Silver Lining:The Pay-Offs and The Rip-Offs
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| November 4, 2022 – Episode 7: The Pay-Offs and The Rip-Offs | ||
Shipping luxury contraband goods can be profitable - for a crew capable of avoiding any trouble.
Cold Open
The officer looks at you, then takes a long minute to take in the cargo bay. He turns to the other officer. "Indeps." he scoffs, "You gotta look real close at these indeps."
Characters Introduced
NPCs
- Konstantino Tyndel aka "Dino The Greek", "El Greco", "Greco" - Knaves enforcer, Christina Whitehall's right hand man.
- Officer Chadwick Bene - ISPS Customs Agent
- Officer Trainee Lloyd - Bene's sidekick
- Lorc McGrue - muscle bound thug who's fallen in with Griff
- Fingers "Two-Feet" Malone - non-muscle bound technology whiz who's reluctantly working work Griff
- Karn Muldavy - Unscrupulous fence of illegal goods
Scene 1 - Meeting with Greco
Konstantino Tyndel has a knack for flair. The meeting with him occurs at Lucaille (la cah-aye) 8760, a red dwarf. The system has helium-3 mining operations in an ice planet, Lucaille 8760e, in a station orbiting over the planet that serves as a quarters for workers and a transfer point to-and-from the planet. His ship is immediately noticeable as the Silver Lining docks. It's essentially a mid-sized winnebego, silver with violet accents and edging. As the PCs go to meet with him, they will occasionally pass members of his cell, and all are dressed nicely, business suits, accented in some way violet - a flower, a pair of sunglasses, pinstripes, etc.
Konstantino is a dark-skinned Black man from New York City in the North American Concord. He goes by many aliases, but prefers "Greco". He's waiting for the PCs in the commissary of the space station, and has taken up resident by himself at a table in the middle of the room. Greco wears a simple pair of black slacks with violet pinstripes, a violet shirt with arm garters and black tie. On the table sits a black fedora with a violet hat band. When the Silver Lining crew arrive, he stands up and greets them all, and shakes each one's hand, offering to them to sit down.The workers currently here shoot him and the Silver Lining crew dirty glances. He's very polite, but not overly formal. Anyone who's worked with or dealt with him before knows he values loyalty and respect above all other things, but can be brutal and swift when crossed, though he never tries to be (as far as he sees it) unnecessarily cruel.
He sends his regards from Christina to John. John thanks him, but tries to change the subject.
Greco has several (10) large crates filled with Fomalhut Ivory, a very substance that can only be harvested from a now-endangered animal on a planet in the Fomalhut system. Ten carapaces of ivory per crate. They're filling up his yacht, the Violet Star, and he can't easily smuggle goods like these into populated space. The job is simple. They bring the shipment of ivory to a fence on PLANET, a pawn broker named Karn Muldavy at the Marangard Pawn Shop. These should fetch 100k, the Silver Lining will get a cut of the final amount.
It's up to the PCs to determine their cover story, how they're going to hide the goods,
High Stakes Scene 2 - John Goes Missing aka The Return of Griff
PCs must stop at a way station for refueling, run into an angry crew who say the ivory is theirs and they want it back.
Silver Lining has to stop to take on supplies, so they are forced to stop at a space station at Rigel Cantorus. John wanders off to handle this. He hasn't returned after several hours. Attempts to call his communicator go unanswered. Delivery people start to show up with supplies, but still John still hasn't shown.
Easy Investigation to find him.
Talking with shop keepers, he stands out. A medical supply shop recognized him - he showed up to order some things as well as get some medication filled.
Was also spotted at a general store, where he picked up foodstuff and some other items. Was asking about where to get some equipment for ship repairs, which this store didn't carry. The shop keeper gave him directions and will let PC know.
If the PCs get to that shop, (they fail investigation tests) he will say they never saw anyone of that description.
However, in a dark corridor of the station between the general goods and repair shop, there are signs of a struggle. Trash cans knocked over, some blood spatter. John's cane.
Drag marks (shoe scuffs) can be seen on the ground, and while following them, they find his communicator. Scuff marks lead followed to a door.
Behind the door is a plain room, John at one end, tied to a chair. He's groggy on the edge of consciousness.
Three thugs lie in wait.
Griff leads them up: "Hey Buttheads. We never thought you were gonna show up. We didn't have your phone number or else we would have given you a call. Hand over the ivory, and we'll give you back the fat man."
If asked, Griff would say: "That blonde bitch stole it from us. We hunted those creatures ourself [sic] fair and square just for her to jump us and take it. We just want back what's rightfully ours." (the 'blonde bitch' he refers to is likely Christina)
They don't' want to pay for them.
The PCs must find a way to diffuse the situation.
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Scene 3 - Official Entanglements
PCs must deal with customs a officer when before reaching their final destination. The ship is approached a compact vessel with flashing lights. It passes in front of the Silver Lining and flashes it's lights into the cockpit to get their attention. They must dock and the customs agent comes aboard with a jr agent in tow.
The officers enter the cargo bay of the Silver Lining and remove their helmets.
One has a name tag "Bene", the other "Lloyd".
Bene has dyed black hair, a bushy mustache, and reflective sunglasses. Lloyd is young, blonde and clean shaven, with a nervous look on his face.
"I'm Officer Bene, this is Officer Loyd. Log book and manifest."
As they retrieve these items, Bene turns to Lloyd: "You gotta look real close at these indeps. [independent operators]. You can usually find something wrong to ticket them for if you look close enough. Besides, they're usually looking to cut corners somewhere..."
He hands the two items to Lloyd, and starts asking questions, while Lloyd is typing some things on his datapad.
His questions:
"Port of Origin?"
"Port of Registry?" (Earth)
"Destination?"
"Cargo and Passengers?"
"Do you have an LMC?" (last mile carrier, ie, is the Silver Lining taking the cargo to the surface themselves, or have the hired another party to do so)
Officer Bene then moves to poke around the hold and pick through crates. He will go for crates that hold the ivory. Lloyd is left to review the logbook and manifest against the answers, and what Bene is trying to find. If Bene and Lloyd are separated or if Lloyd is taken out, Lloyd can't add his die to Bene's rolls.
| Officer Chadwick Bene | ||||||||
| Dyed black hair, bushy mustache, reflective sunglasses, slightly muscular build, Bene is a veteran of the ISPS customs division, which oversees customs inspection operations over especially busy systems | ||||||||
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Signature Asset - The Man's Rulebook
Officer Lloyd
Scene 4 - At the pawnbroker's shop
Marangard City Pawnbrokers
Karn Muldavy, ProprieterDealing with the fence - he's going to try to lowball them
Gestures to the price list, and goes on about how it's hard to move ivory these days.
"The market's been flooded with this stuff recently"
d6 if they successfully get paid the proper amount.
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Final payment: or, if they didn't allow the pawn broker to undercut them . Also, cut the reward appropriately if they PCs had to bribe their way out of any complications.
| Musical Inspiration | |
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| Song: | Smuggler's Blues 
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| Artist: | Glenn Frey |
| Album: | The Allnighter |
| Listen online | |
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