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Palanda Ire​

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Home > Universe > Places > The Many Worlds > Palanda Ire

Key Information:

  • Parent star: Othelräd
  • Region: Orion arm
  • Planet Class: Two
  • Orbital Period: 0.831 Solars
  • Rotational Period: 28h 37m
  • Mean Temp: 289 K (16 ºC)
  • Native Life: Abundant

Overview

Palanda Ire is a fascinating planet on the Orion arm. It supports a healthy and diverse natural ecosystem, and is the site of several large Imperial Combine cities.

The planet is terrestrial, however the terrain is strikingly unusual. Apparent tidal rocks seen in close proximity to the city of Arroch were coloured purple-brown on the outside, and had silvery interiors when blown apart by ordnance. These are in fact deposited metal-mineral amalgams which are precipitated continuously out of the sea bed, rather than geological formations which have been eroded from the continental shelf. A defensive wall across Arroch Bay is formed from blocks of a more conventional, dark-coloured stone, which was likely sourced from elsewhere on the planet.

The city of Arroch itself is surrounded by a naturally occurring wall of mountains, containing very high concentrations of minerals and metal ores. This high range protects the city from the megafauna roaming the mainland.

Because of the presence of large quantities of rare earth minerals and metals, fabrication became a boom industry on Palanda Ire not long after it was colonised. Seeking to increase their margins by side-stepping transport costs, numerous companies invested in the development of the cities and sited their high-end fabrication operations on the surface. They have always guarded these facilities aggressively​ (→FSS).

The ecosystem on Palanda Ire is robust and complex. The brackish, organic soup of the seas hosts a variety of life forms, some of which — such as weeds and barnacle-like shellfish — are similar to those found on Earth.

Of more interest to most visitors however are the megafauna species. These are species of huge animals, many stories tall, which roam the plains and forests across the temperate ranges of the continents. Although few of them are predatory, their immense size makes them a hazard to human structures and facilities. Most cities are therefore sited to avoid direct contact. Megafauna safaris are big business on Palanda Ire, and the authorities are required to invest considerable resources in trying to control the number of unlicensed excursions. Unlicensed excursions are of course incredibly dangerous.

It is the level of collateral threat from the indigenous life, in combination with the difficulty involved in growing non-native crops, which causes Palanda Ire to miss out on class one status.

Ecosphere

As noted above, Palanda Ire has a lush ecosystem which supports a number of different biological networks. Competition for resources is characteristically aggressive, and the planet has a number of very dangerous species as a result — particularly in the oceans.

Of particular note on land are the megafauna, huge beasts which are larger than most of the buildings likely to be constructed as part of an Imperial Combine colony. Fortunately these larger creatures are generally less aggressive than other native species, and the only serious danger comes from their size.

The shallow seas around the coastline of Arroch Bay support a number of dense forests of a plant-like structure which the local residents now call "un-kelp". This ironic name derives from the fact that the organism looks very much like Terran kelp, but has no similar properties which would make it useful to humans (→ASTTS).

Dwelling in the un-kelp is a form of organism very similar to the crustaceans or other marine arthropods of Earth, albeit much larger. The species is predatory, and prefers to ambush its prey using powerful, spiked forearms that support shredding pincers. The explosive action of these limbs is similar in fashion to that of the raptorials of Earth's mantis shrimp. The hunting practices of these organisms has led the human colonists to give them the nickname "shred bastards". Fortunately for the colonists the shred bastards do not seem to recognise the silhouettes of swimming humans as prey, although truth be told a human free-swimming in the seas of Palanda Ire would have much bigger problems before very long (→ASTTS).

The deep oceans are known to harbour very large, aggressive fish species, which rival even the great kaibothrites of Whiste in terms of their voracity. Although little is known of these creatures, it is suspected they are responsible for biting apart several of the autonomous mining and harvesting crawlers used to recover precious metals from the ocean floor. This is indicative of the highly aggressive and indiscriminate hunting methods of apex predators 
(→ASTTS).

The rich, diverse ecosystem of Palanda Ire has produced a number of strange organisms and biological relationships — see the next section for specific examples.

Unique Phenomena

Buoyant 'Rocks'

Visitors to Palanda Ire will often recognise lumps and boulders and small plateaus on the planet's beaches as 'rocks', but they are often nothing of the sort. While they give the outward appearance of being rock, they are in fact an amalgam of light, putty-like material, which is a precipitation of metal and minerals.

These blobs are produced as nodules around vents in the ocean floor. They aggregate until they break off — or are knocked off by motile life forms — at which point they wash about in the seas very much like any other buoyant material would. Huge numbers of these nodules wash up on the beaches of the planet, by which time the outer surface has reacted with the sea water to produce a purple-brown or purple-black 'skin' which hides the shiny, silvery contents. A layer of algal slime usually also coats that skin, which encourages sea plants and other organisms to adhere to the outer surface. This further enhances the appearance of the nodules, to the untrained human eye, as 'coastal rocks' (→FSS, ASTTS).

Piloted Rain

One of the great peculiarities of Palanda Ire — not recorded anywhere else in known space — is the piloted rain. A type of microorganism has developed a symbiosis with a tree species on the planet, and hijacks the movement of precipitation in order to take part in a reciprocal relationship. It is believed that networks of the bacteria form 'control rafts' in and around rain droplets, and use adapted flagella to cause tiny changes in the air speed and direction of falling micro droplets of water. The aggregate effect of all of these nudges is that the organisms can focus rainfall into an almost coherent spout, which can be literally pointed in the direction the bacterial colony 'wants' to go. How the organisms come to be in the clouds to begin with is still an open question, however there are three likely models currently being studied which all have Terran precedents.

Preliminary research shows that the trees in this relationship have evolved specific features to play their part. When their seed pods are bursting open, they release a pheromone-like substance which appears to be an essential nutrient in some latter stage of the bacterial life cycle. This substance attracts the bacteria. The bacteria ride rainfall to the trees, targeting the largest first by virtue of the fact that these are the greatest concentrations of the substance. For the bacteria, there is an obvious benefit as the substance appears to act as rocket fuel for their growth and proliferation.

The benefit for the trees seems to be in the mechanical effects of the deluge. Having a spout of water sloshed over their canopy washes out all of their seeds, and carries those seeds away from the adult trees in flash floods. The seeds settle in uncolonised habitats, and are quickly trodden into fertile, well-watered soils by the animals which come to drink from the pools of rainwater. This appears to be an extended, collateral effect of the 
symbiosis, since organisms drinking from these pools will drop manure which further fertilises the soil for the coming seedlings. The benefit to the animals is that the freshly formed rain pools are far less likely to harbour ambush predators than those rivers and lakes which are more permanent.

There is an obvious advantage for the trees in growing as large as possible, and so the distribution of their seeds a distance from them not only prevents competition arising from their own genetic line, but also promotes that genetic line farther afield and in opposition to other lines. Larger trees are more productive, and therefore more attractive to the bacteria, which increases their chances of successful distribution of their genetic material.

The most spectacular effect of this relationship visible to people at ground level is the 'sideways sweep'. This occurs when a target tree has had all of its seeds and attractive substance washed out from amongst its branches, and ceases to become attractive to the bacteria. Bacteria still falling to the ground will start to guide rainfall towards the next greatest concentration of the substance. At ground level, this gives the appearance of a deluge of water sloshing sideways across the ground, from one tree or group of trees to the next largest tree or group of trees, as though a giant hose pipe was being swept across the sky. The phenomenon utterly drenches whatever stands between those two areas (→ASTTS).

Cities

Arroch

Arroch is a large, coastal city, located in a natural basin between a mountain range and a sand beach. The site is in close proximity to vast deposits of naturally occurring, valuable materials, and developed quickly as a major machining town. Various companies from across the empire located their high-end fabrication sites here, and to protect their investments all of them contributed towards the city's mutual air defence systems.

Arroch is well-protected, both from aerial assault and from common forms of precision orbital strike. The same mountains which protect the city from the mainland megafauna also make it difficult to approach on foot or by ground vehicle. The only weak point is the beach, and a three-kilometre defensive wall has been erected to close off this line of approach.

​Because of its location and layout Arroch is limited in terms of expansion and 
development. Real estate now comes with a heavy premium.

Tammatani

Tammatani is a land-locked township, quite far out from the original colony site on Palanda Ire. Like Arroch it uses a blend of natural terrain features and artificial barriers to protect the buildings and population from megafauna.

The predominant commercial activities in Tammatani revolve around the megafauna safari industry, and most of the town's businesses cater to that type of tourism in some fashion. Safaris operate all year round, so there is no specific "out of season" economy. The safaris are so popular with off-world tourists that competition between tour agents is barely noticeable. They are too busy actually planning and conducting expeditions into the Wilds to be able to compete with one another in anything but the most superficial of terms.

Facilities

Because of the nature of the planet's indigenous life Palanda Ire has no starport. All transport between the surface and orbit must be carried out by ships no larger than freight shuttles.

The system has a gate and therefore a nexus, and the planet is protected by significant numbers of orbital defence platforms.

As described above, fabrication cities are generally protected by aggressive air defence systems. These are capable of intercepting high-velocity, high-yield ordnance, and would be capable of bringing down any ships within range, even carriers. Only a heavy bombardment could overwhelm these defences, which would result in the obliteration of the city in question. Any force intending to invade and occupy would need to do so from a position on the planet's surface (→FSS).

​Cities such as Arroch are protected by defensive walls. The wall across Arroch Bay was made from a dark grey stone, almost an astonishing forty metres deep including internal void spaces, and its tiers were dotted with cellular pits containing auto-turrets and autonomous rocket launchers. The auto-turrets were able to roll forwards on rails, which allowed them to fire across the outer surface of the wall or down towards its base. The top of the wall was crenellated, with gimballed interception turrets similar to C-MADS providing cover from long-range ordnance such as 
carriers' sabot rounds (→FSS).

Recorded Events

In April of 3745 ELC it was discovered that Voice had occupied at least one city on Palanda Ire. The entity had seized control of the city of Arroch, and was using the manufacturing base there to serve his own purposes (→ASTTS).

Soon afterwards Commander Operations laid out a plan for Operation Sabre, a joint Navy-CAGA operation intended to liberate the city, retake the fabrication sites, and put an end to Voice's activities there. The operation was conducted with some degree of success, but also with significant loss of life. The discoveries made subsequently on the planet's surface were deeply disturbing (→FSS).
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