Kal
Whispers
- Intent: Optimise both cargo transportation and getting robbed.
- Image Source: Cargo by Gabriel Gajdoš
- Canon Link: N/A
- Permissions: N/A
- Primary Source: N/A
- Manufacturer: The Globex Corporation | CISLO
- Affiliation: The Globex Corporation | CISLO
- Market Status: Open-Market
- Model: HAUL-R Bulk Freighter
- Production: Mass-Produced
- Material: Hexalloy Hull.
- Classification: Bulk Freighter
- Length: 330 metres
- Width: 63 metres
- Height: 51 metres
- Armament: None
- Defences: Average
- Hangar Space: Average
- Hangar Allocations: HAUL-Rs can hold a few tugboats and shuttles.
- Single Craft Hangar: See above.
- Manoeuvrability Rating: Average
- Speed Rating: Very High (Unburdened)
- Hyperdrive: Class 2 | Class 20 (Backup)
- HAUL-Rs are outfitted with all the features and facilities one would expect from vessels of their size and purpose, among these:
- Nutrimax Dispensers for Culinary Efficiency
- N2 Neural Interface; Inbuilt Compatability
- Data-Brain Autopilot / Monitoring System
- HAUL-Rs are outfitted with a variety of tried-and-tested cost-saving measures, including systems that recycle waste heat and cosmic radiation into usable energy, internal tractor beams to cut both labour costs and offloading time, space-efficient crew quarters, a bleeding-edge system for the recycling of waste into fuel or even edible biomass, and a Hyperdrive able to squeeze fuel for everything it's worth. The HAUL-R series is, in other words, near-unchallenged when it comes to credits-to-cargo hauled over the medium to long term. Especially for safe hyperlanes.
- With the HAUL-R series, the Combined Interstellar Shipping and Logistics Organisation have taken being preyed upon by pirates from an art to a science. The inbuilt data-brains are able to generate standardised ransom offers based on their cargo's value, which can be shared with pirates that have 'demonstrably proven their ability to seize the ship'. The subsequent bounty on their heads is equally standardised.
- Actually boarding the ship reduces the ransom as a matter of principle, as does damage to the vessel, its cargo, or its crew.
- Most HAUL-Rs are rigged to self-destruct if violently boarded, destroying their cargo and by extension piracy's profitability.
- Efficient Transit: HAUL-Rs are designed to transport internal cargo quickly or move several times their own mass in containers.
- Defenceless: HAUL-Rs are designed for efficiency, not combat - their shield only barely covers external containers and the like.
Excitement. Great for holovids, expected on the battleground, but terrible for logistics. Fortunately, the Combined Interstellar Shipping and Logistics Organisation is exceptionally good at being boring - containers arrive on time, neatly packaged, and with paperwork that would make a Muun blush. The HAUL-R series is the embodiment of their company spirit, a practical, cost-effective design that gets the job done under most circumstances.
Naturally, the freighter cannot be expected to stand up to pirates, nor can their crews be expected to resist with anything beyond a firmly-worded statement drawing attention to CISLO's anti-piracy policy and, if they feel up for it, a personalised moral rebuke, e.g., 'What would Lakbo think?'.
In cases where firm moral rebukes are not enough, CISLO's policy is firm - pay out a standardised ransom to pirates that would be able to seize the ship if they wanted to, in exchange for them not doing so. The credits would, of course, be paid after the HAUL-R has safely departed, but CISLO is nothing if not reliable, even when it comes to agreements with outlaws. Naturally, they will still place a bounty on the pirates' heads.
To CISLO, getting robbed isn't personal, it's just business - don't take it personally when your shadowport is nuked.
