Tekeli-li

System: Tekeli-li
Hex Location: 2230
Star Type: Double star A2 V, K9 III (distant)
Number of Worlds: 8
Gas Giants: 3
Planetoid Belt: Cometary belt

Starport Type: B
World Size: Mars-sized
Atmosphere Type: Thin
Surface Water: 10 (much of it polar ice)
Population: Large (2 billion)
Political Affiliation: Voormellei Federation (Allies of Carrick Grand Duchy)
Notes:  Many years ago, Voormellei human and old earth-stock humans fought over this planet, which is superficially very similar to Mars—cold, dry, a bit on the small side, with a thin atmosphere and long canals that bring water from polar ice caps to decadent cities in deserts that may have once been ancient sea shores.  Today, the population is a mixed one, with elements of both Voormellei and old Earth stock, but culturally and politically, it is allied with the Voormellei.

The Seraeans have also had an intense interest in the planet for many years, and many of them have established cities and settlements on the planet, which have also contributed to the cultural and ethnic mix of the world.  Idacharians and also came here, and there is profuse evidence of prior Zetan gray presence, including ruins both on the surface and in orbit.  Some of them yet are seen here, either officially welcomed, or skulking around doing who knows what.

The reason for all of the interest in Tekeli-li is the presence of a dimensional "thinness" here.  While bulk drives can pierce the walls of normal space-time and enter the Outer Darkness, of course, the experience is not particularly insightful into the true nature of the Outer Darkness; travel through the bulk provides very little useful observational data, and it is extremely rare that any contact with anything that lives beyond our normal space-time continuum is every made.

But on Tekeli-li, entities from Beyond have occasionally come into our world many times.  These strange creatures, sometimes called sarmaks, molluscs, or even wellsians seem poorly adapted to our world; they resemble large, shapeless bags with large, hooded eyes, a toothy, strange-shaped maw, and many thin tentacles with which they laboriously haul their ungainly bulks across the landscape.  Because of their general unsuitability to our environment, they prefer to operate within advanced suits; large metal pods with deadly weapons and three long, spindly legs, with mechanical pseudopods or tentacles to manipulate things around them as needed.

In the past, these molluscs have come in force, and fought devastating wars against the inhabitants of Tekeli-li and the surrounding systems.  Lately, they appear, if they do at all, in small numbers, or singularly, working to inscrutable purposes.  Some remain on the surface, and have done so for presumably many, many years, and others come from Beyond when they come.

Cultists exploring the ruins of a gray outpost on Tekeli-li

The gray ruins are often particularly known as places where the thinness is strongest, and where disquieting sounds, dreams, and worse linger.  Because of this, they tend to be places where more recent settlement has not happened, and those who try to set up colonies near these ruins find that their colonies wither and fail, the colonists either leaving muttering disquieting rumors, or falling sickly and dying, or going insane.  However, the ruins are favorite haunts of the more disquieting types—Shadow Knights and their dark warlock brethren, Old Ones cultsts, Death Sages from the cyberliches, and worse.