Cestus III
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The M-class world Cestus III is the third planet in the Cestus system located on the edge of Federation space bordering the territory of the Gorn, approximately two weeks from the Bajor system by subspace message and eight weeks at maximum warp. The Federation leases the planet from the Gorn under terms that have proven lucrative to both (the Gorn get 10% of all export revenue in exchange for allowing the Federation to settle), but speculation persists that at least some Gorn are not at all happy about the arrangement.
The Cestus System
Cestus is an orange giant (Type K2 III) with a large asteroid belt between it and its nearest planets, the Class F worlds Cestus I and Cestus II. The Cestus asteroids, called the Cestine Belt, have a very high silica-crystal content and metalloids flash-baked into their faceted surfaces. From space, the asteroids look like metallic studs set into a bright orange boxing glove (at least, according to Starfleet Captain Thomas Riccioli, who named the system after the ancient Roman boxing weapon, the cestus).
Cestus III is the only Class M planet in the system, although Cestus IV is a Class L planet inhabited by a few hundred scientific personnel mostly from the Cestus Academy of Exploration. The next five outer planets (Cestus V-IX) are all Class J worlds, with four Class G worlds (Cestus X-XIII) beyond them. Graduates of the Cestus Academy of Exploration traditionally launch a "senior expedition" to one of the outer worlds or moons, planting the flags of the Federation, Cestus III, and the Academy on the icy crust and carrying out scientific surveys and experiments for two or three months. Needless to say, Cestus Academy of Exploration graduates apply to Starfleet Academy in great numbers; a Cestine who enters Starfleet is hailed as a hometown hero.
Far out on the edges of the Cestus system lies an immensely thick Oort cloud of comets and frozen asteroids. Seeing a comet trailing across the velvet sky of Cestus III is a common occurrence for the fortunate colonists.
Climate
Because of its relatively small hydrosphere, the climate on Cestus III tends to be dry, if comfortably mild. Even along the equator, temperatures rarely exceed 30 degrees C. Storm systems are relatively mild and they are more welcomed for the precipitation that they bring than feared for their destructive power.
Cestus III's single ocean teems with complex life, from fish to carnivorous plants. Due to the lack of tidal influences, the ocean is essentially one gigantic stagnant pond.
Geography
Cestus III has one main land mass; a large, bowl-shaped continent that fills most of its southern hemisphere. A long chain of mountains runs along the middle of it, and the planet's six main population centers dot the coast. Several smaller continental landmasses lie in the northern hemisphere.
The planet itself has few mountains besides some relatively low ranges similar to Earth's Zagros Mountains or to a semidesert version of the Appalachians. Tectonic activity on Cestus has nearly ceased; the planet's internal core remains cool and stable, and has apparently been similarly placed for millennia. Most of Cestus III's largest northern contenient (named Henson) is steppeland descending in flat plateaus and sudden escarpments from the northern mountains. The northern temperate zone holds grasslands, sheep and cattle ranges, and farms; the southern arid zone holds small conifer forests, transplanted Terran pine oaks, and badlands and desert stretching endlessly under the bright blue sky and orange sun.
Cestus III's southern continent, Shackleford, is smaller than Henson and more broken in formation; its tumbled gorges and canyons recall the American Southwest on Earth. A belt of mountain conifers circles the south polar cap, which covers a small ocean.
Between Henson and Shackleford lies the Magellanic Sea, a a globe-encircling ocean rich in organic compounds and carnivorous vegetation. Its frequent storms, "Venus mantraps," and mycocladial predators keep most people inland. The Cestus III colonial government works to preserve the ocean's unique plant-dominant ecology from too much alien (including human) interference and development.
Cestus III Colony
Cestus III hosts a comfortably prosperous Federation colony populated mostly by humans, but with healthy scattering of other races as well. Its economy produces enough goods and services to meet its basic needs, except in the way of high-tech manufactured products and consumer goods. It exports some industrial minerals, as well as agricultural products (primarily exotic hybird fruits and wines distilled from them).
A colonial government administers the planet in the name of the Federation. Despite its success, Cestus III has been regarded as a backwater. Governors have tended to be either civil servants looking for a quiet post at the end of their careers, or also-rans who were passed over for more desirable jobs (S. Hiram Johnson, who helped found the CPBA, fit the latter description). A few have been frustrated cold warriors who see the Gorn as a potential threat rather than quiet neighbors.
Despite early tensions, the Gorn also maintain a presence on Cestus III. Some hawkish citizens claim that it's so they can keep a close eye on the Federation presence near Gorn space. The more open-minded citizens, however, have integrated the Gorn into their efforts; trade and exchange between Gorn and human is common here.
A number of major human settlements on Cestus III ring the planet along the fiftieth northern parallel, roughly between the grassland and semidesert zones of Henson. Cestus, the planetary capital; Pike City, the "second city" of Cestus III; the industrial city of Ricciolipolis all lie in this belt. Coronado lies farther south along one of Cestus III's few rivers and serves as a center for the cattle ranchers and crystal miners of southern Henson. The largest city on Shacklford is Kirkville, connected to the other cities by public transporter booths.
Most tourists who visit Cestus III fall into one of four categories. Xenobotanists interested in studying the ecology of the Magellanic Sea usually set up offices at either the Cestus Academy of Exploration Cestus City or at the Dulika Conservation Center on the northern shore of the sea itself. Baseball fans traditionally follow either the Cestus Comets, the Pike City Pioneers, or the Kirkville Captains on a ten- or twelve-game rotation to every major city on the planet. The Cestus Meteors, Coronado Scouts, and Ricciolipoli Rangers have many more on-planet fans than off-planet ones. Wearing a battered Meteors or Scouts cap is something of a statement of "hometown pride" among many Cestines, while a tourist can easily be spotted by his replicator-fresh Pioneers cap.
Military historians and those on the "Captain Kirk Tour" usually visit the Kirk Memorial inthe middle of Cestus Home Square in Cestus City (with its statue depicting the captain crouched over a bamboo cannon and looking boldly upward). Although Captain Kirk never, as far as can be determined, set foot on Shackleford, Kirkville does a nice business in souvenirs, holotours of the 23rd century Enterprise, and visits to its Captain Kirk Museum.
Xenologists, diplomats, and others interested in the Gorn usually study at the Institute for Human-Gorn Relations offices in Cestus City. Although denied ownership of the Cestus III by the Metrons, the Gorn have maintained a presence in the sector. When the Federation and Gorn governments must meet to discuss matters - territorial concerns, trading agreements, or travel authorization - the summit takes place here. Such a meeting has not taken place in years. The people of Cestus III (almost none of whom are descended from the victims of the Gorn attack in 2267) welcome the Gorn presence, and the Gorntown districts of Cestus City and Coronado offer quite a spectacle to the off-planet visitor.
Population
Almost the entire population of Cestus III is human, mostly of North American and African descent. This heritage and the hot rays of Cestus give virtually ever colonist a dark complexion, although hair and eye color vary along the human spectrum. With Cestus III's slightly higher gravity and lower pressure, native-born Cestines are slightly stronger and have slightly higher endurance and stamina than Earth-born humans. This contributes to Cestine skill at baseball, their planetary sport, but baseball's worldwide acceptance and prestige constitutes a much larger factor.
Cestines are naturally competitive, always seeking to outdo the past (especially in exploration and similar scientific endeavors) and to accomplish as much as possible with the tools at hand. This seems to be a result of their unsettled and unsupervised colonial history, and impels a vigorous pioneer culture which is both enamored of its past and eager for its future.
Although Cestus III is overwhelmingly human, as a Federation colony it does have its share of other races. Centaurans, Bolians, and Tellarites outnumber the other nonhumans in the colony, but they have mostly assimilated to human, and specifically, Cestine habits and cultural tastes. Visiting Tellarites especially complain that it's impossible to find decent Tellarite restaurants on Cestus. The occasional Vulcan tourist, on the other hand, is in for a treat: Cestine vegetarian cooking outclasses that of most colony worlds, even though the average Cestine sticks to "baseball food" like hot dogs, kefta, and hamburgers.
Government
The various towns, cities and large ranches of Cestus III generally govern themselves on a semiformal "town meeting" basis; larger matters come under the jurisdiction of the Colonial Assembly. The Assembly meets electronically for three months out of every year, and in person (in Cestus Home Government House) once every three years. A Federation Commissioner handles day-to-day administrative tasks, but the Cestine self-government works well enough that the Federation presence is minimal - the Cestus III Starfleet recruitment office gets much more business than the Federation Commissioner's does.
History
For half a century before Federation explorers on the U.S.S. Coronado discovered Cestus III in 2258, the reptilian spacefaring Gorn claimed it as their own. On its merits, the planet held little interest for them; although its warm, dry climate suited them, there was no intelligent life there and they couldn't find much in the way of exploitable resources. Besides, the Cestus system was situated on the fringe of their stellar empire, making it hard to defend. They established no permanent presence there and patrolled the area infrequently.
In the late 23rd century, 2262 to be exact, there was a Starfleet observation outpost on Cestus III commanded by Commodore Travers under the assumption that it was unclaimed. In 2267, a Gorn ship attacked and destroyed this colony, slaughtering most of the colonists, one of which was rescued by the landing party. The Gorn regarded Cestus as part of their space, and the Federation colonists as invaders. Shortly thereafter in 2267, the Gorn lured U.S.S. Enterprise (NCC-1701) to the base b attacking the colony and attempted to ambush a landing party led by Captain James Kirk on the planet's surface. The Enterprise then pursued the Gorn vessel to a point near 2466PM, where both ships were seized by the Metrons, and their captains forced to do battle.
Kirk's confrontation with the Gorn on the planet would later become one of the most famous incidents in his career. Benjamin Sisko once admitted he'd like to shake Kirk's hand and "ask him about fighting the Gorn on Cestus III."
By the 24th century, the dispute with the Gorn had been resolved and the Federation colonized the planet. UFP settlers streamed in to exploit its mineral wealth (what there was, anyway), conduct agricultural experiments on alien soil and pursue trading opportunities with the Gorn. Over the next century, colonists achieved the most success crossbreeding fruits transplanted from Earth with native plants to produce wines, liquors, and agricultural products unique to the planet. Trading relationships with the wary Gorn proved more elusive, however, as did opportunities to make money off of the planet's natural resources. The colony's economy grew steadily, but slowly.
In 2371, local entrepreneur Bidwell Tsark came up with the idea of resurrecting the old Terran sport of baseball as a way of boosting the colonies fortunes and so the colonists formed a baseball league with six teams, including the Cestus Comets and the Pike City Pioneers with the blessing of the colonial governor S. Hiram Johnson who was growing bored there himself. Thus, the Cestus Professional Baseball Association (CPBA) was formed. Since being formed, the Cestus Comets and Pike City Pioneers have been the most successful franchises. Kasidy Yates's brother lived on Cestus III and invited Sisko and his sister to see a live baseball game at the colony.
The current Federation Council President is Nanietta Bacco of Cestus III. Aside from her, the only Cestine whom the average off-worlder could probably name off the top of their head would be Desrick Ruwori, the star pitcher for the Pike City Pioneers. Cestus III is also the current home of the Federation's greatest expert in mycology (study of fungi), Dr. Amanda Blekinsop. Although Dr. Blekinsop was born on Altair IV, she has given Cestus III somewhat of a luster in xenobotanical circles with her researches on the Magellanic Sea life. Dr. Blekinsop spends her time either at the Cestus Academy of Exploration (where she heads the Department of Natural History and Exobiology) or the Dulika Conservation Center. She heads the task force there mapping the Magellanic Sea's ecological links and niches using computerized undersea probes and tracer plankton.
Economy
Cestus III has little to drive trade in either direction. Like most mature colony worlds, Cestus III is self-sufficient in all but the rarest medicines or luxuries, and like most worlds of any kind, it produces very little that other star systems do not or cannot. Cestus III is not a poor planet, of course, so a number of ships do stop by, bringing just the kind of luxury goods a booming colony demands such as Andorian and Ennan ale which are especially popular.
The unique planet life in Cestus III's ocean remains primarily a scientific curiosity. Even classifying it has taken a century or so, and figuring out what it's good for may take even more time. Crystalline compounds from the Cestine Belt or from the equatorial deserts remain the only other potential material export from the Cestus system. Although fascinating to mineralogists, and of some use in calibration and collimation equipment, Cestine crystals still have no unique large-scale industrial uses.
Cestus III, like many worlds far more advanced, imports and exports people as well. Tourists and scientists (and not a few would-be colonists and gamblers) come into the system, and baseball players, students, and would-be starship crew members leave it. Cestus III also trades in knowledge, although such trade is primarily of the informal type carried on across the Federation. Finally, Cestus III exports the spectacle of its baseball games. Humans, and other races fascinated by humans, find baseball a useful microcosm of human culture as well as a thrilling athletic contest.
Places of Interest
Cestus III's six largest settlements (scarcely large enough to be called cities) are the administrative capital of Cestus, Pike City, Rupertsville, Wagnerton, Two Rivers, and New Jericho. Each of them fields a team in the CPBA. Although the CPBA only plays a 60-game schedule confined entirely to the summer months, games are popular attractions. They generate considerable internal tourism, and even draw in visitors from off-world. However, some of the off-worlders are rumored to be gamblers drawn by a hot new sport. Not only is gambling on Cestus III outlawed by the colonial government, but many of those who hear and circulate the rumors worry that gambling money may corrupt the integrity of the game.
Creatures
Cestus III had no native land animals larger than a horsefly even before human colonization brought numerous Terran species and created a series of Earth-similar biozones across the continents. Terran cougars and black panthers have been successfully seeded as the native large predators, and the dogs from the first colony went feral after the Gorn attack leaving a relatively high "coyote" population as well. Other Terran species from African savannahs and North American high plains and deserts dwell in the equivalent ares of Cestus III.
The Cestine ocean, on the other hand, holds a number of very highly developed plant forms, including a number of carnivorous ones. The two most impressive species to off-worlders are the "Venus mantraps" and the mycocladials, or "fungusharks." The Venus mantraps, named for the Terran Venus flytrap, are large floating plants similar to water lilies. When an "airflower" ( a hovering epiphyte similar to a giant methane-producing orchid) lands on the mantrap, it disturbs hairlike cilia on the plant's surface. This triggers the sudden closing of the mantrap's jaws and the secretion of digestive juices rendering the airflower into a nutrient mulch. To the consternation of zoologists and the excitement of botanists, a few subspecies of Venus mantraps have developed a taste for Cestus III's transplanted bird population. A few mantraps grow to three or four meters in diameter; more than large enough to digest a human.
The mycocladial "fungusharks" is not a true fungus but shares enough similarities to fascinate mycologists all across the Federation. The majority of the mycoclade is composed of a fleshy mass similar to the meat of a mushroom; organic nutrients pass through a webbing of capillaries with few or no main "blood vessels." On the exterior, mycoclades have extraordinarily light- and pressure-sensitive organs. The core of the mycoclade is the gullet, surrounded by rigid, serrated "teeth" similar to hardwood bark. Anything entering the gullet triggers an autonomic chewing-digestive response. Mycoclades are certainly less intelligent than Terran sharks, and probably less so than Terran wasps (they have roughly equivalent relative "brain" sizes, to the best scientific estimates). In the organic soup of the Cestine oceans, this is enough to make them the most-feared predators around - not to mention an object of supreme curiosity to xenobiologists for the foreseeable future.
Strategic Importance
The importance of Cestus III depends first and foremost on its position at the very edges of Gorn space. The Federation has had little contact with the Gorn since the 2267 skirmishes though there have been recent overtures; the Gorn prefer their own company and have turned more to fully exploring and exploiting their own sectors rather to expansionism. Nevertheless, the possibility remains of a sudden change in Gorn politics or leadership leading to a revanchist war. Starfleet tries to route a starship near Cestus III every few months to keep an eye on things. Since so little is known about the Gorn, the Federation's security planners must assume that the worst could always happen.
A more immediate, although more spatially distant threat to the Cestus Sector is the Cardassian Empire. Cestus III lies only eight weeks' travel from Bajor at maximum warp, a distance easily covered by lightning raids or spy craft. Although there are no clear signs of Cardassian interference in the Cestus sector, Starfleet Intelligence has heard rumors that Cardassian ambassadors to the Gorn have been trying to stir up old feelings of resentment.
A Cardassian-Gorn alliance would pose a strategic nightmare for Federation communications and transit routes throughout the Alpha Quadrant. It could also potentially cut off the Federation from further exploration coreward from Cestus III.
Although newcomers sometimes worry about the Gorn presence on Cestus III, the planet's inhabitants take their tall green neighbors in stride. Cestus III is the only place in the Federation where humans and Gorn can work and talk together. A Gorn named Kaph-ti'izz has even earned a place as the starting second basemen on the Coronado Scouts. Starfleet xenologists are unsure how representaive Cestine Gorn are of the Gorn social and cultural mainstream. Some theorists believe that Cestus III and the Institute for Human-Gorn Relations serve as "safety valves" where misfit Gorn can profitably serve their species without disrupting its cultural values. Most Cestines fancy themselves experts on Gorn, and don't believe that humans and Gorn have anything to fear from one another.
Reference(s)
- Burns, Eric, Kenneth A. Hite & Doug Sun. Star Trek Roleplaying Game Book 7: Worlds, Decipher, 2005. ISBN: 1582369097.
- Cambias, James, et al. Planets of the UFP: A Guide to Federation Worlds, Last Unicorn Games, 1999. ISBN: 0671040065.