#campoestela

[elbiotipo]

Lots to talk about how we percieve the other through fantasy races and civilizations (I'm writing a post kind on that) but in Campoestela, a space opera setting with many alien species, humans are "known" for:

their endurance when running, diving, spacewalking, etc.

legalistic societies full of written and codified rules

and fútbol, which is a game of endurance running full of codified rules

[elbiotipo]

Things that define humans in Campoestela:

Lawyers

Fútbol

[elbiotipo]

I love this picture of an Soviet Aeroflot helicopter delivering a samovar somewhere in Siberia:

And now I have the image of Beto and Co. from Campoestela doing the very important mission of delivering a hot water dispenser for mate to some outpost in a remote moon:

Which, granted, don't look as good as a samovar, but if you've ever been in a road trip through Argentina or studided at a public university here, you'll understand these are pillars of civilization.

[elbiotipo]

Something about future astronauts is that if they dedicate their career to that (not in short missions, but actually living and working in space for most of their lives), they would get old quickly. Exposure to radiation, zero gravity, the stress of compressing and decompressing, stressful "do this right or you die" operations like docking and landing, constantly calculating in your head how things move in zero G (though I guess spaceborns would see it as innate), as well as a lot of other calculations, and who knows what else.

I mean, the constant exercise and keeping your mind sharp would help keeping you in shape, but I bet that if you started your space career at say, 20, you would look like shit by 40 (it's a way of saying, that kind of rugged DILF/MILF is appealing). Also, Planetes got it right, you would get risk of all kinds of cancer, from space radiation to reactors to all the kinds of materials involved in the space industry, it would be one of those "trade diseases".

One of the jokes of my character Beto is that he acts like a divorced dad of 50 when he's like, 25, but perhaps that's actually the standard for such people, you can tell an astronaut because they look older than they should. I gotta read more personal testimonies from deep divers, sailors, and such professions. Of course, there's also the Russian cosmonauts who seem to have spent more time in space than anyone else.

[elbiotipo]

Like in most starships, and indeed like in any kind of ships through history, the mess hall was the heart of the Johann Sebastian Mastropiero. Of course, most of the rest of the ship was propellant tanks, engines, and cargo bays. But what truly mattered was this place, this sacred place with food and drink where the crew could relax after a long day sailing the aether. They were the ones who kept this old bird flying, they were the lifeblood of the Mastropiero, and the mess hall was its heart. At least according to the crew themselves. The cargo's insurance was probably higher than theirs after all.

“Mess hall” might also have been a grandiose name for it. It was basically a table, some especially uncomfortable chairs bolted to it so they didn't flew away in 0g, several handles to walk through while in freefall, an old booth that seemed -and probably was- taken from an abandoned fuel space station, an old fridge/hydroponics combo, some kitchen essentials like an electric kettle and oven, and a counter bearing the scars of poorly prepared food, because you get tired of instant guiso and mushroom chips after a while.

It was Human spacer tradition for the Captain to have a last dinner with the passengers before landing at the destination, so never mind the mess, in a way, the mess hall also needed to show the ship's history. And it did, with the pictures hanging on the paneling. A faded photograph of the crew during the Machine War, and then newer ones, an old captain giving a thumbs up at a newly repainted ship, a group of people wearing smokings doing a comedy sketch, Beto as a kid sitting on the commands with the hat on, an asado under three moons that legend has it bring good luck, and more. The latest picture was just next to the oldest one, with a lanky, angular-faced human male with a mate gourd on hand, a small shark-like girl wearing sunglasses and doing a peace sign, and a cactus-like man with his leaves in a sarcastic attitude, under that same sky as the three lucky moons.

Freefalling, and yet somehow looking busy while at it, Beto arrived at the mess hall to heat up water for the mate and start up his morning shift. As he rubbed his eyes he saw Ragua hanging by her squalene tail on a handle in the "ceiling", her headphones at a high enough volume to tell she was listening to Hermética. Siusini was sitting conspicuously in the center of the booth table -not that he needed to eat anyways-, while holding a bunch of crystals around him that reflected on his leaves in beams of focused light, like glittering rainbows. Beto wondered if Pink Floyd would perhaps be a better soundtrack in this case.

"Mornin', people." Beto yawned as he turned on the kettle, his weightless body hanging as he waited for the water to heat up -not boil, this was mate after all.

"MORNIN', BETO!" Ragua said from the ceiling, her voice more high-pitched than usual, perhaps because of her usual excitement, perhaps because of the metal screaming that seemed to envelop her. Siusini's chromoplasts shifted into a greeting hue.

"What are you listening to, Ragua?" Beto asked as the water began to heat.

"It's that music you told me about last night!" She answered, perhaps a bit offended that Beto didn't notice. "I love it, though some lyrics are hard to understand..." She noted. Beto nodded thoughtfully. He was amazed at how quickly she had picked up Rioplatense Spanish in any case.

"Yeah, I told you, they talk a bit about the things that happen in my history tapes..."

"Of course you like them because of that." She grinned while narrowing her eyes playfully. For various reasons, perhaps because she was part of it, history just didn't sit well with her. "But that's the fun part. The voices go... like all low and deep like yours..." Ragua did a frighteningly good rendition of Ricardo Iorio, "...and then it goes all like YEEEEEEAHHHH." Ragua did an even more frightening impression of Claudio O'Connor. Beto just smiled, amused.

"I don't sing like that."

"You don't sing. At all." Ragua teased back.

"Shut up." Beto said. It was true, he couldn't sing at all.

"But what I like the most is the controls." Ragua continued as the album rocked on, her fins shifting to the music.

"You mean instruments?" Beto corrected her word use, helpfully.

"Yeah! Those! It's just so AWESOME... Like, I love the sound, the noise, it feels like when prey moves on the ocean, when you're about to just bite on it? You know? So nice." She said, a bit too giddy, kicking her finned legs against the ceiling.

"That's cool man." Beto answered in a monotone as he poured water on the thermos. 

Perhaps not wanting to awaken her predatory instincts, he turned to Siusini.

"What about you, you finally gave up engineering to become a table decoration?" Beto bantered in friendly confidence. Siusini didn't seem to listen through his sound translator. His leaf patterns shifted in ways that were difficult even for the experienced Beto to decipher.

"Sius'?" He asked again. The chromoplasts reacted.

"GOOD DAY BETO." The patterns of colors said. Beto knew how to read them, and he'd better, since Siusini was his engineer after all. Not a good relationship for miscommunications.

"Testing out the crystals you bought the other time?" Beto said while pouring himself a mate.

"RIGHT."

"Are they, uh, good?" Beto asked, not sure how to put it.

"VERY GOOD." the leaves answered, as Siusini shifted the crystals to what Beto assumed was a more pleasant light show for him.

Beto sipped his second -always the best one, after the yerba is settled- mate of the morning and watched the crystals dance in Siusini's tendrils. Being a heterotroph himself, Beto didn't quite get what was so interesting about the focusing crystals that many photosynthetic species enjoyed, but visually, they were very striking.

"You know." Beto said with his usual curiosity, "You never quite told me what does that light show feels, exactly." Siusini's color shifted to one of amusement, and Beto sighed, wondering what he was gonna say.

"EXPLAINING IS DIFFICULT. WE HAVE TALKED ABOUT THIS." the leaves said.

"Oh come on. You can explain how a dark-energy inductor works, but not that?" Beto bantered back, knowing he won the argument.

"WILL TRY THEN." Siusini said, his color still in an ironic hue.

The communication leaves of Siusini shifted a bit in some patterns Beto didn't recognize. "IT IS LIKE. GOOD FOOD. VERY GOOD FOOD. NARCOTICS[?]. [?]."

Beto blinked a couple times, trying to understand. The last two patterns looked familiar, but... Then he noticed Siusini's leaves and tendrils shifting in a rather strange way... and he groaned.

"You dirty motherflower, I shouldn't have asked..." Beto groaned again in the tone of someone defeated while Siusini's leaves shone brighter in their amused state. He just grabbed his thermos and mate and decided to go to the cockpit.

Ragua, always up for some good gossip but who wasn't keeping up with the conversation because of her headphones, followed Beto with a teasing smile. "Wait, wait, what did Sius’ say?" she asked.

"Never mind, you don't wanna know." Beto said as he made his way to the cockpit.

"Come on, tell me, what was it?!"

"Ragua, no."

"COME ON, TELL ME!" Ragua insisted as she hovered on 0g after him, grabbing his leg while he grumbled. "BETITO, COME ON, TELL ME, WAS IT FUNNY? I KNOW IT WAS FUNNY!" She was not gonna let it go and he knew it. But never mind, first it was time to do trajectory corrections and get to work.

And so, another day started in the good spaceship Mastropiero, 614 years after Gagarin.

[elbiotipo]

Funny bit about Campoestela is that all Usamerican planet names are spelled in Spanish. Nueva Jiustón. Puerto Jaivén. Brigmangourld. Trancuiliti. Reinbou.

Well, maybe I got too far with this but you get the idea.

[elbiotipo]

Vengo re manija porque empecé Dungeon Meshi. Qué bichos comestibles hay en Campoestela?

AGUANTE DUNGEON MESHI

Uff, no tenés idea. En Campoestela, debido a la extensa minería espacial, cosas como los metales preciosos, las gemas, etc. están disponibles por todas partes. Por eso justamente las cosas orgánicas, como la comida, son las más apreciadas. Un tema interesante es que aunque la biología es similar entre diversas especies (para hacerme la vida más fácil a mí), culturalmente, lo que a alguno le parece apetecible a otro no, así que hay mucho para hablar y acordar cuando te encontrás con astronautas del otro lado de la Campoestela y se juntan a comer.

Algunas cosas que me acuerdo:

Una de las delicias más comunes son los cloroplastos (o estructuras equivalentes, mejor dicho) de las amebas espaciales. Es todo un tema controlar su mitosis (sus ciclos de vida son lentísimos) para cosecharlas sin dañar a la población.

Ragua, en su mundo natal hace miles de años, vivía con sus abuelos cosechando "miel", que es en realidad una sustancia creada por equivalentes camarones que tenían colmenas en esponjas marinas gigantes, para alimentar a sus larvas. Ella no está segura si esos bichos están extintos en la actualidad.

Uno de sus bocadillos favoritos, como de muchos seres marinos, son una especie de amonites que ella muerde y come como caramelos. A Beto le da asco pero cada cual con lo suyo.

Otro bocadillo muy popular son de ciertas ostras que crean perlas dulces para atraer a sus presas, que por supuesto han sido domesticadas para hacer caramelos artesanales

Otros bichos comestibles... hay todo tipos de carnes. Pero en general, los animales preferibles son los pequeños, porque se pueden mantener en estaciones y naves espaciales. En el caso de los humanos, estos incluyen gallinas, conejos, cuyos y una variedad de peces, invertebrados y otros.

Por esta razón, por ejemplo, las empanadas más comunes entre los esteloplatenses son de pescado, diversas verduras, y hongos, mientras que las de carne, humita o jamón y queso son consideradas cosas de la Madre Tierra.

En realidad, una gran proporción de los humanos tienen una dieta mayormente vegetariana, no necesariamente por razones morales o culturales (aunque sí hay muchísima influencia del Medio Oriente y de la India en la "civilización humana" actual) sino por el hecho de que las plantas son más fáciles de mantener en el espacio que animales grandes.

Las culturas que comen más carne en esta situación son los esteloplatenses, los tejanos y los australianos, que tienen mundos enteros para dedicarse a arriar vaca pal asadito.

Entre las criaturas no terrestres utilizadas para carne, hay equivalentes de dinosaurios y elefantes criados por varias culturas extraterrestres (de las cuales no tengo mucho creado todavía), pero eso no se encuentra en una carnicería, son sacrificios muy especiales con festividades que duran hasta un mes, banquetes al por mayor. No es algo que se hace a la ligera.

No es carne, pero otra delicia muy particular es el ámbar de ciertas plantas en mundos secos, crujiente y dulce como almíbar!

Ya que estamos, la bebida más popular de Campoestela se llama posca. Es de origen desconocido, pero es básicamente agua carbonatada con ciertos nutrientes, y se vende en distintas concentraciones de CO2. No es ni estimulante ni alcohólica ni alucinógena mucho menos, hidrata bien pero no es la gran cosa (algo así como el gatorade), y tiene un poco gusto a soda con Algo, PERO es algo que todo el mundo puede beber y parece que la mayoría de las especies disfrutan las burbujitas, así que se vende y se toma en todos los espaciopuertos, hasta que puedas acordar en un menú apetecible para todos.

[elbiotipo]

Notes on technology in Campoestela:

Most spaceships are single-stage-to-orbit. They have rather standard jet engines to lift off from the ground like a standard plane.

To get into orbit, they use a rocket engine that uses a solid fuel made of a HIGHLY combustible (yet stable) carbon-nitrogen compound which allows a better fuel than anything previous. This was first discovered by Iranian scientists who named it "Nafta".

(sí, Beto tiene que estacionar su camión espacial para cargar nafta)

Nafta was a big discovery on its time, allowing cheap SSTO rockets. Nowadays it's produced in many worlds and widely available. It also has uses as weaponry, but it's not that efficient.

Nafta is used for lift-off and orbital burns. For manuevering in space, there are small jets on the nose and tail of spaceships, similar to the Space Shuttle.

Spaceship piloting is still not an easy task, but it's comparable to being a jet pilot, about 4 or 5 years to master. Hard, but something on the reach of many people. People from the generation ship clans are a bit more used to it and often represent an outsized part of space pilots, but there's always many wellers (from down the gravity well) who get their licenses too.

The hardest thing is always landing. Especially given all the different gravities, atmospheres, orbits and such you have to learn in each different case, even with all the automation in the world. Many spacers feel confident sticking to one or at most two or three planets they know.

Pilots that only do shuttle or cargo runs in the same star system or planet are called "Starters", because they go around the same star. It's rude, but many spacers do it.

FTL travel is another thing. FTL travel is done using a ring-like structure that projects a bubble around the ship and takes it to a (completely made-up for the setting) dimension called the Aether. The Aether is one of the meta-dimensions (there might be more) that uphold reality. Conveniently, you can use it as a shortcut to travel between stars, which project "shadows" on the Aether.

The Aether has its own navigation, with currents and whirpools and areas of thick dark matter (which, for cinematic purposes, actually look like bright nebulae) There are routes that are easier to travel and navigate, and these are where the most visited worlds are. Even stars that are close in real space might be very hard to get in Aetheric space, so there's routes that can take you all over the galaxy in a week, while many other places are out of reach.

Navigating the Aether is very similar to flying a plane through a cloudy sky. Some spacer says it's even easier than flying in real space.

Staying on the aether depends on how much you can keep the fields upholding your "bubble". This depends on the energy of your ship. Big ships can travel all over the galaxy but they have enormous energy consumption requirements.

Smaller ships (such as Beto's Mastropiero) dock with a ring-like structure that allows them to make short jumps. The average jump in an explored route is about 12-48 hours, so it's much like aircraft flights.

Exploring new aetheric routes is something that is very romanticized but in reality is a tedious process of jumping, cataloguing new systems (many of them empty and useful only as refuelling stations), seeing where the streams go and end, how they change, and more.

There is no FTL radio or live communication. There is a kind of aetheric radar that allows you to see incoming ships and do some morse-like communication, but it's not very efficient, there is no such thing as a galactic internet (though it's said ancient civilizations had one)

Aether travel engines require very sophisticated manufacturing and materials, which were hard for humans to develop. This was long only in the hands of governments and corporations, but after the Machine War, accessible aether starships hit the civilian market.

Smaller ships are still used by governments (more like loose "leagues") to do what big ships can't: supply satellites and equipment to remote bases, small-scale transport of engineers, researchers, aether "meteorology" and exploration, etc. This is very much like bush planes in remote regions or the role of Aeroflot in developing the USSR.

While humans in the setting, like most species, are composed of many different leagues, cultures and organizations, their technology is remarkably consistent. This is because cheap and reliable spaceflight depends on very reliable standarization. Some of the spaceship parts used six centuries after Gagarin are still the same used in the Soyuz. The ISO is perhaps one of the most enduring legacies of human civilization, along with FIFA.

[elbiotipo]

One thing regarding videogame consoles in Campoestela is that by the time it takes place ("500 years after Gagarin") most physical videogame consoles, cartridges, disks, etc. are degraded to be unusuable except for those carefully preserved in museums and antique societies (and there must be countless online games that are just... lost). Most, or rather all games from our current console era(s) are preserved in emulation. Another thing that is always a theme in Campoestela, however, is cultural and species diversity, it's a setting with hundreds (thousands?) of different sentient species and each with their own countless languages and cultures. Things like that are common in Campoestela, most common use things like clothes, electronics, utensils, tools, have to be made with many species in mind and are often tailored, like going to a spacesuit tailor, an electronicman, etc

While this removes the idea of my characters rummaging through street markets in search of ancient videogames, it does open some interesting possibilites. So instead of mass-produced standarized consoles, videogaming in Campoestela resembles building a PC, except even more artisanal because you have to factor anatomical differences... someone like Ragua could work with a human controller "fine", but come on, you do like REAL gamers do and go to your local electronics shop in the big space station and ask them to build a controller and console for you. This has bearing in the plot because Ragua was a cringefail gamergirl in her ancient precursor civilization, and besides being thrown into an unknown time away from everything and everyone she ever knew, she's also concerned all her favorite fandoms and videogames are now only known to archeologists, if that. So she is trying to learn what kind of 'future' videogames are there (the graphics suck so much).

In the separate Biopunk Future setting (2143, more 'realistic' even with the talking dolphins), consoles are still produced, even if Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft are long gone by successive global economic crises. In this setting, WW3 and the Ecocide managed to devastate global industries and telecommunication, lots of things preserved in the internet were lost and people are acutely aware of it, making physical media more important than ever. Melanie (the communist catgirl) was raised by her grandparents in one of the shops that dedicates precisely to recovering and emulating old media, with an especial focus on nerd and otaku culture. And that's one of the reasons why she's Like That. Overall, electronics have also taken in a more modular and conservative bent (almost back to brick phones), since the era of global commerce is reaching its twilight and society prefers things that are cheap and last long instead of flashy. Retro videogames are very much in, and since many characters have entered public domain and people are nostalgic for an era where things were simpler and half of the biosphere didn't die, there is a retro wave in the past decades. There was an era around the mid 21th century were lots of people were hooked to VR and AI characters and it was considered a global health crisis, but that was stupid and we don't talk about it.

[elbiotipo]

Some random cultural quirks of the Campoestela universe:

Because some of the most economically powerful human worlds have been settled by people from the Middle East (like Hilav, settled by Alevi Turks), around the human worlds Arab, Turkish and Persian fashion are considered formal high fashion.

Suits and ties like what we wear now are antiquated, showing up wearing one is like showing up in plate armor. Some very, very old corporations and institutions use them in special ocassions.

The human custom of kissing is considered unsanitary or just plain wierd by most other species. Except those who are into weird fetishes, of course. Like ew, you're really into that?

There are NO grey spaceships like in other science fiction (though there are some with faded paint). It is a point of pride to paint your spaceship in your colors and personalize it, what fucking kind of spacer are you if you don't? Rioplatense spaceships are painted in proud fileateado, Serenissima spaceships display the coats of arms of the trading families, Australian spaceships are decorated in intrincate geometrical designs, every corporation has its own logo and livery, and the Socialist Interstellar flies in proud red and gold. And yes, of course, some paint flames on them to make them go faster.

Most worlds of Usamerican descent were initially settled by the late 23th century expansionist drive of the Latter Day Saints Church. For most of the galaxy, Usamerican is at least partially synonymous with Mormonism.

Of course, by the time this all happens (2600-2700 or so), nations such as Hawai'i, California, Cascadia, and of course Tejas have been independent for centuries.

Posca (name given by humans) is Campoestela's favorite drink. It's basically sparkling water with some salts and vitamins. It's sold everywhere and everyone drinks it because even across most alien species, they all like a little bit of the bubblé

There are many calendars across the stars, but the one accepted over most of Campoestela is the King's Calendar, which counts all the kings of the Precursors from the last one, around 22.700 years ago. Why was he the last king? Well, that's the mystery, right? The year is about 558 days long, and fortunately for humans, the day is easily converted into 21 hours.

While most human ships use "Earth Time" (24/365) and the Space Calendar (counting from the first flight of Yuri Gagarin), those who work elsewhere with the King's Calendar (or other) complain about the "missing three" hours. Conversely, cultures with longer days allow you a little more time to nap. Sometimes hours of it.

[elbiotipo]

Secondary characters of Campoestela (outside the Beto-Ragua-Siusini trio)

Xipi and Xapa:

A couple of Jeparet, a small pterodactyl-like species.

They do the night shift on the Mastropiero, Xipi pilots and Xapa co-pilots and does extra engineering (Siusini doesn't sleep but he has free time)

Much like Mother Earth's Agapornis lovebirds they are literally unseparable and would die if they stay apart. They are very very much like those extremely close couples you must have met.

Born in Taraguí, so they speak Rioplatense and Tandar but also a couple dialect they only understand. They help Ragua with language lessons but mix a lot of things that not even Beto understands.

They LOVE cumbia music and spend their free time dancing.

Erika:

Beto's childhood friend from Aerolito and his ex

Archeologist and historian, she is an endless fountain of trivia and history rants, one reason why she got along so well with Beto.

Intensely analytical about people. You know the mad scientist stereotype? She's a mad sociologist. It works in some ocassions, not all of them.

Broke up with Beto under Unclear Circumstances during an archeological expedition.

She knows ancient languages, and so is probably one of the few people who can actually hold a conversation with Ragua on her language. How very convenient.

DISCO TEX:

YEE-HAW VAQUEROS HERE COMES DISCO TEX BETO'S SPACE EX

A vaquero disco fan space trucker from Tejas (independent from the old Usamerica for over four centuries now)

Exactly what you'd expect. Dances and sings like a devil. Always speaks in ALL CAPS.

His spaceship is decorated with disco balls, lava lamps and carpet EVERYWHERE inside, outside there's a decoration of the horns of a space creature he tamed himself. Alledgelly.

Dedicates himself to speculative trade rather than contracts like Beto and is quite rich. His spaceship is bigger and has a bigger crew who also dress as disco vaqueros. He must pay real well.

One hell of a friend, though.

CB-2:

Cebedós, a maintenance robot of the Mastropiero. (probably should name him after a Les Luthiers reference)

Looks like a sphere with lots of robot limbs and tools, surprsingly cute.

Over time robots develop their own personality. CB-2 is like a good dog, even wagging his robot "tail" when he does a good job.

YOU CAN'T PET HIM THOUGH, he goes into the spaceship reactor, no matter how much you clean him he's full of radation :(

[elbiotipo]

I'm doing some political fixing to my Campoestela setting...

The main thing that was bothering me is how humans fit. Since this is a setting with multiple sentient species, each with their own civilizations and cultures (because I dislike the recent trend of human-only sci-fi setting, it's an intentional retro throw). However, the main thing here that allows such a diverse setting is the presence of diplomats/traders (because no universal translator!) and standarized equipment. Where did the latter come from, though? If there are older space civilizations than humanity, it must be humans who adapt to that standard, and I'm not nearly creative enough to build an entire alien technology set. If it was humans who "created" space civilization, it would mean they're way too important in the setting and I want humans just to be one civilization out of many.

My solution is that there would be a mix of both; humans have their own set of technology but they have adopted some alien tech and customs. This also throws me back to the early history of this setting. My idea is that humanity spread on its own on the Solar System, developing some standard space technology (perhaps there are equivalents of the Soyuz running around) before they invented FTL and added other alien standards to their own technological base. So human spaceships are similar and quite compatible, but they are very different to other civilizations. FTL is a whole discussion on itself, how did things come from big slow generation ships to aircraft-sized spaceships? I'll deal with that later.

Another thing I was never happy with was with the "Confederación Esteloplatense" thing, it's an ugly name (ironically it sounds better in English, Silverstar Confederation). OF COURSE there is a Space Argentina, and more accurately they are the descendants of the generation ship Esperanza, which had a mostly Argentine crew. But I've decided that, at least loosely, Argentina is part of a larger whole that includes the whole of South America or Latin America. I'm going to call it the Cruzur Union, the Union of the Southern Cross (Cruz del Sur). Rioplatenses, or Esteloplatenses, are just one nation inside of this wider... nation.

To see it from a wider perspective now, I'm picturing humanity in Campoestela much like the Ancient Greeks and Phoenicians (the Poleis model), establishing trading posts, colonies, communities and such all over space, but these are mostly independent from each other and only organized in very loose trade leagues and cultural alliances, with exceptions, there are few truly interstellar states beyond that. This is the Poleis model I made in my Space Empires post.

Ancient Greeks poleis were sorted by dialect and cultures (Doric, Aeolic, Attican, Ionic, real stuff) and their mother cities (the metropolis. And so, the human communities, all very independent and belonging to many overlapping organizations and alliances are also loosely grouped by their origins back on Earth. I'm imagining there were a couple wars and conflicts between the Western Powers (US/Europe) and the Eastern Powers (Russia/China), with other blocs such as the Cruzur, the African Union, the Arab League, India and more eventually overtaking the two. This is in the far past by now, it's like talking about the Habsburgs in the context of the modern European Union.

So, in this context, Beto, our loveable Argentine space trucker, is from the Esperanza Federation (name pending), a loose interstellar trade alliance of the descendants of generation ship of the same name. However, this alliance itself is part of the Cruzur, the old goverment of South America which still has a deep cultural and political influence. And Beto himself considers himself Rioplatense or Argentine, depending on the context. Oh, and he is part of a spacer syndicate that might or might not be international too. And of course he does belong to a wider human civilization or cultural sphere. If this is all complicated, it's because it's supposed to be, this setting is a bit of a reaction against single-culture, single-empire civilizations in space opera.

Why am I not making it the URSAL? Because this is a retro setting in the style of space opera. In real life sooner or later, we're gonna become all Star Trek communists (this is not a joke)

It's funny that this is all just background for a space trucker and a gamer girl having silly adventures.

[elbiotipo]

Space flight (in real life) is not actually that exciting besides lift-off and landing, you just input the coordinates, make the burn to the desired speed, and then your spaceship just flies like a bullet to destination. You could need some course corrections and of course you need to keep the spaceship in shape, but computers take most of the busy work.

In my Campoestela universe, the aether, the *dimension* that spaceships use for FTL, is a bit different. It's a bit like a eternally cloudy sky. You do need to sit down and stay alert, much like flying an airplane. Most solo spaceships do it in stages, they lift off, fly a little on the aether, stop in some asteroid in deep space to rest a couple hours, fly again, and then land/dock at destination.

The whole experience is actually very much like long haul truckers.

Beto is, as established, a Space Trucker. So he needs to keep himself awake in those long hauls, and for him, who is often in the role of express delivery, it's even more important. So yerba mate is of course, VITAL, but there's also that has kept Argentines on the road awake for centuries: funny cassette tapes

That's right, since there's no radio in FTL and it's not practical in real space due to light-delay, when you NEED to keep your mind sharp, nothing is better than listening to the jokes of Space Luis Landriscina or Space Dr. Tangalanga or Space Les Luthiers. You can buy them in any gas station spacedock, and you better stock on them because the spacelanes are long

Beto, being a man of culture too, also buys a lot of tapes about history, geography and general culture too, this is why he has so much unexpected knowledge (they're technically podcasts but still). But you know his 'Mastropiero Que Nunca' tape is scratched to death from how many times he has listened to it.

[elbiotipo]

Much like I did with Beto, I'll try to make a timeline of Ragua's life. It's in Earth years, but her species ages differently and much of her life is spent in virtual paradises/relativist travel, so the dates here are very approximate:

0: Is born in one of the paradise hatchery worlds of the Irruita (now called Precursor) civilization

1-15: Learns to swim, talk and all that (she did NOT eat her siblings at this time how dare you imply that's RUDE)

23: her parents "get bored of her" and she's raised by her grandparents in a rural world

23-54: Mostly gaming and herding fish and making shrimp egg honey

54: goes into her first galactic cruise with her girlfriend, she has a short honeymoon relationship with her (about 25 years max)

75-97: (plays gacha games):

98: reconciles with her parents for a brief time, works as a retainer in the Irruita celestial bureaucracy, quickly resigns

120: (plays gacha games)

130: Tries a singer career, goes kinda well

130-170: her "sex drugs and rock n' roll era" according to her (exact ratio unknown)

168: Gets bored of fame, might have blown up a moon in her farewell concert

170-210: (plays gacha games)

210-260: her second galactic cruise, has some short relationships but mostly goes sightseeing and such

270: (plays gacha games. some lady on Earth is inventing agriculture at this time, don't pay much attention to it)

295: goes into her third galactic cruise, this time alone

320: tries a contemplative pilgrimage to the center of the galaxy. Just kidding. (plays gacha games)

327: has a short fling with her girlfriend again (about 10 years)

340: nostalgic about her childhood, decides to become a retro game streamer/idol.

353: Reaches a thousand subscribers

360s: the retro fashion in this era gets her more popular

370s: she has about two billion subscribers now, making her a minor celebrity

381: she gets dared by her chat to wait for the release of a new game in relativistic travel, she takes the bet and goes into animated suspension.

The spaceship fails, sending her into relativistic travel for thousands of light years.

The Precursor civilization dissappears mysteriously.

The enterity of human recorded history happens

After the Machine War, modern galactic civilization emerges

381: spaceship deaccelerates into regular speed again, only a couple of months of internal time has passed, millenia have gone by outside.

386: discovered, still in suspended animation, by antiquities collectors who might be working for more secretive powers

387: Awakened by Beto and Suisini in a regular transport mission. After a short fight with the grave robbers, they agree to shelter her. She joins the tripulation of the Mastropiero

[elbiotipo]

Notes on gear in Campoestela, mostly spacesuits:

Spacesuits are cheap and widely produced compared to today, but they are also tailor-made, much like a VERY, very high-end business suit. Going to a spacesuit tailor is often expensive and a bit of a chore, as you have to tailor everything from the actual suit to atmospheric mixes, especially when it comes to different species. However, once they are done, they usually last for life.

The main kind of spacesuits are the "skintight" counter pressure suits (see here). They look remarkably like racing suits, and are rather easy to put it on and comfortable. Carbon nanotube and smart materials deal with most of the uncomfortable parts, but you WILL feel a certain Tingle in your more curvy parts. You've been warned.

You can, actually, wear your suit as everyday clothing. There's also zippers for when you have to go... The astronaut underwear, of course, still works as a diaper (dissolving *stuff* with genetically engineered bacteria for that purpose), and when missions get extensive, there's no other way. Because of the bad past reputation of astronauts who did it anywhere, they have gone all the other way now, and most spacers are meticulously clean and very touchy about that subject.

(the beforementioned bacteria, as well as atmospheric and pressure mixes, have to be customized for different species, which makes spacesuits a rather expensive lifetime investment)

Helmets are standarized, but by far, the most complex part of the suit. Equipped with radio, lights, a HUD controlled by eye movement and blinking (though many prefer wrist buttons), and even some little snacks and water in case you are stranded and have to wait hours or even days for rescue. They are very easy to put it on, seal automatically with the collars of all spacesuits, and unlike current ones, they allow you to move your neck inside.

(there's also a little stick to scratch your nose).

Astronauts love to put stickers on their helmets. In fact, spacesuits are very much personalized; a plain space white suit is frowned upon. Mission patches and flags, much like punk battle jackets, and very often the name is on big letters on the back, like a football jersey, for easier identification. Many spacers, especially those who like to stand out, go even further and decorate their suits with family heradly, or special artwork like tattoos, you can find some that look like an abstract or baroque painting and you can say "oh, it's This Guy" (and that's exactly the intention). Most of this of course applies to human spacer cultures, other cultures and species have different traditions. Some might look all the same, but in ultraviolet or infrared reveal all sorts of complex patterns.

Spacesuits backpacks are very much miniaturized, also easy to connect to standarized helmets. Helmets themselves have limited air recycling capabilities, but you need a backpack for any EVA.

LISTEN UP, ASTRONAUTS! Here's what you need to have in your belt before heading off: a beeper (radar to check distances from objects), backup radio, sealing patches (if there's any puncture on the suit or helmet), intravenous iodine (for radiation), sedants and anti-nausea (not a good idea to go out with nausea or The Bends in an emergency, species dependant of course), signal flares and flashlight, multiknife (or facón if you're Esteloplatense), and don't DARE going out without a safety line.

On a planet, suit or not (what, are you going out with your suit planetside? are you from a movie or something?) you still have some gear on your belt all the time. Breather mask and goggles just in case, again, a multitool or knife, pills with nutrients for when the local food isn't enough (for Argentines, they look like La Yapa candy), iodine pills, a kind of smartphone for rugged terrain (like two months of battery and capable of being sunk in mud with no problem), advanced wristwatch (many carry a mechanical one for emergencies) and various other tools. If your belt doesn't do a jingle jangle when you're walking, are you even an astronaut?

Bullet or energy weapons are frowned upon in spaceports, obviously. Most spacers have some 'on the trunk' for emergency, but unlike most science fiction, they don't usually go carrying them around all the time. In fact, gunfights in remote spaceports are mostly a fiction from the equivalent of western movies.

Most spaceships also carry a lot of little bots that do all the maintainance that biologicals can't do, especially since these are ATOMIC ROCKETS we are talking about, and a human fixing a nuclear lightbulb engine would get their DNA chopped. These droids are ubiquitous in all spaceship garages and cargo bays, and usually you can adopt one for cheap, they're treated much like pets and are very hardy; they do need a lot of radiation cleaning though.

[elbiotipo]

Me resulta muy interesante el mundo de Campoestela, y tenía una duda: ¿Cómo se adaptan las distintas especies a climas y territorios distintos a los propios? ¿Hay alguna especie de trajes o dispositivos "multiproposito" para esto que cubran todas las necesidades de la especie en cuestión o tienen que conseguir uno especifico para cada entorno que visiten?

Muy interesante la pregunta! Los trajes espaciales en Campoestela son hechos a medida y personalmente, aunque hay algunos para emergencias, son todos personalizados para cada individuo. Cada especie tiene sus distintas necesidades fisiológicas y su distinta anatomía. Aunque muchas cosas se facilitan por el uso de tecnología de carbono (el oficio de hacer trajes espaciales tiene mucho de sastre) sigue siendo algo bastante elaborado, especialmente el casco. El traje espacial que te va a acompañar en tu vida de adulto es algo muy personal, y suele estar cubierto por la comunidad (o en el caso de Beto, el Gremio de Espaciotransportistas). Estos trajes también sirven para prácticamente todos los ambientes que puedas imaginar.

En cuanto a vivir en distintos climas y entornos, las estaciones espaciales y las ciudades cosmopolitas sí tienen muchas habitaciones y edificios enteros adaptados a distintos ambientes y necesidades. Sin embargo, los asentamientos planetarios no tanto. Hay miles de millones de planetas habitables para todos los gustos, e incluso dentro de un mismo planeta podés encontrar climas diferentes. Una especie que disfruta del frío y otra del calor pueden convivir en un mismo mundo sin ningún problema, las conexiones de transporte son el mayor tema. Las naves espaciales suelen tener "cápsulas" adaptables para pasajeros, pero en general, la tripulación tiende a ser más o menos del mismo "rango" habitable, para que un ser humano no trabje por ejemplo, en una nave donde la temperatura ideal son los 60°C

(Acá estoy siendo un mal biólogo y asumiendo una evolución muy convergente y diciendo que la mayoría de las especies comparten la misma bioquímica y fisiología (o sea, casi todas son basadas en carbono, respiran oxígeno, etc.), con diferencias más que nada anatómicas y climáticas. Esto no es muy realista, pero es una concesión que hago al ser un mundo estilo Space Opera (como el viaje FTL). De todas formas, no son humanoides, la tripulación de Beto es una chica tiburón, un cactus-sepia, una pareja de pterodactilos camaleónicos y una especie de simio lampiño que toma mate)