The Army cracked down on the unestablished provinces of far space. Through some absurd application-- or rather appropriation-- of law, an eternal state of martial law is permitted there now, and outlaws no longer need to be tried. Field executions are immediate. And until these reaches are colonized, it will stay that way. But some still travel there. It is a trade, a business because it is all that the wild west was and more. But it is no longer sheriffs or deputies on horseback firing across wide plains at old homesteads. It is now the outlaw and the soldier in that wretched jurisdiction of space. Only the greatest captains may return.