The man sits with his feet up on his desk with a thick, tobacco-based cigar hanging out of his lips. The smoke fills the room as the ash dances precariously off of the edge of the recreational relaxant. His hat is half-pulled over his head and the sign on his desk reading "Richard Y. Cart, P.I." has been half-knocked to the side and is barely legible from the dust. The buildings out of the window behind him would have made a beautiful skyline if not for the fact that he was on the 3rd floor of a dilapidated apartment building surrounded by skyscrapers.
"So...crew of the
Intrepid Explorer, eh? I figured it'd be a hard payday, but these damn kids have been all over
The Rim stirring up shit wherever they go. Ain't none of them proper famous, but looks like this crew tends to walk into the muck and walk out either as local legends or with a target on their back. Either way, they keep walkin' out so far." He tosses a yellowed, ancient
datapad in front of you with a folder pulled up. "That's them, right? Let's make sure we got everyone you're looking for here."
Characters
He slides on the screen and shows an early-thirties dark-haired human man wearing a trench coat with a gun at his side. "That's
Dash Reynard there.
Deliverer, or...supposedly an Ex-Deliverer at least. Been wander the galaxy for years now taking orders from fate, supposedly, and executing anyone he's told to. Assassin for hire only by the powers that be, it seems. Though...rumor is that he's tossed his gun and found a new path. Folks close to him say something changed in him on
Xanti while hunting down one of his own,
William Blake. Let the man live, flicked off the powers that be, and seems like the whole crew are in a mess of trouble for it. He's pissed off a load of folks from the
Krasian Meritocracy,
Court of Scavs, to even the
The Hollow Man himself its said. Hopefully they are pacified with him going all gunless now, but I wouldn't wager a
CredStick on it."
The screen shifts and an attractive man with strong features and a firmly set jawline stares back up at you. "This one has been traveling with him for a while, it's said.
Jason the cyborg, the worst kept secret this side of how to process
Utopia. Rumors have it that he ate some funky, mutating Utopia himself and it's either growing on him or in him depending on who you hear it from. He claims to not remember much beyond being a
Krasian soldier at some point. Some folks say he cracked something stopping him from remembering things not too long ago, but you know how reliable rumors are...Anyways, it's said he's damn near unkillable. Folks have seen him shot point-blank with rifles, take swords without flinching, and stand toe to toe against a group of brawlers. I wouldn't want to face him in a fight, that's for sure."
A beautiful, wealthy attired girl with pockets full of beakers crosses the screen. "Ahh yes, the princess of the crew herself. Ms.
Kyralin Straussedorph, heir apparent to the
Straussedorph Estates from the good ol'
Allied Terran Systems themselves. Born and raised in privilege on
Earth, supposedly would have been top of her class if not for some family problems, and went off for some internship that she just never showed up for. Not exactly sure how she fell into this group, but folks claim its her that keeps them patched up and tends to collect samples of plants and animals from all the places they travel. From palaces to crew bunks...what a journey, I guess. I suppose knowing that she's related to
Barabas "Barr-Barr" Straussedorph, you'd have to figure she'd get into some hot water eventually."
The screen flickers again to a beautiful blonde woman in her mid-twenties. "
Anna Cross is an interesting one. She's apparently an inventor of a universe-changing product, those apparently only a handful of people have ever used or tested it. No records or patents have ever been filed under her name, but apparently she's traveling around looking for investors into her invention. Seems from the stories that she spends her time instead on cracking technical systems, building strange devices, or befriending little robots like
Botley. Doubly strange is the rumor that she utterly hates robots and tech...though that may just be related to AI. Folks seem to think that the
Plastike Assassins show up on occasion where she's been, but who knows for sure? Rumor just came in that she was shot dead on
Paphadis, so I guess you can’t run forever."
The screen reflects an image of a young,
Versian man that appears to have been taken from a
Gavel application form. "
Tumerian Li Shen...yeah, from that Shen family. If you know anything about them or spent time in a certain part of
the Bound Borders you know they were disgraced and kicked out of the Gavels generations back. He got rejected from the process 3 times...guess he gave up and left the Bound Borders out of frustration. Though now that I think about it...didn't that group of Gavels get ambushed and killed a little bit before he left? Hmmm...Anyways, it's said that he's a genius with his blades, a hell of a pilot, and somehow even gained the respect of a
Hornet Pod."
The screen is immediately filled by the image of a bearded, robed man that was obviously taken from a Holovid Advertisement. "Oh...what can you say about
Guru Kevin that he hasn't already said about himself. Traveling holy man claiming to know the one true path to the golden city, whatever that is. He's an odd one for sure, but he always seems to find people willing to listen to him. Folks that know him well claim he found some orb thingy on the
Star Forge and has been keeping to himself ever since with it."
The Ship
He swipes and shows the image of the cherry-red hull of the Intrepid Explorer with it's unique emblem. "You know, this ship wasn't always called the Intrepid Explorer. Found out this thing used to be named the Salters Peppers and was owned by
Indigo Travel Agency. Leased out to some guy named
George Salter on official records. They've long since reported it stolen and ol' George was last seen being attacked by a group of folks on the
The Port of Aberteen so...I guess it ain't looking too good for ol' George."
"Now it's said that the ship has been squibbed, repainted, and a dang AI lives in the ship now. They've picked up strays, stragglers, and wanders from various places and have a strange mix of humans like
William Blake, AI like
“Alexa”, robots like
Mark 37-091 and
Botley Botterson the 17th, and even a supposed mutant girl named
Chiara Mekiee."
The Exploits
"So...you know that crazy shindig at
Nibian 6 Outpost months back? Miners getting mutated, attacking the outpost, the whole horror story? Turns out that our little crew were the ones that figured it out, stopped the attack, and saved the day. Apparently they high-tailed it out to
New Avon next and took out the notorious
Slater's Boys who had enslaved the daughter of the mayor of
Colby’s Church. They supposedly were attacked by Plastike Assassins and survived that assault some way or another. Somehow or another, they pressed on to the
Star Forge and got mixed up in a whole investigation into sabotage that went wrong. Whatever you've heard about the Star Forge Attacks, it wasn't some
Krasian Meritocracy attack. They found some ancient alien bugs messing up the station that almost got the whole place fried by the sun. Luckily, they managed to save the day and the station itself."
He ashes his cigar and leans forward with a shake of his head. "Their exploits verge from the righteous about there it seems. Something happened on the Port after their time on the Star Forge that got their pilot snatched and them spooked about their ship. Rumor is that they smuggled off a prisoner from the Star Forge and held a little jailbreak. From there, they vanish for a bit until they popped back up at
New Avon. Apparently, they killed some
Hausaga Syndicate thugs plaguing the city before booking it out of there again. Locals called the firefight a straight up
dumpster fire."
"Next place anyone sees them is the
Hersperus Nebula: Graveyard trying to get an audience with the
Court of Scavs. Turns out they needed to hire
Squibby Alvin "Mad Al" Takeo to make the Salters Peppers into the ship it is today. Some trouble got stirred up with the locals during their stay and 8 people ended up dead by Dash's hand. Their remaining stay got a little tense after that. Things finished up easy enough, Li made a name for himself with some locals, and they ended up in debt for some favors as a
mia culpa to the great
Lady Ash herself."
"They disappear for a bit until showing their faces again at
Xanti of all places. Rumors are they are hunting a rogue deliverer down on some quest of vengeance. They disappear into
The Slush and aren't seen coming out, though folks say a ship managed to survive the rockets and
Renders to pull off a retrieval."
"Time passes and folks say they were seen over at
Paphadis looking for some R&R. Guess they'd need it after Xanti, but who knows what they are up to now."
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