Things to See, Places (Not) to Go (8)

Spandore (Diaspora Margin): The formerly inhabitable planet of its system, Spandore was once home to a worldbound species that achieved a high-technology civilization with particular advancement in the fields of biochemistry and genetic engineering.

Unfortunately, several centuries to a millennium before contact (approximately), the planetary civilization wiped itself out in a global war, utilizing a large number of biological, ecological, mutagenic, and teratogenic weapons, along with a smaller number of “salting” nucleonic weapons. The ensuing apocalypse, bolstered by the synergetic effects of these weapons upon encountering each other, destroyed 90% of the planetary population and effectively transformed the descendants of the surviving remainder into monsters as twisted as the thousands of biological weapons systems, both microscopic and macroscopic, which continue to roam the planet today.

Due to the obvious risk potential of these weapons, Spandore is an interdicted planet, protected by an englobement grid. Unlike the majority of englobement grids operating under the aegis of the Conclave Commission on Latent Threats, however, that of Spandore is relatively easy to bypass – in the inward direction.

Since every known attempt to run the grid by those attempting to recover Spandorian biological weapons for their own purposes has resulted in a variety of horrifying deaths before any attempt to leave the planet could be made – the grid beacons monitor and record these events as well as they can from orbital overwatch, and append the resulting recordings to outgoing warning advisories – this author feels safe in ascribing this particular peculiarity to the Commission’s taste for irony.

– Leyness’s Worlds: Guide to the Ecumene