Though the current project started as a series of posts charting my grief journey after the death of my mother, I am no longer actively grieving. Now, the blog charts a conversation in living, mainly whatever I want it to be. This is an activity that goes well with the theme of this blog (updated 2018). The Sense of Doubt blog is dedicated to my motto: EMBRACE UNCERTAINTY. I promote questioning everything because just when I think I know something is concrete, I find out that it’s not.
Hey, Mom! The Explanation.
Here's the permanent dedicated link to my first Hey, Mom! post and the explanation of the feature it contains.
Once he became 20th level, I made him an NPC in my Dming campaigns.
Hey, 20th level happened much more easily in those early days before second edition had come out.
Likewise, SARPEIDON popped into my head and started to get used for things that I shouldn’t tell you about for fear of security breach, not that any readers could really figure out where and how I used the term.
So, it comes from STAR TREK, which should be no surprise for anyone who knows me.
This post was a long time in the making.
It’s more for me than for you, so that I can remember what Sarpeidon is and where it comes from, just like I need to remember Sargon of Akkad and Baader-Meinhoff Phenomenon.
This next bit is not related to SARPEIDON but it's worth adding here.
via Warren Ellis - Late For Everything - OO 13 Aug 17
There's a code for successful Star Trek shows - the Hard C Rule. Original series - Kirk, Spock, McCoy. Next Generation: Picard, Riker, Crusher. Deep Space Nine: Sisko, Kira. Voyager wobbles: Tuvok. Chakotay, and Kathryn Janeway. (Janeway is actually an interesting surname.) Ah, but Enterprise: there's a Tucker, but all other characters fail the Hard C Rule.
I have written this down only to fuck with Eliza Gauger's brain, really. Don't @ me
Many events of Sarpeidon's past paralleled events in Earthhistory, including an extended period of global glaciation and paranoia due to fears of witchcraft. The planet was once ruled by a tyrant named Zor Kahn.
In 2269, hours before the sun went nova, the USS Enterprise arrived to warn the native species of their impending doom. However, they found that prior to the planet's destruction, all of its inhabitants had evacuated back in time, using a time portal known as the atavachron, into various eras of the planet's past. (TOS: "All Our Yesterdays"; PIC: "Maps and Legends")
In the novelNo Time Like the Past, Spock speculates that the Sarpeidons pursued time travel rather than space travel as a means of escape as the lack of other planets in their solar system meant that they had no real incentive to develop space travel out of a lack of anywhere to go in their immediate vicinity. During the novel, a time-displaced Seven of Nine meets a projection of Nehwa, the original inventor of the atavachron, who reveals that he left his people for the distant past out of disgust at what his work had come to.
According to the script notes, from the 12 December1968 copy of the final draft, "The place and people's costumes, although they do not exactly reproduce any period in Earth's past, are sufficiently reminiscent of Charles II's England to give the impression that this is a corresponding period in the planet's past. Similarly, the people speak with a slight brogue and some inflections of Early Modern English. But it is clear that it is not Earth."
According to a deleted line from the script's final draft, Zora Kahn's rule ended over a century prior to the date of the supernova.
When the natives became aware of the pending supernova of its star, Beta Niobe, all of the inhabitants of the planet evacuated to various time periods in the planet's past of their own choosing, through the Atavachron, using verism tapes. As the natives passed through the portal to the time period of their choosing the Atavachron prepared their cell structure and brain patterns to make their lives natural in the chosen time period, with the understanding that they may never return to their planet's present time.
While investigating Beta Niobe's final hours in 2269, the planet was visited by the FederationstarshipUSS Enterprise. A landing party consisting of James T. Kirk, Spock, and Leonard McCoy, beamed down to learn the whereabouts or fate of the natives. Upon their arrival, it was noted that the species lacked the ability for spaceflight to escape; mass suicide was ruled out as well. After locating a power source, a library containing the Atavachron, they discovered the lone survivor of the planet, Atoz. Atoz, believing the three to also be natives, who was surprised to see them, as he believed "that everyone had long since gone", attempted to hurry them off to the past.
During their brief encounter at the library, Kirk was accidentally sent the the planet's era of witchcraft, while Spock and McCoy were sent to the planet's ice age, 5,000 years into the past. Upon their return, just moments before the supernova occurred, they were able to escape the planet's destruction, and Atoz, the last of the planet's natives was able to successfully escape into the past. (TOS: "All Our Yesterdays")
Also according to cut dialogue from final draft of the script, this species was identified as "Sarpeids".
Of the many unanswered questions on the inhabitants of the late planet Sarpedon, there is one which has especially interested me. It comes from considering the very last words ever spoken on that planet. They are the words of Science Officer Spock of the starship Enterprise, spoken even as the exploration team was beaming up and the ship was warping out of danger of the nova sun.
Referring to the mysterious Zarabeth of Sarpedon, he said, "She is dead -- dead and buried long ago." To those unfamiliar with Vulcan psychology, this seems to be a case of redundancy due to the stress of the situation. But it would be contrary to Spock's Vulcan nature to make any statement for which he did not have sufficient reason to accept as true.
Therefore I ask the question, "Who buried Zarabeth?" The hypothesis I proppose is based upon the answer which is found to hold true for all comparable planetary cultures. She was buried by her surviving relatives.
But we also know that she was exiled by Zorkahn to the Ice Age, specifically specifically because she would not only be separated from her relatives but from anyone at all. To answer the question of where they came from, we must make further investigation into Sarpiedonian biology. Perhaps they reproduced by parthenogenesis like several known life-forms and she required only the stimulation of a Vulcan (or Terran) male to become fertilized? Or perhaps there has been an omission in the memoirs of Mister Spock and Doctor McCoy? In any case, there is definitely a need for further investigation into this question. Who did bury Zarabeth?
The following is based on thirty years further investigation.
ADDENDUM
Sarpeidon was named for the legendary son of Zeus and Europa, the king of Lycia and brother of Minos and Rhadamanthus, the other two already dead planets in the system. The names were chosen based on an reasonable approximation of the name heard in radio transmissions, Zarpedon, the Land of Zar, much as the planet Vulcan was named for a Roman god to approximate its native name. The third and only habitable planet of the beta Niobe system (aka Noethna), it is unique in the archives of the IDIC Institute, because of it's inhabitants' remarkable atavachron. The name atavachron comes from attawa* (father's grandmother, akin to atavism, "throwback") + khron* (time). The name indicates its long-term (multigenerational) time travel capability. This unusual time machine, a prototypical version of the Guardian of Forever, was originally invented by Atoz ("Beginning-to-end") who used it to observe the past and the future and which was later misused by his nephew Zor in a futile attempt to rid the world of "witches" (i. e., those with Vulcan telepathy), inadvertently creating this most complex time-knot civilization.
According to United Earth Space Probe Agency Registry NX-01 (2155): since the plane of the orbit of Sarpeidon happened to be in the same direction of Beniobe's proper motion, the atavachron's use caused instabilities that triggered its premature novation. Atoz the last Sarpeid's final use of the atavachron was not because of the imminent nova, the star went nova because the atavachron triggered the star's novation.
During the geologically brief period of 5070 years when Sarpeidon was in Noethna's habitable zone, its inhabitants had a most extraordinary history, the most complex time-knot known, much more convoluted than the larger but looser Alcwell knot.
The rift in time that made the atavachron, and so all of Sarpeidonian civilization, possible was utilized but not created by Atoz, nor was it a natural phenomena. It was the result of the providential collision of an Arretian scoutship's transwarp fields with the Beniobe nova's wavefront at warp minus thirty-five or more than twelve years-per-light-day. When the Enterprise tried to rescue the Arretian ship as Beniobe was still in its death throes, the Enterprise was flung along with the Arretian ship pastward. The Enterprise eventually managed to reorient itself futureward via the Minerva nova near Babel (star date 5536.6). but not before Commodore Robert April and his wife Sarah were rejuvinated.
Zor improved the atavachron so that longer visits to the past were possible, but also permanent, as was learned at the loss of Atoz' son and niece. Zor however proceeded to then misused the rifts in time to assemble an army and treasure and sent those who tried to rebel against his monomaniacal imperialism (and their families, even whole tribes) to scattered places in Sarpeidon's past. This however only resulted in strengthening the retronauts as individuals and their remaining family ties. Even with the so-called "adjustment" to the time period to which they were sent many exiles still remembered fragments of their past in the future. Those who attempted to go back to the future they knew found that they only relived via a timeloop their original experience of the past without being able to change it.
Those were alternately honored or burned as the eras either accepted or rejected their foreknowledge. Although this knowledge of future history turned into ancient legend over the millennia, Zor Khan's tyranny was eventually overthrown as the foreseen destruction of Sarpeidon neared. His atavachron was finally used for a one of most incredible accomplishments of any civilization, the mass evacuation of every inhabitant of a pre-space civilization to the safety of their own past.
Thus nearly every one of the last few generations of Sarpeids is his or her own ancestor, some, like Atoz, as close as grandfather/grandson, and few greater than twenty generations apart.. Since Atoz prudently scattered these last millions of Sarpeids throughout the five millennia of the planet's history the gene pool remained unusually stable throughout. "Identical cousins" were more common than twin siblings among either the Humans or the Vulcanoids and mutants were also more common, but so too were the psi-gifted.
Technically the civilization has been classified as the first Vulcanthrope colony, even though it began two millennia before Vulcans went into space and over four millennia before the first official Vulcan-Human hybrid. As it turned out it lasted less than half as long as the Capellan-Eridani experiment on Krypton. It ended, as prophecied, almost immediately upon the first Human contact with the first and the last time-traveling Sarpeid, aptly named Atoz.
From the time Atoz first used the atavachron until the last time, more than 20,000 verisim [from werosem "true as one"] recordings, at most a few days every decade or so, were made by the atavachron. Each recording linked to a different segment of the time rift at thousands of different locations from the glacial ice wall of the 28th century BC to the Library wall of AD 2269. Cross-time communication was possible, but only by painstakingly mapped periods and locations. Some ended in literal "dead ends". The traversable portals were the times and places of mysterious appearances and disappearances of people. The term "witch" was applied indiscriminately at times to anyone who seemed to have come from nowhere, communicate with disembodied spirits, had uncommon knowledge of the past or future, were able to read and plant thoughts, or in the worst of times merely those with pointy ears or slanted eyebrows, anyone who was "different".
Witches were blamed for any unfortunate event, any unsolved disappearances of valuables or people, whether demonstratively connected to conjuring evil spirits or not. The seemingly demonic spirits of Sarpeidon legend were not identified until late in its history as Zor Khan's phantom army. They were mercenaries and criminals and mind-controlled political prisoners who had crossed, returned and re-crossed through the atavachron. Each return crossing through the portal threshold reduced the raider's time of no-return so that two replicas would have half the time of the verisim recording, about a day or so. Three crossings would halve the time to one third each, and so on. Zor Khan could, and did, replicate his forces who had been gathered throughout five millennia an estimated 100,000%. Only the last such replica, the , the one with the memories of all of the others and all their escapes from death, could be killed, a one-in-a-thousand chance. The unintended and unnatural selection for touch telepathy as the primary way of distinguishing and mind-freeing replicas was therefore the fatal flaw in non-telepath Zor Khan's scheme and lead to the eventual overthrow of his evil empire by his librarian, Atoz.
One of his last acts was the exile of Zarabeth to the earliest portals. Had he paid closer attention to the end of her verisim recording he might have seen her not alone but with Spock the legendary father of Zar, uniter of the Asyn, Danreg and Kerren tribes, first sovren of the Lakreo civization.
This would have been barely noticeable however given the high probability of avatars or throwbacks given Sarpeidon's gene pool. From generation to generation the population would shift back and forth slightly from predominantly humanoid to predominantly vulcanoid about the vulcanthropic average. Sarpeidon's cyclical history of Ages of Reason alternating with Dark Ages is tied intimately with cycles in Sarpeidonian biology.
If two average vulcanthropes reproduced, for example, 6.25% of their offspring would be all-humanoid, 25% mostly-humanoid, 37.5% vulcanthropoid, 25% mostly vulcanoid and 6.25% all-vulcanoid. In the next generation the distribution would even more concentrated in the center with only 0.2% all-humanoid or all-vulcanoid and 72% vulcanthropoid. These vulcanthropes would share many characteristics and a not so small percentage would be throwbacks or avatars to their ancestors, typically diverging for two generations and then reconverging in the next two. This was therefore the typical cycle in witch mania.
Humanoid characteristics generally dominated the culture when living conditions were less harsh and more Earth-like, with shorter but more fruitful generations, while Vulcanoid/Eridani ones did so when times were harsher, drier, hotter, more Vulcan-like. Too much deviation in either direction or both at once however seemed to trigger "corrective" tribal or racial wars, although many of these were later discovered to be the result of or aggravated by Zor Khan's gangers.
During Beniobe's Earth-like yellow flares, which occurred unpredictably even during its red or white periods, those having that particular combination of non-Human Capellan-Eridani traits called Kryptonoid exhibited levitation, X-ray and/or heat vision, supersenses, superstrength, etc. These were the superheroes and/or supervillains of Sarpeidon legend and history.
Rather than supporting the Hodgkins' Law of Parallel Planet Development, Sarpeidon (along with the even more damaging discovery of the Preservers) actually discredited it. Although the history of the planet closely parallels that of Earth and Vulcan, this seems more the result of the subliminal telepathic linkage of the vulcanthropoids with their closely related races, the Capellans, Eridani, Humans, Remians, Romulans, and Vulcans. As has been observed by the Nitcentral Bulletin and elsewhere, the atavachron had a striking resemblance to Gary Seven's "Beta 5 computer". Although the secular Sarpeidonian calendar determined years by reigns and dynasties, the traditional Zarite religious calendar counted down the five millennia to the exact day, hour and minute until the End of the World.
5070 BE first Sarpeidon portal, Atoz' son can't rescue his cousin, Zarabeth's sister
5069 BE Zarabeth's niece born
5050 BE Wynn's grandfather born
5040 BE Atoz' son died
5030 BE Wynn's father born
5000 BE Zarabeth exiled
4995 BE Spock and McCoy visit {"All Our Yesterdays")
4994 BE Zar born
4990 BE Wynn born
4959 BE Zarabeth disappears (to 200 BE)
4955 BE Araen exiled
4954 BE 2nd contact ("Yesterday's Son")
4946 BE Zar marries Wynn ("Time for Yesterday")
4947 BE Zar's son born
4917 BE Zarabeth's great granddaughter/Atoz' wife born
4890 BE Atoz meets wife-to-be
3259 BE war
3000 BE Age of Expansion
2700 BE messiahism
1700 BE Dark Age
1413 BE war
1050 BE Zarabeth's cousin exiled
1040 BE Sladykins' father born
1010 BE Sladykins born
1009 BE gypsy Vixen born
1030 BE Prosecutor and family settled
1039 BE Kirk visits
930 BE Age of Reason
313 BE Narab kidnapped to Earth, marries Sue Davis
200 BE Spock brings Zarabeth from 4959 BE in Enterprise
198 BE Jarrod born
190 BE Lidia born, Enterprise returns Spock to 8 AE
130 BE Zarabeth's and Zor's fathers' grandmother/Atoz' great granddaughter born
121 BE Atoz's father/Zor's grandfather born
100 BE Atoz and family escapes to Cerelon ("The Celeron Dilemma")
90 BE Atoz's grandson, Zareth born on Cerelon ("The Celeron Dilemma")
80 BE Zarabeth's uncle/Zor's father born
70 BE Zarabeth's uncle Atoz born
65 BE Zarabeth's father born
59 BE Surak and Zareth meet, Zareth and Verena return to Sarpeidon ("The Celeron Dilemma")
58 BE Spock born, Atoz' daughter born
56 BE Atoz' son born
55 BE Zareth helps Atoz invent atavachron, observes 4890 BE
50 BE Atoz' nephew Zor born
36 BE Zarabeth's sister born
35 BE Zarabeth born
33 BE Atoz' son trapped in 5013 BE
32 BEZor "fixes" atavachron to become Khan
31 BE Jaryd rebellion against Zor Khan fails, Zarabeth's sister sent to 5070 BE, Zarabeth to 5000 BE, Zor's brother to 1050 BE, Zor's Araen to 4955 BE
30 BE Zor Khan killed by Atoz from 50 BE
0 BE Atoz finishes exodus to past, settling family in 100 BE on Cerelon, Spock and McCoy visit 4995 BE, Kirk visits 1039 BE ("All OurYesterdays"), End of the World, time rift created by Arretian ship ("The Counter-clock Incident")
8 AE Capt. Spock visits Beniobe -- in 4959 BE
Zarabeth's partial genealogy
1. Zarabeth and Spock (later married to Saavik)
2. Zar married Araen and then Wynn
3. Atoz's father-in-law married Atoz's mother-in-law
4. Atoz's wife married Atoz
5. Atoz's son married Zarabeth's sister
6. Wynn married Zar
7. Atoz's father-in-law married Atoz's mother-in-law
8. Atoz's wife married Atoz
9. Atoz's son married Zarabeth's sister
6. Zareth married Verena
7. Zareth's daughter
7. Zareth's son
6. Wynn's sister
5. Atoz's daughter married Atoz's son-in-law
6. Adon
7. Milos
8. Milos's son
8. Milos's daughter
7. Milos's sister
8. Milos's nephew
8. Milos's neice
6. Adon's sister
7. Adon's nephew
7. Adon's neice
4. Atoz' brother-in-law
4. Atoz' sister-in-law
5. Atoz' neice married Jaryd's father
6. Jaryd married Zara
7. Zarabeth's sister married Atoz's son
8. Wynn married Zar
9. Atoz's father-in-law married Atoz's mother-in-law
8. Atoz's wife married Atoz
9. Atoz's son married Zarabeth's sister
10. Wynn married Zar
7. Argus
8. Argus's son
8. Argus's daughter
7. Zarabeth married to Spock
8. Zar married to Araen and then Wynn
9. Atoz's father-in-law married Atoz's mother-in-law
This page and the use of the names Arretian, Asyn, Atoz, Capellan, Danreg, Guardian of Forever, Eridani, Hodgkins, Kerren, Krypton, Lakreo, Preservers, Sladykins, Spock, Vixen, Wynn, Zar, Zarabeth, Zareth, Zor Kahn, are in no way intended as infringements upon any of the copyrights or trademarks held by Paramount Pictures Corporation, Viacom, Lincoln Enterprises, the Estate of Gene Roddenberry, Jean Lisette Aroeste, author of "All Our Yesterdays", A. C. Crispin, author of Yesterday's Son and Time for Yesterday, John Culvert, author of "The Counter-clock Incident", or any other licensees, individuals, or organizations. All rights therein are reserved to those persons, entities, and organizations.
The inhabitants of Sarpeidon were provided the opportunity to escape into their own history to avoid the death of their star. It appears that limitations regarding the exact time/place chosen by the residents were minimal - a library full of events ranging from recent history to deep in the past were available, although Atoz, the librarian, mentions that there is little demand for recent history. Presumably few residents desired to live through the final days of their planet...again.
Nevertheless, the effect of a massive migration of people back in time is bound to be a major influence on the planet's [new] history. Innovative ideas, fresh perspectives, and advanced knowledge is likely to creep its way into the past, accelerating historical events and progress (or destruction). I'm betting on an overall progressive effect on Sarpeidon history (putting my Gene Roddenberry blinders on, here), and that although a few sour grapes will use their knowledge of the future for opportunistic self-advancement, the majority of people are just looking to live out their lives and forget about the impending demise of their planet...and in fact will do their [small] part to improve (based on their own sense of morality) their own history - we see this almost exactly with the Prosecutor who promises to help Kirk, albeit within the powers of his new gig (although Kirk doesn't wait around and finds his own way...).
Fast forward until the descendants of our doomsday escapees are now facing the supernova - presumably the Atavachron is constructed, and yet another planet full of people are send back in time...again. At this point the "present" has changed, but perhaps not significantly enough to find a different solution for the supernova.
Eventually, any Sarpeidon concepts of the temporal prime directive (or at least the underlying principle) will significantly break down, truly eroding Sarpeidon history. Cycle upon cycle of repeating (and contaminating) history will become obvious to society, not just to the escapees. They will realize that the Atavachron is not sustainable (I'm assuming they value their own history), and Sarpeidons both "past" and "present" will seek another solution. Once the desire for another solution is solidified (i.e. escaping the planet all together), inhabitants making the jump into history will no doubt encourage others to seek an alternate solution. With time on their side, and presumably multiple opportunities to "get it right", they will no doubt be successful. I'd like to think that it's Kirk and crew with some dubious application of the Prime Directive and heavy-handed Roddenberry-esque monologues that encourage the Sarpeidons to preserve their own history and seek out a new home, continuing onward with life, not repeating the past just to avoid reality...
Finally, in an alternate "present", The Enterprise will arrive to an empty planet, this time with a deactivated time portal, no librarian, and evidence of a massive emigration to another world where they begin a new future...
tl;dr: In an alternate "present", Kirk convinces The Sarpeidons to stop living in the past and use their time portal as a tool to escape their planet all together.
- Bloggery committed by chris tower - 2405.07 - 10:10
- Days ago = 3232 days ago
- New note - On 1807.06, I ceased daily transmission of my Hey Mom feature after three years of daily conversations. I plan to continue Hey Mom posts at least twice per week but will continue to post the days since ("Days Ago") count on my blog each day. The blog entry numbering in the title has changed to reflect total Sense of Doubt posts since I began the blog on 0705.04, which include Hey Mom posts, Daily Bowie posts, and Sense of Doubt posts. Hey Mom posts will still be numbered sequentially. New Hey Mom posts will use the same format as all the other Hey Mom posts; all other posts will feature this format seen here.
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