The Planet Venice, Eakoi Subsector, Reavers' Deep

Date: Sun, 9 Apr 1995 09:55:36 -0400
From: Mark Urbin
Subject: Venice article data

Here is the Venice data again. I should sit down with my copy of World Tamers today and work out more detailed world data.
(Pocket list history quiz: How long have I been saying that? ;-})

Venice circa 1115: C35A995-8	Hi Wa	714 Na         114 Na M5 III DM         F

Water World, thin atmosphere, population 7 billion (3.25 billion human & 3.75 billion Phin), TL 8, Civil service beauracy gov. Law level permits long arms.

The seven largest landmasses are no larger than the island of Hawaii on Terra.

The Class D starport is on the island of Rome. The islands of Urbino and Naples are government-run resorts, where vacations are expensive or available as top prizes in the government run raffles.

The other large islands, Bern, Bonn, Liverpool and Dresden, are heavy industrial sites. Workers are housed offshore in floating buildings or buildings anchored on the shallow sea bottom surrounding the islands.

Most of the planet's population lives in floating cities, built out of locally manufactured light plastics (a kelp derivative). Solar and wind power is used to crack water into hydrogen, which fuels MHD turbines for steady power. The cities serve as bases for various sea-product industries, including fish and kelp farms, fishing fleets, sea-based dredge mining, and light manufacturing industries. These cities are built of linked buildings designed wide and deep for stablity. The cities float free with stablizing engines built in buildings to keep a city from drifting too far from their area of ocean - though buildings, neighborhoods, and whole cities occaisionally move. The cities also provide 'shore leave' and other support to smaller vessels.

There are also cities built on the summit of submerged mountain or plateau tops. The `ground floors' of these cities are from 50 to 150 meters below the surface. Most buildings rise above the water level. Power comes from a combination of solar, wind, petrochem, MHD turbines and nuclear fission.

Neo-Amsterdam, the largest of these cities, is built on a string peaks along an undersea mountain chain, with `floating-city' structures providing connections. Neo-Amsterdam is one of the primary sources for TL 8 electronics on the planet. Neo-Amsterdam has a population of 63 Million Solmani decended humans and Phins.

The mountain top hubs that make up the Neo-Amsterdam chain are called, Manhatten, Bronks, Brooklyne, Konigin, Staten, Scarsdale, Pokipsea, Neo Paltz, Bison and Albany.

Smaller than the floating cities are city-ships, large (50-100Kton) vessels carrying an industry and its thousands of workers. The industry moves to its resources. For instance, the Dutchess County filter-mines metals from the sea water (preferably near active under-sea volcanoes). It's crew filters several metals from the sea water, refines the metal, and rolls the ingots, selling several types of finished metal product - then delivers the metal as needed. Other industries include large scale fishing, seaweed farming, submerged mining operations, and petrochem extraction. City ships are powered by imported fusion or locally built fission reactors, petrochem-powered (if the city-ship has access to a pumping station), or by IC engines fueled by a high-energy alcohol analog brewed from kelp. This fuel, Kelphol, is also a popular export item. A cut down version is flavored with local additives and sold under the brand name `Venician Flame Water'. VFW is a popular drink in parts of Reavers Deep.

Notice that more than half of the population is (dol)Phins. Some of these work in close cooperation with the humans - some as `fishboys' at the fish farms, spotting and repairing holes in the nets, driving schools of fish toward collection pens. Others scout for fishing ships, safety swim buddies for human divers, and undersea construction workers. Many also live 'free' in mid-ocean.

Venice does a lot of trade with the Ekaftouth system. Ekaftouth is an asteroid belt system with no human/aslan friendly planets. High tech items and rare metals flows from Ekaftouth. Venice exports fresh foodstuffs and provides a vacation spot with gravity, sky and beaches.

Venice        1534 C35A7FD-6	Wa i1	714 Na         114 Na M5 III DM         F

Venice	1534 D35A764-4	Wa	114 Na			914 Na M5 III DM

Venice was first infected by a `Destroyer' strain of the Virus. Infection was through a 200 ton trader. It infected the Class D starport computers on the island of Rome, before crashing into the starport's fuel refinery. A 400 ton trader docked at the port was infected also. It rose just high enough to smash into a powered down SDB. The starport was reduced to a Class X starport in about 90 seconds. There are a few patches of concrete large enough to land a 200 ton trader, but's that's about all you will get in the way of services. There might be some equipment stored underground still. Natives won't go to Rome anymore. The Rad count is still a bit high. There are also still tales foating about from those who escaped the island.

A lot of lives were lost very quickly. Submersible vessels took their occupents with them when infected. Computer assisted deep diving suits became computer assisted coffins. Fly by wire aircraft adopted the glide ratio of one winged pelicans. The lower levels in Seamount top and floating cities flooded, trapping and killing hundreds of millions within 24 hours in the initial infection. Several floating cities and City-Ships sank out right. Population continued a downward spiral over the next 30 years. Loss of weather satellites resulted in lower kelp crop results. Lack of high tech equipment to harvest it with made the problem even worse. Lack of aircraft to spot fish schools and the equipment to do fish harvesting in massive quantities resulted in dramatic reductions in the fish harvests. Many people starved during this time.

By 1175, Venice was again producing more than enough food for it's population. Venice has some 900,000,000 humans. Figure at least that many Phin. Many Clans are living `free' in the oceans and don't like to be counted. About half of the Phin harnesss were equiped with radios and locator beacons. These where used when they surfaced. This allowed closer communication with shipboard humans in fish herding and mining operations. Many infected harnesses used their waldo's to destroy themselves. Unfortunally the Virus really couldn't tell the difference between the harness and the Phin wearing at the time. A lot of Phin's died that first day. The harnesses without the radio equipment survived fairly well. There was a lot of mistrust of harnesses after that, by both Phins and humans. Distrust between some Phin clans and humans broke out years later when several Phins known to own functional harnesses where found dead and their harnesses missing. Shortly after that incident, the City-Ship Ulster County brought it's main computer back online. Seems they had some how found some uninfected CPU's to repair it with. The Ulster County sank four years later. A re-infection had caused considerable internal damage. A combination of high pressure steam leaks and Kelphol storage tanks exploding. Survivors also claim explosions from below the waterline hastened the vessel's sinking.

The Phin clan MacKensy still is a major owner in the City-Ship Columbia County. A Kelphol powered vessel that contains the only major Phin hospital left operating on planet.

The MacKensy and Mcleod Phin clans are intergal parts of two of the largest organized salvage operations on Venice.

Other Virus side effects. All the communications and weather satellites were either destroyed rendered inoperable when the Virus first hit. Any satellites still in orbit can be considered targets or plunder waiting to be taken.

[ --I have two views on this. 1) Such space junk is seen as a source of possible Virus infection and should be destroyed. Good target practice for your laser gunners. A typical low tech `scavenger' approach. 2) Such space junk is a wealth of spare parts. This is coming from those with the needed tech to protect themselves from reinfestation and the ability to make us of the electronics it can salvage-- ]

Venicians were never much of space going culture and remain planet bound in the New Era. Traders and explorers coming there can find a wealth of material though. At the low end is lot's of fresh food. Both meat (fish mostly) and veggies (mostly a wide varity of kelps, both raw and processed). The Venician processed kelps are a good shipboard foodstuff. It's concentrated; high in calories and protein; stores well and comes in a wide varity of flavors. The floating cities support a fraction of their former populations. They are a goldmine in old tech salvage. It's a time consuming process though. Many rooms in the still floating building were flooded or exposed to the salt water oceans and/or spray for the last 70 years. Rooms still sealed though hold TL 6-8 household and light consumer goods that will bring a good profit on many other planets in Reavers' Deep.

Venice's oceans made a good hiding spot for many pirates during the Hard Times. There are many rumors and tales of treasure cashes hidden beneath the waves. Every dozen or so years, one is found. This keeps the stories alive and fresh. Some tails tell of entire starships, stored underwater, powered down and Virus free...

The human & Phin natives of Venice are of Solmani decent. Some clans still take pride in their heritage. You can even find `offical' Solmani Party members in Neo Amsterdam and the City Ship Middlesex County. They are `pure' humans and damn proud of it. They dislike geengineered humans, particularly their Wuan `neighbors'. A Venician will however, take the side of a Wuan before that of an obvious alien. Wuans may be designed, but at least they don't have the fur pelts of the Aslan. This view doesn't not extend to their Solmani decended Phins though. Most Venician humans view the Phins as `brother Venicians'. The majority view the Ulster County affair as a dirty bit of history. There are extremist groups on either side though. Random acts of violence still happen (mostly when there are no witnesses to the acts).

The basic TL is 4. You can find pockets of 5 and 6 scattered about. When I say the TL is 4, I mean that is what the local population can produce. There are still pre-Virus items floating about. Some actually do float. Last count put a half dozen Contra-Grav vehicles on the planet. This includes one grav belt.

The current government structure of Venice is Balkinized/Feudal Technocracy. Kinda depends on where you land and who you talk to. The folks who produce TL 6 electronics at Neo Paltz will tell you that they are in charge. The folks producing steel on the Dutchess County will tell you that they are in charge. The O'Conner Phin clan living free in the southeastern hemisphere will tell you that they are the ones really in charge. Take your pick.

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