Repo Jocks

Discontent in Winter

James tried to relax a little inside the cockpit of their repossessed fighter as they flew towards the nearby system gate. There was no sign of pursuit, so all there was to focus on was the gate in front of them.

The gates, officially known as the Stellar Intersystem Transport Portals, otherwise known as Star Gates, Jump Gates or just <I>gates</I> by the general public, were the new, space age railroad system. They were massive devices that simply sat out in a star systems space or in high orbit of planets, within various star systems or travel routes. They were what allowed people to make their way through the stars without buying passage on massive liners or joining up with some group, military or otherwise.

Big ships were able to use hyperspace jumps to move around between the stars, but the massive power and space requirements for hyperspace engines meant that they could only be mounted on big ships; <I>Capital Ships</I>. Heavy Transport Freighters and above fit into that category, but smaller freighters, shuttles, miners, star fighters, and so forth couldn't use Hyperspace Engines, so they needed a work around.

The Jump Gates were that workaround.

Even with hyperspace, ships can't travel in a straight line between different stellar distances across the stars. Occasionally, you had to drop out and adjust your course, sometimes new systems were discovered, or the engines needed to be cooled, or your hyperspace position had been reached, and more jumps were required.

At these typical points of rest, whether within a star system or in-between, Jump Gates were built there for non-hyperspace traffic to eventually pass through. New systems were discovered all the time, new colonies, way-stations and bases were established all the time, and it was the big ships that basically determined the travel routes between the stars for all the smaller ships.

The Jump Gates themselves were massive, circular devices; basically giant rings in space with green glowing portals of energy inside them. All the power generators, docks, control towers and living spaces a structure like that required were on the outer ring, while the artificial wormhole was generated and contained within the inside ring. Often times they functioned as hotels, fuel stations, transportation hubs and military strongholds, all rolled into one or divided up depending on the system.

All this flew through James's head as he contemplated the gate in front of him. Soon they would be lightyears away from colony station <I>Mist Drifter</I> and on their way back to a more passable form of civilization, where they could get some money, have some fun, and find a decent job.

Of course, they had their own bills to pay first.

He sighed in frustration at that.

By the time they'd paid everything up, they would have hardly any money left over, which meant more dangerous or long term work which meant the bills piled up while they were gone which meant little money left over which meant more work.

<I>How the hell does anyone live anymore?</I> James wondered. <I>I mean, what the hell? How do you get out of this mess? I want to live again, not just work!</I>

The Frontier was a vast chunk of space, with various nation states and factions of all shapes, sizes, and types. Yet strangely, most, if not <I>all</I>, were having serious economic problems of late. It was almost like someone had come along and stripped everyone of all their wealth, or at least, their ability to earn more, so eventually they ran out and became poor like everyone else.

There was wealth to be had out here; vast resources, discoveries, raids, hunts, skirmishes, security work, inventions, production, construction, advertising, trade of all sorts, so on. However, it seemed like so few were actually getting money, and everyone else was left in the lurch, fighting to the death for scraps, or slowly dying under crushing debt. Every year, hell, practically every <I>month</I>, it got worse for everyone but the ultra rich.