1) The Planetary Union (PU) is an extension of US/EU governments. Take what we have now, move it 500 years into the future, and that's the basic intention. The League of Planets, however, is more scientifically oriented. All aspects of that culture are there to advance science. Freedom of religion is not a right. Religion, in fact, is viewed as a primitive belief and an indicator of lower intelligence. The League is run like a corporation, with all revenue-generating activities meant to drive funding back into research.

2) You will see "The Wasps" in THE CRYPT, either in Book Two: Shakedown or in Book Three.

3) The Triangle from INFECTED/CONTAGIOUS are modern-day, taking place in our time. They may or may not play into the far-future stories of THE CRYPT (500 years from now) and THE ROOKIE (700 years from now).

4) The subjugation of humanity is intentional, and a "fuck you" to every friggin' scifi story that has a human empire, hegemony, association, etc. All those stories are the same with different names for the government. The Creterakians are there to set up a different approach -- the benign overlords that will kill your ass if you get out of line. Yet despite this domineering society, there are still four major human governments (League of Planets, Planetary Union, Purist Nation and Tower Republic) that can't work together to overthrow them. However, even if those four did work together? They still can't hang with the Creterakians. Makes for an interesting universe where humans are not the end-all, be-all, and are also not being hunted to extinction (the other oh-so-common scifi plot).

5) Favre, at his best, wouldn't have made it in Tier Two. Maybe in Tier Three.

Gozer, if you haven't picked up a hardcover copy of The Rookie, you may want to.  There's a detailed timeline that shows a lot of the interaction and hstory between the LoP, the PU and the Purist Nation. It's almost a sotry in itself!

At least I thought it was. Took me two sittings to get through all of it. Think it's 15-25 pages long. When Scott first advertised it, I was thinking like a page or two. No, this is like a Siglerverse bible he'd have on his wall to map out what's going to happen over the course of the next 700 years. I was astounded at how detailed it is. I will feel sorry for any Junkie who does not get the timeline if there is only one printing of THE ROOKIE.

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A life vacant of laughter is not worth exerting the effort it takes to live it.

Ok we know - or at least can make a fairly educated conjecture based on the creature stepping through the portal at the end of Infected - that the probe and the triangles were tools of the Ki. This would indicate that in the present day, the Ki are a very advanced culture, at least a few hundred years more advanced than humans because it was indicated that the probe was launched many generations before it got to Earth. Jump ahead 700 years and one would assume that the Ki must still be significantly more technologically advanced than humans and way more advanced than the bats who had developed FTL travel only shortly before taking over the galaxy, but that doesn't seem to be the case. There must have been some great catastrophe that hit the Ki and set them back a few hundred years, perhaps the civil war that led to the creation of the Ki Rebel Establishment. In Quentin Barnes' day, it is entirely likely that the technology to create the triangle spores has been lost or is simply not useful because it's over 700 years old. It would be like taking a trebuchet onto a modern battlefield.

**UNdead / GirlCo: All we wanna do is eat your brains. We're not unreasonable, I mean, no one's going to eat your eyes.**

1. Have you decided what the bonus content in THE STARTER is going to be yet? I assume there will be some, as there was in THE ROOKIE hardcover. We had a thread going regarding the color insert for a bit, and there were many suggestions tossed out. I'm not going to re-hash them here. I recall you said a map would have to wait until at least book 3, possibly book 4 so you could confer with Phil or another astronomer for veracity. If you have not considered the black & white bonus portion (I don't think that has been discussed yet), I would suggest you do a write up of the various governments and political structures and how they came to be. I would be interested in the historical backstory of all the races, not just the hu-mans. I'm betting I'm not the only one. You did a little bit of this with the excerpts in THE ROOKIE and it was awesome IMHO. I didn't particularly like your choice to move them to the rear of the book, but Baskin Robbins FTW! I can see pros & cons for either decision. 
2. SWEET!
3. Gee, go figure. Scott's playing it close to the vest. Can't say I blame him. He does have to maintain suspense for us lowly readers, after all. I'd be kinda pissed if he spoiled upcoming stories for us.
4. I love the way you've set up the future racial hierarchy. You have extrapolated the way in which we seem to be going in a logical progression. You've introduced a new, physically inferior, but technologically superior race with completely different attitudes about individual loss of life. Hell, BOTH the Sklorno & the Cretarakians fit that description. Then there are the Quyth, Ki, & Harrah. Their complexities I can't sum up quickly. I look forward to seeing what you do with this diverse racial tapestry.
5. I'm prejudiced. In his prime, I think he might have been able to serve as a backup QB in Tier Two. Same with Elway.

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A life vacant of laughter is not worth exerting the effort it takes to live it.

.....the timeline. My guess is that the gate tech is Giver technology and the Ki are their foot soldiers. I don't particularly want to debate it though. I kind of want to leave details of the timeline in THE ROOKIE until Scott and A have sold out of the first print run.

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A life vacant of laughter is not worth exerting the effort it takes to live it.

 

I need to re-listen to the end of Contagious to catch that bit about the Ki and the gate. 

Loved the science in Infected/Contagious and in the Washington DC Crypt stories. 

The Washinghton DC Crypt story reminded me of the great movie "Das Boot".  Had a very old school feel to it...Intense, quiet, nerve wracking, hot, sweaty, .... but with fancy bio-tech and clones!  I thought the lengths that the Washington had to go to to avoid detection were clever and logical.  Nice Work!....this aint no stinkin Star Trek.  I look forward to more strategy, tactics and science in the crypt when you pick it up later in the year.

The use of apoptosis with the story of the crawlers had me nodding my head an harkening back to my days as a bio major in college.  GREAT stuff!  Is science in your background, or did you have to do some good old fashion research?

One of my fave things about the Rookie story line are the Quith names!  Mopuk The Sneaky!  Vyrak the Mean!  Whatever his name was The Efficient!  A quith name generator would be cool!  Someone get on that! 

Gozer the Demanding

I think I missed that one. Are those the wasp-like race from The Tank?

**UNdead / GirlCo: All we wanna do is eat your brains. We're not unreasonable, I mean, no one's going to eat your eyes.**

The Givers have only been mentioned in the 25+ pages of Timeline at the end of the hardcover version of The Rookie.  They seem to pop in and out of the timeline, interacting with multiple species and then disappearing but leaving behind technology and gadgets.  Methinks The Crypt might be a product of Giver tech gone wrong...but I might just be starting vicious rumors!

Though not sure of the spelling

My favorite line in the entire ROOKIE may very well be in the timeline, but I am not going to spoil it for anyone. It doesn't work unless you're reading the entire timeline as a chronological story.

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A life vacant of laughter is not worth exerting the effort it takes to live it.

I take it you *don't* have a ROOKIE HC then?

When did Scott mention the Ki rebellion in the 'cast proper? I must have missed it somehow.

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A life vacant of laughter is not worth exerting the effort it takes to live it.

....when the captain is ruminating about what the artifact might be.

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A life vacant of laughter is not worth exerting the effort it takes to live it.