Sanity IV is nearing completion of mining.

A sports and entertainment arena similar to a habdrill orbits the planet, and live feeds from The Virtual Dome are broadcast throughout the mining colonies and fed to the entire empire via Imperinet, the Imperial Internet.

Click planet and tour images to open full-sized in another window.

Miner City is a collection of domed habitats, called habdrills. Each habdrill is an independent district, populated by up to 10,000 individuals. Habdrills are transported to different worlds via a habship. When they arrive, they detach and anchor themselves to the planet, moon, or asteroid being mined. Trade secrets long held by the miners prevent explanation of the technology here.

Initially connected to each other by tubes built after anchoring, the habdrills are merely part of one larger city. No worker is actually a resident of the world where he/she works, but is an empire citizen of Miner City, an independent world of its own. So, even though one million people live and work on Sanity IV, not one of them is a resident of the planet.

Sanity IV is nearing completion of mining.

The gravity well in the Sanity system makes it an ideal jump point. Occasionally, an errant asteroid interferes with navigation. It is a myth that jumping into Sanity IV's space can trigger space time disruptions. If that were true, events would repeat at random intervals. This has never been observed. If that were true, events would repeat at random intervals.

Sanity IV is nearing completion of mining.

Qallag is a major crossroads. Seven different planets in the Tarthian Empire lie one jump away.

Without drugs, human, Tyran, and Chiasmii pilots often suffer extreme jumpsickness when "shooting the flames", a reference to the "flaming hole" left by a ship's jump engines. The Kin do not suffer jumpsickness. Stars appear blurred during the transition from hyperspace to realspace.

Below, one of the Droid Discovery ships seems to punch a hole in space during a stopover near the Qallag system.

Click planet and tour images to open full-sized in another window.

Qallag was colonized in 4649 tradestandard. The only other planet conquered that year by Empress Destoiya was Badledeerin, site of the famous "Last Ground War" in the empire. Qallag's citizens refused to take part in the assault.

Their protests against the devastating war were passive but effective and helped end the war early. Peaceful disruption of business by sitting or lying across entryways was called Qallaging, and was later simply referred to as lagging.

Only the planet Kyrenie has as many jumppoints as Porosen la. No less than eight worlds are reachable within one jump point from here.

The finest technology is developed and exported. It is the home of NETway Systems, one of the largest jump-point companies in the empire.

Crystals mined on Kyrenie are tuned here for use on ships throughout the Empire.

Click planet and tour images to open full-sized in another window.

To accommodate less technologically advanced transports, older freighters, and small craft, the command centers all provide access for less than top-of-the-line technology. The seeming chaos is actually tightly controlled.

Automated systems are run by sentient androids as well as humans. False color is generated by the jump point opening, which casts a glow around ships and for a moment or two, makes color fade to gray.

Ohy gets its red color from sand and rock. The black areas are its seas, and the greenish yellow and red are landmasses. Of the planets created by the Terraformer's Circle of Fellowship, while Ohy was not the first to be completed, it was the first to be successfully inhabited.

Click planet and tour images to open full-sized in another window.

Here is the official denial that Ohy is a "dumping ground" for misbehaving soldiers: "While it is true that some soldiers routed to Ohy on tours of duty have been involved in less than stellar behavior, it is not true that duty on Ohy is considered punishment." It is interesting though, that slang for duty on Ohy is "Shipped to Oh H*ll."

Occasionally, civilians do manage to find their way into areas not generally permitted.

Our intrepid and wandering artist, Nim, sent us this message recently:
Here is the Ohy outpost. Had to do some sneaking around so they didn't catch me. Sorry it took so long to send the file. NETway was giving me grief over the size but in the end money helps people see your point of view. Since I changed my encryption, they didn't even know what kind of file I sent. It sure pays to have friends on Tarth who are in the "market."