Geography: An enormous artificial ring orbital structure made of unknown alien material, encircling a small, debated jewel-like planetoid (Pallisada system).
Population: Estimated 10 Million (Imperial Navy and Adeptus Mechanicus personnel, support staff, and permanent service families).
Tithe Grade: Exactus Prima/Secundus (Naval vessels, advanced ship components, logistical services, strategic control of Warp routes).
Government Type: Imperial Navy Station Command (Governed by the Askellon Station Command).
Planetary Governor: Admiral Marus Vertigon (Inferred: Commander of Askellon Station Command).
Adept Presence: High (Imperial Navy officers and crew, Adeptus Mechanicus capital shipwrights and researchers, Ordo Malleus investigative presence).
Military: Askellon Station Command fleet (Second-line and reserve vessels); specialized orbital defence platforms; Imperial Navy personnel.
Trade: Naval repairs, refuelling, resupply, and logistical support for Imperial vessels and allied Rogue Traders.
"We are the gatekeepers. If the Warp-born filth or the green-skinned beasts come knocking, it is we who take the first blow. Pray the Emperor holds back the tide, for we certainly cannot do it alone."
– Lieutenant-Commander Solven Xantus, Port Lokhart Garrison
The Imperial Navy maintains several facilities in the sector, collectively referred to as the Askellon Station Command. The most important of these is Port Lokhart, strategically located to provide its vessels with ready access to a number of Warp routes leading towards the nearby Scarus Sector, as well as away into the unknown reaches beyond the sector’s trailing borders.
It is unusual in that it occupies a far older orbital structure discovered long ago in the sector’s distant past. The port takes the form of an artificial ring, apparently wrought from some unknown material by the hands of unidentified, but undoubtedly alien, masons. The ring encircles a small, jewel-like planetoid in the Pallisada system, itself the source of much debate amongst the Adeptus Mechanicus.
Port Lokhart was established at some point during the first millennia of the Age of Imperium. The archives relating to this period are incomplete at best, but they appear to suggest that the Imperial Navy wrested the system from the control of local forces who opposed segmentum high command establishing a presence in the Askellon Sector.
Whatever the truth, the Navy has occupied the alien construct for almost nine thousand years, the structure now studded with countless thousands of weapons turrets, docking arms, observation blisters, and similar, man-made components. The interior of the enormous ring is divided into a honeycomb-like structure, an internal arrangement that has been altered, expanded, and rebuilt over the ages by the capital shipwrights of the Adeptus Mechanicus. Despite millennia of occupation, the Navy has only ever imposed its presence on a fraction of the interior, leaving countless thousands of chambers unexplored.
Though an impressive facility, Port Lokhart is well past its prime. At its height, it functioned as the base of operations for a formidable number of vessels, from squadrons of destroyers to mighty battleships. Over the last few centuries, it has decayed as naval forces have been diverted to more pressing wars in the Segmentum Obscurus. Only a number of second line and reserve vessels remain, leaving the protection of an entire sector and surroundings to a woefully understrength force. As pirates and foul xenos raiders have grown even bolder, Port Lockhart has become pressed to counter these threats with the limited resources available.
The personnel stationed there are aware of their status. Many of its officers come from other sectors, often as punishment. Invariably, they have sufficient family connections to avoid more severe, perhaps even lethal censure, but have committed some sin so dire that some form of punishment nonetheless had to be imposed. These range from strutting martinets to borderline madmen. Some insist on exercising the full range of command responsibility, while others are only concerned that the mess room silverware is kept polished to an impossibly high standard. Their crews know only that they face ever more pressing dangers, both from the Pandaemonium and enemy vessels, and hope to make it back to the port after each deployment.
The Surena Rogue Trader Dynasty has been known to work alongside the forces of Port Lokhart, both offering assistance to its beleaguered fleets with its own powerful voidships and, from time to time, calling for aid in driving off xenos raiders, pirates, and other Rogue Traders that threaten its nearby interests. Though this alliance is at times tenuous, Port Lokhart’s increasing reliance upon the Surena Dynasty means that many of its officers cannot refuse the house’s calls to war.