After breaking out the orders from Rachel Starrunner, Wrasp assembles his command team to his office to discuss the mission.
Unsien Mos (Break Out) is a better pilot than Celeste and he will be flying left seat from here on out with Celeste (Duster) flying as the co-pilot. The Lucinda is a big ship and flying her solo is not an option. Both Break Out and Duster are both bona fide members of the Rebel Alliance so both make natural choices for the Command Team.
Fiaye K’faiya (Boomer) will remain an engineer and will supervise the Lucinda in that role. She is eager to get at the job as this bucket of bolts needs a lot of work. Boomer will also request Duster’s help as an assistant engineer, as needed. No issues there. And for as long as she’s been operating on DC-01 Boomer’s inclusion on the Command Team makes sense too.
Lastly, Marhan Gadhan (Stitches) is invited in. She’s been with the Rebel Alliance for quite some time as a medic and she joined the Rebellion shortly after Mandalore joined the Empire. Stitches looks like she has the needed skills to be a capable combat medic.
Also, Break Out and Stitches were assigned to this team for the same reason that the rest of the command team were. All are force sensitive and were being trained by Yoda.
First, there is an intelligence lead for the team to check out on Bothawui (R14) so that will be their next destination.
Everything appears normal on Bothawui and Slider is able to make contact with his network. His team lets him know that the Givin on Yag Dhul have been contracted for a massive construction project and that a test project was placed in one of the Lagrange Points for Yag Dhul.
Wrasp is contacted by Soshu the Hutt and informed that she has discovered that the Empire is marshalling a fleet at the nearby system of Nexus Ortai (Q14).
With those tid-bits, the team picks up a cargo of luxury food, based on some research on what imports would be appropriate for delivery to Nexus Ortai.
The team arrives at Nexus Ortai and observes three Imperial Star Destroyers with two Vindicator Star Destroyers. There are scores of TIE Fighters conducting maneuvers, and most of those are TIE Bombers. The team also observe some of the newer TIE Interceptors.
After delivering the Food, the team heads back to Iseno (N13) in order to rendesvoux with Celeste.
After the rendesvoux, Wrasp lets the team know that their next destination will be Wroona (L15).
Celeste points out that she’s been approached often by star port cargo personnel asking about their destination. Iseno is an industrial world and has a great deal of product to ship off world. Celeste has been to Wroona, and knows that it’s a major importer of finished goods. There’s a good chance that they could pick up a cargo and even passengers, but at standard shipping rates. Good, but not as good as shipping adventure.
Since the ship’s purse is perilously low, he agrees to having a cargo and passengers secured for the trip.
And as the group will continue to use the cover of being a cargo crew, having cargo to process and transfer about will help them keep their cover story.
And so begins Mission 22: “Unwilling Greeting.”
Celeste and Aliz contact a cargo broker and secure a big shipment of cargo and book passage for a platoon of Imperial Troopers.
The new crew seem to integrate well enough as they work on loading the Lucinda. Hammer’s gregarious and natural leadership stands out and he quickly moves into a position of acting as an advocate for the four gunners.
But one of the benefits of hiring NPC’s is so that they can take care of mundane issues “off screen.”
The trip to Wroona takes a bit of time and Wrasp asks why the relatively short journey is taking much longer than expected.
Boomer, Break Out, and Celeste explain that this ship has a Class 3 hyperdrive. The ships that he was used to flying in previously both had Class 0.5 hyperdrives meaning that those smaller ships traveled 6 times faster through hyperspace.
Wrasp asks Boomer to figure out how to get this ship to move faster. The answer is going to be money and downtime to install upgraded drives. But first, they’ll need to secure the upgraded hyperdrive components. For a C-ROC those are rare.
GM’s Answer: “No you can’t install or upgrade hyperdrives while traveling. Especially while traveling through hyperspace!”
Just before landing, Wrasp gathers his four new gunners for a quite conversation.
He asks if the guys have blaster pistols and none of them do. Wrasp suggests that they make that kind of purchase as this ship goes places where blaster pistols come in handy, from time to time.
Hammer: “With what money?”
Good question, but Wrasp doesn’t have a ready answer. The pay rate that he’s contracted these four at doesn’t allow them to purchase that kind of hardware just yet. But that topic is shelved for the moment.
Wrasp then asks the four for their general opinion of the Empire and the Rebel Alliance.
All four indicate that they favor the Empire. They all just graduated the Imperial Academy and are familiar with the evils of the Rebels. If they can have a chance at fighting Rebels while on this crew, all the better!
Wrasp informs the four that this ship is actually operating under the auspices of the Rebellion and that they have effectively joined the Rebellion!
While three of the new gunners go quite, Andy freaks out! He promises to notify the Empire as soon as they make it to Wroona and he’ll see to it personally that Wrasp and his crew are rounded up!
Wrasp retorts to Andy, that the Empire is just as likely to kill Andy for his affiliation as they are to help the kid.
Andy does not relent and Wrasp is forced to stun him with his blaster.
Hammer jumps in and offers to take care of Andy, but Wrasp indicates that his crew has dealt with this issue in the past. And besides, this kind of work is above Hammer’s pay grade.
The other three are sufficiently cowed and are dismissed by Wrasp.
Wrasp calls Drips down and has Andy heavily sedated. Drips is only too happy to oblige.
On arrival, the NPC’s take care of offloading the passengers and cargo and getting that delivered to the appropriate holding stations.
Slider dumps Andy’s body in some dark corner of the star port and Wrasp contacts the ISB and informs them that he found a rebel agent on his crew who should be detained and questioned at the earliest convenience! Andy is turned into a suspect.
The DC-01 members head over to meet up with their rebel contact Zhwaz Brei (a Gran) working for the entertainment vendor Djaric Distribution of Wroona.
The team catch up with Zhwaz, who is happy to get updated on the team. Wrasp is eager to show off his new ship, and Zhwaz offers to have two brand new state of the art Djaric tables installed in the Lucinda at no cost. Anything for a friend. Wrasp readily accepts.
Once alone and in a secure environment, Zhwaz informs Wrasp that his network has developed a new lead, but Zhwaz is leery to approach this new contact as they are a high ranking Imperial Officer. While Zhwaz is pretty certain that the Empire hasn’t figured out who he is yet, the ISB have a lot of officers working on Wroona.
Zhwaz was hoping with DC-01’s “luck,” that they are able to check out this contact and evaluate whether or not this is an Imperial Security Bureau (ISB) trap.
Wrasp’s team is provided basic information about the new contact, Major Skyali Pargam and she is known to work at the local Imperial Logistics office. Wrasp is given a contact protocol that will identify him as a Rebel agent to Pargam.
Wrasp figures that the most direct path is best and heads straight to the Imperial Logistics Office.
His team of specialists are stopped by the troopers at the front door and they’re not eager to let five alien (non-human) strangers wander about the facility.
Wrasp lets the guards know that he’s an old friend of Major Pargam and would like to meet with her.
A message is passed on and Pargam meets with the Kel Dor briefly. When Wrasp presents her with the communication protocol, Skyali indicates that she isn’t in a position to entertain a personal visit while on duty. Skyali invites Pa Pooga to visit her later at her home that evening.
Skyali signals for Pooga to keep his mouth shut and escorts him from the building.
Later that evening, the five team members head out to meet with Skyali, while Hammer gathers the rest of the crew to head out for a night on the town.
The meeting with Skyali goes much more smoothly later that evening.
Skyali Pargam is a logistics officer and has grown concerned at the actions of the Empire and believes that the Alliance needs to defeat the Empire.
As a logistician she has noticed that there has been a pretty dramatic shift in shipments, noticeably in basic star ship components and raw materials that are being channeled into the Vandelhelm (M15) system. This is highly suspicious because Vandelhelm almost exclusively produces raw and refined metals. It doesn’t make sense to ship these cargos to Vandelhelm.
Also the raw materials that are normally exported from Vandelhelm are no longer being sent to their core world clients!
Skyali has also learned that the Empire contracted with either of Yag’Dhul’s major engineering consortiums ZDX ZDX or “Gigantic Mega Engineering Corporation” GME Corp on a massive “test project” to be completed at one of the Lagrange points off the orbit of Yag’Dhul.
Pargam is fearful of what the Empire is up to especially after the destruction of Alderan.
Additionally, Pargam is willing to secure an appropriate cargo from Wroona to Yag’Dhul (L14), if Wrasp hasn’t set one up yet.
Plus she can encode the Imperial Transportation database to recognize the Lucinda as a trusted shipper. With that credential, Wrasp should be able to contact a Captain Kavor Needa on Yag’Dhul to acquire a follow on shipment, as needed. However, Needa is not a rebel agent!
The project that Skyali has concerned is under the direction of a Director Zelnik.
But there’s more! Skyali let’s Wrasp know that Colonel Garth Drillhammer with the ISB has the Lucinda on a special watchlist and Skyali Pargam has learned that there is a ISB agent on the Lucinda!
Wrasp assures Major Pargam that he’s already dealt with the agent.
Lastly, Major Pargam let’s Wrasp know that the Empire is planning to deploy a task force to Mechis in order to handle a “Rebellion Issue” at that system. Pargam recommends that Wrasp inform his superiors of this situation.
GM’s Note: Wrasp completely forgets about the Mechis issue which will have deletarious consequenses for Mission 33.
The NPC’s secure the cargo provided by Major Pargam without incident.
It’s a bizarre world, but has busy traffic. First, Unsien Mos (Break Out) and Cop’ruchi (Ghost) check the lagrange points for Yag’Dhul but find that there isn’t anything at either Lagrange point.
Space traffic is pretty heavy for Yag’Dhul, but it’s nothing like any of the major core worlds (from Mos’ perspective). The other odd thing that Usien Mos observes on the trip down to the surface, is that the atmosphere is oblong with portions of the planet being exposed to space.
Their business is in the capital so their trip takes them to Dodecapolis a tall towering spire that reaches impossibly high straight up from the surface of Yag’Dhul Prime.
The spire has several landing bays and Mos delivers the Lucinda perfectly.
As the crew departs the Lucinda they notice that Aliz is talking with a human male, flanked by two large industrial load lifters. In passing they learn that the guy is responsible for unloading cargo for that bay and is proactively working with Aliz to get her cargo unloaded.
That’s a noteworthly difference from most starports and Fiaye K’faiya (Boomer) is intrigued by the droids and the detours to check them out. They’re pretty unremarkable class five droids, but all of the cargo handling on Dodecapolis is performed by droids. This frees up the crew of the Lucinda who have previously been responsible for operating load lifters themselves to unload the cargo.
Free time! Most of the crew take off for shore leave.
Meanwhile, Pa Pooga (Wrasp), Fiaye (Boomer), Unsien (Break Out), Marhan Gadhan (Stitches), and Josus Laorl (Slider) head to the upper levels of Dodecapolis to check out the two top Engineering firms ZDX ZDX and GME Corp GME Corp.
The five learn that the Given are pretty grotesque looking species of humanoids that look ghastly. They’ve developed a bony exoskeleton lending to a skeletal or zombie like appearance.
Even more disturbing is their penchant for starting conversations with a math question. And not your easy “What’s two plus two” type of question.
Wrasp gets quickly impatient with the math questions and rebuffs the various Given for asking these questions. (A bit of a social faux pas, here on Given, but this Kel’Dor is obviously not from around here so he’s obviously not as intelligent as the local Given).
Math questions aside, the representatives at ZDX are open about the fact that they don’t have any contracts with the Empire and that they exclusively work on commercial orbital space stations. They stay quite busy as they serve a galaxy wide clientel.
When the team steps into the offices of GME Corp GME Corp (and after dropping the ball on the math question) the managers at GME report to Wrasp that they aren’t willing to comment on their clients or clientelle work.
However their lobby has a number of models of some of their more impressive projects that they’ve worked on in the past, if Wrasp and his party would be interested in a similar project GME Certainly has the capabilities to perform any engineering feat, as they are the premier engineering firm in the galaxy.
Wrasp makes his excuses and departs (with his team).
And they they plan to return that evening and to slice into GME Corp’s GME Corp’s computers that evening!
The B&E job is quiet enough, between Slider’s skills and Boomer’s ability to extract data from computers.
The team easily confirms that GME is working on a project for the Empire and get the schematics for a 2 kilometer long strut. Based on some reverse engineering, the crew figure out that these struts would be best implemented for a spherical object.
A very big spherical object.
Included in the engineering project is the equipment needed not only to manufacture these struts, but then to transport them to another site via hyperspace travel.
This Given project was ordered and supervised by Director Zelnik.
The team gets a copy of the relevant data and escape the offices of GME GME Corp without being discovered.
The next morning, Wrasp stops by the local Imperial Logistics office and asks to meet with Director Zelnik. He is informed that Director Zelnik has departed Yag’Dhul and is likely on Vandelhelm.
No problem! Wrasp happens to have a cargo ship and is willing to head to Vandelhelm. Could the logistics office supply him with a contracted cargo?
And while checking out the ship, Celeste discovers that the Lucinda came with smuggling compartments. She quietly points this out to Boomer (Faiye K’faiya) and the two share this detail with the Captain. The smuggling compartments are capable of holding up to 100 EC of cargo.
After the cargo is delivered and loaded up the crew heads out to . . .
Shortly after landing Wrasp asks about securing an appointment with Director Zelnik. The Imperial admin team recognize the name of the Director and inform Wrasp that with his clearance, that not only should he plan his next trip to Nkllon (L16), but since he’s headed that way, is he willing to take on a high priority cargo headed to Nkllon.
It all sounds like seredipity for Wrasp and he readily agrees. The logistics agent then asks Wrasp how many passengers his ship is rated for. Twenty? Great! The logistics team will have the cargo and passengers, plus two “super cargo” delivered the next morning.
This all seems so convenient for Wrasp and notifies his crew that they only have one night of leave and that they should be prepared to load the Lucinda up first thing in the morning.
The next morning, the loading of the cargo proceeds easily enough with bulk cargo being loaded first, but at about noon, things change quite a bit when seventeen cages each holding a Wookiee are delivered. Their supercargo are two Stormtroopers.
They ask for the Captain and introduce themselves to Pa Pooga.
The lead Trooper introduces himself as Sergeant Rodnvic Chapdimm and his assistant is Corporal Kervick.
Sgt Rodnvic notices the crew of the Lucinda go pale at the sight of the caged Wookiees and tries to reasure Captain Pooga that he and the Corporal are quite well trained in handling Wookies and that his crew will be quite safe with the two specialists on board.
Sgt Rodnvic: “Just don’t get within arms reach of the cages. The Wookiees have surprisingly long arms and this batch isn’t quite domesticated yet.”
Most of the crew nod and stay well away from the cages. The seventeen Wookiees are a mixture of angry and forlore pathetic.
Fiaye grabs Pa Pooga and insists that the two need to have a talk in his office!
Wrasp asks Aliz to show the two troopers to their cabins . . . in the back of the ship!
The player characters head up to the Captain’s cabin for a quick discussion.
Boomer: “We’re shipping Wookiee slaves? How could you agree to that?”
Wrasp: “I didn’t know! They didn’t tell me there were Wookiee slaves. They told me we were shipping ‘passengers!’”
Boomer insists that they can’t deliver the Wookiees and insists that they free the slaves.
But there’s the logistical problems that they are on an Imperial stronghold and delivering their cargo to Nkllon to another Imperial stronghold!
Boomer insists.
The command crew decide to make their move once they take off and decide to take out the two Stormtroopers once they take off from Vandelhelm.
After that they’ll liberate the Wookiees and transfer them into the actual passenger cabins.
Boomer will need to alter the shipping manifest before they arrive at Nkllon, but as slow as the Lucinda travels, she should have plenty of time to make the needed alterations.
The plan sounds good and everyone breaks to prepare for combat.
The Lucinda gets clearance to take off and once Break Out initiates the jump to Nkllon, the command crew make their move.
Sgt Chapdimm and Cpl Kervick are down in the hold, still settling the Wookiees in and are preparing to feed the Wookiees, when the various crew members begin to attack the two Stormtroopers.
However, the Stormtroopers aren’t happy to be attacked and their armor protects them sufficiently from the initial salvos, that the two troopers are able to fight back!
A couple of Wrasp’s crew are taken out of action!
But the two troopers are outnumbered and eventually are both taken down.
Drips is enthusiastic at the opportunity to treat wounded on the Lucinda once the firefight is concluded, and reports to Wrasp that this incident will help increase the “Casualty to Mass” ratio back toward the norm for most Gozzanti cargo ships.
The two troopers are spaced and Wrasp then turns to the task of molifying the Wookies and his crew (who are bewildered that a firefight broke out in the cargo hold).
Wrasp (to the Wookiees): “I’m going to let you out of your cages. Please don’t kill me?”
Lead Wookiee: {Angry Roar}
Wrasp: “That doesn’t sound like a yes . . .”
Still in shock, the crew is ordered to help navigate the freed Wookiees to the passenger berths and then to break down and discard the cages.
The Wookiees, once they understand what’s going on, aclimate well with their freedom and settle into their berths easily enough. When given the option to join the Rebellion, all of the Wookiees agree, as they won’t be able to return home and the Rebellion will give them the best opportunity to liberate Kashyyyk (P09).
The Wookies learn that the Lucinda is on a Rebel mission deep inside Imperial space and promise to stay out of sight while they are in the Nkllon system.
The rest of the trip is busy as the various crew prepare the cargo for delivery sans Wookiees.
The Lucinda emerges from hyperspace and after taking a reading of the various nav beacons, Ghost (Cop’ruchi) locates the Vindicator Class Destroyer Lacerator.
After a quick conversation with the system control officers on the Lacerator, Cop reports that they are expected and directed to a waypoint closer in system.
The Lacerator is located closer to the outer ort belts of the Nkllon system and is clearly there to guard a facility know as “The Wedge” a massive deep space construction facility (with an obvious wedge shape).
Ghost also reports the presence of an Action IV cargo cruiser, the Determined Dewback.
With their orders from the Lacerator, Break Out follows the course down the well toward the Primary.
The single world orbiting the Primary is actually located close enough to the star that the radiation envelopes the primary, making it impossible for a starship to get to the sun blasted world!
Enroute, the Lucinda makes contact with a ship called The Guardian, which emerges from the worst of the radiation belt.
The Guardian is a purpose built ship, with a massive ray shielding array that allows it to escort visiting ships to the sole world. As long as the escorted ship doesn’t stray from it’s protecive shadow.
The two ships coordinate their course and descend the well until they arrive to the planet.
Once in the shadow of Nkllon One, it is safe for the Lucinda to emerge from the protection of The Guardian and to make an abreviated descent to the sun blasted surface.
The Guardian assures Break Out that they’ll stay in orbit above Nkllon and will still be there once they deliver their cargo.
Proceedurally, The Guardian hands the Lucinda over to the Crawler’s flight control.
The decent is not a routine course, as it’s deadly for the ship to make a standard orbital descent around the world as any exposure to the deadly rays of Nkllon prime would melt the Gozanti C-ROC to slag in moments.
The Crawler is a massive construct atop a tracked chassis. The crew figure out pretty quickly that this Crawler maintains a constant westward trip to stay well away from either the dawn or dusk of Nkllon.
Another minor issue is that the landing pad for the Crawler isn’t designed for a ship as large as the Lucinda. Break Out figures out how to land on the Crawler, but much of the Gozanti will be hanging over the edge of the Crawler.
As the crew disembark their ship and enter the Crawler, they are greeted by a young wintry human woman introducing herself as Nova Zinn.
Zinn invites the crew of the Lucinda to house themselves in the “Luxury Suites” (guest quarters) on the Crawler while the cargo is unloaded. Because the Lucinda will need to transfer the cargo slowly through airlocks, unloading and loading the Gozzanti will take much longer than usual.
Nova Zinn coordinates with Aliz for the rest of the logistical issues with loading and unloading of the cargo, which involves most of the NPC’s. (Aliz gets to explain why the replacement Wookiees weren’t delivered, and she does a sufficiently good job that the issue is dropped).
The PC’s are then introduced to Jeeters Kimbly, the Crawler’s sole cook.
Jeeters is a gregarious chef and is dressed like a professional show chef, one might find in an upper class establishment.
Jeeters informs his new “guests” that he only prepares two meals per day and if they don’t show up on time they don’t eat. Breakfast is ussually custom omlets and dinner is ussualy Bantha steaks.
The Human crew on the Crawler is tiny and they are content to let the members of the Lucinda explore to their hearts content. Just don’t walk out an airlock. Everything outside the Crawler is fatal.
Boomer, feigning bordom, asks Nova Zinn if the Crawler could use an extra maintenace hand and offers to help out.
Zinn checks with the Operations manager and Boomer is assigned to the “Delta” repair team, where her mechanical skills are indeed highly appreciated.
Over the next couple of days, Boomer learns that the maintenance work on the Crawler is easy enough but nearly unending. The Crawler needs to stay in motion almost always. (They can stop the Crawler occasionally, but a stop longer than a day or so could be fatal).
Boomer also learns that the Crawler sends out mining trucks, piloted by Wookiees, which return. She asks if the Wookiees try to leave permanently, but is assured that the only time the Wookiees don’t return to the Crawler is when one of the trucks has a break down.
Wrasp and a couple of the other crew are able to make their way down to the Wookiee quarters. At first the Wookiees are upset at the interuption, but warm up quickly enough, once Wrasp convinces the Wookiee that he and his crew are friends.
Turns out that the Wookiees are fairly well treated and well fed. In spite of the fact that the Wookiees are trapped in a metal cave, they have set up a series of warrens with comfortable furs and Wookiee furnishings in their area.
Wrasp gets a census of the Wookiees and determines that there are way more Wookiees on the Crawler than he can safely ship out on the Lucinda.
Wrasp lets the Wookiees know that he hopes to rescue them later and asks that they prepare for a future departure.
Days later the Lucinda is loaded up with metal ores and escorted safely away from the Nkllon primary.
Once clear, Wrasp orders the Lucinda to leave the Nkllon system and to return to base at Innton (M18) with all due haste.