Humanity has expanded beyond the solar system and on the way there they have discovered artifacts from a long extinguished alien species. Their artifacts sometimes make sense, sometimes not. They obey physical laws or they don’t. If humanity can understand the artifacts’ purpose (or impose it onto them) they work better than their human-made equivalents.
Once in the early days of the human diaspora you helped spreading goods and knowledge or bringing people to their desired destinations. You travelled the newly discovered star systems. You were explorers, logisticians, fighters. Many of you worked for a company called Cat & Canary. Then, the dictator united humanity under its banner and you went underground. What once was Cat & Canary is now Pounce & Pandemonium.
You gathered in small bands. Crews of a handful adventurers, owning a ship and a more-or-less well established hideout, together forming your homebase. Most of the time you simply try to survive. But you also try to extend your turf – and to hit the dictatorship wherever possible.