Here's one of the super new paper models that we mentioned were in work yesterday. Péricles is currently in the middle of the Venture corvette design. This one has a twist - it's based off the Standoff color scheme. There is still work yet that needs to be done, but expect a few new ships and a full Paper Commander update in a month or two.
The trip to Hephaestus included a rather large Kindred encounter. I had somehow anticipated an ambush and brought a Nuke'em bomb along. I didn't need it though, my own Flux Beams combined with the heavy guns of the beer-carrying Ilia MkII I hired to earn a few extra creds took care of the situation well enough. I went out of the skirmish without a scratch, the freighter wasn't so lucky and took heavy damage. Luckily freighter repairs are to be paid for by the freighter captain and not by the customer. Auntie Marie on my backseat was quite thrilled by this encounter, must've been the biggest engagement in her lifetime. I must admit it was also one the biggest for me up to then. Ser Carmichael of course preferred to stay away from the battle, I hadn't expected anything else from the rich sucker.
Down on crowded Hephaestus, Auntie Marie thanked me for helping her escape. This lady must've had experienced a pretty traumatic time back on Bex, telling by the way she acted. I then went to the "premier address on Hephaestus," the Galactig Gourmet Hotel(TM) where I was supposed to meet Hugo Carmichael. On entering his room, I saw a professional assassin leaning over Carmichael's body. And a professional he definitely was, since he saw me coming. I had more luck than sense in dodging his gunshot and overcoming him. I would've liked trying to beat a name or something out of the bald killer, but since the place was already a mess I had to hurry and get out before any uniforms showed up. So I quickly finished the killer and took the shiny capsule he had obviously just retrieved from Carmichael with me. I wonder whether Hugo was going to give that capsule to me as a thankyou or if I should be thankful to the assailant in a strange way for uncovering this object for me.
I had no idea how what was in this capsule and how to open it. My best guess was to ask Joe on Hermes if he knew someone who's familiar with the thing. But instead of heading directly for Hermes, I made another brief visit to Petra. There, I sold the local miners the shipment of hephaestean hardware I had bought for 30'000 credits for a nice 44 thou. Big, big money. I also used my stay there to have another look at the public database's entry on Larn Regis a.k.a. Malakai. My memory was right, the man really had been described as "one of the richest men of the Tri-System." Boy, if such a high roller was only one of the subordinates of Kindred boss Kronos, then what might Kronos probably be? God himself? I started to understand why Hassan's folks were fighting an obviously losing battle against organzied crime: Saying that the Kindred controlled half of the Tri-System wasn't just emptry words but rather an under-estimation...
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