The Belt

A large asteroid belt runs through the center of the system. The largest asteroids here are small moons, easily big enough to accomodate hidden bases, especially a handful of corporate dark stations. There’s likewise a fair number of pirate outposts and even mercenary bases hidden among these trillions of massive rocks. The Belt offers a great expanse to hide in, run from pursuers, or just have your own low-cost private base.

Asteroid Layout

The Belt isn’t uniform. There’s about 30 regions of asteroids clustered close enough together that a pilot would actually have to dodge and manuever. These areas are designated as “sub-planetary” or “proto-planetary”. Given another few million years, these areas will start to develop into moons or possibly planets. They’re also another unusual detail about the system. Usually there’s only one planet in any given orbital band, not the slow build up of 30.

From a compositional standpoint, the asteroids vary. There are millions that are just loose clumps of gravel caught together. They’ll burst from a single bullet. Others are denser, traditional nickel-iron cores. The toughest of them will crush a ship on impact or even provide suitable armor for an internal base. A few even have fissures large enough to pilot a ship into. The variety is extraordinary.

Key Sites

The Golden Twins

A pair of large asteroids, measuring 50 and 67 kilometers in diameter, these two larger bodies are a common landmark for those navigating the system. Their orbit is just outside the belt and thanks to the orbital dynamics of Atlas, generally keeps pace with Poli. They’re uninhabited and unoccupied, but their extremely high albedo makes them an easy point for astral nav systems to lock onto.

Berratna Bay

Literally “Brother’s Bay”, this is a pirate market. It’s meant as ‘the brotherhood of pirats’, there is a general set of accepted rules about who comes and goes, trading goods, and everyone here opposing the corporatists. The station itself is a modular ship. Each section has its own drive. They move around the asteroid belt, finding a new location and either pulling the rocks around them to create shelter/cover or drilling into them. On one occasion they jsut strung out mining nets, covered them in gravel, and floated there for months undetected.

There is no legal precedent for anyone to arrest them per se, the void is the open seas, but mercenaries and other such hunters are always looking for a bounty.

The Sentinels

A rare collaboration of the three factions, the Sentinel Network is a system of 6 dozen autonomous rail guns spread throughoug the asteroid belt. These units are constantly scanning the asteroids, mapping their trajectories, and shooting down any that are on an intercept path for any of the occupied planets. It’s a necessary safety feature. The leadership of each major faction is in lock-step agreement. If anyone tampers with or interferes with these systems, the consequences would be lethal.