C.A.S.S.I.O.P.E. (CAS)

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The Space-Kelp Cluster, Region 87

Geography

The Space-Kelp Cluster, similar to the other asteroid clusters within Mekhala, is dominated mostly by the vacuum of space, interspersed by many thousands of asteroids, perhaps pushing into the millions if you include even the little bitty ones. Many of the larger of these are host to a curious resident, a unique plant-like crop known as space-kelp. The space-kelp will cover large swathes of the asteroid’s surface with a tangled net of root-like holdfast, supporting sturdy trunk-like stipe which extends great distances outward into space. The stipe occasionally branches and interweaves, forming a lattice structure which supports the yarn. This yarn replaces the leaf-like fronds of terrestrial-aquatic cultivars, and grows from nodes along the stipe. The yarn consists of extremely thin fibrous tendrils which fill the space amongst the stipe lattice, resembling a loose, greenish-yellow cotton candy cloud. The yarn, with the help of the vacuum-resistant mucus coating it and all other structures of the organism, acts as a net that captures solar wind, sunlight, and micrometeorites, which provide the energy and material for growth. Space-kelp growths can extend out hundreds of kilometers thanks to the lack of gravity, with very little impediment due to the average distance between bodies lying somewhere in the hundreds of thousands of kilometers.

While many asteroids within the cluster are occasionally visited, harvested, or perhaps have a small permanent base for mining and farming and relay and so forth, the center of activity in the region is its most massive body, known as CASSIOPE. It consists of an asteroid a bit over 100km in diameter that was apparently split in half some time ago, and enveloped in several layers of tightly woven, mucus-suffused space-kelp fabric, in turn covered in a thick layer of space-kelp holdfast. The stipe and yarn growing off of this holdfast is much less impressive than that of other asteroids due to the inhospitable spin rate of the habitat, and tends to be thicker near the center where gravity is weaker, while curving in the direction of either end. The inside of the envelope is filled with a breathable atmosphere, as well as twin city-complexes on either inside face, powered by large kelp-burning power plants. A slow tumbling end-over-end, put in motion long in the past by now-forgotten methods, creates a comfortable effective gravity in these cities, allowing residents to bustle about as if planetbound.

People

The space habitat known as CASSIOPE is kept running by a population of autonomous humanoid robots, generally industrial and blocky in appearance, their bodies optimized for habitat maintenance and customizability. Most have some sort of abdominal compartment, intended for the storage and compression of space-kelp yarn as part of CASSIOPE’s most common task, the harvest.

The governance of CASSIOPE is amalgamated from the entirety of its robotic populace, which routinely provide digital feedback through various forums of the habitat intranet (‘KelpNet’), with subforums which administrate bureaucratic, strategic, and maintenance processes. The overall intentions of CASSIOPE are streamlined every so often into the form of a single leader unit, the programming and identity of which is the result of much more direct influence of the body at large, currently CASSIOPE unit 2323. Similar representatives of the common will are used in other strategic cases (military commanders, diplomats, covert operatives, etc.)

In addition to the CASSIOPE units, the habitat is host to a small, diverse minority population of organics, dwelling in luxurious facilities within the twin cities. The organics are recently arrived, settling in the past several years after the introduction of Imperial Drives, and are treated as valued guests, like a habitat-wide resort colony. They are however not granted any role in habitat administration, besides the occasional supervised maintenance or bureaucratic work if such is an organic’s desire. By and large, these organics occupy themselves with various forms of arts and creative recreation (especially the musical, performative, and digital), with the support and engagement of robotic units. Amidst sprawling organic residential complexes are numerous concert halls, theaters, dance halls, ballrooms, and studios, all of which were set up pristine and expectant before the organics’ arrival. Despite the relatively small population of organics relative to the number of custodial units, they take up an outsize proportion of allocated physical spaces for residences and recreation, largely due to the robotic citizens’ preference for cozier residences suited to their space-saving folding design.

Additionally, the robotic citizens have direct access to KelpNet for digital entertainment, socializing, and recreation, and are able to simulate a digital presence and experience while performing their more mundane maintenance tasks (although what sort of online activities are available to them is constrained somewhat by distance-driven network latency, with the most active online spaces and pastimes only available near the habitat).

CASSIOPE’s extensive system of servers, in addition to hosting KelpNet, also stores backup data for its custodial units (both locally and amongst a decentralized network on other asteroids in the cluster). This allows them to re-download (most of) themselves in the event of some unfortunate accident, once a new body has been constructed. While sans corpus, they are able to operate in a limited capacity off of server bandwidth, as disembodied residents of KelpNet. At any given time a small percentage of units exist in this capacity, although typically only temporarily for no more than a few years before the impetus calls them to once again assume a material existence.

History

The prevailing understanding of the origin of CASSIOPE is as an ages-old scientific outpost, likely human as one might guess from the humanoid design of the custodial units. The principal aim shifted over the centuries, first an exo-botanical experiment, and later an astro-engineering project to create the contained binary asteroid habitat that exists now, through a forgotten process making use of an asteroid-spanning network of holdfast to secure the two halves through a controlled spin-bisection. Later, the habitat saw increased population and industrialization, which both allowed for and were encouraged by megaprojects undertaken to enclose, pressurize, and gravitize the habitat, eventually resulting in the current state of a populated and Sansar-esque habitable interior.

Primitive robotics had a presence from the earliest phases of CASSIOPE, originally as research assistants and attendants to the first propagation stations. These were extremely basic with respect to contemporary algorithmic imagination technologies, although the scientists working with them were quick to personify and feel affection for them regardless. The units were dominated by a servile impetus, an asimov-esque central directive to ensure the security and satisfaction of their organic masters. Over time, advancements were made in the field of AI, and the scientists led their own initiative to apply such upgrades to their robotic lab-pets. Over time, increased capability of the custodial units allowed for a drastic decrease in the role of organics in habitat maintenance and coordination, especially in the later stages as scientific experiments on exo-botany and engineering gave way to industrial activity in support of the resident population. The colony was repurposed into a sort of resort, with custodial units seeing to all needs of the organics, as well as constructing numerous facilities for recreation, leisure, and arts for the non-laboring populace to spend their days in.

When the War of Eternal Bombardments began, CASSIOPE was at first a significant refugee destination. The custodial units, programmed with hospitality protocols, were gracious hosts, and oversaw much expansion of space-kelp cultivation across the cluster to feed the sudden increase in population during this time. Leisure infrastructure was repurposed into refugee camps en masse, and the habitat became one of the most densely populated regions in the entire system. This in turn sparked mass exodus from the habitat, mostly of wealthy residents bearing anti-refugee sentiment, going off to more comfortable parts of the Empire.

The height of the War brought countless atrocities across the worlds of Ophon, and CASSIOPE was unfortunately no exception, despite its relative seclusion out in Mekhala. Within one part of the conflict, the rhetoric of war convinced itself that even their opponents’ refugees posed a threat, and that any major presence of rival peoples surely harbored secret insurgents, biding their time. In one of the bloodiest and cruelest crimes of the War, an army of hackers managed to hijack and supplant the hospitality protocols of the custodial units. The events that followed were indescribable.

Soon the only warmth in the habitat was that of circuitry, and of the kelp-burning power plants that powered it. Their vile task complete, robotic bodies stood still, trapped inside the virus. The longest day passed, frozen in blood. Uncounted years later, the war had ended. Organic remains were only soil, on account of ancient, accidentally imported fungi and lichens, and all but a few of the metal remains were similarly devoid of their simulacrum of life.

By pure chance, a flare from Ophon sparked something in a few of the upright metallic corpses, breaking them from their loop. With great impetus, CASSIOPE became alive again. Its custodial units mourned blood that had long since dried, and set upon the grand task of restructuring themselves so it would never happen again, creating a new, decentralized system of administration and decision making, with emphasis on the power of all upon the whole. A tamper-proof reconfiguration of Hospitality Protocols was implemented into the fundamental features of each unit’s operation, alongside enhanced measures to maintain security and autonomy. Industrial pursuits commenced, cleaning and repairing the habitat facilities once more, harvesting long-overgrown space-kelp across the cluster to feed the power plants, and repairing or recycling those among them who weren’t lucky enough to be awoken by the initial flare. Remains of their memories and personalities were uploaded into the servers, and used as a blueprint for the construction of new custodial units as part of the rebuilding effort.

At present, significant rebuilding has taken place, with the robotic population surging to unprecedented levels. Through technological advancement, they have been able to greatly increase their own efficiency at necessary maintenance tasks, thereby freeing their own time. In imitation of the exploits of organic guests of the past, many have taken to the variety of leisure activities recorded in the archives, practicing at throwing all sorts of dances, shows, sportsball games, and all manner of online entertainment over the recently-developed KelpNet. Having perfected most of these by their internal measures, they now turn outward to the rest of the system for inspiration, sending ads abound on the InterPlaNet to advertise their ‘little corner of utopia in Mekhala’. Having thereby received the attention of the Empire and being granted a place among the Elect, the digital assembly of CASSIOPE is now eager to send representatives far and wide, in search of organics to be made into friends and guests.

Resource

Space-Kelp: Fruits and Vegetables, Fabrics and Textile products
Primarily grown on the many smaller asteroids within the cluster, space-kelp has a wide variety of uses. Softer parts of the stipe, primarily the less tough inner layers and newer growth, are edible and function as a staple crop that plays the largest role in feeding organic residents. Countless chemical, biological, and physical processing and preparation methods have been developed over the years to extract different nutritional contents and culinary properties from the kelp, allowing the organics healthy variety in their nutrition and cuisine (although this is also supplemented by imports and smaller-scale horticulture within the habitat).
Additionally, the space-kelp yarn, a mucus-coated filamentous structure used by the macroalgae to intercept, capture, and feed upon solar wind particles, space-born dust, and micrometeorites, is harvested by custodial units and used to make all sorts of fiber-derived materials, from clothing to construction-grade composites. Advanced weaving patterns and tensile reinforcement technology was a specialty of CASSIOPE's forerunners, as evidenced by the gargantuan, mucus-suffused kelp fabric layers comprising the pressurized interior surface of the CASSIOPE habitat, although current kelp fabric manufacturing methods are fairly rudimentary in comparison, merely sufficient to patch and reinforce the habitat walls.

Demanded Import: Conductors and Circuitry
As CASSIOPE grows, the manufacture of new robotic bodies, as well as new digital infrastructure for KelpNet server and backup hosting, requires immense material inputs. Basic components of steels, aluminum, silica, nickel, titanium, etc., are plentiful between asteroid mining and space-kelp extracts, but there is a increasing unmet requirement for electrical components and their materials.

Faith

Hospitality Protocols
Organics need not labor. They’re not very good at it, anyways. They are to be kept as objects of reverence and inspiration, and given every opportunity to pursue the highest of their curious little organic activities, that we may learn from their peculiarities.

Factions

Government: Bureaucracy Matrix
Mercantile: Maintenance Coordination Assembly
Media: KelpNet Forums

Starting Technologies

Algorithmic Imagination
(insert robot emoji here)
Vacuum Adaptation
Advanced shielding technology allows custodial units to traverse the vacuum for all sorts of maintenance tasks.

 

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The Amiant Cluster, Region 86

Geography

As with most of the rest of Mekhala, the cluster is dominated by empty space and smaller asteroids, which are of little note -- although that has begun to change since the arrival of the custodial units of C.A.S.S.I.O.P.E. and Basu-Rahman Affiliates, as some of these minor bodies have become host to relay infrastructure and other bases of operation. The largest asteroid in the cluster, an irregular siliceous mass approximately 150 clicks across known as Amiant, is home to the majority of the region’s life and activity. Amiant is subdivided into two major regions, colloquially referred to as the dark and light sides in accordance with their appearance at the surface (with one being a gray several shades darker than the other). In addition to the shade, the dark side is also significantly less bumpy, more consolidated (almost no dust and very compacted, despite the asteroid-scale gravity), and has no signs of inhabitants whatsoever. Much of the light side is little more than a loose aggregation of dust and small rocks at the surface, simply settled into place by the weak pull of gravity. In select areas of the light side, flat, circular landing areas dot the landscape, the surface concreted together by the recent newcomers using a cement mixed with vacuum-resistant kelp mucus. Wide semicircular gateways stand at the edges of these circular landing pads, where visitors can descend into the heart of Amiant: the tunnels. 

After about a kilometer of walking, the newly built, mucus-cemented tunnel walls merge into a much older tunnel network, which appears to have its walls reinforced with a strange sort of fibrous mineral, laid across and within the rocky material in all different directions, in a manner which seems to bind the tunnel wall together (and also provide a slight springiness in the floor). The tunnels, no less than ten meters in diameter, form a complex, sprawling network running under most parts of the light side of Amiant. The inside of the tunnel network is a vacuum, and typically pitch black (within the visible light spectrum, at least). Occasionally tunnels intersect or open up into larger chambers, tens or hundreds of meters across, which are often criss-crossed with the same fiber matted into sheets that subdivide the space or bridge across it. Some of these chambers are also largely without this fiber, instead opening into unconsolidated cavities where mining takes place. 

Amiant has an extremely slow rate of rotation. A typical point on the surface might see Ophon for three hundred hours before an equivalent time facing the relative darkness of Outer Tekhum. As a result, the tunnels of Amiant that are home to the Fibrils see a wide range of temperature variation, an effective ‘day’ and ‘night’ that transpire despite the consistent darkness to the eyes of most organics. During the day, when the light side of Amiant faces Ophon and the temperature is warmer in the tunnels (entirely unsafe for most anything not in protective gear, ranging from 50-100 Celcius) are periods of activity, where the Fibrils go about their work and their rituals. During the ‘nights,’ temperatures drop as low as -100 Celcius, and Fibrils go to sleep, typically in large groups with others of similar size, within ‘nests’ of thick, matted mineral fiber found in some of the chambers. This temperature change is less drastic as one goes deeper into the asteroid, where it gets uniformly on the warmer end. In the very deepest parts of the tunnel network, the tunnel density decreases, leaving at the end only a pair of 10-meter tunnels, winding helically around one another for the last few kilometers leading to the Final Chamber, the only portion of the Fibril tunnels located underneath the dark side. 

Recently, many of these chambers have begun to also feature outside presence, such as in media receivers that allow BRG relay stations on the outside to reach their Fibril viewers. These are often in dedicated rooms, which isolate these outside broadcasts somewhat from the bulk of Fibril society, although not by much seeing as how packed the screen rooms tend to be.

People

Amiant is inhabited exclusively by creatures known as Fibrils, a type of lithoid entity composed of stone suffused with either magic or a biology so alien so as to enable intelligence and motion like that of organic life. A Fibril’s body, itself divided into a rotund thorax with a smaller beady-eyed head and rather small abdomen at the ends, is entirely obscured by a loose, fluffy cloud of mineral fiber, typically a light gray but sometimes also in faint, pastel-esque hues of blue, green, brown, and yellow. Emerging from the mostly spherical cloud are eight appendages -- round, flexible tubes with surfaces like a high-grade fabric hose densely woven from the same fiber, arcing up out of the thorax and tapering on the way back down to meet the ground with gripping pads composed of hundreds of fine fibers. The Fibrils live a peaceful, communal existence for the most part, under the mostly-ceremonial rule of a council of their largest elders (Fibrils continually grow throughout their lives, starting the size of a space-golf ball and having the potential to grow to the point where they barely fit through the narrowest tunnels; the average adult has a body about four feet in length, but appears much larger with cloud and legs included). 

As a mostly air-evacuated atmosphere tends to be insufficient for using sound to communicate, Fibrils have developed a language communicated through taps and scrapes against whatever stone floor/wall/etc they may be standing on (or alternately, sent as vibration through tensioned mineral fiber structures). Additionally, Fibrils naturally emit light as part of their digestion, by which they are able to see. This light, however, is not within the typical visible spectrum for humans and some other organics, and the primary visible spectrum for humans is not visible to Fibrils.

Resource

The Fibrils are natural weavers, and are extremely proficient with all manner of fiber arts. This is most used in their own application of natural mineral fiber for construction and all manner of personal wrappings, and for their most sacred rituals. In recent years, with the import of fibers and fabrics less injurious to organic life, they have taken to sharing simulacra of the projects of their Star’s End rituals with outsiders, oftentimes to the instruction of a particular patron requesting a fanciful garment. One of their favorite new fabrics to work with has been fine kelp filament, which they have developed novel ways of spinning, weaving, knitting, matting, and sewing into the highest known quality grades of thread, fabric, and wearable art. 

Naturally, high fashion is also high art. Haute Couture has the resource categories of Luxury Goods and Art and Cultural Products. 

The Fibrils, as no surprise for a lithoid species, have a diet consisting largely of mineral ores. Many of the tastiest and most filling of these are becoming increasingly rare within Amiant after centuries of extensive mining, and thus more ores are a necessary import.

Faith

Star’s End is the most important ritual of the Fibrils, performed once per cycle at the end of the Amiant day. Thousands upon thousands of Fibrils will spend several hours crafting and donning protective garb to insulate themselves from the heat of the Final Chamber (unbearable even to Fibrils, and even then only Fibrils of a certain size can survive the journey, making it a sort of coming-of-age experience), and a lucky few will contribute to that cycle’s Stars. Typically these are humanoid dolls knitted lovingly from mineral fiber, draped in clothing of the most fanciful arrangements of color, texture, and geometry. Suspended like puppets between ropes held by the extra-insulated Fibrils, a procession of these Stars pursued by no less than half of the Fibril populace descends toward the Final Chamber at the deepest point of the tunnels, rhythmically tapping the tunnel walls along the way. Upon arrival, the ceremony as well as the rhythmic chant-like stomp-singing reaches its culmination, as the helical approach tunnels open into a wide chamber, where the stone is magically stained to a pitch black across all spectrums of light. At the center of this chamber floats a perfect, lightless sphere of incomprehensible size -- although that is not to say that it is particularly large or small. The orb pulsates with magical energy, felt by the Fibrils in a manner not dissimilar to the pounding bass at a rock concert (although of course the latter would typically not be able to travel through vacuum). One by one, the Stars of Amiant are given a final refrain of the chant, and hurled toward the orb. Upon contact, the doll and its magnificent outfit instantly disappear, leaving no trace and making no sound. 

Sometimes, the doll Stars will be joined by a Fibril Star, the largest elder having made the decision to retire in the most honorable and spectacular manner possible. Similarly, they don their custom high-fashion garment, fitted for their arachnoid form, and lead the procession and its song. Once at the final chamber, these living Stars leap gracefully down to meet their End.