Fifthday, Erastus 8, 317 AG
First a murder investigation, now a missing persons case. Can’t catch a break around here. This is exactly the kind of thing the Stewards are for! At least the money is better this time.
A couple days ago we found a jet black piece of paper slipped under our door. The door to our secret, off-the-books apartment. Seems that bit of subterfuge didn’t do us any good. Anyway this piece of paper is an invitation to meet with Gevalarsk Nor, the ambassador for Eox. The Eoxians are some creepy lookin’ SOBs. Seems our shenanigans down in the Spike caught the attention of Ambassador Nor.
The good ambasador has been waiting on a package that the Acreon was supposed to deliver and the feud between Astral Extractions and the Hardscrabble Collective has been interfering with its timely delivery. The ambassador has stepped into the middle of that mess to offer his services as mediator. As a side benefit of being mediator he gets to select a team to go investigate the quarantined ship, and like I said we had caught his attention. Taking out the head of the Downside Kings apparently makes us “capable operators” and so we’ve been offered the job. We go check out the ship and let a little camera drone follow us and we each get 600 credits. Not a bad payday. There is also that package I mentioned, if we return that to the ambassador, unopened, there is another 500 credits each for us. Simple package delivery job for 500 credits is perfectly acceptable to me, with or without the ambassadors assurances that it contains no contraband.
Not five minutes after taking the job we all get a message from Astral Extractions wanting us come to a meeting at their offices. One of the best looking Lashunta women I’ve ever seen met us in the lobby. Took us up to the penthouse conference room and wined and dined us. Even offered us pretty trinkets. I went over those trinkets with a fine toothed comb and didn’t find anything out of the ordinary. Seems they really just want to get on our good side. Crafty corporate bastards.
While we were in the meeting with Astral Extractions we got a message from Otal Serissi, head of the Hardscrabble Collective wanting his share of face time with us and inviting us out to his ship the Dust Runner. His presentation was lacking the fine food and expensive trinkets we got from Ms. Joss at Astral Extractions, but it did make up for it by not being coated in so much slime. Otal seems a solid guy, and is just trying to support the crews that work with him and their families. This investigation would already be over if it were just me making the decision, but I’m just hired to look around. Decision making wasn’t in the job description.
Tomorrow morning we head to the docks to pick up the shuttle Gevalarsk Nor said he’d supply for our trip out to the Acreon. I am itching to get behind the stick again! Hopefully he finds something better than the clunker that ferried us out to the Dust Runner.