THE SETTING
Stardate 65370... or May 2388.
Thirteen years have passed since the Dominion War shook the foundations of the United Federation of Planets (UFP), and one year since the Hobus Star supernova destroyed the civil capitals of the Romulan Star Empire, throwing much of the Beta Quadrant into chaos.
The UFP government and its 6000-ship Starfleet navy are spread thinner than ever, as elements of the Fourth and Ninth fleets struggle to assist the devastated Romulan and Reman populations, the Sixth and Seventh help rebuild the ruins of the Cardassian Union, the Second and Fifth fleets guard against Beta Quadrant incursion by a restless Klingon Empire, and a brief resurgence of aggression by the Kzinti Patriarchy along the Delta and Gamma Quadrant border draws ships from nearly every task force. While the threat of protracted military conflict remains uncertain, rumors of secret alliances forming between the Kzinti and the Ferengi Alliance, between the Tzenkethi and the Son'a, and especially between the Klingons and the Breen Confederacy persist and unsettle civilian governments across the Galaxy. The promise of renewed peace and scientific exploration which heartened society during the past decade has once again given way to suspicion, hostility and creeping paranoia.
Thirteen years have passed since the Dominion War shook the foundations of the United Federation of Planets (UFP), and one year since the Hobus Star supernova destroyed the civil capitals of the Romulan Star Empire, throwing much of the Beta Quadrant into chaos.
The UFP government and its 6000-ship Starfleet navy are spread thinner than ever, as elements of the Fourth and Ninth fleets struggle to assist the devastated Romulan and Reman populations, the Sixth and Seventh help rebuild the ruins of the Cardassian Union, the Second and Fifth fleets guard against Beta Quadrant incursion by a restless Klingon Empire, and a brief resurgence of aggression by the Kzinti Patriarchy along the Delta and Gamma Quadrant border draws ships from nearly every task force. While the threat of protracted military conflict remains uncertain, rumors of secret alliances forming between the Kzinti and the Ferengi Alliance, between the Tzenkethi and the Son'a, and especially between the Klingons and the Breen Confederacy persist and unsettle civilian governments across the Galaxy. The promise of renewed peace and scientific exploration which heartened society during the past decade has once again given way to suspicion, hostility and creeping paranoia.
On the UFP's porous Alpha
Quadrant border with the severely depleted Cardassian Union, the
Seventh Fleet helps manage judicial, commercial and civil assistance
via a string of border outposts, including Deep Space 9 (DS9),
a formerly Cardassian station serving as SFBAJCOM, Bajor
Sector fleet command headquarters, and host to the 707th
Federal Circuit Court.
DS9 is also a hub for traffic passing between the populated planets of the sector: Bajor XI, Kobliad, Fahleena III, Prophet's Landing, Regulon III, Koralis III, Bardeezi VI, Nivoch, and Trivas. Of these, only Kobliad and Regulon III face serious challenges. |
The former is subject to
a radiological phenomenon that threatens the native population, while
the latter struggles against the Second Wave, a violent ex-Maquis terrorist group bent on radical social and political revolution.
The station achieved legendary status during the Dominion War, changing hands more than once and demanding the lives of many thousands from both sides of the conflict. Its value as a modern point of interest is limited, however, as the sector it serves exerts less and less influence on Federal politics and strategy.
While it does serve as a hub for humanitarian aid traveling into the Cardassian Union, and has lately provided elements from its 221st Marine Expeditionary Brigade detachment for the fight against the Kzinti, DS9 itself has become a rather pedestrian place of business, its days as a wild frontier outpost dimly preserved in a permanent museum collection located on the uppermost floor of its famous Promenade. The traditional criminal element operating out of DS9 is mostly gone, along with other local threats like the Circle, the Maquis, and the Obsidian Order, all of which functionally collapsed in the conservative and self-protective postwar political climate. While agents of the Ferengi Commerce Authority (FCA) and the Central Bank of Lissepia (CBL), two monetary authorities looking for rechartering favors from the UFP, now aggressively duel for political and economic influence throughout the sector, most local organized crime rings have sought refuge in outskirt regions like the Badlands or over the border in poorly-regulated Cardassian space.
The station achieved legendary status during the Dominion War, changing hands more than once and demanding the lives of many thousands from both sides of the conflict. Its value as a modern point of interest is limited, however, as the sector it serves exerts less and less influence on Federal politics and strategy.
While it does serve as a hub for humanitarian aid traveling into the Cardassian Union, and has lately provided elements from its 221st Marine Expeditionary Brigade detachment for the fight against the Kzinti, DS9 itself has become a rather pedestrian place of business, its days as a wild frontier outpost dimly preserved in a permanent museum collection located on the uppermost floor of its famous Promenade. The traditional criminal element operating out of DS9 is mostly gone, along with other local threats like the Circle, the Maquis, and the Obsidian Order, all of which functionally collapsed in the conservative and self-protective postwar political climate. While agents of the Ferengi Commerce Authority (FCA) and the Central Bank of Lissepia (CBL), two monetary authorities looking for rechartering favors from the UFP, now aggressively duel for political and economic influence throughout the sector, most local organized crime rings have sought refuge in outskirt regions like the Badlands or over the border in poorly-regulated Cardassian space.
One criminal organization
that continues to operate on DS9 with apparent impunity is the
Atte Afsanjoori smuggling ring. Afsanjoori arrived in the Bajor
Sector from New France in 2370 and gradually built a business there
that has grown to include four freighters and nearly four dozen
full-time employees. He uses the station as an occasional base of operations, customarily acting through his lieutenant Laurent Kaiser, a long-time
station resident and taskmaster to a half-dozen local fixers and enforcers.
Afsanjoori has partnered many times over the years with Prophet's Landing venture capitalist Hister Goteborg and notorious arms dealer Kels Tharissen, using the former man's substantial assets to fulfill the latter man's contracts. Persistent tavern rumors suggest that the Afsanjoori-Goteborg-Tharissen ring has proven too useful over the years to certain Seventh Fleet Command admirals to extinguish completely, while others suggest that Goteborg's long and lucrative relationship with the CBL, an important source of credit to strategically important systems like Regulon III and Trivas, affords him protection from serious regulatory harassment. Whatever the reason, he has been able to shuttle various forms of contraband in and out of the station with virtually no interference. Two years have passed since the last serious Federal intervention into their activities, when the cargo carrier SS Fawkes was swarmed and boarded by Seventh Fleet interdictors at Starbase 494 on the Cardassian Union border, and her load of illegal arms seized.
Afsanjoori has partnered many times over the years with Prophet's Landing venture capitalist Hister Goteborg and notorious arms dealer Kels Tharissen, using the former man's substantial assets to fulfill the latter man's contracts. Persistent tavern rumors suggest that the Afsanjoori-Goteborg-Tharissen ring has proven too useful over the years to certain Seventh Fleet Command admirals to extinguish completely, while others suggest that Goteborg's long and lucrative relationship with the CBL, an important source of credit to strategically important systems like Regulon III and Trivas, affords him protection from serious regulatory harassment. Whatever the reason, he has been able to shuttle various forms of contraband in and out of the station with virtually no interference. Two years have passed since the last serious Federal intervention into their activities, when the cargo carrier SS Fawkes was swarmed and boarded by Seventh Fleet interdictors at Starbase 494 on the Cardassian Union border, and her load of illegal arms seized.
Fawkes was held in
Command Property Control Unit impound at DS9 while the trial of her
commander and crew in Federal Circuit Court commenced. During the
course of their investigation, Starfleet Security detectives
discovered that the freighter's registry was muddled and difficult to firmly
establish. After the trial was finished and the defendants
sentenced, Seventh Fleet Legal Services set about tracing its real
history, finally tying it to a fifteen-year-old unsolved missing
persons case. For a while the trail ended; the
property was set to be auctioned off to the FCA, who retained a
sizable lien on it going back to the time of its 2372 disappearance
in Orion Syndicate space.
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At last, however, the
true owner was discovered by Starfleet Legal Services. Petty Officer Second
Class Máthénwy Eidelwel, a communications specialist attached to
the Sixth Fleet, was determined to be the illegitimate daughter of
the last legal owner of SS Fawkes, and thus was duly apprised
of her ownership status by a Starfleet property attorney handling her
intestacy case aboard DS9. Eidelwel enlisted the help of her cousin
Ryan Warner, a disgraced Starfleet flight control officer and sometime
freelance freighter pilot living on Starbase 349, to travel to DS9 and
assess the space-worthiness of the battered vessel. Depending on what they would find, she had the option
of resuscitating her lost father's cargo carrier business or selling
off Fawkes to the FCA via Ruhl, an important liquidator
dispatched to recover the Authority's lost profits from the old lien.
Upon arriving aboard the
station, Warner wasted no time in recruiting crew to
help with the assessment, including Nausicaan propulsion engineer
Behr and his Vulcan apprentice Sherlock, retired
Starfleet medical officer Erns Olmquist, and a Bajoran environmental
control systems technician, Anïb-Baur
'Aïbe' Ecbe. Eidelwel meanwhile busied herself contracting civilian property lawyer Felix Salvi to manager her financial negotiations with the FCA. Salvi
not only accepted Eidelwel's case, he introduced her to a
potential client, in the form of Kelton Cryson, a retired Starfleet MACO captain and heir to a majority stake in the profitable and powerful civilian defense
contractor CrysonCorp.
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Cryson
and Salvi are collaborating on a scheme to overthrow Mason Darvis,
the powerful and trenchant CEO of CrysonCorp. The scheme requires
that Cryson make himself unavailable to his own company's board of directors, and to accomplish this, he agreed to rent a passenger suite aboard SS Fawkes while a replacement for Darvis is found.
Before Cryson could act, however, he was approached by a station security watch officer and warned against joining Eidelwel or her ship, which was under close Starfleet Security observation. He decided to withdraw at the last moment, but Cryson was not the only person to take an interest in using Fawkes as a sanctuary: Ruhl, the Ferengi liquidator, has decided to leverage the FCA's bargaining position to force Eidelwel to safely conduct him, his steward Agoh and Bolian ex-Marine-turned-bodyguard Flaxen to Regulon III, where he intends to offer high-interest loans to the conservative planetary government for use in their internecine battle against the Second Wave.
Ruhl might be the least of the Fawkes crew's problems, however. While exploring their new freighter for the first time, Warner and company come face to face with a trio of unwelcome guests who have taken emergency refuge there: Lucas McGee, Selah Zanaz, and Ysil Keren, all of whom are tangled up in a very strange smuggling scheme and are faced with death or imprisonment if they set foot back on DS9.
Before Cryson could act, however, he was approached by a station security watch officer and warned against joining Eidelwel or her ship, which was under close Starfleet Security observation. He decided to withdraw at the last moment, but Cryson was not the only person to take an interest in using Fawkes as a sanctuary: Ruhl, the Ferengi liquidator, has decided to leverage the FCA's bargaining position to force Eidelwel to safely conduct him, his steward Agoh and Bolian ex-Marine-turned-bodyguard Flaxen to Regulon III, where he intends to offer high-interest loans to the conservative planetary government for use in their internecine battle against the Second Wave.
Ruhl might be the least of the Fawkes crew's problems, however. While exploring their new freighter for the first time, Warner and company come face to face with a trio of unwelcome guests who have taken emergency refuge there: Lucas McGee, Selah Zanaz, and Ysil Keren, all of whom are tangled up in a very strange smuggling scheme and are faced with death or imprisonment if they set foot back on DS9.
Atte
Afsanjoori is the major source of their problem. His business
partner, arms dealer Kels Tharissen, has assigned him and his
smuggler henchmen the task of recovering from SS Fawkes a single crate of small arms specially hidden just prior to
the interdiction raid at Starbase 494 two years earlier. The weapons
allegedly share direct, traceable links to Section 31, the branch of
Starfleet Intelligence responsible for carrying out black operations,
and to an elaborate rearmament scheme intended to benefit reactionary
elements of the disbanded Obsidian Order in Cardassian Union space. Afsanjoori and his lieutenant Laurent Kaiser have little choice but
to comply with Tharissen's request.
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Kaiser,
duly assigned to organize the recovery effort, hired Ghorbanifar, a recently
paroled Dominion War profiteer, to obtain information on the crate's
whereabouts from Materiel Droz, the ex-Maquis former commander of SS Fawkes, who was sent
to prison following the Starbase 494 arms seizure. In exchange for
her aid, Droz was promised legal absolution for what she sees as an
unforgivable betrayal by her Section 31 smuggling partners, who not
only stood back and allowed her to take the fall for their operation,
but also gave away the freighter to which she claimed long ownership.
Ysil Keren, a Trill techno-anarchist with ties to the CBL, was hired by Kaiser to arrange security clearance aboard DS9 for Lieutenant Commander Quinton McGee III, an unwitting Starfleet executive officer with an uncanny resemblance to his less-fortunate identical twin brother, Lucas McGee, a security officer-turned-mercenary who has agreed to infiltrate SS Fawkes on the smuggling organization's behalf and track down the hidden crate of weapons. Keren was able to arrange McGee's clearance, but only by virtue of the fact that she had already been blackmailed by a Starfleet Security (SS) officer named Fergus Caton into infiltrating Afsanjoori's group to serve as a double agent and informant for the Federal government. She had ties to a deuridium smuggling ring, and was threatened with extradition to Kobliad if she refused to help.
Ysil Keren, a Trill techno-anarchist with ties to the CBL, was hired by Kaiser to arrange security clearance aboard DS9 for Lieutenant Commander Quinton McGee III, an unwitting Starfleet executive officer with an uncanny resemblance to his less-fortunate identical twin brother, Lucas McGee, a security officer-turned-mercenary who has agreed to infiltrate SS Fawkes on the smuggling organization's behalf and track down the hidden crate of weapons. Keren was able to arrange McGee's clearance, but only by virtue of the fact that she had already been blackmailed by a Starfleet Security (SS) officer named Fergus Caton into infiltrating Afsanjoori's group to serve as a double agent and informant for the Federal government. She had ties to a deuridium smuggling ring, and was threatened with extradition to Kobliad if she refused to help.
Caton
and his team are only posing as SS investigators. Really they
are members of a Starfleet
Intelligence unit assigned by Seventh Fleet Command to clean up a
potentially embarrassing (if not downright dangerous) mess created by
Section 31 when it decided to trade weapons for favors with the New Hebitian Way, an Obsidian Order-related political reformist group operating near Korma.
Caton has been ordered either to recover the weapons for disposal or
to destroy the freighter altogether. To accomplish this, he tricks
Keren into installing a bomb in the SS Fawkes radio shack by
convincing her it is merely a special tracking device.
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Before
the oblivious McGee can proceed with his plan to board the freighter
by impersonating his brother, he is approached independently by Selah
Zanaz, a Betazoid confidence artist who happens to have been paroled at the same time,
and from the same Federal penal facility, as the war profiteer
Ghorbanifar. Zanaz convinces McGee to let her help him with his plan
by impersonating another Starfleet officer – much to the chagrin of
the smugglers, who suspect her (rather than Keren) of being a
security informant. When one of Kaiser's enforcers in mysteriously
murdered on the promenade and Zanaz is suspected as the responsible
party, she, McGee and Keren all seek refuge aboard the freighter,
though Keren goes along by order of Caton, rather than her fear of
being discovered as a double agent.
The
real killer is not Zanaz, of course – it is Sask Rellon, a
professional revolutionary who built and delivered Keren's bomb to
Hiram, a man posing as a political sympathizer trying to prevent the
Federal government from breaking up a Kobliad smuggling ring. Hiram
is in reality a particularly deadly mercenary and he, like Keren,
works for both Starfleet Security and the smugglers, playing both
ends against the middle for maximum profit. Upon discovering Hiram's identity, Rellon convinces station security to disrupt everybody's plans for SS Fawkes and
especially to stop the bomb plot before it results in the murder of
the unsuspecting owner and her innocent new crew members.
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Keren, weary of being
manipulated by criminals and government agents, enlisted McGee and
Zanaz to help her convince Eidelwel and Warner that taking the crate
of weapons for themselves and hiding it somewhere else as an
insurance policy would allow them all to operate the vessel as a
legal cargo carrier, free of interference from the government. The Ferengi liquidator learned about the weapons from the mercenary Flaxen, who he sent to spy on Eidelwel and her crew; his protection being provided for the moment by one Patience Valentine, a.k.a. Drusilla Creon, a Romulan bounty hunter posing as the courier hired to recover private property once belonging to Kristina Petrova, Fawkes's former boatswain. Creon was actually working for Hiram, an old contact, but she was warned about the bomb by Sask Rellon, and is the only one aboard ship who knows of its existence.
The three infiltrators convinced Eidelwel to seek out Lt. Sileis, the Legal Services officer in charge of her intestacy case. He contacted Lt. Sam Aricola, a friend of his in DS9 security, who confirmed that Caton's unit is planning to impound the freighter and arrest its crew as soon as they received a warrant from the circuit court. Sileis took this information to Eidelwel who, fearing the loss of the ship, made an emergency escape plan with Warner and Behr. They elected to leave by 1300, staying only long enough to take on Vedin Berek, a Cardassian engineer connected to the original Droz plot. Berek agrees to help recover the hidden cache for a significant sum, but he has an agenda of his own.
Ruhl offered to arrange a carrier contract for Fawkes with a mining company on Koralis III, which is located near Regulon, his ultimate destination. Since Koralis is terra nullius and thus off the Federation radar, Eidelwel agreed, and the freighter left port less than an hour before the arrest warrant goes through. After a shaky start, they managed to limp out of the system, but they have not been safe for long when Creon found McGee loitering in a lonely part of the ship and promptly murdered him. The body was not discovered for hours.
The three infiltrators convinced Eidelwel to seek out Lt. Sileis, the Legal Services officer in charge of her intestacy case. He contacted Lt. Sam Aricola, a friend of his in DS9 security, who confirmed that Caton's unit is planning to impound the freighter and arrest its crew as soon as they received a warrant from the circuit court. Sileis took this information to Eidelwel who, fearing the loss of the ship, made an emergency escape plan with Warner and Behr. They elected to leave by 1300, staying only long enough to take on Vedin Berek, a Cardassian engineer connected to the original Droz plot. Berek agrees to help recover the hidden cache for a significant sum, but he has an agenda of his own.
Ruhl offered to arrange a carrier contract for Fawkes with a mining company on Koralis III, which is located near Regulon, his ultimate destination. Since Koralis is terra nullius and thus off the Federation radar, Eidelwel agreed, and the freighter left port less than an hour before the arrest warrant goes through. After a shaky start, they managed to limp out of the system, but they have not been safe for long when Creon found McGee loitering in a lonely part of the ship and promptly murdered him. The body was not discovered for hours.
The journey to Koralis III required about two days' travel, as the ship can manage speeds no greater than Warp 4.6. During this time a number of grave issues with multiple systems were discovered: Fawkes has no way to shield itself from attack, several batteries need replacing, and the weapons are shot. By their arrival in orbit, they were assembling a list of critical parts they will need to acquire from Ruhl's contacts to achieve a minimum standard of safe travel.
Ruhl, Flaxen, Creon, Haskins and Olmquist took the shuttle to a subterranean mining complex, Western Deep Site 4, where they were introduced to Dr. Tailus Mosring, Director of Operations for Prograde Services Koralis, the company responsible for mining the planet. |
Dr. Mosring partnered with an unknown racketeering organization to transport refined transuranic materials from his three active mines to Regulon III, where they are sold on the black market. He sought an angel investment from the Ferengi Commerce Authority in order to help ramp up production of these materials. He was willing to offer a carrier agent contract to SS Fawkes as part of the bargain, provided that the Authority guaranteed completion. During their initial meeting, Flaxen was surprised to see a member of the Prograde Services science staff who looked eerily like Dria Freeman, the human chef who was murdered on Deep Space 9 - so surprised, in fact, that he failed to demand an explanation before she was gone from the chamber.
Back on Fawkes, Vedin Berek reveals to Eidelwel, Warner and (to a lesser extent) Zanaz that the now-recovered cache was intended for a Cardassian political reform movement supposedly receiving covert support from Starfleet, and that a team of Cardassians attached to the movement are operating in secret on Regulon. He offers to transfer the cache to this team in exchange for their help in wiping the freighter clean of any evidence connecting it to smuggling and thus removing the legal threat to the crew. Eidelwel and Warner are unsure of Berek's guarantees, since the cache has turned out to contain no weapons at all, but rather a small collection of unique, mysterious technological items. Keren warns them that the technology is potentially too important to hand over to Cardassian strangers. Eidelwel puts off making a firm decision for fear of alienating Berek and his allies, who she suspects could resort to violence if thwarted.
Back on Fawkes, Vedin Berek reveals to Eidelwel, Warner and (to a lesser extent) Zanaz that the now-recovered cache was intended for a Cardassian political reform movement supposedly receiving covert support from Starfleet, and that a team of Cardassians attached to the movement are operating in secret on Regulon. He offers to transfer the cache to this team in exchange for their help in wiping the freighter clean of any evidence connecting it to smuggling and thus removing the legal threat to the crew. Eidelwel and Warner are unsure of Berek's guarantees, since the cache has turned out to contain no weapons at all, but rather a small collection of unique, mysterious technological items. Keren warns them that the technology is potentially too important to hand over to Cardassian strangers. Eidelwel puts off making a firm decision for fear of alienating Berek and his allies, who she suspects could resort to violence if thwarted.
On the nearby planet Regulon III, a retired private investigator named Bendan Zavor was hired by a mysterious woman to journey from his residence in Rose Weir to the capital city of Amaurot and locate none other than the same Ferengi Commerce Authority diplomatic party making Eidelwel miserable. During his journey he encounters Dempsey Boudreaux, a casual friend who agrees to help. The two have few clues with which to start; they visit an old ally of Zavor, an alien fixer named Elinas, who directs them to visit a local market in search of Ferengi food wholesalers.
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Olmquist and Haskins returned to Fawkes with Harper Drake, a Prograde Services mental health specialist ordered to spy on the ship and its crew under the guise of a medical facilities quality check. Haskins was then sent back down to Koralis with Warner, who was asked to play bargaining agent for a pergium shipping contract, and Zanaz, who has decided to leave the ship; while they were arriving at the operations complex, Creon, ordered by Ruhl to try and determine whether Flaxen's story about a secret weapons cache is true, headed back to the ship in the company of three more mine employees under orders to assist the inexperienced freighter crew: Lucreavus Gali, a replication specialist, and Bernard Hendricks and Khaf Tamm, two transporter systems technicians.
The arrival of Warner and company goes astray when Mosring and his lieutenants react with unexpected hostility to the inclusion of Zanaz in the landing party. She, Haskins and Flaxen are arrested and sent down to the company's sub-level brig, while Warner and the Ferengi are held aside to continue the negotiations. Haskins escaped and tried to rescue the other two captives, but not before Zanaz is murdered in cold blood by the same woman whom Flaxen earlier mistook for Dria Freeman. Haskins arrived in time to rescue Flaxen before he too can be killed. The two were forced to fight their way past over a dozen Prograde security personnel to regain entry into the upper levels of the complex.
The arrival of Warner and company goes astray when Mosring and his lieutenants react with unexpected hostility to the inclusion of Zanaz in the landing party. She, Haskins and Flaxen are arrested and sent down to the company's sub-level brig, while Warner and the Ferengi are held aside to continue the negotiations. Haskins escaped and tried to rescue the other two captives, but not before Zanaz is murdered in cold blood by the same woman whom Flaxen earlier mistook for Dria Freeman. Haskins arrived in time to rescue Flaxen before he too can be killed. The two were forced to fight their way past over a dozen Prograde security personnel to regain entry into the upper levels of the complex.
Mosring and Ruhl, convinced that Fawkes is carrying a load of weapons from the Droz days, hailed Eidelwel with a new business offer: she can sell Prograde the weapons and thereby avoid the possibility of a Starfleet interdiction at Regulon. Mosring revealed that Starfleet has issued a warrant for the ship, and that a frigate visited Regulon in search of them. Eidelwel and Warner denied the existence of any such cargo and are given an hour to make a comply.
While Eidelwel tried to put together a plan, Ecbe stole the thumb drive from the crate and brought it to Keren, who managed to crack the password and retrieve all the secret data from it. They stored the data in an escape pod. |
On Regulon III, Zavor and Boudreaux took a cab from the Sroesus District to the Chaemaenid District, on the northern side of Amaurot, and from there walked to a local imported foods market with which Boudreaux was familiar. There they stop to spoke with Yanek, a Yridian seafood merchant, and paid him for information about the possible whereabouts of the Ferengi. They were directed to seek Cardilla House, a hotel in a Chaemaenid high-rise called the Dauntless Building, once used by the Four Voyages trading company (out of which evolved the current Regulonian government).
Meanwhile on Koralis, Haskins and Flaxen continued to make their way towards the upper levels of the Prograde complex. Capturing the head of the maintenance department, Haskins took her uniform and radio. Warner, in the mean time, was taken by Quodde and Kim further down into the complex to find the renegades and convince them to surrender. Warner, realizing that Zanaz had been murdered, decided to make his own break for it; he was unexpectedly helped in this by Quodde, who shot Kim, revealing her Changeling identity.
Aboard Fawkes, Eidelwel decided that the only way to convince Ruhl of his mistake is by showing Creon the contents of the Cardassian crate. Berek was strongly opposed to this, and Eidelwel's explicit distrust of him pushed him to actively dislike her. He submits to open the crate, however, and Creon gets her first look at the mystery technology. The three go back up to the bridge to contact Prograde.
Meanwhile on Koralis, Haskins and Flaxen continued to make their way towards the upper levels of the Prograde complex. Capturing the head of the maintenance department, Haskins took her uniform and radio. Warner, in the mean time, was taken by Quodde and Kim further down into the complex to find the renegades and convince them to surrender. Warner, realizing that Zanaz had been murdered, decided to make his own break for it; he was unexpectedly helped in this by Quodde, who shot Kim, revealing her Changeling identity.
Aboard Fawkes, Eidelwel decided that the only way to convince Ruhl of his mistake is by showing Creon the contents of the Cardassian crate. Berek was strongly opposed to this, and Eidelwel's explicit distrust of him pushed him to actively dislike her. He submits to open the crate, however, and Creon gets her first look at the mystery technology. The three go back up to the bridge to contact Prograde.
Zavor and Beaudreaux crossed town to the Chaemaenid District to conduct an impromptu surveillance mission on the Dauntless Building. They were able to enter the hotel restaurant and confirm that the Ferengi were present but guarded by a government security unit on one of the upper floors. A building next door, Afsharid Tower, appeared to be a safer bet from which to spy on their target. The pair headed off to buy some binoculars and locate the Hotel Modera, the sanctuary arranged for them by Elinas. Unfortunately they were followed on the train; splitting up, Zavor drew off their tail, and after a brief flight and narrow escape from airborne security forces, rejoined Beaudreaux at a local dance club. Worried now about being tracked by the government, they went immediately to their hotel to spend the night in hiding.
Back aboard Fawkes, Creon convinced the Ferengi that the freighter was no longer carrying weapons, but Prograde does not relent in letting go of their hostages, and as a safety precaution Eidelwel had Olmquist pilot them to safety over the equator, beyond the reach of the company's transporters. She then went and tried to convince the Prograde technicians still aboard ship to try and talk them out of using their weapons to take over the ship. Gali and Tamm, already suspicious of their employers, elected to switch sides and join the crew; Hendricks, however, was convinced that some mistake has been made, and that the away team must have done something wrong. He demanded to be allowed to contact the Prograde management, and Ecbe escorted him upstairs to do so.
On the bridge, Hendricks held everyone at gunpoint and used the Fawkes to try and reach his managers. Instead he was only able to reach Haskins and Flaxen, who had split with Warner and taken the Prograde communications compartment by force. Haskins, wounded in the battle, informed the bridge crew of the away team's situation, Zanaz's death, and that Warner was attempting to regain control of Olmquist's shuttle on his own, in hopes that they could all escape together. Hendricks, baffled by the situation and in no mood to see more violence done to his department employees, told Haskins about an escape route they could use from the loading bay. After the transmission ended, Olmquist took advantage of Hendricks's uncertainty to disarm him, though not without a scuffle. Eidelwel arrived soon after and took Hendricks back down to the bowline, where he attempted to convince Tamm and Gali to return with him to Koralis. Drake, convinced that Prograde was culpable in something, decided to join the Fawkes crew as well.
Back aboard Fawkes, Creon convinced the Ferengi that the freighter was no longer carrying weapons, but Prograde does not relent in letting go of their hostages, and as a safety precaution Eidelwel had Olmquist pilot them to safety over the equator, beyond the reach of the company's transporters. She then went and tried to convince the Prograde technicians still aboard ship to try and talk them out of using their weapons to take over the ship. Gali and Tamm, already suspicious of their employers, elected to switch sides and join the crew; Hendricks, however, was convinced that some mistake has been made, and that the away team must have done something wrong. He demanded to be allowed to contact the Prograde management, and Ecbe escorted him upstairs to do so.
On the bridge, Hendricks held everyone at gunpoint and used the Fawkes to try and reach his managers. Instead he was only able to reach Haskins and Flaxen, who had split with Warner and taken the Prograde communications compartment by force. Haskins, wounded in the battle, informed the bridge crew of the away team's situation, Zanaz's death, and that Warner was attempting to regain control of Olmquist's shuttle on his own, in hopes that they could all escape together. Hendricks, baffled by the situation and in no mood to see more violence done to his department employees, told Haskins about an escape route they could use from the loading bay. After the transmission ended, Olmquist took advantage of Hendricks's uncertainty to disarm him, though not without a scuffle. Eidelwel arrived soon after and took Hendricks back down to the bowline, where he attempted to convince Tamm and Gali to return with him to Koralis. Drake, convinced that Prograde was culpable in something, decided to join the Fawkes crew as well.
At the Modera, Elinas's contact, the night manager Phvoltin, warned Zavor and Beaudreaux that the hotel was only available to them so long as they were not being tracked, and procured Zavor a pair of binoculars and some rain gear. The two decided it was safer to split up, at least for the time being. Beaudreaux signaled his intention to head back to Rose Weir once he'd procured a loan for his struggling restaurant from a contact at the produce market, and offered Zavor shelter if he also returned at some point but found his regular domicile to be threatened, either by the government or by Corffu and whoever her allies actually were.
On Koralis, Warner rescued first the Ferengi - discovering in the process that Tailus Mosring is a changeling, just like Hester Kim - and then Haskins and Flaxen. Using the Alfa 340 shuttle, he and Agoh managed to get them out of the comm compartment, but they were all promptly attacked by a changeling in monstrous form. They crashed the shuttle in the loading bay, injuring Haskins still further, but were able to get to the safety of a nearby Wyvern Hopper (where Ruhl was waiting for them), and effect their escape from the planet.
On Koralis, Warner rescued first the Ferengi - discovering in the process that Tailus Mosring is a changeling, just like Hester Kim - and then Haskins and Flaxen. Using the Alfa 340 shuttle, he and Agoh managed to get them out of the comm compartment, but they were all promptly attacked by a changeling in monstrous form. They crashed the shuttle in the loading bay, injuring Haskins still further, but were able to get to the safety of a nearby Wyvern Hopper (where Ruhl was waiting for them), and effect their escape from the planet.
The Fawkes crew, still struggling to put together a response to the situation on Koralis, were stunned to be contacted by Warner and company, who warned them that it would not be wise to linger in the system a moment longer than necessary, since Mosring intended to use a another Wyvern, this time remotely-piloted, to try and disable the freighter badly enough to prevent its escape. Most of the crew assembled on the bowline to receive the away team. When the shuttle finally arrived, Warner headed straight to the bridge with Eidelwel and Hendricks (who now reluctantly agreed to go with them as far as Regulon), while Olmquist and Drake took Flaxen and Hendricks to the infirmary. Creon escorted the two Ferengi back to the passenger deck. Soon SS Fawkes was warping out of the beleaguered system to safety.