Keeper's Dance Fleet Yards

The insignia of KDFY

**Keeper's Dance Fleet Yards** (KDFY), formerly known as **Santana Starworks**, is a major shipbuilding and former Drift Gate manufacturing company located in the Keeper's Dance System. The company is by far the wealthiest and largest shipwright in the Tantalus Cluster.

## History

### Founding

Founded as Santana Starworks, the company began life constructing the first Drift Gates, enabling humanity's expansion from the Centrum System. Santana Starworks constructed the Hadimus Gateforge in 0010 PCU, which constructed the Centrum-Pioneer Drift Gate, allowing the colonisation of the planet Storm, humanity's first colony beyond Centrum.

### Rise

Following the discovery of the Keeper's Dance System, which lacked any planets suitable for colonisation, Santana Starworks laid claim to the resources of the system's extensive asteroid belts and reorganised itself into Keeper's Dance Fleet Yards. KDFY assembled a massive shipbuilding facility but continued to produce Drift Gates. In an effort to monopolise the colonisation market, the company aimed to establish new Drift Lanes to as many new systems as possible. This enabled the colonisation of the Axius System, but the effort ended in apparent tragedy in 0053 PCU when an entire expedition, later known as the Great Merician Exile, failed to return. The expedition was given up as lost after a year and, while it was eventually discovered that the bulk of the expedition had survived and established the Merician Freehold, the fiasco resulted in KDFY losing its gatebuilding and colonisation licenses.

### Return

The bulk of gatebuilding work moved to Grathan Gateworks, but KDFY remained the largest shipbuilding concern in the Tantalus Cluster, securing a permanent lease on the Keeper's Dance System from the Centrum Assembly. KDFY provided the great majority of publicly-sold spacecraft models prior to the economic collapse of the Great Famine. The company also achieved a lucrative contract to supply warships to the Centrum Defence Force, and its *Tripathia*-Class Third-Rate Ship of the Line, introduced in 0284 PCU, would become the most-commonly-employed capital ship in CDF service during the Frontier War of 0290-0300 PCU. The vast shipyards of Keeper's Dance ultimately allowed the Centrum Defence Force to fight the war to victory in 0300 PCU.

In the immediate aftermath of the Frontier War, KDFY enjoyed a brief period of full wartime funding without the constant demands of fleet maintenance and repair, and began a project to introduce modern designs into the largely-outdated and war-weary Centran fleet. This project resulted in the creation of the CSV *Huntress*, a prototype for a revolutionary new class of ambush corvettes. By 0302 PCU however, virtually all strategic materials and KDFY's design efforts had been committed to the Avalon Exploratory Initiative, and the project was abandoned.

## Products

### Military

* S-36 Stardancer Multi-Role Attack fighter
* *Huntress*-class Ambush Corvette
* *Confiance*-class Frigate
* *Tripathia*-Class Third-Rate Ship of the Line
* *Tetrarch*-class First-Rate Ship-of-the-Line
* *Trespasser*-class Second-Rate Ship of the Line

### Civilian

* *'Caspian-G'*
* *'Caspian-P'* Express Passenger Schooner

## References

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 The Sojourn: Worlds of Tantalus - The Centrum Assembly
2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 *The Sojourn Visual Dictionary - Edition One*
3. ↑ The Sojourn: Drift and Drift Gates - Avalon Archives
4. ↑ The Merician Freehold | The Sojourn Lore
5. ↑ The Sojourn: Huntress Class Ambush Corvette (Guinevere) - Ship Breakdown