The Aryl Blackout

Story so far

Hours before the warlord council, orcs aboard Princess Formidable's stalled ship boarded the station and manually pressed The Failsafe themselves after it became clear the princess was not coming back. Nothing happened locally — the expected detonation never came — but at that exact nanosecond the Aryl System went dark and its Tunnel Node switched off.

Zev brings the news, still only a few hours old and thin on detail, to Carl and Princess Donut. Tens of thousands of miners and reclamation workers plus a surface investigation team are stranded beyond reach; a rescue is being discussed but tunnel access is severed and even the old Borant Gate System cannot bridge it. It will take three cycles to learn whether Aryl's star still burns. Carl's first instinct is to ask whether the timing matches the thing in his head, but Zev says no — that season's AI went quiet, though never offline, back around the Sixth Floor.

Role

An unprecedented galactic catastrophe that unsettles even the Syndicate's oldest certainties.

Relationships