The Solarian Accord and Orbital Consortium watch warily as tensions continue to rise between the Venusian Empire and Martian Republic over the recent uprising at the Noach Desert Relocation Facility. Some reports indicate that the uprising was a cover to justify the execution of the psychically gifted citizens housed there as a reprisal for the terrorist attacks by the Madhatter's Guild against the Martian delegation on Triton. In the outer system, the Jovian blockade of the Free State of Saturn continues as they try to choke out the remaining resistance after their punitive incursion late in 3647. Having cut off the water supply to the resistance controlled sections of the Flotilla, it is only a matter of time. In the Outer Reaches, the Blind Seers of Orcus are silent, the bloody-minded Red Sisters of Dysnomia sharpen their knives, and all the while, the Technocracy watches and waits...