Chaos' Heir-Chapter 1084: Lawless zones

Captain Lochport's hesitation mainly had come from distrust. Keeping Nott Station away from the imminent chaos sounded impossible, so he preferred to leave it in the hands of the only person who would fight for its well-being: Himself.

However, Khan's revelations had changed the Captain's mind. The latter was almost sure Khan would protect Nott Station with everything he had. Khan would never sacrifice it for his needs, so Captain Lochport found no reason to refuse him. Being stubborn would only prevent the structure from having the best tools to face the imminent, unavoidable mess.

What followed was what the meeting was always meant to be. Captain Lochport used his genetic signature to gain access to classified information, which the interactive desk showcased.

Khan downloaded everything on his phone while studying the various holograms and labels. He wouldn't risk leaving anything discovered on Chuwei in Nott Station's menus. Still, Khan had long since committed everything to memory, allowing him to perform a few mental simulations without cross-referencing data.

Those distant, almost unregulated quadrants were more active than Khan had expected. Most of the criminal traffic didn't converge on Nott Station, but those activities kept the structure into consideration, occasionally negotiating deals when the situation allowed it.

That would theoretically prevent Captain Lochport from learning valuable information about the criminal activities, but he had played his cards well. During his ten years of service in Nott Station, he had gathered as much information as possible, doing his best to avoid getting caught by surprise or exploited.

It turned out that the criminals had a series of makeshift colonies of various sizes in the planets that littered the nearby quadrants. They weren't anything fancy or big, mostly acting as warehouses for their smuggled goods and secret hangars for their illegal ships, but Khan still found their existence surprising.

After all, criminals needed to earn a living, and the more assets they had, the higher their expenses would be. Maintaining colonies, no matter how small they were, was a pricy endeavor, and that money had to come from somewhere, which the area theoretically didn't have.

Criminal activities didn't exist in a vacuum. Smugglers needed buyers and sellers, and the same went for the different iterations of those occupations. Yet, the area only had Nott Station and the mysterious small colonies, which weren't nearly enough to sustain that apparatus.

After studying the holograms for a while, Khan could only find two possible explanations. Either Captain Lochport was lying, or Khan was missing something.

Captain Lochport didn't strike Khan as the lying type, especially after many heart-to-heart exchanges, so Khan reviewed the data, trying to find different and broader perspectives. Luckily, he had done plenty of research about those topics, and clues eventually became visible.

The quadrants didn't have anything too valuable. The Global Army had already made sure of that decades ago, so Khan could dismiss the idea of some massive secret criminal headquarters hidden on that side of the universe.

Instead, Khan took the area as a simple, safe travel path. Those quadrants were mostly unregulated, so no one would stop or notice ships with illegal cargo there. That was the perfect place where criminals could disappear, only to reappear on another side of the universe.

Source and destination remained the main problem and what Khan truly cared about. Finding them would reveal the whole apparatus' nature, but there could be multiple instances of both, complicating the search.

'There isn't anything recorded past this point,' Khan thought. 'No mighty alien civilization or edges of other domains. Nothing should come from there. It has to come from the regulated side.'

The Empire was relatively close, but the Global Army's domain was closer. Moreover, it enveloped those mostly unregulated quadrants, making it the most likely source and destination. The issue was highlighting the places that could benefit from that hidden travel route.

'All the legal structures have better methods and routes at their disposal,' Khan considered. 'Their available resources are also public, so Nott Station would have flagged something curious during the last ten years.'

As soon as Khan understood that point, the answer became obvious. The regulated structures wouldn't bother engaging in such small, contrived, and long activities, so the sources had to be as illegal as that hidden travel route.

Few places could be publicly unregulated while occupying regulated areas of the universe, and Khan had been on a couple. Milia 222 and Neo Station, the space station nearby, matched those requirements, allowing Khan to uncover a clearer route.

Captain Lochport opened his mouth in surprise when he saw Khan jumping on the interactive desk, crouching among the holograms while tinkering with them. The scout inside him had awakened and taken control of his actions, demanding a different perspective of that star map.

Khan zoomed out the map, occasionally messing with the menus to highlight a few locations. He even traced routes with his fingers, which the interactive desk recorded and reflected in the holograms. A proper pattern took shape, and even Captain Lochport stood up to inspect it better once he recognized something.

'That's a name I haven't thought about in a long time,' Khan chuckled internally, highlighting the last location before standing up on the interactive desk. He towered over the holograms, his glowing eyes fixed on the red label "Merth 290".

"I never thought about this," Captain Lochport gasped, studying the array Khan had drawn. "Are they smuggling goods between lawless zones?"

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"Some," Khan commented. "They should only resort to this area when long travels are unavoidable."

"Do you think all the lawless zones converge here?" Captain Lochport wondered.

"Unlikely," Khan responded. "There are unregulated zones all across the Global Army's domain. They probably use its edges only when other options fail."

Captain Lochport nodded. Khan's idea made sense logistically. Only those targeting the nearby lawless zones would rely on the quadrants around Nott Station.

"So," Captain Lochport continued. "Merth 290 should be the destination and source, but where's the other end of the route?"

"I have no idea," Khan exclaimed, "But the area is more active than I thought, and the people navigating it should be quite knowledgeable. I guess capturing a pirate or two wouldn't hurt."