Black Phillip Syndicate / WARLOCK

During the height of the Vanduul conflict, a small commando unit was tasked with the defense of a small outpost just outside of UEE patrolled space. Publicly, the group (known only as “Stike Team Alpha”) is said to have gone rogue and murdered everyone in the colony in order to steal the rich resources that had been gathered and were awaiting shipment back to the UEE controlled space to finance the war effort.

If you talk to conspiracy theorists they will often tell you a variation of that news headline that goes quite differently. It seams that there was a human outpost on the planet but it had been previously wiped out. Although it wasn’t the military or the Vanduul. It was a terrorist faction of Tevarin who took over the colony. The commando unit was sent to secure the cargo for transport before the terrorists could off world it for their own funding. The conflict ended in all out slaughter and the images that were retrieved and disseminated illegally shocked the human race and Tevarin. The photos that were released showed only unarmed human “civilians” but that is because they were photos obtained by the Tevarin following the raid on the human outpost and not the actual photos of the Tevarin terrorists.

Of course the Tevarin publicly denied the existence of a rogue terrorist faction hiding in their society because their war with the UEE was over and they were clinging to the hope for survival of their remaining number through integration into UEE society. The UEE leadership didn’t need any more domestic strife with the Vanduul war raging and the small number of Tevarin that could bolster their numbers was far larger than the relatively few members of strike team. And so it was in both party’s best interest to make the incident vanish.

The unit was publicly denounced and charges of war crimes were pressed against the members. It is unclear if there was actually an attempt to apprehend the members of Strike Team Alpha and it failed or if the matter simply vanished along with the unit’s members. But there are those people that will tell you that the outlaws, unable to return to their homes and families, sought a living on the fringes of space using their skills for their own good and no longer that of the UEE.

And so the Black Phillip Syndicate was born. Over the years new members joined… some were former military in a similar state of false accusations, some were deserters, some were upright citizens tired of what they viewed as tyranny by the UEE, others seeking political asylum, and still other’s looking for the excitement of deep space and the opportunities for adventure that piracy has always offered since man first took to colonizing new worlds by ship. If anyone has the facts of their true origins at this point, they aren’t talking. Some people will tell you these men and women are heroes and, no doubt, there are countless tales of them coming to the aid of the weak when needed. There are just as many stories labeling them as a horde of scum and villainy. Whatever the true origins of this organization, they persist in a hostile world and enjoy what opportunities it brings into their lives until their lives are no more.