Editing Nobledark Imperium Drafts (section)

==== The Rogue Trader's War ====

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The Surat Incident, more popularly known as the Rogue Trader’s War, began when Leopold van Cortez, head of the van Cortez Rogue Trader dynasty “rediscovered” the Surat Subsector and claimed it as his own. The Surat Subsector was an area of the Segmentum Tempestus that was originally colonized by the Imperium in early M32, mostly consisting of typical human colonies but also several native species of Xenos Independens and even one of the first colony worlds of felinids outside of Carlos McConnell. However, the whole subsector was deemed lost when a Warp storm blew over the area and made navigation there untenable. The storm dissipated in M37, and Van Cortez was simply the first “modern” Imperial with a working starship to journey to and make a claim on the sector. However, he found that the Surat Subsector was not as uninhabited as the Imperium had thought, with most planets having reverting to Feral Worlds populated by the regressed descendants of the original colonists who had little if any knowledge of the Imperium.

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Rogue Traders claiming far-flung planets as their own personal fiefdoms was nothing new in Imperial history. In some cases, the planet profitted with the Rogue Trader dynasty, growing with them as a bureaucratic and administrative hub to the point that their standing in the business world rivalled the megacorps of Kiavahr. In other cases, the planets were kept in the muck and exploited for all they are worth as a colonial market and source of cheap labor. The central Imperial government is not happy about this type of arrangement but is often unable to do anything about it, partly because the affairs of a single backwater planet are typically not important enough to reach the ears of high-ranking members of the Administratum and partly even if they do hear about it finding said planet is a difficult feat in and of itself.A single planet acting as an extralegal hideaway off the official stellar charts tends to be rather hard to find, even if you know what you are looking for.

Exactly how a Rogue Trader dynasty made use of particular planets depended on the dynasty in question. The von Cortez Dynasty made their fortune as planet speculators, finding uninhabited planets of value and then auctioning their coordinates off to an interested buyer for a significant finder’s fee. The Adeptus Mechanicus were always interested in a new location for a Forge World, the Administratum is always interested in potential new Agri-Worlds or land to sell off to Guard regiments that had completed their tour of duty, member states are always looking for uninhabited worlds on their border. The von Cortez dynasty acted as middlemen for these various powers and got filthy rich doing it. However, under Imperial law one couldn’t simply sell a planet if it already had humans, eldar, or Xenos Independens living on it. It would simply be…easier if those people were to simply disappear. The decisions of what to do with these kinds of planets should not be made by people with the kind of money to buy high-end military grade weaponry, the kind that the more cynical sort often call “budget Exterminatuses”.

Leopold’s grand plan backfired enormously when several of the Xenos Independens and human colonies, specifically those with enough a tech base to achieve space flight and Warp travel, survived the initial bombardment. Deciding to unite against a common foe, they retaliated against the Imperium by striking at major population centers, beginning what became known as the Rogue Trader’s War. Two Imperial guard regiments, six Howling Banshees and a brief visit by a company of Astartes later, the war ended with the near-complete eradication of the Surat Subsector’s native population. Having already been attacked without provocation, the inhabitants of the Surat Subsector refused to believe any offer of peace by the Imperium and in the end even turned to the Ruinous Powers for support, leading to their annihilation.

Unfortunately, while the Imperial military was very good at wiping out life on a planet, it was somewhat less good at figuring out what to do with them next. The Administratum, who usually handled such matters, were too far away to easily figure out what to do with the worlds of such a backwater region as the Surat Subsector, requiring some sort of planet broker in order to make things move along efficiently. On top of that, the Rogue Trader’s War left the Surat Subsector nice and uninhabited, just as Leopold had wanted it in the first place. It seemed as though Leopold would profit, at the Imperium’s expense no less.

Seven months after the end of the Rogue Trader’s War, Leopold was found dead at the hands of an Eversor assassin. The van Cortez family’s Writ of Trade was revoked and the majority of their assets were liquidated and distributed to the survivors and veterans of the Surat Subsector Incident. The surviving members of the family were left with almost nothing to their name but what they had with them, the notice informing them of such encouraging to find a “more ethical” line of work. The Administratum extended the possibility that one of the junior family members, upon demonstrating good character, could come forward and name themselves as the heir to the von Cortez dynasty’s remaining assets and seized heirlooms, though it would require making their identity publicly known as Leopold’s heir. Even though there were entire star-systems of people with scores to settle over what happened in Surat, there was no surer way to draw the remains of the house van Cortez out of their refuges, and many were served unexpected justice when they arrogantly tried the Imperium's scrutiny.

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