I-116-Lia: Roseman, Twilight City Central Shopping Market

Dominion Communications Routes

This may help.

This diagram shows how standard Dominion message traffic travels between Captree, Mundo Zargo and Roseman.

A selection of relevant star systems is shown on the diagram, with the distance in Lights between them. 

• The colour of the star system icon shows to which Octant it belongs
  • Yellow – Octant 3
  • Magenta – Octant 7
• The shape of the star system icon shows what type of system it is
  • Captree is the capital of Octant 3
  • New Zargland is the Capital of Octant 7
  • Zarg’s World and Mundo Zargo are A-Colonies
  • Mung is a B-Colony
  • Roseman is a Way Station
• The colour of the lines show what sort of communications route runs between the systems
  • The Dominion has message services of different frequencies between systems based on their type; a key is shown at the bottom of the diagram

So, say Raina sends Lia a message and Lia is on Mundo Zargo.  Between Octants, communications are maintained between the capital systems, so a Net Packet ship leaves Captree every Shift bound for New Zargland via Mung – 24.4 Lights.   When the Packet arrives at Mung, it transmits its data cargo where it is picked up by the next Net Packet ship due to leave.  That Packet departs at the start of the next Shift and arrives at New Zargland after travelling 18.0 Lights and transmits its data.  Mundo Zargo is on an A-Colony route, but to get to Mundo Zargo  one travels via Zarg’s World first.  So, the next Net Packet departs at the start of the next Cycle (not Shift, this time as this is an A-route.)  The Net Packet travels 19.0 Lights, arrives at Zarg’s World and transmits its data to the next Net Packet, which leaves at the start of the next Cycle and travels 21.9 Lights to Mundo Zargo.  On arrival it transmits its data load to the local Net, and it will find its way into Lia’s inbox for her perusal, having travelled 83.3 Lights to reach her.

Contrast that with the direct route Spanial is travelling from Mundo Zargo to Captree, via Roseman of 14.1 + 21.2 = 37.4 Lights – less than half the distance the messages travel.

Also consider the message scenario if Lia happened to be on Roseman not Mundo Zargo.  Roseman is on a Way Station Comms Route, which is only serviced every 10 Cycles.  Depending on when the first Net Packet arrives at Mung and transmits its messages, the Net Packet for Roseman might be just about to leave, or might not leave for 10 Cycles, so Raina’s message might or might not get to Roseman before it reaches Mundo Zargo.

Message Courier

All of which is background for the Courier question.  It’s relatively easy (though not always cheap) to hire a courier, though with Spanial about to depart on the final leg for Captree, it probably isn’t worth the trouble.  Spanial is quick through hyperspace for a freighter, and a courier is unlikely to make up that much time on the ship Lia is already on.