Chapter One: The Two Old Birds and a Final Wish.

Whulpul. The unthought about back water that breeds only criminals and hack scientists. But in the minds of it's residents, they scrape by with hard work, the occasional discovery and a hope and dream that one day, they will be comfortably rich.

On one side of the ocean Li was paid to help try to figure out the best way to interact peacefully with the tree dwellers in the thick forest. They weren't aggressive, but they also weren't quick to interact at all. Given a week off, Li returned to the THE HUB for some down time.

Veya was on the run again from her good friends in the Undersea Settlement 2C. She had taken on a job in their engineering squad but apparently some her more colourful behaviour was not "professional" enough, so she decided to head back to THE HUB to see if she could land a co pilot job to get her off world finally. She had finally saved up enough to maybe bribe her way on in "borrowed" artefacts.

And after a busy season Bowie Nye had been given a few days off from her canteen at THE HUBs support settlement and she was quickly drawn to the hall of trading. To watch all the different traders come in and barter or deliver.

All three characters find themselves in the same corner in the giant hall of trading. The hall is surrounded by different sized shipping containers. Some of them are there permanently, used as storage both temporary and long term. Some are shop fronts dealing in local produce and trading for off world treasures. Three of the bigger containers serve as the customs office. At this time of day there is a line of 12 different groups waiting to be allowed to trade for the day, or stay for weeks.

In the corner where the three characters sit, are 35 tables sat at by a collection of students, pilots and workers involved in a myriad of activity. Eating, studying, planning, laughing and some sleeping. People come from far and wide like a sports final to watch the carnival of happenings. Others come for work or as their only meal of the day. The hall of traders acts as an off world trading hub and a local gathering point.

The three characters sit and watch and see and think.

The sounds, the sights, the smells of the trading hall continue around them. The tall slender Esherukas are seldom seen outside of their ocean deep kingdom, but these must be the trader emissaries seen in the trading halls every three months. Their visits are always very busy so they can return home as quickly as possible. Their out of water conversations are always visually entertaining for the land dwellers, only two of them have learned to to be interpreters to the outer world.

Old Junker has been a mainstay in the area both as a public secret black market first port of call and also as a passionate negotiator. The three main staff never want to sell at the first mentioned price. They find trading to be more an entertaining game than putting food on the table.

Bowie glances at the shady business man a few more times and sees some oddly shaped packages exchange hands.

Veyas regular look out gives her the nod of all clear - communicating that her attempts and keeping a low profile are somehow working and there is no one in the area that will be asking after her.

And as the traders and travelers and tourists continue to mill around the table, the three continue a conversation.

As she shoveled noodles into her mouth, Veya felt the weight of the letter in her shirt pocket. Maybe these would be the people to get off world with her and finally get a chance to make it big.

Bowie's last glance at the businessman confirmed that his shadiness had grabbed the attention of more of the customs agents than would normally be needed. He had placed the suitcase down on the ground and was looking in his pockets for paperwork maybe.

Whatever the business man had been hoping, was not going to plan. After more customs agents were alerted and the papers he was looking for were not presented, some yelling had begun. "Look, I just need to get off world. I had my papers but someone must have stolen them. You need to find the thief. Why am I being treated like I am guilty? I haven't done anything." AS he yelled he began gesturing wildly. Pointing, holding his arms out like he was appealing to some crowd, scratching his neck a little. And then suddenly he ran for the gates.

Without realising, during the dramatic scene unfolding a non-descript man with dark goggles had walked up to the group and nodded. "Veya, you got the letter. Is this your crew? Maybe we should get going whilst the the gates are dealing with that"
He points to the businessman who was now swinging his fists at one of the agents as if he never been in a fight.

The dark goggle man motioned for them all to follow.

"Yeah, yeah, we're all good," Veya said to the man in the goggles, swallowing the last of the brew and noodles. "And, yes these guys are totally my crew."

She turns her back to the man and makes a desperate plea with her eyes to to Play along!

"Like family! This is Li and Bowie. Solid, Two of the best. They're coming"

She turns back to face him. "Lead the way! So you're from Dec? Do we have to worry about trouble getting to him?"

Dec was her cousin, the author of the mysterious letter.

Mr Goggles nodded, looked around to understand more of the situation and motioned to follow. The suitcase man was now on the ground being held by multiple agents, a nearby agent seemed to be having a heart attack nearby and smoke was coming off their uniform. Mr Goggles quickly walked in a wide circle around the pile on, slipped through one of the unmanned side gates a broke into a light jog until they were around a corner and into one of the giant hangers.

To the left and right sit 16 large and small ships of different shapes and clearly different purpose. Some giant mining ships for shuttling back and forth between different asteroids. Some people ships, - the cruise liner of the sky and the transport between worlds. And then further down the line the traders and the fighter ships. Turning to them and slowing them all up to a stand Mr Goggles sees that some of the party have never been here before.

Quite a sight isn't it? We should be fine with the guards from now so we can walk the rest of the way. Veya filled you all in? Ready for a very questionable adventure?

Mr Goggles nodded "That's fair. The letter was quite light on details for a reason. We will have a meeting on the ship in about an hour if you need to get anything before then, we should be on ship all night just to avoid any over flow from whatever that was"
He pointed back to the gates. And then if you agree to take this on, you'll be away in less than 24 hours.

As he walked along speaking the surrounding ships we covered in different people and machines, refueling, fixing, painting, loading. On either sides of the giant hanger were shops and suppliers, trucks and trailers and storage depots.
Mr Goggles stopped pointing at a medium sized dark blue ship 100 metres away. That one might be your future ship. We will meet there in an hour, I just need to get some more stuff ready. Keep your heads down enough not to be noticed but.... get anything you need. Theres a giant clock up there if you need it. He pointed to an oddly designed analogue clock. Not a style that is used often. And walked away.

As you all returned to the ship, you were met by Mr Goggles who motions you all on to the ship. Climbing the ramp you realise very quickly that most of this ship was the shuttle hanger and storage. It definitely isn't a new ship. but it seems to be a very well maintained ship. Entering and turning a sharp left, Mr Goggles starts an impromptu tour.

I'll take you straight to the flight deck and we will get down to business, but to your left are most of the cabins, the kitchen and the workshop. Upstairs is the shuttle controls and extra storage.

After continuing up a good sized corridor you enter a large room with an even larger window that is half screen half actual window, able to see all of the other crafts in front of the ship. Sitting in different chairs are two other men in black non-uniforms and a woman dressed in a power suit.

Please sit. Mr Goggles says motioning to a temporary looking bench seat in front of desk showing a hologram of the ship itself.

Quick introductions for those I am not related to, my name is Tristan but everyone calls me Mr Goggles, the two in black are two of my associates, they would prefer you not know their names and this is a lawyer I have recently met called Ms Noname. Apparently that is her legal name and not some hilarious joke. She doesn't seem to be much of a joker. What I am offering you Veya and by extension the rest of you cannot leave this room. If you accept, my associates and I will leave and you will complete the task and be paid quite handsomely and be set for life as traders and deliverers. If you refuse, then you will be legally required to not speak of this offer to anyone, especially not my name or who I am associated with, due to it's sensitive nature. So I will need you to sign these contracts before I go on. Does everyone agree to sign, and do you have any questions before I go on?

He hands out pieces of paper with simple language binding the signed to a non disclosure agreement linked to the larger trades unions of this trigant (a measurement of space).

As Mr Goggles watches the signing and the pen sharing and the ship nerding out he offhandedly says "Oh yeah, the... skiff? as you call it, it is the newest part of ship. They upgraded it after the...."

And then he caught himself about to go into story mode. He clearly wants to spill the beans on everything but is trying to be above board. Waiting until the last signature is placed, Ms Noname also seems impatient. But she seems more impatient to get off the ship and return to her boring office back on world.

Excellent Mister Goggles says whilst picking up the signed paper and handing it to the lawyer. After checking it and putting it in her bag, she nods to everyone officially, places a business card on the table in the middle and leaves.

"I have never liked lawyers but, they serve a purpose I guess" Mr Goggles sits at the table in the middle of the three newcomers to the ship and takes a breath.

I will take questions at the end but for now I will tell you what I know and what I need from you. Veya is my cousin. We aren't the closest family due to my mothers.... career, but, we had an ok childhood. My mother trusted her most of all the cousins because Veya always had..... her own way. My mother has been sick for a while, and as stubborn as she is, she refused to slow down and listen to any doctors so she has worked herself further into sickness. One of the reasons she did this is because she was about to hit a pay load like she never thought possible. For a long time now, there have been three major scientific schools of thought when it comes to limb regrowth. One - the robotic"

Mr Goggles motioned for one of his associates in the back who un-sleeved his left arm to show a very rough robotic hand.

"Robotic was never beautiful, but it was strong. Then you had plastics, which were beautiful but not strong, and sometimes made the lost limb rot. And the last was organic. To regrow the arm using plants or other meat based forms. The main genius in that school was a man they called the butcher. As he built his own space station offworld to experiment to his hearts content. For some reason.... well... because of money, my mother started a trade relationship with the butcher, providing him with such stuff that I asked her to stop telling me, but it was lucrative. So lucrative that the butcher began to trust her with more than just trade. She found out how far along his research was going, and just as she started getting sick, rumours started that his ship has been raided. So no longer received orders and with sickness on the horizon she had other things to do. But one of her last trips, she went past to see if she could tell what had happened. She reports that it was clear that their was a lot less life on that space station and some suspicious debris outside. And thus, our business proposal.

My mother wants an almost untraceable team, to fly out there and check. Anything. If the butcher is still alive, reconnect a trade agreement. If the butcher is not alive, find out why and find out where his research is up to. She has a few ideas of where he could hide it if he was getting raided and if his research is still on the ship, she knows who to sell it to to make enough money to retire everyone involved instantly.

You are that untraceable team. I understand how under the radar Veya lives her life on official channels. And if she has chosen you two, probably similar. The deal is. You take my mothers ship. Do some recon, bring back either information, research, a trade deal or a mix of all three. And you walk away with my mothers ship and 20% of whatever you find there.

We think this is a good deal as my family has set up the trade lines to make this possible, but you are risking the mystery of what happened so you deserve a large chunk. I also understand that Veya would kill to be given a working ship.

The last part of all of this is sad. My mother died last week. This was her dying wish, to assist the butcher further or to make sure his life's work goes somewhere. She didn't really care about the money, but she cared enough about our family that she wanted to set us up well.

So... are you interested, any questions?

Mr Goggles quietly nods at Li, points at Veya with two index fingers and yes "Exactly"

And turns to Bowie thoughtfully and puts one hand on his face to tap his nose thoughtfully.

"You ask very good questions which makes me think you have a quick mind that has thought of many things you aren't asking about. But I will answer the things you did ask about. Mother thought about what happens if the Butcher is still alive and left you these."

Motioning to one of his henchmen he collected a package of what looked like papers.

"Look through these. If you need to use some to convince him that mother sent you please do. It's trade records and love letters. The raid, was most likely a disgruntled assistant trying for a power grab or just straight up revenge. He had many assistants throughout the time and wasn't known to make a lot of friends. As far as I know, no local governments know of the extent of his research. He was officially a lecturer at a modular university. 20% means whatever profit we collectively make from any of the research taken off that ship. If you find a gold pocket watch or find someone to buy the entire station, that's yours to keep."

He laughed a little to himself. "Untraceable does mean expendable. But, you are free to go if you do not want this. We have a few back up plans but mother wanted to keep it in the family. And I can't be tied to this at all."

If you need a moment alone to talk it through we can go upstairs for a moment.

The business card has her contact details on it, an office number etc. Bowie recognises the offices to be a part of the more successful lawyer type businesses on the planet.

The papers in a quick look range from what looks like emails, to health report records, to some diagrams of plants and limbs, and receipts. Like tax invoices.

Mr Goggles smiles and nods.

"That is a great observation and also shows that my cousin has been on certain ships, and not on others. This is indeed what we call the bridge. As it is not just a cockpit but also a ship management area and meeting point. This isn't the largest ship around, but it is bigger than others.

He quickly sketches the ship.

This is a really rough drawing of the ship. You will explore it at your leisure and there are better maps in the system and downstairs. And you can of course change things around if you need to after it is yours. But the basics are these.

F - is the fuel. This will keep you in the air for some time but don't push it.
1 - The engine room.
2 - The cargo area with your extra smaller ship.
3 - Bunks enough for 4 comfortably and 8 uncomfortably. You can also use one of the bunk areas as a prison if you need to. Its reinforced as mother needed it a few times.
4 - Living spaces. Kitchen, bathroom, gym etc.

I'll need one of you to put your finger print and eye scan into the computer so that you can set passwords for everyone. There is a great tutorial on its use that was set up for noobs. And I assume at least on of you can fly?

Li is impressed at how complete and compact the gym is. Everything is solid but made in such a way that it can be packed down to save space for whatever reason. The chin up bar is very solid, there's cables, dumbbells and bar bell plates for a whole range of skill levels and a play back camera for checking form.

As Mr Goggle gets one of you to scan fingerprint and eye into the computer, you set passwords for all of you to be able to access the computer. Mr Goggle says that you can change its name when you wish but for now the computers name is BeefBeef Md but it answers to BB if needed. Computer gives you access to everything on the ship, an impressive library of media and the longway communication system. Quick with text, Slower with video and audio.

As you all get acquainted with the ship BeefBeef MD has already been keyed in to make its way to the butchers station. The computer has set course for there many times will begin setting up for take off. It advises everyone straps in for the first hour and then the journey will slow down somewhat.

Veya takes over the controls to position the ship into the take off lane and gets instructions from the take off commander in the offices at the side of the exit dock. Veya recognizes the voice from a time before memory but thinks nothing much about it as she stresses a little bit being "at the wheel" of a new ship. Everyone straps in and gets comfortable for a quick one hour trip toward the station.


As the Sargasso glides silently through the vastness of space, its sleek silhouette cuts through the starlit void, a testament to advanced engineering and design with an added bonus of the occasional creek a sign of it age and experience. Engines hum softly, a rhythmic heartbeat that propels the vessel forward. After a fast 1 hour and a what feels like a slower 4 hour journey the BeefBeef MD comments "We approach"

Through the viewport, you begin to see the Mesininkas Alpha, a not giant but definitely not tiny sprawling space station orbiting a large dark rock. Its structure is adorned with shimmering solar panels and a main docking port. As the Sargasso approaches, navigational beacons do not flicker to life, guiding it toward one of the vacant docking bays. It seems that there are no lights on at all.

BeefBeef MD robotically mentions over the PA "We will now commence docking. But it seems the bays are deserted so I will need assistance from one of you"

During the discussion with Beef, Veya very quickly learns a lot about the ship. How it moves, it's limits, how to track fuel etc. The scanner can be controlled from the bridge, but Beef explains that sometimes it gets stuck so to be careful and slow when maneuvering it.

Li finds the spacesuits very quickly. There being 12 in a locker packed away and the generic sizes should fit everyone on board. They are very straight forward to use.

Logging into the computers scanners, Beef start to comment on some things. Beef has been to this location a few times and they cannot help but point out some differences.

"Currently there is very little life on board. Some. But not as much. Last time we were here, in human terms, it was a hot house of activity. Not it seems more like a few tents in a snow storm. Ships are missing, there is some damage to the far side of the station. A lot of damage. But the scan shows that the area has been isolated. There is debris floating around the main dock, you will need to be careful there. But, the docks to seem clear to land, you may not get much response so you will have to land it further in for me to anchor.

Secondary scan shows a ship left very quickly from this area within the last three hours."

Beef quickly guides Veya how to dock using the override. She has used similar controls before on smaller ships and as she glides toward the docking bay, the crew begin to hear some of the debris bounce off the outside.

"Don't worry about those, they sound worse than it is.... I hope" Beef says. The ship gliding further toward its goal.
Li, already into his space suit hands the other two theirs.

"Those suits are a good idea. I am not sure what their air systems are like now, but if the damaged part of the ship is damaged any further, these suits will give you 2 hours of air before you..... don't have any more air I guess is the polite way to put it, Veya can take a earpiece to stay in contact with me. I can access the scanner and the ships computer for you but cannot do anything outside of the ship while you're away"

Beef then directs Veya further who deftly lands the ship into the dock and runs it as close to the inside wall as possible and is then direct to clamp it to the ship.

Outside the main windows the crew sees a worrying desolation of gear and debris. Like a battle between groups of commandos was fought and then deserted. In the dim light of a few LEDs at the edges of the large hall they see shapes that could be anything. Ones imagination would find elephants dead on their sides or a pile of human bodies. A ship smashed to the side and in pieces and some black spots from explosions.

As the ship starts to power down for now a silence descends on them. What has happened here? And where to go first?

As you all suit up and leave the door of the ship you descend to the floor and look around. Big but not huge, this station seems like it would have the capacity for a lot of different things, but as a research ship you understand that it has a lot of influential power in whatever industry it would be in. But this also reflects on the damage. Someone wanted to damage this ship and cause as much suffering as possible. The two ships are in pieces and Veya at least understands that the intact ship is not going anywhere any time soon. There are burn marks up the storage units and the crane on the other end is twisted somewhat. There are two doors close and one very far away. The far away one looks the most damaged but still closed.

What would you like to do?

Edging toward the door, the silence is deafening. The door looks scratched up and a little warped but seems to be sealed enough as it should. There is a key pad next to the door. Normal number pad with a green button and a red button and a microphone button. What would like to do?

Li starts to poke at different buttons, the other two watching understand that, he has done this before, he has some type of system to is mayhem and after pushing 12 different buttons, each with a piercing beep, the key pad starts flashing red with a lower beep to it. The screen on it begins also to flash "Error" and as the door begins to open, all members hear a distinctive metallic release sound, as if there was something behind the door being armed or triggered.