Homecoming

Paal
The travelers jumped to Paal where they were welcomed by high ranking officials and attended functions where they met more high ranking officials. They found time to see the radioactives and luxury consumables, making over 30 MCr.

Pourne
After Paal they jumped to Pourne. Deciding to look for news of Drinax, in case anything had happened, Nitrane found news reports of an Imperial treasure ship that had gone missing, possibly hijacked. Apparently the Imperial Navy had already sent a fleet into the reaches in response. More details were expected to follow in the coming weeks.

Drinax
Refueling and leaving as quickly as possible, the ships jumped to Drinax. Originally the plan had been to just arrive in one Harrier, with the other two out at a distant gas giant, or possibly not having them jump to Drinax at all. At the last minute though the realisation that the powers in Drinax might hear about three Harriers anyway turned the plan on its head and all three arrived and requested landing permission at the king's private landing pad.

When they landed they immediately requested to see the princess, who granted them an audience inside an hour. Having discussed what to say to the princess many times over the past few weeks, then arrived at just bringing her the treaty that they had found in the treasure ship vault. After that they would just play it by ear, but not volunteer any information.

Princess Rao was very pleased to see them, and had then sit and take tea with her. The party presented the treaty and said it was so important that they broke their rule of keeping their distance from Drinax to bring it to her. She looked at it, agreed it was important, but wanted first to hear everything that they had done since they had seen her last.

Exchanging glances with the rest of the party Nitrane began talking.

The travels started with the hunt for the Treasure of Sindal. The journey went from Noricum (where they found someone who declared themselves to be the true descendant of the Sindalian Emperor), to Thebus (where they made diplomatic contact with the Proactive Recycling Company) and then Number One (where they met the Warden, a young girl). At this point they realised they needed a number of particle cannons to solve a complex problem which should give them the whereabouts of the treasure.

They went to Salif, where they hoped they could get the weapons. Unfortunately the government realised who they were and in exchange for access to the weapons they wanted were asked to stage a mock hostage-taking of Tiznee Zazzle so she could go to an Imperial planet for medical procedures. This complete they created some self-contained particle cannons, loaded them in their ships, and continued to Ace.

On Ace they determined the final location of the treasure and after jumping to the secret location they found an old derelict station that had two Harriers, which were repairable only because they had been mothballed and packed away for storage.

Rao clearly knew who the Warden was (she described Rannid as a dear) and Tiznee (pursed lips and a nod). She asked about professor Haut-Belzoni and was told that he was being looked after by a friend. Also she wanted the location of the derelict station as there may yet be some items of interest to be found there, which the party gave her after exchanging glances once again.

Nitrane continued.

Getting the Harriers repaired meant utilising the resources of Theev and they left them there and continued on to Palindrome. When they arrived they made contact with Lady Yemar who needed some help getting a scientist to cure her of a long-standing illness. If the party could get the scientist who could cure Lady Yemar then she seemed open to the idea of aligning herself to Drinax. With details about the scientist they made their way into the Imperium and followed his trail until they eventually found him and sent him to Palindrome.

While Nitrane was telling the princess this she looked concerned, and then at the end remarked that she hoped poor Anastasia would get the cure she needed. It was clear that the princess knew and regarded Lady Yemar highly.

After that Nitrane mentioned that they had established diplomatic relations with Tech-World (in exchange for system defense boats) and Paal (who were very pleased to just be visited). Rao wished the travelers well with getting the system defense boats and thanked them for their diplomatic attempts to far.

Talk then turned to the treasure ship, which Nitrane described as too good an opportunity to miss. She briefly described what happened then broached the subject of the treasure that the party obtained. This included the two unopened strongboxes as well as the goods on Sink and the diplomatic papers, one of this was the important one in front of the princess.

Princess Rao turned more serious and admonished the party that the idea had been to not implicate Drinax in these acts of piracy. Unfortunately the description of the Harriers and the fact that they were accompanying the treasure ship was widely known. This was good for the purposes of stirring up the Imperium but not for the overall plan to have systems turn to Drinax to resolve the piracy menace.

Not all was lost however and that was because of the treaty the party had brought her.

The treaty stated that the Imperium agreed that the Aslan could extend their borders to within 6 hexes of the Imperium instead of the 10 that was currently in place. In exchange the Imperium would get improved trading terms. This deal meant that Drinax, Torpol, Clarke, Tech-World and many others in the Drinax belt would be engulfed by an Aslan horde.

This was clearly bad news for Drinax, unless that is they were already working towards bringing planets under their influence. As yet the treaty was not ratified - the physical copy in front of them was required for that. Until then the Drinax royal family and the travelers could spread the word about the treaty.

Lady Nitrane then mentioned the strongboxes again and Princess Rao asked that they fetch them. In the meantime she would go and get the king, now that the important discussions had taken place.

When the party returned the princess had not arrived so they waited. Not long later they heard her voice in the corridor saying "but you have to go" in an exasperated tone. At that the princess and King Oleb entered,. the latter in a waterpolo uniform.

To be continued...