Underground Relic Auction by the Calico Syndicate

[Mr. Lime]

It's an advertisement for an auction, all right. It seems the Calico Syndicate (who?) is attempting to auction off a miner they've stuffed to the gills with Xeno Relics and somehow moved to the heart of Liberty.

C a l i c o S y n d i c a t e
RELICS AUCTION

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Hello everyone receiving this. You know who you are and why this is in your inbox.

The Calico Syndicate has acquired a Hegemon full of Xeno Relics. As we lack the facilities to utilize all of them, we're reaching out to those who do.

We only have one lot. which contains the following:

• One (1) Edison AM-333 Hegemon Civilian Miner (armaments stripped to make room for...)
  
• Ten thousand (10,000) standard units of assayed Xeno Relics
  
• Suitable identity-scrambling package.
  
• Located in California

Submit a bid in this channel. All submitted bids will be read. Confidentiality guaranteed. Secure delivery guaranteed. Bidding ends in 24 hours.

Mr. Lime
of the Calico Syndicate

[Mary Taylor]

Incoming Transmission

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User ID: Mary Taylor, Akutan Productions
Recipient: Mr. Lime, Calico Syndicate
Subject: RELICS AUCTION
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Good day,

Akutan Productions would like to put in a bid for 1,000,000 credits. Our assumption is that the craft is not in great peril and within reasonable retrieval range.
We're not bidding on a derelict or ship held within house authority custody.

Who is the Calico Syndicate affiliated with if any?

End of message.

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Transmission Ends

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[Mr. Lime]

Lime was consulting with G. “A million bid by Bristol. Hell of a coup for them if nobody else bites.” His associate nodded sagely. “The crew reports safe arrival. They’ll be returning to the Calico once remote control is established.” “Thank you, G.” “My pleasure.”

C a l i c o S y n d i c a t e
Double Checking

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Always a pleasure to hear from the Bristol ladies, the local Platinum VIPs.

Your assumptions are correct. To the best of our knowledge, the craft is not impounded, imprisoned, derelict, or crewed/deputized by law enforcement. I personally inspected it a few hours ago, it’s in mint condition and it’s cargo secure. As yours is the only bid submitted so far, I was going to ask them to start shifting it to Bering to save you some time before we handed off the keys.

Rest assured, the only reason we pulled the guns off the thing was to make room for the nice round number. When we say ten thousand, we measured out ten thousand.

As for who the Calico Syndicate is, you’ve met us. We’re the guys who deliver discreetly for people who really don’t want to think about where they get it from. We’re not a pack of bandits waving something too good to be true out there. Don’t bother looking us up, you’ll find nothing except what we say about ourselves.

Mr. Lime
of the Calico Syndicate

[Mr. Lime]

Lime was once again consulting with G. “And nobody else bit.” His associate tilted her head. “What you were offering really was too good to be true, they probably thought it was a Hegemon in Omicron Pi, or something equally needlessly cruel…” “Except it wasn’t, and now we have to close out the auction at a single bid at about a third this stuff’s street value.” “You aren’t canceling?” “No, a deal’s a deal.”

C a l i c o S y n d i c a t e
Winning Bid!

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Still a pleasure to hear from the Bristol ladies.

If you had shareholders, they’d probably give you a pretty big bonus. I’ve already had the team slide the lot towards Akutan, no need to thank me. Wire your bid to the Trader.Calico and you’ll get your goodies. My associates already have the requisite security in trust, ready to wrap this up.

Mr. Lime
of the Calico Syndicate

[Mary Taylor]

Incoming Transmission

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User ID: Mary Taylor, Akutan Productions
Recipient: Mr. Lime, Calico Syndicate
Subject: RELICS AUCTION
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Good day,

I see, we've had no record about you here but we're admittedly not very involved with the rest of Bristol Constructions. We've allocated the funds for Trader.Callico:
[18.09.824 19:54:25] You have sent 1.000.000 credits to Trader.Calico.

It was a surprise we got the winning bid. We'll see if any of the relics are containing the materials we need immediately. Luckily this is a legal transaction within Bering.
It was a pleasure.

End of message.

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Transmission Ends

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