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This evening, I intended to write up an entry for the Moon Kingdom Memorial Outpost. My muse nudged my thoughts onto a slightly different path... so I now present a History of the Crystal Millennium, for consideration and comments. Since this should go onto the Crystal Millennium page in the FenWiki, Wiki markup is already in place.

Mind you, I still have to come up with something for the Outpost...



==History==

The '''Silver Millennium Kingdom''' was established in early 2009 by a group of ''Sailor Moon'' Fen who thought the laws their governments had recently enacted regarding [[handwavium] were too stringent. They left en masse for [[Luna], landing in Mare Serenitatis because that's where the original story put the kingdom's capital.

After the initial rush of being in space wore off, life in the Silver Millennium Kingdom quickly started to become uncomfortable - the settlement was too far from [[Kandor City] and [[Port Luna] to have easy access to the infrastructure that was being created, and too poor to hire [[Hermes Universal Deliveries] to deliver supplies on a regular basis. The colonists deliberated, made what they considered to be a courageous decision, and invited fans of similar works to join them in order to increase their numbers. (The group was still popularly called "the Senshi", though - some habits are difficult to break.) The acceptance of this invitation by groups of other magical-girl Fen, feminists, and equal-rights promoters slowly increased the settlement's wealth as well as their numbers. It also brought them to the attention of a wealthy person in [[Cislunar Space] who shared many of their views on life, [[Yayoi Fujisawa]. Yayoi visited the Kingdom, paid for some desperately-needed essential equipment out of her own pocket, and made a few suggestions. In exchange, the colony very nearly elected her to be the first Queen Serenity; only her insistence that it would be better to choose a leader who was committed to the faction got them to change their minds. Yayoi left as soon as [[Serenity I] was chosen, but by mutual agreement kept her ties to the Sammies, and Serenity I named Yayoi the first of the Named Sailors: Sailor Stellvia.

Three of Sailor Stellvia's suggestions were taken to heart almost immediately. The first, and easiest to implement, was a change of names from Silver Millennium Kingdom to the '''Crystal Millennium'''. This changed the group's focus from dwelling on the past to looking toward the future, and inspired the faction to create something big. (What, they weren't yet sure. But whatever it was, it would be ''big''.)

The second was to institute a permanent search-and-rescue group for the benefit of all. The '''Sailors Armed Militia''' quickly became a respected part of Fen life, with the "Sammies" acting to preserve lives wherever they could and asking nothing in return.

The third was to create something that people would want to visit. Having sightseers visit was an easy way for a settlement to keep in touch with other groups, and the money the visitors spent could be used to purchase a few luxuries - given their recent history, the Crystal Millennium deemed both of these to be important considerations. To this end, the faction built the '''[[Moon Kingdom Memorial Outpost]''' in Mare Serenitatis as a tourist trap.

In mid-2009, '''Yoko Kayabuki''' came up with an idea for a major project: The terraforming of the planet [[Venus]. The idea caught the imagination of the entire faction, who gained approval for the '''[[Venus Terraforming Project]''' at the first [[Fenspace Convention], Anticipation. As a reward and an encouragement to continue coming up with good ideas, [[Serenity I] named Kayabuki-san her Prime Minister, a position she still holds in 2014.

The faction left a token presence at the Moon Kingdom Memorial Outpost and moved to [[Mare Marginis], on the far side of [[Luna]. There they built the headquarters of the Venus Terraforming Project, '''[[Crystal Tokyo]''', and used the process that had previously been used on [[The Island] to launch the entire city into space. Further Unreal Estate followed Crystal Tokyo - [[Crystal Paris], [[Crystal Seattle], [[Crystal Osaka], and others - built from both the Lunar regolith and transparent carbon sheets harvested from the atmosphere of Venus. The Senshi built eleven cities then discovered there weren't enough faction members left to populate a twelfth; the few Senshi remaining on Luna decided to remain there and build ships for the faction instead of joining their sisters above Venus.

In late 2010, the Terraforming Project created processes (with the assistance of Sailor Stellvia's employer, [[Stellvia Corporation]) to turn some of the hydrocarbons they were extracting from Venus' atmosphere into various fuels. This secured a stable funding base for both the Senshi and the Stellvians, and brought the two groups into close cooperation on many matters of concern to both.

Corruption within the Venus Terraforming Project and the Sailor Armed Militia came to light in 2013, in the middle of the [[Boskone War]. Early in the year, it was discovered that [[thionite] was a byproduct of the terraforming bacteria being produced by Crystal Osaka - this was discovered by the faction leaders during a battle which caused the outright destruction of that city. Four months later, one of the connections that the [[Boskonians] used to ship the drug from Venus to the rest of Fenspace were discovered when the commander of Crystal Paris' Sammies was acting as a lookout for a large drug ring. The Sammies have recovered from that revelation, but not without some lifestyle changes being instituted, especially in [[Crystal Kyoto].

The Senshi continue to terraform Venus, promote Love and Justice throughout the Solar System, and provide a place for independent women to live their lives to the fullest no matter their background.
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012
Y'know, the FenWiki is a Wiki. It can be edited easily. So there's no reason not to post this and let folks play with it.

http://www.fenspace.net/index.php5?titl ... um#History]It's up. Have at it. (Maybe somebody else can come up with some history as to why the Senshi play well with the Wizards, Supers, and VVS - the only allied faction I mentioned in the writeup were the Stellvians...)
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012
I dunno about the VVS, but the Wizards and the Supers have Similarity of Source: most prominent Senshi source protagonists who aren't "Maho Shojo" are otherwise Superhuman.
Have they any reason not to?

In general, don't factions play well with other as a matter of course, unless there's a pre-existing rivalry (Trekkies -v-Warsies), some specific incident to sour relations, or a general mismatch in ideologys? Unless they're someone everyone hates, like Draka or Goreans.
________________________________
--m(^0^)m-- Wot, no sig?
Well, they're listed as known allies - that implies (to me, at least) a closer relationship than just "plays well with others".
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012
Well there's also the fact that there are boys/men in the supers faction that wouldn't mind a het relationship with a strong girl/woman.

Not to mention the heavy "dual faction" crossover of say, Wonder Woman, Power Girl, etc.
''We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat
them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary.''

-- James Nicoll
Hell, it could be argued that the Ur-Magical Girl is Mary Marvel, circa 1949ish. Yeah, they're allies because the source materials all share common roots, and if they hadn't started their own faction from the start, they would have been a major power bloc -- maybe the dominant one -- within the Supers.  The Supers recognize this, too, and especially since both had their first toeholds in space on the Moon they more or less automatically offered the hand of friendship -- without even the obligatory "beat-each-other-up-over-a-misunderstanding" first! 
Well, actually the hardcases on both sides insisted on the traditional "befriending-each-other-into-the-ground", so they held one after formalizing the alliance.  It was a for-fun head-to-head featuring the best fighter each side had at the time -- a fistfight with padded gloves, preceded by a scripted sketch that "justified" the "misunderstanding" leading to the battle in such an extremely overwritten, over-the-top manner that it left the entire arena roaring with laughter.
The actual fight was to first blood, and took all of five minutes.  The rest of the night was a party celebrating the alliance.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
Aside from Similar Sources, the Senshi, Supers, and Wizards have common goals in Handwavium research, most notably (at least before/until the magical portions of the Whole Fenspace Catalog escape Footnote 11) obtaining genuine magical abilities from biomodification.
Bob, I'm going to take your idea and run with it at lunch today. I should have something to add to the FenWiki entry this evening... unless you beat me to it.
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012
Quote:unless you beat me to it.
Not with my holiday schedule... have fun.

Hm. Maybe they have an annual re-befriending... that they bill as a "Crossover".
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
Bob Schroeck Wrote:Hm. Maybe they have an annual re-befriending... that they bill as a "Crossover".
It does seem awfully convenient a certain cyberneticist is otherwise busy whenever this comes around however... (A.C. not being adopted as a Super until well after Kandor-Con).
It's in, as a sidebar.

And I took the liberty of giving the battle a name: the Mary Marvel Memorial Melee (the alliteration trumped the fact that only two people took part).

Quote:It does seem awfully convenient a certain cyberneticist is otherwise busy whenever this comes around however... (A.C. not being adopted as a Super until well after Kandor-Con).
Yeah... Yayoi's never available for those, either... You think maybe they're seeing each other once a year?
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012
So the Senshi are officially allies with the Supers and the Stellvians because all three interacted while the Senshi were still in the formative stages. They have a close (though possibly less formal) relationship with the Wizards due to the sources and interests they have in common. That leaves the VVS. Why do the Senshi and the Soviets care about each other beyond the requirements for neighborliness?
Good question... Mal?
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012
Because the Senshi and Soviets probably have an "after-action" rapport, or they are the ones who have done the most "real life" work in Fenspace. Hell it may even be that the earliest Sammies got Ptichka out of a jam with the Earth-Grazing asteroids early on?

--$--

Near-earth space, 200X

Amy Waters tapped the side of her gooped visor, hoping that what she was seeing was just a quirk. She also flicked the windshield wipers on her powder-blue Mercury Mariner, bringing up the HUD for her tractor beam, ignoring the Massey-Ferguson logo that momentarily blocked her view.

"What the heck is the Space Shuttle doing way out here?" She wondered. "Max? Threat scan, please."

//Of course, ma'am. Happy to oblige,// the sport-utility-spacecraft's AI replied. //Tarnation! Got a passel of maverick space rocks in a stampede!//

Amy pursed her lips. "Right. I don't care if this gets me in trouble with the 'Danes, we've gotta help them."

//For Love and Justice, ma'am?//

Amy smiled. "For Love and Justice."
''We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat
them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary.''

-- James Nicoll
Quote:Good question... Mal?

Well, I can say that it isn't part of a long-range plot to destabilize the aristocracy, topple Serenity from the throne and establish a socialist republic. Really. And pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.

(I'll let you know when we figure it out.)
Mr. Fnord interdimensional man of mystery

FenWiki - Your One-Stop Shop for Fenspace Information

"I. Drink. Your. NERDRAGE!"
Socialist policy is a matter of government, not economics. Even the US, the very heart of modern capitalism, has some socialist programs (Welfare is the only example I can think of, but I'm sure others exist). The Crystal Millennium government is almost certainly a constitutional monarchy in which the Queen holds reserve powers. (The example I'm familiar with is the British Commonwealth, in which the Queen and her Governors-General can dismiss the Prime Minister and appoint a caretaker PM, dissolve Parliament to force an election, or refuse to sign into law a bill that has passed, though not exercising these powers is such a strong tradition that their use inevitably causes a constitutional crisis and the dismissal of the Governor-General in question.) Given the faction's focus on Love and Justice, I imagine that socialist programs are a fairly large chunk of the budget: welfare, universal healthcare, social housing, advanced education as a basic right, the works.
And if American politics circa FS 2012 are anything close to those in our time line, that and their feminist bent (along with their free and easy gender reassignment) just might make them one of the most reviled factions as far as the United States is concerned. Everyone to the right of center -- but most notably conservative Christians -- are going to hate their guts. Especially when their wealth ("transparent carbon", ho!), size and success make it kind of hard to dismiss them. The propaganda against them would make for some fun reading, I'm sure.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.

HRogge

Bob Schroeck Wrote:The propaganda against them would make for some fun reading, I'm sure.
Or the sermons against them on some of the religious tv channels. Wink

The Crystal Millennium must have some pact with a devil... AND they will "own" Venus...
let's see if they manage to get a small crusade together against Venus.

"Again ?"
"Yes, again... a small waved bus with nearly 20 guys from the US, armed to the teeth with some small arms and even a pitch fork, trying to free Venus from the devil spawned Crystal Millennium... It took their preacher five hours to make them leaving the bus after they landed at Crystal Tokio, I don't think they had any perception how large and populated our cities are."
"And then ?"
"Security took them out quickly without a single loss on both sides, we are organizing a tour back to Earth for them at the moment."
Be glad they didn't land at Crystal Osaka:

"Again?"

"Two buses full of fundies this time."

"And?"

"The usual - routed them to the tourist docks, let them sit in their buses for four hours while they tried to work up the courage to come out and attack, then sent Hiroko out with the box-lunch cart with everything marked up 300%. This bunch hadn't packed any food at all, so we sold out in ten minutes."

"I suppose the fact that Hiroko's photoshoot was published in Playboy last month has nothing to do with why you sent her out, right?"

"It has everything to do with why we sent her out! And we made sure she was wearing her skimpiest bikini, too!"

"Right. Silly me. There was nothing funny in the food, right?"

"Of course not! Mess with a customer once, and you lose the customer! But we did include a free 1-liter bottle of water with each lunch."

"Uh-huh. How much did you charge for access to the washrooms?"

"Oh, just 500% of the normal rate."

"I'm beginning to understand why they had to sell you one of their buses before they could go home..."
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012

HRogge

robkelk Wrote:Be glad they didn't land at Crystal Osaka
Crystal Osaka seems to be very... enterprising ? Getting the maximum out of customers they don't really care about ? Wink
HRogge Wrote:Crystal Osaka seems to be very... enterprising ? Getting the maximum out of customers they don't really care about ? Wink
That's the stereotype of real-world Osaka - I thought it appropriate to borrow the stereotype along with the city name.
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012

HRogge

robkelk Wrote:That's the stereotype of real-world Osaka - I thought it appropriate to borrow the stereotype along with the city name.
Ahh okay... good idea. Might even be a quirk of the whole city...
*Giggles hysterically* Ohhh yes! Karma's a bitch, ain't it?

HRogge

Someone should add a "Crew/Inhabitants quirks" section for the city... *G*
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