Update 10: My blood runs cold, my memory has just been sold...
In Errai space a internecine dispute rocks the foundations of the Rasheed family/factions power. The eldest son of the President, convinced of his fathers age and oncoming senility despite the range of cosmetic surgery he regularly undergoes, tries to engineer a silent coup within the corridors of the government. Unfortunately his allies turned out to be less influential than they thought, and the dispute spilled out into the public arena, and the elder Rasheeds control of the media allowed him to destroy the rival factions credibility and see them ousted from parliament. Lingering emotion remained towards his son however, and he was kept under a light house arrest in the safety of the mining colony of Errai II. Whilst very entertaining, this rather prevents the government getting anything done this year and most of the Ik resources are stockpiled. One enterprising functionary does assign a new hydroponics farm to be built in the orbiting habitat to lift the food limit on Taik, something Rasheed doesn't quite approve of due to his critics in that satellite. Without a volatiles mine under Ik control the new farms operate with less than full effectiveness, but new discoveries by Ik biologists enable all the Ik farms to produce more food.
Cease mewling young one, you're lucky to have escaped the harvest yourself with your education scores! I too miss your dear sister, but she is gone to the reclamation plant now the glorious Akresian nation cannot feed all its people, and the weak and infirm must be the first to go. Hold her in your heart, and honour her memory by remembering why we must never be forced into the situation again
-Anon Akresian parent.
Meanwhile the Akresians would dearly love to play whilst the cat is distracted, but their on going food situation prevents them from doing more than skipping their protection payments this year. They still lack resources to construction a space habitat with suitable radiation shielding and have to put it off for another year. They do make several scientific breakthroughs, and begin work on a new spacecraft code named 'Pride' perhaps something to break free of Ik control once and for all?
The halls of Ningbao (Gemstar I) are filled with appropriately sober and respectful celebration this year as the volatiles mining operation on Gemstar II is finally completed. Clearing the compressors and of the dense fogs of sulphurous microbes and their molecular fragments, and the constant efforts to prevent the bases being enveloped in ground coral prevent the project from turning much of an economic profit, but the flood of cheap hydrogen and oxygen allow a vast expansion of the Ningbao farm units enough to even double food output! The eternal struggle against the alien biosphere makes Gemstar II something of a hardship assignment, and political exiles and prison labour rubs shoulders uneasily with the scientists fascinated by the exotic life. There were some reports of people starving to death before the volatiles mines came on line, but the government assured the populace that this was not the case. In other Ningbao news a new condensed matter research centre was opened in the main industrial city, perhaps to add value to manufacturing processes, and the heady rush of scientific research continued as the Lantians began to push up to the heights of megastructure engineering. There was still some worry about what the 'Al might be up to on horn though.
The Esani seem filled with a new, if somewhat undefined, sense of purpose this year. They mount an expedition and base building program on the second moon of their current Gas giant primary. Unlike their capital world this moon lacks an atmosphere to scour for volatiles, but the relative purity of the ice means not having to scrub the hydroponics feedstocks and a general increase in farm production. Not that the Esani really needed extra food as they enjoyed a comfortable surplus, and are indeed the most adept of the Hydra Tuft societies at artificial ecosystem management and efficient use of resources. Though the mysterious kilometre high ruins on the outermost world continues to intrigue them, they still lack the intellectual tools or spare research effort to begin analysis [1].
The Soulon league constructed their first real cities this year, the squat and heavily toughened towers reaching into the skies above the pine forested ravines and fjords of Kaus II. This was perhaps rather faster than they had perhaps intended but the leaders of the Senate determined that something had to be done rapidly to stem the flow population to Kaus II. These practical cities were still rather more palatable than the buried tunnel bases most Soulons had inhabited before, and were soon ungraded with many social amenities and centres of higher education and research. These herculean efforts, and the stern disapproval of their elders and the expulsion of official Gardener Reverend Fathers has managed to stem the flow of the disaffected for this year at least. However it has still caused some problems thanks to the by-world representation in the Soulon senate the stripping of population from the outer worlds to inhabit the new cities and that leading to the outer worlds corresponding loss of economic strength and political influence. Some habitats are even stripped of their population entirely! This obviously created many arguments and dissatisfaction with the favoured position of Kaus III. The Soulon Senate, now dominated by the city dwellers of Kaus II, also announced long term research plans to attempt to reduce the vast effort required to hold their unwieldy multi-world polity together. Despite these grandiose announcements the league remained dependent on Gardener technical expertise to advance their goals commissioning a long range scout probe from the Gardener shipyards, and paying through the nose for its design and construction. This newly minted device was flung onwards to the system of Izar (visited by the Lantians some years ago) with a long term goal of piercing the spinward lobe of the Hydra Tuft star cluster.
The influx of Soulon capital did prove favourable to the Gardeners, as it allowed them to actualise their plan of developing the southern hemisphere of Kaus II for human habitation, and soon their small towns of white stone and synth-marble were dotting the savannah and open forests. Rather than being irritated with the rise of competing Soulon centres of culture, the Gardeners appeared ambivalent, and even allowed many of their permanent and temporary citizen to take up jobs in the new Soulon institutions. The removal of the official representatives of the Gardener faith did little to curb the follow flow of Gardener ideology due to open access documents in the datasphere, and the return of Gardener trained Soulons who proselytized on a more subdued level. Indeed it would prove difficult to prevent intermingling, as the common cosmopolitan base stock of both the factions meant their differences were really only ideology, attitude and accent, all of which could be easily adjusted by infiltrators moving in either direction. Despite their mimetic success, the vast majority of Soulon on Kaus III didn't take up the Gardener faith, but rather used some of its precepts to inform their world view something that seemed irritating to the industrial and conservative Soulon on the outer worlds. The Gardeners are also approaching capacity in their northern hemisphere habitats, and whilst some advocate the upgrading of these cities into true megapoli to reap the possible intellectual benefits, the Hierarchy has decided on prioritising a ring of orbital habitats in which population and factories can be placed without marring the world below.
What kind of wavelength does the Principle Investigators visual sensors use? 40 Hertz!
-Kation joke, refers to lack of foresight
Meanwhile in Zavi space both of the cyborg factions heavily focus on their data infrastructure and research projects, both now replete with ambitions that extend beyond the gentle orange sun of Zavi. The Vazan finally take proper possession of the exotic world of Zavi I, but investing their military outpost with a substantial presence and rapidly building it into a proper settlement. If the Kations were developing this settlement they might not develop it industrially, preferring to study the biosphere in its unmolested state, but the Vazan have no such inhibitions. Meanwhile they add research centres and universities to many of the sprawling but underutilised cities on their homeworld of Krige (Zavi II), though they place a research centre into structures on the distant Zavi III, where the lowered gravity can allow them to test many constructions before adding them to the oppressive gravity of Krige. Oddly they choose not to send their scout probe anywhere this year perhaps waiting until they can send it out with a more formidable escort, as the armed exploration by the Ik has shown them that the Hydra Tuft may be more dangerous than first imagined.
The Kations complete their current five year plan of building up Zavi V into a place worthy of being called their capital the geometric domes and sails of the Kation cities peppering the planet from pole to pole. They also upgrade their research facilities with attendant mechanisms of higher education. Although this is much appreciated by the generally system population, the biotechnologists next act, of sweeping all the systems 'spare' population to live and work on Zavi V, is rather less favoured. Whilst they like the new opportunities they don't much enjoy being crammed into one or a few cities like Maggots or Vazan, even if doing so enables much less bureaucratic effort to hang the polity together an arrogant Kation would rather the government bring the opportunity to her, rather than the other way round. The ruling government is forced to take up a coalition with some of the independents and 'Third Way', and is forced by its allies to further upgrade the data infrastructure so that the government can more responsively meet its citizens needs. Searching desperately for a new long term project to focus the restless population on after the completion of the capital and the continuing delays on 'Genesis', PI Aiur makes bold statements about mining the lonely gas giant of the Zavi system. Though quite expensive in start up, the influx of materials would certain provide long term economic benefits and push the Kation even further past the Vazan.
Random Events
Poor accounting during the power struggle leaves some production lost to mismanagement and corruption: -8e from Ik stores.
Flaking fragments off the near indestructible alien groves yields a few ideas about nano-structures for the Esani: +2s to materials.
Karmically Blessed Societies:
Shortest Orders: Esani +1 lucky roll
Least whining despite being worst hit by the update 9 rules change: Akresians +1 lucky roll
Random Stats
Favourite Kation delicacy: Sushi burgers with tank shark filling.
Least Technologically advanced: Esani/Akresian tie
Most Technologically advanced: Ik/Lantian tie
There are exactly three times as many metals mines as there are volatiles mines.
Notes:
[1]Kraznaya: Investigating the Ruins costs 10s and requires Social 3 its there on the Tech tree. You alos neglected the alpha habitat beachhead on Heze IIIb, so I paid the 9e cost for that with the 15e you assigned to archaeology and saved the surplus 6e.