Captain Grum is the Europan captain of the Big Fish Tow and Repair Company, a former member of the Emergency Service Workers Union- its members often seen wearing a white rectangular patch with an orange "hotline" band across its middle. Big Fish is one of Titan's older licensed tow services, tasked with venturing out into space to recover stranded or distressed starships and to bring them home to safety. Captain Grum was a distinguished member of the union, standing out as an exemplary captain for their polite candor and courteous wreckside manner in approaching, addressing and tending to starfarers caught in extremely stressful situations. The Captain is very empathetic, knowing well what being stranded in open space can do to people and having decades of experience in disarming those specific tensions and anxieties. They played a direct role in the modernization of Titan Dispatch and the emphasis on the importance of sufficient enlistment of tow crews that protects union shops from the dangerous impact of understaffing in times of crisis. They helped improve the distribution of emergency relay satellites to ensure a rapid response to all sectors from every orbital position of Saturn and Titan can be calculated, they know exactly how long it takes for help to arrive wherever the relay network might pick up a distress call. Captain Grum helped pour the foundation of the modern starship emergency response service. Captain Grum and the crew of Big Fish Tow and Repair last disembarked from Titan Garden some twenty years ago, and they have not been home since.
Encounters with Captain Grum and their crew have faded from glowing testimonials into the shadows of whispered rumor. Their ship, the Silverback, drifts in a lazy orbit around Sol, perpetually running dark on the smallest amount of power it can maintain. Its interior is frigid cold, the stale air never circulating, and its hangar and hallways are ever-awash in the red glow of emergency lighting. The crew of the Silverback live their unlives in the void of space, unable to return to port for fear of their own obliteration, by one means or another. Entombed in their starship, the crew of ten vampires allow the deep chill of space to slow down their bodies, to frost them into a liminal half-sleep that staves off the hunger as long as they can. The Silverback could easily be mistaken for a shipwreck, and it's not known if a wayward salvage crew might have mistaken the drifting vessel for a lucrative opportunity- if they had, no one has heard about it. A samaritan crew, like Frank Luckey's Wreck Recovery Company, could easily happen upon the drifting hull and mistake it for a newly-distressed ship, attempting to board it and assess its passengers. A glimpse inside the Silverback is like a look inside a morgue slab- the frozen, torpor-like bodies laid out with care are a shock to find, slow to thaw but quite quick to move once they've fully awakened. Until their paths intersect some other misfortunate crew, they lay still, they reflect and they dream.
They crew of the Silverback fell adrift of Sol's light when they were dispatched to answer a routine distress call; a small personal craft from the Inner Belt had run out of fuel outside Jovian space. When they had arrived to no response, the Tow and Repair Company suited up to board the distressed little ship and commence a wellness check of its occupants. While on board, Captain Grum's gunnery officer was caught by surprise in an isolated room in the lower decks of the ship and assaulted by a lone passenger, a red-eyed Venusian who hadn't packed sufficient rations before making their way out past the Asteroids. The hungry starfarer tasted a warm tinge of copper and drank with desperate abandon, unaware of the tow crew discovering their feast, unaware of them raising their weapons. An emergency call to Titan dispatch was the last any Titan service worker would hear of the Silverback or its crew- enroute to medical intervention the deceased gunnery officer would wake up, cold and thirsty, and take his first meal from a crewmate, who in turn would later wake up and feast on another. By the time the First Mate realized what was happening the ship was already lost; its broadcast array went dark, its engines went quiet. Trapped in a pocket of air hanging in the unforgiving void of space, one by one, the crew of the Silverback were afflicted with a vampiric strain that would set them on a course towards infamy.
Ships become stranded in space for many reasons, but every one of them becomes a grave crisis the minute they stop their crew from moving towards their destination. The Outer Belt's emergency relay satellites were designed to ensure a distress signal could be delivered to the nearest dispatch as quickly as possible, since even the readiest tow crew can take some time to arrive at a stranded ship's location if it happens to come adrift outside the convenience of planetary orbit. It is a tried and tested system, the crews who work with dispatch are selected for their reliability and their professionalism- it's understood that you should broadcast over the emergency relay if you need help, because the help that arrives will be trained and capable of seeing you safely back to breathable atmosphere. You need to trust that a call put out over the relay network will reach help, and that help will make its way towards your location without delay. It has worked thousands upon thousands of times, saving countless crews from an icy grave. But every once in a while, every one in ten thousand calls, a tow ship will arrive a little earlier than expected. Sometimes you draw the short straw, and the Big Fish Tow and Repair Company answers your call for help.
Captain Grum has a responsibility to their crew, even in death they need to ensure their men are well-fed and looked after, that they might someday chart a course out of their unique predicament. The Captain was there when the protocols were authored, they helped plan the emergency relay network and they know the approximate travel time a UESW rescue vessel disembarking from Old Titan Station will take to arrive at a given coordinate of space. Having access to the emergency relay frequency, They and their crew of vampires sit adrift in space, their ship cold and dark, listening quietly for a ping on the radio band, for coordinates nearer to their position than they are to Titan. In the frigid cold they conserve their energy, trying to make their stored rations last as long as possible, but when an opportunity presents itself the Silverback will come to life once again. The lights will flicker on, the heating systems will thaw the crew's deathless flesh and the engines will stir from their slumber. A good captain does everything they can to try and deliver their men through the harrows of hardship, and Captain Grum was among the best to ever wear a union patch.
When the crew of the Big Fish Tow and Repair Company answer your call and step out of your airlock, Captain Grum will introduce themself with a cordial grace that quickly sets a desperate soul at ease. They'll gesture to their doctor, they'll inquire as to the well-being of the people on-board and ask to speak to the ranking officer, whoever it might presently be. It's a tremendous relief to be delivered into the capable hands of a licensed starship tow service- you are at the mercy of the stars, there is nowhere else you can go, and little else you can do but coordinate with the Captain, deliver an assessment of your passengers and trust that your dire straits have come to an end. What few stories escape these ships say that Captain Grum is very patient, very accommodating, that they well and truly put a stranded crewman's heart at ease; but in hindsight there was always something off about them, something that didn't quite feel right. Little details that don't line up with... something expected. Something that should be there, but is not. Have you spotted them yet? The Captain has finished reviewing your ship's details, they've consulted with their doctor. A disquieting smile curls across their gracious expression like the burnt end of a lampwick. Captain Grum is satisfied. It's time to feed.
Emergency responders will answer a distress call as expediently as possible. Their ships are held to high standards, to ensure they're capable of arriving at a given coordinate as quickly and safely as they can, and sometimes it isn't enough. That's understood to be a part of the job, sometimes you can't arrive at a ship adrift before calamity reaches its airlocks, but you do everything in your power to try anyways, because you never know how a call will turn out. Sometimes you save the day, other times there is nothing left to save, but some rare few times- some one-in-ten-thousand- a tow crew will arrive at a ship intact, with all life support systems in operation, and no one is able to answer their hails. Their crew board the vessel to find the ship's occupants strewn about like ragdolls, alive but unresponsive. Neck wounds, head wounds, chest and thigh wounds are common. Organic passengers still breathe, but they appear pale and severely anemic; awake, but heavily sedated. A responding tow crew will find the distressed ships have been picked clean of essential supplies, their store rooms pried open and emptied, but personal effects and priceless valuables remain with passengers and in their quarters. These ships are always found with empty fuel reserves, regardless of the original call of their distress. Synthetic starfarers are found rended to pieces, their parts scattered as though they were descended upon by packs of wild dogs. Some rare few times a tow ship will answer a distress call and arrive to find the stranded starship in a very specific state of distress- it has happened enough times that union crews have started to recognize the pattern and put together the pieces, but they're not sure what to do with the puzzle as the bigger picture slowly comes into focus.
In order for the safety of the starfaring community to be maintained, there must be absolute trust in the emergency broadcast satellite relay network- starfarers have to know they'll be heard if they put out a distress signal, that the channel is secure and that help will arrive as soon as possible. Trust is vital for this system to work. If starfarers lose trust in the emergency relay network they might not put out a call, they might think they have better odds of survival on their own, and the toll that loss of trust would take is incalculable. Something is listening for distress signals, something which knows the system, its encryptions and its protocols. There is never a sign of forced entry, something is trusted enough to be invited on board these ships, and that something is always beyond a ship's scanner range when an emergency responder arrives. Stories have circulated among the Emergency Service Worker Union crews, but the concensus is that these stories must never find their way into broad public awareness- the details of these calls must never spill across the bartops and corner booths of Titan's pubs and taverns. Starfarers can't be warned about whatever is stalking the radio waves, they can't know that a distress call might lead a lost crew of blood-thirsting vampires to their airlocks- if they stop trusting the emergency response system, there won't be any calls for help to respond to. Until they can work out a better solution, it is the grim burden of every union crew who happens upon the wake of Captain Grum's command to keep what they see to themselves. We can stabilize them, we can tend to their injuries and bring them home to safety, but if they lose trust in the system, if they never reach out for help, they will assuredly be lost to the stars.