piratekitten has declared February world-building month.

Every day in February, I will answer one question about any one of my settings.

The question post is here, please feel free to add more questions!

The twenty-third question comes from wispfox and is for Tir na Cali.

Why did it originally start out as a hostage situation?

(Referencing the end of this.)

This is a bit of worldbuilding that could definitely use more scrutiny.

When Tír na Cali began as its own country, it was in a precarious place. The Civil War was in full swing, and the northern U.S. was very clear on what it wanted to do to rebellious states.

The Californians needed a decisive victory. At the same time, they needed workers; there was plenty of labor to be had and less people to do it. Thirdly, with the aristocracy just beginning to flex its muscle, the powers-that-were understood that their normal human population was going to need some sort of sop to accept a ruling class.

The royalty – or the extended family line that would become California’s monarchy – had always believed in a stratified society of responsibility and control. It was, while not easy, reasonable and practical to expand that to all segments of their new country; bringing in a slave population gave normal-human citizens, even the poor, someone else who was below them.

Back to the hostages. The first slaves taken were actually hostages, the children and sometimes (unlike in modern day) wives of decision-makers. Along with them were a large swath of ordinary teens and twenty-somethings and relatives of newspapermen and financiers. The first round of slave-taking was done with the intention that no corner of the Union would have a family who didn’t have a child somewhere in California.

This could have backfired horribly, yes. It could have led to a massive retaliatory war.

But it didn’t.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/682929.html. You can comment here or there.

piratekitten has declared February world-building month.

Every day in February, I will answer one question about any one of my settings.

The question post is here, please feel free to add more questions!

The twenty-third question comes from cluudle and is for Tir na Cali.

Is there a stereotype for who the slavers take? Is it the young, the handsome, the pretty, or do you have to worry about your children, worry about your grandparents, worry about your spouse and boss and lawyer?

The stereotype from the American point of view, which is generally accurate to the Cali slavers’ point of view, is that the slavers tend to take those who are older than puberty but younger than grey hair – generally between sixteen and thirty years of age. They appear to tend towards the attractive, although that is not always the case (at least not for American standards of beauty), the healthy, and the unwise.

It is common knowledge in America that going out to a bar without a group of people can get you “disappeared;” that taking a drink from a stranger is a good way to wake up somewhere unpleasant, that going home with the wrong person can mean you never actually see home again.

But of course, kids will be kids, and college boys and girls continue to go out to bars and take drinks from strangers and, even in prudish America, sometimes sneak out with a stranger. And if they’re lucky, their parents will get a polite note from the police department that got a polite note from a slave raider.

That’s the American story.

The Californian raiders, if asked, might say things a bit differently: they look for people who are alone, who will be missed but not quickly. They look for the unmarried, and do not take those wearing wedding bands; the Californians hold marriage in very high estimation. They don’t always pick up in bars, not by far – they prefer joggers running alone, shoppers in a dark corner of the mall, smokers out alone in the parking lot – people who aren’t surrounded by other people, people who are a lower risk. They like the young and healthy, of course, but minor ailments can be cured, and attractiveness can be fixed to whatever the buyer finds prettiest.

Very few people in the Tír na Cali-verse America worry about their lawyer or spouse or boss being taken, but every once in a while, the raiders will take some sort of brain trust specialist – scientist, engineer – regardless of other qualifications. And even more rarely, they’ll snatch a politician’s kid for leverage.

This started out as a hostage-taking situation, after all.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/676883.html. You can comment here or there.

piratekitten has declared February world-building month.

Every day in February, I will answer one question about any one of my settings.

The question post is here, please feel free to add more questions!

The sixth question comes from moonwolf and is for Tir na Cali.

Why Cats?

Cats are cool. 🙂

Cats aren’t the only moddies the Agency worked on (and the Agency aren’t the only ones who created moddies); almost every animal-type has been experimented with.

In terms of “skin jobs” (appearance-based modification with no underlying behavioral or physiological changes), in the proper underground markets in Tír na Cali, one can buy a moddie with almost any appearance. Cats sell very well, as do rabbits and other fuzzy things; snakes and lizards are more of a niche market. That’s simple aesthetics; when people are purchasing someone for their “cute” and “attractive” features, they tend to want someone that will look, well, cute.

In terms of full mods, the Agency has discovered that cats are the most versatile of the moddies. The more wild animals tended to lead to behavioral problems, and dogs either went feral in packs or followed their handler around. Cats maintained a level of independence while still being friendly with their handlers or owners.

The most successful moddies in terms of the burgeoning space program were the monkeys. However, while they performed all of their tasks very efficiently, they were too independent-minded, or, rather, they had a similar problem to the dogs but while in space and in control of a ship.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/668335.html. You can comment here or there.

piratekitten has declared February world-building month.

Every day in February, I will answer one question about any one of my settings.

The question post is here, please feel free to add more questions!

The sixth question comes from clare_dragonfly and is for Tir na Cali.

Does the West Coast being cut off from the US change anything for the way the modern US works?

This is one of those realms in which I am more than open to suggestions, because my worldbuilding in Tír na Cali is admittedly flimsy.

That being said: Yes. The United States in the world of Tír na Cali is more insular, more reactionary, more socially conservative, and did I mention more insular than it is in the world in which we live. Embarrassed by not one but two rebellions, one of which it did not manage to put down, it never became quite the same meddling power-house on the world stage.

That is not to say that Cali-verse US does not have military might – it does – or social/diplomatic clout – it also does – just that it is not as loud, as powerful, as sure.

American tourists walk with care in the world – Americans walk with care anywhere, because the boogeyman of the Californian slaver is behind every bush, even in foreign lands. A Californian might not grab a French citizen, but they won’t hesitate to grab a verifiably American tourist in France.

And the American nuclear program? Never reached full fruition. When you attempt to bomb a neighboring country and the bombs just bounce back onto your land… you look for other ways to be strong, other ways to attack.

This is a rough summary; as I said, I am open to other ideas, too.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/659511.html. You can comment here or there.