CoActionDrama

Mission is the space faring game of the distant future.  Earth is lost, but mankind lives on in the stars, and occasionally between them.  All player characters in mission are Human, and will usually be attached to “Human Affairs”.

Species and Space Travel

Different species use different forms of space travel and the networks involved can be complex.  The history and predisposition of each species can make unsuitable for certain types of space travel, indeed some forms of space travel which might seem mundane to some can be lethal for others.

Here is a Synopsis of the known species and the types of space travel currently known to be available.  The species are not in any particular order.

Sirithi

Insectoid

Warp Drive, Wormhole.

The Sirithi are a gregarious species, interacting on the trade exchanges of the galactic federations, they come and go in the space-ways as if they had been raised in space.  In fact they have been involved in space travel for a very long time indeed, nearly 100,000 years.  Their command of the technology is second to that only humans only, perhaps because they are more interested in trading than anything else.

The surprising thing about Sirithi, given this interest, is that they have a large and well organised government, and despite the difficulties of communication across large distance of space, they maintain a centralised government that strengthens their species specific advantages.

Sirithi politics can be complex, especially as their social structure is not based around the nuclear family.  Sirithi are “born”, i.e. hatched, almost fully capable.  They look on with amusement at other races  and their extended childhoods and see only a weakness that is nobly overcome.   (Web addenda;  Sirithi are in fact remarkably good with the young of other species, even when the young are scared, as they often, an individual Sirithi will overcome this to make a great “uncle”).  Sirithi are often bemused by questions of parentage or lineage, although good records are kept, one must remember that nearly all Sirithi in the wild are males.  The egg laying females are kept in opulent luxury, and incidentally are the ultimate rulers of the species.  The females run “houses” which are in the ascendant depending on the political situation at the time.  These ”houses” are organised into colonies, which generally exists on one planet, or solar system, but can be spread over a small region of space if the queen so desires.

An individual Sirithi may live his entire life without ever seeing his queen, or may be expected to report everything he has done in the last six months to her personally.  Houses may consist of anywhere up to 100,000 individuals, or as few as 30 or 40.  Small houses are not necessarily poor, they may be research facilities, teaching facilities, or whatever else the queen finds of interest.

Sirithi are physically tough, they can survive vacuum for a remarkable length of time, some 3 or 4 hours before any ill effects are felt, (usually some nausea), and a day or two at the extreme.  They are not very good in water at all, and cannot swim, drowning if not rescued.

Sirithi do not sleep as such, but require a period of inactivity each day.  They are regarded as one of the more normal, predictable, races.

The Mandorn

The Long Trek

The Mandorn are, or rather is a Gestalt being consisting of some 80,000 individual components, all of who look very much like blue human beings.  This appearance has given rise to some exotic theories about the nature and origin of life and intelligence, as it is now considered that that the likelihood of two distinct species looking so much alike is remote.  The Mandorn is little bothered by this, but cannot remember where it came from or how it came about.  It also does not know how all its disparate parts are in immediate contact with each other, at least in the same solar system.  For further contact, beyond a billion and a half kilometres or so, transmission time becomes greater and greater.

The Mandorns’ avatars all seem to experience the universe in a slightly different way from each other, one may never see blue, one may not be able digest eggs, (otherwise they have same dietary requirements as humans).  In other words they have the human characteristic of being highly individual as well as the Mandorn gestalt.  They never need to speak to each other of course, but will refrain from simply being the gestalt being in front of others if it makes them uncomfortable, as long as they are not asked any questions, when they will inevitably reply in the crowd form of whatever language they are speaking.

Their linguistic skills are legendary.  Because of the superior processing capability the Mandorn is able to absorb languages much faster than any ordinary entity, and Mandorn avatars are in demand for translation services galaxy wide.  The Mandorn is currently engaged in a major expansion project for this, and other reasons.  Each avatar is able to disengage the gestalt status for a short time if the mission is sensitive, but ill effects inevitably follow.

The Mandorn is a well balanced individual playing large on the galactic stage.  The Long Trek is the only form of space travel that the Mandorn can engage in because of the peculiar nature of  its existence.  Other forms break the gestalt, in extreme cases this can be permanent and the avatar can die shortly there after.  Its isn’t pleasant, so it’s avoided if at all possible.  Other interacting with the Mandorn can take these deaths badly too even if they really understand the gestalt, because the Mandorn expresses each avatar as an individual.

The Mandorn is also highly telepathic, if and only if more than 95% of its processing power, i.e. more than 95% of its avatars engage in the process, that 95% will then know everything that is happening to the others irrespective of distance, and the Mandorn is then able to communicate with other beings during this process.  It cannot read shielded minds.  This happens extremely rarely of course, as the Mandorn is spread, now, in very different time frames, and it would not be possible without advance notice for the Mandorn to get 95% of itself awake and ready for this process.

Technology has allowed the Mandorn, therefore, to travel and spread itself around in space without becoming hopelessly out of synch.  By taking the Long Trek, (explained later), the Mandorn is able to communicate at greater distances than would otherwise be possible, but each avatar must be in the Long Trek space at the same time, and they must be within a 1300ly of each other.  Messages are often passed around in this way, and the upkeep of the gestalt is maintained by regular visits to this space.  A returning avatar can be quite distracted by this upkeep as it absorbs new information.

The ratio of female to male avatars is about equal, and the Mandorn is known to be able to breed with Humans because of their similar physiology.  This is generally avoided, because it does not produce viable off spring in terms of the gestalt, but blue humans who are always trying to hear something just beyond their reach, and cannot travel by any means other than the Long Trek.

The Foremen

Bleak Garden Walk.

The Foremen are sub-humans who attack other species on sight.  This unfortunate tendency is result of their gaining access to space travel before inventing underarm de-odorant, television or indeed, the wheel.  They seem to have no idea that they have colonised other worlds simply by walking from place to place, in fact, some of they place they have settled are right in the middle of the Bleak Garden, presumably because they got bored with walking the great distances involved.

Technically, space faring species are free to interact with non-space-farers, but the Foremen seem to understand so little of their situation that they are generally avoided, and certainly not interfered with.  They can’t, it seems, afford to waste the good protein found in study groups, marauding forces and the like.

The Foremen are actually one of the most numerous and successful space-going species.  May colonists have arrive at a world only to find it swarming with Foremen, (at which point they leave).  The Foremen, for themselves, seem to find a world too small if their population is above about a million people.  They fight.  internecine wars break out on what is presumed to be the Foremen home world regularly, and the losers are usually thrown off the planet to cause trouble somewhere else.

There are no hard fast rules about how to deal with the Foremen except perhaps, run away.  Their lack of armaments make them seem a simple problem to deal with, but when your spacecraft can be overwhelmed by Foremen who have simply walked through the Bleak Garden and climbed a tree in order to pop out in normal space right on your craft and beat the living crap out of it with a tree branch, you can find that the assessment “simple” can be woefully inadequate).

It is suggested that the Foremen see the universe purely in terms of the Bleak Garden, but this hardly explains why they sometimes settle on arid worlds when the Bleak Garden, though not always pleasant, provides more or less everything they need.  Perhaps a trip in the Garden Walk would explain this to those scholars, as even this bucolic place would not be settled by anyone with any sensitivity at all.

The Iffens

Gas Giant Dwellers

Mildspace

The Iffens are an extremely, gregarious, sensitive, enlightened race who blow up should anything go wrong with their environment suits, at all.  This is because their high pressure suits try to replicate their extremely high pressure environment, and even, latterly, come staged, and thus massive, so that this risk is lessened.  They love, life, and are keen party goers.

They are most often compared to the bucolic image of Gypsies from the old world, (the old Human world), although their appearance, because of their environment is more like that of a small blue whale.  They are generally human sized, but some very long lived Iffens can be very large indeed, though they have normally stopped reproducing by this point.

The Iffens are technologically very efficient, thought they cannot travel in any way expect Mildspace, this has not restricted them from spreading their bounty amongst the galaxy.  They trade, play, fight and love, though non-physically with all other races except the Foremen, who stay away from them, because a staged high pressure suit explosion will teach even the most recalcitrant and stupid of peoples that perhaps messing with it not a good idea.

Iffens trade in heavy metals and industrial processes that are difficult or impossible to replicate outside the high pressure environment of a gas giant.  Fuel for star-drive is supplied almost exclusively by Iffens now, though they do this for free, partly as a rebuke to humans (who they otherwise get on with), after their first contact thousands of years ago when the humans turned a heavily colonised world of Iffens into a second sun for the system they were colonising.

Perhaps an insight into the mind of Iffens can be gained examining the note that the ambassador sent to the humans following this incident.

“Sire,

You do not know us.  We are the Iffens, and we dwell within gas giants in many solar system throughout the galaxy, [at this point it was six, but Iffens exaggerate sometimes] and while we are a peaceful people, the wanton destruction of some three billion of our inhabitants is somewhat grating, especially as some of the people were my personal relatives.

We are prepared to believe on this occasion that the destruction was simply carelessness or ignorance on the part of humans, but we should advise you that if it happens again we will be forced to take punitive action, including the possibility of hiring lawyer to sue all of humanity after we have kicked your sorry butts back into the stone age.

Yours truly,

Your new friends,

The Iffens.”

The Human response was a classic diplomatic note, (engraved on a gold block for delivery to the centre of a gas giant as it was, gave it greater force; at least, when it dropped out of the sky and landed on someone, it seemed to have a certain gravitas).

“Sire,

Sorry.

Yours truly,

Humanity.”

This note is stored in the Museum of Galactic Diplomacy, on Ignis Prime.

I’Drothen

Garden Walk, Warp, Wormhole

The I’Drothen are very much like Humans in that they are bi-pedal, forward thinking, curious and inquisitive.  They are sparse in population now, because they live long and reproduce slowly.

In appearance they are largely reptilian, though their polymorphism makes an absolute description hard to quantify, it can be said that they have two arms and two legs and are generally cold blooded.

Their spread throughout the galaxy is said to have been slow, but I’Drothen can be found everywhere.  They prefer Human colonies because of the family groups and relationships are the closest in kind, but this can also cause frictions.

They are some of the most robust travellers in the galaxy, only Humans can travel in more ways.

Humans

Any except Deep Hyperspace

Earth is lost.  So many thousands of years have passed since Humans moved away from Earth, that all that remains now are legends and artefacts.

Humans are the most prolific, infectious and gregarious of species.  You will find a human to mix with anyone if you look hard enough.  There are even humans who have passed themselves off as Foremen and live amongst them.

Humans trade, keep the markets moving, are curious, have a loosely held federation, and other alliances, make frequent mistakes, and push for contact with other species.

They are also the only species who polices themselves and others, everyone else obeys the principle that you do what you can get away with, they are true communists.  Humans require that others obey laws, and are in fact the principle law makers for the galaxy.

They are also the principle law enforcers.  Given what humans are capable of, and no other species except possibly Foremen, this means that generally the enforcement involves humans.