Random Musings on Fools and Their Money Parted
02 Feb 2022Janid
CMDR Janid's Log, 3308-02-01Ship:SpaceTruckerJalopy IDENT:ST-730, Type-9 Heavy
I set out this evening for a night of standard cargo hauling after spending the better part of a week performing various mercenary works for interested parties in the Kwatsu system. As I hopped around the regions, I happened upon a couple odd listing for Agronomic Treatments.
In the Leesti system, at the Coriolis Starpart 'George Lucas', I found they had an overabundance of Agronomic Treatment supplies they were trying to offload. Apparently, some tool-bag made a mistake when putting an order in their systems, and missed a decimal place, and added some zeroes. The end result was they had 100's of thousands of tons of agronomic treatment and no viable buyers.
Looking around the region, I then found a listing just a hop away in the Quator system. They had a massive buy listing for Agro treatments for a cool 31,059 credits. My initial excitement at the potential 28k profit per ton quickly faded when I saw that the buy listing was for a single ton.
Hopes dashed, I headed back to my ship to continue my search for a profitable route. Just as I was climbing the steps, a shout from behind caught my attention. Over amongst some cargo containers stood a hooded figure, motioning me towards them. Immediately suspicious, I placed my hands on my sidearm. At this point they took down their hood and held their hands up and shouted "Please, I just need some food, but I have valuable information to share...". Sigh... another hungry soul. So common in these Allied stations. The allies and federation may sneer at the empires use of voluntary slavery, but at least we would never let people go hungry in the cargo heaps of our major stations.
Grabbing some rations from my pouch, I approached the poor soul. With thankful, weary eyes, and quivering lips, they stammered while accepting the rations, "Madame, I just overheard your frustration over at the commodities boards about the sales prices in Quator. Earlier today, I heard a couple of smugglers talking about their "acquaintance" on the take at Quator Station. Apparently, this urchin is accepting all imports of Agronomic treatments to their system at full price, regardless of demand. That's all I heard, sss-ss-sorry. Thank Youoo..". They then skittered away, pulling their hood back on.
I'm not typically one to take the word of a cargo bum, but something seemed genuine about this info. Still, not wanting to risk significant capital, I decided to do a test run. I went ahead and picked up 10 tons of agronomic treatments before leaving George Lucas, and made the quick 3.75ly hop over to Quator. A few minutes of supercruise later, and I was docked at Quator Station. Feigning ignorance, I asked the cargo controller what their price was on agronomic treatment imports. Sure enough, they quoted the same price. When I inquired about how much they would be buying today, they told me "as much as you can bring. No limit". Huh. Well I'll be damned. That little urchin bore fruit after all.
I quickly offloaded my 10 tons of agro treatments, and returned to George Lucas in Leesti. 2.5 hours and 12 trips later, I had moved 9156 tons of Agro Treatments, and sold them for a net profit of 255.5 million credits! At that point, George Leetsi's supply had dried up, and I was worn out.
As I set course for my home station in Kwatsu's Fossum Ring, I cranked some tunes and mused to my copilot on the days profits. We wondered allowed what was going on in those systems. We both agree that clearly there were some shady dealings going on. Someone in George Lucas must have intentionally rigged those "accidental productions", and whoever that cargo controller was in Quator Station accepting ALL import orders was clearly risking a lot for some reason - profit, promotion, who knows what.
But then, who are we to turn down a little slice of the action? And I won't shed any tears about extracting credits from the totalitarian Feds at Quator, nor will I shed a tear for the Allied loss of materials that Leesti suffered as a result of this whole affair. We will sleep well on our profits, for surely there is no way our involvement in this odd little trade snafu will come back on us. And so too will we rest easy knowing it won't be long before we get our own fleet carrier, and set out into the wild frontiers.