The Raiders return

We've been dealing with Raiders for a while now, but we've finally been able to determine that there's at least one recurring group that's been coming to hassle us. May be that we're a little better equipped than some of our neighbors, that that we're well equipped, except in medicine and machine tools. Whyever though, they've taken an interest in us as a favored port of call to set down for a spell and steal shit.

I wasn't in the town proper when the Raiders set down the other day, but I heard about it not too long after they took off. Seems one of the transport pilots who'd been nosing around earlier in the week had been scoping out more than a place to move cargo. Seems they were after something a whole lot more important to the Colony: Our doctor.

Word had it they'd managed to capture Belize without spilling blood, which was good. At least the no bloodshed part We'd had them on navtrak in and out, but rather than clawing for orbit in their little shuttle, they vectored off to the East where it looked like they settled back to the surface some three hundred kilometers from town.

Given the size of their skiff and the soot in their exhaust plume, I figured they were setting down outside of town to wait for pickup from a bigger boat. We'd already seriously damaged a couple of their boats during previous raids, so it made sense to bring in something short range and land the more valuable transport out of harm's way.

Sure enough, Lily managed to find their skiff set down out near an abandoned cargo storage building that dated back to the original Weyland Yutani mining expedition days. There were only a couple of them holed up in there holding Bel, so we scrambled who we could get and had a go of it.

The fight was harsh, but fortunately brief. Bel would have her work cut out for her when we got back to town, but we managed to take down both of the Raiders without killing anyone. Including them. Unfortunately, we lost track of one of them before we evacuated - probably crawled into one of the cargo boxes before we took of - but managed to get the other one back to town. Bel patched him up and we stuck him in the single Jail cell for the time being.

Something still nagging me about these Raiders. The fella we captured hasn't said much, but there's more to this than just thieving. Thieves don't go after a doc, even if they were talking about selling her. The things they've stolen haven't always made sense either: leaving valuable goods behind to take food and bedding? That's not common thieving.

Be that as it may, we had Bel back, and a prisoner to question. Gentle like. Even with the Raiders, we were going to act civil. We'd shown those Purple Bellies and Loyalists we were civilized folk, in spite of living on a mining colony. Weren't going to stop now. Not while I still called Town Hall my office.