H
HANZO TENSEGRITY: insurance company based out of Sol. Not known for their customer satisfaction.
HATCHING POOLS: shallow tidal pools where Wranaui would hatch their eggs. Now replicated in artificial pools for travel and convenience. Upon hatching, young Wranaui are combative and cannibalistic; only the strongest few survive.
HDAWARI: large, saltwater carnivore native to Pelagius. One of only a few predators known to prey upon adult Wranaui. Closely related to Wranaui but less intelligent.
HEPTARCHY: ruling council of the Old Ones. (See also Highmost.)
HERESY OF THE FLESH: see Tfeir.
HIBERNACULUM: Entropist term for a cryo tube.
HIGH LFARR: a famed prominence on Pelagius. Temperate weather made it a favorite location for Wranaui hatching pools. Later, acquired enormous socio-political and religious significance with the discovery of several artifacts of the Old Ones built upon it. Original site of the Wranaui Conclave (later the Abyssal Conclave) prior to the joining of the Arms and the ascendency of the regnant form.
HIGHMOST: wielder of the Staff of Blue. Leader of the Heptarchy.
HIVE MIND: psycho-mechanical joining of two or more brains. Usually accomplished by continual-beam synchronization of subject implants, ensuring agreement between intero-, extero-, and proprioceptive stimuli. Total exchange of prior sense memory is a common (though not required) part of establishing a hive mind. Effective range depends on signaling bandwidth and tolerance for lag. Breakdown tends to occur when physical proximity exceeds tolerance. Largest recorded hive mind was forty-nine, but experiment was short-lived as participants experienced debilitating sensory overload.
HUNTER-SEEKER: small drones used for surveillance and assassination.
HUTTERITE EXPANSION: series of intensive colonization efforts by Reform Hutterites, starting in the Solar System and expanding outward following the discovery of FTL. The period is said to begin shortly after the construction of Earth’s first space elevator and end with the settlement of Eidolon. (See also Reform Hutterites.)
HYDROTEK CORP.: company specializing in hydrogen extraction and refinement around gas giants. Hydrotek stations are the main refueling and remassing facilities in most systems.
I
IDEALIS: as the Seed is able to change shape/form at will, the Wranaui consider it the Platonic “ideal” of physical embodiment.
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IPD: interplanetary diploma. Only educational degree accepted throughout all of settled space. Accreditation is overseen by Bao University on Stewart’s World in cooperation with several schools in Sol. IPDs cover most relevant subjects, including law, medicine, and all the major sciences.
ITC: Interstellar Trade Commission. A department of the League tasked with overseeing interstellar commerce. Its remit includes enforcing standards, collecting tariffs, and fraud prevention, as well as providing loans and resources to spur economic growth throughout settled space.
J
JELLIES: see Wranaui.
K
KNOT OF MINDS: in general, any group of Wranaui bound and dedicated to a singular purpose. A solemn and sacred joining. Traditionally sealed by winding one’s tentacles/limbs around those of the other bondees. As such, a Knot often only has seven members (that being the number of primary tentacles the main Wranaui form has), but the concept is often expanded to include more. In the modern era, a Knot can be formed over lowsound nearscent, but there is a bias against those Knots as being less binding than those formed in person.
Specifically: the Knot founded by Shoal Leader Nmarhl and its compatriots with the purpose of opposing Ctein’s leadership and safeguarding the Idealis later bonded with Kira Navárez.
L
LAMP LINES: seaweed-like growths that provide illumination in the depths of the Plaintive Verge.
LAPSANG TRADING CORPORATION: interstellar conglomerate that began as a mercantile venture before shifting into founding, funding, and running colonies such as Highstone on Weyland. Headquartered on Stewart’s World. Slogan: “Forging the future together.”
LEAGUE OF ALLIED WORLDS: (LAW) interstellar government formed after the discovery of the Great Beacon on Talos VII. Consists of the settlements in and around Sol, Alpha Centauri, Epsilon Indi, Epsilon Eridani, and 61 Cygni.
LION CLAM: animal native to Eidolon. Noted for its amber shell. Used in the manufacture of a sepia-colored ink.
LOADER BOT: semi-autonomous robots used for manual labor.
LOWSOUND: vocal emanations used by Wranaui for communication over long distances in their oceans. Similar to whale song.
LOWSOUND FARSCENT: traditionally a combination of the two methods Wranaui use for long-distance communication in water. More commonly, a term for STL or FTL transmissions, such as radio.
LUTSENKO DEFENSE INDUSTRIES: a Ruslan-based munitions company.
M
MACHINE BOSS: see Boss.
MAG-SHIELD: either the magnetospheric dipolar torus of ionized plasma used to protect spaceships from solar radiation during interplanetary trips or the magneto-hydrodynamic system used for braking and thermal protection during reentry.
MANYFORM: see Seed.
MARKOV BUBBLE: sphere of subluminal space permeated with a conditioned EM field that allows for tardyonic matter to transition through the membrane of fluidic spacetime into superluminal space.
MARKOV DRIVE: antimatter-fueled machine that allows for FTL travel. (See also unified field theory.)
MARKOV, ILYA: engineer and physicist who outlined the unified field theory in 2107, thus allowing for modern FTL travel.
MARKOV LIMIT: distance from a gravitational mass at which it becomes possible to sustain a Markov Bubble and thus transition to FTL travel.
MEDIBOT: robotic assistant capable of diagnosis and treatment for all but the most difficult cases. Doctors rely on medibots for the majority of surgeries. Many ships forego a doctor entirely, prioritizing cost savings over the relatively small risk of needing a human physician.
MEDIFOAM: sterile, antibiotic-laced foam that hardens into a semi-flexible cast. Used to stop bleeding, immobilize fractures and, when injected into bodily cavities, prevent infection.
MILCOM: official UMC communication network.
N
NANOASSEMBLER: 3-D printer that utilizes nanobots to produce complex shapes, machines, and—given the appropriate stock—biological structures such as muscles, organs, and seeds.
NARU-CLASS: medium-mass Wranaui ships that carry a limited number of troops. Usually no more than three squids, two or three crawlers, and the same number of snappers.
NEARSCENT: chemicals secreted by Wranaui for communication. Their primary method of conveying linguistic and non-linguistic information.
NEST OF TRANSFERENCE: Wranaui device for copying memories and basic brain structures from one body to another. Also used to imprint stored personalities/memories onto a new body after the original individual dies. (See also Tfeir.)
NIGHTMARES: malignant, self-sustaining growths caused by an unsuccessful joining between Seed and host (usually when either Seed or host—or both—are damaged beyond proper repair).
NNAR: coral-like organism native to Pelagius, commonly used as a decorative element by the Wranaui. Some varieties secrete a clear coating that has mild psychotropic effects on the immature forms of the Wranaui.