Across the Scattered Worlds

20090311

The Year 2030

It had been quite a year. After four bloody years and over a thousand deaths, the Euskadi civil war was concluded with the establishment of a second Basque homeland, the Basque Republic. On the recommendation of the AIs, the United Nations set 2030 carbon emissions totals at the same level as 2029; Secretary-General Pham Cao Ky predicted that2029 levels were sustainable indefinitely, and declared the global climate crisis over.

Three different clones of Seattle Slew carried off the Kentucky Derby, Preakness, and Belmont Stakes respectively, leaving the racing world divided over whether the Triple Crown had been won or not. The Disney-Hohokus animated virtie Gorbachev shattered earnings records and made an instant star of its lead vocalist, Mahari Ge'ez -- but was widely criticized for its distortions of history. With the establishment of Kilwa, the second Umojan settlement on Mars, the Red Planet finally (albeit reluctantly) implemented a system of postal codes.

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20090304

The Daamin

Homeworld: Verkorra (Gathered Worlds), Nephestal (Scattered Worlds)

Also known as The High Race, the Daamin are small in number and stature, peaceful and philosophic. Physically, they most resemble meter-high rabbits. The Daamin were one of the original Seven Races of the Pylistroph.

When the Gergathan proclaimed Mertorthar c. 1.2 billion BCE, many of the Daamin refused to yield allegiance to the repressive new government. Led by the Elder Ashli Sicne, and accompanied by many of their friends, several million Daamin fled to the Scattered Worlds, where they established a new home on the planet Nephestal. This event became known as The Flight of the Daamin. One of the Singing Stones was destroyed in the Flight.

The Flight of the Daamin was a central event in Daamin history. Even though a billion years of slow evolution permanently sundered the exiles from those who remained behind, the Daamin of Nephestal never forgot their lost home, and never stopped longing for the star-crowded skies of the Core.

To the Terran Empire, the Daamin are known as the Kien Khwei. In the Scattered Worlds, the Daamin are often referred to as The Elders.

The titular head of the Daamin race is referred to as The Senior. The ruling council of the Daamin is referred to as The Wise.

The Daamin spend a large part of their lives in an alternate mental state called Forever Dreams, a state of nonlinear causality. Natural intitutive mathematicians, they constantly extrapolate and visualize possible futures, readjusting their visualization with each change in the environment. The Daamin see every person/place/thing in the world overlaid with possible future versions, a constantly-shifting kaleidoscope of predictive visions.

To the Daamin, some things are relatively stable and in focus: physical landscape features, buildings, anything motionless; also periodic or easily-predictable events. More fuzzy are living beings and things in chaotic motion; these tend to blur or smear.

Usually, it takes great concentration for a Daamin to leave the Forever Dreams anbd become exclusively aware of the world of the present. Those who can focus on the present to such a degree that they can deal with other races, are usually considered unstable or even mad by other Daamin.

The touch of other sapient beings is a source of discomfort and even pain for the Daamin, and they will take even extreme measures to avoid being touched. Throughout the Scattered Worlds, there is a strong taboo against touching one of the Daamin. Which is a pity, as their fur is so fine and beautiful that the impulse to stroke it is almost irresistable.

Daamin reproduction resembles a Greek tragedy crossed with the mating of fish and played out backwards over several years. Basically, one Daam drops an unfertilized egg. Years earlier another Daam, figuring out exactly where the egg will be dropped, arranges to have it fertilized at some time after it is dropped. Both the egg and the fertilizing material are carried by any of several intermediate lower animals.

The whole thing rather seems like a large-scale chess game, and is further complicated by the fact that the Daamin are female most of the time, and only develop the ability to fertilize or drop eggs under certain conditions -- conditions which vary with the individual and the tribe.

Nowadays it's all done with machines anyway, but primitive Daamin versions of Romeo and Juliet probably sounded more like Tristram Shandy.

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20090225

Abomination

In June 2015, just in time for the Southern Baptist Convention, Cetaire-Maris Designs released a very chic, retro-1920s line of linsey-woolsey fashions under the label "Abomination." At a Paris press conference, Madame Rose Cetaire explained that the new line had been inspired by Deuteronomy 22:11: "You shall not wear a mingled stuff, wool and linen together." The Southern Baptists obliged her by noisily denouncing her company's "mockery of Scripture," and overnight Abomination became the hottest-selling line in fashion history.

A celebration, Miranda Maris decided, was quite definitely in order.

Accordingly, Cetaire-Maris Designs rented a large hotel for the Bastille Day weekend, and threw the door open to friends, relatives, business associates, and assorted well-wishers of all types.

Like all creative souls, Miranda and Rose had always been at home with artists, musicians, actors, talented people of all stripes. Sensing free food and great parties, they flocked to the hotel -- taking advantage of universal bohemian brotherhood, each brought his or her own entourage.

Drawn by the bohemians, journalists and reporters swarmed like moths to the flame. Journalists of course brought politicians and gray eminences; these in turn draw those who worshipped power. In the end, more than two thousand people eventually passed through, and Miranda did her best to spend time with all of them.

The party passed into legend, so that eventually tens of thousands would claim to have been there. When all was said and done, the Abomination Party was credited with the creation of twenty-five books, twenty new bands, fifteen billion-dollar mergers, a dozen marriages, ten gold records, eight blockbuster virties, six corporations, four Broadway musicals, three masterpiece paintings, two religions, and a proof of Goldbach's Conjecture.

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20090218

Filtan of thakar Lyph chaio

born on Kree c. 28,470 (Kreen calendar) (c. 750,000 BCE)

Filtan was the greatest of the Kreen poets. He lived in the days of Nova Barentikater, and although he was of Kree, he belonged to a chaio which symapthized with Barentikater. thakar Lyph chaio, in fact, had strong ties with ban Tau chaio on Barentikater IV. thakar Lyph chaio kept no Sebhra slaves (unlike other powerful chaios on Kree), and Filtan spoke out against Sebhra slavery at all times.

In the days directly before Nova Barentikater, Filtan was sent to Barentikater IV by the Miethara as a putative peace envoy (in fact the Miethara was trying to get rid of him), with two chaio-mates named Hylie and Aeth. Upon return to Kree, he found thakar Lyph chaio slain, and the Miethara in command of their ancestral lands.

Filtan's poetry was largely what we today would call science fiction, but his best-known work was his lament, "The Deathsong of Filtan."

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20090204

Jackie Paper

Miranda watches one boy, late teens or early twenties, easily the oldest she's seen. He struts across the floor like a swaggering tomcat, no doubt exuding pheromones with every step. She wonders what he will make of himself, when the muscles start to fade to flab, and the chestnut hair starts thinning. Will he become a respectable career man with a wife and a house and two children of his own? Will he go to church every week and pray for the souls of other lost kids? Will he be content with such an ordinary, uneventful life -- or will he strike out for the outside world that he has only seen reflected in the eyes of his erstwhile customers?

Born in the Christian Confederacy of American States, Jackie Paper was raised by Omi, an operative in the covert international organization known as The Nexus. But Jackie is gay, and if he stays in the Christian States much longer, he risks the death penalty. Now, in the company of Miranda Maris, the legendary Ivory Madonna, he has one last chance to escape....

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20090128

The Avethellan Empire

The Avethellan Empire ruled much of the galaxy for a period of about 58,000 years c. 5.2 million BCE. For the last 30,000 years the Empire was ruled by the legendary Queen Aemallana [some scholars conjecture that Aemallana was not one person, but was a throne name used by a succession of individuals].

Avethell's matriarchal culture was rich, although somewhat spare. Poetry and music were much valued. Avethellans tended to be long-lived, in excess of several centuries at least [whether this was their natural lifespan, or their lives were extended by technology, is unknown.]

There is evidence that psi played some part in Avethellan culture. Telepaths were much more common than in Human populations.

The windmill, which Avethellan settlers constructed everywhere they went, became the symbol of Avethell. The Golden Throne, cast on Avethell at the beginning of the Empire, was another important symbol.

In the 600th century of the Empire, Queen Aemallana summoned the hero Kylvin delv Minatan, who traveled to Messilinia in the Galactic Core and all-but-defeated the Gergathan, bringing an end to Diebethar. Messilinia becomes second Capital. The Seat of Aemallana was established there as a second Throne.

In the 700th century, Aemallana was lost. Her successor, Mooridann, took the Seat of Aemallana, reduced the defense fleet and made other unwise decisions. Ten years later, the resurrected Gergathan proclaimed Malreppidar. The Avethellan Empire fell soon after. In the chaos of the Fall, Dareenten, an Iaranori known as "The Last Galactic Rider," rescued the heir and the Golden Throne, taking both to Nephestal for safekeeping.

The period of Avethellan rule, especially after the conquest of Diebethar, is considered a Golden Age by succeeding cultures. To this day, Aemallana is worshipped as a goddess among the Avethellans, and her name is revered throughout the Scattered Worlds.

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20090121

Maerdik

Situated a few parsecs outside the actual boundary of the Galactic Core, somewhat to Galactic South, Maerdik is one of the few Gathered Worlds which has any commerce with the Scattered Worlds.

Maerdik is the playground of Delger. Delger's creations abound there: Talebba constructs that supervise the channeling of the populace. For Maerdik is primarily a port of entry and departure, a controlled gateway through the Curtain of the Hlutr.

As recently as 100,000 BCE, Maerdik was a much busier world of two-way interaction, when the Core's power had been broken. When the Gergathan was still fighting to regain power in the vicinity of Messilinia, the Galactic Riders were paying regular visits to Maerdik, and there was a vital, thriving culture composed of a melange of all the peoples that had been left there two million years earlier in the fall of Malreppidar.

Gradually, over a thousand years or more, Kaylpeskrit expanded, and finally Maerdik felt first the rumor, then the breath, and finally the full smashing power of the Gergathan. And with Maerdik's fall, the Curtain of the Hlutr was re-established to warn Scattered Worlds vessels away from Kaylpeskrit.

Still there is an underground on Maerdik. The Galactic Riders may have given up on the world, but the Council of Free Peoples never did. Now Maerdik is a vulgar ruin compared to its former self, a planet dominated by Delger's agents and by the transient population of soldiers and servants who pass through its cities -- but even yet there is some small hope, and both the name of Aemallana and the knowledge of the Scattered Worlds are kept holy in the ruins by beings of peace.

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20090107

Delger

Delger is the Gergathan's majordomo and right hand. A Talebba lifeform, Delger directly participates in the thoughts of the Gergathan. Delger, however, retains considerable independence and autonomy, and acts as a mobile lieutenant for the Gergathan.

Delger's physical body has gone through thousands of generations of replacement; each Delger customarily bears a surname which is actually its Coruman serial number. For example, the Delger active during much of the Second Terran Empire was Delger Maisimnunter, or Delger 234612.

While individual Delgers have been persuaded to join the side of the Scattered Worlds, the Gergathan maintains a prototype Delger within its own substance, and can regenerate a new, improved model whenever necessary. Each new Delger learns from the mistakes of its ancestors.

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20081231

Empress Mary Tattersall

b. 12 October 390
d. 6 July 419
Empress of the Terran Empire 401-419

Mary Tattersall was the result of a political marriage between Empress Denise Löwenger and Edward Tattersall. At the time, Idara Tattersall controlled a bloc of about 25 votes in the Imperial Council, votes which were desperately needed by the unraveling Carroll Coalition. The Tattersall allies, who generally steered a middle course between the Throne and its chief opponents, agreed to support Joseph Löwenger and, later, Denise, against the Elendan-led opposition which wished to make peace with the Patalanian Union.

In 390 the Imperial Council passed an Act of Succession which named Mary as Denise's Heir. The same Act also, as a matter of routine, named Edward Tattersall as Regent in case Mary was too young to take the Throne.

Denise had little interest in her daughter or her spouse; she left Mary to be raised by Edward under the vague supervision of other Carroll elders.

Idara Tattersall won their gamble in 401 when Denise died while Mary was only 11. Under the terms of the Act of Succession, Edward took on the mantle of Regent, while at the same time he moved Mary firmly away from the influence of the Carrolls. Edward's Regency lasted until 406, when Mary passed her adulthood tests and took on the Crown. (Edward remained Mary's most trusted advisor until his own premature death in 411.)

Edward's Regency was a time of quiet anticipation and political suspense, as Edward worked to balance the two factions -- Carroll and Opposition -- against one another. By skillfully adjusting appropriations, Edward was able to beef up the local Navy forces of Borshall, New Sardinia, Credix, and Geled -- the Provinces which adjoined the Patalanian Union, and the sites of the heaviest fighting. At the same time, he allowed the Provincial Dukes to increase their control over Navy forces in their Provinces, thus satisfying those of the Dukes who wanted more autonomy. Edward began a strategy of "defense only" -- under his rule (and, subsequently, for the rest of Mary's reign), the Empire ceased attacking Union worlds and did not intrude into Union space.

In TE 406, days before she turned 16, Mary took and passed her adulthood tests; she formally ascended to the Throne on her sixteenth birthday (although, thanks to her rigorous training and daily stints under the Memory Crown, she appeared to onlookers like a woman of thirty.)

Mary continued Edward's policy of political neutrality, balancing one party against the other while all the time trying to keep the Empire together and defend it against the Union.

In order to placate Opposition forces, who still formally called for peace with the Union, Mary agreed to an Act of Succession which named her cousin Charles Castiligoni as Imperial Heir. (The same Act, as a major concession to Carroll forces, named Thomas Carroll as Heir's Heir.)

In all her dealings, Mary tried to steer a middle course. Personally, she was a calm and diginified person, and after the juvenile excesses of Denise's reign, she brought a sense of style and decorum back to the Throne. During Mary's reign, a new restrained style of fashion and furniture swept the Empire; it is referred to by historians as Regency or Tattersall Style.

By force of personality and skillful politics, Mary Tattersall soothed the Imperial Council and the Dukes, and restrained the growing power of the Noble Families. Beginning in TE 412, she held an annual summit meeting between Galactic leaders -- she and Union President Pola Masilek were the chief attendees, but the summits also included the Archdukes of Elendan, Odonia, Sedante, and Teleskany. Largely as a result of these summits, hostilities between Union and Empire slowed down.

Mary's reign, which had begun in a hostile atmosphere with all sides waiting for the other shoe to drop, turned out to be a period of relative peace and quiet -- just what the Empire needed.

In 419, at the chronological age of 38 and the biological age of 100, Mary Tattersall passed the Crown to her Heir, Charles Castiligoni, then closed her eyes and died peacefully. She was mourned throughout the Galaxy; even in the Patalanian Union flags were lowered and the President declared a tenday of mourning.

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20081217

Jamiar Heavitree

The other, a slender Amerind with chestnut eyes and wide lips visible through transparent polymer faceplate, pats Damien's shoulder before releasing him. "No disgrace, Nexus, if you can't handle it." The slightest hint of a French accent sounds more than a little accusative. "It's rough the first time you see something like this. Look away, and if you feel yourself going, leave. Just do not take your helmet off. Faint if you must. The evac team will pick you up."

Jamiar Heavitree is a doctor with Medecins sans Frontieres, the international medical assistance organization. When a deadly disease breaks out in the Navajo homeland in 2042, Dr. Heavitree brings a team to contain the epidemic. There, he makes the acquaintance of a young Nexus operative, Damien Nshogoza. And from that meeting, his life will never be the same....

copyright (c) 2008, Don Sakers

Find out more in Dance for the Ivory Madonna

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20081210

The Curtain of the Hlutr

In order to contain the evil of Mertorthar, and to shield the developing races of the Scattered Worlds, the Scattered Worlds Hlutr created the Curtain of the Hlutr, a screen of thought and mental song which surrounds the Galactic Core to prevent accidentally entering the Gathered Worlds, as well as to prevent traffic out of the Core. This Curtain effectively isolated the Core until Mertorthar's war against the Empire of the Iaranor about 600 million BCE. By that time, the Gergathan had learned how to penetrate the Curtain.

Following the defeat of Iaranor, the Curtain remained and functioned as a one-way membrane, telepathically warning Scattered Worlds vessels away. The Curtain was lowered and raised again several times, most notably in the Core interregnums.

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20081203

The Aetorian League

The planet Aetor, located about a kiloparsec from Earth, was colonized in 2098 CE. In 2153, Aetor was one of the founding worlds of the First Terran Empire.

After the fall of the First Empire, Aetor became a minor player in the region, but always remembered that its history predated the Empire's. In 4518 Aetor, with a few surrounding worlds, proclaimed the Aetorian League. In 4601 Aetor-Tethys-Zinnberg-Bosip signed the Aetorian Pact for mutual co-operation. This is the traditional date of founding for the Aetorian League.

At its greatest extent, the League included Tethys, Zinnberg, Bosip, and many of the surrounding worlds.

The League remained a minor player on the Galactic stage until 6697, when Lathyros declared war. Tethys, Zinnberg, and Bosip made individual settlements with Lathyros, withdrawing form the League. Although the Aetor-Lathyros War dragged on until 6712, when a treaty ceded most of the Aetor's's territory to Lathyros, historians date the end of the League at the start of the War, 6697.

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Across the Scattered Worlds

20090311

The Year 2030

20090304

The Daamin

20090225

Abomination

20090218

Filtan of thakar Lyph chaio

20090204

Jackie Paper

20090128

The Avethellan Empire

20090121

Maerdik

20090107

Delger

20081231

Empress Mary Tattersall

20081217

Jamiar Heavitree

20081210

The Curtain of the Hlutr

20081203

The Aetorian League

Scattered Worlds Books

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