Tansad Beach Shadowport
Tansad Beach is a major shadowport in the Solerian Sector, located just within a small, milky white nebula located in one corner of the sector. Beyond Tansad Beach there is no need for a smuggler's secret base - the wilds beyond the Solerian Sector are so unsettled the smugglers can go about their business in the open.
| Solerian Sector |
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- Controlling Race: Outlaw-tech group
- Type: Unique; modified former mining asteroid
- Location: between systems in the Solerian Sector
- Commissioning Date: approximately 2280
- Hull Characteristics
- Size/Structure: Unique & varied
- Docking: No external docking ports; several primary internal docking bays each able to hold 20 Danube-class ships or smaller; dozens of secondary internal docking bays each able to hold 3 Danube-class ships or smaller.
- Personnel Characteristics
- Crew/Inhabitants/Capacity: 1200 / 7,000 / 50,000
- Systems Characteristics
- Transporters: none (unknown technology)
- Tractor Beams: 10 projectors: covering all arcs (720 degrees)
- Sensor Systems
- Long-Range Sensors: 5 lightyear range
- Lateral Sensors: 1 lightyear range
- Weapon Systems
- 80 Turbolaser Batteries: covering all arcs (720 degrees)
- 20 Ion Cannons: covering all arcs (720 degrees)
- Defensive Systems
- Caraadian Deflector Shields
- Craft
- 5 fighters
- 8 assault fighters
- Dimensions:
- Longest side: 900 meters
- Cargo Capacity: 800,000 metric tons
- Incidentals:
- Docking Fee: varies (see below)
- Customs: Local Inspection
- Services: Food, lodging, repair, entertainment
- Notes / Description:
Tansad Beach isn't much of a beach, actually. Its name grew out of a joke about the huge amount of sunlight the shadowport gets - though it is far from any star, the bright light of the nebula illuminates it from all sides.
The shadowport was once the site of a major mining operation in a major system near Lagor Ciro. A large processing base was established on the asteroid to mine both Tansad Beach and nearby asteroids, and when the miners exhausted the local resources, they moved on, leaving the gutted rock to an outlaw-tech group. This group somehow got it transported out to its present location about a century ago.
Tansad Beach, set up to service the technical needs of pirates and smugglers, quickly became one of the main smuggler roosts in the sector, one specializing in high technology. Over the years, the tech group built up the existing structures, and filled the huge caverns and mining shafts within with buildings and living complexes to support the growing businesses and personnel needed to serve a growing clientele. It's difficult to see much of the asteroid today. The external surfaces are plated in metal and plastics, and have grown out beyond the original surface by as much as 10 meters in spots.
Tansad Beach packs quite a punch for a mere spacer station. Boasting a generous number of turbolaser batteries procured from military shipyards, it can fight off any single ship smaller than a destroyer, and hold off entire fleets made up of lesser craft. The Beach also maintains a defence force of five fighters, and eight assault fighters.
There are dozens of docking bays down the length of the Beach, ranging from small private bays to teh huge central bays designed to hold a large number of smaller craft. There are no docking provisions for capital ships and bulk cruisers. Largers ships must position themselves in an assigned sector of space some distance away and use shuttles to get to the station (there are a number of space taxis flitting about the station who service parked ships as well).
Customs is not as lenient as one would expect from an outlaw spaceport. Station secturity take their jobs seriously. They don't particularly care what a spacer brings aboard the Beach, but they do want to know about it. The penalty for holding out on security is immediate expulsion from the station, and a permanent ban from returning. And it's no use trying to pull anything on smugglers on guard duty. They've not only seen it all before, they've done it all before.
Personal weapons are permitted within the station, but grenades, heavy artillery, and anything else which could be used to threaten the station from within (such as cannisters of lethal biowar cultures) may only be taken into the Lock, a huge cavern at the bottom of the station which is sealed from the rest of the station and is only accessable from outer airlocks.
Docking fees vary from a few 100 credits a day for using the smaller bays to 1000 credits a day for using the larger ones with magnetic airlock fields. Larger ships in parking orbit are also charged 1000 credits a day. Shadowports are not cheap, but they are priced according to the amount of money that flows through them - often billions of credits a year.
Tansad Beach has 15 levels of designated open trading space. Spacers often buy floor space in one of the large open bazaars located on each of these levels, and sell their cargoes directly from the floor. Other merchants use teh bazaars to sell rolfs, illegal ship parts and weapons, food, and so on. The infamous Level 12, the meat market, is a level many spacers avoid.
The Slavers Market
There aren't many smugglers who feel comfortable dealing in slaves, but those who do have to buy and sell them somewhere. Shadowports are the de facto places to make these transactions, and the Beach is no exception. Level 12 is devoted entirely to the buying and selling of slaves. While most of the slaves brought to the Beach are aliens, humanoid and near-humans have also been seen leaving. It's a good idea not to lose your last credit while on the Beach.
Kail's
Kail's specializes in extensive redesign of existing starship systems of all sorts. It fills the largest repair bay in the entire space station. This is where Kail works his miracles. People whisper the old man has a pipeline into some of the Expanse's and Empire's top R&D labs. This may or may not be true, but Kail's work is definitely first rate, and some of his improvements border on genius.
There have been plenty of attempts to work Kail out of his prime spot, both financially and criminal, but those stupid enough to lean on cheerful old Kail don't quite realize what they're taking on - Kail is the man who procured and installed Tansad Beach's armaments, and as far as Khazam is concerned, anyone messing with Kail is messing with him. Not that Kail has trouble justifying this use of the bay - he usually has a list of ships waiting to put in for repairs several months long.
Uljin's Trifles
Uljin has a small stand just inside the main intercourse on Level 2, where he sells flowers he grows himself in a small hydroponic garden in his quarters. Uljin makes a nice enough living as a florist, actually. People who spend weeks at a time shut up with nothing to look at besides blackened rock and old bulkheads are drawn irresistibly to the bright and colorful plants which remind them of bright sunny days on their homeworld, or dark, methane fog-banked ones, as the case may be. Even hardened pirates with the death sentence in a dozen systems have been seen creeping away from his stand cupping a small delicate flower in their thick, calloused fingers, glaring wildly about as if to dare passers-by to comment.
But as lucrative as the flower business is, Uljin's real line of work is somewhat different - he's the local infochant (information merchant) and newsnet code dealer. If something remotely interesting is going down anywhere within light years, Uljin is sure to know of it. He seems to know the business of everyone visiting Tansad Beach, and for the right price, will match buyers with sellers, and vice versa.
He charges top credit for his codes, since he has to have a private courier rolf run the public network feeds out from Lagor Ciro (regular distributors do not service the station). He will warn customers that as far as they are from the core of civilized space, news will be days or weeks old by the time they get it. He has access codes for the Fringer's Infonet, but will only sell them to smugglers who come recommended by current members.