<div align="center"><strong>It is a dark time in the Galaxy.<br/><br/>The Paddedbra Emperor Shaddap the Fifth, the Beige Lord of Emo, has decreed a new era of seriousness and sobriety thoughout his realm.  From the seat of the Imperial Bureaucracy on Administratium, hordes of accountants have gone forth to preach the Proper Order.  The Gardens of Naughtiness on planet Aphrodesiac are no more.  Imperial might is brought to bear on any worlds inclined to frivolity or even dry sarcasm.<br/><br/>Worse, rumors abound that from the laboratories and workshops of the Imperial Tech Worlds, a vast doomsday engine of unparalleled might has arisen for those occasions when His Imperial Majesty might prove to be in a rare mood.<br/><br/>And nothing gets the Emperor in a rare mood like news of a recently discovered Pirate Haven...</strong></div><br/>Out of the velvety blackness of space, not too far from a rocky little world with only a navigational designation instead of a proper name, the orange-tinged swirl of a hypergate pops open, followed by a dozen or so blunt-nosed, grey and beige Imperial Men-of-War, followed by a massive Siege Monitor.<br/><br/>Any minute now, the free pirate haven is going to detect the incoming fleet.  But for now, the rascals and rapscallions who call it home are still going about their daily business, pursuing whatever business brought them here...