As the freighter that most definitely is not actually named Ahmin descends onto the Kesh family berth at the Akis spaceport, Angel can see from the bridge that Gorlan is waiting for him down below next to the cargo skimmer and the crew of porters. Once the ship touches down and the proximity caution lighting switches from red to green, Gorlan leads the crew towards the opening cargo hold doors.

“Brother!” Gorlan says, giving Angel a big hug as the porters walk past Angel and into the hold of the ship to start unloading all of Angel’s worldly possessions for transport to the Kesh estate. “How was your journey?”

Angel smiled, hugging his brother tightly.

"Boring, as it should be. It was a pleasant break from all the packing. And how are you Gorlan?"

As his adopted brother answers, he motions to Erika as she disembarks as well. "I know you two met at one point or another, but given she'll be staying with us for a bit...Erika, this is my brother Gorlan. Gorlan, Erika. One of you is responsible for me having a business empire to manage, and the other one is responsible for it not collapsing the moment I looked at it. I'll let you two sort out which is which." He winked, giving them both a semi-helpless grin.

"Oh, you know, busy as always," Gorlan says. "There have been exciting times in replicating Harumdor's anti-BRAF-V600 melanoma cocktail that I will not bore you with the details of."

When Erika walks up, she gives a well-practiced deep bow. "It's an honor to meet you, Master Kesh."
Gorlan smiles and returns the bow - not as deep, of course. "Not that I do not appreciate the deference, Miss Byrne, but this is not what I expected from the fiery assistant that Angel says is more important to Kesh Holdings' success than himself."
"Oh, well, gotta keep up appearances," Erika says, allowing a small smirk. "I've studied up on Naranai'i business culture - don't want to stick out too much."
"My dear, with your natural-looking red hair and pale skin, you will have all sorts of people asking who did your gene work," Gorlan replies. "I would not worry about sticking out." He gives another slight bow. "Welcome to Akis. Angel said you will be staying in his guest quarters to start, while we prepare your suite at Nga'a?"
"Yes, it's the first time I have been asked to prepare a mood palate for my interior decorator," Erika replies. "In fact, it's the first time I've had an interior decorator."
"Tangesa does spectacular work, I think she will have a fantastic time outfitting you and your quarters," Gorlan says. "Well, I look forward to working with you, Miss Byrne."
"Same to you, Master Kesh," Erika says, with one more bow. "If you'll excuse me, I have to make sure the porters have everything loaded up correctly."

"Of course," Gorlan says, and watches her walk off for a moment. "She has practiced her Naranai'i well. Barely a hint of Narsai'i accent."

Angel nods. "She takes her job seriously, and she's been prepping for this for awhile. This has honestly been too long in coming."

He sighs. "I've missed you brother. Missed...being somewhere. Lovely little vacation doing what I...used to do. But it's a suit that doesn't seem to fit as well as it used to." Angel smirked. "But don't tell Tangesa that, or somehow I'm going to find myself in something with far too many laces."

Gorlan lights up a bit when he hears Angel talk about his friction with fieldwork, but then just as quickly looks a bit ashamed at his own reaction. "Yes, well, we'll see what she comes up with for Erika. But for right now, I have had the larger skimmer brought over. The Faxom-Io board has requested a conference with the three of us once you have landed."

Angel catches Gorlan's expression, and gives him an understanding smile. "It's alright brother. It's not a feeling I'd hold against you - nor one I'm surprised by." He let out a slight sight and straightened his posture a little.

"Can't say I'm surprised by that news either. Any idea what in particular they want to bring up?"

Gorlan quickly flicks up his wrist holo and slides a Cortex article to Angel's vox from one of the more prominent Hedion gossip rags.

---

"CONSTRUCTION WINDING DOWN AT KESH ESTATE"
"Hama Zakand here with another tidbit for my loyal listeners. After making a splash several months ago when he came onto the scene having ever-so-sadly - and briefly - wooed dearly missed Expansion official and former Akis social starlet Tora Kesh, Angel Kesh has been absent from the hustle and bustle of Akis, and Hedion in general. Faxom-Io and Kesh family representatives have repeatedly stated that the newest Kesh tycoon is off solidifying his business empire in the border worlds he called his home, while the extensive remodeling going on in the Kesh family estate after Reno's violent end prepares for his return. Over the past couple of weeks, construction seems to be winding down, with the last contractors sighted hovering above the estate a few days ago. With renovations at an end, curious Akis'i citizens are wondering - is the mysterious Angel Kesh finally coming home to stay?"

---

"I suspect this is mostly why," Gorlan says with a grimace. "We can keep them out of our house, but nothing stops them from flying past in traffic."

Angel smirks slightly at Gorlan's grimace. "Well, given the Terran media's take on this from time to time is 'Is Angel Riviera a TRAITOR in (literal) BED WITH ALIENS?'..."

He smiles. "So, a combination show-the-flag, give the rumor mill something more innocuous to gossip about, and lay the groundwork for 'Yes, Angel Kesh is sometimes offworld, and it is for terribly boring reasons and definitely not because he is currently on the Imperium's most wanted. And because the Faxom-Io board really does hate uncertainty."

"They hate it so very much," Gorlan says. "I presume some mix of normal life at the estate and just enough social appearances to appear desperately normal."

Angel nodded.

"To be quite honest, I would deal with a little desperately normal."

Desperately normal would have to wait, however, as there is nothing normal about the interior of the skimmer Gorlan, Angel and Erika piled into. Less a normal skimmer interior and more a small conference room that flies, all the normal controls are hidden away in favor of a circle of seats around an inner table. Once in the air, grav impellers gently counter any force experienced from the skimmer's flight, creating the illusion of being rock-solid stable on the ground. This is extremely necessary, as the windows immediately turn opaque and the inside flashes a Kesh Pharma animation, revealing that the walls, ceiling, and floor of the skimmer is a seamless holodisplay - and at this moment, one revealing a simulated boardroom of Faxom-Io.

"Good afternoon," the older man says. Angel remembers him as being rather agnostic about the little Narsai'i rebellion. "I trust your travel from Narsai was comfortable?"

The fact that the skimmer felt even less like a skimmer and more like a conference room - complete with the absence of the reassuring humm of the grav impellers - tipped Angel off that this was not going to be a relaxing skimmer flight.

That's a no on the cat nap then.

The visual effect is impressive though, and Angel is pretty sure that without the glass-smooth movement, he'd likely feel more than a little nauseous. He raises an eyebrow at Gorlan. "Neat trick."

He inclined his head to the older man, before nodding. "It was - comfortable enough to start feeling routine, which is a bit disconcerting, but also encouraging."

Various parts of the board react to different parts of that sentence in turn. Two of the women on the board, one the older woman that seemed likely to be the partner of the older man and the other the one that sounded like a former Turai, nodded to the "comfortable" part of the sentence. The younger man that was...unenthusiastic about Narsai'i contributions frowned at the "disconcerting" part, as did another young man. The two other board members nodded at the "encouraging" part.

"Good, encouraging has been profitable," the older man says. "Gorlan has kept us appraised of your progress on Narsai and Boranai - Boranai is as expected, our administrata had a good read on the profitability of flipping that system, but the prospective infrastructure purchases, even for testing, on Narsai, has been very encouraging. The reports you have provided regarding population density...it is like as if we were building Napai from scratch." Angel can practically hear him drooling over the lats that could be on the way. "And this...GRHDI? UNHAO? I presume this is the Narsai'i Turai that you have contracts for?"

Angel notes the different reactions in the room, and the balance of the board - not everyone was, as yet, fully bought in to this particular play. The leader of the meeting did, however, help set an optimistic tone. Boranai for an emerging market, but when it came down to it, a relatively stable play. Narsai carrying...considerably more risk to it, but also a massive potential upside in terms of a customer base, ranging from infrastructure and heavy industry to pharmaceuticals and electronics for which, at present, they had a functional, if precarious monopoly.

"That's correct." Angel inclines his head slightly. "Narsai is not united under a single planetary government. We have, well, a little over a hundred of them, though in reality less than a dozen have the infrastructure for regular orbital flight, and at the moment, the balance of power is...well, rather favored toward the United States, with both rising and ebbing contenders to join them as what we refer to as 'superpowers'."

He pauses to make sure everyone is up to speed on the rather fractious nature of the species homeworld.

"But...in times where it is beneficial to act, or at least attempt to act, as a unified voice for the planet, we use the United Nations. GRHDI, which is now the United Nations Homeworld Affairs Office - Narsai organizations tend to have slightly less poetic names than our Imperial counterparts - is the independent organizing body for anything beyond Narsai's immediate orbit. And, pursuant to that, we do indeed have the contracts to provide security for that organization, as no nation is especially keen on having another's sitting armed ontop of one of the gates, even if it is just for security. Enter ExTerran, which is a wholly owned subsidiary of Kesh Industries, which in turn..." He waved his hand vaguely, knowing everyone in the room could then work their way up the chain of holding companies.

"In that respect, the increasing comfort with transit is a good thing. There is still some friction as to how...prominently...the United States is represented in UNHAO because of the...beginnings...of contact between Narsai and the Imperium, and the less I am associated with their military, the easier it is to defend ExTerran as a neutral guarantor of gate security."

Angel from eight years ago was wondering just what the fuck was happening.

"And this military, it would be under the command of..." the ex-Turai woman asks.

"At the highest organizational level," Angel continues, deciding that the Board doesn't actually need the full - and at the moment, somewhat fluid - organizational chart, "that's the Director of UNHAO. That's currently Director Samantha Barnes."

Angel Talk + Tycoon: 1d8,1d6 vs. 2d8 (4,3 vs. 7,4)

"And this...un-haow, it's the stewards office?" she asks. "Or the Narsai'i military?"

"More the former than the latter, but neither is precisely accurate." He pauses for a moment, collecting his thoughts. "As I mentioned, Narsai does not have a single unified government - but it does act through a single governing body at times, via the United Nations, and in this case, the UN-HAO." He deliberately spaces out the acronym to make the relationship more clear. "In this sense, it is acting as a centralized authority, something like a Steward's office, but it both has the consent of the member governments - which they can withdraw - and a limited scope of authority. Within that authority - off-world matters - they have fairly broad powers though."

He pauses again to make sure that's all clear. "The UN traditionally does not have a standing military - they draw volunteer forces from member nations, depending on the nature of the mission. In this way, the contract with ExTerran is somewhat unusual, but it's better to conceptualize that as a security force, rather than a standing military capable of a sustained campaign."

"Responsible for orbital and gateway security and customs," she says with a nod. "And the 815?”

Angel nods. "Yes." It's a simple answer - the actual answer is a far more complicated and nuanced one involving the question of who if anyone is actually in charge of a renegade unit of...whatever the hell 815 is at this point - but at least nominally, it's the truth.