Public Traveling the Hylian Way | FONOPS In Light of CIS Executive Order

[Sor-Jan Xantha]

Between Devaron and Teyr

The Confederacy of Independent Systems was a rather large customer.

Or, at least, it had been a rather large customer. With a political-economic cloud covering the Southern Galactic Systems, the Confederacy not only overlapped the established systems into which Corellia Digital had built its client base, but also covered five of the six available hyperlanes that Corellia Digital relied upon in order to ferry merchandise from its headquarters in the High Republic to retailers across the Outer Planets Alliance and beyond the Mara-Perlemian Trade Corridor. Even for its defense contracts that were produced quietly in orbit of Laekia, travel through Confederate space was unavoidable.

Which made the recent announcement a question mark that would require an answer.

Was this business as usual? Perhaps some additional customs and border permits that would need to be filed?

Or was this a halt to travel? Forcing the company to try and find avenues around CIS space, at the cost of millions of lightyears and exponential expense -- where even possible. Moving merchandise from Laekia, for example, required very precise navigation to avoid the growing Bryn'adul threat to the south as well as the ever-present Sith-Imperial threat to the north.

No, if the company was to continue, they would need the answer to that question sooner, rather than later. Once they had their answer, then the company could devise a proper response.

And, so, the young clone had set out from orbit of Corellia with the next shipment bound for the Outer Planets Alliance. It was a routine movement for the company: A pair of unarmed Liorre super-freighters -- loaded with holo-games, comlinks, and other Corellia Digital merchandise -- with an old Corellian freighter guiding the shipment.

Ordinarily, the Liorres would have been escorted by an unmanned droid ship. But, in this particular instance, a manned crew was preferred in order to have the benefit of first hand witness accounts, should things go poorly. And, should things go poorly, there were few that Sor-Jan would trust as much as he did the clone trooper at the helm.

Now, as the ships approached the border just outside Teyr space, the young clone at the controls of the Corellian freighter waited to see just what kind of reception was in store for them...


Corellia Digital Merchant Fleet
1x YT-2400 Light Freighter (Lead Ship)
2x Liorre Super Freighters

 

[Darth Metus]

O V E R T I M E​

Tag: Sor-Jan Xantha

Azid wasn't one to look a gift horse in the mouth.

When the portly man woke up in the morning, it was to hop in the shower and clock in. When it was quitting time, he stopped by the local watering hole for a few beers, a plate of wings, and a few laughs from the yahoos singing in the karaoke. Life, for the most part, was simple. Dull by Galactic standards, but simple. 5 o'clock was usually quitting time - but today, Azid was still at the desk.

The politicians in Golbah had made a call that added a nice, beefy bonus called overtime to his payroll. Now, on one hand, Azid was missing out on the usual. And it was two for one drafts at the spot. On the other, come next payday he'd be able to finally put a dent in those credit chit debts. So, for an extra three hours per evening, Azid's graveled voice would greet the increased traffic at the border.

His job - and the process as a whole - was so easy a Mand'alor could understand. As the young Clone would soon find out.

Azid, firstly, tapped his chubby fingers on the console to enter a command. There were, of course, a couple slips of the finger and a few choice "c'mon ya karking thing" uttered by the man, before his station read the IFF of the incoming vessels. Registered to: CORELLIA DIGITAL flashed on his screen. Easy enough.

"Corellia Digital, welcome ta the Confederacy. Y'know, my nephew has one of those ah, whatsyacallem, game men? Boy games? The beep boop in your hands. Anyway." he began, waving his hand casually as if the Clone gave a flying kriff about his nephew. "You're all set ta go. If ya want faster processing at ta border, you can sign up for a Fast Pass on the HoloNet."

"And if I did ya good - and I did ya good amirite - leave me a good review ya?"

And just like that, the Clone was free to go about his day and his business. After all, Corellia Digital was a corporate entity - a simple check-in at the border was what they'd expect. Now, for those non-residents? They'd get asked that famous pile of questions, starting with: Business or Pleasure?

Gone was the era of open borders. So began the dastardly era...of passports.
​

 

[Jerec Asyr]

Darth Metus

The next ship in line was an unregistered Tempus Ardet independent freighter, the Fortunate Son.

Captain Draska was a fire-breathing Glottalphib of the Spacer Guild. His crew of fifteen encompassed spacers of every description and port of origin. Most had minor warrants out on Nar Shaddaa, Zeltros, Ord Mantell, Tatooine, and so forth: drunk and disorderly, smuggling, assault. None had anything approaching a passport. A few of them might have been High Republic or Sith Empire residents but formal citizenship might not have been a thing. In a couple of cases (a Whiphid, notably) they hadn't seen their homeworlds of citizenship since before interstellar government X moved in. A deckhand named Gawrsh was actually a mail-order spouse on their way to Zonju V. The Sullustan chief engineer had Strong Feelings about CIS border policy and had posted some HoloNet comments that even Draska found incendiary. Half the crew had done this run before, half (Gawrsh included) hadn't.

The cargo bay held eighty crates of droid parts, from motivators to multispectral emitters; a dozen nice starfighters en route to an Outer Rim irregular partisan unit; six camtonos of giggledust bound for a transfer to certain parties in the Unknown Regions; eight tons of counterfeit consumables; and the contents of a ship-component factory that fell off the back of a bus. The pilot's cabin held fifteen grams of ryll kor.

The ship had numerous modifications, including a few military-grade items.

All things considered, just your average freighter.

 

[Darth Metus]

W O R K I N '​

Tag: Jerec Asyr

The Fortunate Son would find a brief delay in the commencement of processing.

This, of course, was no fault of their own. But rather because Azid - or more aptly Azid's horrendous bladder - had decided to get up from the seat as soon as the Clone's processing was complete. Upon returning to his desk, the transmission would begin. If the crew listened real close, they could hear the flush in the background. "Welcome ta the Confederacy." he began, amidst placing two pumps of sanitation gel in his palms.

Who had time for washing their hands? Not this momo.

Once "cleaned", Azid initiated the basic scans. No IFF reading. The only info available was the make of the ship and the name "the Fortunate Son." Nothing that denoted Confederate citizenship. Just a run of the mill freighter - neat.

"Alright Cap'n, I'ma be real with yous." he began, peeking over his shoulder to ensure the supervisory droid was not within earshot. "Those Golbah mooks threw a twelve parsec long checklist at me. I'ma try to get yous moving real quick here. Ya stoppin' in or passing through?"

As he spoke, a pair of unarmed probe droids were dispensed from the station. Lifeform scanners ran over the hull, resulting in a count of fifteen. "Aight got a pack of yous aboard. Gonna need passports if ya got em. If not, names and aliases. Gonna also shoot over a form for ya - declare what ya got aboard." Like clockwork, the captain would receive the transmission.

One thing Captain Draska would learn today is that the Confederacy only gave a hoot about one capital offense: Slavery. With Ryloth being a founding planet, everyone was doing bumps of Ryll or Dust in their freetime. And with the Galaxy as karked as it was - no one upstairs was batting an eye at having "decent" equipment. Well. Except those Eriadu stiffs. Anyway. As far as identification went, the names of the cap'n and the fifteen weren't present on any of the Confederacy's watch lists. A few blips for drunken and disorderly, but that was every other night on Tatooine. Not nearly enough to bar entry.

When it was all said and done, the Fortunate Son would be met with the following amidst a chuckle. "Aight, here's the skinny. Got two check-in stations between here and your end point, yous gonna stop and give 'em this transit pass. It's temporary, gonna last ya a month. You can apply for a passport on our HoloNet site - do it within the month and ya get the Fast Pass free too."

"Yous fly safe. And if I did ya good - and I did ya good amirite - leave me a good review will ya?"​

 

[Jerec Asyr]

The Fortunate Son went on its way, having duly declared everything but the pilot's spice and provided names or aliases for the crew. The Sullustan chief engineer was taken aback by the ease of their passage. The Gran pilot was immensely and verbosely relieved. Captain Draska ignored both of them, as he was busy leaving the border officer a glowing review that called him strict, courteous, and efficient.

Word on the signal was the Feds were dropping a new tariff regime, probably kicking in soon. That meant anything in the hold was worth more, especially in the short term, before the Feds got a good enough handle on import substitution to match the affordability of import item X plus tariff markup Y. And the beauty of a tariff was, the locals paid, not the folks selling to them. Draska salivated incendiarily and began watching market prices for gear he'd planned to offload in the OPA.

That wouldn't work so well for things produced locally, of course. The CIS had plenty of factory parts and giggledust. Pretty soon, though - long before that first checkpoint - Draska had a local buyer for those multispectral emitters, at a price higher than he'd expected to get and a notch below what the upcoming tariff regime would bring.

"Marginsss," he hissed to himself, belching a happy fireball across the bridge. "It'sss all about the marginssss."

 

[Hacks]

A vessel winked into the system, a whisper on the sensors. The border between Confederacy of Indepedent Systems and the Corporate Authorities of Denon had always remained busy with a flow of traffic through the Hydian Way but as of late there had been some freighters stalled on the border, awaiting to move forward from Corporate space. It was here Hacks found herself.

She moved through a maze of rusted corridors, her footsteps echoed across the ship as the individual ancient plates protested the sudden weight of each step. She could hear groaning from the frame of the freighter as forces pushed against one another, the ship was slowing down very suddenly. It had been said before the only thing holding this ship together was hope and luck. She usually didn't believe in that type of philosophy but this time she did.

Reaching a porthole she glanced out into the midnight darkness and summoned sensor data on her wrist-mounted pad. Transmissions were pinging between a vessel and a CIS operator somewhere far out in that void. She thought for a moment and wondered if this was a dangerous idea she had in mind. Pirating vessels jumping out of hyperspace on the border and raiding them before they had a chance to reach any station checkpoints. Either way she had been paid to do it, it'd help push spacers into purchasing the 'premium security package' the Corpos were trying to sell.

For now, it would wait. She turned from the porthole and walked back the way she had come, the ancient freighter slowly turned back the way it had come, lurched forward, and then vanished.​

 

[Sor-Jan Xantha]

Darth Metus

The clone just gave a shrug. It appeared that the answer was that this was business as usual. Perhaps the talk about border security was just for political points at home.

Whatever the case, the clone trooper would report back to the corporate headquarters that it was safe to continue shipping through Confederate space, for the time being at least. If the political winds shifted inside the Confederacy, who knew where that would lead them.

But, for today at least, it seemed as though the Outer Planets Alliance would get their holo-games with no interruptions.