Faction THE AUDIT OF MAHPOREEM

[Rue]

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"Zenith will audit the opportunity. If Vūm is correct and Mahporeem has two years before serious systemic failures begin, we will know what requires immediate investment... If Lady Asara is correct and Mahporeem is already recovering, then we can stop discussing rescue and start discussing growth... And if the truth lies somewhere between the two..."
-- Nolle Tron at the end of the Tarsai Summit.

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Tag: Nolle Tron | R'ayne Asara

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They say Mahporeem was vibrant once-upon-a-time. It's primary terrain suggested that the world was once filled with rolling plains and forests for all the eye to see. The perfect place for a colony, at least, at the time. If you know where to look then there are still signs from what used to be before the Mahporieem surrendered themselves into exile, on the furthest edges of the Galaxy, as they hid following the fall of Palpatine's Galactic Empire. But now there is all the smog and smoke in the air that makes your eyes water and obfuscates the senses hiding what used to be. It comes from all the centuries of junk that has been accumulated and piled over which feels like eons in a mere blink to time. You start getting used to the smell if you live for long enough in Corrox City.

Rue stood in the streets at early morning rise amid the fog. The mask on her face was an uncomfortable weight. But it was better than breathing the air all around it. It smelled and even tasted something awful. The fog was so thick in the air that not even the Weiss' star could break through it to illuminate the polluted streets. But even down here at this depth beneath those certain iron grey clad skies and the towering skyscrapers of a city built together through the scrap Rue couldn't escape the eye of Umbrella. Neon advertisements littered the billboards and on the windows of almost every build telling Corrox about some new product that the N&Z were promoting for sale. It felt like Umbrella corp was everywhere when you were on Mahporeem. Pandora's box had been opened a long time ago before Sularen ever made contact with these people and the Mahporieem soul was being sold to the devil himself. Hunger satiates itself for now.

They had Her to thank for that.

N&Z ENGINEERING SOLUTIONS ' EnSol ' ADVERTISEMENT: Corrox never sleeps. Neither should your infrastructure. When the skyline fails, EnSol builds it higher. Precision engineering. Industrial solutions. Tomorrow, delivered today. N&Z Engineering Solutions. EnSol. A proud division of N&Z Umbrella Corporation. ' Build beyond survival. ' THIS ADVERTISEMENT WAS BROUGHT TO YOU BY VŪM ​

It was bitterly cold in the morning and frost ate at the dirtied pavement beneath Rue's boots as she stood beneath the passing purple strobing lights of the advertisements while they played somewhere overhead. They served as a continuous loop played among many others throughout the day and night that was never ending. It was an assault on the senses and the mind. Rue tried to ignore all of it. She kept the shoal of her cloak close while hiding beneath the cowl of her dark robes. Traffic was light in this quadrant of the city but that would change within the hour as more people got up to go to work. It was the beginning of a new day on Mahporeem on the advent of a great change out here on these edges of the Outer Rim. This new High Command, who have replaced the planetary' triumvirate, is said to have eyes on reclaiming former Imperial territories now. A thousand-years in the fog and dirt emerged a new superpower. There was something to be admired about these Mahporieem.

They refused to die in the dark and lived long enough to see a new Iron Sun emerge from the darkness.

Bweep… bweep… bweep…

Rue tried not to stare at the Umbrella neon advertisements and instead focused her study on the probe droids as they floated all around her. They were collecting dirt samples in both the ground and the air. Others were conducting analyses on pollution both in noise and other criteria that Rue honestly didn't entirely understand. Not that their findings would carry much weight on what Vūm thought. It was imperative to their designs on the planet that the company deduce, present or convince others within the Mahporeem Imperial Remnant that this world was on the cusp of an ecological disaster. That their capital was going to fold unless they did something about it. What they wanted them to do about it. Someone was going to find out the truth one way or the other in the end. These things have a way of revealing themselves.

Von Strauss was close. So close.

If the audit proved the theory that Mahporeem was going to die within two years was true then that was perfectly acceptable to the hedge funds plans. But this was Vūm that they were dealing with. Truth and lies were often blurred between what was fiction or reality. When you are the strong then it is through this strength that a solitary individual can acquire power; and it is the powerful who dictate what is true or what is not. If they want to convince you that your world is dying then that is what they are going to do. In one hand presents the disaster that is coming on the horizon and in the other a cure for all your problems. Purple shades and lights continue to cascade through the smog to assault Rue (and the other denizens around her) from Umbrella's boards as the advertisement changes to something else. Rue can't help but look up at this one.

N&Z TARSAI VIGIL ' Tarsai ' ADVERTISEMENT: In the Mid-systems lies a New Mahporeem. A new colony. New homes. New industry. New horizons. Tarsai Vigil is building for tomorrow, today. A new world rises and awaits. New Mahporeem — Coming Soon. N&Z Umbrella Corporation. THIS ADVERTISEMENT WAS BROUGHT TO YOU BY VŪM ​

There be tyrants walking these streets now. Dreams within dreams, plans within plans, with a scope that is never ending, and an invisible hand guiding through these smog covered lands.

Reaching, pushing, deceiving . . .

---

 

[Nolle Tron]

Zenith Point Ventures

The first thing Nolle Tron noticed about Corrox was that it was very easy to believe the world was dying. That was precisely the problem. She stood several steps from the lowered boarding ramp of the Zenith shuttle, looking out across a city half-lost beneath its own morning haze. Advertisements burned through the smog in brilliant purples and blues. Somewhere beyond them were towers, traffic lanes, factories, reclamation projects, and millions of people who had apparently managed to survive here despite centuries of accumulated industrial abuse.

Nolle adjusted the collar of her coat. "Well."

Beside her, Cira Velmari looked down at her datapad. "That is not a scientific observation."

Nolle glanced toward the blue-skinned Mikkian. "I was going to say that the air is terrible."

"Still not particularly scientific."

"My eyes are watering."

Cira finally looked up. "Better."

The corner of Nolle's mouth twitched. This was why Cira was here. Nolle had made the commitment at Tarsai. Zenith Point Ventures would determine whether Vūm's projections were correct, whether the Mahporeem Science Division's considerably more optimistic assessment was correct, or whether—as Nolle suspected was usually the case when two interested parties presented mutually exclusive certainties—the truth occupied the inconvenient territory between them. But Nolle would not conduct the audit herself. She had investments to consider. That alone made her unsuitable.

Cira did not. The Mikkian descended the ramp first, dressed with almost aggressively understated professionalism. Her datapad was already connected to the portable audit system being unloaded behind them. Environmental probes, sealed sample containers and independent sensor packages followed. More important than any individual instrument, however, were the protocols Cira had spent the journey establishing.

Nobody got to grade their own examination. "Vūm's data remains segregated from the Science Division's data," Cira stated as she walked. "Neither dataset will be used as our baseline. We establish our own."

Nolle followed. "They are both going to hate that."

"Then I have probably made the correct decision." That earned an actual smile. Cira continued without looking away from her datapad. "Atmospheric contamination. Soil toxicity. Groundwater. Industrial runoff. Biodiversity where sufficient records exist for comparison. Waste accumulation. Reclamation rates. Agricultural sustainability. Population exposure. We will also examine historical measurements rather than limiting ourselves to current conditions."

That last part mattered. A filthy planet was not necessarily a dying planet. A cleaner planet was not necessarily a recovering one. Direction mattered as much as condition. Nolle's gaze lifted toward one of the enormous advertisements glowing overhead. "And the projections?"

"Rebuilt independently."

"Including the two-year estimate?"

Cira stopped walking. Now she looked directly at Nolle. "Especially the two-year estimate."

The answer pleased her. Vūm had presented Zenith with an opportunity measured in enormous infrastructure requirements should Mahporeem truly be approaching systemic ecological failure. The Mahporeem Science Division's position suggested an entirely different opportunity: investment into a recovering economy rather than emergency intervention. Either conclusion could make Zenith money. That was another reason Nolle wanted the answer to be real.

"Follow the numbers wherever they go, Cira. I don't care whose argument survives."

The Mikkian gave the faintest inclination of her head. "I wasn't planning to ask permission."

Nolle chuckled softly and resumed walking. Ahead, probe droids were already moving through the streets, gathering samples beneath Corrox's artificial neon dawn. She recognized Vūm's work easily enough. Their presence was expected. Their conclusions were not.

"One more thing." Cira's tendrils shifted slightly as she glanced sideways. "Audit the auditors."

That brought her to another stop. Nolle gestured vaguely toward Corrox around them. "Vūm benefits if Mahporeem is dying. The Science Division has reasons to want Mahporeem declared stable. Zenith benefits from knowing which investments are actually necessary. Everyone involved has an incentive."

Cira regarded her for several seconds. Then her attention returned to the datapad. A new category appeared within the audit architecture.

INSTITUTIONAL BIAS / CONFLICT ANALYSIS

"Including Zenith Point Ventures?"

Nolle didn't hesitate. "Especially Zenith Point Ventures."

Cira nodded once. Good. No speeches. No accusations. No assumption that smog hanging between skyscrapers proved an approaching apocalypse, nor that functioning reclamation equipment proved salvation was already underway. They would take samples. They would inspect records. They would compare decades of measurements. They would identify who collected every dataset, who funded the collection, what methodology had been employed, what had been omitted, and who stood to benefit from the resulting interpretation. Then Cira Velmari would balance the ledger.

Nolle slipped her hands into the pockets of her coat and looked through the polluted haze toward Corrox. At Tarsai she had promised them an answer. Now they simply had to make certain it was the right one.

Nolle Tron

• Location: Corrox City, Mahporeem
• Objective: Establish the independent ecological audit
• Outfit: Grungy Professional
• Company: Cira Velmari, Audit staff
• Interaction: Rue | R'ayne Asara | OPEN

 

[R'ayne Asara]

the audit of mahporeem

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dark aresnal • Draconic Scourge | Aura of Asara
tags • Rue | Nolle Tron

The Day Before...

My office was quiet save for the low mechanical breathing of the station beyond my walls, a distant chorus of machinery and recycled air that seemed almost alive in the darkness.

Jord Du’mas sat opposite me beneath the cold illumination of my desk, his datapad casting pallid light across his purple, fur covered face as we reviewed the material that would soon be placed before Zenith Point Ventures; and the mysterious Vūm. I rested one hand upon the arm of my chair, my black nails tapping softly against its surface while the holographic model of Mahporeem turned between us.

“The audit will not merely ask whether Mahporeem can survive,” I said, watching the image rotate beneath my gaze. “It will ask whether it can remain alive while we continue to consume, salvage, manufacture, and expand.”

Dr. Du’mas adjusted the data streams, bringing up atmospheric composition, soil degradation, water reserves, industrial contamination, agricultural output, and population projections. The figures were neither comforting nor damning.

Mahporeem was wounded, certainly, but wounds were not synonymous with death.

They were simply opportunities for something clever enough to stitch the flesh together.

Jord leaned forward, explaining that with deliberate investment into water reclamation, soil restoration, controlled industrial zones, reforestation, atmospheric filtration, and sustainable agricultural systems, Mahporeem could transform its ecological trajectory rather than merely postpone its collapse. I smiled faintly at that thought, because there was something almost obscene about the idea of an empire treating its own planet as something worth preserving.

“And our territorial expansion must obey the same principle,” I whispered, letting my fingers trail across the holographic projection of Mahporeem. “We cannot continue collecting planetary real estate simply because empty worlds happen to possess coordinates.”

Expansion without financial calculation was merely gluttony wearing an imperial uniform. Every new territory had to justify itself through resources, trade, infrastructure, strategic value, and its capacity to strengthen what we already possessed. If Mahporeem invested wisely in its ecosystem while expanding with economic purpose rather than vanity, the data suggested something far more interesting than survival.

I looked toward the doctor, the smile sharpening upon my black-painted lips. “If Zenith Point Ventures and Vūm truly wishes to understand what Mahporeem can become, then let them examine the evidence carefully. With the right investments, disciplined expansion, and enough financial thought to restrain our appetites; Mahporeem need not remain another forgotten world of scrap and industry.”

I watched Mahporeem flicker within the hologram like a distant diamond buried beneath ash. “It could become the Jewel of the Outer Rim Territories.”

Location • Corrax, Mahporeem

Corrax received us beneath a sky the color of old iron, its smog atmosphere hanging over the capital like a vast, bruised cathedral ceiling. Jord Du’mas and I were promptly transferred from the landing platform, where we donned our breathing apparatus prior to departure, toward the newly erected Palace of Engineers, its unique architecture rising from the heart of the city with all the bravado of something built to convince the galaxy that Mahporeem indeed possesses a future.

Our masks were collected upon arrival to be sterilized, as it was protocol at Palace of Engineers, for all incoming bodies. We were then escorted through its private wings by silent attendants, our footsteps swallowed by polished stone and dim architectural lighting.

Along the way, Jord briefed me again on the Doan Mines restoration and upgrade project, detailing the improvements in extraction efficiency, geological surveying, environmental containment, and scientific data gathered from the previously neglected depths.

I listened with my hands folded behind my back, allowing the information to settle into the darker chambers of my thoughts. Doan had become more than another mining planet being dragged back from industrial death; it had become evidence that even discarded places could be made useful again when science was permitted to dictate rather than merely serve.

“But Shinbone is the more interesting precedent,” I remarked as we approached the office assigned to us. "If mining companies could be enticed toward Shinbone by the promise of profitable extraction, infrastructure, and access to resources, perhaps Mahporeem could cultivate the same appetite elsewhere."

I glanced toward my furry, spikey companion, allowing a thin, knowing smile to creep across my lips. Our junk problem was no secret, the planet had accumulated years of refuse until entire landscapes seemed constructed from the bones of forgotten industries.

Yet perhaps what we considered waste was merely an asset awaiting the correct parasite. Mining firms, reclamation corporations, industrial recyclers, someone might be persuaded to descend upon those mountains of discarded machinery and discover profit beneath the rust.

“But that is a problem for another day,” I said as the doors opened before us, revealing the private office beyond. “First, the audit. We determine whether Mahporeem can sustain the future we intend to build upon it as we believe. Then we decide precisely what that future is worth.”

I stepped inside, the doors closing behind Jord and me with a sound like a tomb being sealed. “One problem at a time, Doctor. First the audit, then the future.”​

 

[Evan Kade]

Evan Kade had learned that the easiest way into a place was rarely through the front door.
The second easiest was to arrive carrying equipment nobody wanted to inspect too closely. By the time the audit had properly begun, Evan was already somewhere within it.

He wore the subdued uniform of a contracted environmental systems technician, complete with an identification badge that suggested he had been brought in to assist with the calibration and maintenance of several pieces of monitoring equipment. Nothing about him was particularly memorable. His clothing was practical, his credentials were plausible, and the equipment case in his hand contained enough legitimate tools to make the rest of the story considerably easier to believe. He belonged. Or, at least, nobody had found a reason to question why he was there. That was usually enough.

Evan moved between the probe droids and their operators, occasionally stopping to check a reading or make a minor adjustment to a sensor. He offered little conversation unless someone spoke to him first, and when they did, he answered like someone who had spent years working around people who were far more interested in the numbers than the person collecting them. It was an excellent position from which to observe.

Rue was interested in the environmental data. Cira was interested in what that data actually proved. Others were interested in what the conclusions might mean for Mahporeem. And somewhere beneath all of that sat the corporate interests that had brought everyone together in the first place.

Evan didn't need to decide which of them was telling the truth. He simply needed to determine what each of them believed was true. That was often considerably more useful.

His gaze moved casually across the worksite as another series of readings appeared on a handheld display. He noted the equipment being used, who handled the data, who had access to the records, and who seemed particularly interested in the results. More importantly, he watched the people: Who spoke privately when the others moved on. Who seemed uncomfortable when certain subjects came up. Who deferred to whom. Who asked questions. Who avoided answering them.

His employer hadn't given him a particularly complicated instruction. Find out what the High Republic knows. And, just as importantly: Find out what Mahporeem wants them to believe.

Evan glanced down at the display in his hand. He gave a minor adjustment to one of the sensors. It was nothing suspicious. And nothing interesting. Exactly the sort of thing nobody would remember him doing later.

A quiet voice sounded through the comlink concealed beneath his collar. "We're in position."

Evan's expression didn't change. "Good."

One of his trusted slicers was monitoring the digital side of the operation. Another contact had been given a more mundane assignment: keep track of movements around the audit and identify anyone who might have reason to meet privately with the Republic delegation.
Evan preferred not doing everything himself.
It reduced the number of ways an operation could fail.

He looked up as another group passed through the area. His eyes lingered for only a moment before returning to his work. He wasn't here to steal a datapad. He wasn't here to sabotage the audit. He wasn't even particularly interested in discovering whether Mahporeem was genuinely facing an ecological crisis. He was here to find out what everyone else intended to do about it. That meant patience. It meant listening. And, occasionally, asking an entirely harmless question that sounded like it had nothing to do with anything.

Evan crouched beside one of the environmental monitors and adjusted a connection.

"Everything reading correctly?" someone asked.


He glanced up with an easy smile.

"So far." He looked back at the display. "Give it another few minutes before you trust the numbers." The answer was mundane enough to be forgotten almost immediately. That was precisely what he wanted. Because while everyone else was busy deciding what the data meant, Evan Kade was quietly collecting something much more valuable; the people behind it.

Tags: Rue Nolle Tron R'ayne Asara

 

[Rue]

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Tags: Nolle Tron | R'ayne Asara | Evan Kade

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It wasn't a surprise when Rue discovered the truth. When Mahporeem had been a state of the Imperial Confederation there hadn't been a ten-year window for the planet's apparently impending ecological disaster. The same was true for the newer two year projections now that the Mahporeem Imperial Remnant was a solitary power no longer allied, aligned or tethered to the other Imperial movements that had banded together under Liraeth Deschart. It was a lie, of course. But sometimes lies could lay in the truth. You need only spend two minutes in Corrox to see why it was easy to believe that this planet was a blip in time away from catastrophe.

Bweep… bweep… bweep…

As another probe passed by Rue she continued to try and ignore the unsettling advertisements going on all around her. It had been the same during her youth back in Lianna City before it had been destroyed. Back then you couldn't embark on public transportation or the city walkways between each intersection without seeing Umbrella posted everywhere. Rue was just old enough to remember that there had been days before the N&Z could be found in every corner of the old city. They had settled in slowly, over a long period of time, and it was only now that Rue understood why. A certain enigmatic woman had been helping them seep into the cracks of the Imperial movements who took over the Tion Hegemony and later the Ash Worlds. Now they were doing the same thing to Mahporeem.

It quietly made her ill to think that they could have been behind the Mandalorian and Sith retaliatory strikes. Someone who was more honest with themselves could put the links together. Rue's master created Project Tion. Umbrella had been a member of the clandestine group. Brosi was attacked twice. Then the Sith Empire retaliated and destroyed the city that Rue called home with their allies from Mandalore. Now those same people were up to something on Mahporeem and it involved this audit. They wanted the Imperials to think something was wrong and Rue was helping them to do it. But Rue wasn't going to admit any of that even to herself. The Dark Side has a way of warping your sense of self and the truth after-all.

Ignorance to bliss.

A probe stops before the vulnerable undercover Sith apprentice and displays a message:

VŪM AUDIT PRELIMINARY FINDINGS: ​ Corrox is one of Mahporeem's largest population centres, with approximately 34.6 million inhabitants out of a planetary population of at least 787 million. Its environmental problems are intensified by the condition of the planet itself: vast areas outside the city consist of accumulated scrap, discarded machinery and industrial waste. Corrox therefore exists within an already heavily contaminated environment. The atmosphere remains technically breathable, but air-quality measurements are troubling. Average PM2.5 levels are estimated at 18 µg/m³, rising above 35 µg/m³ near major scrapyards and industrial districts. Residents commonly report burning or watering eyes after prolonged exposure outdoors, while protective masks and eye protection are routine. Atmospheric monitoring has also detected elevated concentrations of metal particulates and industrial gases, although generally below immediately lethal levels. Water contamination is similarly widespread. Nitrate concentrations in some waterways reach 45–49 mg/L, while traces of dissolved heavy metals have been detected downstream from large scrap fields. Around 6 billion litres of water are consumed by Corrox each day, placing additional pressure on already contaminated supplies. The city generates approximately 44 million tonnes of waste annually, much of which ultimately joins Mahporeem's existing scrap fields. Corrox is therefore not facing an instant planetary catastrophe. The greater concern is chronic environmental deterioration: polluted air, contaminated water, expanding waste fields and enormous population growth are combining to make the city's environment progressively less habitable.

If Rue's face was visible beneath the mask then one might find her upper lip curling in annoyance as the preliminary findings were displayed. There were a lot of things wrong in this city. That much was obvious before these probe droids begun surveying the city for the signs which Vūm wanted to find. But according to these finds it would be a very big stretch to say that a planetary wide ecological disaster was on the horizon.

What they wanted to find here in Corrox (and by extension the rest of Mahporeem) was evidence to prompt a response which bordered on panicking. Then a solution would be provided to that panic, to the disaster, thereby creating a sense of debt and gratitude thereby embedding them deeper into the planet's institutions. This was how they had achieved leverage, influence and prominence in former Imperial regimes.

Kilran wanted a coup d'état and an invasion of the Outer Rim Territories. They had provided him the means.

Deschart wanted to elevate her name back into the prominent position it had formerly held in the past. They had provided her the means.

Now they wanted leverage over Mahporeem. Now it was a question of finding out what the people here wanted. An ecological disaster would warrant a response and the need for a saviour. They would find one.

Rue adjusted the probe as it hovered in front of her. First she checked to see if the report had been circulated along the sub-routines connecting it to the other droids that were in operation and found that it had. So Rue ran a diagnostic to find the report in the other probes before commanding them to delete the preliminary findings report save for the one hovering in front of her. When that was done Rue programmed the probe to send the report into an archive controlled by Vūm before deleting it out of the probes memory banks. Then she let go of the probe and commanded it to go back to work.

Beneath the cowl of her robe Rue lowered her mask to a transmitter and activate the device after removing it from her utility belt. Between two gloved hands Rue activated the device and brought up the display. Two contacts were pinging green on the interface which told Rue that Z.P.V were now in Corrox and that the Ministry of Science were patched into the audit. Rue couldn't help but frown when she discovered that both sides were commencing with their own audits which differentiated from Vūm.

"Competition," Rue muttered to herself.

---

 

[Nolle Tron]

Zenith Point Ventures

Nolle had learned long ago that there were few things more dangerous than two groups of intelligent people who were both absolutely certain they were right. Three groups, apparently, made things interesting. She stood beside one of Zenith's temporary monitoring stations, boots already carrying a healthy coating of Corrox grime despite the relatively short time they had been outside. A respirator hung ready at her side. The professional coat she had selected for the occasion had proven its worth against the occasional drizzle, industrial residue, and one particularly inconsiderate puddle.

Cira appeared entirely unconcerned by any of it. The Mikkian stood over a portable terminal while Zenith's environmental teams populated its display. Atmospheric readings. Water samples. Soil contamination. Scrap-field measurements. Population figures. Historical records where they could be reliably obtained. Vūm had its probes. The Mahporeem Science Division had its assessment. Zenith now had its own.

Nolle leaned slightly closer to the display. "So?"

Cira didn't look up. "So what?"

"Is Mahporeem dying?"

That finally earned Nolle a glance. "That's a terrible question."

Nolle smiled faintly. "I suspect several people here would disagree."

"Then several people here are asking terrible questions." Cira turned the terminal toward her. There was no single number highlighted in red. No convenient countdown until planetary catastrophe. Instead there were columns upon columns of measurements accompanied by confidence intervals, collection locations and timestamps.

"Mahporeem is polluted. We knew that before we landed. Corrox is polluted. We knew that before we landed too." A finger moved across the display. "Neither observation tells us whether conditions are stable, deteriorating, improving, or approaching a systemic threshold."

Nolle folded her arms. "So what should I have asked?"

Cira immediately answered. "What is deteriorating? At what rate? Why? Is that rate accelerating? What happens if nothing changes? What happens if the proposed interventions are implemented?" A beat passed. "Those are questions I can audit."

Nolle's expression became more thoughtful. That distinction mattered. A planet could be filthy without being on the verge of ecological collapse. It could also appear stable because the process killing it happened slowly enough that nobody noticed until recovery became prohibitively expensive. "And our preliminary numbers?"

Cira looked back toward the terminal. "Not enough." Nolle waited. Cira sighed. "You want something more dramatic."

"I am surrounded by Imperials, mysterious corporations, environmental scientists and enough industrial pollution to discolor the sky. I feel entitled to a little drama."

Cira's tendrils shifted slightly. "Fine. I can already tell you one thing."

Nolle's forehead furrowed. "That sounds ominous."

"Everyone has been answering the wrong question." There it was. Nolle gave a quiet laugh. Cira returned to work. Whatever satisfaction Nolle might have taken from coaxing that answer out of her disappeared when several new datasets appeared. They were preliminary, incomplete and geographically narrow. Cira wasn't going to pretend otherwise. Good. That was why she was here.

"I want the Science Division's complete model."

"They've offered us their evidence."

"Evidence isn't a conclusion." Cira began composing a request. "Raw measurements. Historical datasets. Sampling locations. Methodology. Population assumptions. Industrial-growth assumptions. Proposed remediation programs and the models used to determine their effects." Another request appeared beside it. Vūm. "Same from them."

Nolle tilted her head. "No special treatment?"

Cira looked genuinely offended. "Of course there's special treatment." Nolle blinked. "I'm going to assume everyone is wrong until they demonstrate otherwise."

"Ah. Equal-opportunity hostility."

"Independence."

"Your word is less entertaining." Nolle stepped away from the terminal, looking across the collection of technicians, probes and monitoring equipment scattered through their portion of Corrox. Three audits. Initially, she had considered that inefficient. Now she wasn't so certain. Three independently collected datasets could create noise. They could also expose it. "Invite both sides to submit everything."

Cira glanced toward her. "Not reports. Everything. If the Science Division believes investment can reverse the trajectory, I want to know exactly how they reached that conclusion. If Vūm believes we're approaching a crisis, I want the model that puts us there."

Nolle paused. "And don't compare either one against the other."

Cira's expression softened by the smallest amount. "Compare both against ours."

"Exactly." That was something Zenith could offer which neither side could. Not another argument. A control.

Cira's attention shifted toward the technicians working around the monitoring equipment. "Then I'm changing our collection protocol." She keyed several commands into the terminal. "Every Zenith sensor will mirror its raw output before processing. Independent timestamp. Read-only archive. Calibration happens afterward."

Nolle's brow furrowed. "Meaning?"

"Meaning I want to know what the instrument actually measured before somebody decides what the instrument was supposed to have measured." That sounded considerably more ominous. Cira continued. "Every calibration, maintenance cycle, software adjustment and physical intervention gets logged against an individual credential. Nobody touches Zenith equipment anonymously."

Across the worksite, technicians began receiving the revised procedures on their datapads. "Expecting sabotage?"

"No." Cira locked the terminal. "I'm expecting an audit."

For a moment Nolle simply stared at her. Then she smiled. That answer was precisely why Cira was here. Nolle looked beyond their station toward Corrox itself. Somewhere beneath the smog and towers were nearly eight hundred million lives spread across Mahporeem, an economy built from industry and salvage, and a government trying to determine whether its homeworld could support whatever ambitions came next.

There would be plenty of time for solutions. First they needed the problem. "All right. Present condition. Historical trajectory. Future projections."

Cira nodded. "And provenance."

Nolle glanced back. "You really don't trust anyone, do you?"

Cira picked up her datapad and started toward the next monitoring station. "I trust records that balance."

Nolle followed her into the grime. "And if they don't?"

Cira didn't bother turning around. "Then we find out why."

Nolle gave another nod. "I think it might be best that I deliver your requests in person." With that the Near-Duros departed to meet with Vūm and Mahporeem’s representatives.

Nolle Tron

• Location: Corrox City, Mahporeem
• Objective: Establish the independent audit baseline
• Outfit: Grungy Professional
• Company: Cira Velmari, Audit staff
• Interaction: Rue | R'ayne Asara | Evan Kade | OPEN

 

[Tyger Tyger]

Location:Luxo-Lite Run, Mahporeem Badlands Interaction: Slice of Life | Everyone/Noone/Open

Once in a lifetime, the suffering of fools...
To find our way home, to break in these bones
Once in a lifetime​

Stray beams of fluoros lap circles at the Luxo-Light Run. Through the rusted, grime-crusted speakers dangling from the grandstand eaves, a tinny synth-pop track from some distant world bled into the dust, its driving rhythm beating out a desperate longing for a shot at the night. It was a fleeting trend in pod racing – these neon-wrapped engines brought vibrant color to the salvage wastes in streaks of pinks and turquoise against the dusk and descending night. The pods had cost a fortune (well, in local terms) to be overhauled with the lighting effect, and as trends shifted, it just became cheaper to manufacture whole new chassis than to refit these old ones. After all, the bright lights served as little more than a beacon for aggressive opponents, making the drivers easy targets against the dark salvage wastes. So now, they burst around their little piece of the junkyard just because they can, because they don't know what else to do.

Once in a lifetime​

Tyger Tyger wasn't completely alone from where he watched in the open stands. This far from Corrox, the air was reasonably free from the stench of rot brought on by the food and fecal castaways of the city's denizens. The pollution here was a more localized decay – the track's own middling, half-eaten concessions overflowing from garbage bins and a spare crowd of gamblers offering a perfume sampling of the stink of many worlds. He took note of a man who made no pretense of thinking this a "night-out" – apparently sporting a pair of boxer shorts, partially disintegrated by rectal mucous and bleacher friction.

Once in a lifetime​

Still, the other attendees were more than happy to give Tyger Tyger his personal space. Some were old-timers who recognized the bounty hunter at a glance from his centuries-old reputation. Others were less underworld-savvy, simply seeing him as one more gunned-up nerf herder ready to spark a shootout—the exact kind of creature ensuring that nowhere in this galaxy could entertain the dream of peace for even a second. Whatever their reasons, they kept their distance, leaving him free to recline and manspread to his heart's content.

Oh​

But there was none, be it "contentment" or even "heart." Instead, he looked out on the racing fluoros with dead eyes, twirling the mouth of a beer bottle between his thumb and two fingers and tried desperately not to finish the leavings swirling at the bottom, lest he be forced to get up, to buy another, to submit to a miserable cycle.

It was the story that drove this shit; what kept the lights on long after the novelty gave into boredom and finally collapsed into an all-swallowing stillness. A younger Milo would have been amazed at the ability to be surrounded by such commotion, yet remain so unaffected by it.

"Stop it. Talk to me."

He could hear her say. He could picture her in his mind's eye, standing in the hallway to the Far Star's pilot seat, pleading with him to end the silence he had taken to carrying around with him like a blanket.

"Tell me why we're here."

Milo gently set the finished drink down at the empty benchspace beside him as his body folded in half, jetpack stacked on his back. His hands folded together as if entering into an unconscious desire for prayer, while his eyes now sought out the teals and radical pinks to speak to them as if they were the face of God.

"I read about this in holozine before I started as Tyger Tyger…or maybe it was after…," he grumbled, initially speaking under his breath in a low, gravelly tone. "It was awhile ago, though…I know that." But with each additional word, he got lost in the pantomime, and the conversation became more natural.

"Anyway…It came from the Natives finally acquiescing to participate in one of the planet's sole tourist attractions…I think they were called the Mer-ZOD-dians? Mer-ZOID-dians?"

He didn't know. He let it lie.

"They were colorful. Like, literally. Red, blue, and green skin, face tattoos…" He attempted to construct the appearance using his hands. "A long… Twi'lek… brainstalk thing coming out of the back of their head."

Milo noted someone was looking at him. He shrugged, falling back into a more closed, introverted posture as his voice dropped even lower, the spoken words blending back into the privacy of his own head.

"I don't know. It said the loud colors of the pods, their long, neon streaks trailing behind them—it had something to do with the karkin'… tentacle whatever-it-is. A 'cultural expression,' fostered out of environmental constraints and a desire to survive. But when the constraints were lifted, and survival became almost guaranteed, all 'Culture' expressed was a couple lines in a consumer profile for how the machines should market to you. In the end, it came down to whether or not you could bet on the races. Then, once the betting became remote, there was really no reason to come out anymore."

Down below, the podracers drifted through a wide turn, their engines humming in a low, distant drone. The turquoise and pink fluoros cast long, watercolor hues across the mounds of scrap metal, illuminating the rusted frame of a vintage, Las-Vegas-style neon billboard overlooking the track. The sign was a relic from a different era: a heavily weathered, light-up image of Danger Arceneau offering a suggestive wink and a deep neckline, her neon-lit lips curved into a permanent, seductive smile to hawk an obsolete blaster pistol or scattergun. It was straightforward, transactional greed—a relic from a time when corporations still had to seduce the consumer with cheap fantasy and actual product to get their credits. All the folksy charm of a cigarette vending machine.

"I figured this was the kind of thing I should go see when I ever got out of Kaas City. When I got out of the Navy, and was a big Tommy Toughguy who could take on all comers and do whatever I wanted… But I never made it over here when it was all happening. I was always elbows deep in some horror, filling coffins with someone else's enemies or mass graves in someone else's war. Always working…"

He watched a lone streak of magenta glide smoothly over a ridge of crushed starship hulls. It didn't flash or explode; it just sailed quietly against the descending night sky like a stray shooting star, completely indifferent to the graveyard of iron beneath it.

"In eight years, I'll be as old as my dad was when he gave me the ship, accidentally put me on this adventure. How much more will I have missed in another decade?"

He deliberately didn't think of Leia.

"Would it have really been so much different if I – I don't know – worked at a bank my whole life?"

He sighed, mushing his face in his hands, groaning, "What do you do when you're bored of living out everyone else's big escape fantasy?"

Peripherally, it dawned on him that it wasn't "everyone else's." It was specifically his father's.

The pack thundered past the grandstands one final time, leaving behind a thick cloud of dust that hung suspended in the heavy air. Settling slowly back onto the dirtied pavement was the faint, luminous mist of the chemical exhaust—a soft, residual shimmer of violet and pink that refused to fade immediately into the shadows. It was a beautiful, radioactive scar left on a wasteland that didn't care, left behind by a sport that nobody watched anymore.

The soft light illuminated the ghost of a smile on the bounty hunter's face.

"Well…I guess it's still new to me. I'm glad you're h-…"

Milo turned to smile at Leia in the bleacher beside him, only to find the beer he couldn't quite abandon and a feeling he hadn't experienced in nearly 25 years. His eyes reddened, flushed wet, as his mouth involuntarily warped into a crooked frown. As if it could hide his eyes, hide his thoughts, he looked down at the bleachers in the rows in front of him, leading on into the pit.

She was gone.

The toilets of the Luxo-Light Run stadium stood empty, silent save for an errant dripping and the periodic buzz as passing fluoropods shook the thin durasteel walls. The vibration rattled the pipes within, as well as the long piss trough constructed for the full gamut of the galaxy's genital anatomy. Tyger Tyger threw caution to the wind and splashed what passed for water onto his face, glancing up into the bathroom mirror to ensure it had washed away what remained of the earlier discontent.

Thumbing away some of the gunk from the surface, he peered at his own reflection, moving closer to inspect his maturing hairline and whether or not time had managed to shapen his widow's peak into an atomic edge.

The glass flickered, a purple pulse of light enveloping his reflection and then muting it into the background until it vanished entirely. An ad by Vūm.

N&Z TARSAI VIGIL
Tarsai​

Tyger Tyger noted the symbol appeared to have horns – like some minotaur, or the devil, or the Mandalorian insignia. He pondered passively if this were a residual byproduct of his aftermarket health stims.

ADVERTISEMENT:

In the Mid-systems lies a New Mahporeem.

A new colony.
New homes. New industry. New horizons.

​

It occurred to him that none of that really meant anything, and he had literally no idea what the product was. The slick sterility of the ad could be anything from DJ software to pharmaceuticals to planetary holocaust. Tyger Tyger wagered all three. He watched the screen dubiously, waiting for it to pass.

Tarsai Vigil is building for tomorrow, today.

A new world rises and awaits.

New Mahporeem — Coming Soon.
N&Z Umbrella Corporation.​

It stood like a monolith at the edge of his primate community - You should know it, or you should know you don't know it. Regardless of which, it was part of your life, now and forever. It didn't need to sell him anything – It already owned the infrastructure that governed the rhythms of his every day. What more could he offer it but his cheap, stupid life?

The ad quietly subsided, disappearing back into the world whence it came and leaving Tyger Tyger with his reflection.

 

[R'ayne Asara]

the audit of mahporeem

​

dark aresnal • Draconic Scourge | Aura of Asara
tags • Rue | Nolle Tron | Evan Kade | Tyger Tyger

Dr. Jord Du’mas sat opposite me within the private wing, his hands folded over the illuminated projections of Mahporeem’s ecological models. Between us, the office was quiet save for the muted hum of processors and the occasional pulse of data crawling across the transparisteel display.

“The audit may reveal more than degradation,” Dr. Du'mas said, his voice carrying the sterile precision of a scientist accustomed to speaking in probabilities rather than fears.

“If Zenith Point Ventures and Vūm have independently reached similar projections, then we may be dealing with systemic instability rather than isolated environmental failures. Atmospheric filtration, soil nutrient depletion, water-cycle irregularities, microbial collapse, declining pollinator populations; each variable is interconnected. A failure in one subsystem increases the stress placed upon the others.”

I studied the models without blinking.

Mahporeem was not dying in a single dramatic event. It was unraveling by degrees, each ecological mechanism quietly surrendering its function while the population continued to breathe as though nothing beneath their feet were changing.

“The danger,” I replied, “is not merely what the audit confirms. It's what it may quantify.”

I enlarged the projected ecological cascade, watching the models fracture into increasingly severe projections. “If the calculations establish that Mahporeem possesses a measurable threshold beyond which recovery becomes exponentially more difficult, then that information becomes detrimental in ways that have little to do with science. Investors will see liability. Industrial interests will see opportunity. Political representatives will see weakness.”

Jord nodded. “Which means our immediate objective is not simply to obtain their findings. It is to influence what happens after they are presented.” His wording amused me. Influence was such a civilized word for survival.

“Precisely,” I said. “We must sway the representatives of both Vūm and Zenith Point Ventures toward cooperation. Their expertise, modeling, and resources could provide us with the foundation for remediation. But their support alone may prove insufficient. Mahporeem's ecological deficit is too broad, and its industrial infrastructure too damaged, for two companies to repair everything without external assistance.”

I leaned back, allowing the projections to cast pale geometric shadows across my hands. “There are other companies we can summon. Environmental engineering firms. Atmospheric specialists. Agricultural restoration groups. Hydrological corporations. Perhaps even private scientific consortiums capable of reconstructing damaged ecological networks. And those already aligned with the Mahporeem Empire.”

Jord glanced toward me, his fur slightly twitching. “And each will expect compensation.”

“Naturally.” I closed the projection with a gesture. “But Mahporeem will not become collateral for its own salvation. We will not surrender territorial rights, strategic resources, infrastructure, or political sovereignty merely because some corporation arrives carrying a cure wrapped in a contract.”

The silence that followed felt almost ecclesiastical.

“We will accept assistance,” I continued, “but we will not sell Mahporeem into slavery to obtain it. First, we determine what the audit reveals. Then we determine what assistance is actually necessary. And only after that do we negotiate terms that preserve Mahporeem as a sovereign world rather than turning its recovery into another company's long-term investment property.”

I looked toward Jord. “The planet may be sick, Doctor. That does not mean we allow the vultures to decide who owns the corpse if it dies.”​

 

[Evan Kade]

Evan had learned a long time ago that the most useful information was rarely the information people volunteered. It was the information they became concerned about once someone else started asking questions.

His attention shifted toward one of the nearby terminals as a fresh set of instructions appeared across the audit network. Zenith was changing it's collection protocol. Raw sensor output would now be mirrored before processing, calibration and maintenance would be logged against individual credentials, and every alteration to the equipment would leave a record behind.

Evan glanced down at the sensor he had been working on. Then back towards the terminal. A faint smile touched the corner of his mouth. Well, that's going to make my job slightly more interesting. He hadn't done anything improper, of course. His credentials were legitimate, his equipment was legitimate, and the adjustments he'd made were exactly the sort of routine maintenance his cover required. If anything, the new procedure simply meant that he would have to be a little more deliberate about making sure his paperwork remained as boring as the rest of him.

He finished the calibration and allowed the monitor to run through another cycle. The readings were consistent. That in and of itself was useful. What was considerably more useful was the growing disagreement over what those readings actually meant. Evan had been watching the different teams for long enough now to recognize the distinction. Vūm wanted to demonstrate deterioration. Zenith wanted enough raw information to determine whether deterioration was actually occurring, how quickly, and why. The Ministry appeared to be building models around the possibility that the problems were interconnected.

None of them necessarily needed to be wrong. That was the interesting part.

He glanced towards one of the probe droids as it moved through the industrial haze, it's sensors continuing to collect atmospheric and environmental data. Somewhere beyond it, another team was taking water samples. Further away, technicians were cataloguing the scrap fields and the infrastructure surrounding them. There was a great deal of information being gathered. And far less agreement on what it meant.

A soft tone sounded from the comlink beneath Evan's collar.."Zenith is requesting full raw datasets from the other participants."

Evan kept his eyes on the monitor. "And?"

"The request has been received by the relevant systems. No indication yet whether they're going to cooperate."

That earned the smallest shift of Evan's expression. "Good."

"Good?"

"If everyone immediately agrees, we learn very little." He disconnected before the other voice could answer.

Evan straightened and carried his equipment case toward another monitoring station. As he passed one of Zenith's temporary setups, he slowed just enough to examine the instrumentation. It had an independent timestamp. Read-only archive, too. And raw output preserved before calibration..Someone here was taking the possibility of manipulated data seriously. That didn't mean that they suspected sabotage..It meant that they understood something Evan had learned years ago. Data could be perfectly genuine and still tell a very different story depending upon what happened before and after it was collected.

He crouched beside the station and examined one of the connections. "Need a hand?" he asked the nearest technician. The question was deliberately ordinary, the sort of thing one worker asked another.

While waiting for an answer, Evan glanced across the worksite again. Nolle was moving away from Zenith's monitoring station, apparently intending to speak with representatives from Vūm and the Mahporeem side directly. That caught his attention, and it wasn't because of where she was going, but because of who she was going to speak to. People behaved differently when they were sitting behind a terminal than they did when someone was standing directly in front of them. The latter was usually considerably more informative.

His hidden comlink clicked again. "We're seeing multiple requests for the same historical datasets. Some of them aren't coming from the people currently collecting samples."

Evan's eyes remained on the equipment in front of him as he spoke under his breath. "Can you identify them?"

"Not yet."

"Then don't try too hard."

"You want me to leave it?"

"I want to know who asks next." That was different. If someone was interested in the same historical records being requested by the audit teams, Evan wanted to know why. They might be another interested party. They might be an administrator doing exactly what they were supposed to be doing. Or they might be someone who had no obvious reason to care.

Evan finally received an acknowledgment from the technician beside him and stepped aside to let them access the station. He closed his equipment case and looked once more toward the sprawling city beyond the worksite. Corrox certainly looked bad..That much required no sophisticated model. But appearances were cheap. The real question was whether the conditions were getting worse, how quickly they were getting worse, and whether someone already knew the answer.

His employer hadn't asked him to determine whether Mahporeem was dying. They had asked him to determine what the High Republic knew and what Mahporeem wanted them to believe. Those were two very different questions. And judging by the way the audit was developing, Evan suspected he might get answers to both before anyone realized he had been asking.

Tags: Rue Nolle Tron R'ayne Asara Tyger Tyger

 

[Rue]

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• To promote and spread the politics, economics and military aspirations concerning the ideology of ' Imperialism ' in the Outer Rim Territories and Mid Rim Territories.
• To ruin the commercial, economic and political activities of the Trade Federation as well as their numerous subsidiaries.
• To expand the economic and political powers of the Mahporeem Imperial Remnant in the Outer Rim Territories.
• To acquire control of the commercial, economic and political activities of the N&Z Umbrella Corporation.
• To influence the internal and external politics of the High Republic towards war with the Sith Order.
• To break the Treaty of Twin Crowns between the High Republic and Mandalorian Empire.
• To spy on and report the activities of individuals passing through Shiraya's Sanctuary to the Kainite.

-- The goals of the peculiar and enigmatic investment hedge-fund group colloquially known to a few as Vūm.

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Tags: Nolle Tron | R'ayne Asara | Evan Kade | Tyger Tyger

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Early morning broke at dawn and Corrox stirred beneath the fog. Traffic increased expeditiously as a city became alive again. But no star could break through the canopy of the dark-grey stirring overhead. Street lamps flickered and blazed neon-orange above passers-by as denizens of Mahporeem traversed this walkways on course for places of work or some other type of activity designed to help the planet's continual survival. They say that these people fled here onto a world formerly lined with luscious forests and greenery to escape the tyranny of a Galactic Empire; and yet they could not escape who they were even after a millennia in hiding up until Marlon Sularen made contacted with the former triumvirate that used to govern here.

Culturally Imperialistic there was no room for inefficiency, degradation of the individual, or room for those who did not possess a work ethic on Mahporeem. That was part of the problem wasn't it? You could see why the Imperial Confederation desired to absorb these people into it's industries, it's military and politics at the height of it's power; or why Umbrella, Z.P.V and Vūm were so invested in acquiring assets, influence and economic leverage across the world. These Mahporieem know how to work and they don't seem to stop. With that understanding you could see how they ruined this world as they built over the scrap and the dirt. Progress has a way of eroding what used to be important in favour of the moment. It's something akin to all Humanoids. Something succinct and underlying where the soul is. It only becomes a problem on the day that it arises. Projections, predictions and a certain worry for the future is heresy. It is deafening when you are chasing progress. Surviving.

Hope can be cancerous. Infectious.

An audit plays out beneath the smog and as the figureheads work out the cure a conspiracy connecting Mahporeem to the Mid-systems plays an exclusive report distributed on the morning papers and billboards in Corrox City.

VŪM | SAE | K.R.C " THE UNPOPULAR KENARI AMBASSADOR TO CHOMMELL MINOR "​ Sae Answers Mahporeem's Call Following a formal invitation from the Mahporeem High Command, Ambassador Sae has arrived to champion Mahporeem's rights and interests across the Mid Rim Territories. Though her Imperial-aligned politics have made her deeply unpopular among High Republic officials, Ambassador Sae has refused to be intimidated. Her supporters praise her willingness to stand against the Republic's growing influence and defend Mahporeem's sovereignty. For many on Mahporeem, her arrival represents a welcome ally in a difficult struggle—and a determined voice willing to carry their cause far beyond their world. In other news Ruisto has become a vital star system for the Mahporeem Imperial Remnant as food-shortages have become a growing issue in Dangama Junction . . .

"Which means our immediate objective is not simply to obtain their findings. It is to influence what happens after they are presented."

Minster Asara of the Ministry of Science and Bioengineering was an unexplored commodity amid the politics playing out on Corrox. Naturally, High Command supressed the idea that Mahporeem was on the brink of an ecological disaster after the idea was suggested during the Tarsai Summit. Two years can pass-by quicker than you realise, however. Questions were arisen and required answers. High Command would have them. Soon. Still, that did not mean that the brass up above desired an outbreak of panic and revolt in the streets. It was so easy for the common-man to break at the idea of the world ending. Mahporeem couldn't afford such ideas to propagate in the masses. Everyone involved knew how to be silent. Rue had seen what could happen to a city first-handed when it's economy seemingly dies overnight. Lianna hadn't been the same after those riots and it didn't nearly even have half the issues Corrox was facing. The idea of that type of panic made Rue shiver at the thought.

Yet Rue desired to explore the Minster in question. Asara had vehemently disagreed with even the slightest suggestion that Mahporeem was on the precipice of falling. Whence the audit to determine the facts in question. Rue could see why through an objective lens at least. Here was a new superpower that had taken over the Ash Worlds and Instrop sectors. It was the start a new Imperial occupation in the Outer Rim; and yet here was Vūm suggesting that the capital was on the brink of total failure. If it wasn't for Umbrella then, perhaps, they would have been laughed out of the room at the time. But when you're connected to such people then the naysayers started to take notice to what you have to say.

The sterile chamber was a box illuminated by a faint red light that hung overhead and orange rays hanging from the rafters. As Rue entered the chamber she held her arms out parted and spread her legs to the sides while the chamber door closed. Then the red light turned green and the walls opened to fill the chamber up in a mixture of elements designed to kill contamination or other pollutants that Rue had collected on her garments, skin and equipment as she traversed the city during that eerie time between night and day. It took no-longer than ten seconds before the chamber walls closed and the door re-opened to let Rue enter the Ministry.

As Rue's credentials were being checked and scanned upon entry she folded her arms to admire the scenery. It was time to meet with Minister Asara to sort out this issue. If she could not be convinced then the need for the Svivren Pass would not be there to be exploited and used for political purposes. Commerce, resource retention and the half-dozen other criteria regarded in " The Mahporeem Question " were merely tools or excuses design to obfuscate a truer purpose to all of this work. Asara needed to get out of the way. . .

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