Keeper

2016_K

(Alternate words: kindergarten, kinetic.)

BLACKFALL’S LANDING, KAMEQÓ

[Informational: Until 27 hours previous to message dispatch, the city of Blackfall’s Landing was designated as Ilin Var; such codings may still be in use.]

Another coup has rocked the former Whatever of Kameqó today with the ascension of Lord Blackfall, unquestioned savior of the Kameqán people

[Informational: q.v. Spintronic Fictions, Shadowed Planet, emergent intelligence]

and destined Overlord of the Starfall Arc, to the position of Keeper of the Eternal Kameqán Empire and Master of All. In his first and so far only speech for public consumption, Lord Blackfall instructed his new citizens to “rejoice at Blackfall’s coming, and revel in the freedom and dignity that comes only with total submission to Blackfall’s commands”, adding that “their petty, insignificant lives would finally know purpose in in supporting the greatness that is Blackfall, and his Empire of One Million Years”.

Despite the greater than usual bloodshed of the coup – in which Lord Blackfall’s just and proper disintegration of the weak-willed fools and mindless mongrels comprising the former Kameqán political class proved substantially more thorough than is typical of a Kameqán coup – local opinion, while subdued, proved supportive of the new regime, with particular reference to the legal and economic reforms already instituted and the promise of more to come.

[Informational: Despite and due to this publication’s normal skepticism with regard to news releases originating in autocratic regimes, this appears to be true for the moment.]

Interstellar governance commentator Victoria Diarch’s initial remarks perhaps sum up the Accord’s response to the situation: “Well, whatever he is and whereever he came from, he has to be more competent than the last ones.”

 

Whatever of Kameqó

Single-system polity, consisting of the star system of Kameqó (Uulder Shore) with the exception of a small number of independent drifts. Its unusual galactographic sobriquet comes from its extreme governancial instability. Over the last century, Kameqó has enjoyed the following governances:

  • Kingdom of Kameqó (constitutional monarchy)
  • Kingdom of Kameqó (absolute monarchy)
  • Republic of Kameqó (democracy)
  • Holy Land of Kameqó (theocracy)
  • Kameqóan Militate (military junta)
  • Lintenian Kameqó Protectorate (externally-imposed governance following an unsuccessful attempt at interstellar imperialism)
  • Restored Regent-Kingdom of Kameqó (regency)
  • Confederated Workers’ Soviets of Kameqó (communist state)
  • Kameqóan Interregnal Period (anarchy)
  • Eternal Holy Land of Kameqó (theocracy)
  • Civic Plutocracy of Kameqó (corporate city-states)
  • People’s Republic of Kameqó (socialist democracy)
  • People’s Techlepathic Republic of Kameqó (hive-mind democracy)
  • Ascetacy of Kameqó (primitivist)
  • Panic Guilds of Kameqó (prandialist syndicracy)

Despite this rapid turnover in governance, the Kameqó system remains relatively safe to visit for outsiders, provided that they refrain from opining on political topics or otherwise appearing to take any sides in local political affairs; unusually, the Kameqóan political sects tend to concentrate their internecine warfare on each other, and even local “non-polit” residents find it possible to keep their heads down and get on with their lives, despite the ongoing rain of inconvenience from above and the severely deleterious effect it has on the system economy.

The primary export of the Kameqó polity is newsbytes; its primary imports include weapons, relief supplies, political memes, and sociodynamicists. Those considering speculative trade should bear in mind that, due to the aforementioned deleterious effects, Kameqóan local currency is commonly valued below an equivalent volume of blank scrip, and is in any case subject to complete devaluation at the next change in governance; trading only in hard currency is advised.

Libertist theorists point to Kameqó as an example of the systemic failure modes inherent in any kind of cratic governance. Serious libertist theorists point to Kameqó as an example of a pathological case that makes for a terrible example.

– Leyness’s Worlds: Guide to the Ecumene