Tuesday 25 November 2014

From The League To The Commonalty

(i) In "A Sun Invisible," David Falkayn is the factor on the planet Garstang's for the Solar Spice & Liquor Company and the Polesotechnic League. In "Starfog," Daven Laure is a Ranger of the Commonalty.

(ii) "A Sun Invisible" begins as Falkayn travels solo in a speedster through hyperspace to the planet Vanessa. "Starfog" begins as Laure, with the consciousness-level computer of his spaceship, Jaccavrie, travels through hyperspace to the planet Serieve.

(iii) Falkayn is forty light years from Beta Centauri, which is 350 light years from Earth, in the twenty fifth century whereas Laure is at the galactic fringe two spiral arms away in the seventy second century.

(iv) For information on his destination, Falkayn reads Terrestrial Pilot's Guide To The Beta Centauri Region on microreel. For information about what to expect at his destination, Laure asks Jaccavrie to display on screen a text molecularly recorded on a plugged-in memory cylinder.

(v) On Vanessa, Falkayn has a sometimes difficult conversation with the meter-tall factor Beljagor. On Serieve, Laure has a sometimes difficult conversation with the small physicist Vandange.

(vi) Beljagor would have preferred to be sent "'...an experienced man... '" rather than "'An unlicked cub!'" (The Van Rijn Method, p. 275). Vandange had hoped that "'...the Rangers would have sent a real team, instead of - '" (Flandry's Legacy, p. 721).

(vii) Beljagor denies that the blue giant, Beta Centauri, can have a planetary system. It does but those planets did not condense around that star. Vandange denies that the "Cloud Universe" as described by the Kirkasanters can exist. It does, although not as a separate universe.

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