Port Loren

Port Loren, one of a thousand Pan Gal cookie cutter corporate hubs of civilization among the Frontier. But you never thought you would see one here. Who would ever think they would ever see any civilization on Cass. A relatively worthless rock in space claimed by the Megacorps until they found out it was sucking up more money in maintenance and lives than it was making profit. CDC finally gave permission to the Council of Worlds to have Cass serve as a dumping ground for refugees and survivors of the Blue Plague in one of the biggest public relations coups of all time.

The damned Plague. 170 million victims before they found a cure, it killed anything it touched, it took nations and planets down with it, but in the end it took more that lives. 9 decades later Cass was still dying, not by plague but by spirit, the only thing the natives believe in here is death. You see it in religion, in clothes, in the rituals of the burning death dolls and in the suspicion that everyone holds against health and hope.

So looking down from the far side of Dusty’s Mountian and for the first time and seeing a real spaceport you feel the excitement spring up from your toes and grab your torso until the beautyflies are buzzing within. Deputy Ranger of the local desert patrol was a nowhere job and this is a nowhere planet. You feel the urge to be healthy and not guilty, you want to find somewhere you don’t have to exercise or study in secret. Anyplace there is a chance to get away from dying and hopelessness…

1. This system is owned by the CDC who does not realize its potential value having shrugged the planet off as a write off. CDC has one orbiting AG station manned by a staff of 2 and a planetary staff of “advisors” (basically failed executives who could not be eliminated for whatever security reasons are marooned here to finish out their careers as the administrative head of a refugee camp, thus the joke in CDC if your career is diseased you go to Cass). Because the camps are mostly run by ruined unproductive egomaniacs their conditions would be notorious around the Frontier if anyone cared. The only point of interest here is the CDC executive rehabilitation center which is the only way off the planet and back to paper pushing a real job again. The planet has two habitable regions at both poles, the rest being some of the meanest desert on the frontier. 88% of the refugee population and all CDC installations are located at the North Pole. The CDC is trying to cut expenses and has limited contact with the planet, Once every 90 days a supply ship will visit and drop off some used supplies and a few more failed execs.
2. Recently and unexpectedly Pan Galactic Corporation has made huge investments in infrastructure in the South Pole region raising and building the town of Port Loren. Everything in the town is new and pre-fabbed straight out of Pan Gal. The town is a bit eerie and after a few moments you realize that there are not as many people here as there should be. The town a size for 100,000 but only 783 people live there. Most of the inhabitants are a Pan Gal engineering and surveying team. Only a few natives that act as guides and consultants on the planet live here.
3. Pan Galactic recently purchased from an undisclosed agent a star route from the Devco system to the Klaeok system in the Rim. Currently the only way into the Rim is by passing Pan Galactic’s nemisis the Streel Co’s Truane’s Star. This system has gained untold wealth by having almost a monopoly on Rim exports. Pan Galactic hopes move in on this profit and at the same time rip Streel of its monopoly. Two things need to happen in order for that to work. First Pan Galactic has to acquire Cass. They are willing to simply buy the rights of the planet from CDC for an insanely cheap price seeing as how the planet has brought them nothing but red ink. but barring this they are prepared to support a revolt by the indiginous population against CDC or if it comes to it they will go to war. The megacorp is confident, however, that it won’t come to that as long as it can keep its route discovery a secret so no one knows the true value of the planet. The second thing is they need to establish themselves on the planet and prepare it for its premier trading outpost status. This will entail massive infrastructure initives which the company would rather not incur if it can help it. For this reason they intend to employ the inhabitants of Cass in a form of indentured slavery. They provide for them cheap prefab homes and entertainment while making them sign away their lives to work for them(be sure to read the fine print!). Any person who refuses to work off their “loans,” which were originally preached as gifts, is put in jail. It is a essential that they have an economic majority and base of operations if they are to plead for the system rights and have a large enough physical presence to dominate the trade route. They must move before the route info becomes public! But now Pan Gal has a problem.
4. Likit Kit a Vrusk CDC double agent in the top echlons of Pan Gal’s management has landed on Cass to oversee its production operations. He recently discovered the missions true objective and was on his way to cash out his intelligence career with CDC and retire to some tropical paradise planet forever. However he was discovered by Pan Gal’s security team and with Billions of Credits on the line they will do anything to get him back even if it means hiring locals to hunt him down as long as they don’t know what’s going on. (and dead men tell no tales)
5. Pan Gal hires 3 locals and places one of their own agents to keep an eye on things as well as prepare to tidy up any messes or spills of info that may occur. The rate is 1000 Cr. plus expenses plus another 1000 when they find Likit. (very good rates! of course they never intend on paying that second half!) They simply inform the characters that the Vrusk has stolen some information and ruthlessly killed 5 employees in the process (lie which may be found out). They say that he might try to sell the info to the CDC in the north pole. No CDC satalite is in place for global info transfer and all of Pan Gal’s are tightly monitored so he will probably try to physically make it up to the North Pole and catch the next CDC supply freighter out after he has used the subspace radio at the academy to transfer the info!
6. To find Likit is not hard. The only way to the north is by desert transit by ground or air. Air doesn’t run this time of year cause of storms so only ground can be had. And the only ground transport would go through the only mountian route to the North where a local caravan leaves in 3 days 40 miles west of the city. The Vrusk is hiding in a nearby cave with a security robot guarding his camp. He is not accustomed to the harsh living here and may surrender when the characters approach almost out of water and food, he is used to the luxuries his position affords him. The info is encoded on his body comp. At this point once he has been debriefed and the info received the agent will attempt to kill all the characters and blow the cave to bury them.
7. The aftermath: Trying to get your pay? Or your payback? Many scenerios exist. Sell the info to CDC, sell the info back to Pan Gal for a higher price, get the info to the Council of Worlds and register it for all to see, not to mention a slap on the wrist, try and inhibit the Pan Gal forces, the choices are endless but one thing is for sure the players are going to need to get off this planet and Pan Galactic isn’t going to let them if possible!
8. Players can chose to try and make it to the CDC compound in the North and hide out among locals in an attempt to wait for the next transport. The CDC will gladly get the characters out for the info they provide! This calls for a Desert campaign which may include any one of many encounters such as assaulting by force a Pan Gal wind electric station (desert Fort) before a wind storm kills the characters. Or character can try and hijack a shuttle from Pan Gal from the Shuttle port by covert ops or by rebellion. (town).
9. The Town:

   1 Warehouse
   2 Main warehouse
   3 Barracks
   4 Shuttle/Freight control station
   5,6,7 Underground fuel pods for shuttle
   8 Officers barracks + ground and weapons storage
   9 Heavy machine/freight hauler shop/garage
   10 Shuttle landing/launch pad
   11 Local Robot shop/ storage
   12 Apartments
   13 Safe Room
   14 Security Briefing room
   15 Cafateria
   16 Radio Room
   17 Strip Mall
   18 Robot MFC facility finish and storage
   19 Generator Room
   20 Robot MFC facility for security Robots
   21 Guard Tower