Container Wars | Corellia Digital Supply Run to the Outer Rim Coalition via Rimma Trade Route (ATTN

[Sor-Jan Xantha]

To be completely honest, the public statement on the Imperial Bloc Treaty had really just been a PR stunt.

Corellia Digital's major customers were the Outer Rim Coalition, Confederacy of Independent Systems, and the Silver Jedi Order, so any opportunity to make a public statement to the effect of, hey guys, we hate the Imperials, too usually saw an increase in sales around Demonsgate, Druckenwell, and Kashyyyk. Not to mention the host of former Galactic Alliance planetary markets.

With that said, Corellia Digital never objected to the color of money. It had sold to the One Sith when Corellia had been a Sith world, and it continued to operate a Corellia Digital Store on Voss under the regime of the Sith Empire. If the First Order was going to tax them for using the hyperlane, or conducting business in First Order space, it made complete and total economic sense to just pay the tax and move on with it.

This was a Corellian company. It understood the concept of paying the cost of doing business... provided that business was profitable.

And it was concern about profitability that had promoted this excursion. When the First Order declared that it was instituting military checkpoints between itself and the Outer Rim Coalition, that escalated the tension in the corporate board room regarding the ability of Corellia Digital to collect on a rather substantial investment in the Coalition. If this was a single contract, Corellia Digital would probably just terminated service to the region and moved on. However, the Outer Rim Coalition was one of the major sponsors of the corporation. That relationship represented millions of credits to the company, on the hundred million scale.

And that meant that the company was fully willing to spend credits in order to maintain the relationship with the Outer Rim Coalition as a vital source of income. So now the time had come to test the First Order's intentions with regard to its mandate over the hyperlanes that fed into Coalition space.

The eight ship formation had traveled from Corellia along the historic Corellian Trade Spine, reverted back to normal space just south of Yag'dhul in order to calculate a course along the Rimma Trade Route hyperlane. The formation had last checked its bearings at Eriadu and would shortly be dropping out of hyperspace in order to perform routine navigation computer checks in the Sluis Sector, in the vicinity of Dagobah.

If allowed to continue from there, the group would continue down the Rimma hyperlane toward the destination of Pergitor, after which the formation would divide up to deliver parts and equipment to Demonsgate, Kesh, Utapau, and the Kathol Republic.

In any other sector of the galaxy, it would be an uneventful trip, the likes of which were made by unarmed freighters everyday. And if it proved to be such, then Corellia Digital would resume its normal shipping operations. Except, this was the First Order. And Corellia Digital had already lost some of its commercial shipping assets to the First Order. In many respects, the company owed its aggressive expansion into military-grade hardware to the ongoing conflict surrounding the First Order.

So what happened next would be completely up to the First Order to decide. They could do business or they could start some real Clone Wars chit.

Sor-Jan would prefer the former. He'd be lying if he said that Corellia Digital wouldn't jump at the opportunity to open up markets on Bespin, Skye, or Dosuum, but he was also prepared for the latter option should the First Order decide it would rather exchange turbolasers than credits.


Corellia Digital Corporate Fleet
1x MC80B Star Cruiser (Flagship)
SS Odyssey - 1200/1200
2x Recusant-class Light Destroyers
SS Intrepid - 1187/1187
SS Defiant - 1187/1187
3x MC63E Repellent-class Escort Cruiser
SS Guardian - 600/600
SS Sentry - 600/600
SS Defender - 600/600
2x Variable Geometry Self-Propelled Battle Droid, Mk III
Binary - 200/200
Hexadecimal - 200/200
Total Combat Fleet Length: 5,774m

 

[Peyton Steele]

This was her thing now. The fact that Peyton Steele was a very capable field agent also meant sometimes that she had to take a rotation as a listening post. It wasn’t her preferred task, but with her handler being a member of the Shattered Order, she was trusting her handler knew what she was doing and where was best for the agent to be. She was on Odyssey at the moment, and the fleet of the Corellian Digital corporation seemed to be heading into territory that was better suited for a flotilla from one of the major governments of the galaxy.

She wasn’t really placed in any major position, but was working in the electronic warfare department. She could keep updated on the situation outside of her department, but it also gave her the ability to help probe the First Order with a few tools to see if there was a weakness that could be exploited. The blonde was fully assuming that the biggest thing to do was to just use smaller vessels, go-fast ships, essentially, to get through the First Order.

But that was not anything she was going to suggest. If the Digital Corp wanted to bring big guns and clear out any blockades in the shipping path. The First Order was starting to get on her nerves, and that was saying something, as she was at Lothal for a hot minute. Then Confederacy and not Corellian Digitial. If worse came to worse?

Her ship was onboard, she could always make a move through the blockade.

[member="Sor-Jan Xantha"]

 

[Jerek Zenduu]

The stars pulled back into view as the dozen starfighters erupted from hyperspace in the Sluis sector, partway along the Rimma Trade Route. Heading back from an escort mission in the southern part of the galaxy, the Raging Nexus squadron now found itself facing an assortment of vessels flagging themselves as part of the Corellia Digital corporation.

In the lead fighter, an older J-1 class interceptor, the blond-haired teenage pilot sat evaluating the situation. There wasn't much he knew about Corellia Digital, save that its leader was a Jedi Master and it made killer hologaming systems, one of which was tucked in the survival pack the boy had stashed in the storage compartment of his cramped fighter, so he wasn't sure what the Digital flotilla was doing here. But with recent events on the galactic political stage, it wasn't too difficult to guess the reasoning.

Flipping open the comm channel to his squadron, Jerek heard the chatter spilling in, much of which confirmed his own suspicions.

"...probably itching for a fight."

"I can't wait to see what the First Order sends."

"If they send anything."

"They're gonna get whomped."

"Who is? FO or CD?"

Jerek grinned to himself as he cut in, "Question is, do we want to stick around to find out?"

This was hardly the disciplined and efficient squadron it had been under the Silver Jedi Order's reign. But when the pilots had largely decided to pull out from the SJO following the debacle at Korriban, military decorum had been the first thing to go. That a series of other misfortunes had befallen the squadron in the meantime was evident in Jerek's assumption of the leader role and the motley assortment of starfighters that now made up the unit. Besides Jerek's own J-1, salvaged from his days with the Galactic Republic, there were a few Liberty Interceptors, a half dozen or so Aureks and one Cutter-class that had escaped numerous attempts to turn it into dust thus far.

"Oh hell, yes."
"Sure, why not?"
"We're gonna mess up the First Order, right?"
"Let's get those punks."

"Okay, so I guess that's pretty well settled. Form up," the boy ordered. There was still a little bit of decorum left in the squad. Muting his headset input, he opened a channel to the lead cruiser of the Corellia Digital fleet. "Corellia Digital, this is the Raging Nexus squadron, you seem to be raring for a fight. Mind if we join you in waiting for our new self-proclaimed trade overlords?"

 

[Sor-Jan Xantha]

Lorn Frisal had been a student of Jorus Merrill's at the Levantine Astronautical Academy.

For a time, he'd been part of the Frontier Corps, transitioning into the ExplorCorps of the Silver Sanctum Coalition. Until the debacle at Ruusan, at which point the man had cut ties and become a merchant captain. He'd been picked up by a Corellia Digital recruiter and his education and experience had gotten him moved to one of major assets of the company.

Coming to a halt just a few inches away from where a child rather noticeably stood out against the remainder of the crew filling out the bridge, the man said, "General, the fleet has moved out of lightspeed."

The boy had been discussing something with a protocol droid. Dismissing the automaton, the boy held up two fingers as though to reinforce something he'd said, and then turned his attention up at the seasoned spacer.

"Com-scan reports it will be several minutes before the navi-computer has finished making final calculations for the jump to Pergitor," Captain Frisal noted. They were now in First Order territory, just a parsec away from Dagobah. Sitting here wasn't at the top of Lorn's 'to-do' list for the day. "Shall we hold here?"

If he was concerned, then the boy had a terrific Sabaac face. Probably the latter, given the fact that he was Corellian. "Transmit standard commercial shipping notices," Sor-Jan remarked with a nod. "We're just a corporation delivering on its trade agreements, we've nothing to hide from the First Order... other than the fact that they're between us and Demonsgate."

As Captain Frisal stepped away, the droid returned with a tray that had two cups of hot cocoa on it. Taking one for himself, the tow-headed boy wound his way through the bridge toward where there was a face that he didn't recognize. Odyssey had become a ship that he used with increasing frequency, so he was growing accustomed to its usual bridge crew.

A blonde haired woman seemed rather absorbed into studying the com-scan board. She was assigned to the EW station, but that was about all that he knew of her. Extending the hot cup of cocoa out toward her, the boy asked, "Anything of interest?"

In the meantime, the communications officer responded as the ship was hailed. The fighter escort was using Silver Jedi codes. Older ones, but they checked out.

"Raging Nexus squadron, you are cleared for approach. Welcome aboard."

[member="Peyton Steele"] | [member="Jerek Zenduu"]​

 

[Cim Salro]

Grief.

It could be either a powerful depressant, or in Cim Salro’s case a potent narcotic, which caused her to re-fuel her desire to reign supreme as one of the leading spice dealers in the galaxy. Trouble was the sadness she felt over her lover’s death, had lent a recklessness to her endeavors, and instead of helping The Black Bha’lir to congeal into a tight-knit smuggling group, the devastated Anzati tore it apart once more.

Kingsley, the alcoholic Hiitian, remained her only companion out of the group, mostly because she was too disgusted to feed upon the life essence of the greasy-feathered bird. The other Bha’lir had been subject to too many attacks by Cim, as her hunger appeared to multiply with her grief, and most of her loyal smugglers - which hadn't been extremely loyal in the first place - had fled because they’d rather not be culinarily assaulted by an Anzati. Yes, it was difficult to make friends when you would rather eat your companion’s brain than make lively conversation with them.

Piloting a junky G9 Rigger-class freighter, Cim and her avian colleague departed from Maramere to one of the more unstable parts of the galaxy right now - the Rimma Trade Route. With the unraveling of the Galactic Alliance and the slow progression of the First Order to seize and subdue planets, resources and other assets in the area, the space lane was a perfect location for piracy. Cim had a shipment of glitterstim for Terminus, but instead of going to the Hydian Way, she passed the crossing and continued past Eriadu and Clak’dorr VII.

It would be clear by now to Hittian that they would not be going to Terminus.

“Do you like joyrides, Kingsley?”

[member="Kingsley"] [member="Sor-Jan Xantha"] [member="Peyton Steele"] [member="Jerek Zenduu"]