Karatos was a progressive industrial world under SLA Industries regime. It was a the sparkle in the crown, it was forward thinking and it's technology was considered ground breaking. Towers spiralled into the air, liturally reaching up to the edges of the atmosphere. In fact, the tallest tower was so tall that it ended in a space station. Karatos was a hive of commerce, and a hive it was indeed. Roadways spanned the buildings from even the highest heights while the buildings themselves held roads and streets. For those familar with the term, Karatos come be considered the world of progresses largest Arcology.
At it's best, Ebon fold ships would regularly traverse back and forth from Karatos, carrying Karatos's greatest trade with them, heavy industry. A number of firms worked on Karatos including it's own branch of Karma, Dark Lament, FEN and all the other SLA faveriotes. But Karatos also had a unique company of it's own, DWL or Draconian Weapons Limited. The heavy industry company produced a number of items, from trucks and shuttles through to heavy weapons and heavy artillary that was shipped off world to the war worlds. Money flowed regularly into Karatos's coffers and Mr Slayer was pleased.
450 years ago, Karatos vanished. Not just the planet, but the whole star system just simply disappeared. Ebon Foldship navigators stated that the disappearance of Karatos felt like a large wave of pure darkness enimated from where Karatos had once existed. After the intial shockwave, all that was left was a hole in the Ebb, as though Karatos had been pulled from the very fabric of reality and gone, well, who knew where it had gone?
The results was intially catastrophic. SLA Industries, without the large amount of goods coming from Karatos, found that it started to suffer on some of the War Worlds. It was said that the disappearance troubled Mr Slayer so much that no one saw him for three weeks while he contemplated the reprecussions. However, as SLA Industries always seems to do, it shrugged off the effects of the loss of Karatos, got firms like FEN to build heavier weaponary and continue to Progress with out Karatos.
'It's hard to describe to those who are not attuned to the Ebb, but I shall try to put in words that you may understand. The Universe is like a sheet velvet cloth and ever so easy to bend and fold to our needs. By folding the cloth, we can move the great foldships between worlds. However, this cloth is not perfect. Large pain and torment can twist the cloth, such as Mort and Artery do. Foldship navigators learn to navigate these with relative ease.
When Karatos reappeared it felt like that some of those creases in the sheets were ironed out. A great big hole vanished from the sheet and some of the darkness that shadows the galaxy retreated to plug the hole that once had been Karatos. After the intial shock, another darkness seemed to creep out of Karatos, one which was more attuned to that we would feel with Mort and Artery. We took relief, Karatos was back. But everytime I go there now that it has reappeared, there seems to be a shadow in the cloth. It is so like the other worlds, but there is also something different with it. I do not wish to investigate that extra darkness, I fear what it might reveal.
Over 400 years after Karatos disappeared, Karatos reappered just as suddenly and unannounced as had vanished. Where had it been? What had happened to it since it disappeared? Why did it disappear? And would it still be loyal to SLA Industries? These were questions upon SLA Industries officials minds.
SLA Industries sent out an intial task force of veteran operatives from SLA Industries worlds and soliders back from the war worlds. They went in and found to their surprise an incredibly loyal world. However, it's years away from SLA Industries over all control left it's toll on the world. Roads were crumbling, and buildings were in a sad state of disrepair. SLA Industries began to fuel credits into repairing the world. However, it became obvious that SLA Industries were not the only ones interrested in the return of the world...
Whether Thresher got there first or after SLA Industries is still unknown. But they soon began a mass campaign of pulling the world a part, piece by piece. Thresher knew that Karatos return would mean a whole load of new resources would be flooding into SLA Industries and this meant bad news for them on the War Worlds. The Southern continent of the planet became embroilled in a mini war between Thresher and SLA forces. SLA was determined however not to allow Thresher to turn this planet into another War World and to date, the fighting has been restricted to the Southern Continent.
But Thresher was not the worst threat to hit Karatos...
Dark Night were soon to begin infilitrating the world of Karatos themselves. In many ways, the terroristic activites of Dark Night were to prove to be more of a hinderance than Thresher. Roads that were still standing were easily brought down by Dark Night and SLA's operations to rebuild and repair the world have been hampered by bombs planetd by the organisation. To date, SLA Indsutries have brought in other several thousand SLA operatives just for the main purpose of bringing an end to Dark Nights activities.
But even with Dark Nights activities, there was one last problem on Karatos...