On the backside of the universe, tucked beside a major shipping lane in a sparsely settled galaxy, sat the only outpost for light‑years. New Eden Station. It clung to the edge, the frontier between the Empty and the Galaxium Populari. The Empty was a vast stretch of nothing, a place some swore marked the end of the universe. Others called it hell, thanks to what hid there.
The atmo‑station had been here since the first colonization runs, held together by hope, scrap metal, and the kind of piracy everyone pretended not to see. The steady stream of travelers and miners made it seem legit, at least on the surface. The usual mixture of people running away, people looking for work, and people looking to get lost in the Empty.
New Eden station blinked like a beacon of desperate hope. The docking rings were clogged with mining vessels and military corvettes. All of it ran by Sepav, the slimest lizard man this side of the Galaxium Populari. Some loved him, some hated him, but nobody, I mean nobody, trusted him.
The Pinkertons, space cops, kept a tight fist on the station, deep in the pocket of Sepav, and twisted as the roots of a terran oak tree. They ran under the pretenses of justice and fair law, but it was in name only. Even with its shortcomings, many called this atmo-station home, and some found themselves pulled back no matter the distance they'd run.
A small, worn-out agriculture shuttle powered through the inner-verse on a routine trip to the edge. Its passengers and crew are sealed away and waiting on the blink and stretch of coming out of FTL.