During the United Colonies quest line in Starfield, you have to infiltrate the Crimson Fleet to gather evidence of all their wrongdoings. In order to gain the fleet’s trust, you have to perform some jobs for Naeava, the woman in second command. Your first task for Naeva is to kill a target of the Crimson Fleet, someone named Austin Rake. Austin Rake was once a member of the fleet but left them to work on board a ship called the Ragana in Starfield.
Depending on your moral compass, you might not want to kill Austin Rake, no matter what he did. However, you also have to think about your mission with the United Colonies, as the captain of UC SysDef explicitly stated to not kill anyone during your undercover operation. As such, the task to kill Austin Rake becomes a little murkier.
In this guide, I’ll go over the pros and cons of killing Austin Rake in Starfield and if you should actually go through with it.
After accepting the task for Naeava, you can fast travel to the Ragana’s location and dock at the ship. Upon boarding, you will run into a mustachioed man along with some other members of the Ragana. The man will confront you and ask what you’re doing on board their ship.
From here, you have a few options. Austin Rake is one of the other members in the room, and you can choose to immediately attack everyone on the Ragana. The mustachioed man will not give up Rake’s identity to you, so if you want to kill him, you need to eliminate everyone on board or persuade the man to kill him for you. However, you can also tell the man that you want to resolve the situation peacefully by using the UC SysDef dialogue option.
Choosing to not kill Austin Rake
If you go with the UC SysDef dialogue option, then Austin Rake’s identity will be made known to you. You can tell the man that you just need Rake’s identity so you can give it to Naeava to prove that you killed him.
Your final step is to tell the man that Rake needs to turn himself into UC SysDef so he can keep himself safe from the Crimson Fleet. With that, you can leave the Ragana, return to Naeva, and she will buy your story, letting you join the Crimson Fleet.
Killing Austin Rake
If you truly want to eliminate Austin Rake, you can persuade the mustachioed man to kill Austin Rake for you. This takes a hefty persuasion check, so it will be difficult to pull off. If that succeeds, though, then the members on board the Ragana will eliminate Rake. You can then take his identity back to Naeva.
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Failing the persuasion check will leave you with one option, which is to kill every member of the ship. Then, you can loot Austin Rake’s body and return to Naeva.
Which choice should you pick?
In my opinion, there is no need to kill Austin Rake, as you can easily progress the Crimson Fleet quest line by sparing his life. Naeva will buy your story as long as you bring back his identity, which you can acquire by making Rake turn himself into UC SysDef.
Killing Rake will only net you a few extra items if you kill everyone else on the Ragana. While you can persuade the Ragana crew to kill him for you, this is basically pointless, as it has the same result as sparing his life.
