Technocrat of Ceres
"Corruption doesn’t always look like a man with a mask and a gun. Sometimes it looks like a smile and a ledger. My job is to smash both with equal force."
The Balancing Act
The Technocrat of Ceres carries one of the most paradoxical mandates in the Pan-Solar Consortium: to govern a world that exists less as a homeland than as the beating heart of interstellar finance. Ceres is the vault of the PSC, its oceans home to Unionhouse Veylan’s impregnable chit-mints and guarded by Uplifted Orca militias in towering HOOK exosuits. Every transaction, from a child buying a sweet in Mars City to a House transferring the fortunes of nations, eventually passes through Ceres’ ledgers. For the Technocrat, the task is not only to maintain order among the diverse human, Orca, and Tankbrain populations — but to do so under the shadow of Unionhouse Veylan, whose quiet authority outweighs any title.
The role demands a blend of political acumen, military competence, and financial literacy. The Technocrat must negotiate with Veylan’s representatives while ensuring that Ceresians live in safety, balancing the PSC’s demand for stability with the world’s natural tendency toward Criminal infiltration. Any slip could destabilize the financial nervous system of Human Space.
Crime and Trust
For the Technocrat of Ceres, corruption is not an abstract threat — it is endemic. From petty divers who skim kelp shipments, to white-collar accountants laundering stolen Chits, to offworld conspiracies aiming to counterfeit the currency itself, crime on Ceres wears many faces. The exospheric shield and Veylan’s vaults are impregnable to outside raiders, but the criminals within are another matter. Every Technocrat inherits a mandate to cut away rot before it festers, and every misstep risks an erosion of trust in the chit, the very bedrock of civilization.
This has produced a political office unique in the PSC: the Technocrat of Ceres is part governor, part detective, part executioner. Where a Jovian Technocrat must balance industry with defense, or a Saturnite Technocrat balances diplomacy with philosophy, the Ceresian equivalent balances survival against corruption.
The White Collar Hammer
The current Technocrat of Ceres is Fau Kala, a man whose legend is equal parts soldier, financier, and vigilante. Kala began his career as a Solar Special Operations Directive Commando and Cataphract Pilot, notorious for his ability to “smash” entrenched opposition with overwhelming force. Retiring young, he turned his talents to finance, becoming a vulture investor who thrived by stalking the weak. Kala earned both fear and grudging admiration by buying up failing corporations riddled with corruption, stripping them of rot, reforming what was salvageable, and selling off the rest.
His enemies soon discovered that trying to kill him was unwise. When a hit squad came for him at home, Kala responded not with lawyers or bribes but by climbing into a privately owned Cataphract and smashing them into paste. This blend of brutal legality and showmanship transformed him into a folk hero in the murky world of corporate finance.
It was inevitable that, after the Bacchani Massacre and the near-breach of the Ceresian vaults, the PSC would turn to Kala. His appointment as Technocrat was public and symbolic: Ceres needed someone who could clean house both in the ledger and in the streets, someone who could smash corruption whether it wore a mask, a uniform, or a smile. Kala has leaned into the role with gusto, personally leading raids on embezzlers, syndicates, and white-collar saboteurs. For him, there is no difference between pulling a trigger and pulling a balance sheet apart — both are ways of defending the chit.
Sidebar: Governing Ceres
Ceres’ governance is unlike that of any other world in the Pan-Solar Consortium. Technically, the Technocrat of Ceres is the supreme civilian authority, entrusted with the well-being of its people and the maintenance of order. In practice, however, the position exists in constant tension with Unionhouse Veylan, whose financial empire saturates every corner of the planetoid.
Unionhouse Veylan’s Role
- Economic Dominion: Every chit minted, every vault maintained, and every offshore ledger is ultimately Veylan’s domain. The House’s authority over finance eclipses politics, and the Technocrat has no power to alter the flow of money.
- Security by Proxy: Veylan does not maintain its own military. Instead, it contracts Celestial Securities, whose guards, drones, and fleets form the outer walls of Ceres’ defense. For this reason, the Technocrat’s jurisdiction ends at the edge of the security cordon; beyond that, Ceres is “owned” in all but name by CS and Veylan.
The Technocrat’s Sphere
- Civil Oversight: Within the islands, cities, and submerged vault communities, the Technocrat governs like any other PSC-appointed ruler. Housing, education, civic welfare, and crime fall under their purview.
- Counter-Corruption: Unique to Ceres, the Technocrat has extraordinary authority to investigate and purge corruption. Courts are perfunctory; financial crime is punished with exile, indenture, or, in the most serious cases, “exemplary justice” carried out by HOOKs or CS enforcers.
- Balancing Act: The Technocrat must balance between the needs of the citizenry, the Orca militias, the Tankbrain collectives, and the financial imperatives of Veylan. Overstepping in either direction risks collapse — either of civic order or of financial trust.
Checks and Shadows
- Celestial Securities answers to Veylan, not the Technocrat, but Kala has pushed them into grudging cooperation through force of personality and reputation.
- UVIS (Unionhouse Veylan Investigation Services) operates in the shadows, often cutting down threats before Kala even sees them. Whether this makes his job easier or undermines his authority depends on the day.
- Tankbrain Oversight provides a quiet, unofficial check: many vault systems require cephalopod oversight, and the Uplifted octopuses enjoy enough leverage to slow or block Technocrat orders that threaten their long-term interests.
The Reality of Rule
On paper, the Technocrat of Ceres is no different than their counterparts on Venus, Jupiter, or Saturn. In practice, the office is a hybrid of governor, warden, and auditor, constantly forced to reckon with the fact that Ceres is not merely a world — it is the keystone of human finance.
Comments