81103

Significant Sentient Population

3.2 million

Allegiance

Partial towards anyone carrying luxury goods.

Hazards

Giant sector resulting in unpredictable gravitational effects. Pilots may be adversely or positively affected by exposure to the entertainment that is broadcast continually in this sector.

History

Although linking directly to Boraxus, with the gate being known about by Boraxians, their lack of desire to explore the stars (at the time) meant that the sector was not first explored by them but was actually the third sector to be discovered by Krilgorians in the year 2127. Since the invention of holovision in 2012, Krilgore had been slowly sliding into a zombie like culture grinder with the vast majority of the population addicted to cheap soaps and dramas. By 2090 the conversion was official, the majority of Krilgorians had become morons, the last Krilgorian spaceship still in service was destroyed in the asteroids, scientific and technological progress had all but ceased and popular entertainers became worshipped as gods, given all positions of authority. Naturally, education became a taboo subject and the entire population wallowed in self induced mediocrity. Fortunately with too much power and money many of the popular icons began to grow bored and marvelling at their reflections on the panels of strange but shiny old spaceships that adorned museums all across the planet they wondered what space was like. Directors dreamed of new settings and script writers wrote the same old tired, rehashed plots under the guise of a fresh new space theme. Under the direction of the Follywood Council the Krilgorian Space Agency was reopened and retired spacecraft were dusted off from museums, given a fresh coat of paint and readied for launch. It was with much fanfare and eye candy that the first celebrity space ship piloted by none other than Marvin Slockberg himself launched towards fortune and glory. It was about then that Follywood discovered WHY the old ships had been retired as the unspaceworthy craft promptly exploded much to the delight of the minority of educated Krilgorians.

After 17 movies were made about the tragic event, life stories sold, countless docudramas made and so forth a second attempt was made with even more fanfare than the first. This attempt never even managed to launch instead exploding spectacularly on the launchpad. The failures only seemed to inspire celebrities more to try and all dreaming of the doors space would open for their flagging careers, celebrity after celebrity poured their fortunes into the space program and celebrity after celebrity blew up spectacularly.

Finally, in 2122, after nearly a decade of trying, 81103 star, Loki Parry, in a desperate attempt to prevent his character being killed off (his fading looks no longer enough to override his lack of acting talent) successfully launched in his spaceship "Jerky Sprunger III" (named after the famous talk/shlock show host). With absolutely no idea of how to fly a spacecraft and with a crew of half-wits, whilst looking for the remote control to the expensive entertainment system he had installed in the ship he accidentally toggled the hyperspace switch and the craft jumped to it's most recent destination, the Asteroids. (this was in the days prior to the Tibran's violation of the Galactic Atomic Weapons Treaty).

Upon arrival and with absolutely no piloting skill, the ship immediately began to take extensive damage from the Asteroids. In a panic Loki pressed lots of coloured lights and turned dials with the outcome being that the ship was soon en route to Tripe.

Detecting a rare Krilgorian vessel behaving erratically on their scanners, the recently arrived, highly intelligent although eccentric 'Trippers' of Tripe mistakenly assumed that this was a ship full of refugees come to join the Tripper colony and that the ship was experiencing difficulties. Repeated attempts to contact the ship failed further leading the Trippers to believe there was a problem on board. In reality the only problem was the morons on board who couldn't figure out how to use the comms equipment. A tug was sent out to the rescue.

It didn't take the Trippers long to realize what they had on their hands, and terrified that the insanity these people carried might be a result of some kind of infectious disease, they quarantined the ship's crew, hastily patched it up into a spaceworthy state, gave the crew a crash course in how to fly a spaceship, restocked their supplies, updated their computer's navigational information to include a new gate from the sector that the Trippers had detected and sent them on their way. Luckily, Tripe radiation affects highly intelligent people most of all, so there was no risk of the Krilgorian entertainers ever wanting to stay.

Once back in space Loki and with his new found knowledge, and his curiosity getting the better of him, Loki set course and engaged the hyperdrives through the new gate.

Arriving in the year 2127 some 5 years after launching, Mr. Parry in an attempt to suck up to the directors and writers of the popular drama, 81103, in which he starred, he named the sector after the show and a dramatic infotainment news clip back home. After scanning the sector and feeding a steady stream of data back home, the crew of the "Jerky Sprunger III" found, on a similar gravitational wavelength to the Tripe gate, yet another gate leading to an unknown destination. Desperately craving the adulation of the adoring masses, irrationally afraid of the Asteroids and dying dreaming of more fame and fortune, Mr. Parry set course through the new gate hoping the new sector would be able to satisfy all his goals. The new sector ended up being heavily populated by a race known as Boraxians and needless to say, he never made it home which was just as well because it saved him the pain of learning that the script writers had killed off his character in 81103 the moment he launched.

Loki Parry's discovery of the new sector sent the entertainment world into a spin and they became completely obsessed with getting there. Old colony ships pulled out of museums began to join in the attempt loaded with entertainment junkies and entertainment nobodies dreaming of becoming somebodies. Before his demise ad looking for more fame, Loki had prepared a 'documentary' about space flight based loosely on the quality information provided to him by the Trippers. Featuring excessive close up shots of his face and loaded with eye candy, the 'documentary' was of course more like an entertainment piece than anything else, low on content, high on rubbish, but it was better than nothing. Using this 'scientific masterpiece' as it was referred to back on Krilgore, the launch success rate did improve somewhat but was still pathetically low. A small number of elderly Krilgorian space veterans still had in them the ability to improve the success of the launches but wisely chose to keep quiet. The insanity spread until by the year 2135 almost 100% of the popular entertainment industry had either set course for 81103 or been blown up trying.

With all the misinformation, infotainment and mindless drivel removed from their lives the citizens of Boraxus awoke from their zombie like state, shook their heads wondering what the heck just happened and underwent a cultural revival.

Meanwhile in 81103 the dome colonists were quickly learning that docudramas don't grow crops and holovids aren't a viable cure for disease. The crazed directors insisted on continuing to churn out cheap mindless entertainment, and used the scant resources the colony ships carried to build sets and powerful transmitters capable of broadcasting their creations to anyone in the sector. Fortunately with less than half a brain between the lot of them, by 2150 they had all starved to death on a steady diet of 81103 or died from simple, curable ailments.

The sector is at once stunningly beautiful but at the same time violent and harsh. The sector is composed of a giant sun and a number of large planets, the orbits of which interact in such a way that the gravitational forces they exert on one another as they swing past each other produce techtonic nightmares on each planet. As such, with the exception of a few tiny, outlying rocks, the sector is unsuitable for habitation.

It was on these rocks that the original settlers built their dome colony and whilst they wiped themselves out through stupidity, the infrastructure remained in good shape. For some reason the glamour of the entertainment industry has remained attached to 81103 and it has since become a playground for the megarich. The dome colonies were refurbished and turned into luxury resorts and casinos taking advantage of the stunningly beautiful view the sector provides.

To the majority of people in all legions the sector is seen as a dumping ground for refuse. In fact, the Boraxians now use the sun of 81103 for dumping radioactive and other hazardous waste. The fact that lawyers, media tycoons, CEO's, movie stars and popular musicians prefer to live their lives there only backs up the consensus opinion of the place. With such individuals removed from the various legion societies, the home worlds have never been so productive.

With the exception of technology related to the entertainment industry, the rich and famous of 81103 are almost entirely technologically inept and as such are incapable of building any form of defense system but that's ok because no one wants to attack them. Every legion sees the benefit of having somewhere they can use to get rid of their rubbish and in fact encourage the colony's survival through providing free shipments of luxury foods, alcoholic beverages and even illicit substances from Tripe.

The space around the planets is another matter entirely with legions frequently fighting for domination of the sector. There is however one drawback. The resorts insist on maintaining the transmitters and broadcasting their mind altering drivel which they palm off as entertainment out to anyone in the sector with the ears to hear it or the eyes to see it. Frequently destroyed by pilots who just couldn't stand it anymore, the transmitters just got rebuilt and are now securely protected . Depending on the day and what's on, this constant stream of 'entertainment' has varying affects on pilots and seems to coincide with natural gravitational effects in the sector. Sometimes it drives them into a violent rage and they attack and repair with abnormal success, other times it annoys them so much they make careless mistakes and damage their own ships, for example by routing weapons power to the life support system. And still at other times the drivel depresses them so much their attacks and repairs are performed with almost no motivation.

Although Boraxians detest the colony and everything it stands for they don't bother trying to destroy it for several reasons. Firstly they are far more interested in habitable worlds and 81103 is a waste of time, secondly the other legions will defend the colony aggressively if attacked due to the benefit it brings them, and thirdly, Boraxians just can't stomach the crap the 81103 colonists broadcast for long enough to be able to make a concerted attack (which requires close proximity)