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Description
View from the rear loading bay of the Vat Jou Goed En Trek, an Ossewa-class heavy lifter of the Transorbitaal Republiek's Laerstaat Kalahari. In the background, from left to right are the Bakkie-class escort vehicle Protea and the Ossewa-class heavy lifters Hendrik Potgieter and Groot Marico, also of the Laerstaat Kalahari. The scene depicts the Orbitaaler burghers of the Laerstaat Kalahari as they prepare to make a sortie through the Dry River Run.

The traditionally democratic and egalitarian command structure of the Orbitaaler and Afrikander fleet republics is on full display during the prelude to any armed action that runs the risk of bloodshed among the participants. Individual burghers among the Ossewa and Bakkie crews are accustomed to gathering for a krygsraad in which they vote on whether to commit their vehicles to the planned operation, their votes weighted by their share of clan and personal ownership in their vehicles. Meanwhile, the details of the battle plan are often a product of dubious compromises between bickering Orbitaaler kapteins and kommandants of rival clans or republics, who gather aboard the command cabin of the flagship vehicle in order to hammer out some semblance of half-hearted agreement over rounds of Boer coffee and cigarettes. Although the exigencies of the Great Dust War necessitated the adoption of an emergency system of unconditional, military-style command and control among those Orbitaaler republics and clans drawn into the war, in the following decades of relative peace with the great powers, the old krygsraad system has largely returned to the norm, especially in smaller scale actions against lesser pirates or marauding raiders. Such is the case with the burghers of the Laerstaat Kalahari, who enjoy a respite from the tedium of their battle preparations as they wait for their elected kapteins to reach a consensus on whether to enter the Dry River Run from the northern or the southern approach.

The Run is a treacherous passage through the western reaches of Du Toit's Debris Field that leads directly to the relatively untapped masses of high grade salvage that lie at the heart of that maze of ruined orbital infrastructure and fragmentary starship wrecks. The passage is fraught with danger in the form of Freeporter pirate tribes who have purchased modern hyper-velocity musketry from unscrupulous Red Djong-Kok privateer-traders seeking to reduce the quantity of premium Orbitaaler-salvaged ceramsteel that makes it to the global market and thereby safeguard the price of Red ceramsteel. Although the shoddily manufactured hyper-kinetic swivel guns and muzzleloaders sold by the Red gun-runners are frequently as much of a danger to their users as their targets, they represent a serious threat to any Orbitaaler laager formation that makes the mistake of blundering blindly into a full-scale ambush. Fortunately, the parched and often windless terrain of the Dry River Run makes difficult for Freeporter pirate skiff flotillas to quickly maneuver into position to exploit the initial success of a dismounted ambush, and most attacks are beaten off with heavy casualties among the Freeporter savages.

Still, a closely fought skirmish is often more than enough to rattle the nerves of a less experienced Orbitaaler kaptein and induce him and his crew to vote for turning around and heading for the safer, if less lucrative, debris fields of the southern salt flats, which have nearly been picked clean by generations of Orbitaaler salvaging expeditions. In such an instance, the end result is all the same for the Red gun-runners who supply arms to the Freeporter savages: less high-grade Orbitaaler ceramsteel will reach the market to compete with the Red ceramsteel leaving the great industrial forge-yards of the Longliu Archipelago.

Description
View from the rear loading bay of the Vat Jou Goed En Trek, an Ossewa-class heavy lifter of the Transorbitaal Republiek's Laerstaat Kalahari. In the background, from left to right are the Bakkie-class escort vehicle Protea and the Ossewa-class heavy lifters Hendrik Potgieter and Groot Marico, also of the Laerstaat Kalahari. The scene depicts the Orbitaaler burghers of the Laerstaat Kalahari as they prepare to make a sortie through the Dry River Run.

The traditionally democratic and egalitarian command structure of the Orbitaaler and Afrikander fleet republics is on full display during the prelude to any armed action that runs the risk of bloodshed among the participants. Individual burghers among the Ossewa and Bakkie crews are accustomed to gathering for a krygsraad in which they vote on whether to commit their vehicles to the planned operation, their votes weighted by their share of clan and personal ownership in their vehicles. Meanwhile, the details of the battle plan are often a product of dubious compromises between bickering Orbitaaler kapteins and kommandants of rival clans or republics, who gather aboard the command cabin of the flagship vehicle in order to hammer out some semblance of half-hearted agreement over rounds of Boer coffee and cigarettes. Although the exigencies of the Great Dust War necessitated the adoption of an emergency system of unconditional, military-style command and control among those Orbitaaler republics and clans drawn into the war, in the following decades of relative peace with the great powers, the old krygsraad system has largely returned to the norm, especially in smaller scale actions against lesser pirates or marauding raiders. Such is the case with the burghers of the Laerstaat Kalahari, who enjoy a respite from the tedium of their battle preparations as they wait for their elected kapteins to reach a consensus on whether to enter the Dry River Run from the northern or the southern approach.

The Run is a treacherous passage through the western reaches of Du Toit's Debris Field that leads directly to the relatively untapped masses of high grade salvage that lie at the heart of that maze of ruined orbital infrastructure and fragmentary starship wrecks. The passage is fraught with danger in the form of Freeporter pirate tribes who have purchased modern hyper-velocity musketry from unscrupulous Red Djong-Kok privateer-traders seeking to reduce the quantity of premium Orbitaaler-salvaged ceramsteel that makes it to the global market and thereby safeguard the price of Red ceramsteel. Although the shoddily manufactured hyper-kinetic swivel guns and muzzleloaders sold by the Red gun-runners are frequently as much of a danger to their users as their targets, they represent a serious threat to any Orbitaaler laager formation that makes the mistake of blundering blindly into a full-scale ambush. Fortunately, the parched and often windless terrain of the Dry River Run makes difficult for Freeporter pirate skiff flotillas to quickly maneuver into position to exploit the initial success of a dismounted ambush, and most attacks are beaten off with heavy casualties among the Freeporter savages.

Still, a closely fought skirmish is often more than enough to rattle the nerves of a less experienced Orbitaaler kaptein and induce him and his crew to vote for turning around and heading for the safer, if less lucrative, debris fields of the southern salt flats, which have nearly been picked clean by generations of Orbitaaler salvaging expeditions. In such an instance, the end result is all the same for the Red gun-runners who supply arms to the Freeporter savages: less high-grade Orbitaaler ceramsteel will reach the market to compete with the Red ceramsteel leaving the great industrial forge-yards of the Longliu Archipelago.