Strip-Mining

2003-05-29 00:00 By Svarthol

The empires are becoming concerned that independent individuals are harvesting too much of the stellar resources the empires had staked for their own use. Couple this with the intensified pirate activity due to increases in space traffic and the empires have a real problem on their hands. They have now joined forces in a program that will augment their authority throughout civilized space in the near future. The police will make itself more visible with more staff and increased number of patrols, for instance in areas of empire space hitherto ignored by the police. In reality many feel this effort is too little too late - the asteroid fields owned by the empires are already almost totally ravaged and experts believe that rare asteroid ore is now only available out in the outer regions.