236-1107 – Exe Kuiper Belt
The Recent Convert, with Penelope, Eric, Deanna and Timaeus aboard, arrived in the Exe Kuiper Belt to rendezvous with the Martin II and the Mercifuge. The crew and droids of the latter ships had been stripping the last useful systems from the Martin II – her jump drives, power plant and weapons – and jettisoning them in the kilometres of light-absorbent, carbon-fibre wrap they had brought from Acrid, for later collection. Only an emergency backup power plant would remain to keep the soon-to-awake crew of the Martin II alive.
They then sent accelerated the Martin II away from the spot and jumped to Exe station. The beacons would start to broadcast her position three weeks later.
244-1107 – Exe Station
On Exe Station, the party entertained the senior officers of the Imperium repair fleet, lead by Captain – now serving as Commodore – Burghof, alongside whom they had fought against Hroal.
With Burghof, they drank riotously, requiring him to be carried back to his ship, and he went into some further detail about the factions of the Imperium Navy in the Trojan Reach, and their varying attitudes towards Drinax, GeDeCo and the Aslan. They also discussed the Martin II and Torsa and where they might currently be, with the theory that a terrible misjump caused by the Martin II’s ailing jump drive was the culprit. The Voidsedge Cluster was notorious, after all, for misjumps.
When discussing the new responsibilities facing the Kingdom of Drinax, Burghof mentioned the second hand, downgraded Vigorous Class light SDBs that were available on the market as planetary navies in the Imperium saved on running costs by upgrading to newer, more automated system defence boats.
A couple of days later, Timaeus spoke to Tark Kerneval, the long-serving chief engineer on Exe’s station. Kerneval had served on the automated refuelling station for decades (where others did a two year stint and left), had a better office than GeDeCo’s nominal Chief Administrator, and seemed to know everyone and everything about both the station and the miners and prospectors on the planet below.
The Drinaxians had brought nearly a third of a million credits’ worth of drugs, alcohol, artistic portrayals of excitable young ladies and cold, hard credits. He worked with Kerneval to arrange a party for as many of the station staff and planetside-workers as could attend, and got the Exe kingpin to help him distribute these delights amongst the attendees, with a substantial take going to Kerneval himself. By the end of the week, Exe was a haven for Drinaxian ships, which would ask no questions about their activities and look the other way if illegality seemed to be involved. With this, Exe moved from Friendly to Haven status.
After this, the repaired Size Isn’t Everything – previously Hroal’s Meatgrinder – left for Drinax via Acrid and Orpheus at Jump 3, while the Mercifuge, Recent Convert and Never Talk To Strangers made directly for Drinax at Jump 2, meaning they arrived within a day of each other, assembled with the Phlebotomist andf the Grey Area from Acrid, and docked as a fleet at Drinax.
275-1107 – Drinax Palace
The six ships of the Drinaxian privateers’ fleet – together massing some two and a half thousand tons – docked at the Royal Highport and the Travellers were invited to a royal audience in Oleb’s private chambers, away from Thao Polloc, the Imperium diplomat. They had had the replicators on the Recent Convert make three, iron-bound caskets and had had it use the rhodium to make coins, which literally overflowed when Oleb’s share was presented to him. All his gathering complaints about a lack of piracy were, temporarily at least, put to the back of the King’s mind as his cupidinous instincts came to the fore.
Next, the players inspected the spacers, Thornback troopers and Vespexer soldiers that Tug Wilson had been recruiting [using the recruiting rules from the Mercenary set] over the past eight months. This gave them sufficient crew for all of their ships, although the crew of the Size Isn’t Everything would still be stretched.
277-1107 – Drinax Floating Palace
Next came the conference of the Privy Council for which Oleb had summoned them. The time had come to lay down the negotiating positions which the Kingdom would take with Clarke and any further additions. Acrid had been done somewhat ultra vires, and this could not happen again: after all, it was packed with revolutionary communists and lacked any hunting whtsoever (Oleb did ask to clarify the latter matter once more at this point).
277-1107 – Initial Positions
Oleb, Harrik and Rao each laid out their positions on government, the use of force and technology policy.
Oleb: centralised monarchy; mutual defence pacts but ongoing state-sponsored piracy; no technology transfer at all to member worlds.
Rao: feudalism; a crackdown on piracy and centralised naval power; limited technology transfer through investment and training individuals.
Harrick: a decentralised council of equals; a crackdown on piracy and centralised naval power; broader technology transfer.
Also present were Lady Hil, Scholar Voha and Admiral Wrax.
That evening, the party decided on their own preferred approaches. As so often, they were broadly aligned with Princess Rao, albeit more aggressive in attempting to raise the technological levels of Kingdom worlds.
Party: feudalism; a crackdown on piracy and centralised naval power; broader technology transfer.
278-1107 – Government
Timaeus opened the discussion by attempting to sway Oleb to delegate some of the government of the wider kingdom to feudal lords. In this, he was perhaps motivated by his own designs on Torpol. He succeeded here, primarily by deploying the argument that less time spent on the financial and administrative details of running an empire would mean more time for hunting.
Harrik was initially unpersuaded by Eric’s arguments on the need for strong government in the chaotic Reach, but Penelope partially persuaded him with an argument on the need for administrative efficiency and coordination, while Deanna talked about the need for protection for those who placed their trust in Drinax, particularly for protection from Ihatei.
Rao needed no persuasion.
With a consensus for feudalism, Lady Hil was extremely pleased with the party.
279-1107 – Security
Only Oleb needed persuasion, here, in what was the easiest day of the Privy Council meeting.
Timaeus took the lead, appealing to Oleb’s humour regarding his love of a strong navy, of which he was unusually self-aware. Oleb was reluctant to give up entirely on the plunder that piracy brought, but was won over by the promise of tariffs and taxes, instead.
Admiral Wrax had hoped for the most extreme size of armed forces – and particularly navy – but was still fairly pleased with the party’s achievement, here, and his opinion of them improved as a result.
280-1107 – Technology
On the sharing of technology, the party found themselves in alignment with Prince Harrik, but had work to do with Rao, who felt their approach was too liberal, and Oleb, who strongly opposed such “damned liberalism, giving the means of our destruction to the foul communists you’ve brought into the Kingdom’s bosom”.
Eric spent time with Rao, persuading her that, while chosen individuals and specific concerns would see investment and uplift, Drinax itself would retain the edge required to impose and assert her will.
Oleb required more work. First, Deanna pointed out that greater technological knowledge across the kingdom would increase the ability of the Kingdom to raise more money through taxes, choosing to point out that Hive Queen droids (with which Oleb is borderline obsessed) are expensive things that require technological support.
Next, Timaeus and Eric worked together [skill chaining] to persuade Oleb that with greater technological advances would come a more advanced and puissant Drinaxian navy. Oleb, suddenly seeing a fleet of Harriers imposing his will across the starlanes, yielded.
At the end of the day, Scholar Voha was delighted with an outcome that would lead to greater investment in science and learning, but with the Scholar’s Tower still at the heart of the Kingdom’s research.
298-1107 – Clarke
With this, the Diplomatic party headed to Clarke to smooth troubled waters with the Shield Church of Neumann and to negotiate the Treaty of Accession with Clarke.
Word arrived with the party from Kteiroa, from where Sum-Of-All-Hopes asked them to arrange for the transport of Prince Hteilotorl’s companions from The World, and for the rescue from bonded servitude of the surviving soldiers taken prisoner after his first attempt to seize land on Arunisiir. Arunisiir had no prison system worth speaking of, and the captured Ihatei companions of Hteilotorl were punished by sentences of years of servicec to Arunisiir landowners.
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