Appendix A: Planet list
1: Coalition Planets
The area settled by the planets involved in the fight against the alien Bn. These planets were all settled at about the same time, during a time of particular stress on Earth. Vaccillating between more ‘conservative’ and more ‘liberal’ epochs similar to the Catholic/Protestant wars in England… with the two sides alternating power and alternating persecution.
The liberals eventually won, at least for a half century or so, because of their control of the media and the government beaurocracy. The rather unified planetary semi-government instituted a series of policies that made life more and more difficult for their opponents: who were largely political and religious conservatives but included some despised ethnic minorities as well.
At the same time an abortive scouting campaign by a company that had figured their was money to be made in interstellar exploration (their bankruptcy came soon after the takeover of the liberal faction) had discovered a particularly promising series of planets. The two events combined to make colonization a particularly attractive proposition.
New Caledonia
Largely mountains
adventurers
joined willingly
colonists and soldiers
occ dsm
New Texas
Settled, as the name might imply, by a combination of Texans and wanna be Texans, along with some other, smaller, groups that saw an opportunity to get out of a situation of oppression, New Texas became a generally libertarian planet with a strong patriotic tilt. They have very few laws, but those laws which they do have the enforce in a draconian set of penalties.
New Texas was one of the most difficult planets to integrate into the SC system, requiring dozens of exemptions and exceptions to the various rules. Each change, however, meant that more total resources were given to the CF. And, once they joined the Colonization Force, due to their ‘patriotic’ nature, the planet of New Texas became one of the most eager participants, with huge numbers of purely volunteer recruits, and a larger than usual proportion of soldiers, Scouts, and Pathfinders.
New Texas has all the usual suspects as far as geography, but the part of the planet that is the most settled are the rolling plains. The weather on these plains are, in the summer, largely hot and dry, with the majority of the precipitation coming during the winter in the form of snow. Planting occurs in the spring while the snow is still on the ground, and then the plants live off that moisture plus the occasional spring thunderstorm.
New Texas food is rather diverse, but they are known for their grilled food and sauces. New Texans in general dress rather modestly, if rather plainly.
New Sparta (Sparta Agnafos)
The history of New Sparta is unique among all the planets in the local sector. It was settled by an extremely diverse group of people with only one thing in common: they were all subject to persecution, harsh, unrelenting persecution.
No one knows who managed to organize the NS expedition; to contact people all over the world and, even more importantly, to pay for it all.
But organize they did, even to the extent of ensuring that everyone swore an oath, one that ensured, basically, ‘never again’.
The New Sparta mentality might have been designed to stand up against the aliens. In addition to basically being almost the entire space navy the New Spartans are over represented as soldiers, deep space miners, and scouts. The recruitment from NS far surpasses that from any other Colonization Force planet, with easily twenty percent of the adolescent population volunteering. Marriage among New Spartans is entirely voluntary, and couples tend to form at a very early age. Unlike most other colonial cultures sexual experimentation is not strongly discouraged before marriage and many a New Spartan girl comes to marriage either with child or with a child.
New Spartan geography is, for the most part, rugged. They have very few mountains, but myriads of hills. The weather is extremely varied, both during the year (with, for the most part, four strong seasons) and depending on the location (with areas of greater cold, etc. ).
New Spartan dress and clothing vary widely with the only real comment that can be made on it is that, especially in recent years, any suggestion of modesty in clothing or gourmet cooking is frowned upon if/when it is seen to detract from the war effort.
Hargrave
In AD 2025 after a long and painful fight the Catholic hierarchy finally gave in and allowed an open Sodomite to serve as a priest. This caused a dramatic rupture in the ranks and approximately ten percent of the ‘faithful’ (ie the actual attendees of Catholic mass) ‘left’ the church, not that they called it that, of course. They claimed (with some justification) that it was the hierarchy who had left the church.
This led to a situation of rather some tension, which continued for some years, until a rich member of the new church came up with the idea of colonization. The church hierarchy, at first, resisted but then, after a meeting with leaders of the new church, they seemed to realize that this was a way to end the tension, so they shifted sides completely and sent them off with their blessing.
The break from the Catholic church, especially the move to the new planet, caused the group to revert to some very old-fashioned Catholic values, including a rejection of birth control and an emphasis on some rather militaristic values. Ironically one old fashioned Catholic value which did not survive was the concept of unmarried priests, and, within a few years, the rule actually completely shifted and no one was allowed to even apply to the priesthood until they had grandchildren.
Some of these values might have died out, over time, but, as it happened, only twenty years went by before the first encounter with aliens, and Hargrave became one of the first members of the space council.
Hargrave, with its high birth rate and family oriented values, specializes in colonists, although their soldiers are considered above average. Hargravers, unlike most other planets, forms recruits en masse from their population, with all ages and marital status represented. Marriage is, on the planet at least, an entirely voluntary activity although a Hargrave youth which reaches ‘a certain age’ unmarried will be heavily pressured by church and family authorities.
Hargrave is an odd planet, geographically, with one large continent being basically the only land mass except for hundreds of small islands. Divided in half an east to west mountain range, Hargrave is split by dozens of large rivers, which serve as important routes of communication.
Hargrave cooking is very eclectic and their clothing tends toward the ‘modest’, with the women preferring dresses unlike the skirts preferred by some other cultures.
Leeman’e (Haven) or New Geneva
New Geneva was settled by a particular sect of Christians with strong Calvinistic and theonomic leanings. They had found themselves more and more out of touch with the surrounding culture; and facing increasing persecution, to the extent where many were losing their children to the state.
New Geneva was unique among the colonies in its organization, in that the colonists came with religious and civil organizations already organized. The population tended to be younger, as well, with mostly young families: twenty somethings with several children, and only a few older families, mostly leadership.
The philosophy of New Geneva made them one of the first of the planets that New Sparta approached, and they have always served well in the CF. Unlike most planets New Geneva has no particular specialty, with New Genevans serving in all of the branches almost equally. Many New Genevans find some of the cultural traits of the Colonization Force difficult to deal with and they tend to self-segregate whenever possible, making serious (and in the view of the Newtonians, foolish) changes to their housing to increase ‘modesty’.
New Geneva recruits into the Colonization Force largely in a voluntary manner, with a ‘draft’ filling out the necessary number of recruits. Recruits from New Geneva come into the Colonization Force in a block from each area, and almost always include a sprinkling of older recruits which form the spiritual leadership for the block.
New Geneva has a fairly Earthlike set of continents and weather, but the New Genevans settlement is largely focused on a large port in the north of the main continent, in an area with a fairly serous winter.
New Genevans eschew excess in their cooking, preferring (for religious reason) ‘plain’ fare; although there is a tendency to overeat this ‘plain fare’. New Genevan clothing is a combination of modesty and practicality. Some NG churches hold that women should wear headcoverings as well.
Muslim Planet Rihlah (Journey)
The planet Rihlah has a culture that most of the other planets find extremely offensive, and they were approached almost last in the formation of the alliance, with some suggesting that they should be completely ignored. However the New Spartan representatives were most insistent that all planets be included, so, in the end, a way was found.
All male citizens are required to serve five years in the Colonization Force army upon reaching a certain age of puberty. No women are recruited, and recruits all form their own units which, basically, have no contact with women. These units perform adequately, although not up to the standards of some other planets recruits. Their units are usually officered by New Genevans, who share some, although by no means all, of their cultural assumptions.
Rihalah is the only planet which encourages polygamy and returning recruits, those that survive their five year stint, find wives immediately on their return according to some family based system that is not clear to outsiders, and rarely talked about. As many units have a fifty percent or greater casualty rate, most Rihalahn men gain at least two wives.
Rihalah is occupied almost completely by Muslims (the few non-Muslims have their own system for recruitment and service). No Rihlahns serve in any service except the army.
Rhialan geography, ironically, is rather different from the deserts that most of them came from. Instead the planet Rihalan consists of mostly cold, wet, islands similar to Ireland.
Muslim clothing is extremely modest for both men and women. Men prefer very light colors, mostly white, and women darker colors. Men and women largely wear headcoverings as well, of different types.
History
Religion
Food
Culture
Dress
Specialty
no women induction
all 5yr soldier men,all men
own units
polygamy
other’s don’t object
2: Newtonia
Newtonia was settled by a unique group, united not by a religious or even political philosophy, but by a philosophy of education. The Newtonians were convinced that education was the key to human happiness. But not the kind of education popular in the society they came from; which was designed to produce a general, homogenous set of knowledge and skills. The Newtonians believed in education focused completely on the individual: tailored to his aptitudes, which were rigidly tested for. They almost completely denied the concpet of a general knowedge set; instead pushing each student as far and as fast as they could go in their particular study: even if it was farming.
The Newtonians, upon being approached by the Colonization Fleet, capitulated immediately. As they already practiced a very rigid form of selective breeding, with mates selected exclusively for genetic diversity, they only had to make two changes to their pattern to meet the Colonization Force demands. The first was that they lowered, slightly, the age at which the mating of the couple began. Already the couple, assigned at puberty, were accustomed to living together in the boy’s housing, but with the Colonization Force demands they were allowed to come together sexually six months earlier than they had been allowed before. The Newtonians were among the most open of the colonies, sexually, and often found the mores of the more conservative groups absurd and even amusing.
The second difference was the actual system for recruits. The Newtonians, alone among the Colonization Force, settled this with a strict lottery. Each couple, on their assignment as couples, received their life assignment, either to some occupation on Newtonia, or to become a colonist, solider, or Ship Handler. Elite assignments were not within their power, and are, instead, made when the Newtonians are already within the CF. Due to the nature of the Newtonians educational system, they provide a disproportionate number of ship handlers and their home planet provides a substantial amount of the CF’s technological base, and much of their ship construction.
Newtonia consists largely of coastal mountains similar to Norway, if a bit less cold, along with dry/cold interior plains. The seas and rivers abound with fish, which make up a great part of the Newtonian diet.
Ironically for a people that are considered to be very cold and logical (a claim the Newtonians dispute, even deride) Newtonains are excellent cooks, and produce a wide variety of different foods. One aspect of Newtonian education is that Newtonian children, after a certain age (approximately five years old) are not allowed to eat except what they cook (barring special occasions and family meals and the like). This encourages a wide knowledge of cooking, as well as a wide variety of cooking styles.
Newtonian dress is extremely utilitarian, with men and women alike in jumpsuits similar to those worn on ship. A distinction between the sexes would be that the males tend to wear single color suits, of very neutral and dark colors, while the women tend to toward brighter colors, multi-colored, suits and the like. Newtonian children, in the home, tend to be in the nude, as do their parents. In public they are also frequently nude, but, when not, uniformly wear shorts. In cooler weather they wear jumpsuits similar to that of their parents.
3: Greenwich IV
Grenwich IV (so named because they settled the fourth planet from their sun) was settled by very old fashioned ‘colonists’… mostly from the former British Empire, who hankered back to old days. These largely wealthy people, along with hundreds of others whose fees they paid, were moved to Grenwich IV, a lovely planet with huge swaths of areas just ‘ripe’ for old fashioned ‘estates’.
Surprisingly the experiment worked, after a bit of a rocky start, and by the time the Bnentarri were discovered they had a well functioning economy largely based in rural areas.
When the Cf arrived at Grenwich IV the negotiations went surprisingly well, and although the solution arrived at differed from that of every other planet, both groups were extremely happy.
The solution was this: that every single ‘second’ son or daughter was assigned, basically at birth, to the CF. For the most part these, once they reached adolescence, were married in great state (weddings being enormous social occasions) and then, after a six month honeymoon, were shipped off… largely to be colonists, although, occasionally, Grenwhichians have done excellent jobs in other fields.
Grenwhich IV is similar to New Texas, except that the rain on Grenwich four is not so finiky and one can expect a rain storm on basically any day. Unlike England, however, there is almost never fog on Grenwhich four.
The Grenwhichians are NOT known for their cooking, which largely consists of boiled dishes.
Grenwhichian clothing is extremely ornate, and largely very ‘modest’, with most of the body covered. Among some groups, during formal occasions, females may show more of their body, but the general populace looks down on this practice as ‘degenerate’. The poorer classes of Grenwhichians tend have their children in the nude and even a higher class of Grenwichian will not be embarrassed to ‘strip down’ to any practical extent for a given job. Unlike their predecessors on Earth the Grenwhichian high class prides itself on not being ashamed to ‘get their hands dirty’; and this pride applies to both sexes with the women, in the house, feeling free to cook or clean right along with ‘the help’.
4: Hallycone Islands
The Hallycone Islands was another colonization effort gone very south. Indeed, it wasn’t really a colonization effort at all, but an ‘investment opportunity’. The planet was blessed with a beautiful ocean, mild weather, and a wonderful chain of islands (thus the name); and certain parties back on Earth thought (or claimed to think, the jury was hung on the subject) that it would make an excellent ‘vacation planet’.
It was only later, after hundreds of people were recruited to work, and millions of credits were spent on improvements, that the question was raised as to whether anyone would actually use a ‘vacation planet’.
The resulting stock-crash and arrest of various of the initial ‘investors’ back on Earth left the planet dwellers suddenly ‘stranded’. Luckily farms and the like had already been planted (no one being quite so stupid as to think that foodstuffs, at least, could be imported from Earth) and, after a bit of an initial shock, the Hallycone Islanders just sort of went on with life.
Recruited late into the Cf (with their low population and lower economy) the Hallycone Islanders reluctantly fit themselves into the Cf… largely in the space fleet. Recruited, most of them, to work in hotels and the like, they fit rather well into the work on board ship.
Hallycone islanders are known for producing excellent cooks. Their natural diet consists largely of dishes revolving around fish.
Hallycone Islanders have the most ‘scanty’ dress of all of the colonists, due in part to their extremely mild climate and in part because the original intent was to ‘entertain’ their guests. Women tend to wear skirts, either of actual grass or fabric designed to look like grass, and the men largely sport brightly colored shorts. Ironically the children, unlike some of their more modest counterparts, largely wear dress similar to their parents except when swimming.
5: Tsion Hadash or ‘New Zion’
Israel, as a nation, suffered more from the vagaries of political changes than almost any other nation. During the conservative shifts the basic liberalism of the Israeli state was offensive to the general consensus.
But it was during the liberal phases, particularly the last liberal phase, that the truly serious problems arose. While the conservatives merely disapproved of the nature of many of the Israeli policies, the liberals didn’t believe the nation should exist.
Israeli society split into two separate reactions. One held firmly to the concept that Eretz Israel must be preserved, and prepared to fight and die on the land.
The other, seeing the availability of colonization, opted for Tsion Hadash… a colony in the New Spartan sector.
Tsion Hadash was well organized and very serious. Their design for their colonization ship was revolutionary. The ship that they had built was such that it was almost perfectly cannalizable, with the parts brought down to the planet in pre-prepared sections, and the materials therefrom used for the colonial industry.
Tsion Hadash was one of the first planets contacted by New Sparta to join the Colonization Force and their participation was almost immediate. Recruits from Tsion Hadash serve in all branches of the Cf, but largely as soldiers, scouts, and pathfinders.
Tsion Hadash, like New Sparta, sends only recruits to the Colonization Force, averaging fifteen percent of the appropriate population. These recruits are all married pre-recruitement, theoretically according to the child’s choice, but everyone acknowledges a large degree of parental involvement and pressure.
Tsion Hadash has a fairly ‘normal’ geography, differing from Earth only in that it is a trifle hotter during the summer, as the orbital pattern brings it nearer the sun.
The dress on Tsion Hadash is very ‘modest’; with dark colored pants and white shirts the standard for men and boys, and dark colored skirts and lighter, colored, shirts the norm for women and girls. Girls and women alike wear long flowing headcoverings.
6: New Brazil
New Brazil was settled by a largely Hispanic group. On Earth Brazil was one of the countries to benefit from an earlier conservative resurgence: taking the opportunity to drastically reduce not only their governmental budgets but the number of areas of life that the government poked its nose into.
For a while after the liberal resurgence, the Brazilians waged a passive guerilla war against the plethora of new regulations and beaurocracies coming down from on high… passively resisting passing the legislation, avoiding implementing it, and generally standing in the way.
However this became more and more difficult as time went on so when a wealthy Brazillian consortioum announced that they were seeking colonists for ‘New Brazil’, there were a large number of subscribers.
New Brazil was a reluctant member of the CF… more because of their almost anarchichal governmental stricter than anything else. There is no real patter to their participation, except that they tend to prefer to be colonists.
The food on New Brazil is considered excellent, for those that can stomach it. They have largely meat oriented dishes, with both beef and a variety of ‘deer’ type meats; and almost all dishes are extremely spicy.
New Brazil consists of coastal plains and large interior jungles, with a temperate climate with a strong rainy season.
New Brazil dress is rather varied. The most common dress for women involves brightly patterned cloth loose shirts, and wrap around skirts. Men also tend to wear what others consider to be ‘loud’ colors and patterns, and loose fitting trousers and shirts. Younger children are often naked, while older children imitate their elders.
7: Erendis IV
Erendis IV, Capella III, and Nonandi were settled by a diverse group of settlers. They arrived at their respective planets via a company that specialized in colonizing, and that found a way to make even small scale colonial groups profitable, both by combining them together and by some method, never fully understood, of selling information about their colonization status before it became widely known.
As a result these three planets are among the most ‘normal’ of the entire group… made from a very diverse group of settlers.
Like their population, the dress and food of these planets is widely diverse.
8: Capella III
See Erendis IV
9: Nonandi Fellowship
See Erendis IV
10: Planet 15
11: New Colonies
NC 1
NC 2
…
NC 56
12: Enemy planets
Settled
Desert Planet
Jungle Planet
13: Enemy Planets
Desert Planet
Jungle Planet
Other Planets
Iceland
10-20 ft ice cover
1-2 mile liquid water
Counter rotating planet vs cap
New hq of CF
14:
Appendix B: The price of exemptions
15: New Sparta
16: New Geneva
17: Rhihalah
18: Newtonia
19: Grenwhich IV
20: Tsion Hadash
None of these planets use exemptions
21: Hallycone Island
Exemptions on HI are bid for, and the prices range wildly between one hundred oz to one oz, depending on when in the auction cycle the expemption is purchased. The richer HI’s buy their exemptions first, driving up the price, then the price goes down toward the middle of the cycle. Towards the end of the cycle the price goes up again.
22: New Brazil
New Brazil, which joined after New Texas, has a similar system for exemptions, except their economy is at a lower status, so their exemptions go for considerably less.
23: New Texas
Exemptions are priced in the following manner: Each father indicates how much he will pay to have his son or daughter be exempt. The state then gives the exemptions, starting with the highest paying and moving down until the exemptions are gone. Each father actually pays the amount they stated, regardless of what others paid. Thus suppose that there will be 100,000 total exemptions given and:
10,000 fathers pledge 1000 oz in gold (current US$ Equivalent as of 3/29/11 = $1,420,000)
50,000 fathers pledge 500 oz in gold (current US$ Equivalent as of 3/29/11 = $710,000)
100,000 fathers pledge 250 oz in gold (current US$ Equivalent as of 3/29/11 = $355,000)
1,000,000 fathers pledge 200 oz in gold (the winning amount at the last cull)
Then 100,000 exemptions are given, with 10k paying the 1k oz, 50k paying the 500 oz, and 40k paying the 250 oz. And, since the price was 250 this year, the next years exemptions would probably go for more. Exemptions for sons and daughters are listed and priced completely differently, with daughters exemptions typically being much higher, as many more daughters are culled then sons (boys being much more likely to volunteer or be caught for some crime and inducted. Exemptions are useless if one has committed a crime. ).
Appendix C: The number of exemptions/culls
The fleet examined the population of each planet and required all populations above a certain critical mass to give 5% of their population, each year, to the fleet, consisting entirely of newly mature adolescents. This was not quite the handicappe it might be assumed to be among our populations as these were almost all colony planets and had a very standard population pyramid for such societies… ie largely youth heavy. This, then, was augmented by the calculation, by the fleet, of how much a given planet ‘should’ increase in population.
24: New Texas
Thus New Texas which started with an initial population of 10,000,000 was assessed and initial ‘cull’ of 500,000 individuals a month, including conceived children still in utero, and this amount was increased by 1% a year, both amounts causing huge objections by the NT leadership when it was first presented to them in secret. But as the alternative the fleet presented was to wipe the planetary population clean (starting with the leadership) and restart with a more ‘willing’ population, the planet quickly complied. The cultural changes that were implemented immediately were highly successful, however, and, at the time of the story, the cull represented just under 4% of the planetary population per year.
This seems draconian, but the combination of massively increased fertility plus good access to pre and neonatal health care resulted in a dramatic number of children/woman, with the average during the time of our story being 8 living children, two of which could be expected to be recruited or culled. In addition, most of the recruits are voluntary, and include a partner and at least a conceived child, both of whom count for the number taken. As a result only 1% of the population is, at any one time, in ‘finishing school’ where they (along with the prison population) are eligible for the cull. Each year aprox 50% of the finishing school is culled.
Appendix D: The timeline of NT life
Childhood: Pre-puberty: During childhood the child is completely in the care of their parents. No registration etc. is necessary. Schooling is per-choice.
Puberty: At puberty the child is required to go to their doctor, to have puberty confirmed and genetic testing done. They take these results to the local recruitment office where the child and their parents also fill out a variety of tests concerning mental ability, skills, religion/culture etc. The child is then ‘registered’.
Puberty II: At various times as the child develops they visit their doctor again until they are declared mature enough for breeding. During childhood and puberty a child who commits a crime is publicly flogged, along with their father.
Eligible: for the next two years the child is ‘eligible’ for partnering. Partnering is for life, birth control (including abstinence) is categorically forbidden, and the partnership needs to be both registered and consummated to be official (although emergency exceptions are made, as Aliya was hoping would happen to her when she was about to be culled. A boy could have declared himself her partner and they would have been tested for ‘consummation’ the next day… giving them time to make his lie a reality. ) During eligibility and beyond a child who commits a crime is inducted, unless the crime is a death penalty crime.
Finishing school: If the child is still unpartnered after two years of eligibility (they are still called a ‘child’ or boy or girl if they aren’t partnered) they are required to attend a ‘finishing school’ of their choice. They are now eligible for the standard cull… ie not because of some offence.
Bachelor age: A child who gets through finishing school neither partnered nor culled is considered a ‘bachelor’ and is available for regular employment; often at a higher pay level than their partnered counterparts since they are eligible for considerably more hours of work per week, and are never pregnant, etc.
Final choice: Two years is the maximum allowed for bachelors. If they haven’t partnered during that time they are involuntarily partnered after a two week ‘final choice’ conference. Almost no one reaches that stage, though, as everyone that attends the conference knows they must make their ‘final choice’.
Any attempt to evade or any violation of these rules or stages is an automatic grounds for culling. Various cultures are allowed to have exceptions, as long as the end result (average age of marriage, first child, etc. ) are the same.
Cull OOB
Space Council
Defense Council
General of the Force (or Admiral of the Force)
(Army)
(General of the Army)
Sector General
Front General
Commanding General
Colonel
Captain
Lt
Sgt
Cprl
Private
(Fleet)
(Admiral of the Fleet)
Sector Admiral (or Transport Admiral)
Front Admiral
Fleet Admiral (or just Admiral)
Captain (or heavy captain)
Commodore
Lt
Midshipmen
Crew
(Pathfinders)
(Front General)
Colonel
Captain
Lt
Sgt
Cprl
Private
(Deep Space Miners)
(Front General)
Commander
Sub-Commander
Ship-commander
Crew
(Scouts)
(Front General)
Commander
Sub-Commander
Ship-Commander
Crew
(Colonizers)
(Front General)
(Colonel- Army position, not in command of troops)
(Colonels staff)
Colonists
Alternate Chapters
== Staring from ‘I walked thorugh the door…
Orientation notes
History
NS attacked, destroys invader
-tell about NS
NS response, finds several alien planets, discovers alien nature
NS forms coalition with several like minded planets
Story of NT secret meeting
-threat
-solution
-cull
-Exemptions given and sold
-Pro war recruit drive
-media
-movies
-exemption industry
-cultural exemptions with same result
-each planet responds differently with same result
Alien anatomy/physiology
-no herd I nstinct
-women, little known, develop same, bigger physically
-worry they are communicators/ information exchangers
Growth
-Eggs
-swimmers
-Juvie
-pack, not herd
-worker
-leader
-genius
-??
No death via age
-ind genious but little/no cooperation
Map, large circle enemy
-example of radioactive decay
-humans must be damper rods
-prvent arise of mature forms
Planets of the coalition
-Highlands planet, only 10% settleable per humans,
Ice world
-spinning rock warms water
-ice shell around water
-no alien go there
-new human headquarters
-deep in alien territory
—
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May 29, 2011, 4:49 pm
Appendix P: Colonization Force Training
The Colonization Force uses the most advanced version of the VRT (Virtual-Reality-Training) suit. This suit goes far beyond the VR suit of earlier days. The VRT suit not only shows its user (and allows them to feel, smell, hear, etc. ) a virtual world, it is also capable of controlling the users muscles while working in that world. A user that does not know how to swim, for example, can be taught to swim by the computer using this method. They enter the virtual water and the VRT suit moves their muscles for them in the correct swimming pattern. It then measures the work of the underlying nervous system signals to see when the user begins to mimic the action of the VRT suit so that it can release those nerves to actually move the muscles.
Over time more and more muscles are released to the user until he is actually swimming. As corrections are needed along the way, the muscles are again seized, until the necessary brain pathways are built.
The other incredibly efficient feature of the VRT system is that the system is able to keep a database of all of the user’s capabilities… thus never going over skills unnecessarily, nor advancing past the user’s knowledge when testing reveals ignorance.
Appendix Q: The Recruitment system on various planets
25: Newtonia
Newtonia holds a strict lottery when the couple is first assigned at puberty, with children being assigned life-roles, which includes assignment to the CF.
26: Halycone Island
Halycone has a bizarre recruitment system that is, basically, completely financial. Basically exemptions are bid for and those not exempt are ‘recruited’. These recruits, which are always 50% male and 50% female due to the system of auctioning, are then sent to a two month ‘matchmaking’ party where they match up and, at the end of the party, join the Colonization Force en masse.
The exception, of course, is the normal prisoners and the culls matched with them. Hallycone has a rather relaxed legal system, however, so there don’t tend to be many of these.
The finances paid for the auction go half to the Colonization Force and half to the families of those recruited.
27: New Grenwhich?
All second children, males and females, are automatically recruited into the CF. Marriages on NG are arranged, with the will of the child taken into account to differing extent depending on the family and social class.
28: New Texas
At the time of NT membership in the Colonization Force NT had a population of approximately 10 million people and thus a recruitement quota of 500,000 a year, or 41,000 a month. NT organized themselves into 50 districts for the purposes of managing recruitment, thus each district had a ‘quota’ of aproximately 820 people a month.
The overwhelmingly normal method of meeting this goal was, of course, recruitement. The original signing of the Colonization Force treaty by the NT leadership was accompanied by an enormous wave of recruitement, meeting the entire years goal in approximately three months. Unlike normal military, their numbers were swelled by the fact that men, women, and children were all counted toward the goal, even including children in utero, with a medical exam even determining whether there were twins.
Even after the initial excitement most of the recruiting goals, approximately 90%, are still met by recruitement. Recruitement is managed at centers in each district, and staffed by near-retirement NT military personell, almost excusively sergants.
The second method of meeting the goal is the involuntary recruitment of prisoners. All non-capital punishement crimes except for the most trivial are ‘punished’ by involuntary recruitment. NT law underwent some interesting changes and, at the time of this book, prisoners were divided into two classes. Those who admitted guilt (and spared the state the expense of a trial) were given a brief home leave, and required to report for their ‘sentencing’ on Monday morning. Those, on the other hand, who demanded a trial were, if found guilty, not only immediatly transported, but also whipped.
The third method was related to the first two. Any prisoners without partners were matched with ‘culls’. Culls matched with prisoners were known as ‘true’ culls. As, for the most part, prisoners all admitted their guilt (or were found innocent) these culls were exclusive to Mondays.
Prisoners that fought their sentence, on the other hand, could be found guilty, and immediatly transported, on any day (except Saturdays and Sundays, of course, when the courts weren’t open).
In addition, there were a class of culls known (on the inside of the system) as ‘honor’ culls. These were culls matched with already serving members of the Colonization Force (typically if not always from their home system) or recruits. Often the serving member would come back to their home planet for a leave to attend the memorial of their partner and would be partnered after the service and leave were over (for example Jessica?). Others would remain on scene and their partner would come to them (Beth-any and Carl).
Recruits rarely came into the system unpartnered, as the financial etc. incentive was very high for them to partner, and get their partnere pregnant, first.
The final method of meeting the quota, and NT prided itself on how rarely this happened, was ‘pure’ culling. A district which, over a few months, was not reaching their quota, would after exhauting the more natural ‘recruitement’ methods, quietly resort to ‘pure’ culling: culling both a boy and a girl to partner with each other.
The culling system involved a computer system and a series of officials. Some are purely administrative, and all are employed by New Texas itself. The two officials that are commonly known by the public are the reader and the binder,w ho travel around picking up culls.
The result of this system is the following:
Recruits: Monday through Friday there is a fairly steady stream of recruits to the various recruitment centers, which exist in all large towns and many smaller ones.
Culls: The list of those prisoners who have admitted guilt and their matches are processed during the week and available by Monday. The cullers travel from school to school on Monday, stopping by the induction centers (one per district) when their vans get to full.
During the rest of the week they pick up culls for prisoners that had a trial and honor culls.
Prisoners: Prisoners present themselves to induction centers Monday morning; or, if they had a trial, the court system delivers them whenever they are available during the week.
The end result is that Mondays are very busy, with most other days rather quiet.
The Colonization Force participation:
Colonization Force personell are only involved in this system once someone is committed to the CF. Each recruitment center has a Colonization Force member, usually fleet, who conducts physicals… one each for the male and female sides. Each induction center has a medical personell who puts the new recruits, prisoners, or culls, into the med cylinders and monitors them.
Med cylinders can hold someone for at least 48 hours completely safely, and longer when needed. This means that the Colonization Force shuttles have a more routine schedule, picking up med cylinders from one center after another and taking them to the ship.
The initial training personell on board ship, as well, have a more routine schedule. Whenever enough cylinders are available, from whatever locations, they are unpacked and the initial training (for Aliyah this was the Newtonian, and for Andrew he had a man from Halycone Island) is accomplished, and people sent to their cells.
The various groups tend to be isolated on the ship: with recruits and their families, older prisoners and their families, and culls forming three, seperate, groups. Andrew and Aliyah were odd in that they were placed with the prisoners/culls as per Aliyah’s status.