20080130

Princess Mahlowi

Princess Mahlowi sits straight and serene, gazing into the middle distance rather than at the supplicant before her. She wears a full-skirted, wide-sleeved gown in her trademark African Tudor style, kinte cloth and other West African fabrics trimmed with leopard skin and gold ornaments. Her headdress is based on Congolese basket-weave, her gloves adorned with Fante ritual designs. She wears a stunning gold necklace fashioned in the shape of the Nexus starburst. She cools herself with a fan of ostrich feathers. In browns and greens, amber and gold, she is the colors of Africa itself.

Mahlowi Sisse Keita Touré, born in America on the first full moon of 2001, returned to Africa at the very start of the Great Kurudi, the Return. Princess Mahlowi combined splandor and pomp with true management ability, technology with tradition, and progressive vision with respect for history. In months, she was West Africa's darling; in a year, the world's.

copyright (c) 2007, Don Sakers


Find out more in Dance for the Ivory Madonna by Don Sakers

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20080123

The Imperial Galactographic Survey

The Imperial Galacographic Survey (IGS), run jointly by the Grand Library and the Department of Colonization, is the branch of the Imperial government responsible for mapping the Galaxy, planetary systems, and the individual planets of the Empire.

The IGS also places and maintains thousands of automated reference & navigational buoys throughout the Galaxy.

Additionally, the IGS maintains and publishes the Planetary Catalog: a complete database of maps, surveys, and other geographic information about the thousands of worlds, inhabited and not, which come to the attention of the Empire. The Planetary Catalog is made available through the Grand Library.

Technically, the IGS operates under the authority of the Imperial Department of Colonization; agents wear the sky-blue uniforms of DeptCol, with appropriate insigniae. IGS Headquarters, however, is located in Alexandria on the Grand Library campus. Due to their close cooperation with the Grand Library, and the independent nature of their work, IGS agents are largely insulated from DeptCol's legendary bureaucratic intrigues.


copyright (c) 2007, Don Sakers


Find out more at The Scattered Worlds site

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20080116

Provincial Capitals

Seven worlds were founded in TE 37 to serve as bases for Imperial expansion. These seven, along with Earth, became the capitals of the eight Imperial Provinces.

Each Province was ruled by a Provost. In theory, a Provost was appointed by the Imperial Council (and later the Emperor), but in practice they were basically hereditary positions. (Maj Thovold, however, did change some of the appointments, and the ability to make and un-make Provosts remained a perogative of the Throne, albeit a little-used one.)

The eight Provincial Capitals (clockwise around the Galaxy) were:

Terra (Earth)
Geled
Borshall
New Sardinia
Patala
Credix
Phuctra
Neordan


copyright (c) 2008, Don Sakers


Find out more in The Leaves of October: a novel of the Scattered Worlds by Don Sakers

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20080109

Sebya

Human world 1.6 kiloparsecs from Neordan. Also home world of the Scattered Worlds race called the Dawn People.

Sebya is the first of five planets orbiting a K-Class star.

Distance From Primary: 82.3 million km
Total Irradiation: (Terra = 1) 1.06
Length of Local Day: 21.6 hours
Revolution: 1.714 Terran years (695.74 local days)
Diameter: 12,639 km
Mass: (Terra = 1) 0.757
Surface Gravity: 0.785



Sebya was settled by Humans in TE 312 and remained populated through the Interregnum.

The natives, called the Dawn People, inhabited the Forest of the Dawn. They were candidates for a successor race to the Hlutr. They divided themselves into three tribes: the Blue Hills Tribe, the Riverbank Tribe, and the White Rocks Tribe.

The life cycle of the Dawn People included sessile and mobile stages.

Stage One:

Birth to 3 years: Individual begins life as a sapling, in Spring. Grows to height of 3-4 meters and trunk diameter of 10 cm by Winter. By year 3 (height 6-8 meters, diameter up to 60 cm), flowering may begin.

3 to 12 years: Sexual maturity phase one: Individual begins producing female gametes. These remain inactive until Autumn of Year 13.

Year 13: Breeding. In Autumn, mature Dawn People unite with individual and pass male gametes to flowers. Seeds develop and are dropped at end of Autumn.

Stage Two:

Birthing (Year 14): In Spring of Year 14, as saplings begin to grow, individual enters motile phase. Trunk splits and roots begin to dissolve; at Birthing time the individual pulls up from the ground and takes first steps.

14 to 25 years: Individual begins production of male gametes. As Dawn People grow older they shed their bark and limbs...by year 20 most individuals are under 3 meters high and only about 50-100 cm in diameter. Carnivorous behavior becomes more well-established. Until end of life, crown supports leaves, both for photosynthesis and as sensory apparatus.

Stage Three:

Death (approximately 25 years): Cell division stops at about 25 years; individual begins a rapid disintegration and usually takes root once again. Process of disintegration is accompanied by enzymes which produce happiness, as well as a heightened sensitivity to the Hlutr Inner Voice. Natural death is regarded as a happy and gentle experience.

Future:

When Dawn People culture is stabilized, the Hlutr plan to remove the limit to cell division; at age 25 individual will enter an alternate third stage in which he/she is in full command of Hlutr gene-altering power, as well as the ability to control rate of metabolism. In this stage the Dawn People will resemble short Hlutr with limited mobility.

By age 100, motility will have decreased to zero; Dawn People will seek a final standing place and start another growth spurt that will leave them nearly identical in behavior and life-cycle to present-day Hlutr.

copyright (c) 2008, Don Sakers


Find out more in The Leaves of October: a novel of the Scattered Worlds by Don Sakers

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20080102

The Kreen


The dominant race of Kree is a vastly degenerate form of Avethellan. The Kreen are small burrowing mammaloids, about 60-80 cm in length and individually about as intelligent as larger dogs. (The Kreen look very much like groundhogs or large hamsters.) The Kreen brain is far more convoluted than its size would indicate; it is equipped with all major forebrain functions; and the brain volume given over to sensory functions is proportionately about 25% greater than in the Human brain.

The Kreen are so nearsighted that Humans would consider them almost blind. In compensation, they have several different forms of vibrational senses (including a complete tectonic awareness and high-frequency doppler sonar), a sense of magnetic fields, an electrical sense, highly-sophisticated biochemical detection surpassing even the Terran bloodhound, touch pads with hindredth-millimeter sensitivity, a gravity-balance sense accurate to one part in a billion . . . Kreen perception approaches clairvoyance.

The Kreen have one additional advantage: their society. Multiplexing on all sensory channels, they are capable of communication that approaches telepathic rapport. Kreen intelligence increases as a power of the number of individuals involved. Kreen individuals in rapport take on specific roles: communicator, sensor, manipulator, memorizer. Three Kreen are about as intelligent as a smart Human -- this is the minimum number of Kreen that can achieve self-awareness.

A Kreen "clan," containing between three and 729 individuals, is called a chaio. The chaio, corresponding in many ways to the Human family, is the basic unit of Kreen society. The traditional maximum number for a chaio is 729 (three-to-the-sixth) -- above that number, a chaio will naturally divide into two or more smaller groups.

A group of chaios is called a riako, and can involve up to hundreds of thousands or even millions -- and reach the mental ability (although not quite the speed) of a supercomputer.

The most notable example of a riako is the ruling riako, called the Miethara, which gave its name to the Kreen empire.

Typically a Kreen individual reaches sexual maturity at 4-7 Terran years, and at that time decides to ally with a particular chaio. This is often a mutual decision. Thereafter, individuals frequently move from chaio to chaio at the whim of the chaio.

Kreen philosophy has a keen awareness of the individual and individuality -- but it is only within a chaio that the individual is able to apprehend its own existence.

The Kreen come in three different genders: female(XX), male (XY), and kemale(XZ). All three must be present for intercourse. The kemale and male both impregnate the female, and hormones in the spermatic fluid of both combine to make the ovum receptive to conception. The ovum is impregnated by either a sperm from the male, or a sperm from the kemale, so only two of the three "parents" actually contribute genetic material to each offspring -- but since the Kreen give birth to litters of 3-8 pups, the mix is usually fairly good. Births average 50% female, 25% male, and 25% kemale.

Kreen females bear their litters live and in the context of the chaio. All intercourse is carried on freely among all eligible male/kemale/female triplets -- in fact, intercourse for the Kreen is a social matter, most closely resembling the orgies of ancient Rome.

copyright (c) 2008, Don Sakers


Find out more on the Scattered Worlds site

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