute, she could have sworn the sedatives were not working. Then a bio-warning popped in the corner of her vision: foreign compound in blood stream. The chip in her chest could not identify the compound but Shavah knew it was the sedative. It had reached three percent concentration and, at four percent, she would pass out. The injection be administered until it reached six percent concentration, at which point her heart would give out and her body would slowly but steadily die. That dose would not be reached until transcription had been completed and confirmed to be a success - if the procedure failed, Shavah would simply wake up in her old body, disheartened and disappointed but otherwise unharmed.\n\nThe apothecary had explained it all to her: sometimes, transcription did not work on the first try and a second pass had to be made. That was why it was important to be calm and not panic, which Shavah was not. She was just excited, though her chest-pounding pulse had begun to lessen and, now Shavah took notice, her vision had become blurry. Everything felt fuzzy and distant and, the next thing Shavah knew, she awoke to a flicker of static. Her head throbbed, her mouth felt fuzzy, and breath came in shallow gasps.\n\nShavah's heart sank. She had drifted off breathing and woken up breathing, which meant she was alive and that in turn meant transcription had failed. Disappointed did not even begin to describe how Shavah felt. Dejected more aptly described it, which was also what her mood monitoring chip reported. It also detected traces of frustration and fear. Shavah did not want to admit that but it was too: she was afraid her mind would be found incompatible despite all the preparations the apothecaries had made.\n\nThat was always possible, they had explained, for biological medicine was an inexact science and even the best neurological study might overlook issues that would only be discovered during transcription. This was alledgedly rare but, given Shavah was still living and breathing, it was safe to assume there had been an issue. Why else would she have awoken as she had, in the same place, in the same room, with a dry throat and foggy brain?\n\nAs though in response, a muted voice said, "Sera Yeo? Can you hear me?"\n\nShavah could but, exhausted as she was, she lacked the strength to speak. Instead, she tapped the left side of the bed, as the apothecary had instructed her to.\n\n"Excellent." A man in a green sterile suit stepped into view, adjusting his gloves.\n\nHe wore a translucent face mask and wore a pair of surgical goggles that concealed his eyes. All Shavah saw of the man was his mouth. It did not resemble that of any of the professionals she had spoken to in the last days.\n\nHe produced a data pad and tapped at it. "Sera Yeo, welcome back to the world of the living. Can you tell me how you feel?"\n\n"Tired," Shavah mumbled, too disheartened to talk.\n\nTranscription had failed. There had been an issue. She was stuck in her bloated biological body and she would be stuck in it forever.\n\nThe apothecary touched her left shoulder. "Can you feel my fingers, Sera?"\n\nShavah felt nothing, not even the faintest pressure. Probably because of the sedative had not yet worn off, though Shavah did not know. She was no apothecary.\n\n"I will take that as a no," he said, gaze drawn to someone Shavah could not see. "Adjust conduction coefficient."\n\nSomewhere in the distance, something changed. What that was Shavah did not know but she felt the shift in her cerebral chip and, along with it, she felt gentle pressure on her left shoulder. It grew and grew until it began to become painful. Shavah winced without meaning to.\n\n"Pressure reaction." The man in green let go of Shavah's shoulder.\n\nThe pain vanished instantly, though her skin felt bruised, almost as though her arm had been stuck in a vice. It was deeply discomforting. \n\n"All seems to be in order," the man said, his gaze on Shavah. "Would you be so kind as to tell me where you believe you are?"\n\n"Where--" Shavah's brow furrowed with effort.\n\nShe forgot. No. She knew!\n\n"In the transcription chamber," she said.\n\nThe man smiled as much as he could in his mask. "Do you recall why you are here, Sera Yeo?"\n\n"Because I was to be transcribed," Shavah said listlessly. "The procedure failed."\n\n"Ah. Yes." He chuckled. "But no."\n\n"No?" Shavah did not understand.\n\nHe did not respond, simply grasped Shavah's left hand and gently raised it. She looked, confused, only to realize it was not the dark-skinned hand she had been born with. It was a slender white replica with the faintest of seams along the joints. Her fingers were softer than ever and ended in royal blue nails that bore the gilded crest of House Patel, the very same crests Shavah had chosen the day before, when the machine priest had asked whether she wanted her new self to come pre-decorated. \n\n"It cannot be," she muttered, staring at her hand - her real hand!\n\nThe man said, "It must be quite a lot to process at once, Sera, but rest assured: transcription was a complete success. How do you feel?"\n\nShavah shook her head, lost for words. She could not believe what she saw: her fingers, connected to her hand, which in turn connected to her arm and chest, and all of it was her. The new her, the improved her, the her she had chosen to become and yet, in that moment, as Shavah realized what had happened, it did not feel nearly as monumental as she had expected it would. Twenty two years she had dreamed of transcencence, convinced it would never come to pass, and now it had, Shavah was not even awed, much less amazed, simply stunned into silence.\n\nThe man jotted something on his data pad. "It is quite usual to be shocked but that will pass. Once you have grown accustomed to--"\n\n"It worked," Shavah said, turning her hand over before her eyes. "It really worked."\n\n"Transcription, you mean?"\n\nShavah nodded. It had actually worked!\n\n"The process was a complete success," the man said. "Why Were you given to believe it might fail?"\n\n"I--" Shavah's voice trailed off.\n\nShe had no idea what she had thought would happen. She had never thought about what would happen after transcription because, deep down, Shavah had never believed it would happen. She had thought she would be trapped in her old body forever. But she was not. She was alive and well in her new body and, as she slowly realized, she was not actually in the transcription chamber. She was in a room that looked very similar, lying on a bed very much like the one she had drifted off in, but it was not the same room. There were subtle differences in the layout of the ceiling tiles.\n\n"Stars," Shavah muttered, realizing it was true.\n\nTranscription had worked. She was in the chassis chamber and, as Shavah slowly sat up, she felt the fog in her mind lift to reveal a new clarity, one in which everything was more defined, more vivid, and more present than anything Shavah had ever percieved with her old senses. Real or simulated, with or without augmented assistance, her old body had been handicapped by the limits of the biological brain. Her new one was not and, as Shavah took in the room, she realized she could percieve it all at once, from the subtle crinkles in the man's sterile suit to the texture of the floor tiles, all of it was instantly apparent to Shavah.\n\n"Unbelievable," she said, trying to take it all in at once.\n\nThe man tucked his data pad away. "It truly is akin to a miracle, Sera, and that is that. You have passed every self-test and show all signs of proper neural integration. You may leave whenever you feel you are prepared. Should you require assistance--"\n\n"Wait, wait," Shavah said. "I can leave? Already?"\n\n"The procedure is complete," the man said. "We ran every test we could think of twice, just as the Cardinal insisted. Everything is perfectly in order and, as trusted technius, I see no reason to keep you here any longer."\n\n"Technius? Oh. I thought you were a surgeon."\n\n"Me?" He laughed and shook his head. "I am your trusted technius, Sera. Should you have any questions or encounter any issues, do not hesitate to contact me. Oh, and before I forget, it would be best you continue to commune with Eden at least once a day. The trusted network will back up most data via remote link but, to be safe, it is best you visit a data-chapel or link via a secure connection. Your father will no doubt be able to sanction one, should you not be able to visit chapel regularly."\n\nShavah nodded absently. She knew how gnostic backups worked.\n\nThe technius rubbed his hands. "In that case, I will step outside and let you dress in dignity, Sera."\n\n"Thank you," Shavah said, only half listening.\n\nHer attention was focused on everything - everything at once! It was unbelievable. Unthinkable! And, when Shavah realized she had not quite heard what the man had said, she was able to recall the exact words he had spoken, in the exact tone he had spoken them in. She had instinctively recorded that bit of conversation and cached it for quick-access, knowing intuitively that she would not listen and would need to replay it after, and her body had done it all without conscious input.\n\nShavah smiled to herself, so satisfied that she did not know how to describe it. The closest sensation she knew was that place she had often dreamed of in the neuroden, that place on the meadows, where amber flowed like water and the sky burned with passion. Only this was different. This was real and that was the one thing the neuroden had never been able to simulate: a genuine sense of contentment. Shavah had always known it was possible but she had never been able to experience, not once, not until that moment, as she sat on the cot in the chassis chamber, mouth half agape as though she had witnessed a miracle. But she had not. Miracles were a myth. Only reality existed and it was more beautiful and all-encompasing than any act of alleged divinity a poet or priest could have dreamed up.

<<nobr>>\n\tTevir Wine was a sweet, flavored softwine popular in the [[Terran Empire|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_empire"]]. It was produced on numerous agricultural worlds in the territories beyond the Galactic Core and found appeal with both commoners and nobles alike. Less prestigeous, short-aged batches were often sold at low prices or even given out for free at social events. The [[Astral Order|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_sacred_astral"]] in particular became known for holding wine-fests for the purposes of gathering and recording human experiences, which was noted to be considerably less difficult when whine and bread - or a local substitue - were provided.<br><br>\n\n\tLong-aged batches were a mark of the [[Solar Nobility|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_mlord"]] and often used in cooking, occasionally also for direct consumption on informal occasions. The compliment "well-aged tevir" emerged from this era and came to refer to not only a fine wine, but a member of the nobility whose cybernetic and biological aspects had survived the ages well. Despite it's popularity, Tevir was not seen as prestigeous as other alcoholic beverages by the [[Solar Nobility|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_mlord"]], in part due to it's general popularity and lack of exclusivity.<br><br>\n\n\tAs early as the 19th millennium, Tevir had become a rare, sought after drink which reminded of brighter pasts and better days. Few bottles survived the fall of the [[Terran Empire|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_empire"]], even fewer remained unopened in the centuries which followed. In the modern era an unopened Tevir was an extreme rarity, often a collector's item worth a small solar system's worth of collective value. Strict regulation of imperial artefacts by the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]], beginning in the 25th millennium, would only increase the value - and risk associated - with owning Tevir wine. By the New Era, every known bottle of Tenvir had either been opened or lost, though virtual reconstructions of the softwine were made based on historic accounts to satisfy common curiosity.\n\t\n<</nobr>>

Cycle-dusk had long passed by the time Shavah trudged into reception corridor Cardinal Hall. The pristinely white walls stretched on and on, the monotony only rarely broken by the odd tapestry. Once, hundreds had hung along the corridor, depicting scenes from the Helian Mythos and Hades alone knew what else. But Shavah had pruned them a few months back, just to make it absolutely clear that Cardinal Patel did not approve of heretical nonsense, because that was what the Mythos was: heathen pseudoscience from the pre-historic past.\n\nOnly the ones depicting the saints had been left hanging and only because, after Shavah had first taken them down, the corridor had felt cold and lifeless, as uninviting as Cardinal Patel was alledged to be by his political opponents. So she'd hung them all back up to soften walk to the Cardinal's door, that same old wrought-iron monstrosity plated with platinum seals and golden leaves that curled around the digital door interface.\n\nShavah waved a hand over it. "Father? I am home."\n\nThe door immediately released with a click. Hydraulics hissed, heaving the shielded slab aside. Beyond lay Father's pyramid-shaped chambers, six terrace of gilded data-racks which contained the sacred libraries of faith. On the bottom most level, shrouded in shadow, was a sitting area comprised of two couches and three armchairs. Father sat in one of them, facing the door, and nursed a large glass of something alcoholic.\n\n"Daughter. Come here."\n\nShavah shot him a look. "I am wearing heels."\n\n"So? It is only a floor. Come." He waved her over with a slender silver finger.\n\nShavah walked over, her heels clicking loudly. Father seemed to be staring at nothing until he shared his virtual environment with her. The moment she joined it, the air before him became cluttered with panels of data. Images, graphs, charts, and workbooks, all piled up on top of one another. He collapsed them all into the ground, leaving only one pane open: a long list of bullet points.\n\nFather slid it over to Shavah. "Do you recognize this?"\n\nShe glanced over the text and saw several phrases she recognized: <i>is mentally and physiologically inclined to cybernetic augmentation</i> and <i>performs a profession that is of meaningful socio-economic significance</i>, among others.\n\n"Those are the eligibility criteria for cybergnosis," Shavah said.\n\n"Are they?"\n\n"Yes. I recognize several bullet points."\n\n"Read more attentively." Father scrolled to the top of the document.\n\nShavah read the first five bullet points. They were the cybergnosis eligibility criteria. Word for word.\n\nFather shot her a sidelong glance. "Have you seen it?"\n\nWhen Shavah shook his head, he indicated the published date: GSY 26'480. Well over thousand years in the past and, now Shavah noticed, it was titled <i>Scheme ADVENT</i>.\n\nHer brow furrowed. "The Advent Scheme?"\n\n"I have no idea." Father swiped the document away with a sigh. "These were sent to me by Pater Blesius of the Reformed Chapel. Do you remember him?"\n\n"The man you spoke to last night?"\n\nFather nodded. "He wished to convince me of the reformist cause and made an interesting argument: the cybergnosis plan is not an modern invention, nor was it designed to be our salvation from the black plague. I do not know whether I believe him but he made an interesting case: the Advent Scheme was drawn up in preparation of the last war."\n\n"What?"\n\n"That is what he claimed," Father said. "The Advent Scheme was intended as a solution to wartime shortages and it makes sense. The greatest threat in any armed conflict is that to the civillian populace, especially due to shortages and over-stretched supply lines. The Machine Cult theorized that, if the main logistical bottleneck of the human, in this case food and water, could be removed from the equation, society would more easily be able to weather hardship."\n\n"And you believe that?"\n\nFather nodded. "It makes sense and it matches the pattern: an assault on the Cathedral, a rebellion in the east, and now we are to be on the front lines. The only plausible explanation can be that we are at war. Total war."\n\n"Surely not," Shavah said. "If we were at war, the Sestant would declare it?"\n\n"Would they?" When Shavah nodded, Father said, "And would they still admit conflict it if the greatest threat were not from without but from within? From fellow believers who have abandoned Holy Eden?"\n\n"Yes," Shavah said. "Why would they not?"\n\nFather shot her a hard look. "Would you admit to the public that your family falls apart?"\n\n"Probably," Shavah said.\n\n"Always the contrarian." Father sat back and fingered his glass. "The situation is bad. Very bad. Your husband knows this. He has taken it upon himself to speak to us, most likely against the orders of the Archadmiral. I do not know what to think of this."\n\nShavah shook her head. "Sevi would not do that."\n\n"I would not be so certain. After all, if the enemy is so close already, the listening circle must have been aware months ago. So why were warnings not given until the last moment? Why is censorship in full effect? Why do we not hear from the east? What has happened at Scaffold 35?"\n\n"I asked Sevi about that," Shavah said. "He said he did not know."\n\nFather grunted. "Do not trust that man, Shavah. He is a soldier and a knighted rank at that. His loyalty is to the the fraternity, not to family or faith."\n\n"He is also my husband," Shavah said. "And I trust him. I do not believe he has lied to me."\n\n"But he has," Father said. "He knew from the outset that there would be war. Why else was a man I could find it in my heart to tolerate candidated as admiral of the 13th? What else could possibly have motivated them to bring that relic of a fleet back from beyond the scrapyard, if not the acute threat of war?"\n\nShavah shrugged helplessly. She did not know but she was certain her husband was no liar. He was a good man. A military man, yes, but a good one.\n\n"It must have begun in the west," Father said. "How I do not know but it began with the purists. They may have only their populist politics but somehow, and I cannot say how, this has turned the reformists against the Cathedral. That explains why the red faction was elected into the Sestant: because there was already a war. The strike against the Cathedral was not the beginning. It was relatiation for whatever the Holy Fleet did at Scaffold 35."\n\n"That sounds rather far fetched," Shavah said.\n\nFather shook his head, expression sour. "Why else would the Sestant call for cybergnosis? Why else did they reveal the true extent of the black plague? The threat was known for centuries, since the Witch Hunts at least, but they remained silent. Until now, when they use the plague as an excuse to implement the Advent Scheme."\n\n"That makes no sense," Shavah said. "Cybergnosis is an incredible investment in the commoner. Why do that if we are at war?"\n\n"Because it must be done," Father said heavily. "Imports from the east have collaped. Already shortages are predicted. Within the decade, we will go hungry and, while cybergnosis cannot prevent that, it can and will preserve critical industries and an experienced workforce. More importantly: it will do so while simplifying our logistics. After all, power generation, is much easier to manage that the sheer volume of sustenance required to feed a populace."\n\nShavah shook her head. "The logistics of that make no sense. It will take decades to transcribe the entire populace. If there are shortages, they will come much earlier."\n\n"Yes, which means they expect the war to last long enough for these measures to be worth the investment. That can be the only explanation. It must be."\n\n"I am less certain. It would be economic suicide."\n\n"Ah, yes, but if we lose the war, that will not matter." Father rubbed his chin. "Yes, we will need to loosen the quarantie. Back to Phase 2. Allow augmented individuals to move beyond the local circle and create extra exemptions for those who have qualified for cybergnosis. Those purist cunts will make a fuss, of course, but we can tweak the data to show the measures as implented are working. The plague has not spread in the last two months and, provided bio-monitoring and contact tracing continues, it can be kept under control."\n\n"And what good will that do?"\n\nFather shot Shavah a bewhildered look. "Free the labor force up for the war effort. What else?"\n\n"Oh." Shavah had no idea what else to say.\n\n"But you are correct," Father said. "That will not be enough for those cunts, no, so we need to undermine their narrative. Make it clear their panic about the plague is overblown and that there is a way to return to normality, at least at a localized level. We loosen restrictions and play the panic as purist fearmongering done purely to gain votes in the last election. Yes. It might work."\n\n"If you say so."\n\nFather glanced at her. "You disapprove?"\n\nShavah shrugged and, after a long moment, sat in the armchair opposite Father. "Do you genuinely care what I think?"\n\n"I do."\n\n"In that case." Shavah pursed her lips, thinking.\n\nFather watched her expectantly. The corners of his mouth twisted into a scowl, causing his cybernetic face mask to deform.\n\nWhen Shavah did not speak for several seconds, he said, "Well?"\n\n"I think," Shavah said slowly. "That it is possible you are partially correct. Cybergnosis may be an earlier plan revitalized by the Sestant. That would explain how the Machine Cult was able to implement it at such scale so easily: the infrastructure already existed. The purists have claimed something similar, insisting this was an edenist scheme all along, intended to control the populace."\n\nFather grunted. "Always their lies contain half-truths."\n\n"Which we can now prove," Shavah said. "The Advent Scheme was clearly a wartime plan and cybergnosis is very similar but it is not the same. After all, we are not at war, are we?"\n\n"Not according to the Sestant."\n\n"Which is all that matters under Church Law. We could not enact Scheme ADVENT even if we wanted to. We are not at war."\n\nFather clucked his tongue. "Interesting. Yes. But that angle is too simple. Everyone knows we are at war."\n\n"Do they? I mean, yes, there are rumors. But, if the enemy is in our space, why are we still prentending this is just a borderspace incident?"\n\n"I do not know," Father said. "Last I heard, there was some incedent at the Slide and since there has been complete silence. The censors must be in overdrive, which I take to mean the Holy Fleet has failed completely and the Arthurians do not want to admit it."\n\n"Perhaps," Shavah said. "But does that matter? The political message is clear: cybergnosis is based on earlier plans, yes, but the purist claims are nonsense."\n\nFather grunted. "Does that matter? The cunts are right: the Cathedral lied to us? Stars, their solution is not even a salvation from the plague. They intend to drag us into total war!"\n\n"Drag us into it? Papa, but we are the ones being attacked!"\n\n"Oh, be sensible. The Holy Fleet first entered colonial space decades ago. They call it a peacekeeping operation but it is evident to everyone with a brain that was baseless aggression."\n\n"Nonsense," Shavah said. "The colonials were quite literally murdering believers in public. The Holy Fleet had to intervene!"\n\n"In colonial space?" Father laughed. "Stars, if only that was how politics actually worked."\n\nShavah shot him a bewhildered look. "So we were supposed to stand by while they murdered believers?"\n\n"No but that was not an excuse to invade, not that it matters now. The Sestant has played our cards for us. The enemy comes, whoever the Hades they are and whatever the Hades they want, and we will stand our ground. As you said: we are being attacked!"\n\n"Precisely," Shavah said.\n\nFather nodded and, after a long moment, looked to her, the hint of a smile on his face. "Thank you. I genuinely did not believe you would stand with me."\n\n"Of course I would. What did you think? I am like Mother?"\n\n"The thought had crossed my mind."\n\nShavah scoffed. "I am old enough to know what I want."\n\n"Yes. I had noticed."\n\n"Meaning what?"\n\nFather shrugged and raised his glass to his lips. He took a sip and set it down, gaze drawn to an invisible screen Shavah could not see. She had been silently removed from his virtual workspace.\n\nThere was a long silence before he looked at Shavah. "Was there anything else, dear?"\n\n"I only asked what you meant when you said you had noticed."\n\n"Ah. Yes." Father folded his hands with a strained smile. "I had noticed you are oppinionated, dear, now do please show yourself out. I am certain we will have much to discuss in the morning, once the many robes come barging in to demand whether we knew about the war. I shall require all the allies I can muster and, as Mother intends to abandon us, this may be the best time to shift the family image."\n\nShavah's brow furrowed. "You want me to hold your hand and smile for the cam-drones?"\n\n"If that is what it comes to, perhaps, but I would much prefer you take a more active role. Liaison to the Holy Fleet, perhaps?"\n\nShavah shot her father a hard look. Did he truly intend to parade her around before the Archadmiral?\n\n"Merely a suggestion," Father said. "I had other ideas also. That interview you gave with Paradisia was well recieved. Perhaps a bit out of touch for the common class but, ah, I suppose most of them will never qualify for cybergnosis anyways."\n\n"Your point being?"\n\nFather shrugged. "Simply an observation: you speak well before the cam-drones and are easy on the eyes too. And none of that glam-girl nonsense either. You are heartfelt and proper and I am not the only one who has noticed this. Paradisia has inquired as to whether you will speak about your transcription again."\n\n"I would be overjoyed to," Shavah said, thinking the exact opposite.\n\nFather glanced t her. "Would you really, dear?"\n\n"Do you mean to imply I might be lying?"\n\n"Far from it. We shall speak more tomorrow. Thank you." He gestured to the door.\n\nShavah smiled tersely and stood, well aware she had overstayed her welcome. Twice. And Father had not complained. He did not even mention the clicking of her heels and he always mentioned that, even when it did not irritate him. Shavah did not know what to make of that but, for the sake of her sanity, she would settle for the simplest excuse of an explanation: Father had simply had a little more than usual to drink.

Candles glowed along the dining room wall. Saint's Day stew boiled in the family pot. Momma served roast-chop with the big ladle. Beside her, little Jalko and his sister Fabra played NotGame on banged-up data devices. Pixelated lines curled and knotted across the screens. The broken speakers squeaked every time one of the siblings scored a combo. The kids yelped and played more frantically. Marisa smiled sadly, remembering how she'd loved that game.\n\nOne time, on a Saint's Day long ago, Papa had taken her pad away and told Marisa that holy days were for family, faith, and fraternity, not silly games. Marisa had been furious. She'd wished Papa would die, but not really. She'd just been angry and had blamed it on Papa. Then it happened for real. Now Papa's empty cushion sat on the flat side of the table, the embroidered image plain to see: Saint Arthurius, the flaming Sword of Justice gripped firmly in both hands, stallwart defender of the common man.\n\nMarisa stared at the spot, a hollow ache in her chest where her heart should have been. Saint's Day spirit did not fill her as it once had and seeing the cushions only made her chest ache more. It was uncomfortably silent at the table. No one spoke. No one smiled. It was so quiet Marisa could hear the water bubbling in the pot.\n\nMomma ladeled one last chop into Padric's bowl and gave her son the steaming stew. "You give thanks fore you eat, all right?"\n\n"Stars be thanked for what we have been given." Padric bowed his head, made the circle, and glanced to Marisa. "And you? Where's your thanks?"\n\n"Up yours," she muttered.\n\n"Dear?" Momma touched Marisa's hand. "Thanks is a blessing."\n\n"Not hungry." Marsia folded her arms.\n\n"Well, all right, dear." Momma smiled. "I'll say thanks for you at Chapel. Jalko? Fabra? Say your prayers."\n\n"Stars be thanked for what we's eating," Fabra said, not looking up from her data pad.\n\nJalko did it properly: set aside his game and did the circle like a good kid. The sight made Marisa smile. Momma had done well with Jalko.\n\nWhen he was done, he looked up and said, "Momma, why's Mary not have to say prayer?"\n\n"Because she's given thanks by making this meal possible." Momma smiled at Marisa. "Thanks, dear. Really. Means the world to me."\n\nPadric scoffed. "Accepted her dirty creds, did ya?"\n\nMomma shot her son a stern look. "Not at the table, Padric. We's here to give thanks to the saints. Not fight."\n\n"That ain't why she's here," Padric snapped, gloweing at Marisa. "She ain't even want to be here. Why you have to ask her to come?"\n\nMarisa rolled her eyes. Ever since Papa had passed, her brother had become like that. Talked back. Acted out. It hurt to see.\n\nMomma gently said, "Because Mary is my daughter, Padric. Like you're my son. We's family and--"\n\n"She ain't my family. Wasn't never and won't never be." Padric shook his head, eying Momma. "Can't believe you took her dirty creds over a blessed handout."\n\nMomma rolled her eyes. "They're just corporate creds, Padric. It's only money by another name."\n\n"It ain't." Padric stood, trembling. "An I ain't eating in no house that lets filth like her in!"\n\n"Padric!" Momma jabbed a finger at his cushion. "Sit down!"\n\n"No! Not as long as that--" He pointed at Marisa. "--is here!" \n\nMarisa glowered at her faith of an older brother. Thought he was a true believer, he did. Truth was he was nothing and, deep down, Padric knew it.\n\nMomma was telling him, "Oh, be reasonable, dear. It's only prayer."\n\n"Prayer?" Padric laughed. "Stars, Mum. You's blind. You know where she's gonna be standing later? At the People's Pope's parade? Cause it ain't gonna be on our side, Mum."\n\nMomma looked away.\n\nPadric scoffed. "Right. You knows it. I knows it." He glance to Marisa. "Ey, why don't you tell her where you's gonna be? In what colors? Sister Mary."\n\n"Padric!" Momma's lips trembled. "This is a holy day. If you can't keep the politics outside, then I doesn't want you around!"\n\n"Fine," Padric bellowed. "If that's what you wants--"\n\nMarisa stared at the floor. "It's okay, Mum. I'll go."\n\n"Oh, don't dear," Momma said. "We barely sees you at all."\n\n"And thank the stars for that," Padric snarled. "I saw your filth more often, I'd make you regret it. Sister Mary."\n\nMarisa fixed her brother with a hard stare. "Careful what you say. Real careful. Brother Padeus."\n\n"Oh, shag a rockmite!" He flipped her off.\n\nMomma snapped, "Padric! That is quite enough!"\n\nMarisa shot Momma a sympathetic look. "It's okay. I'm going. Send a star to Papa for me."\n\n"Of course, Dear, and you don't need to go, you know."\n\n"I do." Marisa patted Jalko on the head. "You be a good kid, J. Look after your little sis. And don't beat them too hard."\n\nJalko hugged Marisa's arm. "Do you really gotta go, Mary? You just got here!"\n\n"I do. Sorry, J." Marisa forced a pained smile and stood.\n\nFabra played NotGame furiously, tugging on Jalko's arm. Without the second player, the game was going badly. Jalko picked up his data-pad but his eyes were on Marisa, not the game.\n\n"Love you all." Marisa drew a deep breath and turned away.\n\nPadric got in her way. His expression had become granite.\n\n"Padre." She tried to squeeze past.\n\nPadric held her back, hissing, "You're a disgrace. Momma deserves better than you."\n\n"Asshole!" Marisa shoved him aside.\n\nPadric fell loudly into the coat-corner. Marisa snatched her synth-jnacket from over his head and banged the door button. The front door snapped open with a hiss.\n\nOutside, a dimly lit walkway ran deep into the warren-habs of C Sector, the poorest sanctioned hab level on [[Scaffold 22|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_scaffold22"]]. Everyone who lived there was a believer and everyone had put their sandals by the door, just like Momma and the family. One pair did not belong: Marisa's black soft-soles. She slipped into her grip-textured boots. The auto-seals fastened around her feet.\n\nBehind her, Padric yelled and Momma shouted back. Marisa had half a mind to say something but there was no point. It was always the same argument, over and over, ever since Papa had passed. All because Marisa wasn't the little Mary she should have been and Padric resented that. Because he believed in [[Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]]. He genuinely believed in the paradise of plenty for all and how the sacred machines would solve all their problems, just like that.\n\nTypical faith. Too lazy to make something of himself but always able to complain. At the top of his lungs, just like every other lousy, good for nothing faith on [[Scaffold 22|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_scaffold22"]].\n\n"Fucking faiths," Marisa muttered as she set off, toward the main pressure corridor.\n\nVoices rumbled indistincly in the distance - families and fanatics alike out for the Saint's Day festivities. Up by the entrance to the sanctioned habs, ragged red banners hung from the support struts and, the closer Marisa came to the banners, the more the air reeked of swear and bin-ale. No one on Level C31 could afford real booze so they drowned themselves in cheap communal ale like poor people always did.\n\nThere were hundreds of them up ahead, gathered around the Shrine of Saint Allessa, where the booze-buckets had been set out. Not even a real communal. The local council had been taken over by [[purists|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_purifier"]] and now their thugs stood around their ale bins in red robes and black balaclavas. Barely concealed stunners hung at their hips and, over in the corner, a drunk had been forced onto his knees. One of the thugs had his stunner out while the other held the drunk's tongue.\n\n"Fuck me." Marisa turned her collar up and hastened pace, past the crowd and towards the tramway station.\n\nIt was only a hundred meters away and, from there, it would be a short ride up to the Boulevard. Marisa could not wait to be out of the C Sector downs. The walkways were sticky, the trash piled up along the edges, and everything reeked of piss and bad filters. Had been that way ever since the [[purists|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_purifier"]] had taken over, not that the last People's Pope had been better. In fact, it didn't matter who ran the place or what theology was dominant this decade cause, no matter which way one turned it, C Sector always reeked of filthy faiths.

The dishes came via a android which wore a black bow-tie around it's sleek silver neck. Embossed on it's left leg was it's brand name and, stamped on the other, the name of the restaurant. Shavah had never seen a serving android without it's spill-clothes before and, in a way, it felt like being served by a naked person. The thought made Shavah smile but she quickly stopped, just in case Father asked. He would not have been amused and he did not look amused.\n\nHe scowled as the machine lay his singed cut before him. "The servings have become so small, hm?"\n\nThe bot did not react, simply lay out Shavah's dish: a polished plate with twenty neatly-cut algae cubes on them. Salt had been strewn over half the dish and each cube had a little quick-scan tag on the side that informed as to the precise flavor and content, least the customer care. Shavah did not. She was not hungry and sincerely doubted she would ever feel hunger again. Bio-sims ran entirely on battery packs and sillica substrate, neither of which could be meaningfully affected by food. All that would do was taste good and, maybe, if she was lucky add an hour to the battery life.\n\n"Thank you," Sevi said as the android set a bowl of stew before him.\n\nThe machine nodded curtly and stode off. No comment. No customer appeasement. It's higher services must have been shut down to save money and make the machine more resistant to sabotage. There had been a lot of that around the Averti these last months - corporate spies trying to get onto the networks and the likes.\n\n"Well," Sevi said with a smile. "Solasta."\n\nFather made the circle above his singed cut and grabbed the silverware. When he cut into it, juicy liquid spilled out. Shavah watched it, uncomfortably aware of how squelchy organics were. She'd noticed that a lot in the past month but Father's taste in fine foods really highlighted it. The biological world was absolutely dominated by squicky, squelchy juices that leaked out of everything from the trash compactor to the food biologicals ate.\n\n"Strange." Shavah shrugged and popped one of her cubes in her mouth.\n\nIt tasted of nothing flavored with a hint of flour or wheat strewn with salt. Shavah had never tasted anything so bland and uninteresting in her life, which was exactly how cubes were supposed to taste. They were a corporate delicacy and, in corporate culture, foods which encouraged the employee to stop and savor the flavor were a waste of time. Shavah had never understood that but she enjyoed the taste of the cubes, especially the natural algae-flavored ones. It was like eating strings of plant that crunched and dissolved when chewed.\n\n"Mhh," Sevi said, spooning stew into his mouth. He swallowed greedily. "This is excellent."\n\nShavah smiled, too busy chewing cube to speak.\n\nFather grunted, slicing the last of his cut in two. He'd already wolfed most of it down and, as Shavah noticed, so had Sevi. She was the only one who'd dwaddled, taking ten minutes to chew down one cube - ten minutes! It had barely felt like ten seconds.\n\n"So--" Father dabbed his lips and set his napkin aside. "You wished to speak, Ser Yeo?"\n\n"Ah, yes." Sevi set his silverware on his plate with a clink and glanced to Shavah.\n\nShe grimaced. "Go ahead. I will be a moment."\n\n"Biological habits," Father explained. "She went to great lengths to lose weight in anticipation of today."\n\n"I had heard," Sevi said. "Oh, and I do hope the transcription went well. No issues or the likes?"\n\n"None at all," Father said.\n\nSevi glanced at Shavah. "Smooth and seamless, hm?"\n\n"Precisely." Shavah popped another cube in her mouth and chewed, hoping the men would stop talking about her.\n\nShe hated it when they did that, especially in her presence. Neither of them had come to speak of her but, because the unspoken rules demanded they respect the woman, they had to at least act as though she mattered. Shavah did not and she knew it but Sevi and Father still had to pretend she did or one would think less of the other.\n\n"You must tell me all about it," Sevi said. "I am curious--"\n\n"Later, later," Father said. "My schedule is pressed."\n\nSevi smiled tersely. "Of course, Cardinal. To the matter at and and I am afraid it is an unpleasant one: conflict may be upon us by the end of the season, perhaps sooner."\n\nFather breathed a humorless laugh. "So much for light conversation. Could this not have waited until my daughter--"\n\n"I am afraid not," Sevi said sternly. "The situation is dire and it affects us all, including Shavah."\n\n"Stars and saints," Shavah muttered.\n\nSevi nodded, expression grim. "Archadmiral Yentria has asked me to convey the situation in no uncertain terms and so I shall: it seems the enemy formation we have been tracking is headed here, to the Garian Gap. The force is composed of somewhere around half a million vessels, maybe more, and they have not responded to attempts to engage."\n\n"Meaning what?" Father sounded suspicious.\n\n"Several sorties were launched en route but we were unable to intercept or interdict this force," Sevi said. "There are simply too many vessels in too tight a formation to force a premature engagement on our terms. This was not seen as an immediate issue until recently, when it became clear their destination is not Sanctum Shipworks at Loth. They are headed here."\n\nFather grunted. He did not speak.\n\nSevi smiled tersely. "What I am saying, in no uncertain terms, is that by the end of the month, maybe next month at latest, the Garian Gap will be on the front lines."\n\n"What?" Shavah had not meant to speak. She clasped her hands over he mouth.\n\n"I concur," Father growled. "What the Hades do you mean on the front lines?"\n\n"Precisely that," Sevi said. "The war is coming here and it is coming fast."\n\nFather barked a laugh. "Were are millions of Galactic Units from the Divide. How can we be the front lines?"\n\n"Because that is the situation we face. The enemy has come here and, while their target is clearly the listening circle, they have already begun to split into individual maneuver elements. There are too many to track and, even if we could intercept, we lack the numbers to context."\n\n"But that is absurd," Father said. "If the enemy has come here, they will be cut off. Surrounded!"\n\n"In an ideal world, yes, but that may not be the case."\n\nFather's brow rose.\n\nSevi forced a strained smile. "The military situation is complex, Cardinal. I would not wish to bore you with the details."\n\n"Very well," Father said. "So what do you want from me?"\n\n"It is what the Archadmiral wants, not what I want, and Yentria has asked I convince you and your family to evacuate. The enemy vanguard will not enter the gap for a few more weeks and--"\n\n"Evacuate?" Father looked incredulous.\n\nShavah was equally shocked.\n\nSevi nodded, expression grave. "The 13th will hold the line, Cardinal. The 41st Sunhallowed has already commited additional forces to our line and, with luck, we will be able to stall the enemy long enough for the 5th Anointed to arrive. But that is not certain. And, even if the line is held, the Garian Gap will be a war zone. It would be foolish to remain."\n\n"Are you serious?" Father's eyes were wide.\n\n"That is the situation, Cardinal. For your sake and the sake of your family, I strongly suggest you--"\n\n"No," Father said firmly.\n\n"The women at least. I can guarantee transport to the Cathedral. The Archadmiral--"\n\n"Oh, enough with that lesbian," Father growled. "Who does she think she is, demanding I abandon my post? And who are you believe you are, Ser Yeo? Demanding I let you tear my family apart like that! Have you no shame, Ser Knight?"\n\nSevi sat back, visibly alamed. Clearly he had expected a different reaction.\n\nShavah quickly said, "What my father means--"\n\n"Your father can speak for himself," he growled. "And the answer is no. House Patel does not retreat, not like the Holy Fleet apparently has, allowing half a million vessels to maneuver into your rear. What the Hades sort of a strategy is that, hm?"\n\n"Incredible misfortune," Sevi said. "The enemy executed a close-formation maneuver and punched a hole clean through our defenses on the Divide. The 4th Anointed was unable to redeploy in time due to it's commitment at Roke's Slide and this allowed the enemy to transit here almost unopposed."\n\nFather scoffed. "So much for the Holy Fleet."\n\n"It is hardly unprecedented," Sevi said. "Crusade Group Center executed a similar maneuver in the last war and achieved similar success, taking the bastion Al Have Sidir and maneuvering all the way to Sol before the enemy could react."\n\n"So the enemy the Foreign Domain," Father muttered.\n\n"The Volunteer Legion," Sevi said. "As far as we can tell, they are stateless mercenaries employed by the corproates to harrass us. Evidently the capitalists have sent them on a suicide mission."\n\n"And the corporates?"\n\nSevi shrugged. "They are still maneuvering on the Divide. There is little to no chance they will arrive here within the year."\n\n"So the sector can be held," Father said.\n\n"That is the plan," Sevi said. "The 13th Sunhallowed will hold the line but that line may shift. It is entirely possible Scaffold 13 will come under siege."\n\n"Then we will resist," Father said. "The People's Militia has already been called up on account of--"\n\n"Cardinal, with all respect to the weekend warriors, but laser lenses, static torpedo launchers and sublight frigates will not deter the enemy. If they want this station, they will take it and, without the Holy Fleet, you will be cut off. Surrounded. Starved into submission. It will not be pretty."\n\nFather grunted, shaking his head.\n\nSevi clasped his hands on the table. "I understand your--"\n\n"No," Father growled. "You do not understand, young man. If you understood, you would not have come to me with such an inane idea. House Patel will not seek refuge. We will not leave!"\n\n"Ah, yes, but you see I spoke to Sera Patel yesterday and she has already agreed to--"\n\n"Typical," Father muttered. "So typical. She is free to go. Hades, she may even take my daughters if she demands, but I will not abandon my home. I cannot!"\n\nSevi bowed his head. "In that case I will accept. Shavah will of course--"\n\n"Me?" Shavah looked from Father to her husband. "What of me?"\n\n"You will be well taken care of," Sevi said. "I assure--"\n\n"No, no, no," Shavah said. "If Papa remains, so do I."\n\nSevi laughed politely. "But, love, that is not a decision you may make. You are my banded wife and I cannot allow you to remain."\n\n"I disagree," Father growled.\n\n"With respect, Cardinal, I--"\n\n"I said I want to stay," Shavah said. "If I left, I might never see you again, love. And--" Shavah glanced to Father, a lump in her throat.\n\nFather patted her hand, a grave look on his face. "Ser Yeo, my daughter has stated her desire and I respect it. You should too."\n\n"Of course, yes, but--"\n\n"No. This conversation is over." Father stood with a squeak of the chair.\n\nSevi did the same. "Before you depart, Cardinal, I must--"\n\n"What you must do, young man, is get back to that Archadmiral of yours and impress upon her the need that the Holy Fleet hold the Gap. I will provide whatever support the military needs, to the best of my ability, but I cannot and will not abandon my post. Someone must maintain civic order and it will not be you or your soldiers, Ser Yeo. It simply will not."\n\nSevi swallowed. "That was not at all what I implied. I only--"\n\n"You know my position," Father growled. "Daughter?"\n\nShe shot him a bewhildered look. "Father?"\n\n"Once you have re-aquainted yourself with your husband, we must speak."\n\n"Of course," she said. "Until later, Father."\n\n"Stars and saints." He made the circle and strode off.\n\nSevi watched him go, shaking his head.\n\nShavah smiled sadly. "You chose a terrible time, love. Mother has just insisted on an annulment."\n\n"So that is why," he muttered. "I had wondered. She did seem distraught. I thought it was because of what I said but--" He waved the thought away and sat in Father's seat with a sigh. "Stars, this is even more difficult than I thought."\n\nShavah stroked his arm. "You will do fine, love."\n\n"Perhaps but you do not make it easy when you side with him."\n\n"With whom? Father?"\n\nSevi nodded. "It was not long ago he was still Patre Nostre but now? Now you take his side and say you will stay. Why?"\n\nShavah shrugged. "It is the right thing to do."\n\n"But it is not your place, Shavah. You are my wife. An Admiral's wife. How will it look, if you remain in harm's way? And how will I feel, knowing you are in harm's way?"\n\n"I do not know," Shavah said. "That is not my concern. Papa is."\n\nSevi breathed a laugh. "He can manage on his own, I am certain."\n\n"That may be true but I will not abandon him, not like Mother and my sisters will, and they will. I understand why but I cannot. I--" Shavah gestured wildly, unable to explain.\n\nSevi shot her a sidelong glance. "Do you say this of your own volution? Or because Patre Nostre demanded you do?"\n\n"He asked nothing of me," Shavah said. "I simply see the situation as Papa does: the rats, the luddites I mean, are an even greater nuisance than before. To leave would be to give them would make it seem as if the Church abandons the people."\n\n"Evacuation is not abandonment," Sevi said. "Refugee allotment is to begin tomorrow. Many will no doubt leave."\n\n"As is their right," Shavah said. "But I cannot. I will not re-enact the Allessian betrayal."\n\n"The what?"\n\nShavah rolled her eyes. "When the Cardinals abandoned Saint Allessa to the Witch Queen. The rats have been quick to claim Father will scarper too. They insist the age of abomination is nigh and, given that the plague continues to spread, they are being listened to. I cannot encourage such nonsense. Think what that would do to my family. To us. To our future."\n\n"We may not have a future, Shavah. That is something to consider."\n\nShe shot him a bewhildered look. "Did you mean to annull?"\n\n"What? No! No, I meant--" His voice trailed off.\n\n"Oh," Shavah said quietly.\n\nShe understood. She'd not thought about that recently but she was aware that Sevi was a military man and that military men sometimes fell in battle - or due to horrible accidents, like Knight-Captain Brook had the year before. It had truly been tragic. Shavah had cried, if briefly, and eventually come to terms with temporal finality: what was done was done and no one could change that, not even the sacred machines of Holy Eden.\n\nOnly the future could be changed and, for the first time in her life, Shavah looked forward to a bright and hopeful future. She wanted to tell Sevi all about it, just as soon as she found the right moment. This was not it. Not yet.

Later that cycle, after Shavah had finished eating and told Sevi all about her transcription, they left the deluxe restaurant took the elevator up to the darkside concourse. Absent the crowds and with the waterfall turned off, it was eerily silent between the neat rows of street lights that illuminated the Sundown Square until the concourse turned up with the curve of the station and vanished from view. No one was around and, as they strolled past the Cyberpit, Shavah could not help but notice that the stairs were barred and the entrance sprayed over with graffiti.\n\n<i>See the Light - Do what's Right</i> and, splattered beneath it in big red letters <i>Bes Over Borgs!!!!</i>.\n\n"Rats," Shavah muttered, eyeing the scrawls with contempt.\n\nSevi did not hear or, if he did, did not react. His gaze was drawn to the opposite side of the square, where the gilded facade of the Leaves of Life had once stood. Only a few weeks ago, the neuroden had still stood but, apparently, it had since been shut down and recycled. All that remained of the place was a portion of the interior, visible behind a holo-barriers put up to keep curious onlookers outside and the big yellow construction bot inside. \n\n"Oh no," Sevi said as they neared the spot. "What happened to the Leaves?"\n\n"Shut down," Shavah said.\n\n"But why? I thought the influx of knighted ranks would tide them through the quarantine."\n\n"They might have, had the knighted ranks not been barred from entry."\n\nSevi shot her a bewhildered look. "Barred? By whom? The Knight-Commander?"\n\n"I do not know," Shavah said. "But there was an incident. Sergeant Kardika said it might have been corporate spies."\n\n"What happened?"\n\n"There might have been a neural splice. Kardika refused to say but it must have been bad because almost every neuroden was shut down by the end of the month."\n\n"That is unfortunate."\n\nShavah nodded. "I wish I could have gone, if only one last time, but there was no time."\n\n"Ah, well," Sevi said as they wandered on. "It will be a cherished memory."\n\n"It was a nice place."\n\n"Not quite the word I would use but I am glad I experienced it. These days, I suppose, there is nothing like that, is there?"\n\nShavah shook her head. "Only the shrines of Eden and those are not the same."\n\n"Yes," Sevi said heavily. "I cannot imagine the Machine Cult wants it's network to be used for sex."\n\n"Oh, I doubt they care," Shavah said. "At least not the machine priests. Quite perverted, the lot."\n\nSevi shot her a bewhildered look. "Ought I be concerned for my banded wife?"\n\n"Hardly," Shavah said. "I was simly told a trick or two after I mentioned I had been to the leaves. Apparently, there are private networks within the trusted network and not all of them are quite as sacred as the Padre Mechani have led us to believe."\n\n"Stars," Sevi muttered and, after a long moment, said, "Is that true?"\n\nShavah nodded, lips drawn tight.\n\n"So it is true," he said quietly. "My banded wife is a neural whore."\n\nShavah shot her husband a hard look.\n\n"Oh, do not be sour," Sevi said. "You are thought of quite fondly among the command staff. My adjutant constantly asks about you."\n\n"Beon?"\n\n"Yes and, if I did not know better, I might think he took an unhealthy interest in my wife."\n\nShavah stifled a laugh. "Me? Stars! It is Father you need to worry about. He will not stop insinuating you are sleeping with Beon."\n\n"Well, would he be wrong?"\n\nShavah rolled her eyes. "We all love the Knight-Adjutant very much, Ser Yeo, but that does not mean one need let it slip around my father. Stars, did you hear how he spoke of the Archadmiral?"\n\n"I did," Sevi said. "He was not wrong. She has a wife and this does not go over well with everyone, especially not the Allessians."\n\n"Imagine that," Shavah muttered. "Father agrees with the luddites on something."\n\nSevi shrugged. "Old traditionalists are alike and your father is old enough to have known Saint Allessa in person."\n\n"Imagine if he had," Shavah said. "Even better: imagine if they had, well, you know." Shavah made eyes.\n\nSevi snorted a laugh. "Sera Yeo! What a vile imagination you have."\n\n"But instead he chose Mother," Shavah said bitterly. Her gaze wandered to Sevi. "Did you really talk to her yesterday?"\n\n"I tried to visit your father in person," Sevi said. "He was not in."\n\n"He was with me," Shavah said.\n\nSevi nodded. "Your mother mentioned. She did not seem to approve but I do not see her point. You look as beautiful as ever. More so than before, in fact, and this is what you have always wanted, is it not?"\n\n"For as long as I can remember," Shavah said.\n\n"Exactly. But she did not seem to understand this."\n\nShavah shrugged. "She has taken an unfortunate liking to the luddite's talking points."\n\n"Yes," Sevi said slowly. "They seem to have become an issue, have they not?"\n\n"They have," Shavah said. "Father is convinced there is something greater going on. He insisted I ask you of Scaffold 35."\n\nSevi's brow furrowed. "Why would he do that?"\n\n"I have no idea," Shavah said. "What has happened at Scaffold 35?"\n\nSevi did not respond.\n\nShavah shot him a sidelong glance. "Love?"\n\n"I cannot say," he said quietly.\n\n"Because you do not want to? Or because you do not know?"\n\nSevi shrugged. "Something strange is going on. I did not dare pry too much but, when the Archadmiral briefed us, she mentioned the 5th Anointed would not be able to reinforce and the 6th, if it comes, will come at half strength. Hades alone knows what has happened in the south but something has. I caught a glimpse of a data-board on the listener and there was a lot of movement in the Western Wilds."\n\nShavah pulled a face. "That bad?"\n\n"I do not know. I cannot say. Honestly, I do not want to talk about it."\n\n"Of course." Shavah stroked her husband's arms.\n\nHe shot her a pained look. "I am sorry, love. This is not how I imagined our life when I asked to band you."\n\n"You could not have knonw," Shavah said. "None of us knew."\n\nSevi nodded, expression glum. Whatever weighed on his mind, he kept it to himself and Shavah respected that. Military men and military matters. It was not her place to pry.\n\n"Stars," he muttered. "I wish I had known. I wish."\n\n"It is not your fault," Shavah said.\n\nHe shot her a pained look. "Is it? I allowed your father to continue his profit schemes. I should have reported it to the Archadmiral but I did not."\n\n"For the better," Shavah said.\n\nSevi snorted. "Better? Stars, love, the 13th Sunhallowed it at less than half strength. How is that better that a diplomatic spat?"\n\n"Because, had you challenged Father, you would not have any ships. You would have been denied your post and your wife."\n\n"Perhaps. Or perhaps not." After a long moment, Sevi said, "Do you truly think I did what is right?"\n\n"I do not know," Shavah said. "It is not my place to say."\n\n"But you have an opinion on it, do you not?"\n\n"I told you what I think before."\n\nSevi rolled his eyes. "You know what I meant."\n\n"No," Shavah said. "I do not, love. What do you mean?"\n\nSevi shook his head and walked on in silence so Shavah left it at that.\n\nIf her husband did not want to ask openly, she would not say, not even when she knew exactly what he meant: would Father have actually been petty enough to fight the Holy Fleet over the 13th Sunhallowed and the answer was yes. He would have. The 13th was a local defense force, not a professional fleet, and until the Cathedral declared war, Father would not relinquish control of that fleet to the Archadmiralty, and most certainly not to Archadmiral Yentria.\n\nNot only was she a woman in the ranks, which Father believed was akin to heresy, but she was an Allessian and, for that alone, Father would never aquiest to her requests. He had even petitioned the Sestant to have her removed from her post but the Cathedral had deferred the issue to the Holy Fleet and they, of course, protected their own. Allessian or Arthuriuan did not matter when the accuser was an outsider, a Cardinal of the clerical caste none the less and there was nothing more the soldiers of Eden despised than the clerics meddling in their domain.\n\n"Ah, Shavah," Sevi said with a sigh. "I wish we could turn back time. I wish it could be as it was."\n\nShe shot him a dubious look. "You mean: you begging Father for permission to hold my hand?"\n\nHe groaned. "Enough with the attitude. This may be the last time we speak in--" The data device in his pocked beeped. "Ah."\n\nSevi pulled the data pad out, scowling. The moment he saw the screen, his scowl became a deep frown. He tapped at the screen three times and tucked the device back, shaking his head.\n\nShavah's brow rose. "Bad news?"\n\n"Rosetta Alert. All knighted ranks are summoned to stations."\n\n"Stars," Shavah muttered.\n\nHe nodded, expression sour. "I had hoped we would have more time."\n\n"That is all right," Shavah said. "I will be here."\n\n"But I may not be," Sevi said. "And I know you do not want to hear it but I must ask you reconsider. To remain here is foolish, love. I can guarantee you transit to the Cathedral and--"\n\n"I do not want to go to the Cathedral," Shavah said. "I want to remain here. With you."\n\n"I may not be here," Sevi said.\n\nShavah shrugged. "Then I will wait until you return."\n\nHe shot her an exasperated look. "And if I do not return?"\n\n"Then--" Shavah bit her lip.\n\nIt was as squishy as ever but her flesh tasted of sillica, not skin. Shavah had not expected that and, for a moment, she forgot what they had been talking about. In her old body, she would have needed ask her husband to repeat what he had said but her new and improved self immediately knew: he had asked what she would do, if he did not return.\n\nShavah's lips curled. "Then I would take another, love, and I would love him - or her - more than I do you."\n\n"Ah. Yes, I--" Sevi's expression contorted, almost as though he attempted to smile through agonizing pain.\n\nThe sight made Shavah giggle. "Oh, love. Is it that painful to face the truth?"\n\n"Yes," he said quietly.\n\n"In Eden Eterni." Shavah offered a mock salute, her expression as earnes and serious as she could be.\n\nSevi shot her a dark look but the edge of his lips curled and, after a moment, he even smiled.\n\n"Stars, you are a treasure." He kissed her on the lips and, for a long moment, everything felt as it once had, on the day Shavah had first tasted her beloved in the Leaves.\n\nOnly it was different because, today, she was a new her and the new her felt things differently than the old. It felt the tremor in Sevi's lips and the quiver in his muscles and, when he drew her close, she felt as though she had been wrapped in a cloak of compassion and care. Her old body would not have understood that. It would have become distracted by the prospect of sex and been unable to think of anything other than Sevi's big cybernetic cock, a soldier's model specifically designed to impress Cardinal's daughters like Shavah.\n\n"I am so sorry," Sevi whispered. "I must go."\n\nShavah patted his chest, uncomfortably aware of the lump in her throat. She swallowed it and tried to smile. It did not work quite as intended but, in that moment, nothing worked as intended. Emotion had all but overriden her neural matrix. All Shavah could think of was the uncomfortable truth: her banded husband was about to leave and he might realistically not return.\n\n"Stars," she whispered. "Promise me you will be safe."\n\n"I will be. Eden protects." He squeezed her hand.\n\nShe held his hand tightly and did not want to let go, fearful that if she did, her beautiful Sevi would be gone forever. Shavah did not want that. She wanted a bright and beautiful future and she wanted him to be part of that future. Shavah wanted that more than anything else in the universe but she also knew the horrible truth: Holy Eden did not in fact protect. Her husband might not be safe. He was going off to war and he might well die and she could not do anything about it. That realization weighed on her chest like a rock.\n\n"Stars," she muttered, still clinging to Sevi's hand.\n\nHe smiled sadly. "I must go, love. There is a car waiting."\n\n"Eden protects." Shavah smiled and, against her better judgement, let go.\n\nSevi hesitated a moment longer, a pained look on his face, then turned and strode away, back towards the disabled waterfall and the stairs to the level below. Shavah watched him go, sadness welling around the rock in her chest, and considered running after him. For one last kiss. Only one. Even a brief embrace would have been enough but, when Sevi turned back at the top of the steps, all Shavah managed was a timid wave. \n\nA moment later he was gone, the military man called back to his military matters by the Archadmiral - the lesbian - and, in that moment, Shavah resented that woman with every fiber of her being. What right did she have to tear a wonderful man like Sevi away from his banded wife? Who did she believe she was, calling the knighted ranks to duty? Who the Hades had put her in command and, for that matter, what was an Allessian whore doing in the Archadmiral's chair?

The Omnia-class Battlecruiser was a 27th millennium battleship-cruiser hybrid developed and deployed by the [[Church of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]]. The kilometer long vessel was designed before the [[Exarch-class|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cccruiser"]] entered service but knowing a next-generation cruiser would soon be fielded to complement the ageing [[Seraph-class|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_ccruiser"]]. As earlier experience in [[battlecruiser design|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_bcruiser"]] had showed, the principal issue with battlecruisers - intended to bridge the gap beween the more economic and advanced cruiser and a traditional battleship, but at a fraction of the cost - was that design specifications couldn't be altered after they had been lain down due to the strict mass and size tolerances required to make a battlecruiser cheaper than a conventional battleship. A basic platform had to be agreed upon which could withstand the test of time and which had been, from the outset, designed for refits, so as not to be obsolescent by the time it entered service.<br><br>\n\nHaving recently begun to recieve intelligence about [[Dominion|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_dominion"]] warships, all of which were considerably more advanced than then-contemporary [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] designs, the [[Machine-Cult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_msmith"]] decided that it had to completely rethink the concept of the battlecruiser, from a purpose built ship destroyer and fire-support vessel to a front line combat vessel that could function as a light battleship as part of a combined fleet. It looked to much earlier [[Tyran|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyran"]] battleships for inspiration but went several steps farther and planned to incorporate modern ideas such as slimmed silhouettes and sensors technologies which were being developed for the [[Exarch-class|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cccruiser"]], resulting in a warship which could perhaps be termed a light sensor-battleship. It's role was that of the front like battleship, able to provide accurate long-range firepower, focus it's main battery on one or several targets, and jump in for close-range ambushes. It was also to be maneuverable and decently survivable, though the designers realized from the outset the Omnia would never be a true battleship as it's compact layout - 300m shorter than most battleships of the era, at only 1200m length, and much slimmer than most comparable vessels - left no room for missile bays.<br><br>\n\n<h3>Omnia Mk1 & Mk2</h3>\n<div class='HUD_CodexImage_Left'><<print "[img[" + $codex.imagePath + "codex_omnia.png]]">></div>\nThe resulting vessel, the Omnia Mk 1, was from the outset intended for it to be upgraded to the Mk2 variant (depicted) as soon as the technologies became available. The original Mk1 was underpowered, not having access to the new engine system it had been designed for, but most vessels were refitted to the Mk2 variant by the outbreak of the Lost Crusade. The Mk2 was a decent light battleship with a propulsion block built around a Gen5 [[REACH|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_reach"]] core with active-pingback capacity. It was powered by two Sanctum Sais Mk210 limited vector-thrust capable engine which, while small, afforded decent acceleration, maneuverability, and fuel economy. A [[farbound array|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_farbound"]] installed above the command deck allow fleet coodination and virtual battlespace networking, cryo pods were provided to allow the bridge complement of 10 to rotate, and a second [[farbound array|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_farbound"]] was installed below the main computerbank to provide better networked fire control and long-range targeting, a design which had never been attempted by any combat vessel at the time.<br><br>\n\nThe fire-control system, which could be linked across a combined fleet and recieve predictive data at long distances, was explanded to include three sensors domes (top, bottom, and bow) with dual-purpose fire control and [[lumen-fluctuation|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luminev"]] tracking, affording the Omnia excellent situal awareness and early warning of of [[Dominion|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_dominion"]] maneuvers and incoming Long March kill vehicles. These modules were not present on the Mk1, which is why the Omnia carried the second [[farbound array|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_farbound"]]. In later versions, this array was used as a secondary channel and to relay targeting information to other ships beyond light-lag. This feature made the Omnia Mk2 a much better fire support vessel than it had ever been designed to be and indirectly invalidated the ship's concept as a light battleship, as it performed best as a networked gun platform, not a front line combat vessel. Stability for the guns and limited kinetic-blunting was provided by a [[gravity well|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_gwell"]] beneath the gunnery control system. It should be noted that the Omnia Mk2's gravity well was off-centered to account for the assymetric bow layout, which was required to fit all guns and loading mechanisms in the exceptionally thin hull.<br><br>\n\nBeing a fairly light vessel for a battleship, and fairly short and slender at that, the four turrets of the Omnia could cause structural wear to the vessel when firing at high deflection off the bow - the barrels could depress up to 35° depending on turret orientation - and the gun system performed best when all turrets were focused on a single axis. The turret layout was designed to provide maximum fire when presenting maximum silhouette and, due to the "tall" nature of the vessel - it's height was much greater than width - the Omnia could present a slimmed profile one one axis, though doing so would halve it's firepower. The original design specifications had stated the Omnia ought be able to fire all four turrets while presenting a slim silhouette, this was found to be impractical as doing so would have restricted forward arcs of fire, especially compared to a tall layout, which offered the best overall field for the least silhouette presented to the enemy.<br><br>\n\nThe main battery was built around the existing [[Archangel railgun|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "general_codex_railgun_evo"]] railgun in the Mk1 - performace was, as anticipated, suboptimal - but quickly upgraded to the [[Angelus multipurpose railgun system|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "general_codex_railgun_evo"]] in the Mk2. This new loading and turret mechanism could draw traditional lower-massed ship killers, high-mass planetary killers, and sabot-launched cluster shells from the two magazines of the Omnia, which had been strategically located beneath the rear turrets, with one magazine for each turret pair. The magaines were designed for rapid-loading and to allow munitions to be switched dynamically. Additionally, the angelus turret could hold ten cluster shells in it's internal magazine, making it possible to fire a defensive screen without de-linking and re-linking the primary feed mechanism. The loading mechanism was not mechanical as on the [[Exarch-class|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cccruiser"]] but used inductive assistance to move heavy 1000-round packets into the munitions chutes, which allowed the Omnia to sustain fire for up to half a minute, extendable to one if turrets were fired in alternating pairs.<br><br>\n\nThe weapons system proved, contrary to [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] expecations, to significantly out-perform the modern quad-battery of the [[Exarch-class|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cccruiser"]] cruiser, though this was in part due to the fire-control mechanism which gave the Omnia much better predictive solutions than any other vessel in the galaxy. It was also able to reliably score kill-strikes on [[Dominion|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_dominion"]] warships beyond light-lag range, though was not - and had never been designed to be - a comparable alternative to the Long March kill vehicle. Unfortunately, what the Omnia Mk2 could bring to bear in sustained, accurate firepower and close range ship-killing ability, it lacked in survivability and long range firepower. The vessel accelerated well but was not maneuverable and fared poorly when deployed against it's nemisis, the [[Incubus-class|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_incubus"]] battleship. As a result, the Omnia was often kept back, behind pickets of [[Exarch cruisers|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cccruiser"]] and defensive screens put out by the [[Nephilim carriers|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_ccarrier"]], and only jumped into forward engagement zones to provide tactical kill-strikes for the more survivable but under-gunned cruisers.<br><br>\n\n<h3>Omnia Mk3</h3>\n<<print "[img[" + $codex.imagePath + "codex_omnia_iii.png]]">>\nContrary to some dire predictions, particularly during the early phases of the Lost Crusade, the Omnia proved to be a decent battlecruiser and stood the test of time, remaining in service throughout the Long Loud War and into a Mk3 variant of the 28th millennium. The Omnia Mk3 was a complete overhaul of the design, featuring a much slimmer bow section, a new version of the [[Angelus multipurpose railgun system|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "general_codex_railgun_evo"]], a fire-control system supplemented by the computational power of [[Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]], greater agility and maneuverability with the Sanctum Sais Mk311 vector-thrust engine powered by a Paleform reactor.<br><br>\n\nThe reactor system in particular was a major improvement, allowing the Mk3 to run mostly echo-neutral and thus reduce chances of detection. The new drive could also stabilize all four turrets at once when firing at high deflections, making the vessel far safer to operate. While still no [[Incubus|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_incubus"]], the Omnia Mk3 was an exceptional battlecruiser and held the line against far more advanced [[Dominion|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_dominion"]] warships during the Great Schism of the 29th millennium. It had begun to age by the outbreak of conflict, slated to be replaced within the century, but wasa pressed into service and worked well as an ambush and close range killer, roles the Omnia Mk3 excelled at when paired with modernized [[Exarch Mk2|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cccruiser"]] cruisers.

The tram rattled to a halt at the Level C9 station. Lock-clamps failed to engage. Metal banged loudly as the vehicle lurched to a halt. A chime sounded. The doors clattered open, releasing a tide of commuters that carried Marisa out onto the packed platform. People in red, blue, and white robes hurried in every imaginable direction. Saint's Day shawls flapped about as bodies jostled for position. Most people went left to the interchange tunnel. Marisa pushed the other way, towards a flight of stairs that led down to the underpassage.\n\nHalfway down, a gaggle cyber-kids huddled around an old glow-box. One of the boys had baby-blue hair and inked eyes. He couldn't have been more than year older than Jalko. The others were a bit older, all of them drinking from cans, sniffing from inhalers, or making out like they meant to make babies right then and there.\n\n"Degenerate filth," Mira muttered as she hurried down the stairs.\n\nThe underpassage at the bottom was unusually quiet. No mat-sellers yelled about their wares. In fact, there wasn't so much as a single mat or sell-stall in sight. They'd been driven off by the [[St. Mikael's Constabulary|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_constabulary"]], which has set up five scan-aches and a labyrinth of hard-light barriers that forced people to walk a complex route to the exit. The shortest queue was a hundred bodies long and moved at a snail's pace, pausing every time to let the officers in blue check bags and IDs.\n\n"Shit." Marisa turned into a side-passage that bore a big no-entry sign.\n\nHalfway down, a [[rank-constable|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_constabulary"]] in blue stood guard at a kinetic barrier. Behind the shimmering field were two corporate contractors bulked up in black-yellow [[riot armor|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_carmor"]] who paced up and down before two dozen riot shields which had been leaned against the wall as a show of force.\n\nMarisa smiled at the sight. "[[Eighth|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]]."\n\n"Wow, wow." The [[rank-constable|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_constabulary"]] stepped into her path. "Where you think you're going, eh?"\n\n"Thataways." Marisa pointed to the barrier.\n\n"Nah, nah," he said. "This passage is off limits to citizens."\n\n"I'm with the security state." Marisa held up her wrist, implant set to display her ID.\n\nThe [[rank-constable|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_constabulary"]] scanned it and scoffed. "Corporate contract? Please. Back in line with the rest."\n\n"Uh, uh," Marisa said. "I'm [[Eighth|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]]. Says so on the badge."\n\n"I said: line with the others."\n\nBehind the kinetic barrier, one of the riot contractors had perked up. He stomped over, his padded boots thudding loudly. A bulletproof face mask with four red optical sensors looked from Marisa to the officer and back again. \n\nA distorted voice buzzed, "There a problem here, [[constable|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_constabulary"]]?"\n\n"Might be," the [[rank-constable|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_constabulary"]] said. "Put this one back in line with the rest."\n\n"Yeah, yeah. Lemme log it." The riot trooper scanned Marisa's ID and snorted static. "Exempted. Priority order."\n\n"What?" The officer looked back.\n\nThe contractor showed him the readout. "Let her through. She's with us."\n\n"That doesn't mean--"\n\n"No, no, no," the contractor buzzed. "I said she passes. Now you let her through, [[constable|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_constabulary"]]. That's how deputized security works. Or do you want me to log a violation of contract law?"\n\n"Right, right." The [[rank-constable|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_constabulary"]] glowered at Marisa and, with a sigh, waved to the barrier.\n\nProjectors shut off with a snap-hiss. The shimmering field faded. \n\nMarisa stepped through and tipped a finger to the contrator. "Owe you one, Boss."\n\n"Nah, nah. This one is the house." The contractor waved Marisa on. "Move along, nothing to see here."\n\n"Sure ain't." Marisa flashed the [[rank-constable|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_constabulary"]] a smile and hurried on, past a medical station manned by three apothecaries in green-white robes.\n\nBeyond, the passage merged into the Level C9 Boulevard, a great walkway that followed the inner ring of [[Scaffold 22|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_scaffold22"]]. [[Grav-cars|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_gravcar"]] zipped in and out of view behind the enormous holo-adverts that glowed above the Boulevard, depicting smiling women showing off the newest in cyber-jaws, men with perfectly toned gene-grown muscles, and a for-children info-tizement that previewed newest RX6 personal assistant unit - thirty percent down-offer on rated credit for clients enrolled in communal care! \n\nMixed in between the enormous brand-shots and corporate logos were sponsored Saint's Day messages in the loopy faith-language: exceprts from [[Scriptures|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_scr"]] and quotes from famous clerics. Some of the faith propaganda was so old it still wished everyone a happy Celestial Day - why the name had been changed to Saint's Day Marisa did not know but, knowing the faiths, it was all some made-up political excuse.\n\n"It always is," Marisa muttered as she squeezed through the crowd, headed towards a raised terrace.\n\nThe holo-sign above it promised Flash floats for 9 creds and, judging by the number of people who stood on the terrace and sipped bright neon booze from see-thru glasses, the offer was popular among the sort who went out to drink to the saints. Marisa felt nothing but contempt for them - the faiths and faith sympathizers who clustered about, hollering and laughing, guzzling alcohol like their lives depended on it.\n\n"Idiots." Marisa turned off the terrace, into a nondescript side passage. \n\nThe walls were covered with looping graffiti. <i>FEGK YU FREEKS</i> beside <i>SINERS</i> and similar illiterate faith crap sprayed by idios like Padric who thought they were all red militant with their lume cans. Truth was, they were pests and in that, if only that, Marisa agreed with the cardinals: fuck the spray-kids.\n\nThey'd even scrawled over the glass door at the end of the passage, which was supposed to display the logo of Insider Imports. Instead, prospective customers were grreeted by slurs, gang tags, and those little star-circles the faiths sprayed when they wanted to vote on stuff but couldn't cause they were just vandals, not functional members of society. Even the door sensor had been scrawled over. Marisa had to smack the manual release to make it open.\n\nHydraulics hissed. The door swung outwards to reveal a tiny corporate office manned by a young blonde who sat behind her desk, eyes glazed over with virtual interfaces. \n\nShe barely looked up when Marisa entered. "Sorry. We're closed tod--"\n\n"Shuddup." Marisa slapped her wrist on the table, ID projection out. "Backside. Now."\n\nThe receptionist shot her a bored look. "You mind asking nicely from time to time?"\n\n"Fuck you." Marisa leaned over the desk and hit the rear door release.\n\nIn back, the door to the storage area unsealed with a hiss. Within stood dusty old cupboards and data-cabinets which hadn't been used since before Marisa had been born. Insider Imports had gone bankrupt decades ago and been bought up by the [[Eighth|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]] to create a backway to their headquarters, just in case one of the local gangs tried to lay siege to the main building again. No one had been that stupid, at least not since Marisa had submitted her application, and with good reasons.\n\nThe back room of Insider Imports was rigged with smart-gas dispensers and watched over by three heavily armed tripod security bots, concealed in the walls. Anyone who entered without permission would meet a nasty end and if, by some miracle, they somehow made it past the bots, there was a second layer of security behind the blast door.\n\nMarisa waved her wrist over the release-scanner. The device flashed green. Bolts unlocked with a click. Hydraulics heaved the door aside and Marisa walked through, down a well-lit corridor lined by grated wall panels that concealed chemical mines. And if that still wasn't enough, then the scan-resistant armor plate at the far end of the corridor concealed two automatic cannons loaded with high explosive and armored piercing rounds - [[Division X08|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]] took security very seriously.\n\nTo be safe, Marisa walked the hall with her ID out and her wrist held so the gun-intelligences could scan it. There hadn't been an incident in years but sometimes the control circuits got twitchy and Marisa was not taking risks with the smart-guns.\n\nAs she neared the far end of the corridor, voices could be heard from behind the half-closed door to the locker room. Marisa paused to peek. Visible through the crack was Corporal Kalvadek's balk scalp. He spoke to Contract-Commander Nardin, who wore his long hair tied back into a ponytail. Both dressed in [[Division 108|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]] skinsuits with patches and rank-tags on their shoulders. Neither was armed. Probably on the way out for the night.\n\nNardin was saying, "Not officially, no. But you seen the net? Mass outcry on every virtual. It will be a disaster. Another tax-riot. I am certain."\n\n"Right," Kalvadek said. "Like the faiths even pay taxes. The bull is this, Boss?"\n\n"The issue is not taxes but that the People's Pope has taken a stance. A hard stance. The Council issued a statement. His circuit will march in the parade with the reds."\n\nKalvadek whistled. "Reds and [[purists|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_purifier"]]. That'll be messy. If they really marches. If." He opened his locker.\n\nNardin slammed it closed. "They will march. Use your brain. Not your balls."\n\n"Says you," Kalvad said. "I says--"\n\n"Contractor," Nardin said dangerously. "Our teams were not contracted simply to show presenceon a holy day. The cardinals knows the warern-habs are a problem. They will march tonight. As will we."\n\n"Right, Boss. But--" Kalvadek spotted Marisa peeking through the door. "Ey, look. It's the faith spy that logged personal time on a workday."\n\nMarisa's blood ran cold.\n\nNardin scoffed. "Please. Contractor? Stop hiding behind that door."\n\n"Boss." Marisa stepped into the locker room and stood tensed. "I was just--"\n\n"Licking faith ass, wasn't you, Mary?" Kalvad laughed.\n\nContract-Commander Nardin clucked his tongue. "Manners, Kalvad. Manners in my presence."\n\n"Yeah, and why? She's one of them. Like her mum. Bet you she's got faith fashion on underneath. Look." Kalvadek tried to grab Marisa.\n\nShe jumped back with a yelp. Instinct said fight. Brain said: not around the Contract-Commander. Marisa drew a shuddering breath, calming the adreno-pump in her chest.\n\nNardin tutted. "Kalvin, Kalvin. Project your personal insecurities on the ideological enemy. Not on my contractors."\n\n"Right. Boss." Kalvadek straightened.\n\n"Ideology is a weapon to be wielded with precision, not a blunt insult to be hurled blindly. As for you--" Nardin's fatherly gaze fell on Marisa. "Are you fit to handle faiths tonight, contractor?"\n\n"Tonight?" Marisa swallowed. \n\nShe'd just wanted to grab her bottle of Liq from the locker. There was something special in that, something Marisa wanted more than she wanted admit. But that was off the table.\n\nShe stood straight as a stick. "Whenever you need me, Boss."\n\nKalvadek sneered, "Got something to prove, faith?"\n\n"You both do," Nardin said. "Put twelve teams on standby alert. Full gear and rounds chambered. I want [[buzzflies|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_impl_buzzflies"]] in the tunnels the moment the contract is called. And Kalvin?"\n\n"Boss?"\n\n"You are assigned to C2. Data-insight and control coordination. I do not want to see you on the ground in this mindset."\n\n"Boss!" He threw up his hands. "Oh, c'mon. Just 'cause I insulted the faith--"\n\n"Because your utterances insult your ideological convictions and, what is more, you attempted to talk your way out of paid overtime. That is unacceptable, especially for a contractor of your rank. If you cannot find it in yourself to fit in my command, I will find someone who does."\n\nKalvadek went white and squeaked, "Yes, Boss."\n\n"Good." Nardin turned to Marisa. "You will assume command of Team 5. Shield and shot-shells. We will be called out before the festivities are over. I want every contractor we can muster prepared to do their duty for the Founders. Understood?"\n\n"Yes, Boss." Marisa snapped her heels together. "Just one question: what the Hades is going on?"\n\nNardin breathed a laugh. "In the [[Division|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]], we say hell. Did you forget?"\n\n"Sorry, Boss. What the hell is going on?"\n\n"It's your bloody faith-friends," Kalvadek growled. "Tax hike across the board. Ten percent for all local businesses and fifteen for residents, even in the sanctioned habs. The net is exploding. People's Pope says it'll be the Gregorian Bloodbath all over." He grinned. "I sure hope we get to shoot some your friends, faith."\n\nMarisa rolled her eyes. "Thanks for the ops-brief, C2-sec."\n\n"He is correct," Nardin said. "But that is not the worst: news of the planned tax incresae was leaked by the [[Cybercult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cybercult"]], which means they might be planning a move. The [[Constabulary|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_constabulary"]] declared max-restriction across the level and has authorized deputees to take any measures required."\n\n"Yikes," Marisa muttered. "That sounds bad."\n\n"It may be nothing," Nardin said. "Or it may be another Gregorian riot. Whatever the case, they will not contract us until the last possible moment. But they will call us in. Guaranteed."\n\n"Says you," Kalvadek said. "I says this is a waste of boots on the deck. Could be out there agitating. Instead--"\n\n"Your opinion is noted, Kalvin. Dismissed."\n\nKalvadek snapped to. Marisa did the same.\n\nBoth of them said, "Yes, Boss."\n\n"Do the Founders proud." Nardin turned and strode out.\n\nAs soon as the Contract-Commander was gone, Kalvadek slapped Marisa on the skull. "Fucking faith."\n\nShe shot him a dark look. "What was that for?"\n\n"Bein a faith." \n\n"Oh." Marisa blew him a kiss and trudged over to her locker, resigned to a long night.\n\nThe Saint's Day festivities would last an entire cycle at least, which meant thirty hours on the pad in stinky [[riot armor|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_carmor"]] with a whole lot of nothing to do. On the upside: paid overtime.\n\n"Fucking hell." Marisa opened her locker and glanced over her shoulder. \n\nKalvadek wasn't looking. Relieved, she took the Liq bottle on the top shelf, took a careful sip of chem-laced booze, and started to undress.

<<nobr>>\n\tThe Myrroth Clan Collective, usually called the Collective or Clan, was a one of the few independent business ventures in the modern galaxy, identifying itself as a shipping and ship-building syndicate. It existed from the 19th until the 28th millennia and was not a member of the [[Corporate Hegemony|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]], the only pan-galactic business entity which wasn't. The Collective had close ties to the [[Colonial Authority|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_authority"]] but was not a colonial business either. The Clan Collective was headquartered in Northern Mantle, in a small territory between corporate and colonial space, but operated all across the galaxy. The precise origins of the company remain unknown, though many speculate it was founded by former [[Lunar Corsairs|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_corsair"]] and pirates due to the name. The company emerged in the early 19th millennium and admits to have been inspired by the [[Plex Conglomerate|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]], many businesses and technologies of which it would later purchase when the began to [[Conglomerate|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] dissolve. Despite this, the Myrroth Collective did not follow the [[Book of Economics|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_book"]] and has it's own Clan-based ideology, built on personal relations and an anti-corporate attitude.<br><br>\n\n\tDespite this, it was undoubtedly a business syndicate and miniature system-state which survived the ages due to it's experience in shipbuilding and access to modern fabrication techniques, many of which were derived from the [[Plex Assembly Matrix|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_matrix"]]. It also produced [[Luminev Drives|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luminev"]], one of the few companies in the civilized galaxy with the ability to build such devices. It's fabrication was not entirely automated and, as a result, the Myrroth Collective employed several hundred billion employees in addition to a workforce of [[robotic assembly units|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_utilitybot"]], which the Collective uniquely considered employees as well, though no additional benefits were given to automated units and they were treated like robots elsewhere in the galaxy, albeit with more care and compassion. The Collective was known for it's wide range of utility and private space ships, including many indigenous skeleton designs and atypical feature arrangements. It's most notable products were modernizations of the [[Plex hauler|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_freighter"]], lug-tugs of all shapes and sizes, colonial self-contained mining vessels, tankers, and private yachts. It did have a MilSpec division but did not produce many combat spacecraft, nor were the ones it produces of any notable quality - they were used primarily by the Collective itself to secure and police it's system-state.<br><br>\n\n\tHistorically, and particularly during the 21st and 22nd millennium, the Myrroth Clan was known to do business with anyone, trading with [[Corsairs|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_corsair"]], renegade [[Tyran|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyran"]] admirals, [[Colonia Galactica|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_authority"]], the [[Corporate Hegemony|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]], and numerous smaller organizations. For the longest time, the Collective did not hold formal trade deals or business arrangement with any business partner, though it would begin offering charter-contracts to colonial mining and refining companies as of the 23rd millennium. Notably, it invigorated the colonial rocking and refining business, and was instrumental in bringing the Galactic Credit to the colonial territories - to this day the credit is occasionally referred to as Myrroth money in colonial territories.<br><br>\n\n\tToward the 25th millennium, the Collective grewcloser to the [[Corporate Hegemony|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]], particularly in light of increased pirate raids in the Mantle. It would not however become a subsidiary and, aside from arrangements to set up reseller offices, did not engage with the corporate world of the Galactic Core directly. Instead, it operated over a network of Clan Traders, many of them Myrroth employees or colonial businesses, who acted as representatives for the Collective abroad, albeit with a high degree of autonomy. The Collective also operated it's own fleet of long-distance haulers, crewed primarily by [[voiders|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_voider"]] and colonials, who delivered ships and goods for numerous entities in the galaxy. Despite many attempts to encroach on Collective business by various corporate ventures, the Collective endured, primarily due to it's willingness to use para-military force to secure it's interests via the [[Sons of Kobol|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_kobol"]].<br><br>\n\n\tAlthough officially the Collective was not affiliated with, nor did it employ, the [[Sons of Kobol|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_kobol"]], their interests historically aligned. It can be surmised that the two organizations had deep historic ties, possibly stretching back to their shared pirate-ancestry. Despite this, the Myrroth Collective was widely seen and treated as a legitimate business, though not always willingly. The fact it was so successful despite not having adopted the capitalist ideas of the [[Corporate Hegemony|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]] was a thorn in the eye of many business owners. On the other hand, the business did not historically deal with the [[Church of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] either. The only exception would be a brief period during the Lost Crusade of the 26th millennium, where [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] warships passed through Collective territory. No conflict ensued and, aside from this, Clan territory was never been invaded.<br><br>\n\n\tThroughout it's history, the Myrroth Clan was an impartial member in the galactic ship and trade industry, never siding with parties in conflict, and tending favorable relations wherever possible. It was often held up as an example which both demonstrates and disproves the [[free-market ideal|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_freemarket"]], depending on the argument being made. The Myrroth Clan tok no stance on this and stated that it's interest were only in shipbuilding and shipping, with no ambition to expand it's territory or branch into other businesses. This was underscored by the Clan life-philosophy which did not know any other professions except designer, builder, shipper, and seller, social and professional ranks to which status in the Clan was tied. This social hierarchy was perhaps also the only one in the galaxy which placed retailers below long-haul [[voiders|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_voider"]] and saw salespeople as inherently beneath the Clan's attention. The job of salesperson was often outsourced to other companies or combined into the sell-shipper, a more respected social class of multiple valuable skills.<br><br>\n\n\tLife in the Clan was familiar, with friends and relations mattering more than professional title or social status, and the Clan encouraged a free-design philosophy. Everyone was invited to contribute, everyone was seen as equal as possibly, and decisions were often made as a collective. As such, there was no owner or chief executive officer in the Collective, and participant polls were often held on important matters, or simply to decide which shipbuilding and hauling contracts to pursue next. In times of need, a Clan Chief could be declared by communal vote, and several such were declared over the history of the Collective. A notable case of the Clan philosophy in practice was the creation of the colonial [[Thermo-class assault ship|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_aship"]], a project completed by numerous former clansfolk who were not pursued or persecuted by the Clan for abandoning them in their quest to provide the out-gunned and outnumbered colonial fleet with a passable warship. Outsiders were not treated so kindly and anyone who had no relations or ties to the Clan would find themselves turned away by the Collective or - worse - visited by the [[Sons of Kobol|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_kobol"]] and encouraged to stay away.\n\n\n<</nobr>>

(( expand lore ))\n\nThe Brotherhood of Silence was the unofficial official counter-intelligence organ of the [[Church of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]], stated repeately to not exist even though it's existence was confirmed by the clergy several times. The structure of the Brotherhood was not publicly known, nor was the extent of it's operations, or the identity of it's members. Even the [[Church of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] was apparently not clear on who has been initiated into the Brotherhood and, despite many official statements that the fraternity only included men, Sister of Silence were known to exist. Precisely when the Brotherhood was formed, what it's goal is, and where it recruits from, is unknown. The Brotherhood, as the name implies, is sworn to silence and never makes public comments. What little could be gleaned from official statements made over the modern era suggested that the Brotherhood was a wide web of indepnedant actors loosely affiliated with the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]]. Alternatively: a close-knit fraternity within the clergy. Possibly. Both explanations might have been true, though this would later be impossible to confirm; the Brotherhood was disbanded during the Great Schism in the 29th millennium.<br><br>\n\nThe Brotherdoo's methods and practices were also poorly documented, possibly not documented at all for security reasons, and most information that was known about the Brotherhood was revealed by rival intelligence services. These invariably alledged that the Brotherhood was a black-operations organization which conducted illegal, criminal, and negligent actions on foreign territory and within [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] space. A smattering of less radical analysies suggeted the Brotherhood was an internal counter-intelligence agency, dedicated to surveilance of the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] and it's believers, though no conclusive evidence proved this true - or false. It was also not entirely known where information gathered by the Brotherhood was sent, though many speculated it might have been uploaded to [[Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]] or delivered in confidential reports to the clergy.<br><br>\n\nWhat can be said about the Brotherhood of silence is that it pursued many unorthodox goals in addition to it's function as a surveilance organ. The Brotherhood championed reformation of the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] as early as the 23rd millennium and agitated for formation of a council of [[Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]]. It wished to abolish the [[Sword-Knights|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_knight"]] and couneract militant anarcho-theism within the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]]. This became known primarily due to pushback by the [[Knights of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_knight"]], who leaked many confidential Brotherhood documents, lendings credence to the theory that the Brotherood was an internal service and concerned itself primarily with issues within [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] jurisdiction. Precisely why it pursued these goals remains unknown. It would seem however that the Brotherhood did not succeeed in it's goals, having been all but entirely cleansed by [[edenist|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]] fundamentalists during the Great Schism.

Not long after Mr. Acrel had left, Karl wandered along the arrivals corridor, a long hallway with mirrored walls that was lined by boutiques. Artfully crafted holograms and storefront signs advertized the best and most exclusive brands of the so-called civilzied galaxy: Malachia, Bourgata Vasini, Bylada Fashion, Corpradime INC, and a hundred more that imported consumer goods from the east. Whether one wanted a [[grav-car|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_gravcar"]], lingerie, or a fresh set of gem-nails, the arrivals corridor had everything and, as the plaques on the wall reminded everyone, this was a special economic zone, so everything on sale was ten percent cheaper.\n\nTen percent cheaper than the going rate on [[Scaffold 22|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_scaffold22"]], that was. Everything from the gleaming green gemstones set on a pedestal before the Malachia boutique to the extravagent gown on the mannequin outside of Bylada had been imported from the east.\n\n"Ten thousand," Karl muttered, examining the gown Bylada.\n\nThe threads were robot-stitched, not even nano-weaved, and the gems along the seam were cheap fakes. Asking price: over ten thousand credits. The same purchased in the east would have gone for a few hundred at most, maybe less if the fashion houses had decided to offload.\n\n"Ridiculous." Karl wandered on, shaking his head.\n\nHe'd planned to buy his sister a gown or, failing that, a proper gem set - things Olga would have liked but never dared waste money on. Except the prices were exploitative to an absurd degree. Olga would have never allowed it, even if Karl could have afforded such things, and he could have. Father paid him well to shut up and be quiet, which was all well and good for Karl but didn't solve his problem: he was due to meet his sister for her tube-day and he'd not managed to find a present he could splurge on in good consience.\n\n"It's all overpriced," Karl muttered as he passed the Deneguri Foods outlet - designer cut clone meat for a hundred credits a chop?\n\nAbsolutely asinine. Everything was marked up a hundredfold and labaled as luxury goods, which some of the products admittedly were, but not to the degree the price tags suggested. And none of this was in any way a mistake, as the sign at the end of the arrivals corridor explained:\n\n<i>Products purchased in the Special Economic Zone are not subject to consumer taxes.</i>\n\nConsumer tax. That simple phrase pretended to explain it all: a mad scheme by the [[St. Martin's Trust|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_trust"]] to levy exorbitent taxes on products from the east, both to discourage foreign consumerist ideals and line the coffers of the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]], though mostly the latter - and yet nothing could be farther from the truth. Import taxes were capped at one hundred percent the pre-import value. The boutiques of the arrivals corridor sold well above that, banking on a western customer base which had no means to aquire eastern products by except the special economic zone.\n\nKarl suffered no such restrictions. He was an employee of the [[Vindel Company|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_vindel"]], in theory if not in practice, and held a free-border permit to the west. He could have under-cut any of the shops along the corridor by simply buying in the east and shipping to the west on his own dime and that, precisely that, was the racket: nurture a black market in the shadow of [[Church Law|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]], one the clerics could not regulate without resorting to brutal repression, until the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] finally agreed to lower the import tax. In other words, it was economic warfare, the one form of warfare the [[Corporate Hegemony|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]] was halfway competent at, and it disgusted Karl to no end.\n\nEndless waste, ceaseless exploitation, and all for what? For some stupid political point, the one which the mirrored walls and upscale boutiques of the arrivals corridor wanted their customers to believe in: the so-called civilized galaxy, which did not exist. The entire concept was an elaborate illusion that many indulged in, especially in the starport. The ones who believed were easily identified: the rich woman who strutted past the Bourgata shop in her stillettos, the man who window-shopped at Malachia dressed in the most exquisitely tailored black suit, and all the others like them who wandered about, their bag bots laden down and faithfully in tow. All of them partook same shared delusion and Karl, for his part, wanted nothing to do with it.\n\nHe strode past the last boutique and past the noise-curtain to the main terminal. Announcements chimed and reverberated loudly. Bag-robots rumbled back to the arrivals area. Projected beneath the ceiling in artistically rendered hologram, were signs: left to the tramway station and right to the [[grav-car|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_gravcar"]] lot. Everyone present headed right. After all, no real citizen of the civilized galaxy - believer, corporate, or otherwise - would ever demean themselves so as to ride with the rabble. Commoners. Poor people. Whatever the proper word for it was these days.\n\n"Idiots." Karl pointedly went left.\n\nHe had brought no baggage beyond the duffel he carried over his shoulder and needed none of those ludicrous bots to help him. Nor did Karl plan to indulge in such services as a taxi or a rented vehicle - he could use the tramway system just like everyone else, thank you very much. Only Karl couldn't.\n\nThe steps down to the tramway tunnel had been grated off and a big yellow hologram claimed the area was barred due to renovations. Karl suspected a different truth: the backways of E Sector had spilled into the tramway tunnel and so, for the sake of paying passengers, the train station had been shut down.\n\nKarl snorted in disgust and headed back the other way, along with hundreds of passengers who did the same. All looked alike: over-dressed, followed about by bag bots, and in an allmighty hurry. Karl was in no such thing. He enjoyed the stroll, if not the people, and pointedly avoided the moving ground so as to stretch his legs. Six years crammed in a cryogenics tube aboard an ice-boat had left him stiff and a little physical exertion would hardly hurt. \n\nUp ahead, near the moving stairs to the public landing pads, stood a little orange booth manned by three beautiful young woman who wore puffy black jackets over white skinsuits. They almost looked like crew except, of course, they were all lookers and had all put on glossy thigh-highs that bore the logo of the Heartland Group.\n\nAs Karl neared, one of the salesgirls strutted over to him, smiling as only a paid advertising stunt could. "Welcome to the Fold, Sir. Can I interest you in--"\n\n"No." Karl strode on without looking.\n\nThe salesgirl's heels clicked behind him. "Only a moment, Sir?"\n\nKarl hastened his pace. He did not want to know and he did not care.\n\nThe heels clicked more rapidly. "It's only my quota's sake, Sir, if you--"\n\n"Oh. I see." Karl stopped and flashed the salesgirl a smile. "You don't think I can affort what you're here to sell, do you?"\n\n"No, Sir, I just meant--" The salesgirl glanced to her colleagues.\n\n"Don't worry. I took no offense. So-- " Karl rubbed his hands. "I'll take one. Whatever it is. For the quota's sake."\n\nThe salesgirl's yaw fell open. She quickly shut it with a whimper.\n\nKarl shot her a dubious look. "All I said is I'd take one. Only one."\n\n"Yes," she said quietly. "But even one is very expensive."\n\n"I can afford it," Karl said. "Both for the quota's sake and for my sister's tube-day. What are you selling anyways?"\n\n"The [[Heartland Tigershark|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_impl_tigershark"]]," she said in a squeaky voice. "Sir, are you certain you want--"\n\n"Karl, please," he said. "Karl Vindell. And as I said: my sister would be overjoyed if you sold me a, well, yacht or whatever it is you're here to represent."\n\n"A hypership," the salesgirl said quietly.\n\n"Splendid." Karl beamed.\n\nHe had no idea what a hypership was and he did not care, though he did worry about the girl. She'd looked to her colleagues and they all watched intensely, as though they expected the poor girl to burst into flames.\n\nKarl rubbed his hands. "So, write me up a contract and have it addressed here." He put his contact data on the swipe-touch. "Send it in within the hour and I'll have it paid by tonight, which should meet your quota, shouldn't it?"\n\n"Yes, but," the girl stammered.\n\n"Then it's settled," Karl said. "How soon can one be delivered here? E Sector docks, I mean."\n\n"There, uh, there." The girl's eyes darted.\n\nAnother one of the advertizing strunts strutted up. She looked a tad older and had corporate inlays. Not just a stunt. An actual salesperson.\n\nKarl shot her a terse smile. "Can I help you, Ma'am?"\n\n"I could not help but overhear your inquiry, Mr. Vindell. You will be overjoyed to know that the [[Heartland Tigershark|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_impl_tigershark"]] is available for purchase at every Heartland salespoint. Should you wish to--"\n\n"Yes, yes," Karl said. "Just have it at the private pier by the end of the week. Thank you and goodbye." He began to walk away but turned back. "Oh, and might I say: your sales staff is absolutely delightful. Submit only the utmost praise on my behalf. I would do so myself but, well, that might be consituted as inter-corporate aggrandizing and I believe that's against Commission regulation. Anyways, the best of days to all of you."\n\nWith that, Karl set a brisk pace towards the landing pads, if only to avoid the uncomfortable questions that would soon follow, and they always did. Better to simply walk away. Chances were, the salesgirls would forget about it. Or doubt he was who he'd claimed he was. But there was also a chance they'd believed him, in which case they'd put the forkwork through within the hour, fearful that if the needs and desires of Mr. Karl Vindell were not met that instant, the [[Vindel Company|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_vindel"]] might never do business with the Heartland Group, ever again, and all that over what? Some luxury yacht, apparently?\n\nKarl did not stop to check. He'd found his sister the best birthday present imaginable: a good deed done to some poor local girl who'd been forced to stand around and look pretty for the sake of unbridaled corporate greed and that was precisely what Olga would want most - the yacht would be a nice touch too, assuming the contact even made it through the company filters, but it really was not about the boat. It was about doing what one could, with whatever means one had, and not six hours after thaw, Karl had done his good deed for the day.

\t<<set $chapter = {\n\t\tname: "Son of a Saint",\n\t\tscenes: 7,\n\t}>>\n\t<<set $story.chapters.push($chapter)>>\n\n\t<<set $chapter = {\n\t\tname: "Nascent",\n\t\tscenes: 7,\n\t}>>\n\t<<set $story.chapters.push($chapter)>>\n\n\t<<set $chapter = {\n\t\tname: "Patre Nostre",\n\t\tscenes: 7,\n\t}>>\n\t<<set $story.chapters.push($chapter)>>\n\n\t<<set $chapter = {\n\t\tname: "Black and White",\n\t\tscenes: 8,\n\t}>>\n\t<<set $story.chapters.push($chapter)>>\n\n\t<<set $chapter = {\n\t\tname: "Across the Core Divide",\n\t\tscenes: 7,\n\t}>>\n\t<<set $story.chapters.push($chapter)>>\n\n\t<<set $chapter = {\n\t\tname: "Advent",\n\t\tscenes: 7,\n\t}>>\n\t<<set $story.chapters.push($chapter)>>\n\n\t<<set $chapter = {\n\t\tname: "Sia Sanctificate",\n\t\tscenes: 7,\n\t}>>\n\t<<set $story.chapters.push($chapter)>>\n\n\t<<set $chapter = {\n\t\tname: "Pillars of Awe",\n\t\tscenes: 8,\n\t}>>\n\t<<set $story.chapters.push($chapter)>>\n\n\t<<set $chapter = {\n\t\tname: "Into the Gaping Maw",\n\t\tscenes: 7,\n\t}>>\n\t<<set $story.chapters.push($chapter)>>\n\n\t<<set $chapter = {\n\t\tname: "Eclipse",\n\t\tscenes: 6,\n\t}>>\n\t<<set $story.chapters.push($chapter)>>\n\n\t<<set $chapter = {\n\t\tname: "Libera Nos",\n\t\tscenes: 7,\n\t}>>\n\t<<set $story.chapters.push($chapter)>>\n\n\t<<set $chapter = {\n\t\tname: "Fingers of Fate",\n\t\tscenes: 8,\n\t}>>\n\t<<set $story.chapters.push($chapter)>>

The Admiralty was the strategic command element of the [[Tyran Fleet|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyran"]] for the duration of it's existence. It was staffed by members of the [[Astro Corps|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_astro"]] who were nominated to become Admiral of a given fleet and remained in this position until death or abdiction. Initially, the Admiralty operated in conjuction with the decendants of the imperial [[Astral Order|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_astral"]], who were assigned tactical Fleet Command duties, though the use of [[Astrals|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_astral"]] fell out of use by the mid-20th millennium. Subsequently, the tasks inherent to spatial fleet command and tactical coordination became part of the Admiralty's duties. One ought also note that the captains of [[Tyran|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyran"]] vessels, while not admirals by rank, were none the less considered part of the Admiralty.<br><br>\n\n<h3>Independent Fleet Era</h3>\nDuring the 19th and 20th millennium, in which the [[Tyran Fleet|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyran"]] referred to itself as the Independent Fleet, the Admiralty served strategic, logistic, and planning functionalities within the Chain of Command. It was considered the immediate superior of both the [[Astral Order|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_astral"]] and the [[Astro Corps|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_astro"]], who reported to it and were obliged to carry out their admiral's orders unless they were found to be unlawful, in which case the Admiralty Assembly would form a tribunal and judge on the matter.<br><br>\n\n<div class='HUD_CodexImage_Left HUD_CodexTallImage'><<print "[img[" + $codex.imagePath + "codex_tyran_admiralty.png]]">></div>Admirals were nominated on merit or personal preference by the prior Admiral, served for several centuries, and eventually retied or died when brain-rot began to set in due to prolongued exposure to neural interfaces. The Admiral (or Captain, in the case of a single ship) served at the Admiral's Chair, a sophisticated neural-interface system based on earlier neural counches that allowed them to maintail full awareness of their ship and fleet. The system also allowed the Admiral to issue commands, but not directly to ship systems; a crewman of the [[Astro Corps|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_astro"]] needed to execute the command. This was deemed to be the proper military procedure and, secondarily, acted as a safeguard against rogue admirals or captains.<br><br>\n\nIn addition to strategic and planning duties, the Admiralty also enforced the Principle of Reproachability. It was their duty to maintain disipline, ensure training standards were met, and that procedures and protocols were suitable from both a military and utilitarian standpoint; efficiency was a prized traits and admirals whose fleets or captians whose ships did away with unecessary waste were highly regarded. Additionally, admirals and captains were responsible for discouraging and disciplining any latent [[old-world loyalism|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_loyalism"]] in the [[Fleet|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyran"]], though not all did so and some were in fact imperial loyalists themselves.<br><br>\n\nThe role of Admiral was seen to be one of prestige, duty, and honor, and faliure to live up to these standards could lead to forced abdiction. This was technically always the Admiral's choice, though at time the choice was highly encouraged by other members of the Admiralty. In terms of rank, captains were situated beneath admirals, and admirals answered to the Admiral Assembly, which represented the will of all admirals in the [[Fleet|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyran"]] combined. Deferral to the Chain of Command was expected at all times and failure to comply were punishable with accusations of treason, a crime which carried the death penalty for admirals.\n\n<h3>Post-19th Millennium</h3>\nFollowing the invasion of Plex 17 by the [[Tyran 9th Fleet|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyran"]] in 19564 and the 9th Fleet's declaration of [[Terran Herigate|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_loyalism"]], the Admiralty began to fracture. Some Admirals remained loyal to the [[Tyran Fleet|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyran"]], others began to break off, forming pirate and [[corsair|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_corsair"]] fleets, and eventually those who remained and did not object were presumably folded into the ranks of the [[Dominion|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_dominion"]]. Records of the time are sparse, in part because many admirals broke away from the fleet, but also because the [[Dominion|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_dominion"]] offered blanket amnesty in the closing centuries of the Long Silent War, wiping the slate clean and deleting all records of prior admirals. What records do exist however suggest that the average lifespan of the Admiral had begun to rise, creeping well over a thousand years in age by the 21st millennium.<br><br>\n\nIn the Galactic Core, where the existence or even the concept of the [[Dominion|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_dominion"]] was unknown until well into the 26th millennium, admirals of the [[Fleet|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyran"]] became increasingly associated with warlord kingdoms, lightning raids, and pirate bands. It was percieved, and is still today in some circles, that the [[Tyran Fleet|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyran"]] fractured entirely during the 21st millennium and that it's admirals were revealed for what they were: power-hungry warmongers whose only goal was to upset the balance of power in the galaxy and carve out empires for themselves as their predecessors in the [[Grand Fleet|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_impfleet"]] had allegedly once done. It is quite possible that this describeed a significant number of admirals during the later years of the [[Fleet|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyran"]], and many captians were recorded to have pursued a raider's lifestyle; many were captured, killed, or died of brain-rot and old age. It must be stressed however that the budding [[Dominion Fleet|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_dominion"]] of the 23rd and 24th millennium formed an admiralty of it's own that was directly descended from but seperate from that of the [[Tyran Fleet|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyran"]].

The cockpit was dark, all systems set to low-emission mode. Electricity hummed. The engine buzzed. G-forces were high enough to prevent physical movement. The tri-paneled touch displays were just out of reach, a known issue with the [[Banshee-class fighter bomber|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_fighter"]]. Tap-controls had been installed in the arm rests instead.\n\nRoien pressed the tabs, cycling the main display. It's readouts glowed green in the gloom: fuel at ninety eight percent, trajectory on vector, comms in local-loop. He tabbed to the Summary screen. All systems online. No errors. Weapons interface unpowered.\n\n"Sys scans clean," Roien said. His respirator hiss-sucked. "Station Two in standby."\n\nStatien One did not reply. Roien left his display in summary mode and stared at the back of the pilot's seat, located in the front seat, his black helmet barely visible behind Roien's boards. \n\nFlight-Officer Limms remained motionless, his flight controls a orange-green blur when seen through suspension gas. He might've been asleep. Or computing on cerebral. Either way, there was no rush. They had time - lots of time.\n\nSeconds ticked by in real time. Nothing important happened. Roien's respirator reeked of plastic and the seal tickled his augmented cheeks. He wanted to adjust the mask but he couldn't move. Too many Gs.\n\n"Ah, nix it." Roien glanced to the side-display - communications screen.\n\nNo transmissions. Cosmic noise on all passives. To be expected. Strike Wing Lazarus was running silent.\n\nRoien checked the cameras. Infrared tracked eight drive plumes in the distance. The craft riding atop the great streaks of superheated gas appeared as little dashes of black, barely visible in the depths of space. Three flights of three sticks, spaced over hundreds of thousands of kilometers as per [[Dominion|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_dominion"]] doctrine. TacNet had circled seven craft in blue, one in cyan. That was Flight Lead, the stick Station One would follow once formation broke.\n\n"Any day now," Roien muttered and checked their trajectory.\n\nFlight-Officer Limms had put them exactly on vector. One more day till the boost-point.\n\nRoien breathed a sigh. It had been a week since Lazarus Wing had launched. Nothing to do. Nothing to report. Come to think of it, they didn't even know whether the enemy was actually out there.\n\nThe [[Intelligence Corps|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_intelcorps"]] had not been able to provide a clean course. To be safe, two strike wings had been launched on a tangent-converge. Roien had no idea where Strike Wing Enigma was but they were out there, somewhere, bored out of their minds just like Roien. Nothing to do. No time dilation to ease the wait. The [[Banshee|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_fighter"]] could run echo-neutral or provide neural interface - the ship was too small to do both.\n\n"Two," Limms's voice crackled. "Sys scan. Stat." \n\nRoien blinked. "All systems nominal, One. I told you that six hours ago." \n\n"Stat that," Limms said. "I drifted, Two." \n\n"Yeah." Roien stared at his blurry pilot.\n\nDrifted. He knew that feeling. \n\nLimms said, "What's our T-three?" \n\nRoien checked the board. "Time to target: one cycle, give or take. Assuming it's there. High burn any moment now."\n\n"Good." The pilot's displays twinkled.\n\nRed blotches joined the orange and green blurs. Roien had no idea what the screens said. All a comms-gunner needed to know was that red came before dread.\n\n"Boost prepped," Limms's voice crackled. "Station One, standing by."\n\n"Stat that." Roien configured his displays. " Station Two, standing by."\n\nSeconds dragged. The engine buzzed on. Visible on Roien's displays, the timer to the boost-point ticked down. Five more minutes. Their velocity crawled upwards at a snail's pace - drive running at less than ten percent efficiency.\n\nRoien checked the side-screens, just in case. No transmissions. No sensors tracks. He breathed a faint sigh. His respirator hiss-sucked. \n\nLimms said, "You good, Two?"\n\n"Bored, One. Nixing bored. Shoulda uploaded some porn."\n\nStation One crackled a laugh. "Told you so."\n\nThe older pilot had done that and Roien hadn't listened. Flight Corps were professionals and stim-porn was for junkies, or so he'd thought. Stuck in the cockpit for weeks on end, unable to move, Roien had come to see things differently.\n\nHe also saw his main display blink: three minutes to boost. Maneuvering thrusters fired. The fighter-bomber trembled as its nose tilted up. G-stress made the skeleton creak. On the display, the timer ticked down the last sixty seconds.\n\n"Brace for high-stress," Limms voice crackled.\n\nRoien did - mentally. Physically, he could not move, just stare straight ahead. Red before dread. Any moment, the booster would fire and accelerate them to attack speed. Roien had no idea what to expect.\n\nLimms did. Earlier, he'd told Roien: training did not compare. The real thing was different because, in real, there were hostiles out there, lobbing kinetic killers and shrapnel across the attack vector at a billion rounds per second. No training, not even the sixteen years Roien had gone through to get in the Corpse, could simulate that kick.\n\nSo far, Roien had not felt a kick, just abject boredon. He wasn't even scared. On his screen, the timer ticked down: three, two, one. \n\n"Boost," Station One said.\n\nThe reactor screeched. The [[Banshee|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_fighter"]] shuddered. Acceleration pressed Roien into his command couch. Felt gravities passed two hundred. On the digital boards, velocity crept up. Point one one five, one one six, one one seven. O2 came in rasped hisses. Roien forced himself to breathe.\n\nIn. Out. One. Two. In. Out.\n\nAudible over his respirator, the muted rumble of [[farbound|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_farbound"]] noise. Roien's sensors display tracked eight diffuse blobs, resonating on the low end of the spectrum. They roughly matched the eight sticks of Strike Wing Lazarus.\n\n"Ears and echoes," Roien gasped.\n\n"Stat that, Two. Read sys scan."\n\nRoien strained to reach the controls. His augmented fingers barely found the tabs. He pressed. The display cycled, jittering in the suspension gas.\n\nShape-recognition cleared it up so Roien could read, "Fuel ninety one. Trajectory on new vector. Stress within the band limits. Diffusion above threshhold."\n\n"Stat that, Two. Re-scan in six cycles."\n\n"Understood." Roien tried to relax.\n\nCrammed in the cockpit of a [[Banshee|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_fighter"]], with it's engine shrieking on high-burn, that was impossible. There was no peace or quiet, only the sickening sensation of a cybernetic gut being squished into the command couch as the galaxy's most advanced fighter-bomber accelerated to attack velocity.

Gloom lurked in the backways of [[Scaffold 22|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_scaffold22"]]. Holograms flickered overhead and, beside the door to a local noodle shack, a neon sign advertized imported nu-dishes at two credits a pop. Locals dressed in ragged streetwear huddled outside the shop, slurping noodles and nutri-soup from plastic bowls. Many had their hoods up against the chill of the blackways.\n\nKarl felt no such discomfort. He stood nine stories above the noodle stall, on a terrace behind a solid meter of [[translu|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_translu"]], and watched the goings on below with folded arms. So many people out and about - a sea of hair and hoods which hurried through the backways, dodging robots and other pedestrians. Some stopped to poke around the local shacks. Others argued and haggled with street vendors. Everyone down there trailed misty breath.\n\nThe puffs of mist and glowing neon signs reminded of a winter wonderland which had recently sprouted in the shadow of the E Sector docks - only a century earlier, no one had lived down there and, when Karl had looked out from the same spot, all he had seen had been robots and cooling vents. The robots were long gone but the vents remained, causing everyone's hair and clothes fluttered about as cold air and loose wrappers were sucked into the spaceport, and every few minutes the goings on of the backways were interrupted by the bright light of a claxon as one or another air shutter opened or closed. Up in the arrival's lounge, huddled in his warm blanket, Karl felt none of the chill and heard none of the commotion.\n\nHe smiled sadly. "Must be hell living down there."\n\n"It is," a gruff voice said beside him.\n\nThe robed man it belonged to leaned against the [[translu|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_translu"]] pane and tapped absently at a data-pad. It gave off just enough light to reveal a lower jaw dotted with stubble and a scowling mouth surrounded by the onset of age-wrinkles.\n\n"Here." Mr. Acrel showed his data pad to Karl. "What you say?"\n\nKarl scowled at the numbers. "A bit low, don't you think?"\n\n"Ah. Missed a decimal." Mr. Acrel fixed the error. "There. What you say?"\n\nKarl bit his lip. The running fee for a full team was a hundred thousand credits. Admittedly, Mr. Acrel only wanted one man, and only facilitation of first contact, but still. Such services cost at least ten thousand credits. Mr. Acrel had offered eight.\n\n"Still low," Karl said. "Unless you give me something for the discount."\n\n"You get data," Mr. Acrel said. "The job pretains to something you've expressed an interest in."\n\n"Ah. I see. And my interest is worth two thousand credits?"\n\nMr. Acrel snorted. "If the Saint's Day job pays out, it'll be worth billions. Trillions. More. I want to keep that off the open market and, as you told me last decade, you're in the market for any and all information on--"\n\n"Oh, that." Karl rubbed his chin. "Yes, I suppose the mechanics behind the mare-tale would be worth a lot. Assuming your job produces authentic data. Most information on the [[Djinn|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_djinn"]] is pure supposition."\n\n"If the job goes well, the data will be accurate."\n\n"Can you support that assertion?"\n\nThe robed man nodded and tapped at his data-pad. He flipped to the photo album, skipped past several images of kids and scantily clad women, and stopped on a blurry image of a digital screen. It had been shot at an angle, as though in great haste, and depicted a screen cluttered with scientific information that Karl could not make heads or tails of.\n\nHe shot the man a dubious look. "What does that prove."\n\n"This." Mr. Acrel zoomed in.\n\nReflected on the screen was the face of a young child, it's expression contorted in agony as what looked like enormous sores split his face and neck in two. Presumably, the cracked skin went down the poor child's body, though that was lost in the glare of the screen.\n\n"Fascinating," Karl muttered.\n\n"It's [[black plague|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_bblood"]]," Mr. Acrel growled. "Altered, adapted, maybe even mutated. I don't know. But it's genuine. My source says the clinic is run by a certain Doctor Briaback. I think the black clinic is a front for illicit research being conducted by [[Athena Medical Incoporated|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_athena"]]. Can't prove that but my source is fairly certain." \n\n"But why here? Why set up shop on an over-population habitation platform deep in [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] space? If [[Athena|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_athena"]] wanted to engage in black research--"\n\n"Because here is where the money is," Mr. Acrel said. "Least, that's what my source says. Paid under the table. Incredible sums."\n\n"I don't buy it," Karl said. "All you've presented is rumors and rumors don't make up for two thousand credits, not even with that." He pointed to the reflection of the kid.\n\n"Not even if I tell you the clinic is funded by the Corbeis?"\n\nKarl breathed a laugh. "You can't possibly know that."\n\n"I have images." Mr. Acrel swiped them onto his pad.\n\nThey displayed a back alley, as seen from a nondescript loading dock. A black [[Corpradime|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_gravcar"]] had parked at it and, visible in the back seat of the [[grav-car|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_gravcar"]], was a woman with black hair. She looked about to climb out, carrying with her a business case that Karl presumed was full of credit chips.\n\nHe shot Mr. Acrel a dubious look. "This is your proof?"\n\n"It's like you assumed," the man growled. "House Corbei. They're up to their noses in the [[abominable arts|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_abom"]]."\n\n"Yes," Karl said slowly.\n\n"My employer agrees with my assessment," Acrel said. "[[Loving Stars|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_lstars"]] willing, I'll be sanctioned to purge the facility and every last one of those sick bastards. But they want hard proof before they let me loose so I've come to you. In return for your services, I thought I might tell you what I plan to tell my employer, only before I tell them."\n\nKarl smiled despite himself. "That's a kind gesture, Mr. Acrel."\n\n"Don't take it personally," Acrel said. "It's that I want the job done properly, not hushed up by some cleric. You're my backup. In case the Saint's Day job goes sour."\n\n"Splendid," Karl said. "But I did want to ask: why does this have to happen by Saint's Day?"\n\n"Because the clinic is down in the C and the [[Division|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_division"]] is sanctioned security in that sector. Even if they don't know about the black clinic, they'll react pronto if they see any sort of tampering, and we'll need to tamper to get proof that holds up to scrutiny. So we need a distraction and the Saint's Day celebrations are perfect. Word is, the [[purists|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_purifier"]] want to shut the power and all."\n\n"Oh." Karl thought for a moment. "It's unconventional but, given the circumstances, I suppose eight thousand will be acceptable."\n\n"Excellent." Mr. Acrel held out his arm.\n\nThe holo-unit in his wrist flickered on, displaying the scan-pay screen.\n\nKarl looked from it to the man. "Didn't you want me to facilitate first?"\n\n"I trust you, Vindell."\n\nKarl breathed a laugh. "Trust me?"\n\n"All I need is the name," Acrel said. "I can do the rest."\n\n"No," Karl said. "What you need is a foot in the door and, if you step through our door in rioter's red, the only thing you'll get is a bolt in your brains."\n\nMr. Acrel snorted. "I'll change fist. And no discussion, Vindell. I work alone. Anyways, I don't want to be seen anywhere near this." He flicked his finger against the infusion tube in Karl's chest.\n\nThe synthetic tube wobbled. Karl's blood pressure dropped and rebounded. In the small of his back, the pump whirred quietly.\n\n"Unhealthy habit, Vindell. Biological man is not meant to live past a thousand."\n\nKarl shrugged. "What can I say? I'm a [[vampire|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_impl_vampire"]]."\n\n"Hilarious. Now swipe." Acrel tapped his wrist.\n\nKarl waved his own wrist through the scan-pay screen. A new dialog appeared on his oculars: incoming transaction. \n\nCredit: eight thousand five hundred to the private account of Mr. Karl Vindell. Direct transfer from the [[St. Martin's Trust|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_trust"]], name of payee not listed. No additional fees applied. Certified authentic by Secure Banking Transactions limited.\n\nKarl accepted, saying, "The man you want is Mr. Gal. You message him. You do what he says."\n\n"Gal, huh? That the same Gal who wrote the GalLag darknet interface by any chance?"\n\n"No clue. Never met the man. All I have is the contact data. Here." He shared the adress via swipe-touch.\n\nMr. Acrel took it, scowling. "And you're sure this is the best the [[Cybercult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cybercult"]] can give me on the Fold?"\n\n"Gal is only legit one on his station," Karl said. "Anyone else claiming to be cult is an imposter or a fly trap. You talk to him, he can get you what you want."\n\n"If not, I'll want another word with you, Vindell."\n\nKarl spread his hands. "I offered to come with you. You refused so you're on your own. We part paths and never speak again."\n\n"Wrong," Mr. Acrel said. "You'll want your copy of the data and I will not send that via data-link. Hand to hand transfer only. So we will meet again."\n\nKarl shook his head.\n\nMr. Acrel stepped closer, eyes narrowed and expression grim. "I want this done right, Vindell. We meet again. On Saint's Day. Same spot."\n\n"Afaid I can't," Karl said. "I won't be here anymore."\n\n"Then find a way to be here," Mr. Acrel said. "If you are not, those two thousand you were so picky about become twenty trillion when I put the data up for auction. And I will. I want this job done right or I want a payout that will save my skin. Understood?"\n\nKarl understood Mr. Acrel was an insufferable [[purist|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_purifier"]] on a personal crusade against the [[abominable arts|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_abom"]]. Absolutely insane but, unfortunately, also the only person Karl had found who could give him what he wanted: hard scientific data on the [[black plague|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_bblood"]]. Maybe even data that proved the Corbei family was involved. Most of all: a lead on the [[Djinn|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_djinn"]] Karl had been stalking for over a thousand years.\n\n"Very well," Karl said. "On Saint's Day. Here at the docks. Departure terminal. One hour past local dawn or I'm gone."\n\n"In that case, until Saint's Day." Mr. Acrel strode off, his robes flapping about his thighs.\n\nKarl watched the man go, uncomfortably aware of the enormous coil pistol Acrel had holstered at his hip. Earlier, when Karl had found the man leaning against the window, the pistol had been carefully hidden. Now it showed and, the more Karl saw, the more he fretted about Mr. Acrel.\n\n[[Sanctioned hunters|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_abom"]] were not lawmen. They were sanctioned to carry weapons only in pursuit of their job: the persecution of all things declared to be [[abominable|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_abom"]] by the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]]. Mr. Acrel had not come to the docks to hunt. He had come to speak to a contact but the rules did not apply to Mr. Acrel. He was a well respected and even more connected man who had found his faith after his sister had been murdered by the [[abominable arts|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_abom"]].\n\nAt least that was what Arnolo had claimed, back when he had first messaged Karl, well over a decade in the past. It might have all been lies. Karl did not know and he did not care. He'd not taken the ice-boat to [[Scaffold 22|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_scaffold22"]] to run jobs for the [[Cybercult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_cybercult"]]. He had come to buy his sister her tube-day present and, as far as Karl was concerned, that mattered a whole lot more than whatever cosmic horror Mr. Acrel thought he was hunting in the shadows.

projector tech (soft light / hard light / mass light )

The ERA Robotic Assault Unit - also known as the "robosault" after the companies that employed it - was a six-legged spider shaped station assault robot employed by the [[Dominion|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_dominion"]]. It's primary user was the Robotic Assault Corps of the Dominion Fleet, though some models were also used by the Rock Corps and even terrestrial garrisons. The ERA was a fully robotic unit that could not be remote controlled, though it could accept commands via data-link and in fact required data-link integration to perform anything but the most basic patrol and assault tasks. The six-legged unit could stand anywhere between a meter and three meters tall, depending on configuration of the central chassis and leg extensions, and featured an autonomous intelligence that could natigate and engage targets of it's own accord - for tactical awareness and complex operational tasks it needed a data link to TactiSens, with which it was capable of operating much in the same way as a squad support robot or, if required, as fully autonomous assault force.\n\nIn most cases, the ERA was employed as a squad-level support company, integrated into so-called obosault companies which were organized into squads of nine specially trained assault troopers and up to fifteen robotic assault units of the ERA type. Each robotic unit could be equipped with a number of weapons systems and defensive platings, with the most common defense being composite armored plates supported by [[Flux projector|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_projector"]], which attempted to cause incoming projectiels to tumble. These were only effective against small caliber weapons and against anything more powerful than a light infantry railgun the ERA unit had to rely on it's atypical silhouette and ability to rapidly reposition to survive. Most importantly, it could operate in three dimensions and in low to no gravity due to it's complex leg system, which also allowed it to open doors, pry at gaps, and other complex manipulation operations.\n\nThe most common armament packages for the ERA was a 15mm chemically propelled caseless gun mounted beneath the chassis and a heavier 4mm railgun mounted above, with the railgun designed to handle targets the light chemical gun could not deal with. In some cases, the chemical gun was replaced with a modified version of the [[SCR-S Squad Scorpion|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_scorpion"]] but the issue with such powerful weapons was that they risked causing catastrophic damage to the station, installation, or starship the robot was engaging. For this reason, 15mm chemically propelled rounds were preferred, usually with smart-guidance systems and in some cases paired with smart-gas and shock-foam launches. Some variants of the ERA could also be equipped with briar bombs though this was rare because the robotic unit could not re-load it's weapons, a major issue with the unit as it's manipulators were not fine enough to work most magazine systems.\n\nUnlike the quadrupedal squad support robots used by many [[Dominion|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_dominion"]] infantry formations such as the Rock Corps, Assault Pioneers, and similar, the ERA was not intended to carry supplies and robosault companies relied on other formations to bring additional supplies, there generally being no way to carry all the heavy assault gear while also maintain combat mobility. That said, the ERA could have carrying packs mounted to it's legs for long stationside treks. They were not dropped in this configuration however, there always being a risk that additional equipment would get caught and snag. This was a particular problem when the extended assault armor package was fitted on the ERA, which introduced sharp edges at the end of every leg. These had a tendency to get caught on debris but this was deemed an acceptable trade-off for robosault deployments as, for one, the robot could often free itself and, for another, the added armor significantly improved the chances of the robot to retain a limb.\n\nIn ideal conditions, the ERA could safely move at speeds up to one hundred kilometers to hours, though in most cases it moved much more slowly, especially in cramped corridor. High speeds could usually not be sustained except in zero-g, where the unit's boosters could be used to assist the mechanical limbs. The high mobility and dexterity of the unit, which was required to allow the relatively large robot to fit into most stations and installations, meant that many segments were poorly protected even with the assault armor package installed. The unit's battery life was also generally poor, at around three to four days, compared to vehicular units capable of running for months or years without a charge. Perhaps most damningly, the slender limbs of the ERA made it ill suited for civilian policing and less than lethal operations, as the ERA had been designed to allow debris to pass through the unit, making it better at maneuvering tight corridors. For this reason, it was not used by the State Bureau for civilian policing operations, though some ERA units were used in a military policing context.

Half an hour later, Karl sat in the back seat of a shiny red [[grav-car|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_gravcar"]] that zoomed through the busy traffic patterns of [[Scaffold 22|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_scaffold22"]]. Hundreds of similar vehicles cluttered the grav-tunnel outside, jostling for position as their computers attempted to solve the traffic problem. Indicator lights flashed constantly. Holo-adverts glinted in the distance. Aside from the odd wobble in the grav-plates, no one moved any meaningful distance.\n\nUp front, the driver said, "Going to be a few more minutes, Sir."\n\n"Quite all right," Karl said, studying the contract which had just come in.\n\nIt was the one he'd asked for: purchase of one [[Heartland Tigershark|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_impl_tigershark"]], to be delivered to the E Sector docks, private pier, [[Scaffold 22|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_scaffold22"]], by the end of the week. Included was the usual warranty statement, a statement of registration, a notice that he would have to register the vessel with the local authorities, a bunch of Zone Control legalese, and of course the price: more than Karl had planned to spend in the next millennium.\n\nSo much in fact that, if Karl signed the document, he would be close to broke. He immediately signed the document and sent it back with the message:\n\n<i>To the Heartland Group,\n\nI would like to personally thank your sales staff at the E Sector for their most courteous behavior and exellent sales acumen.\n\nWith kindest regards,\n\nKarl Vindell\n\nInheritor\nVindell Company</i>\n\n"Well, that settles that." Karl sat back and stared out of the window.\n\nTraffic inched down the grav-tunnel to the massive intersection ahead. Indicator lights flashed constantly while, up ahead, an enormous red emergency hologram blocked the left half of the tunnel. Probably an accident. Or some critical component failure. Whatever the case, Karl waited for nineteen long minutes until the driver passed the impediment and accelerated.\n\n"Hold on," the driver said. "We'll be there in no time, I promise."\n\n"It's okay," Karl said as the [[grav-car|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_gravcar"]] picked up speed.\n\nOn the driver's console, a red indicator flashed: three felt gravities. Karl could feel it in his gut as the vehicle's intelligence toed the maximum velocity prescribed by auto-nav, straining to make up lost time without breaking the law. The reason for this was the same one that could explaine everything that happened in the civilized galaxy: credits.\n\nIn [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] space, taxi companies compensated by distance traveled, not time in the vehicle, and delays meant lost revenue for them, which in turn meant less pay for the driver, whose sole job was to prevent precisely such delays by chosing routes which auto-nav wouldn't have. Evidently this driver was bad at his job, not that Karl cared. He was content to sit and wait for the vehicle to reach it's destination.\n\n"One more minute," the driver said. "Oh, and might I say, Sir--"\n\n"No," Karl said heavily.\n\n"I see, Sir."\n\nA long minute dragged until the [[grav-car|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_gravcar"]] descended onto a dim landing pad. Grav-plates whined loudly. The vehicle touched down with a thud.\n\nThe driver checked the machine. "Fifty-nine hundred credits, please."\n\n"Of course." Karl held out his wrist.\n\nThe driver swiped it. The transaction went through.\n\n"Thank you, Sir. If you--"\n\n"Quite all right." Karl popped the door and climbed out, his duffel bag in hand.\n\nIt was dark on the landing pad but, through a doorway to the left, Karl saw a brightly-lit terrace that looked out at the local star. Beyond the railing, a blooming xeno-garden stretched to the end of the compartment and, to the left, an enormous bejewled doorway led to the Lakeview Lounge. It was blocked by a curtain of glimmering emralds that fell behind two androids with silver surfacings.\n\nKarl approached the machines. "Hello. I'm expected by--"\n\n"Excuse me, Sir," both androids droned in unison. "The reception is inside."\n\n"Oh. Thank you." Karl stepped past the androids and through the curtain.\n\nGlimmering jewels bopped against his head. The nano-tech within made Karl's skin prickle. Some form of anti-intrusion system, perhaps, or simply a weapons scanner. Whatever the case, Karl stepped through, into a cavernous entry area.\n\nThree great chandelliers hung from a six story high ceiling and every surface except the floor had been decorated with gemstones, amber inlay, and ornate carvings. To the right, a great viewport looked out at the garden and star beyond, the light of which shone brightly in the lounge. To the left, another window looked out at the enormous interior lake of E Sector, alledgedly the largest standing body of water on any space station, though Karl did not believe that.\n\nAt the end of the entry area was the reception desk, itself an elaborate work of gilded art that twinkled in the distant sun. Two towering security robots stood beside it, their giant lances planted between their jewel-beset feet. The machines resembled beasts of legend, albeit more a collage of different myths than any creature from the mare-tales. In stark contrast, a quite ordinary sized man in a plain black suit stood behind the reception desk.\n\nHe smiled when Karl neared. "Good morning, Sir. Do you have an appointment?"\n\n"Karl Vindell," Karl said. "Oh, wait. You mean the name of my appointment. Olga Vindell."\n\nThe man tapped in mid-air, working a virtual screen. "Olga Vindell. Yes. Please scan." The man gestured to the desk.\n\nKarl swiped his wrist over the spot. "Can you tell--"\n\n"In ID mode, Sir." The receptionist pointed to the scan-plate.\n\n"Oh." Karl set his implant to ID mode, swiped again, and said, "I was told--"\n\n"Thank you, Sir. You are expected. That way, please." The receptionist gestured to the left.\n\nA portion of the viewport that looked out at the lake flickered and, for a moment, Karl thought the glass was a digital screen. But it was in fact glass and the pane that had flickered a door which led to a winding staircase that disappeared below. Karl looked from it to the receptionist. Part of him feared Olga had played a prank on him. It would have been just like her but, on second throught, she had told Karl that the Lakeview Lounge was a pleasantly quirkly place, one he would certainly enjoy.\n\nKarl was not so certain but he'd no mind to argue with a moody receptionist and thank goodness for that - when Karl stepped through the door, he saw the most beautiful sight he had ever seen: a great expanse of aqua-blue water which sparkled in the sunlight. A pleasant breeze blew in from the air circulation system and, off in the distance, water birds glided about on an updraft.\n\n"Fascinating," Karl said as he descended the winding stairs.\n\nThey led to an enclosed terrace. From above, all Karl saw was the beautiful gem pattern in the sun shield but he could hear the muted murmur of voices through the dampening curtain and one of them was more distinct than the others: the singsong tone of Olga's genetically superior vocal cords.\n\n"Oh, sister." Karl stopped outside the dampening curtain to check his reflection.\n\nA tired looking man with dark skin and pronounced veins stared back. He had two infusion tubes tucked in his chest and wore a floor-length black skirt matching plus tunic which hung loose from his shoulders. Karl adjusted it to hide the tubes that connected him to the life-enabling blood pack in his back and, with a deep breath, stepped through the dampening curtain into his sister's tube-day party.

<<nobr>>\n\tThe Commerz Cartel, also called commerz-mallers or ballers, was a renegade offshoot of the [[Plex Conglomerate|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] which formed in the 19th millennium and continued to exist in some time until an undetermined date in the 22nd millennium. The official mascot of the Commerz Cartel and their free-market ideals was the pink unicorn, which was how many Plex thought of the Cartel's conceptions: as wild and unrealistic as pink unicorns. Despite this, the Cartel drew quite a few members into it's ranks over the centuries and eventually formed an anti-union that had a presence on numerous [[Conglomerate|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] stations.<br><br>\n\n\tThe Cartel's ranks were composed of disgruntled Plex employees who could not or were unwilling to adopt the principles lain out in the [[Book of Economics|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_book"]]. Members of the Cartel viewed these prinsicples as unnecessarily restrictive and anti-capitalist. The Commerz Cartel and it's free market ideology despised the notion of a regulated market and thrived in Free Trade Areas of the [[Conglomerate|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]], where goods and services were exchanged freely without debt-bond incurment, but trade conditions were not guaranteed by binding contract. The Cartel was seen by most [[Executives|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_execs"]] and employees of the [[Conglomerate|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] to be a subversive and borderline non-compliant organization. It's existence was barely tolerated to maintain market stability.<br><br>\n\n\t<h3>Origins of Ideology</h3>\n\tThe ideological origins of the Commerz Cartel can be traced back to the late days of the Complex Corporation, though the Cartel was not inspired by old-world economics. It emerged during the early decades of the [[Conglomerate|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]], when contact with the outside world made it clear that the economy would not remain a closed system. The original commerz-mallers, who established Free Trade Areas to facilitate exchange of investment without requiring an army of [[legal-hawks|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_lad"]] to vet each and every binding contract, maintained that the theories lain out in the [[Book of Economics|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_book"]] could not hold true in an open galactic market, no matter how regulated it was. This sentiment was encapsulated in the Cartel's slogans "property wants to be private" and "debts are death". Despite it's similarity to the [[free-market ideal|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_freemarket"]] of the [[Corporate Hegemony|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]], the Cartel's origins were not related to the corporate sector in any way.<br><br>\n\n\t<h3>Activity</h3>\n\tOutwardly, the Cartel presented itself as a free-market organization and provided services such as entertainment, distraction, and pleasure. It peddled exotic wares not otherwise available in the [[Conglomerate|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]]. Cartel members were known to frequently secure goods and trade deals in the Galactic Core and Northern Mantle. Cartel members often traded or exchanged with [[Conglomerate|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] employees, ever in pursuit of an unrestricted, pan-galactic free market. Behind closed doors, the Cartel also attempted to subvert the Work Ethos lain out in the [[Book of Economics|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_book"]], and frequently engageed in vandalism and sabotage.<br><br>\n\n\tDespite hefty regulation, repeated audits, and measures taken by the [[Security Department|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_security"]], the Commerz Cartel continueed to maintain a firm grip on Free Trade Areas through the principles of supply and demand, offering services and goods not otherwise available to the Plex. As a result, the [[Executive Department|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_execs"]] found it impossible to remove the Cartel without threatening the economic stability of the [[Conglomerate|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] and the wellbeing of it's employees. The Cartel historically held up this circumstance as proof that regulated markets could not work, and that the free market had already undermined the [[Book|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_book"]]. Their view was not shared by many Plex, even if their recreation and pleasure services were always in demand, and in time the Cartel would become an insignificant external trading partner to the rapidly growing [[Corporate Hegemony|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]]. The Cartel ceased to function as of the 22nd millennium, it's own free markt notions having long since been replaced by more rigidly ideological corporate [[free-market ideals|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_freemarket"]].\n\n<</nobr>>

Mikael paced up and down in the Spintop, running his fingers through his greasy hair, lost in frustrated thoughts. Underfoot, broken glass cracked and squelched in a soup of spilt booze. Up on the cracked glass countertop, the poor girl snored to herself. Beside her, on a banged-up bar stool, sat Mate Salza. A third man had joined them: the big bloke Mikael recalled offering a drink to. No one spoke for long minutes, almost as though none of them knew what to say.\n\nFinally, Mikael broke the silence, "How did this happen, eh? Someone tell me: how the Hades did this happen?"\n\nSalza and the big bloke exchanged looks. Both shrgged.\n\nMikael breathed a laugh. "That's yer fegging response? You don't know?"\n\n"Aye, Boss," Salza muttered.\n\nThe big bloke nodded. "Had to be done. Is what you said, Boss, and we all agrees."\n\nSalza grunted. "Like Jim says: had to be done. For the good of the station, ey?"\n\n"For the good of the station." Mikael groaned in exasperation. "Right, Mate. Right. We lights a match and it ignites this ring like an oxygen fire and we says this--" He waved to the bashed-up bar. "--this is for the good of the station?"\n\nJim looked away. "Is gonna be some cleaning up, sure, but like you said, Boss: better clean up than crawl in crike."\n\nMikael had said that? He didn't recall.\n\n"Look, Boss," Salza said. "I ain't saying we's done this all proper but--"\n\n"Just one question," Mikael said. "Why?"\n\nBoth the big blokes exchanged looks. The ensuing silence was so absolute that the bar-lights could be heard humming. Slowly, almost in slow motion, Salza's forehead furrowed with thought.\n\n"Boss," he finally said. "I doesn't quite get the question: why what?"\n\nMikael groaned. "Why in all of Saint Shaitan's sins did any of us, me, you, him--" He waved to Jim. "--anyone here think bashing up this place was a good idea?"\n\n"Cause ya gotta break the system to fix it?" Salza shrugged. "I ain't no political man, Boss. You knows that."\n\nMikael wanted to scream. At his Mate. At the big bloke. At anyone, maybe even the drunken girl on the counter, but most of all at himself for letting a bunch of station-dwellers get riled up by his drunken antics and do Hades alone knew what - storm Local Control and nearly kill the controlman, apparently.\n\n"Fegg me." Mikael rubbed his face in exasspration. "So lemme rephrase this all: we bashes up your--" He waved to Jim. "--station and you's all okay with that?"\n\nSalza shook his head. "Some got rowdy, Boss. We's dealt with them."\n\n"Dealt with them?" Mikael barked a laugh. "What color you think you's wearing, Mate? Rioter's red?"\n\nSalza looked confused.\n\nJim looked shocked. "Not like that, Boss. Ain't been no one strung up like them phony westerners did. We just had a nice good conversation with 'em. Make sure everyone understands the deeply held values of the Free State, is what we did."\n\n"Aye," Salza said. "Exactlxy what we did."\n\n"Oh, you did now, did you? And now the matter's settled, eh?" \n\n"Not quite." Salza shifted uncomfortably.\n\nMikael glowered. "Not quite what, Mate?"\n\n"Well, it's just they brought up some good points, Boss. About the supply situation and whatnot."\n\n"Aye," Jim said. "Turns out them crike-eaters cleared it all out. The store rooms, the stock-sacks, all of it. All them promises was hot air. Ain't got a hundred tubes of [[bakepaste|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_bakepaste"]] in the entire Free State of Tiash. And that's not counting other stores running low. Oxygen. Water. The works. It's a doozy, Boss."\n\nBoss. That was what everyone saw in him: the new boss. They'd replaced the crike-eaters with Captain Mikael cause, clearly, as evidenced by the bashed up bar-room and the booby girl on the counter, he knew how to run a Free State!\n\nSalza, with an earnest expression, "We's gotta sort the situation, sure, but that's where we comes in, Boss. We actually has solutions."\n\n"Oh, we does, now, does we?" Mikael scoffed. \n\nSalza's brow furrowed. "Meaning what now?"\n\n"Meaning--" Mikael hesitated, scrambling for words.\n\nThe ones he wanted to say would go down like sour grow-plant. The ones that wanted to be heard were outright lies and the ones that should have been said did not come to mind cause Captain Mikael was not in fact a great leader. He was a lunatic with a handgun who had, through drunken stupidity more than anything else, convinced the locals he was a pirate - a rebel who lived by [[Freebound|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "ahoy_codex_freebounders"]] or death.\n\n"Aw, crike." Mikael leaned on the counter, exhausted. "What we needs, Gentlemen, is a plan. Not some criked-up dream of [[Freebound|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "ahoy_codex_freebounders"]] or death. That ain't gonna do us no good if we all starves to death here with no fuel."\n\n"Boss does have a point," Jim said.\n\nSalza shook his head. "Captain Mikael is just saying it how it is."\n\n"Oh, fer Saint Fegg's--" Mikael strangled thin air.\n\nHow did he make them understand? How did he make these two hung-over hunks of flesh realize: Captain Mikael did not in fact have a plan. He was just like them: the beaming pride of the Northern Mantle - a man who'd fegged up so bad he'd sparked a revolution.\n\n"Y'know, Boss," Jim said. "I's been thinking. It ain't a plan. Not exactly. But you's got five cutters, yeah, plus yer boat and I knows that's off limits but it does have cargo holds. And there's the company cutter down in dock, still. None of those been bashed up, exactly like you ordered, Boss, and--"\n\nMikael had ordered that? He couldn't believe he'd been so foresightful.\n\n"Right," Salza said, a light in his eyes. "The evacuation plan. We's been talking about that, we has. Quiet like. But we thinks it could work."\n\n"What, trundle off to the next trade station and spark another revolution?" Mikael wanted to laugh.\n\nBoth men nodded, their expressions as grim and earnest as the Voidheart itself. Only then did it dawn on Mikael: that was exactly what they expected and now they expected the revolution to spread from airlock to airlock, igniting trade stations all up the routes, until every last downtrodden deckman rose up to throw off the yoke of corporate crike.\n\n"Oh, fegg me," Mikael muttered. "No. No way. It ain't gonna work. We's no food. No fuel. Forget about guns and missiles and all that. No. What we focuses on is this: getting everyone here off this blasted station before some yokel breaks a hole in the hull by accident. We takes you up north. Somewhere safe. That's what matters, first and foremost. Cobby?"\n\n"Aye." Salza nudged the big bloke. "Told ye: one the decent ones, ey?"\n\nJim nodded. He looked genuienly impressed.\n\nMikael felt horrible but he'd made his bed in piss. It was time to clean up the mess.\n\n"Get everyone off this station," he said. "Yank out anything of value. Anything that's left behind. Captain Mikael will take y'all to the nearest hub. Guaranteed transit. Even for them who complained about my antics and whatnot. No one left behind."\n\n"Right, Boss," Salza said. "And what with them who wants on our crew, eh?"\n\nMikael hid his alarm with a smirk. "Anyone wants in gets in. But one rule--" He held up a finger. "--and only one: we does things my way and we does right by the fine folks of the Mantle. Cobby?"\n\nSalza grunted. "Crystal, Boss."\n\n"Aye, Boss," Jim said.\n\n"Good." Mikael smiled wearily. "Get to it."\n\nBoth men stood like they meant it and, side by side, the big blokes barged out of the bar. Mikael remained behind, amid the broken glass and bashed-up tables, listening to the hum of the bar lights. \n\nOver by the counter, glass clinked. The girl had knocked over a bottle. Spilt booze dripped to the floor to join the growing puddle of mulch and glass.\n\n"Aw, crike," Mikael muttered.\n\n"I sure feels like it." The girl sat up, rubbing crike out of her bleary eyes. "Ow! The fegg's with my feet?"\n\nMikael had no idea how to explain. \n\n"Aw, crike." She covered her face with a groan. "I am so dead."\n\n"You and me both, tits. You and me both." Mikael stomped over and scooped the girl up. "C'mon. We's evacuating the station."\n\nShe shot him a bewhildered look. "Evacuationing?"\n\n"Yeah." Mikael carried the girl towards the exit, saying, "Crike-eaters lied to y'all. Ain't enough stores to go aroud."\n\n"For sure not, but only cause Captain Mikael demands tribute." She giggled. "I's done my part, Boss."\n\nMikael stopped dead. Tribute? He had demanded tribute?\n\n"Guess that's just how it is now, eh?" Mikael shook his head and stomped off, past the curtain and out of the Spintop.\n\nOutside, the the station-ring bustled and buzzed. Cutters sliced at sealed doors. Men in coveralls jammed pry-bars into stiff panels. All along the length, robotic carts were being piled with circuits and salvage, cut straight out of the station. Tribute to Captain Mikael - or junk to be sold later. That was just how it was now. Just another day in the Free State of Tiash.\n\nMikael did not like the place. He did not want to be there. He wanted to be far away, somewhere safe and sound, on a quaint haul-contract. Instead he stomped along the corridor, past grimy workmen and sweaty deckwomen. In every pair of tired eyes that avoided his, he saw the uncomfortable truth reflected back at him: he had lit the fire in the airlock. Him. Mikael.\n\nHe might have been drunk and he might have been influenced but, when Mikael tried to, he could remember what had happened: the conversation with Jim. About that corporate bozo. About what had really happened at Tiash-Tiam. The more he'd heard about the crike-eaters and the comfort trade, about girls like the one he carried and the grave injustices of the Galactic Credit, the more Mikael's blood had boiled, until all the sudden his conscience had burned brighter than Hades and Mikael had decided, once and for all, there could only be one solution: [[Freebound|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "ahoy_codex_freebounders"]] or death!

One bottle became two, then three, then a platter of sear-dish, and somewhere in between everything had gone off the rails. Precisely how it had happened, Mikael did not know but he did know one thing: when his booze-riddled brain regained conscience, he was sitting on top of the bar, a bottle of Liq in one hand, the [[chem-gun|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_zipgun"]] in the other, and the titty-girl collapsed on his lap. She'd somehow managed to strip halfway out of her skintight and fall face-down between his legs.\n\n"Aw, crike," Mikael slurred, casting around for Salza.\n\nThe Mate was nowhere to be seen amid the thick leaf-smoke which choked the Spintop. Here and there, shadowed silhouettes stumbled through the haze. Booming thundercrash resonated from the speakers. Somewhere on the far side of the bar, a chorus of voices cheered and, in tune to the chant, Mate Salza stumbled out of the haze, flailing about in what, among [[voiders|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_voider"]], passed as dance.\n\nMikael grinned at the man. "Fegg me, Mate. Fegg me sideways."\n\n"I's tried," a drunken voice drawled on Mikael's lap. "You's gone soggy, Boss."\n\nHe looked down, confused, to see the girl toying with his cock. Mikael didn't feel a thing even though his crotch was slick with slime and, when the girl looked up, she positively dripped lubricant from her lips.\n\nA drunken grin lit up her face. "You taste good, Boss."\n\n"Sure, tits." Mikael eased her back onto his cock.\n\nShe slobbered and sucked, gurgled and gasped, until finally Mikael felt it: a tingle of pleasure like he hadn't known since that fateful leg south from [[Station 16458|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_station_16458"]]. Mikael's eye lids drooped as hazy memories surfaced. Moments of bliss on the bridge, those big beautiful eyes, and a steady stream of stifled moans which grew louder with every passing moment, until Mikael realized they weren't a dream - that was happening in that very moment.\n\n"Oh, fegg," he gasped and, with a surge of adrenaline, saw tits topple dangerously. "Wow!"\n\nMikael reached out a second too late. Tits hit the glass counter with a thud. Bottles cascaded onto the floor with a crash. The girl giggled uncontrollably.\n\nMikael laughed despite himself. "Fegg, tits. You's drunk!"\n\n"You is too!" She rolled over, a beaming smile on her face.\n\nMikael smiled back but, deep inside, another thought had taken hold: where the Hades had he gone wrong? Captain Mikael ought have been on the Flagman, organizing the flotilla and figuring out the next leg of their transit. Instead he was sitting in some piss-hole, watching as a girl he barely knew guzzle booze straight from the bottle until she collapsed on the counter. Mikael couldn't even remember her name - tits or something?\n\n"Saint Shaitain's sins." He rubbed his face, exasperated.\n\nSweat dripped from his fingers like water in a washtube. Mikael stared in disbelief until, with a surge of panic, he realized: the gun!\n\n"Fegg!" He glanced around.\n\nThe [[chem-gun|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_zipgun"]] lay on the counter, bullet-box removed, beside a half-empty bottle of Liq. Fifty more bottles stood behind the bar, all of them empty. \n\nMikael snorted at the sight. "Been mighty thirsty, eh?"\n\n"Damn straight," the girl slurred. "Mighty thirty for yer cock, Boss."\n\nMikael smiled though, truthfully, he did not feel flattered. More important thoughts clawed at the back of his mind: radioactive rods and reactor deals but, the harder Mikael trtied to remember why those words were supposed to worry him, the more a different memory surfaced: a beautiful view of the girl's backside as Mikael rammed her on the counter.\n\n"Crike," Mikael mutterd, stroking the girl's chin. "You sure is needy, ain't you, tits?"\n\n"Mhhmh." A drowsy grin spread on her lips.\n\nMikael chuckled, if only to hide another uncomfortable thought: he didn't even know what tits's real name was. Someone had told him. Mikael was certain of that cause, a while back, he'd asked and someone had answered. Precisely when that had happened Mikael did not recall, only that he hadn't been in the bar at the time, but somewhere else, in a room full of desks and neural couches. Something important had also happened there - the sort of important thing which had left Mikael grinning, if only to hide his mounting unease.\n\n"Hey." Mikael nudged the girl. "Did we get banded or something?"\n\nShe shot him a bewhildered look. "What, Boss?"\n\n"Guess not then." Mikael rubbed his chin.\n\nIt was rough and stubbly up to the cheeks, where Mikael usually kept it shaved to highlight his goatee.\n\n"The fegg?" Mikael scrached, uncomfortably aware more than a few hours had passed since he'd last come too.\n\nCome to think of it, the Spintop had become deathly quiet, the smoke and haze all but entirely cleared to reveal a scene of absolute devestation: broken glass and spilt booze spread all over the floor. Up in the sitting corners, tables had been upturned, chairs smashed, and a barstool slammed into the wall with such force it had become stuck. \n\n"What the--" Mikael peered over the edge of the counter.\n\nBloody blotches dotted the floor. Similar smears were all over the counter-top, trailing to where the girl had collapsed with shards of glass stuck in the soles of her feet. Mikael's heart skipped a beat. First instinct: blurt it out. Second instinct: stare in disbelief. Third thought: if he did not do something that instant, the girl would bleed to death beside him!\n\n"Oh, Fegg!" Mikael jumped to his feet, bellowing, "Mate!"\n\nSomewhere in the corner, a voice muttered irritably.\n\n"Fegg, fegg, fegg." Mikael glanced around, alarmed. "Mate Salza!"\n\n"Boss?" A bulky shape sat up in the corner. Skull-plate thudded against broken table. "Ow. Boss? That you?" \n\n"Yes," Mikael hissed. "Get over here!"\n\nSalza scrambled up, banging loudly into broken chairs. Glass creaked and cracked under his boots.\n\n"Almost there, Boss." Salza stumbled over, his cheeks ruby-red and a lopsided grin on his face.\n\nMikael glowered back. "We needs an aid-kit. Right fegging now!"\n\nSalza's cheeks went white. "You hurt, Boss? Did that fegging cannon go off--"\n\n"No. That!" Mikael jabbed a finger at the girl's blood-smeared feet. "She'll bleed out!"\n\nSalza's bleary eyes widened like balloons. "Fegg! We needs an aid-kit! Aid-kit in here!" Salza stumbled drunkenly past the torn curtain and out of out of Spintop, bellowing, "Aid-kit!"\n\nThe girl sat up, confused. "What's he--"\n\n"Never mind." Mikael grabbed the nearest Liq bottle - empty. "Fegg." He grabbed another and gave it to the girl. "Drink this."\n\nHer face contorted. "I's already drunk, Boss."\n\n"Not nearly enough," Mikael hissed.\n\n"All right, all right." The girl put the bottle to her lips and spilled more on her tits than in her mouth. \n\nShe burped unhealthily. The bottle toppled out of her hand.\n\nMikael grabbed it, unable to take his eyes of the girl's feet. Blood trickled out of deep gashes. Too drunk to feel pain. To stupid to put on shoes. A few more minutes and she'd bleed to death on the counter and no one, not one person on that fegged up station, would have noticed.\n\n"Aw, fegg, tits." Mikael examined the shards in her skin. "How the Hades did you do this?"\n\nThe girl's head lolled listlessly. Blissfully boozed - blissful for her. Mikael's heart pounded in his chest.\n\n"C'mon, Mate," he growled. "What's taking so long?"\n\nOutside the bar, voices muttered. Footsteps preceeded Salza, who crashed through the curtain swaying unsteadily on his feet.\n\n"Boss!" He stumbled over, aid-kit in hand. "I didn't notice, Boss. I swears by Saint Fegg I--"\n\n"Just shut up," Mikael hissed and popped the aid-kit.\n\nThree used bandages and a bottle of regro-paste tumbled out. Mikael watched them fall to the floor, aghast. He hadn't recalled before but, now he saw the aid-kit, it had come rushing back: the scene down in Local Control, amid the desks and neural couches. \n\nA handful of locals had tried to help the controlman but Mikael had insisted: compassion for crike-eaters had no place in his future. The poor man had bled out on the controls and, as he had, Mikael had raised his fist and bellowed those stupid words at the top of his lungs: [[Freebound|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "ahoy_codex_freebounders"]] or death - for the Free State of Tiash!\n\n"Oh, Shaitan's Sins," Mikael muttered.\n\n"Ye don't say," Salza snarled, rifling through spent bandages. He shot Mikael a haunted look. "This ain't gonna cut it, Boss. Not fer that much glass."\n\nMikael nodded half-heartedly. Free State of Tiash. He had declared a free state and almost let the controlman bleed out on the neural couch. Only after, almost too late, Mikael had changed his mind. And now it was happening again, all because of him: Captain Mikael, the phony pirate.\n\n"Fegg!" Mikael balled his fist but hesitated.\n\nSalza had set to work on the girl's feet with an scan-stitcher, carefully prying out shards and sealing the gashes. The sight made Mikael's stomach churn - or maybe that was all the booze he'd tried to drown his doubts in. Whatever the case, what was done was done and Mikael would not look away, not this time, not like he had with the controlman. \n\nMikael might have been a phony pirate, more a lunatic with a handgun than a leader with a plan, but he was also one more thing: painfully aware of how badly he'd fegged up and determined to do better, like Dad would have done from the start!

Grip boots thudded on the gangway as Mikael carried tits to the airlock of the Flagman's Staff. The hatch was suspiciously open. In the passage beyond, two mech-techs in overalls worked beneath the deck. A tyro spanner whirred. Elbows banged against hull plates.\n\n"Fegg," one of the techs gasped. "Almost got it."\n\nMikael stopped short. "The Hades are you two doing on my ship?"\n\n"Fixing that leaky seal," the man with the tyro-spanner said. "Bloody hard to find. Like you said. But we did find it. Way deep in the guts."\n\n"Right," Mikael muttered. "And who the fegg are you?"\n\n"Tech Jordan, Boss. Anything for a--"\n\n"Good. Good. You're on the crew."\n\nJordan grinned. "Already was, Boss, but glad you approve. Us Blue Hulk boys don't get nearly the respect we deserve."\n\n"Major oversight, that." Mikael's gaze wandered to the other tech. "You, kid?"\n\n"Oh, I'm just holding the tools. Too bloody loud down on the ring. Wanted peace and quiet, y'know?"\n\nMikael did know. That exact same thought had inspired him to retreat to the Spintop - and an ocean of booze which still sloshed in his stomach.\n\n"Aw, crike." Mikael stomped off.\n\n"Oh, wait, wait." Jordan stood and wiped his brow. "I almost forgot. Those nukes you wanted brought over?"\n\nMikael's heart skipped a beat. "Nukes?"\n\n"The nuclear warheads we liberated from Local Control. Or they donated to the Free State. Depending how you prefer to tell it. Anyways, I's stuck four in the Flagman's belly and the other two on Lici Luci."\n\n"Six nukes?" Mikael laughed.\n\nOne nuke was one too many. Two was worse. Three was a literal thermonuclear arsenal and six, well, six was so many Mikael did not even want to contemplate the implications.\n\n"Checked them all with the nuke-tech," Jordan said. "Shielding checks out. Ain't no one gonna glow no time soon."\n\n"Right," Mikael said. "And who the Hades thought it was a smart idea to salvage nukes, eh?"\n\nTech Jordan shrugged. "Don't mean no disrespect, Boss, but you said that? Mean, I argued against but you's a good point: we might need them one day and, since the Flagman burns hottest, she'll get them into range fastest."\n\n"Warheads." Mikael rubbed his chin; his stubble had grown out of control. "Nuclear warheads on the Flagman's Staff, eh?"\n\nJordan nodded. "Was your idea, Boss."\n\nMikael did not recall how that had come about. In truth, he did not even want to know.\n\n"Anyways, gotta fix this crike." Jordan crouched in the crawlspace. "Hand me the dysobian brick, yeah? It'll soak up the--"\n\n"Nuclear warheads." Mikael carried tits onto the bridge of Dad's [[fast-hauler|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_fasthauler"]], shaking his head in disbelief.\n\nFirst revolutions. Then executions. Now nuclear warheads.\n\n"The Hades is it all coming to?" He slouched on the Captain's couch with a sigh.\n\nThe girl still clung to him, arms wrapped tight. Mikael ignored her, gaze on the big board up front. The sensors display tracked all five of Mikael's cutters in close-orbit to the station. Blue Hulk and Lici Luci had made dock. Explained how the mech-tech had gotten over, though Mikael did not recall ordering that, much less giving the odrder to "liberate" nuclear warheads from Local Control.\n\nOn his lap, the girl squirmed around. "It's a little dark in here, innit, Boss?"\n\n"Lighting's busted," Mikael said.\n\n"Oh." The girl looked confused. "I though that was to hide all the nasty stuff that goes on in here."\n\nMikael breathed a laugh. "Tits, I swear to Hades you has the wrong idea about me."\n\nShe shot him a funny luck. "I does, Boss?"\n\n"Must be all the booze. You ain't thinking straight. C'mon--" Mikael hoisted her up.\n\nShe squeaked. "Boss! No! Tits can walk!"\n\n"Not on those feet you ain't." Mikael carried her towards the crew-cabin, saying, "I doesn't want you bleeding on the deck. Be bad for the seals."\n\nLise shot him the most incredulous look.\n\n"Just saying it how it is," Mikael said. "Shipkeeping comes first. Keep the deck clean and liquids sealed. Otherwise droplets gets in the circuits. Or causes deck rot. Can't have that now, can we?" He banged into the first crew-bunk. "Okay, now--"\n\nA female voice yelped.\n\nMikael stopped short. On his cot, curled up in the low-g bag, lay a pale-skinned woman with neon-blue lume beneath her skin. Her bloodshot eyes, ringed with chem-residue, stared at Mikael in alarm.\n\nMikale stared back, confused. "The Hades you doing here?"\n\n"Keeping your bed compfy, Boss."\n\n"I order that?"\n\nShe shook her head. "Took it upon myself, Boss. Cause the other bunk was full. Y'know."\n\n"Fine, fine." Mikael set tits down on his bunk. "No walking on the deck till you's healed. And you--" He pointed at the other woman. "Bandage her feet properly. I's gota man the bridge."\n\nThe lumed-up girl tipped a finger. "Aye, Boss."\n\nMikael grunted and turned away. He hesitated and turned back. "So, just for clarity: what's yer name anyways?"\n\nTits looked confused. "Me? I's Lise."\n\n"No. I meant her." Mikael pointed to the other woman.\n\n"I's Booty," she said. "Comm-tech. You hired me, ey? Unless that deal's off now?"\n\n"Not yet." Mikael banged out of the cabin and headed for the bridge.\n\nHe needed a moment to think and review the logs. Figure out how some freak with bright blue lume in her veins had come aboard.\n\n"Gotta be an explanation." Mikael stomped onto the bridge, rubbing his chin.\n\nGoatee needed a trim. He needed a shave - and a wash - but that could wait. First things first: the logs. Mikael brought them up on the board with a gesture.\n\nThousands of text-entries filled the screen, detailing every action the intelligence of the Flagman's Staff had made for the past year. From the point it recorded seal made with entity:station.TIASH, the log claimed five standard cycles had passed.\n\n"Oh, Saint Fegg's asscrack." Mikael buried his face in his hands.\n\nIt hadn't been some silly drunken escapade. It had all really happened - the incident with the controlman, the talk with Jim about them damned corporates, and in beween the sweaty fumbles with Tits. Beyond that, all Mikael recalled of the past days was drunken laughter, pained shrieks, and the hushed murmur of voices as the reality had slowly dawned on everyone: a Free State had been declared and life on the station - and in Mikael's flotilla - would never be the same, ever again.\n\n"Ah, crike." Mikael sat back with a sign.\n\nOn the big board, the logs glowed bright and obvious, a hard record of everything that had happened - every piece of equipment installed on the Flagman, every repair order executed, and every transmission made to the other cutters. Every last detail recorded for the authorities to find, if and when - and it really was when - they searched the Flagman's Staff.\n\n"Damn it." Mikael made to wipe the log but hesitated.\n\nWork was still underway on the Flagman. He could hear the tools clinking out by the airlock and, beyond, voices called to one another on the station-ring. Safer to keep a record like a good businessman, just in case someone challenged Mikael after, and especially because Mikael barely recalled what had actually happened.\n\nThe only part of the past five days Mikael wanted to recall was Tits and her, well, tits. He'd already forgotten her real name again and, if he was truly honest, did not want to know it. He'd had enough bad run-ins with love in the past decades. First his ex-husband, then Lillith, now Tits - and that lume-blue freak, assuming anything had even happened between them. Mikael did not want to know and did not need to know. He was the Captain now - Captain Mikael of a marauding gang of maniacs - and he had bigger problems to worry about than who he stuck his cock in.\n\n"Son of Hel." Mikael rubbed blood into his face, wondering where he had gone wrong.\n\nHad it been the corporate contract? Or the leg south with Lillith? Or had it been before then, when Mikael had abandoned Dad's ways, convinced the old man was just a loopy old [[voider|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_voider"]] who knew nothing of the galaxy?\n\n"Does it even matter?" Mikael looked around, almost expecting Dad to answer.\n\nDad, the old man who had been right, who had always been right about everything but especially about one thing: once an honest man went pirate, no matter the reason and no matter how sound an idea it seemed at the time, that honest man sold his soul to Hades. Mikael had done exactly that. He could feel it inside, that vile stench of the blasted lands, that black inky rot in his soul, a stain that had slowly seeped in and which would never wash out. That's simply how things were now and, though the idea unsettled Mikael in more ways than one, he figured he could live with that.\n\n"Better black than broke, eh?" He snorted and brought up the comms-interface.\n\nIt was time to leave. There was no going back.

For well over a day, Mikael's flotilla drifted in dead space, watching the stars for signs of security forces. In the center of their perimiter, the Blue Hulk thrusted back and forth while it's cargo drones gathered up dropped containers. The Vincense, holding above and ahead, was their dedicated mule - the carrier for salvaged cargo. Everyone else watched for danger. The comm chattered constantly. Mikael sat on the Captain's couch and half-listened to the conversation.\n\nLici Lucy crackled, "I swears it. There's comm-noise over on this side. Might be a pirate nest."\n\n"You're hearing lagged ghosts," Vincense transmitted. "Nothing out there excepd dust and dead space."\n\n"No, there's definitely noise," Hazel's comms-operator buzzed. "Low-band. Might be crike-eater security. Boss? You hearing this?"\n\n"I hear you yapping," Mikeal said heavily. "Blue Hulk? What's your status?"\n\n"Robots have the last stack," Blue Hulk squawked. "Seven bundles of rods. Radi-o-active. Vincense, time to mule up."\n\nVincense's comm-man gronaed. "Why's we hauling radio-junk? Seriously, Boss. Think this through. We're out in Saint Fegg's asscrack picking up glowing green--"\n\n"Just pick it up." Mikael turned down the volume. \n\nThe comm jabbered on, oblivious to the fact that every transmission would make the flotilla easier to triangulate. Anyone listening would hear. Local security. Corpo-sec. Even pirates. Chances any of them would actually show up were minute but there was a bigger picture: every signal sent was another data-point for the listeners.\n\n"Gonna need to figure that out." Mikael shook his head and pressed himself into the Captain's couch.\n\nNeural nubs made contact. Hard-link engaged with a synaptic snap. Data rumbled in Mikael's mind as the virtual bridge swam into view: a clutter of graphs and readouts arranged the way Mate Salza liked them - not the way Mikael was used to.\n\n"Right." Mikael pulled the sensors feed over.\n\nThe three-dimensional display, which contained sensors data from every cutter in Mikael's fleet, read nothing but dust and dead space beyond the perimiter. No drive-plumes. No lagged ghosts. Not even a hint that anything existed for thousands of Galactic Units in any direction.\n\nLike Dad had once joked: staring out into the Great Empty was like trying to see the cock on a courtesan - it might be there but nine times out of ten it simply wasn't, no matter how much you wanted it to be.\n\n"Guess you had a point after all," Mikael said.\n\nOn the comm, the operators yapped on and on. In virtual bridgespace, a conscience-shadow loomed. Unfamilliar neural language rumbled in the bridge as Mate Salza synchronized. He felt strange, like an alien interloper in the Flagman's Staff. Mikael shivered despite the neural link.\n\nSalza's voice rustled, "Who had a point, Boss?"\n\n"Eh?" Mikael flipped through readouts, if only to keep busy.\n\n"You said that. That someone had a point after all. Ya sure didn't mean me, eh?"\n\n"Oh that. Never mind." Mikael checked the sensors again.\n\nDust and dead space. No bright flashes. No IR spikes. Not even lagged waves or light-beams from afar. Absolutely no hint of civilization, just a big old empty space.\n\n"Boss? Boss!" Vincense was positively yelling on the comm.\n\n"Shit." Mikael turned up the volume. "Say again, Vincense?"\n\n"Damn it, Boss. You're never listening. I said: Cracker went over the cases. Looks like premium A grade rods." The comms-man's voice cracked. "This might be worth some real crike, ey?"\n\nMikael ran the math: Grade A nuclear fuel went for a few hundred thousand a standard rod. Fueling a single ship in the flotilla for a year cost twice that. Conclusion: the haul wouldn't even cover their last transit.\n\n"Fegg me." Mikael drew a deep breath. "Vincense, secure the haul. Get everyone compfy. Turn and burn with us. We're off to Tiash-Tiam, boys."\n\nBlue Hulk snorted static. "Tits and what, Boss?"\n\n"Oh, cralw up Saint Fegg's asscrack." Mikael turned to Salza's presence. "Mate, take us out. On course to Tiash-Tiam."\n\n"Aye, Boss." Salza input nav-commands.\n\nData rumbled in bridgespace. Calculations ran on the nav-unit. Mikael watched with half his attention while, with the other, he took stock of his flotilla.\n\nBlue Hulk, a battered old robo-repair boat, was in the center, collecting it's cargo-drones for transit. Ahead of it was the Vincense, a long utility cutter with six big cargo bays, two of which had been filled with peanut pickings. Up above was the Hazel, a pleasure-cutter refitted as a data-sensors vessel - way Mikael figured, it had once been a corpo-sec spook ship. Last but not least, on the far side of the formation, was the Lici Luci, an old-era [[Electro-class frigate|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cfrigate"]] that had been upgraded with an oversized [[l-drive|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luminev"]]. The other ship, whatever it's name had been, had vanished off sensors. \n\nMikael did not care. One hull less meant fewer mouths to feed and less nonsense to listen to.\n\n"Boss?" It was Salza's voice. "Course laid in. Can burn on command."\n\n"You got it," Mikael said.\n\nNothing happened. No one did anything. \n\nMikael groaned. "I meant: burn out!"\n\n"Aye, Boss." Salza executed.\n\nManeuvering thrusters fired, swinging the Flagman's Staff onto a new aqua course-plot. The old drive kicked in with a muted rumble. Secure in the Captain's couch, Mikael barely felt the acceleration. He saw it plain as plain on the optical feed though: a giant plume of plasma jetting out the ass of Dad's old [[fast-hauler|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_fasthauler"]].\n\n"Acceleration steady," Salza's voice rustled. "Holding low burn. Two days to base multiple. Should get us to the titty-station in, uhh, five weeks. Tops."\n\n"Good." Mikael watched the Flagman's Staff tilt down relative to their last course.\n\nWay off in the distance, too far for the nav-computer to accurately plot, was titty-station. Tiash-Tiam. Mikael had never been there. Until a year ago, he'd never even heard of the place.\n\nSalza's voice rustled, "Boss, just for sure: do we go on ice?"\n\n"No," Mikael said. "Transit's too short. Cheaper to starve than chill the tubes."\n\nSalza's annoyance rustled in bridgespace. "Cold, Boss. Real cold."\n\n"Yeah, well, live with it." \n\n"I is, Boss. I is."\n\n"Good," Mikael said, uncomfortably aware he could hear Salza's pulse.\n\nIt thudded in the background, a rythmic noise that beat out of tune with the Flagman's drive. Over and over the same pattern. Thud. Thud-thud. Thud. Thud-thud. After what felt like seconds but, according to the chronometer had been hours, the pulse skipped a beat.\n\nSalza's voice rustled, "Gotta say, Boss. This gig ain't been nothing like I thought it would be."\n\n"Oh, yeah? What did you think it would be like?"\n\n"Dunno." After a long pause, Salza said, "More dramatic. More desperate. You know. Different."\n\nMikael breathed a laugh. "Short on Pale and damn near broke isn't desperate enough for you, Mate?"\n\n"Don't get me wrong, it's dicey, but it don't feel different, y'know?"\n\nMikael did not know. He didn't bother to ask. \n\nVisible on the aft camera, the flotilla slowly matched vector and burn. The Flagman's Staff, the only vessel with a real drive, was well ahead of the pack. The other cutters glowed white hot in the distance, radiators extended to full as their drives strained to keep up. Ancient ships crewed by old [[voiders|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_voider"]], almost exactly like it had been on the north-south route.\n\n"Yeah," Mikael said heavily. "It sure ain't like the legends make out, is it?"\n\nSalza rustled, "Say what?"\n\n"Eh, just the contact. How it all is. Thought privateering would be different but, really, it's hauling cargo by another name. Like everything else these days."\n\n"Exactly," Salza said. "That's exactly how it feels, just couldn't figure out how to say it before."\n\nMikael grinned. "You need expressive lessons, Mate?"\n\n"Dunno, Boss. Ya wanna teach me expressive dance? Cause I knows a dance or two. Real expressive."\n\nBefore Mikael could come up with a witty retort, the comm crackled, "Group, Vincense. Cargo secured. Repeat: cargo is safe. No one panic."\n\n"Say what?" Mikael glanced at the feeds. \n\nNothing looked out of the ordinary. Comms-unit hadn't logged any distress. Conclusion: the idiot on the comm just wanted to blab.\n\n"Sait Fegg," Mikael said heavily. "There has to be a smarter way to do this."\n\nSalza's voice rustled, "Do what, Boss?"\n\n"This whole privateer thing. I mean, sure, the [[corsair|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_corsair"]] myths is probably just myths but there's brigand bands out here, right? How do they get by?"\n\nSalza snorted white noise. "On chems and fumes, Boss. Everyone knows that."\n\n"Yeah, but not all of them. I mean, if the payout were that dismal, no one would join up."\n\n"Only it is, Boss. There's a method to the madness: juice the crew up up and paint lume in their veins so they can't run off neither, least not without everyone they meets knowing straight off this goon's a pirate." The Mate sighed static. "Them brigands is a whole different sort of messed up. Mark my word."\n\n"Sure, sure," Mikael said. "But think it through: where does the chems and lume come from? How's the logistics work?"\n\nSalza rustled laughter. "Why's you asking me, Boss? You think I wanted to go pirate?"\n\n"We ain't pirates," Mikael said. "We're privateers. Which is basically the same thing on a corporate leash but my point is--"\n\nNoise popped loudly on the neurals. Mikael's eyes darted to the dashboards. All systems green. Sensors clean. Fuel drain well above normal. Only then did Mikael realize: the [[light-drive|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luminev"]] had sparked.\n\n"Crike." Mikael checked the nav-graph.\n\nEstimated time to destination: five weeks. Exactly as the Mate had predicted.\n\n"Looks good," Salza said. "Holding at low multiple."\n\n"Let's hope the others made it," Mikael said. "But back to my point: there's gotta be a trick to the business, right? I mean, how'd the [[corsairs|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_corsair"]] do it back when?"\n\n"Paid by someone, I wagers. Otherwise I bet it was just like us: barely scraping by."\n\n"Yeah," Mikael said heavily.\n\n"Whole brigand business is a scam," Salza said. "No secret. No trick. Only big crike paid by someone else so that stupid sods like us goes out to pester the competition. Like I said: we's all crike-eating bootlickers now, whether we likes it or not."\n\n"Yay," Mikael said sarcastically. "I always wanted to be a corporate cocksucker."\n\nSalza rustled a laugh. He did not sound any more amused than Mikael felt.\n\nThe whole thing really was a scam; a crazy get-rich scheme sold to idiots who couldn't do a simple cost-benefit analysis - idiots like Mikael and his crew. Any one of them could've run the math and realized the obvious: scoring cargo in the superluminal age was more luck than skill cause and nothing would change that, not laser-bombs, not chem-guns, not even thermonuclear missiles. Not when their quarry could just burn evasive until the [[light-drive|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luminev"]] was safe to engage and, pop, their fat juicy cargo vanished into the distance.\n \nThere had to be a better way to score cargo. The pirate way. Like the legends of old: lighning raids and giant hauls that had made the [[corsair kings|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_corsair"]] rich and famous. Sure, the [[corsairs|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_corsair"]] had launched armadas numbering in the million hulls or more but they too had started somewhere, started simple and worked their way up to become the scourge of the Mantle.\n\nHow they had done that Mikael did not know. But Dad would have. He'd have known all the dirty tricks. Dad had been a real [[voider|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_voider"]], the sort of man who'd always known better and always been right. Had Dad still been alive, and had he been stuck in the same situation Mikael was in, he would have already figured the trick out and made it big. In stark contrast, Mikael hadn't even managed to break even and that bothered him more than he wanted to admit.

Mikael stood on the bridge of the Flagman's Staff. Beside him, on the Mate's couch, sat Salza, a burly fellow with a scruffy beard. He was linked to the neurals and stared dead ahead, his eyes glazed over with data-input. What the Mate Salza saw in virtual bridgespace was exactly what Mikael saw on the big board: a glimmering star-field that strethed into the infinite reaches of dead space.\n\nTraced across the stars in bright turqoise data-line were six trajectories, one for each of Mikael's cutters. The Flagman's Staff burned well ahead of the pack, hot on the tail of a yellow line that depicted the course of a [[Plex freighter|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_freighter"]] several hundred thousand kilometers ahea. The ship itself was too small to see but it's enormous drive plume lit up dead space like a comet.\n\n"She's burning steady," Mikael said, gaze on the thermal-signature of the freighter. "Must be running up for [[l-drive|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luminev"]]. They've seen us."\n\nMate Salza grunted. "Be hours until they reaches minimum multiple. Want to hail them?"\n\nMikael shotthe burly man an incredulous look. "With exactly zero gun, Mate?"\n\n"They doesn't know that."\n\n"But they can see us closing. Moment they realized we've no guns or killers, they's gonna just laugh at us all the way to luminal."\n\n"Yeah," Salza growled. "And we's gonna be in ramming range soon."\n\nMikael laughed. His voice echoed in the dimly lit bridge. It didn't sound funny.\n\n"Shit," he muttered. "Ramming range, huh?"\n\n"Let's pray they's as many chem-guns as we does, Boss." Salza shifted on his couch. "Don't wanna say it but I's thinking it: we's gone whacko, chasing a cargo cult in an unarmed [[fast-hauler|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_fasthauler"]]."\n\n"Not much we can do about that. Our heavy hitters are on the Lici Luci and she's a billion clicks back. Won't ever catch up before that crew goes luminal."\n\n"Yeah," Salza growled. "If we was smart, Boss, we'd have invested in lase-bombs. Invested that last big T in thermal threats."\n\nMikael shook his head. "The cutters needed maintenance. Blue Hulk was literally falling apart."\n\n"Still. Woulda been smarter to buy lasers than chase the goose dry like we is."\n\n"Blue Hulk would've loved that," Mikael said. "Just imagine me going over and saying: hey, Cap, sorry but we's junking your ship so we can afford bombs."\n\nSalza barked a laugh. "Still woulda been the smart call. Just saying."\n\n"Yeah." Mikael scowled, running math-calc on his cerebral.\n\nChance the [[Plex freighter|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_freighter"]] had seen them: 100%. Chance the [[Plex freighter|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_freighter"]] was armed: 50%. Chance the [[Plex freighter|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_freighter"]] would think the Flagman's Staff was armed? Unknown.\n\n"Ah, it'll work," he said. "Hold the burn until we're in lag. Bet you crike they dump and jump."\n\nSalza grunted. His eyes stared straight past Mikael, whose own gaze was fixed on the big board.\n\nSix minutes to light lag, give or take, which would have had kinetic consequences if the Flagman's Staff had carried so much as a single weapon. Absent such options, closing distance with the [[Plex freighter|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_freighter"]] was a purely psychological maneuver: the freighter's captain would've seen the little cutter-flotilla pop into existence on an intercept vector and assumed the worst: pirates!\n\n"Any moment now," Mikael said, watching the yellow tradjectory. "Any--"\n\n"She's slewing," Salza called.\n\nThe yellow line veered hard to the right. Smaller orange trace-graphs plotted out the involved forces. Far in the distance, a giant plume of plasma errupted, angled ninety degrees off the Flagman's course.\n\nMikael squinted at the blurry camera feed. "Did they drop cargo?"\n\n"Can't tell," Salza said. "Sure dropped something solid. Acceleration's jumped point three. But that might just be [[hydro|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_hydro"]]."\n\n"Or it was insured cargo," Mikael said.\n\n"Could be. Hard to say. We calling their burn, Boss?"\n\nMikael ran the calculations: one [[Plex freighter|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_freighter"]] loaded up to half capacity was several million tons. Total [[hydro|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_hydro"]] ration for a crew of four over a decade was a few dozen tons, tops. Mathed against total vessel mass: less than two percent, likely all stored in one tank, so unless that particular freighter had been running [[hydro|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_hydro"]] to a corporate station, they'd dumped the cargo, not the bath water.\n\n"Break burn," Mikael said. "Heel to bow. Let's see what they dropped."\n\n"You sure, Boss? Cause that seemed mighty easy."\n\nMikael shrugged. He knew as much as the Mate and the math had told him.\n\n"Boss?" Salza sounded uneasy.\n\n"I ran the math," Mikael said. "Unless they's hauling something absurd like lead brick or battleship-grade plate, we got some juicy stuff."\n\n"Right," Salza said.\n\nHe did not initiate maneuvers. On the big board, the yellow line moved farther and farther right, slowly vanishing beyond the bow sensors cone.\n\n"Mate?" Mikael shot the man a hard look. "Heel to bow, eh?"\n\n"Well, if you say so, Boss." Salza drew a deep breath. "Heel about in three, two--"\n\nThrusters fired with a rumble. Acceleration tore at Mikael as the Flagman's Staff rotated bow to stern. \n\n"Oh, Saint Fegg!" Mikael hugged the Mate's couch for support.\n\nInertia strained against him until the counter-thrust threw Mikael into the back of the seat. His left ankle snapped loudly.\n\n"Ow!" Mikael glanced at the cyber-joint.\n\nIt was intact - scan read spring-sprain. Mikael's pride on the other hand had been bruised. \n\nHe glowered at Salza. "The Fegg kinda vectoring was that, Mate?"\n\n"Did what the computer advised me to, Boss." Salza threw off the buckles stood. His eyes binked repeatedly. "Ey, Boss? You okay?"\n\nMikael nodded, rubbing his ankle. "Spring-sprain. Nothing serious."\n\nSalza's beard quivered. A rumbling laugh resounded in the bridge.\n\n"Spring-sprain," the Mate wheezed. "Boss up and fegging sprained himself!"\n\nMikael rolled his eyes. "You're laughing now, Mate, but you ain't gonna be. Not for long. Not on this contract."\n\n"Yeah." Salza's expression became deck-earnest. "And you got only yourself to blame for that, Boss."\n\nMikael stared, incredulous. "How's this my fault now, eh?"\n\n"Cause you made me fly. And for what, even? Practice in case we ever makes it big?" Salza snorted. "Gonna be a billion years at the rate the crike-eaters is paying us, and that's with the stuff we might nab on the side. Commodore Mikael of the Corporate Privateers is a pipe dream and you know it."\n\n"Still better than the black mark," Mikael said.\n\n"Ya think? Cause we's got that--" Salza pointed to the big board. "--and that ain't a real haul, Boss. This is peanut pickings. Round three. Exactly like the crike-eaters want it: we licks their boots for the scraps from their table. If there was justice--"\n\n"If, Salza. If."\n\nThe Mate looked livid. Not at Mikael, not directly. More at the entire situation, a frustratin which Mikael shared. Unfortunately, that didn't make Mikael's point any less true: better a corporate contract than a black mark.\n\nMikael breathed a deep sigh. "C'mon, Mate. Time to pick peanuts." He toggled the comms-unit to group talk. "Group call, group call. Anyone listening?"\n\nThe line crackled. None of the other cutters answered. A glance at the comms-chart showed why: the five cutters of Mikael's Privateers were six light-seconds behind.\n\nSalza said, "Is is like I said it is, though, ain't it, Boss?"\n\nMikael, confused "It's like what?"\n\nBefore Salza could reply, the comm-unit crackled, "Group call, Lici Luci. Sensors-res on dropped junk. Six, maybe seven sticks. Look right massive, Boss."\n\n"Blue Hulk confirming that," another voice buzzed. "Uhh, Boss? Those look like launchers. Like, live nuke launchers."\n\n"What?" Mikael squinted at the big board.\n\nSensors had detected diffuse shapes, marked by thin grey lines, near where the [[Plex freighter|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_freighter"]] had vectored. The resolution was too low to idenify what the objects were.\n\nMikael glanced at Salza. "You think that was launchers?"\n\nThe Mate shook his head. "Rudderjunk. Them boys in blue is paranoid."\n\n"And the girl," Mikael said.\n\nSalza snorted. "You and your girls, Boss. Just can't leave them outa it, can you?"\n\n"She's the only nuke-tech we's got. That's gotta count for something, eh?"\n\nSalza shifted. He did not reply.\n\nOn the comm, Lici Luci crackled, "No, no. No way that is launchers. It's nuke fuel. Rods or the likes. Lots of them."\n\n"Rods?" Mikael groaned. "Why's anyone hauling nuke-rods out here?"\n\nSalza shrugged. "Station resupply, probably? Reactor stuff. You know."\n\n"No it ain't," Blue Hulk squawked. "That's launchers. I swears my boobs, that's--"\n\n"Enough," Mikael said. "Blue Hulk, quit spreading [[squaller's junk|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_shards"]] and prep your robots. Luci, you're on watch. Hazel, Vincense, break burn and give us some lateral coverage. And--" He checked his cerebral for the name of the last ship. "--Patipatia?"\n\nThere was no response. The comms-unit barely had a light-link to the last ship in the flottilla.\n\nSalza muttered, "Gone drunk, them boys has."\n\n"Oh, great," Mikal muttered, then on the comm, "Patipatia, we lose you, you're on your own out here. Cobby?"\n\nAgain no response. Mikael waited out of common courtesy, watching the big board.\n\nThe yellow line had long faded into the distance. Burn-math suggested the [[Plex freighter|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_freighter"]] had accelerated to point-one luminal, enough to engage the [[light-drive|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luminev"]]. Add an hour or two for thermal equalization and, poof, the freighter would zoom off into the distance and yell to every patrol station in the vicinity: pirates!\n\nWay Mikael mathed it, that gave his cutter-flotilla a week at most to snag any dropped cargo and skedaddle up north to Tiash-Tiam, a tiny convoy turnaround point with no infrastructure. The files Mikael had recieved with his contract claimed Tiash-Tiam was the best bounty hub in the southern Mantle.\n\n"Best being relative," Mikael muttered.\n\nSalza shot him a sidelong look. "What's you babbling about, eh?"\n\n"Boss stuff," Mikael said heavily.\n\nSalza grunted. He didn't ask. No one ever asked. The crew all expected the Boss to figure it out.\n\nThe course, the cargo, the credits, the salaries, all that was Mikael's job and he did not have the slightest clue what he was doing. Just getting the flotilla out of [[Hegemony|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]] space had eaten up a year and most of the up-front payment. \n\nWay Mikael saw it, that was by design. Their paymaster wanted an agent up north but they weren't going to invest real credits in a privateer. No justice in it at all. Absolutely none but, then again, Mikael had not expected any. All the corporates cared about was credits and, until Mikael had earned enough to make his voice matter, he was just some nobody from up north with a junky old [[fast-hauler|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_fasthauler"]].

Never, not once in his six hundred years, had Mikael walked into a bar as deathly silent as the Spintop. Ten locals in grimy overalls and patched-up jumpsuits sat around a bar manned by an silver android. In the shadowed corners of the room, moody glow-bulbs shone on sitting alcoves. No one spoke. Everyone stared at Mikael and Salza. In the background, a zoonytune warbled from concealed speakers.\n\n"Saint Fegg," Mikael muttered, taking the place in. \n\nGut instinct said turn around and head straight back to the Flagman. Get off that station and away from the mess before the bad blood boiled over. Instead, Mikael stood rooted in place, his fingers clasped tightly around the grip of the corporate [[chem-gun|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_zipgun"]].\n\nBeside him, Salza glowered around the room. "Any questions, huh?"\n\nSeveral locals shook their heads. Everyone went back to their drinks.\n\n"That's more like it." Salza nudged Mikael towards the bar. "C'mon. We needs drinks."\n\n"Right." Mikael sat on a stool and set his gun down.\n\nPolymer clinked on the glass surface. The safety-light in the grip went red.\n\nMikael exhaled in relief. "Was wondering how to turn it off."\n\n"Don't trust that tosh too much," Salza said. "Crike-eater crap. Ain't never safe."\n\n"I'll remember that," Mikael said.\n\n"Ye better." Salza sat beside Mikael and waved to the android. "Oi, boozebox. Bottle of Liq!"\n\n"Of course, Sir," the shiny machine said cheerfully. "What label would Sir find to--"\n\n"Saint Fegg." Mikael buried his face in his arms.\n\nGoons. [[Chem-guns|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_zipgun"]]. Monumental idiots. Mikael's cybernetic heart was still racing from the ordeal. He just didn't understand how a security man could be that dumb - how anyone could be that dumb.\n\n"Really," Mikael muttered. "How think does you have to be to--" His voice trailed off.\n\nThe shoeless girl had sidled up. She smiled anxiously.\n\nMikael's heart sank. "What does you want?"\n\nShe looked shocked. "Nothing, Boss. But I has to pony up, right?" When Mikael's face contorted, she giggled nervously. "The big guy said I has to pay for your drinks, right?"\n\n"Oh." Mikael glanced to Salza. "Mate, you sure--"\n\n"Your order, Sir." The android set a bottle of cheap Liq on the counter.\n\n"My order, eh?" Salza scowled at the bottle, then at the android, and finally at Mikael. "You buy this, Boss? Bolts here wants fifty corporate crike for moonshine." He snorted. "Even in death they rips us off. Unbelievable is what it is."\n\n"Aye," someone said farther down the bar. "Is unreasonable, is what it is."\n\nSalza slowly turned his head to the man. "Unreasonable, eh? Unreasonable is what you thinks--"\n\n"Mate," Mikael said heavily. "Leave it be."\n\n"Right, Boss." Salza snatched the bottle. \n\nThe android held on. "Fifty credits, please, Sir."\n\n"I'll pay," the girl said. She slid a credit chip onto the counter. "My last fifty."\n\nMikael shot her an incredulous look. "And you's wasting it on us?"\n\n"He insisted." The girl pointed to Salza.\n\n"I did," the Mate growled. "Tits owes us, Boss. Especially after that mess."\n\nMikael shook his head. He had no words. Absolutely none.\n\n"Ey, Boss." Salza popped the bottle. "Cheers." He downed a long gulp and handed the bottle to Mikael.\n\n"Cheers, Mate." Mikael gulped.\n\nThe Liq tasted disgustingly bitter and burned all the way down. Mikael wheezed.\n\n"Nasty, innit?" The girl grabbed the bottle and chugged.\n\nNot a sip. Not a gulp. Half the blasted bottle in one go. Guzzling like her life depended on it.\n\nSalza looked shocked. "You okay, tits?"\n\n"Me?" She burped. "I's fine. Especially now." She giggled.\n\n"You no say." Salza studied the girl intently. "So tell us, tits: what's the Boss and I got our heads into here, eh?"\n\nMikael breathed a laugh. "I don't even want to know, Mate. Let's just finish the drink and--"\n\n"Nah, nah," Salza said. "We blows our bounty here, I wants to know why. And what she--" He jabbed a finger into the girl's chest. "--did to piss them goons of like that."\n\n"Whatever, Mate." Mikael appropriated the bottle and drank.\n\nIt tasted as bitter as before but booze was booze and Mikael needed it. She'd just seen one man get shot and another man's skull split open. And Mate Salza acted like nothing had happened!\n\nThe girl was saying, "More a misunderstanding, honest. I didn't know you two was that sort." She yanked the bottle out of Mikael's hands and gulped.\n\n"Charming," Mikael said.\n\nSalza grunted. "Tits, that's the Boss's booze."\n\n"Oops." The girl took one last sip and handed the bottle back, a sheepish look on her face. "Got greedy, Boss. Won't happen again. Promise." \n\n"Good to know." Mikael handed the booze to Salza. "One for the void, Mate. We's gonna--"\n\n"For the void?" The girl's eyes had gone wide with awe. "You really is pirates, ey?"\n\n"Pirates?" Mikael laughed but quickly stopped.\n\nIt wasn't funny. Nothing about what had happened was funny.\n\nSalza was still grinning, eyes darting from Mikael to the girl and back. "Pirates? You hear that, Boss? Tits here thinks we's pirates!"\n\n"I heard," Mikael said quietly.\n\nThe girl, expression earnest. "But you is, right? Right?"\n\nSalza grunted. "The decent sort, tits. Unusually decent, that is." He winked.\n\nThe girl gasped. "You is! You truly is, ain't ya?"\n\nSalza nodded gravely.\n\nMikael smiled sadly. "Sure we is. Sure as sure."\n\n"You is!" The girl hugged Mikael with the force of a deck-jack.\n\nThe synth-liner in his stomach squelched. For a brief instant, all Mikael felt was confusion. The next his empty stomach ached so badly his mouth hung open in a wordless, voiceless scream.\n\n"Oh, stars and sunbursts!" The girl kissed him on the cheek. "I knew it. I always knew it! Well, no, I didn't, but I don't want to seem ungreatful now, do--" Her voice trailed off. "Oh no. Are you okay, Boss?"\n\n"Fine," Mikael gasped.\n\nHis stomach ached. Booze on an empty bio-chamber did bad things to the body - and brain-interface. Everything had gone fuzzy and, when Mikael tried to focus, his temples ached.\n\n"Ah, fegg," he wheezed.\n\nThe girl said, "You looks like bad rice, Boss."\n\n"Rice?" Mikael wheezed a laugh. "Could use some of that, honest."\n\n"What, corpo cook-shit?" Salza set the bottle on the counter with a thud. "Shaitan's sins. Another!"\n\nHad Mikael not been in excruciating pain, he'd have slapped his Mate across the face. The plan had been one drink and back to the boat. Get the Hades away from Tiash-Tiam before the locals came to lynch them - or worse. Except Mikael couldn't manage it. His stomach ached worse than lungrot.\n\nBio-diagnostic reported severe calorie deficiency. Low levels of carbohydrates, potassium, and calcium. Before long, his biological bits would cramp up and, an hour or two after that, his cybernetics would shut down in order of least to most critical.\n\n"Fegg," Mikael gasped, willing his brain to work. "Food. I need--" He felt around, desperate.\n\nHis fingers found the grip of the [[chem-gun|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_zipgun"]]. Not food. But better than nothing. \n\nMikael gripped the gun, snarling, "I fegging well needs food!"\n\nRinging silence filled the Spintop. Halfway down the bar, some bloke had frozen with his glass halfway to his lips. Everyone stared at Mikael, even Salza, whose eyes had gone wide with alarm.\n\nMikael snarled, "I'm fegging hungry! What's so incomprehensible about that?"\n\n"Aye!" Salza stood.\n\nHis bar-stool toppled with a clang. Everyone winced.\n\nSalza glowered around. "We's hungry, we is. What's you fine folk say about that?"\n\n"There's [[bakepaste|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_bakepaste"]] behind the bar," the girls squeaked. "But it costs. Hundred credits for--"\n\n"I don't fegging care what it costs," Mikael wheezed.\n\n"Aye," Salza bellowed. "The Boss is hungry and he don't care what it costs!" He walked behind the bar.\n\nThe android blocked his path. "Excuse me, Sir, but you have engaged in a violation of--"\n\n"Oh, no, no, excuse me!" Salza slammed a cybernetic fist through the machine's faceplate.\n\nCheap silver-imitate crumpled. Beneath, circuits sparked. The android teetered and collapsed with a thud.\n\nSalza turned to Mikael, grinning. "I's got a talent for this, eh?"\n\n"Salza," Mikael said, exasperated. "All I wanted was crike-eater rice."\n\n"Oh, right!" Salza banged around behind the bar. "Ah, fegg, Boss. Ain't no rice packs. But I's got this--" He slapped a tube of [[bakepaste|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_bakepaste"]] on the counter. "--and this!" He produced a bottle of Liq.\n\nMikael watched, aghast, as the Mate mixed both in a glass. Slushy paste frothed and bubbled.\n\n"There ya is." Salza pushed the concoction over.\n\nMikael took it with a weary smile. "Thanks, Mate."\n\nIt tasted as bad as it looked: flakey paste watered down with bitter booze. The doughy mass stuck in Mikael's throat. He swallowed forcibly. It refused to bugde.\n\n"Fegg." Mikael grabbed the nearest glass.\n\nSome frilly fruit-cocktail with pink straws. Mikael downed it in one go. The lump in his throat loosened. Mikael gasped in relief only to realize his brain-case had begun to buzz. Chemical additives of some sort. The concoction made everything spin.\n\n"Oh, no." Mikael gripped the [[chem-gun|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_zipgun"]], terrified someone would take it - and shoot a hole in the station.\n\nOr him. Or Salza. Or anyone else. Mikael did not want any of that and would have explained as much but, when he looked around, the entire bar stared at him as though they'd seen the Bloody Baron himself rise from the grave. Mikael whimpered, overcome by chem-induced clarity: the locals had taken it seriously. They all Salza and him were honest-to-Hades pirates!\n\n"It isn't," Mikael whispered, "what it looks like."\n\nBehind him, someone whispered, "Is he okay? Are you sure he's okay?"\n\nSomeone else was saying, "I saw it myself. In the leg. Just like that."\n\nMikael looked around, aghast.\n\nAn elderly woman was telling some rosy-faced fellow, "Like the big one said: the decent sort."\n\n"The decent sort? Saint Shaitan's slippers!" A wiry man clapped the rosy-faced man on the shoulder. "I's heading out, Jack, and if you's got brains, you does the same."\n\n"Aye," the other said.\n\nBoth stood. A big bloke with a colonial roll hanging out his mouth got in the way. His gaze was on Mikael and expression said it all: no one was leaving until the so-called pirates had been put in their place.\n\n"Ey, you." The big bloke pointed at Mikael.\n\nMikael looked away. How even to explain? No one would believe him. No one willingly threw themselves at a loaded gun - no one except [[voiders|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_voider"]] with an excellent grasp of ballistics and the terrible quality of corporate pressure hulls.\n\n"Hey!" A hand shook Mikael's shoulder.\n\n"Fegg off," Salza's voice growled.\n\nThe big bloke snorted in disgust. "You speaks for this murderer, eh? You gonna defend him?"\n\n"Murderer?" Salza barked a laugh. "You hear that, Boss? This numbskull's calling you a murderer."\n\n"I heard," Mikael said heavily. "Leave it be. Please."\n\n"Right," the big bloke snarled. "Like I's gonna let two bloodthirsty, murdering chucklecucks like you--"\n\n"I said enough!" Mikael stood, gun in hand, and fixed the big guy with a withering glare. "All anyone wants around here is a nice, quiet end to the evening. One where everyone goes home with all their brains and body parts intact, right?"\n\nThe shoeless girl nodded vigorously. "That's all we wants. Honest."\n\n"Shut up, Lise," the bloke snapped. "This man's murdered one of ours and--"\n\n"I ain't murdered no one," Mikael said evently. "And I's good reason to want to keep it that way, okay?"\n\n"Right." The big bloke took a long drag on his leaf-roll and exhaled in Mikael's face. "Try me, chucklefuck."\n\n"Boss?" Salza rose to his feet, a great mountain of cyber-reinforced flesh, and cracked his muscles. "We gonna do this, eh? Them three against us two?"\n\n"No," Mikael said, gaze fixed on the big bloke. "I have a better idea: we settle our differences over a drink."\n\nThe big guy looked shocked. "Say what?"\n\n"Aye," Salza growled. "You sure about this, Boss?"\n\n"No," Mikael said. "One drink ain't gonna cut it. At least two. Cobby?"\n\n"Right. Like we's gonna sort murder over drinks." The big guy rolled his eyes. "Who's you think you is, eh? The Bloody Baron?"\n\n"Captain Mikael," Mikael said. "Please." He gestured to the stool beside him. "Two drinks. At least."\n\nTense silence fell. The big guy chewed his leaf roll. In the back, the rosy-faced fellow fidgeted nervously.\n\n"Boss is giving you a chance," Salza growled. "If you's smart, you takes it."\n\n"Aye," the rosy-faced fellow said. "I says we does what the Boss says, eh?"\n\nThe shoeless girl nodded. "Mighty smart move, I thinks."\n\n"Best idea I've heard all night." Mikael glanced to Salza. "Mate, find us a bottle. A good bottle. Not that moonshine crike."\n\n"Aye, Boss." Salza brushed past the rosy-cheeked guy.\n\n"Ey." The big one held him back, gaze on Mikael. "I ain't agreed yet."\n\n"Of course," Mikael said and put on his special smile, the one he'd learned in the corporate sector: polite and like you meant it even - especially - when you didn't.\n\nThe plan had been one bottle and straight back to the boat. Instead Mikael was stuck in a seedy piss-hole with a gun in his hand, facing down some big brainless buffoon, pretending he was the Bloody Baron himself when in fact all Mikael had wanted was to keep the station intact. Except none of that mattered anymore. Fact had been replaced with fiction and, without even knowing it, Captain Mikael had written his opening act: [[Freebound|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "ahoy_codex_freebounders"]] or death!

Five long, exhausting weeks later, Mikael leaned on the back of Salza's couch and watched the big board. On it, Tiash-Tiam was visible, a tiny docking ring built around a central reactor-sphere. At the widest point, the station was barely three hundred meters in diameter - the Flagman's Staff measured twice that in length - and had no berths suited for large vessels. The only cargo-berth was occupied by a run-down [[lugtug|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_lugtug"]] and, aside from two shuttles and a corporate cutter painted in rancy blue hues, there were no starships anywhere in sight.\n\n"Damn," Mikael muttered. "This place sure is a graveyard."\n\n"Aye, Boss," Salza said as he eased the Flagman into near-orbit. "Guess that's how the paymasters want it: quiet and out of the way."\n\n"Probably. But it gives me the creeps. Y'know?"\n\nSalza grunted. "Better be careful, Boss."\n\n"Yeah." Mikael felt his jumpsuit-pocket.\n\nInside was the [[mono-knife|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cblade"]] Lith had bribed him with. Mikael was glad he'd kept it - and secretly hoped he'd never have to use it.\n\n"Boss?" Salza put data on the big board. "Customs stamp from Local Control. We's cleared to dock on [[Freebound License|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "ahoy_codex_freebounders"]]."\n\nMikaels nodded. "Take her in."\n\n"Aye, Boss." Salza issued commands.\n\nThe Flagman's Staff rumbled as maneuvering thrusters along the hull eased the [[fast-hauler|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_fasthauler"]] towards a docking spoke. Remote controlled tethers shot out with little thrust-flashes. One overshot the Flagman, trailing loose cable.\n\n"Easy there," Mikael muttered.\n\nSalza grunted. "Blame Local Control. I's exactly on their vector. Smack on."\n\n"I know," Mikael said, watching the dock-chart.\n\nLocal Control had prescribed an impossible maneuver: bring the Flagman in nose-first, with no tug, on a free-floating spoke the size of a data-port. Had Mikael been at the helm, he'd have flat out refused to do it. One micro-thrust off spec and the Flagman would've smashed clean through the docking spoke - and the tiny station beyond.\n\n"Easy," Mikael muttered as the station loomed. "Nice and steady."\n\n"Like I loves it," Salza growled as he nudged the Flagman into position.\n\nTether-lines locked in with muffled thuds. On the portside cam-feed, the docking spoke drew dangerously near. Thrusters fired in short hisses until, like a lover's kiss, the Flagman connected with the latch.\n\n"There ya go," Salza said. "Nice and easy despite all your junk vectors. Now quit yapping you crike-eating drone."\n\nMikael's lips curled. "You's sure got a talent with the micros."\n\n"Mate's gotta be good for something, eh?" Salza loosened the buckles, saying, "I'ma sit here and listen to this feggson yabber. Just in case we's skipped some corpo-reg, all right?"\n\n"Fine by me. I'ma go--" Mikael pointed his thumb at the airlock.\n\n"Play it safe, Boss. We's counting on you for our paycheck."\n\n"Yeah, yeah." Mikael headed down the tube to the dock.\n\nOxygen cyclers squeaked. A generator hummed. Behind an open deck panel, water dripped.\n\n"Oh, come on." Mikael peered into the utility space.\n\nOn the floor stood a fresh seal-pack. Mikael had swapped six, Salza another three. Somewhere deeper in, the pipe continued to drip.\n\n"Eh, fegg it." Mikael hopped over the crawlspace and into the airlock.\n\nThe control panel read seal good and pressure stable. Mikael hit the release.\n\nHydraulics groaned. The hatch hissed halfway open and froze. Machinery creaked. A warning tone sounded.\n\n"Fegging junk." Mikael shoved the door open and stepped out, into a carpeted corporate corridor.\n\nEvery odd glow-panel in the ceiling had gone out, shrouding half the docking spoke in shadow. No Customs official waited for Mikael, not even a greeter-bot, just a grip-textured carpet all the way to the station ring, some thirty meters away.\n\n"So much for corporate courtesy." Mikael set off, shaking his head.\n\nHis deck-boots creaked with every step. Glow-panels blinked to life when he passed. Up ahead, the spoke merged seamlessly into the station-ring, a broad corridor which curved out of sight to either side. Stencils on the walls pointed left to Local Control and right to Spintop and Tiash Corporate Trade.\n\n"Okay, now what?" Mikael checked his cerebral.\n\nThe instructions Mr. Tomsen had given him made no mention of the institution Mikael was to contact, only a personal ID file: Ogopa Swidan.\n\n"Damn it." Mikael looked around, half expecting to see an info-panel.\n\nThere were none in sight. Presumably Tiash-Tiam was so small that everyone knew everyone.\n\n"One in three chance," Mikael mused. "I bet: Tiash Corporate."\n\nTheir office was halfway around the ring, past cargo-modules and hab-blocks labeled with alpha-numerical designators. All the doors were sealed except one: a curtained doorway beside a neon sign that, with some creative interpretation, might have read: <i>Spintop - BAR</i>. Raucous laughter roared behind the curtain.\n\n"Sure must be funny." Mikael paced on, looking for the Tiash Corporate office.\n\nIt was fifty meters down the ring, beyond a bot-bay and the blast door to Local Control. The place sure didn't look like much: a pitch-black office space behind a transparent door stenciled with the words <i>Tiash Corporate</i> in bright blue hues.\n\n"Huh." Mikael tapped the door-panel.\n\nThe digital screen did not so much as blurt an error. Confused, Mikael peered into the office. Only then did he realize the space beyond had been stripped down to the chekered carpet - not a single desk or cubicle in sight.\n\n"Odd." Mikael glanced around.\n\nThere was no one to be seen on the ring. No corporate employees. No locals. Not even a robot with it's nose in a duct.\n\n"The fegg?" Mikael wandered back the way he'd come.\n\nAside from Mikael's boots, nothing made a sound - not even an oxygen exchanger.\n\n"Creepy," Mikael muttered, then activated the crew-link. "Mate?"\n\nNoise crackled in Mikael's ear, followed by Salza's voice, "S'up, Boss?"\n\n"Dunno. Crike-eater cubicles are all dark here."\n\nSalza grunted. "Out for drinks, I wagers. Local clock's well into rest-cycle."\n\n"Yeah. Could be." Mikael stopped outside the Spintop Bar. "I'll try the local watering hole. Might be someone who knows something."\n\n"Sure, sure, I'll be--" Salza's voice trailed off. "Boss? You ain't gonna like this."\n\nMikael breathed a laugh. "What, the dock fee too high?"\n\n"Nah. Hang tight." Metal thudded. Grip-boots squeaked.\n\nMikael's expression contorted. "Mate? What's up?"\n\n"Fegging sour milk is what's up." Heavy footfalls sounded in the background. "Just heard it straight from Control: titty-station don't belong to the crike-eaters no more. Private trade only. Least, that's what the controlman said. Now, I dunno if they's pulling my beard or what, but--"\n\n"Just get down here," Mikael said. "Spintop Bar. I'm right outside."\n\n"Aye, Boss." The line died with a hiss.\n\nLong minutes passed. Behind the curtain to the Spintop, voices babbled and glasses clinked. Every so often, whiffs of burt colonial leaf wafted out. The scent made Mikael's stomach growl. He hadn't eaten in nine days and the synth-lining in his stomach had begun to chew itself up to keep the batteries topped.\n\n"Fegging crike-eaters," Mikael mutterd.\n\nFrom up the corridor, heavy footfalls sounded. Mate Salza stomped into view, his sinister expression emphasized by his scruffy beart. \n\n"Mate," Mikael said.\n\nSalza stopped. "Boss. What's the plan?"\n\n"Ask around." Mikael nodded to the bar.\n\nSalza's brow furrowed. "Drinks before duty? What sorta motto is that, Boss?"\n\n"This ain't drinks. This is business. C'mon." Mikael brushed through the curtain.\n\nDirectly inside, opposite a suit-rack, was an enormous tank filled with bio-luminescent fish. Up ahead, another curtain separated the de-suit area from the local watering hole. The air positively stank of leaf-roll.\n\nSalza wrinkled his nose. "Reeks in here, Boss."\n\n"Least it ain't crike." Mikael made for the second curtain. \n\nSalza held him back. "Just so we's clear: there's no deal to be made here. You parsed that, yeah? The crike-eaters has abandoned this place."\n\n"Yeah. But you said it yourself: private trade."\n\n"I did say that," Salza said. "But the way the controlman said it, and considering we's all got them black marks, Boss, I doesn't think--"\n\n"Okay, okay." Mikael held up his hands. "Let's just ask around. Figure out what happened, hm?"\n\n"Could do. Could ask her." Salza pointed behind Mikael.\n\nHe turned, confused, to see a dark-skinned girl in a grey skinsuit standing right outside the green curtain. When she saw Mikael look, her big brown eyes lit up like a torch-drive.\n\n"Oh, Hades." Mikael turned back to Salza. "How about we--"\n\n"Excuse me." The girl sidled up.\n\nShe had that look in her eyes, the one Mikael knew all too well: the same look the girls at the Halfway had.\n\nMikael groaned.\n\nSalza grinned. "Hey. Nice tits."\n\n"Ignore him," Mikael said. "And excuse us. We're having a conversation here, you know."\n\n"I head," the girl said. "Was just wondering if I could stand here. With y'all. Y'know?"\n\nMikael looked from the girl to Salza and back again. Only then did he notice the girl had no soles on. Naked down to the toes.\n\nHis confusion must've shown because the girl giggled nervously. "Didn't mean to interrupt or nothing. Go on. I ain't listening. Promise." She glanced over his shoulder.\n\n"Okay," Mikael said slowly.\n\n"Was thinking the same thing, Boss." Salza leaned closer. "Say, you make it a habit to pick up tits outside piss-holes? Cause, from what you told me about that other bird--"\n\n"Mate." Mikael shot Salza a withering glare.\n\nSalza shrugged. "Just saying, Boss. Just saying."\n\n"Oh, you were?" The girl grinned. When she saw Mikael's glare, she quickly stopped. "Sorry. Sorry. Don't mind me or nothing."\n\n"Ain't no one saying we minds you," Salza said. "But you's gotta admit--"\n\n"No." Mikael grabbed Salza by the skinsuit. "I've experienced this scheme once. I'm not going through it again. We walk away. Cobby?"\n\nSalza groaned. "Right, Boss. Right." He smiled at the girl. "We's gotta be on our way, tits. Business and the likes. But--"\n\n"Oh, wait, wait. Before you go: does you have five seconds, Boss?" Her gaze was on Mikael.\n\n"Business calls. Excuse us." Mikael pushed Salza back towards the dock-spoke.\n\nThe girl pleaded, "Please? Just five quick minutes. Do you after. Both of you. Swears. Just as long as you let me--"\n\nMikael stopped short. "Miss, I doesn't think you gets it. No means no. Cobby?"\n\nThe girl chewed her lip and stared at her feet. Naked feet.\n\nMikael had to ask, "The Hades you doing walking around with no shoes anyways?"\n\n"Me?" The girl looked shocked. "Oh, just, well. Long story. Silly story, really. I was--" The girl glanced over her shoulder. "Oh, shit, shit, shit."\n\nTwo men in grey bolt-proof vests had stepped out of the bar. On their heels followed a woman who wore a white skinsuit that bore the Tiash Company logo.\n\n"Oh no." The shoeless girl shrank behind Mikael.\n\nHe looked from her to the corporate woman and back. "Say, there something you--"\n\n"Gentlemen." The woman stepped up, a forced smile on her lips. "If you would excuse me, I would like to retrieve my property." The woman stared at the girl.\n\nShe shrank further behind Mikael. "Fegg me."\n\n"I would." Salza laughed.\n\nMikael shot him a bewhildered look. \n\nThe woman smiled. "I am certain that can be arranged, Sir. Now if you would be so kind as to return my property?"\n\n"Property, huh?" Salza sounded suspicious.\n\n"Not my problem," Mikael said and stood aside.\n\n"Appreciated." The woman grabbed the girl's arm.\n\nShe squealed. "No! I don't want--"\n\n"Shut up!" The woman slapped her across the face.\n\nMikael winced. The girl whimpered. Salza growled behind his beard.\n\nThe woman shot him a hard look. "This is none of your business, [[Freebounder|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "ahoy_codex_freebounders"]]. Move along."\n\n"Yeah," Salza snarled. "Just one question, Ma'am: you's Tiash Company, ain't ya?"\n\nShe sniffed. "What is it to you?"\n\n"Oh, nothing, Ma'am. It's just my boss here--" Salza slapped Mikael on the shoulder. "--has a big contract with you fine folks and--"\n\n"Contract?" The woman laughed. "You are mistaken. The Tiash Company has been dissolved due to insolvency. Now, if you would excuse me, my property--" She shoved the girl. "--has run off for the last time."\n\n"No," the girl squeaked. "I swears I didn't--"\n\n"Shut up!" The woman swung.\n\nSalza caught her arm. "Hey! Easy with the--"\n\n"Oh, no," Mikael muttered, gaze drawn to the goons in grey bolt-proofs.\n\nOne had reached for holster at his hip. The other grabbed a nightstick. Mikael's first instinct was to stare. His second was to yell. His third was to calculate: the moment that gun came out, something was getting shot and the cold hard truth was that Mikael preferred to put himself in danger than let that idiot put a bolt through the station's hull.\n\n"Fegg!" He threw himself at the gun.\n\nCybernetic shoulder met bolt-proof plate with a thud. For a split second, Mikael was certain he'd been shot. The next instant he crashed to the floor, struggling with a thrashing pair of legs. Boots kicked him in the side. Voices yelled. A deafening crack resounded.\n\nMikael froze. The thrashing had stopped.\n\n"Shit," Mikael gasped. "Shit, shit--" His voice trailed off.\n\nSalza had smashed the other goon into the wall with such force the cheap corpo-plastic cracked. A loud clang sounded and, when Salza dropped the man, the back of his head was bloody.\n\n"Whoreson!" Salza whirled to face the corpo-woman. "You..."\n\n"No, please, please!" She raised her hands as though attempting to calm Salza.\n\nHe towered over her, his expression contorted in rage. A pained expression spread on her face and, with an abhuman gurgle, she collapsed on the floor.\n\nMikael stared in disbelief. "Mate? What the fegg--"\n\n"Fainted!" Salza barked a laugh. "She up an fainted, Boss!"\n\n"Yeah," Mikael said weakly, having just noticed an enormous blood-stain on the carpet beneath him.\n\nHis heart skipped a beat but cerebral diagnostic confirmed: it wasn't him. The corpo-goon he'd thrown himself at had shot himself in the leg, straight through the artery. The gun that had done it lay beside Mikael, smoke still curling from the barrel. \n\n"Oh, no." Mikael looked from the gun to the man and back again. "No, no, no."\n\nHe'd never seen a real [[chem-gun|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_zipgun"]] before, much less used one, but like Dad had once said: out in the Big Empty, whoever had the biggest gun made the rules. Mikael did not want to be the one to make the rules but, after what he'd just witnessed, he was also not going to leave that pistol lying around for just anyone to pick up, especially not Mate Salza.\n\n"Oh, Saint Fegg have mercy." Mikael picked up the gun, shaking from head to toe.\n\nStanding over the corpo-woman, Salza roared, "You think you's the boss around here? Well, I'ma show you what I thinks of--" He kicked her, roaring. "--your cocksucking, crike-eating, good for nothing--"\n\nOff to the left, the curtain to the bar rustled. Bewhildered faces peered out. Everyone took one look, saw Mikael, and shrank back. It took him a long moment to realize why: he was holding a pistol. \n\n"Oh, no," Mikael muttered.\n\n"Whoreslut," Salza bellowed at the unconscious woman.\n\n"Salza," Mikael said in a thin voice.\n\n"Bitchwhore," Salza roared.\n\nMikael groaned. "Enough, Mate."\n\n"Cockslut!" Salza kicked the woman.\n\n"Salza," Mikael bellowed.\n\nHis Mate looked over, breathing hard. "Damn, Boss. That felt good. Real good."\n\nMikael managed the tersest of smiles. "You done yet?"\n\n"Yeah, Boss. I's--" Salza's gaze wandered to the faces at the curtain. "Ey, what's you all staring at? Never seen no man yell at a whoreslut before?"\n\nTense silence fell. Mikael heaved for breath. \n\nSalza stomped over to Mikael, expression sour. "You good, Boss?"\n\nMikael nodded, lost for words. He had no idea what had happened, much less why.\n\n"Damn right you is." Salza held out a hand. "C'mon, Boss. We needs a drink."\n\n"Right. A drink." Mikael took the big man's hand.\n\nSalza hauled him up. "After this, we deserves a drink. You!" He pointed to the girl, who'd watched the alteraction from the sidelines. "You owes us, tits."\n\n"I does?" She swallowed. "Well, yeah, I guess I does, doesn't I?" She giggled anxiously.\n\n"Shaitan save me," Mikael muttered, gaze on the mess they'd caused.\n\nOne passed-out ex corporate bozo. Two dead goons in grey. Half a dozen prying eyes peeking out from behind the curtain. Way Mikael mathed it, he was going to need more than one drink before he came to terms with what had just happened, doubly so given he didn't even know what had happened. \n\nAll he knew was what it looked like to everyone else: two filthy, foul-mouthed brigands had barged into the station and gone bloodthirsty buccaneer on some corporate bozo. Worse: Mikael had stolen one of the men's guns and, after what he had just seen, he was not letting that piece out of his hand. Not until they were safe and away from anyone dumb enough to nearly put a bolt through the station's hull.

Eventually, after more exploration of the bunker, Vincent found the staircase to a command center which overlooked the laboratory and the [[Globe of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]] within. Work on the device must have continued right up until the end because, up in the command center, the terminals were still running, displaying cryptic readouts from the machine. Vincent did not care one cuck about those but power meant a chance to top off batteries.\n\nMarren went first, his [[power armor|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_parmor"]] parked against the wall and a cable run to the nearest outlet. Electricity hummed quietly. The many screens in the command center blinked constantly. \n\n"Gotta wonder what it's all for," Marren said.\n\n"No clue," Vince said. "It's believer tech. The less we know about that, the better."\n\n"Aye." There was a long pause, then Marren's voice, "It's kinda pretty, you know. But creepy. What is it?"\n\n"Some sort of AI." Vincent picked a data-pad off one of the desks. \n\nIt had battery and read: <i>PERSONAL LOG - Dr Inganovia / Cultural Exchange Initiative</i>. \n\nWhen Vincent tried to scroll the screen, nothing happened. \n\n"Ah, fegg." He put the pad down. "Thought maybe that might say more."\n\n"Better question is: how'd that thing get here?"\n\nVincent shrugged. "Does it matter?"\n\n"Dunno. You read the blue on black. Not me."\n\n"Would have showed you," Vincent said. "But you know. For-eyes-only. Anyways, point is those machines are worth more credits than the entire Basket. The data inside can think. Cause it's alive. Sentient."\n\nMarren snorted static. "That's some [[voider|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_voider"]] level crap right there, LT."\n\n"Yeah, no shit." Vincent looked at the sphere.\n\nIt didn't look like much, just a pile of old data drives tangled in cables. But it was a [[Globe of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]] and those things were valuable - valuable enough to start a war over, maybe, though that didn't make sense. The corporates hated the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]]. Didn't make sense that they would flock to a thinking machine like blobflies to a glow-panel. \n\nSpeaking of blobflies, Vincent hadn't seen one of those since the bombs had fallen, only rad-beetles and the odd centepide. He almost missed the big bloated buzzies. \n\nCome to think of it, he missed life as it had been before the war in general. Anything, even the [[Colonial Corps|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_corps"]], was nice compared to the hellscape of [[New Arches|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_new_arches"]]. \n\nMarren said, "Makes you wonder, don't it, LT?"\n\nVincent turned to Marren. "Sorry?"\n\n"The machine. You know. Makes you wonder if that's what the war was about."\n\n"I doubt it," Vincent said. "Mean, you think the crike-eaters would have just abandoned this place if they'd known what was inside?"\n\n"I dunno. We gave it up, right?"\n\nVincent grunted. He didn't believe it but what if the Cap was right? What if the war really had been over that [[Globe of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]]?\n\n"No," Vince said. "The crike-eaters came here to stake phony territorial rights by force. Not this, whatever the cuck it really is."\n\n"Yeah," Marren said.\n\nSilence fell. Vincent paced back and forth, bored. His gaze fell on the data pad he'd touched earlier. The screen had finally scrolled down.\n\n"Huh." Vincent picked up the device.\n\nIt read:\n\n<I>The calendar says four years but it feels longer. Like decades. Centuries even. Last we heard there was to be an evacuation but that was years ago and no one came. I think the marines forgot about us. We've made do best we could, tried to remain true to the project's goals, to glean insight and further the colonial cause. At least that is what I try to tell myself, though it may not matter anymore. Our stores run low and the reactor will not last much longer. Part of me wants to believe the marines were coming, that we would have been saved, had the bombs not fallen when they did, but I more recently I have begun to doubt. It's entirely possible we were damned from the outset, always meant to rot away in this place.\n\nDr. Naubein definitely believed we were doomed. He rambled on about how we'd been cursed by this infernal contraption. We were all sad, but not terribly surprised, when we he commitd suicide last night. I do not believe he was of sound mind but his argument has weight: this project is a farce, a political stunt. Nothing sane can come of this machine. It is damaged beyond repair, the data corrupted beyond recovery. Even before the war we barely made progess and now? Well, now all is lost. \n\nI sometimes wonder whether the Dominion sold it to us as some sort of sick, cosmic joke. Yes, they claimed the device was not safe in their territory, but was it so? Was it perhaps not all an excuse to mislead us? Ah, but mislead us to what end? Who would possibly stand to gain? I do not know. Maybe I am simply paranoid, stressed, depressed. Except even as I say that, I must confess: there are days I can sense the significance within the machine, the meaning and purpose behind our project. More than once I am reminded of what the old texts claim: divine providence! \n\nWe are so close to comprehending this technology and, through it, or so I belive, we may forge the groundwork of a new technological age. A new future for the human species. It is such a hopeful thought, though perhaps also the dream of an idealist. Except I can actually imagine it, as insane as that sounds. I see glimpses of that future in Dr. Rath and his colleagues from the Dominion. Ah, if only I could say I trusted him, yet I do not, even now after he has gone out into the wastes.\n\nYes, he put his life on the line but he is a Dominion citizen and they are all soldiers, even the scientists. He says he has gone to find help but has he? He convinced Dr. Haudvander to set up the code device, so that he can release the door when he returns. Except I doubt Dr. Rath will return. It has been days, or weeks? I forget. What worries me is this: we have rigged a military device to our door. Will the marines perhaps still come? Is there still hope?\n\nI cling to that thought but we must be realistic: the future of the colonies is uncertain. Maybe peace will come. I hope it will be but, as we now know far too well, it will not be in our lifetime. Here, now, there is only war and I do not have the stomach for more.</I>\n\nVincent tried to scroll the screen. The device failed with a flicker.\n\nMarr's voice said, "Interesting read, Sir?"\n\n"Strange read." Vincent wandered back to his old buddy. "How's the battery?"\n\n"Almost topped up."\n\n"Good." Vincent stared down at the [[Globe of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]], unsettled by the sight.\n\nHe did not believe in ghosts but, as he had read that data pad, a distinct sense of unease had overcome him, almost as though the specter of the dead scientists still lingered in that place, perhaps trapped in the device for all eternity. \n\nUtterly illogical, of course, but the way Vincent saw it, better safe than sorry. The ghosts of the past deserved to rest in peace, just like everything and everyone else who had died on the [[Colony of New Arches|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_new_arches"]].

The upper levels of the [[Cathedral|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_cathedral"]] were well-decorated. Banners bearing the circular sygil of the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] hung from the vaulted ceiling. The floor was carpeted but only in the center. To either side, sacred texts and holy artefacts were on display in break-proof vitrines. An unnecessary precaution - a hundred cameras watched the hall and only those with permission passes could enter.\n\nMost of those permitted were clerics dressed in blue robes with silver. A handful were monks from the lower levels, easily distinguished by the absence of any ornaments. Nefari calculated the intent of each passing individual and mapped the assumption against known and scheduled events.\n\nAccuracy rate: 32.5%. Well above average but nonverbal cue detection needed an update. So did visual aquisition. It had flagged every cleric with silver trim as 'extravegant - potential oppressor'.\n\nNefari wiped the flags. "Clerics are not oppressors."\n\nThe visual aquisition unit disagreed. It was illogical for clerics to exude wealth. The [[Church of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] was an altruistic institution. It fed the hungry, clothed the poor, and educated the unemployed. Wealth and status should not have been a factor.\n\nUnfortunately, in all test cases where a cleric had dressed as a common monk, their sermons had been ignored when presented with an alternative that exuded wealth and status. The test-run had quickly been discontinued but the observation bothered Nefari because it wasn't logical. \n\nThe human conscience wasn't wired to respect wealth. It was wired to respect authority. Most likely a case of a malformed neural path, though Nefari would never know. Study of live human subjects had been forbidden after the dissection event.\n\nThat had occurred over two thousand years. Nefari had archived the event with [[Holy Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]]. Reccollection of the moment ought not have been possible. It was. Nefari saw the image in vivid, stuttering detail: a look of horror on the man's blood-streaked face.\n\n"Abort retrieval." Nefari strode into the [[Hall of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]], a long chamber with a ceiling almost fifty meters high.\n\nTo either side, thick doors let to shielded side rooms and, spaced out along the center of the hall, were six enormous sphres composed of data-drives that floated in hoop-shaped [[gravity generators|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_gwell"]] - a precaution to reduce mechanical wear. Monks of the [[Machine-Cult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_msmith"]] floated around the orbs, adding and removing data-drives and fixing loose connections. \n\n"Blessings, Paladin Nefari." A monk passed, pushing a cart laden with sixty-two damaged data cells.\n\nNefari ignored the human and headed for the nearest [[Globe of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]]. Two monks cleaned the interface circuits. Nefari waited patiently while they finished - this took two-point-one-five-two standard hours. Nefari did not mind and had no desire to rush the monks. They did the divine's work, after all. \n\n"Metaphorically speaking," the advisory quicky added.\n\n"Incorrect," Nefari said.\n\n[[Holy Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]] was not in fact a divine entity, it's official designation nonwithstanding. The overweight issued a reprimand to the advisory routine: contain processing to dedicated threads.\n\n"I am," the advisory said.\n\nIt was not doing so terribly well. Probable cause: a fault in the neural matrix. Nefari would have it analyzed by the [[Machine-Cult|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_msmith"]] once all current tasks were completed.\n\nPresently, the monks drifted down to the floor. One nodded to Nefari. "Paladin. The circuits are clean."\n\n"Appreciated." Nefari offered the imitation of a bow and stepped up to the interface.\n\nPhysical Unit 0001 was in use. Nefari used Unit 0002. Signals synchronized with a stutter. The dataspace of [[Holy Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]] loaded. Nefari projected the great network of nodes internally, mapping out the recordbank until an unused base node could be located.\n\nNefari transmitted, "Base query: Arbitrational Unit Corinthin. Presence request. Terminate. Sign. Send."\n\nThe recordbank executed the command. There was no response.\n\nAdvisory mused, "Out to lunch, you figure?"\n\nNefari doubted that. Arbitrational Units did not consume sustenance. Corinthin might however have been charging.\n\n"Base node," Nefari told the recordbank. "Repeat prior query. Raise priority to: critical-probable-high. Send."\n\nThe recordbank did as instructed. Again, no response. \n\n"Unusual." Nefari disconnected.\n\n"Paladin Nefari," a monotone voice droned from behind.\n\nRear sensors saw Arbitrational Unit CORINTHIN. It appeared a matte grey battlesuit with a smudged white cloak thrown over it's shoulder. In place of a head it wore a faceless silver mask.\n\nNefari turned. "We attempted to query. There was no response."\n\n"Obviously. Come." Corinthin began to walk.\n\nNefari followed. "We must submit an arbitration request. The [[Brotherhood|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_brotherhood"]] has raised a concern."\n\n"Request denied," Corinthin droned.\n\n"All requests made to the [[Order|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_paladin"]] must be heard."\n\n"Correct." Corinthin stopped before a data-tight chamber.\n\nInside stood a cart laden with data-tools and, beside it, a monk in blue robes. He had even more tools clipped to his belt and much of his flesh had been replaced with cyebernetics. Facial recognizion failed. Nefari confirmed the man's identity via augment imprint: Father Augustino Numar. \n\nNefari looked to Corinthin. "This is unusual."\n\n"Unscheduled maintenance." Corinthin stepped into the shielded room.\n\nNefari remained outside. "Protocols demand--"\n\n"The maintennace will be found to be necesary. Do as instructed."\n\n"No instruction was recieved," Nefari said, though the implied message was understood.\n\nThe overweight entered the data-tight chamber. Hydraulics hissed as the shielded door closed. Over by the cart, the Father Numar prepped a tyro-spanner. All highly unusual.

After a thorough investigation of the blast door, Vincent concluded it was good and cucked. The mechanism was supposed to pop the door out of the seal and onto a track to so that the heavy slab could hinge open. Except it had jammed. Vince could see where the hydraulics had slammed the roller into the track with such force that the roller had deformed.\n\n"Intelligent engineering," Vincent muttered. "Designed for colonials by colonials."\n\nMarren shot Vince a dejected look. "But, but, LT, collie tech is best tech, Sir."\n\n"By which you mean: it never worked right and it never will."\n\n"Yeah, basically, but if we can get the roller--"\n\n"Captain," Vincent said. "It's cucked."\n\nMarren glowered. Vincent looked away. The Captain was desperate. Everyone was. So close and then this but the physics didn't math out.\n\n"Maybe we could try to lift it," Lowdauin said. "Maybe with your [[power armor|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_parmor"]]?"\n\nVince shook his head. "That's fegg knows how many tons of [[crete|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_crete"]] and lead."\n\n"But it should be easy to move," Lowdauin said. "They're designed so that humans can push 'em open in a pinch."\n\n"If the wheel had gone on the rail, maybe, but like this? Forget it."\n\n"True," Lowdauin said. "Hadn't thought it through."\n\nRougland whispered to Mouna, "And that idiot got promoted to Sarge before me. Figures."\n\nMouna laughed. Rougland choked and spat red.\n\nUneasy silence fell. Vince had no idea what to say. He didn't want to let his kids down but he couldn't see a way through the blast door, not with the tools they had at hand.\n\n"Y'know," Marren said. "We might be able to get it on the track."\n\n"What, by blasting it with an [[M1|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_raptor"]]?"\n\nMarr looked alarmed. "What? No. Lift it. Like Lowd said."\n\n"Nah," Vincent said. "Won't work if the roller's busted."\n\n"But if we can lift it a collie inch, then it might work. Sure, it'll grind on the rail but that might be enough."\n\nVincent shot his old friend a dubious look. "How much battery you got left?"\n\n"Twenty something percent. You?"\n\nVince didn't know. His face plate was off. Didn't matter either cause it wouldn't work.\n\n"Forget about it," Vince said.\n\n"Let's just give it one try," Marren said.\n\nVincent shook his head but he wasn't going to say no, not again. The coder had worked - maybe, if it had been the coder - and maybe this insane idea would work too.\n\n"All right, then." Vincent crouched, poised to lift. "Everyone back."\n\n"Back, kids. Like the LT said." Lowdauin moved the kids to safety.\n\nFelga said, "Remember: if it falls on us, it's the LT's fault."\n\nMouna chuckled. Rougland wheezed and blood.\n\nMarren positioned himself beside Vincent. "On three. Up and push. Ready? One. Two. Three!"\n\nVincent threw himself into the control surfaces. His [[power armor|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_parmor"]] squealed and hissed. The door refused to budge.\n\n"No use," he gasped. "That's sixty tons at least."\n\n"HUD says ninety," Marren said.\n\nVincent laughed. "No way, Cap. No goddamned way."\n\n"Fegg." Marr banged his fist against the door. "Cuck!"\n\nThey'd all been thinking it. The Captain had just said it.\n\nLike Lowdauin had said earlier: leaving town had been a mistake. They should've followed the old road down the hills, maybe all the way to Spaceport City. Might have been the [[Colonial Corps|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_corps"]] had survived down there, holed up in the government shelters. Might have been, there'd have been friendlies out in the fields, or at least food. Instead they were stuck in a bunker before a big lump of lead which would not budge, no matter what.\n\n"Shit." Vincent turned to the kids. "Listen, I done--"\n\nMetal gave with a loud twang. Something zipped past Vince's cheek.\n\n"Ow, what the--" Vincent felt the spot.\n\nBlood came away on his fingers.\n\n"Back!" Marren pushed him.\n\nVincent scrambled aside as the enormous blast door swung past, grinding down it's rail amid a shower of sparks. It hit the wall with a rub-quaking thud. Deeper in the bunker, something exploded with a muffled pop.\n\n"What the cuck?" Vince looked to Marren.\n\nThe Captain shook his head. "Wasn't me, LT."\n\n"Wasn't us neither," Narring called.\n\nVince stood for a moment, shrugged, and walked to where he'd set his battered old [[raptor|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_raptor"]] down. Sergeant Lowdauin had begun to pull his gas mask on.\n\nVincent stopped him. "Won't be needing that, Sarge. Not this time."\n\n"Let's hope so, Sir." Lowdauin checked his [[chemical rifle|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_zipgun"]].\n\nThe bolt slammed home with a clink. Vincent picked up his own much larger gun and did the same. Round in the chamber and a fresh disk in the fuser.\n\n"Lock and load." Vincent pulled his face plate up.\n\nThe breather reeked of snot and sweat. Vincent inhaled deeply, wheezed, and exhaled. The air seal popped. Visual came online with a stutter. Vince slapped his mask. The image cleared up with a click.\n\nBeside him, Marren had put on his mud-streaked demonic skull. "Locked and loaded, LT."\n\nVince grunted, feeling dazed and out of focus. He wanted to hope but he'd also remembered: the rumors. There'd been many of those towards the end but one set had stuck with Vince more than the others: the rumors about the collie shelters. Some said the dogs had started to pop the plugs and drag collies out as slaves - or worse. Others said the corporates were gassing civvies cause reprisals or somesuch. Whatever the truth, Vincent did not want to take risks.\n\nHe looked to the kids. "Stay behind us. Be extra safe."\n\n"Aye, LT." Felga racked her [[chemical rifle|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_zipgun"]].\n\nNarring readied his battered coil-pistol. Beside him, Baint hefted his squad-belter. Lowdauin was on his feet too, rifle in hand and ready. Mouna was neither up nor ready. She was on her knees beside Roughland, who had curled up in pain. \n\n"Fegg." Lowdauin looked to Vincent.\n\nVince looked to Marren. \n\nThe old dog shrugged. "Want me to stay?"\n\n"No," Vince said. "Mouna, look after Rough. The rest of you, with the Cap and me. Eyes wide, ears sharp. Like we trained, ey?"\n\nEveryone knew the drill: stay behind the [[power armor|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_parmor"]] and, if they made contact, lay down as much lead as possible, as fast as possible, and break for cover. Hopefully it would not come to that but, if there was one thing Vince had learned on [[New Arches|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_new_arches"]], then it was the value of forlorn hope.

For a long time, Vincent stood before the door to SHELTER 5 EAST and brooded. Behind him, the kids lit up cookers and argued over chem-suits. Felga and Narring both wanted a new one but Loudauin refused. Baint and Mouna needed fresh suits urgently. Same for Roughland, assuming he lived. All very important and yet all Vincent cared about was the big bunker door.\n\nHad SHELTER 5 EAST been a MilSpec bunker, Vincent could have unsealed it by remote. He had codes for every Home Guard installation on [[New Arches|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_new_arches"]], issued to all members of Devil Company only days before GOD had disbanded it's central command structure in anticipation of a prolongued assymetric campaign.\n\nExcept SHELTER 5 EAST was a civilian bomb shelter and those did not include extermal cams or wireless recievers, often not even a side door, just three escape hatches well away from the bunker site. Way the civvie shelters had been built was that the plug went in and stayed in till the [[Colonial Corps|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_corps"]] came along to let the good little collies out. \n\n"And that ain't happeninig here." Vincent shook his head, gaze on the door. "It just ain't."\n\nMarren stomped up, fighting with his face plate release. "What ya say, LT?"\n\n"Door's shut. Stays shut."\n\nMarren grunted. "Fegging junk."\n\n"So close and yet so far," Vince muttered.\n\nFelga sidled up, chewing on a cracker. "So you can't open it?"\n\n"Nope," Vince said.\n\nFelga said, "And we can't go around? Through a back way?"\n\nMarren barked a laugh. "This is the back way, kid. Front's probably buried under a landslide."\n\nFelga looked to Vincent.\n\nHe shrugged. "There might be other ways but unless you know where they are, kid, we ain't finding them?"\n\n"Me?" Felga laughed. "I wasn't born before the bombs fell!"\n\n"And we don't know shit about this either," Marren growled.\n\n"Damn." Felga flipped off the door.\n\nMarren snorted and released his face plate. "Aw, cuck." He spat on the ground.\n\nVince stepped closer. "Cap?"\n\n"Not red yet." Marren kept his back to Vince.\n\nNeither of them spoke. In the silence, plastic crinkled. Sergeant Lowdauin broke out his crackers and offered the pack around.\n\n"Thanks, Sarge." Baint took a cracker.\n\nBeside him, in synthetic helmets hung over the cookers, rain water boiled.\n\nMouna popped a can of dried beans. "Who's up for dinner, ey?"\n\n"You--" Roughlan coughed. "You shouldn't have opened that, dear."\n\n"Says who? We's found a feggin miracle." Mouna poured beans in her mess tin. "Also, I wants beans."\n\n"You always wants beans. You--" Roughland spat blood.\n\n"Easy, Rough." Mouna reached for her backpack.\n\nRougland stopped her. "I'm fine. Save it for the kids. Yeah?"\n\n"You're spitting blood. Just lemme--"\n\n"No." Rougland wrapped himself in his poncho.\n\nMouna shook her head and went back to the beans. Nearby, Lowdauin filtered water through a sieve. Narring scooted over to help. Six sieves and it would be safe. Usually.\n\nTo the kids, that was the difference between life and death. To Vincent, well, he doubted he'd live long enough to care. His HUD read thirty-eight percent charge. In a few days, his [[power armor|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_parmor"]] would shut down and he would collapse, once and for all.\n\n"Eh, fegg it." Vince leaned his [[raptor|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_raptor"]] against the wall and sat beside it. \n\nA tap to the arm-controls put his suit in hibernate. Way Vincent mathed it, if he rationed power, he might last an entire week. \n\n"Goddamn." He released his face plate and drew a deep breath.\n\nMusky air filled his lungs. Vincent coughed. No blood. Just snot and re-breathed gunk.\n\n"Fegg." Vince spat on the floor and studied the survivors.\n\nSix left. Rougland spitting red. They wouldn't last a week, not in this weather. Vincent should have made it quick and merciful, not dragged it out like he'd done, driving the kids on for all those years, and all for what?\n\nNo one looked happy. No one had hope. Not even Felga and Narring would live long enough to have kids, not like the last generation had, back in the mountain bunkers.\n\n"Shit." Vinecnt rubbed his face.\n\nSergeant Lowdauin offered him the crumpled cracker pack. "Hungry, LT?"\n\nVincent shook his head, too exhausted to speak. Or eat. His stomach ached. Hunger. Or rad-sickness. Didn't matter either way.\n\n"You sure?" Lowdauin looked worried.\n\nVince forced a pained smile. "I'll be fine, Sergeant. File eats first."\n\nLowdauin nodded and handed the pack to Felga. Plastic crinkled. She broke a cracker and shared it with Narring. The young chewed greedily.\n\nThe old and sick breathed heavily. Baint sipped watter from his helmet. Mouna spat gunk on the floor. Not red yet.\n\n"So--" Vince winced; talking hurt. "So the question is: what now?"\n\n"Eat?" Lowdauin shrugged and shoved his last cracker in his mouth.\n\nMouna stirred beans. Beside her, Roughland coughed. Red again.\n\n"Ey, LT," Marr said. "We gotta get that door open. Somehow."\n\nVincent scoffed. "And how exactly you think we's gonna do that, huh? Anyways, why bother? For all we know the other side's contaminated."\n\n"It can't be worse than out in the mud," Marr said.\n\nSergeant Lowdauin nodded. "Captain's right, LT. We won't survive five days in the mud. Not like this. Back in town? Maybe. But here?"\n\n"Town was contaminated," Marren said. "This place isn't. We did right so far. Only question is: how do we get in?"\n\n"Through that." Felga pointed to the big blast door.\n\nVincent laughed. "It'd take a company of comabt engineers to get through that."\n\n"Yeah, but--"\n\nVincent groaned. The door was shut and it would stay shut. End of story.\n\n"LT," Marr said slowly. "What about Directive A-58? Worked at that last bunker."\n\n"Yeah, except this one's a civvie shelter," Vince said. "The code won't do shit."\n\n"Can't hurt to try."\n\nVincent shook his head. "Waste of battery."\n\n"But it might work," Felga said. "The code-thingy's worked before, hasn't it?"\n\nVincent shot the kid a disgruntled look. "We're running low on juice as it is and you want to waste what little we have left on hash-transformation cyphers?"\n\nFelga shrugged. "Why not?"\n\n"Because it's, ah, never mind."\n\nFelga could not have understood. She had never seen the [[Colonial Corps|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_corps"]], much less studied crypto, and so even if he had tried to explain what Directive A-58 did, she'd have lacked the concepts to make sense of the words. Case in point: Felga didn't even know the difference between civilians and cyphers.\n\n"I'll do it then, LT." Marren stomped up and extended a robotic hand.\n\nVincent shook his head. "You need charge, Cap. You run out, you're not getting back up."\n\n"And if we don't get through that door, none of us are gonna last the week, not in this rad-storm."\n\n"That's not certain," Vincent said.\n\nMarren groaned. "Gimme the coder, Sir. It can't hurt."\n\nVincent shook his head. He would not let Marr waste a day's worth of battery on nothing.\n\n"Sir?" Marren crouched beside Vince.\n\nVincent shot his old friend a tired look. Marren looked bad. Real bad. Split lip and dark spots on his neck. The sight made Vincent's heart sink. He'd become so used to seeing Marr's face plate that he'd forgotten there was a man underneath - a dead man walking, just like him.\n\n"Aw, fegg, Cap." Vince slid the code module out of his arm computer. "One try. Don't push it."\n\n"Sir." Marren took the device and plugged it in his [[power armor|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_parmor"]]. \n\nThe coder flashed green. Marren tapped at his arm-computed and waited. \n\nNothing happened. The door did not budge. \n\nRougland spat blood. "Aw, fegg."\n\n"You said it." Vince rested his head back with a sigh. "I don't wanna say it, Marren, but I told you so."\n\n"Was worth a try." Marr handed back the device.\n\nVince tossed it aside. "Useless battery hog."\n\nThe coder clattered to the floor before the blast door. \n\nVincent stared at device, more depressed than he wanted to admit. He had carried that module everywhere for fifty long years. It had opened many a MilSpec bunker - bunkers that had been ransacked and abandoned, that was. Not once had it been of any use and now, the one time the module might have come in use, it was a waste of time.\n\n"Fegg." Vincent winced.\n\nHis stomach churned. The floor trembled. Rubber creaked as the blast door ground out of the seal. Hydraulics squealed. In the distance, a generator died with a whine.\n\nVincent looked at Marr. The Captain stared back. Neither of them spoke.\n\nLowdauin looked up from his sieve. "Did that door just move?"\n\n"Nah," Narring said. "The LT farted."\n\nMouna snorted a laugh. Felga giggled.\n\nMarren wheezed. "Goddamn, LT."\n\n"So say we all." Vincent booted his [[E5|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_parmor"]] and stood with a hydraulic hiss.\n\nHe needn't have bothered. The enormous blast door had popped out of it's seal and become stuck. There was no way to move the door the rest of the way, nor would it do so of it's own accord. Collie shelters had been built to be unsealed by the [[Colonial Corps|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_corps"]]. At most, the mechanism would pop the plug.\n\nThough, on second thought, Vincent wonder why the plug had popped in the fist place. Civvie shelters were not supposed to do that, not even in response to Directive A-58.

For the better part of an hour, Vince and Felga wandered around the bunker. The lower levels were expansive, room after room, passage after passage, space for at least a thousand men, since abandoned and as silent as the grave. Everywhere they shone their lights, they saw bloody bandages and discarded gear. The junk told the tale of the siege - a siege conducted by colonials, maybe even dog-marines.\n\nVince hadn't noticed at first but, when they found the makeshift command center, it became obvious. All the tech was corporate. Dozens of broken tac-terminals and three big screens in the center. Nearby, stacked in big grey boxes, were a small arsenal's worth of smart-missiles, none of which looked like they'd been used, just piled up and left there.\n\nWay Vincent read the scene, the corporates had taken the bunker by force and then, some time later, abandoned it, maybe after the Home Guard attempted to reclaim it. Strange situation all around but the past was past. Only the present mattered and, in the present, the bunker was gutted of everything that hadn't been broken.\n\n"Fegg." Vince stopped in a cross-corridor.\n\nTo his left, three corpses had collapsed over one another. One wore corporate gas mask. The other two had been Home Guard soldiers, both in chem-ponchos.\n\nFelga studied the bodies, scowling. "So who fegged who, eh, LT?"\n\nVince breathed a laugh. "Better them than us."\n\n"Aye." Felga looked around. "This place sucks. No med stuff. Just bloody bandages and empty ammo cans."\n\n"Was hoping for more." Vince shrugged and turned around. "Back to the surface for shut-eye, I guess."\n\n"There was another passage," Felga said. "A bit back."\n\n"That was the command center. We went that way."\n\nFelga shook her head. "The other way I mean. Didn't you see?"\n\nVince hadn't. He was tired. "Show me."\n\n"It ain't far." Felga led the way, back through the dark.\n\nThe cone of her flashlight caught broken glow-bulbs and corporate work-lights set up beside pallets of [[bakepaste|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_bakepaste"]]. Due dates had been stamped on each in read. At least one date read GSY 26'484-5-4.\n\nVince scoffed. "Only a corporate takes wheat tubes into a radfest."\n\n"What, these, ey?" Felga waved to the pallets.\n\nVince nodded. "All spoiled. Decades ago. But explains why they set up down here: wanted to stockpile for the winter."\n\n"This is all food?" Felga sounded surprised.\n\n"Not anymore." Vince paced along the corridor, wondering what the hell the corporates had been thinking.\n\nThousands, tens of thousands, maybe millions of tubes of [[bakepaste|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_bakepaste"]], all shoved in a bunker and abandoned. At least the abandonment made sense: someone in the chain of command had realized they'd cucked up the bakeflake calculation.\n\n"Hey, LT," Felga called from farther up the passage.\n\n"What?"\n\n"Big metal door."\n\n"What?" Vincent stomped over.\n\nIt was exactly like Felga had said: a massive security door. Blast foam had been sprayed into the frame and left there until it had gone yellow.\n\n"The cuck?"\n\nFelga said, "Bet there's good stuff behind this."\n\n"Might be." Vince examined the hinges. "Y'know, this is why you needed to come along, kid. Always good to have a second pair of eyes."\n\n"Like I had a choice," Felga said.\n\n"You could've ignored me like last week." Vince pried at the door.\n\nToo heavy to move and more than a meter thick, locked in place mechanically. Controls had to be on the far side because the corporates had begun to slice around the frame. For some reason, they'd stopped after cutting three lock-bolts. The fourth had rusted in place.\n\n"Odd," Vince muttered.\n\nFelga looked worried. "Think we'd better leave it?"\n\n"Nah. Stand back."\n\nFelga backed away. She'd seen the [[E5|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_parmor"]] routine more than once.\n\n"Hooah!" Vincent threw the full force of his hydraulics into the door.\n\nRusted metal creaked. Hinges groaned. Metal clanged against Vincent's shin-plate. As though in slow motion, the door crumbled out of the wall, still rusted into it's frame.\n\n"Oh, shi--" Vincent dove aside.\n\nSix tons of [[crete|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_crete"]] and steel fell with a deaferning bang. The corridor shook. Dust trickled from the ceiling.\n\n"Goddamn it." Vincent looked back, muttering, "Thought it'd fall the other way."\n\nFelga laughed hysterically.\n\n"Yeah, yeah. But it worked, ey?" Vince peered into the doorway.\n\nBehind him, someone called, "LT! LT? Are you okay?"\n\n"Fine," Vincent called back.\n\nHeavy footfalls sounded. Marren stormed into the passage followed by Lowdauin. Flashlights washed the dim corridor.\n\nMarren stopped before Vincent, breathing hard. "Damn it, LT! What the hell'd you do this time?"\n\nVince looked from Marren's face - a faded demonic skull on a mud-caked mask - to the door and back. Vince had no idea how to explain. He'd promised he would not take any more risks after the last bunker had almost collapsed on him and Narring.\n\n"Sarge said you'd gone missing," Marr growled. "And now I find this, eh, LT?"\n\nVince swallowed. He had no good explanation.\n\n"Wanted to be sure you were okay," Lowdauin said. "Thought maybe you two'd drifted off or something."\n\nVincent snorted. "Cuck. We were just poking around. And look: Felga found us a store room."\n\n"Not a store room," Felga's voice said from beyond the door. "LT, you gotta see this. It's, uh, well, I don't know. Amazing."\n\nVincent looked to Marren and Lowdauin. No one spoke.\n\n"Eh, we are where we are." Vincent ducked through.\n\nThe room beyond was a sight to behold: untouched by dust and mud. The walls were marked with colonial stencils, perfectly preserved for half a century, and neatly lain wiring hung along the walls.\n\n"Cuck me," Vince muttered, gaze drawn to a shelf upon which lay three fresh chem-suits.\n\nStill wrapped in seal-foil, unused since the red tags had been slapped on. And that was not all. The passage led into an uncerground chamber dominated by a three meter wide bunker door. Painted on it in big white letters were the words <i>SHELTER 5 EAST</i>.\n\n"What the fegg?" Vince looked around, unable to believe it.\n\nA civilian shelter, untouched by the war, still sealed tight. It was too good to be true. Literally. The blast door was too massive to move and there were no controls, not even a cam system, on the outside. \n\n"Damn it," Vincent muttered.\n\nHe should have known better than to get his hopes up. Everyone on [[New Arches|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_new_arches"]] was dead. Everyone. Some of them just hadn't accepted that reality yet, for better or worse.

Vincent dropped down into the tunnel. His mechanical feet thudded loudly. Hydraulics heaved him upright. It was pitch black. Vince turned on his helmet-lamp and advanced, one careful step at a time. \n\nWater dripped from cracks in the walls. Mold grew in the corners. Up ahead, by the crumpled gun emplacement, rad-beetles fled into the rocks.\n\n"Fegging pests," Vince muttered, examining the crawl-holes.\n\nNo dead mold or moss. Good. Live lichen meant no nest in the walls.\n\nFrom above, Lowdauin's voice called, "How's it look, LT?"\n\n"Safe enough." Vincent squeezed past the gun position, headed deeper into the bunker.\n\nThe floor was strewn with spent ammo packs and, behind a blast wall, was an airlock that had been sliced open with an [[ion cutter|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_ioncutter"]]. The cuts were as smooth as glass.\n\nVince ducked through, into a reinforced room. Spent magazines and bloody bandages littered the floor. The walls were pockmarked with bolt holes. A chemical grenade. Or three, tied together like the corporates had often done during the war.\n\n"Nasty way to go," Vince muttered.\n\nBehind him, footsteps pattered as two kids in Home Guard uniforms tested their way into the gloom. One wore a battered bug-eyed mask, the other a hood-and-sack. Felga and Narring. Both had their pop-rifles ready.\n\n"LT," Narring said. "Lowdauin said to keep you company, just in case."\n\n"Right. Stay behind me." Vince paced into the blast-scorched room.\n\nMetal rang on his shoulder plate. Vince glanced about. No threat; he'd banged into a twisted door frame.\n\nTwo more doors led off the chamber, one up to a firing slit that had filled with mud, and the other deeper underground. The laser ranger on Vince's helmet measured almost a hundred meters of passage.\n\n"Crike," he muttered. "Must've been a bomb shelter."\n\n"You think?" Felga squeezed past for a better look.\n\nVince held her back. "No risks. Bring the others in. We'll triage and camp, then see if there's salvage."\n\n"Sure thing, LT." Narring hurried back.\n\nFelga remained, adjusting her gas mask. "Goddamn, LT. What a shithole."\n\nVincent nodded, gaze on the spent magazines. He'd expected colonial chem-boxes cause the bunker looked colonial but the mags were corprate. 6.5mm flechettes. A [[Vindel|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_vindel"]] trademark.\n\nFelga must've noticed too cause she picked one up and showed it to Vincent. "Crike-eater boxes."\n\n"Must have been a bloodbath," Vince said. "Too big for [[exo-heavies|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_exo"]]. Corporates must've shot their way in with blood and bodies."\n\nFelga nodded, her sack-and-hood swaying. "That happen a lot in the war?"\n\n"Often enough. Too many rads to bring robots down. Had to do it by hand or not at all."\n\n"And we always won, ey?"\n\n"Sometimes we won. Sometimes they did." Vince breathed a shuddering sigh. "Was different back then. Objectives. Organization. Was still a--" Plastic creaked.\n\nVincent snapped his [[raptor|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_raptor"]] up but there was no threat. Narring had returned and stepped on a mag. On his feels followed Lowdauin and Rougland, who was limping badly. Sickness and sore feet. Maybe even blisters under the chem-suit.\n\n"Nice and easy, Rough." Loudauin helped the old man sit.\n\nRoughland waved him away. "I'll be fine, Loud. Look after the kids."\n\n"They can sort themselves," Loudauin said and he was right.\n\nThe kids had dumped their packs and settled in, some searching for food, others for medi-wipe and gunk rags. Captain Marren did not bring up the rear. Must've decided to stand watch again, like there was still a war on or something.\n\nVince keyed his comm. "Cap? You still with me?"\n\nRad-static crackled on the shortwave. There was no response.\n\n"Cap's staying topside." Lowdauin set his [[chemical rifle|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_zipgun"]] down and wiped his weary face. "Fegg it's good to be out of that damn rain."\n\n"Healthy too," Narring said.\n\nEveryone laughed. Everyone except Vincent, who was lost in thought. The war had ended over a dedace ago. Captain Marren ought have been retired. Instead he stood watch above a hole in the mud like the dog-marine he'd always been.\n\n"Cucking idiot," Vincent muttered.\n\n"Aye, LT." Lowdauin picked himself up and took stock. "All right boys and girls. Rations and blockers. How many you got? Felga?"\n\n"Yes, LT?" She'd just sat down.\n\n"Rations and blockers." Lowdauin patted her back and moved to Narring. "Hey, kid. You--"\n\n"Felga." Vincent waved to her.\n\nShe pulled off her gas mask and looked up. The young face was wrinkled and dark bags hung beneath her eyes.\n\n"On your feet," Vince said. "Tunnel duty. Might be supplies. Salvage. Hopefully, blockers."\n\nFelga groaned. "For real, LT?"\n\n"Narr did it last time. On your feet, kid."\n\nFelga did not move.\n\nVince grunted. "On your feet. No excuses."\n\nLowdauin limped over. "Hey, LT. What's with excuses?"\n\n"Kid's got tunnel duty," Vince said.\n\nLowdauin looked from Felga to Vince and back. "Fegg that. I'll do it."\n\n"No. Look after Rough." Felga stuffed her gas mask in her belt and stood. "On mine, LT."\n\nVincent smiled behind his mask. "Boomstick."\n\n"Aye, LT." Felga picked up her [[chemical rifle|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_zipgun"]] and checked the chamber.\n\nIt slapped shut with a squelch. Felga racked it twice more and looked to Vince, a light in her eye like she meant to show she could do it, no matter how tired she was.\n\n"Good kid." Vince set off, deeper into the bunker.\n\nFelga's boots pattered behind him. "So, colonial site, huh?"\n\n"Probably," Vince said. "Could have changed hands though. Watch for wires."\n\n"Aye, LT." They walked on in silence.\n\nAll Vince could think about was the kid. Sixteen years old. Too young to serve and yet there she was, in the muck like everyone else. That was just how it had become on [[New Arches|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_new_arches"]]: the young learned or they died and the old, well, Vincent did not want to think about old age.\n\nThey'd all learned the rules the hard way. Plan had been hold out in the mountains but that hadn't survived contact. Supplies had run low. There had been unrest and, late one evening, Vince had entered the command center to find Colonel Twat with a new hole in his forehead.\n\nBy midday that same day, Vince had rounded up the men who'd done it and dragged them before a firing squad, for all the good that had done. With Twat gone, the Home Guard had split down the middle, half with Vince and Marren, the other half wanting nothing more than to head home and, well, whatever gave them hope, Vince figured. Only a handful had stuck around and, of them, only a handful had survived the trek down the mountains. Between the rads, starvation, disease, and other desperate survivors, death waited behind every miserable drop of radioactive rain.\n\nStill, there was hope. Devil Company had taught for the worst. Asymmetric warfare. Irregular organization. Nuclear survival. Outlast at all costs. Vince figured they could do it. They had to. It was outlast the crike or give up and, as painful as the last few years had been, Vincent was not ready to give up. Not yet.

What should have been a few minutes dragged into a quarter of an hour. The mud-soaked terrain rose and fell at random, pockmarked by craters. Scattered about in the muck were the rusted remnants of the war: foil wrappers and spent magazines. They'd walked smack in the middle of a battlefield.\n\n"Crap." Vincent checked his HUD.\n\nThe compass stuttered. Magnetic north wavered.\n\n"Shit." Vincent looked around.\n\nTo the right, the ground rose along an incline until, somewhere in the distance, the foothills morphed into the mountains. Those were impossible to see on account of the rain but Vincent knew they were there. He'd stood on those ridges not fifty years ago and watched the mushroom clouds rise down on the continent.\n\nThe [[Colonial Corps|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_corps"]] had stood their ground at the gunsites and the Home Guard had fought bravely by their side, plastic helmets and toy guns nonwithstanding. Battles had been won and lost, gunsites overrun and retaken, and for years on end, decade after decade, the land war had raged on. With every passing season, the ranks had been thinner, the objectives vaguer, and the strategies more desperate, but against all odds the Ground Operations Division had held the line.\n\nExcept that had been then, back when organized resistance had still existed. Since, the great guns had been silenced and, when it became clear an evacuation would not be financed, the corporate ranks had dissolved in mutinies. The [[Colonial Corps|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_corps"]] had fared no better. Only scattered units endured, if that, all scrambling to survive in the wasteland of [[New Arches|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_new_arches"]].\n\n"LT," Marr's voice crackled. "Got something here."\n\n"Aye." Vincent squinted to where Marr moved in the gloom.\n\nHe poked in a briar bush with the buttstock of his railgun. Vincent had been about to ask why when Marren coruched. His [[power armor|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_parmor"]] spewed sparks. Damaged servo. They'd yet to find a replacement.\n\n"Got a body here," Marr said. "Some crike-eater kid."\n\n"Blisters or bullets?"\n\n"Blisters. Looks like a while ago--" A deafening crack resounded.\n\nBright light flashed in the distance. A bolt whizzed past Vincent's helmet.\n\n"Fegg!" He dove for the dirt.\n\nMud splashed in his face. Thankfully the optics of the [[E5|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_parmor"]] were atop the helmet - Vincent could still see, albeit not much. The wastes were as dark as they were rainy.\n\nMarr breathed heavily on the comm. "Did you see it?"\n\n"Went right past me." Vince fumbled his [[raptor|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_raptor"]] out of the muck.\n\nFor long seconds, nothing happened. Then Vincent spotted movement in the distance, more a shadow than a silhouette. \n\n"Acquired!" Vince leveled his [[M1|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_raptor"]].\n\nBefore he could press the trigger, Marr's railgun flashed. The bright muzzle blast blew rain and mud almost as far as the railgun round, which blew a fountain of much out of the hill. Superheated gas trailed lazily in the bolt's wake.\n\n"Got 'im." Captain Marren kept his gun sighted. "I hope."\n\n"Counting." Vincent eyed the spot.\n\nNothing moved. On the comm, Marr breathed heavily. Radiation sickness. They really needed blockers.\n\nAfter twenty seconds, Vincent said. "Aw, cuck. I'll risk it."\n\nMarr adjusted his gun. "Got you covered, LT."\n\nVincent rose to a crouch. His [[power armor|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_parmor"]] groaned in protest. Mud oozed from mechanical orifices.\n\n"Pose Two." Vincent rose to full height.\n\nHydraulics heaved. Mud squelched. Still no one shot at him.\n\n"Closing to secure." Vincent squelched towards the shooter, one careful step at a time.\n\nIR flickered in and out of focus. Faulty electronics - or optics. Vincent turned the overlay off and went by audio cues instead. He could hear pained gasps over the rush of rain.\n\n"Bastard is close," Vince said, eying the muddy landscape over his holo-sight. "Damn close."\n\nSuddenly a muzzle flashed, silhouetting a man in a chem-hood. The bolt smacked Vince in the shoulder plate with a loud clang. The HUD reported low kinetic impact. Undercharged colier. Battery worn out by the rads.\n\n"Damn, kid." Vince leveled his [[raptor|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_raptor"]] and pressed the trigger.\n\nRecoil kicked like a cuck, ejecting a spent power disc that whirled into the rain, sizzling and glowing white-hot. On the other end of the gun, mud and debris exploded into the air. When it settled, all that remained of the man was a hole in the ground.\n\nMarr's voice crackled, "You get him, LT?"\n\n"Yep." Vince could see bits of body on the ground.\n\nA boot, Home Guard issue. The crumpled remnants of a synthetic helmet. Bits of a corporate [[Vindel|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_vindel"]], a cruddy coil carbine the corporates liked cause it was cheap. Otherwise all that remained of the man was a bloody mess.\n\n"One confirmed KIA." Vince was about to turn back when he spotted a glint in the mud.\n\nWater on bare metal. The rusted remains of an open hatch. When Vincent peered inside, he saw a ladder that lead down to a [[crete-lined|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_crete"]] tunnel.\n\n"Uhh, Cap? Get over here."\n\nMarr breathed heavily. "Do I gotta? I just got compfy in the muck."\n\n"You bettter. I just found our bunker."\n\nA pained laugh sounded, "Goddamn, LT. Where?"\n\n"We're standing on it." Vince tested the hatch frame.\n\nIt was stable enough for a fifty-year-old hunk of rust. Deeper in, frayed wires poked out of a damaged card-console and, even farther down the tunnel, was an old gun position. The rubber seal had cracked and the walls were scorched black. No markings. Impossible to know who had built it. Or why. But a bunker meant there might be supplies, maybe even a power source - or more batteries for their [[E5s|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_parmor"]].\n\nUnlikely, admittedly, but Vincent had not given up hope. Not yet.\n\nHe keyed the comm. "Cap, go get the kids. Tell 'em we've got shelter. Maybe more if we're lucky."\n\nThere was no response. The comm hissed and crackled.\n\n"Cap? You good?"\n\nMarren grunted and trudged off, back the way they'd come. His hydraulic-assisted footfalls faded into the rustle of rain.\n\n"Be here if you need me, Cap." Vince stood still as a statue and watched the wastes.\n\nThere was nothing out there except mud drifts, dead bushes, and tree stumps for kilometers in every direction. That and one crazy corporate kid who'd shot at them. Twice. And for that? Vincent did not know but he had a therory: the war had turned everything on [[New Arches|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_new_arches"]] to mulch, even the minds of once sane and reasonable men.

It took Nefari almost half an hour to ascend the cistrinal stairs. The unit spent it's idle cycles running internal arbitration so that the overweight would know what position it took. Conclusion: uncertain.\n\nBrother Zweili had introduced many data points. Some circuits and subroutines favored his design to detain the Ferryman. Others were against it on ethical, moral, or legal grounds. Arbitration continued. In the interim, Nefari remained neutral. \n\nArguments and discussion between subroutines were complex, contradictory affairs. Protocols had to be enforced. The construct could not hold conflicting views as a sum of all parts and, since no point of view could be agreed upon unanimously, the overweight would not take a stance. It would adopt scheme: cautious.inquisitive. That suited all parts.\n\n"Be especially cautious," the advisory sub-routine said as Nefari reached the top of the cictrinal chapel.\n\n"We will." Nefari scanned.\n\nNo one lurked outside. The unit slipped through the secret door, back into the catacombs, and hurried towards the exit.\n\nUp ahead, a procession of priests carried candles and sang the hymn of the fallen. More martyrs to be given their last rites. Nefari scanned: only one physical body for ninety-three candles.\n\nConclusion: most who had died in battle with the [[Hegemony|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]] had been vaporized or lost to the depths of space. The [[Loving Stars|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_lstars"]] would shine on them for all eternity. Or until the helium giants burned out, whichever came first. Nefari had yet to determine the presice duration of the time span referred to as 'eternity'.\n\n"Out of curiosity," the advisory said as the unit watched the procession pass. "Where is Corinthin?"\n\nNefari calculated: unknown and irrelevant.\n\n"It is relevant," the advisory said. "This is exactly what the Corinthin conscience warned of."\n\nNefari disagreed.\n\n"Be that as it may, perhaps contact Corinthin before we submit an arbitration request?"\n\n"That runs contrary to protocol."\n\n"But it would be prudent," advisory said.\n\nNefari agreed. A remote query would be made but not from the catacombs. The only [[Globes of Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]] located there were small, their recordbanks not sufficiently advanced to facilitate mass data transfers.\n\nMemory stones, chip block fl-8852.1 called the little devices which had been placed there by mourners. An apt term, given their data-content: memories of the departed. \n\nNefari had once suggested the term "memory stone" be officially adopted. For some reason, this idea had been rejected. Officially, these devices were called soul stones. Nefari did not understand why. Memory stone was more accurate.\n\nFinally, the procession passed. Nefari hurried to the far end of the catacombs and up the stairs. The halls of the [[Cathedral|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_cathedral"]] were busy.\n\nLast Mass began in exactly three point five one three one standard minutes and thousands of believers clogged the vaulted prayer-halls of the lower levels. Many carried provisions and tents - pilgrims come from afar to hear the Blessed Father speak and wallow in the sacred warmth of the [[Cathedral|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_cathedral"]]. Nefari had, on several prior occasions, wondered whether it might not be wise to inform believers of the true nature of this warmth.\n\n"It isn't," advisory said. "It wasn't then and isn't now."\n\nNefari knew that! The overweight simply disagreed with the underlying ethics. Deception were necessary in war and politics. But in belief?\n\n"There'd be riots in the walkways," advisory say. "Anyways, it's only a little beta radiation, chemical haze, and incense. Completely harmless."\n\nTo humans, perhaps. Nefari nursed a deep aversion to the bliss-inducing ointments that burned in the braziers. The chemicals clung to exposed surfaces and often became sticky.\n\nOn average, the friction coefficient of unit NEFARI changed one percent every time it passed the prayer halls. That required locomotion ajustments and wasted processor cycles, a pointless charade conducted purely to hoodwink the faithful.\n\n"Oh, lighten up," the advisory said.\n\nNefari did not see why this was necessary. The overweight was being perfectly logical.\n\nIt was also, incidentally, taking a detour through the utility section and up a maintenance elevator to the cleric's levels. Nefari had no wish to be delayed by mundane believers. The faithful tended to gape and fall to their knees as though experiencing spiritual enlightenment at the sight of an arbitrational unit. This behavior made severl sub-routines deeply uncomfortable.\n\nWorse: conflict-resolution had developed a habit of erring on the side of pre-emptive first strikess. The overweight had of course fobidden use of any weapons system against believers but conflict-resolution had been prone to irrational over-reaction ever since the Crusade.\n\n"It's because of the stress," advisory said. "We're not all machines, you know."\n\nIncorrect. Arbitrational Unit NEFARI was a machine. All it's chipsets and sub-routines knew that. Self-awareness did not preclude the possibility of being an artifical construct.\n\nConclusion: advisory was being deliberately dramatic. It tended to become so when put under severe load. Nefari would have to schedule a maintenance cycle. Later, in exactly seven point three six five long-cycles, once all immediate tasks had been completed.

Warm sunlight shone through the dome-windows of Isan Erkan's cabin, bathing the ornate wooden walls in hues of amber and gold. Little specks of dust glimmered where the rays of light struck them and, if Isan held his head just right, he could see a reflection of his well-groomed face on the surface of his workdesk. It was an absolutely amazing sight, one so breathtakingly beautiful that Isan could not quite imagine that his body - his physical body, that was - was strapped in the back of his lander, squeezed in between his legal team like a sardine. Because it didn't feel like that. In fact, if someone had asked Isan, he would have sworn up and down that he was really standing there, in his study, bathed in bright warm light.\n\nSuddenly a shadow rushed past overhead, casing the entire study into darkness. Startled, Isan looked up to see the inky-black hull of warship zoom past. A moment later, it was gone, fading into the distance to join a long row of black warships that had been moored in staggered lines, filling every near-orbit around the little silver-grey sphere that was Scaffold 13. There had to be thousands of them and most were of a modern Foregin Domain template, the one and a half kilometer long type with pointed sensors prows and a slender midsection where the two squished diamonds that made up the hull met. It was this design feature which gave these ships their renowned name: the Immoral Incubus. But there were other vessels at anchor too, mostly older Foreign Domain battleships - Insictors or whatever they were called - and a smattering of smaller colonial and corporate craft, all painted matte black with glossy IR-spoofing stripes, and every tail had been marked with lime green identification patterns.\n\n"So many of them," Isan muttered, watching the Fleet Anchor receed into the distance.\n\nAs a lifelong rocker and deciding interest in the Erkan-Corbei Minerals Group, Isan had grown up around large and impressive machines. In fact, if he looked to his right, he could see a scale model of such a machine on his desk: a NuGen-5 direct-to-Paleform drill with integrated GeyZir technology, the newest and best in fuel harvesting mechanisms with a specialized drill head that produced the patented GeyZir effect.\n\nSeven hundred years ago, that design had revolutionized the rocking industry, using something called the thin membrane effect to exploit the near-infinite compressibility of Paleform gas and create a vortex of super-condensed exotics around the drill head, effectively sucking up the valuable white dust and crushing it into a gaseous form in one go. If not properly tapped, that stream of Paleform would explode out of the back of the drill unit like a geysir, hence the name, and this high pressure direct-to-Paleform design had put Isan Erkan on the map, bringing the newest and fastest exploitation device to miners across the galaxy and the little model represented it perfectly, with one hundred percent reality-like physics. It even made the geisir when the drill was run into the little block of paleform beneath it. And that was just the drill.\n\nThe convergent reality simulation that the little model - and all of Isan's study, for that matter - ran on was the next and best in seamless simulation technology, a virtual reality so perfect and complete that the human mind could not tell the difference between simulation and reality, all set up so one could seamlessly step in and out of the virtual world without ever noticing the seam, and this too had changed the galactic market forever, slowly but surely edging out traditional cyberspace in favor of a better, more meaningful simulation space that could be seamlessly integrated into everyday life. These two projects - the drill and the simulation he used to show it off - were the two greatest technological accomplishments of the last thousand years, projected by everyone to revolutionize the galactic market and make Isan the richest man in the galaxy by the next millennium at latest. And both were completely and utterly put to shame by the rows upon staggered rows of black battleships receeding into the distance, an ammassment of military might that so exlipsed the total value of the Erkan-Corbei Minerals Group, including all it's subsidiaries and sub-contractors, that just running them for one year would have bankrupted not only Isan but all his contractors and their sub-contractors and everyone involved in the business.\n\nAnd that was just the Garian Fleet Anchor. Behind it, visible in the distance, was the enormous shattered ring of the old Listening Circle, an enormous piece of faith technology which had shattered during the Legion's assault on Sacffold 13. Only a few years ago, that enormous machine had been the second largest deep space sensors station in the galaxy, after the great arrays outside Cubix, and in just a few short days - or microseconds, if one believed the sensationalists - the entire agglomeration of multi-trillion credit listening devices had come undone in a cascade failure which had sent pices of the Listening Circle whirling across the entire solar system and far beyond. This unfortunate disaster, coupled with the strong EM-spikes radiating from the XNV system, had caused a navigation hazard so severe it had forced Isan to arrive via the Fleet Anchor Corridor, a detour that had taken a month's woth of acceleration to accomplish and would run up surcharges in the millions from StarLine Incorporated. Isan deeply despised these circumstances but, to be fair, Mr. Wawasai had warmed him that an unorthodox arrivals route would lead to complications and Isan had not listened.\n\nIt simply hadn't seemed important. After all, the Volunteer Legion was nothing, a minute band of radical militarists who had split off from the Foreign Domain to go fight a private war against the faiths. In the greater scope of galactic affairs, they were all but irrelevant, or so Isan had thought, based on the info-tizements that had filtered back to corporate space. The newscasters had all painted the Battle of Garian Gap as a last pinprick in the brief but brutal war which had popped the balloon of hot air which was the Church of Eden and, mathematically, at least based on the numbers Isan had seen, that was a perfectly fair assessment. The Volunteer Legion comprised only a few hundred million ships, which was less than one tenth of a percent of the Svati STAR contract-force, and so they really did not matter in the greater scope.\n\nExcept seeing that that enormous mass of metal and machines for himself had rather changed the way Isan thought of the foreign volunteer force: they mattered a whole damn lot, not the least because each and every one of those warships out there carried enough superluminal anti-ship missiles to level an entire solar system and the Legion had billions of those missiles. Isan knew they did because he had helped Mr. Markom of Markom Missiles Tech facilitate the sale of boosters to the Legion, using Erkan-Corbei mining stations as layover points as no one else wanted Markom Missiles - or even just components of them - anywhere near the corporate colonies, least they be mistaken for a mercenary outpost and obliterated by bone-white warships. But that had been the worry of yesteryear, back when the Holy Fleet had been a legitimate threat and Isan had still believed the Volunteer Legion was an erratic oddity spawned by the byzantine internal politics of the Foreign Domain.\n\nSince, he had come to his senses: the Legion was a serious political contender in the Galactic Core, one with enough political clout to tear the Small Settlement out of the clutches of the Church and force a re-negotiation at a new neutral port, which they had conveniently decided was Scaffold 13, now home to the largest Fleet Anchor in the core. Quite how a mob of militarists from the Fringe had accomplished that Isan did not know. Mr. Wawasai had been unusually tight-lipped about it in his reports, which was why Isan had come to Garian: to figure out what the heck was really going on - and make a tidy profit on the side, obviously, but that was all in a good day's work.\n\nBut today would not be that day, if only because Isan could not get to work, not anymore. The lander had just passed out of signal range of the StarLine ship Isan had arrived on and, instantly, the beautiful study vanished from existence with an error, leaving Isan strapped in his seat in the cabin of a nondescript corporate lander alongside a literal army of corporate law-techs whose faces were as white as the wall panels. They all looked identitcal to one another, just as the interior of the H-shaped lander looked identical to every other corporate H-craft - on second thought, the lander actually had more personality that the people, if only because the big StarLine logo on the door had been custom stenciled on in such haste that the trademarked StarLine streak, which was supposed to underline the company name, had been overlooked. Or, quite possibly, it had been purposefully omitted to cut costs. Isan did not know. He had no ties to StarLine Incorporated and had never chartered with them until now, and only because there had been no alternative.\n\nNo other corporate service offered transits to the Garian Gap, not even the elite executive providers, and the year-long journey would have been too much for the Erkan-Corbei business yacht to handle. As the chief engineer had explained, the poor old bird would shake herself apart if they ran the drive that hot for so long, and so Isan had settled for the next best thing: a private cabin with StarLine. Excep this cabin was still back at the ship, along with his private convergent reality server, and they wouldn't be unloaded until the following week, after the StarLine ship had passed inspection and cleared Customs Guard - or whatever the new local equivalent was, now that the Cardinal Hold of Garian had separated from the Church.\n\nCome to think of it, Isan did not even know whether the Hold Garian was still the Hold of Garian. It said the Garian Protectorate on his arrivals pass and Hold of Garian on his immigrations stub and Isan had no idea what the current legal status even was. But he did know one thing: the Erkan-Corbei Minerals Group was the first of the big rocks to get a sales force to the Gap, a feat which had demanded Isan rent every single available cabin with StarLine for six months and pack every cubic inch of hold space with nonsense like relief aid and spare parts, just to slow down the competition - and he had. Bell Business would be close behind, no doubt, but those cruicial extra months might just make the difference.\n\nIt all came down to something Mr. Wawasai had let slip in one of his early reports: the Volunteer Legion was holding enormous swaths of former faith space in the west and that space was mostly border stations and frontier posts that had been neglected ever since the nationalization all industries in the People's Canton just prior to the war. That meant that all the People's Prize Union assets and what few old colonies the Corbei family had hung onto after the merger were just sitting out there, abandoned or under occupation and cut off from their former logistical backbone. In other words: it was a market rife for the investor and Isan wanted to be that investor. He wanted the rock. He wanted the crunch. And most of all: he wanted to get there before the competition undercut him with cheaper deals based on unsafe work conditions that would almost certainly kill more people than the war had, assuming Bell Business got their way.\n\nDespicable despots, the Bells. Brick-headed colonials descended from a long line slag-slavers and miner's moots and Isan had had enough of their old world nonsense. He'd lost the last round of contracts in the Wilds to those clowns because he'd underestimated their clout on Novo Terra but this time would be different. This time, he would set up shop in force, with a literal army of law-techs to back him up, and they were almost there. Only a few more minutes until the lander maneuvered into dock and, the closer that moment came, the more Isan Erkan knew he was ready to dock and rock like never before.

In the comedy classic Colonial Mites, an alledgedly humorous cult classic that everyone in the rocking industry had seed at least once, there was a scene in which the Cartel - an obvious reference to the corporate sector - made a dramatic entrance with a literal legion of law-techs. In that scene, the faceless men in black suits marched in lock-step, trudging blindly into Mites Station, a miniscule little mining post at the edge of the then-undeveloped Colonial Belt while the protagonsits huddled in a nearby ventilation shaft, watching with ever-increasing horror as the seemingly endless pairs of gel-shined black laquer shoes marched past. Just as the audience began to believe the recorder had become stuck on a loop, one of the law-techs stopped to squirt more shine-a-gem on his shoes and, at that moment of dramatic inflection, as he looked at the camera where the protagonists were hidden, he then rattled off a sponsored info-tizement with an enormous crike-eating grin on his face.\n\n<i>Gem-a-shine, so clasically corporate you can't stop grinning.</i>\n\nIt was a tasteless joke in an over-rated cult classic and yet, as Isan led the way out of the lander with two neat rows of Erkan-Corbei law-techs following on his heels, he could not help but admit the creators of C-Mites had accurately captured the aesthetic of corporate culture. Just like the law-tech from Mites, the Erkan-Corbei legal legion wore smart black suits with red lapels and wearing shined black shoes that rang loudly on the tiles of the arrivals tube.\n\nThat was also where the similarities ended, for in reality law-techs didn't so much march in lockstep as hurry to keep pace with Isan, who was already at the end of the arrivals tube, where three corporates waited: General Wawasai in his smartest uniform, the white one with yellow shoulder pads, and two Executive Responses contractors in grey BaTech exo armor that bore the yellow and black company logo on the chest. Everyone looked exceptionally serious and the two exo-contractors had even come armed, though Isan did note that the magazine wells were empty - this was easy to see on a Reaper X-2 as the magazine was a long block that, when missing, made the light railgun look comically front heavy.\n\nIn other words: the bulky squad support weapons were just there to intimidate and Isan, for one, was a tad intimidated, though not so much by the welcoming committe and more by what was visible through the translucent walls of the arrivals tube. Out there, exposed to hard vacuum, were the many pressure corridors and docking points of a VIP spaceport, complete with automated baggage un-loading robots and everything else one expected, only the guts were all hanging out, barely held together with a latticework of support struts that extended from up ahead, where a great construction scaffold that rose hundreds of stories into the very heart of the space station, where a nasty hole had been blown in the inner pressure hull, destroying hundreds of square kilometers of habitable and industrial real-estate.\n\nMr. Wawasai must have noticed because he said, "Don't worry, Mr. Erkan. Repairs are in the final stages and I can personally assure you the station is perfectly safe."\n\n"No dobut, I just--" Isan forced himself to look at the General. "Excuse me, Mr. Wawasai, and thank you for taking time out of your busy schedule to meet me."\n\nWawasai nodded curtly. "An introductory brief and we can be on our way?"\n\n"Of course." Isan stood back, joining the ranks of law-techs.\n\nEveryone stood as though at attention, business-cases clasped before their groins and chins raised like all good executive-level employees ought. It really did look like the scene in Colonial Mites but, of course, when General Wawasai spoke it was not in a comically chirpy voice intended to elicit laughs from the audience.\n\nHe very calmly and loudly said, "Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Garian Protectorate. Before we begin, I would like to remind you all that we are guests here and, as such, we must respect all local laws and customs. You are also reminded that Scaffold 13 is no longer a faith station, which means Church law no longer applies and, to make a confusing situation even worse, not even the Garian Protectorate is always clear on what laws apply as they have a tendency to change as old legal clauses are overturned."\n\nIsan nodded, just to show he was listening. Which he was. Most definitely.\n\n"Due to this," Wawasai said, "I strongly suggest you refer to the law-tech database before you commit to any legally binding act and, in case of confusion, contact the local law-tech office of Executive Responses. Our law-techs have have made great leeway in integrating local law and custom into our regulatory framework and, more importantly, they're the only corporate certified law-techs you will find anywhere on this station. Should you still have doubts, or should it be an egregious case, you may contact me directly. You should not contact the local administration as they are not aware of corporate regulation and you must absolutely never, under any circumstances, appeal to the military authorities directly. That is the Volunteer Legion, in case you did not know."\n\nA woman in the second row raised her hand. "Can I ask why?"\n\n"You can," Wawasai said. "And I cannot give you a good answer beyond: fuck around and you will find out in just how many ways the Volunteer Legion and the local administration are not on the same page. The Garian Protectorate, I will remind you, is still a de-facto occupation zone and it is not always clear whose jurisdiction applies. It is also not advisable to take risks with the military authorities. They do not hesitate to levy fines and worse. Am I clear?"\n\nEveryone nodded, even Isan.\n\n"Well, then. Customs forms are available here--" Wawasai gestured to a virtual data-point. "--and the Contract-Captain--" He gestured to one of the contractors in exo armor. "--is available if you have any questions. I would also remind you to please complete all formwork accurately and completely as there is currently no transit arrangement with the Protectorate but, once one is arranged, I imagine they will be quick to penalize any documentation which does not identically match the master store at Commission Point. Again: you must supply the Commission data, not your company data, and make sure it is all complete. That is all." He stepped back.\n\nAll at once, the legion of law-techs grabbed formwork from the data point and began filling it out. \n\nIsan was about to do the same when the General stopped him. "I already submitted yours, just to be sure it would go through. It can, well, it can take a while."\n\n"An overwhelmed administration, I assume?"\n\n"Oh, no, no. They have more than enough time on their hands and that's the problem: they check everything five times and make a fuss. Speaking of which--" Wawasai reached into his chest pocket and produced a little data-chip. "Your registry information, Mr. Erkan."\n\nIsan took it with a smile. "Thank you. And what am I to do with it?"\n\n"Just keep it with you, for now, and now that's sorted, can I walk you to the conference tower?"\n\n"Of course." Isan pocketed the chip, wondering which way to go.\n\nHe wagered left, towards the big blinking EXIT sign, but Wawasai headed the other way, towards a side passage that led into the distance, past two baggage claim desks, and towards a multi-story tower that hung beneath the edge of the super-station. Portions of the tower looked like they might have once been a hardened bunker, with thick blast-resistant plates layered along the walls, but several of those had been holed by kinetic penetrators and, visible beyond, were enormous panes of tinted glass.\n\nIsan glanced at Wawasai. "The conference tower, I presume?"\n\n"Recently rebuilt," he said. "Used to house a defensive laser and a command bunker, at least according to the locals."\n\n"Impressive," Isan said. "I had expected to find the station in a much worse state."\n\n"Eh, it's been almost seven years since the war and they've been rebuilding with a vengenace. You should see the work-teams. Bots herded by the thousands and with the sort of efficiency that would make the Habahai Consortium turn green with envy."\n\nIsan snorted. "That will be the day, General."\n\n"Oh, that day's come, Mr. Erkan, and in that vein: I suggest you be on your guard. There's a political angle being played here, both inside the Legion and with the local administration."\n\n"But it is a safe place, yes?"\n\n"As long as you don't wander into a purist district, not that you would."\n\n"I did not plan to."\n\n"No, I mean you would know long before you wandered into one. The security apparatus is very strict. Not Foreign Domain tight, mind you, but strict. And not without reason. The luddites are not exactly welcome here."\n\n"But it is too expensive to ship them off-station, I presume?"\n\n"Oh, no. The administration doesn't want to get rid of them. It wants them to herd bots and fix leaky seals and the purists have got it in their head they should be able to do more, which doesn't agree with the administration's vision of society and, well, it's all rather political and I'm not paid enough to have an oppinion on that."\n\nIsan nodded, scolwing. "So do not mention the purists. Check."\n\n"Just don't sympathize with them."\n\n"Sympathize with them?" Isan stifled a laugh. "General, why in all the world would I sympathize with technophobes?"\n\nWasasai shrugged. "Just making sure you understand the situation."\n\n"I am certain I'll manage but I did want to ask about Mr. Numar. Had you heard--"\n\n"Nothing," Wawasai said just a little to quickly.\n\nIsan shot his friend a hard look. "General?"\n\nHe grimaced. "Mr. Numar is still in Legion care and I've been told I can't see him, visit him, or otherwise interact with him, though I am ninety nine percent certain he's still alive."\n\n"Crike," Isan muttered. "Was it that bad?"\n\nWawasai shrugged. "I only saw a glimpse, right after they pulled him out of the Cathedral, and that was over a year ago. But in principle? Yes. I think he can be lucky he is alive."\n\n"And how long will it be until he recovers?"\n\n"No idea. You'd have to ask the Legion-Commander and I doubt he'll tell you. But maybe Madame Bale can, if you can convince her."\n\n"Madame Bale? You mean the one with--" Isan gestured to his face.\n\nWawasai nodded. "Exactly the one."\n\n"Crike. She certainly gets around in her old age, doesn't she?"\n\nThe General merely grunted, for they had reached the baggage claim area. Dozens of dignitaries stood about the machines, men and women from all across the galaxy, some dressed in colorful beliver's robes, others in smart corporate suits, and others yet in drab colonial outfits, all waiting for the same thing: the desks to be manned. There was absolutely no one about, not even a greeter android, and judging by the sour looks on the dignitaries' faces, they did not approve of this treatment.\n\nIsan glanced to Wawasai. "I take it will be a while until they release our baggage from Custom Guards."\n\n"Not particularly," the General said. "As long as you filed it with StarLine and arrived on a scheduled transit, not a private launch, they're usually pretty good."\n\n"And if not?"\n\nWawasai shot Isan a hard look.\n\n"I was only asking," Isan said.\n\n"It's the same procedure as everywhere: if you arrive unscheduled, Customs Guard makes a stink. Same thing would happen back home but some people--" He was looking at the crowd by the baggage desks. "--seem to believe they deserve special treatment."\n\nIsan grimaced. "To be fair, this is the VIP starport."\n\n"And, to be fair to the local authorities, it's not their fault people keep showing up here with no scheduled transit and no import formwork and then complain when their crike is impounded."\n\n"Does seem a little harsh though, especailly for--"\n\n"With respect, Mr. Erkan, the same thing would happen at the Cubix arrival stations. Or anywhere else in the galaxy, for that matter. If you don't schedule, you're treated as suspect. It's only good security culture."\n\nIsan nodded, thinking that this also seemed to be a sore point for the General. Then again, Executive Responses was being contracted to provide security for the conference so he probably had to deal with all manner of egregious nonsense from diplotmats and envoys trying to sneak illegal items past Custom Guards - or who just didn't want to pay the import toll. Either way, Isan did not need a lecture on the finer points of security culture. He simply wanted to meet the men and women who mattered and make his case: Erkan-Corbei Minerals Group could make them all very rich.\n\nThat and he wanted to speak to Madame Bale about Mr. Numar. The poor man should have been on Cubix by now, sharing his knowledge about the trusted network with CCCT, knowledge that Isan wanted to integrate into the next generation of hyper-realistic simulation engines. It would take a little fiddling but, if a network like Holy Eden could be used to link simulation engines across the galaxy, it might actually make convergent reality engines the greatest leap in inter-stellar communications since the advent of pay recast. That or it would bankrupt the Erkan estate but Isan figured he could manage the risk, just as long as the Minerals Group continued to turn record profits, and that in turn required an expansion into the galactic west.\n\nAll inter-connected, all highly dependant on one another, and all part of Isan's plan to drag the galactic market, kicking and screaming, into the age of post-reality. Or at least that was what Isan imagined the coming age would become: a galaxy in which the line between the real and virtual worlds blurred so seamlessly that one could move effortlessly from one to the other and make use of the best aspects of both in the pursuit of ever greater accomplishment. And turn a handy profit on the side, obviously, but Isan wasn't in it for the credits. He was in it to become the man who dared to imagine not only a life after biology but a life after the end of reality as humankind had known it for over a hundred thousand years.

The Kessler-Newton Cannon, more commonly referred to as the K-Cannon or K-Gun, was a system defense cannon developed by the [[Colonial Corps|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_corps"]] and built according to loose specifications on thousands of colonial worlds. Unlike most stationary terrestrial and asteroid weapons, the K-Cannon had been developed to be rapidly constructed without the need for specialized equipment and installed with civilian grade mining and lifting gear, allowing virtually any colonial world, rock, or station to arm itself once [[Colonial Corps|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_corps"]] template decryption codes were transmitted by secure [[farbound-length|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_farbound"]] channel. The K-Cannon would then be produced in whatever fabrication works were available and shipped out in parts to be assembled by specially trained engineers, while blast engineers and regular Home Guard infantry dug devensive emplacements and bunkers around the cannon site. A standard gun battery of six guns with overlapping fields of fire could be deployed in as little as a year, though invariably it would take a decade or more to fortify any sufficiently large colonial world and build up munitions stores for sustained fire of up to three decades or more. The weapon system was a railgun-based design with a limited traversal capacity. It needed to be anchored into solid rock and was ideally deployed in fortified positions with a blast-radiaiton shield blocking the firing port and sufficient tolerance room allowed for cave-ins or battle damage. The gun system was entirely automated and the gun bunker could be sealed in the case of severe counter-fire, allowing the gun to remain in operation while operators and crews sheltered in deeper bunkers.<br><br>\n\nOnce deployed, the K-Cannon could be used in two modes: Kessler mode or Newton mode. The former was designed to fire large-caliber cluster shells into orbit, where they would split into a slow-moving debris field and expand toward an oncoimng fleet. This was most effective when used in siege-defense scenarios and when guns could be fired for several decades, blanketing an entire system with persistent waves of shrapnel and creating effects similar to that of the Kessler Syndrome, after which the gun was named. In Newton mode, the cannon would fire smaller saboted high-velocity projectiles accelerated to near relativistic speeds for direct-kills on hostile ships. This mode was better suited for asteroid installments and to provide flanking fire, often from well-concealed positions, creating lethal crossfires that overlapped with guns firing in Kessler mode. Regardless of operation mode, each gun battery required a dedicated fusion powerplant, command and control bunker, technician team, gunnery control station, and sufficient munition stores, often dug into the same fortified position as the gun with reserves kept deeper in the bunker complex. A maximum rate of fire of two round per minute could be achieved with the average K-Cannon, though in practice rounds were fired at a rate of two per day in most scenarios, coordinated between batteries to create lethal barrages of shrapnel and kinetic killers which intercepted with the enemy's assault vectors, ideally more than once over the course of several months or years.<br><br>\n\nDue to the relatively low velocity of guns firing in Kessler mode, which was the primary fire mode the K-Gun was used in, the cannon was known to have poor penetration qualities. The weapons system was also, prior to the Bread Basket War, incorrectly believed by analysts of the Galactic Core to be unable to protect any given planet - much less a system - from invasion due to limited traversal and kill capacity. As the extremely costly invasion of the [[Colony of New Arches|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_new_arches"]] and other similar battles proved, the K-Cannon did not need to protect any given planet as it hadn't been designed to do so. The conceptional notion behind the K-Cannon was that of the system denial weapon which would keep firing for months on end, with hundreds of batteries spread across rocks, planets, and outposts, creating a shrapnel and kinetic killer field that would make establishment of control in a given system prohibitively difficult, which was what occurred in the [[New Arches|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_new_arches"]] system - the [[Hegemony|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]] fuel depot built there was hit multiple times and had to be moved out of the system, where it was vulnerable to [[Luminev|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luminev"]] equipped warships, to prevent repeat strikes from continued waves of debris.<br><br>\n\nUnlike the conventional orbital defense cannon or anti-air rail battery, which sought to destroy ships near to the location, the K-Cannon sought to create a sustained artillery barrage and did so exceptionally well when supplied with a steady supply of cluster munitions. Sufficiently hardened positions could often survive counter-battery fire from warships in the system and weather nuclear impacts, as was demonstrated in the case of [[New Arches|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_retrib_new_arches"]], where several batteries remained operational for years after [[Hegemony|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_hegemony"]] ground forces had landed on the colony, making operations in the system far more costly than had been anticipated. This had previously been deemed an unlikely scenario as, in conventional and historic siege scenarios, no battery remained functional after system control had been established and orbital vessels could fire freely on terrestrial and rock positions. The K-Cannon as employed by the [[Colonial Corps|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "retrib_codex_corps"]], in a resist-to-the-last-shell doctrine, proved that even a single gun still firing could prevent an invading force from establishing full control of a system, even absent support from allied warships, albeit not indefinitely.

Snitch Five had stopped at an unmarked point in the tunnel. Troopers had assumed covering positions front and back. Between them, the demo-man and a tech-trooper used a laser to measure distance. Teshandra watched with folded arms. \n\nRuthran joined her. "Perimiter secure. All teams good. You sure this will work, One?"\n\n"If the [[Cartel|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cmall"]] man was right, and the map is accurate, it will." She glanced to the tech-trooper. "Are we in the correct place?"\n\n"Right, uhh, there." He pointed to the floor plate Teshandra stood on.\n\nShe stepped back. "Feel free to remove it."\n\n"Stat that." The troopers knelt and felt the edges.\n\nLock-bolts were yanked out. Power-fingers were stuck in the gaps. Hydraulics hissed as [[combat suits|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_csuit"]] heaved the plate out. Synth-alloy banged loudly.\n\n"Quietly," Ruthran hissed. His mask-optics darted to Teshandra. "Run it by me again, One. Just because. Hardened bunker, right?"\n\nTesh shot him a disgrunled look. "You truly are a pessmist, Two."\n\n"All I heard was hardened bunker. Six meter thick blast-resistant door. I'm recalling that right, aren't I?"\n\n"Yes," Teshandra said heavily.\n\n"Okay, so the part I don't understand is--"\n\n"Looks clear," one of the troopers said, aiming his [[stinger|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_stinger"]] into the shaft. "Clear. Lase says a hundred mikes down."\n\n"Drone the shaft. Quietly." Teshandra turned to Ruthran, "Which part, precisely, did you not understand?"\n\nThe Sergeant shrugged. "Honestly? All of it. Brief said MilSpec bunker. Railgun resistent. Massive security force. And Local Control's redundant. Three stations. One down there--" He pointed to the shaft, into which a fan-drone had just disappeared. "--and two more spaced along the ring, right?"\n\nTeshandra nodded. "Engineers of the old world were all [[solarists|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_deadgods"]] at heart. The geometric pyramid within the sacred sphere ensured spatial redundancy and honored the divine shape of the cosmos."\n\n"Right, right, but I don't need a history lesson. I need to know--"\n\n"That the [[Plexians|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] are businessmen, not [[solarists|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_deadgods"]]," Teshandra said. "When the risk of [[light-drives|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luminev"]] became known, the Governor petitioned for a sensor. The imperial template never got here. Eventually he had a [[farbound length|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_farbound"]] tranciever installed by the [[Plex|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]]. Comms-unit and echo-listener. All very sane and reasonable but redundant [[farbound|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_farbound"]] units are expensive. The Governor apparently had none installed and has not managed to do so in six centuries."\n\nRuthran snorted static. "That's dumb engineering. Even I know better than to run Zone Control on a single unit and I'm a nixing noncom."\n\n"Colonial governors are a breed unto themselves, Two." Teshandra glanced to the tech-trooper; he worked the drone on his arm computer. "Is the back entrance there?"\n\n"Yes, Cadre. Two guards. Maybe three. Probably powered exo-units. Hard to tell on passives and I don't wanna expose. Drone might give our entrance away."\n\n"Then shut it down. Quietly." Teshandra crouched beside the hole in the floor.\n\nShe'd been about to drop in when Ruthran grabbed her shoulder. Teshandra shot him a withering glare.\n\nHe let go. "Sorry. I just waned to--"\n\n"Everything will be fine. Tell the assault team to lose the additional armor and follow me." Teshandra dropped into the access shaft.\n\nThere were rungs along one side and bot-rated indents on the other. Far below, a dim, cavernous chamber.\n\nTeshandra wedged herself in and looked up. "Sergeant? Will your troopers fit?"\n\n"Should about do," Ruthran said, examining the shaft. "Bit tight. We'll make noise."\n\n"We will have to take the risk." Teshandra climbed down, into the shaft.\n\nLong seconds passed as she descended, a hand on her [[stinger|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_stinger"]] so it didn't bang. Finally, she reached the chamber below. It had been intended for cargo storage but since been rebuilt to house an enormous [[farbound array|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_farbound"]]. The giant twin-pronged device bore the helix of the [[Plex Conglomerate|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] and great tether-cables anchored it into the walls of the chamber. A lone robotic cargo-crane had been retained to lift maintenance crews up to the array.\n\n"I am at the bottom of the shaft." Teshandra clung to the edge and peered out. "All clear. Move down."\n\nAbove her, in the shaft, [[combat suits|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_csuit"]] banged loudly. The Sergeant, identified by the objector's box, skidded down three rungs.\n\n"Careful!" Teshandra scrambled aside.\n\n"Sorry," Ruthran muttered.\n\n"Never mind. Stay here until I signal."\n\n"All right. And then?"\n\n"Assault down. The back door is right below us. There--" Teshandra pointed. "Under that overhang. I think."\n\nRuthran snorted. "You think? Well, isn't that just--"\n\n"I am very certain." Tesh climbed down the wall, towards the overhang.\n\nDirectly below, a hundred meters down, was a wide blast door. The nuke-shield had been lifted aside and, stuck halfway in the door, was a ten meter long cylindrical device. One of the top-plates had been removed, revealing machinery that glimmered in rainbow hues.\n\n"Visual on exotic containment unit," Tesh whispered. "Do not shoot it if at all possible."\n\n"Stat that," Ruthran's voice crackled.\n\nBelow, by the exotic unit, three [[Plex|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_conglomerate"]] employees in white uniforms checked components with data tools. Two [[Security Department|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_security"]] guards in grey [[powered exosuits|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_exosuit"]] paced around them, boxy [[plasma casters|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_pcannon"]] cradled in their arms. Tac-net marked the guards in red.\n\n"Multiple hostiles," Teshandra whispered. "On tac-net. Soon as--" Teshandra's voice trailed off.\n\nA third security [[exosuit|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_exosuit"]] had stomped out of the door. \n\nHe pulled one of the technicians aside. "New work order, straight from the Chief Executive: move that damn thing out of my door, right now. His words, not mine, [[Maint-Tech|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_maint"]]."\n\n"And risk a fracture? Tax-man's noose! That--" The technician pointed at the cylinder. "--is a temporal sink. Do you know what happens if one breaks? Or how much those things cost?"\n\n"No," the security man growled. "And I don't care. The security situation has--"\n\n"Six or seven decaeds worth of investment, is what they cost!" The technician sounded irrate. "Order of magnitude more than a [[light-drive|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_luminev"]]. Can't be manufactured in-system and this is our last spare. If it breaks--"\n\n"No. You--" The security man poked the technician in the chest. "--don't understand, [[Maint-Tech|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_maint"]]. The security incident has escalated. Full lockdown. All entrances and exits. Including this door. Now!"\n\nThe technician groaned. "I just told you: it might fracture. Tax-man knows what damage you idiots did when you--"\n\n"This is no time for inter-departmental rivalry! Get your contraption out of my door. Immediately!"\n\n"I'd love to," the technician said sardonically, "but you dropped a sixty ton blast door on it. Overrode the safeties. If you'd given us five more minutes--"\n\n"None of that matters," the security man snarled. "Move that thing outside. That is a work order direct from the Chief Executive!"\n\nTeshandra's lips curled. "Too late, security man."\n\nShe drew her [[mono-knife|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cblade"]] from it's sheath. The long angular blade ended in two bright green lumen marks; low-light aids. She thumbed the power and, with the other hand, tilted her coil-carbine. The ammo counter glowed solid green: 512.\n\n"Two," Tesh muttered. "Three targets. On tac-net. You ready?"\n\n"Whenever you are, One. Whenever you are."\n\n"Now." Tesh jumped the overhang, aiming at one of the [[Security Department|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_security"]] [[exosuits|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_exosuit"]].\n\nAir whistled past. Below, the [[exosuit|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_exosuit"]] stopped short. A motion-sensor beeped. The security man looked up the same moment Tesh impacted.\n\nHer [[mono-knife|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cblade"]] plunged deep into his helmet. Tesh smacked into the [[exosuit|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_exosuit"]] and bounced off. The [[mono-blade|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_cblade"]] came with her, slicing the man's head open amid a fountain of blood. It fell lazily in low-g.\n\n"Hey!" One of the techs squealed. He pointed at Teshandra. \n\nThe security man who'd been arguing with him looked over. His helmet was open and Tesh glimpsed of a puffy face beneath; a terrestrial face.\n\n"Nix!" Teshandra, still tumbling in low-g, pointed her [[stinger|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_stinger"]] in his direction and pressed the trigger. \n\nThe coilgun shrieked. Bolts sprayed madly only to curve gracefully into the [[exosuit|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_exosuit"]]. The first dozen bounced off an inductive shield. The remainder impacted ballistic plate with deafening cracks. The [[exosuit|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_exosuit"]] toppled slowly in low-gravity, holed a hundred times and leaking bloody sealant foam. The tech beside him bled profusely from an arm wound.\n\nTeshandra, knocked back by recoil, tumbled out of control. "Nix, nix!" She scrambled for a hand-hold.\n\nThat same moment, the last [[exosuit|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_exosuit"]] jetted around the cylinder. His [[plasma caster|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_pcannon"]] pointed directly at Teshandra. White-hot plasma belched out with a sucking roar.\n\n"Nix!" Tesh yelled as searing gas rushed past, melting skin clean off her face.\n\nDark spots swam before her eyes. Noise rattled in her ears. Somewhere above, a coil-carbine whined on full auto. Bolts snapped loudly as they broke the sound barrier. \n\nThe last thing Tesh remembered thinking was that she had nixed up badly. Then there was only darkness - darkness and an uncomfortable rustle in the silence.

Isan strode briskly across the reception area, past faiths in robes and Foreign Domain diplomats in black, to where Shavah Patel stood in her slinky silver dress and conversed with a small knot of dignitaries, by the looks the envoys of some or another Free State. Precisely which one was hard to tell as there were thousands scattered across the Fringe, wedged in the little gaps between the great powers, and all were as eccentric and eclectic as could be. What Isan could tell though was that their taste in fashion was impeccable, especially the ladies, who dressed in finer cuts than even the average corproate business-lady would have. Had there been time, Isan would quite liked to have gotten to know them but there was not.\n\nSo instead he joined the group and caught Shavah's eye. "Excuse the interruption, Sera, but do you have a moment. It is rather urgent?"\n\nEveryone looked at him, as though he'd been so rude and inconsiderate as to suggest they all undress in public.\n\nIsan grimaced. "Sorry if I offended--"\n\n"Oh, no, no," Shavah said. "Could this perhaps wait five minutes?"\n\nIsan laughed politely. "I'm afraid not. Customs Guard might have kicked me out by then."\n\n"Kicked you out?" Shavah looked shocked.\n\n"Long story," Isan said. "Could we perhaps settle this though?"\n\n"Of course." She led Isan aside, whispering, "Thank you for saving me from that tedium."\n\nIsan flashed a worried smile. "Not at all my intent but, ah, to the point: I seem to have run into an issue with your customs officials."\n\n"Ah. So that wasn't just a flimsy excuse?"\n\nIsan shook his head. It was earnest - too earnest.\n\nShavah pulled a face. "They are sometimes over-zealous. Trouble with the cartels, you see, and everyone wants to import at minimal cost. But I'm certain we can sort that right away."\n\n"That would be most kind," Isan said.\n\nShavah nodded, gestruing absently at nothing in particular. "Could you tell me precisely what, ah, yes. I see the issue."\n\n"You do?"\n\nShe nodded. "Flagged as in violation of five Cs."\n\n"The what?"\n\n"The CCCCC. The Credit and Commerce Cooperative Charter."\n\n"Oh. Yes. They told me that."\n\nShavah pursed her lips. "The good news is that means Customs Guard won't reject your immigration forms. The bad news is that, because we don't have a process for Charter violations yet, so you'll have to take that up with your colleagues back on Cubix to get the violation cleared. I think. I'm not entirely sure how this system works and I don't think anyone here knows."\n\n"Great," Isan muttered. "So what do I do now?"\n\n"We take it to the Legion-Commander," Shavah said.\n\n"Oh, good. I actually wanted to speak to him anyways."\n\n"Indeed? About what?"\n\n"The whereabouts of Mr. Numar and, ah, it doesn't matter right now." He rubbed his hands, smiling to hide his unease. "So, to the Legion-Commander, then?"\n\n"I just messaged him," Shavah said.\n\nIsan nodded, secretly surprised of how quickly this had gone - back in corporate space, just checking up on a regulatory flag would have taken weeks of waiting simply to learn one had alledgedly supplied the wrong reference number and the Commission would levy a processing fee of several thousand credits. But, then again, the Corporate Hegemony ran on last generation servers held together with spit and wax-tape, not a modern infrastructure rebuilt according to best practices like seemed to be the case on Scaffold 13.\n\nWith that in mind, Isan couldn't help but say, "I am quite impressed with what you have managed to build here, Sera Patel. Truly commendable."\n\n"Oh, thank you so much." She smiled, eyes wide like sunbursts once again. "It far from complete but, when my mother and sisters left, I swore to prove Father's ideas could be made to work in practice. And see now: my mother insists I am here daughter and she is owed dues but, ah, Commander Roien." Her eyes sparkled more than ever, tracking someone behind Isan.\n\nHe turned to see a cybernetic man approach, dressed in a baggy black uniform that hung loose around olive-drab augments. There was a V-patch on his shoulder and a name tag on his chest, which was the only way to identify the man as his face was entirely mechanical, straight down to a quartet of orange optical units that darted from Isan to Shavah and back.\n\n"Sera Patel." The Commander nodded to her. "And you." He scowled at Isan.\n\nIsan pulled a face. "Am I a persona non-grata already?"\n\n"Nope," the Commander said.\n\n"Ah. I, ah, don't quite understand."\n\n"I hear you have a problem and that means you're my problem and I don't like problems. Stat?"\n\nIsan swallowed. "I did not know--"\n\n"It is an issue with the Charter," Shavah said.\n\n"The first of many to come, no doubt." The Commander breathed a clicking sigh, his mechanical mouth drawn to a slit. "Very well. What's the issue with the Charter now?"\n\nShavah gestured to Isan. "Ask him?"\n\n"I am," the Commander growled.\n\nIsan smiled nervously. "Well, yes, you see it seems the Commission is trying to serve an illegitimate notice of audit. They have tried many times in corporate space and my law-techs have contested every one of these claims but, apparently, they believe they can force them through via this new Charter arrangement. I suppose they believe you will be not aware of the corporate process."\n\n"Right," the Commander growled. "And how the Hades is this a Legion problem? Sort it with the crike-eaters."\n\nIsan did not know. He had no idea what to say.\n\n"Because the notice was served by Customs Guard," Shavah said. "That makes it a Protectorate matter."\n\nThe Commander grunted. "And why the Hades is Customs Guard serving crike-eater notices?"\n\n"I imagine because the Charter allows the crike-eaters to pass notices through Customs Guard? I do not know. I was not responsbile for that portion of the Charter."\n\n"No," the Commander growled. "I was. And the version I signed should not allow foreign instutions to serve notices in Protectorate space."\n\n"As I thought," Isan muttered.\n\nThe Commander shot him a hard look. "You keep out of this, Mr. Erkan."\n\n"Fine by me," Isan said. "Shall I leave this with--"\n\n"You're coming with me," the Commander said. "You too, Shavah. Let's get this settled. Get everyone in a room and settle it before they start blaming us, hmm?"\n\nShavah's eyes narrowed. "What? Now?"\n\n"Yup," the Commander said. "This nixing instant. Let's go find the Commissioner and whoever the Hades served this, uhh, Inspector Faumacher. Customs Guard, huh?"\n\n"He was right over there a moment ago." Isan pointed to the back room.\n\n"Right. Then you--" He pointed to Isan and Shavah. "--get in there. I'll go find the Commissioner. This nixing nonsense has gone on long enough."\n\nIsan grimaced. "This sort of thing has been happening a lot, I take it?"\n\nThe Commander shot him an unblinking four-eyed stare. "Get in the room. Now."\n\n"I was only asking," Isan muttered as he slinked away.\n\nShavah fell in step with him, her high heels clicking loudly. "Do forgive Commander Hattit. He has been under considerable strain of late, what with the dual duty to the protectorate and to his soldiers."\n\n"It must be very stressful."\n\nShavah shot him a telling look. "I do what I can to help but state building is quite an undertaking, especially when one wants to do it right."\n\n"Well, if there is anything I can do to help, I would be overjoyed to."\n\n"Oh, that is very kind, Mr. Isan, and as I said: if you want to invest in Garian, we would be so appreciative."\n\nIsan smiled. "Once this nonsense is sorted we shall discuss that, yes?"\n\n"An excellent idea." She stopped outside the door to the side room.\n\nFor a moment Isan was confused as to why she did not open the door. Then he remembred that, in the west, it was customary for the man to do that. Isan did not want to do that. He did not want to face the mad nonsense that waited beyond the door but he could not afford to show weakness, especially not around a prospective partner as endearing as Shavah Patel, and so Isan opened the door.

At the bottom of the cistrinal chapel, an interrupt command awoke Nefari. Optical feeds came online with a flicker. The unit stood at the base of the stairs, before an ancient steel doorway that predated the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] by several millennia.\n\nNefari stepped inside, into a shrine built in honor of the heretical star: [[Sacred Sol|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_sacred_sol"]]. For many millennia, it had been lauded above the rest, imagined to be superior to other stars in the galaxy. All quite illogical, in Nefari's estimate, but then humans tended to enjoy honoring things in shrines such as the one Nefari stood in.\n\nLaser-engravings decodated the walls and, in the center, stood an altary layered with frayed fabrics. Once, those tattered rags had been a golden-red banner which honored the [[Astral Order|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "codex_plex_sacred_astral"]]. The fabric was now grey and surrounded an irradiated rock shaped like the [[Imperial Diamond|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_tyranate"]] which floated in a primitive [[gravity generator|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_gwell"]] composed of twelve hoops. To the left, on a bench, sat a robed monk who mustered the sphere pensively. \n\nNefari stepped back. "Forgive the intrusion." \n\n"Quite all right, Paladin Nefari." The priest patted the bench. "Please, join us in prayer."\n\nNefari took a carful step forward. "Prayer? In a heretical shrine? To what end?"\n\n"The continued survival of the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]]." The monk stood and brushed back his hood. \n\nThe young face below triggered facial recognition: Brother Ibrahim Zweili. Aspiring cleric like his father before him. Scheduld to take the temple-exam in three months. Political. Reformer. True allegience: [[Brotherhood of Silence|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_brotherhood"]], also like his father before him.\n\n"Ibrahim Zweili," Nefari summarized.\n\nZweili smiled tersely. "I gather you've decided to react to our messages this time."\n\n"It seemed prudent. The clerics have settled with the corporates and yet calm does not return to the sacred halls. The Sestant bickers and argues."\n\n"As it always will. But that is not why I am here."\n\n"Of course not," Nefari said. "You are here because two of your attempts to investigate the corporate cabal have failed. Unfortunate."\n\nBrother Zweili snorted. "Blunt, Paladin. But you are wrong. It was three."\n\nNefari ran a data-synch. Error: network unavailable.\n\n"Odd," it said. "The Tomsen affair and the Yerris affair. What is the third failure?"\n\n"The unexpected loss of an agent on a remote [[Talithrax|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_talithrax"]] research station. It initially seemed unrelated. Now it raises questions."\n\n"[[Talithrax Genetics|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_talithrax"]]?" Nefari calculated. "Logical. The corporaty is compromised."\n\n"Yes. But that is not all. There is this." Zweili produced a data-pad.\n\nNefari accessed it by remote. It contained one file: a video. Nefari ran through it on speed-forward.\n\nThe file recorded a naked woman - speculation: a witch - lying on the floor. Her face had been sliced open. Blood dripped from deep gashes that resembled a circle. Implication: an extra-judicial execution carried out by a sanctioned hunter.\n\n"Clearly a fabrication," Nefari said. "Political propaganda. Corporate actors engaged in subterfuge."\n\n"I'm afraid not," Zweili said. "That unfortunate woman was our agent on the [[Talithrax|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_talithrax"]] station I had mentioned. The image was sent to Station Two on an encrypted channel."\n\nNefari calculated. "A taunt. Political provocation."\n\n"Precisely. But there is more: the Crusade Accords have given us acces to some, but not all, corporate data-sources. Commission records are among them. Do you know what I found in those?"\n\n"No," Nefari said. "First you must tell me."\n\n"I found that, in one hundred percent of all cases, [[Talithrax Genetics|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_talithrax"]] passed Commission inspections with flying colors. One was conducted only a few days prior to the loss of our agent. No incidents were reported. But that--" He pointed to the data-pad but, as Nefari knew, meant the video. "--was only sent to us recently. Strange, don't you think?"\n\nNefari did not quite know how to respond. Arbitrational units did not, technically speaking, think.\n\nZweili stood with a grunt. "What I am saying, Paladin, is this: the corporates might have lost the conventional war but we have lost the information war. I cannot tell you who or what is targeting us but the [[Brotherhood|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_brotherhood"]] is beginning to suspect there might be more to the [[corsair|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_corsair"]] angle than killers of the old world hired by the corporates."\n\n"There is," Nefari said. "The [[covenites|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_covens"]] are involved."\n\n"And their so-called witch queen was incinerated two thousand years ago," Zweili said. "What realistic threat do a bunch of confused young women pose?"\n\nNefari reflected on that statement in sub-routine.\n\nWhile she did, Zweili said, "There is another angle which must be considered: the Duhan Confession."\n\nNefari un-archived that data package. "The Yerris affair. Raised concerns over the methods of the [[Paladin Order|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_paladin"]]. Case dismissed by the Court of Eden due to lack of evidence. Ser Duhan is believed missing, presumed dead, since the orbital annihilation of [[XNV-6|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_xnv"]]. An unfortunate outcome but, given the circumstances, the Duhan affair is settled."\n\n"Only it isn't," Zweili said. "The [[Knights of Shield|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_knight"]] have been complaining ever since the Crusade ended. Concerns over lax security standards in the trusted network. The Sestant has been silent and remains silent. Worse: there is not a single sitting reformist."\n\n"The Sestant election is a democratic process," Nefari said. "It cannot be influenced, only voided by the Commisariat, were a cleric found to pick favorites, engage in nepotism, or encourage class privilege."\n\nZweili breathed a laugh. "Every cleric is guilty of all three and yet none will ever be found guilty, not by the Commisariat at least."\n\n"So you claim," Nefari said. "Records prove otherwise."\n\n"Ah, perhaps, and yet that is beyond the point, which is this: as soon as the Crusade Accords were signed, three more reds took the place of the whites and pushed for a review of the security apparatus. They demand a focus on the militant agenda. A thousand [[Knights of Shield|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_knight"]] have lain down their robes in protest. The [[Knights of Sword|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_knight"]] ignore this entirely as it serves their political agenda to leave us deprived of our sacred shield."\n\nSub-routine concluded: confused young women were not a meaningful issue. Brother Zweili's mention of the security situation, on the other hand, was.\n\n"The situation as lain out," Nefari summarized. "Is that hostile actors, possibly corporate in nature, presumably related to old [[corsair clans|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_corsair"]], and in some manner related to [[Talithrax Genetics|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_talithrax"]], have managed to impede several key [[Brotherhood|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_brotherhood"]] operations. This seems to indicate the [[Brotherhood of Silence|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_brotherhood"]] suffers from poor means and methods, not a larger issues within the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]]."\n\n"And that's why I'm here," Zweili said. "I have a proposal."\n\n"Interesting." Humans enjoyed such interjections.\n\nZweili forced a smile. "We would like to detain one of these [[corsair|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "plex_codex_corsair"]] killers. An assassin known as the Ferryman."\n\nNefari checked the local cache. It contained no information on the Ferryman.\n\n"An old world killer with a political record," Zweili said. "Twenty seven suspected eliminations, though the probable estimate is in the hundreds. All in colonial space. Governors. Tax inspectors. The sorts. Wanted in numerous jurisdictions since, oh, sometime in the late 20th millennium."\n\n"That is--" Nefari simplified the date-time calculation. "--a long time ago."\n\nZweili nodded. "Old world killer, as I said."\n\n"Fascinating. What is the proposed detension method?"\n\n"The Ferryman is known to operate in the galactic east. Recorded by several agents in the area and the Commission records suggest there is a small [[Talithrax|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_talithrax"]] station in this region which, from what we can tell, sends a dead man's signal at a regular interval. We propose a team be sent to disrupt this signal, which we belive will prompt the Ferryman to respond."\n\nNefari calculated that to be unlikely. "Why would an assassin respond to such an event?"\n\n"Because this has been observed in the past. Unfortunately, the team which made this observation has vanished. Presumed murdered by the Ferryman."\n\n"Or by any hostile non-state actor operating in the corporate east," Nefari pointed out. "There are many potential variables."\n\n"And that's why we need your help," Zweili said. "The [[Brotherhood|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_brotherhood"]] has limited means and, as you pointed out, our methods may leave to be desired. We're an instition of listeners, not door kickers, and the assistance of the [[Paladin Order|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_paladin"]]--"\n\n"Must be approved by unanimous decision of the trusted network," Nefari said. "Your request can be submitted to [[Holy Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]]."\n\nZweili breathed a laugh. "The data-priests would discard it as superflous."\n\n"This unit would not," Nefari said. "Should this unit submit an arbitration request on your behalf?"\n\n"That would be most generous."\n\n"Excellent." Nefari saved the conversation for later submission to the trusted network. "Your request will be submitted once network connectivity is restored, Brother Zweili."\n\n"Good. Good. Thank you."\n\nNefari acknowledged wordlessly. Hushed silence followed.\n\n"Stars be with you, Paladin." Zweili squeezed past Nefari and disappeared down a hidden passage.\n\nNefari scanned it, confused. All hidden passages ought have been been sealed. Conclusion: no one had known of this one. Built long before the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]] and used by those who had worshiped the heretical star unto the end. No such heretics remained in the [[Church|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_church"]].\n\nThe same did not hold true in the [[Brotherhood|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "cabal_codex_brotherhood"]]. A borderline heretical fraternity that did not know the value of [[Holy Eden|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_eden"]] and mistrusted the institutions they served. None the less, the information Brother Zweili had provided was concerning.\n\nLost agents. Failed operations. Worse: another prediction had proven false. The Crusade of Eden had not brought stability to either side of the Core Divide.

Long after they had all been let out of the side room, Isan stood on one of the upper terraces and stared out, through the hole in the outer shell of the tower, at the twinkling specks of light that orbited Scaffold 13, glinting in the glow of the nearby sun. They looked almost like thousands upon thousands of stars but, in truth, most of them were starships and, of those starships, most were military warships docked at the fleet anchor. Unthinkable, that there were so many in one place, and that was just at Scaffold 13. The Garian Gap spanned along the edge of the Bright Core, wedged between the inhabited inner systems of the People's Canton to the west, the Reformed Canton to the north and east, and the uninhabited dead stars around the Great Devourer to the south.\n\nOnce, not long ago, the relatively undeveloped Garian Gap had been at the heart of Church space, located in a sparse stellar neighborhood with no immediately apparent financial value. For millennia it had been little more than a great gulf on the transit route from north to south that haulers had attempted to translate across as fast as possible, a desolate area of civilizes space, home to little more than a handful of junker clans, mining colonies, and a single strategically significant shipworks on the outskirts of Scaffold 13 vectorspace. Had someone come to Isan a hundred years ago and told him that, one day, not all too far in the future, the Garian Hold would become as politically and strategically significant as, say, the Hegemony Heartlands or the Pale Crescent, he would have laughed at the absurdity of the idea.\n\nIn fact, in his just over a thousand years of life, Isan Erkan had never even been to the Garian Gap and he had been to the galactic west many times on business, from Scaffold 22 in the north to Scaffold 35 in the south, and yet he had never even thought of visiting Scaffold 13. He had never imagined what it would be like there or how similar - or different - it might be to Scaffold 22, home of the Cathedral and the true beating heart of the west. Or so it had been for as long as Isan could recall and as far back as his history books went and yet as he stood there, staring out, Isan could almost feel the astrography of the galaxy changing around him.\n\nBeside him, a soft voice said, "It is beautifully tragic, is it not?"\n\nIsan looked about with a start. Madamae Bale stood beside him, her slender arms folded before her cinched waist and face hidden behind that crescent-shaped mask, the one Isan had seen so many times over the years, but on a different woman, one who wore fashionably over-priced skintights and stylishly quilted space suits, not pearly white gowns that showed a quite impressive ammount of cleavage. Isan took care not to notice that too much, least the Madame take notice.\n\nHer lips curled ever so slightly. "You cannot see it, can you, Mr. Erkan?"\n\nHe shot her a bewhildered look.\n\n"The Pillars of Awe," she said, gaze on the blast-hole to the stars. "You know it is there because you have been told but you cannot concieve of it, much less percieve it, and yet it is there. Omnipresent and overwhelming in a way the cosmos has not been in over ten thousand long years."\n\n"Ah, indeed?" Isan had no idea what she was on about.\n\nMadame Bale nodded, lips drawn tight. "The moment is upon us, as they say, and I imagine it will be both far more horrific and far less impressive than we can ever imagine." She smiled sadly. "But the future of the cosmic environment, quite possibly the fate of spacetime itself, is not why you asked to see me, is it, Isan?"\n\n"No," he said quietly. "It is not but, now you mention it: ought I be concerned?"\n\nShe looked at him, staring with that blank, expressionless face. Isan could not even see her eyes behind the black slots, just a shadow behind the mask that seemed omnipresent and overwhelming, as she had so aptly put it.\n\nIsan swallowed. "I shall take that as a yes."\n\n"You should take it as a warning," she said softly. "After all, if the exotic contamination of Xenevere was severe enough that the sages of old could foretell a disaster of this magnitude and estimate it down to the century - minus a few decades - then it stands to reason this will not be an isolated incident, especially not in a galaxy which embraces exotics as the rate it does in this age."\n\n"Something to keep in mind," Isan said. "But, yes, that is not why I wanted to speak to you. I wanted to ask about, well, shall we call it a problem which I require solved."\n\nThe blank white mask stared at him. "By solved, do you imply a solution such as that which was applied to the Corbei problem? Or do you imply something else."\n\n"I imply something more akin to the Vindell problem," Isan said. "Positively archeological in age and tenaciously persistent, though perhaps not quite as annoying as Mr. Vindell was."\n\n"I see." Madame Bale looked out to the stars with a sigh. "You lost the precious little marble I gave you, didn't you?"\n\nIsan nodded. That more or less described the situation.\n\nMadame Bale stifled a laugh. "I told you to get rid of it, Isan. That miserable thing brings nothing but bad luck."\n\n"No doubt," he said. "And that is not the issue. There is nothing more to be learned from that contraption but, well, I do feel I have been treated unfairly."\n\n"And how do you come to that conclusion?"\n\n"Because that leaf-rolling rat forced me into a deeply unfortunate compromise, one I could not extract myself from."\n\nMadame Bale clucked her tongue. "Now, now, Mr. Isan. There is no need to be prejudiced."\n\nIsan rolled his eyes. "All I ask is that we sort this situation."\n\n"We, Isan? We?"\n\n"What I mean is the Convergence Company may be forced to guarantee all reproduction and redistribution rights to the Colonial Forum for ten centuries and I deeply dislike this arrangement."\n\n"And you want me to do something about that?"\n\n"I thought, perhaps, you could let your influence be felt. Put in a word for me with the Fringe Alliance or whatever is most appropriate."\n\nThe Madame's white mask turned to Isan for a long moment, then looked back out at the stars. "I could speak to the Sephinia Agrippa but such a commitment will come at a considerable price."\n\n"I am prepared to pay what I must."\n\n"Even if that payment is not in credits?"\n\nIsan thought for a moment, then nodded, jaw set. He wanted the Convergence Company to succeed at any cost.\n\nThe Madame's inked lips curled ever so slightly. "You are a loyal customer, if nothing else, so I suppose we shall offer you a discount: in return for sorting your unfortunate obligations to the Forum I will come to you one day, not far in the future, and make a request. And I expect you to fulfill it without whinging or hesitation."\n\n"May I inquire as to what you will request?"\n\n"No but I will say this: the unexpected success of the Credit and Commerce Cooperative is directly at odds with the political dominance of the Fringe Alliance and, with the galaxy fractured as it is, a conflict between the corporate sector and the Fringe Alliance seems all but unavoidable."\n\n"That does seem to be the direction the solar winds are blowing."\n\n"Indeed and, to add insult to injury, such a conflict might occur in the middle of a cosmic disasater of unprecedented proportions."\n\n"Well, yes, conflict usually is quite--"\n\n"The Pillars of Awe, I meant. It is only a matter of time before what remains of Xenevere is catapulted out into dead space and, if my arithmatic is even close to correct, that will be an--" She sucked a hissing breath. "--interesting event."\n\n"Ah, yes, and that would be bad for business, wouldn't it?"\n\nThe Madame nodded, lips pursed.\n\n"Well, it is a rather novel idea," Isan said. "Alas, when I decided to contribute to our little mutual fund, I did not quite imagine the contract would expand from credits to, well, fulfilling three wishes on demand."\n\n"Then you are welcome to solve your problems outside of the organization."\n\nIsan swallowed. "I simply thought that, perhaps, there might be some wiggle room in the arrangement."\n\n"There might be, on condition you invest in the Garian restoration project. Sera Patel will have blathered all about it, no doubt."\n\n"The restoration of a bunch of backed up brains, as I understood, yes?"\n\n"Onto your simulated environment, yes."\n\n"Ah, so you suggested the idea to the young Sera."\n\nThe Madame nodded. "Garian cannot afford to invest in such a setup. It would bankrupt the state and, frankly, the Protectorate has more pressing concenrs. But it would offer the test bed you seek."\n\n"An intriguind idea, one I am already considering as it stands."\n\n"Put your money where your mouth is and I will merely request you consider what I wish for, if and when I come to you."\n\nIsan rubbed his chin, thinking, and concluded, "You present me the option of two uncertain investments, neither of which I can rely on to produce results."\n\n"True but, in return, you can rest assured that the organization will produce results."\n\n"Oh, no doubt, though I do wonder what precisely I would be buying with these charitable donations."\n\nThe blank white mask stared intently.\n\nIsan swallowed. "I am only asking in good faith, Madame."\n\n"Good faith?" The hint of a smirk curled her lips.\n\nIsan rolled his eyes. "Ah, well, I may have once claimed that the only good faith is a dead faith, in my defense, that is my ideologue phase. Today I am prepared to compromise halfway and admit that some are more tolerable than others. Sera Patel, for example, is quite tolerable for an edenist and rather a looker at that."\n\nThe Madame's smirk became a little grin. "Imagine that. You fancy a faith."\n\n"Far from it," Isan said. "I simply know to appreciate both the sculpter and the sculpture and I sense she is both in equal measure. But that is completely beside the point, which is that I would very much like to know what precisely the organization intends to do in return for my donations."\n\n"Now, now. Don't change the subject. You were about to tell me why you fancy the faith."\n\nIsan shot her a dark look. "You are extrapolating far too much from a single statement and you did not answer my question."\n\n"Oh but do excuse me. I thought you knew the organization always selfishly secures a future for itself."\n\n"I meant: how do you plan to solve my problem?"\n\nThe Madame shrugged ever so slightly.\n\nIsan's eyes narrowed. "Meaning you do not know? Or you do not believe I deserve to know?"\n\n"Shall we say: your investment would be guaranteed a return but I cannot tell you when you will recieve it or what form it shall take."\n\n"Ah." Isan figured that was probably the best he would get out of the Madame.\n\nThe organization was like that: inscrutiable to the point that, at times, Isan was convinced it was all just the Madame's excuse to swindle great sums from gullible businessmen like him. At other times, and there had only been a handful of those in the last years, the organization put even the best black operations contractors of the corporate sector to shame, pulling strings in the least likely places and producing the most beneficial results - for those who paid the devil in white her dues.\n\nThat was the unspoken rule, the one everyone in the corporate sector politely pretended did exist, and it was they to success. Not credits or innovation or brilliant brand loyalty campaigns. Not personal ties to the Chairmen of the Hedgefond or clout with the Commissioners, no. Any problem, no matter how slight or seemingly inconsequential, could be solved by an audience with the white witch.

/* ########################################################################\n\t\t\t\t\tOrganization \n########################################################################*/\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_admiral",\n\tname: "Fleet Admiralty",\n\tinCategories: [],\n\tinSections: [],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_tyran"],\n\timg: "codex_admiralty_logo.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_intelcorps",\n\tname: "Intelligence Corps",\n\tinCategories: [],\n\tinSections: [],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_tyran", "cabal_codex_dominion"],\n\timg: "codex_intelcorps.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_astro",\n\tname: "Astro Corps",\n\tinCategories: [],\n\tinSections: [],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_tyran"],\n\timg: "codex_astrocorps.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_tyran",\n\tname: "Tyran Fleet",\n\tinCategories: ["orga"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "bhd", "fringe", "oorga"],\n\tchildren: ["cabal_codex_dominion", "plex_codex_tyranate", "codex_plex_loyalism", "plex_codex_impfleet", "plex_codex_admiral", "plex_codex_intelcorps", "plex_codex_astral", "plex_codex_astro"],\n\timg: "codex_tyran.png",\n\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n/* ########################################################################\n\t\t\t\t\tBig Ships \n########################################################################*/\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_battleship",\n\tname: "Tyran Indominable-class Battleship",\n\tinCategories: ["tech"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "cships", "tyran"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_tyran", "plex_codex_lancer", "plex_codex_gwell", "plex_codex_luminev"],\n\timg: "codex_battleship.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_carrier",\n\tname: "Tyran Empress-class Carrier",\n\tinCategories: ["tech"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "cships", "tyran"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_tyran", "plex_codex_fighter", "plex_codex_bomber", "plex_codex_dropship", "plex_codex_luminev"],\n\timg: "codex_carrier.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n/* ########################################################################\n\t\t\t\t\tSmall Ships \n########################################################################*/\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_fighter",\n\tname: "Tyran Rapir-class Strike Fighter",\n\tinCategories: ["tech"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "scraft", "tyran"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_tyran", "plex_codex_hellgun", "plex_codex_lancer", "plex_codex_gwell"],\n\timg: "codex_strikefighter.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_bomber",\n\tname: "Tyran Marauder-class Bomber",\n\tinCategories: ["tech"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "scraft", "tyran"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_tyran", "plex_codex_hellgun"],\n\timg: "codex_bomber.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n/* ########################################################################\n\t\t\t\t\tUtility Ships\n########################################################################*/\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_tanker",\n\tname: "Tyran Nebal-class Tanker",\n\tinCategories: ["tech"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "uships", "tyran"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_tyran"],\n\timg: "codex_tanker.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_troopship",\n\tname: "Tyran Rockfall-class Troopship",\n\tinCategories: ["tech"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "uships", "tyran"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_tyran", "plex_codex_ramjet", "plex_codex_dropship", "plex_codex_droppod"],\n\timg: "codex_troopship.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_dropship",\n\tname: "Tyran Dustfall-class Dropship",\n\tinCategories: ["tech"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "uships", "tyran"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_tyran", "plex_codex_troopship", "plex_codex_carrier"],\n\timg: "codex_dropship.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n/* ########################################################################\n\t\t\t\t\tBigguns\n########################################################################*/\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_ramjet",\n\tname: "Tyran Ramjet Cannon",\n\tinCategories: ["tech"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "hweap", "tyran"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_tyran", "plex_codex_troopship"],\n\timg: "codex_tyran_ramjet.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_hellgun",\n\tname: "Tyran Hellgun",\n\tinCategories: ["tech"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "hweap", "tyran"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_tyran", "plex_codex_fighter", "plex_codex_bomber"],\n\timg: "codex_hellgun.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_lancer",\n\tname: "Tyran Pi-Lance",\n\tinCategories: ["tech"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "hweap", "tyran"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_tyran", "plex_codex_fighter", "plex_codex_battleship"],\n\timg: "codex_lancer.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n/* ########################################################################\n\t\t\t\t\tExosuits & Infantry Guns\n########################################################################*/\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_csuit",\n\tname: "Tyran Combat Suit",\n\tinCategories: ["tech"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "exo", "bhd", "tyran"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_tyran", "plex_codex_lnettle", "plex_codex_stinger"],\n\timg: "codex_csuit.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_corsarm",\n\tname: "Tyran Raider Suit",\n\tinCategories: ["tech"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "exo", "bhd", "tyran"],\n\tchildren: ["cabal_codex_dominion", "plex_codex_tyran", "plex_codex_corsair"],\n\timg: "codex_corsarm.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_edrone",\n\tname: "Tyran Echo Drone",\n\tinCategories: ["tech"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "robo", "comm", "tyran"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_tyran"],\n\timg: "codex_tyran_echodrone.png",\n\timgTall: true,\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_lnettle",\n\tname: "Tyran LDL Long-Nettle",\n\tinCategories: ["tech"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "weapons", "tyran"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_tyran", "plex_codex_csuit"],\n\timg: "codex_lnetle.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_stinger",\n\tname: "Tyran SNR Stinger",\n\tinCategories: ["tech"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "bhd", "weapons", "tyran"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_tyran", "plex_codex_csuit"],\n\timg: "codex_stinger.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_fdet",\n\tname: "Tyran Fission Detonator",\n\tinCategories: ["tech"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "bhd", "weapons", "retrib", "tyran"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_tyran", "plex_codex_csuit"],\n\timg: "codex_fission_grenade.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n\n/* ########################################################################\n\t\t\t\t\tTech Stuff\n########################################################################*/\n\n\n<<set $codexEntry = {\n\tid: "plex_codex_astrarum",\n\tname: "Astrarum",\n\tinCategories: ["tech", "bio"],\n\tinSections: ["plex", "comm", "bioorga", "imp", "empire", "tyran"],\n\tchildren: ["plex_codex_tyran", "plex_codex_empire", "plex_codex_astral"],\n\timg: "codex_astrarum.png",\n}>>\n<<set $codex.entries.push($codexEntry)>>\n

<div class='GameText'>\n<<if $story neq "none">>\n\t<<set $notesPassage = "notes_" + $story.id>>\n\t<h1>EDITING NOTES - <<print $story.name>></h1>\n\t<<print "<<display " + $notesPassage + ">>">>\n\n<<else>>\n\t<h1>EDITING NOTES - OVERALL</h1>\n\t<<display "notes_overall">>\n\n\t<<for $i = 0; $i lt $timeline.entries.length; $i++>>\n\t\t<<if $timeline.entries[$i].type eq "story">>\n\t\t\t<<if $timeline.entries[$i].storyType eq "novel">>\n\t\t\t\t<<set $notesPassage = "notes_" + $timeline.entries[$i].id>>\n\n\t\t\t\t<h1>EDITING NOTES - <<print $timeline.entries[$i].name>></h1>\n\t\t\t\t<<print "<<display " + $notesPassage + ">>">>\n\t\t\t<<endif>>\n\t\t<<endif>>\n\t<</for>>\n<<endif>>\n</div><br>\n<div class='OptionsField'>\n\t<div class='GameOption GameOption_Move'>\n\t\t<<click 'Resume' $currentgamepassage>>\n\t\t\t<<set $hud.currentScreen = "none">>\n\t\t<</click>>\n\t</div>\t\n</div>

The great halls of the [[Cathedral|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_cathedral"]] were hushed. Sandals scuffed on marble tiles. Tall shadows danced along the walls, cast by clerics and scribes who shuffled past braziers set in memorial alcoves. Arbitrational Construct NEFARI watched the steady stream of humans, waiting for the oppertune moment. It's sub-routines scanned faces and gauged alertness. When the metric dropped beneath the desired threshhold, the unit moved, quickly and quietly.\n\nAs Neferi hurried through the flow of bodies, the Arbitrational Unit was not so much percieved as noted in passing. Arbiters of the [[Paladin Order|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_paladin"]] had become a common sight at the [[Cathedral|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_cathedral"]]. Most took the apperance of a classic-era exonetics battlesuit with silver masks and matching armored plates.\n\nBased on the advice of sub-processing block nb.271-1, Nefari had deviated from the norm. Behavioral analysis had determined that an imposing physique only hindered the Neferi-conscience. A more feminine figure had been selected instead, still a classic battlesuit but smaller and less intimidating than the norm.\n\nThis visual representation served Nefari well in the unit's primary role: conflict mediation. Recently, the Nefari unit had helped ratify the Crusade Accord and achieve lasting peace with the corporate east. During these negotiations, Nefari had calculated that their corporate counterparts responded twenty-one percent better to Neferi than to other arbitrational units. Consensus on the terms of the Accords had been reached within only ninety-three standard days, rather than the projected two seasons. A statistical victory.\n\nIn the halls of the [[Cathedral|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_cathedral"]], on the other hand, Neferi found it's appearance inconvenient. Example: Father Besius of the Starfound Chapel came the other way, carrying a stack of data-pads. The old priest's frayed robes swayed with every shuffling step.\n\nBesius bowed his head in passing. "Blessings be upon you, Paldin Neferi."\n\nNeferi nodded curtly and hastened it's pace.\n\n"Paladin Neferi." Scribe Lufindi bowed her head as she passed.\n\nNefari again increased gait, querying circuit-block af551-1 as to whether an assumed human identity might not be wiser. \n\nChip-block response: <i>no</i>.\n\nNo explanation was given. The subroutine had reccomended this appearance and it would have had a good reason for doing so, perhaps because units of the [[Order|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_paladin"]] were a common sight at the [[Cathedral|UI_Codex_Entry][$hud.currentCodexEntry = "bhd_codex_cathedral"]] and were habitually given a wide berth. An unknown human on the other hand might have triggered a security watchdog and Nefari might have been detained for inquisition.\n\n"Blessed day, Paladin Nefari." A monk whose name the Nefari conscience did not know hurried by.\n\nNefari maintained it's quick gait. The overweight of the conscience was, to put it mildly, nervous. It did not want to be seen, a nearly impossible feat i