Session 42 (12 April 2024)

Location: Eeren (Halcyon 2022)

Date: 322—5600

Travellers: Ada Windsor (astronavigator), Nogudnyk (steward), Sasha Danlami (comms)

The first stage of your coreward shortcut

After an uneventful jump-2, you arrive in the Mendezo-Eeren System. Eeren is an airless moon circling a small gas giant, its population of two million distributed amongst several politically independent arcologies and habdomes. The largest and most powerful is Mani, which also happens to be the location of the moon's C-class starport.

You disembark your passengers and unload your cargo. The payouts from your two of your last three jobs have allowed you to settle the arrears on the ship's mortgage and leave you with a comfortable margin in your coffers. You're flush with cash and feeling positive about your future. Perhaps that explains what happens next.

While taking care of routine paperwork at the starport's administrative offices, you are distracted by a sudden commotion. A set of double doors leading to backroom offices opens and two burly security guards usher out an elderly couple, a diminutive man and woman attired in middle-class clothes. Both are clearly upset and distraught, pleading pathetically for someone to listen to them. "Please help us find our daughter! We beg you!"

The guards deposit the couple unceremoniously on the floor and retreat inside. The man attempts to console the tearful woman, but then grasps at his chest and sinks to the floor. She turns to tend him. The starport's onlookers take in the scene for a minute, then resume their business. Ada is inclined to do likewise.

Marie-Eve Onishi

Moved by the couple's plight, Sasha approaches and guides them to chairs. Soon enough she learns of their situation. They are Yukari and Jean-François Onishi, an art teacher and accountant, whose daughter Marie-Eve has disappeared. They show you a picture: you see a youthful, enthusiastic young woman with reddish hair, brimming with positive energy and curiosity. Having recently earned her doctorate, Marie-Eve had recently taken up a prestigious postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Athune and won funding to support a new research project: the study of a cult on one of the other moons in the Mendezo-Eeren system. Her parents had been thrilled to learn that this would bring her closer to home, despite the fact that the moon in question was known to be a dangerous and lawless place. Since leaving several weeks ago, Marie-Eve had kept in regular contact with her parents. But they have heard nothing in the past week: far too long for their comfort, given that inter-moon communication was only a matter of minutes (15 or 16 minutes, to be precise). Distressingly, the Manian authorities have brushed off their concerns. The moon's local authorities seem equally uninterested; missing persons are a dime a dozen, they say. No doubt she perished in the wastes like so many others have.

Yukari and Jean-François, buoyed by your kindness and aware that you are experienced Travellers, ask for your help. Their health does not permit them to travel themselves. They are willing to sell their home to reward you. You promise nothing and accept no payment for the time being. Nogudnyk senses no deceit or malice from them.

You do your research. (Sasha uses a computer; Ada and Nogudnyk hit up a piano player named Archie at the seediest starport bar.) The Onishis' story checks out. Marie-Eve's research had taken her to a habitable moon orbiting a large gas giant in the same system. The cult in question, the "Dawnseekers," was mostly composed of descendants of the first humans to reach this sector many centuries ago. They appeared benign enough: the Library Data describes them as white-robed rustics who eke out a rudimentary existence near an ancient silver spire in the desert. Their only weapons appear to be air rifles. But the moon itself was a deadly place, a point repeatedly stressed in the stories Archie tells as you ply him with drink. Never mind the ancient orbital installations that rained down fire on any ships that attempted to land; the entire world was a desert that abounded in dangerous wildlife, such as  the giant sandsquids. The Manians had, in the last century, established something of a colony there, accessing the surface via an ancient space elevator. The main trade was export of something called coral dust, from which a drug with astonishing anagathic properties could be extracted. Scattered widely about the moon, the coral dust deposits attracted desperate and unscrupulous prospectors with a gold-rush mentality. The government of Mani was content to sit back and tax exports at a 50% rate while providing a minimum of administration and law enforcement. A wild frontier if there ever was one.

You decide you can spare a few days to look for Marie-Eve and bring her parents some peace of mind. You pack your belongings and board the next shuttle.

Next stop: the desert moon of Karth.

Image credits: the Traveller Map (travellermap.com); Marie-Eve "photo" screengrabbed from YouTube video on some sci fi topic.