The Great Game 🔮 Baulis Prime (Orange Hoop Universe)

The Ascendancy of Baulis Prime

Time & Place 

Baulixion 83 looked out over the humming pink cityscape of Baulopolis and shivered with delight. He opened wide the five eyes of his upper square and soaked in the beauty of it all: the pink rumble of buildings that rose and fell among smooth arches and fantastic turrets for hundreds of kilometres in all directions; the colourful waves of energy that emanated from the different districts, as they sent messages to and fro; the commuter beltways with their lakes and parks, their cafés and libraries; the serene stretches of the Pink Well, 3.7 kilometres wide and 320 kilometres deep; and to crown it all, the majesty of the Great Temple, which rose beside the Pink Well and cast patterns onto it from its fantastic sculptures, bright beams, and viewing platforms.

Baulixion took it all in, and thought with pride that it had been like this for a quarter million years. That is, since Year Zero, when the Baulian Republic ended and the Baulian Empire began.  

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Baulopolis was initially referred to as The City or sometimes The Eternal City. Yet as the Baulian Empire expanded, it added thousands of new colonies and regional capitals. It also discovered cities that were founded thousands of years before the Baulian Empire. For instance, the Sarkandian capital Turretopolis was still standing after a million years. The Baulians therefore felt obliged to change their capital’s name to the less grandiose Baulopolis.

Baulixion was a Chief Officer of Colonial Knowledge, or COCK, and was responsible for storing up and releasing the historical records of the Empire. Before any information was disseminated to prospective members of the Empire, he made sure that the inevitable accomplishments of the Baulian Empire were crystal clear. Thus prospective members would learn, without the distortion of fake news, that the Baulian Empire is comprised of

1) the nine solar systems of the original Baulian Republic, including the spectacular planet of Baulis Prime,

2) 780 thousand Baulian colony planets, which were uninhabited before the arrival of the Baulians,

3) 27 million subjugated empires, which are under Baulian control and have at least 50% Baulian population, and

4) 380 thousand planets in the process of pacification, all of which are still undergoing transfer of population, rectification of frontiers, and elimination of unreliable elements.

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Baulixion dutifully informed prospective members (who were still being pacified) that once they were a part of the club they would be privy to the enormous historical and informational systems of the Empire. What he did not tell them, however, was that they would not be fitted with internal relays, through which every Baulian child learns the co-ordinates, features, and histories of every galaxy and planet. Nor would they be updated during their regenerative cycles on major events during the previous 13 temporal units (of 2.3 hours). It went without saying that they would not be allowed into the communal regeneration chambers, as these were the exclusive reserve of the Baulian overlords themselves.

Baulixion also made it clear that prospective members would adjust their regional concepts of time to the universal standards of the Baulian home planet. While their daylight might be 7 hours, it made no sense to send the number 7 to Baulopolis, or to use the number 7 in their daily affairs, given that their every action and transaction was determined and measured according Baulian Standard time. From now on, their daily cycle would be that of the Baulian daily cycle, which was 64 hours long. This cycle was unconfused with notions of night or day, since Baulis Prime is poised equidistant and unmoving between two small stars of equal density. For millions of years Baulians lived blissfully free from the dichotomous concept of day and night.

Baulixion further explained that Baulis was an absolute planet which could, if they were constrained to contemplate it long enough, give them absolution. For Baulis was literally and metaphorically unmoving: the two stars on either side of it gave light to both sides of the planet, which remained absolutely still. This unique astronomical arrangement meant that the Baulians were blessed by the cosmos itself. Although Baulians didn’t believe in a God, they was sure that if God did exist He would choose them as His people. In the absence of any confirmation of this truth, the Baulians took over the universe.

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Baulixion also provided prospective members with a pamphlet, showered down on them while the orange beams were rectifying their frontiers and elimination unreliable elements. Baulixion was proud to say that he had written this pamphlet himself. It gave information on the grandeur of the Great Temple, the glorious rise of the Baulian Empire, and the misfortune of prospective members who resisted their own pacification:

The Great Temple

Our Great Temple is built on the craggy eastern slopes of The Pink Well. The Temple rises 700 stories, and each story is about six metres high. The Temple City’s diameter is the same as that of the Pink Well: 3.7 kilometres.

Our Great Temple has two peaks, which sit on the base of the first 350 stories. The top 14 floors of both peaks house the elite and executive branches of our Empire. Lines of orange energy run back and forth from peak to peak, and a sky bridge vaults between the two pinnacles whenever the High Council is in session. There are 360 gates that lead into the Temple, and the no-fly zone above the Temple and Well extends for kilometres in all directions. Any attempt to breach the perimeter will be met with immediate obliteration.

The twin peaks of the Temple are occupied by the highest level of Baulian authority: the Fractal Masters and the Fractal Mystics. These two groups are the most highly venerated of all Baulians, and it is an offence punishable by death to speak ill of them. Sarcasm and parody carry with them a minimum life sentence.

Surrounding the double circle of Temple and Well is the Metropolitan Area of Governmental Authority (MAGA), which stretches for over 250 kilometres nord-est and suood-est, with a population of about 15 billion. Diplomatic quarters of subject species are situated outside MAGA, although diplomats are permitted entry on day visas, which can be granted with no less than 10 day’s advance notice. These are almost never granted to non-Baulians, given that visas would also require identification markers to be grafted into their skin. In any case, there are already a sufficient number of acubic, non-pink workers in Baulopolis for the comfort of the inhabitants.

History

The Baulians are a tolerant yet proud race. Their history is one of benevolent expansion, with the sole aim of making life better for all the species who don’t know what’s best for them.

It was from deep within the Pink Well that the first Baulians swirled upward 1.6 million years ago, having evolved over the previous million years from nearly-blind creatures that resembled many-headed tadpoles to fourteen-limbed, cube-shaped amphibians who were smarter than dolphins and more ruthless than sharks. 

Even in the Pink Well the earliest thrashing Baulians could see that circles slip and slide laterally and transversally. Circular species couldn’t find a solid footing from which to coordinate a defence and or develop an offence. Deep in the Well, our ancestors dreamed of castles, and imagined their cubic bodies jammed up tight against one another so that even a volley of lead cannonballs would bounce off their rock-hard sides. They built castles in their minds, and imagined earth and air and flight into the stars. In his famous volume of poetry, Cubic Pink, Baulis the First wrote,

While once we slipped,

in later times we learned to grip,

and in our square and massive guise

we launched ourselves into the skies.

The mastery of language exhibited by Baulis I cannot be denied. Succinctness, rhyme, he has it all. Arguments to the contrary require a court hearing and a mandatory sentence of five years community service and lifelong re-education.

In the years between leaving the Well and finishing the Great Temple, we were a busy species. Since we were experienced in deep-well combat (we fought like octopi and bit like sharks), we were equally proficient soldiers once we left the pink, unpredictable water. Although largely immobile on land, we moved with our stone war formations slowly outward from a base, never giving up an inch once an inch was taken. We devised slings, pulleys, and winches that could obliterate or drag down entire fortresses. We invented chemical guns that could project burning acid two kilometres in the air.

The secret to our success lies in our intelligence and in our interactive anatomy. Our cubic shape allows us to create dense groupings, like the 27 cubes in a Rubik’s Cube, yet multiplied by however many cubes are needed. Because our appendages can link one Baulian to the next, the resulting structure is literally as strong as the sum of its parts. It is, for instance, almost impossible to dislodge a Baulian from a defensive cube.

Our fourteen appendages are retractable at each of the six vertices of our octahedron inner bodies and at each of the six vertices of our outer bodies. This allows us to pass information and energy quickly in any direction. In case of an external threat, energy from the inner cubes can be transferred with electric speed to the outer cubes. Once we learned to harness orange energy, we erected terawatt electric barriers around the communal cube. We also emitted burst of poison, acid, and fire that easily stunned or killed any species foolish enough to attack us.

Prior to our discovery of orange energy, we were able to defeat the beasts of the Wide Desert, who resembled raptors or dragons: they had the teeth of a T-Rex and could spit an electromagnetic burst equivalent to a bolt of lightning. After this, we defeated and enslaved the Swamp Monopoly, a confederacy of gigantic crocodiles, poisonous dart-spitting pteradactyls, and 28-sided iguanas that spun their piranha faces to create a whirlpool that sucked in their prey. 

The slave creatures of these two primordial enemies were reverse-engineered so that any trace of resentment or independent thought was impossible. For millennia these creatures were used as domestic labourers and ammunition drudges. They are still used today in outlying planets as accountants and dental assistants.

The far continent of Andrantis was inhabited by Scimmians, peaceful herbivores who were less capable of defending themselves than baby deer. The Scimmians had constructed tree towers overlooking the lakes, rivers, and waterfalls that gave the air a fine gold mist. From their guest-dwellings in the trees they wrote poems about the ecstasies of love and the infinite expanses of the universe. They also wrote and acted in plays about the tenderness of forgiveness and reconciliation. Recognizing that all of this was flowery nonsense, we decimated the Scimmians, except for 7% of the population, which are still used as zoo keepers, massage therapists, and lab specimens.

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Baulixion was proud of his pamphlet, which was scattered daily onto those who would one day be members of the greatest Empire ever known.

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Next: Out of Country: 🧚 Maria de Tondo

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