Our tale begins in the world of Xiraltá, a minor planet orbiting a red-orange star smaller and cooler than Sol.
Xiraltá is overwhelmingly reddish in hue where its surface is not covered by the ever-receding patches of green vegetation introduced from off-world long ago, thanks to a soil rich in bauxite. Those that have been to old Mars notice a certain resemblance when viewing the world from orbit.
The planet was slated for long-term terraforming by House Thurd with little priority, as more than one other star in the vicinity held either better prospects or even Garden-class worlds. The orbit of Xiraltá was slightly altered to give it a Terran day-night cycle but the extremely limited green-zone orbit of its star didn't permit a major change of the length of its year.
The process rate was decelerated and eventually abandoned completely. About the time the native land fauna and flora (with the exception of a particularly resistant red-brownish moss) had been mostly replaced by imported species, prospectors on the second continent discovered uncommonly vast quantities of radioactives and rare metals. To this day Imperial planetologists are still at a loss to explain this occurrence satisfactorily in a world that is not particularly rich in mineral resources; the most widely accepted theory attributes the origin of these fields to a planetary collision or metal-rich meteoric showers long ago.
The colonization of Xiraltá shifted from attempting to create a garden/agricultural planet to massive exploitation of the 2nd continent's mineral wealth; and has remained thus since. Vast numbers of proles were transported from offworld and set to work on the mines. The mining was done seeking only efficiency and production; as time went by the 2nd continent's surface became unfit to live, tainted by radioactive particles and waste products. The proles now live in large underground settlements. The oceans fared little better, being used as a dumping ground for the mining activity. The shores of the 2nd continent are dead, and the rest of the planet's marine ecology is degrading, nearing a point of no return.
Airborne radioactive particles taint the atmosphere and shift around with the winds. Every settlement on the first continent has detectors and a system of alarms to warn the locals when masks or filters should be donned to go outside. The particles in the air rarely get to very high levels in the 1st continent, but sometimes strong intercontinental winds make people shut themselves in for weeks.
The higher classes live mostly in Domurbias, a local colloquialism to refer to town-sized settlements away from the city fully enclosed in a transparent dome. Sealed from the outside the Domurbias have their own atmosphere, climate control and even ecologies, richer, greener and healthier than what is found outside on the planet's surface.
When Xiraltá began turning into a world "not very nice to live", it was handed down to Minor House Pixul, a subject noble lineage of House Thurd. As long as the mineral profits keep coming, the Thurds care not how their subjects handle the world.
Today the ecological damage is reaching alarming levels. The introduced ecologies on the 1st continent are receding and local farming yields have dropped. The loss of land and sea flora decreased the rate of oxygen replenishment and the percentage of that gas in the atmosphere is nearing catastrophic lows.
Despite all this, easy money and a lax attitude by the authorities have made Xiraltá into a beacon for many Shadows, traders and persons of questionable repute. Several local and at least one interstellar Crime Syndic are known to operate here. And the only Starport in town won't pose too many questions about the provenience of your cargo.
SHIP'S LIBRARY PLANETARY DATA
System Title: Xiraltá
Location:Ketyel House Thurd Space
Ownership/Administration: Private feif of House Minor Pixul, subject of House Thurd.
Surface Gravity: 0.92 norm
Atmosphere: Standard Terran nitrogen/oxygen/inert mix with variable level of contamination by radioactive particles. Oxygen percentage is 19.9% and declining.
Hydrographics: 81.2% percent, mainly shallow seas. Three major landmasses.
Surface Mean Temperature: 18şC, ample variation during day-night cycle.
Local Day: Terran-standard.
Local Year: 272.64 days-standard.
Moons & Satellites: None.
Ecology: Primitive fauna and flora mostly extinct on land, oceans undergoing beginning of possible mass extinction event. Most land biosphere composed of introduced Terran & Alien species. Most ecological niches currently in regression.
Tech Level: Mixed, lacks sufficient native industry to maintain a Super-Scientific society without interstellar trade.
Population: Precise figures unknown. Resident and transient population combined estimated between a quarter and a half a Billion.
Major Exports: Lanthanum, Iridium, Uranium, trans-Uranic elements, Rare Earth metals.
Minor Imports: Technology, Luxury goods and foods.
Starports: One (1). Super-Scientific, surface facilities near planetary capital. No Highports present. Abandoned spaceport facilities on second continent.
Joined: Apr 2012 Gender: Male Posts: 68 Location: Asteroid-ship on Oort Cloud Karma: 10
Planetary Capital « Reply #1 on May 10, 2012, 5:05pm »
THE CAPITAL -------------
The Governor's Palace, The Palace of the Realm and the Headquarters of the Mining Corporation
The unimaginatively named Xiraltá City, commonly called "Xir" is the planetary capital and center of government.
Officially the resident population is a mere 15,000,000 but non-census population (shadows and offworlders staying long-term) is bound to be about an extra 20% of that number.
Most of Xir is a sprawling chaotic mass that grew from what was once the outer of 3 circles. The innermost, called "Core" is were all the local government and Imperial buildings are located. Most resident nobles own property (sometimes vast property) within the Core, but their homes are almost to a man located in private Domurbias dozens, sometimes hundreds of miles from the city itself.
Air travel is the most common method nobles use to move between their private residences and the city, but the truly wealthy ones prefer using a tube-car traveling in a suspended transparent tunnel. It is considered a status symbol in Xiraltá for a high-born to have a private tube-car route for travels from his Domurbia to Xir.
The Core is commonly described by foreign visitors as "jumbled". There hasn't been any master urban development plan in centuries, and the high-born and corporations are very keen on maintaining whatever property they own within Xir proper exactly as it is. Old cubiform building models mix with more recent (but already considered passé on the Core Worlds) ovoid architecture and towers in the phallic-obelisk tradition. Lightbeams and outward-fluorescent windows are everywhere. Some offworlders say (away from Xiraltian ears) that the whole Core resembles an immense red light district after nightfall.
Outside the core is the Old City. An architectural classification of this area is impossible. Besides what few pre-fab structures remain from the original colonization, the word of the day truly is "variety". Most styles of dwellings found in Humanspace and beyond can be found here, excepting really recent tendencies emanating from the old Core Planets. This is were most of the citizenry makes their homes.
Beyond the old city, but with no clear line of demarcation, one enters the Shantytowns, vast swathes of impromptu buildings and labyrinthine streets were the poor, the downtrodden, the Proles and the Shadows take residence.
The "borders" between old city and the shantytowns are called Hives, and one can know he is there by noticing the profusion of taverns, bars, shops, gun stores, pleasure domes, holodrug-inducer clubs, gambling parlors, legal narcotic peddlers and the groups of Puppet & Pleasure Yéleth androids loitering at the entrances or at the windows of pseudobio-brothels. True biological base "courtesans" are present too, and in considerable numbers.
A typical Hive Pimp
Xir is located on the equatorial region, near the eastern coast of the 1st continent. Even without climate control the temperature in and round the city is several degrees higher than norm.
Originally the capital extended all the way to the sea and fishing was a major local industry. The native marine life was human bio-compatible with little treatment and there was more than one true sea delicacy. The pollution and contamination of the ocean changed all that. Today the coastal area of Xir, miles upon miles in expanse, stands abandoned. The ruins of the old harbor and the surrounding quarters remain mostly empty, being considered unfit to live even by desperate shadows and escaped proles or slaves.
Several tube-ways lead to the Starport and other settlements. Connection with the second continent is also assured by massive underwater and surface tubeway tunnels.
Joined: Apr 2012 Gender: Male Posts: 68 Location: Asteroid-ship on Oort Cloud Karma: 10
Starport & Startown « Reply #2 on May 12, 2012, 1:52pm »
THE STARPORT ---------------
Xiraltá's Starport on a normal day with sparse traffic
The only functioning starport on the planet is located on a plain some 50 miles south of the capital, Xir. It is a vast and well supplied facility although somewhat chaotic.
The landing pads are divided into areas according to the nature and importance of the visitor: highborn, military, imperial, corporate, trader, commoner, etc. But it is not uncommon in times of greater traffic for restricted zones to be used by arrivals of lesser status. This has led to problems and social faux-pas when an unexpected person of status arrives to find his space "taken by rabble". Several Starport administrators have met the impaler's stake during the course of their careers.
Surprisingly, for a world of its size and population Xiraltá lacks a Highport or any orbital facility of importance. The starport has a fleet of cargo shuttles to service interstellar ships that are not designed to land planetside.
Planetary Defense
One of the oldest sections of the spaceport used to house the Orbital Defense Force fighters and ships, but as Xiraltá has never been a target of invasion or hostilities, as time went on the force was partly phased-out and their base integrated into the spaceport proper to service civilian ships. The few anti-orbital artillery guns Xiraltá once had have long since been dismantled and sold for parts.
Today the ODF is reduced to a handful of pilots on single block within starport. Their duties are mostly ceremonial and they rarely fly besides forming greeting escorts for important visitors. The hangars near their HQ contain outdated fighters and the great cylindrical hulks of cruisers that have not seen the light of days in centuries. Some rumors say a few of the Moon-class spherical battleships that once formed the core of the ODF were not sold or mothballed, but are being kept on secret locations, in orbit, underground or on one of the other dead planets in the system.
Startown
A few miles from Starport, connected to it by tube-way lines and ground roads, lies Startown; a city in its own right with all the facilities to cater the needs of visitors. It is a fairly comfortable place but it seems to many to have too much of a "hotel atmosphere" with no real nightlife or red light district to speak of. Prices are considerably steeper than on the rest of the planet and items such as weapons and armor are not available for sale.
Many traders and short-term visitors to the planet don't leave startown at all during their stay, but starship crews with time on their hands and looking for a cure to cabin-fever usually trade it for the hives of Xir.
Joined: Apr 2012 Gender: Male Posts: 68 Location: Asteroid-ship on Oort Cloud Karma: 10
City of the Dead « Reply #3 on May 13, 2012, 5:00pm »
THE NECROPOLIS ------------------
One of the facets of Xir that has been known to attract tourists and scholars is the uncommonly vast necropolis. It is thousands upon thousands of years old, spanning several square miles in area and having many underground sub-levels. Its southern border can be seen at the edge of the horizon from the northern city walls. Once a river flowed between the cities of the living and the dead but it has long dried out. The tube-way bridges connecting both are still there, suspended over a red-brownish plain which has never known any buildings, and never will.
Cities of the dead in long-colonized worlds are found everywhere, but rarely on the scale of Xir's necropolis. It is known bodies in their tens of millions have been interred there, and if one believes the tales of the old geezers in the hives of Xir, the whole population of the capital could fit and live within the complex with room to spare.
Its History
The vastness of Xir's necropolis has an ancient religious cause. Long ago, before the mineral wealth on the second continent was discovered a weird off-world religious cult took root in Xiraltá and eventually rose to become the dominant religion. Among other dogma the cult mandated that the bodies of the dead should be kept preserved and undisturbed in wait for some future resurrection at the End of Time. Under no circumstances was desincorporation or recycling of cadavers to be allowed. So the necropolis grew and kept growing.
At the height of its power the cult counted all the members of House Minor Pixul residing in Xiraltá as its acolytes. The priests began exerting real influence within the Planetary Governor's court and one remnant of their meddlings is a very old law still in effect today. That law grants any sentient creature residing on Xiraltá, regardless of status or religious affiliation, the right to be interred within the Necropolis of Xir. It was after this custom began that the expansion of the city if the dead really exploded.
Today, the cult has long since faded into obscurity and even its name is forgotten. But the traditions remain. The conservative proles are peculiarly fierce about maintaining their privileges and to do away with the free interrement in the necropolis would surely lead to an open revolt. A special tube-way train connecting the 1st and 2nd continents exists solely for the purpose of delivering prole corpses to the necropolis.
The Dead
Over 80% of the bodies found on the necropolis belong to proles, shadows and slaves; preserved by such methods as primitive alchemy, encasement in hermetic paraduraplastic cocoons or direct plastification.
The highborn and rich prefer super-scientific methods of preservation that will last for aeons, combined with extensive post-mortem plastic surgery to make the body appear to be in the bloom of youth with a semblance of life. Ever since Vermilion Actuators became available the new fashion for the very rich is a transparent artificial crystal sarcophagus were the body of the deceased is preserved outside of time under the effect of a Vermilion Actuator, at great energy costs.
The Vermilion-Actuator preserved body of Bandassira HiPixul, former Planetary Governor of Xilartá, died on the 785th year of the Dynasty of the Veritable Autocrator (61,951 AD)
The Necropolis Today
Xir's necropolis has gained a tenebrous reputation within the city. Even if most won't pass the opportunity to sleep there once death takes them, everyone counsels visitors not to remain there after dark. The city of the dead is rife with some of the worst elements in Xiraltá, the crazy, criminal and desperate who make their homes among the departed and come out at night to prey on the unwary.
But wost things supposedly reside there besides these dredges. Tales whispered in bars and taverns tell of packs of rabid Ghola, cannibal cults, necromantic rituals, adepts of proscribed religions, disquieted dead who permit no trespassers and the Underpeople, descendants of the original caretakers of the necropolis who have not seen starlight in millennium and are not fully human anymore.
The museum-mausoleums of the nobles and wealthy are deemed safe, security being assured by hired guards or robots and androids. A visitor can literally spend weeks in those towers or ziggurat-shaped buildings, observing the exalted dead in their rest while watching the tales of their achievements in holographic projections. Should a visitor be trapped in the necropolis after nightfall and be of sufficient status to visit a noble mausoleum, he can spend the night there in safety.
The Tomb Police
A group titled The Guardians of the Hereafter is all that remains from the off-world cult that long ago made Xir's necropolis into what it is. The common folk call them simply the "Tomb Police" and while it is true they provide guide and escort services (for a fee) and chase out interlopers, their duties go much further than that. It is the guardians that keep records on who is buried there, provides maintenance and repair, and expands the necropolis when needed.
The size and membership of this organization is unknown. The guardians are given a considerable portion of the yearly planetary budget to accomplish their tasks (which the ruling council would like to slash mercilessly) and by law are not allowed to live outside the necropolis. They make their homes in the Under-levels. Where exactly, no one knows.
The visible face of the Guardians visitors are most likely to meet is the Tomb Police proper, in one of their patrols. These men and women dress in brown uniforms are are remarkably badly equipped. Their standard armor and weapons are primitive so veteran policeman must save credits from their salaries if they want to afford an energy pistol or needle gun. Most are recruited from the very rabble that makes the necropolis their home and tend to be surly, mean and underpaid. But a few lineages of professional tomb police have been in the trade for tens of generations and take their jobs very seriously. It advisable that visitors seeking a guide to the tombs hire exclusively from this last group.
Joined: Apr 2012 Gender: Male Posts: 68 Location: Asteroid-ship on Oort Cloud Karma: 10
Violence & Bloodshed « Reply #4 on May 13, 2012, 7:25pm »
THE HIVE FIGHTING PITS --------------------------
Xiraltá lacks formal Hirilákte Arenas. Shortly after House Minor Pixul gained the planet as a fief from Ketyel House Thurd something happened that so infuriated the Charukél, the hereditary guild of major domos who maintain strict control over the Imperial arenas, that the venerable organization barred the minor house from their services ad infinitum or until proper amendments were made.
The precise event that led to the banishment of house Pixul from the graces of the Charukél is not known except by guild itself. House Pixul's historical records have been expunged of that episode and the course of time effaced memory of its occurrence.
To fill the void caused by the departure of the guild and slake the mob's thirst for violence and bloodshed, illegal fighting arenas were soon created by unsavory persons on Xir's hives. After an extended period of persecution by the authorities their (discreet) presence was finally accepted as a facet of Xiraltian life. While the pits have never been sanctioned by the government, it no longer takes any efforts to dislodge them.
The bouts played on the hive pits are bloodier, more brutal and often dishonorable and unfair compared to real Hirilákte Arena fights. This of course only increases their popularity among the audiences. The fights are never televised and one must physically go to a pit to enjoy the massacre. Shadows, proles and lower-class citizens form the bulk of onlookers but it is not unknown for nobles to be present too, concealing their identities behind masks and cloaks even while their true nature is revealed by their cadre of bodyguards.
Some of the pits are fighting rings of remarkable quality; well-lit, with comfortable seating and modular fighting rings that can change features at a moment's notice. Many suspect outside agencies, perhaps House Pixul itself, sponsor and fund them.
Local Flavor
The fighting pits offer a great deal of variety. Besides traditional gladiator combat and duels, events like Sophont vs. Beast, Man vs. Machine, Team Fights, Last Man Standing, Capture the Flag and One Against Many (where an experienced fighter faces a multitude of naked and lightly armed slaves promised freedom if they vanquish him) are regular occurrences.
The favorite variant, found only in two of the fighting pits is called "The Labyrinthine Dungeon". In it a structure of corridors and rooms rises from below the arena surface to form a labyrinth complex with a single exit. The ceiling is made of a substance which allows viewing from the outside only. Monstrous animals, robotic or biological assassins and traps abound...as do treasure, riches and equipment.
Solo or group contestants must make their way to the exit without any prior knowledge of the layout, they win if they reach it and get to keep whatever they found during their excursion. The variants are numerous; sometimes several teams compete against each other or there is a time limit to reach the exit, the "Attrition" variant has many solo dungeoneers and a limit on the amount of times the exit will allow passage inferior to their total number, forcing the contestants to choose whether to becomes allies or foes when they meet and often ending in duels by the exit door when there is ample number of survivors.
The most challenging version of the the labyrinthine dungeon has a major adversary guarding the exit that must be vanquished before the contestants can regain freedom.
The Jumpers
The simultaneously most curious, popular and ignoble pit-arena tradition in Xir are the "Jumpers". No one knows exactly when this custom began or how it became acceptable. Jumpers are fanatical fans of particular gladiators that cross the arena wall to help their champions in a fight. A single jumper tends to be responded by one or more jumpers from the opposing faction, vice-versa and so on until dozens of commoners join the fray.
The pit adepts tell joyful tales of singular matches between gladiatorial champions that ended up turning into minor field battles, involving hundreds of fans of both gladiators vaulting the arena wall into the fighting field to aid their idols.
Use of missile weapons by fanatic adepts, or attacks from the balconies themselves are strictly forbidden. Guards with dragon-headed helmets and boarding poleaxes stride the seat corridors and cut down anyone who violates this rule, regardless of station. Concealed snipers take care of any jumpers who use ranged attack methods within the arena field.
Non-Humans and Proscriptions
Aliens are present in low numbers on Xiraltá so non-human gladiators are rare. Shen, Ahoggya and specially Pachi Lei Cymek Berserkers can command a very high price if they fight in the pits.
Everyone is welcome to the hive pits with one glaring exception. Sultyat Clone Legionaries are barred from the arenas both as combatants and audience members.
This hearkens back to an incident in 61,511 AD. A platoon of Sultyat Clones from the Legion of the Supreme Scintillating Halberd were planetside on leave and made their way into a hive pit for R&R. One of their number entered the "New Prospects" challenge and performed so well she was soon pitted against one of the arena champions and as she was gaining advantage in melee against her opponent, a group of jumper adepts took to the field to help their chosen idol.
Seeing this, the whole Sultyat platoon jumped in too and a major melee ensued. The end result was the death of most persons in the pit and audience seats, including seven nobles, one visiting non-human dignitary and the arena owner himself. Material damages were calculated in between 1 and 2 million Imperial credits and Shamtla reimbursements for the families of dead spectators ran several times that. The pit went bankrupt and most of its personnel met the impaler's stake.
In spite of this rule, since then more than one retired Sultyat in disguise has fought in the hive pits.
Joined: Apr 2012 Gender: Male Posts: 68 Location: Asteroid-ship on Oort Cloud Karma: 10
The Powers That Be « Reply #5 on May 15, 2012, 8:00pm »
POLITICS AND FACTIONS --------------------------
The World Government
The Xiraltá system is a fief of House Minor Pixul, subjects of Ketyel House Thurd. House Pixul's original homeworld is the Terran-Class planet Khuludan, located in the same space sector as Xiraltá. A former agricultural world, Khuludan was turned into a Garden-Reservation under direct Imperial administration after the exodus of most of House Pixul and their servants to Xiraltá. The current head of the house is unknown to the general public as is the identity of the current heir to that position. The number of members of House Pixul is rumored to be quite small, even for a minor noble house.
The planetary governor of planet Xiraltá is Gobelx HiPixul, nephew of former governor Bandassira HiPixul. Lord Gobelx has ruled for 60 years and has not made any public appearances during the last twenty. Gossip claims he has put on quite a few pounds since then.
Day to day administration is assured by the Planetary Council, a small tightly-knit group that, with one exception, is formed by members and stockholders from the Mining Corporation and whose major concerns are the operations on the 2nd continent.
The odd man out on the council is Chancellor Drannu Shó, a white-bearded elder of incredible age and unclear origins that has been around since everyone can remember. Reputedly this man is the only person that has direct access to the head of House Pixul and acts as his/her spokesman within the council.
Remarkably, none of the council members are of House Pixul noble blood. Most are Citizens and a few have been elevated into gentry by the house.
The Planetary Council in Session
The Empire
Imperial presence in Xiraltá is next to nil. The planet has no Sultyat Legion military bases, no Imperial Navy shipyards and lacks even an Imperial Embassy. A wandering Imperial Ambassador roams the sector and pays a visit to the planet once every standard-year. When he is absent, in case of pressing matters contact is possible trough a local representative that operates a specially-encoded Ansible.
The Imperial Navy Sector Fleet visits the system sporadically on patrols. Every few years or so, one of their ships descends planetside and remains hovering over the Spaceport as a physical manifestation of power to remind the Xiraltians they are a part of Humanspace. These rare visits are usually declared a local holiday so the populace can visit the starport and gape in awe at the visiting battleship.
As far as it is known Veregyá, the dreaded Imperial secret police, has never conducted any operations on Xiraltá. But if it did, who could tell unless the agency choose to reveal itself?
The Nobility
Looking at the demographic data from a per capita perspective Xiraltá is awash with petty nobles and gentry, both from House Pixul and from other houses of such low repute they lack a homeworld of their own.
A few nobles can be found in administrative positions within the government or the para-military forces but the bulk of them is either landed gentry that controls planetary food production or indolent dilettantes living idle luxurious lives off the dividends from stock held in the Mining Corporation.
As such, the world lacks an organized Highborn political faction. As long as the good times roll, as they have (for nobles at least) for the last centuries the low nobility seems quite uninterested to play the games of the corridors of power.
Religion
Xiraltá is not a particular spiritual world and lacks an official religion. Many proles on the 2nd continent do follow a bizarre doctrine that combines paleo-socialistic ideals, elevation of productivity above all else, the Cult to the Veritable Autocrator May the Light of His Presence Drive Off All Traces of Inimicals, and a lot of superstitions about radioactivity.
On the 1st continent and the City of Xir proper the only doctrine seems to be the pursuit of material gains and feeding of the senses. This is not to say the city is fully un-theistic; minor religious groups are known to inhabit both the Necropolis and the ruined harbor sector, and their prophets and preachers can sometimes be seen roaming the streets of the Hives, carrying their messages to any who will hear. Not many do.
Military and Defense
Xiraltá has no real military forces to speak of, order is enforced by two paramilitary organizations, the Popo-Proles and The Watch, which would be mobilized as defense forces in case of a military confrontation. A planetary militia does exist but it is small, underfunded, under-trained and under-equipped.
Most factions on the planet rely on private security forces to assure their defense. House Pixul is rumored to have a few platoons of older-model War Robots at concealed depots to be activated in case of a true emergency.
Despite being a frontier region, the space sector where Xiraltá system resides in is relatively well-traveled. The planet relies on its close proximity to other inhabited systems and the actions of the Imperil Navy to deter any aggressors.
A typical Popo-Prole Agent
The Mining Corporation
Anyone with even an iota of political acumen knows the Corporation is the de facto power on planet Xiraltá. The whole economy is dependent on the mining operations of the 2nd continent and its smooth running takes precedent over all other considerations.
The company was incorporated by the head of House Pixul who oversaw the moving of the house from Khuludan to Xiraltá. Originally the head of the house held the hereditary position of CEO and most of the administration seats belonged to other nobles, but as time progressed the nobles relegated their positions to vassal commoners. Eventually the Mining Corporation became an independent company, with House Pixul tutelage being maintained by majority holding of its shares.
The Mining Corporation is exempt from normal planetary taxation. Instead of taxes, before dividends are calculated and distributed among shareholders, a portion of the annual bulk profits is directly transferred to a government fund that is used for social ventures.
The Corporation is an AS-class company, so the precise roster of shareholders is not disclosed. But it is widely known this institution is very zealous about keeping as complete as possible independence from foreign interests and that off-world shareholders are a diminutive minority.
The Khórum Banking Guild
This quasi-governmental network of information and financial brokers is well established on Xiraltá. One of their representatives is a non-voting member of the Council and close ties exist between the Mining Corporation and the bankers.
Since time immemorial, a portion of the metal from the mines on the 2nd continent are allocated to the Khórum in re-payment for past loans to the Corporation's capital enterprises. A specially-armored starship protected by a massive escort detachment visits Xilartá on regular intervals to collect the mineral wealth and transport it to the secret Satellite-Safe that the Khórum supposedly maintains somewhere in the sector.
Academia
Xir has a small Imperial University campus. It mostly educates future administrators, engineers and technicians for the operations on the 2nd continent. A century or so ago, off-world funds have re-instituted the old Planetary Sciences faculty, this section of the university dates back to the original colonization of Xiraltá but was progressively de-funded and eventually abandoned after mining began on the 2nd continent.
Several dozen biologists, xeno-biologists, environmental engineers and planetary ecologists have visited the planet in the last few decades on university grants to study the noxious changes taking place in Xiraltá's biosphere. A few have taken residence and formed a group which is attempting to call the planetary government's attention to the problem and persuade it to take measures. So far they have been fully ignored.
Criminal Elements
The Hives of Xir supply ample opportunity for profit to those that are willing to bend or break the law and the local authorities have a rather laissez faire attitude towards these miscreants. As long as the activities of the crime syndicates don't affect profits and production or disturb persons of interest they are pretty much left alone and undisturbed.
In fact, the quasi-legal and illegal commercial enterprises of the crime syndicates play a major role in servicing the proles that visit Xir on leave from their labors on the 2nd continent, and thus contribute to social stability in the grand scheme of things.
Most criminal groups are petty local enterprises but a mysterious off-world gang has made its way into Xiraltá. These muscled off-worlders are at least a sector-wide organization, perhaps larger. So far their activities seem to be limited in extracting "protection money" from the local syndicates and monopolizing the interstellar commerce of certain illicit substances. This group has ruthlessly purged all attempts made to find more about their true nature, even their name is unknown. They are commonly referred to by Xiraltians aware of their presence as The Circles.
Crime Syndicate negotiations take a turn for the worse in a bar at the Hive
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