Defictionalization: My terrific taste for metafiction aside, this also happens in-world, quite a bit. Most notable, perhaps, is the incident (see: Stranger Than Fiction) in which the protagonist species from the virtuality game (novel, InVid, watchvid, and slinky) An Ending Not In Fire, the temĂsi, arthĂĄl, and zal!en were
âIt is ridiculous, and near-slanderous, to suggest that âfree traderâ is synonymous with âsmugglerâ! Why, I can guarantee that over fifty percent of voyages made by our members involve no illicit or even borderline-illicit cargoes at all.â âYouâre counting the inward legs separately, arenât you?â âThatâs beside
Defcon Five: Three of these systems, actually. The Admiralty has its âstrategic conditionâ levels, in both global and theater senses, ranging from Six (âall is peaceful, quiet, tranquil, and frankly boringâ) to One (âfull-blown war, or, if this is the global level, galactic armageddonâ). Likewise, the Emergency Management Authority has
Deface of the Moon: Monuments are by far the commonest type of this; with small moons, even, sometimes, although far more common are things like carved mountains. (The minor range to the âeastâ of Calmirie is the classic example, slowly being carved one mountain at a time into likenesses of
Decorative Apostrophe: Theyâre not decorative. Nor are the other accents. The acute indicates a long vowel; the diaeresis indicates, as it does in other languages, that two vowels are pronounced separately, and an apostrophe, found trailing a vowel with a diaeresis, indicates that that vowel is both long and
Decade Dissonance: Played fully straight. The gaps in the Associated Worlds are full of backward âForgotten Worldsâ and âUnemergedâ, who either are undeveloped enough to not have anything anyone wants, or who managed â after reaching non-worldbound status â to squander whatever cultural capital they had without bootstrapping themselves to meaningful star
Well, I was going to write something about the nature of evil and all that for today, seeing as this is post number 666, but honestly, I couldnât think of anything suitable. Which may or may not have something to do with my plague of the day, which I
âFive scientist-explorers were exploring an abandoned outpost in the Expansion Regions one day when they came across a freshly-excavated artifact, still humming with power and covered in unknown controls. âThe first, a galari, said âWe should transport this back to our laboratory, so that we can investigate it properly, and
Death World: In one very real sense, most of them, since most worlds that arenât your own come complete with an atmohydrosphere that you canât breathe, a temperature that will probably kill you, and quite possibly a very unhelpful gravity, to boot. Many of the Apocalypse How worlds
Death Ray: Far too many to mention. Plasma lances (a.k.a. giant freakinâ electrolasers â very much above stunner grade) are the classic example, but far from the only one. But for the world as a whole, missile storms and railgun choruses are generally to be preferred.
J is for Junklight, the glow in the sky. Thousands of stations shine as they pass by. K is for Kinesis, to move with the will. A thought made a deed while the body is still. L is for Lighthugger the fastest of ships. For beyond the Worldsâ edge, the
CATHCHAL (Principalities) â A prominent codramaju businesssoph and head of the Surameru Trading Coalition, Surameru Kenth, was reported killed today at the Starcradle Xenodochium in CĂŠmĂĄlles, Cathchal, after falling into a waste-disposal conduit. In an apparent oversight, the safety parameters of the Xenodochium recycling system had not been updated to include