High Wings
The most notorious confederation of sky pirates in Acarn is unquestionably the High Winds. They plague the trade routes between the plateaus and regularly prey on other pirates. Even large trade convoys are not safe from their well coordinated attacks. Most of the High Wind’s members are harpies and their flying capabilities makes them particularly efficient at boarding or escaping airships.
The group has its roots in a Thamassan airgroup by the same name. The High Wings were specialized in harassing and raiding Tasnican airship installations, supply ships and sky forteresses. The group operated under the command of Colonel Rias Newt , a Dark Elf who had been freed from slavery and mentored by Vampire Lord Sascha Vykos , Admiral of the Thamassan Fourth Fleet. Thanks to Vykos’ patronage, Captain Rias Newt was given a lot of leeway in recruitment and set out to recruit an all Harpy crew to fulfill the high risk raiding missions she was being handed. Her successes eventually earned her a promotion at the head of her own airgroup, detached from any fleet and operating with nearly complete discretion. Colonel Rias Newt kept her Harpy-only crew policy mostly intact, recruiting a few fellow Dark Elves with good management skills in her command staff.
For the second half of the war, the High Wings were deployed in the Eastern theater. As they would often operate behind enemy lines, many of the the High Wings developed great infiltration skills to conduct reconnaissance. They also often had to resort to scavenging enemy supplies and equipment to keep their own ships airborne. As the war dragged on Newt’s mind turned toward the long term future. As a former slave, she had concerns that her elevated status might not survive the end of the war. Her Harpy personnel, while not former slaves, were also used to racial discrimination in peacetime.
The High Wings thus began to plan their retirement from military life by hoarding the best equipment and loot in various caches in the Eastern, Central and Southern plateau. They would misreport results from their operations to Thamassan command, for instance claiming to have destroyed an enemy airship while they actually commandeered it. The biggest haul the High Wings did not report was the Tasnican sky castle Gurei Yosai, which they overtook without allowing the defenders to scuttle it. The incident was considered a major blow to the Tasnican Admiralty given the potential for Thamasa to reverse engineer their arcane devices contained therein. Thanks to their spies, Thamasan high command learned of that capture while reading Newt’s report which stated that Gurei Yosai was destroyed. Thamasan high command tried to lure Newt back and even sent “advisors” to join her airgroup. Newt saw through the traps and decided to cut and run along with the vast majority of the High Wings. The few who would not joined were left on a single unarmed airship bound toward Thamasan territory.
The High Wings managed to get Gurei Yosai moving and renamed it the Aviary. From that base the group began raiding supply airships from both sides. They tried to thread a fine line between hitting enough ships to make money while avoiding certain ones that were tied to the various contacts they were cultivating as fences and clients for mercenary work in parallel to the Great War which came to a close under two years later.
The post-war period was great for the High Wings, regular trade was being restored between the plateaus and the Empire and Republic were pulling back, particularly of the Eastern and Central plateaus: more prey, fewer threats as Newt put it. With the safer conditions came a certain amount of discontent: why was the handful of Dark Elves in charge of the harpies which did most of the work? To avoid a bloodbath, Rias Newt stepped down as leader and the High Wings adopted a loose democratic governance system: the crew of each airship would elect their Captain who would in turn elect a Top Wing who would be the ultimate authority in the group, managing relationships with friendly or client factions and setting policies.
The size of the High Wings has waxed and waned with the years as ships were lost and new ones captured or built. The most sought after are the superior Tasnican airship with their floatstone ballasts and engines. Since 3031, the highly charismatic Sydney Sheba has been Top Wing. She is the captain of the Sky Queen, a retrofitted Tasnican Frigate and largest vessel in the High Wing fleet. After a couple years out of the limelight, Rias Newt became captain of the Aviary (Gurei Yosei) and remains one of the most influential captains in the organization.
Harpies still remain by far the majority racial group but crews have expanded their recruitment offers to others, with a heavy bias in favor of female recruits. A major notable exception is a considerable cadre of male Elven slaves purchased for recreational purposes, mostly kept at Gurei Yosei.
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