You say, Columbus with his argosies
Who rash and greedy took the screaming main
And vanished out before the hurricane
Into the sunset after merchandise,
Then under western palms with simple eyes
Trafficked and robbed and triumphed home again:
You say this is the glory of the brain
And human life no other use than this?
(Trumbull Stickney, 'You say, Columbus with his argosies')
Culture & Politics
Extraterrestrial Unification activities have a particular orientation not shared with the mainstream of that civilization. Unification culture beyond the Core not only draws upon a different combination of sources than anything encountered around Sol or the Centauris, but has a unique character of its own. Even the powerful centralizing and homogenizing forces in the Unification cannot entirely overcome the vast distances, long separation, and great isolation of interstellar expansion.
Demographically speaking, the Mainline sees significant numbers of foreigners working and living among Unification citizens: researchers, technicians, crews and support staff from the SPL in particular, but also the CDN, Indonesia, or some of the smaller non-aligned 'corporate nations'. And of course, there are the ubiquitous Exo-Americans. This kind of cosmopolitanism is not as common on Earth.
In the sphere of religion, Baha'is are a particularly well-represented group along the Mainline, even more than in the Core; the Raelians are even more disproportionately influential. Conversely, of the 800-plus dioceses of the New (a.k.a. 'Green') Catholic Church, exactly one lies beyond Barnard's Star.
Where political traditions are concerned, one cannot fail to note the dominance of a school of thought (‘party’ is far too strong a word) descended from the late phase of a minor 20th century Marxist faction: Posadism. In its contemporary form, Posadism extends Trotsky's argument that socialism in one country is untenable. Posadists argue that socialism on one planet is unworkable and that only interstellar, even universal communism can obtain. Contact with the Squids, who have an arguably 'socialist' socio-economic organization, served as fuel to this theory's resurgence, and through the 22nd century various subsects of Posadists have nudged the Unification into interstellar space. Until recently active Posadists were loosely coordinated as the ANPW (Association of Neo-Posadist Workgroups), but there is no central body or committee.
The Unification Mainline has no single authority, naturally. Local councils and committees report back directly to the World Council on Earth; there are no intermediary levels of government and no centralized extrasolar political body. A few agencies are particularly important all along the Mainline, each with their particular concerns: ConCom (the Contact Committee), QuaBSEn (Quarantine and Biosafety Enforcement), AsASN (Astrogational and Aerospace Safety Network), ComCore, and PeaceForce (the Peacekeeping Forces, i.e., the Unification military).
The Contact Committee may not have the largest staff, or even the greatest resources under its direct control, but it absolutely has the most political clout. After all, from the perspective of the World Council – and Unification popular opinion – the primary justification for supporting the creation of the Unification Mainline was communication with the Squids. ConCom is the body charged with effecting that, and as other xenosophonts have been encountered since then, their remit has grown (as well as the quantity of numbered subcommittees). Accordingly, ConCom has far more influence on the other agencies and programs along the Mainline than vice versa.
Likewise, scientific organizations have more pull than comparably sized and situated commercial ones. Industry and business is present in Unification space in order to support research and education, not the other way around. Many of these scientific programs are what the Unification recognizes as 'Independent Reconnaissance Groups' – self-organizing autonomous bodies created to pursue a particular line of investigation beyond the interests and priorities of the Unification's councils. Only a few actually live up to the name and in fact explore beyond established frontiers.
Quarantine and Biosafety Enforcement (QuaBSEn, QBSE) is a Unification agency with wide reach; it is responsible for ensuring decontamination of all materials, including sophonts, as they move between ecosystems – both natural and artificial ones. It also funds continuing development of bioblockade and fukamization protocols and provides the service as needed to unmodified humans (or Phants, Pins, etc.) departing Earth. The Astrogational and Aerospace Safety Network performs regulatory and safety inspections of space vessels and in particular SDRT drive-equipped starships, provides orbital traffic control and debris-clearing services, and to the extent possible in the remote reaches of outer space, rescue and salvage services. ComCore nominally just provides communications with the Core systems, but on an interstellar scale this involves managing a fleet of packet ships with high-bandwidth information relays as well as maintaining the infrastructures of "local" (planetary-orbital scale) communications networks. In practice they provide mass media and news services to the inhabitants of the Mainline; they are also responsible for data security. The military presence is light or even completely absent, outside of chokepoint systems (Barnard's Star, 36 Ophiuchi) where the Unification confronts the seething savagery of the ESA.
The official language of the Mainline is Esperanto, as in the rest of Unification. Aside from being the language of government, corporate-level business, and education, it’s also the home language to a much larger proportion of the population than in the Core systems: the inhabitants of the Mainline are drawn from throughout the Unification (and some of its allies) and live together, so tend to wind up speaking Esperanto at home as a compromise between native speakers of different old-fashioned ancestral languages. That being said, the initial wave of exploration predated the entrenchment of Esperanto in the Unification, and was largely sinophone. As a result many place names and local slang terms are from Chinese, and the most widespread secondary language is still Chinese. (Or English, among the Exo-Americans.) The Unification Pins speak their own creolized forms of Cantonese or Yoruba but usually have a basic grasp of Esperanto. The Squids technically speak Lojban with humans, but it is almost always machine-translated to Esperanto or some other more natural(istic) human language.
On the subject of language, it is worth noting that the Unification tends not to give extrasolar planets official names – only settlements, stations, or outposts. Most worlds have nicknames used by one or another faction in the area.
Also, it bears repeating that the Unification's purpose in being there is research, not empire. If a settlement or outpost exists, it can be assumed that there is something there interesting enough to scientists to warrant the expense. An installation of primarily economic, residential, or military purpose is the exception, not the rule.
It may also pay to recall that humans were not the first explorers to visit the stars along the Mainline. Aside from the relics of prehistoric spacefarers in one section of it, more recently the Squids traveled most of its length to get to Earth, before human explorers had penetrated past Ross 154.
Astrography
A map, and some notes, and below that some brief sketches of the more interesting points of interstellar space explored by the Unification and its allies.
- From many of the systems named here, one can also reach other, unnamed star systems – uninhabited and lifeless ones, centered on minor red dwarfs or white dwarfs, of little interest or value except to specialized astronomers. They're not shown on this map.
- Packet ships carrying priority passengers and high-value cargoes move between the stars at about 0.4 to 0.5 light years per 24-hour day (lypd), while the heavy transports, moving bulk cargos and large pieces of equipment, average 0.1 lypd. Data moves at around 0.9 lypd.
Ross 154, Lacaille 8760, CD-44 11909, and L204-128
A series of red dwarf stars that never earned new, more pronounceable names before they became the stepping stones to new worlds and new lives beyond them. Even today their main role is to be big lumps of mass you can aim an SDRT drive at. Perhaps in ESA space they’d be ringed with deep-space habitats and home to millions; being in Unification space, the four systems probably don’t support 5,000 inhabitants between them – beacon-keepers, maintenance/tender crews, a few astronomers. Unofficially, the systems are called after four mythological paradises of classical China and Mesoamerica: Tlalocan, Kunlun, Tamoanchan, and Penglai.
36 Ophiuchi ABC
This system, a group of three K0-6 main sequence stars, consists of two relatively close companions in a highly elliptical orbit (A and B), and the third (C) orbiting the others at several thousand AUs. Unlike its neighbors on the Mainline, it has three characteristics of interest: one, it’s a back door into ESA space (via the red dwarfs BD-8 4352 and Wolf 629, not shown). Two, the chromospheres of A and B are unusually active, which appeals to astronomers. Three, those same stars have planets, some of which aren't a complete waste of time.
36 Ophiuchi A's sole satellite of any size is Big Blue, a warm gas giant about twice the mass of Jupiter and to a very high degree of certainty the bluest astronomical object yet encountered.
36 Ophiuchi B is orbited by a quite young, unusually carbon-rich, roughly Earth-sized, life-bearing planet at a primeval stage of development. Its nitrogen atmosphere is thick and rich in carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, and methane; its large alkaline oceans teem with primitive bacteria; the land surface is barren and enlivened only by tar pools; and volcanism and tectonics are very active. Hot, wet, swaddled in orange-brown clouds, and sodden with ethane and its friends, the sci-fi-maddened Exo-Americans quickly nicknamed it 'Giedi Prime'.
All three stars' orbits are host to military and scientific personnel, though the former must outnumber the latter at least two to one. The exact population is obviously classified information, but it’s probably in the neighborhood of 40,000.
Delta Pavonis
Since I came to Cold Mountain
how many thousand years have passed? […]
No one visits the cliffs
forever hidden by clouds.
Soft grass serves as a mattress,
my quilt is the dark blue sky.
A boulder makes a fine pillow;
Heaven and Earth can crumble and change.
(Hanshan, Poem 26; tr. Red Pine)
Here things get more interesting. Aside from its contents, this star system also serves as one of the two main intersections of the Unification Main, where the line reaching back from Barnard's Star and the Core splits into the fascinating but dead-end Beta Hydri branch (aka the 'Arm') and the major, ramifying line starting at CD-49 13515.
Delta Pavonis itself is G8 subgiant star, full of heavy elements and beginning to fuse increasing amounts of helium in its core – not as far along in that process as its neighbor Beta Hydri, but still of great interest to astronomers. The system consists of just one asteroid belt and two planets; it does also have a large number of individual asteroids and comets in highly eccentric orbits, and some of these bodies are quite large. The outer planet, Delta Pavonis II, is a large CryoJovian gas giant, with 1.6 Jupiter masses and a modest family of rocky and icy satellites. The asteroid belt, lying sunward, is much broader than the one in the Sol system. Then, orbiting at just over one AU, is Delta Pavonis I: a Pelagic Gaian world that has been named Hanshan.
Hanshan is slightly smaller and has a lower gravity than Earth (0.85G); it has considerably more liquid water. Planetologists believe that it was formerly much cooler, with the majority of its oceans locked up in icecaps until relatively recent heating processes melted them and dramatically raised sea levels. Its atmosphere has high oxygen content, over 60% – toxic to Earth life at sea-level pressures. And it's a hot planet: at sea level, temperatures average 45˚C. Lacking any moons and having a relatively light core, geological activity is weak and can no longer support plate tectonics (though vestiges of the plate activity and ancient continents can be detected). A cyclic geological process is present, in which pressure builds in the mantle over hundreds of millions of years until it breaks through the surface in a spasm of violent but localized volcanism. Such eruptions are the source of Hanshan's only land masses – bulges in the planet's crust, topped with the remnants of vast shield volcanoes. High winds and heavy precipitation rapidly erode these landmasses: few last more than ten or perhaps twenty million years.
Hanshan does have native life – a very large biosphere, in fact, but heavily concentrated in its ocean and with relatively limited diversity. Its relative primitiveness, considering the planet is estimated to be at least a billion years older than Earth, is attributed to a recent global-level extinction event, possibly within the last 100 million years. While Earthlike in many ways, from biochemistry through ethology, its superficial appearance is strikingly alien. And while it is based on the same amino acids and even on DNA as Terrestrial life, Hanshan's life is built on topoisomers that are left-handed to Earth's right-handed molecules: mirror images, and incompatible. This includes metabolic incompatibility, yet many (many, many) species persist in trying to eat humans.
With unbreathable and inflammable air, sauna-like climate, and the constant threat of ravenous beasts supercharged on oxygen, Hanshan is not particularly hospitable to colonists. A very early Indian attempt ended in tragedy; a later Unification attempt succeeded. At the highest elevations, several thousand meters above sea level, the air is thin enough that the partial pressure of oxygen drops within tolerable limits, temperatures also fall (and become actually chilly), and the barren slopes of the volcanic highlands can play host to imported, artificially maintained Earth ecosystems. Despite Hanshan's tall atmosphere, at these heights little UV radiation is screened out, and this presents the major environmental hazard – after the wind and the cold. To a large extent shaped by Chinese Buddhists in its early days, the surface colony is characterized now as being clannish and somewhat xenophobic by Unification standards, and more than usually puritanical and dour.
The settlements on Hanshan's surface, in its orbit, and in the asteroid belt support a strong economy based on mining, refining, and heavy industry. While SDRT drives can’t be built here, almost all other starship components can be, as well as the majority of the newer heavy machinery (and scientific equipment) used all the way down the Unification main. In all, about half a million people call the Delta Pavonis system home.
CD-49 13515
Another snoozer. Red dwarf, some rocks, some beacons, an emergency response craft standing by, move on.
Epsilon Indi AB(ab)
A K4.5 main sequence star with a garden planet orbiting it – slightly cooler than Earth and with heavier gravity (1.15G), but very hospitable. Moonless, its tectonics are maintained by an unusually dense core, very rapid rotation, and by tidal flexing from its proximity to the sun (just 0.4 AU); but it is characterized by reliable, constant low-level volcanism and seismism rather than the violent eruptions and earthquakes of Earth, Tirana, or other Terrestrial-class planets.
Its native ecosphere is simple and almost globally monolithic, consisting of vast plains of 'goldmoss' that nestle between the large polar icecaps. This extremely ancient autotrophic organism covers most of the land surface to a depth of several meters and, over the many tens of millions of years of its dominance, has left vast beds of peat, coal, and other petrochemicals below. Greenish-ochre in coloration, it's an efficient and tireless photosynthesizer, which accounts for the planet's atmosphere having much more O2 and much less CO2 than it otherwise would. During the summer, meltwater pools at the base of the icecaps, evaporates, and generates wet fogs and light rain through the temperate and equatorial regions; later in the season, the refreshed goldmoss 'blooms' and pollinates on a global scale – turning the skies orange and caking exposed surfaces with a gummy residue. Most people suffer allergic reactions to goldmoss pollen, but the planet is otherwise benign from a human perspective. Placid, too; boring, even bleak, perhaps.
The Unification has set up a model colony on the surface, named Darjeeling (or alternatively, Leizhou) Darjeeling is the intellectual and cultural capital of the Unification outside the Sol-Centauri core – that is, to the extent one can really speak of Unification 'capitals'. In any case, it’s the location of the premiere educational and research institutions along the Unification Main, a center of great political and philosophical activity, an exemplar of low-impact/high-quality design, and generally as close a realization of Unification ideals as has yet been achieved on a large scale. Home to about a quarter million permanent residents, Darjeeling is a few square kilometers of high-tech urban wonderland; the rest of the planet is for the most part, endless undulating tundra of velvety, spongy, yellow-dusted moss hardly even enlivened by the presence of macrofauna… let alone human beings.
Epsilon Indi has several more planets in more distant orbits (small and rocky or icy), but more interesting are its two substellar companions: cool, dim methane dwarfs orbiting at a distance of almost 1500 AU. The larger, Epsilon Indi Ba, is a class T1V dwarf of about 43 Jupiter masses. The smaller, Epsilon Indi Bb, is a T6V dwarf of about 28 Jupiter masses, separated from Ba by 2.65 AU. The pair are the most conveniently located brown dwarves for human study, and so there is quite a significant permanent scientific base located far out here in Epsilon Indi's Oort cloud. Maybe 50,000 people in all live at the dwarfs or elsewhere in the Epsilon Indi system other than Darjeeling itself.
CD-37 15492
Another non-entity of a red-dwarf-centric pit stop. Its great claim to fame? Being the first numbered entry in both the Gliese and the Luyten Half-Second star catalogues.
Tau Ceti
Here’s the second intersection on the Unification Mainline: the home of the Squids is the terminus of a short side branch.
Tau Ceti is G8 main sequence star, very much like home, right down to having a luscious green-blue planet swinging around it. But in fact Tau Ceti is only superficially Sol-like: it's more than twice as old and less than half the metallicity, a light and elderly solar system. Its great dust belt at 50-60 AU is not solely dust, but full of ice and rocks that plunge into the inner system. This would make a lastingly life-supporting planet unlikely, were it not for the large family of gas giants helping deflect interlopers. The planets Tau Ceti IV-XI orbit between 1.9 and 32 AU, all of them cold MicroJovians or SubJovians – even the largest, Tau Ceti V, is just the size of Neptune in the Sol system. All have satellite systems composed of small and probably ever-changing rosters of small icy planets, and more rarely rocky ones. Tau Ceti III, though strictly speaking a Helian Nebulous-class planet, is often referred to as a 'teacup gas giant': topping 8 Earth masses, its dense helium atmosphere just by itself is 2/3 the mass of the planet Earth. What about Tau Ceti I? A Moon-sized silicate-rich GeoThermic world, baking in the sun and crater-spattered. Let's get on with the main event.
Tau Ceti II is a Gaian world of the Lacustric subtype: its surface is less covered by liquid water than Earth by a small amount (70%), but the real difference is in the distribution. While there is one major range of tall mountains and several lesser highlands, the land surface is broken up into a large number of small and low-lying continents. Some planetologists hypothesize that Tau Ceti II has become more tectonically active in its recent history. Increased plate tectonic activity would spur orogenesis and also atmospheric CO2 levels, which could account for present-day geography as well as the growth of the already lush phytobiota. It is likely, they say, that Tau Ceti II is presently evolving into a classic Continental-subtype Gaian world.
The planet's atmosphere is rather thin for its mass (0.93 Earth) and gravity (0.77 Earth), possibly due to long-term loss to solar and cosmic wind, possibly due to major impacts in its earlier history. It is, however, perfectly breathable by humans at most altitudes, provided occasional local contaminants can be filtered out. Rotation is fast, and axial tilt moderate. Weather systems are dynamic and winds are swift and strong. The planet has a large and diverse biosphere, biochemically a near-twin of Earth and the other 'garden planets' found at the Core and along the Mainline. It even employs an Earthlike array of dextro-amino acids. The downside? A very large number of native plant species and a majority of animal analogues use toxins for defense or predation – and almost all of these are toxic to humans as well. Who lack the natural defenses that native species may have evolved. For that matter, some enzymes and proteins are mutually toxic between Terran and native species. If Alpha Centauri A.II is a plague planet, Tau Ceti II is a poison planet.
The largest continent, the two archipelagoes attached to it, and the larger half of the continent facing it across one of the seas, is covered by one of the most famous alien biomes in known space: the so-called 'acrosilvus'. The iconic organism here is the genus of skyscraper-tall tree-analogues, the tallest of which can exceed 800 meters from ground level to tip. Average height is actually on the order of 300-400 m, however. Propagating by rhizome or its aerial strut roots (depending on species and environmental conditions), growing from the low foothills of the continental divide well out into the shallow seas, they are so tall that even in Tau Ceti II's low gravity they cannot pump water into their bodies above 140-160 m. Above that height, they are sustained by reservoirs: cysts within the main trunk, open or sheltered pools on lateral branches and at joints, fed by specialized leaves and channels within the bark. They anchor themselves with root systems that match the above-ground structures for size and complexity, and are aided in resisting the thin but fast winds of the planet by a network of parasitic vines, growing between trees from higher and lower anchor points, thus weaving nearly the entire region into a single woody structure. The understory and ground level of these forests are dark and still, dry yet dripping, and populated by entire specialized ecosystems of scavengers and detritovores.
What has kept the acrosilvan biome from spreading further is its dependence on heavy rainfall – many of the same tree species are encountered elsewhere, but below a certain precipitation threshold they are unable to grow than 100-150 m. But it is still true that all the woody plants of Tau Ceti II tend towards tallness – even on the savannas of the other continents and islands, or in the cloud forests up in the high mountains above the dry coast. Herbivorous animal life grows tall and long-necked, or learns to climb. (The thin air makes gliding and flying more demanding adaptations than might be expected.)
Currently there is one moon, a sizable Lithic-Gelidian world presumably captured from the outer system in the last few hundred million years. This close to the sun, its surface ices have boiled off, leaving a thin hazy atmosphere that is slowly replenished as subterranean volatiles continue to melt and erupt. While larger and slightly more massive than the Moon, its orbit is distant (and fairly irregular), which reduces the tidal forces active on Tau Ceti II.
Humans quickly took up residence in the treetops of the acrosilvan forest zone. High in the comparatively non-toxic branches, relatively isolated from the mass of irritating if not poisonous zoologics, it’s a fairly safe environment. And one that appeals to the tree-hugging elements in the Unification – whether they find themselves on platforms in the canopy or in cautiously prepared cavities in the trunk itself. Unificationers nicknamed the entire planet Senlin; the Exo-Americans, perhaps predictably, immediately dubbed it 'New Kashyyyk'.
At the same time there are other human settlements outside the acrosilvus. In the geologically young highlands, exceptionally rich deposits of valuable minerals have been found, and mines and refineries have been set up to exploit them. This took place only after long debate within the Unification along the Mainline. It is still a hot topic for the Unification on Earth, and a source of bitter disputes and possibly sabotage or violence. Senlin is thus unique in another way: it supports hard rock mining at the bottom of a planetary gravity well. Its mines produce silver, platinum, uranium and other radioactives, mercury, tungsten, tantalum, and lanthanum – in small quantities, to be sure, but economically efficient even after lift-to-orbit cost is factored in. In all, there are at least 120,000 permanent residents of the planet. And off the surface there are significant settlements, too, whether orbiting Tau Ceti II or on its moon, or above one of the outer-system giant planets: perhaps another 70,000.
Epsilon Eridani
Bein' young and all liquored up – WHOOOOEEEEE!
(Some guy staggering past my window the other Friday night.)
A K2 main sequence star, and one of the youngest star systems visited to date. Less than billion years old, it boasts a surprising number of planets but stands out for its immense bands of dust, not yet condensed or swept up into other bodies. The first band (~3 AU) is silicate-rich; the third band (~35-90 AU) rich in ice and young comets; the contents of the central band (~20-30 AU) fall between the two. The inner system sports a trio of young and heavily bombarded Selenian-type worlds; in the outer system there are four gas giants that, despite their eccentric orbits, impose some structure on the system's vast belts of debris. The two outermost are both small CryoJovians (0.15 Jupiter masses at average 34 AU with 0.3 eccentricity, and 0.2J at average 59 AU with 0.1 eccentricity); the next further in is much larger but still cold, in an extremely irregular orbit (4.5J, average distance 7.9 AU with 0.5 eccentricity). Closest in to Epsilon Eridani is a more modest, less frigid EuJovian about two-thirds again as massive as Jupiter and following an elliptical orbit between 3.1 and 5.3 AU from the sun. This planet – Epsilon Eridani IV – actually supports life.
Or rather, one of its moons, labeled Epsilon Eridani IV.13, does. Though lacking a large metal core and consisting mostly of silicates, this massive planet is twice the diameter of Earth, and its gravity is an impressive 1.5G. Tidal forces maintain internal geological activity and, combined with radioactive and compressive heating from its own mass, an atmosphere and liquid ocean persist – despite the dimness and distance of the sun. The atmosphere is too thin to be breathable (6-24 kPa depending on season) even if it didn't consist of nitrogen and methane, with only traces of oxygen. It is thick enough to trap and transfer heat on the surface… though it never rises much above -15˚C. The magnetosphere of Epsilon Eridani IV and its heavy drizzle of high-energy ions give this moon perpetual auroral displays that dwarf anything seen on Earth. The global icecaps are thinner than on classic Europan or PelaGelidian-type worlds: during perihelion less than a hundred meters of solid ice and often just thick layers of stiff slush, and even at aphelion the layer is barely 10 km thick in most locations. While the moon is frequently struck by asteroids, the constant motion and recycling of the ice obliterate all surface traces within a few tens of thousands of years.
The ocean below the surface is a single liquid body, but the topography of the ocean floor is highly varied: there are vast shallows only a few hundred meters deep, abyssal plains deeper than any on Earth, and great irregular trenches and 'hollows' nearly a hundred kilometers in depth. In most cases, the bottom consists of compacted or high-pressure ices, often containing layered sediments and altered by leaks of hot chemicals or even magma eruptions from deep in the mantle. The water itself is slightly salty – and highly alcoholic. About 50 proof, actually. The native ecology, peculiar even for a Europan world, is responsible for this: in the interaction between the marginal photosynthetic 'pseudoalgal' sphere just below the icecap and the more extensive, exotic ammonia-lubricated 'pseudobacterial' sphere covering the ocean floor and fissures in the crust, ethanol is a major byproduct. Not that you can drink the seawater neat: the traces of ammonia and weird carboxylic acids should put you off, and even if the temperature doesn't get you (average -30˚C), the stiff dash of methanol in it will kill you dead.
The pseudoalgae are of particular interest to scientists. Not only do they bear some resemblance to the 'Earthlike' biochemistries and genetic structures (loosely defined) found elsewhere, but a number of them produce chemical compounds with direct applications to human medicine – including powerful antibiotics and potential anti-aging treatments. Needless to say, there is a large community of researchers on Epsilon Eridani IV.13. Actually, the strong radioactive flux on the surface and in orbit and the generally dusty and impact-prone character of the entire star system, encourage permanent facilities to be established in Epsilon Eridani IV.13 – sturdy capsules embedded in the icecap, or floating in the ocean while anchored to the seafloor. About 15,000 regular personnel live on the planet, aided by an exceptionally large and sophisticated fleet of robots; another 5,000 reside elsewhere in the system – other scientific outposts, navigational/communications and refueling stations, etc.
Yet much of the exploration, construction, and pseudoalgae extraction is carried out by prisoners of the Unification. Thousands of them, banished to Epsilon Eridani to serve terms of penal labor. Only criminals caught and convicted while on the Main or at Centauri are sent here; the Unification won’t waste the Earth’s resources lifting convicts out of its gravity well. Living and working conditions for the prisoners are not intentionally punitive (that would be entirely contrary to Unification principles), but they are quite harsh nonetheless.
40 Eridani ABC
Hemp Maiden confided, 'Since I began my service, I have seen the blue sea turn into mulberry fields three times. When I walked across to Penglai Mountain just now, the water only came up to my waist. I wonder whether it will change into dry land again?' Wang Yuan sighed. 'Oh, all the sages say the blue sea will once more become blowing sand.'
(From the hagiography of Wang Yuan in Shenxian Zhuan)
Another trinary star system, known also as Omicron2 Eridani or Keid. The largest star is a K1 main sequence star; about 400AU away the two companions circle one another: a DA4-class white dwarf and a M4.5 red dwarf flare star. The 40 Eridani system does not contain the homeworld of the Vulcans – sorry, Exo-Americans. (It won't stop you referring to the stars as Surak, Sarek, and Spock.) It does contain four planetoidal or terrestrial-class and two gas giant planets orbiting 40 Eridani A (a.k.a. Herschel, or Surak), but only one is marginally life-bearing: the second, 40 Eridani A.I – or Sangtian to its explorers. This planet, smaller and older than Earth, has seen better days; nevertheless vestiges of a once greater bisophere remain.
As the planet's interior cooled, the crust thickened and hardened, plate tectonics (to the extent they had functioned at all) shut down, CO2 was sequestered and greenhouse gas levels fell, oceans shrank while icecaps grew, and the surface became cold and dry. Life survived in the silty waters of the remaining seas and salty lakes, and around their muddy shores. Yet tectonic activity had not entirely ceased: while CO2 gradually trickled back into the atmosphere from below, pressure built up in the mantle until it burst through the crust in a spasm of localized but powerful volcanism. The resulting spike in CO2 levels helped re-warm and re-humidify the planet – but never for more than ten or twenty million years. Then the greenhouse gasses would be depleted, and the pattern begin again. It seems likely that the planet has gone through ten or twenty such cycles – making the planet a treasure-trove for paleontologists.
Countless cycles of glaciation and melting have worn down landmasses and seabeds, so the topography is generally flat. Lowland basins graduate imperceptibly into seas, depending on water level. The highlands are the exception: elevated oval plateaus and gigantic shield volcanoes, rising as high as 10 km above reference ground level. The air is thin but still well-oxygenated (70 kPa, 18% O2 composition); climates are temperate at the equator, cool at mid-latitudes, and arctic beyond 50-60˚ latitude – and always arid, except in the vicinity of one of the seas. Today the planet is at the end of a warm cycle; fossil evidence suggests that three quarters of its biodiversity was lost in the last hundred thousand years. The seas are retreating across the flats, and the deserts stretching out from mid-continent.
Despite its remoteness, there are a number of long-term research camps scattered across the surface, as well as one large geosynchronous habitat. The Squids, intrigued by reports of shallow seas and bioluminescence, have dispatched their own teams as well. Recently one of them has pointed out that during the recent warming phase, a significant amount of water has percolated down through the soft rock of the lowlands and now must form enormous subsurface reservoirs – flooded caves and underground seas.
There is also a permanent human outpost orbiting 40 Eridani B (Otto Wilhelm, Spock): as the first white dwarf star ever discovered by Earth-based astronomers, it was selected as the site for a stellar observatory. Its construction (and continued operation) required extensive precautions and heavy shielding to protect against the flares of neighboring 40 Eridani C (Rupistef, Spock). Total population of the trinary system: probably no more than 30-35,000 at any given time.
BD-03 1123
This is the kind of red dwarf star that would normally be overlooked. But this one has a lifebearing planet – the only such instance so far discovered. (At least on the Unification Mainline… who knows what the ESA have turned up?) So, despite its remoteness, it has attracted enough researchers to give rise to a permanent settlement. Yet most logistical support to the few thousand inhabitants is provided from bases farther up the Mainline.
The planet in question – the only non-asteroidal body the miserable M1V star has managed to attract – is a typical Vesperian-type (i.e., tidally locked) world. In its favor, it retains a large amount of water, and it orbits within the so-called habitable zone of its star (at 0.12 AU – giving it a year shorter than a Terrestrial month). Over the eons, tidal forces have pulled at the spot permanently fixed below the sun, so that now the entire world is distinctly oblate: both the 'Hot Pole' and the 'Cold Pole' stand nearly clear of the planet's relatively spherical atmosphere. Not that it has all that much atmosphere. But there is enough of it, in the twilight zone between the perpetually lit and perpetually dark hemispheres, to sustain a lush biosphere (or 'biocingulum', as the wags put it). In this ring around the planet, the altitudes are low, temperatures moderate, and weather patterns both favorable and reliable. The edges of the enormous, towering icecap over the Nightside are melted away by the high-altitude hot winds arriving from the Dayside. The cold water runs dayward through clammy bogs into the three narrow seas snaking around the circumference of the planet. On the far shores, bizarre jungles of sooty-colored plants crawl up the long slopes toward the Dayside. The cool low-level winds blowing back across the sea strike the kilometers-tall escarpments beneath the sun-baked desert and drop their moisture – on a land of permanent tropical sunset.
The three major basins or trenches of the twilight zone (not considering the numerous parallel valleys, branches, and intermediate highlands) are relatively isolated from one another. Despite a shared biochemical substrate, the common lack of the familiar distinction between mobile heterotrophs and sessile autotrophs, and the basically identical environmental conditions, each of the basins is a distinct biological region with its separate evolutionary and ecological history. But it's all black leaves and purple skins, some orange-yellow goo, reddish flesh and organs, a rare blue flower or marking – nothing green. One working group in particular speculates that life evolved prior to the planet becoming tidally locked to the star, in which case fossils should be found outside the current biotic zone; paleontological expeditions to either the Dayside or the Nightside have not yet returned data. Not counting the crews of the orbital control habitat and the deep space support station, there are hardly more than a thousand humans attempting to survey and study the planet.
From BD-03 1123 the Unification Mainline extends yet farther: first to the binary red dwarf system Ross 614 and next the brilliant yellow-white subgiant Procyon A (with its extremely elderly white dwarf companion Procyon B). Both are visited by Unification science and survey teams every few months, and more infrequently transited by the expeditions into the great unknown beyond Procyon. BD-03 1123 is already eight months from Earth by fast courier (which means by regular transports, easily over two and a half years’ travel time) – and money is always an issue, while life on Earth hangs in the balance.
The Short Arm
The first branch of the Unification Mainline starts at Delta Pavonis and consists of a string of main sequence stars with life-bearing planets, including the homeworld of another alien intelligence: the Guanxiong. Furthermore, ruins and remains of earlier intelligent spacefarers have been discovered in every system of this arm, starting at Beta Hydri.
Beta Hydri
Be still. The Hanging Gardens were a dream
That over Persian roses flew to kiss
The curlèd lashes of Semiramis.
Troy never was, nor green Skamander stream.
Provence and Troubadour are merest lies
The glorious hair of Venice was a beam
Made within Titian's eye. The sunsets seem,
The world is very old and nothing is.
Be still. Thou foolish thing, thou canst not wake,
Nor thy tears wedge thy soldered lids apart,
But patter in the darkness of thy heart.
(Trumbull Stickney, ‘Be Still. The Hanging Gardens were a Dream’)
Beta Hydri is an old, G2 subgiant star which is fusing more and more helium in its core, and is well into the process of brightening, heating, and swelling. A major stellar observatory is located in the system to study its behavior as it evolves off the main sequence and into a red giant.
Beta Hydri I is the mysterious 'ghost planet', originally detected in the 2070s by observers in the Sol system but which could not be found when probes and crewed exploration vessels arrived at Beta Hydri some forty years later. It was believed to be a body of approximately 1 Earth mass orbiting at 0.05-0.11 AU. Given its minimal separation from Beta Hydri, many argue that its existence was a chimerical effect of instrumentation and data processing working at their limits of sensitivity; others more sensationally argue that Beta Hydri I had been pulled into its expanding sun by the time humans re-surveyed the system. Tidally-locked Beta Hydri II is one of the rare Chthonian-class worlds: the remains of a former Epistellar Jovian planet whose atmosphere was heated and ablated away over billions of years. More than 8 Earth masses remain, a huge iron core under layered crusts of carbon, silicon, and aluminum; the vestigial atmosphere occasionally produces clouds of molten silicates that, reaching the perpetually cold and dark side of the planet, precipitate out as a snow of hot jeweled sand. The dayside is meanwhile still semi-molten, and more than enough internal heating remains to keep the crust plastic even on the nightside.
Beta Hydri III is virtually a twin of Venus, and so was soon named Aphrodite. It seems certain that it has been a superheated Cytherean-type world for many billions of years, since before the star began to swell. Beta Hydri IV, however, was once a very Earthlike world that received moderate insolation, but has been greatly affected by its sun's brightening. But it is not destined to become a dense-atmosphere hothouse world like Venus, Aphrodite, or even relatively cool Lakshmi: probably at no point in its history did it have liquid water covering more than 50-60% of its surface (possibly even less). As its seas began evaporating, the water vapor in the atmosphere never created a greenhouse effect strong enough to tip the planet's evolution into that track. Instead, Beta Hydri IV seems destined to become a desert planet.
Beta Hydri IV has three small moonlets and a dust ring; the latter trifling by gas giant standards but substantial enough to be visible as a dim bronze arc in the night sky. Though larger than Earth, the planet is considerably less dense and its atmosphere relatively thin – gravity 1.07G, but atmospheric pressure only 88 kPa at reference sea level. Subcrustal dynamics is quiescent; the loss of surface water has slowed plate tectonics to a near-standstill. Only isolated (though violent) eruptions over hotspots in the mantle, outgassing along some old fault lines, and occasional earthquakes are evident. The poles are worlds apart biologically but are similar environments: sultry and long-shadowed oases atop a planet of ancient dusty plains, deeply eroded badlands, and perfectly rounded low hills of red sandstone and bleached marble.
The equatorial and mid-latitude zones of the planet are extremely arid, whether at the high altitudes of the former mountains, continents and continental shelves or in the lowlands that were once abyssal floors. Surface water does still exist in the very deep rift valleys and trenches. Even there some bodies of water are seasonal or intermittent, and native species in the rifts have evolved to capture and conserve water – not only internally, but also externally. Many small isolated biomes exist within ponds and reservoirs that are protected from the sun and dry air under crusts of mud, hard leaf or fiber mats, or by layers of waxes and biopolymers. At each of the poles, seas survive and in fact may have grown as atmospheric moisture precipitates out in the arctic coolness faster than it is evaporated. A ring of lush forest and wetlands ring these highly saline waters; farther out lie savannah and prairie zones, where there is more direct sunlight but less moisture; then the vast deserts begin. Each of the polar biomes has been isolated from the other for at least 500 million years; many planetologists make strong arguments for 800-900 million, and even longer is not out of the question. The scattered and relatively poor trench biomes are likewise profoundly isolated and divergent – more than can be truly comprehended from the perspective of Earth's evolutionary history. Even so, the famous Australian-born Unification xenobiologist Joey Lim is known to have described it as ‘Just like home, really… only even older and stranger.’
Even within a single 'pocket ecosphere', the biodiversity is immense: life has been evolving on Beta Hydri IV approximately twice as long as on Earth, and without any apparent planet-wide extinction events of the kind that have helped 'reset the clock' on the other, older garden worlds. What is equally striking is that its biochemical chirality closely follows that of Terran life – though its forms and uses of DNA are more diverse and complex. While the planet does continue to desiccate and heat up, the rate of environmental change is so slow that the millions of species across the globe have become highly specialized in their particular niches. Almost all species effectively 'ignore' humans and other alien intruders: from bacteria to apex predators, they simply don't recognize Earthlings either as food or as threats. Which is convenient, because it makes it safer and easier to get close and appreciate their weirdness.
It's therefore no surprise that vast numbers of paleontologists and evolutionary biologists have descended upon Beta Hydri IV, alongside specialists in physical planetology. Today there are three major settlements, each the size of a small town and supporting a scattered rural hinterland, as well as more distant outposts and expeditions. At this point these colonies are nearly self-sufficient in food, shelter construction, basic household goods and clothing, with good repair and simple machine-shop facilities; they even engage in limited (but still criticized) resource extraction for local and especially offworld consumption – exotic biological products, including what can only be called luxury goods: strange woods, shells, hides, flavorings, and perfumes.
The north polar settlement, Rao, is the largest and oldest; it was built on a high isolated butte overlooking the sea, in order to make quarantine easier. As bioblockade protocols and related capabilities improved, this became less of a concern and the settlement has spread widely, now encompassing some 150,000 permanent residents. The south polar settlement, Wallace, was established later, even though the southern pole had actually been explored and surveyed more thoroughly than the northern pole at the time colonization plans were finalized. Its population is presently around 100,000. The third center of population is in the mid-latitudes of the southern hemisphere, in one of the larger deep trenches which retains a significant body of open water. Atmospheric pressure here is so great that acclimatization is needed if one is to be able to survive and work at all; many rely on sealed environments and breathing apparatus to compensate. Perhaps 50,000 live here despite the conditions; it is unfairly stereotyped as being a rough and grungy preserve of geologists and geophysicists, their crass appetites, and the more degraded class of paleontologists who can tolerate their company. Nevertheless it retains its original name of Huxley, though many residents lobby to rename it after Jacques Piccard – even though it far from the lowest spot on the planet's surface.
Squids also participate in the exploration and study of the planet. They can be found everywhere (as many as 5,000 on-planet at any given moment), but can only tolerate direct exposure to the environment in the smaller but deeper and less saline northern sea. In addition there are nearly 40,000 Phants, mostly at Wallace. They adjust even better to most local climates than had been expected, so long as enough drinking water is available. The outermost of the moonlets serves as an orbital interface station, and has grown to considerable size – nearly 25,000 residents of various nationalities and species. There are additionally several thousand Pins on that planetoid base or elsewhere in the solar system, where they assist in construction and maintenance of habitats and spacecraft. As with most Gaian worlds, they are not allowed onto the surface of Beta Hydri IV under any circumstances, as they willingly admit their motivation for doing so is to get into the water and try eating everything that looks remotely meaty. The lunar base also acts a data integration center for the network of solar observatories looping around Beta Hydri; there are over a thousand astrophysicists plus their own specialized technical support staff on the base.
Beta Hydri V is a very small gas giant which probably originated from deeper in the outer system but whose orbit was disturbed and was knocked into a closer orbit. Even today, it is fairly elliptical (0.19) – in fact, more than any other planet in this very non-eccentric system. Presently, with the growth of Beta Hydri, it falls into the HydroJovian type, with its water ice composing the majority of its upper atmosphere. This gives its surface a faintly banded white appearance, earning it the nickname 'White Queen' – though during periastron the blue methane clouds (normally deeper in the atmosphere) become more prominent, while during apastron and near the poles tan or brown patterns of ammonia appear. Beta Hydri V is almost exactly the same mass as Neptune (17.9 Earths, or 0.056 Jupiter masses), but is larger due to the expansion of its warmer atmosphere (about 4.1 Earth radii). Aside from a large number of planetoids, there is only one moon: the large (Ganymede-sized) planet ('Snow White'). This satellite is believed to be where life originally arose and developed before migrating into White Queen's atmosphere as the two planets drew together. Today life on Snow White has a precarious existence; the moon's orbit is slowly decaying, grazing the gas giant's atmosphere a few microns closer with each revolution. Within a very short period of time – on an astronomical scale – it will begin to heat and burn up in the White Queen's atmosphere before finally plunging into its surface.
The life in question is quite alien by Terrestrial standards, not only for its native environment. Carbon-based but favoring ammonia as a solvent over water, the greatest biomass lies in photosynthesizing aeroplankton in the upper atmosphere. These thin but often multiply layered strata are what give White Queen its frankly grayish cast. Some condense into long streamers in the wind, hardening and thickening until eventually their buoyancy fails and they fall to the surface far below. The aeroplankton, whether in clouds or streamers, is consumed by partially-autotrophic filter-feeding animals of great size but extremely light and diffuse body structure; their equivalent of cytoplasm is gaseous, rather than liquid. In turn these are predated upon by smaller and slightly less foamy creatures relying primarily on gliding and powered flight. Yes, sky whales and cloud sharks. Very floppy sharks, but the label keeps sticking. This planet-wide ecosystem, its alien biochemistry, and its seasonal fluctuations, are of great interest to scientists. Conveniently – very conveniently – there is a layer in the atmosphere where gravity is comfortable, temperatures are shirtsleeve, and the pressure in a hospitable range. Long-term research and dwelling habitats are suspended from aerostats in this zone, some of them quite large – housing hundreds of crew and staff. Above the atmosphere are rings of observation satellites and a few habitat modules; the major station actually orbits the moon Snow White, and coordinates activities on the surface of that body as well.
Perhaps 30,000 permanent/long-term residents are in the vicinity of Beta Hydri V. The outer system proper contains three other Jovian planets (one of them unusually large, some 6.2 Jupiter masses) and their collections of moons, plus three planets with rocky and icy cores – none of which have generated as much interest as the rest of the system. Automated and crewed facilities supporting navigation, communication, and fueling dot the outer system, sparsely – perhaps 2,000 more inhabitants.
For a survey of the alien artifacts and ruins found in the Beta Hydri system, read here.
Zeta Tucanae
It was Christmas Eve, babe
In the drunk tank
An old man said to me
Won't see another one
And then he sang a song
The Rare Old Mountain Dew
I turned my face away
And dreamed about you.
(J. Finer & S. MacGowan, ‘Fairytale of New York’)
Zeta Tucanae is a whitish F9 main sequence star, somewhat younger, larger, and brighter than Sol. Among its modest planetary system – which includes a large asteroid belt – is a single gigantic gas giant, containing the mass of a dozen Jupiters. Generating considerable internal heat of its own, its violently turbulent atmosphere changes quickly as new layers of particular gas mixtures rise and fall. A crisp orange-pink hue at the time of the first camera probes reaching the system, its rich coiling ribbons and bands have faded in only a few decades to no more than a pale ochre… but even Unificationers still refer to it as ‘the Pink Squirrel’ (a popular cocktail of spacers along the Mainline a generation ago) or just ‘Big Pink’. Among Big Pink’s enormous family of satellites are several Mars- and even Earth-sized ones; only one sustains liquid water, and indigenous life. But this is no Earthlike life: the moon’s planetary chemistry is unusually chlorine-enriched, and its biosphere has had to adapt to this challenging environment.
The moon in question, the eighth numbered satellite, is smaller than Earth but denser, with almost exactly Earthlike gravity (0.99G). To the Unification, it is known as Huangquan. Its surface is also rich in calcium, titanium, and chromium; liquid water is accompanied by a large fraction of hydrogen chloride. The surface, as a result, is mostly covered in deep sediments (clay, sand, and mud) left behind by the rapid erosion of most igneous and metamorphic rocks. Sedimentary rocks, thanks to the nature of the biosphere, contain high proportions of kerogens, giving rise to enormous deposits of pitch, coal, oil, and oil-bearing shales. Terrain is mostly swampy or forested plains and shallow seas. Such seas cover nearly 79% of the surface; the high level of precipitation makes for many rivers and lakes feeding into the larger and saltier seas. Coastal plains and continental shelves are on such a shallow grade that the intertidal zones of the planet are enormous: tidal flats ten, twenty kilometers or more wide. Tectonic activity is markedly greater than on Earth; the crust is thinner, the plates smaller and faster-moving. The high rate of mountain building and continent lifting is offset by the high rate of erosion. Hot springs and geysers can be found almost anywhere, volcanoes are widespread, and earthquakes across the planet’s surface.
The atmosphere is not entirely un-Earthly – virtually identical density, 58% N2 and 29% O2 – but also contains a large proportion of chlorine (6.5% Cl2), carbon dioxide (1.8% CO2), and a variety of trace chlorocarbon compounds. The result is an atmosphere that has a strong greenish-yellow tint. The concentrations of greenhouse gasses and water vapor keep the global climate rather warm considering Big Pink’s distance from Zeta Tucanae, but snowfall is not uncommon at higher altitudes and icecaps exist at both poles – relatively pure H2O with much more acidic liquid or solid substrates beneath, due to hydrochloric acid’s lower freezing temperature. Notably, the planet has almost no ozone layer: the abundant light chlorocarbons in the atmosphere react strongly with O3,. Zeta Tucanae gives off more light in the ultraviolet range than a G or K-class star, and less of it is filtered out in the upper atmosphere, creating a further hazard for life on the surface: high rates of cellular and genetic damage.
The basic structure of genetics on Huangquan is Earthlike enough: double-stranded polymer ladders. It’s only the proteins and tempos it codes for that are so alien. The biochemistry is actually dependent on heavy metals – enzymes and photosynthetic pigments, among other complexes, require a ready supply of metal ions that would be rare on a conventional Gaian planet. Yet cells, organs, even gross anatomy are not all that different in outline from Terran standards. While the chemotrophs are more diverse than on Earth, they still account for less biomass than phototrophs. Photosynthesis is dominant, and also uses a parallel process which consumes hydrogen chloride in place of water and produces chlorine in place of oxygen. Respiration likewise is fuelled by chlorine as well as oxygen.
Life on Hongquan is weird and plentiful, and the extent of speciation suggests it has been mostly uninterrupted by major extinction events; but it is nevertheless relatively primitive compared to that of other Gaian worlds of similar ages. Most terrestrial (or amphibian) animals have at least a rudimentary internal skeleton and are hexapods. They breathe through gills, whether external or internal and whether in air or water; species that are more dryland-adapted may also have internal lung-like organs with tracheal openings or tubes. Protection against the environment (concentrated acids, UV light, water) is achieved through a number of adaptations – some species produce a constantly sloughing, ragged integument; many others use resistant shells, bark, or skins of durable chlorocarbon polymers: polyvinyl chloride and polychloroprene being the most widespread. These casings can be reinforced with filaments or scales of graphite, silica, fluroapatite or scapolite, or even acid-resistant metals. Animal life on Huangquan consists of a scuttling menagerie of nightmarish spider-snails, shaggy air-filter-feeding starfish the size of hippos, six-legged wombats perpetually moulting their flapping neoprene skins, glossy vinyl-clad beetles, and turtles tricked out in gold foil… and of course, the slime molds of unusual size. The soil and mud seethe with vermiform species; the seas are riots of eel-like predators and chemically bizarre reef-building colonial creatures.
And it should go without saying that the entire environment is absolutely deadly to human life: if the atmosphere didn’t kill you instantly, the massive concentrations of toxic halocarbons would take care of you in short order. Painlessly, perhaps – the analogues of phytoplankton, and some other species, give off isoflurane and small amounts of benzodiazepines as waste products; many animals excrete various phenothiazines, and one species of pseudo-beetle actually ‘sweats’ 3,4-dichloro tametraline – known to your ancestors as Zoloft.
Hongquan is certainly the least hospitable alien planet that the Unification has invested in. With no interest in colonization and an outright aversion to terraforming on their part, this planet would be frequented only by robots and automated data-gathering stations were it not for the sheer strangeness of its geochemistry and biochemistry. But even so, conditions on the surface prevent any permanent habitation. The planetologists, biologists, and archaeologists working here are headquartered on another moon of Big Pink: Fengdu City. This large vacuum planet hosts a complex of domes and tunnels, providing a secure and comfortable environment for about 20-30,000 researchers and staff; a few thousand more live and work in habitats elsewhere in Big Pink’s family of moons, in the asteroid belt, or deep out-system supporting SDRT navigation. Visits to the surface of Hongquan are brief expeditions, lasting only as long as the safe lifespan of the tightly sealed vehicles and mobile bases sent down from orbit.
Planetologists believe that chlorine-rich planets of this type should be extremely rare; incredibly rare. That one should be among the first few hundred planets encountered by humanity seems highly improbable. Given that biological seeding by super-powerful aliens (the ‘Primordials’) is a widely entertained idea even among mainstream scientists, the suggestion that this world was artificially created, or at least nudged into its odd equilibrium, is received with serious consideration. Clearly any such primeval terraforming would have taken place hundreds of millions or billions of years ago – separated by a vast gulf of time from the ruined structures that were left here only (comparatively) yesterday.
p Eridani AB
Flying Hapalochlaena. Why’d it have to be flying Hapalochlaena?
(Joey Lim, on Xtreem Planetologists Gone Wild!!!, Season 10 Episode 4.)
p Eridani is a binary system, composed of a K2V and a K3V star in an long eccentric orbit about each other – between 29.7 and 97.7 AU, currently at about 34 AU with periastron anticipated in 2297. The primary, p Eridani A, is orbited by half a dozen planetary bodies, all of them but the second dead bodies of silicates and ice of no great distinction.
p Eridani A.II, however, is a Paludial-type Gaian world, orbiting toward the far edge of its sun’s water zone. Were it not for its dense heat-trapping atmosphere, it would be locked in a perpetual ice age. At sea level, atmospheric pressure is 191 kPa while the surface gravity is just 0.83G. Only about one-third of the surface is covered in liquid water (plus <5% in icecaps and highland glaciers), but the atmosphere contains large quantities of water vapor. Except in some continental interiors and rain shadows, the global environment is consistently humid and warm; precipitation is regular and fairly heavy, and vegetation widespread across all landforms. With an almost perfectly circular orbit and a negligible axial tilt (~8˚), there is little seasonal variation: local climates are consistent and stable, winds sluggish. Environmental disturbances come in the form of volcanic eruptions (quite frequent, but mostly local in effect), and rare impact events; near misses are likely to cause sudden shifts in axial inclination (with only a trio of small planetoids for moons, there is no satellite mass to provide a stabilizing influence on the planet’s spin).
The native life that has developed on the planet is rich, very diverse, and very aerial. Biochemically it follows the model of familiar Earthlike life, and its stereochemistry uses a complex mix of levo- and dextro-isomers: some forms of life are actually nutritious, or at least edible. Alas, a vast range of molecules in common use turn out to be potent allergens to Terran life, very much including humans. It's practically impossible to walk ten meters without coming across something that uses urushiol or a related resin in its protective skin or shell; and is there any fresh water that isn’t full of beta-lactam rings? Also at certain times of year, or when triggered by fluctuations in the local microclimate, one encounters widespread and possibly dangerous bioaerosols: e.g., of histamine or even aflatoxin, which are used by native plant communities as signaling devices in the regulation of their reproductive cycles. Perhaps fortunately, the atmosphere is not within tolerable limits for unaided human respiration anyway – with 89.6% N2, 5.9% O2 2.7% CO2, and Ar 1.3% by dry composition, it is one of the few natural environments where a human can simultaneously experience nitrogen narcosis, hypercapnea, and oxygen deprivation.
In the planet's light gravity and dense atmosphere, much life has adapted by learning to glide, fly, drift, or soar. This goes for the analogues of plants no less than of animals: some seeds can fly on spinning or flapping wings, using stored mechanical energy (i.e., springs). Some animals spend so much of their life in the air that their anatomy for standing and moving on the ground is atrophied or vestigial; the most recognizably 'birdlike' creatures exhibit what are essentially blended wing-body planforms. There have even been multiple evolutionary innovations that use aerostatic lift – internal glands or niches with symbiotic bacteria generate one or another type of lift gas, trapped within a thin membrane. There are even predatory animals of this type, dubbed ‘balloon bats’ or ‘zep cats’.
Long-term human occupation of the surface began more than a decade after permanent habitats were set up around p Eridani B; the biological (immunological) conditions on the surface mean that the mixed human-phant-Squid colony lives in sealed habitats and ventures out only with breathing masks and protective gear. Perhaps 20-30,000 individuals are resident on the surface, with a few thousand more crewing the supporting orbital and deep space stations.
The preponderance of human activity actually takes place in the orbit of p Eridani B, which has only a single large planetary body – a very small methane dwarf, class T9 – but does possess a large and chaotic debris field. The asteroid field is of inherent interest to astronomers and geologists (who tentatively hypothesize that a large planet, perhaps two, was shattered in a cataclysmic collision, in which the core or cores were exposed). And among the nickel-iron asteroids in this disk, surveyors have found several large bodies of extraordinarily rich ores, so the field has also attracted industry: in collaboration with scientists, the rich metals and rare earths are refined locally and shipped back up the Arm to Delta Pavonis by bulk freighters. The population of p Eridani B is estimated at 25,000 but short-term workers and transient crews among the widely-dispersed mining operations could amount to 5,000 or even 10,000 more at times. The closest to a main habitat or central headquarters that the system can boast would be Dunlop Station, with a population of a few hundred AsASN traffic controllers and ComCore dispatchers.
For a brief survey of the alien ruins found in this system, read here.
Important enough for our purposes to have its own page.
The Squid Arm
The second arm of the Unification Mainline branches out from Tau Ceti, and is nicknamed the 'Tentacle' by early human astrographers, as distinct from the 'Arm'. It's short, and interesting only for the planet that lies at its far end: the Squid homeworld. To get there one must transit the systems of Van Maanen’s Star and BD+01 4774, a bog-standard white dwarf and red dwarf roundabout respectively. While the Tentacle is open to Unification and ESA traffic alike without any special considerations, as a matter of courtesy and diplomacy the Squids are considered responsible for navigation and safety and travelers are expected to defer to them.
BD+04 123
The sun of the Squids is a K2 main sequence star, smaller and much cooler than Sol, and less rich in heavy elements, but certainly capable of providing a water zone. At half an AU orbits its first planet, a life-bearing one, whose name is firmly translated as 'Home' by the Unification, though Squids generally prefer to call it 'Stark (short for 'Stark Raving Naked', they say – 'no one wears clothes here!'). Farther out there's a wispy asteroid field and a pair of modestly-sized gas giants, each sporting a respectable and varied family of satellites. Beyond, there orbit a few small iceballs in eccentric orbits, and then a distant halo of dust and comets.
Home is smaller than Earth but slightly denser. Like Tau Ceti II, it is a Lacustric-type Gaian world, but considerably drier: just 56% of the surface is covered in water or ice. It also lacks that planet's active orogenesis; all its landmasses display relatively low relief, and continental shelves are broader than on Earth. There is no contiguous ocean, only many separate seas and lakes, which are nowadays connected by artificial canals – the earliest engineering works of the Squids were hydrologic projects, digging and burrowing out links between bodies of water. Internal heating and the small but nearby moon maintain tectonic activity (currently expressing itself primarily along some mid-ocean rifts and subduction zones); the moon also drives the gentle tidal patterns of the various seas and lakes. Global average temperature is only 11˚C, but the extreme axial tilt – almost 43˚ – prevents the development of permanent polar ice and the rapid succession of strong seasonal changes keeps the atmosphere well-mixed. Oxygen levels are high, but tolerable to human visitors.
Native biochemistry is Earthlike enough in most respects, but of opposite chirality virtually everywhere: here, sugars are L, amino acids are D, and so forth. A near-perfect mirror image on the level of molecular biology, even if the Squids are humanity’s twins psychologically. Fortunately for both humans and Squids, their biochemistry is simply inert, inactive to each other: to generate a toxic result, one would have to ingest a huge quantity of a number of materials, and a very small number of substances one could accidentally ingest in the normal routine of things. In any case, Terran and Starkian heterotrophs with any taste find each other bland and flavorless.
Life on dry land is dominated by close analogues of plants: sessile, chlorophyll-based photosynthesizers, which to human eyes mostly seem excessively frilly or even furry. Animal life is relatively primitive, if plentiful and diversified; but it is in the seas that life has really flourished, and in the rich shallows that a populous and sophisticated civilization has developed. The circulatory systems of all aquatic and many terrestrial macrofaunal species rely on hemocyanin and hemerythrin for oxygen transport rather than hemoglobin. Some exotic species, mostly larger-bodied animals, use both hemocyanin and hemerythrin, sometimes in segregated subsystems; also, the broad phylum that includes the Squids is characterized by high quantities of vanadium-binding metalloproteins in their blood, which have a (weak) oxygen transport effect.
While broad tidal flats line many bodies of water, there are also many long verdant shores from which vast half-floating forests stretch out, their roots creating dim cathedrals and tunnels. Analogues of kelp and coral grow up from the muddy shelves towards the sunlight. The pelagic zones, few and cramped as they are compared to Delta Pavonis I's or Earth's, are host to their own biomes, untethered from the encircling land or the muddy abyssal floors. From a microscopic level up to the Squids themselves (the largest motile native life forms) there are close functional and formal analogues to Earth's marine life – though bony skeletons are wholly absent. Bioluminescence is commonplace even in the photic zone, and the Squids claim to have further enhanced this through generations of selective husbandry and culling. In any event, entire bays or seamounts may shimmer faintly, and the Squids' rambling organic cities glitter and glow luridly through the often murky water.
It’s really only in these shallows that the Squids are at home; a relative handful are encountered elsewhere. Squids have little interest in the half of their planet on dry land; a few locales have attracted enough Squids to mandate either the creation of canals and lakes to make them accessible, or in more recent years powered land vehicles and artificial habitats above sea level. Some of these locations are of scenic interest even to humans; others have less apparent appeal – the Squids describe them as 'funny' or 'clever', whatever that might mean. Squids avoid deep water and even the surface layers of open ocean are uncomfortable to them – they strongly dislike the idea of floating or swimming above the vast depths of the ocean, perhaps experiencing something equivalent to human agoraphobia or acrophobia.
And Squids are also less interested than their new bipedal friends in offworld settlement as such. Apparently feeling no population pressure or resource shortages, and being only mildly and occasionally curious about astronomy and cosmology, their chief motivation to leave the planet is to meet people. From a practical standpoint, Squids are generally larger than humans, have at least as great metabolic requirements, and also need water-filled environments; all of these add to the cost and effort of traveling and living in outer space for them. Entering the last quarter of the present century, there are several dozen Squid-crewed habitats orbiting Stark, including several in geostationary orbit; the semi-organic or pseudo-organic Squid spaceships are all assembled (grown?) in low orbit over Stark. There's one understaffed satellite over the planet's moon, and a quite large and bustling space station in the L5 point. The gas giants each have a handful of Squid outposts and fuel refineries, which also support ongoing activities in the system's Kuiper belt.
Perhaps 1500 Unification citizens live among the Squids, though in keeping with general ConCom policy they do not form permanent settlements or enclaves separate from their hosts. (And it takes a special kind of person to live among the Squids…) An exception to this policy is a Unification space station in low orbit over Home that maintains a 'dry' environment and is solely inhabited by humans. However even it is tethered to a much larger, preexisting Squid habitat. Fewer ESA representatives can be found here; probably less than five hundred permanent or long-term residents, plus several hundred transient visitors and diplomats. The ESA demurs at Squid hospitality more than the Unification, and goes so far as to maintain a fully independent orbital terminal and an 'embassy compound' on an island planetside. The island was created artificially, by a pair of gargantuan dredging machines purchased from the Unification – they now rust gently away in the sun – neither too close nor too far from the greatest Squid city-sprawl, one so large and luminous that it can be seen from night orbit as a gentle yellow swirl. The Squids seem to perceive the isolation of the orbital habitat as unaccountable shyness – and a sizable fraction of the planet's population is engaged in attempts to lure the coy stick-people out of their dry tin can.