The Space Sage Handbook: A Compendium of the Imperium | Dedication, Forward, Intro

The First of Many Short Stories in My Imperial World

Author’s Note: here’s the first piece in what I hope will be many short stories set in the world of the novel I’m working on called Block World—so, I guess this is an exploration of the Block World World. This series is my way of working out the broader ‘world-building’ of that universe (world) through short stories instead of info dumps. There’s a pretty cool tradition of short story SF compendiums from the late 70s and early 80s and this is my attempt at continuing on that legacy. Check the ‘Behind the Curtain’ section below for more on those and for some easter eggs and more details about this project.

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The Space Sage Handbook: A Compendium of the Imperium

Dedication

To the impending philosopher-king of the known universe, wise in your dealings, brimming with magnanimity, faithful friend, and wisdom’s lover. May this compendium—which you’ll recall, began by your own hand upon your (ultimately fortuitous) forced transference from Terra, and which I seek to bring to fruition—may it serve you well in increasing your knowledge of the body Imperium, of which you will surely lead as head. And when you come into your ascendency, may you bring peace, freedom, security, and justice along with you. May you rule the empire for the common good, promoting eudaimonia and makarios as you’ve promised. May your sharp intellect and noble heart continue to transform your most ardent enemies into devoted companions. But for those who scorn your hand of fellowship, may Logikē cut them down if your MASER canon doesn’t disincorporate them first—and may you never forget who fashioned your weapons of war.

Remember me also in your inevitable ascension, your loyal unconventional armaments smith,

-Kindred Powderdry.

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Preface

Here you have a project, initially started by The Philosopher-King, the emperor of the Wheel of Heaven Galaxy, prior to his ascension to power, and brought almost to completion by yours truly, Kindred Powderdry. A compendium of the entire Imperium is a tall task—to say the least, but I am a tall man, in spirit if not in physical stature.

Upon his abduction from Terra, The Philosopher-King began this handbook as a personal guide to gain his bearings in the broader world of the galactic empire. Back before his ascension, the Remnants, i.e., the Descendants of those held back from the Great Variegation and current occupants of Terra, were intentionally kept in the dark about the existence of the empire, the Imperial Forebearers, and the history of the Apoikiakratos project which led to the Great Variegation—the multi-planetary diversification of Terran logikon. Why were the Descendants kept in the dark? I don’t exactly know. Sure, I know what the imperial propagandists shoveled to us in remedial schools, but I won’t do their work for them by repeating that nonsense here.

Anyways, The Philosopher-King passed this compendium project off to me just after I fashioned his weapons for him, before all that business on Block World. Yes, it was I who fashioned the laser sword and ball-lighting canon for him—who else do you think could’ve turned that old Terran relic into the most devastating laser blade the galaxy over? Or who else could have weaponized MASER principles to such a great affect? Now, If the reader hasn’t been kept abreast of The Philosopher-King’s weapons arsenal, then they would do well to continue reading this compendium—especially the entries on Logikē (The Philosopher-King’s laser sword) and on the MASER Ball-lightning canon.

I’ve done my best to improve on the original entries, which consisted of mostly of a few Terran notebooks and Terran ink, but which were also partially recorded on imvubu-donta skin covered crystal paper notebooks—I’ve added entries on all of that as well. The Philosopher-King is now the wisest among us, but believe it or not, it wasn’t always so. He began as an insular Terran “philosopher” and his earliest entries reflected it. However, I was too good’a friend to let these entries stand as I found them, and being as this is not an intellectual history of The Philosopher-King’s ascent, but is rather a tool for knowledge acquisition and recollection, I’ve completely reworked and corrected each entry which needed it.

While this project started as a ‘compendium’ of the Imperium, that is, a collection of concise but detailed information about the Imperium, meant to be comprehensive in scope and systematically presented, it has blossomed (through a massive agglomeration) into a full-blown encyclopedia of the Imperium—that is, a massive über compendium containing nearly comprehensive information on all branches of Imperial knowledge, but a “compendium of the imperium” sounds much better than “an encyclopedia of the imperium” so I’ve decided to stick with the original title.

This project has been a major undertaking and, in many ways, it represents my life’s work. I’ve been continually revising the entries and creating new ones to share with the Philosopher-King since even before his ascendency. I’ve pulled from my own vast libraries to research the entries and I’ve spent countless hours synthesizing and analyzing various doctrines, histories, lore, manuals, worlds, philosophies, text books, legends, myths, reports—you name it, I’ve researched it.

The constituent entries comprising this compendium (encyclopedia), have been perpetually scanned and presented to the Philosopher-King in weekly briefings since the beginning. What started as a practical aid for acquainting Fredric Block with the Imperium has become a storehouse of knowledge, such that, the one who finds this compendium and reads it, will in turn become a space sage in their own right.

So, dear reader, tolle lege! You have here at your own disposal one of the very instruments which transformed a parochial Terran philosopher into The Philosopher-King of the Wheel of Heaven, the Grand Autarch of the Galaxy. Of course, he had some additional help from his philosophical muse, but I can’t help you with that, he’s never fully explained that relationship or how he summons her. Nonetheless, take up and read this work, Ouranos knows we need as many sages as we can get.

-Kindred Powderdry, chief imperial syntopicist & unconventional armaments smith

Kindred Powderdry. Another beautiful piece I commissioned from Volodymry Yanovski

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Introduction

(Fredric Block’s original introduction to the project, presumably written in transit from Terra upon his forced voyage reprinted here)

I don’t know if there’s any point in writing this, but in case I die on this ridiculous mission—which is a high likelihood—I guess a little introduction can help whoever finds this understand what they’re looking at. I’m Fredric Block. I’m an inhabitant of earth—what you folks call ‘Terra’. I don’t belong in this broader “Galactic Empire” or whatever. I’ve never even heard of the Grand Autarch before two days ago. I’m still having a hard time believing any of this is real. Everything I thought I knew about ‘outer space’ and the history of the human species has been a lie, contrived by you “Forbearers”. I don’t know if I’ll make it to planet Basel [Block means Bavel* the old imperial planet of Grand Autarch Saulace Theadorak] or to Block World in one piece, but if I do, I’ll need to know a bit more about—well, about everything! So, this notebook will serve as my compendium on the stuff I learn about the empire. I never asked for any of this. I had no idea that more than 5 people would ever read my paper—let alone a whole off world space empire. And I most definitely never asked for a planet to be named after me! But I do like being alive and I have a hunch that if I want to keep breathing, I’ll need to learn about this new world I’ve been thrust into.

So, here’s hoping I can fill these pages with something useful.

-Fredric Block, a betrayed son of earth, forced onto this journey against my will, hoping to survive.

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Behind the Curtain

• In citing both eudaimonia and makarios in the dedication, I’m looking to hit on the good life of the ancient Greek philosophers, like Aristotle who promoted eudaimonia, which is something like deep and abiding happiness, fulfillment, or flourishing, as the greatest good, or telos for the rational animal. And the good life put forth by Jesus Christ in his Sermon on the Mount, particularly his beatitudes, i.e., his teaching on supreme blessedness, what it means to be blessed, who counts as blessed: makarios, happy, blessed, fortunate. Just a little blending of Jerusalem and Athens once more, as they’re both significant source material for my world.

• Wheel of Heaven Galaxy is the Milky Way. I just blended the Japanese name for it, “River of Heaven”, with the ancient Greek name “the Shining Wheel”. ‘Milky Way’ is played out.

• Philip K. Dick fans might recognize the surname ‘Powderdry’ from his novel The Zap Gun, which is an intentional homage. In that novel, Lars Powderdry was a weapons schematician who would go into a trance and come back out with schematics for new, futuristic-y weapons, which he would sketch out and write down in a sketch book. It was while reading the Zap Gun that I decided I wanted to do something similar so I started my Space Sage Compendium. My character is a weapons smith and his first name, Kindred, is an homage to Philip KINDRED Dick himself.

• After reading some of the entries in Di Fate’s Catalog of Science Fiction Hardware and some of the entries in the various Terran Trade Authority Hnadbook’s by Stewart Crowley, I decided it would be really fun to turn the Space Sage Compendium into a handbook, where each entry has the backstory of the hardware on display instead of just schematics or raw bullet-pointed information.

• As I started writing down the entires in my Space Sage Handbook notebook, I realized this would be a great way to build the ‘world’ of the novel I’ve been working on. My friend Christopher Ruocchio, author of the Sun Eater series has additional collections of short stories which further flesh out side characters and other furniture of his world, so I figured if it’s good enough for him, I’d try my hand at writing some short stories in the Block World universe.

• I can’t explain all of the easter eggs in these introductory pieces because they’re being fleshed out in my novel which is currently a work in progress. But if you’re intrigued, then you’ll love the novel itself!

• Yes, there’s a reference to Anakin Skywalker in the dedication.

• Why so many introductory pieces? I want to give the feel that this handbook has gone through several hands. It started as one thing but bloomed into something much bigger. As an agglomerative work, you’d find at least a few pieces from different people. I wanted to add even more but I didn’t want to bore you all too much. If the Block World novel takes off, then maybe I’ll try and get the Space Sage Handbook published and I’ll add 2 or 3 more pieces of prolegomena.

• ‘tolle lege’ means take up and read. It’s what St. Augustine heard right before his conversion. He thought it was a child’s voice singing it from over his fence but didn’t see anyone and took it to be an angelic voice telling him to open his Bible and read. He did and finally gave himself to Christ.

• Here are some of those old SF compendium books I mentioned in the author’s note at the beginning of this post: