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Origins
The Discovery of Our Origins
The XenoGenesis Question
The Discovery of Khar-Toba
The Guidestone
Returning to Hiigara
The Guidestone
Kharakid Environment
Heresy Wars CIRCA 520
Kiiths
Kiith Gaalsien
Kiith Manaan
Kiith Naabal
Kiith Paktu
Kiith Sjet
Kiith Soban
The Mothership
Origins
The Discovery of Our Origins
The debate over our past on this world reaches back through the entire documented history of civilization, a period covering over 1,300 years. The harsh conditions across this world, Kharak, fueled the myths of other places and times where we did not have to spend so much of our strength on simple survival. The issue of our distant past had long been a primarily religious matter, but with the dawning of the Time of Reason, advances in the biological and chemical sciences revealed a disturbing lack of commonality between our biochemical makeup and that of most Kharakian life. Ironically, it was the birth of the Daiamid Movement, with its many scientific breakthroughs, that created a philosophical environment where the oldest myths and the newest theories could be wedded into what we now have accepted as the XenoGenesis Theory. Except for a small variety of bacteria and a single species of small forager, our helix proteins are completely different from those of all other forms of life on Kharak. We are left with no other choice but to seriously consider the theory that we are aliens to this world. Of course, this answer has only led to more questions.
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The XenoGenesis Question and Early Spaceflight Missions
It was becoming more obvious that we, as a species, were relatively new to Kharak, but this theory, by itself, did not bring peace to our world. The mechanism and reason for arrival was still being hotly debated and was even cause for a theological revival on the eve of our first orbital flights. The age of orbital exploration revealed the first clues that we were not the pawns of mysterious gods or travelers from another dimension. Once we had progressed to piloted flights, reports of unusual pieces of metallic debris in high orbit soon led to dedicated retrieval missions, with surprising results. While nothing larger than a handspan could be found, samples were brought down from orbit and soft-landed in the High Desert. Initial analysis made it clear these were pieces of advanced manufactured and machined structures. Detailed atomic analysis revealed trace elements and isotope combinations unknown on Kharak or, as it was eventually discovered, anywhere else in the planet's stellar system.
This was yet another piece to the puzzle of our origins, but it did not truly confirm anything except that some kind of alien device or ship had once orbited our world. Though not decisive, the discovery of this tiny debris belt spurred great leaps in metallurgy and manufacturing, simply by showing that exotic, high-tensile composite materials could exist. This in turn led to advances in propulsion, first with limited fissioning of unstable heavy elements, and then with more viable hydrogen fusion power plants as effective shielding systems became lighter and smaller. The combination of these technologies spurred our fledgling space program even further, and our first steps became leaps. We were poised on the threshold of space, looking outwards for answers, when a twist of fate turned our eyes back to the surface of our adopted world.
In 1106, a powerful radar satellite was launched in the hopes of detecting larger debris belts elsewhere in our star system. A malfunction in its maneuvering jets caused the satellite to turn towards Kharak and scan the surface. This turned out to have unforeseen benefits when a quick analysis showed the powerful radar had penetrated the equatorial desert sand to a depth of 75 meters and there was strong evidence of an ancient city centered on some sort of metallic structure.
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The Discovery of Khar-Toba
Despite conditions that would daunt personnel in modern enviro suits, by 1110 the first brave excavators managed to uncover what has come to be known as the First City, Khar-Toba. While this discovery was the stuff that anthrocists dream of, even greater secrets revealed themselves when the central metallic structure was found to be the skeleton of some kind of advanced vessel. Though virtually nothing of relevant substance remained except a vast array of structural beams, the real treasure lay in a shielded chamber deep below the surface. While tracing the ancient maze of power cables during the first triad of 1112, engineers opened a shielded chamber containing the wreck of the ancient ship's powerplant. Painstakingly transported to the modern polar capital of Tiir, this ancient device was back-engineered to provide another generation of breakthroughs in power and material sciences. But what catapulted our technology 500 years ahead was the analysis of a module attached to the powerplant. This device was nothing less than a solid-state Hyperspace Induction Module. After a decade of analysis, we were ready to take our first steps back out into the galaxy. It was not until 1135 that it was revealed just how far we had to go.
The powerplant and hyperspace module were considered the gems of ancient Khar-Toba, and with them safely in research labs in the temperate poles, the old city was left in the hands of a few dedicated anthrocists. They struggled to do their work under some of the harshest conditions on Kharak. Led by a young woman named Mevath Sagald, they gave our entire civilization an answer and a goal as she pieced together the location of the mythical Observatory Temple of Khar-Toba. Accidents left her to excavate the site nearly single-handedly, but when she opened the inner chamber she recognized immediately the full import of what she found, etched on a single piece of black stone.
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The Guidestone
Anthrocist Sagald had found something that was as unremarkable to the casual eye as it was monumental to the future of our people. When she studied this stone further, she discovered it had once been an ornately carved artifact that had been nearly destroyed by intense heat. Whatever message it had been originally intended to convey had long since been erased. Distant ancestors had cast it through time as a message to generations to come. Etched into the upper surface is a simple rendering of our spiral galaxy. A single gouged line leads from the galactic center out to a point close to the edge. This point corresponds with Kharak's actual position just outside the outer spiral arm of the galaxy. Adjacent to this point is a single string of numbers that yield a three-dimensional vector. At the other end of the line is a single ancient word, common to all clan dialects: Hiigara...Home.
The effect on our culture of this simple artifact, now known as the Guidestone, has been unprecedented. Our materials scientists confirmed the age of the artifact at approximately 3,000 years, and are assured that they can match the Guidestone to its system of origin should we come across it. After a long history of struggle, strife and inter-clan warfare, the confirmation that Kharak was never our true home inspired an era of co-operation like none ever known. For the past two hundred and fifty years there have therefore been no significant conflicts or bloodshed. We have dedicated our entire industrial and scientific resources towards a single, common goal:
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Returning to Hiigara...our Homeworld
The Guidestone
Found in the ruins of Khar-Toba, it has been dated at over 3000 years old. Precise galactic features and the indisputable coordinates of Kharak were etched into its dark surface. In a small area near the region representing the galactic core, a single ancient word is clearly visible: "Home". Had Archaeologist Sagald brought the Guidestone back to her own clan stronghold, Kharak might have found itself once again descending into partisan struggles over possession of the artifact and who would be first to exploit its secrets. Instead she realized what she had found was far more important than loyalties to family or clan. It was a startled gathering of High Ministers that found their debate disrupted by a sand-covered young woman carrying an ancient stone. By nightfall of the following day some of the greatest minds in the Daiamid had examined the Guidestone and confirmed not only its validity but also its implications. With this knowledge in hand the High Ministers returned to their home clans to bring the word that we were not indigenous to this planet. From the most powerful cross-territory industrial Clans to the smallest agricultural villages, the word was unanimous: The entire industrial and scientific might of all Kharak would be put to the task of following the path laid by the Guidestone. For the first time since we came to this world, we were one Clan.
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Kharakid Environment
Kharak is an old planet (6.7 billion years) that is nearing the end of its geological activity. Most major terrain features have been weathered down and vast deserts cover most of the world except for the polar regions. These are shielded from the encroaching sands by the three northern seas and the great Majiirian Ocean in the south. Temperatures along the Equator can approach the boiling point of water and the only life forms larger than microbes survive by burrowing deep under the sands and along sub-surface water channels or by hibernating during the hottest months. The polar regions are almost optimal for our people but the limited arable land and scarce resources has prevented our population from growing beyond 300 million people.
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Heresy Wars CIRCA 520
Early history on Kharak is marked by conflicts between various clans based on territorial considerations and religious dogma. This came to a head in 520 when the two largest clans in the north, the Siiddim and Gaalsien, went to war over the issue of what had caused the Gods to place us on such a world. The Siiddim believed that we had once been a great race living in paradise but had been punished by the Gods for our hubris and cast down to this world. The Gaalsien believed this idea to be heretical arrogance in the light of their belief that we had been created to suffer from the beginning and Kharak was all we could hope for. The conflict eventually spread to the southern zone as well. Even more obscure points of theology provided the rationalization for a series of wars, large and small, that lasted almost 300 years and created clan feuds that would not be put to rest until the discovery of the Guidestone.
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