Dominion Broken Road Campaign - Tollkeepers - MIR Dominion of Chiron

[Prystill Oasay]

Chiron

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Across Chiron's broad grasslands, life continued much as it had long before the Mahporeem Imperial Remnant appeared on the horizon.

Chironian herds crossed beneath open skies. Local freighters rose from scattered settlements and commercial ports. Cargo moved between the surface and orbit while independent haulers carried goods onward toward neighboring systems. Chiron had survived Hutts, Imperials, wars, and the shifting fortunes of the galaxy. Another power extending its influence into the region was hardly reason for the planet to stop turning.

Above them, however, someone was collecting tolls. At first, captains reported isolated attacks. Freighters were intercepted after leaving established shipping lanes, their cargo inspected and a portion confiscated. Crews who cooperated were generally permitted to continue. Those who resisted occasionally disappeared. It was piracy, certainly. But it was unusually disciplined piracy.

The raiders rarely remained in one place long enough to be cornered. Scouts identified approaching vessels before heavier ships moved to intercept them. False distress calls diverted potential victims. Small craft disappeared among the system's clutter while larger vessels retreated to anchorages that Imperial reconnaissance had yet to locate. Rumors spoke of abandoned facilities left from earlier occupations, forgotten stations, and other places where a flotilla could disappear until it was time to hunt again.

More troubling was the pirates' choice of prey. Chironian vessels were rarely bothered. Long-established local shipping concerns reported comparatively few attacks. Some captains admitted paying occasional fees or surrendering minor cargoes, but most described the arrangement as predictable. The pirates understood which vessels belonged in Chiron and apparently preferred not to antagonize them.

Mahporeem vessels enjoyed no such courtesy. Freighters carrying goods to or from the Remnant were being intercepted with increasing regularity. Companies entering into contracts with Mahporeem suddenly discovered their ships attracting unwanted attention. The deeper Imperial commerce reached into the region, the more organized the attacks became.
Then a convoy carrying military components was hit.

The pirates knew its route. They knew its departure time. They knew its cargo. They even knew the strength of its escort. Information that should never have reached Chiron had arrived before the convoy did. Someone had given them the manifest. That changed matters.

Imperial warships entered the Chiron system soon afterward, accompanied by intelligence personnel, diplomats, and representatives tasked with securing Mahporeem's growing interests in the region. Their arrival was welcomed by some. Others were considerably less enthusiastic. To many of Chiron's merchants, there was no crisis requiring Imperial intervention. Their ships still flew. Their cargo still arrived. Their businesses still operated. Whatever arrangement existed between the pirates and Chiron's commercial community had produced something dangerously close to stability.

Now Mahporeem threatened to upset it. The Remnant had a different interpretation. Someone had decided that passage through Chiron belonged to them. Someone had decided which ships could pass safely and which would pay. Someone had decided that Mahporeem would pay.
They were about to learn otherwise.

OBJECTIVE I — BREAK THE TOLL

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Hunt the Pirate Flotilla
The pirates have survived by refusing to fight the battle Mahporeem wants. Their flotilla operates from scattered anchorages throughout the Chiron system, using scouts, raiders, false distress calls, concealed staging areas, and rapid hyperspace jumps to strike before Imperial forces can respond.

Find them.

MIR naval forces have been ordered to identify the flotilla's hiding places, isolate its individual elements, and prevent them from simply disappearing when confronted. Destroy or capture enough of the pirate force to break its ability to control traffic through Chiron. Captured vessels and crews may also possess information valuable to the investigation into the attacks.
There are persistent rumors of forgotten installations and abandoned facilities scattered throughout the region. Whether the pirates have made use of such places remains to be discovered.

Suggested Characters: Fleeters, starfighter pilots, Marines, boarding teams, military engineers, privateers, mercenaries, or independent spacers attached to the operation.

OBJECTIVE II — SOMEONE LEFT THE DOOR OPEN

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Find the Leak
The pirates know too much. Shipping manifests. Departure schedules. Cargo declarations. Planned routes. Escort assignments. Information concerning the attacked military convoy reached Chiron before the convoy itself, and the precision of previous interceptions suggests this was not the first time. Imperial Intelligence has been tasked with tracing the breach.

The information could be coming from inside Mahporeem. A shipping company may have been compromised. Credentials could have been stolen. Communications might be intercepted. Port officials could be selling information. Someone among Chiron's commercial community might be passing manifests to the pirates.

Or someone might simply want Mahporeem shipping to remain dangerous.
Follow the information backward. Identify who had access. Find out how the pirates receive it.
And determine whether this is corruption, espionage, or something considerably larger.

Suggested Characters: Intelligence agents, slicers, investigators, security personnel, spies, bounty hunters, information brokers, law-enforcement types, undercover operatives, or characters with connections to Chiron's commercial or criminal communities.

OBJECTIVE III — THEIR PIRATES, OUR PROBLEM

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Negotiate with Local Interests
There is only one problem with Mahporeem's pirate crisis. Many people on Chiron do not believe it is theirs. Chironian merchants and long-established shipping interests have learned how to operate alongside the pirates. Their vessels are rarely attacked, their crews generally return home, and whatever unofficial arrangements have developed have kept local commerce moving.

Now Imperial warships have arrived promising to solve the problem. To some locals, that sounds suspiciously like creating one. Chironian representatives, merchants, freight operators, port authorities, and offworld commercial interests have been invited to meet with Mahporeem representatives. The Remnant needs their cooperation: shipping records, navigational information, knowledge of local traffic patterns, and preferably their public support.

They have reasons to hesitate. Some fear that attacking the flotilla will turn Chiron into a battleground. Others worry about exchanging a tolerable pirate presence for permanent Imperial oversight. Some may know considerably more about the pirates than they are willing to admit.
And a few businesses may have discovered that competitors being attacked while their own ships travel safely is rather good for business.

Persuade them. Reassure them. Bargain with them. Or discover what their cooperation will cost.

Suggested Characters: Diplomats, politicians, Chironian representatives, nobles, corporate representatives, merchants, trade negotiators, fixers, lawyers, intelligence officers operating under diplomatic cover, or well-connected independent characters.

BYOO — BRING YOUR OWN OBJECTIVE

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Chiron is larger than the Imperial operation unfolding around it. Characters whose stories do not fit neatly within the three primary objectives are welcome to pursue their own interests in the system, whether on Chiron's grasslands, aboard its stations, among its settlements and ports, or somewhere in the increasingly dangerous space overhead.

 

[Prystill Oasay]

Objective: III — Their Pirates, Our Problem
Location: Chiron, Darrinport Commercial Exchange
Outfit: Ministerial Uniform
Tags: OPEN

The conference chamber had clearly never been intended for Imperial diplomats. Prystill Oasay considered that a point in its favor. There was no enormous conference table dominating the room. No rows of chairs carefully arranged according to diplomatic precedence. Instead, the center of the chamber remained almost completely open, broken only by several standing-height holoprojectors and narrow consoles positioned far enough apart to leave broad avenues between them. Most of the people gathered there needed the room.

The majority of the newly organized Chiron Transit Council were Chironians. Their humanoid torsos rose from powerful equine lower bodies, hooves occasionally clicking against the polished floor as representatives shifted position or quietly moved between small conversational groups.

They were not alone. A Human woman representing one of Darrinport's larger offworld freight concerns stood beside a Rodian independent captain. A Duros whose family had apparently operated out of Chiron for three generations occupied one of the conventional seats along the room's perimeter. There were several others besides them: merchants, haulers, port administrators, exporters and representatives of companies which had operated on Chiron long enough to claim a legitimate interest in whatever Mahporeem intended to do next. They were local interests. That did not necessarily mean they shared the same interests.

Prystill stood near one of the central holoprojectors with her datapad in hand. Her bodyguard, Nerra Trulas, remained a few paces behind her. The Chrome Guardian's presence was difficult to overlook among a gathering of merchants and administrators, although Prystill had long since stopped apologizing for bringing security into rooms where everyone insisted security would not be necessary.

Opposite her stood the woman the others had selected to speak first. Maelis Ruun was Chironian. Age had begun to streak silver through the dark hair framing her face, while the coat covering her equine body had faded slightly around the flanks. Ruun Interstellar Freight had been carrying cargo to and from Chiron for generations. Maelis herself had begun aboard her family's freighters before eventually inheriting responsibility for the company. She had also apparently developed the useful talent of quieting a room without raising her voice.

Her hooves carried her several steps closer to the holoprojector before she stopped. One foreleg shifted, weight settling comfortably across the other three. "Minister Oasay, perhaps we should establish something before your people decide how they're going to save Chiron." A couple of representatives exchanged amused looks.

Prystill smiled. "Please."

Maelis' tail flicked once behind her. "We didn't ask you to." There it was. Maelis turned slightly, one hand indicating the tall windows overlooking Darrinport's sprawling landing fields. Beyond the transparisteel, freighters rose and descended while cargo lifters crawled between warehouses. "Those ships aren't grounded. Our captains aren't hiding in port. Goods aren't disappearing from our markets." Her attention returned to Prystill. "You call these people pirates. I won't argue the definition. They demand payment for passage they have no legal authority to control."

A Chironian freight captain farther along the loose semicircle struck a forehoof against the floor. "Extortion."

"Yes," Maelis answered simply. The hoof settled. "But extortion we've survived." That distinction quieted the room. "We know where they usually operate. We know what they usually demand. We know what happens when someone pays and, more importantly, what happens when someone doesn't." Maelis advanced another slow pace. "Then Mahporeem arrives. Your commerce expands. The attacks increase. Now Imperial warships enter our system and we're told there's a crisis." She stopped. "From where we're standing, Minister, the crisis arrived with you."

Prystill allowed the silence to remain. Diplomatic school had spent an extraordinary amount of time teaching people how to fill silence. Experience had taught her that sometimes it was considerably more useful not to. "That's fair." That earned several surprised looks. Even Maelis redistributed her weight slightly at the answer.

Prystill tapped her datapad once. "Mahporeem commerce changed the balance here. I'm not going to insult everyone in this room by pretending otherwise." Her gaze moved across the gathered representatives. "But that balance already depended upon someone deciding who was permitted to conduct business around Chiron and how much they had to surrender for the privilege."

The Rodian captain shifted against the wall. One of the Chironians looked toward another. Interesting. "Your ships are mostly permitted through. Ours aren't. Businesses contracting with Mahporeem are increasingly targeted. A military convoy was intercepted by people who knew its route, departure time, cargo and escort before it arrived." Prystill paused. "That's no longer an inconvenience we're prepared to purchase our way around."

One of Maelis' forehooves scraped lightly across the floor. "And what exactly do you want from Chiron?"

There was the important question. Prystill brought up a list upon the datapad. "Shipping records. Traffic patterns. Known danger areas. False distress calls you've encountered. Places your captains know not to go." Another tap. "And places the tollkeepers seem strangely unwilling to operate."

That caused a reaction. Small, but noticeable. A Chironian exporter shifted backward half a pace. The Duros along the wall looked toward Maelis. Someone else suddenly became extremely interested in the holoprojector. Prystill continued. "Eventually, I'd also like your public cooperation."

That produced a considerably larger reaction. Several hooves moved against the floor at once. The sound was brief but unmistakable. Prystill raised one hand. "Eventually." She gave them a faint smile. "I'm a diplomat. I'm allowed to ask for more than I'm likely to receive."

A Human representative laughed quietly. One of the Chironian captains gave an amused snort. Maelis remained unmoved. "What does Chiron receive?"

Prystill's smile faded into something more businesslike. "That's what we're here to determine." She gestured toward the room rather than the datapad. "You don't want your trade disrupted. You don't want Chiron turned into a battlefield. And I'm reasonably certain some of you are wondering whether Mahporeem intends to remove one group collecting tolls only to become the next."

The resulting silence answered that well enough. Prystill nodded. "So tell me what assurances you need." Her attention settled upon Maelis. "And in return, you can tell me everything Chiron has learned about the people who've been collecting your tolls."

Maelis regarded her for several seconds. Then she began to move. Not away from Prystill, but across the open chamber, hooves sounding softly against the floor as she passed the other members of the council. Several Chironians shifted naturally to allow her through. She stopped beside one of the freight captains. "Everything?"

Prystill watched the movement between them. "We can start with what everyone here is willing to admit they know."

Maelis' tail went still. The captain beside her lowered his eyes. Across the chamber, one of the offworld representatives suddenly found the traffic outside considerably more interesting. Prystill noticed. Nerra certainly noticed. Good. They finally had somewhere to begin.

 

[MIR Starfighter Command]

OBJECTIVE I — BREAK THE TOLL
Hunt the Pirate Flotilla

They had been warned. That was the first problem. Long before the first Mahporeem warship translated into the Chiron system, the flotilla had begun to move. The anchorage tucked among the broken rocks of Chiron's outer system had been busy for hours. Cargo containers disappeared behind armored shutters. Fuel lines detached from scarred hulls. Maintenance crews abandoned repairs that could wait and hurried aboard ships that could not. Tugs pulled captured freighters deeper into the asteroid field while smaller craft scattered in ones and twos.

Nothing about the place resembled a naval base. That was precisely why it had survived. A converted bulk freighter rested against the hollowed face of an asteroid, surrounded by docking frames that looked as though they had been assembled from three different centuries of salvage. A pair of corvettes floated nearby. Beyond them waited gunships, armed freighters, shuttles, and fighters representing enough manufacturers that identifying a common supply chain would have been an intelligence officer's nightmare.

There were no matching hulls. No formation lights. No parade lines. Just ships. Enough of them to hurt someone. "Imperials confirmed." The announcement traveled across the flotilla's encrypted network.

On the bridge of the Wayward Fortune, Captain Dessa Korr leaned against the edge of the tactical display and watched new contacts populate the hologram. The Mirialan had never bothered with the theatricality expected of a pirate captain. No elaborate coat. No collection of trophies. No dramatic chair positioned at the center of her bridge. Just an old flight jacket, a blaster at her hip, and the patient expression of someone watching another being make a mistake. "How many?"

"Still resolving." Her sensor operator enlarged one of the contacts. "Enough that we shouldn't still be here."

Dessa smiled faintly. "We're not."

The order had already gone out. Across the anchorage, engines ignited. But the flotilla did not gather. It disappeared. One corvette vanished into hyperspace. Three freighters accelerated along entirely different vectors. Fighters dropped beneath the asteroid belt's sensor horizon before splitting into independent flights. The converted bulk freighter remained just long enough to transmit a burst of encrypted data before its docking clamps released.

Within minutes, the anchorage was becoming empty space. Almost. A handful of ships remained behind. The oldest. The slowest. The ones that looked exactly like the sort of vessels pirates would abandon when an Imperial fleet arrived.

Their transponders came alive. So did several others that did not exist. False contacts began appearing throughout the Chiron system. A pirate cruiser near one of the moons. Three raiders accelerating toward the planet. A freighter running without identification toward an old orbital installation. Another signal appeared near the edge of the system and disappeared thirty seconds later. Then another. Then six.

Dessa watched the tactical display become increasingly useless. "Think they'll chase them?" someone asked.

"Of course they will." She straightened. "They came here to hunt pirates." Her finger moved through the hologram, separating the incoming Mahporeem contacts into groups. Warships. Patrol craft. Fighters. Support vessels. The flotilla did not need to defeat all of them. It only needed one captain to become impatient.

One squadron to get too far ahead. One ship to believe it had finally found something worth chasing. "Nobody engages the main body." Dessa ordered. "Let them look. Let them scan. Let them find exactly as much as we want them to find." The remaining officers acknowledged. "If they split up, we test them."

Another gesture marked several predetermined rally points. "If they stay together, we disappear." Then she indicated the abandoned anchorage. Charges had been placed among the structures. Nothing large enough to destroy a capital ship. That wasn't the point. Docking records, navigation computers, abandoned cargo and half-repaired vessels had been left behind deliberately.

Enough evidence to reward whoever discovered it. Enough danger to punish anyone careless enough to believe the pirates had fled in panic. "And if they find this place?" Dessa's smile returned. "Then we let them think they've won something."

The Wayward Fortune turned away from the asteroid. Its engines flared. Moments later, the pirate flagship vanished. Across Chiron, scattered sensor contacts continued blinking into existence. Some were decoys. Some were civilian ships whose transponders had been spoofed. Some were pirates deliberately allowing themselves to be seen. And somewhere among all that noise, small groups of raiders were already maneuvering toward the routes Mahporeem vessels would most likely use to investigate them. The tollkeepers had left the gate open. Now they wanted to see who came through.​