In the Beginning ...
My child, my sweet and dearest creature, do you know of the brevity and chaos of life and existence? Let me tell you how, in the beginnings of time Archos, the Creator, the Crocheter, Mother of Life and Maker of All picked up the hook. The divine hook from which all things came to be. All that is, that was and that ever could be came from that hook. She took up the yarn of the universe and began to weave it into order and so it was that the stars and planets and moons formed in the heavens, how the void took shape and form and we called it THE WORLD!
But, my child, there was another. For as the great hook was worked and the world was woven, the echo of existence rattled around and woke Telos! Telos the Destroyer, the Great Unraveller, the Ends of Order. And Telos, woken from slumber by the agonising resonance of existence, began to unravel it. Pulling it apart from the very point of forming. Sending the yarn of the universe back into the void.
And so it is that all things come to be, woven into the world by Archos. And so too do all things perish, unravelled by Telos. Our time is brief, like the ordered yarn, but though it is brief, it is beautiful!
The History of the Mavros System
Mavros is a black hole formed from the death of a vast star in the early stage of the universe. Mavros grew larger as more matter was gradually drawn in. Further out, coalescing debris of the early universe formed into star systems orbiting the black hole at their gravitational centre. In the near vicinity of Mavros though, a planetary system was formed as rogue planets and asteroids fell into long-lasting, decaying orbits around the singularity.
For millions of years, the system was dark. Until a rogue star was drawn towards Mavros and slowly consumed. Light from the dying star began to orbit the black hole, lighting and warming the planets around it.
Many planets had orbited and then fallen into the black hole however, over the course of billions of years, some managed to hold a longer orbit and, lit by the light of Mavros' accretion disk, they grew to sustain life which ultimately evolved into three distinct sentient species.
All three species - the Pithiks, Arkoa and Erpons - all claim to have been the first to have evolved far enough to develop space travel however in truth it was the collective effort of all three that lead to the current space age.
They since developed many great feats of stellar engineering but the first and greatest triumph came as the original star was almost completely consumed by Mavros. At this point, gravitational engineers from all species worked together and succeeded in drawing in another rogue star to feed the black hole. Since then, this process has been repeated and refined, with Mavros growing each and every time.
Over time, the original home planets of the three races in turn fell into the singularity as well however by then they had developed the means to control the descent of other incoming rogue planets and either select them for orbit as new home worlds or direct them nearer to the event horizon where they would be ripped apart into the asteroid belt and could be mined for resources.
Similarly, incoming larger gas giants and ice giants are kept at a further orbit where they are harvested from collection plants on their moons and the precious minerals used to drive the growth of the system.
As yet, while they have developed many great and vast machines, none of the inhabitants of the system have managed to travel faster than about 0.1 x the speed of light. This means that while they have done great things in their own system they have not yet been able to explore the surrounding galaxy.
Though many dream to ...