An alliance between the Al’ar family, Dragon Logistics, and Kristen Wright of Rhine Lab — publicly framed as a trade arrangement, privately the backbone of the Horizon Arc Project.
Overview
The Regional Alliance for Logistics Advancement — RALA — is a covert partnership between three parties: the drow noble house of Al’ar, Dragon Logistics, and Kristen Wright acting through Rhine Lab. The name is a deliberate misdirection; it is, among other things, Al’ar backwards.
Its stated purpose is to facilitate the flow of goods between the underdark and the surface, leveraging Dragon Logistics’ transport infrastructure and the Al’ar’s knowledge of underground passages. This framing is genuine enough to function as cover, and some of Dragon Logistics’ ordinary business does pass through RALA channels. But it is not the alliance’s real purpose.
Members
- Al’ar — The drow noble house. Provide military backing, knowledge of the underdark, and access to underground infrastructure. Their price for participation is refined originium from the deepest veins — and the understanding that the Horizon Arc’s weapons component will serve their interests.
- Dragon Logistics — Provide surface logistics, transport networks, and cover. Their embedded Al’ar operative, L’oriel Al’ar, manages the Malachite office. Grothor Morain, the company’s Speaker, may or may not be fully aware of the alliance’s true scope.
- Kristen Wright / Rhine Lab — Provide the scientific and engineering capacity. The Horizon Arc Project is Kristen’s project, and Rhine Lab’s resources — including Sarcophagus technology via Facility 31 and the Guardian Project’s biological research — are what make it viable.
True Purpose
Behind the logistics framing, RALA exists to enable the Horizon Arc Project: the construction of a vessel and associated infrastructure capable of breaching the artificial barrier above Terra. The project’s components include:
- S.H.A.F.T — Synergistic Hyperbeam Amplifying and Focusing Tube
- H.A.M.H.R.R — High-Altitude Maneuverable Hyperbeam Receiver-Redirector
- Vivarium Lab — A laboratory aboard the Horizon Arc vessel, powered directly by a Sarcophagus
The Al’ar’s understanding is that H.A.M.H.R.R will double as an orbital weapons platform. Whether Kristen has fully reckoned with this is an open question.
Notes
- The name RALA is Al’ar backwards — intended as an in-joke or a deliberate provocation, depending on who in the alliance named it.
- RALA is not publicly known. References to it in other notes are deliberately vague. This note is the canonical DM-facing record.
- Expand when the alliance’s internal tensions, the Al’ar’s true price, or Grothor’s awareness become relevant to play.