Space Bastards

In the early days of the UGH the Frontier was several sectors closer to the Core Planets. A Frontier Charter was granted by the Chamber of Colonization to Bartoli-Stellar-Development Company to place and maintain a deep-space exploration and survey station in the Thrandor Sector. Bartoli managed to make a thin profit on the station, but when the sector was incorporated as part of the Union much of its profits evaporated.

However, one of the partners in the company noticed that there was a clause in the charter that stated that the station could only be inspected or boarded with an order signed by the Colonial Manager of the Thrandor Frontier Zone. But, there were no more Colonial Managers of the Thrandor Frontier Zone, since Thrandor was now a full sector of the UGH outside of Colonial Frontier management. The Chamber of Justice and the Chamber of Colonization argued about it for some decades, but decided that rules were rules and so, no one could legally search or inspect the station.

The owning partners of the station (the old shareholders of Bartoli) decided to use the legal loophole to make some non-legal profits. For a century or two the station has gradually run down, making a narrow living for the owners. Recently, the current partners were killed in a suspicious shuttle explosion, and the “company” solicitor has tracked down their heirs (our heroes, the Space Bastards) and informed them that they are the new owners.

In the current era, a group of scoundrels come into possession of the station because a relative or friend was one of the previous owners and named each of them in their wills as the new owners of this sad station. They all died in a mysterious shuttle explosion and their lawyer Slick Tyrone contacted them to travel and receive their inheritance.

Station Crew a certain number of losers were employed by the previous Bastard Board who form a rickety support crew for the station.

Station Visitors there are some travelers who make visits to the station.

Station Bums there is a mob of fugitive vagrants who scratch out a meager existence in the run down abandoned secrions of the station.

Bastard Station was once very well-appointed and functional, but over the past few decades its style and promise has crumbled to ruin. It is made up of three main sections, each connected by a zero-gravity well.

The first section is the one that still sees a little upkeep, and has seen the most wear. It includes the following elements:

• Docks - While there was once berths for up to twenty-four ships at once, the station can now only reliably accomodate two
• Thoroughfare - This wide avenue was once an impressive atrium stretching the diameter of the docking ring boasting fancy shops and entertainments, but is now a trash-choked ruin
• The Mall - Banks of businesses were once honeycombed in this district of the station, now just dusty husks with the occasional squatter
• Command - At the pinnacle of the station, the command deck that once directed ship traffic and co-ordinated public works and services of the installation is now the location of the bio-vats used to grow the biomass needed for survival by Happy Farmer
• Residence Ring - Cracked and failing, riddled with holes like Swiss cheese, the outer residence ring of the station that once was used as personal space for its citizens is now uninhabitable

The first and second section are connected by a zero-gravity well at the center of the station known colloquially as the “Bum Hole” because of the types of individuals who usually use it.

The second section, once the military center of the installation, has fallen into desperate disrepair. Many of the features it once boasted are now open to space and/or radioactive death traps. However, at its peak this section had the following elements that could potentially be restored:

• Drydocks - There were three docking slips that featured claws and gear to repair and re-engineer craft in deep space
• Gunnery Arrays - Now stripped bare of all control and weapons, there were once five emplacements to mount guns and torpedoes for station defense
• Warehouses - Zero gravity warehouses once stored banks of cubes of all types, but these vaults are empty and open to the vacuum of space once their seals and stays failed
• Launch Rails - Tubes from the hangar deck still exist for fast interceptor deployment, despite being clogged with debris and the power lines stripped for parts
• Salvage - Perhaps the last thing to go was the salvage unit, used to ingest raw ore or derelict ships for new manufacture

The third and final section was once the home of all heavy industry of the station, and is often referred to as “Down Below.” It can be reached from the second section through another zero gravity well similar to the Bum Hole but much larger. It is believed that at least a few of the following elements were once found down here, but since the entire section was taken over by the mutant plant life that resists vacuum and lives off the star's light and the power core's radiation, none have descended and lived to tell the tale.

• Reactor Core - It must still be running somehow, but for how long?
• Greenhouses - Now with more scary plant life!
• Hydroponics - There used to be indoor plumbing at Bastard Station
• Biovats - Before they were relocated to the Command deck
• Fabricators - Massive and powerful, these once dominated the economy of Bastard Station but they have surely fallen into ruin and disrepair

• Bastard Station starts with a small bio-fabricator
• Mech-Fabricator
• Shipyard
• Laundry Brig
• Additional Crew Quarters
• Docks
• Temple
• Tavern
• Accommodations for Travel
• Theatre
• Bordello
• Defenses
• Trade Facilities
• Cybernetics Lab
• Dojo