The First Assignment

(033/1105, Glisten/Glisten)

Meanwhile, the Zhodani brothers Dliiavrnt and Stpierb' were tunnelling into the murkier levels of the underworld of the Glisten asteroid belt. The Chun group are the districts with the pleasure and recreation facilities, and just about anything a true hedonist can want may be obtained here. Working from one tenuous contact to another, the brothers finally made a contact with an influential drug dealer.

Deep in the shadows of a dark alley, a sallow-faced man in a voluminous overcoat and eye-shading hat was guarded by two enormous knuckle-dragging torpedoes at the alley mouth. Stpierb' did the talking; he broached the subject of illegal drugs; PSI enhancement drugs.

Somehow, the man immediately knew that the drugs were for the two and not for sale on. He became very canny, and named some high-seeming prices for two kinds of "booster", one apparently rather better than the types both Zho had encountered in training. Becoming suspicious, the pair decided not to buy. On the way out, Dliiavrnt attempted to cause trouble by telling one of the guards what his boss seemed to think of them ("I draw them a map every evening to get them home"), but the guard seemed too dim to be bothered.

The next morning, the group was gathered in the office of their line manager, Damail Lakuishga. The other members of the team were there; "Jock" MacKenzie the engineer, Doug Eagle the navigator and Oscar Blackwood the sensor op.

Lakuishga outlined the mission; track and retrieve a Marava-class merchant, bought by a group of what he referred to as "the usual just-demobbed layabouts". Built at the Bilstein shipyards on Glisten 2/1104, first flight 5/1104, handover and down payment 7/1104, one monthly payment made at Wurzburg 49/1104, no monthly payments receieved since. He provided a pile of information as to the ship's known whereabouts and crew; the captain is a Darrian known as Thorbad Dreng.

The team were to track down the ship, and - based on their analysis of the situation at the time - either make themselves known to the crew and take possession of the vessel peacefully, or take possession of the vessel by the use of as much force as neccessary. In either case, DAMAGE TO THE VESSEL WAS TO BE AS MINIMAL AS POSSIBLE. A Cr10,000 flat bonus each was offered for mint condition delivery. Recovery bonus for ships retrieved is 1% (.01) of the ship's book value MINUS DAMAGE REPAIRS... For a Marava, this calculates out at Cr640,000.

The team was assigned the Baranduin, a Type CE Close Escort with an improved power plant and more cargo space for the mission. Captain Nose immediately piped up and requested a gunner be attached to the team; Lakuishga promised to sort this out.

The crew then took possession of the ship; on discovering it came with dustbots and scutters for simple maintenance, Captain Nose had to be restrained from shooting one; he seemed to have some sort of problem with robots... He also didn't like the arrangement of the computers. The main model/6 computer was backed up by a secondary model/9, intended for research and analysis work. Nose spent several hours re-routing data paths until he'd swapped them over, assigning the model/9 for ship functions and the model/6 for investigative functions. The team then addressed themselves to the data they'd been provided. After some thought, they decided to start at Wurzburg, Jump-2 away. Just before launch, the Vargr gunner Gvnueghzauerrgh (Gvn to his packmates), joined the ship as requested by the crew.

(039/1105, Wurzburg/Glisten)

On arrival at Wurzburg, the crew checked for landing permission. The system is an anarchic place, run by the mercenaries and arms dealers, and there are no berthing charges and virtually no regulations.

During their descent to the rather small starport, the crew visually scanned the pads for Maravas, finding several, but all far too old for the ship they were pursuing. After landing, Captain Nose and Gvn wandered into the trading halls and hiring offices, looking for clues, while Lasnus and Stpierb' set off into the starport to find the Admin facility.

The whole port and startown was decrepit and rundown; dangerous looking individuals skulked or watched the repo ops as they passed. Nose and Gvn were approached by a mercenary recruiter, scouting for troops. Lasnus and Stpierb' reached the Admin offices, and entered them without difficulty. Asking for reference access, they were assigned a room with a computer terminal and left to it. Shortly after this, Dliiavrnt caught up with them and joined their investigations.