Albatross

The Relativistic Paladins

A legion of seemingly ageless Cosmopolitans, the Albatross is a pan-galactic first responder force famous among the desperate and downtrodden.
In a galaxy as vast as this one, a distress call is a message in a bottle: sent with hope, and in the grim knowledge that, more likely than not, no one will respond in time.
No one but the Albatross.
Snapping from nearlight to realspace already in their suits, the Loyal Wings of the Albatross launch from their carrier ships to engage almost immediately. Their purpose is as simple as their mission parameters are varied: answer the call to help. Broadly, they are seen as paragons of a kind of shoot-first virtue; true heroes in the fashion of wandering archetypal knights-errant, gunslingers, or ronin.

Structure

The current leader of the Albatross is High Commander Lakshmi Bandhav-4796u.
Each detachment of Loyal Wings and their support personnel is organized around a makteba – a monastic moon or station that acts as a diplomatic contact point and evergreen temporal touchstone between century-long (realtime) patrols. Maktebas usually only host one operational detachment of Loyal Wings, with the largest playing host to two or three active detachments. An average Albatross force in the field is built around teams of mechanized chassis supported by up-armored infantry and light to middle-weight ships. They are specialized towards fighting in rapid engagements in null-gee, aboard ships and stations, and in limited, orbit-to-ground surgical strikes. A detachment will typically field anywhere from one to two hundred chassis with sufficient support personnel spread out across four to five vessels.
Owing to the Cosmopolitan existence of its members, the Albatross primarily recruits mech pilots from within its own organization. Promising Makteban youths are invited aboard Albatross range-ships early in their lives, so they may serve as stewards for older Loyal Wings and learn through apprenticeship. It is uncommon, though not unheard of, for adult or outside recruits to join the Albatross, either through invitation or the novitiate process. To join the order, one must shed their past lives, families, friends, and homes – commitment is generally assumed to be a lifetime vow; to live as Makteban is to live apart from the rest of humanity, and to still put your life on the line to serve them.
Albatross cadets – both Makteban and outside novitiates – bear the rank of Young Petrel or Petrel (used interchangeably) during the course of their training, initial deployments, and years of quiet study and self-reflection. During this time they are assigned into small teams of other Petrels, who together work as squires and apprentices for a Loyal Wing, the rank and title granted to Albatross mech pilots. After some years of this service and deployment, Petrels may seek nomination to become a Loyal Wing. The process of becoming a Loyal Wing takes another series of years and deployments as the petitioner is tested, trained, and, eventually, approved by a council of Loyal Wings in their detachment.
Once a Loyal Wing, Albatross pilots are expected to train and protect their own group of Petrels, work in charitable duty alongside other Loyal Wings, and be active senior members of their makteba. There are gradations of rank above Loyal Wings, but at this tier the Albatross’s hierarchy is largely horizontal. Honoured Wings, for example, are considered to be especially wise, brave, or otherwise worth deference in appropriate situations.
Generally, Albatross pilots serve for life in the order, dying either in their chassis or retiring to their makteba to teach, tend to the young, garden, cook, and so on. Their interaction with the galaxy at large is dictated by their makteba’s proximity to population centers; though they are not forbidden at this point from leaving the grounds and returning to the worlds of their birth, few do, preferring instead to live among other Albatross.

Public Agenda

An organization dedicated to first response and triage, the Albatross do not fight protracted campaigns or focus on the fraught, long-term effort of rebuilding nations – they travel light, respond quickly, and move on to the next group in need. The Albatross’s chassis are legendary, draped in crimson banners and flags, shining silver with each pilot’s livery emblazoned across their chassis’ shields and splash plating. Supported by sublight ships, fighter wings, and light ships of the line, the soldiers of the Albatross – its Loyal Wings – are a remarkable and formidable fighting force.

Foreign Relations

The Albatross is recognized by Union as an autonomous nomad state. Long an independent, landless organization, the Albatross in the modern age is kept in supply by IPS-N, which also maintains Cosmopolitan embassies for retiring wings.– Importantly, the Albatross does maintain diplomatic ties with the Argo Navis system in which IPS-N is headquartered.
As Cosmopolitans, the Albatross has served Diasporans in need for thousands of realtime years, its Loyal Wings appearing as mythic, ageless heroes in Diasporan mythology and histories. The lost time of interstellar travel has distanced the Loyal Wings of the Albatross from the Diasporans they serve – they are an order apart, relativistic knights living in their own time.
The Albatross is not without enemies: there is often friction with various Baronic houses and free companies, independent mercenary units (the Murder Cave group in particular), and Harrison Armory legions.

Become the light in an uncaring galaxy. Strike the cruel and serve those who cry out for help.

Type

Military, Paramilitary/Militia

Training Level

Elite

Veterancy Level

Decorated/Honored

Parent Organization

Interplanetary Shipping-Northstar

Related Ethnicities

• Cosmopolitans