The Travellers are in the midst of a rescue. The super liner Amishi has illegal enterred the red zone of Psiac and crashed near the site of the wreck of the local protected sophont’s sail ship. After recovering one high born noble and a couple of Vargr passengers, the team leave Twiggy onboard their ship and proceed to look for survivors inside the liner.
Pressing forward towards the bridge, they come across the door to the Bar & Lounge. Esthel hacks the computer system and seals the two inhabitants in the area. She then does the same at the door leading to the bridge. Accompanied by No-haa and Geryen, she enters the bridge.
Inside the usual configuration of stations and terminals for a ship this size, the captain Rhysse Lalic is barricaded inside his office. Showing some ID, Esthel convinces him that they’re part of the rescue operation and he agrees to come out. He explains he barricaded himself in when the hijackers attacked and killed the pilot. He’s lost control of most systems and only has surveillance on the two main corridors plus the one just outside the bridge.
Rhysse’s intel on the hijackers movements convinces the Travellers they have managed to lock at least some of the hijackers in the Bar & Lounge. They ask about the chief engineer’s location but the captain doesn’t know. He does have plans of the ship and they load these into portable devices before heading out of the bridge.
They move cautiously to the lower engineering section of the ship bypassing the security lockdown. Lower engineering is locked down but someone has tried to access the systems. Moving up a level to upper engineering, they find a dark-haired woman slumped by the machinery. Her badge identifies her as Chief Engineer Penter Deov. She’s barely conscious and looks like she’s been drugged.
Esthel move up to an airlock so he can get a signal to call Twiggy over. Twiggy leaves the growing number of rescues locked in the medbay and proceeds to join the others. As she’s making her way there, No-haa clears all the state rooms on the starboard side. At the same time, Geryen gets the m-drive working again.
The team meet up and plan their next move, outlining what they know so far. But before they can act, there’s a loud bang coming from the direction of the Bar & Lounge. Calculating the hijackers in that room have blown one of the doors, they confirm with Rhysse that nobody has come out of one of the doors he has eyes on. That leaves the exit directly in front of them.
No-haa moves forward and positions himself to open the door with the keycard they got from the medic. There are indeed two people with combat armour bearing battle rifles positioned on the other side.
Geryen is first to act and he moves past No-haa and blasts the area with his shotgun. The shell shrapnel fails to make contact with the enemy. No-haa uses his Gaus rifle on the other hijacker and has much more luck. The hijackers return fire wounding No-haa. As Twiggy, moves out of the line of combat, Esthel moves in besides No-haa. She unloads her Gaus rifle on auto and starts ripping chunks out of one of the hijackers.
The firefight continues for a little while as No-haa repositions in the Bar & Lounge to take cover, darting out to fire with his rifle. Geryen takes a few scratches and his return fire with the shotgun proves ineffective. But Esthel manages to down one of the hijackers before No-haa kills the other.
Twiggy rushes in to treat No-haa before stabilising the surviving hijacker. The team surveys the Bar & Lounge finding two people bound and gagged. One a female passenger in deep distress, the other a young male engineer. Esthel release them whilst Twiggy gives them a medical once over and directs them to their rescue ship.
In the meantime, No-haa and Geryen proceed to clear the other state rooms. In one they find Giovanna Maitte, the Chief Steward, who lunges at them with a knife as they come through the door before she sees how well armed they are. She’s talked into dropping the knife and after briefly asking her some questions, she’s sent on to the Garishi with the other rescues.
In another more opulent state room, the two come across Marin Suwa, his butler and chef who have barricaded themselves in. The shipping magnate is calm but arrogant, tipping the two rescuers as he departs the ship.
Twiggy goes back to the upper engineering and helps the stricken Chief Engineer. She’s been doped but the doctor gives her something to revitalise her. The engineer is soon back on her feet and ready to work the engines to get the Amishi out of the water.
Finally, they find Yanaffi Osteir, personal assistant to Paul Ramaeda. She explains that she knows the armed hijackers had a boss and the Travellers suspect he may be one of the passengers or crew.
With the known hijackers dealt with and the ship swept for survivors. Esthel rummages through the state rooms pilfering anything valueable she can to fence later.
Then they leave the Captain and Chief Engineer onboard the Amishi before returning to their own ship with all the rescued crew and passengers. They lock them in various staterooms and interrogate the surviving hijacker. With the menace of No-haa in the background, Esthel convinces him to talk. He gives up Marin Suwa as the boss and the Chief Steward as his accomplice in the crew.
Armed with this knowledge, Esthel speaks to Marin over the intercom and sees if they can come to a deal. Geryen wants to either deal with him or kill him, not liking the idea of turning over some powerful criminal to the authorities and getting the blowback. Twiggy covers her ears at the thought of killing someone in cold blood. In the end, Esthel decides they’ll leave Marin out of it and keep him as a potential contact for the future.
The Travellers also decide to keep Paul Ramaeda out of their reports, which earns Twiggy a boon from the noble.
As they return back to Psiac station, they put things together implicating the Station Commander Chrix Derisson in the illegal Red Zone tours. They decide against direct confrontation and instead approach the XO Sar Aylen with the information.
The next few months pass in the usual routine of the job. Sar Aylen replaces Derisson as CO of the station eventually, grateful to the Travellers for their support. After that their ship’s supplies are in a much better place although the generous bonuses become scarcer.
Next time: Boons and Grave News from Regina
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