#double galaxy setting

[dgsfms]

Skarii Serket, The Marquis Spinaret Mindfang, commander of the Eight Fold Fleet: I'm home! Had to spend a couple days out on the Longshanks, raider trash wanted to try something, they're dead now. Let's have nachos for dinner.

[dgsfms]

As for what brought on the downfall of the first human empire. No one is certain.

All that is certain is that the old capital world is gone. And many stars that should have had hundreds of millions of years of life left in them went nova. The history of the old empire lost in a wave of early nebula birth.

There is some record of the old empire. Luse Baoshi, the oldest contiguous human government in the galaxy, was a backwater world during the time of the empire, an outpost in one of the spiral arms of one of the galaxies. They took much less time to rebuild after the fall.

[dgsfms]

You wanna know what passes for a pirate operation in this era of piracy in decline?

A half dozen mig-15 or Su-7 flinging themselves off of a converted tramp freighter.

The thing about those older designs is that, in this setting, they are cheap!

For the cost of a single base model SU-27 flanker, you can get a dozen mig-15s and the hardware for maintaining them. And so many licensed manufacturers, and unlicensed manufacturers, have been making them for decades that they won't go away.

And this is where the whole setting's piracy arc clicks into a single, devastating gradient, because I've now shown you all three tiers of it at once, and they tell a complete story of decline:

At the top, the past: the Cardaheinia pirates. The Leprechaun, the Crescent Rose, the Laughing Monk. Formidable vessels, real captains, an era when piracy was grand, when a pirate could be a legend with a named ship worth mourning. That era is dead. The galaxy ended it. It's a wreckage field now.

In the middle, the exception: Skarii. The one who saw it coming and transcended it. Who stopped being a pirate before piracy died, who built a nation-peer fleet from salvaged warships, who left the life for legitimacy, who is so far beyond this bottom tier that calling her the same word, "pirate," is almost absurd. She's not a pirate anymore. She's a head of state who used to be one.

And at the bottom, the present, the pathetic now: this. Six MiG-15s off a tramp freighter. The degenerate remnant. What piracy has collapsed into now that the great age is dead and the one who escaped it has moved on. This is the tide going out. This is the last, desperate, obsolete gasp of a dying way of life.

[dgsfms]

One summer, Skarii ends up taking her daughters on a tour up and down the pan-galacitic line. Six weeks spent hitting up every freeport, trading depot, and gaudy tourist trap along the way! I like how one category of places Skarii took the girls included goofy tourist traps.Deep down, Skarii is all about that goofy stuff. Some of the knick-knacks Vriska brought back include:

A miniature version of the galaxies largest bottle of mustard on Kilterry II, a t-shirt that reads "I lost my cheese-sanity on Polaris Prime", a snow globe featuring a miniature version of the Silent Queens Palace on Senica III, a plush version of Benny the Bison from the WildLand themepark on Farpoint. Aranea couldn't help but pick up an at-home cheese making guide on Polaris Prime, a detailed print of the Silent Queens Palace, and t-shirt from WildLand that just reads "CHARGE!!!" Featuring a charging bison. She also picked up a genuine cephalopod fossil from the world of Eire II.

One of the places that Skarii took her daughters during their trip was the wreckage fields of the battle of Cardaheinia.

A somber visit, more for Skarii to pay respects to former peers.

The Leprechaun, the Laughing Monk, the Crescent Rose, the Snake Eyes, the Deuces Wild.

Each one of these a formidable vessel and accompanying fleet in their own right, each one ripped to shreds by the combined forces of the galaxy. These wreckage fields represented the end of the most recent pirate era, and era Skarii survived.

For what it's worth, Chance City itself was probably not on the trip itinerary.

You don't take a 13 and a 16 year old to Chance City, it's space Vegas. And not modern cleaned up corporate Vegas, I mean 50s and 60s Vegas when the mob still ran things.

[dgsfms]

I ported over the trolls from homestuck, and culturally split the difference between Alternia and Beforus. Prototeria was militarized, but not in the same way Alternia was, they were protective and nurturing, but not in the same way Beforus was. Proud warriors, but not sadistic killers, protectors, but no coddlers. mutation wasn't hidden away on Prototeria, it wasn't coddled either, they stood and learned alongside the others. expected to pull their weight and prove their worth like everyone else. the hemospectrum still exists within Prototeria, but the caste system is a LOT looser. Fuchsias and Violets still have outsized social weight, but also a significant amount of expectation and responsibility. the Fuchsia caste. the leaders, the arch-mothers, the high patriarchs. to be a Fuchsia on Prototeria means to bare even more expectations than even the Violet bloods. they are the imperial leaders, with all the weight of power and responsibility that entails. from childhood, the importance of effective leadership is taught to them. not tyranny, not coddling, but genuine leadership.

there isn't just one or two Fuchsia bloods, there is actually a relative large amount of them compared to Alternia or Beforus, about 1 in every 100 million hatchings. which isn't a lot. at earths population density that would mean about 80 of them. but that's a lot more than the two per world that seems to be the theme for Alternia or Beforus. Does the fuchsia caste govern collectively in some formal sense, or is it more distributed regional authority? little bit of both. a Fuchsia governor or governess may have direct authority over their region, but they also are expected to convene and collaborate. no one troll is a fortress unto themselves.

the annual forum convening at the capitol. the majority of the Fuchsias are in attendance, the arch mother, the high patriarch. from every elder to the youngest grub.

What are the arch-mother and high patriarch specifically — elected positions within the fuchsia caste, or something else? basically the eldest female and eldest male fuchsia who are willing to take on the role of being the face of leadership for the empire. (on the topic of the lifespans, I always figured that the lower lifespans on alternia tended to be mostly a societal byproduct, lower castes getting culled for any reason, rather than a strict function of biology. and we are given no real data on lifespans on Beforus. I always figured that most of the lower castes tended to live about as long as humans do, 6-8 decades being the reasonable range, with the occasional 10 decade long liver.) now we can touch on the violet bloods, the aristocrats, the executors of the fuchsia governors will and decisions, violets tending to outnumber fuchsias 6 to 1. again, privilege being paired with responsibility here. some are more numbers and statistic oriented, some are more social oriented, some tend to be more of right hand man or woman to their fuchsia governor. the right handers tend to stick with a governor for life, the other roles tend to shift location from time to time, usually an older one mentoring a younger one. the prototerian empire is an empire that expands slowly, they don't move on a potential new colony world without having everything ready to go, looking at a world with the intention of having it integrated into the empire and made into a world that will be lived on for tens of thousands of years. the Prototerian Empire is quite old, they were around and actively trading and conducting diplomacy with the first human empire long before it fell.

[dgsfms]

The Ctarl-Ctarl Empire are not a huge empire, about 36 worlds at this point. but they're not alone. they have friends.

enter The Caliban League>

my inspiration came from, not from Shakespeare, but from Warhammer, but aren't as much of a straight lift as this might imply. Caliban itself is forest from pole to pole.

The Caliban League consists of 85 star systems, but those systems are incredibly wealthy in resources. This is why the Ctarl-Ctarl and the Calibanites could afford to build a gate from scratch.

The knight houses of Caliban are some of the few people who could fight a Ctarl-Ctarl to a standstill in melee combat.

The gate within the Ctarl-Ctarl empire is an original gate, and remained in quite good shape. It's original destination gate was completely destroyed. The construction a new destination gate within the Caliban League was a joint effort between the Ctarl-Ctarl empire and the Caliban League.

The knight houses are very selective of who they recruit, but not from where they recruit. Knights often are expected to pick their proteges from the poor and the humble in order to raise them up. The knightly houses, more akin to orders than a hereditary house, suffer few fools or glory seekers.

What is the washout process like for recruits who don't make it? Here's the thing, someone who gets far enough to be selected and begin training but washes out isn't doomed. They likely are still very worthy soldiers, the path to the knights oath is very demanding, not everyone can make it 100%. This speaks to no failing to the proteges, but simply that the order cannot yield to mere 90% adherence. Oftentimes these washouts become quite skilled warriors and commanders and statesmen in their own right.

What does the knight's oath actually demand that makes it the final threshold so many can't cross? The oath demands that so long as the knight shall breath, their existence is to protect the league and all who dwell within, to put the good of the league and the knight houses before their own desires, to reject the desires of pride or ego for the rest of their days, and to be ready to lay down their lives in glory or obscurity.

this is why there is such a high washout rate.

What happens when a knight breaks their oath? See, there is a number of mechanisms in place to prevent that. A knight feeling a pull in those directions should seek counsel of their brothers and sisters (knighthood makes no requirement of gender). That's said, a Knight falling to such temptation is not impossible, and these fallen knights are incredibly dangerous individuals. That said, any knight who lives long enough will eventually lay down their blade, usually in old age, and take the role of an oath watcher. Those who have served long to the point they can no longer carry the duty that comes with the mechanized auto-plate armor. There is no shame in recognizing when one has reached the end of physically carrying out the duty of the knight, and are still bound to the oath, leaning more heavily on the monk side of warrior-monks. the ones who pursue the fallen knights are known as the order of the black tapestry, also known as blackhoods. they are drawn from all the knight houses, they do not speak highly of their deeds, there is no real joy in this. they don't go after knights who have merely stumbled, they go after ones that have gone full tilt betrayal.

What does the mechanized auto-plate armor actually look like and how does it function in combat? Aesthetically, it's a lot closer to fallout power armor than the armor of an astartes. Common gear tends to include a kinetic dampener shield, some form of electro-blade sword, though the style will shift from house to house, some form of heavy laz-rifle, and those are the most common load outs. Again, it'll vary on specific knightly houses on what a knight tends to carry specifically. The average knight is a lot more jovial outside of combat than one would expect. They are sons and daughters of this league, like those they protect. They do not keep themselves locked away form it.

[dgsfms]

Skarii herself carrying a pair of Heatray pistols, known as her Cheliceras. these along with her power-cutlass, are her personal weapons.

[dgsfms]

Figure I'd give a bit of musing on the various types of firearms in the setting.

First up is the most familiar. slug guns. these are just IRL firearms. hammer striking a primer setting off gunpowder propelling a usually led projectile out of a metal barrel. which means yes, even in a different galaxy where an earth may or may not have existed, the Colt 1911, Browning M2, and AK-47 still exist. the big upside to slug guns it that they are comparably super-durable and super cheap to feed.

next up is Laz weapons. like their voidfighter cousins, they are not true lasers, but instead Light Accelerated Plasma. these fit into most all the same niches as slug guns, from the petite laz-derringer for self defense, to massive laz-bombards on naval vessels.

Then we have, confusingly named, Plasma weapons. not light accelerated, hit a LOT harder. they do come in pistol form factor, but they are heavy and hot in that form factor, heavy rifles and crew served weapons make more sense in the man portable context. they punish deferred maintenance more heavily than any other type of weapon, as if you don't take care of it, if you run it too hot too often, it may explode, and if you are not a Ctarl-Ctarl, you are DEAD.

next up, Gyro guns. these are bolters. like plasma, they can come in a pistol form factor, but it makes more sense in rifle form factor at the smallest, and really fits a more LMG to HMG range. there is no stealth with these.

last major type is Heatrays. these are microwave weapons cranked to the extreme. super expensive, super deadly, unlike Plasma, they will fail safe instead of fail explode. preferred type of weapon among Prototeria. there are more niche weapons types for firearms.

Flamer weapons, the flamethrower. Sonic weapons, weaponized ultra-high frequency sound. Cryo weapons, liquid nitrogen projector weapons, one of the few things that can reliably and quickly kill a Ctarl-Ctarl. Needle guns, super high velocity ultra thin needles, stealthy but any plate armor hard defeats it.