The Scamperers

Warden Wellesley drifts into the dim, mist‑shrouded world of Ophir, a planet where twin suns stare like cold serpents over fern‑laden cliffs and the crumbling shells of once‑grand organ‑pipe towers. Assigned by the Rift Constabulary to investigate rumors of genetic deviance, he lands at Aidennsport—a rundown corporate plantation clinging to the edge of a swampy jungle, its modest warehouses storing the dried leaves of a locally grown drug‑plant. The settlement’s weary inhabitants stare with equal parts curiosity and suspicion as the dour officer steps from his ship, his mission already feeling like a bureaucratic nightmare.

Inside the warehouse, Wellesley meets the gaunt factor Amos Sealilly and a bright‑eyed boy named Joseph, who boasts of a backyard “spaceship” named Stygia. The officer’s census request quickly turns uneasy, as the community’s isolation hints at hidden mutations and whispered rumors of inbreeding. As the first act unfolds, Wellesley must decide how far he’ll push the law amid a world that seems both alien and eerily familiar.