JTAS-K

I will be shortly putting out a little book similar to the Journal of the Travellers Aide Society. It will be free, fun, and open to anyone who would like to contribute. Below is a feature article from JTAS-K #1. Enjoy!


The Dolphins of Fronomios
The planet Fronomios was colonized directly from Olde Earth over 80,000 years ago, with nearly 50,000 colonists in stasis and several hundred modified (uplifted) dolphins. The colony was funded from an "green" non-profit organization that was deeply worried about environmental degradation on humanity's homeworld and included those who were like-minded. Even with jump technology the journey took almost a year and the colonists (mostly from the European subcontinent) were grateful to see a nearly pristine world that they could occupy with only a little terraforming needed, mainly the introduction of human food plants and animals. As a growing colony, Fronomios build strong trade alliances with its neighbors over the following millenia, becoming a major source of robotics and android production before the Collapse. The population of the planet also grew substantially during that time to numbers so large that the original charter enforcing "green" government nearly had to be set aside; the population had grown to over 140 billion people and had no sign of stopping its growth. In the end, large floating cities housing these billions were built in the sky prevented a disaster on the ground and in the oceans.

At the same time, the technology from the oceans of Fronomios became very dominant in the sector as sonic weaponry developed by the dolphin population became incredibly popular among planetary police forces and mercenary units. This weaponry boosted the offworld trade of Fronomios into the hundreds of billions of credits and the resulting surge in finances spurring even greater research and development on the planet, leading to huge advances in technology. By the time of the Collapse, the tech level of the planet had far surpassed its neighbors and exploded to the highest level in the sector; eventually it decreased due to those effects, stabilizing at a surprising TL18.

Originally uplifted to sentience on Olde Earth, the Dolphins of Fronomios have continued to genetically tweak their species over time, and also created numerous mechanical sets of "waldoes" to be able to move around on land and in space. Their increasing intelligence worried many in the scientific community across the sector and actually led to a ban on such practises for over 10,000 years on Fronomios itself. This techno-supression enflamed a great deal of anger on the planet, but recently research into the field has increased dramatically since the outbreak of the _____ War. Cybernetic augs (or augments) are currently popular with the dolphins and genetic experimentation continues.

Overall, Fronomios is now considered one of the five most powerful and technological capable planets in the Urbanos sector. It enjoys dominant trade rights across the region and has even colonized 6 other worlds with dolphins further down the Orion Arm: recent communications with these daughter colonies, unfortunately, have been cut off by the advances of the ______.